~ Talk to her, ~ Keilara urged.
~ She needs something to hold onto. ~
Kallan nodded, his chest tight. He knew that his wife was trying to keep up his spirits, to show an optimistic face, but the truth was that they were running out of time and options. All they could do now was try to keep a bad situation from getting any worse. They were going to lose the twins; there was nothing they could do to avoid that, no way that even clever Mercy could save them - she hovered at the edge of death, wracked by this painful childbirth, and this secret prison would have been almost inescapable even if she'd been at her full strength. Abi and her brother, the
other Asher, were going to be taken.
But if Mercy survived, there was a chance - just a chance - to get them back.
Shifting his awareness away from the mind palace he shared with Keilara, Kallan focused his full attention on the physical world. His perception was filtered through the haze of Mercy's pain, so her surroundings were blurry and unfocused. But that didn't matter. The only thing he had to focus on was
her. She called out for her husband, for the elder Asher, long gone now. But he didn't have to point that out. In some ways he
was Asher, and Asher was him, two parts of a mind and soul split down the middle by the Maw. In her agony, Mercy might not even know the difference. He certainly didn't plan to tell her.
He would just try to be the person she needed right now.
~ I'm here, ~ he told her, squeezing her hand with ghostly fingers.
~ I'm with you. ~ Kallan wracked his brain, trying to think of something to say, something that would keep her focused. He needed her mind to stay active, her neurons to keep firing, or she was going to slip away into the cold release of death. That might be what she wanted, but he had to deny it to her for a little longer. If they all died here, the Taskmaster would dominate the twins' destiny, and he could not allow that.
~ Do you remember when you first reached out to me? ~ he asked, trying to filter Asher's memories through his own consciousness.
~ You pressed your lips to the cold transparisteel of my cybernetic face. ~
~ I couldn't feel them, but they changed everything anyway.~
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Finally shaking off Mercy's empathic attack, Tu'teggacha managed to get back to his feet. His captive hadn't made it far, fortunately. She'd barely staggered out the door before collapsing. She lay in the hallway just beyond the cell, convulsing, whispering to a man long dead. What had been her
plan, exactly? She had escaped him once before, it was true, but he had taken precautions this time. There was no way out of his secret prison, this twisting maze of reinforced durasteel corridors, patrolled by loyal fanatics and Ebruchized monstrosities alike. He could have contained her even at full strength. He was sure of it.
Well, her usefulness was almost at an end, so he would never find out anyway.
But as the Taskmaster sidled over to where Mercy had fallen, a curious feeling took hold of him. He realized that he was
angry at Mercy, angry that she had attacked him in her last moments, angry that she had continued over and over to defy him. Death was too good for her. He needed to make good on his threat, make sure that she could not escape into death's embrace. He was the Breaker of Minds, and
no one escaped him! His facial tendrils writhed in agitation as the thought took hold. Yes, he needed her to survive... so that he could unleash upon her torments like no mortal had ever suffered before.
It never occurred to him that his thoughts were being manipulated.
The medical droids arrived just behind him, preparing their instruments for the procedure. The birth had grown.. complicated. A c-section was the only way to ensure that the children survived.
"Commencing extraction," the lead surgical droid droned, leaning down with its scalpel-arm at the ready. It was perfectly content to perform the procedure right there on the floor; after all, it had been programmed to prioritize the survival of the
twins, not the mother. But Tu'teggacha waved it away.
"Alter your directives," he commanded.
"Get her back up on the table first, and sterilize the area again."
"I've changed my mind. I want the mother alive, too."
Ara Sheridan
