Droplets on a Razor's Edge

[Daglobster]

Torien barely felt the knife in his shoulder, but as he stumbled into the loading hangar he still took the time to pull it out, looking at the bent tip for a moment before he discarded it into his side. He paid no mind to the bleeding, knowing he was fine. The knife hadn't even made it through the first layer of plating beneath his flesh, but...

well, his new friend didn't know how sturdy he was.

He pushed past those heartbreaking cries to not come back. Oh, he knew that coming back was a very bad idea, but with just a bit of luck... there!

Parked near one of the hangar's force-fields there was a dingy, neglected looking scavenger vessel, looking a little rusty and scratch-built, but fuck it. It looked big enough for his purposes.

It was a way out. Not just for him, though. If he left that creature alone in that storage room, the Anklehackers would definitely have her at their mercy. It was almost his fault, really, that she'd been rediscovered in a sparsely traveled part of the Stern Club, and if that other goblin woke up before the others... No, he didn't want to think about that.

And so it was with a grim determination that he powered up an old magnetic cargo loader and turned about. It'd taken him only a minute or so before the door to the storage room was opening and he was pushing the hovering loader into the room.

"I know what you said, but... I can't leave you here!" he said, not caring that he'd accidentally raised his voice and brought searing pain onto himself as he brought it up to her tank and started working the controls. They seemed familiar, but... he couldn't quite place it. He didn't have much of his memory left after his reconstruction. The loader's arms spread out and gripped the side of her tank. He turned the magnetic lift on and her tank slowly started to raise from the ground and onto the loader.

"I've... I've never had a chance to save anyone before, only spare them, even then..." his words were coming out as a stream now, the adrenaline having him much more talkative than usual. As the loader worked, he put a hand on the tank.

"I can't just save myself. I'm going to save you too."

[DragonSong]

Seexa was left quite literally spinning circles in her tank, occasionally casting wary glances at the unconscious goblins as she tried to think of something, anything that she could do. No answers presented themselves.

Would they kill her? Would they think she'd done this? Would they go after Torien?

As though simply thinking his name had summoned him, the artificial mermaid was suddenly greeted with the sight and sound of the storage room door opening and...some massive piece of machinery being pushed through.

Her eyes widened and she pressed back against the furthest wall of the tank before she realized who was doing the pushing. "T-Torien!"

She winced, one hand fluttering instinctively to her throat, but quickly brushed the pain aside. He was already at the tank, pressing buttons, doing something--something she didn't understand.

And then she was being lifted--or rather the whole tank was--and she gave a quick, instinctive little cry of fear before she realized what was happening.

"Wha...no." Wide-eyed, Seexa pressed close to the glass again, mirroring his hand as she had before. "You can't, it's...it's not safe..."

They would certainly come after him if he stole her away.

But even as she said the words the fear was plain in her eyes and voice. She wanted to leave. She didn't want to be here anymore, she didn't understand what was happening. Huge black eyes stared up at him through the water, and the pale green scales of her palms went almost white with how hard she was pressing against the glass.

"Not safe..." she repeated in less than a whisper, though now it was a token protest more than anything else.

[Daglobster]

"This place isn't safe," he murmured, pressing his hand a bit more firmly against the glass once she mirrored it. The loader beeped and some hydraulic clicks and electric humming meant that her tank had been safely loaded on and secured.

"You've only seen this room, but... I can't leave you here. If I leave you here, you're going to die," he said, and he left her for a moment so he could start prepping the loader for movement, and then he knelt down and threw the slugloader into the loader's bed with the tank, and he stuffed the sidearm into the pockets of his sweatpants.

"Torien!" came a woman's voice from outside, and he froze for a moment. His handler was here, and she sounded scared.

"Torien, the Anklehackers have a very convincing deal for us. The owner of the whole club's here to talk to us. Come on outside now and talk to us. It's safe, I promise!"

At the mention of "The owner", he only started to work faster, and then the loader was up again. Gods, the tank was heavy, but for once he was thankful to be heavily augmented and he powered through anyways. Madrissa started to speak again, but she was cut off by a goblin's voice.

"Soddit, Ah's sick'a waitin'. Get inn'ere an' bring me dat prizefighta!"

Torien looked back to Seexa. They were about halfway to the door, not enough time. He met her eyes.

"Get down!" he hissed, and just as he said that the door opened once again. This time, it was a group of three hobgoblins, much better equipped and armed then the two mooks Torien had ambushed before.

They raised their black market assault rifles, and one of them yelled out to the others.

"He's leggin' it! Clip'em!" he yelled, and they opened fire, albeit inaccurately.

If Seexa got down low, the bulk of the loader would protect her from any rounds, but Torien didn't have such a luxury. He got clipped in the leg and even felt a bullet embed itself in the stage 2 plating on his back as shots whizzed around them. It was fine, he could take it. It was Seexa he was desperately worried for.

They'd nearly made it through to the loading hangar when Trenk came through the door. A bit on the taller side for a goblin (four and a half feet, absolutely gigantic for his species), he wore rather fine clothes and seemed to be enjoying the perks of his relatively good life. Slicked back hair, perfectly trimmed pencil moustache, and even a tailored suit, red and yellow to represent the gang's colors. he came in and started hollering for the mercenaries to cease fire.

Madrissa tailed behind, looking genuinely worried. She knew Torien's specs like the back of her hand, and she knew it'd take something heavier to stop him. Something that could kill him...

"Stoppit, ya droolin' goons!" he said, swatting at their guns.

"Yer usin' peashootas. Dis is how ya stop a cyborg."

He drew a sleek, long-barreled handgun all decked out in chrome and ivory. When he squeezed on the trigger, there was a distinct electrical sound and a blue flash from the muzzle.

Torien had just finished taking her out into the loading bay through the door when the tungsten bullet tore through his shoulder, spraying equal parts blood, oil, and mechanical bits onto the tank's glass. The shot even went so far as to go through the first two inches of her tank's glass before the thick material stopped it from opening a hole.

Torien's right arm nearly went limp, and he swung his hand to the side to smash the door's panel and close it for good. He kept pushing her, letting his arm rest as he just put his shoulder into moving the loader.

"I've almost... we're almost there..." he whispered, and he rest the hand of his injured arm on the tank.

"Just gotta get out of range..."

[DragonSong]

Seexa screamed again, throwing herself backward as the bullet slammed into the glass, and then quickly surging forward again when Torien sort of slumped against the tank. Blood and oil decorated the glass and she whined quietly, pounding uselessly against the side of the tank.

There was nothing she could do. She couldn't even reach him, much less actually help him.

"Run, just run," she begged, her voice raw and desperate. "Leave me, please, just run. They'll kill you..."

She pressed forward against the glass again, eyes searching his face. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

[Daglobster]

Ignoring the cries in goblinish from the other door, Torien kept going until the loader was by the junker’s entry ramp. He pressed a few buttons and it started to hover up the ramp, he was about to get up after it when Madrissa’s voice came from the other side of the door.

“I’m sorry, Torien! You don’t give me another choice!”

Torien paled, and he rushed up the ramp as quickly as he could, even going past Seexa’s tank to the ramp’s controls. Before he could touch it, however, sparks came from his joints and he suddenly doubled over in agony. He fell to his knees as his pain regulator was shut off remotely and the constant pain or his augmentations suddenly flared up with a new bloom of fresh suffering thanks to his new wounds. In truth, his modifications had been so severe and painful that they constantly agonized every inch of him. Without his pain regulator to block it all out, he was little better than a metallic cripple.

He laid there for a couple moments, just too agonized to really do anything other than cry out until his throat bled. The goblins started to cut through the door with a welding torch, and he found it in himself to rise to his feet, even if supporting himself on his metal legs made what was left of him cry out.

He had to keep going, so he pulled himself up with his one good arm.

He closed the ramp, sealing them inside, taking a moment to just hold himself up on the panel. The rest of the vessel was dimly lit, but it was two chambers. Most of the ship was cargo and scrap space, but there was also a crude airlock and salvaging tools, some goblin-sized space suits, and a bunk/cockpit room that had it’s own waste hatch.

Nice.

Too bad he was in literal hell right now.

[DragonSong]

"Torien!"

Seexa whirled uselessly in the tank, battering herself against the side in a desperate, futile bid to--to...she didn't even know what. Just to do something.

Because he was clearly in pain, and he was the only person she could ever remember showing her even a scrap of kindness, and she wanted to help.

Her eyes narrowed, following the spiderweb of cracks from the bullet that had lodged itself in the glass of her tank. A few of the hairline fractures spread up toward the top, near the metal lid. With the angle the tank was cocked in the loader...

Oh, I hope this works.

Closing her eyes, Seexa curled herself down at the bottom of the tank, then suddenly exploded upward with a powerful beat of her tail, sending the--relatively slight though powerfully propelled--weight of her body against the far left edge of the tank's lid, angled carefully so that she nearly collided with the glass rather than the metal hatch.

She got lucky. Under heavy fire, the integrity of the tank had been weakened enough that even just the force of her lunge was enough to pop the lid on the side, just a bit. Just enough for her to squirm her fingers into the gap and heave.

The metal cap clanged to the floor.

She was free.

Well...sort of. She still couldn't leave the tank. But now, with the lid gone, she could hold herself up above the water; with the way the tank rested in the loader and how Torien had slumped against the control panel, if she heaved most of her upper body out of the tank and stretched she could just reach him.

She started to, started to reach out to him with one dripping, webbed hand, water sloshing onto the floor with every movement. Then she hesitated. What if...what if she couldn't actually do this? What if he didn't want her to?

"Torien...?" Her voice was soft again, rasping and weary. "Let...me...help?"

[Daglobster]

She sharp clanging of the metal lid drew his attention, and he managed to lift his head a bit through the pain to see droplets of cold water dripping onto his forearms. It seemed he didn’t notice that she hesitated, because he desperately took the lifeline of an offered hand without even really thinking of how, or even who.


He didn’t have much sensation in his fully chromed extremities but the smoothness and coolness of the touch, the moisture and water dripping down on him from someone above...

Through the pain, he lifted his head up, and his eyes widened in a little bit of surprise and something approaching genuine happiness to see her.

“Hey there...” he groaned, and he wanted to say something else, but then a sheet of water from the tank splashed onto him and...

It was like bucket of ice-water to the back, and he clutched her hand a little tighter, but no pain came. Instead, the waters dripped into his wounds and flowed over old bruises and he somehow felt... better. He used the opportunity to right himself, and looked back up at her for a moment more.

Somehow, wirhout tje water to accentuate her fishy features and fins, she seemed even more human out of the tank. She was also a bit bigger than he expected. For a brief moment, he just let go of her hand and reached up past to hesitantly rest it on her shoulder. “Thank you.”

“No time to pause now,” he said, and he took his hand off of her to press a few more buttons on the loader, then he pushed her over narby the pilot’s seat.

Using his legs was still fresh torture but it served him long enough to get into the seat.

“We’re gonna make it out of here,” he said, and he examined the controls before him.

[DragonSong]

A soft sort of crooning noise rose up from the back of her throat when he took her hand, and she squeezed back. Water traced over her upper body in rivulets, following the nearly imperceptible pattern of scales down her shoulders, arms, and chest. Any movement splashed a little more onto the floor--what with the way the tank was resting at an angle, it was impossible to avoid.

While experiment #82641 theoretically possessed the DNA that should have made quite a few wondrous things capable for her, she was only passingly cognizant of the fact; so while she didn't entirely understand that the water she had been living in, that had been exposed to contact with her skin and scales for so long, had essentially become a diluted form of the healing agent an alchemist might call "Siren's Tears", she did know that it had certain soothing properties. It was one of the reasons she'd been such a valuable trinket.

She squeezed back when Torien's grip on her hand tightened for a moment, and her markings lit up with a subtle glow of bluish light once again. His hand on her shoulder brought another pulse of light and she looked at it with a combination of curiosity and wariness. The scales on her upper body were smaller and softer than those on her tail, but he'd still be able to feel them, along with the cool slickness of the water that still sluiced off her body.

Then he was moving again, wheeling the tank over toward the pilot's seat, and she was forced to let go so she could grip the the rim of the glass, looking around with wide eyes.

"Torien..." Though the tank still rested at an angle, the top of it was still a good three or four feet above the pilot's chair; she had to brace against the rim and lean out over the edge to try to get closer to him, a little awkwardly. "You're...hurt."

She reached for his shoulder this time, instinctively--not really trying to touch, for fear of hurting him, but trying to get a better look at the bullet wound.

[Daglobster]

“I know, girl, I know...” he muttered, and he focused on lifting his good arm to switch on the fuel lines and engines. He could do this, he... he knew how to do this, yeah. He’d been properly fucked up before (he wasn’t exactly undefeated in the ring), but by this point his only focus was getting this ship out of the hangar and out of the range of the control rig on Madrissa’s belt so his pain regulator could re-activate.

It gave her plenty of opportunity to look at the wound. There was a hole clean through his shoulder, torn flesh revealing the gleaming metal beneath, showing that much of the internal damage was to his augmentations, he had very little actual flesh in his shoulders and arms. There were more sparks and leaking oil than there was blood, and the whole thing looked... jagged and crude. Like his augments were fused and bolted into the flesh rather than properly integrated, save for the chords of alloys sewn through his muscles.

The ship hummed to life, and the engines sputtered before they flared with life, shooting choking black smoke out into the hangar.

“Hang onto something.”

[DragonSong]

The mer-creature's expression twisted into something that was an odd combination of aching sympathy and...anger. Anger was new. She didn't often feel anger.

It wasn't just at the people who shot him. She may not have much experience with the world, but in the before-place, where it was almost always dark save for the light of screens, she'd seen enough in holograms and vids to understand that whatever had been done to him was wrong. And that it hurt.

"I'm...I'm sorry..."

Her hand covered the wound as gently as she could manage, not sure if it would really do anything but hoping it might help soothe.

But then she was retracting her hand again as he told her to hold onto something. She almost asked "Hang onto what?" but then the ship was moving and she grabbed frantically for the rim of the tank again, paling a little beneath her scales.

"Ohhhhh….okay. Okayokayokay…" Her tail churned nervously in the water beneath her, once more sending a few shallow waves sloshing over the glass.

[Daglobster]

Behind the ship, the door finally fell from its frame and Trenko and his hobgoblin guards came barreling through. They levelled their rifles and fired at the ship, but no shots penetrated the hull, and one of them even tried to run up to the ship.

"Just hold on!"

Torien didn't have time to try and do this safely, and so as soon as the ship got some lift underneath it he gunned the engines, roasting the brave goon and filling the hangar with fumes and heat as they went sailing out through the force-field that marked the hangar's entrance.

Water from his new friend's tank spilled about, both from her nervous churning and from the movement of the ship, dousing the cockpit and Torien alike. But once again, he found that he rather liked how that water felt against his battered body and didn't quite care that everything was now wet and uncomfortable.

But they were clear, they... they were actually clear and out!

He held the control wheel tightly, other arm hanging limply from the shoulder, and once he'd brought the ship to a slowing stop once they were clear of the space around Cancer, he just looked back at her, eyes wide...

...and even through the agony, he managed a breathless, incredulous smile, not too bothered that she could see his sharp metal teeth.

[DragonSong]

Seexa screeched as the ship suddenly rocketed forward, and despite Torien's warnings she was thrown against the back wall of the tank. She had the presence of mind to drop to the bottom and brace her hands against the glass to either side of her, but she still thought she'd bruised her ribs pretty good.

But it didn't matter. Because suddenly they were out, through the force-field, and she could see stars.

Stars.

...He'd really done it.

Her head poked cautiously out of the water, staring at him with wide, limpid eyes. And then suddenly she was laughing, the sound rough and hoarse, revealing the sharp, sometimes serrated edges to her own teeth as she just...laughed.

She boosted herself up out of the water, gripping the rim of the tank, then gave a wordless, joyful cry and flipped back into the water, so enthusiastically that her tail actually waved jauntily above the surface for a moment as she turned a tight somersault in the water before surfacing again.

Some of the sheer, nearly painful relief and joy left her as she looked at her new friend and concern quickly flashed back into her eyes. She reached out to him. "Are you...okay?" Was he still in pain? It was hard to tell, she had no idea how much of his distress was from his wounds and how much from...whatever else had happened back there.

[Daglobster]

He allowed himself a moment to watch her tumble around in the water, finding her happiness contagious. The distraction from the pain was welcome, and once they'd gotten a certain distance away from the hangar he seemed to finally relax.

No longer in range, so it didn't feel like his joints were grinding in their sockets, but damn him if he still wasn't hurting. And to him, that was a terrible sign.

"No, not okay," he said, and he banked the ship up so that they traveled across The Cancer's surface. Runaway construction was an understatement for The Cancer's condition as a space station, and new sections and lengths are added by their inhabitants seemingly at random, and yet, like any pirate den, there was always a rhyme and reason to these places.

He looked down at himself, and saw just how frightful he was. He'd been bleeding freely ever since he'd been shot up and the seat was wet with more than just water. He was definitely going to need new clothes.

"We need to... I need a doctor," he said, looking back out across Cancer as he searched for a secluded docking hangar or even an open bay. He had to be careful, if they're spotted by even a single Anklehacker the whole gang could be on them within the hour.

"And we need to hide. No time to relax yet," he said, continuing to push himself. He just needed to land, that was it. Once they were landed and hidden he could finally relax, finally let the edge fade.

[DragonSong]

The mercreature tilted her head and gave a soft, almost crooning sound in the back of her throat that seemed to be a sympathetic sort of groan. She started to reach for him again, then pulled her hand back after a moment of hesitation--there wasn't really anything more she could do, if she'd helped at all.

"I'm...sorry..."

Seexa ducked back into the water, but she allowed herself to rest up against the side of the tank closest to the pilot's chair, keeping an eye on Torien as he navigated the ship. Well, one eye. Despite her worry for her friend--friend, the word even just sounded nice. Friend--she couldn't keep herself from looking out through the viewport in fascination as they navigated the Cancer.

When she'd been left here, months ago, there hadn't been the opportunity to actually see the place from a distance. She'd been given an injection that made her sleep in the before-place, then she just...woke up here. No in-between.

She shook herself and tried to return her attention to the problem at him. "Where is...doctor? Close?"

[Daglobster]

"I don't know many," Torien whispered, and he glanced down to set some coordinates into the ship's console. Thankfully, The Anklehackers had only stolen and slightly scavenged their little salvage vessel, meaning that many of the navigation systems and some of the other rooms should be in fairly good condition as well.

"One. He's old, but was the doctor at my first arena," he continued, and once he was confident about the autopilot he swiveled the seat around to face Seexa. He lifted his good hand up and put it on the glass, and then he followed that by resting his head against the glass and finally letting out a sigh.

"I couldn't leave you, I'm sorry... I know you wanted me to but I could never leave you in that place."

[DragonSong]

Seexa crowded herself forward against the side of the tank so she could press against the glass, mirroring him once again. Her eyes moved over his face, large and open and clearly worried.

But when she spoke, it was at first only to murmur a very soft, "Thank you."

She pressed her hand a little more firmly against the glass and closed her eyes. Her sigh escaped her in a ripple of gills and a small trail of bubbles from her mouth. "Thank you. I wanted you...to go. Be safe. But I didn't...I was scared. I didn't want you to leave, not...not really... I'm sorry."

Her hand moved to gesture toward his injured shoulder, mouth drawing into a tight line. "You were hurt...because of me. I didn't want--I'm sorry."

[Daglobster]

"It's fine, it doesn't hurt anymore," Torien said, thoroughly exhausted now that the pain and adrenaline had finally subsided. He met her eyes and studied her own face in turn, taking the moment to study her properly.

"It wasn't your fault."

His eyes went to her hand, mirroring his movements, and he looked up to the top of the tank, still unsealed. By this point, enough water had fallen that the top no longer constantly surged over with her tank fluids.

He stood, slowly, and motioned upwards.

"Can... Can I touch your hand?"

[DragonSong]

A soft, rasping sort of crooning sound rose up in the back of her throat. He may say it wasn't her fault, but she still felt guilty for it, and she couldn't stop herself from making the instinctive, grief-heavy sound--though there was an oddly soothing quality to it as well.

Then he asked to touch her hand, and her eyes widened. She blinked at him, mute, then nodded slowly. The gills along her ribs rippled in a sharply in-drawn breath, then she uncurled herself from the bottom of the tank and rose up through the water to poke her head up above the surface.

She simply looked at him for a moment, almost considering, before she moved forward and gripped the rim of the tank with one hand to help boost her upper body out of the water again. Very, very slowly, she lifted her other hand and held it out toward him. A few droplets of water ran from the webbing and scales, and the surprisingly elegant, dark claws that capped her fingers shimmered with moisture.

[Daglobster]

The poor girl looked terrified for him, and he couldn’t help but feel a pang of sorrow for her, trapped in a tank all her life, never hugged or held. It made his enhanced heart ache. She seemed to crave the physical contact and the least he could do was to try and soothe her, even going so far as to step up onto the loader so she wouldn’t have to reach as far. The first time, she’d pulled him up and he barely had a moment to register, let alone even think about her touch.

But now?

He met her eyes, strangely enchanted by how large and deep they seemed. Everything that would make her look dangerous instead drew his fascinated gaze. Those teeth and claws looked like they could rend the average man to pieces if she had a mind for it, but strangely enough he was completely unbothered.

Instead, he lifted a hand to meet hers, only for his touch to start a bit higher, and he curiously stroked his hand down from her elbow to her wrist. He could barely feel anything from his limbs but the texture of her scales registered, as well as just how cold she was.

Not that he was complaining, the alloy of his hands was probably cold as well, and he didn’t show any real hesitation as his touch finally drifted down to her hand and he took it and held it genuinely, because he wanted the comfort just as much as she did. He gave her a little squeeze, and managed a tiny smile her way.

“It’s going to be okay,” he said.

[DragonSong]

[Dear god these poor touch starved buttons  ]


The shiver started at the crown of her head and quickly traveled down through the rest of her body, growing from just a few soft shakes to genuine trembling as his fingers skated down the length of her forearm to her wrist.

She couldn't help it; she wasn't scared, or cold, or angry, or any of the other things that she knew to cause such a reaction in her, but she was... No one had ever touched her like that before, so gently. In fact, almost no one had ever touched her at all. In the before-place, any contact was from machines and needles, or through thick gloves. After--well, no one had bothered.

Her hand on his shoulder before had been born mostly of concern, and she'd been too worried about him to really register the feeling of it. But now...now she could actually allow herself to feel it, to experience and enjoy the simple contact. He seemed just as curious about her as she was about him, and it was...it was just nice.

Her fingers tightened through his, stopped about halfway down by the webbing, and a tiny, aching little whimper rose up in the back of her throat. Slowly, carefully, she lifted his hand to press against her cheek, her shivers redoubling at the cool, metallic sensation, but she didn't mind. She closed her eyes and leaned into the touch with sheer, raw desperation. A low thrumming, something between a growl and a purr, started softly in her chest.

Without realizing what she was doing, Seexa pressed closer until her entire body was nearly flat against the glass, so desperate for contact that she moved instinctively. She was like a desert wanderer suddenly presented with the water of an oasis, desperate to the point of giddy stupidity and shivering with something like shock.

Finally, she managed to find her voice. Her eyes opened again and she forced herself to ask softly, "Going to...be okay?"

Once more her hand wrapped around his, squeezing gently as worry furrowed her brow again. How did he know?