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Mortuus Orbis	By : Sparrow & InBrightestDay Category: -Misc Video Games/RPGs > Crossovers Views: 3538 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the franchises, characters, or anything else from the settings in this collection. These include Street Fighter, Marvel, Sailor Moon, Kill La Kill, and others. I made no money from this work.

Chapter List
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The walls of the operating room were bare grey concrete and the ceiling felt like it was a foot too low, making the space seem cramped. The dual ceiling mount surgical lights intruded into the small space even more. It was also colder than the rest of the bunker, but in this case that was fortunate.
No one wanted the subject to rot any faster than it had to.
“Alright,” Doctor Erzsebet Báthory said, attaching the last electrode to the subject’s head, “let’s begin.”
The zombie had been brought in by the search and rescue team, and now lay securely bound to the operating table. Erzsebet hadn’t had a proper study subject in far too long, and she was eager to get inside the creature’s head, in more ways than one.
“Are you recording, Makoto darling?” On the far side of the operating table, Makoto Kino held their video camera.
Makoto Kino (Sailor Jupiter) - Sailor Moon (https://i.imgur.com/FhcPlnM.png)
“Um... yes,” she said. The brunette looked every bit the image of a proper Japanese schoolgirl, her hair pulled back into a high ponytail and her sailor uniform as neat as it could be under the circumstances. Her bright green eyes were something of an oddity, though one Erzsebet found quite appealing.
“Excellent,” the older woman replied. “Commencing cerebral activity test one...now.” Activating the electroencephalogram, she shooed Makoto out of the room, both of them stopping just outside of the door.
“Having fun in there?” Carol Marcus asked.
Carol Marcus - Star Trek [Kelvin Timeline] (https://i.imgur.com/tmh2uMg.jpg)
“Plenty,” Erzsebet replied. “You simply weren’t needed at the time. We’ll get to you when I need someone to hand me my tools.”
“I am a doctor,” Carol said, somewhat testily.
“Yes, but as you’ve said whenever wounds needed treating, you’re not that kind of doctor, so until I need some strange physics experiment performed you will remain my assistant.” Carol simply rolled her eyes.
“I meant to ask,” Makoto said, looking away from the camera for a moment, “what kind of doctor are you?” Carol shifted slightly.
“I’ve mentioned I’m in physics, though I’m also well versed in organic chemistry,” she replied. “Unfortunately I can’t really say more. The situation is...complicated.”
“Yeah,” snapped Makoto, her Japanese accent thickening as her temper flared. “No shit, it’s complicated.” Carol winced at that, remembering immediately the strange breakdown the girl had had not long after their first finding her.
“So what’s the game here?” she asked Erzsebet, trying to change the subject.
“Our subject in there,” the doctor replied, “has some level of cerebral activity, as indicated on the EEG. It’s less than what a human being would have, but it’s dead; it shouldn’t have any activity at all, so where is its baseline? I want to know what goes on in a zombie’s brain when it has nothing to look at.” The three stood outside the door for another five minutes, and then returned to the operating table. The zombie immediately responded, turning its head to look at the women as they approached, its jaws opening and its hands struggling futilely at the straps holding it down.
Walking past it, Erzsebet checked the readout on the EEG.
“Faszinierend,” she breathed.
“What was that?” Carol asked.
“I said it was fascinating,” Erzsebet replied quickly. “Let’s remove our subject’s clothing and examine the body, shall we? Makoto, be sure to get this, and Carol, I’m going to need scissors.” Báthory wasn’t sure if whatever contagion produced the zombies was airborne, but she slipped on her surgical mask nonetheless. Taking the scissors in one gloved hand, she began cutting away the undead man’s shirt, followed by his pants, the whole process very mechanical, until a thought occurred to her.
If there was no blood circulating, could the zombie still… Under the surgical mask, a wicked grin spread across her face. She’d need one of the other two women.
First she glanced at Makoto, but then dismissed it. The girl was unspoiled, unblemished still by the touch of a man. Erzsebet could practically smell it on her.
Marcus, on the other hand…
“Doctor Marcus?” Erzsebet said. “I need to write some things down, if you wouldn’t mind taking over the examination? I’ll tell you what to do.”
“Very well,” Carol replied as Erzsebet stood up and pulled off her gloves. “What do you need me to do?”
“Just go over to it for a moment,” Erzsebet said, retrieving a pencil and notepad from where she’d left them on a nearby table. Carol, puzzled, walked closer to the zombie. At once it jerked towards her, rattling its cuffs and chomping into the cloth gag they had managed to force into its mouth.
“Liiiittle closer,” Erzsebet continued, idly scribbling on her pad as she watched the zombie’s grey, flaccid penis twitch. Carol, now looking somewhat concerned, went to within arm’s reach of the creature and stopped.
“What should I do now?” she asked nervously, trying to ignore how the zombie was thrusting its pelvis towards her as far as its restraints would allow.
“Mm, if you could take a sample for me with that syringe
“I’m not certain we can get a blood sample,” Carol said. “With no pulse, it’s more than likely the blood has clotted or congealed inside the veins.”
“A well-made point, but not what I had in mind,” Erzsebet said. “I was thinking more of a sperm sample.”
“A what?”
“I wish to know how far down the animating force goes. Is the body alone being animated, or does the force affect individual cells, in this case its gametes? To know this, we’re going to need a sample. Just lift the penis out of the way and insert the needle into one of the testicles.”
“Well...alright.” Carol was visibly uncomfortable, but still wrapped one gloved hand around the dead man’s soft organ, lifting it out of the way. At the touch of her fingers, the flesh reacted. In defiance of the lack of blood flow or heartbeat, the zombie’s member began to lengthen, hardening and raising itself toward the ceiling.
“That’s quite impressive,” Erzsebet said, and in spite of the bizarre situation Carol nodded.
“By rights it should be impossible. I’m fairly certain erectile tissue doesn’t work that way.”
“Ah, but in this place the line between the possible and the impossible is not so clear. Let’s see if it ejaculates.” Carol didn’t say anything, but her eyes met Erzsebet’s, and the look on her face certainly said a few things.
“Just continue manually stimulating it,” Erzsebet said, letting the command hang in the air and seeing if the other woman would refuse. After a moment, Carol began stroking the zombie cock again, assisted by the walking corpse itself as it thrust up, as best as it could, against her hand. Carol grimaced, but continued to work at it, and a drop of translucent fluid appeared at the member’s tip.
At which point the door opened.
“What the fuck!?” Ash said. Beside her, Natalia Romanova wore a distinctly bemused expression. Carol quickly pulled her hand back, though the zombie continued to squirm on the table.
“She...um...Erzsebet wanted a sperm sample and we…” Carol eventually trailed off into silence, blushing as she stepped away. Ash shook her head.
“I came here to see if you had any findings to report,” she said.
“Actually, we have quite a few,” Erzsebet said, waving the two new arrivals over. Taking Carol’s place, Ash looked over the zombie as Erzsebet pointed.
“First,” the doctor said, “notice that the skin, while somewhat blemished due to localized decay, is unbroken. There are no bite marks and no puncture wounds, as we would expect if this man were bitten and infected.”
“What about an airborne virus?” Ash asked.
“Well, Miss Cohen,” Erzsebet replied, smiling beneath the mask, “have you been holding your breath since you arrived here?” Ash said nothing, but the slight tensing of her shoulders caused Erzsebet’s smile to grow. “Well, then, since we’ve all been breathing the air since we entered this city and none of us have shown signs of infection, I would think it safe to say that the infection is not airborne, wouldn’t you?”
“What are you suggesting?” the SWAT officer asked.
“It seems as if this man was not infected at all. It’s as if,” she gesticulated for a moment, as though trying to find the right words. “It’s like something just snapped its fingers,” she snapped her own for emphasis, “and he dropped dead. Then got up again.”
“That doesn’t seem—”
“Possible? And yet here it lies, moving with no measurable pulse. In fact, it grows even stranger when you consider the brain.” Here she walked back over to the machine she had connected to the creature’s head. “This is an EEG. That stands for electroencephalogram. You see, the nervous system runs on electricity—”
“Are you coming to a point, Doctor?” Ash said, her expression hardening, “or are you just interested in condescending to me?”
“Do not interrupt me, Cohen.”
“I am in charge here, Doctor.”
“Indeed you are,” Erzsebet said, tilting her head, icy blue eyes regarding Ash from above her mask. “One of life’s little jokes, it would seem.” Before Ash could react, Báthory continued, gesturing to the readout on the machine.
“When we vacated the room, the electrical activity in the subject’s brain dropped to zero. Even in a sleeping human, even in a comatose one, some level of activity is present in the brain, if only to run the organs, but in our absence there was nothing. As soon as we reentered the room, however, the brain became active again.”
“What does that mean?” Romanova asked from her position farther back.
“If there was no brain activity, then how does this creature respond to stimuli? How did it become active again if its sensory organs were not working in the first place?” At this, Erzsebet pulled the electrodes from the zombie’s head and reached over to a tray she found herself standing near, grabbing a bone saw.
“Makoto, if you would be sure to get this,” she said, and immediately began sawing through the calvarium, cutting a line around the circumference of the zombie’s head. The creature made her job somewhat harder by trying to twist and bring its jaws toward her hand, but she held it in place. Eventually, with the circle complete, she placed both hands on the zombie’s head and pulled, and the skullcap separated with a slick, wet noise.
The stench that was released was something the human mind is not equipped to describe. It hit them like a body blow, as though the odour had a force behind it. Ash and Natalia immediately took several steps back, looking as though they were about to flee out of the doorway, while Carol fell on her rear, scrambling backwards and choking as she tried to get away. Makoto covered her mouth, visibly trying not to vomit.
Even Erzsebet blinked.
“Now look at this,” she said, over the sounds of everyone coughing and choking. “The brain is discolored, with no blood flow and evidence of rot throughout. At this point, it’s dog food, and yet for whatever reason, if I do this…” Putting down the saw, she plunged a hand into the open skull, grey matter pulping and squelching around her fingers as she pulled a handful of it out. There was a sudden burst of movement beside her, and Báthory struggled to contain a laugh as she saw Makoto drop the camera and bolt out the door, gagging.
The zombie shuddered on the table and then went completely still.
“So, we have no electrical activity as a baseline, but the brain is clearly still vital to the creature’s continued functionality, yes?” Still grimacing from the smell, Ash and Natalia nodded.
“My hypothesis is therefore this,” Erzsebet said. “The zombies do not function independently. Instead, they receive commands from outside. The brain is involved in receiving these signals, but when no communications are being passed to it, it is, quite simply, dead.” Ash met her eyes.
“So where do these signals come from?” she asked.
“That is quite the question, isn’t it?”
The silence that followed was decidedly uncomfortable. Finally, Ash spoke up again.
“Doctor, I’m assuming this is of no more use to you, so if you would dispose of it. You know where the incinerator is.” Turning about, she headed for the door, Romanova in tow.
“Well,” Natalia asked, “aside from allowing our doctor to remind you why you don’t like her, was that productive?”
“I hate to credit that woman with anything,” Ash said, “but yes. We know that the walking corpses aren’t acting purely on their own initiative, assuming they even have their own initiative. There’s an outside source of control. If that’s true…” Ash paused, a look of disgust coming over her. At first, Natalia assumed she was thinking about Doctor Báthory, but then she smelled it too.
“Those undead bastards really stink, don’t they? Is the smell on us now?” The two women separated, moving through the hall.
“No,” Ash said after a moment. “No, it’s not just on us. I think it’s getting stronger here.” Following her over, the spy found herself looking up at a large vent grating.
While Ash had stopped an earlier question on the subject before it went too far, the fact was that the bunker seemed to be far larger than the building above it. So large, in fact, that they didn’t yet know how large. Aside from the five or six rooms they were living out of presently, they had only explored a few other parts of what seemed to be a truly labyrinthine structure. They couldn’t even be sure where the vents actually met the surface.
That meant anything could have gotten into them.
“This bunker is the only safe place we’ve found so far,” Ash said. “I don’t like the thought of it being compromised by the walking corpses up there crawling in through the vents.”
“Assuming it’s not something worse,” Natalia said. “There are a lot of things up there we don’t know about.” The two women stared at the grating for a moment longer.
“Have you ever used ventilation shafts or ducts in your infiltration work?” Ash asked, her gaze shifting from the vent to Natalia.
“It’s hardly as common as you’d think, given how loud metal ducts tend to get when you crawl around in them, but I have used them on occasion.” she sighed. “I take it you’d like me to go in there and find our uninvited guest.”
“I can’t very well use this in a confined space,” Ash patted the pistol holstered at her side. “I’d kill myself. I know it’s hardly the glamorous life of a super spy, but-”
“If you think it’s glamorous, you don’t know much about the life of a spy.” Natalia thought about it for a moment, and then shook her head.
“All right,” she said, “let me find a grating near the floor.”
Isabeau wondered from time to time why the bunker had a kitchen.
It made sense on general principle, but all of the food they’d found so far was sealed into metal tins. It wasn’t the sort of stuff one generally prepared over a hot stove.
Of course, that didn’t mean no one was trying.
“So,” said Makoto, kneeling on the floor beside a wooden crate they had dragged out of the storeroom. On its discarded lid was written ‘US Army C-Ration M Unit.’
“We have…” her brow furrowed as she read the labels on the cans out in English, slightly over pronouncing the words, “‘meat stew with beans’, ‘meat with vegetable hash’ and ‘meat stew with vegetables’,” She looked up at Isabeau and gave a wry smile, switching back to Japanese. “No mention of what kind of meat it is, but that’s okay.”
The older woman couldn’t help but smile a little herself. The thought had crossed her mind.
“I doubt very much it’s anything too unsavory,” she said, also in Japanese. “Still, do you really believe you can fashion a meal out of that?”
“I’m pretty sure they already are meals...” Makoto began.
“Given a rather liberal definition of the term, yes,” Isabeau replied.
“...But I’m pretty sure I can make something even better out of them!” The girl nodded once, apparently to herself, and went to work. It seemed like she didn’t have much of a chance. After all, the only things she could adjust were adding water to the large pot she was mixing it all in, or boiling it off, and adding in a few basic spices found in sealed containers of their own. And yet, as time passed, Makoto began to do the impossible. The stew she was putting together actually began to smell… good.
“I must admit, Miss Kino, you are exceeding all expectations,” Isabeau said. “Especially with this, um,” she looked awkwardly at the range the pot was on.
As far as she could see there was no flame or gas burners, merely a flat black surface like a polished slate, with several rings drawn onto it. Yet the stew in the pot was already simmering well, and the girl seemed to be controlling how hot it got via deft twists of the dials set into the front.
“This, er, electric stove of yours?”
Makoto laughed.
“You sound like my grandmother,” she said.
“I do?” Isabeau asked.
“Yeah, your Japanese is kind of like hers.”
Isabeau frowned slightly. She was fluent in Japanese, as in many other languages, but she could tell there were differences between her Japanese and Makoto’s. She tried not to think about it, the incredible gulf of time that existed between the world she had known and Makoto’s. Nearly a hundred years. Part of her had wanted to ask someone to try and tell her what had happened in the 20th century, and another part of her was afraid of what she might learn. Whether fortunately or not, so far they hadn’t had the time for such a discussion.
“And you say stuff like ‘this electric stove of yours.’” Makoto’s attempt at imitating Isabeau’s accent was a poor one, but it made the older woman chuckle anyway.
“I… when I’m from, it was only a few years ago that Mister Swan started making his lightbulbs. When I was your age we still had to burn candles in our houses for light. I would never have imagined that something like this would exist.”
She tapped the edge of the range with a knuckle, then glanced over at the scorched remains of a metal box sitting on the far end of the counter. Someone who evidently fancied themselves a wit had stuck a note with “Out of Order” written on it to the front.
“Or that wretched machine.”
Makoto giggled, and Isabeau couldn’t help but smile herself.
“How was I supposed to know the thing would catch fire if I left a spoon in my coffee?” She poked Makoto good-naturedly in the shoulder. “You should’ve warned me, clearly you know how to use it all.”
Makoto smiled. “I guess I am pretty good with this stuff; I’ve dedicated a lot of time to the cooking club. We have one of these in my school, like in all those American cooking shows,” she said, a smile brightening her face for a moment. Then her smile faded. “I can’t really do anything else here…”
Isabeau frowned.
“You mean about your… magic?” she asked tentatively, and the girl nodded sadly.
“I know Cohen-san doesn’t believe me,” she said, “but it’s true. I don’t know why I can’t change here, but I wish I could.”
Isabeau had to admit to herself that she wasn’t entirely sure how to respond. When they had first met her, Makoto had claimed that she derived power from the planets, Jupiter specifically, and that she could transform herself somehow, wielding greater strength by drawing on that connection. When she was unable to do so, she had become frustrated, insisting that the ability simply wasn’t working at this time.
In her time with the Order, Isabeau had seen plenty of traumatized innocents, and she knew how fragile the human mind could be when exposed to horror. Ash had spoken to Isabeau about it at one point, how she believed it was some grand delusion the girl had constructed to try and make herself feel strong and brave in this horrible place. There were horrors uncountable in the city above ground, enough that even the most stalwart spirit would be badly shaken, and though Isabeau was used to feeling nothing but scorn for the sorts of people who unravelled under stress, she couldn’t help but feel sympathetic for Makoto. Anyone would start to lose their grip on reality in a place like this.
It went beyond even that. Makoto had spoken of a group of other girls, friends of hers from Japan, who had all used similar powers, and of how she worried about them, these “Sailor Scouts” and wondered what they were doing right now. It struck a chord with the older woman, who herself had wondered if her brothers and sisters in the Order were trying, somehow, to get her back from this hellish place, or if they’d given her up for dead by now. Isabeau missed them all terribly, and thinking about all the things she wished she’d said whilst she still had the chance was a sure-fire way to plunge herself into crushing melancholy.
She might not have believed the girl’s story, but in some ways, Isabeau D’Argyll knew far too well how she felt.
“Makoto, whether or not your… abilities function here, you are performing admirable work. You are a young woman of considerable sophistication, unlike some of the others here, and I am proud of you for stooping to such a lowly task.”
“Erm…” Makoto said, frowning slightly. “Thanks, I think?” Isabeau smiled a little.
“In the Order, we have a saying, perhaps more specific to me, the motto of the Lady Igraine: Virtue Alone Ennobles.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“The fact that you have taken it upon yourself to help others,” Isabeau said, “means that you have something to be proud of. Know that there is nobility in your service, and know that you are valued here.”
Makoto looked at her for a moment, and then nodded again, smiling just a little once more.
“Thank you,” she said. “I’ll do my best.”
Art from this chapter is from LEC (https://twitter.com/artoflec) and blackened-sun (https://www.pixiv.net/en/artworks/42299607)
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Mortuus Orbis