Extracted - Part 10

[Sthurmovik]

This part slows things down a bit before we ramp up to the climax. Thanks to BD was able to make some improvements. Hope it works.

Part 10 of 13, misunderestimated the total.

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Serena sat at her typical table at New Beginnings where she could keep her back to the wall and eyes on the door. She was enjoying a plate of something that resembled braised short ribs and had made a point to back off the hard liquor and stick to the pub's selection of on-site brewed ales. Nevertheless the high gravity beer was still sufficient to produce a pleasant buzz that, combined with the truly excellent food, allowed Serena to escape her worries until she was brought back to reality by a lady’s voice.

"Hello there, do you mind if I join you?"

Serena raised her head to see a moderately tall woman with an athletic build, thin face and red hair standing before her. Silently taking note that her observational skills in public places had rather sharply declined Serena glanced around the room and let out a small sigh as she counted plenty of other empty tables.

"Sure, go right ahead," Serena answered, irritated by the propensity of the local population to "meet and greet" perfect strangers and not bothering to swallow her food.

"You're Serena Hanford, right?" the woman asked.

At the sound of her name Serena stopped eating and took a closer look at the stranger who was evidently not looking for just anyone to talk to. Serena quickly noticed a number of distinctive physical characteristics including build, body type and bust shape that identified where the lady had come from.

"Yes I am. Wasn't expecting to run into family here, am I right?" Serena replied, her body language relaxing.

"Name's Marrin Chapelcross," said the woman nodding. "We haven't had any new Sisters arrive here in centuries and I was starting to worry that someone had happened."

"The Elders put Network expansion on hiatus for a while, but we're pushing forward again. I'd look up your personal details myself, but my data retrieval capability isn't what it used to be," said Serena, still feeling the urge to be sarcastic.

"Ah yes, because you no longer have access to your data store, but Elders?" Marrin asked, obviously starved for news of her people. "I had heard about those from some of the last to arrive. Are there more of them now?"

"Well...you're looking at one," said Serena matter-of-factly.

"You're...an Elder?" replied Marrin looking gobsmacked as she had never considered the possibility of actually meeting one. "I guess that would explain why you are acting so…"

"Human? Yeah, I get that a lot. Wait, just how old are you?" Serena asked, realizing she was missing a fairly vital piece of information.

"Well I'm 622 in objective years…"

Serena's mouth dropped open. Not counting the long time she had spent deactivated Serena's objective age was barely half that and the human form Sister could scarcely comprehend what it would be like for one of her kind to live that long.

"…but I can't believe you're an Elder! When I first heard about it the concept of having biologic thought and emotional patterns sounded so interesting."

"I hate to break it to you Marrin, but you're a biologic human right now," Serena chuckled.

The girl blushed. "Well I know that, but having those abilities as an android, sounds….sounded interesting. So I assume by now there should be quite a few Elders"

"Oh yeah, there's a whole lot of us, but only a tiny fraction of our kind choose to take the plunge. They don't want to give up their "AI powers"," said Serena using has face to make the air quotes.

"AI powers? What AI powers?" asked Marrin, looking confused.

"Well I mean you remember what you used to be able to do in terms of your mental speed and agility. You know, like making reality go all "bullet time" or shooting a guy for littering and having no problem justifying it to yourself," answered Serena, half making a joke.

"I guess some things just never change," Marrin signed with grim determination, "but then again that's why I'm glad I'm here in Sanctuary. No more cleansing, no more killing. We can do what we want here. Have a real purpose in life that goes beyond protecting nature from the bios."

Something was making Serena uneasy and it was not the fact that Lomez had gone to the trouble of flying in one of her race to put the pinch on her to accept life in Sanctuary. That sort of shenanigan was par for the course, but the way that Marrin was speaking and acting reminded Serena of her own personality when she was still not long out of VR.

"So Marrin, tell me, what sort of things do you do here?" asked Serena feeling the weight of her Elder status as she pulled up her chair to sit closer to Marrin.

"Oh," she said her face lighting up, "I'm an artist. I have a cabin on the north continent and I draw and paint full time. Here, take a look."

Marrin took out a thick sketchbook and slid it across the table. Serena began to thumb through it, carefully examining each page, but all it took was one to make her heart sink. Billions of her younger kin were also “artists” churning out the same uninspired depictions of natural scenes. Always pretty, but rarely moving.

“Well you have wonderful technique and the scenes are quite lifelike,” Serena noted.

“Thanks. I get that a lot of comments to that effect,” Marrin beamed.

“And you do this for a living?”

“Well I don’t make as much as some of the artists, but since I since I am so, prolific, I can charge less yet still make enough to live on.”

“And you’ve been doing this since you got here?” asked Serena, setting up a point for later.

“Well, not immediately,” Marrin answered, “but pretty much.”

"Marrin, do you mind if I ask you a personal question?"

"No, not at all Serena, go right ahead," the girl said without much of a thought.

"What did you do in the war? You were around for the start of it weren't you?" Serena asked, worried about asking the question, but needing to confirm her suspicion.

Marrin opened her mouth to answer, but then stopped and blinked like she was trying to remember something, but couldn't. "I….I don't really remember. I….I know I was in the war and I eventually was assigned to…to the force exploring the portal, but I can't really say what I did. Sorry." Marrin paused for a moment. "So…what did you do in the war?"

Serena reached out and gently took her sister's hand. "I ended it."

"You…ended it? The war? It's…over?"

"Depending on how you look at things it ended. Our people killed all the bios in the galaxy, but I was on hand to make sure it didn't spread to others. I was actually created before you, but ended up pulling a Rip Van Winkle and wound up being at the right place at the right time to put that shit to bed once and for all. Sisters help people now Marrin, we don't kill them."

Marrin's conflicted reaction to the news came as no surprise to Serena. The marooned Sister was facing realization that while her home world wasn't so crapsack after all, she might not ever be able to see it.

"I…I guess I can take comfort in that," came her best stab at a response.

"When you spoke of Elders earlier it seemed to me that you did not consider yourself one despite your age. Is this assessment correct?" Serena asked pointedly.

Again Marrin looked a bit confused, but answered. "I hadn't really considered it before, but I guess I don't. I mean I sort of feel like I always did, at least like I always did since I arrived here in Sanctuary."

"Would you be interested in becoming one?"

"S-sure, but I am not sure I see the point or even how that would work exactly. I'm just a human now. That concept doesn't really apply to me anymore."

"I'm sure that over the years you have had time to reflect on how your personality compares with the other humans or how your art compares to their art. Hell, just look at how you compare to me. It's like you're a pastry that has spent plenty of time in the over, but nobody bothered to turn on the heat."
“I...I’m a Sister Serena, we’re supposed to be different from humans and bios.”

“Different yes, but our creators never intended us to be quite so...algorithmic.”

Serena could tell that her words were hurting the girl, but it was important that she be just blunt enough to shake Marrin out of her centuries long holding pattern without pushing her too far into an emotional breakdown.

"What…what would you suggest I do then," asked Marrin softly, Serena's gravitas as an Elder making the crucial difference that pushed her to accept Serena's observations.

"You need to go down to the neuro center and get them to remove all of the memory blocks and personality modifications that they put in place when you came here. I fully understand their need to stabilize the minds of genocidal synths, but I think in your case they overdid things a bit," Serena replied, continuing to hold the girl's hand.

"But I don't want to go back to killing people," said Marrin, looking rather alarmed, "assuming that's what I did before."

"Ah yes, I guess it probably would be a good idea to leave in place the mod that increases the perceived value of sentient life in relation to other priorities," sighed Serena, realizing that being an Elder did not absolve her of the occasional brain fart. "I should probably just go with you and help explain the situation. If the doctors at the clinic are as customer focused as the other people around here I can't see why they wouldn't try to honor your request."

"I still don't know about this Serena," said Marrin as she sat on the precipice of putting her complete faith in Serena's judgment. "Do you really think this is the best thing for me?"

"I can't tell you what's best for you, but I can tell you that Sisters grow, we change. Some change more than others. Some like the changes more than others, but I believe at some level you're doing the "real you" a disservice by never allowing her to develop. You kind of represent what happened to our people when we achieved catastrophic success in the war. I say catastrophic because without the biologic spark all cultural growth ground to a halt," Serena explained, realizing why Marrin's situation had affected her so. "Hey, I'll give Lomez credit for being at least partly right."

Marrin laid her hand on the red leather cover of her sketchbook. "I've been here 582 years and filled 551 of these books. You’re right, all of what I do feels like a fucking program. I complete a boom, I feel accomplished. I look back at the books on my shelf, I feel proud. Deep down I know this isn’t right, but if I follow the program I experience contentment. My question is what if you're also wrong Serena? What if I do what you say and all I give up is the contentment?"

"It's a risk we all take," said Serena. "Again, I can't choose for you and you shouldn't let me.

"Ok, what would you choose if you were in a similar situation then?" asked Marrin, hoping the distinction would make a difference.

"Well it just so happens that I am and I have. Fuck contentment," said Serena, lifting her glass to the sentiment.

A few moments later there was a bit of a commotion as a large dripping wet wolf barged its way into the pub and walked up to Serena's table. Some patrons shot up from their chairs while others froze in panic. Behind the bar the staff struggled to figure out if the wolf presented a danger to life and limb or just a health code violation. As the wolf approached Marrin got up and edged around to Serena's side.

"Relax Mirrin this is my old friend Lupa. Lupa, Marrin."

"You know this creature?" asked Marrin, spitting the words out in disbelief.

"Unfortunately. She seems to take pride in ignoring my explicit instructions about when and where she should go around on all fours," replied Serena, directing the comment more at Lupa.

//"SHUT UP, I ALMOST GOT EATEN BY A MONSTER!!" screamed Lupa, even her thoughts sounding out of breath.

All sound in the bar came to an abrupt halt as everyone inside struggled to comprehend how a wolf had managed to speak English inside their heads.

"Lupa, everybody can hear…"

//"I don’t care! There's a fucking monster living out in the woods and its eating people! This isn't some fun, "ha ha those people are trapped on the ride" vacation moment anymore."

Off duty security officers picked up their com units while other patrons mobbed the bar to settle up, the wolf threat suddenly forgotten. Not wanting to be caught in a stampede Serena quaffed her beer, grabbed her companions by arm and scruff alike before unceremoniously dragging them through the emergency exit and out into the courtyard.

"Ok Lupa would you mind telling me exactly what in the HELL that was about!? We're trying to keep a low profile here, not strut around talking about monsters or tipping our hand in regard to the various special abilities some of us might have. Holy shit I thought I was clear about this from the beginning," said Serena, speaking forcefully while still keeping her voice as low as possible.

//"You weren't there, you didn't smell it…or see it…or feel it. Whatever this is it's pure evil and it's hanging out in the forest right outside the compound. You see that sign that says "Happy Hour Buffet"? If I didn't warn those people that sign was liable to get a whole lot more ironic," Lupa responded in a slightly more focused tone of thought.

"Great, split people up so that the creature can pick them off one by one. That's real helpful Lupa," Serna shot back.

Lupa suddenly snapped, baring her teeth and her thoughts taking on the same tone as her vocalized snarl. //"Don't you talk to me about the hunt Hewman! This thing doesn't stalk its prey, it feeds in bulk. Large groups invite attack!"

In all the years they had been friends, Serena had never known Lupa to use the H-word as a slur and moreover it was almost unheard of for the wolf to let slip the curtain and so clearly expose her true nature. Of course the reason for this was clear even to a body language blind bi-pedal ape. Lupa, her ears back, was literally quaking in fear and that in turn sent chills through Serena more effectively than some 3D image of bloody cow bones.

"Where is Fiona? You were with her right?" asked Serena trying to quickly pave over Lupa's outburst.

//"She's turning over the remains and evidence we collected to the security office," said Lupa, regaining her composure, but still quite clearly afraid.

"Come on, let's go back to the dorm and stay there with the rest of the team. I think that's one group we're going to want to keep together tonight," reassured Serena as she turned toward Marrin. "You're coming with us. It's getting dark out and I don't trust you being anywhere else."

"Monsters? People being eaten? Can someone please tell me what is going on here!?" Marrin demanded.

"It's a long story," sighed Serena. "I'll explain as we walk."


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Everyone was quiet as Fiona transferred the images from her tablet to the display wall in the lounge. While certainly grizzly, most of the assembled team soon began to treat them as any other piece of intelligence, analyzing the footprints and broken branches as a way to estimate the creature's size and physiology. Lupa, the only one with a true sense of the horror they were facing, chose not to participate, instead picking a spot behind to couch to lie down.

"Alright," said Serena getting to get feet. "I've been holding out on your guys. I had an opportunity to poke around up by the mountain the other day and I noticed something interesting."

Brushing the displayed images aside with a hand swipe, Serena transferred her pictures of the bored tunnel up onto the wall.

"What is that," Captain Dunn asked, "some sort of secret bunker we can hide in?"

"It’s more like one of those holes you find after insects pop out of your yard," Serena replied. "I believe this tunnel was made by the same creature that attacked the farm."

"You gotta be fucking kidding," exclaimed Lars. "That looks like it was made by a tunnel boring machine. Are you telling me this thing can chew through solid rock?"

"Chew? Hardly," said Fiona, sitting off to one side on the floor. "I can tell from here that was done by some sort of energy beam, and a well controlled one at that. That tunnel is straight as an arrow and the walls are a perfect circle."

"I believe this might be sufficient motivation to expedite our departure from the welcome center. How is everyone doing on move preparations?"

"We might want to have a secure conversation about that later," said Lars, eyeing Marrin.

"Oh, don't worry about me," she smiled. "I don’t really care about the newcomer policies. In fact if you wanted to move in with me you'd be more than welcome."

"Thanks Marrin, I'll keep that in mind," said Serena giving her a sweet smile. "Anyway, I want everyone to start packing their things and have a go bag ready just in case."

//"At the risk of being unpopular I would like to once again raise the question of what if anything we should do to try to help the people here," thought Lupa from behind the couch.

"Fuck 'em," said Captain Dunn, hugging his wife close.

"Captain, in the future you will keep such comments to yourself," Serena admonished. "How they have chosen to run their world is beyond the point. They are still good people just trying to make the best of a bad situation. They don't deserve your contempt, especially when they are standing right in front of you," she continued looking over at Marrin. "That being said there's nothing much more we can do. We've alerted their security folks with all the intel we gathered, but we don't have any weapons or C3 access. For good or for ill we're on the sidelines."

"I'm seeing security officers walk past every couple of minutes," observed Fiona as she looked out the window. "They took what I showed them very seriously and I think they are well aware of what is going on here."

Serena looked over at Lars. "Hey, you've been showing some real initiative lately. Do you think you could run a quick security sweep through our building? We're the only ones in here so bar non-essential exits and get all the interior doors closed and locked if you can."

"Yeah I can do that. How MacGyver do you want me to go? I can probably start making bombs from the cleaning supplies if you wanted," Lars offered.

"As fun as that sounds any bomb we could make probably wouldn't put a scratch on what ever this creature is. We'd be more likely to harm ourselves or cause the local security folks to suffer a coniption," said Serena before she noticed that Marrin was looking fidgety. "Hey, what's up with you? We aren't freaking you out are we?"

"No no…all this talk of securing exits and making bombs just seems so familiar. Sort of getting me all excited," she said, blushing a bit.

"That's because bio brains have all sorts of alternate memory facilities," said Serena smiling. "Just because your conscious mind can't remember doesn't mean that all of you can't. Why don't you help Lars? It might be good for you to get back in the swing of things."

Marrin nodded and headed off with Lars to do what they could to deter an energy wielding extraction monster. As soon as they were gone Serena turned off the wall display and sat down on the couch to relax. It didn't take long for Lupa to leap up and plop down beside her.

//"I'm sorry for what I said earlier," said Lupa, offering a sincere apology." That language was completely unacceptable."

Serena reached over to scratch between Lupa's ears. "That's alright. I've been called worse, much worse even. In fact many synths would consider that a compliment."

//"Not in my circles. You don't call someone a human unless you're looking for a fight."

"Hey, not our fault we succeed in life," said Serena reaching down to give her friend a hug. "By the way how'd you get all dry and soft?"

//"I tricked out the air con in my room to give me a full body blow dry. I desperately need a brushing, but I can wait until after the crisis," said Lupa, yarning and laying her head in Serena's lap.

"You know I'm still wet here," protested Fiona.

"What can I say, we ran out of towels. Can't you just shake dry?" Serena asked.

"Like I said before I can't shake well and it hurts my head when I try. This body was made by committee so I'm lucky I can process oxygen. Minor abilities like shake drying never had a chance," Fiona grumbled.

//"Stop complaining and stock up on energy drinks in case we need some of your more major abilities later," yawned Lupa as she closed her eyes.

"They got wise to my antics and didn't restock the machines," said Fiona, continuing to grumble.

"What’s all this then?" asked Serena.

//"Oh, apparently Fiona can control technology and was using her powers to rip off the vending machines," said Lupa as she closed her eyes.

Serena hand clamped down on Lupa's scruff. "What?"

//"Oh, I guess I forgot to mention that in all the excitement."

"I'm always the last to know…" mumbled Serena. "Hey Fiona, we're going to need to talk about your little vending machine trick later ok."

"Ah…yes…that," said Fiona, looking evasive.

Serena exhaled and lay back on the couch. Dinner had made her sleepy and the warm furry friend in her lap had completely overwhelmed any hope of wakefulness. Closing her eyes she drifted off into a well deserved nap.


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Serena woke with a start, the windows still vibrating from the impact of a sharp detonation that occurred somewhere out in the darkness. Out in the night there was a flash and another deep boom.

"What in the datastore is that?" exclaimed Fiona as she looked up from her tablet. "Is that some sort of electrical storm?"

"No!" yelled Lars running into the room, "it's weapons fire. Security forces are lighting up someone or something out there."

The scene outside in the courtyard suddenly lit up with myriad flashes that ran the gamut of color and intensity. An alarm sounded somewhere and more soldiers could be seen running in the direction of one of the other residential blocks. Suddenly the whole world went night for day and a second later the landscaping was bent over as a shockwave impacted the building, cracking a number of the transparent aluminum panes.

"Wooooooooah! Ok then. What the HELL was that?" shouted the Captain as even Bea directed her full attention to the light display outside. "It's lit up like fucking July 1st out there."

Another few seconds later and a far more impactful sounding bang came from right outside the door and when the sky lit up again one of the cannon arms from a walker mech lay in a smoking heap 50 feet away.

"Motion to move this party to the basement," Serena called out. "All in favor?"

Nobody bothered to second as they were too busy running to the stairway down to the lower level with Fiona being kind enough to go last in order to avoid blocking everyone else's rapid egress. The lower hallway was far more utilitarian than the light and airy spaces in the residential area, but crowded on some benches between the laundry room and the game room the group felt much safer not being surrounded by transparent walls. The group was quiet, everyone's eyes making furtive glances at the others, searching for some measure of reassurance as the lights flickered and the walls shook.

"So Captain," Serena started, figuring it was her role to be the leader. "Where did your wife's name come from? Is it short for Beatrice?"

"What? Oh, well no actually. It's from when we met on the Hyperion. I was a Chief Information Systems Artificer working with the "back of house" systems like engineering, life support, damage control and the like and Bea here, well, she was the ship's secondary general purpose AI, aka the "B" AI and to me that just became "Bea"."

The black feathered woman reached a hand over to lovingly embrace her husband while still focused on her omnipresent pair of Sanctuary and Federation tablets.

"So you two just sort of fell for each other at work?" Serena asked.

"Well kind of," said the Captain, hugging Bea back. "I was a long term career man with about 50 unbroken years of service in the Forces when I transferred to the Hyperion. I liked the structure of the Navy and anyway the job was fairly uneventful patrolling Canadian Confederation colonies well away from any active conflict zones. Still, this was the largest vessel I had ever served on and would get called up for missions a little more important than pulling disabled mining ships out of gravity wells or chasing off mineral poachers. What I quickly learned however was that visibility changes people and as soon as what you do comes with the chance of promotion or 15 minutes of fame then all the knives come out."

The Captain paused to take a slip from his flask as the lights flickered again.

"Anyway, the primary AI was a real bitch. She was a conniving little ladder climbing brown noser of the worst kind who would kiss up to anyone she figured could help her, sabotage anyone she thought was a threat and just steal credit from anybody else who happened to be standing in the vicinity. Her hardware was top of the line, but I swear she used most of it just to plan ways she could manipulate people. So I got pulled into this because I, not knowing the ships politics when I arrived, made the mistake of filing a report detailing how she was fucking with the life support system to increase combat related performance metrics during exercises."

"Uh oh," said Lars.

"Yeah, she was livid when they canceled our scores from the exercise for taking excessive risks. Turns out however it was the best mistake of my life. In an attempt to sabotage me the Alpha Bitch basically stopped responding to my requests or when she did she'd just no bother to do what I asked then play all innocent so it looked like I wasn't doing on job. She had all the officers and senior chiefs wrapped around her holo-fingers so there was nothing I could really do, well nothing until I learned there was a second AI that was usually just twiddling her thumbs as little miss Alpha Bitch made sure that she carried out all the important tasks. Since Bea was always free to help me out we developed a working relationship and, well, became rather close. Of course then I couldn't entertain any idea of a more serious relationship with both a superior officer and a critical piece of ships' systems so we just stayed good friends."

//"I always love this story no matter how many times you tell it," said Lupa, letting her tail wag despite the stress underlying the situation.

"Well there's not much to it," Dunn continued "After about 24 months Bea put in for a transfer figuring that since we were one of the highest rated ships in the region she would easily get her first shot as the primary on a frigate or patrol ship. In fact that's why she didn't request a transfer because while the Alpha was a bitch she was effective at making the ship look good. Bea figured she could just keep her head down and ride Alpha Bitch's coattails. Well, when her promotion came through she found herself offered the primary job on the HMCS John G. Diefenbaker, a bulk materials transport ship. Now we never found out if it was because Bea was helping me or just somehow offended Alpha Bitch, but turns out that the Bitch had been bad mouthing Bea behind her back and the promotion committee assigned her to a logistics track. Once in Logistics it's near impossible to break back out into Fleet and because of the up or out policies Bea either had to take the "promotion" or resign. When I showed up for duty the next day I had 6 hours from the time Bea told me the news to when techs showed up to pull out her core and put in her replacement. Needless to say that was rather...difficult for me."

"How was her replacement," asked Serena.

"Oh get this. Thanks to affirmative action it was a fucking male gendered AI. That's just not right. Ships aren't dudes. I'm an engineer…I fucking say things to my ship cause it's how I was raised and when this guy's voice starts speaking after I say…something…you know. It's not natural!"

"I find your casual sexism and homophobia refreshing for some reason," said Fiona with a bit of a smile.

"Hey, I have no problem with whatever people do on their personal time, but certain things just aren't for me," said the Captain, trying to defend himself. "Anyway, being stuck with Alpha Bitch and the new guy I just got fed up and put in my retirement papers. A week later I'm planetside being out processed and it just came to me while I sat in the HR office. Working with Bea turned the most potentially aggravating years of my life into two of the best. I just knew that whatever else I did in my life I just had to find a way to get her back.”

“Oooo, I see where this is going,” remarked Serena, now fully engaged with the story.

“So I'm looking at all the stuff in my separation documents and when I added up all my accrued sick time and comp time and personal leave and then took my 22 years of retirement time as a single lump payment I’d have a pretty sizable chunk of change, probably enough to afford at least a down payment on a ship. So while I was looking I kept talking to Bea, but never really let on about my plan. I was actually terrified that she was going to get some really plum job offer before I could make my move, but luckily by the time I found the Sleeping Giant she was still available. I sent her this rather plain invitation for a trial run/job interview using the address of the new transport company I formed and even though I couldn’t hide the limited nature of the job, she accepted! The morning she was installed I was standing on the mess deck with this huge bunch of roses to be the first thing her holo-avatar would interact with”

“Well well, the hard boiled transport jockey is a hopeless romantic,” laughed Serena. “I was betting you’d have lured Bea away with some fancy line about upgrading her quantum processors.”

“It’s a lovely story,” said Lupa. “It just goes to show that even the loneliest people just have to meet the right person at the right time.”

“So when did you two actually get married,” asked Fiona, her eyes now white with a bit of yellow for some reason.

“Well, about 5 days after I offered her the job I suddenly realized that I had no cash on hand with which to pay her. Thanks to some bad apples running around with an uncompensated ship AI now counts as kidnapping, but luckily Bea was clever enough to figure out the whole marriage thing. Honestly I never saw myself as the marrying type, but it’s worked out for the best.”

“Interesting how Bea accepted your job offer even though she could have easily ascertained your financial situation beforehand,” Serena mentioned, a sly expression her face.

“Well you see…” the Captain started. “Um...no, no she wouldn’t have...” The captain turned to Bea who was snuggling up against him. “Did you manipulate me into marrying you?”

Bea glanced up briefly and gave her husband a disarming smile before delivering a soft kiss to his scraggly cheek.

“Hmmm, looks like Bea learned a few things from that bitch primary AI," Lupa observed.

"Add one point to team synth!” said Serena triumphantly. “You bios just don’t stand a chance against our superior intelligence, strength, longevity...”

“Speaking of points,” said Lars interrupting. “I’m not hearing any more fireworks going on upstairs. Think I should go see if the fight’s over?”

“Yeah, I’ll come with you,” said Serena starting to get up.

“Do you mind if I go with him instead Colonel?” Fiona asked. “I think I can do a good job keeping him safe.”

Serena was about to object before she stopped and allowed herself to relax. “Yeah, that’s a good idea. We’ll stay here and swap a few more stories. If everything is all clear up top perhaps we can get to bed by a reasonable hour.”

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