12012090 EOD B-Kilo

### **1290 [KF] [SP] and [HA]**

*Deep in the heart of European Russia, somewhere in between Siberia and St. Petersburg, an innocuous dilapidated warehouse sits in ruin. The once prominent soviet manufacturing plant housed hundreds of hard-worked and pressed communist civilians slaving away at manufacturing Kalashnikov arms in the 20th century. It again was investigated for use back in the Northern War of Ukraine back in 2086 but once people started to investigate further they found what secrets reside within the dark corners. Something emerged from the darkness and from then on scares away whoever trespasses on this abandoned ground.*
*Incredibly hard to find is a door that appears to lead to a wall by all blueprint's meaning, assuming anyone even still has a copy of the blueprints. Upon opening it (if anyone even has the key) one finds a large blast door on a glossy white wall towards the back large enough to fit a car's width, which come to think of it at this point if one had the ability to remove one of the left or right walls they could clean drive a vehicle down the length of the warehouse and out its main opening.*
*It is in that conspicuous blast door that resides the elusive secret laboratory of Dr. Simon Peterson, a place that few people have been in and fewer people know how to remotely get in with out teleportation. While many people, including Nate and Kari, have been inside it they do not know what it takes to get in. Until now.*
[KF]: We've found it.

[SDR]: Maybe after a bit of topographical miscalculations, yeah.

[KF]: Hours of trudging through the snow, avoiding becoming the next Dyatlov Pass incident. Despite being farther south than Kholat Syakhl. I think. No matter, let's go.

*Within the abandoned manufacturing warehouse isn't much respite as the cold lingers and the large, open space only gives an unwavering feeling of ruin. The nights in this area are dangerous from the cold just as they are from the unknown that wanders the scattered deciduous forestry, unwavered by the unrelenting cold, howling winds, and deep snow*
[KF]: It can't be too hard to find with us, right?

[SDR]: Huh? Oh! Simon's lab. Yeah.

[KF]: I didn't think anyone who's tried before would be as capable. We know what the track him with.

*[KF] has [SDR] take hold of a sterile cloth reeking with the familiar unsettling smell of rubbing alcohol and sterilization, to which [SDR] looks into the direction of the dark hallways and rooms away from the hangar-like main manufacturing floor and disappears into the ground, separating into pieces of shadow itself. [KF] follows the footsteps, which to her appear like truesight*
[KF]: And from there any obstacle is merely trivial!

*[KF] follows the glowing footsteps as it even seems like [SDR] is outpacing her by a lot which leads them both to the locked door that should be facing a wall*
[KF]: Behind here?

[SDR]: If I were you, my sinuses would be clear and my nose would be void of anything in it. That's some serious smell.

[KF]: It's locked, maybe for once I can pick it myself.

*[KF] kneels and checks the lock below the door handle on the rusty metal door. Taking out a small leather pouch she assesses the contents within and pulls out a lockpick and a short hook rake, then controls her breathing. By listening to how she taps the pins within the lock and with careful dexterity she manages to unlock the door, yet it still won't budge open*
[KF]: Well, at least now it should be easy enough even for me to use force against it.

*[KF] backs up a few meters and shoulder-charges the door, bringing it swinging open and to the left outwards, revealing the blast door*
[KF]: That was a bit loud, I wonder if such intrusions can be heard from within from some kind of security system.

[SDR]: We didn't even have to really do that when we can phase through walls like with zippers.

[KF]: It was one door, meanwhile this on the other hand, a huge mechanical blast door? No way we would get through if we didn't do it the easy way.

*[SDR] floats up to the door itself and forms her right hand flat vertically, then bringing it down swiftly to cut a pocket dimension entrance into the door. [KF] walks into it and arrives on the other side of the still closed and undamaged blast door with [SDR]*
[SDR]: I remember when we did that with a whole car just to mess with Tron back in California.

[KF]: I hope for their sake all three of them learned their lesson.

*[KF] now finds herself in a dark hallway surrounded on either side with pipes of varied width and size, a faint red light emanating all around and a bit of smoke flowing at her feet. The width of the walkway is only large enough to fit maybe two people and the other end appears to be within one hundred meters, before long [KF] and [SDR] reach it*
[SDR]: A lot of mechanical something is behind this door, want me to check?

[KF]: You don't have to ask.

*[SDR] assumes a shadow on the floor, like fighting against [LW], and seeps under the door. After some focus [KF] does hear faint servo motor rotation for a few seconds before continued silence, after of which [SDR] returns*
[SDR]: Autonomous ballistic engagement. Sentry guns, like a couple dozen.

[KF]: Yet I wonder how Dr. Peterson manages when he returns to his lab, I doubt the idea that he never leaves because that's not true.

*[KF] and [SDR] pass through a small room with, just as described, around 20 or so sentry guns all on the walls, ceiling, and floor. They approach a hallway that appears to just be a decontamination chamber*
[KF]: A decontamination chamber.

[SDR]: Suspicious?

[KF]: No, not at all. Given my knowledge of Dr. Peterson's nature I believe this to be as it appears. He has an obsession with keeping clean despite the lack of hesitation he has in getting dirty.

[SDR]: Maybe the thought of sanitizing oneself after dirty work is euphoric to him!

[KF]: I really didn't need that thought in my head.

[SDR]: If I'm able to think it, that means it crossed your mind somewhere!

[KF]: I stand by what I said. Listen, let's just phase around it. The control booth access is on the other side of the hall and I'm thinking activating it or any of the other obstacles might trigger something in a control room I'm unaware of. If he's attentive to security then he has to have a means to manage it.

[SDR]: I got a more menacing idea!

*[SDR] stops time*
[KF]: What a waste of our energy.

*[KF] simply walks through the decontamination chamber and [SDR] resumes time upon clearing the other side, warranting no reaction from the entire station. What faces them in a neat and clean white door with a glass slit at [KF]'s eye level, and through it she sees the lab*
[SDR]: So that's how you get in!

[KF]: Strange that this window is at my eye level. Simon is eight inches taller than I and Hyun-Ae is four inches shorter. Perhaps a middle ground, or that he wants the average person to be able to see in.

[SDR]: Do you think the door would be unlocked?

[KF]: Wait! Don't open it, it too could alert them somehow.

[SDR]: Even if it's unlocked?

[KF]: Lock engaged or not, a door upon its use could still be tripped if activated.

[SDR]: Then why don't we just-

[KF]: I know, I know.

*Now [SDR] assist [KF] in phasing in like the blast door, thankfully to them not sounding any kind of alarm. Before them now lies the secret laboratory of Dr. Simon Peterson, the area immediate to them being unfamiliar. The white walls that look almost like fiberglass bathroom showers or porcelain, which are also surprisingly indestructible, and the cold textured pattern metal floors made to add traction for falling hazard reduction with a strange untarnishable durable metal. That part seemed familiar to [KF].*
*Before them was a small hallway that led to a carpeted, and even with some rugs, furnished living space almost like a foyer. It all came back to [KF] as her curiosity about the dark hallway in her visit one and a half years ago finally drew a conclusion. With this [KF] and [SDR] looked around, even so much as [KF] recognizing the kitchen space to their left as the fully entered what would be colloquially referred to as the living room.*
[KF]: The last and only time I have been here before was a little under a year from your conception.

[SDR]: Don't have to tell me.

[KF]: Now, for our reason of intrusion. All this effort, time, and energy just because a trivial secret of his bothers me so much.

*To the left is the kitchen, and behind the wall furthest away from [KF] and [SDR] in front of them in the kitchen leads to the bedrooms, which can be accessed by walking past that wall in the current open area and turning left to see the two doors. A short time after [HA] moved in [SP] has simply been using using her room with her, before that [SP] never so much as used his room due to his lack of needing to sleep ever again, leaving the room dilapidated but with newer furnishings.*
*Directly in front of them was a long hallway that [KF] never went down in her visit, simply staying in this large gathering area. Unbeknownst to [KF] that hallway only led to various rooms of housing needs such as a laundry room, a recreational room, bathrooms, and an elevator. The elevator leads down into the lab itself along with rooms designated to different housed varied experiments, weapons workshop, an extremely long interior firing range of one mile, and an impenetrable vault of Dr. Peterson's ill-gotten gains and "cursed" goods.*
*Before [KF] can venture down into there herself, coincidence makes itself clear as [HA] simply had woken up for something in the kitchen and encounters [KF] and [SDR]. She is sleepy, with hair unkempt, and barely clothed; and just as she might've noticed the two [SDR] skips time with [KF] now down the dark hall and [HA] facing the other direction*
[KF]: I have to thank you for being sentient in times like this.

[SDR]: Not that I thought she'd be hostile, but sometimes I believe you work best alone because allies you get close to cause a lapse in judgement or distract you. I guess what I'm saying is-

[KF]: You thought I'd let myself get caught.

[SDR]: For a moment there you almost did.

[KF]: Let's continue, then.

*As [KF] reaches down the end of the hall she comes across another connecting room with the elevator on the left, bathrooms and laundry through a doorway ahead, and recreational room in a wider doorway to the right. Immediately [KF] heads over to the elevator, which is shown to be at this level on a digital screen and only has one touchpad button option labelled "down"*
[KF]: Using the elevator might also make for something alarming, we'll have to climb down it.

[SDR]: I don't detect any relation to an alarm system to this door, like how I detected the sentries, the main door after the decontamination chamber did have one but I didn't want to sit here and say you were right when we both unequivocally knew.

[KF]: Alright, then. That way we'll get a head start if someone tries to take it as it'll have to go back up again.

*[KF] and [SDR] get in the elevator and notice that the touchpad control panel only has two floors listed, and [KF] picks the bottom one with the joint of her left index finger, leaving no fingerprint and no mark as her left hand is fully gloved. The whole ride down the two patiently wait while having to suffer an elevator music cover of "8-Bits are Scary".*
*Without saying a word [KF] and [SDR] reach the bottom, looking around to another somewhat spacey connecting room like the one above, but more of a large hallway. Down the left path is towards the firing range; to the right all of the experimentation, laboratories, and facilities; in front of them is the intimidatingly large vault*
[KF]: The right looks like the lab facilities, we might find it there.

[SDR]: He already uses it so much, maybe it's in the firing range on the left?

[SP]: Or Perhaps what you might be seeking was vigilant all the while.

*Just then [SP] in behind them in the elevator, Jericho 941 in hand. [KF], assuming he is going to use it, field strips in in his hand with her CQC techniques, then assuming CQC stance away from him. Just then she notices [HA] there behind him, and both are in presentable form and fashion*
[SDR]: Oh yea, Andromeda can teleport through anything! That explains it!

[KF]: I forgot about this ability of its.

[HA]: I actually didn't know if I made contact with someone that it would take them too.

[SP]: Splendid work of dexterity, might hero, but might you consider another scenario? So, it is my rifle you are after, then? Not the handgun.

[HA]: Why did you sneak in anyways?

[KF]: You answer me first, how did you know I was here?

[HA]: I thought I heard the elevator close, by the time I got this guy's attention the both of us saw it reach the bottom floor.

[KF]: I figured Simon would be hostile if anyone entered his laboratory without invitation.

[SP]: If I must interject, you should know that a person of your magnitude cannot be easily refused when prompted with a request of any kind. Additionally, provided your services of relieving my life of a grand hindrance puts me in your debt eternally, for with that it is the least I could do to allow you as a welcome guest at any hour. Your closely-minded virtue of discretion is well appreciated in the likes of you now knowing the process of how to enter this establishment, yet I should now urge you to keep that knowledge to yourself indefinitely.

[KF]: I will consider that notion, given that you do see to what I came here for.

[SP]: And if I could only ponder what that is?

[KF]: Your rifle, the AK-5.

[SP]: The Automat Karbin, Modell 5. Reinvented from the Belgian FN Herstal FNC rifle, a working successor to the FN CAR.

[KF]: Not just any AK-5, yours.

[SP]: My, well what about mine?

[KF]: The only tool that got you this far. With it you can shoot through any conceivable material either it be walls, ballistic protection and ballistic shields, and even through other people. It enhances psychological aspects of the holder making them harder to break, more focused, a better more methodical thinker, and more intimidating to others. When one holds it they forget pain and may see themselves organically auto-repair. And I know because you're not the only one who has used it and gained these effects.

[SP]: These effects can be attributed solely to the construction of the rifle, miss Frost. Material, use of space, and weapons mechanical understanding. This rifle was not my original model from history but rather repurposing the idea with a sidetracked thought of "what if" considered in enhancing its already interestingly intermediate design. I would dare say your Mk23 you always carry is much more advanced in essence and in reality in comparison to any AK-5 ever manufactured, and not simply because you wield it but because Heckler and Koch is a masterful arms manufacturer with centuries of history. Even at this point that handgun is one century old.

[HA]: Why do you wanna see it anyways?

[SP]: It matters not, in fact, I will let you make use of it yourself if you are willing to squander one last predicament of mine.

[KF]: That solely depends its impact and of what it is.

[SP]: I request of you to revisit some of my old endeavors, and of course despite your relation to fame you should most definitely have some method of keeping yourself out of the spotlight. I wish not to do it myself as I've been perfectly at work taking in what ruins you've left for scavenge from our prior ordeal near two years prior. That, or our resident mutual perverted chief executive officer Aki Yamada has taken such salvage for study in Nocturn. I may only hope that she does the right thing, unlike the inhumanity Foundation.

[KF]: That can be arranged, but I need a motive. Not simply using the rifle, not simply even money. I need to be convinced this is for the greater good.

[SP]: This, I would hope, have leads on a black project I've meandered my eye around for some time. One by the alias of "Solar Eclipse", instrumented in the notoriously neutral nation of Switzerland. I have but little information on it other than the certain notion that others will refuse to enlighten me on its nature out of fear, and that what rumors I have eavesdropped are dire. I have to ask of you to take my word on this, as I know if you would ask the same of me I would maintain my honor.

[KF]: Alright, I'll look into it. No promises, but I'll see where it leads me, okay?

[SP]: I must ask, will you pursue them now?

[KF]: I suppose it wouldn't hurt to.

[SP]: Then gladly take my rifle with you now. I have many more weapons enhanced as such, and even the railgun model of the AK-5. It indeed is in the firing range.

[KF]: I will. If so much as either of you two move towards me I will react aggressively, you have my word on that.

*[KF] walks down the left hall towards the firing range and finds the door automatic and only sealable from the inside. There [KF] finds the AK-5 on a massive gun rack with seemingly hundreds of firearms, explosive devices, and even bows lined up on the left wall. She has [SDR] take the AK-5 by its sling and make [KF] wear it on her back to prevent touching the rifle with her hands, although some of the effects seem to seep through anyways. Immediately [KF] feels as if she can take on the world both mentally and physically.*
*She exits the firing range just fine as [SP] and [HA] are still by the elevator, and all three take the elevator back up in silence. Everyone makes their way towards the main door out of the laboratory*
[SP]: I can at least do the honors of seeing a guest out.

*[SP] continues ahead and out the door, but [HA] stays back as per the cold weather and stops [KF] on her way out*
[HA]: Hey! Let me help you.

[KF]: Huh?

[HA]: I have an Anima, I've helped Simon out on his field work before! I also can't thank you enough for what you did for him last time, for us. Honestly with what I've seen you do I'm more than satisfied to have let you take down the Foundation, for a long time my only goal was the get my revenge on the whole thing. I want to help, as a way of saying thanks. That and working with Aki when she needs assistance gets a bit boring.

[KF]: I'll keep that in mind for when I actually do seek out this "Project Solar Eclipse". For now I got what I wanted.

*[KF] makes her way back out to the main entrance of the whole facility and back into the cold*
[KF]: The blizzard stopped.

[SP]: And luckily for you, dawn rises.

[KF]: Did you ever give a name to this rifle?

[SP]: A name? Now, why would I go and do that?

[KF]: The FAL, do you know much about it?

[SP]: The Fusil Automatique Leger, Light Auto Rifle. Developed by the Belgians in the 1950s for the adoption of NATO standardized ammunition. Why is it do you ask?

[KF]: It's the rifle I use. Back then it was nicknamed the "Right Arm of the Free World" for its sheer volume of use around the world. The point was not that it really symbolized freedom, but the idea behind it. Back in the Cold War that idea was flawed, but in the eyes of someone who can see it right then one themselves can be the whole embodiment of the idea of freedom. To be the hero you wish to see in the world one needs to have those kinds of morals, like when a new day rises it gives you hope. The sunrise brings to you a feeling of warmth and virtue, like the idea of true freedom. That's why I named my FAL "Dawn".

[SP]: Then perhaps I am beyond that point. I will leave it to you to name my rifle.

[KF]: Given what I said, that is a tall order.

[SP]: I wouldn't have it any other way after hearing that. In fact, don't return with it until you have. That will be the favor I ask of you.

[KF]: I had one more question, actually. A mere curiosity.

[SP]: And what might that be?

[KF]: How close is here to Kholat Syakhl?

[SP]: Dead Mountain? You can see it well in the distance if you look north. I do realize that superstition follows this location well, it assists in secrecy.

[KF]: Explains a lot, actually

*end*