Welcome to Anti-Rain I! After exterminating Executioner, M4A1 is returned to base, but with three core members of Station 794 dead her arrival is under less-than-ideal circumstances.

While I was conceptualizing the last chapter I had a much more optimistic idea in mind for its ending where everyone was pretty much fine, but in the end I wound up with three deaths and three in need of repair, so in my goal to make a better-flowing Chapter 01-06 I still wound up making it harsh on the 794 roster in the end. My bad, hehe...

I also made a poll concerning GFL War (I haven't pulled the plug on it yet, but I've been focused on Beginning for the most part) so please check it out and leave a vote for it. Also, Battlefield 1 is a literal work of art, change my mind, I dare you, and it's a shame that such dedication wasn't given to Battlefield V. Still better than 2042, though.

For OSTs, Vanguard Sound just released two new albums a month ago on Spotify: "Scarlet," which contains the four OSTs from the Eclipses and Saros event on the CN servers, and the Longitudinal Strain OST (both of them are singles rather than normal albums.)

To Recruit321: Thanks for the idea, and I'm glad to continue this.

To HECU Marine: I was originally going to leave Springfield alive but something compelled me to do otherwise (insert evil laughter.)

To Paranoid Android 64: Thank you for the complimemts, I'm flattered that you thought so highly of that chapter. Also, it's gonna be interesting to write about how our favorite war vet will deal with his subordinates not having some of their memories, and it'll be interesting to adapt Task Force 404 (blame TF 141 for the naming) and the other Anti-Rain members to the fic.

To Culture-Hunt3r: They will return, but as we all know they won't be the same as before, (Soppo is Toppo as they always say) and I've got something real good in mind for Soppo's intro.

Thought dump and review replying aside, let's jump straight into this.

UH-60 Blackhawk, Approaching Station 794

Ukraine, Neo-Soviet Union

July 11, 2062

Tactical Doll AK-47

About halfway back to Station 794 the sun had fully disappeared and night had fallen, the full moon barely visible on the horizon as a pair of Blackhawks flew towards the border-guarding base that was Station 794, one carrying "special cargo" and the other one carrying a backup team.

Unfortunately for AK-47, she was one of the ones sat with the "special cargo," not because of what the "cargo" herself was but because of what it cost— who it cost to secure her, the dead bodies of M1911, MP5, and Springfield carefully placed in the empty seats next to the only survivors of Echelon One— excluding FN-49, who was deemed unfit to partake in the mission due to a lack of confidence in her abilities as well as specialized equipment.

As for the survivors themselves AK-47 sat on the pilots' side with a nearly-empty bottle of vodka in hand, a change in her "no drinking on the job" probation allowing her to do so while returning to base, although half of it went to a girl who should have never suffered a pyrrhic victory like what they just suffered.

Howa 64, who sat directly beside her, was certainly a lightweight, having fallen asleep before she even finished off the vodka the blonde had given to her, and had it been another time she would've spared a laugh for her, but now, after she was forced to watch an ally die in her arms a mere hour ago? It was much better than her crying herself to sleep.

And finally, she looked to the "cargo" they had recovered: AR Team leader M4A1.

Sitting in the seat in front of the Russian the elite Doll had a remorseful expression on her admittedly beautiful face, a cybernetic thumb absentmindedly rubbing the tip of her worn-out weapon's shrouded barrel and a gloved hand propped under her chin with her dark hair obscuring her face slightly to complete her forlorn expression. A brief spike of anger shot up her spine as she remembered MP5 and M1911's death in vivid detail, but she ruthlessly squashed it down, not wanting to blame the girl for something she didn't do, despite the anger she felt towards her.

But still, why did they have to die? What is so damned special about you that everyone's gotta have you? she thought to herself, gripping her bottle tighter. One thing's certain, though: those damned whores are gonna fucking pay.

It seemed that M4A1 somehow heard that thought, her forlorn expression shifting to concern as she turned to look at her.

"Is something wrong...?" she asked softly.

"Oh, most of my friends were just killed a mere hour ago and I nearly failed my mission, but nah, everything's fine...!" the Slav muttered without thinking, gesturing to the dead. "Actually, can you indulge me and answer something?"

When the elite nodded slowly she gladly continued, her anger rapidly rising despite her best efforts to quash it.

"What about you, or your team, is so goddamned special that three of my friends had to die just so you could be safe and sound within our walls, huh? Why does every-fucking-body bend over backwards for you when shit goes sideways but leave everyone else to suffer when shit hits our fan, huh?! Why in God's name did those fucking bucketheads take an interest in you, and why do we all have to pay for it?!"

"I-I don't know, I d-didn't mean for any of this to happen...!" M4A1 tried to reply, only to get cut off by the older Doll.

"And this isn't even the first time this shit happened! You used Skorpion and her team as pawns then left them to die mere weeks ago just so you could escape, and I'm willing to bet that you've done this to countless other Dolls in your lifetime! Or get this: from three months to a month ago numerous frontline Griffin bases were attacked and destroyed, with most if not all their vital personnel dead! At first, I thought it was because Sangvis was getting desperate to breach into the mainland, but it was so they could get to you, wasn't it?!"

The memory of her finding A-91's bloodied and broken body surrounded by dead Sangvis reared its nasty head at her, her fury only getting worse as the idea that this so-called "elite" was responsible for her lifelong friend's death manifested in her head.

"To think that my best friend, a girl I knew for my whole life, died because HQ cared more about you than the people who fought tooth-and-nail for them for years... To think that all those people died, when they didn't have to, while you sat safely in HQ..."

She was no longer yelling, but that simply made the malice in her voice all the more prominent, the only active passenger of the Blackhawk averting her gaze and shrinking fearfully with every word spoken but not daring to speak lest she do something more drastic.

"Un-fucking-believable... you don't even have anything to say...?" the Russian asked incredulously after a moment, about to start again when M4A1 looked up at her remorsefully.

"I'm... sorry..." she said in a whisper, voice so small it was a wonder she even heard it.

"What? Speak up, I can't hear you."

"I'm sorry... that you had to experience that..." the brunette said more clearly, straightening up her posture. "That you had to watch your home burn to the ground around you, that you had to lose everything and everyone you held dear... It may sound hollow to you, but I never wanted to leave those Dolls to die, yet because of my orders I had to... But more than that, I'm sorry I dragged you into this mess in the first place... Maybe, if I was stronger, then I would've been able to avoid having to split up with my sisters, and you wouldn't have had to lose your friends..."

Despite how hesitant she sounded there was no mistaking the honesty of her words, or the regret that stung at her for every Doll she had used to cover for her, and AK-47 found that she simply couldn't stay angry at her for long, sighing in resignation as she slumped back in her seat.

"Your sisters, what're they like?" she asked slowly, anger slowly replaced with curiosity.

"Well, there's Big Sis M16, she's very protective of me, and she's the oldest, most experienced member of the team..."

"What model of M16?"

"M16A1."

"She doesn't happen to listen to 'Fortunate Son,' does she?" the blonde asked with a deadpan expression.

That immediately caused M4A1 to laugh, her voice easily filling the helo as she did so, stopping about six seconds later before speaking again.

"Yeah... Oh, uh, then there's our grenadier, SOP-II, or M4 SOPMOD II. I was terrified of her at first, but time went on and then I got to understand her better and we're good now. Oh, uh, she's a bit energetic and loves to fight, although she's also fond of collecting parts from destroyed Sangvis troops..."

AK-47 raised an eye at her slowed tone, immediately filing this "SOPMOD" in the crazy section of her personnel files before speaking again.

"Huh. Anyone else?"

"A markswoman named Spike's Tactical AR-15, sometimes called STAR. Uh, she's a bit taciturn and it can be hard to talk to her sometimes, but we make it work..." the brunette trailed off. "Anyways, that's all I can tell you off the top of my head..."

Something then lit up in M4A1's head and she suddenly leaned forward in her seat, bright-eyed like a teenage girl who got asked out by a cool guy as she asked a question of her own.

"Do you have any sisters, AK?" she asked brightly, happy to not think of what just went down.

"Uh..."

Reaching into her bag the Russian withdrew a somewhat worn photo from it after a couple seconds of groping around it, showing it to the brunette under the Blackhawk's internal light.

"The one in uniform's AK-74M." she explained, pointing to a beautiful pale-haired girl wearing EMR camo on the far left of the photo, standing next to a younger AK-47. "Professional and reserved, hates bright colors with a passion, but she's actually very sweet. Sucks she wants to serve the Army instead of Griffin, though, says it's too chaotic for her tastes."

She then pointed to a voluptuous darker-skinned woman with magenta hair, a somewhat monochrome outfit and a Saiga-12 shotgun.

"This is Saiga. Clean-freak, but a bit of a perv around cute girls." she told her. "Funny how she bitched me out for drinking vodka when she spent her free time staring at girls' butts."

M4A1 raised an eyebrow at that, but gave no question as she pointed to a blonde girl with clothes arranged in the colors of the Russian Federation flag, a black hoodie, and a strange set of green camo pants/black shorts.

"This is AKS-74U, otherwise called Krinkov. Like with me, her weapon isn't an original Krinkov from '74 since it has polymer furniture instead of the classic wooden furniture. A bit of a prude, once threatened to pump an older Commander full of lead just for taking a tiny little peek at her chest, but she's decent overall."

"Wow, your sisters seem as different from one another as mine." M4A1 said before her eyes fell to a final person in the photo, who wore a true monochrome uniform with white hair and gold eyes.

"AK-Alfa, a collaboration Doll between the US and NUSSR post-war. Liked to collect empty beer bottles 'cause she liked how they shimmered in the morning light." AK-47 explained. "Got drunk a bit easier than the rest of us, so it was inadvisable to give her any explosives if she drank any liquor. Still remember the screams..."

"Hey, we're almost at base, so get those Dolls ready for Andrei, yeah?" the pilot notified, causing the atmosphere to shift back to somberness as the two remembered their losses.

"Don't worry about it, they can come back after Andrei puts in their backup data." the Russian told M4A1 before she could say anything, looking out the window to see Station 794 in the distance. "It's gonna suck to have to tell them they died, though..."

"Right... Is the Commander going to hate me for this...?"

Looking up at the hesitant-sounding elite she simply reached over and patted her shoulder reassuringly.

"He won't, if anything he'll just hate Sangvis more." she told her calmly. "Anyways, I gotta get Howa up, and I'm not sure if she'll get mad at you or not, so don't say anything to her just yet. Oh, what even happened to split you up from your team?"

The girl took a minute to respond, clearly trying to word it in a way that didn't reveal classified intel, but she managed to do so.

"We were on a data-retrieval mission in the Sector, and we were compromised by Sangvis, so we hailed a team of Dolls that were unattached to any base to cover for us, and after an encounter with a powerful Ringleader we decided to split up..." she recalled. "I was supposed to find a capable Commander who could save us while they threw Sangvis off of my trail, and while I succeeded in my endeavor, they're still stranded in the Sector, awaiting rescue..."

Aw, hell... Looks like we've got our work cut out for us...

"Damn. Seeing as you wound up with us, HQ's probably gonna make our Boss help you find the others in your team, and I've got my own bones to pick with those overconfident brainlets, so count yourself lucky."

Moving to her ally's seat after telling the elite that she soon gave the sleeping Japanese girl a good shake, awakening her and causing her to open her eyes slowly as she took in her only surviving teammate.

"A-Are we back...?" she asked hesitantly, still groggy as she hadn't fully booted up yet.

"No, but we're close. First stop is the Repair Bay so Andrei can fix the others up."

Howa 64's blue eyes slowly shifted towards her dead allies secured in the other seats, then looked downwards towards her hands as a remorseful sigh escaped her lips.

"Did we at least get her...?" she asked softly, and AK-47 waited a moment before she spoke again.

"Yeah." she replied with a wry smile as she thought back to that hellish landscape. "Yeah, we did."

Commander Ian Becker

Standing outside the helipad after the sun had fully set a mentally-fatigued Ian sighed ruefully as he reflected on what went down a mere hour ago.

Three KIA, including two Cores.

Three requiring repairs.

Another Ringleader neutralized along with a little over a hundred-fifty hostile infantry units.

And of course, one VIP retrieved.

He had actually spent a lot of time deciding on whether or not to wait for the team he sent until they got back, as on one hand he wanted to be the first thing his surviving troops saw but on the other hand he couldn't bear the thought of seeing the broken, bloodied body of his first friend in ten years, along with two other Dolls he was fond of.

Thankfully, Kalina had chosen to accompany him to the helipad, the ginger ignoring the feel of the somewhat chilly night air on her exposed skin as she stood next to him with a hand on his shoulder, watching as two Blackhawks came into view, the thumping of helicopter blades audible in the distance as they neared the base.

As they came into view two men with signal batons waved them towards the helos, hailing them down as they neared, and as they landed the wind pushed around by the blades pushed against the pair aggressively, causing them to cover their faces to keep the wind out of their faces.

Then the doors opened and a wounded AK-47 and Howa Type 64 hopped out, gingerly carrying the bodies of M1911, who had a cleanly-made hole through her chest from a broadsword of sorts and blood-like coolants trickling down her bottom lip, and Springfield, who had multiple plasma burns and holes dotting her frame. Their faces were remorseful as they carried their fallen allies to the Repair Bay and they said nothing to him as they carried out their orders, but nobody looked more sorrowful than the VIP they died to protect, who carried a slashed-open MP5 with the utmost care as she followed her defenders out of the helo.

"What a fucking waste..." he muttered under his breath before sending one of the signallers to relieve the spec-ops girl of her burden.

"H-Huh?" she squeaked as the man took MP5's body in his arms and started towards the Repair Bay, then she turned to the Commander before her as he approached her.

"I take it you're M4A1?" he asked, calming his nerves despite what he'd just seen.

"Y-Yes. I am ready to take full responsibility for the casualties you—"

"Don't." he said, cutting the brunette off. "You're not to blame for this. You didn't kill them, and you sure as hell didn't use them to evade capture like the rumors said."

Gently grasping the beautiful girl's arm he made his way down the ramp and towards the defunct Forward Basecamp's entrance, where the still-functioning UV filters waited to cleanse them of any radiation particles, and the ultraviolet light washed over them as the mists sterilized whatever contaminants stuck to them.

"W-Where are we going?" M4A1 asked softly as they entered the base from an entrance he hadn't used since he first arrived, her eyes darting across the dark room erratically as she tried to get a clue to her current environment.

"My office, so we can get debriefed and figure out what the hell happened back there."

"R-Right..."

Now sitting in his office and under better lighting Ian could now appraise M4A1 in greater detail as she stood at attention in front of him.

Her posture and the way she held her over-used, dirtied weapon screamed professionalism, and her scarf and weathered, bloodied attire were similar to that of an intimidating Special Forces operator (or Matheson with the skull-patterned scarf alone), but she herself was more like a highschooler with her complexion and gentle demeanor. He privately noted the fact that her tight-fitting top was actually a leotard and that she was very "physically developed" under her layers but he didn't bring her to his office so he could stare at her like some kind of voyeur, despite how beautiful she was, so he instead got up, grabbed a second chair from a corner, and set it down for her, patting it as he sat back down.

"Sit down, please." he told her, watching as she sat down on the provided chair. "Anyways, could you please answer any questions I have about you?"

When the Doll demurely nodded he took that as a sign to continue, pulling out a notepad and pencil as he did so.

"State your name, manufacturer, and affiliation, please."

"Colt M4A1, 16LAB, Anti-Rain Team." M4A1 replied calmly.

"16LAB? Anti-Rain?" the dark-haired veteran asked as he wrote the information down.

"16LAB is IOP's research and development division, lead by the scientist Persica, and Anti-Rain is what the 'AR' in the team's title stands for, not ArmaLite."

Writing the info down with a nod, he asked another question.

"Who are your subordinates?"

"M16A1, aloof and mellow with a drinking habit and protective tendencies over me, M4 SOPMOD II, unpredictable, chaotic in the field, and excitable, and ST AR-15, taciturn and professional despite a civilian background..." M4A1 told him. "If you want more on them, ask Miss Persica."

"I'll keep that in mind. What sets you apart from other Dolls serving Griffin and Kryuger?" he asked. "If there's classified matters in that then answer what you can."

"Mmm, there's my advanced Command Module, and I've got built-in NVG lenses along with a decent Electronic Warfare suite. On top of that, me and my sisters bear experimental Neural Clouds, which allows us to behave even more humanlike than most second-gen IOP Dolls as well as boost our cognitive capabilities, but that also means we can't copy and back up our data like others—"

"Which means you're as vulnerable to death as I am." Ian finished knowingly, causing the spec-ops Doll to nod sadly. "Shit, no wonder HQ was so hard-set on finding you."

"Yes. Commander, may I ask you something?"

"Sure, go ahead." he replied, causing the girl to lean forwards in her seat and stare him in the eyes as she spoke.

"Will you help me find my sisters? I know you almost lost an entire team to get me here, but they're still stranded out there, without backup to rely on or anywhere to restock or get repairs and recharge, and I-I'm scared of what might happen to them while I'm here, so please... just help me save them..."

He had no plans on stopping his search in any case, but to hear the girl ask him to help her so desperately with her weirdly-effective puppy-dog eyes only solidified that resolve to finish the job.

"Don't worry, I'll do whatever I can to help." he told her firmly, causing her to beam at him with hope in her eyes.

"R-Really...?"

"'I will never leave a fallen comrade.'" the ex-soldier replied, quoting the American Soldier's Creed. "You and your sisters may not be part of my roster, but I'll do whatever it takes to help, okay?"

"Thank you, Commander..." she said from the bottom of her heart as she prepared to do something out of gratitude— only for HQ to call at the worst time.

"Damn, I was hoping to have a full-fledged report ready by the time they called, but oh, well..." the rookie groaned, then answered the call.

"Commander, how'd it— you found her..." Helian trailed off as her hologram materialized, sharp golden eyes locking onto the elite.

"Yeah, I did. Just took losing three of my girls to get her back, that's all."

The Sub-Director's face hardened, and a good few seconds passed before she spoke once more, her tone sympathetic.

"I'm sorry for your losses. Tell me who died and I'll get you the supplies to bring them back."

As the dead bodies of his subordinates showed up in his mind again Ian was just about to answer before M4A1 beat him to the punch, speaking clearly so she was heard properly.

"M1911, MP5, and M1903 Springfield." she informed.

"Also, AK-47, Howa Type 64, and M4A1 herself need repairs." the Commander added.

"Noted, I'll get the supplies there by tomorrow, is that good enough?"

"Perfect, ma'am."

"That's good. Now, could you fill me in on what happened in that village, or would you rather file a report on it?" Helian asked.

The two sitting in the office shared a look before replying.

"Mmm, both. Both is good."

"Yep."

"So the first few hours of the op were pretty much just waiting for M4 to show up, with 601's sniper team dealing with enemy patrols coming through the village. Around six, when she finally showed up, turned out the enemy had surveillance on the place and they immediately launched an assault on the place." Ian started, then as the last words left his mouth M4A1 continued.

"Me and the extraction team sent to get me dug into a church and set up defenses as quickly as possible, then when the attack commenced we dispersed and each of us held a separate part of the church against Sangvis. It worked very well, until that Ringleader showed up."

"Ringleader?" Helian's eyebrow went up in questioning.

"SP524 Executioner, elite shock trooper model produced in 2058. Intended to break defensive lines and assert rapid dominance upon the enemy." Ian explained, seemingly confirming something to the Sub-Director.

"I take it she caused your casualties?"

M4A1 somberly nodded, hands clenching into fists.

"It was so sudden... She burst into the church and sent M1911 flying into a wall, then grabbed me and threw me away from my post by an MG placement. While I was getting up I heard the others fighting her, then I heard that MP5 was killed, and when I looked back up, she'd ran M1911 through... AK-47 bayonet charged her out of fury the next moment and Howa 64 planted C4 on her back before detonating it, and while she was disoriented we recovered their dead and retreated from the church, Howa 64 going with Springfield and me going with AK."

She then took a deep breath, and Ian could easily see the regret stinging at her as she continued somberly.

"We spent the next few minutes evading Executioner, and that was when backup arrived from 794, but Executioner found us again, so we had split up so AK could rig the church with C4 and I could keep the target from catching on until she was ready, then an M500 and a Sten joined me in baiting her while the explosives were set while an MG3 and P38 cut down on the enemy infantry..."

"In the end, the plan worked, and Executioner was incapacitated by the explosives. We were unable to extract any information from her and she took to taunting me and threatening my sisters, but me and AK weren't about to let her get the last laugh in, so we finished her off, then when Howa returned with a G36 and a G3, we learned that Springfield died defending Howa, then after recovering their dead we extracted from the area at last..."

It was a bit heart-wrenching to hear about her end of the operation that killed his girls in greater detail, but the Commander steeled himself and avoided doing anything stupid.

"I'm truly sorry you had to experience that, and even though you weren't onsite I know exactly how you must be feeling, Commander." the Sub-Director offered her condolences.

"It's fine, not like they're perma-dead." he grunted out simply.

Which instead means I get to watch them die over and over again, wonderful...

"Maybe, but it doesn't lessen the impact of it any less." Helian advised— just as someone called her on her end.

"Haah, that damned cat." she groaned before turning to the two. "I'm sorry in advance for this, Commander."

Soon, the hologram of a rather eccentric woman appeared beside Helian's, her slim frame clad in a lab coat with a tan shirt under it and a tight-fitting skirt. Her reddish eyes were tired-looking with bags under them and her pinkish hair was a tangled mess any human girl he knew would have an aneurysm over, but other than her pale skin that indicated that she hadn't seen sunlight in ages the strangest thing about her were the white and black-trimmed cat ears atop her head. If he squinted he could tell that this woman was actually rather beautiful, but suffered from a severe lack of sleep that would easily get a soldier killed and a severe case of eccentricity.

"This is Persica, head of IOP's R'n'D division 16LAB." the Sub-Director introduced, and before this weird cat-woman even spoke he knew his superior's apology would be well-earned. "She's responsible for every second-generation IOP Doll in existence, as well as Dummy-Linking, Imprint Technology, and the Zener Network."

"Nice to meet you, Commander." she greeted tiredly, waving a little before turning to M4A1. "Good to see you too, M4."

"Good to see you too, Persica..." the elite greeted demurely, waving at the scientist.

"Have you heard from the others yet?"

"No, not since we split up."

"Oh. Do you have it?"

Ian then watched as M4A1 carefully removed what looked to be an SD card of sorts out of her neck and inserted it into his projector, transferring whatever data was on it to Persica's end, and while he'd gotten used to being around Dolls over the course of May, June, and eleven days of July it was still a very strange thing to see.

"Mmm, yeah, that's the stuff..." the cat-woman hummed tiredly as she checked the data, sipping a cup of coffee.

"You sound like she just gave you a messed-up doujin or something." the Commander couldn't help but comment, raising an eyebrow.

"Wow, you were definitely in a squad with Commander Shi Jun." Helian commented in response, a rare smile gracing the normally-strict woman's features for the first time.

"Anyways, I wanted to talk to you, Commander, about the rest of the AR Team. Helian, do you mind leaving?" Persica asked, causing the Sub-Director's smile to drop instantly and her eye to twitch before she gave in and left, leaving the cat-woman's hologram to dominate his table.

"So... what do you want to talk to me about, Persica?"

The Next Day...

Waking up in a rather calm manner, Ian took a look at the clock on his bedside table and groaned upon seeing it at 7:00 A.M. before pulling his blanket off and slowly getting out of his bed, careful not to awaken his guest, who thanks to a request from that damned cat Persica (who also info-dumped all kinds of shit onto him the previous night) wound up sleeping in his bed, despite there being free space in the dorms, and on top of that she'd convinced Helian to make him her new handler.

He had a bad feeling his workload would increase at least two-fold from there.

Turned out, M4A1 looked even more pure-heated in her sleep than when she was awake (perhaps due to the negativity eating at her— or rather both of them— mere hours ago), clad in a traditional set of pale green pajamas as she lay huddled up in his sheets, the damages suffered repaired by Andrei after spare parts for her got sent their way and leaving her unhurt. Thankfully Kalina and G36 were told of the request and wouldn't get the wrong idea if they came in on him.

"Hey, time to get up, kiddo." he told the girl softly, carefully poking her cheek and causing her to wake up with a cute groan, brown eyes opening up as her head rose from the pillow.

"G-Good morning, Commander..." the brunette greeted with a cute yawn, brushing some hair out of her face.

"Morning." he said back, reaching down and grabbing a spare set of clothes for her. "Use the bathroom to change, then meet me at the range."

Right before he stood up to get himself a new uniform, though, he heard a grumbling noise and turned around to see M4A1 chuckle sheepishly, it only then occuring to her that she likely hadn't eaten in days thanks to being stranded in the wilderness.

"Wanna get something to eat first?" the Commander asked with a disarming smile.

"Yes, please."

As she got off the bed to change clothes Ian thought back to everything he'd learned from Persica the previous night as he changed into his own clothes.

M4A1 herself was described as "too pure for the world they lived in" and fit the descriptor perfectly, which was why Persica wanted her to stick with him like she did. She was also highly indecisive and meek, which were not good traits for a leader to have, but could fight rather well thanks to her mil-spec frame, her advanced Fire Control Core, and her experimental Neural Cloud. In the end he decided to get Shi Jun to assist him in training her leadership skills up so she could be the leader Anti-Rain needed.

M16A1, a tall, shapely woman with features similar to M4A1's but with braided hair and an eyepatch covering her right eye with orange highlights, was first activated a good bit before Sangvis Ferri's uprising, giving her a wealth of experience to make use of, and she also carried a bullet-resistant case of sorts with her for defense against gunfire or as a bludgeoning tool.

M4 SOPMOD II, a pink-haired devil-looking girl with bloodred eyes and hair accents, was highly eccentric and unpredictable, tending to utilize her M203 launcher and clawed hands to rip and tear through the Sangvis horde alongside her namesake rifle and collecting their body parts as souveniers and for further modifications to herself. She honestly terrified him, but he'd never be caught dead saying that to anyone's face.

ST AR-15 was the most petite member as well as the designated marksman, bearing a deeper pink color and indigo highlights to her long hair as well as indigo eyes, and she was listed as being a bit standoffish compared to the others, as well as highly professional-behaving, but M4A1 informed him that it was because she was self-conscious of her civilian roots, among other things.

Unlike M4A1, these three were highly proficient on their lonesome, and he had a pretty good clue where to start looking for at least SOPMOD, although he'd wait until his forces had returned to their former strength first.

"Okay, I'm done!"

His mind returned to the present whem M4A1 herself left the bathroom, clad in a clean, intact version of her standard outfit with her scarf being the only thing remaining the same on her person as she left the bathroom.

"Good, let's go get some food now, 'kay?"

"Yeah."

Walking towards the door, he braced for something stupid to happen, only to ope it and find nothing waiting for him— except for one of G36's Dummies, its limbs distinctly inhuman with visible joints in the knees, elbows, and wrists.

"I have come to report that Grizzly Mk. V has returned to Griffin Headquarters." the support unit replied, voice monotone. "Also, due to M1903 Springfield's damages my mainframe will be assuming control of the Café alongside Sten Mk. II."

"Understood."

As the Dummy left to the Café the pair followed suit, carefully following the Dummy so the brunette trailing behind didn't get lost wandering the halls until they soon entered the Café, where a dutiful G36 stood at the counter, her normal outfit traded for a white button-up shirt with a red tie, a black pencil skirt that reached halfway to her knees with a brown covering of sorts around it, a pair of black flats, and a brown head covering over her blonde hair, a pair of red glasses adorning her face.

"Good morning, G36." the Commander told her, waving politely as he and M4A1 reached the bar, where AK-47 sat at while eating a simple breakfast consisting of bacon and eggs, the dog-eared M500 and Gestapo-uniformed MP41 present as well.

"Ah, guten morgen, Kommandant." the maid-turned-barkeep greeted back as they sat down on a pair of stools. "What would you like to eat?"

"Uh..."

For a moment Ian tried to think of something M4A1 would like to have for breakfast, attempting to use his assessment of her from the previous night to help him— only for that same assessment to come in real handy for him.

"Give the new girl some cinnamon rolls." he told the maid Doll with a smirk. "I myself would like what AK's having, and a cup of coffee to go with it."

"Specifications?"

"Three tablespoons of sugar and one tablespoon of creamer. Use medium-dark coffee for it."

"Give me a moment, Kommandant."

As G36 disappeared to the kitchen AK-47 turned to look at the two, taking a swig of vodka like it was just water before greeting them.

"Morning, Boss." she greeted. "Sleep well, M4?"

"A-A bit..." M4A1 confessed, looking away from the Russian with reddened cheeks and drawing MP41's gaze to her.

"Eh, spent half my night coming up with other ways I could've killed Executioner and playing them out in my head or reliving my best friend's death over and over again, so you're lucky you slept alright."

"Where's Howa?" Ian cut in, curious as to where the new blood had gone.

"Repair Bay. Andrei wants to run diagnostics on her frame before she leaves." AK-47 replied curtly. "She might be mad at M4 for what happened to her friends, so be careful if those two meet."

"You see, her team has an awful reputation for using Dolls as cannon fodder to escape tough situations during their operations, and quite a few of your Dolls were victims of her team's tactics." MP41 added while pointing to FNC, who was giving M4A1 a death glare from an adjacent table. "And last I checked, your team lost multiple members after the enemy attempted to seize her, and someone as new as her isn't exactly able to hold her emotions back, so she would have to have some exceptional self-control to avoid letting loose on that girl."

"How the hell do you know this already?" the Commander asked in both awe and concern.

"I have my ways~" the SMG chirped mischievously.

Remind me not to do anything dumb with her around.

"Okay... so how's FN-49 holding up?" the dark-haired veteran asked, changing the topic from MP41's info-gathering abilities.

"Wasn't onsite when it happened, but I told her before I went to bed last night." AK-47 told him with a sigh, taking another swig of vodka. "Somehow she doesn't blame M4 for it, but she's plenty upset over it."

"What of Echelon Two?"

"Safe to say that everyone's feeling down, and their leader's dead, so they're not left alone by that shitshow, and FNC wants M4 gone as soon as possible. Of course, the new arrivals haven't lost anyone so they aren't as affected by it as the others but they have enough sense not to cause shit."

Looking back to M4A1 he could easily see regret in her features as her fists clenched in her lap, the deaths that occured in her presence affecting her quite visibly as well as being in the presence of so many Dolls who'd been hurt by her team's classified operations.

"Sucks to be FNC then, 'cause I was assigned as M4's new handler." he revealed, causing the Belgian AR to jolt up and glare at the elite in question, only to be stopped by his own glare, his authority making itself known at the right moment.

"Fascinating~" the snitch besides M4A1 chirped, jotting it down in a small notepad before M500 bopped her on the head.

After a minute G36 and Sten emerged from the kitchen carrying multiple plates of food, Sten delivering the cinnamon rolls ordered to his companion before giving him his breakfast, G36 supplying coffee and food to the other two bar occupants, his own cup set in front of him by G36's Dummy.

"Eh, danke." he thanked in German, the delectable scent of the food that was delivered wafting into his nose and making his mouth water.

"Okay, Miss M4, these are my own recipe, so please enjoy!" Sten said before retreating to the kitchen with a perfect customer-service smile.

Despite his own hunger he couldn't help but be entranced as the brunette carefully picked up one of the steaming cinnamon rolls before tenderly taking a bite out of it, her expression shifting to bliss as she tasted it— then gobbled the whole thing up as if she hadn't eaten in days— which was probably the case thanks to being stranded from her teammates.

"Wow, slow down, kiddo." he laughed, causing M4A1 to blush after being caught wolfing her food down.

"And here I though SPAS-12s were infamous for ration consumption." AK-47 laughed along with him.

"H-Hey, I haven't eaten in days, you know...!" she meekly defended herself.

"It's fine, just eat up, 'kay?"

With a quick nod she did as she was told, finishing her breakfast at a slower pace than normal and allowing Ian and the others to finish their food with smiles on their faces, their past struggles briefly forgotten as they dined in peace.

Tactical Doll Howa Type 64

Thanks to the damages suffered Howa 64 and AK-47 had spent their nights in the Repair Bay after getting off the Blackhawk under Andrei's supervision, the weathered repairman currently busy running diagnostics checks on her. Like AK-47 had told her he was well-mannered despite his grizzled appearance, and to her relief he knew exactly what she was going through thanks to serving the Soviet Army's Engineer Corps back during World War 3.

"You girls have it very easy compared to us, you see." Andrei had told her during her actual repairs, as she didn't want to go to Level 2 for them. "While you could theoretically live forever if technology allowed it and you and your friends can back your memories up onto a server as insurance in case of death, we can't. We take a bullet to the head or get hit by artillery, and we're gone for good, just like that. Sure, you've got to wait for a new frame to house your Core if your body was destroyed and you'll lack some memories if you lost your Core, but you're a lot better off than us humans overall."

Despite that, it still hurt to look at or think of her dead friends, whose bodies were stripped down and placed in stasis pods while they awaited repair, and given that MP5 and M1911 needed to make use of their backup data, they'd have forgotten everything they experienced back at the village and before then.

Springfield would remember everything, though, which both comforted and terrified the Japanese Doll, as she'd be stuck with the memory of her death when she woke up. Honestly, the whole operation haunted her even after a day had passed since then, and she couldn't spend even a minute doing nothing without thinking of that damned mission, or of how Springfield pushed her out of the way when her gun clicked dry and a Vespid ambushed them, of how she died in her arms while the backup team was powerless to help.

Then there was M4A1.

Thanks to numerous circumstances, she had been unable to talk with her due to requiring a debriefing from HQ and the fact that Helianthus had to send spare parts for the elite AR due to Andrei not having any parts of her caliber, but even then Howa didn't wannt to see her anyways, the feeling not helped by what FNC told her back in the armory when she was gearing up.

"Wanna know something about AR Team? They're heartless, willing to use any and all nearby Dolls as cannon fodder as long as they can escape from whatever pickle they get themselves into. Doesn't matter if they act like they do care, 'cause the spec-ops types never do."

The thought of her alone made her blood boil, and with how many were killed in that mission it seemed perfectly in-character for who FNC described, and she wanted to do nothing more than imitate her notoriously-brutal Imperial ancestors and jab the ever-loving shit out of that heartless "elite" with her knife the next time he saw her.

"Hey, you alright, kid?" Andrei asked concernedly as he watched her stare off into space.

"I'm fine." she grunted out, currently sat on the gurney with her legs hanging off the side, only underwear covering her slim frame so the senior repairman could watch her limbs' movement better. Of course, had she not been so livid with M4A1 she would havr been embarrassed by her state, but that wasn't the case.

"We'll talk about that later. Right now, I'm going to have to test your body movements. First, please try turning your head in each of the cardinal directions." the technician instructed.

She did as she was told, turning her head slowly in each direction so he could get a better read of her motions as she did so.

"Good, that's still going well. Now, I want you to keep track of this light with just your eyes, got it?" he said, procuring a green light emitter.

She nodded, then began to track the light like instructed, Andrei once again going to the cardinal directions with the light, then doing a full circle with it and smiling when her blue eyes tracked it perfectly.

"Looks like your optics are working properly as well, good. Now, you mind kicking your legs out so we can check the joints?"

She did as instructed, kicking each leg out somewhat slowly a couple times each so Andrei could see her movements, X-ray tablet in hand to see her joints directly.

"Good, good, next up is your arms. Just move them around in a comfortable fashion, 'kay?"

"Hai."

Extending her left arm out she turned it in a 360-degree angle at a slow pace, then bent her elbow until her forearm touched her bicep, then extended her arm again, flexing and contracting her lithe fingers before tilting her hand upwards, then carefully repeating the motion with her other arm.

"Alright, everything's in working order, now get on your feet and walk around the gurney so we can test your balance, then we're done here."

Slipping off the gurney Howa 64 winced at the cold tempature of the dark metal floors against her feet but did as instructed, walking a slow circle around the gurney to test her movement, then stopping once she felt satisfied with the results.

"Looks like everything's in working order." Andrei declared, picking up one of the Doll's spare uniforms and handing it to her. "Come back here if anything feels off out there, got it?"

"I will." she replied, quickly pulling her uniform on before bowing and leaving the Repair Bay, casting one last glance at the stasis pods containing her allies before she did so.

"AK-san, where are you...?"

Walking along the halls of the still-unfamiliar base Howa 64 walked slowly as she tried to scan for her allies with Forewarning, but finding everyone but AK-47. After she left the Repair Bay the first place she checked was the Café, noting G36's presence rather than Springfield's there as she asked about her ally, only for her to send her to the dorms, which did not have her.

However, with both the dorm rooms and the Café lacking the Russian in them, she'd instead seeked out FN-49, the team's Rifle, to ask about her senior's habits.

"W-Well, she tends to go to the firing range to practice her marksmanship daily and destress in an alcohol-free way, so c-check there..." she had told her while reorganizing the armory.

Back in present day as she neared the firing range she heard the Kalashnikov's telltale report and immediately knew she was going the right way, performing a scan just to be sure and finding AK-47's signal, the Commander's signal— and M4A1's signal.

"Deep breaths, Howa, no need to get angry with her just for being here..." she told herself sternly, taking multiple deep breaths before descending down the stairs towards the range.

Thankfully, when she entered the large room, the first thing she saw was her friend in Stall 03, firing at some target drones with Sangvis Dolls displayed on the fronts, a sigh of relief escaping her as she took the next stall, thankful that the AR Team leader wasn't in it as she loaded her battle rifle up.

"So you see, a lot of the shots fired by soldiers in typical engagements are to suppress the enemy to keep them from fighting back, so it's better to have thirty round mags so you can do that easier." she heard the Commander explain to M4A1 in another stall. "And considering how nasty Sangvis' plasma weapons are, being able to effectively suppress them is very important, especially so your more precise teammates can strike them down while they're pinned down."

"O-Okay..." she heard the American AR reply.

"Also, keeping your team consistently informed about your current combat situation is key to preventing the fog of war from affecting your squad too badly, so the minute something changes on the battlefield, let your teammates know about it. Trust me when I tell you that the top brass giving us intergrated comms in 2042 was the best thing they did since they gave us ACOGs back in the 2010s."

Realizing she was eavesdropping Howa 64 returned her attention to the range and shouldered her rifle and took aim as target drones with their default projections were deployed, squeezing the trigger once she lined one up in her sights and hitting it dead-center before switching to another one, striking it down in a similar manner.

Beside her, she heard an M4A1 carbine go off and saw rounds striking at targets displaying Sangvis Dolls on their fronts as tutor and student practiced their marksmanship, the difference in accuracy a telltale sign of the Commander's inherently lower accuracy compared to the Doll he was instructing— the mere idea that a special operations Doll had solicited training from a human Commander boggling her mind.

"AK-san, why is M4 recieving training from Shikikan if she's leading a spec-ops team?" she asked her friend over Zener as she fired at more targets.

"Something about her being too indecisive to make quick, practical decisions on the fly, and who wouldn't wanna be trained by a guy who fought in World War 3?" AK-47 replied, firing a burst at her own targets.

"You have a point. But why isn't she being sent to HQ? Andrei-san told me she'd been repaired before I went through those movement tests."

"She got assigned here for the time being, because her sisters are still MIA and HQ wants us to find the others."

The news that HQ wanted them to find the rest of AR Team and that M4A1 was now assigned to their base left a distinctly nasty taste in her mouth, her gun clicking empty as she dumped the last of her rounds into a target.

"Wonderful..." she grumbled as she reloaded her rifle.

"Okay, first and foremost, the kid is not fit for the job she's got, so don't be hard on her for something she didn't anticipate was gonna happen, and secondly, I'd try to get to know her better before letting the rumors about her team fuck with your perception of them." her senior advised, punctuating the statement with a burst of gunfire. "Trust me, I already ripped into her for that shit, so don't jump on the bandwagon."

Howa 64 didn't know how to feel about that, the sheer amount of things she's heard about Anti-Rain clashing in her head and vying for control, ranging from the stories that solidified their reputation to its leader's apparent indecisiveness, the addition of the deaths she witnessed and the grief eating away at her not doing her any favors.

"Okay, what do you think of her, personally?" she asked next, tone carefully-monitored.

"Sheltered as fuck and certainly not a leader— fuck, I'd be a better team leader and I'm a raging drunk— anyways, whoever created her is overprotective to a T, so her types of operations are limited to low-exposure data retrieval ops according to the Boss, and it was under her order that the actions that earned them their infamy occured."

"Why?"

"It's... complicated." AK-47 replied with a sigh. "Go ahead and ask her if you wanna know, she's right next to your stall, anyways."

Cutting the link with the Russian Howa 64 downed her last target and set her gun down, watching as her results popped up in front of her (showing an astounding 92% accuracy rating) as she opened a link to M4A1.

"May I ask you something, M4?"

"S-Sure." the elite replied demurely, the Commander's instructions barely audible in the background.

"Why is your creator so protective of you, if Dolls aren't able to die permanently as long as they have backup data?"

After a moment of silence, she gave a reply as the gunfire on her end stopped.

"We aren't like normal Dolls... You see, me and my sisters have special Neural Clouds that make backing data up impossible to do, which is why my team used so many Dolls as cannon fodder before coming here..."

As the words left her Neural Cloud the Japanese AR did a double take, Andrei's words about Dolls being semi-immortal clashing with M4A1's statement about her being mortal.

"Y-You can actually die...?" she asked slowly, uncertain if she heard the elite correctly.

"Yes."

While on one hand she was glad to get some answers to the questions she'd had bouncing around her head for a good couple hours, on the other hand she couldn't believe that the members of AR Team weren't immortal, and with what she'd been told just then it gave both a sense of urgency to their upcoming missions and further complicated her feelings towards M4A1, who unlike those she'd lost was completely vulnerable to death.

"Arigato, M4." she said somewhat stiffly. "Tell that to FNC-chan if she gets angry with you, I think she'd understand."

"R-Right... Look, I'm sorry about your friends, Howa..." the brunette apologized softly.

"Don't. I'll get over it once they come back." she cut the other Doll off, a harsh sigh escaping her lips. "If you want to talk to me later, our dorm's the one with an American flag painted on the door."

"Thank you, I guess..."

Soon the link was cut, and Howa 64 groaned as she tried to process everything that'd happened over the past 24 hours, rubbing her head as the operation played back in her head again and everything AK-47 and M4A1 had told her played back similarly, soon leaving her Neural Cloud a cluttered mess.

God, I can't wait for the others to be repaired... she thought defeatedly, grabbing her battle rifle and leaving the firing range behind her.

Commander Ian Becker, a half-hour later...

Watching as M4A1 practiced her shooting with his service rifle as he leaned against the shooting stall's side barrier, Ian pulled out his phone and started looking through his job files, attempting to find a job that only needed a two-man team and was low-risk enough so he could come accompany his newest asset on said job for training purposes, his memories of aiding Ukrainian militias against the Soviet military coming back to him as he searched his contracts list.

Soon, though, he stopped scrolling when he saw a rather fitting job for his current preferrence: a simple crowd control mission involving Sangvis Ferri stragglers formerly under Scarecrow's command, the contract issued by HQ itself. While he'd still bring a full squad with him, it looked to be a good assignment for him and M4A1 to tackle as a training op.

"Hey, I think I found a good job for our little exercise." he said, tapping the file and flippjng his phone around for M4A1 to see, the brunette turning to look at the screen.

"'After SP65 Scarecrow's destruction on the sixth of July, numerous Sangvis squads serving under her now roam the area aimlessly, attacking all forms of life on sight and causing trouble for settlers in the region. If someone were to exterminate these machines we'd be very grateful.' Sounds like a simple operation, but it seems a bit low-priority compared to my previous operations."

"That's the point. This isn't some kind of high-risk mission to eliminate an HVT or rip a base apart from the inside-out, it's just a training exercise so we can get around to broadening your skillset." Ian explained casually. "Besides, we just might wind up finding one of your sisters this way."

"True... Are we going to have backup?"

"Of course we are, even if it's just a low-risk crowd control op I'm not going to go in without people watching my back. So, are you in?"

M4A1 carefully thought it over, and he could see thd geads turning in her head as she did so, cupping her chin with her cybernetic hand as a hum escaped her.

"Let's do it, but can we bring AK-47 and Howa 64?" she requested.

"If they're up to it. Come on let's go."

Getting off the stall the Commander picked up his rifle and exited the stall, M4A1 quick to follow him as he left for the armory, the thought of fighting alongside a human soldier likely exciting her a bit as she did so.

This is gonna be interesting...

So uh, looks like I managed to upload in less than a week again, so I think having a 5-7 day delay between updates is a pretty good pace, what about you?

As for the writing Howa 64's perspective it's a bit weird to think of how Dolls would treat death considering they aren't bound to only one life thanks to their backups, so it might be a bit weird to read. As for everything else I think it went well, although I cut Ian's conversation with Persica short due to being unable to write it well and chapter size concerns were present. Still hoped I did well on it, though.

As for Howa 64 scoring 92% accuracy in her range segment, her accuracy in-game is listed as S grade, making her one of the most accurate ARs in the game, plus it was in an air-conditioned firing range with perfect shooting conditions, which of course is much different from the battlefield.

Also, I'm gonna wait a couple chapters before SOPMOD arrives in the story, so just bear with me on that, but I'll try my best to make her intro the best it can be.

Anyways, I'll see you in the next chapter!