Stronghold of Horrors

Jesse was ready when the portal released her. Her control had improved to the point that while it was disorienting, it wasn't disabling. Normal humans often lost control of their stomachs due to the variable shifts in time and space that occurred in portal transits. But then again, Jesse wasn't human anymore. It still bothered her, but not nearly as badly as it had at first. She remained on her feet and ready as the golden glow faded and she was standing on another portal platform in a room that was Tenno in design instead of Orokin. Raven and Draco stood with her, but her attention was on the pair of warframes that stood waiting just beyond where the portal field would end.

One was a fairly standard looking Nyx warframe, except she was tiny. She might come up to Jesse's waist. She nodded as Jesse looked at her, but remained silent. It was the other warframe that drew Jesse's attention.

"Hello Jesse." The warframe was a Saryn design. That was clear. A mistress of poisons and chemical warfare, it was not a standard Saryn. The armor itself was a greenish white, but gold hung from several places on the form. A Saryn Prime, the first design of the Saryn warframes, from the dawn of the Tenno, before the Orokin had started mass producing them for their war with the Sentients. She bowed her head to Jesse. "My name is Rachel."

"I am pleased to meet you." Jesse replied politely as she looked around. She needed a moment to think. The room was exactly the same as the portal room in the dojo had been. From what she had heard, Rachel led the remnants of the Tenno who lived in the Citadel. So why was she here to meet Jesse? She focused on the Saryn. "You know why we are here?"

"We do." Rachel said with a sigh. "We do not know why the AI self-destructed, but we do know where it came from." Jesse perked up at that and Rachel nodded. "You won't like it."

"If it was hiding from Tenno..." Jesse said slowly. "Then it must have had a reason."

"I can guess why it self-destructed." The miniature Nyx warframe said with a grunt. "Any Tenno finding it would be very upset by it." Jesse went still and the other nodded. "My name is Ona, Jesse."

"Why would a Tenno be upset?" Raven asked softly.

"Because it wasn't an AI." Rachel replied evenly. Jesse froze and she saw Raven do the same.

"But it was." Jesse protested. "I felt it. I felt it die." The tiny Nyx warframe beckoned Jesse forward and she took a step. Then Ona took her hands and pulled her gently down into an embrace. "I felt it die." Jesse said sadly as she returned the embrace.

"You felt an artificial consciousness die, Jesse. Not a manufactured AI." Ona said gently as she held the trembling Cyberlancer. "And it hurt you. It didn't mean to, but it did. The change it wrought in your hair was meant to help seal a door that must remain closed. That particular scanner was supposed to have been destroyed. Small wonder it fell back on its ancient programming. We need it now, which is why it did what it did. But still."

"I don't understand." Jesse said weakly.

"I know." Ona reassured her. "You will. But for now, know that is was not your fault, what happened. The pain that you are feeling is not just yours."

"What?" Jesse asked, even more confused. She went still as Ona hugged her tighter. "Ona? What do you mean?"

"The pain is not just yours, Jesse." Ona repeated. "I need you to trust me, Jesse. There are explanations. Good ones. But first, we have to tend you." Jesse stiffened and Ona hurried to continue. "You are in no danger. You are just hurting. And you do not have to be."

"It was an AI." Jesse protested as Ona let go and stepped back. She urged Jesse to stand and Jesse did as instructed. "The feel was artificial. It wasn't an organic mind."

"No." Ona said softly. "No, it wasn't." Jesse stiffened and then stood up straight, her eyes flicking from the Nyx to the Saryn. She felt rather than saw Raven and Draco move to stand right behind her.

"Than what was it?" Jesse kept her tone polite, but a hint of ice entered it despite her best efforts.

"You are not ready to hear it." Ona said quietly. If she was disconcerted by the young Cyberlancer's tone, it was not apparent. "You need help. It hurt you. It likely did not mean to. But it did. I can sense it in you. The pain." Jesse shook her head and Ona sighed. "Jesse, you can't feel it. It was set up so you wouldn't. The change shouldn't have been detectable. The alteration should have happened cleanly. It didn't. We do not know why."

"You know what this is?" Jesse tapped the side of her head where her hair had been altered. "No one else does."

"No one else was trained by Nikis as long as we were." Ona's tone held no ego. No arrogance. Just simple fact. "We know most of what he did. And we know why. We do not know all of it."

"Can you at least tell me what this is for?" Jesse demanded. Ona and Rachel looked at one another and then the Saryn sighed.

"We think it is to reseal the lock on the vault that is inside Nikis' quarters here." Rachel said quietly. Jesse went still and Rachel continued. "We know he did...things. Lots of things. Before the Collapse. He was dabbling in a lot of things. Most of us didn't want to know." Rachel said sadly. "But he did say that things slept in that vault that were too dangerous to wake."

"Slept?" Jesse, Raven and Draco all chorused as Jesse felt a tingle of fear pass through her.

"Yeah." Rachel said softly. "An alarm sounded a week ago. It was set on a timer. A hundred years, just about the last time Nikis was here before everything came to a head. Before the schism was resolved."

"So he set an alarm." Jesse said slowly. Rachel and Ona nodded. "For?"

"To tell us that someone was going to be changed a little by one of the scanners." Rachel said softly. "To tell us that we have to let that person into Nikis' quarters alone."

"Not a chance." Draco snapped, stepped up to flank Jesse. "Whatever he did can be altered, done by someone else."

"No, it can't Draco." Rachel said sadly. "That was a part of the message. Nikis left us a time release message with instructions. Jesse has to enter alone."

"This is ridiculous. I don't mind helping." Jesse said slowly. "But whatever he did... I am not a Warrior. What good would I do?"

"None of the others were warriors, Jesse." Rachel said quietly. Jesse froze.

"Others? What others?" The younger Tenno asked carefully. Rachel nodded. "What did he do?"

"Jesse." Ona said slowly. "We need to tend you. Now. You are hurting. You do not feel it, but you are."

"I don't know if I can believe you, Ona." Jesse said slowly, not moving. "Every other scanner that has been used on me has shown nothing." Ona nodded and held out a hand. Jesse eyed it and did not move.

"I understand. They were not looking in the right place. This is going to hurt." The tiny Nyx said sadly. "The маска, Nikis' mask, will fade. And when it does, the pain will hit. It will be bad."

"How bad?" Jesse asked, still eyeing the tiny Nyx's hand.

"We really want you lying down and comfortable first." Ona said sadly. "Because you won't be. We can let you sense it for a moment, let you feel it. But then we will have to shield you again or you won't be able to function."

"That bad." Jesse said, swallowing hard. Ona and Rachel nodded. "And then...?" She prompted.

"Then we take you to Nikis' quarters. You enter and lay your head in a machine he built." Rachel said quietly. Draco growled and Rachel sighed. "That is what the instructions said."

"Not a chance." Draco snarled, but paused as Jesse held up a hand. "No, Jesse." He declared, moving between her and the others.

"Draco." Jesse said calmly. "Pain in humans is a chemical reaction that is sent via nerve impulses to the bran where it is interpreted." She shook her head. "I am not human. Where?" She asked Ona who stared at her.

"The message said it was in the appendix." Ona said slowly and froze as Jesse focused on herself. "Jesse, wait!" She took a step towards the young Cyberlancer, but paused as Draco blocked her. "Draco!" She snapped, but went still and Jesse nodded. "Jesse?"

"He was right and wrong. A human would be incapacitated by the pain." Jesse agreed. She met the stunned Nyx's gaze calmly. "I am not human." She repeated as she shook her head slowly. "This is... not right." She said slowly. "Do you know what this is?"

"No." Ona said slowly. "What do you sense?"

"The organ was remade as a camouflaged data repository." Jesse said slowly. All four of the other Tenno in the hall with her went still at that and she continued. "A large one. The data is encrypted and the encryption is not anything I have seen. I could probably crack it, but it would take some time. And if I mess up, the data will probably be garbled or lost." She shook her head."So, I go for another scan. In Nikis' quarters and whoever or whatever is there removes the data and probably remakes my appendix as a regular unused human organ."

"I don't know anything about that." Ona said weakly. "All we had to go on was the message. The alarm and the message."

"I can keep the pain from overwhelming me." Jesse said quietly. "But Draco has a point too. I am vulnerable. His job is to protect me." She smiled a little at the shrouded Tenno. "I am not about to overrule him when he is right. This was done without my permission. Without my knowledge. Why?" She asked nobody in particular.

"I do not know." Ona said weakly. "But I do know where the consciousness that died came from." Jesse looked at the tiny Nyx and Ona bowed her head. "It was a human Not an AI." Jesse did not reply and Ona sighed. "It was... a bad time, Jesse. Master Richard was gone. He had been hurt so badly. We hid his broken body in the Void and prayed he would recover in time. But you need to understand, the only people we trusted were Nikis and ourselves." Something in her tone... Jesse stilled.

"What did you do?" Jesse asked into the silence that fell. "You helped him do it, didn't you?" Rachel stared from the Cyberlancer to the tiny Nyx and back, her posture worried.

"We did, what we could." Ona said sadly. "Then he left. We looked for him, but we had to stay hidden. We had to. The Enemy was out there, looking for us. Please don't hate me, Jesse." Ona begged. "It was the easiest solution and no Tenno was hurt by it."

"Stop." Jesse snapped, her ire rising. "Whatever you did, was bad. I get it. You helped Nikis with it."

"The first time, yes." Ona bowed her head. "Then he left. We didn't know what he did after until we got here. Until we heard the message a week ago. We didn't know, Jesse."

"What did you do?" Jesse demanded, patience fading.

"The Tenno of the time needed medical support." Ona said quietly. "The Citadel was closed to them. The Orokin could not be trusted. Nikis was not a medic. None of the few others who were outside the Citadel when it was sealed were medics. Nikis asked us to find a way to provide medical support to the Tenno. Medical support that could not be subverted."

"That is why it self-destructed." Jesse felt faint. Ona shook her head. "What?"

"Probably, but I don't know." Ona said sadly. "That wasn't... the one we made."

"You made a consciousness to put into the scanner." Raven said as Jesse flinched back. "An artificial consciousness. But not an AI."

"Not an AI." Ona agreed. "The mind... was human." Jesse stared at the tiny Nyx and Ona nodded. "Yes. We ripped the mind from a human Nikis brought in and put it in the machine."

"You..." Jesse stared from the Nyx to the Saryn whose posture was as shocked as Jesse felt. "You... killed a human to make the scanner." It wasn't a question.

"He didn't die." Ona replied softly. "But yes."

Jesse felt a wall behind her. She had backed away from the tiny Nyx. Draco was between her and the others as Raven snarled.

"Let me guess." Raven snapped. "It wasn't consensual, was it?"

"No." Ona replied softly. Jesse retreated along the wall as Rachel and Raven both rounded on Ona. Both started to speak at the same time, both were furious.

"Draco..." Jesse begged as Ona wilted under the verbal onslaught of the other female Tenno. "I..."

"Enough!" Draco's no-so-quiet declaration cut through the growing noise in the corridor like a sword. "The past is past. Jesse needs help now."

"Fair enough." Rachel's voice held fury that matched Raven's. Then she shook her head. "You will not leave her side. For anything." This was not a declaration. More a command. Draco inclined his head and she sighed. "This is going to be a mess. How many... minds did Nikis take to make those?"

"I don't know." Ona admitted in a tiny voice. "The first time, we were so angry. For Teacher, for Master Richard. Only after... did we questions. Start to realize what we had done." She slumped a bit. "I think that was one reason Teacher left. Because of what he asked us to do. We did it without question. We should have questioned."

"So you pulled a human mind out of its body and molded it into the machine." Jesse said softly. Ona nodded silently. "And the human body died." Ona nodded again. "You killed a human for this." Ona bowed her head and did not respond. "I can't trust you." Jesse said weakly.

"I know." Ona said sadly. "We talked a bit, after. Once your situation is resolved, we will submit ourselves for justice."

"Return to your quarters." Rachel commanded and Ona bowed to her. "Do not leave the Citadel. If you do, you will be branded as renegades. Like all who killed humans who were not infected with the Technocyte Virus."

"Jesse may need us." Ona said softly. Rachel glanced at Jesse who frowned. "We have not lied and we will not." Ona said into the silence that had engulfed the hallway. "What we did was wrong. But Whatever Nikis did... I fear it was worse."

"You do not know?" The derision in Raven's could have cut steel.

"Nikis had secrets within secrets within secrets." Ona replied sadly. "So no, I don't know. We don't know. We have... surmises. Educated guesses. No more. He never told us about other scanners. We only knew about the one."

"I need to know what happened." Jesse said after a moment's thought. "If I want to keep any of the other AIs from self immolation, I need to know what happened."

"Of course, but... Your code can keep the pain at bay for a time." Ona said sadly. "But it cannot forever. You need to get that whatever-the-hell-it-is out of your body. Any information we have, you are welcome to, Sister." Ona said as she knelt and bowed her head. "We did something awful. We were so angry when Nikis brought the human to us. We... had very bad memories of human medics." Jesse inhaled sharply. She had heard some of what had happened to the tiny Nyx and her companions. "When Nikis asked us, we... We tried to be gentle."

"Ripping a human's mind from their body cannot be gentle." Raven said with a glower. Ona bowed her head further. "This will not stand." This was not a female Tenno speaking, this was an Elder.

"I know." Ona said in a remarkably even voice despite the sorrow that underlay it. "But right now, Jesse is the important one." Rachel, Ravel and Draco all looked at one another and then at Jesse who flinched.

"The only one who likely knows exactly what happened is Nikis." Jesse said slowly. "And he is unavailable. So... We need to figure this out on our own." Rachel nodded slowly. "You say I am supposed to go to Nikis' quarters?"

"Not alone." Draco's tone brooked no argument and Jesse nodded.

"No, my protector." Jesse said formally. "I am young. I am not totally stupid. But this may involve things that cannot be fought with swords. If I ask you to step aside, can you, Draco? If you do not, I cannot guarantee your safety in a war of code."

"Last I checked, being a Warrior Tenno wasn't safe." Draco replied evenly. "My duty is to you and I am not defenseless."

"Fair enough." Jesse nodded, secretly relieved. She had come to rely on Draco's steadfastness. It was rock in her often turbulent world. She knew it was a weakness, but for right now? She didn't care. "Lead on." She said to Rachel who shook her head. "What?"

"There is one other thing." Rachel said quietly. Jesse stiffened and the Saryn Prime shook her head. "Not pertaining to you, the AIs or the scanners."

"I don't understand." Jesse shook her head in response. "If not me, then what?" Her eyes went huge as the Saryn bowed formally. To Draco!

"Master."