Who's in Charge 1
by Alpesco
Brionn takes responsibility.


Mr Bannor was a powerful man. Ryan, Giorgiu, Paulus and I knew that well. We
had been assigned to work at his research institute upcountry for four months
now. It was one of those experimental alternatives to prison. Our work was
easy but boring - testing chemical-resistant seed cultures, and we had to live
under tight security, sixty miles from nowhere.

As for Mr Bannor, I could see how it suited him to have us working on his
project. He had trained staff he didn't have to pay, and none of us could
leave the facility to talk about the work we did here.

Each night, after work, Mr Bannor's security staff locked us into our living
area on the south side of the large mansion in which the facility was set.
Three other technicians and I shared four small rooms, a corridor, bathroom
and TV/recreation room on the top floor. Those were the rules. We knew about
them when we were given this eight month assignment. But we still hated them.

Mr Bannor's Project Manager, Mr Eppston, was normally in day-to-day charge of
the facility. But today he had been called away to a meeting, and he had taken
two of the three security guards with him. They were supposed to be back by
now, but a big snowstorm had set in a few hours after they left, and no-one
had returned.

At dusk Evans, the one remaining security guard locked us in our quarters. As
we looked out at the falling snow, we began to realise that Mr Eppston and his
heavies might be away for several days. That was good news. We had been handed
the ideal opportunity to slacken off, and gain a break from our normal routine
of work and confinement.

Outside our cramped quarters there was a whole big house, with a gym, jacuzzi,
bar and cinema that no one was using. There were telephones out there too.
With Eppston and his goons gone, we might even be able to make a few calls
out.

At 8.30 there came the usual sound of a key turning in the outer door that led
to the main corridor. We looked up, expecting to see the lone security guard,
accompanying Mrs Lawrence, who brought our dinners.

In fact it was even better. It was Mr Eppston's new assistant, Brionn Landeck,
who came in with Mrs Lawrence from the kitchens. The older woman set the trays
on the table while the younger one watched. I'd seen Brionn a couple of times
before. She was only about nineteen, blonde, good-looking, and a slim six feet
in height. She was wearing a white shirt, and a short dark skirt which exposed
long, suntanned legs.

"Hasn't Mr Eppston got back?" Giorgiu asked as the girl opened the door to let
Mrs Lawrence out. He was an engineer, almost fifty, and nearly three inches
shorter than the girl at five foot nine, but he weighed at least 200 pounds,
with a thickset, heavy build.

The girl shook her head, re-locking the outer door. "All the roads are blocked
by the storm, and they may not be cleared for a few days, so we have no idea
when Mr Eppston and the rest of the security staff will get back."

"Okay," Paulus said. He was the computer technician of our workgroup, thirty
years old, six feet tall and very thin. "We've been locked up in these
quarters for twenty weeks now. Since we're cut off, and most of the staff are
missing, we think things should be a little less formal.

"Less formal - how?" Brionn looked at him.

"We should cancel the work details for the duration, and we shouldn't be
locked up in these rooms."

"No way." the girl frowned. "We run the facility as normal while I'm in
charge."

"But we're snowed-in," I said. "There are no security staff. We could lose
power at any time."

"If we lose power I'll think again about procedures," Brionn said. "But as of
now, I'm not authorising any changes. The rules stand."

"Screw the rules!" Giorgiu snarled. "We're not in jail. I've had it up to here
with being locked up fourteen hours a day. The Director's not here. The
security team's absent. So we're coming out, and you're not going to stop us."

"Nothing's changed," the girl said, her face beginning to harden. "You'll stay
right here tonight, and you'll work as usual tomorrow."

She turned for the door. "Just settle down and eat your meals before they get
cold."

"No way, kid," the lanky figure of Paulus moved between her and the door and
held out his hand. "Let me have the keys."

Brionn slipped them back into her pocket, turning so that she could see all
four of us. "Move back from the door, Paulus," she said, " ... and sit down."

"Or what?" Giorgiu snorted. "Do you see us? Four guys. And you - one teenage
girl. Just give us the keys and run off back to your notepad. We're not being
ordered around by you."

Brionn stiffened. I could see her body tense, and saw the first sign of
trouble. Her legs were really long and slender, but as they tensed I could see
that they were solid-packed with toned and defined muscle. In fact they looked
rock hard. As I watched, two large, perfect teardrops defined themselves above
her knees.

"I warn you," Brionn frowned. "I'm trained in restraint techniques and martial
arts." Her long hands curled into surprisingly large, bony fists. Her upper
body was hidden in her long-sleeved shirt, but her arms were really long. And
as they tensed, I was sure I could see the material around her biceps begin to
tighten and distort.

But I must have been imagining it. To make an impression on those loose
sleeves, she would have to have really huge biceps.

"Just give me the keys!" An impatient Paulus made to grab her left arm at the
wrist. But the girl's speed surprised him as she grasped his wrist first, then
used her long arm to twist his own arm smoothly down, round, and up behind his
back! It was done so quickly and easily, I could hardly believe what had
happened. She was 18. He was 30. They were both about the same height and
weight, but the young woman's long left arm had overpowered his with alarming
ease!

He gave a moan of pain as I watched his arm twisted half-way up his back. And
still the girl continued to force his right arm higher and higher - seemingly
with no effort at all. There was even a slight smile on her face as her arm
continued to twist upward.

"Oooouuggghhhh!" Paulus cried out loud, his whole body now forced forward by
the continuing unrelenting pressure on his arm. Within moments his body was
bent over almost double and he was moaning in pain.

I watched the girl's long fingers tighten and squeeze, biting harshly into his
wrist, and inflicting even more pain.

Ouggghhh! Ouuwwwwww! Oooooowwww!! Let me go!" He howled, writhing at the end
of her grip like a naughty schoolboy.

"Kneel down," Brionn ordered impassively.

I never thought he'd do it. But, to my horror, almost immediately Paulus fell
to his knees. "Stop!" he begged. "Stop! Please let me go! You're breaking my
arm!"

The three of us stared, open-mouthed, unable to believe that her single arm
had been able to reduce this tall thirty-year-old to subservience so quickly.

"Are you going to do as I say?" she asked, and I saw her long fingers squeeze
again.

"Aaaaayaaahhhhh!" Paulus screamed, writhing impotently in the girl's steely
grip. It was pitiable to see the man humiliated so easily by this teenage
girl.

"I can break your arm sooo easy," Brionn said gently. "Just don't tempt me."

"No. Please! I won't. I won't!"

"Let go of him!" Watching Brionn's continuing humiliation of Paulus had become
too much for Giorgiu and Ryan, who both now strode angrily forward.

Giorgiu made a grab for Brionn's arm, catching hold of her shirtsleeve.
Releasing the moaning Paulus, the young woman pulled sharply away, tearing
open the sleeve of her shirt, to reveal the surprisingly-defined muscles
beneath.

In the same movement, she ducked beneath the heavier man's flailing arm,
rising quickly to let her own right arm send two lightning-fast jabs spiking
into his face.

Her action took less than a heartbeat, but to my astonishment, Giorgiu was
sent reeling backward. Surely those two light punches hadn't been able to do
that to so large a man? I was even more startled to see blood trickling from a
deep gash above his eye, and another dark red stream pouring from a suddenly
swollen and misshapen lip.

Already the girl had spun back to face Ryan, her long right leg lancing up
powerfully to crash into the middle of his chest. The sheer power of the blow
was astonishing, I heard Ryan's bones rattle with the impact, his chest
echoing like a kettle-drum as the five-foot-ten Ryan was sent hurtling
backward six yards across the room. He struck the table with astonishing
force, before crashing heavily to the floor.

Without a second's pause, Brionn turned back to the heavy-set Giorgiu. Two
more swift jabs cracked into his face as he tried to steady himself from the
effects of her first two sharp blows. The harsh sound of their impact echoed
round our small common-room like pistol shots. The sound was combined with the
larger man's unexpectedly loud groans of pain. I was still astonished by how
hard the girl's blows hit. They were so fast I could barely see them land -
but their impact was amazingly loud and fierce. It sounded really bad as they
crashed in. And their recipient acted like they were doing real damage - he
staggered backward once more, flinching, and moaning in pain.

But there was no respite. Three, four, five times more, the girl's heavy fists
crumped into the heavier man's head and body. Each blow rocked him visibly.
His whole body shuddered as the blows crashed home. I watched, open mouthed,
astonished by how hard this slim, long-armed kid could hit. The guy was
already looking out of it. His face a mass of cuts and bruises.

What really surprised me was that Giorgiu did not seem able to respond or
retaliate. The girl's blows were so fast that even though he made a few
flustered attempts to hit her back, he was out of his depth. He swung at her,
but her reach was so long that she was able to keep well out of range. She
simply swayed backward, then sent her long arms in to strike him again and
again with punishing force.

Brionn was less than half Giorgiu's age, two thirds his weight, but her heavy
jabs were really taking a toll on him. Incredibly, Giorgiu was swaying. His
movements suddenly seemed slow and clumsy. He looked at her through half
closing eyes. I couldn't believe how much damage she'd done in a few seconds.
The girl's arms were just so strong! His face was a mess - almost
unrecognisable - misshapen and running with blood. His lips, cheek and eyes
were swollen and darkening.

"Not so arrogant now, are you?" Brionn said, suspending her rain of jabs for a
moment. She still looked cool and totally untroubled. Apart from her torn
shirtsleeve, she could just have emerged from a business meeting. "I warned
you not to mess with me..."

She flexed her long right arm and I gasped. From nowhere this huge,
full-bellied bicep gathered itself, swelling and hardening until it was the
size of a small melon - but far denser and more powerful. Most men her height
would have loved to own a bicep three quarters the size. But on this
nineteen-year-old it was amazing.

"Wow!" I said involuntarily. Her flexed arm was easily more than half the
diameter of her waist.

"Cool, isn't it?" Brionn said. "That's one solid bitch of a muscle."
Languidly, she let her arm relax, and turned for the door, casually taking the
key from her pocket and turning it in the lock.

"Take that as a lesson," she said to the bleeding Giorgiu. "Don't try to take
advantage."

Giorgiu began an uncertain move forward, but as Brionn's right hand re-formed
into a fist, he stepped hurriedly back again, raising a hand as if to ward off
a blow. Ryan had still not got back to his feet after his collision with the
table. And at the girl's feet, Paulus was still massaging his damaged wrist.

Brionn was able to open the door to the outer corridor under no threat at all.
"Get to bed now," she ordered. "There will be no delays to the project while
I'm in charge. You will be ready for a full day's work at 8 am tomorrow as
normal."

She shut the door behind her and we heard the key turn in the lock.

"Why didn't you help!" Ryan turned on me.

"It all happened so fast!" I stammered. "I couldn't believe she beat up on you
so easy. There were three of you guys. How could she do that to you?"

"The bitch knows kung fu or something," Ryan finally drew himself to his feet
nearby. He winced as he felt his chest where her foot had impacted. In
addition, he had banged his head against the wall as he fell, and was nursing
a large bruise. He stretched out a hand to steady himself against the wall.
"Boy can she kick!"

"And my arm - I think she tore something. It still hurts!" Paulus nursed his
bruised right arm in his left. "She twisted it so far up my back, she almost
broke it!"

Giorgiu turned to look in a mirror, and winced when he saw his own face. "The
bitch!" he spat, slurring his words through his swollen lips. "She hit so
fast! There's blood everywhere, cuts, bruises! I gotta get cleaned up." He
made to walk toward the bathroom, but stumbled sideways into the wall.

"You better sit down," I said, guiding him into an easy-chair. "And we'll sort
you out."

"How did she do that to you?" Paulus studied the bruised and bloody Giorgiu.
"You must be twice her weight. Why didn't you hit her back?"

"The bitch was so fast," Giorgiu mumbled. He sounded confused. I was sure he
must have a minor concussion. "I swung, but I couldn't connect.. And you can't
believe those hits man, they're so hard. It's like twenty pound rocks that
keep smashing into your face.. There's pain, lights, everything starts to
spin.."

We had a medical kit in our quarters, which I ended up using mostly on
Giorgiu. Having taken all of Brionn's punches, he was in a far worse state
than the other two. His face was covered in cuts and bruises, but when we took
off his shirt I was surprised to see that his upper body was also pocked with
large, weeping bruises, rapidly darkening to a deep purple-black. There was
also a deep cut along his clavicle. Even having watched the girl's jabs land,
I was surprised by how much damage they'd done.

"You'll be stiff for a week," I said. "You'll need a day-off tomorrow,
whatever happens."

"We'll ALL have a day off tomorrow," Paulus said. "We're not letting that
bitch get away with this."

One by one, we retired to bed. And when morning came, the snow continued to
fall heavily.

At 8am the door to the main corridor opened, and Brionn entered with Mrs
Lawrence and another girl helping her carry our breakfast trays.

"It's no use your coming back," Ryan said, as soon as he saw Brionn. "We
aren't going to work until our demands are met. We want time off, phonecalls,
use of leisure facilities, and access to the whole house."

Brionn frowned. "If you refuse to work, I'll just confine you to your
quarters. You'll stay right here, and you'll get minimum rations - one bowl of
oatmeal a day until you come round."

She nodded to Mrs Lawrence and her assistant. "Pick up those trays and take
them back to the kitchen."

"Are you sure?" Mrs Lawrence asked.

Brionn nodded. "The breakfasts go straight back to the kitchens. And you will
see that these men get only the one bowl of oatmeal each day until I change
the order. They're to get their oatmeal daily at 4pm."

"Of course, Miss Landeck. But it's such cold weather for them to be going
hungry."

"Their welfare is my concern," the young woman snapped. "If they don't work,
they don't eat. And you can tell the caretaker I want all heating and power
turned off to this unit."

"Mrs Lawrence," I said, as the older woman turned away. "You can't do that!"

"I have to do as Brionn says," Mrs Lawrence said, "I can't alter matters. If I
don't obey Brionn, she can fire me, and I need this job." She turned away and
left.

"When you're willing to co-operate," Brionn said to the four of us, "just tell
a member of staff. They'll let me know. And so that you don't take too long
making up your minds, for every hour you waste here, I'm going to have you
make-up two in your own leisure time."

"Okay, bitch!" Ryan spat. "There's no way we're taking this crap. We're
busting out!" He raised his hand to wave us forward, but before we could move,
Brionn's long fingers had formed themselves into that surprisingly large fist
of hers, and she had driven it three times sharply into the left side of his
face.

The movement was so quick, I hardly saw it. Her fist was literally a blur as
her right arm moved forward and back like a piston. I heard three sharp cracks
in the space of a heartbeat. Three dull groans, "Uuurrgh. Uuuurrgghh!
Uuuuooorrrgghh!" And suddenly the six foot Ryan was stumbling backward with
blood streaming down his face.

He managed to halt himself after falling back a half dozen paces, but to my
astonishment, that was all he was able to do. His legs looked as if they were
made of rubber. He swayed so drunkenly from side to side that I feared he
would fall right over. Surely the girl's three jabs couldn't have done all
that?

"You b..bitch!" His words were slurred as he took a step forward and tried to
hit her. But his furious swing missed by a mile. The slim girl took a
controlled step back and then unleashed her right hand once again. This time
there was only one punch. But this time she'd been able to draw her fist fully
back, and so was able to generate a lot more power. The crack of this blow was
more than twice as loud as any of the three previous impacts, as it crashed
into his temple.

Ryan's head was twisted round through a hundred and forty degrees as his whole
body was hurled back by the force of the punch. He slammed heavily into the
back wall with a deep groan. Then he fell forward, stumbling to his knees.
Brionn observed him for a moment, her fist still clenched. But when he made no
attempt to get back to his feet, she turned, strode out of the room, and
locked the door behind her.

The three of us looked back at Ryan, who was dripping a startlingly large pool
of blood onto the carpet. He seemed barely conscious. He was still on his
knees, but now had his hands splayed out in front of him for support. I was
appalled. The girl had done this with just four blows from her right hand.

"Are you okay, Ryan?" I asked.

Ryan's voice was so slurred now I couldn't understand him. I tried to get him
back to his feet, but he seemed to have lost all control over his limbs. It
took two of us to haul him back to his feet, and into a chair.

"I didn't see them coming," Ryan murmured. "There were just these three...
explosions. Then... that last one - it was like walking into a truck! That
bitch hits so hard!"

"It still hurts all over where she hit me!" Giorgiu said as all the lights in
our rooms suddenly went out. "She doesn't look like she can do it, but the kid
hits like a sledgehammer...

"What are we going to do?" I said. I could feel the temperature in our common
room dropping rapidly. "We can't hold out long without food and heating.
Hadn't we better give-in, before we have too many hours work to make up?"

"She can't make us work extra hours."

"How are we going to stop her? She seems able to do anything she wants here."

"All we have to do is take her down," Ryan said, feeling his bruised jaw. "But
we have to all go for her at once. Not let her take us one by one like last
time. What we do, is pretend to capitulate, then overpower her out in the
open. There are another four guys like us here. We find them, and take over."

We knocked on the door. Evans, the security guard appeared, and went off with
our message, reappearing 15 minutes later to unlock the door. "Miss Landeck
says to bring you to the gym."

We looked at each other. The gym would be ideal for what we had in mind.

....Continued in Part 2.