"Good morning, Doctor." One of the secretaries greeted him.
It was the same one that greeted him every morning: Nadia, a blue-skinned Urayan woman whose hair was an appalling shade of seafoam green. Not that the man considered any color to be appealing on an Urayan, of course, but the green was particularly unpleasant to his sensibilities.
The woman had worked in the department for seven hundred and thirty-five days, a fact he would remember even if she hadn't publicly celebrated the beginning of her third year of employment with the rest of her colleagues last week. Regrettably, she had been a student in one of his classes prior to her employment, albeit a particularly talentless one. There was a reason she was working as a secretary and not a researcher, after all.
He couldn't understand why the woman made the effort to greet him every morning—he thought he had made his opinion of her abundantly clear when he removed her from the class rolls. Yet, like clockwork, the man could barely make it halfway to his lab without suffering her ineffable cheer.
Just another reason to despise her.
Regardless of his personal feelings on the matter, he resisted the urge to sneer at her and instead offered a polite yet restrained greeting of his own in return. His position would be far more troublesome if he didn't maintain a positive working relationship with his colleagues, and needlessly antagonizing the woman would only serve to spread rumors about him that could damage his standing.
That standing was his primary means of avoiding scrutiny from the academy's administration, after all. He had spent years cultivating a trustworthy, by-the-book reputation, and he refused to jeopardize that for such trivial reasons.
He continued the trek to his lab, exchanging the occasional greeting with his more tolerable colleagues as he went. Unlike with the secretary, these encounters were far more genuine. While he may dislike having to work so closely with them as part of his official duties, these were men and women with academic achievements that he could respect; in some instances, he had even used their works to further his own.
Still, he avoided being drawn into any interaction that went beyond a simple greeting—he may respect many of his colleagues, but that didn't mean he necessarily wanted to be talking with them outside of pure business. Most of what they would drag him into discussing would be, at best, useless drivel, and the few who would focus on purely academic topics tended to be focused on his "official" contributions to their field.
Not that he wasn't proud of that work, of course—he would not have published it had it not met his exacting standards—but compared to his true research, it was rather disinteresting.
Besides, standing around chatting would waste his valuable time. He and his research partner were scheduled to begin experimenting with a new technique, but he had a substantial amount of cover paperwork that needed to be tackled before he could slip away.
Finally, he made it to his office in peace. He let out a beleaguered sigh as he hung up his coat and adjusted his glasses, giving the pile of forms in his inbox a withering glare. What he wouldn't give for an assistant to handle the paperwork for him. Alas, the only ones he had acquired were academy students desperate for extra course credits, not the sorts that could be trusted with such sensitive documents.
"Feeling troubled, Dr. Castrofari?" A rough, feminine voice asked from behind him.
He didn't bother turning around, having long become accustomed to this behavior from his research partner. The woman seemed to be under the erroneous belief that lying in wait, engaging her conversation partners by surprise, lent her an air of mystique.
Castrofari just considered it an annoyance.
"Lynette." He greeted, shuffling through the paperwork on his desk. Thirty-four documents. Eleven supply requisition requests, nine appeals for further documentation on his most recent published article, six requests from undergraduate students seeking the support of a professor to secure grant money, five collaboration requests from other institutions, a notice that his newest paper had been submitted for peer review, a meeting request from the department chair for the annual review of his tenure, and a request from one of his assistants to be released from his duties.
He couldn't help but snort at the last one. Fat chance of that—his undergraduate assistants were too deeply intertwined with his research at this point. Letting him go would run too high a risk of the student reporting his activities. He would have to lean on that one and remind him that he was every bit as complicit in their work as the doctor himself at this point.
If the woman was put off by his tepid reaction, she didn't show it, instead casually maneuvering herself around his desk with an amount of casual grace that always half surprised him, considering how gangly the Indoline woman was.
That was just one of several unfortunate physical traits his research partner possessed. The Indoline people always had strongly defined features—tall and lithe, with stern faces carved from their periwinkle skin—but Lynette had the misfortune to possess all of them in their worst qualities.
Her height and proportions made her look reedy and uncoordinated, her skin so pale a blue that she looked constantly ill. Even her facial features, while still quite stern, looked more like they belonged on a Garlus than a human. The only saving grace was that age had been kind to her; the wrinkles only just beginning to appear on her face, despite being his senior by at least a century, making the worst of her looks appear as weathering, rather than misfortunate genetics.
Personally, it suited him just fine. Too many of his colleagues, both male and female, put far too much effort into maintaining their appearances, something entirely unnecessary in their line of work. It had an annoying tendency to introduce undue distractions in the lab setting. Lynette may have a face only a Gogol could love, but her looks were not the reason she was here—her mind and her own research were.
She casually grabbed the top form off of his desk—a request by an Ardainian science journal for further references about his research paper on the physiological effects of Blade resonance on the Driver—and pretended to read it. "Please, Doctor. There's no need to be so cold." She stated. "Do you truly find my company so poor?"
Castrofari ignored her for a moment, quickly signing off on several of the requisition forms. He already knew what they were requesting—additional equipment and chemicals for both his official and clandestine research—so they required little review beyond ensuring his assistants had filled them out correctly.
After allowing the woman's question to hang in the air, just long enough for the silence to become uncomfortable, he deigned to answer her. "Is there a reason you are speaking to me and not allowing me to dispense with the administrative aspects of my work?"
The woman responded with a long, drawn-out sigh, far more theatrical than he considered appropriate for the situation, but very stereotypical of his Indoline colleague. "Dear Doctor," she said, almost mockingly, "I merely believed you would be interested in several updates about the project."
A muscle tensed in his cheek as he finished assessing the sixth requisition form. There were only a handful of aspects of their work that were safe to discuss outside of the secret lab, and none of them would normally be considered crucial aspects. If the woman was willing to speak of such matters out here without waiting for him to finish with the paperwork, then there must be a notable development.
Given her propensity for dramatics, though, it was also entirely possible that she was merely over-inflating something more benign.
He didn't deign to answer her, instead continuing to work his way through the forms. Taking his silence as an interest in her updates, the woman continued to speak.
"You will be pleased to know that the supply delivery from Osiris has finally arrived." She noted idly, shifting through another form on his desk. "Our suppliers were able to obtain an entire batch from a single source, although the vintage of some of the supplies was slightly higher than requested."
Castrofari nodded idly, unconsciously translating what she meant. It was mostly what he expected, of course, although it was interesting that they managed to collect their quota of test subjects at once. He wondered how they had managed to pull that one off.
'Higher vintage', however… did that mean some of the subjects were older than requested? That wasn't necessarily ideal—he had specified the test subjects be within a certain age range for a reason, after all—but if it was only a handful, he supposed it could be useful, if only to test how older subjects reacted to the procedure.
"I see." He replied as he signed off on the last requisition form. "I assume they at least were able to ensure the requested mix in the quality of the supplies?"
Lynette's face curled into a cruel smile. "Of course, insomuch as we are able to determine that quality, of course." 'Quality', in this case, meant 'estimated Driver aptitude', which could never be gauged with complete certainty. "Three of the high-quality supplies were stored in block eight, while the remainder were used to replenish block three."
"Block eight…" Castrofari mused, assessing the first of the reference requests for his various published papers. "That should be close to capacity now, yes?" He had been hoping they would fill that one soon—'Block Eight' was the cell containing the test subjects with the highest estimated chance of Driver Aptitude. Considering that the procedure they had been using up until now could be rather… unreliable with the lower-Aptitude blocks, he expected to get the greatest return from that group.
Although if the new procedure worked out as anticipated, that may not be a concern any longer. The research they had used to develop it—a parting gift that Lynette had 'borrowed' during her departure from the service of the Praetorium—suggested that the chances of it succeeding may not be tied to the same combination of traits.
"Yes, nearly." She agreed. "We have another shipment arriving soon from the smaller nations currently traversing the Caelium doldrums. If they were able to obtain our requested proportions of high-quality supplies in that batch, we should be ready to begin processing block eight within the week."
Pulling out his reference table to begin transferring the requested information onto the form, he nodded in agreement. "Good, I'm looking forward to that." He said. "In the meantime, we're to begin processing block five today, correct?"
His research partner gave a sound of affirmation. "We are." She admitted, a slight frown gracing her features. "Although we may wish to pace ourselves working with such a low-quality batch."
"Oh?" He asked, finishing off the form before putting it aside before grabbing the next out of his inbox. "Have there been additional complications anticipated with the process?"
She shook her head. "Not with the process itself, but with the supply chain we have been using to source reagents." The woman grumbled. "Our reagent supplier was unwilling to elaborate, but it would appear to be related to the recent issues plaguing Gormott."
The doctor's lip curled in annoyance, finally understanding why the woman had approached him out here. Those 'reagents'—a polite cover word for the Core Crystals that were forming the backbone of their experiments—were difficult to acquire in the numbers they required. If their current supplier was having difficulty sourcing them, it would slow down their progress.
"Well, it shouldn't be too much of a problem to process block five regardless." He said, waving off the woman's concerns as he finished yet another form. "Considering the estimated quality of the batch, I suspect we will have more than enough leftover reagents to process block eight once it is ready, should the success rate of the revised process be lower than anticipated."
Lynette smirked at his decision. "How practical." She commented, leaning back from his desk. "I suppose I should be unsurprised."
The woman slowly walked over to the door, finally deciding to leave him in peace. "I will get the lab prepared for the day's experiments." She commented from behind him. For a moment, her footsteps stopped, and he felt the hairs on the back of his neck tingle as she leaned in close.
"Do try not to enjoy the work too much this time." She whispered into his ear with a voice that, on anyone else, would probably have been sultry. From her, however, it sounded more like a threat of violence. "Your assistants are always so perturbed by your enthusiasm, after all."
Castrofari chuckled despite himself. "What can I say?" He defended, warmth blooming in his chest as he imagined the possible results they could learn from the day's experiments. "I love what I do. What more could a man ask for?"
The tickle of her breath faded, followed quickly by the sound of the door opening. "Another man would probably say 'a woman at his side', but I suppose that a man such as yourself only had room in his heart for science." The woman replied in mocking scorn. "Well, I will leave you to your work, doctor. Do try not to delay too long."
He shook his head as the door closed. She needn't state the obvious; of course he was going to finish this as quickly as he could. Why wouldn't he, when they had so much wonderful work to do?
"Man, that's sure a big Titan for the size of the ship." Rex commented, looking at the creature that was attached to the vessel. "Isn't it a bit overkill?"
"Not really." Nia replied, flashing her and Dromarch's tickets at the attendant standing by the door leading into the ship. "How else do you think we're going to be getting to Tadbir so quickly?"
Unlike their departure from Gormott, the ship taking them to Tadbir was departing late enough in the morning that the group was able to sleep in a bit, at least by Rex and Nia's standards. Tora, having not been previously constrained to the realities of traveling in the wilderness that the Gormotti girl was accustomed to, nor the busy work schedule that Rex himself insisted on while salvaging, had still considered it rather early, but was still more than eager to be up on time.
They had still gotten up well over an hour before boarding began, treating themselves to a leisurely breakfast in the flight deck's lounge while they waited. It gave them an opportunity to go over the itinerary one last time before departure, not that there was much to cover—they weren't stopping on the way, after all—just five days on a ship carrying them to their destination.
Rex had been surprised to learn that, despite Tadbir being more than twice the distance from Voltis that Gormott was at this time of year, it would only take them five days to reach it, compared to the full week that had been required to make their journey here.
"It's a matter of weight, my boy." Azurda explained, leaning over Rex's shoulder as the boy offered his own ticket to the attendant. "It takes less effort for a Titan to haul around a comparatively smaller load. After all, despite how modest the accommodations on the ship we used to get here were, it still was almost as heavy as the Titan carrying it." He chuckled as a thought came to him. "Why, even I could have outpaced that one back in the day, even with your hut on my back!"
"You could have outpaced a bunch of Titans if you even bothered to use your wings instead of floating around, regardless of what you always insisted." Rex pointed out, rolling his eyes. "It should have taken us more than a day to get to Gormott from where the Maelstrom was, but you did it in like four hours."
Azurda crossed his arms petulantly. "And you see what I got for the trouble?" He rebutted. "I'm not nearly as spry as I used to be, you know! Flying at those speeds took quite a bit out of me! If the situation hadn't been so dire…"
"I get it, I get it." Rex patted his 'Blade' on the head. "I'm just glad you're willing to drop the 'old man' act when the situation is desperate enough."
He followed Nia inside the ship, taking a look around the interior. The exterior hatch opened directly into the vessel's common area, a relatively small room mostly filled with seating. It spanned the entire width of the ship, with portholes looking out across the Cloud Sea visible on the far side of the room.
It was decorated nicely enough, the furniture light but sturdy-looking, and the floor covered in carpet, but it was fairly sparse, considering they were going to be spending several days on the ship.
"Boat is definitely more cramped than Tora expected." The Nopon commented, giving the furnishings a critical eye. "Tora understand that weight at premium, but at least could provide more space for activities." He huffed. "How Tora supposed to work on upgrades for Poppi with such little room?"
"Eh, it's nicer than some of the ships I've used." Nia replied, brushing a hand against the interior bulkhead. While the walls were still made of metal, a smooth coating of red paint had been applied to the surface to give the interior of the vessel a less oppressive feel. "At least there is a common area. There have been ships Dromarch and I have used where you were basically stuck in your cabin the whole trip."
Beside her, Dromarch grumbled darkly at the memory. "Truly, there is nothing that I appreciate more than not being confined to the cabin of a passenger vessel for a fortnight."
"Are they really that bad?" Rex asked, following after the Gormotti girl as she led them through the common area and toward the door to the passenger cabins on the far side. "I've never been on a ship like this, so I don't exactly have a good reference point for what the cabins are like."
Behind him, Tora chuckled. "Rex-Rex best keep expectations low." The Nopon said ominously. "Rooms very very small to save space. Even as littlepon, found too too cramped for Tora."
"Don't listen to him." Nia interjected, checking the room number on her ticket as they reached the door to the passenger accommodations. "The rooms won't be that small. Cramped, yes, but not nearly as much as he's implying."
"For a human, yes". Dromarch pointed out. "Unfortunately, I do not possess the luxury of being nearly as compact as the rest of you are."
The Gormotti girl didn't even bother dignifying his comment with a response, instead turning her focus to the room numbers. "Let's see, Dromarch and I are in room…" She muttered, walking past the doors. Two-thirds of the way down the hall, she came to an abrupt stop in front of one of them. "This looks to be the one!"
Rex double-checked his own ticket, frowning. "It's just you and Dromarch in there?" He confirmed, seeing that his own ticket number was two higher.
"Yeah, these rooms are only for two occupants." She confirmed, opening the door. "See?"
He peered inside, frowning at the sight. The room was only about ten peds deep, and maybe half as wide. Half of the cabin was taken up by a pair of narrow bunks, set one atop the other, leaving only enough space remaining to store a modest amount of luggage while still being able to get in and out of the berths.
It was a perfectly serviceable amount of space to sleep in, only slightly smaller than the sleeping compartment in his old cabin on Azurda's back, but he certainly wouldn't want to be stuck in here for the whole trip.
Rex turned his gaze to Dromarch for a moment before looking back inside the room. Those bunks were certainly big enough for a human, but for a full-sized tiger… "Well, at least I see what Dromarch's complaint was." He acknowledged.
"Thank you, Master Rex."
"I don't anticipate that we'll be spending a large amount of our uptime in these." Azurda mused as he observed the room. "But without a reasonably-sized common area, spending our time out there won't be particularly enjoyable either."
Nia shrugged as she walked inside, sliding her back off of her back. "We'll make due. It's only a couple of days."
The others broke off to drop their bags off in their own rooms, Tora and Poppi the one right next to Nia and Dromarch's, Rex's the next one over. The rooms were identical to Nia's, only big enough to sleep in and nothing more, so they spent little more time than necessary before departing again.
As he stepped back into the corridor, Rex peered down the length of it, frowning at the number of rooms. They were only on one side of the vessel, the corridor to access them running directly against the exterior wall of the ship, and there were only a handful of them. Rex's wasn't the last in the row, but there were still few enough that he couldn't help but wonder…
"I'm not going to be sharing a room, am I?" He asked, looking at the two doors further down. "I mean, there's not that many cabins, after all…"
"Probably not, unless they're full up." Nia replied, stepping out of her own cabin. "I don't think they're at the point, but considering that not many other people have boarded yet…"
He nodded, mollified at her words, as he watched some of the other passengers begin filtering down the corridor. There weren't a lot, maybe six or seven, all academic-looking types making for the cabins closer to the entrance of the corridor.
Well, mostly academic types. As he was watching, a pair of slightly more familiar figures came around the corner. The Nothian boy, Ciaran, and his Blade wandered down the hall, the former blearily checking their tickets as they hovered around the end of the corridor.
"Oh, right. He did say he was headed the same way we were, didn't he?" Nia said, glancing over at them. "I guess it shouldn't be a surprise he's on the ship too."
"Maybe should say hello?" Tora suggested as he and Poppi exited their own cabin. "Friends stuck on boat for next few days, would be good idea to be friendly, no?"
"Gasp!" Poppi said, rather than actually gasping. "Masterpon make good suggestion about social interaction!" Looking up at the Gormotti girl, she asked, "Nia! Poppi request examine health of Masterpon at once!"
Her request was met by a blank stare as Nia processed the interaction that had just occurred, before the Gormotti girl broke into a fit of giggles. The mechanical girl's creator, however, was much less amused.
Tora stared at her in shock. "Poppi too cruel!" He wailed. "Where Tora go wrong in programming to create such disrespect!?"
Chortling, Azurda flitted over to the distraught Nopon and placed a consoling hand on his shoulder. "There, there, Tora." He said, struggling to suppress his own laughter. "It's only natural for children to backtalk their parents."
"Normally, children do not become quite so disrespectful that quickly, of course." Dromarch chimed in, a mirthful grin on his face as he joined the teasing. "But perhaps Mistress Poppi is just intended to be at a far more advanced developmental stage than her chassis implies."
Rex tilted his head, Dromarch's words begging a question that broke the boy out if his own amusement. "Does Poppi actually count as Tora's daughter?" He pondered out loud. "I mean, he did create her, but is that how it even works?"
"Poppi culmination of work of three generations of Tora's family." The Nopon huffed in annoyance at how amused the rest of the group was. "Tora build actual chassis and most of internals, but ether furnace and most principles behind construction work of Dadapon and Grampypon."
"And how exactly is that different from normal children?" Azurda questioned. "After all, Human and Nopon children are the result of the work of their past generations. Poppi is just a slightly more… literal example."
Tora flapped his wings in agitation. "That, but…!" He stammered, trying to come up with a rebuttal. "Tora too young to have littlepon!" He wailed in distress.
"Calm down, Tora, they're just having you on." Nia reassured him, stifling her giggles. "I don't think Poppi thinks of you as her father, right?" She asked, turning her head toward the artificial Blade.
Poppi shook her head. "Masterpon is Poppi's Masterpon." She confirmed. As she spoke, her smile faltered. "Poppi is sorry for causing Masterpon much distress! Wanted try out 'sassy sass' module, but clearly overdid."
Seeing her downturned mood, Tora rushed over and wrapped his wings around her. "Poppi!" He wailed, crying over-dramatically against her waist. "Tora promise to be best Masterpon for Poppi!"
The others watched on, unsure if they should be touched or amused by the display, when they heard someone clearing their throat behind them. "Excuse me." An echoing female voice called from behind them. "Would it be a bother if I requested your friend keep his volume slightly lower?"
"Oh, sorry." Rex replied, turning to face the speaker. He vaguely recognized the voice, so he wasn't entirely surprised to see that it was Ciaran's Blade, the one that looked like a haunted set of full-plate armor. "Um, 'Lyta', was it?"
Her helmet shifted in a manner that Rex thought was supposed to be a nod. "My name is Hippolyta, but Lyta is the version that most use for me." She explained. "I suppose I didn't exactly introduce myself yesterday."
"I get it; you were mostly playing support for your Driver." Nia commented, yanking Tora away from Poppi by the collar of his overalls. "Sorry about the noise. We'll try to keep him a bit quieter."
"Thank you." Lyta replied, the metal plates of her armored form creaking slightly as she offered a shallow bow. "Again, I'm sorry to ask, but Ciaran wasn't able to get much sleep last night, and I would prefer he be able to catch a short nap undisturbed."
Azurda, who had returned to Rex's shoulder after consoling Tora, perked up at the comment. "Oh?" He asked. "We heard that there was some sort of commotion last night but didn't hear the details. Did the two of you get involved somehow?"
"Yes, we did." She replied, turning her helmet to check how busy the corridor was. "Perhaps we should relocate, though. I suspect that the other passengers boarding may appreciate us not blocking the way."
Looking around, Rex couldn't help but agree. "That's probably for the best." He acknowledged.
He was in the middle of carefully assessing the ancient stonework of the cell when the sound of a rusted metal door opening echoed through the dungeon.
Almost immediately, the subdued chatter among the other kids went quiet as they went stock still, like animals sensing a nearby predator. Perhaps, considering the circumstances, that was something of an apt comparison.
(A cold sweat ran down his back at their behavior, his heart pounding in fear. More than anything else, he wanted to throw himself into a corner and make himself so small that he couldn't be seen.)
With far more effort than he was happy with, the boy quietly made his way over to where Ewan and Rhona were standing, their eyes wide as they stared at the corridor on the far side of the iron bars.
"Ewan." He whispered, tugging on the other boy's sleeve. "What's that sound?"
The other boy shivered in place, his eyes still locked on the corridor. "…They're coming." He replied, his voice just as unsteady.
Beside him, Rhona squeaked in fear, hugging the Ardainian boy for some form of comfort. Ewan didn't seem to notice, his attention fully on the corridor.
"Who's coming?" He asked, already having a fairly good idea about the answer to his question. "The bad men?" (He hoped that he was wrong. He really hoped that he was wrong.)
His companion nodded sharply, (confirming his fears.) "They already fed us for the day a little before you woke up." The Ardainian boy explained, finally breaking his gaze as he spun around, nearly knocking Rhona to the floor at the speed. "That means they're coming for someone!"
"We gotta hide!" Rhys spoke up, his ears flat against his head as he frantically scanned the room."
Behind him, Leon, who was apparently from somewhere called 'Tantal', began to sob in fear. "There's nowhere to hide!" He wailed. "We're stuck in a bare room!"
(He was right! If the bad men came for them, there would be no hiding—they would be snatched away like the others apparently had been, never to be seen again.)
"Shhh!" A Urayan girl next to him tried to keep him silent. "The bad men will hear you!" She warned fearfully.
Her attempts to quiet him down did little, his terrified crying echoing through the dungeon. The Osirian boy pushed himself as far away from his crying Tantalese counterpart as he could, instead getting right up against the bars of the cell and listening out.
Doing his best to ignore the sounds coming from their cell, the boy closed his eyes and listened, trying to hear the approaching adults. It was hard, Leon's blubbering doing a fantastic job at drowning out any other sound, but as he listened, he could hear a sound that was definitely not from any of the cells. Footsteps, adult footsteps.
There were three sets of them, two heavy, as if wearing some kind of work boots, while the third was quieter. Like the owner of the feet was wearing something lighter. In fact, he could almost hear the telltale slap of bare flesh against stone as they approached, as if the third was… barefoot? (That couldn't be very nice; the stone floor was cold and damp!)
He listened as the footsteps grew steadily louder, becoming increasingly easy to hear over Leon's crying as they drew closer. He couldn't help but hold his breath, trying to keep his own noise level down (in desperate hope that the bad men would stay away if they couldn't hear him), even though he knew that his own noise level had little bearing on what the adults were doing.
Just as he was beginning to believe that they were, in fact, coming for them, the footsteps suddenly came to an abrupt stop just a row up from their cell. Everyone in the room, even Leon, went perfectly silent, as if the next sound they made would draw the adults to come a row further.
"Open the door." An old, raspy voice commanded, sending the hairs on the back of his neck straight up. "I will ensure the test subjects are pliant."
From his position, he couldn't see what was happening, but at the same time, he was reluctant to reposition to the far side of the cell, where he might have a better chance of seeing the next row up. (Doing that would draw their attention! If they didn't see him, maybe they would forget he was there?)
So he listened instead, trying to figure out what was happening from sound alone.
There was another creaking sound as the rusted metal door of the cell diagonal from them was forced open, no doubt by the adults accompanying the raspy old man. Almost as soon as it opened, he could hear the terrified screams of the kids in the cell, accompanied by the patter of feet against the stone, rushing to put as much distance between them and the door as possible.
"Be still, children." The old man commanded, accompanied by the rattle of… something. He couldn't figure out what the source of the noise was… it was something metallic, almost like… chains?
A thin, wispy curl of white smoke drifted down the corridor from the direction of the commotion, carrying a pungent, ashy scent along with it. He immediately darted back, memories of the sleep gas the kidnapper's Blade had used flooding his head. (Not again not again not again notagainnotagai-!)
The other kids in the cell had a similar reaction, immediately rushing to the farthest corner of the cell from the direction the adults were. Leon, the crybaby that he was, began wailing again, although he was accompanied by several others, one of whom he was reasonably sure was Rhys.
(It was only panicked shock that prevented him from joining in with them.)
So focused was he on the smoke that it took him a moment to realize that the screams and footsteps from the cell the adults were at had gone abruptly silent. The Osirian boy's heart dropped at the realization. Had they been put to sleep again? (Or had they been… killed?)
He listened in rapt attention, focusing for any sound of life. He was pretty sure that he would have heard the sounds of the cell's occupants collapsing had… something bad happened to them, but he couldn't imagine why they had suddenly stopped.
As he listened, the old man's cold, cruel voice cut through the sudden silence. "Come." He commanded.
The Osirian boy nearly flinched as, in unison, the occupants of the cell diagonal to them began slowly walking, the sounds of their footsteps clattering against the stone floor in such perfect timing that he could barely tell it wasn't a singular entity.
"Down the hall." The old man commanded, and the children obeyed. A thrumming march echoed through the dungeons as they walked away, silent beyond the clatter of their footsteps, guiding them off toward… whatever awaited all of them, like something out of one of the stories the older kids at the orphanage liked to use to scare them.
(How much truth was in those stories? Miss Maia always reamed the older kids out for telling them, but this…)
"I'll never get over how creepy that is." Another adult voice echoed softly from down the hall, sounding nearly as shaken as he was. "What are we even doing here?"
"Shhh!" Another replied, sounding every bit as nervous. "Do you want the boss to hear!? Do you have any idea what that psycho might do to us if he thinks we're having second thoughts!?"
An exhausted sigh sounded around the corner. "I just want this nightmare to end." The first voice replied, so quietly he could barely hear it. "What was I thinking, going to that monster for grant funding?"
They left the thought hanging, an uncomfortable silence filling the corridor of the dungeon as the footsteps of the children faded into the distance.
"…Come on, we should probably catch up with him." The second voice prodded the first after a brief lull in the conversation. "I don't want to find out what the doctor will do to us if he thinks we're slacking."
He held his breath as the two sets of adult footsteps faded into the distance, his mind running over the implications of what they had said. The person in charge was scary enough that even the other adults here were afraid of him? What kind of nightmare had they landed in!? (They were all going to die here, weren't they!?)
Gulping in dread, he turned around and began carefully examining the masonry of the dungeon cell they were stuck in. There had to be some way out of here!
He didn't want to imagine what would happen if there wasn't.
"So, did you two learn something since you interviewed us, then?" Rex asked, leaning back in his chair.
The group had relocated to the common area in order to allow the other passengers boarding the ship easier access to the cabins beyond their own. Understanding that the topic of their discussion, while not entirely sensitive, per say, also wasn't exactly the sort of thing that should be openly spread, they had pulled a group of tables together in a corner of the room, giving them a degree of isolation from the other passengers.
Soon after they had assembled the tables, the exterior door of the ship had been sealed, and the vessel slowly lurched out of port, leaving Voltis behind. Most of the other passengers, at least the ones who weren't trying to catch up on lost sleep, had settled into seats of their own, the low hum of ambient conversations around the room making it slightly harder for other interested parties to listen in to them.
Lyta sat in front of them passively, her body language difficult to discern beneath the heavy armor she wore. The ghostly Blade held a cup filled with some sort of tea that none of the party recognized, although how she was drinking it through a full-face helmet that (as far as any of them could tell) had nothing behind it was a mystery.
After a moment of staring contemplatively out the porthole, watching the looming form of the Trade Guild fade into the distance, she spoke up. her voice echoing hauntingly out of her helmet.
"You could say that." She replied, touching her cup to one of the vents in her helmet. "What did you hear about the events of last night?"
"Last night?" Nia asked for confirmation. "Not a lot. Some sort of commotion down by the docks, or something?" She crossed her arms behind her head, leaning back slightly in her chair. "We were already asleep by the time it happened, so we only heard the rumors during breakfast."
"There was little information known to the general public." Dromarch added, sitting at a side of the table that had a chair removed. "As such, we mostly ignored the wild speculation in favor of planning for our trip."
She nodded, as if expecting that answer. "That's about what I would have expected." The ghostly Blade replied. "The guards were trying to keep the exact details under wraps, but last night, a group of mercenary Drivers were apprehended attempting to kidnap another child."
Everyone else at the table perked up at her words. "'Apprehended'?" Rex asked. "So you caught them?"
"That is normally what the word implies, Master Rex." Dromarch replied, giving the boy an unimpressed look.
Azurda didn't seem quite as convinced, watching the body language of the ghostly Blade. "I assume there is more to the story." The tiny Titan said, giving her a searching look. "Otherwise, I doubt you would be nearly as pensive."
"Would also not be on boat with friends." Tora pointed out. "Driver said going to Tadbir to search for clues. Would not need if story over."
Lyta's helmet tilted slightly downward as she drummed her fingers on the side of her cup. "Yes, capturing them was not quite the conclusion we had hoped for." She admitted. "For starters, while we were able to locate several of the missing children inside of their ship, they were only those that had disappeared from Voltis over the course of the last week."
"Okay, that's not perfect, but it's hardly anything to scoff at, either." Nia pointed out. "That's still, what, like a half-dozen children?"
"More or less." The ghostly Blade replied. "Don't get me wrong, it's heartening to have recovered them safely, but at the same time…"
"…You can't call this a success after only recovering a handful of the children?" Rex guessed.
She turned her head toward the boy. "That too," she said, "but our primary concern is that it has made it clear that this is a much larger operation than we had previously anticipated."
Leaning over her cup, she continued. "We spent most of the night interrogating the kidnappers, trying to get as much information out of them as possible." The ghostly Blade explained. "But what we learned was… disturbing, to say the least."
"How so?" Rex pressed, curious about the situation, even though he felt a certain amount of trepidation—The information was apparently disturbing enough to have shaken even one of the investigators, after all.
"The kidnappers we captured… they weren't responsible for all of the incidents of disappearing children." Lyta explained. "In fact, they can't have even been responsible for most of them. According to both the kidnappers themselves and the navigational logbook on their ship, they haven't even visited the vast majority of the Titans that have seen children go missing."
Nia let out a low hiss in understanding. If they weren't responsible for most of the disappearances, then that meant there were multiple groups responsible. But considering that all of the incidents had followed a similar pattern, that implied they were working together, which meant… "Someone was hiring them?" The Gormotti girl asked, already knowing the answer.
Lyta nodded. "Yes." She replied, the subtle motions of her body stilling in a way that implied her expression was turning grave. "We were able to confirm as much from interrogating the kidnappers. Once they were in custody, it was fairly easy to get them to reveal the details."
"But they were unable to provide you with the identity of their employers." Azurda inferred, leaning against Rex's shoulder. "As Tora said, it is unlikely you would have caught the ship with us unless you were in search of further clues." Even as he spoke, his eyes widened, as if realizing something. "Unless…"
Rex looked down at the tiny Titan, his own eyes widened as well. "You don't mean?" He muttered, turning to look at Lyta. "Their employer is in Tadbir?"
The ghostly Blade was silent for a moment, looking down at her cup. "Strictly speaking, I cannot say—your group is unaffiliated with the investigation, so by all rights I shouldn't say anything further."
Looking up at the group, she scanned her helmet across them, the ethereal light shining from the eye slit of her helmet glowing brighter as she did. Her apparent gaze fell across each and every one of them, pausing on each of them for a brief moment before continuing on.
Until she looked at Rex, of course.
The moment her gaze fell upon the boy, her entire body stiffened. She leaned back slightly, as if recoiling from whatever she had seen. Under her breath, the boy could just barely make out a strangled curse of alarm.
In the back of his head, Rex could feel… something, although he wasn't quite sure what. It was almost as if he could feel the phantom sensation of… annoyance at whatever Lyta was doing. It made the hair on the back of his head rise as the ghostly Blade stared at him in a shock that could be clearly discerned even through her heavy armor.
After a brief moment, the glow from Lyta's helmet faded back to its normal level, and with it, the sensation faded from Rex's mind. The Blade leaned forward, shivering slightly as she braced herself against the table.
"Hey, are you alright?" Nia asked, her hand reaching down to her rings as she leaned forward.
"I- Yes, I'm fine." The ghostly Blade replied, her voice sounding remarkably unsettled even as she attempted to assuage the Gormotti girl's concern. "That was just… a little more intense than I was expecting."
She sat still for a moment, seeming to collect her nerves. "I was merely trying to double-check whether you could be trusted with this knowledge, but…" She shook her head, glancing warily at the boy. "Let's just say… you've been vouched for."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Rex wondered aloud, giving her a concerned look.
Lyta didn't answer, instead slowly sitting back up. She gazed around the room furtively, checking to ensure the other occupants of the room weren't listening in, before leaning forward slightly.
"Your earlier assumption is correct." She informed them quietly. "We don't know if that's where their employers are actually based, but the kidnappers were instructed to deliver the children to Tadbir."
The mood at the table fell at her confirmation. After the craziness that had been their stay in Gormott, the group had been hoping for a slightly more peaceful experience on the academic-focused Titan. Learning that it may be the center of an international crisis was not exactly a heartening sign in that regard.
"We'll keep an eye out for anything suspicious." Rex reassured her, his eyes hardening resolutely.
Nia gave a nod of agreement. "We might not be able to give you too much help, but we'll pass along anything we hear." The girl offered.
"Poppi will keep sensors active to search for missing littlepons." The artificial Blade added. "Not think kidnappers expect search parties see thermal signatures through walls."
"We appreciate anything that you can do to help." Lyta replied, inclining her head. "The boss won't be able to send us reinforcements for several days at the very least, and I cannot guarantee the cooperation of that vigilante, so you may be the only group we can rely on should the circumstances turn."
Dromarch tilted his head in confusion. "My apologies if I overlooked the prior reference, but I do not believe that you have mentioned anything regarding a vigilante before." He inquired politely.
"That's the first I've heard of it too." Nia said, leaning forward in her chair. "So, we're kind of lost about where that comes into play with all of this…"
Lyta chuckled, the sound echoing inside of her helmet. "I suppose I neglected to mention that part." She said. "When I said that the kidnappers were captured last night, It wasn't actually done by us. Ciaran and I responded to the disturbance by the docks, but by the time we arrived, the vigilante had already immobilized them and left them for us to apprehend."
Nia let out an impressed whistle. "One person took out a whole team of Drivers?" She said, raising an eyebrow. "That's pretty impressive. Any idea what his deal is?"
"Her deal." The ghostly Blade corrected. "And she's a Blade, one that I've heard of before."
"Where from?" Rex asked, crossing his arms. He wasn't entirely sure what all this vigilante business meant, but if they may be encountering her at some point, it paid to know more about her.
"Mor Ardain." She replied, leaning back in her chair, tilting her head back as if thinking. "I don't know too much, but during our brief encounter last night, she called herself 'Tokiha'. I've heard rumors about her from the Ardainian members of our outfit—apparently she and her partner have spent the last few years rather publicly dismantling some sort of crime syndicate operating out of Alba Cavanich."
Tora raised a wing in the air. "Friend says 'partner' and not 'Driver.'" He pointed out. "Is partner another Blade?"
She rubbed the fingers of her gauntlet against the chin of her helmet. "To be honest, I can't remember." She admitted. "I don't even remember what the partner's name is. I think it's a man, but that's about all I know off-hand."
"Well, if she normally works as part of a team, maybe she'd be willing to cooperate?" Rex pointed out. "I mean, you'll never know until you ask."
Lyta shook her head. "We tried that last night." She admitted. "Ciaran reached out to her, but the moment she was sure we had the scene handled, she disappeared." The ghostly Blade crossed her arms, turning her helmet as if averting her gaze in a petulant manner. "Didn't even bother to look us in the eye either. Honestly, how rude." She said in a smaller voice.
Despite the situation, Azurda chuckled at her uncharacteristic behavior. "I suppose that's to be expected from someone who operates like that." He consoled. "I'm sure she didn't mean anything by it." As he finished speaking, he scratched his chin thoughtfully before amending, "Probably."
"I suppose." Lyta allowed, relaxing slightly. She reached out to grab her drink, tilting her gaze slightly down to look into the cup. "It would be so much easier if she or her Driver would just cooperate with us. Had it not been for her, the kidnappers would have gotten away with us none the wiser."
Azurda let out a commiserating sigh. "Isn't that always the case?" He said, hopping off of Rex's shoulder and onto the table. "Perhaps you could fill us in on exactly how the incident last night went down? We may be able to offer you some further insight. Different perspectives, and that sort of thing."
The ghostly Blade nodded in agreement. "I suppose I may as well, if we've already gone this far." She relented. "So, it began shortly before midnight. Ciaran and I had just finished interviewing the guards from the previous shift, when…"
Doctor Castrofari allowed himself to let out a sigh of relief as he closed the door to his office behind him. It had taken him far longer to complete the pile of paperwork that had been on his desk than he had anticipated—nearly two hours, in fact.
He had been making good progress during his conversation with Lynette, but once she had left, he had been forced to deal with the collaboration requests, which were always difficult to dodge around. He was far too busy working on his current project, his magnum opus, to distract himself with such trivial concerns, yet due to the secretive nature of his work, he couldn't use it as an excuse to wave off the requests.
Theoretically, he could just decline without explanation, but doing so out of hand could risk contradicting the helpful and considerate persona he had constructed. It was far better to be able to provide a reasonable excuse as to why he had to turn down the requests, if for no reason other than to avoid needlessly offending someone whose resources he may require in the future.
How fortunate that Lynette was officially a foreign researcher, even if she was no longer associated with the Praetorium in truth. That he was already collaborating with another institute on a project was a perfectly acceptable excuse to deny the requests, even if it took a bit of creative interpretation of his partner's circumstances to make it look credible.
The rest of the paperwork had been far more trivial. He could deny the grant-seeking undergraduate students—he already had several working as assistants for him, so it was perfectly reasonable to deny those requests on the basis that he couldn't handle any more—he didn't have to do anything about the notices beyond sending an acknowledgment to the department chair and the request from his student assistant…
Well, that was best handled in person, now wasn't it?
He turned the corner past his office, following the hallway deeper into the labyrinthine interior of the Biology Department's wing of the academy. It was one of the oldest sections of the compound, built atop the ruins of the Osirian-era citadel that had once been the heart of the city, which meant the construction of the wing did not follow as sensible a floor plan as the sections of the building constructed more recently.
For many of his colleagues, this was considered something of a nuisance, as it meant that the newer faculty and students had a habit of getting lost if they wandered out of the central areas of the department. For Castrofari, it provided an easy means of concealing and subsequently slipping away to his hidden lab.
Making sure that none of his colleagues were in view, he slipped away from the main path leading to the central labs and into a side corridor, passing a small sign warning off the more directionally challenged. He was required to sneak past a handful of the rooms in the area that still saw use, mostly by researchers who, like him, were interested in a degree of privacy for their own work, but at this hour they were largely unoccupied, making the task more trivial.
After a short few minutes of deftly navigating the back halls, he quietly opened the door to an abandoned supply closet, checked to make absolutely sure he was alone, and quickly entered, closing the door behind him.
It was dark inside the closet; the simple lighting fixtures of the entire corridor having long ago been disconnected from the rest of the electrical system. It didn't bother the Ardainian researcher, who snaked around one of the empty shelves without heed for the darkness, guided by practice and a photographic memory of the layout of the room.
Behind one of the struts holding the shelf to the wall, there was a slight depression in the ancient stonework. To the casual observer, insomuch as a casual observer was likely to see such a subtle hidden detail in an abandoned, pitch-black room, it would seem to be little more than a sign of the building's age. But as his fingers brushed against the flaw in the stone, feeling the biting cold of a singular piece of metal carefully concealed within the masonry, he knew from prior experience that it was far more.
After all, the hidden switch had been his design.
There was a grinding noise as a small section of the stonework in the corner of the room, half-concealed behind an abandoned shelf, slid back, allowing light to flood into the abandoned closet. Without pause, Castrofari hurried into the concealed door, hitting the switch to close it back up as he entered.
While he wasn't too concerned about being discovered, the hidden door did make an annoying amount of sound as it opened, an issue he had been unable to solve without compromising the concealed nature of the mechanism. Engineering was, after all, not his area of focus, even if he had picked up the skill to construct the equipment used for his 'personal research' that could not be obtained legally.
Beyond the hidden door was a steep, narrow staircase that descended into the earth; the stonework along the side of it noticeably older than that of the rest of the building. It was a remnant of the Osirian citadel, formerly the access stairwell to one of the towers of the keep's curtain wall, and one of the few remaining ways down into the ruins beneath the academy.
Locating this stairwell had been a major difficulty when he had begun setting up his hidden lab in the ruins below. Despite being one of the literal cornerstones of the academy's structure, it had not been present on most of the publicly available blueprints for the last few centuries. It had taken sneaking into the headmaster's private library to finally locate where the stairwell had been walled up.
It had been a worthwhile endeavor, though. As he reached the bottom of the stairs, opening into the water-worn dungeons of the old citadel, the doctor relaxed, allowing his mild-mannered persona to slip away as he navigated his way over to the entrance to the observation room from which he would be overseeing the day's experiments.
The vacant, genial smile that he had so carefully trained himself to show in public slowly morphed into a cruel, arrogant sneer as he ran through the day's itinerary in anticipation. A malicious snicker bubbled from his throat as he entered the room, drawing the attention of those within.
In the corner of the chamber, standing nervously beside the observation window overlooking the surgical theater, two of his undergraduate assistants suddenly bolted upright, the discomforted looks on their faces at his sudden arrival merely drawing a deeper laugh from him. In particular, one of them, a scrawny Ardainian boy with straw-colored hair, looked on the verge of panic at his presence.
Considering that he was the assistant who had been requesting to be relieved of his duties, the doctor couldn't find it in himself to be surprised. No doubt, the boy knew exactly what the answer to that request was going to be.
The third person in the room, leaning over a rather crude computer terminal, showed no outward sign of reacting to his arrival. Really, he shouldn't have been surprised—considering how enamored Lynette was at making unannounced entrances, it was perfectly logical that she was never surprised when someone else made one.
"You appear to be in a better mood, Doctor Castrofari." She greeted him, still working away at the console. "I'm glad to see that the paperwork you were subjected to has done little to dull your enthusiasm."
"How could it?" He replied, wandering up behind her. "After all, today marks a new stage of our work." He let the sentiment hang in the air for a brief moment before amending, "Assuming everything is functioning correctly on your end, of course."
If Lynette took his barb as an insult, she didn't show it. "Of course, doctor." She replied, entering a final sequence into the terminal. "I've just finished calibrating the inducer. I believe it should be functioning within anticipated parameters, although there is only one way to know for sure."
That would be by testing the device in a live setting, of course—the very purpose of the day's experiments. "I see." Castrofari replied, peering out into the surgical theater below. "I certainly hope that it functions as intended. Our prior methods were far too complicated and temperamental to be scaled up to the level our benefactors desire."
Not that he hadn't enjoyed the work, of course—he had never been one to shy away from getting his hands dirty—but having to surgically graft Core Crystals onto the test subjects piece-by-piece to prevent the source Blade from dissipating mid-procedure was not exactly scalable. Being able to potentially skip the surgical process entirely would go a long way toward justifying the funding they were receiving.
Lynette scoffed at his criticism. "Have faith in your own work, doctor." She replied, stepping back from the console. "The modifications we've made to streamline the process may require some fine-tuning, but the base principles are sound." She gave the man an amused look. "After all, it was your work that made this possible."
He snorted derisively at the comment. Both of them were fully aware that wasn't entirely true. While he had done a substantial amount of the legwork required to make the processes—both the surgical method they had been using up until now and the more direct method that the day's tests would involve—viable to use without certain… exotic resources only available to the Praetorium, it was Lynette who had introduced him to the Indoline research into the base principles.
Still, his own contributions had been rather crucial to making the process work at all, so he supposed that her words were hardly incorrect. He just wished she would dispense with the flattery and proceed; no matter how pleasant having his ego stroked may be, it paled in comparison to the anticipation he felt for the chance to test that his work would bear fruit.
"What is the status of our test subjects?" He asked, grabbing a clipboard off the table. The sheet attached to it was fairly dry, merely providing a simple list of the test subjects from block five, including a short description of the pertinent information about each subject: Age, race, sex, height, weight, and estimated Driver Aptitude… the bare minimum required for his purposes.
"Delphus is collecting them now." She replied, grabbing her own clipboard. "I've instructed him to bring the first test subject along with him after he finishes moving the block to the theater holding pens."
Castrofari nodded idly at the explanation; it was about what he had expected. It also explained why only two of his assistants were currently present, as the rest were most likely assisting Lynette's Blade.
Strictly speaking, Delphus didn't require the assistance—his talents were more than capable of keeping the test subjects pliant during the transfer—but with the size of the blocks, it paid to have an extra set of eyes or two, making sure none of the test subjects got any clever ideas. It had been far more of an issue before his partner had… acquired the Blade, when it was just his assistants doing the herding and subject control.
He still wasn't entirely sure about the exact details about how Lynette had gotten her hands on his Core Crystal; he had been… familiar with the Blade while he was in service of his prior Driver, back when the doctor had still been performing some of his more adventurous experiments into the effects of the Flesh Eater process on a Blade when he was younger. Delphus and his Justiciar master had been something of a thorn in his side, frequently capturing his potential test subjects and dragging them off to Indol before he could 'acquire' them himself.
So it had come as something of a surprise when Lynette returned from her most recent trip to her homeland with the Blade by her side. Castrofari had long since learned to not poke his nose too deeply into the Indoline woman's affairs, however, so he didn't press her on the matter. As with how she had obtained some of the research they were using for their experiments, he was better off not knowing the details.
Besides, having the Blade at their disposal was nothing but a boon. Not only did it reduce the risks of their experiments being discovered by Lynette's former employer, but it also made it far easier to sort their test subjects. While no method of determining Driver aptitude was anywhere near completely accurate, Delphus' tracking technique certainly seemed to be able to detect the ambiguous combination of traits with a noticeably higher accuracy rate than traditional methods.
In the corner of his eye, the doctor saw a flicker of movement on the far side of the surgical theater. Turning his attention away from the clipboard, he saw that it was the door leading to the holding pens, announcing that the Blade had returned with their test subjects.
He watched Delphus lead their first subject, a small Urayan girl with pale green skin, into the theater. Her movements were calm and sluggish, with a detached, unfocused expression on her face, a sign that she was fully under the Blade's spell.
"Ah, right on time." Lynette said cheerfully, watching as his two other assistants, the ones that had accompanied the Blade, hesitantly began strapping the child down to the surgical table, the discomfort on their faces clearly visible even from the distance.
"Excellent!" Doctor Castrofari agreed, watching as his assistants began setting up the equipment for the procedure. Behind them, he could see the test subject's movements slowly becoming erratic and panicked as the effects of Delphus' calming incense began to wear off.
Sealed within the observation room as he was, he couldn't hear the pitiful mewling the test subject began to spew as she regained her facilities, but from the pained looks on the faces of his assistants as they desperately attempted to ignore her pleading, no doubt it was amusing.
Despite himself, the doctor cackled at the scene. There was something about watching undergraduates try so desperately to ignore their consciences when their degrees were on the line that amused him.
"Well then, I believe we are ready to begin." He said, leering maliciously down at the child strapped to the table. Reaching out to grab the microphone connected to the surgical theater's intercom, he issued his first orders.
"Beginning test number one." He announced.
Author's Notes
Theoretically, this was probably the chapter that took me the longest to write, due to getting sick halfway through and having to shelf work on it for a week and a half.
Hopefully, the disruption to my schedule from that shouldn't cause further chapter delays for the near future, but then, I do have another insert art piece that I also wasn't able to work on while sick that is for the next chapter…
…Well, I'll figure it out. Until next week!