Mission 03

Cyber Security & The Monsters Within

It worked in their favor, just as Robin had been hoping that it would.

The dark red fruit flew fast enough, sailing over the table that he and Chrom were hiding behind and bouncing along the tiles, until eventually he could hear it thud against the hard surface of one of the other tables on the other side of the room.

The effect proved to be instant, as immediately there were cries of shock and fear from the enemy party. A peek around the corner revealed schmucks scattering like hornets from a kicked nest, their rifles and positions forgotten in a clear lack of seniority.

The sight told Robin all he needed to know about the enemy and their experience. They seemed to be well armed, but it was obvious that they weren't as well trained as they were funded.

He hadn't quite been expecting it to work as well as it did, but is seemed that no one was really eager to be punctured and battered by the sharp debris of the explosive device, as any semblance of order and cover was quickly discarded – likely from only one man breaking formation in a panic.

"Open fire," Robin ordered calmly, bringing his pistol around and taking careful aim at one of the fleeing soldiers. The gun kicked in his hand while the muzzle flashed, and his target went down as the bullet found its mark in the man's unprotected thigh. "Remember, we need a survivor!"

If he could get his hands on one of the wounded enemy units, they might be able to shed some light on the reason for the assault. As much as it seemed like a possibility, the magician thought it a bit more likely that his loss of memories had more to do with the attack than it did the fantastic brew that he had been drinking.

To be frank, he was already getting sick of not understanding what was happening, and any information given – be it taken by force or voluntary – would be greatly appreciated.

On his mark, Chrom and Frederick both exploded from cover, their guns blazing and greeting the fleeing enemy with a rain of lead that Robin felt would not leave any survivors. A handful of the schmucks ended up getting significantly luckier than their late comrades, he noted, as he could see them ducking for nearby cover as his clever ruse was revealed; most, however, went down for the count under the hail.

"What the hell is going on down there?!"

Robin hesitated, looking around for the quiet and almost entirely inaudible voice. As he looked, a mouthful of colorful cursing led him closer to the source, until eventually he located a small hand-held radio that had likely fallen free of where it had been secured.

Lying abandoned and with a cracked face, the black, dated receiver continued to scream staticky rage, demanding a response. He assumed it had slid towards their side of the room when one of the less lucky hostiles had been cut down.

"Everyone's dead," Robin said into the radio, speaking clearly as to be heard over the other man's own heavy breathing. This wasn't entirely true, as Chrom and Frederick were still keeping their arms up and aimed at the pieces of cover that survivors had taken to, but that was a rather unimportant detail in his opinion. "Everyone's dead and it's terrible. That being said, Robin speaking. How may I help you?"

"You son of a bitch!" Robin held the walkie talkie away from his ear a tad, as to avoid any permanent damage to his favourite ears. "They wanted you back alive, but there's a lot of disappointment going around. When I get my hands on you, you're fucking dead! You hear me?"

"Hold on – let me get a pen," Robin told the man on the other end quickly, deciding this was a conversation best left to someone with more experience in dealing with angry foreigners. As far as he knew, he had none to speak of himself. With that being said, the amnesiac scrolled the dial on the side down, the voice becoming fainter until the voice was gone entirely. "Wait. You're breaking up." He paused. "Ksst."

Meanwhile, Chrom and Frederick were still trading shots with the survivors of the enemy squad, their deadly accurate fire being met with blind sprays of hot lead that didn't even come close to a sentient target. The opposition had at that point been pushed back so far they had nowhere to to aside from making a break for the back room of the establishment, and Robin sincerely doubted that they were dumb enough to attempt such a thing.

That left the two parties in a standoff of sorts, though Chrom and Frederick both were advancing steadily, moving from cover to cover in an attempt to get a better shot at the cowering gunmen.

Lissa hadn't moved an inch since the fight had started, and so Robin took the opportunity to change his position, scrambling across the debris-covered tiles and joining the small girl against the booth wall that she seemed to be glued to.

On closer inspection, he found that her face was drenched in sweat, and her eyes were darting around nervously. For a moment, he thought that it was because she was wary of him, before realizing that this was the most likely outcome when you took a child into a warzone.

"Hey Robin," she said quietly, voice an octave higher than when he had last heard her speak. She waved weakly. "How's it going?"

"I'm doing well, thank you." He nodded at her, playing along with the nervous banter. She didn't seem so much at ease as her words would suggest."I just came over to ask you to get your medical kit ready. After this fight, I need to stabilize one of the bad guys."

Her eyes cleared for a moment, and his request was met with a frown that managed to be both annoyed and unimpressed at the same time. If she had attempted to look angry, however, he thought that she failed miserably.

"You don't need to treat me like a child, Robin," she snarked at him, the biting tone that her words were delivered with causing him to drop his attempt at a friendly grown up impression."I'm a trained field surgeon and medic and stuff. If someone's hurt, I can stitch them back together. Unless it's magic… that'd take a bit more work."

These words were delivered with a proud and upturned nose unfitting – or perhaps more than appropriate – for a girl that looked so young, and Robin was reminded of a snooty high schooler with more money that brain cells. However, there was something in her eyes that told him she could back up her claim, if only in her mind.

Suddenly, there was a sharp crack that pierced the veil of gunfire, and Robin's ears popped as the corner of the booth exploded into a shower of wooden splinters and plastic fragments.

This was enough to make Robin hope she knew what she was doing, because he found that his knowledge of medical care was extremely limited. People die when they are killed summed up his skill in the trade.

Regardless of whether or not she could stitch him or one of his allies back together after being riddled with bullets, he decided that he really did not want to be shot in any part of the body, so for now he put it at the back of his mind, instead changing focus to the heavy computer that was mounted on his arm.

At a glance, he realized that he could easily identify each component of the powerful device, though where he learned such information still remained out of reach. Acting like an extension of his own arm, the dark screen lit up as if by his own will, the thunderbolt icon appearing once more.

"Magic causes different injuries?" he wondered, the fact sounding about right to his ears. She nodded vigorously at that, her pigtails bobbing like they were made of rubber. "I see."

"Don't get zapped," she told him, still nodding as if to accentuate how important the detail was. Her eyes lingered on his TOME for a moment, but she didn't call attention to it as she continued to explain, "It hurts and messes with your body. You don't know this?"

"Apparently there's a lot I don't know." He dimmed the screen again, the vents folding away and out of sight. It was a potent weapon at his disposal then, and one he seemed to know how to use. Perhaps he had some reading to do when he got out of his current predicament. "Since you've got a lack of combat training and I've got three rounds left in my weapon, I suppose it's a fitting time to ask: why is there a child on my battlefield?"

He hadn't meant to call the battlefield his, as such a statement was incorrect – the establishment as a whole technically belonged to the company that ran it, but she didn't appear to care as the fire returned to her eyes, along with an indignant flare of her nostrils.

"I told you, I'm not a kid! I'm sixteen!" she said. Her hands were clenched into fists, but that didn't make her any more of an adult in his book when her face was that of a cherub's. She wouldn't be able to get into a bar, and so she wouldn't be able to convince him otherwise either. "Are you really gonna keep bothering the medic?"

Robin took a moment to consider this, scanning her face to see if he could call her bluff. While he by no means intended to be shot, one could not plan for everything with so little information at hand, and for all he knew this child was a sociopath that could leave him for death without feeling anything.

This seemed unlikely to him personally, as she still looked incapable of hurting a fly, but by then all the hurting would already have been done.

"You win this round Ma'am," he told her, dipping his head in a show of respect. "Good bye."

As suddenly as he had appeared before the medic, he made his exit, deciding that it was safe to come out of hiding as Chrom and Frederick finished off the last of the goons that had been so rudely harassing the building's customers. While disposing of them did little good for the now late civilians, Robin assumed it would mean they wouldn't be causing any more trouble in the future.

The sight of all of the bodies that were scattered across the tiles was something he could deal with, but the fluids that leaked out of them made his stomach churn slightly, and he made sure not to step in any puddles as he journeyed through the room. He wasn't a fan of the mess.

"Hm." Chrom hummed as he watched Robin's approach, though the amnesiac couldn't respond as he carefully skipped over a body, followed closely by a rather green Lissa. The captain looked like he was searching for something, but searching for what was the question Robin found himself asking. "Nothing. Are you alright?"

"I'm fine," he said, brushing himself off as he came to stand next to Chrom and Frederick. Lissa was oddly silent as she joined them. "And you?"

"I'm alright. There were several survivors, and Frederick's talking to them now. If you'd like to ask them some questions, I won't stop you," Chrom said, gesturing to the squatting soldier beside him.

Frederick looked to be deep in concentration as he spoke quietly with one of the downed mercenaries, his face flat and betraying no emotion as his words came in steady and carefully worded questions. From what Robin could tell, the man held no sympathy for his prisoner.

"I'm losing my patience," Frederick growled, holding the man by the exposed collar of his shirt. Blood had caked the merc's thigh, and already Lissa was crouching down at his side and unzipping the medical kit she had been carrying with her. The rifle Frederick wore looked to still be close at hand, and Robin wondered how long it would take for the weapon to become closer. "Tell me how many more of you there are before I begin to hurt you."

"Calm down Frederick!" Lissa said, drawing a sharp implement from her bag and cutting away the bloodied fabric with precision that seemed unfitting for one that looked so young. "He might be going into shock."

"I've seen worse," the bodyguard growled, though he released the man's throat all the same. "He'll be fine unless he doesn't start to talk soon."

Robin watched the two as they traded words, one with his gaze focused into a glare on the enemy soldier as the other carefully patched up the wound in his thigh. It was impossible to tell which of them had landed the shot, but the fact that there was no exit wound suggested it hadn't been Frederick's bullet to down him. Regardless, the way the medic managed to calm the both of them down so quickly was frankly astounding. He had never seen anything like it without the use of sedatives or restraining orders.

These 'Shepherds' were turning out to be an interesting bunch of oddities for certain - he suddenly found himself glad to have stayed behind to assist them. He would be less glad if he died, but so far he still had a pulse to speak of suggesting it hadn't come to that yet.

"Chrom," Robin said, catching the attention of the captain as he turned away from the two and their prisoner. His leg was itchy, but it got that way around blood he guessed. Icky, nasty blood that stained clothing. Reaching behind him he unclipped the walkie talkie that he had found on the floor and tossed it to his new ally. "It's a radio from one of the terrorists. I believe their boss is on the other end, and he isn't all that happy about us killing all of his men."

Chrom looked at the radio for a moment and shook it, before finally turning the dial on the side up. Immediately the familiar cursing was blaring through the speakers again, and Chrom was forced to turn it back down a bit due to its sheer volume alone. "Yeah," he said, "No kidding."

Chrom turned away and began to murmur quietly into the radio, the warbled speech that came through in response indecipherable to Robin. With that task done with, he too turned, facing the rest of their party and cleaning his hands entirely of the vulgar torrent of language that spewed from the walkie talkie like a fountain of rage and despair. He was already getting an interesting idea as to how the rest of his day would go – more so than before, that is – and he wanted a moment to mentally prepare himself.

They were the bad guys. Him or them, and all of that.

After a couple deep-breathing exercises, he turned his attention back to their new prisoner of war, who was at the current time still trying to worm away from his captors with little success. To be fair, the man must have had a lot of willpower keeping him going, as he was at the moment surrounded by enemies and borderline incapacitated. Robin would be impressed, but for no apparent reason at all he found that he wasn't.

"I told ya you fuckwits, I don't know shit!" the Plegian cursed with his thick accent. Frederick had ripped the mercenary's balaclava-goggle combination off to reveal a bald head and puffy red face. The amnesiac rescinded his previous opinion on will-power – it was immediately apparent that the man was not just brave, but most likely irredeemably intoxicated. The augmentations set into the sides of his head weren't all that impressive either – the metallic cylinder plugged into his temple looked cheap and even poorly installed. Robin guessed that it was a neural implantation of some sort, though far too bulky to be anything resembling modern tech. "Piss off, why don'tch- ARRGH!"

He screamed in pain as Frederick snapped one of his fingers. The sound sent a chill down Robin's spine – the man was absolutely ruthless, and it was high time to reconsider aggravating him any further; for the sake of his fingers, if nothing else. "I don't think you are telling me the truth yet." He grinned a frightening grin. "That's alright. I haven't really started asking yet."

"Down boy," Lissa ordered, sounding a bit sick. "If he enters shock, I'll have to take him into my own custody."

"I knew there was a reason we should have left you," Frederick grumbled half-heartedly, his iron grip seeming to slacken.

"Be gentle, mistah tough guy," the mercenary slurred, looking sort of out of it as he eyed the old soldier. Against all odds, he somehow smiled a pale smile of yellow teeth. "'T's my first time, yeah?"

Robin frowned as the merc's head lolled to the side, eyes hazy. What the amnesiac could only assume to be optical enhancements were set into the dead center of each grungy green orb tried to refocus, imitating real irises as they shrunk in response to the light that hit his face.

Something was off about those implants… they didn't look like they were working properly.

"Chrom," he said, looking over his shoulder. The captain, however, didn't even give him a first glance let alone a second, seemingly entirely absorbed by the heated conversation he was holding over the walkie talkie. Chrom shouted something into the receiver angrily, and the choice of words he had for the man on the other end suggested this wasn't a conversation to be interrupted either.

Returning to the now half-conscious rag doll that laid limp on the tiles mumbling to himself, Robin adjusted his gloves and reached for the side of his head.

"Robin?"

He ignored the medic, fingering the metal that was fixed into the side of the merc's head. The man's entire body tensed at the contact, but he paid that no mind either as he felt for the clips that held it in place. The idea was that they were there for maintenance, and though most were locked into place and required special tools this one wasn't – like the job had been left only half done.

He released the first clip, but never got around to the other seven latches.

The mercenary came to life like some sort of machine, a once limp arm whipping around and clocking Robin in the face. The clank that was followed by a star-burst of colors on black told him all he needed to know about the synthetic nature of the arm, and then he found himself sliding backwards across the tiles with a bloodied nose and a split lip.

"Get away from that, ya anime haired cock sucker!" the mercenary screamed in tandem with Lissa. Frederick was faster than Robin had ever thought him to be, lunging forwards to restrain the man while Lissa scrambled away, but that was all he saw before his body lost strength and his forehead dropped to the cool flooring of the restaurant. "I need these! I need them!"

Ouch.

"Shit!"

"Robin!" Chrom dropped the walkie talkie and rushed over to his ally, helping our snow-haired protagonist back to his feet as best he could. He wasn't badly hurt all things considered – just a bit dazed. That hadn't been the reaction he had been expecting to be honest, and he hadn't had time to prepare himself for a robotic arm to the face. "Are you alright?! The hell were you thinking?"

"His augments are dangerous to himself and those around him," he replied shortly, trying to wipe the blood away from his mouth and other breathing holes. What an unpleasant experience – there was some red on his shirt now. "We may be able to learn-"

"Forget the augments you idiot," Chrom said, looking no more pleased to hear the news as he gave the amnesiac a once-over. "Are you okay?

Robin frowned. What an odd question – the man seemed more interested in him than the information he had gathered. He would live and that was obvious; perhaps Chrom cared more about those under his command than what they offered to him and his team. This didn't seem right… not unpleasant, just unusual.

Regardless, he brushed the captain off lightly to show that he could stand. A short distance away Frederick was still wrestling with the mercenary, who had at this point begun to froth at the mouth in a disgusting display of primitivism, like an animal driven to madness. The cylinder connected to his neural implants was cycling violently and sending sparks every which way, like it was malfunctioning.

Frankly, it was terrifying, and he was reluctant to get any closer.

"I'm fine Chrom," he said, sniffling. His nose wasn't broken, which was fortunate, but a tissue and a glass of water would not go unappreciated. "He only glanced me."

"Only glanced you, huh?" Chrom looked dubious. "Hell of an arm. Military grade augmentations?"

"Must be," Robin agreed, though the implantations installed in the man didn't look like the sort any sane R&D department would approve of. "He's lost his mind."

"Someone help me hold this psychopath down!" Frederick ordered over his shoulder, voice strained while the body beneath him continued to thrash. "He's stronger than he looks!"

"We need to get that thing out of his head," Robin said as he started towards the chaos again, shrugging off the aches in his back. Chrom followed quickly, his rifle safety clicking off at the deft movement of his hand. "Just keep him still."

Chrom gave a breathless laugh. "Easier said than done, but I'll try."

Robin crouched down a safe distance from the flailing mass of limbs as Chrom joined the fray, and for a second he briefly wondered why the captain was not asking a single question about the need to recover the modifications. Pushing the wondering aside for the time being as such questions were trivial under the circumstances, he instead dragged his dust-covered backpack out from the rubble and opened it up.

Stashed inside was a small kit of tools, a stack of books, and a small case of colourful chips.

With all due haste he shifted through the mess that had exploded within, freeing the tool kit that could easily have passed for a book due to its leathery face being styled after one. Having no time for grace he ripped it desperately from the folds of his bag.

"Any time now Robin!"

His sarcasm was not lost on Robin. He could see that the man clearly meant they had very little time in actuality, though why he felt the need to use such literary devices in such a pressing and dire situation was beyond him. Hurrying over to the thrashing merc's side with his tool kit clutched tightly to his chest, he kneeled down.

Robin felt equal amounts of disgust and curiosity as the terrorist's head snapped to look at him, what Robin once thought to be optical enhancements having at this point expanded and now glowing a fearsome red. Purple veins had started to crawl across his skin from the spinning augment, the vessels pulsing in tandem with his own heart beat.

Perhaps these weren't military augments after all – monster augments would be more accurate in his opinion.

Wasting no more time the amnesiac set the kit of tools beside him and reached almost greedily for the tech that protruded from the side of the man's head, sticking out of the temple like some sort of plug. Despite his constant struggling, Robin managed to release the remaining latches with a couple harsh tugs, each coming free with a soft click that couldn't be heard over the screams of protest and rage.

The pulsing cylinder that was buried deep within the depths of the man's thinking cage proceeded to explode violently.

Robin let out what could best be described as a horrified, disgusted, terrified and morbidly high pitched scream as he was showered with blood and skull fragments. If anyone had been paying him really close attention they might have noticed his heart stopping for several seconds, his brain shutting down and his lungs halting their functions entirely. The mess that covered his clothing was nothing compared to the mess that covered his face, which had been unwisely leaned towards the slotted modification.

He had thought the worst possible thing that could happen to him would have been his nose being chewed off entirely by the snapping jaws of the crazed mercenary. This was considerably worse.

"Disgusting!" he sputtered as his brain rebooted, and he began trying to clean himself with his dirtied hands only to spread the grossness. "I need aid… Medic!"

Chrom and Frederick disentangled themselves from the now limp mercenary, and though they too had been tainted by the explosion it was obvious that Robin had received the worst of it and, even worse, no one seemed to care.

"He's dead," Frederick observed after a moment, rising to his full height and cleaning a bit of blood off of his goggles. His uniform for the most part remained pristine, though how this came to be is a question no one has the answer to. The way he spoke suggested mild regret, though mostly passivity towards the ordeal. "Unfortunate. I recommend this be the last time we allow Robin to touch our prisoners."

"It wasn't my meddling that made his head explode," Robin grunted, stripping his coat off and tossing it aside. Even washed those stains would never come out. "They must have wired it to detonate if it was improperly handled. A fail safe to prevent reverse engineering, perhaps." He paused mid-explanation, thinking: "... In hindsight, I suppose on a technicality it was indeed my meddling that lead to his head exploding, but the main cause was likely small explosive charges planted inside the augmentations themselves. The head was mutilated to ensure that no information was recovered whilst the rest of his modifications were probably fried by- does anyone have a towel?"

"Walk it off," Chrom said, shaking his head and looking up at the ceiling. "Sumia, I'm not sure there's anything left here to find. We'll sweep the building – request a proper investigation and when I give the all clear meet us on the roof. We'll hold the perimeter until they take this off our hands… yeah, thanks." Chrom paused. "Yes, he's right here. No, he's not dead…" Slowly, he reared his head to look at Robin, and a chill ran down the amnesiac's spine. "Why yes – he is in a lot of trouble."

"Uh-oh." Lissa looked even more green than she had before, now having come out of hiding. She was giving Robin a look of contempt, and because her gear was completely clean of gore and other nasty people-parts he could only assume it was due to the rather unfortunate demise of their prisoner. "Someone's in trouble..."

Robin didn't understand her need to relay this information when it was so clearly and franky menacingly announced by the captain, before reminding himself that such a childish echo was to be expected from a twelve year old girl or whatever. It was probably something Chrom had to put up with every five minutes of his life.

He thanked the gods that he was maybe an only child.

And then there were cuffs on his wrists, and something really heavy hit him in the back of his head.

Things got fuzzy.

O

When he came to, the people that were around him seemed unaware of his consciousness at the time. The world as he knew it had devolved from its usual squalor into a haze of colors and blurred shapes, suggesting that his occipital lobe had absorbed most of the damage and protected his more important mental and – by extension – physical functions – such as his highly fine-tuned vocal abilities.

"Unfhmm…" he murmured.

"I told you that's not how we handle these sorts of things Frederick!" a distant voice said loudly, echoing. It was like hearing it from underwater, and Robin became aware that he was likely drifting in and out of consciousness. "Completely uncalled for! Holy shit…!"

"I was following protocol. He was still a suspect, and I was required to detain him for your safety and the safety of Miss Lowell," another voice offered in explanation. "He may still be an enemy spy."

"Why the fuck did you hit him?! He could have died!"

"He was an immediate threat." A pause. "And I wanted to. He needs to talk less."

When he finally mustered the strength to lift his head from where it had gracelessly dropped onto his shoulder and his vision returned to its previous state, he found himself strapped into a seat. The safety harness that had been pulled down to hold him in place was secured nicely, and to his delight he was no longer covered in grey matter and blood. Whoever had cleaned him of the disgusting attire also possessed the decency to dress him in a new plain shirt and slacks. He didn't want to think about the fact that someone had stripped him and then redressed him, so he simply did not.

Bringing his gaze higher, he instead scanned his new location.

Above, a cage lamp illuminated cold metal walls that were lined with handholds and glowing consoles, and several seats much like the one his posterior was occupying ran along the edges of the room in neat rows. From the way his stomach lurched, he assumed they were airborne – some sort of aircraft, he guessed. Sitting a short distance away and kicking her feet, the medic he remembered to be Lissa looked sullenly down at the streamlined floor of the craft, her thoughts unreadable but her emotions obviously in disarray. He assumed it was because she was young enough for her hormones to begin affecting the way she thought, throwing her into a mental imbalance that defied all known logic in favour of black eyeliner and pierced body parts.

"I know you saw things in the war my pathetic excuse for a dad waged on Plegia, but times are changing Frederick. They have changed." Chrom and Frederick were still arguing in lower voices a fair distance away, close to the steps that likely lead up to the cockpit. They likely didn't think the amnesiac could hear them now, but fortunately for Robin both he had very good ears and they were very bad whisperers. "You've watched after me since I was a kid – you're my friend. I don't want you to end up on the other side of the law."

"I'm trying to keep you safe-"

"This isn't about my safety. This is about keeping you in check. I can't have your discipline lapsing because I might be in danger. Understand?" Chrom went silent, and his anger disappeared as his shoulders slouched. "Please. Keep it together, alright?"

Frederick looked relatively mollified, and honestly completely different from when he had been speaking to Robin earlier. It was like he was a new person, and Robin found himself feeling a bit of sympathy for the man; he wanted to protect something dear to him… Robin wondered if he ever had felt the same for something or someone.

Maybe. He couldn't remember.

"I won't allow my emotions to get in the way of my duty," Frederick said, snapping out a salute as his back straightened. "It's an honour to know that you think of me as a friend. I will not fail you again, Captain."

Chrom chuckled. "Alright, no need for the salute. I'm going to talk to Lissa while Robin pretends to sleep over there. I need you to head for the storage bay and double check our equipment – I'd do it myself, but Lissa looks shaken up."

Robin sat up proper in his seat as Chrom walked past him, feeling somewhat foolish at the revelation that his ruse hadn't fooled the man as he had thought it did. More likely he had just ended up looking like an idiot, or someone suffering from a mild case of brain damage – although, he conceded, the last one may be caused by more than a failed attempt to mimic sleeping.

How hard had Frederick hit him, anyways?

Finding that his TOME was still attached to his wrist, Robin set about exploring its functions, unsure as to what exactly he was looking for. The CST chip had, as he had expected, been removed whilst he slept, but everything else looked to be working properly. It seemed that even the device had been cleaned of the gross that had been sprayed unto it.

After sifting through several of the nifty features that the computer offered, including but not limited to a calculator a calendar and a scale that for some reason was always tipped regardless of how hard Robin pushed on the surface, he finally found what he was apparently looking for.

Biological Statistic Feed

He was unimpressed by the long two seconds of loading time, but he was actually impressed by what the application offered.

It seemed to be giving him a live feed of his vitals, from where Robin could only guess. It was possibly linked to an implant somewhere in his body – perhaps the brain – and he had forgotten ever having it installed, but for the time being that was unimportant.

Aside from the blunt trauma that his head had received on the posterior of the cranium, just above the base, minor lacerations criss-crossed his hands and knees – likely from when he had been crawling across the ground of the Resort grounds. His cholesterol was also rather high…

Alert

o Anomaly in skin pigmentation on the back of right hand, prone. Melanin levels low – possible signs of Vitiligo. - This alert is marked unread. Flag raised: 89 Months, six days, eleven hours ago.

Robin tilted his head, for the first time taking a moment to examine himself for something more than injury.

The back of his hand, once dressed in the gloves he had been wearing for as long as he could remember, was now exposed and pale in the light. The skin was soft and unblemished for the most part – discounting the strange tattoo-like marking that sprawled across its surface like a scar.

A purple vector with six eyes, stacked one over the other symmetrically.

Strange.

Perhaps-

There was a thump from above.