Author's Note: Hello I'm TheSilentOwl, and this is my attempt to make the second half of Darling in the Franxx better. I'm not the greatest at writing Fanfiction, as my skill relies more on original writing with original characters.

For the sake of context and understanding the general idea of this story is to implement an actual rebellion between Hiro and the rest of APE. In this timeline VIRM does not exist, and the war is purely between the Klaxosaurs and the Humans.

The story also aims to answer some things in better ways, such as the effect of Yellow Blood Cells,The Saurification process, magma energy and how it works.

One last disclaimer: I'm not Olcon, who, in my honest opinion, is way better at this whole fanfiction thing. I simply wanted to take a different aspect on the whole plot in general. I haven't read everything out of his work (Mastermind in the Franxx) but any similarities are purely coincidental.

This story is going to be rated M for some obvious reasons, but for the most part will be kept in similar line with the provided style of the original work. So that means some serious innuendo at times, maybe even a Freudian slip.

Hiro didn't forget much. Life in Squad 13, at Misteltein, had always been enough, he had always felt content despite the fact that life had become a repetitive boring cycle of fighting, eating, and sleeping. Perhaps he didn't forget much because there was never anything truly memorable. He never expected to be angry at the powers that be, or their decisions. Their decisions which turned him from a person, to a mere pawn in a war. Being a mere tool wasn't a revelation he expected to have, it was his life, he just accepted it as it had been presented to him. His happiness came in the form of piloting the Franxx, being useful was good enough. It hadn't ever occurred to him that something dear to him had been erased, something so invaluable that he almost couldn't bear to think of it. It was a change in a life so standard that he found himself, like in that memory, clawing for every foothold towards it. It was the kind of thirst he expected to never have; it was certainly a thought he never expected to cross his mind as the cockpit of Strelizia darkened as the HUD and all of its accompanying instruments and flashing lights dimming faintly to their "standby mode." Zero Two straightened out of her normally assumed position, tears streaming down her cheeks, as she stared at her hands in horror.

"Wha- what have I done?" she mumbled as she continued to stare at the white palms of her gloves.

"Get away from him you bitch!" a voice pierced through, which Hiro recognized as the sound of an infuriated Ichigo.

It was an odd series of events, Strelizia collapsed to the ground, and to Hiro it sounded like something important had been ripped free. His vision faded slightly, and he was just able to make Zero Two's anguished face out in the ever darkening cockpit.

"Zero Two… I remember, the book… everything."

"Da-darling," she scrambled over to him, the sound of his voice seemingly having snapped her out of her state of shock, "I'm so sorry, I- I didn't mean to, I-I... " She stopped mid sentence, panic and anxiety washing over as she instinctively brought her finger up to her face, nervously biting it as she only had remembered doing once before. Hiro's body fell limp against hers and she whispered in his ear after a moment, "please don't let me go, not again."

Goro stood awkwardly as his partner, Ichigo angrily yanked at the manual release handle for Strelizia's cockpit. Or rather, he stood awkwardly as Ichigo angrily struggled to turn the large military grade lever that, in all probability, was the least maintained thing on any of the FranXX. All of this not being helped by the fact that her arm hung limply at her side, her shoulder bizarrely poking through in an unnatural positon. He sighed as he gently nudged Ichigo aside, being careful not to touch the bad shoulder, and heaved on the handle, the sound of several metal tumblers moving in a cacophonous manner, the various clunking and clicking reverberating around the inside of Strelizia's head, drowning out the faint murmurings of conversation he could hear before. Ichigo, not hesitating for a moment, barged inside pulling a catatonic Zero Two off of Hiro, yelping in pain as she threw every ounce of strength into separating the two. Goro caught Zero Two as she stumbled backwards, tears still streaming down her cheeks. He looked perplexed at the two in their given states, Hiro and Zero Two seemed almost inseparable. "What the hell happened?" he mumbled to himself as Ichigo frantically called out to Strelizia's comms systems, "Chlorophytum get help!"

Hiro awoke to the peering eyes of Zorome, Miku, Goro, Ikuno, Futoshi, Kokoro, and Mitsuru staring down at him in varying states of concern. Everything on him hurt, from his head to his toes, he was enveloped in a dull throbbing pain. He figured that he was on some sort of painkiller, as he couldn't really think straight past the pain and the one other presiding thought in his head; Zero Two. They needed to talk, about everything, every crucial detail.

"He's awake Ichigo," Miku's voice, despite all apparent efforts, still managing to cut through the silence with its inherent high pitch.

Hiro stirred a small amount, only now realizing that a mask had been placed over his face to ensure that he lived. He began to pull it off his face as Zorome, never knowing when to keep it down loudly stated, "Hiro's awake! See told you he would be okay, you all had nothing to worry about!"

As Hiro breathed in the stale air of the infirmary interior the memories came rushing back, no longer inhibited by the painkillers he had been breathing in just a second ago. The red skinned girl with the horns, the book, all of it. As Ichigo ran over he realized what he had experienced when he first met Zero Two, it was a word he had lost meaning to with the memory, it was love.
"Hiro," Ichigo said worriedly as she peered over the side of the bed much the same way as everyone else, "a-are you okay?"

"I feel fine," said Hiro as he strained to sit up stretching as he did so, "where's Zero Two?"

"We…" started Ichigo, "we decided that it would be best if you two didn't see each other for a little bit."

"I need to see her."

"You don't need to see her," said Ichigo, a small hint of a frown creeping on her face, "you need us, not her."

"Ichigo, it's important to both of us," Hiro shot back, "that's not for you to decide, and I know it was you that decided it."

"Nana and Hachi said that this last encounter started something in your body called Saurification," Ichigo blurted out, earning a slightly frustrated look from Mitsuru. Obviously that was a snippet of information that was supposed to be kept under wraps. "Do you wanna be like her? Like a monster?"
"She isn't a monster."

"She tried to kill you!"

"It was an accident, a misunderstanding," Hiro raised his voice.

"Was this a misunderstanding?!" Ichigo shrieked, pointing to her arm which lay limply in a sling, "she hurts so many people, you aren't the only one."

Hiro began getting out of the infirmary bed, deciding that it would be a better use of his time to simply ignore Ichigo and go directly to Zero Two, as he yanked the IV out of his wrist he struggled against the now increasing pain to pull himself up and over the sideboards of the bed, "if you want to be angry at her, fine; but you don't know what I know."

"I know she tried to kill you," said Ichigo, "she's a threat to everyone around her, she kills people with a sense of normality that isn't human."

It was an accident, an event that was for the most part mainly out of their control. Dr. Franxx had erased their memories, degrading both of them to a level far below human. It made him angry, frustrated. The feelings he evoked during those memories were the only genuine moments of happiness he could ever say he had felt. It was a happiness so real that it made his life look like a lie. Hiro had been robbed of that, given a sad excuse as a replacement. Hiro dove over the edge of the bed, landing on his hands and knees. He stood up, wobbly on both legs before choosing his words carefully, "I don't care anymore; people telling me what to do, you trying to control me… no I'm talking to her."

"Hiro we care," Ichigo began, "just lis-."

"If you truly care," Hiro spat, "then let me see her."

"Leave him alone," said Mitsuru as he yawned, seemingly quite bored of the whole situation, "if he wants to die a stupid, meaningless death, then let him… I've already experienced first hand what that creep can do."

"She isn't a creep," Hiro replied, "I'm pretty sure you knew what you were getting into."

Ichigo started to reach out to Hiro's shoulder, but Goro stopped her, allowing Hiro to limp out of the infirmary room. "It isn't your fight, Ichigo…" he said calmly.

"But she's not even one of us," said Ichigo, "I don't see Ikuno or Miku with horns sprouting from their heads."

"She's been fighting with us for months," Futoshi piped up through a half eaten mouthful of bread, "I like her on the team."

Miku nodded at this, "I really don't mind her, those two are kinda cute."

"Not to mention that it would be terrible to see the two apart," Kokoro mumbled.

"Don't you all care about Hiro?" asked Ichigo, turning the atmosphere in the infirmary room into a confrontation more heated than before.

"We do," Ikuno shrugged, "which is why we're letting him go."

Zero Two pressed her back into the door; she hated herself now more than ever. Hiro was her Darling. Her Darling which she had promised to be with. "How could I do something so stupid?" she thought to herself. She reached up and gently touched her horns, the ends of them jabbing back into her fingers as a further reminder of what she was pretending to be. She had broken the mirror, when she realized she had started reverting to what she sought to escape. Now she hated herself for doing so, it was her only gift from him, her Darling, and she had smashed it. Tears began rolling down her face again as she buried her head into her knees.

Hiro stumbled to the door, he knew the one. As he struggled to compose himself, through the wheezing of his own breathing, he could hear Zero Two weeping inside. He had made it, she hadn't run off anywhere. He didn't bother to knock, simply opting to stand there and speak through the door. "Zero Two," he began, his voice hoarsely calling out, bouncing off the silent walls of the dormitory attic, "I used to live to pilot, to be free of this place."

Zero Two's head jerked up, Hiro was right behind her; her Darling hadn't forsaken her. She couldn't move, she was afraid; in that moment in time, the only place she could find sanctity was in her room, with her gift. The gift that she now cherished so much more.

"I don't think I really know what living is," Hiro continued as he leaned on the wall across from the door. He was tired, the short walk up from Misteltien's infirmary to the dorm was exhausting. At the same time he wasn't going to quit, but just sit down for a second to regain what little strength his now severely worn down body could muster. "I really don't think I know what life would be without you, so could you please come out."

Zero Two shakily reached up, grabbing the door handle as a small handhold to hoist herself up. He was out there, separated only by this over-glorified plank of wood. She needed to get to him, a need that couldn't be stopped by anyone.

"I'd sacrifice everything for you, including my humanity."

The door slammed open, revealing Zero Two with her face messed up, tears flowing freely from her eyes as she immediately dove down to her Darling.

"You don't hate me?" she sobbed into his shoulder.

"I understand everything now," Hiro said softly as he felt her tears soak into the infirmary shirt he was wearing; he took some time to stroke the long locks of soft pink hair that splayed out around her before speaking once more, "I get why you want to be human… and I know what they did to you."

"Finding you was the only thing that kept me going," she said, "I thought you weren't him, but you will always be my Darling."

Afterword: I know this was a short chapter being only about 2k in words. I still have a lot on my mind on where I want the story to go but it will simply be a longer run than the anime. Which I hope is a good thing. If you enjoyed everything thus far and think it looks promising in the long run consider supporting my : TheSilentOwl

See you next time!