Kaine woke on day five of restoration feeling different.
Not better. Not whole. Not healed. Just different. Like she was two beings occupying one consciousness. Person-Kaine and weapon-Kaine, coexisting but not integrated, sharing space but not sharing purpose.
Forty-five percent weapon. Fifty-five percent person. The ratio favored humanity, but the split felt like war.
"This is worse than being total-weapon," Kaine admitted to Tessern during their morning session. "At least then I was unified. Now I'm fragmented again—not into twenty pieces like after eighth kill, but into two massive contradictory chunks that hate each other."
Tessern nodded. "I warned this would be difficult. You eliminated person-self for a reason—the conflict between aspects was unbearable. You've resurrected that conflict. Now you must learn what I learned six hundred thousand years ago: how to make peace between weapon and person. How to make them cooperate instead of compete."
"How did you do it?"
