Seraffo paced about through the lab aimlessly, her red eyes sunken to the smooth floor below. Her chest armor moved in-and-out as she took in deep, shaky breaths of air, thinking of Quint. Only once every few seconds would she stare over at the place where he was now confined, hoping with all of her heart that everything was going according to plan.
He had been sedated and placed within an eerily coffin-like device resting at the foot of the tank housing the male viper. They had just finished planting a forest of wires into the unconscious human's now-shaven head, which went on to combine and connect to a large tube that went directly inside of the Viper King's pod, from where a similar setup was stationed with the creature's own cranium.
And I love you, Seraffo. Through anything... through everything... The words Quint had spoken to her still rang fresh in the young viper's mind. That moment of pure pleasure that the two had shared with their last time spent by themselves. The molten flame that ran through every fiber of her being at just being next to him, longing to be tempered by his touch. Just thinking of it made her place a claw over the translucent glass keeping her apart from him, and she stared at it as though hoping to see the human's shape.
"How long until it starts?" Seraffo's question came from over her shoulder, to the lab director standing over the monitor.
"The operation is beginning in but a few minutes, and will be done not ten after that," he replied. "We are adjusting and setting the last of the wires that the nano-robotic drones can travel through. This is much too delicate for human hands to tread upon, after all. We have to coordinate what gray matter, blood and other assorted material is to be taken out of the human at the cellular level, where it must then be placed by the nano-machines in the appropriate part of the Viper King. And then, once that has been-"
"Yes, yes, I see..." Seraffo halted the man in mid-explanation, not wishing to hear every detail of what was about to happen to Quint; the very thought of it bringing a sickening thought to her head and filling her stomach with worry. "Just make sure it all goes with as little imperfections as possible."
He murmured something in response, as a fellow scientist standing nearby rigging the last of the machinery from the pod housing Quint, to the tank holding the Viper King. And while they toiled away, making sure the last of the final set devices were ready for action, Seraffo once more let her mind drift away to Quint. To what he was giving up to please her, and nobody else.
And, most importantly, to just how perplexing it was to her.
"Firebrand has just told me that we're upon Metz," the voice of Bradford spoke a final time aboard the Skyranger, aimed at the soldiers sitting inside the craft as it soared through the air as fast as its thrusters could carry it. "ETA one minute. Be ready for ADVENT to put up a medium defense until their reinforcements arrive, and lucky for us, you all have the element of surprise."
As the message wrapped up, Cassandra looked to Anais beside her, if only to see something to put a spark of optimism into her soul. Instead, her older sibling looked perturbingly tense and still as carved stone; greatly unlike the normally laid-back and smugly lazy demeanor she was (mostly) fondly known for possessing. Her eyes, like two chips of unfeeling ice, were focused and glaring only on the sword she held in her hands, constantly pulling it out of its sheath to examine its blade, then pushing it back in again. Cassandra knew why she acted this way and shared the feeling in fact, but simply chose not to express it.
Examining the other team members, the sniper saw each of them were on edge as well, but definitely not as much as her older sister. Abdul, sitting opposite to her, noticed her wandering eyes and gave a small smile, which she returned, but smaller. It was soon after that, everyone felt their ride come to a stop. The hatch opened up with a noisy shifting of gears, revealing the cold outside with a powerful burst of brisk air.
Standing up altogether, they all walked to and grabbed onto the ropes that distended from the Skyranger's back. Looking down, any could see their landing point was an empty space of pavement within the city. Anais, hoisting her weapon back over her shoulder, made her way over to them last.
"Men... let's go bring back Quint," she ordered quietly, just before she became the first to descend down the line. They followed her swiftly and after landing on the ground, the Skyranger retracted the ropes and flew off before any hostile forces could discover its presence.
"That is their plan for the human?" Aphis asked Miskaton in utter incredulity. The two stood together in the reception area of the building, guarding the doorway that lead to where the lab was hidden, as human citizens walked around them and the three ADVENT soldiers also stationed there, trying to pay them no mind. "To let that thing become a male of my species?"
"Seraffo informed me of this fact, and she in turn had been given it by the lead scientist," Miskaton replied, just as shocked as she was, though inexpressive of it in any way the viper could understand. "She wanted me to see how you felt about."
"This is not natural... this seems so very wrong. But, if it is the will of the Ethereals..."
"They simply wish to bring to life a human creation they cannot replicate otherwise," the andromedon said again, before shifting a curious look to his fellow soldier. "Hmm... do you have any personal opinions dealing with the reintroduction of a male viper into-"
Aphis, losing her grim expression at his words, couldn't help but hiss a chuckle and raise a hand, stopping Miskaton where he was. "No, I am too old to truly feel such a pang anymore. That ember's long faded in my mind. The only thing I care about in a fashion related to that is the regime and my brood siblings."
"Seraffo is quite a bit more... 'open' than that. But she is still young. She doesn't have hardened age on the side of her judgement."
Aphis continued after he had finished. "You are right, Seraffo does not. But that is a connate factor expected to be seen in all vipers. Perhaps... that also may have something to do with the Elders allowing her to accompany us."
"True, true," Miskaton agreed as he watched the viper tap her scar and ponder the situation from inside his suit. "Or, possibly, there is something that has been going on between them. Something verosk that the human has that Seraffo did not wish to lose yet...?"
"If you're talking about her bearing an actual attraction toward him, then that doesn't sound like it's the case," Aphis frowned skeptically. "There's as much of a possibility of that happening as me taking a liking to the human myself. But, then again, he did save her life back during the chryssalid attack. I have doubts he did it out of necessity..."
Miskaton unleashed a loud, long sigh of hope. "I have seen the signs of such an infatuation between the two, you know. If I were a betting male, I would wager my suit that it's true-"
Miskaton was cut off as loud gunshot went out through the uninspired air like a banshee's scream, followed by a cutting beam that broke through one of the clinic's windows, striking a soldier in the helmeted head and sending him to the ground like a ragdoll; shattering its pane. It was not three seconds afterword that Aphis's reaction time caught up with her.
"Sniper!" she cried out, just as another trooper was gunned down in a similar manner; his lifeless body crumpling to the floor as a second thunderous gunshot went out. "Get down!"
Aphis quickly jumped behind a nearby desk, while Miskaton tried to fit his body behind a relatively thin rectangular pillar. While being where she was, Aphis attempted to assess the situation through her cold mind.
"It is XCOM!" the viper cried out again in a roar, pointing out the obvious amidst the panicked cries and screams of the civilians that fled the building.
"What should we do?" Miskaton asked her, searching for an order to follow. "We do not have a clear sight of them." Aphis thought for a second before seeing the best course of action.
"Fall back!" she responded, lowering her beam rifle and dashing into the doorway. "We do not have the tactical advantage here!"
Miskaton heeded her and broke from his cover, stomping into the hall with her. The last ADVENT trooper taking shots at vague shapes through the window spun about and was about to join them, when a beam burst through his chest, killing him instantly in a spray of orange blood that broke through his dark armor and stained the ground like paint. Without delay upon seeing their final soldier fall with a thick thud and agonized cry to the ground, Aphis closed the door with the nearby control panel on her side and inputted the locking code into it.
All went silent for several moments, when the shape of a ranger sprinted into the clinic through the wide-open door, her boots breaking shards of broken glass below her feet. Anais, sword drawn, looked around the room for any more signs of life, and when she spotted nothing she pressed a finger to her com.
"All clear," she said into it, just before the rest of the team rushed in. Helmut was the first to dash up to the corridor's closed door, which he typed on in an attempt to open it, until he realized it was a fruitless endeavor.
"How long until you can get this door open?" Cassandra asked him, watching as he bent over and began to unscrew the control panel.
"It should only take a minute," he replied confidently, his small GREMLIN mech hovering nearby. "Make sure to keep anyone off me."
"Do not worry about that," Abdul easily said to his squadmate, pointing his gauss rifle away and waiting for any hostile shapes to enter his view. The rest of them did the same, and waited patiently for their specialist to finish his work.
The sound of a repeating, loud buzzing noise went out through the lab's speakers lining the corners of its walls, but Seraffo tried her best to ignore it. Her hand was placed on the glass of the Viper King's tank, gazing in a fantasizing fashion at was was soon to be Quint's new form. She could only cast her red, reptilian eyes over it, even as the door to the lab shifted open from far behind her. She hadn't realized her name was being called by a certain andromedon until her mind snapped to attention, upon which she quickly turned around and saw the familiar shapes of her two allies.
"Seraffo!" Miskaton boomed out again, the thuggish creature running up to his commanding viper as Aphis started to close and lock the last sliding door behind them.
"I see the alarm has been triggered. How?" she spoke to the two, sensing the concerned emotions they bore as she laid eyes on them. "What is happening?"
"It is XCOM," Aphis instantly replied, still catching her breath. "I believe they have come for the human, or the Viper King. Possibly both. We've closed all doors that come this way, so we may be able to hold them off for a short while."
Seraffo's face curled rapidly into one of trembling horror. "No... no, this isn't possible! Not now!" she cried out several seconds later in an anguished, angered voice. "How could they have known?" Looking around in an exasperated manner, Seraffo saw all of the lab personnel were rushing around, already fleeing out of the laboratory or else readying themselves to such a thing. Quickly spotting the director within the small crowd, she slithered up to him and grabbed ahold of his arm.
"How long until the operation?" she hissed at him, her mouth open and fangs bared.
"J-just a minute more! The updates and autoconfigurations are nearly done!" he sputtered in a very hurried manner. "All you have to do is press the 'activate' button once it comes up, and the process will be performed on its own! I cannot stay around for that, I'm afraid. You, or someone else may..."
As she let go of the man, who proceeded to go about and collect his things before fleeing like the others, Seraffo stared at Miskaton and Aphis with an expression of vexation and confusion, before looking toward Quint's pod. "How much time do we have before they break in here?" she inquired, her voice much lighter.
Aphis approached Seraffo and looked over the Viper King and human with her as she calculated what should come next. "It will take XCOM roughly twenty minutes - or possibly just a little less than that - to break through or hack those doors we closed on them," she revealed. "That could leave us enough time for this transfer to take place, after which we can escape with him through the emergency exit, where the scientists left. If not, we can just grab the human and leave. I'm sure, with some time, that we can clone another Viper King."
"...If one truly loves another despite the differences that threaten to keep them apart forever, they make changes to be with them, don't they?" Quint's voice suddenly echoed through Seraffo's mind no sooner than Aphis had finished. She couldn't help but dwell upon the fact that Quint had been willing to give her everything with little else to be had in return. He had saved her life without a second thought. He had revealed his own love for her truthfully. He was perfectly happy to give up his humanity in order to get the same emotion out of her.
"Seraffo," Miskaton spoke up, interrupting the viper's mind as the andromedon turned briefly to the door in a moment of paranoia. "We do not have time to stand around. What must be done?"
Seraffo nodded to him and silently slithered over to the control computer that sat connected between the two pods housing Quint and the male viper. Looking to the screen, her eyes widened as she saw scanned over and read what was said. It stated that all was now ready to begin, and only two options were set to be chosen for the fate of the operation's next move.
Confirm Transfer
Abort Transfer
Seraffo thought of the human's words for a few, quick seconds longer until her mind became fully decided at what had to be done next. What needed to be done, for herself and Quint. Her muscles relaxed after a deep sigh and a closing of her eyelids, she made her decision and quickly pressed her claw down over one of the choices, regretting nothing as she did so.