Children of the Night - Epilogue: Mercy for the Wretched

RFB woke up in the Sector S09 repair bay. Even before physical control was restored to her body, she already knew what happened.

She died.

RFB hated this feeling more than anything else. Her consciousness floated in nothingness as she waited for her physical body to activate, bereft of the memories immediately leading up to her death. How did she die? The last memory stored in the Griffin server was her working finishing through a pile of paperwork in some supply depot. She had decided to take a coffee break downstairs; everything else after that was blank. Did Sangvis Ferri send a raiding party? Was there a ringleader with them? Did she make some heroic last stand, or did her team get quickly wiped off the map? So many questions, and no way to answer them.

RFB sat up in the maintenance bed and looked around. A doll with pink hair was curled up a few spots next to her.

"Panakeia?" RFB called out.

"Hey, RFB," wz.29 quietly said as she lifted her head up. She had a gloomy expression on her face.

"Looks like you had a bad day too, haha…" RFB said with a forced smile.

Panakeia didn't respond. She seemed exceptionally sad for some reason.

"Hey, Panakeia," RFB prodded again, "You okay?"

"I'm not…" wz.29 weakly responded, "I had a very important mission, and I failed…"

"Oh…" RFB said, "What kinda mission was it?"

"RFB, you were at the southern foothill depot, weren't you?" wz.29 asked. She then explained everything she could remember to RFB, including how she was supposed to deliver the data drive containing neural backups to the home base.

"Wait, so what happened to the backups?" RFB asked.

"I don't know. The last memory I have backed up was me arriving at the depot. They're currently sifting through the ruins right now."

"Ruins?"

"The whole depot burned down!"

"And no data drive?"

"They haven't found it yet… It'd be fine if it was simply destroyed; what I'm afraid of is if Sangvis Ferri took the data drive with them…"

RFB shuddered at the thought. As the two continued to discuss what could've happened to the depot and data drive, the door to the repair bay slid open and the Commander strode in.

"Commander!" wz.29 exclaimed, "I'm so sorry for what happened, it's all my fault!"

"No," RFB solemnly interjected, "The responsibility should fall on me, as the person in charge of the depot."

"It's neither of your fault," the Commander responded with a sigh, "The investigation team revealed that the depot was raided by none other than the Mobile Task Force's Sabre team."

"Sabre team, dammit!" RFB cursed, "For us to have been targeted by them, it can't be a coincidence!"

"It's not the end of the world," the Commander said, "Sure, the new supply shipment was lost, as was the facility itself, but this isn't something we can't overcome."

"But the neural backups…" wz.29 murmured, staring at the ground.

"Well, about that…" the Commander began to say. He took out a familiar looking data drive from behind his back and placed it in wz.29's hands.

"H-huh?" wz.29 stammered, her eyes going wide as she stared at the device she was entrusted with.

"We found it in the security room deep within the basement of the base," the Commander explained, "It took a long time for our recovery teams to reach that part of the base, with all the fire damage. But there it was, safe and sound."

"What… But, I thought this was Sangvis Ferri's objective?" wz.29 asked, "Did they not find it?"

"Oh, they found it alright," the Commander replied, "I don't mean to be graphic, but we found it on the floor beside RFB's dummy link, which had a bullet hole in it."

"Yikes," RFB said, "So did they like, make a copy of the backups or something?"

"They didn't," the Commander responded, "The drive shows that the contents were accessed and read for a brief period, but the files weren't copied or tampered in any way."

"So what happened then?" wz.29 asked, confused. "Sangvis Ferri went out of their way to chase RFB to the deepest recesses of the depot, they take the data drive and even successfully connected to it, and then they just leave it there?"

"To be honest, I'm not sure what happened," the Commander responded with a shrug, "It's not like they were forced to retreat by the flames or anything; they could've just taken the drive with them."

"Maybe… they felt bad for the dolls whose backups were in the drive," wz.29 proposed.

"Nah, there's no way," RFB countered, "Some of the Mobile Task Force dolls are alright, but Sabre team? Monsters. They're just as bad as the ringleaders. Have you seen the after-action reports from encounters with them? Even if I tried to talk it out with them… Well, you heard how I ended up."

"Well, in that case…"

"Perhaps it'll just stay as one of life's unanswered mysteries," the Commander concluded, shrugging his shoulders. "What exactly happened isn't exactly important. What's important is the result, that our friends and colleagues are safe and sound."

"You've been spacing out ever since you came out of the depot, Night Eyes," Sapphire pointed out, "Is everything alright?"

Night Eyes didn't respond. She continued to stalk ahead of the group, leading back towards Sangvis territory. A sour mood seemed to hang over the entire squad.

"If you have something on your mind, you should say it," Dazzle said, trailing behind her leader.

Night Eyes didn't respond.

"We really made a point tonight, didn't we?" Swiss excitedly quipped, "I bet you didn't think the whole base would go up in flames when you opened up at it, huh, Dazzle?"

The other three continued to silently press forward.

"So… Did you find the data drive at the end?" Swiss continued after a bit, "Y'know, the thing Alchemist told us to find?"

"…Yes," Night Eyes responded.

"And…? What happened to it?" Swiss curiously asked.

Night Eyes fell silent again. She needed some time alone to think about what happened that night.

"Aw, don't be so upset from failing the mission," Swiss cheerfully continued, "It was bound to happen sooner or later. That makes it what, 73 to 2 now? You're still the coolest cat of them all!"

"The mission… wasn't a failure," Night Eyes quietly corrected her, turning back to gaze at her teammates. Her normally harsh demeanour was mellowed in thoughtful contemplation.

"Huh?" Swiss asked, "Then what was it?"

"I'm not sure…" Night Eyes admitted, "Only time will tell…"