Damage control

"You pitiful whelp!" your sister yells as she knees you in the head. You fling backwards. Your nose is bleeding and your head is ringing. Your head almost hit the fence post of the sparring arena. Outside it the other orcs disinterestedly spectate the fight.

"Get up, you fucking baby!" she orders as she looks at you: "Why are you always this weak?"

You stagger to your feet, and look at the impending train of a woman getting close to barging into you. You manage to halfway sidestep the attack and the muscular frame only manages to hit your shoulder, the hit makes you propel counterclockwise as you fall back against the wooden railing. You manage to lodge both of your arms behind the railing, holding yourself up by the shoulders. You quickly get back on your feet, before having to immediately dodge a fist flying directly towards you. You swerve right again. Your foothold is only slightly compromised and you are finally in a position to counterattack.

You elbow your sister's side but it does jack shit, and she takes the weak hit as an opportunity to smash her forearm into your head. You stagger backwards, but not before you manage to curl your left around her neck, taking her down with you. With you on your back and her face in the sand, this is a perfect opportunity to do some damage. However, your sister rolls to the side before you manage to get on your feet. You rush her, but she manages to get on her knees in time, and when your obviously telegraphed attack nears her, she knocks your fist to the side and uppercuts your stomach, making it feel like she is forcibly jamming all of your organ up your ribcage. It completely knocks the wind out of you.

You fall down on all fours and you are desperately gasping for air.

"Are you going to cry out to Gwen? You can't." your sister taunts you smugly: "She left you, remember?"

Rage boils inside you as you look at the indignant shit-eating vainglorious attitude and you forget everything about breathing as you rush to her quicker than she expects and you smack her square in the jaw. As she stumbles a few steps backwards you hit her again with your other fist as she falls down hard on the ground. You keep punching her face. You keep punching her face hard. You. Keep. Punching. With every hit the face of your sister morphs into the tangled mess of a kobold bandit, and as soon as you realize what is happening you **** yourself to stop hitting and close your eyes. You let out a scream.

"Pathetic." you hear ringing in your ears as you open your eyes once again. Your sister's intolerable face is back, completely unscathed.

"You might have a name now, Jess," she snarks: "But you can't protect it. It will be forgotten like the rest of us. You can't protect any of them. You can't protect Emily or Claire or Farah or Gwen."

You just stare at her as she easily tilts you back down to the ground. Uncharacteristically for her, she nuzzles herself into your side as she lays her head on your shoulder.

"You were always too afraid." she says as she ceremoniously lifts her arm over your body. In the direct sunlight you can only see a shadowy silhouette of how the arm transforms into a scorpion stinger as it plunges into your stomach causing gratuitous pain.

You clench your stomach in anguish as you find yourself back in the bedroom you fell asleep in. The pressure on your shoulder from your sister's resting head is now substituted by Emily's. She is sound asleep. You carefully boop her nose with your finger. You smile to yourself. You gently grab her shoulder and caress her awake.

The naked woman groggily, slowly opens her eyes and looks directly into yours. A smile forms on her lips when she sees the one subtly plastered on yours.

"Hey." she says softly.

"Hey." you respond.

"How are you, Jess?" she asks.

"My stomach hurts." you answer a bit wearily.

"Yeah, it might act up a bit every now and then. Want me to look at it?"

"Please."

She gets up, her petite naked body revealing itself as the blanket falls down into her lap. She kicks herself out from the grasp of the blanket and slowly moves it down your body, showcasing your naked breasts as well. With a knowing smile she stops removing the blanket right before your private parts. She grabs a small bottle from her bag that lies on the floor next to the bed.

"You're not going to knock me out again, right?" you ask.

"No, no, don't worry." Emily laughs: "This is just ointment."

She laps a bit into her hands and gently applies it to your wound. Her nakedness makes the medical procedure very intimate and weirdly sensual. You can see the gentle determination on the woman's face. She truly cares for you. And you should do so in return. It's only fair. Fair. Fair. Fairness is a new concept to you, you realize.

"There you go." she smiles at you.

"Thank you." you nod.

She lies back down at your side. You look once more upon her beautiful face. You gently caress her cheek. She beams even wider. It makes you think of the dream. How you can't protect her from the world. How you can barely protect yourself. How you can barely protect her from you.

Emily can evidently see that something is not right within you.

"What's wrong, Jess?" she asks a bit nervously.

"... About yesterday." you start.

Her eyes widen. She begins to ramble: "You don't regret it, do you? B-because I really enjoyed it and I thought that maybe we had s-something and that maybe we could do it a-".

Oh... bad choice of words.

"No...about the thing in the stables..." you retry.

Emily stops rambling, and gets slightly embarrassed at the things she so desperately just admitted. She looks down into the bed before nodding: "I don't hate you for it." she says.

"I figured. After last night that is." you say sombrely: "But I still... I was just so... I just couldn't stop."

"You did it to protect me." she tries to reassure you.

"Yeah, but... he got knocked out after two punches. I could have stopped there. I could have bee-"

"Jess, sweetie, please stop, okay?" she cries: "You're a good person. You have to be."

"But what if I'm not?" you retort.

"You are. You have just been suffering for so long that you need help. Someone to care for you." Emily replies, obviously implying that that person would be her.

"Do you think it's that simple?"

"No. It's going to be tough as all hell. But I think you can do it." Emily encourages you.

"If the sheriff doesn't arrest me or worse." a small tear falls down to the pillow: "Everyone thinks I'm a monster, Emily."

"I'll talk to Claire. She seemed to be quite shaken up about it." she nods pragmatically: "you should talk to the sheriff and Farah first. I'm sure those two will see reason if you just explain the situation to them and you tell them the same thing you told me last night. That you want to change and that you care about them and the town. When Claire is ready we will talk to her together."

"Yeah, that makes sense." you nod: "Thank you."

You move in and kiss her on the forehead. Emily gives you a mock pout.

"Hey, missus. If you want to kiss me, you do it on the lips, okay?" she laughs.

"That's fair."

You cock a small smile and you press your lips unto hers before getting ready to start the day.