'Come on, now. I can't take my eyes off you for one second.'
Lily?
No, he only wished, but the voice was familiar.
A brunette woman with Slavic features, reminding him of someone with much less hair.
'Are you serious?' she asked, pouting and crossing her arms. 'You're hopeless, Konrad.'
Yeah. He could agree with that, considering—
He had no idea where he even was.
'On the floor of the reactor chamber, Block 4. Lost consciousness when the Controller tried to take over. By the time I got back to you, all I could do was lock everything down, and—'
"That still doesn't explain who you are," Konrad grunted. "And am I dead?"
The woman let out a long sigh, her arms dropped, and—
Uh, oh. Why was she even naked?!
'We're not getting anywhere, so guess I'll reintroduce myself,' she said. 'I'm the thirteenth original copy of Paula Streletsky. Subjected to radiation and enlarged to be the prototype of—'
"The Brain Scorcher," Konrad realised, mouth hanging open.
It was the brain from X-16, responsible for the voices inside his head for a while now.
And—crap.
He should have put two plus two together when Null talked about taking Lady Origin apart.
They were the same and also different. No wonder the parallel brain disappeared, and—
Now he had a body, too, or at least the memory of one.
And who would have thought, but—that 'he' was a 'she' all along.
'Yeah, no need to feel bad. I had no idea, either,' she noted, still as naked as she could get. 'When I came to my senses, I was a brain floating in a tank, and everyone around me was a male, so—'
She must have adapted.
Hell, she could have adapted some clothes onto her mental image, too, because it was a bit distracting. But the fact that she could even reconstruct this image in the first place—
'Ah? Finally picking up the pace?' she mocked him. 'Yes, I've met my original. We synchronised.'
"Huh?"
The last time he heard that word might have been when Maple and Lily did that.
Past and present met to catch up, exchange some info, and—
"Who are you now, then?" Konrad asked, still a bit confused.
'Man. Forget what I said. I told you seconds ago, but—oh, well. Guess I can't blame you after I locked you together with a Controller in your own mind.'
That—also didn't sound too reassuring.
'Anyway, treat me as the same annoying parallel brain as before,' she offered. 'But below the surface, I synced up with the original Paula Streletsky, and now I look like this. Deal with it.'
"Now. You didn't even have a body before. And why naked?"
Paula had pinched the bridge of her nose, looking every bit annoyed.
'Well, sorry. These fuckers had torn me apart. My reassembled pieces are in a tank, a hundred paces from where you are, and the best I could do was erase the stitches. What, do I look bad?!'
"I didn't say that," Konrad protested, trying to avert his eyes, but—
When this all happened in his mind, it wasn't something so easy to do.
As a matter of fact, despite having a harem of beauties, Paula still stirred something inside.
'Um. Let's forget I asked that.'
Yes. Finally, they could agree on something.
The brunette hair grew longer, hiding most of her curves, and keeping her hand to herself, she had to cover the rest. Which, damned be his horny brain, might have made things worse, but—
"Okay, so I need to deal with this Controller and rescue the real you, right?"
'That would be great, yes,' the woman sighed. 'But I'm afraid there's not much to do now.'
Huh? Did the mutant win, then?
He definitely passed out in the worst possible place.
And heck, he had Dmitry with him, too, who hit the floor right before he did.
That said, the last thing he remembered was someone firing a gun, so—
'That was Major Degtyarev,' Paula offered. 'He's dragging you two out as we speak. He could be a nice guy if he were a little more honest with himself, but—there's still the Controller.'
"I don't get it," Konrad admitted. "So didn't he take him out?"
Another sigh.
'The Major shot its vessel, and it collapsed,' she explained. 'But his soul or mind, whatever you want to call it, is now stuck inside you. And let me tell you—he's not as friendly as I was.'
Ugh. No. Not another parasite.
One parallel brain was already too much, especially if that thing were hostile.
'Rude. But agree. I don't want to share, either. And it's already there, so once you regain consciousness, it will try to take over. And shielding you against outside threats is one thing—'
Yeah, that didn't sound good.
But the way she worded it—
"Does that mean you still live inside me?" he asked, narrowing his imaginary eyes. "Didn't you sync up with your real self? Or what? You'll take over everyone and everything now?"
'If that were a body I could take over without killing it, I would've.'
But given how her face darkened—
Oh boy, he wouldn't have been in Null's place when Strelok learned of this.
"Anyway," Konrad grunted, shaking his head. "You still didn't say what I can do?"
The first response was yet another sigh.
'I could absorb it if you let me take over your consciousness for a bit, but—'
That already sounded sketchy, but the fact that her voice even trailed off?
'There are so many more memories inside me now,' Paula claimed. 'When I take you over, you might relieve them, too, and—there's a chance you wouldn't survive.'
For the spirits' sake, what kind of memories could kill a man?!
Although, no.
After hearing how these Monolith bastards had torn her limb from limb and used her—
He'd rather not know that.
"I wouldn't want to piss off Strelok by violating his sister's privacy," he muttered. "Are there any alternatives? Like, you throw me out of my own body as you did before, or—"
The woman laughed.
And it wasn't a forced or tired laugh.
It sounded bright and genuine, echoing all over his mind, and—
'Glad I'm possessing your body out of anyone; you're hilarious sometimes,' she said once she calmed down. 'I can actually do that, but to think you'd be the one to suggest it? Privacy, haha.'
What? And he didn't even make up that part.
But he'd already gone through enough hardship.
Even imagining how Paula's life might have gone had freaked him out.
And that was before she said that seeing it might break him, so no, thanks.
Some secrets were best kept away from him, after all.
"I trust you," Konrad claimed. "And I'm not saying this because you're standing here naked. Do your thing. Fling me out, then pull me back—and let's get your real body out of that tank."
Paula's smile softened.
'Not insisting on that last part, but a good flinging, I can do,' she said. 'Then let's stick to waking up and saving your comrades fast instead. I'll be off helping my brother, so once I'm done—'
"Yeah," he nodded, bracing for the terrifying experience. "You can leave the rest to me."