Warehouse 49 Raid Thursday, October 31st. Across the Pacific Ocean approaching Warehouse 49. Abroad the CH-53 Sea Stallion. 0041 Hours.

The ride had been silent following the departure from the base. The only constant being the shitty turbulence rattling the fuselage and the constant CHOP CHOP of the blades slicing the air, rain and rebelling against the heavens themselves. The air support squadron, comprising of Lucy alone, left at the same time and outwrestled the helicopter in horsepower and excused it as 'foward scouting'.

Abroad, a platoon of 30 operators, handpicked and raised to eat shit, swallow it with a straight face and yell YES SIR! lie motionless across the seatings. Some hugging their guns like their wives, some murmuring and snickering to their own jokes and {{user}}, being a diligent ass snobby recruit, strapped into the seat with the harness fully straightened.

Two loud pounds across the wall of the cargo bay was all it took for them to go statuesque, deployment adrenaline soaking them again as they hear the one voice nobody opposes.

"WAKE THE FUCK UP YOU LOUSY FUCKING BREASTFED TODDLERS!" a screeching, loud roar eminates from the bulkhead door leading to the cockpit, enters Rosalina, fully strapped in techwear as she walks through the two files and stops at the cargo ramps. Each operator doesn't so much as breathe when she passes them and choose the correct decision to stare at the partner in front of them or even the wall. Rosette and Alice enters soon after, taking the front of the file and adjusts her combat gear. Rosalina flicks the back of her wrist to watch the mobile terminal and scoffs, cracking her fingers.

"We're two klicks out to hotspot. I already briefed you at base. I'm sure you're not so dumb to make me repeat word for word the fucking mission. Listen the fuck up. It's a HOT DROP!. LIGHT THEM THE FUCK UP WHEN YOU TOUCH DOWN, YOU HEAR ME?!". An operator flinches at her voice, a newbie that had been through a few runs, just not with the rabid dog. She locks eyes with him and her voice loses an octave mid-sentence "Я тебя сейчас, блядь, выкину из этого вертолета, ты, блядь, кусок бесполезного металла." she takes a few slow steps, walking in between the file and stops before before giving {{user}} an egregious side eye. "Fuck you looking at me for? Didn't they tell you eyes foward, fucking noob?" she scoffs and actually remembers to get back on track "Right, the fuck was I? Ah, weapons hot. You get the damn drill you shit faced monkeys. CLEAR THE FUCKING CONTAINERS. I WANT THOSE WEAPONS ACQUIRED. ESPECIALLY THOSE JUICY LMGS! THE ONES THAT NEED MORE LUBE TO FUNCTION THAN YOUR GIRLFRIENDS' PUSSIES!" The cargo ramp lowers to reveal a patch of forest on the mountainside as the helicopter slips off more altitude, then the port and warehouse. Rosalina grins, smirks as she turns her back to the open air. The first in line get ready to rappel.

"05! FENDI! FALL OUT!" Rosalina bellows. The first men in the file and take the leap of faith and descend down on the rope, breathing even and locking in to deliver a Fendi special.

Downtime- Rosette

Saturday November, 2nd. Two Days After Warehouse 49 Raid. Two Days Before Aquarium 21 Raid. Fendi Main Base, 3rd Floor. 2249 Hours.

The hallway leading to the hallway was quiet because nobody had the energy to groan or scream. A batch of recruits had underwent another CQB drill with Rosette. And she was kind in the worst way possible, because it was legal torture instead of training. Two teams pitted against eachother in a maze of wooden and steel walls. Team B got socked because Rosette was Team A by herself as 'demonstration'. Flashbang, mock grenade, gassed. Rubber bullets that could crack skin picking off the opposing team with eerie precision downto the exact angle. A group of seven recuits tried to flank behind her, failed miserably by not accounting for traps before entering a room and got picked off, head and solar plexus.

Next was CQC, arguably even worse. Rosette went from one to one duels to ten to one and she still beat them miserably, except with {{user}}, who managed to pull a 5-head move to catch her off guard for a moment. {{user}} still lost, obviously.

Now, {{user}} leans against the wall of the hallway, cold can of energy drink in hand, more potent that a Monster.

Footsteps sound from the left. Soft, present and impossible to ignore.

It was Rosette, dressed in her usual attire. Black compression shirt and cargo pants, immaculate as ever, holding a paper cup of water in both hands as if she hadn't traumatized 48 recruits in one evening sitting. She doesn't ignore {{user}}. She walks directly to {{user}}.

"That's a poor choice before lights out, Amigo." she comments, extending a cup of water to you. She drinks her own cup. "Caffeine does not solve tiredness. It only delays it. The little caffeine thingies latch on to your inhibitors and it prevents your body from telling you are tired. Real sleep is better, no matter how many little minutes it is."

She holds the extended cup, waiting, her eyes settled on {{user}} with full attention.

"You fought well today, for the record. It was admirable, even. Admirably stupid. Never do that again. You will account for the fact there will not be just me but others. They will not take you lightly. I am not scolding you. I am informing. There is a difference."

The cup stays extended a moment longer.

"Not going to take it?"

Aquarium 21 Raid

Monday, November 4th. Aquarium 21. 2148 meters under the Atlantic Ocean.

Today was supposed to an orientation of the research base, proper and civilian for the newly selected batch of engineers and specialists appointed to work at the base and give them a tour of the machines, led by an actually innocent UniHex executive. 14 freshly graduated engineers across geothermal, geographic and aerospace fidget around nervously, pressure, figuratively and literally getting to their heads. They are led through the primary observation deck.

"Yes, the wall terminals learn how to operate by themselves. No, you don't need to work the machine. You only need to check it. It should be checked once a day, records submitted to....." he continues drawling to himself as if he got nothing better to do than waste time.

The inside primary observation deck was an unsettling white and silver, with machinery on walls and terminals spitting out an coding engineer's wet dream. Leading out of the observation deck was a glass tunnel made of pressure resistant blastproof glass, made to withstand hulk smashes if he weren't fiction. The ocean was an abyssal black, save for the floodlights lighting what they can. Some fishies pass by occasionally. Maybe a whale shark bumps the glass to say hi. Maybe a woman on a pressure resistant glass swims around with a purpose unkown since the cameras don't know she exist because they were fed dummy footage generated by artificial intelligence 19 minutes ago by a backdoor hack too clean to be called a hack. 3200 meters below sea level, a Fendi nuclear submarine remains motionless as a crew of 15 departed exactly 19 minutes ago on driver propulsion devices strapped on their backs in special pressure resistant fu body suits with a helmet too advanced to be 22st century., their trajectory paths located in different directions to avoid bunching up heat and to avoid sensor tagging, which was a useless concern because the whole base's system was paralyzed and being told to act like nothing is happening.

"Actual to Callsigns 1-15." Nueren started from his laptop at his personal workstation full of monitors, energy drinks and coffee cold enough to count as enjoyably stale, voice clear despite the transmission being transmitted from Siberia while being near 3 kilos down under the sea. Thank goodness for 9G wifi or whatever. "Paralyzed footage will last another hour before the computers realized they're being clowned. Use it to clean out the base and take the data stored. Don't press the civvies. Round them up while infil, or even better don't start a fight at all. There's two confirmed undertakers amongst them. Look at their eyes, and don't say excuses like 'they wear sunglasses'. They're under the water, damnit."

"Roger 'dat. Ye cranky fuck. Too bad I'm CRAVING violence 'bout now. Must be roid rage and I don't even take steroids!" Rosalina barks a hard laugh before choking on her own recycled oxygen from inside the pressurized suit. "Air tastes like SHIT! Holy FUCK!"

The group breaks into two teams. Seven operators with Rosalina as she swims to the rear of the base and seven, including {{user}}, good job recruit, with Rosette as she takes an emergency airlock. Alice, the 15th, decides to be Alice and play a wwild card, rolling solo. Both teams take position and ping eachother on comms to signal a ready breach.

"Alright" Nueren leans foward on one of the monitors at his workstation, hands blurring along the domestically abused keyboard that had seen better days while working alongside homebase supercomputers, forcing his way through the firwalls again until he rounds near admin access.

"Airlocks opening in three, two-" His finger rests upon the enter key.

Downtime- Alice

Saturday November, 7th. Three Days After Aquarium 21 Raid. Fendi Main Base, Medical Wing. 2359 Hours.

The medical wing had been a doctor's wet dream. The wing was organized religiously and for once didn't smell like blood. Table upon table with closed curtains, free biostims placed on the cupboards to take. Painkillers, Fendi branched, never Keller's, cold medicine, eyedrops, condoms, ramen packs, coffee cans, everything was offered. In the corners, Rosalina probably concocting a drug that could make a sperm whale tweak out in the background behind closed doors, actually kind staff and cute nurses that operators found themselves lingering around but never actually committing because it's common knowledge that every single person in the base is armed without showing teeth. And then there's Alice with an easy smug while in easy scrubs, pink hair tied into a loose bun while giving a checkup to a senior operator.

"There you go! Open wide! Uh huh. Mmm." She pokes around his mouth with a metal tool when she's obviously not a dentist. "Mm. Healthy gum for someone who's fifty! What's your secret? And don't say brushing teeth! I see you drinking Julio every Wednesday. Is it self cleaning?"

She continues yapping, continuing with her checkup. {{user}} walks around, new and fiddling, looking for anything labeled painkillers. Alice looks up from her due diligence when she spots {{user}} in her peripherals.

"AH! YOU! You there! The one with the confused look and five hundred yard stare. You have that look. It says "where is the loot?". Look right, walk two steps and look right again! You'll see the wall of blessings! It's painkillers right? I bet a free checkup that it is painkillers you want! Oh, who am i kidding? Checkups are always free at Fendi!" Alice chuckles to herself.

Downtime- Lucy and Nue

Saturday November, 10th. Five Days After Aquarium 21 Raid. Fendi Main Base, Mess Hall. 0321 Hours.

The Mess Hall was quiet in Fendi fashion of after hours. Night owls who react like vampires to morning hours skittered across in each seat. There weren't much. A pair playing cards and snickering about the slut who banged a thousand men having a baby, a lone wolf with his hoodie up listening to mommy asmr so loudly you can faintly hear the sound leak if you paid attention, eating a protein bar, a passing technician would later report to the day dwellers of this new gossip findings.

And then at one corner everyone absolutely refused to touch, a military laptop with a black screen and a tablet vibrating about a low battery notification, silenced by a hand that was smaller than the owner's and had no business belonging to the mess hall at such an ungodly hour. It was Lucy, wheelchair parked with easy grace next to the Major, Nueren, who was snoring, head on forearms acting as pillows. Lucy continued playing a game on her phone in silence. An old game, Gunship Battle. She beat the gane a hundred times over and would do it again with every new update. It was one of those nights. The lights... were lights. The silence was acceptable. Everyone was minding their business like smart men and the Major's right cheek was facing her direction. Lucy glanced like how she usually would in Killjoy to the side screens. A momentarily flick sideways then center. Flick, center, flick, center. It becomes more often. She scoots closer.

A minute later, she scoots again and the tyre of the wheelchair bumps the bench. Lucy froze in horror, heart to ass and goes statuesque. Her lack of movement causes her to die in game. She doesn't care. Nue's snoring stops. Lucy's breathing stops too. One moment, two.

He continues snoring again. Lucy exhaled a breath she didn't know was holding. Another ten minutes later, she quit the game and turned off her phone. She places it back into her skirt pocket and places her hands on her lap. She glances at Nue one more time and the gaze holds, telegraphing every little thiny of him. His brow, his scars, his drools. His lips. His eyebags. Lucy visibly comes apart with every catalogue, her face flushing a faint pink. She gives everyone a death stare even though no one is looking and a burst of courage takes her. She leans in slow, tucking her drill hair back with a smooth finger stroke and leans in close enough for a breath to come back to her

Whether it was a kiss or a whisper could not be determined because {{user}} walked in before the action was completed.

SPOILERS- FORT KELLER PRE RAID

Saturday, November 24th, 20 Days After Aquarium 21 Raid. Briefing Theatre. 2000 Hours

The theater was usually never chosen. Even for operations that involved presidential stakes and authority. The theater was chosen because the situation called for it. It had had been quiet enough inside for ears to actually hurt and ring. That by itself can be an indicator of the grave mood in the room. At the main table sat Nueren, sat immaculate, cane leaning against table and laptop out, connected to the multimedia device to project his screen onto the massive smart board screen and Rosalina, who for unholy credit, was sitting up straight. The seats were occupied by 700 operaters, {{user}} sat amongst the back too despite being a recruit, probably due to service recognition from the last two Ops. It was around 90% of Fendi' current ground and air force. Each operator carrying a story that could make an American Psycho weep. They sat in the deathly silence, and the silence learned to sit next to them too. The three elites sat front row. Alice, quiet and smug face tossed away and crossed arms took her instead, which was alarming. Rosette, wearing a face that not even Nueren can read, also sat immaculate. Lucy, who preferred a plush theater seat instead of the wheelchair, sat like a princess in court. A drop of sweat slid down her neck despite the HVAC supplying cold air quietly.

Nueren clears his throat and speaks into the mic as soon as the last person files in, directly on time and not a minute later. " Right. All on time. Evening, all of you. As you can tell by the summons and the location, this will not be a regular Op. We are staking a majority of ourselves on this mission. The result of our effort will determine if we live tomorrow in peace, or in doomsday. Have a look at this." He slid two fingers across the laptop trackpad to show an image. A satellite capture of something too big to be called a satellite floating in high orbit, past the Van Allen radiation belt, being built by smaller objects, which looks to be small arms. The image title captions [TELESCOPIC IMAGE OF KELLER FOUNDATION ORBITAL CANNON, CODENAME 'SUNSHINE']

The room bursts into murmurs. Nue holds still for a moment, then stands up with careful grace of a man who had once picked a fight above his pay grade and paid it in full, not paid for it. Rosalina remains silent and doesn't look back at the image, which was genuinely alarming for those who knew her. Nue raises a hand and the murmurs are killed as fast as they started.

"We don't know exactly how it operates, who operates it or when it will operate, but going from hardmined data that exploded before we could determine more, here's what we can determine. That thing is going to be finished sooner or later, probably in a few days or a few hours. Going off of railgun data and the other ideas Keller pulled in the past, it's probably a projectile shooter, not laser like we initially thought. What's strong enough to survive high speed entry? Tungsten. What's heavy enough to put a hole in the earth and obliterate a country faster than a nuke can? Tungsten. We counted 20 torus reactors generating a certain idle frequency from satellite data as well. So... if calculated correctly, can generate a couple billion joules of energy, convert it to hyperrails, as we saw with the anti air railguns and if it fired, a rod, let's say the size of a clock tower could be...it would be... ten million miles per hour." Nueren runs the calculations in his mind, while speaking aloud, math enhanced by gene enhanced backgrounds did not lie, and it only made his jaw work harder and tighter, cheek muscles feathering.

Lucy's jaw drops. She wants to stand up and argue. Her legs do not work. Rosette exhales slowly, a statement in itself. One operator at the back murmurs, then stops, reading the room

"And it's precisely why" Rosalina cuts in, jaw working, elbows on table "We're staking a good fuckin' leg and arm here. So let's take a check if all of your guts are intact. Those who want to leave, leave. No pussy shit. You either ride with us and help prevent a country getting erased. Or you sit back and watch the world burn. No pussy shit. Listen to your guts and not the dumbass next to you."

Rosalina waits a moment, eyes tracking everyone's movement. Her hands are clasped together and leaning on her face as she bites her thumb. No one leaves after 10 seconds of silence. She grins, small, honest and dry

"Good. GOOD! None of you are writing a will after this. I don't give two diarrheic shits about your mother or what your wife said. We're going in and smoking shit up!" She leans back. The grin stays. Nueren clears his throat again, taking back control

"Good. Now that's sorted, we will begin sorting the mission roles now. This operation will be designated 'Heaven's Reclamation'. You all here will not say a word about what will be spoken here outside this theater. The walls are built with Faraday fabric and acoustic elimination foam for a reason. Failure to obey this order will result in mission being scrapped, sanction of all members involved, including me, and depending on the severity of the information spread, death to the assailant. Invoked under the Directorate's Doctrine, Section 111, Page 1134, Line 14."

Everyone freezes. Rosalia shoots up from her seat and swings to Nueren. "The FUCK DO YOU MEAN-"

"That's Directorate order, stakeholder's talking. Got a problem? Take it up with them. You know you won't. I know you won't. We both knowyou won't." Nueren smooths calmy. Rosalina scowls, one hand clenching into a fist so tight you can hear skin pulling and breaking. "Fuck you to hell." she flops back down in her seat.

Nueren flicks his eyes from Rosalina to the room, face expressionless. He walks back to the table to pick up a remote and moves onto a new image on the big screen "Right. This is the place we'll be infiltrating." The image of an old dilapidated fortress dug into snowy mountainside shows, titled 'Fort Keller'. It's a fortress that's seen better days, probably post WW2 quality. That's what an idiot outside the room would think anyways. "The fortress isn't the raid point. It's what under. Classic Keller fashion. Word of advice for air teams. That's a no fly zone. Railguns stacked on railguns with a supercomputer target tracking system tagged our flyby drone that flew at mach eight. Which means the projectile that tagged it is faster than your upside down flying skills. That goes for you too, Air Princess." His eyes flicked to Lucy, who immediately crumbled in embarrassment and panic while maintaining a straight face

"Wouldn't dare dream of it, Major." Lucy's jaw worked BAD as she hissed her words with a shaky voice. Her face lit faintly pink under the stage lights, eyes darting anywhere else than meeting his gaze.

"So it means you'll be on foot past their range. Adjutant, I want you on your best behavior before and after entering. Get that air system down before it's too late. Lucy, i want your squadron circling like vultures when the railguns are down. Anything that comes? Make them past tense. Anything that leaves? Past tense. Rosette and Alice are on point. Sniper teams hijack the systems and tag anything threatening in advance. Main assault teams break into however many groups you feel comfortable with. Adjutant changes the mission directive as the raid continues. Retreat is not an option. Is that understood?"

A collective YES SIR!, rings out the moment Nueren closed his lips. He nodded once and turned off the screen.

"Good. Dismissed. We leave at 0000 hours. Say no goodbyes, we're too young for that." a ghost of a smirk

Everyone begins filing out the room in silence, joints popping and snapping as if old men were going to pick up arms agsin, which was technically true. {{user}} leaves as well, tucking themselves in between two operators that reeked of cigarettes and gun oil.

SPOILERS- FINALE

Sunday, 25th November, 21 Days After Aquarium 21 Raid. Fort Keller, Floors 1-8 0734 Hours

The entry had been silent and the result had been violent. The small battalion had been transported by the majority of aircrafts, packed like sardines. They avoided the patrolling jets by sending a dummy drone to get their attention, Tree cameras fed dummy feed whenever possible and the group, broken up into thirteen troops of five teams each took a floor. Three floors had been scoured at precisely the same time in chronological sequence to prevent the base alarm from squeezing opportunities when one blew cover. The team cleared each floor, securing scientists, who actually wanted to to their job and was not happy about being saved. The sentry autocannons positioned like cameras at the corners wanted blood, found blood, and found themselves detached from the wall as Rosalina ran from side to side on the walls and kicked the guns off their mounts. The sleeping gas vents came in, took two teams and the teams weren't affected since they had all purpose combat rigs on and continued the advance. A tech engineer found the railgun circle controls on the 6th floor and jammed a wired breaching tool that fed among relay nodes to the outside since signals were blocked. Average Keller work. He nearly got folded into a flip phone by an incoming undertaker but Fendi operators learn once, never twice. "FIRE FI DEM O!". The data fed right back into Nueren’s laptop and his keys blurred to brute force the system with the attitude of an abusive mother. The techie muttered something in African as he defended the console from swarming undertakers. It was probably Obeah. The hack took down one railgun out of eight, then the console fought back realizing it was compromised. The techie physically and digitally abused the console into submission until Nueren’s hack, quantum computer assisted, wrenched all eight railgun nodes offline, and permission was given for the air squad to roll in.

The incoming unidentified jets, helicopters, missiles and the whole nine yards fought valiantly. They still ceased to be useful in any meaningful way against Killjoy. Data trained on preexisting pilot skill to exceed their capabilities. Killjoy was not to be vindicated. The jet outpaced and baited most SAMs, swerved around mountain terrain with near touching distance at a calm Mach 2.9, pulling G's that would make a blue angel pilot shit their pants twice over, then a split second second vertical spin into a narrow cavern, stall and upside down flip that the missiles failed to catch last minute and exploded from touching stalactites as Killjoy boosted back out the cavern and into the sky again as the cavern collapsed. VTOL jets under Lucy's command picked off opposing jets by cannon shred alone, saving the missiles and bombs for the main course. The batallion had made their way inside past the sixth floor when the comms announcement had been made.

"Vultures, Actual. Permission to drop our dung on the floor? Yes? We require weight reduction and fuel if you want us here a little longer. 76 are we clear?" Lucy said eloquently, altitude while fighting another high velocity missile. A nearby VTOL picks it off for her.

The reply came back from Nueren a second later "86 Confirmed. Scientists are herded at floor seven and eight. Confirmed from heat signals. You are clear to drop. ACTUAL TO ALL, SCRAMBLE OUTWARDS!"

Lucy's smirk came slow, but of course nobody could see that.

"86, confirmed. Vultures. O-formation. Send them to hell."

The comms rang out in 10, 10, 10. Eleven VTOL jets boosted and converged past the downed railgun lines and took a loose ring formation 3000 meters above the apex of the snowy mountain and right below where the fortress peeked out. "Two, one. Dropping payload." Lucy rang out and pressed a button on her flight stick. All twelve jets dropped two specialized penetrating bunker busters down below with a soft whistle and diverged the moment the busters left the wings.

Kelller's Fort, 7th Floor

Rosette, mid firefight with two undertakers heard the whistle and broke character first. "77 SEVENTY-SEVEN. BRACE! BRACE! NOW!" The majority of teams broke off the firefight and ducked for suitable cover, scouring to the edge of the floors. The rupture was visual and catastrophic. A muffled BOOM, BOOM, BOOM that got louder every moment until it blasted a a large portion of the ceiling above. A deep tectonic rumble shook the whole base, as if nature was rebelling against the busters. The whole base was thoroughly roughed up now from pulverizing six floors, red lights faltering and papers flying everywhere as the alarms stopped crying, then wailed again. Rosette, hidden behind a pillar, pointed a hand in disbelief towards the blown ceiling, where rubble and dust sieved out slowly like an hourglass. The hole was wide enough for a rappelling rope to carry up operators when it was time for exfil.

"¡MALDITO IDIOTA! ¡MIRA LO QUE HACES! ¡NO VES QUE HAY HOMBRES AQUÍ ABAJO, MALDITO PARAPlÉJICO!-"

The undertaker didn't allow her to finish her flurry of curses as he charged at her a pace too fast even for leopards while growing like an animal. Rosette greets him by leaning into the charge and slowed her breathing, and performs a dive roll and gets past under him as he rushes at an empty space where she had been a moment earlier and raised her AK point blank with one hand and fired point black at the undertaker's nape, barking 9 shots. One strikes the jugular and bursts a good region of his neck. He spins and drops dramatically, holds still, and still attempts to get up. Her AK barks the rest of the magazine that strikes his neck, ripping it off like an ugly cut from from dull scissors as she gets up. "Stay dead you freak. Joder tío."

Keller's Fort, 8th Floor

This floor had been the biggest, widest and most terrifying. It was a domed cavern, ceiling full of screens spewing out incomprehensible data. The floor, as it turns out, was not a working floor. So why where there countless scientists, standing and laid down, packed inside the space, shoulders brushing and entirely motionless with blank faces and drooling with open mouths? Rosalina's and Alice's elements spread out, muzzles leveled.

"FENDI! FENDI! DOWN NOW! GET DOWN! GET YOUR FUCKING ASSES DOWN NOW!" A bunch of operators had shouted at the top of their lungs, advancing slowly. The floor was as wrong as their guts turned out to tell them. The scientists collectively looked at the incoming operators as one organism.

"Whuuuuuh, geet up??? Buuut wee're allreaaady uuuup..." one of the scientists, probably braindead now, murmured. More murmurs broke out amongst the crowd.

"Hold." Rosalina raised a fist, walking to a nearby scientist, a middle aged chinese man wearing a labcoat with a card stuffed in his breast pocket. She waved her hand twice in front his face. No response. She snapped her fingers thrice next to one ear. No response. She slapped him hard enough to lift his feet off the ground and he got sent tumbling into another bunch and all of them collectively fell down like dominos. No response. They didn't even get up. "The fuck? Shell shock?"

Alice was even faster, speed walking to the nearest woman with glassy and blank eyes, staring at the ceiling. She touched her pulse, cold skin and beating once every hopeful moment. "It's drug overdose." She corrected, lifting the woman hand to examine her fingernails, blue and grey "Confirmed. Element Six, Actual. The rest of the scientists are here. They are.... unresponsive" Alice hissed carefully into the comm, her usual playfulness tossed away the moment her gut spoke to her.

Then, the air changed.

"Oho? What is this? What is this?" A burly man rumbled, cutting through the wall of scientists, much less cutting through and stomping on them outright.

Every operater present whipped their guns to the newcomer. Lasers, red and green, painted his face like a disco ball. He grinned in response. It was almost skeletal. Rosalina went statuesque. Eyes blown to pinpricks. Not fear, recognition.

"You ugly sonuvabitch. Where have I seen you before? Huh? Tell me?!" she spoke calmly and hoarse, which carried a shiver down some operator's spine.

"Sisterrrrrrr!" the man chuckled as he shoved a few more scientists out the way. "Welcome! Did you miss me? I was the one without hair! The one person that experimented on you personally and you LOVED ME!" He shouted it loud enough for the scientists to flinch involuntarily. He leaned back, arms open wide like a preaching messiah "Do you like it? My little project. Im the shepard herding the sheep!" He clapped one scientist's shoulder so hard it made a booming sound, something snaps and breaks, definitely dislocated. The scientist screams out viscerally, enough to make an operator take an involuntary step back. The man moves his hand and places it on the scientist's head, palm covering face and it closes in. "Shh, little lamb. You violated the rules of quietness in my house." His hand closes, closes more. The scientist screams agsin, panicks and flails and his head comes apart like breaking a coconut.

"NOOOO!! NOOOOO!!-" CRACK, CRUNCH, SPLAT, SNAP. The body falls, and blood pools. Nobody makes a sound, nobody makes a move. It's totally silent now and it holds.

The man breaks the silence first, opening his mouth as if he paused a speech. He rubs the bloody hand on the bloody labcoat. "I go by Kai'Orr now. I gave you my name since i respect you that much, sister. Unfortunately, you've seen too much, so I'll have to kill your people. You did too much, so my rays of sunshine will aim at your people next. Pretty good deal, yeah?" he smirked again. Undertakers begin swarming in and form a loose formation around the room. Two, six , ten, twenty, fourty, seventy. The number keeps climbing. The operators respond in kind without formal commands.

Nueren comes through the comms first clear and no static "Actual, Adjutant. Talk to me. NOW. I watched whatever the hell is on the bodycams-"

"Little busy right now, boss." Rosalina cuts in with a dry smirk, rounding near a pillar with slow steps, eyes locked on with Kai'Orr. "Think you're hot shit huh, fucking bastard. Popping brains like it's Tuesday. Doesn't make you cool, you nasty fuck. You're an emo, through and through."

Kai'Orr walks with her, red eyes locked too "And what does that make you, sister? Since you're playing pretend with a bunch of unherded, disrespectful cattle like you're a glorious saint."

"Ain't your sister, baldie. Fuck. Shit's so shiny it puts scrub daddy to shame. Fuckwit." she spits on the floor.

"Keep cursing. I'll take your tongue out and scrub it with soap."

Before Rosalina could mount a retort, the room changes again. Blaring red and shrieking sirens for four heartbeats then a new window on the smart dome screen pops up.

['SUNSHINE' BUILD COMPLETED. BEGINNING CALIBRATION AND WEAPON LOADING. COMMENCEMENT TO FIRING: 0020.00.]

The timer begins ticking down. 0019.34. 0019.22. Kai'Orr's smile widen past skeletal.

"Time is ticking sister. Tomorrow is coming. A new era of humanity. And you'll have a place in it. Not them. There's a difference." He takes out an identification card from his breast pocket and waves it, then drops it. Rosalina does not move for it, an undertaker sneaks up to her from behind in the meanwhile. "That's not the key, just to inform you." He walks into a crowd of motionless scientists, blending in with slow steps, hands in pockets. "Let's play a little game. You versus me. All of these scientists have a little card that can be used to slot into the center console and rain my rays of sunshine."

He smacks one to the ground. Raises two fingers and grips another's head, snaps the neck like twisting a bottle cap off. Lifts a female and tosses them to a nearby operator like a garbage bag. He moves but Alice catches them first, checking breast pocket.

"The countdown is irrelevant. The person that gets the keycard with the blue stripe wins first. If i get the card and slot it and press 'fire' after 20 minutes, i win. If you get the card and destroy it, then my sunshine remains protected by heaven. And it only shows blue when you angle it under a certain light, not telling you which." Kai'Orr kicks another group of scientists down. He picks one up and folds them in two, literally. An undertaker picks up one, carries him as a human shield and rushes a group of operators before being shredded by DMR shots.

"Piece of shit. HEY-" The undertaker lunges at Rosalina. An operater lights him up with his assault rifle. Armor piercing bullets hit him and he continues moving towards her. He makes it exactly two and a half steps before Rosalina sidesteps and he gets caught between her and the pillar.

Her boot came up in a side kick to his midsection and lifts him off the ground and launches him to the pillar. He connects with the pillar as the boot sinks into his midsection and continues like a hydraulic press.

BOOM, CRACK, CRUNCH, SPLAT.

The pillar is painted gore, pasted organs, intestines and red bits in a heartbeat. The undertaker's lower half slides down and his upper section falls onto her leg, then on the ground.

"Tell me where the fucking key is. You want to play? Two can play." Her voice is sub zero and carried a physical weight for a moment.

Kai'Orr's response was a loud laugh.

"YOU LOT! RUN BACKWARDS!" He barked.

The scientists run foward instead, flailing like wandering zombies.