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Post by Insano-Man on Sept 20, 2018 13:38:17 GMT -5
LAYING LOW
It didn't happen. Somehow, more gunshot wound than woman, Ves knocked out the team that'd gotten Amin on the ground. She pulled up her sister, dragged her off to a sewer tunnel, and ran. The two spent about an hour in a raging gunfight with VANDAL hitmen and S&C clones. They might've hated eachother going in, but family ties were still family ties. Survival was still survival. They were covering eachother and fighting for their lives harder than the city had ever seen before. How the two managed to fight their way out of the siege is a question Drassa's still talking about to this day. Neither of them had much blood to share when they got free.
The aftermath was a nightmare for both. They were trapped with eachother somewhere in the sewers below, mixing crimson with brown. They had to stay there. S&C wasn't going to just let them walk. About a week later, they came back up. They went back to Drassa as soon as it was safe to move. Both of them had stories about all kinds of infections and diseases that'd nearly done the job for Chuikov. Neither of them wanted to talk about where they had to sleep.
Drassa did its part in keeping them safe. The siege earned its name as the Red Bonfire, but the flames didn't die when the fighting was over. Chuikov knew there were survivors. His men had the footage of Narun and Solah breaking loose. He didn't care how much Drassa thought it had sovereignty. He was going to find them, even if he had to launch a war against the SDC to do it. Before the month was out, S&C mercenaries were all over the Enclave, turning up everything they could and shaking down everyone they could find.
No one snitched. No one so much as sneezed in the sisters' direction. Here were the humans, on payroll for the Red Menace, trying to kill two of their own on their own turf. If someone might've talked, the Self-Defense Committee took them in for "extended questioning". If S&C got too close to the two, there was a mob and a protest to cover their movements. Chuikov never found them. By the time he was ready to burn the place down, the SDC was passing out guns to civilians and getting ready for an invasion. He had enough trouble killing fifty mercenaries. A people's army a few thousand strong wasn't something he was in the mood for.
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Post by Insano-Man on Sept 20, 2018 13:38:28 GMT -5
COMING BACK
About half a year went by before Ves was confident enough to get back up. It took about that long until she actually had the bones for it, too. She took it smooth and slow. She still had a good reputation, but she didn't want to stress it enough that Gregor might've heard. With a few tricks from her Fair Hand days, she duped a middleman for Beth into hiring her. Beth's contracts were always nice and quiet, so it worked out just fine. Ves was running low-level hits on problem persons in places where Chuikov wasn't. Every once in a while, all she had to do was get a body into position to scare someone. For a mercenary on the mend, it was just what she needed.
At some point, Ves's contracts took a turn for the city's depths again. Her middleman had wised up, but only just. He'd found out Ves was an alien, but she was bringing in results. He wasn't all that worried about what Beth had to say. He just had to keep Ves a secret. The bottom of the city was his best bet. If anything, it was just what Narun wanted; she was back in familiar territory, eavesdropping on mutant hovels on the outskirts of town. She was getting her ears back on for another trip into the wastes. As soon as she had the money to make a safety net, she was going back to her old habits.
It was around that time that she learned about something. The mutants were scared pantsless down there. The reject clones were coming out already checking every corner. Police chatter was lit up with something terrible. Something down there was wiping out everything from armored patrols to gunship landings. The cops just called it "Perpetrator #550-666-451" or something about as useless. The slack-socketed freaks knew it as the Red Hand, a bloody menace from above. When Ves found it, it was happy to see her again. She knew him. She had a different name. A few, actually. Ezimat nes Zak and the Leather Man, the Meatskin Horror and the Dough Man. Of all the things that could've survived the Fair Hand, it was that.
Nobody knows why Ves didn't run screaming. Nobody knows why she brought that thing back up to Cloneston. She didn't win any favor in Drassa. Amin branded her as pure evil for it. The city regretted every minute of it. People hated her for it. Even the wasteland was a bit disappointed; they didn't get their favorite freakshow back to keep the mutants in line. Ves doesn't know why, either. Some sense of family honor, professional respect - even the White Hunter's still guessing at her own motives.
All she knows is that she wanted to know what happened - even if it was just for closure. She wanted to know what had happened to Raki and the rest. She wanted a source of information that wasn't tainted by Chuikov's propaganda or VANDAL's manipulation. She didn't get it. Ezimat didn't know - or just couldn't figure out how to say it. Just like everything in her life before, it was a certain kind of closure. It just wasn't the kind she'd wanted. The Fair Hand was gone, her cousin was dead, and that thing was the one who'd made it out. She buried the memory. She went back to her job. She just wanted to forget it had all happened.
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Post by Insano-Man on Sept 20, 2018 13:38:42 GMT -5
RUMBLING ALONG
1311 started off as business as usual. Ves was prepping for the wasteland trip she'd wanted, away from Ezimat, the old city life, and everything else - again. When January landed, she'd had it in her head that it was going to be a mid-year trip around late July or August. She'd piled on supplies, charted a map, and settled on one last job to get out of her Beth contract. That didn't work out the way she'd hoped. Instead, Jimmy caught her with her pants down on the job - figuratively, as God intended.
How he managed that was something else. Ves's job took her to the Exeter Utilities tower. Not more than fifteen minutes in, she was caught in a crossfire by S&C grunts who'd used her contact as bait. Not more than fifteen minutes later, a team of out-city mercs hit the position and mopped the floor with the goons. For the city, the sheer level of violence and giant salamanders involved stamped it into memory as the Exeter Massacre. For Ves and Jimmy, it was nothing new. It was their usual start to a business relationship.
It was also something Ves didn't want anything to do with. The job dragged her back into the mud of the worst history she had; the Fair Hand and Raki'Sakazzah. Before she'd even signed the contract, she was back on the Tombstone Plate, basking in the stink of her dead relatives. At the same time, Jimmy's money was good. His intel was good. His scheme was nuts and she didn't buy that Raki was alive, but money was money. To top it off, he wasn't even trying to kill her or screw her - usually.
What followed was a reunion tour Ves could've done without. Her team was the Cross-Cloneston Rampage crew. She was part of the back-to-back brawls that earned it a name. She was there to bring the Dough Man onto the team after nearly being slapped off an undercity ruin. She was there to watch the Lion's Den Breakout from the sidelines - and wake up to Amin screaming at her the same day. She was there to meet the soon-to-be-infamous Ironbrains and see him slap the city with the Gorralad Lockdown. She was there to take on Chuikov and Beth in the Siege of TransUrban Tower - and died in the process.
[ ! LOCKED: Legends never die. ]
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Post by Insano-Man on Jul 7, 2019 4:06:41 GMT -5
LOST AGAIN
[ ! LOCKED: Legends never die. ]
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Post by Insano-Man on Jul 7, 2019 4:06:49 GMT -5
SLIPPING AWAY
[ ! LOCKED: Legends never die. ]
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Post by Insano-Man on Jul 7, 2019 4:06:57 GMT -5
ALMOST THERE
[ ! LOCKED: Legends never die. ]
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Post by Insano-Man on Jul 7, 2019 4:07:07 GMT -5
FINALLY GONE
[ ! LOCKED: Legends never die. ]
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Post by Insano-Man on Jul 7, 2019 4:07:14 GMT -5
SLINKING BACK
[ ! LOCKED: Legends never die. ]
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Post by Insano-Man on Jul 7, 2019 4:07:34 GMT -5
DRIFTING ALONG
Things went back to normal from then on. Ves was crammed into a van full of freaks and murderers, acting as pathfinder in a place she'd never seen before. She slept on bouncing beds with a Looney in throat-slitting distance. She was eating better, and the action had died down, but the long days hadn't improved. The only thing she got in return for her near-miss with Zaja's blood feud was a begrudging explanation - and even that wasn't much. Mumbles and shrugs with a side of sociopathy; Zaja and Adrian had killed enough cultists to earn a permanent spot on the meat's hit list.
Still, Ves wasn't dense. Disenthused with the company, but not dense. She knew well enough that she was dead anywhere else - especially if the Cult confused her for Zaja again. She hung around and did her best to make the most of it. More towns passed by. Each one reaffirmed her choice. People didn't look at her like a senator's agent, or a mutant with better sense and symmetry. She was still just a glass siren, a tundra-lurking horror, or "that thing." The average villager backed off in a hurry whenever they made eye contact.
Meanwhile, the van was an oasis; a little box of warmth and friendly flatulence in the Darimesan cold. She might not have liked them, but her new crew was willing to treat her square. They were willing to take a bullet for her just like any decent team of mercenaries. Sylvester didn't even seem to realize he was a Looney most of the time; worked with her, chatted with her, addressed her as a person. It was almost like a little slice of Cloneston had followed her out - even if it was a Cloneston from another universe altogether. It was a comfortable kind of communal vagrancy. Things stayed quiet and stable for a few months. That was up until the team hit the Pig Pen out near Karzak-Schiller.
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Post by Insano-Man on Jun 30, 2022 4:32:52 GMT -5
SUMMER IN CAIRO
Things didn't take a turn for sanity out there. Instead, it all dropped off a cliff face - which was about what happened to Ves. Not too long after turning up in the Pig Pen, the van hit a rough patch - just about literally. It ran into the stretch known as the Waverly Bridge, which - up till then - had seemed an innocuous anomaly; marching snowdrifts, inexplicable flurries. Not a minute later, the crew's home on the road was sailing through the sky. Ves had the pleasure of being up in the van's gun turret at the moment. She had the further delight of having her head smashed in when the van finally landed - and collided with a solid rock wall.
Things just got weirder and weirder after that. Next thing she knew, she'd woken up in a medical facility - at the bottom of Precinct Zero, home of a bunch of clone-imitating Loonies. Somehow, for some reason, she'd had her concussion and spinal trauma treated. Not a day later, she met Vari'Surkovat, a lost spacer who'd had some of the same hospitality. She met Ashton Winters again, Valadile the giant salamander again, and Azeem'Ulem for the first time. She met Drac and Suzy, the absurd duo of a quasi-sentient glass siren and an antarctic urchin. She met Fleet Admiral Laka, who was some kind of alien that nobody knew anything about. She was convinced she'd either lost her mind altogether, or found a way to some fresher sub-Hell she'd never considered before.
As wrong as it all was, things were content to stay passively ridiculous. Most everyone was all squeezed together into the van. The rest bunked in a new scout car, freshly constructed out of recently-disabled clone vans. The newly-invigorated crew bumbled out into the ice wastes to starve. They had incidents out in the Shenanijims Forest, and raided the pirate spaceship Vari had been held captive in before - right as it was being raided by cutter drones. They pressed on to the north to Randy's Bastion, where they were all treated like wild dogs. They met Cathrin Lauritz and a caravan from Cutter Valley. Things were getting more lively, but the structure of it all hadn't changed much.
Then Ves found out the Cult had taken Drassa. Then she found out that Vari was an AI pretending to be a grey. Things didn't get better.
Where once she was just on a mission for herself, she'd then abandoned her people to die. Where once she'd had someone who was growing on her as a friend, she then had a confused, clingy robot that reminded her of clones, Jimmy, and Damsel's sexbots. That set her down a slippery slope of suicidal ideation. By then, she'd just about lost everything; her life's possessions, her hopes for a new home, and her dreams of meeting a single normal person. She started wandering off again. She started getting in trouble again. Every other trip, her sinking sanity nearly got her killed - and that damned robot was waiting for her whenever the crew dragged her back.
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Post by Insano-Man on Jun 30, 2022 5:06:11 GMT -5
FALLING STARS
The crew of the Party Van had plenty of adventures - in Cutter Valley, in Wargsjo, in Broken Stone, and a miserable little town called "The Ditch". Ves played only a bit part for most of them. She had a sit-down with Adrian in Wargsjo - that she'd gone in expecting to be a beat-down. Instead, it helped build bridges between the two. All the same, she stopped the suicide-by-siren attempts. She took her life - and the lives of her crew - seriously again. For a long while, that was about it; Ves was a scout-sniper in someone else's shadow, just as she'd always been in Cloneston.
There were a spree of things that came in to change that. The first was a broken girl the team took in, around August, headed for Broken Stone; Caroline Guse. She was actually 19 at the time, but fate had conspired to beat her into quasi-juvenile submission. Most people on the crew had some kind of sympathy or pity for her, but Ves took it a step further. She saw this young woman who'd lost her mother, her sister, her father, and even a leg for good measure. She looked at this girl who'd fallen out of orbit in her mother's belly, and came out into a world of tragedy. If anyone knew her story, it was the White Hunter.
Complicating matters was Vari. Not too long after Carol was adopted into the crew, Vari adopted her as her own. She wasn't exactly the best mother; the stunted semi-spacer needed someone with experience and training, not a three-year-old android just as damaged as she was. Everyone on the crew cared for Carol in their own way, but Vari was the one to step up to wear the title of mom - even if the half-spacer was legally an adult. Ves couldn't just look at her like "that thing" anymore - not when she was always just a hair trigger away from being Carol's co-mom. She accepted the AI. She let the friendship come back. She started putting up with weird romantic advances, but whatever. At least someone was interested in her.
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Post by Insano-Man on Jun 30, 2022 6:02:47 GMT -5
GOLDEN GETAWAY
The second wind of change was a new hire; Sabik Nerax, a mercenary waxworlder in a human shell. That kind of description didn't do him any favors, but he integrated well enough. The third was what went down by around late December, when the team started pushing into a place they noted down as the "Eastern Bleaks". There, it seemed like they'd found either the source or the destination of every black blizzard in Darimesa; the whole of the environment was choked with that same, sooty, ashy black stuff, that ate radio waves and light all at once. It only got worse the deeper the the team went in - and weirder all the same.
The team had been following a lead that there was light at the end of the tunnel; a source of food, somewhere in the darkness - which sounded like one awful joke when the whole scene was a pitch-black wasteland. As it turned out, it wasn't just a bad joke. Deep in the Bleaks was a place of thicker ash, hellish humid heat - and lakes full of glowing honey. Just as it stunk something awful, the pools weren't quite honey; they were some kind of soupy colonies of micro-organisms, that could be cooked and fixed up into something pleasant on the tongue. As long as nobody went for a swim, there was enough in the hills that they could drown themselves - or the greys' bioreactors - with.
All around were orange and golden glows, mixing together with blowing ash and roasting heat. That all gave it a feeling like being trapped on the outskirts of Hell itself. So, it was only natural that Gregor Chuikov made himself at home, and came around to deep-fry Ves. Much as everyone on the team had wished otherwise, that wasn't another terrible joke. Around the time of Carol's 20th birthday, a long-range reconnaissance helicopter - built for long treks just like the team's van - came flying in with the S&C logo on it. It dropped a capsule full of digital flyers for the team; turn in Ves, get paid, and don't get shot by the impending mercenary deployment.
To say everything went wrong at once was being generous. Ves and Sabik were the first to check out the bounty bomb. Not a moment after looking it over, Sabik decided to cash in. A shotgun went off into Ves's ankle, and nearly blew her foot off. Ves managed a shot into Sabik's side and a struggle, but that was it. She was taken hostage, and dragged off into the ash. He would've gotten away with it, too, if it wasn't for those meddling spacers. A few of the crew chased after, and pulled Ves free. Sabik died of his injuries not long after. Nobody else was ready to turn Ves in, but that was it. When she was finally stable again, Ves snapped inside.
The price tag was hers. The problem was hers. S&C wanted her - and they were going to kill every last person that tried to protect her. When the opportunity came, she slipped away into the ash fog. She hobbled off into the darkness with a stolen rifle and only one thing on her mind. Out there, she was going to die. Out there, she was going to save her crew's lives. Out there, she was going to make a last stand, and either kill off the mercs by her lonesome, or die trying. She'd been running all her life, in one way or another. She was still running, then - but right into death's jaws.
She might've gotten away with it, too, if it wasn't for those meddling spacers. S&C picked up reinforcements by way of spacer mercs, but Ves's crew had the darkness on their side. They knew the ash better, the land better, and all the hungry honey better. Before long, after a few skirmishes with S&C patrols, they caught up with Ves. She'd been shot a few more times in what she thought was her final stand. She was ready for the end, there. Then in came Vari, Ashton, and others of her crew. Then in came Commissioner Ironbrains, who'd flown a pursuit in his own scout chopper. Somewhere, somehow, fate had decided Ves wasn't done. Against all odds - against her own designs - she went right back to the van.
Fate didn't just intervene that day; fate conspired, more than it'd ever done before. Ves went back with a half-melted Vari, who'd hurled herself into a flamethrower to save her crush. She went back to hear a message from Ironbrains, who gave her definitive proof that her sister was still alive in the city - and wanted her back. She went back to a team that all agreed, one way or another, that Ves was part of the family. She was rude, quiet, and practically oozed with bad luck, but - just like they'd do for everyone else - the team was ready to die for her. She went back to recover, to apologize, and to spend a long time thinking on what her life meant to the rest.
And right back to that damned robot again.
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Post by Insano-Man on Jun 30, 2022 6:06:18 GMT -5
NAVY ON THE ROCKS
For a long while, Ves had to bench herself. Out in the wilds, without any medical professionals or advanced healthcare, she was lucky enough just to be alive. The team had the tools to get her back on her feet, but it was going to take time. That meant she had to dial back, from field operations to a management position. She helped coordinate the team's scouts, review their maps, and manage their supplies. She tried to forge stronger ties to her partners - much as her history as a solo merc didn't give her many skills for that.
She tried to figure out what she was going to do about Vari.
A woman-imitating AI-driven android from space, still not even five years old - Vari was just about everything Ves was not interested in. An adventurous, outgoing girl, who was almost on the road to being a good-natured mercenary herself - Ves wanted a civilian, who wasn't going to burst into flames. She'd said as much to Vari. She was adamant it wasn't going to work out. Vari kept trying, and Ves kept shooting her down - even with her foot jellied and the android taking care of her every need.
As much as Vari was almost a picture of every turn-off in Ves's book, the waster was fighting herself off as much as the android. Where what Vari was didn't appeal to her, but what Vari did had just about swept her off her feet. She wanted Ves's friendship honestly. She wanted Carol's safety earnestly. She'd risked her life - and lost her skin - to save Ves from what seemed like a confluence of the worst possible luck in history. She cared for her, whether she could walk on her own or not. She wanted to be a real, breathing woman, with grey flesh and crimson blood - which made her about twice as lively and passionate as the rest of the crew.
While all this was going on, the team arrived to the ship-town of Goodman in around February of 1313. Goodman was built into a fleet of old sea-going warships, trapped on the surface of a permanently-frozen icy river. They took up hotel rooms aboard the carrier Robarr - and, of course, Vari and Ves were booked together. That close together, tension spiked. Ves had another crisis - this time, inside. Her run of luck with grey men hadn't gone so well - and that Azeem wasn't interested only ramped up that self-doubt. Her time spent without a real partner had worn on her - and having one waiting on her like a personal maid was driving her insane.
She caved in. She clammed up in the wrong conversation. Vari kissed her.
What happened after wasn't exactly fit for a public viewing, but, suffice it to say, the two were together then. It hadn't been love at first sight, but it was love. From then on, cliche as it was, the two were inseparable. From then on, sudden as it seemed, the two let their passions run wild - with their hearts as much as their bodies. There were struggles to work through as they went. Ves was still limping, and Vari had to put up with a latent harvester infection she'd picked up years ago in orbit. Ves had to come to grips with how strange Vari was to keep hold of her, and Vari was in the process of evolving from a buggy AI to some kind of biogel-based synthetic woman.
Ves had gone through plenty of flings in the past, but most were brief. At least half of them had ended in the line of duty - and the news usually reached Ves by way of an obituary. Vari was just as much at risk, but Ves knew she was different. She had a stronger will. She had a hotter heart. She didn't bleed to death when someone shot her too many times. Any other kind of relationship would've been a footnote to the wider world, but what Ves and Vari were set to have was something more. Just like they were inseparable in their hearts, they were inseparable in the field. From then on, Vari wasn't just Ves's life partner. She was her spotter, her accomplice, and her second pair of eyes on the trail.
She was her life's duty - and another reason not to run off into a shallow grave.
The time in Goodman, meanwhile, wasn't much else for Ves. For the rest of her crew, it was a wild ride; clearing out a massive nest of glass sirens, diving into a garbage hauler processing center, watching Adrian massacre a bandit camp by his lonesome - heroic antics by the bucketful. Thanks to her busted ankle, Ves only got to watch it from afar, or hear about it second-hand. The one incident she was able to participate in was a brawl with a mob of mystery mooks - MADVAR - and, even then, all she could do was shoot from the sidelines. The most she got from it was watching her new lover have her arm blown off. Ves had made her memories. She was ready to leave before they started turning traumatic again.
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Post by Insano-Man on Jun 30, 2022 6:40:39 GMT -5
ACTION REPLAY
Being a robot, Vari recovered a whole lot faster than Ves did. That let the squishier of the two get back to loving her instead of kicking herself. As the team set out for Turnaround Canyons, somewhere around March, the two went right back to being weird, freaky, and impossible. They were happy. They were committed. They'd have probably been involuntarily committed if anyone outside the team ever found out, but that only made it more fun. The honeymoon kept going. Ves hadn't found a redworlder town out past the wastelands. She'd found something better instead.
Not too far into Turnaround, the team found something serious. It might've seemed like all of Cloneston was rushing out to find Ves when the crew caught wind of a mutant warband sweeping in to make camp just a few valleys next door. There, out in the tundra, were real, live, half-finished clones. There, turning snow to slush, was a massive convoy of buggies, jalopies, and old riot vans. Bone tribes, raiders, slavers - everything Ves had seen in her time as the White Hunter and worse. This was the Clay Brotherhood. This was the kind of heat that made real clones think twice. It'd seemed like something had finally come around to ruin Ves's winning streak.
It might've even been up to the task, too - if Ves wasn't a wasteland legend herself. The team snooped in on a speech by the warlord; Camish Pero Ninwun - who the clans all knew by a different demonic nickname each. They eavesdropped on his plan; the Brotherhood had a beef with the Cult of Meat - and they were going to smash every town from there to the Veinlands to settle it. Naturally, Ves had a mind to change that. Naturally, she expected everyone was going to look at her like she'd lost her damned mind.
Some of them did, but Vari? Adrian? Zaja? Really, they were just waiting for her to ask.
Ves and Vari cased the camp at nightfall. They picked out the worst of the bunch. Priests, interpreters, and Ninwun himself, along with all their big cargo trucks and people-movers. They brought the intel back home the next day. Soon as the sun was up, just about every marksman in the crew was set up in sniper nests all around the warband's rest stop. It started first with low-key killings; for as long as they could, they popped anyone important who was out of sight from the rest. As soon as somebody found a body, they let it rip; every last rifle on the team took a major figure, and knocked him dead at a distance.
In one lightning strike, the Clay Brotherhood was over. It took months for their infighting to split the clans all over the ice wastes, but the mutant marauders were never going to get another shot. No more burning towns, no more sieges on Goodman, and no retaliatory strike by the Cult. Meanwhile, in that same instant, Ves and her accomplices melted away into the snow; nobody lost, nobody hurt - not even enough time for the raiders to return fire. It was the lesson she'd learned in Dirtville, put into play before the Brotherhood could even find their own sand-farmers to slaughter. After being benched for so long, it was one Hell of a comeback.
The meat of the team's trip through Turnaround was spent in an old ruin full of ghosts, but Ves's highlights were all on the edges. She met Dajha'Nessekah, and felt honest sympathy for the girl, but that was almost a footnote compared to what she and Vari were up to. They celebrated her 34th birthday bash just before the mutant bash. They went on a trip near the ruin to crush a cult of monsters. They worked hard to scout a safe path ahead, and harder to get the team through a road rampage of Clay leftovers. Vari had to go under for a revamp to her code, and Ves watched over her as faithful as ever. Dajha might've been sticking around for good, but, with everything going on, Ves had nearly forgotten who she was.
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