The area that the warehouse and offices are located seemed to pretty decent. Given that this planet was run by droids and an AI, Minerva really could not expect anything less. Security seemed to be fairly regular, with several droids questioning Minerva, but otherwise allowing her to go on her way. They seemed to want to make sure she was not going to cause an y problems rather than profile her.

Once the redhead got away the port the number of organics dropped off considerably. The number of security droids also had dropped off as well as they seemed to be not needed. In fact, the warehouse were only guarded from the front.

As Minerva continued to observe the huge warehouse. In the yard there was the same van she saw earlier parked near the rear doors near the large doors. Obviously it was ready to receive something from the warehouse. However there was also a smaller door nearby for people to walk through instead of large ones the van was parked against.

Minerva had duck out of a sight as a single droid made its patrol around the back of the warehouse. It continued on its route around the building back out of sight. Security seemed pretty light here, but the agent knew she had to make her move now.

Quickly the redhead went over to the warehouse near the van. It seemed like the large doors had been locked but fortunately for the agent she was able to open the smaller door. As Minerva slipped through the door, she could hear the machinery of the warehouse whirling away making it clear that it is working. However there was large sections that were dark.

The dark areas seems to be sections that were not currently in use. The lack of security droids seemed to confirm that. There were plenty of crates as well even in the live areas, though Minerva did not have the tools to open them. They at least would provide cover for the redhead when security came to close.

The agent could hear repulsors everywhere in the warehouse, adding to the din of the noise warehouse. Minerva however could at least identify when one of the repulsors was getting too close for comfort, and duck out of the way. It made security droids the easily to deal with. However there was another type of droid to deal with.

The agent came around the corner to find herself in front of a basketball sized droid floating in the air. It had a pair of arms that had a blaster on each arm. It was facing the opposite direction so it had not seen the red head. She quickly dived into some crates as it turned and scanned the area. It remained stopped for a moment, and Minerva was not sure if she had been made. Then the little droid hovered silently away.

Minerva let out a sigh of relief, the basketball droids were not much a threat in of themselves. The agent recalled a briefing she had a while back describing a similar model. The droids were linked to a central computer and were not really capable of dealing with a trained agent in a one on one situation. The problem lay that the droids were always in communications with the central computer. They could always call in more help. And with them being silent Minerva would have to be careful she didn’t walk into their path on accident.

For now, Minerva moved back into one of the dark areas of the warehouse. She remembered she had saw a computer there and it might be easier for her to the find out more about the warehouse’s contents. The agent quickly accessed the computer and was able to determine that most of the crates contained cybernetics or parts for droids. However, there was some medical equipment stored here as well. A file caught the agent’s eye and she opened only to find that it was a blueprint of the warehouse. She noticed there was an area below listed as a holding area. The agent now was determined to go investigate the basement.

Out side of the warehouse areas where goods had been stored the droids had been scarce. There were none in the inactive areas and it seemed that the droids had not been too concerned with the security of other things in the offices. Some had been expensive like computers but nothing that seemed overly so other than what was in the medical facility and that was stuff far too bulky to move.

Getting to the basement was easy. There were more droids down there requiring a bit more stealth to slip around as none seemed stationary patrolling the level. She did find a manhole cover that was alarmed with motion detectors if anyone attempted to access the place from the sewers. Maybe it had been an emergency exit like a fire door in the event that anyone had been breaking in here, she was uncertain as only droids seemed present.

Fortunately none of the droids she had witnessed seemed to be AI. Basic security models hat she still wanted to evade but in a pinch she could deal with any in a fire fight. They were slow to get upgrades to their tactics and thus were often not too creative unless someone was in command of them as they were incapable of independent thought reacting to changes in their situations was limited. She was more versatile.

Next to the holding area had been a security room. The door would open and she would see the green one eyed humanoid AI model. From the bare glimpse that she could see of the room before the door slid closed had been a bank of computer monitors displaying sections of the warehouse from the look of it.

There were cameras in the holding area she guessed. She saw some of the slaves from the port in a cell, which she guessed was the nearby holding area that the AI was going to. It must have seen something it didn't like or something suspicious she guessed.

The AI wasn't tied to a central computer but could react on it's own. Just how long it would be gone was uncertain though she clearly saw it enter the holding area. From that security room she should be able to watch it and monitor other droids in the warehouse or even take steps in dealing with it.

The dark areas seemed to be devoid of droids. Minerva heard them nearby, but she had been able to hide when they came close. The droids were not so much focused on security, which made some sort of sense. How many people really try to sneak around on this robotic planet, not many Minerva suspected.

The agent made her way to the basement. There were more droids in the basement for some reason. The young woman was able to make her way downstairs when the droids were at there lightest. As she moved to a corner of the basement, Mienrva saw a sewer cover in the middle of the room that seemed to have motion detectors. Seem to be a way to ensure no one would seek in from the sewers.

Fortunately for the young woman, she had only seen basic security models. She could fight them if she wanted to them, but she wanted to avoid them lest she give away that she was here. The young woman was not sure if she could handle a fight with two or more of them. For now, stealth was the far better option.

There was a security room nearby. The redhead moved quietly to the doorway. She could see the a one eyed droid, was it the AI? The door was slid close and Minerva could hear the sounds of the machine wandering off.

Though the redhead had only a brief look at the security room, she had seen that it had a bank of monitors. Given from what was on screen, it looked like it was for cameras scattered out and around the warehouse. It meant that the agent would have to be very careful about where she wandered if she didn’t wanted to be spotted.

The agent waited for a moment and then moved up to the door. She listened carefully to see if she could hear anything on the other side. Once she was sure it was safe, she quietly entered the security room and closed the door behind her. From here she can see what the AI was up to.

When it was safe to do so she entered into the room. There was a seat here at the bank of monitors not that a droid needed a seat in the first place eluding to the fact that the place may have had organic workers from time to time or maybe visitors.

There were two doors here, the one she entered from and the other that lead into a detention area of some sort. From the monitors that holding area had two doors one adjacent to this room out in the hall and the one here.

The warehouse had no unusual activity that she could tell though her main focus had been on that holding area. Five of the slaves she saw earlier were standing against the north wall. The cell was opened and standing at the doors had been the AI.

It was strangling one of the slaves and had a blaster pointed at the others. There were small tools on the floor, pieces of a utensil maybe. It took an extra second to catch the computer chip there, the doors being electronic in nature and incapable of being picked.

A second further allowed her to see that the slave was trying to pry loose the AI's grip with only one arm. The other was simply dangling there as if it were broken but there was no damage to it. Then it dawned on her that the limb wasn't real. It was cybernetic. It had to be, either it had been replaced recently or no one knew about it and she was trying to use some components to sort out the door. If that had been the case the camera may have been hidden. Since she did not see cameras while sneaking about it was safe to say that they all were hidden. They were only in active areas too as additional insurance perhaps.

Now the agent had a moment to stop and think about it, it was weird that an AI would monitor all the cameras via something as quant as giant monitors. Do aliens take of the AI duties from time to time? It seemed to be off.

The redhead could see there was two doors, the one she just came through and the other directly across from her. Minerva assumed that doorway led to the holding cells where the slaves were being kept.

Minerva walked over to the monitor where she see what all the cameras were looking at. For now at least, it seemed that the warehouse was continuing its normal activities, as if the agent was never there. However, it was on the last monitor that got Minerva’s attention.

The AI was in the holding cell keeping all but one of the slaves at gunpoint. That last slave was caught in grip. It seemed like the AI was choking the young woman. It seemed that the woman had been working on the lock.

The agent was not sure but she thought the slave was trying to hold him off with just one arm. The other seemed that to be hanging there limp. It was then that Minerva saw she had a cyberarm. Regardless, the redhead knew she had to do something. She immediately headed to the detention center to see what she could do to help.

The door slid opened and she could hear the choking sounds as the slave's legs thrashed. She knew it would only take a few seconds to black someone out into unconsciousness. Little effort to actually kill someone in such a fashion so it had to be playing with her., allowing her to get air then closing it off again and again, punishing her for her failed attempt.

Even with all the noise the AI heard the door slid open. It was quick in reacting turning half way around to face her while the blaster came off the slaves it was coming to face in her direction, the thing analyzing threats in just a fraction of a second unlike an organic.

As it twisted it moved the slave it was holding towards the other slaves as if to use her as a shield against the other slaves should they rush it. Unable to turn all the way around in that split second it was unable to get the slave in front of it and use her as a human shield, which was a plus as it had no cover from her whatsoever.

That single eye locked in on her, had it not been for the delay in spinning about, collecting the data and reaching the decision to shoot she would have been shot already. If it had been ready for her, not that it had been delayed for long it was just long enough for her to get off a shot.

Standing in that door way it could not dodge at all and would be hit. The first shot threw off it's aim, a second was necessary in destroying it as it dropped the slave. There were no alarms and as far as she could tell there were no droids coming this way thus far.

A crackling sound came off of the AI as she saw sparks rise off of it's chassis as that lone eye began to dim ...

As the door slid open, the agent could hear what sound of choking sound of one of the slaves. The young woman’s legs were thrashing on the ground in a desperate attempt to try to get some leverage. The young woman probably could not last long in that condition, probably just a few moments before passing out.

The AI seemed to hear the agent, and began to react. Already it turned half way around. For Minerva, it seemed like she was caught in molasses and the AI was free. It could move so quickly, its blaster already pulling off the slaves and being moved in the position to fire at her.

Fortunately for the agent, the AI could not trust the slaves it was keeping in its holding area. So as it turned to face the agent, it continued to hold the slave as a human shield against the other slaves in the holding area. That would give Minerva a stationary target to shoot even as she bringing her pistol to aim.

It felt like it took forever as time slowed down, for Minerva to bring her gun to aim. The AI’s single eye was locked on to her, and she was sure that there was a bullseye’s appearing on her head for he AI. However because she was not dealing someone in one of her hands, she had managed to get her gun up first.

The first shot caused the AI to jerk back as its gun arm jerked wildly to the left. Her second shot hit dead center in the AI’s. It let go of the slave dropping the young woman to the floor. Fortunately, there were no alarms going off.

A crackling sound seemed to mark the death of the AI as its eye began to dim. Are you girls all right?

The slave was dropped. She was holding her throat with one arm trying to sooth the pain there. Her cybernetic arm just dangled there and the other slaves rushed forward to tend to her. Unable to do much more then nod as she tried to breath one of the slaves collected up the chip and placed it into an open port on the arm. The port was covered up. It was clear where the port was now as synthetic flesh had to be peeled away to get at it.

Minerva could see a rectangular outline since the skin had been torn away.

“Yes. Thank you.” The slave finally managed as she had been assisted to her feet.

Another looked at her. “ADD?” The answer obvious though the slave was trying to work out her objective. It felt as if she might have been wondering who the VIP among the slaves here had been.

Another slave gathered up the blaster of the droid. All this took only a matter of seconds. Sneaking about the warehouse with six slaves posed a bit of a challenge even if it had not seemed that anyone had been alerted yet. She could try it of course or even attempt to study patterns with the monitors in the other room. Other then that there was attempting to disengage any alarms on the man hole and flee through it. And there was always leaving the slaves too which was the least likely of all. But she could attempt to get some information from the slaves in any case at least.

The dead AI dropped the slave. Her normal hand was holding her throat trying to recover from the strangling she just received. Her cybernetic arm just dangled there useless. The others slaves quickly moved forward to help her. Even as she began to catch her breath, one of the over slaves picked up a chip and placed it in the arm. Apparently the arm had been disguised as the synthetic flesh hung of the artificial arm.

Yes, I am an agent of the ADD. The agents was surrounded by the slaves that were happy to see her. What was happening here? How did you get that arm? There was more questions than answers for the moment. Another slave picked up the blaster the AI was using, however firepower was not going to get the girls out of here. A firefight would be a losing situation even with Minerva on their side. We are going to have to be careful, tell me all you know about the place.

“Birth defect. I was born without an arm. All throughout my life I was fitted for cybernetic limbs concealed as the real thing. When I stopped growing I was given my last one minus a few upgrades. My medical coverage is pretty good.” The slave smiled rubbed her throat.

“We were gathered up at a slave market. Captured at various times and for various reasons. I was on a space faring cruise ship attacked by pirates and imprisoned for instance. Gayle there was born into it and Stella was abducted. We were all gathered up and brought here. The guy who purchased us had been unclear as to what was going on.”

Stella, the one that armed herself interjected herself into the conversation. To Minerva she seemed familiar with blasters checking settings, changing them and so on. “The guy who purchased us revealed a few things in passing. One was that we were being purchased for a being named Ven. Another being that we had to make a stop here to be modified first for whatever reason implying that he was going to later take us to Ven afterward. I haven't been able to figure out anything useful about this warehouse.”

The woman with the mechanical arm explained that she had been one armed her entire life. Among the ones that were here she had the most experienced with the cybernetics and her limb seemed as natural to her as her real arm.

As was somewhat expected among slaves they had all been brought into slavery. Some were captured or abducted, others were born into it. Somebody had gathered for eventual sale to some alien named Ven. That named sounded familiar to the agent, but the redhead had only heard the name in passing.

We are going to be careful if we are going to make it out of here okay. She waited a moment to see if they understood. We need to go and check the cameras to get a better idea of what patterns the droids are using.

She received a chorus of affirmations and nods Getting back to the room with cameras was easy since it was adjacent. Spending time with the cameras they were able to determine patterns in most of the droids. Some seemed to pace given areas as they made a circuit. Even the stationary ones rotated their facing every so often due to cheap sensors they could only scan in the area they were facing, at least visually.

Unless something disrupted them or drew their attention it was safe to reason that they would follow the same patterns. It meant spending time predicting patterns. The toughest was getting the timing down.

When one droid was here then another was there. There had been a fair degree of blind spots On her own or with one or two others it would have been simple. With six though it meant using more time to sneak. A few could slip by at a time and they would have to wait a bit as the droids got into a position to see them then move out the others.

Fortunately the droids did not seem alerted, nor did any of them get close enough to the security room to be an issue at first. The hidden cameras had been less of an issue, there was no one here to monitor them. Trickier would be dealing with any droids in blind spots but if she stuck to retracing her steps that shouldn't be much of an issue.

Getting out of there would take time with all this studying. Placing things into practice took time too. The big issue was what to do once they got out of the warehouse. There was the vehicle after all, getting to her sip and departing before anyone was aware of anything or looking into the matter further.

After a bit they seemed ready to give it a try. The slave with the blaster recommended breaking into two smaller groups with an armed individual in each so that they could move through the warehouse easier.

The girls seemed to agree with Minerva’s plan, making easier for the agent to implement it. The first part was of course gathering information the droids. The agent and the slaves went back to the room with the cameras to better the understanding about the how the droids operated as they moved around the warehouse. It was time consuming but given how many women were attempting to escape, the time spend observing was important.

The droids seemed to be only able to scan in the direction it was facing. That would make it easier for the girls to sneak around behind them it was necessary. They were going to need all the help they could get as there was six of them. The more girls, the easier for one of the droids to accidently discover them.

There were several areas that the droids seem to move in such a pattern that it meant that it would be difficult for all six women to get through at once. Of course Minerva hadn’t had anytime to figure out the next plan once they were out of the warehouse but that would be something they could worry about later.

Okay we will move in two groups, One after another. Just be careful as we go through and do not shoot unless you have to.

There had been a series of nods. Making their way along had been time consuming but possible. On group had to wait for the other. The had been a few tense situations but no shots had been fired and they got out of the warehouse.

There were no droids out here yet but there was one that patrolled the grounds and had to be on the side or front of the warehouse. Stealing the van or attempting to just walk back to the port had been the option now and before they had been able to even decide the large warehouse doors opened. Several security bots were coming at them, firing stun bolts at them. They were missing their mark, firing blindly. They were beginning to use their targeting systems which wasn't as good as that of the AI or as quick fortunately as they were simple models.

One of the former slaves discharged her weapon on shear instinct, mostly blind shots too but the droids were group together so there were a few hits. However, of greater importance and more of a threat had been the massive war droid she saw earlier at port. Where it was had been unknown but it seemed to use the security models as inorganic shields as it calculated events.

Then a second or two later the droids broke into two groups one rushing to the left attempting to circle them there when the other tried the same to the right. There was a clear path now to the war machine who had a better shot to them too. One of their guns fell silent as a stun bolt from a gauntlet mounted weapon struck the slave merely a fraction of a second before it was wheeling on her ...

The women agreed with some nods. The slaves made their way through the warehouse but it was a time consuming affair. However it seemed to be a successful and careful plan as all the girls got out without a shot being fired.
Now the agent was sure all they had to do was find away back to the port. Minerva was trying to find a van as it would be easier to hide the girls, when all of the sudden the large warehouse doors opened. There was the several security bots charging out firing away. Get down. Find cover. Fortunately the bots had bad aim and none of the shots hit. Minerva was not sure why but perhaps they lacked coordination of the AI to make their aim true. It seemed only the agent who was hitting her marks.
One of the slaves discharged her on gun, but she proved to be almost as inaccurate as the droids were. However a new threat appeared in the form of massive droid. Already it was organizing the other bots as shields to protect itself as it was trying to understand what was going on. Not even Minerva shots got through to the droid.

The droids quickly organized into two groups as they attempted to encircle the women. This gave the larger droid a chance to fire on them which it did with precision. One of the women dropped from a stun bolt. Minerva now at least had an open shot on the droid and fired upon it with several shots in hopping to down it.