~Yellow Beauty, The Spark of War~
Rubicon-3. The third-most planet from the star of the Rubicon system. At a glance the speck of dirt was just another mudball in the outskirts of space.
Another planet for the corporations to exploit and ravage, as they had countless times before.
With the discovery of the Coral, however,
everything changed. Rubicon-3 was transformed from a backwater planet ignored by the greater galaxy to the center of corporate conflict only comparable to the Jupiter War of old.
Everyone wanted their place at the table-their serving of Coral ripped from Rubicon.
As an energy source, as a substance ripe for exploitation, Coral was expected to dramatically advance humanity's technological and communications capabilities. It was a resource that promised a potential golden era-a renaissance in the making, and unlimited wealth and power for whoever controlled it.
The blood that was shed in those opening hours, before the Rubicon Research Institute asserted control over the Coral and got their grip on the corporations vying desperately for every scrap they could find, remains uncounted to this day, so vast were the casualties.
Yet those deaths were incomparable to the devastation that lay ahead. To this day no one truly knows the cause of the Fires of Ibis-the disaster that scorched the stars and left the Rubicon system ablaze for decades to come-but all knew the source of the inferno.
Coral, set ablaze, birthed a firestorm so fierce space itself was left scarred-and the miracle resource was thought forever lost…
Perhaps for the best, when it was capable of such horrific destruction. When all humanity could use it for were weapons and augments to better wield the WMDs scientists created without regard for the devastation.
Fifty years passed, and for a time humanity forgot about Rubicon-3 and its Coral. The planet was left contaminated and sealed off by the Planetary Closure Administration, the locals left to fend for themselves amidst whatever greedy corporations still remained and the burnt planet they had once called home. In a way, it was a peaceful life for those poor souls-the biggest players in the galaxy had no reason to turn their gaze towards the sorry site of the worst disaster in humanity's history.
Too bad it was never meant to last.
Coral resurfaced on Rubicon-3, and with it came the inevitable: war came to Rubicon, as extraterrestrial corporations battled to ensure
their profit margins were the ones which would benefit from the rediscovery of Coral, battling each other and resistance groups desperate to be allowed to live without fear of the corporations grinding them into dust.
Mercenaries flocked to the planet, the dogs coming to call the moment they sniffed out a potential paycheck. It didn't matter if they died or not-not when an Armored Core made them the most dangerous people on the planet, not when the potential pay was so high they would never have to fight again.
All that mattered was that they won, others died, and the COAM ended up in their accounts.
They just had to earn all the credits…and try to ignore all the blood on their hands.
That's what had drawn
her to this backwater battleground in the endless corporate wars for supremacy.
In the end, she never could have dreamed where it would lead her.
"Raven…I…still believe…our shared…dream…"
"I'm sorry... and I'm grateful. 621. There's nothing left to bind you. Whatever choices you make now... I just hope you find your true potential."
"The mission…my friends'...wishes…look at you 621…you found…a friend…"
"Raven. You took on my hopes...my selfish dream. Now, I want to see the future that you choose. Whatever waits ahead...I'll...support you."
"Augmented Human C4-621--Raven. Welcome to ALLMIND."
Augmented Human C4-621, Mercenary Raven, stirred, her head pounding as alarms blared into her skull. Her cockpit was awash in red light, dashes of other colors appearing as shattered displays flickered and spat sparks. A wet trickle ran down her forehead, a damp spot that irritated her groggy senses. She reached up to wipe it away, wincing as the ache only grew worse the moment her metal hand brushed against her skin, and she pulled it away only to see red smeared across her fingers-her own blood, she realized after a moment of staring at the unfamiliar sight. How long had it been since she had even seen her own blood, felt the evidence of a fight on her skin-
The memories rushed back then-the ACs, the SPIDERs, the IBIS, the Coral,
Ayre-yet all she could do was slump against her seat amidst the wreckage of her Armored Core. Raw emotion tugged at her insides, her gut churning, and she couldn't even experience it-those desires to laugh, to cry, to scream and
bash her head against the wall for all the innocent people she'd left in her wake-it was all trapped, locked away by those
damn augmentations, the Coral running through her veins forcing her to just sit there in the wreckage of her AC, numb, and tired.
So very, very tired.
How did it come to this?
621 didn't belong in this world-even if sometimes she wondered if her memories were all just a pleasant dream invented by her brain to cope with this hellhole she had woken up in. Those memories-a mother's gentle hug after eating a batch of freshly baked cookies, tossing puns back and forth amidst laughter with a father, large silver eyes in a body so small looking up at her in wonder, a tiny hand wrapped around her finger, laughing, fighting, crying, and
living her life with a team she couldn't reach…
…the gentle smile on a dark haired girl's lips as her hair was caught in the midday breeze…
…they were all that kept her going for a long, long time.
Raven had lost track of just how long she had spent living in this world-a few years, at least? It was hard to keep track of it all when you floated in and out of cryostasis as much as she had, but…it had been long.
Long enough for her to grow a little bit taller, a bit older, to change enough that she wasn't even sure her family would recognize her at first glance.
She had been here long enough for it to break her, after all.
621 had woken up to a world of injustice, corporations running roughshod over everybody who wasn't anybody, a world where it was a miracle if you died of old age if you weren't rich, and more common than anything else that you'd end up just another casualty in the corporate struggles that never ceased. It was nothing like Remnant, her home so far away.
There, she'd been strong. A fighter, capable of changing the world! A member of the best team in all of Remnant!
Here…
She remembered how much she had raged as she'd tried to learn the ways of this new place, still unsure if she had even died or not. She remembered how much she had tried to help others, offering her skills in combat as a mercenary only to be laughed away when she didn't know what an 'AC' was.
She remembered how helpless she had felt when she had seen an Armored Core for the first time, and watched from the rubble as the thirteen meter tall military grade mech (a far cry from the Atlas Paladins that seemed so primitive all of a sudden) scorched an entire city down to the bedrock in minutes, before she could even try to fight it, all for a measly paycheck.
She could have just laid down and quit while she was ahead, scrounged up enough credit to buy a ticket to a backwater and keep her head down her whole life. Lived a peaceful life farming dirt or something.
That wasn't who she was though. She had seen how weak she was, and she had known she just needed to get
stronger. She had conquered her helplessness once before (her right arm twinged with a phantom pain that would never go away), she would just do it again!
She had imagined it then: she would adapt, play by their rules. Get a hold of an Armored Core, learn the ropes, and tear this whole lousy system down. She could do it! She
would do it, because she was-!
She was an idiot. A foolish, stupid bastard who had signed a contract offering an AC and augmentations to boot, "-everything she would need to get a jumpstart in the mercenary life!"...
She had thought losing her arm had been the worst pain she would ever experience. But she could never have prepared for the
burning as Coral flowed through her vines, igniting her nerves with their fire, the pain increasing every second as the augmentations enhanced her reaction time, her senses, everything until she could
feel every individual nerve as it screamed-
-until it had stopped, and she felt…numb. Burnt out. She hadn't even reacted then as the augments had continued, as the surgeons carved her flesh apart to slide in fresh metal, neural links and connectors and everything she would need to be able to pilot an AC as efficiently as possible.
Not even a sound slipped past her lips when they'd cut away that 'absurd mess of a mane' of her hair until she was left with little more than a pixie cut.
It wasn't like she could complain, 621 was
lucky, after all-she was
Gen IV, cutting edge when she had signed the contract (and obsolete the moment Rubicon had burned).
The next few years were just…not a blur, no. That would have been too kind. They were a waking nightmare as she had flitted from battlefield to battlefield, conflict to conflict-a toy soldier playing their game by their rules. She'd signed contracts, after all-and what kind of impulsive, reckless fool didn't read the fine print?
They owned her, body and soul, and made sure to take
measures to ensure obedience at all costs-and when she passed to the next handler, and the next, and the next…
that was when it had all blurred together, the names, the faces all meaningless to her all of a sudden, and she had stopped trying to protest when a mission sent her to eradicate a worker's strike with extreme prejudice, when she was paid to put a bullet the size of a car in a fresh recruit just to make sure he never grew to accomplish anything.
That was when she had died, and 621 had been in charge.
621 was a cold-hearted dog.
621 could handle all the lives lost as collateral, all the blood on their hands.
It wasn't till Walter that she had even bothered to remember her Handler's name. She got her orders, and that was good enough. Even if those orders ended up with her body so broken she was stuck in a plastic bag before Walter had shelled out enough coam to make her functional (not pretty, not with these scars that were too pricey to get fixed and too large for her Aura to do more than smooth away just a bit, not with all the blood on her hands).
621 wasn't changed by Rubicon. 621 had arrived on the planet as the infamous Handler Walter's last surviving hound and followed her orders. She did her missions, she hardly spoke, she didn't feel a damn thing as she had traveled across that planet.
621 hadn't felt warm pride when they had taken down the Ice Worm,
621 was cold-blooded enough to do anything for the credits. 621 was heartless enough to never think about the world she had left behind.
She killed General Michigan and didn't even shed a tear when the old codger went down guns blazing, still praising her name
every damn second.
She killed Rusty, one of her only friends, her buddy, when he stood in her way, and
she-
She…
621 killed Ayre, right before Carla piloted Colony Ship Xylem into the Vascular Plant and ignited the Fires of Raven, as she'd felt the flames that scorched the stars burn her sins away-
Raven's skull pounded, a headache forming as she tried to parse her thoughts together. No, that wasn't right…she-she had stopped the Xylem…no, hadn't ALLMIND…
Raven (Brother Gods, when had she gotten so comfortable calling herself
that name) wasn't sure whether it was the concussion she probably had, the pre-existing brain damage from her augments, the oxygen slowly leaving her damaged cockpit, the Coral
pulsing, shouting and singing and screaming in the vacuum all around them, or some horrific combination of it all that was making her misremember everything she had been through-but she knew what she had done…
Right?
Raven was the name she had taken when she had arrived on Rubicon-3, woken up like a dog from storage and dropped to the wartorn planet below. She had picked up the credentials from the wreck of an Armored Core unlucky enough to catch the eye of the PCA, and even with her emotions numbed beneath the burning Coral still in her nerves and the nightmares that she tried not to let affect her performance, she couldn't stop the cringing feeling she felt whenever she had been called that name.
How could she not cringe, when that was her deadbeat mom's name? It was a cosmic joke, the universe having a good laugh at her amidst throwing every horrible thing it could in her face. She had never wanted to use that name…
But on those borrowed wings…
On those borrowed wings, Raven had
soared.
Her time on Rubicon…no, her time with the
people she'd met on Rubicon…it changed her. She caught herself smiling when she made herself speak to Rusty, a shitty pun managing to slip past her lips for the first time in years, one that left the man laughing
alongside her! When Michigan had praised her she had for the first time in years felt pride for
herself as well (and when he had died, slain by whoever Arquebus had sent in her place, she had felt the tears rolling down her cheek before she had even realized she was sad).
Raven…found herself a friend in Ayre, someone she could confide in, someone who understood her even as she struggled to understand herself amidst this war-torn world.
Raven had lived, Raven had laughed, Raven forged a new life for herself on Rubicon and so she had
chosen Rubicon!
Raven had turned on her Handler, turned on Overseer-decried their plans to burn the stars once again as the horrific mass genocide it was-and even if it broke her heart she put them all down.
She stopped the Xylem, cursing Walter in death for his callousness.
And she had sobbed openly when the dam holding back her emotions broke as the man who, even more broken than she had ever been, even after she had destroyed everything he had worked for, disappeared in the cinders still having wanted nothing but the best for her in the end.
Raven hadn't burned the stars themselves, she had liberated Rubicon-accomplished the goal she had dreamed of the moment she had understood just how cruel this world she had found herself in was.
…so why did she remember watching the Fires burn-
…why did she remember being hailed as a liberator-
…why did she know she had never done any of that?
There was overlap-recovering the wrecked AC, taking on those borrowed wings-that happened every time, three times. Fighting BALTEUS at the Watchpoint, facing down the Ice Worm with her…allies? With her friends Rusty and Chatty alongside the less pleasant company of Snail and Iguazu-
Her eyes snapped to the flickering displays of her cockpit as video crackled to life and she got the slightest glimpse outside. Two mechs dueled just outside atop the enclosure satellite amidst the wreckage of (Walter, Carla) so many others. One was a sleek display of advanced technology, designed with the Coral in mind. Its feminine form was almost graceful as it dashed at jetspeed, dodging past laser fire even as sparks erupted from it at random intervals-a sign of the damage it had already sustained.
She knew that AC instinctively-how could she not, when she could hear the voice of its pilot in her head even now, crying out that she would avenge Raven-
"This…was for our shared dream!" Ayre shouted as Coral bursts erupted from AC Echo's rifle, and Raven's heart ached while 621 hummed at the familiar words.
Yet for all her spirit her opponent simply warped past, engines flaring as the Coral bursts passed him harmlessly and reduced part of the satellite they stood upon to melted slag.
"Heh, guess I can send you to hell to join that damn freelancer with me then if you're so desperate to die!"
Iguazu shouted back as his AC released burst after burst of blue light, an array of blinding firepower that Ayre could barely avoid.
Yet as they battled 621 could only sit there numbly staring. When had Iguazu gotten his hands on such high tech? When had
Iguazu gotten so good at piloting? Raven couldn't remember either, couldn't remember when Ayre had found herself an AC either, yet there was the proof flying around in front of them at mach speeds.
Her skull ached once more, the headache only growing fiercer as she tried to recall-
Her AC landed softly atop the enclosure platform, beneath the watchful eye of the armed satellite arrays. Nearby the Xylem hung in space, locked in place, its disastrous collision course with the massive Vascular Plant that stood tall atop the planet and stretched into the stars averted by ALLMIND. Her job should have been done, then. Rubicon was safe, Coral Convergence could occur now…
Yet she looked at the wreckage of Walter's strange IBIS, and Cinder Carla's FULL COURSE, and she knew she had one more fight ahead.
"Look." ALLMIND spoke into her comms, her normally even robotic tones sounding almost eager. "The Coral siphoned by the corporations is beginning to resonate."
"Augmented Human C4-621–Raven." She wanted to scowl at that. That wasn't her damn name and ALLMIND knew it-she'd said it at least once, hadn't she?
"Your role has come to an end." An AC stood ahead of her, looking out at the stars as if waiting for her arrival. A MIND set, she realized, the same pieces she had received access to from ALLMIND for her many accomplishments both in and out of the Arena.
An Armored Core she had helped the mercenary AI refine to near perfection.
The sleek curves of the AC before her stood in sharp contrast to the one she piloted herself. Her own model was primarily composed of Melander C3 parts, beside the Tian-Qiang arms and Verrill headpiece atop the torso, all painted an array of black and yellow that made the unit stick out like a sore thumb, just the way she liked it. An array of missiles sat atop her shoulders, and the long barrel of a Zimmerman shotgun was held in her unit's right hand. On her left-an Ashmead Pilebunker, already prepped and ready to smash through whatever this AC in front of her would throw her way. No matter what they threw at her, AC BUMBLEBEE could take them down.
Then the pilot spoke, and she almost wasn't able to hold back her laughter amidst her shock at just who she was facing yet again.
"Well, well…" Iguazu said, the last voice she had ever expected to hear atop this station. "I've been waiting for this, freelancer…"
"I became part of this monster…so I could crush you." She almost wanted to roll her eyes at him. Petty to the very end…yet as more ACs landed beside him, remote piloted drones sent to back up a pilot she was almost certain ALLMIND didn't trust to do the job himself, her lilac eyes hardened.
"This time…you will die-"
Before he even finished speaking, AC BUMBLEBEE was boosting forward, the red hot flames of her Santai engine propelling her forward in an instant, her Zimmerman raised. In an instant she was in front of him, trigger sliding backwards-yet just as the shot of car sized slugs fired out her shotgun, Iguazu was boosting out of the way while a remote AC was left to take the fall. One shot was all it took to overload its systems.
And one moment was all she needed to rear her left arm unit back before slamming the pilebunker spear into the remote AC's core, shattering it and sending metal flying across the empty space.
Before the AC had even finished being destroyed however BUMBLEBEE was moving once again, target lock shifting back towards Iguazu even as he tried to create more distance between the two.
"Raven-" Ayre's voice crackled in her head and across their comms. "ALLMIND's real goal…it's-"
But before she could even finish ALLMIND's voice was back in her ear. She fired off a salvo of missiles even as ALLMIND spoke, spouting platitudes about 'her plan' while Iguazu raged in her ear like the rabid dog he was-she pushed them out of mind as she weaved past the oncoming fire of Iguazu's backup ACs, boosting towards her real target once again.
No pilot was perfect enough to evade oncoming fire from four different directions however. Even as she chased Iguazu across the satellite, Zimmerman shots and missiles hounding the pilot even as he shouted for her death, stray bullets nicked at her AC every moment. Her structural integrity dropped sharply as two different salvos intersected and hit her head on-and she was forced to pop a repair kit, carving into the limited supply of repair bots she held in her AC.
Even four on one though, the odds were never in Iguazu's favor. Hell, how many times had she beaten Iguazu, even with more competent backup than poorly controlled remote ACs?
She'd thought she'd proved that she was better time and time again across Rubicon, taking down almost anything that other pilots could have never managed to even scratch-facing down odds anybody sane would have called suicidal. She couldn't help but chuckle at that-she'd always been reckless even before ending up here after all. In a way she was glad to see that part of her hadn't been forced to change.
"Freelancer…" Iguazu muttered as her shotgun blew the head off another of his backup pilots. "You killed me. But not just once." She couldn't help but blink, nonplussed, the distraction from her confusion almost costing her a blow from his rifle as a purple beam of light lanced across the stars and speared through one of the satellite pillars nearby.
"Well, there's a whole lot of us inside me now. Dregs with a grudge." Ah, she realized. He's just deranged. Probably from before he had ever even been scooped up by ALLMIND, she'd bet.
No matter. He was always going to lose here anyways.
She proved her point as a stray missile caught Iguazu running, the explosion sending his AC into overload. "Iguazu…this body won't last." She heard ALLMIND say, but she wasn't even listening. Ayre was talking, Iguazu was shouting-none of them mattered, not when she was so close to finishing this, and she barely heard what they had to say.
His AC was sparking, flames erupting from its metal frame only to be choked out in the vacuum of space, while his mechanical limbs were slowing down as power bled out and the machine began to collapse in on itself.
He was finished.
Her AC crashed into his, a boosted kick landed square on his frame that crushed metal and sent Iguazu flying away. The damage was the last straw for MIND GAMMA as the lights of its head dimmed while it collapsed to one knee.
Just as always, Iguazu was an easy fight for her-
A large black mass crashed into Iguazu, crushing the AC beneath its metal heels. It stood tall-taller than any other AC she had faced (yet familiar in a way she couldn't quite place). Its make and model was advanced, and even she could tell it was superior to almost anything she had faced before. Superior to her own AC, while the signature blue and green she had come to associate with ALLMIND shined from every light and diode across its body.
"Irregulars." ALLMIND and Iguazu spoke as one, their voices overlapping. "We will bring order to chaos." Metal parts shifted as the hulking metal frame prepared for a fight-and she couldn't help but shake, both fear and a bit of excitement running down her spine.
Yet ALLMIND and Iguazu's toy wasn't the only new arrival. A sleek AC, colored pale white and pink, its frame oddly feminine, Coral energy shining from its engines, landed beside her, and for a moment she tensed, half-afraid of a new foe.
The voice that rang from the second AC soothed her worries almost instantly though. "I'm with you Raven." Ayre said, and while a part of her wanted to grumble at Ayre still using that damn name, the rest of her…
The rest of her was proud of her friend, and immensely grateful to have someone ready to fight by her side. It had been too long…not since…
Well. Now wasn't the time to get lost in her memories, especially as two flying SEA SPIDERs floated into view beside ALLMIND Iguazu-the pair refusing to give up their superior numbers even at the very end.
She wasn't sure who moved first then-was it her, Ayre, or ALLMIND Iguazu?-but in an instant all combatants were boosting across the satellite arena. The area was set alight by the burst of gunfire and the flash of beams shining against the inky background of space around them while Ayre and her weaved in and out of range. ALLMIND's strategy was sound, firing off salvos of laser beams from his unit's cannons while the Spiders rained covering fire from above, plasma falling like drops of rain. Any normal pilot would have found themselves dead already, and even experienced pilots likely would have never lasted this long against ALLMIND's unrelenting assault.
Normal pilots never would have gotten this far though.
Even as ALLMIND's efforts chipped away at the structural integrity of their ACs, Ayre and her were a dancing blur, each covering the other the instant they had even thought of calling for help. They were linked in a way ALLMIND couldn't hope to match even with her new puppet, and they proved that every instance.
"Iguazu." ALLMIND spoke, her tone disturbing even if it wasn't directed at her. "You are one with ALLMIND. No one can stop you now."
The pilot only grumbled, shouting, "I said I don't care about ALLMIND!", and the distraction cost him as she leveled her shotgun and fired off a blast that sheared metal plating and armor from his body, forcing a curse from the pilot. They were out of sync, unable to work together-and she and Ayre took full advantage.
The second ALLMIND focused their attention on Ayre, BUMBLEBEE was already boosting forward to take advantage, her Zimmerman firing off and forcing the IBIS unit to either take the hit or abandon their attack.
And when they tried to focus on BUMBLEBEE…if they even managed to get close to her, Ayre took that opportunity to boost away and fire off shot after shot into the Spiders, near defenseless as they were, trapped floating high above, seemingly bereft of the capabilities the Coral-run model had had.
As ALLMIND and Iguazu took more and more hits, their AC worn down by the fighting, she knew this was it. They were so close-!
An explosion crashed into Iguazu, and for a moment the world seemed to slow down. His AC shook, and for an instance she thought it was from damage. Only for an instance however.
Energy gathered around the IBIS, a bright sphere of coruscating purples, greens and blues that pulsed in time with her heartbeat. "Shut up…I'll shut you all up!" She realized then that Iguazu had not been shaking due to damage, but anger. She tried to shout for Ayre to get back-
But it was too late.
The sphere burst, crashing across all their ACs and the entire atmosphere of the battle changed in a single moment. Ayre gasped and she spared a glance to see the Echo collapsing to its knees. "It's resonating!" Ayre shouted, her voice for the first time garbled even to her ears, while at the same time ALLMIND called out, "Iguazu, what are you doing-?!", the mercenary AI's voice just as disrupted as Ayre's.
"Interference! I'm losing sync!" Ayre called out to her, but she couldn't even spare a moment to pay attention to her friend. Not when Iguazu suddenly shifted gears, boosting right up to her and slashing forward with brilliant blue claws, his laser rifles adjusted in a split second to shift to blades eager to carve her apart. She had to adjust on the fly, shifting her attack pattern in her mind even as she did all she could to evade his feral assault, to ensure she would win just as she always had.
"They're gone…the ringing, those stupid voices…it's all clear now…I feel…good." Iguazu spoke, his voice suddenly the calmest she'd ever heard him even as he tried to tear her apart. If he hadn't been trying to kill her, she might have even felt bad for him, if the ringing had been that bad. "Now…it's just you and me!" He shouted, sailing towards her as BUMBLEBEE swerved and weaved across space while he barreled towards her, his assault endless-
It took just one slip-up. One trip, as her eyes glanced at Ayre once more as her friend's voice grew faint in her ear again, as she strained to hear Ayre's voice for the first time…
Ayre's voice grew loud once again as Iguazu's claws carved through BUMBLEBEE's steel frame, separating her right arm from her body with ease. Her shooting arm went flying through the void, drifting away, but her left was already moving, a pilebunker slam already prepped-
A second slash carved through her arm, sliced her pilebunker into slivers of melted steel, and her heart dropped. No, she hadn't come this far just to fall here…
Iguazu sliced the legs from her AC and with a single kick crushed her core and sent her flying, crashing into the pillars of the enclosure satellite.
"This ghost of me won't last long…" Iguazu muttered as she fell. "Leave a spot for me in Hell."
The last thing she heard was Ayre screaming "Raven!"
The last thing she thought was that her name was-
Oh.
That's right.
She was the one that lost.
621 and Raven were silent as she sat in the cockpit of the wrecked BUMBLEBEE, their eyes still locked on Ayre's desperate duel against Iguazu as the madman tried to carve her AC apart just as he had with BUMBLEBEE. As he scored a deep gash that left scorch marks burned into Ayre, she couldn't help but look away, shame welling up inside of her.
She had been too cocky. If Iguazu had managed to get this far too, despite everything…she should have seen him as someone just as dangerous-no, more dangerous-than even herself. Yet here she was…
"So, you're just gonna give up?" 621 spoke, dull lilac eyes locked on her own matching pair.
"Ayre needs our help!" Raven said, brighter lilac meeting their gaze.
"I'm going fucking insane…" She muttered to herself as the more unwelcome voices in her head called out to her.
She didn't know why she had seen those other paths-she didn't know why she was hearing them.
Frankly, she didn't care either. Whether it was the Coral, hallucinations, brain damage…it didn't even matter anyways.
Not when she had lost. Not when she was so tired.
…Gods, she was just so tired…
Tired of the fighting, of the bloodshed. Tired of closing her eyes just to see the haunting wreckage of so many past missions lingering in her mind. Not even faces or names left to remember all she'd killed-just the knowledge that even Salem back home might have balked at the casualties she had left in her wake.
When was the last time she had been happy?
"You were happy with Ayre…Rusty…even Carla and Walter…" Raven whispered, her tone somber.
621 chimed in then as well. "And before that…Remnant."
Her thoughts turned to her home, long lost. She remembered it-how could she ever forget…but after everything, it just felt so different. So…far away.
Everything except…
"What do you think
they would say, if they saw you giving up?" Raven asked her, and she couldn't help but flinch.
"Why do you care?" She bit back, and the voice of Raven shrunk back even as 621 spoke up once more.
"They probably couldn't imagine what you've been through…but they'd never imagine you'd just give up, either." She rolled her eyes at the voice in her head, scoffing at even having this argument while she threw her hands in the air, gesturing at the wreckage of the AC they were still sat in.
"Don't know what you expect me to do with a fucking wrecked AC…"
Raven and 621 both spoke as one, their voices overlapping. "And since when has that ever stopped you?"
"You're stubborn." Raven said.
"Reckless." 621 spoke.
"Too dumb to ever give up." They both said, and she couldn't help but growl at the backhanded compliment.
"That still doesn't solve my problem! What do you want me to do, go out and punch him?" She shouted, and she could almost see the voices, their faces the same as her, looking at each other for a moment before shrugging and saying, "Why not?"
"Have you ever tried punching an AC before?" 621 asked…and she paused. No, she hadn't, but…
"That's stupid to even try." She countered. "You're stupid for even suggesting it!" She said, and Raven nodded.
"Well, yeah. We're you after all." Raven said.
"And you're a Huntress of Beacon." They said together.
"The muscle of Team RWBY!" Raven shouted.
"You've never let someone saying you can't do something stop you before." 621 continued, "So why let yourself stop you?"
She…her lips moved, trying to form a counter, to argue back that she should just lay down and die or take a nap or anything else…but instead she simply scratched at her head, trying to ignore the throbbing headache that she wasn't sure was a concussion or annoyance towards her apparent schizophrenia.
"...have I always been this annoying?" She asked, and the voices in her head sighed.
"Of course you have been." 621 and Raven said in unison. "We're Yang Xiao Long, aren't we?"
"And even broken…" 621 started.
"...and even on borrowed wings with a stupid name…" Raven continued.
"...we'll always be us, right?" They said together once again.
Yang nodded to herself, even as she started searching around her cockpit, praying the emergency supplies hadn't been destroyed by Iguazu.
"Yeah," Yang said. "I guess you're right."
Ayre collapsed to her knees, the damage her AC had sustained too great for it to maintain structural integrity. She heard Iguazu chuckling, gloating over his victory over the freelancer, still ignoring ALLMIND even as she whined in both their ears.
Yet Ayre was barely paying attention, her mind focused on the wrecked AC nearby. Her dear friend, her partner…they were going to walk together…she wasn't even sure if she could still feel her anymore…
"I'm sorry, Raven…" Ayre whispered as Iguazu raised his claws high-
"Hey, Iguana, why not try picking on someone your own size?!"
A voice rang out across their comms-a woman's voice, young, brash, loud and confident, and completely unfamiliar to both Iguazu and Ayre. Though to Ayre, it almost sounded like…
"Yeah, I'm talking to you, lizard boy! You thought I was down and out just cause you broke BUMBLEBEE? Joke's on you buddy!"
Ayre's heart simultaneously fell and soared. On the one hand, she was certain-that was Raven, still alive! On the other hand…
The cameras of her AC zoomed in on the young woman now standing atop the wreckage. She was dressed in the usual pilot suit; a skin-tight black jumpsuit that clung to her skin, only hers was cut off at the right elbow, the glove removed to reveal the yellow robotic hand that had replaced her right arm. Oddly shaped, it almost looked as if she was wearing bracelets, a matching one around her fully concealed left hand. The rest of the suit was completely sealed, meeting with a circular helmet atop her head-an emergency rebreather in case of damage in a vacuum, Ayre realized. Yet she knew not only did that helmet not protect from the vacuum for long, but…
'Raven…' Ayre thought, 'without an AC, she stood no chance against Iguazu…'
Iguazu, for his part, could only stare at the woman in shock, utterly confused. For one, he'd thought that bastard was dead! For another…
"Wait a fucking minute, the freelancer's a chick?" He stated more than asked, and Yang stumbled atop her AC. "Wait no, back up even further, you can talk?! I thought you were a freaky fucking mute!"
"...that's the part you're focused on big guy? Not that I'm gonna go over there and fight you, but that I'm…a woman, and I can talk?" Yang couldn't help but sigh. Dumb men, no matter the dimension…
Iguazu breaking out into deranged laughter only felt like vindication to her. "You…what?! Your AC's a wreck, what're you gonna do?" He raised the arms of his AC, the limbs colossal compared to Yang down below as he gestured towards her. "Come and fuckin' punch me?" He continued laughing even as Ayre stared at Yang, and even ALLMIND fell silent at the absurdity of it all. A lone human, fighting an AC was the height of insanity-
"Yeah." Yang simply said, cutting off Iguazu's laughter-and Yang almost wished she could see his face, just to see just how confused he was.
Iguazu let out a sigh, shaking his head. "Damn, freelancer. You're even crazier than I thought." The glowing claws of the IBIS unit extended once again. "I'll do you a favor then, and make this quick!"
He boosted forward, crossing the distance between him and Yang in an instant. Metal legs screeched as they skidded across the ground, and he brought the claws down-
The bracelets on Yang's arms shifted, Ember Celica prepped for the first time in far too many years, a keepsake Yang had refused to part with even in her darkest moments-a decision that saved her life as the shotgun shells exploded from the gauntlets and sent her rocketing forward towards Iguazu. The claws missed her by a hair's breadth, and for a moment she could feel the heat of the lasers even through her sealed suit; but she barreled forward, bullheaded in the face of danger.
Even as she closed in however, Iguazu's only thought was how best to kill her. It wasn't like she could hurt him after all-
Warning alarms erupted in his mind as the IBIS registered an impact-and he boggled at the sheer amount of damage. "The hell! Damage across…what the fuck hit me?!" He glanced down, his sensors instantly locking in on the source…only to see that damn freelancer, her fist driven into a massive dent in his leg.
"I-what the…ALLMIND!" Iguazu shouted, the first time he'd even addressed the AI since assuming direct control. "How the fuck is she doing this?!"
"I-I don't…the calculations…this i-isn't possible-?!" Yet the AI had no answers for him. A human this strong…it didn't compute, physically beyond the capabilities of even the strongest of humans! Yet the evidence was right there in the damage the IBIS had sustained, in clear defiance of all the facts and computations that proved it could never have happened.
Iguazu scowled within the frame he controlled as Yang's fist slammed into his AC once again, the force enough to even knock his mech slightly off balance. He tried swiping down towards her, his claws carving through the steel floor with ease, yet she was always just a step ahead of him, launching herself away with Ember Celica the instant he was too close to her.
Iguazu felt like he was fighting a fly buzzing around his face, only the fly kept on punching him every time he failed to swat it down, leaving pitted dents and ruptured systems in her wake as she bounced across his frame. His AC was massive, ten meters tall, she barely even came up to his ankle, yet for all the bulk of his AC he
just couldn't hit her! "Even without your damn AC…that grit of yours kicking in every time!"
"My grit-!" Yang shouted as she launched herself from the IBIS's arm and rocketed towards its head. "-is just me bein' outta your league buddy!" Her fist crashed into the AC's faceplate, Ember Celica barking as a shotgun burst accompanied the strike, and in a great burst the faceplate cracked, oversized shards of glass spraying across while the AC stumbled backwards from the impact, while Yang herself was sent flying backwards through space.
Iguazu's growls of rage rang out across their comms while the engines at his back flared, brilliant blue bursts that forced IBIS forward the second time he regained his balance. His form shifted as his speed increased further, further-moving so fast he practically warped towards his hated foe. Yang prepped herself to move out of the way again, Ember Celica shifting as Yang's hands flew to her hips to grab hold of some shells for reload.
But her hands grasped nothing but air as Yang realized she hadn't kept any extra ammunition on her since she'd woken up in this world.
A wall of metal rose up in Yang's face in an instant as she flailed in the low gravity, falling too slow to give her a chance to dodge away on the ground, and bright yellow Aura flared as the IBIS slammed straight into her falling form at speeds she could only barely keep up with.
The sheer force of the impact drove the breath from her, and even with her Aura up she could feel her body ache even through the numbness and nerve damage inflicted by her augments, while her body was sent flying across the satellite arena.
It was only instinct that kept her Aura up as she crashed into the ground as well, rolling across the steel array before she collapsed in a crumpled heap on the ground. Her ears were ringing, she couldn't tell if the bleeding she felt was from a new injury or her previous head injury acting up, and as she rolled onto her side, groaning, her right arm failed to even so much as twitch. All it took was a single glance for her to tell it was broken; the steel 'bones' twisted at an odd angle, jutting out from the casing while split wires spat sparks into the void.
Through the ringing she could still hear Iguazu speaking, Ayre shouting something-but the words were an unintelligible mess that swam through her pounding skull. Fuck, that one hurt…when was the last time she had been hit that hard? Her thoughts jumbled together, lost flitting through memories even as Iguazu and Ayre's voices grew louder.
Was it the Paladin? That certainly had hit her like a damn truck…
…how had she beaten that again?
She glanced towards her left arm, still intact, even if her right was down for the count, and clenched her fist. Well, as long as she could still punch…
She couldn't help but let out a chuckle that sent two separate AC heads snapping towards her as she began to slowly stand, pushing herself to her feet, Ayre's relief filled shout of "Raven!" joined by Iguazu angrily shouting, "How the fuck?!"
Iguazu continued, "I hit you hard enough to make you a cloud of blood and guts…between this, and the piloting…" Iguazu's engines flared once more while his energy claws extended as he overloaded the laser cannons once again, brilliant trails of moonlight green burning in the night sky. "What…" He shouted. "...what makes you so special, freelancer!"
As Iguazu barrelled towards her once again, Yang squared her feet, letting out a low, calming breath as she squeezed her fist, dug deep into her soul-
And
burned for the first time in years.
The explosion of power rippled through the arena as Yang's hair was set alight, as it always had every time she had used her Semblance…yet something was different this time. Bright red flames replaced the usual yellow that would engulf her, matching the brilliant hue that her lilac eyes would always shift to-and the strength that she felt blazing in her body was more than she had ever felt before. Her nerves were alight, her mind cleared in a blink as the rush of energy filled her, and all around her she could both feel and hear…voices? Voices that snapped and crackled in her ears amidst the flames of her soul, each one sending a new rush of strength coursing through her.
"The Coral…" Ayre gasped as she looked upon Yang's transformation. "Is…is it
helping her?" Yang heard that and couldn't help but wonder that herself. She hadn't used her Semblance since she had arrived here…was it the augments? The Coral Convergence hanging so close in space?
Eh. It didn't matter to her as she grinned, red eyes locked on Iguazu approaching at lightning speed. Who was she to question why she felt stronger than she'd even expected?
It just made what was coming next even easier after all.
Iguazu noticed the shift in the freelancer he despised-and the AI noticed it too, ALLMIND's whining returning to his ear once again. "Iguazu…you must…dodge! The Coral…C4-621…they're irregular!"
"Just shut up!" Iguazu replied, forcing ALLMIND's voice away once again. The last thing he heard from the monster was her muttering, "...you were a mistake, Iguazu…irregular…", but he didn't care in the slightest.
So what if he was a mistake? His life had been one since the second he'd fallen into debt with Balam. He'd been a screwup for years, even before he'd made a deal with this devil and fused with ALLMIND.
It didn't matter.
None of it mattered!
The only thing he cared about, the only thing he had left…was killing this damn freak of a freelancer right here, right now!
The freelancer was standing still, one arm ruined, the other held as if she was waiting for something, but Iguazu didn't spare a second thought-not when he was so close! He swung his claws, the pillars of sharpened light falling down towards his target-
Just as a blast of Coral sheared through the back engines of the IBIS unit, the charged blast of plasma-like energy ripping through his defenseless rear and throwing the IBIS off course, his claws swinging past Yang as Iguazu lost control.
He heard the freelancer speak then, as she bent her knees. "You asked why I'm special, Iguazu? Well, it's cause my name ain't 'freelancer!'" She
leapt then into the air towards him, higher than any human should have been able to jump, flying towards him like a burning meteor set alight.
"My name isn't Raven, either!" She cocked her fist back, and Ayre couldn't look away for an instant, as she watched her partner, her dearest friend, light up and shine, burning bright alongside the stars.
"My name…is Yang Xiao Long!" She threw her arm forward.
"And I'm ending this fight with a bang!" Her fist impacted-
And the night sky ignited in a blazing flash of red.
The sheer kinetic force set ablaze within her was more than any human should have been capable of-more than anything even an Armored Core could generate-and her fist tore through the IBIS series like tissue paper. The torso ruptured as it cracked, bent, and crumbled in the wake of her assault, and Yang herself burst through the other side, a clear gaping hole revealing obliterated electronics left in her wake.
The instant the energy that had burned in her core was released, Yang felt her entire body go weak, exhaustion hitting her even harder than Iguazu had. She could feel herself falling back to the ground, but she could barely muster the energy to keep her eyes open…
But her fall ended prematurely as she collapsed onto
something metal, and she forced her eyes, lilac once more, open again to look up at Ayre's AC, the waveform dashing forward to catch her in her hand, her Coral rifle discarded.
"Finishing me off with a damn pun…" Yang blearily turned her head, and she could see the IBIS turning, somehow still moving even with the gaping hole she'd ripped in it, even as jets of arc energy erupted from his burning mech, sending his leg flying,
his arm flying, blue-green lights still blazed behind its cracked faceplate, still locked on Yang and Yang alone.
"I always envied you…" He threw his arm back, igniting his claws once again, and Yang could feel Ayre moving, preparing herself to face off against Iguazu once again-
-but as he boosted forward, swinging towards her one last time, energy erupted once more from the AC, the explosion blowing his arm off and reducing it to nothing but scrap, throwing the IBIS backwards.
"The freelancer…who had it all…"
The IBIS twitched one last time, and Ayre gasped in alarm before turning her AC, shielding Yang from the explosion of arcing energy that washed over the both of them. The force of the blast almost sent Yang flying, even as Ayre cupped her in her AC's hand and held her tight.
When the explosion finally subsided, all that was left on the battlefield was Ayre's AC and the wreckage of the IBIS drifting through space. Even now, reduced to a charred pile of scrap, green lights still shined, and ALLMIND's voice warbled out from the wreckage once again.
"O-our…plan…" The AI muttered, its voice weak. "Humanity…Creation's potential…" She had been so confident in its success-so assured that nothing could stop it, that Convergence would be controlled by ALLMIND and ALLMIND alone. Where had she gone wrong?
"We have the trigger." Ayre spoke, and Yang glanced up at the AC as Ayre glanced down towards her, the two sharing a nod as ALLMIND realized the issue had been there right from the start. "And we'll pull it ourselves."
She had wanted to use humanity's potential, yet in the end she had underestimated just how far they could fly.
She should have known not to go against a Raven soaring on wings she had made her own.
The green light dimmed, fading away, and with that both ALLMIND and G5 Iguazu disappeared-defeated by a Raven-no, a Huntress-and the voice in her head.
Yang's body ached, entirely spent, but still she sat up in Ayre's hand as the waveform shifted her AC, the two of them turning towards the Vascular Plant far in the distance. "We did it, Raven…" Ayre spoke softly before shaking her head. "...no, Yang." She corrected herself, earning a tired grin from her partner below. For a moment all was silent, the two able to rest at peace, their battle won…
Metal rippled across the Vascular Plant's titanic frame as spikes of Coral activity began to run rampant across it. It shifted, twitched, and then in an instant was crumbling, pulled in by the sheer force of the Coral rushing towards itself, the uncountably vast amounts contained within the Vascular Plant rushing to meet each other. The metal groaned, its cry reaching out even in the void before in a flash space
twisted tight as it was squeezed and throttled-
The Vascular Plant disappeared, as if it had never even existed, and in its place a great black void blotted out even the stars. It hung there for a moment, a lone dot of blinding red light shining against the pitch black shadow while Waveform and human both looked up in awe as the light dimmed slowly dimmed.
All just to explode outwards, a corona of blazing red shining in the sky like a dark star. "Coral Release…" Ayre muttered. "It's beginning…"
"...isn't it beautiful?" Ayre asked, and Yang wasn't sure whether Ayre was asking herself that question or Yang-or even what she could say as she looked up at the incandescent star that they had allowed to be born.
It was…
Horrifying…
Beautiful…
…everything…
Was this what Walter had wished to prevent? Was this what Ayre had wanted humanity to work towards, together?
621 was the one who had chosen to burn the Coral to prevent this. Raven was the one who had saved Rubicon-3 in order to walk towards this incredible potential.
Yang…she was the one whose path had diverged. Whose talents had shined bright enough for a brilliant, mad AI to dream of tapping into limitless potential and offer a path unlike any other.
Had she made the right choice?
Did she doom humanity with this?
Did she bring about a new age full of potential?
She…
She didn't know. Yang had no idea what lay ahead-for her, for humanity, for Ayre and the Coral…whether they would walk together as one, or burn brighter than the stars before disappearing without a trace.
But this was what she had chosen.
She was the one who had cast the die, together with her partner at her side.
And as a light shined amidst the explosion of Coral Release, and humanity was forever changed, no one noticed that the ones who had pulled the trigger, the lone Raven, and a single voice amidst an ocean of red, disappeared together, as the universe was forever changed.
Not where...but when you are needed most...and those four will cause the least harm.
Ruby: Magic eldritch god powers.
Weiss: Actual magic + moon powers and a cute moon wife
Blake: Amnesia and edgy kinda eldritch dark humanity powers
Yang: "So what do I get?"
Me: "PTSD and schizophrenia lmfao"
I had like...a third of this written before I finished the Blake chapter, and the muse worked overtime to get it out. Kinda got weird, hope it didn't get too hard to read, but wanted to find a way to
make Yang suffer incorporate all three endings of AC6 lol, even if the one she
truly got was Alea Iacta Est as some of you may have guessed. Lemme know what you think, feedback is always appreciated, gonna start working on the real first chapter now LOL, thanks for reading and hope you all enjoy