When Rachel awoke she found herself in an unfamiliar room with a very familiar smell. It was sterile and tinged with the septic odor of a hospital. The lights felt blazingly bright, and the bed she was in had the feel of something well used. She sat up and looked around. She was in some sort of a medical ward with strangely low ceilings, not low enough for her to even touch with her fingers but lower than she had ever seen before.

There were curtains draped around her bed, and an IV needle in her arm as well as a clip on her thumb. She took the clip thing off her thumb and the soft beeping she had been ignoring went silent. Seconds later a women with deep red skin, silky black hair, and black horn like protrusions on her forehead poked her head in.

“Aluth nib barta” she said.

Rachel blinked. “what?”

The women ignored her and closed the curtain. Moments later another women walked in. She had violet colored skin, ivory white hair, and small bone like protrusions on her face following the line of her cheek. She smiled “Good morning miss Heart.”

Rachel blinked, she recognized that voice. “You’re Bones!”

In the dark it had been hard to make out any details, but now that Rachel got a better look at her she realized that she was a very strange looking person.

She pursed her lips. “That’s the crew’s nickname for me. You, miss Heart, may call me Doctor Alwen Djani.”

Well that was a rebuke if she ever heard one. “Alright. You’re… purple?” she said it like it was question.

She made a bone-weary sigh. “Yes I am.”

“Are you a new kind of human variant?”

Not many of them made their way to Unity, but Rachel had seen a few humans whose ancestors had recklessly spliced their DNA with others. They had been lizards skinned humans with a natural ability alter their stripes and scale colors.

“I’m not human” the doctor stated simply.

“Not human?” she looked human.

“Not human.” The doctor repeated.

“Then- what are you?”

“I am Torweni.”

“Torweni?”

“Yes, we’re new to the galactic stage.”

“I- think I’ve heard of you before, from Astarte. I just didn’t think you’d look so… human.” Rachel said hesitantly.

“Convergent evolution. Now would you like to go over your chart?”

“Chart?”

“For the medical attention you received.” Doctor Djani said plainly.

That was right, “You drugged me!” Rachel exclaimed as the memory of the prick in her neck returned to her.

The doctor, the deathworld doctor, looked unamused. “Of course I did. Be thankful I didn’t have to tase you instead. The power settings are still set to max from when I had to tase my boyfriend.”

“That’s barbaric!” Rachel accused. What kind of backwards hellhole did this Torweni come from for that to be considered normal.

Her slim silver eyebrows flew up and then pressed into a scowl. “Don’t look at me like that. I had never once needed to subdue a patient or chain them to their beds until I met you Terrans. I have performed amputations, reattached limbs, preformed an unexpected brain surgery in an abandoned mosque! I once had to break and realign a patients bones over and over again for a month just to make sure she could walk again because she decided to challenge an Aunviry warlord on her own. Its like you Terrans are actively trying to find the dumbest ways to injure yourselves!”

“Don’t lump me in with whatever morons you have been dealing with!” Rachel shot back.

The doctor quirked an eyebrow. “Oh yeah. Tell me; how did you wind up in my infirmary?”

Rachel winced.

The doctor gave her a self-satisfied smirk “That’s right, fighting a cyborg serial killer with a shovel.”

Rachel hung her head.

The doctor flipped through her chart. “Three broken ribs, two on the right, one on the left. Internal bleeding. Damage to the spinal column, which would have resulted in at least a partial paralyzation. As well as several torn ligaments and extensive bruising.”

Rachel blinked and looked up at the doctor. “How long have I been out?”

“Roughly nine hours.”

“Union or Terran?”

“Terran of course. While I may be a Torweni doctor this place isn’t sanctified enough to be an ancillary temple of Ashendra. This is by all means and metrics a Terran hospital.” The doctor reported.

Rachel shook her head “That can’t be right. I had a broken arm a few weeks ago. It took longer than this to heal. You can’t just mend bones and fix internal bleeding over night.”

The doctor looked amused. “Maybe an incompetent Union doctor couldn’t, but they have to generalize their knowledge to accommodate the over one hundred Union species. But injuries like yours are just another Tuesday for me. Honestly given the technology I have access to there’s very little I can’t fix. The injuries would have to be catastrophically severe for me to fail.”

“That, that’s insane!”

The doctor ignored her outburst “We also ran a more thorough examination and found several instances of malnutrition, a lack of certain vital vitamins, and places where your bones failed to properly form. And you have the weakest most underdeveloped immune system I have ever seen from a human. You’re likely to die of the common cold if you ever catch it. Likely a result of living your whole life on a Union station with no access to Human doctors.” The Doctor said flipping to another page of her chart.

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Rachel lifted her shirt and felt at her stomach, looking for any indication of what had happened to her. But there were no marks from the likely invasive procedures she went through. Maybe, was that patch of skin paler than the rest?

“You won’t find any marks or scars” the doctor stated. “We have a means to mend the flesh without scarring, the most you might notice is a slight discoloration that will fade in a couple days.”

“That’s, not possible.” Rachel murmured. “Human flesh is supposed to be impossible to seamlessly mend.”

The doctor snort derisively “I have learned that when it comes to Terrans; impossible is just an obstacle, not an absolute. If anything your people seem to revel in doing the impossible.”

Rachel just stared. “Am I free to go?” she asked after a while.

“Almost, your body did suffer a great deal of trauma, and some things must take their time. I have you on an IV feed, but after that’s done and your body has had time to process it I’ll consider allowing you into a wheelchair.”

“A wheelchair? But I feel fine.” Rachel protested.

The doctors eyes went sharp. “I just spent two hours with my hands in your guts, you were nearly paralyzed. You are going to sit in that dammed chair, and you are not going to complain. I am too busy to patch up someone because they were stupid enough to get themselves reinjured because they felt fine.” She snapped.

Rachel felt a tingle of fear crawl up her spine. “Yes ma’am”

“Good, now lie back down, you shouldn’t be using your stomach muscles right now.”

Rachel obeyed, and spent the next half hour suffering through the grumpy doctors ministrations.

~~~*~~~

Astarte leaned back in her office chair and rubbed the bridge of her nose. Things seemed to only be getting more and more complicated. A brewing disease, likely a bioweapon, amongst her crew that would rob them of their sense and threw them into a murderous rage. An SS officer in her med-bay, an SS officer who she was finding herself thinking of more and more often. And now her mother had arrived, with the rest of the fleet on its way.

And then there was her father to consider. Before last night Astarte had been sure that Gin Hanzo was her biological father, the man she had promised to help her mother murder. But now she wasn’t sure.

She certainly had more in common physically with Hanzo, but the this Kenzo bastard gave off serious date-rapey vibes.

Whether that Kenzo bastard was her father or her Uncle, Astarte felt her stomach roil in disgust as she recalled his very unsubtle attempt to invite her to bed with him. Astarte was typically free with who she considered a valid partner, and even had her fair share of bedroom kinks. But incest was not one of them, the very idea made her feel sick. Especially given what she knew of him.

“Star, Lucile is here.” Karega said from outside her door.

She was not going to enjoy this conversation. “Door open.” She called back.

Her door slid with a whoosh, she had learned with the refit that there were in fact small speakers installed around the doors to make that noise every time they opened, and Lucile stepped in.

Her mother was a hard faced women, she observed everything as if she were deciding whether to kill it on the spot or let it live a little longer. She was a women who quite literally wanted to watch the whole galaxy burn. Her white-gold hair was put up into a plaited braid, and she wore a synthetic wolf pelt around her shoulders making her seem broader and more imposing as she filled in her doorway.

“Daughter” She grunted. This was something she had begun to do after the Draxori incident. It seemed the nearly fatal ambush had shaken her mother’s stoic façade, and she realized that she might regret never having a mother/daughter relationship with Astarte.

It should have been a happy development. But every time she said the word Astarte felt like Lucile was trying to force maternal affection in her voice and was falling flat. “Lucile” Astarte responded.

Lucile frowned. “What is this I hear of a Union pig in your Med-bay?” She asked bluntly.

Yeah, this was going to be a fun conversation. “That’s Rachel. She’s an SS Spook who was trying to use her civilian persona to find damming evidence about our activities.”

“I see. And why is she still alive?”

“Because I knew who she was from the very beginning and I’ve been using her to give the SS false information, or I would have if I had more time.”

Lucile “I see. And why is she still alive?”

Astarte rolled her eyes. “Because now that she knows that I know, I plan to use her to find our missing terraforming equipment. And because I can’t kill her yet.”

“Why not?”

“Because the SS Chief probably knows she’s here. I’m honestly surprised he hasn’t come bursting in yet.”

Karega cleared his throat. “About that. Chief Gin has doubled the observation team watching us, and appears to be among their number.”

Lucile’s eyes flared. “Gin” she said with a quivering voice.

Astarte shot her lieutenant a glare. “That’s the other thing. I’m fairly certain ‘he’ is here.”

Lucile’s had griped the pommel of an axe. “Is he the chief?”

“I don’t know. I’m fairly certain that I’m at least related to the Chief, but he has a brother who gives me the wrong sort of feeling.”

“Then we kill them both!” Lucile growled in a low bestial tone.

Astarte glared at her mother “One is the chief of station security for the entirety of Unity. And the other is the Terran councilman and Chair of Amaterasu.”

“I don’t care,” She barked!

Astarte slammed her hands on the desk and rose from her chair. “Goddammit Mom, we can’t just start a bloodbath in the heart of Union space!”

A tense silence followed her outburst. Lucile glared daggers at Aster, and Aster held Lucile’s glare with a look of unwavering conviction.

“Pah” Lucile spat. “Fine, how do you plan to kill him?”

Aster didn’t smile in triumph. “I’m working on that.”

She raised an eyebrow “Working how?”

Aster sat back in her chair. “The way I see it, killing him is still a secondary goal. Father, Zera, and even the potential bioweapon driving my men into a murderous horny rage is all secondary to our main goal. We need to find what we came for, then plan for secondary objectives afterwards. And even then I’m fairly certain we’ll only get a chance at one Gin, so we need to make sure it’s the right one.”

“I still believe it is the younger brother.” Karega interjected.

“And I told you that I look far more like the elder than that slimy, oily bastard.” Aster retorted.

He rolled his eyes. “I think your letting personal biases sway your opinion. Kenzo isn’t that bad, I’d even say moderately attractive, if his older brother didn’t have that chiseled chin and hawkish gaze I’d might even call Kenzo handsome.”

They both glared at him.

“What, I have eyes” He gestured plaintively.

Aster turned to her Mother. “Would you know him if you saw him?” She asked delicately.

Lucile shook her head. “No, they pumped me up with too many drugs to trust my memory. I can only confidently say that his attendant called him Gin-sama.”

Karega tried to hide a sympathetic wince. He had only ever heard the annotated version, not the full story. “Okay, that’s a bust. But I think our guest might know for certain.”

“What makes you say that?” Aster asked.

“Call it a hunch, something about the way she looked at the three of you implied that she knew.” Karega explained.

Aster drummed her fingers along her desk. “Alright, we press Rachel for the truth.”

“Fine” Lucile said harshly. “Now, tell me about the ‘cyborg psycho bitch’ from your days aboard the Black Saint.” She commanded.

Astarte explained, and by the end of it her mother was leaning back. “It is either a credit to her makers that she’s still alive. Or a sign that your going soft.”

“Trust me, I’m not going soft. Zera is just… hard to kill.”

“And your deal with the pig is to help her kill Zera for information?” Lucile asked.

“Yes, she’s come after me twice now. We can probably bait a trap for the next time, and this time we’re taking no chances at her getting back up. Thermite, acid, plasma throwers, hacksaws if we have to. We’re not leaving a single piece of her intact.”

Lucile nodded, taciturn approval for Aster’s conviction in her eyes. “And our true objective?”

“We’re under constant surveillance, and walking amongst the populace is difficult since we’re getting harassed by SS for no reason.”

Lucile glared “You’re not telling me that’s an actual impediment to your stealth specialists.”

She snorted. “No, Alice somehow snuck a whole sniper rifle to Silver Tower city. I’m just saying we wont be able to launch operations directly from either ship. We need to deploy teams all around Unity with enough heat to be a viable threat for when we actually have a plan in place. I say we each send out one third of our combat ready crewman on top of all of our marines, maybe even some of the doctors if they can be spared.”

Lucile frowned, or well, frowned harder. “That reminds me, tell me about this… murder boner virus.” She said with a sigh at the name.

“Don’t give me that look, I didn’t name the damn thing. I think Bones was trying to push ‘Unity 79’ as an official name, but I don’t think it’ll stick.”

“What do we know about it?”

Aster frowned, “Frighteningly little. We only detected it because a few select members of our crew were highly susceptible to the effects. For most it just made them a little friskier and energetic.”

“Is it a threat?”

“I believe so, especially if we put it off. It has a naturally corrosive effect on peoples minds. We think it transmits via bodily fluids, blood, semen, maybe even spit based off of one report. But there’s a lot we don’t know. We only just discovered it.”

“We’re lucky Bones and her team are as skilled as they are.” Karega added.

Well wasn’t that the truth. A stab through the shoulder, severe burns on several parts of her body, and Alwen had needed was a couple hours with Astarte in surgery suite. She was very glad she had decided to splurge on the med-bay during the refit.

“We’re going to need to dispatch teams to investigate this. If this is a potential Union bioweapon then we need to be prepared. This may be their whole reason for creating the Uplifted.” Lucile deduced.

Aster nodded. “As we speak I have Temperance team gearing up, once we have a beat on the Chimps location we’ll deploy them with a medical team in tow.”

Karega rubbed his chin. “Are we really going to deploy most of our fighting force across a station of half a billion residents? It seems risky.”

“Because it is” Lucile growled.

“But we have no choice. Even with Hellworlder strength on our sides we’re completely outnumbered and on hostile ground. But it’s what has to be done.” Aster explained.

“Alright, we shouldn’t deplete from our command or engineering crews at least. Just the Marines and some of the Deck Apes.”

“Good idea.”

They were about to continue on with their strategy session, when a priority message was sent to Karega and Astarte.

They read the message and frowned.

“What?” Lucile demanded.

“It seems that our dear Chief is unwilling to wait.” Karega said with an amused smirk.

“He’s on the deck, banging on our front door, as we speak” Aster said with a frown.

Lucile’s glare darkened. “Then we let him in and make sure he never sees the light of day.”

“I would caution against kidnapping and murdering the Chief of security in broad daylight with over a hundred other officers watching us.” Karega said.

Lucile groaned. “You sound just like John. You’re too cautious.”

“Well someone needs to keep you two in check.” Karega retorted.

Aster stood up, “Kareaga head to the meeting room, mom you should head back to your ship for now, I’ll greet our uninvited guest.”