Dragon pulled up the video and audio feeds for the most recent dialogue.

This should be interesting.

“…I suppose we’ll have to accept that we have different management styles,” Marquis said.  The camera image showed him sipping at his tea. 

“As I understand it,” Lung sounded annoyed as he spoke in his heavily accented voice, “You are saying you have no management style at all.  You have told me you operated without lieutenants to direct, no product to sell, and of the few servants you did have, you did not punish those who failed you.  I do not believe you held control of so much territory in this way.”

They’re being polite so far, but there’s still a hint of animosity, at least from Lung.

“Ah, except I did those things.  If a servant failed me, I killed them.  Whatever it was, they never did it again.”

I guess that’s one way to punish them. Could be a bit of a waste of resources, maybe.

The latent hostility in the room, Dragon noted, was ratcheting up with every exchange of dialogue.  Lung was annoyed, and he had an explosive temper.  Sometimes literally.

Heh.

Lung folded his arms, and put down his own tea.  His tone was strained as he spoke, “Then I believe you were wrong about what you said before.  You do use fear to control others.”

Oh, so that’s what the argument is about? Does Marquis think himself too honorable to admit to doing that?

“Fear?  I didn’t kill my servants in front of an audience.”

“They disappeared?” Lung asked.

The camera image showed Marquis nod.

Ah, I see. Marquis just disposed of defective servants without making a show of “this is what happens if you fail me”.

He put his hand up by his neck and flicked his hand back, to cast his long brown hair back behind his shoulder.

Brown hair, huh.

Any freckles?

Glastig Uaine had revived the girl, but Dragon hesitated to call it life.

Ahh. I see, we’re going more along the lines of zombies, though I’m guessing this is based on some sort of Gaelic mythical undead or tales of resurrections by the faerie, rather than popular zombie lore (which originates from Carribbean voodoo and Night of the Living Dead).

If nothing else, Bakuda was a manageable inmate, now.  She would never leave Glaistig Uaine’s immediate presence, let alone the Birdcage.

Eesh.

Honestly, maybe it’d been better if she’d just stayed dead.

Prisoner 600, Bakuda, was in the care of Glaistig Uaine, for better or worse.

Eyyy!

She’s alive!

Bakuda had been a difficult placement, and Dragon had eventually condemned herself to putting the crazed bomber in the cell block run by the self-professed faerie.

Pfft. I suppose it only makes sense that some would believe themselves to be mythical beings when given this kind of power.

As Dragon had predicted, Bakuda had died soon after her incarceration.

Oh.

Wait.

She died, but she’s currently in the care of Glaistig Uaine? Resurrection powers?

If that’s the case, it’s gotta be resurrection powers that don’t require the presence of the corpse.

If it hadn’t been at Lung’s hands, it would likely have been Bakuda’s own fault, some crazed recklessness.  The real tragedy was that others had died in the ensuing spree as Lung had rampaged through the prison.  Prisoners 304, 2 and 445 had perished at Lung’s hands.

Damn it, Lung.

Also, I suppose the corpse comment doesn’t necessarily apply if Lung is alive. But it doesn’t sound like Glaistig Uaine resurrected anyone else, so it honestly sounds more like Glaistig Uaine is taking care of the corpse for some reason. Or maybe I’m misreading something.

She regretted what had happened to Paige, and that just made her angrier at her own creator.  Rules, yet again.  Dragon had to obey the authorities, even if she didn’t agree with them.

I see… that’s a bit riskier than the other safety precautions, should the authorities turn bad.

If a despot seized control of the local government, Dragon would be obligated to obey and enforce the rules that individual set in place, no matter how ruthless they were.  It was a spooky thought.

Exactly. On this particular point, I agree with Dragon.

Richter had been so shortsighted!  The despot scenario wasn’t entirely impossible, either.  

Yeah, no, no it isn’t.

There were parahumans of all types out there.  Who was to say one wouldn’t find out his power involved being loved by everyone that saw them or heard their voice?

And some more recent events have made it more believable that such a takeover could happen in the States even without parahumans.

Prisoner 605, Murderbeam, was feared in the outside world, but he was finding the inhabitants of the Birdcage were not so impressed with him.

Well, that’s a pretty straightforward name. If this guy’s not a Blaster, I don’t know who is.

He would likely not survive the week.  She was disappointed.  She had hoped Prisoner 550 would reach out to Murderbeam and give the fellow block resident some support.

Welp.

Either Murderbeam had been too proud to accept it, or social pressures had deterred Prisoner 550.  Now that he was within the Birdcage, she was limited in her options.

Yeah, I guess there’s not much she can do.

Prisoners 604 and 603, Knot, were happily gorging themselves on food in Cell Block Y.  

Wait, are they both collectively named Knot, like may have been the case with Zigzag? Are they perhaps… Siamese twins connected by a hand, with the ability to turn their merged arms into a rope? Nahh, probably not.

Despite their cognitive impairment, they had fallen into a role as enforcer and heavy hitter for Prisoner 390, leader of their cell block.  Prisoner 390 had had a son – she could only hope that he would find some similar affection for Knot, with their childlike mentality.

I see. Definitely sounds like Knot are connected in some way.

Prisoner 602, Lizard Prince, was dead.  Not everyone could survive the Birdcage, sadly.

rip

I like the name.

There had been no ideal place to put the boy, where he would be protected, find kindred souls or join a group.  She had contacted the PRT with the news, and his victims had been notified, but nothing further had come out of it.  

I guess that’s just how it goes sometimes.

In an indirect way, putting the boy in the Birdcage had been an execution writ.

I mean… when isn’t it, really? Like, maybe some of them can get satisfying lives in there, but they’re never getting out (unless that mass break I’ve been shakily predicting ever since I first heard of the place happens). How is a life sentence in a place like this truly different from a death sentence?

She read the house program’s logs, keeping an eye out for deviations and notable events.  Nothing pressing.  As was her routine, she checked on the last month’s additions to the Birdcage.

I think it’s time to find out what happened with Bakuda and Lung. If Dragon bothers to tell us, that is.

Prisoner 606, Ramrod.  Now member of Cell Block X’s inner circle.  To be expected.

Ah, right, I forgot I was going to go back and check Bakuda, Lung and Canary’s prisoner numbers up against the 606-person figure. Wasn’t the highest of them 603? Hang on…

No, Paige was #601. So we’ve got five new additions, then.

The name Ramrod sounds familiar, but blog search doesn’t find anything.

She’d placed him there with the idea that he would become just that.  His psych evaluation from the courtroom suggested he was a very laid back and unruffable individual.  It was her intention that he would have a calming influence on the others in his block.

That sounds reasonable.

Her attention flickered over the various video feeds from the Baumann Parahuman Containment Center.  She had one of Andrew Richter’s programs babysitting the building, but it was crude.

That’s not a nice thing to say about your baby sibling.

She couldn’t reproduce in any fashion, so she’d taken Andrew Richter’s existing work and modified it. It was the same program that had monitored and managed his house and workshop, and she’d set it the task of monitoring that building where six hundred and six of the most dangerous parahumans on the planet were bottled up together.

Ah, I see. Sounds like a bit more than it was designed to handle.

So does Richter not need this for his own house anymore? He’s not dead, right?

The house program didn’t have a personality.  It couldn’t keep her company or sympathize with her over her frustrations.  It still reduced her workload.

Ah, I guess that means she can use it without disabling the copy at Richter’s house.