Shiny Things

The office that served as leadership central for the planet of Chorus was a rather large, expansive piece of real estate.

Granted, Leonard Church knew that largely had to do with the fact that, in the years before he, his sister, and their ragtag group of Project Freelancer survivors had made it to Chorus from Earth—the fledgling little colony world had actually had two elected leaders.

The cobalt-wearing man couldn’t help but spare another glance at the unoccupied desk that took up half of the office. The object was now devoid of personal artifacts, but whenever he came up here the desk’s surface was always polished to a fine, metallic sheen. As if its former occupant would come waltzing back in for work like business as usual any day now.

From what Church was able to gleam about the Elvari known as Donald Doyle, the man had always been a stickler for keeping things neat and organized. Evidently, Kimball had wanted to ensure that some of Doyle’s habits were carried on. At least when it came to the space that he had once occupied.

No one had ever, as far as Church knew, broached removing said desk from the office once it had been decided that Vanessa Kimball would remain as the only leader of Chorus following Doyle’s unfortunate passing. Apparently, the thought had never crossed her mind either. Funny. She never struck him as the sentimental type, but Kimball was full of surprises.

He recalled that the asshole Director of Project Freelancer, Church’s “father” for lack of a better term (though Church had a string of more colorful descriptors at the ready should elaboration ever be needed), had a fairly large office too. But it had always been too cold, too sterile, and altogether too devoid of life for Church’s liking. Then again, the Director had been a secretive, self-absorbed mother fucker. The goateed man hadn’t even liked being in the Director’s presence for more than a second anyway. It was no wonder that the Veroni man’s workspace was as suffocating and stifling as his personality.

Church interrupted his familial nostalgia trip by glancing from Doyle’s pristine, obviously well-maintained desk to Kimball’s messy, disorganized one. The Elvari swore she had a system, but it was one that only Carolina had ever bothered seriously trying to learn. Suddenly, his past seemed distant and cold. There was so much more life here in Chorus, so much more fucking heart than he could ever associate with Freelancer.

Maybe that was why Church personally didn’t mind moments like this, where he was just standing around like a total jackass with nothing to do even though in other circumstances he would be frustrated as hell.

No, currently he was only growing slightly more agitated, more like worried, as the seconds that he and Kimball remained in relatively companionable silence continued to kick by. His blue eyes darted to the communication monitor, willing it to come to vibrant life.

It didn’t, however, because Church’s non-existent powers of persuasion over inanimate objects failed him once again. Or they didn’t. He wasn’t sure how that really worked, and he didn’t actually care all that much to begin with.

Kimball, who had joined him in staring at the monitor, pulled away her dark-eyed gaze to glance down at the tornado of documents and datapads on her desk’s surface.

“They’re late.” She stated the obvious under her breath not a moment later, the frown on her face making it quite apparent as to what she thought of the situation.

“Yeah, no fucking shit.” Church noted the same in his colorful way, ignoring the deepening of the perpetually downward motion of his own mouth. Tex often teased he must have been born with a scowl on his face, always amused by his counter that she must have been born punching holes through metal. Deciding that maybe now wasn’t the best time to be dwelling on an infuriatingly hot blond Veroni who could kick his ass whenever she liked, Church instead asked, “Think we should be worried?”

He was going to be regardless because those idiots were his friends and family, but right now his brain was still trying to gauge just how fucking worried they should all be.

The dark-skinned Elvari thought about his question for a moment, lacing her long fingers together on top of the messy pile strewn about her desk, “Ideally, I’d like to say no because I do trust Carolina and the others, but…”

“Something is telling you that some weird shit is probably going down.” Church surmised for Kimball after the dark-skinned woman trailed off.

She chose to say nothing verbally in response to that, simply nodding her head in agreement.

It was probably that very same trust that caused Kimball’s hesitation. After all, Trocadero was supposed to be a simple, routine mission. One in which a certain someone should have been able to easily message them on time.

If his sister wasn’t able to contact them like she had assured she would following Price’s involvement, well then that was definitely cause for concern. After all, both of the people in this space trusted Carolina quite a lot for two very different, but no less important, reasons.

Church closed his eyes briefly before slumping into the chair that Kimball had offered him when he had first entered her office. Another few seconds ticked by, the comm remaining aggravatingly silent. His frown deepened.

“I say trust your fucking instincts then.” Church advised. It was sound advice. After all, who knew what kind of trouble he could have avoided in the past if he had simply done just that?

Kimball raised an eyebrow curiously as Church mentally readied himself to explain his viewpoint further…

“I’m sorry to say that we’ll need to worry about ourselves first and foremost!”

Doctor Emily Grey’s voice was its usual cheerful frenzy of words despite what she had just stated as the dark-skinned Veroni came racing through office doors that were still in the process of opening.

Church nearly toppled out of his chair at the woman’s sudden intrusion, “Fuck! How is it that you manage to scare the living shit out of me every goddamn time I see you?”

“Oh, poor reaction time and high stress levels would be my guess.” Doctor Grey tapped thoughtfully at one of the softly glowing purple lines on her face as she stopped just short of running into Kimball’s desk, “Now that I think about it, you really are in need of an actual physical this year.”

…Somehow, he’d rather just go to Doc for that. At least Church would get some orange juice and yoga pointers out of it without the threat of potential dissection.

“Never mind that right now!” Kimball’s urgent voice snapped both of the Veronis’ attentions back to her, “Doctor Grey, you were saying earlier…?”

At her prompting, vivid realization blossomed across the genius’ face, “Well, there isn’t much to do at the hospital right now, so I’ve been up to my usual pastime. You know, monitoring outgoing planetary transmissions for funsies?”

Both Kimball and Church shot each other slightly alarmed glances. They had not, in fact, known that Doctor Grey did such a thing to kill time. Church had kind of hoped he could have gone his whole life without knowing what the scary doctor lady was up to in her spare time for “funsies.” For the preservation of his remaining, tentative grip on sanity and all of that.

“On a rather noteworthy frequency, there were quite a few common catchphrases being used. Most likely a code of some kind.” Doctor Grey concluded over their slight trepidation, her voice slightly sing-song in delivery.

The serious implication of her words put the entire matter in a whole new perspective, especially since, not even a second later, there was the telltale sound of an alarm going off in the distance.

“It’s just too bad that things are often so busy with sudden medical emergencies this time of year.” Grey noted in mild exasperation as one of Kimball’s office monitors flared to colorful life with all sorts of security updates.

Church rolled his eyes, sighed, and subsequently swore all at once.

Richard “Dick” Simmons remained standing on the catwalk as he stared up in awe at the gigantic, humanoid machine that he had just helped to bring back. It was garbed in what appeared to be maroon armor, reminiscent of the very kind he wore.

Everything that had happened recently was still very much a blur in his mind. If he closed his eyes, Simmons was greeted by quickly moving images and a constant rush of emotions.

Still, he couldn’t believe that such an incredible piece of technology had actually responded to him. The idea of him being a pilot of anything so astounding was nearly beyond belief. He couldn’t tear his eyes away from the mech. He remained transfixed in the hangar, having a strange sense of déjà vu as he continued to gaze up at the machine.

The redhead was truly grateful that Price had given him some time to think by himself. He needed an opportunity to ponder things.

Though, right now, all he could really think about was how it had been a shame they had been in such a hurry to retrieve the mech. He hadn’t even had time to process his strange new surroundings before they had been flying here, to this unknown place.

Simmons couldn’t be sure, but hadn’t there been other mechs and people there too? If that had been the case, taking off like they had was a definite safety risk!

A part of Simmons desperately wanted to assist Price and his men, since they had helped him so much just by freeing him. But, as a wave of monstrous figures and tinier forms all in differing colors swam in a blurred-up mess in his head, Simmons couldn’t help but feel like something was off.

Hadn’t someone back there when they were retrieving the mech even called out his name? Did he know them, or…?

His confused jumble of thoughts came to a screeching halt when he felt a sharp, stabbing pain close by his belly. Simmons dropped to the floor of the catwalk, one hand loosely gripping the railing while the other came to rest at the ache at his side. He winced, the pain and discomfort oddly familiar.

…Was this an aftereffect of the Tevkask? Simmons’ green eyes widened in alarm at the thought. He hadn’t thought that he had been on it long enough for any long lasting changes to occur…!

“Are you all right?”

A gruff voice momentarily distracted him from his panicked thoughts. Simmons glanced up to see the rather intimidating Sharkface looking down impassively at him.

Sharkface looked positively uncomfortable by the turn of events, as the brown-haired man lowered his good eye’s gaze towards the floor below, “Want me to get the doc, or…?”

With effort, Simmons shook his head and rose up on shaky feet. He wiped away an embarrassing bead of sweat from his clammy forehead, “Tha—thanks, but please don’t.” He managed to get out, “It’s probably…just an aftereffect of Tevkask ingestion.”

Simmons decided not to mention that prolonged exposure to the drug forcibly changed a Strassian’s body similarly to how finding a mate did. It still upset him that his father had decided he would have been better served as breeding stock than anything else…

“Right. Tevkask.” There was a momentarily unreadable look on the scarred man’s face that Simmons wasn’t sure what to make of. It was probably either disgust or pity, and he couldn’t decide which would be worse. But then Sharkface looked at him appraisingly, “Sounds like you’ve been through a lot. You even smell a little different from the other Blue Dots I’ve been around before.”

Simmons frowned slightly at the rather derogatory term for Strassians, though at the same time he had to suppress a shiver at the remark about his scent being different. He hadn’t met any potential mates that he was aware of, so that must have all been the Tevkask’s doing. He felt himself flushing from the shame of it all over again as he tried willing his body’s frustratingly pointless mutation down.

Sharkface, meanwhile, gave Simmons a considering look. Apparently he had decided to pay no heed to the obvious internal dilemma raging on inside the younger redhead. “If you take your hand off of that railing in the next two seconds, then I won’t go and get Price.” The half-Arenian finally offered.

Simmons blinked at the proffered deal before he shakily nodded his head. He would prefer not bothering Price if he could avoid it as he was sure he must be busy with whatever else his group was doing here. The Strassian hesitatingly let go of the railing that he had been supporting himself upright with, steadying his wobbly legs a moment later.

Sharkface looked him over approvingly before hitting his shoulder in a motion that took all of Simmons’ strength not to topple over with, “You’re tougher than you look.”

Simmons’ natural reaction to the praise was a hesitating smile, his cheeks feeling warm again. It was as if he was back home with his father again. How pathetic…

He still felt as though something was strangely off, but he couldn’t place his finger on what it was.

Someone was moving what looked to be an orange…traffic cone down below, and he frowned as an all too blurry figure filled his mind. He couldn’t place who the figure was or what they really looked like, but there was an odd sense of urgency flooding his brain and chest.

“I think it can be arranged for you see the test results from the mech, if you want.” Sharkface said, obviously still talking to the redhead and unaware that Simmons’ mind had been somewhere else.

Simmons did his best to unsuccessfully shove the orange form to the back of his mind in order to cover up the unease that he was feeling in front of Sharkface. He nodded his head earnestly instead, hoping that did the trick as he followed the other man like a lost puppy.

Beyond being thankful for having retrieved her helmet earlier, Agent Carolina’s thoughts were slow to gel following the rather tumultuous fall that their group had just taken.

Something, most likely someone, was definitely fucking with them on Trocadero. Given what had just happened with Simmons, she was beyond tired of it. All that mattered to her now was getting all of her team off of this planet while hopefully getting some much needed payback along the way.

She knew that would probably be easier said than done as she glanced up at the cavernous, rocky ceiling far above her head. Thank fuck that they had all been wearing their armor. Her joints and muscles ached as it was, she didn’t even want to think of how much worse things could have been.

There was a loud moan off to her right. The cyan-armored woman turned her head towards that direction as she gingerly pulled herself up off the ground. She couldn’t make out anyone, meaning that they must be further inside the cavernous space.

It looked like Carolina had somehow ended up falling into what appeared to be an underground chasm following Maroon’s stomp and takeoff. Much of the debris that would have fallen down along with the half-human, half-Veroni had evidently been caught by the rocks making up the cavern’s roof. The rest of it had fallen down into a huge barrier off to the right.

She had no doubt that was where a majority of the mechs were seeing as how she could make out the blue top half of Freckles partially buried in the crumbling mess.

She spotted two forms in pink and purple huddled in front of the mech, as if the robot’s massive form had helped to shield them in some small way. The moaning seemed to be coming from the pink-armored Donut since he was gripping his shoulder tightly.

“Doc! Donut!” Carolina was racing towards them over the debris-strewn floor as soon as she saw the telltale signs of red seeping through Donut’s gauntleted fingers, ignoring her own aching body’s protests.

“H—hey, Carolina!” The younger Elvari’s voice was laced with false cheer and bravado despite his pain, “That’s certainly one way to bottom, huh?”

“The fall reopened his gunshot wound.” Doc informed her, his tone a bit more hurried and urgent than Carolina was used to as he focused all of his attention on trying to stop Donut’s bleeding.

“Oh, this is nothing!” Donut tried lightening the somber mood, though the dirty blond hissed in pain a second later when Doc forced his hand away from the wound to get a better look at it, “I bet Doc here is an expert at plugging holes over and over again!”

The blush was evident in the brown-haired Elvari’s voice when he responded, “W—well, I’m not sure if that’s how I’d word it, but…”

“Come on, Doc, have faith in yourself!” Donut leaned his helmeted head close to Doc’s purple one to stage-whisper, “I believe in you!”

Seeing as how Donut seemed to be in decent condition despite his injury, and even with his stuttered out “Can I ask you why?” that Doc responded with, Doc seemed to have the medical situation as under control as it was going to be.

Carolina took another moment to glance at their surroundings, frowning all the while. There were no signs of the others, which either meant that they had fallen into other areas of the cavern or that they had been buried along with the other mechs.

The redhead was once again thankful that they had all been wearing their armor.

“Will you both be all right to move soon?” Carolina asked the pair tersely, fingers twitching uncomfortably at her sides at her current inability to be of more help.

“Yep!” Donut assured her, his brightness sounding more genuine now, “I was totally right about Doc’s ability to plug holes!”

“I’ve stopped the bleeding, at least.” Doc ignored the innuendo from Donut this time, sounding both surprised and relieved by his medical accomplishment.

Carolina nodded, glad that the situation hadn’t been as serious as it could have been. She extended her arms down to the two men awkwardly to help them both up.

“And I have to ask you yet again, Agent Carolina,” a cold, impossibly familiar voice stated from the left side of the cavern, “Just what is it exactly that you’re doing here?”

Carolina stiffened considerably as her head jerked up, coming face-to-face with the impassive stare of the Director. Doc and Donut remained rooted to the ground, hands clasped around hers, their shocked gazes also pointed in the same direction.

“You’re both seeing them too, right?” Doc asked out loud in a tiny, hesitant voice.

Two ghosts. Carolina’s breath froze in her throat. Sure enough, York was standing alongside the Director. His one good eye seemed to lock onto her green ones through her visor as he smiled directly towards her and waved.

True to its namesake, the Tank had survived the tremendous fall into the underground cavern in near mint condition. Really, even though Sheila knew the specs on her particular mech by heart now, including all of its various modifications and upgrades, it was still something to behold.

Though, truthfully, she knew that their current situation left precious little time for such things.

She blinked up at the brown-armored figure that framed her field of vision now that the blurriness in her eyesight had dissipated. Lopez towered over her, both robotic arms framing either side of her helmeted head. The last bit of rock and soil that had fallen down onto his back due to their tumble cascaded downward to somewhere close by their legs.

Once her brain started processing things efficiently again, the petite Veroni in gunmetal green armor slid out from underneath the protective form of Lopez’s body. “Lopez!” She exclaimed as she crouched into a sitting position a moment later, reaching carefully out towards his shoulder, “You’re not hurt, are you?”

There was an amused sort of electronic huff that came from the robot’s helmet as he moved into a sitting position next to her and Tank. He carelessly shrugged off some more dirt from his joints.

“Debería preguntarte eso, creo.” {“I should be asking you that, I think.”}

Sheila couldn’t help the slight, fond smile that crept its way onto her face, “Yes, well, someone here decided to gallantly shield me.”

The robot bowed his head slightly in acknowledgement, and Sheila was grateful that her helmet hid her reactionary blush from view. What Lopez had done was actually rather sweet, but what if he had been damaged in the process? She was torn between wanting to hug him or scold him.

“Thank you.” She stated quietly instead, looking at the ground between them.

“En cualquier momento.” {“Anytime.”}

Sheila then let out a deep breath that she hadn’t even known she had been holding, ignoring the loudness of her thudding heart in her ears.

“At any rate, we can probably use Tank to help us dig the others out if they are close by.” She stated, standing up to reach out to the metal shielding of her mech.

“Hello, Sheila.”

Lopez swore under his breath in Spanish at the polite, feminine voice that greeted the Veroni mech pilot.

Sheila froze, letting out another shaky breath of air before slowly turning to face a person she knew couldn’t actually be standing there with them in the cavern.

Her older sister’s kind smile greeted her back, “It has been a while, hasn’t it?”

As far as falling to your doom scenarios went, Lavernius Tucker supposed that things could have gone a whole lot worse. For starters, they could have died and that really would have sucked major balls. So, yeah, props for that not happening.

On the other hand, he was now stranded on a smaller-than-he’d-like ledge overlooking another enormous fall down below with only Washington and Caboose for company. The others, along with the mechs, seemed to be nowhere in sight.

That probably meant…

The half-Strassian cautiously tilted his head down to gaze at the cavern below from the very edge of the cliff, pulling away a second later before the view made him sick. That most likely meant that the rest of their group was down there somewhere. Tucker gulped and hoped that they were all okay. Thank fuck for armor and all of that, huh?

Behind him, Washington and Caboose started to stir. The Strassian bounded up on his feet almost instantly, though that hardly caught Tucker off-guard anymore. Dude always seemed primed for something. Washington was a walking paranoid mess at the best of times.

In any other instance, Tucker might have thought of a killer joke about what Washington should be getting ready for instead, but this hardly seemed like the best time so he filed it away in his brain for later.

“Are you two all right?” The steel-with-yellow-tinge-armored Freelancer questioned, whipping his head around to both Tucker and Caboose as if he could somehow assess their conditions through their armor.

Tucker ignored the part of his brain that oh-so-helpfully told him he wanted Washington’s gray eyes peering at him like that later on when he was out of armor.

“I don’t know, dude. What the fuck do you think, given what’s happened?” Tucker asked instead, raising a dark eyebrow.

Washington’s shoulders slumped, “I…I know that, Tucker. I—”

Okay, so now Tucker felt like a major dick on top of everything else. He sighed in frustration, knowing that Washington was just as concerned about everyone else being stuck down here and separated as he was. No doubt he was concerned about Simmons looking all mind controlled too.

Before the teal-armored man could awkwardly get out an apology for his sarcasm, Caboose’s shoulders sagged, “Everyone’s…gone again.”

Oh, shit.

At the despondent tone in the usually quite cheerful, younger Arenian’s voice, both men turned to glance at one another. Hadn’t Church mentioned before about how Caboose and Freckles had been stuck all alone on some moon colony for who knew how long…?

Both Tucker and Washington moved as one to get to Caboose at the same time, reaching upwards to grab reassuringly at Caboose’s shoulders even if he couldn’t exactly feel the motion all too well in his blue armor.

“I know, buddy.” Tucker started as he patted Caboose’s shoulder in a sort-of very awkward way, “But they’re going to be fine, okay?”

“We’ll find them, Caboose.” Washington reassured the taller male just as awkwardly as Tucker had.

The two men glanced at one another before quickly glancing away again as Caboose nodded his head slowly.

Tucker turned to Washington again, “Any clue as to what we should do now, or…?”

Off the cliff’s wall, there appeared to be a small tunnel of sorts hewn out of the rock. Tucker hadn’t paid it much attention before, but now that he did his voice trailed off. Was there something actually glowing inside of it? Eerie blue light had started to pulsate just then around the opening, and he could only imagine the commentary Donut might have given had he been around to see it.

Fuck. Knowing this planet, that couldn’t be anything good.

Caboose turned around and noticed the light as well, “Oh, someone is coming to meet us!” He exclaimed excitedly, breaking free of the loose hands still gripping his shoulders as he sprinted with long-legged strides into the tunnel itself.

“Goddamn it! Caboose!” Tucker shouted, taking two hurried steps after him. Sometimes, the blue-armored young man was even more childish than Junior. At least he knew his kid had the common sense not to go running towards strangely glowing who-knows-what.

The dark-skinned man paused when he noticed that Washington was making no attempts to do the same. Agitation built up inside the half-human, half-Strassian. He turned to Washington to tell him to hurry the fuck up before Caboose went and somehow got himself killed…

But he stopped when he saw Washington’s visor glued to the cliff edge, his whole body completely rigid.

A hulking figure in white armor with an intimidating domed visor, who most definitely had not been there before, was now standing on the ledge and silently regarding the two of them.

Simmons stood over him, desperately trying to pull him out of his nightmare. Grif could only watch on as history repeated itself.

The knife that he still had no idea where it came from was thrust into Simmons’ side by his own fucking hand. The blood pooled at his feet as the lanky redhead collapsed…

But then, this time, Simmons was staring up at him with unseeing eyes. The floor dropped out beneath their feet before the knife even fell from his limp, shaking fingers.

“Simmons!” Dexter Grif gasped as he woke up, choking on the Strassian’s name as a new wave of guilt and panic washed over him.

He was suffocating, and he couldn’t even wipe the beads of cold sweat off of his forehead thanks to his stupid, fucking helmet…

“Hmph. Finally back in the land of the living, dirtbag?” Sarge’s gruff voice asked not a moment later.

The older Arenian stood off to the side, peering down at Grif with red-armored arms crossed over his chest and a scowl no doubt covering up his features behind his helmet. Thankfully, though, Sarge chose not to comment on Grif’s sudden outburst.

“It’s a sign that the universe has a cruel, sadistic sense of humor, us getting stuck down here together.” Sarge lamented instead, turning away so that Grif could collect himself.

The chubby human instinctively rolled his dark eyes, though oddly enough Sarge’s presence did seem to do the trick of getting his brain back on the right track.

“Any idea on what we do now?” Grif heard himself ask since they definitely needed to get out of this fucking cavern and find Simmons fast…

The two men were standing by an outcropping of rock that seemed to tower above them quite some ways. Sarge glanced upwards, motioning with a tilt of his head towards what appeared to be a small ledge high above.

“I say we get to climbing.” He stated matter-of-factly, already reaching out to look for handholds in the wall before them.

“Of course we fucking do.” Grif sighed and complained outwardly, but the orange-armored man was already joining Sarge at the wall—intently trying to focus on the task at hand instead of on the nightmare that he had only recently woken up from.

Mentally, Grif tried telling Simmons to hold on for just a bit longer.