With M4
Though she was tense, seeing humans around put her somewhat at ease. She'd never heard of this 'Ark', however. As storm clouds gathered above, she stared down this team's commander, rifle gripped tightly in her hands now. The three behind him were all armed with heavy-looking weapons, so she dared not risk upsetting them. Not while she was still alive.
She pulled down her mask, stating, "I've never heard of the Ark," in as calm a voice as she could muster after what she'd just gone through. She continued, "Tactical Doll M4A1… That's my name," and she made sure she had a full magazine loaded. Though the squadmates behind him exchanged some looks, the Commander seemed surprisingly unfazed.
He told her, "Nice to meet you, M4A1," as he sighed in relief. He then told her, "I'm Commander Alyosha Harris. These are Rapi, Neon and Anis," and he pointed to each respective girl. Rapi simply gave her a nod, while the other two seemed surprisingly more peppy in their greetings, though Anis was visibly concerned.
M4 nodded, her grip on her rifle ever-so-slightly loosening. As the first drops of rain began to fall around them, she slung her rifle's belt over her shoulder and pulled out her poncho, draping it over her shoulders as she said, "If we're going to move, we should do it now. Before more of those things come… It took me an entire magazine to kill a small one."
"That's about how bad the Raptures are," Alyosha spoke, then tilted his head and said, "Follow us," as he smiled. She nodded, face remaining impassive as she grabbed hold of her rifle again. As the team started moving out, their feet plopping against the ever-growing puddles, the rain intensified, a gentle wall of water falling all around them.
Faint trickles of radiation played warnings across her heads-up display, but nothing life-threatening. As they walked, she watched the three members of 'Counters' squad talking with each-other. Neon and Anis were pestering each-other, more-like, with Rapi calmly leading the pack next to her Commander. She had flowing, long, pink-blond hair and bright red eyes. Her outfit was black with eerily familiar red accents and stars.
Anis, meanwhile, had dirty blond hair, golden eyes and a somewhat skimpy outfit and Neon had silver hair, green eyes, glasses and a blue and white sailor's uniform. A really strange bunch, honestly. Even stranger that they found her in the clutter of a massive necropolis like this. She paused as she felt a bone crunch underfoot and looked down to see a skeleton laying in the tiny crater she'd walked over.
It was filling with browning water, to the point she was sure the skeleton would be buried underneath the broken asphalt, reclaimed like the rest of the place. Sighing, she shook her head and kept walking, moving ahead to join Rapi and the Commander. She asked the two of them, "How did you find me? And what were you doing up here?"
"We were on a scouting mission and… We were on a scouting mission?" Alyosha replied awkwardly.
Rapi looked at her and said, "One of our comrades picked up your arrival, somehow," as they walked. She continued, "Said it was a ping of sorts, like an 'Old friend' appearing out of thin air," and M4 noticed how the girl was pretty much the embodiment of precaution. Her eyes scanned the areas around them for any hostile contacts while they walked.
… Machine eyes, too.
New Tactical Dolls? M4A1 spoke, "Suppose that makes sense…" though it really didn't. She'd died, hadn't she? Given up her body for Lunasia to use in order to bring about the changes she wanted to bring. And she wasn't home. Those machines were not employed by any known military in the world. The URNC itself never deployed mechs like that and the NUSSR's Military had better-looking vehicles than stuff that looked like a horrific merger of living tissue and synthetic machinery.
What 'friend', though?
She wanted to go into Type-II to search for familiar signals, but decided against it for the time being, simply telling Rapi, "Thank you," without so much as meeting her gaze. She was trying to be proactive, too, keep her eyes peeled for possible machines like the previous… She asked, "What do you call your enemy?"
"Raptures. Why?" Rapi raised a brow.
"So I know what to call out if I see movement on my side," The girl answered, gently shifting her rifle from underneath the poncho and at a ready position. She felt the droplets drip down on her hands and saw them landing on her gun, fogging up the AimPoint red dot sight she'd installed on the top Picatinny rail mount.
As they strode the empty city, the rising monoliths that used to be inhabited were now a stark reminder of a world lost. Whatever these Raptures were, they seemed to have destroyed human civilization to the point they had to remain stuck to this 'Ark', the biblical transport to weather a great calamity. Even the Rapture was a biblical thing.
For someone who was by no means religious, M4 knew a bit too much about the Bible at times. To the point she felt some degree of sadness at the fact that whatever Rapi, Alyosha and their team were, they were part of the last few humans on a planet that no longer belonged to them. She kept her ears peeled for hostile contacts, but heard none in their walk over to whatever would take them to their Ark.
When they arrived to the center of the city, she paused as she saw a seam in the ground, right in the middle of the destroyed town square. It was shielded by the canopy of overgrown trees. Some roots covered what looked like a panel which opened up the moment they walked close to it, only for an elevator of some kind to spring up from the ground.
Boarding the Elevator, she felt the group's guards lower. The Commander took his helmet off, revealing the face of a young, hopeful man, not too different from someone else M4 used to know. She unclipped her helmet and took it off, too, straightening her hair out and looking at the group of girls present.
They were colorful indeed, with Neon seemingly being a sort of foil to Anis. Their attitudes were so vastly different that M4 couldn't really put a finger on which was the more annoying of the two, though if she were to ask anyone here, they'd probably say it was the 'Firepower' enthusiast, AKA Neon, the one who was continuously screaming about firepower to Anis.
Rapi and Alyosha both gave her apologetic looks, but she waved them off, sighing and finally setting her rifle on safe, before moving it to her back. As the Elevator descended surprisingly quickly down one of what seemed to be hundreds of tubes, the girl caught sight of what looked to be a deep, underground construction of some kind. A sprawling Metropolis built underground, under the guard of a False Sky that glowed blue.
Her eyes grew wide, mouth slightly agape. She'd heard rumors of something very similar being buried deep within the Arctic somewhere. A metropolitan Utopia meant to represent freedom and liberty against the Rossartrists' vile coming of the night. Regardless of that, all she knew was that it was, in fact, a rumor. Maybe not unfounded, but rumor nonetheless.
Still, to see one built in such a cavern, what seemed to be the ancient caldera of a dead volcano going by how jagged and black the rocks were. Regardless of that, their target seemed to be a specific 'floating island' of a sort, a gravity-defying artificial construct that, if M4 looked at it properly, looked more like a livable small town than a standard military outpost of any kind.
Even from here, she could see the local inhabitants. Other women similar to the ones next to them. She blinked, then asked, "What are you three, anyways?" as she turned to face Rapi, Anis and Neon. The three exchanged quick glances, before looking at her. The Commander let them speak, taking a step back and smiling.
"We're Nikkes," Anis replied, "Kinda close to you, really…"
… Some part of M4 suddenly felt agitated. She spoke, "I probably should have asked why none of you reacted to me being a Tactical Doll, but now you mention that you're similar to me…" and she grew a little tense, a bit more distrusting, "What do you mean by that?" as the elevator began to gently slow down. Anis and Neon grinned with the commander, while Rapi rolled her eyes.
She tensed enough for her hand to instinctively move an inch closer to her rifle. Noticing this, she steeled herself and stared all of them down for a moment. As the Elevator came to a halt and the door opened behind her, she said, "If this is something you want to speak of in private, let's get moving to your command post, because-" and she paused as she swiveled about. A red military beret was the first thing she saw.
She gasped, feeling whatever passed for a heart in her chest skip a beat, then swallowed. Whoever this was, she soon rationalized, was too short to be him. Instead, as she glanced down, she was met by a pair of bright auburn eyes, long jet black hair that was kept out of her face by two familiar, symmetrical black pins at the sides of her forehead and a pale face. Her thin lips were curled into what she could only describe as a smug smirk as she pulled up on the collar of her red military jacket, which was too big and bore a faded Griffin and Kryuger emblem on the left of her chest.
Below it was a black dress that flowed neatly to just above the ankles, down from which jagged black high-heeled stilettos resided, reflecting the glum light of the Outpost ahead. M4 stared, dumbfound, into the eyes of a familiar figure, recognition visible on her face. Said figure opened her arms and spoke, "Hello, M4. It's certainly been a while."
"... Dandelion…?" M4 felt her breath catch in her throat.
"Yes, 'tis I, the Dandelai~," She proclaimed in singsong, then poked her head past the girl, stating, "Glad you found her alive up there, Commander Harris. I was half-worried I was going to have to drag her Digimind all the way from the Surface," to which Alyosha laughed awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck. She looked at M4, watching the girl go through all five stages of grief in a few facial expressions.
Then, she uttered, "... What are you doing here…?"
"Same as you, I suppose," The girl hummed, putting her hand, which was covered by the long sleeve of the coat, up to her chin and looking away in a feigned thinker's pose, "I think I died somewhere along the way, but Lunasia decided to drop me off here. And we're not exactly alone, either, by the way. Quite a few familiar faces are around," and she saw M4 visibly perk up.
A sad smile crossed Dandelion's lips. She looked down at the floor and said, "Not him. Not yet, M4, but I'm sure he's around," and yet, still, she saw the veteran Doll ahead of her deflate, frowning. Despite said frown, however, the unmistakable glimmer of a never-fading hope showed itself in M4's emerald eyes.
"Should we head inside and have a chat? I bet there's a load of questions here," Alyosha asked, motioning to the papillon-shaped Command Center of the Outpost. The T-Doll looked between him, his 'Nikkes' and Dandelion, then locked her gaze onto his and nodded, tilting her head toward the building. He smiled, nodded and sidestepped her, with Anis letting out a 'pardon' and Neon an 'excuse me' as they followed. Rapi gave her one apologetic look, to which M4 nodded sagely.
God, did she understand having rowdy comrades in arms… She looked at Dandelion, who was, by now, simply smiling at M4. She offered the girl her hand, which was still hidden behind the sleeve of the uniform jacket. M4 hesitated for a second, but gently took it, allowing herself to be led toward the Command Post.
Eden
Lukas couldn't help but feel a sense of unease. As absent from Religion as he was, he knew 'Eden' was supposed to be the foretold Paradise-like Garden that resided in Heaven, where the Original Sin of Man was committed. So, to see both a supposed Angel and Death take the form of highly technologically-equipped women with wings and strangely oversexualized forms was… Something.
It was something. He didn't know what it was, but it was something. He thought that to himself as he was led down the hyper-advanced, starship-like corridors of the place, past what looked like yet more advanced, well-equipped women. These ones were clad in more standard, semi-Science Fiction military garb, their guns rested either by their sides or secured via their straps to their bodies.
He said, "Not a lot of civilians here, are there?"
"Most are in their rooms," Harran replied, casting a glance back at him, "They were told not to bother interacting with yet another new arrival. That's more Cecil, Dorothy and Commander Johan's prerogative than theirs," to which Lukas tensed. A new commander and what must've been science staff.
"There's another new arrival?" He raised a brow, scratching above the attachment point of his prosthetic, where some tissue was still a little raw from time to time. It was a phantom pain, really, one that would never pass as long as he had this specific prosthetic arm. Isabel, the one he'd knocked out of the sky, seemed to notice him scratching the arm. It wasn't what she was looking at though, her face turning red.
Harran laughed, then replied to the man, "Yeah, but she's been here for a while longer than you…"
"..." The man visibly paused, eye widening. He blinked, then scoffed, deciding not to get his own hopes up. He thought to himself that there was no way that she was here. Life would never really be that easy. Not for him. Not anymore. He followed them still, stating, "Sounds like I have a lot of catching up to do with whoever this is."
"You sure do," Harran quipped, "She's one hell of a Nerd, though, I'll tell you. And one hell of a mess… Cecil's not particularly fond of working with her. First things first, though…" and they walked out from the Halls into the middle of a massive Atrium. Holographic screens hovered around the square, people chatting with each-other, their sterile clothes strangely familiar.
A single figure stood out among the crowd, clad in a dark-brown uniform with a cape of some sort, a blade on his hip and a handgun holster made of leather on the other hip. He had silver hair and bright blue eyes. One additional was that his arms also looked to be heavily-modified and prosthetic in nature, almost like his.
"Good afternoon, Commander," Harran spoke, jovial. The man turned and raised a brow.
"Harran," He started, his voice a bit aggressive and ear-scratchy, but tolerable enough. He and Lukas locked eyes and the man hummed, "This is the one who took down Isabel in CQC?" to which Harran nodded and the aforementioned girl blushed and averted her gaze, grumbling. The man scratched his chin, then looked straight at Lukas, before stating, "It's not easy to survive one of Inherit's tests, much less defeat one of them…" while trying not to show he was impressed.
Lukas replied, "She dived straight at me. If she had a better plan than that, I think I'd've liked to hear it," with a smirk on his face. He crossed his arms to his chest, staring the man down before asking, "I'm guessing you're Johan, 'Inherit's' Commander," to which the man simply nodded in reply. He decided to be the good guy in this upcoming partnership, extending his hand and stating, "Lukas Taube… I'm a Commander, too."
"Ark?" The man asked, staring at his mechanical hand for a moment. When Lukas shook his head, the man (seemingly) begrudgingly shook his hand, before stating, "You're going to need a lot more than that basic Prosthetic if you want to survive up here, Commander Taube… Believe me," and he visibly tightened his grip on Lukas's own hand, a faint creak of metal scratching against metal echoing.
Lukas returned the favor, pressing his own fingers into the artificial arm, feeling the fake muscles bend under the pressure. He said to Johan, "I think I'm gonna be alright," before both men, never flinching, separated. Johan nodded approvingly, to which the German crossed his arms again and asked, "I heard you have someone that dropped in like me. One, how'd she pass these supposed tests and two, where is she?"
"Ah, yes, the Doctor," The silver-haired man replied, "She's in the lab with Cecil. Probably arguing again about the development of her 'Tactical Dolls' to supplement our tactical combat units," and that got Lukas at least a little hopeful that it was someone he knew. Maybe even Persica. God, he had a lot to talk about with Persica…
"Luckily for all of us, Commander Johan, I and Cecil are done with our pro-v-con arguments about Tactical Dolls today-" A familiar, dangerous and rough voice spoke, causing Lukas to freeze the same way she did. When he turned to face the newcomer, he was greeted by the sight of platinum blond hair, deep teal eyes and a mole on the right-hand bottom corner of her mouth.
She grinned and spoke, "I'll be damned… Commander Taube," then puffed from one of her standard cigarettes. Lukas sighed deeply, shoulders sagging as he looked her over. Disheveled as always, with even her black hairband looking a little worse for wear, not to mention her old labcoat and clothes, there she was.
"... Doctor Samantha Shaw," He spoke to her in a deadpan, "I think I just got an answer as to if I'm gonna stay here or not."
"Oh, please," She snorted, "Is that how you'll treat an old friend? Abandonment?" then she sighed deeply as she saw him seemingly glare at her. She told him, "As much as I'd love to send you on your way so you can find your Dolls, Commander, I'm afraid I do have some form of a conscience. Enough to not let you go out there alone. Come to the lab. We have a lot of catching up to do."
With a particular, Guilty Doll…
Her head thumped. It hurt, or at least the simulation of the pain hurt about as much as she expected it to. Like a bad hangover a day after downing a whole cask of Whiskey back at base. She gasped for air, feeling whatever passed for the Tactical Doll version of bile rise up in her throat. Turning to her left, she barfed it all out, emptying every bit of the contents of her artificial stomach into what she hoped was a drainage grate.
As she cracked open her eye… Correction, eyes, she recalled as she had had her missing right one replaced with a fresh one after her return, she saw a mix of sprawling greenery and dilapidated buildings ranging from small front shops to tall, rising skyscrapers of some sort of advanced Sci-Fi design like in the old movies and games.
"Oh, great…" She mumbled, pushing herself to her feet, then wobbled. She looked at herself, checking her gear. She saw her orange left sleeve, bandaged right hand, her torn coat and jacket and her leggings. She also saw her single braid hanging over her shoulder. Silver and brown hair, remaining from the days of the infection. The brown was the color 'returning to normal' in a way.
She sighed deeply, wobbling again and feeling the full might of whatever hangover she was in. She looked down, seeing her rifle laying on the floor, then gently knelt and picked it up, checking it over and gazing around at the place she was in. She'd failed, that much she knew. M4 had gone to the Great Beyond, leaving only Lunasia.
It was depressing to think about. Her very goal had always been to keep the youngest of her sisters safe and she had failed. She sighed deeply, scratching the age-old three claw mark on the right side of her face before mumbling, "... All of it for nothing…" and turning. She tugged on the collar of her coat, making sure it was right, before starting to walk.
The concrete below was unsurprisingly overrun by plants and roots. It was as if she was walking through the Apocalypse, much to her own dismay. Maybe she'd find her end in the jaws of some ELID monstrosity, or fighting whatever URNC unit was out there. She knew for a fact Lunasia had talked to her before she woke up, but her words must've rung hollow enough for it not to matter.
As she waded forward, stumbling with every step, the faint trickle of warm tears running down her cheeks made itself known. She scoffed, wiping them away as images of everything that had occurred up to Frankfurt and somewhat beyond played back in her mind. All the deaths, all her comrades. Her sisters…
She began to whimper, slowly waddling through the emptiness, weapon at the ready for nothing else than if she decided to end it herself. She scoffed again, stupid as she was. Then, within a few steps, she fell to her knees, hugging her rifle and quietly sobbing. Rain droplets began to fall from the gray, cloudy sky, slowly dousing her.
Through the splashing rain, she could hear the movement of something massive with four legs, or… Multiple things. The very ground began to shake below her as whatever these creatures were drew closer, their voices chittering almost in unison an angry screech. She barely shifted herself into a proper fighting stance, rifle up, grip slipping through her gloved fingers as she peered down the rifle sight.
She gasped, however, when the alien machines that emerged were unlike anything she'd ever seen. Three tall, quadrupedal mechanoids of some kind, armed to the teeth and with one baleful azure eye each, glaring the woman. Dozens of smaller creatures surrounded her, too, weapons aimed right at her. She grit her teeth, feeling fear for the first time in a long while…
She shivered. Better than taking her own damn self out. Not even worth her own bullet, she thought, quietly calling out, "C'mon…" before her whispers slowly turned into louder cries, "Come on!" and yet again into screams, her voice cracking, "COME ON, YOU BASTARDS! DO IT! WHATEVER THE FUCK YOU ARE, DO IT!" as she thumbed her selector to burst and fired.
The rounds sparked harmlessly off the body of one of the larger machines, shattering. She scoffed, then aimed to fire again… Only to gasp as three smaller creatures took the first steps, only to split at the seams. The screech of metal clashing with metal echoed, slashes like purple light shining in the rainfall, making the droplets seemingly stop wherever they struck.
Moments later, each monster's eye flickered. They exploded in a thunderous roar, before a figure clad in strangely ornate white clothes and with a very wide-brimmed, familiar hat landed in front of her, sheathing her blade and speaking, "Vile critters, these ones…" in a mumble. She turned toward the woman she'd just rescued, then smiled and asked, "Art thou well, friend? Need thee a place to rest?"
"... Y-Yes…" She replied, stunned, the muzzle of her rifle dropping into the mud.
"Then by all means," Her savior spoke, offering her hand, "Take mine hand and follow me… Thou name?"
"... Sixteen… M16…" The girl replied.
"What a strange name!" Her savior laughed, "Truly, however, a pleasure. I am Scarlet, M16," before gently lifting her to her feet and telling her, "And we art a longeth way from home," as her golden eyes glimmered. M16 could smell liquor on her, a promising start to drowning out one's own sorrows, she thought. Scarlet then said, "Followeth thy new friend, M16. Let us depart."