Monsters and children and...more monsters, oh my!

[tidesnpc]

Characters: Everyone in the Badlands fighting!
Content: The Badlands is being attacked by monsters! And children!
Setting: Various places in the Badlands, plus the Convoy itself for gunners and powder monkeys
Notes: Remember, the Convoy and the Amestris are heading for the south, while Serenity is in the Garrettstown/mountains area. However, if you

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AND SOME OF THE MONSTERS ARE HUMAN ONES

[son_of_the_lake]

[This takes place after Kaoru and Bright are retrieved, but before all the battles come to an end. Also before Before Bradley’s death.]

Hisoka and Gus Metonic left Serenity and returned to town. There was still a ruckus going on, and they had to run for it more than once. It wasn’t just the kids shooting dark energy or lightening at people. There was something gathering in the air that hadn’t been in it a few hours before, and Hisoka could not put his finger on what it was, but it was certainly ominous. It felt like the very clouds over the mountains were striving against each other. There was a dark, dangerous smoke hanging over the plains, far to the southeast, on either side of the mountains. Hisoka realized with a start that he was seeing it with the eyes of his spirit, not with the eyes in his head. To his earthly eyes, the sun was still shining, even over the mountain peaks

[son_of_the_lake]

"Well, perhaps," said Hisoka.

The problem was, he did know something about Bradley. The Admiral had failed to kill Commander Edgeworth. These people were certainly not going to learn that from Hisoka. (They might have an interest in remedying the matter.)

Besides that awkward fact, he knew little. But he had made a few surmises about
Admiral King Bradley, by thinking through the very slight evidence he did have. However, there was a problem with telling his knife-wielding adversary any of that. As Hisoka knew from being hauled up before a Navy Board of Inquiry, if you said anything at all, your answers were bound to lead to other questions. And there was a psychological phenomenon well known to lawyers, interrogators, traveling salespeople, and all types of scam artists, namely, that if a person answers one question, then it becomes increasingly difficult not to answer the next, and the next.

Three years ago, Hisoka had chosen not to step out onto that slippery slope. It had worked. And that was how he would choose now.

[tidesnpc]

"Think of it as sharing mutual interests," she replied, rather calmly for someone who had a knife to a person's throat. "After all, neither of us have much reason to like him, do we? He hasn't been as faithful to us as we would have liked, and you...well, I don't have to tell you what he did to your little friend, now do I?"

[son_of_the_lake]

"Who?" said Hisoka.

[tidesnpc]

She pressed the knife ever so slightly against his skin. It wasn't enough to draw blood...yet, but it was close.

"Don't play stupid with me," she spat back coldly. "I know what you talked to Bradley about."

[son_of_the_lake]

Hisoka managed not to flinch, though concentric circles of chill radiated outwards along his skin from the prick of the knife's needle-sharp point. "Do you?" he said.

[tidesnpc]

"You talked to him about a mutual friend Somebody who wasn't acting quite like himself. Does that ring any bells?"

Both her grip and her voice was steady, and did little to reveal her growing sense of irritation. To a normal person, she would appear as cool as a glacier.

[son_of_the_lake]

Hisoka said, "Oh, that."

[tidesnpc]

"So," she replied, "Are we on the same page now?"

[son_of_the_lake]

[Moved left to avoid post crush]

AND SOME OF THE MONSTERS ARE HUMAN ONES

[son_of_the_lake]

[Continued from here]

"I suppose," replied Hisoka.

An odd series of troubling events and impetuous decisions had brought him to this. It had begun last December. Worried by his Long Night encounter on a street in Antrim with an Edgeworth-look-alike phantom, Hisoka had tried to contact the real Edgeworth. Of course, he had gotten the imposter. Little things about the man's speech and behavior didn't add up, and Hisoka had become seriously alarmed. Then he had contacted Admiral Bradley, but his natural caution had led him to speak in veiled terms.

Apparently, Bradley had understood him well enough.

[tidesnpc]

"So, I repeat - what do you know about Bradley?"

[son_of_the_lake]

"Whatever's in the Navy Guide to All Current Airship Personnel Assignments," replied Hisoka, reasonably. He was referring to a publication most commonly used to prop up a desk with one uneven leg.

[tidesnpc]

"Nice try, kid" she said. "But I think you know a bit more than that. Try again."

[son_of_the_lake]

"Ah," said Hisoka. The position of the knife prevented him from nodding to emphasize the tone of helpful curiostiy.

[tidesnpc]

With that, she yanked his head up roughly by the hair with her other hand.

"Let's try something simple," she said. "Why did you go to Bradley in the first place?"