The Inquisition.
They closed the door behind them, plunging the room into a darkness lit only by the purity monitor, shifted again from green to red. The first Inquisitor spoke as though he were not quite … there. As if some part of him drifted in a cold and distant dark, only a splinter showing above this surface.
“You have served well, sister,” he said. “But now the time for service is over.”
“No,” she breathed. “Please…”
“You are lost, sister,” said the other. “But we will show you the Way.”
“No, not yet.” Tears welled in her eyes, spilling warm down her cheeks. “I did what you asked me. I brought him back to you.”
“You did,” the first sighed, staring at outstretched fingers. “And you have our thanks.”
“But you are poisoned,” breathed the second. “We have watched it spread. Dragging you down, leading you here, where no sister who walks Purity’s Way should find herself.”
“Skin is strong,” said the first. “Flesh is weak.”
“Weak,” came the whisper.
“I did what you asked me!” Ayane’s voice rose, raw and growling, fistfuls of sheet clenched at her breast. “I turned him against them! Them against him!”
“We have been wondering at the how of it.”
She looked between the pair, shame rising at the recollection, her litany of deceptions.
“… I sabotaged his machines. The shuriken-throwers he built them. I rigged them to fail when the demons attacked the village. And when that wasn’t enough, I … hurt myself. I made him think they…”
“A talent for deceit, sister.”
“He killed for me. Do you know what that feels like—”
“Come.” The first held out his hand. “You shame yourself.”
“You knew this future would come to pass,” the second said. “The moment you chose to step inside this room and seek the way of flesh.”
“What did you think would happen?” Ayane pushed the tears down into her toes, felt them pushing back harder than she could hope to manage. “What did you think I’d become when you let me out of this cage? Feel someone touching me, really touching me for the first time in my life? Did you think I’d crawl back into this pit with a smile? What did you think I would do?”
“This.” A gesture to the room around them. “Just this.”
“You bastards,” she moaned.
“Skin is strong,” said the first.
“Flesh is weak,” said the second.
“Come with us.” The first stepped closer, hand outstretched. “There will be no pain. Not like for those who remain. This quiet parting is a blessing to you, sister. A gift.”
“No…”
“She comes.” The first shook his head slowly. “Her children also. In a handful of years, all will be ash. No place for a child of man. You or any other.”
“Godsdamn you…”
“Come.”
Fingers outstretched, gentle on her arm, the thought of another’s flesh against hers suddenly utterly repulsive.
“Don’t touch me!”
She snaked to her feet, quicksilver, the limbs at her back unfolding, air agleam with the shape of razors. Whistling chrome tore into the Inquisitor’s face, chest, outstretched arm. He stood taller, eyes wider, like a man fresh woken from a dream.
“You dare…”
He lashed out with his foot, a thunderbolt in her chest, crushing her mechabacus like it was paper. Blinded by sparks and pain, Ayane flew back against the wall, hit hard. She lashed out with her chrome arms again but he was gone, a hiss of smoke, an impression of black vapor moving along the floor. He coalesced before her, his fist demolishing her chin. She spun sideways, silver arms drooping as she crashed to her knees, chin slicked with red. She began weeping then, weeping as the chatter of the mechabacus died and she felt silence inside her head again. The same silence she’d known in the Iishi, blinking at the dappled day through a singing curtain of leaves.
She looked up into bloodshot eyes, wide and pitiless, tunic torn, pale skin that had probably never felt sunlight. And as his bloodied hands reached for her, she saw the ink on his right arm: a coiled black shape where the skinless bore the tattoo of their clan.
A serpent.
His hand was in her mouth, pushing past her teeth. She tasted ash on her tongue, in her lungs, filling her eyes. She tried to bite with her broken jaw, tried to speak. To whisper the name of her love, the dream dissolving into blossoms of brilliant white. But there was no breath in her lungs, not even for the tiniest of words. Only smoke. Blue-black smoke.
And so she held it inside. Close to her heart. And as the light became dark, and the blackness pressed down on her eyelids, her pulse spoke the word her lips could not.
“Kin.”
The light faded.
“I’m so sorry.”
And true silence fell at last.
*
Click.
Kin blinked, his breath deafening, the iron-thrower in his hand refusing to roar. Daichi let out a ragged sigh, ending in a stifled cough. The weapon in Kin’s hand felt heavy as mountains.