Lana would've wept at the gentle understanding in his voice, the empathy for her own situation. But the eyes of the pitiless force that had taken hold of her remained dry and coldly focused; she could no easier fight it than she could will away the need to breathe. In fact, there was nothing to fight, because she couldn't even sense whatever it was that had control of her, and her limbs wouldn't even respond with a twitch to her most frantic attempts to bend them to her will.
In fact, she was now specifically going for the most vulnerable parts of his burned arm, using the knowledge she'd gained about his injuries from sitting supportively by his bedside as Ali treated him. Trying to cause the most pain possible, trying to cripple him again and gain an advantage.
This was beyond terrifying. Like suddenly finding herself imprisoned in a place that had been her comfortable, protective home all her life. As if everything she'd loved about it now inspired horror. And even more awful, her prison was a weapon that could, that had harmed her friends.
Dax thought she could fight this, but he was wrong. Dead wrong.
And soon he might just be dead, because the most awful thing of all was discovering that whatever had taken control of her could fight. Well enough to make up for their considerable difference in size and strength, or the fact that her boyfriend had the knowledge and skills of some of humanity's best warriors literally burned into his DNA.
Some of that might've been his reluctance to fully commit, to hurt her. But even so she was pushing him back, and back. A blur of blows not only meant to injure but to put him off balance, creating openings she could exploit to finish the fight: feinting with punches while trying to hook his leg out from under him, an attempt to knee him in the groin while she tried to slam her stiffened knuckles into the side of his head. Slipping around his own return blows with the grace of a dancer, trying to get inside his guard at the same time.
And with each attack and counterattack and shift of balance, she gained more space in the corridor while he lost ground. “Fight it,” he panted as she cornered him against a bulkhead. “Lana, this isn't you. Fight it!”
He was finally a heartbeat too slow, focused on trying to get through to her with his words, and her heel connected with the side of his knee. He managed to twist aside before she felt the vulnerable cartilage give way, but from his change in posture she knew he no longer had full use of that leg.
At that point Dax's expression changed to firm resolve. “Fine,” he growled. “If whatever's controlling you won't let you stop, then I'll have to stop you. Before you do something you won't be able to forgive yourself for.”
The young man charged forward, movements nearly a blur in spite of his injuries. And as the Dormant stumbled a step back, suddenly focused completely on turning aside incapacitating blows and ducking out of inescapable holds, with all thoughts of going on the offensive abandoned, she confirmed that he had been holding back.
Quite a bit.
* * * * *
Aiden shouted triumphantly as his shot melted the cauterizer attachment on Fix's arm. Finally. Although, if he had to be honest, he should've been pissed that he'd just been forced to damage the expensive combat android. The last of his prizes from Recluse.
While he decided whether to mourn or celebrate, he spared a moment to check how the gunner was doing with the Dormant, and whether he could help.
It was honestly hard to determine either of those things; the two were barely in sight in the corridor, with his weapons officer mostly visible and only flashes of Lana's arms and legs. And flashes was accurate, since she was moving so quickly that her limbs were a blur. Which meant that Aiden hitting her with his cauterizer would've been hard enough, even if the gunner wasn't so close he might accidentally hit him instead.
As for how the young man was doing in his fight . . . he was holding his own? Considering Aiden had seen him literally take apart combat androids, the fact that a slip of a girl was going toe to toe with him, matching his strength and precision with her technique and agility, was impressive.
The deadly, almost choreographed looking speed and ability from both combatants would've been incredible to witness if the stakes weren't so high. If he didn't stand to lose someone he cared about no matter who won, unless the gunner was able to take down Lana without needing to kill her.
Which, frankly, didn't seem likely at the moment.
He reluctantly tore his attention back to Fix, only to jerk out of the way with a curse as a portable terminal flew at him with the full force of a combat android's strength behind it. It sailed through the main display and across the room to smash into the bulkhead there, with a sound that made him wince at the destruction of such a valuable piece of equipment.
Unfortunately, chucking things wasn't the extent of the reprogrammed robot's threat now that its cauterizer attachment was slag; it had begun ducking from cover to cover to get at Barix, all the while throwing more portable terminals and other expensive objects snatched up from around the outside ring of the bridge as a distraction. Aiden winced every time one flew past and was smashed to junk somewhere behind him, grimly struggling to bring down the rogue android but unable to find an opening as it drew ever closer to the Ishivi.
Even more alarmingly, the slight man didn't seem to notice the danger; he'd also turned towards where Lana and the gunner fought their almost
