"Who are you?"
The question hung in the air between them, like a line twisting in the wind, the line leading from Arc to the woman slackened before suddenly going taut, thickening as she received her response.
"I am the price of ridding this universe of its maddened creator. A parasite on the corpse of a dead machine... and the woman your father vowed to kill, Arcine Gale-Eros."
Arc tensed. She felt such gravity in the tired regret and sliver of happiness she felt from the stranger that she almost didn't notice she'd spoken her name and the family names of her fathers.
She gulped. She waited, but there were no words until she worked up her courage and asked, "How do you know who I am? You said I'm dying... what happens to me now?"
