Erasure and Affirmation (Hypernaturals 11)

One Person Decoding Crew

The useful thing about a great big tall open space warehouse is it is four walls and a roof. You can make the inside be whatever you want it to be. I had my fangs knocked out in a smaller version of one of these things once.

Inside the space is not only a lab, and my ever-growing kitchen. The Crew brought in a special team to build special things like detention for the prisoners. Mostly Siren prisoners, based upon their scent, but as expected humans were co-opted. This came as no shock to anyone. Sirens do not typically gravitate towards the sciences as professions. Not young ones especially.

All the prisoners are being treated well, other than having their knowledge drained by Crew. Even Juice resistant Sirens only resist Juice long term. To get answers in the short term, Juice is making them spill their guts. The humans have no chance, of course. They were co-opted for their specialized knowledge, and so the people we need the most in order to tell us what all this stuff is and how it goes together are the one's least resistance to our charms.

I made them all tamales. That was a long day. Morgan helped, or it never would have gotten done. We grabbed some passing Crew as well. Cooking for an army is hard. Prisoners do not expect to get homemade food.

One Siren woman during the Tamales/Tacos/burritos dinner spoke for many when she said after a bite: "You know what? I had no idea that Vampires are like this. I'm on the wrong side."

That got a fair amount of agreement in the room.

Later, Denise told me again, "You fucking killed it today. You make my job so much easier! I am keeping you."

"Morgan helped you know." I said.

"I am keeping her too." Denise said. "I don't send nudes to just anyone you know."

In addition to the interview rooms the interior construction team built (also known as the Juicing area), there is a reading room. All the documents are there and have been re-sorted. This is where Helen and Rachel live. Denise made a couch appear in there so they could read in comfort, and also snuggle when so inclined.

We built an open-air data center. Very makeshift, but the crucial point is to keep heat away from servers, and great big open areas are good for that. A few fans here and there for hot spots. It looks like crap, but it works. There is a lot of power dropping from the rafters in thick black cables, to feed the data center. If we had time to build in better air management, we would. This is quick and dirty.

Our reading room has computers in it to be able to access all the data stored in the data center. The cables go up to the rafters in a tight bundle, over and down. If we can avoid it being totally junky, it is.

Every cipher, every passcode, every way the Sirens locked the information down has been revealed to the Crews convincing ways. Anything with a biometric? We have the people, therefore the biometric. If it's two or three-factor authentication, all the parts are here now.

I met Olivia. She is a hoot.

"Hi, Oliva. I'm Adrian. I heard you on the phone. When we were driving away with the lab in the trucks. I was in the car with Denise and Morgan." I introduced myself.

Her eyes went wide. "Your... him. Your Morgan's husband. Is she here too?" the freckled, curly copper-haired asked, her eyes behind her glasses darting around. Oliva did not get perfect vision from the Vampire changeover. Not even close.

"She is. Last I saw her, she was in the reading room." I said.

"Oh my god Oh my god Oh my god!" Olivia said. The last time Morgan had a fan, I had to kill his ass dead. Olivia is not Jeffery, though. This is a lady with a crush. 'You stationed in the data center?" I asked. "Because she comes in here all the time to look things up on computers, or to put one together she just found the documentation for."