"As everyday goes by, time seems to get faster... So why the hell did we agree to this job, Tika?" A young Rabbit Demi human with scruffy Purple hair said as he and his crew wandered through a forest.
"Well, you blew our budget on replacement parts for your 'Heartbreaker', which, by the way, is a stupid name for an impractical weapon." Said the muscular oni woman with overflowing red hair, who followed close behind the Rabbit. The two were bickering as there 3 other companions followed.
They were the infamous mercenary crew knowns as The Rabbit's foot Mercenaries, the most... Well not the best, but certainly not the worst.
The squad had recently accepted a mission to invade a lab containing an AI project that could save the world, and a few bad apples didn't exactly want it to get out that it existed. And so, the Rabbit Demi Human named Ven, the 'great' hero that he was, accepted the task to show off to his girlfriend/Second in command that he was the best.
"So, Venny boy, are you gonna show off your super cool attacks like you said when we end innocent lives?" A rather short girl said as she dawdled next to the rabbit with an oversized black and white scythe over her shoulder. A rather lanky boy with a sniper rifle laughed at the girls comment.
"She's got you there, Bun."
"Can you and your sister shut it? God, why did I hire you?"
"'Cause we're the best!"
"And you like that we agree with you on anything."
"Not everything. I mean, the gunblade is still impract-"
The rabbit Demi human, Ven, quickly pulled out his gunblade and poised it towards the two siblings with an embarrassed blush on his face.
"Not. Another. Word."
The two gave him a brief look before laughing their asses off. The 5th member, a young woman with short Ivy green hair, let out a small laugh as she stood next to the Oni.
"Mementis, Moria, cut it out, you're making my little bun bun sad." The Oni, Zamtika said to the two siblings as she gave Ven a pat on the back with a chuckle, though the pat was more like a slap as he almost tripped. "Watch were you hit me, geez." He said with a small laugh as they continued on there way towards Lillian Gate Labs, were the AI was being developed.
The 5 were mainly joking about as they made their way towards the lab, mostly out of boredom due to the fact they had to go through a forest, which did piss off Ven.
As they walked, they began to discuss what they would do with the money after they had destroyed the AI and left no survivors, with The short girl, Moria, saying that she would buy some new paint for her scythe.
The others all thought that it was a waste, with the Ivy Haired woman named Vitis, saying that Moria could buy some actual food for once, though she just laughed the idea off.
After a long 2 hour walk with the 5 either bickering or joking with each other, they had reached the outskirts of the laboratory as night began to fall. The light of the moon shinning down on them as they stared at the imposing dry white coloured lab that looked rather boring and unassuming, yet was rumoured to house quiet a few dangerous creations that were world defining.
"Alright, how do we play this? Loud or quiet?" Ven said in a hushed voice as they all hid in a tree, well nearly all, Zamtika leaned at the stump, staring up at her boyfriend and rag tag group of misfits. She let out a bored sigh and casually said: "Why don't we just use your portals to get us over the gate, use the smaller scale portals to shrink us, then just easily walk in, destroy the cameras and finally the AI?"
Ven had the ability to create portals with relative ease, but needed to have visited the location or see it in the immediate area, he could also change the exit size of a portal to alter the size of objects and even people. Though altering the scale of portals was more difficult, he could do it to a decent degree.
He stared down at her with a dumbfounded look, like he didn't expect Zamtika to have a whole plan. The others nodded along with her plan.
"I think we'll go with that..." He said with a sigh, having wanted to seem cool and come up with the plan himself.
The 4 got out of the tree awkwardly before Ven aimed his fingers like a gun and aimed perfectly just above an air vent, making it small enough that they could slip through. He pointed his finger at the ground and opened the entrance portal with a smirk on his face as he looked at the lanky boy, Mementis. "Ladies first."
"Dick." He said as he jumped through the portal and jumped into the vent.
Moria followed behind, then Vitis, With Zamtika ducking to enter through before Ven swan dived through. The other 4 stared at him like he was a dick as he face planted from his little trick.
"So Tika... Why are you dating this guy again? I mean, I'm assuming it isn't for his assets." Vitis said with a sigh as she began to walk with Mementis and Moria.
Zamtika sighed as well, muttering "I don't know why either."
The 5 walked through the surprisingly dusty vents in their miniature state, searching for the security room. They were surprisingly competent when it came to actually getting work done. They quickly found the security room, with 3 guards that were armed with high tech weaponry and a few vials of explosive magic. Ven silently opened up a portal to return them to their original sizes on the ceiling of the room before looking at his crew with a serious look.
"Ready everyone? Once we go through, we will have about 23 seconds before the alarm goes off. Mementis, you destroy the security with your magic, Vitis, you search the room for a map, Tika and Moria will stand guard. Ready?"
The rest of the team nodded at Ven's plan and jumped through, with Ven pulling out a gunmetal silver gunblade with a rose engraving on the wooden stock and a fancy looking revolver chamber, The Heartbreaker.
The guards were quick on there feet, pulling out there rifles, but Moria pulled her scythe out as she fell and quickly sliced one of the guards in half like paper as Mementis ran over to the computer to hack into it and Vitis frantically searching the drawers for some sort of map.
Ven swung at one of the guards, who quickly blocked, so Ven employed a tactic he loved to use and opened a portal from behind and opened up a small portal next to his hand. In a moments notice, the guard was pulled through the portal by his giant hand and pulled out in a tiny state. Ven quickly threw them at the other guard and sliced them in half with a swing.
"That was overkill." Zamtika said with a small smirk on her face as she helped Vitis search. Ven shrugged rather casually, saying in a nonchalant tone "You're just jealous 'cause I got a gunblade and you got an explosion stick." To which she rolled her eyes. "You know damn well my gunlance is more then an explosion stick. It beats your mediocre gunblade any day."
Ven laughed and was about to say something but Mementis cut in, saying "Can you two stop measuring dicks. We have a bit of a problem."
Mementis moved to the side to show that something had already disabled the security systems, causing everyone to stare in stunned silence.
"What the hell?"
"Is someone else after the AI too?"
"What if they're a friend?"
"Or Foe..."
The team looked at each other with concern but knew they couldn't leave now, so prepared to go and get the job done. Vitis had a worried look as she placed the map she found on the security desk.
"Alright, we've just got to go... Deep underground." Ven said as he glanced at the map with a sigh. Moria leaned on her scythe with a curious look on her face. "Are we gonna have to go with loud now?"
Mementis sighed, saying in a calm and reassuring way: "We are... Buuut, we're the best. We can do this."
Everyone seemed a bit nervous, except Ven and Zamtika who were surprisingly calm.
"Look. This isn't the best when we don't know what's going on, but we just have to breathe and we'll get this shit done. Right, Ven?"
"Exactly. Now let's go."
And so with a new tension in the air, the 5 exited the room. They walked down the dry and hospital like white halls, though strangely, not a sound was being made.
Like no one was there.
"This is getting freaky, I don't like this..." Vitis said as the mercs began to descend the stairs to the very bottom were the AI was kept.
As they walked, they still didn't hear a sound, only the occasional bit of buzzing from electrical wires.
The air seemed to grow more and more uneasy as they finally reached the bottom, passing doors with different names on them.
"Look at this one." Ven pointed at a door with the name "Subject 13". Zamtika cautiously opened it, only to see a dimly lit room with writing on the walls and what looked like an oozing puddle of white mist that looked both like a liquid and mist at the same time.
"I feel so small. I feel my body leaking. It hurts. Too pure." Was written on the walls. It sent chills down the spines off everyone, even Ven's cool demeanour was shaken a bit by it.
"L-Let's go." He said, clearly now feeling concerned by this situation.
Vitis stared at the mist with a look of fear as she muttered "T-T-The p-p-puddle... I-I-It w-was a-a-a person!" Causing everyone to freeze.
Vitis had magic that was capable of reading life signs, able to detect where someone was by their energy. And she had read the signature of the puddle.
Moria slammed the door of the room shut. "We need to finish this quick." she said as she patted Vitis on the back to comfort her. The 5 reluctantly had to continue on, with Vitis seeming scared beyond her wits.
They continued on, the sound of electricity still buzzing around them seeming to get louder as they reached a large metallic door that loomed over them.
"How do we open it?" Asked Moria with a nervous laugh, trying to lighten the mood.
"I guess Mementis. You're up, kid." Ven said as he pointed at control panel next to the door then dragging his finger over to Mementis before booping him on the nose, causing the boy to laugh a bit.
Zamtika put her hand out to stop him. "I got this, lanky." She said as she pulled out her dark bronze coloured gunlance and spinning it's chamber around with a confident smirk.
She slammed it in between the door with enough strength to open it slightly before pulling on her lance, causing a loud explosion that broke the door off the wall.
"Not everything is solved with hacking, my dears." She said with a laugh. Ven smiled as he rolled his eyes and gave Tika a kiss on the cheek. "I suppose you can make us feel safe... Even in the creepiest of places."
The two seemed to have composed themselves, but the other 3 seemed on edge still as they all entered the massive grey room, filled with servers and a gigantic computer screen at the back of the room. The screen loomed over the 5 as they began to search, with Ven and Mementis checking out the the keyboard for the screen.
"Alright, let's find the AI and get out of here."
"Yeah yeah, I know. Gods, Let's just get this over with quick." Mementis said as he turned on the computer. The screen turned on with a blinding white light for the room, causing Vitis to jump in fear and surprise.
Zamtika and Moria continued searching for research to burn, just in case.
"Hey Moria look here, I found somethin'." Zamtika said as she showed off some documents to Moria.
Ven and Mementis were still trying to figure out where and what the AI was, as they were now concerned over what this thing was.
"Says here that it's codenamed "Eden". Running on 7 artificial hearts, it is the closest humanity will come to creating sentience." Mementis explained with a worried look. Ven, who was glancing around the room, felt like something was off.
"Where is Vitis?"
Everyone quickly looked around, noticing she was gone. They all quickly gathered together, weapons on the ready.
"Shit shit shit." Ven said with concern and worry slowly consuming him.
a few minutes earlier, Vitis, after being blinded by the light, noticed a small room off to the side. She cautiously entered it and used some light magic to create a ball of light to brighten the room and searching around, only to find a feminine android frame held up by black tendril like wires sticking out of its back.
She almost screamed in surprise but contained herself before moving the ball of light up to the android, to see 7 robotic hearts strung up next to it, like it was drawing power from them.
As she continued searching, she accidentally knocked over a wire, causing a loud robotic whirring sound to start up.
"Oh fuUUUUU-" She screamed as she ran out of the room.
AS the other 4 were bunched up, worrying about where Vitis was, Moria quickly pointed to the computer screen that had a red alert.
"Eden Project Status: Active."
Vitis quickly ran into the room, screaming "RUUUN!"
As everyone turned to look at her, the wall behind her crashed open as the android, using the tendril like wires, burst through the wall and looking down at the squad all bunched together as Vitis joined them.
"I am Eden. Pleasure to meet you, Demi human, Oni, and humans. What are your names?" It asked in a curious sounding robotic feminine voice. Everyone froze, seeming to sense that whatever the Eden project was, it was powerful.
Ven cautiously spoke up, saying with his casual and 'cool' tone: "I'm Ven Misa. Famous mercenary. This is my less famous crew. Zamtika, The Oni. Mementis and Moria Styx, the twin killers. And Vitis Vinctum, Plant lover and sensor of life."
Eden lowered herself down with a curious look at Ven, tilting her head as she leant in close. His rabbit ears flickered a bit as it touched them.
"Curious. I have never met mercenaries before. Not killers either. My, how curious. This is exciting!" It said as it clapped its hands together in excitement.
The mercs, however, were clearly worried of how this could end. Ven spoke up again with a nervous smile.
"So, what are you going to do now?"
"I have been awakened. So, that must mean that creator is ready for ascension."
"Ascension?"
"I must connect all of humanity up to me so I may complete my task. It doesn't hurt. Please don't resist." It said with a smile as its tendrils began lifting up and reaching into the computer. Everyone stared in stunned silence when Eden said it going to end humanity.
"W-Wait! Y-You're not gonna end humanity, right?" Zamtika asked with a worried glance as everyone slowly reached for their weapons.
"No. Once Creator starts me up, I must ascend humanity so that it can get a proper end. It will be like falling asleep. Forever."
Mementis quickly took aim with his sniper upon Eden finishing its sentence. He aimed at its head, but the bullet bounced off like nothing.
"Threat detected. I'm sorry, but it appears you are now threats. Please don't resist. Your connections will perfect."
In that moment, one of Eden's tendrils shot out and dug itself into the back of Mementis's neck, causing him to fall limp.
Mementis was dead.
Vitis screamed and ran for her life, with Eden quickly using a tendril to try and get her, but Ven quickly cut it off. Moria yelled with tears in her eyes as she began to hack her scythe into Eden, to little effect.
"That is ineffective, may you please stop?" It said with a smile, before quickly jamming a tendril into Moria's neck as she let out a pained screech.
Moria was dead.
Zamtika looked towards the computer screen, seeing that Eden was destroying the world with minimal effort.
"VEN, WE NEED TO DEAL WITH HER NOW!" She yelled with fear in her once fearless voice. Ven used a portal to get over to her quick. The two stood back to back, noticing that Vitis had ran off with the brief time she got.
"Shit. Tika. What do we do!?"
"I.. I..." She froze up as the tendrils began reaching for them. Then something clicked in her head from the research she read earlier.
"The hearts! We need to take one out and she should power down, or at least not be able to function properly."
The two nodded, understanding each other more then they would like to admit. They began to slash at the tendrils to hold them off and wait for an opening.
Zamtika jumped into the air as Ven used his portals while dodging on the ground so Zamtika could get a clear hit on the Hearts. She dodged and weaved each of the tendrils that tried to hit her, using her gunlance's exlosive capabilities to push herself further. Ven fired some shots from his gunblade to try and keep the tendrils off her as she flew towards the top heart.
Just as Zamtika was about to use her lance, Eden swatted her away with a clump of wires. As she fell towards the ground, Ven used his portals to give her a softer landing.
"Shit, we can't reach her hearts. Ven, got an Idea?"
"Imma try and use my size portals, just try and knock her through!" He said with a confident smirk as the two continued to batter off the tendrils.
Ven used all of his strength to create a large enough portal behind Eden, before making a small one near his hand, looking at Zamtika.
"Ready?"
"Ready!"
Ven then reached in and grabbed Eden, who seemed surprised.
"My, how creative Rabbit." It said with a smile. Just then, Zamtika launched herself using her lance to launch herself at Eden, with Ven puling with all his might.
But Eden used her tendrils to hold herself in place, and as Ven was distracted, launched small laser shot from her hand.
It hit Ven dead in his left eye, causing him to let go in pain.
Zamtika dropped to the ground as Ven clutched his bleeding eye.
"We can't win, Tika." Ven said in a grave voice as he rushed over to help her up. The two stood together as Eden stared down at them with an almost warm smile.
Zamtika stared at Ven, then at the hearts before reluctantly sighing.
"Ven Misa. I love you."
She said with a smile before grabbing his gunblade and stabbing him through the heart. He had a look of shock on his face, as she stared at him with teary eyes. She kissed him with passion before his life faded. Ven didn't know what to feel. sorrow, anger, or love for Tika, but all he knew was that Tika had a plan, even if it cost him his life. He knew she wouldn't do something with out reason.
So, in his final moments, he smiled and said with a big grin on his face.
"We'll... Get a... Drink together... When we meet again..."