Chapter Text
It is all over, O’Keeffe thinks. He is no match for ALLMIND’s new candidate.
He knew it before they started trading bullets, of course. He was not exactly appointed V.III for his battle prowess. Sure, his rank in ALLMIND’s virtual arena is not all that terrible, but baseline competence in combat simulation doesn’t necessarily translate into reality. He, for one, has never been good at processing stress in situations where he might actually die at a moment’s notice. Isn’t it ironic? As a triple agent, his life is always on the line, every waking or sleeping hour, but he has managed just fine. So why is the fog in his head so thick right now? The alarm blares twice as the enemy AC fires their shoulder-mounted grenade cannon. He reflexively quick boosts to dodge, but fails to watch where he is going, and stumbles right into a cluster of missiles that has been fired earlier.
Maybe it is a pain thing, he reflects as he swallows a mouthful of foamy saliva, tasting faintly of blood. Trudging through life is miserable enough on its own, but the pain of a migraine brought on by sleep deprivation can barely compare to that of a concussion caused by multiple simultaneous missile hits.
So this is truly his end, then. It is quite frankly overdue. After all, the only reason he was able to dispatch the run-of-the-mill assassins that ALLMIND had previous sent, was that he managed to maintain access to the backdoor he had built into ALLMIND’s system even after the not so omniscient AI became aware of his betrayal. Knowing beforehand which seedy gun for hire had taken up on ALLMIND’s bounty, he prepared specifically for each encounter. But no amount of combat data analysis was going to magically turn him into a dueling ace capable of responding in kind to the vicious attacks of Rubicon’s hellhound.
Believe it or not, the fight didn’t start out with him getting torn apart in midair. The mercenary known as Raven was initially cautious in their approach, keeping at a relatively high altitude to survey the environment, firing only a few tentative volleys of missiles, concealing stray shots from the burst rifle behind misty exhaust trails. Perhaps they wanted to test him out first. Perhaps they were mistrustful of ALLMIND, wary of the possibility of a trap. It didn’t matter. Soon enough they would bare their fangs to him, no doubt.
So he started talking, while he could still form the words.
He didn’t believe for a moment that he might simply persuade the enemy pilot into seeing things from his perspective, but he tried nonetheless. And he was even being honest; he meant what he said. A rare occurrence, if not a decisive failure, for a spy.
He was not ready to die yet.
He still wanted to remain human, despite it all.
Perhaps the presumption that his lecturing would fall on deaf ears was exactly what made him willing to let those unnecessarily genuine words slip in the first place. Or perhaps it was the sight of that burst rifle in LOADER 4’s right hand, he thought, smiling bitterly as he braced himself for the incoming onslaught. It didn’t take long for the independent mercenary to realize that there was no trap, and V.III O’Keeffe had no trick up his sleeve.
The MA-J-200 RANSETSU-RF is a burst rifle developed by the Rubiconian corporation BAWS. Since the first day of the planet’s liberation movement, the rifle has been a stolid yet dependable companion to tenacious revolutionaries operating across the frozen hellscape of their beloved home. In O’Keeffe’s mind, the weapon performs best on an agile lightweight frame, with arms that boast high firearm specialization. The steady attack power and impact potential of the weapon make it decently versatile, adept at applying pressure from range as well as delivering critical damage in close quarters when fired with precision. Elcano’s FIRMEZA frame is a well-suited setup that immediately jumps into mind. Unconventional, yet similarly effective, is Schneider’s NACHTREIHER, despite the automatic connection between Schneider’s fixation on aerodynamics and the energy weapons produced by its parent company.
VE-46A, however, is not a pair of arms that can bring out the best performance of RANSETSU-RF. Neither are the tetrapod VP-424 legs. Not enough continual output when acting as support fire from afar, not enough burst power to overwhelm an enemy up close. When he first equipped the RANSETSU-RF to BARREN FLOWER’s right hand years ago, he did not exactly do it to give himself an edge in battle. Rather, by committing to a BAWS weapon, he was making a silent promise to someone who, at the time, was at a distance so faraway that words meant little and couldn’t be depended upon.
It was uncharacteristically brash and naive of him, to believe that the choice of his right hand weapon could speak louder than words. No, it was downright unlike him, to take on the risk of another Vesper’s suspicion just to make a point. But, given the way things were, he needed—or at least he thought he needed—to clarify where he stood, in a way that only his distant correspondent could understand. He trusted that his “old friend” would be able to surmise from his actions sentiments he would never put into words— if you do decide to entrust your people’s future to me, my betrayal should not be something that you have to fear.
Good thing that the only Vesper who paid avid attention to what types of guns his peers were sporting was a man completely disinterested in politics. Still, despite fully expecting to be accosted by Freud for his sudden switch to Rubiconian weaponry, O’Keeffe was not ready for what his commander had to say.
One day, as O’Keeffe walked into the garage shared by high-rank Vespers, he was greeted by a relaxed voice that he had yet to become accustomed to hearing. “Good day, V.III,” said the ever elusive V.I Freud as he leaned over the railing on the section of catwalk directly in front of BARREN FLOWER, “Fun new toy you’ve got there.”
“It is not a toy, V.I,” O’Keeffe’s response was dry and terse. He must avoid indulging his superior’s whimsy at all cost.
Freud turned around and shot him a quick glance. To O’Keeffe’s surprise, he saw no sign of malice in Freud’s dark, scarred eyes, only a noncommittal curiosity. “Sure, whatever,” Freud shrugged and turned back to examine BARREN FLOWER, “I was just wondering why you picked the BAWS burst rifle of all things.”
O’Keeffe was prepared for the question. “The same reason that I adopted Furlong’s container missile launcher,” he stated plainly, “I wanted to expand the range of damage types that BARREN FLOWER can deal.”
Freud did not turn back to face him, but he could see a few contorted expressions pass over his commander’s face. Good, O’Keeffe thought. The best possible outcome of this talk was to appear completely incompetent in front of Freud, so that the latter would no longer be interested in striking up a conversation with him about his AC build.
Eventually, Freud straightened up from the railing, and stretched his arms as he yawned. O’Keeffe was half expecting a rant on how AC combat “doesn’t work that way”, but that was not what Freud went on to say.
“A word of advice, V.III,” Freud crossed his arms in front of his chest, still looking at BARREN FLOWER rather than O’Keeffe, “you were running two plasma rifles before, right? You should go back to that. This weapon, RANSETSU-RF,” he glanced at O’Keeffe again as he spoke, “it’s not made for someone like you.”
The closing statement has been haunting O’Keeffe ever since.
Not made for someone like you.
Of course Freud was right. O’Keeffe has never had any trouble admitting to himself that Freud was right. But he has only just realized how right Freud was as he finds himself on the receiving end of RANSETSU-RF’s bullets, doled out by a fighter who understands this gun.
How it hurts. His mind is lulling, failing to keep up with the rhythm of the duel. He can barely avoid the missiles and grenades, and has no bandwidth to account for shots from the RANSETSU-RF in Raven’s right hand, which always seem to catch him as he is about to run out of energy. The rifle bullets are eating into BARREN FLOWER’s steel flesh and the ends of his nerves. He tries to block out shots directed at his cockpit with the bulk of the VE-46A arms; the NACHTREIHER core can be a fragile thing. He is unsure how a stray bullet hasn’t punctured a weak point and blown his brains out yet.
The futility of it all.
Look at Raven’s movement. O’Keeffe has never considered the C-2000 series of frame parts by RaD to be particularly viable for combat, or a good fit for RANSETSU-RF, for that matter. But LOADER 4 is weaving through his missiles and rifle shots with ease, all the while steadily wearing him down, pressuring him into backing away endlessly.
Must avoid being forced into a corner, O’Keeffe thinks, eyeing the PB-033M ASHMEAD in their left hand. The last time he was unfortunately caught in the pile bunker’s range, it took out the entire elbow joint on the left arm of his AC, and he could do nothing but watch in disbelief as the severed segment fell into the depth below, along with the plasma rifle, still clutched in hand.
Really, why is he even trying at this point? It is only a matter of time before the mercenary retracts the bloodied steel pile from the wrecks of BARREN FLOWER’s core. He breathes out shakily, feeling the fog in his head intensify. There is no way out but death.
He has never expected to fight an AC wielding a RANSETSU-RF, much less die to one.
Someone once told him that the massive firearm was the namesake of a Japanese poet. One of those oblivious little figures in the distant past, who composed aesthetic linked verses in a time where humanity were trapped firmly on Earth. O’Keeffe once thought it a miracle that the name of such a seemingly irrelevant character would be remembered after more than a millennium had passed, carried across stars and galaxies to take root in the motley culture of an isolated planetary settlement. But perhaps the meaning of the name struck a chord with Rubiconians. For “Ransetsu” was a combination of two parts: “Ran (嵐)”, meaning storm, and “Setsu (雪)”, meaning snow.
He will never forget the eyes of the person who revealed the allusion to him. The frank, unguarded expression in those eyes always makes him think of clear skies. Time after time, he finds himself dazed in moments of distraction, imagining seeing the same eyes through the veil of a snow storm—the pure and intense kind, occurring only in the mountains of Rubicon 3.
He feels strangely calm as his thoughts meander. “Life on Rubicon sure does suck, huh,” he mutters to the enemy pilot through the broadcast channel, “Don’t tell me you like it here.”
LOADER 4 pauses in their near constant movement and fires another burst of charged RANSETSU-RF shots towards his core, but BARREN FLOWER has neither the energy needed for a dodge, nor the time to turn. O’Keeffe swallows the acid in his mouth and, without deliberation, toggles VP-424 out of hover.
There is nothing underneath him save the unknown abyss of Watchpoint Alpha. He needs to boost once and let the generator recover some energy, he thinks, but his tense pupils are still fixated on the image of his would-be killer, who has just started assault boosting towards him right as the rifle bullets tear through BARREN FLOWER’s head part and cut off his main visual feed. He moves his finger to press the quick boost button, but before the movement comes out, he feels a heavy kick connecting, and his mind goes blank from the explosion of pain.
There is a visible dent on the inner wall of his cockpit, and blood on the inside of his visor. His brain fog is taking on a red tint, and the organs in his abdomen might as well have been rearranged. It takes a moment before he is able to hear the screeching of the ACS overload alarm and, at the same time, the plunk of the pile bunker’s firing hammer being primed.
He smiles in spite of the sensation of blood and spit sticking to his face, and starts mumbling to himself. He has no idea he’d be this talkative in the face of death. “Maybe now… I’ll get some sleep…” he closes his eyes, “See you on the other side, Rusty.”
The pile bunker connects, scattering countless pieces of metallic debris as it tears through its target. O’Keeffe feels on his skin a rain of sparks from the cut wires, enveloping him in an overwhelming warmth. The warmth of metal fatigue, of electric components short circuiting, of his own blood, the fog in his head turning a blinding crimson. He finally realizes that part of the noisy headache he feels must have been caused by the residue of Coral burnt into his brain reverberating with the intense activity from the 4th Gen enemy pilot. But it hardly matters. The pain shall trouble him no longer, he thinks, feeling half of his torso disappear into shiny streams of red.