The handshake lasted a moment longer before the Operator pulled back, the contact breaking with a sense of finality.
Taylor slid her mask back on. When she spoke, her voice was steady, but curious. "So… what do I call you? After seeing my face, you probably already know my real name thanks to Ordis. And no offense, but calling you 'Boss' would feel a little weird."
The Operator raised a brow, his glowing eyes dimming slightly. He shifted on Dante's lap, suddenly looking a lot less like a mysterious benefactor and a lot more like a regular teenager caught off guard.
"Well, you're not wrong to suspect I know your name, but… Ah." He scratched the back of his neck, trying to figure out how to phrase his response. "My name is actually kinda complicated."
"Complicated how?" she questioned. "Like, hard to pronounce?"
"I don't… really have one," he admitted. "There's a lot of my past that's just… missing. Amnesia, basically. A side effect of how we got here. Umbra and Ordis are missing pieces, too."
It was a stretch of the truth. Sure, they had gotten stranded here via the Void, but the specific chain of events that led to the memory loss was history older than she was.
He saw Taylor's expression soften through the lenses of her mask, the suspicion replaced by a flicker of sympathy.
"That sounds horrible," she said quietly. "I can't imagine just having parts of me removed like that."
"It feels that way sometimes," he shrugged. "But it's stopped bothering me. The people I surround myself with make those empty parts feel full. But if you need a name, you can just call me Tenno. Everyone who knows the truth does."
"Tenno," she repeated, raising a brow. "So you named your team after yourself?"
If only she knew.
"More or less," he deflected. "Now," he added, transferring back into Dante and floating lightly into an upright position. "We promised you a medical exam. Umbra mentioned that Liset's cloaking field gave you a headache. I want to make sure there's no lasting damage before we send you home."
------------------------------------
The "Med-Bay" was a couple of floors below the garden, and a minute later, they were there.
Stepping out of the elevator, Taylor noted that the aesthetic appeal of Ten-Zero's tower seemed to fluctuate wildly. The garden had been serene and beautiful. The hangar had been industrial but functional.
This room looked strikingly mundane at first glance.
The walls were painted that soothing, clinical shade of pale green common in hospitals, lined with standard equipment and monitoring stations. The floors were tiled in sterile white linoleum, the kind that always smelled faintly of antiseptic. There were privacy curtains on metal tracks, a vital signs monitor beeping rhythmically beside a regulation hospital bed, and a steel sink in the corner.
"Is this…?" She started, sounding a bit disappointed.
"A conventional medical bay," Dante admitted.
His voice had shifted; the British accent and the adult tenor of the interview were gone, replaced by the Operator's natural, youthful tone.
"This base is a public-facing facility, after all. The genuine, advanced medical technology is stored elsewhere."
If that was the case, Taylor wondered what the hell she was staring at.
Floating in the center of the otherwise ordinary room was the only piece of tech that looked genuinely out of place.
It was a giant eye.
A massive, football-sized orb of glossy black material, suspended on a flexible metallic stalk that rooted into the ceiling. It swiveled slowly, a red ring around the pupil spinning with a soft whir as it focused on them.
"That," Taylor said, pointing, "is unsettling."
"It was made that way so people would be less encouraged to wind up here during tours," Dante explained. "It's also not for show. It's a real scanner. So please, take a seat on the bed."
Taylor sat, the paper crinkling beneath her. The giant eye drifted down from the ceiling, stopping inches from her face. The red ring spun faster, a thin beam of red light scanning up and down her body. It was close enough that she could see her own reflection in the glossy black surface.
"Hello, Ms. Hebert. I am Ordis." She startled slightly at hearing his voice emit from the eyeball. "While I am processing the scans, I would like to take time to properly welcome you to Ten-Zero. I look forward to working with you. And… finished."
"Thanks, Ordis. I look forward to working with you too," Taylor replied, trying not to go cross-eyed as the scanner stared into her soul. "So, what's the verdict?"
"You are in remarkably good health for your demographic," Ordis reported, and she felt a spark of pride at that. "Your diet lacks sufficient iron, but your musculature is well-developed. A few minor contusions on your torso—likely from last night's engagement—but nothing a good night's sleep won't fix."
Taylor relaxed at the news. "And the headache?"
"No sign of concussion or trauma," Ordis continued. "However, I did detect a faint energetic residue in your parietal lobe. It has dissipated now, but it aligns with the Liset's cloaking field. It seems your Tether simply had a negative reaction to the cloak's energy."
Taylor stiffened, confused. "My… Tether?"
Dante held up a hand, and holographic data of the scans scrolled into view. "It's just terminology we coined. Thanks to intel we extracted from a… certain asset, and our own foray into parahuman research, we have advanced data on Parahuman physiology. Ordis, pull up the brain scan."
The hologram shifted. A 3D model of a human brain floated in the air. Taylor stared at it. It looked normal to her, until Ordis highlighted a section near the front.
"There," Dante said, pointing. "The Corona Pollentia. The source of your powers."
Taylor leaned forward, staring in amazement. "That's… that thing that gives us powers?"
She had never seen anything about this online. She had always assumed powers were just some genetic factor because of New Wave.
"Indeed," he confirmed. "In every Parahuman, this specific formation develops in the brain. It acts as a biological antenna for whatever the source of Parahuman abilities is. In your case, it is located between your frontal and parietal lobes. Standard positioning for a Master-class ability, though yours seems to be slightly larger than average."
The hologram zoomed in. Taylor could see faint veins swelling around the area, a slight depression—or dimpling—where the growth pressed into the grey matter.
"Is that… bad?" she asked, her voice tight.
"No, its size can vary from person to person, even among those without powers," Dante replied. He pointed to a smaller, brighter cluster of nerves connected to the main mass. "This is your Gemma. It controls the active use of your powers so that every whim and thought won't activate them. It's a growth only found in Parahumans. What triggers this growth is a sufficiently traumatic experience called a Trigger Event. During it, the Corona experiences a rapid growth spurt. That expansion is why many Parahumans black out when they gain powers; the brain is literally restructuring itself to support the connection."
"I see," she murmured, remembering the locker. The darkness. The screaming. Then nothing, before thousands of chittering voices filled her head. She briefly wondered what the Tenno's Trigger Events had been, but quickly dismissed the insensitive question to focus on the scans. As she looked, she noticed something alarming. "It looks kind of invasive."
"It is," Dante agreed as he traced a line from the Corona to the cerebellum. "Your Gemma has a strong emphasis here. The cerebellum coordinates movement and action. This explains your ability to coordinate your swarm with such ease and precision. It doesn't explain how your brain processes all that information, however. I have a theory, but that's for another time."
Taylor stared at the scan a moment longer, mapping the places her Gemma reached, when a thought occurred to her.
"Does getting rid of that depower someone?" she asked, the question slipping out before she realized.
Dante was silent for a moment as he processed her sudden question. "Technically? Yes. But it would be akin to removing a part of your personality. The Corona is woven into your neural pathways. Removing it would likely cause severe brain damage, personality death, or simply render you catatonic. And that is assuming a surgeon could even navigate the variance. The shape and location change from person to person."
"So you'd just be killing them," she summarized flatly.
"Hence, only technically," Dante shrugged. "Even if you could pull off a successful surgery while keeping the brain undamaged, it probably wouldn't depower the Parahuman. Turns out, you don't need your little brain tumors to use your powers. It's just easier to use with them. From what we understand, the only surefire way to depower a Parahuman without a Trump ability is to send them to orbit."
"Well, that explains why the PRT doesn't do that," she muttered, before her eyes went wide as she remembered something. Taking a deep breath to center herself, she tried not to show embarrassment or make her aims obvious in her next words. "You… mentioned my eyesight."
"Ah, yes," Ordis chimed in, and the hologram shifted to show x-rays of her eyeballs. "Your vision is frankly suboptimal. Myopic. Correctable with standard lenses, or…"
"Or?" Taylor asked.
"I could fabricate a solution," Dante interjected. "A biological corrective treatment. We can administer it now if you wish."
Taylor's smile almost widened into a grin; this was exactly what she hoped for. "You can fix my eyes? Permanently?"
"Not permanently," he answered, taking the wind out of her sails. "This treatment would need to be reapplied every few months. A stopgap method until more research on the effects of how our technology's power source affects Parahuman brains takes place. But it would spare you the need for glasses. Think of it as… a signing bonus."
Taylor didn't hesitate. "Do it."
She had always viewed her nearsightedness as a massive weakness, even with her swarm sense. Before her powers, no glasses meant she was left stumbling around half-blind whenever the Trio decided to mess with her by stealing them.
Dante nodded.
"Lean back and take off the mask," he instructed.
Taylor lay back on the bed and pulled the mask off, the world going blurry. Still, she could see the giant eye scanner drifting away, giving Dante room.
He held a hand over her eyes. Something green and warm washed over them. She blinked at the sensation of whatever Tinkertech solution was being applied, but when she opened them, the blurry world she knew without her glasses had changed.
Taylor gasped.
She sat up, blinking rapidly as the world became clearer and sharper. She looked at the wall across the room. She could see the tiny imperfections in the paint. The dust motes dancing in the light. She looked at Dante, seeing the intricate scratches on his armor that she had missed before.
"Oh my god," she whispered.
"Your vision is now approximately twenty-fifteen," Ordis announced. "Enjoy the view, Ms. ebert."
Taylor turned her head, looking around the room with wonder, as if seeing the world for the first time.
"Thank you," she said, her voice thick with emotion.
"You're welcome," Dante replied. He nodded toward the door. "Now, while I would prefer to let you enjoy the big city a bit longer, I believe you have a father waiting for you. Umbra will take you back to Brockton Bay. We will be in touch regarding your training and equipment."
Taylor slid off the bed, her movements full of new energy. She looked at Dante, then at the eyeball, then back at the Warframe.
"Thank you, Tenno," she said again, serious and sincere. "And goodbye."
"Get home safe, Taylor," he replied easily. "Umbra is waiting for you at the elevator."
She turned and walked toward the exit, her steps lighter than when she had arrived.
------------------------------------
The giant eye watched her go before it swiveled back to face Dante.
"Scan complete," Ordis said, his voice dropping to a whisper as if Taylor might still hear them. "Operator, I have uploaded the full data on her Corona Pollentia to the Orbiter archives. It is… fascinating. As we suspected, their Parahuman powers are not biological in origin, but the interface is. It resembles, in a rudimentary way, Transference."
"So we've confirmed something's on the other side," the Operator mused through Dante. "Not a surprise, given my own deal for power. My question is—what and why?"