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The inevitable rebellion begins like clockwork: the fifth class trial screeches to a halt, students up in arms against the killing game. Clues gathered, bonds forged, distrust cast to one side. They will not kill anymore, they declare - Tozu will not manipulate them anymore.
Mara knows it won't last. She knows it from the fear, still lingering on them. She knows it from her own personal experience: Orias and Marilyn had declared these words so boldly, against Tozu before. Their bold optimism had earned Marilyn a bullet to the head, and Orias a knife to the jugular. Their blood had stained the very floors the new Ultimates walk on today - their dying screams, ringing across the rooms they talk and laugh in. Their dead bodies, in the exact same positions where they sit together, walk together - if the new group of Ultimates knew about the bodies of the past who lay in the very seats they use to eat, tucked inside the beds they now sleep inside, would they still feel their naive bravery?
But Tozu is swayed - he brings Mara out from the camera room, claiming there's been a breach. That Mara is needed to keep them in line, and to make examples of some of them if needed. She ignores the shiver down her spine at the memory of pointing the gun at Jean and failing to commit, and tunes in the best she can to his instructions. That they will be unruly, and she will need to use force. That non-fatal bullet wounds or physical attacks will be required if they do not listen fast - attacks to maim, not kill. Attacks to break their spirits - destroy hands used for Ultimate talents, or throats used to speak - Mara will need to crush their spirits under her foot, grinding their hopes into dust.
She doesn't think it's worth it. She doesn't think their hope will last long enough to justify such force. Such brutality isn't required to get them to comply, and attacking them so viciously is a waste of her energy. Tozu sees through her flimsy excuses and insists she must do her duty as enforcer. That whatever bias she has towards the Ultimates will have to be permanently cast aside. That if she ever wants to go home, see her mother safe and sound, then she must comply here and now. Attack them - dodge the strikes of the physically skilled and the uncoordinated blows of the desperate. Utilise the lengthy training Mara had undergone and bring them back to their previous states - numb, despairing, doubtful.
"Do we have a plan?" Tozu demands.
Mara, the living weapon, can only comply.