Chapter 9: Government Aid

Belle had walked through central park before, but not quite like this. It was definitely a novel experience to stroll through greenery taller than the tallest trees. It was even more novel to actually feel said trees break underfoot. To her credit, Belle was trying to keep her steps on the more easily replant-able grass and shrubs, but she wasn’t about to try and do any fancy footwork either. If she tripped, then she would ruin far more foliage than her feet alone could manage.

The airships hovered at a safe distance to the brass woman, but close enough still that anyone knew she was with them. Some scouted ahead, honking their horns to help disperse whatever few stragglers were still near the area.

A bit further into her stroll through the park and Belle had a realization.

She was naked.

The events had been such a flurry of emotions and developments, that it wasn’t until that moment she had truly comprehended the implications of being stark nude at 1000ft tall. The former reporter suddenly felt very shy.

The body felt at once her own and yet not. Even as she got more comfortable moving the thing, it still wasn’t her fleshy form. It was different. Perhaps that was why Belle didn’t seem to mind till now, she thought.

It was only once she reached the current level of comfort and familiarity with her brass form that she began to think “damn, my tits are out.”

Though far from the most pressing of her concerns, she was still quick to try and cover herself. She curled her fingers back over Angelica despite the spy’s protests. That arm crossed over her chest, with her left hand now hugging Angelica close to her sturdy right brass breast.

Her right hand quickly slid--as quick as her lumbering movements could be, at least--over towards her crotch.

The body’s design had an appropriate ‘shape’ where her vagina should be, but it was just for aesthetics and design: non-functional. That is, it was just the appearance of having the genitals rather than actually having them. There was an exterior relief of folds and a slit. It was like a sculpture, only of brass rather than marble. There were no ‘parts’ past the appearance of folds. There was no ‘depth’ to it. She couldn’t even pry the shaped ‘lips’ apart.

Belle wasn’t exactly in the mood to get frisky, but the fact that she couldn’t even if she wanted to stung. She simply had to get out of this body before she lost anymore. It was ironic to her, that the more she became in tune with this brass form, that the more she realized she was missing something.

She tuned back into the military radio channel as she walked. Upon reaching the edge of Central Park, the captain was trying to relay orders on how exactly to move her feet to cause the least amount of damage.

Belle paid it little heed. For one, she was not in the mood for such minutia directions, and secondly, she knew better than them just how awkward it was to move with her form. She had grown more in tune with it, but her legs still felt a bit stiff.

So, she ended up stepping on some small bank building on the outskirts of Central Park’s north side, rather then cleaving her left leg through some newspaper company’s HQ which was a taller building. They chastised her over the radio for it, but said if they didn’t pipe down she’d have to tune out of the station.

That got them to calm down, which made Belle feel a bit better.

To their credit, the military’s announcements over the civilian radio seemed to have worked pretty well. The streets were about as clear as they could be on short notice. Though plenty buildings still crumbled, at least partially, into her footprints, the amount of people caught in them had dropped to near-nil.

When the capital building finally came in sight, Belle’s mood perked up a little. The stately building had a domed top and was wider than it was long. It laid within its own private, walled-in courtyard complete with green grass and a private little fountain and pond no less than 50 square feet at the center.

“Walled-in” meant something entirely different to the 1000ft tall Belle, though, and she simply stepped over the fencing which hardly crested her metal toes. She felt the grass flatten deep into dirt beneath her brass feet.

The courtyard was cleared in advance, and the lack of any panic clearly meant the president had a heads-up.

Belle stood just outside the right-front of the building, facing it. Her width was about the distance between the structure and that private pond. Carefully, she started to squat down to sit on her haunches. While the airships hovered nearby, Belle started lowering her hand to the ground outside the front door. Even at her gentlest, there was still an audible clang when the back of her hand cracked the ground.

Everything was simply so fragile to Belle now.

Some staff rushed out the front door to help Angelica down, but the spry spy simply hopped off the fingers herself, landing flawlessly.

“Ms. Pankhurst”, said one of the suited men. “President Griswold is waiting for your report.”

“Wait.”, said Belle. “I wanna talk to her too.”

“I’ll bring her out when I get the chance. Just wait here Belle. I’ll fill her in on everything.”, said Angelica.

Angelica brushed her hand through her hair and dusted herself off, then followed the men inside.

Belle watched her recent ally disappear behind the doors. She had covered her chest once again with her arm, and her bent legs serving to conceal her crotch. Despite her supposed invulnerability--if Victor’s words were anything to go by--she felt very vulnerable with all the airships watching her.

Seconds passed with the only noises being the propellers and whirrings of the airships. Then, a few minutes later, Belle heard some rumbling through the streets. With large barrels and clunky treads, big bronze geartanks were driving through the nearby roads. Belle grew a tad concerned.

“Angelica, what are those doing here?”, she called out aloud. But, even if Angelica could hear her booming voice through the layers of the capital’s building materials, it seems she couldn't hear Angelica’s response. That was assuming she even saw fit to reply. She certainly didn’t run outside to reassure Belle’s concerns.

So, Belle reopened the radio channel the airships used and talked to them.

“What’s with the geartanks?”

“Ah, one moment.”

Silence for a few seconds as the captain surely consulted someone.

“They were called into the area when we were”, she said. “They just arrived now. Nothing to worry about.”

“Ok.”, said Belle. And, she proceeded to worry about it even more.

Over 15 minutes passed, and Belle began to wonder what was going on in there. There was no attempts to contact her: no aids to the president walking outside to rely information, and certainly not the president herself like Angelica had promised. Meanwhile some of the smaller airships, the ‘airzeps’, had moved to hover not that far from her shoulders.

Belled turned to the left to look at the pond.

‘Such a stately, clear body of water.’, she thought. ‘Shame they closed so many of the public ones.’

It cheered her up for just a moment, then sadness hit her like a locomotive. The face looking back at her from the reflection was not her own. It was a beautiful face, made by the world’s best artists. The hair, the eyes, the mouth and nose: it was all shaped to perfection in its proportions. It was beautiful, more so than her old face but, ultimately, it was not hers.

Belle had lost her old face, her old body, and as big and beautiful as this one is, it wasn’t the same. She didn’t want to be a giant. She didn’t want to be a god. She just wanted to be a reporter people would remember. Yet, here she was, naked on the president’s front lawn, freaking out over the prospect of never getting her old body back.

She was getting impatient. She couldn’t risk waiting too long so that her old body, whatever it was, might rot. She still held out a silly hope that her body wasn’t in the complex when it blew up, but even if it was...

‘The government scientists had to have some spare body around right?’, she thought.

And her thoughts went from sadness to panic. Anxiety that she’d be stuck like this. A tad of frustration that she still didn’t have answers. So, in her haste, she did something rather stupid.

Belle turned towards the roof of the capital building. She moved her hands over near the spherical dome of its center. Her fingers clenched, digging through the stone like it was butter. With a fast movement from her arms, she quickly lifted the roof away before any dangerous rubble could fall down. She haphazardly dropped it in the pond after, where the concrete and bits of metal sank much as they could in the shallow waters.

Naturally, this prompted the nearby airzeps into firing at her. She felt their bullets against her exterior thanks to that steam-based sense of touch under the surface. They were faint tickles if even. Hardly harmful feeling, and indeed they didn’t manage to even dent her exposed shoulders. But, they were distracting nonetheless.

Once again, without thinking, she stretched her arm out to swat one of the airzeps down. Her fingers tore through the balloon part of the craft, even with the metal-shielding over it. The dirigible fell fast into the courtyard.

A call for ceasefire came over the military radio.

“Stop shooting. The president is in the area.”

Belle heard it, then tuned out of the military channel once more. She moved her head over the hole she had made in the building. Part of her face now hung over the leader of the US government, Angelica, and a group of military personnel and scientists who had entered the president’s office.

“Sorry.”, said Belle. “But it’s been awhile, what exactly is going on in here? Can you help me or what? Angelica? Madam President?”

The expression on the president’s face matched those of everyone else in the room: shock. Madam President herself was one Cleora Griswold. She was a career politician with tan skin and silver hair. Close to her 50s, she was still sharp as a tack. Like many presidents in the nation’s recent history, she seemed to care more for the economy than the welfare of the people.

She did want to do what’s best for her country, but in her mind that meant keeping the big business interests happy so that the state of development could keep in the race with all the other nations in the world. To this end, she was most skilled at keeping policies and positions at the precipice of widespread tolerance. Her administration was known for being slow, but calculated and predictive.

Yet, no one could predict the events of today. Oddly enough, the president was the first to speak, even before Angelica.

“Ah! M-miss Braxley. I, I’m sorry but that was not necessary and over the line.”

“Yes I’m sorry madam president, but Angelica said I would get a chance to speak to you, and it’s been awhile.”

“I said to wait!”, said Angelica. Although no rubble fell, she had some dust on her person and wasn’t happy about the fact, brushing it off with a huff.

“You can’t just rip off the roof of the capital building, circumstances be damned.”, said Angelica.

“Angelica!”, said the president. “This is just a misunderstanding.”

“Look, I think at least one of you in here is a scientist right? You, with the coat.”

Her eyes focused on a bespectacled man. The light of her irises shone upon him to make that clear.

“I just want to know if you can put my brain back in my body, or any body, if there’s a way to come back from this. You can, right?”

There was silence in the room for a few seconds. Though Belle was past feeling pain, it felt agonizing all the same.

+“Answer me!”+, she bellowed, her voice shaking the chamber and causing everyone inside to cover their ears.

“Yes!”, said Cleora. “We can do it, we’re just... discussing how. If you can give us more time, we’ll get back to. Just, please, stay still and don’t move or touch anything. These are... unprecedented circumstances. Angelica has filled me in on the events of the Voxhaben Complex. I’m... sorry for your current fate.”

Belle seemed to calm. She nodded, her face conveying a hint of shame as she turned back away from the building.

“Thank you.”

With one loud little mini-quake, she let her brass rump fall to the courtyard in a proper sit. Some shrubs flattened beneath it, but Belle didn’t care. She hugged her knees close to her chest for comfort, and waited.

And waited, and waited about a bit more before she started to realize she heard something. Little voices growing louder. It was those inside. Without the roof in the way, she was able to start picking up their conversations even though they seemed to whisper. The auditory mechanisms in her ears were shifting: it felt odd, just like much about her body at times. Still, it resulted in their voices being better picked up. Bits and snippets. She had wanted to hear them, and her body responded.

“We... need more men for that... else... not work...” said Angelica’s voice.

“Too... strong for that...”, said a man’s voice. A bit squeaky, probably that scientist or doctor from earlier.

“I... don’t want to risk... all those men... can’t... abide... this level... destruction.”, came the president’s voice after.

Belle grew concerned again. Something was going on. She felt another sense of hers tingle. It was a new one: the sensing of radio waves. There was a channel being used nearby inside the capital building. IT was encrypted like the military’s. Belle focused on listening to it. If cracking the military’s channel was like kicking down a door, getting access to that channel was like blowing apart a solid metal wall. Still, it couldn’t resist her for long, and she was able to listen to the channel.

“This is Doctor Smith of the termination and analysis team, responding to the inquiry set out by Angelica a few minutes ago. Relay my response to her and the president. No matter if the technology is understood, we can cut into whatever ‘Black Box’ container is used for the brain and just terminate the subject thus. Although we had to use executive powers to do so, we also managed to acquire enough metal cutters for the job. I don’t think any sedatives can reach the brain obviously, so it’s probably best to just trick her into laying down or something.”

Belle wanted to scream, but she kept her mouth shut, and she refrained from ‘talking’ onto the channel herself. It sounded like some aid was getting a message from some team: a team meant to cut her open and ‘terminate’ her.

She didn’t want to believe it, but her ears focused, listened to the building. The elaborate cones and gears in her ear shifted. She could hear the pitter-patter of some flats against the smooth hardwood. She heard the door open, and she heard some woman, whispering into into the ears of the President and, then Angelica. She knew it was them, as she recognized the faint, hushed “understood” they each gave off.

‘Those monsters, they don’t think I can hear them. They thought to kill me.’

Belle moved to rest on her knees now. The building shook from her shift in position. Her face hovered over the gaping hole of the executive office where Angelica, the President, and the others were still gathered.

“Ah, Belle, A bit more time please dear!”, said the President.

“What a damned worm you are.”, said Belle.

“I-I beg your pardon!?”

Belle moved her hand into the room. Everyone inside screamed. She pinned the President, Angelica, and a few of the others under her brass thumb.

“Belle, what the damn are you-”

“I heard it, all of it. Where’s my body? You said you could help me.”

The President stammered.

“I-”

“Don’t play dumb. I heard the radio. Seems you didn’t adapt quick enough, maybe Angelica didn’t rely that I could listen in to radio did she? Slipped her mind? I heard you whispering too. I’ll ask again, where’s my body!”

The people squirmed beneath her digit. She could feel them.

‘Worms.’, she thought again.

“Guards, do something-”, said the President, but she was interrupted.

“It’s gone.”, shouted Angelica. “You ate it.”

“What? I would’ve remembered that.”

“I saw it. I saw everything once they extracted your brain. Victor made me watch. He said it’d serve as the first bit of fuel for ‘our new god.’. The first ‘sacrifice’. His words... not mine. The man was mad, Belle.”

“No, that’s not true, I would’ve felt that, like I felt it when I ate him and his goons.”

She pressed harder with her thumb. Someone’s something cracked, she heard it, but it was a man’s, so not Angelica or the president. Cleora did let out one heck of a scream though.

“It was hours before you awoke. You were asleep for some time after they put your brain in the Black Box thing. Think about it Belle, the back-part of your head wasn’t on when you underwent surgery, yet was seamlessly and smoothly integrated when you woke up. That took time, all the while your freaky steam stomach was cooking your brainless corpse.”

Belle felt a surge of anger run through her. She was tempted to pop them all beneath her thumb than and there, but Angelica spoke the truth. She had to be.

“By the time you were awake.”, spoke Angelica. “You already ‘digested’ your old body. There’s no going back Belle, we can’t put your brain in a new body: that’s just absurd. We did bring it up to the doctor here, honest, but no one knows how to connect neurons like that. Damnable Victor didn’t even know how that Black Box of his fully worked, and that’s the only example of a brain interfacing to any body other than the one it was born in.”

Belle slowly moved her finger away, but her anger still boiled.

“Fine, I believe you, but you were still gonna kill me, give up on me.”

Angelica replied, slowly rising to her feet. Her ankle had been twisted, but she hid the pain well.

“Belle, just walking to the capital you’ve ended dozens of lives and caused more damage than the city has ever seen. You’re gigantic, you weigh several tones. The city can’t handle you.”

“And that’s an excuse to kill me? I’m a reporter, not some common idiot. I’ve read about the government’s scandals. You were gonna cut up my body, study it, weren’t you?”

The President herself chimed up.

“Belle, there’s steamtech within you decades ahead of our current levels. If we can figure out how that works, the United States will be able to cement ourselves as leaders of the world. Our country will prosper, our interests secured. Yes you’d die, but you’d be a hero. You’d be a patriot.”

Belle scowled.

‘Damnable drivel, all of it.’, she thought.

Angelica spoke again.

“Think about it Belle. You always wanted to be remembered right?”

Belle paused. Rage coursed through her body. She was losing track of her emotions again. She could feel the minibots again took, her body took in all the tactile sensations it could get.

Then, after some tense seconds, she spoke.

“I understand.”

Belle slowly started to stand up to her full and imposing 1000ft height.

“Y-you, you do?”, said Cleora.

“Yes, I understand perfectly. “I understand that for all his repulsiveness and evil, Victor was right about one thing...”

Belle lifted her right foot over the middle of the capital building. Her metallic sole glistened above as they screamed.

“You politicians are rotten, scheming worms.”

Angelica muttered. “B-belle!”

The brass woman wasn’t having it. She put all her might into her right leg and stomped.

Just like that, Belle had assassinated the president of the United States: underfoot. The building crumbled as chunks of rubble sprayed out from the impact. Angelica, Cleora, and some of the government's top military officials, scientists, doctors, and aids were crushed flat beneath her step.

Belle was still angry, pissed. Yet, a new feeling reached her.

She felt powerful.

The president, their top spy, and their much of their cabinet had just been flattened under the eyes of the military nearby. The airzeps gave a bird’s eye view, after all.

As Belle twisted her colossal foot in the remains, smiling, the airships started to fire at her.

Belle talked over their radio channel, as well as aloud with her normal voice.

“None of those ticklish pebbles of yours are hurting me. I’ve got a lot of stuff to think over right now, how about you just surrender, and give me some space for a bit.”

The fire intensified, with the captain ordering other the channel to unleash everything they had on Belle. Then, the captain said to keep the communication low, as that ‘monster’ could hear.

Belle sighed.