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You are valiant. You power through the Surgeons, or weave around them, or knock them away from you. But in the end, they are too numerous. You fall under their number, as you'd anticipated. Worse still, in your last moments of consciousness, you see that the black portal remains. Despite your distraction, Katariki has failed.

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At last, you regain consciousness. You feel sore, beaten, in every sense of those terms.

The Surgeons surround you, thousands of them. For now, they make no aggressive move.

"Where is Katariki?" you ask, your voice strained.

The voices of the few dozen nearest to you come to you in unison, sounding in your mind. "He is no more."

Does that mean he's dead, or something else? The distinction hardly seems to matter, now.

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