"Synaptic protection overloaded! Readings are in the red!"
"Consciousness bleed-out! 30 seconds!
"Cut the link!"
"We can't! It's a perfect synchronization, we can't safely..."
"Forced link removal! Now!"
"We might kill him!"
"Cut the goddamn link!"
Hiro woke up with a start. It took him a few moments to realize where he was, at which point he slumped back in his seat. He was on a shuttle for the moon; in a little under twenty four hours, he would be joining the Prime class of the Lotus academy.
It was still so surreal for him. A week before, he was about to take the exam to enter a pretty average university in Tokyo, just another black haired guy with dark eyes among the masses of Japanese students, but then there was the attack.
A small group of Sentients had attacked the area where he lived. The government had launched their countermeasure: the void bomb. It submersed the affected area in void energy, killing the Sentients… and any living being as well. When it was all over, everyone was dead. Everyone but him. The exposition to the void had given him the ability to survive its energies, and to pilot a warframe.
Hiro looked around. He was alone, as the shuttle would remain in auto-pilot all the way to the moon, and nobody else needed to go to the academy at this time, as the academy's year had already started a few weeks before. Every other person capable of piloting warframes would be sent later, once the following year started. But Hiro had been sent as soon as it was possible.
Because he could pilot Excalibur Prime. Because Primes were too important to leave them inactive.
Excalibur Prime had been sent in the shuttle with him, in a specially designed suspension unit made to keep the warframe secure during travel. Even with the frame being kept in the cargo bay, he could feel its presence in his mind, as if it would take nothing but a thought to take control of it again.
But he didn't want to take control of it. If it was up to him, he would never see the damn thing again.
Pain like nothing he had felt before cursing trough him like liquid fire in his veins. A pressure on his mind like someone was trying to squeeze his brain out. He could feel himself, but he could also feel something else. Hands so strong they could crush diamonds, legs so powerful he could clear a football field with a single jump.
He opened his eyes, but he was not strapped on the table. He was looking at his own body trough the glass of a containment unit. And then the voice!
"Hello there kiddo! We'll have so much fun together you and I..."
He screamed, his pain multiplying tenfold as muscles that had not been used in centuries moved for the first time.
And then he knew no more.
That voice… if he ever heard it again, it would be too soon.
Landing on the Moon had been nothing too exciting. Even with the atmosphere the satellite had recently gained thanks to some Orokin machine, there was still next to no weather, and no wind, so the ride down was smooth.
Upon exiting the shuttle, Hiro found a man waiting for him at the edge of the landing pad. He was dressed in a white shirt and black pants, with a lotus symbol pinned to his left breast pocket. He had dark, short hair, and as he walked closer Hiro could see he had Asian features, and appeared to be in his forties.
"Greeting," the man said once he was in front of Hiro, "I'm Hinata Reo, code-name Nidus, I'm the teacher of Class A here at the academy and, as I was the only one available, your guide for today. You can call me Professor or Sir. Your class teacher, Jack Vandham, is currently busy, but you'll meet him tomorrow morning when you'll start classes".
He looked towards the back of the shuttle, where the academy staff was unloading the warframe containment unit.
"Your warframe will be brought to the Arsenal," he continued, "where it will be put in your assigned area, together with the weapons you've been assigned. You'll get the chance to get familiar with your Arsenal area during the next few days, during somatic link acclimatization period".
Having said his piece, he checked his watch and then said: "I believe that's everything. You'll find a folder on your desk later detailing everything I just said, so don't worry about having to memorize it all right away. Now, follow me and I'll show you around".
The academy looked a lot more like a school and a lot less like a military academy, even though a few things were very much military in nature: when Hiro and the professor passed other students they would snap to attention and offer a salute, as if they were soldiers and he was a higher rank.
Which, when Hiro thought about it, was essentially the truth.
The corridors clearly used to be Orokin ruins, rebuilt and re-purposed. Even with how good the builders had been, you could still see in several places where the ancient Orokin's designs clashed with the newer human's constructions. Even then, the place was well lit, the corridors massive and awe-inspiring. From time to time, the two would come across white and gold sphere's, about as tall as Hiro's shoulders. His professor had told him they were security systems.
It took Professor Hinata about two hours to show the new student everything. Among the most important places, there were the floor with all the classes, the Arsenal, the hangar and the infirmary. Hiro was also shown the tram that would bring him and his classmates to the exercise areas. Their final destination was the common areas. They were all on the same floor, each of them the same design. Each class had its own area, which led to the dormitories and was, in a word, massive.
It was circular in shape, almost like a tower. It had a large, decorated fountain in the middle, with the part that let out the water floating about five meters above the pool to collect the water. Crystals shaped like trees were placed around it, white with pinkish crystals shaped like leaves on the branches, all of it emanating a soft light.
All around the fountain, a few meters away, there were comfy looking couches and sofas.
Going up from the top of the fountain, there was another crystal tree, which went high and reached the second floor, which itself was accessible thanks to two sets of stairs on the sides of the room.
The second floor was open in the center, to give room to the crystal tree and giving an open view to the first floor. Along the circumference of the floor there were more small crystal trees and benches, and in the point that was the opposite of the entrance on the first floor there was an arc leading to the dormitories.
"I'll leave you here. Get familiar with the place and get some rest, your classes start tomorrow".
That said, Professor Hinata left, leaving Hiro alone in front of the fountain, a bit overwhelmed.
"You look lost" said a voice right next to his ear, making him almost jump out of his skin.
"Don't do that!" he cried, finding a girl behind him.
She was rather petite, her dark brown hair becoming bright red towards the tips, pulled together into two pigtails. Her bright hazel eyes were bright and curious, but there was an edge of something the boy couldn't recognize.
She had an easy smile on her face, her head slightly tilted to the right. Hiro thought she looked quite adorable.
"Are you the new guy?" she asked, hands behind her back and slightly tapping her left foot on her right. "We were told someone would arrive who could use Excalibur Prime. That's so cool! So are you it?"
A bit overwhelmed – she had spoken remarkably fast and with a slight accent – he had to take a moment to collect his thoughts before answering her: "Yeah, I guess I am. My name's is Hiro Yamamoto. Who are you?"
The girl raised an eyebrow, her eyes half-lidded, and her smile turned into a smirk.
"You guess?" she repeated. "Well, that doesn't sound very encouraging. Are you sure you should be in the Prime Class?"
She approached him, quickly invading his personal space, making him sputter and take steps back until his back hit the side of the fountain.
As she got her mouth right next to his ear, she whispered: "My name is Annalisa. I can't wait to play with you!"
Having said that, she turned around and walked away, humming one song or another to herself.
Hiro slowly let himself fall onto the border of the fountain, waiting for his brain to catch up to what had just happened.
"Yeah, don't worry about her: she's crazy" said a voice, again right beside him.
The boy jumped again, this time falling on his back on the floor and looking back at the boy who just spoke to him.
"What is it with you people needing to scare the shit out of me?" he demanded, getting back on his feet.
The boy who spoke to him was tall, the dark brown of his skin contrasting heavily with the bright yellow of his T-shirt and the amazingly out of place green dye of his short curly hair.
Noticing that Hiro was stuck staring at his hair, the newcomer barked out a laugh and said: "Yeah, I do have that effect on people."
"Sorry," said Hiro. "My name's Hiro..."
"Yamamoto," finished the other guy for him. "I heard you speaking to Anna. My name is Carlos de Santos. I'm guessing nobody told you, but me, Annalisa and a girl called Ai Wang are your team."
"My team? What do you mean?"
"Everyone in the academy is divided in teams of four," explained Carlos. "In our case, that's the four of us: me, you, Anna and Ai."
Sitting down on the fountain's border, he patted the spot next to him. Once Hiro had sat down, he continued:
"My warframe is Oberon Prime. I mostly operate as a support, manipulating the battlefield around us and, should the need arise, healing you guys. Ai uses Mirage Prime, and her job is to keep the heat off of you using her illusions and manipulation of the light spectrum."
He took a sip from a bottle of water Hiro just then realized the boy had been holding the entire time.
"Then there's you, Excalibur Prime, and your job will pretty much require you to adapt to the flow of battle and strike down our targets with either your blade or your gun, whichever will be the most appropriate."
"The last one is Anna, and she uses Valkyr Prime. Her warframe has a pretty tick armor and great mobility, so she's our tank. She attracts enemy fire and then dances out of the way. On the battlefield, she's both amazingly beautiful and incredibly deadly."
Carlos then turned and smiled at Hiro, raising his fist in offer.
"So, we're a team now! Let's kick ass and take names!"
Hiro smiled, and returned the fistbumb.
On mars, a black warframe was calmly walking through the dark corridors of a slumbering Orokin ruin. He had not even bothered to search the generator to power it up, he had no need. He still remembered the corridors and floors by heart.
Thanks to that, he reached the main hangar quickly. It had taken him weeks of walking trough the deserts of Mars to reach this ruin in the first place, but he had finally found it.
Walking up to the small landing craft in the center of the hangar, the warframe stilled for a moment as a boy appeared in front of him in a small flash of blue light. Said boy ran his hand on the smooth surface of the craft, before said hand started glowing. The glow then slowly traveled ontu the landing craft, reaching all of it before the entire thing glowed brightly for a moment, before the light disappeared and it started raising to hover about 5 meters into the air. The boy smiled fondly.
At the same time, in orbit around the sun, an ancient ship, hidden in a cocoon of void energy, awoke for the first time in millennia. Its systems picked up the signal coming from a liset on mars that had been irradiated with a power all too familiar.
In the center of bridge, a holographic prism appeared. Around it, the ship lights and systems started working overtime to catch up to every scrap of information available around it. The figure remained still and silent as it examined the reading of the found Liset, then started buzzing in excitement.
"Operator?"