The Butcher stood crouched over his latest lamb.

They had brought it in just last night, and he had been furious when he had realized nobody had awoken him right away. It was a most delicate thing, his line of work. It was best to start when they were still fresh, and ideally, warm.

That one had now regrettably already grown cold and stiff when he had begun his work in the early hours of morning.

He reached for a scalpel, his hand shaking. He didn't like that part of the work, not even after all these years. They called him the Butcher, but that didn't mean he enjoyed it. It was just that by nature, his work was bloody and gruesome. But there was no sense in dwelling on semantics now. His lamb couldn't wait much longer, or his cause would be a lost one, so he began.

That one was young, and might have been quite beautiful at some point. But not anymore. Now the body was stiff, but it had been broken and fractured before that. Dark bruises covered the spacer's sickly, pale skin and made it hard to find the traces of what he was looking for. But once he had found one, it was easy. With nothing more than a delicate pull, they would always come apart in the end. Like ragdolls.

It was over quickly. The butcher was disappointed. This one had held much less than he had hoped.

They were running out of time. He would have to tell the others that waiting was no longer an option. He would have to send them out to look for new lambs.

~ ~ ~

Null?

Yes?

What do you think will happen if we die? he asked.

I don't know, Lars, she replied. Isn't that the thing about dying? Nobody knows what comes after, all we know is that everyone finds out eventually.

But we're different, he claimed.

How so? she asked.

Because we already died, once.

Seems like we're not very good at it, then, she said, considering we're both still around.

She could feel the familiar warmth of his intangible smile, and opened her eyes. It wasn't intangible any longer. It was right there in front of her. He was right there. Her eyes went wide with surprise.

They were back at the beach.

They were lying in the sand next to each other, not far from where soft waves rolled across the sand.

"Lars, open your eyes!" she said. "Lars!"

She sat up and leaned over him, just when he opened them wide and bolted upright, almost bumping his head against hers in the process. Bewildered, he stared back at her for a moment, then his gaze darted past her, toward the ocean, and the fog.

"We're-"

"Back," she completed his sentence.

"How did we get here?"

"No idea," she said, as she got to her feet, stretching out a hand to help him up. He seemed uneasy on his legs. Perhaps because the body he had in this strange place was so different from the shell.

"Could we be dead?" he asked, taking in their surroundings.

"No way," she replied. "I'm absolutely certain I got the dosage right."

He squinted his eyes at her doubtfully and she felt a shiver run down the back of her neck. She wasn't used to seeing his expressions, she only ever felt them. It was confusing. Irritating. Fascinating.

"Well, in that case," he said and plopped down into the sand again with a sigh.

"Lars, what are you doing?"

"What am I doing? What are you doing?" he asked, looking up at her and gesturing at her body. "If this is the same place as last time, we'll be stuck here until we wake up anyway."

"But.... shouldn't we... I mean..." she turned around in a circle once, looking at their surroundings. There was just the beach, the ocean, and dense fog in every direction.

"Perhaps you're right," she realized. "If we go out into this fog, we might just get lost."

"Of course I'm right," he said, lying back down in the sand and crossing his arms behind his head. "After all, I'm the rational one here."

He smirked, and it was probably the strangest thing she had ever seen.

~ ~ ~

The Butcher leaned over another lamb.

"Interesting. Where did you find that one?" he asked, as he brushed a few strands of hair from the girl's face.

"On a derelict spaceship in the asteroid belt," one of the two men who had brought her in explained.

The butcher took her hands and turned them over, checking the palms and fingertips. To his trained eye, the interface implants were visible immediately, but they had been hidden very well. She might have spent the past years successfully hiding, but it would only have helped her to deceive humans, not the scandroids.

Besides, he could recognize a work of art when he saw one, and whoever had put those wires into her body had certainly created one – quite recently, that was for certain. The augments were high quality, arranged in meticulous order and wired to her neurons with nanometer precision, but they were mix-and-match. A clear sign for post-Purge surgery.

Patchwork, just like the girl herself, he noted, and combed his fingers through her hair. It was half white, half black, as was her suit.

What a strange one, he thought.

"Alright," he said to the two men. "Good job. Go pick up your reward and get back out there. We need more."

Once they had left the room, he bent over her again to take a closer look at her face. It was a beautiful face, and he wondered how old she was. She might have been quite young during the Purge, which would beg the question how she had survived it. Perhaps she hadn't been augmented at all back then. But that begged the next question of when, how, where and most importantly from whom she had gotten her hardware.

He caressed her arm, tracing his fingertips along the path of the wires that ran underneath her skin. It would be interesting to take this one apart. She was so pretty. Perhaps he could have some fun with whatever was left when he was finished.

But first there was the bothersome task of cutting her up. He already dreaded the mess it would make in his little laboratory. With those subcutaneous wires everywhere, and the augments in her head in particular, she wouldn't be very pretty any longer when he was done.

That thought in mind, he hesitated for another second, and then quickly looked to the door to assure himself that it was closed and he was alone, before he bent over her and pressed his lips against hers. It made him feel all giddy and excited, and for a moment he considered to go for some pleasure before business. But he couldn't be certain when the other promised delivery would come in. He would just have to be fast, so she'd still be warm at least.

With a deep sigh, he pried his eyes away from the girl to prepare his tools. But just as he was about to turn to his set of tools beside the work bench, something startled him and he froze.

For a split second, from the corner of his eyes, he could have sworn that she had flinched.

He cocked his head to the side and furrowed his brow, watching her closely for a moment. Nothing happened. But something about her was odd. Something about that strange, doll-like face of hers. It seemed more strained than before, and he could have sworn that he had heard a muffled noise coming from her. Perhaps the stiffness was setting in?

He came back up to the side of his work bench and bent over her, until his face was mere inches from hers. Nothing. On a hunch, he brought his ear close to her lips. There was no sound, of course. But then, he felt a breath tickle his ear.

His eyes went wide with surprise and he recoiled, but he didn't get very far. Her hand shot up with terrifying speed and grabbed him by the collar of his lab coat. His face still only inches from hers, he frozen in horror as she opened her eyes, and he found himself staring down into a mechanical abyss in one of them, and an overcast sky in the other.

"A-alive...?" he croaked, and tried to reach for his scalpel, but she was faster once more.

She came up, head-butting him so hard that his sight went black for a second. The next moment, a sharp pain shot through his hand. It took him a few moments to see clearly again. Perched on the table before him, like a cat about to leap,she fixed him with her mismatched eyes. There was one of his knives in her hand, dripping with blood. And the first segments of three of his fingers lay on the table between them.

He couldn't even scream in pain, his terror seemed to have numbed his vocal cords. In fact, all of his body felt paralyzed.

"Who... what... how..." he breathed.

"You sick fucks are all the same," she said with a sigh, shaking her head in disgust.

She traced her thumb over her lips, not letting him out of her sight. Her heterochromatic gaze was unsettling, and he wanted to run, but he couldn't move his legs. And that was when he noted that he didn't feel any physical pain at all, not even as the blood continued to seep from the stumps of his fingers.

"Now what do I do with you?" she asked, cocking her head to the side.

"Please... Don't... I didn't... I didn't know..."

She pointed the knife at his face.

"Don't play innocent," she said, the softness in her voice not matching the cold expression on her face.

"Do you think I'm an idiot? I understand your business model very well. And I wouldn't even mind – there's no sense in letting these things go to waste. It was a brilliant idea, and you're really good at the job. Quite talented probably also at putting the augments in, not just pulling them out. New Elysium could have used somebody with your skills. Or we could have just done business. But alas, you got greedy," she said and gestured at the room around them. "Taking only the scraps just wasn't enough for you any longer, was it?"

He wanted to say something in his defense, but his tongue felt leaden. All color began to fade from his vision, and the world around him turned black, white and grey, just like the woman.

"Who... are..."

She sat on the edge of the table now, her legs dangling, and she watched him with a playful smile on her lips. She was still beautiful, but above all, the look on her face was utterly terrifying.

"The name's Amy Larsson," she said, as she stretched out her hand and softly tapped her finger against his nose. His stiff body lost all remaining balance and he keeled over backwards, flat like a board, and he felt his heart stop beating in his chest.

"Not that you'll have much use for it where you're headed."

~ ~ ~

That was the most disgusting thing we've ever done, Lars remarked, as the door to the Butcher's laboratory closed behind them.

Yeah, I didn't particularly enjoy it either, she remarked, wiping their hand on the wall to get rid of some of the blood and grime that covered it.

No. I meant the kiss. He shuddered.

I sense a certain hostility in your voice, Lars, she commented with a smirk. And I just noticed a peculiar bias. You never seem to feel such a strong aversion when we're kissing women.

I have no idea what you're talking about, he replied, disgruntled, and retreated behind the veil to pout.

Never mind, Mister Rational, I can handle it from here, Null thought, still smiling to herself.

She hauled the heavy bag over one shoulder. They had grabbed whatever they could – some of it hadn't been cleaned properly yet, and she could only hope that Higgs would find a way to take care of that without damaging them, or they would have to find a place on the ship to contain the revolting stench of death and decay that emanated from that bag right now. She realized once again that having an android crew was quite useful when it came to her line of work. She didn't even want to imagine how a human crew would reactif she brought that bloody bag back aboard the Blackstar.

She used the moment of Lars' silence to activate her communication augments. She had resented the idea of having them but Lars had convinced her of the practicality. He was right, of course, but she still hated them. It was always her who had to speak during transmissions, because they couldn't be sure if his voice would transmit sounding like the body, or, well, like himself. It would have raised some questions, even among the androids. They were still oblivious of the AI living in their captain's head.

So it was Null who had to make and take all their calls, sometimes having to relay messages from Lars from the back of her head to their communication partner outside. It was strenuous to keep conversations with somebody else with Lars still right beside her, occupying half of her brain, and it usually left her with an unbearable headache within minutes. Besides, it made her feel like she was Lars' secretary. It was degrading. Her only consolation was that he could feel the headaches too, so they both tried to avoid using the augments unless absolutely necessary.

Heisenberg, you there? she called out.

Yes, General, the AI's voice resounded inside her head. It felt weird to imagine that once, Lars' voice had been similarly mechanical. She was glad that, except for their dreams of his memories, Lars didn't sound like that, now that he was in her head all the time.

Heisenberg. You know I'm not a general, she scolded him.

Of course. Apologies, Admiral.

Whatever, she heaved a sigh. Are you in position?

Yes, sir.

Good. Wait for me there and tell Higgs to get the Blackstar in position, she ordered.

Aye-aye, sir.

And quit- oh, nevermind.

With another sigh, she cut communications and continued along the dark hallway. According to their intel, there was supposed to be another storage room around that should have contained something interesting.

Lars, I could really use your help here, she called out to him, as she approached a locked door at the designated location.

Lars?

Her pulse spiked at his lack of response. The sound of her heartbeat was unbearably loud over the silence in her mind, and a moment seemed to drag on forever, until she could finally hear him again.

Sorry. I was distracted.

"Don't do that to me!" she hissed under her breath. "What the hell were you doing?"

Sorry! I'm here! I'm here now!

Then haul your incorporeal ass into that door's circuits, we're running out of time! she thought as she placed one hand on the panel next to the door.

It was pre-Purge, designed to be accessed via augments. Those things were easier to break, because they could be interfaced with, whereas most retrofitted electrical doors had to be hot-wired. Her fingertips began to tingle as Lars sifted through the code now. In the back of her head, she thought she could see endless rows of intangible ones and zeroes passing through.

The door opened with a soft hiss and revealed a room, about five by five meters, stocked to the brim with augments, parts of androids and other technology. Her jaw dropped.

This is more than we can carry, she realized.

Heisenberg, she opened the com channel again, I need you at my position. ASAP.

Yes, sir, on my way. Also, Rutherford asked me to ask you whether you would like to have Earl Grey or Darjeeling upon your return.

Null groaned. There was a reason she had only established a communication channel with Heisenberg. Rutherford was too chatty.

Tell him to shut the fuck up and get the Blackstar ready, she ordered before she cut the channel again.

We have a problem, Lars informed her, while she began to pack as many smaller pieces as still fit into the bag.

We have more than one problem, she thought, but one of them is a hell of a marksman, the other a six-armed engineering genius and the third one makes pretty good black tea, so I can live with them.

We have been scanned, he clarified. It happened after the hack. Somebody is on the way.

"What?" she exclaimed, almost dropping the bag.

Where the hell is Heisenberg?!

She could hear steps approaching through the corridor now, but it wasn't the android.

How many? she asked.

When I accessed their system to hack the door, I could see that there are four guards stationed here on this deck. Judging from the sound of their footsteps, I believe it's two headed our way now.

She took a deep breath and receded into the back corner of the room. Their heart was racing in their chest.

So much for hit and run...

Relax, Null, he said, and seemed to smile, The worst part of today is already over. We've been clinically dead and came back - that makes it twice.

Four times, the two of us combined, she realized.

The footsteps were at the door now. From her position in the shadows and through the shelves, she could see two men enter the dim room.

Click your heels together, Dorothy, he said, cracking an intangible grin. Time to go home.

She nodded, and did just that. As the heels of her boots touched, the soles came off with a quiet click.

"Did you hear that?" one of the men asked the other. "It's over there."

He went around the corner of a shelf, and found himself facing a woman with mismatched eyes and blood-smeared clothes, pointing two guns at him.