---

There is a single immutable universal truth; 

Nothing is without cost. 

- Legion Vade Mecum.

****

My eyes roamed around room III after I'd stepped into it from the examination room. It was cramped, around one-by-one-by-three, with the same sliding doors, semi-faded white paint, and black numeral on the doors as the previous ones.

The difference in this room was that the right wall was covered in shelves filled with what I assumed were piles of blue-black camouflage clothes, and the left wall had a cracked floor-to-ceiling mirror. Even with my desire to finally get dressed, I forgot the clothes as I saw the woman looking back at me from the mirror. 

What the actual fu-

Obey. Trust. Keep calm. Be silent. Surrender. Obey.

It was like the glass hand had been waiting for this moment and slammed into me with full force, physically bringing me to my knees and my ears ringing from the intangible impact. I didn't even have a chance to fight back, and all I could do was assent. 

I Obey. 

My reactive agreement caused the pseudopods to stop pulsing and the overwhelming pressure to fade as quickly as it had come. 

I'd bitten my tongue in surprise when it had blasted me, and I spent a few moments focused on checking that I hadn't drawn blood while ignoring everything else except my breathing and the damage I'd done to myself. Eventually, when I'd calmed down a bit, I determined I hadn't drawn blood. 

Swallowing a few times and trying to hold on to the tranquillity being forcing into me while looking at myself in the mirror. 

I bit my lip -avoiding my tender tongue-, then looked myself in the eye. 

Breathe in. Breathe out. 

In. Out. 

Lists. Ok, List it all. 

Who do you see?

Emi Alana Kelly. Lana for everybody except Gran. Twenty-seven years old. Irish absentee father. Japanese mother. An obvious Mixey. Half-breed. Impure.

I bit my lip harder and used the pain to stop thinking about the Purist rhetoric. 

What else?

I'm one-fifty-one centimetres tall -well, short-. Overall, I still had a sort of fit physique. Slight belly from not going to the gym for the last few months and eating and drinking too much after breaking up with... 

I stopped any thoughts of Adam, even if that pain would be preferable to what I was avoiding in the mirror. 

I turned slightly, then clamping down on any emotion, I looked at what they had done to me. 

I had scabbed scratches and cuts across my face, neck and arms. They looked a few days old at least, but none close to healed yet.

That means they took me at least three or four days ago, right?

There was a dull metal bracelet around my left lower arm, and when I turned, I could see the segmented metal implanted where my spine used to be. 

Tears were welling up in my reflection's eyes, and I let out a muffled sob. I scrabbled to keep hold of the tranquillity forced into me, but it started to slip away again when my eyes drifted to my reflection's head and confirmed I was completely bald. 

The cause was obvious when I thought about it; whatever the viscous fluid had been in the shower room, it had not just burned off the dried blood and the rest of my clothes but also taken my eyebrows, eyelashes and my long hair with it. 

My reflection's hand went up, and felt her hairless scalp. Tears began dripping down my reflection's face, and my vision became blurry.

I angrily rubbed my eyes, looking at myself in the mirror again. With everything that had happened, it felt ridiculous that I was looking at my head and getting emotional because I was bald. 

But I'd spent years growing it out and still keeping it healthy while getting it dyed in the perfect shade of strawberry red instead of my natural black. 

I loved my hair. I loved the way it looked. 

I sobbed again, and the glass pseudopods started pulsing in reaction. 

Obey. Tru-

"PISS OFF!" [PISS OFF!] I snarled at them both with and without sound and lashed out at the pseudopods, clutching onto them with my new incorporeal hand. It felt like I slammed into a wall while grasping a live wire, but I didn't let go. 

Obe-

Then I attacked. 

[FUCKING] [PISS] [OFF] [AND] [LEAVE] [ME] [ALONE!] 

I clawed, bit, and ripped at the pseudopods connecting to me with my intangible limb, punctuating each word I snarled with a blow on the main glass body powered by every bit of hatred I could muster. 

I'm not sure how I did it, but it was like I physically lashed out at the bastard keeping his disgusting tentacles clamped around me. The slick glass held against the first blows, the electricity of its defences coursing across my new limb, before it buckled and I smashed it into pieces. Simultaneously, everything around me turned a shade of red. 

Bastard, I'll...

My head started spinning, and vertigo brought me to my hands and knees an instant later. 

"What the..." I mumbled, feeling bile rise in my throat, and then all strength went out of me, pitching me face-first into the floor. 

A moment -or an aeon- later, the red became black, and I knew nothing. 

***

Unfamiliar aches and pains joined the disturbingly familiar ones to welcome me back to consciousness. 

My throbbing head took the poll position in things that ached, and I squished my eyes tightly to keep the light out. It felt like my brain had been put through a blender to be frozen solid in the next instant, and now it was being shoved out of my skull through my nose. 

Eventually, I opened my eyes again, and a slight red haze still covered everything.

Before I could get my bearings, something locked my intangible limb in a vice-grip, then completely wrapped me up in slick steel. I tried to move, but the thing was utterly unyielding. Panicking, I scrabbled at it with every millimetre of motion left in my incorporeal fingers. It let me get a good feel for the unbelievable difference between its strength and the meagre power the glass hand had exerted.

Then it took away every thought, emotion, and feeling I had without an iota of effort. 

GET DRESSED.

I got up without feeling any of the pain I was in just a few seconds before, found boxer shorts, trousers, socks, and a shirt that were only a size or so too large for my small frame and put them on. 

The smallest size boots, at least three sizes too large, followed, and I wrapped the laces around them tightly to try and minimize the movement. 

GET OUT.

Without conscious thought, I exited the room and walked down a myriad of light blue hallways and through sliding doors until I stepped into a truly massive chamber. I'd have called it a hangar if I could have formed the connection. 

Hundreds of bald men and women wearing similar blue-black camouflage clothing stood in orderly lines facing one side of the room. There was about two meters between every person in the line and at least five between the lines themselves. Mechanically, I walked over and joined the rearmost forming line. All the bald people in camouflage clothing entered and lined up without a sound. 

STAY.

Time passed without me moving or thinking. I'm not sure how long it was or if I was even conscious. I became aware of -or was allowed to become aware of- a group of five grey-and-brown armoured soldiers and a wheeled rack filled with all manner of spears, swords, axes and other melee weapons that I couldn't remember the names of.

The first of the soldiers, an older dark-blonde one, stepped in front of one of us who had lined up, looked at them for a few seconds and then said something to the other soldiers. He then moved on, repeating it for every person he looked at. One of the other soldiers quickly pulled a weapon from the rack and handed it to the one the older soldier had examined.

It was a practised dance of three soldiers just on the right side of rushing to keep up with the examiner while the last soldier just kept the weapon rack moving forward. 

The old man stepped in front of me, looked me up and down, and I saw a sneer appear on his face.

"So you're the Tine who broke Huub," he growled in Dutch, and I understood every word he spoke. 

Even tightly wrapped up by the slick steel, my surprise burst through the muting effect giving me a little room to think and notice things. 

There was nothing that was translating the words the old man had spoken. I just knew what he'd said as if I'd learned the language. I also knew it was Dutch and not German, as I'd thought guessed it was before. 

How the fudge is that even possible?

The man looked at me again, his disgust being joined a few seconds later by cruelty blooming across his aged face. 

"Give this thing a long kinesword," he said in Dutch again. 

The old man moved on, but the soldier following cast him a questioning look before shrugging and pulling a large sword out of the weapon rack and handing it out to me. 

I just looked at him and the absolute unit of a weapon he casually held up. 

It looked like one of those medieval things; a double-edged steel blade slowly tapering towards the end before ending in a short sharp point. It had a blocky crossguard, a hilt wrapped in something grey, and a blocky pommel with a spike at the end. 

It was also almost as long as I was tall. The blade was absolutely more than a meter long, and the rest at least thirty centimetres. 

There had to be something wrong. The others around me had been given weapons that were in line with their stature; the big ones got big weapons, and the small ones got small ones. 

TAKE THE KINESWORD.

The tiny bit of freedom I had gotten was effortlessly swept away. Without hesitance, I seized the weapon, only barely able to force myself to grab the hilt instead of what looked like a very sharp blade.

I awkwardly manoeuvred the heavy thing to stand point-first to the right of me, my hand on the hilt keeping it steady, and the end of the pointed pommel reached my eye level. 

Then I stood unmoving and unthinking again.

***

"MATERIALS!" 

I blinked and looked upwards to see an imposing blonde man standing on a balcony at least ten meters up on the wall all of us were facing. He wore grey and white armour, sleeker and somehow a lot more solid than the grey and brown armour the guards wore. 

Wait, materials?!

The steel hand keeping me unthinking and docile loosened a fraction, and my eyes snapped to a black-haired man in sleek grey and brown armour standing beside the man in grey and white. I'm not sure how I knew, but I was sure the dark-haired one was the one controlling me. I tried to glare at him, but he was keeping me focused on the man who was giving a speech.

"You are no longer in the place you were born," the blonde man continued, "a few of you will survive long enough to return to your birthplace, but most will die."

This has to be the worst inspirational speech ever.

"The Anathema has invaded this place and will soon spread to your birthplace. The Anathema is like a virus infecting and destroying all it can."

"To give your birthplace a chance at survival, we have taken one million from your compatible Material and remade you into what stands before me now."

"Less than half of those we harvested have survived the Joining, and only the best, luckiest, and most powerful of you will be able to return to your birthplace to defend it."

"The rest of you will die here."

What?!

"The way back to your birthplace only has enough power to transport the first thousand of you. If you aren't one of them, you will not return and will die here." 

The steel hand keeping me under control was slowly withdrawing from me, and panic was welling up in its place. I couldn't look directly at the black-haired asshole, but I was sure he was enjoying himself. I struggled against him, but it was like a child futilely raging at a giant. 

"If any of you are amount those that make it back, I suggest you convince your birthplace to build defences against what will be coming for you. It might help."

Black-hair released me a little more, 

"You have all been supplied with a Kineweapon," the blonde man held up a sword that looked a lot like mine, except in his armoured hand, it didn't look ridiculously large. 

I felt something intangible burst from the man, and every single person I could see lifted their own weapons in front of them in unison. I automatically followed suit, holding my sword with two hands like a few others. 

"The Kineweapon you are holding is what will give you a chance to stay alive. Use it like this." 

Another intangible burst of something was sent across the hanger by the blond man, and I finally noticed that something had entered me. It was controlling everybody just like Black-hair was controlling me, but it wasn't using a steel grip. Instead, it was like silk sliding across me and smoothly directing me in what it wanted. 

It didn't even occur to me to try and fight it. Instead, I felt my back heat up and that warmth travelling through my arms into the weapon I was holding. 

"Remember that feeling. The only way back is in the fortress city of Alkmaar. You have to reach the fortress city before a thousand of you have gone through, or you will die here." 

HUNT

GROW

SURVIVE

The burst of intangible silken words slipped into me and dissipated before I could think to fight them again, but I knew they were significant. Stronger and more comprehensive than even the steel control wrapped around me. 

"Good luck and good hunting to you all. Move out."

Still holding the heavy sword extended in front of me, I marched forward in lockstep with the hundreds of people around me. 

Kaleidoscopic lights started forming on the light blue wall directly in front of each person striding towards it. 

When the first line reached the wall, they stepped through the lights and disappeared in a small flash. New lights instantly started forming to welcome the next line of marching people. 

The steel around me was loosening its hold on me excruciatingly slowly. Even though I knew the black-haired bastard was enjoying my futile struggle to get loose, I couldn't stop myself from fighting back. 

It let me look around, though, and even pulled my attention to others around me; I'm sure I saw Reae, Ron, and Alice. But I couldn't open my mouth to call them. But they were here and alive. I just had to find them. 

I saw that Purist asshole Ben marching forward with an even bigger sword than I had in his hand. He turned his head towards me, looked at me in surprise, and then he gave me a soulless grin. I was very certain that I never wanted to see him again. 

Before long, my line was the next one marching forward towards the light, and anti-climatically my struggles came to nothing and I stepped into the light.