From where he sat he could see most of his team sitting across the warehouse, Shiloh sitting among them; they were all talking - he watched as Shiloh lifted her arms, miming the act of aiming a rifle down at something in front of her, acting out what she was saying. Whatever it was must have been pretty funny because while he couldn't make out individual words he could definitely hear it as Soldier and Demoman erupted into loud laughter. Engineer chuckled a bit at that but then his view of them was momentarily broken as Medic stepped around him to settle in the chair beside him with a tired sigh.

"How are you doing?"

"Much the same as before, doc," Engineer answered. "No pain, the spasms have stopped. I'm fine."

Medic smiled a bit, reaching up to pluck his glasses from his nose and rub them on a sleeve. "Your physical health is not my only concern, my friend. You have been isolating yourself."

"Hard to isolate myself when we're all stuck in the same building," Engineer snorted.

With a quiet chuckle Medic slid his glasses back on, then inhaled and sat back in the chair. "That may be true, but you have been trying your best to do so."

"Well if you fellas would just let me brood and get it over with..."

"We have all been injured - some of us quite severely - but we were always able to recover from it, reattach all the pieces so to speak. They are worried for you, as am I."

Engineer crossed his arms, remembering to put his left over his right this time, blowing out a sigh that trickled into a quiet hissing. "You've got other things to be worrying about, not me. Did you all settle on a plan for taking that club?"

Medic nodded. "Small arms, a quick strike, we'll enter very early in the morning to take advantage of minimal staff. The fewer eyes that see us the less chance of law enforcement getting involved - or at the least, getting involved quicker than we'd like. Our Spy seems convinced that our Administrator is arranging to make law enforcement a non-issue but I find I'm not entirely convinced or willing to stake our plans on an unknown variable."

"You're not going in mass cloaked?"

With a heavy snort, Medic's expression immediately soured. "Nein, we do not possess any mass cloaking devices at current."

Engineer stiffened at that. "...what? Yes we do, we had 'em-"

"-packed into a truck that was destroyed the same night you were kidnapped," Medic interrupted, his expression as flat as his tone. "Our weapons and supplies were more or less replaceable, but the prototypes we were using - they are gone, as is all our information we took from the dam."

"God dammit..." Engineer muttered, rubbing his face with his hand. "Given time I might be able to reproduce the cloakers...great, and now I'll be kicking myself for letting myself get distracted with other problems, with all that damn time I had to do something with those things."

"Do not blame yourself, I was not exactly prolific in making redundant copies of the more pertinent information we recovered either. All that remains of it now is a pile of ash and what we retain within our heads." After a moment or two Medic straightened in his chair, hands on his knees. "At any rate, it was mentioned in idle conversation that you already had plans in the making for a new hand."

Engineer nodded and slipped fingers into the front pocket of his overalls, pulling out the folded up sheets of paper he'd stored there hours earlier. Shiloh had been amazingly patient, drawing these out for him, and seeing things put to paper had helped him get a better idea of how to craft the thing whenever he managed to get back to a workshop; he awkwardly smoothed the papers out on his knee, then handed them over to Medic.

The German took a few moments studying the drawings - there were three total - then nodded thoughtfully. "Have you given thought to how you will power it?"

"Yeah, sort of," Engineer said after a pause. He leaned over to gesture at the second drawing, one that detailed the metallic cuff that would connect the mechanical hand to the rest of his arm. "See, here and here - there's places I could easily attach a battery, if I wanted it to be external, or I could rearrange the wiring here and put in smaller bearings to make space to put the power source inside the palm of the hand."

"You are not thinking of putting the powering source in your arm?"

Engineer frowned, nose wrinkling, then realized the man was joking when he glanced up to see Medic smirking at him. "No thank you, I'm not about to go the route of metal monstrosity like our good friend Zane did, plus I'm not too keen on being one bullet graze away from having battery acid in my blood stream." After a moment he went back to sitting with his arms crossed, staring across the warehouse to where the rest of the team sat and talked. "...bad enough I was debating whether I wanted to use that madman's knowledge to attach this thing to nerves so it'd move like an actual hand. At least with all that nonsense gone I won't be tempted."

Medic chuckled, then went back to looking at the drawings. "The man may be insane, but there was a great deal to be learned from him. And besides, if the idea is so distasteful to you, I believe I see another method to make this hand as realistic as you may be dreaming of."

"Yeah? How's that?"

Medic patted down his front, locating a pen tucked into a pocket on the inside of his vest, then turned over one of the sketches to the blank back of the sheet. "May I?" At Engineer's nod, Medic began to quickly scribble a sleeve-like contraption. "With the proper application of external sensor nodes sensitive enough to read the minute movements of the muscle below, along with some manner of translating those movements into informational outputs, it would be feasible to create a sort of sleeve of sensors attached to the cuff...here, or perhaps here-" Medic pulled out the sketch that detailed the hand in its entirety, tapping a few points along the cuff with the tip of his pen. "We could extend it up your forearm, potentially even to the muscles of the shoulder, and see if we cannot create a prosthetic that will seem real and organic in its movements."

As the man spoke Engineer simply stared at him, one eyebrow raised. When Medic paused Engineer looked between the messy, ink-smudged drawing of the sensor sleeve and the slightly manic look on the doctor's face. "...all right, doc, you've got my attention."

Carmichal had the sense to take a few steps back as Zane slowly turned from cleaning up an impromptu operating table to stare icily at the Spybot that had just entered the room.

"...what?" Zane whispered, his tone and volume dropping.

The Spybot let a twisted hunk of metal clatter to the floor; there was a ruined eye socket visible, about the only thing recognizable on the bit of junk.

"The imprisoned humans have escaped, assisted by the Elite Medicbot. They have not been located - unit was destroyed in pursuit of the humans."

Into the silence of the room came a quiet, high-pitched tinkle of metal hitting the floor and bouncing away; Zane had actually snapped the tip off the scalpel in his hand, and as Carmichal watched a new red stain began to seep onto the towel the man had only moments before been using to dry the scalpel.

"What about my guys?" Carmichal asked. He hated talking to that stupid robot, but... "I had men left there to watch 'em, did that thing kill them?"

"Sedated," was the robot's simple reply.

"YOUR MEN DO NOT MATTER!"

Carmichal actually jumped at the sudden thunderous bellowing, Zane whirling around to shake the freshly blood-stained towel at him. "Hey now," he started, holding his hands up in front of him, but Zane again brandished the towel at him.

"I needed those two for information and leverage," Zane snarled. "That...that..."

"Soggy old hag?" Carmichal offered, trying to make his tone helpful to defuse the man's anger or at the least, redirect it.

"If I hadn't been trapped down here catering to that woman's ego, I would have been THERE to stop their escape!" Zane growled, spinning on a heel and awkwardly pausing; Carmichal had the impression the man wanted to lash out, to move, but had no idea what to do with himself.

Finally Zane hurled the towel into the floor and ground his foot into it, his breathing coming harsh and fast. Carmichal clasped his hands behind his back and waited; wouldn't be the first time he'd witnessed a break down of one of his employers...

After several minutes of nothing but the sound of Zane breathing into the silence, the man turned around; his expression was composed into something resembling self-control though Carmichal could tell the man was grinding his teeth together.

"...call your men," Zane ordered quietly, his voice barely audible. "Send them back to the base locations we already have, and burn them to the ground. I want there to be nowhere close or familiar for those two to run...and if we cannot find the others by looking, we will flush them out by provoking them into action."

"Right away, sir. Anything else?" Carmichal shot a glance at the Spybot - that thing was standing next to the phone that was hanging on the wall. Stupid, stupid thing...

Zane was moving to pick up that metal...whatever that was, Carmichal assumed it was what was left of the other robot's head; he stood silent and watched as the man turned it over in his hands, the muscles in his jaw visibly clenching.

"...I do not understand how this could have unraveled so quickly..." Zane muttered. "I wiped my creation back to its original state...how could Conagher have..."

"Sir?"

"What? No, just - just get your men to work," Zane snapped after a moment. "Have them burn wherever they are, then backtrack to the other bases they've already searched."

Carmichal nodded and moved toward the phone, staring stonily at the Spybot until it took several steps to the side to give the human easier access. It only took a few moments to phone back to the club and give the orders; Carmichal took a second to simply watch as Zane puttered around the room, still obviously agitated and looking for an outlet to express it.

"So uh...everything about that machine of yours," he finally said into the quiet. "It all true?"

"What?" came Zane's reply, quiet and distracted.

Carmichal waited for the man to stop and look toward him before continuing. "This machine-thing of yours in the other room - it actually brings people back to life? You weren't just pulling that hag's leg?"

"No, it - I mean, yes it does but-" Zane sighed heavily and pinched the bridge of his nose before then lowering his hand to stroke his chin. "It does...everything you heard was truthful, but I never intended to give the woman access to it. There is a reason I told her it constructed other things."

Carmichal mentally pictured the surgery he'd just witnessed. "All it needs is a thingy in the brain to work? What happens if the little chip thingy breaks?"

Zane's lip curled up in a sort of half-sneer at the man's clumsy words. "Yes, Carmichal, the 'thingy' is all one needs. Given time to familiarize itself with the host, the transmitter chip will notify the machine of the death of said host and everything stored within the neural mesh's memory will be transmitted and relocated to a new brain within the created body. If the chip detects itself failing it will broadcast what it already has as a means of a back up."

Carmichal nodded slowly. "Right, right, I read you... So, what happens to the old stuff, then?"

"In a perfect world the old body would be reused for future rebirths, providing that it isn't diseased."

"But that ain't the case here, then?"

"Not so much that I am willing to depend on it, no."

Carmichal thought of the giant machine that was just a room or two away - he questioned how the man had even gotten the thing down into the tunnels here. "...is there always going to be a copy of a person in that thing?"

"Storage permitting, yes."

"What happens if someone steals the - the storage?"

Zane was back to staunching the blood from the scalpel-created cut in his hand, but at the question he slowly turned around. "What do you mean?" He gave Carmichal a decidedly suspicious look.

Again Carmichal held his hands up. "No plans here to steal it, boss, I'm just asking. You had me thinking all this time we were guarding medical equipment - which I mean, I guess that's what this is, but hell, now I know you've got a copy of your brain in that thing and that it's not just some fancy bit of hospital work. That sort of makes it a higher priority, you know? And you've told me all about the men you're hunting down. Is this something I ought to be worrying about, that someone'll take just one bit? What's it even look like?"

"It's quite simple, Mr. Carmichal: kill anyone who isn't me, you, or one of your men that comes near this machine," Zane said, eyes narrowing. "Anything beyond that is not something to be concerned with. Understood?"

"Understood, sir. I'm still increasing security down here though, if it's all the same to you."

The hours crawled by and they'd taken to sitting around in near-silence, having exhausted small talk. They were already eager to get down to business and get out of this city and the addition of boredom was making them all a bit twitchy, so when the three cars showed up outside the warehouse just as night was beginning to fall, the mercs were definitely suspicious enough to quietly debate among themselves whether they should shoot first and ask questions later.

It wasn't until one of the car doors opened and let a mountain of a man spill out that Sniper waved a hand to hush them all, putting a finger to his lips a moment before he leaned closer to the window to observe the solitary figure.

The man was...goddamn huge. Sniper hadn't even thought he'd meet someone larger than Heavy, but this man would have even Heavy looking up to address him - in addition to being tall the man was wide at the shoulders and in the chest. His arms and legs were thick, heavily muscled, and his graying hair was wild and curly and mostly gathered into a ponytail at the nape of his neck.

When the man turned enough for Sniper to get a look at his face he saw the crooked nose, the wide mouth, and eyes as gray as his hair. He was dressed in plain black slacks and a white shirt, with a heavy overcoat on and hanging open - strange to see in this climate, but if the heat bothered the man he gave no indication.

The giant calmly walked over to the door and raised a meaty fist, knocking heavily. No one else exited the cars but they remained running as they waited.

Sniper quietly relayed what he was seeing to those who were clustered nearby, but there was a small memory twitching in the back of his mind...he was pretty sure he knew this man.

The locks turned and the doorway opened; from the woman's perspective he no doubt filled the entire doorway and then some.

The giant of a man stared down at her, starting at the top of her head and making note of details as he dropped his gaze slowly until he ended at her dusty, well-worn boots.

She was looking him over as well and when they'd both finished their visual inspections, they stood in a rather tense silence.

Finally, she spoke. "You told me when I left to put the wind at my back, and to not let it blow me back to this town." She paused, then reached up to scratch at an ear. "...you should have included some advice on what to do if I got dragged back here without a choice in the matter."

His face shifted, breaking into a craggy smile. "I was thinking, you would not be caught." He glanced to either side of him and the cars behind him soon went silent, engines shutting off. "Tell me. I get very interesting phone call, rush back here from Europe. I find you have returned. I find you hiding in warehouse, with men. There is a story, yes?"

Shiloh blew out a sigh. "Yeah, there's one hell of a story."

She took a few steps back and from where he stood the giant was aware of movement near her, no doubt the men moving either to intercept him or simply to get out of the way. He gave it a few moments before he ducked through the doorway and shut the door behind him; there was a cluster of ten men here and another woman, armed and eying him. He offered them a silent nod before turning his attention back down to Shiloh.

Goodness, but he really dwarfed her...he did not remember towering over her so much when she had been his charge. "My men, they will remain in the cars."

"It's not like we'd lack the room for them," Shiloh said, looking around at the warehouse a moment before sighing again. "All right, well - guys, this is Mr. Alexei, probably our only friend inside city limits."

Alexei again eyed the men silently before his attention fell on the other woman in the room. He shook a large finger at her. "You - I know you."

Miss Pauling smoothed out a wrinkle in her skirt as she stepped closer. "I'm Miss Pauling, sir. We've never met in person but the Administrator has mentioned you before." She offered her hand and Alexei shook it politely. "I wasn't aware she was calling in local assistance."

Alexei nodded slowly, then dropped a hand onto Shiloh's shoulder - it completely covered the shoulder - and sniffed. "I would not call me local - I have been traveling overseas. I come back when old woman got word to me. We have much to discuss, but first - the story. I would much like to hear it."

"And like that, we are trusting him?" Spy asked, stepping up behind Miss Pauling.

She nodded and pushed her glasses up. "He is who he says he is, and if he's the one the Administrator told us to wait two days for..." She shrugged. "Looks like we'll be getting inside the club fairly easily, Alexei is Madam Zoya's son."

Shiloh slowly turned her head to stare up at him. "Son...? You never told me that!"

"Some things are not needing knowing," he replied. "What is needing knowing right now is, what has my mother done this time?"

Miss Pauling smiled a bit. "The cliff notes version is she's harboring a serial killer with a grudge against the Administrator."

"There's quite a bit of...side plot...tangled up in this story as well," Spy said, glancing at Miss Pauling. "Might I suggest we all sit down and take turns?"

Alexei blew out a long, steady sigh that ruffled Shiloh's hair. "This is...new, even for her. Tell me, please."