“Amissa,” I croak at length. “Total repair time?”

“Five hours, forty-eight minutes.” 

That sobers me up fast. It certainly does not feel that long. 

“Bring me the board, so I can sign off the repair and we can all get paid.”

The hand that offers me a clipboard does not belong to Amissa. I tilt my head back until I can see the face attached to the hand. “Oh, hello Merrick. You hate watching me work, so what are you doing here?” I let a heaping helping of snark color the words as I accept the clipboard and lay it on my chest.

“I don't precisely hate it. It just makes me deeply uncomfortable.” His light baritone is unremarkable and lacks inflection as he speaks.

“That is all well and good, but it does not answer my question.” I accept the pen he offers me, and I roll up to a sitting position with a weary groan. “Or maybe I should ask why you are here getting in the way of me and my technicians.” I scan the page quickly, checking the documentation and repair notes, then scratch out my signature before lifting the clipboard over my head. 

Merrick neither answers me nor takes the paperwork. I wave the clipboard in the air in annoyance a couple of times, but he doesn't seem to notice. “Is that a wrench in the wall?”

“Felt like the ⅝ inch by the weight and heft,” I affirm offhandedly, flapping the clipboard around again. Nearby, one of my crew snickers at my utterly unrepentant attitude.

The clipboard is finally tugged from my hands. I hear Merrick sigh. 

“Darkwalker, you're needed.” Jakara’s voice has me on my feet in an instant. I orient on her quickly and sprint over, the walkways swaying beneath me in response to the speed of my passage.

She has the door to the safety cage open.

My blood seems to freeze within me as implications rocket through my mind.

“Kellen?” I speak the lad’s name even as I begin to assess his situation. He is sitting slouched against the far wall of the small enclosure, body limp. I squat down on my haunches in front of the door. “Hey. Wake up. Kellen!” I hear him groan, and there is a soft rustle of fabric as he stirs weakly. “Kellen, I need you to talk to me. The repair is finished. You can come out now.” His emotions swirl slowly, stirring in muted colors heavily overlaid in grey.

“Finished?” The lad’s words slur badly. “All done?”

“Yes. Work is done. Can you sit up? Slowly, now.” I start to reach my hand in, but flinch. The safety cage is off limits. I refuse to violate that sanctity, especially when the rule is my own. “Jakara can help you if you need it.”

He looks up at me then, awkwardly lifting away the welding mask as he does, and I fall back onto my rear in surprise. His face is alight in absolute ecstatic joy. A tiny spark of yellow flutters immediately behind his eyes, almost lost in a wash of exhaustion. He does not seem to notice the trickle of caked blood from his nose. 

“That...was amazing…” he breathes.

I feel a fierce grin spread across my face, and I chuckle in weak kneed relief. “You did great, Kellen,” I tell him softly. “Absolutely great. Jakara can take you back to the equipment room. You should eat again. Are you hungry?”

He wipes his mouth on his sleeve in reply, and I see an ellipse spring to life as I mention food. He nods his head as though his previous action was not a clear response. I gesture for him to come out of the safety cage and he crawls toward me with ungainly movements. 

“Slowly,” I counsel as he emerges. He pushes himself to unsteady feet and I keep a hand close behind his elbow just in case. My mind is spinning at roughly the speed of sound as I try to push past my own exhaustion and put thoughts together. “Merrick, I want him on Team One.”

There is a pregnant pause before Merrick replies. “I beg your pardon?”

“Did I stutter?” I shove a hard edge into my words and stare Merrick full in the face. “Team One, Merrick. Effective immediately. Jakara, get him a locker and permanent gear. Have Regali mentor him.”

“We don't have any openings in the roster…”

I cut Merrick off ruthlessly. “Gellis is retiring. The paperwork should be on your desk already. Grant it, effective immediately upon conclusion of this repair. Transfer Pralla into Six, and get Kellen into One.”

“Who do you think you’re speaking to?” The curl of red I see in him ought to be a warning, but I am beyond caring. 

“I do not give a damn, Merrick! You are the one who sent him to me!” I am shouting at him now, spittle flying from my mouth, as I move to stand toe to toe with him. “This terrified kid did a better job than any other employee you have ever hired on their first day. And he comes out grinning like a fool, telling me it was amazing! Do not tell me who I can or cannot have on my teams. Because you know as well as I that there is only one person in this room right now who is absolutely irreplaceable. And it is not you, Merrick!” I jab a finger at him in enraged emphasis.

The room is graveyard silent. I can practically feel everyone’s eyes upon me. But I am absolutely seething right now. It is entirely possible I will regret this later, but I forge ahead recklessly.

“I have had perhaps six hours of sleep across the past three days. My teams are tired, and I am exhausted. We just spent almost six hours on an intensive repair. Do not push me, Merrick! Because if I collapse, you will have no one who can fix these machines. You have no other Darkwalker. No one of Denzai blood. And as much as I hate to admit it, I need people like Kellen to refresh my teams. There is only so much I can draw out of an experienced crew.”

Thunderheads glower behind Merrick’s expression. “That's cold, Darkwalker. Even for you.” The words come out flat and emotionless despite the churning irritation within him.

I run both hands over my scalp, frustrated. “If I could draw from only myself I would do it in a heartbeat. But under this repair load, I would husk out in days. If not hours.”

That seems to take the wind out of his sails. His expression and emotions shut down completely.

“Just make it happen, Merrick.”

Still, he hesitates. I look at him closer.

"Why are you fighting me so hard on this?" I ask softly. "You never argue with me on these sort of placements and I rarely ask them of you. True, Kellen is young…" I clamp down on the words and my teeth meet with an audible click. Why is there a knot of possession drawing ever tighter within him? A puzzle I did not even know existed suddenly begins to assemble itself. "Oh." And then I feel my eyes grow hard. "Well, that was stupid of you, Merrick. To risk your own offspring."

I can see the anger surge in Merrick. Outwardly, he controls it admirably. But a wide scythe of scarlet flows from his head down into the rest of him. "What were you thinking? To bring him with you?"

I feel my own eyes narrow. "Do not put this on me, Merrick. I told him to run a message back to you. He refused my instructions."

Shock transforms Merrick's face, and the anger twists in a frozen instant to become crystalline matrices of pale surprise. The intensity of it nearly knocks me off my feet. "What?" That single word, whispered roughly, pushes me a step backward. I struggle to remain grounded.

"He told me your instruction was he should accompany me." 

The final piece twists in my mind to lock the puzzle together with an almost physical snap. Merrick and I lock eyes, and I see him reach the same conclusion I do. As one, we turn to stare at Kellen.

The boy stands in rebellious opposition, fists clenched at his sides, staring at both of us openly. He holds no denial upon his face or within his heart. And I see in an instant how I was deceived. 

"You lied to me." My voice is a hard rasp, choking out through my suddenly tight throat. Emotions roil within me, unchecked, and I find I cannot keep them from display. Anger surfaces first, but disbelief follows sharp on its heels. Subtle variations on those two chase each other around through my guts. Guilt curls around my heart for an instant before rage crushes the life out of it. Betrayal chases it away like a vicious dog, only to be torn apart in turn by disappointment. I let it all play out across my face. "You lied to me."

And in the next breath, I chuckle low in my throat. "You played me well, boy. No one has done that in years. You were not afraid of me, per se. It was fear of being caught." I step closer to Kellen, one footfall at a time, slowly and deliberately stalking him. Uncertainty enters him, an edging of silvery moss upon his defiance. His eyes flick to Jakara, checking to see if she will intercede, but she remains impassive. She will not interfere with anything I do. Jakara has been my lead on Team One for the past 12 years, and she was the primary lead for my sire before me. Her loyalty is absolute. I continue speaking and Kellen's eyes flick back to me, and the very real threat I represent. "Cleverly done. The real question is why." I stop just within reach of him, looming.

He looks away first; I expected nothing less. "I wanted to see for myself." His voice is low and rough. He remains unrepentant, but now uncertainty has him by the throat. "Dad tells stories of the things you can do. But he would never have let me come see for myself. You said yourself, Darkwalker: he hates watching you work. It scares him. But I wanted to see it. To know for myself what scares him."

"Of course it frightens him," I reply at once. "As it should. I am dancing with dangerous forces, drawing out raw emotion and using it as rebar in concrete to reinforce the very machinery that makes life possible here." I see the youth flinch before the harsh truth and angry edge in my words. It cuts him like a razor. I forge ahead regardless. "If I make even a single mistake, someone dies. Or worse, spends the rest of their life a husk."

"I've heard that word a few times now." Kellen latches on to what I say with an iron persistence. "Husk. But no one will tell me what it means." He looks up to me again, and I see his confusion. The youth wants to hold my gaze, but wilts beneath my glower and turns away once more. He hates this weakness in himself, but is powerless before it.

I reach out and softly place my fingers beneath his chin, lifting, forcing his gaze to mine. "Imagine going through life without joy. Without anger, sadness, or disquiet. No anxiety, but also no elation. Imagine, if you can, a life of utter blankness. Unable to feel anything in your heart." My steady look drills into him as I speak these soft words. I watch as understanding and then horror dawn upon him. "A husk feels nothing. To be husked is a fate worse than death. It is an endless twilight of disassociation. A husk cannot even summon enough feeling to end their own life."

Tears form in the corners of his eyes and I feel a shudder of a sob pass through him. "I just...wanted to see. For myself." His whisper is ragged. He is still not able to summon adequate fear yet, as I had to draw deeply from all those around me to effect the repair and it will be days yet before that renews fully. But I can see understanding in the sadness that streams unnoticed from his eyes.

"You played a fine game, Kellen. You manipulated me masterfully. There have only been three others who have managed it to such a degree. You are either supremely brave or impossibly stupid. Perhaps a little of both. I am willing to overlook it this time, so long as you come work for me. Make no mistake; this is not forgiveness. I will ask as much of you as any member of my teams. You cannot remain a runner for much longer at any rate. So you will now work for Internal Order." And then I let the full force of my fury slam into my voice as, with a simple flexion, I cause my scales to erupt once more. "But if you ever lie to me again, not even your sire can save you."

His reaction is instantaneous and enormous. I watch the youth's eyes widen as he is treated to a very personal display of Denzai physiology. His muscles stiffen in response to the sudden and unexpected feel of sharpened scale beneath his chin. Reflexively, he understands that one wrong move will part his flesh and possibly endanger his throat. I smell his body release fear sweat and a dribble of urine. 

And then I step back from him abruptly. With calculated pressure, I barely crease the skin beneath his chin enough for a single line of blood to well up beneath my middle finger. He is too frozen to flinch.

I turn away, hating myself, and stalk off. This show of open aggression is all I can do for now to bring Kellen's headstrong ways to heel. It is the opening salvo in what could either be immediate reform or half a decade of battle. Merrick is watching me, eyes guarded, and I dare him with a look to open his mouth. He wisely says nothing. 

"All teams, finish up and clear out!" I bellow as I stride away, pulling my goggles once more into place over my eyes and allowing my scaling to recess beneath my skin. "Four, replace and reset the casing panels. Six, see to the disposal of the scrap metal." I shimmy down to floor level and begin to strip out of my tool belt without pausing. "Three, run diagnostic checks and get systems back online. One, split up and aid as needed. Jakara is in charge on the floor. Leave the wrench for Five to figure out tonight. 24 hours of personal leave, Merrick, starting now. I am going home!" 

I hear a chorus of "Sir!" follow me as I sweep out of the room, and I do not stop until I am outside.