After a round of painful experimentation, Whumpee is out of it. Not passed out, but not aware either. Just lying on the table, tied down, head to the side and eyes glassy and far away.

Assistant observes them. "Looks like they're about to pass out."

Whumper hums without much interest, as they're busy cleaning up or writing something down.

"They already did, to a degree," they say as they look up and walk to Whumpee's head. They grab their chin and tilt it up, searching Whumpee's eyes. "They just retreated in their mind, I've noticed they do it when it becomes too much."

Trying to stay as still as they can as they're being experimented on.

Maybe their body holds the cure and they want to help people with it.

Maybe they're actually the one with the sickness that needs curing and they want it gone.

Maybe they fear infecting others.

Magic in their blood.

Or magic believed to be in their blood.

Their loved ones, maybe even the person experimenting on them, worries for their health and sanity, but the whumpee of your choice insists that they continue.

There are answers that they want/need.

A mutation that they want to understand.

A mutation that they want to cause.

Not wanting to take any sedatives that could put them to sleep because they want to be there.

Desperate for some kind of result, maybe something specific.

Signing up for a trial of some kind that will benefit someone that they love.

Taking someone else's place.

They're the ones who got bitten and infected by something and offer themselves up as the test subject to see the timeline and the symptoms up close.

The experimenter experiments on themselves.

"Is that...?'

"One of the humans from D'rthaxs' office??" Xalt breathed, clearly incredibly proud of himself, "Yup! She's busy handling that new shipment of specimens we've been waiting on, she even left the keycard in the slot!" All his eyes were gleaming with excitement.

"Put it back before you get us both fired into the nearest black hole, idiot!! That thing is worth more than your miserable moon's entire GDP"

Xalts' stalks sagged. "Are you kidding me?? You were the one salivating from every orifice when you heard we were going to be the ones assigned the specimens from Earth!! Carbon based organics!! Your entire larval research topic, remember?? When do you think you're ever going to encounter a fucking human again?? Their home system is 38 million light years away!! Not to mention the Priorourtor won't even let us look at these babies without supervision, you think she's gonna let you just borrow one?? Just to prove your thesis??"

Yrrd clasped its claws apprehensively, just staring at the writhing little brown thing tumbling around inside its vial. It looked so soft and delicate... one of the few documented examples in the known universe of imperfect progenetics. Yrrd had been obsessed with them ever since gaining access to the Great Consciousness's collective awareness. Since it was so rare, there was little documentation that had been added into the GCCA, and Yrrd had spent its first three instars meticulously piecing together what it could about them. Apparently something about how they were composed meant each successive generation was an imperfect copy of its progeny, a molecularly unique offspring. Yrd's theory was there was some sort of primitive code within each individual that was getting spliced and recombined with each pairing of organisms. That's why their home worlds fauna was so diverse, so unlike the homologous nature of The Collective. Yrrd's stomata twitched visibly. This could be its chance to peel back the veil of what had eluded its understanding for so long...

Yrrd reached for the vial, claws shaking with nerves before freezing and stepping back, shaking its head. No!! Taking it now could jeopardize its whole ability to do research on this ship at all!! No to mention with so little known about the humans metabolic functions they risked ruining such an expensive sample if they mishandled it.

"We have to take it back, Xalt, before D'rthax-"

"Before D'rthax what, intern?"

Both interns flinched hard as the hallway grew dark with the mass of their approaching supervisor blotting out the lights. D'rthax glowered down at the two of them, affixing her sensitive barbels the larger one's way. These two were often seen going off together, whispering together... They were both bright contributors but too strong willed for her liking.

"What are you two doing in the admin wing of the ship when the dock needs crew unloading?"

Xalt was fizzing and clicking the way Tyrians did when they got flustered so D'rthax rolled her many eyes and turned towards the smaller grey one, Yrrd, was it?

"Intern, explain yourself."

Yrrds' whole body froze up like Galtic ice, its mind racing so hard it barely felt the human's sealed container being pushed into its claws. Yrrd shot a venomous glance at Xalt. They were going to be fed to the detritus zolgs..

And yet... this would likely be its one and only chance... after a lifetime of effort... surely it could die after having made its contribution to the Collective? Isn't that all it had ever wanted?