It was strangely satisfying, that she could hold her ground here. A thread of something that had been bothering her for years had finally been tied up. How long ago had it been, that she had been placed in an elevator, an oxygen mask on her lower face in the midst of a vacuum, and dropped into the Birdcage?

How strange it had been. Little her, barely even an adult in full then, picked up by heroes and escorted to PRT custody, questioned by people with powers that gave them insights into the real her. She had baffled half and scared the other half, somehow. Itty bitty her.

Itsy bitsy Miranda Webb had been told what to do and how to do it by Blood Diamond, who picked the one girl from her cell block that had disappointed her the most every week and punished them. Often it was the same girl, unless someone else did something to put themselves in Blood Diamond’s bad books. Heads shaved, forced to eat only the expired foods, beaten, cut, nailed to the table. The administrator of the ’Cage, it hadn’t been Dragon back then, they’d started slamming the doors shut and sucking oxygen out of the room, just for a few moments, to put a stop to the worst of it.

Then Blood Diamond had exhausted the use of her girl, broken her. Everyone knew and nobody said that she was looking for her next girl to set as an example. She had given Miranda a sideways look.

So Miranda had given a boy from the men’s side of the prison a different sort of look. The kind of look that was sly and inviting at the same time, that formed a hook in the curl of the eyelashes and tilt of the head, then set that hook with a wink.

Well… a wink and the handjob, and the blowjobs, and the butt stuff, and the lovemaking, her breath hot and her words sweet in his ear.

But she didn’t like to think about that part of it. Being the sweet sort of virginial was a state of mind, nothing else. Dwelling on lurid particulars made that harder.

Blood Diamond had had an accident. The only reasons she could find for her own nomination to Blood Diamond’s position managing the girliest end of the girl’s side of the prison were her sweet disposition and the fact nobody else wanted the job.

Well… Love Bite had wanted it, but Love Bite had her head torn from her shoulders. Teacup had wanted it, but Teacup had had her porcelain armor torn off, her head shaved, and her tongue torn out. No boys had even been involved in Teacup’s demise, whether the demise was marked at that point she lost her tongue and nearly died of blood loss or when she carried out a hunger strike and died of dehydration.