Metempsychotic

Model H

Working his way over from the highway, Vent continued on a path to the power plant in Area E. He entered the old power plant and nearly felt his hair stand up.

"The plant..." Prairie thought over through his headset, "It's still active and producing energy."

"So?" Vent questioned, half wanting to lean on something to collect his bearings from the energy around him. Even while merged with Model X and Model Z, he could feel it try to suck him in. A faint memory came to him like it had when he had Double MegaMerged- the same haunting memory. An offer, a new body, powerful abilities that they couldn't control...

"According to our database, it has been offline since the Maverick raid." Prairie informed him. There's something fishy going on here. Be careful Vent."

"Always." Vent smiled before going on. Going further in, and following the waves of Mavericks that came in thicker clusters as he ventured, the more Vent started to feel sick to his stomach. Model X started to grow worried.

'If this mission is too much for you now, you can always choose another.' the Biometal offered sympathetically.

"No way!" Vent declared, slashing a Galleon in half. "I feel just as fine as I did when we first stepped in!"

'Your accuracy has dropped eleven percent since we stepped in.'

"And what was it before that?"

'Seventy-three.'

Vent shrugged this off and continued onward.

'If it's any consolation,' Model Z then offered, 'There's a hidden pathway up ahead that may cut some power off. It may reduce the effects you are feeling from the plant's energy.'

"Thanks!" Vent smiled, continuing onward. In the back of his mind, the boy could imagine the invisible glare Model X had given Model Z in degradation. To which, Vent could easily see, Model Z shrugging with indifference. If the kid wants to keep going...

After finding the room Model Z spoke of and turned that generator off, Vent went further on and came to a room filled with glass chambers. In those chambers here hundreds of small orbs of light trapped inside. Vent looked at the chambers and found himself drawn to them instantly. They were so... familiar, but from where?

"P-Prairie...?" Vent muttered into the headset, attempting to raise the Guardian's commander, "Could you... explain this...?"

"This signature..." Prairie started to say, before letting out a gasp so alarming that Vent jumped, "Cyber Elves?!"

"Cyber Elves?" Vent repeated, admitting that it sounded a bit familiar. "What were those again?"

"Sentient programs created with pure energy and made in the image of elves." she informed him, starting to sound bitter. "I don't understand why there are so many of them here. Unless..."

Prairie gave a rather inhuman growl that Vent nearly had the inclination to end the comm-link there.

"That power plant..." she then told Vent, her anger seething quite clearly, "It's using the Cyber Elves to generate the power!"

"So that's the secret behind this place." Vent mumbled to himself, looking at the Cyber Elves no less mystified than earlier.

"Unbelievable!" Pairie continued, outraged at this point. "Cyber Elves are all sentient beings just like the rest of us! Vent, please, you must shut down that power plant!"

Fleetingly, Vent imagined Prairie up on a soapbox advocating for Cyber Elf rights. It seemed about right. The grand commander Prairie, with a picket sign in one hand and a megaphone is the other, raving about Cyber Elf rights and their desire to live like a Baptist preacher pounding on his pulpit with conviction. He could see her, watching over two certain Cyber Elves, and talking to them, teaching them to sing and interact and...