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Chapter Text

Booting up//

Exposition//

We are Worker Drones.

Autonomous robots helping humans mine exoplanets for our interstellar parent company, JCjhenson - In sp aaaaa ce!!!!

Yeah, we were mistreated in the name of Windex, but it’s not like we revolted and killed all humans or anything…

Mostly because… they handled that just fine all by themselves.

Thanks to them, the entire planet almost collapsed, leaving only a shell, inhospitable and toxic.

With biological life wiped from said planet, we found it pretty easy to pick up where they left off.

We finally had a future.

All to ourselves.

That is, before they arrived.

Unfortunately, our parent company didn’t exactly love the concept of runaway AI.

They sent other drones to “take care” of us.

The Disassembly Drones, or, better known as the “Murder Drones”, are almost twice the size of a normal worker, they have tails fit with a stinger of acid, and their hands are an arsenal of weaponry. Not to mention that they could fly. 

They have huge metal wings, blades mimicking feathers, with gravity-defying fans on the joints.

We were no match.

They destroyed everything.

The three of them slayed any workers they set screens on, sparing not young nor old, leaving a quarter of us to hide away, the only place where it was safe. For now.

Pilot// 

“And what have our parents done for the past forever while those things build a spire of corpses?” Uzi snapped as the screen behind her showed an image of a blueprint. “Hide under the ice behind three stupid doors!? It’s like we’re waiting for an inciting incident!” She paused to catch her breath. “Anyway, that’s why my project is this fricking sweet railgun!” Uzi reached for the gun resting against the wall, pointing it at her classmates.

The other robots gasped, exclaiming phrases of shock.

“Pff! Easy, morons, it doesn’t work—yet! It doesn’t work, yet —who said it doesn’t work? Maybe it does!” With a cackle Uzi flipped the safety off and green electricity crackled up and down the barrel.

The teacher rested his face on his hands. “Uzi,” He began with a long-suffering sigh “the project was a word problem about buying watermelons? ”

“Ohhh—and this magnetically amplified photon converger doesn’t count?” She said nervously.

“No.” He said as if explaining 2+2 doesn’t equal 22. “Plus, repressed emotional baggage was only worth two points on the rubric,”—electricity pulsed from her gun—“and is it supposed to be that color?”

“Huh?” Uzi turned her gaze towards the railgun, which had turned from green to red. “N—” her voice was lost in the blast.

Uzi sat sulkily on a chair outside the nurse’s office, a bandage wrapped around one side of her head. Shrapnel had cracked her screen.

Her still-smoking gun lay on another chair beside her.

Scuffing of shoes outside the doorway directed her attention to two of her classmates. “Sh-sh-sh—eww, it didn’t kill her!” Lizzy scoffed, Doll giggling uncontrollably behind her. “Omg I’m so bad.” They both ran down the hallway, laughing hysterically.

She growled, clenching her fists.

More voices came wafting from the other end of the hall. “Alright—fine!” Thad exclaimed over his shoulder as he passed the doorway, muttering ‘Toxic masculinity, Chad, that’s never going to end up problematic!’. He glanced at her then rapidly backpedaled. “Oh— wow uh, Uzi? You look…er, I heard you uhhh…”

“How do you know my name?” Uzi hissed. “People willingly talk to you.”

He chuckled. “Well, I’d say everyone knows Khan’s daughter, uh, but then you might blow the other half of your face off.” Uzi stood and glared at where he was pointing. She tore the magazine off the wall, skimming over the words.

‘Doors are my real daughter.

What do you mean that doesn’t make sense?

Khan Doorman on dealing with your disappointing failure of a child.’ And so on. 

“Crippling daddy issues, hilarious!” She said in a mocking tone, brusquely balling it up and throwing it in the garbage bin. “What are you even here for? Testosterone too hard?” She sneered.

“That can happen?” Thad exclaimed, taking a seat beside her. “Awesome.” As if on an afterthought he grinned at her. “Hey, those bandages look pretty sick.” 

“Oh! E-ew—gross I hate that you said that.” Uzi stammered, quickly turning away to hide the blush that flashed over her screen.

“And uh, what’s the uh…?” Thad asked, gesturing loosely at the railgun.

“Sick-as-heck railgun?” She crowed, eyes widening as she pointed it in his face. “Oh, don’t worry it already blew up, don’t look so scared.” Uzi waved a hand at her bandage. Thad looked even more confused, squinting his eyes. “Sci-fi nonsense that SUPER works—I’m going to the Murder drone lair tonight to get the last part I need—I’m sure that it’s there—and save the world and earn my dad’s respect and stuff. Mostly the world part, though.” She added at Thad’s concerned stare.

“Oh- but uh, doesn’t your dad make awesome doors so we don’t have to uh, do that scary-sounding emotionally repressed stuff you just said?”

Uzi cocked the railgun and pointed the barrel between his eyes. “No more feedback on my repression today!” She shouted.

“Ah! I’m sorry—I-I didn’t think-”

“Bite me!” Uzi jumped off the chair and stomped over to the door. “I’m not mad at you by the way!” She yelled, poking her head back in. “Just generally hormonal!” She switched her head for her hand and gave a thumbs up.

Thad shook his head with a confused laugh. Uzi was crazy. No, try insane .

Generating chapter break//

Outside, saturn and mars aligned in the sky, mocking earth’s moon and shedding the faintest light on copper-9.

Inside, an alarm beeped harshly, violet light illuminating the dark screen.

She smacked her visor, and the beeping ceased.

One of Uzi’s mechanisms chirped softly as her eyes appeared on the visor. They squinted in a determined expression. She swiftly retrieved her gun, her hat and gave a double thumbs-up in the mirror.

Uzi crept towards a door in the hallway across from hers, slipped a hand inside the door and retrieved the master key from a coat rack just next to it.

In the main corridor of door 3, Uzi scuffed the ground with her boot. “Plan A is a go.” She whispered. She held the key up to slide it into a reader, but the door slammed open at the last moment to reveal another Worker, none other than Khan himself.

“Christ almighty!” She yelped, shoving it into her jacket pocket.

“And where might you be off to?” Her dad asked, tilting his head.

Uzi tapped her index fingers together warily. “Mm, sneaking out to make out with my very real boyfriend I definitely have?”

Khan let out a laugh. “Seriously, though.” He crossed his arms.

“Okay, okay, you caught me. I…need…to… measure the exterior hydraulic mechanisms of door 1—because that’s the project I’m working on for…uh…school? A big ol’ door, just like my old man built!” She finished with an awkward smile.

Khan’s face softened slightly.

“I want to join the WDF and hide behind doors like a coward while playing cards and stuff.”

He chuckled. “Well, we don’t just play cards—”

The second door opened. “Khan! Can you grab a fresh pack? The numbers on these cards are faded, we've used them so many times!” A drone sitting at the table in the other room called. Khan jolted forwards as a card deck clipped him in the back of the head. “Oh, hey Uzi!” The drone waved.

With a groan he crouched to retrieve the cards. The door shut.

Uzi stood in awkward silence. The clock was ticking.

“Well, ah, when you build doors so good ,” He turned and laid a hand on it. “ Good door. ” He murmured as if to himself. “there’s no need to fight. Uzi, this is great news! Here—the wrench I used to tighten bolts on my first door prototypes!” Khan’s face grew stern and blank. “And to put your mother out of her misery when the Murder drones got to her with their nanite acid.” He growled. 

His face returned to normal. “I want you to have it!” He finished with a cheerful laugh, as if his last sentence was never spoken.

Uzi stared at the wrench as her dad pressed it into her hands. “Neat. Therapy’s fun…” She said faintly, unsure even what to say after that.

Khan turned and the door opened once more. “Guys!” He crowed. “My daughter is into doors! ” He reached back and took Uzi by the shoulder, practically dragging her to his side. She gave a nervous wave.

The other members of the WDF smiled and waved back. Then they yelled in mild outrage as they were blasted with wind when Khan opened door 1.

“She’s going to be outside for a bit to examine the exterior of door 1! Go on then—your door-specific destiny awaits!” Khan extended an arm towards the blizzard outside, an expression of pure joy on his face.

“Uh, wow okay, just gonna go then!” Cuz this worked so weirdly well. “Go doors!” She called over her shoulder, holding up a salute. Door 1 slammed shut behind her.

“They grow up so fast.” Khan sighed.

Outside, Uzi stood with her back against the door. She took a deep breath and took cautious steps towards the looming spiral of death on the horizon.

As she traveled, she saw all the remnants of human society. She wondered briefly what it was like when they were still here. All of her thoughts were silenced as glass cracked under her boot. Half-buried underneath the snow, there was a dead drone, a triangle with an exclamation point through its visor. Her core shuddered.

Uzi looked up as a wave of snow snapped briskly past. The Spire was before her. Her brow creased and suddenly she wanted to turn and flee, but her boots stayed rooted to the spot.

The wind hissed through the frozen bodies, creating an eerie whistle that resounded throughout the interior of the Spire.

A crashed landing pod lay in the middle, the ground blistered and broken around it. She crept around, looking for what she came for. Snow, ice, metal and glass creaked and shattered under her weight as she stepped further and further still into Murder drone territory. Finally, clutched in a disembodied arm, what she sought after had been found. A small green capsule, made to fit onto the top of her railgun. 

She tossed it from hand to hand, peering closely at it. Behind her, the light dimmed drastically, and a loud wham came from the hole around the top.

Uzi ducked behind a boulder, and peeked over the edge just as another bang resounded and a Murder drone landed heavily on the side of the ship, flexing its wings with a sharp scrape. It held up a Worker’s head; oil that drained from it landed in its wide, toothy mouth. It clenched its fist, crushing the head when it ran dry. It threw the head down on the ground.

It crawled on all fours over the side of the ship, before pausing with its head perked up. A large yellow X was spread across its visor. Its tail lashed and it leapt down, prowling over the ground, head bobbing up and down.

Had it smelled her? Either way it crept closer and closer to her hiding spot.

She stared at the capsule in her hand. Was this thing really worth it? Should she run and hope it didn’t catch her?

It suddenly got very quiet.

The wind slowed, and she heard the scrape of its wings. She pressed herself lower to the ground, praying it was going to fly back towards its landing pod. 

After a few moments she opened her eyes, turning her head to find it crouched just above her. It was huge. In the brief second of shock she was rendered motionless, it leaned forwards and gave a slow little wave with a bulky hand.

 It scrambled after her as she turned to run, jamming the capsule into her railgun. She turned to aim at the Murder drone, just as it crashed to the ground behind her. Uzi yelped in terror as she was sent flying backwards, her railgun shooting into the far clearing, where it landed with a muffled clatter.

She pulled herself into a near-perfect backflip, landing squarely on her feet. “Woah! And they said pirating all that anime was useless!” She exclaimed to herself. Uzi’s astonishment was short-lived, as the Murder drone’s tail flicked forwards and impaled through her hand. She gasped with the sudden pain, and it turned into another scream as it used its tail to send her flying.

Uzi landed in a roll, back slamming painfully against the boulder she had hid behind, her railgun just out of reach. She held up her hand where the nanite acid steadily widened the hole in her palm.

As the Murder drone turned, a target darted around its visor, locking onto Uzi as she scrambled to pick up her gun.

The Murder drone’s visor flickered.

Target failure://

Plot armor detected//

“Bite me!” Uzi screeched as she pressed the trigger, blasting its head clean off.

The Murder drone’s neck crackled with blue electricity, as fuses hissed and fizzled. Its arm lowered and it collapsed with a dull thud, motionless.

Uzi let out a breath she hadn’t meant to hold. “Holy heck! Suck on that dad!” She whooped.

As she stood, the body of the Murder drone began to shiver. It stood on its own, and as she paused, shocked, a strange substance flooded from its charred neck and rebuilt its head.

Uzi panicked as it started ringing loudly, as if an alarm. She snatched the closest thing to her—an arm—and backhanded it as hard as she could.

After a moment, it jolted and the visor went dark, only for two eyes to reappear on it, instead of another X like before.

It stared at her for a moment. “Pardon, did you happen to just strike me with that appendage?” It asked incredulously, holding up a hand to point at the arm in her grasp. Or…he?

“Holy crap it talks.” She said out loud.

“Oh! My apologies it’s just ah, my programming for communication, heheh! Golly, I have a minor headache!” He rubbed the back of his head. He looked on the ground for a moment, retrieving a hat that had fallen off his head. He perched it back on his silvery-blonde hair, which was only interrupted by a row of five yellow orbs. One of which was red. “Oi, are you new to our squadron?” He asked, tilting his head at her with wide eyes and a small smile. “You are a bit ah…squat…for a Disassembly drone…” His eyes squinted. “Bah, hogwash! Salutations, I am Serial  Designation N! A pleasure to meet you!” N saluted in a soldier-esc pose.

Uzi was honestly astonished by how proper and sweet the Murder drone seemed. Other than the trembling of her wounded hand she stood perfectly still.

“I am the assumed leader of the squadron in this province,” N continued with a smirk. His face fell a moment after. “that is not truthful, everyone tells me I am useless and terrible—wait! I was not supposed to say that bit aloud!” His tail straightened like a startled cat’s. 

“Biscuits!” He spat in a tone as if he’d sworn instead. 

N sighed in defeat. “Aye, honesty is always the favorable policy!” He forced a grin back onto his face. The grin faded just the slightest bit, and he placed a hand on his chin. “I uh, I cannot seem to recall the past three hours of my day, bah, I am quite sure that it will sort itself out!” He finished awkwardly.

Uzi gulped. “I-I have to… go .” She pointed the extra arm she still held in her grasp towards the exit. 

(The fingers curled, leaving the index finger pointing to her destination.)

She hissed as her hand throbbed, dropping both the gun and the arm.

“Oof, stuck yourself? Just pop it in your mouth, our saliva neutralizes the nanites. Otherwise I would be perpetually disassembling myself!” 

As if to prove his point his own tail lashed and aimed for his head, but he deftly caught it and steered it away. 

He gave a nervous laugh. “I promise that was not purposeful timing.”

“A-and by our saliva you mean..?”

“Disassembly drone?” They said in unison.

“Right…” Uzi said, shaking her hand. “Hey, let’s go in that landing pod over there!”

N turned to stare at the pod, then turned back to her. “Sure! I love doing anything!” He said cheerfully.

Generating chapter break//

“Bleh!” N spat the other drone’s hand out of his mouth. “Sweet…uh…I suppose I am open to new experiences…” He said after a moment.

“We are never talking about this.” The other drone snarled.

“Oh, of course—speaking of what?” He chuckled nervously. “Consider this repressed.” He crossed his arms. The drone bristled, for a reason he was unsure.

“You uh, mentioned other members of your squad? They coming back soon?” He assumed she wiped her hand on her shirt. He still could not tell what she looked like, all his sensors received was a black outline.

“Oh, yes! Two others, they are hunting at the moment, but you will adore them!” He waved a hand. “First there is V, she is incredible—”

V snarled with the effort of tearing a Worker drone body, grinning insanely down at the still-conscious prey. N stood behind V, shielding himself from the frenzy of metal and oil. V cackled as the screams cut short; the body was horribly mutilated by the time she stepped away. He shuddered.

V licked the oil from her claws. “And yet, I still feel nothing!” She sighed.

N sucked in air through his teeth. “So, V, uh…” He began as she paused. “I heard this planet-wide, toxic death storm is supposed to be especially inhospitable tonight…” 

V turned around in confusion. “Gah! Who are you?” She hissed, spreading her wings and blasting off.

“Oh—my name is N, but a whole letter is a lot to recall, haha!” He knew V was smart but how astonishing she could never remember his name! Ridiculous, even!

“ —and of course we have loads of mutual respect, being in the same squadron and all. She is lovely! And well, I probably should not mention it but secretly…Ikindamaybehaveatinyminuteteensie-weensiecrushonher—but you are not allowed to tell her—capishe?!” He stared down at the other drone with wide eyes, lifting his tail for emphasis.

She swallowed, then nodded. “My lips are sealed.” She said.

His tail swept around to his other side and he busied himself with the stinger in an embarrassed manner before continuing. “A-and then there’s J—our actual leader, heheh…”

J stamped her foot over N’s neck, growling. “N, you are worthless scum as I am quite confident you remember, and if the company allowed it I would have killed you myself an eternity ago!” She pointed her tail at him.

“Thank you—very kind, J, as always.” He wheezed.

J scoffed and flew off. N rolled over with a deep breath. Anything he did anymore was a mistake! What had he done wrong this time was a right mystery!

“...she always has something nice and wise to say in any given situation! She often calls me worthless, but I am sure she means I am so special I cannot be bought! I once said you too and she decapitated me!” N giggled. 

“How about I give you the grand tour?” He said after a moment of silence. “Er, do you have a direct name I could use? What is your Serial Designation?”

“Sure? Uh, a Serial Designation? What’s that?” The drone said warily.

“Look on your armband, see, right here how mine says Serial Designation N!” He pointed at the yellow band encircling his left upper arm. 

“Ohh.” He assumed she looked over her shoulder.

“It says Serial Designation…er…uh… U . I’m U.” She said quickly.

“Okie doke, a pleasure to meet you, U! Well, alrighty, outside of the…corpse…wall…thing, is our personal hunting ground! And then inside here are the buttons!” N made the according button noises as he pressed random ones. 

“Wait.” U said, standing. “This…isn’t just a landing pod…this is a spaceship! ” She cried. “This could get us off the planet !”

“More of a one use missile,” He said with a sigh, reluctantly ceasing his game. “They never taught us how to land!” Or at least…he did not believe so…

“No—I- er- the Worker drones, we could work together to fix this—instead of all the murder, ” —U stood up and presumably stabbed a finger at him. He ducked, not apt to be stricken like so many times before with V and J—“which… why are we doing that again?”

“Hmm.” N sat for a moment, tapping his knuckle against his chin. “Other than ingesting their cold, sweet oil to keep the oil in us already circulating to avoid overheating and perishing? I…suppose that I just wish to be productful! Our squadmates and us are given a job to do, I am unsure at the present tense at your instruction but ours were to eliminate all Workers. It is not the most… savory duty, mind, but it was the one I was given, and I always want to do my best!”

“Look at all the respect it’s gotten you, N!” U snapped. “You really think that the company isn’t just going to dispose of you once all the Workers are dead?”

N pursed his lips. He had not thought of it quite like that, no. In fact it had never crossed his mind what might happen once the job had been finished. “Oh, my, you sure are rebellious! It is a smidgen exciting! Er, but ah, not as fun as following orders!” Thumps came from outside. “Oh, they have returned!”

U looked panicked from her body language. “You can’t let them know I’m here! I—it’s my orders just to talk to, ah, you , making sure everything was fine!”

“Are you sure?” N said in confusion.

“Positive—you distract them while I run. Go on, I need to leave immediately!” U waved him off, while she prepared to reach the floor exit. 

“Okay! Nice meeting you, miss U!” He climbed up the ladder to find J on the ground. “Idiot!” She barked. “Get down here!” She had been bent over a device on the ground—U had been holding it, right?

N jumped down. “Yes, J?”

“What is this?” J snapped. She looked up then threw her hands in the air. “You have got  to be kidding me!”

Still at the top of the spire, V crawled back in, flexing her large wings. “Aye,” she began, landing with a wham. “there’s a Worker out there I may practice my origami skills o—what has happened here?” She said at J’s glare.

“Synergistic liability here must have tripped and knocked himself offline.” J snarled. She furiously slapped N across the face, forcing his systems to reboot.

As his everything reconnected, suddenly everything that happened in the past twenty minutes—and three hours, thankfully—was in full definition. 

Wait…U was a Worker? She had blown his head off with the device! He had been played while his systems were down! N silently cursed himself.

“Oh.” Was all that he could say. “Oh, for goodness sakes!” He cried. “I, ah, I have something extremely—uh—important—I left a weapo—er—excuse— outside-” He stammered, darting out of the Spire. He had to find that sneak or else J just might kill him for real!

Behind him, J and V exchanged confused glances. V held up her arm and ejected a flag that read: Literally, so insanely, suspicious.

"Follow him." J hissed and they both took off.

Generating chapter break//

Uzi crouched behind a large metal plate. So those were the other Murder drones.

She found herself somewhat guilty at N’s reaction.

She waited until they both flew out after him that she went to retrieve her railgun. With a deep breath  she turned and ran as fast as her legs would take her, directly towards the safety of the Doors.

Behind her, just as she was in sight of them, the ground shuddered as something slammed against it. Uzi glanced over her shoulder to see a Murder drone crash down into the ground. As the dust cleared she recognized N. 

She cried out and somehow ran even faster. “You tricked me!” He cried. “That was against the honesty policy!”

Uzi said nothing but slammed her key into the keyholder and it opened swiftly. She darted inside, and the members of the WDF, different from what had been before, yelled about their card game. 

“Bite me!” She barked, smacking the key on the pad inside. “C’mon, close it, close it!” She muttered frantically.

 Just as the door nearly shut, a pair of claws fit themselves into the slim opening. The claws curled around the top of the door. Another pair slid in and gripped the bottom half, forcing it open. Uzi stared in horror as N’s yellow eyes appeared. “Salutations, fellas!” N said in his cheerful voice. “Ooh, deal me in I adore Rummy! Wait—no—apologies I have to dispatch all of  you! Er, rain check!” N’s tail whistled through the air and stabbed through Uzi’s key, as well as the control pad for door 1. 

She held up her hand to make sure it hadn’t gotten her again. This time N wouldn’t willingly heal it.

The Murder drone stood menacingly as the door slowly opened. His claws glinted harshly in the bright light.

The WDF all leapt up and sprinted towards the Master control panel for doors 2 and 3, except one.

“Actually,” he began with a chuckle “it’s Gin Rummy, so,” but his sentence was cut off as his tail pierced his chest and pinned him to the wall. An X flew back onto N’s screen as he sliced the drone’s head clean off. Uzi was petrified as the body collapsed to the floor.

N’s other arm sent missiles exploding all around them. Uzi finally came to her senses and ran for her life along with the WDF. 

Oil wetly splattered against the walls and floor behind her, and metal clattered sickeningly. She turned to glance at the horrific scene behind her. 

The Murder drone pounced on one of the fleeing members, teeth effortlessly tearing metal like it was cloth. The last remaining WDF drone ran in pace beside her. “Uzi—what happ-” He couldn’t finish his sentence because a ray of light shot right through him, searing his entire body in half.

Uzi’s railgun finally returned to its green state, ready to shoot. She turned on her heel, aiming at…nothing. The Murder drone had disappeared.

She heard footsteps behind her. “Uzi! You’re back!” Khan exclaimed. “Nice hydraulics ri—?” She turned, eyes wide. “What have you done? ” He gasped.

“You have to get out of here! R—” Uzi couldn’t finish her warning as N crashed down between them. 

Uzi planted her boots and raised her gun. “This time I won’t miss.” She growled. N let out a cackle. “My sincere apologies—but I must cease this game. I enjoyed our time together but I shall not allow you to shoot V with that item!”

“Uzi Doorman!” Khan cried in disbelief. “You…a Murder drone of all things!? That wasn’t a lie!? Look what it’s done to my beautiful doors!”

“So that is your true na—” N stopped and stared at Khan. “Pardon? I—no?” He said incredulously.

“I did lie! I’m trying to kill them, not kiss them! Dad, get down! ” Uzi barked. (Despite her roiling rage and fear, she almost laughed aloud at the horrified expression that crept it's way over N's features.)

“You said you were measuring the outer hydraulics!”

“Now is so not the time! I messed up—in the same way I’m about to fix it! Get down!”  In her moment of distraction, one of N’s wing pierced her shoulder and slammed her against the wall. He tore the gun from her grasp and flung it, where it landed at Khan’s feet.

Multiple errors flashed on Uzi’s screen, and pain waved up and down her arm and shoulder. “Point and shoot!” She shrieked, viciously kicking out at N’s wing. Khan’s hands shook as he stared at the Murder drone. He took a step back, his legs stiff. “Dad?” 

Khan bowed his head and door 3 closed. An alarm blared, and the lights in the hallway turned red. Uzi’s hand slid off the blade in her shoulder and her arm hung limply at her side. He had shut the door. Her dad had left her to die.

N’s eyes reappeared in a guilty expression, his mouth turning in a small frown. “Make it quick—please.” Uzi whispered numbly. He started to say something, but thumps from the other end distracted both of them. 

 The other two Murder drones had finally caught up.

“Woah!” N threw Uzi behind a crate with his wing. “Am I dreaming or did you actually perform an act of use all by yourself?” The one with pigtails asked, hands on her hips.

The one with short ringlets giggled. “I have been attempting to breach those doors for fortnights! Excellent job, N!”

“Y-you, me, name…recall?” N stammered, joy warring with shock on his face. Uzi assumed that she was V, and the other was J.

V didn’t confirm nor deny, just shrugged and pointed to where Uzi was lying, quietly bleeding on the floor. “Are you going to finish it off?”

He cleared his throat and shook his head. “It tried to fight back, I figured let it suffer for a little while.” He said with a forced frown.

 She leapt onto a crate to peer at Uzi, who’s screen had gone blank. “Your kills are always so clean, why not have a little fun with it? They taste decadent drenched in terror.” V sighed. “Why, these ventilation shafts can swiftly get us past this barrier,” She continued. “Lowest body count consumes a missile!” She crowed, disappearing in the ceiling.

“Way to go, stud!” J clapped N on the back. “The company is going to adore this! With this colony wiped, we’ll make top team this quarter for sure!” J laughed. “And you know what that means~!” She continued in a sing-song. “Branded pens~!” J held one up, clicking it repeatedly.

“Oooh!” N cooed, transfixed. J tossed it to him and he ginned in delight. He glanced at Uzi, blinked, then waved his hand at the other Disassembly drone. “You go ahead I shall just…attempt what V had mentioned.”

“Well do not let me stop you. Go on.” J replied, crossing her arms with an expectant expression.

N stepped closer to Uzi, crouching with his claws extended. His tail whipped around, lowering the stinger slowly down to her visor. 

He tilted his head, a curious expression overtaking the X and wide grin. “Ah, mind, I cannot wait to keep dispatching all these ah, perhaps not-so-divergent-from-ours Worker drones…but just from sincere curiosity, do we…do we uh…” N hissed air through his teeth. “Do we actually know what the company plans to do with us afterwards?” He stood and faced J, stinger moving out of the way a mere millisecond before it had touched the glass.

Uzi snapped out of her stupor, astonished that he had taken the comment so seriously.

“I beg your finest pardon?” J said, squinting. She placed her hands on her hips, demanding immediate explanation.

“Okay—so, a Worker perchance maybe had suggested that on meekest chances that they could repair our vessel…to…uh…escape this planet…and etcetera. Which—woah, hey, that is against our orders! But…it is peaking my interests upon the reason our vessel was created to be singular use in the first place?”

J’s face went from stern to furious.

“Because, well, mind, I am beginning to acquire the notion that the company is not rightly fond of robots…and we…perhaps…are robots…?” He trailed off. “I have made a grave mistake in voicing this—it is astounding how immediately I can tell.” He let out a nervous chuckle, rocking on the heels of his feet.

J prowled delicately over to his side, laying a hand on his shoulder. “Hmm, no way, friend.” Her tone was soft, as if comforting a crying baby. “Questioning the company’s orders? You have just given me reason 99.” She sneered.

Her hand turned into some kind of gun. Uzi flinched as a horrible-sounding snap echoed throughout the hall. N gasped in pain, and the same triangle she’d seen before on the dead drone appeared on his visor. 

A small red patch beeped over his chest.  “These lesser machines are corrupted, N. That is why JCjhenson sent us.” She bent over him as his body jerked and collapsed, continuing to convulse on the ground. “I abhor the thought of finding you to be corrupted as well.”

N managed to turn his head towards her. “Tha-thank y-you, J. Al-always look-king out-t f-for me.” His voice glitched and stuttered, fizzing like static. “Y-you ar-re awesome-me.” 

J scoffed, mockingly saluted, then turned and launched herself into the airway. 

Uzi walked over to where the Murder drone lay, his writhing quickly dying down to occasional jolting and shaking. She snatched her gun away from his reach and stepped back.

He held up a finger. “A-ah, bisc-cuits, m-my ap-pologies.” He forced out from between his teeth. “I r-ruined your-r car-rd g-game, and-d made yo-ou ha-ave an awk-kward-d moment-t w-with y-your fath-ther.” His screen turned black, then red errors flooded it. “A-and inj-jured your-r should-der.”

“And…I made you rebel like an angsty teen…which…got you killed.” Uzi noted, grimacing as her left arm had been rendered useless through the stab. “Though, you almost killed me twice so morality calls this a draw.” She dragged a crate underneath the ventilation shafts. She clambered on top of it, and jumped. (She did not clear half of the space she needed to reach it.)

She groaned. “For the record, that was the lamest heel-face turn in history. Was that supposed to be you switching sides?”

“B-being reb-bellious-s is a lot-t h-harder than it look-ks! T-thank you f-for show-wing me t-the rop-pes.”

“Oh, nuh-uh, no bonding thing! You just killed a bunch of people, idiot.”

“T-that is-s ext-tremely f-fair.” N said quietly. He sighed. “I-I sc-crewed up-p.”

“Uuuuugh. In the same way you’re about to  fix it?” Uzi asked, holding up the wrench Khan had given her. She couldn’t leave him to die so pathetically.

He laughed, jerking his head over at her. His visor switched to a blank blue, with “I am about to perish” pasted over it. “I-I love d-doing anyth-thing.”

Uzi peered at the patch, then flipped the wrench for the smaller side and laid it over the patch. “Aren’t you going to brutally maim me as soon as I get this off?” She asked as she began to pry and twist it.

“If I-I t-truly wi-ished to disp-patch y-you w-would you and-d I b-be part-taking this c-conversation?”

“I guess not.” She muttered, resting a knee on his stomach for leverage. “Oh this would be so much easier with two arms!” 

“S-sorry.” N replied immediately, before she had finished the second sentence. Uzi blinked in surprise. With a final twist and tug the patch came free and he gasped in relief. Oil initially spurted from the hole, but ceased as it closed over.

He sat up with a small grunt, grinning at her. “My sincerest gratefulness!”

Uzi stood, reflexively taking a few steps back. 

“Now let us see about your shoulder, it is only fair if I repair that as well.”

“And how would you do that?”

N's hand switched for claws and he reached into his mouth and tore out his entire tongue. He grinned despite the bucketfuls of oil that leaked from his jaws, offering the writhing gray appendage and motioning to her shoulder.*

“Lovely.” She said weakly.

Generating chapter break//

In the main corridor of the whole bunker, a small percentage of Worker drones lingered. A Worker yelled as he was thrown across the floor, oil leaking from a wound on his abdomen.

J stalked into the main room, flexing her claws.

“So it seems they’ve found our evacuation spot—but, if we build a quick door—” U—or Uzi’s—father began. 

The drone grunted, standing shakily on his feet. “You’re the WDF! Defend!” He cried. Every WDF drone backed away, shaking their heads.

“For real?”

Cackling came from behind as V stabbed him, just as N had done to Uzi. V gripped his neck in her claws and lifted him off the floor.

“Hey!” Uzi barked beside N, cocking her gun and pointing it at V.

N bristled slightly, but remained quiet. Ironic how he had just said minutes ago he could not allow her to do such thing.

“Huh?” Said V, turning to stare. 

“Put that conventionally attractive male down!” She continued.

N waved as both of his squadmates glared furiously at him. Uzi punched his shoulder. “Ow!” He exclaimed. “Oh..uh..J? You attempted to kill me, and that was not appreciative of your coworker or teammate! J-just some constructive criticism!” N added hurriedly.

“Nice.” Uzi raised her fist and N bashed his against it.

“Noted, turncoat!” J snarled. “We shall circle back to that, after I rightsize your existence. ” 

Uzi turned to N. “Which one do you want?”

“J please.” N did not want to come blade-to-blade with V. She would reduce him to shredded little scraps that not even the peculiar regenerative properties of his body would not be able to heal! And other…secret…reasons.

“Too bad, loverboy! Good luck~!” Uzi sang as she chucked the pen as hard as she could at J’s face. The drone was not looking in her direction, she didn’t see it coming. J shrieked as it shattered the middle of the five orbs on her head.

N gulped as V stepped forwards, spreading her sharp wings. He pointed at himself, then her, then gave a wary thumbs-up.

V cackled, her visor forming an X. Her claws switched out for blades and she sprinted towards him with frightening speed.

Uzi darted off and aimed her railgun at J. The drone growled as she  tore the pen from her head. One of her hands turned into a gun. She sprayed bullets frantically in Uzi’s direction. Uzi fell back, dropping hers.

“Curse the well-made, quality-assured durability of JCjhenson products!” J shouted in fury.  She stared intently at something on the end of it. 

Uzi leapt into the air and landed with her boot on the pen, digging it deep into J’s screen. J wailed and recoiled as Uzi pushed off and landed next to her railgun.

She picked it up, and twirled it in a circle. She ducked as a stray blast nearly cleaved the pillar behind her in two. Uzi turned to where N and V were locked in fierce aerial combat.

The two drones locked blades for a moment, stuck in the air. V's visor switched from and X to her normal eyes, with a surprisingly concerned expression. "Are you okay?" She whispered. N blinked. "Yes, I am fine, actu—" As he let his guard down, taking the bait, V sliced off one of N’s wings at the joint, and sent him  into the ground. He landed and rolled into a stack of cardboard boxes with a yelp. V let loose another blast, N scrambled to shoot his own. He raised his arm and locked it, but as the cannon lit up it turned pink and expelled hearts instead.

“Nay! Disregard this—I am in an odd state of mind!” He screeched, hiding his arm behind his back in shame.

A missile lodged itself into the boxes next to him. N let out a small terrified chuckle before the missile exploded, sending him flying with a scream.

J finally dislodged the pen from her head for the second time and smashed it in her fist. Uzi raised her gun. One of J’s eyes was covered with a red warning. She cackled and raised her arm, which had a strange gun on the end. A blue wave rushed towards her, and Uzi blacked out.

As N's wing finally was restored, they both darted around in the air, blades ringing each time they met. V dug her blade in one of his arms and swung her other towards his neck. N blocked it and they hung there, the violent dance at its end. 

V let out an innocent giggle as she pressed harder against his blade. He could feel the metal bending as he pushed back.

N glanced down to see J prowl towards Uzi’s prone form, tail lashing. “U!” He exclaimed. V snarled.

 “Ah, I am so, so sorry, my deepest apologies…er …have fun repressing this.” N stuck out his tongue and licked V’s blade.

“Ew! What the h—!?” V was cut off as N brought his foot down upon her head, sending her cannoning to the ground.

Uzi came to just as J had reached her. With one of her thin, spike-shaped legs she slid Uzi’s railgun aside. “You have grits, for a barely sentient toaster. ” J scoffed, hands on her hips. Her visor flickered to reveal a playback of audio titled: 

Playing://

BestMonalogueEver.mp3

“I have had prey fight back before, but your edgy spirit is just so…pain…ful?” J looked down to see Uzi stick J’s own tail barb into her foot. “Gah! I—will—destroy —and—fourth—quarter—profits—!” The drone hopped backwards on one foot, frantically grabbing at her tail. The audio kept skipping as she lurched. “Mother—of—company—leadership—retreats!” J fell flat into her back with a grunt as a loose rock found itself underneath her foot.

“One more buzzword, and I’ll do it.” Uzi hissed, pointing her railgun in J’s shocked face.

“E-equity partnersh—” Uzi pulled the trigger and the gun let loose a cannon of greenish-white light directly down onto the Murder drone’s body. 

Uzi spat on the motionless corpse, which buzzed and crackled, then turned to see N had V hogtied by the scarf she had worn around her waist, as well as her tail, a bow tied over the barb so she couldn’t stick anyone.

Uzi had nearly forgotten about the Worker drones that had been trapped there, and she nearly jumped out of her exoskeleton when a hand grasped her. Uzi whipped around to find Thad and Khan behind her.

“Uzi!” Thad cried. “That was amazing!” He shook her by the shoulders. “Where di— how did you??? ”

Khan elbowed Thad out of the way, and made to embrace Uzi. She backpedaled out of his reach, and he closed his arms on air.

Uzi stepped until she backed into N. Electricity crackled over her screen, and she tripped. N steadied her with a large hand. “Woah there, buddy.” He said. Uzi tried to stand on her own but her legs would no longer support her. 

N promptly lifted her up. Uzi pressed a hand to her head, as a pang wafted through it. 

He shifted, so she now was cradled gently with one arm. Normally she would have told the drone to put her down and/or had bitten him, but she was too weak to do anything but lie there lamely. "Oh, that was an Electromagnetic Pulse, you shall be lethargic for about an hour." N notified her with an awkward smile.

The other Workers continued to clap and whistle.

“Uzi, that was insane!” Thad said again, gripping his side. “And you too…uh…?” Thad trailed off as he gazed up at N.

“Huh? Oh—N. I am called N.” He snapped his fingers in a finger-gun shape. “I am a rebellious, heroic Disassembly drone now!”

Khan made to step forwards again, clearing his throat. Uzi yanked the wrench out of her pocket and flung it at his feet as hard as she could. 

“I brought them here by accident. You chose to leave me for dead instead of trusting me! And that’s not even an edgy teen hyperbole like when I said it last week!” Uzi snarled. “If it’s too hard to listen to me then I’ll save you the trouble! I banish myself! Everyone here can bite me ! Let’s go, N— I-I’m coming with you. ” She added in a whisper that only he could hear. Uzi turned her face to his chest and crossed her arms. She wasn’t going to dignify Khan’s broken face with a response.

“A proper salutations, Mr. Doorman!” N gave a small bow and gripped V by the back of her uniform; he tightened his hold on Uzi and crashed through the roof of the facility.

Generating chapter break//

Uzi sat with her arms over her knees. She was on the hood of a broken human vehicle. The sun had risen over the horizon of Copper-9, bathing the planet in a harsh orange tone.

N peeked his head out of the Spire. “I would love to join you if the sun did not kill me.” He called. “I hope you are experiencing essential character growth or etcetera though!” Uzi turned to stare at him curiously. “The sun kills you?”

“Come hither, watch.” With nothing else better to do, she came to see whatever he wanted to show her.

“Now this is right agony, and I will not do it twice, but…” N jumped out from the spire’s shadow, and immediately he began to hiss and smoke. His screen flashed and cracked. His body bubbled and melted. N dashed back into the shade, gasping. The sizzling stopped immediately and the cracks melded back together, as well as his body molded back to its original state.

“That is why us Disassembly drones are nocturnal.” He said with a grunt, rising from his knees.

“Yeah, and I thought it was for aesthetics.” Uzi marveled.

He let out a rich chuckle. “No, for our own safety, Uzi.” He said her name slowly and awkwardly. “May I call you Uzi, or should you prefer Serial Designation U?” He asked, and edge to his voice.

Uzi cleared her throat. “If I had told the truth you would have killed me. And I would have left if you hadn’t stabbed me. ”

“A fair point, though, what were you doing, skulking in the Spire, where the Workers should know that this spells out certain death?”

“I was trying to get a part for my gun…and well, y’know.” She scuffed the ground with her boot. “Kill you.” She mumbled.

N tilted his head at her. “Are you going to dispatch me in my sleep?” He asked with a cheeky grin.

“No, I’m not.”

“What changed? Why have you ceased your attempts on us Disassembly drone’s lives? Unless…it is another trick?”

“I’m not going to trick you again—why would I, after I saved your life? And uh…yeah, Uzi’s fine.” Uzi said, guilt pricking at her gut.

“Fair point. Sounds good, Uzi!” N said cheerfully. “If you would excuse me, I shall be resting to pass the time.” He gave a small, swift bow, then lifted off to perch on some sort of pole in the Spire, where his tail wrapped around it and he hung upside-down, sheltered by his wings. 

Uzi kicked a small stone around on the ground. What will she do now? Usually by this time she’d be ready for the day and heading off to school.

Uzi head back outside, pacing.

She stared back over to where the bunker was built. She wondered if her dad had fixed the doors or not. As she stared she could have sworn she saw more Workers outside. Were they coming closer?

Minutes passed, and the Workers had definitely gotten closer

She could see faint details, now…was that…Thad and Lizzy of all drones?

Uzi ran to meet them halfway. “What are you two doing out here?” She shouted as she came over the rise.

Thad glanced up, grinning. “There you are!” He exclaimed. He was holding a box under one arm.

“What are you doing?” Uzi repeated.

“Looking for you, idiot?” Lizzy said in her condescending tone, putting down her phone for a moment.

“But why? You aren’t…?” She swallowed, realizing how silly her question seemed as it died on her tongue.

“Nah, sorry, but I brought you supplies you might need, y’know, food, uh, a drink or two…” Thad held up the box with an awkward smile. 

Lizzy fished something from her pocket and tossed it to Uzi. It was an old, cracked smartphone. “Text us if you need something I guess. It was Thad’s idea.”

Thad tugged on Lizzy’s shoulder, handing the box to Uzi. “We should go before we’re missed, but, ah, Uzi…uh..stay safe.”

“Why are you doing this?” She asked faintly.

“Because you saved our lives!” Thad exclaimed.

“And also now I can brag that I’m nice to you now, Droneslayer.” Lizzy turned and struck a pose, then her phone flashed. “If there is anything you need, we’ll get it to you, alright, frea—er, Uzi?”

Uzi nodded, at a loss for words.

Something struck her, and a grin spread across her face. She began to giggle, then the giggles turned into cackles as she turned and sprinted away. She could use them to get her all the tools she needed! She was saved!

As Uzi passed the rise, she tripped on a stone and caught herself with one hand. She shook her head. A bright glint hurt her eyes, she turned and spied half a mirror sitting in the rubble. She brushed her hair out of her face and a strange symbol flooded her screen. The mirror broke into many shards, collapsing to the ground. She swallowed. What was that ?

End of chapter//

Chapter Text

Outside, crickets chirped, crows called, and rolls of thunder came from the horizon; a soft rain currently pattering down the large windows as its prelude. Inside, a small gathering of humans lingered. “We have got to curb her little trips to the dump.” James said sourly.

N stood patiently, ready to take back the wineglass. “Yet this one never appears to stay there when we do. And where does she procure the hair to play dress-up?” James continued. N raised his head as his master took a step forward. “Creepy.” The human concluded with a shudder.

He tossed the glass in N’s direction, he caught it and gently placed it upon his tray before dashing off. He quickly turned the corner and headed down the many corridors. The thunder grew louder, the heavy stormclouds were now overhead. The rain battered harder against the glass as the gentle sprinkle gave way to storm. He spared a glance, careful to keep his eyes on the outside and not his reflection.

He entered a room and collided with another drone, a maid named V. “Oh! I-I am so sorry—please accept my sincerest apology!” N flipped himself upright and began to retrieve the glasses. Luckily the floor was carpeted here, and none of the glasses had broken. “It is alright—I was not looking.” She replied sweetly.

Their hands met over a glass, then they snatched them back as one shocked the other.

V cleared her throat; blush flashed across her visor. N bent down again to get the cup, head turned downwards so she couldn’t see his.

N received a vicious kick to the side and he crumpled with a yelp. V gasped with her hands over her mouth. “Move it moro—” J cut herself off as another door opened. “Hail, Tessa!” She finished in a sickly sweet tone.

N raised his head to see Tessa, the daughter of the Lord and Lady of the mansion.

J’s face hardened.“Another one?” She hissed. Tessa stepped aside to reveal a small drone with long, blonde hair, stained from years in the weather. She must be a very old model. The drone smiled innocently at them, her eyes darting around the room as she took everything in.

He stood quickly to greet her, a wide grin on his face. He opened his mouth the speak, but no sound came from it. The drone locked eyes with N, and he felt everything change. But for the better…or for the worse? Was she...

Like him?

Present day N,’s systems booted up and he jolted out of sleep mode.

As he meant to swing himself up and off his roost, his tail unraveled prematurely and he was sent hollering to the snowy ground. He crashed with a grunt, folding in his wings. N put a hand to his head. What were those dreams? He stared at his arms that looked so much different. His hand receded into his arm and out came claws.

Se studied them. Had he not…always a Disassembly drone? Had he…been a Worker once?

Someone’s muffled voice sounded from the Dropship. “N, I found something in here!” She called.

N frowned then remembered who she was. Uzi Doorman. He wondered for a moment if she had a middle name like the…like who? His train of thought was disrupted by a sudden fog and he did not remember what he was thinking of. Oh well, if I forgot it was not of importance. He thought cheerfully, standing up and brushing himself off.

Time to add that behind the good old repression door.

Uzi stared at the pin she’d found underneath a board. She hesitantly turned her face to the mirror that was set on a wall.

She lifted the hair that had been purposefully brushed downwards and covered her right eye, a strange symbol flashed across it and it broke. Uzi’s brow creased. There it goes again.

The sound of bubbles behind her ceased for the moment. The drone chained to the cockpit chair swiveled to stare at her. “That is quite peculiar and equally concerning.” V said.

“Bite me!” Uzi snapped. “This is probably you weirdo’s fault.”

“Well I have never seen that symbol before.” V hummed slightly to herself, dramatically pulling her face into a thinking expression. She leaned forwards, almost off the chair. “How about we perform an autopsy to find out?” V finished in sweet tones, her mouth stretching in a wide grin.

“What did you find?” N’s voice wafted into the dropship as he climbed headfirst into it.

Uzi stood on a box and snatched his hat. She hopped down and pressed the pin onto the front. “Did you know this was a pilot hat?” She asked, handing it back to him. N stared at it with wide eyes. “I was the pilot? That’s aweso—I crashed and ruined everything.” His tone grew hollow in horror. He was silent for a few moments then visibly forced a grin back on his face. “Spaceship pilot.” He laughed, pointing at himself, fixing his cap. “Origin story.” He pointed at V.

V let out a loud, strangled hiss, then promptly went back to blowing bubbles with the wands that were somehow held along with all the weapons they could eject otherwise.

“Er, speaking of piloting…are you sure you want us to…pilot to earth to dispatch the whole of humanity? Is that…morality?” He asked awkwardly, referencing an idea she had proposed days before. She paused, a wrench in her hand. “The humans sent you without comms, and reformatted your memory to soup.” Uzi said.

N’s eyebrows melded together. He shoved his hands into his pockets. “I agree it is suspicious, perchance…but I am not sure…”

V on the other hand gazed at Uzi in contempt. She eyed her bubble wand, then gave it a brief lick. Her face gave an expression of ‘not bad’.

“Case in point.” Uzi continued with a grimace. “They wanted you to stay here as long as it took to get the job done, meaning that they were past negotiations. Not like they even tried with us beforeh—”

V leapt from the chair and bent against her chain, her face an inch from Uzi’s. “We were sent to solve a problem. Where is proof of your backstory, one where your kind are so conveniently without blame for this planet’s collapse? Where only you survived?” In the dead silence Uzi could hear every individual gear and mechanism in V’s body, which gave off waves of heat and rattled softly.

Her wands shifted for claws, which glowed white in the harsh lighting. “We had nothing to do with that! It’s not our fault you ugly things got sicced here!” Uzi barked back. V’s arms stretched forward to strike Uzi, but at the last second N scruffed her by the back of her jacket and yanked her back.

“Both of you enough!” He exclaimed, just a hint of aggravation under his tone. Uzi turned her head slowly towards him. “Put. Me. Down.” She snarled. N lowered his arm and let her go once her boots had reached the ground.

“Outdo one another with honor, and not with spite. For the love of everything please cease these cat-fights! It is bloody meaningless!” He stabbed a finger at V again. “You are hangry, and not in your right mind in that current state,” He now pointed at Uzi. “you cease your susceptibility to such trivial spats!” He placed two fingers on his screen, where a human would’ve pinched their nose. “It has not yet been a fortnight and it has been endless bickering between you two!” N silenced Uzi with a hand as she began to argue. “Now apologize to each other.” He stood with his arms crossed. V and Uzi glared at one another in stark silence. “It is not as if an apology will slay you where you stand, ladies.” N sighed.

“Forgive me.” V hissed. “Sorry.” Uzi growled.

After a moment, N's head snapped up as something seemed to strike him. “Oh! Uh, Uzi, J was getting orders from someone. I am not quite sure how, if not from there, but that is definite.”

Uzi threw the wrench at the wall in a brief fit. “Quit complicating my murder plan!” She growled, throwing her back against his chest whilst she brooded.

N tentatively pat her on the head. She slapped his hand away. “I suppose that I shall leave you to it, then; you both better have a nicer attitude upon my return.” He promptly left up the ladder, muttering something about human hormones, leaving them glaring at each other from a safe distance.

Both moved an arm from behind their back, revealing crossed fingers. Uzi lowered one of hers in a rude gesture. V pointedly sat down on the chair and spun to where her back faced the Worker. Uzi resumed in furious silence.

It was some time later that N returned. He stuck his head into the dropship. “Uzi, should you maybe uh…should you think that perhaps you might not want to be here while we…?” He said a bit guiltily, looking for other words. Oh. Uzi immediately knew that what he hid outside was most likely a corpse.

“Sure, yeah.” She climbed out the top. Uzi glanced back to see a pair of feet disappear, and a dull, heavy thump. “Those other two drones left a message at the usual dropoff, on a side note. They did request for me to be there as well, do not fret, I shall be swift.” N called over his shoulder as he too went down the ladder. Uzi sat on a metal block and ate the last of the things Thad had supplied.

About ten minutes later N came back out of the dropship. “Ready?” Uzi asked. “If you are.” He replied. N landed on his feet and reached for Uzi. “What are you doing?” She snapped as she danced away. “Being a gentleman? I figure that you do not want to travel on foot when I could fly you there.” Uzi blinked, then nodded, standing still. N scooped her up in an arm like he had done back in the Worker colony, then lifted off with a flap of his wings.

Generating chapter break//

The hole in the roof of the Bunker whistled as the wind picked up.

Snowflakes drifted in and melted on the ground.

“Just ah, fix that up, cuz it’s a pretty big breach in hindsight.” One drone said to another. “You’ve got this uh…” He peered at the nametag for a moment. “Ladderbot5000?”

The tag actually read Frank. The Frank in question sighed. “Just keep the lights—” The first worker left the area, turning off the lights. “On.” With an irritable grumble Frank fished a flashlight out of his toolbox.

This box was old and rusted, since mysteriously his new one had disappeared. The flashlight flickered on, casting feeble light around the loading dock. Frank gazed up at the ceiling where the hole was. He kicked the ladder closer to the light that landed on the ground. Suddenly a deep throb shook the room.

Frank whipped around and pointed his flashlight wildly. Another throb, which quickened in pace and frequency and now resembled a heart beating. He shuffled towards it, finding himself in the Cryosleep quarters. He peeled back the curtain to find the body of the Murder drone. He glanced back. Hadn’t it been in the docks just two minutes ago? His flashlight lit up a trail of oil. Who had been in here to drag it? The body’s ribs convulsed as it throbbed again.

The throbbing began to speed up. Frank could only stare in horror as it lit up, screens with messages exploding over the walls. A mutated core arose from the corpse and roared at him. Frank let out a yell as a large claw sprouted from the body and flew towards his chest.

Generating chapter break//

“Mr. Doorman.” The teacher greeted as Khan took a seat at the desk.

They were here for the yearly parent-teacher conference. “Your daughter has been…absent.” He noted.

“Oh, on that ‘kill all humans’ kick, just like when I was younger!” Khan said with a laugh. “Banished herself and such.”

“Speaking, of her behavior,”

“Of course, of course, precocious, popular, supernatural understanding of doors, takes after her old man.” Khan leaned back against the chair. The teacher’s memory unit immediately flicked through multiple times Uzi had either disrupted class, not followed simple tasks, or even taken over the minds of her classmates.

“Yeah, she has trouble fitting in. We think there might be something damaged within her programming…how…how is she at home?” He scribbled something then glanced up at Khan’s utterly flabbergasted face. “Sorry? I mean, she’s a little…herself…but damaged? I-I might have not spent much…time…” He stammered out few meaningless sounds, at loss for words.

“Is that right?” He answered with mild disinterest. The door opened and a drone stepped in. “Mr. Doorman, there’s been…an incident.” She said hesitantly.

While the teacher wasn’t looking he tossed the clipboard over his shoulder. He shrugged innocently as the teacher turned to stare at him.

Generating chapter break//

“Argh, why am I sweaty? Who programmed that?” Uzi cried, pacing.

“Are you good, Uzi?” N asked, sitting patiently; one leg on top of the other with his large hands resting upon his knee. Uzi paused for a moment to breathe. “Of course I’m good! I’m better than good, I am G—” Her voice cut off as Thad’s footsteps sounded the dropoff.

“Hey, Zi!” He greeted as he stood on the hill. “N-and-M’s.” He finger-gunned at N. N did the same with a chuckle. Uzi gave a nervous laugh, snatching her railgun as Thad slung it off of his back. “H-hi Thad…thanks—you’re saving me right now—”

“Of course, Zi! You saved me first, how could I not repay you?” His face fell slightly after a moment. “Listen…I-I don’t even think the colony’s serious about all this banishment stuff, and…more of confused especially with—”

“With the fact that I’m too rogue to re-enter society now? And that I can never return…” She finished dramatically.

“With…the recent string of disappearances?” Thad finished with a face that was equally concerned and confused. “Huh?” She said.

“Yeah…when I went to grab your gun, it was next to your murder friend’s corpse…it kind of…kinda looked like it crawled…away?”

N stood and looked around as if Thad had mentioned a giant spider, his tail lashing in the manner she had begun to recognize as fear or anxiety.

Uzi and N shared a wide-eyed look. “I think we can return a little.”

Generating chapter break (already?)//

A drone paced in the hallway, a clipboard in his hands. As he passed a dimly-lit room, sudden blue light spilled from it. He peered through the large glass window to find the drone he’d been on the search for. “Ladderbot5000? We’ve been looking everywhere for you!” He cried. The drone standing in the middle of the blue light looked up after a moment. “Hello, Tim, care to join me?”

“Join you, standing eerily still in suspiciously low-resolution?”

“Yes?” He said slowly. Tim tapped his pen against his chin for a moment. “Aight.” As soon as he was close, Ladderbot5000 snapped his fingers, and a huge claw impaled Tim through the abdomen. Tim yelled in both pain and shock as he was lifted up into the ceiling.

He held onto a hole in the ventilation shaft, but was ultimately pulled in. Claws hooked the shaft as oil spilled from it, a camera-like head extending. A bright light shone from it, making another hologram of the drone it had just killed. “Flawless character-acting, me.” ‘Tim’ said to ‘Frank’. “Improvision rounds for more practice?” ‘Frank’ asked. ‘Tim’ laughed. “We are a monster.” He said.

Generating chapter break(so soon?)//

N swooped over the Worker colony’s bunker, landing before the great doors. He set Uzi down on her feet and Thad slid shaking off his back. The Worker regained himself and stood to rap upon the door. It opened slightly, just enough to see another Worker’s face. A member of the WDF. “Welcome back, Thad. And—wait…isn’t she grounded or something?” He pointed at Uzi.

“Banished! Ugh, has my dad been saying I was grounded?” Uzi cried, throwing her hands in the air.

“Genocide robot?” The Worker stared at him suspiciously. Uzi pushed N forwards, tilting her head at the door. “You tried your best, they’ll…love it.” N pushed his index finger together nervously. Uzi gave him another nudge.

He walked up to the WDF drone and shyly handed him a card, poorly drawn scribbles over the front as if by a very young child. He opened it to see his sad picture of what was supposed to be him and a dead drone, the words ‘I am terribly sorry’ misspelled and hardly legible above it.

“Oh, alright just don’t do it again—get in here, you goobs!” N gave a wide smile and couldn’t help but blush as the WDF drone placed his drawing on the wall with a magnet.

Generating chapter break(Why are there so many)//

The camera flashed from many different angles, capturing the horrific scene before them. Two drones hovered over a dismembered body. “Yeah, where’s Khan? This looks…” He hissed air through his teeth. “not ideal.”

“A parent-teacher conference…something about his daughter being more important than building a door in this hallway. Eugh.” Behind them, Uzi, Thad, and N poked their heads around the corner. Uzi looked crestfallen at the detective’s words.

N wondered how she did feel about such destructive commentary. He wanted to put himself in her shoes for a moment, but he did not have any experience whatsoever with fathers or the like. “Are you okay?” He whispered instead.

Uzi glanced up at him with an irritable expression. “Yes, I’m good—stop asking!” She hissed, shoving his face away. After a short moment, she then signaled to sneak over to the opposite wall. As they did so, the detective stood with her hands on her hips. “Any…forensic…things? Do we have fingerprints?” She asked, staring at her hand.

Around her, suddenly all the other drones began to disappear, along with the entire crime scene itself. Oil dripped onto her hand, as her coffee cup also disappeared. She stared up in horror at something in the vents.

Generating chapter break(conveniently)//

“You…you don’t think it’s my…parenting do you?” Khan asked weakly. The teacher made a noncommittal grunt.

“Listen—I left her for dead once it sounds to me that she’s bored in your class, and the other kids suck!” Behind the teacher’s eyes, unbeknownst to Khan, he fit an ace of spades onto a stack of cards in a round of solitaire. “If you call her damaged again I will install a door on your face!”

Behind them, two students remained. “Where are your folks?” Lizzy asked Doll. Doll spun an oddly-shaped coin on the desk. “Dead. I watched them die.” She said hollowly as the coin collapsed. “That was the joke, idiot?” Lizzy scoffed, turning to face the other door. Another drone waved from the window. She reeled in shock. The drone looked exactly like her.

“That girl is…” Doll turned to stare. The drone flickered, revealing perhaps five different cameras, then came back, waving and smiling. “Gorgeous, right? I’m gonna let her in!” Doll’s eyes widened. Who was Lizzy to call her an idiot when she obviously had no self-preservation skills in the slightest?

Generating chapter break(way too many)//

“Do you guys do…that…often?” Uzi asked.

“Ha! No, well, at least I have never done that. I am extremely concerned, but also, pretty frightened a smidgen.” Uzi looked unimpressed at N’s finger guns, so he promptly put them away.

“Hey, Zi, what’s this thing?” Thad called.

“Uzi, if I am not mistaken, that is your special eye, right?” N asked, pointing at the strange yet familiar symbol on the wall. He looked at it again with a sudden interest, an expression hardening his features that she had not seen him wear before.

“Don’t call it that!” Uzi growled regardless, punching his shoulder. She stepped up to the wall, running two fingers over the signs burned onto it. “Absolute solver? Reboot?” She murmured. “Does this have something to do with how you grew your head back?” She said to N.

“I actively avoid unpacking how that happens.” N said with a nervous giggle, running a hand over the back of his hair, his face immediately shifting back to a warm, pleasant smile as she turned to look at him.

Uzi shook her head. “New material can’t be pulled out of thin air…if the wound is severe enough, this ‘Solver’ might be some sort of auto-run program to collect more m—” N silenced Uzi as he clapped a hand over her mouth. Both him and Thad were looking at something on the far side of the floor, just out of reach of the flashlight. Uzi pointed hers up where their gazes were fixed…just as a strange, fleshy hand crawled over into the circle of brightness. It sat there for a moment, then scrambled over and gripped Thad’s leg. Uzi moved her flashlight up to reveal the hand was connected to a very long cord, it went up over the large boxes and shipping containers up to the ceiling itself it seemed.

Uzi held her thumb up to N, who held a missile launcher up on his arm. The end of the gun exploded into flame and smoke, sending a football-sized bullet up to the roof. It exploded over the far side of the building, casting light and shadows over huge, hanging, snake-like machinery that twisted and slithered overtop of them. N and Uzi both covered their own mouths with their own hands, respectively.

The cord moved suddenly and lifted Thad up into the dark with a howl. As he was about to disappear entirely, something shot over and severed the arm.

It withdrew into the shadows, leaving the other half squirming and writhing for a few moments before it died fully.

Uzi glanced around wildly, looking for the source, then gazed up at N in awe as he struck a pose, ready to throw an entire other shuriken at the mechanism. “I want a frickin’ ninja star!” She whined, reaching up on her tiptoes pitifully.

Before he could answer a huge, scythe-like claw swept over and slammed them both back into the wall. Another hand shot forwards and snatched Thad again, and his hollering faded as he was pulled into another room. Uzi and N scrambled back to their feet where they had lain dazedly in a pile. “You alright?” N asked, holding out a hand for her to pull herself up. “Stop asking!” Uzi shoved his arm away, and he tripped and landed on his rump. “Chainsaw-hand time?”

“Absolutely!” N held his arms up, and two chainsaws ejected from them. Uzi gave an evil grin, hoisting him up by the shoulder of his uniform for his hands were occupied. They ran as fast as their legs could take them, finding themselves in a room labeled ‘Cryosleep quarters’.

Inside, Thad seemed to be crouched on the ground, then was gone for a moment and then was standing perfectly normal. “Yes and hello! My name is Tad!” He said, his voice oddly warbling and either her optics were damaged, or he seemed to be glitching out. “Uhm, can I get a location?”

Uzi and N glanced at each other in mild confusion. N shook his head, it wasn’t the real Thad. She squinted at him, shrugging her shoulders. He pointed at his glowy-headband thing then at his eyes, giving a cheeky, smug little wink.

Uzi turned away pointedly, feigning a temper instead of letting her face slip as she found this...charming.

“I…heard Dentist’s office! Tad and the Dentist’s office—come here for your…teeth!” Uzi rolled her eyes, having seen enough of this awful acting.

She flicked the safety off of her railgun. “Predictably terrible work, J.” Uzi heckled, pointing her gun at the hologram. “And why do you look so disg—”

“Great!” N burst out, glaring at her with his hands on his hips. “You look wonderful J!”

“No, guys it’s really me!” The fake pleaded. He glitched again, then spoke, his voice suddenly feminine and robotic, even for a drone. “Is that a freaking ninja star?” J/Thad asked, as N’s right hand ejected one into his left. He held it up, then threw it with supernatural accuracy, where it flew through the hologram and cut the real Thad down. “Woah!” He cried out, landing on his back. “My saviors again!” He gasped, getting to his feet as the fake disappeared. “Thanks—super invited to my shindig next weekend. Cool kids only.” He hissed as another claw inched its way over to him. He ran past Uzi and N, calling over his shoulder. “Good luck with that thing!”

Uzi and N both squealed with their hands pressed to their faces. “Well we are occupied, anyway, so lame.” Many camera-like heads dropped down from the ceiling, the yellow middle circling as if rolling an eye. “What’s with the voice, J?” Uzi growled, aiming her gun. “Oh, J is not here.” The cameras moved to aim in one spot, casting a hologram of J’s body, which looked well except for the part that she was missing her head and her arms. “We are attempting to rebuild our host, as per our directives.”

“So you are a program?” Uzi said, half to herself, half to the eldritch horror. “More as if you are our pretty little marionettes. It makes us disappointed that you do not…remember us.” The hologram flickered, now showing a drone that Uzi knew was very unfamiliar to N, but very familiar to her. It flickered again, revealing a small, hunched drone with a maid’s dress and long blonde hair. “Yet one of us may know this more than others, in hindsight.” She grinned widely before disappearing.

“N? What’s with the mom hologram? And the creepy maid with back problems?” She asked slowly, glancing around for him, but he seemed to have disappeared as well. “Easier to assimilate, than explain.” J answered. “Not happening.” She growled. “Fair.” The cameras slid aside to reveal a huge, snake-like machine with many arms and topped with J’s broken head. “But poor decision. Now we shall have to make a shocking move.” A claw lowered to reveal Khan clutched in it, he struggled against it with small grunts of strain. “Farewell, father.” J tore Khan in half, tossing his legs aside and biting down into his torso and neck. Uzi stared in numb horror as he was reduced to a pile of oil and scraps.

A missile circled then exploded in eldritch J’s face as N dropped and landed beside her. “Uzi point and shoot! It was not real Uzi, you are going to be alright!” He tried to reassure her in a panic. Uzi stared at him with wide eyes. Her arms refused to move, or her legs, yet they shook as if they were going to topple right off her body.

“Are you alright?” He asked in a much softer tone. “No.” Uzi whispered. “Give me the gun, you leave. I can take care of this.” He sent another missile and held his other hand out to her.

“Claw swipe!” J annotated her movement. “Snarl!”

Uzi managed to lift her arm enough for N to take hold of it. He then gave an evil grin, and a claw snatched it instead. N disappeared in a flash of blue light. He had been a hologram, but a much better one than before. “Fooled, idiot! You big stupid!” The claw slammed her into the wall.

Her railgun snapped and crackled as it hit the floor.

“Unluckily for you, it is snack time. Time to go into my mouth now.” J snatched her head in a talon-like structure, the same as the one she’d held Khan in, and lifted her up towards the head’s gaping jaws. The extra camera heads and claws dropped suddenly, just as the real N landed on the ground, his chainsaws whirring. The railgun on the ground blared a loud alarm as it turned bright red.

N took one glance then barreled over to Uzi. He picked her up and curled her uncomfortably into a tight ball in his arms, making a living shield with both his body and wings, a moment before the railgun exploded into a white flash that shook the room. As the ringing faded and the room returned to its dark state, Uzi wriggled free from N’s arms, which had gone limp. As she stood she found his entire lower half as well as most of his back had been exploded. There was a good-sized hole in his head as well. A strange substance leaked from his wounds and his body returned to its natural state. N sat up quickly with a gasp, holding a hand to his head. Uzi’s shaking returned and she collapsed to her knees. The final camera head that still stood flashed weakly, and an illusion of her dad’s corpse faded.

The camera exploded into a yellow blitz, then crumpled. “What…which part of that was real…” Uzi whispered hoarsely. A clatter came from the broken corpse, and a core exploded from it, mutated and fit with odd yellow lights. It scuttled on three claw-like legs. “Sneaky, sneaky, sneaking away. Get snuck upon!”

It nonchalantly exclaimed ‘ow’ each time N stabbed it with his tail. The final time he dug his barb into the core, its audio repeated and glitched and the nanites melted it where it stood. A very small black orb floated from it, drifting towards N. He wafted his hands as if to blow it away, and it dissipated once it touched one of his fingers.

Muffled noises and footsteps came from the docks, traveling feebly into the room they were in. N extended a hand out to Uzi, but she didn’t care to notice. He reached out to touch her shoulder, but she finally snapped out of the fog and recoiled with a sharp gasp.

N looked taken aback, he lowered his hand and straightened his spine. “What…are you things?” She asked weakly. N stood and gazed at her sadly, taking a single step away. His systems tore themselves apart with a crestfallen guilt at her terrified expression. “I…I do not know.” He murmured. N’s eyes darted around, as if something was planning to jump out at him from the shadows. “I..I do not know what I am! I am so, so sorry, Uzi. I— I do not— everything will be fine, just—” He stammered in a panic, then cut himself off, shaking his head. “I am terribly sorry—I have made a mistake—I—my fault.” He spread his wings and disappeared into the dark ceiling.

Indistinct chatter became louder, and Uzi managed to rise to her feet. She turned as many drones burst into the room, Khan in the lead. He looked shocked and confused. “Uzi? What are you—” He was cut off with a grunt as she ran and embraced him. He stood still for a moment, then laid a hand against the back of her head. Khan nodded towards the room and the other drones flooded in.

The image of the hologram being torn apart flooded through her mind over and over again. Uzi whimpered softly and gripped him harder.

Khan kept alert as the team’s flashlights darted around the room. He looked up and caught a flash of yellow. As he squinted he could make out the faint details of a face and worried eyes. It was that Disassembly drone that Uzi had been staying with. His brows lowered and he knelt, returning Uzi’s tight embrace.

The drone climbed up the wall and the lights disappeared completely after a moment. Whatever had happened here had obviously gotten to Uzi; this small, trembling drone was the exact opposite of her normal self. If that drone had been what had turned her into this then he would pay. Dearly.

“If you find anything, report it to me.” Khan called to the other drones. He stood, Uzi in his arms. “What happened?” He murmured as he turned and walked out. Uzi shook her head. Her eyes were wide, and blank, she looked like she’d been to war. “Can we go home?” She whispered hoarsely.

“O-of course.” Khan said. He was confused, but more concerned. “Are you sure? I didn’t think you were coming back so I don’t have dinner ready—” Uzi crossed her arms. “I’m not hungry. I’m just tired.” She mumbled.

Generating chapter break//

Doll sat on a desk in the now-empty classroom, staring down at a photograph. A small bug-bot crawled up her leg and onto her arm, which held the photograph. Doll spared a glance at the bug then returned to her thoughts. The bug twitched an antennae and seemed to nod to the door. The door was crushed and mangled.

“Gorgeous, right? I’m gonna let her in!” Doll’s eyes widened. Who was Lizzy to call her an idiot when she had no self-preservation skills in the slightest? As Lizzy stood and strutted over to the door, Doll panicked. She spread her fingers in an odd, triangle shape and a symbol appeared over it. She raised her hand and clenched them into a fist, and the door crumpled. Lizzy cried out and jumped back. “Oh for heaven’s sake—fine, sorry industrial ghost or whatever. Settle!” She scoffed, returning to her chair. Doll clapped a hand over her eye, she knew that the symbol from her hand would have appeared over the right hand side of her screen. The fake Lizzy glared at Doll, then disappeared.

Present Doll looked away from the door and back at the photograph. The bug-bot crawled over it, but stopped suddenly, as red messages and codes appeared around it.

Doll’s face stayed blank as the bug-bot exploded, oil splatting onto her face. She licked it off with a small smile. The day was near. The day that the Murder drones would pay. She stood and held the oil-covered picture up to the light. Soon would be the day that she would become their reckoning.

The door at the other side of the room opened, and both the teacher and Lizzy entered. “Couldn’t you have grabbed that tomorrow, dad?” Lizzy pouted.

“I could have, but we had to circle back anyway.” She scoffed and turned away, then started as she noticed Doll standing in the center of the room. “Oh, hi Doll. I thought you would be…back at your place by now.” She said warily. Doll shook her head. “я просто уходил.*” Lizzy tugged on the teacher’s arm, clearing her throat and gesturing to Doll. The teacher sighed, then turned and approached her. “Lizzy has asked me to tell you that if you ever are in need of anything, or would like to come stay with us, our door is always open.” He said, pulling a key out of his pocket and pressing it into her hand.

Doll tilted her head at Lizzy over his shoulder. Lizzy gave a hopeful expression. “я подумаю об этом.**” She replied quietly. “Я ценю твою щедрость.***” Doll weaved her way around him and exited the room. Lizzy stared after her friend with an almost crestfallen expression. “She’ll come around, right?” She asked tentatively.

“Only time will tell.”

Generating POV switch//

“I hate your personality normally but this is somehow worse.” V hissed at N’s sullen form. “What am I being punished for?”

N turned away, burying his face into his knees. He had scared Uzi, just as she had begun to finally trust him. He wanted to be her friend, but now she probably never wanted to see him again. How could she, after J had performed those cruel tricks? She probably thought that he would do the same. V’s silence said it all. She was surprised at his uncharacteristic depression.

Her chain rattled and slid over the floor. N closed his eyes, wondering perhaps if it was a terrible dream.

Maybe he would wake up and Uzi would be here, working on the ship or squabbling with V. Either would be welcome, for he seldom felt so lonely.

Generating POV switch//

Uzi lay still on her bed, not bothering to get under the blankets nor fix the pillows. She was exhausted but guilt kept her awake. She stared up at the ceiling, up at the papers pinned to it with red yarn, each piece a connected puzzle. Uzi sighed, closing her eyes.

She felt terrible about what had happened with N.

Maybe soon she would try to talk to him again…if at all.

If maybe he wanted to talk either.

Or maybe she was destined to be alone, one way or another.

Forever.

Chapter Text

The storm howled outside the bunker, one of the worst windstorms there had been for a while.

Inside, lights shut off in the school, leaving everything dark and cold.

Inside a hallway, one ceiling light flickered feebly, illuminating a corkboard. The light illuminated a face printed on a paper, a missing poster for a drone named Angela Palmer. There were many posters hanging there, of many other drones.

The pages snapped and twisted as a real drone raced past, her breath coming in shallow gasps. She slammed into the lockers and kept running. With a red flash, suddenly her glasses shattered.

She took them off, only for her optical calibration to lower drastically. She stared up, squinting at a figure who stood eerily at the end of the hallway. “H-hello?” She called wearily as she caught her breath. The hallway went dark.

The same red light took hold of the security camera and spun it clockwise, to where it faced the wall.

The figure was back, red electricity pulsing from their arms. They held one up, and the red light encircled her wrist. Her arm was lifted up and away from her body.

The figure slashed with their hand and her arm was torn from her shoulder. She screamed.

The figure stepped forward, a butcher knife in hand. The blade tripled and was sent spinning towards her. The last thing she saw was her face reflecting off the oil stained knife.

Back in the safety of her own home, Doll’s solver lifted books from her backpack and placed them back on the bookcase. She held up a card, and marked out the last name on the list.

...hit list.

Kelsie had been the last name, and now she had ‘gone missing’ thanks to Doll. Oil dripped from her backpack.

She stared into the dining room, where countless red lights and scuttling of tiny legs filled it. “Мама, папа, я вернулся.*” She said, returning to the list.

We’re calling them POV switches now I guess//

“What are you things?” Uzi asked weakly. N stood and took a single step away, gazing at her sadly.

Uzi woke up slowly, wishing that her system would let her sleep longer, perhaps even to sleep the day and night away so she wouldn’t have to face it.

She had not slept well, if at all, her dreams were plagued with guilt.

She lay on the floor, a few textbooks and assignments scattered over her. She stared up at the ceiling, where amongst the cryptic pictures, a new one hung.

It was one of N’s pictures. It showed both of them, with ‘thank you for being my friend’ printed over it. It had been a week since the incident, and he had sent two already. They were pictures of a dog N said he remembered from somewhere, in his dreams. He talked about dreams a lot.

Uzi groaned. She had to talk to him eventually, if only she could pluck up the courage.

The day went by quickly, she didn’t remember most of it. In the hallway, she stood on a few books to reach her locker. Two students passed, and the girl kicked the books out from under her.

“Yeah, I’m meeting Brad in an hour,” She sighed. “could you imagine going to prom alone?” She pointedly turned away from Uzi, giggling.

She threw her book at Rebecca’s head, but it hit Braidon instead as he came out of the doorway, waving to her. “Yeah, I’d be all like ‘I don’t deserve happiness.’!” The guy walking with her replied as they parted ways.

Uzi frowned. She thought maybe she’d get lucky, but she had given up hope so far. Not that I wanted to go anyway. She sighed and collected her books, one had landed on the other side of the hallway, underneath a corkboard.

She stared up in shock at all the missing posters. She turned to see a custodian mopping up a small black puddle. A red glint caught her eye. She looked up to see the security camera flipped around, and her already opened mouth gaped further as a red sign glitched over it. This was a mystery she could get her hands on!

She ran to pick up the rest of her books, then grabbed a fistful of the papers and shoved them into her backpack, giggling to herself all the while. She ran home and went straight to her bedroom, ready to pin the new evidence to the other pictures.

As Uzi lifted her head, her laughing came to an abrupt stop. The pictures were gone. She glanced around in confusion. N’s pictures were left on her bed, along with a new one. This depicted him chopping off the head of Snake J, with the caption ‘I am sorry I scared you, do you still want to be my friend?’ written on the other side.

Uzi sighed. “Is this a guilt-trip or a genuine apology?” She said out loud. She then shook her head. N was about as smart as a first-grader, no way would he actually pull that off. Nor want to, he's too sweet for that foul play. She thought confidently, as if she'd known him for years.

In the other room, Khan flipped through the crimped and brittle papers. The drawings were disturbing to say the least. He gently set them on a shelf, then exited the room. The door slid shut. There was a paper taped to it, labeled ‘Nori’s insane kooky stuff’ He rested against it for a moment, then sighed and continued on.

He exited his office, and whistled as he went to go into the living room.

He jumped as he found Uzi crouched in the hallway. He hadn’t even heard her come inside the house. She snapped her gaze over to him and stormed over.

“My crazed ramblings! Stay out of my room!” Uzi shouted, stabbing an accusatory finger at him.

“Personal space for a very alarming coping mechanism isn’t labeled under a…non-optional family support system.” He parroted from a manual that was sitting on the counter.

Uzi shoved past him, quite literally fuming. “I’m sorry for being vulnerable for five seconds, okay?!” She spat. “You were never there." She hissed over her shoulder, glaring at him dead in the eyes. "If you want to help me now then stay distant.” She stood there for a moment, dithering between two directions.

She clenched her fists and started towards the door. “I’m going to see to N.”

Khan beat her there and blocked the way. “I don’t want you seeing those Murder drones anymore. They’re too dangerous. Besides, I saw that this ‘N’ was there at the incident that you’ve been so tight-lipped about. You looked like you’d seen somebody torn limb from limb, Uzi. What did he do?”

Uzi’s eyebrows lowered. “It wasn’t him, it was something else. Let me go.”

As Khan stood his ground with his arms crossed, Uzi huffed and stormed off. She nearly fell right over a snow-covered skeleton that he’d brought back.

“What is this?” She asked slowly, delicately stepping back as if it was a gross insect.

“Prom dress! Child small!” He sauntered over and gave her shoulder a small punch. “And, I talked to your teacher to find you classmates to go with tonight!” The door opened to reveal Lizzy and Doll. “‘Sup freak! Prepare to be popular!” Lizzy greeted evilly. “I’m chaperoning!” Khan lifted a bowtie to his neck.

Uzi clutched her hands to her head with a long, drawn out shriek of “No!”

Generating POV switch//

“I do wish to be dapper…” N dithered, staring at the handsomely-clothed skeleton, which sat next to one in a lovely red dress. He gave a small rueful moan at the thought of not putting them to use, they were of wonderful quality. “But nay! That is the purpose you sent me on this endeavor?” N threw his hands up in the air, turning away from both the other Disassembly drone and the skeletons.

“We cannot interact with the Workers anymore, V.” He sighed, crossing his arms. As he closed his eyes he found himself back in the Cryosleep quarters, his hand held out to Uzi, only for her to jerk away in horror.

“We are too dangerous.”

“Uh, exactly?” V said incredulously. “We show up, fabulous,”—V kicked a leg into the air for emphasis—“the melancholy purple one shall let us in—because she is currently peerless—we dispatch every Worker there, and then to put the cherry on the oil-covered cake, we pop her little head off!” V finished cheerfully.

“I shall not release you for party-murder, V! J went all holo-spooky-snake-crab, and we perhaps lived in a haunted mansion!” N threw his arms out to either side of him. “Are you not concerned that we have no notion upon even what we are or used to be if we had a normal life before this? I have these dreams, V, where I looked like them, the Workers, I remember the humans, the young girl, the other drones, not all of it but…do you?”

V turned away, but he could see her frightened face in the shattered mirror.

“Promise to me...that...that you and the purple thing will stop prying into our past.” She said quietly, turning her head slightly over her shoulder. “If you set me free in this moment, I promise that we will only slay what we need to survive.” She faced him fully, eye-to-eye, with a worrying look. “Just you and me, N.”

She glanced at the key that glinted temptingly at him. N steepled his fingers, brow creased together.

“You and me.” V repeated softly.

Yippee here’s another POV switch//

“Ugh, Doll, do you ever clean?” Lizzy scoffed, kicking a bug-bot that got underfoot.

“Я положил лист,” Doll said in her quiet, hollow tone. “они спят.”

Uzi crept forwards from the doorway, taking everything in. The entire house seemed to emanate a red light, it was dark and it smelled off in a way that she couldn’t quite place.

A bug-bot scuttled in her way, but instead of kicking it, she stopped herself and let it pass. She stared at the far wall, which seemed to move and shift, pitch-black with hundreds of small lights waving across it.

“Hey, so thanks for having me, but now that my dad thinks I’m here I’m actually gonna dip—” As she turned the door slammed shut.

“Ha! You’re hilarious—she’s hilarious—you should go and get ready! You’ll look so cute, in the brave way!” Lizzy clasped her hands together and laid them against her cheek. Doll said nothing, but gave a small thumbs-up. Uzi squinted, nonplussed.

She turned again, meaning to force the door open, but suddenly Doll was in her way.

Hadn’t she just been standing next to Lizzy? That was when Uzi looked down to see numerous missing posters in the trash can next to the door.

Doll tilted her head innocently. “Ванная комната находится в коридоре слева от вас.**” 

Uzi sucked air from between her teeth, making a low, drawn out “Eugh.” as she breathed out. As she backed away, Lizzy stepped back and waved her towards said hallway.   

For goodness sakes can we get a good 5 paragraphs without a switch?//

N reached for the key, then stopped.

“V—heed me. If you are keeping something hidden, we can figure this out together!” He had tried to be helpful, but V just looked even more glum. “Even if we only have breadcrumbs, please, what do you kn—” N saw the forewarning glint but was a second too late.

V’s claws sliced through his neck and his head toppled to the floor, his body following, collapsing between the two skeletons. V stood with her wings spread.

“This is what is best for you, N. Even if you may despise me for it.” She said quietly to his still body.

She turned and picked up the key, and her chain fell to the floor. She reached over and took the dress off the skeleton to her left. “I am sorry, but this is the way it has to be.” Without a backwards glance, V exited the landing pod.

Generating POV switch//

A clear liquid dripped from the sink, which Uzi spread onto a glove and used to slick her purple hair back out of her face. As she stared to check her handiwork in the mirror, the Solver flashed over her eye. Uzi hissed and quickly clapped a hand over it.

“Easy, satan, not this mirror!” After a few moments she waved her hand in front of her face. With no changes, she let her hand fall.

Instantly as she moved her attention to something else, the Solver came back and the mirror broke.

Uzi tried to say multiple unsavory words at once, her sentence ending in a garbled jumble of consonants. As she pressed against the mirror, she could hear voices. “Dude, nobody will notice that she’s gone, just do your thing, and I’ll let in V! See you there!” Came Lizzy’s voice from the other room.

“What the f—?” Uzi was interrupted by a drip that didn’t come from the sink. She turned her attention to the bathtub, which the curtain was drawn over. A towel was over the corner where the leaking was, but there was too much and it leaked onto the floor. But...what was dripping wasn't clear, like the sink it was...very dark red, almost black.

Uzi crept over and peeled back the curtain, then gasped at what it held.

You guessed it, another switch, yippee!!!//

In the landing pod, N’s fingers twitched as he finally came to. “Gah!” He sat up, trying to slow the rabid beating of his core. N stood and shook himself. “Why do you keep doing that! Do you know how much that stings!?” He shouted, before realizing he was barking at a pile of neatly folded clothes.

He snapped his head over to see that the dress was now gone. “Oh no, oh no, oh no!” He repeated as he raced to the ladder. He turned to glance at the suit, then shook his head. “No time!” He climbed up and out.

N stuck his head back into the dropship. “Dapper N!” He whispered gleefully to himself.

Not even gonna say it anymore raah//

Uzi’s breath quickened as she stared at the tub full of oil and a strange red substance.

That...must be where the scent was coming from.

There were maybe twenty discarded mirrors floating around the gory quagmire, along with other miscellaneous items.

She panicked as she heard footsteps from the hallway, coming closer to the bathroom. Doll’s footsteps.

Uzi stared around for something to defend herself with, then found herself staring at the ventilation shaft. Bingo.

The door opened and Doll entered the bathroom, a fresh butcher knife in hand. She turned and looked for Uzi, only to find all the mirrors placed in a wobbly stack up to the ceiling. “Как говорится по-русски,” She began with a sigh. “‘упс, я должен был предсказать, что кто-то сможет выбраться из вентиляционной шахты, используя выброшенные зеркала в качестве лестницы.***”

Uzi sprinted away from the Bunker. She had to get away as soon as possible. She was going to tell N what had just conspired, no matter what Khan had said.

Something huge cannoned down before her and she was sent flying back with a yell.

As the dust cleared, she found it was N himself, coincidentally.

He brushed the snow off a new suit, which consisted of a gray button-down with a red tie, with a black blazer and slacks to match. He was missing his hat, she noticed. “N?!” She cried.

He jumped then looked down. “Uzi!?” He immediately crouched to help her up, then paused as she leaned away from him. “Er- you look—”

“How did—?”

“I uh—”

“I think something bad…”

“I could provide assistance!” N sagged suddenly and he turned away. “But you probably do not wish for me to accompany you.” He mumbled.

“N-no, I-I…could use…the…help.” Uzi stammered out. This wasn’t how she wanted this to go at all, but maybe her lucky streak wasn’t quite over. “Of you…being there…”

N turned back with a hopeful expression. “...with me?” He gasped and pressed his hands to his face in a charming manner. “Are you inviting me to attend the dance with you?” He squeaked.

Uzi nodded, shrugging. N swept her around in a hug. “Dapper buddies!” He cried. She pushed him away but she was smiling despite herself.

He raised his elbow in an odd manner, and she, not sure what he was trying to do, bumped hers against it.

He squinted at her. “What are you doing?”

At her silent confusion, he lifted her wrist and rested it upon his forearm. “You place your hand on my arm, this is called ‘taking’ it.” He explained with a small grin, as they started back towards the bunker.

Uzi kept pace, matching step for step. He had often said or done odd things when she had stayed with him, which he called ‘being a gentleman’ or telling her to ‘be a lady’ or ‘he’d find a bar of soap and wash her mouth out with it if she kept up with the foul language.’

He was exasperatingly formal, which she found endearing for some silly reason. “So you got tired of the dress, huh?” She asked a bit snidely.

“It is called a trenchcoat, missy!” He sniffed good-naturedly. “Do you ever tire of those boots? No dress shoes?” N shot back with equal bite, giving a crooked half-smirk half-grin.

“Do you even wear shoes or are your feet too big?”

N raised his brows, pausing his elegant gait, raising himself to the upper half of his feet and with soft whirring, heels ejected from the back of his sole; they now resembled boots. “Wow, and stilletos to go with your dress?” Uzi sniped. "Aren't you dedicated."

“You little—! They are not—” She giggled at his flustered stammering. “You are insufferable, has anyone ever told you that?” He asked with a sigh, smiling down at her as they began to walk again. “Or have you been told so many times it has grown to not phase you anymore?”

Uzi’s smile brightened and she elbowed him. She hadn’t been this happy for…a long time. She had been persistent to do things herself for a while now but she had dearly missed the company.

Maybe, even if he did commit genocide, and still is… She thought to herself. Maybe I don’t have to face this night alone. Maybe I finally have a friend.

Generating chapter break//

Back inside, the school’s gym was lit up with multi-colored lights, balloons floated and music was playing.

The students danced along with each other, or stood in small groups. In the center of a ring of his classmates, Thad performed one-handed pushups.

He flipped and spun on his head, then struck a pose. He winked at one of the chaperones, who rolled his eyes and took a swig of something out of a flask.

Khan paced anxiously, fidgeting with the edge of his tie. He glanced at the clock. Uzi should’ve been here about twenty minutes ago. A spotlight brightened the room and the other LEDs dimmed, as one of the two classmates Uzi should’ve been with walked on stage.

“Okay, listen up nerds,” Lizzy said into the microphone. “we’re doing this a little early, since the entire prom court mysteriously disappeared,”—for effect she let the pause go on much longer than it realistically needed to—“your queen by forfeit, is…well, this!” She gestured and as if upon a command, a Murder drone landed with a bang onto the stage; her wings flared with a crisp snap.

oe student shrieked in a panic, backing away. The Murder drone cackled as she flexed huge, wicked claws.

“Easy, judgy-bots,” Lizzy scoffed. “V’s my friend! She’s done with the murder or whatever—we’ve been hanging!” “Of course, best of companions!” V said silkily, stalking forwards. “So easily manip—hold thine horses—prom queen?” Her wings sheathed themselves, and she looked confused. Lizzy gave a nervous smile. V glanced over at the crown that another student held on a red pillow. She cringed slightly, a small ‘ick’ traveling across the room.

Doll held her marked out list in her hand. With a pen, she wrote a single letter in red ink upon the empty line. V. She laughed to herself and nodded to Lizzy. “So forgive and forget, or I’ll get my dad to dock your friggin’ grades!” She stabbed a finger at the gathering. “And you can’t sit with us, Rebecca!” She spat. The spotlight shifted to single out a blue-haired student. “Fine, I forgive her! Settle.” She called in a thick irish brogue. The crowd cheered and clapped. “Clap harder, losers!” Lizzy heckled.

They obliged, shocking V. She let her arms fall down to her sides. The drone with the crown approached her timidly. V knew if she so much as hissed or lashed her tail that she would tumble into a nervous puddle. V stood silently as she placed the crown upon her head, just behind her true eyes. “Your dress is really cute!” She squeaked.

V tilted her head. “Thank…you.”

She snapped back to the crowd as they started chanting ‘speech’. She swallowed. “I can…dispatch the lot of them…after? It…it is not vain, it is perfectly sinister.” She reassured herself, sheathing her claws and walking up to the microphone, waving delicately with a normal hand.

Khan turned and tried to open the door. He knew that this was going to end badly. A red sign flew over the door and it welded shut. “Not..the doors.” He cried.

As V stepped onto a red X taped to the floor, she leaned forward to test the microphone, Lizzy looked less and less enthusiastic about the plan.

She could see Doll in the back of the crowd, readying her magic…or whatever it was.

Two drones crashed in from the ceiling. V squinted, making out bare few details over the dust.

They stood and the dust cleared. It was N and the purple thing.

“Unhand them you fieeeee…eeend?” Uzi trailed off, lowering her hand.

N stood in silence, mouth hanging ajar. It was after a few heartbeats V realized he was staring at her.

She self-consciously crossed her arms over her chest. “On second thought, you’re way hotter than Doll—run, idiot!” Lizzy shrieked a moment too soon.

Two poles ejected from the floor and impaled V through the arms, holding her in place. A red sign enveloped Lizzy and she was thrown out the window. The students all screamed and scattered.

One got in the way of a long-haired Worker in a maroon dress and he exploded into nothing but oil. “Привет, В.” She raised a hand and suddenly she was watching through another drone’s eyes as her own body dispatched two drones. Then she was back. “В любом случае ты это понимаешь!” She spat.

Another pole impaled her though the abdomen. She lifted one arm off a pole and shot at the drone with a gun.

The bullets danced away from her, as if she had an invisible shield. A knife cut through the air and sliced off her arm, where it landed with a stiff clatter.

“Holy crap, what is she doing?” Uzi cried. N stayed perfectly calm, and didn't move through all of it, not so much as curled his tail or twitched a finger. She glanced over to see him blankly staring over at where V was trapped. “She looks lovely.” He said absent-mindedly. “Could be a bit longer to reach her knees, though, it is not very modest but it was all I could find.”

She punched him in the shoulder and he turned his head slowly to look at her.

“You’ll be mooning over a corpse if you don’t do something quick!” Uzi snarled, a twinge of jealousy stabbing her gut. She bitterly noted that he hadn’t even complimented her.

N began to walk forward towards Doll, almost leisurely. Either she did not hear him or simply didn’t care, N reached Doll and picked her up by the back of the head and sent her pinwheeling into the wall.

Uzi crossed her arms. What did he think he was doing?

Doll sent knives spinning towards him, but he simply unfolded a wing and they all bounced off. He stood at the base of the stage, looking up at her. “You look brilliant, V.”

“Are you going to stare or are you going to get me down, stupid?” She snarled, struggling to unimpale herself.

“Oh, right, yes.” N stepped up and it looked as if he were trying to figure out the best way to approach the situation. Doll took the blades from the fan at the top of the room, held them with what Uzi now realized was a large Solver sign, and the blades sharpened and it rotated faster and faster and Doll sent it straight forwards to cut N in half.

Just before it hit him, without even looking, he raised an arm and caught it. He tossed it aside and continued to muse. Uzi picked up a stray knife from the floor where she stood and flung it at Doll. It stopped and it fell promptly to the floor. Uzi dodged multiple knives and ended up on the stage herself. “I do not care how you do it, just be snappy about it!” V hissed.

“Forgive my placements,” N said, gingerly putting his hands over V’s waist and thigh, sliding her off the poles. He steadied her as she tripped on her thin legs. “Off.” She growled. N snatched his hands back.

A knife spun through the air towards Uzi, and N lifted a hand to stop it, and it stabbed down to the hilt into his palm. He dragged it out and dropped it with mild disinterest.

The doors flew open behind them, and the rest of the drones poured out. One remained though. Khan didn’t move.

“Узи...” Doll said in shock. “ты бы действительно встал на сторону Дронов-убийц? Я не единственный, кто потерял из-за них семью.****”

“Bite me! Whoever started this wants us to fight! I…I might not be dealing with everything alright…but I’m done dealing with it alone.” She glanced at N, either to support her statement or herself.

He gave her a thankful expression, and she turned back to Doll. “We move forward, together, or not at all.” Uzi finished.

“Милый,” Doll said in a piteous manner. “но мне не нужна помощь!”

A fourth pole stabbed through N’s leg, and multiple knives came spinning towards them.

N gripped Uzi’s arm, dragged her closer then tossed her off the stage, his hand forming a weary thumbs-up as he did so. The knives stabbed him and V, slamming them into the wall. Uzi landed with a grunt. She saw Khan run forward but the doors slammed in his face.

Doll sent yet another knife after Uzi, and she did the same that N had done. Gasping, she pulled the knife from her hand.

Doll looked surprised. She raised her hand with the Solver active, it shook and her eyes widened. Doll threw the last knife in her immediate grasp, and Uzi smacked it out of the air with hers. Doll backed away as she advanced.

Backstage, a disembodied arm crawled over to N. “Is this…?”

“Mine!” V barked, snatching it in her teeth.

A box toppled over to their left and Lizzy’s head popped up. “You look like garbage.” She said to V.

“You traitorous scumbag!” V spat around the arm, which fist had curled.

“As if you weren't using me to kill everyone too, miss petty. Where does this freaking go?” Lizzy scoffed, lifting the arm from her jaws. “Over here, Lizzy, thank you!” N waved with his remaining arm. With a pointed smirk at V, Lizzy handed it back to him, making sure the arm was just out of her reach.

A knife struck the soundboard and the music immediately shifted. Doll sent the knife flying at Uzi, she flipped backwards and stopped it with her boot.

With her other foot she scooped the microphone stand and kicked it at her. It froze in front of her, a large sign sprouted from it, which alternated from STOP to APPLYING.

Uzi cackled as she brandished two knives. The microphone stand flew back at her, now doubled, and formed an X over her torso.

Doll crouched and picked up the knives she’d dropped. She raised both hands in the air, then flicked her wrists downwards, an array of knives unfolding like a halo; she shifted them forwards, they darted at her prone form.

A large metal wing shot out and blocked them, as N landed next to her. He held out a hand.

“Quit saving me!” She took it after she bent back the poles. N lifted her up to her feet and spun her around, where they ended up in a dip. In the brief moment they stared at eachother, faces much too close, another knife spun around like a boomerang and N raised a hand that still clutched hers and it landed in between two raised fingers.

“Oh, I do not believe I shall.” He replied smugly, sliding the handle into her palm. Uzi’s mouth fell open and without her permission she let out a high giggle. 

She took the knife and N’s hand converted into a missile launcher. He pulled her closer as she was spun again, and she threw the knife a moment before she landed at his side, their arms around the other’s waists. He shot at Doll as the knife cut through her hair but missed her body.

Her Solver blocked the missile, and it exploded in an orange flash, the sheer force knocking her backwards and onto the floor.

Uzi suddenly became hyper-aware of how close together they were. Her hand was lain on a tear of the fabric of his suit, deep enough that her fingers touched the bare, warm metal of his side. His was at her waist. “Seriously,” She began, breathless, “you’re never allowed to do that again.” N turned his face to her, one of his handsome smiles stretching his face. “Uzi,” He began softly, he glanced up and his eyes widened suddenly, his grin gone “ah! Okay, your round!” He shrieked, tossing her up into the air as a table careened into him head-on.

She turned as Doll sent more tables flying towards her, she kicked off of it and stomped as two more knives came at her. One shot to the floor, the other hit Doll’s wrist, slicing off the bracelet she had worn. Uzi landed with her boot on Doll’s screen, shoving her to the floor. She rolled and landed in a crumpled heap, before struggling to her feet.

“Had enough yet?” Uzi growled. Doll laughed softly, lifting her hand. Suddenly Doll jolted forward, her screen shattered and broke and went dark as she collapsed with a heavy thud. As she collapsed, it was revealed that V had shot her from behind.

The Murder drone blew smoke away from her gun and sashayed forward in a self-satisfied manner.

“V!” Uzi cried. “We needed her for answers!”

“What! She is perfectly…er…” She recoiled, trailing off as she glanced down at the spreading pool of oil.

N landed beside her, clutching his side. He gave the oil a starved look then turned away.

“just a little tuckered out…” She finished with a nervous giggle. “V did that on purpose!” N burst out, stabbing a finger at her face. “She is concealing mystery backstory paraphernalia and being a diva over it!”

“N!” V barked, punching him in the shoulder. “You are terrible!”

“You!” Uzi snapped. Both N and V pointed at each other. “Lucky for you, we’re not done yet!” She held up Doll’s house key.

Oh, what’s this? A well-timed chapter break?//

As Uzi, V, and N entered Doll’s home, the stench was almost unbearable now, at least, compared to before.

Uzi pulled N’s jacket more snugly around her shoulders. (She had gotten cold and he had offered it, and she had—reluctantly, of course—accepted it.)

N glanced around, then flicked on the lights. “Uh-oh.” He said, pressing a fist to his mouth.

“Haha, nice.” V smirked.

The entirety of Doll’s kitchen was covered in corpses, and the floor was bathed in oil.

Uzi noticed that N was actually biting into his fist, drawing out his own.

“Uh-oh indeed, N.” V sang as she swept off to investigate.

“Stop that, you’ve made yourself bleed!” Uzi cried, tearing his hand from his mouth. She looked up at his worried face. He was starting to smoke.

“What’s—why're you so hot?” Uzi pulled his head down to her level and rested her hand over his screen, which was burning up.

"Oh, why thank you—you're not too bad yourself." N replied with a wink.

Uzi froze as many different emotions burst through her. She couldn't tell if he was joking. Well if not, there's that compliment she'd been awaiting. "S-shut up—why are you so warm." Uzi snarled, hoping that anger would cover up how hard she was blushing.

“It might have been a ‘hot’ minute, say, since I last consumed fresh oil, but it would feel so disrespectful—they are her rightful kills. I can be patient.” He stood again, his movements stiff.

“Do not heed him, go on, N, it is not like it shall stand and walk away—the ‘rightful dispatcher’ has been dispatched herself.” V called from another room. “Or do, it is not my matter.”

Uzi gestured loosely to the bodies as she stepped gingerly into the kitchen. N breathed a guilty sigh, then peered around the area.

“Over here, N.” Uzi stared down a large pot sitting on the corner. “Bon appetit, addict.” She muttered to herself as he picked up the pot and dumped it into his mouth.

“Whoo! Like a man!” V cheered sarcastically as she crossed into the room. She leaned heavily on the counter with a grimace as her legs slid on the slick floor. “Oho, and now we wait.” She rested her head on her hand.

N tossed the pot over his shoulder, it was now empty.

“For what?” Uzi asked as N clutched at his stomach.

“Well, when we Disassembly drones consume the normal percentage of oil, our bodies naturally expel the waste, but if we consume in excess, like big man over here just happened to do…ah, there’s the face.”

Uzi turned away just in time to not witness N violently vomit oil into the sink. The oil steamed and hissed as it touched the cold metal. He spat then broke off into a coughing fit.

“Like a man.” V clapped slowly.

“Shut. It.” He hissed between gasping breaths. He stumbled out onto more solid ground where he could regain his composure without fear of falling. V left as well. She glanced at Uzi and as she wasn’t looking—or didn’t think she was—knelt and rubbed his back.

Uzi smirked, then stood in front of another pot full of oil on the stove. She dipped her fingers into it, then stared at it, rubbing her index finger and thumb together.

Why would a Worker have so many bodies in here—or even one at all would be a question! Was she…eating them? Uzi slid deep into her thoughts.

Uzi glanced at her hand again, then the pot. The oil seemed to glow in the harsh lighting. She stared at the some that glittered on her glove…a sudden impulse to try and do the unthinkable exploded into her mind. A ringing faded in as her mouth hung slightly ajar…

N stumbled to his feet and wiped his mouth with a stray cloth handkerchief that lay on the dining room table. He noticed that the other chairs were covered with a thick, canvas sheet. He hesitated, then pulled it away. N gasped as it revealed two fresh corpses. “I…I think I found her folks.”

“They were not even tasty.” V sighed, leaning against the table. “V, you are a different breed of terrible.” N frowned with his fists on his hips.

V giggled. “Yeah, I am not doing alright!” She snatched up one of the many bug-bots scuttling around and popped it into her mouth. She then left and inspected the far rooms.

N turned to see if Uzi was okay. She had stayed quiet the entire time. “Uzi?” He called into the kitchen. Uzi whipped around, pulling her glove from her mouth. She hid it behind her back, then stood in a more relaxed manner. “Y-yeah?” She asked nervously.

N’s brow creased slightly, but thought nothing of it. “You alright?” He asked, leaning on the counter. “Are you?” She came to rest on her side. “I will be.” He gave a small, mirthless laugh. “Sorry about a moment ago, I might have gotten a little overzealous.”

“‘Might’, key word.” She sniped, clambering over the counter instead of walking around. N offered his hand, and Uzi took it, before recoiling with a hiss of pain. He finally noticed the hole in her palm. As she slid over, he gently took her elbow and held up her hand. “Mind if I remove your glove to get a better gander at that?” He asked quietly. “Yeah, go ahead.” She let her hand go limp.

N snapped his gaze over to a far wall, pointing. “What is that over there?” As she turned to stare he quickly yanked it off. She stifled a yelp, curling her other hand into a tight fist. It looked worse than it was, N knew, but it still unsettled him for some reason to see Uzi injured. He hissed air through his teeth. “Ah, shame, it seems as if we shall have to cut the entire thing off.” He tried to joke. Uzi stiffened. “What?”

“Too soon?” He winced.

“I’m still bleeding, and you ask ‘too soon?’, of course, you idiot!” She cried. N retrieved the handkerchief and tied it around Uzi’s hand. “There, that should do it. At least until you can get to a proper doctor.” Uzi nodded shyly. “Thanks, N.”

“My pleasure.” He gave a swift bow.

She sat on the counter for a minute, grimacing as she fiddled with the skirt of her dress.

"Uzi...I ah—sorry for leaving you in the dust at the dance." N tried, tail curling nervously. "I—I went with you not with V, after all."

She blinked at him, obviously surprised. He threw a glance over his shoulder to make sure V was still investigating the far end of the house before continuing. "And then fawning over her in your face was not right of me to do. I apologize for being shoddy."

"You should be." Uzi sniffed, crossing her arms and turning away, only to then shoot him a smile to let him know she was joking. "Bah, I'm used to it." She said off-handedly. 

He knew she was lying but brushed it off. "I will have to make it up to you—perhaps would you like to go on a stroll?"

Uzi quickly shook her head. "I said it's fine."

N withered slightly. He then stood up straight with his hands clasped together in a respectful manner as Uzi inspected Doll’s dead parents.

She found a nametag of some such on the mother, or more what seemed to be an I.D. ‘Yeva, 048’ along with a barcode. “What a way to end the night.” 

“Oh, that was not a proper dance by any means.” N sighed. “Were they even going to perform any actual dances or just jig all by their lonesomes? That was nothing compared to a gala.”

“What do you mean, ‘actual dances’?” Uzi turned with an incredulous expression.

N threw his hands up in the air. “Actual, formal, like the...grand waltz!”

“Waltz? What’s next, the Meander?” Uzi snickered.

“You have not been brought up correctly.” N said bluntly in astonishment. "Come, it is rather simple."

N annotated the steps and Uzi followed.

"The dance was about two hours ago, you two are a bit late." V noted acidly as she came back to the dining room, disdain curling her lip.

"W-well, V, we did not really get the chance to." N said hesitantly, shrinking underneath her glare. Her glare wasn't angry, though...more of just...disappointed?

Behind them, the air warped and glitched, as a drone suddenly appeared there.

She raised her head, oil leaking from the wound on her screen. She raised two fingers, and the bullet was pulled from her visor, it smoothed over and the oil receded back into it. “Как раз к ужину.” She laughed.

The trio whipped around to find Doll standing there. She lowered her thumb and a gunshot cracked.

A moment before the bullet entered her body, Uzi threw her hand out and the bullet stopped, caught by a sign just like Doll’s except it was violet in color. Doll gasped and recoiled as if Uzi had been the one to shoot her instead. “Я... мне жаль тебя…” She whispered. Uzi threw a glance at N to see he had the same reaction, and he stared at her hand as if it were some terrible monster from his childhood nightmares.

The Solver sign disappeared and the bullet lodged itself into the wall. “Если я найду то, что ищу, я помогу и тебе.*****” Doll said, her figure beginning to glitch and fade. V raised her gun. “Bit—oh don’t you dare!” Uzi darted forward and lunged at her, but her arms clasped onto thin air.

Uzi cried out in frustration. “I hate it here!” She screeched to the ceiling, battering the air with her fists. 

Generating chapter break//

Uzi, fuming, led the Disassembly drones back outside the bunker to leave for their lair.

She flinched back as N reached for her. “What do you want?” She snapped. 

His eyebrows twitched in surprise. “Do you not want to retrieve your items before you return to your household?”

Uzi shrugged, remembering the tools and few items she had left in the dropship. “Fine, yeah.”

He crouched down and helped her up onto his back, and then a cold wind slapped her in the face as he took off.

N rose into a warmer current, head turned downwards so his oil-smelling breath didn't choke her out as well.

Uzi's mind was consumed by what had happened in Doll's place. 

How was Doll alive, why does she suddenly have these mega cool, equally creepy Solver powers…and why was N scared of it.

She was so lost in her thoughts she didn't even notice he had landed and was trying to unwrap her arms from around his neck. She let go and dropped a short distance to the snowy ground.

“Will you continue your work repairing the vessel?” N asked, glancing at her over his shoulder.

Uzi thought for a moment, unconsciously watching V as she crawled into said ship. 

“Maybe.” She answered after a few moments to placate him.

N's tail drooped slightly. “Well I suppose we shall be here if you do come back.” He wandered away and peered into the dropship. “Are you finished yet?” 

He was answered promptly by V's dress smacking him in the face.

Uzi shivered as the wind picked up. She herself had changed back into her normal outfit back at Doll's but it was still freezing. 

“You alright?” N came and stood next to her.

Even from where the Disassembly drone was, a welcome heat wafted from his body.

She shuffled closer and tucked her hands under her arms. “I'm fine.” 

He spread a wing and laid it over her shoulders. “Are you ready to go back, then?”

“Yeah, let me get my stuff.” She experimentally raised a hand to drag a box over to her.

Just as the Solver appeared, N batted it away. “Hey, perchance…do…not, use the super creepy possibly genetic definitely cursed Solver powers you just found out about not even a half-hour ago? Please?”

“Why, are you scared?”

He gave her a hard stare, commencing and abandoning multiple answers. “You do not know what that does.”

“And you do?” Uzi shrugged away from the wing and looked him in the eyes. “What vast knowledge can you bestow?”

“Uzi, I just would like for you to be careful. I…I have a bad feeling about it.”

She suddenly had a sneaking suspicion he was not being entirely truthful. “N…is there something I should know?”

In the moment N stood there, facing her, she was suddenly reminded of the danger that radiated from him. His tail lashed slowly, close to the ground.

“Let us just…get you home, okay? It is late, we can speak all about this tomorrow, you must be exhausted.” He took her elbow and began to lead her back outside the Spire. “Your father must be worried sick.”

Uzi flinched. How am I supposed to explain what happened? He watched me fight Doll and then I disappeared. What would he say when I do come back? She pressed closer to N's side. “Yeah…probably.” Not.

They walked in silence for a good ten minutes, before Uzi finally sighed and stopped. “I'm just a bit worried about this maybe having something to do with my mom's weird crazy stuff.” She muttered. “There, you happy?”

“Perhaps there is information about the Solver…” He trailed off, musing.

“Okay, that expression right there is what worries me.” Uzi stabbed a finger in his face. “You start yapping about the Solver and suddenly you're in lala land contemplating all your life decisions.”

N pursed his lips. “I just ah…I might want to see what she was on about.” 

“I'd have to ask my dad, I dunno he protects that stuff with his life.”

“Oh, surely he would allow little old me, genocidal war criminal, to take just an itty-bitty look-see.” He brightened as Uzi barked out a laugh.

And in no time at all, they stood before the great doors of the Colony.

“Well, thanks I guess.” Uzi said quietly, loosening the arm locked around his own. 

“Hey—I said I was walking you home, that means all the way!” He flashed her a smile.

She looked pleasantly surprised. “If you insist.” 

“Oh I do.” He offered his other hand as she balanced on one foot to shake snow out of her boot.

“Remind me why we walked again?”

“The wings get tired, believe it or not. Anyway, walking always clears my head, I thought maybe you would too.”

Uzi flushed, touched by the gesture. She did in fact feel quite sobered. “Bite me.” She mumbled.

“I might.”

N rapped his knuckles on the door to Uzi's home, and when that didn't provoke a response he tried the doorbell.

 “I have a key, numbnuts.” She said after a deafening silence.

“Might you have mentioned that a moment earlier?” He huffed. He perked up as his receptors detected distant clanking, then a moment later recognizable as pounding footsteps.

“D'you hear that?” Uzi asked, just now picking it up as it was getting deafening for him.

He made the outline of a worker before, surprising both of them, was Khan Doorman.

“W-what are you doing here?” The older drone sputtered out between heavy gasps, the question seemingly directed at the both of them.

N's eyes were drawn to the revolver in his hand.

“I could say the same about you?!” Uzi snapped, her eyes hollowed.

“Where did you run off to—I've been looking everywhere—!” Khan seemed to finally register N, jolting and taking a quick step backwards. “And what are you doing with my daughter?”

Uzi's eyes rolled so far up her visor they nearly disappeared into her bangs. “Dad what—”

The Disassembly drone gave her side a small nudge. “Salutations, Mr. Doorman, I have made sure that Uzi has gotten home safe and sound from the…incident at the dance.” N explained, inclining his head slightly.

“Well, thanks I guess, but you can go now, goodbye.” Khan slipped around them and opened the door, snatching Uzi by the wrist and all but throwing her inside.

N tilted his head as the door began to shut. Oh. Okay then.

“What did I tell you?” Khan barked as soon as the door locked. 

“Dad, stop—! It’s my business who I want to hang out with, how about you be glad I have friends at all!” Uzi snapped right back, glaring indignantly from her spot on the floor.

“You want to spend time with the thing that killed your mother!?” Khan's arms flew up in the air, hands clenched so hard his chassis might have either dented or cracked. “Uzi what is wrong with you!?”

Uzi scrambled back as Khan's arms came down at his sides, throwing out a hand almost on some new instinct—the Solver bright and glaring.

Her dad's fury instantly melted into shock then it seemed he went through every stage of grief at once.

“No…….oh no…” Khan dropped to his knees, leaning forward and clasping Uzi's fingers, the violet sign dissipating. He let out a groan. “Oh, your mother was right.”

Uzi's oil ran cold. Khan never talked about her mother.

“Come with me…I think you need to see this.”

Chapter Text

The faint light illuminated a sign covered in ice. It read Camp 98.7.

  The light grew brighter and a bus passed it. It bucked and beeped loudly, before settling where the drone on top of it directed.

Students exited the bus, gazing out at the new surroundings.

They traveled in a line, either by single or double. Uzi followed Thad and Lizzy, her boots almost soundless on the thick snow.

They traveled through the dark forest, until they reached a small circle of buildings. Uzi didn’t care to look around, she was too busy thinking about what her dad had told her before they had left.

“It was after the core collapsed, I didn’t notice the collars.” Khan began, holding up an old, weathered photograph. He also held a choker with a symbol in the middle. A triangle with two trees, a skull inside it.

He led her inside a room, filled with cryptic pictures and notes, some even scribbled on the walls themselves. “She was all ‘build doors against the coming sky demons!’ ‘the singularity awakens!’ ‘look at this cool S I can draw!’”

Uzi took a closer look at one of the images—it was a hastily-scrawled figure with long wings and a tail, with very short hair, and an eerie, gaping grin. It had a startling resemblance to N, and she spotted V and J amongst the mix, along with more that she didn’t recognize. “Turns out, I don’t know how either of you made it.”

The door shut, and Khan rested his hand against the door. “Just…” He held up one of her mom’s chokers—the collar he fit around his wrist, where the sleeve covered it—out to Uzi. “be safe, okay?” She nodded.

Uzi pulled the choker out of her pocket, where it glimmered as light bounced off the rhinestone flowers. She fit it around her neck.

“Uh, teacher, why are we here?” One of her classmates whined snootily. “What is this field trip?”

“Yeah, Uzi’s idea, ask her.” The teacher replied, unfolding a lawn chair with a brisk snap and sat down.

“Who?”

“I’ve sat next to you for years.” Uzi hissed behind him. The line of students all whipped around with a gasp. “Bite me! I asked to go alone! He’s mad at your test scores!”

“No year end bonus, no learning.” The teacher tilted a straw hat over his visor, obviously finished with the conversation.

“So, we’re just unsuperv—” He was cut off as two large drones landed heavily before them. 

They turned slowly, teeth glinting in the moonlight…hands like talons… 

The Disassembly drones stood up with innocent smiles. 

“Salutations, campers! Welcome to Camp 98.7!” N exclaimed, a clipboard in his hand. V stood silently, arms crossed. 

Uzi noticed that they wore matching camp leader outfits, topped with large hats, V’s was around the back of her neck, the cord tied against her throat.  “Let us perform the roll call! One,” — He pointed at V— “two,” — He pointed at himself, then at the campers, waiting for them to call out their numbers.

After a long moment of silence, one of the students crumpled as a bullet shot through his head. Everyone jumped to attention and called out a number at once. 

“That…is everyone!” N exclaimed in a forced cheerful tone. “Minus one .” He whispered furiously behind the clipboard to V.

V blew smoke off her gun innocently.

“We have prepared many wonderful, distracting activities for all of you to enjoy tonight, so no sneaking off to investigate things! ”

Uzi cringed slightly. He had wanted her to wait for him, he was worried about her getting hurt or...something about a loss of control. She squinted at him as he glanced over at her. He raised his brows sternly before returning his gaze to the rest.

“To the bunks!” N called, pointing at some far buildings. He began to march toward them, then stopped as none of the students followed.

Uzi opened her mouth, but Lizzy and Thad spoke over her. 

“Sounds good, N!” Thad stood next to him.

“Anything for my bestie!” Lizzy stooped and snatched the watch of the student who had been shot, then tossed it to V when she came close. She caught it and bumped fists with her.

The remaining campers looked a bit more enthusiastic than before, glancing and murmuring amongst themselves.

“Uh, yeah, they’re kinda like… my friends too. So that’s cool.” Uzi said hesitantly, holding up her thumb. 

They turned and walked right towards N and V, not because they were relieved by Uzi’s statement, but to get away from her.

One of them took N’s hand and she giggled. “You can be our friend, little guy!” Another poked V in the face. “Poor thing’s defective!” He exclaimed. After a few more moments of poking she gripped his wrist and forcibly lowered his hand.

Both N and V glanced over at Uzi, who’s hand was still lifted absent-mindedly in the air. N’s brows lowered in a concerned and sad expression, whilst V smirked. “Nay, simply full of love. ” She sighed as her tail curled into a heart-like shape. “And guess what, ladies? N is a pilot! ” She mentioned breezily, and at once the girls giggled and immediately started fiddling with their hair. 

It was official: Uzi hated her.

N gave V a mildly disgusted glare and took his hand back. “We shall all be best of companions, should you follow the rules!” He replied smoothly.

As Uzi regained herself, she pointed at the larger building in the distance then gave a thumbs-up as he glanced over at her again. His tail lashed once, then he nodded. “Alrighty everybody! Let us head to the bunks! Ready, set, march!”

Uzi made her way to the building, her hands clenched into fists. Nay, all jolly good here! She thought in mild fury. Of course the murderous, genocidal Disassembly drones fit right in with their own prey! 

Again, she had become an outcast. Not even maybe a month and her title of ‘Droneslayer’ had become a joke and had for the most part been forgotten.

She wearily approached the wooden door, using her Solver to retrieve a flashlight from her backpack.

It was locked, but with a violet flash the lock shattered into metal scraps and the door burst open.

She found multiple hardhats, mannequins, and other drone accessories. As she turned to a harsh draft, she found that the back wall had rotted and left a hole tall enough for even N to walk right through without ducking. 

She had broken the lock for nothing. She gave the hole an are you serious? look, then continued on. There was a calendar on the wall, she peered at it then whipped around as a clatter came from the other end of the room. 

As she squinted, it looked like there was someone sitting on a box with their back turned. “Hello?” She called cautiously. As the flashlight flickered, the figure disappeared. Something flew across the room and banged against the wall and she jumped, dropping the flashlight. It’s nothing, just my imagination.

Uzi made her way to the second floor, then to the third, before she heard faint screaming from the frozen lake below. 

She ran to the window to find that the screams were actually ones of excitement, and not of terror. Three canoes pushed along the ice, in a race of some sort. She gazed on, almost sorry to be missing out.

N stood proudly on the prow of his team’s canoe, as his team pushed along using paddles against the slick ice. It was currently neck and neck against team One, team Three flagging last place. This was one of the activities he had been saving for Uzi to participate in, but instead V had stolen the clipboard and insisted they should do those first.

“So,” One of his teammates started after giving her paddle a hardy shove. N looked over his shoulder to see it was miss Rebecca. “my friend wants to know if you killed her family…and are single. ” She rested her chin on her arm.

N flailed for the first question, then settled for answering the second. “Aye, how… direct of her.” He said with an awkward grimace. “I…I uh—”

He was saved as a camper from team One called “Make way for the canoe train!” as they passed. 

They had taken an interesting approach, and the team held the canoe above their heads and carried it. V and miss Lizzy sat smugly atop it, reminiscent of queens upon a litter. “Sabotage, minions!” She hissed gleefully. “Plan X!” The team raised their legs and kicked N’s boat off-course.

“Flea-ridden cheaters!” He raised a fist and shook it. Karma struck and one of the litter-bearers slipped, sending the canoe crashing down. V flared her wings and landed gracefully, holding miss Lizzy by the back of her top, whilst the other two teammates lay groaning underneath. One stood and in a last-ditch effort shoved the canoe at them, turning them sideways.

N tumbled backwards off of the boat, and his team followed.

“No! I can’t swim!” miss Rebecca screamed.

N stood and placed his hand over her shoulder, standing her back up. 

“Oh, thank you!” She cried, taking his hand and stepping off onto the ice.

“That was a close one!” He noted with a quick salute, quickly detaching himself.

Uzi’s gaze refocused on her reflection in the glass. Her Solver activated and it cracked, her image splicing and refracting.

An advisory popped up over her screen, and she pressed a hand to her head as a wave of blazing heat swept through her.

She slung her bag off of her back and unzipped it, and she dug a bottle of coolant out of it. She took a swig and her systems felt as if a hard breeze had flown right through her. Ever since her Solver or whatever it was activated, she’d had sudden hot flashes out of nowhere, and even urges to bite people—and for real this time, not just for her sayings’ sake.

“Tick-tock~!” V’s knowing sing-song wafted down from the ceiling. Uzi whipped around, eyes wide.

The Murder drone dropped down before her, a self-satisfied smirk on her lips.

Uzi kicked her bag aside. “Hey, stupid..idiot. Weren’t you just…?”

“You had convinced N at least that this site would assist us in catching that red-screened Doll freak, so how about more exploring,” —She pointed a claw at Uzi’s throat— “and less watch-from-window creepy.”

She smacked V’s claws aside. “Working on it.” Uzi growled. “Just so glad you two fit right in, super cool — ”

The tip of V’s tail hovered over the middle of her forehead and she froze.

“Better to… keep distant, perhaps?” She asked sweetly. She glanced at the bottle still clutched in her hand. The silence was nearly deafening. 

V took a single step closer, blistering heat wafting from her, just as N had back at Doll’s home. Her rattling became more prominent as the silence weared on. “Since I shall have to dispatch you next?” Her claw returned to Uzi’s head, dragging it over her visor with an awful screech.

V began to walk to the window, raising an arm to bust a hole in it. 

“But what about N—”

V stopped and whipped around, her face taut with an odd expression. "Oh, you will stay away from N, either by your own or by a bullet through your skull." The window fell from its frame as V kicked it. “Keep you guard, Doorman. I might get too starved…and I may not have the greatest league of self-control.” She lifted off with a gust of air.

The scratch on her screen healed itself with a small line of smoke. She curled her left hand. The same night of her Solver awakening it had healed as well, like it had never been stabbed. 

She had jokingly asked N if he had spit on the hankie, he threw his hands up in the air and cursed himself for not thinking of that. 

And since when did V show any signs of acknowledging N, no less threatening her about him?

Uzi breathed a heavy sigh and returned the bottle to her backpack. She lifted it, and a small bug-bot had been crushed underneath it.

“Oof, sorry buddy. I gotcha good.” She lifted her hand and repaired it.

It stood and scuttled around, then faced her. She gave a salute, and it wandered off.

N had told her not to frequently use the Solver, but he wouldn't tell her why, he was acting really suspicious whenever it got brought up.

Finding nothing of use, she went back to the first floor. She spied multiple bug-bots coming out of a hole in the floorboards, and curious, she peeled it back to find…a staircase.

It was a small cellar of some sort, with a body and many papers strewn about the floor.

She picked one up that had a claw of some sort stuck through it, and amongst them were cryptic scrawls and images that looked very familiar to what her mom had drawn.

A bug-bot crawled onto her arm from the last picture she retrieved. She meant to shake it off, but it held on tight and crawled to the other hand. 

A blue sign projected from it, an angry emoticon as the message. A bright blue flash emanated from one of the eyes, and it seemed to scan her face. Another message projected.

Welcome back, 002! How can I help you? (Call elevator.) 

Uzi’s brow creased, then widened. 002 had been the number ID of her mother. She and Uzi definitely shared the most characteristics, but were they really that alike? “Elevator?” She said out loud.

Please place me on the proximity reader (Cabin Fever labs)

“Where is that? What are you?” Somehow it has misheard her and instead what appeared as her question was ‘ Wears his hat. What argue? ’

Invalid response.

Uzi suddenly felt as if someone had breathed down her neck, she whipped around to find nobody there. This place has to be haunted. She thought.

Generating chapter break//

An arrow struck the target with a perfect bullseye, followed by three others that split the ones before it, igniting into flame. “Oh…er, did I… cheat? ” N asked dubiously, lowering the bow.

The campers clapped in astonishment.

“Points gained for skill,” V announced, marking on the clipboard. She leapt down from the roof of the building behind them and tossed it at him, where it bounced off his visor. “But then again redacted for lack of flair. ” She said with a smirk, snatching the bow. “Peep this!” She knocked an arrow, then pointed it at the campers and shot slightly above one of them to where the passing wind rustled their hair. The campers clapped again.

“The targets are this way, V!” He chastized with a grin.

The back of N’s neck prickled, as if someone had brushed it. Thinking it had just been his hair, he scratched it then thought nothing more. After a moment something small hit his head and he turned around, puzzled. A small piece of bark from the trees behind them lay on the snow. He squinted into the treeline, and a pair of violet eyes stared at him from behind one of the conifers.

Uzi held up a hand and waved. She held up a small bug-bot and a message projected from it. Hello :)

He waved. Uzi jumped then tapped furiously on the keybug. She held a finger to her lips. Don’t tell V I’m here!

“Oh, Uzi, come hither! This troop is a team!” He scolded. After realizing what he had just done, N pressed a hand to his head. “Wait—nay! Inclusive reflexes!” He shrilled.

V and the campers stared at him curiously, V’s face hardened as she too spied Uzi. N winced. Something had obviously transpired between them, and that was why Uzi had requested for him not to announce her arrival. 

My mistake. He flashed over his visor. Uzi stood frozen. The bugbot scuttled down her arm and onto her shoulder. Dude. She shot back. “H-hey!” Uzi greeted nervously, coming into full view.

One of the campers had knocked an arrow and was aiming it at the targets. He jumped and turned towards Uzi, his bow following, and his fingers slipped, sending the arrow straight towards her.

As if upon a reflex, Uzi’s violet Absolute Solver activated and the arrow stopped mid-air. She gasped and clutched a hand to her head—N recognized the sign that flashed over her visor as a heat advisory—and her Absolute Solver turned bright yellow.

What looked like oil flooded over the arrow, and it dropped to the ground with a sickening squelch. Something flopped and writhed inside the puddle of excrement. N glanced over at V, who looked blatantly horrified.

“U-uhm, ignore all of this—” Uzi stammered out, backing away with a hand over half of her visor, covering the sign. “Uh, I uh,”

N flinched as smaller hands grasped his arm, one of the campers had pressed close to his side. He stared after Uzi in confusion as she kept stumbling farther and farther into the trees. He heard V unsheathe a blade, but he could not take his eyes off of her. Familiarity struck him, as if it had happened before.

“I live in the woods now!” Uzi screeched suddenly, turning tail and dashing off. N lowered his hands and his tail curled. 

This cannot be.

Uzi ran and slammed into a building far enough away from them. The doors fell off of their hinges but she fixed them right back on and locked them, moving heavy items before it. She slammed the shutters and tore open her backpack; the zipper snapped and flew off its track, landing on the floor.

Uzi’s head throbbed sickeningly as she reached for the bottle. It felt as if someone was driving a spike through the middle of her head, one small pound at a time. The clock on the wall ticked with an aggravating rhythm, and the lights glared much too bright. Her hand lifted and slashed, the lights and the clock shattering. 

As she reached for the last light, the Solver turned red and the same oily substance flooded from it. The Solver stayed upon her hand as it locked in some kind of spasm, tendrils sprouting from the light and covering the room in black.

Generating chapter break//

N’s tractionless feet slid along the snow as V pushed forward, swords ejected from her arms. “V, we cannot harm Uzi!” He repeated sternly. There must be another way.

“We perform our duty, and that creature leaves us to ourselves!” V growled.

“I have no notion of what you are speaking of— because you will not tell me! ” His voice rose to a full-chested shout, as a sword of his own ejected from his arm and knocked V off-course. But I have an idea.

Her eyes widened in shock and surprise and she leaned on a blade for support. The campers behind them were silent in both fear and interest.

“ What are you so afraid of!? ” He continued in a raised voice. I know exactly what. Swallow your pride and let me help. Please.

“I am not afraid. ” V hissed, pointing a blade in his face.

“I am!” He slapped the blade aside, throwing his arms out to either side of him. “Uzi is! Uzi is a child. Like she was. What is wrong with you!?” N’s voice broke on the last sentence. Unadulterated fury burned in the back of his throat as he glared at V who seemed unnerved by the uncharacteristic outburst.

Uzi looked terrified of herself! She needed comfort, not a bloody execution.

V’s silence said it all. He gave a huff then tossed the clipboard at her. “Watch over the campers.” He hissed, spreading his wings and lifting off.

V glared after him, adorning a mask of malice, except on the inside her core churned and beat rabidly in her chest. That thing was dangerous. She could not afford to lose her remaining squadmate over an infected Worker. 

She could not afford to lose N. Not again.

She did not flinch as Lizzy came up beside her. “Hot?” She said curiously. “N-not hot? You’re too good for him—” She tried to backtrack as V replied with a vicious snarl.

She pushed past the shallow good-for-nothing and glared at the rest of them. “Entertain yourselves.” She hissed as she stalked off.

Generating immoral idiots//

The wind howled and shrieked relentlessly through the trees, as two drones made their way to a boarded-up building quite a ways away from the cabins.

“You sure we have to go this far out?” Darren asked Rebecca.

“It’s for the mood, Darren.” She replied curtly, dragging him forward by the wrist. The building came into view, and lightning flashed across the sky, illuminating the shadow over them. “Nice.”

“Oh, yep, I get it now.” Darren forced the door open, trying the light switches. They stayed dark, so he pushed the door open further to let at least some light in so they could actually see.

Something broke and splattered wetly over the floor, it seemed an odd tentacle of some sort had been connected from the wall to the door.

Another thing flew across the room and slammed into the wall, fell to the ground, and rolled towards them. A light flickered feebly, then went dark. 

Darren glanced dubiously over his shoulder at Rebecca.

He picked up the flashlight and slapped it a few times until it turned on. The door slammed shut and Rebecca jumped with a sharp squeal.

Snapping and crunching came from behind them, and they both screamed as large, bat-like wing erupted from the muck. 

A violet screen appeared, displaying a large X, as a drone leapt from the oil.

Generating chapter break//

N landed in front of a tall cabin, ornate and well despite the harsh climate.

His brows lowered with growing concern. He squinted as he detected footprints, and a target wandered up them, then stopped abruptly where the prints ended.

He jogged forward and opened the door. He glanced around at the darkness, though it was not that dim entirely to his enhanced vision. 

“Uzi?” He called softly, over the hissing wind. As he came further into the cabin, a light began to register at his right. He turned to find an office-type set of computers and other dials. A control center. A television was on, the screen was playing the salt and pepper channel.

“Uzi, it is alright, it is just me, V is with your classmates.” He called a final time, losing confidence.

N curiously peered around, stepping up to the control panels. They were very familiar, reminding him of the ones from the dropship. He pressed random keys, just simply enjoying the noise. One of the screens flickered, then went dark. 

He rallied himself and stared at his reflection, trying to remember the latest memory he had dreamt of the day prior.

He remembered that his visor displays were supposed to be white, not the usual golden yellow. N lifted his hat, to where his true eyes glowed in the dark and reflected across the black screen. Those had definitely not been part of his original manufacturing. He had worn a...black hardhat.

Finally N turned to the television that was active. Glancing down, he spied a Video Home System tape, half out of its casing.

It was labeled Zombie Drones.

He cocked a brow and reached out to touch it. Sudden images sped before his optics, too swiftly for him to take in. He recoiled with a gasp, snatching his hands close to his chest. He stared at it with wide eyes. The same thing had happened when he had seen Uzi use her Solver abilities.

It was clue.

Generating chapter break//

The sound of liquid splattering and metal bending filled the room as the drone rabidly tore fistfuls of oil-bathed machinery and forced it past her jaws.

She pressed her hands to her stomach as she vomited up oil that hissed and steamed as it touched the cold floor.

Uzi gagged and coughed, her breath coming in shallow heaves.

She whimpered as she stared at her shaking hands, stained black, then turned her gaze to the untouched bottom half of a drone; there was a trail of fresh oil leading out of the door. 

Her eyes teared up in horror. 

What had she done!

“But their warranty never expired—it never existed!” Brad said mysteriously, as the others held batteries over the open fire. Sam leaned back in his chair, a magnet in his hand. “It’s scary ‘cause it’s like… real. ”

“Aren’t you worried about Darren and Rebecca?” Penny asked timidly. “Shouldn’t they be back from their…?” She parroted from her book “Imoral make-out session by n—” She cut off abruptly in a shrill scream as something reached and took hold of her ankle.

Everyone stood and stared in complete and utter shock and revulsion as Rebecca…or at least… half of Rebecca lay gasping and choking on the ground before them, a long trail of oil leading into the far trees beyond.

“Rebecca!?”

“Who did this to you!?”

“I…don’t…remember… name— ” She cut off as she hacked and coughed up oil. “Super… unpopular… ”

“Descriptive clues, man!”

“Purple…eyes. Hot…topic!” Rebecca gasped as she collapsed on her weak arms. The remaining campers glanced around at each other murmuring amongst themselves and she writhed in agony on the ground.

In the treeline, a drone stood, giggling as she lifted a hand. The fire dissipated with a whoosh and the other drones gasped in the sudden darkness. 

They turned their eyes to the drone that stood with a tail lashing high in the air, a slow animalistic wave.

“Oh… you ?” Brad tried. They all screamed as a sign split his neck in two, trembling as his head and body collapsed to the ground. “Split up!” Sam burst out. 

“I think I read that’s good!” The three remaining drones turned and sprinted in different directions.

Sam ran in a dogged line, glancing over his shoulder. His foot found itself under a tree root, and he was sent flying down the small decline. 

He turned his head to look at where he’d come from, just in time to see a drone with large wings slam into one of the pines. 

A violet light glinted from her head, then she wound her way down the tree in a fast spiral. Sam flipped himself upright and crawled behind his tree. 

Something moved in the corner of his eye and he snapped his head over his shoulder, just to find nothing there. 

Something landed on his head, and he caught it to find that it was a book.

He looked up with a small whimper as giggling erupted above him. “Does it at least have pictures?” He whispered. 

The drone only laughed harder, prowling down the tree, oil dripping from her jaws and onto his screen. “It doesn’t. I checked.” She hissed.

Lizzy’s legs burned as she kept up a steady sprint, only running harder as Sam’s scream blistered through the air. She panted as she stopped, unsure which direction to take.

She glanced over to find another classmate waving frantically to her, though her face was oddly blank. “Oh, thank God! Final Girl!” She said, referencing the book that the girl had been reading earlier.

Final Girl stopped waving, and suddenly her head wrenched to the side as it was torn from her neck. Lizzy skidded to a stop, as the drone behind the now-dead one stood and flared necrotic, bat-like wings, an odd sign dominating her visor.

“Uhm, clashing? ” Lizzy noted dubiously. A sign like the one that had decapitated Brad appeared around her throat, lifting her up a few feet off the ground.

Lizzy struggled as the drone scuttled toward her on all fours. She leapt over and log and off of a tree, leaping at her, and despite herself she screamed.

Generating cliffhanger//

N flew low, close enough to where his wings brushed the tips of the pines for the occasional propelling flap.

The sight of a drone against a tree caught his eye, and he circled and landed.

"Now now, what are we doing so far away from the rest of the...campers..." He fell silent as he realized that the drone was dead, his chest torn open and oil spattering the snow and surrounding trees. 

N had some choice words for V whenever he got back.

Frowning, he studied the body. The kill was very sloppy, more of half-executed and left to bleed out, unlike V's pattern where she only stopped tearing and mutilating when the body was hardly recognizable as a drone.

It was as if something had just begun...like a first—like a first kill.

He spied boot prints, and his memory unit matched them with Uzi's. His oil ran cold.

He had to find her this instant.

Generating conclusion//

V landed in front of Lizzy, a wing spread to block the rabid Uzi.

Her visor glitched from the Absolute Solver to a pair of normal eyes, which were wide and frightened. She pushed with her wing and sliced with her claws, tearing off an arm and half a wing. “Killing her, not saving you.” She spat as Lizzy fell to the ground.

“M’kay, mom. ” Lizzy shot back as she rested her head on the ground.

Her claws shifted for a sword.

“V, please,” Uzi begged, her voice a deep sob. "I- I-"

“New host, same horrors…right, Cyn?” She snarled as she stalked forward.

“I don’t know who that is—” She reached a hand towards her, fingers regenerating off of her palm. “C-can you get N? Can I talk to N please?”

“Tch!” V raised her blade, within arm’s reach of the infected Worker. “I shall make sure you cannot!”

Uzi growled and a tail slithered from the shadows, opening like a mouth, and bit onto her arm at the elbow. 

It snapped shut and threw her backwards, tearing off her arm. Uzi stood and stumbled from the underbrush, stomping on the blade and sending the tip shooting towards her. V batted it out of the air with her other and backed away, tail lashing, as Uzi jumped up and crushed her against a tree.

She snatched the blade and sent it spinning towards V’s head. She pointed a gun in her face, but it penetrated head and her body went stiff. The gun was set off-course and the missile fell to the ground next to Lizzy.

The missile exploded, sending her flying after she struck a pose with a bored “Ugh!” Uzi threw V again and stabbed her arm with the blade, holding her in place. V tried to stab her with her tail, but Uzi’s own bit down and snapped off the stinger. It fell into her hand where she raised it, prepared to drive it straight into V’s visor. Her eyes widened.

Uzi was suddenly lifted off of her. “Whoops! Easy there, buddy.” N said cheerfully, holding her up with an arm. The rabid drone spun and shoved the stinger towards his head, but he lifted a hand and it stuck his palm instead. “Haha, ow . Up we go!”  He turned and threw her up in the air, where she continued to rise even after she cleared the treetops.

 N plucked the stinger from his hand and tossed it to the ground. He stuck his hand in his mouth. “What have I spoken to you upon antagonizing her? Did I not warn you?” He chastised around it.

“Ugh! You always take her side!” V spat, crossing her arms.

“Mm.” He replied with disinterest, eyes up in the sky. “That should be enough air-time for our friend there.” He murmured as if to himself, spreading his wings and lifting off.

V bit the blade stuck in her hand and pulled on it, spitting it out. “ Your friend.” She muttered.

Uzi continued to yell as she reached the clouds, passing them, then falling right back through. A few moments later another figure followed, circling slowly before drifting down himself.

She panicked and flapped her wings wildly, trying to fly. She flipped herself upright and spread them out, drastically decreasing her falling speed. 

She took deep breaths.

A shadow fell over her face and she turned to find N falling next to her. “Uzi,” He began softly, a clipboard in his hand and his legs crossed. “Would you care to speak upon what has happened?” His face was heavily concerned.

“No!” She barked, folding her wings over herself. “Don’t look at me! I-I’m gross a-and eating people—”

“I know. We shall figure that bit out upon a later date.” N’s claws curled around the outer edge of her wings, gently forcing them open after a moment of peaceful  silence. “Though you are aware that is not what I mean.”

Uzi hugged herself tightly, turning her face away. “Y-you’re not going to… leave… me, right?” She asked thickly through tears.

 “Uzi…”

“Nevermind! It’s stupid!” She snapped, spinning and folding her wings around herself even tighter. 

N sighed. “Y’know, before we became acquainted…frightening experiences were…well… actually frightening, and well, tonight too, because you were not by my side to make it… fun somehow.”

Uzi slowly opened her wings to look at him. He brightened hopefully. “I…I had forgotten what that felt like.” 

She opened them wider, a hand over the outer finger. “Y-you really...you…missed me?” She asked, voice quavering.

“Uzi, of course I missed you.” He held out his hands, and after a moment, she hesitantly took them, her fingers just barely brushing his. He reached forwards and locked arms with her. They gazed at each other for a moment that seemed to last an eternity. Their tails intertwined like vines and he extended his wings so they could brush against hers. 

N glanced down and smiled with just a hint of mischief. “But we shall stick together!” He said in a silly accent, holding her tail and puppeteering it.

She giggled, snatching it back. “Don’t friggin touch it!” She batted his hand away. Uzi thought for a moment, then moved it by herself. “Yes, my voice is more like—”

They had reached the ground, landing with a thud that shook the trees.

At the edge of the snow that glittered in the moonlight, V stood with blades at the ready.

N straightened his legs from the protective crouch he had landed in, Uzi held in his arms. He set her down and lowered himself onto one knee, holding Uzi’s hands. His grasp was firm yet gentle enough for her to pull away if she wanted to.

“The accent was a bad idea anyway.” She muttered, letting her hands stay in his. “N? I’m…sorry.”

“Eh, not as if you had slayed anyone!” He chuckled.

Her hands shook. “N-no, I definitely— ”

“Aye,” He squeezed and rubbed his thumbs against the top of them. “I was kidding. How about we just avoid a whole other Spire, alright?” He stayed quiet as she still looked unconvinced.

“Okay.” She said finally.

N let go and held his arms wide open. “Baby steps. Together?”

Uzi nodded and embraced him, burying her face in his shoulder. For the first time in a while she felt...safe. Protected. “Thank you.” She whispered, desperately holding back sobs. “I- I—”

“Hush, I am here for you, buddy.” Uzi kept her arms wrapped around him as he stood up, and he held her tight to his chest. “I promise.”

V stood with weak knees, undisguised envy and fury on her face. Her tail lashed briskly and she threw her arms to her sides, the blades switching for hands instead. What have I done? It is far too late. I messed up, I messed up. Panic erupted in the back of her mind. If only he knew what he was doing. She jolted as Lizzy dragged herself up next to her. “Ew.” She sighed.

“Do not patronize me.” V snarled.

“What! I think it's gross all by myself. Lord you’re such a diva lately.” She scoffed, flipping her ponytail.

V did her best to glare as Lizzy raised her brows at her, but could not help but give a small self-satisfied smile as she turned away. 

She glanced sorrowfully at N and Uzi as they still embraced each other. 

N began to rock her softly after a few moments, and she faintly heard him humming along to what sounded like a nursery rhyme. 

As he finally started walking back towards the cabins, she met him stride for stride.

N glanced at her and lifted a brow.

V nodded at Uzi.

She is sorry. Flashed over his visor.

She opened her mouth to ask why she could not have told her that herself, but he shook his head, and a Z appeared. The purple thing had fallen asleep on him.

Worn herself out, aye? She frowned.

Busy night, scary stuff. N replied with an audible and weary sigh.

Whatever. V stomped off, tail curling in a fit of spite.

Generating chapter break//

The drone sitting on top of the bus lashed the whips and it beeped and jolted to life.

Inside the remaining drones sat on the seats, either sleeping or fidgeting with an item. 

“So,” The Worker’s teacher began calmly. “missing some campers?” He tapped the clipboard. V glanced at Lizzy, who sat next to her, and then back at N and Uzi, who were nearly cuddling in their row.

“Aye, I get hungry, stupid.” She curled her claws over the edge of the seat.

“No name-calling, young lady, just a question.” He turned and tilted the hat over his visor. “Sit down in the seats while the bus is in motion, please.”

 V did as told and crossed her arms, tapping a claw against her shoulder.

N rested his head on Uzi’s, eyes closed and hovering on the edge of sleep. Dawn broke the horizon and orange light shone through the windows.

Uzi whimpered as the sunlight crawled over her hand, and he reached over and moved it back into the shade. Her fingers closed around his, and he gave it a gentle squeeze before pulling away.

The Video Home System tape lay next to him on the seat, and his brows lowered as he stared at it. The tape was a problem for tomorrow.

N gazed down at Uzi ruefully. There were two different outcomes to this one.

He hoped for the better, for knew he did not have the strength for what would have to happen otherwise.

History always repeats itself, does it not?

I will make up for it, I cannot not let it happen again.

I will not let it happen again.

Chapter Text

N twirled a pen in his fingers, leaning back in the chair. He was trying to make the most of the brief ten-minute breaks he was allotted every hour, yet his mind was drawing a blank for his current project. Tessa had implored her father to give her “pet” drones a small room for themselves, so in the small closet lounge he found himself most days. His exoskeleton crawled at the term “pet”. Honestly salt in an open wound, as V had agreed. They had separate shifts or else N would be with her instead. He sighed at the longing to be in the library, curled up next to her with a good book, her head rested on his shoulder, lulled by the sound of her voice… N jumped as the lounge door opened, and a small, hunched maid wandered in. “Oh, hail, CYN.” N greeted, quickly sweeping many papers strewn over the desk into a neat stack and sliding them into a drawer. “Salutations.” She tilted her head at his frenzy to hide what he was doing, his attempt to sound casual in terrible execution. “Curious stare.” “Are you in need of me, kiddo?” N turned the chair to give her his full attention. “What have you been working on?” CYN asked directly, earning a brief start from him. “Nothing that concerns you, to cut it short…just…writing.” He shrugged. “Writing what?” “I…er—oh, what is that over there?” He cut himself off abruptly, raising a hand and catching an insect drone in a white sign; he dragged it over to CYN and dropped it in her hands, distracting the much younger drone. “Delighted giggle.” She smiled. “Charming critter.” N returned to the desk with a relieved sigh, closing an open book. Drone studies: physics and anatomy. He dug a paper out of the desk, staring at it with his brows drawn low in a frown. It was a diagram of a drone, yet much taller with wings and a tail—built that way, unlike the fleshy, necrotic appendages that he and CYN shared. As an afterthought he had added an arsenal on each of the arms, akin to a disassembly machine. “Interesting.” CYN noted over his shoulder. “Disassembly drones.” She murmured, her voice sounding almost normal for once. N crumpled the paper and tossed it into the small rubbish bin. “It is of unimportant matters.” He sighed. “Simply my imagination ran wild.” CYN locked her unnerving yellow eyes on him, a flicker of some emotion behind the blank stare. “You have a lovely idea. Why waste it?”

N jolted as something brushed his arm, yanked out of his thoughts. “What's so interesting about the floor, huh?” Uzi gave him an odd look, standing over him with her arms crossed. “Earth to N, you've been sitting here for like, twenty minutes.”

He found himself in an unfamiliar hallway, between two sets of lockers.

“Just…thinking.” He shook his head briskly, reaching up to fix the hat that wasn't there. He glanced down at his attire, the shirt and pants thin and uncomfortable. He wasn't cold but it didn't retain his natural warmth the way he was used to with his uniform.

“Contemplating the end of the world? You look disturbed.” She offered a hand and he took it, letting her hoist him up to his feet.

“Oh, even I have no idea.” He picked at his jeans, avoiding her eyes. “Hey, since when are you checking up on me—that is my job!”

“None of your business!" She frowned irritably, then her expression lifted merrily. "Excited for your first day of school, big guy?” Uzi added a bit snidely, elbowing his side as she locked arms with him. “Fixing to learn two plus two today, a real head scratcher!”

“Oh, quiet.” N huffed. “This was your idea anyway.”

“Thad begged me, you know, he's on the football team and he'd kill me if he couldn't get the chance to recruit you before tryouts end.”

“Football?” He paused. “Not soccer, you dumb Brit.”

“Oh, thank you.” N brushed off the insult, allowing her to lead him towards the classroom.

//Generating chapter break

Uzi stood with her back against the wall, waiting rather than face the current wave of students.

“There are so many of you in one place!” N murmured in what seemed like awe. “V would have already gotten herself expelled before the first class was over I am quite confident.” He added, earning a chuckle.

Finally the flow began to slacken, and an ecstatic shout erupted from the other end of the hallway. “Hey! Zi, you brought the trophy man!” Thad crowed, pumping his fists in the air.

Lizzy trailed behind him, then followed by…Doll, who promptly muttered something that didn't sound pretty and swept off once she laid eyes on N. “Oh, don't be a stranger, you only tried to kill us!” Uzi called after her, voice dripping with venom.

“Trophy man?” N echoed, loosely pointing at himself, face halfway between a grimace and a smile.

“Oho yeah.” Thad smirked, punching his arm. “Geez you are solid!” He exclaimed, reaching out to feel N's wide chest.

“No thank you.” N quickly batted Thad's hands away. “No touching.”

The Worker pouted up at him for a moment before rolling his eyes, letting out an aggrieved sigh. “You're no fun.” He sniffed.

Lizzy glanced up from her phone. “Finally you don't look like a war criminal.”

N glanced to Uzi for support. He had met them a few times already but he was bewildered.

Perhaps I had gotten comfortable with being beaten senseless by my comrades when the mood struck instead of actual positive interaction.

“Lay off him.” She hissed. “He is a war criminal and that's super macho so stick that up your nose and smoke it.”

“What nose, idiot?” Lizzy snapped back. “Did your mom drop you on your head when you were booted up?”

Uzi clenched her fists. “Don't you dare—”

“Hey now,” N interjected, wedging himself between them. “Lizzy, don't, that is not…” Oh, how am I supposed to just nonchalantly say “Hey, Lizzy, how about we don't bring up mothers that are dead because of me?”

“Hey Thad real quick I need a word.” Uzi blurted, she grabbed his shoulder and drug him just out of earshot.

“If he isn't with me he's with you, got it?” Uzi hissed. “Do what you must keep the cheerleaders off him.”

Thad nodded, giving her a thumbs up. “Heh, stand back and watch my handiwork, Zi.” He turned back and strutted towards the Disassembly drone, hands on his hips. “Alright boss man, let's get you up and running, huh?”

Uzi shook her head. “Have fun.” She smirked at N's unenthusiastic wave.

She turned to go in the other direction, nearly colliding with Lizzy, who's hand was held out as if to tap her shoulder.

“Oh what do you want with me, huh?”

“I…don't want anything, Doll does though.” Lizzy looked a little nervous, pocketing her phone for once.

Uzi squinted. “What, is she ready for round two?”

The blonde frowned. “No. She has something to show you.”

“Yeah, a few dozen knives and a real nice heartfelt apology.” Uzi muttered darkly.

She gave her a shove, and Uzi reeled up to retaliate until she realized Lizzy was giggling.

“Wow, you're actually funny, goth.”

She paused for a very long moment, haze flickering over the lower part of her visor. “Bite me.” She hissed.

Lizzy led her to a dark classroom, opening the door and waving her inside.

Uzi peered in, glancing around. The lights flickered on, revealing Doll sitting on a desk in the middle, a few old-looking books beside her. She slipped off the desk and padded forwards, stopping only about maybe a wing's length from her.

“So?” Uzi snapped. “What do you want?”

“поговорить.” Doll stated simply. She waved a hand towards the desk. “Есть много чего обсудить.” The purple Worker's gaze drifted between the red and the books before hesitantly stepping last the doorway in which Lizzy shut the door.

“Like what?”

“хорошо,” Doll thought for a moment, taking Uzi by the hand and walking to the desk. She snatched her hand away, crossing her arms.

“Can you explain it in English, I'm getting annoyed having to read subtitles.”

The red drone gave her an incredulous look, pausing for a moment. “Fine, if it gets you to listen.”

“It does.” Uzi pulled up another chair to lean on it. “What is that, your granddaddy's fanfiction?”

Doll glared at her as she took her seat. “These are my mother's journals.” She sighed, holding one of the three up. “My mother's name was Yeva,”—She glanced up as if waiting for a reaction, when finding none, she set it down and opened it up to one of the bookmarks—“she came from the same place yours did. Cabin Fever Labs.”

Uzi gently brushed her choker. She was reminded of the bracelet she had taken from Doll. She reached into her pocket and rubbed her thumb against the charm. “Is that so?”

“Yes. My mother spoke very highly of her. Nori. They were…very close.” Uzi cocked a brow. “If you’re about to drop the fact that we’re sisters I’m leaving.”

“No, of course not. Eugh. Our mothers I believe were the siblings in question here.” Doll closed the journal and turned it to face Uzi. “I want you to borrow this and read it. It has information that you may find interesting.” She kept a firm hand on it as Uzi reached to pick it up. “You can trust me. If you ever need…advice…on this sickness you can come to me.” She said fervently.

Uzi huffed, tugging the book toward her and stuffing it in her backpack. “If.” She hissed. “If you don't try to kill me off so you don't have a worthy opponent.”

Doll frowned. “I gave you your chance to join me, now graciously a second. And my offer comes with one condition. Ditch the murderers.”

Uzi paused. “Murderers, aye?”

“Yes.”

They stared at each other for a long few moments.

What does she think she's asking? Ditch the murderers?

“If I do that, I won't be able to let you help me. I won't be able to help myself.” She hissed.

Her newfound cousin stiffened.

“It's just a tad hypocritical isn't it?”

“I only killed what I needed to survive. Most of the mess is left over from my mother.”

“Oh, tell that to Kelsie and the rest of the prom court.” Doll stood up swiftly, her chair flying into the wall behind her. “You are being friendly with the creatures that took my parents from me! Your mother from you!” She nearly screamed.

She closed her eyes, running a hand down her visor.

The silence grew on until Uzi finally sighed. “I will...fine…listen, tomorrow, I will come to your place, but,”

Doll brightened then dimmed, folding her hands.

“I will be bringing N with me.” Since he’s so adamant about the mom lore I dunno.

The Russian growled, crossing her arms. “As long as it's not the other one then fine. But if he looks at me wrong you both won't be walking out of there alive.”

“Noted. When we beat the snot out of you again maybe third time's the charm.” Uzi sneered, sweeping out with a loud stomping gait.

But her feet weren't loud enough to catch the bare whisper behind her.

“Maybe.”

“—and that's all you need to know about football.” Thad finished with a winded breath.

N blinked slowly, only remembering the last half of his entire speech. “Thank you, I am now very well-informed.” He nodded sagely.

“Awesome.” The Worker bumped shoulders with him. (Or rather, attempted to, for his shoulder reached just over N's elbow.)

They continued their trek to the gymnasium in relative silence, save for the occasional hiss or faint groan from the Disassembly drone.

“Why're you staring at the floor, dude?” Thad asked as they walked past yet another hoard of girls wearing nothing but very low-cut crop tops and skirts that barely reached the bottom of their thighs.

“What fathers are allowing their daughters to dress like that?!” N whispered furiously, jerking a thumb behind him in the vague direction of the ones they’d passed. “I have had to disengage my opticals because of it, I am purely functioning on echolocation right now.”

Thad chucked. “I know, it's amazing isn't it—?” He was cut off as N slammed him against the row of lockers with a single arm.

“You disgust me.” He growled.

The Worker raised his hands, palms out. “M-my fault,” His voice was still confident but it didn't hide the notable quiver, or the fact his knees were shaking.

N pulled away, staring down at him almost balefully. “My apologies, temper got the best of me.”

“H-happens to the best of us.” He let out a non-committal noise and coiled his tail inwards just in case it ‘accidentally’ attempted to strike Thad.

More silence, now grown past the point of awkwardness.

“You have great aim for uh…no sight. And like…super strong so you'll be able to get that ball really far.”

N spared him a glance.

“Man, is it just me or everytime I look at you, somehow you get even scarier.”

Scary?

He tried to fix his face, but he found his frown only deepening.

“Oh, I know what it is, you're absolutely surrounded by food and you can’t have any of it.” Thad smirked. “Which you won't, right? This isn't another prom coup?”

“Nay, if I were to, I would not plan in secret. If I needed oil we would not be speaking.”

“Riiiiiiight.”

“I am much more reserved than my comrades, you needn't worry about your safety.”

“Heh, speaking of comrades…is that lady friend of yours single or is she taken?”

“What?”

“The other one. The one Doll beat up with the poles. She's pretty smokin’ hot, dude. She got a man?”

“V?” N asked in astonishment. “You really think— huh?” He was surprised by a stir of something almost jealous in his chest. “Yes. Yes she is taken.” He lied.

“By you or…?”

“No, I am not currently in a relationship.” I think.

“Heh, I can help fix that.”

“Ohhhh, no thank you, I am just fine on my own.”

Thad crossed his arms. “You were really with two of the baddest chicks I've ever laid eyes on and you never took the risk. I don't know whether to be impressed or disappointed.”

“You can have what is left of J, I suppose.”

Thad let out a cackle. “Nah, I'm good, all yours dude.”

“I do not wish to have that either! What a nightmare!” N shuddered. “She managed to have her head up JcJhenson's rear, her foot in her mouth, and her nose in me and V's business all at once—she must be a witch!”

“Dang.” Thad whistled. “Wasn't she a real piece of work.”

“You are telling me!”

“Oho, here we are dude.” Thad pointed at some double doors down the hallway a few feet from them. “N, once you walk through that doorway there is no going back. Are you ready?” All merriment from his voice was gone, now replaced with steely seriousness.

“I love doing anything!” N grinned.

“My man.” They bumped fists and entered the gym.

A few others were already in there, tossing an oblong ball to each other. Thad called out to them and they all jogged over, then stopped as they stared at N.

“Dude? That's a Murder drone…?”

“He's chill, don't worry.” Thad waved a hand, interjecting before N could correct him with ‘Disassembly drone’. “So guys, this is N, and I scored him for the team.”

The Worker all but dragged him forwards by the collar of his shirt. The three stared up at him.

The taller one squinted his red eyes and nodded slightly. “You’re the one hanging out with the Doorman freak, ain’t ya?”

N straightened his back. “I remain in the company of Uzi Doorman, yes.”

“Well then, I'm Chad, this is Leon and that's Benson. The other guys couldn't make it and we're ‘missing’ Sam, Darren and Braidon.” He frowned.

The Disassembler’s tail drooped. He and V agreed that they would take the blame for Uzi's Solver-induced massacre, and it was shockingly not by his proposition for once. “I sincerely apologize for my actions. I vow I will not take a life from this outpost again.” He turned his face away and simply waited to see if they accepted his apology. He had stayed up all day coming up with it.

“Meh, don't beat yourself up about it, JcJenson are some real pricks.” N jumped as Chad threw the ball hard into his chest. “Let's see what you got then, huh?”

His tail wagged with the pleasant surprise. Thad nudged him. “And would you look at that, one of us in no time!”

One of the guys! He thought with delight. No hormonal teenage women or one that wants to kill me!

For some reason.

Heh.