Vengeance.

Max stared up at the abnormality in front of her, CENSORED. As the employee who it generally seemed to affect the least barring Christopher, she understood why she was there but that didn’t mean she had to like it in the slightest.

“This is one of those times I wish I hadn’t gotten Nothing There’s extra eyes…” She mumbled, sullenly. “You’re one ugly motherfucker.”

CENSORED made a disgusting groaning noise in ‘response’ in a similar manner to a cat meowing back at its owner. Max idly continued her work, trying very hard not to touch the thing in front of her. She couldn’t help but glance up in disgust every so often, like trying to take her eyes off of a car crash.

“I wish I could finally get a day off, but instead I feel like I’ve been getting more and more jobs piled on me instead,” Max vented to the creature in front of her. It didn’t seem to register her words this time, but she just needed to get her thoughts and feelings out. “I just want to have some time to rest, to mourn. But noooooo, why would I? It’s not fair.”

Another groan from the creature. Max dropped her clipboard in surprise. She could’ve sworn, it almost sounded like someone saying “it isn’t.” But that was preposterous. Nobody had ever recorded CENSORED talking. It wasn’t sentient, it couldn’t be. Could it?

“I… Yes… That’s not fair. It isn’t fair.” Max probed gently. “And Linus’s death wasn’t just. His killer wasn’t punished at all.”

“That’s why you’re here.” ‘CENSORED’ groaned as it shifted in its containment room. Was it CENSORED that was speaking to her? She didn’t know. She didn’t want to.

“That’s… That’s right…” Max said as she began to hyperventilate. She couldn’t breathe, she was terrified. She didn’t understand. Her legs felt like jelly and she fell to her knees. “I don’t want his death to be in vain. But there’s no future left for him. He didn’t deserve it.”

“Get justice.”

Max turned her gaze up from the floor to the creature in front of her in stunned silence. And there was no horror, no fear, but a lightbulb going off in her head. Eureka. And she smiled, letting out the smallest of chuckles.

“Why didn’t I think of that?”

Max casually got to her feet, dusting off her pants before holding out her shredded hand to CENSORED. “Thanks, pal.” She said cheerfully as she gleefully shook one of its appendages and left the containment room, leaving the door wide open and her pen and clipboard inside. It was time to get back down to business, after all.

As she entered the hallway, and she thought about what justice should mean, Max’s blood began to boil. Taking out her dear hammer, The Smile, and twirling it like a baton from hell between her hands, she began to think of all the people who had wronged her brother. Her dear, sweet, innocent Linus who could never hurt a fly.

Everyone in Extraction team was working by then, but her beef was not with them, for now. Christopher was on her list for sure, but she could simply ambush him at the end of his work. What could he do to her? Hit her with his little bandage stick? Pah. Pale damage, shmale damage. It didn’t matter to her.

“Ooh darlings, I’m heee-eere~!” Max called loudly in a singsong voice as she sauntered down the hallway of the Disciplinary team. “I’m here in the name of justice, everyone!” Her voice was lazy, and casual. Some clerks gave her the side-eye out of confusion.

And then she raised her hammer above her head, aiming for some poor newbie sap. “Today’s trial is for Linus. And this facility is the defendant.” The clerk let out a sad excuse for a scream before Max’s hammer came down on his head, obliterating him. The hallway began to scatter like mice, and Max made quick chase, a twirl here and a skip there, as if it were a game, or a well-practiced choreography. Listening to the screams of those who were being smashed to a pulp reminded her of music. What wonderful songs to be making, especially over top the blaring sirens and announcement that Max couldn’t make out. Lexa would be proud.

“Hey, the fuck?!” Penelope yelled as she got to the scene. Max paused for a moment to wave hello.

“Hello, Miss Penelope! Are you here to help me punish this department? That would be lovely~!” She replied, picking her hammer back up and smiling. She and it were both covered in a spattering of blood. Was Justita washing-machine safe? Or hand wash?

“What? No- Why are you killing people? Didn’t you hear the announcement? We need all forces to help suppress Censored down in Extraction-”

And then, Max spotted the armband on Penelope’s arm. Red, with a “G” stitched into it.

“You’re in disciplinary…?” Max asked, her voice suddenly low and quiet. She hadn’t considered Penelope particularly close, but they chatted often enough that Max had trusted her. Traitor. How could you. You’ve become a part of the problem.

“Well yeah, of course. After what happened, somebody needed to step up. It wasn’t too far from Mic so I-”

Max was in her face in a second. “You what?!” She seethed, using the butt end of The Smile to jab her in the stomach. Penelope stumbled backwards, and prepared to pull out her own weapon, Twilight. “You decided to aid a traitor? That you would follow a scoundrel no better than a vicious abnormality?! You were there. You saw what she did. Surely you lost some friends too, didn’t you? Didn’t you?!” She slammed the head of The Smile on the ground. It was time to enact true justice. To erase from the world those who were the sneakiest, the parts of the roots of evil left unclipped to regrow.

“Max, you have to understand-” Penelope tried to reason one more time over the sound of the sirens in the dead hallway.

“No, I don’t.” Max tightened her grip on The Smile and lifted it, this time fully intending to hit Penelope. “Tell me what you’ve done, to deserve to live? Show me your repentance.”

Penelope hadn’t even opened her mouth when Max’s hammer slammed into her side, knocking her hard into the wall, winding her as she fell to the floor. Twilight had fallen out of her hand and she grasped for it wildly as she attempted to breathe.

“Pathetic,” Max scoffed, kicking the sword away and stomping hard on Penelope’s searching hand with her heel. “Even a worm writhing in the dirt would be able to plead for its life.”

“Get.. Out.. Of.. My.. Face..” Penelope wheezed as the air came back to her. Max ground her foot in further, eliciting a cry of pain from the woman beneath her. Penelope looked up at Max and spat at her. Max began to raise her hammer again, this wasn’t worth her time when she had so many others to contend with, after all.

“Stop! Max, stop!” came the familiar voice of Micaela as she and two others ran down the hallway towards Max. “Daniel, dearie, can you restrain her?” Micaela frantically asked a redheaded man, Daniel from Records whom Max had tried to joke around with on occasion, pointing towards Max.

“Ah, I’ll do my best, ma’am!” Daniel dropped his weapon, The Lantern, and rushed towards Max who’d decided to discard Penelope for the moment. After all, she couldn’t have anybody get in the way of atonement. Max smiled. She's seen Daniel in a fight, and he was utterly incompetent and quick to flee. Surely he was only expecting her to stay still and take it. And what sense did that make?

Max went limp as soon as Daniel grabbed her, forcing a small, insincere sob. "I'm sorry… I don't know what happened! I didn't mean to hurt anybody.. I'm so sorry, Mister Daniel, Miss Micaela…"

"M-maybe we should, uh," Daniel began, his grip on her arm loosening only a little, but that was just the amount of slack Max needed. She dropped, spun, and socked Daniel in the face with as much force as she could, sending him reeling backwards, and tripping over Penelope, who was still trying to get up off the floor. Max briefly considered the possibility that she’d broken some of Penelope’s ribs, but did it make a difference? Linus suffered the same, after all.

“Dang it-!” Micaela yelled as Daniel was knocked out of the fight. “Careful, Danny!” She called out to him as he stumbled to his feet. She rushed to his aid but Max intercepted, her hammer smashing Micaela’s face into the floor and sending her skidding several feet. And now it was just her and the other person there: Greig.

Greig made her pause for a second; she’d remembered that he and Linus had always been close. At least friends, if not something more as she’d suspected by the way Linus acted when Greig was nearby. Oddly enough, she’d become eerily calm, snapping so quickly from rage to observation, like the flip of a switch.

“It’s you,” Max commented. “Greig.”

Greig shifted uneasily, raising his arm to fire. “It’s me.”

And then Max hit him with a question that made him falter. “Where were you when Linus died?”

“I was tending to the injured-”

“Linus was injured. I watched as that witch broke all of his bones in a single go.” Max said flatly, cutting him off. “I watched blood drip down from his mouth due to organ damage. I laid his crumpled body to rest. What did you do for him?”

Greig fell momentarily silent.

“Did you even give a flying fuck about him in the first place?” Max hissed. “I really don’t think you did.”

“I… Did care about him, Max, I still do. His death hurt me so much-”

“Not as much as I will.”

Max swung her hammer hard into Greig’s gunning arm with an audible CRACK as it became limp and useless. His gun, Ecstasy fell off of his hand and skittered across the floor. Greig muttered some expletives, grabbing his broken arm with his good hand and staggering backward towards the elevator. Max swung at him again, hitting him in his bad shoulder and sending him toppling sideways.

“Max, you can’t do this. You have to stop,” He grunted, grabbing onto the wall for support. “Linus wouldn’t have wanted this.”

“How the hell do you know what he would’ve wanted?! I heard him! I heard him speak to me, through CENSORED! He wants me to get justice. He wants me to execute the traitors.” Max explained frantically. Greig shook his head sadly.

“That doesn’t sound like him at all, think for a second, Max. Even when he was given a weapon, he never hurt a soul.” Greig smiled wryly. Max let out an unintelligible screech of anger.

“Shut! Up! Shut! Up!” Max screamed, slamming the hammer into Greig with each word. Greig sunk to the ground, motionless. Max took a second to catch her breath, her throat stinging with each shaky inhale.

She made her way out of the lower Disciplinary hallway, and calmly into the main room, dragging her hammer tiredly behind her. What an ordeal. But as she made her way through that too, and into Central Command, she came face to face with Evirah.

“Miss Ev!” Max smiled. “Finally, someone who will listen for half a second. Come with me, you’re my ally!”

Evirah shook her head. “No, Max. I can’t do that.” She readied her weapon, Discord, and pointed it at Max. “Please surrender.”

“No. I won’t-” Max began, and that was all it took for Evirah to begin her attack. She jabbed Max with discord, and for a second in the pain, Max was able to think clearly. But only for a second, as Evirah pulled back to strike again, which Max quickly used the handle of The Smile to block. Max was fast but Evirah’s weapon was leaner, and easier to control. So in the end, Evirah kept striking and it was all Max could do to keep blocking without an opening.

And then from behind her, Max felt the odd, calming sensation she felt before, on the day when Greig hit her with the bubbles the day Linus died. Greig… Was he still alive? She hit him pretty hard, she thought to herself, as she sank to her knees and to the ground. And then the gravity of what she’d done hit her, and she began to sob uncontrollably. What had she done? Perhaps she, too, was a monster on the level of her brother’s killer. And then another wave washed over her, and her eyelids felt heavy, and she began to fall asleep, thinking of the day her brother died in her arms.

Greig, having managed to fend off passing out for just long enough to assist Evirah, using Ecstasy with his good arm, waved at her, grunted a quick “Thanks,” and then promptly fell unconscious where he stood.