~bzzt~

Beep.

Beep.

Beep.

Elara shot up in bed, tearing off the electrodes attached to her chest, and the needle pierced into her arm. She looks around, disoriented, and pulls away a curtain at her side.

She’s safe. Home base medical center. Pyralis was still breathing, and the heart rate monitor softly chimes a soothing rhythm. Elara climbs out of her bed, walking over to Pyralis’s sleeping form. Her arm is wrapped up in layers of plaster, and she notices the familiar bag of liquid heaven hooked up to her love.

She’ll be fine, Elara thinks to herself, as she plants a light kiss on Pyr’s forehead. Elara softly grabs one of her hands, staring intently at it, gently picking it up, as if handling an expensive gift. It was, in some sense, exactly that, given the work and value that Elara put in these hands. She caressed the rough palm, feeling every little imperfection in the skin, everything that made Pyralis who she was.

Gently setting Pyr’s arm down, Elara rose and turned to leave the bay. Pyralis could use a rest, she thought. She continued to think about her freshly bloodied weapon. She unconsciously pathed towards the weapons bay, intending to say her goodbyes to the blaster that had served her well for the last few months.

Twelve. Twelve kills, she now kept close. Elara made a mental note to ask Rhine, the post-combat debriefer, to give her any details about the downed Greybird. Any details they had on its pilot, any previous encounters with the machine. Their name.

She approached the weapons prototyping sector, punching in a security code without thinking, and strolled into the workshop. It smelled like sweat and oil, with the faint scent of burning rubber burning her nostrils, with the sounds of gunfire and active weapons testing ripping through the room. Elara grabbed a pair of goggles and standard-issue ear protection. The blasts still pounded in her head, and the lenses of her goggles had a large scuff in the left eyepiece. Better condition than usual, she thought to herself.

She approached one of the workstations, observing a young man who was tinkering with a salvaged Tesla accelerator. Elara tapped the engineer on the shoulder, who swiftly dropped his tools and spun around.

“Field Commander Callisto E! Apologies for not greeting you at the door, I was checking our spoils from your last outing.” He quickly adjusted his goggles and stood at attention.

As she thought. “Cool it, Krill. Drop the formalities, the accelerators, like the one on the table, can you use them?” She thought about the railgun that the Greybird had—this must have been salvaged from its weapon. She remembered her old plasma blaster, a salvaged weapon from her last… incident.

Hreya Leyman. Elara had made a mistake identifying her machine, a newer model of Hailsparrow. She slammed a hook into the mech, piercing straight through the cockpit, as well as the pilot inside. A mistake that cost a life.

“The remains were salvageable, E, but it’ll take a bit of time to get it formatted for the Moonrise. I presume you’ll be ditching the plasma cannon? I worked hard on that one, I’ll have you know.” He rolled his eyes a bit, not really being upset about it. He knew her feelings on tainted weapons, and the cannon could be fitted into Sunset’s rotating arsenal.

“Blood on its cannon, you know the drill, K. How long do you think until the railgun is operable? I don’t want to be running out there without a ranged option.” Even if Elara preferred up-close combat, running outside without any way to defend a long-range assault would be borderline suicide. Let alone the fact that Sunset was going to be out of commission for at least a week.

“Five days, unless you want to run it on low power for a day or two. This is some high-power equipment and we don’t want this breaking into pieces as soon as we send it out. Try to keep from blowing this one up, the accelerators alone are in short supply, not to mention the reactor in this thing. This could blow your arm off if you don’t keep it safe.”

Elara nodded, a little surprised at the fact that the weapon was housing a small reactor inside. No wonder it had sheared through the Sunset, given the sheer power it was channeling. “Owe you one, K.” She patted him on the shoulder and turned to leave the lab.

Krill shouted out after her, “This is like, owe you seven, by the way! I expect your desserts for the next-” The door slammed behind Elara. She’d get him something nice for this. Maybe set him up with one of the pilots whose mech that he had been drooling over. The Halcyon maybe? Anna was looking for a new mechanic ever since her last one sent her out into the field with a half-broken sensor array.

Elara began heading towards Salvage, lost in thought, as she was knocked to the floor. She quickly rolled backward, reaching to draw her dagger as a response, realizing that she had probably been disarmed before being placed in the medical bay.

“Oh! Sorry, Ellie! I didn’t see you there.” Rhine, the mission manager looked at her, worry painted over her face. “Are you hurt? I can take you back to medical if you are.”

Elara quickly recovered her composure, shaking her head out. “Ah- yeah, sorry. I mean, no. I’m not hurt. Sorry, I wasn’t paying attention.” She held her hand out, offering a handshake. She looked up at Rhine’s face, her friend towering over her.

Rhine looked a tad confused, before quickly grabbing Elara in her arms and squeezing. “Maybe I did knock you a bit hard, Ells, I’m glad you’re safe.” Rhine picked her up and spun around as Elara struggled to break her grip. “You sure you’re doin’ okay? We can grab some lunch if you want.”

“N- Let me down!!” Elara flailed a little in her arms, attempting to pry herself free like a trapped cat. “I’m fine I swear, put me down!” She continued kicking a little, before making a squeak as Rhine dropped her.

She climbed to her feet, brushing herself off a little before looking at Rhine with a little blush. “S. Sorry. I’m alright. I was just heading to Salvage to grab a memorial, but I can grab lunch with you after.” She shook her head out again, more to avoid making eye contact, rather than for any other purpose.

Rhine chuckled a little, pinching Elara’s cheek. “Sure, sweetheart. I’ll be waiting in the dining hall for you once you’re done. This is for you, by the way.” She reached into a satchel at her side, passing a folder to Elara before continuing past her.

Elara looked back at the departing manager, and then down at the files in her hand. Post-mission dossier, probably. She opened the folder, skimming over the mission overview, proudly labeled SUCCESS. Lies. She encountered a page marked with red, a note, left in Rhine’s trademark script.

===

Casualty Information for Gerard Hanes. It was the only choice, Callisto.

Elara tore the note off, reading the collected information on the now neutralized target. Gerard Hanes piloted an Imperial Mech, Model 2-GR, the second generation of Greyhawks. The Greyhawk first appeared in combat two years ago and was subsequently upgraded roughly seven months ago. Seven such mechs have been encountered in the field, and are built to be long-ranged assault weapons. Each is fitted with a standard issue Imperial railgun, able to fire custom-made ammunition, as well as standard rebar with slightly lower efficiency.

Gerard Hanes was a known Imperial pilot, first having been encountered three years ago in a simple 5-Fledgeling. Hanes was captured once, and was traded back to the Imperial army in a prisoner exchange. He was cooperative and cordial during his capture, having been passive towards his captors. Hanes has no known family, and it is not on record why he enlisted with the Imperial Army, although Intelligence speculates that the mandated draft drew him into service. Ever since re-entering the Imperial army, Gerard has been an elusive target, staying back during encounters while attempting to disable opposing machines non-lethally.

Hanes is classified as a low-priority target and has been added to an internal list of Imperial soldiers who may be susceptible to defecting, due to his likely involuntary nature of recruitment.

Target Status: Deceased

Cause of Death: Plasma-related Burns

No family. A loner. A pacifist. A sympathizer.

Would he have killed Pyralis? What if she hadn’t shot? What if she had put down the weapon? Would he have run? He could have killed her. She saved Pyr. Did she save Pyr? What if she had talked more? Tried to bargain? He could have crushed her in an instant. She had to make that choice. Did she pick wrong? He threatened Pyr. He threatened her. She was defending herself. He was running. She pushed him to his limit.

Elara slammed the dossier shut. She made her choice, and Pyralis was safe. That was all that mattered, right? She didn’t have time to doubt herself. Mourn the dead, push forward.

She kept heading towards Salvage. She would make her amends. Her heart pounded in her ears, as doubt continued to leak into her thoughts. The crinkle of the documents as her hand balled into a fist, and tears began to run down her face. Elara approached the blast door, wiping her tears onto the medical gown she was still wearing. Pyralis was alive.

Punching in another security code, she stepped into the glorified storage shed. She looked out to piles of scrap lying on the floor, labeled by mech type. Running her hands along the aluminum tables filled with disassembled weapons, movement systems, and various other salvage. She headed towards the new arrivals, stopping in place as she saw the body.

The Greybird lay there in pieces, the metal blackened and peeling away from the damage it had taken during her encounter. Nothing but a corpse left in her wake. Bits of metal lay strewn about, the heart of the metal beast laying bare beside it, as if confirming that nothing could revive the creature.

She approached where she knew the cockpit shell to be, kicking the exit open haphazardly. Elara thought about closing her eyes, but it was her responsibility to face her decision. Inside laid a male body, face and arms charred to a crisp. Gerard Hanes. Murdered by her hands.

At least, her last pair of hands.

Kills one and two. Five years ago. She had refused to pilot again with her bloodied arms. Elara had murdered two pilots that day, and could not bear the guilt any longer. She balled up in her room, refusing to see anybody for over 60 hours. Pyralis had broken into the room to a bloody scene, Elara bleeding out on the ground. She had torn off one of her arms, the other broken and disfigured.

The medical team worked for a week to save her. Amputated her arms, and replaced them with metal. Clean, free of her sin. She was put back into Moonrise after two months of physical therapy. Not enough time to atone. Her old arms were incinerated, and the pile of carbon left behind hung in a vial around Elara’s neck.

Kill three, she had refused to use the new cybernetic arms, and had to have them replaced before she would go back onto the field. By the fourth, they had replaced her arms during her post-mission checkup. She kept the old ones in her cockpit, hanging there. A reminder not to make a mistake, the names of her victims engraved on them. 10 sets of arms now. New hands for every kill since the day saw red.

Elara surveyed the insides of the Greybird. It was well kept, besides the burn marks left inside. The controls were worn, standard-issue. She shed another tear for the deceased pilot.

“Sorry, Gerard.”

She felt the cold metal in the shell. Cool to the touch, and peaceful. Hopefully, it would be a nice resting place. She expected to find out on her own someday.

Elara stepped back from the gruesome scene, walking towards the disassembled weapon attached to the arm of the Greybird. She ran her fingers over it, feeling the steel that she would be taking. Elara Callisto was a monster. She killed her enemies and took their weapons for herself, using them to kill even more. She stole from the dead not just their lives, but their means of fighting. Elara was more of a beast than the Sunset and its pilot.

It was a beautiful weapon, despite the scarring. She’d look deeper into its specs later, but the effectiveness of a weapon never really mattered to her. She would use the thing until either she or the weapon broke. Usually, it was the former.

She stepped back from the wreckage, beginning to make her way back outside to the hall, mumbling another apology for the deceased.

Sometimes Elara wondered why she was a rebel. Why did Elara fight? She fought to protect Pyralis, of course. This was never her war. Her parents had been Imperials, but she saw the plight of a young girl so many years ago. She saw what the Imperials were doing to those they considered dissidents. Pyralis had been torn away from her life, orphaned by the famine induced by cuts in food rations for lower-class citizens.

Elara never lost people to the Imperials. Never had her best friends and lovers killed in an attack on “Rebel Camps” made up of nothing but noncombatants. She fought so that didn’t happen. She fought so that the innocents could live. She thought she was ready to stain her hands for a cause.

Beep.

The blast door slammed behind her.

Pyralis had told her, on that bloodstained bed, while holding her disfigured arm, that she would never have to stain her hands again. Elara could fight without killing. Pyr would finish the job for her. She would kill to protect her and every rebel that lived in the base. She had a reason to fight, to kill, she looked for revenge.

Elara had no right to kill.