2...
Isa snaps awake taking a deep breath as if she'd been underwater. She's laying on a cold floor. Tries pushing herself to her feet but that just gives her head rush; stay still, then. What was she doing just now... and where is Erika?
Her left hand stings and Isa hisses, examining a fresh bloody cut on the palm. How did that happen?
You know.
While Isa applies pressure to the wound, she examines her surroundings. An atrium to a facility of some kind, deadly quiet – and totally unfamiliar. Benches and a receptionist desk flank a large elevator, a restroom on the opposite side, and and a door each going left and right.
"Hello? Is anyone there?"
Once the lightheadedness fades, Isa stands up and her foot sends a big kitchen knife sliding across the floor. Based on the bloodied blade, Isa must have sliced her palm open on it. She doesn't particularly want to touch it, but something in her gut tells her this place, whatever it is, isn't safe. She grabs the knife in her undamaged right hand and gets to work looking for something to tell her just where exactly she is.
A pamphlet rests on the bench, looking like it'd been dropped after given a brief perusal, and by skimming through it Isa learns where she is: S-23 Sierpinski, a mining facility on Leng. She blinks, flips it around as if that will explain more. Her pulse quickens.
How in the hell did she get to a whole other planet?
Panic bubbles up inside her. She's supposed to be on Rotfront, right? But Erika isn't with her. Where...? Okay. Calm down. There's a rational explanation for this. There has to be. Isa's not in her school uniform, right? So it stands to reason that Erika has been assigned to work at this facility, and Isa just... forgot. A fugue state. That's got to be it.
Okay. Erika is somewhere in here. All Isa has to do is find her, and...
She lets the pamphlet drop back to the bench. No time to waste. One of the doors is inoperable and the one bathroom is in disrepair, so there's only one way to go now. Isa walks through the door and finds herself at an intersection, hearing the telltale hoof-falls of a Replika further up. A Protektor? Whoever they are, they move like they're on a mission.
Isa heads north and freezes when a sickly sweet stench assaults her senses. Her stomach lurches and eyes water – a corpse lies in the hall, and another further up, both bearing the distinctive white accents of an EULR. The one closer to Isa looks horrible, diseased meat bulging out of her broken shell. What could've happened here? Did that Protektor she heard earlier do this?
Isa covers her mouth, feeling sick. But she doesn't know where else to go and she has to be thorough if she wants to find Erika. And besides, the dead won't hurt her. Just take it one step at a time...
...did the body just move, or is it her imagination?
Isa picks up the pace. But no running. Running in the halls is forbidden. The door is unlocked – good. She practically jumps into the room beyond, only feeling safe when the door shuts at her back.
She finds herself in a small library of sorts, the shelves full of books comforting in its familiarity. Seems empty. Isa heaves a sigh of relief at the sight of a medical kit on the far table; with her kind of luck, that will come in handy. Isa disinfects the cut in her left palm and begins dressing it, having gotten used to bandaging herself from the myriad of accidents she gets into. There's no telling where Erika is, so for all she knows her sister could be right behind her. Better leave a note in that case, to let her know. Isa grabs a sheet of paper, uncaring what's on it, and scribbles on the back.
That's when she hears a fleshy-metallic crack in the corner.
Not empty.
Isa slowly turns to her right, watching a shambling mass of Replika shell and meat stumble to a standing position like something out of a fever dream – an Eule, like the two outside. Where an attractive face would be is a bloody skull, eyeless and horrible, tilting like a curious bird. Isa holds her breath, grips the knife in front of her defensively and begins stepping back as slowly and quietly as possible. If it doesn't have eyes, it can't see. All she has to do is slip back out the door, nice and easy...
There's a distant gunshot somewhere nearby.
Isa, startled, bumps into a table.
The living carcass wails and surges in her direction, fingers clawing out for purchase – Isa tries calling for help only for a cry to leave her throat, her mind blanking on what to do, what do i do? All she can think of is the knife, thrusting it out and squeezing her eyes shut as the undead Rule pounces.
There's a sound like metal piercing a sopping wet, overfull trash bag, and a wet gurgle hits her ears. Isa opens one eye fearfully. The Eule's blind charge had left her vulnerable to the knife's tip and ended up getting the blade skewered into her neck. Warm blood spurts onto Isa's fingertips as the Replika turned monster chokes to death, falling limp and taking her down with it.
Oh, god.
She's tearing up now, the shock and unbearable reek of death overwhelming. The knife is stuck, so she has to step into the thing's head to pull it free with a few yanks, blood pooling under her feet. Oh, god!
I... I just killed...
But it was going to kill her, no? Self-defense? Surely whatever Protektor patrolling this place will understand, and definitely believe the out of place city mouse from a whole other world who doesn't even remember how she got here over the testimony of a reanimated corpse promptly rendered inanimate.
Deep breaths, deep breaths... you're okay... what matters is that you're okay...
Remember what she taught you.
Isa's heart leaps into her throat when the door hisses open and gleaming red dots lock onto her like a monster from the shadows of childhood nightmares, but with no hideous shriek ringing off the walls it quickly becomes apparent the danger has passed – for now, at least. Isa staggers away from the misshapen Eule corpse, bloody knife lowered. The figure steps inside, sure and confident, a pistol being holstered; a Replika unit, but neither a Protektor nor one Isa recognizes. She stands taller than Isa with a strong build, boasting a red chest plate and dark unkempt hair cropped short, blue eyes piercing even without the flecks of red. Something flickers in Isa's memory and is gone just as quickly.
"Oh... hello," she greets the Replika lamely. As if 'hello' is the first thing you say when someone catches you with a dead body at your feet and a weapon in hand. Not suspicious at all.
Thankfully the Replika pays no mind to the scene, instead landing that intense gaze on her again, probably noting her civilian attire.
"You don't belong here either, do you?" Isa hazards a guess. "I'm Isa. Isa Itou."
A beat.
"LSTR-512," the Replika says in a low velvety voice with hints of a Vinetan accent. After a second she adds, "Elster will suffice."
An LSTR unit... maybe that's what gave Isa déjà vu. She probably heard about those back home, anti-social combat engineers or something. At least Elster will have an easier time in this place than she will, being designed for unpleasant things like... Isa tries not to look at the dead Eule. But Elster's familiar accent soothes Isa's nerves and she immediately feels more comfortable. More safe.
"You should be careful. There's something wrong with this place." Isa points her knife at the corpse for emphasis. "I don't know what happened, but it's probably dangerous to go any further."
Elster grunts. She pointedly looks at the knife and then at Isa's face, eyebrows raising in an unspoken question. As if this facility is more dangerous to her than a non-combatant like Isa. Maybe wondering if she has to babysit a scared Gestalt.
Isa won't be a burden.
"That's okay, I understand. I have something I need to do too. Take care. I hope you find who you're looking for."
Isa steps over the body and heads out, leaving Elster alone. It's not until she's halfway through the corridor when she stops and looks back, realizing something. Elster hadn't told her why she's here...
Isa's managed to get lucky so far, catching a break near an elevator – useless without a Protektor pass, but at least there's a bench she can sit on and gather her thoughts.
S-23 is crawling with what she can only describe as corrupted Replikas, not a single Gestalt in sight. What documents she finds paints a dire picture, but Isa has a lead to go on. If Elster is fine, then surely there are other Replika survivors who can provide her with information. They keep logs and records of anyone who works here or is being reeducated, so maybe one of them has seen Erika. With any luck, she might even run into an administrator.
At least the corrupted are predictable in terms of behavior. Eules will stand around staring at nothing or gaze into a mirror, or just mindlessly pantomime the duties they had before... whatever it was that swept through this place. Even Isa can sneak past them without trouble as long as she stays quiet and out of their line of sight; some aren't as blind as the one she encountered. But if Eules can be changed, then surely other models can as well, and Isa would rather not see what a corrupted Star would be like. Or a Storch.
Maybe she should've let Elster accompany her. She seems capable enough, brave and sure and reliable... everything Isa isn't.
The elevator dings and Isa swivels around, relaxing once the occupant steps out; Elster. Speak of the devil and she will appear.
"Ah, it's you again!" Isa greets with bit of cheer.
Elster nods, probably not knowing what a welcome sight she's quickly becoming to the young Gestalt.
"I'm glad to see you're still okay," Isa says, smiling slightly. "Have you found what you're looking for?"
How do you know about that?
Elster shakes her head.
"Oh... sorry to hear. I'm looking for someone too – my sister. If you see her, could you tell her I'm looking for her? Don't worry, you'll recognize her when you see her."
Another nod. Elster's certainly the strong silent type; maybe that's just how LSTRs are, like how EULRs can be friendly or STARs laid back. Isa can't help but be reminded of someone who is also on the taciturn side, but her mind draws a blank. It occurs to her that she's staring at Elster, who is in the middle of grabbing some stray shotgun rounds and, assuming the one-sided conversion is over, makes for the elevator. Isa doesn't know why, but she suddenly starts talking again.
"Hey, have you ever wondered if you're speaking to someone for the last time without knowing?"
The question causes Elster to pause.
Isa continues, "I wish I could go back, so I could say something else." Maybe then she wouldn't have... but it's too late for that now.
Elster stares at the wall with slow blinks. She seems... contemplative? Bored? It's hard to get a read with how impassive and nonverbal she is, nothing like the expressive Eules back home.
"This place is very strange, isn't it?" Isa asks, more to fill the silence, but it feels asinine to ask all the same. Like talking about the weather. "I wonder what happened here. But it doesn't really matter."
Elster grunts. At least she's a listener; it's good to have some confirmation that she is, as without those occasional grunts, Isa might start thinking she's talking to thin air. When the Replika doesn't leave right away, Isa looks at her and tries to give a reassuring smile.
"You don't need to worry about me. I can take care of myself now. I can't keep relying on others. That's why she left me, after all... I'm sure of that now."
A beat.
"Is the knife enough?" Elster asks. "Do you have any firearm training?"
Isa blinks in surprise. "Uh, no?" She remembers someone in her family was a soldier who stayed on Vineta when the war came, but neither Isa nor Erika have so much as touched a gun before.
"Do you know how to use that knife?"
"I mean, you just chop and stab with it, right?"
"More to it than that."
Elster marches around the bench and stands in front of Isa, taking hold of the girl's knife hand and positioning it at certain points of her body.
"Replikas have shells to protect our vitals. Aim for vulnerable spots if you can, where the shell is weaker. Back of the knees, the face, and especially the neck. Front or sides. Don't get any blood in your mouth or in open wounds – ours is oxidant. Poisonous."
Isa swallows when Elster positions the knife close to her own neck without any fear of being accidentally cut by a klutz like her. She doesn't even blink. There's that déjà vu again – Elster is kind of scary in her own right, but unlike the corrupted Replikas roaming this facility she's untainted and in full control.
"I understand," Isa says shakily.
Elster releases her knife hand. "I'll be checking the third floor now. Where will you be?"
"Uh, wherever administration is, I guess. I can try looking for whoever is in charge."
"That will be Falke. She's commander of this facility. But be careful, she might be sick too. I also heard from a Storch that the ADLR unit running the place in her stead is acting suspiciously. Remember what I taught you."
"Face and neck, I got it. Thank you."
Elster nods, the corner of her mouth quirking. "Good."
And with that, they separate again. Isa considers her knife – with that Eule it had been a fluke, but does she really have it in her to drive a blade into someone's flesh? She doesn't know. Maybe she can get by the way she's been doing, and save the stabbing as a last resort.
You always did hesitate to do anything.
She'd better get going too. Isa stands up and decides to give this floor another scouring for a Protektor pass, and then the power dies, trapping her in pitch darkness and a silence so absolute it's deafening. Isa's saved when light flickers in one of the adjacent rooms – she can always slip in and see if there's anything useful to scrounge up.
...wait a second. Is that a window? She can hear voices, jeering and mocking, cruel laughter, a pained cry. Isa looks around, eyes adjusting to her surroundings. It can't be... Mandelbrot Polytechnical High School? No, that can't... no...
The laughter grows louder, muffled. Isa's feet carry her closer to the scene, forcing her to peer in and see for herself, forcing her to remember.
The gang of schoolgirls look monstrous in their gas masks, cackling like demented imps as they shove a girl to the floor. A girl whose brown hair turned prematurely white. One of the wretches kicks her in the back and she whimpers, curling into a ball. Unable to do anything while blows rain down on her. All Isa can do is watch just like before the fear of repercussions holding her back. The fear of getting into trouble, or her family getting dragged into trouble. People already view her family's bookstore with suspicion, can Isa really be blamed for cowardice caution?
Teary red eyes bore through her.
I'm sorry. I didn't know what to do.
You could have done something instead of watch.
The power cycles back on, but those eyes linger in Isa's memory. She turns around and finds herself in a completely new area.
The lower levels are more cramped, making it increasingly difficult to evade the corrupted. And what's worse, there are STARs equipped with stun prods and shields, and their longer legs make them a terror to run from. At least those have the decency to cover up their mangled heads with sacks, the implications of which make Isa shudder if she thinks about it for too long.
She's just finished applying a bandage to her nose after an attempt to dodge two STARs went south, earning a shield bashed against her face. Isa mentally thanks Elster's impromptu lesson, managing to escape by slashing the back of one STAR's knee and making a break for it.
There's nowhere else to go without an administrator's pass into the mine, which a little detective work lets Isa deduce that Erika is bound to be there, since other Gestalts are apparently being corralled into the depths. Surely the Commander Falke who Elster mentioned will be able to tell her for certain; that would take a lot of frustration and guesswork out of it.
Isa opens the next door and jumps out of her skin – there's a STAR right on her, letting out an avian shriek that rallies the EULR troops. Isa ducks under the stun prod and scrambles, running in a serpentine pattern around the pillars to throw off her chasers, yelps when a blade catches her arm. She crashes into the opposite door; functional, thank goodness, but not cooperating fast enough.
"Come on, come on!" Isa begs through clenched teeth, hammering the activation while a trio of corrupted Replikas draw closer and closer.
Just when it seems she might meet her end as a bloody smear on this door, the damn thing swishes open and Isa all but collapses inside, pulling her legs in and letting the door hiss shut again. The Replikas bash the door for a moment before quietly giving up. Object permanence and their apparent lack of it is a beautiful, wonderful thing.
Isa rests on the carpeted floor to catch her breath, get a look at the latest addition to her collection of injuries. There goes another bandage. At least nothing's broken, though now that she's thought of that there's a high likelihood that she's jinxed it. As much as she'd like to hide in this office room for a while, it's probably best if she avoids places that might lead her to that administrator unit Elster warned her about. Breathing back under control, Isa walks past the desk and hazards opening the next door. Just as cozy as the last room, if a bit spartan in furnishings with only two couches and a small table. Two paintings flank the the next door, and Isa finds herself drawn to them.
Gestade der Vergessenheit. Die Toteninsel.
Charming.
One is a serene coastline with sharp mountaintops in the background, the other featuring an oarsman rowing toward an islet. Isa isn't really an art person, but something about these... like there's a tickle in the back of her mind. Isa immediately doesn't care for the paintings herself, what with the kind of titles they have, but also because the islet gives her conflicted feelings. Is it supposed to give off an air of both warmth and coldness? The curving inner walls of the islet almost bring to mind arms held open in offering of embrace, or an open box. Like with Elster, there's a sense of déjà vu, but more ominous. Has she seen these before? Definitely. Maybe. Shown to her by someone she knew once, who was deeply invested in forbidden things.
These were her favorite paintings.
Isa shakes the thought off. Commander Falke must be beyond this door, and even if she is sick, she might be willing to talk. If not, maybe Isa will luck out anyway and be sent to the mines as punishment for trespassing. What does she have to lose? She tentatively knocks on the door. Don't want to risk getting shot at for being rude or something.
"Hello? Is anyone here? I'm looking for my sister!"
"I'm afraid the Commander won't receive any visitors at the moment."
Isa gasps, whirling around and brandishing her knife. A male Replika – an ADLR unit – slowly enters the room. Where did he come from? How did he get past the corrupted? His voice is soft and pleasant, but carries an underlying edge to it that has the fine hairs on Isa's arms standing on end.
"But perhaps I can be of assistance instead," Adler continues.
His actions don't match up with his words, hand brushing along the furniture while he slinks closer to Isa, like a snake. Isa's back presses into the locked door, rapidly focusing on his face or neck so she can possibly deal with him like Elster showed her.
"...who're you?"
"I'm the administrator of this facility. Please, there's no need to be afraid. I'm just here to help."
He's getting too close. If Isa can't get him with the knife, she'll have to run for it, but then what? She can't go into the mines without a pass, and she'll just be running back into the corrupted horde...
"You'll forgive me for saying, but that doesn't put me at ease," Isa remarks.
Adler's smile feels practiced, like he's just putting on a mask. "Admittedly, this facility has seen better days. It's dangerous for a young lady to be wandering around. You say you're looking for your sister? If she's among the Gestalt workers then I'll be happy to assist, Miss Itou."
That just seals it. Isa puts on her bravest face and tightens the grip on her knife.
"I never told you my name."
Adler closes his eyes wryly, chuckles to himself. His posture changes subtly, turning from amicable to a predator ready to pounce. A bead of sweat rolls down Isa's cheek when his mouth shows a hint of white teeth, less smile and more of a snarl.
"My sincere apologies... I've done this so many times they're all starting to blur."
Adler lunges but Isa swipes her knife to deter him, practically vaulting over a chair to reach the door she just came through with him hot on her tail. What now? What does she do? Where does she go?! Isa can't stop and try anything without him doing who knows what to her, ADLRs aren't meant for combat but she knows he's physically stronger than her. He'll overpower her if she tries facing him head-on. Isa bursts out of the office in a panic, back into the corridor with that STAR and her EULRs, only now she sees a red light emitting from the paternoster lift. Not seeing any other option, she jumps inside, the rational part of her brain knowing it's just a dead end with the engine down, but the animal part of her is preparing to fight for her life. Isa faces the opening and prepares to stab the first thing that gets too close—
It feels like a pair of hands materialize out of the wall and pull Isa backwards, her scream being silenced as quickly as it comes out. She's weightless, falling, and then bangs her head into something.
It's cold, but unpleasantly humid when Isa comes to. She groans, feeling the back of her head where she must have bumped into something but can't for the life of her explain how or why whatever happened, happened. She's managed to escape Adler, though. Lucky. Isa staggers to her feet, grabbing her knife where it fell beside her and looks around; somehow, she's made it into the mine, or at least what she assumes is the mine. Maybe it's best not to question how exactly that happened...
Isa thinks to call out but decides against it, considering Adler got the jump on her last time she tried that. A massive circular hydraulic door looms ahead, the only way to go, so that's the direction Isa heads in if only for lack of an alternate route. The door is loud, rattling Isa's bones and making her flinch for fear that Adler or any corrupted will track her from the noise alone, forcing her to rush on in. Isa passes by stone walls and rolls of monofilament wire, taking care to stick close to shadows in case she needs to duck and hide. The mine is eerily silent, making every step she make feel much too noisy for comfort.
Another door, this one just as unethically loud as the last. Isa tiptoes across the metal threshold, and then a blast of sound nearly knocks the life out of her. A flash from behind, stone exploding into dust ahead right in her path – a gunshot. Adler! Like a frightened rabbit Isa sprints into the darkness, the door slamming behind her. No posters or cameras to stop her from running, not when she's being literally hunted down by a Replika with a gun!
Oh god, oh god, oh god!
Elster's not here. Erika's not here. No one's here to help, but this is what Isa wanted, isn't it? To not be a burden on others? God, but she wants to be a burden right now, especially when the door groans open for Adler. Her quaint kitchen knife won't be much protection against whatever Adler's brought. Isa banks right, down a stone corridor with more unused monofilament and skids to a halt seeing the huge yawning hole in the ground. Dead end. But there are pillars! Isa sidles up to one and clutches her knife, tries to control her breathing while steady hoof-falls approach. Oh, if only those could be Elster's hooves...
He's not even in a rush, taking his sweet old time. What could possibly drive him to hunt her down like an animal?
Adler's voice echoes off the stony chamber walls. "I know you're here."
Isa holds her breath, bites down on her lips. Heart is thundering against her rib cage like it's trying to escape. The sheen of sweat coating her skin is making her bangs stick to her brow, rolling down her face and stinging her eyes. Adler walks past her pillar. This is it. Here's where she either dies or makes good on that brief lesson Elster gave her back on the first floor. She can't stop now. Not after everything she's...
"I've done this countless times before," Adler tells the shadows. "You don't belong here."
ewige wiederkunft
Slowly, quietly, tentatively, Isa steps behind Adler, her knife held in a reverse grip. She'll have to put all her strength into one strike. Adler's shoulders straighten and he turns. Isa rises to her full height. Adler spots the glint of her knife and his eyes widen. A scream erupts from Isa's chest as she throws her full weight into the attack and plunges her knife into his right eye. It creates a sound like a wet plank of wood being snapped.
Adler doesn't even scream, only managing a shocked gasp followed by a gurgle, but that doesn't matter. He drops his weapon, the momentum of Isa's ambush pushing him to fall backwards into the hole; only then does he scream, the echoes ringing off the walls. Isa breathes rapidly, muscles aching from the exertion.
She... she did it. Holy shit, she did it!
At the cost of her knife, though. But it's not all bad, since Adler's lost his gun. Lucky, lucky, lucky. Isa doesn't know the first thing about firearms beyond which end the bullets come out of, but she assumes that the rifle laying at her feet must be a powerful one based on the large chunk it took out of stone. Adler was willing to use this cannon on her? What in the world... well, if nothing else, she can always use it as a club.
Odd that she hasn't heard Adler hit the ground. Just how deep does this hole go? She leans over the hole and strains to listen for anything. Ah, there's something. It almost sounds like there's water down there... how long has it been since she last heard rolling waves like the ones on Vineta? Does she drop in? Adler might have a hard time telling up from down while in water with a knife in his skull, so Isa's got that going for her.
Besides, there's no turning back now. Erika's not here. All she can do is keep going.
Isa takes some steps back before running and leaping into the depths.
For theRe bE divers sorts of death - soMe whErein the body reMaineth; and in some it vanisheth quite away with spirit.
In one kind of death the spirit also dieth, and this it hath Been known to do whilE yet the body was in vigoR for many years.
In his black staRs, wE shall find our salvation or destruction.
To know the King in Yellow is to enter a realM of forbiddEn knowledge, where the Mind itself Becomes a twistEd labyRinth.
O
zyklus
Isa nearly inhales water, scrambles to her feet and coughs violently, leaning on the rifle like a cane. Oh god, what's that smell? She'd hoped to fall someplace that reminded her of home – not Rotfront, but Vineta, the planet of her birth. Instead she seems to have tripped into a long abandoned room of rusted metal, grimy walls and old stagnant water dripping from the ceiling. There is no way this place is connected to the mine, is it? It feels wrong. But there's nowhere else to go, and Isa has no choice but to continue.
She wouldn't, couldn't stop even if she wanted to.
Wherever here is, it's a non-euclidean nightmare. Isa's mental compass can't make heads or tails of the directions she goes in; a door going left turns into a next-floor exit, ascending a ladder takes her downstairs, she banks right and finds an intersection that shouldn't physically exist. At one point she heads what should be north and finds herself facing south, confronted with a room full of EULRs and STCRs and even a MNHR.
Fuck that room very much.
A silver lining is that all this aimless wandering around has led her to collect some Nitro Express bullets for the rifle, should a situation arise that she needs to fire it. Isa turns around and heads a different direction this time, climbing down a ladder – which actually does take her down for once, a welcome favor to her sanity. The corridor she finds herself in is dark, some parts of the floor so rusted she worries it will give out under her feet, but that clearly isn't hampering the EULRs further up. The nearest door doesn't work. North it is, by definition of whatever gibbering insane architect is responsible for this place.
This feels familiar at least, sneaking past an EULR or two in the shadows. Isa doesn't want to risk trying the left or right doors in case it sets them off. The northernmost door opens just fine, leading her to a large open room positively rank with the smell of meat. It doesn't take long to find the source, a pit in the center made of undulating, pulsating, bulbous flesh. Wet and sticky, audibly gurgling like a giant digestive system.
"Nope," Isa tells herself.
Only problem with this perfectly reasonable response that anyone in their right mind would have is that the rest of the room staunchly disagrees with her, all doors stuck fast with broken locks or stuck tight with disgusting squelching. Even the door she entered from won't budge, which leaves the flesh pit as Isa's only avenue of getting anywhere near our of here. She hates the idea, but if it means finding Erika...
Like a carrot on a string.
It won't be much different from jumping down that hole in the mine, will it? Doubtful it can get any worse than this, and things are supposed to get worse before they get better, right? Isa takes a breath and steels herself, jumping down the hole. Not as graceful this time. Isa winces and shudders as she makes contact with the red flesh, feeling it on every single cut and bruise she's accumulated over this whole search, and at one point she lands on a sticky mass and has to push herself off of it. It takes an uncomfortably long time for her to finally land on solid ground, even if it's still as squishy and disgusting as the pit.
And thus the universe betrays her fleeting optimism.
Somewhere behind the support pillars is a mass, shambling and shuffling like the corrupted, but... different, somehow. A hiss of multiple pieces of metal scraping together. Isa hefts up the rifle and squints one eye shut, trying to get a glimpse of the thing. Maybe, if she's careful, she can catch it off guard and take it out before it knows she's here, like with Adler.
A hand reaches into view. Followed by another. And another, and another, and another. It's not one single creature, but many.
[ 鵺 ]
The rifle nearly slips out of Isa's grasp as she struggles to wrap her mind around the thing. The hands reach out of the metal cage binding them all together, a mass of flesh writhing inside. Are those melted faces in the flesh? it calls to me in a sea of flesh. an ocean of memories where "i" ends and "we" begin. we will become one. Pure animal instinct has Isa backing away from the monster as it shuffles closer, hands reaching out in search of something as if hidden eyes are stowed away in the desiccated palms. Her skin crawls at the sight of it, the distorted faces grimacing and groaning, pleading for something, and Isa hopes she dies before understanding what coherent thoughts could possibly run through such a thing.
The hands twist to face her and she whimpers. Isa stumbles away, backing herself into a corner while the creature looms ever closer. Terrifying, but with a bizarre longing. No, stay back! come join us. together we will be eternal. Get away from me! there is no escape. we will be one. But I will never go back to being me. I fear the dark sea that will swallow me.
Help... someone...! Erika! Elster! Ari—!
The thing is right on her, hands clawing out and ready to sink into her flesh, but then there's a thump some distance away followed by a thunderous gunshot report making the tendons in the walls flinch, the monster recoiling with a gargle. Isa cries at the volume of it but the monster shuffles away in search of a new target. A familiar voice cuts through the metallic shrieking.
"Isa! Talk to me! ISA!"
Isa's vision is blurred with tears, but she can see a dark mass rushing up to shield her body from danger; she sees the distinctive red chest plate belonging to only one other person, the most beautiful sight she's beheld in what feels like an eternity. Her spirit soars.
"Elster!"
The Replika swaps her shotgun for the rifle laying uselessly at Isa's side, kneels into position and takes aim, but when she squeezes the trigger nothing happens. Elster snarls out a "verdammt!" and picks her shotgun back up, fires off a round to keep the monster at bay. Isa flinches, covers her ears but it's not enough protection from the meaty punch of buckshot as Elster holds the thing back.
"Isa, you load that rifle! I'll keep it distracted!"
Elster is so different in a fight, her tone sounding like a soldier shouting orders in a warzone. Decisive, efficient. The words finally register in her brain and Isa looks down at the bullets littered at her feet. She scrambles, but her vision is blurred with tears and the pop in her ears leave her disoriented, dropping as many rounds as she can pick up.
Must be brave! I must be brave!
Elster bellows across the room, keeping the monster's attention on her. A hideous scream of many voices, the sound of a scuffle. Meat punching into metal – Isa looks up and the monster has Elster locked in a grapple, howling in outrage and trying to rip her apart. Another shotgun blast, meat bursting and metal squealing, the monster's four Storch legs collapsing as it contorts in agony. Hurt, but still alive. She has to hurry. Isa wipes her eyes and grabs two of the large Nitro Express cartridges in one hand. Now to reload the thing, which – how?
"Elster, how do I open it?!"
"Bolt handle!"
How is she supposed to know what that is?! But fortunately it's easy to spot a small red switch or lever of some kind on the top of the rifle, above where the trigger is. The monster rises back up, hounding after Elster. Isa pulls it to the right and yanks down on the barrel, rifle unhinging open with two spent cartridges ejecting from the chamber and somersaulting over her shoulder. Her fingers are shaking, but she manages to slide the replacements where they need to be, latching it closed, bolt handle locking in place. Reloaded and ready to fire.
The rifle is heavy in her untrained arms, but she lifts it up all the same. Isa fumbles to line up the sights, trying to keep the barrel trained on that shambling monstrosity. Her finger shakes on the trigger, nearly squeezes but stops at the last moment – Elster gets into view, bashing the creature with the butt of her shotgun to gain distance, ducks across the room.
"Elster!" Isa calls out.
"FIRE!" Elster roars.
The monster's in her sights. Clear shot. Isa holds her breath and squeezes the trigger. There's an ear-splitting crack, a burst of muzzle flash, a sudden blinding pain in her right eye, and the world goes dark.
Isa gasps back to consciousness then coughs hoarsely, a powerful scent of ammonia in her nostrils. She looks around in fear of the creature but relaxes; they're in a safe room from the looks of it. As safe a room can be in a place like this. Isa's laying on a hospital bed and Elster kneels in front of her, closing up a small bottle and looking worse for wear. Guilt stabs at Isa's gut – maybe if she wasn't so clumsy, the brave Replika wouldn't be as banged up. The feeling is replaced by throbbing, stinging pain in her right eye, clapping a hand over it with a whimper.
"Easy," Elster says. She gets up and holds Isa's face still to examine the damage.
"What happened?"
"The recoil knocked you out. No wonder. That rifle of yours is chambered with some ridiculous anti-armor rounds. But the one shot was all we needed – you finished off that thing in the other room. Good work."
There's a hint of a smile on Elster's face and Isa feels warmth in her chest at the praise. She can be useful after all. It doesn't ease the hurt, though.
"Is it as bad as it feels?" Isa wonders, unsure if she wants to know.
Elster's brow furrows. "It's bad."
Isa sighs sardonically. "Sounds about right. It would be just like me to put my own eye out trying to shoot something." She tries to laugh it off, but winces. Ah, note to self: Don't laugh when your face is falling apart as it is. "Thank you for your help."
"You're welcome."
"You know, I don't think I want to use that rifle again... why don't you take it instead?"
Elster looks her in the eye for confirmation and takes the rifle, unloads the spent cartridges, and goes through a whole series of examinations to ensure it's completely harmless. It's kind of scary how experienced she is with guns, but that's just part of who she is, Isa supposes.
"What happened to your knife?" Elster asks.
Isa prods at the swollen flesh around her eye and almost laughs at the irony. "That ADLR you mentioned? I ran into him in the mine. He was hunting me with that rifle. I snuck up on him and uh... stabbed him in the eye."
A beat.
"Good girl," Elster praises, smiling crookedly.
This time Isa actually laughs, as much as she can with a throbbing skull. "Ow, god... my medical kit?"
"Right here."
Elster pulls a white box out from under the bed and opens it, begins to disinfect the wound despite Isa's hissing. The stoic Replika is unexpectedly gentle tending to her like this, making Isa wonder.
"Have you done this before?"
There's a brief look of confusion on Elster's face. "Maybe. With the person I'm looking for."
"Oh, yeah. Did you find them yet?"
Elster looks away.
"...you find your sister?"
"No..."
Elster finishes the prep work and lays bandages over Isa's eye, takes a knee to examine her makeshift patient. Another flicker of a memory – for a split second, Elster's hair is longer and her face is worn; both with scars and the lines of someone who is too young to look so hardened, who can't sleep at night and looks a decade older than she really is. Isa feels much smaller, like a child.
"Do you need a new weapon?" Elster asks.
Isa blinks and she's back in the fleshy safe room room. "Uh, I better not... I can manage if I stay quiet. Every time I use a weapon things seem to mess up in some way." Elster doesn't seem convinced, but Isa gives her a stubborn look so she lets it go. Now something occurs to Isa, adding, "You're a lot more talkative than usual..."
"I just remembered what you said. Not knowing if you're talking to someone for the last time. Might have better parting words than 'hrmmph.'"
Isa smiles, another laugh starting up but it turns into a cough, which only makes her right eye throb painfully. Her body feels like a leaden ton, weak with exhaustion. The whole journey through S-23 with all its own horrors and then unexpectedly being thrown into this whole new nightmare is starting to take a toll on her in many ways. Now it's like every time the walls pulsate, Isa can feel it under her skin. Her left hand twitches. Her hand hurts, her head hurts, everything hurts...
Elster interrupts her thoughts. "Are you sure you'll be fine on your own? This place is more dangerous than S-23. If you want, I can—"
"I'm not a child, you know!" Isa snaps, harsher than necessary. Another flicker in her vision – did Elster just flinch?
"I never said you were," the Replika says quietly. She looks off to the side, and now Isa feels bad.
"No, I'm sorry. I didn't mean it. It's just, I feel sick... it's hard to breathe. The air in this place feels thick, like you could bite it. And it's like there's a fog in my head... I'd only slow you down. That's all."
"You should rest then," Elster says. She gets up and searches through a storage box by a computer monitor with a red screen, pulls out some thermite flares. "I need to move on, but I'll clear the way for you as best I can."
Isa lays on her side, peers up at Elster gratefully. "Thank you, Elster."
A shrug. "It's what I do." She examines the locked door heading north and then opts for the east exit instead, looks back in Isa's general direction before opening the door. "Don't overexert yourself. I... hope we meet again."
She's really taking that one question to heart. Isa doesn't know if her outburst hurt Elster's feelings or not, but the Replika's usually good at looking her in the face when talking, and pointedly avoiding looking at her reminds Isa of...
Like flipping a switch, Elster's expression hardens and she departs once more, revolver and thermite in hand. Not long after, Isa can hear the telltale cry of corrupted Replikas followed by unearthly screeches. She catches a whiff of burning metal and meat, the combination making her stomach churn. Then silence. Should it be impressive or frightening that Elster doesn't even need to shoot those monsters just to kill them?
Isa's good eye aches with the barely-there, almost burn of the totally exhausted, lingers for a time on that monitor. One could hardly call this room a suitable place to take a nap in, but her body is so heavy and she's so tired...
Erika... where are you...?
A hexagon blinks on the monitor as Isa blacks out.
In the King's realm, time loses its meaning, and madness becomes the only truth.
and now
ROTFRONT
Isa wakes up.
Oh, what the hell?
Gone is the meaty flesh room with its hospital bed and red computer screen; now she's in a perfectly normal public restroom. A restroom on Rotfront. Sure, why not. Only one of the fluorescent lights is working and even that bothers her eyes, forcing her to shield herself with a hand as she forces herself to stand. God, she feels so grimy and filthy... what Isa wouldn't give for a hot shower right now, but one of the sinks here will do just fine. She runs the water and uses her right hand as a cup to wash her face, or at least the parts of her face that aren't bandaged up. One might be tricked into thinking S-23 Sierpinski and that flesh prison were just fever dreams if not for the aforementioned bandages.
Isa spits in the sink and looks up at the cracked mirror. She watches her reflection for a minute, feeling a laugh building up inside her. Her face doesn't hurt as much anymore, so she lets it out.
"Hey Eri," she cracks at her nonexistent audience, "Get a load of this, huh? In the time it's taking me to find you, I went all the way to Leng, made a badass Replika friend, got sent to the meat dimension, punched my eye out with a gun and made it back! I bet you're going to say I look like her!"
Oh, if only Isa could look like her. For all her sorrow and the lines of war etched on her face, Auntie always looked good. More handsome than pretty, but she made the army's dress uniform look good, and Isa remembers Erika had once wished they had a picture of her in battle armor with rifle at the ready. Isa's laughter peters out, sobering at the thought. Why did she have to be so skittish around Auntie?
Papa was conflicted about it, had probably argued with her about it, but ultimately praised how his sister cleaned up in uniform. Erika oohed and aahed over how cool she looked, and Auntie smiled her usual crooked smile as she ruffled Eri's hair. Then it was little Isa's turn, won't you be a good girl and give your aunt a hug before she leaves, Isolde? But Isa cried easily as a child and could be scared by her own shadow, so she hid behind Papa's leg. She still peeked though, and immediately felt bad because Auntie wasn't smiling anymore. She looked hurt.
Isa sighs. Stupid, stupid thing to do.
Her left hand throbs and she rubs it; the bandaging is damp, so that wound on her palm must have reopened. Well, Mama always said she's going to contribute to a doctor's early retirement at this rate. Assuming she lives long enough to get out of this mess with Erika in tow and be able to see a doctor again, that is. She looks down and...
...what the...?
That is not normal. It looks like the skin on her left hand is rotting, the stained wrappings a much darker red than would be expected. Almost rusty. She clenches a fist and relaxes her hand, watching in horror as the skin on her fingers begins to peel. How did... when did she get infected? Was it that monster in the flesh pit, or that first EULR, or...
No. You know full well what caused it. You knew all along.
No.
The Protektors never confiscated that book. You stole it away, sticking your nose into things you don't know anything about.
No!
The King's whispers echo through the ages, luring the lost and the desperate into his ever-waiting embrace.
No... please...!
Erika's not here.
I can't stop now!
What will it take for you to see the truth? You're rotting. You've BEEN rotting. It's time to go home. Remember.
"SHUT UP!" Isa shrieks at her reflection.
She bursts out of the restroom and finds herself in a metro platform, unpopulated save for fellow corrupted. They don't even notice her anymore. A forlorn KLBR sits in a fetal position on the far end, the grotesque swelling of her skull twitching as if in pain when a train with no passengers rattles by. There's one passenger, a lone girl with white hair. Isa looks at her and sees that islet again. She approaches a lone EULR who stares into a hand mirror, one skeletal hand attempting to comb whatever patches of hair she still has. A STAR sluggishly patrols the platform; were she an average height, the tip of her stun prod would drag along the floor. None of them pay her any mind now.
They once looked like monsters to her. If Elster were to appear... would she see Isa as a monster?
Isa passes the Replikas, passes an ashen stain on the wall in the shape of a person, passes a wall of televisions blinking hexagons at her. Empty, filled by the abandoned and forgotten. You must remember. I don't want to remember, because that will make it real. You must. You must.
Down the metro, past Yeong Photo. Past a lone STCR mutated beyond recognition, stalking the cable hallway. Into a service room, up the ladder. Past the atrium. Into the commercial corridor leading to her family's bookstore. This isn't the Rotfront she knows – the layout is all wrong. It's as if everything was taken apart and put back together by someone who doesn't understand how it works. The STAR officer and her EULR cohorts step out of Isa's way.
Here she stands on the precipice, like The Fool, but rather than the beginning of a journey it feels like the end is drawing near. Isa's hand hovers over the door panel, shaking. She has a terrible feeling in her gut that if she steps inside, uncovers whatever secrets lie within, then...
The boat is waiting to take you where you need to go.
It's time.
Charon doesn't make change.
...there's no going back. Where else is there to look? How much longer can she keep putting off the inevitable? But she's come this far...
Remember.
She opens the door.
R
E
M
E
M
B
E
R
d
e
a
t
h
...so.
This is how it ends. How it was always going to end.
Isa barely registers the store's back door opening, looks to her left. There stands Elster, a bloody gash on her brow, clad in white and blue armor, stronger than ever and ready for anything. Elster always looks so brave and cool. Elster could do anything. Meanwhile, Isa just...
"Isa?"
She slowly blinks at the shrine.
"I couldn't find her... I've looked everywhere, but she's not here anymore."
Elster almost looks like she has something to say. Isa knows, suspects she's known all along, it was just obscured by the fog in her mind that has only now dissipated, granting her clarity before the end. She even suspects that Elster knows as well. When Isa looks at the Replika, her expression isn't accusatory or angry – though one couldn't blame her if she felt that way. No, she's not angry. It's just that a numbness is beginning to settle in.
Still, she has to ask. "You've been here before, haven't you?"
Despite not being able to age like Gestalts, Elster seems ancient now. World weary, ever vigilant, unstoppable and unyielding, each battle scar patched and sprayed over bearing a story to tell. So much like those flickers that flash in Isa's vision every now and then, a familiar face that she ought to know. Elster's stoicism slips away and she looks hauntingly melancholic.
The magpie who wanted to be a knight but turned into a dragon.
"Yes," Elster answers.
"How many times?"
"Too many. Not enough."
Isa gestures to herself. "Does this ever change?" She knows the answer but wants to ask all the same.
"No. I'm sorry."
The girl huffs what might constitute as a mirthless laugh, watching the corruption crawl over the flesh of her hand. Why should she expect any different in the Sisyphean nightmare of this existence? Was Isa Itou, the one Elster has encountered, ever real in the first place? Or is this hell a product of her own making, made manifest by outside forces exacerbating the efforts of a desperate girl clumsily meddling with something beyond her ken? All because she loved and missed her sister so terribly that she'd do anything?
"Maybe there's no other outcome than this. Here we are, just as we were always going to be and as we always will be."
Once upon a time, Elster might have argued that that's not how things work. That there's no grander destiny at play and things just happen, with only the benefit of hindsight interposing a sense of narrative. She knows better now. Not that it matters. Like Isa, she'd do anything.
"Looking back, it's all so obvious now," Isa continues. "What business would I or Erika have on Leng anyway? It just drives you mad, doesn't it? Now that it's too late, knowing what I know... I can't go on. I'm so tired..."
There's nothing left, no reason to go on with her entire purpose here being wishful thinking given flesh, the result of a haphazardly performed ritual, or a dreaming god rolling in its sleep, or maybe something out of this world really was dug up from the innermost depths of Sierpinski's mine and it decided it likes puppet shows. Only it's not strings compelling Isa or Elster on and on through the endless horrors, but cancerous flesh and distorted dreams, patterns that go on for eternity.
Elster steps close enough to rest a hand on Isa's shoulder, her face stern but with a hint of something else in those eyes.
"It's okay," Elster says, softer than she's ever spoken to the girl before. "You've done well to come this far."
Isa stares at her, emotion rushing back in a last wave before oblivion claims her. "But... I failed! Erika was never here! I was never here! Just look for yourself, I'm a pretender! I'm not the real Isa! All along, the both of us, over and over, again and again... if everything's just going to repeat in an endless loop, then nothing either of us did ever mattered in the end! Nothing matters!"
Elster's hands suddenly grab Isa by the arms and she forces their eyes to meet, her blue-red gaze flashing with anger. Isa balks at the sight; that's definitely new.
Elster growls, "You are the realest thing I'm looking at in this moment! Do you feel this?" Her palms pat Isa's arms, one hand prodding at her left cheek.
"Yes, but—!"
"Then it matters! Adler didn't take his own eye out! I didn't kill that thing in the pit by myself, we did! We made it to this point, every time!"
"And every time, we failed!" Isa pushes the Replika away, steps back and brandishes her infected arm, waves it towards the shrine bearing her and Erika's photographs, the black band revealing the inescapable truth of it, her voice rising to a scream. "I'm already dead! Look at it! LOOK AT ME!"
Elster doesn't budge, expression unreadable. "I am, Isolde."
Isa sniffles, vision blurring with a fresh wave of tears. "Don't... don't call me that. Only people who call me Isolde are my parents and..."
"And who?"
"My auntie. Not that it matters. She's dead too, if not from the war, then..."
Elster is silent for a moment. Then she rummages through her pouches, stepping closer to Isa – the girl doesn't even try pushing her away.
"Is this her?" Elster asks.
"What?"
Elster is holding a photograph between them. Isa wipes her eyes and looks closer, gasping. There, in the ruins of a Vinetan city, a cracked moon in the sky, are two members of the People's Army, 5th Vinetan Infantry Division, Unit 12: Alina Seo... and her aunt.
She remembers now, fully. When Isa was a little girl, Auntie seemed a bit scary to her because she was a soldier, and war was a terrifying thing. But Isa has always regretted fearing her, because Auntie looked so sad and lost in this photo, as though war was eating up who she used to be and spitting her back out into a world that didn't know what to do with her anymore. She remembers a veteran in their block who'd been in Unit 12 brought it to Yeong Photo. Ariane had been so stunned by her own resemblance to Seo. Oh, Ariane! And now...
Wait a minute.
Isa looks at the picture and at Elster, holds the photograph up so her aunt's face is next to the Replika. While comparing them, Elster's face changes once again for a split second. Suddenly Isa finally understands why the Replika seems so familiar now. The accent, the voice, the face, the mannerisms, just her hair and eyes are slightly different.
Isa's chin quivers.
"...Lilith?"
Elster looks away, lips pressed into a thin line. Isa steps closer now. The resemblance is even more striking, that melancholic gaze in Auntie LilIith's scarred face flickering over Elster as if superimposed, the Replika rubbing the back of her neck where a low ponytail ought to be hanging but isn't.
"Is that really...? How do... why do you look like...?"
"...Replikas all have a neural pattern given to us from a Gestalt donor. In the case of LSTR units like me, we get ours from a decommissioned unit from the Penrose Program, because the central Neural Archive was destroyed along with the original. This pattern came from a Vinetan soldier. I couldn't say for sure, but maybe my Gestalt was Lilith Itou."
"Did you know that all along too?"
"No. My focus was elsewhere – I didn't care much for details like this. But now I'm looking deeper, seeing patterns. I never really stopped to think of it until I ran into you by the first floor elevator, back on S-23."
"...do you remember anything? From her?"
"Just snapshots in the back of my mind. Bodies in a trench. Pain in my right eye. Alina. Lilies. What do you remember?"
Isa gnaws on her lip. "That she scared me, but it wasn't her fault and I didn't know any better. Now I don't just want to go back and say something different to my sister, I also want to apologize to Lilith. The last time I saw her in person, I hid from her. I feel so awful about it. I'm sorry. Not just for that, but for not being brave enough like Erika... for not doing anything until it was too late..."
Ariane... forgive me...
Isa hiccoughs. "I've done something terrible."
"So have I."
"Will you...?" Isa's voice cracks, watching the corruption spread slowly up her arm. "Elster, I'm scared..."
Elster doesn't say anything, opting to pull the girl into an embrace. The contact surprises Isa momentarily, and after all the hardships endured to reach this point, all the brave faces put on, the dam finally breaks. Isa wails and buries her face in Elster's armor, clutching her like a lifeline as she bursts into tears. Elster tries to remember the last time she had to comfort a crying woman; perhaps if she imagines Isa with white hair...? No. That wouldn't be fair. She rubs one hand up and down a shuddering back.
Dann erschein sie und sagte:
Hab keine angst.
Sie war geworden wie sie sind.
"Auntie—" Isa chokes. "I'm sorry! I'm so sorry!"
Elster doesn't have the heart to correct the verbal slip. There wouldn't be any point. If the poor girl needs her to be a ghost from the past in these final moments, then surely Elster can manage that. Isa's legs buckle and they collapse onto the floor, Elster not once letting her go. She can pretend for a minute that her name is Lilith. Elster holds Isa close, uncaring of the corruption, pets her hair soothingly.
"It's okay. Cry as much as you want. I've got you. Auntie's got you..."