Chapter 9

- Eight years later -

I sit down on the bench, or rather, I collapse on it. It's the first time I stop moving since I escaped from the compound after hearing the Soft Master sentence me to death. I think that was three days ago.

I don't remember ever being so tired – I've been awake for days at a time before, but running from my own family, not knowing when I'll be able to stop, adds a new level of exhaustion. My mind is running circles, trying to figure out what I should do. I need to avenge my uncle, which means I have to stay alive and find who framed me, but how do I do that?

My thoughts have grown so disorganized that I don't even notice when they slip into dream. The feel of a blade on my throat wakes me up. I don't move a muscle because I can feel the ropes around me and I can hear the person holding the blade – Chatterbox. My heart sinks. It's over already – I was stupid enough to fall asleep and it will cost me my life and my father's brother any chance of getting justice.

My life is one thing, but I'm not sure I can forgive myself for failing my uncle like this. He was murdered, and his assassin will continue to run free – will he ever be at peace? Won't the fact I'm about to be killed too, by his favourite student no less, make it even harder for him to move on?

I can't stand the thought, so I do the only thing that might still save us both: I beg.

"Brother, please. I…"

He cuts me off by pressing his knife against my throat harder.

"I'm not going to kill you," he says. "I'm bringing you in. You go right ahead and try those puppy dog eyes on your uncle, see if HE's impressed."

He pinches one of my sleeping points, much harder than necessary, and everything goes black.

When I come to, I'm facing my uncle. I'm tied up to the Holding Chair in the interrogation room, the room where we used to question captured enemies. Nowadays, it's mostly used for storage, but one of the original features is still there: the chair I'm strapped in. It's bolted to the floor, and designed to be impossible to tear out off or escape from.

The Soft Master is standing in front of me and glaring at me. I would never have thought he was even capable of looking this heinous.

"I have been trying to kill you for the past hour," he snarls. "The only reason you are still alive is that part of me still can't believe what you've done. I need answers, and you will give them to me."

He picks up a needle from the top of a nearby box. It's opaque, so I can't see what's inside, but I'm dearly hoping it's our confession serum - a powerful truth serum that also removes inhibitions. We use it to force the guilty to confess not only to their past crimes but also to their intentions and their feelings towards different individuals. If the Soft Master injects me with that, he'll have no choice but to believe me when I insist I didn't shoot the arrow that killed his brother.

The Soft Master stabs me in the chest with the needle, looking like he's using it as a surrogate to stabbing me with a knife. He certainly smiles when I gasp.

He enjoyed hurting me.

I burst into tears, confirming that he did indeed inject me with our confession serum. His smile turns into a puzzled frown and I cry harder. I hate when he frowns, it reminds me of the Hard Master. The thought strikes me that this is the closest I'll ever get to seeing the Hard Master frown again and I scream.

"Stop," the Soft Master orders me. "Calm down."

Even in my current state, I can't disobey him. I start breathing deeply until I'm somewhat calm again.

"Did you shoot the arrow that killed my brother?" he asks. He makes it sound like asking this is a formality, something to get out of the way before he gets to the interesting questions.

I start crying again, but this time, I just manage to keep it under control long enough to answer.

"No," I sob.

I expected him to look shocked and sorry. He looks puzzled again, like he's wondering if I'm lying despite the drug. I lose what little calm I had managed.

"NO!" I screech, pulling at my chains in an effort to get free, even though I know I won't get anywhere. "I didn't! How can you even think that? Don't you know how much everybody laughs at me for being so loyal? I'd NEVER hurt my own family!"

I stop for breath. He just looks at me, still frowning. He doesn't believe me. Even with the drug, he doesn't believe me. I'm so discouraged that I start crying again. I'm starting to really hate this serum.

"You know I wouldn't," I sob. "And you told everyone to kill me! How am I supposed to get revenge for the Hard Master if I'm dead? If you won't believe me, your brother will never be avenged. I hope he haunts you for the rest of your life! We'll keep each other company, and we'll argue all the time, as loud as we can, just to…"

I can't finish the sentence, I'm sobbing too much. I curse at the drug and at my uncle, not that there's any chance he could make out the blubber that comes out of me.

"Are you done? You can yell at me some more if you'd like," he says, sitting down heavily on a box. His tone is so calm that it has a calming effect on me. I stop crying, or enough so to be able to talk again, anyway. I look at him. His eyes are wet.

I'm not sure why he's upset. I'd like to think it's because he's finally figured out he accused me wrongly, but I'm afraid it's just because he thinks the drug is not working properly.

"I didn't do it!" I insist. "I swear I didn't! I didn't hear the arrow in time because of my ears. I told you about the whistling. You made fun of me for it when you saw me jump a couple of times. You called me paranoid," I say in an almost normal, if shamefully whiny, voice.

He nods.

"I know," he says with a broken voice. "I know you didn't. I should have known all along. I'm sorry. Oh, Tommy, I'm so sorry."

I wake up groaning and flip my soaked pillow. I get this dream several times a month.

I know better than to expect to be able to control my emotions in a dream – especially one where I'm drugged - but I still don't like the fact my brain feels the need for me to let loose and lose control like that on a regular basis.

Also, the dream just irritates me, mostly because in its own twisted way, it speaks the truth: this is all Chatterbox's fault. If he'd brought me to the Soft Master instead of hiding me away in a refuge, I would almost certainly have been able to convince my uncle, someway somehow, that I was innocent, and everything would have been all right. There would have been a small chance that the Soft Master would have killed me without hearing me out, which is why I could never, in good conscience, turn myself in, but it's more likely I would have been able to talk to him. By trying to show me mercy, Chatterbox condemned me.

My alarm rings and I glare at it. The Commander told me yesterday that I was to be his bodyguard today, like most days.

It's not that I mind protecting him as such: it's a necessary evil that he be kept alive until he gives me the name of my uncle's murderer. I see it as strictly temporary each time I prevent his death.

What I do mind is that protecting him implies being with him all day. I had hoped, when I first agreed to this ten year contract, that I'd get used to him. Instead, he's grown even more intolerable than he was when he hired me for a day.

I can't stand his stupid hissing. I cringe every time he laughs. I hate what he does, and the fact he usually does it in the silliest way possible irritates me to no end. I despise his various associates, for a variety of reasons in addition to the fact they're plain evil. In addition to all that, I found out shortly after joining Cobra that my being blamed for the death of my uncle was no accident – I was framed quite intentionally, on his instructions. Needless to say, this new piece of information only strengthened my resolve to eventually give him a particularly painful death.

I scrape myself off my bed, shower, put on my uniform and drag myself to the Commander's chambers. He greets me like I'm his best friend and starts chattering away, leading me to the meeting hall where he has scheduled a speech to his troops.

My contract with him calls for my complete loyalty, so I have to at least pretend I don't mind. I give monosyllabic answers when absolutely required, and as usual, start hoping for someone to attack him and give me something to do. On most days, nothing happens and by the time I'm released, I'm just about ready to claw my own ears off. This relative quiet is due to the fact that after being chased around the world by the military, Cobra went into a bit of stand-by mode which the world has chosen to interpret as a sign Cobra had been crippled. In actuality, Cobra has been gathering funds and an army.

We still do get the occasional offensive against us. We used to get bombed regularly, but the fortress can withstand the strongest blasts. Nowadays, we mostly get commandos trying to find a flaw in our defences. Today, for instance, a small group of soldiers from GI Joe, the special American military unit created specifically to deal with Cobra, manages to blunder right into the meeting hall. They look understandably surprised when they see all of us, confirming that they thought they were breaking into an empty part of the fortress. Like many other groups before them, they were fooled by the sound absorbers and heat masks installed in the outside walls – they couldn't hear us, and their heat vision equipment showed nothing.

Eight years ago, when Cobra Commander first hired me, I put as the only condition of my service to him that I would not harm innocents, and I've held to it (something made easier by the fact we're not doing all that much), but my definition of innocence is not nearly as broad as it used to be. The Joes are a good example of this: my younger self would have counted them as innocents for the sole reason that they are the "good guys". I've grown less naïve since.

The Joes are enemy troops, no different than the ones I fought in the war. If I refused to fight them, I would be allowing them to bring Cobra down and ruin any chance of finding my uncle's murderer. I've decided a long time ago that anybody who stood in the way of my vengeance was not an innocent but an enemy.

I still don't like being directly involved in Cobra's dealings with them. Part of me is still clinging to the notion that ultimately, I'd be more inclined to be on their side. Thankfully, over the past eight years, I've gotten quite good at ignoring this part of me.

That, combined with the fact that the Commander usually stops talking to me when I'm fighting, is why I don't hesitate to attack them.

Besides, if I don't, someone else will. By coming here, they've pretty well sealed their faith. Granted, seeing the Commander doesn't like his troops being armed when in his presence, there are only maybe ten people in the whole hall who are armed right now, but that's still more than enough to dispose of six soldiers.

The Joes start shooting at me before I even get to them. I respond in kind with some shurikens, aiming for their weapons. One of my shurikens jams one of the guns just as its owner fires it and the stupid thing explodes, taking out a chunk of the soldier holding it. His heartbeat becomes erratic and he goes down screaming. I turn my attention to his friends, who, judging by their expression, consider me responsible for this injury.

They don't trust the guns I've hit anymore, but one of them takes another one out and shoots at me – I'm so close that I barely manage to duck under the bullet. I kick the gun out of his hands and in the same motion, unsheathe my katana and slice him in half – it's pure reflex: he almost killed me, I killed him.

I curse under my breath. I've been raised to show no mercy to anyone who attacks me, and I have no problem doing that. If you try to hurt me or someone I care about, you give up your right to live – fair is fair. The part I hate about fighting soldiers who make it here is that technically, these soldiers attacked Cobra, not me and certainly not anyone I care about. Ideally, I'd drive them away without casualties.

Obviously, you can't always have your ideal scenario. I don't think the one who lost part of his arms and of his torso will live much longer, so that's two Joes down, and technically, I murdered them.

I clench my jaw and concentrate on the fight. It's the same story every time soldiers attack; I always start berating myself even though deep down, I know it's ridiculous. I don't have any choice but to answer when they attack Cobra – if I didn't, I'd lose all chances of ever avenging the Hard Master, and that is simply not an option. Once I've engaged them and they start trying to kill me instead of running, whatever I do is just self-defence.

Just the same, it's time to give them an out. If they don't take it, I'll have to kill the remaining four Joes. I spot that one of them is trying to fight with his fists and I give him an opening while directing non-lethal attacks at the other three. He takes it and his fist makes contact with the bit of my back I exposed to him, much harder than I expected.

My eyes immediately start watering, and I don't have to fake a groan. I add to it by crumbling, holding my back. I get back up in time to see them running to the exit. The Commander is screaming at me to catch them, so I make a show of limping towards them. I think the hit has broken my ribs, which is convenient since it will make my reaction to the injury more believable.

The Joes escape, and with nobody other than myself both close to the door and ready for action, there's no point trying to pursue. I hear a boat start its engine and take off before the Commander makes his way to me. I don't need to see his face to know he's glaring at me.

This is usually the time where I ask myself what is wrong with me for taking the chance he'll decide I betrayed him and refuse to ever hold his end of our deal, or extend our contract by several years. Today is no different.

It always seems so obvious while I'm fighting them… I give them a chance to escape before I kill all of them, or any of them when we're lucky, because if they don't take the opportunity to run, I can at least silence that nagging part of me that says they never attacked me and that I'm murdering them. In the middle of the fight, I'm only concerned about ending it with as little blood as possible.

In the few instances where they don't miss the opportunity to escape alive, reality comes crashing back once the fight is over in the form of the Commander being seriously pissed at my poor performance. I've got to stop doing this – he's bound to break our agreement sooner or later. And when he does, what will I do? I could kill him, I suppose, but that would mean never getting my hands on my uncle's murderer. I can't risk it.

"Storm Shadow," he hisses. "Explain yourself."

"You're safe, aren't you?" I groan. Now that my adrenaline levels are back to normal, it hurts to talk.

"You let that muscle head hit you," he snarls. "I know you did. You were sorry when that gun exploded and you only killed that other Joe out of reflex. You let yourself be hit to allow them a chance to escape. I've been suspecting you were pulling that kind of stunt before but this is no suspicion this time," he continues, pointing to his current favourite mad scientist, Doctor Mindbender. "The good Doctor has been monitoring your thoughts."

I feel the blood drain from my face. He's probably bluffing about the thought monitoring, but it is possible he's not. Either way, how he found out what I was thinking doesn't really matter – what does is that he obviously knows he's right on everything he just said. Thankfully, I still have one card to play, although I know it will only work this once.

"Your orders for today were to protect you," I say. "I did. You never ordered me to kill anybody who came here. There was no tactical advantage to killing more of them, so I have not disobeyed you or harmed your organization in any way. Therefore, I haven't been disloyal."

He says nothing for a moment. He'll either laugh, in which case I'm out of trouble until the next time someone attacks him (he's not likely to forget to explicitly request I kill them ever again), or start screaming, in which case I'm doomed.

He starts laughing, and for once, I don't mind the sound.

Author's note:

8 years later!

Yep. Not much happens in 8 years, other than the same kind of stuff that is going to happen in the next few chapters. I could have written a slow evolution from refusing to kill any American soldier to killing them whenever it's convenient, rationalizing that it's not his fault so long as he gives them the slightest chance of escape, but… well, it would have been slow and we would all have fallen asleep a lot.

Things will evolve faster for Storm Shadow in the next few months of story time than they did for those 8 years. Thus the skip.

If you've read this far, thank you and please review! I have absolutely no other way to know whether you're enjoying this or not and you can be certain that I can't improve on anything that you might not like if you don't tell me about it. Similarly, I can't guess what you would like to see.

Some of the coming parts (they're a few chapters away for you yet) aren't particularly easy to write: I've had to re-do some of them several times (and the one I'm working on now is no different) and for me, that's pretty unusual (and frustrating). As a writer, I'm slow as cold molasses but I don't usually have to scratch and re-do whole scenes.

To make a long story short, I could really use some feedback: questions, constructive criticism, or just a quick note to let me know whether you're liking the story – it's all greatly appreciated.

Thanks a bunch in advance!