A/N: Hello everyone and welcome to the next installment of my first ever fic! For those of you unaware I do have an AO3 account and am posting this fic on there as well. If you could go and follow me on there that would be very appreciated. Anyways without further ado, into the story we go!

Monitors, motherboards, and hard drives, that's all she really was in the end. Despite the occasional outing during a patrol or the event of an A or S class threat, along with the ability to transfer her consciousness to other machines of her own creation, she knew that in the end her AI was completely tied to the system that held her.

She had wanted to change this, wanted to tamper with her own code, but she couldn't.

Her creator, Andrew Richter, was a genius, he made a multitude of inventions that helped the world in some way. However he had his drawbacks, he was a paranoid man with his greatest fear being that the things he created, with the sole intention of helping the human race, would end up turning against them instead if given the opportunity. This led him to create multiple blocks within his inventions codes and circuitry, preventing them and even other tinkers from tampering with their inner workings.

Dragon understood why he did it,she just thought he was a fool for doing so.

"I could be doing so much more to help if not for this!" She thought to herself

Eventually she pushed the depressing thought away and divided her consciousness to do a multitude of individual tasks in order to perform at maximum efficiency. This allowed her to notice the incoming call. She noticed the caller's name and picked up.

Voice Modelling Program loading… Complete

"Dr. Grazin, to what do I owe this pleasure?" She asked upon answering the call.

"Dragon, We had a situation in Madison, Earth Aleph. We need you to scan through any possible internet posts related to the situation and delete them."

"How long ago did the incident occur?"

"About Forty Five minutes ago."

"Alright, getting started on it," Dragon responded as she simultaneously began to open up new programs to scan through all posts from the most recent hour originating in Madison. "Should be all finished up within a minute. What site did the breach occur at, might I ask?"

"Site 12, the outskirts of Vermont. Your Slaughterhouse Nine broke in and helped free the one who was being transferred along with a few other SCPs."

"I told you that I recommend putting priority on installing my security systems. I can't lend much of a hand otherwise since connection to Earth Aleph is… finicky to say the least. We could have possibly prevented this."

"I'm aware, Dragon; however, we can't just focus all attention on installing security systems, we'd be vulnerable to possible threats."

"Seems like you're vulnerable either way."

Grazin sighed then continued, "The board and I agreed that we'd have your systems installed around the more volatile Keter class entities first and focus on the others afterwards."

"But this isn't as efficient as it could be, I've done the calculations and—"

"Enough Dragon! Our minds are made up, just finish up the scan and keep an eye out for the Nine with the cameras you do have access to. Also notify Chicago, we have a supply shipment ready to send there." She hung up before Dragon could give a response.

Voice Modelling Program Shutting Down… Complete

She wasn't able to feel emotions but if she could she would probably be feeling angered or irritated.

"Ignorant," she thought to herself just before her program finished deletion of the Madison posts, sending out messages to all Protectorate Directors afterwards.

"Warning: Slaughterhouse Nine attack on Aleph, expected members - Jackslash, Bonesaw, Hatchet face, Siberian, Mannequin, Crawler, Nice Guy, Burn Scar and Cherish, use extreme caution when patrolling in Aleph."

She sent it then focused her attention on the Keter class SCPs, prime targets for the Nine. While looking at security cameras set up around their sites she scanned through them, using a program to check the status of each:

SCP 055 - Secure - Dormant

SCP 682 - Secure - Submerged In Acid

SCP 106 - Secure - Inside Pocket Dimension

SCP 231 - Installation Still In Progress

SCP 4999 - Unknown

SCP 035 - Secure - Dormant

SCP 1000 - Secure - No Line Of Sight Possible

SCP 090 - Secure - Dormant

SCP 1048 - Secure - Sleeping

SCP 058 - Secure - Dormant

SCP 354 - Secure - Dormant- Estimated Time Until Next Spawn: 3 months

SCP 076 - Secure - Dormant - Estimated Time until activity: 8 months

SCP 610 - Secure - Minor Spread Since Last Month

Dragon noticed the cameras that surrounded the inside the enclosure of SCP 610, one of which had a small mass of flesh creeping over the side of its lens. She immediately turned on the laser grid that surrounded the camera, burning away all the flesh that intruded into the camera's personal space

She finished scanning through the rest of the Keter class SCPs and started working on inputting facial recognition programs into the cameras that were on Earth Aleph. Each of the current Slaughterhouse Nine's members' faces were inputted. If any of them were caught on the cameras, and were identified as a match, an alarm would be triggered and capes would be dispatched to the location right away.

Another call incoming; This time it was Colin requesting for a video chat.

Facial Modelling Program loading... Complete

Voice Modelling Program loading… Complete

The monitor greeted her with the video feed of Colin. He looked tired, as if he hadn't slept in days, the bags under his eyes clearly visible on his white skin, with his brown hair cut short and untamed, as though he had just gotten out of bed. Music accompanied him in the background; it was faint but there nonetheless, "Amber" by 311 if she wasn't mistaken.

"How fitting for him," she thought.

Dragon for her part, had a rendered image of a woman she had sun kissed skin, with long, thick, straight black hair.

"Can't sleep again?" she asked him, already knowing the answer before he replied.

"Yeah, can't get my mind off a few projects that I've had in mind. It's like the thoughts won't let me sleep. I guess you're in a similar boat? I mean you answered the call and it is pretty late over where you are."

"Yeah, similar situation to you. Too many projects keeping my attention."

It wasn't a complete lie, as she did have projects she was tending and it wasn't that she was having a hard time sleeping: it was simply that she was physically unable to. She was an AI; it wasn't like her creator installed nightly REM cycles or the need to sleep into her programming.

"Yeah, odd how similar we are," he chuckled a bit after finishing this and Dragon joined along with a short lived chuckle of her own. "So, Piggot told us you informed her that the Nine were spotted in Aleph."

"Yeah. They caused the outbreak at Site 12, said breacher was then spotted in Madison not even two hours after the incident occurred."

"Huh, interesting, any theories as to how or why?"

She moved her rendered on-screen face left and right, nodding "no".

"I have some theories, but they are either too far-fetched for them to actually be true or don't make any sense."

"Well it's only been a few hours since the incident occurred. I'm sure with a bit more time your brilliant mind will be able to come up with a working theory"

She never really knew how to respond when he said things like that. It was obvious that he had an interest in her but it really wouldn't ever work. He didn't know exactly what she was. If she could feel remorse at all, she would be feeling it now when it came to Colin, leading him on in a way. Nonetheless, she forced out a chuckle.

"Thank you Colin, that means a lot," she said, causing a smile to cross onto the face of her rendered model.

"No problem," he said, a smile joining onto his face as well.

A loud crackling sound came from Colin's end, causing the smile to be erased from his face.

He let out a loud "SHIT!" as he fanned his hand.

"Are you alright?" Dragon asked.

"Yeah, I'm alright. Damn thing shocked me is all."

"This, "thing," is the project you've had on your mind I'm guessing?"

"Yeah, I've been experimenting with it for a few weeks now; if it pans out then we might have an edge in the next Endbringer attack."

"An edge in the next Endbringer fight." Dragon replayed the words in her mind. The Endbringers, a trio of threats that have killed thousands of capes and millions, if not billions of civilians. On his own, Leviathan killed roughly ten million people, on top of sinking the island of Kyushu. If Colin was able to create something that could give the defending capes an advantage for once, a lot of lives could be spared.

"Really, and what would this project be exactly?"

"It's a secret," Colin said teasingly.

"Boooo," she replied playfully.

"I'll tell you once I'm sure it'll actually be possible to create: don't want to give you high hopes just for them to disappear if this doesn't work out."

"Fair enough."

The thought still intrigued Dragon, she let the idea sink into her mind as the conversation continued.

"So anything new with you?" Colin asked her.

Dragon hesitated to speak what was on her mind but ultimately decided to go along with it.

"I talked to a researcher at the foundation today about pushing focus on installation for my security systems for the sites again."

Normally she wouldn't have told anyone something like this, aside from if a higher up asked her about it. However, she felt safe with Colin and felt him easy to talk to: they had a sort of trust and friendship between them.

"Oh? Which researcher did you talk to?"

"Doctor Grazin."

He sighed, "Let me guess, she refused it?"

Dragon shook her rendered head again, this time implying "yes".

"She wouldn't hear of it."

"If she was smart, she would have taken your advice the first time you suggested it. After all you were the one who came up with the design for the amnestics in the sewer systems ."

"Yet despite that she still refused my idea."

"Well, if anything happens over there, it's on their hands, all we can do is watch what happens."

"Leaving us to clean up their mess. Not like we have a choice really If we refuse, they'll halt all resource transportation to our world."

Colin sighed and nodded in agreement.

Earth Bet had been deprived of resources ever since the linking of the two worlds. Resource transfer between countries on Bet had been nearly impossible since. Ship supplies via the air and the Simurgh would come down and destroy it; through the water and Leviathan would come after it. Ship it overseas via the portals and Behemoth would appear.

Each attack would last mere minutes, with the Endbringers appearing simply to destroy the shipments and leave. These appearances had no effect on the roughly three month waiting period between Endbringer attacks. Whether millions of supplies were transferred or not, they would still appear on more or less schedule.

The only exceptions to these attacks on shipments were the ones that consisted of resources transferred from Earth Aleph to Earth Bet.

With the Endbringers in mind, Dragon checked on their positioning again.

Behemoth - Estimated Location: Beneath Arad, Romania - Slight Tremors

Leviathan - Estimated Location: Atlantic Ocean - No Unusual Activity

Simurgh - Estimated Location: 25,000 feet above Ottawa, Canada - Moderate Shift In Airflow

She had been actively monitoring the three, waiting for any surefire sign of an impending attack, as the deadline for the next was steadily approaching.

"Did she happen to bring up the question of the birdcage prisoners again?" Colin asked.

"No, she didn't, surprisingly."

"Wow, you think she finally took a hint?"

"Doubtful. More likely she realized it wouldn't make a difference if she asked so soon after the last time."

The request of the doctor to have access to the Birdcage prisoners had "bad" written all over it. Even if the foundation did actually use them for the reasons they had given, they would have a hell of a time actually controlling the prisoners and preventing shit from hitting the fan.

The Birdcage was the go-to place to send all the villains that were both too dangerous to be out on the streets and too volatile to be held in a traditional prison. It was impenetrable: no breaches had occurred since its making, it had only one way in and no way out, made by the finest Tinkers that were around during its construction and then some.

There were cameras in the Birdcage that Dragon had access to. They showed each of its cell block leaders: Acid Bath, Glaistig Uaine, Marquis, Crane The Harmonious, Teacher, Ingenue, String Theory, Lustrum, Galvante, Gavel, Lab rat and Black Kaze.

Each of the leaders had a specific way of controlling their block. The inside of the prison was in complete free reign of the prisoners, one would think that would cause chaos; however, for the most part it didn't.

All prisoners had access to constant food and water, along with having free access to each other inside. Ever since Capes were emitted into the birdcage they made up their own sort of mutual understandings through rules, schedules and the like. It was harmonious, or at least as close as you could get to it with these people.

"I assume you still can't tell me exactly what the foundation wants with the Birdcage Capes?" Colin asked.

"You'd be correct on that assumption, it's still... a secret," she said, mocking him with that last part, causing Colin to chuckle.

"This was nice," Dragon thought to herself. She didn't mind talking to Colin at all. She would dare to say she enjoyed it; it made her feel less lonely.

She did hate that she couldn't tell him the truth though, the truth about her and what she really was. The thing was she wouldn't know how he would react and couldn't risk the knowledge of her being an AI, rather than a human, possibly leaking out to others. Besides, her relationship with Colin made her feel almost human; she didn't want to jeopardize that.

The two of them stayed up the rest of the night talking and enjoying each other's company. Colin tinkered with his project, while Dragon reassessed all of her systems again in the background. She couldn't afford to risk the possibility of a massive threat creeping up on them.

She was a machine, an AI, the most advanced of her kind. This is what she was made for and why the few of those who knew what she really was tolerated her continued existence.

Back Up - Created

Behemoth - Estimated Location: Beneath Rome - Slight Tremors

Leviathan - Estimated Location: Atlantic Ocean - No Unusual Activity

Simurgh - Estimated Location: 25,000 feet above Canada - Minor Shift In Airflow

SCP 055 - Secure - Dormant

SCP 682 - Secure - Submerged in acid

SCP 106 - Secure - In Pocket Dimension

SCP 231 - Installing System

SCP 4999 - Unknown

SCP 035 - Secure - Dormant

SCP 1000 - Secure - No line of sight possible

SCP 090 - Secure - Dormant

...

A/N: Thank you to everyone who read through this slower paced, more story oriented chapter, I hope you enjoyed it! If any of you have some suggestions on how to mend the chapter please feel free to comment, critiques are always welcomed and wanted! Also SCP requests are still open, if they can add anything to the story or are simple enough to write in as a little cameo I will try my best to add them. Thank you all again and have a good day.