[You really...do have to go, though,] Saga said at long last. [Better to leave now before they get suspicious.]

"You make it sound like you aren't coming with me." I shook my head. "There's no way I'm leaving you here."

She laughed gently, and the fact she could still do that made my heart brim with elation. [The elevator knows how much you weigh. If I get in it, there'll be an alarm, and then gas, fire, electricity, all that fun stuff.]

"There's no alarm for me cutting you down?"

She shrugged. [My weight kinda...changed a lot while being hung up there, sometimes.]

I had a memory of Blackett reaching back and snapping Saga's lower back while she writhed and screamed into a gag. It hadn't broken cleanly, and he had to tear away at it, using a foot against her exposed ribs as leverage to rip her pelvis away. The memory alone made me shudder and a white-hot ball of rage seared my insides.

"How...did you not die before?" I settled for asking.

[You mean...dying for real, or dying like I do?]

"Well, it's obvious that he has some tech or something that stops you from dying like you usually do. I just meant...fuck, Saga, there was like, less than half of you left, and you were still awake and conscious."

[Yeah,] she said, and I felt dark thoughts moving through her. [Targa explained a lot about my situation to me. She said it made for interesting research, and I don't...don't think...she had anyone else to talk to about it.]

"So she told you? While you were hanging there, dying? Holy shit, that's fucked up."

[Yeah.]

I tried to think of anything else to say but all I had right now was hate and the same topic in my mind.

[She said...my anatomy was unique. Like, I knew that...but apparently...I can do with a lot less than a human...and still be alive. I think...Blackett knew that...when he took pieces of me...away…]

Just...fucking...I couldn't believe this. I wasn't exactly on Blackett's side, didn't exactly trust him, but Jesus fucking Christ, there was no way I thought he'd ever do shit like this to anyone. With his own two hands, on a helpless girl…

[Athan, seriously. You have to go. If you don't, we'll get caught, and...and if nothing else, I'll get strung up again. So...if you don't want that...you need to leave me.]

"It won't happen."

[It will if you stay. Come back for me when...when you can stop the alert or something...okay? Promise me...please?]

"I promise. They won't touch you."

[Even if they do, I'll be strong. I'll wait for you to save me again, as long as it takes. I know you will.]

She gave me a teary smile and one more hug before pushing me to the elevator. The round thick transparent plastic door slid shut between the two of us before I was ready for it.

"I'll come back!" I shouted.

[Pretend you were redeveloped! Do everything Targa or Blackett asks! Don't forget!]

She continued to yell and thank me and praise my salvation as the elevator ascended back into the blackness above, until at the limits of her range, her voice just stopped, leaving me feeling very empty and alone in my own mind.

Without her outpouring of relief and gratitude, there was nothing left in my head but hatred. Seething, billowing, red. I wanted to tear Targa and Blackett apart just like they'd done to her, make them regret ever daring to hurt her. I wanted them to feel all the pain she'd endured this entire month she was in their clutches, and more, a hundredfold.

They were sick and twisted and just evil. They deserved the worst fate any person had ever experienced. If there was such a thing as hell, it was made with those two in mind, and I would be so happy to send them there, the last thing they see--me. The last thing they hear, the breaking of their own bodies. The last thing they think, some pitiful regret about how maybe, maybe they shouldn't have fucked with Saga. Should have left people alone to live and be happy.

The elevator arrived and the glass receded. In the next room, I was a little surprised to find Karu and AEGIS sitting in two of the several chairs outside of Targa's office.

"Athan! You're okay!" AEGIS said. "We heard you got taken in for...redevelopment, whatever that is. Targa insisted you'd be right back, so...we waited." She lowered her voice conspiratorially, "And if you didn't, we were gonna come get you."

I couldn't return her smile, and the look on my face replaced hers with a shocked, worried expression. "Athan, what the fuck happened?" She forced a laugh. "She make you...read a whole manual or...really bad...slideshow present...ation…?"

I looked at Karu who was sitting there, helmet in her lap, avoiding my gaze, irritation on her face. I was so mad right now I just wanted to slap the shit out of her and tell her to fuck off with feeling sorry for herself, there were people with actual issues beyond boy troubles.

But I didn't. That would be really reckless and stupid. Even if she were being bitchy, she wasn't the reason I was mad right now. Instead, I turned on Targa's office door, and walking right through the two soldiers on either side, threw the door open and walked in.

She was there, with the same exosuit on, writing something on a tablet. I didn't get any further before the two guards grabbed me with impossibly strong robotically-assisted arms.

"Oh, you're back," she said, sounding bored. "Stop struggling at once."

I wanted to keep doing it just to spite her, but thought, hell...if she believed me, I might get to kill her right now. I let my body go limp as I could, given my rage.

"Good. Good. See, isn't that much better? I'm sure you're confused right now. See, the corpse that you probably saw downstairs...that's actually the remains of a Code-X. Have a seat. Would you like some tea?"

I was walked to and sat down in one of the plush, comfortable chairs in front of her desk, the guards still remaining on either side, though no longer actively detaining me. She glared at me. "I asked if you would like some tea. Answer me."

"No," I growled.

"Hmph. You may be obedient now but your attitude is still the worst of anyone I've ever met. Maybe I should send you back down for another round to have that corrected." She turned to me from her work finally. "When you leave this office, you will leave New Eden and never return. In the future, you will avoid wherever I am working and never threaten my career aspirations ever again."

She glared at me and I felt my eye twitch as I stared back.

"Say 'yes, mistress,'" she said, bemused.

"...yes…" a feral growl escaped me "...miss...tress..."

"Delightful. Like I was saying, you just had a Code-X under my employment in your head. It's not surprising for you to be a little confused how I'm making you say and do things, but just know in the future, if you ever imperil myself or the XPCA, we will send you right back down there, and fix you for good." She laughed. "I bet by the end of it, you won't even be yourself anymore. So consider me merciful that all I took away was your ability to resist me."

"...merciful…?" I found myself muttering. "...merciful? You're the most...the...most merciless...most callous…"

"Shut up," she said.

My heart was ready to explode, and I was sure I burst a vessel in my face as my hands clenched and unclenched and the thought that I could just move a few feet closer and conjure my swords inside her face, right now filled my whole head.

"You can go," she said, sounding bored. "Oh, though I don't like either of your friends waiting out there. Once you get off my property, kill the both of them and dispose of the bodies where they won't be found." She thought for a second. "Or, I suppose you could be found out, that's really no bother for me. No...won't make the XPCA look good. Yes, don't be found. Now go."

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

I knew she was a monster the moment I learned what happened to Saga, but hearing her casually instructing me to just kill my friends...and the implication that if I were anyone other than me, other than someone that close to Saga, I'd be doing it right now?

I didn't have the self control for that.

She screamed as the blades manifest inside of her exosuit. The two guards were on me in an instant, pinning me to the floor, but as soon as they restrained me, my shield exploded, sending one flying through the door like a wrecking ball through a house of cards, and the other slammed against a wall hard enough to crack it through to the ceiling.

I didn't hesitate. I was on Targa in an instant, twisting my blades within the suit like a thousand blades in a blender, hoping that what she suffered now was a millionth of what she'd done to Saga. She only screamed and writhed for a moment before her body went still.

"Holy fucking...fuck!" AEGIS screamed from the doorway. "Athan, what the hell!"

I didn't care. I worked my way through demolishing Targa's exosuit until I could rip her faceplate off. I needed to see her dead eyes, wanted to burn that memory into my mind so I could deliver it to Saga.

"Athan, this guy's dead. This guy is too. What the fuck are you doing?"

"Shut UP!" I shouted at her. I smashed a ceramic plate which wasn't burning away with my bare hands, slicing my knuckles up pretty good, but I felt nothing. A couple more pieces of her suit later and I grabbed the faceplate by the bottom and pulled it free.

A voice boomed over the base PA system as sirens kicked to life. "Attention all XPCA forces. This is a code black. There are three known hostiles within the annex facility, of which one is an Exhuman. All units are to converge and engage. This is not a drill. This is not a drill."

The voice on the PA was hers. And under her faceplate was nothing. Just...nothing. No corpse, no anything at all. It was just an empty exosuit until I'd fried it from the inside. I swore and threw the faceplate into the wall, ready to cry from frustration.

"Athan, what the fuck is going on?" AEGIS shouted at me. She moved around the desk and kneeled next to the empty exosuit, putting her hands on my shoulders and her face right in front of mine. "I need you...to calm down...and tell us. Whatever happened, we'll be here with you, but we need to know."

"I...they…" I took a deep breath and tried to find words through how angry I felt. "Saga."

"Saga?"

"Redevelopment. It's Saga."

"She's working with them? To rehabilitate Exhumans?"

"She's they're SLAVE!" I screamed at her. I turned to move but she held me down with inhuman strength.

"Athan, calm down. Targa has Saga captive? Here? Now?"

"Yes. I freed her, but she's stuck down below. Let me go."

"Not until you calm down some. Why did you...why did you kill all these people? Why are you doing something so stupid? You know you just basically declared war on the XPCA didn't you?"

"I don't care," I said. She sighed heavily.

"Fuck, Athan. Do you have any idea how many XPCA are here? And what kinds of weapons they have on hand in case of an Exhuman riot?" She shook her head. "We can't win this. Especially not just the three of us."

"Or two of you," said Karu bitterly.

AEGIS looked like she'd just been slapped. "Karu? How could you even say that at a time like this."

"I came here merely as a personal favor to you and to Ashton," Karu spit. "You first demonstrated that you did not trust me to be alone with him, and then saw fit to utterly betray me. I see no reason why I should die...simply because he is an enormous enough fool to make an attempt on an XPCA officer within her own fortress."

"Karu, wait," I said, but she was already turning and putting her visor on. She levelled her wrist at where the ceiling and wall met in the waiting room, and with an explosion that made my ears ring even through my hands, the whole corner of the room was reduced to dust and smoke.

"Fare well, Ashton. You goddamned fucking idiot," Karu said. And then her wings spread, and with a streak of blue, disappeared into the hole she'd created.

"Well...well fuck her!" AEGIS yelled, red in the face. "We don't need her anyway! The nerve of that girl...god damn it! Damn her, damn all of it! Athan, why couldn't you just...why did you have to do something so stupid!" she screamed at me, tears building in the corners of her eyes. "I don't want you to die, you dummy! I just wanted us to live together and be happy, was that too much to ask? Why does it always have to be like this!"

Seeing her cry eroded the edge out of my anger, and Karu's unexpected disbandment felt like a stab in the gut. I looked down at Targa's remotely-piloted exosuit and felt just as empty and defeated as it. Alerts and sirens went off again and again, and outside, I could hear the sounds of engines spooling and heavy machinery moving around.

"Why does it have to be like this," she whimpered.

"They hurt Saga."

"She can't be hurt!" she screamed. "You can!"

I shook my head. "They found a way. They hurt her...hurt her so bad. She was...mutilated, AEGIS. They tore away more than half of her body, left her hanging there crucified, promised to kill her, to actually kill her if she didn't do what they wanted."

AEGIS had her face in her hands. "I...I don't care. I'd rather she get tortured...then you die. That sounds so horrible of me, but...it's the truth. I love you, Athan, and--"

She froze, staring at me. The sudden arrest of her movement prompted one final tear to fall from the corner of her eye down her cheek.

And then, falling on top of me, she collapsed. I swore and frantically dug through my pockets. Thank God, I still had the boot drive, Targa had me arrested but didn't confiscate my belongings.

Two soldiers appeared near the wreckage Karu had created. Speaking to each other on internal comms, one gestured towards me and they took cover on either side of the doorway. I felt a hot spray of grit as their gunfire blazed against my shield.

Carefully, deliberately, like it was the most important thing in the world, the only life and love I had left, I pressed the drive into AEGIS' port and waited. A moment passed, and a thrown grenade disintegrated into pieces on my shield.

Her eyes fluttered awake inches from mine. A frown crossed her lips and I realized I was also crying.

"I don't want to lose you either," I whispered, holding her hands.

"Are...are we getting…" I could feel her hot breath on my face, the faint smell of eraser shavings and bubblegum from her synthetic skin. "...getting shot at?" she whispered.

"Yeah," I said, and kissed her.

Just for a moment though, because even if we were at death's door together, she was still pragmatic, and pushed me off after a couple seconds.

"Maybe," she said breathily, "we can't win. But even if we can't, that doesn't mean we lose." Her brows knitted. "Was Saga really that bad off?"

"The worst off I've ever seen...anything. If she were a normal person, she would have just been dead. They...they flayed her flesh…"

"Okay, enough," AEGIS said, pressing a finger on my lips. "I'm sorry. You don't have to think about it. I just wanted to make sure before we went forward."

"Went forward how?" I asked.

She was already digging through her hair for something. I realized I should probably do something about the guards in the door, so I stood up, keeping myself between AEGIS and them, and once I was in range, popped a sword through each of them like they weren't even there.

Exosuits really weren't designed to fight against Exhumans who could summon their powers inside the suit.

AEGIS looked more irritated that I'd killed them than at the constant hail of gunfire and deafening report of ammunition, but said nothing. Inwardly, I agreed with her. I'm sure that most of these guys were just fine, and in Saga's own memories, it was nobody but Targa and Blackett who ever even saw her. Interacted with her. Tortured her.

But the hot ball of hate in me churned. If they threatened Saga, even indirectly, if they stood up for Targa, even just as orders, I would cut them down without mercy or guilt. She was pure, distilled, unwavering evil, and she had to be stopped no matter the cost.

AEGIS was plugged into the exosuit now, her hands and eyes moving constantly as she cracked her way in.

"It was being remotely piloted...nice smart little safety precaution...no wonder she didn't mind walking around in front of Exhumans. Ooh, good news, she had a dedicated line put in the base just for that purpose. Better connection, higher throughput, lower latency...but also tells me right where she was piloting it from."

"So we can find her?" I asked.

"Yeah. The real one this time."

I stood up and watched as more soldiers moved outside the room. A grenade flew through the doorway and exploded against my shield. I cracked my knuckles and my blades sprung to life around me, still ten of them now, less than had shown up before with Saga, but more than my norm.

"Let's go find and kill that bitch," I said, walking out the doorway as gunfire pounded against my shield. "I want to look her in the eyes as she regrets every decision she's ever made to hurt Saga--to hurt anyone--as she dies."

"You're a little scary sometimes," AEGIS said quietly, clinging to my back to stay in the sphere of my shield. "But…"

I glanced back at the yellow eyes burning brightly at me from over my shoulder.

"But?"

"...but...as bad as this sounds...it...makes me happy. To know...that if something ever happened to me...you'd do this for me."

"Of course I would." One of the soldiers screamed as my sword cleaved through him, while another ran down the hall. I settled for just injuring his leg and blowing out the comms in his suit. I wouldn't always have the time to be so precise, so this guy could consider himself lucky, I guess.

"Then...I learned something. From the exosuit. Targa's," she said.

"What is it?"

She stayed silent for a moment, and the way she hovered right behind me, I felt like she was almost like a ghost.

"I'd say don't get mad or do something stupid...but I think that's exactly the plan, right now, isn't it? Get mad and do something stupid?" AEGIS said, "So I'll tell you. But don't do anything more stupid, okay?"

I shook my head. "Just tell me."

"Okay. Well. Uh." She paused, and I think despite the fact we were getting actively shot at, she was playing with her hair. "The exosuit, the remote pilot program that was in there to allow her to drive it...it was custom code, good code, written specifically for that suit and that purpose."

"...okay?"

"And whoever wrote that code, I can tell you with certainty...it was...a coding style I've seen before. It all matched up...with...with code inside me, actually."

"What does that mean?"

"Whoever wrote the code in that exosuit...wrote the code for the virus." She swallowed hard and looked at me with worry-filled eyes. "The virus...inside of me."