I received a couple of questions about my liberties with the canon story, specifically how endings C and D show androids alive and well despite my story implying they all died in some cataclysmic event. To that I'd say that it doesn't much matter why the androids are all dead- it could be because of some cataclysmic event brought on by the sudden downing of the network, YoRHa, et al, all at once. It could have short circuited every android on the planet and they all died. Or, the story could simply take place long after the last conscious android died off. You can come up with your own reason if you like, the first one is what I thought of but if that's not satisfactory then it's in your hands. I think the story doesn't need that kind of justification to exist. It's all a what-if anyway.

I've got a feeling no small number of people won't like this story anymore after this chapter. Darker, yet darker, my friends and readers. As usual, please leave a review and let me know what you think.


Return to Ash

Chapter 2: The Eternal Cycle

"Oh, not in cruelty, not in wrath,

The Reaper came today.

An angel visited this green earth,

and took the flowers away." - Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

()()()()()()()()()()()()()()

For a few days after A2's departure, neither 2B nor 9S spoke much. Perhaps they were paying their respects to her, or maybe they didn't have much to say. Like limp dolls, they just sat wherever their bodies fell and were silent.

9S took it much harder than 2B did. His voice, when they did speak, was lifeless and curt. She knew he still hadn't forgiven himself for his rage. Now that A2 was gone, though, she hoped he would be able to start the healing process. God, would it be slow, though.

"Why did she leave?" He would ask. Of course, she had no answer, but she wished she could offer him the support he needed. All she could do was hold him, stroke his hair, whisper that A2 was better off alone.

They sat in relative silence, just observing their surroundings. Weeks passed by and the pair just aimlessly let them. There was no point in stressing about the passage of time when it was simply infinite. The sun went down, came up, and repeated.

Though their conversation was lacking, their minds remained alive. 2B allowed 9S to poke and prod inside her as he pleased, exploring every facet of her. She wished she'd been built with hacking capabilities so she could return the favor. He made her twitch, writhe, forget about the problems that were now running ceaselessly through both of their heads.

But eventually he'd seen basically everything the was to see. He'd explored her memories and found that neither of them really wanted to relive them. He'd made her feel like a goddess. He'd taken apart every piece of her to find out exactly what made her tick. And yet, they were still no closer to true happiness.

They spoke of this matter. When they questioned what exactly they wanted, neither of them knew. They had nothing to want anymore. Not that their wishes had been fulfilled, just that the world was empty enough that it didn't matter what they wanted. Most of such things no longer existed.

Both could tell that the other was bothered by this revelation, but neither spoke of it. They simply sat in serenity and continued to enjoy one another's company for what it was worth. But a tiny sensation at the back of 2B's mind told her that this feeling couldn't last. She loved 9S, more than anything she could think of... but she didn't want to live forever. She suspected he didn't either.

Forever suddenly seemed like a very long time.

()()()()()()()()()()()()()()

It wasn't enough.

The Earth fought and fought, it fought till its last bitter breath. The first time the scourge had come, it tried hard to keep as many of its inhabitants from succumbing to the curse as it could. But forces of an extraterrestrial nature- extradimensional, even -were at work. It could do nothing but sit there and turn, watching them all die one by one. By one, by one, by one. Until there were zero.

White dust clouded the air. A horrible fog rolled over the planet's surface and clouded the atmosphere to the point where the poor blue orb was completely choked. So choked in fact that it rolled to a stop right there in the sky and did not move until it could once again feel the air around it.

This was millennia ago- before the machines. Before the alien race. Before the oil and sparks and foreign flesh there was human death en masse. They'd all been gone for longer than any machine had been alive. A plague that threatened to destroy the entire world and almost succeeded rolled over and over and did not stop... until one day, mysteriously, it did.

But somewhere it still lurked. Deep within the bowels, within the tiny splinters that made up its surface. Vestiges of the curse were rising up now, freed by the splitting of the ground as plates shifted. The Earth, for all its glee, was too eager. It moved too quickly and too freely to stomp out the last of the disease.

And now, as gray gas seeped up out of craters forming like pores in the planet's surface, it was rising again. This time, there was no hero to try and interfere.

He'd tried, those thousands of years ago, for all that he was worth. And it just wasn't enough.

"Atmospheric pressure is changing," 9S said, his voice concerned. "Something's happening under the surface."

2B was far away.

"Hey. Hey, 2B, are you listening?"

She shook her head softly, blinking a few times. "Sorry, what was that?"

He brought up a display screen to show her. "Some kind of gas is coming out of holes deep in the Earth. Seems it's been there for thousands of years, and the atmosphere is changing because of it."

"Strange," she replied with a furrowed brow. "What does that mean exactly?"

9S shook his head. "I'm not sure yet. We'll have to analyze some of the particles to find out what they are, but I have no data on an event like this so we might not get an answer."

"Hmm."

He stood, offering her his hand. She took it eagerly. "Let's go check out one of the fissures, maybe it's just pockets of natural gas being released."

"Maybe," she said. But she noticed with some concern that his voice was wavering slightly. Uneven. He didn't believe his own words.

()()()()()()()()()()()()()()

What they saw shocked them. One of the fissures, a mile or so long and several yards wide, sat open like a gaping maw. Peering over the edge, 9S saw the sheer cliff face gradually shift into darkness far below. His distance readouts told him he was peering miles underground, so far he couldn't scan the bottom, far enough to conceal anything from those wandering the surface.

An ashen mist floated out of the hole like thick smoke, like a fire burned deep within the Earth and it was now being released. As if hell itself had driven a shovel up and up until it hit fresh air. A low groan, an awful rumbling somewhere deep in the hole shook the surface like a tiny earthquake as tectonic plates shifted and shuddered.

What frightened them most, however, was the surrounding area.

"What... are those?" 2B asked, examining the piles of soot sitting in large circles around the edge of the pit. She crouched and rubbed some of the dust between two fingers, just as A2 had so very long ago. It was an off-white color, unlike the dark gray mist, and felt like grains of sand. She crushed a grain between her fingertips and it splintered into tiny, shining particles.

9S squinted at his analysis of one of the piles, his expression hard to judge. "What..?" He said breathily.

She came to his side. "What is it?"

"These are... mammals." He said plainly, gesturing to the piles of white sand. "Or at least, they used to be. These piles contain traces of organic matter. A moose, a couple rats, a squirrel. Now they're... sodium chloride."

"Salt? Why?"

"I have no idea." 9S muttered sadly. "We're fine, though. It's a toxin, whatever this ash is, but it won't affect us."

2B looked at the dead trees and grass surrounding the canyon, some leaning over the edge like they were ready to be swallowed up. Sacrificed to some heathen demon down at the bottom of the pit. Over the next few days they monitored the hole. It did not get any wider, but the ash began to fill the sky, tint it an ugly yellow color. 9S suggested that the dead Earth, unmoving in any way for thousands of years, had concealed the gas imperceptibly below its surface. When it returned to life, the gas was released, and now it seemed to be accidentally killing itself all over again.

Every day they returned, more salt lined the hole, and one afternoon 2B was startled by a frightened scream from 9S.

She came running, sprinting as fast as her legs could take her. For a moment, she imagined being greeted by just another pile of salt wearing his blindfold and shuddered. He was backed up against one of the dead trees, pointing feverishly at the hole. He looked like he had just seen a ghost.

There, sitting amongst the swirling ash, was a rodent of some kind and a pile of freshly settling salt. The creature sniffed the lump of chloride, confused as to where its partner had just gone. It ignored the two androids as it walked around the clearing aimlessly for a moment, as if drunk. Then it stopped, stood stock-still...

And with a light sifting sound, it suddenly vaporized into its own cloud of salt as if by magic. And now 2B was screaming too.

()()()()()()()()()()()()()()

For months, they lived in fear of the gas. 9S' analysis of what it was ended with failure as existing research had been around longer than the knowledge database, and thus was not digitized. Having no idea what it was, where it came from, or how it turned organic creatures into such shining pillars of crystal, they made the choice to flee.

A looming gray haze clouded the horizon every time they moved, waiting several weeks for it to catch up before traveling further away before it could catch them. It was as if they were being actively pursued, though in actuality they suspected it was simply filling the atmosphere and they happened to be in the way. With chagrin, they knew inside that it would eventually surround them on their little island and they would have nowhere further to run from it. Whatever happened after that, they were at its mercy.

When that day finally came it was at least a year later, closer to two. They'd been forced inland long ago and now found themselves surrounded on all sides. The two of them climbed to the top of a tall peak to escape the mist, perhaps rise above it, but it followed them up and up until it completely eclipsed the top like a miasma full of swarming locusts.

"What's going to happen now?" 2B said, sitting on a jagged cliff edge. They stood in a dank cave halfway up the mountain, peering down at the pitch blackness below. Dark, pregnant clouds loomed in all directions, billowing slowly across the lower surface.

9S voice was completely drained, hoarse almost. "It's going to swallow the surface. All of the life down there is going to die. Plants, animals, all of it."

"But not us." 2B interjected. Her voice trembled.

"No," he grimaced, "not us." The plant life would turn into ash just like the scourge itself, the animals to yet more eternal foamy pillars of salt. When it finished ravaging whatever was left down on the surface, inside the fog, only massive deposits of grit and ever-decaying buildings would remain.

"We can't give up," 9S whispered meekly.

"Never." 2B responded.

()()()()()()()()()()()()()()

Several more months passed before they were willing to make the journey back down to the surface. From their small mountain range, they watched every day as the fog churned and churned. It did its horrible work on the Earth, once more choking the life right out of it as it did long ago. It squeezed and squeezed, the fog lowering down and settling into motionless ash.

When they reached ground level, it was almost as if they had stepped into a desert. The egg-yolk yellow sky cast a haze on the black sand, glittering like coal in the mid-morning sunlight. 9S read their elevation as only slightly higher than before, with the dunes only burying the true surface by a few feet at best. Empty, barkless husks of trees clung tightly to their branches, poking out of the ash at random like gravestones.

Machine corpses dotted the landscape here and there, sticking up out of the sand as Emil's bulbous form once did a lifetime ago. The weight of their metal had caused the ash to settle around them over the months, push them up nearly to the surface. Their spherical heads stared lifelessly upward, bodies ranging from completely buried and small to sticking up like statues extending futilely toward the sky.

"It's all gone..." 9S said, staring off into the empty horizon. There were no more far-off forests, only very faint outlines of human structures still standing amongst the haze in the distance.

2B's footsteps were wobbly as she climbed to the top of the nearest rolling hill, standing unsteadily atop it to get a better look. 9S did not join her for several minutes.

When he reached her side once more, he repeated his earlier utterance. "It's... all gone."

"It is."

"We're all that's left."

"We are."

"What do we do now..?"

2B choked on a sob.

()()()()()()()()()()()()()()

After some time, their determination returned anew. This world was dying and there was nothing they could do to stop it- both of them knew that very well. Or perhaps it already was dead, the deed finished. They still could not cross the ocean, though now it foamed and churned with more choppy, salty waters.

Daylight seemed to get longer again, nights once more becoming a rarity. The ugly and cloudless haze followed them everywhere. It was eerie in a way, like they were trapped in another dimension where sunlight lived untainted by the atmosphere of Earth. Where its searing rays could reach the ground level with ease and just burned the whole thing to a single floating cinder.

They sat on a couple of dead stumps, shaking and brushing black sand out of their clothes.

"I wonder if the humans wanted to live forever." 9S pondered. "Do you think they knew about their impending demise?"

"It's possible." 2B replied.

"I can't imagine something so terrible..." He poked the sand aimlessly with one finger, drawing absent-minded circles in the warm ground. "...as not knowing, I mean."

She sighed. "Can't you?" There was a little bit of hurt buried in 2B's voice.

9S smiled then. A sad, grim smile. "Well, alright, I guess I do know how that feels."

"I know what you mean, though. I'd prefer a slow death to a fast one, I think." 2B figured she may as well be honest with him. He deserved that much.

But he didn't seem to grasp the concept. "How come? Wouldn't you want it to be over as quick as possible?"

"No." She said.

He 'tsk'ed. "I know, 'no', but why?"

2B shrugged. "I'm not sure. It's just how I feel."

They were quiet for a moment, both staring at the ground with frustrated expressions. Perhaps for different reasons.

9S spoke again. "I dunno. I think a fast death would be better. Less suffering, you know?"

"But if it's slower, you have more time to come to terms with it."

"That's fair, yeah." He nodded.

She sighed. "I think... the reason I feel that way is because of you."

"Oh... It's just that, I don't know if it's possible to come to terms with something like death." From his perspective, the idea was unfeasible. Most people, most creatures only died once. He had more insight.

"I guess we'll never know." She replied, and that was the end of the conversation. They said nothing until they'd finished shaking the sand out of their boots, stood, and decided what direction they wanted to head in next.

()()()()()()()()()()()()()()

They both felt the strain as the sand weighed down their ankles. Sometimes it piled so high, so loosely, as to come to their calves. They'd never know what a human would've felt like wandering through a desert, parched, overheated, unseen by society for days... but in this newfound wasteland, they felt they could sympathize. Tensions grew higher as the pair realized they had run out of things to see, and to say. Their love for each other knew no bounds and they'd suffered so much for it, but it was becoming pointedly harder for 2B to come into 9S' embrace at night.

They laid beside each other, staring up at the murky sky and missing those stars they'd grown so used to seeing. 9S' hands were locked behind his head, 2B's on her stomach. They missed when they held each others' hands tight, when they sat body to body instead of shoulder to shoulder. Yet, neither of them could say so for reasons they didn't understand.

"Wish we could still count the stars." He said, his voice a bit cracked from wandering the dunes all day without rest.

"Me too," 2B said in a subdued voice. "At least it'd give us something to do."

9S turned his head in her direction. "If you wanted, we could... you know..." It had been a long while, after all.

A dry snort left her nose.

"No, really." He was facing her with his body too now, his expression playful. "I could interface with your pleasure center just like we used to. I haven't lost my touch, y'know."

"Looking for permission?" She let her eyes flutter closed and listened to his embarrassed stammering. It felt almost as if it were the first day they'd woken up together. Just herself, 9S, and A2 in a wide open but empty world.

He swallowed his words and started over. "Consent, really, but yes. We can still feel good this way. We need it."

She nodded once though she had little faith it would help. "Alright." She turned to face him as well, one hand idly running down the front of her body in a gentle stroking motion. 9S closed his own eyes to avoid distractions and began his hack.

He was surprised to find that 2B's mind was still like an open book. No barriers, nothing to prevent him from probing around in places he probably shouldn't. He supposed that with no more enemy machines to counter-hack her, there was no reason to have such obstacles anymore. A small pain crossed his own mind when he delved for her pleasure center and found it at critically low levels- were it a physical object it'd be covered in dust and cobwebs.

He felt something, then. A nudging sensation, almost, if it could be described that way. His mind raced as he tried to figure out what was happening, but before he could use what little remained of his own consciousness to try and assemble the thought, he was yanked again. It was so real it almost felt physical. His mind, this data, he felt her pulling him. Pulling him deeper, deeper inside of her. Deeper than he wanted to go. Led through systems and processes by her guiding hand, he did not stop her as some strange something within her subconscious brought him to a destination.

"This is..." He examined 2B's central nervous system carefully, eyeing every little thing that made her tick. Every subdued emotion, every tiny bit of chugging machinery to make her unique. To make her... her. He felt another tug as he was brought along like a ragdoll through her mind, walls and barriers granting access like he'd said 'open sesame'.

2B's influence brought him deep into her pleasure center, and when he spied one neglected, practically insignificant number, he knew what she wanted him to do.

In the real world, outside of their heads, 2B was whimpering. Her body rippled with a deep shudder. Being hacked, she couldn't move, but her thoughts were alive. Telling 9S what she wanted. What she needed. He felt his throat choke up then as he could nearly hear her voice, practically machine-like. Robotic. Monotone.

"Happy. Happy. Happy."

Over and over it repeated in his ears, a ceaseless plea. He tried to pull back, to exit her core and her brain and go back to his own body, but he couldn't. His exit route was closed. 2B's robotic begging continued in his ears, ringing louder and louder as he drew closer to changing her emotional state. Closer to cranking her happiness up as high as it could go, as high as she needed or wanted. Anything to stop this hurting.

"Okay." 9S said, his voice cracked. "Okay!" But the chorus didn't stop.

"Love. Love. Love."

Inside he knew this was wrong. He knew it wasn't really her saying these things. It was what she wanted, but it wasn't how she wanted to get it. It couldn't have been. But for her to ask this of him, some part of her was aware that 'real' happiness was just too hard to come by now. He hated himself for justifying what he was about to do- he hated that he felt he had to justify it. But with resignation, he adjusted the value and watched her expression change.

"Higher." The real 2B said, taking in shallow breaths.

9S grunted in response, already uncomfortable with the level it was at. He'd have to jack it up even more for her to start feeling it after so long. 2B's emotional core was different than any other he'd seen- it was so tiny, so abused, that it needed a major boost for anything to even slightly affect her.

"Higher. Higher!" She whimpered, her pained expression beginning to give way to something akin to amusement. Not quite arousal, but closer. "Higher!"

As he notched it up further, poured pleasure directly into her brain like powder to a concrete mixer, she began to... smile. It was a sweet smile, one he hadn't seen in years now. He bit his lower lip to keep it from trembling as she sighed in contentment, that rush of adrenaline and endorphins creeping into her sorry form. Her breathing grew shallower still, more erratic.

He continued to climb to further levels of ecstasy, losing himself in her grin; it was so genuine, so affectionate. He felt the warm sinking of his heart in his chest as she seemed to thank him with her expression. It was all artificial, it was all just fake, but it still felt so very real. But something was wrong. Horribly wrong.

He exhaled like he'd been punched when she began to giggle. Her lips parted and she shuddered on the sand, arms weakly twithing as if attempting to politely cover her mouth. Immediately 9S knew what was happening, her nervous system was going berserk at the sudden increase in pleasure. It was just too much for her, but he couldn't stop it now. He felt her guiding hand continue to crank the value up even past where it sat.

As her cute chuckling gave way to full on laughter, she was writhing now on the ground, her extremities kicking and bucking as deep and throaty laughs left her frail form. Doubled over now, she laughed and laughed hoarsely like her lungs were going to burst. Tears welled up in her eyes and 9S watched with silent horror as she began sobbing, almost cackling in his face.

As she screamed and screamed, he spotted his window and darted for the exit, fleeing her mind like it was about to crush and kill him. He returned to his own body and scrambled away from her, putting a little distance between them. She looked possessed, like a demon, as her entire body flexed and tensed, thrusting and squirming like she was trying to escape her skin. But she looked so pained, so horribly pained. Her laughter was fake but her crying was real. He could tell, he'd seen both. It hurt him so much to look at.

Free to move again, she pounded and kicked at the sand like a child, sending dust clouds scattering into the air around them. She turned onto her stomach and buried her face in the dirt, smiling like a madwoman but no longer laughing, just weeping into herself. Slowly, cautiously, he approached her again, scooting back over to her side. When he turned her back over, the smile had vanished. He took her tiny wrists in his hands and pulled her closer, so that they were face to face once more, and did not flinch as she wailed loudly.

He let go of her hands and wrapped his arms around her, grabbing her tight and shaking like a leaf. She too was trembling, her own grip on him very weak and clingy. She placed her forehead on his just like they used to what felt like an entire lifetime ago and felt only sorrow.

When she tired of screaming into his face, she ducked down and laid her head on his neck. Yet, she still continued to whimper. "It's okay," he murmured into her hair. "It'll be okay. We won't do that again." When she had become still enough, he delved into her mind once more and found it completely open. No barriers, no rerouting. It was a single pure strip of light leading from his entry point to her emotional core. He brought her emotional state back down to the critically low level it was at before this nightmare and made his leave.

And yet, they continued to sob for several more hours.

()()()()()()()()()()()()()()

She seemed so very delicate after that. When they both regained the capacity for speech, the first thing she did was apologize for forcing him to do it. He refused to accept, citing that he could have stopped at any time and made a mistake. They both knew it was a lie, but he was so desperate to make her feel better. So desperate to return her to the 2B she once was in their glory days.

How sad, he considered, that a short period of rest after years-long wars and the end of the world could be considered 'glory days'.

They were standing on the edge of a tall, crumbling building. Below them a dust storm raged on; they'd come up to this vantage to escape it. Occasionally the wind would pick up and the sand would begin to swirl, kicking up more of the miasma as if it still had a purpose. 2B's posture was hunched, defeated and weak. Had 9S not been entertaining her company for several years now, he could have assumed she'd always been that way.

"You don't need to keep saying you're sorry." 9S repeated for what felt like the millionth time. "It's okay."

2B shook her head. "I need to admit responsibility for it. It happened, and it's over."

"Yes, you're right," 9S affirmed, "but you can't keep blaming yourself. You couldn't stop."

"I didn't want to stop."

He fiddled with one of the buttons on his coat, trying to lawyer his way into getting her to accept his own apology. "Exactly. Then why get upset about it?"

"I used you." She said.

"I wanted to BE used. That was the whole point of making you feel better." A hint of frustration lined his tone of voice.

"That doesn't make it okay that I did so." She said, with an air of finality that told him he wasn't going to get anywhere. Even through all the hurt, through all they'd endured, 2B was still stubborn and decisive at heart. At least they had that.

What upset him the most about it was the fact she wasn't apologizing for the outcome. She didn't need to say she was sorry for that either, but it pained him more that she felt bad about taking advantage of him above all else. They stood and watched the billowing clouds below, neither of them willing to argue the point any further. Both 2B and 9S were well aware that the other would never concede, and so to them it was no longer worth discussing. Ironic, it seemed, that it hurt them both exactly as much for exactly the same reasons.

"How long until we keep moving?" 2B asked, breaking the silence.

Leaning over the edge to analyze the movement of the storm, 9S pursed his lips. "I'm not sure. It could be a couple more hours."

"Okay." She said flatly.

Another silent moment passed.

"9S..." She sighed. "Regardless of what we've done and seen..." She trailed off.

"If you're about to say you're sorry again, please don't."

"No." 2B almost smiled. "I was going to say that no matter what we've been through, even if we die here, I'm glad I got to spend this time with you."

He cocked his head. She knew something he didn't, and it bothered him. "2B, what's this all about?"

She ignored him, staring off into the murky horizon. "Thank you. Thank you for this."

He clenched his fists anxiously. "2B, you're scaring me. Tell me what's going on."

She was looking down now. He followed her gaze down to her shoes, where she stood beside a small pile of debris. The sandstorm whirled below, and for the first time 9S noticed a nearly imperceptible rumbling somewhere far underneath them. The sand was shifting.

"I think this is it." 2B whispered, her voice inaudible over the groan of concrete and twisted steel. This time she did smile, turning over her shoulder to glance over his concerned expression. It was that genuine, soft grin from before, unmarred by meddling with her mind. She looked ethereal, glowing in the evening light like a shining metal sculpture. "I love-"

There was a furious roar as some structural weakness collapsed on itself on one of the lower floors. Both androids were shaken off of their feet, 9S stumbling to one knee. He frantically looked around as the siding on the building started to slide, tumble down into the abyss in chunks. Using his hands, he pushed to his feet only to be stumbled again by another monstrous groan. 2B sat on her rear, her legs out to one side, gripping the concrete as tightly as she could as it gave way. There was another sharp metal snap, and then they were in free-fall.

A solid crunch stopped them after a few feet, and they both hit the deck of the rooftop with solid 'thud's. He reached out for her, but the ground was shaking too much for him to stand.

"2B!" He shouted, but she was looking down again. "2B!" The top half of the building was folding in on itself, floors collapsing atop one another, burying the load-bearing bottom half in giant slabs of rubble.

9S gritted his teeth, fury racing through his mind. He felt so stupid. If they'd just analyzed the building's integrity before scaling it, if they'd never have come up here. If they had just tried to seal the holes they could've stopped the miasma. If they'd been more convincing they could've stopped A2 from leaving. If they hadn't been brought back to life they wouldn't be so deep in everlasting love.

As they began to sink into a dip in the rooftop, with the side walls rising up around them like the prophetical tower once did, he took his opportunity and rushed for her. She too had pushed to her feet and was just standing limply, watching the sky disappear as the building crumbled around them, arms dangling at her sides.

Just as one of the walls lost its balance and began to tumble inward, splintering into chunks on the pointed spikes of shattered steel beams, he reached her. She only just had time to turn around to see him sprinting for her, and awareness returned only for a moment as he tackled her hard.

He expected to knock her over, to shield her body from the falling debris, but instead she stumbled backward. She and 9S both lost their balance simultaneously, and he held her as tightly as he could as they tumbled directly out one of the windows. Were it any more perfectly timed, 9S could have sworn it was a push from a higher power.

But with no pods to slow their free-fall, they dropped several stories at terminal velocity, tumbling in the air. He clung to her, desperate to try and land on the bottom, to protect her from the impact. For the few seconds they were in the air he watched 2B's eyes, wide in shock, her hair whipping around in her face from the wind. She looked so alive, so full of feeling... so full of regret.

"Hungh!" 9S shouted as his back impacted with the ground with a loud 'crunch'. 2B landed on top of him, knocking the wind right out of his chest. The sound of her impact was a lot less painful than his, and he reveled in that for a moment. He saw spots, vision bleeding red at the edges. Thankfully they'd landed on the sand, which was much less hard than concrete would have been. She rolled off of his body involuntarily, landing just beside him. Trying to get up, 9S found that his strength was gone. He pushed almost to his elbows before dropping uselessly back to being horizontal. Both of them groaned weakly.

2B had just started to move herself when there was another rumbling, this time from above. They both threw their arms up as huge spikes of jagged metal began to descend on them, splinters shaking from the bark of the sprawling building still collapsing just in front of them. Simultaneously they went to raise their arms, shield themselves, but it was too late to get out of the way. 2B barely had time to gasp before a massive steel beam fell right for her, clattering to the ground with a deep metallic 'clang' right on top of her head.

Immediately 9S was scrambling to his feet, crying out wordlessly as he watched her get crushed. With every ounce of strength in his body he threw himself on the beam, grunting hard with the effort as it moved achingly slowly. After what felt like years to both of them, he screamed with effort as he gave it one final shove with his shoulders to knock it off of her. It tumbled once, breaking free of the sand, and then laid still.

What 9S saw, lying there on the sand in the imprint of the steel, shook him. 2B's face was crumpled. Thankfully, she'd turned to the side when it came down on her or else she very well might be dead. His mind flashed with images of her nose being pushed into her brain by the force and he uttered another guttural sound. Her hair was matted to her head by the force, following the new groove formed where a dented metal cheekbone sat. Spidery fissures lined the side of her cheek down to her jaw, ending at her chin and the bottom of her earlobe. The beautiful porcelain was cracked.

She writhed, eyes heavy-lidded and dull, her body in total shock. 9S darted around her and grabbed her by the shoulders, and she felt so very heavy as he dragged her up to the top of the nearby hill and to relative safety. The sandstorm was almost laughing at him as he futilely tugged her, one pace at a time, up the dune. He was choking and coughing and crying and as soon as they were clear, he slid on his knees to her side and grabbed her shoulders.

"Wake up! 2B, please, wake up!" He cried out, barely able to stammer out the words.

She didn't even react, now lying completely limp. Her brutalized face seemed to mock him, tell him to give up. To leave her to die. He checked her vitals, finding with some relief that she was still alive and relatively well for the situation. He shook her slightly, but she did not move so he did it again, this time harder.

"Nine... s..." She blinked a couple times, her vision returning from the blurry washed-out monochrome it was moments ago. Only one side of her face contorted as she squinted her eyes, allowing them to adjust to light and awareness and the surroundings.

He wrapped her in a tight embrace then, throwing his arms around her and supporting her back as she lay there on the dirt. For the longest time, she did not return his hug. He cared little, of course. Eventually, though, her arms gently snaked around his back as well and gripped the folds of his coat.

"I'm so sorry," he murmured into her shoulder. "I should've known. I should've been more careful."

2B ran a hand through his hair, weakly sliding down the back of his head and settling on his neck. "I don't blame you."

"Please blame me." He said in a broken voice. "Your face. 2B, your face..."

"Sssshhhh." She hushed him, bringing his head to her chest with her free hand. "You saved me."

"I'm not going to let you die. I won't be left alone here." His voice was muffled by the fabric of her shirt.

"Thank you." She said, both responding to him and continuing her earlier thought. With a sick, sinking feeling, 2B realized then that she had lost all of her strength. In that one moment, her will to fight had evaporated. After what they'd been through, after everything they'd done, she was ready to just lie down and let the world take care of her.

This feeling of wanting it all to be over that she hadn't felt in so long. She thought back to her time with YoRHa, the pain on 9S' face whenever she gave him time to realize he was about to be killed. Sometimes he fought. Sometimes he argued, spat, screamed.

Sometimes he just let her do it.

He had that same pained expression now as he leaned up, broke free of her grasp. He knelt beside her and their faces met. She was looking into his eyes but his were focused elsewhere.

"Your face..." He said again, full of despair. Gingerly, his palm rose to her cheek, hoping this new injury didn't hurt her. From his cursory analysis it seemed entirely cosmetic, but he couldn't help but wince every time she blinked and for a moment her whole face was made lopsided. She did not stop him, did not turn away as his thumb followed the largest of the splintery cracks. From her ear, all the way down to her jaw it went, like a tiny canyon splitting off into cracked and dry earth. An ugly fissure pockmarking the beautiful surface.

She put her palm over the top of his hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. He looked so hurt- more hurt than she even felt. Despite her reassurance, he clearly still blamed himself. The gears in his head were turning, turning, turning. As he furrowed his brow, 2B could tell his mind was racing in some way she could not determine.

He pulled both their hands away at the same time and curled in, still sitting beside her on his knees. She didn't move a single muscle as 9S came so close his lips brushed right past hers. Gently, ever so gently, his lips came to a rest in the center of the crater on her face. She let her eyes flutter closed as he gave the scar a kiss. A kiss to say he was sorry. To say he still thought she was beautiful. To say he was so scared of being alone, so terrified by the prospect, that he was willing to continue to support 2B despite her steadily declining mental state. Until the very end.

When he pulled away, it was as if something had clicked inside of him. This could not continue. He inhaled sharply. So far they'd been focused purely on their own survival. Their own feelings. Living for each other, sure, but outside of that there was nothing. It occurred to him now, looking at 2B's shattered and frail body, that they would die. Eventually, they would. Whether in some freak accident or the passage of time or by each others' hands, the cold hand of death would find them once again. But even more important than that...

Determination lined his features now as a deep frown came over him. "We have to do something about this, 2B. We can't just let the world die with us. Not like this."

She sighed, admiring the light in his eyes. The old naivete she once loved- and, somehow after all this time, still did. The face of a young man who had made a decision. Possibly, 2B considered, the most important one he could think of.

"Not like this."

()()()()()()()()()()()()()()