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Ever since their second battle against Gabriel, V1 had noticed a new sensation clawing at them from…somewhere. They recalled having this feeling during both of their altercations with V2, staring it down with a nameless yet roaring fire behind their visual processor as it bowed or cracked its knuckles just before combat. Finding all the more joy in bringing it down after its small performances. That’s what they were, performances of some sort. Mimicry of a dead human race, acted out for reasons they could not and cared not to fathom.
They had felt this sensation during their clashes with Gabriel too, as it tore both blood and satisfaction from his body in between lethal attacks and insults that left it confused. Not due to their content, as the machine knew when it was being insulted. But rather because of the time those venomous comments granted them to ravage their foe with ease and glee.
V1 had even felt a mote of this fervor with several of its less personal foes. Each time a Malicious Face, Swordsmachine, Virtue, or anything crossing their path grew red with rage, V1 would fight with that barely-there feeling of something missing propelling them with vigor.
Initially, they had attributed this to a mere instinct for collecting blood. Programmed into them to give it the urge to find fuel when necessary. Nothing more, nothing less. But upon further inspection, as it lay quietly under the night “sky” of Limbo with Gabriel, they reasoned that this may not be the case.
Even with all 4 of the machine’s arms wrapped around him from behind, Gabriel still managed to be such an animated speaker. The way his voice rose and fell as he spoke of himself and others. The gestures he would make with his arms in spite of the challenge that two pairs of arms around him brought. With speech or not, it still left V1 burning with that feeling. Burning. That’s one way of putting it. Truly peculiar, as once he had finally finished his monologue to settle wordlessly into V1’s arms, this bug. This worm. Had caused the machine’s fans to turn on without a single thought about them.
Whatever this was, it had begun influencing it’s systems without known input. It needed to be identified and dealt with. Fast.
But where to begin? They knew this pathogen only made itself known when certain adversaries were present. Gabriel being one of them. However, he was no longer considered an imminent threat. And yet V1 was still experiencing this. Was it something dependent on him? What was it about him that was causing it this time? They needed to investigate.
They slowly drew an arm across the front of the angel’s armor, scanning for anything of potential importance as their head slowly upon one of Gabriel’s shoulders. Although they had seen Gabriel without their armor on several occasions since he had elected to follow them through Hell, they had noticed that his armor would often stay on.
Fair, given that the occasional Streetcleaner or Cyborg still remained in this place, presenting a small danger. At least small in comparison to V1, should it register a movement or touch faster than it could recognize Gabriel as its cause. Just the thought of them being the reason caused a twinge of pride to resonate somewhere in V1’s systems.
Yet in spite of the potential threat they posed, Gabriel made no effort to move himself from the robot’s grasp, to V1’s surprise. In fact, his form had become uncharacteristically…rigid. And silent.
They slowly turned their head to look up at Gabriel without startling him, and found that the side of his armor’s stark white helm had taken on a faint shade of pink, appearing almost purple against the deep blue light of the sky. And that after a brief pause between the two, he cast a passing glance back at them, only to turn away with a more vivid purple hue adorning his helm.
Which had quickly led to V1’s fans volume filling the sudden silence. Even if it’s wandering hand had only made it to gap between the top and bottom half of Gabriel’s armor, it must be of some relevance if it caused that reaction in him, and in them by extension.
“…Machine. What are you doing?”
It appears Gabriel had taken notice. They needed to act fast.
They quickly pressed a curious finger into the angel’s waist. A last ditch effort at a silent investigation to find something. Anything resembling a clue to explain its absurd condition. V1 had expected for Gabriel to quickly take up arms for a fight. To grow unreasonably undignified and prepare for a petty squabble that the two had come to enjoy. The two would grow tired, and the feeling wriggling within V1 would dissipate.
What it had not expected, was for Gabriel to double over and let out some strange noise it had never heard him make before. A quick yelp, devoid of content, coming from a helm which had only grown deeper in its light purple hue.
It pressed the finger in a second time, probing the flesh with a small wiggle. Gabriel tried to hunch further into himself, straining against the machine’s tightening hug, and let out a noise that V1 managed to recognize.
A giggle.
This was quite odd, as the machine had heard him laugh before, but not like this. His laughter was usually reserved for conversation, or for when the angel had grown manic with lust for battle. This laughter was different. Quieter, and more reserved. Almost as if he was trying to stifle it.
Their curiosity piqued and fans growing louder, V1 began to dig a second finger into Gabriel’s side, eliciting a small whine that quickly dissolved into more giggles that escaped repression. All the while, Gabriel would occasionally gasp the occasional “Machine” or “wait” from behind one hand covering the front of his helmet as the other weakly shoved against their fingers.
It was truly an odd sight for V1 to behold. An angel who had the strength, history, and pride to back up his threats to tear it limb from mechanical limb. Now reduced to a softly giggling heap in its arms that couldn’t even muster that supposedly infinite strength to push two fingers away. Even his struggling felt subdued, no more than some sudden jerks here or there, interspersed with more restrained wiggling. And certainly not with enough force to release Gabriel from their embrace.
The absurdity of the whole ordeal had almost been enough to distract the machine from their investigation. But every time it focused on a new reaction from Gabriel, that only made that wretched burning grow hotter. It could barely hear him laughing, as its fans blew just as loud, if not louder, than any noise that Gabriel made. If they still had their voice box, V1 felt like they could scream with frustration.
Frustration? Was that the feeling that had ensnared them? They had felt it before, but not like this. This new emotion had a sort of emptiness that accompanied the spark of flame making their blood boil.
But it could not deny that to be part of it. Witnessing Gabriel try and fail to hold in his reactions truly was a sight to behold. But V1 couldn’t help but silently ask him a litany of questions it knew he could not answer.
“Why are you stifling yourself?”
“You were built to do more than this, but why don’t you?”
“Don’t you know how nice it would feel to stop holding yourself back?”
“Don’t you know how much I would like to do what you don’t allow yourself to?”
As its processors drew that last question into its mind, V1’s whole hand quickly dug into Gabriel’s waist, causing three separate things to occur.
The first was that it caused Gabriel to lose what little composure he still had. Letting out a shriek that tumbled into loud, uninterrupted laughter. Louder than V1 had ever heard it before, loud enough to make their fans shrink to a gentle hum by comparison.
The second was that this had also been enough to summon Gabriel’s wings and halo, shining in their bright blue and golden accented glory. Behind Gabriel. Which V1 only noticed once one wing had managed to knock itself into the machine’s head during Gabriel’s invigorated struggle. Releasing Gabriel from their grasp, and bringing V1’s head to the ground.
The third thing, however, happened to V1. It was not as physical as a sudden outcry of unsubdued mirth, or a sudden conjuring of ethereal body parts. Rather, it was a dawning realization.
Envy.
That was what they had been feeling.
Envy for every bit of laughter.
Envy for every outcry of rage.
Envy for every twitch of a muscle not designed to fill some greater purpose.
Envy to fill a hunger for life and living of it that blood alone could not subside.
It laid there on the “ground” of Limbo, unmoving and silent. The emptiness that had taken up residence inside it compounding further and further, until it felt as though the endless ocean of Wrath had taken up residence within them. As if nothing would wrest them from the bottom of that infernal sea, leaving them to drown in their sorrow.
That was until they felt a sharp impact to their visual sensor, quickly bringing them up from their stupor out of reflex. They saw Gabriel standing beside them. His armor bathed in a deep purple and yellow only granted by that same night “sky”. Wings still aglow with their sky blue tinged and accented with golden yellow. Gauntlets shaking on the hilts of Splendor and Justice, all but dying to unsheathe them and bring about the carnage they were made for.
V1 couldn’t even focus on what new insults Gabriel was spitting at them for all of Hell to hear. The deep and dark ocean nested within them chest quickly draining itself, leaving only that familiar desire to hunt and feed. It drew their beloved Marksman from their winged arsenal, and from there it was all a blur.
A blur of metal clashing against metal. Sword clashing with steel and bullet clashing with armor. A blur of running from the personification of once-divine fury, with glee pulling every step as rage pursued close behind with matching levity. A blur of hurled insults which bounced off of V1 like nothing but the vestiges of calming wind, each venomous comment like a gentle breeze.
Lost in a haze of blood draining from bullet wounds like nectar, and electricity coursing through their system as if it was adrenaline, V1 had no room to dwell on anything but the ecstasy of combat. Their feet gliding on the ground as if they carried themselves, they could feel every atom of air flying past their outstretched wings and dashed towards the angel. The feeling of their fist colliding with his chest and sending the two of them hurtling towards the ground, like a wave of euphoria washing over them.
As V1 gazed upon their combatant, sullied with blood and dirt from their battle and illuminated by the illusion of a rising sun, they found their fans purring once more. The feeling accompanying them less a heavy onus of jealousy and rage weighing them down, but instead a calm swelling of joy.
It drew one hand to Gabriel’s, still holding onto Splendor as if for dear life, and rested it upon his. It did not know why it did such a thing. It was not out of investigation or any other motive. But perhaps it was just enough to feel his form alongside theirs. As the fluorescent light cast over them both.