Chapter 43: Do you really know him? (II)
"Mummy’s been hiding quite the number of secrets, huh?"
K shoved at him, pushing the admiral back a few steps.
"Watch it, K."
His tone was icy and laced with warning.
"Thira hasn’t bothered to properly learn English, as long as he can communicate with you guys, Kagu and I. He’s couldn’t be bothered to."
"Did he tell you that or it is just your assumption?"
"..."
"K.A.G.U..."
Kagu squeaked and turned to face Bak.
"Admiral..."
"Tell the poor boy of your origin."
"O-only the doctor knows of that."
"You’re smarter than that, try again."
"...I was... uh... created approximately a year ago. I was proposed to as a part of the Maytr program but as an integration."
"..."
"I was unfortunately rejected and marked as a scrapped project by the board of the ’Above’, which included Admiral Bak Seong-Hyun. But, the doctor, my master, didn’t follow. I was reformed and displayed as a simple assistant Artificial Intelligence. To other people I just assist the doctor with his researches and projects but..."
"But what?" K snapped, a thick vein lined his forehead.
"I... I walk the network and systems of Command..."
"In short, a spy."
"N-no! I’m not a spy! I swear!"
"...is what a spy would say."
Kagu turned to K,
"I know what this looks like but I swear, K, I swear I am not a spy... my—"
"What or who do you think took him?"
His voice cut through her like a sharp knife.
"I... I don’t know..."
K glanced around, his eyes moving between Bak and the soldiers standing behind him. His fingers curled against the edge of the stretcher.
"You lied to me, didn’t you?"
"What?"
"You lied to me about not knowing why I took out my pellet, didn’t you?"
Kagu’s holographic interface flickered.
"I really didn’t know! I know things, okay, but I only know things I’m allowed to know... the doctor has restrictions on me." Her voice cracked slightly at the end.
K’s expression steeled.
"Restrictions?"
Kagu’s avatar shrank back a fraction, her eyes darting toward Bak.
"I can’t access everything. Thira locked certain files behind his authorization. Some memories, medical records, research data—anything he classified as restricted. I tried to access them after you told me about the pellet issue, but..." Her voice faltered."...I couldn’t."
"Quite the pity party here, you—"
Bak raised a hand and pointed directly at Kagu.
"You’re coming with me for dismantling."
"What?"
Kagu’s entire projection warbled.
"No! You can’t do that!"
The light from her outlet flickered rapidly, her voice rising as she struggled to maintain composure.
Bak didn’t even blink.
"A member of the Order of Above can’t place an order for you to be dismantled?"
Kagu went silent.
For a moment, only the faint hum of the medical equipment filled the room.
Then her gaze shifted toward K.
"K..."
It was the first time she had sounded genuinely afraid.
K’s jaw tightened.
"Don’t touch her."
"Excuse you?"
"...don’t touch her."
"And why is th—"
"She knows the doctor more than anyone of us... do you want to destroy the last hold we have of Thira?"
The admiral grumbled and clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth. His eyes darted from K to Kagu,
"Temporarily... you will give us every information pertaining to the doctor and why you are still existing. After your job is done and we find the doctor, you’ll be sent immediately for dismantling."
"Oh s-stars... please c—"
"You will be sent immediately for dismantlement." His words hung heavily between the three of them with finality.
A long silence poured into the room.
Finally, Kagu choked out.
"Yes, Admiral Bak."
"Good, now get to work."
"W-where do we start?"
"Here."
He tossed a small chip at her. "This contains the feed of the doctor being taken away, we have had advanced technicians enhance and sharpen the footage. So far, we’ve seen how he was taken but not what... or who took him."
"You um... you need to input the chip into my outlet."
Bak threw her a deathly stare before inputting the chip into a small slot behind her outlet.
Instantly, a large hologram of the footage appeared in front of her.
"Why is he going to get his original body?"
"Original body..." K stepped forward. "You said something about flash clones..."
"The doctors walks in the bodies of finely created clones of himself..."
The Thira he had been interacting with...was a clone?
"And why did he create clones?"
"...because of —"
"Because of me." Bak cut in.
"Admiral Bak has... ahem... violent tendencies towards the doctor. After nearly killing him one time ago, the doctor made flash clones of himself which the Admiral approved... given, he monitors his original body."
K faced his superior, "if you were supposedly monitoring his original body, how did this slip past you?"
Bak stared at him, his mouth parting slightly before he seemed to remember himself.
"...I was occupied."
"That’s not what is important right now!"
"..."
"The only reason the doctor would retrieve his original body can only be that you, Admiral, ordered it."
"I have time stamped proof, I didn’t order it neither did I send those men. Not to mention, that uniform... no the insignia is outdated. I don’t even command that division."
"Why then would you order for the retrieval of his original body?"
"..."
"Admiral..."
"I didn’t order it."
"Kagu." K picked up the Ai, "why would the admiral ask for the original body of Thira?"
"...um... I’m... uh...the doctor and the admiral...um—"
"Fucking out with it!"
"Eep!"
The Ai glicthed and cowered, shrinking by multiple more fractions.
"The doctor has been running compatibility tests with humans...to ensure the extinction of his species, The Miwa, doesn’t happen."
"What the fuck is that supposed to mean?"
"You already know this but the doctor is an hermaphroditic variant of the Vashki species and you might not know this but...before he arrived here, his species back on Qashka are going extinct."
"..."
"So, he has been running compatibility tests to find humans he can mate with to birth a evolved Vashki-Human offspring."
"What...what the fuck?"