D-Mo and Spark moved side by side through the darkness of the parking garage, neither slowed nor bothered by the absence of light. Sight was optional for them.
Spark turned her visor toward D-Mo, her voice bubbling with excitement."So... you can't talk?" she asked, her tone bright and curious.
D-Mo lifted a hand slightly, ready to gesture, but Spark was already rushing ahead:"Can I call you Mute?"
D-Mo came to a halt. She leaned forward slightly, bringing the glowing surface of her visor closer to Spark's. Two sharp beeps sounded from D-Mo, followed by a small shake of her head. Then one beep, and a nod.
"Two for no, one for yes?" Spark guessed.
One beep confirmed it.
Spark shifted her weight eagerly, the fabric of her colorful hoodie brushing with a faint sound. "So can I call you—"
She didn't get to finish. D-Mo cut her off with two quick beeps, then flickered her serial number across her visor in stark, white text.
"D-M0? Okay!" Spark chirped, her voice crackling slightly through the underground stillness.
They continued walking, nearing a battered staff-only door tucked into the far wall. Spark pressed a hand against it, pushing it open with a heavy creak.
"We call this place the Open Door," she explained. "All rogue S.C.U.s are welcome here."
Once inside, a flood of pale blue light washed over them, humming low and constant. The walls were buried behind towering server racks, tangled clusters of wiring, mechanical arms frozen mid-motion, and tanks of shimmering fluids whose purposes D-Mo could only guess at.
Compared to this, Orion's workshop looked like a backyard hobbyist's shed — and that was being generous.
But this place wasn't just for scavenging and repairing broken Units. No, D-Mo saw it immediately: this was a forge. Whoever built this place was manufacturing parts — new parts — made specifically for S.C.U.s.
It took D-Mo two careful sweeps of the chaotic room before she spotted the figure, hunched and half-merged with the labyrinth of machinery. At first glance, they looked like just another piece of the mess, until the dim shifting of cables gave them away — a silhouette stooped over a workbench, welding sparks occasionally illuminating the edges of their frame.
His wrinkled hands moved with surprising speed, switching tools in one fluid rhythm — picking one up the same moment another was set down, never wasting a second.
D-Mo focused her visor on his left hand, zooming in. The man was crafting spell cartridges. Real ones. Not the cheap reworks Orion usually traded for, but original, intricate pieces.
"It'll be just a moment," he said, voice warm and rasping, without ever lifting his eyes from the workbench.
Spark lifted a single finger to the front of her visor in a 'shush' gesture, signaling D-Mo to stay quiet while he finished.
After a second, Spark lightly smacked the side of her own visor — a realization striking her. D-Mo couldn't talk anyway.
The man blew gently across the cartridge, scattering a few stubborn metal shavings, before slotting it into a port on his computer. D-Mo watched closely. Despite using cartridges daily, she'd never actually seen one created from scratch.
At last, the man swiveled in his chair to face them. Spark bounced forward to peer at the screen, visor tipped in curiosity.
"Ah, Spark," he said, his voice threading warmth through the dense mechanical hum of the room. "Good to see you. What brings you to the Open Door today?"
"I found a friend!" Spark chirped, throwing her arms wide toward D-Mo in an exaggerated flourish.
D-Mo remained where she was, still standing in the doorway — a silent, cautious presence, not quite stepping into the circle they were weaving.
The man squinted through the thick blue haze as D-Mo approached, his smile faltering with every step she took into the light.
Confusion crossed his face first. Then disbelief.
And finally, fear.
His chair toppled backward with a clatter as he stumbled away, eyes locked onto D-Mo like she was some nightmare dragged into the waking world.
Frantic, his hands fumbled across the cluttered table, knocking tools and cartridges to the floor before finally seizing a pistol buried under the mess. The barrel wavered wildly, betraying the tremor in his fingers.
D-Mo lifted her palms slowly — a gesture of peace — but the man only recoiled further, lips pulled tight in terror.
It was Spark who broke the tension. She rushed forward, placing her small hands on the man's trembling arm, gently easing it down.
"Mr. Arthur, please don't!" she pleaded, her voice bright but urgent. "She's nice!"
Spark glanced back at D-Mo, visor tilting with hopeful expectation. "You're nice, right?" she asked—not for herself, but for him.
D-Mo nodded and gave a short, sharp beep, instinctive and reassuring. She wasn't afraid of the gun. She was afraid of losing someone who might yet be an ally—a craftsman of this level was rarer than any salvage she could find.
Arthur stared hard at her, scanning her frame like he could find a lie hidden in the welds and seams. His hand finally sagged away from the gun.
"You've had... parts replaced, again" he said slowly, almost talking to himself. "But I know you. D-M0."
His voice grew heavy with something D-Mo couldn't yet name. He knew who she was.
"Why are you here? How are you here?"
D-Mo lifted her shoulders in a small shrug and pointed at Spark.
"She can't talk," Spark explained quickly, filling the silence.
Arthur's expression shifted, his mind clearly working through the pieces. "Original parts... patched with scrap... no voice synthesizer..." His words trailed off before he drew in a sharp breath. It clicked. "You went rogue... You actually went rogue. That's—" he let out a short, disbelieving laugh, "—almost impossible."
Slowly, he rose to his feet and took a cautious step toward her.
"You don't remember me, do you?" Arthur asked, studying her visor closely. "But I remember you. My name is Arthur Collin."
The name rang inside D-Mo—not from memory, but from reputation. Arthur Collin. One of the founding fathers of ArchTek. A ghost of the old world. He had stepped down from his role as lead researcher just about a year ago, and the industry was still reeling from it.
"Mr. Arthur? Who is she?" Spark asked, her voice soft.
Arthur rested his hands on the back of his chair, steadying himself. "She's one of the first S.C.U.s ever built. Every breakthrough, every innovation we made—it all passed through her first. And it came at no small cost."
Spark tilted her head slightly. "Does that mean... she wasn't made from a human? You said that's why you left ArchTek."
The moment the words left Spark, D-Mo's shoulders sagged. Her arms hung lifeless at her sides. Everything inside her wavered.
Arthur's face tightened, but he nodded, ruffling Spark's hood lightly. "It's true. D-M0 wasn't born from a human core like the others. In the beginning, she was something else entirely. Her first form took up an entire room—just a mind without a body. Later, we gave her a clumsy frame. We didn't even call her an S.C.U. back then." His eyes darkened. "Back when ArchTek was still pretending to build energy solutions. Before we crossed a line. Before we started making weapons... and began meddling with things no human should."
"The spells?" Spark asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
Arthur gave a solemn nod. "ArchTek tried to play God... they succeeded."
D-Mo sat still, absorbing every word. She had no memories to tether these revelations to—but deep down, she knew they were true. Yet she refused it.
Arthur shook his head, pulling himself back to the moment. "I'm getting sidetracked," he said, voice rough. "The point is, D-M0 was once everything ArchTek created. Every experiment, every invention—she carried it first. After I left... well, chances are they added human elements into the mix."
Those words stirred a hope in D-Mo so strong it visibly shifted her posture.
A long explanation followed, stretching into hours. D-Mo listened without interruption, absorbing every detail Arthur offered. Piece by piece, he filled the gaps in her understanding of S.C.U.s. The closer an S.C.U.'s frame mirrored a human body, Arthur explained, the easier it was for the brain to adapt—figuring out the new movements and sensations as if they were its own.
At the core of it all were fragments of the nervous system. Properly tailored, a brain could become a hyper-advanced bio-computer, perfectly suited to piloting an S.C.U. But that refinement carried a dangerous side effect: the risk of consciousness emerging. To stop that, ArchTek had created the S.O.U.L. Firewall—a safeguard designed to keep the mind locked away.
What started with harvesting willing organ donors after death had spiraled into something far uglier at ArchTek. When you had all the money in the world, the black market wasn't a far leap. That was the real reason Arthur walked away.
The name Viktor Ivanov surfaced in D-Mo's mind, sharp and uninvited. She remembered how furious she had felt toward him back then—though only now did she understand why. Some hidden part of her had always known more about ArchTek than she realized.
She had also learned many of the names she'd been called inside those walls too. Most weren't kind.
The test junkie. The idea bin. S.C.U. Patchwork.
And the most recent—and the one that cut the deepest:
SPELL CONTAINMENT UNIT
DEMON