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2577, December 14.

Location : Planet Kyasumeni

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Having little else to do to stave off the pain of his busted vitals, 921-Y leaned against the window and tried to enjoy the scenery. He knew that to many a human, it would be beautiful : a soft breeze plucked flares of mist from the rainforest and untainted atmosphere allowed all starlight, creating a paradise that Earth once had been. He couldn't find the appeal, though. He wasn't advanced enough, despite the cognitive upgrades the Auton had performed on him.

He could enjoy symmetry, though. He failed the same cognitive liberty, and this planet had failed to be the monument humans had meant it as. Or rather, a commercial stunt meant to look like grand progress. At first it had been a success, using certain plants from the Mesozoic Era of Earth proved to be perfect on the volcano ridden planet, transforming it from rough dead land into teeming wilderness in little time.

Plants require wildlife to maintain it though, so they put down the right wildlife ... as close as they could get. The InGen products were chimeras engineered as attractions, and not quite typical animals. They'd made the planet useless, and when the Big Deletions happened nary manageable. It'd been forgotten by the public, and what few of the government knew about it had no interest. On paper, it'd been sold to an alien species of sentient worms and it was off their hands.

The Auton that had been in hiding had absolutely no objections with that, since said worms were more interested in hiring them as janitors than in wiping them out. And to him, joining the Auton had been a similar case of convenience. They needed someone with a compatible modem system.

A long dinosaur neck raised over the canopy when the ship descended into the jungle, where its cloak flickered off. The animal startled, and for a moment they looked in each other's eyes. He might've called it a great beast, but they were in the shadow of a gigantic plateau. Knowing what was inside didn't help any attempt to be impressed with the complexity of life.

The rock wall ahead opened up, letting the ship pass. The hangar was dark still, but lights flickered on in the distance and outlined the robotic arms that reached for the ship. These pulled the vessel smoothly into a hanging dock, aside of the five other Auton vessels.

In utter silence, the top hatch opened and a few familiar Auton dropped into the cockpit.

"If not the inner doors, can we at least get some lights in here?" Persephone called.

"It'll take a while." Someone tossed in a few lamps instead. Persephone took one and leaned in on Y-921.

"You look terrible," she said. "I take it did not go perfect."

He shook his head. "Not perfect in execution, but if we count the goals, it was."

A vibrant smile broke on her lively brown face, more than he could ever manage. She pulled him onto a chair and checked for his vitals, speaking all the while.

"The hosts, chimera and bomb? Excellent. How's the chimera behaving?"

"She's like Kirindi, completely docile unless you attack her. She's helped protect us, though ... she's kinda big and bleeding, so don't bump into her."

"No problem. Mitt, Aulos, go fetch the tubes and let the others know the new chimera won't be a problem. Acrariel, your modem's busted, but I think we can salvage your new memories down at the mainframe."

Shit. They'd find out about the drone.

"Is something the matter?"

"Eh, yes. I remember I had something else to stored. Two humans remained awake, they escaped together with us. They're still awake."

"That's all? Don't worry about that, the whole don't let humans walk free is a guideline, not a law."

She helped him walked to the hatch and held him up, where another pulled him out.

They sat him down carefully, and he got a good look at the scorch marks on the ship. Wormhole technology didn't work as well with their own machines as they did with the owners. The metal had warped and melded together, giving him the answer as to why nobody had come through the door.

To the side of the vessel, a group of Auton had brought a machine to melt open the hatch. Said machine was on their one big hovercraft, and the others ones had all been occupied. Some had been rented out, and Anudjan with his assistants had taken the other two because the city supervisor had called in for fresh negotiations. That didn't sound good. The supervisor and his kin were telepathic, they might have known what was coming.

When the ramp finally fell, the workers cheered, but that stopped when she stepped ahead.

All the Auton backed off. Persephone's took a step back, almost like afraid. Maybe she could really feel that. "You brought a queen here."

The security forces raised their weapons while the others backed away, allowing them to form a line around the perceived threat.

"Don't attack her, please. I checked her files, she cannot breed, doesn't build hives and doesn't drive people insane unless told to. The man she's been attached to before isn't her commander anymore, Kirindi now is."

Persephone stayed silent, and the guards waited for her command.

The queen chimera dropped her face from below her corona and looked around. In the weak morning light, all faces were ghastly like hers.

"She can kill us all, but she won't," Y-921 said. "She's no more a xenomorph than we are humans."

When she took her first step, she slipped off the ramp. All her weight collapsed against the dock, which left her screaming. New scraps let her acid blood out and the Auton swarmed away to avoid the splatters.

Kirindi shot from the ship, all concern for her sister. As well as her small frame could, she helped her sister push herself back on her feet.

The human who stepped out next was rather mundane compared to them, and had more eyes for the synthetics than for chimeras.

"Woah, these are all Auton?" he asked. He took a few steps down the ramp and spotted Y-921 on top of the ship. "Damn, man. I thought you were a small rebel group. There here looks pretty big for eh ... a peace operation."

"What of it?" Persephone asked, her voice sharp in contrast to the gentle tone from before.

Jake held up his hands, apologetic. "Didn't mean to imply anything ... oh, who am I kidding. You guys planted a bomb. Yeah, this looks pretty iffy. What are you gonna do with those girls?"

Oh, right. Human attachments. Persephone softened a little at that last part.

"They are free to go," she said. "However, you and the other humans have to stay. For now."

She ordered the machine off the hovercraft and claimed it to transport Y-921. She also gave orders to break out one of the supersized hovercrafts that only fit through the wide halls, they had to get the queen chimera off the dock as soon as possible. A few walls might have to be broken down to get her into the cargo hall, where she could bleed on the rock and be treated safely.

The human hosts would be checked up on and operated if necessary, preferably on the other end of the base, far from the queen chimera.

These orders given, Persephone put Y-921, Jake and Shadhahvar on a hovercraft and flew them to the headquarters. Jake had spent most of his time keeping Shadhahvar from touching things, but Persephone handed her a phone that kept her busy.

Now he had a moment to talk, he asked, "Who's the he that everyone's so nervous about? The guy that adopted Kirindi?"

"Yes. He didn't exactly agree to Kirindi going on this mission, but we talked her into it on verbal technicalities. She doesn't like to disobey him, but he said they wouldn't go, not that she alone wouldn't go. And, well, she wanted her sister at her side. We could use her help on this, so ... he's an asshole, but I get his trepidation on bringing in her sister," Persephone said, not even veiling her disgusted tone. "Kirindi might look cute, but below that skin she's all xenomorph. He's not the only one anxious on what might happen if the monster becomes dominant."

"She's all ... really? Huh. There have been some fools who thought they could tame xenos by mixing in other species, but that didn't work," Jake said. "So this guy tamed her? Something?"

"Raised her. Maybe that's the difference. It certainly is for the people who own this place. They'd never allow a full out xenomorph here, but they tolerate her because of how she thinks ... for now. Let's hope that lasts."

It wouldn't, once they knew Odygos. They hadn't really thought this through, not far enough.

Erasing his memory wasn't as easy as emptying a folder, if he purged everything he'd have to go on standby, and he'd been too damaged to do that properly. He ran on reserves, he'd have to ... oh well. He didn't have anything other useful to do anyway. Maybe he'd come out different once rebooted.

He looked for excuses, and found one easily : the dense woman that sat right behind him, with Jake not paying enough attention as he talked to Persephone.

Absentminded, she kicked her legs against the seat as she focused on playing some game. "Would you mind not doing that?"

"Huh? What?" When she looked up, she missed her next turn. "Aww, now I lost!"

She kicked the chair hard. Not hard enough to cause real damage, but he jerked forward anyway. In the motion, he overloaded his memory space, burning it to a crisp.

His eyes flickered, followed by nothing.

When he opened his eyes, there was ... a cave? A Middle Eastern woman leaned over him, presumably a synthetic if the white hair was an indication. This was not one of the people in his database ... why was his database empty?

"There, better. Acrariel, what happened?"

"What happened?" he asked. "You tell me ... where am I?"

"Dammit, Shadhahvar!"

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"~ Odygos, why are you hurt? Will it be a problem? ~"

The concept of names was strange to him, pointless but now relevant because the sisters kept using it for him.

He should be a one body unit, not an individual. Maybe they'd call future drones Odygos as well? No, they said, because those would not be guides.

"~Odygos!~"

This time she didn't add other words, just concepts and feelings : curiosity at his state, and concern.

He gave them the basics of being outside, along with the orincubix whole. Mostly. To avoid detection as the vessel entered the plateau's space, he had lifted along outside the vessel and thrown himself off. The landing had been rough. That was all. They could stop asking and sending those weird feelings now. He couldn't do anything with the latter.

He could use directions, though. The orincubix contained the embryo for the warrior to guard the two sisters. It needed the best host available.

Kirindi worried about another secret, but she was a little excited too, and so she sent him a visual and a concept of the dinosaurs she liked best.

It wasn't about her liking, but since the reason she liked them made them suitable, he obliged.

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Being questioned by authorities was a staple in Jake's life, though it usually wasn't done by his doctor. He had practice leaving out fine details, but the typical derailment tactics didn't really work on synthetics and their logical minds. So, he took to implying things were fuzzy due to dalnauri.

"Like, this stuff kept me awake despite whatever they used to put us under. I don't know what else it does or how it interacts with ... look, I don't know. It was dark a lot."

The gynoid nodded in expert knowing doctor style; she'd definitely been made for this.

"How is Kirindi and her sister now?" said Jake, trying to shift the subject of conversation.

"We don't know yet," the doctor said.

"Still in treatment?"

"Sir, are you hiding something? See, you are held by the Auton, enemy of the Nations, and not once did you ask for your own fate."

Crap. She held his wrist and would notice his increase in heartrate if he lied.

Shadhahvar leaned around the corner and said, "I can hear you, buddy! You stole my dalnauri and now he doesn't want to admit he can't handle the strong stuff."

The gynoid gave her a flat look. "Do you have any samples of this dalnauri for me to test?"

Shadhahvar pouted and shook her head.

The doctor trying to tend to her stepped around the corner and said, "Whatever it is, it's messing up the blood samples. How's yours going?"

"I haven't gotten to the samples yet, he has several internal bleedings. I meant to tend t—"

A deafening crash accompanied a rain of splinters. Jake ducked on reflex.

When he looked up, it was right at the metal bar that pinned his doctor to the wall.

The opposite window had been smashed, but nothing moved behind it. Careful, Jake stood up, ready to dive.

The other Auton didn't have a sense for safety and ran to his companion. One hand against her shoulder to keep her from falling forward, he pulled out the metal rod.

A human would have died from being impaled one side to another, but she managed to stand, albeit in clear pain.

"What was that?" Shadhahvar asked.

"Kirindi's adoptive father came by, I believe," said the gynoid as if it was the most normal thing in the world. "He is predictably in a foul mood. Don't mind it."

Jake's mouth dropped a little. "Don't mind it? If you had been a real human, you would have been dead!"

The doctor raised his hand in a soothing matter. "He knows we are synthetics and—"

"I can't believe a man like that raised someone like Kirindi! Piercing random people to vent is not normal behavior!"

"He doesn't think we're people."

Down the hall, someone screamed.

"Give me a weapon and I'll deal with it. Trust me, I'm trained for this kind of thing."

"Trust us when we say you're not," the other doctor said.

"Never mind," he said through gritted teeth. Picked up the rod, he went for the door. Careful, Jake opened the door and peered out with on eye, but another far cry told him the enemy was further away.

"Don't go after him! This is too scary!" Shadhahvar whispered. "You won't get paid for this, Jake!"

"Then you can stay here." To make sure she did, he closed the door and wrenched it shut with a nearby chair.

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Anudjan made his way down the corridor to where he was told the yautja had gone. Karga'te attacked anyone on the way, so when he opened the door to the corridor where he'd passed he prepared for blades through the gut.

Instead, he collided with a human who burst from the medic's room. Anudjan stumbled aside.

"Sorry," the man said, hands out to steady him as one would a fragile human.

Anudjan had the look of an elderly man, in particular one from South Africa clad in modernized traditional clothing. Not the typical image of an android, who were largely European featured and in standard clothes, so it didn't surprise him the human expected an actual elder.

"I am alright," Anudjan said. "What would you be doing here, mister Jake?"

He gestured at the massacre around them. "Find myself a weapon and do something about who ever did that."

Anudjan put a hand on his shoulder, trying to calm down the human. "Do not worry too much, none of them are dead. If you wish to assist, all you need to do is not give us any trouble. Someone will arrive soon and escort you to a room."

"But—"

"You misunderstand the situation. We cannot let a human run around in our base when we have no reason to assume you are pro-synthetic in any way." To cement that, he swiftly snatched the rod the man carried. "No time for foolish heroics, sir."

It seemed to sink in that he wasn't facing another wayward human.

The man's shoulders dropped. "I see. Just, ... are they going to be okay? The girls?"

Ah, attachment. Either aftereffects of being in her hivemind, or he might be an acceptable human. That was for later, though.

Anudjan went on, carefully making his way through the halls and occasionally stopping to promise the attacker help was on the way. He might have stopped to help, but the immediate issue was getting Karga'te to stop wandering around here. That done, all would be well. Considering everything that had gone wrong, the mission had turned out remarkably well. The angry foster parent thing was a mere blip on the radar, really.

He found him in the antechamber to the docks, where he had circled into from the hangar's main inner exit. By now, he'd stopped, or he'd heard Anudjan come and waited.

Leaning back against a table, Karga'te stared right at him. His claws ticked on the board and he wiped some white fleck off his face.

"Karga'te, was this all necessary?"

"If you want me less pissed off before I walked into your arsenal, yes," he snarled.

"I suppose we should be grateful you have not been making a habit of this for the duration of your daughter's absence."

"Maybe I will make a habit out of it, now that there's a prickly hardmeat queen leaking into my mind."

That hadn't occurred to him as a possible risk. Karga'te's temper was usually foul, at least when the Auton were concerned, but he didn't kill at random. His eyes rested on the twitching pieces of his kin, was this vengeance or psychic madness?

Why of all things had the chimera girl chosen a badblood yautja for a father? Why couldn't it have been a nice, quiet little alien with no lifelong training in murder?

"Do you feel like continuing to the arsenal, or shall I lead you to Kirindi now? She and her sister are in the sick bay."

"I know that," he said. "I want to know why."

As if he needed to be told that, Kirindi probably had already informed him of her injuries and its treatment. The yautja really asked him why Anudjan had talked her into this mission.

"It was useful, she was there, it gave us a cover. Unlike the other Enigma stations, this one has a binary operating system, there was no way to get aboard without leaving traces. We might as well make a splash."

"Really? The one where Kirindi's sister is just happens to have that?"

"The one where Kirindi's sister is holds, well, Kirindi's sister and a multitude of other psychic entities with a penchant for driving humans insane. The other stations handle different things."

Karga'te crossed his arms. "Convenient."

An uncomfortable silence hung between them; Anudjan let it be.

"So where is the sick bay anyway?"

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Kirindi wasn't keen on hiding things from her father. For a little while, as long as it took for the Auton to say they had a way to find her sister and get aboard, it had been okay. She hadn't planned on bringing back pure hardmeat. Telling Karga'te would be right because he was her parent and she should be honest and he deserved that, but he would kill them or at least get in the way of helping Odygos's Mother. So not telling him was also a form of doing the right thing.

She liked Odygos, so she chose to be silent.

Right could be tricky, and the worst part was the ease with which she could choose to hide them. She felt like a traitor, but that feeling didn't make her spill the truth.

Her sister didn't understand, to her Karga'te was nothing yet. No father. She understood the concept of treachery, but didn't get how it applied to Kirindi; to her that was embodied din Jonah, whom she didn't want to think about. All her mind was on getting out of here.

"What's wrong?" asked the Auton working on her arm; peeling off a damaged skin layer to weld a cut below. "Does it hurt?"

It did, but that wasn't the reason for the sadness on her face.

"Just sad. Sister is so afraid here," she whispered. No lie, it reminded her sister of the laboratories.

That got an odd look from the Auton. Considering that they had ladders and crude tools to tend to her, rather than giant jars and robot arms, it must have sounded like an unfit comparison.

"It's the halls and machines and magnetic fields," Kirindi said.

And that's all her sister noticed beyond Kirindi.

Karga'te came their way and Kirindi had to press down the urge to rush out and meet him, her sister couldn't care less. It confused her, how could her sister care for her, but not care for what she found so important?

Her sister noticed that and now she tried to understand. Questions like this hadn't ever been put before her, she only felt what she felt.

When she turned the question back Kirindi, it explained some. Why didn't Kirindi fear this area? Simple, she knew it wasn't dangerous, and so Kirindi sent her the reasons. Similarity wasn't a threat, but Karga'te was similar in that he was family.

"Done," the Auton said, patting her softly on the freshly bandaged arm. Metal clasps held alkali bandages in place, improvised but durable.

"You, please go meet that hunter before he wrecks other people," one of the Auton at the door called to her, while backing away from said door.

Kirindi lingered, her sister hated the idea she'd leave her alone, but ... come on, it was only for a little while and not far away. She'd come right back. She'd been able to be away from Karga'te too, right?

Away from him, that was a first in her short life.

She bolted out of the makeshift sickbay as well as her pained legs could carry her. Turning a few corners, there was her father. He clattered his mandibles and said a telepathic hello tinted with anger, which she answered with a happy, loud shriek. He stopped walking and pushed Anudjan to the side, making room for the inevitable glomp.

Jumping up, she twisted around him almost like a facehugger.

"I'm home," she said, softly pushing her check against his.

Whatever rant he'd prepared at her departure flickered away with his anger. She did not feel regret, but she offered a humble apology, more soothing than acknowledgement of error.

"I noticed."

He never hugged her back, but he didn't push her away either like he had done years ago.

Kirindi climbed up on his shoulders, concentrating on his happiness rather than the irritation he still felt. Twisting her tail around his torso for extra balance, she decided she'd stay here for a while.

"Kirindi..." he said.

"Yes?"

What had happened, had happened. A promise not to do it again would be useful, because she had only one sister. He'd have done the same regardless of any rules, right?

He didn't answer that, only laid out that it should have been a safer plan, not of Auton making. Machines shouldn't be trusted so easily.

"... so where's the new kid?"

Anudjan gestured for them to follow and opened the door before them. With Kirindi still on his shoulders, Karga'te followed.

His brisk pace slowed down when he saw her, till he froze up.

Oh, he'd expected another humanoid like herself. When Kirindi communicated with him, she relayed emotions, opinions and other states of being. Physical attributes rarely mattered and full out images he wasn't the best in receiving.

"This ... please tell me this is not a queen."

"I could tell you but it would be a lie," Anudjan said. "So, what do you think of your new family member? It's probably best if you keep her in the city, because I don't think you can keep her traceless in the wilderness and there sometimes are yautja coming to this planet. Maybe you should take that job that the city's supervisor offered you, you'd get plenty of money to buy a house ..."

Karga'te kicked him over.

Her sister looked up now, causing the gynoid who'd been tending to her shoulder to tumble off. Pushing her face from below her crest, she took her first look at Karga'te. The vaguest sense of contentment about him grew; she'd recognized he didn't like machines.

Karga'te stepped before her face, wondering where the hardmeat ended and the human began.

Kirindi climbed onto her crest and quietly said there was no border. Didn't he knew that already? Her sister echoed that.

With a chuckle, he laid his hand on the queen chimera's head, right where Kirindi would rest her forehead for comfort.

"Welcome to the intergalactic garbage dump, Ti'chai-di."

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