Sunny looked on in helpless horror as her human friends slumped to the ground and grew still. There was nothing she could do, the window remained unbroken by her attack, and no matter how hard she hit it, or what she hit it with, it would not break. Krill, likewise stood staring on helpless unable to help. She wasn't sure which one of them suffered more. Her for her emotional attachment to them or him because, as a doctor, he knew what might just happen to their bodies.

Between the two of them it couldn't have been worse. She turned from the window ran out the door, pushing past Connn, who floated like a useless sack of garbage staring off into space with nothing but a vacant expression.

She made it to the place where the intake room had been locked down jamming her fingers under the door and began to pull. If she pulled hard enough, than maybe...

"STOP!"

She didn't stop.

"I said STOP."

A body dropped in front of her between her in the door obscuring her vision and stopping her progress. She reacted suddenly and violently jolting upwards and grabbing the distraction about the throat. Ribbons of white billowed around her as she moved.

Conn almost died right there and then. Had she pushed him any harder against the wal his entire body would have shattered. But you couldn't tell just by looking at him such a thing had taken place. He stared at her defiantly, his unnervingly human face pulled into an expression of annoyance rather than fear. Slim fingers raised towards his head, and his hands began moving quickly translating his words into speech that she could hear, "You will only get them Killed. If you run in there now they surely have cameras and sensors. We are lucky if they have not noticed us yet."

"I won't let them die." She snarled

"Oh yes, and getting yourself killed heroically while you attempt to save them and fail is even better." The sarcasm was thick, layered on like butter. She was reminded how human Conn was compared to the rest of them. It almost made her jealous at times, and she wondered if that may have been one of the reasons she couldn't stand the smug creature.

But he continued speaking, "I can hear them, you're humans. They are not dead yet, but we must remember that, somehow they managed to defeat two teams of humans on the insides and two teams of humans on the outside. They have all our men, what do YOU think you can do? If you storm in now they WILL die."

"But Ada-"

"Is still alive." The straborn signed exaggeratedly, "And dreaming cute fluffy dreams about bunnies." He mocked. With one hand he reached out and pushed her away. As weak as he was it wouldn't have done anything if she had been trying to resist him, but she stepped off and ran back onto the observation deck, leaving Conn floating behind her massaging his throat.

Krill was still there waiting and watching in wide eyed horror as doors opened up in the sides of the room leaving six cavernous black spaces from which nightmarish things poured.

Large, blocky, black robots gilded their way onto the floor. They were tall slabs of black with blocky mechanical arms resembling no species that she knew of, simply wide rectangles with blinking lights and a set of arms. She would assume they had originally been used as autonomous guards when the prison was still under friendly hands.

But now, they were busy picking up the fallen humans, taking their weapons and stripping them of some of their gear. Helmets rolled across the floor and vests were sliced off to be piled against one corner. The robot that held Adam turned in a wide circle and then proffered the body in a random direction as if it was asking someone's opinion on the specimen it had collected.

"Fascinating, truly fascinating." The robot spun the limp body about in its arms, "Show me the leg." A loud ripping noise broke through the silence as fabric was sliced, and a single knee guard was torn off and tossed away. The glittering blue of her carapace glowed slightly in the ambient light. The prosthetic itself was dead, and unmoving just like the brain up to which it was synched. "How FASCINATING." The scientist repeated, "I wonder..... How many parts can you remove before it stops being a human.... This one already has a leg and an eye missing. Shouldn't be an issue to see what else I can take. Sure humans are powerful all by themselves, but the MIND of a human integrated with the body of a machine...... GLORIOUS. Take the other leg, and the arms, then that eye of course. Oh, and then destroy the ears, implant something a bit better."

The scientist paused for a long moment as Sunny stood hands pressed against the glass in despair.

"What else could I remove..... The pump system is fine, and so is the waste system I suppose. Probably want to keep its ability to breed if I want more of them..... Does it need a tongue? Well I suppose it does if I still want it to eat. You know, on second thought, can we just replace the entire rib cage, I want it to be stronger. The soul of the human, body of a machine. I mean of course I could just remove the brain and put that into a robot, but..... I don't know what that would do to the soul..... Besides the trauma might just kill the poor creature. That's why the human's haven't made full cyborgs after all the brain doesn't like it."

A soft keening broke into the quiet of the observation booth, and she suddenly realized the sound was coming from her. Adam was carried away through the black door and into darkness.

"Mmm, I was also thinking soe biological weapons. Humans are nasty little creatures aren't they, just chalk full of delightful diseases." One of the female marines was being held up now, "An epidemic here a plague there Viral Hyperactive Ectomucsacytosis,for the Gromm, it already destroyed them once, so it will do it again, not a human disease per say, but they are glorious carriers. For the rundi? Well they seem to be rather susceptible to the human flu, I am thinking Influenza A H7N9. Of course I have most of the starborn under my control, so that won't be much of an issue. Oh but the Vrul.... The ONE good thing about those annoying creatures is that they don't get sick very easily..... Perhaps I will just send the painless in to deal with them. Their limbs are big enough for the humans to just rip off.

The last of the humans was being dragged away through the doors. The last one to be carried through the door, Ramirez, head lolling arms dangling down towards the floor completely unresponsive.

Then the doors slid shut, and they were left in complete darkness.

Sunny leaned her head against the glass with a soft keening. She pounded her first halfheartedly against the glass. That crazy scientist was going to rip them apart, and there was nothing she could do about it.

That's when she heard it, "Slimy little bastard." She turned just then to find Krill floating at the control panel. As he did, a wall of holographic projections leaped to life before him, the cameras for the entire facility. The little doctor muttered something low in his throat and began cycling through the screens. Behind he, the convict floated his slow way into the room hands clasped lightly behind his back weaving through the ribbon-like strips that streamed from his back.

Krill turned to look at Sunny, "Asshole just gave me access to the entire facility, so maybe we can do something after all."

Suny walked over leaning against the control panel to look at the screens, "That doesn't exactly seem in character for you. I thought you would want to do something logical." The Vrul went silent, and she looked down to find him glowering up at her, "Now listen to me little missy, saving our friends IS logical. You forget that I have been with them MUCH longer than you have, and I am just as attached as you are...... I have kept them alive for this long, and I am not about to fail..... Just because you..." He paused here and then trailed off

Her eyes narrowed, "Just because I what."

"Nothing, It doesn't matter. We have to get going if we want to save them. Conn floated up just behind them peering over sunny's shoulder, "I can hear them now.... A lot of deranged souls here, a lot of sick starborn.... There are many. This will not be easy."

"Yeah, no shit." She said keeping with her back to him.

The star born made a gurgling noise deep in his throat, "I find it interesting how you haven't liked me from day one even though you have never openly spoken to me. I may not be able to read the inside of your head completely, but I have this theory that you don't like me because I can see inside your precious human's head, and that rankles you because you wish you knew how h-"
This time she was very much intending to kill him when her hand went around his throat. His hands were dropped as they went to her wrists.

"BOTH OF YOU, KNOCK IT OFF!" The anger in Krill's voice stopped sunny, and she turned to look at him where he was leaning up close to the projections, "This is hardly the time for childish insults and name calling. Conn, quit being an absolute dick, and Sunny, I get that you are upset, but Killing your allies isn't exactly an appropriate reaction." He flipped through a few more screens then stopped, "This is hardly the time because things are only going to get worse."

Sunny leaned closer to the feed and her eyes widened when she saw a familiar figure. He was short, not as short as Krill, but not as tall as Adam. he had a furry tan body and large bat ears. He had thrown a guard's uniform jacket over his prison jumpsuit, but was leaning back against the warden's desk like he owned the place.

"Noctus." She breathed quietly, before Krill could answer she shoved further forward, "Can we get audio?"

"Yes.... hold on." He played around for a few moments before pressing on the projected image. The other cameras fled towards the corners of their vision growing smaller and dimmer. The selected image grew large in their vision and audio, both hearing, and radio began to leak out into the room.

"Calm yourself my battle hungry friend. Give the scientist time to work. He may be a little bit crazy, but I guarantee he does good work." He raised his arms and waved them about the room, "I mean look at everything he has already done for us." He leaned back a little further in his chair brushing down the fur on the top of his head which was slicked back in a way that wasn't particularly Tesraki in nature. "You just need to calm yourself and wait your turn."

Sunny gasped as the figure came into the photo slamming her fists down on the desk, "I did not agree to this plan to be bossed about by a furry little maggot." General Cosma, hissed leaning over the little creature in all her terrible glory.

To his credit, the Tesraki didn't even flinch, simple flicked one of his large ears, "Please you shiny beetle, you aren't going to hurt me. I think by now you have realized that, while you are perhaps good at war, you are completely garbage at politics and economics." He motioned to himself with two thumbs and hopped down from the over-sized desk.... Perhaps once belonging to a Rundi or even a human.

He walked around the side of the desk and out of frame leaving General cosma standing alone by herself in the center of the room, "Look, Iet it. You are out for revenge against the race that killed your mate, corrupted your daughter, adopted your traitorous son, and turned your entire race into a spineless lot of peace loving pacifists, but let me tell you one thing, even in the new world empire, philosophy doesn't run nations. Economics does. We give the people what they want, and they will fall into line. Once the humans are taken care of, than the rest of the galaxy should come quietly."

General cosma remained quiet for a long moment before turning away, "I don't care what you do maggot, as long as I get what is my due."

"Yeah yeah, princess I'm right with yah."

General cosma didn't grace the last comment with a response, nd turned away and off camera. The feed was silent after that, and Sunny felt her bones grow cold. Krill, knowing what had just happened turned to look at Sunny, "I didn't know your mother was here."

Sunny shook her head, "I had no idea either. I didn't pay attention after I heard she was locked away..... This is very very bad."

"Mm angry at you." Sunny turned around to look at Conn, who had his head tilted to the side. His usual blank ace was dusted with a distant heir of concentration. She assumed that meant he was concentrating very hard.

" You can hear them." She demanded

"Not easily, not their thoughts per say, but their feelings. She is bright with anger like a star that burns in the blackness. She doesn't intend to work with either of them. Once she has control of the troops, she intends to take over completely..... The same goes for that Tesraki. He's only working for her as long as she is useful, and then he intends to cause an accident. He is willing to wait longer though...... Your mother, she doesn't like that human of yours. Let's hope she doesn't find out that he's here."

Great, great, things couldn't get much worse now, could they.

Krill flipped through a few more screens before turning back to them, "I've got it."

"Got it.... Got what?"

"The floor plan." He muttered in annoyance

"But this prison is huge, you couldn't have just....." She trailed off at the look he shot her

"Of course I can JUST. Perhaps you don't pay enough attention to notice, but I WAS one of the greatest doctors in the galaxy before this mess for EVERY species, and I have four separate cortical hemispheres that can work separately or in tandem, so yes of course it wouldn't take me that long to memorize a floor plan."

Sunny frowned, "What is your problem."

Another incredulous look, "Oh, so now your the only one who is allowed to be upset that our friends are missing, but I have to be nice calm and collected, is that it."

"Well no I-"

"Just because your Adam's best friend does not give you the right to act all special." He turned away towards the monitors and began working furiously.

"Wait..... Are you jealous." Conn wondered aloud from the other side of the room.

There was a long silence, and Sunny turned to look at rill who stood ramrod straight still working, "I wouldn't call it jealous. I am logical enough to understand that you two have a lot more in common as friends, and have a lot of the same hobbies that I cannot participate in, but I find it rather unfair that he seems to spend all of his time lavished upon you when there are others of us that he has known longer and gone through more with."

"So he is jealous." Conn hooted from the other side of the room, "I knew it."

"SHUT UP." Sunny and Krill snarled at the same time.

"Krill I.... Didn't mean-"

The doctor held up one of his three hands and with a sigh shook his head, "This isn't the time or the place. The only thing I will say is I consider the entire crew my family, my clan, my people, and I worry about them. Things are changing, and I am not particularly known for enjoying change."

"But."

"Ah, there it is." He turned around and scuttled past her, "I have dissabled the feeds for as long as I can. Hopefully that will give us enough time to make it through without he guards noticing. Sunny, I need you to pry open that door." He glanced back towards Conn, "And you... well, think helpful thoughts I suppose ."

Sunny did as told eager to be doing something again, fitting her nails under the door and pushing with all of her might. It was tough, and on any other day she might have given up. But today was not that day. She shoved and shoved and shoved, until something gave, and the door began to slowly slide open.

Krill was the first to make it under followed by Conn before sunny was able to fit her massive bulk under the door and let it slide closed.

They were left in almost complete blackness. The Drev weren't exactly known for their night vision. With the volcanic activity on their planet, there was always light at night, but with the help from Krill, she was able to make it across the room and past the stacks of discarded equipment. On second thought, she grabbed two of the guns as she went past. She knew it wasn't much, but one of the marines would be happy to have it when they finally found them.

She tried to keep her thoughts positive as they pushed their way into the dark building, but it was hard when she thought of what might be being done to her friends.... Adam, at that very moment. Were they cutting off his limbs? Ripping out his rib-cage? The thoughts were just too horrible to fathom, and she tried to keep her mind clear as they stalked through the darkness.

She did her best to keep quiet, but with her size and carapace, it was rather more difficult. Of course the motor on the back of krill's backpack made a quiet whirring, but the thing was battery/ solar powered, so wasn't much more than that. And Conn, well he was completely silent simply floating through the air unhindered by the weight of gravity and propelled by the stored energy on the small solar cells along the ribbons on his back.

They came around the corner and were met by a dim illumination. Now that she was able to see, her sealth improved remarkably, and she took point keeping the other two behind her back as she stalked forward. The other two would be worse than useless in a fight, so things were left to her to keep everything going well. Reaching the end of the hallway, they came across a juncture, and Kril indicated the need to turn left.

Holding her staff out before her, she took the corner eyes wide in anticipation, but saw nothing. The hallway was much lighter than before, almost blindingly so. The source turned out to be a wide row of windows just to her right.

From the angle she stood, she was unable to see through the windows, and slowly she began to push forward ignoring Krill's warnings from behind her. As her angle grew closer, she began to see snatches through the window. What once must have been a massive prison block towering thousands of feet into the air and lined with rows upon rows of glass fronted cells, was now plastered with medical equipment. Large, white tarps lay over the floor of the cell block, while each and every one of the prison cells housed either some sort of experimental unit, or one of the test subjects.

They came in all shapes sizes and species. There were Drev, and Tesrkai, and Rundi and Tvek, and the list went on. The "researchers" themselves wore the same prison garb as many of their own subjects, but the glittering tools in their hands separated them from their counterparts. There were many species among them as well. There were Drev, Tesraki, Gromm, Tvek, and maybe one Vrul. The Rundi were conspicuously on display only as prisoners and not as scientists. Of course, they didn't wear the garb of prisoners which made Sunny suspect that they weren't originally prisoners, but were, in fact, the old prison guards.

The Rundi would never allow their government structure to collapse/

No one seemed to notice her as she starred in at their experiments most gruesome, some painful, and all wildly unethical.

She turned back and motioned the other two forward.

They came a little hesitantly, but kept at her heels as she hurried up the hallway trying to keep to the far right side to avoid as much notice as possible.

Krill directed them down a few more hallways, before they came to a hallway much like the one they had seen originally. There was another large viewing bay onto an upgraded cell block, accept this time, there was one big difference.

All the subjects were humans.

They were kept in the small cages, sometimes packed together. One of the humans was strapped down and screaming as an apparatus was secured about his head. From behind her, Sunny listened as Conn whispered, "Don't worry, human, it will hurt for a second, and then never look again." Sunny wanted to look away, but kept her eyes riveted. Krill made an involuntary squeaking noise.

Out on the table, the human went still before a slow grin began to spread across his face, and he began laughing maniacally.

"By Sanctum's rings." She heard Krill whisper

"What are they doing to them." Sunny hissed.

"Making their army." Conn muttered. Krill and sunny both turned to look at the starborn who was staring off into the distance with a blank expression on his face, "They are creating an army. They will use biological weapons, humans that carry diseases, they will use the ones who don't feel pain, they will see how far they can push project steel eye, and turn their humans into machines." He turned in a slow circle as if he was trying to catch a better signal, "They are testing weapons viruses, chemicals, things that will incapacitate and kill humans. They will have some so that even their saliva causes burns. They can send a sweating human into a peace conference and kill all those with a water intolerance. Man can be turned into an enemy against everyone, and a friend to no one but their master. I hear them speaking, they feel no human emotions..... They are no longer human."

Sunny shivered at the words, and went to move forward when the doors at one end of the massive room opened, and the large black robots filed themselves into the room carrying their human prizes.

One of the Terasaki doctors stepped forward to inspect the humans. It looked Adam over, "The boss wishes to see this one. Project steel eye." Conn's voice was oddly eerie in the long hallway. Sunny watched as the man was carried down the length of the floor unconscious.

She didn't bother trying to break the glass.

"This next ones will be in the carrier project. They look strong enough to hold off a virus for a little while."

Ramirez was dragged up afterwards. He looked strange dangling in the arms of a robot despite how large he was. His short, dark hair was matted with sweat and his head lolled back uncomfortably.

"A good specimen for the painless, I think. Can get him done in a few minutes."

At the other end of the room, the door had closed, and Adam was gone, the others were brought into cages and locked inside lying on the floor, on their sides, unmoving.

The human test subjects screamed in agony.