DT was a miracle. Or at least that's how they saw it, Entrapta would vehemently disagree and argue that their survival had been the result of cutting-edge scientific experimentation. A teenager in Bright Moon City's poorest district when the revolution happened, the young DT saw little of the hope that the interim government promised – efforts to build a better society after Prime were largely focused elsewhere, and the forgotten pockets of BMC stayed forgotten.

As with most of the younger citizens who needed to find money, security or friendship (or all three) DT turned to the gangs that fought to rule their district. Most of their friends were members of The Lost Valley Tribe, a named feared across much of Eastern BMC, and at barely 18 years old, DT was initiated into the gang. Around that time, the Lost Valley Tribe were embroiled in a vicious turf war with another, similarly ruthless, gang, and the fighting only intensified with every passing day. There were no rules, no code of honour that stopped lines from being crossed or weapons from being used; deaths were not just an unfortunate consequence of the conflict, they were the goal.

DT wasn't naïve, they knew that getting into this world would be fraught with danger, that there was a real risk that each day they left their apartment, lying to their father about where they were going, they would not return home. But they were savvy, they knew how to spot danger and be alert to their surroundings, and slowly carved a niche as someone who with a talent for staying unnoticed. The gang tended to use them as a courier, likely for weapons or drugs (they knew better than to ask), rewarding DT with both cash and a growing respect that would provide some level of protection amidst the vicious war. At least, that was the theory – respect counted for nothing when they became just another casualty.

About six months after the revolution, DT had been tasked with running a package to some buyers and collecting money in exchange – it was nothing they hadn't done dozens of times before. Everything appeared to be going just as it had done every time prior: a confident walk, a subtle nod of the head to signal the group of three to follow them into the service entrance of a warehouse they knew had no cameras, a quick flash of the merchandise. But that was as far as DT got before being set upon by the buyers; they threw the teenager to the ground, savagely inflicting blow upon blow on the defenceless kid. Even knocking them unconscious was not enough for the gang, who wanted to send a clear message to the Lost Valley Tribe and set the warehouse alight with a lifeless DT laid on the floor inside.

Trapped inside a rapidly spreading inferno in a secluded building in a part of the city where most people would see a fire and walk on past with their heads down, DT should have died that evening. They should have been found days later in the wreckage, their father never knowing what became of his child but forevermore suspecting that they'd been caught in a gang war, the type of thing the police shied away from investigating. That's what would have happened, were it not for an agent of a newly formed organisation that aimed to monitor the dark underbelly of Bright Moon City; an organisation that initially concentrated its effort on de-escalating tensions between the gangs of Eastern BMC by any necessary means. The agent, a young biohacker by the name of Entrapta, saved DT's life that day.

Entrapta had been experimenting for years with DNA vectors, aiming to one day help people recover from an illness that affected those in the countryside known as the Etherian Death. When Prime's power was at its height, the non-urban areas of the colony were harder to keep under his control due to their remoteness; his response was to reclassify about a dozen rivers in these rural areas as sewers. Almost overnight, the clear waters were flushed through with industrial waste, poisoning the water supply for millions. People across Etheria began to exhibit the same symptoms: severe shortness of breath, an intense cough, lack of energy, and their skin being tinged with a deep blue colour before they succumbed. The death toll ran to thousands during Prime's reign, and even after the new government ceased the practice of dumping waste into the waterways, the Etherian Death pervaded and continued to claim lives. Entrapta theorised that she could alter people's genetic makeup to fight the disease and set about working to make it happen, ultimately catching the attention of NEON's founder as word of her skills spread throughout certain sections of society.

When she brought DT back to her lab, a chaotic jumble of flashing servers, computer monitors and petri dishes, Entrapta had to work fast. Her research revolved around injecting a mixture of a programmable set of RNA vectors attached nanomachines which could initiate that programming, the plan being to encode one set to alter their DNA to enable faster regrowth of the teenager's skin, and a second set shortly after which could act as an off switch. She laid DT into an office chair, the only vaguely comfortable thing she could find, and hooked them up to a plethora of monitoring equipment, most of which was more about obtaining data from what was entirely an experiment rather than preventing the death of a kid who had been the casualty of a gang war.

The first part of her experiment succeeded, Entrapta returning after an hour to find DT's skin newly unblemished, with no signs of the horrific burns they'd suffered mere hours before. She gave them the second injection but stopped in shock when she went to scan for the location of the new set. There were double the number of vectors awaiting programming than there should have been; they were single-use, it should have been impossible to reprogram vectors that had already undergone the process once before. After switching off the DNA alteration, an intrigued Entrapta injected a third set of RNA vectors and the results were the same – for reasons she could not fathom, DT's body was allowing the RNA to be reprogrammed over and over.

DT finally awoke the following day, barely extracting a basic understanding of what had happened to them from the torrent of excitable scientific jargon that Entrapta launched into. Over the following weeks, they came to comprehend a little more about their uniqueness – they had gained an ability to alter their DNA like no-one on Etheria had ever been able to before. Entrapta taught them to code the vectors, eventually building the necessary program into a visor computer to allow them to do it on the go. Each reprogramming took a few hours to fully translate into a change in their appearance, but the potential of it was not lost on NEON, who took them on board as a messenger. Their ability allowed them to either blend in or stand out as they deemed necessary.

Today, they stood out. Clad in a sleeveless black and mint green skin-tight bodysuit that allowed them to show off the bioluminescent ink tattoos that ran the length of their arms, lights flickering on the visor across their eyes, DT had a look that demanded people stop and stare. They had recoloured their hair to blonde the night before, collecting it into a loose braid that fell across their right shoulder, and even altered their eye colour to match their outfit, despite the fact nobody would see. It was the secrecy of some of their missions, the pressure to fade into the background, that made them want to go over the top with the strikingness of their appearance on days that they didn't need to be hidden. And in the hallway outside Spinnerella and Netossa's apartment, they had no reason not to give people something to remember.

DT pressed the button on the buzzer next to the door and waited a few moments for Netossa's face to appear on the little screen, static interference taking the definition from her features. They didn't wait for her to speak first, "Netossa, darling. I've got some information you'll like."

The door slid sideways almost immediately, allowing them inside. They'd been in this apartment dozens of times, the pale grey walls and purple accent lighting now a familiar sight. The couple went for a very minimalist look, which DT assumed was more Netossa's doing than Spinnerella's, and it left a lot of vacant space in their rooms, although somehow it still felt very snug and homely. What little there was had an intimate warmth to it, an almost old-world vibe: tables made of wood rather than metal, countless cushions on the sofa that weren't just plain-coloured but exhibited a little of their personality with cute cartoon animals and playful patterns. Few would know what they really did for a living based purely on the look of their home.

"What have you got," Netossa demanded, launching straight into business without so much as a 'hello'. Her wife behind her gave a smile and a small wave of the hand by way of a greeting.

"Sweetheart," they gasped theatrically, "Always so serious with you… where's your sense of hospitality? Where's the grand welcome?"

DT had always been a very kinetic speaker, using their body to punctuate their words, and their slim frame allowed them to effortlessly snake around others like a gentle breeze creating momentary tornado of autumn leaves. It made them hard to pin down, made conversations with them require more attention than just listening to words, and that was how they wanted it to be. They loved creating a theatre from a simple exchange of words; the fact that it riled up the more straight-down-to-business types like Netossa was merely a bonus.

"Forgive me if I'm not throwing you a party, DT, but the man we took out last night seemed to be under the impression that Prime was still about. That's all we've thought about since. So what have you got?"

They swirled around the two women and into the living room, a much larger space to impart information than the cramped hallway, then tapped the side of their visor. It projected a green wireframe map of the colony onto the bare wall opposite, and with another couple of taps, the image zoomed in on a section about half an hour's drive out of Bright Moon City, "The Whispering Woods, ladies."

"Great, thanks," Netossa said sarcastically, "So glad you just dropped by to give us a geography lesson."

Spinnerella place a hand around her waist, gently pulling her wife a little closer and feeling her calm instantly, "Darling, give them a moment to explain."

"Thank you, sweetheart," DT winked at her. Spinnerella had never been able to work out if they way they acted was purely playful or if they actually held a bit of a crush for her. Netossa didn't get the same treatment, so she suspected the latter; they were able to joke about it and it never became an issue between them, but Spinnerella not-so-secretly enjoyed the attention, "People have been spotted going in and out of the Woods recently, far more than usual, and NEON suspects that there's some kind of facility there that they are visiting."

"Nuh-uh," Netossa shut them down, shaking her head for emphasis, "There's nothing in there but trees. I grew up around there, I would know if there was a giant building."

DT hit the side of their visor again, the map zooming further and displaying a rotating outline of what appeared to be a small cliff with a door in the centre, "Then I daresay, my lovely, that your childhood adventures in the forest came up short. A satellite passed over the area not long ago and we spotted this little entrance to what we suspect is an underground bunker built as a secret retreat for Prime."

Though Netossa found it hard to believe that the Whispering Woods, a place she thought she knew better than almost anyone on the colony, contained a huge subterranean facility, it wasn't beyond the realms of possibility. Prime built dozens of military installations during the early years of his dictatorship, mainly as a demonstration of his power rather than out of any strategic need, and the idea that he would construct places he could retreat to in secret should the need arrive was very much a realistic one. After his death, most of the facilities he built – the publicly known ones, at least – fell into ruin, the equipment held within disappearing rapidly into the hands of looters drunk on the chaos of revolution. What might remain within the more covert and unknown of his constructions could be worth looking into if it could give them more information about the disappearances and how they linked to Prime.

"You think the kids are being held here?" Spinnerella asked, resting her head on her wife's shoulder momentarily.

"Couldn't tell you, darling. That's why C asked me to let you know about this place, I'm guessing she wants you to go and investigate."

Netossa had already started pulling her jacket on, pausing momentarily to press her finger onto a reader which in turn whirred opened a drawer full of weaponry. If this place in the Woods was as crawling with Prime devotees as she feared, they were both going to need to be armed. Netossa quickly scoured the contents of the drawer before picking out a rapid-fire laser gun, a beast that could blast out over eight hundred pulses of intense energy every minute, and holstering it at her hip, "Then we go now."

"I've only just got here, Netossa, darling," DT spiralled around her, but she ignored them, steely-eyed determination driving her towards the door. The emphatic shutdown stopped them, and they stood staring at her, a hand on their hip, "I thought I'd at least get a drink."

"Life's full of disappointments, get used to it. We need to get to the Whispering Woods now."

Spinnerella chuckled to herself. That was the woman she loved – always fiercely passionate for those she cared about and what she believed in, and even if Netossa did often err on the side of 'act first, ask questions later', she would never deliberately put either of them in danger. And while Spinnerella regularly acted as the brake for Netossa's bull-headed intensity, so too did her wife bring her out of the paralysis that fear often put her in. They had different approaches to missions, and to life itself sometimes, but from the first time the two of them met, those differences were complementary, never the source of friction.

"Why don't you come over one evening when this is all done, hey?" Spinnerella rested a hand on DT's shoulder, one that they found themself looking at for a little too long, "We have to get moving, but thanks for the information. You might just have just helped save a bunch of kids."

Although it had been nearly a decade since Netossa called the Whispering Woods home, so much of it was still familiar to her. Trees had grown, animals had made long-since-abandoned homes and plants had lived and died in those years, but the land, the ridges and slopes, the rocks and soil, hadn't changed. DT had given the couple the exact co-ordinates of the suspected facility, but Netossa knew its location from the second she saw the map projected onto the wall of their home and was able to take her car as close as the terrain would allow, parking it halfway down a remote dirt track. And while that was a good mile closer than the main routes would take them, they still had a half-hour trek through dense vegetation and over steep earth banks before they reached their destination.

They weren't the only ones who had made the journey, given the well-trampled path that led unerringly to their destination. It gave more credibility to the idea that this facility – or whatever it may be – was not a remnant of Prime's dictatorship left to dereliction in the middle of a forest where few people dared to venture into the undergrowth. Netossa could tell from the bare earth visible in the centre of the track that people had been traversing to and fro for several months, a time frame which coinciding neatly with the first disappearance. And though the trail was a little harder to follow in certain places, it led them to a more open area where a small cliff blocked their way, a wall of rock about thirty feet high in the centre, tapering off at either end.

"This… this wasn't here before…" Netossa found herself staring at the rusted metal door embedded into the stone. She felt a small pang of nostalgia, tinged with the sorrow of a childhood now very much in her past; this was her home, the place she explored daily as a kid, and after 8 years away in the city, it had changed without her. More than that, she realised, it had changed because of him, just as so much of her life had too.

"How do we get in?" Spinnerella tentatively explored the undergrowth around them, hoping to happen upon something that might help them gain entry, "I can't see any keypad or any- OH MY GOD!"

Netossa rushed over, fearing her wife might have fallen victim to the kind of vicious anti-intruder measures that Prime often put around his more secure buildings, but it was not a trap that Spinnerella had walked into. Laid in the tall grass that lined either side of the worn path, wearing a uniform reminiscent of that worn by Prime's militia, was the body of a man who had clearly suffered a violent death. His clothing was ripped and stained with blood, and though his face was down in the dirt, both women could see signs of horrific injuries to it, and they had no desire to investigate it further.

"What the hell did that?" Spinnerella took a step back, her face still portraying a mix of surprise and disgust at the discovery, "Are there wild animals around here?"

Netossa shook her head, "Nothing that vicious. They left all the things with big teeth back on Krytis. We need to be careful."

"There's got to be some way to get in," her wife turned her attention back to the door, trying in vain to pry at various edges of the metal to see if anything would give. There was no handle or keyhole, so it had to be some variation of an automatic door; potentially it may only have been openable from the inside, but the drone flights over the area had found no other entrances. The only feature on the door was a small square, oddly free of rust, bounded by a raised outline of ridged metal. Spinnerella ran her finger over it, pressing down in case it was a concealed button, and though the door remained steadfastly shut, touching that area did produce a faint beeping, that stumped her only for a few seconds, "Netty? I think it's a fingerprint lock. Autopicks aren't going to work on it."

"Good thing we've got a fingerprint then."

"What do you mean we've got…" she followed her wife's gaze to the body on the floor, "Oh you're joking. I'm not touching that, ew!"

"Stop being a wuss, Spinny. You kill people for a living, you've touched a dead person before."

Spinnerella wrinkled her nose in disgust, "Yeah, but they're fresh. We don't know how long it's been there."

Shaking her head, Netossa reached down and grabbed the arm of the corpse. She wasn't anywhere near as squeamish as her wife, and if it meant they could take out a bunch of Prime worshippers who had been kidnapping children, she would touch as many dead bodies as it took. Spinnerella took several steps back as Netossa dragged the man towards the door, much to her wife's amusement, and with one last effort to extend out an index finger to the reader, the door slid back to reveal an imposing darkness.

"Okay, not quite what I expected," Netossa took out the handle of a small plasma blade, tapping the button to turn it on and illuminate the entrance in a blue light. There was no long corridor teeming with guards, nor sounds of children trying to call for help, just a faint banging noise from somewhere deep within and a ladder that descended far into the ground, "Let's go."

The two women climbed down into a deep shaft that seemed to go on forever, but eventually landed them in a small room lit only by a handful of red emergency lights. The banging was louder down here and worryingly un-rhythmic, the sort of noise that was not made by a machine but by something alive. Through the dimness, they could just about make out a mess of upturned furniture and equipment: a couple of tables on their sides with paperwork strewn across the floor, a filing cabinet that had smashed the window into a neighbouring room as it fell. Thick wires ran from a small entrance on the left-hand side of the room across to a door opposite, where the exposed ends sparked against the metal, the resulting surges of power confusing the door's opening circuits into trying to continually force it shut.

"I'll follow the wires, see if I can stop that," Spinnerella headed off to her left to trace the source of power that prevented them going any further inside. Every step she took on the metal floor echoed in the intermittent near-silence as she let the wires lead her into the adjacent room where they ran into a small generator, quietly humming to itself. The mess was equally as prominent in this room as the last, and Spinnerella had to navigate over a large piece of ducting that had fallen from the ceiling and the associated rubble it had brought down with it. She touched the control panel of the generator, but nothing happened; these older units were often used by the gangs inhabiting the abandoned buildings of Bright Moon City where mains electricity had been switched off, and it wasn't uncommon for the controls to fail and lock them either on or off. This left only one option.

"Stand back, darling, just in case this gets a little overexcited," she called through the broken glass to her wife, drawing her pistol once Netossa had moved away. It took a couple of seconds to initialise, the lights on the side turning from red to green when it was ready, then Spinnerella took aim at the generator and fired a bolt of purple light. She scored a direct hit, and the low rumble of the machine ceased, "Did that work?"

"Yeah, we should be able to get in once the main power is back on. Have you found anything for that?"

Spinnerella stepped back across the ducting and into the corridor. To her right, it sloped downwards and opened out into a room that was mostly obscured by a red light pointed directly at her, "I'm going to check down here."

As she descended further into the facility, Spinnerella was struck by just how oppressive this place was. The rooms barely high enough for them both to stand up straight in, the corridor only wide enough for one person, and the darkness that obscured so much of the space, like it could hide things they'd both rather not see. It was eerily still, as well, the air stale and what must have been a good 50 feet of ground above insulating them from the outside world and amplifying every little sound to make it seem as though it was all around them. Spinnerella's steps, her every breath, even the beat of her heart sounded as though they came from a being much larger than herself; the only thing keeping her from feeling scared was acknowledging the irony of that fear coming from the sounds of her own body.

The corridor ended in a tiny room, barely more than a storage cupboard, that had walls covered in electrical wiring and discarded fuses and cable off-cuts strewn over the floor. To her right, Spinnerella saw a cabinet covered by a grimy beige metal door, behind which was an electrical panel. Even in the dim red lighting, she could see that one of the large circuit breakers was switched opposite to the others, and though the labelling had worn off, she hoped that flipping it across would bring power back to the facility.

A fraction of a second after she switched it back, the emergency lighting turned off, leaving everything in complete darkness. Spinnerella couldn't help but let out a short scream, the thought of them both being buried so far underground and without any light to guide them back to safety making her anxiety build. She wanted to shout for her wife, but before either of them had the chance to call out to the other, a brighter, white light flickered overhead and steadied, illuminating the room and the corridor she had just come down.

"Spinny? Are you okay?" Netossa's voice made her relax a little, "The lights have come back on in here."

Spinnerella hurried herself back up the slope, eager to return to the safety that came with being at her wife's side. There was no place on Etheria where being with Netossa couldn't make her feel safe, no situation so dire that the woman she loved couldn't make it better, and it had been that way from the moment they met, "I'm okay. Just got a little scared when the lights went out, but I'm back with you now. Nothing we can't get through together."

"I've got you," Netossa took hold of Spinnerella's hands, gazing into her eyes as she repeated the mantra that had got the couple through the worst times of Prime's terror.

"And I've got you."

The two of them shared the briefest of kisses, lips touching for just a moment to seal the reassurance, before Netossa brought their attention back to the door that likely served as the entrance to the main part of the facility. Neither knew what they would face on the other side, whether it would be crawling with guards or empty, if they would find the missing children or even any clues as to their whereabouts. The fact that the facility had been on emergency power, and how they had remained undetected thus far gave credence to the idea that there were few, if any, people down here; the banging that echoed from deeper within served as a worrying indicator they were not alone, however.

Netossa pressed the button next to the door to open it, and though it faltered momentarily, it slid back to reveal another corridor. This one was a little less imposing, being wider and higher than the ones they'd experience so far, but it was not the size of the space that filled them with horror. On the floor directly ahead of them were two bodies, both clad in identical Guardian uniforms, and both showing signs of having been savaged by something powerful. The one nearest them, a young woman with jet black hair, laid at the end of a heavy streak of blood that emerged from behind a makeshift shelter made of several large flight cases, a shelter it appeared she had been unceremoniously dragged out from. The second body, that of an older man, had crumpled below a heavy bloodstain on the wall above, as though he had been thrown hard against it in the attack that ended his life.

"What the hell did this?" Spinnerella whispered, as much fearful for her own safety as she was disturbed by the needless and apparently violent deaths. These people may have been lost in a misguided worship of Prime, but they were still people with families and friends – just as her own parents had been.

Netossa clutched her wife's hand tightly, leading her carefully forward and around the bodies, "We need to be careful."

An open door to their right took them into a dormitory, the walls plastered with Horde Prime propaganda posters that were just beginning to peel away. The dozen or so bunk beds were covered with shredded linens, and a couple had been overturned, their mattresses now a little way across the floor. One wall was lined with lockers, some of which were open with various personal items fallen to the ground below. Something horrible had happened here, something that most, if not all, of the inhabitants of the facility couldn't escape, and the couple's fear for the missing kids grew.

They returned to the corridor, following it around a corner where they were greeted with more mauled victims. Broken metalwork and equipment cases with deep gashes scored into them littered the floor, whilst a damaged light fitting dangled dangerously from the ceiling, sparking and flickering. Of the bodies, however, the one that caught their attention most was a young man, no older than 30, who had fallen in front of a locked door with a keycard still clamped in his outstretched hand.

"I'm guessing there must be something good in here," Netossa bent down to extract the card from the man's hand and swiped it on the reader, which turned green and slid the door open with a loud beeping. The room that had been unlocked was a small office, centred around a desk with two monitors perched on top. Banks of servers lined much of the room, with dozens of green lights flashing on and off and reels of tape stopping and starting intermittently, whilst on the women's left, a collection of screens showed live footage from the facility's security cameras. At least, from those that were still working; half of the cameras had stopped feeding any images and had turned to static snow.

Spinnerella sat at the desk, the green text against the black background on the monitor showing her that the computer was still logged in as 'Disciple#018'. There were several options presented, but it was the one labelled 'Experiment logs' that stood out amongst the more mundane functions. She tapped the corresponding key to enter in and began reading.

EXPERIMENT LOG: SUBJECT C31.

21st June 2158

We finally (i.e. on our 24th attempt!) managed to successfully embed the DNA from our Lord Prime's remains into the microchip. The Chairman wants us to implant it into Subject C31 right away, but I want to monitor the chip for a couple of days before doing so. If we move too early and the experiment fails, it could be another two months before we are in a position to try again.

23rd June 2158

Microchip implantation has been successful. I had a lengthy conversation with Subject C31 this afternoon, and he is showing no signs of adverse reaction to the microchip. There is also no sign of reaction to the data port installation. This, indeed, is a testament to the scientific prowess of our Lord Prime and the durability of his plan. If this experiment is successful in bringing about his return, I will be sure to show my gratitude.

27th June 2158

I was unable to carry out monitoring tests on Subject C31 today as he violently refused to let me into his enclosure. A psychiatric examination has been scheduled for tomorrow to ensure that this is not due to the microchip, however this is just a precaution. I imagine that being the vessel for the return of our Lord Prime is a daunting task, and the anger is borne of fear.

1st July 2158

Subject C31's outbursts are increasing, and it appears that his strength has grown. During an outpouring of anger earlier today, the subject was able to pick up several heavy items of furniture and launch them at the observation window. The window was undamaged. It has been recommended that we cease all but essential tests on the subject for the safety of all Disciples.

3rd July 2158

Subject C31 has breached the enclosure and has attacked several Disciples. I am unable to approach them to assess their injuries, however I fear the worst. I briefly locked eyes with the subject and there is no humanity in them, not that of the Disciples nor of our Lord Prime himself. C31 is dangerous, and my only option is to remain locked in my office until help arrives.

4th July 2158

A rescue team entered the facility and evacuated as many Disciples as they could before they were savagely attacked by Subject C31. I understand the survivors will be transferred to the Kindergarten to assist with experimentation there under a full lockdown. Unfortunately, the rescue team were unable to reach my office, and I remain here until the small supply of food and water I brought in runs out.

6th July 2158

This will be my final entry. I have no more water and my options are to either die of dehydration in this office or make a run for it and hope Subject C31 does not notice me. I choose probable death over certain death. Praise be to our Lord Prime.

Spinnerella clamped her hand over her mouth as the shock of what was happening at this facility began to set in, "Netty, they're… They're trying to bring him back."

"No, that… That has to be impossible."

"You think that matters to them?!" Spinnerella turned to her wife with extreme determination in her eyes, a resolve that she would never let Horde Prime or those who followed his ideals return to plunge Etheria back into the misery that his reign had left, "They want to implant Prime's DNA into the chips in some crazy attempt to… Oh no. Oh no."

Netossa saw the colour drain from her face, "What, Spinny? What's wrong?"

"What if they're doing this to the children?"

"Shit…" neither of them needed to state the obvious about how awful – beyond awful – it would be for these deluded Prime followers to conduct invasive experiments like they'd just read about on children. It was starting to become more obvious that the kids weren't being held here, however, but somewhere else entirely, "Wait, didn't the logs say something about another place the survivors were going to?"

Spinnerella pressed a couple of buttons on the keyboard, scanning the text that appeared on screen for the line she was looking for, "Yeah, it was a place called the Kindergarten."

"Does it say where it is?"

"I'll see if I can find out," with another few clicks of the keyboard, the screen returned to the initial menu where Spinnerella tried several different entries to gleam any information about this second facility. She found several mentions of it with little other context, before, buried in a sub-menu, an option for the contact details of someone referred to only as 'The Chairman' appeared. Spinnerella entered into it, but was met with an error, "It says I don't have clearance to access it. Dammit!"

"Well maybe someone else around here has got access?" Netossa exited the room to check more of the bodies for anything that might help them, but her attention was immediately drawn to the far end of the corridor. She pulled her wife away from the computer and silently pointed to what had now taken precedence over finding keycards or passcodes.

Silhouetted in front of a floodlight, a solitary figure moved towards them with terrifying calmness. It stood at least eight feet tall, and though it had the shape of a well-built human, the tentacle-like appendages that writhed from the back of its neck were an indication that this was not a human they were dealing with. Or, at least, not a human anymore. It stopped, staring at the two women with glowing green eyes, its whistled breathing the only audible sound for ten terrifying seconds, then reared a hand up, attacking with a roar.

"Shit, Spinny!" Netossa dived across to push her wife out of the way, the two of them clattering to the floor against the opposite wall of the corridor. She fumbled around for her gun, pulling it from its holster and initialising it in one quick motion, then fired several laser bolts at the creature, which gave no reaction beyond a momentary surprise. Netossa looked at her apparently powerless weapon, checking it had been set correctly, "What the fuck…?"

Whilst Spinnerella regained her bearings after the sudden crash, Netossa drew the creature away from her wife. She fired her weapon again, but each shot found only Subject C31's arm which it held across its chest as a shield, seemingly sustaining no injury that could halt its advance towards her. With the distance between Netossa and the wall behind her decreasing rapidly, she had to make an escape and ran towards the wall, jumping at it with both feet to help her spring up towards the creature. She hauled herself up on its left shoulder, leaping with both feet on its shoulder blade to help clear the height and land behind it.

"You can't get me that easily," she teased, retrieving the handle of her plasma sword from the waistband of her leggings and extending the blue blade out to its full length. She stood with the sword held in front of her, eyes fixed on Subject C31, who was still struggling to turn around, "Come on then, you don't stand a chance against me."

"Darling, please don't antagonise the rage-filled abomination," Spinnerella clutched onto her wife's upper arm, lightly enough that she wouldn't stop Netossa from moving, but with enough of a grip to remind her that she needed to be careful.

"I know what I'm doing," Netossa reassured her, waiting for C31 to turn around so that she could launch her attack. She had noticed during her jump over the creature that it visibly cowered when her foot neared the back of its neck, and the strange tentacles had shrunk away from her, so that was where she was going to focus her efforts.

When she was face to face again with C31, Netossa sprinted diagonally towards it, launching herself to the side wall of the corridor and springboarding towards the creature's head. As she flew through the air, she twisted her body around and drew the sword back, slashing hard at a couple of the tentacles. The blade went straight through, severing them and sending the thrashing appendages towards the ground, whilst Netossa reoriented her body to land on her feet behind her opponent. The stumps of the tentacles that remained on the back of C31's neck oozed with green liquid, and the now-static parts of them on the floor also sat in a pool of the stuff.

"What the hell is this thing?" she muttered to herself, jumping just in time to avoid the slash of a sharp clawed hand from the creature. Netossa's attack had clearly done some damage that had weakened, or at least distracted, C31 as it kept bringing a hand to the back of its neck. She took this as a sign that her strategy was working, and made no hesitation in continuing, "Spinny, get its attention and make it come towards you. I promise I won't let it hurt you."

"On it!" Spinnerella took aim with her pistol and fired off several shots at the creature's arm. She knew it would do no damage, that wasn't her intention, and followed it up with a loud yell that got C31's attention firmly on her. It moved towards her, step after thumping step, with pure rage behind its pulsing eyes. She ducked one attack and dodged back from another but was rapidly running out of room to avoid any more swipes of its hand, "Whenever you're ready, Netty, please!"

The sword in Netossa's left hand was joined by a smaller plasma blade in her right, and she ran straight at the creature's rear, jumping and burying the sword into the concrete floor to give her extra leverage to gain enough height to land on C31's shoulder. Her sudden appearance was not welcome, and it tried to swat her away with both its hands and the flailing tentacles, but Netossa remained steady. She took aim at the point on the back of its neck where the tentacles converged upon a small green light and plunged the blade in as far as it would go. C31 roared in pain, throwing Netossa off as it crashed from wall to wall in its struggles.

The dying creature lashed out in all directions, both women narrowly avoiding a hit from its sharp claws, until it finally coming to rest on the floor of the corridor, its last remaining breaths raspy and laboured. The green light of its eyes flickered and faded, giving way to the frightened stare of the man who had once been in control of the body for several seconds before finally yielding to death. A silence fell upon both women, the only sound their rapid breathing as they calmed from their exertion.

"That was…" Spinnerella couldn't find a word that accurately captured the way she felt towards discovering what was really happening. 'Angry' served to cover some of it, but not the void that opened in her stomach when she thought about the families that had been ripped apart by this group, the so-called Disciples. Nor did 'scared' seem correct; she was scared for the innocent people caught up in the evil that was being done in Prime's name but held no fear to face those responsible. If she needed to fight, then fight she would.

"This thing, it's not… It's not human," Netossa looked more closely at the wound as she pulled her blade out and turned it off. Prime had implanted most of his microchips in the back of the neck, but there had been no outward sign beyond a small mark that faded after a week; whatever had been done to C31 had gone beyond simply continuing where Prime had left off. The experiment had left it with strange appendages that met around something akin to a data port on a computer, "It's like it's part machine or something? What did they do to it, Spinny?"

Her wife's arms enveloped her waist, and Spinnerella kissed her cheek before resting her head against Netossa's shoulder, "I don't know, darling. But I promise you we're going to find out, and we're going to stop them doing it to anyone else."