act19side

I'm talking about... four years ago.

Do you know why I signed up for the experiment that night?

Every Pioneer has a reason to wanna go back to the city, and my reason is...

I have to go back to someone I hurt bad—Someone who used to be my dearest friend.

I owe her an apology, and—

I deserve to be judged.

I've been on the run for four years. At first, I thought the wastes swallowed my dreams, and changed me into a different man...

But that's not what happened.

On that night four years ago, I killed the Sonny Romano who believed in justice and equality. I did it with my own two hands.

If you do get arrested, there's only two possible punishments waiting for you.

One, you'll get thrown in prison and then the Infected quarantine zone once you've done your time.

And the other...

You be a Pioneer, and the nomadic cities will be closed to you forever.

I know.

But you're already a Pioneer.

So that means you...

Let's stop it with all this talk about whether I forgive you or not. Your old buddy is here to send you on your way. Shouldn't you hurry up and do something more meaningful?

A long overdue, warm hug.

A true reunion, and also a formal farewell after years apart.

Have you figured out where to go next?

It's some guy who's got a bunch of letters for a name. Starts with a D. He sent us all a kinda weird email the other day, and there was an invitation to work with him attached.

I still have no idea how he got the contact information for the Pioneer Team... He doesn't seem like he's from a recruiting agency.

You should be more careful the next time you pick up work...

Try not to break the law again either. Otherwise, it doesn't matter where you run. I'll drag you back here. I promise.

Haha...

You got it, Officer.

Not far away, his brothers and sisters on the Pioneer Team call out to him.

Sonny knows that, this time, he's truly prepared to go on his journey.

They started cleaning up the mess at the test site.

It was your Energy Director who made the mess anyway...;Rhine Lab's still in charge of cleanup.

Yeah... I guess this is a kinda corporate social responsibility for us, huh?

I'm more willing to believe this is a deal.;......;On the essence of what you just said, I agree.

Alright, not like there's anyone who believes that explanation here.

Those Pioneers...

You've been watching them for a while.

They're starting a new journey.

I wonder... what they'll find next time?

Again and again in a never-ending cycle.

They can never go back home, and they might never again have a place they can even call home.

Doctor, I found that the Rhine personnel are digging away in the rubble of the labs...

Director Muelsyse, you're here too.

Muelsyse...

Have you figured out when you'll answer my question yet?

Question... What is it that's bothering me?

When I'm prepared to talk...

You'll be the first to know, Dr. {@nickname}.

Relax... It's all been taken care of. No civilians will ever find out what happened at Site 359, and there is no chance of anyone using this against you in your upcoming election.

Yes, I'm well out of Trimounts already, on my way to Max D.C. now.

Ferdinand...?

He's no threat anymore. You can be sure of that.

Ma'am... Y-You're standing right outside Rhine Lab. Why did you lie to the vice president?

Because...

I still remember my original goal.

He doesn't know how far he's walked.

His aching, hoarse throat reminds him that his body cannot bear such exhaustion.

However... It feels as though Trimounts is right behind him.

It could be right in front of him too.

The shadow of a nomadic city is enormous, and it grows endlessly with the passage of time.

He must hurry... hurry...

Where is he going in such a hurry? Will someone betray him at the next waypoint, just as Elena and Ho'olheyak did?

Hold it there.

We know who you are.

Ferdinand... You think you get to just walk away scot-free after everything you've done?

Don't think that gear you're in is going to scare us. You talk big, but you can't actually control it.

Even if you open fire and kill us all here...

You'll run into the next team of Pioneers.

Look out into the wastes! No friends here! Your enemies go on forever!

It doesn't matter.

The 'Transmitter' he developed himself is right at his fingertips. All he has to do is inject it into himself, and he will immediately be able to wield this power armor with ease, and all these so-called enemies will be powerless against him.

But why doesn't he do it?

Is it because he doesn't have the courage that Dorothy does?

Or is it because...

Ferdinand, you are the one who's being left behind by the times—the grand ideals in your eyes.

Because you never believed that you belong to this epoch.

You always talk about how you're in control of it, you're always thinking, controlling... but you never feel.

Whose voice is this? Is it... Elena's?

Right, if you don't want to be left behind... you must become a part of it.

The power armor remains silent. It proceeds no further, and it does not put up a struggle.

It simply raises its arms...

Just like it is embracing the winds, the sunlight, and the lands before it.

An onslaught of angry Pioneers rushes toward it, and just as the silver monster that once hovered midair above the test site—swallows the iron-forged body whole.

Does the Maylander Foundation still have doubts about this?

No, Control.

I'm not representing Maylander this time.

I'm a busy woman, you know...

Right. It so happens I prefer to skip the pleasantries.

You retrieved the most crucial part of the experiment at Site 359.

The 'Hub' was destroyed in its entirety, by Dorothy—That's what it says in the report submitted to the government.

But it so happens that I saw a team in some pretty low-key outfits driving a discreet, completely curtained off transport into your personal laboratory.

Saria said you turned a blind eye to what Ferdinand was doing... Perhaps it would be more accurate to say you used him.

The thing that you wanted most is now sitting right on your desk.

The cleanup work at Site 359 is a project that Rhine Lab had to take.

And every day, countless failed experiments' byproducts are destroyed.

No matter what it is you think you saw, it's not worthy of outside attention.

Destroyed? Well, of course. I'm sure that scrap heap is gone from your desk.

Evidence can be destroyed, and memories can be modified, but whenever something happens, it tends to have a lasting effect on the things that come after.

Loken, Parvis, Ferdinand... Maybe, at some point in the future, their names will be completely absent from the history books.

But there is no doubt they changed the course of history.

Arts Unit implants, technologies imbued with revived ancient Sarkaz powers, power armor controllable over a long distance, and mental manifestation networks over even broader areas...

What will be the next experiment that alters the very epoch we live in?