Editing Bleeding Out (Warhammer High) (section)

===Coming Home===

The next day, for the people of the Imperium, couldn’t have been much farther from a normal Monday.  The entire Palace district, and the towns around it, were still crawling with Arbites and Treasury, but the airlanes had been released, and the sky was thick with people trying to catch a glimpse of where the shooting took place.

The lockdown continued. Though Imperator High was open for classes, the place looked like a firing range, with beehives and local police at every hall. None of the Royal family even attended, but the paparazzi was still clustered at every corner, catching shots of their neighbors and boyfriends and distant relatives, dispersing after the bells.

Jake made his way back to his car, wondering if it was too soon to call, and deciding that he didn’t care.  Sitting down in the cab of his aircar, pointedly ignoring the reporters clustering outside the parking lot, he flipped his vox open and called Venus’ number, then jumped a handspan sitting down when it went off from the cupholder next to him. He squeezed his eyes shut and sighed, turning off the vox where she had dropped it the previous day.

Idly, he started up the car, wondering if the Treasury would let him return it. A thought struck him, and he dialed her house. The vox immediately turned off in his hand. “Thought as much,” Jake said to himself, starting the engine.  The autopilot lifted him smoothly off the ground.

“Let’s try…this,” he said, dialing the house again, this time with Venus’ vox.  The cell buzzed once, and an unfamiliar voice answered.

“Hello?”

“Uh, hello.  I’m trying to return Lady Venus’ vox?” he tried.

“Excuse me?” the voice on the other side said, chilling about seventy degrees.

“She left it in my car yesterday,” Jake said, suddenly placing the voice, “after you pulled her out of it.”

“Sir, the Royal Family is uninterested in solicitation,” the voice said flatly.  “Lady Venus will be free to retrieve any property of hers after the lockdown ends.”

“Solicitation,” Jake said.  He stared at the vox for a second.  “All right.”  He tapped an extension number into the vox and waited.  A moment later, the vox sounded another dial tone.

“Hello?” Lord Vulkan’s voice said on the other end.

“Hello, S…Vulkan. It’s Jake.  I found Venus’ vox in my car,” Jake said quickly, before the no-doubt-enraged vox operator could cut him off.

“Oh, yes, hello, Jake.  Yes, she was wondering where it was.  Are you offering to drop it off?”

“I’m in the neighborhood, yeah,” Jake said, glancing out at the ocean of red, gold, black, and orange uniforms on the ground beneath him. “But I doubt they’ll let me in.”

“True. Can you just bring it back to your apartment, and I’ll send someone to pick it up?” Vulkan asked, from the line in his office.

“I certainly…could,” Jake said.

“Ah.” Vulkan was quiet for a moment, then snorted. “What the hell. Come on by. I’ll waive your car for the security.”

“Thanks. I’ll be by in a few minutes,” Jake said, then tapped his finger against the microphone. A moment later, he heard the *click* as the Treasury agent on the main line hung up, and smiled. “Vulkan?”

“Yes?”

“Thank you.”

“No problem, Jake.”

Several minutes later, Jake parked his aircar outside the now-familiar mansion, grabbed Venus’ vox, and clambered out, noting the cluster of beehives at the door.  Slipping the vox into his pocket, he walked up to the sealed door, reminded subtly of the last time he had seen Treasury agents standing outside a locked door, and glad that his previous verbal sparring partner hadn’t returned.
Before he could even reach the door, however, one of the Treasury agents at the door spoke up.

“Be aware, sir, that your presence here continues at Lord Vulkan’s sufferance.”

“The house is ringed by bolter turrets, Sergeant, everyone’s here at his sufferance,” Jake shot back, tapping his pocket.  “I’m just here to return Venus’ vox.”

“Then you won’t mind when we keep this entire visit of yours under recording, just for the sake of clarity,” the beehive said crisply.

“I can think of four or five different, very good reasons why you really shouldn’t do that,” Jake said on a moment’s reflection. Before the beehive could reply, however, the door creaked open, and Venus launched out of it, squeezing Jake in a bear hug.

“Mmmph, tookyousolong,” she managed, burying her face in his neck.

“Sorry, baby,” Jake said, squeezing her back.  “How are you feel-”

“Get in here,” she cut him off, pulling the door back open.  He followed her back in, ignoring the glowering beehives behind him and shutting the door.

Venus’ arms wrapped around his waist and pulled him into a vice-grip.  “I needed to see you,” she muttered darkly.

Jake turned around and returned it, directing a stare of malice at the beehive loitering at the bottom of the stairs.  “I’m here,” he said softly, returning his attention the girl clutching his shirtfront.  “How are you feeling?”

Venus tilted her head back and glared at him, red-hot light bathing his face.  “Guess,” she said bitterly, then immediately turned her eyes away from his hurt expression.  “I’m sorry.  That…damn it.”

“It’s all right,” he said, gently disentangling her from his clothes and directing her towards the couch in the sitting area.  “Have you heard?  The Heads are just repeating the same things over and over.”

“She’ll make it.  When?  Don’t know,” Venus said, dropping heavily on the leather sofa.  Jake sat down next to her and threw an arm across her shoulders.  “But she’ll live.”

“Good.  Good.”  Jake leaned back on the sofa and searched for something to say.  “Here,” he said, digging the vox out and dropping it on an end table.

“Mmm.”  Venus dug her fingers into the couch, clearly at a loss as much as he was.  “…guards give you any trouble?”

“A bit, but I don’t blame them.  Thank your dad for me, ok?  For letting me in,” Jake added, rationalizing that his odds of actually talking to Vulkan himself were pretty low.

“Yeah.”  Venus sighed, leaning back into his arm and closing her eyes.  “…What do you have planned this weekend?”

“Uh, just the last Senior Project report…what did you have in mind?”

“Well, a few of us were planning to go visit Morticia if we could.  It would mean a lot to me if you could go,” she said.

“Sure thing, I’ll go.”  Jake said.  “When should I be here?”

“I’ll have to pick you up.”  Venus sighed again, squeezing the leather until it creaked in her hands.  “This is not a fun way to be reminded of your own mortality.”

“There’s a fun way?”  Jake quipped.

Venus managed a snort of laughter.  “Probably not.  Uncle Mortarion called from the hospital, this morning.  He said she was still out cold, but she’s recovering.”

“Good,” Jake said.  Venus shook her head.

“Why Morticia?” she asked of nobody in particular.  “Why her?  The poor thing barely even sets foot outdoors at the best of times, and then…” She opened her eyes and stared into space, lighting up the corner of the room with a diffuse red glow.  “It’s just not fair.”

Jake grimaced.  “No.  It isn’t.”  He wrapped his arm around her shoulder and pulled her in.  “But what can we do?”

“I dunno,” she said sadly.  “I dunno.”  Her eyes slid shut again as she leaned into him.  “…you’d think I’d be used to this happening by now.”

“It’s happened before?”  Jake asked.

“Yeah.  I told you, someone tried to shoot Grandpa once,” Venus said.  “Back when-”

“When the Fiat was imposed, right,” Jake said, remembering.

“Yeah.  That was…scary too,” Venus said, grinding a palm against her eyes.  “Agh, fuck.  This is the worst!”  She turned her head up to look at him, her blank red eyes dim and sad.  “Did the Treasury tail you to your house again?”

“Not visibly,” Jake said dryly.  “And there was no door-to-door solicitation this time.”

Both of them managed a brief laugh.  Venus settled back against him as the sound faded into the cavernous sitting room.  “Nothing keeps you down for long, does it, Jake?”

“Nope,” he replied, wrapping his arm around her back.  She snuggled back against him.  “But then, I didn’t get to see you at all today.”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be.  Here,” he said, sliding down the couch a stretch and lying down sideways, jutting his lower elbow out.  She settled down in front of him, resting her head on his arm and draping his free arm across her stomach.  With one pointed glance at the two beehives visible from the seat, they had the room to themselves.  “I’m here now,” he said, and gently kissed the top of her head.

“Yep,” she said, clasping her hand over his.  The room went silent.  They had both run out of things to say, after all.

Jake closed his eyes and tried to relax, to let the stress of the past day fade.  Slowly, the little knot in his stomach unwound.

“That girl can fall asleep at the drop of a hat, can’t she?” a voice asked quietly.  Jake cracked an eye open to see Lady Misja, Venus’ mother, standing over them, her expression between maternal indulgence and exasperation.  Jake peeked over his girlfriend’s head to note that she was, in fact, fast asleep.

“I didn’t need this arm for a while,” Jake murmured.

“Poor thing didn’t sleep a wink last night,” Misja sighed.  She looked up to Jake, now pinned between her daughter and the couch.  “Stay a while, will you?  Keep an eye on her?”

“Count on it,” Jake said softly, settling back down.