Chapter 3- MASK

Nicole would never forget that feeling of unease, as she continued to sit in that fabricated chair. The vibrations of the nanites on her fingers and hind paws, the static pulsing in the air, and the piercing stare of that woman staring into her soul. By all accounts, she was a perfect facsimile of the Holo-Lynx by appearance and voice alone. Yet underneath that façade, she saw only emptiness behind it—as well as something much darker. Every line out of the administrator's mouth was handcrafted to perfection, not unlike the piece of furniture formed from the nanites around them.

"You have not spoken for quite some time. Are you well, Nicole?" Her voice cut through the Holo-Lynx's thoughts like a straight razor, bringing her back to reality. They had been traversing the halls for quite some time and now found themselves on a thin grated bridge, traversing a veritable lake of the green liquid from before. Looking around, the room seemed to dwarf them both in its expanse, with the roof stretching upward into an unknown darkness. A tower of machinery beckoned forth from the center, with numerous lights and wires wrapped around its mass.

"To tell you the truth, not particularly." Those words carried quite a bit of honesty, but now it was her turn to prod back with careful deception. Nicole knew that it was easier to gauge the other one's demeanor when she showed signs of protest. A sign of a true manipulator is their need to stamp out dissent, either with honeyed words or something far worse. There was a particular beast of a man, Ixis Naugus, that immediately came to mind. A wizard who fancied himself a king, with his rule built on lies and deceit. She hoped that wasn't the case here, that her building suspicion of NICOLE was entirely unfounded, but...

"That is a reasonable stance to have, especially in a war-torn place such as this. This base is one of the last bastions on Earth, after all." Earth? The question of where she was exactly lingered in Nicole's mind. Sally had mentioned at some point that Mobius and Earth were one and the same, but most had excepted the former as the proper name for the planet. That ruled out Moebius and the Anti-verse out the equation. However, that was not the most pressing concern...

"War-torn? What did you mean by that?" NICOLE did not flag in her stride once as she continued further within, seemingly ignoring the query from the Holo-Lynx. An outstretched hand slid across a nearby console that sit at the base of the massive column, where some sort of testing ground resided. A tall cylindrical tube was mounted to the ground nearby, with a large purple crystalline mass pulsating within. Numerous readouts with details scrolled down the monitor screen in green lettering.

The words "Anarchy Beryl" caught Nicole's attention but her memory had lapsed once again. She silently cursed this persistent issue with her logs and knitted her brow in frustration. The other lynx did not seem to notice her lack of focus, thankfully. "Yes, a group of dedicated terrorists led by an underground anti-G.U.N. unit have been a thorn in our side for quite some time. Before then, our united nations have enjoyed a time of unprecedented peace, of which yours truly had a large part in bringing about." NICOLE bowed for effect with a flourish as she capped off her tiny speech.

You sure do like to hear yourself talk...

Despite the air of importance that this particular section of the facility was giving off, she began to doubt that this was the actual location of the main server room. Far too easy to access, since it was a small walk away from where she emerged, and practically unguarded... "So...this is where the central server is held? Rather small, don't you think?" Nicole's repeated jabs only earned her that ever present plastic smile. No change in expression, no tensing of the muscles, not a single crack to be found in the administrator's act. An involuntary shiver traveled throughout her body, starting from the tip of her tail and capping off at the poms on her ears.

"The primary focus of this facility is experimentation and testing. It's current status as a safe-house is a most recent addition to its intended use. Nicole..." She snapped to attention to her name being called, as if by impulse. The numerous readouts had snatched her attention away from her host—there was still the question on her mind of what exactly Anarchy Beryl was. The designation that mineral carried seemed so familiar...

"We need to run a check on that body of yours before reintegrating the core data. Any instabilities could be...deadly." As the administrator traced her eyes over the Holo-Lynx's features, a pit in her stomach began to grow. There was no way she was entering that cylindrical prison, no matter how inviting. "Now..." The tube separated at the center, as NICOLE retrieved the Beryl from it's housing. Turning to her, she extended an arm toward the glass cage with a fanged grin. "Get in."

Nicole stalled for time, her eyes flitting about for any sort of exit. An escape route, possibly. "Perhaps a handshake is in order, NICOLE. For good luck...?" The words left her mouth bereft of thought, her voice almost breaking mid sentence. It felt similar to what one would say before walking to the gallows.

Laughter erupted from the other's maw, teeth glistening in the hazel lit glow of the screen nearby. It was the first genuine emotion that she had teased from the lynx, but it still did not dispel the terrible anxiety she felt in her breast. Did she not understand the confusion and terror that the Holo-Lynx felt? The effort it took to drag her memories to the surface? The encroaching feeling of dread and pervasive loneliness that threatened to envelop her?

"Pardon me..." NICOLE took a moment to flick away tears from her eyes, bringing her gaze up toward the distraught lynx. "My word, you are full of surprises. Fine then, a handshake it is." As her black-furred hand opened wide, that all too familiar wide eyed expression was locked into place once more. A frozen gaze that would burned into the Holo-Lynx's brain long after she left this place... "To a new friendship. How does that sound, Nicole?" The smile she wore now seemed to be quite endearing, but the slight smirk and head tilt gave off an air of smug superiority.

As NICOLE's right hand continued to extend outward, Nicole hesitantly brought her own towards it. Alarm bells were ringing in her mind, but something compelled her to press onward. She had only been kind to me since we have met, all things considered... If I was down here alone long enough, perhaps I would be a bit eccentric as well. Well, only one way to find out. Fingers spread out and retracted before coming to rest firmly in that paw. In an instant, she felt the nanites arc an unknown energy of some sort between the two, and Nicole's vision fell into darkness as a flurry of vivid, nightmarish images followed soon after...

A station floating in space, a scientist approaches her fallen daughter as G.U.N. soldiers move to silence him. A hedgehog with spiked features on his head watches on in horror as the tragic scene plays out, helpless to stop it. Laughter.

Two women sit in steel chairs as fluids of an unknown nature are forcibly taken out of them. A creature opens its eyes, a small hedgehog standing on two legs. It cries out for someone...anyone. More laughter.

Numerous flashes of more creatures wearing pained expressions. The last one was a small fox begging for his brother to save him before being quickly silenced. Blood trickling out of their lips.

Nanites flow over the form of a black and red hedgehog this time, until a garish mask forms. The trilling mirth continues unabated.

Finally, several more hedgehogs appear. One spectral with a glowing cobalt glow. The next, carved from steel with an eerie red glow in its eyes. The black and red one emerges once again, gagging and clutching at his throat as the mask takes hold once more.

"Ahh...!" With a start, Nicole opened her eyes wide only to find that she had leapt all the way back to the edge of the bridge, almost twenty meters backward! She struggled to breathe as the flood of new information and memories continued to burrow themselves into her own logs. Combined, a terrifying conclusion emerged as countless secrets became known. This NICOLE was indeed very, very old. Cunning. Ruthless. She was...

"Evil. You are...pure evil!"

"That wasn't very kind of you, Nicole." Her mouth agape, a gasp sputtered out of the Holo-Lynx, struggling to comprehend what she was now witnessing. NICOLE's right arm had been wrenched clean from her body, with green ooze spilling out from the open wound. She felt a dead weight in her left hand and peered down to see the severed limb firmly grasped in her paw. Instinctively, she flicked it away and the limp arm landed on the floor with a resounding "thud". Soon after, it dissolved into a green mass before reverting back into the liquid that surrounded them. Too much was happening all at once, as Nicole clutched at her head with eyes unblinking.

The nanites. All of this is... What are you!?

The horror barely had time to register in her mind before she brought a shield up from the inert nanites that surrounded her, and she immediately felt the impact of... something. Closing her eyes and gritting her teeth, she barely staved off the sudden attack with a hasty barrier. Lowering her shield, she saw a translucent green tentacle thrashing about where NICOLE's right arm once was. Her eyes flashed with a renewed ferocity, as a smile slowly formed on her lips.

"And we were getting along so well..."