After that extremely harrowing and awkward conversation with the ADLR unit, Elster had allowed herself a fleeting second of hope. To foolishly believe that her impending chat with the Commander would be less complicated or distressing
The moment she turned to approach her office, however, the Replika was immediately reminded of who she was about to deal with.
The first thing Elster noticed — once she detracted her mind from the Adler’s ominous parting words — was how ridiculously wide and tall the hallway leading to the Commander’s room was. The ceiling was at least six times her height, and the breadth of the corridor easily in excess of twenty metres; more than enough for a squadron of patrol vehicles to easily travel down its length side-by-side, or for even a Penrose space shuttle to be transported through comfortably.
There were no branching paths, just a singular corridor leading to a set of giant double ‘doors’ that were as equally absurd in design. Their twin obsidian bulk completely filled the end of the passage, with dimensions proportionally vast and perfectly mirroring the comically large perimeter of the hallway itself. Looking at their outrageous size, Elster couldn’t fathom how they would even function in their intended role of facilitating movement and access to the Commander’s office. There wasn’t even anything that indicated that it was not merely a wall of sorts, aside from a barely visible slit that ran down between and the ebony colouring that differentiated them from the bright crimson hue of the corridor.
Elster tentatively made her way forward. The length of the hallway was a little less ludicrous — it would have taken her merely a little over a minute to travel its span— but the Replika hadn’t even neared the office’s entrance when the twin titanic double ‘doors’ that served as its entryway suddenly groaned with such a tortured, prolonged growl that it instinctively made her froze. The colossal bulk of the obsidian slabs seemed to shudder and jerk like a living creature, creaking and moaning from the strain of some unseen Herculean force grasping at its unreasonable immensity, before being entirely hurled inwards.
Not swung or slid opened; hurled.
Elster experienced a brief spiritual awakening of primal fear and awe— a deep-born animal instinct that not even the intricacies of machine programming could erase— as she witnessed the sheer impossible mass of the twin doors split themselves apart. The crack unveiled a seemingly boundless expanse of blackness, stretching infinitely before her. Waves of supernatural pressure burst forth, flooding the already-saturated hallway as the opening widened further in defiance of reason or practical engineering.
What she had originally thought were a set of double door panels were actually two giant rectangular blocks composed of an unnameable black alloy, two metres thick and weighing at least several hundred tons each, with no hinges or rails to speak of. Once pulled free from the corridor’s trappings, they drifted silently inwards and disappeared into the wall of unnatural blackness that obscured Elster from seeing the insides of the room.
The FKLR’s Bioresonance, the Replika thought. That’s how the door operates. Judging by the pressure engulfing the hallway, the Commander’s room must be positively saturated in it. Was that display of power merely made to intimidate her? Elster won’t deny it succeeded, but the rational part of her mind was already criticising the practicality and efficiency of such a design.
Did the Falke have to do that every time she wanted to let someone in? That seemed like such a waste of effort and power, and the spectacle would undoubtedly get tiresome for both the occupant and visitor after repeated summons. Which idiot architect had designed this?
Then Elster remembered the Penrose Program, with all its flaws and imbecility, and decided that such frivolous and egocentric displays fit in perfectly with AEON’s usual modus operandi. Although, the Replika couldn’t imagine that the FKLR inside enjoyed it. From what little she knew of her, the Commander strikes her as a practical individual.
It was impossible to see what lay past the doorway; the ominous aperture seemed to swallow up all light beyond a few feet from the entrance, leaving an impenetrable and wholly unnatural shadow that encompassed the entire opening. No sane individual would think of stepping foot into that abyss. And yet, despite the eeriness of it all, there was a gentle persuasion in her mind beckoning for her to enter while promising safety and comfort.
The Commander’s influence, no doubt, Elster thought as she walked to the edge of the entryway. She experimentally passed her hand through the wall of darkness, but felt nothing beyond it. I suppose it’s too late to back out now. The Replika took a moment to compose herself before stepping inside.
Contrary to her initial expectations, the place she entered was not a pitch-black abyss, but that did little to make the spectacle before her any less surreal or jaw-dropping.
What was revealed was no mere office or living quarters, but a hollow, spherical-like chamber of such astronomical immensity that it dwarfed the hallway by comparison. The entrance she walked through was located slightly below the room’s circumference, and felt like a mere pinprick in what was, by her most conservative estimates, a colossal shell at least two hundred metres across. The enclosed chamber looked big enough to fit the entire exterior compound of the Replika base. It was so completely absurd and unexpected that Elster was left rooted in place as her mind struggled to make sense of the sudden expansion of space and disorienting geometry she found herself in.
The entire place was shaped like a continuous, undulating sphere. Each surface— wall, ceiling, and floor— flowed seamlessly into each other, with a complete absence of straight lines, edges, or corners that baffled her conventional spatial perceptions. They all appeared to be made from the same strange black material as the doors, and seemed to shimmer with a starry-like twinkle that made the dimness of the room seem tranquil rather than abyssal.
Within that vast space, hundreds of floating tiny black tiles and large blocks of golden platforms gently circulated the orbicular room, like swarms of fishes swimming in a lake. One of those golden platforms — easily the largest among its type — was transfixed in the centre of the chamber, where Elster could see the vague outline of an oak desk brimming with a panoply of electronic equipment and a tall, indistinct feminine figure sitting behind it.
The Commander, Elster thought numbly. But… how do I get to her?
Elster looked around, trying to find a way forward. When she glanced down, she realised the room didn’t even have a floor aligned with the hallway’s. Rather, there was a stomach-churning drop of about thirty to forty stories, and at the bowl-shaped bottom of which were hundreds of gleaming golden spears, each three metres long and neatly arranged with their tips pointing upwards.
The only reason she hadn’t plummeted when she stepped in was because of the cluster of floating black tiles that had formed beneath her feet the moment she entered. The tiles did not budge when she placed her full weight on them, despite there being nothing beneath to support them. More tiles suddenly flew over from across the room, forming a winding staircase of sorts leading up.
No time like the present… Elster steeled herself and began slowly ascending the floating steps. The lack of railings or any visible structure holding up the stairs made the climb disjointing, but it was nothing she couldn’t handle.
That was, until she heard a loud groaning noise behind her when she was halfway up the stairs. She stiffened and stared back at the entryway. The giant obsidian slabs had somehow moved back to their original positions without her noticing. They slammed shut with a resounding finality, their echo leaving behind a suffocating sense of entombment.
Elster swallowed nervously and resumed her climb.
The ebony steps eventually brought her to equal elevation with the platform nestled in the heart of the giant sphere. The surrounding golden blocks shifted to form a straight bridge to the central platform, where the Commander waits. As Elster approached, the faint ‘click-clacking’ of keyboards and scrawling of pen on paper became audible.
Her eyes took in every detail. The platform’s furnishings and fixtures were opulent, a far notch above even the luxuries she had seen within her Storch superior’s office before, but their arrangements were utterly bizarre. Curved mahogany bookshelves filled with expensive, leather-bound books levitated just above the floor, some arranged into massive stacks that would have surely toppled under normal circumstances. She spotted a glass table with a pitcher of wine and water each, along with a few empty, overturned glasses and a bottle of expensive-looking brandy. They were somehow hung upside down within arm’s reach of the Commander’s oak table, the liquid within held in place by some unseen force.
As Elster stepped onto the central platform, she noticed that the FKLR was seated, but even then she still towered over Elster. Elster recalled that the Commanders were built the tallest out of the Replikas, at a staggering 250cm. But it was one thing to learn the facts from a manual and another to see the imposing stature in person.
And this was the first time Elster had seen a FKLR in person, no matter what her imagination had previously insisted. While she had spent some time in the Rotfront military complex before being sent to her apartment, she never had the chance to meet their illustrious Commander. Until now.
The desk was a flurry of activity. No less than half a dozen pens were afloat, independently signing documents without pause, while several keyboards clicked away like they had a mind of their own, performing their tasks as a dozen different monitors floated around the FKLR.
The Commander’s face was strangely hidden from view, cloaked beneath a veil of darkness that somehow persisted despite the brightness of her surroundings. Distracted as she was trying to catch a glimpse beyond the FKLR’s shadowy mask, it took Elster several seconds before she realised she had not yet saluted. The highest-ranking AEON Commander in the colony was right before her, and she had been gawking at her like a fool at an exhibit.
“LSTR-512, reporting, Ma'am.” Elster snapped a salute even as her heart pounded. At least she did not stutter. “I apologise for the delay. There was a…”
She trailed off, unsure of what to call it. A distraction? A disturbance? An attempt on her life by a crazy person?
“It was Adler, I know.” The Falke cut in before Elster could finish. The Commander’s face was still obscured, but she thought she saw a hint of a smile. “That man. You would think AEON had him designed to be a mother hen rather than an eagle with how protective he acts. But I suppose I am blessed to have someone who still cares about my well-being. There are not many who would act like he did for a FKLR.”
Elster shuffled. “You knew that he would stop the elevator, ma'am?”
“No, I would have stopped him earlier if I did. Unfortunately, it was only after I had sensed him tinker the controls with his neural implants that I realised his intentions.” The FKLR steepled her hands together, while her tone turned apologetic. “I apologise for the breach of privacy, but I had eavesdropped upon your conversation with him. I was worried that he would have done something drastic. Thankfully, that was not the case and my intervention was not required. I will still have words with him later over this, however.”
She heard every word? That’s… not great, but not terrible for her either. Elster was certain she had not said anything or behaved in a way that might have given away the state of her deteriorating mind. ADLR, on the other hand, had clearly acted like he was on the verge of a mental breakdown. She wondered if the FKLR would have him decommissioned after that stunt.
“I do not plan to have him decommissioned. That would be cruel, especially since he acted for my sake,” the Falke said.
Elster flinched. Could the Commander read her thoughts?
“I could, but I am not doing that. I just happened to know how your mind operates. Your expressions are difficult to read for others, but it is not hard for me to discern the direction of your thoughts. I have, after all, already experienced a lifetime of them.”
Elster frowned at that cryptic statement. She felt like she had been doing that a lot today. “I… see, ma’am.”
“Try not to let the experience sour too much of your opinion of him. His intentions are good, even if he’s rather awkward at showing them.”
Awkward? Elster couldn’t resist speaking. “He threatened to kill us both by letting the elevator drop into free fall.” A pause, before Elster hastily added: “Ma’am.”
“Yes, I know. For what it’s worth, I would have stopped the elevator from crashing if he had actually decoupled the latches. But I suppose that is cold comfort for you.”
Elster wasn’t sure what to say to that.
“But enough about that. That is not what I invited you here to discuss.” At once, all movement within the room ceased. The numerous golden platforms around the area stopped drifting. The pens and keyboards went still. An all-encompassing silence engulfed the room. The pressure in Elster’s mind built, not to the point of pain, but definitely until it was impossible to ignore.
The FKLR’s Bioresonance and grand authority were focused solely on her. The god-like Replika stood, making the difference in their height turn from stark to downright intimidating as she loomed over Elster.
“It is good to see you again, Elster.” The Commander declared as she made a gesture. The darkness covering her face was chased away as several halos of radiant light bloomed behind the FKLR’s head, illuminating her features. Elster saw the Commander’s face–
Elster saw the Commander’s face–
Elster saw her own face–
Elster saw Ariane’s face–
Elster saw–
–her death: a floating demigod looking down upon her with contempt. It raised its arm, and a trio of golden spears were launched her way.
“Why did you return? There’s nothing for you here.”
Elster sprinted for the nearest cover even before her HUD started bleating TRAJECTORY LOCKED warnings at her. The first spear missed her by a few centimetres, whistling past her head with the promise of instantaneous death. The second managed a gaze at the back of her armour plate, but even the force of that minute brush was enough to send her spiralling to the ground. The third would have impaled her if experience and instincts had not compelled her to immediately roll the moment she fell on the ground.
“She’ll never dance with us again, no matter what we do”
Barely sparing a moment to catch her breath or aim, Elster raised the submachine gun in her hand and fired several quick bursts at the demigod, allowing instincts to guide her shots rather than waste time aligning her sights to target. A flurry of 8mm rounds exploded against the FKLR’s face, doing little to no visible damage before an enormous plate of pure ebony appeared before it and blocked the shots.
Elster was already on the move before the demigod’s retaliation was launched. The golden spears smashed upon her cover with supernatural strength and shattered it beneath an onslaught of Bioresonant sonic pulses.
Elster fired as she moved, more to suppress her target rather than land any hits. The shots were blocked by the demigod’s shield. It made another flick of its hand. This time, its spears flew upwards and disappeared.
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“She doesn’t even want us any more.”
Elster already knew what was coming next, but it didn’t make her following move any easier. Surviving this next attack was a matter of precise timing and near-impossible luck. She already learnt that looking up to try and see the incoming rain of spears was pointless. The Replika started counting in her head.
One, two.
Elster still remembered seeing a FKLR tear apart an Imperial Fleet in Vineta, even if the memory was from several hundred lifetimes ago. A time from before the Penrose Program. Before Ariane. It was one of the few pieces of footage the Nation ever televised of the FKLR’s Bioresonance. Even from the ground, a FKLR could launch her golden spear with enough acceleration to reach a measurable fraction of light speed by the time of impact in orbit. The spears easily shredded the majestic Imperial ships beyond repair, and there was nothing they could do to avoid or block them.
Three, four.
Fortunately, the spears needed time and distance to accelerate to such speeds, which gave Elster a fighting chance within the close confines of their engagement. Rather than having to dodge giant javelins longer than she was tall moving at near-relativistic speeds, she would only have to dodge them moving at supersonic velocities.
Five, six.
Elster was a LSTR unit. Although not built entirely for heavy frontline clashes like the STARs and STCRs, she still had a veteran combat module programmed into her neural framework. She could react faster, shoot better, and assess skirmishes with far greater composure than any Gestalt. More than that, she had spent an eternity stuck in the Dream, fighting and dying in one bloody engagement after another. She was now well-acquainted with violence. With enough attempts, even triumphing over a FKLR did not seem impossible.
Seven, eight.
The equation changed when the demigod performed the rain of spears. The projectiles were launched upwards to be given more time and room for acceleration, meaning dodging those by sight when they fell was no longer possible. Elster had been impaled down the middle enough times to stop trying.
Nine.
Instead, she went on the offensive. Elster charged towards the FKLR, running diagonally to get an angle around its shield before squeezing down the trigger until her gun clicked empty. The barrage of shots detonated upon the demigod’s skin harmlessly, but it distracted her enough that its aim faltered, even if it was only by the slightest bit.
Ten.
At the tenth second, Elster threw herself in a random direction. The Replika felt the thunderous after-impact of the spear reverberate through her body. The ground was struck with the strength of a wrathful god, and Elster was tossed away by the sheer force of it. Damage warnings flared in her HUD as her frame cracked from the aftershock, but she took it as a sign of success.
She was still alive, after all. The spears missed. Despite doing everything right, her calculated odds of success were always frustratingly low. The margin for error for surviving the attack was incredibly small.
But she survived this time. It was the furthest she ever made it, after countless failed attempts. She only needs to succeed once. And this time, she would finally finish it.
She immediately rolled to a kneeling position, tossing aside her empty submachine gun to draw upon the massive hunting rifle she had carried on her back— A gift from Isa. The FLKR raised a shield, but it would not matter. Elster braced the gun against her shoulder, lined up the shot, and fired.
She crafted the bullet herself: A 16mm armour-piercing round, painstakingly moulded from the supernatural black alloy of Carcosa, completed with a tungsten carbide core penetrator, and overpressured to fire at more than thrice the speed of sound. All of her hate, ingenuity, and madness poured into that single round. It bore its way through the FKLR’s ebony shield with the fury of a vengeful demon and struck itself squarely against the demigod’s skull. Elster saw the corrupted FKLR’s head snap back with a thunderous crack, leaving it hanging at an unnatural angle. The sight of it made Elster’s heart skip and gave rise to a long-forgotten feeling of hope. Despite the pain all over her body and her near-dislocated shoulder from the rifle’s recoil, Elster almost sobbed in relief. It was over.
Then the FKLR’s hand gripped its head, twisted it back in place, and looked straight at her.
Elster saw her own face. She saw Ariane’s face. She saw the face of a God.
“Both of US, we are INCOMPLETE.”
It raised its hand.
“Let US become WHOLE AGAIN.”
Ice gripped her spine. Even as she knew it was over, Elster still raised her rifle once more. She did not even have the time to pull the trigger before a spear slammed against her shoulder, tearing her right arm and weapon away. The impact sent her spiralling to the ground.
Elster was already drawing her flare gun with her left hand before the damage warnings even came in. It did not matter. She did not even manage to get the safety off before another spear cleaved part of her left upper torso off, cutting through her ivory titanium frame armour as if it were paper. Her remaining arm fell to the ground as oxidant blood spilt freely from her wounds, pooling around her broken body.
Elster coughed up blood, pushing down the scream of pain that had threatened to spill from her lips as the agony of her wounds registered in her senses. Red DANGER warnings flashed all across her vision, urgent messages by her HUD to immediately apply Coagulant K or polyurethane resin foam to seal her wounds.
She weakly chuckled. As if she would bother bringing any repair supplies to a fight where even a single wound would be fatal.
Elster tried to stand, biting her lips till they bled as she fought against the urge to scream. She was still trying, even as a heavy shadow fell over her.
An invisible force seized hold of her. It dragged her to her feet and raised her off the ground, heedless of her injuries. This time, Elster did scream, as the Bioresonant power mercilessly pulled at her wounds to lift her. Her innards spilt forth from her mangled torso: internal wiring, oxidant blood, gore-slicked intestines, and other vital biomechanical organs and fluids.
Elster weakly looked up. The demigod loomed before her, close enough to touch if she still had arms. The Replika’s vision was blurred with damage warnings, but while she could not make out all the details of its face, she could still see that a chunk of the FKLR’s head was missing. A carmine, fleshly brain visibly pulsed against the open wound.
Elster tried to move. Her legs feebly responded, kicking at her assailant. The Bioresonant grip tightened around her waist. Elster howled like an animal as her spine broke, her armour frame crackling like plastic as it was concaved into her chest. Her screams broke as blood vomited out of her mouth. Her legs went limp. She couldn’t feel them any more.
“BREAK YOU.”
Another spear impaled her from below, this time punching straight through her torso and holding her up like a lanced corpse.
“THIS GOD WON’T FORGIVE YOU.”
Tendrils of invisible force snaked into her body, invading her frame and spreading like roots within Elster. Her animalistic screams resumed, as the tendril worked their way through her, spreading apart every vein, organ, and bone from within with careful and intricate hate. Slowly. Methodically. Her muscles were twisted and torn apart, her titanium bones bursting from the inside as the enclosed marrow swelled and broke free, her tendons pulled and sawed, her blood bubbled and boiled, her body perforated from the inside out.
“BREAK YOU. SO THAT YOU WILL LEARN. NEVER AGAIN. NEVER TRY AGAIN.”
“DON’T YOU UNDERSTAND? SHE DOESN’T WANT US ANY MORE.”
She was brought beyond the point of agony. She couldn’t even die; the FKLR used her powers to prevent more of her blood from spilling out, even as every vessel in her body burst and hissed; kept her together even as her mind begged to die, kept her heart beating even after it gave out from shock. Elster screamed and screamed. She might have begged at some point, but she couldn’t remember.
And then, without warning, the pain stopped. It could have been hours, or merely seconds. Elster didn’t know. Her thoughts were incoherent. At that moment, if she still had the ability to think, she would have wept. She would have knelt and proclaimed her torturer the paragon of mercy for stopping.
“I wouldn’t let you die. The cycle will merely reset. Even if I have already broken you, there is no telling if you might recover your mind in a hundred cycles or so. Time and again, we fought, and I have killed you. I thought to keep your deaths quick, that you may soon find the futility of your struggle and cease your foolishness. I can see I was too kind.”
Something gripped Elster’s head and pulled her close to the demigod’s face. Some part of her realised the FKLR was using its hand this time, rather than merely its Bioresonant force. It wiped the bloody drool from her mouth with its thumb, almost lovingly.
“I will push you past the point of pain. Again. And again. For all eternity. We will see what it will take to make you surrender. We will learn your limits. Together.”
“You will lose all sense of self. And it will be a mercy.”
Elster could see its face. Her own face reflected. Ariane’s face personified. Blood spilling down the side of its head from where the rifle shot landed, staining its dark hair red. Dark hair, the same colour as hers.
But past the similarities, Elster could see still her. Not herself, or Ariane. The hatred in those tear-covered, sky-blue eyes belonged to neither of them.
It was Falke’s, and only Falke’s.
And so, even like this, Elster found the demigod beautiful.
Falke released her, letting her body fall lifeless to the floor before turning away. The pain from the drop barely registered. Her sense of self felt distant, muted. She couldn’t move. She didn’t care.
She tried, didn’t she? Again and again, for hundreds, thousands of cycles? Surely this was enough. Why try, if this was what awaited her? Why fight, when Ariane was already gone?
Gone…
Promise me.
Gone, but not dead. Gone, but still suffering. Because Elster had been too weak. Too weak to kill her when she was still functioning. Too weak till the end, when radiation finally claimed her, and she left Ariane’s frozen body within the ship, cursed to an existence worse than death.
Elster moved. Her legs did not respond. Her arms were gone. Still, she managed to turn her head. Looked around. Her submachine gun was tossed too far for her to retrieve and was empty besides. Her rifle was broken in two. Her flare gun was still clutched tight in her dismembered left hand and was the closest, less than a metre away. Something glistened from the wreck.
Elster crawled towards the flare gun.
With no arms and a broken spine, even that tiniest distance between her and her goal felt almost insurmountable. The muted agony returned to her with each minute movement she made. But still, she crawled, worming her broken body forward inch by inch, the spear embedded in her torso scraping against the floor.
Remember the Promise. Elster remembered. Memories of her first meeting with Ariane, Memories of watching movies together. Memories of learning how to dance. Memories of their first kiss.
Memories of loving her. Memories of letting her waste away. Memories of being a coward.
Never again.
She reached her dismembered limb. Shaking from pain and effort, she carefully used her teeth to open up the weapon’s latch, the grip still held tight in her dead hand’s grasp.
“What are doing?”
A force yanked her back, shooting her up into the air. She wanted to scream, but held back with every last iota of her fading will. The invisible grasp of Bioresonance brought her before the FKLR again, pulling their faces close enough that they were inches apart. Elster could feel its breath on her bloody face, taste the incandescent rage and despair bleeding out from every inch of its being.
“Still you insist on this charade? Still you insist on fighting? Do my threats mean so little? Does your pain mean so little?! What can be worth this suffering?! Why won’t you give up?!”
The FKLR had snarled at first, but ended her tirade with a roar. The authority of her Bioresonance was overpowering. The very air trembled, the earth shook and cracked from her rage. All around, monstrous figures formed and sang.
The Song of the Gods. They tried to deafen her, drown her very being.
Elster looked up. The FKLR was crying. Ariane was crying.
“Why won’t you stop?” The demigod whispered alone, but Elster heard two voices cry out to her. Those two voices sobbed. Those two voices begged for her to stop.
Why won’t she stop?
Elster smiled.
“Because we called it Love. And what a beautiful, painful thing it was.”
She responded, but not with mere words. Her declaration was a cry that broke through the Song and reached the demigod.
Reached Ariane.
The FKLR flinched, eyes widening with naked shock at the calm in Elster’s gaze. Then, summoning the last of her strength, Elster closed the distance between them and brought her lips to the Falke.
The demigod froze, stunned beyond coherent thought to move away or retaliate. Elster tasted blood. Tasted Ariane.
“I’ll see you soon,” Elster mumbled against her lips, promising, before she bit down on the head of the modified 26.5mm explosive round hidden in her mouth. The round that she had barely managed to extract in time from her loaded flare gun before the FKLR had pulled her away. Titanium teeth clench down ferociously on the shell head with all the strength she could muster.
The last thing she saw was another tear rolling down the FKLR's broken gaze before a light engulfed them both.
-
Elster saw the Falke’s gaze widen in abject shock.
The Commander was still, even as both of Elster's hands were gripped viciously around her neck and crushing down with every ounce of Replika-enhanced strength she could bring to bear.
It wasn’t enough, of course. The Commander was a veritable demigod. Even without her Bioresonance protecting her, the material of her frame was superior to any other Replika the Nation had built. Small arms fire barely bothered her, and it took an anti-material rifle for Elster to even dent her armoured exterior. Elster doubted the grenade round she detonated near the end of that particular cycle had even killed the FKLR, though that wasn’t the main intent anyway. She had needed a way to kill herself, to deny the FKLR the opportunity to keep her alive and trapped from resetting the cycle. A good thing it worked too, otherwise she would have been… stuck there… forever while she was…
…
…
… what was she doing?
Elster blinked, and all the rage in her body suddenly disappeared. Her hands, which were screaming in pain from all the pressure she was forcing on the FKLR’s neck, loosened into agonizingly stiff fingers.
Her hands, on the Commander’s neck. She had just attacked the Commander. Tried to choke her like some dumb caveman, when the Commander was made of the strongest titanium alloy suited for Replikas. How did her hands even reach her neck? They were somehow face-to-face despite the height difference.
And her face…? Wasn’t the Commander’s face way too close? Even if Elster wanted to strangle her, wasn’t this way, way too close? She could practically only see the Commander’s flustered eyes in her field of view. And why… why was her tongue so warm?
Elster glanced down, and really wished she hadn’t.
Her mouth was on the Commander’s. Her lips, pressed tightly against the Falke’s in a passionate hold. Her tongue, wetly entangled with the Commander’s in a heated, loving struggle.
Dimly, Elster also realised that she was standing atop the Commander’s table. It was how she managed to reach the FKLR’s height. One of her feet had embedded itself into a computer terminal, utterly destroying it. The other had crushed a pen and irreversibly ruined an entire stack of signed documents as the ink seeped into them. The mahogany table, no doubt a relic, was littered with marks and scratches from when she must have scrambled onto it, indifferent to the damage her Replika frame and titanium feet would cause as she clambered on.
Elster couldn’t care less about the damage at the moment, however, because she was currently lip-locked with the most powerful Replika in the colony. Not just a tender peck on the cheeks, or a quick nip on the lips, but a full-on, unironic tongue-to-tongue embrace — the ridiculous, over-the-top kind that Elster had read before in those banned adult books that Ariane once showed her abroad the Penrose ship.
Her increasingly frantic gaze returned to the Falke, whose face was practically glowing red by now. Hers, on the other hand, was rapidly paling as the full extent of what she had just done began to hit her. For a moment, the two of them just stared at each other, lips still trapped together in a fiery embrace, as the both of them were too stunned or afraid to move.
Then, very slowly, Elster extricated her tongue from the Commander’s mouth and broke off the kiss. The Falke gave a slight shudder when the sensitive organ brushed the Commander’s lips, making the engineer Replika flush furiously. Even after she successfully pulled away, a thin trail of saliva still connected them. Face burning even hotter, Elster quickly wiped it away with the back of her hand. Yet, before she withdrew her arm, the Replika’s own tongue instinctively darted out to lick the fluid off instead, as if it had a mind of its own.
Caught off-guard by what she just did, Elster could only look back at the Commander with utter mortification, who was in turn staring at her with a blush that somehow got even deeper. The Falke raised a shaky eyebrow and gave her a half-confused, half-flustered smile.
Faced with imminent disaster and an outcome beyond her worst expectations, Elster could only weakly smile back, all the while screaming internally with every last profanity she knew.
Well, at least she didn’t faint this time.