The air is thick, like old breath. Vael's suit pushes through a choke of thorny vines, their tips scraping against the reinforced bio-plate shell. The convoy behind him grinds forward, the tread of heavy vehicles crushing the overgrown asphalt. The world here is broken, drowned in green. Overgrown structures loom, skeletal outlines swallowed by rampant growth.
Vael's internal systems hum low, registering the organic decay that saturates the atmosphere. His visor filters the dim light, painting the choked street in shades of sickly green and brown. A scent invades the suit's filtration—wet earth, rot, and something else, metallic and cloying. He sweeps his arm, the integrated comms crackling static. Nothing. Just the slow drag of the armored vehicles.
"GRAVEMIND-7, status," the convoy leader's voice cuts through the comms. "Any anomalies ahead?".
Vael's response is clipped. "Clear path, leader. Bio-signatures: high ambient organic presence. No hostiles registered." His suit's external scanners confirm the assessment. He registers Zara Kim's Culex suit in the rear, providing high-mobility cover, her profile sharp against the collapsing skyline. Anna Reeves, the Mournclad pilot, moves near the medical transport, her movements precise, efficient.
The convoy passes a cluster of abandoned homes, their roofs caved in, walls bleeding moss. Strange, peeling organic matter clings to their sides, a muted brown against the green onslaught. It looks like dried skin, or old, flayed layers. Vael's suit registers a faint, unsettling echo from the bio-matter. Not a threat, more like a lingering presence. His neural crown pulses, a low thrumming behind his eyes.
"Hold," Sarah Chen's voice cuts in, sharp, immediate. Her Ravelin suit, an immovable wall of obsidian plates, pivots toward a ruined house. "I'm picking up residual heat signatures inside that structure. Possible survivors.".
Vael's systems process her report. Civilian protocols dictate a sweep. His own algorithms calculate tactical efficiency. The heat signatures are faint, barely clinging to the thermal spectrum. "Low probability of viability," Vael states, his voice flat. "Continue push. Maintain schedule."
Sarah's helm cants, an almost imperceptible shift that broadcasts her disapproval. "GRAVEMIND-7, we don't leave people." Her Ravelin is built for defense, for protecting. Her survivor's guilt, Vael remembers, drives her empathy for the unseen civilian fates. It is a weakness. It is human.
"Standard procedure, Pilot Rask," the convoy leader interjects, backing Vael. "Time is critical. Scans are for primary threats. Residuals are non-actionable."
Sarah remains silent, but her Ravelin suit continues to face the ruined house. Vael feels a subtle pressure, a shift in the air that is not atmospheric. It is the friction of their priorities, of his hardening focus against her human concern. His suit system registers her dissent as an inefficiency, a vulnerability. His internal monologue is not a voice, but a cold, predatory focus.
Anna Reeves, near the medical transport, pulls her Mournclad's helm back, revealing her face. Faint self-harm scars spiderweb her wrists and neck. She gazes at the ruined houses, her eyes wide, jumpy. Every rustle of the overgrown vegetation makes her flinch. The anxiety radiating from her is almost a tangible thing, polluting the comms with a silent hum of fear. Vael's suit notes her elevated heart rate, her shallow breathing. He processes it as data: trauma, a liability.
A sudden jolt. Vael's vision glitches. The overgrown wall of the abandoned house blurs, then twists. For a searing second, he sees not wood and decay, but sterile, white walls. Lab equipment, glinting under harsh light. Fragmented images flood his internal systems: metal trays, something dripping. Then, a flash of something fleshy, impossibly warped, strapped down. The sound is not real, but a high-pitched whine that scrapes against his auditory processors.
His suit's internal nervous feedback flares, a burning sensation behind his eyes. His vision snaps back, the green decay returning with a sickening lurch. The air chokes him. It is not air. It is a memory. Not his. His father's experiments. The Fracture. The suit is processing corrupted data. He feels a brief, disorienting hallucination, the sensation of warped flesh overlaid on his surroundings. He clenches his armored fist, the knuckles cracking. Maintain control.
"GRAVEMIND-7?" Sarah's voice, sharper now. "Your suit readings are unstable. Are you taking feedback?".
Vael forces his response. "Negative. Atmospheric distortion." A lie. His internal systems scream. The Memory Leak intensifies, pulling at the edges of his consciousness. The suit battles to process the overwhelming data, causing brief sensory distortion. It feels like his mind is a battlefield, and he is losing ground. The designation "Subject Rask.09-V" flashes, a silent accusation in his processing unit. He fights to suppress it. "Vael Rask." The name is a whisper, a desperate mantra to ground himself against the suit's unnerving presence. It provides little anchor now.
The convoy pushes deeper. The vegetation here pulses faintly, a subtle, rhythmic throb that Vael's sensitive suit picks up. The organic matter on the derelict homes is thicker, almost alive. It is not merely plant growth. It is bio-matter, twisting and clinging, a vast, unseen network. The Thrashgrove. Its pervasive influence is felt.
Vael sees a movement. Not the wind. A dark, skittering shape, low to the ground, scurries between two collapsed sheds. Too fast to be human. A Scarp Maw gorebreed variant, blending seamlessly with the debris. It twitches, then vanishes. Vael registers it, a fleeting threat. Just a scout. A dry thought: Another welcome party.
Sarah's suit optics track the movement too. "Contact. Scarp Maw." She raises a shield arm, ready.
Vael's systems confirm the sighting. "Minor variant. Moving on." He does not stop. He pushes forward. His focus is on the convoy, on the mission. Nothing else. The suit's cold, predatory focus solidifies, pushing aside any lingering human instinct. This detachment, he realizes, is what Sarah Chen finds unnerving. She tries to connect, but he withdraws. This is the trust breakdown. She cannot understand the shifting priorities of his suit.
Another wave of corrupted data slams into him. This time, the vision is even more grotesque. Twisted flesh, organs pulsing in fluid-filled tanks. The smell of burnt copper and wet moss, acrid and sharp, filling his internal filters. Not his smell. Not here. He sees a gloved hand, his father's hand, reaching for something in the murk. A sound. A distorted scream. He's still inside it.
His suit responds to the assault. A low, agonizing throb behind his eyes. His neural crown, fully grown, obsidian ridges pronounced, pulses with cold power. He almost stumbles. His entire suit shudders, a deep, resonant vibration that threatens to tear through him. His comms static again, muffled. "Pilot Rask?" Sarah's voice, now laced with outright suspicion. "Report your status. Your systems are spiking.".
Vael forces himself to move. One foot in front of the other. The ground beneath his seismic feet feels…different. Not just rubble and dirt. A subtle, rhythmic vibration. Too deep to be surface tremors. Too regular to be random Gorebreed movement. It is a pulse. A heartbeat from below. Massive. Unseen. The Thrashgrove's root-network. His suit registers the signature, an overwhelming bio-mass shifting slowly beneath them.
Then, everything twists. **His suit systems register the deep, localized vibrations. The ground hums, vibrating up his limbs, through his spine, into his very brain. A pressure builds inside his helmet, intense and crushing. His visor flickers, displays an error message, then goes black. His comms go dead, a final burst of static. The low thrumming of his neural crown intensifies, becoming a piercing shriek in his mind. Something deep within his suit, within him, snaps under the strain.**The air is thick, like old breath. Vael's suit pushes through a choke of thorny vines, their tips scraping against the reinforced bio-plate shell. The convoy behind him grinds forward, the tread of heavy vehicles crushing the overgrown asphalt. The world here is broken, drowned in green. Overgrown structures loom, skeletal outlines swallowed by rampant growth.
Vael's internal systems hum low, registering the organic decay that saturates the atmosphere. His visor filters the dim light, painting the choked street in shades of sickly green and brown. A scent invades the suit's filtration—wet earth, rot, and something else, metallic and cloying. He sweeps his arm, the integrated comms crackling static. Nothing. Just the slow drag of the armored vehicles.
"GRAVEMIND-7, status," the convoy leader's voice cuts through the comms. "Any anomalies ahead?".
Vael's response is clipped. "Clear path, leader. Bio-signatures: high ambient organic presence. No hostiles registered." His suit's external scanners confirm the assessment. He registers Zara Kim's Culex suit in the rear, providing high-mobility cover, her profile sharp against the collapsing skyline. Anna Reeves, the Mournclad pilot, moves near the medical transport, her movements precise, efficient.
The convoy passes a cluster of abandoned homes, their roofs caved in, walls bleeding moss. Strange, peeling organic matter clings to their sides, a muted brown against the green onslaught. It looks like dried skin, or old, flayed layers. Vael's suit registers a faint, unsettling echo from the bio-matter. Not a threat, more like a lingering presence. His neural crown pulses, a low thrumming behind his eyes.
"Hold," Sarah Chen's voice cuts in, sharp, immediate. Her Ravelin suit, an immovable wall of obsidian plates, pivots toward a ruined house. "I'm picking up residual heat signatures inside that structure. Possible survivors.".
Vael's systems process her report. Civilian protocols dictate a sweep. His own algorithms calculate tactical efficiency. The heat signatures are faint, barely clinging to the thermal spectrum. "Low probability of viability," Vael states, his voice flat. "Continue push. Maintain schedule."
Sarah's helm cants, an almost imperceptible shift that broadcasts her disapproval. "GRAVEMIND-7, we don't leave people." Her Ravelin is built for defense, for protecting. Her survivor's guilt, Vael remembers, drives her empathy for the unseen civilian fates. It is a weakness. It is human.
"Standard procedure, Pilot Rask," the convoy leader interjects, backing Vael. "Time is critical. Scans are for primary threats. Residuals are non-actionable."
Sarah remains silent, but her Ravelin suit continues to face the ruined house. Vael feels a subtle pressure, a shift in the air that is not atmospheric. It is the friction of their priorities, of his hardening focus against her human concern. His suit system registers her dissent as an inefficiency, a vulnerability. His cold, predatory focus solidifies, pushing aside any lingering human instinct.
Anna Reeves, near the medical transport, pulls her Mournclad's helm back, revealing her face. Faint self-harm scars spiderweb her wrists and neck. She gazes at the ruined houses, her eyes wide, jumpy. Every rustle of the overgrown vegetation makes her flinch. The anxiety radiating from her is almost a tangible thing, polluting the comms with a silent hum of fear. Vael's suit notes her elevated heart rate, her shallow breathing. He processes it as data: trauma, a liability.
A sudden jolt. Vael's vision glitches. The overgrown wall of the abandoned house blurs, then twists. For a searing second, he sees not wood and decay, but sterile, white walls. Lab equipment, glinting under harsh light. Fragmented images flood his internal systems: metal trays, something dripping. Then, a flash of something fleshy, impossibly warped, strapped down. The sound is not real, but a high-pitched whine that scrapes against his auditory processors.
His suit's internal nervous feedback flares, a burning sensation behind his eyes. His vision snaps back, the green decay returning with a sickening lurch. The air chokes him. It is not air. It is a memory. Not his. His father's experiments. The Fracture. The suit is processing corrupted data. He feels a brief, disorienting hallucination, the sensation of warped flesh overlaid on his surroundings. He clenches his armored fist, the knuckles cracking. Maintain control.
"GRAVEMIND-7?" Sarah's voice, sharper now. "Your suit readings are unstable. Are you taking feedback?".
Vael forces his response. "Negative. Atmospheric distortion." A lie. His internal systems scream. The Memory Leak intensifies, pulling at the edges of his consciousness. The suit battles to process the overwhelming data, causing brief sensory distortion. It feels like his mind is a battlefield, and he is losing ground. The designation "Subject Rask.09-V" flashes, a silent accusation in his processing unit. He fights to suppress it. "Vael Rask." The name is a whisper, a desperate mantra to ground himself against the suit's unnerving presence. It provides little anchor now.
The convoy pushes deeper. The vegetation here pulses faintly, a subtle, rhythmic throb that Vael's sensitive suit picks up. The organic matter on the derelict homes is thicker, almost alive. It is not merely plant growth. It is bio-matter, twisting and clinging, a vast, unseen network. The Thrashgrove. Its pervasive influence is felt.
Vael sees a movement. Not the wind. A dark, skittering shape, low to the ground, scurries between two collapsed sheds. Too fast to be human. A Scarp Maw gorebreed variant, blending seamlessly with the debris. It twitches, then vanishes. Vael registers it, a fleeting threat. Just a scout. A dry thought: Another welcome party.
Sarah's suit optics track the movement too. "Contact. Scarp Maw." She raises a shield arm, ready.
Vael's systems confirm the sighting. "Minor variant. Moving on." He does not stop. He pushes forward. His focus is on the convoy, on the mission. Nothing else. The suit's cold, predatory focus solidifies, pushing aside any lingering human instinct. This detachment, he realizes, is what Sarah Chen finds unnerving. She tries to connect, but he withdraws. This is the trust breakdown. She cannot understand the shifting priorities of his suit.
Another wave of corrupted data slams into him. This time, the vision is even more grotesque. Twisted flesh, organs pulsing in fluid-filled tanks. The smell of burnt copper and wet moss, acrid and sharp, filling his internal filters. Not his smell. Not here. He sees a gloved hand, his father's hand, reaching for something in the murk. A sound. A distorted scream. He's still inside it.
His suit responds to the assault. A low, agonizing throb behind his eyes. His neural crown, fully grown, obsidian ridges pronounced, pulses with cold power. He almost stumbles. His entire suit shudders, a deep, resonant vibration that threatens to tear through him. His comms static again, muffled. "Pilot Rask?" Sarah's voice, now laced with outright suspicion. "Report your status. Your systems are spiking.".
Vael forces himself to move. One foot in front of the other. The ground beneath his seismic feet feels…different. Not just rubble and dirt. A subtle, rhythmic vibration. Too deep to be surface tremors. Too regular to be random Gorebreed movement. It is a pulse. A heartbeat from below. Massive. Unseen. The Thrashgrove's root-network. His suit registers the signature, an overwhelming bio-mass shifting slowly beneath them.
Then, everything twists. His suit systems register the deep, localized vibrations. The ground hums, vibrating up his limbs, through his spine, into his very brain. A pressure builds inside his helmet, intense and crushing. His visor flickers, displays an error message, then goes black. His comms go dead, a final burst of static. The low thrumming of his neural crown intensifies, becoming a piercing shriek in his mind. Something deep within his suit, within him, snaps under the strain.