trans_9 | Buy a Little Mercy [Open; Potentially Graphic Material]

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Buy a Little Mercy [Open; Potentially Graphic Material]

Less than an hour after the ship leaves Agrestic's orbit, an announcement is broadcast throughout Stacy.

|| Attention, crew. Your crewmates, Howard Bassem and Charles Merriman, have been apprehended attempting to desert. They will now be given Punishment. According to established guidelines, you are all requested to report to the Observation to witness the Punishment. Attendance is not mandatory, but highly suggested. This will serve as a reminder of the consequences of treason and desertion. ||

On the observation deck, Archon Yavek, Archite Rekkti, two other Daligig and a handful of Kessek soldiers stand outside a spherical force field. Inside the bubble, Orc and Howard are suspended by tentacles looping around their wrists. Orc's ceased thrashing around and struggling against his restraints; rust-colored fissures have developed around his shoulders and forearms from the strain, but now he simply hangs there, looking defeated. Howard's nose is bleeding, and every time a drop falls to the bottom of the forcefield there's a small sizzle. He's weeping and begging the Daligig with every plea possible, but they act as if they aren't listening. Instead, they wait for an audience.

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There wasn't anything Barbara could do to help Howard - there were plenty of medical staff and people around him to comfort him. So she strolled sullenly around the ship until she saw Ian.

Without a word, she reached out her arms and hugged her friend close.

A hug from Barbara was just what he needed. He held her close and buried his face against his neck.

After a few moments he loosened his grip, but didn't let her go. "I never thought they'd consider us all soldiers."

"Makes sense when you think about it," she said into his shoulder, "we eat slop, are kept in specific areas where we're constantly watched and only allowed out every once in a while, so long as we're back when told to be. If we're not in the army, we're inmates in a prison."

Barbara pulled back, letting go of Ian to wipe a tear that had spilled down her cheek. She smiled a little up at him, "at least Stacey didn't go through with it all. That's something."

He nodded. "But they're just children. Children shouldn't be soldiers." He knew they were in some cultures but he had thought of the culture on Stacy as being more civilised.

"They are and that's what I hate most of all about those wretched Daligig. It is impossible for them to see us as anything more than replaceable foot soldiers." Which wouldn't be entirely true. If it were, they might have been more reluctant to let Howard and Charles go.

"It isn't fair for them, Ian. I can understand you or I being recruited but not teenagers. It isn't right."

"I know." And yet there was nothing they could do about it. "I had thought that if things got really bad we could just find a nice, peaceful planet where they needed a couple of teachers and settle down there."

"Apparently not. We'll just have to be patient and wait for Earth to be returned." She sighed because that could take months or years or decades...

"Might be better to wait for Earth. We don't know anything about the universe. Finding two places to live on a planet we've never been on before could potentially be impossible."

"As long as we do get it back. And it doesn't take to long. We can't live like this forever. What if we wanted to do ordinary things like have children? This is hardly the place to do that." Once Howard leaving had got him thinking about it Ian could think of many reasons to do the same one day.

"You'd have to find someone first, and on a ship filled with aliens, that would be difficult." but she could tell what he neant.

"Are you saying that you want to leave?" Barbara asked quietly.

He shook his head, ignoring the comment about having to find someone first. "No. I want to help fight to get the Earth back and everyone else's planets too. But I can see that there might be a time when I do."

She thought a moment. What Ian was saying made sense, there was an urge to leave Stacey but she wanted to fight in the war, help where she could, to restore Earth and all the other planets that had been destroyed.

"What do you want to do at the moment?"

He opened his mouth to answer and then realised he didn't have an answer. He was still too shaken up by what had happened, not to mention what might have happened, if not for Stacy's intervention. "I don't know."

"Come for a walk," she said and took a couple of steps away, back in the direction she'd come from. There wasn't any destination in mind when she walked, Barbara merely thought that it might help to clear his mind. Although after an event such as that, it would be difficult to think of little else for a while.

He followed her, happy to let her make the decisions for the moment. Although he did take her hand. "I saw you trying to talk them out of it."

"And a lot of good it did, too," she sighed. "They're more stubborn than the Doctor and full of so much more arrogance!" Without realising, she gripped Ian's hand tighter in her frustration.

He sighed. "And if we don't do exactly as they say they can do whatever they like to us."

"They can't just do whatever they like," she corrected, "but they do anyway."

This was counter productive. As awful and horrid as the entire affair had been, it had happened and there wasn't anything Ian or Barbara could do about it.

"I met an alien the other day that looked a lot like a centaur with four eyes," she said, loosening her grip on his hand.

Stacy would only be able to do so much. Not without making the Daligig suspicious anyway and who knows what they might be able to do to Stacy.

But he went with Barbara's change of subject. It was probably better for taking their mind off things they couldn't change. "Really? Horse and everything?"

"Horse and everything. No mouth, though, he communicated with thought rather than speech," Barbara smiled a little, "very unique and...interesting."

"He won't be unique if there's a whole race out there like him," he pointed out with a small smile.

"There isn't." Her chin jutted out in defiance, but a smile played upon her lips at the thought of besting Ian for a change.

"There isn't?" He frowned. "What happened to rest of his race?"

"War, of course. There are some left, I should be fair, but the majority is gone." Once again, they'd come across a depressing topic and even though it seemed rather apt, given their situation, that wasn't the point of clearing their heads.

"Oh." He was quiet after that, thinking about a war wiping out most of a race of four-eyed centaurs.

"I'm glad you're here," he said after a while. And then stopped walking because he realised that might mean to Barbara like he was glad she was caught up in this mess. "Selfishly, I mean."

"It would be awful to do all of this alone," Barbara agreed and squeezed Ian's hand, "and I'm glad that it's you I'm stuck with, with all of these Doctors around." She smiled and let Ian's hand go to wrap her arms around herself.

Buy a Little Mercy [Open; Potentially Graphic Material]

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