Cannibal, Cannibal

[Ada Wong]

“Hi, boss-lady!”
 
The irreverent greeting burst from the communications device resting in the palm of T’Jung’s hand— far, far too familiar of an address from the subordinate officer she knew to be on the other end.
 
T’Jung had been in the process of preparing her evening meal and was thus standing in her kitchen when the call came through. Held precisely in her left hand was a pestle, the companion mortar having been set aside so that she could answer the call, and over her hands she wore a pair of sterile blue gloves to prevent any contamination. The blunt pestle, a tool made of finely polished soapstone, was pinched between the fingers of one hand, and scattered across the countertop before her were a mixture of ingredients, one of the most eye-catching and exotic being a bright, smooth-skinned crimson root similar to a carrot in appearance. A bowl of water, too, was set off to the side, bits of red dust already beginning to form a chalky brown paste inside.
 
Her apartment was sparsely decorated despite the large amount of space it contained, the wallpaper a demure shade of brown that reminded T’Jung of the harsh desert sun and swirling grains of sand. A meditation mat was rolled up and placed against the far wall, and that was adjacent to a low table adorned solely with a bronze-colored incense holder in the center of the room. Several potted cacti were scattered about the open area, a spray bottle half-filled with water sitting beside one of the clay-swaddled desert plants. A long, fan-bladed lirpa was buttressed against the space over her desk and supported by two simple hooks; the deadly pole-arm seemed especially conspicuous in comparison to the placid atmosphere hanging about the rest of her home. It was one of the few ornaments she had allowed from her home world, not for sentimental purposes as one might expect, but solely because it might prove useful in the event of an invasion of her place of living. The weapon appeared fierce even in its resting state, familiar characters carved into it and the polished, curved blade glistening under the low light.
 
Placing the communicator on the countertop with a click, T’Jung returned to her task. The steady flick of her wrist as she turned the pestle was the only motion in the kitchen area, her tall, trim figure backlit both by the electric-blue neon sign outside her window and the open sky of Coruscant, grandiose spires and shiny glass windows sparkling and unsoiled by dirt or grime as far as the eye could see. While she could easily create the same dish using much more efficient, less primitive means, she found the repetitive movements soothing, and so continued to prepare her meal by hand.
 
Scchhsh, schssh, schssh—
 
The call had come as a surprise to T’Jung. She could almost hear the human breathing into his comm, their connection simmering with static from the volume of his words, but the only outward sign of puzzlement she allowed was the slightest lift of her sharply-upswept eyebrows. She would overlook this blatant disregard of their place of work’s hierarchy for now. There were more pressing matters to consider, after all.
 
First and foremost, it was… unusual for one of her fellow researchers to contact her while she was outside of the research laboratories, forcibly separated from her experimentation by the facility's security due to the long hours she typically kept, but most unusual of all was her subordinate’s lack of explanation for the initiation of said contact. This must be rectified at once, the woman concluded, and immediately sought to do just that.
 
“Science Officer Myers. What is your purpose for contacting me?” T’Jung asked, and if she was displeased by the man’s impertinence, she did not elect to verbalize or acknowledge it for the sake of brevity. Unlike her human coworker, she made sure to posit a question right at the start of her speech to make her purpose clear.
 
A sound like crumpling paper flittered over the speakers, as if Myers was searching for a report to read from. As if he had not already prepared said report before initiating contact. T’Jung tilted her head to the side, the shell of one pointed ear grazing against the phone’s hard plastic surface. Most illogical.
 
Scssch, schssch. T’Jung paused to scoop the contents of the mortar into the bowl of water, observing with mild interest as the pulverized dust sucked in moisture, becoming clumpy and wet in a matter of seconds. Taking another handful of finely-chopped root pieces and dropping them into the mortar, T’Jung resumed her earlier ministrations.
 
Myers continued to speak.
 
“Well, ah, you know..."

Ah, 'you know.' Another expression that T'Jung was swiftly becoming accustomed to, although the phrase still grated over her own, much more literal understanding of the common language. It was no small wonder that she was able to restrain herself from sighing, her focus again slipping toward the very labor-intensive recipe.

"There’s been a small… accident. A very tiny one! The teeniest, tiniest accident possible. It was just an oversight that we really should’ve caught on to, and, uh.”
 
Ssscchh!
 
T’Jung was silent. She stared expressionlessly at the wall of her apartment, all efficient movements having ceased. Her head bowed over the bitter root paste she had been preparing, pitch-black hair encircled by a halo of bluish light cast by the massive, glowing neon emblem looming outside of her window.
 
Her next words were toneless. As was her way, she did not allow for any emotion to creep into her voice, and yet T’Jung found herself struggling to quell the mounting panic within the boundaries of her own mind. Any error in their line of work, even a small one, could prove disastrous.
 
“An accident,” repeated T’Jung, her meal now thoroughly abandoned.

"Yeah," said Myers, and this time T'Jung recognized the nervousness trembling in his voice, the audible hesitance of his tongue as it painstakingly inched over each damning syllable. "You need to get down here. Now."

[Ada Wong]

As always, Stefanie Gordon’s morning began with a styrofoam cup filled with the most bracingly-hot coffee Coruscant had to offer. She blew the occasional puff of air over the molten brown drink as she walked down the hallway, her legs reaching in long strides and her eyes never once leaving the screen of the Dataverse device resting in the crook of her elbow. A clipboard stuffed with loose sheaves of paper fluttered on the opposite arm, the pages filled from corner to corner with Stefanie’s chicken-scrawl handwriting. Her wavy blonde hair appeared dead and pale under the severe artificial lighting, straw-like strands falling over her withdrawn eyes and the brightly-illuminated screen.

Dark bags were smeared under her eyes like bruises, the direct result of too many consecutive late nights spent processing data, hunched over and pecking at her keyboard in the labs. But, if building her résumé meant starting small, and if starting small meant being the equivalent of a data monkey for Drs. Myers and T’Jung, then Stefanie would become a goddamn data gorilla.

Glinting glass doors parted before her with a silent hiss. Marching purposefully inside with her lab coat swirling behind her, Stefanie cast a quick glance around at the maze of glinting metal tabletops, sharp dissection utensils, microscopes, and other finely-tuned instruments that emitted the faintly pungent scent of thorough sanitization. Glowing screens were spread both far and wide, each one flashing streams of precious, irreplaceable data; she could hear the myriad yelps, chirrups, and whines of the beasts these computers were monitoring echoing from the rooms behind the test center, the metallic dirge of nails clicking across icy-cold cage floors sounding like music to her ears.

Strangely, Stefanie’s co-intern Viola Burns was conspicuously absent from her operation table in the corner of the room. She had been very diligent in her study of a certain strain of lab rats, of which all but one had expired upon being injected with tranquilizer powder and other drugs. Stefanie was surprised that she would miss out on any observation time whatsoever, even to sleep, but brushed it off. There had been a rather nasty bug going around, after all.

In the center of it all was Chief Assistant Dr. Daveed Myers, gloves on and elbows deep inside the gaping, lividly-colored chest cavity of a Vorticon.

CA Daveed Myers had a strange sense of fashion and an even more questionable sense of what was acceptable clothing to wear in the workplace. Aside from the literal rose-colored, heart-shaped glasses he wore that day, he had on a dark red velvet jacket and matching pants under the starched white of his lab coat. Stefanie often wondered if Myers wore such garish things in an attempt to irk Dr. T’Jung. She recalled a specific incident where, at the turn of the year when Coruscant was still young but standing in all its glory, he had worn a pair of tinsel-laced glasses to commemorate the occasion. It had almost seemed like T’Jung was going to have a fit— in her own quiet, distinctly Vulcan way, of course.

Yet despite his silliness, Stefanie liked CA Myers. He was a pleasant enough man, a brilliant scientist, and never, ever flirted with her as some of her former superiors had done before. The two treated one another with a mutual respect born of excruciatingly long hours spent poring over tissue samples and the endless data sheets produced by Dr. T’Jung. It was nice, almost freeing to have someone in such a cutthroat environment that she didn’t have to always seem perfectly capable around. And, judging by the amount of postmortem dissections he had fudged up around her before (on one memorable occasion severing an artery and sending cascades of blood everywhere,) he likely felt the same way. She might even venture to say that they were friends.

This familiarity between them was the main reason why Stefanie noticed the man’s unease. Despite his flamboyant clothing and cheery attitude, some of which was very true to the man himself, it was possible to dig deep into the sugary coating and uncover the more genuine, less needlessly saturated emotions he liked to conceal from sight, revealing whatever private concerns he might have about, say, changes in staff or the lingering, always noticeable presence of the Imperial guard in their research laboratory. Stefanie noticed these things all the time, but she was in no way prepared for the bone-deep terror she detected on the man now.

He looked up when she walked in, the lenses of his heart-shaped glasses flashing and his bronzed face falling into an open-mouthed look of alarm. His arms ripped out from the corpse with a disgusting squelch. “Gordon! What are you doing here? I sent out a message to all interns to remain outside of the labs today. You shouldn’t be here.”

He was trembling, the blood on his gloved fingers spilling off from his shaky hands and flecking the floor with dark droplets. Beaded sweat sparkled on his brow and shone in his short black hair, the crimped curls even more distressed than usual; it was as if he’d been raking his fingers through his hair again and again, tearing at his scalp in agitation. Even as he peeled the gloves off from his hands she could see his jagged, shortened fingernails, each one gnawed down to the quick. To make matters worse, the purplish-brown discoloration under his eyes was even worse than Stefanie’s, and that was saying something.

A half-filled ceramic mug sat on a surgeon’s side-table littered with cutting tools nearby, sticky brown stains trailing down the sides from where his jittery hands had beckoned the coffee to spill over. Stefanie’s eyes widened; CA Myers never drank coffee.

“Dr. Myers…? What’s wrong—“

The stare he fixed her with in that moment, his rounded eyes damp and begging for a reprieve, would have been more than enough to immediately convince the intern that something was deeply, profoundly wrong. The sound of the doors bursting open behind her only confirmed it.

What looked to be an entire battalion of Stormtroopers marched in through the glass doors, heavy boots clomping intensely over the tile flooring and their white armor gleaming in sharp flashes. Dr. T’Jung was at the front of this horde, her robes undulating around her in a torrent of sunshine-yellow fabric. Her pale skin and sharply-angled features appeared almost bone white in color, her pointed ears and dark hair making her seem statuesque, not exceptionally feminine nor masculine but most certainly a being to be obeyed.

She stopped just after entering the room, her nebulous black eyes flicking first to Chief Assistant Myers, taking in his distressed appearance. Then, her gaze filled with such seriousness Stefanie hadn’t known a mere mortal could be in possession of, her eyes landed on Intern Stefanie Gordon. The blonde-haired intern immediately felt bare, stripped of her sense of belonging and safety.

The vulcan’s mouth thinned a touch more, her eyes tightening around the corners. Her unblinking stare returned to CA Myers, her hands folding neatly together behind her back. “Science Officer Myers. I can only begin to think that this is another one of your so-called ‘practical jokes’— unless, of course, you have knowingly placed Intern Gordon in harm’s way.”

“Wait, what?” Stefanie stared, mouth gaping like a door thrown open by a windstorm. She glanced uneasily between the two scientists who seemed to be polar opposites, subconsciously shifting out of the way.

Dr. T’Jung had said ‘practical jokes’ as if it were the vilest of profanities, the words sounding uncouth and bitter rolling off her tongue, but that wasn’t what Stefanie focused on. Oh, no. Her brain focused on ‘in harm’s way’, the phrase repeating itself over and over again to her ears, echoing and distorted in the scientist’s crisp tone of voice until it lost all meaning except for the one emotion it inspired: fear.

Myers cast her a hurried glance, the lenses of his pink glasses slipping down an inch, his eyes silently willing her to be quiet. He then turned fully to look T’Jung in the eye, his shoulders hunched in a defensive slouch and his hands flexing unconsciously at his sides as his agitation grew.

“I would never do something like that! There must have been some interference with the memo I sent out— and besides, the contamination may have occurred here, but the… the contaminated specimen is gone.” Myers gestured helplessly with one arm, staring around at his surroundings as if his whole world had been turned on its head.

And, well. Stefanie supposed it had been. She felt a rush of compassion for the man, but T’Jung was speaking before she could say anything to stave off the self-hatred that was obviously beginning to consume him.

The vulcan’s eyes flashed. She greatly disliked the drama these humans so loved to surround themselves with. “Which specimen, Dr. Myers?”

Wincing as he spoke, Myers looked with anxious eyes at Viola Burns’ desk in the room’s corner.

“The rat.”

[Ada Wong]

They were making that noise again. That loud, mechanized drilling noise, right outside her window and vibrating against the glass pane. Viola Burns curled up into the fetal position on her Tier 3 apartment floor, her skin burning like dozens of fire ants were marching across it, biting and digging, trying to seep into her pores and devour her sweat.

The fever had been easier to deal with yesterday. It hadn’t made it impossible for her to move without wailing in pain, ripping into the plush surface of her down comforter as she crawled toward the bed, flames licking under her skin and searing down her throat. Only the cool planes of the hardwood seemed to quell that fire now, but even that was starting to not be enough.

Viola groaned like a dying animal, unable to compel her arms to move and scratch at the itchy, dried tear-tracks curving down her cheeks. Her body was dry as a desert on the inside, yet sweat peppered her skin in a salty-sweet layer, a strange scent that her brain had begun to take notice of. Or perhaps that was the smell of her girlfriend in the other room, that strange mixture of pinkish-yellow plant matter she liked to burn and inhale…

She’d been robbed of the ability to cry hours ago.

Memory was not on her side. Viola couldn’t remember how she’d gotten home last night, how she’d gotten in and managed to jam her key into the lock. The remaining memories she had were blurry and numb and weak; they came and went like moths from a hanging lantern, fuzzy antennae tickling the air and feeling their way through the night. She didn’t want to find her way. She wanted to forget. She wanted to be lost to the darkness, to end her suffering now.

She could see something on the floor; a limp thing, furry and stiff. Her eyes rolled toward it, the whites stained a painful yellowish-red, the blunted edges of her mind attempting to comprehend what she was seeing. Sweat and the haze of fever clouded her vision.

Focussss. Find food.

Finally, the discarded thing swam into view. It was a dead rat, covered in short brown fur and with prominent yellowed teeth jutting out from its mouth, the little thing’s jaws gaping in death. She remembered those teeth, the indent of a bite from them still stinging on her wrist, but the pain was growing duller.

Questions eddied about inside her mind, churning like sour stomach acid. Why was it a rat? Had she killed it? Should she bite it back?

The sickly woman stared at the rat, her mouth suddenly watering; not even the fever could combat this sudden, gnawing emptiness in her belly, the salivating hunger that scorched through her. She crawled forward on her hands and knees, palms sliding forward to cup the tiny, frail corpse between her hands, cradling it as gently as if it were a babe.

A gurgling, chuckling growl burbled up from her throat as she hunched over it, stripping flesh and fat from the bone with her teeth. The rotten skin of her chest and arms, turned into a gory mess by her endless scratching, began to slough off in pieces, falling away like meat torn from a fiery spit. Sickening and wet popping sounds echoed around the room, veins and tendons mashing disgustingly between dull white molars, blood slicking down the corners of the woman’s lips and painting her chin with dark red.

Thu-thump.

What was once Viola ceased feasting, head snapping up, nostrils flaring like a hound on the scent. Ghostly pale eyes fixated on the door, swollen and bulging with infection. It was cracked open, just slightly. There was something moving on the other side of that door. Something that smelled good, spicy and soft and candy floss-sweet.

Sluggishly staggering to her feet with the bloody remnants of the rat spilling down the front of her dress, her lab coat still falling over her shoulders like a ghastly shroud, Viola nudged her way out into the apartment proper. Moments later, horrible, awful screams rent the air.

The drilling outside abruptly fell silent, the mechanical drone leaving the entire neighborhood swathed in complete and utter silence, save for the muted sounds of shuffling and something heavy and soft bumping into furniture, the slick sound of tearing meat.

After a moment's pause, the drilling from the construction zone began anew.

[Ada Wong]

The stark white of the Nexus fell away, the sensation of stepping through the portal being not unlike plunging face-first into a body of water— overwhelming, confusing, tangling her thoughts into an indiscernible mess. The city-verse of Coruscant drowned out all of her senses in a flood of raw information and sights, the sprawling cityscape seeming like a crystalline forest of metal and glass, compactly-placed buildings gleaming and jutting out against the pale, cloud-free atmosphere. There were all the usual sounds of urban life and then some; Ada observed with great interest as a flying craft whirred past, thinking that perhaps she’d been struck a little too hard on the head, but— no. No, it was all real.

Shaking off her awe, Ada glanced around at the high-tech checkpoint she had been ushered into. The windows directly across from her provided a view of the glistening metropolis; the building was obviously designed to give first-time visitors a staggering impression of the city’s magnitude, and even without a bird’s eye view Ada could tell that the assembly of high-rise buildings extended for miles. Narrow concourses fanned out to either side of her, elevated walkways occasionally dotted with security cameras hanging overhead like a particularly oppressive cloud, countless lenses staring her down.

Her bloodied face and body were almost garish under the harsh, artificially judgmental glare of the overhead lights; there was nowhere to hide inside this building, every architectural aspect bringing the words ‘bright’ and ‘spacious’ to mind. Several of the other loitering visitors cast her strange looks, quietly shifting away at the sight of her gore-spattered appearance.

This was fine by Ada. She wasn’t in the mood for playing nice with a bunch of perfect strangers.

It felt like arriving at a party she really had no business attending. She had done this numerous times in the past to acquire information, sidling up to diplomats and benefactors when their tongues had been loosened by cheap Merlot and complimentary champagne. Still, a feeling of unease crept up her spine, an uncomfortable sense of being exposed, like having her back unprotected against enemy gunfire, twining through her muscles until she stood ramrod straight, eyes flashing, her chin lifting almost subconsciously to ward off any staring.

Ada regarded the soldiers in white armor with trepidation even as she waited to reach the point for spot checking. It was not unlike other military checkpoints she had encountered in the past, but then again, the scarlet spy ordinarily occupied her time with trying to sneak past such terminals, not going through them. It rankled, really, not being familiar enough with her surroundings to go unnoticed, but Ada was so, so tired. While one couldn’t see it from her stiff posture, a trained eye could likely discern the delicate way she was holding herself, arms curved just slightly toward, but not quite covering, her wounded hip, like a prey animal trying not to seem injured to a hungry lion. She needed a place to curl up and lick her wounds in peace.

“Welcome to Corusc… whoa, are you okay?”

Startled, Ada blinked and looked directly into the shaded visor of the soldier waiting to scan her, a peculiar rod-shaped instrument clutched in black gloves and half-raised in the air. Despite the helmet concealing the soldier’s face, the woman could tell that he was giving her a quick once-over to gauge how much of a threat she might pose.

Her eyes slid to the other troopers standing guard behind him, more specifically the rifles in their hands, and then returned to Helmethead. Wisely, Ada didn’t give any indication that she was bothered by this, smoothing her features into a neutrally pleasant look. She even smiled.

“Not really. Ran into some trouble on my way here, but I’m fine,” Ada said, because there was just no sense in lying, and then directed her attention toward the skyline, feigning impatience to be getting on with the scanning process.

The soldier visibly deliberated on something before relenting, gesturing to the side. “If you say so, lady. Stand with your hands at your sides for scanning.”

Doing as she was told, Ada glanced briefly at the ceiling as she waited for the trooper to finish with his scans, the rod waving over her limbs and giving soft hmmzzms every now and again.

She stiffened when the device gave an alarmed squeal. In an instant her eyes had flicked around to take account of the situation, noting how the other guards fell into defensive poses almost immediately. A mental catalogue of her weapons flickered in her thoughts, her posture having become rigid with tension.

“What is it?” One of the armed soldiers spoke, his voice altered into a clipped drone by his helmet. The black metal weapon shifted in his arms, white plastoid armor seeming shiny and luminous under the lights. Ada eyed the gaps in that armor where a black body glove peeked through, wondering if she would have the time and physical capacity to drive a knife-blade into it if things took a turn for the worse.

The guard who had scanned her gave no visible reaction aside from glancing boredly at the instrument, no doubt reading over the information there.

“Read-out says multiple life signs detected, two to be exact,” he glanced up at Ada, his helmeted head shaking just a bit at whatever she had done. “Unless you’re pregnant, miss, that has the potential to be contraband. Exotic species are not permitted into Courscant without going through us, so that includes any pets you might be trying to hide. You’ll need to hand over whatever you’re carrying for scanning. Immediately.”

Multiple life signs…? A shock of cold went down Ada’s spine, her eyes widening as the fear struck true. She hadn’t contracted something while dealing with the Los Illuminados, had she? Or had Albert Wesker found the time to inject her with some infernal substance during their little spat? Aside from the Las Plagas, there were far worse things that could have been done to her. She hadn’t felt the old familiar sting of a syringe, but—

Abruptly, Ada went totally still as she felt a stirring just above her ribcage, steadily wriggling to the ripple of black fabric at the chest of her qipao. As she and the stormtroopers watched in horrified fascination, the budge under the red cloth revealed itself, a panicked gasp rising in Ada’s throat when…!

“Peep!” A fuzzy yellow head poked out, tiny black eyes staring up at them in perfect innocence. It was a duckling.

“Oh my god.” The stormtrooper that had scanned her barked out a surprised laugh, then reached up and reeled away as if he could stifle his laughter through his helmet. Ada, for her part, reached up and scooped the tiny thing into her hand, staring absurdly as the soft pink bill nudged at her hand in curiosity. Well.

She how no idea how it could have gotten into her clothing without her noticing, especially considering the fitted style, but could only assume the baby duck had - somehow - wriggled in there while she’d been busy sloshing around the Fountain of Infinity and trying not to die.

“Okay, that’s… That’s adorable, but I really need to scan the little guy, too.” The soldier said, holding one gloved hand out to accept the animal. Ada had her suspicions that he maybe just wanted to hold it, but politely relinquished it to him.

Holding the small ball of fuzz in one glove, the duckling utterly swamped by the size of his hand, the stormtrooper lightly bapped it on the bill with one finger, delighting in the answering ‘eep!’ He quickly turned and gestured to the armed guards at his back, waving one arm excitedly. “Holy crap. Guys, come look at this.”

After a moment’s hesitation, the other troopers joined him, three bucket-shaped helmets bowed together to inspect the little thing. A collective ‘awwww’ rippled through the group as the duckling fell onto its back, struggling against the black-fingered gloves with its teensy-weensy orange feet kicking at the air.

This went on for a little under a minute, right up until Ada heard an impatient visitor loudly clearing their throat from behind her. Abruptly realizing their slip in professionalism (not to mention the growing crowd of exasperated visitors waiting to be scanned,) the two armed troopers stiffened and returned to their positions by the terminal’s exit, while the armored cop with the scanning instrument swiftly returned the duckling into Ada’s care.

Ada, for her part, held the baby animal with a great amount of gentleness, absent-mindedly rubbing its puffy chest with her fingernails. There was still blood and skin caked under them, flakes of rust and black chipping off and sticking in the yellow fuzz.

Clearing his throat, the stormtrooper began to speak. “Well, nothing too dangerous aside from the lethal cuteness your little buddy seems to have, haha. Though I am sending a notice to the EPD about all the weapons you’re carrying, so they may contact you with some questions. I’d strongly advise against answering anything but honestly.”

Stricken with a curious sense of déjà vu, Ada tilted her head to the side. “The EPD?”

“Yeah, the Empire Peace Division,” he said, walking over toward to control panel filled with all sorts of glowing computer displays. After a moment of tapping at the screen, he turned to her with a tablet-shaped data pad held loosely in his grip, numerical data spiraling in a dizzying array across the digital screen. “They’re always looking for volunteers given the amount of trouble they get from wandering Primes, so if you’re interested in keeping your nose clean… that’s the way to go.”

All Ada could do was nod, wincing a little as a pang of sharp pain jammed through her skull like an icepick, blurry darkness threatening to overtake her vision. “I’ll be sure to keep that in mind. Thank you.”

She squinted at the tablet in the soldier’s hands, watching as he prodded at the screen and made a myriad of selections with one finger— tap, tap-tap! Then, to her surprise, a fully-body map of herself was staring back, all her injuries and guarded posture documented in soft bluish-white holographic light.

It was incredible, a stunning example of graphic reproduction tech. Technology like this had only been available to the most lucrative of top-secret organizations in her own world, but in Coruscant its seemed to be everywhere. There was simply no telling the true extent of military might the place possessed. Ada could hardly keep the unbridled interest from appearing on her face, dark hair falling across her face as she leaned forward to get a better look.

“Pretty fancy, right?” the soldier gushed, noticing her curiosity and apparently all too eager to showcase this bit of technology. “We just got a patch in today that adds extra muscle definition. Way better than the old models we had to work with. That stuff was too smooth, lacked character. But, here, check it out— apparently some game designers were asked to help with the coding.”

“Impressive…” Ada murmured, and she meant it. “Is this gateway always so heavily guarded?”

The soldier again returned to the control panel, but this time he gestured for Ada to join him. Waving his hand over the largest viewscreen of the plaza, he began to explain. "Usually we’ve got people who aren’t in full security regalia running the place, but there have been a few warning flags put up about dangerous persons in the last week who might attempt to evade Imperial custody or tear their way in. I almost pity the poor bastards when they get caught. But, enough about that. We need to get some more information recorded…”

He held the digital tablet aloft with great ceremony, then began firing questions at her that would give a corporate interviewer a run for their money. "Full name, occupation, special powers or abilities?”

There was no point in lying about her name, Ada supposed. "Ada Wong... I was an employee of a pharmaceutical corporation, along with several other companies of a similar creed. As for abilities… athleticism, specialization in martial arts, experience with several diverse weapon types… I’m fairly sure that’s everything."

Nodding his head a few times, the soldier paused over one part of the info he had just entered. “And what was your role as an employee of this pharmaceutical corporation? I’m asking because we can use this information to find the best possible fit for you in Coruscant’s workforce.”

Right, Ada thought wryly.

“I was an informer,” she said, less wryly.

“Riiiight. Covert activities it is. Do I even want to know what happened while you were in the Nexus? Just... if you’ll place all of your weaponry on this table for scanning…”

Ada relinquished her weapons, observing in polite silence as the soldier went about examining each item, painstakingly going over them with the solemnly droning scanning instrument. “Ah. Well. This is… quite the arsenal you’re packing, Miss Wong. The original scan didn't show this level of detail..." The stormtrooper straightened, the prior friendly camaraderie replaced with stiff-legged professionalism. "Since you’ve been so obliging and less disruptive than even some of the weaker Primes we’ve had come through, you will have 12 hours maximum to speak to the EPD about employment, or face confiscation."

The former secret agent nodded slowly, her eyes seeming unfocused as she took that tidbit of information in. Her fingers rubbed under the duckling’s chin. So, she would either need to leave Coruscant as soon as possible… or become an asset. Well, it could be worse.

“You’re registered with the system now. If you’d be interested in learning more about our city, the Visitor Center is right through there. They can even direct you to the EPD’s headquarters.” The stormtrooper indicated a glass division off to the side labelled as the VISITOR CENTER. Ada turned her head to look. A smartly-dressed woman sat behind a desk on the other side of the glass, head bowed, and her eyes fixed on the screen of her computer. Colorful displays filled with brochures and advertisements littered the area, some even decorated with a riot of moving images.

"Thank you," Ada said in turning back, almost forgetting her manners, but the soldier was already scanning the next person in line. Giving what was more or less a mental shrug, she decided to take his advice and pay the small information desk a visit.

[Aello]

Aello cursed under her breath and clutched at her forehead. This was entirely all too much to process. Not that the situation was entirely unfamiliar. This wasn’t the first time she had been abducted and dropped off at an unfamiliar place, hell she had arrived at the Helios under similar circumstances. It was partially due to this familiarity with the unfamiliar that helped her keep her from shutting down losing her metaphorical shit. She allowed her body to relax, undoing the tightened ball of cords that was her gut. She exhaled and sat on the edge of the fountain. The woman took stock of her belongings, her gun was absent and so was her phone.

“Well fuck,” she muttered.

No point in crying about it she figured. Aello stood and began to walk towards one of the few landmarks available to her. It was hard to judge distance in the sea of featureless white. What had appeared to be a quick hop and a skip turned into a two hour hike. Not that she minded the distance, it gave her plenty of time to collect her thoughts. As she approached the gate of her choice she became aware of a few armored guards. Their shock-white armor blended in with the ivory background. They carried a brand of energy rifle that was foreign to the  girl.

“Uh, where am I?” she asked one of the guards.

The soldiers shared a glance amongst themselves before one of them stepped forward and addressed her. His helmet added a robotic intonation to his words.

“Are you a prime?”

She scrunched her face and responded, “the hell’s a prime?”

Again the retinue of soldiers shared looks. Aello felt a twinge of danger in the air, perhaps it was paranoia -- perhaps not. She felt the urge to cut and run to another gate, but she didn’t feel like getting shot in the back.

“Did Omni greet you when you first arrived here?” the soldier’s distorted voice asked.

“Yeah,” she responded, “at least, I think?”

There was a moment of silence before the soldier spoke again, “please come with me.”

Aello’s danger radar was going off the charts. Instinctively the joints in her robotic arm whirred to life and she raised the limb across her chest.  The soldier stepped forward and grabbed the wrist of her real arm and tugged. Her entire body tensed up and a gallon of adrenaline was dumped into her veins. She stepped back and pulled back.

“Get off me motherfucker,” she shouted and swung.

A vicious and hollow thwack echoed across the barren landscape. While her prosthetic appendage had not been designed for direct combat it still proved to be a formidable weapon. Bits of a white plastoid composite were sent splintering off from the trooper’s mask. She had scored a solid hit, but the soldier merely stumbled for a bit before regaining his poise. In response the trooper pulled the butt of his rifle back and slammed it into Aello’s gut. Such a sudden impact forced her over and she began to retch violently. Rifles were leveled at the fresh arrival and radio chatter filled the air.

“Stay down!” the soldiers commanded.

“Bite me,” she shouted back.

Aello raised her head and found herself staring down several barrels. Her hand reached for her pistol, but found nothing but disappointment. The trooper she had struck adjusted his helmet and fell in line with his brethren. A stranger, wearing an impeccably clean uniform stepped through the gate. A layer of baby fat gave his face a warm and friendly visage. Despite his soft face he moved with a kind of precision found only in a military man. Aello locked eyes with the stranger and he offered a courteous smile.

“Gentlemen,” he spoke, addressing the troopers, “lower your weapons, this is not how we do things.”

“Who are you?” Aello asked, adding as much scorn to the word “you” as she could.

“Me?” he responded, “why I’m just a concerned friend, you must be terribly confused, and rightfully so.”

The officer made his way to the downed woman. His polished boots slapped against the ivory white floors. He removed his glove and offered her a hand.
“Welcome to the Omniverse, I’m Lieutenant Boggs,” he said, once again offering his cheery smile.

Aello scowled, swatted away his hand, and said, “the fuck you think I got legs for?”

“Sorry, I meant no offense,” Boggs said and retracted his hand.

Aello climbed to her feet, wincing as her bruised stomach cried out. Again she had the powerful urge to turn tail and run, but just where in the hell would she go?

“What do you want?” Aello asked.

Boggs replied, “nothing, but a moment of your time, miss…?”

“Aello, just call me Aello,” she said.

“Aello it is, let’s go somewhere a bit more conducive to a conversation,” he stepped aside and motioned her towards the gate.

She bit the inside of her cheek and huffed, but began to walk towards the gate. Boggs followed shortly behind, stopped only to regard the battered stormtrooper. In response the trooper seemed to stand up straighter. A more than stern talking to was coming once the Lieutenant was done entertaining.

As she passed through the Coruscant gate she half expected to be vaporized instantly or that someone would be waiting to throw a bag over her head. Instead she was greeted by a checkpoint so fortified that would make even the most hardened Space Vaults blush. Static turret emplacements lined the checkpoint’s walls, giving it the appearance of a dragon’s mouth. Squads of stormtroopers stood sentinel as well as a handful of massive warriors that she would come to know as Space Marines. Lieutenant Boggs led her through a series of security gates, each one more secure than the last. Invisible scanners combed her for hidden guns or other more exotic armaments. Eventually they reached the interior atrium and Boggs led them down a corridor titled “NEW ARRIVALS”. They came to a rest inside a small office that appeared to be the Lieutenant’s personal quarters. He offered Aello a seat and took the one at the other end of his desk.

“Well,” he said, exhaling and resting his elbows on the table, “I’m sure you have more than a thousand questions, and I’d be happy to answer them as best I can.”

“Okay then, what the hell is this place?” she asked, “where did you take me to?”

“Well, that depends on how specific you want to get,” he said and pointed to map of the Omniverse that hung on his wall, “as you could probably surmise this place isn’t your home, we’re in the Omniverse, I’ll leave the speculation up to the scientists and philosophers, but here are the facts…”

Boggs went on to explain each of the eight main verses and the general geography of the Omniverse. He ended the exposition with his description of Coruscant.

“Coruscant is split into seven tiers, each of them with their own personality so to speak, you’re on tier one currently, with tiers two through seven below you,” he said, “this’ll probably be the most comfortable verse for you, we try to keep things as modern and habitable as we can.”

“Who is ’we’?” she asked.

Boggs once again flashed his characteristic grin, “we’re the Empire, Aello, the ‘good guys’ so to speak, when the Omniverse was first created, our Emperor, Palpatine, was one of the first primes summoned here, along with Aragorn, the current king of Camelot, our Emperor envisioned a united Omniverse, a utopia under one banner where men and women of all backgrounds could live in perfect harmony. Aragorn, the arrogant man that he is, was simply too myopic to see the greater good and formed his own faction to act as a thorn in the Empire’s side, but that is all they are Aello, just a thorn, nothing more.”

“So what do you want from me?” she asked.

“I’m not going to twist your arm and offer you an ultimatum Aello,” Boggs said, passing a business card to her, “you’re free to explore the city and indulge in all it has to offer, all I’m offering is a job that not only pays well, but also offers a sense of accomplishment that you can’t get anywhere else.”

She turned the card over in her hand before shoving into her pocket. Aello pushed back her chair and stood. Boggs shuffled around some papers on his desk.

“Think on it,” he said, “my door is always open.”

Aello said nothing and turned for the door. A jackhammer was set to full bore against her skull and she was tired of listening to this guy talk. She needed a drink, not a lecture. As she approached the threshold of the Lieutenant’s office Boggs spoke up.

“One more thing,” he said, his voice adopting a serious tone, “do the people where you come from believe in a hell?”

Aello froze in place with her back towards the Lieutenant. The word “hell” brought back a flash of memories. A cold cell in a strange world filled to the absolute brim with misery. Inside this dark world a familiar looking girl named Amelia found herself. Aello’s headache worsened. White splotches assaulted her vision and wiped away the memories. Amelia’s name went the way of the wind and Aello could no longer grasp it. She rubbed her forehead with the heel of her hand.

“Well, even if they don’t I can give you this bit of warning, think of it as friendly advice,” Boggs said, “being a prime you’re immortal, but don’t think that gives you free reign, there are laws for a reason, and should the need arise there is a place for primes that makes Dante’s Inferno look like a summer vacation, please do keep that in mind.”

“Tch,” Aello responded as she walked through the door, “don’t worry, I’m what you’d call a model citizen.”

[Ada Wong]

Ada emerged from the fortress-like structure of glass and metal, face bared to the artificial sunlight and her breath leaving her in a long-drawn sigh. A lush park was directly across the street, a handsome pond and several trash-free benches strewn alongside straight sidewalks and bicycle paths. Vehicles sped through the skies on invisible highways, and others simply dithered and buzzed through the air nearer to street-level— dizzy, bobbing, turning in broken loop-de-loops like drunken bumblebees. Sounds and sights and harsh echoes burst all around. As the automatic glass doors slid closed behind her with a musical whine, Ada brought out a map she'd obtained from the Visitor Center, scrutinizing the colored pathways that denoted the location of prominent buildings and the layer-cake depiction of Coruscant's tiers, each one accessible by elevator.

The clerk at the information desk had said that hailing a sky taxi would be the best way to travel, taken one good look at Ada's bullet-riddled side, and then promptly began to sort through a catalogue of taxi services and the levels of amenities each one offered. Ada had thanked the woman, her lips smiling a false smile and murmuring soft, friendly lies, and then she'd beat a hasty escape.

She was fairly sure she could handle catching a taxi, thank you very much, even if her appearance was a little bloodied.

A small alcove—sort of like an urban bus stop— was located just outside the checkpoint zone's doors. She had been standing under this sheltered overhang for quite a while when another person joined her, dumping themselves onto the bench with a sharp grunt and the malignant sound of metal pinging against metal.

Turning her head just a bit, half-expecting to see yet another heavily-armored soldier come to escort her someplace, Ada was surprised to see the woman who had actually elected to come near. Most of the other visitors she'd encountered were wary enough of her to keep their distance, but this one appeared almost at ease, a striking metal arm curving along her left side and a fierce fohawk spiking up from her scalp, a few prominent bangs sloping downward in a sweep of hair over her forehead. A faint snarl twisted her lips as she squinted up at the sky, her eyes darting about, seeming almost... hunted, the fingers of her mechanical arm twitching.

She noticed Ada watching her a beat later, eyes snapping up to focus on the secret agent's face before slanting down to take in the entirety of her form, blood and bruises and all. She didn't seem all that bothered by obvious signs of violence, a trait that Ada could respect, but her expression also seemed fractured, a bit cagey, like she was scanning Ada for hidden weapons about as thoroughly as the Empire's soldiers had. Her gaze lingered on the duckling, confusion evident on her face.

"The fuck happened to you?" She finally ground out, syllables grinding hard against one another like a vocal chord-sized chainsaw. "Someone kick your ass?"

Ada smiled, lowering herself to sit primly on the opposite edge of the bench, hands tucked neatly in her lap. "I was the one doing most of the ass-kicking, actually. At the risk of sounding cliché, you should see the other guy."

"Huh," the woman said, giving Ada's amused expression a skeptical glance. Apparently deciding that she liked what she saw, the other woman's face split into a shark's grin. "Not bad. Not bad at all."

Ada bowed her head graciously, accepting the compliment with a slight smirk on her mouth. An only vaguely uncomfortable silence fell between the two women, and just as Ada began to suspect that they would not be speaking anymore, the other woman began again.

"So... you a Prime, or what? 'Cause this Omni stuff is all sorta new to me and shit. Creepy law enforcement slash corporate-type lectured me back there about it all. S'not a bad deal, but I'd rather be back in my own damn universe, you feel me?"

Eyebrows knitting together in confusion, Ada canted her head to the side. "A Prime? Is that what someone brought here by Omni is called?"

"Yeah, that's what the man said. Seems like a dickish name if you ask me," the other Prime shrugged, favoring her flesh-made shoulder a tad more than her mecha-arm as she did so. Ada agreed; it was a pretty dickish moniker. She hadn't much of an idea of what sort of world she'd been so unceremoniously dumped into, but that definitely wasn't a good sign.

Then again, Ada mused to herself, Wesker would probably like a title such as that. He'd probably take it as a sign of his superiority to other life, or something. It was a good thing she'd taken the time to score a lucky hit when he was already severely weakened upon entering the Omniverse— she'd likely never get a chance like that again.

Snapping back to the present, Ada noticed that the stranger's eyes had turned to the busy street, her lips pursed in thought. Clearing her throat and regaining her newfound conversation partner's attention, Ada asked about where the other would be going after this.

The woman shook her head, looking down at the metal fingers of one arm. Gradually, the metallic joints locked into a tight fist.

"I dunno. Wherever the wind blows me, I guess, or however that dumb saying goes."

There was a long silence after that. Looking down and away, Ada reflected on her own situation and realized that she felt much the same way, but couldn't quite express it in such simple terms.

"Peep," said the duckling folded in her hands. Ada had to forcibly tamp down on the urge to roll her eyes, but stroked the yellow fuzz on the top of its head in a way that was far too gentle for someone who'd just clawed someone's face off not even three hours ago.

Determining that maybe the stranger would prefer being left to her own devices, or perhaps deciding that she was finished waiting around for something to happen, Ada stood, then made to step into the street and signal at one of the vehicles flying overhead. Her heel had scarcely laid flat against the asphalt when she was immediately waylaid by a large sky taxi swooping down in her path, heat and expelled air whooshing all around it and stirring the red folds of her qipao.

One of the glass windows on the torpedo-shaped, silvery metal vehicle slid to the side, revealing a green-skinned creature with a variety of pink-tinged tentacles curling around its face like a sea anemone.

"You looking for a ride?" It asked in a cheerful, human-sounding voice. This left Ada feeling rather cast out into a sea of conflicting thoughts and urges, unsure if she should shoot this thing in the face or locate a psychiatrist as soon as physically and temporally possible.

In the end she didn't do either of those things, primarily because the other woman had leapt up and was crowding into the cramped, curved inside of the flying taxi, dragging Ada along with her. The spy found herself pretty unluckily trapped between a figurative rock and a hard place as the vehicle gave a shocking jolt and began to ascend, the ground receding in a rush of color and blurry shapes.

"You two ladies interested in the tour?" The alien asked, and oh god, Ada could see it peering back at them in the rearview mirror around the mass of writhing tentacles covering its face.

"Sure," said the woman with the metal arm, her eyes sweeping the interior of the craft as if searching for something in particular. When she apparently didn't find it, the woman leaned back in her seat with a grumble, shifting around a bit to get more comfortable.

When she was finally finished, she turned to Ada, spiky hair brushing the roof of the space they'd crammed themselves into.

"The name's Aello, by the way."

She held out her hand. Her metal hand. Ada gently accepted the handshake with her own, marveling at the surprising warmth of the metal as it touched her fingers. At least she could cross shaking hands with a cyborg limb off her bucket list.

"Ada."

[Aello]

Well at least the tour wasn’t boring. Aello found herself enraptured by the sights that were laid bare before her. As far as the space-born girl could recall she had never been to a megacity before, not that her memory was all that reliable. Still, when compared to space station Helios, Coruscant was a crown jewel. Magnificent skyscrapers, built with state-of-the-art materials and fashioned in a manner of architecture that was designed to elicit a sense of wonder, covered the city like sprinkles on the perfect ice cream cone. Worm-like trails of hovercars twisted throughout the city, following invisible highways and roads. None of the technology by itself was particularly impressive to Aello, she had seen it all before, but she had never seen so much of it in one place. Despite this excitement the metal-armed girl had appearances to uphold and contained her childlike amazement, only pretending to adjust herself or stretch in order to get a better view of something.

Their cab driver, despite his strange appearance, offered a more than hospitable ride. He spoke with enthusiasm, and drew their attention to several landmarks and points of interest. Once the initial glamor of the city wore off and they found themselves trapped in a three-dimensional traffic jam Aello turned her attention to her new companion.

“So,” Aello said, “what’s your deal?”

Ada glanced out the window and deflected the question, “what do you mean?”

“Well, I don’t know, like where are you from, what do you do, that sorta stuff,” Aello said, “y’know, just trying to make a conversation.”

There was a moment of silence as Ada weighed her answers, “well, in this context, I suppose Earth would be the most appropriate answer, and as of now I suppose I’m unemployed.”

Aello chuckled, “oh come on, [i]Earth?[/i} Really? You don’t have to fuck with me, if you didn’t want me to know you coulda just ignored me.”

“What?” Ada responded, “I’m not fucking with you.”

“You’re kidding.”

Aello studied her partner’s face and came to the conclusion that, no she was in fact not kidding. Disbelief swept over the scoundrel like a curtain. She sank back into her seat and rubbed her forehead. Now there was no doubt in her mind; the Omniverse truly was one nutty place. Ada’s curiosity had been piqued. Not that she showed it, she knew better, but the conversation had moved on from being just simple small talk.

“Why is that so hard to believe?” Ada probed.

Aello scoffed and regained her composure, “well other than the fact that Earth has been under a galactic cordone for the past few millennia, I suppose that’s not so hard to believe.”

“Galactic cordone?”

Aello shrugged. Textbook knowledge came rushing through her skull, things she had learned but could not remember where she had learned them. She explained that Earth had once been a member of the Intergalactic Peace Syndication, a group of supernations that had banded together to create a utopian society. However as they strove towards their grand goal of peaceful unification Earth amassed an army and set out to conquer the galaxies. Eventually they were defeated and confined to a single planet. Their punishment? Complete and total isolation. They were stripped of their technology and hurled back into a primitive era. As the final nail in the proverbial coffin a fleet of ships were set in place, keeping them confined to their own miserable existence. Aello strained to remember the little details, but found herself unable to recall much more than the broad strokes.

“Though it seems like none of that really matters anymore,” Aello said, shrugging, “don’t suppose you got a smoke I could borrow do you?”

Ada shook her head no.

“Pfft, figures,” Aello said.

Aello watched as their craft picked up speed and peeled away from the hellish traffic jam. Their tour ran for another thirty minutes.

“So now that you’ve seen all there is to see, where would you lovely ladies like to go?” the creature asked.

Aello spoke before her companion, “well, I need a ship, and some smokes, so take me somewhere that sells spaceships, preferably a place that gives out easy lines of credit.”

“Spaceship,” the creature said, adding an upward inflection to the words.

“Yeah, you know, spaceship,” the girl said, pointing at the sky, “flies in space.”

The taxi driver’s belly rumbled as he chuckled, “oh, it took me a bit of getting used to too, but I’m terribly sorry, there is no space here.”

“What?”

“Yeah, I mean, you can go up pretty far, buuut eventually you hit an invisible ceiling,” the alien shrugged, “guess Omni doesn’t want to go through the trouble of keeping track of a bunch of spaceheads.”

Aello deflated. There was no space, and by extension there were no space ships.

“This place is bullshit,” Aello mumbled.

“Actually,” Ada said, “if you could take me to the EPD’s headquarters, it’d be much appreciated.”

Aello pulled out the business card that Boggs had offered her. Jet black letters on an eggshell white background read “E.P.D. Empire Peace Division”. Contact information for the kind Lieutenant was kept underneath. She was a stranger in a strange land with no place to live and no sure way to make ends meet. While she wasn’t exactly the type to be a model employee she figured it wouldn’t hurt to make some scratch while she sorted this whole thing out.

"I've got nothing better to do so I'll tagalong with the earth-girl," Aello said.

For a while longer the three of them shared small talk. The alien explained the other tiers of Coruscant and told them that there was nothing but crooks and pariahs below tier three. Aello made a mental note to see what the lower tiers were all about, after all crooks and pariahs were her kind of people. Eventually they floated down to the ground and came to a complete stop. Compressed air hissed as Aello opened her door.

As she stepped out she pointed a thumb towards Ada and said, “the earthling’s got the tab.”

Aello stepped outside and glanced around while waiting for her new friend to cover the fare.

“Fuck me,” she said, “this place has got a lot of cameras doesn’t it?”

[Ada Wong]

The Empire Peace Division looked exactly as Drs. T’Jung and Myers remembered it, but Intern Stefanie Gordon had never been inside the imposing building before. After entering through the first section of front doors and security, the next set of doors were heaved open for them, harshly glowing lights blazing a clear path into the heart of Coruscant’s law enforcement branch. Still, it was not precisely a branch— any citizen of the immense city-verse would agree that the EPD was more like a dense, crawling scrub of bracken, thorny and sharp with vines seeping into every nook and cranny, snuffing out the hopeful buds of petty crime all over the topmost tiers.

There were half a dozen soldierly Stormtroopers, brilliant and daunting in their shiny white plate-armor and black under-vests, nodding shortly to the three scientists as they walked past. With the lights glaring down on them, the sound of boots tromping over the floor echoing from the furthest reaches of the building and the cool reminder of a sheathed weapon around every corner, it was rather easy for Stefanie to keep her feet moving and stay close to her superiors. The air sizzled with menace, a malevolent snap of instinctual electricity nipping at the young woman’s heels.

Dr. T’Jung strode slightly ahead of Dr. Myers, her shoes striking the ground at a steady, unbreaking clip. She appeared… well, not necessarily at ease or comfortable under the scrutiny of so many soldiers and law enforcement officers, but certainly focused on her destination and unwilling to let any nervousness whatsoever dissuade her from looking straight ahead, chin held high, her dark eyes roving in an intelligent and easy survey of their surroundings. Her golden yellow robes swished as she walked, stirring like the petals of a flower beneath a breeze.

Myers, on the other hand, lagged somewhat behind, his footsteps sloping and uneasy. He had removed his lab coat earlier and left it folded across the back of a chair in his office; the red velvet of his clothes appeared utterly ridiculous under the EPD’s severe lighting, but that absurdity was entirely at odds with the man’s actual mood at the time. His hands fidgeted as he walked, repeatedly going up to fuss at his suit jacket’s lapels, his fingers flapping them around like he was an agitated flamingo. Thankfully, he had removed his heart-shaped glasses at T’Jung’s request, slipping on a pair of simple silver readers as an alternative. Stefanie had to remind herself that the man wasn’t at fault for what had happened, though her conviction wavered somewhat under the onslaught of his obvious distress. With all his fussing, Dr. Myers seemed spectacularly suspicious.

Abruptly, Dr. T’Jung drew to a halt in front of an open doorway. Her posture was stiff and unrelenting as always, but the Vulcan woman appeared to hesitate, contemplating the few steps ahead of her. For an elite science officer to make such a horrendous mistake, no matter how accidental, could spell the end of her and Dr. Myers’ careers. Possibly even their lives.

Turning her face downward, her regal bone structure and high cheekbones accentuated by pale flickers of white, T’Jung looked over at Myers. Their eyes met. She nodded, and then the trio walked into the room.

Stefanie expected almost anything as they entered. Immediate apprehension, maybe, or a harrowing execution. Fortunately, it had apparently been arranged by T’Jung that they would bring all the information they had on the rat experiment before a few of the EPD’s more experienced officers so that a solution might be found— quickly.

A long table was at the center of the room along with several chairs. The three were not examined in any way, likely because security had already sent out a notice ahead of time, so Stefanie and Myers accepted the chairs offered to them while T’Jung remained standing. Only two uniformed officers stood at the head of the table, three Stormtroopers wearing all but their helmets seated across from them. Stefanie was unsure of each one’s rank, though she inferred that the two standing persons in uniform, a man and a woman, were captains of some kind. The woman had her hair tightly-packed into curls against her scalp, her dark bronze tan, muscular shoulders and sharp grey eyes making her appear like an Amazonian vision. The older man at her side had drooping eyelids by contrast, but a clean-shaven face and bits of starched white tinging his short, black hair.

Both focused immediately on the standing Vulcan, and then the conference began.

“Dr. T’Jung,” said the woman, her words curt and all business, “I am Captain Werrman, head of the sector you reached first with your distress call, and this is Captain Yung, a secondary advocate selected by myself. The three officers seated here at our table are meant as witnesses and advisees to your questioning. I understand that there has been a grievous mishandling of Research and Development’s resources in the past eighteen hours. Do you have any information to present that was not mentioned in your initial notice?”

T’Jung did not react to the obvious slight, nor the underlying thread of Captain Werrman’s words. “I do. The source of the leak would be an intern in our laboratory, a Ms. Viola Burns. For the past two months, one week, and sixteen days, myself and Chief Assistant Science Officer Daveed Myers, as well as interns Gordon and Burns, have been focused on an experiment involving a specimen recovered from the Pale Moors by an auxiliary agent. By my calculations, as of thirteen point twenty-six hours ago, Intern Viola Burns was—"

“We don't need your near estimations, Dr. T’Jung. Just tell us what we’re dealing with, here,” Captain Yung interrupted with a sigh.

Stefanie noticed the slight bristling of T’Jung’s disposition at the acerbic use of near estimations, but was surprised when the scientist didn’t rise up to the bait with a remark of her own. Instead, T’Jung’s features smoothed even further, her every facet seeming intentionally filled with all the cool, chillingly tranquil detachment of a plaster statue.

“Of course, Captain Yung,” One of her hands shifted to reach into her sleeve, reappearing a moment later with an unmarked data chip between her fingers. “This video should assist with what my data briefing could not explain.”

Werrman flicked her fingers at one of the seated Stormtroopers, who then quickly reached out to take the data chip. The tiny chip was inserted into a smooth black data pad, and moments later, a shifting combination of audio and visuals appeared.

A weird, distorted video began playing out on the screen. Rats inside of pure glass cages scuttled around, the camera recording device apparently aimed down from a high corner inside one of the cages. There were all sorts of rats: black-furred rats, white-furred rats, rats with brown spots and big piebald splotches of healthy, glistening fur. The video seemed innocent enough, some of the rats picking at pieces of nutrient-rich pellets that had been scattered around the cage. They were just rats, beady-eyed and whiskered and following the natural code of rat behavior. Nothing atypical, nothing sinister or malevolent. Just a group of about seven to ten rats.

The timestamp at the corner of the screen read 8:19:25 PM, the seconds swiftly ticking by with no significant changes whatsoever. “What is this supposed to explain, exactly?” asked Yung, leaning forward to squint at the scurrying rats.

“You’ll see,” Myers said from where he was seated at Stefanie’s left. He visibly shrank into his chair as all eyes turned on him.

“Who are you, again?” Werrman said, her calculating stare shifting slowly between Intern Stefanie and CA Myers.

“Dr. Daveed Myers is my Chief Assistant at the testing center, as I said before,” T’Jung cut in, the volume of her voice never quite raising, but definitely brooking no room for argument. “Now, if you will return your attention to the screen…”

“She almost never calls me Dr.,” Myers muttered at his lap.

The rat video once again became the most pressing concern of the interview. As everyone watched, the timestamp at the corner of the screen circulated forward by nearly ten minutes, the rats all going about their ratty business at exaggerated speeds. Suddenly, the video slowed just as a brown-furred rat was being picked up by a pair of gloved hands. A syringe with a long, metallic needle glinted as it disappeared inside the furry nape of the poor rodent’s neck, the creature squalling and its tail twisting about like a decapitated snake.

Out of the corner of her eye, Stefanie could see that a few of the Stormtroopers were somewhat disconcerted, armor clacking a bit as they shifted around in their seats. Werrman and Yung appeared unfazed.

“This was the first injection of a subject with the Pale Moors specimen, conducted by Intern Viola Burns. And,” said T’Jung, unblinkingly, “A mixture of several steroids to enhance the subject’s physical vitality and prevent premature expiration.”

With a hurried motion, the gloved hands plopped the rat back into the cage, pausing only to rub at the injection site with a few jerky gesticulations of the latex-coated fingers, the only sign that the dealer of the drug cared at all about the test subject's well-being. The hands then retreated out of the frame, shuffling shadows and reflections denoting their retreat.

Stefanie watched with a confused frown, her eyes flicking between the timestamp and the scene unfolding before her. Why was this important, again? Had Viola done something wrong, like sealing the cage incorrectly? It wasn’t often that Stefanie assisted with anything beyond coffee runs and number crunching. She thought the rats were cute little things… for a bunch of test subjects, anyway. But beyond that, she hadn’t observed the experimentation process all that regularly. She didn’t really get Viola’s fascination with them, to be 100% truthful. The things ate and pooped and nibbled on the water drippers with their teeth, and that was literally it. Looking around the room, Stefanie could tell several of the others were thinking the same thing, all except for Myers and T’Jung.

They were just rats, weren't they?

After sitting still for a moment after being so unceremoniously dropped, the injected rat began to meander around unsteadily, sniffing at the glass bottom of the cage and appearing just utterly bewildered. The other rats even wandered over to sniff curiously at it, probably searching for scraps of food pellets. Certainly nothing to write home about.

The video shifted forward by about half an hour. Gradually and over the course of those thirty minutes, Stefanie noticed that the injected rat began to move more erratically around its rectangular glass prison, movements growing more and more uncoordinated, almost jolting from one place to another, its tail and limbs seeming oddly stiff. It was weird, but nowhere near as unsettling as the behavior of the other rats.

At first, they appeared to avoid the injected rat, deviating around it like strangers on a crowded street might pass one another. The rats usually let each other alone, however, so this was hardly unusual. This bubble of avoidance steadily expanded, however, until there were at least two rats crowded into each of the four corners of the cage— clumped together in piles of shivering, terrified fur, as if they were seeking body heat from each other. The rat that had suffered the injection fell still after a while, twitching painfully and curling into itself in death.

Scarcely two minutes later, and the rats were screeching and tearing each other apart in a desperate bid to claw their way out of the cage.

Three minutes later, and the rat injected with the specimen was very much awake, if not necessarily alive— cutting into and attacking other rats in a tangle of writhing fur, gore, and clicking mandibles-- a real berserk frenzy. The rat's torso ruptured open, insides oozing sticky and black fluid as new teeth began to form, the hapless uninfected rodents desperately trying to burrow their way out or kill the imposter. All failed.

Four minutes later, and it became very obvious that something was very wrong with the only rat left standing, the creature’s whiskers streaked with red, its ears and face torn to bits until blood-soaked bone was peeking through. It busily gnawed at the mass of furred corpses in the enclosed area, dragging them nearer to its own body in a strangely intimate kind of hug, ripping them to shreds until muscle and flesh began to pulse and shift and throb, binding them together even in death. The corpses shifted in a strange kind of awakening, with the moving, hungry, beady-eyed thing squatting in the center of all that carnage, consuming them until its own mass became twisted, horrid, and impossibly, horrifically engorged with additional organic growth.

“My god,” Stefanie breathed.

[Ada Wong]

It was disconcerting to stare at the monster frozen on the screen for too long, Stefanie thought. The mindless terror beginning to take root inside her mind felt unreal, like speeding down an aerial speedway while blindfolded. The blonde-haired intern had to force herself to look away, squeezing her eyes shut as the memory of protruding, sharp incisors and bloody, shriveled, mummified skin writhed behind her eyelids. We may be small, but we are legion!

After a moment of quiet, one of the seated individuals in Stormtrooper armor spoke up. “A virus? Well, that should be easy to eradicate. All we need is to eliminate patient zero and any other infected, and then manufacture a vaccine to prevent future outbreaks. Right?”

Dr. Myers suffered a furrow to his brow, while Dr. T’Jung appeared to ignore the soldier’s words entirely. Stefanie, for her part, took advantage of her relatively unimportant presence at the meeting and scrutinized the soldier who had spoken more closely. The woman had gingery hair shaved close to her scalp for the benefit of the helmet in her lap, but it still managed to tangle itself into tightly-wound curls. These curls flicked about and caught the light as she talked, looking like tiny electric sparks going off around her ears, and her eyes were bright and unwavering. She seemed like a fresh-faced recruit, painfully assured of the Empire’s strength to her very core, and while the solution she had produced was complete, it was a little basic. Perfect video game or horror movie logic, an easy answer to a complicated problem. Unfortunately, it was all a bit more complicated than that.

T’Jung shook her head. Her dark eyes were intent upon her research, months of effort and careful testing that would inevitably die. All of it gone to waste, all over a simple mishap that wasn't even her own; there was something immensely upsetting in knowing that it had been someone else's mistake that killed her life's work and not herself. The words and images glared back at her from the screen, stinging about as acutely as an accusatory finger pointed in her face.

“No, this is not just a simple viral disease. It is a mutation, one that attempts to expand the primary body’s lifespan by absorbing further hosts,” She did something with her hand in midair, fingers twisting and doing a cursory wave over the screen presented before them. More images of the unfortunate rat specimens appeared in blurs of bluish light, each one more misshapen and malformed than the last. “Flesh, muscle, bone… all of it is collected from other organisms the mutant slaughters and assimilates. The new biomaterial becomes a protective layer surrounding the mutant’s core… a zone which is home to the central nervous system, cardiac muscle, and gastrointestinal organs, among others. These layers are then shed in a necessary manner to preserve the internal core as damage is dealt by outside provocations. It is not too dissimilar to a snake detaching from an old layer of skin, if such a comparison will assist in your understanding.”

“Ugh,” another of the officers at the table grunted, leaning back in his seat with a disgruntled creak. “That’s just gruesome. Sounds like some kind of godawful matryoshka doll.”

The Vulcan woman regarded him briefly. “Quite.”

Captains Werrman and Yung appeared to have a kind of hushed conference full of urgent murmuring and sharp gestures toward the screen. Finally, Yung looked up and fixed T’Jung with a hard look. “What was the purpose of this experiment, doctor? If Empire Research and Development has really created something so monstrous and outstandingly dangerous, then I assume that there was some benefit you hoped to derive from it?”

“Indeed,” T’Jung confirmed immediately, and Stefanie was continuously awed by her superior’s apparent immunity to the kind of stern glaring that would make any ordinary person quake in their boots. She didn’t even fidget once, not even to adjust her yellow robes, only staring placidly back at the captain. “Our objective was to replicate the healing factor exhibited by the myriad of undead beasts commonly found within the Pale Moors. The potential for bio-enhancements was clear, but seemed far more promising than the comparatively simple machine-driven augmentations of the past. Case in point, while the introduction of biomechanics has, at times, coincided with a reduction in the loss of life in Coruscant’s streets to crime—”

“Anyway! My colleague’s point is, we always intended to share our findings with the Empire at large,” Myers interjected, smiling fretfully, his finger-tousled hair and constant fidgeting making him appear a tad deranged.

T’Jung silenced him with a glance, but was otherwise unruffled by his interruption.

“Of course,” she said smoothly, and if she were human she might have taken one golden opportunity to sniff haughtily. “There was never any doubt.”

“Good,” Captain Werrman stated simply, leaning on the edge of the table with her arms crossed, eyes the color of storm clouds searing into the trio of scientists. “Now tell us how to kill it, if you would.”

This appeared to drag a reaction out of Dr. T’Jung. Her head snapped up, lips parting slightly as if to speak quickly and without thinking. She then seemed to take a moment to school her body language into some semblance of her earlier serenity, but Intern Stefanie couldn’t help but notice that the lines of her body appeared especially severe all at once, her pointed ears and dark, glossy hair serving as a striking contrast to the purely human characteristics of all else gathered.

Dr. T’Jung tilted her face downward as if about to acquiesce, but shifted her eyes at the last moment to Captain Werrman’s face. “It would be more advantageous to the Empire if the subject were to be recovered alive.”

The woman scoffed, a sneering veneer overtaking her words. “Really, doctor? Because as far as I’m concerned, if R&D can’t keep its toys to itself, we have every right to break them.”

It was the most subtly insulting way to say ‘Stay in your own fucking lane' that Stefanie had ever heard. Yowzah.

“Now wait just a minute, the good doctor might be onto something here,” said Captain Yung, stroking his chin thoughtfully. “Think of the things we could do with a weapon like this! The things we could do if we trained and mastered it! I’m sure the rebel scum would never see... Well, that coming.”

Suddenly, the previously stern captain looked like a kid on Christmas day, his eyes taking on a distantly dreamy gleam as he grinned a shark-like grin. He was already thinking of the violent possibilities, apparently. Taking in Yung’s almost playful expression, Stefanie couldn’t help but shudder. She sure would hate to be a rebel if something like whatever the man was dreaming up ever came to pass.

Werrman appeared to actually be considering such a thing, but Drs. T’Jung and Myers were outright alarmed.

“Bio Organic Weapons, huh? Could be something to think about.” Werrman mused.

“Our experimentation never extended beyond— admittedly lengthy— observation periods, captain,” T’Jung warned, “These mutated creatures are mindless as far as I am currently aware, I would recommend extreme caution when considering an idea so ambitious. Possibly even disregarding it entirely.”

“Yeah, disregard it. Disregard the shit out of it,” Myers said.

The two captains glanced at one another, communicating something to one another that Stefanie couldn’t interpret. A communicator abruptly crackled with incomprehensible radio static from Captain Werrman’s hip, but she ignored it in favor of whipping out a new data pad, a grim look on her face as she examined the glowing screen. “Viola Burns of Tier 3, lives with her girlfriend Lindsey, apartment number…” Her voice faded as she strode from the room, the company of Stormtroopers quickly rising to follow her out.

As the sound of boots tromping along faded, Captain Yung refocused on T’Jung and Myers, all stone-cold professionalism once more. “Fine, we’ll recapture your monster for you, though no guarantees on its… still being put together, if you get my meaning. There are a few new Primes snooping around that need to be put to good use. We'll send them in.”

[Ada Wong]

A narrow-eyed man in a crisp, dark blue uniform walked in front of Aello and Ada, his black tactical vest emblazoned with the Empire Peace Division's logo across the back and a pistol-type weapon at his hip, the accompanying baton or stuncuffs nowhere in sight. As her stiletto-blade heels clicked over the EPD precinct's linoleum floors, Ada caught a glimpse of a room lined with long, bright-screened banks of computer monitors, a fair number of surveillance officers standing around and drinking coffee while watching for any signs of suspicious activity in Coruscant’s streets. Metallic desks littered with stark blue holograms took up much of the area's desk space, scenes of homicide and other distasteful bloodshed circulating around the room, some of the images flickering almost too fast for the eye to see.

The building had appeared almost Olympus-like in size from the busy street outside. A pristine, block-lettered sign bearing the EPD's name and logo stood out proudly against the roof, the metal of the sign seeming hardly aged at all, lustrous and silver as the reflections of moving sky traffic sparkled across it-- a fitting hint of extravagance for Tier 1. Inside, staircases and several elevators branched off from the central foyer toward what Ada supposed were the right and left wings, the ventilation ducts making the air crisply chill. Alas, the spy and bio-mechanical girl weren't given the chance to investigate this multitude of pathways further before being hailed by the reception offices nearby, which was also how they had been introduced to their current guide.

Ada also still had that damned duckling with her, the adorable thing resting calmly in her hands as she walked. Which was, well. Something.

She could hardly chuck it into a bin on the street, right?

"This place is loaded," Aello remarked to Ada, not even bothering to whisper despite the faux-conspiratorial way she leaned in. Her teeth flashed in a roguish grin. "Yee-zus, look at those fancy-schmancy blasters everyone's carrying 'round. I bet they've got the real good stuff under lock and key, chica!"

With a sharp, reprimanding scuff of his jungle-grade boots that had both women straightening up quickly, the uniformed man stopped in front of what was, apparently, a very specific door. It didn't appear all that different from any of the other doors, but Ada supposed that didn't exactly matter. At least it wasn't a cell door-- it just wouldn't do to be placed behind bars. Not so soon after arriving, anyway.

"Here we are," their attendant said, a bit gruffly. Brandishing a key card that he had inexplicably produced from somewhere on his person, the officer scanned them in.
 
The door slid open with a soft hiss of compressed air, a rush of coolness wafting around as it was released at last. Drinking the sight of the room in, Ada was not at all surprised to see what looked to be a space designed for interrogation purposes, complete with a severe metal table and three uncomfortable plastic chairs. It was all slate grey flooring and one-way mirrored walls, but the attendant who had brought them to the room didn't seem to even consider locking them in; quite the contrary, for they were both invited to sample the coffee and other refreshments in a break room several doors down. Ada watched the EPD logo on the back of the man's uniform as he retreated down the hallway, her eyes boring into him right up until he disappeared around the corner and from her sight.
 
Aello promptly vanished, presumably to go see about the proffered coffee. The scarlet-clad agent inferred that her companion was likely also taking stock of the EPD’s resources while she was at it, but decided to stay put instead of going looking for trouble. Besides, she had all the information she needed; the EPD was highly organized, secure, and vigilant. Armed soldiers patrolled almost every street corner, security cameras were everywhere, and anything that seemed at least somewhat important to Coruscant’s existence was heavily guarded.

After a minute of scouring the room with a degree of scrutiny that would put most intelligence agents to shame (discovering a number of security cameras and other surveillance tech in the process), Ada slumped into one of the table's chairs with a pained groan, all of her aches and pains coming back up to say hello.

The duckling in her lap peeped, apparently seeking attention from its current parent. Mindlessly, Ada began to stroke the top of its fuzzily yellow head with her fingernails, heedless of the rusty traces of Albert Wesker's blood and torn skin still caked under them. Her head lolled to the side as she contemplated the nearest camera lens staring down at her with bland indifference, skull flaring up in needle-point pain over her temples.

God, did she need a drink.

[Aello]

“Here,” Aello said as she sat a cup of coffee in front of her companion, “looks like you could use it”

Ada glanced at the cup and then watched as Aello pulled up a chair across from her. Aello leaned back in her chair, kicked her feet up on the steel table, and sipped her coffee. Absentmindedly she rubbed the bicep of her mechanical arm as if she actually had any sensation in the metal limb. Aello’s eyes loped throughout the room, taking their time to study every sterile crack and crevice before falling upon Ada’s lithe form. For a moment their eyes locked and reluctantly Aello shifted her gaze to the spy’s untouched coffee.

“Sorry,” Aello spoke up, “wasn’t sure how you liked it so I kept it black, though I’d peg you as the type to drink black coffee, me? I can’t touch the stuff without a fistful of sugar.”

Ada wrapped her blood-stained fingers around the styrofoam cup, “no, it’s alright, just a long day is all.”

“Yeah, ‘bout that,” Aello said, her voice trailing off for a moment before adding, “so what’s the deal with all the blood, you just got done killing somebody?”

Ada smirked. With one hand she played with the nape of the duckling’s neck and with her other she brought the coffee up to her nose. She sniffed at the warm vapors before blowing them away with a curt puff of air.

“Yeah, something like that,” she answered.

“Well come on then,” Aello prodded, “you can’t just leave it at that, you’ve got me curious now.”

Ada took a sip of her coffee and crinkled her nose. It was basically hot muddy water. She set the drink down and pushed it away.

“Well I ran into an old boss of mine,” she said, “things got a bit heated and it ended with him lying unconscious in a puddle of his own blood.”

“Woah, badass,” Aello exclaimed, “I wouldn’t have pegged you for a scrapper.”

“Yeah, well, he started it,” Ada replied.

Before Aello could probe any further a sharply dressed government official burst through the door. He nodded to the two as he moved to the front of the room. In his hand he held two manilla folders.

“Good evening ladies,” he said, his voice adopting a professional tone, “I am Captain Yung, and I hear you two are interested in a job.”

“Sup,” Aello responded.

The Captain eyed Aello, taking particular note of her dusty boots resting on the table. He turned his attention towards Ada and her bloodstained hands. A slight, almost imperceptible, scowl tugged at his lips. Primes were still primes, despite their shabby appearances. He cleared his throat and slid them each a folder.

“In the past twenty-four hours there was an incident on Tier 3...” he said as he began to explain the situation.

Aello’s eyes glazed over as Captain Yung droned on. She grabbed at her folder and leafed through its contents. Pages filled with walls of scientific text and information greeted her. She grimaced at the words and kept flipping through. Eventually she came to a series of gruesome pictures, each more violent than the last. Rats being slaughtered by one of their kin followed by the rodent consuming their corpses. The final picture was a still from a cctv camera that showed a vaguely humanoid blob of muscle and bones scuttling into an alleyway.

“Euugh, what the fuck?” she exclaimed and tossed the folder aside.

Yung cleared his throat and continued, “as I was saying, it is a viral infection, but it is unique in that rather than spreading from host to host it insteads seeks out biomass to consume and assimilate into its being.”

“And you want us to kill it?” Ada asked.

“We’d prefer if you brought it back alive to be studied,” he responded, “but should the need arise I’m sure an autopsy would be just as enlightening.”

Aello piped up, “yeah, thanks for the offer and all, but I’m gonna pass, real nice place you got here and I appreciate the offer, but I’m not game for hunting down whatever that is.”

She stood up and moved towards the door.

“Wait a minute prime,” Yung said.

“Name’s Aello bud,” she said, her hand still on the door.

The captain inhaled through his nose and said, “sorry, Aello, you’re new here, are you not?”

“What if I am?”

“Well, I’m offering you an opportunity to be more than just some wandering prime,” the Captain said, “surely you need a place to stay and food for your stomach, to be honest, whether you think so or not, something like this should be child’s play for two primes you are, after all, immortal.”

Aello turned around and looked at Ada and asked, “what do you think earthling?”

Ada tilted her head back and forth, weighing her options before speaking, “well, I can’t speak for you, but the money would be nice.”

Aello frowned and looked back at the Captain.

“I’ll need a weapon, my blaster didn’t survive the trip here,” she said, “maybe you guys could hook me up with something real spiff.”

The captain smiled and answered, “you would probably feel more comfortable summoning something made for you rather than taking one of our standard issue rifles.”

Aello flashed him an incredulous look, “I… I can do something like that?”

“Of course, you are a prime afterall,” he said.

“Badass.”

“So do we have your cooperation?” Captain Yung asked.

“Sure, but only if the earthling goes too,” she said, “and if things get too dicey I’m free to cut and run.”

“Of course,” Captain Yung nodded.

[Ada Wong]

At the center of the industrial neighborhood that the late Viola Burns had once called home, a towering multi-story complex jutted out against the pale-colored sky, the tall upper-floor windows staring out across the boulevard to where yet another retro-futuristic behemoth was in the process of being constructed. The monotonous droning of machinery overlapped with the stream of noise from off the street, sounding like a nest of angry wasps getting tossed around in a metal bucket; while it was yet another much-needed addition to the impressive commercial district of Tier Three, the construction created a near-deafening cacophony of sheer air pollution. It was this chaotic jungle of sound that Ada and Aello found themselves in, the directions provided by Captain Yung providing a clear course between the city-verse’s tiers.

Ada stopped her motorbike at the curb, the tires spinning out over the concrete and rolling to a smooth halt. Sharp-eyed and wary of the airborne vehicles flying several feet above her position at ground level, Ada slid off her perch in a single fluid motion, removing the lightweight, aerodynamic helmet she had summoned along with the bike. She smoothed away any flyaway strands of her short black hair with a hand, looking up at the building and committing the height (seven stories) to memory. Compared to what limited information Yung had provided to them about the dead intern, every detail fit this location to a T.

This was ideal, of course. Even something as simple as pinpointing the right dwelling would go a long way in making this mission easier to handle, and Ada intended to take full advantage of that.

She turned as a sort of purring hum spiked in volume from behind, a warm gush of air stirring the red folds of her qipao and hitting her exposed shoulder blades and legs. Ada watched as Aello hopped off from the seat of a bulky hover-bike, the thing unpainted and dented in places, deep grooves digging into the metal carapace until bright silver glinted through in shiny, scratch-shaped marks. It was almost as if a wild animal had attempted to latch onto it, the battered state reminiscent of the punk rogue’s cyberkinetic arm. The bike whirred and bumpily lowered to the ground following the other woman’s dismount, the undercarriage hitting the pavement with a dull clunk.

Aello shot her a quick, sharp-toothed grin upon seeing the secret agent’s grudgingly-impressed expression, but all mirth dropped from her face the second she caught sight of Ada’s own ride. Her eyes widened, lips falling open in shock. “Yo, is that an old Earth bike?! That baby has gotta be an antique or some shit.”

“Really?” Ada asked, busying herself with latching her helmet to the bike’s bars. It was a simple thing, her bike. It had been a spur of the moment decision to summon it using Omnilium, done more out of a need for efficiency than anything. Although… the bright red paintjob was attractive, and the shallow buffer made of dark bulletproof glass at the front appealed to her immensely. She hadn’t even considered the possibility that Aello might be interested in its origin. Maybe she should have expected it.

Cocking her hip to the side, Ada smiled and gave the hotrod red bike an affectionate pat. “Maybe where you’re from, but for me, she’s top of the line. Though I really must admit, I’ve never seen anything quite like that,” she said, nodding to indicate the parked hoverbike.

“I’ll bet. This Omni-place is kinda fucked up, you get me? But that, that is pretty cool. And I’m deadass serious when I say that,” Aello drawled, stomping onto the curb. She squinted a bit as Ada removed a pearl-colored gun from a hidden side-compartment, eying the weapon guardedly in her peripheral view, but relaxed somewhat when the gun was quickly stowed away in the woman’s thigh holster jutting from below her hip.

Her gaze dropped lower as Ada withdrew something else from the compartment, a loud snort leaving her nostrils. “So what’s the deal with pipsqueak? Is it some kind of terran-culture thing to carry fuzzy animals around with you all the time?”

Ada glanced down. The duckling was half-tucked inside an additional thigh holster, one which Ada had been in the process of strapping to her other leg, fast asleep and curled in on itself. She had determined that it was unsanitary to just be carrying it around, and because there wasn’t much else she could do with the poor displaced creature at the moment… well. She wasn’t cruel.

Shrugging, Ada sealed the compartment shut and began to walk toward the apartment building’s front entrance.

“Not exactly,” she called over her shoulder, side-stepping several meandering pedestrians who looked at her funny because of her blood-stained appearance. “This is more of a special case. To tell you the truth, I don’t fully understand it myself.”

Open-air traffic whirred high overhead as Ada studied the clear and metallic grid-style front of the apartment complex. Through the shifting reflections on the sliding glass doors, she could see a doorman standing at attention just inside, a mail collection area, and a set of elevators designed to take residents and visitors to the upper floors. After a moment of deliberation, Ada’s gaze slid to the side and she began to walk purposefully right beside the building’s wall, gesturing mutely for Aello to follow.

Fortunately, the complex was not so tall that it didn’t have a fire escape attached. The fire escape, as Ada quickly discovered after slipping around the corner, was in a narrow alleyway on the building’s eastern side, scarcely wide enough for three people to stand shoulder to shoulder between it and the neighboring laundromat. When Aello rounded the corner soon after, her face creased by a defensive scowl that seemed to be her resting expression for now, Ada made sure to stand back and make plenty of room for her in the closed space. The area was rather stale and dark in comparison to the openness of the street, large garbage bins littering the claustrophobic area and the audible scrabbling of something— most likely rats— coming from a nearby plastic sack. An occasional draft of fetid air stirred around the two women, ruffling Aello’s shock of spiky hair and carrying with it the oily, artificial stench of urban life.

From where she was standing, Ada could just barely catch an occasional glimpse of the busy street that laid beyond the mouth of they alleyway, lit up with glowing signs and rife with the ever-present hum of speeders. The Chinese-American woman eyed the folded fire escape with a tactician’s eye, the light of Omnilium having already manifested in an ever-shifting banner of color that swirled and palpitated like a heartbeat around her hands. The crystalline pulses of red, cyan, yellow, and green hummed gently from where they were cupped between her palms, already beginning to take on a slender, lumpy sort of shape, like a piece of folded cloth rendered in dozens of shimmery rainbows. She twitched her fingers experimentally, observing as the particles would shift and twist with the slightest movement.

“No offense,” Aello began, shifting impatiently from foot to foot, “But… remind me again why we aren’t gonna use the goddamn front door like normal people? Not that I’m complaining, but it seems kinda pointless to do the whole breaking-and-entering bit when you’ve been handed permission to waltz right on in. And, uh, why are we even here. We already know where that grody thing was headed, shouldn’t we just go... y’know, to wherever the hell it is?”

Her eyes flicked to Ada quickly. She crossed her arms over her chest, lips pursing further. “Again. No offense.”

Shaking her head, Ada glanced up and met Ada’s expectant look head-on. “We don’t know who, or more importantly what, could still be in there. Who knows, that creature might have left a scrap of itself behind… this is the best way to get in and get out without causing a disturbance for the other residents… or immediately getting our faces eaten off. As for why we're here first...”

There was a pause as Ada warred within herself, questioning whether what she intended to say would reveal too much of her blood-spattered history. Finally, she gave herself a light shake, narrowing her eyes determinedly at the Omnilium in her hands. Did it really matter if Aello knew about Umbrella? The others? Surely not. For the first time in her life, she could say whatever the hell she wanted.

Still looking at her hands, Ada glanced at Aello out of the corner of her eye. "Well, let's just say I need to see if an old employer has a stake in all this."


“Right, right. Like that's not ominous as hell,” the punk girl muttered, head bobbing up and down as she processed this. “Wait. How d’you know that there’s not something waiting on this side if we take your way in? That shit could be anywhere. I don’t think it’ll have the smarts to hang around the front door waiting for dinner to walk in.”

The pulsating, Omnilium-based light receded abruptly, a pair of elbow-length gloves left resting in Ada’s hands. Not wasting a second, the secret agent slipped the gloves onto her arms one hand at a time, flexing her fingers and marveling at the strange warmth of the black leather, mouth curling up into a faint smile.

Brandishing her hookshot gun, Ada discharged the long chain with a pull of the trigger, humming in satisfaction as the metal hooks latched onto the retractable stairs with a harsh scraping sound that echoed off the alleyway’s walls. Two hard tugs on the chain had them sliding out and down, the grated, black metal steps striking the damp ground with a deafening kuh-clang!

Ada leapt up onto the first step, shifting onto the blades of her feet as her black stilettos balanced precariously on the metal grates. She turned to look at Aello, an unrepentant smirk on her lips.

“Well, if that is the case, then we will just have to remove it from the equation.”

[Ada Wong]

Getting in through the window was easy. Entering silently, though... not so much. It took several long seconds of careful deliberation before Ada decided where, exactly, to place her feet, and even then it was hard to see through the darkness that was mere inches in front of her nose.

Ada looked around. The deceased woman's apartment was swathed in shadow, cat-like slivers of silver emerging in the sharp edges of her modern décor. The stainless steel kitchen appliances droned out their machine-language hums into the quiet room, the sound carrying even over the low coffee table and soft curve of the chaise lounge.

A chill raised the hairs on Ada's arms. It felt like walking into a dreadful stretch of no man's land— unseen and nameless dangers hidden from her senses, ringing about her position like cruel barbed wire.

Creeping about on silent feet, Ada noted that there was not a single hint of personal affectations in the room. No family photographs, no artwork, just barren walls and carpets so clean they might have been carded through with a fine-toothed comb. Yet, there were other signs of home life hidden here and there... If one knew where to look for them, anyway. Head-shaped indentations in the sofa cushions, strands of shiny blond hair caught on the edges, somewhat greasy from the strain of either a long work day or something more physically tiring. A beaded meditation mat stuffed inside an umbrella holder. Traces of plant material scattered beside the coffee table, bright pink and strong-smelling.

Lips pursed, Ada ran her hands over the plush sherpa blanket thrown over the back of the sofa, her fingers questing for anything out or the ordinary. She felt out a small plastic bag with traces of pink left in the narrow wrinkle at the bottom— interesting, she supposed, but irrelevant to their search.

Of course, the most obvious signs of their mark was the enormous misshapen blood stain on the carpet, coppery-smelling red having sunken into the fiber and dried into a rusty smear. The parts of a body left over were barely recognizable as belonging to a human, seeming more like strings of muscle stripped from a corpse in a meat market.

Surmising that this was where the main struggle between the B.O.W. and its prey took place, the dark-haired woman felt a touch of discomfort. She was hesitant to hypothesize just how the encounter might have gone, but then again, she didn't really have to. The utterly decimated state of the remains was evidence enough. It likely hadn't been pretty, but these things never truly were.

Blood splatters painted the wall beside the open door of the apartment, the handle absolutely slathered in sticky red— almost forming the shape of four dainty fingers and one horribly malformed thumb. It looked like it had almost been ripped off its hinges, but the wooden door was indeed still locked in place, obvious scuffing and stress marks impressed into the dark hardwood.

"Well," said Ada, her voice a low murmur as she leaned in to examine the damage more closely. "It can open doors. Intelligent enough, then."

Dodging around a particularly large bloodstain, Aello came to stand in the light falling in from the hallway, her legs spread apart and hands planted firmly on her hips. Her hair seemed a bit more frazzled than usual due to their mode of travel, puffed up like a vibrant cockatoo. Her teeth flashed in the dark, a crescent moon of a grin.

"Oh my fuck, it can open doors? That's the definition of scary, isn't it? Mastery of doorknobs. Goddamn!"

Glancing around at the carnage, however, the smile dropped from her face.

"Goddamn," she repeated emphatically, much quieter this time. "Goddamn."

[Aello]

What kind of a shitshow had she gotten herself into? Aello’s eyes scanned the fringes of the room, carefully avoiding the greasy bloodstain soaked into the carpet. Sure the scoundrel had seen her fair share of fucked up shit on the Helios and it’d take a little more than a bloodstain to get under her skin, but it wasn’t just the bloodstain that made her queasy. No it was the implication that the bloodstain brought with it. This thing ate people, bones and all, and it didn’t look like it would wait for them to be dead neither. Mankind’s seedy underbelly was frightening, but at least it carried a sense of civility that this animalistic thingseemed to lack.

“I’m starting to get the vibe that we’re getting severely underpaid here,” Aello muttered and scowled when Ada failed to answer.

The sound of wood scraping against metal teased the air as Aello ran her fingertips across the splintered door frame. She watched as Ada scoured every last inch of the apartment in a fashion that one could only describe as meticulous. Aello huffed and walked past her companion. With a blatant disregard for the carefully arranged throw pillows Aello plopped herself onto the couch. Twin thuds hammered the air as she kicked her boots up onto the coffee table.

“Something wrong?” Ada asked, taking only a moment to glance in Aello’s general direction.

“No,” she answered, “just figured I’m not really built for this kinda stuff so I’ll let you handle the detective work.”

“Mhm,” Ada responded, not necessarily surprised by her friend’s lack of help.

Once the earthling’s back was turned Aello reached for the discarded baggy of, presumably, drugs. A quick sniff assaulted her nostrils with an overpowering scent that made her cringe. Aello licked her lips. Ada had moved her search into the bathroom and was taking great care in tearing through the medicine cabinet. Aello licked the tip of her finger and pinched the lip of the bag open with her free hand. The pink substance clung to her saliva and held a faint sheen in the light. As the residue melted on her tongue it numbed her taste buds and sent a momentary flash of electricity throughout her body. Goosebumps riddled the vagrant’s flesh and she shivered. As quick as it came so too did it fade, leaving her with nothing more than a funky taste in her mouth. Aello frowned and discarded the empty baggy as she stood.

“Yo, Earthling,” she said as she moved towards the door, “I need a breather, so when your done I’ll be outside.”

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Consume

Hunger was the only directive that drove the fleshy amalgam that was once named Viola Burns. That burning primal instinct to devour smoldered like a coal deep within her gullet. How much meat had she eaten already? Not enough. How many gallons of blood had she guzzled? Not enough. How many bones were gnashed to pulp in her misshapen maw? Not enough. It would never be enough and she knew this. She knew this hunger could not be sated and yet she still feverishly clamored forth devouring every last scrap of viscera she could wrap her claws around. With every new feast her body was twisted into something even more monstrous. Layer upon layer of sinewy muscles wrapped around her ragged core, constricting it like so many pulsating cords. Chitinous plates of repurposed bone covered her like a shell. Grey matter, which she discovered was the most delectable of meats, was reconstituted inside her bulging cranium.

Were it not for her expanding intellect she would have been content with tearing through Tier 3’s homeless population, but with every successful kill her mind grew more and more uninhibited. Scuttling through the streets like some dog searching for scraps wouldn’t do. No, too much work, not enough food. Meat was meat, regardless of its source. A living body would run, but a dead one would sit quietly like the good little meal that it was. Fortunately for her Coruscant liked to keep collections of dead meat in nice compact mausoleums located throughout the city. Viola’s grandmother had always lamented the idea of being stuffed inside a mass-produced box and kept on display for future generations. It was a shame ashes provided no usable flesh.

Getting in was easy. A security guard tried to stop her, but the man was pudgy and armed with only a baton. He tasted good. Fat always added flavor to the meat, as did fear. Formaldehyde and other preserving agents assaulted her heightened sense of smell, but beneath that sour musk she could practically taste the hundreds of bodies waiting for consumption. Digestive enzymes flowed freely from her gaping mouth, leaving behind a trail of acidic mucus. It was a shame, she figured, that the blood had long been drained from her meals. Blood, like grey matter, had a special flavor to it that she savoured. Not that it mattered, the feast had begun and she would not leave until every last morsel was devoured. Bland or not, meat was meat.