[ChicletPrime]

Chapter 5: Covert Operation

• okay. we're at some abandoned building? caution tape, broken stuff, the obligatory dark and very, very stormy night.
  
• every city has its slums, sweetheart, even if you never see it.
  
• wild grass covers the ground, testament to years of neglect. yet pieces of metal shine as new. the signal from the necklace abruptly vanishes.. a jammer? 
  
• "Test Site 5 has been cleaned. We will now advance to the East Zone."
  
• oh, hey? somebody is hiding in this place? ooh! we've been pulling into a makeshift shelter.
  
• "Crystals adorn her skin. She wears a thin dress but she's unperturbed in such cold rain." 
  
• oh fucking hell. cleanup. the test subjects for Ever's experimentation with grafting cores into people and people into Wanderers.
  
• Fleet Guy: "The contamination levels here are extremely high. They're practically indistinguishable from Wanderers now."  "This batch of specimens is on the brink of transformation. Salvage value 0%. Requesting confirmation to cleanup."
  
• oh you poor kid. you're still alive. i.. i am not sure if your heart is still beating though. but you're still talking!
  
• oh YOU POOR KID. there's just a hollow cavity, covered in crystals, in her chest.  a large crystal pulsates where her heart should be.
  
• "If I passed the test, I could have been the Professor's daughter." 
  
• i am going to rip this man's fingers from his hands, his hands from his wrists, his wrists from...
  
• "Your power... it's warm. and you smell really nice."
  
• um. girlfriend. you still have your gun in your hand, right? i think we're about to hit critical crystal mass here.
  
• no, you can't eat me! that is not a question you ask strangers, were you raised by wolves? 
  
• she still looks sort of like a little girl so i hesitate and now i am enspeared with some of her crystals. i, lucky i, am bleeding. Caleb is going to be very pissed.
  
• Rafayel! I'm bleeding and we all know what my blood can open. Can your tsunami reach to the heavens? 
  
• oops, she's also got friends. black crystal covered friends.
  
• i shoot them, but not where it would hurt because... i am not sure why i tried to target something less vulnerable. i don't think they're save-able, girlfriend.  but then somebody else shoots them and they break up into particles, just like a Wanderer.
  
• The Fleet Guys! i'm saved! well, relatively saved. actually, this is more of an "oh, bollocks" situation methinks.
  
• "Admist the howling winds, the space in front of me distorts. A vortex appears, sucking in and  tearing apart two or three looming figures." 
  
• I Am In So Much Trouble. 
  
• "The rain stops, and the smoke from guns and crystal particles appear to be suspended in time."
  
• It's either Kevi, or Caleb is really, really, really angry. 
  
• "Through a veil, an indifferent face gradually comes into focus. Raindrops are deflected away."
  
• eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
  
• *cough* *ahem* 
  
• "Do you see? There will always be people who want your power." 
  
• aaaand the hungry maw of a vortex just swallows up everything. 
  
• the remaining particles coalesce into a Wanderer, that heads for Caleb.