Chapter Text
The sun was setting, casting its fire-hued glow across the chamber through the high balcony windows.
Ri’kara sat with her legs tucked underneath her, brow furrowed in concentration as she tinkered with the unruly, broken-down limb. One of their sparring matches had gone awry, her tendency to aim for his obvious weak point fully loosening a joint and detaching the back toe. They had stumbled back to his chambers, her holding him up as best she could with their height difference, so that she could fix her mistake.
Alarak was making his irritation about the matter known, lay out on his sofa with a murderous scowl and an aura that chilled the air around him.
“I said I was sorry.”
“Hmph.” He crossed his arms over his chest and deliberately looked away from her.
“Look if you let me actually make you a new one then maybe this wouldn’t happen so often. This thing is falling apart anyway. You could have tripped and the same thing would have happened.”
“Yes, of course, because tripping is the same as having you kick the thing.”
She sighed, letting it taper off into a loud groan. “I’m fixing it, ok!”
The leg seemed to be worse than the first time she had tended to it, even with the obvious fixes that had clearly been added by a third party. With a grumble, she tightened some bolts and oiled the joints, but the silence was grating, especially with his psionic warfare putting another shiver down her spine.
“… You never told me how you lost your leg.”
“You did not ask.”
“I’m asking now.” The little Tal’darim looked up at him with an expression that she hoped would melt him a little; it seemed to have been effective before, though she had no idea why someone like him would crack so easily under a face that she made.
He glanced at her, and she saw something waver. His scowl deepened, but the air didn’t feel as cold.
“Fine. I suppose I will indulge you.”
Instead of launching into his story, he instead seemed to hesitate again before sitting up, taking hold of both legs so he could turn himself to face her and rest his only foot on the floor.
She looked at him, tilting her head slightly.
“You don’t seem like you want to. That’s ok too.”
Alarak held out a hand, rolling his eyes. “I was debating whether showing would be more efficient.”
“I thought you hated the idea of anyone being in your head. You complained for months about the crystal—”
“I did not trust you then, Ri’kara.” His eyes rolled. “I am sure you can appreciate how invasive it was to have been forced to transplant a memory in such a manner. I did not much enjoy the subsequent analysis of my emotions either.”
Passing a hand over her crest, she shrugged. “It was helpful at the time, but I get what you mean… If you like, we can trade.”
“What?”
“You show me this one, and I show you one of mine. Any you like.”
The fingers of his outstretched hand curled back into his palm, his other hand giving a dismissive wave. “As though such a trade is necessary. There is nothing that I would wish to see from you.”
The way that he rebuffed her offer so quickly… She let out a soft little laugh, putting the limb to the side and shuffling over on her knees to sit at his feet. From this angle, she had to crane her neck up further to meet his gaze, giving him a knowing smile. For a moment she swore she saw his crest tinge lilac.
“There is something, isn’t there?”
“Hmph. Believe what you wish.”
Ri’kara let out another laugh, reaching up and taking his hand in both of hers. “You’ll ask me eventually, I’m sure. Go on, show me.”
He nodded, their eye contact suddenly so intense and uncomfortable that she had to hold onto his hand tighter, an anchor point to keep herself from looking away.
Through the crystal, the dip into his mind had been like stepping into a long-abandoned room, cold, only echoing the memory it held. Here, being allowed directly into his active consciousness, was more like plunging into a warm pool, sinking deeper into the inky dark until—
The harsh, grey cliff face stretched up towards the Terrazine-soaked sky, the great holes that riddled its surface staring down at them in the silence.
Alarak shivered, scowling a little as the cold night air whipped up into another gust of wind, swirling the purple mist that rolled up out of fissures in the ground at their feet. He took some in, letting the wash of power sharpen his senses to the point that he could hear, even from this distance, the skittering of something in the cliff’s tunnels.
His companion dropped the arm of the corpse they had been holding, sighing softly and stretching.
“So. First to kill it wins?”
“That is what you stipulated.” He dropped the other arm, looking down briefly at the dulled eyes of their unfortunate third. He had lost their first game, and now he was to be bait.
Already the skittering was increasing from inside the rock. Zoanthisks. They were elusive creatures, insects that fed off the carrion of other wildlife that once dwelled here. After the terraforming of the planet by His nightly gifts, they had retreated to cave systems they had hewn from the cliffs outside of their settlements, growing many times their natural size thanks to the countless bodies left to them.
“They have smelled our offering.” Alarak said, taking his knife from the belt at his hip. It was light, the blade made of metal, though he could channel his psionics and turn it into an energy blade if he so wished; the standard personal arms of a supplicant.
“I expected you to have run away by now.” Kir’ark laughed a little, eyeing up the blade and pulling out two of his own.
“Tch. I would have expected the same of you.”
The ground rumbled, heralding the appearance of their prey. It emerged from one of the holes high up in the cliff, its many spiked legs allowing it to scale the sheer angle as it made its way down to the ground level. The large, paneled sections of its body shone iridescent even in the choked haze.
Both Protoss crouched low, watched as it approached the body. Pincers and long antennae explored the length of it, considering the meal before it bowed its head and began to eat. Inwardly, Alarak winced at the sight, but glanced over at his companion.
He nodded, and both of them broke into a sprint, flanking the creature on both sides.
It didn’t notice at first, too busy with its feast to see the danger it was in. Perfect.
Alarak launched himself into a high jump, landing on its back and driving his blade in between the plating to get to the soft flesh beneath.
The thing screamed, throwing its head back and curling around to look at what had just happened to it. Kir’ark took advantage of the distraction meanwhile and began cutting off as many of its limbs as he could before it began to thrash and squirm.
“Keep it still, Alarak!” He snapped, jumping back to avoid the volley of spines it shot out at him from its underbelly.
“As though that would ever be possible!” He snarled back, holding on as tightly as he could to the knife still wedged in its body. Activating the energy blade, he began to slide backwards, the added heat slicing through the armoured sections like butter.
With a yell, he slid off, knife still in hand as he hit the ground and rolled twice before getting back up onto his feet. A little disoriented, he whipped his head around to try and get his bearings.
Kir’ark once again narrowly avoided a second volley but didn’t see the great tail swing around towards him. It was prehensile, wrapping itself around his body and lifting. He yelled, began to scream, as it tightened around his body.
There must have been something just as sharp as the projectile spines on its underbelly. Blood, fresh and dark, began to spill from his rival’s middle, and like a popping balloon, he completely split in two, the separate halves dropping uselessly, viscera and organs trailing after them like ribbons in the wind.
Alarak decided then, while it was distracted, that he could leave. Part of its plating was close by; just enough of a trophy to prove that he had done what they had agreed. Nobody else had followed them out here, nobody that he came with had lived to refute his claims.
Grabbing the piece, he began to sprint back the way they had come, glancing back for a moment and feeling rare dread crawl up his spine.
It was following him.
That tail whipped out after him, grabbing his ankle and lifting to slam him against the rock below faster than he could dodge out of its way. The impact and the explosion of pain immobilised him for just long enough that it was able to crawl above him, holding him flat on his back and tilting its great head, considering him briefly just as it had their bait.
After another moment, two huge lower mandibles opened up to reveal its gaping maw, rows and rows of huge, razor-sharp teeth filling the cavity.
His hearts thundered in his head as he tried to struggle out from under the pincers that kept his arms and his neck pinned. He glanced to the side at the body of his would-be rival, ripped in two with his guts splayed out across the grit.
That will be you if you do not focus, you fool.
In desperation, he lifted a leg and kicked at its face, trying to jab a claw into one of its many faceted eyes. It recoiled from the blows, then jerked forward and clamped down on the offending limb, closing around it all the way up to his first knee.
Pain like pinpricks at first, then like burning as the sound of his flesh being stripped from the bone filled his senses and engulfed him in an agony he had never felt before. Warm blood pooled below him, soaked him as he screamed into the purple-tinged night. Its teeth bit down harder, and the ugly snap of bone followed his next pained cry.
Tears poured down his face, blurred his vision with red vapour as he weakly tried to kick it off him with his other leg, but he was trapped there, forced to watch it devour him piece by piece.
Another snap, another tear, and the leg was gone down its gullet. Somehow, he could still feel it, as though it were still attached to him, the sharp points of the creature’s teeth still running across skin that no longer existed.
Again, he tried to struggle, even as the pincers dug into his wrists and neck, his shoulders heaving as he took in more air and let out another ragged scream. Any rational thought had blown away with another gust of wind, replaced only by the primal need to somehow survive this.
More scuttling across the rock caused him to freeze. Another one, larger, loomed over the both of them. They both started chittering, making warning clicks not unlike those of his own species, before setting upon each other for the right to the food that had been presented to them. Alarak didn’t stay to watch.
Turning onto his belly, he crawled back the way that they had come, following the trail of congealing blood and leaving one of his own in his wake.
This time the creatures did not follow.
In a safe hiding place, he ripped the loincloth from his belt and tied the fabric tightly across his thigh, at least trying to slow the amount of blood he was losing. The world was spinning, the Terrazine in the air doing little to calm him no matter how much he took in.
Do not overdose, fool. He chastised himself and continued his crawl.
On the outskirts, the looming entrance to the underground complex of the phase-smiths cast a long shadow over him. Hope, brief, fleeting, washed over him, pushing life back into his shaking limbs as he got close to the structure.
Finally, he pulled himself through the large door to the rear of the structure, looking quickly back and forth even as another wave of dizziness washed over him. A smith sat in a dark corner tinkering with what looked to be a probe, large, deep orange eyes widening as they met his own.
“You.” Alarak managed to snarl, pointing the knife he still somehow had in his hand at him as he shakily pulled himself into a sitting position. “Fix this or I’ll make you wish you had never been born.”
The smith nodded quickly, fear clear on his face as he grabbed him under the arms without question and began to drag him over to one of the smaller elevators. The probe that he had been working on followed, taking some of the weight off him by training its eye on Alarak’s middle and lifting slightly. He was very lucky that the smith was too weak to consider the opportunity presented to him.
It was only at that moment that he began to drift in and out of consciousness, the sound of the whirring elevator platform and the crash and grinding of machinery and the many-layered psionic whisperings of no doubt hundreds of Protoss speaking the only things keeping him from fully succumbing to it. He was carried down narrow, twisting corridors for what seemed like an age until the smith put him down against the wall of a sparse room with a diamond-shaped door and a forest of equipment. The probe that had helped to carry him powered down in a corner.
“Master?”
Alarak stirred slightly, blinking to make his eyes focus on the smith’s face.
“I’m going to cauterise it. I have some Terrazine here.”
He nodded, taking the dose shakily and not even bothering to open the bottle, crushing the thin glass in his hand despite the shards that dug in and breathing deeply. Everything was once again sharp, almost too sharp, but he was able to at least sit himself up properly.
“Your name, phase-smith.”
“Irinax, master.” He was rifling through a particular pile of machinery, pulling what looked to be a large metal sleeve from near the bottom of it. Walking over, he knelt beside him and untied the makeshift torniquet, closing the metal casing around the stump instead. “This will hurt.”
“Obviously.”
With a grimace, Irinax turned the thing on, getting up and going to the door to look away.
It was warm at first, almost pleasant, then suddenly burning, searing, the smell of cooking flesh filling the room as he tensed his whole body and tried not to scream again. His claws scraped across the stone floor and his face once again became wet with tears as the machine did its job.
After the burning, there was the pulling at loose skin, fine pincers stitching it together; it seemed smiths lost limbs so often that they even had machines to fix their biggest mistakes. He could appreciate that; anything to avoid the final punishment of a Vanguard shell.
Once it was done, the smith came back and removed the sleeve, wincing at its handiwork. The remaining skin had been closed around it in an ugly set of stitches. No doubt it would take weeks to fully heal, but it was better than bleeding out.
“There.”
He stood there, hesitating, his fingers lacing themselves together. Alarak forced out a growl.
“What?”
“… Forgive my insolence, master, but how will you get out of here?”
Again, he pointed his knife towards him, scowling. The pain and his meek, soft voice were grating on his nerves. “You are a smith, are you not? Make a limb and I may spare you.”
His eyes widened. “A… A limb?! That would take hours—”
He reached up, grabbing the stuttering Protoss by one of the straps of fabric across his chest and pulling him down to his eye level, jabbing the knife hard enough to draw a speck of blood. “I do not care how long it takes. Do it.”
Irinax’ gaze shifted to the middle distance, focusing on a spot on the floor as he no doubt tried to weigh his options.
“Of course. I just need a few things—”
“Fine.” Alarak roughly shoved him away, scowling. “Do what you must.”
He nodded, heading towards the door and looking back and forth.
“Hey.” He gestured to someone down the dark corridor. “Get over here, help me.”
The patter of feet echoed down the stone walls, stopping just before the door.
“What are you doing?” A voice, its owner just out of sight, hissed.
For a moment, the memory stuttered, threatening to pull them out of their trance as Alarak replayed that part again. She could feel his mind chafe against recognition as it strained to pinpoint who…
Ri’kara suddenly recognised it as well. It was her voice. The surprise loosened the tether between them just enough that for a moment she felt her own body and the real room around them before he fully pulled her back into the dark and dust of Slayn.
“What are you doing? You’re supposed to be on the factory line.” The newcomer hissed.
There was a pause, and then a short gasp; she must have been able to see him from her vantage point. “Is that a supplicant in there? The overseer will kill you—”
She was cut off as Alarak shifted his weight; he had intended to say something, to tell the other smith that she could keep her opinions to herself but instead he gasped with the lance of agony that shot down to the toes of his missing limb. Irinax glanced back at him.
“I just need some joints, some metal plates, some Bloodshard, you can get those right? He needs a limb and some armour, and I don’t know about you…” His voice lowered, but not enough that Alarak couldn’t hear it. “But having the favour of one on the Chain would be a huge boon. I don’t know why you wouldn’t jump at the chance.”
The insolent way he was speaking sparked anger in his chest, not that he could say anything about it; he hated owing anyone, let alone a Protoss right at the bottom of the barrel they swam in, but if he didn’t get the help he needed, he would be in a Vanguard himself before he could blink.
“Why would I take advantage of that? You’ve basically kidnapped a superior! Look—” She growled. “Fine, I’ll get those but that’s it, ok? I’ll be back.”
Irinax turned back into the room, beginning to once again rifle through the various piles of scraps and tools and machinery, laying what he needed out in the floor in front of Alarak.
“You may rest if you wish, master.”
“Tch. As though I would be so stupid as to close my eyes around you.”
He nodded but said nothing in retort. “If you could stretch out your other leg. I’ll need to make this accurately.”
What followed was hours of tinkering, adjusting, oiling. The other smith didn’t show up again, the parts requested simply dumped with an unceremonious clatter outside of Irinax’ door. The probe automatically sprung back to life, taking them inside and within reach of the smith’s workspace.
Neither of them spoke. Even with the danger that he was in, Alarak could not help but feel his eyes begin to droop as his hearts finally decided to stop their constant sprint and the pain began to dull to an irritating ache.
“There.” Irinax said finally, pulling the mouth of the metal limb towards his stump.
Alarak nodded, fitting it into place using the provided screws to tighten it. He gasped slightly with the renewed, raw pain of having something chafe against his still freshly cauterised wound, but he bore it, shakily getting to his feet and connecting his mind to the various crystals at each joint. It almost felt like his own leg, though he had to put in more effort to move it; its weight was almost double what he was used to.
He then reached for the armoured panels that were to go on his other leg. He was thankful that the smith had the foresight to realise how exposed he would have been should he only leave with the one leg ‘encased’ in metal, not that he would ever show it. Finally, he put on the armoured belt, the soft supplicant grey of a fabric skirt and loincloth covering the rest.
“Adequate, smith.”
Irinax bowed so deeply his long cords, weighed down by the phase-smith’s ring, trailed the floor.
“I will grant you the boon you so crave when I see fit.”
“Thank you, master.”
Though he still felt dizzy, though his hands still shook, Alarak swept out of the room with as much dignity as he could muster, even with the new limp he was now sporting, taking the half-remembered path back to the elevator that would take him to the surface. He could recover properly in the privacy of his own little hovel.
Ri’kara was finally able to untwine herself from Alarak’s mind, panting slightly as the sensation of Aiur’s fresh, clean air began to fill her. For a moment, she looked down at her leg, ran her fingers across the dappled skin. Just to be sure.
“That was you…” She said softly. “I didn’t even see you, I just saw your armour and panicked. Wow. That really was my own stupidity—”
She frowned a little, trying to unpick each event from herself like removing splinters; she always had a little trouble differentiating herself from the memory of the other once the dust had settled, and right them was no exception.
“Your own stupidity. You killed one of your allies to use as bait. You were going to try and kill one of those things for what? Glory? What were you thinking?”
Alarak looked… embarrassed under the obvious fatigue of the memory. “I was freshly out of the temples, young, reckless; we had formed a competition of sorts that we all drew pebbles to participate in. I had abstained up until then, but they thought me a coward for it.”
“So you joined in.”
He nodded. “And the one time I decided to do so, I paid dearly. After that incident one of my masters found out that I had been hiding a prosthetic.” He glanced at the limb. “You know what came of that.”
She sighed, rubbing her face. The ghost of the zoanthisk’s teeth prickled up her limbs and she shuddered, unable to think of anything else to say.
Her companion seemed to recover a little, a chuckle leaving him. “… It seems you were always soft.”
“Tch. How about a thank you? If… Irinax?” For a moment, a sadness washed over her; she didn’t know many of the names of the smiths she used to work with. Just then, though, she shrugged it off. “If he had gone to get the supplies, he would never have come back, and you would have been found.”
“Thank you. Of course I would be grateful for that.”
“As you should be.”
The little Tal’darim thought briefly of the body they had dragged to the edge of the settlement, thought of how… Nonchalantly it had been treated. The bodies she had to drag out of ships were treated in the same way near the end of her time in the complex, the anguish that she had once felt at a colleague she was unable to save dulled to almost nothing. Still…
“Did he expect to die? That third Protoss?”
He shrugged. “Mm, each of us did; it was the way of things. I can understand the cruelty on display disgusting you, but it was expected. Weed out the competition while there was little scrutiny.”
“Just like in the batches, I suppose.”
“Yes. Though I suppose you avoided partaking.”
“I was always soft. Defective. I had to hide so much of what I felt.” She examined each one of his calloused fingers. For some reason he let her, allowed her to turn his hand back and forth to trace the lines and patterns.
“Something you may allow me to see, perhaps.” His voice took on that softness it had begun to have sometimes when they were alone. She could feel him watching her.
“Maybe.” Glancing up, she felt her crest flush at his equally soft eyes. “Trading fear for fear doesn’t sound like a bad idea. I could show you what it was like in my batch, unless you have a request.”
“I wish to see something equal to what I have shared with you.”
Ri’kara tilted her head. “I thought you would have something more specific in mind.”
“Trivial things that are to be told not shown.” He waved his free hand dismissively. “I trust that you will use discretion.”
She sifted through her various memories of Slayn, of the dark pits and the pain and the terror that slowly melded together into a mundane blur the closer the End War slid towards what she had once thought was an inevitable conclusion. Something equal…
“I don’t know how much of it is going to be tainted by the nightmares; a lot of my experiences from that time are. It might not be authentic.”
Alarak shrugged, using the grip she had on him to pull her up onto the sofa beside him. “As though I care so long as it is what I have asked for.”
Once she was up, he turned towards her, lifting his one leg to tuck underneath him. It felt natural to do the same in turn with her own legs, facing him so that they could more comfortably maintain that eye contact. They hadn’t once let go of the other’s hand.
With a soft sigh, the little Tal’darim steeled herself to properly look into his sharp red eyes, for a fleeting moment thinking of that dream she often had of a dance partner under Aiur’s golden moon, a recreation of their own little dance, before pushing the thought deep down and away so that there was no chance he could accidentally see it when their minds once again wrapped around each other.
A sharp slap, the sound echoing in the small, dark chamber, sent her tumbling to the floor. The gritty stone scraped the skin of her hands and forearms, the friction insufficient to slow her descent as her face slammed against the floor as well, pain exploding across her cheek and jaw.
“Clearly I have been too lenient with you, Ri’kara.” Urach spat, disgust dripping from each word. “If you refuse to work to the standard that I expect, then I refuse to give you the privilege of a soft hand.”
Fear gripped her tightly, constricting her ribcage around her thundering hearts as she tried to shakily get on her hands and knees.
“I’m sorry, master, I will do better—”
She was cut of by a kick to her gut, sharpened by his armoured foot as she was sent skittering across the floor again, more scraping, more cuts, abruptly brought to a halt by the back wall, more pain shuddering through her spine with the impact.
“Yes. You will. This lesson will ensure that.”
He reached for his belt, hand closing around the handle of his whip as he unhooked it slowly, taking measured steps towards her. She knew better than to try to run then, the dread and anxiety building in her gut the whole point of his suddenly lazy movements.
“Look at me.”
The bright red of the summoned whip bathed the room a fraction of a second before the electrical crackle. A sharp snap right next to her head made her jump and shrink away, a wordless demand to obey.
Quickly, she lifted her head up to stare into his one bright eye, though the deep, empty socket of his missing one seemed to bore into her just as intensely.
Something closed over her mind in the moment their gazes locked, forcing her body to lie still as he leant down and cut the straps from her upper body, exposing her back to him. For a brief moment, his fingertips snaked down her spine, and she tensed up so hard to try and get away from his touch that she felt every muscle cramp. He scoffed, straightening and taking a few steps back.
With a flick of his wrist, the whip came down, the searing pain and the sound and smell of sizzling flesh filling the air. It took all of her willpower to fight back the scream that bubbled up from the depths of her body.
Another crack. Warm blood began to pool underneath her as she choked out a soft, pained sound. Tears welled in her eyes, but Urach’s expression barely changed; she knew what he really wanted.
Again the whip snapped across her body, again she tried to stop herself from screaming. It felt as though everything were on fire, seared flesh and hot blood and pain so intense that the room spun around her. Each blow only added to it, threatened to draw that desired yell of submission out of her.
“You are only making this harder on yourself, Ri’kara.” Urach sneered, drawing his whole arm back to put more force into the next strike.
That last blow shuddered a bolt of electricity through her, the veins under her skin burning as the bolt snaked down her arm. It was only then that she gave in, letting out an agonising scream that she was sure the whole complex could hear. All at once her body was released from its invisible binds, slumping against the stone as she sobbed and whimpered.
“Clean yourself up. I expect you back on the factory line by tomorrow.” A tinge of satisfaction coloured his command as he swept from the room, leaving her in the pool of her own blood and swimming in shame.
It hurt to even just lie there trembling, but that was all she could do for what seemed like hours. She deserved it, of course. Any mistake she made, any device broken by carelessness meant that another phase-smith could be killed. Urach’s anger was justified.
Still, he had never left her like this. He had promised that he would be more careful, promised to keep her safe from the others, and yet…
Maybe this time he wants me to die.
The thought swirled in her head like a marble around a bowl, despair following in its wake, betrayal. He had promised.
And yet.
Ri’kara, somehow, despite her pain-racked body, pulled herself to her feet, discarding the cut top of her uniform and trudging out of the little room, muscles shuddering with every step.
There were vents in each of the thick walls that made up the maze of the complex, all leading up to the surface, cycling the stale air and bringing down the nightly Terrazine flow, at least a little of it; they weren’t allowed too much of a gift from Him.
Keeping to the shadows of the alcoves, smearing blood against the stone each time she slipped, Ri’kara made her way to one such vent hidden in one of the darkest corners of an abandoned corridor, feeling the fresher air from above and using a tool she kept in her belt to slowly remove each of the clamps keeping it firmly attached.
Each movement sent another burning spike of pain through her; she hadn’t realised until just then how much of her work needed the muscles of her back. She had to steel herself, force the urge to sob or make any sort of noise deep down.
Finally, it popped off, and she quickly caught it as it fell forward, finally letting out a small cry as the weight of it pushed down on her trembling arms. She dragged it out of sight and crawled in, trying not to think of the ship vent that had led to all of this as she shimmied all the way to where she could stand again.
There were no handholds here save for the slim weld marks that jutted out a little at intervals that she knew she would have to stretch to reach. There was no way that she could press her back against the wall to brace herself.
Using those flimsy grooves, she heaved herself up, clammy hands threatening to slip with every pull and push. She had climbed the smooth curve of a ship’s hull before, never this injured, never this much of a steep incline, but she forced herself to focus; relief would be at the top.
The grating at the mouth of the vent popped open with a few slams of her fist, thankfully, tipping to the side to properly open her up to Slayn’s choked air. It was night, the sky shimmering with that ominous purple haze, the moon shrouded in its cloak.
Here will be a good place. If he wants me to die, I’ll at least see the sky beforehand.
Letting out more pained sounds unbidden as she tried to take in more air, Ri’kara heaved herself up and onto the grass. More tears poured down her cheeks, but there was, as she had hoped, some relief once she got herself comfortable as she could in the dirt.
She couldn’t really make herself move that much anymore. Part of her, the small, scared part that didn’t want to go yet, hoped that it would at least be peaceful, maybe even quick—
Instead of silence to wrap herself in, footsteps thundered through the ground towards her, fear once again constricting itself around her ribcage. The psionic whispers of a private conversation followed, and another set of steps joined the first.
She didn’t dare look up; the armour that she could see on their feet meant either overseers, bloodhunters, or warriors on the Chain out for the night. Any of those three spelled trouble. She shut her eyes tight, waiting for a possible attack.
Instead, she heard the shift of metal, and the stern but surprisingly gentle voice of the Protoss speaking to her.
“Are you alright, phase-smith?”
Ri’kara opened her eyes, dared to look up into the speaker’s own; one bright, one stitched closed, and felt a bubble of fresh tears. Maybe, if they were going to pretend to be kind, she could dare to get her last wish from them.
“Please just… Please just kill me already, master.”
The other one spoke then, voice strained as though trying to hold back some sort of emotional show.
“I was once a Votary. I can help you.”
Dread snaked down her spine. A votary? Urach’s saccharine promises mirrored this one’s own mirage of softness.
“No. I don’t have anything I can give you in return, please, just—”
“We don’t want anything in return.” She spoke insistently. “We can take you somewhere safe.”
Safe? Two Tal’darim of undetermined rank wanted to lead her off somewhere and help her for nothing? No, there was something wrong. Her instincts screamed from the depths of her pain-addled mind; they must not want to reveal their motives until she was in their debt.
Pouring as much venom as she could into her tone, she shot back; “Fuck you; just kill me! I won’t let you lead me into a trap!”
For just a moment, the one with one eye scowled. Yes, that was it; maybe being insolent would make them snap, either show their hand or strike out at her.
Instead, she softened again, sighing and sitting back on her rump in the dirt.
“Uljia, we can treat her here. Run back and get your stuff.”
‘Uljia’ grimaced. “If you’re sure, it’s not exactly sanitary—”
“As if anything here is. Go.”
She nodded, getting to her feet and racing off into the night.
The phase-smith sobbed, the heaving of her shoulders only racking her with more pain as each cry was punctuated with a whimper. The world began to spin again, but she let herself take in some of that Terrazine, let it dull her slightly; she had to stay conscious.
The other Protoss didn’t speak, only sat there and watched her with an expression that she couldn’t read. It only made her anxiety worse.
“What do you want with me?”
“We told you; nothing.” She shrugged. “I know it’s not believable to you, but you’re going to die if we don’t get that looked at.
“I want that.” Ri’kara insisted, even as hope began to undercut her suspicion. “Besides, I could die tomorrow, and all that effort would be wasted.”
“But you won’t.” Again, she scowled, as though her command alone would ensure that all the dangers of her occupation would avoid her forever.
All she could do was slump herself against the dirt again, rolling all the possibilities she could think of for their motives round and round in her head until she let out another frustrated sob. What could they gain from her survival? What could she give them?
It wasn’t long before those same footsteps sounded, the Tal’darim’s companion rejoining them and immediately kneeling down in the dirt beside the phase-smith.
“That was… fast.”
Uljia spoke. “We live here. Ilira, help me wash her.”
In the surface houses? Where the overseers and their pets lived? Terror washed over her, her whole body shying away from their hands.
“You’re overseers—?!”
“No. We’re warriors. Think; we would have dragged you back by now if we were, right?”
That was true, not that she had the time to think it through very thoroughly as she cried out from the pain of the cool water and the cloth that felt like sandpaper across her flesh.
“It’s all blistered… I’ll stitch the gashes first, just hold her still.”
Uljia’s voice remained soft, concerned. Despite everything, it made part of her relax. Whether it was a ruse or not, she couldn’t detect any sign of irony, no patronising tone. This one seemed… Concerned for her. Truly so.
The new rounds of fresh, boiling pain slipped her in and out of consciousness. She took in as much of the Terrazine-soaked air as she could again, the sharp shimmer making her fully alert, dulling it just enough for her to keep awake again.
Still, with the Terrazine came that voice, low, layered with many voices in a deep, mocking choir.
What weakness to accept help from those who would use you once they are finished.
She tried to ignore it, tried to stay still, tried not to shy away from ‘Ilira’ as she held her down. The ointment stank, sent sharp prickles through her back and shoulders before finally easing how raw the skin felt. They sat her up, and used large swathes of bandage around her torso, pinning it in place at her side.
“There.”
Ri’kara’s shoulders sagged. Suddenly she felt so tired…
“Thank you, master.”
“Don’t fucking call me that, by the way.” Ilira snapped. “Come back here tomorrow so she can change them.”
“I can… bring you resources. Something else, maybe?”
“We don’t want anything, phase-smith.” Uljia placed a hand on her shoulder, a habit of all temple Tal’darim, it seemed, even as she flinched away.
“If you want this to be transactional, then just survive. We’ve gone to all that trouble now, haven’t we? Don’t be ungrateful and throw it away.”
None of it made sense. Her head was spinning again, that voice telling her that there must be more, there must be something, but… She supposed that it was as much of a bargain as any.
“Ok. I’ll come back tomorrow.”
“Good.”
Letting the memory fall away, she found that, there in Alarak’s chambers on Aiur, her face was wet, her limbs trembled. It had been a long time since she’d felt agony like that which she had experienced then. For some reason, the scars that still lingered on her back burned.
Alarak wasn’t much better, his eyes still pouring with tears as he blinked away vapour and let out a choked sob.
Startled, Ri’kara fully pulled herself back into the room. “Alarak, are you—?”
“Yes.” He snapped and then softened himself after a moment, wiping his face. “The way that you feel emotion is potent. These are not mine.”
The little Tal’darim could feel his rapid heartbeat through the pulse at his wrist. They both looked down, extracting their grip and wincing together at the bruises they had inflicted on each other from how tightly they had ended up holding on.
“Sorry…” She mumbled, stretching her hand as it cramped.
“Do not apologise.” He was doing the same, rolling his wrist and examining the scratches she had managed to leave with her claws at the ends of the marks her fingers had made. “I believe that was more than equal. What could have even warranted such a punishment?”
She shrugged, resting her head against the back of the sofa, suddenly as exhausted as she had been at the end of the memory. “I had wired something wrong on the ship I had been left to fix up, and it caused an explosion. Nobody was hurt, but…”
“Even more reason for me to have—” The Highlord stopped, frowning. “For you to have killed him.”
It seemed that he had a similar issue extracting himself from her. He rubbed his face, sighing softly and leaning against the back cushions as she had. His eyes drifted, gaze fixed on a spot on the ceiling.
“I admire your will to survive.” He finally said after a few moments of silence. “We are similar in ways that I had not expected.”
“I could have told you that without the traumatic memories.” She laughed weakly. “I’m… Glad it was fruitful for you.”
They sat in silence again for several minutes before she finally pulled herself from the cushions and grabbed the leg to continue her tinkering. Everything seemed to linger; the ghost of his grip, the Terrazine in the choked air, the sense of dread and pain and sadness…
“That voice was Amon.” Alarak spoke quietly. “A ghost of Him.”
“Oh? Well, I suppose you heard Him more than I did being first Ascendant and all.”
He nodded. “It was different through your mind. Likely your own insecurities took on his tone when under the influence.”
Ri’kara let out a sad little laugh. “I guess it was easier to blame my despair on the god who wanted me dead in the first place.”
“I should hope that you do not think such things anymore.”
“Not to that degree.” She shrugged. “What happened to Irinax, by the way?”
His glance at her was disapproving, though it barely masked the true concern underneath. “… I gave him his boon and did not speak with him again. He may have died or escaped.”
“What did he ask for?”
“Supplicant armour and a blade. I had no need for mine after I had ascended to a warrior’s status.”
I guess that’s one way of getting out of there… She didn’t know if trading one hell for another was worth it.
It had become dark during their dives into each other’s memories. The crystal lamps had flickered themselves on, the last of the pinks and purples of the sunset outside fading into the deepening blue of the night.
“I think this is fixed up now. I should probably go.”
“You may rest here if you wish.” Alarak took the limb from her, swinging himself around to clip it back onto his stump.
She blinked, watching him as he tested that everything was in order. He looked as exhausted as she felt, the frown over his eyes troubled. That look of concern a few moments ago flashed across her mind’s eye again.
“… If you’re sure.”
“I am.” He stood, rolling his shoulders and wincing, as though he could still feel the sting of the whip.
Something in his tone reminded her of how insistent Ilira had been in their first meeting. She hopped off the seat awkwardly, heading over to the balcony doors and closing the curtains across them as best she could. It felt odd after being his height for so long, to have to stretch up onto her tiptoes and extend her legs to complete the task.
“It was nice to be tall, at least.” She said, turning back to the room and watching him place a few pillows and blankets on the sofa.
“It was unbearable to be short. The idea that you willingly put yourself into those enclosed spaces is baffling to me.” He shuddered.
“I didn’t like it either, but I had to.”
Gesturing to the ring on the end of her cords, his eyes narrowed. “I suppose that was the contingency?”
“Yes. And it was for pulling us around when they didn’t feel like barking orders. Urach used mine a lot.”
Alarak nodded, moving to sit on the edge of his bed and remove his prosthetic again. Ri’kara couldn’t help but feel the ghost of the creature’s teeth again before she settled on the little bed he’d made for her.
“Goodnight.” He said simply, allowing the crystal lights to dim.
“… ‘Night.” She replied, pulling the blankets up over her head and trying to drift off into a sleep not plagued with what she had witnessed.