by P. S. Power
The one that the Vampires sent in when Vampire armies needed to be put down. Tyler focused, and held the concept of speed, walking across the room. Running wouldn't help, and being stable would. If he could pull the move off. Still he didn't use magic, and the woman was stuck behind a row of seats, which she awkwardly had to climb over. That let him get there in time, to be hit instead of the Vampire Council member. He took the half dozen weak slaps to the face without feeling them.
They probably didn't even do any damage.
"Stop that now." He let his voice go cold, having had enough of these silly people. "I said stop! What the hell do you think you're doing here? If you push these people, you will die, and no one in the world will even be able to punish them for it. If you want to do that, just get a gun and take your head off with it. It will save lives."
He, for his trouble, was struck again by the big red haired lady.
"You misogynist! You can't tell me what to do. I'm oppressed!" She yelled it with no sense of irony.
"Um, if you're oppressed, then you have to stop hitting me, because I said so. If you aren't then you should stop oppressing me, please. Which is it?" He thought it was a good point, but she screamed at him and hit again, making a loud clapping sound using her hand and his face. That one made his head move, even though he didn't feel anything.
"I'm being triggered! Help! I'm being scared!"
That was the right reaction, since Skalla walked over, and picked the woman up by the back of the head. It was done with one hand, the other on the blade which seemed to be about to behead the woman. Zack shook his head, as she started to pull her sword back to strike. Tyler did the same thing, but the large warrior kept going.
Then he realized that she didn't know that shaking a head meant no. At least not naturally and under stress. It was a cultural thing, after all.
"Skalla, please spare her, at least for now?"
The big red woman was tossed back to her people, several of the men trying to catch her, which had them knocked over, going down under her weight. Not that it wasn't a valiant effort. You just didn't catch a hundred and seventy pounds out of the air if you weighed that much yourself, or less. Not if you were a regular Human.
The woman wasn't hurt though and got to her feet, reeling a little maybe, but still seeming ready to fight. So at least there was that. She was loud, wrong, and violent, but not a coward hiding behind the people she seemed to think of as being less than her.
"You... You can't do that."
Bey smiled and bowed toward the woman, his entire being seeming ready to have tea, rather than fight. If it came to that however, it wouldn't be a battle. Just Humans dying. It was, in the end, Ty's job to stop that kind of thing, if he could, using reasonable methods. That should have been by talking to the local police, or government, but this place was a school of some kind it seemed to him. A university. They didn't even have security guards or campus cops in the place. That probably saved their lives. If a real fight started, the Humans were going to die.
There was no need for the innocent ones to do that too.
"We won't be oppressed by you pigs!"
Tyler moved, standing between the Vampires and the feminists, and shook his head.
"Yes. You will. These beings are not your people. They don't answer to you, and if you keep coming at them you are all going to die. No amount of chanting, calling the cops, or even the army will help you. You've lost, because you've finally run into the people that can actually oppress you. This, right here, is what real oppression looks like. Learn what it is, and stop bothering people that have the power to actually make you go away. Do that now, or die. You heard Skalla. There is no third option. You kept poking at things until you ran into what you truly feared. You found it now, and it's going to pounce on you. Now, I need an agreement, from each of you here, not to bother the Vampires any longer. Any Vampires. If you don't then you'll be made to vanish. Right here, right now."
That got him stared at by the feminist.
One of the men, who reminded him a bit of Will, the form that The Storm had taken most of the times they'd met, having curly dark hair and being very thin, moved forward a bit.
"But... We have rights?"
That got a laugh, from Eve.
"Seriously? Weren't you paying attention? You were just saying that you were oppressed. Fine. Oppressed people don't get to set the rules. Tyler does. Either you play by his rules now, or you don't live. You had rights, right up to the moment you pushed us into taking action. We were going to leave you alone, you know. Feminism... That's not even a thing to us. You thought you had power though, and acted like it. You tried to bully the wrong people finally, so now the real oppressors are going to see what oppression really means. We should kill one of them so that the others get the idea." She stalked forward, slowly, to the heavy lady with the red hair. That got the skinny man to move in front of her. Protecting this woman that he probably didn't even know, with his own body. Against a Vampire.
Which got her to laugh.
"Can't you even see it? These women claim to be oppressed, but even though it means dying, you moved to protect her. You're willing to give your all to save your master. That's fine. I won't even argue that point with you. The part of a man is often to sacrifice to protect his ruler. Let's not pretend she isn't in charge. The sacrifice should be hers. Go ahead Red. Tell them that you'll go to your death, in order so they can live. Any of these men would do that for your sorry ass. You owe it to them."
The woman, getting that things were not going too well, finally swallowed and took a step back, then two.
"No... I... You shouldn't kill anyone. We're oppressed and weak."
That got a snort.
"Yeah, you can't take us in a fight, but weakness isn't always about the ability to punch through a steel reinforced door. Tell you what. You can sacrifice your life, or we'll kill all the men here. You guys come forward now. If she steps up, you all live. Go ahead. You don't get a choice anyway."
The woman stayed remarkably silent, even as the Vampires rather gleefully started to pull the men forward, so they could be slaughtered. The women all clutched together, sobbing a bit. It was kind of sad, but given how they'd all been acting earlier, Ty was able to shut that down by holding a very calm and collected concept. One mixed with high situational awareness.
It was clear, at least to him, that Eve wasn't putting on a show. The Vampires all got it, but none of the Humans really did. Even Skalla seemed to understand.
"You, red one! Go forward! It is the part of the powerful to protect the weak. These dead will kill your men, if you do not! Are you a coward then, to hide behind them, rather than see what claims you after you die? Go, or I will cut you down myself to save them!"
The leader of the rabble didn't move. She cried, and seemed scared, which Tyler could agree with, but she didn't step up to save anyone else. Faster than seemed possible, the large curved blade in the giantess's hand came around.
"Hold!" The voice that rang out was, a bit surprisingly, Richard Swerlin. "I beg you for her life, Skalla of The People. We need to find another way to handle this. Please."
The blade stopped, but Tyler had an idea, that might work well enough.
"Um, all right. Beg then. All of you. Get on your knees, and beg for her life. You claim to have been oppressed, because of... You know, I never really got that. It was that the hardest working five percent of people tend to be men, isn't it? Or that you were asked to get coffee in meetings? Well, now you live under true oppression, and for you it isn't going away. Beg now, or we'll kill this woman. Notice though, you only get that option because the Patriarchy is asking for it? The same one that had these men about to die for you, Red."
That started more chanting, oddly enough.
"This is what oppression looks like! This is what oppression looks like!"
The ones in the front row, most of the men, died then. Their heads vaporized suddenly. At first he didn't get it thinking Bey, or
perhaps Eve had done it. Then he noticed that Zack had a few flecks of blood mist on him, even though he was still across the room. A scream went up, but silenced after a while, on its own.
Eve sighed.
"Fuck. Well, yes, this is what real oppression looks like. Notice, it's a little more serious than catcalling in a bad neighborhood? It's about more than controlling how half of all people are allowed to sit too. Real oppression is bloody, horrible, and a thing that you won't survive if you don't adapt to it. Zack you should take out the leaders too. Just getting those men and a few pawns won't be enough. I could do it, but I don't want them to see who's giving the orders here. A woman. Now, kneel, and prepare yourselves, because all of you are now our slaves. Kill anyone in that group not kneeling in twelve seconds."
Two died. Both men who tried to fight. The rest knelt, though a few of them died at Skalla's hand, the last being the one that had failed to protect the men. That was even the reason the Amazon gave. She looked at the others with a sneer.
"You were free. All of you had choice. Power over the men of your world. Now you must serve on your knees, and the fault is your own. This is what you made happen."
One of the women, near the back of the huddled, kneeling collection spoke up. She was crying, and looked horrible, her face twisted already.
"That's victim blaming, this isn't our part, you're oppressing us!"
Eve sighed, loudly. It was very fake.
"Don't you see? Victims don't get to choose if they're blamed or not. Not outside their own heads. We are oppressing you. Now, admit that you understand how your poor choices got you here. That, or be beaten. You have ten seconds."
The girl, who was dark skinned, had short hair, and a pierced lower lip that made her look funny, and a bit wild, cringed.
"I shouldn't have taken Gender Studies. I should have gone into Engineering like my mom said."
That was, it seemed good enough for Eve, who smiled.
"All right, stand up." The girl did, and was waved over to the side. "She learned a lesson here today. Change majors. We'll be checking on that. You can leave when this is over. You aren't going to blame others for your own decisions anymore however. Bey, will you make sure of that? Compulsion, please?"
That got a big smile.
"Of course. Come, dear, I just need to talk to you about your new life and career path. You'll be much happier now, I'm certain of it." He held out his arm and walked over to her, moving her away from the others gently.
One by one after that, Eve talked to each of the remaining people. Not all of them earned their freedom, being too stupid to just lie. Most of them got the idea.
It was a dismal scene, but was, in the end, the only thing that would work for these kinds of people. They were the powerful in society. They ordered others around in ways that would never be applied to them, and couldn't see that they were the ones on the top of the heap, oppressing others with their silly rules and laws.
Then, telling men they had to sit to pee, while it wasn't a good thing, wasn't oppression, as Eve and Skalla had shown. Zack too, though Tyler kind of thought he just didn't want to stay there all night, hence his expediting things.
After a while Tyler walked over to him, letting the Vampires clean up the mess. The ones they brainwashed into being slaves did the work for them, carrying the bodies out to cars. That was going to be hard to explain, nine people vanishing like that, but it wasn't his problem really. His job had been to get the Humans out alive, and they'd gone out of their way to make that hard on him. They'd been acting entitled and as if being a self-proclaimed victim was a power. It was, really. Right up until they got in the face of the wrong kind of people.
They should have known better, but he got that one, too. No one had ever really taught these women, girls really, that anyone could harm them. They'd grown up coddled and protected. Even the few who'd been harmed by men had, for the most part. They honestly thought that no one could touch them, and it showed in how they bossed the world around them into doing what they wanted.
Worse, he understood that was the issue that Keeley and he had really had. He'd gotten pissy and pushed her around. She'd pushed back in a way that had a greater impact on him than the other way around. Thankfully he hadn't had to die over it.
Of course, for him that had been a temporary lapse in judgment, not a lifestyle choice.
Yeah, he'd been an asshole with the wrong Demon, and that had cost him a bit of peace of mind. Some of these people had paid a greater price for being wrong. There was nothing he could do to fix that either. Not unless he could borrow that time machine of Allison's.
Sighing he made a call on his cell phone. Keeley was paying the bill on it, after all, so long distance charges could be damned.
Not that he had anything near the value of the device's use. It meant waving for the bodies not to vanish. After the call, while they waited for the girl and her magic machine to get there, he shook his head.
"So, Zack. You hate all women? I notice a few died here."
That got a shrug.
"Nope. I love women. They barbeque up so nicely. Men are too stringy. Are you sure you want to do this? Owing a Greater Demon favors won't be fun, I'm willing to bet."
The thing there was that Ty kind of knew that already. He just didn't have anything else to offer.
Chapter thirteen
The event itself was simple enough. Allison The Technician, Darla as Zack called her, came about ten minutes later, and with a bit of work brought back the dead. Not like he was. She undid time itself, and returned them to true life.
How that worked, he didn't know. There had to be some trick to it. After all, he wasn't allowed to just come back like that. Still, there was a trick in there. Somewhere.
"I just need to learn how to be alive again."
He spoke out loud, which got the girl to smile at him, in an unpleasant way.
"That... Might be the answer, I think. Tarsus was asking if I could do that for you the other day. Come up with a device to feed you life energy. I could of course. You'd just have to slave for me for all of eternity to pay for it."
That didn't sound much better than being tied to his mom. At least she hadn't wanted him to do anything too bad yet. It would, eventually, come. He didn't enjoy the idea, but his interactions with her people had, over the last days and months instructed him in a few simple facts. The prime one was that Greater Demons, no matter what they looked like, or what they did, weren't people. Not Human ones anyway.
If it became needful, Lucy would make him do evil on a level that few could even imagine. Then eating the flesh of the living would be the least of his worries.
Focusing on The Technician, he noticed several things suddenly.
She'd said that coming back to life might be the answer for him. Also that she could build a device to feed him energy. It just would be too expensive for him.
"So, I can learn to get that energy via magic? Generate it, or collect it myself?" That hadn't been said, and it was clearly going to be easier to talk about than do, but the girl stopped repacking the time device and stared at him, meaningfully.
"Did I say that? I don't think I did." It was sly sounding though, like a little girl half admitting that she'd stolen the candy from the jar, by not really denying it.
Zack, clearly being a better friend than The Technician was, tilted his head and added his own two cents.
"I can see that. If he can learn to absorb energy from the world around him... Well, that normally takes one of us about fifty to a hundred years to learn how to do. I'll admit that he's good with magic, but no better than most of us are really. Still, fifty years... That could be worth it."
Allison snorted at him, as Eve glanced up from the red haired woman she was brainwashing with her eyes. The boss feminist. The idea made it sound like a video game, which was a lot more interesting than what had really been going on. At least in a game he could have left the enemies dead and been done with this scene by now. Not t
hat he played games like that. A few over the years.
Then his self-styled mentor nodded.
"I can see that one, too. It would have to be constant, but as long as he doesn't use too much energy, that should work. Or we could teach him to link to other sources. Animals, or Humans? It's what I do." The other Vampires nodded, or at least a few of them did. Most of them didn't acknowledge that anything was happening.
People came back from the dead? Ho-hum.
Then, after a fashion, all of them had already mastered that trick for themselves. It was still kind of impressive to Ty. A lot of that was trying to guess what he'd be doing to pay for it all. He was hoping to work out some kind of Coalition discount for it, but what were the odds of The Technician going for that kind of thing?
The Technician, looking a bit slutty, if in a cute way, went back to her work of packing the wooden box back up. After a bit she smiled, not looking in his direction, even if it was clearly about him.
"That could work. Perhaps a combination of several things? I've never thought of siphoning from the living for my own power before. It could be a very rich source of energy, if done correctly. Hold a stable of a few thousand people at once, and they'd never even know it was happening. I don't really need that kind of thing, but for the young that might be a good idea. Don't you think, Zack?"
The good looking bookstore owner laughed a bit and shook his head.
"It sounds like a good way to have your energy stolen, if you aren't careful. Find the energy providers and kill them all at once and you'd starve. Most couldn't do it, but we have all those pesky Greater Demons around us. I wouldn't want to risk it. Even we could be starved if our output was high enough. In a fight, say, or survival situation."
"A point, Zachary. So what do you think Tyler should try?"
That got a shrug.
"How would I know? Tarsus is working on it. Information is his gig. I'd talk to him and see if he had anything."