Dross expected something awful from their final destination, even worse than those gruesome fields of freedom that would now surely haunt his dreams for quite a while. Well, he thought sarcastic to himself, with a bit bad luck he wouldn't suffer long at least. Dross was, however, very surprised by the thing peaking out of the darkness.

A prodigious pearl-white wall was sticking out of the slimy cavern walls. It was so silk-smooth and clean, that Dross held it at first glance for fantasy, his mind was projecting on the thing better left unseen. But Raja's comment about what such an alien wall was doing here dissipated that theory. Looking now closer at the wall Dross was able to make out fractures at the edges, where the wall gave way to the crude, natural rock: The wall, or room went on probably far into the bedrock. What was this so completely out of place looking thing that was so suspiciously clean in comparison with everything else down here? As if someone was down here . . .of course, it must have been the doctor or whatever the occupation of the individual was, of whom Terminus claimed would maybe help him against his constant flimmering.

Dross was already dangerously accustomed to his ability to be able to look through his paws but recently the flimmering additionally grasped hold onto his eyelids, rendering him now unable to truly close his eyes ever again. His condition was gradually getting worse with each hour passed . . .Dross felt his clock ticking, and that faster and faster. Hopefully, this chance will be a successful one, Dross thought worryingly. He worked all his life for the moment of finally achieving the rank of an enlightened watcher and getting reborn into a shiny new body, like Terminus', when his mortal coil wouldn't be enough for him anymore. Dross, however, never expected a situation, where the ability to choose the when would get forcefully taken away from him. He was sure, considering this dire situation, that he should be panicking right now, but him concentrating on the breath and strong heartbeat of Raja was able to ground his inner hellfire. As long as she was next to him, he felt oddly optimistic, that this misadventure would lead to a happy ending.

They watched Terminus approaching the ground-solid wall and then starting to talk, gesticulating with seemingly nobody:

"G.U.A.R.D., I know that you are still active, so bow before my voice and open the door!"

The wall suddenly started rippling as if it was made of water, and a door appeared in the midst of it. Two eyes, flowing in the solid material, formed themselves out of the strange matter looking happily down at Terminus:

"Sir Terminus! We are glad that you are now finally here. Our prisoner E.V.0 is misbehaving again, ranting about everything that is holy and unholy. We certainly hope that Terminus will be able to calm the prisoner down."

The eyes stopped in motion, as they laid a vision on the rest of the group. They were now looking highly displeased, nearly angry. With reddish eyes, G.U.A.R.D. was continuing:

"Wait a second . . .we weren't expecting additional visitors out of schedule. Identify yourself or be terminated!"

Visibly annoyed by the A.I., Terminus was placing his body between the angry guardian and his sheep and stared terrifyingly into the eyes of the wall:

"If you even dare only scorching my dear watchers, I will personally boot you down and restructure your motherboard. Dross Hegraven and Raja Hiss are with me, so deactivate the hidden railguns at once. Now!"

G.U.A.R.D. spared itself a reply and returned with a noticeable displeased buzzing to its neutral self to open the door. Dross was fascinated by the strange technology of the cube. The dense wall restructured itself fluently in front of the eyes, making way for a gateway to pass through. Passing the threshold Dross felt an odd sensation shocking him slightly. He suspected some kind of genetic barrier, as he felt his body rebelling. It was as if the cube now knew about all of his secrets. This suspicion proved itself promptly as a correct guess; the white room was quickly building a protective barrier all around him, excluding Dross from Raja and Terminus. the monochrome hall was now illuminated in the light of freshly formed red alarm signals pulsating. One signal was repeating the same message over and over through its crackling loudspeaker:

"Unknown illness discovered. Thread fixated."

Through the milky barrier, Dross scowled angrily over at Terminus, who immediately spoke up to the room with his thundering voice:

"Override security! Administration code Genesis-X-Ts-200: The illness is not contagious. Release patient zero."

These words spoken, the sirens died down, and Dross reclaimed his freedom again looking at the barrier circulating back into the cube without leaving any traces of its existence. Terminus was seemingly embarrassed by that incident and started to prepare a speech only to have his attention averted by a sudden green light flashing up. The cold voice of G.U.A.R:D. echoed through the perfect white cube:

"Exits locked and sealed. Access to prisoner 002: E.V.0 now granted. Please follow our guidelines and don't break the rules given by Notitia Inc."

Prisoner . . .Dross was already weirded out by that word before at the gate. He blamed his brain for mishearing that particular term back there. Thought it was messing with him, but he did hear correctly. So his saving grace was an individual called E.V.0, who was a prisoner of the eternal counsel. At least that would be obvious, given that Terminus had administration rights. With a mixture of confusion and displeasure, Dross asked Terminus:

"So she is a prisoner of . . .you? What the hell gets played here? As far as I can remember, are private prisons, according to Justitia's very own laws, highly illegal. And still . . .please explain yourself Terminus. Dissipate my suspicion. Please."

Dross saw Terminus looking over to him and Raja, and pain shone through the golem's eyes. Dross could feel the god struggling to find a satisfactory answer. But no words at all escaped his speaker; he remained silent. Raja followed up his question with a simpler one. Dross felt that she didn't like to see Terminus in such a situation, and was trying to provide him with a saving throw with her question:

"Who exactly is E.V.0?"

That was a question Terminus was able to answer and happily accepted the assist. But a suddenly appearing metallic glancing, that was approaching them slowly was stopping Terminus set up speech and caught the groups attention. A robotic voice, reminiscence of the chords of an elderly female elf, was angrily echoing through the halls:

"I am E.V.0, and who the heck gave you the right to speak that way with my son? Of all people present on Prius, only I am allowed to give that goodie two shoes a divine ass whopping."

Dross was looking around left and right, trying to get a view of the woman speaking. He found her in a newly formed hallway sassily leaning against a corner. E.V.0 was a small eternal, who was barely taller in size than Raja, with an imposing aura. Her body looked, unlike Terminus' one, however not very imposing. She looked like a scrapyard welding job gone wrong. No part of hers truly fit; even her head got welded out of multiple different designs; her red glowing eyes were differently sized, and the one-sided mouth of hers was frozen in a state of constant displeasure. Hearing E.V.0's voice, Terminus was overjoyed by the presence of the newcomer. He let out a soothing beeping before speaking up to her with an unusually soft tone:

"I am so, so sorry, mum, that I was not able to visit you earlier. -"

Dross and Raja nearly choked on their surprise upon hearing that particular word, that caught them way off-guard. Unisono, they spoke out their surprise with their jaws dropped to the ground and below:

"MOTHER!?"