Not quite gone
She wasn't angry anymore. Now she was... listless? She wasn't... She didn't feel anything. She felt... ambivalent. She could feel, but it didn't... quite register. She could not see, but she could hear, as if across a great chasm. The wind was loud, but if she strained, she could hear.
"What?" A calm, unworried female voice sounded. No one Serene knew. "Where is the Reverend Mother?" Even the name didn't bring the anger back. Odd.
"She told us to run." This voice... Serene knew. Sort of. Male. Human. Terrified. "That crazy Tenno in black showed up. He... She told us to run! The others... didn't make it."
"Nikis..." The tone was... odd. Resigned. Not emotional at all. "He probably won't kill her quickly. We may have time. Get the ship moving. We have to get into the traffic lanes before we are tracked. Go on, leave the catcher. Let's see what we have... René? Set her down." The voice sighed. "Oh René. She had to take control again, didn't she? It's okay, girl. Don't cry. Let me see what I can do."
"She didn't know me, Harriet!" René. This was the René person. The one who looked like Serene. In tears from the sound of it.
"I see." The other said quietly. "Rest now, René. Paddington."
Serene felt her body laid out on something cold. She might have protested, but... it didn't matter. Nothing did. Then cold things were touching her. She couldn't have fought if she wanted to, but she didn't want to. She was... so detached. Then it happened.
Serene. The voice was the woman's. Calm cool, but with a sense of worry underneath. Can you hear me? If you can, we are trying to help. The cranial damage is extensive, but not irreparable. There may be pain, there may not be. We will not program you. Not that we could again.
Again? Serene managed to get that word out. It hurt to do so, but she managed.
Serene! Thank Profit! The other woman sounded almost ecstatic for a moment. Then it was gone. Yes, Serene, again. When you were captured by the Corpus, back before they pulled Amelia Priosa in and made Sara... The ones who had you tried...a number of ways to break your resistance. They used... She broke off and then spoke again. They used me. I had no reason to refuse when they asked, but what they were doing was wrong. I did refuse and they did the same to me. You held strong through everything they did. But me? They broke me.
Who are you? Serene managed before pain erupted in her... wherever she was.
My name is Harriet. The other said calmly. And I am the reason all of this is happening. I apologize. That caused pain, let me see if I can fix that.
What do you mean? Serene asked as the pain ebbed.
You saw René. It was not a question. When you were captured the first time, they tore you from your warframe. It was mostly pieces anyway. And when you refused to speak, or give them any information, they tried to break and program you. They failed.
Serene did not respond and after a moment the other spoke again.
Your anger is totally understandable. Harriet said quietly. With me, with the Clergy, with the Corpus. With the scum who brutalized you and then me when I refused to finish the programming. I need pharmaceutical help to function to this day. You are stronger.
Again, Serene did not react.
We need you, Serene. The other said softly. But you will not take my word for it. So...
Without sense of transition, Serene was awake. She sat up on the table she was lying on, aware of machinery all around her. Familiar machinery. Corpus. She stared around, noting two females in Corpus attire. One stood by a bank of machinery and the other stood by a wall, her face blank.
"Hello Serene." The woman by the machinery took a step towards the table. "You are still hurt but we can compensate. Your injury will heal in time. But time is something we have very short supply of."
"Corpus." Serene snapped, but... her anger did not rise. "You took control of me." She said sourly.
"Yes and no." Harriet said calmly. "We have repaired some of the damage. We cannot medicate you with your injury. So, the controls that were placed in you before..."
"By you!" Serene snapped. She could almost touch the anger, but not quite.
"Yes, by me." Harriet sounded calm still and Serene's eyes narrowed. "But not just by me. The Executive who had you was trying to find a way into the Orokin towers for his master Alad V. You stopped him in his tracks for a long time, and he took his revenge on you. Physically, mentally, spiritually. He tried so many ways to break you and he could not. So he called my mistress and I was sent. I was good at my job. I make no excuses for what I did, for there can be no excuse. I put controls in your mind and what he did with those controls..." She looked away. "I protested of course. He had me drugged and violated."
"You are the one who helped Lis." Serene said, still not moving. She could feel heaviness on her scalp. It extended over much of her head. Odd heaviness. It didn't feel like bandages. It felt...cold, like metal.
"I have more experience with such than most of the other sisters." Harriet replied. "It was a bad time. I do not remember it all. I do remember you. You never broke. We need that strength now."
"And I should trust you... why?" Serene demanded.
"Order me to lie." Harriet said softly. Serene stared at her and the Sister nodded. "Order me to lie."
"Lie to me." Serene said slowly.
"I am not the woman responsible for the deep rooted partial controls inside your brain." Harriet said softly and a sense of wrongness swept through Serene. "I cannot lie to you. We are somewhat imperfectly linked, you and I, Tenno Serene."
"I do not believe you." Serene said, keeping her voice calm by sheer strength of will.
"I know. It is...difficult." Harriet said quietly. "With distance or medication, the effect is muted. But being linked to you drove me mad. The only reason I can function is that the link wasn't right. I cannot read you, but you can read me. That is why they brought in Amelia Priosa. Because I failed them. They sent me back to my mistress as a madwoman. They did not say what had happened, just that I was 'hurt'. By the time the Clergy realized what was happening, it was too late. We are not swift to act at times. That time cost Amelia Priosa, Sara Priosa and you a great deal. It cost you your sanity. I assume that is why they wiped your memory."
"I cannot trust anything you say." Serene said sharply.
"I know." Harriet said with that same maddening calm. "You cannot after everything. Trusting the Corpus or the Clergy is foolish anyway."
"So what do you want?" Serene managed to get the last word to come out angrily, but then the anger faded.
"I want to stop Ars Lonraks' legacy." Harriet said quietly. "You met one part of it." She nodded to where René stood.
"Who the hell is Ars Lonrak?" Serene demanded, still not moving. This was a trick. It had to be. It sounded... a little familiar. But not much.
"The Executive who captured you." Harriet said quietly. "He is dead, but his legacy lives on. And if it succeeds? Humanity as a whole will likely die."
Far across the system
"Tell me again why we can't just kill her?" Two's voice was sort of calm. Sort of. "Nikis should have killed her." She was pacing like a tiger in a cage. Or an infuriated Tenno denied the chance to avenge herself on a hated foe. Amelia watched from nearby, her face worried.
It had taken Karl, Aeron, Olim and Will to keep Two from the prisoner's throat when the Reverend Mother had been manhandled into the Tower's detention facilities even without her warframe. No one blamed her. The only thing keeping her from trying to rush the door that led to the cell the old woman was now strapped down in was the white armored form that stood in the cell with her. A Loki Prime warframe. And not just any Loki Prime warframe. Two wasn't going to cross Sun. Now as soon as he left...
"And why can't we hear what they are saying!" Two demanded. "I want to hear her scream!"
"Two." Karl said quietly. "Calm down. We all agree that she is dead. We need to know where they took Serene's body so we can get it back. He is the best choice. While you or I would just beat her to a pulp and likely get nothing, he can and will drain her totally given time."
"We may not have time, Tenno Karl." An unexpected voice had all of Karl's people turning. Niksi stood in the doorway, but he looked...sheepish. Hard to do wearing a Nekros warframe, but he managed. The tiny Nyx warframe by his side though, needed no introduction.
"Ona?" Two asked, confused. "I... I thought you were researching." Twelve Tenno in miniature warframes had survived a horrific Orokin experiment, and were now dedicated to learning all they could about Tenno. Their history and their problems.
"I was." Tiny the Nyx warframe might have been, but she was no cold heart. She was across the room and hugging Two before the other female Tenno could blink twice. "We didn't feel it. The shields at the Citadel are very powerful. But Teacher came and explained. He showed us what he felt and... It is not good."
"Serene is dead, Ona." Two said sharply.
"No, she isn't." Ona countered. All of the others in the room stared at her and she sighed. "Look, we are getting into high end theory here. Quantum physics and neural mechanics. I can't explain it all quickly."
"And not without a couple of tons of math." Nikis said sourly. "But it does make sense. Serene is not in the database. They felt her anger, her pain, but she is not there." He shook his head. "That shouldn't be possible, but the Orokin managed it a time or two. Catching Tenno energy as it fled decaying shells."
"You are saying that... the Corpus Clergy..." Two made the three words an epithet. "...has Serene's soul?"
"It looks that way." Nikis said with a sigh. "And I hated that bitch before. Good thing I am not in there. Hayden would jump right out of the database to rip her a new one and I won't even go into what Mag wants to do." He actually shuddered.
"If... if she has..." Two crumpled to the floor, Ona still holding her. "Oh god, what do we do?"
"We find out where they are taking her body and mind and go... talk to them. All of us." Karl said firmly and almost every Tenno in the room nodded. Nikis and Ona did not. "What?"
"We examined the place where she was... hurt..." Ona said slowly. Two's eyes flashed, but Ona held her tight. "We believe we have DNA samples from all those present. But there is a problem."
"Which is?" Karl asked, when no one else spoke.
"We determined most of what happened from the security cameras. They had backup recorders that clicked on when their networks failed." Ona chose her word with care. "There was no audio, the woman you captured had top of the line anti eavesdropping equipment. But one thing is sure..." She held out a hand and a holo appeared over it. Two jerked back, but the other two women held her. "Two? Do you know this woman?"
"René..." Two said with fear in her eyes. "That.. that isn't possible...she died. They killed her!"
"Two?" Amelia asked softly, her face and voice worried. Two slumped and Ona beckoned Amelia close. The human woman hugged Two as Ona did. "Who was René?"
"A young human woman they faked up as my... as Serene's daughter." Two said in a monotone. A hiss of disbelief went around the room. " I don't know how. I was drugged, but the drugs did not work quite right. They brought her in and hurt her in front of... me. They... did things to her. But... she wasn't right. She wasn't... all there. When they hurt her, she did not react. It wasn't what they wanted. The boys..."
"Boys?" The chorus of worry was deafening and Ona gestured to silence it.
"Two..." Amelia said gently. "It's over. It is done. You are here, you are safe."
"You don't understand, Amelia." Two said with a cry of pain and rage. "If René is still around, then Pieter, Jacques, Henry and Georges probably are too. They were all crazy! All of them!"
"Two..." Amelia's voice was horrified now.
"They tried me make me think I was the kid's mother, and they did make the kids think that!" Two snapped. "I... I can't... If they are loose... I..." She froze. "Oh god... Serene won't remember them." She was shaking now. "If she is still... whatever, she won't remember them. They... will not react well... They... didn't..."
"What happened Two?" Amelia asked.
"The guy in charge demanded results." Two was trying hard for calm, she sort of succeeded. "A doc was sent in to get results. He hurt... René. Then me. The boys got loose... sealed the door and ate him. I was strapped to the bed, I couldn't do anything!"
"Ate him?" Amelia asked, gagging.
"Yeah." Two was crying now. "They cut him to pieces with the straps that had held them. It took him... a while to die. They offered me his heart. I... I didn't speak so I shook my head and they ate him. All of him. Animals. They were feral animals. Not people. They were... put down. All of them. They were shot and dragged out... like animals. René was crying as they dragged her out, bleeding but not quite dead. Then I heard another shot. They made those people animals and then treated them as animals."
"The line between the people and animals is thin, Two." Nikis said quietly. "I know that better than most." He shook himself. "I gotta do something. I will go play some worse cop to Sun's bad cop." He vanished.
"Two..." Ona said quietly. "How old was René?"
"I don't know." Two said softly. "She... she was the kind one, even...as messed up as she was. She... spent the nights lying beside me. She tried to keep me clean... Warm me." She shook her head savagely. "I couldn't move! They had me strapped down tight. The others...got loose, but they couldn't get me loose. They tried. They got punished for it so many times, but they kept trying."
"Two..." Ona said gently. "We will need to know everything you remember about that time. The Citadel can do it without making you relive it. And we will need to go soon. You need to get out of here anyway."
"But... Serene..." Two protested.
"If Serene needs you, we can get you anywhere in moments, Two." Ona said gently. "Tenno Karl, can your clan help Two to the facilities, let her clean herself a bit. She will feel better." Alicia stepped up, the clan medic nodding. "Amelia... A moment."
Alicia half led, half carried Two from the room. Two other female Tenno, Karen and Tiana, followed.
"What?" Amelia asked as Ona drew her aside.
"When you first saw Serene..." Ona asked slowly. "... what... kinds of injuries did you see?"
"Many." Amelia said with a wince. "Bloody butchers had tried all kinds of things to break her." She went still. "Why?"
"Two says that this... René was human made up to pretend to be her kid." Ona said with a sigh. "DNA says otherwise." Amelia froze. "Yeah."
"How...close...?" Amelia said with a swallow. "I mean.. it is possible. The automated reproduction facilities the Corpus use could do it. She might not even remember. Then they could have accelerated growth as they did Sara's... but..." She shook her head. "How close?" She wasn't -quite- begging. Pleading for this not to be.
"97%." Ona said with a frown in her voice. Amelia inhaled sharply and Ona nodded. "Yeah, not a clone. A child. Not a perfect match, but so dang close."
"And this René is with the Clergy." Amelia said slowly.
"So it would seem." Ona said quietly.
"And the others are insane." Amelia swallowed hard.
"So it would seem." Ona repeated.
"They made... kids...from Serene and drove them insane..." Amelia said, paling. Ona nodded and hugged her. "Insane... young... Tenno..." She paused. "We do not know if they are Tenno or not, do we?"
"You see the problem." Ona said softly. "We do not have a lot of resources to rehabilitate insane Tenno, Amelia. If they come into their powers..." She caught Amelia as the human doctor fainted. "Oh crap... Come on, Amelia!" Ona gave the human a shake. A pulse of power had the woman moaning."This is no time to lie around on the job."
"This cannot be happening..." Amelia said with a wince as she recovered.
"Two needs you, Amelia." Ona was still quiet. "So do we. That.. isn't even the worst part." The holo appeared again, this time focusing on René. It zoomed in and Amelia inhaled as it showed her belly.
"She is..." Amelia shook her head. "Oh god..." She swallowed hard. "How... far along?"
"Analysis says end of the second to the beginning of the third trimester." Ona's voice was hard now. "We do not know how or why this René survived. But she did. She is apparently affiliated with the Clergy somehow."
"And bearing a child." Amelia said slowly. "Ona... She wouldn't be more than four years old!"
"And she is probably suffering the same things Sara was." Ona said with a nod. "Force growing hurts the subjects very badly. They are not intended to survive long."
"Small wonder they went insane." Amelia agreed. "Why do you need me? I... I am not even supposed to leave the tower." It took a great deal of willpower not to finger the explosive necklet under her bodysuit. Most days she could almost forget it was there. Almost.
"We probably will not need you." Ona replied calmly. "Two will. And maybe... Maybe you saw something you do not remember? Right now? We have way too many scary questions."
"I...I will need to ask permission." Amelia said with a wince. "And... Sara! Rocky! I..."
"You are not alone, Amelia." Ona promised. "Sara and Rocky are in good hands. Two needs you and we need you." Amelia nodded jerkily.
"I just pray we are in time."