Challenge #04510-L126: Not So Helpless

I may be in a wheelchair, but I can still kick your tail before you raise that blade. I'm limited, not helpless. -- Fighting Fit

[AN: Tempted to use Kosh's all-terrain wheelchair with caterpillar treads for this one, but nah. Should aim for the normal model]

The streets are paved well, and for that I am grateful. I've seen the perambulatory chair favoured by a noble or two, but that thing is frighteningly complicated. My main wheels are from a velocipede, and the secondary ones are from a baby buggy. There's lever brakes and straps for my legs, and that's usually all I need. There are calipers for when I need to reach something high, but they remain in their holster, most of the time.

Most people in my neighbourhood know me and offer to help, or otherwise let me pass by when the aisles were narrow. Most people saw the chair and chose to be kind. Most. But not all.

There's always someone who chooses to be an asshole because they can look down on a person. And when you're in a moving chair? Lots of people are taller.

This example was not a local. Rich clothing, but not Noble clothing. Likely some moneyed Merchant's brat who thought he could buy his way out of anything. He literally tried to kick my chair out of his way, but my brake was engaged so he stubbed his toe and scuffed the suede of his shoe.

I turned the chair just in time to watch him screaming at me. "You get that inconvenience out of my way, you pathetic wretch! I could have you hanged for abusing my property!"

"You kicked me," I said.

"You will address me as sir," he sneered down his nose, "Cripple."

I said, "No. You don't deserve it."

He reached for his steel. I reached for my caliper. The instant his sword hit my caliper, it shattered. I continued my swing and battered his arms, his head, and his stupid fancy clothes until he ran screaming for the Watch.

It helped that his sword fragments cut up my face and arm. It really helped that there were a dozen people who had seen it all. The biggest help of all that the Watch had great difficulty believing I was the aggressor.

After all, I had never in my life picked a fight, and the Watch knew that.

Asshole rich boys, on the other hand, were more trouble than their purses were worth. That boy was going to get an interesting discussion with his father when it was time to bail him out of the tanty.

[Photo by Eduardo Ruiz on Unsplash]

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