It's yet another quiet day in the office until the intercom buzzes and snaps you out of your afternoon torpor. "Senpai? Eyjafjalla here, Dr. Kal'tsit just dropped off some paperwork here and asked you to interview a potential recruit ASAP. She said she wanted your approval, first."

You sigh. More combat operators always means more work, although there's no denying that Rhodes Island is much more capable of force projection than it was a year ago. "I'll be right down to HR, Eyja."

"Uhh... she's not in the interview room, Senpai. She's in the brig."

Well. Top operators do tend to come with their own personal quirks. "Drunk? Disorderly conduct?"

"Former Reunion, Senpai."

"Please tell me they were noncombat personnel, like Ethan."

"Dr Kal'tsit said she was a demolition and explosives specialist. Also, she said 'Tell the idiot that there's a good chance she'll try to kill him on sight, so stay at least six feet away and don't release her restraints no matter what.'"

How nice. You've suspected Kal'tsit of more than academic dislike for a rival ever since you were rescued from your experimental lab in Chernobog, but at least she had the decency to warn you before sending you into the same cell as a homicidal bomber.

"She also said that the new recruit represented a possible solution to the problem you discussed at the last medical checkup. An old friend, she said."

You jerk upright in your chair. A solution to Amiya's encroachment issues with her Originium implants? Impossible. Then you realize what Kal'tsit means by solution, and to what problem, and you slump back down. "I see. Thank you, Eyja. I'll be there in half an hour."

Damn. For all that people call you a devil, Kal'tsit has you beat all to hell. Forget the monsters she's breeding in her lab, she's the real thing. And the worst thing of it all is, Amiya would agree.

You use the half-hour to review camera footage from the brig to see what you can learn. There's no sound, but there's obviously shouting on both sides, and eventually Kal'tsit leaves in tears. Since you've never seen her show the least bit of emotion in the twelve months you've known her (post-amnesia), this is incredibly disturbing. One other thing you learn is the recruit's name, which is apparently W. You've heard worse codenames (Durin never chose one and people just got tired of referring to her as "that Durin in Engineering"), but only barely.

The cell door hisses open and you scan the cell briefly. One toilet. One bed. One depressed Sarkaz in handcuffs, with the handcuffs chained to the bed. And one cheap plastic chair placed sufficiently far away from the Sarkaz that she probably can't throttle you with the chain. "Hello, Miss W."

W eyes you silently for a while as you take a seat. "Is it even you under that mask? I can't tell. Is it a fashion choice or is your face just that ugly?"

"The last time I looked in the mirror, my face was just fine." You neglect to mention that you were still wearing your mask at the time. " And as for your first question, well, the answer is - maybe. Did Kal'tsit mention the amnesia to you?"

W grumbles a little. "Seems awfully convenient to me."

"It is a well known side effect of physical intervention regarding Originium infection. In my case, as a last resort. There are also several former Abyssal test subjects wandering around Rhodes Island. Memory issues, a tendency to get lost easily... more than I can list easily, really."

She looks somewhat interested. "Can you do that? Physically remove the Originium infection?"

You shake your head. "A temporary reprieve, unfortunately. And until recently, almost impossible to survive. Without the knowledge I gained from Doctor Kal'tsit's Abyssal contacts, I would have died."

"A shame, that."

You'll take verbal sniping over actual murder attempts any day. "In any case, while you appear to have known me before, for the me that I am now, this is the first time I am meeting you. And might I add how pleased I am that you aren't trying to murder me?"

She rolls her eyes. "Oh please. It's been a year since Rhodes Island broke you out. You made plenty of enemies while you were in Babel, don't tell me no one's tried."

You can't leave Rhodes Island without Gravel and Plume shadowing your every step, and while you don't know exactly what it is that Red and Scavenger do, the expense reports give you a pretty good idea. But you don't tell her that. "Let us just say this is the first time someone has gotten this close. It's good to have friends."

"Friends, huh? I used to have one, but then she died." She stares at you balefully. "Her brother had her assassinated, and then someone botched the surgery to keep her alive."

You spread your hands helplessly. "I don't remember. But from what Kal'tsit tells me, she never had a chance of survival. You're the explosives expert! You know what blast damage does to the body."

"Oh yeah? Then why spend twenty hours in surgery? What about the body? Why all the fucking secrecy?"

Should you tell her? You stall for time. "I didn't realize you cared so much."

"Shithead asshole!" W curses. "I don't give a fuck about a free Kazdel or infected rights. But Theresa did! And she died for it! And you bastards let Babel fall apart after her death like it didn't matter at all!"

How can you possibly attempt to explain the chaos that followed Theresa's death? Especially when your knowledge is obtained secondhand from your own sparsely kept diary? "I-"

"You know what I think?" W growls, cutting you off. "I think some of you were paid to let Babel collapse. Maybe Kal'tsit was bribed to let Theresa die on the operating table."

That's a hell of an accusation, and you can see how it would piss Kal'tsit off something fierce. Especially since you were her assistant during the surgery, and there's a grain of truth in it. In the words you yourself wrote in your diary, "Resuscitation deemed unworkable after exploratory surgery. Switched to salvage."

"Maybe the others were. I don't know." Maybe you were a spy yourself before the amnesia. It would explain a great deal. "But Kal'tsit wasn't, and Amiya isn't, and all the proof you need is right here in this Rhodes Island ark, because everyone here is one hundred percent committed to the peaceful and equal coexistence of infected and uninfected."

W sniggers derisively, but you think her heart isn't really into it. "And a free Kazdel?"

"With Theresa's death? Even you can see it would be a lost cause. It took years for Amiya and Kal'tsit to build up Rhodes Island, even with the ark and the deal they struck with RIM Billiton."

"An ark they stole from Babel."

"Continuing Babel's legacy as best they could. Weren't you complaining about Babel's collapse just a minute ago?"

For once, W has no snappy comeback, and you take advantage of her silence to elaborate a little on the fall of Babel and its rebirth as Rhodes Island. "Without Theresa holding them together, most of the Sarkaz warriors left the fleet. Medical and Engineering were left with a mostly empty ark and no funds to speak of. After Amiya recovered, she ordered the ark to the closest RIM Billiton facility and struck a deal with them. Three birds with one stone. They subcontract infected medical treatment to us in exchange for supplies, exile potential troublemakers from their facilities, and they get to look good while doing it."

W gets a suspicious look in her eyes. "What do you mean, Amiya ordered? She's just a little squirt Theresa liked to have underfoot. Are you telling me she's some kind of genius or something?"

Finally. You've been trying to steer the conversation in that direction for a while now. You lean forward, place your elbows on your knees, and lace your fingers together under your nose. "Tell me, W, have you ever heard of Originium... Prime?"

Now she looks confused. "No? What the hell? What does that have to do with anything?"

It is decidedly liberating to be able to speak to someone else on this topic. The anger was real. The betrayal was real. Whatever W might have been doing in Reunion, it was in service to Theresa and her ideals. You can trust her. You have to trust her. "Originium Prime is Originium harvested from the corpses of infected people, instead of from mining."

"Eurggh." W looks momentarily disgusted. "So what?"

"There have always been superstitions about Originium eating the souls of the infected. And like many superstitions, there is a kernel of truth in them. Remove Originium, remove memories. Implant Originium, implant memories. Hence, the visions that drive so many infected mad."

"Oh wow." W looks morbidly fascinated now. "That explains a lot of spooky stuff Reunion had going on. But someone must have had figured it out by now, if it's so simple? Why doesn't everybody know this?"

"Fragments. Shards. Madness. There was a cult leader once, who said he would never die. The cult implanted the remains into a new sacrifice every few years. Apparently, it turns you into a gibbering wreck, if not done scientifically." You stress the last word.

"You're kidding me." W looks appalled. "You're not kidding me."

"Some researchers from Columbia had a bright idea. Two bright ideas, in fact. Firstly, the Originium transplant must be inserted in exactly the same position as from the donor. If the shard is infringing the olfactory nerve, it must be inserted into the olfactory nerve. If you put it in the optic nerve, you'd be seeing smells instead. Understandably confusing."

You pause and look at W, but she gestures at you irritably. "Go on, then."

"And to recover and map the location of each and every shard from the donor body requires exhaustive effort. It takes about twenty hours of surgery on a grown Sarkaz."

W blinks as she processes the implications of what you are saying. You plow on regardless. This is not going to be easy.

"Secondly, the recipient should be a child-"

"You FUCKERS!" W roars. She lunges at you, but the chain snaps taut and she falls off the bed. "Fucking researchers! Fucking sciency types! Arrgh!"

You don't take it personally. After all, you had much the same reaction when you read the relevant bits in your diary. Rhine Lab has much to answer for, even if it is more expedient to blackmail them for now.

Still, it doesn't take long for W to regain control and climb back onto her bed. Hugging her pillow, she glares at you. "So that's what happened to Amiya. Or Theresa."

You shake your head. "She prefers to be known as Amiya. Much less complicated, on the whole."

W bites her lip. "How... how much is Amiya and how much is Theresa?"

You shake your head. "I have no idea. Amnesia, remember? And frankly, I'm the only one in the senior leadership she can talk to without that ghost hanging over her."

"Frigging bastards... what the hell?" W is curled up in a ball now. "I need to talk to her."

"And why would I let our CEO and leader within fifty feet of a known Reunion operative?" You've got her off balance, and you need to keep her that way.

"Fuck you, Doctor Doctor, or whatever they call you nowadays." There isn't any real venom to the curse. W is no idiot, despite the significant emotional wringer you've just put her through, and she can tell you want something from her. "You aren't telling me all this for your own twisted fun. Well? What is it?"

You straighten up and spread your hands in supplication. This is it. This is the solution to Amiya's encroachment issues. A temporary stopgap, to be sure, but you are familiar with triage work.

"The researchers were wrong. They thought children would lack the necessary strength of will to resist the Originium ghosts." Idiots who had never dealt with a child before.

"A ghost can never be as strong as the original inhabitant of the body. What is needed is consent." Kal'tsit would have briefed Amiya before the transplant procedure. It is standard procedure for risky operations, when time permits, and you cannot imagine Kal'tsit would not have done so. You are equally certain that Amiya, who loved Theresa beyond all measure, had agreed without reservation. Even so, what does the consent of a child mean? When they are being asked to spend their life for another? No wonder Kal'tsit had left in tears.

"They must work together. Live together. Know each other. There must be a bond of complete trust." Perhaps someday you will have the time to cultivate that level of trust in your successor.

"Despite my advice, Amiya insists on sharing some of the risks of combat. And every time she channels more power than she should, the infection advances just that little bit more." Apparently this was a habit of Theresa's as well.

"Should she fall... no, when she falls, there will be no one left with her ability to take up the reins. To bring justice to the powerless. To make a home for those driven out by fate." You have no illusions about your, Kal'tsit's, or Closure's ability to lead and inspire.

"Unless someone were to inherit the mantle. Someone who knew Theresa well. Someone who shared her ideals." Ordinarily impossible, in Theresa's case, since she was already dead. Unless the bond had been established well beforehand.

"I am offering you a chance to change the world, W. To remake it as Theresa would wanted. To continue her legacy."

You stand up. The offer is made. It will buy you maybe another five years.

"I will send Amiya to you after dinner. She will be delighted to see you again, although she does not know you know."

One last push before you leave. This one, you mean from the bottom of your heart.

"I hope you will be her friend."