Our journey upwards was silent for the most part: the lights within the elevator cabin flickered sporadically, and I became aware of several...fluids coating the floor I was standing on.

"Disgusting, I know," Alannah murmured, loosing a deep sigh after she finished her thought.

I could only nod in agreement.

A few moments later, I felt the elevator lurch to an abrupt stop.

"What the hell?" Alannah hissed, "We're only on the fourth floor. Why are we stopping–?"

I drew my handgun and shot the lights out. "Get in a corner. Don't move."

We both pressed ourselves into the back corners of the elevator and waited. The doors opened with a load screech, and darkness greeted me as footsteps could be heard.

"Are you sure there's intruders?" a voice in front of me inquired.

"Boss said almost all the outside patrols went silent about half an hour ago," another person answered, "Boss has a feeling our special guests are inside the complex right now, so let's search around. Anyone have a flashlight? the light grid went out again."

"Courtesy of moi," Boreas chipped in, giggling to himself, "Sic em, Mortie."

I made sure the light of my helm was off, and I waited for my targets to get near me. When the infrared of my helmet picked up the filthy body of an armored individual in front of me, I aimed my handgun at the fool's head and pulled the trigger.

With a faint click, I blew the bastard's brains out. Without missing a beat, I trained my weapon on three other individuals wearing beaten up sets of combat armor. A slew of clicks could be heard as I unloaded my clip into my targets. When only one person was left, I lobbed my knife at them.

After they hit the ground with a thud, I motioned for Alannah to follow after fetching my knife and loading a fresh clip into my gun. "They're going to expect us to be in the elevator. It's time for plan B."

She nodded, only to chuckle when she saw me holster my pistol and remove another weapon from my back. "You brought Betty with you."

I powered up the scattergun and smirked behind my helm. "Best purchase of my life."

"Aw, you flatter me." Alannah replied as she laughed. "I take it you wanna try Betty out?"

"Since the element of surprise has been lost, I don't see why not."

After the scattergun had fully powered up, I sighed. "Is there a stairway nearby?"

"It's on the other side of the elevator. If you take a left, and another left, and another left, you should be able to find a flight of stairs to take you up to the fifth floor," my partner replied.

"Gee, how helpful." I grumbled, only to fall silent when Boreas sent me a layout of the building.

"You can thank me later."

I rolled my eyes and followed his directions. With Alannah bringing up the rear, we took a left and started going down one of the hallways that was connected to the room the elevator had taken us to. 

Walking along the hallway corridors, I was silently horrified when I saw the people that laid around us.

"Wh-What is the meaning of this?" I breathed.

"I told you...People call this hellhole their home." Alannah answered me. "They have nowhere left to go..."

The sound of faint coughing could be heard, and I couldn't help myself. I searched for the source of the coughing and found a small girl curled up beside her unmoving parents.

I knelt before the child and shook her shoulder. "Mijn lelie, do you hear me?"

"I...I tried so hard..." I heard her murmur. She held a ratty teddy bear to her chest, and I felt a single tear escape my eye. "I...I tried to tell my parents to get out of here..."

I bowed my head and squeezed her shoulder. "You did your best. That's all you could've done, mijn lelie."

I saw the girl look up at me, and her blue eyes widened in surprise.

"A-Are you the grim reaper?" she asked me in a hushed voice, her eyelids drooping.

"I suppose I am." I mused, taking her hand in mine.

"A-Am I dying?" the poor girl inquired, grabbing my hand.

"It appears so."

"I...I don't want to go..."

"You're going to a better place." I assured her. "Please, rest mijn lelie. Your pain will fade, and you will be at peace. You...will be able to see your parents again."

She gave my armored hand one more squeeze before fully going limp, and I bowed my head in  mourning.

"Rust in vrede." I murmured, closing her eyes with two fingers.

Slowly, I rose to my feet and closed my eyes. A few heartbeats later, I was able to turn and face Alannah.

"Let's get moving." I breathed.

Without saying another word, we resumed our journey. This silence persisted until I frowned.

"Alannah, what floor is this, exactly?" I prompted her in a soft voice as the faint sounds of revelry could be heard.

"Oh, this is the...floor where guards reside..."

Right as she spoke, a group of filthy individuals stumbled into view through a door on the right side of the hallway. They were obviously high out of their minds, so I saw an opportunity.

Aiming Betty at my targets, I pulled the trigger. With a loud whistle, several blue spike-like projectiles flew out of the scattergun with a resounding bang.

"That's how it's done!" Alannah cheered when her baby accomplished its goal.

Sweet  mother of god...I thought as I took in the carnage I had wrought: all four individuals had been shredded to hell and back.

I chuckled, only to freeze when shouting could be heard.

"Time to go." I breathed, grabbing Alannah's hand and booking it. We hopped over the desecrated bodies and took another left when the turn came up. The next turn came a few moments later, and I found myself sprinting down another musty-smelling hallway full of rubbish, human excrement, and bodily fluids. 

"Do you have any explosives on hand?" I prompted the gunsmith. "I know that's asking a lot, but I need you to buy us some time."

She nodded and pulled a cylindrical explosive off her belt. "I always come prepared."

Alannah pulled the pin from the explosive and grabbed my hand in turn. "Now's really the time to run."

"Wh-What did you just lob?" I prompted her as we finally reached a room similar to the one we found when we arrived on this floor. Instead of an elevator, a single door could be found on the right wall. Opening it, we found a set of stairs.

"Oh...I like to call it a hellraiser." she replied in an innocent voice.

"What's a hellraiser?" I inquired, only to flinch when an explosion could be heard.

"I...Let's keep moving!" Alannah chirped as screams greeted our ears.

Running up the staircase, we were met with another landing full of unconscious people.

"Are there people on every floor of this god-forbidden building?" I inquired, not quite believing my eyes.

"Unfortunately, yes." she breathed. "Oh, good. This flight of stairs goes up to the sixth floor. We need to keep going."

"Cylus..." Boreas murmured. He had been silent up to this point, which was worrying to say the least."

"What?"

"There's a welcoming party waiting for you on the sixth floor, and you're heading right for it."

"Luckily for them, I'm bringing the party favor." I replied, finding a small dial on the side of the scattergun and switching it to the homing mode. "Give us an update."

"The fourth floor has been blown to shit, and everyone is flipping their shit on every other level." Boreas began. "Some areas of the third floor have caved in, and guards are mobilizing now to catch you and Alannah."

"Maybe the grenade wasn't the smartest idea..." I murmured.

"It was a distraction." Alannah chirped.

"Whatever you say, toots..." my partner grumbled.

"Have you been hacking into my commset, Boreas?"

"You and Mortifer have been talking up a storm, so I thought I could hop into your head as well."

"You used my comms to get into hers." I mused. "Smart."

"Now's not the time to do this." Alannah barked. "Prepare for a beatdown, Cylus."

I nodded in understanding, and we resumed our ascent to the sixth floor.

When we reached it, we were greeted by the business ends of several dozen rifles.

"Put your damn weapons down!" one of Tobias' goons screamed at us.

Without a word, I stooped over to set my weapon down. Before it even touched the ground, I pressed the trigger of Betty and watched as a veritable hive of crystallized death flew out of the barrel. This time, the projectiles were red.

In a flash, I had my hand gun drawn and shot a target in the head while red needles flew around and tore into the crowd before us. Betty had seriously overheated, so I left her on the ground while Alannah and I worked to pick off our enemies. Even with the assistance of the scattergun, we were still sorely outmatched. I drew my knife and started stabbing at those who got too close. 

I don't think it needs to be said, but I tore through anyone who got close to Alannah. She was proficient with my other knife, but we were still surrounded. Bullets pinged off my armor while others punched right through into my body, but that hardly stopped me. 

Speaking of the fiery gunsmith, Alannah fought with a kind of raging grace that stole the breath from my lungs. When she wasn't shooting at her enemies, she used my knife to lethal effect. She slipped past her enemies before they could shoot her and wiped the the floor with their sorry asses. Suffice it to say, Alannah definitely knew how to fight with a blade.

"Hey! *Whistles* Cylus, please come back to reality!" she called while in the middle of disemboweling a guard.

Damn it...I thought, shaking my head to clear the stupor that had settled in it. How can someone be hot whilst in the middle of killing another person? I suppose that's Alannah's specialty...

With every barrel pointed in the direction of the gunsmith who had been dealt a shit hand in life, I gunned them down. When I blew through my tenth clip of ammo, I flipped my gun and held it by the barrel, effectively using it as a melee weapon. Anyone who decided to take me on with a blade of their own found themselves cut down in a heartbeat.

And so I continued on my rampage, breaking teeth and shedding blood with every blow I landed. When I heard Alannah cry out in pain, I saw nothing but red. Without looking, I cracked the butt-end of my pistol against the side of someone's head and heard a dull crack. I tore through a few more enemies, aiming for key weakpoints in their chests, necks, and arms before spotting the faint glimmer of my latest purchase laying on the floor.

I dashed toward Betty, scooped the weapon up, and trained it on the bastard who had shot my friend. With a pull of the trigger, he was turned into minced meat. Deciding to throw caution to the wind, I loosed several volleys at the remaining enemies around me. 

By the time the last hostile had been reduced to a pile of gore, the entire room was painted red.

With a shuddering breath, I fell to a kneeling position. I wasn't taking count of the amount of times I had been shot, but it probably wasn't good.

"Damn it!" Alannah hissed, limping over to me. "What the hell were you thinking?"

I shrugged my shoulders and pushed myself to my feet.

"We...need to move." I breathed out, ignoring the pain that blossomed from my chest, legs, and arm.

"Not in the condition you're in." she snapped at me. "I have a medkit on me. I decided to bring it as a precaution."

"N-No." I protested. "Don't use it on me."

"I was shot in the arm, dumbass. You, on the other hand, were shot everywhere."

"I'll live."

"Not for much longer, you won't."

We stared each other down for several tense moments before I hesitantly conceded. Sliding down one of the rough, grimy walls, Alannah knelt before me and removed a small rectangular box from her belt.

"Remove your chest plate." she ordered me.

With a hiss, my chest armor detached. The gunsmith cringed when she saw my crimson-stained undershirt. "Damn...It's a miracle you're still alive."

I loosed a ragged chuckle. "I get that a lot."

She pulled out a needle from her medkit and jabbed me in the chest with it.

"This'll help dull the pain a little." she assured me. After that, she pulled out a small pair of scissors and cut my shirt vertically down the middle so she could assess the wounds on me. "Oh dear...You know I'm going to have to fish the bullets out of you, right?"

"I have enough lead in me as it is. Besides, you don't have to remove the bullets–The damage has already been done."

"Well, then what do you suggest I do, hmm?"

"Maybe stop the bleeding so I don't bleed out?"

"Okay, wise guy." she growled, removing gauze and a regenerative salve. "Didn't know you were a medical expert."

I huffed. "I'm not. Thank Boreas for educating me on how to deal with gunshot wounds."

"Okay...You go me there..."

And with that, she got to work. Even though she worked at a quick pace, Alannah made sure she didn't hurt me.

At some point during her time spent patching me up, I saw my father. His face was shadowed with anger, and I could easily guess why that was the case.

"You've been ignoring me." he pointed out. "Why."

I loosed a shuddering laugh. "I don't need you anymore, old man."

"Hmm?" Alannh inquired, too engrossed with applying pressure to one of my more severe wounds to fully pay attention to my words.

"Is it because of that woman?" my father prompted me, a sneer forming on his face.

"For one, her name is Alannah." I managed to get out. "Also, you're dead. I need to move on."

"Oh please, you never will." he snapped. "Remember what happened to Katherine, your beloved? She was gutted like a hog, and you were left heart broken and enraged. Do you really want to risk the same happening to Alannah?"

"I'll take my chances." I murmured, my eyes drooping closed. "For now, fuck off."

Silence greeted me before Alannah spoke: "You were talking to yourself."

"It's a habit." I assured her, eyes still closed. "Don't worry about it."

"That's a strange habit." she continued. "You were acting like someone else was here."

"I said don't worry about it." I repeated, too weary to deal with this right now. "Please...Just leave it alone."

Alannah looked at me dead-on, and I saw pity glitter in her amber eyes.

"Don't feel bad for me." I murmured, pushing myself to my feet. "We need to move."

"But your wounds..."

"Are inconsequential." I cut her off, re-attaching my chestplate. "We're close to your brother, and I don't plan on letting him get away."

She nodded to herself and stood up as well. "Right...Right...Let's go."