Quarantine

The eldrie had been created to be companions. It was a race composed entirely of beautiful specimens, and they were also intelligent and industrious. In thanks for their creation they happily served their creators for generations.

Eventually, however, it came time for their creators to move on and leave this physical galaxy behind. In thanks for their faithful and loyal service the creators freed them and left the whole of their world to their child race.

Had the next travelers to find the eldrie been different the story may have had a happier ending. The peaceful people, however, began to suffer steadily increasing raids from a carnivorous species that not only did not appreciate them for what they were, but considered them a delicacy.

The eIdrie could have fought, but it was not really their way. They used the knowledge they had gained from the masters and built a "generation ship." Big enough to hold the whole of their species.

The ship was created without knowledge of hyperspace so did, indeed journey for generation upon generation before landing on the planet the Legion called Nathea. The planet suited them well, it was far from anyone else, had a pleasant climate, and was deserted.

The generation ship landed and the ship itself formed the building materials for the first settlement. Over time the eldrie again built up a world spanning population. They had learned to fight if needed on their long journey but they still did not seek to dominate either their own people or others.

Their computer technology was quite advanced, which helped them when the sith science party arrived. Using the computers to work out a way to communicate they reached an agreement with the new people to allow them to build a compound out in the eastern desert to work on their science projects without interference.

It is debatable how much longer the truce would have lasted as stories had begun to circulate of young women going missing in areas where the soldiers from the compound had been seen. The government was making plans to question the newcomers, and, of course, how to respond when such questioning led where they were sure it would, when suddenly those near the site began to show strange symptoms.

It very rapidly became a plague of biblical proportions, all those who did not die immediately suffered horrible disfigurements and insanity and no matter what the medical teams tried they could not defeat this new disease.

In desperation they attempted to contact the lab but no response came. When a team went to investigate they found everyone inside dead in horrible fashion. They managed to interface with the base computer and found the information on what research had been done. The eldrie were horrified to find out the lab had been tampering with nature and that the lab was what was killing all their people.

In desperation those who were still alive banded together. They built an underground facility and a powerful computer system to run it. They created automated repair systems and droid servants to tend to all of it. Then they tested the population and all 528 non-infected were placed in stasis.

Before they sealed the facility they placed within the computer the instruction to protect the facility until someone came who did not show signs of the virus. At that point a delegation of the brightest of the survivors was to be awakened to arrange for the healing and release of the rest.

A few weeks later there was not a living sentient being on the whole planet.

Time ran on for thousands of years before the legion came.

The computer had done its best to follow instructions, it had maintained the stasis pods to the best of its abilities, but by the time the droids began to encroach there were only 56 pods left operational. Its instructions covered only life forms, so when the droids tried to enter it incapacitated them.

The facility, unfortunately, had to prioritize its repairs. When the base sensors had failed it determined that as long as the entry point sensor functioned it could perform its task. In the deep recesses of the place a colony of a local species of rodent moved in and grew. That colony carried the virus, though over the centuries the rodents themselves had become immune.

So it became the opposite of what the designers had intended, rather than the base being an oasis from a planet covered in the viral spores, it grew into a breeding ground.

Into this situation arrived Sparrow, Deux, and the clones. They followed Deux as he, in turn, followed the trail of the missing droids. The trail led to a suspiciously regular opening into the ground. They could see the droids lying in a pile right inside it.

"Do you have anything on the sensor pack?" He asked Tony.

"There's some sort of field there, it is much too weak to have affected battle droids though, they are hardened against interference, obviously."

The clone had a point. Battle droids needed to be protected against interference because otherwise they would be much too easy to counter. It was hard to believe anything could accidentally drop 3 like that.

He also made note of Tony's professionalism and knowledge. It seemed obvious to him that their training system was working well. Both the combat clones had taken advantage of the time alone with him to request the new chips so they could continue their education. He certainly had no issue with it and had forwarded the request to Kai.

Raul had been examining the area closely.

"It looks like there is some kind of constructed facility beyond where the droids fell. If you look at the walls around and the basic layout I would guess we are standing roughly where the original door was."

"I agree." Sparrow's trouble bump was starting to itch, he requested that Deux send an update to the other synths and that whoever was on duty running the droid workers send some around to make sure the local area was clear of civilians.

It took a few minutes for Lori to reply but she had cleared out the few who had been wandering nearby. She had also contacted the others in the command team and they were all drawn into the information stream from the explorers.

Deux decided to go first. He was in manual control of the sith droid so hoped it wouldn't set off whatever had disabled the others. As soon as the droids lead foot crossed the threshold, however, there was a bright flash and it dropped to the ground.

Sparrow felt real fear for a second before he saw Deux exit the droids foot. He reached down and collected his friend and waited while he made contact.

"Okay, now that was a bit unpleasant. It is some kind of energy field or shield. Pretty high power because it tripped every breaker the droid had."

"You ok?" Sparrow asked the creature.

"Yeah, just takes a minute to get rid of the jitters." Deux responded.

Meanwhile the two combat clones did a quick rock, paper, scissors and Raul, who lost, fearlessly stepped forward to cross the threshold.

"Stop!" Sparrow ordered in his command voice. "You guys aren't a good choice to cross first. You are much bigger, have alot more surface area to take the hit. You also will be much better suited to using your grapple lines to pull us back if this doesn't work."

The explanation was complete garbage, of course, and both clones were well aware of it. They both opened their mouths to protest but Sparrow had already entered the field.

Unlike with the droid the light moved up and down his body. Obviously scanning for something, and a few seconds later the light went out.

Something in the energy field still didn't agree with their method of power generation, however, because Sparrow's armor went dead. He could immediately tell his air wasn't circulating so he took off his helmet and hung it off the prepared hook on the upper back.

"Oh No!!" Deux said a few seconds later. "You two stay out there!"

"Why?" All three asked.

"Because I sense that something has just infected him. He is showing small signs of his DNA shifting already."

"Quarantine the area! Seal that door and get word to Miley and the team back on the ship, NOW, Hurry!" Sparrow ordered, something getting into his system and further altering his bastardized genetic makeup had been one of his nightmares since this started.

"Deux, you should get back on the other side of the barrier before it gets sealed!"

"No can do buddy. I am immune and you will need me to send data back and forth. Even if you get it working again the suite in your armor can't work in nearly as much detail."

"It's your choice but it might get rough."

"You two get moving! We need to get this done before something gets out we can't pull back!" Sparrow insisted.

Tony headed away to carry out his instructions but Raul, to his complete amazement, pulled off his helmet as he crossed the threshold as well.

"What are you DOING?" Sparrow demanded.

"You might need my help here alot more than the entire Legion does out there." The clone calmly returned.

While Sparrow tried to decide between being impressed with Raul's bravery and beating him unconscious the bases intelligence continued to follow instructions.

The Eldrie had left a list of whom to awaken when help arrived and had thankfully planned for the unexpected. 315 names down the list the computer found a viable candidate and sent the command to awaken.

Siscasse Xunvreen was the candidate, she was 19 years old and had shown considerable promise.

When Siscasse woke up she was being tended to by one of the few remaining automatons the facility had at it's disposal. The figure was a beautiful woman and only the obvious difference in skin type showed the being was a droid. The eldrie, unlike most galactic cultures, chose to make their droids as eldrie-like as possible. As a species they found obviously mechanical creations to be visually displeasing.

She received a situation update while she was being checked out by the medical droid and given clothing to dress in.

Finding out that she had been effectively frozen for almost 4000 years and that there were less than 100 of her species left alive was quite the blow. It didn't get any better when the medical droid reported the base had the virus permeating the air system and that she had become infected did NOT help.

There was nothing to do now but hope these new people could aid them so she readied herself and followed the automaton towards the door.

Sparrow, meanwhile, was fielding frantic calls from, it seemed like, everyone. Since his armor was still powerless and he had not had time to remove the rest to access the hidden breakers that needed reset all the chatter was being run through Deux in his head. It was not a pleasant experience.

When Sparrow had heard enough he had Deux cut off comms. After enjoying the silence for a few seconds he asked to be connected to Omni.

Sparrow and Omni quickly worked out a plan and the synth put it into effect.

Within minutes a portable airlock arrived and was deployed at the entrance. While it was being sealed into place and then the ground actually piled up around it several synths with sensor packs conducted tests all around the area and determined that the field in the doorway had kept the virus localized.

They also fed back Deux's data and determined the problem was not with the gene editor, that was actually the only thing aiding them right now. As the mutated virus altered DNA his own corrupted immune system was re-writing it with the imperial doctors code. It was a stalemate for now but one or the other was going to win out.

Sparrow almost had a blackout rage when the hatch in the airlock opened, revealing a portable med lab, and Miley, who was in a containment suit.

"Don't get your panties in a wad, this suit is rated for heavy use and is the max level possible for avoiding hazardous exposure. Like it or not there are two reasons I need to be here. First, obviously, you need help, and second, we need to get a handle on this new problem before it finds another way out of this place."

He could see her point but the fact they had gone from one exposed to three, and that Raul had already passed out, was not easing his temper.

She came forward and scanned Raul, he could see her frown through the clear face plate of her helmet.

Wordlessly she went ahead and scanned him as well.

She fed the scans into the equipment in the portable lab and then analyzed the results.

Sparrow, who had managed to reset his armor and the Deux droid, put his helmet back on and entered the lab.

"What have we got?" He asked, hoping he would understand the answer. Maybe, he thought, he should get his own learning chip.

"As usual your luck is both horrible, and incredible. While you have picked up this new virus strain and it is going through altering your DNA the active gene editor is altering it right back. Currently we have an effective stalemate."

"Raul isn't so lucky, he was created by a more normal process so has nothing to fight back against this virus, I estimate in about 30 hours the changes will be complete."

"I am assuming that is bad."

"Sadly, it will be fatal. This is not an engineered virus Sparrow, it is a mutation. The changes its trying to make simply aren't possible."