Since the suns had set, Rhea managed to prepare a fully functioning chemical laboratory. She persuaded Makoe to prioritize some seed chemicals, which could be used to synthesize more complex medicine. As for the rest of the materials, she asked Uric to organize regular shipments of various ores and plant matter. Rhea’s nanites could grind and isolate the elements within to produce pharmaceuticals.

Rhea’s clinic had two parts: the aboveground, where Omrica had first set her up back during Daynight, and the belowground, where space was tight and she was guarded at all times.

For the Miriani, night represented freedom; they could venture into the open skies of Rosamond’s World and gaze up at the Duchess. Rhea was sitting on a pillow in her aboveground clinic. She had decided to name it the Laboratory. When she first suggested the name to Uric, the man had nothing but confusion on his face. With a little tweaking of the language pack, Rhea devised a new word in the Miriani language – one that meant “a room equipped with tools and equipment for scientific experiments and research.” It had begun to take hold, at least judging by the whispers of the Miriani on the street and in front of the Laboratory’s door.

Rhea rose and walked to the stone window, overlooking the streets of Erdon. She gazed at the Duchess and its violent atmosphere. Erratic lightning bolts would arc around the planet, nearly encircling it. This noticeably illuminated the city. The various glass and steel apparatus behind Rhea churned and bubbled, and an old Miriani man knocked on the door. He was a member of the Family, no doubt, judging by a small red scarf worn under his robes – all senior members had one. He was accompanied by his genetic granddaughter, both were red-furred. The guard at the door smiled at the man and let him pass unbothered.

Rhea had identified what ailed the man before he passed her precipice. Age had begun to eat at his body, with significant deterioration present in both his circulatory and neural systems. Caused by irregular duplication of cells in his body over his lifetime, as well as the regular intake of alcohol and occasional drug use, judging by the trace elements in the man’s bones. Rhea bowed to the man as he and his granddaughter walked in. The two Miriani observed the room, their gaze lingering on the small chemical factory.

“Is this the um—” the girl gazed at Rhea, “The Laboratory?” she asked, enunciating the word with care.

Rhea bowed again. “Indeed. And the two of you are?”

The older man straightened. “Obel. This is my granddaughter Eriva.”

Rhea smiled and said: “Please have a seat sir.”, motioning for the man to approach the mattress she had prepared. The patients would lie atop it, and she would examine them thoroughly, taking care to simulate the actions a Miriani doctor would need to do to get a rich bio-medical picture her Imperial sensors provided.

With Obel’s state, he would experience occasional migraines and bone ache. Stray blood cells had started to clog the nerves in his mind. Rhea would give him something to ease the transmission of electrical signals across nis neural system. As for the bons, Rhea had few options without the use of groundbreaking technology. She supposed she could use trace amounts of hydrochloric acid. It would soften the man’s bones ever so gently and alleviate the calcium buildup pressing upon his nerves.

Obel looked at her, blinking a couple of times.

“There’s nothing wrong with me!” he explained. “It’s Eriva.” He pointed to the girl.

She was freshly an adult, in good health. The only marginal issue Rhea could detect was a small lack of manganese, which would make the girl slightly near-sighted. Rhea could give her some supplements.

Eriva nodded. “I’ve been having bad dreams. I think it’s because my neighbor started to clean his dishes using a yellow sponge. I heard yellow sponge is poison.”

Rhea blinked. “The yellow sponge is giving you bad dreams?”

Eriva clasped her hands. “Yes. They bring the yellow sponge over from the Sea of Horror. It is unholy.”

The Sea of Horror was a part of the southern ocean between the 9th and 7th Kingdoms, where Rhea had scanned the near-sentient crustacean species.

“I see,” Rhea said and went back into her scans of that area. Back when she was on the Sliver, the crustaceans had caught her eye, and it’s a good thing they did, because under their feet, Rhea had managed to catch some of the vile yellow sponge. The sponge was composed of high amounts of surfactants. This provided the sponge with its cleaning properties. By all accounts, it released no airborne particles which could affect the Miriani brains.

Matrioshka saw Rhea conclude that this was just a bad case of paranoia and decided to spin a good-natured lie: “Very correct,” Rhea said. “But that is only true if you do not apply some red healing sand on your forehead.”

The two Miriani exchanged glances.

“Red… sand?” asked Obel.

Rhea clasped her hands once more. “Yes. Procured from the coasts of the 4th Kingdom. It protects from the aura of the Sea of Horrors. And it has the added benefit of helping with eyesight.” Rhea walked to a cabinet and began mixing the red sand. She used some ground stone, leftovers from element extraction, coated them with a binding agent, added some manganese to absorb through contact. Finally, she added some ground tomato-potato, giving the mixture a red color. Rhea packed the entire mixture into a small wooden box. She presented it to Eriva and said: “Let it dry in fresh air for an hour or two. And apply some liberally to your forehead when going to sleep. Preferably long-sleep.”

Eriva looked at the box and brightened. “Thank you so much, doctor!”

Obel smiled too when he saw his granddaughter’s joy. “You are all right, doctor. Thank you.”

Rhea bowed. “Don’t mention it. While you are already here, mind letting me take a look at you too?”

The man considered her, what made him accept was a gentle hand and gaze from Eriva. “Aye. I suppose it can’t hurt.”

Obel sat on the mattress, and Rhea on the pillow next to it. She brought out a stethoscope and told Obel to pull down his shirt. The man was scandalized, but relented once Rhea explained the need:

“This will let me hear your heart.”

“Giant’s shadow… what will they think of next?” he pulled down his clothes, and Rhea faked an examination.

“Been in the Family long?” she asked.

The man considered her, and her sharp turn into the subject. His ears twitched. “All my life,” he said.

“I’m new. Can you tell me about the Family? From your perspective.”

Rhea could tell the man was growing slightly suspicious, but he started talking anyway:

“Good people. We take care of each other. Been in the city since the city came to be. We have our own royal family you see; the Rai-Brens.” His ears vibrated as he continued: “Though not much is the same since the chief passed.”

Eriva clasped her hands. “Giant keep his soul.”

“Who was the chief?” asked Rhea, as she inspected the man’s arms. His veins were starting to get thick enough they could be seen through his fur.

“A great man. A great, great man,” Obel said. “He became boss at age 17. Young that was... I could hardly stand the man then; I was 20 years his senior.”

The man laughed. “Me? Taking orders from a boy. No chance. And yet…”

“Yes?” Rhea asked.

“By the Light, he had the blood in him. You should have seen him back in ’02. He managed to trick the Rosefists and the East boys into warring with each other. Ha!”

Obel lifted his arms, gaze deep in the past, joy clear in his heart. “We scooped in! Took it all for ourselves. By the Light, Zar was the best of us. Now we have become clowns.”

Rhea had approached her cabinets, preparing the medicine for Obel. “Why? You seem large in number… the royal guard avoids your territory.”

“Aye, they do. Right now. But what of last month? They raided the compound up on Irden street. And what did the boss do?”

“Grandpa!” said Eriva, and pointed to the door. The guard was just outside, and Rhea scanned that he was listening in. Obel’s loud voice piqued his interest.

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The old man grunted and clasped his hands towards Eriva. “Thank you, flower. I lose myself.”

“You don’t like the boss?” Rhea pressed.

“Doctor, that would be enough,” warned Eriva, her eyes leaving no room for discussion.

“I simply want to know what I am getting myself into.”

Obel looked at her. “Get ready for disappointment!”

Eriva whispered intensely: “At least be quiet about it!”

The man grunted, keeping his voice low. “She married the chief, she did. Omrica gave him a daughter, an heir. Young Temri.”

Rhea matched the name and DNA to the girl Makoe had met – the one that wished to end the Family.

Obel continued: “The chief got sick. Poisoned him, she did.”

Eriva jumped at the accusation and looked towards the door. Rhea calculated there was less than a 1% chance the guard heard Obel’s words. “Grandpa!” Eriva warned.

"Where was the man buried?" asked Rhea.

Obel thought about it. "I wager by the old cemetery, facing the Duchess, in Springhall."

Rhea summoned a crow-bat, equipped it with sensors, and sent it toward Springhall, the district in lower Erdon.

"Omrica drove away the girl. Temri hates us because of her. And Temri was like Zar, brave, smart, she would have led us straight."

The man grunted. "Nobody complains; the woman has little patience for internal conflict. Dundm got assigned to latrine duty when he suggested she stop pestering the remnants of the East Boys."

"She even brought that cunt. Her new man, sired a kid with him too." The man looked sad at his own words.

"Hey," said Eriva. "Memri doesn’t deserve that."

Obel looked up at her, teeth clenched. "She will inherit. If Temri doesn’t return. Rai-Bren blood will be lost."

Eriva’s ears vibrated. "There’s more to life than blood. I’m sorry, doctor, but I think we will be on our way."

Rhea gave the man his medicine, two pills encased in cellulose, that would gently alleviate Obel’s symptoms of age. The man thanked her, and the two Miriani made their way toward the door.

Rhea spent a couple of minutes at her tiny chemical factory. She had taken up a hobby too. The Miriani who passed by her clinic were scanned; their ailments catalogued. Rhea would then create small insects, filling the same biological niche as Terran mosquitoes. She would summon a unique version for each Miriani, fill them up with microdoses of chemicals, and send them to hunt down their targets – delivering, in some cases, life-saving drugs. It was by all accounts a perversion of her Imperial power, but Matrioshka had little energy to protest. She was busy elsewhere, currently talking to Rumel and Nehri back at the palace.

Omrica had decided to visit then, bringing with her Rhea’s breakfast. By all accounts, Rhea should be starving; this was one and a half hours later than a Miriani would usually eat. Rhea thought it might have been intentional, a display of power, so she didn’t let it affect her.

Rhea bowed as the white-furred matron of the Family entered her Laboratory. Her gaze too lingered on the equipment. She placed the tied cloth next to a brewing beaker and greeted:

"Blessed night, doctor."

"Blessed night. Is that food?" Rhea asked. "I’m starving."

Omrica managed to hide her smile. "Yes. Apologies for running late."

Rhea opened the cloth and found some bread and dried slabs of fruit paste. It reminded Rhea of bacon, though this was much healthier. She took a bite of the presented meal and decided to turn on her simulated Miriani taste receptors. It was quite tasty. Hints of lime, chewy like a gel of starch and sugar. It paired well with the fluffiness and crunchiness of the bread.

Omrica smiled once Rhea dug in, and Rhea looked at her.

Omrica grinned. "How’s work?"

"Fun," Rhea admitted. "Wide variety of ailments. I am learning a lot."

The joy left the white-furred woman’s face. "Learning?"

"Ah. Worry not. I already know all I need to take care of your people. Might I suggest introducing a workout routine to all members? Higher wages could be the incentive. Your people could run faster, lift heavier weights, live longer. This would translate directly into profits – they would be slightly offset by the higher caloric intake."

Omrica’s ear twitched. "Can you go five minutes without trying to take control?"

"You are in control. I’m trying to advise," Rhea said, taking another bite.

"Don’t condescend me. I have enough people saying what they think I want to hear."

Rhea grinned at the woman. "I have heard."

This startled Omrica; her eyes grew suspicious. "And what have you heard?"

Rhea planned to make a gamble – tell Omrica what she didn’t want to hear. The results could cost her dearly. Worst case for Rhea, they would kick her out of the Family, kick her corpse out that is. She was sure Omrica had at her disposal a couple of Miriani with a smaller center of harmony.

Rhea gulped the last of the food and said:

"Granted, criminality is necessary for someone with fur like your and mine. But you live in the shadow of your predecessor, whether it was through luck or actual skill. Zar Rai-Bren has left a difficult legacy to uphold."

Omrica’s eyes widened as Rhea spoke. The crow-bat identified the grave of the Family’s late leader. The scans confirmed poison in his system, the type of poison that was hard to apply and would have entered the body of the poisoner as well. No trace of the compound was found within Omrica. She did not poison Zar.

"He left you alone," said Rhea. "You had to keep up with him, the idea of him, in the eyes of your people. It must have been lonely."

Omrica sat on the pillow. "How do you know all this?"

"People talk to their doctors."

The woman didn’t buy it. "Sure they do. But not like this. What do you know?"

Rhea’s processing speed spiked. "I was in a similar situation once. A man left me his legacy; I didn't know what to do with it. Ended up throwing it away… The biggest mistake of my life."

Rhea didn’t need to fake the sorrow she felt; it was clearly visible on her body and her lattice.

This seemed to calm Omrica. "Then you understand. I was alone. And Temri, my eldest daughter – we were so hurt, we just couldn’t stand each other."

"I understand," smiled Rhea. "But time has passed. It would do you good to reach out to your daughter. Especially now since Memri’s dad also died. The three of you need each other."

Omrica stood, to escape the growing onslaught of tears. "Yes. I will try," she said, turning away towards the exit. "Take care, doctor."

Rhea let her go, fighting her own body to escape the tears.

Matrioshka split her attention between the conversation she was having and appeared in Rhea’s virtual space.

Rhea’s own human form appeared next to Matrioshka.

"You heard that, huh?" she gritted her teeth. "The Enslavement bond comes in handy."

Matrioshka wanted to reach out, but she kept her hands where they were. Instead, she said, "I heard everything. Loss is hard, is it not?"

Rhea nodded, fixing her white hair back and away from her face. The woman turned away from Matrioshka, hiding behind her own tall form. "I envy you."

Matrioshka cocked an eyebrow. "You do?"

Rhea nodded. "You do not suffer from the human reluctance to change oneself fundamentally."

"Envy me no more," said Matrioshka. "I have the very same doubts chain my actions. I have immense portions of my mind I wish would vanish."

Rhea turned back with a smile; there was a dried tear crossing her left cheek. "Such as?"

"The entire Reconstruction War, for starters."

Her science officer smiled. "Most older minds would agree."

"The day my father died – just the images of his dead body," Matrioshka said.

"Ah. The visions of the dead," nodded Rhea. "Me too. I have their cold faces eternally just outside my vision, trying to creep in."

A silence filled the room, Matrioshka offered her hands. Rhea considered it for a long moment, and Matrioshka was growing embarrassed. But Rhea’s soft touch startled her. She didn’t know why, but Matrioshka expected Rhea’s skin to be cold, yet it was warm, blissfully warm.

Contact.

It made everything easier.

So human of me, thought Matrioshka.

They held hands for a few moments more until Matrioshka decided to send the scans of Rumel and Nehri to Rhea. The doctor then wished to speak to the pair of guards, and Matrioshka allowed it.

Not long after, Rhea was alone again in the clinic. She spent the next hour tending to five patients, three of whom had serious ailments. The other two were a repeat of Eriva, a placating lie to ease the mental tension. Some added supplements too, to make everything seem legit.

At some point, a Miriani man with a large dormant tumor passed by on the street, and Rhea decided to summon the man using covert actions. She sent a group of nanites to whisper in the man’s ear: “A new clinic has opened nearby. The doctor inside is world-class.”

The man looked around, attributing the voices to the two female Miriani that had just passed him by. The other nanites then delivered a dose of a neurotoxin into his leg, causing it to tense. He fell, landing on his arms. A gentleman helped him up, and the man decided it was time to visit a doctor.

Rhea smiled as her insect nanites returned to her body.

The man entered, still helped by the gentleman. Rhea performed a quick surgery under local anaesthetic. The man, a woodworker named Traih, watched with fascination as Rhea removed the tumor from his lower right abdomen. She explained that it was what caused him to lose control of his legs, and that it was good of him to come to her.

After the man left, Rhea planned to do the same on a larger scale. There was a young girl with a badly healed leg a few blocks away – she could summon her here too.

Yelling caused Rhea to return to her immediate vicinity. It was Omrica, standing atop a small carriage being dragged by horse-rabbit. It had been freshly painted white, with a red circle on its front and back – the Miriani symbol for health. It was the ambulance, newly in use. It carried several Miriani, tending to an extremely damaged body within.

Rhea also noted the sharp increase in both Makoe’s and her captain’s processing powers.

She was about to ask what was going on when she scanned the burned body. It was Memri, the girl Rhea healed when she first landed on Rosamond’s World.

The men carried Memri out of the ambulance and towards the clinic, up the stairs toward the door.

Rhea became a cloud of nanites. Tendrils reached out towards surgical instruments, the matrass was disinfected. Intravascular fluid and anaesthetic stood at the ready.

She diagnosed the girl as she was brought through the door – fourth-degree burns – concentrated on the front of Memri’s body. 83% of her bones were fractured – breaks induced by a shockwave.

Memri was unconscious, her breathing shallow. The muscles which regulated her breathing were in shock; while some tried to compress her lungs, others sought to extend them.

Rhea calculated:

- 0.0007% chance of survival using technology preceding the 21st century.

- 0.9% with technology of the 22nd.

It took until the 25th century, and the bionic press, before Rhea’s calculation reached double-digit chances of survival.

Memri would die.

Rhea invited her captain back to advise. Both Matrioshka and Makoe appeared, yelling at one another.

She tuned them out. Rhea looked at Memri, laying on the precipice of death before her. Omrica had approached Rhea, and was screaming at her – to save her daughter.

Rhea could, if she moved her nanites into Memri’s body. The nanites would shred all dying flesh and simulate a replacement. Memri would become 38% Imperial technology.

Thus, Rhea decided to scan her brain. It was asleep already, easy to scan.

The heat and force had implanted microscopic chunks of stone into Memri’s body. A Miriani heart, which filtered blood alongside pumping it, was not designed to comb though silicates. Memri’s heart was starting to clog – this would be the cause of death.

Less than five heartbeats away.

As gently as a snowflake, Memri’s heart attempted a final constriction. The silicate buildup, growing like a knife from within, pierced her gentle heart.

Rhea placed the scan deep within her lattice – safe, and noticed she was crying, Rhea looked to Omrica, and said:

“She is gone.”