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For a moment, she did not process the sounds of hushed, pained groaning coming from behind her, only recognising the incessant buzzing of the security camera displays that she had become so accustomed to. Still, she hardly acknowledged any of it for now, preoccupied with her scavenged Sentinel prey.
She brought down the axe. Once—clunk. Again, more forcefully—crunch. Promptly, the Worker’s head detached from its neck, teetering momentarily on the side of the table where she had laid its limp body before splashing into a bucket, where it bobbed atop a glossy pool of oil.
A rustling sound told her that whatever intruder she had previously heard stirring was likely now completely alert. And not a moment later, her suspicion was confirmed by grunts of struggle and strain, a telltale sign of wrestling against constraints. And how strange it was that part of her should want to think a quality of that voice gave her a feeling of distant familiarity; one she couldn’t quite place. Of course, she disregarded the idea. It was entirely insignificant. And stupid.
Observing the corpse for a moment longer, she noted that this Worker had been female. Maybe it was someone she had once known, maybe not. Shame, too bad. Blots of dried oil were spattered around teeth marks denting the metal, from which she inferred it had been scavenged and preyed upon long before she found it.
“Sentinels picked at this one,” she said absently, gently pulling on a newly exposed wire poking out from the throat. She supposed the intruder might listen to her musings—she seemed to have no problem with making her wakefulness known. When the only response she received was the whirring sound of the drone blinking, she diverted her attention.
Swinging her tail forward and tightening its grip on her blade, she took the serrated edge to the extended piece of wire and deftly sliced a portion of it off, then took her cut of the wire between her fingers and examined it momentarily. Not much use, but she tied it around her helmet’s left antler and quickly flicked on the lightbulb next to it anyhow.
“I try and not damage good parts,” she added (not that there was a lot to salvage from the corpse), turning to face the intruder with a wide, opportunistic grin, but hardly actually glancing at her. “‘Course,” she continued, scurrying away to get a look at her other captive, “some parts are more valuable than others, ain’t they?”
In one swift movement, she pulled back the curtain obscuring the table where she had manacled one of the drone’s accomplices. And the moment she saw the two of them lock eyes, she was overtaken with the same glorious hunger as when she first saw their little group… When she had seen the second intruder’s pristine, shining metal, her gorgeous wingspan, her headband lined with pods full of acid… And it wasn’t only her either—there were two entire Disassembly Drones here. So much to dismantle, so much value to each and every perfect strand of silver hair she could pluck from their disembodied heads… The Disassembly Drone she had just unveiled might have spoken then, but if she did, it went unheard, as electric greed ran through every wire in her body… and once again she raised her axe high above the drone’s neck, and—
“Woah, hey—”
The spell broke. She dropped the axe heavily to her side, her face dropping with possibly even more weight. Was that the first intruder speaking? She had to choose now, of all times, to find her voice?
“—Cut that thing up and you’re gonna get a big, creepy worm.”
Again, she hardly registered the rest of what the drone said. Because something struck her mentally like a club to the back of the head when she spoke. The disgustingly snarky quality to that tone of voice… it stopped her in her tracks. She forgot all about the Disassembly Drone, still laying subdued right there for the taking. A face appeared in her mind’s eye, a vague, hazy shape swimming momentarily in her vision, a beautiful shade of violet that had haunted all her strongest memories for so many years…
It almost pulled her in, almost tore her away from the real world. If she hadn’t shaken herself, she may have been lost to reality. But… no, she was just… desperate, tormented. By her loss. Her loss of everything. There was nothing left. Of course some wandering randomer had nothing to do with the drone whose presence she swore had lingered in every empty space of this laboratory since the day she left her here… alone.
What did the girl even just say, anyway?
Oh, right. Something about body-rebuilding worm-witches.
She crawled across the ground to the oven where she and Beau preserved the hearts of all the Sentinels’ previous victims. Perhaps an uneducated surface slicker would like to know there were ways to neutralise such a threat.
“Nah, heat keeps ‘em sluggish.” She tried to sound unfazed as she waved her hand at the heat-doped cores tapping lethargically against the glass of their jars—and fit for eatin’. “Ain’t our first rodeo.”
As she slammed the oven door shut again, for the first time since capturing this drone, she turned her head to properly look at her captive. The first thing she found was a pair of bright purple eyes staring back (though one was squinting beneath a large ring of malfunctioning pixels where her head must have hit the floor), the brows on the intruder’s visor furrowed in what she assumed was a combination of perplexity, disgust, and mounting apprehension.
Once again, she was stunned into silence by that ominous familiarity. Because the second thing she noticed about her was that vibrant purple, side-swept bob. Even when it was half-covered by the grey beanie the girl was wearing, she knew… she knew someone with an almost identical head of hair. And she was sure she knew who. But— It had to be a coincidence… surely…
“Okay,” the intruder spoke up, dragging out the word with evident unease and lifting an arm as high as her constraints would allow—and a holographic sort of glyph spun into materialisation above the palm of her hand, “that’s enough of this—”
And, presumably, the sedative was doing its job of disrupting her control over herself, and her… apparent witchcraft, as a glitch in her vocoder stuttered the final syllable, distracting her so the vaguely familiar glyph disappeared as soon as she had conjured it. Oh, she knew what this was. She knew all about this.
Nevertheless, the vermin was persistent, straining her outstretched hand in an effort to fight back that could only be pitifully applauded. Each flicker of purple that sparked from her fingertips… she saw her face reflected in every one. Witchcraft… witches… she knew a witch… Or, had.
It taunted her. Tainted her mind as another feeble spark flew and she saw it like a fleeting mirror, reflecting two numbers at her that echoed with betrayal, fury, and anguish— 002.
She knew what they meant. No, no she didn’t. She didn’t know anyone with that ID number, and she never had.
Surely this wasn’t her, finally back again? With… with Disassembly Drones? No, she didn’t exist.
Not anymore.
Not since the last time the humans ever summoned her, and she last saw the look on her face as she left her for the final time without saying goodbye, and she never saw her again. But now this drone sitting before her looked so identical to her that she couldn’t fight the strangled, tortured giggles escaping her throat as she crawled across the floor towards her, to end the torment the mere sight of her was inflicting.
It couldn’t be what she thought. She was only another intruder who thought she could make her way into places that were far too dangerous for any regular feeble drone. This one just had… the same witchcraft-y powers she was all too well-acquainted with. Coincidentally.
“Dealt with witches ‘fore, too. Though…” Supporting herself on the edge of the operating table, she again brought her tail forward, this time to inspect the ID number engraved on the choker around the drone’s neck. She slid her knife underneath the choker and pulled it slightly into the light, and—
Her smile vanished as quickly as her laughter. She could’ve brought up the most recent drone heart she had eaten in the absence of other sustenance.
002.
Her eyes moved rapidly up to the intruder’s, where they widened as she returned a bewildered violet gaze. All the pieces that had been forcing themselves together in her mind clicked into place instantly.
Nori.
It all made sense. In the worst possible way. It meant her suspicions hadn’t been entirely wrong. As her ire met that terrified purple gaze, she now understood why this particular intruder had felt so different and yet so familiar to her. This was the godforsaken offspring of that wretched, traitorous angel.
“Ain’t seen ‘02 since she left us to die.” Left me to die.
She didn’t want to imagine it. And yet, here the proof was, right in front of her. Nori had abandoned her, with as good as no worthwhile company or protection, and run off with someone else… someone who wasn't her. She had known all along that it should have been her. And yet she was glaring directly into the eyes of the wrong outcome. The spawn of the love of her life and the lover she chose over Alice.
She staggered a few steps back from the operating table, all the memories swarming back and taking the form of pure agonised rage that she directed towards Nori’s daughter in the most hateful glare she may have ever cast. Her mouth twitched upwards in temptation to form an incredulous smile.
“You don’t get it, small fry,” she breathed, voice shaking, “I loved her. I loved her so much. She was my pretty little psycho.”
“Wha— Loved who, you sicko?” The girl’s eyes were darting to and fro now—god, she even spoke exactly like her—until something seemed to occur to her as she glanced down at the number on her choker. “Wait— my MOM?”
Alice’s entire body convulsed at hearing Nori referred to that way. It was all wrong. She couldn’t bear to hear some kid she’d never seen before calling her Nori mom. She thrust the knife again to the kid’s throat. “Who’s your daddy, darlin’?” she sputtered as another brief fit of giggles overtook her. “I’ll get him next! She’s mine!”
“Why the hell would I tell you anything about my dad?” the girl shrieked back at her, and suddenly her own palm was tightly clasped around Alice’s knife, a futile effort to pull it away from her throat. Alice only grinned in amusement; at least, until she was jolted by a sharp pain in her fingers—looking down, her eyes widened at the sight of Nori’s rabid little brat biting down as hard as she could on Alice’s hand.
And yet, she still could only laugh in shock in her attempts to pull her hand away—but the girl wasn’t giving in. In fact, Alice realised her laughter was being echoed back as the kid continued to clamp her hand between her teeth, and she too giggled in that way that was so excruciatingly reminiscent of her mother.
“What in tarnation? Hold it, squirt—” When she finally pulled her hand away, she ignored the snap as it came painfully free and lunged immediately for a radio transceiver—before noticing a fingertip missing from her outstretched hand. That little…
Whatever. She shook herself and, using her fully intact hand, desperately pressed down the button on the transceiver. “Beau,” she cried, and heard a faint, tinny echo of her voice from the radio in a nearby room, “we’ve got Nori’s kid here!”
Apparently, the kid in question was not pleased with her saying this, because Alice hissed through her teeth as she was bitten again with the fierceness of a wild Sentinel (if not quite with the same severity), this time on her forearm. She glanced briefly at the magnet clinging to the girl’s head before turning back to the transceiver, raising her voice over the continuous laughter. “Need more sedatives, it’s bitey.”
After a while longer of wrestling with the metal jaws locked around her wrist, the girl finally pulled herself away from Alice, jolting up in apparent alarm. Alice followed her gaze, relaxing a little at the sight of Beau scuttling through the doorway with three more sedatives in his claws, which he promptly magnetised to their captive’s head. Phew, maybe that’ll settle the rabies.
Except that, in the same moment, the girl forcefully spat Alice’s severed fingertip directly into Beau’s visor. Right, she should get on replacing that.
“How’d you know my mom?” the girl asked a moment later, in a tone of voice Alice hadn’t heard from her yet. She sounded almost normal. Like those rare moments when Nori acted… sane. The only times her eyes were that pale purple colour, like her daughter’s.
How did I know her, huh? She scoffed to herself, fighting an urge to turn around and face her. Wouldn’t Nori’s perfect little girl like to know?
Still, the girl couldn’t keep her mouth shut for more than a second. “Was she cool? She didn’t suck, did she?”
How dare— Alice scowled to herself, continuing her disinterested façade with great effort. Trying hard to feign ignoring the girl, she screwed a spare segment onto the open joint of her finger, flexing it until she was satisfied that it was properly attached. Still, the thought remained. How dare she even suggest that her mother “sucked”?
Your mom was the finest drone I ever knew, chit. That fair, crazy heart was meant to be all mine… In that moment, after all those years, every intricate detail of Nori’s face flashed into her vision, like it hadn’t been even a day since she last saw her. All this time, and she could still remember so vividly, exactly what her beautiful traitor had looked like.
She couldn’t tolerate the torment this girl’s mere presence was inflicting on her mind any longer. A hand pruner sitting innocently on the counter seemed to wink up at her, as if it were beckoning her to take it; she snatched it up, a vengeful grin spreading across her face, before she scooted back over to the operating table. Let’s see how you like it. At least you’ll never be able to break any hearts like your mom broke mine.
She rested a hand on the side of the table to support herself and leant forward, only to realise that Beau was still cumbersomely standing over the drone too, awkwardly holding out a latex glove-covered hand as if he was expecting Alice to assign him more work—as if he didn’t have the other captives to deal with.
Alice waved a dismissive hand at him. “Back to the others,” she demanded, half to get him out of her way, and half because she wouldn’t put it past him to let them escape. And she couldn’t afford to lose the other Disassembly Drone. Or the one who, after a few moments of initial confusion, she had been shocked out of her wits to realise was almost undeniably the first human she had seen down in these labs in decades. (She still wasn’t one hundred percent certain, but she would have Beau determine the colour of the blood it spilled for her eventually.)
After the tapping sounds of Beau scuttling back out of the room had faded away, she returned her attention to the bundle of purple malice crouching on the operating table before her. Oh, she had been asking her about Nori.
And she was still glowering up at her, her face bearing a coldness that perfectly reflected how Nori used to look after those experiments the humans loved to conduct on her. So much so, in fact, that Alice found herself chuckling at it.
“You’re a lot like her, I’ll say,” she declared with fond reminiscence, swivelling the pruner in one hand and lifting the girl’s finger with the other, and slowly closing in on her, observing each nuance of her face before she was dead and gone. “‘Cept her yellow eyes…”
That was the biggest difference she could immediately notice between them. Only on some occasions had she ever seen the fluorescent lights of Nori’s eyes any colour other than yellow, and when she did, it was always light purple, a little like her hair. Her voice was different on those occasions, too. And she acted differently… more like her kid was acting. She used to prefer that Nori. Not that she minded either version of her, because the yellow seemed to be some kind of byproduct of the witch-y stuff, and Alice could recall always thinking they were the closest thing to the beauty of a sunset she would ever see.
She brought the hand pruner around the farthest joint of the kid’s finger, the same fingertip she had severed from Alice’s own hand earlier. Nori would never forgive her—this was her daughter. But Nori had left her. She went and ran off with someone else… had a kid with that someone else… Alice didn’t care what Nori thought of her anymore. If she even remembered she existed.
If she was even still alive.
It hurt so much to realise that she didn’t even know. It filled her with such vitriolic hatred and injustice and conflicting desires to never think a negative thought about her, all she could do was press the blades together, force her pain onto something else.
She was so deadset on hearing the sound of crushing metal that she didn’t take notice of the look on the girl’s face, so distracted that she was fleetingly taken by surprise when she snatched her hand back and batted away the utensil.
“Easy, creep, you’ve got the wrong—”
Oh, no, you don’t. Before the girl could finish talking, she smashed the knife on her tail as hard as she could into the back of her other palm. Keep it down, now, kid.
Alice lowered herself down to the other drone’s level, eyeing her reflection in the blade’s metal, while the girl heaved laborious, agonised breaths. Of course she didn’t have the wrong drone. The scene seemed to come to life before her, as though the knife’s surface were a mirror into the past; that day, when Nori had come closer than ever to going rogue and causing mass homicide, and Yeva was the one the humans chose to bring her back to her senses.
“Nori, right?” she said to the girl’s hand, in an effort to deflect how the memory had jabbed at her heart. “Sure thought imploding all them folks was pretty slick.”
And of course Alice had to hear about how the both of them escaped through word of mouth, after they were gone. Now she was truly the only one left here. She was never anyone’s first priority.
Especially not Nori’s. Evidently. What a bitch.