Here we are, back with a new chapter! Sorry this took longer than usual, had some brief schedule troubles. A few things to cover here. Firstly, i went back to change the name of one of our main characters. I plan to use that name for someone else we will meet later down in the story. Secondly, I plan to go back and fix up some grammar errors that I glossed over when reviewing each one. Thats all! Also, happy 8k words mark!

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CommsEstablished/001/Fs01p.9a…

A - Update.

9a - Recon missions by remaining nearby squadrons all confirm the same thing. Plantation 13 is all just rubble and ash now.

A - Survivors?

9a - Eleven. Destination, UnLondon. Evidently, there's some sort of connection between the two. Should we continue to investigate?

A - As of now, no. We're stretched thin as it is. They are on their own.

9a - Understood, we'll keep an eye to the sky just in case.

A - Was that supposed to be a joke?

9a - It's just an old saying, just a bit of irony.

A - What is the status of the Lamark Club?

9a - The station was destroyed by a crashing satellite and crashed onto the surface. Survivors are not likely but any expeditions to confirm are right now virtually impossible.

A - Any word yet from Werner?

9a - Not yet. We haven't had a word from him, communications at his lab are still down.

A - Is construction on 1678 proceeding as on schedule?

9a - As of his last communication, affirmative.

A - Anything else?

9a - One more problem. It's about Nine Iota.

A - Hardly a pressing matter, all things considered. Nevertheless, send it.

9a - Attached File: Rec046/scp001drlck7wdb.

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Zero Two runs all the way back through the tunnels under Site-46, rarely looking behind her. The only thing heard were the sounds of gunshots, explosives, and screams. She watched in horror as the other Foundation personnel were dragged up through the vents and out of the exit to the tunnel. First went the D classes, then Claude, followed by Director Phillips, and finally ending with Ari and Logan having their clothes ripped off and thrown out into the sunlight, screaming all the way. And when they needed her, Zero Two just ran away. In the end, they would have probably done the same thing.

Zero Two once again entered the main portion of the site, She slammed the door behind her, being chased all the way by the horrific flesh monsters from outside. Zero Two slammed down a shelf to prevent entry, locked it, and turned back around, running through the now empty facility. She threw herself into a room and closed the door, shoving another small shelf in front of it. Looking around, the only things in the room were a bed, computer screen and monitor, mirror, and bathroom. With the reassured safety of the locked down site, she threw herself against the wall and broke down.

Zero Two slid down the wall and hit the floor, breaking out into a weak cry. She dropped the radio that she had acquired a few hours before by her feet, and covered her mouth to muffle the crying. Those things could be anywhere watching, waiting, taunting. She just wanted to apologize and plead for forgiveness, but there was no one there to listen. Zero Two dropped her head into her knees and covered her head with her free arm. For the second time, she was alone. More importantly, she was afraid. Afraid of...them. Whatever they were called, nothing was human about them.

But she was too distraught to accept the reality around her. She began to shake her head in a desperate attempt to snap herself out of a dream she wasn't in. "No, no, no, no, no, no…," she muttered to nobody in particular. The first stage of grief had begun. Zero Two was too disconnected with reality to think about anything else but an overwhelming depressing feeling of grief. Maybe, just maybe, if she did something, she wouldn't be the only one left of the failed expedition. "T-this can't be happening, this isn't really happening...i-its not real!," she continued, begging for someone, anyone, to wake her up from a nightmare that was all too real.

Finally gathering the composure to move, Zero Two makes her way over to the computer sitting against the wall, and turns it on. Skipping over most of the anomalous stuff and ignoring any deactivated kill agents, she clicks on the main page of Site-46. Scrolling through, she finds a feature attached to the SCP-001 file named 'Attach File'. She types the word 'help' in all capital letters before clicking on a box titled 'Update File'. She backs away from the screen, still traumatized. "Someone has to see this, please...They w-will come for me, I-I…" Zero Two could barely structure a sentence as she continued to back away from the computer screen, letting it automatically turn off from inactivity.

In the end, she was still alone. Very alone. There was nobody to save her, no one to track her down and find her, if anyone was left. Zero Two begins to hyperventilate, continuing to break out into a panic attack. Desperately trying to calm herself and divert her attention, she threw herself onto the bed in the room she was now stranded in. Once again isolated from her darling, getting more desperate by the day, and depressed by the hour, Zero Two just cried herself to sleep, preparing for the next inevitable panic attack, and a long period of torture called isolation.

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Nine Alpha hated the new assignments he was getting from the nameless administrator.

With Papa and his council most likely dead, and no one left to fill the power vacuum of leadership, what's left of APE's fighting force fell under the authority of the Foundation, or what was left of it. Everything APE and the foundation tried to turn things around failed, whatever weapons they developed became ineffective, and Plantations fell one by one. Alpha thought he would have a more glorified position or importance other than rescue missions of fallen Foundation sites. After Site-46 went under a lockdown and offline, the Nines were sent to go and apprehend survivors. The most important undeniably being Zero Two.

The last time the Nines had been deployed, they were trying to lend a hand in an evacuation of Plantation 43, before it blew itself up in defiance of the flesh monsters that assaulted it. Alpha however, threw all caution to the wind. He rode with the assumption, despite protests from his now superiors in the O5 that he was immune. His arrogance shielded him from the reality that nobody was immune to the scorching sun. The Nines were special forces after all, the best of the best in all of APE. What could a minuscule amount of sunlight do to really harm them? They had the blessing of Papa to shield them. Some called them fanatics, others called them war hero's.

The Nines positioned their Franxx's outside of Site-46. "If we are correct, this should be Site-46," Alpha begins, debriefing his allies. "As I recall as well, Nine Iota should be here as well." "Maybe her partner will be here, as well. Hopefully, it will get us a more dignified position," Beta continues, popping a smirk on his face. Alpha wasn't the only one agitated by the irrelevance they had gotten. Sometimes they felt ignored as if on purpose. "Isn't that a good thing?," Delta questions, a hint of relief in her voice. "That means we get the autonomy to do whatever we want in the meantime. I'd call it more a burden off our shoulders."

"Being ignored by Papa isn't a relief off our shoulders, rather a burden," Gamma responds, a thick hint of disagreement in his voice. "That would mean we would simply be ignored should we die." "Ignored by Papa? Ridiculous," continues Epsilon, his voice even more in disagreement than Gamma's. "He needs us for the-." "Enough," Alpha rallies his squadron members, snapping them back to the mission at hand. "Let's just get this over with and deal with that later." An overlay about Site-46, including its employees, date of establishment, site director, and much more information appears on a screen installed in each of the Nine's Franxx's.

"It's not looking like there's anyone here left. They might have evacuated before we arrived," Delta debriefs Alpha on the situation. "I don't see anything either," Beta confirms, viewing the same information in his Franxx. "All the life vitals of each researcher here are not moving. It's our best assumption they are dead." "Do you think they got them all?," Gamma questions, motioning to the giant conglomeration of melted flesh standing by the underground tunnel exit. Much to his concern, the flesh monster takes notice, and begins slugging its way towards the row of Franxx's.

"Great," Epsilon sarcastically groans. "Now we attracted their undivided attention. What do we do now?" Ignoring the bickering of his colleges, Beta opens the cockpit of his Franxx, staring into the sky. "Open your cockpits and look at the sky. It's certainly something, he recommends to his fellow squad members. Complying, the other remaining Nines members open their Franxx cockpits and stare into the sky. The sun lets out a blistering orange. It's rays. bounce off the cockpits exterior, and the blistering red sky exposes itself with no clouds hiding the sun.

"It's a nice view, but we should report back to the administrator. He wants an update after receiving the document on Nine Iota," Alpha orders. All of his colleges except Beta respond. "Beta?," Alpha questions again. Looking over at his Franxx, Alpha watches in horror as Beta steps right into the sunlight. His skin bubbles into a darkish red, before his head slides right off his body. Now fully turned, Beta slithers out of his Nines uniform,and turns back to the other Franxx's.

"Do nOt ResIst, alpHa. ThE sUn iS BeaUtiFul. CoMe aNd SeE It," his distorted voice cracks over the comms. On queue, several identical flesh monsters storm the cockpits of the Franxx's, dragging the Nines out one by one, and ripping off their uniforms. Alpha watches as they turn, letting out screams in pain blocked out by the moaning of the flesh monster as they blend in with each other. Looking straight ahead, he watches as another monster finally drags him out and rip away his uniform, all of this without him saying a word. He watches as his arm bubbles and disintegrates, before feeling his face side from his head, and the rest of his body melting away, before joining and blending into the flesh monster with his now dead colleagues.

In just a matter of minutes, the Nines, the most powerful squadron in APE's arsenal, was no more. In the distance, the voice of the Administrator plays over the comms of the Franxx's. The only thing he hears is the inhuman voices of the melted Nines, before ending the communication, left speechless.

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Hiro had spent the last 20 minutes looking for a computer with power, but always was left disappointed when each one refused to turn on. "Damnit," he cursed to himself. Looking around the whole room, ignoring his previous strat, he cheers up once again when he notices the blinking light of the power button on one of the computers along the back wall. "Finally!," Hiro shouts in joy as he rushes over to the computer and presses the power button, giving the screen life,and showing the official page of the SCP Foundation.

Navigating through the website until he reaches the long list of SCP's, he gets lost reading through them one by one, for 001, and stopping at 096, horrified by the names of some of the anomalies with files. "Ah, focus Hiro, focus!," he tells himself. Scrolling back up, he clicks on the 001 file designated 'When Day Breaks'. Hiro freezes when he sees the warning about the memetic kill agents installed, but presses on anyway. To his luck, the screen reads 'EMERGENCY PROTOCOL ACTIVATED. ACCESS LEVEL SAFE GUARDS REMOVED. FULL ACCESS GRANTED'. Hiro lets out a large sigh of relief, before he begins reading the document. "At least they ignore the whole 'privacy' part of their job now…," he tells himself.

His brief grace is interrupted by a message that appears on the screen.

'AUTOMATIC SECURE SYSTEM NOTIFICATION ERROR 235. There has been an error in retrieving the current iteration of the SCP-001 file. You are currently viewing Revision 3. Newer revisions can be accessed at the bottom of this page.' "Damnit," he curses again. He scrolls down only finding no new editions of the file. Disappointed once more, he scrolls up and clicks on the file titled 'Revision 3: Updated 2 hours ago.'

Reading through, he seems astonished by the depth of information he receives, but remains unsurprised. The description and containment procedures, if they were some, remains simple. 6.8 Billion dead in one day, stay out of the sunlight, and avoid the monsters. Just the usual, unaltered facts of the situation he found himself in. However, catching his eye shows an attachment titled 'Message attached- Site 46'. He clicks on the message, which reads only one word: "HELP."

Hiro steps away from the monitor and stumbles on the ground, overcome by emotion. Site 46 was Zero Two's site. Was she alive after all? Had Hiro been given something of bright news for once? Could he finally keep his promise? A tear runs down his cheek, his expression turning into a massive grin. "Hang in there for me Zero Two, I'm on my way. I won't leave you again-."

His declaration is interrupted by a pounding on the door. Hiro panics. He couldn't tell if a flesh monster was behind that door or an actual survivor. Not wanting to wait and find out, he bolts behind a large desk in the corner of the room and ducks down to hide his head. The door finally caves and is thrown open, disregarding the shelf that previously tried to block it. It's over, I'm screwed, I'm so fucked, Hiro thinks to himself panicking. Much to his relief however, he looks to see two men patrolling the room. One appears with a camouflage hoodie, black sweatpants, brown boots, and black gloves. On his face is a N40 gas mask. The other man is cloaked with a heavy brown jacket, brown cargo pants, and green boots. his face is covered with a head wrap and heaving goggles covering his eyes. A familiar voice to Hiro speaks up.

"I swear I heard someone in here, the computer is on and everything…," the shorter figure, about Hiro's height, says. "They probably left when they heard us coming. Could have left it on in a rush," the man, the same height of Hachi counters, causing the shorter man to sigh and concede. "I guess you're right. Let's grab some loot and head out to 46," he offers, causing the other man to nod. Hiro debates revealing himself, but is overwhelmed by his suspicion of who that might be, and throws himself from behind the desk out into the open.

"W-wait! Don't shoot!," he shouts at the two, as they turn around tracing their guns right at his chest. To his relief, one of the men is able to recognize him, and speaks up. "Hiro, is that you?," the shorter figure speaks out in a slightly nasally, more northern voice. Removing his hood and gas mask, the figure finally reveals himself to Hiro: Its Dr. Brandon Lavigne. A scar across his left eye is easily visible. "Brandon? What…," Hiro questions, even more confused than Brandon, who finally snaps out of his turns to ask him another question. "What the hell are you doing here?"