The Robotics division of Black Wolf Company was originally established in secret as a safety pretense for the Chairman’s illegitimate heiress, Claire Lykos. The division looked like a shoddy startup garage office, but that was true for everybody entering the new cybernetic craze. In the early days of the so-called startup company, Wolf Pack Experience™ and other “worker positive” policies were also implemented under her short reign in the Robotics division in order to retain employees. Each of those rewarded loyalty and conjured a sense of commitment towards each other during projects— something not prioritized in the other mainline divisions.
As the technological brains also belonged to the Wolf Family’s shame and her achievements were threatening to overshadow the legitimate heirs, she was swept away from the public’s eyes. Lykos was able to fester as a hidden wound and then eventually metastasize as a powerful leader in the ever expanding and cutthroat tech industry. From the newest intern to the seasoned veteran, her loyal dogs’ unusually long tenures remained unwavering in the face of company hardships, falling profits and highest peaks. Those factors have caused her to become unstoppable. She eventually overshadowed Black Wolf Company’s main branches in nearly every important quarterly metric. Their leader, Code: DIREWOLF was in shambles. It is unclear whether Code: DIREWOLF was one individual or multiple shareholders, but Lykos could easily bypass anything they said and defeat anyone they sent.
As anyone could imagine, the Black Wolf Company’s mainline was not particularly pleased on her rising fame and power.
By the time Code: DIREWOLF found out that Lykos still had company stocks, they stormed the Robotics division’s existing labs only to find a few empty shops. She had already successfully escaped with her loyal pack, taking valuable data and eventually establishing the Iris Corporation. After all, you can’t really outsmart a genius who was always prepared and extremely paranoid if you’ve grown complacent over the century. Their company took old clients and new startups making it grow ravenously. Their resulting profits alone took several hundred lobbied bills and international interventions to reform over the next three decades. Claire Lykos, never one to settle down despite multiple assassination attempts, constructed her ultimate dream: The Space Elevator.
Odd alien signals started being intercepted around this time, despite the general public’s ignorance of the sudden breakthrough of reality as they were aware of currently. It was unknown if contact with whatever thing lurking in the stars was actually made, the Corporation’s repeated comebacks resulted in massive technological leaps. They created quantum Data Curves, better space stations, energy production and of course, new weaponry. Lykos was also extremely difficult to track.
It was not like Black Wolf Company was idle during this time, but if they were to hunt down a trillionaire with godlike powers and infinite resources, massive settlements and cooperative deals must be made in order to even track her down. The new Code: DIREWOLF partnered up with Cruise Industries. Cracking the strange technology preventing them from infiltrating the Space Elevator would be difficult, but through the combined efforts of Cruise and Black Wolf they prevailed. With her disappearance, one would think that the Iris Corporation would fall apart. Yet, the company still had thousands of powerful individuals who were loyal to Claire.
Which is why, currently, Hazel Iris had a problem that was currently stamping mangled craters in the air duct. Ominous crunching noises aside, she knew that she would have to time the damnable abomination’s drop on her just right. The air duct groaned as the noisy machine slowed itself, while she stood in sheer anticipation. The Corporation needs to send a couple of their own murderous robots to clean some Wolf heads one of these days, she scoffed. Her systems warned her that the robot had locked in on her location, but immediately an energy bursted out heightened heat signatures and the crackling metalic screeching of parting metal surged towards her.
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The robot had found its target. Time seemed to slow as her cybernetic eyes were able to speed up her perception a trillion times. She now was able to observe the assassin coming towards her at a more leisurely pace. Female model? Please, Hazel stifled a laugh. Like the same freak who had allegedly killed Claire some months ago, this one also was humanoid and had been in the lab for quite some time. However, not only was Hazel prettier than both Claire and that psychotic metal monster, the sound of metal crashing against each other echoed throughout the whole bunker she had another secret: One that she was about to reveal in .006 seconds.
The clang was so loud her ears could not cancel out the sound completely.
“So… noisy!” Hazel glanced at the machine. Brief confusion flashed on its sickenly human face, but she could easily tell its annoying little flying ants were recalculating on how to kill her quicker. A fine facade. Its confusing look took into the account all of the evidence that its mark should be expired. The first factor was the seven bullets have riddled holes in her body. The second more obvious factor; its own laser blade had been locked in a bind.
“You…” The assassin unit’s feminine voice uttered in disbelief. “You’re like us?”
“Yeah, bet you didn’t know our camo is this good now,” Hazel retorted. The blade let off a violet shower of sparks as the freak jumped off her arm, tilting its head in an odd directive: Recognition. “Heh, they never fixed your glitch, didn’t they?”
“You are a Great Chain?”
“I’m you,” Hazel instantly teleported to its location, gripping its cDNA Exacord and whispering in its ear. “But better.”
With that, she tore the component out of its spine. Hazel knew that component was the reason why the infamous personality glitch did not ever get fixed until they upgraded their technology. A horrid sound rang in her ear as the smelly electric scent plugged her nose’s sensors. All of the invisible nanites swirling around her force field instantly died, falling to the floor like pencil shavings. Heh, pencil shavings. She was old. Hazel did not have time to gloat, since more alarms blared through the entire dark bunker. Red lights illuminated the metal hall in swirls, nauseating her.
— MULTIPLE HOSTILES INBOUND —
Hazel noticed sixteen hostile Swarms were headed straight to her. Oh, they’re really agitated now. Iris is going to kill her, she bemoaned. This machine is quite expensive. The Swarms formed their annoying and gracefully sleek humanoid assassin machines, quickly eroding her shields. This seemed to be the end of this unit, she thought. Suddenly, a bright light exploded across her vision. A new alert expressed itself through the bunker.
— Unknown alien lifeform detected —
Instinct forced her to duck, as a sudden surge of energy pierced through all of the Nanite swarms. What in the hell, Hazel thought. I didn’t even know we had an alarm tied to aliens! If she had known otherworldly contact was established here beforehand, she would have taken the time to make herself look good before the appointment arrived. Dammit! A bright white light blinded her. The hostile Swarms seemed to go inactive due to exposure to the pulsing alien energy.
“What?” Hazel couldn’t stop herself as she stared upward at the ceiling’s mangled intercom. Even the vaguely humanoid faces of the remaining Swarms glanced at the new invader. When the bright light dissipated, something glimmered in her eyes. The alien, looked vaguely… no, Hazel scanned it. It was exactly like a human, true to all of its skins and organs. Nothing was out of the ordinary with this guy, yet the system labeled him as an alien?
The man had a real sword in his hand. Who brings a stick to a Nano-machine fight? Hazel wanted to shout, yet the man decisively aimed it at the rest of the psychos. In another bout of unknown alien energy, the man vanished before her eyes and following a slashing noise each of the Swarms were busted.
“Y-You,” she stammered as she looked at the man. “W-What, or, who are you?”
The man said something her translators could not interpret, but raised a finger to his lips before vanishing completely. All of a sudden, the blaring alarms and pulsing alien energy alerts became silent. She made a note to make the offices in this bunker tidier before the aliens visit again.
Hazel was left completely alone with a broken cDNA Exacord in her slightly scratched arm.