-?-
The computer terminal boots up.
Command module losing power…..
Siphoning power from active pods…
Unable to siphon power…
Waking up Command module inhabitant….
The room lights up, illuminating the many thousands of pods that hang off the walls and ceiling. In the center of the room lies a singular pod. The pod's locks open, causing its door to sightly open. The door is pushed open roughly, causing it to swing open.
Out of the pod, on shaky legs, steps Ilos. His legs shake like a newborn horse as the frost on his clothing starts to melt. His mask's eyeholes are entirely frozen over with only a single purple light emanating from behind the mask.
"S-s-s-h-h-h-i-i-t-t-t." Ilos stammers out his body, shivering.
He looks around and spots the terminal. He slowly makes his way to the terminal and examines the buttons on it. He spots a button with the label "Heat" over it. Instantly he presses the button and can hear machinery moving. Within a few minutes, he can feel his body warming up as a warm breeze starts to filter through the room.
"Alright time to check on the passengers," Ilos says to himself, touching the terminal.
He presses a few buttons on the terminal, and the monitor starts to display a variety of information. He carefully looks over the information presented to him and can barely believe his eyes.
"The year is…..9999?" Ilos his breath unsteady. He brings a hand to his head. "That can't be true that would mean…."
He quickly presses more buttons of the terminal. In an instant, the blueprint of the pods is brought up on the screen. The plan displays the status of the other pods as well as the details on the inhabitant.
Ilos looks over the blueprint. "No no no no no….This can't be true…." Ilos says disparately.
He moves away from the terminal and rushes to one of the pods. He stops in front of pod #1 and looks into its window. The pod is dark, making it impossible for Ilos to make heads or tails of who's inside and what condition they're in. He tries to open the pod, but the lock still remains and has frozen over. He steps back and, with a flurry of kicks, breaks the lock, and the pod doors open.
A mummified body falls out of the pod onto Ilos. Instinctively Ilos kicks the body off of him, hitting it to the side. Ilos calms down almost instantly and comes to the realization of what has happened. He rushes to another pod only to find it dark as well. He continues down the line checking each and every pod. With each subsequent darkened pod, he can feel himself losing hope. As he reaches the last pod in the line, he already knows what he's going to find.
Ilos sits down and lies against the last pod in the line and puts his head in his hands.
"Jesus Christ…." He quietly says to himself. "All of them…."
Just as the last of his hope starts to fade, like an explosion, hope rushes back to him.
"This isn't it," Ilos says, standing up. "There's still Purgatory and Helheim, right?" He says confidently. "There's still hope for mankind!" He clenches his fist.
Ilos rushes to the terminal and starts to press buttons on it. A blueprint of the facility is brought up on the screen. Ilos uses his finger to track the directions to the equipment room. He pushes more buttons, and the coordinates to the other facilities are brought up. Using his eye, he scans the coordinates into his brain. Satisfied, he leaves the pod room and enters into the hallway.
-9999-
Even with the years passing, the facility has barely changed from how it looked back in 2020. With the exceptions of the dust problem, everything is still in immaculate condition.
Ilos walks down the hallway and enters into the equipment room. The room itself is quite big, though not as big as the pod room. The wall is lined with lockers and shelves, and in the middle of the room is a sortie table.
Ilos walks to the closest locker and opens it. Inside is an empty recon pack in urban print as well as a P90. Ilos takes both of them and puts them on the table. He searches the shelves next to the locker to find extremely expired rations and necessary survival supplies such as flashlights, matches, bandages, medication, and survival axes. Ilos grabs as much as he can hold and places them on the table next to his pack.
Ilos looks around the room and spots a gas mask on the far side of the room. He walks over to it and picks it up. This style of mask only covers the mouth as opposed to Ilos's full facial mask. Unfortunately for him, the filters that the facility has are only compatible with the half mask. Ilos lets out a sigh as he removes his mask in favor of the new one.
With the new mask on some of his face is revealed. His black hair is freed from the previous mask's straps. His bangs cover a portion of his eyes, causing him to sweep them away. His hair is tied into a loose low hanging ponytail that falls on his back. Over his dark brown non-mechanical eye lies a great scar going vertically down his face. His skin is a golden brown that heavily contrasts his purple eye.
Satisfied with his new mask, Ilos moves back to the sortie table and starts to pack his inventory. As he packs the last item, he looks at the P90, which sits nicely on the table. He picks up the gun and heads over to the other lockers only to find that each locker has the same loadout as the previous. He unloads every P90 in the lockers and puts the clips on the table.
"52 clips, huh?" Ilos says, admiring his handiwork. "That'll do."
Ilos stuff most of the clips into the pack while leaving some in his pockets. He puts the bag onto his back and, once satisfied with the weight distribution, heads out of the room towards the elevator.
Ilos steps into the elevator and presses the panel the woman once did before. The panel opens, and a retinal scanner appears. Ilos puts his eye to the scanner, and the elevator starts to stir to life. Within a second, the elevator shoots up the shaft and lighting quick speeds. Before Ilos can even say anything, the elevator stops, and the door opens.
Ilos steps out of the elevator to be greeted by a ruined parking garage. The stones have collapsed everywhere except the entrance to the elevator. The rubble forms a sort of path for Ilos to follow to leave the garage.
"Almost like someone wants me to leave." Ilos snickers to himself.
Ilos follows the path until he spots a choked light in the distance. He follows the light until it becomes brighter. As he approaches, the light becomes almost blinding as he leaves the garage and enters into the cool night. He looks towards the light to see that it is an old-world light that is still on for some reason.
The first thing that greets him is birds chirping, and the sound of trees swaying in the breeze. Ilos's eyes finally adjust to the night, and he finally beholds what the future has become. Destroyed buildings long since abandoned overgrown with moss and ivy. Roads that once facilitated travel long unused and broken under the weight of nature. Trees growing where trees have not grown in decades.
Ilos takes a deep breath in and deep exhales. He looks around for any signs of human life but sees none. He takes a step forward.
"KILL."
"KILL."
Ilos takes cover behind some rubble and looks around to see where voices are originating from. As if to answer him, two stubby looking machines appear on the road facing each other. One carries a metal spear while the other carries a metal sword.
The machines charge each other and start to fight. From Ilos's perspective, these machines have obviously never picked up a weapon in their lives as they mindlessly swing at one another.
"KILL. SPEAR KINGDOM. KILL."
"KILL. SWORD KINGDOM. KILL."
The machines mindlessly swing at each other until the sword-wielding one finally connects a blow to the spear-wielding one. The sword goes through the spear machine.
"OUCH." The spear machine says as it collapses to the ground.
"VICTORY FOR SWORD KINGDOM." The sword-wielding machine shouts.
"I guess I should leave." Ilos thinks to himself as he attempts to sneak away from the scene.
As he moves, a rock from beneath him dislodges itself and tumbles down the ridge he was sitting on. The remaining machine looks towards the direction of Ilos and spots him.
"I SEE YOU." The machine shouts, dislodging his sword from his adversary.
"Malaka." Ilos curses under his breath.
Ilos comes out of the shadows and puts his hands up as he approaches the sword-wielding machine.
"ANDROID!" The machine panics. It throws its sword down and starts to run in circles, panicking.
"Wait, no…" Illos put down his hands and takes a knee. "I'm not an…..android."
The machine stops running in circles. "NOT ANDROID?"
"Yeah, not an android. A human."
"HUMAN?"
"Yeah."
The machine picks up its sword and points it at Ilos. "WHICH SIDE HUMAN ON? SWORD KINGDOM? SPEAR KINGDOM?"
"Uh….Sword kingdom?"
The machine lifts up its sword skyward. "SWORD KINGDOM WILL PREVAIL." The machine starts to chant.
"Uh-huh."
Ilos gets up and starts to walk away from the machine. The machine barely seems to notice him leave as it continues chanting over its deceased enemy.
"Weird," Ilos says as he continues down the road the chanting becoming quieter and quieter. "I guess machines took over the US or something."
Ilos looks at his watch. "It's 8:00 am?" He looks at the sky to see that the moon remains at its height. He looks back at his watch. "Must be broken."
Ilos continues down the road, humming as he walks. It's only now does he realize how hot the night truly is. He takes off his jacket and ties it around his waist, leaving only his black tank top to protect against the environment. His walk is interrupted by the sound of an explosion above him. He looks up to see a bright orange star above him that quickly fades into the night sky.
"That can't be good."
The remnant of the star starts to plummet to the ground. As it dives, it curves and starts to head towards where Ilos is located.
"Oh shit."
Ilos starts to run and dives as the star basically follows him on its descent, crashing just above his head into a nearby building.
"Holy shit," Ilos says, dusting himself off. He looks above him to see a fire break out from the crash. "Could be a person piloting that….." He quietly says to himself.
As if on instinct, Ilos starts to free climb the building and enters into the floor that the star crashed into. Flames greet him as he enters, but they are quickly snuffed out by the star. Ilos gets a better look at the star to see that it's not a star but some type of mechanical flight device.
From his position, he can see a figure locked into the device. He quickly heads over to the trapped person and attempts to break them out of their metal cocoon. He smashes the cocoon with the butt of his P90 until the clamps come free. He grabs hold of the person, but as he pulls it, he falls backward as he is unprepared for the weight of the person.
"Christ, you're a heavy bastard." He says, rubbing his hands. He gets up and tries again to drag the person out rather than pick them up.
He successfully drags them out of what could be called the cockpit of the machine. However, the fire has not been extinguished on the person, and its foot is still on fire. Ilos thinking on his feet throws his body on top of the fire, and tries to pat out the fire. He succeeds, and the person is pretty much unscathed at least externally.
Its only now does Ilos get a better look at the person. The first thing he notices is the ample breasts the person has.
"Female." He quietly says.
She wears some type of equipment that he has never seen before. It's some skin-tight kind of gear, which gives off some fetishist vibes and a militaristic vibe. She wears a helmet that reminds Ilos of the type that the Reich used in WW2 that covers the face and the head. He attempts to remove the helmet, but as he touches it, his exposed fingers burn up as the metal is still heated.
"Need to get that helmet off before their head burns," Ilos says, wrapping his hands in his jacket.
With his hands fully wrapped in a protective layer, Ilos tries to remove the helmet again. This time he succeeds and quickly throws the helmet to the side. What greets him leaves him speechless.
He was correct that it was a woman, but he could never have expected what a beauty she is. Short red hair and fair skin contrast her dark-colored military uniform. Her eyes are covered by some sort of black bandage. Her lips are full, and one would not be remiss to think that she wore lipstick.
Ilos can't help but stare at her face. After a few seconds, he shakes his head and returns to business. He puts two fingers by her neck to check for a pulse, but there's nothing.
"Damn, and she was cute too." Ilos shrugs as he removes his fingers from her neck.
He turns his back to the female and moves to the edge of the building in preparation for descent. As he turns to descend, his scruff is grabbed roughly. From a quick glance, he can make out that its the female from before. She tosses him like an empty sack to the far edge of the building.
Ilos flies in the air like a ragdoll and is caught by a stone pillar. He can feel something break within him as he struggles to breathe. He can hear the clacks of heels against stone as the female approaches him. He attempts to get to his knees, but before he can do that, the female grabs his neck and toss him into the air again.
This time he hits the ceiling and falls down almost immediately. The female grabs his throat again with one hand and holds him high above her. Ilos struggles against her grip, but can only feel it tighten as he struggles.
"Identify yourself." The female orders.
"...Ilos…." Ilos struggles to say his throat starting to collapse.
The female removes her grip around his throat, causing him to fall to his knees. He grabs his throat and fights for breath.
"Malaka…..Almost killed me." Ilos growls.
"This can't be….." The female starts.
"What? You found out that you ALMOST KILLED ME!"
"You can't be human….." The female quietly says.
Ilos staggers to his feet. "Well, unfortunately, I am, and the broken bones are proof of it," Ilos says, grasping his stomach.
The female bows, almost planting her head into the ground. "I humbly apologize if I knew I wouldn't have treated you as such!"
Ilos is taken aback by the sudden apology. "Well…..Don't uh mope about it, yeah? Honest mistake."
The female doesn't raise her head and remains silent. Ilos lets out a sigh and walks over to one of the stone pillars of the building. He can feel her eyes on him as he moves. He puts his back against one of the pillars and slides down it.
Ilos rolls his eyes. "You can raise your head now. It's getting a bit embarrassing for me."
The female raises her head. "What are you doing so far from the moon?"
"The moon?"
"Yes, where the rest of the humans are."
Ilos puts a hand to his mouth. "The rest of mankind's on the moon?" He quietly says to himself. He quickly shakes his head. "No, I can't even consider going there without completing my mission." He thinks to himself. He looks at the female. "Your not human, are you."
"No, I'm an android manufactured by YoRHa. My designation is 32B."
"Ugh, more questions," Ilos says exasperatedly. Ilos lifts his mask and coughs into his hand. He looks at his hand to see blood covering it. "Questions I don't think I'll get answers too."
He attempts to stand up but falls forward on his stomach. 32B rushes over to him.
"You really banged me up, huh?" Ilos says with tired cheerfulness.
"My scans indicate your bleeding internally, but-"
"But what?"
"It seems that the bleeding is slowly stopping. Your broken ribcage is also starting to repair itself. I would suggest getting rest to fully recover. Humans are quite resilient."
"Yeah, sure," Ilos says with suspicion. "Am I to trust you to watch over me? Someone I just met, and who just moments ago tried to kill me?"
"I could always leave," 32B says with a slight smile.
Ilos closes his eyes. "Nah I think I'll just-." He passes out before he can finish his sentence.
"Ilos?" 32B shakes him. She scans him to find that his condition is improving, but at a snail's pace.
She smiles as she folds her legs underneath her. She drags Ilos over to her and places his head on her thighs. She puts a hand on his head and gently brushes his hair.
"You're safe with me…" 32B says in almost a whisper.