Summary:Following her flight from the Cyberian Arena, Amur Khatun comes back to Mutant Town with her people in tow. Lexi finds her there, so some eye-opening results. Log Info:Storyteller: None |
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There was a rather sizable noise coming from out in the Disaster Zone, as several of the Pride reported. Then something even more striking happens: a gigantic tiger-woman figure comes bounding out of the Zone and straight down the streets of Mutant Town carrying and 'wearing' four others. Word passes rapidly, the Pride always aware of anything this striking. None have ever seen this tiger-creature before; it's huge, as big as Amur Khatun (the name, apparently, of Diya's tiger), but it runs upright on two digitigrade tiger legs. It attacks no one, but runs up the street, turns and makes the L before leaping to the front doors of the Tolliver Clinic. There, with a mighty roar, the tiger figure yanks open the front door and carries those she has born through it …
Unable to reach Hunter, who has been out of touch for quite a few hours now, word also reaches to Lexi. The mauve mutant squidgirl often knows how to reach Hunter when no one else does, and Weather and the others will use any means available to find their leader and protector. This is pretty damned freaky to them.
Days ago Hunter went with Lexi into the Zone to find those Domino had been seeking. In the aftermath of that, Domino was gone; missing. And Diya kept hunting. A bit more than twelve hours ago a message came from some of Domino's other allies that they had found a lead; Hunter geared up heavily - very heavily - and then headed out into the Zone. She has not been seen nor heard from since. That's not so unusual, really. But something like this doesn't usually follow from that.
Lexi is more than a little annoyed that Hunter, not suprisingly, managed to evade her the moment her back was turned, so she's been searching doggedly for any sign of her. The rumors of a tiger thing running around on two legs that ran into the clinic? That's…enough that Lexi is on her way there, pulling up outside as she slides out of her car, then trots up towards the front doors to slip inside, looking around.
The clinic, to no surprise, is wide open; might have something to do with the log that has been literally cored out of the door. Inside, four of the beds in the clinic now have figures lying in them, all in pretty rough shape. Most interestingly, each of them is a member of the Pride, or a citizen of Mutant Town, and each has been missing for months, with one as long as a year ago. The smallest and least of these is young Newt, a girl whose only talent is that she can communicate with animals and convince to help her, even fight and die for her.
And then there's the enormous tiger woman in the middle of the clinic, sitting down with the clinic's phone laid out before her, trying to very gently tap at the keys to dial the phone. She is not completely naked, but all that remains upon her is a ragged, stretched-tight bit of olive drab belt webbing with some gear - a pistol, some grenades, etc. - and a black collar of some technological sort stretched very tightly about her enormous throat.
When the purple mutant girl comes to the door, amber-luminescent eyes lift, staring through her. And a low basso rumbling voice issues from that enormously fanged maw. "Lexi."
Lexi stops. Blinks. And stares a bit. "…Diya?" she says after a moment, cautiously stepping forward. It could somehow be a completely different tiger woman, she supposes. It's hard to tell from the voice. Not like the tiger version of her talked much, after all.
The massive tiger-woman shrugs those enormous shoulders, and then bobs her head up and down. She looks at Lexi and sighs, a basso rumbling sound. "Help." she asks, lifting the phone towards the purple mutant.
Lexi blinks and lets a little chuckle that she stiffles. Of course she can't use the phone. She heads over to it immediately though, saving further questions until she's solved that. "Who am I calling?" she asks after a moment, taking the phone from Diya.
The tiger-woman's shoulders slump in relief as the phone is taken from her; she was pretty afraid she'd manage to punch through or crush the thing. She points to the phone list also taken from the front desk of the clinic. "Doctors." she growls, frowning toothily because apparently she just can't do 'quiet' very well right now. Then she points at the others laid out on their beds. She wants medical help for their people.
There' sa quick nod at that, as she reaches over to tug over a phone list, then starts calling. She knows some of the people at the clinic who are willing to put in time for emergencies, and some who can be persuaded with a little extra payday to overlook who they treated or how they were injured. "Should we call that SHIELD girl, or one of the RESCUE types?" she notes after a moment.
Diya gruffs darkly, then reaches up and taps a claw at the collar. "Came. RESCUE. Enough problems." Proof Diya is running the show inside all that fur and muscle: she still parcels out words like precious treasure. "Doctors." That is her priority. All of the rest can wait. Or just be ignored.
"Yeah, yeah, give me a sec…" Lexi says distractedly as she starts calling up doctors and a few nurse practitioners that work at the clinic that might be willing to come in to help. She just calls it a "gang attack" for the moment, rather than going into details and that there are four patients…though she pauses to look over and makes ure that Diya isn't obviously bleeding from silver or obsidian or something this time before she confirms that.
Having called everyone up, she hangs up, then says. "Okay. What the fuck happened?"
Diya relaxes once Lexi has made the calls. Then she scoots over closer, twisting to put her neck first towards the woman. "Help?" she rumbles, and waits as patiently as she can; she cannot get the throat-mike collar off without destroying it unless Lexi can help. Then she finally slumps to the floor, laying down. She has been keeping it together by a thread for a while, now, and she can finally let loose.
Once laid down, Diya closes her eyes and inhales deeply. "RESCUE." she starts. Lexi knew that part, of course; RESCUE called her, to reach Diya, because they had found a lead on Domino. That's when Diya geared up and disappeared into the Zone. "Waited, watched." Of course, the sniper went full-on ghillie suit and virtually disappeared in the Zone. "Cyborg came." That would be the one called Posse. The one who apparently also works with the PCB and has done patrol routes through Mutant Town. She and Hunter have met and talked before.
"Tunnel. Abandoned subway." Diya explains. It's so hard for her, trying to keep her voice soft, when she is so huge, so naturally loud. "Scout. Search. Find." Here, Diya's relaxed state issues forth a rumbling growl; it's not a purr, and Lexi has enough experience with Amur Khatun to know the difference. "Pit fighting. More hounds." Lexi will remember the Nova hounds faced at the Kennel. "Missing Pride. Hellcat." That last is the term Diya has used for Domino. She hasn't really explained why.
"Tried … open tunnel. Not strong enough." A scary thought, that there was something Diya wasn't strong enough to do; Lexi has seen up close and personal how powerful the homeless vet's body can be. "Tried. Pushed." She sighs again. "Changed." Massive shoulders shrug. "Rip open. Jump. Fight." Visions likely come in those words, of the total bloodbath slaughter at the Kennels. One imagines Diya likely was lethally efficient and murderously enraged, especially if she had spotted kidnapped Pride. "Then … Sarin." She shudders. "Grabbed. Warned. Ran."
Diya left her allies behind, to get her people out safely when lethal poison, nerve gas, was deployed.
Lexi leans back against the counter behind her, folding her arms over her chest. "So ya got 'em back from th' assholes doing th' pit fighting stuff…and they're using mutants an' stuff in them?" She frowns more deeply at that. "And ya just..ended up like this cuz ya weren't strong enough when ya were nontigery…but ya needed hands so..this time yer just halfway?" It always helps to repeat things back…because half the time Lexi gets confused as to what is being meant.
Diya nods. Her entire answer, after all of that, is just to nod. It's like she has used up all of her words.
Lexi resists the urge to facepalm. "Fine, okay." she says. "So ya can't change back? Or, uh…ya just want some clothes or somethin' before ya do?" she offers, eyeing the belt that's the only fashion wear Diya currently has on.
Diya frankly would be oK with nudity; she can just grab scrubs or something from the clinic. But she looks at Lexi and sighs. "Never … like this. Before." Diya has been Amur Khatun for years and years. Yet she is saying she has never, ever been in this mid-form. Indeed, the implication is that she may not have even known a mid-form was even possible until … today. Until now. And now she has no idea how to get herself back to human. Back to Diya.
Lexi mmms, thinking it over. "I wonder why not…maybe…because ya didn't think ya could?" she wonders. "Yer always thinkin' th' tiger is always in control, even when I've told ya ya don't seem ta forget people or things or what's goin' on even when yer a tiger. Yer just thinking more instinctively." She pokes the big tiger woman. "I've been tellin' ya that for years…this is…good, I think. I mean, not that ya can't change back but…this is you, but with th' tiger's strength too. See? Yer always in there. An' ya don't need ta be afraid of th' tiger so much like this…because this is proof ya don't change, even if ya look different. Not where it counts."
The tiger woman reaches out and pokes Lexi with a giant clawed finger; not so hard that it'll cut her, but far more strongly than one might expect. "Tiger. Bigger. Hungrier." Yeah. As a human Diya may eat a lot for a homeless woman, but nothing compared to the consumption demands of a half-ton tiger. She needs to shift back. The tiger always seems to do this easily. But now her conscious mind is in control - such as it is - and her conscious mind only knows how to call up the tiger. Not how to send it away. "Need change."
"Oh no, you mean you might have to eat more as a tiger because larger metabolism? I don't know /how/ I could relate." Lexi says sarcastically. She frowns. "I dunno, Think about things that you like being a human? Think human thoughts!" She frowns. "Not tiger instincts or fighting instincts, but human stuff."
The tiger-woman chuffs a bit; is taht a frown? It's so hard to tell with that muzzle face of hers. "Not much." she murmurs sardonically. Not that Lexi will understand what she's saying, but basic idea is that she honestly doesn't have many human thoughts. She has warrior thoughts. Soldier thoughts. And angry fighting thoughts. She hasn't had much in the way of human thoughts for a long, long time.
There's a reason why the tiger is better at this than Diya is.
Lexi mmphs. "…fine. We'll just have to try something else." she insists, stepping forward.
Then slides her arms around the big cat woman and snuggle sinto her, hugging her tight.
"What?" the tiger-woman rumbles with a bit of irked startlement; she was not expecting that.
Lexi mmphs. "Shush. Enjoy the hug." She continues to hug!
Thing is, Diya has PTSD. She does not like to be touched. She most definitely does not go for being hugged. Amur-Khatun does not mind hugs, because she does not have PTSD. So hugged, Diya protests, and then starts pushing Lexi away. No. No hugs for the veteran.
Lexi grumbles as she's pushed away. "…well, I thought that'd work." she mutters, folding her arms.
The tiger woman tilts her head looking at Lexi questioningly, even curiously. "Why?" Yep. She's lost.
"Because human contact like that isn't tigery." Lexi says with a frown. "And it's not soldiery to be hugged either."
Is that a tiger-face frown? "I … no hug." she admits. Then she chuffs a sigh. "Not … feel … as good." She's not going to say hugs are wrong or bad. They're not. She's just broken. SHe knows it. BUt hence she has real issues with that kind of prolonged or protracted physical contact. Nevertheless, she cannot fault Lexi's logic, here. Not the squidgirl's fault Diya is broken.
Lexi sighs and frowns. "I'm not sure what else is something human but not tigery or soldiery. Um….music?"
Diya is definitely frowning now, as she looks forlornly at her left wrist. Lexi might recall that Diya has been wearing a wristband there for quite a while, a gift from Hank apparently. It plays music for her. But it does not appear to have survived the massive size change.
Lexi mmms, then pulls out her phone. "I could play something from this, maybe? Focusing on it might help. What music do ya like ta listen to?"
Diya proceeds to name - in deep, thrumming rumbles - several Russian composers, as well as some Western classics - Brahms and the like. "Smooth. Soft. Flowing." The 1812 overture, for instance, is not on her approved list.
Lexi will create a play list then, then set down her phone and start it playing. "Here. Why don't ya go in th' room over there, an' I'll deal with th' doctors an' stuff while yer focusin' on that?"
The tiger-woman nods, and gets up to walk over to the alcove suggested. With those claws and her strength, she does not bother with the curtain, just slides under it rather than risk tearing it to shreds. Once Lexi leaves her the phone playing, she lays down on the floor and waits, closing her eyes. Perhaps ten to fifteen minutes later, some rather disturbing and disgusting sounds start coming from that alcove, as her body goes through the agonizing transformation process. Changing forms is never easy or comfortable for Diya.
By that point the first medical staff are showing up and Lexi shows them to the patients and such, then heads out to her car to get a duffel bag with some spare Diya clothes in it she's been carrying around with her, just in case, that she just slides under the curtains, wincing at the sounds she's hearing.
It takes a good five to ten minutes for Diya to fully shift. It is a good twenty more minutes before the bag opens and she gets out some clothes to put them on. She hasn't talked about it - when does she ever?! - but Diya is always hypersensitive after shifting, and the slightest things cause massive discomfort if not outright pain. Nevertheless, within less than an hour she has emerged from the alcove to check on her people.
None of those recovered are in super shape, but none are as bad off as Mink, recovered from the Kennel. And they are all alive; not all of the Pride members taken have been so lucky. These will, at least, recover physically. How they do psychologically is a different and difficult question. And of them all, it seems like Diya is more haunted than the others combined. And angry about it. So angry.
Lexi frowns quietly, then murmurs. "…they're gonna need help dealing with this. I mean, long term. I'll post the cash for it." she says simply, after listening to the explanation. "Not doing me any good anyway, right?"
Diya frowns and nods. "Remind. Next lab." Eventually, it happens. A drug lab. A stash house. Someone tries to set up something in Mutant Town. And when they do, the Pride finds out, and eventually Diya takes the place apart. She then usually finds places to donate everything she has taken in. Heavy drugs are usually incinerated. Cash is donated. Lighter drugs or pharmaceuticals might be stockpiled or donated.
Lexi sighs, then frowns. "I've actually been…thinking. Um. Maybe…making a clinic of our own. Get people off the street, working, jobs, just…care they need. That sorta stuff. This…this stuff is too much for them ta deal with. Crazy nutcases kidnappin' people off th' street ta experiment on, crazy guys in armor huntin' you an' anyone around ya, it's just…they deserve more than that."
Diya tilts her head, regarding Lexi as if she may have grown an extra head or something. "Jobs. Here." She motions to the clinic that is already present; clearly she doesn't see a need to build a whole additional clinic just for the Pride to work, when the Pride could instead work at the existing Tolliver clinic. She has long said that she felt the Pride deserved something better than the danger of being around her; but Lexi was one of those demanding that she stay rather than go. As far as the homeless vet is concerned, girl needs to make up her mind.
"I don't know that th' clinic here would allow th' sort of security ya would require for it ta be considered safe." Lexi says, without batting an eye. Because who else is going to be around to keep such a juicy target safe, after all? None of the other Pride members know anything about such things, and Lexi is decidedly more someone who is about getting quietly in and out of locations, not providing security.
The vet just shrugs her shoulders. They won't allow the proper level of security? Who said anything about asking them their opinions? Diya has been security Mutant Town for years without making it too obvious to the majority of people; this would just be more of the same. Right? "Do what must." she finally responds.
"Then ya should stay an' be security an' plan out how others could be too. Just you isn't enough ta keep people safe anymore." Lexi says steadily. "This proves that. People gettin' snatched like this. Ya can't be everywhere. We need ta have people who can defend each other in addition ta you bein' there for 'em."
Diya raises an eyebrow at the mauve mutant curiously. Clearly she could train the Pride and set up something like this. But is that really what should be done? How it should be done? "Can ask." Maybe no one will want to do this? No way to make a plan without knowing whom and what she's working with, anyway.
"Between you an' me, we know lots of people, Hottie." Lexi says simply. "An' ya know full well how many of th' people on th' streets are ex-military types who couldn't go back ta normal when they got back. Some of them might be willin' ta help. Especially if we can get thm some medical and psychological help that they couldn't get elsewhere."
Diya growls. "Stop calling me that." She is not amused. She hates that nickname. Still, the rest of the idea is not a terrible one. She can't know how well it may work, but she cannot deny it is something worth looking into.
"
"And…th' reason I was thinkin' of a clinic of our own to set up is that way we can pick th' buildin' and modify it however we want without, y'know, reportin' every lil' change we might have made. Plus we can pick people we want that we think we can trust. Th' staff here are good, but they're definitely all civilian like. Maybe we can find some ex-medics or somethin' who might be interested." Lexi points out.
"We're not construction." Diya responds. She can tell Lexi has some real ideas about this, and she's not going to say they're all crap; she has no idea just now. But she's not going to discourage the younger woman. Not yet.
"We're not, but I know people who owe me a favor or two. With some cash to put on th' table, they'd be willing ta do some work for us." Lexi says thoughfully. "I mean, it's not like we can make it a fortress…but pretty sure we can put a good secure sniper nest in it, for example.
Diya cannot help but shrug. She's not one to arrange anything like that; she just takes things as she finds them and deals with it. "Your money, Tendril." she murmurs. It's up to Lexi to do as she sees fit. Of course, she could come up with money of her own to put into things. But she's not going to start it.
Lexi hesitates. "Do ya think we should, like, reach out ta others that might be interested in footin' th' bill for somethin' like that? Allies? I mean…havin' somethin' like that near th' Disaster Zone alone would be helpful in lotsa ways."
The homeless vet just shrugs her shoulders again. "Wouldn't know." Who the Hell would they ask, anyway? She would have know idea. And she's not one to be asking anyone for anything. It's not really her way. She does consider something else. "Have looked, construction?" she inquires.
Lexi hesistates. "i've…sort of looked into some buildings. I mean, mostly in the Disaster Zone, that are a bit damaged but not so bad they couldn't be fixed up and used. An' they're cheap. An' close to tunnels that could go to Mutanttown. An' some in Mutanttown, or near it." she allows after a moment.
"In Zone, government land." Diya murmurs darkly; she doesn't trust the government, and she has good reasons for her concerns there. She'll not say no, nor put the kibosh on this plan. But she won't just be silent about her concerns, either. "No look, then?" she asks, prodding again. She has her reasons. But as always, she uses so few words one has to figure it out for oneself.
"I haven't looked seriously yet cuz I wasn't sure if you'd go for it." Lexi admits after a moment. "I mean, th' thing about th' goverment land is that they're willing to sell it for people willing to develop it again. Anythin' that puts taxes in their pockets."
"Should come out. Hunting." Hunter murmurs to the mauve mutant. She doesn't explain where, or why. She just offers it out like a plumb little tease. Hunter knows something someone else does not. No surprise there.
Lexi looks unsure. "Ya want me ta come huntin' with ya?" She does perk a bit at the idea, though she's unsure why Diya is offering it. "…okay. When? Where?" she says. "An' what gear should I bring?"
"You." Diya answers, pointing at Lexi. "Binoculars?" she adds in recommendation. "Tomorrow, dusk. Meet here." Whole goddamned paragraph by comparison to her norm, that.
Lexi mmms. "Guns?" she asks after a moment. She knows Diya will be carrying them, if not her sniper rifle then others. "Something, um, heavier or something more easy to hide?"
Diya just shrugs. "Whatever." She's not offering advice there. Not just now, at least. "No expected threat."
Lexi frowns a little at that, but nods. "Alright. I'll be here. Tomorrow. At dusk." She eyes Diya a bit. "…you should go rest. You've been through a fight even settin' aside th' changin' back and forth, I'm sure ya could use some food and sleep."