“Ou nu tink Diwectow wouwd settwe fow dah Bwass wing when can hab ouw body, du ou’?” The two were back in the mind space but it was in your own head rather then the fluffies. Smarty ID was still wearing the crown despite it being on your own head. The lighting and atmosphere was slowly shifting behind Director, a clear sign that something unknowable was working to invade your mind from beyond. “Su abou’ dat deaw. One fwuffs twash am anuddah daddehs tweasuwe. Diwectow wet ou weave, ou can hab Diwectows body an ou’ can wib dah happy famiwy wife ou’ aways wan. Enjoy ou’ widdwe hewd and Diwectow wiww take aww ou’ suffewing an embwace dat which ou’ negwect.”
Thankfully Johnson wasn’t so weak as to not consider what someone under the control of the helmet would do with the power of the institute at their back. “You miscalculated one thing Director.”
“An wha’ am dat?”
“My heads not like your head, and Im not alone here…” With a flash of overhead spotlight and music qued by your subconscious mind that was acting as stage crew your form flashed and Johnson split into his Id, Ego and Super ego. The three stood posed and ready.
“Director nu awone hewe, eidah…” Eyes slowly began to open in the hazy dark background that had been consumed behind Director.
“Hmm, it seems the artifact is going to be more of a problem then I thought… No matter, even if Johnson survives they cant get back here quickly without his teleporter.” The only information he was getting from the fluffy was general vitals so he knew the Courser fluffy was still alive in some capacity. “Send out some scouts to get me visuals and recover the aberrant prototypes.” Zimmer added in reference to Sundaes foals. He was interested in Bio sciences report on those.
“What the hell did you do!?” Came a green light with the words ‘voice only’ from his screen as the head of bio science had connected..
“Just ensuring my checkmate per our gentlemans agreement.” Zimmerman wasn’t about to jinx himself by asking ‘why’ he asked.
“Yeah well the warning lights black was just eclipsed by an orange~” Came a call from the sudden appearance of the red light in voice only mode. “That blew out the bulb and it’s replacement!” The blue light added cutting in in voice only.
“Well then, its looks like we need to conduct an emergency council meeting.” Zimmerman added confidently assuming the other directors would have no choice but to throw in with him now because their asses were on the line as well. “Pam, what’s the report?”
“ERROR ERROR ERROR~” Zimmerman did not know what he expected from the glorified toaster but stumbled forward holding onto the desk as a ‘THUD’ of extra power and coolant systems kicking on was followed by a massive cascading scream as all the synths were slowly tasked for additional processing power to try and understand what was going on. Every fluffy synth in ascending series was screeing and reeing from robotic containment and the sound of the first generations and second generations were closely behind followed by the third… Even the coursers!?
A series of feeds pulled up to draw additional data sets. One from the ground scouts observing sanctuary hills from a few angles and one from a satellite feed. The blue butcher armor was standing with an unconscious black unicorn held by the neck. ‘Johnson had expressed vehement disgust for the artifact! Why would he be wearing it?’ Zimmerman thought his plan of removing an annoyance and preserving his life until the MIT project was completed evaporating.
“Processing… Enhancing…” Pam added as the satellite focused in and the synths with scopes or other magnifies used them while others advanced with caution through the deactivated defense lines. The eyes were rolled back in Johnsons head, veins throbbing across his exposed skin from the head down their neck that had begun to thicken. “Probability of a equivalent or superior compound to documented ‘Mysterious serum’ being introduced to the user 87%.” The seams between the power armor were struggling and began to split. “Likelihood of enhancing or having unknown Interactions with the power armors prepared combat drugs suite, 93%.”
“Danger levels are predicted to rise over time. Director Johnsons capabilities will likely sky rocket until they have reached an equilibrium with the artifact at which point It will platue into a more stable incline as they become more accustomed to using it.” Pams voice adds with a warning hint.
After three seconds all lit up simultaneously. “Options?” They queried.
“Using all conventional forces for a surface attack as soon as possible, this unit calculates a 12.56% chance of successful neutralization.”
“Recalling all forces and using all resources via a last stand protocol, 8.57% and will likely decrease with time.”
“Im not liking those odds..” The green light for bio sciences adds.
“Using arsenal consumables, this unit calculates a 33.3 repeating chance if we deploy a singular pre war missile or satellite laser strike. Depleting our entire reserves of prewar munitions and tapping the current year arsenal to increase likelihood of repeated impacts to the target, raises the chances to 69.420%.”
“While we will continue to survive down here, I for one do not want to waste all the efforts we put in on the surface and condemn them to nuclear winter just for the chance of stopping Johnson.” The blue light of dr li added.
“This prediction may be unconventional, but this unit does project a 50% chance of neutralization if we simply surrender Zimmerman and return the synths to sanctuary hill.”
“Now wait just a minute~” Zimmerman was about to add but a vote had already been pushed to remove his standing. “All in favor?” Dr Li’s blue light asked. The lights were unanimous save for the individual in question who was prevented from voting on an issue involving them.
As they discussed and held their votes Johnson began moving again. They entered their component storage building and came out with a small platform apparatus they carried under arm while slapping a device with a fusion core onto the chest plate of his power armor as they looked around the garage searching for a signal. They soon found a transmitter device the courser had planted to aid the institute in locking on and recalling the synths in sanctuary hills. They set down the disk and stepped on while pointing the unicorns head and horn like a pistol at the relay device.
The red light lit up. “Isn’t that?”
The blue light lit up. “Shit that’s a shipping pad.”
Before the call could go out to emergency shut down the teleporter or restrict/redirect incoming travel Johnson had already used the artifact to trigger the unicorns courser component to send a permission request for a retrieval pickup. The platform would simply redirect him to materials processing rather then the teleporter in general.
“Last stand protocol, engage. Seal every bulkhead and for gods sake! Have Zimmer escorted down there to see if he can talk Johnson down.”
“You cant do this to me~” Zimmer gave the expected complaints as he was dragged out by synths to the lower levels of the institute where they processed materials.
“We’d better hurry. I don’t want to assume he’ll set the reactor to blow or anything but…” The green light from bio sciences added. If the bulkheads and defenses were particularly annoying, he could just pop over to the reactor and end them all that way.
~THWOK!~
Johnsons body marched through the materials processing floor. Large sections of floor with walkways between them were marked off to avoid people standing there despite it being open in case it was assigned to incoming tribute. Dumpsters of concrete arrived and were mag lifted to a crusher in the distance to reprocess the materials into those that can be mixed into new cement or disposed of as filler. Similiarly ingots of metal were hauled off to storage where containers were accessed as they needed those metals for various production projects.
Just as he was about to reach the blast door before the elevator it opened and Zimmer was tossed to the ground. The two synths side glanced to each other and the one by the button slowly reached over and pressed it as the doors closed and left the two men behind.
“Your plans got a lot farther then they should have Zimmer, but you’ve never seen my bad side so it’s understandable you didn’t use excessive force. Pity. Your rides over old man, time to die.”
Zimmer struggled to get himself to a standing position. “Looks like I check mated myself trying to place you in check.” Zimmer sighed. “Im sure your toys will be returned to you,” Johnsons hand began to extend to palm his head. “Hold on, lets talk this over…”
“We just did, time for talking’s over.” With only a second of resistance Zimmers skull collapsed into a chunky mess that sprayed out both sides of Johnsons head. “Good game.” They said with a morbid respect looking only at their soaked hand long enough for everything to float and slough off with telekinesis.
There was a slight pause in the psychic battle as all parties could agree. ‘Damn that felt good.’
The button lit up as if it had been pressed. “You better not make me come up there.” Johnson added to no one and soon enough heard the elevator coming back down.
When the doors opened Johnson was greeted by a series of mostly sedated fluffies in cages. Some were coming around though. “Whewe am fwuffy?” A curious voice added. Then suddenly they caught sight of the massive figure before them. “Eeep~ Munstah!” The fluffies began to stir and a similar series of surprised expressions wailed out.
“What did daddy say about meanie words?” Their hand extended threateningly forward as the elevator door closed. Time to show these disgusting creatures what a real monster was. The hand stopped short spasming slightly.
Returning to the mind space. The combined forces of the Id, ego and superego had managed to restrain the fluffy by the front and back legs from the side. Though holding them still for their counterpart to strike left little room for them to dodge or block the various tendrils of darkness extending from the black horizon filled with countless distant eyes that lashed down upon them.
“GET OUT!” With a flying drop kick the two released hurling Johnson back through the curtain of darkness broken only by the eyes towards the two largest which allowed you to gaze upon what was happening in the real world.
The crown toppled from its head. “NUuuuuuuuuuuuu~” The psychic entities shattered through the window of the soul and the reaching hand found itself wrenching to its own forehead to hold their eye in pain as smoke poured out. The fingers brushing quickly against the crown on his head sending it tumbling off.
Johnsons muscles and body was on fire and his pores were leaking steam like sweat as the mysterious serum was no longer regularly pumping through his system to stabilize the near overdose levels of drugs in his system.
A series of synths filled the hallway that had been prepared per the last stand protocols. All aiming towards the elevator. The door opened and smoke rolled out revealing director Johnson coiled up on the door of the elevator with his fluffies that he had managed to release before losing the remainder of his strength.
“Shhh~ daddehs sweeping.”
Targeting lasers snapped to each potential target before a “Code orange, cancelled.” Came over the PA system by PAM as the last stand protocols were disengaged by the department heads.
“Stand down.” Could be heard from the courser commander.
