Sorry for being a bit late with this chapter!

It was hard to tell when you truly woke up, since you wavered between wakefulness and sleep multiple times. Eventually, you found your body deciding that it was, in fact, choosing to wake up. Complying with its wishes, you pushed yourself up. The jacket that 9S gave you slid off your body as your head pulled off the pillow-

Wait, when did you get a pillow?

Looking down, you quickly connected some dots. It was obviously a makeshift pillow, the fabric being balled up before it was tucked beneath you. Holding it up and letting it unfurl, you realized that what you were holding was one of the shirts that 2B or 47D wore- considering the lack of buttons and the inexplicable cleavage window. There was nothing in the design that easily told you which of the two left it wrapped up beneath you, but considering their personalities, you knew exactly who it was.

Standing up, you folded up the spare articles of clothing and started toward the exit. 47D stood guard to the right with 2B being nowhere to be seen. You did briefly consider it odd that 9S was gone, but on second thought, he had been the group scout all yesterday when he broke off. 47D still had her shirt on, but it wasn't too far out there to assume that units would have spare clothes with them.

You turned to the present android. "47D, I really appreciate what you did last night."

She jumped, looking back at you, confused. "I- uh, I-" Her surprised, nearly aback reaction seemed suspicious. You brought up what you now doubted was her shirt and held it in front of her. She looked it over quickly, then glanced back at you. "This isn't mine. It's 2B's." She seemed to realize something. "Oh, did you ask her for it when she stopped in? 9S asked for her assistance somewhere off in the park, and she stepped in to check up on you quick before heading out."

"…No? No one woke me up. Last I knew, I went to sleep with this other jacket," You motioned to 9S's jacket in your other hand, "but I woke with this one under my head."

"Well, now that you're awake, we can keep exploring, right?"

"Yeah," you brought the clothes back together under your arm, "right after you explain why you were so flustered earlier."

"Right, off we go." You were almost surprised at how quickly she blurted out those words, spun on her heel, and nearly took off.

"Wait, 47D." She hesitantly stopped a few paces away. It was obvious by her body language- her arms suspiciously pulled to her sides, never looking directly at you. "What. Did. You. Do?"

"Alert:" 320 spoke up behind you, "this unit has evidence for three separate incidents while you were unconscious."

You turned to her with interest. "Do tell, 320. What is it?"

"This unit has taken photos of the incidents in question: there is nothing to 'tell'. Displaying most recent incident." A picture appeared in front of the pod in the form of a flickering hologram. Seriously, what happened to the whole screen technology? There wasn't anything wrong with screens before, other than that they could crack, that you needed the surface, that there could be glare…

You just didn't like the semi-transparent surface, okay?

As the picture came into focus, it took you a second to realize what you were looking at. The darkness of the image made it hard to recognize until it automatically brightened. You saw yourself laying down, 9S's jacket still covering your torso. 2B was kneeling down right next to you, holding your head up with one hand, and slipping a balled up shirt- you involuntarily glanced at the one at your side- underneath your head with. Though engaged in an uncharacteristic act of kindness, she still wore her emotionless façade.

Well, you had your evidence for who the guilty party was. While that didn't explain why 47D was worried, you still had two other (presumably) photos to go through. "Next, 320?"

A new photo flickered onto the hologram. You were still lying beneath the jacket, but instead of 2B sitting above you, it was 47D, seated on her knees. Her visor was off, clutched in one hand, as the other reached down, holding the side of your face. She seemed… far calmer than you've seen her before.

"And the third, 320?"

The image remained for a second before flickering away. 320 cautiously and slowly spoke. "Unexpected error: the image has been corrupted."

You turned to face her. "Come again?"

"This unit is set up to automatically log overnight incidents- a process that runs while this unit is inactive. While these events and their number have been logged, the data must have been manipulated in the meantime."

"…So, by process of elimination…"

"9S is a potential culprit. Suggestion: interrogate to find out why."

"We'll do that when we find him. But first, 47D." You turned back to the frozen-in-place android. "Care to explain?" During the next few seconds, it became increasingly apparent that 47D was struggling to know where to start. "Look, follow my logic. You're an android. Before you do something, you have to make all of these decisions and evaluations. You're not irrational, you don't make decisions casually. Maybe you took a gamble, thinking I would never know. But I want to give you the benefit of the doubt, that you do have some reason behind this."

47D slowly lowered her arms to her sides as she turned around. "I… don't know what it originally was. I've just felt… useless, I guess? I can't really say why I've felt like this. I know that I've been doing my part in the war, doing whatever I could..." she paused, gathering her thoughts. "But everything seems like it's all…" she crossed her arms, gripping the fabric of her sleeves in a tight grasp, "…pointless. Like I know we've taken steps forward, but we always seem like we're right back to where we started.

"But you… no, that's a lie. I'm not sure whether it's linked to you or not. But things have been different lately. Things have been changing." She seemed to gradually speak faster, like she was picking up on some thread inside of herself. "I feel like things have been moving forward, even- even though nothing's changed in reality. The minor commander that I helped take out. I know there was going to be another one on the field before the week closed, but it really felt like we finally made progress! And…

"And this whole trip." Her voice dropped close to a whisper. "Nothing huge is going to come from this, I know that. We're not saving trapped androids, we're not taking out some huge linchpin. You asked us to accompany you, and we agreed. That's the extent of this trip's 'usefulness' to the war, unless 9S miraculously finds something.

"But it's felt…" she uncrossed her arms, letting them drop to her sides, "it just seems like I've done more here, in this one trip with you in tow, than I've done for the past year. I couldn't tell you what's going on, but I know that it has been. Maybe I'm not even seeing it right." She paused. "Maybe there's something else I'm just not getting."

She suddenly flinched, bringing her hands to her head. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry! That doesn't explain what I did. I…" She let her hands drop as she looked away. "I… I don't know. Some part of me must have just attributed this whole thing to you, and I just… I…"

You stepped up to her and set a hand on her shoulder, looking straight into her covered eyes. You only spoke when she looked back at you. "It's fine if you don't know. Hey, humans are pretty unreliable and we do things even we don't understand pretty often. Just, next time…"

"Yeah?"

"Ask before doing something to me, and probably don't do it at all while I'm sleeping, alright? You can inadvertently come off as really creepy."

She shrank back slightly under your words. "I understand."

"Good." You squeezed her shoulder slightly and offered a smile. "Let's go find 2B and 9S then, shall we?"

While the other two androids had gone their separate ways, it didn't take long for you all to reconvene; you were confused for a few minutes after 47D brought you to what seemed to be an empty plaza and told you to wait. 2B was the first to make her way into the square. Unsurprisingly, she made a beeline straight toward the two of you.

"So, 2B," while waiting, you had folded the shirt she left for you, which you held up now for her, "thanks for leaving behind this as a pillow." She stopped in her tracks. "Next time, you could stand to give it to me before I go to sleep. While the overnight gift was appreciated, I think I'd appreciate it more if I were conscious when you gave it to me."

"…Understood." 2B resumed her earlier pace and retrieved her shirt, dispersing it in a flash of light. "I apologize for disturbing you."

A crash reached your ears, resonating down a nearby street. You saw 9S stumble into the square, a poor machine thrown off-balance right behind him. He turned around and set the machine back on their feet, then turned and jogged up to the group. "Sorry to keep you guys waiting. I tried to hurry, but there's not much I could do when they wouldn't move out of the way."

"It's fine, 9S. Hey, quick question." You motioned back toward your darker pod. "Something happened on 320, a file deletion, or something like that. Think you know anything about it?" Perhaps you were being overly pointed and accusative with that last question, but you had to drive a point home.

9S replied slightly slower than normal. It felt like he was chewing through his thoughts as he spoke. "No, I wouldn't be able to know without looking at the data specifically. Besides, I'd need to sit down and analyze it all." He seemed to be delicately avoiding a dangerous subject. "320?"

"Information sent." 320 chirped before you had the chance to ask her.

"I'll look at it soon, Theo. I promise." He waved his hand, dismissing the topic. "I've been scouting around this area of the park to see what there is: gather information, neutralize threats, make maps, that sort of thing." He glanced over his shoulder at his pod quickly, "Pod, forward them the maps before I forget. I'm still not completely sure about the machines, but at least they aren't attacking. Couple of them are rather chatty, but they have nothing to say. Selling some broken product, throwing out nonsense gosip, empty warnings about some…" he searched for the name, "Simeon, I think. Basically, talking, not saying.

"153 ran a number of sector scans. Lower number of machine signs than I thought there would be. There are a couple of odd signals I'm getting from the castle, though."

"What are they like?" You quickly asked. "What type?"

"I'm having a hard time telling, myself. It's some kind of gestaltized signal, though whatever's making it probably isn't sending it out on purpose. Too many tags and pointers for me to be able to make out. Could just be that there's some broken transmitter, emitting random noise, but I can't be sure unless I see what's making it."

Most of 9S was trying to say went right over your head. You turned and posed your question to the three androids. "What do you guys think? Want to head over and check it out? We might as well see what it is, unless there's something interesting in this half of the park."

"Just more broken rides and aimless machines where I went. Why not?"

"Memory serves, you said earlier that there's some convoluted route up to the castle. Is it any clearer with the new map?"

"Yeah, there's this one section that looks rather promising. It has this open area and a broken down ride right next to it- I think I passed right by it on my scouting mission. Forwarding route."

9S must have cleared this route out during his scouting. He led the group down a number of… slightly questionable streets, but eventually got everyone to the broken ride he had apparently been talking about. One princess carry over the wreckage later, 47D set you down on top of the wall overlooking an open square. The neglect and decay was obvious- the dilapidated buildings sagging inward into the square, the rusted-through entryway to the rollercoaster which climbed off into the distance, the concrete plaza spiderwebbed with cracks and various grasses growing freely. The surface was marked with…

Wait, are those tread marks?

An explosion slammed through the air as a cloud of dust and debris rose from the far side of the square. A tank crawled out of the cloud, its treads shrieking against the ground. The androids leapt into action.