“How do we keep our worst people under control, you ask? It’s not really a secret, so to speak, and our approach to the problem is very simple. We just have someone even worse than the worst of our people take charge of them. Like understands alike, so such a person is very effective at handling the worst kind of scum amongst our troops, and they in turn also know better than to antagonize such a person in any way.

That way lies only a gruesome death.” - Reinhardt Edelstein, Captain of the Free Lances Mercenary Company, circa 12 FP.

As Astrid reached the source of the noise she heard, she finally realized it for what it was. Two of the mercenaries – both women – were sparring with wooden weapons, albeit in a spar that looked horribly lopsided at first glance.

One of the women was a slender and rather tall human woman with straw blonde hair, who wielded a pair of oddly shaped wooden swords of some sort, ones with exaggerated handguards and a second “prong” perpendicular to the blade at the last quarter towards the tip. She moved with lithe and certain steps, but looked positively small compared to her opponent.

Her opponent was a therian woman who Astrid felt must be related to the mercenary Captain in some manner, given their mutual white spotted fur that she had never seen before. The therian woman was taller by at least half a head, and she wielded a pair of wooden rods that might well be logs instead as they were easily as thick around as a strong person’s arm, and likely just as devastating.

And that was before one accounted for the speed and power with which the therian woman moved.

Each blow from the therian woman likely carried enough force behind them to outright crush a human body in one hit, yet somehow her opponent either avoided them – often by no more than a hair or two, which nearly made Astrid jump in fright – or skillfully pushed them away using her odd weapons. The human woman’s own pair of odd training weapons often struck from tricky angles that the therian often only managed to avoid thanks to her superior speed and reflexes.

As such, despite the horribly lopsided first impression, the spar was surprisingly even between the two, and they kept exchanging blows for another quarter hour – an exercise that Astrid thought would have made most people winded – before they finally called a stop to their spar. Neither woman looked the worse for wear other than a little bit of sweating.

Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

“Oh, we got someone new?” asked the human one after she wiped her sweat off with some clean rags and took a couple steps towards Astrid. Astrid was curious how the woman just noticed her at that point, since she was looking in her direction all that time.

“Yeah, boss. New one the Cap took in just earlier,” said one of the spectators next to Astrid, a rather slender-looking man with a scar that bisected his lips vertically on the left side and a glare that made him look like he was a wanted murderer of sorts. Probably just a man with an unfortunate face, she thought.

“Ah, the one dad told us about, mom,” said the therian girl, whose voice made Astrid readjust her estimation of her age. The girl was probably still a teenager, even.

Then the implication of the words the girl said caught up to her in her mind and she almost stammered and made a fool of herself as she gave a hasty salute towards the two. “Astrid ver Hevia, Ma’ams, it is my privilege to be part of this fine Company,” she said nervously. Astrid had most definitely not expected to run into the captain’s wife and child sparring of all things.

“Ah, yeah, I remember Rein talking about you bringing in a good number of former soldiers with you,” noted the human woman. “Just call me Elfriede, by the way, no need for Ma’am this Ma’am that, we’re all the same rank within the company,” she added.

“Erycea Edelstein,” introduced the therian girl as she shook Astrid’s hand. “Nice to meet you, Miss Astrid.”

“Uh, nice to meet you, Miss Edelstein,” replied Astrid, clearly unused to people so closely related to her superior treating her like an equal that way. “Is it the norm for us to be more relaxed like this amongst the Company, or?”

“Not really. There’s the chain of command and some hierarchy to follow as usual, but the three of us are platoon commanders since I hear you brought enough men to constitute a new platoon with you, which places all of us at the same rank in the Company,” replied Elfriede with a shake of her head. “It’s why I said you shouldn’t use honorifics when referring to us. We don’t exactly needle you just because you’re new here.”

“I guess I should know better than to judge a book by its cover,” said Astrid with a chuckle. “Here I was, worrying because some people just happen to be born with unfortunate faces that give off a bad impression. At my age I really should know better.”

“What, you mean how my platoon members look like crooks and murderers?” asked Elfriede, to which Astrid nodded with an embarrassed blush on her cheeks. “I would say that you have a good eye then, actually. That is exactly what most of them are. Crooks, murderers, and killers who kill for the pleasure and thrill of it.”

“Mom and her officers wrangle and deal with the misfits we got in the Company,” explained Erycea in her mother’s stead. “Even if we’re strict in the recruitment, some would always slip through anyway. As long as they’re usable, we make use of them, and keep them under control at the same time. Not an easy job, but mom’s best at it.”

“How do you have the confidence to deal with… such people on a regular basis?” asked Astrid, somewhat shaken by the revelation.

“Why, it’s a simple case, actually,” replied Elfriede with a smirk on her lips. “A killer recognizes another instinctually, so all of them knows that I’m worse than any of them, and if they dare fuck shit up under my watch, what awaits them would make even their worst imagination pale in comparison. It’s as simple as that.”