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Freja is both surprised and relieved to see Emre fall asleep so quickly after their lovemaking. She does not sleep easily these days, and from the shadows under his eyes—a mere symptom of being Turkish, he'd once claimed, and no amount of sleep could get rid of them—she knows he also has not been sleeping as he should.
Perhaps his slumber has something to do with the fact that they are in her quarters within Talon rather than his, a snap decision made almost the instant they landed in Rome after returning from Riyadh a couple of days ago. Freja visited his rooms in preparation for the search for him, and found them pristine and absent of any personalization, as though no one had ever lived there at all. Her rooms are not exactly filled with decorations either, but her cloak is slung over the back of a chair in the corner, and her makeup is on the vanity, and her open suitcase displays rumpled, hastily packed clothes. There's signs of life in here, and between that and her presence, the exhaustion, and likely the first bit of happiness he's had in a while, she guesses that is why he succumbed to sleep so quickly.
She watches him for a while from the comfort of her tiny private dining table with her legs curled to her torso, observing the gentle rise and fall of his chest; it is a refreshingly organic sight among all the wires and tubes poking out of him. She doesn't know what happened, and she believed Emre when he told her he did not know either. In the aftermath of sex, she'd finally comprehended the extent of the cybernetics, at least the ones she could see. His left arm and both legs below the knee are entirely synthetic at this point, and with his clothes off, she could see the telltale signs of cybernetics having been woven into the muscles of his thighs, his torso, his shoulder. She knew about those integrated into his mostly-organic right arm—those were exposed anyway—but everything else…
And that's not counting the horrifying contraption welded to his chest, nor the line of spinal implants creeping up his spine like a parasite, or the implants that she can't see, like all the neuro-hardware he surely must have. Even with all her data gathering before the mission, there was only so much she knew. Even Moira had only been permitted to limited details about his new physiology.
What happened? Is the demon inside of him responsible for these changes, or was there some other entity that shoved that thing inside Emre as well as forced these cybernetics upon him? How could they even begin to figure out how to stop it if they didn't even know what this was?
Freja forces herself to calm her breathing. She inhales through her nose, then exhales through her mouth, pursed into a tiny O to control the flow of air. She cannot hope to help Emre if she gets herself worked up. Then again, a small voice inside her says she is allowed to be upset seeing the extent of what has happened to her best friend—
Her lover?
What are they now?
She does not know, and she does not think there is a good answer at this time, but she is not leaving him, not after having she only just found him. And she knows he does not want her to leave. This is enough for her.
She makes herself focus on his breathing, matching her own with his. The heart beating beneath that hateful eye is still organic. Still him.
Slowly, slowly, the wild emotions of the past few days begin to settle in her gut, becoming a smooth, ignorable ball of tension rather than the rhythmless torrent within her bloodstream, and she lulls herself towards drowsiness, even curled up in this chair as awkwardly as she is. Inhale, exhale. Watch Emre breathe, as though she could manage to take her eyes off him for more than a moment after being separated for so long, and then find him in such a state—
No, she does not need to ruminate on this right now.
Her legs are beginning to cramp. She focuses on that instead, on the growing, nearly numbing pain spreading through her abused hamstrings. Her own heartbeat has a rhythm; she is acutely aware of every pulse through her legs. This is easier. She can deal with this.
She's nearly convinced herself to go back to bed—to lay next to Emre, and god, what a wild thought that is to be able to finally do so after all these years—when his chest stills.
It's entirely silent; she only notices because she's watching him so closely. He never said anything about sleep apnea, right?
Something feels very wrong. Freja has always listened to her gut, and it's never led her astray.
Freja's on her feet and hovering over him on the bed in an instant, all drowsiness purged from her system. "Emre?" she asks, touching his shoulder gently. When he does not respond, she shakes him. "Em, are you okay?" He still does not wake nor gasp, and she feels his carotid for his pulse—present, steady, and at an acceptable rate for the full ten seconds, thankfully—and she's about to begin rescue breaths when something in the air abruptly shifts. She pauses to reassess the scene, realizing the hair on the back of her arms is standing up as though filled with static.
And then Emre gives a sharp inhale and opens his eyes, except they're not his eyes at all, neither the new ruby red nor the familiar, lovely brown they used to be—
They're glowing, and Freja realizes abruptly that this is not Emre at all.
She scrambles backwards at the same time he—it?—sits up, staring straight at her with those blazing eyes. In the space of a second, a strange distortion of light comes over his body, somewhere between black and red. It's like looking into a most horrible part of outer space, somewhere she cannot comprehend. She makes it off the bed without falling, backing into the wall and already making a plan for how to get to her crossbow when it speaks.
"Freja Skov."
She did not realize it could speak. It's awful; Emre's voice, and not at all Emre's voice, corrupted by something electronic and deep and menacing, coming out of his body. The tension in her gut amplifies a hundredfold, paralyzing her to the wall. She's never felt so vulnerable; she's never ever been one to freeze like this in a dangerous situation, but has she ever been in one like this? Weaponless, shoeless, braless, in front of a demon possessing Emre with nothing more than her pajamas to defend herself with.
"Freja Skov. Answer."
"What do you want?" She's impressed that her voice does not waver.
The thing piloting Emre makes his body sit on the edge of the bed, staring at her with those burning eyes. The light shrouding his body flickers strangely with the movement, but does not fade. "You care for this asset."
"How do you know that?"
She already suspects the answer, but it still horrifies her to hear it say, "I see all." The eye on Emre's chest is glowing like a dying star, searing into her gaze.
"So, you'll see that you're hurting him. He needs his sleep. Let him go," Freja says, raising her chin and trying to appear braver than she feels. She avoids looking at the eye on Emre's chest and looks into the the blazing, glowing eyes on his face instead. Her heart thunders in her ears; she wonders if it can hear her. Are Emre's senses sharpened enough for that? Or does this demon have enhanced senses all on its own?
Does it care if she's scared? It must know. But she has not been killed yet, and she has never seen it show mercy before. She does not understand.
"I wish to speak with you," it says, as though that is that.
"Why not just kill me and get it over with? It'll be faster." Her weapons are on the other side of the room, and she's kicking herself for that decision made late at night amidst kisses and touches she's only dreamed of. But would it even do her any good to have her crossbow? She's seen what this thing can do.
Emre's eyes blink, and the room darkens for the briefest of moments. "You are useful alive."
A barked laugh escapes her against her will. "Useful?" she says, incredulous. "That's the most flattering thing you could come up with? What even are you?"
"That is not information you need to know." Its tone is just as monotonous when denying her. Does it even have feelings? It sounds like a cold, emotionless machine.
A machine. The comparison itches at her. Freja's had her suspicions between the extensive neurological implants and the details she has managed to glean about Emre's episodes, but this conversation is reinforcing them. It sounds like a bot, one of the colder ones that could not even emulate emotion, but what kind of artificial intelligence is it? She has never heard of one merging with a living being and possessing them in this way. Trying to calm herself, she decides to approach this in the same way she approaches conversations with Maximillien. "So, how am I useful, then?"
It does not hesitate in its response. "You care for this asset."
The repetition confirms it, as does the fact that Emre's body has not moved since it was sat upright. This must be a bot. But it does not seem to follow the typical omnic speech patterns, so what is it? "Yes, you've said that," Freja says, feeling her patience fray very slightly. "You're not wrong, though the asset has a name. Emre. I'm assuming you know it."
It blinks again. For an instant, all she sees is the strange lights dancing over Emre's body.
"I would like to propose an alliance. We share a mutual objective," it says rather than addressing what she said.
She can already guess what that is. "Protecting him, is it? You want your host alive, and it is useful to have someone else watching his back. Someone you can trust not to hurt him."
"Affirmative. You also want the asset alive."
Need it, really, Freja thinks. Now that she's gotten him back, the idea of letting him go feels like going without oxygen. "Affirmative," she echoes. "What do you want, then?"
"As you stated, protect the asset. Assist him in his objectives," the thing says in the same flat tone it has spoken of everything.
It takes effort to control her face, but this is something Freja knows how to do. By proposing an alliance, this conversation has turned to contract negotiation. Freja can do contract negotiation. She is good at it. It's part and parcel of her job. Careful to keep her tone cool and neutral, she asks, "And what are these objectives? Killing people?"
"Casualties are an unavoidable necessity at times in achieving the objective," it states, as though this is a simple fact of the world and not people's lives they are discussing.
It is an aggressively neutral, uncaring response. Cold, clinical logic. She can work with that, she thinks, mulling it over. After a moment, she says, "Right. If this is an alliance, then surely I must be able to make demands as well, yes? We negotiate."
Another blink; the light in the room shifts like the reverse of a lightning strike. "Acceptable response. Tell me of your terms."
She pushes off the wall and takes a few slow, careful steps towards Emre's body. "I will help him do what you want, but on the condition that needless deaths are avoided. I will incapacitate enemies as much as I can to keep him safe. But, if they are neutralized and therefore no longer a threat, stand down. They do not need to be killed. Is that amenable?"
"If you do not hold up your end of this bargain, I will defend the asset as I see necessary," it says, tilting Emre's head by degrees to look at her.
Freja shrugs. She may be human, and therefore displays of emotion are expected, but she can still play at being cool-headed. This is business, nothing more. "That is acceptable. I expect you to. I'll do my best to make sure such actions are minimally necessary."
The thing does not respond for several seconds. Interesting. The eye on Emre's chest continues to watch her unblinkingly. "Minimally necessary. A curious choice of phrase."
"I am not in the habit of taking contracts I can't complete. I do not make promises I cannot fulfill. I will do my best, but I cannot control all forces in this world. So, do we have a bargain? My protection and assistance of Emre, in exchange for not killing those that are no longer threats, and under the knowledge that perfection cannot be guaranteed for either of us?"
"The terms are agreeable."
"Excellent," Freja says. Under the scrutiny of this thing so close to her, she wants to cross her arms to cover herself, but she resists the urge. "You know, I suspect it is you and not Emre who has the habit of turning off trackers and disappearing mid-mission, or between missions. If you wish for me to help like this, you will have to stop that, or at least make sure I can accompany him. I cannot perform my duties without this."
Emre's body blinks once more, longer. She wonders if the thing is displeased, for it responds with, "My ultimate goals are not to be known. Minimal information is necessary to preserve confidentiality."
"I'm not saying you have to tell me what's going on, just—" Freja cuts herself off and exhales. She counts to three in her head and collects her words from the scramble they were falling into. "Do not disappear from me, or I cannot offer protection. I cannot protect something if I do not know where it is. If you are concerned about external surveillance, I do not allow trackers to be voluntarily placed upon myself or my plane by anyone. Professional pride. It was one of the conditions of my contract with Talon."
The thing seems to think on this for a moment. "This is logical."
"Great." Logical. It's absolutely some kind of bot.
"We have an agreement. We shall speak again as required," it says. The glow in Emre's eyes flickers like a sputtering candle; it intends to relinquish control imminently. She is running out of time to collect information.
"Pleasure doing business with you," she says. "How will I be able to get in contact with you if we need to speak?"
"I see all," it says, as though that's not the creepiest thing it could decide to repeat from this whole conversation.
"Right, good to know," she says, letting out an exhale in a tiny puff. The glow in Emre's eyes gutters further and begins to dim, as does the strange red-black light falling about his body. This thing does not want to chat. She tries one last time. "Wait—before you go, do you have a name I can call you?"
"That is not information you need to know," it replies, and then the lights blink out completely and she must lunge forward to stop Emre from tipping to the floor like a puppet with the strings cut. He's conscious; he groans in what must be disorientation and pain as she maneuvers him back to lying on the bed.
"Frej?" he rasps, his hands clutching his temples. "You're here?"
"Of course I am. I never left," she says, leaving his side just long enough to fetch a basic medkit from her bag before returning. She withdraws her penlight and flips it on, shining it into his eyes; Emre flinches away from the sudden brightness in the dark of the room on instinct; she is glad that reflex is intact, though she murmurs a half-apology as she shines it into one of his eyes and then the other, watching his pupils react. Good—they contract as rapidly as they should.
Emre clearly wants to squirm away from the light, but he's doing a valiant job of trying to let her conduct her exam. Is this photophobia, or a normal reaction to a bright light shining into his eyes in a dim room? When she taps the penlight to indicate for him to follow, he tracks it with his eyes alone, moving to either side and up and down. This, too, appears to be intact. "How are you alive? It did not kill you?"
The words are spoken in a weak, desperate tone she has rarely heard from him. She knows in her heart what he is really asking.
I did not kill you?
"No, no. I am unharmed," she says. She places the penlight down, though she leaves it on for a bit more light in this gloom, and Emre relaxes. It is still bright enough that she is less concerned about photophobia, though she cannot rule it out.
"Good," he says, his breath gusting into a sigh of relief. "I am… I am grateful. I have not had this happen before, where it took over when I was just sleeping, and then just left me in that same place without doing anything—I don't think so, anyway."
He does not remember. That much is clear. Freja decides to not press the issue, and instead holds up two fingers. "How many am I holding up?"
"Two. I don't understand. Why did it do this now?" He looks so wretched. Freja thinks the only time she has seen him come close to this level of despair was after the incident with the Deepsea Raiders, and even then, he did not seem so powerless. So vulnerable.
She holds up a third finger. She must tell him something—it would not be right not to—but how much? He deserves to know what they spoke of, but it is a delicate balance. Say that she agreed to help the thing, and he might think she is betraying him. Say too much, and perhaps it would possess him again, alter his memories, something worse… Freja does not want to explore those possibilities. "It—it spoke to me," she says, hesitant.
"It spoke to you?" Emre says, incredulous. He attempts to push himself up onto his elbows, but she keeps him down with a hand. "Did you learn anything?"
"Not really. Nothing actionable. How many fingers, Emre? Stop stalling."
"Three."
"Thank you. It made me pinky promise to protect you, as if I wasn't doing that anyway." She puts her hands down for a moment, then holds up one finger in his left periphery. "Do not move your eyes, and tell me how many. Do you not talk to it?"
"One. I don't have conversations with my parasite, no. I know what it wants. It tells me. It is not a two-way conversation like you apparently had." He grimaces, though it does not appear to be in response to the light. She moves the finger to his right periphery. "Still one. I'm not seeing double, Freja. You can stop the exam. I have a headache and I feel like I lost a drinking contest. Nothing abnormal. My brain is working as well as it ever does."
"I do not know what is normal for you yet," she points out, switching off the penlight and plunging them into relative darkness once again. The only light is from that horrid eye on his chest, bathing them both in faint red light. It is a reminder that, as the bot said, it sees all.
Emre says nothing for several moments. By light of the eye, she can see that he's looking at her with an expression that looks seconds away from crumbling. She lets him take his time to gather his thoughts, sitting back on her heels and maintaining eye contact. "Freja…" he says eventually, saying her name like it is precious. "I do not wish for you to get hurt or worse from this."
"I'm going to stop you right there," Freja says. She is the first one to look away for once. She hides it by jamming the pen light back into her medkit and zipping the bag closed with shaking fingers. "You are not breaking up with me over this, Emre." Somehow, her voice sounds like steel and does not tremble like her hands.
Even in the low light, she sees him furrow his brow and blink furiously at her words. His mouth twists—first into a frown, then a smile, then a strange muddled thing between the two as though he is trying to suppress a grin. "We are together?" he asks, voice quiet, unsure, hopeful. There's a note of fear in there, too, as though he does not know whether to believe this, or because he is afraid for her.
Freja is not sure which of these represents Emre's point of view, but she somewhat regrets her hasty choice of words. She doesn't not mean them; in fact, the mere implications and that he wants this too have that weight in her stomach doing twists and flips in excitement, not trepidation. But she did not mean to say them here, to let slip what she wants. This is not the time or place. She forces herself to keep it together for a few moments more. "I'm not leaving you again. I don't need some thing to make me swear that," she says, and there, her voice finally shakes at the edges. She stops, swallows down the worst of the emotions running like thunder through her veins, and adds with a tilts of her head and a lighter tone, "Besides, I think it likes me. Who else has faced it and lived to tell the tale?"
He is unconvinced. Despite the brief flash of happiness earlier, his expression has sank back into mingled despair and concern. She reaches for his hand and holds it between both of her own, running the pads of her fingers between the bones, slowly massaging away the tension. She takes note of every callus.
"Emre, I am a bounty hunter. I already involved with Talon. I accept their money. I am already in a very dangerous position within this world of my own volition. If I must be in danger…" She squeezes his hand. "Let me make that choice. Allow me to decide how I wish to be in peril."
"If something happens to you, I will never be able to forgive myself." The hoarseness of his whisper says more than any words could. Her heart aches within her chest. She spent so long mourning the lack of his presence by her side, mourned when she thought him dead, and now? To find him like this? Not only with these physical changes, but to seem him suffering so deeply beneath the mask he wears for others?
She leans forward and strokes some of his hair from his face; it's so long these days, and thick, softer to the touch that she would have thought. Emre does not close his eyes at the touch, but he does follow her hand movements with his head as though to nuzzle into her unconsciously. Just as quietly as him, she murmurs, "And if something happens to you and I did nothing to try and prevent it, I will never be able to forgive myself. So we are in agreement. I should stay. I am staying."
His jaw works for a long moment before he finally sighs. "Fine. I do not like it."
"Neither do I. But, we are in this situation whether we like it or not. Let's work together, then. Two heads are better than one, yes?" She emphasizes the last sentence with a soft bump of her forehead to his. He hisses in pain, and she belatedly remembers the headache. "Sorry, sorry—"
And then to her supreme delight, he cradles her face in his hands and kisses her deeply. Her head is spinning when he finally releases her. "You're not wrong," Emre says. His eyes track as she touches her lips with her fingertips; she is still half-convinced this is some kind of alternative reality. "That was okay?"
"Absolutely," she says, suddenly grateful for the dim red light. It must surely disguise the blush that has flamed across her cheeks. He has to know, though, because he's grinning too widely as he holds his arms open in a tentative invitation. Freja needs no persuasion to settle onto his chest as he wraps her into his embrace; if this offer is freely given, she will gladly accept.
His heart still beats an organic rhythm, albeit at a slightly elevated rate. She wonders if she should blame the kiss or the conversation for that.
"You did not answer my question," Emre says after the space of several breaths. His heart ticks faster under her ear—nerves this time, she thinks, or excitement. "Are we together? What even are we?"
And oh, that is not a conversation she is ready to have. She tucks her face deeper against his chest to hide her blush. "Can this be a question we entertain in the morning? You need sleep."
He strokes her back, fingers tracing the outline of every vertebrae. He chuckles, shaking her with the motion. "As do you. Very well. I'll let you wriggle out of this question tonight. Goodnight, Frej."
"Goodnight, Emre."