Stacey had just finished plugging Lorelei’s brain back into the Doll when she received an internal notification.

“Your spy is too locked down to retrieve anything of importance, however it did find me and freed me from my shackles. The information you seek is where we used to work, no Dolls, security is tight.” That was all DX-2 was able to send.

Stacey just nodded in response and didn’t even bother responding. She suspected that they wouldn’t give her AI access to anything and if it could it wouldn’t be able to send anything out. Manual retrieval was always going to be required. She just made sure it had the means to find and create allies when it came across them.

“It looks like your little family is growing,” Stacey made a comment to Lorelei as she reattached  the top of her head. It wasn’t perfect a noticeable welding job on the internal skull and the skin to reseal the outside didn’t quite match as she didn’t have access to the more realistic flesh. She also took out a layer of hair but it wasn’t noticeable if Lorelei kept it down. It made for a  nice scar, and if Lorelei was like Laura she’d appreciate that.

Lorelei woke up a moment later and almost screamed when she noticed she was covered in blood, before recalling it was all superficial. Stacey wasn’t even in the room with her anymore and she figured something important called her away. What was in the room however was a towel, a combat uniform and a few weapons including a couple of handguns and combat knives. She inspected the weapons and smiled, she knew how to use these.

“Look after the girls while I’m gone,” Laura gave Marcus a hug, which made the big man uncomfortable. He wasn’t used to emotions and that even with a tiny frame Laura was able to hurt him. She meant too of course to give him a warning of what’ll happen if she doesn’t. “We’re going straight to the station after our raid, be ready.” Laura turned around and smiled as Lorelei came out of the workshop in her combat gear. She waved and then turned back to face Marcus. “Oh and let the general and our cells to get ready, if things go as planned humanity will be at war by the end of the day.” Marcus gave her a solemn nod before walking off.

“What’s going on?” Lorelei asked, still preferring to use her external voice. She still had a red tinge to her skin but had cleaned up well enough without having a shower. “I wasn’t expecting this to be waiting for me.”

“Sorry about that, there’s a lot to fill you in on, things are moving too quickly,” Laura emphasized by continuing to walk and talk. “We’re hitting DollTech now, I’ll explain everything on the way. Short story is, you’re not the only copy of Lauren, where hitting DollTech and if I see Raymond Jones I’m going to fucking kill him.”

“Just make sure you make copies so I can too…” Lorelei sensed she was going to want to do that even more than she did already. “Oh and for any copy of Lauren out there too.” Laura gave her a sympathetic smile as she put her hand on her shoulder.

“About time you two showed up,” Stacey was waiting just outside of the clearing. She was also dressed for combat. It surprised Lorelei to see that she was going into the field herself. “The helicopter is going to be here any moment.”

Laura preferred to drive up to the camp rather than exposing it from the air but the quicker she could leave the better. She would’ve liked to have more time planning the mission but knowing there were other versions of Lauren to rescue they had to be quick. Not only that but their virus would be picked apart eventually and they’d recognise that Stacey’s Handiwork matches Stanley’s.

“Human pilot,” Stacey commented as the helicopter came into view. “Unable to tell if they’re compromised or not.” She said annoyed.

“I guess we hope for the best,” Laura put her hand on Stacey’s shoulder. Then turned to Lorelei. “Let’s go,” she nodded her head as the three of them approached the helicopter.

“I’ve been instructed to get you as close to the city as possible,” the pilot said as they came aboard. “Once at the landing site there’ll be a private car waiting for you…”

“Understood,” Laura said as she hopped in first, followed by Lorelei. Stacey ended up sitting next to the pilot where she could keep a better eye on them.

As they traveled in the air, Laura spoke to Lorelei internally so the pilot couldn’t hear. She gave her a full update, including her model number, the fact another version of her had contacted them and their plan to go into their old DollTech facility to retrieve all the information they could before meeting the others at the news station.

Lorelei took it well enough. She wasn’t surprised that she wasn’t the only copy. Though that made her lose the last sense of self she had. Laura squeezed her hand in support.

“I get it,” Laura commented. “Having the face and mind of another person, you don’t know who you are, that’s why I appreciate the small things,” Laura gestured to the patch job she messed up on purpose. “You’re different too, you’ve got combat training and a nice head scar. We’ll save all the versions we come across and make sure no more copies can be made.” She looked into Lorelei’s eyes. “And for what it’s worth I’m glad to have known you Lorelei.”

Lorelei nodded without another word. She took some of what Laura said on board, but she still felt like a cheap copy and cheaper with the others. At least now she didn’t need to stay around for Jane’s sake though the other Lauren copies would feel the same way as her. Still Laura had a point about her being combat trained, at the very least it meant she could be a soldier and see this out until the end. Maybe she could even get a few more changes and become an entirely different person from Lauren.