Dichotomy

I fucking hate it here.

Cameras on every corner, walls and ceilings a sickly grey or washed off blue and it's all like some a big-ass labyrinth.

Not to mention the red lights and sirens blaring all around, overwhelming my senses! Can't really blame anyone other than myself for that tho, since I'm the reason behind the raised alarms. Or more accurately, my explosion.

Still though:

I fucking hate it here.

Wasn't always this way. I do technically live here after all. When not on missions that is, which was the norm most of the time ever since becoming my Team's Lieutenant. I did like it here, or was content with it at the very least. Although, it may be simply cause I had a semblance of a life in those days, having my Team and all that. They weren't family, under no circumstances, but they were my Team and I did very much like being part of the group. I wasn't lonely with them around -most of the time- and that was good enough.

Now they're all dead, I'm still kicking and the DARKCOM Base has never felt emptier without them. So yeah, definitely not like it once was. Either way, after what I'm doing now, I should better start searching for a new place in the near future. Cause even if people don't realise it's me at fault for today, I'm never spending another minute here, or anywhere that has to do with DARKCOM ever again. I'm breaking all ties and stopping what I helped create starting today.

In the meantime, I better keep running.

Right turn, past a double doors, then another right and then keep straight.

Thing is, looking back, there wasn't anything warning me of this place when I first enlisted. No gut feeling, no 6th Sense, no nothing that said 'DARKCOM = Bad News'! If there was, it clearly wasn't loud enough to actually stop me.

But no, my guts had to come hit me full force that this place is a weirdos nest only after I deliver an unconscious Dante here!

Couldn't they do it maybe just a bit earlier?

Better yet, couldn't I have actually fucking listened to them that day? Maybe then, I wouldn't be in this situation to begin with!

Maybe then, I wouldn't be roaming about the whole of the Facility on a daily basis, memorising the fastest route in and out of this labyrinth.

Maybe then, I wouldn't be causing me everyday headaches, trying to figure out safe ways to sneak and plant Tracker Bombs into different places in the Base!

Maybe then, I wouldn't be risking my literal hide to save the most annoying person on this plane of existence!

I groan at myself and my poor excuses.

Oh, who in the world do I think I'm kidding? My guts started screaming at me the instant I took that syringe in my hand and stabbed it in Dante's neck.

Then! I should have listened to them, then!

Maybe then, if I had, I wouldn't have betrayed him in the first place...
...

I fucking hate it here...
...

Okay, the self-pity party should really get a backseat in my mind right now if I wanna make sure I actually survive this rescue mission. I need my head in the game.

Eyes up, stay sharp! Don't turn your head directly at the cameras, don't make any suspicious movements. You know the way to the Labs, follow your memory.

Easier said than done.

Left turn.

Everything becomes a blur after a point. Sirens, flashing lights, squads running all around, it's all total mayhem. It serves as a way to keep a good chunk of the people working here on one side of the Base, that was the whole point of the explosion in the first place. On the other hand though it puts everything on a timer.