"It would seem," Zero-Nine began with a wide flourish of her hands, "that we have earned sister's full attention."

They were human. As Petre stared and his heart churned with unease, he realized the dozens and dozens of faces that surrounded them were inhumanly human.

Some were missing noses. Other eyes. Their postures were slouched, their eyes bulging or not open at all. Their hair fell in mad unwashed ropes or as a thin pattering of baldness. Their bellies exploded with obesity or shriveled up to reveal the ribs underneath.

They were men and they were women. And then there were others so broken and starved or inflated that there could be no telling.

Petre's hand, almost unconsciously, wrapped around Zero-Nine's own. He did notice the unconscious movement at first, but then she squeezed back and offered the room a high pitched squeal.

"T-this is a nice development," Zero-Nine said, and he looked up into her wide eyes, confused. She had returned to her motherly form with long black hair and enormous breasts. "But you reaaaally have nothing to fear. They're just sister's eyes. They're harmless."

"B-Blurb want... up?"

Petre looked down, and winced at the pitiable state his black blob was in. She continued to roll over the trash strewn floor, her goo collecting waste like a wet mop.

"Come on, Blurb," Petre said, kneeling. Her black flesh shivered with delight as she crawled onto his outstretched hand and up his arm.

"No, youuu come on," Zero-Nine said, her voice full of petty jealousy. She squeezed his hand hard enough that he could feel the bone underneath crack. She tugged him towards the wall of freaks that surrounded them.

Petre continued to stare, his heart beating loudly in his throat. Behind the wall of onlookers he could see what had to be bedding and half-eaten meals. He could not recognize the food, but the trash thrown up against the gymnasium wall was easy to make out.

"They... live down here?" Petre asked, which was a stupid question. He could see them. He could see their misery. But it still seemed like madness. Better to bash your head into a wall then remain in this hell.

"Mmhmm," Zero-Nine cooed. "I'm sure Zero-Zero has sustained them. Can't imagine there was toooo much food down here."

The shambling bodies stumbled, slowly and mechanically, out of their way as Zero-Nine reached the wall of stares. Petre's eyes widened when he realized, so close and so near, that most of the deformed humans were looking at him.

"Things are going preeeetty well," Zero-Nine said, and she pulled Petre closer as they passed the wall of humans.

[ H-hey! ] Blurb released an angry wet plop as Zero-Nine linked her arms around Petre's own like a lover. She started to release a barrage of wet tentacle slaps at the offending arm to little effect.

"Jeaaaalous, runt?" Zero-Nine asked with a delighted laugh. "I've rather warmed to that nickname for you, ruuuunt."

"Peterey likes Blurb's love-touches more!" Blurb said, and she wrapped her cool tentacles around his face in an awkward embrace.

"Peterey? Do you think he finds that mispronunciation cuuute?" Zero-Nine asked with a sneer. "We both know the human's name is- "

Her words were interrupted by a loud wail, and Petre's head started to throb violently. He jumped in surprise as his head filled with quicksand, pushing his brain against the back of his skull in a violent rush. Behind them, the gymnasium filled with a clamorous objection.

Their arms still linked, Zero-Nine whirled about, forcing Petre to face the mad cacophony as his head tried to spliit open.

The deformed humans had watched them in a catatonic stupor, but no more. Their faces were made bestial with hate and violence. Their misshapen arms, and the stumps of lost limbs, shook in violent protest. Some of the creatures jumped up and down on all fours.

And they no longer stared at Petre.

Zero-Nine did not let go of Petre. Her other arm inflated to monstrous size and the terrible sharpness of her claws clicked and clattered against one another. Her face was impassive, but his head bulged with such intensity that it was hard to focus.

The humans rushed them in a mad wave, and Zero-Nine waved them away with her claws. Their bodies fell apart in decapitated slops of meat. The steel of her violence sliced through their flesh without a hint of resistance. They fell to the gymnasium floor in a puddle of red blood and ropy intestinal flesh.

But they still crawled forward. One of the humans, their body severed completely in half, crawled across the floor with a snarl of hate over his bloated face. He did not seem to care about the trail of entrails that spilled and dragged behind him like some unpacked accordion.

"Peterey no look!" Blurb said, and she wrapped her cool tentacles around his eyes as the room became quieter and quieter with each swipe of Zero-Nine's massive claws.

"How are you feeeeling?"

Blurb's tentacles were peeled away, and he looked into Zero-Nine's impassive face. His eyes darted away, and widened at the horrible carnage that befouled the ground around them.

"Over here," Zero-Nine said, and she pinched his chin. Her claws had disappeared.

Petre stared into her eyes, he tried to stare into her eyes, but his head continued to throb with such violence that it was difficult even to focus on something directly in-front of him.

"That bad?" Zero-Nine asked, and Petre nodded. Sweat poured off his face, and a nervous horror started to crawl up his spine. Any minute now he would have another hallucination.

"That's fiiiiine," Zero-Nine said, and she released him from her embrace. Petre knew a moment of blind horror at the absence of her touch, but then he felt Blurb's cool black on his neck. "You can wait here."

Petre's head still throbbed, so he did not understand her at first. But then she started away, and the words clicked.

"W-wait!" Petre cried. He looked around at the death and violence that filled the floor. "You want me to..."

"Wait here," Zero-Nine said, turning around with a frown. "Any closer and... You're tooooo human, Petre."

"You can't leave me here!" Petre said, his heart hollow. "You can't drag me down here and then, then!"

He waved around at the decapitated bodies, the black death and the white horror. Never mind that he could be attacked by another hallucination. He only had the vaguest idea of how Zero-Nine pulled him out of them, but she would not be able to if she went off on her own.

"Buddy. Paaaal. You'll be fiiiiine," Zero-Nine said with a lazy yawn. "They're just human. Starved, half-mad humans. Even you could have torn them in half. And you have your guard dog."

Petre looked to his shoulder, but the sight of the black blob did little to allay his fears.

"Please, Zero-Nine," Petre said, but when he turned back, she was gone.

"No," Petre said, his voice hollow, and he quickly turned to his shoulder, his horror mounting. But he found the quiver of his black goo still on his shoulder.

"The other one go bye-bye," Blurb said, as if she understood. "Peterey. We go, too. This place bad. This place ungood."

He stared at the black lump, taken aback by her words. So far she had filled the air with nothing but childish nonsense, but these sentences felt more developed. As if she had only been pretending to be simple.

Petre looked around at the carnage, and he did not need that much convincing.

"But... how?" Petre asked. "I don't... Where are we?"

"Blurb know way back," Blurb said, and her black goo puffed with pride. "Blurb show way. We go now?"

"We go now!" Petre said, and he found himself laughing. Blurb was like a different person, and it frightened him only slightly. Some of her childish veneer had disappeared as soon as Zero-Nine had left. It made him wonder what else she was hiding.

Her black tentacle stretched forward, and she said, "That way!"

"Wait!"

Petre's eyes widened and his heart caught in his throat.

His head jerked towards the sudden human noise. He expected to see Zero-Nine, full of anger that she would be abandoned.

But instead, at the other end of the wide gymnasium, stood... a familiar figure.

"Petre!" Trepe, the assistant assigned to him at the facility, shouted from afar. "This way!"

"Trepe...?" Petre could scarcely believe his eyes. He had thought he had seen the unusual fellow following them as they had made their way through the upper levels of the facility. Had the man even followed them into this hellhole?

"Petre, quickly!" Trepe shouted, the panic in his voice unquestionable.

"Peterey...? Where go?" Blurb asked, as Petre rushed towards the familiar human voice.

"Quickly!" Trepe shouted, and he disappeared beyond the doorway to the gymnasium. The patter of his hurried steps urged Petre faster.

"W-wait," Blurb said. "Peterey go wrong way."

Petre did not listen. It all made so much sense. Zero-Nine and the scientists were no friends. They had assigned this Trepe person not so much as to watch Petre, but to watch what Zero-Nine did to Petre. That had to be it!

He left the gymnasium, his heart beating madly. A darkness fell over his thoughts for a brief moment, but then he caught a glimpse of Trepe further down the hallway. The man ran with a crimson fear, and looked over his shoulder only once.

"We have to hurry!" Trepe shouted. "It's not safe here!"

Petre almost shouted back, but the thought of making too much noise horrified him. Who knew if those had been all of the broken humans down here? Who knew how Zero-Zero noticed the humans that dwelt within their lair?

And so he raced after Trepe, the one small hope offered to him in this dank hell. The man always seemed to be at the other end of the hallway, always out of reach, but always within sight.

"The people down here are bad business!" Trepe shouted as Petre's lungs burned with exhaustion. The scenery around them seemed almost identical to the hallway outside the gymnasium. Blurb had given up her protests and had fallen... had fallen oddly... silent.

Petre stopped in the middle of the hallway. Trepe had disappeared around the corner, but his head poked back, his distant face marked with distress.

"Come on!" Trepe shouted, but Petre turned slowly to his left shoulder, to where Blurb had roosted.

She was gone.

"T-trepe?" Petre shouted. He looked around the hallway, to see if he could not find the black blob. Had she fallen off in his haste, or...?

"Petre, we need to hurry!" Trepe shouted. "Come on!"

"C-come over here," Petre said. He had been chasing after Trepe for what felt like hours, but not once had Petre arrived any closer to the man.

Trepe's face was blank. It was unmoving.

"Trepe...?" Petre called. He wanted to believe.

The man's distant head disappeared. Poof.

Petre was alone. He looked around in a white panic, and the familiar hallway disappeared. He had been running through what seemed to be the same dilapidated hallway for what felt like hours. But now he stood in a large room made busy and cluttered with various metal instruments and befouled surfaces. It almost looked like a kitchen.

Petre jumped at a sudden noise. Metal clattered behind him, and Petre whirled around. His eyes alighted on... a small child?

Her hair fell in a massive tangle of uncombed locks. The untended explosion of hair covered her like a dress, but the impression of her wide eyes somehow bled through the wall of hair. She was staring at him, unblinking, through blind irises of white.

"U-ummm..."

Petre jumped at the noise. The voice of a young girl, full of nervous tension. She twiddled her pale hands in-front of her as wide blind eyes darted between Petre's shoes and his anxious face.

"A-are y-you... you... a h-human, human...?"