Krill had never not been afraid, but this time he wasn't alone.

Dr. Katie sat across from him, long dark hair spilling down onto her scrubs, large brown eyes wide with shock made even wider by the lenses of her glasses. She may have been a doctor, but she could have easily fit the human movie trope of- unreasonably attractive librarian.

"You aren't serious." She said

Krill nodded , outside the room, and down the hall, he could hear the sound of running feet and tromping boots battering at the floor of the Empyrean. Waylayed on their trip, once again, the Empyrean had taken a detour at the Europe colonies within the Jovian system. Pockets of void resistance fighters had made the system a hell in space, and Adam had been unable to pass up the request for help levied on him by the governor of Io.

"I can't just do that, not without permission...."

"Permission from who?"

Katie stammered, paused, bit her lip and then tried again, "From .... Adam."

"Not his decision."

She wrung her hands, "But krill, you, if you die-"

"If I die, you are more than capable of taking my place ."

He didn't miss the incredulous and skeptical eyebrow raise that she leveled at him, it was an expression that could only truly have the full effect when used by a human.

There are 42 muscles in the human face, two eyes with visible white sclera and eyebrows upon the eyebrow ridges, which, while they help to keep sweat out of the eyes, also helped to harness the full effect of the human nonverbal communication . The entirety of the human face was designed for communication , and over the past few years Krill had come to read expressions with the same unconscious know-how of any human .

He reached on one small, frail hand and placed it over her strong, human one. Despite the skeptical eyebrow, he could see the fear in her face too, the tightening around the corners of her mouth, the hardness of her jaw, the set of her lips into a thin line against her pale skin.

"I am tired of feeling useless."

Katie shook her head, "But Krill that's stupid. You-"

"Yes yes, best surgeon in the galaxy. What would we do without you, how could we go on etc etc. Katie, there are plenty of great doctors in the world, but very few of them who can harness Anima power." He continued to pat her hand, "I am tired of hiding in the background while my friends go off to die in glorious battle. I hate having to watch it and I will tolerate it no longer

She looked at him with a pained expression, "I don't think I could live with myself.... If I killed you."

"Than Don't/"

***

Krill's words had not been comforting. The little doctor that tried his best of course, and the fact that he was placing his life in her hands was, well it was certainly the greatest compliment he could have given, but even so.

No pressure.

She was being asked to fill the shoes of the greatest surgeon who had probably ever lived. Four arms and four separate cortical hemispheres, not to mention the ability to float which was sort of handy when it came to operating. Krill's Vrul body was almost meant for the surgical suite.

But her....

Well she had only two clumsy human arms and only two cortical hemispheres of which neither could operate independently, and even if they were separated, like they occasionally were in extreme cases of epilepsy , only one hemisphere of her brain was capable of speech.

Not exactly stellar .

Compared to Krill's brilliant mind, her brain was like the slow kid eating paste in the corner while he did rapid physics computations on the chalkboard, there was simply no comparison, and still somehow, she was here standing as the orderlies helped her to dress in the sterile gown.

She held her hands before her face, newly gloved and ready. Someone held a surgical gown in front of her, and she stepped into it waiting patiently as they tied it down in back. All her hair was pulled back into a tight bun and tucked up under a hairnet. As far as surgeries went, it was both the least invasive and most invasive form of brain surgery possible.

The risk of infection was low, and the incision would be microscopic, however cutting someone's soul out of their head is probably the definition of invasive if one were to look up the word in Webster's dictionary .

"You ready?"

She turned her head Catching a set of inhuman eyes staring back at her from behind a hairnet and mask. Celex cocked one technicolor eyebrow at her. The face he had picked for himself was a good representation of his personality, looking every bit the emperor he used to be with a hawkish nose, sharp eyes and neatly trimmed beard. It was a look she happened to find annoyingly handsome, despite Celex's choice to take on the form of a man in his late thirties rather than youthful twenties.

But she supposed anyone would look good if they could take on any form they chose.

"No." She said bluntly.

Behind Celex Conn floated gently past ribbons tied back and braided into neat rows to keep from getting in the way. They should be out with Adam right now, helping to clean up the Jovian system, but krill had either bullied or cajoled both of them into being here, without Adam knowing about it . Then again it probably hadn't taken much to cajole either of them.

Both Celex and Conn had similar personalities in that way.

Not giving a damn was a pretty big part of both of them.

Despite her earlier answer, when the surgical doors opened, she stepped inside with a purpose, opening to a room with a waiting surgical staff, and Krill's tiny body lying in wait for her on the operating chair. He looked so frail from here, a tangle of stick thin limbs she could have snapped over her knee if she half wanted .

In a way this surgery would be harder than any Krill had had to perform, since it would be on a subject who died more easily than any human. Brain surgery wasn't something they tended to perform on many other species other than humans. If she messed something up, it might not matter if Krill had anima power because in all likelihood he would spend the rest of his days in a vegetative state drooling everywhere.

She tried to shut off those thoughts, which certainly weren't doing her any good.

She took a deep breath and stepped forward, two telepaths flanking her on either sde.

She didn't have telepathic abilities herself, and had no desire to gain them in the future, but she would need their help to guide her to the source of Krill's anima and all of the extra tethers she would need to sever.

Conn positioned himself around behind Krill, and Celex stood behind her resting one heavy, gloved hand on her shoulder, "Ready/" He asked again

This time she nodded, and she felt as Celex shifted bringing his hands to rest on the back of her neck and head. The sensation was like a chain of lightning bursting through her body, electrifying her limbs and brain. She struggled to orient herself for a moment, confused at the new sensation that lapped inside her mind.

It was a strange feeling to say the least, like if your arm had been numb for your entire life, and all of a sudden sensation came flooding back.

She could sense her brain now, her own mind like a physical space, and Celex with her, his thoughts lapping around through her head like warm, rolling eddies of water in a shallow sea.

Through him she could sense a tether to Conn, whose mind was alien and strange, but not difficult to understand.

And she knew where to go.

She couldn't have said it was easy. It took all her concentration just to stay on task, to keep her hands moving at the microscopic levels required to perform the surgery. On many occasions her focus began to fade a bit, bolstered only by the slow pressure of the emperor's mind pressing against her own . Even so she was glad to have him, because when the ache in her feet rose up, he tamped it back down, curtailing her awareness to this signal moment.

Cutting away what held Krill in place.

The further she went the harder it got, until the last few strands were left in place.

She cut one,

Then another.

Just one more left, just had to position correctly. Her hands faltered, second guessed. Celex did his best to steady her, and in a moment of clarity she cut, praying that it wouldn't be too much.

The slice came, and in a moment she knew she had taken off more than intended. She watched the thread holding Krill in place, fray, like it was going to break, and listened to the sound of the machines going haywire.

She had killed him.

And then the room erupted into light, and she was thrown backwards slamming hard into Celex's chest and sending them both to the floor some feet away. Somewhere in the fall he wrapped his arms around her chest, so when they did hit the floor, she was relatively cushioned.

She lay there stunned and in shock as her eyes burned and tried to recalibrate.

Her surgical lenses had fallen off and her vision was blurry when it finally came back into focus.

Krill's body lay silent and listless on the table, unmoving.

All the lights had gone out, but still the room was lit like noon day, from a glowing ball of energy hovering at the center of the room. As she watched the ball of energy began to churn and contort, forcing itself slowly into shape as the light died away.

And as it did, her eyes went wide

***

Adam felt it when it came, a sudden psychic blast of energy that rocked through the entire empyrean just moments after stepping off the shuttle. He was tired, exhausted from a day's work dealing with cultists, but that sudden rush of power had him up and alert in seconds.

He tossed his SE helmet to one of the shuttle officers, and turned towards the docking lieutenant, "What the hell was that."

The look on the man's face was pretty clear, he had no idea.

Beside him, Sunny straightened herself from the back of the shuttle faceplate on her armor sliding back, "did the Void breach us "

"I don't know." He said, and together they started up the hall. He didn't like the idea of the void breaking onto his ship while he was away. Together, he, Sunny, and a few other marines charged up the hallway after the origin of the explosion. It took them a few minutes to make their way through the massive ship racing down hallways and corridors in a mad dash.

They weren't far away from the medical wing now. Adam skidded around the last corner, feet flailing on the floor, and only had just enough time to register the brief image of a man, tan russet skin, reddish hair, thin, not very tall, holding krill's limp body under one arm, stark raving naked, and with a look of absolute rage on his face.

But that was all he got before the naked man drew back his fist and coldcoked him across the jaw so hard he went down seeing stars and little cartoon birds.