Scarlet took the list from the Doctor and started reading. The entries started simple, with a ten-day box of ration bars for two credits, continued with survival gear, a tent for twenty credits or cookware for five and so on. But there were also more interesting things, like a map for ten and even training from more experienced harvesters that would show you the ropes.

What she didn’t know was what her two crystals would be worth, or if Keera would add her crystal to her two.

“Could you assess what these two are worth?” Scarlet asked, showing the Doctor the two crystals her monsters had drained.

The Doctor, when seeing the two crystals, gave a wide smile, showing clear approval.

“Certainly.” he picked them up and gestured for Scarlet to follow, walking into the room with the large scanner. Scarlet followed after him and watched as he put them into another slot. The machine made a whirring noise for a moment and numbers started to appear on the screen.

“Not too shabby for orientation, I’d value them at somewhere between two and three credits.” The Doctor explained and it caught Scarlet short. She wanted the survival cookware for five, meaning she either had to convince Keera to give her the single crystal she had, beg for credit from the Doctor or give away Crysna. None of those ideas appealed to her, so she stalled for time. He took the Crystals out and dried them before looking at Scarlet expectantly.

“Could you add this crystal’s exact data to my scanner?” she asked, pulling Crysna’s crystal from her pouch, seeing the Doctor’s smile widen but there was also a sharp edge to his eyes.

“My, oh, my. You are either brave, lucky or stupid, I’m not sure which. You can already control two crystals, impressive.” he took the crystal and placed it into the fluid bath and Scarlet placed her scanner in the receptacle, waiting for the machine to work again.

“Would you tell me why you are so eager to risk yourself?” the Doctor asked, looking intently at her. Scarlet felt as if she was under a microscope, her every motivation circumspect. It was not psionic, of that she was reasonably sure, but still, it set her on edge, convincing her that trying to bullshit, or prevaricate, as her instructor’s had called it, the Doctor would be a bad idea. So, instead she went with the truth.

“I assume you’ve read my file? If so, you know that I’m here because of politics, I was attacked by a scion of an ultra-wealthy business-clan and defended myself. As a result, said scion’s mind burned out, likely making her a vegetable permanently.” she explained and the Doctor nodded, but his gaze didn’t soften in the least.

“I didn’t know that, our files are quite sparse, but it doesn’t matter. Even if it’s a clear miscarriage of justice, the rules of Verdun apply to everyone equally. But go on.” he urged her to continue.

“Exactly. But I tell you that so you can understand my motivation. I didn’t resist getting sexually assaulted just to be raped over and over again, on some inofficial prison-world. So, I need the strength to make such an undertaking requires the undertaker afterwards. It is quite likely that I will need to either kill someone or burn out their mind before I am left alone as I wish but if it is that or getting raped, well, now you know where I stand.” Scarlet explained, her voice steeled and her mind ready to pull a knife and jam it into the Doctor’s chest, if it became necessary.

For a tense moment, the Doctor examined her, until finally, his gaze softened a little. It wasn’t enough to make Scarlet relax and when the machine next to her gave off a beep, she almost pulled a knife, she was that wound up.

“While I won’t claim that I know your fears, I can understand and empathise with them. And I know that nothing I can say or do will keep you as safe as you desire, so I’ll just remind you that there is a thirty credits fine if you kill one of the normal workers. There has yet to be a serious fight between psions in town and I hope that doesn’t change. Even the biggest fool should know better than to try raping a psion, what with emotions potentially boosting their powers to the extreme.” the Doctor had ignored Scarlet’s twitch and was operating the machine, taking Crysna’s crystal back out and drying it with a small cloth.

“Hand me your original crystal, that way the calibration gets better and you know how much power your monster gained.” he tod Scarlet.

Again, the crystal was submerged in the liquid and Scarlet had a sudden idea.

“Doctor, you said that we’d get ten days worth of Ration-bars for completing the orientation and according to the list, that’s two credits. Could I use my two crystals and those two credits to trade for a survival cooking gear?” she asked, hoping for him to agree.

Again, he looked her over with quite a bit of interest.

“Yes, I think we can do that. Not a normal thing, but hell, what’s normal on this dirtball anyway.” the Doctor agreed and a little emotion about his situation shone through.

Before Scarlet could thank the Doctor, the machine beeped again and Scarlet picked her crystal and scanner after a nod from the Doctor. Cyca seemed to have strengthened a little, even if it was rather minute.

“What does that mean?” she asked the Doctor, showing him the new numbers.

“These are the absorption-rates, the radiation-rate and a few other metrics that crystal monsters seem to have in common. We tried to get a rough classification-system and noticed that there seem to be thresholds that trigger a macro-change in your monster, a sudden evolution, if you will. Once they evolve, they get quite the boost in power, sometimes gaining quite interesting new abilities, you’ve seen them, right?” he asked, waiting for Scarlet to nod before continuing.

“Sadly, these thresholds seem to be specific to each type and there are hundreds, maybe thousands of types, with every monster of a type having a slight variation. Nearby, for example, there are mostly rat-type, a few squirrel-types and bird-types as the majority. There are a few others, like your cat-type, that are rare, so count yourself lucky.

“Anyway, the more you calibrate your scanner, the better our data gets and maybe, we’ll be able to fully understand crystal monsters at some point. That understanding might enable us to make significant contributions to the Federation, to the point that we will not only be freed but be freed and rich.” For a moment, the Doctor’s eyes shone with desire, making his motivation quite clear.

Hearing him, Scarlet wondered about her earlier suspicions that the prisoners were actually not allowed to leave Verdun at the nominal end of their sentence. Hearing the Doctor, there were two ways to interpret it, either she was right and the Doctor knew that they were stuck until they had something that the Federation desired enough to allow them to bargain or she was wrong and the Doctor had been given a sentence long enough to make waiting it out unfeasible.

Either was possible, but the second seemed less likely, she doubted that the Federation would leave someone with such a sentence in charge, even on a dog-eats-dog world like Verdun.

“Interesting. I’ll make sure to bring my crystals every so often, that evolution-thing sounds useful. Could you tell me more about the special abilities, I’ll guess those vines your tree-monster used when helping me were one of those and the earth-moving that the badger-monster used to bury the guy you killed for mouthing off. How do they work?” Scarlet asked, fishing for knowledge without giving anything away.

“Good question. My current conclusion is that the monsters have different energies within them, the first is the one that keeps them active and depletes due to attacks until they can’t stay manifested any longer and become easy prey.

“Then there is the energy they absorb when devouring other monsters, from what I’ve seen, it is not the same but there are some correlations.

“And finally, the one that they use to fuel those abilities, even if I have no idea how they work.There is a correlation to the second one that they absorb but not to the first one. Otherwise, I have honestly no idea how the abilities work, only that some monsters learn them, seemingly on their own, and that they greatly vary in power and effectiveness, depending on your monster and their target.” The Doctor explained before gesturing for Scarlet to follow him as he left the room.

While the explanation in itself made sense, somehow, it left Scarlet with more questions than answers.