AI: Apocalyptic Intelligence (Nivansrywyllian, Windsong)

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Mario encapsulated the human warmth that was Elly's mind once again as they descended. The sentry came after them, more slowly. Once they were all clear, he triggered the entry door again, and it closed behind them. There would be no disguising the signs of disturbance that their passing had caused, but Mario was counting on old security measures, and the sparseness of the population in this section of the town to keep them hidden, for the time being at least.

"Doors are closed and secure behind us. No thermal signatures, or vibrations coinciding with active life below. I'm reading a number of mobile signatures belonging to active sentries below, but we are showing staff signatures. They will not assault us." More confidence from the AI.

"Power is functional." He added, as the came to the first landing that had a door. It whispered aside to lead directly into what looked to be a sterile lab setting, rather than the reception-desk front that the last lab had used. Glass windows sided a long hallway, looking in upon long-dormant laboratories filled with all sorts of odds and ends, from machines, to complex chemistry equipment.

The deeper in they moved, the more clear the direction of the testing became. Great tubes lined the wall one lab. One looked to have been the source of a small fire by the scorch-marks on the paneling. The rest were filled with what appeared to some sort of cloudy, semi-transparent liquid. What looked to be bodies, were suspended within, connected to the machines by tubes and wires. Some were alien bodies, with strange anatomy. Some were animals native to the planet before the bombardment.

And some were human.

None showed the touch of time on face or figure, but for the damaged pod. That was empty of liquid, and in it remained only the husk of a body, long since mummified by the cool, dry lab air.

"I... I think we need to find a computer terminal." Mario said, troubled.
 
She followed along easily, not really worrying about finding others or having a run-in with the sentries after his admittance to the staff ID, it did wonders to ease her fears as well as his presence. Each thing she passed was something new she wanted to stop and look at for a bit, all of it was like being in a museum where you could touch and see pretty much anything. Though the tubes did give her a start.

Some of the alien life forms looked rather ghastly, but clip boards with aging paper declared them sentient and actually allies to the human race. The empty insectoid eyes looked dead, she hoped they were dead too. She hurried along as it was, stopping to glance at the humans in the tubes. Two women and a few other men, all naked and looking quite well preserved, even alive were it not for the murky look to the liquid they were in. What a way to go.. Came her thoughts, at least it was likely peaceful.

His mention of the terminal had her pick up the base just a bit though, looking along the walls of glass until she found a door. Rather than go inside she paused at it's access panel. "Will this do?" Soon fiddling with his cords to try and find a suitable inlet.
 
"No. We've got to get to one of the machines that's on the network. The access panels will allow me to access personnel files, but I've got to access project files. Most computers won't have the kind of access I need. I need one of the administrative computers, or the master computer."

He paused.

"Accessing local sentry treadmapping." A bare bones map popped upon the hud, appearing only to outline the hallways. The complex was smaller than Mario's had been, unless the sentry routs were misleadingly small. The compound only seemed to have two stories, despite the depth beneath the ground.

"Let's keep looking. Keep your eyes open."

There were some signs of a hurried escape from the building in passed rooms. Papers strewn haphazzardly. Coffee mugs left on tables, the liquid within long evaporated. Overturned chairs.

"I... I don't understand why they'd keep humans and aliens in tubes like that. I don't know what they were kept in, but they weren't aging, and their bodies didn't look atrophied. It must be some sort of preservative gel Perhaps that is what this laboratory was experimenting with."
 
The little map caught her eye and for a moment she was all too aware of the loud thudding of her heart and the sound of the suit's air cycling through. For a moment it was highly disconcerting and causing unfounded fears.

Still she continued forward following his mark on the map, hoping to avoid seeing anymore of those tubes. A cliche she wasn't aware of was one of them looking at her or moving, cliche or not, that was a terrifying thing to see.

"Research?" She questioned, trying to keep a firm tone. "Maybe they were sick and this is like a medical clinic?" Not the best question or one that made much sense. "... Do you think they're alive?"
 
"It's possible that this was a medical facility, but... I don't see why they'd need to hide their research if it was to cure disease. That sort of thing used to make people happy. Willing to support it. I think that this is something else entirely."

Mario studied the rooms that they passed, filling in the map with what he could see from Elly's view.

"Alive? It seems to be unlikely. None of them were cryogenically frozen. Even if their bodies were well-kept by the liquid, I doubt that they could be sustained for this long without some source of fuel. It seems more likely that they're specially kept cadavers. Likely for experimentation. Of course, I'm just speculating. I'll know more when we get to the right terminal."

More rooms with tubes were passed. Most of them were also full. There were a whole lot of bodies.

"There is an office at the end of this hall. Check in there for a computer, and plug me in." If nothing else, he'd be able to access further floor plans, general data, and a location of the administrative, and master terminals.

"What were they doing here?" He wondered aloud.
 
His words brought her some much needed comfort, smiling briefly as she kicked a mug across the floor accidentally. Sending it skittering into a glass pane wall with a loud and thick sounding thunk.

What lay beyond made her meander closer and raise a palm to the glass, alien species the likes she'd never imagined in her wildest dreams lay within. Cadavers. Mario had said, dead and no longer living. That helped ease her fears, at least being surrounded by the dead meant they couldn't harm you in any way. The more diabolical types of clearly went over her head, still having some naive tendencies in the waning years of her youth.

"Studying them so they wouldn't kill us all?" Another stupid question that she let off with a shrug, pushing open the double doors into the office. Obviously in no rush as she picked up clip boards and looked at their contents, mostly numbers and diagrams. Big science words like Deoxyribonucleic acid and the like, no place for a mechanic that was for sure.

The terminal looked like a standard computer of the age, connected to a bank of servers on the wall who's only signs of life were the gentle flickering of their LED's along the sides. Looked like only one was left powered up after all these years.
 
"Possible, but unlikely." He said. Something about the whole situation continued to bother him. "That sort of research would belong to the Military Sciences division of the OEG. They were pretty big on military labs being very clearly marked, and I haven't seen any such markings. Or any company markings at all, for that matter. Whomever this laboratory belonged to didn't want any connection between their work and themselves, should the compound be discovered."

Mario let out a ponderous sigh. "There's only one way to get to the bottom of this. Plug me in."

[Short! >.<]
 
((Short is okay. I'm worried my quality is slipping really fast..))

She did just as he asked and fiddled with the wiring until she found the right plug, taking his brief silence that she found the wrong one she quickly placed it in another with a knowing smile. They matched up perfectly.

"Secret stuff. Like you." Eleanor mused with a slight shrug, having adopted a squat to avoid walking off with the cord still attached to the suit. Once more having grabbed a clip board and thumbing through it. "Wasn't there a broken tube back there?" Came her question, flipping up some pages to reveal one of the resident aliens picture. Purple, almost brown skin on a thick and squat muscular frame with four eyes, two to each side of its almost canine head. It struck her as being incredibly strong looking, many of the highlighted words on the page declared it toxic and highly venomous to any life. Salivary glands growing an incredibly contagious virus that when irritated by sudden motion (slamming its jaws together) could expel it over quite a distance.

Not something she wanted to bump into. Still she continued reading, apparently it'd had a name, maybe sentient?

At the top it had its subject number and qualities, but below that someone had scribbled quite beautifully the name: Acrid.
 
When Elly plugged him in, Mario began to immediately rewrite the allowances, granting him administrative access. It wasn't the master computer, but it would do for the time being. "Yes. One of the tubes opened when exposed to fire-damage. There was a desiccated corpse inside."

About a hundred different information feeds blossomed to life in the AI's mind. "Woah," He said. He didn't bother bringing up any for Elly, but he did complete the map in her hud, and labeled the rooms upon it. "There's a lot of information here. Give me a minute." Vital signs. Causes of death. Infections. Immunities. Races. Languages. Alien biochemistry and neurology.

"It looks like there were a few different projects going on here." He paused again, checking on the wireless system status. After double, and triple-checking his allowances, he gave a mental nod to his partner. "You can pull me out. I have remote access."

"This... This was big, Elly. I think that they may have been experimenting with eugenics. Trying to access the secrets of alien biology to doctor up humanity. And..." Blossoming hope rose rather suddenly in the AI, before he shrouded his bubble again. "And it looks like one of the machines is still reading vital signs. Very low vital signs. Perhaps one of the alien specimens entered into a hibernative state. This is an incredible opportunity, Elly."
 
Quickly she pulled the cord free and let it retract into the spool that held it in place snuggly beside the helmet. "Plenty of things to go with then.." She mumbled while still holding the clip board in hand, tossing it back onto the floor where she found it. None of what was there had much weight to her anyway, she was a mechanic, an engineer at best, not a biologist or a scientist.

For a moment she had no idea what eugenics even meant, but when he began talking about vitals and life signs still ticking away somewhere her heart stopped cold for a moment. He'd just said nothing was alive, nothing kept alive for that long. A flicker of thought brought the map over the HUD, she was getting better at it, letting her look over where they'd been already, perhaps she'd seen it and passed by it?

"Where? I want to see it."
 
"It looks like it's in pod number 273. We passed it on the way in." He highlighted one of the rooms, and placed a little red marker along one of the walls, to signify the particular pod that he was indicated.

"Elly," He said cautiously, "Whatever you do, do NOT remove your helmet in the presence of an alien. The suit can filter any diseases, or toxins that they may be carrying, but it will not protect you if you are not breathing through it." As almost an afterthought, he added, "And stand back from the tube."

Mario was getting incredibly excited. An actual alien! He'd never met one before. He had several alien languages that he could speak and read fluently, but he'd never had the opportunity to use them in the field.

_____________________________________________________________________

The room in which the life-signs were reporting from was fairly similar to the first room they'd entered, with tubes of specimen lining the walls. Each tube was filled with a single body, and the cloudy liquid. The tube in question however, was the only one showing a little green LED light on the little access pad set into the machine.

"Would you like me to open the pod?"
 
For a moment she wondered if coincidence had begun to fall into place, quickly shaking the wariness from their drifting minds. "Wonder which one it was." She mused, an almost cheerful tone, false, but she was trying.

A soft laugh was issued at his warnings. "I've been through the wasteland a time or two, Mario. This suits only more advanced than my old one, but they still function the same in protecting me." Could she kiss his cheek for being so sweet she likely would've as she walked along, stopping only once to look at a first aid box and pilfer it of a few ageless materials, gauze, bandages, and some alcohol that was still sealed.

Upon entering the room she began stating off the numbers with movements of her lips. "269.. 270.." Skipping the next two and looking at the cloudy liquid, squinting as if it'd help. For a second she swore she saw the silhouette move, how foolish of her.

"Yeah, go ahead. Let's say hi to our new friend." Somehow she wasn't so sure.
 
"I worry," Admitted the AI, apologetically. "I haven't been through the wasteland."

"Stand clear," Said Mario, waiting until Elly was well away from the proper tube before keying the automated release function. The cloudy liquid began to drain out of the tube, revealing first a tangle of tubes and wires.

When the liquid had drained a quarter of the way from the top, the tube itself began to descend, and more rapidly than the water was draining. A spill of cloudy liquid splashed down over the machine, spreading out over the floor. "Oops," Mario said. The machinery didn't seem any worse for wear for being doused by the stuff.

"I think this is one of the known races. I'll activate the translator."
 
She took a few steps back past the thick grates on the floor to let the liquid slosh down into it. For some reason despite the air filtration she was sure that it had a pungent odor to it as it drained. That draining seemed to take forever to her, though she was sure the impatience of seeing a live alien was partly to blame. Then she realized to it, she was likely the alien.

Still the tube came down, until a thick set of clawed fingers latched onto the edge, machinery whining as it began to pull the tube down a bit faster. The beginnings of thick, brown, no, nearly purple flesh could be seen as it seemed to struggle to get it's head free from the liquid. From inside the suit she swore it sounded like coughing. "It's going to choke on the stuff!" She didn't even slow down as she jumped forward to try and tug the thick tube down as well, her slight weight not doing a whole lot more.

It's head soon broke the surface and it was indeed choking, spitting up the green cloudy liquid as eyes like quartered limes narrowed on her, lacking pupils but looking at her none the less. It made the girl pause and drop back as it finally fell from the dropped tube, cords and tubes being yanked free as it continued to hack and choke.

The strangest thing though, was that it remained chained at its incredibly muscular wrists to the wall.
 
Mario made a panicked noise as Elly dove in to tug on the tube. "Are you always this reckless?!" He demanded. True enough, the thing was choking. "Contaminant detected. Stay within the Closed-Environment-Suit."

Mario couldn't make the tube descend any more quickly than it already was, but the beast's head was free.

And it was shackled. That was odd.

"It must not have been a volunteer," Speculated the AI.

From the external speakers, the AI spoke again, a series of low, glottal noises. A translation track in his voice played over the internal speakers.

"We greet you, visitor. It has been long since you have been interred in that machine. We want to know why you are chained. We want to know why you were chosen, and what happened to you."
 
She didn't have a chance to reply to Mario's stern question of recklnessness, not always, but a sudden instinct to help was the first thing on her mind. Even if it was really really foolish of her to do so. Of course, she also didn't expect to get out of the suit anytime soon, what'd he think she was, stupid too?

"More like a prisoner." Eleanor corrected.

When the noises left the speakers it's eyes narrowed briefly, sitting up and snapping back something, though to her they were more snarl than speech. Even the small translator in the corner of her view popped with an error, it wasn't speaking.

Of course, she wasn't expecting the stark white sentry to glide up behind her and begin charging it's weapons. The danger of the specimen overriding the safety of the one who was in it's line of fire. Eleanor had just the time to turn and see white plasma arc within the short stubby barrel. A moment after a thick claw grabbed her hip and yanked her aside, sliding across the still wet floor. The whole scene seemed to happen in slow motion.

It's throat distended greatly before it's jaw snapped back and a thick line of green was expelled at such speed it was hard to know it'd left it at all. The poor sentry didn't stand a chance against the acidic material, a clean hole burned straight through it's 'head' and torso, the weapon powering down as it's reactor lost power.

Now a piece of concrete hooked to a length of thick chain hung from it's wrist, giving it a yank to send the old building material bouncing to the floor with a heavy crunch. A hard yank snapped the other chain, likely corroded by the mingling of fluids inside the tube over the years.
 
As soon as he heard the whine of the energy weapon charging, Mario began kicking himself for not noticing. He should have been able to rout the sentry patrols, monitor their positions, and anticipate their response when the tube came down. He was processing too much information. He began a shouted warning, but a sudden shift in direction made the point moot.

And then acid was eating through the sentry's chassis.

"Take cover," Suggested the AI, keying the suit's shield-generators. He began to push himself into the network, trying to force his way past the firewalls protecting the sentry code.

It hurt.

The shroud over his knot of emotions was growing thicker, and prickly as he fought for access. A response from the sentry team to a destroyed sentry would result in a firefight, and that was something that they could ill afford. Presuming they didn't slag the alien immediately, it meant that they'd be in the middle of a room suddenly filled with flying plasma, and acid.

He had to get into that code.
 
For a moment she figured she already was in cover, having been thrown into a table. Whether on accident or on purpose wasn't abundantly clear as the alien shoved aside the sentry and cast its eyes at her once more.

Eyes without pupils looked to her, all four of them as he sort of hopped over, using its rather large and muscular arms as a means of locomotion, it's back legs, while thick, weren't nearly as long. Saliva dripped from its broad maw, hissing as it came into contact with the white tiled floors. Was it not for another sentry rolling up and priming it's weapon it might have gotten closer.

This time though, a ball of thick orange mucus was lobbed at the sentry. Impacting it with a loud splattering noise upon it's weapon. That's when it began to grow, enveloping the sentries arm and 'shoulder' before giving a mighty crunch. A brief blip on the suit warned of a powerful contagion as well as a massive heat burst as it contracted. Eleanor only stared in awe as it began lumbering its way out past the damaged sentries.
 
"Stay here," Mario instructed tersely. Who had programmed him to feel pain? Pain was a triggering of the nervous system to report damage to the body. That meant he was undertaking damage. He was going to have to catalog his damaged systems, when this was all said and done.

Off went the shield generators, and on went the cloaking mechanism.

He had no clue what sort of damage a firefight between the alien, and the sentries would do to the compound.

A sudden bursting sensation overcame him, and he was through. He had access to the sentries! It was a measure of his exhaustion that he let out a jubilant shout, rather than triggering the power-down immediately. Down went the sentries. And the cameras. And the lights.

"Whoops..."
 
Maybe it was her imagination that filled in the soft whirring down sound of distant generators. Unlikely that she actually heard it. For a few seconds she blinked, the only light's coming from the HUD inside the helmet, casting her face in it's soft glow through the near opaque visor. Soon the visor lit slightly and the world was cast in the gray scale of low light vision enhancement. "Mario?" She asked.

"Are you alright?" It was a soft whisper, she'd not really moved more than to get to a kneeling position like a runner before a race. The pain he'd felt had drifted over somewhat and begun to make her body itch as if someone were scraping it with needles.

A distant thud made her jump a bit as it, Acrid, came back into the room. It's eyes had a dull green glow akin to the generic neon of radiation from those corny safety videos. They swept the room, lingering on the shifting silhouette that was her. For a time it simply stared at her, she was quite sure the cloaking wasn't doing her much good, maybe it saw something else other than light? Radiation? Heat? Infrared? X-Rays or something else silly? Before the thoughts got any further it turned and began trudging out. A thick voice came as it turned around, like a person with so much phlegm they could barely speak. "Thank you, human."
 
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