Calan and his team sprinted down the halls, weapons at the ready, looking for any trace of an intruder as they made their way to the Petting Zoo to retrieve the two agents. Their route was predictable, and with so many cameras down the corridors, Rex could track their journey — a bit disorienting from the different camera positions but he could get used to it.
Hallway. People running down them. New hallway. Calan's determined eyes, lit by the fluorescent red of the alarms. Hallway. Everyone else had their masks and visors on, and Rex doubted that they held the same determination.
Calan was a pretty goal-oriented person (he did climb up to the rank of Captain quickly, from the brief profile skimming Rex did) and the common soldiers were, well, common soldiers, but it wasn't that they were outshone by Calan's light.
All of them were less than enthused to reach the cure.
He was temperamental at best, wrathful at worst. If it wasn't for the fact that the Providence minds up in space hadn't reverse-engineered his nanite programming yet, Knight would have been left in the Zoo. Right where dangerous E.V.Os belonged.
Ha, ha.
….That was a bit mean-spirited.
Rex exhaled, closing all the camera windows. He didn't want to see his face again. Plus just sitting and watching wasn't productive.
After some brief calming exercises, which was to say, ten minutes of blankly staring at his screen unable to do anything and ten more minutes of stretching and breathing, Rex went to work.
Checking for any unusual behaviour since Knight had arrived, looking at the list of active agents and searching for outliers —
But Holiday and Knight had escaped the system's attention (and still escaping it, since they were continually allegedly in Knight's room), so it wasn't beyond the realm of possibility that someone else had, too.
So what could he do?
Sit pretty in his room.
His hands moved to his face, then smeared his hair — white strands gripped tight, almost pulling.
This wasn't going anywhere!
Hair suitably ruffled, he placed a hand on each side of the screen.
First: check for any more alarms.
Nothing else was shaded in with red, so that was a relief.
Second: check up on Holiday and Knight again, who hopefully were doing just fine in the Hole.
There was a small shift in brightness, not enough to make Rex wince in the dark light; the Petting Zoo was in nighttime mode, and the Hole was naturally dark anyway to provide a comfortable experience to any permanent residents. Pshh. More like it was dark to keep them thinking it was still nighttime. Easier for Six to deal with them, anyways, despite Six not sporting the same night vision goggles Holiday had.
Speaking of her —
"Agent Holiday, report. Is—" Rex would have liked to make it one hour, just one hour, without fumbling his lines or outright forgetting them, but looked like fate had other surprises in store! "Holy shit! Is that blood?!"
"It's not mine, and who taught you that?"
"Who taught me concern over your well-being?"
"You know what I'm talking about."
Crossing his arms, Rex huffed and leaned back into the chair. The blanket almost slipped off of him but he clung to the warmth like a lifeline. What was he supposed to say? It wasn't like she was going to hunt down and reprimand every random soldier, or track down all the people insulting him on the internet.
Priorities, though —
"Whose blood is it, then? How'd it, y'know," Rex motioned a gun shooting with his hand, dodging the non-issue of his perceived politeness.
"Not important."
Ouch. Don't put me swearing and someone — thing? — being injured on the same level. That's at least, like, a level above.
He didn't voice his thoughts, instead curling up more in his blanket against the cold and dark. The heating had shut off, and the larger-than-life open room layout didn't exactly do wonders for keeping the heat in.
Ah — he was getting distracted.
"Is Calan there yet?"
"No. However, Dr. Fell has rendezvoused with us."
"Uh, what? I didn't even know Dr. Fell was awake," Rex drummed his his fingers on the table. Cold. Contrasted against the heat built up in his bundle. "What's up?"
She froze. Weird, Calan was the one leading the rescue team and he was 100% sure he would tell him if he handed control over to Fell. Actually, 80%.
"Where is Dr. Fell?" Holiday asked. Well, more like demanded, but from the tone of her voice, forced calmness seeping through her words, Rex assumed it was supposed to be a casual question. "Right now. Where is he?"
The list of employees flew by his screen on a window next to Holiday's face, a lot more active now that the alarm had been blaring for an hour or so. He slowed at 'Last Name - F'. Checked out. Asleep. "In dreamland, I guess."
"That doesn't…" Holiday's eyes grew wide with horror as she mumbled. "What's he hiding?"
Another weird reaction. What, was she worried about him? That would be a complete one-eighty of her thoughts towards him the last time he checked, which was pointed glares and scoffs whenever Fell opened his mouth.
He might have a lower approval rating than Knight, which would be impressive.
Speaking of Knight.
"By the way, where's Knight?"
"With Fell."
"Asleep? With that slimeball? Come on, don't tell me he's suddenly not a germaphobe anymore. He was just complaining about his sheets being dirty yesterday." That wasn't an exaggeration. Knight had used the Providence priority line and everything, which was super annoying since Rex was in the middle of a shower at the time and had to reply with the sound of water in the background.
That Knight had also complained about. What was he gonna do, stop showering and stand in the cold, dripping wet? Sheesh.
"How long until the Captain meets up with us?"
Us? So Knight was still —oh, no, she meant her sister. Right.Rex was mentally blocking her out of his field of view. Half-hidden in the shadows, the other half blocked by Agent Holiday herself, it was easy to miss the broken form on the ground.
Amputation made his skin crawl.
Holiday made his skin crawl. Sometimes.
Not now, though.
The views flickered across the window right next to her, settling for a shot of Calan approaching the hall that led to the Zoo. "I dunno, one or two minutes?"
"Not fast enough."
"One or two minutes isn'tfast enough?!" Rex gawked at her, "What d'you want them to do, teleport in?"
"I want them to be in the Petting Zoo to protect Beverly so I can rip the skin off of Fell!" Her hands formed a fist to the side of her, irritation evident by the way she began to pace — that, or she was deep in thought. Probably irritation, though. "That fu- that filthy liar!"
"Well, just wait a minute and open up the door from your end. Even better, I'll open it! Probably," Rex moved her window to the side, navigating menus while idly tapping his foot. He'd never done it before, obviously, Providence was too high security for lockdowns to be a common occurrence, but he could figure it out. The fact that he didn't even know how to react to a lockdown until earlier today? Irrelevant. Rex glanced up at the ceiling before returning the computer, "Wait, why do we hate Dr. Fell so much again? Other than the obvious."
Blank. Rex was staring at a black, blank screen.
He was so going to dock her pay next month. Or at least send in the request.
Third: check the alerts around the Petting Zoo. All about somebody tampering with the system, jargon that Rex couldn't quite understand. Forwarded to Volkov.
Still no sign of any more alarms.
Fourth: check…
Check what, now? He didn't want to check what was happening right outside his room — that was horror movie speak for "the killer jumpscares you right then and there" (and he doubted any intruder rooting around the Petting Zoo would climb all the way up to his office. Probably?) — and Calan would notify him if he got into trouble.
Or at least, Rex would automatically be alerted if Calan's life signs went silent.
The room seemed just a bit colder. He pulled his blanket tighter.
Nevermind that, he needed something productive to do. Something to keep his mind off of things. Something he was technically authorized to do, which cut his choices down by a lot. Sleeping was a no-go, the alarm shock and the panic fully woke him up and he didn't feel like passing out due to emotional exhaustion yet, so he supposed…
Six was still awake.
The call was received immediately and Rex was greeted by Six's stoic face again. Calm in a sea of chaos. Six nodded, signalling that he was aware of him.
Other employees usually did a half-hearted salute, but Rex didn't mind. Six was someone close, after all.
"How is the situation in the Petting Zoo?"
"Haven't found who's responsible yet, but Calan and his crew are heading over right now," Rex paused, "Actually, Holiday was pretty incensed about Dr. Fell. Apparently Knight ran off with him without anyone knowing."
Six swore – at least Rex assumed it was swearing – under his breath. "Of course. He should have been disposed of earlier."
"Again with this Fell hate, which I totally understand – ah." And Rex felt like a complete buffoon as the gears finally started turning together. "He's responsible."
"It may just be a theory, but it's the most likely one."
An inside job. Was he alone, or a cog in a larger, unruly machine? Rex leaned back, "...To be honest, I kinda want to take up your offer."
"What offer?"
"Y'know, you jump in the nearest plane and order someone to take you back so you can… wander around the Zoo, I guess?"
"Oh, that offer. Already on it."
— and of course, the joke flew over Six's head. Unless...
"When you say, already on it, do you mean you're preparing to come back or I'm talking to homebound Six right now?"
"The latter."
Rex winced. Oh.
"You didn't ask for permission?"
"No comment."
"Six," Rex leaned back into his chair, raising an eyebrow, "Did you at least notify the other passengers on the jet?"
"No comment."
Just like wrangling a cat, huh. Rex tapped all ten of his fingers in a short rhythm, inaction buzzing within his body. There was something odd with the scene in front of him, Six sitting somewhere with a headset over his face and —
Wait, wasn't he sitting at the desk before? Doing paperwork? If he was a passenger on the Providence airship, he should have just been sitting idly around, just like before. And his arms were outstretched, almost like...
"You're sitting in the pilot's seat. Why am I not surprised," Rex was, since nowhere on Six's sparse files did it list his piloting prowess, but the fact was immediately accepted into his mind. "How'd you get them to give you the reigns?"
Six paused, emotion untraceable from his posture or his covered eyes. Another no comment?
"I may have intimidated them into submission after the pilot resisted. Get a doctor on call."
He did not just imply that he knocked out the pilot and co-pilot. By himself. Unarmed. Was that against the Providence code?
"Yeah. Sure. What the heck, Six?!"
"'Heck'." Six paused, shifting his arms. "Still, get a doctor on call. Six, out."
"That doesn't answer — hey, you're a doctor!" Black screen again. Was there anybody in headquarters that didn't speak in riddles? Rex dragged his hands down his face. Way too tired for this. EVOs weren't that different from humans in that regard. Frustrating as hell.
Well, if you had to do something right, you had to do it yourself!
...did that expression apply when you had no experience in the thing to be done?
The armoury was a short walk from his desk (though that applied to any area in his office, the entire place was small once you were used to it), and — luck would have it — it was open to him because of the heightened security. Thank god for emergency situations.
Knight was missing and he was back in his suit. Hopefully it would go better than the last time he and Knight were involved.
--
If Rex was a doctor on the run with a feisty EVO in tow, he would first find a place to contain that EVO. Obviously the Zoo was out – Fell was seen running away from it, and it wouldn't make sense to loop around and stay there when it was going to become a hotspot of agent activity – so that left surprisingly little other spaces in headquarters.
His own room was too obvious, as was Knight's. The Lab was too close to the Zoo. Most of Providence was kept under surveillance from numerous security cameras.
Most.
Except some parts of Providence were still under construction.
The liminal space between fresh, dangerous, full of exposed wires Providence that required a hard hat and signing a contract to enter, and the proper Providence – dim, isolated, deserted. That's where Rex would shove an EVO.
Also, he managed to find a recording of Fell running in that direction from one of the security cameras he did cross, so…
And that was how Rex found himself, wandering the halls, suddenly realizing that he was totally a hypocrite for scoffing at characters in horror movies acting dumb and wandering into an abandoned place themselves armed with nothing but a (low battery) flashlight and a camera when they knew something was up.
Man, this sucked. He didn't want to be eaten by a ghost or whatever.
"It escaped. The last I saw of it, it was running down there," a voice rang out, faint, farther up ahead. Fell? Sounded like him, but… strained. "I followed the correct EVO containing procedure, but —"
"Correct? This work is something I'd expect from a Basic trainee, not a professional." That was Six, for sure. "These bindings are old. This type of table has not been used since Providence was first founded."
"The point is, it broke free and ran down that hall once I rang the alarm," the voices were growing louder now. Rex moved at a slower pace — didn't want to overshoot, or worse, run across an open door when they were looking right at it. "I was lucky to have escaped with my life."
"Dr. Fell." Agitated. "Why was he even here?"
Rex pressed himself flat against the wall right next to the doorway, sensors turned up to hear the two. Six and Fell. Their images warped in the reflection of the door that Rex was watching them from.
"It's such a shame it woke up halfway through…"
"You studied him."
The glacial calm in Six's pose —
— frostbite, hypothermia, the wild night that held nocturnal predators in its cold —
— froze the atmosphere of the room. Like time was slowing to a crawl and nobody could move, say anything, do anything, especially not Fell who was stuck right in front of the headlights.
"He didn't consent to that, did he."
"It's an EVO, of course not —"
A whipcrack-like sound sliced across Rex's speakers as Six's hand struck Fell's cheek.
Thump. Six taking his shoulders and ramming his chest to his knee.
Neither of them knew he was watching — specifically, Six didn't know. This wasn't like him. He was calm and collected, a doctor unfazed by the EVOs of the Zoo, someone…
Someone who acted differently when he thought Rex wasn't looking.
"What did you do." Briefly in the eye of the storm. "What did you do."
Or someone with way too much devotion towards one person.
"I did what all doctors and scientists do. Research," Dr. Fell glared at him, tilting his head upwards and cradling his cheek with one of his hands, "What you should be doing."
A small smirk rose to Fell's lips as Six stared, cold, at him, before — he crumpled. Fell just crumpled down to the ground, expression shocked, and Six was standing next to him. Six's body blocked Rex's view, but still, he should have saw something. Six reaching out to choke him, or kneeing him, anything.
Yet Six stood still.
"I know you're there."
Now it was Rex's time to freeze, a chill running down his back. Six was facing away from him.
"One of Fell's henchmen? You saw what happened to him. I will not hesitate to do the same."
The mad thumping of his heart. The silence otherwise. With the helmet's HUD in front of him, forget a horror movie, it felt like a horror game. Right before a big bloody GAME OVER appeared on the screen because the monster of the game tore the protagonist apart in excruciating detail, viscera flying across the room.
"I will give you three seconds. Three —"
"Whoa, whoa! Alright!" Rex nudged the door open and turned to face him, hands up, sweat shining on his forehead. "It's just me!"
Rex smiled, nervous, at Six. Six stared back with his usual poker face.
"To be honest," Six drawled, "I would have preferred one of Dr. Fell's assistants."
"Uh, thanks for the glowing seal of approval."
"How much did you hear."
Dangerous, that's what Rex's instincts screamed. And the red words flashing across his viewport. This was a dangerous situation, and Rex had better answer correctly or face the consequences, whatever those may be.
"There was like, a thump noise, and I ran over to check, and you said something like," Rex put on a deeper, gruffer voice that had a passing resemblance to Six's voice, "'Who's there?!'"
'Correctly' in this instance being a bold-faced lie.
"Noted." Hopefully that meant Six bought his lie. Rex even flashed him an award-winning, or at least investor-winning, smile. "Now get back to your room."
"Not until I finish my scouting. Check out the lay of the land."
SIx opened his mouth, looked at Rex, and sighed almost too faint for Rex to hear. "Look around. And turn on the lights in here."
"Lights?" Rex tilted his head — oh! It was dark outside of his suit, wasn't it? "Right! Lights."
Six had slipped back into the room, unnoticeable if a target on the HUD wasn't following him. The red faded back to a light blue as the suit registered the situation as safe.
The door slid open fully, revealing scattered papers, broken equipment, and a table with conspicuously broken bindings. Like someone had lifted them right out of the table, distorting the metal.
It also revealed Dr. Fell.
Fell's unconscious form was slumped unceremoniously across the middle of the room, splotches of burn-like marks across his face. In the matter of fact… those were burns, weren't they? Red and pink and disgusting. Labcoat covered with a thin layer of soot, clumped together with red.
It was horrible.
He couldn't stop staring.
"Further inside, Rex."
Right. Rex flicked the switch on to the makeshift lab, turning the horror game setting into… admittedly, something still scary.
The light didn't reveal anything Rex hadn't seen before in his helmet except colours. Providence pure white interspaced with pitch-black marks — most noticeably on the table situated in the middle of the room. A laptop stood nearby, open, screen displaying data that Rex couldn't decode, all in perfect company formatting and blocky letters. They blurred together for him.
Rex shook his head and looked away. Next to the laptop, a mug lay on its side, contents dripping onto a stack of papers next to it.
Shrugging and finding nothing better to do — Six was still examining the area, muscles tense — he walked over and righted the mug.
An Examination of "Curing" E.V.O.s
Rex vaguely remembered reading a title like that. From where, again? He read often in his spare time. His gaze flicked downwards.
A red [ EXPERIMENT REQUEST REJECTED ].
Ah, right, it was in the pile of requests that had to be signed and rejection-stamped by him, for ceremonious reasons. He supposed they intended for him to read the contents so he could guarantee they were 'rejected on fair terms' or whatever but who had time for that?
It didn't seem like Fell listened, though.
"What is that?"
"Six!" Rex felt his heart hammering at the scare, Six next to him when hesworehe was across the room a second ago. "If I didn't have this suit my bones would have jumped right out of my skin."
Six didn't respond, instead reaching over to pick up and flip through the papers himself. For a few seconds, the only noises in the room were the drone of machinery and paper against paper.
"An anti-nanite field…" Six was almost speaking to himself, voice low as he skimmed over the half-finished, unofficial report with no hint of emotion despite the worrying content. Coffee stained the pages, but not enough to make the ink illegible. "Rex—"
Charred, too.
"Oh no. No, no, no, no, N-O. I am NOT letting him into my room."
"I wasn't going to suggest that."
"... and he'd strangle me anyways. EVO powers or no."
"Again, I was not suggesting that."
"Plus, isn't he like, three times my age? I can't like, room with him."
"Rex."
"Don't send me out... there... either..." Rex trailed off
No way he was going in there. One small scratch and his job security went down the drain.
One small scratch and he had nothing.
"I am going to confront him. Alone. I'm not forcing you to do anything."
"Oh."
"Fell said that Knight ran farther east into headquarters. It shouldn't be too hard to find him."
Rex doubted that — Providence was expansive, full of identical hallways — but didn't speak up. Maybe Six brought a map.
"I —" Rex swallowed, unsure of what to say. "Sure. Yeah. I order you to and stuff."
"Order received."
And that was that. Rex left alone in the horror movie-esque room while he was split from the party, watching as Six bolted off.
He couldn't hear his footfalls.
It was cold, despite the suit being warmed for comfortable levels of heat.
Fear.
It coursed through Rex — if he was infected, maybe, maybe he could pick up the pieces afterwards. Go back to school. Find a family or mooch off of Providence money for his "retirement". Not the end of the world, he was lucky enough to have people — Six and Holiday — to help him.
If Six died out there, alone, and Rex was still trapped in the room waiting, hoping, praying, that Holiday would come back from her current mission —
He was so selfish.
He had to help him.
East, right? He had to retrace his steps and go east. A minimap appeared on his screen, top-right like where every minimap should be.
Six's blip wasn't on there — wasn't on anywhere, actually, infallible as Providence technology was — and he was blindly charging east, ignoring the possibility of another hostile third party like Fell or reasoning them away with thoughts of "I wouldn't have been safer back there"or "if they're really after me, they'd go to the office first".
Knight's blip was still in his room, clearly untrue.
The helmet's night-vision switched on as the sensors picked up the dim lighting conditions — oh, that was why Six had sprinted off with such ease.
Ashes, in a trial from the room he was just in leading elsewhere.
That made things easy, if a bit disconcerting. Did Knight have fire powers nobody was aware of? That was a sobering thought. But cool, Rex admitted, like a big EVO furnace.
A few turns here, a few steps where the ashes were farther apart and Rex guessed the direction, there, and —
Against the wall was a verdant blotch — Six. Looking around the corner, being all stealthy-like, taking way more time than, say, just following it normally like Rex had.
"Hey Six — "
A flash of green —
A fist was right up in his face, mere inches away, something that he literally did not see coming. It was almost comical, how he jumped after it seemingly teleported right in front of him, except for the fact that Rex felt his heart briefly stop and his soul briefly leave his body.
"Rex, what are you doing here?!" Six hissed, low, keeping deadly silent in the sporadic shadows casted by the alarms. There was something strapped to his back, something that Rex couldn't quite make out, something that swayed when Six brought his hand back and moved his body to a less aggressive position.
"Couldn't stay away from the action." Rex flashed a lopsided smile, interior lights of his helmet making his bright teeth shine. "Besides, can't send a doctor in without some beefy backup, right?"
"Beefy." Six looked fairly unimpressed.
Rex flexed at him.
Six continued looking fairly unimpressed.
"Right." Six turned his shoulder towards Rex, a not-so-subtle gesture to brush Rex away. "Head back. I can handle this."
"Whoa! Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold up a second." Rex reached out to grab Six but he twisted away from his gloved touch. Just like a cat. He settled with pointing up at him. "What're you gonna do? Talk about cells until he falls asleep? Scan him until he comes back handcuffed? You're just a doctor."
Six — his posture, his expression, his entire being— shifted.
"Just a doctor."
A dangerous shift, like seeing a hint of frost against the windowpane before the blizzard set in. Cold that pierced through the helmet and straight into Rex. A face that sent chills down Rex's spine — he couldn't name the feeling, the mix of dread and panic and cowardice that forced itself to the surface.
"Some of us don't get the luxury of choosing our profession."
The object strapped to his back — sword and sheath. No scratches, no rust, no dents, just a perfectly cared for weapon; Rex highly doubted that it was just because Six was an enthusiast.
"Go back to the office and get some rest. I will personally tell you the details in the morning."
Part of Rex wanted to follow his orders.
Keyword: part.
His fist clenched. He didn't choose this either, not really.
"Do you have,any idea, how stressful this is?!" The dam broke. Words rushed out of his mouth and he couldn't,couldn'ttake them back — he had to talk, not about the mission, not about Providence, about himself. Maybe he was selfish, but he was long past the point of caring. "I watch you head out with other agents and grunts and then I don't know if they're coming back or not! I don't know if you're coming back or not! If the goodbye and good luck I said seeing you, and them, off will be the last one they'll ever hear! And the worst part is, it has been! Multiple times, Six, multiple times, and then I have to apologize on the behalf of Providence to their family while they sob and scream for them back and I look on beyond the screens and I can't help them. I can't help anyone!"
He was letting his mask drop. Dangerous. His voice was hoarse, throat raw, a sheen of liquid building on his eyes that he blinked away. What was happening to him? Getting caught up in emotions that he was entrusted to hold down.
"I'm only a kid, I should be worrying about tests or projects or who I'm gonna date, not who'll live and die on a daily basis!"
"I won't die."
"What?"
"I. Won't. Die."
"Then —" Aftermath; the fight trickling out of his body, shoulders slumping. He wanted to believe him. Wanted to believe that everything would be okay, but Six's track record — namely, his lack of a track record (that Rex could find) — failed to reassure him. The sword — katana? — wasn't comforting, the willingness to fight —bloodlust?!—definitelywasn't comforting.
It made Rex scared.
Everything was unknown and out of his control, and for once he'd like to be there in the action instead of reading the sugar-coated report in his free time.
"Please. I want to help."
Six was looking right at him, Rex knew it despite not being able to see his eyes. Like an ice shard digging into his face, etched with resolve, unmoving from his determined expression.
"Fine."
"What?"
"Just don't slow me down."
"Won't let you down, Six! Lead the way!"
He moved, Rex's following steps sounding like pots on pans in comparison to his catlike grace. Deeper into the hallways, deeper into the unknown, alarm lights blinking but producing no sound, not an agent in sight. They were still doing construction to this area, if Rex recalled correctly; admittedly, he may not have been.
The trail rarely wavered, as if dead set on going somewhere.
It continued on like this for what seemed like forever — just nerves, just the tenseness like his skin was too small for his body that never really left him —
Six put a hand to Rex's mouth, indicating in the universal language to hush it.
Two red circles in the distance, striking against the darkness. Gone in a flash when Rex saw it.
Knight.
Pause. No more movement. He saw them for sure, assuming those lights in the distance were his eyes glowing or reflecting light. Rex didn't know if that was a soothing or anxiety-inducing thought. Likely the latter.
Six motioned for them to go,quietly please and thank you, up ahead. Knight had turned sharply from the hallway into an area under construction, half-built with bundles of wires neatly tucked into the walls and framework laid bare.
This was it. Six entered, Rex close by.
"He talked about you."
Knight's back was to them, presumably, an echoed voice reaching Rex's receptors. Light, flickering white, shone from the hallway behind them and pierced through the dark of the room — not nearly enough to fill the area, but enough to cast long shadows that danced when Six stepped closer.
"Six."
Authoritative. Commanding. An undertone of static and high-pitched keening that Rex wasn't sure was an audio glitch from his helmet. Six's next step hesitated, stuck in the area between dark and light. Knight was hidden there, somewhere — sitting behind the desk, waiting? Shoved in a corner of the room, waiting for Rex to drop his guard so he could sprint?
Next time he was going to ask the engineers to improve the night vision feature. The bright light at his back would blind him if it was turned on.
For now, he was content staying back while Six unsheathed his katana. Silent, and he motioned for Rex to stay silent too. Chances were, Knight couldn't see them.
"Six, I'm starving."
"The cafeteria's still open. We can grab a burrito."
Another step forward. The katana stayed steady in his hands, ready to strike at any moment.
"Six…"
One more. Rex's heart hammered as he raised his hand, weapon systems powering up — unlike Six's rock-steady grip, Rex was shaking. Target locked on but gauntlet quaking. Rapid-fire spray-and-pray, then. Everything was throbbing — his ears, his view, his veins as blood rushed through them.
A form rose from the ground right in front of them, behind the desk — the wall lit up in red despite the alarm lights not reaching in. For a second, Rex thought he was seeing spots in his vision, black blobs as he felt his body beginning to panic.
"Knight, let's go."
"Six…" Knight breathed out again, wistful, red on the opposite wall growing stronger. His body swayed (or was that just Rex's view wobbling?). Through the dim light, he could make out blotches against the tile against a space where a mandated painting would have been. No colour, yet, just the red overlay casted from — from somewhere.
Something was wrong.
Rex wanted to step back. His body, his mind, screamed at him to step back.
There was colour on the wall. It just matched the red light, though darker in colour.
Like burns.
Something was horribly, horribly wrong.
"Six." A return to the authoritative voice that made Rex's nerves act up, made Six halt.
His head turned, and Rex could see —
Red streaking all over his face. Blood, light, a mix of the two in almost hypnotic patterns. Crimson instead of green eyes that cut through the dark like a screen, unseeing and wide. Focusing right on him. The emotion was unplaceable — fear? Anger? Regret?
"Get. Out. Of. MY. WAY!"
Knight's face twisted into a mask of hate —it was anger, then—
Like cuts, scarlet lines ran down his clothes and skin. Bleeding red light.
It was ink peeling from paper, patterns writhing out — Rex's heart stopped as he recognized those sounds from the first time they met. Metal on metal. White bursting from skin, larger than anything that should reasonably be put on a human. A grotesque mockery of his form.
And that was why the collar existed.
"I said," Knight spat out the words, wholly transfixed on Rex with his sharp teeth glinting in the mixed light, his mechanical form clawing out, "Out of my way!"
Even if he wanted to — no, no way he was too scared and was backing down from a threat — his legs locked and he couldn't do anything but stare straight ahead, unmoving, unblinking.
Well, unmoving was a bit of a lie. His arm still shook, stretched out, laser at the ready.
"Fool."
"Rex, run!"
Knight didn't even try to block Six's attack. Rather, he couldn't — the dark hid Six and there was no footfall despite the tiled floor. Six was a living shadow striking out, the definition of a ninja. Rex made a mental note to make a physical note to ask Six what the heck was up with that
Six's fist connected with Knight's face right as he whipped it around. Sword still on his back, and he made no attempt to draw it.
Run.
A command. He was supposed to follow them, right, leader that he was. Run. What every muscle in his body wanted him to do. Run.
More red joining the splatters already on Knight. A crunch. Rex stepped back, his eyes still looking on, still staring, never focusing on how twisted his face was glinting in the light shining with his own and someone else's blood— Six's other arm held Knight's throat while his right was poised to punch again.
"You — you're supposed to—" Knight spat out, coughing as he struggled to come to his senses, "Aren't — we — friends?!"
The right arm, hand curled up in a tight fist, paused mid-swing.
"He— you —" The mechanical fist fell limp on the tile, spreading dark cracks.
Knight wheezed.
Six was still frozen.
And Rex was standing there, watching it happen.
Just watching —
Six had hesitated and Knight, like a cornered animal, leapt at his chance. The pleading look in his face disappeared in a flash of red and the weapon that was unmoving just a second ago rushed up to Six's body. His unprotected, human body.
"Kni — "
He reacted to it. Too slowly.
— it happen.
Pushed wasn't the right word for it. Launched was more appropriate, the way Knight batted Six aside like an annoying insect, sliding to a stop near the wall. Somehow the sunglasses were still on. The blade clattered uselessly against the ground, adding to the cacophony of static and screams cut short.
Rex slowed Six down.
"This — this isn't —" Knight was mumbling something, flashes of crimson across his face as metal built up on his skin. They were like veins, angular, glowing, neon veins, throbbing and pulsing as he staggered up and scratched at them. Flesh bulging and shifting to machinery. "It's… not…"
Rex could have used anything. Any of his so-called "powers". He was scared. He was scared.
"No, no." He was staring at Six, green and white clothing stained darker. It was as if he didn't even notice anything outside of his transfixed gaze, even though he was hellbent on destroying Rex earlier. "I didn't…"
He was scared.
"Six was… Six was…"
His arm lifted up. The laser was fully charged.
"In — our —"
Strangely, he wasn't shaking one bit.
"He was in our way, of course, of course —" Still staring, like his whole world was Six and Six alone. He still hadn't moved, not a twitch from his hands. The katana lay a few feet away.
Fury.
And Rex. Knight tilted his head to face him, expression dead, a far cry from the (confusion? anger?) emotions that were coursing through him earlier. "Still there?" Knight's eyes narrowed, glinting with a dangerous red light. "That face does not suit you, b—"
Knight's head jerked back, the room lit up completely by brilliant blue for an instant before darkening again. What just happened? Oh, Rex's arm was outstretched and his power reserves indicated a laser was just fired. Two. Three. Knight tilted back, head hitting tile and body slamming into Six's.
It was over. Wasn't it? It felt like a nightmare he could pinch himself to wake up out of. But his armour was on and it hardly came with built-in pinching features. He could walk over to Six and drop him off at the infirmary, call Calan and Holiday, and sleep. For a week. Everything would be back to normal.
It was over —
"You are annoying. Do you understand that?"
He could barely make it out of the static in his ears. How was he still moving, dragging himself up, barely recognizable from the red lights and wounds and metal across his skin? Like he was possessed. Or unable to feel pain. Or both.
Oh no. Oh no. Oh no.
Distortions flashed across his faceplate, and barely — enough — he could make out that his emergency signal was being transmitted. If anything, they could locate his body for the funeral. Screeching, like nails against blackboard, assaulted his ears, Knight hoisting himself with his arm and lurching forward, it was all too much.
Rex shut off the receptors for sound. That was one problem taken care of, but it made a new one — Knight's mouth was moving, repeating the same actions, his eyes burning holes into Rex's armour. He was burning. Skin flaking like ashes where the red circuit raced across him, glowing.
If Knight noticed, or cared, he didn't show it.
Instead, he was smiling.
--
She had left Calan with her sister sixteen minutes ago. She had noticed that Rex was out of the office seven minutes ago, leaving the administrator computer logged in, perfect for her uses. She had discovered the root of the security systems hack four minutes ago.
Currently: she was standing in a ruined Providence room, on the edge of construction where no agent went, papers thrown everywhere, and one traitor trying to clean it.
"Dr. Fell."
"Agent Holiday." Impressive stoicism, thought she noticed the waver in his voice at the start and the way he froze like a deer in the headlights. "What are you doing here?"
"Finding out who disrupted Providence. Funny I should find you here."
"If what you're implying is what I think you're implying —"
"It is."
He opened and closed his mouth, quiet, defiance in his eyes.
"You can't prove anything."
She swept one leg ahead of her, Fell's eyes widening as his feet left the ground and his head met it. She almost felt bad for him. One bruise added onto the burn scars on him. One more bruise, if the way he gripped his stomach with his face indicated anything.
And by almost, she felt absolutely no mercy. Nobody, absolutely nobody put her sister in danger like that and got away with no consequences. She readied her tranquilizer, looming over his prone, dazed form.
"No. You," Holiday said through gritted teeth, loading in the next round, "should find a new job."
"You can't do this to me! I won't be thrown out of Providence like this! That thing— you're harboring a monster! It should be studied, not sheltered! Six should have let him die in that cage."
Odd.
Dr. Fell was nowhere near the Zoo on that day, according to the logs.
...Just like he wasn't near this room now.
"You were behind that, too? Thanks for making my job easier." And she dearly wished she could have recorded his face along with his voice, stuttering out half-formed explanations.
She fired off a tranquilizer shot.
Easy. Clean, unlike the makeshift lab she was in. Fell didn't make a sound, just went limp on the floor, mouth still open. She nudged him away and surveyed the —
Another alert, at this hour?
She switched the communicator on —
"Please help, I don't know if anyone's hearing this but uh, Wing B6 Hallway 12 Room 2, please, broadcasting to all channels, someone respond." Rex's voice, fear and panic, rang in her ears. Muffled-sounding. Harsh breathing coming across the channel. "I repeat, Wing B6 Hallway 12 Room 2. Anybody?"
"Reading you loud and clear, Rex."
"Oh, thank god, I'm just in Hallway 12 now, heading to Hallway 13 — whoop! Uh. Sorry about that. Knight's here with me."
That was a new development. Though he wasn't strapped to the table in the room she was in, so the fact that he was out and about wasn't surprising, and Wing R6 was reasonably close. "How's his condition?"
"He's fine. Cool as a cucumber. Except for the burns. Oh!"
"Burns?"
"Yeah, burns, and he's trying to kill me right now —"
"Mention that first!" What was she doing, just standing around? Fell was tied up with nearby cable in a blink of an eye before she was rushing towards hallway 13. Left, right, straight, right, the building growing more and more unfinished as she got closer to Rex.
Who hadn't been talking ever since. She hoped dearly that was because Rex was hiding.
She pushed away the thoughts that she was the reason Knight was out of his room, she was the reason Knight was uncollared, replacing it with the knowledge that Fell was the one who escalated the situation to its current state. She couldn't have known that Fell would kidnap him. That Knight would become aggressive.
She had to try to cure Beverly. She was her sister. And her current form was also her fault, she thought bitterly.
Going straight again. Another left. Dodge the chunk of building heading her way —
Successful, no scrapes, just a spike of pain as she slid across the floor. What was that?
"Holi!"
"Rex?" And she just had enough time to dodge another white chunk, only to see it pivot and turn right to —
"Am I glad to see you!" It was Rex, not a piece of Providence buried in her gut, his arms wrapping around her waist in joy and panic alike.
"Likewise." She patted his back, but her eyes darted around the hallway — the first shot must have meant Knight was close by. One foot back, then the other, steadily going towards the flickering hallway lights while her mind raced.
Why was Knight aggressive? Scratch that. More aggressive than normal. Why was Rex outside? How could she protect him? Was Six out there?
Was that mumbling?
Two red dots streaked down the hallway, shifting erratically — she could hear metal screaming as it was ripped from the foundation, but it was too dark past the barely-functional lights to make out anything distinct other than the striking red.
"It's," Rex spoke, wincing as another screech rang through the air, this time accompanied by a low-pitched drone amongst the static. "Way too loud. Almost forgot to turn off the mute for a bit."
"Let's get out of here." If Rex hadn't insisted on the bulkier armour design, Holiday simply would have picked him up and carried him out — granted, the extra defence could have made the difference between life and Knight cutting him down. He wasn't disagreeing, or frozen on the spot, though Holiday made a mental note to pay a close attention to Rex in the coming weeks. Once the adrenaline had passed and Rex wasn't going through the day with instinct alone, she didn't know how he would react.
Staying alone in an office didn't help.
"Wait, Six is still back there!"
The red was getting closer, brighter, in the direction Rex frantically pointed at. She bit her lip; they couldn't double back, carry him, and keep running. At least without freaking Rex out, slowing them down considerably, or further injuring Six.
If Six was still…
She shook her head. Couldn't let them down. No, they had to go back for him, make a loop through the unfinished bowels of Providence.
She led the charge, contacting any active agents and waking up nearby inactive ones. She didn't dare call Calan and his team to her – they were safeguarding her sister. Perhaps it was selfish. Others would call it familial love.
The structure was there, pipes, covered wire, reinforcement that Holiday couldn't name but trusted to not collapse under their weight. She wasn't worried about Rex here, his suit was built to withstand anything from blunt blows to slashes. She, however, was relatively unarmoured.
She half-expected Rex to chime 'safety first!' as they headed into the darkness, past the construction notices.
Instead, she was met with silence.
In fact–
The sounds of exosuit boots hitting tile stopped. Holiday whipped herself around, drawing her weapon –
No, Rex was alright, stopped in his tracks. He had a hand to his helmet's earpiece, expression filled with confusion.
"Holiday, I can't hear him anymore."
Wasn't that a good thing? For them. For Providence, she corrected, Rex was a fantastic morale booster, and they had more time to retrieve Six.
"I'm not letting you go after him, if that's what you're asking."
"But –" Rex turned his head back where they came from, "He's going towards the Petting Zoo."
No. No. She knew what Providence wanted her to do. Be a model agent, save a valued researcher, trust that other agents were guarding the Petting Zoo, don't look back at another incurable EVO's death.
"Rex," she started, placing a hand on either of his shoulders, kneeling down, "A squadron with a medic will be here shortly. You lead them to Six, then let them escort you back to your office immediately, alright?"
She wasn't exactly a model agent. Sorry, Six.
He hesitated, eyes gazing to the ground, mouth open as if he wanted to say something, to dispute her orders. "I want to help," his voice was quieter, an undercurrent of guilt in his words.
"You'll be helping Six."
She patted him on the back one last time and stood up, mapping out which corridors she needed to enter to reach an access to the Petting Zoo.
"Holiday." She stopped and looked back, her eyes meeting Rex's haunted, wide ones. An expression unfit for someone that young. "Please be safe."
--
Holiday entered the Zoo to the sound of gunfire, bullets ricocheting off metal, and the thought thank god I didn't order Calan out of the Zoo.
She sprinted to the Hole's entrance, avoiding any areas she saw flashes of light from either the muzzle of a Providence assault rifle or the sparks as it hit something – someone's builds...
"Agent Holiday." Another Providence agent nodded as she approached the entrance, recognizing her presence. "Captain Calan is leading the fight against the intruder."
"Fell's the one responsible for the alarm, but that's Knight."
While the mask hid his features, Holiday could tell from the way he tensed that this was news to him. Not likely news to Calan, he would have met him in the skirmish by now.
"...Noted."
"And the Hole's EVOs?"
"Safe and sound," she breathed a sigh of relief, "A few others are in there to make sure they don't escape. Or fight each other."
"Keep up the good work."
She stepped into the Hole –
A high-pitched wail cut through the air; she flinched, the agent beside her flinched, and the Zoo briefly went quiet as everyone sought to catch their bearings. The unspoken question, "what the hell was that?"
, lingered in the air. It didn't sound human or Knight-like, closer to the squawks from the emu EVOs that wandered around the Zoo. Was one caught in the crossfire?
She bit her lip. Her sister… she was safe, guarded by agents. She'd confirmed it, but she wanted to see her. At the same time, she had a responsibility.
It was her fault. She had to fix it.
No more hesitation.
Beverly could wait just a few more minutes.
"Captain Calan, what is your position?"
"We're near the south entrance," His voice crackled through the earpiece, "Good to see you join us. Holiday."
She didn't reply, instead heading over, footfalls light. The gunfire had stopped, leaving an eerie silence as even the resident EVOs didn't make a sound. Only the rustle of leaves in the artificial wind, the rush of water, hid her movement.
Up ahead, she could see the telltale black and white of Providence uniforms. She stood next to Calan as her oversaw his squadron.
They surrounded Knight, fingers on the trigger, wary. He wasn't making any sudden movements, just shivering on the spot, hands around the throat of one of the bird EVOs. He was focused on it, barely considering the soldiers around him.
The EVO halted in its tracks, legs wobbling, and as it collapsed –
Like sand in the wind, the EVO disappeared, grey dust joining the filth that covered the ground it once stood on.
What?
"I want more. I…" Knight was convulsing, eyes darting wildly. "I need more. It hurts."
The circle grew tighter, one step closer, sensing his growing weakness.
Knight was useful to Providence as a cure. But to them, a cure didn't need to move from its room. If Holiday's shot missed, or didn't work, they wouldn't think twice. His power was dangerous.
That, or they would cut out the middleman and dissect him.
Knight's eyes locked with hers, red flickering in them without pattern. They were almost glossy and unseeing, yet had a quality of hate and anger simmering underneath.
"You're Holiday." She flinched though his words held no malice, unprepared for the way his distorted voice echoed in her earpiece.
"Stand down, Knight. Providence needs you."
He was hunched over, animalistic, a snarl reaching his lips. Half a ready pose and half due to the malformed metal that crawled over his skin. Calan braced, ready to give the order to fire at the slightest hint of attack.
A part of her understood; the other part of her didn't want to see that order.
"We're not going to hurt you if you calm down."
The red glared brighter, Knight's eyes moving from Calan, to the grunts surrounding him, to her again. Holiday recognized that gaze; he was sizing them up, running the calculations, a predator seeing if it could get away with attacking another.
"Activation code Iron. Three. Zero. One. Protection of the host is first priority. Shutting down—" She didn't have time to process what he was saying, much less understand or react to it, before Knight collapsed to his knees, eyes growing unfocused. Machinery, grotesque, half-formed clumps, shed from his limbs as the red circuit lines faded to reveal burnt skin.
He wasn't unconscious, more like he wasn't completely there in the moment. Knight looked at the group of soldiers standing around him, then at the weapons they pointed at him, then at himself. The malice from before was completely gone; it was curiosity, not calculation, that drove his actions.
"Holiday? Why is…" Knight slurred, "What's happening?"
--
It was bright out. Not that she could see outside, only guess from the digital clock displayed in front of her. The meeting she scheduled was about to begin.
A sense of calmness permeated the room, conflicting with the chaos outside of the walls – waking up to Knight going berserk and calming down, the Petting Zoo losing a few EVOs, Fell being fired after obstructing Providence's path…
All that paled in comparison to the turmoil inside of her, having lived through it. Having to make a few unpopular decisions.
The screen flickered on, only one out of the five. The figure was in shadow, reclined in his chair. Disconnected from the world at large.
"For the good of Providence, Agent Knight should be let outside."
"Request denied. Do not waste the Council's time, Agent Holiday, and do not overstep your bounds." A short pause. "Even if you did apprehend Fell."
She expected this. He was a threat, and especially after the recent Fell fiasco she could understand why everyone wanted him caged in his room. At the same time, she couldn't forget how… casual he was towards being alone, towards being hated.
She couldn't imagine keeping Rex in those conditions, without anybody to talk to. A bit of fresh air couldn't hurt.
But they wouldn't care for an EVO's emotions. Not her sister's, and not Knight's. They barely even cared for Rex. Instead, she played to their interests.
"You saw what he did. He needs to be in the field, curing EVOs at every opportunity – it's either he gets enough nanites to support himself or he starts vaporising the Zoo again."
"His builds require nanites, do they not?"
"Much less than the nanites he takes in from curing an EVO. Think about it, Providence doesn't need to spend money hauling an EVO back to base then sending the cured form back to wherever it need to be. He can just be there."
The shadowed Council member steepled his hands, pausing for thought.
"Then keep him on a short leash. That collar does not come off. No chances," he finally responded, distaste clear in his voice, "You know the other option when contain doesn't work. Don't hesitate."
