She was drowning, disappearing into the expanding existence of the Soft Blade. Panic sparked within her, but the spark was too feeble to rein in the suit. A sense of pleasure emanated from the Soft Blade at finally being let loose to pursue its purpose; from it Kira had flashes of … yellow fields with flowers that sang … memories that … a treelike growth with metal scales for bark … disoriented her further, made it almost … a group of long, furry creatures that yipped at her from between brindled mandibles … impossible to concentrate.
In a brief shard of lucidity, the horror of the situation struck Kira. What had she done?
With ears not her own, she heard a sound like doom itself: the measured tramp of armored soldiers marching into the outer part of the terminal. Discomfort, sharp and piercing, disturbed several grasping pseudopods. Startled, she/they retracted.
Attack her/it, would they?
Walls and beams and structural supports crumpled beneath her/their grasp as they collapsed the station in around the shield. The deck buckled, but it didn’t matter. Only finding more mass: more metals, more minerals, more, more, more. A hunger formed inside her/it, an insatiable, world-eating hunger.
“Kira!”
The voice sounded as if from the far end of a tunnel. Whoever they were, she/it didn’t recognize the person. Or maybe she/it didn’t care to. There were other, more important things that needed her/its attention.
“Kira!” At a remove, she/it felt hands and shaking and pulling. None of which, of course, could budge her/it from place: her/their cords of banded fibers were too strong. “Kira!” Pain shot through her/its face, but it was so slight and distant as to be easily ignored.
The pain appeared again. And then a third time.
Anger formed in some part of her/itself. She/it looked inward from every direction, with eyes above and eyes below and eyes still made of flesh, and with them beheld a man standing next to her, red-faced and shouting.
He slapped her across the face.
The shock of it was enough to clear Kira’s mind for a moment. She gasped, and Falconi said, “Snap out of it! You’re going to kill us all!”
She could already feel herself slipping back into the morass of the Soft Blade. “Hit me again,” she said.
He hesitated and then did.
Kira’s vision flashed red, but the bright sting on her cheek gave her something outside of the Soft Blade to focus on and help center herself. It was a struggle; gathering the different parts of her mind back together felt as if she were trying to free herself from a pool of grasping hands—one for each fiber of the suit, and all of them freakishly strong.
Fear gave Kira the motivation she needed. Her pulse soared until she teetered on the brink of passing out. But she didn’t, and moment by moment she was able to retreat into herself. At the same time, she recalled the Soft Blade from the surrounding walls and rooms of the station. It fought her at first; it was reluctant to abandon its grand project and surrender what it had already subsumed.
But in the end, it obeyed. The Soft Blade recoiled upon itself, constricting and contracting as it returned to the shape of her body. There was more of it than she needed, and at the thought, ropes of the suit’s material shriveled and turned to dust, leaving nothing useful behind.
Falconi started to lift his hand again.
“Wait,” said Kira, and he did.
Her hearing was returning to normal; she noticed the whistle of escaping air and pressure alarms sounding in the distance, overriding all other alarms.
“What happened?” said Falconi. She shook her head, still not feeling entirely whole. “You ripped a hole in the hull, nearly spaced us.”
Kira glanced up and quailed as she saw—directly above them—a thin, dark rift of space showing through the ruined ceiling and several layers of ruptured decks. Stars spun past the opening, a crazed kaleidoscope of constellations, dizzying in their speed.
“Lost control. Sorry.” She coughed.
Something clanged against the outside of the dome.
“Hwa-jung!” he shouted. “We need to be outta here. I mean it!”
“Aigoo! Stop bothering me!”
Falconi turned back to Kira. “You good to move?”
“Think so.” The Soft Blade’s intrusive presence still wormed restless within her mind, but her sense of identity held strong despite.
From the source of the clang, Kira heard a spitting, hissing noise, like something a congested blowtorch would produce. A spot on the inside of the dome began to glow dull red, then yellow, and almost immediately, she felt the temperature in the space increasing.
“What is that?” said Nielsen.
“Shit!” said Sparrow. “The pricks are using a thermal lance!”
“The heat will kill us!” said Vishal.
Falconi gestured. “Everyone in the car!”
“I can stop them!” said Kira, though the thought filled her with fear again. As long as she concentrated upon one area of effort and didn’t let the Soft Blade run amuck … Even as she spoke, she started ripping up the floor within the dome and slapping the pieces onto the glowing hotspot. Fumes shot out sideways from the sections of composite as they turned red and softened.
“Forget it. We gotta go!” shouted Falconi.
“Just close the doors. I’ll buy you some time.”
“Stop fucking around and get in the car! That’s an order.”
[[Itari here: Idealis, we must leave.]] The Jelly was already crammed into the front end of the car, tentacles pressed against the sides.
“No! I can hold them off. Let me know when you’re—”
Falconi grabbed her by the shoulders and twisted her toward him. “Now! I’m not leaving anyone behind. Comeon!” By the burning light, his blue eyes seemed bright as flaming suns.
At that, Kira relented. She released the dome and allowed him to pull her into the car. Sparrow and Nielsen shoved the maglev door shut; it locked with a loud click.
“You trying to get yourself killed?” Falconi growled in Kira’s ear. “You’re not invincible.”
“Yeah, but—”
“Stow it. Hwa-jung, we good to go?”
“Almost, Captain. Almost…”
Outside the car, a spray of white-hot metal erupted from the center of the glowing spot as the lance burned its way through the full thickness of the dome. The spray started to move downward, slowly cutting one side of a trooper-sized opening.
“Don’t look at it!” said Sparrow. “It’s too bright. It’ll burn out your retinas.”
“Hwa-jung—”
“Ready!” said the machine boss. Kira and everyone else turned to face her. The turret lay in parts between her feet. The power pack had been pried open, and wires led from it into the machinery that filled the car’s undercarriage.
“Listen to me,” said Hwa-jung. She tapped the power pack. “This is damaged. When I turn it on, it might melt and explode.”
“We’ll risk it,” said Falconi.
“There is more.”
“Not really the time for a lecture right now.”
“Listen! Aish!” Hwa-jung’s eyes gleamed with the searing light of the thermal lance. “I was able to splice into the feeds for the electromagnets. This thing will lift us, but that is all. I can’t access the directional controls; it won’t move us forward or backward.”
“Then how—” Nielsen tried to say.