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Politics

In the end, Pearl settled for a silver sequined gown with a knife holster in the skirts, less because she expected to use it than for the novelty of a ballgown that came with a military combat knife sheath as standard. This ball was either going to be pretty fun or life threatening (or possibly both), but given that the reaction of SOLDIERs she spoke was more 'caution' than 'panic' she figured she'd probably be okay. Most of the other thirds' biggest concerns seemed to revolve around trying to find someone who knew how to tie a tie (she did, but preferred to watch them flounder.)

Ursula proved to be well received, both within SOLDIER and beyond it, not least because she turned out to be a shrewd political player. On discovering that her fledgling fanclub was calling itself 'The Sable Elite', she immediately dismissed this as 'too derivative' and dyed her previously black hair orange-red, simultaneously winning hearts within SOLDIER (for messing with her fans) and amongst the club itself (for caring about them at all.) Had it been anyone else, Pearl would have dismissed it as naked politicking, and she obviously wasn't doing it blind, but it also just seemed like something Anna would do, and thus was somehow inoffensive. She was just so sincere about everything she did that it was hard to take offense, whether that was beating someone to a pulp with her bare hands or an advertisement for a new type of cheese.

That did not translate to being weak or a doormat, though. Anna had already proved herself a capable fighter, if a little over eager, and she quickly developed a reputation as a force to be reckoned with, demonstrating it when a SOLDIER named Briggs asked her out a few too many times. Eventually, she accepted his number, then leaked it labelled as hers, so that the SOLDIER woke up the next morning with two thousand missed calls. Briggs surprised everyone, probably including himself, by being completely horrified and pledging his allegiance if she needed backup dealing with anyone else. Anna accepted the offer without committing to spending any time with the guy, proving that diplomacy was among her talents.

Anna's chosen dorm was next door to Pearl's own, and as such they encountered each other quite a lot in the next few weeks. PR had warned that many people were watching to see how they interacted, and so they became neither very close friends nor sworn enemies (although that didn't stop at least three columnists from declaring that they were clearly deeply in love). Anna was good company, but soon grew her own independent social circle, with what seemed like much greater ease than Pearl had. She also rose to much greater prominence than Pearl in things like posters and photoshoots, due in part to her being younger and prettier, but also because she was much more comfortable in front of a camera or tape recorder –Pearl could do such things adequately, sometimes even well, but she didn't have the same sense of ease in the centre of attention, and relinquished the spotlight without regret.

She couldn't evade it entirely, however, and eventually, the inevitable day came when Anna and Pearl were called on to lead a squad of infantry to root out an AVALANCHE enclave. Two SOLDIERs was overkill for the threat level, some enclave on the sector 4 plate that might or might not be affiliated with AVALANCHE. It wasn't likely to be fun. Pearl had no particular qualm with the infantry, but the Midgar garrison didn't like having their missions muscled in on, so weren't always as friendly as they could be. At least there was no cameraman on the mission, but the reports would likely be leaked to the press before the ink was dry, assuming no disasters.

Despite their initial reserve, even the infantry were not immune to Anna's relentless sincerity. There were twelve of them, kitted out in standard gear waiting for them in the lobby. Not the stealthiest crew, twelve infantrymen escorting two women in sunglasses carrying swords, one with bright orange hair, but it probably wasn't meant to be more than a show of force. That was the hope, anyway. As they progressed, Pearl fell into step with the squad commander, a short, squat man named Wells, going by his tags.

"So, where do you want us?"

Wells spread his hands. "I don't want you at all, but here we are. Bosses screw you over, you gotta deal with it."

She glanced over her shoulder at La, who hadn't reacted, even though she would have heard. Diplomacy was down to her, then.

"Fair enough, but we're here now. You want us to sit out on the pavement and wait?" Despite her indifference to the mission, she'd rather not do nothing. It was a hard one, making a meaningful contribution without overshadowing the other division, especially with such a low level threat as this was likely to be. Politics were annoying.

Wells eyed her sidelong. "You want to go first?" Straight into the teeth of whatever surprises they did have, he meant.

"It's a thought." Her mandate was to protect human lives, wasn't it? "Not here to do your job for you, though."

"Oh, lighten up!" called Anna, three ranks back, "we'll toss a coin for it or something. I'd rather you guys go first, really, this's your deal. It'll be fun, come on!" She stopped under the nearest lamp-post and tilted her head, letting the light glint off her sunglasses. "It's time…to mosey."

Approximately half of the squad burst out laughing, the younger half, mostly. Wells and Pearl exchanged mystified looks. Anna fisted her hips, glaring at the silent ones.

"Really? Nothing? You never watched Blisters? Cyrus Nightshade, Turk with a Heart of Gold?"

The other half of the squad and Pearl burst out laughing. Anna cracked a smile.

"A little late, but it'll do. We get back upstairs, though, I'm putting together a movie night, stat! There are some things that the modern SOLDIER simply cannot live without!"

"Can I come?" A very small infantryman at the back piped up-minimum age of recruitment was fifteen, technically, with a bit of wriggle-room, but this girl could have passed for twelve. How she got assigned to counterterrorism duty was a riddle for the ages.

Anna looked at her. "You have clearance for the SOLDIER floor?"

The soldier shook her head.

"Well, I'll look into it, see what I can do, but no promises, okay?"

The soldier nodded brightly, eyes shining. Yet again, Anna had managed to make a friend in less than three seconds.

"So, back to logistics," Wells said after a moment, quashing the smile in his voice. "What's the plan?"

"Y'all oughta go in first," Anna said, "so we can help if you get into trouble." Her diplomacy wasn't perfect, then. Or else it was a deliberate mistake to get on Pearl's good side. Of course, thinking like that was the route to madness. Wells clearly wanted to agree, but was caught between pride, pragmatism, and mistrust.

"Or we could go first," Pearl offered, "help take out whatever resistance there is, in case of surprises. Your mission, your call."

Anna shot her a glance. It was generally considered unwise to place yourself in the hands of people that disliked SOLDIER as much as these clearly did. But how much threat was there likely to be in this enclave or whatever it was?

Wells was silent for a moment, conferred with a curt woman to his right who had referred to herself as Twitch in the introductions, and then proposed a compromise. The SOLDIERs would open the door, take out the first resistance, and then let the other crew sweep the rest of the building, unless they heard death screams in the comms, in which case an intervention would be deemed appropriate. After more discussions this proved to be acceptable to all parties, and the conversation died for the present.

When they arrived at the designated address, a middling shopfront with reinforced steel shutters flanking a heavy wooden door. La went straight up to the door and knocked, and after a moment the hatch slid back, revealing a shadowed set of eyes.

"Hi!" Anna said happily, waving to the bemused bouncer before she could speak. "My name's Rebecca, I'm in conflict resolution, and the world needs my help! Anyone in your life causing problems, I can help you out."

"…Door to door… conflict resolution…at night?" said the bouncer, scratching her forehead.

"Yeah!" said Anna brightly, "I think it's a niche market!"

The bouncer laughed. "Well, this is Midgar. But I'm just night watch, love, I can't speak for the boss."

"Aww, come on! You'd be one of my first customers, I can offer really good deals."

"Sorry." She closed the hatch, at which point Anna elected to take the direct approach and tore the door off its hinges.

That, of course, set off the alarms, and the shutters around the door slid back, revealing two Moth Slasher robots that immediately charged.

Drawing the machines away from the door was easy enough, allowing the infantry to pour in past them, but that didn't put the things down. Pearl actually knew something about the model, having looked up that insect phobic supervisor in Weapons Dev after Aeris the receptionist mentioned him. The Moth Slasher model was one of Weapon's Dev's better answers to all the rogue SOLDIERs that were popping up. It was a robot designed to counter the standard SOLDIER tactic of 'get behind it and smash the control unit on the back' when dealing with most other machines. Moth Slashers could spin on their metal globe to face any attempt at flanking. It moved fast, either charging directly at its opponent or just slashing at them with blades, and continued to do so as long as it could keep up with its target. The way to deal with them was typically to sidestep the charge and slash once the machine passed by, but the things could wheel and come back at you more quickly than most of Shinra's machines, or just revolve on its axis and retrace its path, so care was needed.

Pearl had bolt materia, but the machine moved too quickly to easily target, and her bolts flashed off the street in its wake, although stutters in its charge suggested some damage was being done. To her right, Anna was successfully fending off her own Slasher, but wasn't making obvious progress. Pearl's first instinct was to retreat before its charge in the hope that that weird spiky ball thing would damage itself, but it just tore holes in the pavement and kept coming. The equally weird face-sword thing at the top attempted a vertical slash, before the main body spun on its axis, almost ripping the sword from her grip and coming around the other side in a decapitator. She threw up her shoulder, taking the strike on her pauldron and staggering three paces to one side. She wouldn't be able to move the arm tomorrow, but for now the impact merely blazed with pain after the first instant of numbness. She'd retained her grip on the sword, though and slashed a rent in the things armour as it charged again. Her back hit a steel wall, and the Moth Slasher crashed against it as she sidestepped, denting but not penetrating, while blunting its spikes with a horrible screeching noise. Jumping for the eaves, she managed a solid kick to the machine's body before it could spin to find her, before dropping down to grab the tear she'd previously cut and bend it barehanded into a fist sized hole, and then tore away the whole section of armour. When she sprang away, the Slasher tried to follow, lacking any ranged weapons, but was thrown back against the wall after a helpful fireball from Anna. With the segment of armour torn away, the next sword strike slashed enough of the wiring that the Moth Slasher stopped functioning.

When she caught her breath, Ursula had put down the other Slasher and wandered over. The rest of the infantry had poured inside, leaving them standing alone on the street amidst the wreckage.

"Well," she said brightly, "that was fun."

Pearl rubbed her shoulder. "Speak for yourself!"

"Should we help the rest?"

"You're better at the political end, what do you think?"

"Best wait. If they get into trouble, we'll save the rest, but if we get surprised and decapitated, that's game over."

"Funny, I was taught to prioritise human lives over all else."

"You can never save everyone."

Silence for a time, except for crashes of furniture and the occasional gunshot from inside. Eventually giving way to her impatience and pacing, Pearl regretted the decision immediately as she kicked the sheet of metal she'd torn away. 'XK loves CH' was etched into the back of it with a plasma torch. At her snort, Anna looked up and followed her eyes. She grinned.

"Cute. 'Love among the killer robots'. Sounds like a good idea for a sitcom."

"Huh, that reminds me, did you ever figure out that love triangles thing?"

"What? Oh, no, we thought it must be sides for a while, because I used to hear my friends talk about 'murdering the hypotenuse', but you only get hypotenuses in right angled triangles, and the one thing nearly everyone agreed on was that love triangles come in lots of different shapes and sizes."

"Um, Anna?"

"Yes?"

"Get new friends."

"Noted. Lost most of the ones I had when I came to the city, to be honest."

"Yeah… that happens. Sorry."

"It's okay. We-"

"Death to the Shinra!"

They turned. A man in a half mask had emerged in the doorway of the shop, a snub nose revolver in one hand. The SOLDIERs looked at each other. Pearl was still not entirely comfortable being held at gunpoint, but was a lot more relaxed than she would have been pre-enhancements. Being shot would hurt, a lot, but it was pretty unlikely to kill her or cause permanent harm before one of them took him down.

Anna raised her hands, tossing her head so that her sunglasses slid down her nose. "Take it easy, partner. Put it down. How do you think this will end?"

The AVALANCHE member shivered. His teeth were chattering but his gun hand was steady. "Doesn't matter. I've heard what you do to prisoners. Just make it clean if you can."

Anna looked at him, eyes brimming. "Look, it doesn't have to-"

He fired. Pearl moved. She hauled the gun hand up, and shoved the AVALANCHE backwards with her other hand. Ribs cracked under her palm, and the man fell back against the doorpost before hitting the ground.

He drew a single breath, and caught Pearl's eye.

"Thanks, love," he said, and died.

Pearl tried to flick the blood off her fingers.

It didn't work.

Anna had been shot in the shoulder, just under the pauldron. She'd been knocked over, but hadn't even screamed. She raised her head, teeth bared but eyes focused and voice steady.

"Is it, supposed to hurt this much?"

Pearl crouched beside her, took a quick look. "Yeah, pain's good, it means you're alive. You did better than I did, first time I was shot. I didn't have the enhancements then, so you can imagine how much fun that was. You'll be fine, but it's going to hurt for a while."

Wells appeared in the doorway, along with two of his crew, and took in the scene. "The fuck'd you do? These guys were strictly small time, there was no need to beat his lungs in."

Pearl looked at her bloody hand. There wasn't much point in hiding it. The soldier to Wells' left was inching her hand towards her weapon. It wasn't usually a good idea to move somebody that was injured, but she wasn't leaving Anna behind in this atmosphere, and PR would want her off the streets before the press showed.

"You knew who we were when we showed up," Pearl said, hoisting Anna's good hand across her shoulders and walking away.

000000

"You know," Pearl said, alone in the kitchenette with Den, "I used to think all that talk about SOLDIERs being monsters was an over-reaction, y'know? Like, understandable given how you were recruited, but a little over the top all the same."

Den hadn't spoken much after making the tea. Ursula had had her gunshot wound cleaned and was in bed, leaving her to her own devices. Ant had tried to give Pearl a carving of a Moth Slasher (how many of those things did he have lying around, anyway?) but she'd shrugged him off. Den had found her not long after that.

"And now?" he said, looking at her.

"I don't know." She hadn't precisely been holding back, but she hadn't intended to kill the AVALANCHEr either. He hadn't been much of a threat really. If the same thing hadn't happened with Vanessa the trainee ninja, she might have been able to shrug it off, but now… Was she going to spend the rest of her life touching nobody for fear of hurting them?

Den sighed. "It's a tough one. The strict definition of monster is 'organic being modified by Mako for combat purposes,' so going by that, monsters are we for definite. For the rest, it depends on who you talk to."

"What about you?"

"I'd like to say different, but… we kill things for a living. Not the most noble trade. Other humans have done worse, but we can't just give it up like everyone else, not as long as Shinra is holding the leash. No easy escape, we're caged killers. Is that the trait of a monster, or just how life works? I don't know."

"Den?"

"Hmm?"

"You suck at motivational speeches."

"Sorry. I need a soundtrack to get into it properly." He reached across and took her hand. Now that she thought about it, in addition to the many blade scars across his palms, he did have one on his right wrist that looked a lot like one you got from straining against tight handcuffs. "Listen, Pearl, I'm not begrudging anyone their shot at happiness, if you can manage it, go for it, and that's not me condescending to people that don't know how the world works, my viewpoint is skewed because of how I got here, I know. SOLDIERs can and have done a lot of good for the world, we can save lives, a lot of them. And we don't kill everything we touch, either. Generally, you have to be trying to hurt someone to do much damage, you're not going to tear someone's arm off shaking hands. Sleepel is recommended for non-lethal take downs."

"Now that one was better." She squeezed his hand and stood. "Thanks, boss. Where can I get a dictionary?"

He gave her directions to the SOLDIER library –never a big reader, she hadn't been there yet. Shinra sanctioned the contents, most likely, but there might be some food for thought there if she was very lucky.

On the way out, she paused on the threshold.

"What if you had a way out?"

Dennis hesitated. "I think you can figure that out. But there isn't, trust me. It's been tried."

Pearl was not planning on deserting, but a back door was never a liability. That is, if she could survive the hunt.

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