Headfirst into the Abyss

It doesn’t know what hit him, but all of the sudden Viktor is suspended in the air, then pushed back into the wall. His vision goes angry red and then tired black and by the time he comes to himself, he realises that there is, in fact, nothing pressing him to the wall.

Nothing physical, at the very least.

His sister is very close to him—they are the same level now that she’s brought him up like this and she’s hissing in his face, each word acid.

“You have reported me!” She says and grows more venomous with each word. So that’s what the fuss is about, Viktor thinks, and feels less afraid now that he knows what’s up. He would feel a lot easier, too, if the cafeteria wasn’t empty, although he highly doubts it would save him from Arianna’s wrath either way.

“They would’ve known anyway.” He says, attempting to shrug, but that only makes his shoulder ache and he hisses as his vision becomes blurry again. “I do my fucking job.”

He doesn’t actually care about her.

“I don’t owe you shit.” He knows she’s going to get more angry, he’s not an imbecile. It doesn’t stop him from saying it – there’s a worm of insecurity in him, that’s for sure, but he says what’s on his mind even when it’s risky or could cost him a lot. It’s not even the entire saviour thing, really—that was a while ago and, besides, the universe is big. Nobody is going to baby him for saving just one station in sea of them.

He still feels like he can and like he should talk back to Arianna, because she’s always thought herself to be greatest, to be sure – but the whole Grimgrinner thing is the very peak of everything.

“How dare you?” She spits through her teeth. “Even if I wasn’t your sister, you ought to respect me! I am your authority.” She’s positively seething, eyes bright and violent and face contorted in her selfish rage. Viktor is afraid of her, he’s very afraid, but he swallows his own fear and tells himself to cut it out.

“The last I remember, TIA was my employer. You’re just an ally, and just because we had no other choice.” Viktor and Arianna, they’ve never been too similar. Aria, she was never similar to anybody, she was her own person to the point of it becoming worrying sometimes.

She leans further into him, eyes red around the sclera with broken blood vessels and mouth open, black, monstrous tongue visible when she opens her mouth to speak—

And, in a second, her head splatters in front of Viktor.

The invisible hand holding him lets up for a moment and he manages to slide few inches down the wall before it’s back full-force. Arianna’s head, hair included, seems to build out of her remaining shoulder blades and when it’s back completely it’s perched on the body in a way that’s not normal for the human, its back towards Viktor.

It’s like her body belatedly realises that this is not natural and, in the most grotesque motion, it twists around until she is lined again in humanoid posture.

“Do you realise you’re going to die?” She screams at the intruder and only then does Viktor notice another person in the room. He didn’t hear the door opening or Virgil approaching, but she’s there, double-barrelled laser pistol in her hand. The tip of the barrel is still red from the force of the charge.

“And I’m going to die as the only person who could land a wound on you, bitch.” Virgil’s always been too confident for her own good. Viktor loves her and hates her now. “So bring it on, if you really want.”

You cannot taunt death again and again and escape every time. He’s not surprised that this lesson hasn’t reached Virgil yet, given how many times she’s gotten close to losing her life and then escaped by the thread.

Arianna, though—Arianna didn’t need her permission at all. With a sharp tug of her wrist, the pistol flies from Virgil’s hand only to end up hovering behind Arianna. In seconds, there’s a green charge stripe filling up on the side.

Now is the time for Virginia Virgil to flinch, if she knows what being human means. Viktor’s now let down completely, his sister’s rage not on him anymore, and he slides down the wall, boneless. Three seconds more, just for him to somewhat even his breath out and he’s moving, going towards Virgil.

It might not be the smartest move, it’s true, but he stands in front of the woman anyway.

The laser beam stops less than in inch in front of him and then disintegrates when it has nothing to hit. It would’ve surely passed through both of them, but Viktor had to try, at least. There’s hurt in his chest still, because he knows that it wasn’t Arianna who stopped the bullet.

No – his sister’s face is contorted in mild disgust, yes, but she wouldn’t have stopped. She cares for no family and life anymore. What Viktor sees behind her, unanticipated, was the Butcher of the West Belt, the Sundowner himself and Viktor’s own personal miracle.

“What?” Arianna turns around, half mad, and the more angry she gets the more inhuman she looks. If it’s possible, Viktor feels like she’s gotten even taller, her claw-like hand even sharper and shinier. “What, Sundowner? What?”

It’s him who stopped it. It was the Sundowner who saved Viktor and Virgil.

“We’re not supposed to be here.” He says, shortly, although still with his grin plastered to his face. “Besides, I don’t think TIA will give us Essia if we damage their favourites. That’s why they sent them of all people in the first place, don’t you think?”

A sharp movement of Arianna’s head, the change of view from the Sundowner to Viktor and Virginia still standing frozen one in front of another is enough of an answer.

“You’re fucking right. It was stupid of me.” She says and Viktor thinks—for a moment he thinks his sister is back. And then—“I’m just gonna go and spill blood elsewhere.” In the flurry of coats and ties and ringing, ever-changing voice, his sister disappears, away from cafeteria.

They’re left standing awkwardly, then—Virgil, with her hands clean, but uniform still with specks of dried brown blood straining her red coat and white dress shirt, Viktor with his entire body aching from the impact with the wall and the Sundowner with a helmet hovering next to him.

“Thanks.” Viktor’s not sure what else to say. He doesn’t owe Arianna anything, but he’s gotten himself messed up with Sundowner and now he owes the other tyrant. He figures it comes about the same.

“I thought it was charming.” He’s not grinning anymore, but more smiling. It looks a little bit strange on him – the yellowish, although a little bit pink skin too, nearly human-like and yet not quite, and bright eyes and the scar on his forehead. He’s looking past Viktor and at Virgil. “Impressive, really, and very brave – to shoot my Aria like that!” He sounds so amused.

Viktor gets out of the way and sits on the closest chair, drained.

Sundowner moves, shorter than Arianna but taller than anybody else on the Sleeping Sun. He’s nearly Arianna’s height anyway. Even though he leans into Virgil, he’s not that much taller than her – she is only shorter than Ursa, and she’s the same height as Naim.

Sundowner offers Virgil his hand, claws still in-tact. Viktor doesn’t think he’ll ever get used to them. “May I have a name?”

“I would prefer to hear your name first, apart from the title.” So Virgil knows who he is. It’s not that hard to guess, after all. “Then I’ll think of giving away mine.”

“Gaige Osborn.” Sundowner replies without missing a beat. “Just Gaige works fine enough.”

And Viktor has seen enough of the sly smiles and eye-contests to know where this one is going when Virgil snorts and then says—“Virginia Virgil. Just Virgil works perfect.”