Janie Gunn/Zig-Transcript

From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe

Oh, no, darlin', what've you done?

dum, dum dum, it's the sound of my gun

Transcript of Ziggursky parole interview

File #490415385727 - "Janie Gunn"

Officer Claire Davies, interviewing.

*click*

...

... Guess you're not going to get out of my face until I tell my little story again, huh. Geez, don't you cops have real work to do? Fine, fine. Get me another coffee and I'll start.

I had a bad childhood, boo hoo. Well, actually, I didn't, until dad got himself killed in a stupid accident involving a truck, a giant robot and a so-called "hero" with a flexible definition of "acceptable collateral damage".

*swearing*

Mom tried to sue the city with the help of that Chris Jenkins asshole. He won a big settlement, too - and then showed us the small print in the contract she'd signed that gave him 90 percent of the proceeds and bound us not to discuss what he'd done with anyone or he'd take the other ten percent as well as everything else we owned. Mom wasn't tracking too well to start with, and that drove her over the edge to drinking.

Jamie joined the PPD when they started recruiting. I was furious; he was all I had left and he just walked out of my life to become a cop.

Yeah, so I started hanging with the Hellions. What can I say? Scorch was good-looking in his own way and I was furious with the whole fucking establishment in general and my brother in particular. Figured that at least if my name showed up in a police report he'd at least have to pay attention to me.

... Don't bother with that look. I know it was a moronic decision. I was young, I was angry, I was impulsive, and I was fucking stupid. I don't need it rubbed in.

Anyways, there was this meeting, and all the guys were chugging booze and sharing stories about the heroes that kicked their asses and doing some male bonding while I was stuck with the rest of the girls chatting about how cool it was to be the girlfriend of wanted criminals, and bored out of my skull - until the shooting contest started.

Yeah, shooting contest. A bunch of the guys had decided they needed to prove their alpha-male mettle and had stuck a bunch of empty bottles - if there's one thing a Hellion party will have after the first hour or so, it's a surplus of empty bottles - over on a flat rock a couple dozen meters away and challenging each other to shoot them off. Of course, they were lousy shots to begin with, and they'd been the ones emptying the bottles in the first place, so after about a dozen of them had emptied a clip each a grand total of two bottles had been hit. But at least it was some action, and if I'd have to listen to Cherry yack about how cool her boyfriend was for running with a gang I'd have shot her so I walked over and asked if I could try.

... Yeah, it was a classic sucker bet. Dad used to teach me and Jamie both to shoot since we were old enough to heft a BB gun, and Jamie and me kept up the practice when we had time - it helped us remember the happy times back when Dad was still alive, and we needed the occasional time to relax. He's a crack shot with a rifle, but I could beat him nine times out of ten on handguns. Of course, Scorch didn't know about that - he never really asked much about who I was or what I did at home.

Looking back, I should have taken that as a warning sign, but I'm getting off point.

The guys had a big laugh when I asked to try; after all, what does some stupid girl know about guns? Anyways, Scorch told Jimmy - you don't get to pick a cool name with the Hellions unless you "prove yourself worthy", and all that bullshit - to hand me his gun and let me try.

It was a lousy gun, poorly cleaned, and Jimmy most likely never sighted it properly in his life, so naturally my first shot went WAY wide, which of course made them laugh even more.

My second, third, fourth and fifth shot smashed one bottle each in the space of about ten seconds, and that shut them up for a minute. Then one of them told Scorch that his bitch just out-shot him, and they all shared a laugh at Scorch's expense. He couldn't do much of anything to me there, of course, with his status already in the crapper, but he and his personal suck-ups hauled off without me and left me to find my own way home. At least Jimmy had enough of a gentleman left in him to offer to come with me, make sure I'd get home without being cut up by zombies or some shit.

Anyways, Scorch starts giving me cold-shoulder treatment, but on the other hand Jimmy and some of his friends start hanging out with me, talking, getting shooting tips and a quick lesson in gun maintenance, generally treating me like a person, y'know? I was kind of feeling guilty toward Scorch about humiliating and then deserting him, but he wasn't talking to me either, so what can ya do?

Long story short, couple weeks go by like that, then Scorch shows up at my doorstep, making this big romantic speech on how he knows he's been neglecting me, but it was really because he was busy talking the higher ups into admitting a girl to the actual ranks rather than just a useless hanger-on, and they were finally coming around to the idea. There was just this test they wanted me to perform to show them I had what it takes...

Needless to say, I jumped at the chance. Didn't even bother to leave a note to anyone or to call Jimmy to tell him I wouldn't be around to hang out today - I figured that after I'd been initiated into the gang I'd drop by and surprise him.

Anyway, Scorch drove me around to this decrepit little storehouse in the 'Row somewhere. I wasn't paying much attention to the scenery and I didn't really care where we were. From the outside, it looked decrepit, with the windows smashed and boarded up. On the inside, it was all smokey and hot and smelling of burning wood and sulfur, just the way the Hellions like their places to be. Of course, I didn't have one of those handy bandannas to wrap around my nose and mouth, so I wasted a few seconds coughing and hacking, then I turned to Scorch to ask him if he had a spare one I could borrow, and something hit me on the back of my head and the lights went out.

When I came to, I had a splitting headache, which didn't help my mood any, and I opened my eyes to look around where Scorch is so I can let him know what I think of his stupid tricks. That's when I noticed a few more disturbing things: One, I'm on my back and very uncomfortable; two, there's chains around my wrists and ankles and they don't leave me much moving room; three, I'm buck naked; four, I was unconscious long enough for someone to paint all kinds of freaky signs all over my body in dark red paint. At least, I was hoping it was paint.

Anyway, I'm shifting rapidly from anger to fear when Scorch steps into my field of view. Naked from the waist up, which I'm not in the proper mood to appreciate, and also painted with a whole bunch of weird signs on his chest. I spend a minute or two yelling at him and ordering him to knock it off with the bullshit and let me out of here or I'll kill him, and he just grins and tells me I'm not the one that's going to be doing the killing.

Turns out that while he was off fuming over getting humiliated, someone higher-up -- or maybe I should say lower-down -- noticed him and liked how much dark emotions he was giving off. Made him prime material to strike a bargain with the "dark powers" to get a little more edge to himself, rise in the ranks, become one of the Damned, etcetera. Except there was a little catch - he had to prove that he had what it takes for true damnation, and he had to prove it by feeding them a soul by ritually sacrificing someone. Guess who he picked?

He was gloating, describing the ritual, explaining how everything was set, barrier between this world and the dark hells having been weakened by the pentagram I was stuck inside, and once the signs on my body were empowered by a dying person's blood my body'd become a funnel for the dark power which would then pass into the nearest person with sufficient negative emotions. And just to make sure that'd be him he spent a few minutes explaining to me how much he hated me for showing him up and precisely how he was going to cut my heart out and hold it in front of my eyes so it'd be the last thing I'd see.

*pause*

... And then he did just that. I remember the knife going in, I remember the pain when he broke my ribs apart, then even more pain, and a tugging sensation, and suddenly he was holding something bloody in front of me and I realized I couldn't feel my heartbeat any more, and then things started going dark.

*pause*

... But the last thing I felt wasn't fear. It was anger. Anger at dad for dying, at the cape that got him killed, at Jenkins for shafting mom, at mom for going after the bottle, at Jamie for deserting me, and most of all at Scorch for killing me...

*pause*

... And I guess all that anger was a lot more powerful than Scorch's hate and greed and murder, because suddenly I'm back in my body and I opened my eyes and the first thing I saw was Scorch still standing over me with that bloody knife in one hand and my heart in the other and an expression of stupid surprise on his face, and those stupid lackeys of his standing around him without a clue what's going on and I realized I wasn't dead any more but I wasn't entirely alive yet and to come back the rest of the way I had to tear out their souls and consume them ...

*pause*

... Sorry about that. No, I'm fine, I've got it under control. Yes, I'm bloody sure.

Anyways, I did it. I drew... something out of them, and I felt a surge of power like you wouldn't believe. I snapped those chains like straw, and most of them were just staggering around, reeling from whatever I'd just done to them, and they could barely put up a defense...

... I don't remember much of what happened after that. I must've broken free and attacked, because the next thing I was clearly aware of was hitting the wall and feeling like a truck just hit me, then collapsing to the ground and looking up to see this guy in spandex with glowing fists hauling back...

... And then I woke up here.

Anyways, medics here looked me over, and they say I'm just as alive as any of them - body heat, pulse, heartbeat, brain activity, the works - and it's not as if surviving getting killed is a completely uncommon experience around here. So I'm legally still alive, et cetera.

... Scorch isn't. According to the police report, by the time the cape got there, there wasn't enough left of him in one piece to bother sending to the prison hospital.

I can't even make myself regret it. The bastard wanted to kill me for power - did kill me for power - and instead I got the power and killed him.

So there you have it, Lady Officer, Ma'am. One unrepentant ex-ganger with a murder rap. I can't even argue self-defense, since he'd already killed me by the time I attacked. Put that in your report, and tell my brother to stop trying to pull favors to get me out of here. And if you don't have anything else to add, I'd like to go back to my cell now, please.

Interviewer's analysis: While unrepentant, the prisoner's crimes took place under a situation of extreme duress - and despite her own interpretation of the circumstances, both self-defense and reduced culpability due to severe emotional distress clearly apply, which should be enough to have her sentence reduced to less than the time she has already been incarcerated. As well, her residual anger towards both the meta-human responsible for her father's death as well as the one instrumental in her arrest should give Recruitment ample ground to work from, by offering her a chance to bring them in line.

Recommendation: Transferral of subject to re-education facility 27 under guise of prisoner transfer. Caution will be required in case her brother tries to contact her; standard rehabilitation program cover story should suffice.

Recruiter Gold 2-1-7, signing off.