Chapter 3 : Inexorable Purpose

In Another Existence

From upon the Golden Throne, the Emperor turned his gaze away from Terra. He closed His eyes, spirit soaring across the sea of stars. Malevolent darkness lurked in every corner, waiting to swallow up the light that He projected, as He seared His golden radiance all across the stars.

But there was just the slightest of a hole in the very fabric of reality. Even its nigh nonexistent light pierced through the muddied miasma of chaos and taint, a glittering gem surrounded by unforgiving stone.

He turned His gaze to it, willing His mind forward. He watched as this minuscule, ephemeral tear shuddered and gasped, a proud golden soul accompanied by three fading ones, winking in and out of existence. Sorrow clutched His chest as he watched, following as the last remaining light vanished from existence.

He furrowed His brow and came closer, searching for that tear - watching, hoping.

He found it there. He found it bleeding into a new universe with gentle, warm light, where the darkness was cold and comforting. He found it peaceful, hopeful, where the madness of the stars could not take hold.

He watched as the tear closed now and forever, taking with it one Golden son, the last vestiges of the familiar blazing light snuffed out, as darkness once again melded together to hide His son from his gaze.

Nothing.

He opened his eyes.

"My Lord?" came Malcador's aged, hoarse, yet firm voice.

A single, golden tear of ambrosia fell.

"So you played hula-hoop with a Vanguard and used it to break the door," Yasuo sighed, rubbing the stubble on his chin with a half-perplexed, half-amused look on his face. Katarina simply rolled her eyes and groaned.

"You're getting crazier the more we talk to you. It's like we're dealing with - I dunno, a super super soldier," she huffed.

"You also must realize that your civilization is tens of thousands of years younger than mine," he replied patiently - though he did little to hide his own amusement. "I suppose being much older than many of your forefathers helps t-"

Movement. Southwest - eighty meters out.

He tensed, gripping the haft of his blade and quickly snapping his gaze over to the left. He narrowed his eyes, willing the lenses of his helm to zoom and focus, where he could make out the shifting of three, hazy figures.

"Contact, southwest. 76 meters out, closing," he grunted, to which Katarina let out a small noise of excitement akin to a snarling chuckle, while Yasuo sighed.

"I don't have anything on the radar, they must be Shades. Opening hatch doors. Let's keep this baby clean, just replaced her hull two weeks ago," Ekko called, pressing a few buttons. The sides of the vehicle peeled away, layer upon layer of metal stripping back and folding off to allow the passengers to leave. The vehicle gave an audible creak as Kyphan rolled out, his boots landing on the ground with a solid thump. He kicked up a dust cloud, as he shifted to glance at Yasuo to his left, who exited first.

Kyphan twirled his blade in his hands, his heart beginning to pump just a tad faster. He watched as Katarina came at their flank, and Ekko jumped out of the vehicle.

"They know we're here, no doubt they're calling for backup. Let's make this clean, and get home nice and safe Tea-"

Woosh-Fwoom! The whistling of an incoming explosion ended with a crack of explosive force, stabbing from above down into the vehicle they had just disembarked from. Ekko immediately threw up a bubble of green hexagonal shields, hovering over them all for a brief moment as debris and flames burst out.

"God fucking damn it!" Ekko cursed.

"They got an Erebus platform somewhere! Bet they're wanting to get back their golden experiment," Katarina shouted out as the bubble faded away, a flaming wreck behind them illuminating the small area, surrounded by pillars of garbage. The three Projects scrambled for cover, Yasuo diving behind a large disposed washing machine, Katarina blinking away to somewhere behind and above Kyphan. Ekko seemed to duck behind the burning husk of the vehicle.

"No way that was an Erebus, we got to figure out the source now! The SCARs operate on a Capture protocol for all Projects, it's probably Jh-"

Woosh-!Remaining silent, Kyphan heard the crack of the projectile ring out towards him. Within milliseconds, he widened his stance and gripped his blade tighter. Twirling it forward and in front of him, he thumbed the activation rune just as the bolt of burning red-purple energy was about to collide with him and deflected it, the scream of white-blue energy exploding out from his weapon sending the projectile hurtling off into the distance. A plume of fire and heat radiated off of the trash heap that it had collided with, as debris rained around them.

Slinking out of the shadows came twin forms in perfect unison, mirroring one another. He watched as glowing red armblades slid out from atop their forearms. He fell silent as he watched the two, red-black constructs, skulls acid-etched into their helms, mechanical chittering warbling from their forms.

He smiled.

"Yasuo, I'll handle our pretty little sniper. You boys fight off these ugly sons of bitches and we'll meet back in 5," Katarina's voice crackled in Yasuo's earpiece. He confusedly grunted an affirmative as the long-range bombardment ended, having no time to process what just happened. He gripped his blade, the plasma edged weapon thrumming with energy. He felt a twinge of danger behind him, and spun around while drawing his sword.

He cast from the sword's edge a web of plasma, capturing an incinerating the neo-steel shuriken that was hurtling towards him. He narrowed his eyes, gripping his weapon with one hand more soundly while sizing up his opponent.

The Shade stared at him for a second, cocking its skull as if it were thinking. With a warbled bleep of noise, it threw its arm out to the side, projecting a red-black hardlight construct of itself. He cocked his lips in a grin, leaning down and dashing forward at his foe. The Shade threw another pair of shurikens, one hardlight and another neosteel. He let his armor take one, a white glow of energy shielding deflecting one while he ducked under the second. He lashed out with his blade, only for the Shade to swap places with its shadow construct in a dark burst of energy.

Now standing at his flank, the Shade jut its arms forward together, aiming at his chest. Yasuo shifted backwards, gripping his blade with two hands to swing upwards to deflect the twin armblades. He was met with another set of vicious swipes with those claws, as Yasuo held his blade firm. Twisting the weapon so that edge of the blade caught between the twin teeth of the shade's weapons, Yasuo grinned. It still seemed to work - easy prey for him.

Suddenly he watched as the machine's faceplate clicked and pulled away to reveal a vicious-looking tether, his eyes widening in horror.

He didn't trap the machine. It had trapped him.

He tried to free his weapon as the javelin shot through his shoulder, piercing through his shielding and digging into his flesh. He howled in pain, only to be silenced when electric fury burned through his veins. His vision blurred and twisted, feeling his limbs clench and lock up in agony. He arched his back, letting out a piercing yell of shock, his body no longer obeying his commands.

Centuries of experience made this battle less than trivial for Kyphan. Their weapons, while most definitely lethal on an unaugmented human, did little more than leave temporary scratches against his warplate - if they could get past his impeccable defense.

These machines, Kyphan realized, were working in perfect harmony with each other. It took little effort to deflect the attempts of the pair of machines to breach his defenses. He took his time, allowing them to strike at him over and over to come to understand their method and style.

Blows aiming for his joints and limbs told him they were attempting to disable him. Shurikens at his weapons told him they were trying to see his guardian spear's limits. Their short-range teleportation reminded him of the Aeldari, though they were naught but fractions of the detestable alien's dexterity and grace.

Ten seconds had passed, and Kyphan had become a flurry of defensive spins and deflects. Suspecting their next attacks, Kyphan moved to counter. With a sweep of his blade, he pushed back both the right and left constructs just as they attacked from his front and back as he had predicted, spinning the staff to deliver a devastating blow to the head with the butt of his spear to one construct, its head reduced to a dented, broken mess. He immediately followed it by carrying his momentum backwards, stabbing into where he deduced the construct would warp to next.

He was right.

His spear screamed as it pierced metal, cutting a burning, smoking wound into the chest of the Shade. It let out a few electric noises, its head and limbs jittering and twitching violently. Twisting his blade, he locked the Shade in place as he swung the weapon over his head, Shade still attached, to crash down upon the other wounded machine.

Quickly pulling his weapon free, He aimed directly at the piled Shades, smoking and sparking, before pulling the trigger. A burst of energy was accompanied by a howl of destruction.

He didn't even watch to see their torsos vaporize into nothingness, turning away when victory was assured.

Yasuo's cry of agony alerted him, locking his gaze to where he saw Yasuo on his knees, body twitching. He clearly saw the machine's tether stabbed through his shoulder. It took him half a second to frown and lower his staff- he could not take that shot without potentially vaporizing the swordsman from existence. Kyphan pursed his lips and broke into a full on sprint...

Only for Katarina to blink behind the shade with a static buzz and sever its head from its body, her vibrant-purple blades burning through metal. She twirled the vicious-looking dagger free of oils and metal scraps, before sheathing it. She reached out, gripping the head of the tether and yanked it out, eliciting a gasp of agony from the now conscious Swordsman.

"Can't even take out a shade by yourself, old man? And here I thought you two would do just fine without me," Katarina mocked, as she reached out to take Yasuo's outstretched hand. She pulled him up, and Yasuo gripped his shoulder with a grimace. Sparks and wires were now freely shown between his fingers, gripping the wound.

"Fucker had an electric tether hidden in his face," he grumbled. "Guess we can tack that onto the newest Shade version they're making," he sighed.

Kyphan made his way up the sloped trash heap, metal crunching under his boots with each step. He gazed silently at the pair for a moment, before tilting his head. "Are you alright, Yasuo?" he queried.

Yasuo let out an aggravated grunt. "Yeah, yeah. I'll be fine. At least it wasn't like - a few inches over. Then it'd hit meat and that'd hurt like a bitch, not to mention take way longer to heal," he conceded. "Did you take care of that fucker?"

Katarina shook his head. "Just about took apart his arms, but the bitch had a stun grenade array waiting for me. Ran off before I could finish the job," she growled, twirling one of her daggers. "As crazy as that bastard is, he's really good at running away."

The three of them turned and began walking down the slope, as Kyphan questioned, "Who was the sniper? Was it a Battlecast?"

Katarina shook her head. "No, that's a rogue Project, like the rest of us. His name is Jhin, and he was unplugged around the same time as me, a few months later I think. Unlike us, though, he decided to continue working for the Creator. Crazy bastard is psychopathic beyond measure... but he's the best sniper Runeterra's seen in a long time."

Kyphan frowned. "The Synapse?" he repeated.

Ekko chimed in as they made their way to the center of the clearing. "The Synapse is a simple way of describing the synaptic neural webway that connected all Projects to the main hub. Essentially, each Project is an individual that is bound to the synapse's rules and code. This allows Projects to retain some amount of personality and individualism while ensuring their absolute loyalty to the Creator and his orders. The synapse is-"

"Yeah yeah, we get it Ekko," Katarina impatiently interjected, waving her hand," he doesn't want the whole nerd explanation."

"Actually," Kyphan patiently replied. "I have to admit that this topic is rather intriguing. Do continue, Ekko, if you wouldn't mind."

Yasuo snorted, eliciting a punch from Katarina, followed by a small 'that hurt!' from the injured man. Ekko simply grinned and continued.

"Aaanyways. The Synapse is also a datastream that allows both memories, knowledge, and directive to be both sent and received from various Projects on the field. All Projects are almost constantly in contact with one another to ensure maximum efficiency and security, though once a Project is unplugged from the Synapse, all of that changes.

"That's what a rogue Project is - just someone unhooked from the System. We all are rogue Projects, and once we were unplugged, the directives that repressed and subdued most of our own personalities and thoughts quickly died out now that they were no longer reinforced by the system. It was pretty much inevitable that we realized that we were just basically slaves to the system, or oppressors of our own people, or... you get the point." He shrugged. "Some rogues didn't really care about all of that, though. They just wanted to kill, or... hunt, or whatever. Like Jhin."

He paused. "It's our goal to free all the Projects from the Synapse first - and then eventually, free the people from the Creator's grasp. Nobody is truly free, ya see. Everyone's got chips, propaganda, controllers, inhibitors... If you're not living for yourself, are you even alive?"

He frowned. "Which goes to another topic. We actually aren't in our original bodies - all of us are, in actuality, seventy to a hundred years old - or at least, something around that. These are just bodies that are designed to best fit the bodies that our original personalities, memories, skills. and whatever were like upon being recorded, duplicated, and captured. So - are we even ourselves? Me and Master Yi had this debate for a-"

"Ekko," Kyphan interjected calmly. "Thank you."

Ekko blinked, and coughed. "Oh - yeah, uh. Sorry for rambling, kinda just happens."

Kyphan nodded, as Katarina looked around, holding Yasuo up with one arm around her shoulder. "Guess we better contact Ashe for transport. For now, we better move. No doubt they'll be sending more after us soon," she huffed.

Ekko nodded, tapping at his wrist. "Already on it," he replied.

It took just about twenty minutes for their new transport to arrive, though this one was markedly smaller and more piecemeal than the previous. It had been running on autopilot, and with Ekko at its helm the trip became much smoother than Kyphan expected. He barely even fit in the transport, having to remove his helm and hold it in his lap so that the pointed tip and tassel of his armor didn't carve holes into the ceiling.

They traversed the junk heaps after some time had passed, heading south from the mountains deeper into the sprawling metropolis. Meeting a sudden cliff face, the transport slowed to a halt and met the edge, before slowly lowering itself the cliff face. Before them now was a markedly different area of the city, resting in some sort of naturally occurring ravine that seemed to fall deeper and deeper, surrounded by a haze of smoke and smog. The ravine's shallowest edge bled into the glowing city above, while this lower half was characterized by thrumming green and red lights of almost oppressive nature.

"Welcome to Zaun," Ekko softly remarked, sighing out in relief," the lower half of the Commonwealth, where people go to rot and hope dies."

"Don't be so dramatic, kid," Katarina snorted. "This isn't half as bad as Ionia has it. Or Shurima." She turned to gently nod her head at Kyphan. "This is basically the slums of Piltover. There's almost no law enforcement here except for some of the Converted - they're people hypnotically and cybernetically indoctrinated to obey the local Node's commands. So, they're slaves to the system, wearing human skin. Zaunites don't look too kindly on Battlecasts down here, and the Creator doesn't have much power down here anyways," she finished.

They passed through what seemed to be a huge maze of factories and piping, dancing around huge metallic tubes that hissed with escaping gas and vaporized fluids. Underneath them was almost solid metal, marked with entrance hatches, energy cabling, and strobe lights. They continued to travel for a whole five minutes, until they came to the wall shooting straight up into the glittering Piltover above.

"The heart of a massive energy facility that keeps Piltover alive," Yasuo explained. "It's just about impossible for any sensor to see anything in this area."

They lowered at the very cusp of the machine complex, where metal gave way to worked earth and concrete. A metal docking bay door began to open, just a touch larger than their small transport. It gave way to expose a garage inside, where they touched down. The door slid closed behind them with a groaning slam, as Kyphan studied their new location.

They exited the transport as it powered down, the hatch pulling back to allow all four passengers to leave, with the machine giving a hearty creak once Kyphan stepped out. He gazed at the party of individuals waiting to meet them at the edge of a staircase, slowly approaching step by step.

A white-haired woman wearing a tight bodysuit with a purple visor was on the right, stalking forward with suspicion radiating off of her. To the left was a darker skinned male with white hair twisted into dreadlocks, a touch more aloof though underneath that facade Kyphan suspected was a professional, cold, and calculating heart. At the center of the party was the familiar figure known as Ashe, who carried herself with the confidence that marked her as the leader of this party.

Ashe offered a small smile, and lifted her chin. "A pleasure to meet you at last, Shield Captain. Welcome to the Resistance."

AN: Yeah, this took a hot second to write. Sorry about that - finally decided to figure out a storyline for this, so I might start writing a bit faster. Let me know thoughts and whatnot - I need more ideas for more Projects to use.

Projects are gonna fall into three categories; Resistance, Synapse, and Rogue.

Resistance members are Rogues that joined the Resistance - duh.

Synapse Projects are those still attached to the Synapse, and thus are not really their full selves.

Rogues are out of the system, but still work for the Creator or just do whatever the hell they want.

Let me know your thoughts.