Common Denominator - Chapter 2: Triage
"There is no need to be worried!" Kirov's voice emanated throughout the village's main intersection. In front of him stood a crowd of about 30 or so villagers who had all gathered after word about the contamination got around. They knew enough about ELID to be rightfully terrified at the situation and they turned to their leader for guidance. However, it seems that even the respected village chief himself was not enough the quell the people's fears.
"What are we going to do?!" a young woman in the crowd shouted out, "We'll be forced out of our homes!"
"Just how bad is the situation anyway?" a man from the crowd shouted.
"We are still trying to determine the extent of the problem," Kirov calmly informed the crowd, "For now, I need you all to stay out of the cordoned area, remain vigilant, and keep in touch with each other and me!"
"My house is in the cordoned area!" an old man exclaimed, "How will I eat, where will I sleep?"
"I have an infant son at home, he won't be able to tolerate the radiation!" a middle-aged woman cried out near the back of the crowd, "We can't stay in the village!"
"We can't go out there!" someone else replied, "We'll be slaughtered by the dolls if we leave our village!"
"Who could have done this? Could it be scavengers?" a man from the middle shouted out, sending another ripple of panic throughout the crowd.
"What about Sangvis Ferri?" another person asked, "Aren't there Sangvis dolls in the village right now? What are they doing?"
Almost as if on cue, Kia stepped out of the chapel having finished her talk with the Griffin Commander. Adjusting to the late-afternoon sun hanging above the intersection, Kia stopped in her tracks when she noticed the large crowd standing in front of her and Kirov. With her mind still reeling from having had a full-on conversation with the enemy's highest-ranked commanding officer in the entire region, Kia simply stood in front of the crowd blankly.
"Is that one of them?" a man shouted, pointing at Kia. "Is that a Sangvis doll?"
"Whuh-? Me?" Kia confusedly asked, pointing at herself.
"It's her! It's the Sangvis doll!" a villager cried out.
"What?" Kia incredulously asked, "I-"
"What if Sangvis Ferri is behind all of this?" a man in a bowler hat shouted at the top of his lungs, "What if they purposefully planted the radiation in our village to kill us all?!"
"Please remain calm!" Kirov's hoarsely shouted while the crowd dissolved into chaos as the people tried to come up with a perpetrator to pin the blame on. "Think about it, if Sangvis Ferri wanted us dead, they wouldn't have to go through such measures to do so!"
"Sangvis Ferri is here to exterminate us all!" the man screamed—obviously not in a rational state of mind—as he fled the scene. The crowd, already on-edge, completely broke down as they hurled accusations at Kia.
"Murderer!" the crowd screamed at Kia, "Heartless killer!"
"Nonsense!" Kirov sharply retorted, barely managing to remain heard despite the mob's chanting. "Who was it that saved Petra's child? Who was it that provided medical aid to us on this very intersection? Who was it that tried to save Nikolay's life when he stepped on a landmine?"
"You should stop defending her, chief!" a feverish man responded, "It's clearly all a ploy for us to lower our guard! Did you see all those boxes they unloaded when they first arrived? I bet the collapse fluid was in one of them!"
"Yeah!" a woman near the side added, "They've already killed our people in the past!"
"Everyone quiet!" Kirov finally bellowed, completely losing his temper after having kept a calm composure for so long. "Have you all lost your minds?!"
Kirov rarely let his emotions flare up, but in his current state the village chief was beyond irate. The entire crowd quickly turned silent in shock like a child who was caught by his parent with his hand in the cookie jar. Even Kia, who was standing behind Kirov, unconsciously took a step back, shaken by the old man's sudden change in attitude.
"This stranger comes into our village, offering help as a gesture of friendship, and this is how we treat her?" Kirov harshly scolded the crowd, "Kia here might be a doll, but she has shown more humanity today than some of you people; have a bit of introspection, would you? Can anyone even prove that these Sangvis Ferri dolls have done a single bad thing within this village today?"
The crowd remained silent, lowering their eyes to the ground from their leader's sudden outburst. Having had their panic temporarily suppressed, they slowly began to realise that Kia and her team really didn't have any reason to be suspected after all. Sure, Sangvis Ferri have conducted atrocities in their village in the past, but those events could hardly be attributed to the dazed brown-haired doll standing before them right now.
"Thanks…" Kia muttered, walking up to Kirov's side.
"Hmph. What a mess," Kirov scowled, looking at the crowd. "It seems this incident has brought to surface all the people's pent-up tension."
"Yeah, no kidding," Kia agreed, "Not that I can really blame them, though."
Kia looked at the crowd in front of her. Thankfully, they weren't fervently shouting allegations at her anymore, but their ambivalent expressions told Kia that they weren't ready to accept her quite yet. A moment of silence washed over the intersection as Kia and the crowd stared at one another, tension filling the air.
"We're sorry, but we simply cannot trust her kind, Sangvis Ferri, I mean…" the man near the front finally told Kirov before turning to address Kia, "We understand you are not like the… previous dolls from your group, and we are grateful for your help in the present situation. But given the past events, and the ongoing war, there is simply too much history between you and us for us to fully trust you…"
Kia lowered her gaze. She was disappointed by the villager's response, but on the other hand, she couldn't exactly blame her either. What right did Kia have to ask for the villagers' support when Sangvis Ferri was the root of almost every vice the village found itself in?
"I trust her," a voice suddenly announced from behind. Kia looked behind her, her eyes widening as she saw the figure walking from the chapel door: it was RFB.
"I trust Kia," RFB repeated once more, looking at the crowd as she walked over to Kia's side. "Although I can't claim to know the things y'all have gone through in the recent years, I can understand how you feel toward this doll and Sangvis Ferri. I've been fighting them for more than a year now, so like you people, I certainly can't fully trust her like I'd trust my comrades… But I would certainly like to!"
Surprised murmurs swept through the crowd, the villagers curiously watching the Griffin doll who had suddenly appeared and was now standing shoulder-to-shoulder with the Sangvis doll.
"I used to believe that Sangvis Ferri was utterly irredeemable," RFB admitted, "But after meeting Kia here, I've realized that perhaps some of them are not so different from the rest of us after all… The Mobile Task Force… nobody knows what their true nature is, but the thing they need the most right now, is a chance. So while you should rightfully remain cautious, I urge you all to keep an open mind, I certainly know that I will."
"RFB…" Kia muttered, looking to the Griffin doll standing beside her—the same doll who had her rifle trained upon her chest less than an hour ago. Although Kia already noticed earlier that RFB had been hesitant to shoot her, she didn't think RFB was willing to going this far for her. Kia's face broke into a smile, deeply moved by RFB's gesture.
"This is my apology," RFB grinned as she wrapped her right arm around Kia's shoulders, giving her a slight nod. "For real this time."
"Thanks…" Kia laughed, "Looks like we can see eye-to-eye after all."
"Just this once," RFB agreed, looked onwards at the shocked crowd. "Just this once…"
"Aaaand, done…" Magic muttered to herself as she dropped a soil sample onto the ground. As her handheld collapse radiometer transmitted the sample's data into her wrist port, Magic began compiling the data from all the soil samples from various parts of the village into a radiation density map.
"Yo, Howl," Magic said into her radio as she waited for the data analysis to complete, "I'm done here, how about you?"
"Last sample," Howl replied as she lifted a thin column of dirt using a special tool, "Meet you back at the truck, yeah?"
After a few minutes had passed, Howl and Magic were assembled back at the truck they arrived in, going through the data they collected. As expected, the density map showed a peak in collapse radiation concentration where the collapse fluid container used to be located, with the radiation strength decreasing the further one travelled from the epicentre. Thankfully, the rate of spread seemed to be relatively slow, and meaningful amounts of radiation haven't reached the nearby river yet. Unfortunately, the two didn't have the means to determine how deep the radiation penetrated into the ground. Furthermore, the level of radiation in the village was significantly higher than the basal concentration, probably due to the slow leakage from the collapse fluid container that had been hidden there for who knows how long.
"Mace Actual, this is Mace 1-Delta. Come in, over," Magic talked into the long-range radio.
"Magic, it's Archangel, go ahead," Archangel's voice returned, "Did you get a handle on the situation?"
"Yeah, Archangel, it's pretty much what we expected," Magic replied as she transmitted the collected data, "We've also managed to block off the danger zones, but that's not gonna fix the root of the problem. Any idea how we're going to get rid of the CF?"
"Not sure yet, unfortunately," Archangel replied, "We're sending over a team, sending you the manifest now."
"Alright, thanks," Magic said as she received the data packet, "Where's Nyx, by the way?"
"Just sorting some stuff out," Archangel responded, "Anyway, once Axiom's team arrives they're going to move the most contaminated matter onto an isolation mat; they've got radiation gear with them."
"Got it, that should slow down the spread somewhat," Magic acknowledged, "Wish we brought some suits with us to begin with."
"Hindsight twenty-twenty," Archangel remarked with a sigh, "Anyway, keep the situation under control. Oh, and you should share the data with the Griffin dolls. We need to stay on the same page here."
After the conversation, Magic got up and walked over to Howl, who was conducting maintenance on one of the demining drones. Although the two Mace dolls had been completely sidetracked by the recent disaster, the handful of drones they brought with them were at least able to continue and mark the positions of probable UXO.
"Axiom's gonna come and clean everyone's shit up again, huh." Howl noted as she detached a cable from the drone, freeing it to fly back up into the sky.
"Pretty much," Magic agreed.
"God damn it, I'm so tired," Howl sighed as she stood up and leaned against a wall. "Can't we just relocate all these humans and call it a day?"
"You're joking, right?" Magic chuckled as she copied the radiation map onto a storage drive, "Where'd we even move them?"
"Fuck, I dunno, set up a temporary camp or something, at least until we're done here" Howl suggested, "It's a fucking pain in the ass when some asshole won't let us enter their property when there's literally a fucking bomb in it."
"It's a mess, that's for sure," Magic agreed, "But what can you do about it?"
"Why can't we just kick 'em out?" Howl asked, "It'd be in their best interest, after all."
"What if they don't want to be saved?" Magic asked. Of course, the actual premise itself was a bit farfetched, but the thought exercise behind it was a completely valid ethical dilemma.
"Fuck them, then," Howl muttered as she looked down the street at Glock 17 (or one of her dummy links?), who was busy talking to one of the villagers.
"You know, there's something to be said about autonomy and whatnot," Magic pointed out, "Out job here is to help, but sometimes we should ultimately respect the villagers' wishes. At least, that's how medical ethics work, I think."
"Sure, whatever," Howl handwaved, "Is Kia still out there getting stoned by rioters? Guess we can let her figure this out."
"Anyway," Howl said after a while, looking at her tactical map in her neural cloud. "Axiom's team's gonna arrive soon, better go tell the Griffin fuckers."
"Actually, seems we won't have to," Magic noted, looking down the street. A group of unknown dolls were now on the street, talking to Glock 17. "Looks like they're already here."
"Well, damn," Howl muttered as she locked eyes with the lead Griffin doll, "Looks like things are gonna get real crowded here…"