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The Mouse's Plans

Chapter 3: Three Strikes

By Draconicon

Whatever Lars was doing to his aunt lasted for a total of one hour, six minutes, and forty-three seconds. Salla knew because he timed it, looking down at the clock at the edge of the kitchen the minute that the noise started and marking that point. He waited, his fingers digging deeper into the table further and further with each passing second. Sixty. One-hundred-twenty. One-hundred-eighty. And so on.

The screams were impossible to ignore, even if he wanted to. He didn't; Yilla was being punished for something that he'd done, hurt for something that he'd done.

For something that needed doing. For something that you shouldn't be punished for. For something that doesn't deserve punishment.

The white-furred mouse leaned forward, his eyes fixed on the table for lack of anything else to look at as the seconds ticked by. Three-hundred seconds. Three-hundred-sixty.

They turned shrill, the screams did. It hurt, but even as his mother pulled her ears down, he kept his up. He wasn't going to pretend it wasn't happening. He wasn't going to just ignore it and try to act like it wasn't happening.

Actions had consequences. He had to remember that.

Four-thousand-three seconds later, the sounds stopped. Silence echoed through the house of the mice, and a few minutes later, the thud, thud, thud of someone coming down the stairs followed. Salla felt like his fingers had worn the table to a hair-thin thickness under his hands. That, or his fingernails were about to snap. One or the other. One or the other.

The rat stopped at the bottom of the stairs, looking at him and his mother. Lars hadn't even bothered to button his pants up yet. He walked right past them, showing off a cock that was soaked, drenched. The smell of sex, piss, and a hint of that metallic blood smell followed. The rat smirked.

"Aunt's a good lay, bitch."

"..."

"Heh. But I think I might have roughed her up a bit. Might want to check on her."

The urge to throw something rose, but he managed to keep himself quiet. This was meant to get a rise out of him, meant to provoke a fight that he could not win. If he was going to help his aunt, if he was going to do anything, it wasn't going to be done with him and her in the hospital.

Lars walked out, laughing about his 'free session', and then made his way down the drive. Salla waited for a count of ten before getting to his feet.

"I will be right back. Call an ambulance."

His mother didn't question that. She knew as well as he did, even if she had been trying to ignore it, that they were going to need one. If they didn't want to bury a family member tonight, they were going to need one.

Salla walked up the stairs, his hand shaking until he managed to grab the railing and squeeze it. His tail took up the slack after that, twitching nervously as he climbed the stairs, and his heart felt like it was going to beat right out of his chest. At the same time, he felt...distant. Pulled back from the world. Pulled back from everything save for the curious rage that burned just under his thoughts.

Why is this fair? he thought, looking back at the front door, as if Lars was still there to be glared at. Why does he think that this is...permitted?

It couldn't be the fact that his uncle was a cop anymore. That was done. That was gone. That officer was going to be buried in a trial for so many months that this was not even close to being okay.

So, what was it? Him being a mouse? Him standing up for himself? The fact that Lars had money, and he didn't? The fact that -

His attempt to puzzle it out stopped dead in its tracks as he rounded the upstairs corner and saw his aunt in bed, her legs sprawled apart, her thighs bruised and cut, her nose broken and her visible teeth chipped. She had been beaten while she had been used, and she oozed from either end with spent -

Then the smell hit him. Thick, heavy with the scent of blood and urine, as if she had been broken, or if Lars had just...just...

Salla's hands curled into fists as he walked into the room, the fire burning hotter under his thoughts, his breath coming a bit faster before the stink made him slow that down. He ever so slowly pulled the loose blankets over his aunt, covering her enough to salvage her dignity, before leaning down and listening. A soft breath told him that she was still with them; a finger to her neck proved that her pulse was still there, unsteady, but there.

His mother came up the stairs to join him, only to gasp at the doorway. He looked at her, watching as she walked over. The two mice sat at the side of the bed, each of them holding one of Yilla's hands as they waited for the ambulance to arrive.

#

Salla sat outside the ICU, his hands folded together as he bounced his knees. Yilla had been admitted and the doctors had gone through her case, looking over the different injuries that she had suffered during the course of her...

Employment. That...was not...employment.

Salla lifted his hands to the edge of his muzzle, holding them there to still the shaking that was starting. A little snag along his teeth was enough to still it; the instinct of the mouse to stop at the prick of something sharp remained, and it was useful to calm himself the hell down. At least, for this. For this. Not for the rest of it.

His mother hadn't come to the hospital. No surprise. She didn't speak, and she was barely coherent after what had happened to Yilla. She was more than willing to stay home, to keep anyone else from coming in, and let him deal with this. Her past damage made it hard for her. He knew that. He knew that.

That didn't make it easy to keep a straight face when the doctor's first question to him after she was admitted was:

"What kind of insurance does she have?"

It only went downhill from there. Now, he sat outside, taking deep breaths and hoping that there would be some sort of plan he could find, some sort of credit scheme that would keep them afloat while they paid off many broken bones, stitches, and worse that were still being treated. He knew that there would be; hospitals wanted money, and businesses wanted people in debt. It was just a matter of finding one that would be willing to give them time.

The mouse shook again, and this time, biting a finger did nothing to stop it. He leaned his head into his hands, taking one deep breath, waiting for the shaking to stop, then taking another. If he mistimed them, he would sob, and then he would be taken from the door outside the room in the name of peace and quiet. He wasn't...he would not leave. Not yet.

While he was still waiting to be allowed in, a shadow fell across him. He looked up to find a crow looking down at him, one that was in the same police blues that Lars's uncle had worn. Salla bit back whatever his first instinctive response was, let out a tired sigh, and stood up.

"Can I help you?" he asked.

"Who are you, mouse?"

"...I'm Salla. My aunt is in the room behind me."

"Yilla?"

He nodded.

"She's under arrest."

"Like hell."

The words escaped his lips before he could think to stop himself, but now that they were said, he was more than willing to back them up. He sidled between the avian cop and the doors behind him, shaking his head.

He recognized the crow, now. This one had been by the house before, though not often in uniform. It had taken him a second to make the connection, but the little chip on the beak, like a missing tooth on the left-hand side, was unmistakable.

"She's under arrest," the crow said again, trying and failing to sidle around the mouse. "She's a prostitute, boy."

"Very selective charge, that one."

"It's illegal, mouse. Ain't any surprise she got the shit beat out of her."

"Urine, officer."

"...What?"

"She got the urine beat out of her. As well as blood. That which you accuse her of losing remained inside. And nearly caused an infection due to the extensive beating that she suffered."

"...Fucking pedantic kid. Get out of the way."

The crow tried to shove him out of the way, but Salla had already decided he would not be moved. He might be a half-foot shorter than the bird, but he was still holding firm, his tail wrapped like a rope around the door handle behind him, and he grabbed the policeman's arms tightly when the crow tried to move him. He clung so tight that anything the bird did was akin to trying to throw a ball of tar away.

And it was making the officer more and more agitated. More angry, the mouse realized. Clicking his cracked beak, the crow tried to pull him one way, then the other. He even went so far as to shove Salla into the wall, almost bouncing the mouse's shoulder out of its socket to push through. Salla held firm, refusing to be knocked loose.

"You aren't...are not arresting her, Officer Archibald."

The crow finally stopped. His eyes narrowed.

"I didn't introduce myself."

"You have also left your badge behind. And your uniform lacks a name tag. But I remember you."

"..."

"I remember you coming to visit my aunt for the same purposes that put her here."

"...You little -"

"Prostitution is illegal in both directions, officer." He gritted his teeth again, feeling the damaged teeth screaming at him, but it was better than the dull, sickening ache that was trying to make him let loose. "The minute that you try and put those cuffs on her, I will tell everyone what you did...including every damning, specific detail."

"...Fine. She's got two days. If she's still here after that, she's getting taken in, regardless."

Which meant that they'd send another officer at that point to do the deed that wouldn't be blackmailed the same way. Doubtless, they'd try and get away with it before then, too, but Salla had already made his threat. It was better than nothing; at the very least, it meant that there was something that could be said to the hospital staff...particularly when they asked why his arm was injured. The cameras here would be good for something.

The crow stomped off, and Salla sighed. His good arm came up, his hand over his eyes as he felt the tears trying to come. One more nail in the coffin for a decent world. One more thing that told him that you couldn't rely on anyone else.

#

After the hospital staff told him that Yilla would need at least one night in the ICU before they could even think about sending her home, Salla took himself back to his mother. She had gone to bed - no surprise, it was well-past midnight, at that point - and he sat on the couch. He was too wired to sleep, too angry to allow himself the peace of oblivious dream. He flicked the remote at the TV, turning to the news.

"In recent news, Principal Samuel Mattis has been let go of his position at a local school. Accusations of neglect and even abuse of power have run rampant ever since a previous suspension at several schools across the country have come to light, with many of the students submitting evidence of his, shall we say, preferential treatment of others."

At least there was one good thing that had happened. Someone had been brought low by all of this, and someone that deserved it pretty damn badly. Salla rubbed his forehead, shaking his head as he leaned back against the couch.

As he did, one of his mother's notebooks slipped from its place on the arm of the couch. It flopped down, falling open to reveal a note that had been tucked inside. It had his name on it, so he reached over and flipped it open.

He barely made it halfway through before he lost his grip on it, dropping it to the floor. The mouse stared at the falling piece of paper, its contents seared into his brain already.

Heard from school. Scholarship canceled because of 'criminal record'. Sorry. So sorry.

Just like that, the tiny victory of getting some small revenge on the principal and his bigger victory over Lars's uncle went up in smoke. His future had just been ripped away from him. His ability to do anything more than just keep coasting along, the thing that he had earned, had been taken from him by a technicality. He didn't even have to guess as to why this had happened; this would have been Mattis's last push, something that he'd gotten his chosen successor to actually put through as punishment for him.

Everything, everything that promised a half-decent future, from the settlement to the scholarship, was gone. The rules that were supposed to protect people were turned against him, against everyone that he cared about, and...and...

We're supposed to trust this? he thought. We're supposed to trust a system that only uses its power...when it wants to? When it gives them the chance to keep that power?

It wasn't even anger anymore. That fire had burnt itself out, lost all the fuel that had kept it going. No, no, this was something else, something more bitter, something colder than it had been all night long. He got up from the couch, pacing, his fingers tapping against his palms as he tried to sort himself out.

If there was one thing that had come clear to him in the last few days, it was that those in authority were not interested in fulfilling their responsibilities. The principal didn't want to look out for the best interests of his students. An uncle wasn't interested in correcting the bad behavior of his nephew. A police officer was more interested in showing off his power than actually going after a real criminal.

They were all part of the system. If they were all part of the system, that meant that he had anecdotal evidence that the system producing all of these figures of power didn't work. And that, in turn, meant that there were likely other anecdotal bits of evidence that he hadn't heard, and perhaps a greater than anecdotal level of evidence to be found.

Salla reached the house window, resting with his hand on the glass. The chill coming through it helped, drawing him forward, focusing him on that. He looked down at his fingers, at the space between them, staring into that space.

If the system is broken... He paused, shaking his head. Provided that the system is broken, what does that mean?

With the proviso, that meant that one could not rely on the system. Its rules meant nothing, nor its protections. The only segment of the system that one could rely on to some extent were the punishments that would come down on oneself rather than others, and one must assume that they would come down strict, hard, and harsh.

Provided that this is true, do you continue operating in the system?

If one had a choice, one did not. Once one was cast out by the system, ignored by it until one became an irritant, one had precisely three choices: live within the system as an invisible, live outside the system as an invisible, or remain that irritant.

The former two were interchangeable. Staying within the system and staying without were the same if you were already ignored by it. It just meant that you tacitly allowed it to continue operating as it wanted, doing nothing to shift it, without the protections that allowed others to continue having power. You were not even a cog in the machine. You were the dirt that the cogs ground down.

To stay on the outside, to become the irritant that ignored the rules, the regulations, the everything that the system propped itself up with, that it promised to enforce, you made yourself a target. Salla knew that. He had suffered that already, twice. If it punished him, he could handle that. He could take it, as he had shown when he allowed himself to get beaten up. But if they came for his family again...

He gripped his hand into a fist, his nails scraping along the window with a screeching sound. Having his aunt in the hospital was bad; knowing that the system's neglect had put her in there made it worse. Lars would face no punishment from the system, either; they were mice, and he was a rat, not much higher on the social ladder, but higher than a mouse. He couldn't expect any protection for his family...not by the rules of the system as they were set down.

Well...if they want to pick and choose the rules, then so will I...

After all, there were hundreds of ways to interpret the laws, and dozens more loopholes spread through them. The police, the lawyers, the rich men and women used them all the time to keep their power in the system. Why shouldn't he show them that he could play the game at the same time?

Why shouldn't he be the one to get something, for a change?

Think...Do not make another mistake. Salla took a deep breath, slowly letting his hand go flat again. Find some back-up. Then deal with Lars. Then take it further. One way or another, this WILL be sorted...

The End

Summary: Salla goes up to tend to his aunt, and finds out that she's been beaten badly by his bully. Things are going to have to escalate.

Tags: No sex, nudity, pain, abuse, series, mouse, rat, crow, police, abuse of power, dark, patreon, humiliation,