Consoulia Chronicles: Booting Up [~ read description]

Chapter 13: Virus

"Iris? Hey, Iris, wake up.." a voice rang out beyond the darkness. Her vision swam into focus to see that she was now in a bright room; a massive one at that. The floor was smooth and cool to the touch with a shade of cerulean while the walls and ceiling were gray; the latter was embedded with large bulbs. There was a slight buzz associated with the light sources, so they must've had some age. "Oh, thank goodness. They would've killed me if something bad happened to you. You good?" 

As Spire fussed over Iris, she did a health scan. There was nothing that she could find thanks to the familiar power of Zerrin's Fall Damage Negation that also happened to be in the USB, and from the looks of it, Spire benefited from it himself. She thought of everything. That was their Zerrin. "It's not safe here. We gotta move," Spire warned. 

He grabbed her hand and ran forward, but she was practically bolted to the floor. "Come on, please! We don't have time for this." Despite his pleading, Iris kept assuming the fetal position. It wouldn't be long until he saw a glowing orange aura come off of her and a sound that reminded him of windchimes. "Iris, snap out of it! We have to save the others. Your grandmother will be all right, I promise. Everyone will be okay if we can find them, all right?" 

Iris's aura and the sounds surrounding it calmed down with a conclusive chime. She unfurled herself and grabbed his hand. 

"Leaving so soon?" Purred a woman's voice, causing the two of them to stop in their tracks. A tall, womanly figure approached the AI as they were in their defensive statures. She had moved her long, black locks out of the way with a hand with fingers tipped with red painted claws. Her glare sat safely behind red framed glasses. "Please, stay a little while longer. It's not often I have guests." 

"Who are you supposed to be?" Spire questioned with Iris hiding behind him. 

"The one and only Desiri." She purred. Any word with the letter 'R' in it rolled off her tongue as if she was imitating purring. 

"Desiri, just go back to your bankrupt creators already. Honestly, they kept pouring out add-ons to the point where you physically looked like an earthly biological waste depository." This made Iris giggle as she shared a quick low-five with Spire. "Why don't you get lost so we can find our friends, yeah?" 
 

"You wound me, children," she cooed. "I would go back to my creators if our world wasn't destroyed. You think I'm here because I like it here?" She still rolled her r's, but it was now more subtle and at least pleasurable to listen to.  "I'm not a big fan of fighting kids, so let's make it easy on all of us. I lead you to Satara and we avoid all the carnage that could come from this." 

"We're never going anywhere with the likes of you." Spire talked down. 

"You know, I'd be a little more scared of the Plaything you've got behind you if she didn't look so pathetic. What're you, a rerelease?" Desiri rambled. "You're just so small and powerless. Satara told me as much at least, otherwise you would've been a better help to Zerrin and Spire during the fight. You're a weakling."

"You're talking trash in ass kicking distance-." Spire threatened. 

"I'm not weak!" 

Iris ground her teeth and summoned a shard of ice and launched it at her opponent. It missed her body, but Desiri's neck felt lighter than usual. She looked at her black hair to find that her waist length mane now only reached her shoulders. "Just get out of our way already, you big jerk!" 

"Fine, you asked for it you brats." Desiri's breathing became erratic and she fell to her hands and knees. Her teeth grew in length, her eyes changed from red to yellow, her smooth skin transformed into fur that was as black as her dress, and all of her clothing disappeared. Instead of a humanoid AI, there was now what appeared to be a full-fledged beast in front of them.

 "What is that thing?" Spire breathlessly backed up keeping Iris behind him; the quadruped only advanced.

"Well, since I've spent some of my time here watching programs about wild animals, I can say for certain that this thing is.. is.." Desiri began to run at them. "She's a panther!" 

The panther lunged at the kids, causing its prey to jump sideways to avoid being pounced on. As soon as the monster came to a stop and turned around to make her next move, the Consouloids were on the same side of the room, but on opposite sides, divided by the beast. 

Iris was on one side wielding her cutlass whilst Spire produced his tablet device. Desiri gazed at the both of them for a while, then suddenly pounced the latter, much to Iris's fright. "Spire, no!"  The panther landed on top of Spire as a splash of water hit her in the snout. Confused, the frost user looked around for her friend, but gazed above the attacker and smirked. "Get her!" 

The panther looked up with an expression of annoyance to see Spire airborne, tapping his tablet device to cause the water around them to become a waterspout. It was thrown at Desiri, sending her back into a metal pipe with so much force that it broke it, sending more water into the battlefield. The water's waves became storm-like and rose high above Desiri, pounding her with water currents underneath the waves that could easily end a human being's life. Iris didn't have to worry about being caught up in it; Spire made a wall of water to keep her corner of the room dry and safe. 

Using his tablet device, the water calmed down to a standstill. As it drained out of the room, he could see that Desiri was motionless. It was over. 

She ran to him, giving him a hug. "That was so scary! That was the coolest thing I ever saw! But is she?" 

"Afraid so. I might've gotten carried away." 

The kids approached her while Iris took out her icy sword and poked her body with it. Poking her, however, only caused a wave of ice to coat her body. The orange aura and the sound of windchimes caught Spire's attention again as the ice also turned the same color. "Iris? Iris, hey, look at me! She's already dead! Stop!" 

The ice broke apart, and so did pieces of Desiri's body. Her Identity Choker was a casualty as well, which shocked her body. Any pieces of her body no longer constrained by ice jolted and flailed and released more blood onto the floor, causing the kids to step back. "We should go." Spire grabbed his glowing friend's hand and ran out of the room.