The gray-haired woman held out her hand. "I was your mother's lawyer. Before. I've been trying to get to you for sixteen years. There's a failsafe in your spinal column. I can disable it. But you have to choose. Not as a weapon. As Karall."
As his fingers closed around the cylinder, a fourth mercenary emerged from the shadows. She was small, gray-haired, wearing a technician's vest. No weapon. Just a data slate. Serial Number Karall
He didn't remember his mother. He didn't remember being seven. But as the floor charge built to a scream, he looked down at his own hands—the knuckles split, the fingernails caked with mercenary blood—and for the first time in seventeen years, he felt something. The gray-haired woman held out her hand
"What was my first name?" he asked.
And somewhere, in a facility that had no name, a grate hissed one final time. But there was no one left to report. I've been trying to get to you for sixteen years
Karall felt nothing. Weapons don't feel.