FIC: "Penthesilea", Tarantino-verse, R

[very_improbable]

This is a bit of a teaser; it's the first of a sort of expanded Five Things series (that are all readable independently of each other), but I probably won't get the chance to wrap up any of the others until a few weeks from now. (If I don't post this one, I'm sure I'll never get around to finishing the rest.)


Title: Penthesilea
Author: Malograntum
Fandom: Tarantino-verse (actually, mixing universes! naughty of me.)
Rating: R on general principle.
Warnings: I mean, it's Vic Vega's POV? So: violence, swearing, misogyny, violence, and pejorative use of the word "retarded".
Summary: Five Things That Never Happened in the Tarantino-verse, number one: Eddie and Vic try to take care of a problem. She's not inclined to be taken care of.
Notes: Thanks to kumquatweekend for beta and general enabling.


She's probably the most beautiful woman Vic's ever seen, though he didn't have much time to look at her while she was standing upright. Tied to a chair and a little bloodied up ain't such a bad look on her either.

"I'm not gonna tell you shit," she says, not even a hint of fear in her voice. Vic smiles and glances sidelong at Eddie, who's standing a little way off, looking too serious, hands in his pockets.

"Miss Kiddo," Vic says. "We're not here to get information from you. We're here to give information to you." He's been pacing a little, and he stops in front of her. "You got a good memory?"

She gives him a long, penetrating look. "Photographic."

"That's good, that's good. So. The message is, This is what you get for fuckin' around with Joe Cabot. Can you repeat that back to me, please?"

"Fuck you," she answers, predictably. Vic punches her as hard as he can in the left breast, knocking the chair over backwards. She coughs and gasps; nothing seems to be broken. He waits for her to catch her breath and sets the chair back upright. The concrete floor is hot against his knuckles as he picks her up.

"Okay, so your memory's good but you're having some problems with comprehension. You probably didn't do real well on the SATs."

"I'm surprised you know what an SAT is, you mouth-breathing grade-school dropout."

"Hey, Vic, your reputation precedes you. Are we gonna shoot this bitch or what?" Eddie's doing that nervous laughing thing. Vic was hoping that Eddie would take off when the other guys did, once they got the chick under control, and maybe let Vic work alone for a while, but that was not to be.

"I'm working, Eddie." This warehouse is a fuckin' furnace. It's making him tired and draining what's left of his sense of humor.

"Yeah, Eddie," she says with a little grin. "Don't interrupt your boyfriend."

"Now, that's not very creative," Vic says amiably. He crouches down in front of her, checks that her legs are still well secured, and pulls off one of her high-tops. Her foot is bare beneath it; she curls her toes down. "Let's try it again. Can you remember that message?"

"Suck my cock," she says. Vic takes out his knife and has a long look at her toes. Her breathing is steady. He holds the blade against her instep.

"We're goin' big toe first, ma'am, and then if you and I aren't able to come to an agreement we'll start on your eyes."

She laughs, and it's getting the fuck on Vic's nerves, this bitch's attitude. He stands up and looks down at her.

"Enlighten us, Miss Kiddo."

"I'm a twenty-year-old white girl from south Texas, I weigh a buck thirty-five, and it took three of you guys just to slow me down--four if you count the candy-ass," she amends with a nod in Eddie's direction. "Tell me one more time what's the message you want to send?"

Vic slaps her across the face and her mouth starts bleeding again. She spits.

"Miss Kiddo." He takes hold of her by the hair and puts his face near hers, though well out of biting range because he's not retarded. "You obviously have about as much martial arts training as any white American in history. I don't doubt you're one of the top assets of your organization, which is why we've been tryin' so hard to arrange this kind of meeting. If you think the fact that you can kick real hard is threatening my manhood, I'm gonna have to disappoint you on that count."

"Nobody's concerned about your manhood, Vic." There's that smile creeping in again. "I'm laughing 'cause you think Wonder Woman's all tied up with her magic lasso and now your troubles are over." She gives him her last question slowly, enjoying herself way too fuckin' much. "What makes you think there aren't more where I came from?"

And that's when she busts out of her restraints, head-butts Vic and kicks his legs out from under him, all so fast he forgets to feel the pain as he falls on the hot concrete and his knife goes flying, too busy registering that the bitch is loose. Eddie's still reaching for his gun when she gets to him and kicks him in the face, breaks his nose, blood going everywhere. Eddie grabs at her arms and tries to kick her in the groin--she does something horrible to his wrist and he shouts in pain and crumples to the floor.

Once she's put Eddie down, she spins around, her arms up in some kung-fu readiness posture, her body all lethal angles and her hair plastered down with sweat and blood, and Vic is not a poetic-violence guy, he's a stray dog who's good at beating people up, but for a tenth of a second he gets why people submit themselves to lifetimes of brutal training. He gets a bead on that shit about honor and service and becoming one with the blade, because for a guy facing an unarmed woman he sure feels like there's a fucking samurai sword at his throat.

He stares at her for that tenth of a second and it's almost too long of a hesitation, because then she moves and she's halfway to him when he shoots her. He gives her everything left in his clip, four shots in the chest, spraying blood all over the damn place. She's dead before the surprise fully registers in her expression.

"Fucking A," Eddie says, clutching at his face. He's sprayed with the girl's blood too. "Is she dead?"

"Dead as Dillinger," Vic answers, getting to his feet. "How's your face?"

"How does it look? Jesus motherfuckin' Christ. Crazy bitch did something to my arm, too."

"You'll live." Vic holds out a hand and helps Eddie up. Eddie takes off his shirt to soak up the blood still issuing from his nose. Vic studies the dead body on the floor while Eddie's white wifebeater fills with red in the corner of his vision.

"I'be gbbn cll by dmm," Eddie adds through his shirt.

"I'll call him, you can't talk." Eddie points Vic to the phone in the far corner and doesn't argue. Vic calls the office, apprises Joe of the situation. Joe listens without saying much.

"Christ, Vic," he says when Vic's done. "First it turns out Bill's psycho bodyguard who's been giving us so much trouble is some kung-fu-fighting co-ed. We get ahold of her for a minute, and instead of fucking her up and sending her back, you boys kill her. And what'd you say she told you?"

"Well." Vic spots his switchblade--landed right near where he's standing--and pushes it towards himself with his foot. "General idea was that she wasn't the only girl in the organization who could do what she does."

"Well, that fits in with what I've been finding out today. Matter of fact, I ought to tell you right now, so you don't run into this other broad and have a heart attack."

"How's that?"

"The girl you just killed, Mia Kiddo? She's got a twin sister, not as much training and not as fuckin' psycho, but still a real piece a' work. I've seen pictures, they're like two peas in a goddamn pod. And I'll bet my last Cuban cigar the next face we see outta Bill's organization will be the one you just blew away."

"Great." He doesn't say that this sister's face is barely damaged, or that he shot her in the chest because his hand wouldn't aim higher. That doesn't seem relevant.

"Yeah. All right. Goddamn. Who's on clean-up? You still got Rocco and Coop with you?"

"They went to get a burger. They'll be back in a minute." He turns over the knife in his hand, holding it up to the light. Over it, like a split-screen, he looks at Kiddo's body again. At a distance, her limbs seem unnaturally long. Eddie is standing over her, having some kind of Eddie thoughts. "Identical twins?"

"Identical twins."

"Things are getting pretty fuckin' weird around here, Joseph."

"Tell me about it. Call me when the boys get back, we'll figure out what to do with the deceased."

"Will do." Vic goes back to Eddie, his steps echoing in the dead emptiness of the warehouse, and recaps the conversation.

Eddie leans back against the wall, contemplating the blood-soaked shirt in his hands. There's still plenty of blood on his face, and now it's dotted across his bare chest as well. "So there's another of this bitch out there somewhere."

"Seems so."

"More lethal? Less? I mean, I hesitate to ask."

"Sounded like less. Joe seems to think, even if there's others out there, this Mia bitch was the big fish. Which if it's accurate would be the first good luck we've had this summer."

"Uh huh." Vic goes over to his jacket, which did not escape the spray of Eddie's blood or the dead girl's, and gets out a pack of cigarettes. Eddie keeps eyeing the corpse for a minute before he speaks. "So, Vic. How do we know that the one we just killed was Mia?"

Vic lights his cigarette, takes a drag, considers the body. "Well," he says. "That's something to think about."

The more he looks at the girl's face, the more he feels like behind those dead blue eyes she's laughing at him.


- end? –

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