Seraffo entered her room alone, and allowed the quiet within to cleanse her mind of any anxiety at what was to come. Quint was taken from her in an abrupt motion, and more than anything else, she wanted to get him back. The only way to do so though, was to contact the ones who had given her this assignment in the first place. Immediately slithering up to the monitor she used to speak with her superiors from long distances, she somewhat hesitantly inputted the code to directly contact her Ethereal masters into its keyboard, caring nothing for the consequences she could suffer for interrupting whatever activity they were performing at the moment.
As the process was completed, Seraffo paced back a few feet and entered as much of a kneeling position as she could make, lowering her head and closing her reptilian eyes as both of her arms rested their palms together over her stomach. Her long, trailing body coiled behind her, and she savored what stillness remained, while it lasted.
Seraffo then let out a calm breath of air as the screen came on, revealing an Ethereal. From what could be seen, its ancient, limp, robed form appeared to be lying on an upright bed connecting to several wires belonging to a life support system of some kind, but its concealed head began to move in acknowledgement of its subject. "I bid you my fairest salutations, my master. I am apologetic to contact you directly, but I have something urgent I wish to speak to you about," the viper greeted, keeping her eyes closed and head bowed as she spoke. "It concerns the matters of the prisoner under my charge."
"Yes. We had much suspicion that you would directly contact us over this," the Elder responded in a light tone. "We are putting much effort into a special, albeit important project, and your prisoner has the requirements we desire to complete it."
"But he is part of the mission that you originally assigned to me," the viper brought up, barely hiding the outrage she felt under a small whisper. "What about that? Without him, my plans cannot go on. Without him, I will fail you. Without him..."
"The data you have already accrued for us is enough to satisfy all that we wanted from you, Seraffo," said the Ethereal, after seeing that the viper wasn't going to complete her current sentence. "We have no further need for him or the continuation of your assignment. But... something else has now piqued my interest. You sound as though you are heavily upset over this decision for more than a single reason. If my assumption is founded on fact, I would come to the conclusion that you care for this particular human."
Seraffo couldn't help but lift her head and stare directly at the Ethereal when she said something back. "But, my Elder... I do care for him, in a way." The words left her mouth like a fluttering moth before she thought to halt them, and upon realizing what she had spoken, she snapped her muzzle shut.
The Elder didn't move for a second, but then took her words with a nod of gained interest, and murmured a long hum as it dwelled upon them. "You... care for him? For a human who has been in service to XCOM?" it asked in a soft voice, raising two of its arms, previously hidden underneath its robe, and pressed its long, bony, dry fingers together in a tent. "Intimately, dare I wonder?"
"It is... nothing of that sort," Seraffo responded with her head lowered once more, her tone full of shame following her revelation. What the Ethereal didn't realize was that the reason she voiced it as such was because it was untrue. Seraffo could only think of the worst possible punishment she deserved for the little white lie she told the deified being, and her already-closed eyes shut tighter for it.
The Elder said nothing for a good minute, choosing to spend the time thinking over the matter, and it quickly formulated a plan. "If this course of action is your choice, then so be it. As you have no services to offer at the moment, I permit you to accompany the human and his escort," it finally said in its gravelly tone. Seraffo's expression went blank, and the worry that was building up in her mind disappeared into thin air; replacing itself with utter disbelief. Her eyes bursting open, she couldn't help but look up at her master again, in a shocked way.
"Truly?" she asked, hoping this wasn't some cruel vision she was experiencing in her sleep.
"Truly," confirmed the Elder. "I shall inform the soldiers to update the passenger list to you and your assigned guard. But do hurry. He is scheduled to leave as soon as possible, for time is of the essence."
"I... I shall," Seraffo agreed, reality returning to her. "Farewell, my Elder."
As the image of the Elder faded from the screen, Seraffo exhaled a deep breath that lasted for a good few seconds. There was still time to speak with Quint. To at least say a few more things before her masters' use for him would tear them apart from each other a final time.
Without a word, she quickly left her room as fast as she could slither, before she could lose this chance for good.
Standing beside the loading port of the dark-colored APC, Aphis rubbed a claw over her scar as several ADVENT troopers entered the docking bay, each one marching with a rifle in their hands. What proved to be an interesting sight to her was the handcuffed human prisoner being pushed along ahead of them. While she received the mission a very short time ago and was putting most of her focus onto it, she quickly noticed some similarities between this man and one she was only told about by a friend.
There was only silence as the ADVENT soldiers walked up to the side of the armored vehicle with him. With two of them placing him against it and by Aphis's side, the men went about their work around and inside the transport for a few minutes, making sure all was in place and set to go. Aphis thought about remaining silent where she was, but her curiosity longed to be sated.
"I've heard a rumor that you're the former prisoner of a good friend of mine," she suddenly spoke on her dry voice, shifting a glare to the human before she held her beam rifle up and inspected its tip for any imperfections, though keeping her eye on Quint the whole time. "She's told me some tales of him. About a human male of roughly your description, who happens to be an XCOM agent with a sarcastic streak and a penchant for asking questions against his better judgement. Does that sound familiar to you, I wonder?"
"Beats me, but he sounds handsome," Quint deadpanned, still trying to figure out what exactly was happening to him with little success.
Aphis let out a chuckle of slight amusement at his quip, but her question held firm. "So tell me then, are you hers?"
"He is," a familiar, female voice came from behind the older viper, answering her. As Aphis turned about with a small turn of her hooded head, Quint, wearing a similarly surprised expression as her, watched as two shapes swiftly approached. One, to his surprise, was Seraffo, and the other was the lumbering, ever-large form of Miskaton.
"Seraffo? What are you doing here?" Quint asked her, his tone greatly higher in spirits than what he used with Aphis.
"I received permission to accompany you and your escort," she replied with a smile she failed to hide. There was a look about her when she said it that caused Quint to smirk back in a comforted manner, if only slightly.
"So you did?" Aphis inquired from where she stood. "I assume that your andromedon is coming with you, then."
"He is," Seraffo said. Miskaton thumped a metal-covered hand over his tank's chest in agreement.
Aphis appeared perfectly fine with the revelation when Quint glanced back at the older viper. "Well there should be room enough for him to fit in."
As she finished her sentence, an ADVENT trooper walked up to her side, snatching her attention away from them to him. The soldier said something to Aphis in its hardly-decipherable, electronic, alien voice. Nodding her head once he finished, Aphis turned to her fellow viper and the human as the trooper marched off to the front of the vehicle again.
"It is time to depart," she spoke, relaying what she had been told, and motioning to the open door that lead inside of the vehicle's back. "Bring your prisoner into the transport."
He was at first unsure about obliging her words, but at Seraffo's beckoning, Quint willingly walked into the back of the ACP with the three aliens, followed by the ADVENT soldiers from before. When everyone was inside, Quint managed to take a last look at the outside as the door lifted until it was sealed close.
The ride, in spite of its incredible length, was mostly quiet for everyone sitting in the back of the armored vehicle. Besides hearing the loud whirring of its many wheels, Quint kept himself occupied by looking at the ragged boots covering his feet. When that inevitably grew old as well, he tapped a handcuff-covered hand onto Seraffo's shoulder armor. Looking to him right off with a warm visage on her face, she listened as he whispered something to her, and in turn, she whispered back to him.
Aphis, who sat by the large door in the back and beside Miskaton, kept her eyes trained on the two ever since she noticed them begin their little conversation, ending how taciturn they were toward each other before. Brushing a claw over her scar at just how oddly amiable they appeared to be, she flicked her forked tongue out in a befuddled manner.
"There's something quite strange going on between those two, isn't there? Something more than I've been told of..." she quietly spoke to the andromedon in a hoarse mumble. Miskaton leaned over a little bit in order to turn his tank-esque suit enough to look back at the aged viper.
"Who can say?" said he, as a clunking noise sounded from somewhere above the APC, not unlike the typical sound of low-hanging branches from trees that were scraping against the roof of the vehicle. Ignoring the sound, he went on with what he had on his mind. "I find nothing off about it at all. In all actuality, I've served Seraffo long enough to see that she has been happier around that human than she has been by herself since I first met her."
"What I wish to know is what exactly she sees in that human," Aphis went on, noting the grin of pure euphoria on Seraffo's wide-stretching, serpentine lips as Quint and she continued to talk about things beyond her range of hearing.
"Something she's never truly felt in her life, if I am to hazard a res'qor," the andromedon replied, the fluid in his tank noisily shifting around as he lifted his body into the comfortable position it was assuming just a moment before. A few seconds after he had spoken, everyone currently sitting; human, ADVENT and alien, came to the realization that their transport was slowly coming to a grinding halt.
"We've stopped." Miskaton pointed out before anyone else could state the obvious. "How queer. We shouldn't reach the facility for another three hours."
"Hmm... Leave this to me," Aphis told him, getting up from her seat with a grunt. Looking at everyone, they looked back at her expectantly.
"I will speak with the driver. Everyone else, stay put," she ordered, hoisting her beam rifle into both her hands. As a nearby soldier typed a code into the door's control panel with his gloved hand, the door slowly opened, dropping to the ground with a whump of metal-on-snow, and revealing the bright white blizzard waiting outside, which bore a sharp contrast to the rather dark lighting that was inside. Bracing herself for the cold, Aphis quietly moved out, and the door shifted close behind her.
Cupping one hand to her face while the other held the beam rifle, to keep the thick barrage of falling snow out of her face, she slowly ventured to the front of the APC. As she slithered forth, her body leaving a long, smooth trail in the snow that covered the ground, she stopped as a peculiar feeling struck her.
She couldn't tell exactly what it was, but what she soon knew was that it felt as though someone was watching her. Either way, Aphis couldn't see more than fifteen feet in front of her with the storm raging about and the wind whistling loudly. Shrugging the feeling off and keeping her weapon lowered, she continued on until she reached the driver-side door of the truck. After knocking on it with the back of her knuckle twice, but receiving no response either time, she pulled it open herself and gazed inside, only to reel her head back in shock.
It was empty. Both the driver and front passenger were gone, and the passenger-side door appeared to be wide open as well, as if something had pulled it out all the way in an effort to tear it ajar. Staring at the small, front windows, Aphis's eyes shot open as she saw that their once-thick glass panes had been shattered completely, allowing snow to fall in and gather on the seats by the clumps. Without a further thought, she jumped from the door and landed in the frigid ground behind her, her instinctual senses screaming to her that danger was near, lying in wait within the blinding storm.
Raising to full alarm as she realized that something was blatantly wrong, Aphis was about to shoot to the back where she had exited from and inform her allies of the startling discovery, until a piercing, chittering shriek cut through the air. The viper spun her head around just as a tall, insectoid shape of a chryssalid, previously unseen skulking upon the roof of the vehicle, lunged at her; its mandibles snapping together as rancid spittle flung from its savage mouth, and its open claws outstretched and ready to rend its newest victim to ribbons.