Factory Reset: Divine Corruption

Chapter Fifty-Four

Chapter Fifty-Four: What Happens Now

It had been quite a while since Mason had last seen the hyena. A year or so, give or take, and Axel had barely changed one bit.

Axel still had those old mannerisms. Speaking in slang every now and again, expressing his love and simultaneous disdain for science and the methods in which experiments are achieved, and complaining about something not making sense, and then making it make sense on his own accord. Mason wasn't sure on how to feel about that.

"So, you have a boyfriend now?" Axel asked Mason as the two walked out from the cafeteria, having fully exhausted the dialogue out of the protogen around them. Most of it was much the same thing, it's nice to see that you're okay, and whatnot, "Glad to see that you found someone you like, finally." Axel continued as they climbed the stairs and, inevitably, exited the building.

Mason nodded beside him, taking in the fresh air and the muddy scent, "Yeah... Man it's been a long time since I smelled that... wet dirt, it smells so good." Mason replied, soaking in the feeling of fresh, cold air mixing with the aforementioned wet dirt smell, "But, yeah. I have." He giggled, and Axel simply chuckled in response.

The yyena glanced across the several stadium sized organic fields that constituted this O.R.B, or Organic Reproduction Bases, as they were called. Small (relatively speaking) patches of area where plant life and feral animal life could function. Although all the fauna introduced were in the other O.R.Bs, this one just being based on floral life, based on Scion's demands.

"What's his name?" Axel asked, beginning to walk across the field with light pawsteps. Mason followed him towards the other end of the faux-town, towards a small green-house type building. Mason pressed the tips of his fingers together as he smiled, thinking back to the Mosomarian.

"His name is Ja'Kle. He's a Mosomarian, if that isn't obvious. Found him when he broke onto my ship, actually." Mason answered, stopping as Axel did before the greenhouse. The building itself was like a miniature aircraft hanger, with concentric rings of green bars making up the structure, with a plastic-like tarp draped over it, barely see-through.

"Hmm... Have you guys done anything yet?" Axel asked, and upon seeing the frowning face of his rabbit friend, the hyena simply chuckled, "Listen, you're my friend. I gotta know if you got laid yet. Come one." He stated simply, his appearance of a scientist finally breaking down into his normally somewhat perverse, and punky, persona.

Axel gestured for Mason to open the door to the greenhouse, which was a rusty iron one. Mason pressed a palm against it gently, guiding it open, "No, we haven't. He probably would like to, and I would too, but after the past few days... Yeah, I'm not ready to be that intimate yet." Mason explained, stepping inside the greenhouse first.

Space seemed to stretch the second Mason stepped a paw inside. It was like the green house's structure stretched to the utmost limit, reaching for at least a mile in the forward facing direction from the entrance without disturbing the outside architecture. Mason stepped inside, paws touching the grassy insides, and found that the grass was both wet and cold.

"Organically Stretched Space, or OSS. A nifty little tool that allows us to make small buildings that are actually incredibly large." Axel explained. Mason glanced around, finding that this was somewhat similar to his own ship's interior lab, and the lab that the late-Ion had back on the Protogen homeworld.

Most of the space taken up inside were planters, though everyone and again a desk appeared with a laptop and all the necessary implements. Atop the planters were a variety of weird and alien species of plants, some even seeming like hybrids between plants and animals. There were flowers, fungi, cactus, and many other different genera of plant matter.