[reaper0002000]

Greetings all, and thanks again for your comments. Here begins the character background I had written about earlier that I feel is necessary to explain the obsession Mercy has with muscles…

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———————
…cont'd…

“I was only four, and I could already do back handsprings that my sister was learning in gymnastics. She was almost ten, and she was so frustrated that her four year-old sister could do ten of them in a row, when she could barely do three. I mean, it was pretty obvious I was already stronger than she was. I could do way more pullups that she could, and when we would fight like kids do, I always ended up overpowering her – pinning her down, and making her cry my name – Mercy — before I let her up. I always beat her, and she was six years older and a whole lot bigger! She was very athletic and was pretty well built for a ten year-old girl ‘cause of the gymnastics she was doing, so she was the strongest kid in her class. But even at age four, I could beat her up bad. I could make a muscle, and it was way bigger and harder than hers… she used to get so mad! If you saw the photos of us in the pool, I have this amazing hardbody — there isn’t a picture of me in a swimsuit as a kid that doesn’t make me look like a mini-bodybuilder already. Grownups always asked me to flex and I loved how freaked they’d get when I did. I had muscles everywhere and I wanted to show them all off, veins on my biceps and legs, even chiseled abs. It was pretty weird…” Her face crimson, Mercy finally stopped for a breath. She looked like she was about to run, her eyes wild with anxiety from her revelation of abuse.  But before the man could even raise his pen to interrupt her, she raced on, her words getting faster and faster as she tried to verbally run away from the admission she’d just made.

“…but I’ve always had abs, even when I was, like, an infant – I’ve actually seen pictures and home video of me right after birth, and you can totally see the squares on my tummy! My calves and my delts are really built, too – the doctor actually makes a comment on camera that he’s never seen any baby as muscular as me. I mean, it's obviously genetic. But when my parents finally let me start doing formal gymnastics —”

“Mercy, please…” he started gently, trying to interrupt her panic-driven tirade. But Mercy kept talking, getting even and more wound up as she started to gesture. The therapist watched her, his own anxiety growing as he saw her already mindblowing musculature ripple and (Good Lord) grow as she became more and more animated. He watched in helpless fascination as veins popped up all over her ripped body, sprawling visibly beneath the straining cloth as she gesticulated, her movements and agitation pumping her already impossibly powerful physique up.

He thought his eyes were playing tricks on him at first, as the beautiful girl’s countless sinew striations danced and swelled, but the audible tearing of her clothes failing to contain her muscles confirmed his observation. His mouth felt dry as he saw absurd peaks and bulges all over her granite body become even more prominent. “Stop” he said in a tone of authority.

“— and then I started training for real, and I became even bigger and stronger! At six years old, I started outmuscling even the boys in drills. All of them – pushups, leg raises, pullups, straddles – you name it, and I could double or triple the next best kid. I could even outrun anyone else. I was so much better that they put me in boys’ elite division so I could have some competition for strength and endurance. The next thing you know, I was doing iron crosses and strength holds longer than anyone in the gym, and —“

“Stop.” he ordered more forcefully, as he watched her become more and more wild-eyed and distressed. She ignored him, plunging forward at full steam. He felt compelled to do something to interrupt her, but instead all he heard was:

“ – then I had this instructor who was also a competitive bodybuilder and he was amazed at my “power.” In gymnastics, your physique and strength is referred to as “power”.  I was only six, a little kid, but my body was so powerful that I probably outmuscled even him in proportions! It was obvious that I totally outmuscled all the boys. I mean, it wasn’t even close. Those 12 year-old boys were twice as old as I was, so their frames were bigger all around, but my muscles were actually far more developed…”

The therapist slapped Mercy. More accurately, he tried to slap her lightly on her cheek with his good hand. But before his palm and fingers could make contact, they were intercepted by the back of her right hand, moving with inhuman speed and economy of motion, blocking his therapeutic blow just inches from her face. In fact, her reflexes were so lightning fast, before he even registered that his hand had never reached its intended target, she was already staring him steadily in the eyes.

For a second, there was a unnerving, icy malice in Mercy’s deep blue eyes. But she had stopped talking, her anxiety clearly broken. Then she blinked and sighed heavily, her posture crumbling as she dropped her intercepting hand, and used it to rub her eyes. “Thanks” she uttered in a quiet whisper, before lapsing again into a discomfited silence.

…to be cont'd…

[reaper0002000]

Kudos! Way nice job — can't wait to see what happens…

[reaper0002000]

Thanks again, all!

I want to add a very strong disclaimer here; what follows is by no means, in no way, anything other than essential character background. Mercy is seriously warped, and the most common way that someone is warped is by something that happened early on. Therefore, some of this is portrayed, but I have limited the muscle descriptions of a young Mercy to shift as much focus away from her body to her experiences at that age… and it's probably not what you may think, after reading this next secton.

Ok, onward….
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…cont'd…

As the astonishingly muscular beauty settled into the rhythm of the conversation, the therapist found that Mercy was indeed capable of unexpected bursts of expression, speaking freely and passionately especially when she was talking about something that held her interest. Gymnastics, bodybuilding were two of those things. On the other hand, college was making her yawn – she absorbed scholastic information like the proverbial sponge, and she was on track to graduate summa cum laude in under two years.

The only thing Mercy spoke about extensively on was her fascination with anatomy, physiology, genetics, and biochemistry, and in details and terminology that made the psychologist’s head spin. He was certain it was all revolved around muscles, but she was at a level that far surpassed his knowledge of the subject… and unbeknownst to him, was actually pushing past the boundaries of research in the field.

Unable to follow the scientific content of her topic of comfort, he concentrated on her process and manner instead. Her voice was itself something a revelation. As he had initially noticed, it was almost melodic in quality. Enchantingly feminine and effortlessly bewitching in tone, Mercy could change her speaking timbre from feathery and ethereal to edged steel in one word.  He had no idea exactly what that technical word meant, but it apparently it meant something to her.

Again, she was a study in contrasts, a puzzle that seemed to keep unfolding. And so he kept listening, nodding when appropriate. Inside, the psychologist was himself a mess of ambivalence – Mercy couldn’t possibly be the girl those witnesses described, could she? Then after her dissertation, out of nowhere, she dropped a bombshell.

“I think I was abused.”

His head snapped up. And almost accidentally, looked her straight in Mercy’s cerulean eyes. It was exactly the wrong thing to do, for it seemed like he had jumped into the deepest, blue ocean and it took all his training as a therapist to break the hypnosis in her gaze. The man focused hard on what she had just said. Abuse?  He looked at the smartest, strongest, most muscular being he could even imagine sitting across from him, and tried to understand how anyone could ever make this beast do anything she was not willing to.

He stared at her, and  Mercy coughed nervously, sending a tidal wave of pure shredded brawn dancing across her barely contained torso. “I have this recurring dream – from when I was just a kid,” she added awkwardly, by way of explanation. Looking mortified that she actually blurted her secret out, Mercy flushed bright red. She visibly flinched when he raised his eyebrow, and hastened to quickly continue “Though I was really strong for a kid…” and then to his surprise, she just kept talking in an unstoppable stream of tangents.

…to be cont'd…

[reaper0002000]

Wow, I am very appreciative of all your comments… but I fear that the rest of the story will not live up to all your expectations!

As you all know, the hardest part of writing for many people is not the idea or its beginnings, but the continuing and finishing of it. "The Muscles of Mercy" is no different. Those of you who have read my other stuff know that my protagonists are antiheroes. Mercy is a very disturbed character… and for even more disturbing reasons. Those of you who are not used to depravity, the "(NSFW and very gory)" are in the subject line for a reason.

No matter how gratified I am that you like my writing style or descriptivity (I really am humbled!) and continue reading for that purpose alone, please be aware:

The slaughter is coming.

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[reaper0002000]

Thanks all! Here's some more:

…cont'd…

The psychologist shook his throbbing hand a couple of times, wondering if anything was broken, and couldn’t help but marvel at what a paradox Mercy’s shy demeanor was to her fearsome, immensely powerful physique. That too contrasted with her straightforward beauty – with her looks, she might easily have been a model… if society could forgive the freakish, hypermuscular beast she actually was from her head down.

Her astounding muscles notwithstanding, Mercy was fretting worriedly in front of him. He assured the powerful girl that he was all right, and wriggled his fingers in front of her, covering up the agony shooting up his arm with a short laugh. She seemed a bit relieved, and awkwardly tried to apologize again. With a pained smile, the man waved her off and directed her down the narrow hall and to the far room.  Nodding, Mercy headed in that direction.

He followed her, amazed at the sight of the utterly outrageous body walking in front of him. She looked like an anatomy chart…an anatomy chart overdosed on steroids. Mercy’s dark ponytail snuggled between such thick, high traps that she didn’t even appear to have a neck from some angles. Even more impressive than the girl’s towering trap muscles was the sheer breadth of her shoulders and upper back. He marveled at her back’s immensity — Mercy seemed to take up most of the width of corridor, her vast, flaring lats looked like they were about to send her bulging, capped deltoids straight through both walls at any second.

Her massive upper proportions were made even more absurd in comparison to her tiny waist and miniscule hips, which he estimated as easily less than a third than her shoulder span. The utterly inhuman taper she possessed, the monstrous lat flare, would have made physique judges weak in the knees. No one could approach, let alone equal her: Mercy far exceeded the athletic shoulder-waist and shoulder-hip ratios for anyone, even males, and every step caused an incredible landscape of hardened muscle to undulate beneath the straining fabric of her vest and skirt, which was losing the battle to contain her monstrous physique by the audible creak of seams giving way to bulging, unrelenting sinew. The vest couldn’t even cover half of her enormous back span, and her bared flesh looked like golden paper stretched over the exaggerated definition of each overdeveloped muscle, punctuated by protruding veins that snaked all over.

As Mercy made her way forward and turned into the room, the therapist froze for a moment, jaw agape. What transfixed him was the flash of one of her calves, visible for a millisecond through her long skirt’s slit. The unearthly calf was a vast, huge beast and utterly shredded;  steely separations and large veins were clearly visible even in a darkened glimpse – an undeniable match for her matchlessly muscled arms. The girl was the embodiment of perfect physique development taken to a nightmarish exponential degree. Remembering the details of the incident, he swallowed hard and entered the room, gripping her file as he closed the door behind him.

Since she took the couch — actually a small loveseat — nearest to the door, he took the chair by the far wall and started the interview. Belying her brutishly powerful physique, Mercy was painfully shy and distracted at times, but the apprehensive psychologist quickly discerned an intelligence as extreme as her body.

As they conversed, it became apparent that she exceeded his brightest, most gifted patients. This girl, barely a young woman, was simply extraordinary – an extraordinary puzzle. He marveled at the bizarre combination of stunning beauty, undeniable brains, and limitless brawn. She was absolutely loaded in all three attributes, far more than he thought anyone ever could be. She could intellectually run rings around the Mensa members he treated, and just by the look of that impossible physique, physically run over the Olympic athletes that he helped in nearby Colorado Springs. It was almost frightening, almost incomprehensible, to estimate what her potential abilities were. Everything about her was off the charts. Mercy was the complete prodigy. Except for one very apparent thing – for all her near superhuman gifts, Mercy was so… inhibited. He had the damndest time establishing a rapport, but she seemed to genuinely want help of some kind, although she apparently found it impossible to say exactly what was bothering her.

Of course, she obviously had no idea that he performed a background check on all new clientele, and that exhaustive search had inadvertently unearthed something – an awful briefing. From an old contact at Justice who told him that the contents of the dossier in front of him was something out of the “X Files.” After reading it, he was forced to agree.  But the thing was, her personality was completely and utterly opposite to what he’d expected from reading the consensus statements of eyewitnesses. Something was amiss. So the man waited for her to get comfortable, letting Mercy’s obviously low confidence grow by exploring things that were comfortable and familiar to her.

… to be cont'd…

[reaper0002000]

I see you haven't been to many busy doctors' offices with busy waiting rooms! So picture this (what happens before "Hi"):

The therapist is carrying some paperwork, including a new file on his new patient. From behind the reception area, he opens the door to a crowded (or say, even an empty) waiting room, and peers at the name on his paperwork, carefully looking at it so he doesn't mispronounce the name.

He says her name outloud, and Mercy quickly rises from her seat right by the door, flinging out her hand. His eyes still somewhat on the paperwork…maybe there's some information on the cover sheet, like her address or insurance info that's added… the therapist notices her offered hand out of the corner of his eye, and instinctively grasps it, like people do without thinking when someone's hand is held out there to shake.

"Hi"

…

So there you go, Lupus.
In this case, I don't think it's so much about logic as having things spelled out to your satisfaction. And you, my friend, are a sufficiently critical thinker to require a lot of gaps to be filled in for me to suspend your disbelief! Oh, there are some pretty big logistically-challenged holes in the narrative later on — but this isn't one of them. And I may not have the time to fill them in (just be forewarned)

For what it's worth, I also appreciate your sense of moral balance or outrage, if I may call it that. But Mercy… well, she was never intended to be balanced. And I'm curious as to what you draw, since Mr. Shhh has drawn, years back, a picture of a girl who basically was my visual of Mercy.

Best wishes,
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[reaper0002000]

Fair enough! I put a lot of effort in crafting my language, so your appreciation is very welcome.

Just a quick note to those all those that happen to agree with Lupus (and it may be the large majority of readers) on finding the antihero premise objectionable:

**Spoiler**
Looking at the Mercy character, she is every bit as violent and probably even more ruthless than Esther… which is why, of course, I named her "Mercy." While The Monster as written in the series was sheer overwhelming (and often mindlessly straightforward) dominance, Mercy is a litte more fleshed out. She has more than one side to her. And that, in my opinion, makes her even more disturbing and psychotic. Her vicious sadism has a seed of reason planted in her past, and unlike her exterior, it's not at all pretty.

As I remarked to StMercy2020, the entire Esther series was not so much akin to a movie as episodes of fetish porn. Suspension of disbelief is key to this "genre", and I admit that I've stretched it past the breaking point several times in the heat of the scene.

And will continue to do so in "The Muscles of Mercy"
You've been warned…!

Regards,
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[reaper0002000]

Out of business?
Yea right…!

While I'm humbly gratified by the sentiment, I think that there are so many terrific writers in this forum that I'm honored to simply be a member of this club. Even our two most recent additions — Mimi and StMercy — are top notch. Hell, if the talent here were a sports team, we'd be a con-ten-duh…

(and I'd be the duh)

Best wishes,
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[reaper0002000]

What StMercy said. (Not to diminish Lupus — you certainly have  valid opinions in your rant)

And my "Hmmm". signoff in the previous post was missing an edited portion when I cut and paste my reply. I MEANT to sign off:

Hmmm. Maybe I'll write a sequel.
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Hey, anyone else unable to edit their posts or topics?

[reaper0002000]

Appreciate the compliment! Y'know, I'm kinda glad you don't LIKE the character. She's a little morally challenged, I think.

He doesn't know she won't kill him… and that's the nature of the fascination. No one would venture that this is a …normal… relationship; in every sense that Es is a twisted narcissistic sadist, he is an equally twisted, spineless, masochist. That's why it "works".

As to the notion every creature has a sense of self-preservation, I humbly disagree: that statement is of only limited truth. Nature is replete with self-destructive sex and violence — look at the mating cycle of the praying mantis, for example. Even in higher-order creatures, say, humanity, there are scores of battered spouses who are still "in love" with their abuser. Sadly, sometimes all the way to their death. Now obviously, this is a work of fantasy, and in no way would this writer ever condone the depravity found here… nor would any reader, I suspect.

I actually considered The Monster's Demise as a worthy end to the series, but testing it proved problematic. Suspension of disbelief, so necessary to the effect of the fantasy, tends to fail when the antihero falls to reality. So as a result, you would never get the drop on Es… and a .44 Magnum would be reduced to a crumpled, mangled scrap with your pulped hand in her grip, while the explosive bullets turn to merely stimulating playthings when fed to the snarling crush of her cunt…

Hmmm.
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