Destroyer
(Soji, Picard, Jurati)
Agnes is in no way prepared to meet Soji Asha.
Of course she knew from the beginning that their charge would be the most human-like android ever created. Bruce (she still can't think of him without breaking into a cold sweat) would never have settled for anything less.
But this … this is a woman her own age with bruised knuckles and haunted eyes, dressed in a gray coverall like a prisoner or hospital patient, who clings to Picard's arm as if he's her only refuge.
"You're safe now, my dear," he says, disengaging her hands in the gentlest way possible. "Dr. Jurati will look after you."
His misplaced faith strikes Agnes like a heart attack.
"Pleased to meet you, Doctor," Soji murmurs, with a painfully polite smile. She holds out her hand to shake. Dried blood (as red as any human's) still spots her fingers.
Destroyer, whispersCommodore Oh in Agnes' mind, but if anything, she looks like the one who's been destroyed.
"I'm afraid our EMH is offline right now," Agnes says. "But I can fix those cuts for you if you like."
And scan her while she's at it, down to the molecular level. This is what she's worked for all her life.
But as she holds Soji's bloody hand in her clean one, wielding the dermal regenerator with the other, the Commodore's voice echoes in her memory once again: Destroyer.
It could apply to either of them.
/
Protector
(Elnor/Soji)
"Please, my friends," Elnor tells the Tal Shiar agents closing in on him, "Choose to live."
They don't.
It's the hardest battle he's ever had to fight. Not just because they outnumber him and are exceedingly well trained, but because with every stroke of the blade, he's tempted to go against everything Zhani taught him.
He doesn't want to kill them quickly. He wants to draw this out, make them suffer, leave them howling on the floor. But most of all, he wants to squeeze the name of their leader out of them, because that's who deserves to be punished.
Elnor could see upward through the hole Soji Asha tore when she punched through the ceiling. He could see the Zhal Makh lanterns lying scattered – desecrated – in a cloud of poison gas. He could see the wildness in her eyes.
How strong she was, how resourceful, in the face of unspeakable betrayal.
What kind of coward – what kind of liar – invites a woman to so intimate a ritual in order to kill her?
Even if Elnor hadn't already decided to bind his sword to Picard's cause, he would do it now. If Picard's cause is to protect this woman, so is his.