Witchers of Nifelheim - Finale

Rains glare flicks along the halls. Her face twisting in disgust at the scene. While it might be clearer to others that this disgust was because of the gore, to squiggles, that was only half of it. 'A waste of life.' The thought crossed Rains mind, 'Reserchers who either, didn't sign up for this... or got more then they bargained for.'

Rain glares at the man in the screen, "Not this time Brice... Not this time." She says quitely before scampering paws reach her ears, "...There you are..." she says gently, menace creeping into her tone as the parasites approach. She waits, letting them charge, before in a flash of purple, just like a particular parasite, she beheads one of them. The look in her eye convayed that this action was thoughtless. Like deciding to get a glass of water. She freezes her stance as the edge of her blade flips, before lunging forward at the nearest parasite in another purple blur, swipes at its chin in an underhand swing.

Circi stares a long moment at the screen memorizing his face, "Death is coming Mr. Rich man. You better hope neither I nor Zoy are the first to find you..." the sound of scampering paws draws her attention. Her spider legs twitch as she turns to face her first threat on Keplar... some lowly parasites, "Childs play..." she scoffs waiting out their charge, her hands sliding behind her back. Shes simply going to dodge an attack if its made at her, and crack its skull into the floor with the tip of her spiderleg in riposte.

"It's not 100% needed... Just wanted to tell my son we were okay." She admits.

She looks to where she thought her was. "Sorry Ryu. Mother will contact you as soon as possible."

(In the aircraft)
Wincing from the sudden grasp from her daughter, the decided to gently holds her and speak softly. "It's okay, this aircraft is designed to fly like this. It's like a Griffon, except you're even safer in here."

She continued for as long as was needed.

(At the battle)

"Four of them in the area. It should be fine." Twilight says calmly.

"Guys, don't lose your heads so easily." She says. "It will only make you more likely to fall into a trap. Okay, before we murder the last one, give us a scan, to see what we're dealing with here."

As soon as they step onto the surface of the building Thena had begun to charge a frost spell up to 3rd level. Though she doesn't look as bad and at one point in the flight she took a power nap, she still hasn't spoken for a while. At this point she's more in deep thought trying to make sense of everything around her in this new world. She begins to raise her arm to fire the spell, but upon Twilight's call out lowers it back down.

//Dodging rockets in Be'er Sheva, in the middle of 15 hour work shift, fook me sideways omg halp me Hulk Hogan.






A particulary grizzly, scarred wolf with an insane look in his eyes darted at Rogue, moving much faster than you expected. Turning into a blur, it threw its body left and right, zig-zagging unpredictably at you and throwing off your aim. By the time you had him in your sights, the wolf had already dodged to the side, leaving your hand directed at empty air. It was just too fast.

When the range between you was practically zero, the wolf lunged at you, barking horribly and going right at your throat. Only in that split second instant when it went airborde, did you manage to get a beat on it and unload a lightning bolt in its maw, point blank.

The electricity visibly washed over your body, accumulating inside your palm, before deafeningly discharging, frying the creature point blank and cooking it alive in the span of a second. The air became filled with the smell of burning meat, as Rogue stepped aside, allowing the dead carcas to fly past him, right into a bloodied TV column, making its glass shatter and explode into a million shards across the lobby.



"My name is Kashiwagi Brice and I might have doomed our planet." The haunted man on the other TV screens began to speak, as a purple blade ignited in Rains hand, its searing heat palpable.

Turning into a blur and leaving behind smeared after-images, Rain flew past the wolf, the path of her blade just barely traceable, and the wolf's neck exploded in a fountain of orange blood, its head skidding across the polished floor and leaving a long ugly smear.


"This pre-recorded message has been uploaded to the net and distributed to every major news station on the planet. It will continue
to loop, until there is no point to loop it.

It will serve as my confession."

Brice spoke with a steel gaze, as Rain spinned in place and cleaved through half a skull of another wolf, its head popped like a watermellon when Circi planted it face first into the floor, spraying her in brain matter.




"This is for the record." Kashiwagi's harsh, piercing gaze was staring seemingly into the depths of your soul.



The last Parasite was charging right at Viktoria. The girl had a haunted, miserable expression ever since she boarded the VTOL, something that improved slightly when Twilight took hold of her hack then, but when the VTOLs doors had opened, you practically had to push her onto the roof.

Her eyes went wild ever since she peered off the edge of the skyscraper and saw how high she was off the ground. She shouldn't have been logically afraid of heights, she flew of Griffons before. But something about standing on solid ground, so high above the earth, gave her a strong sense of vertigo, one that didn't improve, even after you entered the lobby.

It was as if she was keenly aware, just how high she was above ground, at any given second, and even surrounded by walls on all sides and a ceiling, it was as if she was afraid to fall through the floor, walking unsteadily and grasping every available object on the way. The amount of high-tech equipment around her, all beeping at her and flashing their lights, coupled with the foreign slick arcitectural design on everything, only exhaserbated the effect, it was if she was afraid of everything, withdrawing more and more into herself, keeping her eyes shut, shielding herself from the world.


By the parasite lunged at her, she was so out of it, she left herself completely open.

"Viki, he's yours!" Lightning yelled with a grin, her eyes tracking the wolf like a trophy, oblivious to Viki's condition. By the time Lightning shifted her gaze to the girl and gasped, growing pale, it was already too late.

The wolf lunged at Viktoria, tackling her to the ground and violently ripping the collar of her sweater, trying to get at her throat. Viktoria was shrieking, haphazardly thrashing and trying to throw the wolf off of her, as the frenzied creature clawed and bit at her hands.

Her palms shaking, she tried to draw the sign for a Fireball in the air, screaming and thrashing in panic, but something seemed wrong. Instead of her Fireball materializing, only a spark of orange flame flickered, replaced by a harsh sizzling of ice that too faded away. Then her horn lit up, briefly, the light fading and glowing for several seconds, before disppearing entirely. Viktoria released a single incessant scream.


The next second Lightning collided with the wolf, knocking it off Viktoria with her shoulder and sending it sliding across the floor, right into Ryu's outstretched katana that went into the wolfs throat and split its skull in half, extending out of the back of its head.


"Viki!" Ryu yelled, rushing toward his sister, as Lightning tried to take a hold of the girl and restrain her thrashing.


"It hurts!!" Viki cried, blindly writhing on the floor and colliding with Lightning "It hurts!!!"

"Show me!" Lightning yelled in her ear, trying to get a hold of her "Show me where you're hurt!!!"

Viktoria screamed and briefly stopped, grasping her own left wrist and staring at it. Flaming sparks continued to sizzle inside her palm, her horn glowing and fading.

The same effect was observed in Ryu, although the boy only grimaced and bit into his lower lip, to avoid showing the pain he was in.

You've never seen anything like this before. In all your time on Nifelheim, their horns didn't glow even once. But the images were eerily familiar to Twilight and Rogue. It looked like the signs of Unicorn magic. The one that stopped working a long time ago.


As if in confirmation, Rogue tried levitating his rifle. The metal object shook, slightly but visibly and lifted only for maybe 1 centimeter into the air, before you felt fatigue washing over you and the rifle fell down to hang from its strap.

But it was something. Weak, fragile, feeble, but it was there. You felt it in your bones.


"Whats... happening to me?!" Viktoria cried in pain, clutching her left wrist and lifting her desperate, pained gaze at you.

"You are coming into your birthright..." Rogue says calmly to Viki,

"We told you before, back on Nifelheim, that unicorns had inate magical abilities.

But when the pillars appeared on Kepler and the madness started spreading, those abilities appeared to be suppressed in some way, and they remained so when we travelled to Nifelheim.

Now that the pillars are gone however, it seems that our power is returning, even to you.

Most unicorns begin to develop it during childhood, so I'm not sure what the effect would be on an adult. Do you feel up to continuing and seeing how it goes, or do you want to hold back for now until it subsides?"

"Viki?!" Twilight cried in surprise, noticing just how much she was out of it.

At the sight of the horn glow, Twilight's perception slowed down, filling her with elation, a smile unknowingly growing on her face.

This wa then replaced by the realization just how much magic Viki might be struggling with, and with Ryu there, two unicorns ready to blow up without control.

She dashed over there, making room for herself by force if must. She then held Viki, motion Ryu to come closer.

"Bear with me here for a second, it will all be clear soon. For now, I need you to focus on the source of the pain, the pressing feeling. This is mana. You have to use the energy yourself now. Hold your hand up to an empty space, close your eyes, and think you're shooting the energy out your hand. I'll help you if needed."

Her voice was authorative, but not harsh. It was more like a first responder to a disaster then demanding, instructing them for their own safety.

Rain stares at the disolving parasites. An easy fight, "Too easy..." It sounded like a half taunt, The other half holds a deep consern, "If the weak ones are up here... The bigger ones must be below..." her eyes fall onto the human soldiers. Easy for the witchers in the room... yeah. But the humans would have been eaten if the team wasn't here with them. She glances over to gauge what their thinking.

Rains eyes then flick to the unicorns for a long moment before letting out a soft tsk, "Unicorns USED to have magic on Keplar before it was ripped away. It appears to be returning quite violently." She cringes, "I dont envy you."

Circi looks to Victoria and Twilight, "Magic? Without parasites or some other means?" Circis hands unlock from her back as the fight ends just as soon as it began, "Do you think you can continue, would you like to return to the transport?"

"Inate magic sounds like more spells," Thena is suddenly bright eyed at this knowledge "When this is done I want to know everything about Kepler magic!"

Viktoria looked at you, her eyes horrified, then at her palm still sizzling with sporadic flames and electrical sparks and released a prolonged, pained scream as she thrust her hand toward the far wall. For a moment, you expected a burst of energy to erupt out of her hand, perhaps strong enough to melt everything in its path, until it shot out of the building. But only a sad, fragile sizzle came out, before all traces of magic inside her palm faded.

Viktoria slowly lowered her hand and stopped screaming, looking emptily at the floor in exhaustion.
"...I... can't." she simply said, the look in her eye vacant, resigned "...its interfering with my Glasgow Synergy... I can't cast... anything." she bitterly gritted her teeth, closing her eyes "...this Unicorn magic... I DON'T WANT IT!" She screamed in anger, before her expression turned miserable again.


"Viki.." Ryu quietly said and his sister violently shook her head, then slowly sighed and smiled to you with tears in her eyes:

"I'm sorry, I... lost myself..." she looked at you apologetically, her eyes shining with tears and she got off the floor. Even with her smile, her expression remained hollow "...its fine. I can keep going... I don't need my magic anyway." before you could respond, she simply summoned her scythe and marched on, careful to stay at the head of the group, so you couldn't see her expression anymore. Her body-language stiff and robotic.



The far glass doors parted in her wake, revealing a long reinforced hallway. No windows or glass, just a tunnel with light-purple sheets of metal coverings the walls, floor and ceiling. All smeared red.
Well over a dozen bodies were strewn about the room, wearing elite military uniform. Black and orange colored fatigues, armored pads, bullet proof vests, helmets, night vision goggles, experimental firearms and tactical gear, all cutting edge, all, perfectly useless.

The victims were butchered, eviscerated. Half eaten body-parts and internal organs were lying strewn across the room, soaking in puddles of blood, arterial smears coloring the walls where the soldiers had their limbs slashed. Faces frozen in abject horror, smeared in blood, their features almost unrecognizable. All dead. Except one.

A single soldier with an assault rifle spinned in place, startled by the nose of the opening doors and shrieked in paralyzed horror. Half his body was covered in blood and viscera, and you couldn't tell if it was his or not. Screaming in panic, he pulled the trigger and a wild burst of high caliber rounds peppered the wall horizontally, about a meter over your head.


Viktoria didn't even flinch. Her eyes narrowed, locked onto the patch the soldier wore on his sleeve. A skull with three arrows coming out of its mouth, locked inside a spiked wheel. Chariot PMC. The soldier's expression was wild, unhinged, his mind snapped long ago from the panic but for some reason, he didn't perceive you as a threat, and the moment he actually looked at you, his gaze immediately darted away, and he started scanning the empty walls, aiming his rifle at nothing, looking for something only he could see.


Zoy and Bastila stepped in a second after. Their eyes glossed over, their expressions filled with so much hate in the span of a second, you barely recognized them. Gritting their teeth so hard, they could snap, nails painfully digging into the palms of their clutched hands, faces turning to ugly, rage filled masks, the desire behind their eyes was clear.

Chariot, the PMC that unleashed genocide upon Nifelheim for generations, was reduced to a single soldier. And yet, he didn't perceive you as a threat. His eyes kept darting back to the far door, at the edge of the hall, where a massive, broken barricade stood, made up for riot shields and desks and metal cabinets. You realized they were trying to keep something, in the tower, prevent its escape to outside.


As you entered the hallway, Brice's voice continued to sound from the speakers:



"I, am the wealthiest and most influential man on the planet.

With the power in my hand, I swayed public opinion, influenced government policies across the globe and presided over the greatest pharmaceutical breakthroughs of our generation.

But all of this power was rendered mute, when my daughter was born."



A dull, heavy sound came from the ceiling, akin to a bulldozer being dropped onto concrete and the soldier shrieked in abject panic, releasing a wild burst into the torn air vent over his head. A giant scorpion stinger flashed down from above, piercing the man through the stomach. He frothed, as blood came pouring down in droves from his mouth, flowing down his throat and staining his uniform, before the stinger sharpy pulled back, slicing the soldier in half.


His legs and bottom torso collapsed to the floor, spilling his intestinal tract everywhere, as his upper body was snatched into the ceiling. You heard his guttural scream from above and a massive pair of jaws snapped, crunching bone, and three liters of blood spilled onto the floor from above like a dam had just broke.



"Never have I felt more helpless, than when the doctors read me the diagnosis." Brice went on
"My precious daughter has a rare genetic disorder, it prevents certain proteins from forming inside
her lung tissue. The doctors called it Cystic Fibrosis. It makes the lungs fill up with mucus
restricting her breathing.

Its terminal.


There is no cure. No effective treatment, known to man.
All of my influence, all of my wealth, could not buy her life. I was rendered completely and utterly useless."


With the sound of rending steel, the ceiling before you caved in, spilling a giant formless monstrosity into the hallway before you. It was writing, gasping for air. A mass of poorly formed muscle tissue and spikes. It reminded you of a bull, filled with cancerous tumors, with the spikes of hedgehogs over his back, a long scorpion tale with a razor sharp spike at the end, no skin, only rotting mass of muscle, mad eyes and mouth that resembled the one of a centipede.

The thing was almost 7 meters in height, standing on all fours and barely fitting into the hallway. Its mad, completely insane eyes locked right on you and it charged.

"Well I was gonna say we needed that guy alive for information, but nevermind..." Rogue shrugs, "Don't suppose there are any alternative routes back there that we can take around this?"

Circi reaches out and grabs Victorias shoulder, "No magic. Dont take the front." She states quietly as she moves her behind, "Wait until the enemy is focused on us, and strike from their blind side you will be much better at it then taking the full brunt of whatever we're facing and not being able to cast anything to stop it." Circi gives her a supportive pat on the shoulder, "You aren't alone here." Her ears perk at the soldier down the hall.

"Hey! Get over he-!" Rain shouts before he's ripped into the ceiling, "Jeezus. Karma really IS a bitch!" She jests as a new monstrosity reveals itself, "bigger... better..." Rain glances to circi.

Circi without another word casts tendons grasp down the hallway "Blow it away!" She calls after.

Rain raises her palm and casts Lightning at the thing.

Kaylee Brown wrote:
"...I... can't." she simply said, the look in her eye vacant, resigned "...its interfering with my Glasgow Synergy... I can't cast... anything." she bitterly gritted her teeth, closing her eyes "...this Unicorn magic... I DON'T WANT IT!" She screamed in anger, before her expression turned miserable again.

At the words, Twilight froze. It was a horrible slap in the face to her, to hear those words.

Her daughter, rejecting unicorn magic. Her own flesh and blood, the girl she fought so hard for to get back in her arms, who she carried for the better part of a year in her own body. And the power she prided herself so much on, which she had dedicated herself to to master, and at one point be chosen as "THE element of Magic"...

Viki's violent discardment of that shut Twilight down. Her expression was full of shock, and you could almost see her eyes showing the Blue Screen Of Death. She sat there in silence, unable to response, trying to make sense of it all.

After a bit, she got up, her mood visibly fouled. She marched along with the rest of the group, but her eyes were focussed on her daughter.

She was going to have a very serious conversation with her daughter about this.

Upon seeing this new foe, Twilight just scowled at it. There was no fear, no anger, just annoyance. In her right hand, she called her weapon, and her left hand, she held up to the side. Her horn began to glow. She could feel the magic again, but she couldn't feel the elation.

After 3 more steps from the creature, she swung her left hand to the right. With it, the Thing got a harsh jab to the temple, like a direct punch. Then she didn't hesitate and went in to strike the neck, aiming to take the head off in one go.

"Go. This one is mine. Now I got unicorn magic on my side again, it stands no chance."

She pointed to it's leg, and a telekinetic grip began twisting it.

Thena, for some reason that she can't explain and even with the knowledge that they still do nothing against the glysteria, decides to take one of the guns from the corpses. The gun of choice being the closest thing to a handgun. She'd been watching how the Union Soldiers had been handling the firearms and did her best to copy it. With the firearm in one hand and the fully charged ice spell in the other she keeps moving with the rest of the group.

Thena wrote:Thena, for some reason that she can't explain and even with the knowledge that they still do nothing against the glysteria, decides to take one of the guns from the corpses. The gun of choice being the closest thing to a handgun. She'd been watching how the Union Soldiers had been handling the firearms and did her best to copy it. With the firearm in one hand and the fully charged ice spell in the other she keeps moving with the rest of the group.

Rogue notices Thena picking up the pistol with some alarm, and shakes an open hand at her to politely suggest that she does not follow that course of action.

"It's for Brice. As soon as we see him I'm going to shoot him in the fucking face" Thena states with a matter of fact tone like a teacher telling her students how to cast a spell

"If Brice is still alive, he will face justice, in a court of law, not a summary execution" Rogue states, "And besides, you have no firearms training, you would be more of a danger to yourself than to him."

Thena sets the gun down after a moment of consideration "You're right about the training so I'll listen there, but in terms of Brice he's not going to get away with his crimes and unless Zoy specifically says not to or you have an actual logical factual argument not to he's dead. After defeating Kaznachey, on the way back to before we migrated, I came to the conclusion that everyone connected to Kaznechey that caused harm to Nifelheim and her people should die on sight."

"Amen!" Circi calls out to Thena, "Goddamn right!"

"He is still a citizen of Kepler within Kepler jurisdiction, that comes with certain rights." Rogue says,

"Whilst nobody is above the law, it is equally true that nobody is below it either. So no matter what attrocities he has committed, he still has the right to a fair trial, denying him that would be a crime itself.

People may not like it sometimes, but it is the only thing that separates courts from lynch mobs."

The deformed, bloated monster bellowed in rage, as black ooze slid through the cracks in the floor and materialized into sickly tendons that wrapped around the creatures legs. It rushed toward you, stretching the tendons to a breaking point by brute force alone and you heard the tendons start ripping in several places, when Rain raised her palm and discharged a Level 3 Lightning Bolt right in its ugly, rotting face.

The bull seized up and shrieked, its deep rasping voice cracking and sounding almost human for several seconds, as it screeched and cried in agony. The exposed muscles under its rotting skin, began to cook alive, releasing a horrid, vomit inducing smell and you involuntarily took a step back, gagging and trying to fight bag the gag reflex.


A spectral glow began to materialize around the bulls leg, but it flicked like a strobe light and faded after several seconds. Almost at the same time, the glow around Twilight's horn flickered and faded again, accompanied by a profound feeling of fatigue, as if you had been awake for 24 hours straight.
It was hard to tell exactly what went wrong. Was it because you were out of practice, and the simplest of spells now required an immeasurable amount of effort, or was the Unicorn magic coming back, but gradually, slowly. One small, tiny step at a time.

The only thing you were sure of, is that you Unicorn magic was growing stronger with each passing minute. Perhaps in an hour, or in a few days, but it will come back. Slowly, but surely. You'll make it come back, you'll force it, if you have to. Like a muscle of a leg that has forgotten how to run, now seizing up with lactic acid from lack of use. This was going to take time.


Still dazed from the lightning strike, the bull wildly swung its tumor-filled head, colliding with both walls, left and right, shaking the foundation and leaving huge dents in the purple sheets of metal. Running up to it and then jumping and briefly running along the near wall, Twilight launched herself in the air with graceful precision, like a dance and stabbed her flaming sword right in the things temple, piercing its skull clean, the tip of the blade coming out the other side.


The rotting pile of muscle jerked, its white iris-less eyes rolling into the back of its skull, its tongue hanging out and it began to collapse onto the floor, its muscle mass making it take its time, not much, but just enough for Twilight to land next to it and with a vicious swing, cut its head clean off at the neck.

Her blade wasn't long enough to go through the whole width of the neck, but the sheer force of the strike sent a shockwave that ripped the muscles in its wake, separating the neck clean off the body. A disgustingly crunchy sound echoed over the hall, as the rotting spine snapped and a spray of orange blood and bile spilled out of the stump, forcing you to leap back and keep leaping back for several meters to avoid the splash of rotting liquid that sprayed everywhere, as the tumor filled corpse collapsed to the floor, sending a small earth-quake to wash over the building.




Heavily breathing, you watched the thing writhe in post-mortem convulsion, before its body disintegrated, turning into orange burning grains of ash that scattered over the hall, sticking to your clothing and armor.

Kaylee slowly moved past you, keeping her rifle raised and pointed at the far door, scanning the area and briefly looking up at the massive hole in the ceiling, before hugging the far wall and motioning you an all-clear. Only when you got closer, did you recognize the far door was an entrance to a luxurious elevator.

Hammering the call button, the doors parted immediately, revealing a suspiciously clean elevator cabin. No blood, only a few claw scratch marks on the walls, if you looked closely enough. Thankfully the cabin was large, spacey and expensively decorated, just like everything else in this building, allowing everyone to pile inside.


Kaylee hung outside in the hallway, as Viktoria entered, but slightly raised her hand as Twilight approached, motioning her to pause for a moment. Leaning closer to you and throwing a quick glance at Viktoria in the distance, she whispered:

"...you know what I see when I look at her? An eight-year-old Kaylee who was just gifted a new bicycle with no training wheels. Trying to ride and falling, and falling and bruising her herself, over and over, and throwing the bicycle to the ground in anger, screaming how stupid and useless it is." she shifted her gaze back to you, her expression quite serious:

"...you know what happened? My parents pushed me to keep trying. Six months later I was riding that bike up and down every street in my neighborhood like the god-damn Speed Racer." she heavily looked at you:

"She's going to buck, Twilight. Don't let her.
Don't let her bury her talent. Its in her blood." Kaylee nodded to you and went into the elevator.


Viktoria was leaning against the corner, staring emptily at a wall. Bastila was still seething from seeing the Chariot company. When you made a quick scan of the hallway, you found that Zoy was still outside, crouching down on one knee, next to one of the bodies in black and orange fatigues and lifting it halfway by its vest, squinting at his rank insignia or name plate, you couldn't tell. But she was gritting her teeth so hard, you thought they would crack.


"Zoy, come on!" Lightning called, waving her to come over "He's fucking dead, leave him alone."

"He had... no right!" Zoy hissed, her nails beginning to dig into the dead man's vest, as she tried to lift his corpse into a sitting position.

"What are you doing Zoy?!" Kaylee called in alarm from the elevator, starting to head back to the girl.

Zoy just scowled at the corpse harder "...this is Colonel Porter... the commander of PMC Chariot! THIS PIECE OF TRASH MASSACRED MY PEOPLE FOR GENERATIONS, AND HE THINKS HE CAN FUCKING DIE BEFORE I FUCKING FIND HIM!?!" The blond girl violently threw the corpse back on the ground, rose to full height and marched over to a SPAS-12 shotgun discarded on the floor, picked it up with some effort, pointed and blasted its barrel point blank into the dead-mans head, the resulting blast exploding his head into a spray of blood and bits of bone, painting the floor red.


"ZOY WHAT THE FUCK!?" Kaylee screamed out reflexively, stopping halfway to the girl in shock. Zoy unceremoniously discarded the shotgun and with an eerily calm expression marched past Kaylee, heading back to the elevator:

"Now we can go." Zoy said, her voice still eerily calm.



Stepping into the elevator and finally letting its doors close, you began a descent down the tower, in a very, very awkward silence. Even with the elevator being as spacey as it was, you still felt cramped in it like sardines, and your summoned parasites had to dissipate back into the depths of your soul, just out of necessity.


"Zoy..." Kaylee quietly called. Zoy didn't make eye contact, just kept emptily watching the wall, just like Viki was. You slowly realized that none of the children were doing quite well. The realization only began appearing now, that the amount of cultural shock, mixed in with the horror and revelations they were witnessing in such a short time-span, was really starting to affect them.

Ursula was just wrapping herself in her arms, in an attempt to shield herself from the world. Bastila and Ryu remained incredibly stoic, wearing a completely blank mast they usually wore, when they didn't want to betray their emotions. Lightning reached for her flask of booze again, only to have Kaylee block it with her open palm, prompting Lightning to scowl at her, and hide the bottle back.


Viktoria looked at her open palm again, winced, furrowed her brow and tried to draw a simple sign for Heightened Senses. The glowing pentagram materialized in the air, traced by her index and middle finger moving together, and you thought the spell might have activated, when her palm suddenly erupted in a spray of sparks and ash, and her horn emitted a dull black like a firecracker.

"FUCK!" Viktoria flinched back in surprise or pain, you couldn't tell, and collided with Ursula, who in turn collided with Rogue.

"Careful!" Ursula called, wincing and rubbing her bruised cheek that ended up smacking against Rogue's shoulder.

"...I'm sorry." Viktoria lowered her hand and faced the wall completely. You think her eyes were starting to water.



Kaylee watched her with a pained expression for a moment, before lifting her hand up to her earpiece:

"Bruiser 1-1 to Baseplate, has there been any updates on Unicorn magic and mental breakdowns, over?"

"Baseplate, we are uh... getting reports from Union forces that Unicorn magic is making a resurgence. Its a global phenomenon, not restricted to any geographical area. The Unicorn soldiers all seem to report their magic is coming back in a weakened state, but slowly increasing to what it used to be, prior to the Pillar incident." Councilor Mercer's voice calmly rang in your ear-piece, she sounded distracted, like she was doing, or looking over something else in the background:
"Mental Breakdowns have ceased across the globe, all at once, roughly 5 hours ago. Coincidentally, at the exact same time as the Castle Towns materialized in our world."


"Just as I thought." Kaylee furrowed her brow. "The Teleportation Pillars were a link between this world and Nifelheim. For the longest time, I thought the Nifelheim's Shimmer was interfering with Unicorn magic somehow, disabling it in both worlds. And the Parasites influence spilled over to Kepler, causing Mental Breakdowns across the globe.

Now that the connection between Kepler and Nifelheim has been severed, both the Mental Breakdowns and Unicorn magic suppression have ceased."


"Bruiser team, be advised," Mercer continued, more focused and serious now "There are massive reports of Mental Breakdowns appearing all over Beusoleil. It seems to be a localized event, tied to that area, but its slowly spreading. Proceed with caution, over."

"Roger that, ma'am." Kaylee pulled on the charging handle of her M4 rifle again, pointing it at the floor and checking if there's a round in the chamber. It almost felt like a nervous tick.




She quietly listened to your conversation about Brice, then quietly, slowly nodded:

"...its true, we should do this properly, according to international law. That and we were ordered to bring in Brice alive for interrogation.." she uneasily looked down "..unless he poses a direct threat to your life, please try to apprehend him alive." after a few moments, she threw a nervous, weary glance at Zoy.

Zoy was pointedly facing the wall, as the elevator descended. A moment later the wall disappeared, and you realized you were going down the side of the skyscraper, watching a massive city landscape, through the elevators transparent wall. Zoy shifted in place, in some relief, now seemingly having an excuse to stare out at the city, not having to make eye contact again.

The view was gut wrenching. A massive city of 5 million people was covered in pockets of fires, tank and small arms fire was arcing across its contours non-stop, with gunships and fighter jets periodically zapping past, conducting one carpet bomb after another, paining whole city avenues orange in clouds of explosions.


"Zoy..." Kaylee timidly called. The blond girl didn't answer, just staring at the war-torn city outside. "Z-Zoy." Kaylee called a bit louder and the blond girl deflated.

"Quiet." Zoy said "I'm trying to listen." she slightly tilted her head at the speaker, built into the corner of the elevators ceiling and you realized Brice's voice was still coming out of it. After another moment Zoy heavily sighed:
"...Don't worry, I'm not in the business of shooting unarmed civilians in the face."


Even as the words left her mouth, the image of Colonel Porter's head exploding in a shogun blast, painting the wall red, flooded your mind. Zoy's too, it seems as the girl visibly shivered and wrapped herself in her arms. It seems she was disturbed by the memory:
"...that wasn't a civilian... he was a soldier, he was dead... he deserved it." she defensively retorted with an audible frown, but you weren't sure if she was trying to convince you, or herself.


In the following silence, Brice's voice continued to quietly sound from the speaker:









"...-The doctors predicted she wouldn't live past age 22, but she lasted until 26. My precious daughter is strong. She's a fighter. I hoped against hope that she would survive long enough to live a full life, but I guess, every fairy-tale has to come to an end.

My daughter finally succumbed to her illness. She can no longer breathe without a ventilation machine, expanding and constricting the lungs for her, pushing air into her lungs. The doctors placed her into a drug induced coma, to make sure the last months of her life will fly by without suffering.

I have dedicated the past 26 years of my life to genetic research, to find a way to cure her,
before her time expired, but I failed. Every attempt at genetic treatment, failed.
This was the end.

And as she laid in bed, surrounded by beeping machines and dozens of tubes sticking out of her,
all keeping her alive, in a blissful unconsciousness, I laid down beside her, and swallowed enough
drugs to down an elephant.

If my precious child was going to die, then so will I. Without her, I have no more reason to live.
I will drift to sleep, peacefully, just like she will, laying beside her, holding her hand, and I will never wake up. This was the end."


The elevator descended further below, and you began seeing a massive park just under the skyscraper, a beautiful, almost magical courtyard.


"Ahhh... but something happened to me, in that self induced coma. I didn't know if it was a fever dream induced by the drugs, or had I just gone insane in my sleep, but... as I laid there unconscious beside my daughter, dying slowly as the drugs destroyed my body, I had a... a vision.


A mystical figure appeared before me, beautiful, gentle and kind.

She called herself Lucretia, and she gently asked me, what caused such a powerful man as myself, to end his own life.
So I explained it to her. And she listened, patiently, empathically, absorbing every ounce of my
pain, feeling it as her own. And then just like that, she offered me a solution."


The elevator plunged into the depths of the building again, hiding the view of the city and plunging the elevator cabin into darkness, before the ceiling lights adjusted again, casting a dim white light across the cabin. The floor indicator displayed that you just passed floor 80 and are continuing your descent.



"All I needed, was the secret to Perfect Gene Editing. Something our ancestors had, before
the Great Impact. Something we lost and forgotten, in the fires of the Impact, two thousand years ago.

If I only had that technology, I could SAVE her. I could bring her back!

The treatment was so ludicrously simple, it would be no different than having a flu shot!
And she would be cured! Permanently and irreversibly, cured!"


Brice's voice began to sound crazed, more unhinged by the second. You could almost see the deranged look in his eye, as he clutched his fists in front of his face.



"All I had to do... was built a Portal to Lucretia's homeworld, and extract a certain Red Orb from there. If I bring it before my daughter, it will cure her. It will give me the secret to Gene Editing!

And as I laid unconscious in a hospital bed, while my employees worked feverishly to pump the poison
I swallowed, out of my system, I hatched... a Plan. I had a plan now.

I can SAVE her."



Brice sighed, calming down, his voice becoming methodical:


"Lucretia taught me everything. The technology, the quantum physics behind it. She gave me access to technology I hadn't even dreamed existed! I threw all of my resources, all of my wealth and influence into building a portal, under her guidance.

But, of course, I wasn't completely blinded by my dream.

Not yet... that came later.




I knew that going to another world, another planet, had to carry its risks. The most obvious would be contracting alien viruses and bacteria. I had to think of my child. Of the world she'll inherit. If I rendered Kepler uninhabitable by introducing alien bacteria to it, my plan would be useless. So I had to take... precautions..." Brice said with equal disdain and derangement.

"Design plans for containment...



The first base I built was on the edge of the Marina Trench, 10 kilometers below the water surface of the Verrian Ocean some 50 kilometers off the coast of Ragnveig. The containment protocol was simple enough. A portal will be constructed inside the underwater base, and a small strike team of Mercenaries sent to the other side, to retrieve the Red Orb.

If they come back with some kind of alien virus, and it somehow escapes containment and
spreads throughout the underwater base, I will simply detonate the charges built in its support structures, and the entire base will fall into the Marina Trench. Whatever inside, would be likely
crushed by the water pressure in those incredible depths.



...I thought I did everything right, I rechecked everything personally, dozens of times, even after my staff had gone over it. The calculations, the metrics, the portal. It was all constructed exactly according to Lucretia's specifications.

It was perfect.

9 months ago, the first away team had activated the Portal and went through, to the other side.




Aahh... but something must have gone wrong with the figures. Some... miscalculation on our part.

The Teleportation Field was supposed to be 15 meters in radius, just large enough to swallow the
strike team in the teleportation chamber, deep inside the underwater base...
Instead, the Portal had extended to 50 kilometers in every direction, teleporting not just
the entire staff of my base, but extending 50 kilometers, all the way to the coast, teleporting
the entire population of Ragnveig, off to the other side.


1 million people, gone, in a split second. Unceremoniously booted into an alien world without
their knowledge or consent.
It was a god damn humanitarian disaster.



I tried to salvage the operation, but my efforts were hindered immeasurably by the time difference
between our two planets. A factor I didn't even know existed.

My mercenary away team contacted me, requesting immediate extraction. I told them there will be
no extraction, until they find and bring the Red Orb back to the portal!

Seconds later, they said they found it in an old tomb somewhere... and that's when their transmission cut off.




They must have contracted something in those ruins... some, ancient plague that sat dormant there.
Because the following transmissions broadcasted from the makeshift camp of the 1 million Ragnveig
citizens, was chaotic at best.
The Plague was invisible under a microscope, on a cellular level, hard to quantify and impossible to contain.

The symptoms were horrifying - first, the people went mad, butchering all those around them, then
clawing their own eyes out. Then, their bodies rotted over the course of a week, while they still
remained living. Finally, their bodies would crumble to ash.

The vector of transmission was impossible to trace. People who never went to the tomb, got infected and died. People who never came within a hundred meters of the infected, somehow contracted the disease. The local science team failed to determine if the plague was transmitted by air or fluids.
It simply defied explanation.



All we knew, was an unstoppable plague was rampaging across the alien planet. With no cure and no possibility of containment.


I couldn't bring that to Kepler... I couldn't endanger my daughter that way...





I detonated the explosives below the underwater base, making it plunge into the depths of the
Marina Trench, destroying all the evidence of my doing, and in the process, destroying the portal
and leaving behind 1 million people I accidentally sent to the other side.

I abandoned them. I left them to die."



Zoy punched the elevator wall so hard and so suddenly, she cracked the glass, making you flinch.




"...-and then I simply turned around, and tried again." Brice continued:

"A new portal, in a new secret location in Verria. This one was build above a giant tectonic fissure
in Keplers crust, deep inside a mountain. Should anything happen, the base would be dropped
inside the fissure and dissolve in the magma.


Now that I knew of the time difference between our two planets, I tried again.
I waited until at least a hundred years have passed on the other side, making sure everyone of the
1 million Ragnveig citizens had succumbed to the sickness and the Plague ran its course,
falling dormant again.

And then I sent the next Mercenary team. From a new location, with new defenses against local
pathogens. New isolated environment suits. Better armor. Better weapons, better everything.

They went to the other side and found the Red Orb, that much they managed to transmit. But
on their way back to the portal, they ran into... natives.




Humans. Living on the other side. No... survivors. Ancestors of the population of Ragnveig.
Somehow, they survived the disease, grew immune to it. Somehow... they survived, even after I left them.

They demanded to be portaled back to Kepler immediately, refused to let my men pass.


I got... scared. Afraid. Terrified that the horrible crime I committed, will come to light, here
on Kepler. I stopped thinking clearly.
I just wanted it all to go away... I wanted to cover my tracks, so no one would ever find out
what I did...



I ordered the mercenaries to kill everyone. To wipe out every survivor of Ragnveig, so they could
never tell anyone, of what I did."




Brice heavily sighed:
"... I miscalculated. The survivors of Ragnveig were not simple plague ridden farmers that they appeared.
They were... changed.
They didn't die, when shot in the head. They regenerated ludicrous injury. They used magic, even though there was not a Unicorn among them.
My Mercenaries, died. All of them.

I once again failed to obtain the Red Orb.



I thought I could solve this problem with money. With overwhelming power. And so in the coming days,
I sent progressively larger and larger forces to the other side, ordering them to acquire the Red Orb
by any means necessary and kill any who stood in their way.

First I sent 250 soldiers. Then 500.

Then I sent -
4 Tanks
2 Combat Helicopters
6 Armored Transports
10 Armored Cars
3 Spider RUMBA's and
1000 Mercenary Cybernetically Augmented soldiers, all in the same strike-team, at once. Everything the Private Military Company Chariot had to offer. It was supposed to be enough to topple the government of a small country.

I waged my own private war, on the other side. This lasted for months.




None of the mercenaries ever returned.





The... 'changed' humans on the other side, were growing exponentially stronger, and pissed off.
They knew... no matter how many generations had passed, how many hundreds of years,
how many of them died of old age, or succumbed to disease, they always passed down their history to their children, the history of the Great Exile, of the horrible war crimes I unleashed
upon them. They never forgot.


No matter how many times I tried to eradicate them, to wash away the blood from my hands, erasing
all evidence of my wrong doing... they always survived. They remembered. They wouldn't let me forget.



Ultimately, one day, a Union investigation team found my Verrian base and I had to, once again, cover my tracks.
I was forced to order the death of those Union soldiers, making sure none survived, and then I plunged the base into magma, destroying the second portal and all evidence of my crime."



Kaylee's bitterly bit into her lower lip and you saw her biting back angry tears "...my team" she whispered.



"...-that's when I began sensing that Lucretia was growing disappointed in me." Brice continued
"She wasn't giving up on me, no. It just felt as if, she gave me a very simple task, and like
a clumsy toddler, I just kept messing it up, over, and over.

So like a patient and caring teacher, she empathically spoon-fed me the solution.


A third portal. Right here in Beusoleil.
She said it was the perfect geographical location. Our two planets were geographically synched, somehow.
She gave me coordinates of the Red Orb, in a place far from the 'changed' humans on the other side,
far from the plague. And with a fraction of the force I once used, just 10 good men, they effortlessly traveled to the other side, and brought me the Orb.


Just like that.

I... finally got it... I got what I wanted. After 10, very long months. But I finally got it." Brice released a very bitter, broken laugh. You thought you heard a suppressed sob in his voice.




The elevator emitted a peaceful chime and stopped, on the 60th floor. The doors parted, revealing a cozy office. Expensive red carpets on the walls and floor, pristine wooden furniture, historical paintings on the walls, and those of prominent artists, all original, belonging in a museum. Glassed cabinets of polished wood housed hundreds of books, their leather wrapping and paper growing yellow over the dozens of years.

A peaceful classical music played for an ancient styled gramophone with a horn speaker, a very old waltz, from the pre-Impact era. An office desk of polished red wood with an out of place holographic computer screen and neon keyboard on top, where the recorded message still played, displaying the words:

"Upload Successful," still blinking on the computer screen, even as the recording continued to play.


You're still inside the elevator and can't see deeper into the room from this angle, but you think you hear the soft beeping of medical machines from inside, vital signs monitors, infusions and ventilation machines all peacefully beeping somewhere, deeper inside the room.

"I'm going to kil him" Thena mutters under her breath as she steps out of the elevator and into the room to get a better look at the environment.

Rain wraps an arm around her daughter and gives her a comforting hug, "Hay... I get it things are weird out here but... out here isn't home." She says quitely, "Once we're done here, once our job is finished-" she smiles and nods, "I promise you, you'll find the most accepting and sweet people you've ever met. Everyone out here is a bunch of assholes who cant get their head out of their ass for even a minute, try not to hold that against them." She gives her a firm squeeze.

The doors open and Rain slips away. Her heat vision clicking on. She pokes her head out from the doorway and scans the room, first for anyone potentially waiting to shotgun them as soon as they exit the elevator. She draws her pistol in one hand and casts an instant shield in the other in case she has to eat said shotgun blast.

Circi stares up at the speaker. Listening to the... the... REVERANCE Brice is giving to Kaz, "He speaks so brightly of her..." she chuckles, but the humor is faint, " ...you think he thought he even had a chance with her?" Circi suddenly hears something that makes her cringe, but then smirk, "Thena... Thena!" She suddenly exclaims as if coming to a sudden realization, "Nooo... you CANT kill Brice." her voice comes out as though she had changed her mind on the matter, she places a hand on her shoulder. Circi's gaze about as wild as it could be, "Listen to his voice Thena..." she whispers, "...Listen to that... emotional agony... This, Right here, Right now, and likely for the rest of his, short, pathetic life... is hell. Remembering crimes he did..." she shakes her head at thena, "It would be like crushing a bug to us I know it would but... lets... not crush the depression bug but instead." she cocks her head, "I think what the machanica would do is... put the bug in a cup... and leave it to die... or keep it as a pet." She chuckles as she waits on Rains check, "A sad... depressed... warcrime dwelling bug. We can stand around and watch the conflict bounce around his brain for hours~"

In the elevator, Twilight looked at her daughter trying it. She got closer to her, and laid her hand on Viki's hand.

"When I first started using unicorn magic, it was difficult for me as well. I could barely make heads or tails of it, and trying it out started with more trouble then it was worth. A good example is the simplest spell, telekinesis. Why would I need that when I got hands?"

She looked at her, smiling. "But I wasn't alone. Others helped me to explain how to do it, what to keep in mind, how to use it. And when I finally succeeded? I was overjoyed, started to use it more and more, and before I realized it, telekinesis had become part of me just as much as my limbs."

She nodded. "I understand it's weird for you to feel this new power rushing through you, especially since you're so used to witcher magic and it's mechanics. It might go against much you know so far. But if you give it a chance, I promise I will help you make use of your unicorn magic, without it hindering your Glasgow Synergy."

She smiled again. "So, what do you say?"


(At the 60th floor)

Arriving there a bit after her speech, she tried to make a light with her own magic, seeing how such a simple spell would be a good warm-up for the bigger spells. The sound of the machines made her ears perk in that direction. "That must be his daughter."

She looked at her group. "Under no circumstance, is she to be harmed, understood? That girl hasn't done anything wrong in this scenario, and her life is something Kashiwagi holds more dear to him then  the world. If we want him to talk, her life is immensely important."

She then looks ahead. "I will say now, if you are feeling the emotions cloud your judgement, step back into the elevator and clear a way for us to escape. Is that clear?"

"Oh how the other half life..." Rogue sighs as he listens to Brice recounting his crimes.

As the lift door opens, Rogue has already raised his rifle, and after glancing to the floor for tripwires, he quickly steps out and kneels down before sweeping the room.

Rain wrote:"Hay... I get it things are weird out here but... out here isn't home." She says quitely, "Once we're done here, once our job is finished-" she smiles and nods, "I promise you, you'll find the most accepting and sweet people you've ever met. Everyone out here is a bunch of assholes who cant get their head out of their ass for even a minute, try not to hold that against them." She gives her a firm squeeze.

Ursula waited a moment, mulling things over. The culture shock still hasn't passed, and likely won't for a long time, but at least she felt better now.

Circi wrote:Circi stares up at the speaker. Listening to the... the... REVERANCE Brice is giving to Kaz, "He speaks so brightly of her..." she chuckles, but the humor is faint, " ...you think he thought he even had a chance with her?"

"I doubt he was even thinking along those lines." Kaylee emptily said, watching the interior of the room "His daughter was the only thing he could think about. He was in an emotionally vulnerable state, and Kaznachey exploited it."

Twilight wrote:"I understand it's weird for you to feel this new power rushing through you, especially since you're so used to witcher magic and it's mechanics. It might go against much you know so far. But if you give it a chance, I promise I will help you make use of your unicorn magic, without it hindering your Glasgow Synergy."

She smiled again. "So, what do you say?"

Viki avoided eye contact deliberately, visibly pouting and trying to resist the notion of even trying to learn this new craft, as some sort of knee jerk reaction. After a moment, she glanced at you briefly, noticed your expression and deflated. Becoming very interested in her shoes, she finally said:

"Fffffffffffffffine... I guess it can't hurt to try..."

Ryu subtly smirked from afar but avoided to comment, glancing away.






The music from the gramophone continued to play as you tactically swept the room and moved in. You didn't see any tripwires and the heat sensors didn't pick up anyone waiting in ambush. The only thing coming through the thermal vision was the dull shining lamps in the room and the beeping medical equipment behind a curtain, further inside.

You moved further in, gliding silently across the floor, as Twilight lifted her arm and tried casting a simple light. Her effort was met with the same violent reaction as was Viki's - her hand sizzled out with sparks and you felt a jolt of electricity zap your hand. No light had materialized.
It appears this too, will take some getting used to. Perhaps in time, with more practice.


Brice's voice continued to sound much closer now, and you saw his video recording continuing to play on his holographic computer screen, as you quietly moved further into the room, toward the heavy curtain, hiding the beeping and whirring medical machines.




"...-I made it in time." Brice's voice echoed from the computer, coming off bitter-sweet:

"But now as I sit beside my daughters bed, pressing her palm to the Orb, just like Lucretia told me to,
I can't help but notice... the signs of the Plague, outside my window.


Somehow... despite everything, despite my precautions and the mass murder I committed, somehow,
I still brought the Plague back to Kepler. Maybe it was in the Orb, all along. I don't know.


All I know is that, my daughter will be immune to it. If she survives.
If she survives the genetic treatment the Orb will bestow upon her. If she survives... she'll be immune to the Plague.

Lucretia gave me her Word. And she always, kept her word." Brice heavily sighed, his eyes in the recording drifting somewhere off screen.


"But, just what kind of world have I left behind, for my daughter? Every death, every soul I snuffed out in Ragnveig, all of their ancestors, and now, the population of our world, their deaths will number in millions. I sentenced them all to die. To save one person, my daughter.

I have destroyed the world to save her. That is my confession." Brice locked eyes with you from the computer screen.


"I chose my daughter, over the world. And even now, I have no regrets." he released
a sad smile, even as tears began to stream down his face:


"Because...... we would do anything for our children... wouldn't we?" he sobbed, quietly and wiped
the tears from his face, giving a sad smile to the camera.

"This message will now repeat."



You reached the curtain and moved it out of the way. Behind it, among the sea of machines that filled almost every inch of the room, among the vital sign monitors and ventilation machines and IV drips and catheters and syringes and bags of liquids, there was a large double bed and a chair just next to it.

They were empty.


You could even see the spot where someone had laid in bed, creating an outline in the sheets and blankets. There was no one inside this room. Only a dull gray Orb, sat quietly on the nightstand nearby, no longer glowing. Its contours hollow and empty, like a misty glass ball.


Viktoria sighed and slowly approached, crouching down next to the bed and squinting and the barely visible specs of ash that covered the blankets. Her senses were amplified and you weren't quite sure what she was seeing, until she finally spoke, after a moment:


"The spectral residue indicates she has successfully competed her Joining. She's a Witcher now." Viktoria slowly stood up and carefully walked in a wobbly line, further into the room, toward a massive, wall-sized window and a second express elevator nearby.

"...two sets of tracks, one, a man in large boots, unsteady, fatigued. The other, a woman's, limping, she was leaning on him, walking barefoot. Their tracks lead to the express elevator" Viktoria pointed ahead "...judging from the temperature of the floor and the bed sheets... they left roughly 5 hours ago. They're in the wind."


"..she walked away on her own two feet..." Kaylee released a small, bitter-sweet smile:
"He saved her... in the end."


"Yeah," Zoy quietly approached the wall-sized window "but at what cost?"



"Zoy?... Are you okay?" Kaylee gingerly asked.

"Brice." the blond girl bitterly grimaced at the window.

"Do you hate him?" Kaylee walked closer, standing beside her.

"...I don't know." Zoy winced, gritting her teeth "It was easy thinking of Brice as just another piece of shit on the other side of the portal, trying to kill me. But he was a person. A regular person, just like you and me.
I can't stop myself thinking, what would I do in his position? I don't want to know.
I never want to be in his position." She covered her face with both palms:

"But some people are. Some parents are faced with a brutal reality they have no control over.
One day they wake up and get hit in the face so hard, they never recover.
An imminent death of you child.

Most have no power to change anything. Brice did... that's all." she let her hands drop, her eyes vacantly locked on the window.















Black clouds rose over the city, covering the horizon, as the fires consumed the structures below. Pockets of hundreds of Parasites writhed in the streets, devouring each other and every living thing they came across like locust. Their orange bodies swayed in the wind, fickle and mindless.

The civilians of Beusoleil, the soldiers and Parasites all blended together, you could no longer tell them apart, as they all flooded the streets, fighting, running and dying. Tanks rolled down the once beautiful avenues, trammeling the palm trees below their treads and firing off shells into far away skyscrapers that exploded in a sea of fire and orange blood.

Attack helicopters and jets buzzed the streets, peppering the asphalt with guided missiles and heavy machine-gun fire that cratered the ground, as the Parasites writhed below them, spreading in every direction like roaches avoiding the fires above.


Your earpiece began to flood with static and such a staggering amount of radio traffic, it became nearly impossible to comprehend the words being screamed.


"...-Captain Durand from 31st mechanized! Taking massive casualties! Repeat, massive casualties! Everyone's dead or wounded! Cannot make visual contact with the enemy! Does anyone copy!-" His voice was cut off by shredding metal and a piercing shriek and out of the window, you saw a convoy of tanks being overrun by the horde, the parasites ripping the turrets off and climbing inside, dismembering the soldiers and devouring them alive.


"...this is Captain Brown, Bruiser Tasks Force, Union Navy" Kaylee spoke faintly into her ear-piece, her voice hollow
"31st, send traffic."


"Bruiser... can you help us?" A voice on the radio pleaded "We're cut off from the main force and pinned down under heavy enemy fire between the 56sth and 29th street! Cannot make visual contact with the enemy, please, can you assist?"


"This is 24th airborne! Our convoy's been hit, something tore open our APC and ripped the driver to shreds, they're killing civilians, please!" Another voice cut in through the first "Someone!!! ITS EATING ME AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!"

"I DONT WANT TO DIE! I DONT WANT TO DIE!" A woman was shrieking somewhere.

"WE NEED BACKUP! MY PLATOON IS WIPED OUT, I NEED BACKUP NOW!!! NOW DAMN IT, NOW!" A third hoarse voice rang through, with the sound of heavy bombardment in the background.


Kaylee looked at you grimly, her face ashen and gestured toward the express elevator, leading to the street level.

"...move out."