"Alright, Viper. Elsa is in position outside of the sky-lift and the displacement drive is just about ready to fire up! Have they detected your position yet? Please tell me you remembered to synchronize the stealth drives before you took off?" The voice of the young commanding officer of The Eclipse, Sammy, was blaring over the com as an image of his face and torso appeared to the pilot of the distant craft. Viper was within; it was large, massively so: a sleek, humanoid fighting mech that had been code-named, 'The Shroud,' for its advanced stealth capabilities. The golden-eyed woman silenced her com as Sammy's face fizzled to static, however, it was the face of her would-be-lover, Draziel, that appeared to her then.
"Hey." He paused, just staring at her through the cybernetic communications link. "Be careful. If you find yourself in a bad situation..., remember the promise that I made you."
"We might die in here, you and me." In a dark, damp cave, Viper and Draziel sat together, huddled together for warmth. Blue light flickered from the man's fingers, some sort of energy, in order to illuminate the space just enough that he might look upon his companion.
"I'm not going to let that happen." His black hair, bone-straight, fell along his shoulders as he tilted his head towards her.
"I never thought I'd find myself in here with one of your kind." Her words were seething with anger, though she soon found herself wincing in pain. Her leathers were torn and ripped all over, her fair skin covered in dirt and dust. A large cut bore into her leg, which was stained with a deep crimson and oozing small amounts of thick fluid.
"Keep still." He set a hand on her leg, causing her to press back against the stone behind her as she endured the pain radiating along her wound.
"Don't touch me." He did anyways, and soon that blue energy from his fingers wove its way into her leg. That cut, however deep, began to miraculously heal as her skin seemed to simply meld its way back together to close the tear.
"There. That wasn't so bad, now was it? What are you even doing here, Viper?"
"I'm stuck here." She examined her leg. "Same as you."
"That's not what I mean. What are you? Why are you with us- with The Eclipse?"
"We have a common enemy." The woman was shivering, which made the man beside her instinctively drape an arm around her shoulder.
"I said don't-"
"You're freezing."
"Why are you with The Eclipse, then? Why are you fighting against your own kind?"
"I am not fighting against my own kind. Not all of the Kaneren are as twisted as those who live in the towers. Many of us defected- I was set apart from birth. And while those who rebel are hunted like animals, I have carried on. I don't expect you to understand-"
"I do." Viper did seem to have a hard time with the cold. She leaned into the pale man dressed in black and allowed him to hold her shivering frame. "I too have decided that some of my own kind are worth saving."
"What kind of name is, 'Viper,' anyways? That can't be your real name."
"It's not. But it is the name I have chosen."
"What name were you born with?" He held her flush against him, his hands kneading into her back. There was a vulnerability about that strange woman that he could feel pulsing through her veins, and she knew it just as much as he did. She had never been held so, and it made her feel weak, and peculiar.
"...Arika." She said the name in almost a whisper, as if it were something long forgotten. "I do not wish to be called by that name. I suppose it does not matter. We probably won't make it out of here alive."
"Arika." He cupped her face in his gloved hands and tilted her head up to look at him. "We're going to make it out of here."
"I always thought that...- I'd die alone. Not in the arms of my enemy. Even if you're different, even if you're-."
"While I am still breathing, you will not die. Do you understand me?" Viper stared into those bright blue orbs as she felt her body practically grow numb. For a moment, she felt a pang of grief that she had not felt in such a very long time; unable to fight it, tears began to pour down her cheeks. "I promise you, do you hear me? I don't know who you are, or where you come from, but I will save you from death."
"Viper? Viper, are you hearing me?"
"I'm..., so cold." He held her tight to him, rubbing at her flesh to warm her. "I want to go home..."
"Arika!"
"Keep your promise to me then, Kaneren!" With a wave of her hand, Draziel was off screen and she turned her attention to her navigation. She was mere meters away from the outside of the rotating structure that housed New Babylon. "Sammy. Do me a favor." She opened the com-link with the commander once more. "The girl, Vanessa. Tell her something for me, before you send them back home."
"Uh, yeah, okay. What is it?"
"Tell her that...- if she wishes to be a truth-seeker, she must follow her instinct."
"Cryptic as always, Viper. I'm on it."
It was Elsa, who next appeared to The Shroud's pilot. "Alright, Vipes! You remember the plan?" Before she could get a word in, the purple-haired woman continued on. "We're going to fire up the displacement drive so that you and I can switch places. I will then cause a maaaajor ruckus at the outside of New Babs with Shroud and you will be poised to use the electro-magnetic charges I set up along the perimeter to temporarily confuse the security systems while I play the distraction. Then you can sneak into the sky-lift and locate the council chambers."
"I'm ready." The lithe woman, leaning against the seat of her cockpit, adjusted her hands around two control sticks. Elsa, flashing a wild grin, spoke with gusto.
"You can fire the first shot! Warm 'er up for me!"
"Locking onto target." Upon her navigational screen, a diamond-shaped cross-hair danced to and fro until finding itself set on a key point in the tower's upper infrastructure.
"Ready! ....Aaaaaaim...."
"Fire." She said the final syllable in a stoic tone, pressing down on two separate trigger buttons; one located on the helm of each control stick. Suddenly, a shockwave shot through the air at a high velocity and impacted the spiral station, causing a fairly large explosion. It would seem that advanced stealth capabilities weren't the only thing in The Shroud's repertoire. Sammy's voice came on the com, then.
"Displacement in three, two, one..." Viper suddenly found herself along the outside of the elevator shaft, using gravitational devices strapped to her back to keep her level in the air. She must have been half-way up, high above the city and grasping for the metal covering the construct within. Her eyes narrowed and focused, keenly searching for the charges that Elsa had prepared. Eventually, she found the central device, and with a flip of the switch, a short-ranged electro-magnetic pulse wracked the internal systems.
"Viper, do you copy?" She could barely hear him over the rush of wind.
"Copy. I set off the charge."
"The elevator is going to be out of commission from the blast, you're going to have to pry your way inside and climb." The woman didn't respond. She removed the black, metal bracelet she wore and placed it against the outside of the shaft. Pushing a hidden switch, the ring expanded into a large circle, which then began to swiftly heat itself to molten temperatures. It bore a hole into the metal, which the woman was then able to kick in and crawl through. Without power, the inside was almost pitch black.
"What are you doing!?" Viper was screaming. "You're going to get yourself killed!" In the dark, a large pillar of stone was crushing down upon Draziel's back. He held himself up with his limbs; the woman was beneath him, frantic. The raven-haired man was trembling, visibly pained.
"It's..., it's okay, Viper-...I've got this. I'm just going to have a sore back...in the morning." He managed a slight smile, which seemed to only outrage her further.
"Just let it fall! You're killing yourself!"
"I won't..., let you get hurt!"
"Shut up! You idiot!"
"Finally, I get to hear what you sound like when you're not talking like a robot!"
"Please, stop making jokes. I-"
"When we get out of here, I'm going to make your voice do all sorts of things. So you..., better hang on."
"I've lost too many to lose those who do not deserve to die."
"Then it's a good thing I don't..." He grimaces, practically howling with agony.
"Draziel!"
Reaching the top of the shaft, Viper discovered a small door that would open up a floor panel for her to crawl through. Though as she raised the panel, one of the Kaneren who had been rushing down the hallway had tripped over the trapdoor. Swiftly, the golden-haired woman pushed herself up onto level ground and readied a gun towards her enemy.
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