Calmer, Harder, Collected.

<Snip>

“It sounds like you girls are having fun” a familiar-sounding voice echoed out of the darkness.

“Shit.” startled, Cass drew her pistol “Is that who I think it is?” she whispered to Jade “How did they get a sample?”

“I seriously don’t know”

Cass aimed the weapon in the direction the voice had come from, while she fumbled the psi-scanner from her belt with her free had “Show yourself”.

“I’d have hoped for a warmer welcome” a figure ambled nonchalantly into the light.

Cassandra’s eyes widened “Jay!?”

<End Snip>

"Jay?" Jade echoed. She cringed inwardly dreading that this was somehow a real Jay. The man was harder to kill than a cockroach. That and thinking about another round of Jay, Jade and Jamie was making her cringe. Didn't anyone have any ideas for names beginning with letters other than J? Cass fumbled the Psi-scanner, trying to get it out and hold onto her pistol, it slipped out of her fingers.

"Shit." She cried out, lunging forward for it. This wasn't like Cass, she was normally much calmer, harder, collected. Jay shouldn't be having this affect on her unless... Jade sighed, of course, the AR that Cass had been in. Jade levelled the pistol at Jay and pulled the trigger.

"OW! What the smeg?!" The Jay hollered dropping to the floor clutching his injured thigh.

"Darn it. I missed." Jade grumbled.

"What the hell were you aiming for?!" He said, wincing thinking about the damage that could have been done.

"Never you mind. Now stay there like a good boy till we diced if you are human or not." Jade made a visual inspection of the wound. He wasn't in danger of bleeding out any time soon. She'd not missed at all, but rather said it to try and intimidate Jay into being co-operative. She'd shot him cleanly and it hadn't nicked anything vital, it'd hurt like a bitch if he was human though.

In the meantime, Cass had managed to get the psi-scanner back and was pouring over the the readout. She shook her head.

"They're adapting. I don't think it's human but... It's Ja... I can't, uh, be too sure." Her hand wavered on the trigger. It was Jay, human or not, she couldn't pull the trigger.

"That's troublesome. Lets tie it up, and we can figure it out after we get Holly back online. Once we get it to the medical bay I can run some tests to find out one way or another." She grimaced. "and patch that leg up."

The Jay creature put up remarkably little resistance as it was tied up and propped in a corner. Unable to go against her better instincts, Jade did patch up the leg as best she could with her field first aid kit. With the experience she'd gathered over the years, it was quite an impressive field kit and contained several non-standard issue tools and items.

"Right. I think I've got the correct start up sequence" Cass said, running a hand through her hair and looking slightly nervous.

"That doesn't fill me with confidence Cass." Jade said, frowning.

"Yeah. What's the worst that happens? Flip that switch over there will you?" Cass gestured with the psi-scanner to a bank of dials with a single big pull switch on it.

"This one?" Jade double checked.

"You see any others over there?" Cass quipped, sarcasm oozing.

"Alright. Alright." Jade grumbled.

She pulled the lever. Cass flipped switched, pressed buttons and turned dials. She was typing in the boot commands and muttering under her breath. concern was creeping over her face as she typed.

"Oh. Oh shit. Oh no." She said, panic rising in her voice. "We've got to turn it off. We've got to reverse the process before it's too late!" She typed furiously, trying overrides and commands to abort the boot sequence.

"Is there a power switch? Can we just pull the plug?" Jade asked, worry in her voice.

"No, it's too late now, it's linked into the ships systems, navigation, ramscoop, the turrets, Cannons memorial toilet, even that fucking novelty singing bass fish in the officers rec room. It's too late... I can't..." She backed away from the console as ship wide the monitors and PA systems bonged into life. The screens were black for a moment before hundreds of tiny toasters with wings started to drift across the screen. They coalesced into a giant image of a metal two-slice toaster with a plastic pop lever and a speaker on the front.

"Hello. Would you like some toast?" The voice asked across the whole ship.