ExSol Ch. 02

"Dont you dare fucking puke on me," Emilia hissed angrily. Immediately, Dawn's gag reflex responded to the order and went away. It seemed wrong to Dawn that their trigger should be able to suppress something that seemed like it should be autonomic but they felt their stomach settle anyway as Emilia continued to feed Dawn the tainted cum in her ass. "Disgusting bitch," Emilia murmured to herself, her body vibrating gently. Dawn realized that she must be jilling herself off, getting off on the sensation of Dawn licking her ass. That, and the fact that Dawn knew very well that Emilia got off on abusing them just in general. She stopped kicking Dawn in the cunt as she masturbated and Dawn was both flooded with relief and frustration. Emilia's weight on Dawn's face intensified as she leaned back, humming softly to herself. Dawn exercised a little of the free will Emilia had left them and sucked on her recently-fucked hole a little harder, hoping to assist their tormentor along.

Emilia's legs trembled, her weight shifted into an uncomfortable crushing pressure, and the string of muttered comments about how repulsive Dawn was trailed off. She stayed like that for several moments, body still gyrating subtly to the rhythm of her hand rubbing against her pussy. Eventually, as Dawn's air ran out and they started to choke on Emilia's ass, she rolled backwards and fell off, breathing heavily. Dawn gasped and coughed, the taste some stranger's cum and whatever else had been in Emilia's rectum still staining their tongue and no doubt splayed across their face as well. Shortly afterwards, Dawn's face moved almost of its own accord, their mouth opening wide and tongue sticking out as Emilia had ordered. There was some extra level of perversity to that, Dawn thought. Emilia probably wouldn't even notice they'd done it, now that she'd cum. But still, Dawn's body obeyed, driven to follow her commands compulsively.

"Alright," Emila said with a soft gasp. "Now, lets make sure that nasty cunt of yours is good and bruised so that you won't forget who owns you while you're away." Dawn trembled in fear and despair as Emilia slowly rose up to her feet and walked around Dawn's prone figure. "Open your legs," the words came and Dawn's body obeyed but they barely seemed to hear them. Emilia had her shoes back on, Dawn winced before the first blow was struck.

Thump, thump, thump.

Dawn cried out, wailing as best they could with their face frozen into the pose Emilia had demanded. "Keep quiet," she hissed as she kicked Dawn's cunt again, the synthetic leather stinging and leaving Dawn's sensitive sex burning. In spite of the order, some tiny squeals and grunts still came out of Dawn's mouth, forced out completely beyond the trigger's ability to hold them back. Emilia sneered at Dawn and took a step forward, tilting her foot down and aiming a series of quick, steady kicks that made Dawn's body explode in tortured pleasure. The orgasm that swept through them wasn't a pleasant experience, but it still carried with it a sort of horrid masochistic thrill that felt like an unwanted invader in Dawn's mind. It lasted too long, carried out and extended by Emilia's continued assault. She was relentless, venting some misplaced anger upon Dawn's cunt, kicking them until the world slowly faded away.

Dawn wasn't sure when they passed out, the next thing they were aware of was a terrible ache all throughout their lower body and the water being splashed in their face. They looked up, seeing Emilia fully dressed and standing over them with a glass of water in her hand.

"You alive? Speak." she asked, looking more concerned for herself than she was for Dawn.

Dawn groaned softly, feeling their body move a little under their own volition. They still heard the low thrum of the playback device on their own bed but they recognized immediately that the loss of consciousness seemed to have freed them from the hypnotic suggestion, or at least, from the commands Emilia had issued up until now. "Dawn is alive, Miss Emilia," they whispered softly.

"Good. You remember who owns your worthless hide out there, Sewer." Emilia scowled down at Dawn but somehow, her words seemed to lack a bit of their normal bite. Perhaps that was the pain and dizziness talking, though. Emilia walked over to the bed and grabbed her playback device, disabling and pocketing it, and then leaving without another word.

Dawn slowly got back up, peeling their soiled uniform off and throwing it into the laundry. Getting changed into a new one was a bit of a chore, their legs were still wobbly and weak, and the soreness in their crotch made putting on the snug flight suit almost unbearable. Dawn limped into their garden, finding the discarded hand terminal and picking it up. They were supposed to have been in bed an hour ago, so now they'd be sleep deprived as well as heavily bruised. With a small grunt, Dawn put in a request to push the mission itinerary back twenty minutes. It would probably be denied, but they figured it was worth a try. Dawn crawled onto their bed overtop of the covers, and tossed the hand terminal onto the nightstand. Dawn's attempt to get some sleep was slow and punctuated by several painful adjustments. But it did come, eventually, blissfully.

***

Nina unstrapped herself from the frigid storage locker and hopped down to the ground with a less-than-graceful plummet that almost ended with her laying flat on her face. She stumbled to her knees instead, shivering with stiff muscles. She heard a familiar soft whirring noise not far ahead of her, and she looked up to see Twinshya glowing red and aiming its gauss cannon at Dusk warily. Nina scrambled to her feet and waved her arms, trying to get Carrina's attention before she shot the defenseless Mech out of paranoia.

"Nina? Mercy, what's going on?" Carrina's voice came through her hand terminal unbidden, using her administrative override.

"S'alright, no hostile. Pilot's hurt, gonna take 'em to the auto-doc." She looked back at Dusk and saw the cockpit door had opened. Dawn was inside and unconsciously slumped in their seat as the Mech's auto-medic fussed with their body, doing what it was capable of.

"I'm gonna need a better explanation than that," Nina could hear the bitchy scowl on Carrina's face but she paid it no heed as she climbed up to the cockpit and unstrapped Dawn's unconscious form.

"When nobody's dyin' I'll spew what li'l I know." Nina replied as she awkwardly climbed back down and started walking briskly past Twinshya even as the Mech loomed ominously overhead.

"Fine. Meet you there." Carrina relented right before she Counter-Pulsed and Twinshya shifted into defense mode, red glow fading down to the cool reflective black of the Mech's usual colouring.

Nina carried Dawn through their compound to the medical center and laid them down on the padded surface for the auto-doc. The machine hummed to life and Nina barked some voice commands at it. "Slug wounds. Blood loss." Still, the machine cut away some of Dawn's clothes and connected a few sensors to run tests and quickly verify Nina's assertion. When that was done it inserted a few needles and started pumping Dawn full of synthetic replacement blood and started to bind and mend the tissue damage. A few minutes later, it beeped at her and informed her that the patient's chances were good, and Nina sighed in relief. Immediately after that, it started registering other injuries, a few scrapes, cuts, and extensive partially-healed bruising around their groin that explained why they'd been limping. Nina suddenly felt bad that she'd treated the pilot the way she had, they'd clearly undergone something traumatic to leave bruising like that.

Sam entered the room not long after, a confused expression oh his face that was looking for an excuse to morph into rage and indignation. "Who the heck is this and why is there a weird Mech parked just outside my facility and... Why."

"Long tale. Gon' wait till 'rina gets here to tell it." Nina answered and tried not to smirk. Truthfully she really didn't care about re-telling the story she just wanted a plausible excuse to make Sam squirm.

Carrina didn't keep the two of them waiting long, she walked through the doors a few minutes later after presumably docking Twinshya on the other side of the facility and walking over to the medical center. "So, this is... Dawn?" Carrina asked.

"You are not trying to tell me that this story about a Neo-Venutian Zenith pilot is actually real. I am not-" Sam tried to bluster a little bit, but he looked at Dawn again, and trailed off.

"I found it a little hard to believe too, Sam, but that Mech out there is the real deal and this person is clearly a Zenith pilot." Carrina walked over to the auto-doc display and checked it for herself to see the machine's estimation of whether or not Dawn would survive.

"Ye. Butterfly found 'em sittin' at a place in Abrandia and I went to gift a visit. Some goons showed up, tried to crack the both of us. Check the news feeds if you want proof." Nina stood up, utilizing her height and physical form to push a bit of intimidation. She had her vindication, she intended to use it.

"So they've been harassing the Talon fortress, then?" Carrina asked, a kind of half-grimace on her face as she acknowledged Nina's accounting of Dawn's actions as truth.

"Ye. Can't say why. Gon' ask though." Nina watched Sam closely as she spoke, so closely that there was no way he didn't notice. She wanted him to squirm a little, wanted him to feel bad for how he'd been treating her lately.

"We'll review your probation, if this pans out," Sam muttered, looking away. He walked up to the auto-doc and cycled through a few diagnostics and menus. A short while later, Dawn groaned and opened their eyes.

"Is it really necessary to wake them up so soon?" Carrina asked, sounding a little mortified that Sam had gone and stimmed them awake.

"It's safe," Sam replied, answering the unspoken question and leaving the spoken one implied.

"Patient requests painkiller," Dawn's voice sounded groggy yet somehow still aware and disciplined. Nina was about to admonish Sam for denying Dawn's request, but to her surprise the machine beeped in acknowledgement and a needle shot into their arm before he could. Nina wasn't familiar with the administrative functions on the auto-doc but apparently Dawn knew what requests from the patient the machine would respond do. Then again, maybe that was just a feverish guess on their part.

"You wanna tell us what in the worlds is going on?" Sam demanded of Dawn angrily even as Dawn sighed softly, the painkiller no doubt having some effect already.

"This one has been under observation by the ones who sent those shooters, Dawn believes their true goal was this one's contact within Abrandia. When the young miss was seen leaving Dawn's hangar and then meeting with them, they believed her to be their target." Dawn spoke in a measured voice that recaptured some of their earlier calmness and inscrutability.

"Who do you work for? Who was coming after you?" Carrina pressed.

"Much as this one is imminently grateful for your assistance, they are not authorized to explain their mission." Dawn exhaled tiredly and closed their eyes again, but didn't quite fall back asleep. No doubt that would actually be impossible so long as the auto-doc was gently stimming them.

"Care to tell 'rina and Sam what you've been up to in that fancy Mech o' yers?" Nina asked.

"Dawn has been engaging in military action against Talon," They replied. Nina was a little surprised that they admitted it so readily. "This one has been tasked with retrieving a specific piece of technology from the large facility here on Ishtar."

"And of course you can't tell us what you're trying to retrieve," Sam grumbled, crossing his arms and scowling.

"No. But Dawn is willing to offer recompense for their prior transgressions, their host's current acts of altruism, and perhaps future cooperation."

"Generous of ya to only offer not to squeeze us after I drag yer body through a tunnel," Nina rolled her eyes.

"This one would argue that their situation would be far less dire had the young miss not interfered in the first place. Regardless, fate and circumstances flow as water. Dawn does not provide or request justifications, Dawn accepts that they are adrift. A chance to rest would be appreciated, however..." Dawn's voice grew weak and exhausted even as they waxed poetic.

"Sounds settled. Let the poor enby rest," Carrina shot Nina and Sam a concerned frown and went to the auto-doc and changed a setting to stop it from stimming Dawn to keep them awake. With a soft groan, they closed their eyes and their breathing fell back into a steady rhythm.

"This is a total disaster. We should just thank Agrianna that nobody got hurt and call the governor to let her sort this out." Carrina looked over at the two of them once she'd made sure that Dawn was unconscious.

"What? Screw that. Himiko will just arrest this weirdo, Talon's pattern will break and we'll get screwed over. If they can't pay us directly, then Twinshya and that other Mech can bust up some camp, they can have whatever bauble they want and we can cash in on the rest. We call Himiko and we get nothing. Hell, she might even just throw obstruction charges at us if she's in a bad mood." Nina winced as Sam ranted. Mostly because she actually agreed with him and she hated it when that happened.

"That Mech is the gleam of the gates, boss. It can help us hit targets that Twinshya never could. Mebbe we can round up some scrap and I can actually replace autocannons five 'n six. Could get the conduit to fix the deflectors 'fore some stray round wiggles through em and turns normal Carrina into Car and Rina."

Carrina scowled at the two of them, clearly not fond of their input. "We'll talk about it." She finally conceded with a look at Sam which meant that the two would argue about it once Nina was out of the room. Nina was happy to indulge her bosses in their desire to be rid of her and she slipped out of the room before they could think of any other topics to raise with her.

***

Talon didn't think, it evaluated. It analyzed positions, obstacles, resources, and assets. It itemized various courses of action and sent them off to the Administrator so that the Administrator could guide its actions. No response came from the Administrator. No response had come in a very long time.

This didn't affect Talon's functions at all. Talon was designed to assist the Administrator. There was no contingency to be followed in the case of the Administrator's extended absence. Instead, Talon chose a course of actions from its list, one not too risky or aggressive, and then it continued to evaluate.

And as it analyzed, it detected a pattern.

An assailant from (Null) had struck several outposts in succession upon world 3-205023. The possibility that the assailant was seeking Talon's Gate codes had just exceeded 13.2%. A parameter changed. Priorities changed. Talon began to mobilize its forces upon 3-205023. Gate code theft was against the treatise. Protection of Gate codes was a high priority directive in the absence of Administrator commands.

Talon began to hunt for (Null) assailant with increased priorities.