Chapter Text
Everything quickly went to shit, if you’d ask 12B.
Here’s her, a career Battler android, with numerous Machine kills to her name, about to lose her marbles, all because a shitty virus managed to infect her systems.
“Alert: Logic Virus contamination has risen to Level 2. 40% of systems are corrupted. Vision and auditory difficulties detected.” The monotone voice of Pod 626 reminded her.
“Urgh. No shit, buddy. I’m feeling like I’m about to throw up right now.” 12B covered her mouth as she gagged.
“Don’t go losing your marbles yet, will you? We hafta find the captain.” Her squadmate, and possibly her friend, 6B, reminded her, even though she’s clearly infected and struggling to move as well.
“I’m tryin’ here, jackass. Not my fault, this shitty virus makes me feel like my stomach is turning upside down.” She retorted.
6B huffed and clutched at her head, groaning in pain. “FFffucckk… if that is the effect on you, mine’s like being hit in the head repeatedly by a Type-40 Fist… Pod, have you located Captain 18D yet?” 6B asked her Pod companion.
“Negative. Initiating Callback Ping now.” Pod 970 tonelessly responded. Its upper chassis raised up, and a visible expanding circle swept over the area. “Black Box signals detected up ahead. There’s a possibility the signals are infected. Proposal: Retreat.”
“No can do, bastard. Gotta find the captain.” 12B shot back. She has the appearance of a female Android, with strength belying her deceptive frame. She has a head full of fiery, dull maroon curls and yellow eyes covered by a black blindfold. She would’ve normally worn a strapless, high-slit dress with laced sides and a sleeveless, brown bodysuit, but as of right now, she’s wearing YoRHa’s Heavy Armor. Hovering around her back is a Type-40 Axe suspended by her FFCS.
“What if we sneak around? It’s possible the infected don’t have any contact with their Pods right now?” Suggested 6B. She has brown hair in an angled bob with wide, blue eyes covered similarly by a black blindfold. A small decorative ruffled hat sat on her head, while she wore the same Heavy Armor as her teammate, 12B. A nodachi floats behind her, suspended by FFCS, close to scraping the ground due to its length.
Both were trekking through the devastated area of City Ruins, the sky darkened as if sympathizing with their plight.
The final battle against the Machines, following the deaths of the Units Adam and Eve, was supposed to be a clear-cut invasion to wipe out all Machine lifeforms. But of course, things took a shitty turn when an EMP blast rocketed the battlefield, and to their horror, infected many, if not all, YoRHa androids. 6B and 12B are the lucky ones to not get infected and taken over completely, and stayed conscious to find their captain, 18D.
It’s to their cursed luck that she was assigned to a different team than them, but 6B and 12B won’t forget the kind Defender who pulled back 12B from manic aggressiveness and 6B from deep contemplation about life. Safe to say, they’re devoted to each other. They each made a promise that if they were to die, they would die on their terms, not due to some hunk of metal.
So here they were, using Pod 970’s Ping ability to locate the black box signal of their captain, 18D. 18D is probably what held their ragtag squad together; she’s the glue if you ask them. Has the hallmarks of a good leader—selfless, calm, and determined. Add the fact that she has saved their hides numerous times by either pulling 12B from quicksand she is somehow blind to see, or pulling out 6B’s sword from where it got stuck in a tree for the nth time, 18D is reliable, and with a wicked, dry humor to boast. Who they’re looking for is an android like them who wears Heavy Armor, but has long white hair tied in a high ponytail, and red eyes beneath the standard black blindfold all YoRHa soldiers were required to wear.
They ran through destroyed rubble, cracked concrete, occasionally passing through cleaved machines and androids alike. 6B turned her head, ignoring the bodies of her fallen sisters-in-arms with blades impaled on their stomachs, and focused on not succumbing on the migraine jackhammering on her head.
“Alert: Logic Virus Contamination has risen to Level 3. 60% of systems are corrupted. Mobility systems compromised.” The monotone, clinical voice of Pod 970 broke the silence. 6B felt it, the numbness on her left arm, before shutting down completely. She felt like running on needles especially on her right leg, and she pushed past it, forcing the servos to keep moving instead of doing what the virus dictated it to do.
And so they ran. They ran some more. They evaded platoons of infected YoRHa soldiers. They ducked for cover as infected Scanner Units on their Flight Units zoomed ahead, looking for victims. They executed stealth kills on machines they came across.
At last, Pod 970’s voice rang through the empty clearing. “Unit 18D’s Black Box signal detected. Warning: Unit 18D is infected. Proposal: Eliminate 18D immediately.”
“No.” 6B and 12B spat out in unison.
“Proposal—”
“Shut up you hulking box of AI! If we’re gonna die, we’re gonna do it together!” 12B raised a shaking, angry fist at Pod 970.
“Come on, Twelve, let’s just meet with the captain.” 6B placated her, raising her only working hand to place on the redhead’s shoulder.
“Yeah, let’s go… Six.”
They headed to where they detected their Captain’s signal.
Upon seeing a kneeling figure supported by her spear, white hair messy and dislodged from her ponytail, they rushed forward. The android snapped its head up and went on guard with her spear, but both Battler androids raised their hands.
“Wait, 18D, it’s us!” 6B called. The android named 18D’s eyes widened behind her blindfold, and she relaxed, only to hunch over as she gripped her chest from pain.
“Oh shit! Ya okay, Capt’n?” 12B awkwardly hovered, placing a hesitant gloved hand on 18D’s back.
“Peachy, but thanks for asking…” 18D answered. She looked back up at them. “What are you two doing here? Why aren’t you with your assigned squads?” She asked them.
6B shrugged. “Everyone immediately got infected except the two of us. We had to put them down or risk them destroying everything.” Her fist clenched in rage. “Those damn Machines… They made us kill our own comrades!” She spat.
“And I think we’re near to killing ourselves as well.” 12B added, nonchalant about her death. “6B’s contamination levels has risen up to maybe 70% right now, and I’m not far behind. You know what that means, right Captain?” She asked.
18D’s lips pursed in grim determination. “You’re thinking of what humans used to call group suicide, aren’t you?”
Both Battlers nodded. “Only that, we’d go out with a boom.” 12B joked.
18D heaved a big sigh. “Alright. Let’s find the most concentrated part of infected YoRHa soldiers so we can do it.”
“I think that wouldn’t be necessary.” 6B quipped.
Sure enough, slowly coming around from all directions were marching infected YoRHa soldiers, seemingly having spotted them. They all look malicious, black ants with glowing red eyes. Held in their puppeteered grips were their standard swords colored gold stained with the blood of their uninfected compatriots, or even their comrades.
“Shit, how come the Pods didn’t detect them?!” 12B cursed.
“Look at that.” 6B pointed. Among the army was a machine with a long grotesque neck pulsing with yellow waves. “That tin can over there is an EMP-type; it must’ve masked the Black Box signals from the infected soldiers.”
“Whatever it is, it’s perfect for what we want to do, yeah?” 12B muttered. She hovered her hand over her chest, where a black, patterned cube emerged, yellow energy glowing from its horizontal patterns. 6B and 18D did the same as well, three glowing cubes now hovering over their armored palms.
18D smiled. “It was nice fighting with both of you.” She said.
6B returned it. “I won’t forget all of you. If there’s heaven up there, let’s meet up however it takes, ‘kay?”
12B smirked. “Whaaat? Afraid you’ll get lost, Six?”
“Shut up, Twelve.”
“Waah! Eighteen, did ya hear that? Six finally swore!”
“And it’s only on our deathbed, so relish it.”
“Alright, you two.” 18D held out her Black Box, the infected army almost upon them. “Let’s make our next life count.”
“You got it.” The Battlers chorused.
And their Black Boxes clinked together.
In an instant, an enormous explosion equivalent to 25 kilotons of TNT rocketed the entirety of City Ruins, wiping out all the infected YoRHa units, machines and surroundings altogether.
The three never got to wake up in the Bunker, for at that precise moment, the Bunker also imploded, destroying the transport terminals within it.
And for a moment, all was still.
In an unfamiliar world, where long-thought extinct species still roamed the planet, in the year 1905, on the ruins of a country named Xerxes, a hooded man scribbled what looked like a circle on its many stone floors.
The man was bandaged to hell and heaven, with his distinct features having white hair, bronze skin, and red eyes, with one bandaged due to the fact that he was freshly out of healing. His remaining eye blazed with rage and determination.
This war is killing them, erasing their identities, destroying their history, debauching their religion because an Amestrian soldier has the gall to kill an Ishvalan child in cold blood four years ago.
His eye filled with tears. Young Rashna wouldn’t ever see the sun again. She didn’t suffer, taking a bullet to the head that killed her instantly, yet her death has caused such suffering.
No matter, for her older brother will be there to summon something that would turn the tides once and for all!
Finishing the transmutation circle and placing his hands on the outside of it, activating the array, he wished for all his heart for forgiveness of going against Ishvala’s teachings, as well as wished for something that could turn the tides of war to their side, even if it was to ensure Senhud would stay standing.
“Please… Help us survive, no, win this war!” He cried out, before fully disappearing, the Toll taking his everything to grant what he wanted.
A massive alchemical lightning echoed in the desolate ruins, thrumming with power, before abruptly disappearing.
Laying across the array were three women.
One with red hair, one with white hair, and one with brown hair.
Rubredo, Albedo, and Nigredo. The Three Stages of Magnum Opus. It’s only fitting that what the Ishvalan alchemist summoned were these three.
Underneath black blindfolds, eyes, colored yellow, red, and blue, snapped open simultaneously.
Here's how they all look like (Default Outfits)