Several Hours Later

“I see smoke!”

“Of course there’s smoke, the Compound’s under attack,” Ralak responded tersely. “But are the Bleeders still around?”

“I don’t see anyone, but I’m still looking…” Captain Travis replied, his eyes glued to the back of his binoculars as he peered through the dark desert skies.

Colonel Saito tensely glanced back at Travis before looking out over the desert himself. Several hours had passed since Compound Tresnon first got word of a Bleeder attack on Compound Falnon; shortly after, Saito had gathered CSF-1 as well as Mark and Danielle to go reinforce Falnon. Ralak, despite still recovering from her lost arm, had insisted on coming along, reasoning that the attack was a response to her and CSF-1’s recent visit to Falnon — and Saito had decided that they didn’t have the time to argue with her.

The group now approached Falnon by aerial transport, with one side of the craft opened up to the winds to give a better view of the Compound below — and the smoke that embroiled it. Amidst the dark of night, only raging fires illuminated Falnon, making evident the incredible damage to the Compound’s walls and buildings even to those without binoculars.

“Is there anyone left…?” Hackett questioned as she beheld the smoking Compound.

“The only way to know is to go down there—!” Ralak started, beginning to shove her way past Travis, only for Saito to grab her arm.

“We still don’t know what’s down there,” the Colonel insisted. “And, more importantly, you don’t have any energy shields! Do you want to lose another arm?”

Ralak looked back at Saito, her brow deeply furrowed. A second later, she shook him off, but nonetheless retreated from the open doors. “…We still need to do something,” she insisted. “If we hadn’t come here earlier, then Falnon—!”

“Shit! It’s the infection!”

“What?!” Everyone on the aircraft turned to give Travis an alarmed look.

“The metallic infection, you mean?” Mark questioned uneasily. “Here? Are you sure?!”

“Yeah…” the Captain replied. “There’s people down there, walkin’ around, but they have that silver rash all over them. It seems like that’s all that’s down there, actually — I don’t see any Bleeders, or any other survivors.”

“That doesn’t sound good…” Danielle commented.

“It’s worse than that,” Hackett asserted. “If the infection is here in Treséd, and spreading freely, then—!”

“Look out!!” Mark shouted, quickly grabbing Travis and Hackett to shove them aside just as a man leaped up at the aircraft, clearing dozens of meters in a single bound. Red light from the fires glinted off of the metallic rashes stretching down his neck and arm as he bared down on the aircraft, only for Mark to summon his giant halberd and slam the infected man out of the air with the flat of his blade.

“MacTavish, evasive maneuvers!” Saito shouted toward the cockpit, and then turned toward Mark and Danielle. “You two are up! Contain the infection at all costs! …Wait!” He then reached into his pack and grabbed two small disc-shaped devices, that he handed to each of Mark and Danielle. “These are Infection Capture Devices. You should be able to throw them at an infected person to capture them in a containment field. I only have two with me, since I wasn’t expecting this — but if you think you can save someone, then capture them with that and we’ll bring them back to Tresnon!”

“Will this really work?” Mark questioned.

“Hard to say. The Nimalians gave us a bunch of those devices, but we haven’t had the chance to try using them — until now. If nothing else, this is a good chance to see how effective they are.”

“Alright. We’ll try to bring someone back, then.”

“Good.” Saito nodded as he waved Mark and Danielle off. “The rest of us will offer fire support from up here!”

“Got it!” Danielle replied as she and Mark moved to jump from the transport.

“I’m goin’ with you,” Ralak insisted. “If that infection is spreadin’ among Falnon, then—!”

“Then you’d be a perfect target!” Saito cut in, stepping in her way and grabbing her shoulder to force her into one of the transport’s seats. “Sit your unshielded ass down! The infection is even worse to fight than the Bleeders, especially if you don’t have shields! It only takes one injury, one cut, and you’re dead!”

“…Rgh…!” Ralak growled, a deep glare directed at Saito, only for her to eventually shake her head. “…Damn it! Fine. I’ll stay here.”

“Good,” the Colonel replied, and then glanced back at Mark and Danielle. “Now, Mark, Danielle, get going!”

“…Alright, sir. We’re on it,” Mark replied, though his gaze lingered on Ralak for a second. As close to Falnon as they now were, the light of the raging fires shone upon Ralak’s contorted face, exaggerating her already deep scowl and furrowed brow into the likes of a furious monster. Nevertheless, Mark quickly turned his attention to the task at hand, and leaped from the aircraft to the streets below, with Danielle following soon after.

A mere second after leaping from the aircraft, a massive boulder slammed into Mark, causing his energy shielding to flare up as he was sent flying into the dirt just outside of Falnon. As soon as he landed, Mark jumped to his feet, just in time to fend off two women who lunged at him with fingers that tapered off into sharp, metallic claws. In reflex, he moved to cleave through them both with his halberd — but just as the blade was about to sink into the flank of one of the women, Mark quickly rotated the polearm to instead slam her with the flat of the blade, throwing her into the other woman. His brow furrowed in consternation as he quickly backed away, uneasily eying the two women as they scrambled back to their feet. “…Hey!” he called out to them, “can you hear me? Say something!”

Only a guttural growl, followed by a hideous snarl, came from the infected women as they turned back towards Mark, their teeth bared. They both pounced toward him again, prompting him to dismiss his halberd and intercept their lunge with his bare hands. Effortlessly, he grabbed their wrists and used their own momentum to yank them to the ground in a pile, where he quickly pulled out the Infection Capture Device and attached it to the back of one of the women. Immediately, a golden sheet of energy exploded from the device and completely surrounded the two women, holding them in place as they lashed out at the energy field that now contained them. Mark eyed them for a moment, watching uneasily as they clawed at both the field and each other in what could only be described as a feral rage; the spark of intelligence was completely gone from their eyes, replaced by the bloodshot eyes of a rabid animal.

An eerie howl from within Falnon tore Mark’s attention away from the captured women. Quickly, he crouched down and then leaped over Falnon’s wall with a massive bound. Smoke and fire passed by beneath him as he cleared several blocks before crashing down to the ground, just in time to see Danielle tangling with five infected people all at once. Deftly, she dodged around each of their lunges and feral thrashes, occasionally making use of her shapeshifting to contort in unnatural manners while attempting to lead the infected into the middle of the street. While the group was distracted with Danielle, Mark charged forward, smashing down the burning buildings surrounding Danielle so as to make some room for her.

The thundering echo of crumbling stone immediately drew everyone’s attention to Mark, however, and two of the infected people soon turned toward him. As they did, Mark looked into their eyes, glazed over and slightly silvered — a sight that, when combined with the ominous dark red lighting of the Falnon inferno, gave Mark a moment of uneasy pause. That moment was enough for the two infected to pounce on him, one of them attempting to sink their teeth into his thigh while the other latched onto his chest and began banging on his head. Flaring energy shields protected his bare skin from contact, enabling him to leverage his massive size and superior strength to simply grab the two infected and yank them off of himself, at which point he chucked them out of the ruined building and into the street.

“Mark!!”

He quickly turned around, just in time to spot Danielle as she dove straight toward him — with the remaining three infected tight on her heels. Immediately, Mark planted his feet wide apart to let Danielle roll between his legs; as soon as she was behind him, he crouched and spread his arms to intercept the three infected people in front of him. As with the others he had faced, they all lunged at him, particularly at his torso. But instead of bracing for impact, Mark allowed the three to bowl him over, using the momentum to roll backwards out of the ruined building and into the street. After one roll, he easily jumped back to his feet while the three infected people remained on the ground in an unorganized heap. Before they could recover, Danielle stretched her right arm toward the heap and transformed her right hand into a small containment field generator. A golden sheet of energy promptly surrounded the three infected, trapping them in place; immediately after, Danielle bloodlessly severed the fabricated generator from her arm, at which point she drew back to Mark.

“I see you’ve figured out how to fabricate those capture devices…” Mark observed.

“Well, not perfectly, but it works well enough…” Danielle said, and then looked back at the last of the five infected she had been dealing with — which she had captured just before turning to deal with the three on Mark. Before either she or Mark could say anything further, however, a chorus of howling and snarling from a block away drew their attention.

“Shit…” Mark muttered as he and Danielle began running in the direction of the snarls. “Just how many more are there…?”

“This… this is what the infection does to people, then?” Danielle questioned uneasily, and then passed a glance toward Mark. “Do… do you think we’ll be able to save them?”

Mark looked down at her doubtfully, and then returned his attention forward. “…We can’t think about that, right now. We need to make sure that the infection is contained and doesn’t leave Falnon. That’s our priority.”

“Oh… right…” Danielle responded weakly, though nevertheless continued on with Mark as they fought to contain the situation in Falnon.

---

1 Hour Later

“Good job, Mark, Danielle.”

“Th-thanks…” Danielle replied despondently.

“It sure doesn’t feel like it…” Mark muttered.

Colonel Saito looked between them before releasing a sigh and turning to their left. Thanks to Mark and Danielle’s quick action, Compound Falnon and everything within had been successfully contained. The infected populace — what remained of it, at least — had been captured in containment fields fabricated by Danielle, and the Compound itself was now protected by a massive containment field, also fabricated by Danielle. CSF-1, Mark, and Danielle now all stood outside of Falnon’s walls, their aircraft parked on the sands nearly a half kilometer out. Mark had brought two of the captured infected with him; Hackett and Travis were now working to secure them in the aircraft, so as to bring them back to Tresnon for study and, potentially, help.

Saito watched the two officers wrestle with the captured infected before turning his eyes to the sky, where the lights of another several aircraft had come into view. “Selind was quick, to mobilize this many…” he muttered to himself, watching as one of the Defense Force aircraft broke off to circle Falnon while the remaining craft began landing nearby.

“Olkath!!”

The Colonel glanced toward their own aircraft in surprise, finding that Ralak had disembarked and rushed over to the infected man that Captain Travis was attempting to drag aboard. On a closer look at the man’s short, stocky, and slightly overweight build, accompanied by his broad, tan-skinned face, Saito realized that the man was the same as the one he and Ralak had met with in Falnon a mere week ago — only now, silver rashes stretched across Olkath’s face, and down both of his arms. His eyes were bloodshot, holding not the sly spark of an information broker, but the feral fury of a rabid animal.

“Olkath—!” Ralak called out, reaching out to him with her arm — only for the infected man to gnash his teeth and lunge for her. Only the containment field surrounding him held him in place, though his sudden lunge still knocked Travis to the ground.

“It’s not him, anymore.”

Ralak whipped around to look at Saito as he approached. She stared at him for a moment, her mouth constantly opening and closing as she sought out the words with which to form a reply; eventually, she settled into a resigned, yet furious scowl. “…This… this is the metallic infection?”

Saito nodded. “Yeah. Although…” He turned toward Olkath, watching as the man thrashed about wildly. “…This is the first time that I’ve seen a human be infected.”

“That’s great, sir,” Travis remarked through gritted teeth as he attempted to grapple with Olkath. “But maybe you could give me a little help, here—?”

“I’ll take care of it,” Mark declared, striding onto the scene and effortlessly restraining Olkath with his superior strength. He then hefted the infected man onto his shoulder and stepped onto the aircraft to secure Olkath for transport.

“…Well, that’s one way to do it,” Travis commented.

“This ain’t… this ain’t right,” Ralak muttered. “What… what even happened, here? I ain’t ever heard of the infection bein’ in Treséd. Did the Bleeders do this?”

“That seems like the obvious answer…” Saito responded as he watched the activity around him. Hackett had just stepped off of the aircraft while Danielle jumped aboard to begin creating rope to secure the infected passengers; amidst that, the Defense Force aircraft had securely landed, with the Defense Force members rapidly disembarking to secure the area. Among the 20 or so that now joined CSF-1 on the ground, two familiar figures appeared, both of them quickly approaching Saito and Ralak.

“I see you already got everythin’ under control, huh?” Selind remarked.

“I can’t believe this is happening…” Kaoné muttered, her gaze turned upward at the smoke that continued to billow into the dark skies over Falnon.

“Selind, Dean,” Saito acknowledged the two women as they stopped in front of him, Ralak, and Travis.

“Were there any survivors?” Kaoné questioned hopefully.

Saito and Travis exchanged a wary glance before the Colonel turned back to Kaoné. “…Depending on how you define ‘survivors’, I suppose you could say ‘yes’,” Saito replied. “However… they’re all infected. Every last one of them.”

“Where? Can I see them?”

“Follow me,” Travis declared, at which point he stepped away from the group to lead Kaoné aboard their aircraft.

Selind watched the two go before releasing a resigned sigh. “So… the infection finally shows up in Treséd, huh?”

“So it would seem…” Saito responded.

“If we were just faster…” Ralak muttered.

“Y’all left Tresnon just about as fast as possible!” Selind remarked. “You got here a full hour before the rest of us!”

“As much as it pains me to say,” Saito added, “I think that Falnon was doomed from the start.”

“And I had even left some Defense Force folks, here, too…” Selind lamented. “But even they weren’t enough to stop this from happenin’…”

“At least they were able to get the word out about the attack. If the infection had been allowed to linger here for much longer, then the situation in Treséd would have gotten a lot worse.”

“True. This whole situation, though…” Selind trailed off, her gaze looking out over the remnants of Compound Falnon before turning back to Saito. “When you got here, were there any Bleeders?”

The Colonel shook his head. “None. All we found were some of the infected populace.”

“Damn… were the Bleeders really behind this, then?”

“It has to be,” Ralak stated. “This attack… it’s got all the signs of bein’ a revenge attack. We came here a week ago to get info on the Bleeders, which led to us smashin’ a base, savin’ a bunch of hostages, and findin’ out about their connection to those SFC outsiders… after that, we should’ve known that the Bleeders would strike back in revenge. We should’ve known…”

“We did know,” Selind corrected. “I made sure to alert the Defense Force here about what y’all did to the Bleeders. What we didn’t know is that the dirt-damned metallic infection would show up. And if you’re so certain that this really is the work of the Bleeders, then that would mean that the Bleeders are fuckin’ around with the infection, now. And if that’s true…” Selind released a wary sigh. “…There’s little worse than this…”

“…We should never have involved Olkath, or Falnon…” Ralak muttered. “Not if it meant the people here would be slaughtered, like this…”

“Don’t you let the Bleeders get to you, now,” Selind insisted. “The Bleeders are thinkin’, actin’ people who can make decisions all on their own. You can’t blame yourself for atrocities that they commit. As soon as you start that, you’ll suffocate under all the guilt.”

“But—“

“Don’t you ‘but’ me. You tried to come out here and fight, even though you lost your fuckin’ arm less than a week ago! You ain’t usually that careless, Ralak.”

Ralak responded with silence, her face still wearing a scowl as she looked out over what remained of Falnon. Saito and Selind exchanged a glance, only to then turn toward the aircraft as Kaoné disembarked.

“…Well?” Selind prompted as the Dean stepped up to the group. “…Do you think you can save them?”

Kaoné wordlessly looked up at Selind, and then at Saito. She then looked down, her lips pursed. Eventually, she replied, “…we’re too late. The infection has reached their brain…”

“I wondered if that might be the case…” Selind responded.

“Damn…” Saito muttered. “…Does the infection really spread that quickly? These people were only infected a few hours ago, weren’t they?”

“Without having been here, myself… it’s impossible to say,” Kaoné admitted. “You’re right, the infection usually takes several weeks, maybe even months to get this bad in a single person. But that isn’t universal. It’s rare, but I have heard of cases like this that progressed at a lightning’s pace, usually if there’s a mass outbreak all at once. Or if their wound was especially large…”

“That would be consistent with the idea of the Bleeders unleashing the infection on Falnon,” Saito mused.

“Of all the things to worry about, now we have that fuckin’ infection on our doorstep…” Selind remarked. “And here I thought we’d never see it in Treséd. Should’ve known that things could get worse.” She then sighed deeply. “…Speakin’ of worse… Kaoné, if you say that the people here can’t be cured, then… we can’t bring ‘em back to Tresnon. We can’t afford to spend time and resources keepin’ ‘em contained and alive, not when we also have to worry about Bleeder attacks.”

“I thought you might say that…” Kaoné responded quietly.

“…I hate my job, sometimes…” Selind muttered as she unshouldered her rifle. “And by the sounds of it, there’s plenty of infected folks, captured here in Falnon.” She passed a glance toward Saito. “Those Eximius Vir of yours sure are thorough, huh?”

“Sorry,” Saito replied. “Mark and Danielle can be… optimistic, at times.”

“No no, it’s fine. They did the right thing. No use killin’ someone if you think you can save ‘em. Still… leaves a lot for me and the Defense Force to deal with.”

“If you need help, my team is here.”

“I am, as well,” Kaoné added.

“Huh?” Selind looked down at Kaoné in surprise. “You wanna help? You understand what we’re about to do here, right?”

“I’m not naive,” Kaoné retorted. “I understand what you meant when you said that we can’t bring everyone back. But with my abilities, I can put them to rest quickly and humanely. It’s… it’s what they deserve.”

“I’m helping, too,” Ralak insisted. “I’m the one who suggested we come to Falnon, last week. So these people’s deaths are on me. I can’t shove that responsibility onto everyone else.”

“What did I just tell you about blamin’ yourself?” Selind countered.

“Selind…” Ralak turned to look Selind straight in the eyes, pleading desperation replacing the scowl she had been wearing until that point. “…Please.”

Selind stared back for a moment, as if looking deep into Ralak’s soul — and still, the former Bleeder didn’t budge. Eventually, Selind looked away, sighed, and shrugged. “Alright. Can’t really stop you, I guess. And the sooner we can clean up here, the sooner we can all return to Tresnon.”

“Got it,” Saito replied. “I’ll let my team know what’s going on.”

“Thanks, Colonel,” Selind responded, and then turned to face the walls of Falnon once more. “…The Bleeders really have crossed a line, endangerin’ the entire continent like this. Once we’re through, here, we need to make sure that Strén pays for this.”

“Agreed,” Ralak curtly replied as the group dispersed, preparing to put a close on the sordid night in Compound Falnon.