Chapter Text
When they got down from one end of the vents to another, Uzi led him as they walked as quickly as possible. He seemed reluctant but, followed anyways considering the urgency. “You know, it would be faster if I just… flew there.” They scolded him, “Oh yeah, I’ll just get on your back after that whole thing. No, I’m going to walk behind you because I know better than to run infront of my natural predator.” He got the point and just kept walking, “Sooo… can we go spare V? I don’t know if you’re going to try to kill them or…”
They thought of it, “She seems… especially ruthless.” They said while picking up their pace to catch up to him, “I don’t know if your kind can be killed anyways.”
They finally got to the evacuation site, the workers were huddled like sheep to the corner. Those unlucky to be out at this hour stayed there watching the slaughter about to happen. So far, it appears they haven’t killed too many in the few minutes that N and Uzi were absent.
Uzi squinted and quickly pulled out their railgun after seeing what was happening. A disassembly drone with green clothing reminiscent of the human’s CADT uniform, a red bandana and a short haircut had stabbed Thad in the chest with her wing. With barely thought, they screeched, “HEY YOU! LET HIM GO!”
The short haired disassembly drone looked at them and N together, in her daze of confusion, Thad slid off her blade and took a moment to breathe before getting away from her. The medics ushered him away. They couldn’t get another glance of how severe their friend’s injury was.
“Which one is this one?” Uzi asked N, “if that’s your crush I swear to-“ N interrupted them, “Yup. That’s her. Did you… know the guy?” They shook their head, “Doesn’t matter; just keep your eyes ahead.“
V stared ahead confused, “So J wasn’t kidding, you really- Wow, this is a new low even for you.” J swooped in from seemingly nowhere and saw the unlikely duo together. She seemed, disappointed and just let her blade out.
“Sooo… which one do you want to fight.” Uzi asked N while calculating their own odds. “J, I don’t want to hurt V.”
“I’m not fighting HER—” The worker said, horrified at that prospect. “Well, too bad for you.” They continued as they disregard his request.
The worker made their way towards J. As foolish as this was, they kept praying for the power of god and anime to be on their side.
The worker threw a pen at her, J moved quickly and swiftly with no hesitation. Unsurprisingly, the pen did absolutely nothing except fall to the floor. Uzi knew they were fast but, this felt like another level for them. The drone with pigtails aimed her gun at the worker and shot several bullets, Uzi’s last thoughts would’ve been, “It’s so over.” If it weren’t for the fact that through some miracle, nothing harmed them and they kept running and evading the bullets.
They hid behind a pillar, they could hear the ongoing chatter and the eyes of the colony upon them. If they fail to fix this, they will be both dead and demonized. While they were thinking, the disassembly drone moved towards the pillar with her blade out and almost stabbed them in the neck, seeing her blade they moved away and aimed the gun.
Stupidly, their mind couldn’t help but look at the fight above. N and V were fighting and a few of the bullets from the fight landed on the ground like raindrops. J saw their eyes gaze upwards and used her tail to drag them to the ground.
Their back hit the ground and they felt a breath of air escape them as the pain travelled to their core. “That was interesting, I have to admit that much.” J said as her tail untangled and freed their ankle. Before they could move however, her blade pointed to their chest. All sound amplified in their focus, the way they breathe, the sounds of chattering and loss amongst the workers, and the sounds of two blades colliding and sliding off each other in the distance.
Their hand reached out for the gun but, J grabbed it with her tail and shook it around, almost mockingly. Her blade made its way in their chest and they could feel it make its way to the bone.
Suddenly, they heard their name being called frantically, “UZI-!” before a loud crash occurred. A worker ran towards J and kicked the blade away from them. The force caused a gash across Uzi’s chest. Doll pulled them away from J.
Doll and Uzi weren’t particularly close, the language barrier was always a problem. She yelled out something in russian but they couldn’t understand all they could say was, “Thank you” while clutching their wound. N suddenly appeared behind J, he forced the gun away from her tail and threw it to Uzi.
They managed to catch it and with bated breath, they pulled the trigger after it landed in their hands. It nearly shot N but, the blast of energy disintegrated J’s upper half. Doll fell from the recoil and the green light left nothing but a streak of black on the colony’s floors and a disassembly drone’s corpse.
N looked at the corpse and the streak of black before placing a hand on his head, “You shot me with that? Jeez-“ Doll helped Uzi up, they could already feel their body patch itself back together. “Thanks, over there. I could’ve died. Um, I have no idea how to say that in Russian.” They said while trying to stabilize themselves on the ground, the russian gave a thumbs up.
They looked towards N, “Where’s V?” he pointed at the disassembly drone tied up by their own tail. “As we talked about?” They rolled their eyes and reluctantly agreed, “Yes, yes.. we can um, take her in..I guess.”
Doll looked at her bitterly before walking off, leaving the two alone. They took a moment to look at her, the bloodied uniform and her sudden act, she just lost someone. They took a moment to process the fact she saved the very drone who caused that, well, not exactly the very drone but, a primary factor to that.
Khan approached her, “You left me for dead.” Uzi said bluntly. “To save the rest of the colony from your irresponsibility, don’t use the fact you stopped the massacre from continuing to justify the fact you were responsible for it in the first place! I told you several times, don’t fight the disassembly drones. Your mother tried that and where did she end up? Do you think she’d like to see you repeating that mistake?!” They couldn’t speak. Of course he’d mention her.
“I don’t care how miraculous you think your “victory” is right now, SEVERAL DRONES still got killed because of you. What should I say to their families? My daughter accidentally lured them in here and stopped them but not in time to spare your loved one? Tell me, what should I say?!”
They snapped back, “Then I’m not your child! Say that to them, save yourself and your stupid reputation. I’m not. Not after this day, not tomorrow, not—- I’ll just, I’ll just leave.” Their voice developed into a sinking sadness as they spoke, it cracked and fell. “Come on N. We’re leaving.”
“Who said you can leave?” Their dad said but they quickly and lightly smacked the disassembly drone, “Move it, go grab the other one.” Khan couldn’t say anything as they walked away, all he could do was watch as they walked away from him bitterly.
N dragged V along as he hurriedly rushed over to the worker drone. Once they were out of sight, neither Uzi or N talked. They got the feeling V wanted to talk but, felt a bit undignified by her position to say anything.
“Where am I going to stay? What am I going to do?” They muttered to themselves. “You can stay with us..?” He suggested while considering how they wouldn’t take that well. “I don’t have much choice anyways. Where do you guys stay?”
“The corpse spire, where we met.” They could only groan at that, “You’ve got to be kidding me..”