Earth

2027

Vehru sat in the chair across the room from Jace and Rory with a fresh bottle of vodka in hand. The image of Rory proclaiming that she'd accept the biomechanical body was stuck in her mind. "What were you thinking?"

"That I have no other choice." Rory held Jace's hand as he slept in the medical pod. "What else was I supposed to do?"

"You don't know what you just got yourself into." Vodka flowed like acid down her throat. "I've made it as far as I have because I've actually conquered planets. You cannot simply take a synthetic body and not do the job."

Bronze eyes tore away from Jace to focus intently upon Vehru. Her Witness had changed, no longer the naive and singularly focused Aeryn, nor the trusting and sharp Rory who had navigated a foreign planet without her memory. This woman looked like the one who had risen from the ground of Fort Freedom on Liberation Day and promised Vehru that she'd made a mistake. "Are you telling me you plan to fail?"

A moment of confusion passed over Vehru. "Fail?"

"You've been going on and on about how you plan to change things. The future can be different. You have ties with the Federation and have cultivated a good relationship. Jace and I can actually help create a better system."

"That easy? You think you can make a better one than I can?"

"I don't know who you once were." Her knowing gaze did not waver. "Before the Federation conquered your world, before Morfrain tormented you, before you twisted yourself into an invader–I don't know who that woman was. She's gone now, though, and the things you've done have changed you. You aren't capable of creating peace."

If Vehru could make peace then she wouldn't war with her vodka every night, so this was not something she could refute. These plans had been in the making a long time, though, and Rory didn't have the experience to know a better way. "You've lost whatever hope your family had for peace once the war is over."

"There was never going to be any peace after the war. As we speak, you have troops all over Earth deceiving desperate people in every nation. By the time this is true, you'll have turned families against one another and ensured a life without freedom forever. What kind of peace is that? I grew up on Lumiea. There was no peace in my life."

Vehru leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. Updates from her Replica came through periodically. They had not managed to entirely suppress the footage that Rory released, but they did remove it quickly as it resurfaced. So far, there had been no word of the data Rory dropped. They'd managed to keep it hidden and quiet. These were only setbacks, though. It wouldn't stop the invasion.

"Getting your bodies won't be easy, you'll have to meet with the High Commanders, and agree to their terms. When you return, you'll be getting used to new forms while Earth is in the middle of a war. Morfrain should deny your request because your job as Witness is too important to go fooling around with a synthetic body at one of the most critical times in your mission."

"It doesn't matter. It's already done. We both know that Morfrain has to die and the current conquest system has to end. Forget about what you think should happen. Plan for the future."

If Vehru had possessed the energy to laugh, she would have. "I told you before, there's no way you'll actually work with me, and even if you did, Jace will find a way to stop it."

"This is bigger than what you did to us, as unimaginable as it was." Rory didn't back down or apologize for what she'd done. "I have to do the impossible if I want to protect this world and my family."

How did this woman manage to sound so convincing? The slightest smile hugged the corner of Vehru's lips.

Rory's voice quieted. "You asked me why I did it. So answer the same question. Why did you protect us?"

Holding her eyes for another moment, Vehru then looked to Jace's haggard form, and finally out the window. "Senseless violence shouldn't be tolerated. We have already asked too much of the two of you and made you suffer more than anyone should. I couldn't let Morfrain get away with what he was doing."

The naivety she'd seen in the young Aeryn flashed over her face. Rory felt tempted to trust her in some way, didn't she? As if she wanted to find out that all along she'd had it wrong and Vehru was really on her side.

"You may be right," Vehru said. "Maybe you and Jace having synthetic forms could be of use to me. Today, though, you don't have them, and the US government is likely sharing the data you dropped as we speak."

Rory straightened, looking serious.

Vehru hardened her voice even though pain clawed into her heart. "I can do more through you than with you. Besides, you've been through enough. You shouldn't have to experience the next part."

Any temptation of trust dissolved from Rory's face as she quickly stood and covered Jace's head, like it could make a difference. "Whatever you plan to do, don't."

"I promise this won't be for long."

"Vehru, you bastard," Rory's voice hitched. "You've learned nothing. Whatever you're about to do, I'll never forget it."

"I stole you from your baby. You're never going to forget anything I've done to you."

Anguish pinched Rory's face. "I saw the look on your face when you saw what Morfrain did to Jace. You care about what happens to us. Stop telling yourself you're doing something heroic by ignoring your own compassion."

"It's pity, not compassion. And pity never stopped anyone from being an absolute bastard. You think you can sway me? I am Death. I've steeled myself to my own humanity."

"It's so creepy when you explain your psychopathy." Rory made a face like she'd just sucked on a lemon. "These are excuses. You can change. You're just scared."

Stolen novel; please report.

"You see that is you softening the truth for yourself. You cannot accept that there's nothing wrong with me. I'm not scared and I'm not a psychopath. I'm choosing to be this way."

"So let me delude myself."

"I don't like being let off the hook."

"Selfish asshole."

Vehru chuckled. How sad was it that she liked the people she conquered? Like she couldn't make normal friends. She had to pretend at some weird level that the trauma-bond she'd forced on these people was an intimacy even remotely related to fondness. Familiarity, forced proximity, suffering–these were not the things of friendships. Vehru had become so pathetic. To actually like her subjects and wish they would hate her a little less than they hated Morfrain. It was the closest she could get to them liking her, afterall.

In the time it took Rory to shift after speaking, Vehru had already completed her psychoanalytic session. Damn, did her mind work fast. After five hundred years it still amazed her.

"I have to do this, Rory."

"Why?" The sincerity and vulnerability in her eyes made Vehru desperately want to guzzle her bottle of vodka.

Would she say the truth? That there wasn't a single why? There were many. That it was both self-sacrificing and selfish? Ambitious and deluded? That there actually was no why that mattered more than the most simple of all the truths. "Because I want to."

The words had sucked the air out of the room. The cruel trick Vehru had played–masking the depth of her depravity with the sincere lightness of her humanity–had caught Rory off guard. Rory truly saw her, maybe better than she ever had before.

The burn of being seen hurt infinitely more than vodka ever could.

As shock hardened to anger and the innocent struggle of a good person to understand someone like Vehru gave way to determined hatred, Rory's expression hardened. Vehru could detect it in the microexpression, the tiniest tightening of fine facial muscles most people subconsciously noticed. Vehru could lessen the shock and remind Rory that her planet had suffered for much longer than Earth and Lumia. She had to save them. Those honorable intentions did not negate the far from honorable ones that also drove her though.

It was a gift to Rory not to make her digest the fucked-up-ness such a highly advanced synthetic mind was capable of. A primitive biological mind could only handle so much and subjecting Rory to suffering through Vehru's actions was enough. She didn't need the other woman to understand her fully. Better to simply be evil, considering that Vehru would never argue that she wasn't.

Or did she enjoy the burn of power from seeing the fear fill Rory's eyes?

Was Vehru villainizing herself more than she should or accepting who she was?

The thoughts made her nearly laugh because she knew the answer. And she would only whisper it into a bottle of vodka late enough in the night for her mind to become stupid enough to not fully feel the deepest of all her truths.

Pain scratched at her chest, pain from deep within a cold synthetic heart, as she thought of how much Rory and Jace truly hated her.

The most potent vodka she'd ever had.

"This can be a mercy if you let it be." Vehru lifted her hand.

Rory turned to cover Jace more fully. The image they made almost caused her to hesitate. Vehru knew all they had been through and seeing the desperation of Rory trying in vain to protect the man she'd loved for most of her life managed to stir the longing to choose the good path for once.

But she had plans and while these two would still come in handy, they'd fucked up enough for one day.

Vehru opened the connection between their neurowebs and her own. In only seconds, it was done.

Rory slumped over Jace, unmoving.

"I am sorry, though I know that means nothing."

A full minute ticked by while the transfer took place.

Rory's body lifted stiffly off Jace while her bronze eyes turned to Vehru again, this time, looking dead.

Jace's eyes opened. "This body is broken. Even increasing the cortisol production, I can hardly open my eyes."

Vehru stood. "Heal for another hour and you'll be stable enough to transport for an intense treatment with a Federation doctor." Her replica stared back at her through Jace's eyes. It was uncanny to see the change in someone she'd had to spend so much time around for so many years. "We'll have to advance Earth to phase 2 sooner than expected with Morfrain on the warpath, otherwise he may convince the High Commanders we're acting too slowly. Jace is the perfect general to lead this. The troops trust him and will put aside whatever reservations they have about the war being more brutal than expected."

"Will I continue telling Earth to resist?" Rory's eyes lacked their usual depth. The cold, unfeeling stare transformed her appearance entirely.

"Do exactly what you know the Witness would do. We'll make no alterations until I say so."

"You realize this is a mistake? You've never had us take over a Witness. This deviation is dangerous, especially during a critical time of the invasion."

Each time her Replica entered a new host, it discreetly altered their behavior, like a film of the original psyche covered her AI. Normally, her replica did not voice disagreements so easily. Rory might not have seemed bold upon first glance, because she was cautious and kind, but she was far more bold than anyone else Vehru had taken over. Without the emotional consideration of compassion slowing her tongue, the steeliness of her will and propensity to push for what she knew was best had influenced Vehru's Replica to speak.

Vehru always had to remind herself that these Replicas were the same persona, with the same mind, spread out into different bodies or mediums and that their hive mind kept them as connected as Vehru was to herself. Though Jace said nothing, it was the same Replica inside him, and so both of these personalities were in agreement.

"There's a reason I make the decisions and not you," Vehru said. "Emotions are as powerful as pure reasoning. You'll see when this is over."

"You're very emotional today, Commander." Rory's cold eyes stirred discomfort within Vehru. "Are you sure you don't want to lower your sensitivity?"

"I'm sure. Go do your job."

Rory's stare shifted to Jace. They didn't need to actually talk out loud, but Vehru was still human after all. She preferred this and the Replicas respected that. It helped her remember that they were on her side, even when their cold stubbornness made them adversarial.

"This host has three names," Rory said. "We've not encountered this before."

Vehru rolled her eyes. It was bizarre to see herself stripped of emotions and in the form of an AI. They cared so much about unimportant technical details. "Take R-Rep," Vehru said. Normally, her Replica named itself based off the first letter of the host's name and a shortened version of the word Replica. "She goes by Rory on this planet."

"I could be WAR-Rep." The small smile that came over her face looked nothing like normal human humor. It lacked the nuance of emotion and was a simple acknowledgement of the logic of a joke rather than the enjoyment of it. "Witness, Aeryn, Rory. Fitting."

"Your host is giving you an odd sense of humor," Jace said.

"Yours is making you stiff. Anger must be the dominant emotion lingering in your host's mind. Interesting. Our Witnesses emotional resilience must be protecting her from those harsher emotions. It shows the benefit of such resilience, Commander Vehru. Maybe you should reconsider allowing your emotions to run so wild." Rory blinked and looked at Vehru. "Are you thinking of us as Jace and Rory? You don't think of T-Rep as her host's name, Trin. Why the change?"

Vehru sighed. "You're annoying me. I'm leaving."

"It's concerning," Jace said. "You know we rarely speak up."

Her teeth clenched. "Fine. I'll take a look inside and see if alterations need to be made. Now get busy."

Vehru stormed out of the room, guzzled the vodka once in the hall, and then leaned back against the wall.

What Morfrain had done to Jace infuriated her and seeing Rory's pain at finding him that way stabbed into her heart. The worst, though, was the hint of trust in Rory's eyes. Vehru had betrayed her again.

She dropped the bottle on the ground and walked down the hall. It didn't matter how she felt. Only that she accomplished her mission.