Mela ignored my suggestion at first. She blustered past my words, trying to cheerfully divert the conversation to her new potential for wide-spread destruction.

I let her.

It was, admittedly, easier. Besides, we still needed to get her fully healed up from the side effects of her surgery, unlock her Behemoth package, and get her some of her own gear. I might have been willing to let her steal one of my guns for a while, but my eyes, Clairvoyance, and cybernetic arms made me genuinely good at dual-wielding those weapons.

I was also distracted, thinking about the conversation I'd had with Amelia before we woke Mela up. Amelia hadn't blown up on me when she heard what I was using a good chunk of her drones for. In fact, she hadn't said anything, or even reacted at all. I kept glancing at her through our talk with Mela, wondering if she'd just been too angry and was biding her time.

Then we shipped off Mela to rest in her own room, and I suddenly had my arms full of the precocious ripper. When we finally came up for air, I couldn't hold the question back anymore.

"You're not mad at me, are you? About the drones? I should have asked for your permission. I'm sorry I —"

"Adrian." She cut me off brusquely, but with fondness shining through in her voice. "I'm not angry. I trust you. I'm also pretty sure you're going to check if the drones actually brought in people who deserve to, well, suffer and then die. Right?"

I nodded, because I couldn't find my voice.

"Then it's fine. So long as you're not snatching innocent people off the street. Am I right to assume this is because you want more, ahh, snacks?"

"Y-Yes. I… have to admit I don't feel ready for your father." I stared at the wall, unable to meet her eyes. "We went out there, stupid and overconfident, and Mela almost died. If I'd let you get hurt, Mela would have died. You too, if the wound was bad enough! I just want to… I don't know, have the ability to protect you properly."

"Adrian, look at me?" I did, was immediately rewarded by one of the deepest, most heated kisses we had shared so far.

"I'm never going to judge you for wanting to get better at protecting us," she said breathlessly, several moments later. "Just remember: no innocents. Okay?"

"Of course."

—

Though I was unhappy with the slow pace of my own growth, I couldn't deny that I was, in fact, growing.

Adrian Flinn

Strength: 9 → 10

Reflexes: 20

Acuity: 20

Physique: 10

Recovery: 3 → 5

Stamina: 8 → 11

Soul: 28 → 32

Adaptability: 28 → 30

Tolerance: 23 → 26

Cognition: 22 → 24

Essence: 38/38

Mind Synchronicity: Reluctant Symphony

Body Synchronicity: Sharpening Harmony

Shadow Runner Package:

Clairvoyance 4 (11/100) → Clairvoyance 4 (36/100)

Programming 1 (99/100)

Movement 2 (0/100) → Movement 2 (46/100)

Quickhacks 1 (99/100)

Assault 3 (87/100) → Assault 3 (94/100)

Tongue of The Ravening Observer

Unseen Stalker Package:

Stealth 1 (99/100)

Tracking 2 (99/100)

Focus 3 (88/100) → Focus 3 (96/100)

Grace 2 (99/100) → Grace 3 (17/100)

Faultline 2 (2/100) → Faultline 2 (19/100)

Some experimentation in the netspace had improved my Movement skill, making it ever easier to travel through the world of data like some unstoppable wraith. I trained in Assault with Amelia's drones, though I was always careful not to break them. Grace had more or less become one with me, too, and experience was trickling in slowly but surely.

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Unfortunately, Stealth, Tracking, Programming, and Quickhacks were providing a much, much bigger challenge. They just weren't clicking for me, which annoyed me something fierce.

Why was I suddenly doing a deep dive into my abilities, you may ask? Well, it was because I was currently watching Mela cackle as she unleashed her own full abilities, first on a boxing bag and then on a poor training dummy.

The bag had lasted approximately two seconds before getting utterly demolished by a grinning Mela. The dummy was currently in the process of receiving the same treatment.

It was… frustratingly impressive, if I was being honest. Power Surge was an utterly busted skill when combined with Scale Mail. It let her hit like a truck and simultaneously protected her hands from the backlash of using them in such a manner. Healing Surge followed that up nicely, eradicating whatever recoil damage she managed to do to herself.

There was a light haze of heat coming off of her, and she was sweating like a pig, but Mela looked to be on cloud nine.

The only thing that put a damper on her mood was the fact that she couldn't really use Dampened Impact and Quake very effectively yet. She'd started on the Essence exercises before she got the cybernetics, yes, but she still didn't have a ton of Essence to play around with. That meant that a couple seconds of using either ability drained her down to nothing fast, forcing her to take her time to recover afterwards.

We tried to explain to her why it was better for her to regather Essence slowly, and with minimal assistance from her cybernetics, but she ignored us. She just let her cybernetic legs chug down Essence and pump it into her, with the sort of indifference to the consequences that could only come from utter disregard for one's long-term health and prospects.

Obviously, that was a problem. But there wasn't much we could do about it. If I thought the regular Mela was a menace, then a Mela with cybernetics that made her that much more powerful was way worse.

Then again, I wasn't sure the fault lay entirely with her.

Mela was elated with her cybernetics test session, sure. However, there was also a very subtle, and very literal, red gleam to her eyes. It faded away quickly after she stopped using her new legs and drawing on their skills. And, once the red light vanished, I noticed that Mela visibly dialed down the aggression and excitement.

This led to a very quick and hopefully subtle chat with Amelia.

"You said you'd be testing her and checking her compatibility with the legs before installing them." The words tumbled out of me in a hurry as soon as we'd dipped out of the training room where Mela was still recovering from her test session. "What happened there?"

"Um… She had an okay level of compatibility, I guess. Around seventy, seventy-one percent? My setup here isn't perfectly calibrated for this kind of testing, but I'm not off by much."

"Yes, but… what does that actually mean? What is 'compatibility'? Also, how high is our compatibility to our respective cybernetics?"

"I'm in the high eighties, but I started around seventy-eight percent. You're… honestly? I'm not sure what your percentage is. One hundred percent? Over that? There's absolutely no rejection between your body and the cybernetics, though there was some clash between your eyes and your arms at the start."

She paused and took a deep breath before continuing with a grimace.

"And that's what compatibility is: the degree of 'acceptance' between you and the eldritch bits the cybernetics were made out of. We still don't know what that depends on. Mind? Soul? Body? Essence, now that I know about it? You know, this reminds me. My father used to get all smug when we were discussing this, like he knew something I didn't… Ugh, I can't wait to off that asshole."

She grumbled a bit more, making my lips twitch in amusement, but I had to disrupt her being adorable.

"Amelia? Focus please?"

She perked up and shot me an apologetic glance.

"Yes, yes. Anyway, if you'd asked me before I met you, I'd say you can't hit one hundred percent compatibility. But then you came along and pretty much perfectly fused with your cybernetics. It's kind of insane…"

I ignored the jolt of discomfort at her word choice. Not that she was wrong. "What does low compatibility mean?"

"Hm? Oh, well, the usual. A unique version of cyberpsychosis. Complete loss of control, and sliding into the observed natural behavior of the creatures the cybernetics were made out of. Then eventual mutation into those creatures."

"Right…" I snuck a glance back into the training room. Mela looked calm enough, but she was tapping away with her now ultra-powerful foot. "And, high compatibility stops this?"

Amelia cringed. "Well… not exactly. You had your own episodes, didn't you? Compatibility reduces the chances of complete insanity significantly, but it seems like Essence is the best way to combat it. And even that's not a guarantee. Overall? A calm emotional state and a decently stable environment are recommended for users of eldritch cybernetics."

She rattled the last bit off like she was reading from a pamphlet, and I frowned. "That something your father's research showed?"

"Basically. You want to minimize, or even eliminate if possible, the various triggers that could cause brief bouts of eldritch behavior. Not that we had a lot of data on the subject. The need for live testing was why he wanted to give those cybernetics to gangers to begin with."

"Right. Avoid triggers." I massaged my forehead. "And we have a massive Mela trigger in the merc HQ, laid out in a room with all his limbs missing."

Amelia sighed. "Yep."

—

"Listen… about what ya, erm, said before? I think yer right. I think I should talk to him, and I'd like ya ta be there while I do."

It took me a few seconds to recover enough breath to speak. After all, we were in the middle of a workout session during which I'd become Mela's training dummy once more.

While Amelia apparently deserved careful coaching, exercise routines, and lots of handholding through her initial combat training, I went right back to getting pummeled, just like during my Kittens days. Sure, things were different when I used my arms and Clairvoyance in tandem, but Mela quickly banned that the first time I started 'cheating.'

"I'd be more than h-happy to," I finally gasped out.

And I meant it. I needed the distraction. The mercs were finally starting to bring in victims for my snackie time, but I couldn't quite bring myself to indulge in increasing my Essence reserves. I wasn't going to put it off forever. Still, the irrational fear that Amelia would suddenly be disgusted by me was hard to shake.

"Thanks," Mela replied. "After this, then? Once we've cleaned up a little?"

I just nodded, and we went right back to 'exercising'. It was a good thing that Amelia could fix me up so easily, because twenty minutes later, I needed it.

"I'll grab a shower, and we can go," Mela muttered as she walked out.

I grabbed Amelia's hand and dragged off the giggling ripper into a shower of our own. Surprisingly, we emerged long before Mela showed up. She was typically much faster than both Amelia and me, and that was when we showered separately.

With how miserable she looked when she did come back, she was clearly just dragging her feet.

I gave Amelia a kiss and a hug, sent her off back to her job at the clinic, and then we set out. We were actually pretty close to Mak's room, having been exercising in the merc HQ facilities.

The drone guards posted outside his room moved aside as we approached, and I tore the door open before either Mela or I could lose our nerve.

"Fucking finally! Do you have any clue how long I waited you limp-d—"

Mak's tirade collapsed faster than his bravado when he spotted Mela walking in behind me.

"O-Oh…" he stammered. "You're alive, then."

"Yes, I'm alive. No thanks to ya!" Mela snapped.

She almost walked right through me before catching herself. Carefully grabbing my sides, she lifted me and set me aside like a mother would a child. It was thoroughly humiliating, let me tell you, but it was my fault for freezing up.

"I'm alive," she snarled. "And yer going to either give me a good excuse for what ya did… or I'm going to put an end to ya. Right here and now."

The red gleam was back in her eyes.

I had little doubt that Mela would do exactly what she was threatening him with.

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