The moon in the preparation room…
Quirrel looked less than pleased with the turn of events, but with smile still standing proud across it's face it replied, "Sir you are disrupting my explanation if you continue I will hav-" Quirrel wasn't able to finish it's sentence as the soldier let a burst of fire go aimed directly for Quirrels center mass, coring straight through.
Everyone in the room stood still as the shots echoed throughout the room.
"Hmmmm something like this happens now and then eventually.", Quirrel muttered as it looked down to where the shots were supposed to hit it and observed the small tunnels travelling through it's avatar. Quirrel looked up to regard the soldier who was looking quite bewildered as he could clearly see that he had hit his target but nothing happened besides glowing tunnels appearing instead of blood pouring out? he recovered fast and prepared to fire again, but before he could Quirrel with downturned eyebrows snapped it's fingers loud enough to reverberate around the room.
The soldier erupted in electrical discharge similar to the first man who interrupted Quirrel's monolog but with a lot more intensity and pyrotechnics… and for a lot longer too, but in this instance though the screaming man convulsing had a fully automatic weapon in his grasp while he was being flash fried.
It took a second or two but eventually his fingers tightened on the gun trigger and it started to buck wildly as it fired round after round in all directions causing those nearby to scream and run in terror of being hit by a stray round, but just as those nearby were about to be cut down by the random fire little small orbs of light enveloped them stopping the bullets in mid-air before having them drop to the floor with a little clatter of metal.
As all of those who were about to get cut down were still trying calm down and figure out what happened when they heard Quirrel's voice pick back up sounding very unconcerned, "Sorry about that but it does highlight the fact that we take our gamer's health highly into consideration.", reaching out and making flicking motions with it's fingers causing the bullets on the floor to jump around with each flick sending them rolling off into the distance.
"That was a stasis technology similar to what kept you in place when you were chosen to be part of my stream, this sort of thing happens quite frequently across the Production Empire so it's the least we can do to protect you while we are doing our introduction, you are our precious entertainers after all." ,Quirrel said while lazily waving it's hand to indicate all of those present, "All of you have so much potential…".
Quirrel almost seemed like a cattle farmer in that moment staring at everyone present surveying all of those present with that ever present toothy smile that it gave Seb chills before he switched his gaze to the bullets rolling across the floor that Quirrel had somehow flicked around, all of this technological superiority was making him feel quite small indeed.
"Now I was going to do it at the very end, but it seems like everyone could use a little boost so here we go!", and with that Quirrel rose higher up into the air and the words "WELCOME TO THE SHOW" blew up in a pyroclastic show of white and red sparks above it's spread arms in a silent show .
Nothing happened aside from some people starting to sob quietly again, all of which gave Seb a very earie vibe seeing how jaded…or shell shocked all of those around him seemed to be, "What the fuck is going on!", the question was repeated endlessly in his head without answer as everything just got weirder and weirder.
"Ok well this is glum, shall we continue on with the explanation? This is the product of our sciences adaptation to the human bio-form for our antagonists.", Quirrel points to the spinning figure that had been in place next to it with a thumb glumly.
Now that there was a little less drama everyone was able to fully focus on the spinning image, and to say it was disturbing was to understate it by a large margin, as stated the figure, which seemed to be a man, was wearing a skin tight body suit of a grey material that left certain spots across the body uncovered for whatever reason, the human was also shorn pretty much bald revealing metal imbedded into it's skull protruding out like shinning fins surrounded by about one cm of perfectly bald skin adding a strange outline in the shaved hair. Along his limbs, both arms and legs, were baseball sized lumps in even intervals running all their length looking like regularly spaced cancerous tumors, but the most disturbing change was to the figures face…One of his eyes was fully evacuated and gone and in its place was what looked like an insect with head and antenna protruding from the socket.
Completely ignoring the horrified gasps and looks of all of those present Quirrell looked affectionately towards the hollo and stated, "This is the new host of the parasite branch of species 9562 from the catalogue of THE SHOW, or affectionately referred to as "Drivers" by our viewers due to their interesting life cycle.", Quirrel took a moment to watch the hollo rotating next to it.
After finishing admiring the empire's work Quirrel at last turned to continue, "These little guys have two main ways of starting their life cycle, the first is to stay in hiding and ambush from above," as Quirrel began describing so the hollo flickered and started to show exactly what it was describing, with a baseball sized insect like a fat bodied tick with multiple dangling appendages holding upside down onto a metal rod.
The revulsion was felt through the crowd and when it suddenly dropped extending an appendage with a small boney ovipositor at the end some in the crowd including Seb drew back a small amount.
"Upon detecting movement they launch themselves down and try to infest a host with their eggs from a quick thrust from their bony reproductive organs, this is a last ditch effort that is only taken when their main locomotion is rendered inoperable through any means. They aren't quite able to move themselves and can easily fall prey to other predators or simply dry out and turn into a husk in the sun if they are deprived from a host.", Quirrel made a scrunched up face and brought curled hands up to it's face in a pantomime of a mummy.
"To escape their bonds they use their hard mandibles to chew away the impeding bone and slowly drag their bodies out and away.", the following hollo was both horrible and sickening to behold as it showed the ugly insect laboriously chew away the last part of a woman's face and begin to pull itself out with tiny atrophied hooked limbs, sliding grossly out of the gaping newly made cavity in her face.
There wasn't any sound but Seb could almost hear the sucking sound as that nasty insect pulled itself out of that unfortunate woman's face, and the thought made him reach down for his water bottle to take a drink to clear his head again.
Quirrel took an exaggerated step back and flashed a peace sign in front of it's face covering one eye before continuing, "The second method they use to spread their offspring is much more active!", again the hollo changed to show a video of multiple but different versions of the first humanoid in grey running at a rapid but uncoordinated speed across what seemed to be a white gymnasium.
"The second method they use is to compel their host to actively chase prey down to grapple them!", Quirrel flew through the air above everyone reaching out to grab invisible prey, "And when they have them they then use the host's mandible or proboscis parts to break the skin of an organism through a bite or stab!", again Quirrel opened it's too wide mouth filled with…too many teeth and bit down.
Letting go of the invisible prey Quirrel once again returned to a lounging position to continue with the explanation, "As you can see parasite 9562, or the "drivers" inhabit a portion of the cranial cavity, and these organisms can only properly use a host that has their central driving mass, or brain connected to their nervous system in close proximity to their mandibles, jaw, proboscis, or any other masticating system preferably attached to a digestive track that has a holding system.".
The hollo zoomed in to show a different figure, or more importantly the inside of the figures mouth. On the roof of the mouth they could see sharp mandibles carefully carving a hole through from the inside of the skull to connect directly to the mouth area.
"They chew away a portion of the palate on the bottom of the skull, as well as completely disposing of the tongue in the case of humans so as to use the mouth cavity as a basin for its eggs. These organisms are born ready to lay their eggs and immediately fill the mouth parts with their offspring, the mucus the eggs reside in also have a slight healing additive and coagulating effect that works on most minor injuries in many different species to date, so as to keep hosts alive after infestation.", Quirrel seemed very animated as it pointed this last fact out indicating the new hollo flickering into view, "Isn't that cool?".
"But," Quirrel slowly turned bringing a single finger up and placing it under it's eye as it closed the other sinisterly, "this isn't the most gruesome aspect of this parasite's life cycle.".