[Roboticization]
The Siberian Winter was a brutal one. Snowstorms upon snowstorms, leaving little chance for anybody isolated to wander out and restock on supplies. With hope, the storms would stop for just one day and let the people out of their homes, just to give them the chance to live through the Winter.
Not that it mattered much for the young Seele Vollerei. As she stared out into the onslaught that kept hammering against her window, she could hardly feel anything. The dim light of a jagged red mark running across her face reflected off the glass, making her sigh. The experiments she had volunteered for… They had left her bedridden with a sickness. Not to mention, her Matushka had ordered the other girls to stay away from her since it was apparently really infectious…
“Bronya…” The young blue-haired girl muttered sadly as she leaned her face against the cold pane of glass, almost tearing up a little. Being isolated from the friends and family she had grown to love at the orphanage was tearing her up inside. If she could, she’d probably just get rid of herself right then and there. Maybe the others wouldn’t have to worry about her then…
As her mind turned towards a darker place, she heard a knock on the door. “Who is it?” She asked, her somber mood leaking through her words as she turned towards the door. Her heart was at its lowest, and she couldn’t feel any excitement from finally having a visitor…
Until she saw who it was. Then, her heart sprung back to life as her cheeks flushed red with warmth. “Bronya!” The young girl cried out, wanting to jump out of bed to hug the shorter girl right then and there, only to jolt as the vein on her face grew a little from the spike in energy. “I-I thought Matushka said that we couldn’t see each other…” She muttered through the pain, rubbing her cheek to try and hide the mark…
The younger-looking girl, Bronya Zaychik, shook her head. “Nyet.” She replied with a soft tone as she carried a basket full of a variety of goodies up to the bed where Seele was resting. “She said that. But both Lily and Roza-Idiotka refused. They would’ve run in here if Bronya hadn’t stopped them.” Maturity lingered in her words as she took a seat on the bed beside her friend’s bed, a soft smile on her face as usual.
“They… They would’ve? W-What about Sin?” Seele couldn’t believe it. She thought the others would’ve listened to their Matushka, but here they all were, clearly intending to go against her orders...
Bronya cleared her throat. “She made a show out of her emotions, like usual. Bronya convinced her that it would be best to speak with actions, not words.” She put emphasis on the word ‘convinced’, probably indicating that said convincing wasn’t exactly peaceful in any manner. “The three Idiotka helped pick out gifts for Seele. Good gifts.” Her speech was a little stunted, but it was clear that she meant well. She always cared for the younger girl, despite the discrepancy between their sizes…
The bedridden girl could feel the tears running down her face. She wanted to lunge out and hug her friend, tell her that she loved all of them so much for what they did, but the way the pain paralyzed her prevented her from doing it. Instead, she just smiled. “Bronya… Thank you. Thank you so much.”
Her precious friend took the initiative, climbing off the bed and wrapping her small arms around her body. “No. Thank you, Seele.” She replied, hugging her tightly. “You’re our friend. We want you to get better as fast as possible. So just hang in there, okay?” She pulled back, not at all caring about the potential risk of getting infected through bodily contact…
Seele nodded, tears streaming down her cheeks from how happy she was. “I’ll try, just for you, Bronya.” She muttered, feeling the pain well up again. “Y-You should go. Before Matushka finds out. You know how she is…” She wanted her to stay, but she also didn’t want her to get in trouble. Worst of all, if she got infected… She didn’t know if she could handle having caused her most precious friend’s death. Better safe than sorry.
“Da. Get well soon, Seele.” The grey-haired girl firmly replied as she left the room, hoping that her friend could get the rest she needed. Now, she just had to make it look like she had never been there…
Or rather, that’s what she would’ve tried to do if not for a certain green-clad maternal figure waiting in the hall outside.
“Bronya.” Cocolia, the girl’s Matushka, spoke up. “I’m disappointed in you. I thought I told you all that you were to not approach Seele.” She started launching into one of her lectures, the ones the young girl had heard plenty of already. “You of all girls should know what it means to be infected by the Honkai. You’ve…”
The young girl just turned towards her with a firm look on her face. “Seele needs to know that we’re there for her. Bronya thought it was more important than her own safety.” She explained, maintaining that same air of maturity that she had used to coordinate the other children.
Against a proper adult, that didn’t matter much. “You could die if you get close to her, Bronya. I’m not letting another child of mine die because they weren’t careful!” Cocolia shouted as her hands trembled. “As long as I live, I won’t let another one of my children die.”
“Another?” Bronya inquired, her own eyes lighting up. “Matushka…” Her voice turned chilling as she stepped closer. “What’s going to happen to Seele? Has this happened before? Please. Explain. Remove Bronya’s worries.” She had a million questions at this point, all of them circling back to the sick girl. If her maternal figure, her Matushka, had somehow caused this… Well, she wouldn’t be able to forgive her.
Cocolia bit into her lip as she stepped back. “It… It wasn’t supposed to go like this. She was supposed to be…” She muttered under her breath, until a sudden realization hit her mind. She could deal with this entire situation, which had been caused by experimenting… with another experiment. One of Tesla’s inventions was rolling around in her pocket after all.
“Matushka. Please. Answer Bronya’s questions.” Her insistence was growing as she stopped, barely half a foot apart from her maternal figure. She was in range for anything lethal. It would be now or never.
The older woman closed her eyes, sighing. “Forgive me, Bronya. This is your punishment for prying too deep, and not listening to your Matushka.” She feigned an apology as she pulled the device out of her pocket, lobbing it onto her adopted daughter.
Having been raised as a soldier, dodging sneak attacks like this was the young Bronya’s expertise. Dodging a device that was designed to meld with you as soon as it got within a certain range however, that was a difficult and different task all together. It was as if the ball was magnetized to her as she jumped back. Any attempt to further distance herself just made it speed up, until it made direct contact with her forehead.
“M-Matush...Ka…” Bronya’s voice grew progressively digitized as the metallic sphere sunk into her body, making her slowly grow limp as she lost all feeling in her limbs. In fact, all five of her senses were lost at the very same time, leaving her like a puppet whose strings had been cut. All while her maternal figure, the one she had just tried to extort information from, now watched with a worried and sorrowful look in her eyes.
The hallway was quiet for another few minutes, the tense air refusing to die down as the device worked its magic. As far as Cocolia understood, it was designed to meld with Valkyrie candidates, where it could then harness their innate powers to change them on a fundamental level. This would then fuse man with machine to create a life-form that would be the best of both worlds. Unfortunately, it would fuse them with one of the weakest machines that Anti-Entropy had at their hands, but it was better than nothing if the procedure ended up a success.
After what felt like an eternity, a robotic voice finally left Bronya’s mouth. “UNIT MR-01B, STARTING UP.” It seemed like the experimental device had been a success, yet at what cost? Cocolia couldn’t possibly know, since she couldn’t look into her adopted daughter’s mind, but she truly did wonder if she had done the right thing.
If she had bothered to be careful and even read the instructions that Tesla had given her, then she would’ve realized what had happened. What exactly Bronya was forced to endure. Something that would’ve made her scream in shock.
The grey-haired girl trembled, her mind screaming against the void. It had taken moments for the machine to trap her within a corner of her mind, leaving it to repurpose her body into something more appropriate. Something stronger, something that wouldn’t be broken by a mere infection.
Her body was quickly stripped down to the bare essentials, leaving not a single scrap of clothing on her. As soon as she was naked, she could feel circuitry spreading across her skin, making it look like there were lines running across her limbs. Her skin soon followed swift as the texture took on a much tougher look, while her body grew outward to match. The parts of her flesh that were not currently covered by a line took on a dark blue shade while the surface of the discolored parts growing harder and tougher. The organic parts of her were turning into metal, ensuring that no infection could ever take place again.
When the changes spread to her head, she could feel everything getting covered by metal. Unlike the rest of her body, her head was essentially just encased in a layer of steel that made her look as if she had a helmet on, a helmet with a single eye as the lone optic. Her serial number, MR-01B, briefly flashed on the lens before a bunch of steam was released from the crevices of her armor.
“Unit MR-01B online. Please state this unit’s primary objective.” Bronya’s voice went through a filter as she spoke, her lens lighting up in time with the words that left the mouth within the helmet. It was as if her mind and ego had been erased, leaving only the machine behind…
Cocolia bit her lower lip. She didn’t know how to feel about this. On one hand, she had ensured that her daughter wouldn’t die from the infection she likely acquired… On the other, she had lost her to a machine. But, as she always did in dangerous times, she did something equally unwise. Something that would cost her another daughter’s independence, just like her panic at Bronya grilling her for answers had.
“...Unit MR-01B. You are to approach Seele Vollerei and convert her into another unit. Keep her from contracting further Honkai Corruption symptoms, and ensure that she is kept safe overall. That is your lone directive, and you must follow it until your natural expiration. Are we clear?” The blonde Matushka firmly gave the robotic girl her orders, while mentally asking for both girls to forgive her for what she was doing and what she had done already.
The single-eyed robot girl nodded, her eye blinking to indicate that her orders had been received. “Carrying out directive. Objective updated.” The robotic rendition of her daughter’s voice echoed throughout her maternal figure’s ears as the former walked straight back into the room she had just left, mind firmly focused on what’s important while Cocolia silently began to pray…
Seele looked up from her bed as she looked at the new visitor, tilting her head. “H-Hello?” She asked, never having seen a mech shaped like a girl before, much less one that looked her age. “W-What are you here for?” The blue-haired girl asked, partly curious and partly worried…
Unit MR-01B stopped as she approached the side of the girl’s bed, her eye briefly blinking as she stared straight into the eyes of the sickly girl. “Primary directive states that Unit MR-01B is to take care of Seele Vollerei using any necessary means.” She used Bronya’s voice as she put a hand on the girl’s head, not even bothering to show any sort of mercy. “Internal logic deems total conversion to be the most appropriate way to keep Seele safe. Please stay still.”
The blue-haired girl’s eyes widened, partly from the revelation of what the robotic girl intended to do, and partly because of who the robotic girl actually seemed to be. “B-Bronya? W-What’s the… W-What?” A thousand thoughts ran through her head as she tried to process what she had just been told and what she had just heard…
Only for a shock to course its way through her head, destroying every thought in an instant. It wasn’t just the ones that were around in her mind at that point either, every single thought she had after that ceased to exist just the same. She wasn’t allowed to have a single thought, a precaution to ensure that any primal instincts caused by an infection wouldn’t intensify and consume her.
“B-Bron...ya…” Seele’s eyes grew dim as her thoughts slowed to a crawl, with any true thought taking a trillion years to reach it’s destination. She was powerless to stop any of what came next. Whether it was the metal spreading off her friend’s hand, or the way everything seemed to get darker. As if the sheer concept of thinking became alien to her consciousness.
The dim-eyed girl’s head was soon incased in the same type of metal as her friend, causing her look almost identical. Whether you were looking at her metallized body or her head, the two looked like they were born twins, even though they were clearly just made from the same model. The same useless model that now left them incredibly weak for all eternity… Or however long robots like them were made to last.
“BOOTING…” Came the roboticized voice of Seele from the self-lighting lens of her helmet, the warmth from the pseudo-veins that served as part of her body taking its sweet time to reach its destination. By the time everything was powered on equally, the voice spoke up once more to confirm its designation. “Unit MR-01S, online. Please state directive.” Just like Bronya before her, her mind was now in flux, and she needed a directive to follow to ensure that she would stay functional.
Unit MR-01B nodded as she wrapped her thick arms around the metallic torso of her former friend. “Unit MR-01B’s prime directive is to protect Unit MR-01S. Therefore, Unit MR-01S’s prime directive is to stay with Unit MR-01B.” The roboticized version of the grey-haired girl had a very solid argument, as she continued to hug her precious friend.
The other Mecha-Human hybrid listened carefully, before nodding. “Directive confirmed.” The one formerly known as Seele said before wrapping her own arms around Unit MR-01B. “Unit MR-01S will stay with Unit MR-01B, always.” She stated with as much sweetness as her digitized voice could muster.
Despite the fact that the two no longer had any independence, and that their dear Matushka no doubt hated herself over what she had just done, their love for one another stayed true. They would never be apart from one another ever again, and they would always work alongside one another to deadly effect.
From adoptive siblings, to mechanized sister units. Truly the best possible outcome the two could’ve had.