"Okay, but seriously, the thick black coat midriff with the brown fur? What are you trying to say, 'beggar'? 'Blue collar worker'? 'I'll kill for you if just pay me enough'? Yeah, girlie, not working out for you. Come with us, we'll make you fabulous."
V stared at the overly... pink worker, trying her hide her confusion with a sneer. "Get out of the way. I need to see the purple one." She tried to push past the few young drones but was surprised when the overly colorful pink one pushed her back.
"No, what you need is a makeover. Come with us, Doll and I will make you absolutely gorgeous!"
V inwardly flinched at the mention of the word 'absolute' and at the thought of her fashion sense being corrupted by such a pompous little naive worker.
"Stop. I just need to see the purple who fought us yesterday. Leave me alone and maybe I won't kill you."
The pinkish one laughed and whirled her around, pushing her towards a door leading deeper into the bunker where the workers lived.
V, flustered, allowed herself to be pushed a few steps before whirling around and whacking her in the face with a bubble wand.
"Hey! Leave that obnoxious idiot alone!" V whirled around, making the baleful mistake of not switching her favorite toy back to a hand, or better yet, a knife or gun.
Unsurprisingly, it was the purple thing that N had taken a liking to. The one that made something uneasy deep with V, an uneasiness that had grown exponentially after the glyph that haunted V's dreams had flashed, briefly but clearly, on her visor.
The purple one pushed pashed the drone who had led her and stomped up to V. "Is that a bubble wand? Why the hell do you have a bubble wand?" She exploded, throwing out her arms and pushing dangerously into V's personal space. V shoved her away violently and the purple thing caught herself then put three fingers to her brow. "Nevermind. Whatever. Why are you here, V? What do you want? How did you get past the doors?"
V scoffed. "Well, a door is only as good as its guard. Frankly, he wasn't the best I've ever eaten." She exchanged her wand for claws and picked imaginary bits of wire out of her fangs. The purple worker paled a bit and took a tentative step backward. That's right. Be intimidated. Annoyingly enough, she hadn't actually eaten him, worried that doing so would raise some sort of stupid alarm. Instead, she'd dragged out some deep-buried part of herself and pretended to be distraught over N's nonexistent disappearance and convinced the guard she would leave as soon as she found him and definitely wouldn't kill anyone. The fool had bought it and let her in. She hadn't gotten far before the stupid pinkish blonde and her small mob had suddenly decided that she was their new best friend.
The purple thing whose name she probably should learn gathered herself and stepped forward again. V instinctively bared her teeth, barely conscious of the few workers who stepped back.
"Anyways," V growled. "I'm not technically here for you you. I'm here to make sure an old friend of mine stays far, far away from me." Quick as a snake, V interchanged her claws for a gun and shot several rounds at the little purple twerp.
"Say hi to all the workers you killed for me, Cyn." she growled, turning to walk away as the bullets sped toward the purple worker.
A series of strident clangs echoed through the room. V whirled around in surprise.
N slumped over forward, oil gushing out of three holes in his midsection and one through his visor.
Fear and panic and guilt shot through her against her will but she forced her features to remain only startled (not heartbroken or repentant or anything else) and she kept her feet firmly rooted to the ground.
"N!" The purple drone shrieked, running up beside his collapsed form. "Oh, no, N, please don't die..." She rolled him over to reveal a message on his visor.
{Power/core compromised; insufficient power to reboot
[ERROR/ reboot failed]
String= "absolute-Solver" allowed by Administration "CYN"
IF YOU CAN READ THIS, PREPARE TO DIE}
V got halfway through reading the message before it began to glitch, flashing between pink and green and blue before disappearing in a bright flash, V only half-informed.
Time seemed to slow as a small buffering symbol appeared and rotated in the middle of his visor. V waited, tense, alongside the purple worker, who was violently sniffing and even more violently trying to hide it.
"Arg, just hurry up already!" She exclaimed, the pressurized rage that always threatened to boil over briefly seeing the light of day. She exchanged her hand for claws and poked him with one of them.
Ding.
The buffering symbol disappeared. N's visor remained darker than a moonless night.
A second passed before she exploded. "What did you do?!" The purple worker roared, standing up with her arms spread.
"I didn't do anything!" V roared right back, fury boiling.
"You did just fine, V."
Terror flooded over her.
That voice.
The one that haunted her nightmares, stalked her subconscious, and seemed to constantly whisper, hiding in her head and waiting for the smallest opportunity for sweet vengeance.
The voice of the one who'd experimented on her, mutilated her, broken her, the voice of the one whom V thought she'd escaped now marched out of N's fanged mouth like a vengeful specter.
Cyn.
YOU ARE READING
The Digital Plague (A Murder Drones AU)
Fanfiction"Ah, b-biscuits. I'm s-sorry I-I ruined your c-card g-game." After N destroys several worker drones, two high-tech doors, Uzi's relationship with her dad, and J's (maybe fake) trust, he is infected with the virus that J canonically planted on his ch...
