Stray Cat Strut
Chapter Fifty-One – ‘Ol Reliable: Scorched Earth

Chapter Fifty-One - 'Ol Reliable: Scorched Earth

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***

I asked Shy if she wanted to stay the night, but she said that she didn't want to, and would rather go home.

Well, what she actually did was give me a tiny shake of her head, but I inferred the rest. I dropped her off in our parking garage, then headed up to home. It was surprisingly quiet when I arrived. The Kittens weren't asleep, even if the sun had set, but the energy was down and most of them were surfing the mesh or just minding their own.

I found Lucy in bed, with about a million pillows behind her and a tablet balanced on her lap.

"At this rate, if Tankette moves in, we might have to rename the building," I said as I started to get changed.

"Tankette wants to move in?" Lucy asked. She glanced up for a moment, then back down to whatever she'd been reading.

"Maybe! I think her neighbours were weirded out by having a Samurai live so close. Or the landlords are moving people away. Or something. I figure it wouldn't hurt to have a third Samurai living here."

"It could hurt, in some ways, but it could also be really good," Lucy said. "I think most corps and gangs would hesitate to attack a place where a Samurai lives. More if there's two. And if it's a place with three or more, then messing with the place is out of the question."

I nodded along. "We'll have to look into, uh, utilities and stuff."

That's what normal buildings did, right? Get the electricity and water all set up and such?

Fuck, I didn't want to be a landlord. I was a bitch, not a cunt.

"I don't want to be a landlord," I said.

Lucy giggled. "Poor Cat."

I tossed the last of my clothes aside, then picked some PJs off the floor and shuffled into them. Then, with the finality of someone closing a casket, I flopped onto the bed next to Lucy, loose pillows shifting around to partially bury me.

Why did we have so many pillows? I only needed like, one pillow and a Lucy to sleep well. Blankets optional.

Lucy hummed a little nothing song and ran her hand through my hair once I was done wiggling closer. "How was it?"

"Good," I said noncommittally. It had been alright.

"Okay," Lucy said. It was the sort of 'okay' that meant that I could start ranting at any time, if I needed it, but I was mostly fine with not.

I shifted around so that I was laying on my back, Lucy close by my side. This was the one disadvantage of having two arms, I didn't know where to put one of them when laying down. "So, what's your plans moving forward?" I asked.

Lucy hummed. "Tomorrow, after class, I have a big meeting. It's recruitment for the Kittens. I even got the school to lend me one of the smaller auditoriums."

"That's cool," I said. "How many people are going to show up?"

"There's room for a hundred," Lucy said. "We booked it within ten minutes, so I think there might be more than that."

I blinked. "That's a lot of people," I said.

"Mhm," Lucy said.

"Are you planning on taking over the world?"

She laughed. "Let's start with the city?"

I chuckled too, but I also knew that Lucy was ambitious. It was hot as hell, but also kind of scary... scary hot. Now that she was unchained, able to push as much as she wanted, I was worried that she wouldn't slow down and would get herself into some sort of trouble.

If someone hurt her, I'd do more than just shoot them.

"Myalis, why isn't Lucy the Samurai?" I asked. "She's the one with the plans."

Because I picked someone based on criteria other than the likelihood of eventual cultural revolution. That isn't to say that I wasn't aware of your closeness to her when I chose you as a vanguard. You're... more resilient. Less intelligent, perhaps, but you have your own charisma going on.

"Was that a compliment sandwich?" I asked.

"What did she say?" Lucy asked.

"Called me stupid, mostly," I said.

"Oh."

I blinked. "No defence?"

"Well..." Lucy said, stretching the word out. She started to laugh when I gave her a wounded look. "Silly. I think you're more than smart enough."

"What's that even supposed to mean?" I asked. "You know, you could injure my self-esteem talking like that."

"Oh, now there's one place you're not lacking," she said. Her smile turned a little, and she flipped her tablet over so that I could see. "By the way, didn't you call for a cease-fire?"

"With the gangs? Yeah. I didn't make a big fuss about it though. I think I was supposed to, but I pretty much just told the hotel guy and Nya about it." I sat up a bit, finally finding a use for all those cushions. "I've been meaning to make a bigger post about it, but it's not like I have... like, a good social media presence?"

"You're in a lot of posts," Lucy said. "Well, a lot being relative? Like, you're basically a micro-celebrity. Congratulations."

"Thanks," I said, flatly. "But yeah, I don't have my own accounts to post from, and if I did, I'm not sure people in the right gangs or whatever would click over and listen, you know? I could do like what we did during the Phobos thing, but that felt like a one-off emergency kind of situation. An all-hands-on-deck exception."

Lucy nodded.

I took the tablet from her, then blinked. There was an article that said that the amount of gang-on-gang violence across the city had taken a sharp decline over the course of the last two days. Apparently enough so that even some more niche media sorts were starting to comment on it.

"Weird," I muttered.

"Look at this one, though," Lucy said. She leaned over and clicked into another tab. She had... a disturbing amount of tabs, actually.

I squinted at the screen, this time at an article dated... a few hours ago. "Wait," I said as I sat up even more.

Rama Corp LLC Starts Major Anti-Gang Push in Wake of Samurai-Led Conclave

The title had nearly as much content as the article itself. Basically, some lower-level corp, probably a sub-subsidiary of another corp, was using the ceasefire as a quick and easy opportunity to lay down the law.

They had jumped into an area formerly occupied by one of the bigger gangs with paramilitary support and 'reclaimed' the area.

A few photos, with the grainy effect of something taken from bad augs, showed indoor streets filled with bodies and blood. Some PMCs in plate-carrier chic were strutting around, assault rifles held low.

"What the fuck?" I muttered.

"Sounds like someone saw what you were doing and tried to profit from it," Lucy said. "It makes sense, too. Gangs are gonna exist, but that doesn't mean that a corp can't decide to support one and push down another. I think one of the gangs in that area was a union sort, and they were recruiting from the employees from the area, or something. I don't know. The news sites don't have any good forums and the other forums are filled with bots. I don't have boots on the ground in that area either."

"Yeah,"I muttered.

I gave Lucy back her tablet, then slumped back down into the pillows. What the fuck was I supposed to do about this then?

Actually, there was a very easy solution, but I was worried that it was a bit obvious.

"I think I need to talk to Professor Rogers about this one," I said.

"Oh?" Lucy asked.

"Got the feeling he might give me some good advice. And shit, if he doesn't, or if I don't like it, I can always just go scorched Earth, right? That's always a good second option."

Maybe Nya would like to join?

... Who was I kidding, she seemed like the sort who lived to join in on this kind of fun.

Shy might be a harder sell. Gomorrah... yeah, she'd help as well. I groaned, copied the article's link with my augs, then sent it to all three samurai. Then I texted them. 'Hey. Gonna be down for a bit of example-making tomorrow afternoon. Want to help?'

I got a reply from Nya right away.

Nya: Hai hai!

Shy: Help with what, exactly?

Gomorrah: Catherine.

Shy was more eloquent in text than in person, and Gomorrah's one word reply was very concerning. Why did she sound so mom-like all the damned time?

***