"—what are you doing here?!"

"What's it look like? I'm here for you! I, I'm so sorry about Brad, he jumped to conclusions and, well, sort of sees it as his job to be some stand in for head of security and think about the worst case, and, so I told him in the worst case I don't care! You've shown us again and again that you just want to help. We know you. We love you. I, I don't care what... all of this is or what's going on, I just. Come home? And we can talk about this."

...witch! Another one, ensorcelling Zash and making him lose sight of what matters, of who matters. "If you won't, I will." He snatches the gun out of Zash's hand and starts walking towards Luida.

...what. No. NO. "Nai—!" And he tackles Nai before he can take another step.

...! [Let go, Zash, I will—free you—]

"No! I won't let you, you can't, can't take more people from me, not anymore—"

[...I see. So that's how you feel.] And he's much better than Zash at hiding his intentions from their mental connection, so Zash doesn't see it coming when Nai headbutts and pushes him off before dashing to his feet and to Luida to wrap his hands around her neck. "You will not take him from me again. He is mine, understand, human?"

"Wh..." she struggles against his hand, trying to pry it free of her neck. "He's his! I'm not..."

But it is so very hard to make any kind of argument when you are being choked to death. That's all she manages.

Four chains of blades shoot out of his back, spreading out like extra limbs and pointing at her. And now she dies.

"NAI, NO!" Zash screams, reaching forward and—

—something happens. A hole, a distortion in space, inside and around and on his left palm, starting to suck everything in.

Sucking all of Nai's blades in, breaking their connection to each other and to Nai himself—

Sucking the corpses in, sucking doctor Conrad in. "A gate—!" He has to grab onto the railing of the walkway to not be immediately consumed by it.

And Zash is too shocked to react, too shocked to do anything, and even if he did he's not sure he could do anything—

"...you idiot—!" And there is nothing Zash can do about it, Nai is sure of it. He doesn't know what's happening, gates are usually one-way only, but—some interaction, something about Nai using his own to summon the blades and Zash...

There is only one thing he can do.

He lets go of Luida, turns around, and jumps towards Zash, propelled by the gravity of his gate.

And he cuts Zash's arm off.

...oh.

Yeah, that would work.

His arm falls down and, unattached to him, sucks itself into the gate and vanishes.

And Zash collapses to the floor.

"ZASH!" cries the woman, and she's at his side and attempting to stop the bleeding. Her terror is palpable, she's more terrified than she had been for herself, and even more scared of how she has no idea if she can even save him or not. Hhe's somewhere between plant and human, and she's not specialized in either of them. She has barely any idea what she's doing, but she's going to do her best to save him.

"Don't touch him!"

"He could die!" Stop the bleeding stop the bleeding she has a belt it can go around his arm and be cinched tight maybe that will be enough—!

"I said," he says, summoning his blades again, "don't. Touch. Him."

And he shoots two blade-tentacles at her.

Zash was not fully unconscious, though, and he's alert enough that he manages to hit them with his gun—which he recovered in the scuffle earlier—to redirect them.

It's not, quite, enough. Humans are so very fragile. There are two blades, and one of them leaves one large gash across an artery. She collapses, gasping, in a growing pool of her own blood.

"...no. No, no no no no, Luida." He abandons his gun and turns to look at her—his own missing limb is no longer bleeding nearly as much, he's definitely not dying of it, and all the energy he's recovering is now dedicated to figuring out how to stop the bleeding. "Luida, please, stay awake, please don't die, Luida I need you—"

...so that's how it is. After all this time, after everything... Zash picks the humans over him.

The wound is across the axillary artery of her right arm. It's a big artery, and... there's a lot of blood.

"Heh. Don't be silly, you've grown up so much. You'll be angry and sad for a while, but you'll be okay." She reaches out to touch Zash's face. "Zash... Please, don't stay angry. If we ask him to forgive us for.... for what we've done. Then forgive him for this. Please."

"No, please, don't, please Luida..."

He's not not listening, but her words are barely being processed. He can't, he can't, he can't, he just can't—