LilHiss

Soul Extraction

Ronnie hummed mentally to herself as they proceeded further into the darkening tunnel. She had turned down Quackshot's painkillers. Ronnie never took painkillers or anesthesia when she could help it, even when the pain was so bad that she could hardly move. It was interesting really how painkillers affected her mods. The medicine made her mods...less, in a way. Something about the medication messed with her control and awareness of her own cybernetic limbs. The last time Ronnie took painkillers - she had been desperate and needed to keep moving - Ronnie had lost all awareness of her legs, arms, and eyes. She could still move them, sluggishly, but she couldn't feel them. It was disconcerting how suspended and limited she had felt, almost like the day she had had those limbs first removed and sold for the cybernetic ones. Thus, no painkillers. Ever. Sorry, not sorry Quacky.

Ronnie stopped when Lyra decided to scout further into the inky darkness with her scope and 'Bianca'. Cute name. Ronnie preferred her Guns of Anarchy and Blades of Wrath, each of which had their own nickname, but to each their own. Ronnie stood in the middle of the tunnel watching Lyra's back disappear further down the tunnel, out of sight because of the bends. Hearing Quackshot try to whisper was an amusement because apparently the good doctor didn't understand the concept of whispering.

"Afraid of losing it's mother, what does a chick do? Wait or follow?" Ronnie asked Quackshot in response to his question. She didn't bother whispering or commenting on the mutant gene mods.

Soul Extraction

Ronnie spared a glance at Jhona before looking back to Lyra and saying, "Fairy tale tango with a semi."

Ronnie grabbed her bag of stuff she couldn't be bothered to organize at the moment and wrapped the strap around her waist so as not to block her side arms. Taking in a silent inhale, Ronnie went towards the secret passageway Jhona had been hiding in. Aaaannnnndddd yep. Every step and movement of the arms sent thousands of stabs of pain down her nerves and hit her right in the spine. That was the problem with cybernetic mods. They were hardwired to the delicate nerves around the spine, which is what allowed Ronnie to feel her mechanical limbs and freely move them. And it wasn't just her arms and legs that hurt, Ronnie was essentially half-blind since her eyes were cybernetic as well. Ronnie had gone blind on missions before, so the half-blurred faces of those around her didn't worry her at all. She'd just have to figure out what Jhona looked like after she regained the full use of her eyes. She hoped the face was better than the voice, otherwise this impromptu party was going to have some problems. Despite all the machinery saying otherwise, Ronnie was still human after all, and she could only take so many flaws and such in a person. If someone was going to be trash, the least they could do was be good trash.

Stepping into the passageway, Ronnie nodded at the Jhona-blob and introduced herself.

"Ronnie," she said before passing Jhona-blob and taking out two of her knives, keeping them at the ready and her ears open. She stopped just a few meters into the tunnel, signalling to the others she was good to go and was waiting on their slow asses to stop dilly dallying and get moving. If she was in her usual condition she would have already been jogging off, setting a rhythmic pace for the others to follow or get left behind.

Soul Extraction

Ronnie huffed and stayed silent through 'Alfred's' short speech. She only raised an eyebrow at the appearance of Jhona and the fact that there was a secret room behind a secret moving panel of wall. This was the 'enemy's lair,' of course there would be secret places. People who fancied themselves superior or as villains were predictable that way. It also made things easier for Ronnie when she was shooting them in the faces mid-villainous speech. Ain't nobody from the Gutter have time to wait and listen to a nut job rant and prattle.

Seeing as how 'Alfred' was cutting their impromptu meeting short and rushing them a bit - despite Ronnie's obvious lack of mobility, thank you not - Ronnie mentally scolded herself and just went with the Fuck it flow and pulled the bag meant for her closer. It hurt just as much as she had mentally envisioned that it would, semi-truck and all. In spite of the pain, Ronnie pulled herself up and rifled through her bag. Inside she immediately found her lovingly named 'Guns of Anarchy' and her 'Blades of Wrath,' which she quickly slid into their places upon her person after digging through the bag and strapping her shoulder holster back on as well. There were a few other goodies, courtesy of 'Alfred' as well. Food, survival gear, water, and a couple of toys Ronnie both hated and loved at the same time.

The new toys were a small metal box with a button on it and a black sphere, neither of which she knew anything about. She loved them for their mystery and hated them because they had ThysenKrüpp written all over them. She took them anyway. After mentally cataloging everything she recieved, Ronnie mentally prepared herself for the hardest part of this journey. The first fucking step. For everyone else it would be a piece of Niklas' rare and seemingly extinct Pumpkin Spice and Chocolate Pie. For Ronnie, it was the first of many Little Mermaid-esque steps. Knife-stabbing pain in each one. She took it anyway. . . After hauling her slightly immobilized ass off of the floor first, of course.

Soul Extraction

Ronnie moved her head slightly to watch the newcomer. It was an old man that reminded her of the kind of rich family butler her brother used to tell her stories about when they were young. Ronnie bet the man's name was the stereotypical 'Alfred' too. That would just be the icing on this cake of absolute fuckery.

Ronnie mentally sighed and rolled her eyes at Quackshot. He really could be so damned paranoid and way too cautious. Just looking at the butler-type man, Ronnie could tell he was being somewhat sincere. The old man had that look in his eyes that Ronnie's brother had whenever he thought she wasn't paying attention to him. Fondness, love, kindness. Butler man cared for this 'ward' of his. There was just one problem with his plan.

Ronnie tried sitting up. She could barely lift herself a couple of inches off of the floor before she had to give up and fall back down. She pointedly looked at the old man afterwards. And in answer to his question about this 'Hemingway' man she had only one thing to say.

"Had a Rat, not a writer. Rat got hurt on a job and went to a doctor," Ronnie nodded towards Quackshot. "Doctor tried, Rat died. Smoke came and Rat was no longer a Rat." Ronnie looked around her at the walls and ceiling of their room. "And now some are here."

Soul Extraction

Ronnie had woken up before the other two. It hadn't been a gradual thing nor was it fast. Her eyes didn't just snap open like a maniac, but they didn't flutter open and close several times before slowly opening either. No, her eyes just opened. And she listened to the quiet breathing of Quackshot and Lyra for a while. Niklas wasn't there, she couldn't hear him and she didn't expect to either. She had seen him get shot and collapse before they were all jumped by the Initiators. Ronnie mentally cursed herself for allowing that to happen. She had gotten lazy and lax within the confines of the bar and around people she sort-of knew. Well, that was on her.

Ronnie didn't move when she heard the change in breathing in Lyra and Quackshot. She didn't move when they started to. She didn't move when Quackshot started talking either. With all this non moving one would think she was paralyzed. But she wasn't. In fact, all of her muscles and nerves were tingling and screaming like a small room full of yowling, part pissed and part confused, wet cats. And she would be lying if she said it didn't hurt. It hurt like a full-on collision with an air-semi going well over the speed limit and getting tossed from your crappy speeder through the windshield only to smash into the grill of the semi.

Ronnie huffed from where she lay on the floor. This was going to be a while. (And a really long day.)

Soul Extraction

"Why leave?" Ronnie asked sitting nonchalantly on her bar stool. And yes, it was most definitely her bar stool now.

Ronnie rubbed at her eyes briefly before looking around at everyone. The dead body was different but a corpse was still a corpse, right? Dr. Quackshot being flustered and panicked she could understand, there was very little that couldn't make the old man panic. But Niklas? Now that was different. Ronnie swung her legs back and forth as she rested her elbows on her thighs, waiting for everyone else to come to a decision. Ronnie was perfectly fine sitting on her bar stool and would have liked that drink she had asked Niklas for earlier when she first got to the bar.

Sitting up straight, Ronnie thought to herself. Fate better not be trying to deny her alcohol. If she didn't get her drink at some point that day, Fate - or whoever got in her way - will be finding itself on the business end of babies.

Soul Extraction

Ronnie mulled over how she could accurately explain a dead man's peculiar twitch to others so that they understood the scope and unusual-ness of said physical habit. Eventually she came to a conclusion that she didn't particularly care for but reasoned was the best way to get everyone in the room to understand without having to go through the whole mess that is trying to decipher Ronnie's words, or lack thereof. And yes, Ronnie knew exactly how she sounded whenever she spoke to others and while it was her way of talking she also got a slight kick out of the slightly dazed and fairly confused expressions people would get after listening to her.

Nodding in encouragement to herself, Ronnie hopped off of her bar stool and strode closer to the dead body. Grabbing one of the arms, she hefted the man slightly up so she could act as a rest for the upper body of the corpse. Grabbing onto both arms she maneuvered the body in the way that she remembered it twitching when the man was alive.

"Arm, arm, head, eye, arm, arm, head, eye," Ronnie said as she waggled said body parts. Ronnie made the left arm twitch, then the right arm, leading up to the head where Ronnie would cock the corpse's head slightly for a millisecond, and then she made the left eye wink for the room.

Ronnie repeated those movements a few times, setting up a pattern that occurred every two to five minutes or so. After she was satisfied with her demonstration she dropped the body completely and went back to her bar stool, satisfied in the knowledge that she had helped explain something properly without any further confusion on her part. If her actions had grossed anyone out or seemed disrespectful to the dead...well then maybe they shouldn't ask questions they didn't want to know the answer to, especially if they were asking Ronnie.

Soul Extraction

Ronnie squinted at the dead body, her green eyes blazing against their artificial black back-drop. She huffed before picking up one of the bar stools and dragging it closer to the others. If she had to watch as shit hit the fan, she may as well do it sitting and well rested. Glancing between Niklas, Quackers, and neon lady named 'Lyra,' Ronnie thought back to the day she got the job and all the little details that happened then. The Rat in particular hadn't seemed interesting or especially good at anything, but the Rats' boss had wanted Ronnie to work with that one and if Ronnie had refused she wouldn't have gotten the job. The man hadn't smelled funny, he looked normal - actually he had been pretty plain and ordinary in the looks department - and he hadn't had any weird hobbies or habits. Well, that's no true. The man did have this twitch that irked Ronnie whenever she had to look at him and pay him mind.

"Twitch?" Ronnie said, unsure if something so small mattered. "Rats' had job n' I took it. Had to take 'im too or no job," she said pointing at the dead man briefly. "Was okay, but he twitched. A lot."

Soul Extraction

Ronnie's head jerked up from the bar after hearing her name. She looked around confused for a moment before focusing in on Dr. Quackshot and her now dead ex-temporary partner. Well shit. Boss man can't say she didn't try to keep him alive at least. Ronnie just shrugged off the Doc's words about throwing the dead guy onto a chair instead of placing him on the floor. Hey, she was tired, her arms hurt, and she had just wanted to get a load off. Besides, with his injuries she doubted whatever she did could have done much worse.

Peering through one eye half-open at Niklas, Ronnie had to think over his question for a few seconds. The dead guy was pretty popular for being dead seeing as how he was apparently the subject of conversation at the moment. Ronnie straightened a little on her stool as she peered at the dead man's body, formulating her response to Niklas.

"Rats' job n' a Rat to go with," she replied.

Ronnie never much questioned whenever the Rats' boss wanted someone else to go with her on a job. Usually it was just some other merc, street kid, or Rat looking to make a little extra cash like Ronnie. But she could see where Niklas was coming from with his question, the dead guy had a good gun, better than most Rats. And the boss had wanted Ronnie on this job and the dead guy, who hadn't been dead then, with her specifically. It had struck Ronnie as odd, but she hadn't cared enough to question so long as it didn't get her killed. And it didn't. Just the other guy.

Soul Extraction

Ronnie was going to kill him. Soon. She was going to bash his head in and take immense pleasure from it and no one was going to question why or for what reason because if they did they would end up with a caved-in head too. Ronnie was going to do it soon too. But, of course, she wasn't actually going to do it, especially if she wouldn't get paid for it. Besides, it's not like it was his fault that he got shot in the abdomen like a complete dumb-fuck on purpose. Even Ronnie had missed that third thug. But the man better appreciate that Ronnie was taking the time and effort to haul his heavy ass around the district and not kill him or leave him to get killed. And she didn't have to drag him much farther anyways.

Ronnie kicked the door to Niklas' bar open. Her hands were full carrying the dead weight of her temporary partner half on her back and half being dragged behind her. Her partner, who she still didn't know the name of despite running a job just earlier that day, was bleeding from some cuts in his arms and, maybe a little bit more importantly, a gunshot in his side. Ronnie had thought about just leaving the guy after he collapsed but she didn't want to have to deal with the hassle of telling the Rats' boss that she had let her partner die...again. So here Ronnie was, hauling the man's ass all over the Gutter district.

Ronnie spotted Dr. Quackshot with a neon-colored woman and Niklas at the bar. Ronnie dragged her nameless partner to the doctor and then dropped the load from her shoulders onto a chair closest to the doctor. Ronnie didn't have it in her to bother explaining the situation to anyone so she just took a seat next to the Dustin brothers, waved them hello and signaled Niklas for a drink before throwing her arms over the bar and thumping her head down in between, tired as shit.