Pairing: Polly/Mal implied.
Rating: C
Summary: Polly is beaten in more ways than one. Mal/Polly overtones.

Disclaimer: The author makes no claim to owning the rights of anything to do with Terry Pratchett or Discworld.

Broken
by Hayseed

"Stupid little girls shouldn't play at war," the soldier said in a deceptively sweet voice. "They could get hurt."

And with a grunt, he kicked Polly in the side again.

She couldn't help the hissing sound of air escaping her gut; that sort of thing was involuntary. But she wasn't going to cry out. After all, she hadn't yet.

They'd discovered her gender pretty much immediately, despite the short hair and shapeless uniform. It wasn't that Polly was openly making an effort to pass for a man these days, it was just... easier.

Maladicta still wore her female uniform and had let her hair grow out over the years, but she had the benefit of extra-long teeth. She was taken seriously no matter what. Whereas Polly...

Well, being slight and having curly hair meant that as a boy, she just had to be that much more of a bastard, but as a girl, officers tried to pat her on the head and send her home.

Which was why there was a censure in her file for breaking a lieutenant's wrist. A Borogravian lieutenant. In her defense, he called her 'sweetheart.'

Socks were more trouble than they were worth.

But this battle, this most-recent struggle, had been... worse than usual. There had been something extra behind it.

Now, all battles were bad. But Polly had more or less gotten used to the blood and smoke, the screaming and then the deafening quiet. She'd learned that killing might be tricky, but it was the not-dying you really had to watch for. She could watch one of her lads fight alongside her without her heart in her stomach any more.

Besides, Maladicta was always right beside her, grinning and shouting orders.

She'd once asked her if maybe soldiering wasn't a great profession for a recovering vampire. "There are others that are worse," Mal had replied airily. "I suppose it's like... working in a slaughterhouse for humans. Besides, it has the added benefit of absolutely enraging my mother."

Polly hadn't persisted. She liked to think of Maladicta as her friend, which meant she couldn't listen much to vampire logic.

And she was pretty sure Mal reciprocated. After all, when she'd been taken into custody, the Zlobenians had to load the vampire up with about a dozen arrows -- four in the head -- to keep her from coming after them. Even with that, Mal had still been trying to convince her nerveless limbs to move. "We'll come get you, Sarge," Mal had screamed as Polly's hands were tied to the pommel of a Zlobenian saddle. "We'll burn the bastards alive to get you back!"

It was, in fact, the image that Polly had held on to. Especially after they found out she was a woman.

Never before had she been so grateful to Gummy Abbens. The first two soldiers that had attempted to access her 'forbidden fruits' had wound up not only with aching socks, but a broken nose, a shattered wrist, and three black eyes between them. And Polly actually got the drop on the third soldier with similar thoughts on his mind, taking his sword off him, running him through, and almost escaping from the prison entirely.

They mostly left her alone after that. At least, when she was in her cell.

In the Chamber, however, it was a different matter. The Chamber was all about information extraction, therefore anything went.

"You should never have gotten involved in this," the soldier told her, delivering another sharp kick to her left kidney. His pips told her he was a corporal -- dimly, she wondered if his sergeant had given him the order to beat up what he clearly considered a 'little girl.' "And there's an easy way out, girl. You know what it is."

"Go..." Polly wheezed, spitting out a mouthful of blood. "Go to hell." She even said it in Zlobenian, to make a point.

"Where is Froc?" he asked, leaning down so that his lips almost touched her ear. "Our sources say you personally meet with the general on a frequent basis, so you must know where he is."

"Last I heard, he was having tea with the Soul Cake Duck," Polly mumbled. "Better go check with him."

The corporal growled. "Stop protecting your lover and talk!"

"My lover?" Polly echoed, trying to get her head around that particular mental image. "Me and... General Froc?" She let out an insane giggle and propped herself up on her elbows. "Your intelligence is further off than you think, Corporal."

A vicious slap on the cheek sent her reeling backward, her head cracking audibly on the floor. As the world faded to black, she saw the corporal leaning over her and rolling his eyes. "Take her back to her cell," he shouted, "she's no good to..."

Polly awoke to nothing but darkness. Groping her way to her hands and knees, she realized three things. One, she was back in her cell. Two, it was clearly nightfall. And three, little imps were cheerfully hammering nails into her skull.

"Ah, bugger," she muttered. What if she had a... what d'you call it? A concussion. Igor had warned them all about concussion -- the pain, the dizziness, and then the sleep you might not ever wake up from.

She coughed thinly, wincing at the taste of blood.

It was only a matter of time. She couldn't hold out forever, and the only question was would the corporal accidentally kill her before she cracked. At this rate, it was likely.

Slowly, Polly took inventory. Possible concussion, at least four broken ribs, a wrist that wasn't looking very good, and a side that was at the very least bruised. She'd have to wait until daylight to see if something had ruptured. "If you pith blood," she remembered Igor saying, "that'th bad. I can fix it, if I have enough time."

Moving as carefully as she could, she forced herself to stand up, letting out a quiet moan as her ribs ground against each other. There wasn't a special ointment in the world that could take care of this.

Psst.

Tears sprang to her eyes as she tried to give her hand an experimental flex. "Shit," she hissed.

Polly, is that you?

"Oh, no," she said. "I'm dead. Why the hell do I still hurt if I'm dead?"

Don't be an idiot. You're not dead.

"Of course I'm dead," she said, rolling her eyes. "I'm talking to Death, aren't I? Anyway, it's not like I wasn't expecting it. I've been spitting blood for eight days now."

Just come over to the window. You'll see.

Polly looked through the bars, seeing a darkness about as complete as the black in her cell. But if she squinted, she could make out a dark shape, distinctly batlike, outlined against the stars. "Oh, good, I'm hallucinating," she managed.

"They've really done a number on you, haven't they, Sarge?" the bat said. It sounded almost cheerful.

She gaped. "Mal?"

There was a weird sound, Polly blinked, and there was Maladicta, standing beside her in the dark room. Her teeth flashed in a wide smile. "I've been looking for you ever since they took you," she said. "I have to say this about Zlobenia -- they know how to hide their prisons."

"How... how long has it been?" Polly asked, hating the trembling in her voice.

"Tomorrow'll be six weeks," Mal said solemnly.

"Six?" Polly echoed faintly. Her knees gave out and she very nearly screamed as she slid to the floor, all of her broken parts protesting the motion. "Six weeks?" She could feel the tears on her cheeks.

"Aww... Sarge..."

And Polly felt cool skin wrapping around her, a smooth cheek pressed to hers. She closed her eyes, welcoming the first pain-free contact she'd had in... well, six weeks, apparently. "Mal," she whispered.

"I'm trying to get you out, Pol," Maladicta whispered, lips moving against Polly's cheek. "I don't know how, but I'm going to get you home. And then we're going to put a serious dent in the Zlobenians' day. You and me, right, Sarge?"

"Right," Polly mumbled.

Mal loosened her grip and held Polly at arm's length. They were still close enough that Polly could see the shock in the vampire's expression. "You're in bad shape, Pol."

"I know," she sighed. "I hurt."

"Well, aren't you lucky that your auntie Mal has come prepared for every eventuality?" she asked with a broad wink, pulling something out of her jacket. "I happen to have here... special ointment!"

"Even if you are a hallucination," Polly gasped, "I love you."

The teeth flashed again. "And some food. It's not much -- I can't go bat with a whole lot extra -- but better than what they've been feeding you, I'm sure."

"I don't know," she said thoughtfully. "Blind scubbo's been on the menu a lot recently. I'm afraid my palette has changed."

She didn't know what it was Mal handed her, and she didn't care. All she knew was that for the first time in a long time, her stomach wasn't empty. She ate slowly, carefully, letting Mal rub comforting circles on her back as her stomach threatened to heave -- it really had been too long since she'd eaten.

And afterward, she just let herself drift. She made token protests as Mal stripped her down and started rubbing the ointment into her various wounds, but her hands were gently batted away. The pain didn't disappear, but it faded to a bearable level.

"Thank you," she whispered. "I don't know how much longer I can last, Mal."

The hands, smelling of coffee and camphor, pulled Polly's thin blanket up. "Long enough, Sarge," Mal said. "Just remember, I'm coming for you. Just hold on to that."

And she did. She had to. It was all she had left.

"Do you want to die?" the corporal asked, hitting her again with his strap. "Is that it? Who are you protecting, girl?"

Blood ran down her chin, but she stayed silent.

The ointment didn't work as well as it once did, and the food didn't fill her as well as it used to. Days turned into weeks, but Mal still came every night, her hands moving across Polly's broken body, leaving comfort in their wake.

"How long?" Polly whispered.

"Soon," Mal replied, smoothing Polly's hair out of her eyes.

The corporal brought his elbow down on Polly's shin and she screamed as the bone gave way.

"I don't like hurting you," he said conversationally. "If you'd just tell me what you know, I wouldn't have to hurt you any more."

Her other shin snapped, and she screamed even louder.

"Fuck... you..." she gasped, once the bright spots cleared from her vision.

"No, we tried that, too, now didn't we?" he asked. "And still, you won't even tell me your name. That's all I want to know, child. Just your name."

And somehow, it sounded perfectly reasonable. After all, why wouldn't he want to know her name?

"S-sergeant," she whispered. "Sergeant Polly Perks."

Maladicta found her sobbing on the floor of her cell. "What?" she asked fiercely. "What did those bastards do to you?"

"I... I talked," Polly wailed.

Blinking, Mal just shook her head and began taking off Polly's clothes, looking for new injuries. "No, you didn't."

"But I did," she said, hiccupping with the force of her tears. "I told them my name."

"So?" Mal looked diffident. "As wonderful as you are, Polly, I doubt the Zlobenian army is interrogating you because they want to know more about your personal life." She made clucking noises as she saw the damage to Polly's legs. "So what? Tell 'em your name. Tell 'em all about the Duchess, and Paul, and how your father taught you to dance by letting you stand on his feet. Whatever you need to do to stay alive."

"But..."

And Maladicta's arms were around her again. "Polly, I know you," she said in a serious voice. "You're alone, and you're in pain, but you're not broken yet. You won't surrender without a fight, and let me tell you, old chap, we haven't even begun to fight."

More tears fell, staining the front of Mal's uniform. "I just want it to stop. I don't even care how."

"Don't say stuff like that!" Mal hissed, grabbing Polly's shoulders and pulling her back to glare at her. "You don't ever say that! You're going to survive this, soldier, and that's an order!"

With a weak grin, Polly pulled her hand up in a salute. "Yes, ma'am!"

Maladicta relaxed, and something in Polly realized a tiny bit of what was going on.

"And did we rest well, Sergeant Perks?" the corporal asked smartly, strapping her into a chair she'd never seen before.

"The room service isn't what it once was," Polly replied. "I ordered a hot towel, but it was hours and hours before the maid brought it in."

He placed a strange-looking helmet on her head. "Well, it's hard to find good help these days."

"Don't I know it," Polly continued conversationally, "I used to be a barmaid, you know. By the way, do you mind telling me what it is you've got me tied to?"

The corporal grinned. "Oh, I think it's best if you learn that on your own. See you in a bit!" And with a cheery wave, he was gone.

Three hours later, she realized the whole point of the chair was to keep her as uncomfortable as it possibly could. The knobs welded to every part of the seat and back dug into her flesh, and shifting around soon became an exercise in agony.

The helmet she was still working on, though. As far as she could figure out, its only purpose was to be hatefully heavy.

Four more hours passed and she had it all worked out.

Well, it didn't actually take the whole four hours. All she needed was that thirty seconds when her neck grew too tired to hold up the helmet and her whole head fell forward. Polly thrashed as her lungs began screaming for air, head jerking up at the pain from the seat knobs.

And it happened more and more often, as her neck got weaker and weaker.

The bastard was going to suffocate her!

"I see we've figured it out, then," the corporal said brightly as he entered the Chamber.

She gave him a venomous glare. "You're gonna die a slow, painful death."

"A prophet, are we? Well, Sergeant Polly Perks, that's just not the information I'm looking for, so I'm afraid you've just earned yourself an extra two hours in the chair before we have another little chat." And with that, he turned and walked out.

Her scream of rage was wordless.

By the time he came back in the room, there were tears running down her face.

"Ah, I think maybe we have made a... breakthrough," the corporal said with a hateful little chuckle. He was holding a steaming cup of... something drinkable, and he took a long draught from it, giving her a smirk.

Polly wished he was close enough to spit on but settled instead for rolling her eyes. "Will you let me out?" she said, her voice raspy.

"That depends. You see, Polly -- may I call you Polly? -- there are certain things my superiors want to know, and we're pretty sure you know them. So, tell me what I need to know, and I'll see about getting you out of there." He took another drink. "But if you lie to me, little girl, I can guarantee that your world will be nothing but pain."

"So what's new?" she mumbled.

He just shook his head. "Ah, you're still playing the cheeky little heroine, then? I can see you've read too many books. In the real world, Polly, cheeky little heroines die. And badly, too."

Her resistance was crumbling fast.

I'm coming for you, Polly, she heard Mal say, as if in a dream. Just hold on.

But Mal wasn't coming. She couldn't be. She probably wasn't even real.

"I..." she said.

Whatever it takes to stay alive.

This was what it took. "I..." she said again, defeated. "I don't--"

And the door crashed open, someone wearing a red, stained uniform tumbled into the room, dark hair swirling as she brandished a dangerous looking sword.

"Corporal," Maladicta purred. "I don't believe we've met. I'm Polly's pet vampire, and I assure you that even if you manage to escape my blade, you'll still have to escape me." As she grinned, her pointed teeth glinted in the light.

The corporal's eyes rounded. "I, uh..."

"I hear you've been treating my sergeant very badly, and I'm afraid I cannot allow that." Her grin widened, became inhuman, and a wet spot suddenly appeared on the front of the corporal's trousers.

Mal drew even closer. "I have a black ribbon, you know," she said, "but I seem to have misplaced it." Close enough for the tip of her blade to catch on one of the corporal's brass buttons, she smirked at him. "Boo!"

There was a thud as he fainted.

"Come on," Maladicta said, unstrapping Polly from both the helmet and the chair. "Let's get you out of here. I've got an Igor on standby back at the camp."

"How...?"

"Not now, Sarge," she said. "No time. Can you walk?"

Polly took about three unsteady steps before falling to her knees. "I..."

"That's a no, then." Polly's breath all whooshed out of her body as Mal suddenly swept her into her arms. "Let's go."

The escape itself was a blur.

Polly remembered being slung over Mal's shoulder at one point, hearing the clash of steel on steel as she fought her way down the corridors.

She remembered her first glimpse of the sun in many months, Mal lingering long enough in a meadow for Polly to tilt her head back and drink it in.

She remembered gentle yet unfamiliar hands, and voices full of worry. Something was pressed against her nose, and the world was black for a while.

When she woke up, she saw Maladicta, as close to disheveled as vampires ever got, tilted back in a chair and dozing by her bedside. A half-full cup of coffee rested in her lap. It was the best thing Polly had ever seen before.

"Mal?" she whispered, reaching out a shaking hand to touch Mal's bare knee, exposed through a rip in her trousers. "Maladicta?"

And Mal jerked awake, almost flipping her chair over. She did send the coffee cup flying across the room, however. "Damn it, Polly," she said, "you know better than to ever waste coffee."

"It was cold," Polly said, wincing as her vocal cords protested every noise she made.

"Coffee is coffee." For a moment, Mal glowered, but she abruptly brightened. "Hey, you're awake!"

"I think," Polly said. "Unless I'm hallucinating again."

"What do you mean again?"

She tried to prop herself up in bed, but something on her left hip pulled against the movement, so she gave up. "I dreamed you came to the prison to bring me food," she rasped.

Mal grinned and took her hand. "Hate to break it to you, old chap, but I did. Every night once I found you. Can't have our sarge wasting away in some swede-eating prison, can we?"

"How... how did you get me out?" Polly furrowed her brow. "I can't remember..."

"Oh, you'll get a kick out of this. Heinrich was after you in particular, it seems, and he wasn't going to let you out no matter what. So a bunch of the lads dressed up like washerwomen and snuck in. Once they knew how to get to you, they let me in, and I... did the rest."

"You dressed up like a washerwoman?" Polly asked, amused.

With an offended look, Mal tossed her head. "As if I could pass for a washerwoman. Nah, I ran intel back to Froc at the headquarters. Now she knows where the prison is, so I'd expect a lot of our, uh, boys in red to be busting out soon."

"Froc knows?" Polly was worried. After all, it was Froc's location that the corporal kept asking about. "We have to warn her! They're after--"

"Polly," Mal said, taking her chin in her hand and looking seriously at her. "Polly, you have to listen to me. They were never after Froc -- they know where she is. Heinrich was just trying to see if he could break you before he killed you. You weren't going to save yourself, Polly."

And she fell apart again. "I..." she said, holding back tears with little to no success. "It worked. I did break."

"No, you didn't, Polly. I was behind the door, remember? I heard everything."

"But I was going to!" she cried. "I was going to tell him whatever he wanted to know. I couldn't breathe, and I hurt, and I knew I was going to die, and I just wanted him to let me out!"

"Shh..." In a gesture that Polly suddenly realized was familiar, Mal sat on Polly's bed and pulled her into an embrace. "Even if that's true, Polly, do you know you held out for nearly six months? No one's ever been rescued from the Zlobenians after that long. Polly, you've survived. You're home now, and I'll keep you safe. I promise."

"You've always kept me safe," Polly said, returning the embrace with arms she abruptly realized were wrapped in splints. "Mal, I couldn't have made it if you hadn't been there."

"Like I said, I couldn't let anything happen to my sergeant, could I?" Mal asked lightly.

Drawing back, Polly looked up and saw something in Mal's eyes that she finally realized had been there for several years now.

Something she thought Mal could probably see in her own. "I know," she said, tucking her face into the crook of Mal's neck and relishing the feel of the bare skin she found there. "I know."

Beaten, maybe. Broken? Not by a long shot.

FINIS