Conquest of Paradise Chapter 11

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Machine Menace: Amanda Ellis

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Conquest of Paradise

Chapter Eleven

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Molly ‘Jupiter’ Henderson

I swallowed heavily, eyes devouring Gaius’ glistening, throbbing, swollen cock almost as hungrily as Mary’s cunt just had. I knew I would have to spend some time thinking about what Mary had just said, about the fact that she was apparently so emotionally drained by what was happening that she wanted to get knocked up just to have some peace in her life, but all I could think about right was the situation I was in, and I forced my arousal down.

I watched as he started towards us, only to pause as a series of loud chiming sounds filled the room, and he pulled out a small hand device and tapped away at it for a moment. He started to put it away, then looked at Lucy and tilted his head in consideration for a moment before tapping again with a glint of regret in his eyes.

My squadmate dissolved into particles of light with a cut-off gasp of surprise, and I tried to surge to my feet in protest, only to remain seated. Bound by his command.

A moment later, I frowned slightly and shook my head, a slight buzzing filling my ears for a moment before dissipating as I blinked rapidly. I couldn’t remember what had made me so angry, besides watching and listening as Black Wolf fucked my only female squadmate into a stupor, quite possibly getting her pregnant.

“Mary, stand and approach me. Take position where Mary stood for her own inspection.” He ordered, and I found myself compelled to obey, rising to my feet and stepping over Mary’s clothing to stand ready. “Good. Now, you want to submit to me like Mary did, don’t you? You love submitting, you love feeling pain and pleasure at my hand, at the hands of your fellow submissives, your sisters. You didn’t know it before, you were so sure that you were a top, but you were really just looking for someone who had the guts and the strength to force you to submit, weren’t you?”

I bit my lower lip and nodded shyly, looking at the ground and twisting slightly in place out of the embarrassment of having desires so secret even I had barely acknowledged them aired so publicly by a man I barely knew. Gaius knew me so well despite the brief amount of time we had known one another, knew exactly what lay in my heart and got me wet at night.

“I asked you a question, Molly. A nod or a whimper of agreement is acceptable when your mouth is gagged or full of my cock, but when you have the ability to speak clearly you will answer questions I put to you promptly.” He rebuked sharply, and I ducked my head lower still, falling into a parade rest instinctively at the bite in his voice.

“Yes, Sir. I…I didn’t realize it before, and how could I have? No man has really ever been able to top me, not unless I just did it for them, and I guess I just thought the sex was terrible because they didn’t know what they were doing. But it wasn’t that, not really. They couldn’t give me what they needed, no matter how long or how thick their cocks were, no matter what position I let them fuck me in.” I responded immediately, apologetically, feeling like a weight was rising from my shoulders with every word. “Still, I…I know that you’re going to dominate me, I know you’ll win and take me, but I won’t just bend over for you like Mary. I’m not that kind of sub.”

“You don’t need to be like Mary, Molly, you only need to serve and obey. There are other subs out there like you, a great many actually. What you are, Mary, is called a ‘brat’. A submissive that gets aroused from being disobedient and rebellious, or more accurately gets aroused from being put back in her place after breaking the rules or pushing her Master’s buttons.” He informed me calmly, sounding rather like a professor at the moment, and I nodded in understanding.

“Thank you for explaining, sir.” I said, dedicating that information to memory, before squaring my shoulders and meeting his eyes. “Let’s see what you’re made of when you’re up against a girl that wants you earn her, Gaius.”

“You challenge is accepted with glee. I can’t wait to hold you down and break you to bridle.” He responded, rolling his shoulders and flexing his hands, cock bobbing slightly with every motion, and there was a moment of stillness before he darted forward. I moved to meet him and we clashed, my foot lashing out in an effort to hook his own and push him to the ground. That didn’t work, not that I honestly expected it to, and his sweeping forearm struck my out-stretched knee just above the joint, putting me off-balance enough that I couldn’t recover my stance quickly enough to prevent him from getting around behind me. I raised my own forearms an instant before his could wrap around my neck, having predicted such a simple and effective control technique as that. I opened my mouth, intending to say something clever and taunting, only to squawk in surprise as his other hand spanked me sharply. “Come on, Molly, if you’re trying to make earning you a challenge, you can’t just leave your rear undefended like that!”

“Hmph, I suppose I should have expected that from a lech like you.” I responded with a huff, throwing an elbow at his side. The strike was absorbed by his powerful abdominal muscles with barely a wince on his part, and he grabbed my unprotected throat with one hand, holding tight as he stepped into my bubble and swept my feet out from under me. I coughed harshly as the air was driven out of my lungs by the impact of my back on the floor, and then moaned lowly as he lay a sharp slap on my again, but this time it wasn’t my ass that received his punishment, but my pussy. Even through three layers of durable combat-oriented clothing it stung, and I felt myself grow damper at the pain.

“How am I a lech if all I am doing is giving bratty little painsluts like you and submissive playthings like Mary what you want more than anything else? You should be prostrating yourself and thanking me, and you will.” He responded, squeezing the hand around my throat lightly and pressing one knee across my hips as his free hand set to work on my shirt. I writhed and struggled, trying to move away from his questing hands, but the pressure -the delightful, arousing, controlling pressure- that he was exerting kept me firmly under his control.

He worked my jacket until it was down around my elbows, limiting my arm movement heavily, before palming my breasts roughly, smacking them none-to-gently and tweaking the nipples as he bounced them in his hands. I couldn’t help the chorus of moans and cries that tumbled from my mouth, disjointed and chaotic, has he played my body the way an expert musician would their instrument. I had never felt anything like this, not in my entire life, not with any partner. I was going to cum, I was going to cum with a man pinning me to the floor and choking me while he slapped my breasts and ground his knee into my stomach.

Gaius was right. I really was a painslut. I was a bratty whore that got off on being treated like trash.

The realization, the acknowledgement, of that fact pushed me over the edge. I came with a scream that probably could have been heard at the Statue of Liberty if my airways were a little bit less squeezed than they were.

I soaked my panties, the smell of my sweet, sticky cum rising into the air to mix with the cloud of sex that permeated the room, leaving me panting and sensitive and desperate for more. But neither of us were done yet, and he grabbed the bottom of my shirt, pulling it up roughly, and I resumed my struggles as my bra-clad breasts bounced into view. He straddled my stomach, releasing my throat to grip my hands just as tightly in one of his own before returning to his efforts with the other. The shirt rose inexorably, blinding me and trapping my arms entirely, and I shuddered and bit my lip in anticipation as his strong, calloused hands skimmed over the muscled flesh of my stomach towards my breasts. They brushed the undersides, skimming along the curve of cotton-clad flesh, before I felt them grip the cloth.

Understanding was swift.

“Don’t you fucking dare…!” I started to shout, only to fall into a partially-legitimate appalled silence as a great ripping sound heralded the bisection of the garment, my breasts swaying from the movement as its tattered remnants slid down towards my armpits. “You fuck, do you have any idea how hard it is to find a good combat sports bra these days?!”

“Quiet, slut. Your bra is the least of your concerns, you know? I could just fuck you and tie you up on the bed, leave you there and make Mary edge you for hours while I do my missions. You’d probably love that, you filthy thing.” He scoffed and I could imagine him shaking his head is mock disappointment and contempt. My pussy throbbed in response. I felt him shift, his weight turning and settling once more, the contours of our bodies pressed together letting me know he had just turned to face my lower half, and I heard him snap his fingers at Pyrrha. A moment later, I heard a tell-tale click. “Don’t move, pet, I’m going to cut a convenient hole so I can fuck you without going to the effort of taking your pants off. I’d hate to cut you by accident.”

I froze instantly. Painslut or not, brat or not, there were some very big and very dangerous arteries in that region, and bleeding out because my Master was making my clothes crotchless was not the way I wanted to die. I felt my pants tug and shift, the sound of cloth tearing and being cut reaching my ears as Gaius hummed to himself, the long, burning length of his shaft pressing against my stomach. After a few minutes he was done, and I shuddered again as cool air flooded in through the newly formed hole to caress my heated folds. I didn’t even try to stifle the moan that flowed from my mouth at that, and I blushed as he chuckled, low and deep.

Getting off of me, he rolled me over onto my front and I bit my lip with a sigh of desire as he set about manhandling my body into whatever position his heart desired. My hips were lifted, my face pressed to the floor, my knees spread. I was trapped and helpless, a toy that he could use for his own pleasure. Ready to be defiled and tortured and fucked as he saw fit.

I felt, as much as heard, him grow closer. My core began to clench rhythmically, inner walls instinctively grasping for the cock that was about to split them apart, like a greedy child begging for a treat. My knees shifted further apart, my hips settling ever so slightly deeper, my chest and face pressing harder to the floor as I waited for the press of his rod against my burning folds. Waited for him to shove his thick cock as deep as it would go, waited for him to make me scream myself hoarse, to etch his name into my tongue.

But there was nothing. No cock buried itself in my cunt, no hand caressed my sweaty flesh, no tongue or teeth touched my skin. His body, hot and strong, was just out of reach. That cock, that thick, hard, long cock I so desperately wanted…I was sure that it was just a hairsbreadth away. I bobbed my hips, trying to move my pussy back that tiny distance, but there was nothing there, and I whimpered desperately as I did it again, harder. Still nothing, and when he chuckled again I realized what it was that he wanted.

He wanted me to beg. He wanted me to beg for his cock, to beg for him to fuck me and use me and treat me like his bitch. I opened my mouth, more than prepared to do it, before pausing. My eyes narrowed behind my shirt blindfold and my lips pursed slightly in thought, for Master had described to me what a brat was. He said that I was a brat, a submissive that liked to break the rules and be disobedient, to be forced to obey. He wasn’t wrong, I had loved him pinning me down and getting me ready to be fucked, it had been a dream come true. But…

“I thought you were this big strong man that took what you wanted, Black Wolf. Hmph, more like a puppy if you can’t even get that cock of yours lined up with a pussy that’s pinned down.” I mocked, shaking my hips up at him for a moment more before trying to sit up. Most people wouldn’t have been able to do it, but my abdominals were certainly strong enough to lift my chest off of the ground without the use of my arms. “Hmph, figures you wouldn’t be able to top a woman that didn’t help you fuck her. I’d be better off with one of the JTF boys than…”

I was cut off with a gasp as he shoved me down again, pressing my face against the floor, and I cried out as his hand struck me sharply across the ass. I was going to have a red mark, I was sure of it, and probably one on my cheek to from the force he put me down with. I had little in the way of time to think about it, however, before a howl was forced from my lungs as his shaft pierced me from folds to womb in a single stroke. It ached, almost, a sign of both the angle and fierceness of the penetration, but I had never felt such a feeling of fullness before. Master had been right, there was no comparison between him and the other men I had fucked in my life. His cock was better in every way, his technique was better, and most importantly he knew what I wanted.

“Is that the best you’ve got?” My mockery probably would have landed better if it hadn’t come out breathlessly and been interspersed with a pair of very needed, very submissive whines as my tunnel rippled around his invading length. He chuckled lowly in amusement and satisfaction, and I gave a higher-pitched whine as he started to pull out, the flared head of his cock scrapping my core the whole journey.

“Oh, we’re just getting started. See, Mary is a good girl, so she got the sweet treatment. Bad girls get shown their place and kept there as roughly and as often as needed.” He responded, slapping my ass again as the head of his cock sat just inside of me, leaving me as empty as he could without leaving me entirely, before filling me again a heartbeat later. “Something tells me I’ll be spending a great deal of time putting you back in your place.” He paused for a moment. “I’m looking forward to it.”

The talking stopped then, as he began to ride me for all I was worth. The sound of our flesh slapping together resounded, filling the air as the scent of my arousal began to mix with that of Mary. My arms twisted, hands grasping desperately at the cloth holding them in place, as I sought for stability amongst the pleasure, amongst the bliss of submission. But there was no stability, beyond the cock pounding into me, beyond the hard grip on my body and the muscled form behind me, and I clung to Master’s presence. To the rock he provided me in the tides of delight.

His fingers threaded through my hair, tightening just enough to cause stinging pain across my scalp. He didn’t use that leverage, didn’t pull me upright by my locks to change the angle of his conquest or display me to the other women. He seemed satisfied simply with causing that minor discomfort, exerting that small token of control, even as he continued to ruin me entirely for other men.

Crying out again in pleasure, sweet-smelling fluid squirting out around his length as he hit a particularly sensitive spot and drove me to orgasm, I felt my eyes drift halfway shut from the intoxicating feelings I was drowning in, and I couldn’t help the small smile of satisfaction on my face as his grip tightened and I felt heat bloom in my depths as he came with a growl. Still lodged within me, he picked me up and carried me to bed, laying me down beside Mary. I whimpered unhappily as his softeneing shaft slid out of me, but settled as he pet my head gently, praising me softly and kissing my cheek. The last thing I remembered as I dozed off was curling my sweaty and cum soaked body around Mary’s similarly defiled form as my Master and Pyrrha left the room.

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Gaius Mactire

Leaving Molly and Mary behind, especially once they were cuddling, was no easy thing to do. There was nothing I wanted more than to keep fucking the both of them, but I had a job to do. I was well and truly done with the world of The Division, if I was going to be honest. The shine had worn off, well and truly worn off, and I was eager for greener pastures.

Ignoring Pyrrha for a moment, I double-checked my smart device, eyes skimming the decisions I had made in relative haste while getting ready to take Molly as my own.

Nova and Laura had been busy while I had been with Mary, hunting down Rogue Agents and other threats whose stories were…unsympathetic, to say the least. None of them had stood a chance, of course, and been dealt with in short order, giving me a noticeable (if not titanic) influx of credits. Credits I had used to purchase several upgrades.

Congratulations on Capturing and Selling the Following Waifu!

Lucy ‘Venus’ Anders, Tier 4

Vivian ‘Uranus’ Conley, Tier 4

Lori ‘Termite’ Baker, Tier 4

Tegan ‘Luna’ Silver, Tier 4

Sueko ‘Wraith’ Tanagi, Tier 4

Marley ‘Shade’ Yarrow, Tier 4

Linette ‘Dusk’ Edwards, Tier 4

Larae Barrett, Tier 4

You have Purchased the Following:

Aggressive Initiations

Advanced Tempest Runes (Body, Mind)

Pocket Space, Pocket Apartment, Sweet Home

Your Current Build Is:

[spoiler=Updated Build]

Bindings

Tempest Jewelry (Additional Stock x2), Basic Tempest Runes, Aggressive Initiations, Advanced Tempest Runes (Body), Advanced Tempest Runes (Mind)

Lures

Faerie Feast

Sticky Fingers

Other Control

Apportation

Waifu

Nova Terra, Pyrrha Nikos, X-23, Cortana, Mercy, Mary Masters, Molly Henderson

Home

Pocket Space

Talents

Body (x2), Everlasting

Defenses

Body (x2)

Perks

Exit Stage Left, Pursued By A Bear, Universal Calibration, Sexual Calibration, Fertility Calibration

Remaining Credits: 0

[/spoiler]

Selling Lucy had been unfortunate, but necessary. As callous as it might sound, I needed the credits and I needed to avoid having too much waifu-bloat in my harem. If given the chance, I would keep only the waifu I actually wanted at my side, and I assuaged my conscience with the fact that neither Molly nor Mary remembered Lucy even existed now. Which probably shouldn’tassuage my conscience, so I put the thought in the ‘Multiverse Gurantees This Person Happiness Elsewhere’ box in my head and moved on.

I would probably be wracked with guilt sometime in the future, but for now there was work to be done if I was going to move on to my next world.

“Laura, Nova, standby to meet me near Keener’s base. We’re finishing New York now.” I ordered my two distant brides via my radio, receiving instant acknowledgements, and I looked over to Pyrrha. “Pyrrha, you’ll be staying behind as planned, with Mercy. Cortana, what’s the status of Keener and his remaining Rogues?”

“With the disappearance of the targets Nova and Laura dealt with, Keener is circling the wagons. All Rogue Agents have been recalled to his headquarters on Liberty Island. All of the New York targets are in one place, now. I’ve sent the location to Laura and Nova, they’re close by from capturing Conley.” The AI responded promptly, and I grinned. For any normal opponent, that was exactly the right move for Keener to have made. Unfortunately for him, I was no regular opponent who would have to fight him with regular means.

“I’ll get out of sight and use Apportation to join them. How long until the Second Wave arrives?

“A day, at most. With the situation here looking like it’s on the verge of stabilizing, they moved up the time-table so they can help finish the job.”

That made a lot of sense, if I was going to be honest. They didn’t want to show up when everything was over and done with, even if only for the sake of their reputations, and they sure as hell didn’t want to risk a loss of momentum stymieing or even undoing recovery efforts.

“Good. Very good. After we finish Keener off, we can deal with raiding Amherst’s apartment. Mercy will help the other doctor’s make some great breakthroughs, and we’ll be done here.” I ended the conversation with a pleased expression and pulled Pyrrha into a sideways hug, kissing her temple gently before taking off at a brisk jog.

I made sure I was noticed leaving, but the moment I was sure that I was out of sight, I used Apportation to join Nova and Laura. Light spiralled around me, reminding me distinctly of the animation for the Recall potion from Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance (a game that had defined my childhood). A moment later, I was standing beside my lovers, looking past the ferry terminal towards Lady Liberty herself.

“I can sense them all, clustered together, Sir. They’re nervous, frightened even. Angry. Keener, though, I can see why a world without us would have been in big trouble. That man is smart, dangerously so. Smart, cunning, and dedicated. It’s a damn shame he’s dedicated to making things worse, rather than better.” Nova greeted me immediately, sounding almost sad. “He must have been something before it all went bad, Sir.”

“From everything the games showed, he was. Probably the best Agent that there was. His callsign probably wasn’t an accident either.” I agreed, and she nodded in agreement while Laura frowned lightly in confusion. Taking note, I explained. “Back in medieval times, the vanguard was the leading edge of the army. First in formation, forming the front line or holding the critical flank, that sort of thing. The elite, who lead the way. That sort of thing.”

Laura nodded with a soft sound of understanding, and I looked back towards the objective. God, I couldn’t wait to have proper transports and gunships. Sure, we had the choppers we had taken along with the U.N. Building, but I wasn’t stupid enough to try and fly one of those directly at Keener’s HQ. Nova could probably keep the missiles from hitting us, or make their warheads not explode, but I would rather not test that at the moment. I wasn’t immortal yet, and neither were they. We would have to find a boat or something similar. A small skiff perhaps, since one of the full-sized ferries that had been used in the game would be painfully obvious, and (unlike the game) there wasn’t a full amphibious assault by the Black Tusk underway to keep Keener busy.

Fortunately, the sun was already setting, and I was abruptly thankful that the first game had taken place in the dead of winter. It would be dark soon, and with the city’s power so heavily disrupted, it would be truly dark. Plenty of cover to approach under. If it wasn’t for the number of credits that that island represented, credits I hadn’t originally intended to claim to be honest, I would have just had Nova kill them all. But the value of sixadditional captures and sales, even ‘just’ tier fours, was well worth it. Besides, if I was willing to sell Lucy, then I damn well was willing to sell the likes of Keener and Dragov!

“Sir, there is a loyal Agent there as well. Megan Collins. It looks like they’re wearing her down, trying to get her to flip. Keener seems particularly attached for some reason, keeps thinking about how she’ll come around eventually. Any ideas why?” Nova asked after a moment, and I frowned before shaking my head. I didn’t know who Megan Collins was, but getting another loyal Agent to safety (capture or no capture) was plenty worth it. Especially if we were already going to be in the area.

“Someone he fought besides, perhaps, even an old girlfriend?” I guessed, before shrugging. “It doesn’t matter. He’s going to the company, and we’ll take her back to the UN building. There are only a couple of other people here I actually intend to keep for myself, and with Exit Stage Left I don’t needcredits anymore.”

“Fine with me. I wouldn’t want any women you can’t come to love amongst us, it would be a terrible thing for them.” Laura added her two cents to the conversation. Nova and I nodded in unified agreement. Neither of us wanted that, which I’m sure would come as a surprise to some. Why not gather all the women I could, they would ask?

Simple: there were plenty of women who I genuinely liked out there in the multiverse, there was no reason to claim the ones I didn’t and leave them suffering in loneliness for the rest of eternity. Ignored by a man that they were desperately in love with and utterly devoted to, who didn’t love them back. No, that isn’t something I was willing to do. Which is the whole reason I sold Lucy. She’s already been captured, her chances of finding happiness in this world were shot, so it was better (though not great by any stretch of the imagination) to make her available to Contractors that would actually want her.

“Alright, let’s find a ride and get this done then. As it turns out, this world isn’t nearly as thrilling as I thought it would be. More stressful than anything else, despite the absurdly unfair advantage we have.” I said after another moment of silence, checking my weapon and eyeing the shoreline around us. “There has to be one nearby.”

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Aaron Keener

I swore, hand cradling my nose, and staggered back a step. Within her jerry-rigged cell, the bars of which she had just punched me through, Megan Collins smirked triumphantly.

“I suppose I should have expected that from you, Meg.” I groaned after a moment of evaluation, and I was relieved to see my nose wasn’t broken. It wouldn’t have been the first time, obviously, and probably wouldn’t have been the last either. Still would have sucked.

“You’d better fucking believe it, motherfucker!” my very-recently-and-violently-ex-fiance snarled with a savage smile. “Come back over and I’ll do it again! Kill my team, will you? Turn traitor, will you? I’ll kick your ass, you stupid prick! Maybe a good smackdown will give you back a goddamn brain!”

“Meg…” I started, but she cut me off immediately.

“Don’t you ‘Meg’ me, Aaron! If you think for one fucking second I’ll flip like the rest of your little band of corpses, you know me even less than I thought possible! Especially after you murdered the rest of my unit! My friends!”

“I’m sorry I had to do it, they’ll be mourned, but it was necessary. I couldn’t imprison them indefinitely, and they posed to great a risk to our future if I let them run around unchecked after they refused to join us.” I tried, yet again, to explain. Not that it worked, and not that I had expected it to work. No, Meg had always been so stubborn, so set on what she thought was right and wrong. It was one of the thing’s that had attracted me to her, that had won her my heart so effortlessly.

“You, Aaron, and your delusional plans for the future. I’m not a part of them, and I never will be, and I’m not going to stop trying to get out of here either. So you can shoot me or you can put up with me causing you all kinds of fucking problems, because those are your only options!” she dismissed me, turning away in her cell and lying down. I sighed and shook my head, turning away and leaving her for the moment. She would come around, I was sure of it, it would just take time.

Making my way through the halls of my base, I pushed through the doors of my CIC. My five remaining Rogues were lingering around the room, waiting for instructions. None of them, except Theo, were happy with being pulled away from the groups that they had been integrating with, but it had been necessary. The loss of eight of our comrades to an unconfirmed threat required a drastic shift to our strategy.

“Still trying to convince your woman to play nice, Keener? You know it won’t work, she’s too pissed off. We’ll wake up one morning to find our throats slit.” Circe drawled as I walked past her to post my fists on the large central table that acted as our command station.

“She’ll come around, but that’s not important right now.” I waved her off, and the angry voice of James Dragov filled the room as he slammed his own hands down on the table.

“You’re goddamn right it’s not! Larae is gone, what’s left of the Rikers are collapsing, and we’re here babysitting your ex-girlfriend! We should be out there hunting these fuckers down!” he shouted, and I gave him a quelling look.

“Barret was an asset, but frankly I’m far more concerned with the loss of eight Agents in a matter of hours than one useful criminal. Whoever took them down so quickly is a serious threat, far beyond what the JTF is capable off unless they’re far more capable than they’ve ever shown themselves to be. Theo?” I responded, before looking at my intel specialist, who frowned unhappily in response.

“No confirmation on any of the JTF networks or in ISAC’s systems, but do we really need it? It’s just like the LMB and the Rioters. No warning, no chatter, just total eradication. It’s Black Wolf and his unit. They were set up to hunt Agents, their profession is hunting Agents, and that’s what they’re doing.” He responded, and I frowned at him, not appreciating his doom-saying. Unfortunately, it didn’t seem to do me any good, because he just shook his head at me. “You know that I’m right, boss. I think we need to bail out and make some more friends, because this obviously isn’t working. We need a plan specifically for these people if we want to accomplish anything.

“I believe that Theo has a point, Aaron.” Hornet agreed, folding his hands behind his back as he regarded the map before us. Not a handful of days ago, it had quite clearly shown that the city was shifting in our favour. That my plans were proceeding even better than I had hoped. Now, it showed how much the tide had turned against me, against my goals. “They clearly have extremely good intel on us, they obviously are skilled, and they are trained specifically to counter us. This battleground appears to be theirs. Better to abandon it and arrange things to turn the tables elsewhere.”

“If we leave, if we don’t have people helping keep the JTF in check, they’ll clean the city out! All of our supporters, all of the factions we have influence over, all of our supply caches! Everything we’ve worked for will be gone!” I protested firmly, hating the idea instantly, but rather than rally the group around me it only seemed to firm their support of Theo’s suggestion.

“Our supporters and the factions we have influence over are already gone, everything we’ve been working on is already gone, and everything really will be lost if we get taken out the same as the rest of them have. Live to fight another day, Aaron.” Kajika told me quietly, and I frowned, because as much as I hated to admit it, he had a point. Only the Cleaners remained to any degree out of the city’s factions aligned with my goals, and they weren’t exactly in perfect shape either. As much as I wanted to deny it, my compatriots had a point: if we died, everything we hoped to accomplish died with us. Better to fail temporarily rather than press on and lose everything for good.

“Fine, then. I can see you’re all in agreement on this.” I sighed finally, bowing my head in acknowledgement of the inevitable and rubbing my forehead as a headache started to form. After all, I couldn’t risk losing the support of these few who remained loyal to me. “Let’s get ready to move out then. Javier, James, Alicia, arms and armor. We’ll need some supplies to buy-in with new groups. Theo, start backing up the servers and our efforts on ANNA thus far. Carter, consumables. We’ll take one of the ferries over to New Jersey and move on from there.”

There was a mutter of agreement, though Dragov looked mutinous at the idea of leaving, before we all split up to perform our tasks. I spared a moment of thought for how much more troublesome Meg would be after this (watching us run with our tails between our legs would certainly keep her spine steeled longer than I would prefer) before beginning to gather up all the maps and papers I had painstakingly made and updated since Amherst’s little miracle had begun.

Ah, Amherst. A pioneer, a visionary that understood that humanity had stagnated. Become complacent, rotting under the weight of their inadequacies, so propped up by millenia of advancement that they forgot all the struggles and lessons that had brought them about. I wished that I had found his lab, but I had always put a serious search off. After all, it would have been easy to locate it once the JTF and loyal Agents were gone, and I wouldn’t have had to worry about running into any problems during my search. Now, of course, there was nothing but problems to be found, even if they were surmountable and fleeting ones. All I had to do was wait, Black Wolf would undoubtably bite off more than he could chew at some point, and my problem would solve itself.

I rubbed my head again as my headache worsened, grimacing. Stress-induced headaches weren’t exactly something I was used to dealing with, but under the circumstances I was hardly surprised. Still, this was a pretty bad one. Hell, my vision was blurring a little.

A light thump caught my attention, and I looked over to see Theo leaning heavily on a computer station. He wasn’t looking to good, and even as I watched he slumped to his knees and collapsed to the floor. With dawning comprehension, I keyed my radio and called for my remaining allies. Only static answered me, and I unholstered my sidearm even as I staggered towards my go-bag. If I could just get to my filtration mask, I would be fine.

I fumbled with the zipper, my head swimming. My hand snaked into the bag and latched onto cool, shaped plastic. I pulled it out, hand trembling as I brought it towards my face, only to have it plucked from nerveless fingers as I was ever-so-gently shoved sideways. Black Wolf was standing over me, looking down with emotionless eyes, and in my peripheral vision I saw one of his team members (the blonde sniper, November) crouching over Theo and putting something around his limp wrist. A moment later, the kid dissolved in blue light and vanished.

“It’s too bad, Aaron, that you ended up on the wrong side of history. You had the ability to be one of this dimension’s greatest heroes, the vanguard of this humanity’s salvation. Instead, you will be remembered as a broken, pityable man at best and a psychotic traitor at worst.” Black Wolf told me, sounding like he genuinely regretted the circumstances. I tried to ask him what he had done to Theo, but my tongue was lead in my mouth. I couldn’t talk, couldn’t move, it was all I could do to breathe. Still, he must have seen the question in my eyes, because he crouched down next to me and waved a small black armband around in front of me. “I suppose telling you doesn’t matter, since you’re done with and I’ll not be in this world much longer. I’m an extra-dimensional being, Aaron, who came here specifically to fuck you and your friends over. Theo, your other Rogues, and more have all suffered the same fate you will.”

He waved the armband again.

“The moment I put this under your wrist, you will be considered my property by the rules of an interdimensional slaving company. Then, I’m going to sell you to them. Maybe you’ll be purchased by someone that wants to fix you, piece your mind back together and turn you back into a decent human being, but frankly that’s not my problem. Good luck, Aaron Keener, and good riddance. Maybe your next life will be a better one.”

The band went around my wrist, and my world disappeared in light.

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Another chapter or two in The Division, maybe three, and we’ll move on to the next world! The next story with an update will be Herald!