Anisa moved effortlessly, never having felt this in control of her own body and movement. Her chest was numb and cold, but in a moment like this a cool head was the only path to victory. The only way to protect her new family. The ship's Doctor didn't seem like herself. Or maybe she was more herself than she had ever been. Anisa glanced back to see her fiddling with Tai's interface again, a poorly labeled progress bar filling on it. Unsure of what this new approach meant, Anisa decided not to take it for granted that she was still the same Tak she knew. The doctor sighed, "You can't really believe that leaving Katsi alone is the right call."
Anisa's response was effortless and confident, "Katsi has to seek her own road. I trust her capabilities and her instinct. If she believes she has the time to slow the ship to minimize loss of life, she is welcome to think of it that way. I believe that the more we save the harder our next fight will be, but she is her own person. I can't take that from her." That's right. Katsi would just have to see it with her own eyes, just like she had to.
The Doctor asked carefully, “You seem different. Did something happen while I was out?”
Anisa couldn’t help but respond curtly, “I could say the same about you. You are definitely more tuned in than you were before I stabbed you in the head.”
The comment got a look of bewilderment from the doctor, but she said softly, “While I was recovering, I had a bit of an… adventure. Tai is trying to help me find a solution while helping Kat.” She was playing coy. Anisa could do the same.
"I had something similar. Got sedated and my mind went on a trip. I'm feeling a little more clear now." The doctor wasn't buying it, but Anisa had not interest in dissecting it anymore. She was going to figure this out once and for all. Especially now that her mind wasn't splintered anymore. The weight was still there, but there was no one fighting to remind her. The damage she could do was at the front of her mind and as she was now, there wasn't anything stopping her from ending this fight when they made landfall.
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Katsi ran down the hall, tears forming in her eyes. They hadn't had time to visit it properly. That had to be why Anisa was acting this way. She wasn't the kind to just give up on people. Pushing aside her sister's odd response, she ran onto the bridge and was quickly tackled to the ground. She nearly had the wind knocked out of her by the impact but was surprised to look up and see another clone. Worrying that she had been taken from their foe, the clone sighed and dragged Katsi to the side of the doorway. She spoke swiftly and quietly, "I am Shi. It means four. Zwei is the one with the sword. Hepta is the one trying to rip the steering column off." She looked around and confirmed the other two clones, Zwei waving nervously as she gripped the blade firmly. As Hepta tried to pull on the pirate wheel that Katsi swears was never there before, Shi continued, "The Original is trying to find all of us before impact. We don't know what she is doing-"
Katsi cut her off to explain, "She is using something called a Class 9 Corruptor. I don't know what that is, but I think she is hijacking bodies. Ellefu is infected and-"
Zwei growled, "Then Trinta was right! And..." She trailed off as Katsi turned with concern in her eyes. Zwei explained, "Kuntaret left a communication device that connected to Trinta. She was telling us to run. To get back to the ship and leave before SHE took us."
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Hepta continued to fight the wheel, eventually realizing how it worked. She laughed and spun the wheel swiftly until the ship started to turn away from the planet. As she did, alarms started to blare and the readouts began to warn against this change of course. Hepta shouted, "If Ellefu got Trinta then who knows who else she got. For now, let's just assume we three are the only safe ones... Us and the little captain."
Katsi didn't know who she was talking about at first and upon realizing she shouted, "Katsi. My name is Katsi!" The signals got louder and all the screens were covered with massive warning logos before the viewing windows eventually became nothing but the starry sky as they continued to fall backwards towards the planet. Katsi ran to a panel and started trying to adjust the thrust, surprised that the interface had changed completely. Had they somehow reprogrammed the Ziegfried? Katsi was annoyed, but wasn't going to have it. She opened one of the panels and pulled out some wires before attaching it to her tablet from her workshop. "You are a hardware person, Shawn. Show me what you had planned for when someone reprograms your interface." As expected, as soon as she hooked up the tablet in this makeshift manner, she saw the familiar interface. "Such a hot mess of programming that she couldn't actually touch the code. Just like Dean said. Alright, let's figure this out." Shi continued to play guard while Zwei watched for hidden hatches and Hepta held the wheel in place. Remembering the others she had met while investigating, Katsi couldn't help but want to try and find them using the scanners as soon as she had the chance.
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Kuntaret ran through the unmarked halls, trying to navigate from memory. Last time she was on this ship, she had been impaled by an insect woman. Projection or not, that kind of thing sticks with you. Pushing that thought aside, she tilted her head as her pursuer threw a blade past her head. Rolling to the side to take cover at a turn in the hallway, she waited for The Original to throw Nava's body against her in some predatory way. But there was silence. Not trusting the situation, she got moving down the hall again only to have Ellefu drop down from a tile in the ceiling in front of her. Tak'Nasi approached her with a laugh, "I have to admit, the people who designed this are clever. I've never seen such esoteric code and counterintuitive navigation. It was almost as if they knew I was coming. That said, Tak'Nasi had been living in these walls for a long time and knew them well. You won't be getting away."
As Nava rounded the corner, Tak'Nasi spoke from her mouth, "And here we all are. Soon the rest of us will be here. This entity was intended to hunt me to extinction, but it is through this entity that I can fully realize the potential of my experiment. The natural conclusion to an experiment like this." Kuntaret watched carefully as the two tried to close off her escape.
As she pressed her back against the wall to try and prevent herself from being cornered, she felt a pair of hands wrap around her wrists from behind. Looking back, she saw the panel had fallen back to reveal Trinta. Tak' Nasi spoke with her voice, "All of my experiences consolidated and united in one glorious hive mind." Kuntaret wanted to spit at the idea, to strike back at the woman who had taken her sisters from her. But before she knew it her vision had gone black.
Moments later, Kuntaret was in a lab, floating in a tube, and as she tried to find a way out, she saw her sisters around her, all strapped up and being studied, with plenty more tubes for the other samples. She began to hear the same voice that had been buried deep in her subconscious. A voice that taught her how to walk, how to speak, and what the world was like. The voice that was also her own. Telling her that she was just another cog in the machine, a part of a grand experiment that was more important than anything. As she looked between her sisters she could see she wasn't the only one not buying it, but as things were right now, they didn't have a clear route of escape. For now they were prisoners in their own bodies and minds.