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Chapter 12

Quirk was still a bit shaken from his resurrection, so Niall and the others gave him a while longer to recover. Looking in the mirror he caught sight of the Emperor's insignia on his cheek displays and quickly switched it back to the triangular sigil he had worn before.

Afterwards he sat in front of the mirror for a bit as if meditating. Xerian gave a start as he realised that the creature was playing Defender on his own visor, using the mirror to see the game display.

"Do we have time for that?" the Synth asked, looking a bit put out.

"It's important," the Protogen retorted. "Usually this is something I'd do when I'm bored. But right now... Well, I want to see how it matches my high-score."

"Ah," Niall said. "I think I understand. You're worried that something is missing or not right."

"I've had my brain cut up," Quirk sighed. "Part of it has been regrown. Call it hypocritical if you like given that I put other people through this myself... But I want to be sure I'm still me."

"I quite understand," Niall smiled. "When I was created I did something similar."

"That'll do," Quirk decided, quitting the game. His visor flashed briefly and then displayed a satisfied expression. "Close enough given that people have been talking to me. No offence intended."

At that moment there was a yell and a crash. Quirk and Niall ran over to the other room where Xerian was lying sprawled under a mass of black metallic objects.

"Something fell on me!" the Synth protested, and began to push the objects off of him. "Is it part of the ship...? Are we safe here...?"

"What the hell...?" the protogen exclaimed. He looked at the ceiling, saw that there was no damage and his ears drooped with a worried expression on his visor. "Is it that creature again?" he asked. "The Bob?"

"Has to be," Niall said. "That's my combat armour from Furrae. There is no other way it could be here."

"Does that make this Holy Armour?" Lautrec asked. "Does it have a +5 class?"

"More like +1000," Niall said. "Wait... there's some tickertape in the helmet."

"THIS MIGHT BE HANDY - STOP - WILL GET SOME FOR XERIAN TOO IN NEXT DROP - STOP - BOB"

"How is He going to do that?" Xerian asked, as Niall put on the armour. "I don't think you people ever made armour for a Synth."

"If we'd known you were going to be kidnapped and caught in an explosion, we probably would have," Niall said. "Of course, that might be why he hasn't sent it yet. I'd offer you mine, but you're larger than me so I really don't see it fitting."

"What are we going to do with the message?" Xerian asked. "The Emperor's men won't understand it, but... Do we really want them to find it if they break into the sanctum?"

"Just flush it down the toilet," Niall said.

"The... what?" Quirk looked confused for a moment. "Oh! Sorry, that's at the front of the ship. Far too close to the Emperor's quarters for us to risk an assault, at least for now. But there is a rubbish disposal system."

"Hold on," Niall said, looking at the protogen as if he was insane. "Are you seriously telling me that there's just one single toilet on the entire ship?"

"Yes," the protogen said simply. "We don't need them ourselves - organic waste is either vaporised or converted directly to energy by our augmentations. So the only toilets installed are for the convenience of other races, and that wasn't a high priority for this vessel. However, the ship does have showers and washing facilities at regular intervals, if that helps...?"

"No matter," Niall said. "I'm entirely robotic, can't eat. So is Lautrec. Xerian... I think he can, right?"

"Yes," the Synth said. "We can eat specially-designed food. We'll do that voraciously if we're reconfiguring our bodies and need the extra material, or have taken significant damage. Otherwise we just need an occasional snack to provide material for our self-repair systems. And yes, we do have special toilets. However, I don't think I'll need one for the foreseeable future."

"Not that we can foresee very far," Quirk sighed. "Anyway, let's get to the computer room."

* * *

"Well," Quirk said, picking himself up from the cyberjack couch. "I've reprogrammed the surgery units - I think. We'll have to see what happens next. Keep in mind that as soon as the Emperor or his sycophants figure out that their drones are acting less drone-like, they'll realise what I've done. And it may not be so easy to repeat this once they know what to look for."

"We can but try," Niall said. "Now, let's get out of here before someone else shows up."

"Yes," Xerian said. "I want to see their captives."

"First I'll need to jack into cyberspace again," Quirk pointed out. "But not here, because they have likely detected the intrusion and will be sending mooks to-"

At that moment there was a scratch on the door.

"Trouble, boss!" Lautrec said, diving as a hail of laser and projectile fire struck the wall next to him. "Ow!" he added, taking a couple of hits to the back.

"Remain where you are," a protogen said thickly, entering the room. Quirk's visor flashed "KiLL" again and he shot the newcomer in the head. Xerian gave an electronic-sounding wail and dived to the ground.

Lautrec jumped over the dying grunt and tackled one of his colleagues, pinning them to the ground, while Niall, now fully armoured, went hand-to-hand with one of the surviving mooks and put them in a choke-hold.

Quirk left the room and promptly received a round in one arm. He screamed with pain and then went completely insane. Niall backed off, holding his captive in front of him like some kind of meat-shield.

"K-Kill," Quirk babbled, and then promptly collapsed in a heap.

Lautrec poked his head out from the computer room, suspicious at the sudden quiet. "Ewww," he said, looking at the carnage. Three protogens had been shot in the head. Another was lying decapitated in a pool of blood, and there was just one survivor, a red and black protogen being held tightly by Niall.

"Stay back in there, boss," the cyberjag warned, glancing at Xerian. "You won't want to see this."

Cautiously the robotic panther padded towards Quirk, who suddenly sat up and shook his head. "Ow," he said, looking at his arm which hung limply by his side.

"Waste not, want not," he muttered, crawling towards one of the fallen protogens. Taking off his leather gauntlet, he touched the shoulder joint of his broken arm in a particular way and it suddenly fell off with a crash. He performed a similar manoeuvrer with the dead soldier, removing their light grey furred arm and plugging it into his own shoulder joint.

"That's better," he said happily, flexing the clawed fingers on his new arm and replacing the gauntlet. He glanced at his shoulder, which was still displaying the Emperor's insignia, and a few moments later it cleared to show his usual triangular device.

"You fiend," the captive snarled, watching with disgust as his underling was pirated out for spares. "The Emperor will wreak great vengeance upon you for this depravity!"

"Oh, you can talk?" Niall said, sounding surprised. "I figured you were one of the zombies."

"I can soon fix that," Quirk said, drawing his gun.

"Hold it, hold it," Niall scolded. "You can't shoot an unarmed man... or whatever they are."

"You people are so squeamish," the black protogen complained, and set about re-attaching his broken arm to the protogen he'd just robbed.

"Yes, I can speak intelligently," the captive said. "For now. The Emperor will not be pleased at this failure... I will likely pay for it with my mind."

"Oh, let's just kill him," Quirk protested. "One little bullet to the head and he won't remember any of this. If he dies in action and loses the last 30 minutes of his memory, the Emperor won't have any reason to punish him!" he added happily.

"Robots!" Lautrec barked. "Hide! Or something!"

Quirk glanced around. "No, ignore them," he said. "They'll be distracted by the bodies. Reviving crew members will take priority unless you actively attack them."

"Warning: Casualty detected. Attempting standard restoration procedure," the first robot said.
"Warning: Casualty detected. Attempting standard restoration procedure," the other said. There was a brief conflict as the two robots attempted to retrieve the same corpse at once, but eventually they resolved the conflict and the four bodies were hastily removed to the nearest medical facility.

"See?" Quirk said brightly. "Sometimes I leave them fresh bodies as a distraction." Niall gave him a dark look.

"Hey boss, it's safe to come out now," Lautrec told Xerian. "Hopefully those guys are getting rebuilt shortly. We should probably move along before anyone else shows up."

"What about the captive?" Niall said. "We can't let the Emperor lobotomise him, it's not right!"

"We can't take him with us," Quirk said. "I still say shoot him. He'll wake up none the wiser."

"They'll burn out my brains!" the captive wailed. "I don't want to become a vegetable!"

"Science experiment!" Quirk said enthusiastically. "If he's been flagged for lobotomy, shooting him will tell us whether my modifications worked."

"No!" Xerian and the protogen wailed together.

"Either that or we hit you with a pipe," Niall pointed out. "Or lock you in a cupboard. But then you might try to get back into your master's good graces by telling him about us."

"No! I'll be quiet! I need to think."

"And just why should you be allowed to sit and think?" Quirk demanded. "Why shouldn't I leave your head on the Emperor's bed as a warning?"

"He's a coward," Niall smiled. "When things went to shit, he panicked. Could have done a lot more struggling and fighting back, but instead he's been pretty well-behaved. So far, at least. So I'd guess he's trying to work out our odds against the Emperor to see which side is most likely to win."

"...Yes," the captive said sullenly. "Just don't tell the Emperor that."

"Put him in the cupboard," Xerian pleaded. "There's been enough death here already!"