The people probably do not know. That though love and curses may seem to run contrary to each other, they bear an uncanny resemblance to one another.
April 20, SY 2150 — 17:27 GCT
Time Since Operation Start — T+7:06:52
Aerial did not move. Even the battery backup to power the inner screens had been drained dry. She had to use the manual release of the canopy to open it, and with shaky hands, she had to push the canopy up and open, and saw with her own eyes the battlefield of her Duel against the New-Type Legion unit. The bits of the Legion lay against the ground, haphazardly, having been stopped in mid-flight, and being flung throughout this level hitherto, landing against columns and the floor in various directions. The one that had been cut in two, landing where it had been cut, in two separate pieces.
This battlefield was silent. Not even a hum or creak from her Reginleif. Not a sound from her Para-RAID.
She looked around at the ruins of the atrium, carved up in the battle between herself and the Legion unit. There was nothing else in this area, except the ruins of pillars, the shattered pieces of glass, and the machine itself in the middle of the room, its armor pierced through with the purged pile driver, impaling it, and leaving it stuck against the ground.
She pulled free her personal defense rifle from its place in the cockpit, and brought it up to her shoulder, aiming it at the machine, in case it decided to be hostile, or start moving again at all.
The Witch dismounted her Reginleif, sliding along its hull until her boots land on the ground beneath her. She crept towards the machine impaled to the ground, her rifle centered on it the entire time she moves.
She stands above it, her rifle pointed down at the lifeless, unmoving machine. She gives it a soft nudge with her boot, half-expecting it to start to life and start attacking her.
It does not.
She takes her hand from the rifle's barrel, and kneels down next to the machine, and feels its armor.
Its armor was cool to the touch and brittle, like rotted wood beneath her hand as she reached out to touch the New-Type. It creaked softly beneath her touch. Its humanoid frame was light, she could easily pick up and move the arms of it herself, even though it was seemingly lifeless.
Suddenly, the machine shuddered, and she sprang back from it. Immediately shouldering her rifle and aiming it at the center of the Legion's mass, although she wondered in a split second, what her rifle's bullets would actually be able to do against its armor. The machine shuddered, and despite the pile driver that had been purged through its central mass, it looked almost like a human trying to sit up. She didn't lower her rifle, despite the lack of hostilities that the machine made towards her. It seemed far more focused on trying to sit upright, rather than do anything to harm her. In fact, it didn't even seem like it noticed that she was there at all. It just seemed the most distraught about the pile driver having been driven through where its abdomen would be if it were human.
Glass crunched beneath her boot as she took a step back, and it was only then did the Legion turn its faceplate to look at her.
There was no discernible human features on the machine's face, no discernible human emotion. It simply looked at her for a few moments, all the while, her rifle was trained on the thing.
Maybe if the armor was so brittle that it felt like it would break under her hands — bullets would do more damage.
It looked at her for a long while, almost impossibly long, as if it were determining something about her, before it reached one of its long, slender, silver fingers towards her. Her grip on the rifle tightened, her right pointer finger coiling around the trigger of the rifle more and more until she was sure it would fire. It never did.
The silver finger reached past the gun, never once making an attempt to disarm it or disable it— nor did it try and harm in her any way. It simply reached for the Para-RAID device wrapped around her ear and resting on her cheekbone.
The finger of the machine tapped it once, and immediately there was the sound of a connection.
The Witch held her ground, and did not move, despite the proximity of the Legion's hand to her throat and face.
"Can you… Hear me?" The machine spoke through the resonance with the stolen voice of her Handler.
She shuddered, the voice was different than the one she had heard before, when her Squadron had been ambushed. Almost like it was in control of itself, rather than being forced to live the same moment over and over. Like it had thoughts of its own. How could it speak over the Para-RAID if the person to who the voice belonged to was dead? That didn't make any sense to her. That wasn't how the Para-RAID was supposed to work. It stopped working if someone was unconscious… Much less dead…
But if the voices of the dead were communicated through a link with Captain Nouzen… Then maybe…
"You look just like… A girl I used to know…" The dead Handler spoke.
The Witch simply blinked at this. How could this be real?
"I wonder… Where she is now…"
"Probably dead…" The Witch whispered to herself, and hated herself for saying it as soon as she did.
The machine chuckled. "Then we'll see each other soon."
The Witch watched as the machine retracted its hand from her Para-RAID, making no attempt to be hostile towards her.
"Why did you attack my Squadron?" She asked.
"I had… To comply." Orders, machines followed their instruction set to the letter, never deviating from them.
"Why don't you attack me now?"
"Because… You look like someone… I knew…" There's a pause, that lasts several seconds, where one could easily imagine the Machine coughing if it were to be able to do such a thing. "You're The Witch… Aren't you?"
"How do you know that?"
"Because Báleygr… Isn't a woman."
"Captain N—" She cuts herself off before she admits the Captain's name in front of the enemy. Despite speaking with a human voice, this is still one of her her enemy. "Undertaker…"
"That's… Probably right." The machine stops trying to sit up, and instead relaxes its mechanical body to the ground. "I'm happy… I got to see you…"
The Witch is silent at this. Her rifle never wavering from where she holds it, how the sight lines up with the body of the machine.
"I'm sorry, that we meet… Like this..."
"You're Captain Miorine Rembran… Handler One of LFRITH." The Witch says. "A White Pig, one of my oppressors… But you still speak kindly to me now. Even as you were just trying to kill me."
"…You're right. And I don't expect… Forgiveness for those things. But yet, I'm still glad that it's you."
The Witch wavers for a moment, unsure of what it is that she could even do next, what she should do next in this situation. She never expected to have a conversation with a Legion, much less an assimilated one. This all didn't feel real — it made her head dizzy, and her hands threatened to shake as she held her rifle.
"I'm sorry Miss Witch… But… I have a favor to ask you."
"What's that?" She asked, shifting on her feet.
"Can you please…" The voice of her Handler sounded like it was choking up. "I don't want to live… As a ghost…"
The Witch's fingers tighten around the barrel of her rifle. Every part of her wants to scream, to lash out at this machine, at this ghost that she hears crystal-clear in her head. She doesn't want this to be the reality she's faced with. She would have rather lived forever, not knowing what happened to Miorine, rather than find her ghost like this. And yet, there's nothing denying this reality, nothing proving that anything but what she sees and hears is real.
This is real.
This isn't a dream.
This isn't a nightmare.
This is the reality she's faced with.
"One thing… Before I do…" The Witch says. The machine's vacant headpiece looks at her expectantly. "What was the name of that girl… The one you… Told me about, before?"
The machine looks away from her, at the ceiling above, as if breathing a sigh of relief, or exasperation.
"Her name was Suletta."
There was a shiver that ran along the Witch's spine at the name. A name that felt like it existed at the back of her mind — the shape of which had always been with her, but had been hidden in the years since she had been moved to the Eighty-Sixth sector as a little girl. A name that felt like it was always there, and out of reach. A name that could've been hers, or the name of someone else — but it was a name that she once knew nonetheless.
The Witch didn't say anything at the name, instead letting the shiver run down her spine in its completeness.
The machine didn't make any more noise, it didn't speak through the Para-RAID.
The Witch kept her rifle leveled.
"I'm sorry, Miorine." The Witch spoke, after a moment.
The machine almost raised itself with a start, as if shocked at hearing the name of the ghost inhabiting it. Before a warm feeling came across the resonance, like a smile, or a heartfelt gesture — something that felt indescribable in the moment, and conveyed more emotion than she would ever expect a machine, even one with a human brain, to emit. A warmth that was from beyond just this very moment.
"I'm sorry… I'm making you do this."
"Better than leaving you like this…" The Witch responded.
"I suppose you're right…" The ghost said.
"…Thank you." It said.
The Witch doesn't say anything. Her emotions threatening to boil over into what she knows she has to do.
The Para-RAID blinks silently, indicating a disconnection that she doesn't hear or see. Instead, she centers the sights of her rifle, clenches her eyes shut, and squeezes the trigger.
The rifle bucks in her hands and against her shoulder, rapidly unloading its 7.62 millimeter ammunition into the brittle armor of the machine. Sparks fly as metal scrapes against metal and buries deep into the central processor of the Legion unit in front of her — into the head of Miorine Rembran at its center.
The rifle clicks in her hands, the sound of an emptied magazine. She squeezes the trigger again, another click. Her hands vibrate with the feeling of the rifle firing in her hands and cannot stop the shaking once she has. Opening her eyes to look at the unmoving machine in front of her, the way it lays against the ground, its headpiece pointed at the ceiling above, and resting against the ground beneath her feet. It doesn't move, its hand resting on the ground between them, like it were simply a person sleeping, rather than an unthinking, unfeeling machine that had just tried to kill her moments before. More like the person whose ghost had inhabited the machine not even seconds before.
Her ears were still ringing, and continued to ring in the moments that followed her rifle running empty. They rung for what felt like an eternity, and when the ringing finally began to clear, her legs had begun to shake from standing still for so long — then, and only then, did the silence set in. Gnawing at her bones, gripping her throat, and threatening to bring her down to the ground next to the final resting place of her Handler.
Her hands continued to shake, despite her insistence that they stop. Her body felt less and less like it was under her control, and more like it was under the control of someone else. She sunk to her knees, beside the metallic corpse, and shakily let the rifle drop from her shoulder — the rifle clattering against the ground as it did. There was no worry about it going off uncontrollably — she knew it was empty. And even if it weren't, she didn't have the strength in her body to prevent it from doing so.
She didn't know why she felt this way, didn't know what it was that caused her to feel such sorrow at the final death of a White Pig.
Maybe it was the fact that she had been the Witch's Handler. Maybe it was the fact that she was the first of the Alba to treat her like a human, and not just like a machine to be used and thrown aside when broken. Maybe it was the fact that she didn't know what had happened to her after the Large Scale Offensive, and some part of her had held out hope against all odds that she'd be okay, that she might be alive despite all that had happened to the Republic and its people in the years since the start of the war with the Legion. Maybe it was the fact that their reunion was in this place, in this circumstance. On the battlefield, and not in a camp for survivors, or even in the Federacy itself. Maybe it was the fact that their reunion was here — the battlefield. The same place where once Miorine had commanded the Processors of the Eighty-Six to battle an unwavering enemy… There was a certain irony in the fact that she had become one of the Legion herself that was not lost on the Witch.
There are pangs in her heart that she can't quite understand, and the shape of a word in the back of her mouth that feels like it wants to crawl its way out.
A thought in the back of her mind bubbles forward, and ushers in tears that wont stop flowing once they start.
"What is your name?" A voice from long ago, back in the Eighty-Sixth sector asks from a cuff on her ear.
Her lips tremble, trying to find the shape of her name, long since buried by years of abuse in the Eighty-Sixth sector, and eroded away by fighting the Legion.
"M-my…"
The shape of a word that she couldn't find. That she didn't remember. That no one around her remembered.
They had called her a "Witch", so strongly and so often that it had taken the place of a real name. Something that she had been called with both affection, and with one's dying breath. Something that belonged to her — quite possibly the only thing that belonged to her anymore, after the last ten years of fighting had taken everything else from her.
Her mother.
Her sister.
Her friends.
Her childhood.
All but her life itself and a moniker that haunted her like a ghost. A Curse placed upon her that could never have been broken.
"M-my name is…"
One by one, memories flooded back to her as she formed the shape of the name with her lips.
Memories of the day before her family sent to the concentration camps of the Eighty-Sixth sector. The way it rained and rained that day. So much that she stayed inside, not speaking to the girl next door who had been her best friend in the world.
Memories of the fight she had, with the Silver-haired girl. Who swore that they would never talk again.
Memories of her sister's smile.
Memories of her mother's warmth.
Of going to school, walking side-by-side with the Silver-haired girl.
The girl showing her how to write her name in the flowing script that the adults used.
Her name.
Her name.
The smile of the Silver-haired girl who had felt like all the answers to her problems.
The memories of Miorine Rembran — the girl who lived next door to her.
"M-my n-name is…"
The word threatened to spill out, but it felt wrong. Like the shape of it wasn't what she intended to say, but it came out anyways.
The Witch spoke her real name to the corpse of Miorine Rembran, and wept.
April 20, SY 2150 — 17:56 GCT
Time Since Operation Start — T+7:20:34
"This is VALKYRIE Leader, we've got Lieutenant Mercury. Her rig is FUBAR, no need for retrieval. Returning to the surface now." Sabina reported to Colonel Milizé. Glancing over her shoulder at the sight of The Witch, who Sabina and Maisie had to drag, practically kicking, screaming and crying away from that strange Legion type. The Witch, once she had lost sight of that Legion unit, had practically clammed up, and refused to move, but was able to be wrangled into Bluebird's cockpit, where she was now harnessed into the auxiliary seat.
Sabina's Bluebird was in the middle of the group of VALKYRIE, as they made their way back the way they had come. They had been the only squad to only take damage, rather than destruction of their Reginleifs. So it made the most sense for them to be the ones to dive back into the Legion-infested tunnels, to try and find where The Witch was, while BRÍSINGAMEN and SPEARHEAD looked for Captain Nouzen, who had been separated from SPEARHEAD at roughly the same time. But, because of the nature of the contact that had attacked The Witch, Colonel Milizé opted to send the entire VALKYRIE Squadron, rather than just the remnants of two, to find The Witch.
Sabina's Bluebird had only taken moderate damage to its left side, leaving it injured, but not out of the fight. Causing Sabina to be in the middle of the group, with the other units who had been injured, but not taken out.
But still, something about the sight of that Legion unit, with its nearly humanoid figure, that was more ornate than the Self-Propelled Mines, stuck with Sabina. Why was it that The Witch had been found sobbing over its form? What had that never-before-seen Legion unit, or rather who had that been?
The screaming over the resonance was dying away, as the Legion retreated, and even then, it wasn't like it was coherent screaming — and neither Sabina, or Captain Nouzen with the ability to hear the dead, were close enough to where The Witch had been, to figure out whose voice it was. And it wasn't like Sabina would've known anyways.
Bluebird and the rest of VALKYRIE trudged their way back to the surface, and once there — began their long march back to the transport vehicles that would ferry them back to base.
April 20, SY 2150 — 18:12 GCT
Time Since Operation Start — T+7:26:12
OPERATION: LABYRINTH — CONCLUDED
Book 2 - CALIBARN - COMPLETE