I don't own Cyborg 009, just this fic. This will also end up being an AU of the story! Constructive criticism is always welcomed so I ask you to please enjoy it!
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"Professor, I don't think the computers can handle this!" A woman yelled.
Alarms were blaring and the hanging lights were emitting an ominous red led. The light emphasised the copper hair of a woman in a white lab coat. Her sickly pale skin was glistening from sweat as she stared at a lanky old man. She moved to the side as a man rushed past her, sheer terror on his face.
"I have to do this, Bree!" The old man shouted as he pressed a button on a keyboard. "If I don't, then all my years of research will have been for nothing!"
Bree grimaced in response and covered her eyes with an arm as sparks jolted from the computers around her. The alarms grew faster, and she looked back at the old man. She refused to leave him behind. She slowly moved towards him, keeping her arm up to protect her eyes from any sparks.
"Is it worth your life?!" She asked in disbelief, "What good is having your work proven if it means that you're not around to see it?!"
"You wouldn't understand, you have a whole life ahead of you," He countered as he lifted a lever.
Bree winced as a gust of wind went through the area. She turned her attention towards the source and her light blue eyes widened in awe. A silver orb was in the middle of a ring, she had been one of the designers and builders of the ring. Yet, she hadn't really known what it was for. She hadn't been the one to create the system, even though that's what her job was. She should've figured out that something was going on behind the scenes. The orb started to grow bigger, sparks flying out of it as the wind picked up.
"Professor…" Bree quietly mumbled as her expression became conflicted.
This wasn't how things were supposed to end up. She slowly inched closer to the professor. If it came down to it, she'd try and overpower the old man and turn off the ring. Her shaggy hair whipped around and batted against her skin, causing a stinging sensation. She placed a hand on the main console in front of the ring. It felt as though she wasn't really walking on the floor. The tile was slippery, that was something the entire division had complained about. Sure, it was made to stop electrical fires, but it was difficult to walk across. Her heels made it even worse, she would reach down and remove them but the glass surrounding her caused her to ignore that thought.
The professor was mumbling under his breath and his eyes were wildly moving side to side as he continued to push buttons and type in code. The orb let out a loud crackle and he turned his attention towards it, a grim smile of satisfaction spreading across his face. It was working, his wonderful machine. He heard a sound to his left and looked at the source. It was Bree, the only worker that he had become fond of. The girl was too soft-hearted, as much as she tried to hide it. Her eyes were wide and staring at the ring in surprise as it did what it was supposed to. He felt a pain in his chest, and he grimaced, clutching his shirt. He didn't have much time left.
"I've wondered, Bree," He started, and the woman gave him her attention, "just which government stationed you here."
She was quiet at that, there wasn't much to say. Bree had never cared for politics yet had been pulled into them by a series of foolish decisions. Hacking into government facilities had been one of them and creating her thesis statements was the other. Her ideals caused her to be where she was, and she felt regret.
"Professor." Bree quietly said, she licked her dry lips before continuing, "It doesn't matter, all that matters now is shutting down the ring. If it blows up, it'll take the entire west coast with it."
"And?" He questioned fixing her with a sharp look as the wind grew even stronger, lifting the sickly woman for a few seconds before she tightened her flimsy grip on the console, "What does it matter if that happens? It's already sinking into the ocean."
"That's seventy-six million people that you're condemning to death!" She stated, keeping her voice clear of the strain she was putting herself through to stay grounded, "Not to mention innocent newborns!"
"As I said, you are far too soft for this line of work," He commented, and his calm tone took her by surprise, "only the ruthless become something. You won't amount to anything, not with such a soft-hearted view."
He flipped a final switch and the lights overhead burst, sorting out from the sudden influx of electricity. Bree held an arm up to protect herself from the falling glass. She let out a surprised sound as she was pulled from the ground, her grip on the console not strong enough. He was still on the ground, and she narrowed her eyes, squinting to see that he had a strap around his wrist. She had no clue when he had grabbed a hold of that and cursed her luck.
"Bree, you're in for a wild ride," He informed her, and her eyes widened in response.
It was like being pulled through a tube. She found herself in a silver vortex and she closed her eyes for a few seconds as her stomach revolted. She was able to keep the last thing she ate down and reopened her eyes. The vortex was still around her and she let out a breath of disbelief. A briefcase and a singular suitcase came towards her, and she brought her hands up to catch them. She hooked the suitcase around her ankle as she studied the briefcase. It had her initials on it. G. A. M. Her birth name, not the one she had been using to infiltrate the professor's laboratory. She let out a grunt when she hit cold concrete out of nowhere. She was going to have one hell of a bruise for the next month. She slowly sat up and looked around in confusion.
She was being stared at by a multitude of men. Her expression changed quickly as some small part of her mind yelled at her that something was off…that something was wrong. She'd listen to that little part of her, and wipe her expression clear of her confusion and surprise. One of the men walked up to her as she got up from the ground and patted down the legs of her…slacks? She hadn't been wearing those before. Where had they come from?
"Are you Doctor Marley?" He asked and she took notice of his overly large nose and dark sunglasses.
He was a shorter man, and she felt as though he wasn't real. It wasn't due to his stature but his nose. It wasn't just overly large like she had previously noted, but it jutted out and was round like a ball. She had the oddest urge to gently poke it to see if it was real. She kept her curiosity off her face and her hands at her side. Her mind then registered what he had asked her. He had used her actual surname. She'd have to play it to see if her first name was the same as well. She had an inkling as to what had happened, she just needed time to sit down and fully think.
"Yes, I am," She confirmed, nodding slightly her voice even and not showing her discomfort.
"You'll be working with me on our cybernetic department," The man informed her, and she nodded her understanding, "Doctor Gamo Whisky will be working with us as well."
"A pleasure, sir," She quietly said, giving a curt nod of respect.
Doctor Gamo Whisky was a white-haired man with dark eyes. He narrowed his eyes in distaste and scoffed before looking towards a computer screen. Bree, as she was still going with that name if it turned out that she didn't use her real name for this, almost bristled in response. Sexism wasn't an unusual occurrence in her chosen field, and with her body being weaker than a healthy human's it was extremely common. It didn't mean that she simply laid down and allowed people to walk all over her. She rose to the challenge and outperformed them in mental compacity. She could outsmart her naysayers.
"Don't mind him," The old man said, getting her attention, "he seems to refuse to acknowledge that a woman can do our job just as well as we can if not better."
"You are the first person I've come across in this field that has said that to me," She admitted, letting a bit of truth out, "thank you."
"Well, I'll show you around the compound and where we'll be working," The man said with a smile that wasn't unkind.
Bree looked around at the metal walls and welcomed the gentle breeze from the air conditioning. It was a nice change from the hot and humid laboratory that the professor had worked in. She wasn't sure that she'd ever want to go back into such a humid climate. That meant that parts of South America were out of the question for future places to live. That was thought in good humour, she'd always wanted to visit to see the ancient ruins of civilisations that have come and gone. She had the suitcase rolling behind her with the briefcase sitting on top of it. She watched as soldiers marched past them and noted the strange uniforms that reminded her of the original Star Wars movies. She put her free hand into the pocket of her slacks and slightly frowned in thought.
"You will be staying in this compartment here," The old man said, "it's right across from the mess hall so you won't have a chance of getting lost in the mornings."
"Right," She said with a slight frown.
He left her at her room, promising to show her the rest of the compound in the upcoming days. She went inside and closed the door behind her, it was even colder inside, and she felt her shoulders relax. She hadn't realised she had been so tense. She rolled the suitcase towards a small closet and pulled the metal doors open. Some hangers were hanging inside of it and she knelt next to the suitcase and slowly opened it. It was full of clothing that she couldn't possibly see herself wearing. She had been forced into office wear for so many years that once she had gotten out on her own, she had started wearing clothing that was commonly found in Harajuku fashion. Long-sleeved turtleneck shirts that zipped up and skirts that had straps and barely reached above her knees, yes that was the clothing she found comfortable. She grimaced as she put the dress shoes away. She didn't like the idea of wearing clothes that weren't hers, or if they were hers's they weren't her preferred style.
She got up from her kneeling position and slid the suitcase under her bed before picking up the briefcase and sitting down at the desk that had come with the room. It wasn't wood, but glass and metal. She didn't let anything show on her face, not knowing if she was being watched. She let out a quiet sigh through her nose as she opened her briefcase. Inside were documents, her birth certificate with a date that wasn't what she knew it to be, her diplomas and schematics for the ring. These were all the items that she had brought with her to the laboratory. She brought a hand up to her mouth in thought and wondered why the dates had changed but not the items themselves. 1978, why that year in particular? She didn't know the date of the year she had found herself in but gathered that she was still 23 due to how she looked physically. Just what had the professor done? She looked over the schematics and narrowed her eyes slightly as she noted a small addition to it. A black hole designator? That was experimental technology and shouldn't have been added. How had she missed that? She could've called it in and avoided all the strangeness that was happening. She could've had dinner with her older brother and listened to his boy troubles. She noted that the schematics had small wet spots appearing on it. She moved her hand from her mouth towards her eyes and wiped at the tears that were slowly falling from her eyes.
Her brother probably wouldn't hear about her disappearance, most likely her "employers" would give out the statement saying she was dead. It wasn't that much of a stretch with her physical fragility, and slight heart problems, that she'd have died. She had been told from a young age that she might not live long. She placed her diploma and birth certificate inside the briefcase and placed it next to the desk. She stared at the schematics for the ring before tearing it in half. She wouldn't dare attempt to recreate the ring. The amount of damage that a black hole designator could create would be too much for her conscious to handle for a second time. She brought her hands up to her shaggy hair and gently tugged on the strands. Her world was destroyed, it wouldn't be able to withstand a black hole, especially not one opened on the surface of the planet. World was a loose term, but it was the only one she could think of. A wry smirk appeared on her face for a few seconds, she somehow Isekai'd herself into a different universe without trying to. It made her wonder if this was parallel to her world or exact.
She quietly hummed in thought. No, not exact. Cybernetics was starting to take off in the field of science, here it seemed to be a staple. That was interesting and she closed her eyes in thought. She'd never see her family again, though the only ones she had a good relationship with was her older brother and her older sister. Ezekiel and Mary. She let that wry smirk appear on her face once again. Discomfiture, that was what she was starting to feel. A sense of growing unease that she couldn't truly break, that slowly slipped into awkwardness. Yes, that word stood true to what she felt.
She got up from the desk and plopped down on the hard mattress that was supplied. It was firm, and she knew that her body would end up revolting against her by the end of her tenure, wherever she had ended up. She didn't have any documentation with her that informed her where she was or what she was doing. Seeing as she was called by her title and proper last name, and the fact that she was in the cybernetics department, it had something to do with her life's work. She looked at the metal wall and gently placed her hand against it. It was cold to the touch, and she frowned slightly and brought her hand back.
She had gone into cybernetics with the idea of eventually creating cybernetic organs. Her hand went against her chest, over her heart and she felt its irregular beating against it. She would gladly test out her creations, just to make sure they worked before releasing them on the world market. She closed her eyes and leaned back against the hard pillow. There went that dream, she wouldn't be able to even think about restarting her work without knowing what the cybernetic climate was like. She sighed and rolled onto her side to face the door, she needed sleep more than she needed food. She was exhausted.
Her eyes slowly closed, and she stopped her mind from worrying about what was going to end up happening. She couldn't predict what might happen, and she knew better than to continue to focus on it. She drifted off to sleep, not even dreaming.