It has been a long time since I've felt dread. It renders me motionless, unable to voice the concern that we have already damned our people.

"Were those we just took to New Eden also brainwashed? Did we just send weapons into the heart of our sanctuary?" Oberon asks before I can move past the paralyzing fear.

Belenus flips through the notebook he is reading from trying to quickly find the answer. A tense few moments later, he sighs. "Doesn't look like it. They are listed here as 'resources' that they pulled 'samples' from to make the serums to turn the orphaned children."

We all breathe a collective sigh of relief. Oberon sags against the bulkhead and I manage to lean against the counter before I collapse in relief. That was far too close. If the humans had anticipated us just rescuing our people without verifying what happened to them, we would have been in serious trouble.

"It would probably be best if we keep those not in critical condition in a secondary site and verify what they have been through before we bring anyone else home," Oberon suggests.

"We will also need to deprogram the orphaned hybrids before they can be integrated into our society," I point out. "We can use the submarine as the secondary site until we are sure they are safe."

"So much for using the submarine as overflow," Belenus sighs, "I will contact the deprogramming team and bring them here as soon as we are back. In the meantime, no one should go into that corridor alone."

"Agreed."

"That bad?" Oberon asks.

"They almost got both of us. These kids are incredibly dangerous." Belenus confirms.

"Well, I'm going to make some permanent fairy circles since we are going to have people coming and going," Oberon sends us a casual wave over his shoulder as he walks off.

"We need to finish going through this research," I sigh, "too bad Loki isn't here. He would make short work of this." I see Belenus's flames around the time I say Loki's name. He is back before I finish my sentence, with a startled Loki in tow.

"Some warning next time would be fantastic," Loki scolds in a bored tone.

"This wasn't a generic research lab, it is a weapons lab," Belenus informs, "we need to know if the people we brought back to New Eden are going to pose a threat."

Loki glares at us the way a parent might glare at a child that just broke a priceless artifact after being told not to throw a ball inside. "Are you telling me, you brought potential weapons into one of our sanctuaries? Not just a sanctuary, but the sanctuary where my pregnant wife is sitting meters from said potential weapons?" He speaks slowly as if talking to a particularly dim child.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

"It wasn't intentional," I point out.

"Just once, I wish you would think about the consequences of your actions during a mission. I knew the second you three walked out that I would be fixing some ill-conceived plan, but I honestly thought it would be Oberon causing an international incident."

Belenus and I glance at each other surprised.

"Neither of you knows what Oberon did with the humans," Loki swipes his hand through his hair and sighs. "I'll take care of that later," he starts flipping through the already open lab books, "go get a deprogramming team and get out. I'm going to blow through all this reading, and I need you two out of the way. Give me a warning when you are ready to move the sub."

I walk out of the lab and go to find Oberon. Loki will not forgive me if I don't find out what Oberon did with the humans in anticipation of his asking. My mistake is pretty bad, making his next cleanup job easier is the least I can do.

Belenus flames out of the lab to get our best deprogrammers in here. It will need to be a mixed-race team if we are to deal with all the abilities those kids seem to have.

It isn't too difficult to find Oberon. The ship is small and he has burned fairy circles into nearly every corridor he passed. I catch up with him near the bridge.

"Oberon!"

He stops and waits for me to catch up, "I thought you would still be reading."

"It was too important and urgent, we brought Loki in."

Oberon winces. It is never a good day when you have to bring Loki in to fix a problem. "Ouch. How mad is he?'

"Mad," I sigh, "he wants to know what you did with the humans."

"Nothing too bad, I made them experience everything they did to their prisoners and changed their memory so they believe they were experimenting on humans and that they themselves had been experimented on. Then I gave them a crippling fear of other humans and put them all together on a deserted island off the coast of Florida. If they survive each other, the government will just think they all went mad."

"Well, at least Loki won't be mad at that. Did you make it so they couldn't talk about it?"

"No, I enchanted them so that anything they say will sound crazy to anyone they talk to. That way, if they are discovered, they will never be able to actually get the help or empathy they need."

"Cruel. You don't think that is going too far?"

"They experimented on orphaned children. Human children. Anyone who could intentionally give a child hope that they have found a family only to hurt them like this deserves worse than I gave them. Which is why none of them can take their own lives. They will live long with this guilt."

"You aren't wrong. I hope we can save the children and give them the homes they deserve."

We start walking toward the bridge to update the poor siren working to keep us undetected. "I wish I could do the same to the people who gave that order," Oberon adds.

"I don't think Loki will allow that. It is likely the person who gave that order is high enough in the government that we will have to negotiate with them. When they find their people insane, it will scare them enough that they probably won't do something like this again."

"That or they will just find a way to hide it better."

I agree with him. I don't think this will be enough of a deterrent, but at least we will have all our people safely out of reach soon. We reach the bridge and have the siren start navigating us toward New Eden after we have disabled all tracking devices and made the submarine appear to have sunk on any sensors the humans may have.

I won't risk leading them to any of our safe havens. It is a good thing sirens are experts at making ships disappear.