Katrina carried the unconscious Rebel over her shoulder in a fireman's lift or like a sack of potatoes through the door and into the secure area surrounding the north gate, several guns had been trained on her since the moment she arrived as well as the sentry turrets which quietly whirled over head as they tracked from side to side searching for targets.
"What have you got there?" Asked a rather scraggly looking Exile, lifting the end of his machine gun to emphasise his question while looking at the Rebel Katrina carried over her shoulder.
"A Rebel" Katrina asked sarcastically, Marcus came into the moment later his injuries already healed but himself still looking like shit. "We captured it for questioning, we think the Rebels have been attempting to gain access to the Backdoors" She elaborated more.
The Exile frowned, that wasn't particularly good news, why couldn't they ever say they were just torturing a Rebel for the hell of it?, why was it always an event of epic proportions?... okay maybe he was exaggerating. "Jack and Elisa go with them, make sure our guest is shown a nice room" He ordered two of the other guards in the room before waving Katrina and Marcus through.
"Do you want me to carry her?" Asked the guard Katrina assumed was called Jack, she gratefully handed the Rebel over and the guard Exile threw the Rebel over his shoulder with a grunt. "How much does she eat?" He asked complaining to no one in general, his companion Elisa just rolled her eyes, her being use to such complaining made obvious.
Katrina looked over to Marcus. "You'd better head up to the hospital ward otherwise you'll light up every metal detector for the next 20 years" She told him "Best get those bullets out your body, they are such a nuisance otherwise"
Marcus sighed "Right" he said wincing as he could feel the bullets moving around in his body, quite a disturbing sensation and then kissed her. "See you later"
Katrina watched Marcus as he headed down the corridor in the direction of the stairs which would lead one floor to the hospital ward, the hospital ward was located on the first floor beneath the main security checkpoint along with shooting ranges, one of the armouries, training rooms, guard rooms and machine shops because it was easier to bring wounded from the surface straight down into the hospital ward then bringing them all the way through the Den.
She was heading to the prison and interrogation rooms of the Den which where located in the centre of the Den for security reasons meaning that any rescue or escape attempts would have to travel through the entire Den and its automated defence systems making it unlikely that any such attempt would be successful, Lilith had designed her den to be a veritable fortress and was almost impossible to breach, the reasons for such an impressive fortress seemed just a personality quirk that Lilith held and none of the other first one had. After walking through the Den and passing several people who gave them interested looks as it wasn't everyday that you saw someone carrying a Rebel through the Den, they finally arrived at the Den's cell block in which each of the eight rooms doubled for both interrogation and holding prisoners, this was fine because the Den never really held a large number of prisoners, whilst others such as the Merovingian always seemed to have cells full of prisoners, Lilith never really bothered as she considered prisoners a security risk, prisoners were only kept as long as they were useful and then disposed of in whatever manner considered fitting.
The Rebel was dumped into the first available room, which happened to be the first room since all were available, and someone with sufficient interrogation knowledge was called for immediately, as all involved knew they only had a limited amount of time available to retrieve information from the Rebel before her crew mates pulled the plug on her. The Rebel was put in a chair and her hands handcuffed behind her back to the chair making it very difficult for her to move when she finally woke up, she was also given a drug which would promote the telling of information, the process in which information was retrieved from Rebels by Exiles was similar to that of the Agents, so much so that any Agent would understand and feel at home in one of the interrogations. The main objective was to hack the subjects mind and literately making them spill everything they knew, of course the Exiles had several unorthodox tricks up their collective arms which the Agents simply didn't know about or didn't not employ, if the interrogator managed to get the subject to talk freely without having to hack their mind open then all the better.
A serious looking female werewolf with long grey hair, whom was probably in her twenties entered the cell block along with a larger male companion dressed in a dark blue suit and tie, which he adjusted as he walked into the cell containing the Rebel, the two of them paused in front of Katrina, Jack and Elisa.
The grey haired werewolf raised an eyebrow before addressing the group. "We were called here no?" she spoke with a definite oriental accent.
"We called for an interrogator" Katrina answered, neither a statement nor a question.
"Then that would be us" The werewolf confirmed. "My companion here is amongst the best there are" she said nodding to her suited companion besides her.
"You're the Tokyo lot ain't you?" Jack asked curiously "I heard you were in town for the annual meeting"
"Yes, I'm Alyssa and this is Archon" She answered their questions, gesturing to her companion again.
"This is very touching but I was under the impression we had a time limit?" Archon asked sardonically, raising an eyebrow at the group.
Katrina wordless gestured for him to proceed in to the Rebel who was still handcuffed to a large metal chain.
"Charmer isn't he?" Elisa whispered sarcastically and gained a nod or two for her troubles.
Archon sat on the edge on a steel table near to the Rebels chair and poured himself a glass of water which was promptly splashed on the Rebels face awakening her, the Rebel startled searching around the room before beginning to struggle against the handcuffs.
"I'm going to save us a lot of trouble and just say I don't like you and you don't like me" Archon began "And don't bother trying to break free, I doubt the handcuffs will break so I wouldn't waste your strength, you might be needing it."
"Mother fucking program, let me the hell go!" The Rebel demanded still struggling against her bonds.
Archon raised an eyebrow "How about no?" He answered. "Now miss ..." He paused, waiting for the Rebel to fill in.
The Rebel glared at him hatefully "Arsehole" she spat
"Yes well Miss Arsehole, you're in a bit of a situation as of this moment. You have three choices as of now, you rebels seem to like these life changing choices so here you go, First of all you can sit there do nothing, say nothing and die when your crew mates pull the plug on you. Your second choice is somewhat like the first, you try to escape or do anything stupid and you die again, this time by us, you are nothing special, we can merely get another Rebel and another and another until we finally get the information we require." Archon calmly told the rebel, idly brushing down the front of his blue suit before continuing.
"Your third choice is a more interesting proposal, we process the ability to bring you back to the matrix permanently, think of it... a long and healthy life in the lap of luxury or dying on some ratty chair in a cold flying tin can where everyone will forget you existed ten minutes after your death, all you have to do is tell us what your ship is doing." He purposed to her.
"Not going to fucking happen! I wont betray my friends!" The Rebel shouted back defiantly.
Archon took this all in his stride "Really? You wont betray the same friends who are planning to kill you? Who will kill you?" He asked, the rebel seemed somewhat undecided about that and Archon used the chance to continue ahead. "What is so important that it is worth dying for? What could possibly be so great about Zion that so many people reject the matrix?" He asked the Rebel.
"Its Real! Not some fake world made up by the machines!" she answered passionately.
"Is it?" Archon asked rhetorically "How can you tell that the 'Real' world is really real? That it is not merely just another layer of a simulation, designed to trap those who rebelled against the system, yet another prison for human minds to be imprisoned within. If I was the mainframe it's what I would do."
The Rebel was looking extremely uncertain of herself and her position. "Your lying" accused the Rebel but her voice lacked previous conviction.
"Why should I lie when the truth is so much more satisfying?" Archon asked.
The Rebel glared at him some more.
Archon got out a gold watch and began swinging in on its chain like a pendulum "Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock, your times running out Miss Arsehole"
The Rebel sighed "My name is Laverna" She told Archon defeated.
Archon nodded to her "Nice to see you've decided to co-operate miss Laverna"
The Rebel scowled but said nothing seeming rather dejected at the moment, Archon allowed her to sit quietly with her thoughts as her only companions, it was a long while before the Rebel spoke.
"What was that about returning to the Matrix?" She asked finally.
"We have the ability to convert your consciousness straight into digital allowing you to exist without the need for a physical body." Archon explained
Laverna shuddered "So you mean I'll become a program? My body will die?" She asked in horror.
"Well your body is going to die anyway, the moment your crew mates pull them together and realise that we've taken you, I'll imagine they'll pull the plug quite quickly after that" Archon pointed out.
Laverna lapsed into another bout of deep thinking "Whats the catch?" She asked trying to that out.
"Not much really, I don't think I have to tell you to avoid the Agents but besides that, you would be working for this clan under strict observation for quite a time to come" Archon informed her truthfully.
Laverna pursed her lips "Alright... I'm in, but do it quickly... I haven't much time left." She said slightly aggravated.
"Tell me, what is your ship currently researching?" Archon asked probingly.
Laverna paused for a moment in thought "We were working on the usual new weapons, communications, and intelligence gathering software... oh and something about you exiles disappearing. I assume you used the same trick to bring me here?" She asked before pausing "that's what your after isn't it?"
"Questions later, answers now" Archon ordered in a firm voice that made Laverna flinch. "How far have they got?" he asked all business.
Laverna licked her lips "We figured out you used the doors to create some sort of portal which allows you to travel almost instantaneously to another point in the matrix, the code that allowed this however was both hidden to an insane extent within the code of the door and encrypted to the extreme, it was likely if we had not been observing we would have never have noticed it." She told Archon.
Alyssa watched worriedly from the opposite side of the mirrored glass along with Katrina, Jack and Elisa.
"Fuck" She muttered as she listened to the Rebel explain what her crew had been doing whilst in the Matrix.
"That's definitely not a good thing is it?" Asked Jack in general to the universe and to anyone listening, fortunately this time someone was.
"No its not" Alyssa said distractedly, thinking things over her head and not enjoying the conclusions she was coming to. "You guys hold down the fort, I'm going to head off to find Wraith."
They watched a concerned and worried Alyssa march out of the room as if she had a purpose, intent on locating Lilith's second in command, someone far easier to get to than Lilith herself, and inform her of the very rapidly developing problem that was occurring.
"Think this is serious?" Elisa asked Katrina, looking to the much older Exile for experience, wisdom and hopefully reassurance.
Katrina nodded, deep in thought herself. "It won't be the biggest threat that this clan has ever had to deal with but should the information regarding the backdoors be leaked to the Agents, things would turn very bad, very fast." She told the younger Exile, shooting down any of Elisa hope for reassurance.
"Just hope it doesn't happen" Katrina informed them grimly.
Wraith looked around the devastated room, resisting the urge to explode and start throwing objects around the room right there on the spot. Mainly because it just wouldn't help and she was the right hand of Lilith, the person who people were suppose to look up to, responsibility, dignity and all that rot. Sometimes being in positions of power just sucked, she wanted a decent temper tantrum and she wanted one now damnit.
Taking a deep breath she glared at both Pyro and Ember whom stood in front of an incinerated room trying to look as innocent as possible while they both squirmed under her gaze whilst Wraith herself pondered exactly how she would tell Lilith. Sure Lilith would probably take it in good spirit but telling your boss that a rather expensively decorated room had been completely destroyed by two juvenile delinquents was not particularly high on the wish list for any employee. She should have never allowed a show off male pyromaniac and a half-breed dragon girl who finds temperatures below 100 F cold in the same room, it was a recipe for disaster and a disaster which had become one of the TV rooms.
She was about to chew them both the younger Exiles out and condemn them to a life of harsh labour when they were saved undeservingly by a higher deity as Alyssa came into the room looking rather worried. Knowing that nothing except the direst circumstances worried the normally unflappable Alyssa she dismissed the pair of troublemakers with a wide selection of death threats and promises that she would send them to Antarctica for the rest of their natural lives. The last threat actually making Ember look worried and fearful, damn she was going to have to remember the girl's fear of low temperatures before she made such threats, at least she knew that Ember would think twice before attempting such a stunt again.
When the two had scuttled off, well... sprinted would be a better word, Wraith turned to Alyssa, ready to deal with something that was likely to me a much more serious crisis.
"What's going on?" She demanded straight down to business, her eyes searching over Alyssa face looking for any clue what she was about to say, it was times like this that Wraith lamented not having mind reading abilities.
The young grey hair werewolf looked nervous at the sharp tones in Wraiths voice despite the fact that it was often a tone she herself used to her subordinates. "Katrina found something you should see" Alyssa replied, fidgeting nervously.
Wraith frowned; this was unlikely to be good, the last time a vampire had found something it had turned out to be the corpse of a fellow Exile who had been brutally tortured by Rebels for several days before being executed, the memory of which still made her stomach lurch. "Lead on" She ordered to Alyssa, it would best get this over and done with as soon as possible.
Alyssa turned and prepared to leave the room only to stop curiously and kick a piece of charcoal furniture. "What on earth happened here?" she asked with a puzzled voice.
Wraith just rolled her eyes. "You don't want to know."
Ember and Pyro ran down the corridors of the Den eager to use Alyssa's distraction to avoid any punishment that Wraith might have dished out, she probably would have had them doing hard work until they paid off all the damage they had caused. Pyro in particular had become quite sick and tired of custom installing the Den's fire suppressant systems, especially when it was him who had to pay for all the parts. Only after they'd run far enough down the corridors and gone around a few corners did Ember turn around and thwack Pyro one across the head hard enough to make him stagger, Ember despite having an appearance of a 15 year old girl definitely packed quite a punch.
"What the hell was that for?!?" Pyro asked clutching his abused head.
"You're an idiot!" Ember accused glaring at him, her blue eyes narrowing while she put her hands on her hips.
"Huh?" Pyro asked intelligently while Ember rolled her eyes in disgust before turning around and storming off down the corridor.
"What the hell did I do?" Pyro shouted incredulously.
"Hello?!?" Ember turned and shouted at him "You started an inferno!"
"A small one!" Pyro protested "And you said you were cold" he accused.
Reminded of her temperature problem Ember's face became icy as she crossed her sweater covered arms and shivered feeling the cold of the corridor for the first time despite of it being 20 degree's. "You had no need to set anything alight!" She stated as coldly as she felt "Now if you excuse me I'm going to find somewhere warmer"
And with that she walked off down the corridor leaving Pyro staring at her before shaking his head. "Women" He said as if that explained everything and then walked back the other way to his room, hopefully not meeting Wraith until she calmed down.
Marcus walked through the large open doors into the Hospital ward, the ward itself looked like something that had been taken straight out of star trek with the medical beds and consoles aligned along the walls and in the centre of the floor, the information shown on the screens was radically different from anything in star trek as Matrix code scrolled down alongside images of DNA and metabolic rates. The place was also far large than any Medlab in star trek if Marcus remembered correctly with enough room to accommodate 50 people at once easily, possibly two or three times that in an emergency, various Medtechs and doctors walked around the few patients that occupied the beds either looking a PDA's and consoles or using various unidentifiable tools on patients.
A novel patient was a mermaid which was idly swimming in a small pool of water that was held behind either a force field, an invisible wall or was just programmed to stay as a solid containment without spilling out everywhere across the Hospital wards floor, something which would not have endeared her with any of the staff or patients.
The Mermaid under care was a beautiful specimen of her species with a unique black and red tiger pattern down her tail fin, looking to be in her late 20's by human comparison she was flirting with the Medical staff both male and female to an almost outrageous level but it was all taken in good humour.
The various other patients being attended to were a mixture of races and types, most of the bedridden ones were human exiles which were so closely related to humans and lived like them so much that they had caught a various range of diseases, fortunately the Den's medical staff major advantages over human doctors in having hundreds of years knowledge of future treatments and the fact that they could simply edit the code to fix most problems. Injuries such as broken bones were easily sorted by that method allowing the patient to walk out uninjured mere minutes after being admitted to medical, those that where admitted because they had caught an non lethal or dangerous bug or virus were allowed to simply go through the disease normally with drugs to help build their immune systems while those with something nastier had the disease or virus purged from their codes, a dangerous procedure in its own right.
As Marcus looked around the hospital ward, noticing a doctor and a patient who had obviously just been released but still looked somewhat green around the gills, quite literately in this case Marcus realised as he noticed some fluttering at the Exiles neck.
"Now Mr Silver I don't know why you insist on eating the custard in the mess hall, I have personally seen rubber cement that had less effects on the digestive system. No more custard for a month at least, do you understand me?" Ordered the doctor watching the gilled Exile closely, the Exile just nodded under the doctor's scrutiny before moving out of the hospital ward as fast as he could straight for the mess hall.
The doctor just shook his head before turning to look at Marcus. "Hello sir and how may I help you today? Perhaps you'll be one of the limited few around her that will actually heed my advice..." The doctor muttered sarcastically, leading Marcus towards one of the beds.
"So what is your complaint sir?" The doctor asked as he got down to work.
"Complaints?" Marcus asked confused try to work what doctor was on about.
The doctor sighed "You try to be civilized..." He muttered to himself before focusing back on Marcus "What is wrong with you?" He asked again, this time fair more simply.
"Oh.. I've got bullets stuck inside my chest" Marcus told him
The doctor raised an eyebrow. "Bullets inside your chest?" he asked theoretically as he pulled out his PDA from his pocket and tapped it a few times. "You vampires always come in with the weirdest conditions" He commented idly.
"Do things like this happen often?" Marcus asked curiously.
The doctor pursed his lips thoughtfully "With Werewolves and vampires yes because they often survive injuries that would kill a lesser Exile, unfortunately the debris and shrapnel often finds itself imbedded in their bodies" He chatted Idly while arranging a tray of sharp instruments. "You'd be amazed at some of the things we pull out of their bodies... Now what was your name sir?"
"Marcus why?" he asked curiously.
The doctor shrugged "I'm Dr Woodhall but you can call me James, I just thought since I'd be slicing you up that we might as well know each others names" he replied conversationally picking up his PDA the pressed the screen several times and Marcus felt his code shift disturbingly.
"What was that?" Marcus asked, wondering what on earth the doctor was doing.
"Oh.. I just deactivated you pain subroutines for a few minutes, makes digging the bullets out that much more pleasant" Dr Woodhall answered. "Don't worry they'll reboot after a few minutes, now take your shirt off and lie back on the bed" He ordered.
Marcus pulled his already ruined shirt off and lay down on the table.
"So where are you from?" Dr Woodhall asked as he began the first incision and began the task of removing the bullets from Marcus's body.
Marcus frowned "Here" he answered confused
Dr Woodhall shrugged "One of Alyssa's werewolves was in here earlier, rather unpleasant situation for him it was but he was from over in Tokyo. I find it fascinating how Exiles can say they're from the other side of the world and have travelled here in a few minutes, really gives you an idea how small the world is these days." He chatted socially whilst one and two bullets were pulled out of Marcus's body and dropped into a kidney dish by the side of the bed.
Marcus looked around the ward before a question came to his mind. "How many staff does this place have?" He asked curiously watching the various staff members moving from place to place whilst he tried to ignore the doctor digging in his chest.
The doctor removed another bullet before answering. "10 doctors, 7 male, 3 female and always three on a shift at anyone time. Medtechs?" He paused in thought.
"There's somewhere between 35 to 50 I think, but since they handle the code side of things mostly and all the really techy stuff, they are often drifting between different departments like Research or Engineering. There's usually ten or more on a shift at once but their numbers jump around a lot, I think there has to be at least one for each doctor on shift... not entirely sure... that answer your question?" He asked.
Marcus nodded and the doctor removed yet another bullet, putting it in the kidney dish.
A young Exile came into the Hospital ward and whistled. "Cool, this place is just like star trek" He said in awe, taking a look around at the place.
"More like theme hospital" piped up a Medtech as she passed the exile and gave her PDA to the female doctor that was currently attending the Mermaid, she gave her a disapproving look while the Mermaid obviously amused by the comment smiled and swam over to the edge of her pool, leaning on a seemingly invisible wall before engaging the Medtech in a conversation that involved giggling every few moments.
The single female doctor was tending the Mermaid because she was supposed to be immune to the Mermaids flirting and suggestions, that was the plan however one had to give the Mermaid bonus points for effort and she seemed to be rubbing off on some of the Medtechs, not literately since she was stuck in a pool of water but rubbing off nevertheless.
Dr Woodhall placed the last bullet and bloodied tweezers down in a kidney dish before moving to wash his hands at a sink that was present at the side of each bed. "You're done" He told Marcus. "Normally I'd stitch you up but you Vampires heal so damn fast there really is no point, just give it a few minutes to heal and don't drip blood on the floor."
The good doctor then turned face the young Exile who had came in moments previous. "What now? The bubonic plague? Ebola? Syphilis?" He muttered in a tone so sarcastic it could strip paint off walls before smiling brightly at the Exile. "How may I help you?" He asked in that bright happy way that can only be faked.
Marcus tuned the doctor and his new patient out, sitting up on the bed and cautiously poking the injury which was healing rapidly on its own; he grabbed his ruined shirt and used it to wipe the blood off before standing up off the bed. The injury had healed enough that it was not bleeding anymore, so Marcus decided now was as good as any to perform an escape so he got up and walked out of the ward, tossing his ruined shirt in the bin on his way out.