“Alright, I’ll trust you on this one,” Krahe said. She didn’t quite believe that she had actually said that. “I have two personal requests. First, there’s a certain teique I use to fight well above my baselih no physical side effects — but I ’t do it on-demand. Not anymore. When I fought Semzar, that was the first time I ehat state since I came to Zastreon. If I were to reach that state of mind through meditation for you to observe, could you produce a graft that would allow me to do it at a moment’s notice?”

  “And… What would the nature of this state of mind happen to be?” Firminus asked, making no effort to hide his curiosity.

  “Near-death focus. Some called it nil-thought, but I think that’s wrong. It’s not that I stop thinking, but more that I act with zero dey and think perfectly clearly no matter what is going on around me. As far as I know, various martial arts sects developed their own ways of reag that mental state for short bursts. My world’s grafters learned of a way ter it in-demand and made it into a bare-minimum, low-footprint graft that anyone worth their salt would have. I , of course, share my uanding of that graft, but it might be useless to you.”

  “It surely won’t be pletely useless. Even if it’s not applicable, we still learn from your world’s grafting arts through parison. And your sed request?”

  “Make my eyes better. Motion vision, in particur. I started notig myself pushing up against the edge a few times, things blurring around me.”

  Firminus almost defted at that, but Krahe wasn’t sure if it was relief or disappoi.

  “Ah. The flicker fusion threshold. We address that issue as part of a generalized ocur bat enha course of the close-quarters type. It’s a fairly standard mid-ranker choice. Just some minimally invasive modifications to the eyes, oerves, and visual cortex, nothing too major. A word of warning, your eyes will bee physically stiffer, and it will take a few days to adjust to your new ocur muscles — you may overshoot when trying to look at things at first, but it will improve quickly and any insistencies should vanish within two or three days. In terms of visual quality, it may take some time to bee acclimated to the absenotion blur — thus, the visual cortex modifications include a mental switch for this enhanced visual processing. Ah… Ms. Krahe? Are you alright?”

  Shaking her head, Krahe blinked a few times and snapped back to the present. “Yeah, sorry. I’m fine. I just zoned out. The way you described it sewenty years back.”

  “Alright, well, now it’s my turn to make a request. To be clear, this really is just a personal request, no pressure. I wish to take samples of your… What did you call it? Biosuit? I wish to take samples so that I may study it and attempt to grow more, if it truly is alive. You would have first pick of the results, of course.”

  After thinking it over for a moment, Krahe replied: “I also wao on who gets to have it.”

  “Deal,” Firminus agreed without hesitation. “I will return to take the sample after we finish with this paperwork.”

  “Why?” Krahe asked, already reag behind her back. She hooked a finger under one of the suit’s edges, and with some stretg, she cut a rge regle out of her back. It briefly ed around her forearm, but immediately lost shape and turned into an amorphous mass when she willed it to do so. She uncouthly pced it at the edge of his desk, taking a small measure of amusement in how the mass settled down. “There’s your sample. It needs water and simple nutrients. Probably minerals too, but you’ll figure it out.”

  “Alright, well, let’s go over things all at oo be certain…” Firminus said once he recovered from the slight shock of seeing her do what she had just dohey went over the full list of modifications.

  In summary, the full list of treatments included: Lung rept with a heretofore undecided graft, rept of the spleen with the Adamas an, impntation of reinforced duit lines, impntation of a Jas’raba Scarab, retuning of the Liminal Coil, a course of flesh-transformation elixirs to address her vascur tissue esticity issue, eye and ocur cortex modifications, and stly, a possibly entirely new graft to allow Krahe to achieve the state of Razormind on-demand, or at least to make entering that state and staying in it easier.

  It all brought to mind a reality that Krahe had been aware of, but had ignored until now.

  “Tell me, for how long will I be out of py?” she asked. “What we did at Mirzaii Two won’t mean anything if the Hashems and their Beors just freely regroup and adjust over the course of weeks or months.”

  “Aristedes raised the same . High Grafter Fidelia has ated for it — key operatives of the Inner Wheel have been briefed ouation to the extent necessary for their involvement, and Yazata Heptaxia will remain active within Audunpoint for the immediate future. Moreover, a high-ranking graft-saint by the name of Favonia Aristedes has finally tacted the churd firmed her impendiurn. You may be familiar with her — knowing Casus, he has likely told you about her already. The Inner Wheel has disseminated rumors of her return to create further pressure. In short, we are doing all that we to ehat your work does not go to waste without involving the greater church. Thus far, your modus operandi has worked. Let us hope it tio do so, yes?”

  Krahe released a sigh of relief.

  “It’s not ideal, but it ’t be helped. Let’s get this paperwork done and over with.”

  And so, they did — over the course of the several hours. During those several hours, Firminus pulled ohing after the out of his ass, and even brought in airely new, rger projector alongside several memstes the size of her head. There were stretches of time during whio input was required of her, so she requested some light reading that could help her pass the time without requiring too much attention, so she could still observe what Firminus was doing. What she received was a treatise on the politidscape of the Inax moving isnds seveuries ago, which turned out to in fact be a sort of quasi-biographiovel in disguise, detailing the adventures of a certain saint.

  Just as Firminus had said he would do, ohe paperwork was done, he brought in a kind of brass bowl and three different bottles of dark gss. As he mixed them in the vessel, they bubbled and hissed, ahen stacked in the papers, one by one. He then brought out a thin, silver wand, its tip alight with a small, blue fme.

  He wordlessly offered her the wand, and Krahe took him up on it.

  With a mental and, the mote of fme jumped from the wand, and at the instant it nded in the bowl, a vortex of blue fire erupted towards the ceiling. Without so much as an iota of smoke, and strangely devoid of heat, it rehe stack of papers into white ash before her very eyes.

  Akaso