Eros leaned against the wall. Every breath he took caused a spike of pain in his chest. Across the room from him, Sydney sat with Elena. Her arm wrapped around Elena's waist, as she tended to Elena's wounded nose.

Eros watched as the bone armor around Sydney’s body slowly retreated into her body, revealing the person under it. She didn’t have a top on, save for a white cloth wrapped around her breast. Gang tattoos criss crossed her athletic body. She was a pretty girl, carmaled skinned with green eyes and curly dark brown hair.

The Gerlad and Mohawk were busy uncuffing Eros' fellow guards. Ana was the first to be released; she immediately came over to Eros’ side. “Let me help you,” Ana said as he moved Eros’ arm over her shoulder.

“Thank you,” Eros smiled at her. “Ray, I could use some medical attention.”

“I’ll be right over, once I’m done over here,” Ray said as he worked on stitching together a deep cut on Venessa’s arm.

Ana brought him some distance away from the vault entrance and set him down on the ground. Even from all the way over here, Eros could still hear the ferals pounding on the vault door as they tried to get inside. It sounded like there were hundreds of them running around out there.

Ray finally made his way over to Eros’ side. “Where's the problem?”

“Here,” Eros tapped his chest. “I think my ribs are broken. I’m also coughing up blood, so one of them might have punctured a lung,” Eros said as he took off his armor and laid down on the ground. Ray knelt down and began to examine Eros’ chest.

Eros's eyes wandered around the room. His squad members were either taking stock of their supplies or licking their wounds. Two members of Sydney’s gang, Mohawk and Gerald, were further into the vault looking through the shelves. ‘That might be a problem later,’ Eros thought. Eros could not see what they had on account of him lying on the ground.

He shifted his eyes towards Sydney. He stopped, locking eyes with Elena. She was staring him down, while Sydney was treating her bloody nose. He thought it looked a bit crooked after his elbow to her face. He coughed as Ray applied pressure to his chest, blood spraying from his mouth.

“Damn it, be careful.” Eros smacked Ray’s hand away from his chest.

“The good news is nothing’s broken, but you’re bleeding internally ,” Ray said as he reached into his bag pulling out a syringe. “I'm going to give you some regenerative nanites. This will only be a temporary fix to stop the bleeding, you're gonna need professional medical care afterwards.”

Ray inserted the injection into his chest. Eros clenched his teeth at the burning sensation of the nanites repairing his injuries. This part was not the worst, the worst was the constant icking that came later.

Ray removed the empty syringe from his chest. He then packeted up and went to his next patient.

“Put those back,” Yennifier said. She had her rifle pointed at Gerald whose hands were filled with weapons from the vault. “Now or I’ll shoot.”

“Calm down lady, it's not like you need them anyway with the ferals running around,” Mohawk said with a smile.

“Do as she says, boy,” Tyrone spoke up, picking up and aiming his kinetic rifle at the duo.

Sydney got up from taking care of Elena. Bone visible growing out of her body, covering her once again in a suit of bone armor. She walked over to her two subordinates, standing between them and the rifles. “We’ll take what we want. Without us you would have never made it in here,” she said.

“Ana,” Eros said as he turned to Ana, “help me up.”

Taking his arm, Ana slowly lifted Eros to his feet. Eros let go of Ana and started making his way over to Sydney and Tyrone

“And if you prisoners never decided to escape, we would be in this mess in the first place.” Tyrone said.

Eros stood between Tyrone and Sydney. Tyrone’s finger rested on the trigger to his kinetic rifle. “Guys, we need to stop fighting and work together. Without each other we can’t possibly defeat the ferals,” Eros said. He then turned to Tryone, “Just let them take what they want, we have plenty of it.”

“What are you talking about? We don’t need them at all.” Tyrone said he shifted his gun towards Eros. “Have you joined them or something? Why are you trying to protect scum? You need to be careful Eros, you already have one warning from the higher up, another will get you fired or worse turned into a prisoner. I would hate to lose such a good guard.”

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Eros’ scowled, but before he could speak Tyrone’s radio pinged. “Lisa, come over here,” Tyrone said. She did as he commanded and he handed her his kinetic rifle. “Keep it aimed at Eros and the Tank.”

Tyrone then picked up his radio, “Sergeant Tyrone here.”

“This is HQ, the Commander wants to speak with you,” the voice of the radio operator transmitted from the radio. There was static over the radio as she transferred the line.

“Sergeant Tyrone, I have a mission for your squad. I need your squad to manually seal the train tunnel connecting the prison Sector to the Security Sector.” The commander said.

“Why can't AIs do it?,” Tyrone asked.

“Elsa is out for maintenance and Leto is not responding. We don’t currently know what is going on right now.” he said.

“Sir, we're in a vault right now. There's a horde of ferals just outside the vault door.” Tyrone saids.

“Then use the weapons in the vault to kill the horde. We need you to seal the tunnel, if it isn’t sealed then the ferals will invade the rest of the research base. Then they will make it to the surface and overrun Elysium. Look, sergeant you have family in Elysium right?”

“Yes sir, I have a baby girl and a pregnant wife,” Tyrone responded

“Then you don’t want the ferals to get to them, right?”

“Will we have support from other squads?” Tyrone asked.

“I’m afraid not. Your squad is the only one left in the Prison Sector, the rest are either dead or have fled.”

“Okay, we will do it,” Tyrone said.

“Thank you sergeant,” the commander then terminated the call.

“Silverback get ready to move out, we have a tunnel to seal,” Tyrone said as he went over to a medical rack. Everyone else got up and started searching through the armory for supplies.

“Sir, here’s your weapon.” Lisa brought Tyrone his rifle.

“Right, thank you. It slipped my mind.”

Eros approaches Tryone as he was gathering supplies from a shelf, “Sir, I think we should ask Sydney and her group to assist us.”

Tyrone frowned, eyebrows arched in anger, “We don’t work with criminals.” He then went back to gathering supplies.

“But sir, we could use the help,” Eros said he then gestured to the rest of the squad, “Think about your everyone else. The more people we have, the less likely people will die. Sometimes we have to let go of our principles to protect those that we care about.”

Tyrone frowned, his face in concentration. He stared up into Eros’s eyes, “Okay, but if they mess up, it's on you and we have to ask the Commander first.”

Eros similed, “Thanks, now let's go talk it over with sydney.” Eros and Tyrone walk over to sydney.

“What do you two want? Back to tell us not to take supplies.”

Eros spoke before Tyrone could say something stupied, “No, we want you and your crew to join us on the mission to seal the tunnel connect sectors.”

“Why would we do that? You and your people locked us up and torture us by experimenting on us.”

Tyrone stepped up to Sydney, staring her in the eye, “You prisoners are criminals. The experiments are punishments for your crimes. Don’t blame us for the actions that got you all here in the first place.”

“What about the child slaves?” Sydney shouted as she raised her hands in the air, “Didn’t the Commonwealth make the practice of enslaving children legal. Why are they being experimented on? Why are children being experimented on? They're just children!”

“What child slaves? They owe a debt that they couldn’t pay, so now they are here after breaking the law!” Tyrone shouted.

Eros placed his hand on Tyrone’s chest, holding him back. “Guy, calm down. We need to work together. Neither of these groups are likely to survive the horde of ferals out there. If we team up, at least our odds of survival improve.”

“I still say no,” Sydney said, “After we help you, you all will just throw us back into prison.”

“What about a pardon for you and your crew. You all get to leave the prison as free men and women.” Eros suggested.

“What? You can do that, you don’t have the authority.” Tyrone argued.

“Then ask the Commander.” Eros said, “We need all the help that we can get if we are going to seal the tunnel connecting sectors.”

Tyrone looks around to the other members of Silverback, “Do you all think this is a good idea?”

They all hesitate, looking at each other in contemplation, but one by one they nod yes.

Tyrone signed as he picked up his radio. He pressed the button on the side, turning it on, “This is Tyrone, squad leader of Silverback. I need to talk to the Commander.”

“One moment please,” she said.

“Yes, Sergeant?” the voice of the Commander spoke from the radio.

“Sir, I am currently in the Armory with a group of prisoners. They are willing to offer their aid in the mission, if they receive a pardon for their crimes and are shipped off of Elysium.” Tyrone said.

“Hm, I don’t see why we can’t do that as long as they complete the mission,” the commander said.

“Thank you commander for hearing me out,” Tyrone said.

The commander then terminated the line.

“So, Sydney you have your pardon. Will you and your people be joining us,” Eros asked.

“Yes,” Sydney said as she nodded her head.

“Great,” Eros then turned around, his chest noticeably hurt less as he took a deep breath of air, “You heard your bosses, everyone gear up and get ready.”

Everyone started moving again. Going from one corner of the armory to another, getting the supplies that they need.