A militaristic Foundation transport vehicle pulled in to Site-01. Several armor-clad and heavily-armed guards poured out, their black uniforms cut by the shimmering rose-gold colored dress of their escortee. She was tall, taller than most of the guards, and she easily looked like she belonged on a runway rather than the back of a shady organization's truck. Despite her incredible looks, however, her face was twisted into an ugly grimace, filled with fury.
She stomped towards the front door, dismissively pushing aside her convoy in order to meet with the woman she despised more than anyone. She flung open the door and scanned the lobby, not caring about the scene she was making.
"Where the fuck is Mesmur?!" she shouted at the top of her lungs.
As her guards came back in to restrain her, the elevator door at the opposite wall dinged open, revealing a tall, heavy-set woman with dark skin and curled hair lovingly tied back into a bun. To her left was a shorter girl no older than 20 holding a few files, with hair like straw and very European features. She felt like the antithesis of the woman in power next to her, yet she seemed comfortable around her.
The supermodel pointed a sharply manicured finger accusingly at the dark-skinned woman. "We need to talk right fucking now!"
Dr. Mesmur sighed and stepped out of the elevator. The shorter girl followed suit, making sure to keep a tight grip onto the papers in her arms. The girl stood on her toes and whispered something to Dr. Mesmur, to which she nodded in reply. The girl's expression changed from neutral dutifulness to one of subtle fear.
"I know. You did shout at me saying you wanted to talk. That's why I arranged your transport here." Dr. Mesmur said flatly. "Before we continue, what are your preferred name and pronouns this time?"
The supermodel's face was stretched with a wild grin, followed by a short, bewildered laugh. "Take a wild fucking guess."
Dr. Mesmur raised an eyebrow, "I can't say I know your name, though."
"Desirée, but call me DiDi," the supermodel said.
Dr. Mesmur's face remained stony. "Lovely. Glad you're still treating the existential crisis I had in my twenties as your fun little hobby."
DiDi let out a short laugh that might as well have been a cough.
Dr. Mesmur motioned to the guards with her hand, "Guards, I'll take her from here. You're dismissed."
The entourage of guards surrounding DiDi lowered their guard and stepped to the side. DiDi huffed and straightened her dress before striding towards Dr. Mesmur, her heels clacking against the linoleum tile.
"Who's the girl?" DiDi asked.
"My assistant." Dr. Mesmur replied.
DiDi looked down to the girl, "You got a name?"
Before the girl could reply, Dr. Mesmur interrupted, "She does, but you don't need to know it. I expect this meeting to be short."
DiDi glared at Dr. Mesmur then back down at the girl. The girl shrunk away from DiDi, almost trying to hide behind her boss. DiDi felt like she knew the girl from somewhere… maybe she'd slept with her in a past body or something. DiDi didn't want to put the effort into remembering anything anymore, so she gave up. A chat in Dr. Mesmur's office was far more important than the name of a nobody.

The assistant came into the room last to carefully close the door behind the three of them. Dr. Mesmur took a seat on the comfortable spinning office chair she's used for the last century or so while DiDi begrudgingly sat down on the cheap metal chair in front of the desk. Dr. Mesmur's assistant hurriedly made her way next to her boss, setting the files down on her desk before standing behind her. The assistant flicked a glance at DiDi. DiDi sneered back at her.
"You called about the Buteo Suits?" Dr. Mesmur said, placing her hands on her desk.
"I called because you didn't give me what I fucking gave you money for!" DiDi said. "You and Pyongyang—"
"Could you not, please? Miss Soo-Yun has been more than helpful by convincing Marshall, Carter and Dark to chip in funds." Dr. Mesmur requested.
"I'll be whatever the fuck I want, because you lied to me!"
The assistant winced. An observant person could see Dr. Mesmur's hand twitch.
"I had one request, I said the only reason I would be signing on is if it feels like the real thing!" DiDi laments.
"Your priorities weren't seen as essential compared to—"
"YOU HAD ONE JOB!"
DiDi huffed and puffed, knuckles threatening to snap as her grip against the desk grew tighter and tighter. Her eyes glaring hatefully at Dr. Mesmur's icy, unfeeling gaze. If DiDi had veins, they would be bulging.
Dr. Mesmur cleared her throat, "Well, if I were to quote your words exactly, you just wanted to handle the aesthetic side of the Buteo Suits. You did. They feel exactly like a real person, and the sensation dial and ability to change appearance at will are nice touches. Well done."
DiDi continued to glare.
"What I don't understand is, if you got what you wanted, why do you insist that I lied to you?"
DiDi balled her hand into a fist and slammed down hard onto the desk, her voice rising to a throaty roar. "WHY CAN'T I FUCK?!"
Dr. Mesmur finally let on a sign of emotion as the corners of her lips curled into a tiny smile. "You can do that, you just need your doctor's permission. Don't want to overload your dopamine limiter."
"Why the fuck is there a dopamine limiter in the first place? What the fuck is the point of it?"
"Well, when you combine so many technological advancements and magical anomalies into one product, something has to give. Customizable appearance, durability, comfortably housing a brain, all of that… a little happiness feels like a worthy sacrifice for a higher quality of life for humanity." Dr. Mesmur explained.
"Bull-fucking-shit," DiDi said, "I know why you did it. Ever since the Royale you've had it out for me, you've hated me. You went behind my back, got it good with Anderson and MCD, our rivals, and added it in."
Dr. Mesmur covered her mouth with her hand, trying to hide the fact that she was enjoying seeing DiDi rage in front of her. She knew it wasn't good to indulge in happiness like this, but she felt it was a little worth it.
"I should have known better than to trust you. 'Doctor Violet Mesmur'… sounds like some kind of shitty spy movie villain." DiDi said.
"And I assume you're the heroic spy. You think highly of yourself, DiDi." Dr. Mesmur said, lowering her hand, her smile still visible, "You're not a hero. You get off to scooping brains out of people and having sex with their corpses."
DiDi flashed a wild smile, "Don't forget that you had one of those corpses too. I can just as easily find where she's from like I did for Young, if you want me to pull up her file."
Dr. Mesmur's smile dropped, "I already found her. The moment that I got my Buteo Suit, I looked up my previous purchase from Prometheus and sent people to try to find where you dumped her brain. I was going to give her a suit too, but… her brain was too rotted. It wasn't going to be compatible."
"You're a body-snatcher, just like me. It's because you placed the order for a body that she's now a rotting pile of gray matter, so don't think that you're the hero either," DiDi told Dr. Mesmur, "And now you're ruining more lives by forcing them into bodies that can't be happy. All because you're fucking petty."
Dr. Mesmur leaned forward, seriousness in her eyes, "I didn't do it because I was petty DiDi. I did it for two reasons. First, because people needed a replacement as soon as possible, even if it wasn't perfect."
"And what's the second?"
Dr. Mesmur's eyebrows furrowed in anger, "Because people who use your business have already taken enough happiness away from other people. You harvest innocent men, women and children just so you can have a new experience in bed."
DiDi leaned back in her chair and rolled her eyes, "So you are petty about me, but you wanted to make it sound righteous. I wonder how many decisions on the Ethics Committee were justified like that."
"I'm not petty, you're just trying to find a reason why your business is starting to flop. People want the Buteo Suits more than your brain transplants. The suits are convenient, you don't rot, you can do more. You're being run out of the immortality market," Dr. Mesmur told DiDi.
DiDi and Dr. Mesmur sat in silence for a few moments. The assistant stood silently as well, too nervous to interject. Between DiDi and Dr. Mesmur, it was hard to figure out who was more tired. The silence was broken as DiDi stood up from her chair.
"Well… this was a waste of my time. You refuse to change the suits and that's all I really care about, so… I'm just gonna take a fuckton of depressants and see if I can't get a doctor's note forged so I can go to an orgy I was invited to a few days ago." DiDi said.
"Have a good day, DiDi." Dr. Mesmur said.
"Fuck off." DiDi said, opening the door to leave.
As DiDi was about to leave, she turned around briefly, locking eyes with the assistant.
"I swear you look familiar," DiDi said, "Have I seen you somewhere?"
The assistant shook her head no. DiDi sighed, shrugged and left. The moment the door was closed, Dr. Mesmur hurriedly reached into her back pocket and retrieved a few depressant pills, popped them into her mouth and swallowed. She exhaled and sat back in her chair.
"I swear if that went on any longer I was going to overdose," Dr. Mesmur said, "I'm sorry for having an outburst like that, Mira."
The assistant smiled tiredly and replied, "It's alright. They deserved every word you said."
Dr. Mesmur picked up the files on her desk and finally flipped through them. It was a list of people, men, women, children, all of which were abducted by Prometheus for the use of body-snatching. This list contained all of the 28 people that Greene had used for their perverted means, and Mesmur needed to track them down. At least, the other 27 of them, since she already hired one of them.
Greene was done, they just didn't know it yet. Even though she knew it was slowly killing her, that thought made her happy.

Your New Buteo Series Mechanical Exoskeleton!

End of Death

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