The trip took an hour like usual, but I noted that the girls were not getting nearly as winded and by the time we reached the surface my body was almost completely restored. I pushed out my mind, brushing up against Koma who replied with a simply, “Good.”. As I pushed my mind out a headache crept in behind my eyes and I pulled myself back into the present.

“Really need to practice that more.” I mumbled to myself.

“What’s that?” asked Gamma, having overheard me.

“Oh nothing, just thinking about what we need to get done. I have some plans for when we return, but food is my biggest concern.”

“Yeah, if we want to meet the others it will also be important,” added Zeta.

After that we all were lost in our thoughts, the hike through the moraine turned mechanical. I did not expect Marvin would be much for conversation, but I checked on his status and only yellow damage showed. Its power reserves were also at about seven days, which was the highest they had been thanks to all the fighting. I had an idea for increasing his energy capacity, which topped at fifteen days worth after a bit of math, but before I could think much more on that we exited the moraine.

What I now knew was sunlight shone on the icy moon and we were all forced to equip our helmets to shade our eyes. It only took another hour to arrive at our usual snow drift. Beta had found that there was a rock just below the snow so the snow always seemed to pile up in the same spot. We plopped down on the ground for a brief rest.

“Umm.. Alpha?” I heard Gamma ask shyly.

“Yes?” I had an idea of what she was going to ask, but I let her speak her mind anyway.

“You aren’t going to try to fight the robots again right? Even though I think you are cool and super strong, I think they are a bit much for just you,” she said. Her face was flushed from both the cold and the embarrassment she must have felt trying to tell me what to do. In an attempt to diffuse her concerns I forced a chuckle.

“Don’t worry missy, there are more important things going on than my anger.” I did my best to smile and reassure her, as well as myself. I had had trouble controlling myself before being truly mutated; now that I was in the full blown process I was in trouble.

While I wasn’t convinced, my words made Gamma smile and she began to recount my fight with the mechs for Zeta.

A few minutes later, we headed from the snow drift, arriving at the bottom of the base. Starden was standing inside the holding area like always, but there were four ATCs around him this time, two of the bulky variety and two of the speedy ones.

“Feeling a bit insecure Starden?” I shouted over the howling wind cutting against the base.

“Hilarious, 36589900. Let’s get this over with.” His usual shit eating grin was present, but the twitch at the corner of his mouth told me our last meeting had left a seedling of fear in the man.

I moved forward and dumped the dog corpse to a scoff from Starden. When I instructed Marvin to dump the half torn ape on the snow, specks of congealed blood dropping to the ground, Starden rushed forward to the fence.

“How…” I heard the question linger in the air. The man was staring holes into the ape body and it took me clapping my armored hands together for him to focus.

“What are these things, Starden? That is my question.” I kept my eye on the man. Prior to reaching the base, I had told Zeta and Gamma to keep an eye on the surrounding snow and different parts of the base. I did not trust Starden as far as I could throw him and, while that was much more as a mutant, I did not forget who made me that way.

“Starden! The question!” I saw the man flinch when I shouted my demand. I had never seen Starden hesitate or falter in his swagger, even after all the fucked up shit he had put us through.

“They… were failures,” he paused before turning to look me in the eye, “That is all you are going to get. Here are your fucking supplies.”

Starden motioned his hand in the air and the speedy ATCs repulsor jumped to the main building of the base. When they returned each held a metallic crate, one like the other two we had received and the other smaller but longer. During the end of the exchange I was struggling to contain my anger. It had been mere moments since I had laid eyes on Starden that my muscles rippled under my armor, ready to pounce and tear him to shreds.

When the ATCs dropped off the crates, Starden and his posse left together across the gangplank. As he took up the rear, he used the loudspeaker system of the holding area to tell us that he would no longer meet with us, dropping bodies would prompt an unseen ATC to provide our rations. I was positively seething, but my anger diffused when Gamma put her hand on me shaking arms.