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Chapter Fifteen

Naida stands in front of a host at a very pricey and sophisticated restaurant as she right now tries to talk him into giving her a favor. "Please there must be something that you can do." She motions back to Mort. "I'm here on a date, I can't have Captain Mort at the table with me, you must have an extra table somewhere."

The host shakes his head no. "Ms. Naida This is a very high profile establishment, reservations are needed to get in." He looks Mort over. "Not to mention we have a dress code."

The white horse holds her hand back to Mort. "He's in a military uniform, you should respect him for it." Naida smiles at him, returning to attempting to be charming. "What if I give you an autograph, do you think you could find a table then?"

The restaurant host shakes his head no. "No I'm afraid-"

A woman from a well-dressed feline couple that was standing in line behind her speaks up. "You can have my table in exchange for your signature!!"

The man she is coupled with speaks up to protest. "I've made the reservations months ago"

The woman turns back to him. "Oh you're acting like this is the first time you've ever taken me here! This is a once in a lifetime opportunity!" She looks back to Naida with a smile. "You see I have a step daughter that I'm trying my best to warm up to, and she is a huge fan of your show! You're her hero she absolutely loves you! I'm sure she would adore me if I were to give her your signature!"

Naida is happy for the help. "Oh that would be wonderful! Thank you so much for your help!"

Mort sighs as he watches Naida exchange her signature for a table that Mort would be able to sit at, she looking back to Mort with a smile. "You just order anything you like and I'll take care of it."

"I'm not hungry."

"Oh don't be shy, order something! You don't want the restaurant to feel like they're losing money by being kind enough to give you a table."

The host reluctantly motions for Mort to follow him. "This way please."

Naida watches as Mort is seated, she walking into the restaurant and approaching her own table, letting out a tired sigh when she sees the fox that is seated at it already half finished his meal, a waitress clearing out some empty plates while placing another order on the table. "Oh goodness Aither... don't tell me that's how you've been eating the whole time you've been in this city."

Aither looks up to her from his food. "You are late."

Naida takes her seat on the chair across from him. "And you are acting like a garbage disposal!!"

Aither points down to the food that had just been placed on their table. "Have you tried the steak? Don't judge me until you've tried the steak."

Naida frowns at him as she crosses her arms and leans back in her chair. "Look at me Aither I can't digest anything like that, I'm a vegetarian!"

Aither nods his head as he continues eating. "And so is everyone in the city your show is filmed in. I swear trying get a steak in a city that is mainly populated by equine, bovine and members of whatever you call the deer family is impossible!"

He grins letting out satisfied sigh as he holds up a chunk of meat with his fork staring at it. "Oh but in the wonderful city of Cordella which is populated by a good seventy five present members of the canine and feline family, why you don't have to look very hard at all. I kid you not at least one fourth of the restaurants here are steakhouses. Naida my love I could not be happier here."

Naida looks to the side. "Oh yes... this city is just wonderful, just ignore all the big things like the curfew, military labs and everything getting destroyed by the you know what's fighting one another and you have a wonderful little paradise."

Aither swallows his food letting out a sigh. "Alright I get it. You're annoyed about something so let's hear it."

Naida sighs to herself as she motions toward the table that Mort is at. "I can't talk about what I'm annoyed about because if I did and he happed to overhear things would not turn out good for me."

Aither stares over at Mort, having not realized that he had been there until Naida had pointed him out. "What the heck is HE doing here?"

Naida looks to the side. "He's following me around everywhere I go."

Aither frowns at the information. "Do you want me to take care for him for you? He may be bigger than me but I can still make him mysteriously disappear without a trace."

Naida shakes her head no, that would be horrible. "No Aither! He's following me because he has to. My manager is convinced that this city is dangerous and got the military to give me an escort."

Aither stares at Mort, the large jackal sitting at his table with his arms crosses and a frustrated look on his face. "Well he just keeps getting thrown further and further down the ladder now doesn't he?" He looks back to Naida. "Don't worry about him, even without him you practically have the whole city watching you at one time, so is the nature of your fame. Just do what you would normally do and leave all that messy business with the big six up to me."

Naida seems concerned. "But what if you run into Dmitri again?"

Aither gives her a grin. "Well maybe I've have a chance at beating him when I don't have someone throwing out warnings before attacking all the time."

Naida frowns at him angrily stomping on his foot beneath the table, Aither letting out a yelp as he jumps back. "OW!! Your feet are so hard and painful!!"

Naida nods her head. "Yes, it's as if they have some sort of hoof like quality to them."

"Oh it's broken, I know it's broken!"

"I know you're just trying to make me feel bad, you've done this about a hundred times before."

Aither sighs as he takes his seat, she being no fun right now. "Look, don't worry about me, I got everything under control."

A loud slam startles everyone in the restaurant, everyone looking to the entrance where the restaurant host is being pinned against the wall by Alistair, the coyote clearly not dealing well with being told that he could not go in.

Aither looks over to Naida. "It looks like your new friend has a visitor."

Mort calls out across the restaurant when he sees the scene, his voice sharp and angered, he clearly not pleased. "Quincy! What are you doing?"

Alistair looks back to him. "I need to talk to you."

"You couldn't talk to me over the phone?"

Alistair sneers at the question. "Oh everything's just so impersonal with you, honestly if you weren't so gosh darn cute I would have ended this long ago."

Mort frowns at Alistair, not amused. "Quincy come here..."

Alistair lets go of the host pushing him away from him. "Of course sweetie bell." He stares back at the host with a threatening glare. "Next time I'll skip the threatening bit and go straight to ripping your throat out."

He enters the restraint making his way through the tables and stopping at Mort's, sitting in the empty chair across from him. "Well isn't this a fancy place, and here I was starting to think you would never take me anywhere nice."

"Quincy what are you doing?"

Alistair gives Mort a frown. "Coming up with an excuse to meet up with you outside of military grounds, I wouldn't want people to think I was giving you information on a project you were removed from now would I?"

Mort holds his head as if he were starting to get a head ach, Alistair staring at him. "What, am I over doing it?"

"Yes. Yes you are, and what if somebody were to start asking me about this?"

"The other soldiers can start rumors all they want but you and me aren't obligated to say anything. Not that they would ask as the two of us are extremely intimidating to everyone else. It's a fool proof plan. Besides I'm only alive for a few days more so what does it matter to me?"

"Well I'm not going to be dead in a few days! I'll still have to deal with this!"

"Not my problem, besides, everyone already thinks there's something up with you anyway, what with the way you used to have Magellan by your side at all times."

Mort falls silent after hearing this, he not exactly sure how to respond, Alistair turning away from him as he begins looking his surroundings over. "So what the heck are you doing here in a place like this anyway?"

"My job."

"You're job seems a lot nicer than mine right about now." Alistair looks back to Mort as he gets down to business. "Look, I don't trust Dmitri and I'm never going to, I'm not going to let what happened to Chase happen to me got that?"

Mort lets out a grumble. "Alright fine I get it, now what did you want to tell me?"

Alistair grins at him. "Well, I looked to the files you couldn't get into on concerns to Beright's case. Military intelligence found out that someone hacked into our system to get Beright's attention and lure him out of the facility, whoever did it also had someone keeping an eye on us because the message wasn't sent until after you left the facility."

Mort thinks this information over. "Do you think it was the hacker that Berights was trying to catch?"

Alistair shakes his head no. "Oh come on, Berights is a pussy-cat but he's not that useless, he could have at least been able to handle a little girl. No, the hacking method didn't match hers, but apparently they did match the method to another hacker, one that goes by the name of Marty Eliot. Now, no one else is seeing the link because all of this isn't on file, but I'm sure you see what it is everyone else is missing right?"

Mort frowns everything becoming clear now, he knowing exactly who it was that lynx was working for, they having run across his work earlier in the case yet not recording it due to certain circumstances. "Shanira is the one that has Berights..."

Alistair nods his head. "Dmitri doesn't know this information, and I don't plan on giving it to him. Though I thought you might like to know."

Mort shakes his head. "Shanira is untouchable, if she has him then there is not much that can be done about it."

"Shanira is also all the way in Old Africa, while Vaan is still somewhere in this city. The city lockdown is stronger now than ever before, it used to be that certain higher profile people or those with military escort were the only ones that could come and go, but that's all changed now. No one, and I mean no one is getting in or out. She doesn't have him yet."

Mort thinks this over, even if Vaan was still in the city so were their targets, and finding those was also proving to be a painstakingly difficult task. "If she wants him anyway, she may have just killed him to have him out of the way."

Alistair shakes his head no. "Berights is too good to just pass up like that. Aside from that True Blood hacker there's no one better. She wouldn't have done away with him without first trying to gain his cooperation."

Mort seems impressed. "I didn't know you were they type to think so positively, nor did I even think you would be the type to help out your team mates out of trouble."

Alistair frowns, there nothing nice about his intentions. "I'm not doing this for Berights, I need his skills back, he's the only hope I have at locating my target and if I want to survive I'm going to need Berights help."

Mort shakes his head, there just something he didn't understand about all of this. "You're clearly smart Quincy, so why are you still in the military when they are threatening to kill you in a few days' time?"

"I have my reasons for staying, not that it's any business of yours."

"Fine then."

Alistair begins to look around the restaurant. "So, which of these rich snobs are you supposed to be playing bodyguard for?"

Mort points over to the table that Naida and her mate Aither were seated at. "Her."

Alistair looks back over to her table, a look of recognition filling his face. "Oh! You get to look after Naida Kelpie, you lucky dog."

Mort stares at Alistair not quite sure of how to take this. "You know her...?"

Alistair nods his head. "I've caught a few episodes of her program here and there, a lot of the Soldiers are fan's and have it playing in the break room. I kind of like that show I have to admit."

Mort finds himself somewhat speechless, it taking a while before he is able to respond to that. "It's a children's show... for little girls..."

"So?" He gets up to leave patting Mort on the shoulder before going. "If I manage to find a way to live past the expiry date Dmitri gave me, get me her autograph as a reward."

Mort sighs to himself as he watches Alistair leave, he then looking back to Naida and her boyfriend as they continued their dinner with each other.

*******

Teddy lays on the ground, holding his head and screaming loudly in pain, Fenrir practically in a panic as he paces in front of Teddy's cell watching him, he looking from Teddy as he looks to Rebecca and Commander General Zephyr and questioning them. "Are you sure this is normal?"

Rebecca nods her head yes. "Our records show that all the hosts reacted in this way not long after accepting the Source into their body, don't worry it should pass."

Fenrir holds his hand out to him. "How much longer? He's been like this for several hours!"

Zephyr looks down to Fenrir, raising his voice to him. "Straighten up Fenrir, a member of the True Blood military is not to be so easily flustered by events such as this."

Teddy lets out another scream, this time calling out a name in anger. "Dmitri!!!" A flash of lightning fills the cell that he was trapped inside, this occurrence also coming and going.

Fenrir looks back to his mother. "Why does he keep yelling that name?"

"I don't know..."

Teddy rolls onto his other side baring his teeth while pressing against his head, the pounding voice just not stopping. "Destroy him, destroy him for what he has done. There is no mercy, no salvation for one who wishes to end everything! Get out of here and kill him!"

Teddy shakes his head, this thought was getting stronger and stronger, and as it gained strength all memories of his own life and companions grew weaker and weaker, as if they were vanishing, new memories that spanned lifetimes up lifetimes now replacing his own past, as if Teddy was watching everything that had happened upon the earth from its time of creation until now.

The loud sound of thunder fills the air as another bright flash fills the room, this one followed by everything falling dark and silent, the power shorting and dying out.

Zephyr quickly turns away from Teddy's confines, turning to several soldiers near him and giving them orders. You two see to it that the backup generator gets up, the rest of you make sure he stays here." He turns to his wife motioning for Rebecca to follow him. "You're not staying here, not until this outburst of his is over, it's too dangerous."

Rebecca nods her head as she and her husband leave the room, the remaining soldiers all lining up outside of the glass cage that held Teddy and aiming the weapons they were armed with at him, prepared to use them should he try and escape.

Teddy lets out a deep growl as he gets to his feet, bracing himself as he clenches his hands together, electricity starting to build up and surround him, the wolf letting out a loud cry as a storm of it surrounds his body, the glass around him bursting as it shatters and falls to the ground.

He lunges forward to attack the soldiers that have their weapons aimed at him, his advance stopped when Fenrir runs into him, holding and locking him in place. "Take another stop Teddy and those soldiers are going to kill you."

Teddy lets out a threatening growl before speaking, his voice holding a deep and chilling tone to it, it not typical to the way he usually sounded. "Let go of me boy or I will make you feel pain you never thought imaginable."

Fenrir refuses to back down. "You're not listening to me! You're a source but you're not invincible, you can still die and you're going to if you don't cooperate and stay in place!"

Teddy grabs onto Fenrir's arm, digging his claws into his skin. "I have a target to kill and I can't do it here! There is nothing else for me to do! I have nothing to lose."

Fenrir narrows his eyes, though young he was still brave and knew that he could not back down. "How could you possibly think that you have nothing to lose! Not that long ago you where worrying over your sister." He reaches into his pocket pulling the yellow crystal he had found, holding it in front of Teddy's now yellow eyes. "And what about Iuana? You'll never see her again if you die! Are you ready to just lose her?"

Teddy's grip upon Fenrir lightens, he staring at the crystal that matched the colour of his eyes, Iuana's image along with his own within it, the memory of the moment Iuana has given him the invitation to join Raven Wolf during their journey with Yula right now reflecting within it. Teddy letting go of Fenrir and taking the crystal from him and staring at it, he having completely forgotten this memory until seeing it like this again. "Iuana..."

"She's waiting for you, and you're not going to make it back to her if you die here. You can't tell me that you have nothing!!"

Teddy begins to calm down, he shaking his head as he stares down at the crystal. How could he have forgotten such a memory, this memory was an important one, one that he thought he would have never have forgotten. "I..." He shakes his head. "How old is this memory... it feels as if it's been a thousand years."

Fenrir places his hand upon Teddy's as he begins speaking to him in a low voice as to keep the conversation between the two of them. "It feels like it, but hasn't been that long... I know how you feel... I have someone waiting for me too on the outside of this fortress too, but I can't see her yet, because now is not the time."

Teddy looks back to Fenrir upon hearing this, his guard staring back at him as he speaks to him in an assuring voice. "Now is not the time."

The lights in the facility switch back on, the emergency power having come into play, Teddy pulling away from Fenrir as he takes several steps back from him, he holding up the crystal he had given him and staring at it, memory after forgotten memory showing themselves to him through it, the overpowering rage that had filled him only moments before seeming to disappear as he watched these events, they making Teddy feel like his old self again.

*******

Zephyr walks into a security room, speaking to the guards stationed there. "Get me the feed on the room the Lightning Source project is in and 1342-26's cell."

The security guard looks back at him. "The facility cameras aren't up yet sir."

"The compound uses a lot of power for life support, that's the backup generators priority."

Zephyr frowns. "Well make it work for those two locations! The manual locks aren't going to hold if those two use this opportunity to their advantage."

The guards do as they have been told starting up the security system singling those two locations out, the monitor before them displaying the feed that he had asked for, the video showing that though the room had been completely mangled and destroyed that Teddy was still there, he standing among the shattered glass that had once been his cell as he stares at a yellow crystal he is holding in front of him.

Zephyr frowns at the sight, he taking a communication device and speaking to the soldiers he had left in the room with the Source. "Restrain him before he escapes, and confine him to a cell more secure than the one he was in previously."

He watches as the soldiers respond to his orders to do just that, of one of the guards in the security room speaking up to get his attention once more. "Commander General, we have a problem concerning 1342-26."

"What is it?"

The security guard points to another monitor, this one showing an empty room. "Number 26 is missing."

Zephyr frowns not surprised, the power surge having been so powerful that it had knocked out everything, no doubt the Super Solider would have realized and taken advantage of the situation. "Have maintenance get the electrical system back online, we need our security system working again! Inform the soldiers not to engage him on their own."

*******

Zack runs through the halls of the facility as quickly as possible, the lights and life support systems having just started to come back online, it not long before the soldiers started showing up.

He runs through hall after hall looking for any door that he might be able to open while the electronic locks were down, hoping to find one that my lead him out, the facility a genuine maze he had no idea of how to possibly get through, Zack unsure of if the paths he took were leading him out of the building or deeper into it.

He comes to a stop when the halls suddenly start to look familiar, and not from him being down them recently. He stares in front of him at the large door that he had come to a stop in front of, the skunk walking up to it as he struggles to pull it open, the large door's weight all he had to contend with right now with the electrical systems in the security still booting back up.

Zack manages to open the door just enough to get through it, he making his way into the hall that was just barely being lit by the emergency lighting, he in a hall filled with hundreds of rooms, each one holding a series of four digit numbers over the doors.

Though the numbers were all in numerical order they still seemed to appear at random, Zack walking up to the first room and looking inside, this room given the number of 0074 over it. This number representing the longest lasting early batches of the Super Soldier project, the batch that Kane belonged to.

Zack looks down the hall, as the projects continued weaker batches would be eliminated to make room for newer ones and the rooms would be renumbered accordingly, batches one to seventy three having all fallen to that fate. The numbers that remained over the doors now the last of what was left of the project, it having been deemed as a failure and discontinued, each and every one of the super soldiers that had once been here having developed some kind of defect that in the end got them destroyed.

He continues down the hall, this place having been closed off and unused, the security and build out dated compared to what was in the rest of the facility, the True Bloods having yet to reconstruct it into something capable of hosting another project yet, the rooms now being used for nothing more than storage for old project files and materials.

Zack looks away from the room and toward a security camera within the hall, it not on and looking as if had been out of use long before the power outage as to save on resources, the electronic locks on the doors to the rooms as well as the door that lead to this place the only security feature that worked in this area.

A light is shone onto Zack causing him to jump back and try and shield the light from his eyes, a child's voice calling out. "Hey how did you get all the way in here?"

Zack looks past the light to see a young girl standing alone in the dark hall while shinning a flashlight in his direction, the little girl continuing to speak to him. "I never thought a Wild would have managed to make it this far in without getting spotted, how did you manage to do that?"

Zack begins to approach her, she clearly not a member of the True Blood military, how she had managed to get into this place more curious than what he was doing here. "I'm not a Wild, I'm a Domestic..."

He comes to a stop in front of her as he begins to look her over, she had the very clear features that all True Blood's carried, but she was quiet young, couldn't have been more than five or six, and the clothing she has on was very dirty and warn, her jet black hair all messy and tangled. "How did someone as small as you manage to get in here?"

The young girl grins as she gives him a laugh while holding her hands on her head. "I'm helping my big sister! She brought me inside." She puts the flashlight down running up to Zack as she grabs hold of his pant leg and tugs on it. "I never saw a wild that looks like you before, you have such a big fluffy tail, and I really like your stripes, they're so cute!"

Zack seems rather unsure of how to respond, he right now in the middle of running for his life in an attempt to escape. One thing was for certain though, this little girl clearly didn't belong here, so whatever method she used to get in should be one that could be used to get out. "Where did you come from? You don't belong here."

The little girl looks up at him curiously. "I came from the farms of course, same place you must have come from right?" She looks to the side not sure about this. "Then again... I never saw you at the farms... and I know all the Wilds there... I would have remembered your cute stripes. Maybe you came from the mines... or somewhere else." She looks back up to Zack. "Where did you come from?"

Another voice calls out a little over a whisper. "Lilly I told you not to run ahead of me!! You're going to be in all kinds of trouble if the soldiers spot you in here!"

The little girl looks back in the direction the voice had come from. "I'm over here Ember. I found a wild, he's supper cute."

A girl who looked very much like an older version of the young girl that had found Zack turns a corner, she looking down the hall and spotting Zack and her sister. "Where did you come from?"

Lilly looks back up to Zack. "I've never seen him at the farms, you've seen more wilds than me though right? Maybe you've seen him before?"

Ember approaches them crossing her arms as she looks Zack over. "I can't say I've seen anyone that looked like him before..." She begins to question Zack. "How did you get in here? It's practically impossible for you guys to leave your work areas..." She continues to question him in her attempts to figure out where he could have come from. "Where are you assigned?"

Zack shakes his head not sure about what she was talking about. "Assigned?"

The little girl seems a little worried. "He's confused sis... maybe something happened to him and he doesn't know."

Ember frowns as she approaches Zack to look him over. "Well if he's not going to tell me I have other ways of finding out." She reaches out toward Zack, the skunk quickly jumping back and moving away from her, Ember frowning at the reaction. "Relax, I'm not going to hurt you alright. I just want to check your identification collar."

She reaches for him again, Zack once again backing away, Ember looking a little annoyed. "Don't be so difficult!" She lunges at him once more, Zack once again moving out of the way before she could get him. "Geeze you're fast!"

Lilly looks up to Zack as he continues trying to avoid her older sister, the little girl trying her best to get Zack to cooperate and stay still. "Ember is not mean at all I promise!"

Zack gives Ember a warning glare as he finally speaks up. "Back off or I'll make you regret it."

The girl does not look worried in the least. "Oh please you don't scare me, you know what will happen to you if you even think of hurting me. I'm not going to do anything mean, I'm just checking where you're registered." She grabs hold of the metal collar around Zack's neck pulling it towards her as she begins to read the number on it out. "Well I guess that explains it, you're assigned to this facility. You must be involved with one of the experiments then, did you escape or something when the power outage hit?"

Zack grabs onto her arm pulling her hand from the collar. "Don't touch me!"

Ember stares at Zack having noticed something strange, she staring at the number she had tattooed on the inside of his ear. "1342-26... wait I know you!"

Lilly raises her hand up to get her sister's attention. "That starts out the same as one of the numbers over the doors!"

Ember nods her head, it clear now. "You're a Super Soldier! Man I haven't seen one of you guys for years! I thought you guys were all destroyed!" She points to her face. "Do you remember me? I know we never talked or nothing but me and my family are the ones that fitted the collars around your necks, we got called in a lot because you guys would out grow them pretty fast and they need to be sized just right to work."

Zack frowns at her before turning away, Ember calling after him. "I know it's not a pleasant memory, but we were just doing our jobs! I never had anything against you guys honest! In fact I thought you were all really great!"

She begins to follow Zack, Lilly trotting along after her while Ember speaks to Zack in a found tone of voice. "You guys were so amazing! Lilly you should have seen them! The way these guys completed their objectives, the way they moved in the mock battles! It was so perfect and flawless it could have been a dance!"

Lilly smiles up at Zack. "Wow! You know how to dance?"

Zack comes to a stop as he looks back to Ember. "It wasn't perfect. If it was the project wouldn't have been terminated and all of us destroyed." He begins to question her. "It's clear the two of you don't belong here, you're not dressed to code and you're afraid of being spotted by security, so how do you get in and out of this facility without getting spotted?"

Ember crosses her arms. "Even if we did show you it wouldn't matter, you can't leave not when you're wearing that collar, it's gonna zap you as soon as you try and step foot out of this building."

Zack grabs onto the collar around his neck. "You said you had experience with these right? So then remove it."

Ember scratches the back of her head, things not that simple. "I never actually removed one yet... even though I've been taught how to put them on the art of removing them hasn't been passed down as of yet... see dad kind of found out that I was using my skills as a locksmith to get into places and things I shouldn't be... so he completely decided to withhold hold that information as well as a bunch more from me until I as he says it 'get my act together'..."

Zack thinks the information over. "Locksmiths... that's how you're able to get into the place then."

Ember nods her head yes. "Only locksmiths have the licence and skills to deal with those collars around your neck. I mean it's more than just a lock, there all kinds of wiring and programing involved with it, it used to make my head spin when I was a kid, didn't help that they kept updating the models practically every year too, same with ever other lock in this facility and any other on the colony. You have no idea how many times we get called in to update something or change a code."

Ember smiles as she looks down to her younger sister. "As to what we're doing here now, well as you can see this area had been changed into a storage facility for all kinds of stuff, I kind of come here from time to time to scavenge stuff to sell to people, hard to find supplies that the military isn't even using at all, it's such a waste for all of it to be sitting here."

Zack lets out a heavy sigh, none of that information going to be of any use to him. "I should have known better than to expect a True Blood to help me out."

Ember frowns at him. "Come on don't be like that, I'm not like most of the other True Bloods you know, I like you Wilds and Domestics, as a locksmith I work close to your kind a lot because of the nature in which the security collars work."

Lilly nods her head in agreement as she chimes in. "I like you too! You have cute stripes!"

Zack holds his head, realizing something from what she had been saying. "Wait... just how many Wilds and Domestics are here?"

Ember crosses her arms why she things the question over and produces a rough estimate in her head. "A couple hundred, the military is always bringing in Wild's all the time for their experiments. If they pass the requirements needed for certain laboratory projects they keep them here, and they usually they don't end up living for very long, so I pretty much only see them for their initial fitting. The ones that don't pass the requirements needed get sent to be workers, and I see those guys often enough, I mean that collar is capable of omitting extremely strong currents of electricity while being strapped onto a living person, you can't just let maintenance on those go ignored it's a real life or death situation. The collars need to be calibrated at least once a month, ignore that and really horrible stuff might happen."

Zack continues to question her about what it was he was hearing. "Workers?"

"Yeah, they do the grunt work around here, mostly stuff that keeps them to a designated area like farm work and mining. Not a really pleasant thought I'm sure, but sure a heck of a lot better than being an experiment."

There is a hum as the power is once again restored to the facility, the hall that lead to this area lighting up once again, while the electronic lock on the door that Zack had entered through switches back on locking tightly once more.

Ember looks around her taking this as a signal to be on her way. "Looks like they got the power working again... I wonder what could have possibly caused a surge massive enough to just kill all the power in the facility." She looks back to Zack. "Well, I'm gone. If I stick around you any longer I'm going to get caught, that collar you have on is tracked, and now that the security is back up they'll do doubt find you."

She quickly begins to distance himself from him, waving back to him before taking her leave. "I'll keep you in mind though! Come and get you for sure if the rebellion ever happens."

Zack frowns at the word it curious to hear, he having never been outside of the labs to hear that there might be any such organization among the True Bloods. "Rebellion...?"

The door leading to the area opens, several soldiers entering with weapons drawn as they approach Zack and surround him, Zephyr among them as he stares down at Zack from behind a line of guards while speaking to him. "What could you have possibly been thinking? That you would somehow be able to get out of this place? You couldn't do it when you were a child what makes you think you have a chance now when security is even tighter and more dependable than ever before?"

Zack smirks at the comment, though he found himself unable to lie and having to respond when asked a question, he wasn't too worried about anyone knowing his reasons for doing something like this. "I didn't think I could make it out, but I thought that it would be better to at least try then do nothing at all." He looks to the side. "Also, your security can't be very dependable if it gets taken out by something as small as power failure."

Zephyr frowns at Zack, the situation having been far more complex than that. "Are you going to come quietly or are you going to force me to send waves of electricity through your body?"

"Electrocute me all you like, it's not going to make your job of containing me any easier, I'll kill about half of your guards before you manage to get me under control, and since you're here in person you know that I'm not going to leave you without a few scars and broken bones." He gets to his feet. "I'm willing to make a deal though, in exchange for my cooperation of course."

Zephyr stares at Zack, knowing better than anyone else that Zack could not give him false information or threats. "Is this deal reasonable?"

Zack nods his head yes. "Of course, I know better than to offer you one that wasn't."

"Alright then, what do you want?"

"I want to be placed in the same cell block as Teddy Conner, it doesn't have to be the same cell or even side by side, I just have to be able to see him and know that he is alright. Like I said before his sister is an important partner of mine, I would hate to have her upset because you guys went and killed him."

Zephyr crosses his arms. "That is an odd request."

Zack lays his ears back against his head. "The first bone I'll break on you will be your neck, so choose your answer wisely."