Deep Under The Doctor's Lab, AMI Industrial Complex, The Moon Minamoto...
"There," the shaft of the fire ax dropped onto his shoulder and Ambrose spun it idly with his fingers while looking over his handiwork, "The machine has been suborned."
The Krȃng had been especially clever in its design; A great semi-circular control console could be found at the very heart of the apparatus with all of the lights and sounds one could expect of such a thing. Strange creatures of mocking form had been manning it; Blown apart by a ripple of disruptor cannon fire as his Minions had burst into the chamber. Even as he looked over the thing to try and decipher its weakness one of the great gray slabs had bent to take a hand, another hand, another hand, and begun hauling them away before some kind of rapid infection had begun to spread over his own exposed arm and the safest thing to do have been to put him down first. The resulting explosion of lemon-fresh scent had made the whole scene feel rather more clean but had in no way helped untangle the mess. That had only come when the Doctor - being a brilliant genius and in no way ashamed to admit it - had seized upon the truth of the matter to take up his fire ax, wander around to the backside of the chamber and down a little alcove, and put a dozen diamond-shaped holes in the junction.
"But what to do with it?"
That was a very important question and his keen eye turned to the maze of conduits and pipes that seemingly flowed out through the heart of the moon; A heart that was now notably smaller by volume, "The less discerning might look to this as opportunity. These tubes - they take in the substance of the rock, reconstruct it, and re-purpose it here," he swung the flat of the ax with a clang against the side of the machine, "Into whatever might be imagined. But they would be wrong - another ruse. If I have learned nothing of these Krȃng, it is that every turn and twist of their machinations only serves to hide another lie!"
A crisp swing of the blade and it sunk deep - far too deep - into the nearest rocky wall. Yanking on the haft the wall crumbled and fell away into dust. Hidden among the particles were numerous fine threads, just barely visible, but bereft of their supporting mineral he scooped them up on the hook of his ax like a wad of cotton candy.
"This is no industrial process but an insidious tumor! Look here," he held it up for Miss Nineteen, "These filaments - they are what truly drives the great work. They extract the most needed chemicals from the substance of the body to leave only chaff behind, all while these monstrosities," he pointed to the much larger pipes, "Huff and churn!"
"Has it compromised the moon?"
Stephen cast a critical eye to the chamber surrounding them. As vast as it appeared, it was only an angel dancing on the pinhead by comparison to the enormity of Minamoto. There would be some increased tidal stress due to its proximity to the gas sub-giant Hachiman but, by his reckoning, these would only accumulate over many hundreds of thousands of years, "No, not at present. Not within your lifetime, Miss Nineteen. But I do have concerns! If we have learned one thing, it is that the Krȃng were devious in every form and manner! The temptation to restore this device, this synthesizer, to operation is powerful but I fear that it would lead then to dark places. The traps that they have set even within their own genome are incredible; imagine what might else be contained in a work so vast!"
"No," he decided, "It must be destroyed, and utterly. But that is not to say we cannot learn from it. Study what it is capable of and reproduce the workings through my own intellect. I anticipate a mighty task but I am..." he took a step, his foot catching on a loose rock and his lanky frame toppling over to land with a grunt atop the exposed point of the fire ax, "A mighty man... Oww..."
