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Freedom Day--the anniversary of the final defeat of the tyrannical madman who had taken over the world multiple times in a single lifetime. To many, this day is a time of celebration, but to Cassia, it is an anniversary most foul.

The cyberized pronghorn huffs as she holds her tonfa up in the fighting arena. She's dressed down in a sports bra and airy pants, painted with flames, her electronic eyes focused on the opponent on the other side. It's just like any other fight in the Mobian underground, where the cast-offs of society lived and worked and survived.

Perhaps, that's not quite the word that would suit her opponent. The large bear roars at her, and the pronghorn hops over the metallic claw that swipes at her. The attack sends a decisive strike against the back of the head.

The opponent falls over with a buzz and a spark, her arm twitching before finally going dead.

The crowd cheered and jeered, calling for "Blood and Oil, Blood and Oil," but she's done her duty, and she walks on out to the locker room for a shine and a rinse.

Stuffing the envelope of Mobiums into her pocket, the now hooded deer walks out into the streets of the Forbidden Zone. The old-timers who lived here once upon a time said this place was the "Bottom of the Barrel," but they didn't realize that there was a hole underneath that was much deeper and far darker.

When she got to her dingy apartment, she would find an envelope waiting for her just under the door. When she zooms in, the LED eyes simulate narrowing--just a concession from the good doctor so she could emote properly, probably so that she could show utter fear before his terrible might.

Thank Gaia, he's finally dead.

She picks up the envelope and flips it over. The seal as she expects, a series of stars set into the wax. She tears into the envelope and reads the location of her next dead drop. She grumbles and reaches for the door.

But then, she stops.

She pulls out a tonfa, flipping it in her hand, readying herself for whatever is on the other side, and with that, she yanks the door open, spinning around and aiming for the head.

A brilliant and deadly light arcs out into the blade of a scythe. It hooks around the back of the pronghorn's neck just as the tonfa hits the metal pole of the weapon.

Staring at her, nearly nose-to-nose, is the condescending look of the other pronghorn, staring down at her with a perpetual frown upon her face.

Cassia drops the tonfa, her legs wobbling.

The older two grabs onto her side as she falls, letting her faint into her arms. She deactivates her weapon and carries the younger of the two in.

When Cassia finally awakes, she's lying on her threadbare couch, the buzzing of her microwave and the wafting of soup hitting her olfactory emulators.

"Ugh... w... what...?"

The ding brings her back to attention, watching the older pronghorn hand the bowl to her.

"I see you've done well for yourself," Clove says, a hand upon her hip. She dresses in a suit, tailored but tight against her body. Obviously, it was meant for someone else.

"Yeah, well, who's fault is that?" Cassia grumbles, gripping the spoon, giving the contents of the bowl a swirl.

Clove quirks an eyebrow. "I did what I had to do. You know that."

"I wasn't just a kid!" Cassia snaps, gripping the utensil, which groans in metallic harshness. "I was right up there with you, doing the doctor's dirty work. We could have fought them together, you know. You didn't have to tell them-"

"The truth?" Clove folds her arms over her chest, narrowing her gaze with an upturned nose at her sister. "I told them that you were coerced into working for the Empire because of your condition."

"I wasn't the only one with a bomb planted in me," Cassia grumbles, placing the saucer on the cushion next to her. She stands up, puffing her chest out at the other pronghorn. "We both had that sword dangling over us, and I was gonna fight to make sure you didn't go down either!"

"Is that all you care about? Fighting?" Clove says, shaking her head. "It seems to be because it looks like you haven't done anything else with your life. Couldn't even get yourself decent treatment and a decent house." She walks past Cassia over towards the peeling wallpaper of her apartment. "Why didn't you go for help? I cleared your name."

"Yeah, well, people are Cyberphobic. Who woulda thought!?" Cassia says, hands folding over her chest. "Sure, if you got a metal arm or some fancy legwear, that's no problem, but living with this!?" She waves her hand over her face, "they will never look at me like I'm normal."

Clove sighs, a hand upon the wall, her shoulders slumping. "I know that... but... I had to hope... that you'd survive... that'd overcome it all, and you'd get out of the shadow of my mistakes." She pounds the wall, resting her forehead upon it. "If I wasn't so stupid and through he could have all the answers--if I had just known more--about Chuck the Hedgehog and about the medical advancements of Echidnapolis, then we wouldn't have been in any of this mess. You wouldn't be fighting to get by. I wouldn't have been in prison all this time and-"

"Let's rewind this a bit," Cassia says. "I thought war criminals get sent to the Devil's Gulag, never to return. How did you even get here?"

Clove sighs, straightening herself up, and turns toward the other pronghorn. "Just like how I'd do anything for you back then, so will I do it now, and I found myself a way to get out."

"By making another Ifrit's deal?"

"To make it back to you, yes."