Restoring Mankind (NieR Automata) Chapter 6 preview. Part 2/3 (Patreon)

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High above the planet, a massive installation of silver and glass floated amidst the empitness of space. In front of it, a planet that was once home to seven billion humans, now reduced to a paltry 500 all locked away underneath the yellow-gold sands of the desert. A chorus of voices spoke haphazardly behind bright screens, all on a pale white platform. Operators, as they were called, tapped onto keyboards and monitored live data being fed to them from androids units or from satellites, clattering away behind black veils that served as their microphone. Black clad and in flatteringly revealing outfits, there was only one android that was a stark contrast to their black. 

Commander White. 

She never really considered herself busy most of the times. It had all fallen into a mundane routine. There were of course missions that were important but she only really gave it the effort it was due. Then, the reports came in. Then the data. Then Anemone sending even more proof. Undeniable proof that sprung her to action. 

Hold them there, High Command had said, until they could retrofit one of their space stations into something habitable. The Bunker was one of many such facilities orbiting the earth and that retrofitting would take time. Despite them frantically working round the clock with little shifts, it was estimated that it would take a two weeks for them to fully convert one of their stations. These places, these weren't facilities that one could consider good living in a traditional sense. They were factories and manufacturing centers, important assets that fuelled the war effort against the Machine Invader. 

And so, she worked, sending a YoRHa squad into the planet to help protect the site. Satellite imaging had revealed that the machines weren't exactly alarmed by their movements. Thank goodness for small mercies. 

It was then one of the operators called for her attention. Quietly, she made her way to that operator. "What is it?" 

The Operator, 210, replied. "From Captain 1D, ma'm." 

White thought for a moment before nodding. "Patch it through." 

210 nodded as she typed something down. Not a second later, 1D's face appeared in one of the screens. She saluted at White, an open palm on the left chest. White simply nodded at her. "1D. I see you have touched down successfully," White noted. 

"Yes, ma'm," the android nodded. "I sent my report to 210." 

"I see. Is there anything you have to report?" White asked, getting to the heart of the issue. 

The android nodded furiously. "Y-yes! Um, one of the pods in the site opened by itself. The human inside was the administrator of the facility. He is asking to meet the Council, ma'm." 

And like that, White felt naked. Like a lone android caught between two Goliaths looking at it as one would a bug that needed to be crushed. With practice willpower, White bit back that feeling down. "Understood. I will be contacting the Council and get their orders. Until then, keep that place under guard." 

"Understood ma'am! Glory to Mankind!" 1D proclaimed enthusiastically before she cut off the connection. 

"Glory to Mankind," White muttered underneath her breath. In her talks with the Council of Humanity, a Council who was in actuality the highest ranking members of the Army of Humanity, they had debated and argued what to do when the humans would wake up. It was decided that the truth would be told. To keep up the lie that they had been touting for all these years would fall flat especially to an actual human. 

And White was going to be the one to tell them, as the face of YoRHa. 

"The Council left me instructions to be the one to meet the humans when they thaw. I will be descending onto the desert." White announced. 

"Yes, ma'am!" 

That conversation was an hour ago for White but for those in the planet, a full day had passed. Time had been finicky to measure thanks to the planet not really rotating anymore. On one side, the planet was locked in perpetual darkness. It was a different sort of battlefield that YoRHa had no business in. It was wilder, fiercer and weapons that were deemed overkill by the androids were deployed there to fight the worst of the Machine invaders. On the other, it was locked in perpetual day. Normally, it should have scorched the planet and turned most of it into a arid zone of deserts and savannahs. But it didn't, thanks to the stabilizing and freezing effects of maso or magic. 

But White wasn't exactly thinking about magic now. As her flight unit pierced through the atmosphere, two units following her as escorts, her only thoughts was about the lone human now awake in the desert bunker. What did they look like? Would he look at her and her fellow androids favourably? And...once the truth came out....would he and the rest of humanity trust her? 

Trust them? 

White had been tortured by this question ever since the news first arrived. It ate at her conscience of being the face of YoRHa, of being the public face that facilitated a lie. It was a necessary one. The Army of Humanity was losing. They needed the motivation. They needed the morale boost.

They needed a God worth fighting for. 

And now, those Gods were here. 

She sucked down those thoughts and questions back into her mind as her flight unit touched down before the gates of the outpost. Sure enough, the Resistance pulled all stops to make sure the place was a fortress. She had long since been removed from them but she still understood the old tricks to make their defenses hidden. Outside, Anemone met her, her face stoic and unimpressed at White's entrance. 

"Took you long enough to get here," Anemone commented. 

White sighed. "I was only cleared to descend should and only if the humans were thawed. Now that one of them is, I am allowed to do this." 

A unspoken tension passed between White and Anemone. They were both Commanders albeit leaders of different forces. But they had a history. For now, they weren't going to focus on that. Not when duty first had to be done. 

"Where is the human? What is he like?" White asked. Anemone turned and bid White to follow her. 

"He's inside, eating. As for what he is like...." Anemone paused, trying to think. Behind her, White's YoRHa bodyguards leaned in a bit too interested to hear what she had to say. After awhile, Anemone finally answered. 

"Overwhelming," Anemone said, trying her best not to let the worshipful tone of hers exit her lips. "He is everything that we could ever hope for and more. It took me sheer control to not just...kneel, you know? My very core, my very programming demanded it. It didn't help that he's an actual officer of an old Human army, the United Nations. Do you have any idea idea how hard it was?" 

"Woah," her android bodyguards whispered, awe in their voice. 

White swallowed hard. 

"Alright, Let's get in. The human, Colonel Smith, is very eager to meet you," 

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A/N: Yeah babbyyyy, that's what I'm talking about. That's what I'm looking for. Woooooo