AN: The next few chapters go downhill, uh, quite quickly and somewhat without warning. Consider this your warning. It all will end in Major Character Death.

It started a week later.

The first reports were hushed over, but it didn't take long for whispers and rumors to spread. A Cyborg officer, they said. He killed his own teammates. They had to send another team in to take him down.

Iscom barely thought twice about it.

Two weeks.

Three incidents, all of a similar nature. The patterns were so damn obvious that even the psycho newscasters were getting it right. Cyborgs, officers, no prior records. Seemingly unprovoked attacks on friends, family, teammates, fighting until their own death.

And subtler patterns, one that the news hadn't picked up on, one that Iscom didn't quite have the information to back up. But he knew someone who knew that one had a cerebral biocomputer, and who knew someone else who claimed that another had extensive spinal cord replacements.

Both of which were modifications that Badri had.

Iscom's eyes glazed over the news report. The rumors had become common knowledge over the last week, and some idiots had torched yet another cybernetics factory. They claimed to be starting a movement, some sort of anti-cyborg thing for justice, and liberty, and whatever. It put Iscom off. Those officers… if they were anything like his own CO, they needed help, and badly. Of course, there was a slim possibility that they weren't connected, but really, that was about as likely as Brash wearing a dress. Or Yuo wearing a dress, for that matter.

But there was one person he could ask.

Iscom didn't bother to knock. The sergeant knew he was coming, and he knew it was official.

"Corporal, I wish I could say this was a surprise," Badri said as Iscom walked in, "but I have a feeling I know what this is about."

Iscom stood to attention just inside the room. "I think you do, sir, and I hope you know I don't mean any offence by it," he added. He wanted this to be as impersonal as possible, completely formal and desensitized, because he wasn't sure that Badri could handle it any other way.

Badri, of course, had other ideas. "Come in and sit down," he said, pulling the chair out from behind his desk so they would sit facing each other. "Let's make this informal. I don't want to have to report it," he explained. Iscom suppressed his eyeroll. He doubted that Badri actually reported anything, seeing the speed at which his datawork got done.

"Sir?" Iscom asked, making the question behind his eyes as clear as possible. I'm gonna be blunt as hell. Can you handle that?

"No sir, just Badri," he said firmly. Well then, Iscom thought. "Pretend we're in a cantina," Badri added. "I'm sorry I don't actually have a drink to pull out here," he said longingly. "It would probably make this easier."

Rigil finally sat down, but Badri got to the questions first. "This is about the incidents, right?" the sergeant asked.

"Three in the past two weeks, Badri," Iscom said seriously. "All officers. All cyborgs," he said quickly. It was almost a relief to have the words out in the open, like pointing out the elephant in the room. Only this elephant was made of metal and had killed eleven people now.

"And all of them tried to turn on their own men," Iscom added pointedly, as the man in front of his cyborg officer at this very moment.

Badri sighed, rubbing his temples in that very self-conscious gesture of his. He seemed to realize what he was doing and pulled his hands down abruptly. "I wish I had some sort of answer for you—for me," he added ruefully. "I could say it was some secret underground movement or something," he suggested, the unsaid, That I could tell you I'm not a part of,ringing loud and clear for Iscom. Badri continued, "But we have nothing at all."

We, so he's already been contacted, Iscom noted. By command? It would be likely. They have access to all the medical files for those… the officers. And Badri's files. So there is a correlation between the cybernetics—the type of cybernetics? Installer?—and the incidents.

"All I can tell you is that I would never willingly turn on you," Badri said. "You don't have to believe me, and if I were you I would take everything I said with a grain of salt, but if it came down to my team or the Republic, I would choose my team every time."

Iscom stared at him, trying to glean whatever he wasn't saying from his look. He's being overly self-conscious. He can't really think that I would ever think he could turn on us. Er, maybe he can. If someone has already interrogated him about this, it could have set his self-hatred back quite a bit. And here I was just starting to see some progress from the CO scared out of his wits at the thought of being responsible for the lives of his team…

"So you're saying you know nothing about this," Iscom asked, giving him an easy way to talk about anyone who had come to see him on the matter, "nothing at all?"

"I only know as much as you do, Iscom," Badri reassured him. Reassured himself? Maybe he hadn't been contacted. "Despite what some may believe, I don't know every cyborg in the military any more than you know every Mirialan, and I didn't know any of the three in question. I do know that they all died—at the hands of their teams or families, no less," he added, putting as much emotional weight on team as family. "And I know none of them had any behavioral problems or any indication that they would turn like this."

Which was all information that Iscom already knew. And was quite a speech in of itself.Sounds like he had it prepared, Iscom thought. Then again, I would have expected me to come ask this at some point if I were him. Predicting each other like it's normal, I guess we're a real team. Who would have thought? he added sarcastically.

"In all fairness and honesty," Badri said with a twisted smile, "I meet those criteria as well."

Oh damn, Iscom thought hurriedly. Oh damn, he's really got this messed up in his head now. "Sir—Badri," he corrected himself, the syllable slipping off his tongue out of habit, "I'm not saying that—"

Badri cut him off. "Well, you should be, because there's no way to know. If they turned for some unknown reason, there's nothing that says I won't have the same reason and turn on you. I can't imagine what it might be, other than something against their will, but not every cyborg thinks the same way."

Iscom tried again. "Badri, I trust you," he reiterated, getting annoyed with his CO's constant self-doubt—and assumptions that Iscom shared those same doubts, which he didn't, dammit. "I know that you wouldn't turn on us under your own free will, I just—"

"Had doubts?" Badri interrupted again. Iscom took a deep breath, mentally swearing. No, goddammit, I just wanted to know if command had fucking contacted you yet! "I understand completely," No, you fucking don't, Iscom swore, "and I'm not blaming you, Iscom," and I'm not blaming you, dammit. Get that through your thick metal skull. "I would be suspicious if I were you." Of course you would, Iscom's inner commentary continued, you're suspicious of you and you are you, I can't imagine what you would think if you were me. "But I'm not you, I'm me," no shit, "and that means I have to deal with the fallbacks of being a cyborg sometimes."

Iscom's inner commentary shut up abruptly. Right. Dammit, that's what this was all about. Because the fact was, Iscom wasn't sure if he could handle what the sergeant had been through. Waking up to find your body changed beyond recognition, everyone else dead, and being told to go on with life? It was probably a miracle that Badri had gotten this far. And now he was forced to question his own body, as the same choices he never made destroyed lives in a very public way around him.

"I'm lucky to have been assigned a team that doesn't judge me for it," Badri said lightly, glossing over the fact that half the team didn't know it, "but that opinion seems to be the minority in the Republic."

Iscom sighed, "Ah, prejudice." He forwent the swearing, and instead tried to lead the sergeant to a different topic altogether. "Something I get the feeling we both know a lot about. For a faction that claims to be diverse and welcoming, there certainly are a lot of bigoted idiots in the Republic."

"I, thankfully, have not had enough time to run into too many," Badri said.

Iscom gave a harsh laugh, remembering the childhood bigots and bullies that had haunted him through adolescence. "Sometimes I think I'm almost jealous of you," he joked, "not having to deal with the preconceived ideas of idiots all your life."

Badri's expression darkened suddenly. Oh shit. That might have been the wrong thing to say. "You shouldn't be jealous of me," he said seriously. Then, as if he had noticed his own change, his face lightened abruptly, and he gave a jovial—and very, very fake—laugh. "You certainly wouldn't want my problems!" he said. Iscom fixed him with a steady, questioning stare.

Uh-huh. Don't think I'm buying that one.

The sergeant tried to ignore the look Iscom gave him, but didn't completely succeed. "Look," he relented, "I'll tell you if I have any… issues," he said vaguely. "If anything goes wrong, I will let the team know. I don't plan on leaving you in the dark about something as important as this."

"Alright," Iscom said, still not convinced that he was holding together after that last little show. He would have to tread carefully around the subject of cybernetics for the next few days. "I trust you," he reiterated for the thousandth time, not that he thought it would make any difference in the state Badri was in right now. "Don't make me a fool for that," he added jokingly, making absolutely sure that Badri knew he was joking.

"I won't," the sergeant reassured him. Iscom sighed, standing up. He gave the sergeant a half-hearted salute as he tried to figure out what his next move should be.