MoM VR event memories

[biochemastery]

[[OOC note: There's a bit of the Grineer language in here, translated side-by-side "dukh klhus//like this".]

You're still getting used to your new body. Making adjustments. The synthetic nerves through the suit have a few dead zones. You're figuring out how to balance on the new feet, but those new curves meant amputating a lot. And rearranging quite a few organs.

You're gorgeous and still high on painkillers. The universe is, objectively, the best it has ever been, right at this moment.

And you're in the single most secret, significant and s--something place in the system: The Queens' fortress. It's a miserable cluster of asteroids roaming the system like a bunch of potatoes with ill-intent, but just seeing the royal red and black everywhere is enough to give you tingles.

Or maybe that's another nerve that needs adjusting. Not important! You're here to take command of the ships left over from Vay Hek's repeated failures. Really, the Queens give him a Fomorian Fleet and he managed to get every single one of them blown up? You'd suspect treason if you didn't know it was incompetence.

Still, the remainders would go nicely with the galleons in your research fleet, all of which you're re-tasking to resource acquisition and being Noticeably Elsewhere while you settle into your new secret labs. Which you have. And they're nearly as gorgeous as you are.

Tik-tik-tiking down the halls on your new feet, you're near-positive you're on the right route to where you're going. This place is a maze. But you're following the sound of a familiar voice. A horrible, wheezy, broken-cadenced voice, that catches on certain sounds and doesn't want to let go of them.

"--srowdor not ke. Mars grekwuhures kle fleet. Klegre hus noklhung kle skuenttur roes klat hus rorkull klhus.//--should not be. Mars requires the fleet. There is nothing the scientist does that is worth this." The voice is fuming, though that's normal. Sargas Ruk can boil a kettle just by balancing it on his head.

"So sure of that?" You call out as you approach the door. You're speaking the Old Language. You know it's less comfortable for him. That's part of the point. "It's been a while. You don't know." Around the corner you go, and it is a grand entrance. "That's excusable, I think. You've been very busy, haven't you?"

There he is. Your former boss, General Sargas Ruk. The most heavily-optimized and unspeakably fashion-blind pile of parts this side of the sun. You seem to have actually caught him off guard for a moment--Oh that's right. He hadn't seen you yet, has he? Well, now he has, and it's visibly scrambled his poor little brain cell. Perfect. Perfect! This is exactly the sort of reaction you calculated these curves for! Ugh, but you're going to start appreciating Ruk if you keep thinking like that.

He seems to be thinking much the same, dry lips curling into a sneer. "You rot with insolence and deviation," he wheezes out, joints whirring as he closes the distance. He used to be able to loom over you, but you're the same height as him now, and he visibly hates it. "Beg, and receive mercy."

"Oh, I would but--oh! What's this!" It's a Kuva braid in your hand, showing you're authorized to be here, at a rank that's equivalent to... "It's a lot like yours, doesn't it?"

Now he looks truly shocked. He hadn't known. They hadn't told him! HA! It takes so much effort not to actually laugh.

"So! No more orders from you, we're coworkers now." Are you giddy? Yes you are, and it's only just barely because of the painkillers.

Ruk tries to rally, and you swear you can hear the heat sinks in his armor start to whine as he gets angrier. "Science still waits for the military. nothing happens without our protection. you know this. you were made for us."

"Really! Strategy's something for the Queens to decide, isn't it?" He can obviously hear you smirk, and he hates it. It's so satisfying. "The audience 's this interval. And they're gonna like what I've got. What the whole Empire's gonna have when I'm done with it."

Ruk wants to hit you. He definitely wants to, but there's a whole lot of politics dancing around everything that happens here, and you both know it. Clock you right after a promotion he wasn't informed about and he could end up deep in the protein vats somewhere.

So all he can do is growl at you. It's adorable. "You rejected training. You are no officer. Stay out of my victories, or the Queens will undo you."

You tsk, all showy, obvious calm. "What a shame! And I was gonna let you get the new shock troops first. Out of respect." That, dear you, was a lie. "But now we'll just have to see, won't we?"

A klaxon sounds, and the harsh accent of a Kuva Guardian barking over the speakers is enough to put a lid on Ruk before he can really cook off. "Attention Grineer! The royal audience draws close. Your Queens command your attendance."

Her voice still ringing in your ears, you turn to leave, showing Ruk another of your best sides in the process. "Well, General," You walk faster than he does with his heavy-duty augments, and yes, you are going to rub that in too. "So sorry to cut it short. We'll have to catch up properly some other time!" Like never. He's got some response to that but you're not listening by now. Brain's buzzing too loud.

It's time to meet the Queens.



-♅-♅-♅-



Your brain's moving too fast for anyone else to keep up, as usual.

They're ruined. Your beautiful tubemen, look at them! The poor new never-been grineer, the future, they're nothing now! Faces twisted up in pain, falling slack, falling off--

You pace between the tubes, looking into the murky, tainted waters, splashing through puddles of fluid from the shattered, blood still oozing over some of the shards, and you can't stand it all. You had it! You'd made the leap no one else could've! You made the Infestation dance for you! Alad had failed, best the Corpus had got infected with wild-strain, started waltzing to the hive mind's tune and you'd laughed and laughed as his plague fleets roamed the system. You knew where he'd failed. You knew what he'd done wrong.

You knew. It was all in your data, uncountable exabytes of simulations and observations and numbers you'd cut through to find the solution. Your beautiful children. And now they were ruined! The data was gone! The Tenno, those stinking, sick little lizards, they'd stolen it all! Given it to Alad! Coward! Mush-faced idiot! Tendril-curling thief!

One of the administrators edges closer, starts to talk. At you. You're not listening. If he thinks you're gonna listen to anything today, he's dead. And wrong.

You kill him and keep pacing with a howl of frustration, and the rest scatter. Morons. All of them. But just smart enough not to get in your way.

Your children are all doomed and broken. You'll find a way out of this, you know you will, once the bodies piled up in the next room are incinerated and the last fragments of your data are saved from the ruined circuits and you've smashed enough breakables to calm you down.

You'll do better. You'll do weirder. You've been saying half of all this out loud for at least ten minutes and you only just noticed.

You'll make it all work. But for now, you can't stand to look at your children.