Work Text:
"Ah," Mensah said as Gurathin came into the room. "There you are."
"Are you alright?" He glanced between her and SecUnit. It was half turned away, ignoring everything. It was probably in the feed. Its clothes were not its usual casual ones, nor did they appear to fit. He started, "I heard-"
"What did you hear?" She looked to SecUnit, asking it, "I thought Station Security was able to quarantine the news."
It didn't respond, which was normal for it. Gurathin shook his head, dismissing her concern about the information leak – a SecUnit chasing two subjects through the station mall was hard to conceal. He'd drawn the obvious conclusion. "I … have ways. But you're alright?" He looked her over like he was checking for damage. She looked a bit harried, but no harm otherwise.
"Yes, I'm fine." She sighed and resettled herself. "One of the assassins survived."
His eyes flew wide. "It's on the loose? Unaccounted for?"
"No," SecUnit interjected sharply, without elaboration. So he was way off, which was good in this case.
Mensah said, "No. It's okay. It's … Is it really an it?" She looked to SecUnit again, who again did not respond. With a small grimace, she turned to Gurathin.
"I have no idea," he said, waving away its gender as a triviality. "How many assassins were there?"
"Two." That was from SecUnit. "And a handler. Who has been apprehended."
Mensah nodded. "The handler has been less helpful than one would hope. Medical aid has been rendered to the surviving assassin and a full physical recovery is expected. However," she paused. "The brain."
"What about the brain?" Gurathin's tone betrayed that he suspected what the issue was.
"It has been altered somewhat, through artificial chemical means. It's not really an augmentation, but I still thought you might be able to provide some insight to the situation. Given your history."
"My history." It wasn't a question. She meant the drugs that had controlled him, that had sent him to gather information on her and Preservation, and kill her if the opportunity had presented itself. He knew things about how the Corporation Rim created and controlled their agents. "Can I see these alterations?"
SecUnit sent him a file, a sort of medical dossier. He wasn't the best at reading it as this wasn't his principal area of focus, but she was right that he had a certain familiarity that others, even Preservation medical staff, probably did not possess. He scrolled through it, pausing over the neural imaging. This could have been him, a year or two down the line. Maybe less. "I'm … aware. Yes, I know what this is." He steeled himself, closed the file, and returned his attention to her. She'd asked him for his help. That was why he was here. "What is it you want to know?"
"Can this person be recovered, like you were?"
SecUnit's head jerked so it was looking at him. He met its eyes briefly. It said nothing, but obviously, this aspect of his past was news to it. He looked to Ayda again. "It's possible, but this will be an even harder, dirtier path than it was for me. This person is going to be depressed, depersonalized, empty – everything bad the brain can do to itself – no joy, no pleasure, a crawling, seething, loathing self-hatred when there's any sense of identity at all. Nothingness. A desire to become nothingness. To think yourself to death. To stop existing. A sensation like the after effect of pain, or the awareness of pain, but nothing precisely hurts. Just – everything you are hurts."
He paused to see her daunted expression at his unflinching description. He added, "You can supplement with medication, but that just makes you the new handler."
"They can be weaned off it, eventually, right? That could keep them alive long enough to … heal?"
He noticed the shift in pronoun, but assumed she was still speaking of only one survivor. "What you think of as healing is always going to be incomplete. The craving is still there, for me. Sometimes I want so, so badly. There's never a time when I get stressed and don't think about how much easier it would be with the- with the drugs. This person is going to be worse. They will never be … free." He flicked a glance at SecUnit. This wasn't like freeing a construct.
"But they can live a fulfilling life?" It was a question. It was clearly a question. He didn't have an answer. He shrugged. He wasn't even sure he had a fulfilling life. He had a life and it had been years since he'd thought about ending it.
SecUnit knew what the deal was. "The mission was to kill you, Dr. Mensah. Their life will be fulfilled if they complete their mission."
"Ah," Gurathin said, seeing the issue now. "The reward centers of their brain are directly wired to following those orders. You'd have to be out of your mind to let them live."
She snorted softly. "Then count me as out of my mind. I want them to give them a chance, as much of one as we can."
"Even though they tried to kill you?" He looked to SecUnit to back him up, but it didn't. Not yet, anyway. Or maybe it had already made this argument and lost it. He turned back to see her raise a brow at him, as if to remind him that he'd been sent to kill her.
He wouldn't win this. He sighed and conceded. "How can I help?"