"Hi. I'm Duke. I'm the medical supervisor here."
That was all that Kolvin needed to hear. He leaped off the bed and started yanking out the connectors that were all over him.
He'd had enough medical facilities for his lifetime, thanks. He'd rather die in an explosion than let another humanoid start testing on him again.
Connectors dangled from him as he pulled everything off. He took only a moment to orient himself and started to move away from the bed he'd been in.
"Wait. Please. Calm down."
Kolvin backed himself into the nearest corner to assess. The gauntlets on his arms started to come to life as he determined a plan.
Noting the exits.
The doors.
Marcin came toward him. "Kolvin, calm," he said. "It's okay. We're okay. You're okay."
Kolvin paused. "Marcin?"
"It's okay. We're okay.
Took in the surroundings. Really took them in.
Clean.
The place was clean.
Not like the prison vessel they had been on before.
He looked down and realized that not only was the room he was in clean, but he was clean. He couldn't remember the last time he was really clean.
He could not see the dirt on his joints. Even the scarring on his gauntlets looked less noticeable.
This wasn't the ship. It wasn't what he'd endured.
This might be a legitimate medical facility. But why would there be medical facilities run by humanoids on Sol? Had so much changed while he was gone?
The fear and desire to bolt began to calm, just hearing his friend's voice. "What happened? Where are we?"
"The blast from the ship knocked us around. We had to limp over here, to Disguised Serenity--"
"The space station? It is still here?" The war didn't destroy it?
Disguised Serenity was a space station and trader's post, just off the main warp tunnels that ran throughout the galaxy, a stop for weary travelers who needed to stock up on supplies. It was also a market for humanoids to buy and sell wares. The station was close to the Rhimodian system of Sol, but Kolvin had not been on it very many times. Once. Maybe twice.
The station was built from old, broken space cruisers and generation ships--things that junk outposts wanted to get rid of. The story goes, Disguised Serenity started out as one of those old junkyards, and some creative owner decided to start hooking together parts of ships to make a station.
Regardless, it was known as a location that many traveled to for numerous reasons.
"No, the station's still good," Marcin said. "It's practically its own world anymore. Look," he held up his gauntlet, and a hologram projected off it, showing an irregular-shaped map that detailed where they were, along with what was all around the station. Shopping areas, food, entertainment, markets. It was its world.
There were even some greenery places spread out on the map, he assumed to create oxygen.
"Oh, there you boys are," said a lovely pink humanoid. Her tiny antennas were flicking around atop her head, and she smiled at them. That's when Kolvin realized that Solkan was waking up.
He looked very different, clean as well. Kolvin assumed they all did, considering hygiene was not something that was encouraged in prison.
"Goodness, they didn't give you boys anything, did they?" she asked.
