The Obelus

-17- The beginning of a new chapter

Gen, Mini and you arrived at Liberal Militia. Phoebe sees you and frowns.

"Y/N? you've been missing for a week, where have you been? Oh and whose this you've brought along? A new recruit?"

"No just uh... a friend yeah. Yeah a friend we picked up along the way."

"Oh ok well more recruits I suppose, and I'm assuming this is Gen?"

"Hi? Name. Gen!"

"Hey Y/N? Have you seen Gen?"

"Oh uh..."

"I'm sure she's probably out somewhere."

"Hmm, alright. Y/N you can go to your room I'd like a word with Gen and..."

"Mini."

You walk the corner to your room. You enter to be greeted by the furious clicking of a keyboard and you knock to enter. A high girly voice greets you.

"Hey! Come in, make yourself comfy."

You enter the small grey room. The paint on the wall is peeling and there are shelves stuffed with boxes and boxes of usb drives, cords and technical disks. A single golden lightbulb hangs from the ceiling, casting shadows behind the rows of stuff. A petite asian child sits in the corner, face glued to the green and black screen. She looks up, picks up the coffee, takes a sip, and sits back on the turning chair, smiling until her eye bags crinkle.

"Hey, I've never seen you before."

"Ha, it's okay, I normally do all the backstage work anyway. Hello I'm Eri, and I hack and do all the tech related stuff."

"Ooo, are you working on a project now?"

"Oh, yes, I have! You won't be able to understand it if I show you though."

"Oh, then could you give me a brief overview?"

"Yeah! So essentially what I'm doing is hacking into the N.U.N but having no luck."

Eri swivels back on her chair to face the laptop and starts to squint at the numbers, piling and piling on top of each other. She reaches for her coffee and chugs the rest down and starts to resume her work. She hints at you to help her get another coffee. You exit the room to a cafe.

"One flat white please, with 2 C&C cookies."

"Oh, sure. Here you are, $5.50, oh wait... you're the person who saved Gen! I can't believe this... did you know I look up to you! Here, have these for free! Oh my god I can't believe it!"

"Yeah... Thanks!"

You exit the scene nervously not expecting such an interaction to occur right after you saved Gen, are you famous now? With the cashier of the cafe bar squealing, you awkwardly exit the area and walk back to Eri's room with the coffee and biscuits.

"Here, a flat white."

"Oh, thanks."

Olivia chugs the whole cup.

"Great stuff, this." Eri mumbled pointing to the cup.

"Hey have you heard? People are wild for me, because I saved Gen."

"Oh, boasting?"

"No! No no no, what I meant was everyone knows me now. But you didn't?"

"Oh, I never go out. Only ever interact with Phoebe and that cafe cashier."

"You should go out! Here I'll do this, and you go shower and sleep. Sounds good?"

At the thought of sleep, Eri yawned and rubbed her eyes.

"Yeah, sleep. Good stuff."

She slouched out of the room, her eyes barely open.

"Hey Gen!" you yell as you tumble into Gen's dorm.

"Carrots. Carrots. Carrots? Carrots. Carrots. Carrots. Carrots. Carrots!" screams Gen.

"Oh- um Gen?"

Gen stays still for a moment, then flops to their bed and stops breathing.

"Oh my god! Gen!"

You perform CPR, sweat forming and rolling down your face.

"Phoebe? Phoebe! Gen fainted!"

"Oh god uh-"

"I'll go call Olivia. They're a doctor. Be right back."

You ignore the name thinking it could have been a coincidence.

Phoebe runs into one of the rooms in the back. Olivia joins her. You catch a slight glimpse of her and you realise it's the same person you met a few weeks ago.

"Oliva...?"

"Oh hello Y/N, I didn't expect you to be here."

"But- the bombing! The burnt camp! How?"

"Well, you do realise I've been training for years to survive this kind of situation?"

Olivia takes a look at Gen and comes to the conclusion that she's not breathing.

"Y/N, you may leave. There's nothing much any of us can do but pray that Gen will be alright."

You sigh and walk off, hoping Gen will be fine.

"What was Gen on about though, carrots?"

You think about it for a while while walking to your room.

"Wait a moment, Gen's been in the facility for longer than anyone. Maybe they've heard some things we haven't."

You sprint over to Eri's room, thinking it's worth a shot.

"Eri, Eri!"

You stop to catch your breath.

"You needed a password right?"

"Huh? Oh hello, yeah I do..."

"Carrots!"

"Eri, weren't you gonna tell me what you are working on?"

"Oh, yes!"

She scrolls around her mouse, and goes to the shelf to search for something.

"Ah, here it is!"

Eri grips the disk and plugs it into the computer.

"So, I've got into their system, I just need to figure out the password."

"Gen's been repeating the same thing over and over again. Carrots. You think that means something?"

"I don't know if it'll work or not, but we can always give it a try I guess..."

"Okay."

Eri puts 'Carrots' into the passcode. To both you and Eri's surprise, the code works.

"So that's why Gen kept saying the same thing over and over again to us..."

"Yeah, but what a stupid passcode the Obelus made up."

Eri searches the locked folder and sees a file.

"Okay, what's on this document...?"

"Plans for Evasion, 2.0"

"Huh."

"They're planning to invade?"

"Right. Scroll down maybe. What does it say?"

"Hmm... there's a lot about taming mutants and stopping us."

"Don't we go warn Phoebe then now?"

"Alright."

You and Eri walk towards the front desk looking for Phoebe. Phoebe isn't anywhere to be seen though.

"Eri, you stay here. I'll look for Phoebe real quick."