The woman stumbled out of the beam of light, trying desparately to maintain her balance. She took one uneasy step sideways and her hand found purchase on the post of an electrified fence, creating a small pen around the area she had materialized in. With he free arm, she wiped cold sweat from her forehead, streaking her forearm wet. She turned slightly, dropped to her knees, vision blurring, and vomited in the grass next to the violently glowing fence. She stood up slowly, using the post for guidance and looked around.
As her vision cleared she noticed a large Atrox standing over top of her. He was decked out in the traditional Omni-Pol black armor. He held out a steady hand to her. "Need a hand miss?" he asked cordially.
She tried to compose herself a bit, failed miserably, and took his arm. She quickly gained her feet with his assistance and was looking directly at a small foil rectangle. She looked up at him questioningly. "Nano enhanced chewing gum," the guard said, answering her unasked question. "I had a doctor friend of mine put it together for me. Freshens breath, relieves nausea and even whitens your teeth."
She took the piece of gum from his hand and unwrapped it, chewing almost thoughtfully on it. The guard looked down at her, his face hidden behind the black mask and red visor. "Just don't swallow it," the guard warned, sounding a bit concerned. "Doesn't react too well with the stomach acids or something like that." He stood up to his full height. "Not sure what the details are, but Doctors orders are Doctors orders. Do you need any help?"
Rozella smiled slightly, the gum indeed helping her adjust. "No, thank you I'm fine. I just need some time to adjust---" she trailed off as she looked over at the bulletin boards across the small yard. "What year is it?"
"Excuse me?"
"The year, tell me what year it is."
Almost robotically, the guard recited the date to her, down to the exact minute. Her vision swam again and she flopped to the ground in a somewhat seated position, her legs failing to sustain her. The guard removed his helmet and kneeled down next to her, his large brow furrowed. "Are you all right ma'am?"
"Two years..." she murmured to herself.
"What?" the guard was honestly perplexed now. He was used to 'respawn sickness' from recruits dying in the training fields, but this was something entirely foreign to his experience.
"I've lost two years," she replied absently, standing up once more. "I need to run diagnostic..." she looked up at him, as if suddenly realizing he was still there. She smiled, "Thank you very much for your help, I just need to get readjusted. It's been a very long time."
She left him standing there looking perplexed and wandered off into the Omni-Tek Training Grounds. Almost absently she pressed her fingers to her temple. "Level 3 diagnostic, run complete system scan."
There was no response. Quickly she began to inventory her belongings. A nanocrystal, a solar powered pistol, a map upload, a blank token board, the shell of an android, and an Omni-Tek shirt. She frowned, greatly disappointed with her findings. "So, back to square one then," she said to nobody in particular.
She pulled an ID badge out of her pocket. Rozella 'Vaniity' Bichrest. She sighed heavily and returned it. "It was Caitlin you bastards," she whispered under her breath.
She activated the droid and set about making some modifications to it. She cursed under her breath as some of the modifications she wanted to make were not possible on such a basic model. Also, she was missing her usual tools. Probably lost, along with her DNA print. Which is why she now occupied this form. Form... Quickly she stopped working on the android and walked over to the nearby stream. She turned slightly each way, checking her reflection over. At least they got her body right. She went back to her droid, muttering under her breath about the 'failsafe' reclaim system.
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OOC: Hi everybody. After nearly a year hiatus I have returned to Anarchy Online. Since everything is so different now, I decided to start my characters over again so that I can get a feel for the whole thing again, rather than jumping in as a clueless higher level character. So anyway, I just wanted to say hello, and I hope to see some of you in-game. Vaniity is currently level 11, but if things go near as well as last night, that should change rather quickly. Anyway, Hi!
- AO webcomics for the sake of being silly