A Heart in the Machine (Serial Designation V x Reader)

Pain.

Agony tears through your body, sharp claws rending into flesh as you're flung backward. The impact shatters the solid wood railing behind you, sending you tumbling through shards of glass and splinters. Your body scrapes across the debris-littered floor, each movement igniting a fresh wave of torment.

Blood drips from the gashes in your skin, pooling beneath you as you struggle to rise. A sharp metallic taste floods your mouth as blood seeps from within.

You look up, and the sight chills you to the bone. A creature looms above, its sharp, jagged wings flapping as it hovers in place. Its face and torso are indistinct—a swirling mass of shadows, corrupted and unrecognizable, as though reality itself is rejecting its form.

It speaks. Words emerge, warped and fragmented, lost in the distortion of its very existence. You can't understand. The sound digs into your head like claws, compounding the unbearable pain.

You look down at your trembling hands. They're slick with blood, the injuries sting, but...

Hands?

Human hands.

What...?

Your vision blurs, the edges collapsing into darkness as the weight of pain and confusion drags you under, until nothing remains.

A faint notification flickers into existence within the void:

A-S Backup files repaired. Rebooting.

Your eyes flicker open. The cold air bites at your face as you realize you're standing outside in the snow, your body slightly hunched. Night has fallen, the world around you quiet and still. A dull ache lingers in your head, but it's quickly drowned out by a spike of panic.

Your memory jolts back to the last thing you remember: the elevator, the strange room, the computer...

You spin around, heart racing, your eyes locking onto the shed you'd entered earlier. Without a second thought, you sprint to it and fling the door open.

Inside...

Pool inflatables?

Your stomach drops as you take in the sight of the shed filled to the brim with colorful, half-deflated flamingos, unicorns, and donuts. No sign of a keypad, a hatch, or anything remotely resembling the elevator you'd descended into.

"What... the hell?" you mutter, your voice trembling. You step back, glancing around as if someone might be watching, waiting to spring the punchline of some cruel joke.

Did you imagine all of that?

You look up at the sky, searching for answers in the faint glow of the moon and the neighboring planet casting soft, eerie light over the snow-covered camp.

Oh no.

A cold sweat breaks out as a new thought pierces through the haze: How long have I been out?

The realization sinks in like a stone in your gut. V is gonna KILL me.

Panic propels you forward as you sprint toward the main camp building. You burst through the door, breathless and desperate to explain yourself before V can find you and deliver the brutal end you're certain she's planning.

But inside, there's... no one.

The bunk beds are empty, the bags left scattered where the others had set them down earlier. The building feels unnervingly still, the creaking of its old wooden frame amplified by the silence.

"Where is everybody?" you whisper, your voice echoing slightly in the emptiness.

Your unease grows, twisting into a gnawing anxiety. If the others are gone, where did they go? More importantly, how long has it been since you blacked out?