A/N: Just a little something I typed up after replaying XCOM. It's nothing special, just something to stretch my writing muscles which haven't been used in ages. A review that can give me some tips as to how to improve would be appreciated but the simple "This is awesome/shit" comments are also welcome.
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Anita was by no means a loose woman. She liked a good tumble under the sheets, like any normal human, but she wouldn't do it with anyone who didn't meet her rather stringent criteria. That doesn't mean that she doesn't ogle hot men in her downtime, however. Which brought her to her current dilemma: she had effectively lost most, if not all, of her sex drive. All these stellar specimens of manhood from every ethnicity imaginable going in and out of the barracks and she felt nothing.
The doctors had told her that this was a possibility. Rather, she chose to hear the word "possibility" instead of the uglier word "certainty." But despite that, she volunteered for it. She was told days in advance that she would have to sacrifice her limbs and most of her torso and have them replaced with mechanical parts all in the name of winning a war of extinction. She spared a glance at her metal limbs. They were clumsy, too clumsy to be used in combat. They were also heavy and locked up on rare occasions. Understandable, since these were meant for use after the war and received very little development time. If it weren't for Dr Shen's insistence, they wouldn't even have bothered with the base augments. She briefly wondered if she'd ever be able to feel something from her hands again.
And then the alarms went off. "Alert. Hostile forces have penetrated the base. Begin security protocol alpha. Repeat. Hostile forces have penetrated the base. Begin security protocol alpha." That was enough to snap Anita out of her introspection and her training kicked in before she stopped herself. XCOM strike teams were trained to bolt straight to the armory in the event of a breach. But she wasn't a regular trooper anymore and nothing in the armory is going to help the fact that she was as useful as a cripple in a fire fight. So instead of that, Anita ran against the mob of trained soldiers, some of whom were still naked and wet from the shower, and went straight for the engineering section.
When she rounded the corner towards the MEC bay, she was pleasantly surprised that they hadn't locked it down yet and she guessed that the reason for it was the lone engineer in the middle. "Anita! I knew you'd get here. I was able to convince command to delay locking the MEC bay down until you arrived. They really ought to revise their protocols considering your situation," the engineer rambled. Before she could tell him to shut up and get her suited up though, he continued, "The MEC's been prepped and all it needs is you in it so let's get to it." She smiled, "Thanks Matt." She really should have given him a bit more credit. You don't get into XCOM if you're undisciplined. And she was thankful for having him there, since she'd have to remove her current arms and legs to interface with the MEC.
Once Anita was safely connected to the suit, Matt ran towards the control console and gave her a look, and possibly the last one he'll give her should she die defending the base. "Ready girl?" he asked. Anita closed her eyes and sighed. She had a feeling that she'll never get used to interfacing with the suit. "Ready," she said with as much conviction as she could muster. Matt nodded and began the start-up procedure. "MEC jump-start in 3, 2, and 1." The MEC jolted as a giant current surged through it from the cables connecting it to the rest of the base, jump-starting the on-board elerium generator within it. Anita felt her mind become one with the machine. The arms and legs, multitudes more powerful than any human limb can ever be, were now hers. "Integration complete, no anomalies detected. Detaching start-up cable," Matt report to the side, "You're good to go Anita."
Anita's central nervous system, augmented to become an impromptu processor for the cybersuit, began shutting down certain 'processes' to devote more processing power for the MEC. She noticed that speech inflection was one of the first things she would lose. She briefly wondered if that was intentional for one thing or another. After that, her negative emotions like fear and sadness were removed. It was strange not to feel afraid when going into combat, especially for a career soldier. And then her positive emotions vanished, leaving her feeling generally nothing but thinking about whether or not someone can do this to effectively mind control people. Considering what the aliens were capable of, she considered that this was preferable, since people had to surgically stick things in your head to do it. She never completed that train of thought, however, as all idle thoughts and ideas were purged from her mind as her brain simply could not spare the neurons for them. She still had her imagination and creativity, since that's vital in a combat scenario, but she was limited to combat solutions and not idle flights of fancy.
Once she opened her eyes, the world was not what it used to be. She could 'see' how far she could run, how high she could jump, the effective range of her weapon, how much ammo she had, etc. In the same vein, she 'felt' the flamethrower attached to her right arm, the grenade launcher on her back, and every single subsystem that was installed into her suit. All this was due to the combined nervous and cybersuit systems interfacing and translating all that data into sensory input which she could interpret easier. She 'felt' the cable detach from her back, signalling that there were no problems that she was not aware of. "You're good to go Anita," she heard Matt say, "Good luck." With that, she stood to her full 6 meter height and retrieved her railgun from the far side of the bay. She had already seen countless friends and comrades die to alien plasma fire and there was very little she could have done about it. And so she volunteered for the MEC program. She would sacrifice anything if it meant being able to combat the invaders all the more efficiently. The aliens were very good at dealing death, but as she is right now, Anita was death herself. "All available units are to head to Delta section now!" she heard Bradford just about scream through the speakers. "Well you heard the man," said Matt, "best get to it." Anita nodded. "Acknowledged. MEC trooper call sign 'Freya' online. Heading towards Delta section now."