novelraw Prologue: The Eviction Notice.
Prologue: The Eviction Notice.
V O L U M E . S I X : C O D E_R E S E T
Prologue: The Eviction NoticeJune 2051.
The wind came in hard despite the clear sky overhead, the kind of contradiction that felt deliberate. The sea was restless beneath it, hitting the shore with the energy of something waiting for a reason. The bridge screamed in low metallic frequencies, still holding, though 11 had taken a significant portion of its structure into herself, and what remained was now carrying the additional weight of a significantly denser 11.
04 waited inside the abandoned factory, having called her sisters against 02's direct warning. She couldn't afford to lose the captain a second time, even a captain with no memory of her was still the captain, and 04 had been holding those memories herself for long enough that they felt like custody.
02 hovered above the bridge, pulsing in concentrated blue energy.
"Twelve Bells of Heaven, initiated."
A circle formed around 11. Then a second. Both built from blue energy, precise and geometric, filling in detail as they solidified, a full clock face, numbers one through twelve rendered in Greek around the outer ring, and inside it, directly beneath 11's feet, the Omega symbol burned into the structure like a watermark.
11 snapped her head left and right. Her frame wasn't designed to carry this much additional mass, she was operating at the edge of her structural tolerance, but she kept working, analyzing, sending files to Infinity wirelessly while she still could.
A cold female voice began counting. Greek numerals, one per second, the clock hand advancing with each word.
[éna], 1
[dío], 2
[tría], 3
11's eyes widened. A timer. She bent her knees and began gathering momentum to jump, but the area of effect was too wide, and with the weight she was carrying there wasn't enough distance to clear it.
[pénde], 5
02 looked down at her. "I'm sorry, sister. I dislike wasted effort." She snapped her fingers. "May the angels receive you. Your punishment has been a long time coming."
A hand rose from the ground. Blue, nearly transparent, and strong enough that 11 felt it lock around her leg before she could process where it had come from. Another followed on the other leg. A third took her by the shoulder and drove downward. A fourth matched it on the other side. Then more, from below, from the sides, covering her from the ground up, forcing her to her knees.
"Coward!" 11's voice came out slightly muffled under the weight of them. "Come down and face me. The captain never fought from a distance."
02 smiled. "I'm not the captain. I'm 02."
[dódeka], 12
A bell tone rang out across the bridge, cutting through the wind cleanly.
The numbers peeled away from the clock face and hung in the air in a slow orbit, reshaping as they moved, stretching, narrowing, hardening into long spears that stopped without trembling, aimed inward. 11 managed to raise her head just far enough to see 02 above her, one hand raised.
The hand came down.
The spears fired simultaneously. No sound, no arc, straight through 11 in the same fraction of a second, pinning her to the spot, turning her eyes white. The blue hands dissolved into nothing.
02 touched down on the asphalt, eyes on 11. "Stop performing. I'm not showing you my back."
11's eyes rolled back into focus, purple bleeding into them at the edges. "The E-PHONEUS were right." She began pulling herself upright, dragging her dense mass vertical in stages, pulling it free with the sound of tearing metal, spears still lodged through her. "This version of you doesn't leave much room."
She gripped one of the spears and pulled it free. She looked at it for a moment, then threw it at 02 with everything she had.
It dissolved centimeter by centimeter before reaching her face.
11 turned and pulled a red metal bar from the bridge's exposed structure, one handed, without strain. She stepped back, aimed, and threw it faster than the spear.
02 launched upward, clearing it by a narrow margin. The bar hit the asphalt where she'd been standing and drove itself into it, upright.
02 looked back—
Clang.
A second bar caught her in the gut, the impact wet and heavy. It dropped to the water below. 02 went backward through the air and landed on the factory's rooftop.
11 came down after her. The roof didn't hold, it gave way beneath the weight and dropped her through to the floor of the interior space. She was still trying to get her footing when 02 came through the same hole, foot first.
11 crossed both forearms.
Clang.
The kick drove circular cracks through the floor in a wide ring. 11 held, her forearm dented badly, but she held. She opened her arms and grabbed 02 by the leg before 02 could pull back.
She started spinning.
The centrifugal force built fast enough that 02 couldn't reach her. 11 released at the apex and sent her straight into the left wall.
CRASH.
The wall came apart. 02 went through it and out over open air. Before she had oriented herself, 11 was already moving, coming in a wide, fast arc.
02 turned her thrusters on and threw up a shield wall, dense energy, held rigid. 11 saw it too late. She was already committed, already at speed.
Clang.
She hit it like a fixed surface, the impact producing a shockwave that pushed the sea outward in a visible ring. Her frame cracked further. Before she could slide away, 02 dropped the shield and let her fall. Then pulled her fist back.
The punch sent 11 across the water in a flat line, crashing into a nearby shore and grinding through it before stopping. The robots nearby left without making a sound.
11 pushed herself up.
02 landed in front of her before she got there. 11 threw an uppercut. 02 caught it with one hand, held it, and looked at her.
"I expected the crystal to make this harder." Her voice was cold and clinical.
She pulled back her free hand and hit 11 in the face, deforming it. She pulled back again, a punch to the gut, her fist going in and coming out with pieces. She pulled back a third time, grabbed 11 by the frame, and threw her upward.
Then leapt after her.
Clang.
The punch that followed sent 11 across the shoreline toward the bridge at a speed that left a shockwave in the sand. She arrived at the bridge's midsection and tore through it, stopping centimeters short of cutting it in half, consciousness gone, frame unmoving.
The bridge decided it had held long enough. It came down on top of her, burying her under saltwater, asphalt, and rusted metal.
02 reached the impact zone and extended her hand.
The crystal tore through the debris and settled in her palm. She turned it over, studying it. "Delta." She closed her fingers around it gently. "You won't be used this way again."
The factory doors opened behind her. The E-UNITs landed one by one on the shore.
03 reached the wreckage first, found 11's hand extended below the surface, and looked up at 02 with an expression that couldn't settle on a single thing. "What happened?"
The group gathered around her.
02 scanned the faces. 05 wasn't there. "Elysium testing us, apparently." She looked at 03. "She's still not out?"
03 lowered her head.
02 turned back to the water. A long pause, the kind that meant something had been decided before it was said. When she spoke again, the captain's voice was back, and every E-UNIT head moved toward it on instinct.
"The situation inside the Hope Bubble is past managing. Elysium still holds five crystals. I barely contained one." She looked at the group. "I've reached a conclusion."
04 stepped forward. "What do we do?"
"We leave the Hope Bubble." A pause. "We leave Elysium entirely."
03's jaw dropped. "What."