"I doubt our policy on deserters helped much, either," Roger says. "Before the War it was government policy to shoot anybody who tried. We didn't do that, didn't think it was a wise idea to cut down the human gene pool that way, but... anybody who wanted to give up on the group and strike out on their own wasn't welcome back, ever. No help for them once they left, neither were they to be let back in. The idea was to make sure people knew what was at stake, so they didn't leave in the first place and drain what resources we had."

What had started off as a steadily-more-gloomy expression comes to a screeching halt at Veronica's next comment, though. The West-Tek researchers, in the grand tradition of scientists everywhere, had few to no female subjects in their medical experients except for specifically testing things that had to do with the female anatomy. All their military prisoners had been men. So... "Lady mutants," Roger repeats, a little disbelievingly. "I'm not sure I even- what does that even look like?"