Work Text:
Moze stormed through the halls of the massive Vladof base. Seven years she'd given this organization and what did she have to show for it? A couple of pins for her standard-issue uniform and a heaping helping of trauma. That's it. She enlisted to be a hero, a legend. That and to get her own Iron Bear mech. But after all the messed up shit she had to do, she was still stuck on a low-tier pay grade while most of the recruits in her class were in the officer academy. Or she had watched them die. At this point, she didn't care about any of the reasons she enlisted in the first place. She didn't know where she wanted to go but she wanted OUT.
Kaziak had told her just five more missions and her contract would be fulfilled. She could either renew or leave. But that was five missions ago. And now he was demanding even more from her. An impossible task no one in their right mind would willingly do. Take Darzaran Bay, the highly contested but ultimately Maliwan controlled corner of this galaxy. Darzaran Bay, where good soldiers go to die.
"You quit, they die," Kaziak spoke of the greenies she was to be shipped out with. She felt for the recruits, she really did. But that wasn't going to stop her from trying to get out of her contract and subsequently the mission.
"Think of their families," Kaziak had told her. "You wanna tell 'em you left their kids for dead?"
"I've done worse. Much worse," she had replied. Which was true. Vladof had her running all over the six galaxies committing war crime after war crime. Burning down villages, gunning down civilians in her way, nothing she was proud of, nothing she wanted to remember. It was all a means to an end, or at least that's what her commanding officers said. But where exactly was the end?
It also didn't help Kaziak's case that she couldn't empathize. Her family was a mess. She came from a long line of Vladof soldiers, each more ruthless than the last, both on the battlefield and in their personal lives. Sure she looked up to her dad and her older siblings, but in reality, the Andreyevna clan wasn't a family in any way but the name. Other than her eldest brother, she couldn't care less if any of her family members were gone and they would say the same for her. But she was still going to at least try to make an appeal.
Moze stopped her march in front of the door to the office of one Lieutenant General Alexei Andreyevna. She took a deep breath before tapping her knuckles on the wood. "Come in," an all too familiar voice called out. She pushed open the door to find him stamping a pile of forms with his signature.
"Hey Lieutenant General… Dad," Moze said, shuffling into the cramped office.
Alexei didn't look up from his workspace when he acknowledged her, "Moserah, what a surprise. What are you here to complain about now?"
"Who said I was coming to complain?" Moze asked with a half-hearted smile, anxiety starting to take over. She took a seat in the wooden chair opposite her father.
"That's the only reason you ever speak to me. What is it now?"
Moze choked on 25 years' worth of reasons she didn't speak to her father and just cut to the chase, "My contract was supposed to be up after my last mission but Kaziak says I'm not done."
"You're not," Alexei declared, still looking down and rhythmically stamping the forms.
"How so? I've served for seven fucking years and I've done more than my fair share of missions. I want out and I'm taking Iron Bear with me. I know you're in charge of the scheduling for my division. Please just. Take me off it and let me go. Like you're supposed to."
Alexei finally looked up. "You don't get special treatment just because you're my child. You know this."
"Uh yeah," Moze scoffed leaving out an additional you made that pretty clear my whole childhood. "I would still be in the Lieutenant General's office if it wasn't you."
Her father sighed and tossed his signature stamp into an open desk drawer. "You're so much like Yuri. It hurts me."
"Yuri…" Moze repeated the name of her brother. Her eldest brother. The only person who treated her with genuine kindness growing up. He, like everyone in the Andreyevna clan, was a Vladof militant too. But he was the only one who didn't make it home from a mission.
Alexei opened another desk drawer and pulled out a bottle of vodka and two glasses. He poured about a shot in each glass, hesitated, then turned one of them into a double and took it for himself. He slid the other glass across the desk to Moze. She stared at it for a second and ultimately decided she should stay sober for this interaction, leaving the alcohol untouched. The lieutenant general downed his drink and asked the gunner, "Why do you want to leave so bad? You have everything you ever wanted. Why would you abandon that?"
"I wanted to be a hero. All I've actually done is kill in Ivan Vladof's name and lose everyone I care about along the way. I've had enough," Moze replied.
"Oh but you are a hero! Look!" Alexei pointed at the pins on her uniform. "Those aren't handed out like candy."
"You know what I did to get these? I killed innocent, unarmed people because they lived in Hyperion territory. That's not heroic."
"They were cogs in a machine that has wreaked massive havoc across the galaxies since the first fall of Atlas. You eliminated threats."
"They weren't threats! They were scared!" Moze dragged her hands down her face, smudging her eye black in the process. She looked down and stayed quiet for a moment. When she looked back up to face her father, tears were beginning to form as she asked him, "How many times have you used that to justify killing people who didn't need killing?"
Alexei scratched his beard, taking a moment to figure out how to answer. He poured himself another shot before he said, "I don't know. But I do know all of these other corporations have done the same. An eye for an eye as it were."
"An eye for an eye will leave the whole world blind," Moze shot back.
Alexei rolled his eyes, "God what hippie propaganda got to you? Was it Jakobs? They haven't touched a war in centuries."
"No, no propaganda. You raised me to just obey orders and serve the cause. But in the years I've actually been on the battlefield I haven't seen a cause," Moze said. She was right. What was a 'good' corporation even fighting this violently for? Market share? Which, if won, would inevitably lead to more control somewhere in the six galaxies. Exactly like the other corporations. Not exactly honorable.
Alexei sighed before bringing up her dead brother again, "You really are just like Yuri. He lost sight of the cause. He asked too many questions. And he had to be dealt with."
"Dealt with?"
"Darzaran Bay, Moserah. He was sent to die."
It took Moze a minute to process the information. She was about 15 when Yuri passed. Her father had come home with a somber look in his eyes, the only time Moze remembers him looking like anything but a hardened soldier. He told her and the other two kids that Yuri was KIA. That he died a hero. He went to bed and never spoke of the event again. Moze's sister and other brother barely batted an eye but she was devastated. She locked herself in her room and cried until there were no more tears. Though it was expected of her to enlist when she turned 18, until that moment Moze had been shaky about doing it. That day she decided she would do it with confidence. But with this new information, she realized if Yuri hadn't been sent to Darzaran Bay, he would've begged her not to enlist. And now more than ever she was wishing she hadn't.
Her hands involuntarily balled into fists as she asked through gritted teeth, "Who gave the orders?" Alexei didn't respond. Moze stood up and slammed a fist on the desk. "WHO GAVE THE ORDERS?!"
Her father replied, "I did. And I didn't change them when he came begging to be taken off the mission either."
Moze didn't know what to say. She knew her father was a piece of shit but sending his own son on a suicide mission because he didn't fall in line with everyone else? That topped everything else she'd ever seen him do. Then she connected the dots. He was sending her to her death too. He knew exactly what this was about when she came banging on the door. She didn't know how she was supposed to react to this revelation. So she laughed.
"You killed your son-- my brother. And now you're killing me! Oh, this is a whole new low for you, Dad!" she cackled.
Alexei shrugged. "For the good of the cause."
"Fuck the cause." Moze declared. Her hand traveled to her sidearm. She drew it and pointed it at her father's forehead. "And fuck. You."
Alexei raised his hands to show they were empty. His expression twisted to a smug grin and he started laughing. A low deep growl of a laugh. One Moze had only heard when she was young and about to be punished. "If you're so opposed to killing an unarmed man, you won't pull that trigger."
Moze gripped her pistol tighter now. "There's a difference between you and a civilian. You actually are a threat."
"Hmph. You still won't do it," Alexei snorted. “I know you don’t care whether I live or die, but you and I both know if you kill me, you won’t make it out of this base alive. And you'll never get to keep that damn robot. That's all you've ever cared about in the first place. You have a chance if you go on the mission. Not a good one. But a chance nonetheless."
Moze gripped the pistol even tighter, to the point where her hands were shaking. He was right. With a groan, she holstered the gun.
"Predictable. Weak," Alexei said, Moze able to taste the venom in the words. "I raised you children better than this." He stood and straightened his well-decorated jacket. He walked around the desk and clasped a firm hand on Moze's shoulder. "You are going to Darzaran Bay. And you are not coming back."