[Necromunda] Bad Heir Day (Shift 260124, M42)

Noisette talks while she works. It's the ceaseless top of the mind chatter of someone who spends a lot of time alone, and has to talk to someone, has to put her thoughts somewhere, if she's not to go completely mad.

The listener is not listening. The listener is past listening, past caring, past everything except lying there, the object of Noisette's monologue and the subject of her ministrations. This is exactly what Noisette wants in a listener. 

"So at the start, everything was pretty shiny, yeah? We found a good spot to set up the den, shift stuff from the still and get it uphive, start spinning some cash money out of this dive. Only thing is, the squats had their eye on it too. Mothers alone know what they're making to sell..." 

"At the start, it was supposed to be pretty quick. Annie went out to talk to Drekkson the umpty-seventh or whatever he is, and by talk I mean lash into unconsciousness. He shoots first, course he does, and she's fast but not so fast she can dodge a flamer. She gets a little scorched, takes her shot, and aims too high. Next thing y'know, click click oops, they're both outta juice and running for the lines."

"So Annie pulls back to where Ave and Evan are set up, and that new girl Pow-Pow and her freaky kitty. You hired her, right? You know she can't work a gun, or a door, or any tek at all? Good shot, though. Runs fast. Found that out when she stole my boots."

 "Stabitha comes howling round the corner then, yelling about more squats with big freaking dakka-dakka, and there's bullets all around her, right up her ass. One of 'em runs right into her knife, and she starts climbing the rutting tower instead of keeping on running. I thought she was smarter than that. Was being the operative word."

"Jo does her whole cool-as run-and-gun thing, up the catwalk and then over, takes her shot at Drekksonsonsonson and his goon, and then, Mothers know how a little guy moves so fast, he's over the barricade and WHOOSH, her feets're on fire! She dances, she prances, she goes over the side, and she rolls around trying to put it out..."

"While all that's going on, stupid dumb Mari's trying to cut up behind the chem tanks, and she runs into this thing, this big ol' suit with a lil' mean squat girlie inside. Totally sucker punches her, then turns around and elbow drops Jo. Puts the damn fire out, but that's her KO'd."

"I got the rest of what happened from Evan and Annie. Evan's up there watching this tooled-up squat and his robo-toy creep up on Stabi, trying to get a bead on her; nobody wants to blink first, 'cause whoever blinks first dies second, yeah?"

 "This is when you showed up. The way Shivella tells it, you told her to break left, help Pow-Pow and the laser twins. You were gonna cover Annie and help her save Jo and Mari, get a run on the squatties' mine train or whatever they showed up in. Instead you get locked down trading bullets with one of those rutting autoguns, and no matter how shiny you shoot, they shoot more and faster."

"Pow-Pow and her kitty break the lock on the other side, though. Just run in and murk the tek-guy squat after Ave puts a las in his head. That girl is savage, I tell you. It's kinda hot."

"Shivella's doing good work too, chucking her poison knives around, but she gets cocky: takes herself up and tries to chop the squat who shot Stabi before he can reload. She misses. He doesn't. She drops and rolls 'cause if she doesn't, she's dead meat."

 "It's a mess. We got, three or four of them, but six of us are wasted - Annie's dragging Jo outta there and picking bullets out of her own ass, Mari's bleeding out from head holes she didn't have yesterday and there's not enough of Stabi to scrape up after she fell off that tower. Shivella says she tried, and I believe her."

"And then there's you."

The listener's eyes open. It's not of her own volition: Noisette has peeled the lids back, bracketed them and braced them, as she guides syringes into place and loads them. She turns her back, pulls on cables: spool, spool, click, click, as she fastens the clamps into place. Something starts to hum.

"I asked Jo about you. She said you two go way back. Best friends. And I asked what she'd give, what she'd pay, to keep you here. It's her call. Annie's sleeping it off, she's calling nothing for shifts and shifts, and you're dead, so Jo's in charge. And she said anything. All we have."

If the listener was alive, she would see Noisette's mask, her goggles, her swirl of half-dyed hair, swimming in and out of focus no doubt. She's holding a pair of flat-irons - like pastiche medicae paddles - and the hum is building all around her as she looks down.

"So wake the frag up, 'cause we need you. Rest in peace. Rise in power."

 And in that moment - that electric, systolic, alchymic thump of bastard artifice - in that moment, Harri Karrion is born.