U.L.T.R.A. Builder

Arctic Red Zone

As the strike team returned to Shelter 7, they were greeted by a crowd of WDF officials. They congratulated the team for their efforts in defeating Cyclops. V1 almost immediately excused itself, and it went to a private area and sat down. V1 looked down at its hands, remembering the assault.

It saw the face of the pilot it had whiplashed out of a M.A.S.S. and killed with the shotgun. It relived the moment again and again and again. It could not get the pilot's expression of terror out of its memory. It thought to itself.

Why? Why am I feeling so guilty after killing him? I'm a machine of war, for fucks sake. I shouldn't have emotions. Why? Why do I feel this way?

V1 thought more and more about its predicament. It shouldn't even have emotion in the first place.

These... these feelings all started after I arrived in this universe. What caused them? Human Interaction?

V1 had a revelation. It remembered its development days. The care its engineers put into it. The way the scientists treated it like their own child.

V1 remembered.

It remembered the warmth of emotion that it had felt when it was born.

V1 felt even more guilt about its rampage and killing in its original universe.

I... I have to make this up somehow. I'll... I'll save this version of humanity. If I liberate the planet from the Quarks, I can redeem myself.

With renewed volition, V1 swore to end the conflict.

...

As Uri was being congratulated by the WDF, he saw Reina signaling to him to come over. He quickly excused himself and walked to her.

"Hey Reina, what is it?"

"Commander... I'd like to talk to you about something. If you have the time to, of course."

"Uhhh.. sure! What is it?"

"It's... about your, how do I put this... language during the mission."

Uri briefly thought about the mission before his face flushed red.

"Oh god... I'm not very proud of that. All I was thinking about was 'kill kill kill'."

"Yeah... That wasn't the nicest thing to hear. How did that even happen?"

"A lot of things. I mean, there was the whole thing where I had to relive Shelter 13 while recounting it to V1, and then there was the whole bit with the red Cyclops unit. I think all that riled me up into a revenge-seeking frenzy. Seeing V1 kill their ringleader was probably what brought me out of that trance."

"Well... it's good that you got out of it, at least."

"That's for sure."

Uri quieted down before piping up again.

"Right! I've been meaning to ask this. I've noticed a large amount of gold being shipped to the engineering department, do you know what that's about?"

"I... can't say I do. I've handled paying for the orders, but I haven't been able to see what the engineers are doing with all the gold."

With that, the conversation slowly stagnated. Both went off to take care of official work regarding the latest mission.

...

A few months had passed since the Cyclops neutralization mission. Nothing noteworthy had happened, besides a few stray Cyclops members being caught and imprisoned. V1 and Uri were talking to each other when they were called in for another mission.