Shimmer, Glimmer, & Gleam - A Quest of Loss & Gain

You're not about to wait to get confirmation of what you already logically know is going on. Even if it's somehow not the prison you can make your troops turn around, so you get on Threshold Internal and ring up Hannah, who has somehow gone the fucking distance at three weeks without you arbitrarily getting bored of her. Maybe it's the teeth she keeps flashing at -

"Power crew reporting, 'sup you meme-loving slut?" Hannah says into the call.

...

Yeah, it's that, gods help you but you've found your type evidently. "I'm about to say the words you've been waiting for."

"We'll have a spring wedding, Captain."

You jam your thumb on the button and sigh LENGTHILY. "The words are 'amphibious assault', Hannah. I need the Wreckers, and I need the boats, at these coordinates, and I need 'em yesterday." You take your thumb off the button to text her your location, which means Hannah gets to talk...

Her voice goes more serious. "Cap, we doin' Durance-on-Bay? I thought you said that could wait, that your old man managed to get it proper protection from Impact and it's got supplies for a year or more. You find a bunch of people to sort through the convicts with when I wasn't looking?"

You close your eyes.

Thumb on the button. "They've got Nattie, Hannah."

"...I see. How we doin' this?"

"Heavy metal. How fast can you be here?"

You do some mental calculations while you look out at Professor Nails' crew, wondering if you're gonna have time to do this right or if it's gonna just be a bloodbath...

"Four days, Cap, with the big guns. You got somethin' to scale the walls with?"

"Somethin'," you agree. "Make it happen. Young out." You lock your phone and shove it back into your pocket before you start walking towards Nails with a purpose. "Hey! Gather around and find me Heller's sleepy ass, I think I can get us in touch with the people on the inside..."

Keep your head down. Don't make waves. You need to not act like you're not acting suspicious; the guards will take any excuse. So you go to a quiet mental place, and let the automatic behaviors take over. Step around this Inmate, nod to that guard, spend a few minutes in your cell, go out to the yard, avoid the showers...

You're not doing anything wrong. You aren't. You're just trying to get to your appointment on time. You're not guilty. You're not guilty.

The light from the Panopticon fixes itself on you, and you hold on to that thought. You're not guilty. You've done nothing wrong. You sink to your knees, because you are compliant, and not guilty, and you put your hands behind your head. You're not guilty. They can't pin anything new on you. The worst thing that could have ever happened to you has already happened, and there's nowhere worse to go from here. You're not guilty. You're not.

"Prisoner 17060," booms the voice of the Warden, from high in its tower. And then, in the way of dreams, it is in front of you, flanked by two guards. "What is it you're doing?"

Your mouth is unaccountably dry. It's impossible to look directly at the Warden. It is illegal to look away. You try to lick your lips and can't, so you croak at first before you find blessed air. "I'm getting ready to see the Chaplain, Warden. I have an appointment, m-made it months ago. Esteemed Warden."

The Warden manifests a clipboard, and starts looking it over. You see your cellmate watching from around a corner, biting its lip and looking indecisive. You give a subtle shake of your head, and it closes its eyes. Damn fool is thinking of trying to what, help you? Attack the guards? Not as long as the Panopticon stands. You're not letting that cute face get smashed in for nothing.

"It does seem that your request was filed and approved, 17060," the Warden muses...

Oh gods, this thing again. Why is your day like this?

Like fucking shit you can, this is the Law, and you're just a convict -

"...I find no reason to deny your request at this time," the Warden admits, reluctantly. "But we're keeping an eye on you."

"Yes, Warden," you grovel.

It turns away, muttering 'stupid animal' under its breath, and in a flash of the Law, it is gone. You collapse forward onto your hands and knees, breathing heavily, and your cellmate runs up, holds you up by the shoulder.

We don't even know you, the Wolf reproaches -

"Get out of my fucking head," you sob, and your cellmate tightens its grip, mutters something meant to be soothing. "I'm trying to think, I'm trying to think..."

Choose 1
[ ] Avoid your cell
[ ] Go back to arm yourself with some of that glass

Lose 1
[ ] Your veneer of compliance
[ ] The certainty that you'll make it to the Chaplain on time
[ ] Your mask of sanity

You take in a ragged breath. Let it out slowly. And in your lowest voice, you mutter: "What would it take for you to go along with me on somethin' real stupid?"

"...How stupid..." comes the hesitant reply.

"The kid is up to something. I think I might be dying. So. I'm going to go to the chapel, see the Chaplain like I said I would. Maybe it has answers for me, maybe it doesn't, but -" and here you stop, for you see the light sweeping towards you; you let it pass through you, leaving behind the intimate knowledge that you are vermin, unworthy of freedom, unworthy of love, unworthy of the taste of sunlight. But even a rat abhors a cage, doesn't it? "- but...it's also close to the Panopticon. If I can bring the tower down, this place will explode."

Your cellmate bites its lip, leans away from its one glass foot. Looks away uncertainly.

So you pull it into you by the chest and press your forehead into its, faces close. "You don't have to help," you murmur. "But I'm doing this. It's freedom or death for me, or worse, parole."

Your cellmate lets out a ragged breath, shaky and hot against your lips, and then kisses you. You were not expecting this. You squeak, like a godsdamned toy, and bite it without thinking; it shivers, and you taste blood, see it dripping down your cellmate's chin in a thin stream when it pulls away. "Fuck you," it whispers. "I'm in. What do you need?"

Your heart is trying to slam its way out of the glass prison in your breast, but you concentrate. Focus. Listen to the not-breathing of the Wolf, that needs no air...

"...Distract the guards in twenty minutes. Then stay alive. Maybe get the kid to safety."

"You got it, doll."

* * * *

No. But I'm sure I don't have a choice. What are you doing?

Uh-huh. And you're interested in me because...?

Weird way to pronounce 'big tits'.

Uhhhh...

Maybe?

* * * *

Three minutes to get glass from your cell. Move casually. Don't start shit. Don't make eye contact with the other Inmates. You just have to make it through gen pop without rattling or rolling too much, which is helped by the bit where you fuse your glass into solid masses that spread through the linings of your jumpsuit; it makes the outfit hang a little weird, but who's looking at the hang of your outfit when the extra weight is making your chest stand out? No one, that's who. Some of the guards even inadvertently help you, as their laser-locked attention discourages some of the Inmates from starting shit...

Your cellmate deliberately bumps its -

- Her -

Ass against a guard and starts yelling in that way she does, full of outrage and demanding to know what the fuck the problem is, touching an Inmate like that. The guards around the hall towards the Chapel tighten their grip around their truncheons, start stepping forward. You touch your lip, unconsciously, and wonder again why your cellmate seems so loyal to you. Five years Inside and it's always been there for you, listened to you except about the Wolf sometimes, healed your hurts, and...and...

They're moving.

You slip in past them, unlock the door with your blank key and a touch of power, and you take off running. You've never been to the Chapel, not in all your time Inside, but it's the right of all Inmates to go, right? Your spiritual health is a right given to you even Inside, it has to be, it has to be, it...

That's a guard. "Halt!" it calls, drawing a truncheon. You touch the lining of your jumpsuit and slash out with your hand; a blade of glass springs from your sleeve, punctures the guard's throat like the flick of a frog's tongue, looses an explosion of blood that soaks your face and clothes. You don't slow down. You don't stop. Heavy boots you inexplicably have kept pound against concrete while you turn a corner and make a flicking motion with your dripping arm.

A storm of glass needles shreds three guards, unerringly seeking throats and eyes and faces, because they aren't needles, are they? They're guided missiles, because you say so, because you say so and when you have enough focus what you say goes. You feel your stomach growl, but there's no time. A two-stage gate, but you take a passkey from a falling corpse on your way through, buzz yourself past them, and plunge into a room full of light, full of glorious sunlight and divinity and humanity that has been denied you and -

- Oh.

You do have a name, don't you? It's. It's Orchid.

Someone is screaming in agony, and after a moment you realize it's you. Somewhere across the Bay, at the shore, someone else who is also you is screaming. The two of you bleed from the eyes and mouth. You feel your flesh flicker and shake, unstable, unwhole, unwholesome -

You have been Inside for five years. You are a Convict. You must destroy the Panopticon.

You have only existed for three months. Your name is Orchid. You have never been Inside.

Your cellmate might love you, because you have been Inside, and no one else can understand, and the kid, it doesn't deserve to be here but it's doing something, it's not like the other Inmates, it's -

Nattie barely talks to you because things have been busy. There are others your heart flutters for. Marie never went Inside, and it would be cruel, so cruel, to imprison her.

You are here.

You are there.

You are here.

You can't be both. You could be either. You understand, instinctively, that you've done this to yourself, that the Panopticon tried to steal you from your life and you brought its dream-shadow of yourself to a kind of life, that the Mime's Knack has made of you another thing. But you can't be both. You have to be one, or the other, and when you choose you will take your Cellmate who is Nattie who is your friend who is your strange ally with you, that you will take the kid who is Marie who is innocent who is clever who could help who must stay away -

It hurts it hurts it hurts -

You are...
[ ] Inside, and you will destroy the Panopticon from within and reduce casualties amongst the Inmates
[ ] Outside, and you will spare Nattie and Marie as best you can.