Chapter 7: Mercy

We ran as far away as possible. Soon we had to catch our breath but it looks like we finally lost them.
Silicon Takes out her inhaler and takes a puff. "Where Lieutenant?"
"He might have gotten taken" I can't tell her I left him behind, but I also can't lie to her. We have known each other for too long, She would know when I'm lying. 
"Well dammit, where do you think they took him."
"wait you not suggesting we go after him?" I tell her "Weren't you more focused on getting the prize."
"He has done a lot for us." 
"He was about to leave us"
"Why do you care so much"
"Are you serious" She looks at me with an angry disappointed look "We have been Screwed over, so many times because people's ambitions came before others. The only people we know who attempted to be selfless were our parents and their dead." Her voice gets loader "Even if he did try to leave us, at least he offered. How many people do you think would  have offered us an out instead of just leaving us to die?" A short pause of silence "No one, I'm sorry I try to be better than them. Or just be better in general"
"Look" I put my hands together and breathe deeply "First you argued that we continue on this job, now you are arguing to save him. We can't afford to get distracted, Not when we only have" I look at my watch "2 hours left, we are running out of time"
"Our parents gave us a chance"
"no, don't, we cannot afford to get distracted on this."
"They wanted us to be better, better than everyone else that screwed them over. Better than the factory owners that would force a little boy to pay off a machine that killed his parents."
Mentioning my parents struck a chord with me. I felt a small urge to beat her to a pulp. As frustrated as I'm getting I see she's not budging at all.  "We don't have the time."
"We will make time" She responds to me
"What does this matter, If we die in the gutter nothing will change. If we die here and now nothing will change. The only chance we have is to take control of the system."
"It wouldn't matter if we just end up like them." She starts talking away.
"do you even know where they took him" I yelled at her
"well seeing as the security bot keeps insisting to lead us to the medical bay I'm starting there."
I see her silhouette slowly start to dissipate. I look back at the hallway behind me, the prize is so close. As much as I want to leave her behind she is the only one who can hack its network. I start running towards her and end up following.

We end up in a familiar area, the medical bay we passed after we went through the reception. Sneakily we go through the hallways, staying alert whenever we can. It's somewhat easier now that Lieutenant is not around. He wasn't built for stealth, more like running and gunning was more his style. Silicon is surprisingly light on her feet and can keep up with me. She has mentioned that she sometimes infiltrates places to hack them, so maybe that's why. 
Now that we are looking for someone this place feels a lot larger. Silicon and I have no idea where Lieutenant may be. We keep moving to search every room, We soon realize that we don't have the time to search for every room. 
"This is going to take forever, let's just forget about him and get to Stan's work office and hack the resort's network." 
"shut up and keep moving" As Silicon says this a door open revealing two Security androids carrying the cyborg we shot and skinned a few moments ago. They drop them and start heading towards us. I shoot and them and Silicon shoot the other. We suddenly hear more of them coming.
"We got to go"
"hold on, if that's the person we shot then they must have put Lieutenant somewhere close by" silicon runs towards the body. 
"Dammit" I run and follow her. We start checking the Surrounding rooms but don't find him. Then rounding the corner. "You seem unwell, please come with us to the medical bay" They start running towards us. There is only one more room we have not checked yet. We quickly rush inside Silicon grabs her mini computer and hacks the door to close from the inside. "This will hold them off but only temporally, Help find something to barricade the doo-" she freezes in shock. 

"Oh my god," Says Silicon Shocked 

I turn around and am almost shocked. We see an automated surgical table removing Lieutants and putting Lieutenants' brains inside of a cyborg. Next to it is another table with what I assume to be Lieutenants body covered in a white blanket. The automated surgeon finishes inserting the brain into the cyborg.

"We have to help him," Silicon says Somberly. 

"do what, we can't put his brain back in his body," I say to her in the same somber tone.

Silicon analyzes the automatic surgeon. "The machine only knows how to extract and put the brain into the body, it doesn't know how to reverse it. nor do I think it's designed to, But we can't leave him like this."
I go up to him and point my gun at his brain. Silicon puts her hand on the top of the barrel. 
"No, I dragged you both here. let me do this." I lower my gun and she raises hers. Slow hesitation as she pulls the trigger and releases Lieutenant from this torture. She then turns to me "Alright, let's go see this Stan Works" 

The Androids can undo Silicon hack and unlock and open the door. There they find nothing but Lieutantns body and an open vent.