Operation story: 6-16

Operation

Story

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Characters
Doctor Amiya Blaze GreyThroat FrostNova
Backgrounds
1 2

Before operation

Summary No matter how touching words may be, they ultimately are weak and frail in the face of iron wills. The conversation ends in battle.
<Background 1>
[FrostNova walks to face the Rhodes Island team with black icy crystals floating around her.]
Blaze	She doesn't.... look right... The Originium crystals floating in the air beside her.... How is that possible?
Amiya	It's repulsive dissociation...!
Blaze	Did the Originium crystals permeate her skin to form black ice crystals along with the water molecules in the air? Permeate....? Permeation?! ........Shit........ Shiit!
Amiya	Blaze!
Blaze	Doesn't it hurt! Doesn't that hurt her?!! Don't you feel pain, white rabbit? Enough... That's enough... Why are you doing this? Stop it!
[Suddenly Amiya felt a great pressure in her mind.]
Amiya	Mmmng..... Nnnng!
Blaze	Amiya? I don't like the look on your face.... Wait! Amiya, don't do it! Don't reach into her mind!
Amiya	I didn't... I'm not using Arts! But her emotions.... Her emotions are pouring into my consciousness...!
FrostNova	........ I've been waiting for you. You want to kill Reunion's commander, don't you? Now she's standing right in front of you. Here's your target. Get hot, burning hot.
Blaze	Hot...?
Amiya	Is that.... Her emotions...!
Blaze	Team, stand by! FrostNova, we don't need to waste our breath here!
FrostNova	Lungmen exiled the Infected without a care as to where they could go. They are not coming. Even though there were still thousands of Infected people in the city.... Lungmen resigned them to their fate. No one will interfere in our fight.
GreyThroat	So many of us.... against you alone?
FrostNova	What else?
Blaze	Honestly, we're a little outnumbered. No one should be stupid enough to take an avalanche head on. But actually, head on against an avalanche, I think I'd come out on top? But you're one of those.... like where all the cold in the world gathers up into a single focal point. I thought your Yeti Squad was pushing your abilities to the limit, making your Arts more powerful and effective. I was wrong. They didn't make you stronger. It's your Arts that made them stronger.
FrostNova	As long as my brothers and sisters are with me, I can't risk hurting them by releasing my full power. But now. They're all dead. There are no living things left around me.
[All of a sudden...]
<Background 2>
[...the entire underground chamber froze as FrostNova calmly stands.]
GreyThroat	Hmm! The temperature has dropped dramatically.... Not good! Such a low temperature.... it's thrown off my instruments!
FrostNova	I no longer have any reason to contain the winter within me.
Blaze	What the hell? Does Reunion have its own walking Catastrophe? What is the lowest temperature Originium Arts has ever achieved? I've got a feeling she's breaking records one after another right now... FrostNova, I'll ask you again, are you serious about this?
FrostNova	Anything else you want to say?
Blaze	Yeah. ——Knock it off, white rabbit, you're going to get yourself killed.
FrostNova	Hmph.
Blaze	You're really going to die! You're strong enough already! You don't have to push it this hard! You don't have to do this to get a fight! If you want to fight, fight all you want after this! I don't want to see Infected killing each other! There's no reason for us to fight to the death here!
FrostNova	No.
Amiya	Blaze!
Blaze	Ready up! Pfft!
[FrostNova uses her ice Arts to freeze Blaze's hand.]
Blaze	She froze my fingernails. They're cracking. You really want to kill us?
FrostNova	I have a reason. As commander, I've lost. ——but as a warrior, I'm still in the fight.
[Amiya contact other R.I. units in the vicinity.]
Amiya	...Amiya-1, Blaze-4, all units, do you copy? Exit the area. Now. You too, Gavial! Because you can't come back to save us if you don't get out now!
Blaze	Who's the best sniper in our squad?
GreyThroat	........Me.
Blaze	You might die. Are you sure you want to volunteer?
GreyThroat	I'm sure. I am the best, at the moment.
Blaze	Okay, GreyThroat, you stay. Everyone else, get the hell out. Hurry!
Doctor	Why did you withdraw your team during a decisive battle?
Blaze	Up against FrostNova, the number of squads doesn't make a difference. They have no way to protect themselves. And she can kill in an instant. There's not much you can do, even with someone as skilled as Rangers. It's not the archery, it's the materials.
GreyThroat	My crossbow seems to be useless already.
Blaze	It'll be good for a bit. But you decide whether it works or not.... If it was up to me, I'd take a few shots at her with Rhodes Island's main guns. That'd be pretty helpful. Or conjure up a dozen fireteam to spray ammo and Arts into her to see what she can take. She'll run out of steam eventually. But... maybe not before we do.
Amiya	Did you bring a tourniquet?
Blaze	You should ask me if I have any anticoagulants with me, the kind that won't mess up.
Amiya	Blaze.... ...You asked earlier why FrostNova could endure the pain of Originium crystals piercing her skin?
Blaze	........
Amiya	I know why. I can feel it..... She could endure it because the pain inside her was worse... Several times worse. ........ Now, Doctor, you need to go too.
Doctor	No. / No. / No.
Amiya	Doctor!
<Background fades out>
...Do you want to see it through...? ...To be a trustworthy Doctor...?
<Background fades in>
Doctor	I want to see it through.
Blaze	...Amiya.
Amiya	I... Dr. {nickname} is.... committed.
FrostNova	Doctor of Rhodes Island. Your decision won't do them any favors. So why do you do it?
Doctor	I told you, you can come to Rhodes Island. And I will fight shoulder to shoulder with my operators.
Amiya	I get it. Blaze, GreyThroat, Dr. {nickname}. It's going to be an uphill battle.
Blaze	Hmph. Heh heh. Check it out, white rabbit, that's our Dr. {nickname} and Amiya!
FrostNova	Oh.... ...Don't do this... Whatever. Are you ready?
Blaze	Let's get started! Forward! Explosion!
[The R.I. teams charge at FrostNova, who effortlessly repels them.]
FrostNova	A fine attack.
Blaze	——Ice blades? Pfft!
FrostNova	Kitten, do you think I'm a caster.... So frail?
Blaze	Are you serious?
FrostNova	The heat currents writhing on your saw blades are no match for my cold. You cannot stop my frost.
Blaze	I didn't underestimate you, but I didn't think.... My saw can cut through a city wall, and you can block it?
FrostNova	To me, your movements, your strength, it doesn't even register. Next we go for the throat.
Blaze	Air! Compression! Demolition!
[Blaze countered FrostNova's ice Arts with her own fire Arts.]
Blaze	*Cough*, hahahahaha, *cough*.... Pfft! That was a close call, I almost got an ice blade through my jugular! Hah, that's right. You're a warrior just like me. What do I do, Amiya? I'm running out of ideas. Time to tag you in.
GreyThroat	Amiya... My finger is getting too cold to pull the trigger. We have to end this quickly.
Amiya	........ (Her Originium Arts are a hundred times stronger than they were back in the ruins...!)
Blaze	(And she's not out of tricks yet!)
Amiya	(It won't be enough.... If I don't loosen my rings, everyone will freeze to death!) FrostNova––
FrostNova	Don't even think about it.
Amiya	Huh? My finger?
[FrostNova froze the rings on Amiya's hand with her ice Arts.]
Amiya	Ugh.... Gah!
FrostNova	I watched your entire battle with Talulah. Tweaking these rings enhances your Arts.
Amiya	Ten rings, all of them.... Frozen?
FrostNova	You are too childish to be a warrior.
Blaze	So you chilled a few rings? You've got a mouth on you, don't you? (Huh? What the...? I turned up the heat this high and they're not melting at all?)
Amiya	Blaze.... Stop it, don't waste blood. This is..... This is a very powerful, and very fine Originium Art...! The cold stream swept along the Originium crystals and wrapped around us as we entered the area. She hit us with it before it could get cut off by your thermal currents, without us even noticing! Mmmf.... My Arts can't cut through!
FrostNova	The battle began as soon as you set foot in this room. These ten frost rings will drain your body heat and squeeze your Originium Arts. The more power you apply to them, the stronger and colder the ice crystals become. ........ Pathetic. Eruption? Energy store? Reserves? Trying to defeat me with a few tricks.... Do you know what you're up against?
Blaze	GreyThroat, piercing bolt!
GreyThroat	Roger! Six shot, ready!
FrostNova	The Talulah I knew would engineer your demise long before it all began.
Blaze	Air compression! Fire!
GreyThroat	Loose!
[GreyThroat fires a barrage of crossbow bolts at FrostNova...]
FrostNova	And now Rhodes Island is just like these bolts....
[...but she froze them all mid-flight with her ice Arts...]
Blaze	Wh....
GreyThroat	Wha...? What? Why did the bolt...? Freeze in midair?
[...and shatters them.]
FrostNova	Truly pathetic.
Blaze	(She knocked it off course with her air streams, then broke it with cold?!) (GreyThroat, what are your arrows made of?)
GreyThroat	(It's Rhodes Island standard-issue, carbon fiber hybrid aluminum.)
Blaze	(Oh no. Ugh, we're in trouble.)
FrostNova	Even, somewhat shameful.
Blaze	(Whether she knows it or not, her Arts have reached a level that's well beyond anything the damned scholars are talking about these days.)
FrostNova	Just a little pinch.... And you fall to pieces. Think about it. I'm just the leader of Yeti Squad. Reunion is controlled by the woman named Talulah who intercepted you at Chernobog and killed your friends. What do you think Talulah is...? The leader of Reunion, the Infected messiah?
Doctor	She didn't earn the title of messiah! / ........ / There's no such thing.
FrostNova	Hmph. Whatever image you have of her in your head, if she were some kind of "messiah", the old man and I wouldn't be leading "Reunion" at all. She was at first a military officer, then a warrior, and finally a leader. But she has betrayed us. The most determined and committed warrior I've ever known was actually a case of assumed identity... And her last remaining enemies are people like you who have no resolve and never had to look death in the face.
Blaze	Watch your tone, white rabbit. You're not the only one who puts her life on the line.
FrostNova	You have remorse in your eyes too.
Blaze	You don't have to tell me!
FrostNova	You're not ready to accept their deaths.
Blaze	That's enough!
[Blaze and FrostNova enters a vicious duel against each other, which ends in a stalemate.]
FrostNova	*Cough*, haha, *cough*.... Am I ready?
Blaze	*Cough*.... *Cough*!
FrostNova	I've thought about it so many times, seen them dying so many times in my nightmares, I just never thought... You're the same way, kitten. I can see that. —— "I imagined my tragic death, but I never thought it would be so lonely."
Blaze	........ You had brothers. So did I.
FrostNova	The Rhodes Island operators who fought Talulah at Chernobog were each quite heroic. The one they called Ace was a warrior tenacious to a level I've rarely seen in my life. He fought with an emotion few warriors do. ..."Sorrow."
Blaze	We're not close enough yet that I'm really comfortable talking about my old battle buddies with you.
FrostNova	Only a fighter who incessantly reflects on his battles would be concerned. He was a good warrior. As are you.
Blaze	Pfft.
FrostNova	He died alone. Are you sorry you lost him?
Blaze	Of course.
FrostNova	Do you regret not having the chance to save him?
Blaze	Absolutely!
FrostNova	Aren't you going to ask anyone? Ask. Ask that question you don't know how to form, that you don't know who to ask.
Blaze	You.....
FrostNova	"Why?"
Blaze	........
[Amiya felt a surge of emotions from FrostNova...]
Amiya	(.......Such strong emotions.... FrostNova!)
FrostNova	Why? Why wasn't I there? Why wasn't I stronger? Why didn't I stop it?
[...as the air grows colder in a rapid pace.]
GreyThroat	Ugh.... The temperature is still dropping!
Blaze	Stand by me! Her cold is so overpowering, it's all I can do to keep the air around me warm!
FrostNova	........ ...Why? Why did I fall to the ground when my brothers and sisters needed me most? They're all fools. All fools who only know how to help each other, who only want to survive, who only want a place to live. ...Why can't I even grant the wishes of a bunch of idiots? Why is Ursus so cruel to our people, and so callous to ordinary Ursus? Why is it that the little flame that could ignite the world has to be extinguished in this foreign land? Why is it that in the war we waged to put a stop to evil, I wasted more lives? *Cough*, *cough*.... Unf, *cough*, *cough*...!
Amiya	Unf.... Ugh....
FrostNova	Why did we give up our lives, *hack*, only to have achieved a lie? Why...? Why won't this world give me a little more time? "The Infected should be proud of who they are, and use the simplest means to seize justice from the world".... At first, I saw it as only a part of the Reunion ideal. Indeed, it brought strength to the Infected. They stopped thinking of themselves as the Empire's fodder.... But now I realize that the beliefs that Talulah once taught us about, the ideas that demand grassroots support, and the goals that must be constantly reinforced and corrected, are all gone. Only instigation. Only indulgence. We were thrown into the toughest of battles, with no input in the ranks, and it all came too soon.... If this is all Talulah's doing, then she deceived everyone from the very beginning.
Doctor	She may have deceived you! / ........ / Things are often not as they seem.
FrostNova	If she would take the Infected to that darkest of futures.... To complete her most wicked plan... Then her evil must be destroyed. But my brothers and sisters, the countless dead Infected and uninfected.... Nothing can bring them back. ...What made her this way?
Amiya	Ugh.... Ugh...!
FrostNova	It shouldn't be like this, it never should have been! My people.... My brothers and sisters! ——
[The air grows even colder.]
FrostNova	Amiya Do you hear that, Amiya?
Amiya	FrostNova..!
Blaze	The cold stream is too much.... She can even condense it into a form! It's blasting away my heat flow!
FrostNova	Is the cold enough to chill your body heat? Is death enough to make you squeamish? You won't, Amiya, and you can't! You can read minds, can't you, bunny? Read now, then, my rage, the heart that has been stifled by bitterness and boiled in my breast for more than a decade, and yet never given up beating! Read it, Amiya! Read it well! How much anger is there in this heart, over dead loved ones, over the corrupt Ursus, over the Infected, over the people of Ursus, in this heart that will not stop, that will not die!
Amiya	........ Did you ever hate her, Miss FrostNova?
FrostNova	...*Cough*. Heh. ........ I never hated her. Even if she was the cause of all this pain today, I have never hated her. What does hatred bring you and me? I have nothing but endless, seething rage for this despicable planet.
Amiya	......
FrostNova	How about you? Don't you have such anger in your heart? Don't you have relatives who died of Oripathy? A friend who died thanks to the indifference of this world? You haven't lost the people you depend on to survive, to give you something to live for?
Amiya	........
FrostNova	Just proclaiming a certain philosophy, just taking on a certain Art, just organizing a few teams.... Will that be enough to defeat Talulah? It's time to wake up from your fantastical dreams.
Amiya	—— I get it, Miss FrostNova. Everything that just flooded into my mind, I know what it is.
FrostNova	What's pushing Rhodes Island forward? What motivates you to keep fighting?
Blaze	Dead ahead! A huge cold stream! It's about... Just about... the shape of a dagger! If this keeps up, I'll have to surrender my back and gather the heat flow in front of me as a shield.... But her cold stream was robbing the air of its molecular vibrations. Even if I managed to form the shield, I couldn't hold it for long! Doctor, come on, you must have some idea!
Doctor	Since we can't break it, we'll just have to hold on!
Blaze	That's like saying nothing!
GreyThroat	No... The Doctor is right. FrostNova doesn't have much life left in her. If we can hold out, we win.
Blaze	What are you talking about? If we do that, she'll die!
Doctor	It was her choice, and the only chance she left us!
FrostNova	What about your choices? In the face of the evil that must be destroyed, in the face of the betrayer who has usurped the ideals of the Infected, what is in your heart? Why does it beat? *Cough*, *cough*.... If you can't even defeat me, how are you going to face her? How are you going to lead the countless Infected? How are you going to fight against this malignant world!!!
Amiya	FrostNova... Thank you. But I can't be mad at you.
FrostNova	You..... Are wasting my time.
Amiya	No, FrostNova... I know what I'm going to do. I can't really read minds. And reading hearts doesn't mean I can understand someone better than people who don't have this ability. I just can't refuse.... I can't shut out the emotions that pour out of you. Flooding my mind with pain and worry, and.... Anger. You're sober and calm, but the anger burns so hot that I want to pull back... But I can't. FrostNova, I know exactly what I have to do. I will not refuse you.
FrostNova	........
Amiya	Miss FrostNova, I felt it.
FrostNova	Why are you crying?
Amiya	I.... FrostNova... You.....
FrostNova	No. Wipe your tears! You will not cry before your enemy. Amiya, tell me your answer.
Amiya	........
Doctor	...Go ahead, Amiya
Amiya	Dr. {nickname}... ...Mhm. "If we must fight, then we fight to the end." Doctor, we are going to fight FrostNova. Only one side walks out of here.
FrostNova	Yes. You will now... fight me. Only one of us leaves.
FrostNova	If you can defeat me, it means some will be able to survive——
<Background 2>
FrostNova	I am willing to join Rhodes Island. I am willing to fight together with you against the enemies of the Infected, your way. This is my burden to bear.
Doctor	I hope you keep your word.
FrostNova	When I make a promise, I keep it.
Amiya	And.... Miss FrostNova. The Infected don't need anyone to lead them. We're just fighting for the same beliefs, not for any one person. Never for any one person.
FrostNova	——That's right. Corruption must be eradicated. Defeat me, and defeat Talulah. What are you?
Amiya	I can be anyone.
FrostNova	Who are you fighting for?
Amiya	For everyone.
FrostNova	Good. Amiya... *Hack*.... Thank you. "Even time itself will freeze here.... ♪"
Blaze	The cold is moving in on us! GreyThroat!
GreyThroat	Ready!
Amiya	Doctor, stay by my side. I'll try to protect you.
Doctor	FrostNova!
FrostNova	You will die here in battle, and I will extinguish your absurd fantasies. Or, defeat me. ...Defeat me. And show me hope.