Chapter Text
Mission Briefing - Interception.
MultiVerse Patrol/Preservation, MVP.
Raiders have been seen smuggling resources in and out of their base, which we’ve tracked to the provided location. If our scouts are correct, they’ll be returning to transport more containers off the planet tonight. Shut this operation down.
Destination: Downpour - A universe known for one major living condition: neverending rain. R&D hasn’t come back with an exact answer why, but be careful. I hear the storms there get pretty bad.
MVP Agent “Shallows” will be dispatched on this mission. Their track record speaks for itself, but for the uninformed reading this log, they’re more than capable of exercising stealth. That will be crucial.
Good luck.
- MVP Dispatch.
The sound of rain falling would have been very nice if it weren’t the constant and only sound heard for days on end. Every now and then, maybe it’d lighten up or intensify, but it never flat out stopped. On the first day, it was great for sleep. On the last… not so much.
It also made hauling cargo much more difficult. Every now and then another raider would lose their grip on the handles of a crate, crying out in pain as both the fragile bounty inside and their fragile toes got damaged.
In fact, that was the exact reason Travis sat on the bench nearby, watching the others move the last of the containers onto the massive ship’s loading dock. His foot felt fine, but after dropping four crates in the last hour, the rest of the raiders decided to graciously let him be on lookout duty. Not that he cared, really. What kind of idiot would wander this far into the forest to find an empty field of land full of guys with guns and knives and whatever the hell else weirdos from space carried?
Needless to say, he wasn’t particularly counting on visitors, so he wouldn’t waste his energy looking for them either. The most attention he’d give to the surrounding woods would be a quick scan every now and then. In fact, now that it crossed his mind again, he shrugged and decided another quick check wouldn’t hurt.
Of course, as expected, the forest wasn’t going anywhere. Though as he came back to the ship, he looked over his shoulder one more time and… could have sworn he made out a figure, farther into the woods.
He turned back to face it and… the figure was gone. Huh. Making his way back to the others, he reluctantly raised his voice just enough to catch at least one person’s attention.
“...hey, I think there might be someone out there.”
The nearest raider, a pretty big guy with a super sick looking robot arm, was the only one to really pay Travis’ words any mind. “Out there? It’s probably nothing. But since it looks like you can walk just fine now, help us get these last few crates aboard.”
Travis, himself, wasn’t particularly the biggest person around. He wasn’t super tall and he didn’t really do a whole lot of working out, so compared to most of the raiders, he looked… a little silly. He definitely felt a little silly, too. But it did have its upsides, like him being able to give the raider in front of him a pathetic-looking stare like a sad sopping wet cat.
And somehow, that was more than enough to move the man. “Fine.” He sighed, looking away from Travis and up at the woods, “Move the crates. I’ll… go check. If you’re wasting our time again-”
“Oooof course, buddy. Just yell if you get stabbed, or something.” Travis teased as he watched the man walk away.
Travis did as he was told and helped the others move the last few crates into the ship, nearly slipping on the ramp a few times but ultimately doing his part in getting the whole thing loaded.
When the last crate hit the floor, everyone let out a sigh of relief. Travis just rolled his eyes and went back down the ramp to make sure he had everything he needed. That’s when it finally hit him…
…that other raider never came back from the forest.
He didn’t think much of it at first until the other raiders began to ask the same question. A cloud of unease began to settle over the group as they looked around the ship in case maybe he just wanted to play a little prank. Sadly, as much as they looked, he didn’t jump out at them once.
Oddly enough, when Travis and the others came back together again, it was like even more of them were missing than before. Previously a squad of ten, there were only six left, Travis included.
“Should we call the boss?”
“What’s going on?”
“Is it… them?”
Silence fell. That feeling of dread hit them, one after the other. Even Travis made a face, thinking about… them.
“W-we should… call for backup.” Travis suggested, breaking the nervous silence. He’d seen a lot of things, but a group of armed, trained, grown ass space raiders shitting their pants was… new. He wasn’t even entirely sure who they were, but judging from the other reactions, he didn’t really want to meet them.
One by one, they marched back up the ramp, past all the cargo boxes, to get to the radio in the cockpit. One of them switched it on, and the rest… just kind of sat around, on top or between the strapped-down boxes in the cargo area. Waiting for a response on the other end, only answered by static. They couldn’t just leave; despite their pretty nasty nature, leaving someone behind wasn’t part of it. So they all waited. And waited…
Until something finally caught their attention. A wet thud from the bottom of the ramp. Then another. And another. Everyone whirled at once to face the source of the noise, eyes widening all at once when they registered what was before them.
The first raider to go missing. His arm, the super cool robot one, had been severed just above the elbow, the exposed machinery underneath still occasionally sparking. For as long as the silence lasted, Travis got a chance to inspect it a little farther and… it was cut cleanly, too. Not a rip or a tear, it looked to be sliced clean off. He, himself, held his arm over his stomach, the arm itself being covered in cuts and blood, presumably from the wound on his stomach.
“...dude?” One raider finally spoke up, but the only answer they got was the poor guy falling forward, hitting the ground and letting blood begin to spill all over the ramp.
That, however, quickly became the least of their problems. When he fell, everyone could finally see it. A hunting knife, buried all the way into his back. That, and the figure standing at the very bottom of the ramp. A hooded figure, wearing a long coat. A mask over their mouth and nose prevented them from really seeing much, but their eyes were still very visible, and they scanned each raider on the ship carefully. Not in a malicious manner, but in a careful, collected one. Gathering info.
Then they began to walk. Step by step, up the ramp, until they reached the body and plucked the knife out, using their glove to clean the blood off.
“...alright, put ‘em up.” One raider said, being the first to draw his weapon. The assorted clicks of everyone else, Travis included, raising their guns came shortly after. “Shoulda known we attracted MVP attention, god damn it…”
The person stood still, continuing to look at the group. They glanced at Travis for barely a second and shook their head, before locking on to the raider still trying to use the radio with his back turned to the ramp.
That would be his last mistake. In the blink of an eye, faster than anyone else on the ship could even comprehend, the MVP had shot up the other half of the ramp and behind everyone, taking out the raider at the radio with a quick stab to the back of the neck. He was gone before they could fire the first bullet.
And when they did fire the first bullet, the MVP did it again. Another flash and they were slitting someone’s throat. A raider nearby attempted to fight, but they quickly deflected his punch and struck him in the throat, staggering him long enough for them to duck to the side and let the fool who shot at them realize they just blasted their own teammate instead of the enemy.
By this point, everyone had either drawn their gun to try and get a clear shot, or put their hands up for a chance at scoring a lucky hit on them. None of which would happen, since they would once again move at the blink of an eye and catch another body with a cut to the neck, before launching their knife straight at the one raider who might have had a clean shot, knocking their gun into the air. They lunged for their own gun, but the MVP was leagues ahead of them, snatching it and putting it to good use by gifting them their own bullet between the eyes, then…
…there was one. Travis, who shakily pointed his gun at the hooded killer on his ship. Standing up straight again, the MVP let out what sounded like a sigh and put their knife back in the holster, before taking a step toward Travis. This was more than enough reason for him to fire at them too, but they were already right there on him, pointing the gun away from themselves when the bullet came out. Travis tried yanking it back into his grasp, but they just shoved him back against the crates, forcing him against them with the knife to his neck.
“...answer me and you get to talk away. Do you understand?” They spoke calmly, quietly, just loud enough for Travis to hear and slowly nod in response. “Good. Where are you taking these materials?”
Travis froze. “...I-... I don’t kn-” They pushed the knife even closer, forcing Travis to not flinch or die with the rest of the raiders.
“You do know. You definitely know. So, I’m going to ask you this… one more time.” They leaned in, real close… “Where. Is. This. Ship. Going?”
“...i-it’s headed to th-the recruiting station… I-I’m a new recruit, I don’t kn-” They reaffirmed their grip on the knife, as if giving him one last warning. “I-I overheard… them saying… i-it’s in some place called… ‘Hush’...? That’s all I know, I swear…”
“...thanks.” And the MVP stepped back, giving Travis the illusion of freedom. He grasped his neck, falling to his knees and letting out a sigh of relief. His focus on narrowly escaping death distracted him from the MVP drawing their own gun on him. He looked up just in time to see them point it right at his head.
And Travis’ lifeless body hit the floor soon after.
With that said and done, they raised their hand to their earpiece while counting the bodies and examining the crates. “This is Shallows. Raiders have been dealt with. Requesting cleanup and retrieval of materials.”
“Got it, sending in a cleanup crew. Nice work, Shallows. Not bad for your first job.” The voice from the other end said, stopping to take an obnoxious sip of their drink. “Return to base, we’ll discuss your long-term employment soon.”
They hesitated for a second, before reluctantly responding with a measly “understood” and putting their hand back down.
“...guess I still got it, huh?” They stepped over their handiwork, making their way back down the ramp and into the woods where they came from.
“...Agent Simon Shallows, was it?”
“Wh-huh?” Simon, previously a professional when it came to cutting up a bunch of guys, sputtered and lagged in a normal conversation. “O-oh! Yes! That’s… that’s me!”
They tugged at their collar. Again. They tried their best to smile anyway, even when faced with an itchy collar in front of the person in charge of if they even kept this job. As the man sifted through folders, Simon found themselves looking around the room. For the most part, it felt like a normal office. Cabinets, shelves, a few trophies and pictures of family here and there… their eyes drifted down to the desk, keeping note of the nameplate on it.
“Mr. Greenes, is it?” They asked, trying to break the silence. “I did enjoy that mission, even if all the technology stuff felt a bit… out of my league.”
“Product of where you came from, kid. We’ll get you trained.” Mr. Greenes replied, standing from his desk to search the drawer of files behind him. “You have any reason in particular you want this job? Most people chicken out and we just put ‘em back to live their normal lives.”
“...j-just… um…” There they went, messing with that collar again. “...wanted to put my skills to use for something… good…?”
“Hm.” As if he’d been stalling on purpose, he finally reached the S part of the drawers and plucked a file folder from it with Simon’s name on the front. “Well, whatever the reason, I’m pretty confident in your abilities. Dispatch told me the cleanup crew wasn’t able to recover everything, but you still did a pretty good job.”
“H-huh? I was only able to scope out ten, there’s no way there were mor-”
“Don’t sweat it, kid. They probably sent someone to grab what they could. Weird that you say ten, though. The cleanup crew only found nine bodies.”
“I’m… sorry, I must have forgotten to check-”
“I wouldn’t sweat that, either. If anything, leaving one alive tells ‘em who they’re messing with. And they’ll be messing with you from now on, because…” Mr. Greenes took a stamp off his desk and stamped “HIRED” in big red text on the front of their file, then passed it over to them. “You’re in.”
“I-I… wow, th-thank you so much…!” They took the file and rather aggressively shook his hand after.
“No problem. We’ll notify you about your next job soon, but from the looks of it, you’ll be dealing with more of these raiders in the future.”
They left the room still clutching that file folder close to their chest.
“...holy shit. I got the job…”
“...hurry it up, guys. We gotta haul this shit before the MVP cleanup crew gets here!”
“They’re all long gone, but this one’s weird. He’s not in our records, so they had to have picked him up along the trip…”
“He looks fine. Which is weird. Because everyone else got stabbed and shot, but he looks completely-”
At that very moment, Travis jolted awake with a sharp inhale. Of the two people inspecting his “corpse,” only one looked shocked to see the dead body come back to life.
Two raiders stood over him. Or rather, one stood and the other crouched to get a better look at him. The crouched one was a smaller, frail-looking white guy with short and straight blond hair, green eyes, and strange bandages over his forearms and hands. The standing one was a decently tall asian lady with eerily bright blue eyes. She had her dark brown hair tucked into a ponytail, likely to keep the length from being inconvenient when it mattered most. She also wore a similar coat to one of the previous raiders that were killed. Everyone referred to that guy as a leader of the squad, so Travis could only assume…
“...hey, buddy.” The man said, waving a hand in front of Travis’ face. “You… alive?”
“We don’t have time for this, just… get him on the ship, we’ll get answers when we’re out of danger.” The lady turned away to rush the other raiders while the other guy remained there with Travis.
He tried to pry his face from the cold floor, but an intense headache sent him back to the floor before he could.
“I gotcha, buddy.” The guy above him said, reaching down to put Travis’ arm over his shoulder and, slowly but surely, help him walk to the nearby ship they presumably arrived in. Once Travis was inside, he sat him down and let him rest on the only slightly more comfortable metal seat in the ship instead.
The rest of it blurred together in Travis’ strange brain fog. He could barely form a complete thought, let alone explain… whatever the hell just happened.
“Hel-looooo?”
Travis snapped back into the real world, seeing that same bandaged hand wave in his face again. “...what… do you want…?”
“...jesus, man. What the hell did they do to you?” The man put his hand under Travis’ chin, inspecting his face for any scars or wounds. “...normally the MVPs don’t exactly leave us… alive. You have to tell us how you lived, dude-”
“We need an explanation. Right now.” The lady emerged from the cockpit. Travis hadn’t even realized that the ship was moving, but now that he noticed, he was too rooted in reality to zone out again.
“Yeah, man. Tell us! Did you fight ‘em off?”
Travis went to speak, but… his nose began to tingle. The most inconveniently-timed sneeze came out of nowhere and hit harder than any other sneeze he’d experienced in his life. Hell, his nose even began to bleed after, but not quite for the reason anyone expected.
Both raiders stared at Travis with utter confusion, then to the floor. The lady reached down and plucked something from it, letting the other guy have a look too.
“...well, I think I can assume what happened now…” The man said, turning back to Travis. “What the fuck are you, dude?”
Travis barely heard the end of the man’s sentence and had already tuned out their constant questions as his vision began to blur. They both shut up quick when he passed out on them, nearly falling out of his seat.
“...that was weird. What do we do with ‘em?”
“Keep an eye on him. If he wakes up again, he will explain everything to us…”