Fipp: All Resistance members are named after flowers, so last chapter I tried to pick flowers that had some kind of meaning to what was being written.
"Hydrangea" symbolize apologies in Japanese, which 2B does at the 9S' grave.
"Shion" symbolizes the phrase "I won't forget you", and the corresponding android is located in the Flooded City, near 2B's downed flight unit, where she talks about her memories of 9S, and the Soul Box, which ends with 9S' memories of 2B. Double angst points of Kingdom Hearts fans.
"Orchid" is sometimes associated with love, though I admit there's little to associate this with the Amusement Park in terms of 2B and 9S.
"Hyssop" symbolizes sacrifice; the most recent 9S uploaded 2B's data before his own, which resulted in his own memory wipe at the start of the game.
"Hyacinth" symbolizes sorrow, as the Desert Ruins from The Memory Cage/Thorn is where 2B first began to mourn for 9S.
End of All Meaning
Chapter V: To Fight On and On and On...
The last machine fell, its body torn up, with large cut on its chassis, and the resulting damage was enough for the corpse to explode into a shower of sparks and scrap when it hit the ground.
"Looks like that's the last one," A2 said aloud, only to instantly curse herself to saying anything at all.
"Affirmative: There are no more machine life forms in the area detected, and the path to the objective is clear." A2 walked forward, trying her best to ignore Pod 153 as it followed her through the depths of the Forest Kingdom. "The Rigid Tree Bark is located twenty meters from out location." Every single word this thing said grated on her nerves. "Suggestion: Obtain Rigid Tree Bark and bring it to Pascal so that a replacement fuel filter can be made." A2 grit her teeth, each line coming from the box was a needle in her skull. "While current status does not require immediate replacement of fuel filter, it it highly recommended to-"
A2 swung her sword, and if she had been a couple of steps closer to Pod 153 she would have cleaved the box in half, but instead she settled on simply pointing her sword, 9S' sword, at it. This resulted in a strong silence between them, the only sounds around them were the varying animals of the forest, and she had a very strong urge to step forward and skewer this thing, throw its remains onto the ground and let nature take it back.
She didn't however, no matter how much she wanted to, so instead she put her sword back and turned around to collect the bark that machine sent her here to gather.
To her agitation, Pod 153 spoke up, again.
"Has Unit A2 made a decision on how to approach unit 2B?"
"No."
"Reminder: It was unit 9S' final request that you provide care for unit 2B."
"And why would you care what 9S wanted?"
"This support unit was assigned to unit 9S, and thus his requests are of high priority to this unit."
A2 spun around, almost causing Pod 153 to bump into her, but the Pod was quick to hover away from her, facing it with a glare that could melt steel. As it backed away from her, it slightly lowered its altitude, and pulled it manipulator claws close to its body. Was this fear? Shame? A2 didn't know, but at the very least she liked this.
"Really? What about his safety?"
"Affirmative: Unit 9S' safety was also a top priority."
"Yet you kept selling him out, huh?"
The Pod did not instantly respond, it hesitated. Again, she liked that.
The fragmented memories she inherited from 9S, they had given her pieces of information, and she knew that there were much she was missing, but there were very important details in there. She knew what had happened to 9S, and the roles of everyone in his life played in it, and simply thinking about it made her blood boil.
Finally, Pod 153 answered, "This unit was directly ordered from the YoRHa Commander herself to report unit 9S when he had hacked into The Bunker's servers and accessed illegal information."
"So, you don't deny that you basically signed his death, every single time?"
The Pod did not respond, which was just fine to her, because it seemed like every time it said anything it just made her all the more angry. Piece of shit Pod, being crappy YoRHa equipment. She was glad that YoRHa, and that bitch of a Commander, were now just debris in space, they got what they deserved. It's not like they were actually protecting anything worthwhile. A2 looked up to the sky, through the small gaps in the forest canopy, and to the sky and the stars above, and she wanted nothing more than to rage and scream when that memory came to her. Humans were dead, and have been for thousands of years. YoRHa was only around just to make everyone they were still alive and to hand out false hope. They had been fed nothing but lies from the start. Her squad was sent out on a suicide mission for a lie. Even if everyone had managed to survive long enough to reach the machine's servers, they would have all still been killed anyways via a bomb inside of them.
No. 21, No. 16, and No. 4... They were dead for nothing. Same with 9S, killed over and over just so YoRHa could keep its dirty little secrets, but despite that, his last wish had been to keep 2B safe, and she didn't know if she could do that. She just couldn't forgive 2B for what she had done, because that would mean forgiving YoRHa to an extent, and she just can't do that. To her, 2B was no different than the Commander, and a part of her would have been happy to run her through with her sword.
But her mind always goes back to the pit, and to that memory, and her resolved wavered as a result.
A2 didn't know what she would do if she met 2B, if she would honor 9S' final wishes, or kill her for everything she had done.
000
2B stared down into the ravine, into the deep and dark abyss below, where possibly 9S' body lay, buried underneath rubble, while his bloodstain was underneath her boots. She didn't know how long she had been standing there, looking into the pit, wondering what she should do next, while her boot moved slightly, the toe sliding off the ledge until the pointed heel was the only thing on the rock. According to the machine who had set up shop at the bottom of the ravine, on the Forest Kingdom's side, they had said that a number of machines had thrown themselves into the depths, for whatever reason, and that she had prayed for their souls in the hopes that they would reach heaven and find peace.
She still stuck to what she had told 9S' grave earlier, that if there was a heaven, that she doubted she would end up there. But perhaps...
Her foot moved further, until she only had one foot on the ground, the other hovering in the air, while her body began to tilt slightly forward-
Pod 042 then suddenly appeared in front of her face. "Unit 2B."
2B let out a surprised yelp, and stumbled backwards from the cliff, catching herself before she could fall backward. "Pod?!" she stammered, eyes darting between it and the ravine. "What is it?"
The Pod hovered there, bobbing slightly in the air as usual, but it was uncharacteristically quiet. Usually when she addressed it, it was always quick to give some kind of response, but the dead silence left her unnerved.
"Query: With the mission given by Resistance member Hydrangea complete, what is it that unit 2B wishes to do next?"
"I..." 2B wanted to give an answer, but she didn't know what she could possibly say. She wanted to say something, but without even the slightest idea on how to respond, all she could do was offer silence. What did she want to do? Could she really keep begging for missions from Anemone and anyone in the Resistance who would give her the time of day? Yes, it kept her busy, but...
She looked back down to the bloodstain.
"Pod," she said, her fist beginning to clench and her body heating up. "Can you locate A2?"
"Negative: This unit is unable to locate unit A2."
"Oh." She let out a shaky breath and looked away from the stain, turning her attention to the sky. "Pod," she asked, after a time of silence.
"Yes?"
"What the hell is that?"
"That is The Tower, as the Resistance have dubbed it."
"Oh. Pod?"
"Yes?"
"How the hell did I not notice thing?"
The Tower, as Pod 042 has called it, was easily the most massive structure she had ever seen in her existence; stark white, its odd, swirling and twisting design pierced the very sky, spiraling high enough to possibly even breach through the atmosphere, and in the distance, over the buildings of the city, and past even the horizon, it was held up by truly gargantuan struts made of white cubic material, three in total. All she could do was stare at it in awe, enough so that she almost fell backwards trying to take the entirety of The Tower in.
"This unit has made a total of thirty-nine attempts to inform unit 2B about The Tower's existence when it became evident that you were unaware of it. However, all attempts were subsequently ignored."
"What...?"
"Hypothesis: Unit 2B was entirely concerned on completing the varying missions given to her by the Resistance, that she had developed what is known as 'tunnel vision', which is a state of mind where an individual becomes so engrossed on certain goals to the point where they are unable to notice anything that has little-to-no relation to their current objectives."
"Oh... Where did it come from?"
"The Tower first appeared shortly after you lost consciousness, segments of it appearing from the surrounding area around the City Ruins before connecting just over the crater near the Resistance Camp. Since its initial appearance, there has been no activity from it, however there appears to be an entrance located in the crater."
"So, first the logic virus, and then this thing appeared?"
"Correct?"
2B continued to stare at the Tower, baffled by its sheer size and the complexity of its design. Had the machines really managed to build something this grand without any android noticing? If they were able to achieve something like this, what else were they capable of? If they were so able to easily erect this thing, could they have wiped out YoRHa at any point before? Was there any point in even fighting them to begin with?
She looked back to the ravine, and to the deep and welcoming darkness below.
Pod 042 flew in front of her face again. "Unit 2B."
"Huh?" 2B snapped back to attention. "I'm sorry, did you say something."
"Repeating statement: What is it that unit 2B wishes to do now?"
2B looked back up to The Tower's central spire, which was partially obscured by the clouds. "I guess, we should try and investigate this thing then? You said there was an entrance in the crater?"
"Correct."
"Then let's check it out."
With a new destination in mind, 2B made her way to the crater, though there was no rush as she dragged her feet through the dirt.
000
Eventually, she made it to the crater, where she was greeted by the entrance to The Tower, a tall white spire near the edge of the cliff with a door built into it, while three similar structures were scattered around the pit, each one with a strange red ring floating around them. When 2B tried to touch the door to the largest pillar, her hand stopped in midair, pressing against something invisible, a soft tingling sensation radiating through her arm that soon vanished as she drew her hand away. She didn't know much about defense systems, but if she had to guess, it was some kind of force field.
"How do we get in?" she asked idly. "Could I break it open?"
"Negative: Using brute force would likely end in damage to weaponry. Scans show a complex firewall that is preventing The Tower from being accessed from the outside. Hacking is recommended."
"Hacking? But I..."
She doesn't hack, she was never built for it, the most she's ever done were the few times an enemy unit hacked her, and guiding her own defense systems to expel the intruder, the last time having been when that singing machine had tried to infiltrate her. Normally all hacking, both offensive and defensive, were left to 9S, he was more than enough to cover for her own lack of defenses. To be more technical, she did have a very high-grade defense system against hacking, but that particular program was designed with one hacker in mind...
"Statement: In the absence of a Scanner or Healer, hacking rights can be granted to non-hacking units via this support unit."
"Oh yeah, I forgot you can do that. Then fine, give me the rights."
"Hacking rights requested. Hacking rights permitted."
Who was it even asking? YoRHa and Command were gone.
It didn't matter, not anymore.
"Alright, beginning hacking process."
"Affirmative."
Pod 042 began, and already she could feel her consciousness removed from her body and-
It felt like someone was stabbing into her head as she returned to her body, stumbling backward as an electric sensation charged through her body, numbing her as she backed away from the door.
"Hello, and thank you for choosing Tower System Services!"
"Wha..." The word came out slurred, her head still buzzing at the announcing voice, too cheerful for her to take. She didn't like it. It was too familiar...
"Special authorization keys are required to access Tower's sub-units. We apologize for the incontinence, but access is not permitted at the time. However, today we have a special gift for first-time visitors to this Tower: A tour of our brand-new resource-recovery units!"
There was a sudden burst of static, flooding 2B's skull with a painful buzz, and she could just feel something downloading into her.
"We look forward to serving you again!"
"Just what was that?" 2B asked, cradling her head in her hands as the pain faded away.
"A forced message from the enemy system. Said message relays the locations of objects known as 'resource-recovery units'."
"Is that so?" 2B looked at the tower, to where the voice had announced itself from, and she knew where that voice had been familiar.
It was 6O's voice, and the feeling of dread and guilt filled further; she hadn't thought of 6O since before the Assault, not even when the Bunker was falling apart, and the androids within were infected and attacking...
She didn't even know how she died...
Her voice had been over the PA system, she didn't know how, maybe it was 6O herself using what was maybe her final moments of self-awareness to deliver one final message, or maybe it was the machines trying to play a cruel trick on her. She didn't see 6O anywhere on the Bunker however, but with how dark it had been, and how they were swarmed with infected units, it was hollowing prospect that either herself of 9S killed 6O and neither of them noticed it as they continued on. Or maybe she was somewhere else in the Bunker, crazed and alone, or possibly killed by the very same androids she had called friends, or somehow survived the explosion and was floating, trapped in space...
All 6O wanted was to see Earth, to find love and be loved, and to see fresh flowers in their native soil. Instead, all she got was an her as her assigned unit, and an anonymous, and lonely death.
6O deserved better,so much more, but it was clear the machines still wanted to use her against 2B.
Her black box hummed loudly in her chest.
"Pod?" 2B asked. "These recovery-unit things, are those the towers we saw at the Flooded District and the Amusement Park?"
"Affirmative: When The Tower first appeared, several large structures were detected in several areas."
"And still no idea what they're for?"
"Negative."
2B sighed.
"Would you like me to mark on the map the locations of the three recovery-units?"
"...Pod, can I tell you something?"
"If unit 2B wishes to inform this unit of something, then there are no reason to not do so."
"I don't actually care about this. About any of this."
"This unit is unable to understand unit 2B's statement."
"Pod, what will going to these recovery units accomplish? What will going into The Tower do anyway? Am I supposed to fight every machine myself?"
"This unit suggests-"
"Everyone is dead, Pod. The Commander, 6O... 9S, and YoRHa is gone, along with Command. What is the point fighting anymore?"
"If you do not wish to access The Tower, then what do you wish to do?"
She hesitated because she didn't know how to respond, but it took her only a short few seconds before the answer came to her. "A2. Are you sure you can't tell me where she is?:
"Unit A2's position and current status are unknown."
2B clenched her fist as a slight pressure began to build behind her eyes.
"Unit 2B should state her intentions."
She didn't know what her intentions were, she didn't know what she was supposed to do.
"Unit 2B has already established chain of command with Resistance leader Anemone. Proposal: Rendezvous with Resistance forces and-"
"Just give me a minute to think," she growled, turning her back to Pod 042 and looking back to The Tower.
For the first time, it occurred to her that the supposed entrance to The Tower was right above the caves that lead to the dead aliens underground; they had built such a thing over the graves of their creators. This then led her to think of something else she had given no thought to: the humans. YoRHa was gone, but she knew the Council of Humanity was still alive and well on the moon, meaning that the human were still up there, safely sleeping away in cryostasis, while everyone she knew had died a terrible and pointless death.
"My intentions," she said after a time, her voice low and far off. "Since the humans are still one the moon, we keep following YoRHa's prime directive, so I guess we'll go to these recovery units then and find out what's their deal. And in the event we come across A2..." She bit the side of her lip, almost hard enough to break the skin while she dug small, crescent-shaped marks into her palms through her gloves. "I'll kill her. That takes prime directive over anything else, but until then we'll just keep... fighting."
"Are you certain this is what you wish to do, 2B?"
"Does it matter?"
Pod 042 did not say anything to that, its claws clasping and unclasping.
"Just tell me the location of the recovery units."
000
Despite the fact she knew the location of two of the units, she was first directed to one located deep inside the Forest Kingdom, in front of the King's castle, an obvious sight from the rampart near the transport she had just stepped out of. It hovered near the bridge that led to the rest of the forest, the fog building heavily around it.
"What's with all this fog?" she asked, walking down the path to the courtyard. "We saw this at the other locations."
"Analysis: The fog is actually steam emitted by the resource recovery unit."
"Any idea what's it for?"
"Negative."
2B sighed, she didn't really expect any sort of real answer from her Pod, since she doubted it knew much more than she did.
Her steps were slow, but she did make her way down until she reached the courtyard, where she saw the resident machines of the Forest Kingdom, dressed in armor and wielding knightly weapons.
"For the king of our forest!" the cried as they charged her.
Did they not know that their king was dead? A2 killed him too. Did they not care? Did they just need something to fight for, even if it was meaningless?
She didn't need to fight them, she could easily run around them and make it to the unit without even raising her sword to them, that's what she would typically do in this situations. There was no need to fight, and she didn't want to fight. Instead she picked up her sword in her hand and charged them, swinging at the, cleaving at their armor and plating, stabbing through their bodies. One of them came up from behind her, its sword raised high into the and ready to cleave her, and while it was coming at her at a slow enough speed where she could have dodged it easily, 2B instead chose to go on the offensive, and with a twist of her body drove Virtuous Contract into its chest, but not before its sword cut deep into her shoulder.
"Pod," she said after she pulled her sword from the machine's body, letting it fall to the ground in a heap of scrap. "Apply staunching gel, and make it quick."
The wound wasn't terribly deep, but there was blood, and it did hurt quiet a bit, to the point where 2B couldn't help but wince with even the smallest movement of her shoulder, which only was mildly alleviated by the applied gel.
"Warning: Staunching gel's effectiveness will become greatly diminished if it is not allowed sit properly. Suggestion: Please allow for a short period of time for staunching gel to sit and mend shoulder wound before continuing on."
"It's fine," she said, her pace quickening as she moved further into the forest, toward the cliff and bridge.
Another machine stood in her way. It died.
As 2B finally stepped onto the bridge, so close to the unit, it suddenly bellowed out another cloud of steam, heating the air around her up as the light coming from the inside of it began to brightly glow, almost blinding, and large sections of the outside began to reconfigure, suddenly repositioning along the outside.
"Hello!" rang out Not-6O. "This is the Resource Recovery Unit. Now activating defense mode!"
With an annoyed groan, 2B continuing down the bridge until she was in front of it, and scaled the pipes until she stood in front of the door. It was a bit anticlimactic really, it just looked like any old elevator door that she had seen countless times before.
"What's this writing above the door?" she asked, taking not of the strange, and unfamiliar symbols.
"Analysis: Writing is an ancient language know as Angelic. It reads 'Meat Box'."
"Meat?" She wanted to ask what that meant, but she doubted the Pod knew. So she just pushed the button, entered the elevator, the door closing behind her. The silent moments as the elevator rose felt like torture to her, weighting heavily down on her, and all she could do was wonder what she was doing. When the door opened, she stepped into the darkened area, the floors and walls made with the same haphazardly placed pipes and plating the outside was covered in, and made her way up the ramp to the higher level.
"Analysis: This entire structure appears to be made from machine parts. Many useless parts unrelated to machine lifeform functionality detected."
"I don't care."
It took only moments, but she reached the upper level, a large and round area, with nothing standing between her and the door on the opposite end, but she was not at all surprised when two Forest Kingdom machines dropped from the ceiling in front of her.
Once, 9S had asked her a question; if she could undergo type conversion, which type would she switch to? He had said that he had trouble thinking what he would switch to, given the chance, since they were all so different than Scanners, that he would want to see those differences for himself, though in the end he had settled on Battler. 'To see what life is like for you', he had said.
She had been quick to shut him down, the very idea of him being anything like her, like the way she was, sickened her, and they never spoke about it again.
Five hours later she killed him, and the conversation was left to her and her alone.
Even though she had not given him an answer, she did have one; a non-combat unit, a Scanner if she felt she ever had a choice. Another secret she kept from him, from everyone, was that despite the skill and prowess on she possessed on the battle field, and even though her strength, speed and adaptability had earned her a well-known reputation amongst her peers and superiors, 2B did not in the slightest enjoy fighting. In fact, she outright hated it. Unless she was required to kill a machine she usually left them alone, even if it meant going out of her way to do so, citing that killing them had no benefit to the mission, when the truth was that she just didn't want to fight them. It was odd, for a soldier like her, a killer liker her, to think like this, but the most positive thing she ever felt about combat was that it was a duty to fulfill. Even Jackass' odd research did little to help in that regard, as she never felt the euphoric surges that she claimed androids felt when in the middle of fighting, but it was never there.
2B fought because it was her purpose, because she was told to, she did it for the Glory of Mankind, and even when those words rang hollow to her, she still fought. She fought, and she fought, and she fought, never stopping, never slowing down, even as she died she still kept on because it was the only thing she could do. Whatever spark insider her that spurred her into fighting for the humans had long since died out, leaving her with an empty sense of obligation that she followed even when she did not want to. There ended up being one thing, and one thing only that had acted to drive her forward, something that pushed her through the days no matter how dark and crushing her reality was, even when there were times it all seemed hopeless, even when everything else told her it was pointless to want anything more than what she had.
A future where she and 9S could be done fighting, to be away from the fighting and live with being done with everything. So she kept fighting, she suffered and caused suffering in return, all for that small glimmer of hope that things could one day be better.
9S was gone now, and that future is dead, and she is still fighting because...
"This forest... is our forest... Y-Y-Your... Majesty..." the first machine said as it charged at it.
"R-Revenge... reveeeenge..." the second machine said as it swung at her.
The king was dead, there was no one to fight for, but they kept fighting.
2B cut the machines down, and the following waves, leaving nothing but scrap in her wake, and when there was nothing left to kill, she moved to the next floor, but there was nothing on the above catwalks, so she continued again.
Machines appeared here, and they fought.
"Pain! So much pain!" one cried out as she sliced its arm off, but as she did this one came up from behind her and stabbed a spear into her back.
It didn't matter how much pain there was, the fighting continued.
"Pain pain pain..." another one wailed as she stabbed into its chest. A machine managed to cut deep into her leg.
"I do not... want to die..." one pleaded as she thrust her sword into its head., killing it. She didn't dodge as it exploded, throwing her back to crash against the burning wreckage of the other machine corpses.
She kept going.
Two more floors up, she encountered more machines.
"This cannot continue." Again with that chant. It didn't matter if it continued, you're supposed to fight until you can't.
"This cannot continue." Were Adam and Eve meant to be their trump cards to end the war in their favor? Born to fight and die?
"Pain pain pain." Suck it up, just keep fighting.
"It hurts so much." Work through the pain, that's all that could be done.
"Please don't kill me." Die like everyone else, because living wasn't an option, it never was.
"This cannot continue."
"This cannot continue."
"This cannot continue."
"Pain-"
"It hurts-"
"Please-"
Just accept it. Just keep fighting. It's all that can be done, it's all that could ever been done because there was never a choice in the matter. Fighting forever, the cycle never ending...
"Stop it-" she growled, cutting down another machine as it pleaded. "Just stop talking, all of you!" Her sudden shout surprised herself, she didn't expect for it to come out like that. "Stop talking, stop thinking, just stop-"
They didn't. They kept voicing themselves, telling her of the pain, pleading they didn't want to die, how this couldn't continue. But they would always suffer in pain, they would die, it would always continue. Even so, they kept going on.
"I said shUT UP!" she screamed, driving Virtuous Contract into a large bipedal machine's chest, and she stabbed and stabbed and stabbed until it grabbed her in its large hand and threw her to the ground with enough force to break something in her with a loud snap, but she didn't stop.
Nothing could stop her, no matter how much she wanted.
She hit them, and they hit back. It would have been easy to dodge their attacks, but she just wanted the fight to be over as soon as possible, even if it threw her into another battle all the sooner, so if that meant she would take extra damage, it wasn't a problem with her.
They died and she continued on, pushing through the ever increasing injuries, brought one by her carelessly fought battles, each step causing a jolt of numbing pain through her body, but she still continued on.
When the elevator reached the final floor, she was presented to a bridge leading to a central platform, with some sort of strange structure in the center, beaming a bright beam of light into the open sky, with a glowing orb sitting in the center. All around them, an assortment of varying machine parts floated freely in the air, ascending up into the sky.
"Analysis: It would appear that the varying resources around us are raw materiel from the structure itself, possibly useful for creating weapons," Pod 042 offered.
"I didn't ask," 2B curtly responded. "I don't care."
The machines came at her again, swinging their swords and axes, but still the died, until she was left all alone.
2B's attention turned back to the glowing orb, giving off the bright golden light, and even from here she could feel the power it was giving off. This was the thing she was supposed to destroy.
When she took a single step forward, it spoke.
"Help... Please..."
Another step.
"Help me... I'm scared"
She held her sword out.
"Help me..." it kept crying out, again and again without end.
She stared at it, trying her best to ignore what it was pleading, to try and shut out everything else because she needed to do this.
"2B," she heard her Pod say, but she tuned it out.
For a moment, just before she brought her sword down, she saw 9S, hurt and scared and confused and-
"2B, it hurts, why are you... help me, please..."
-the sword cut through orb, halting its cries, and sparks arced along her blade before they died out. It remained stuck on her sword, but with a swing of her sword it was dislodged, and sent flying across the chamber.
"Forest Access Key obtained," her Pod said, and without a single word she turned back to the exit.
"Kill me..." suddenly came a voice, and one of the machine twitched, clearly alive, however barely. "Kill me, kill me, coward!" it croaked unsteadily, trying to raise its eyes to meet her covered pair. "Go on, kill me you coward!"
So she did, driving her sword right through its head, because that was what she did, it was what she was made to do. There was nothing else for her beyond that.
Even after everything that had happened, she was still trapped...
000
Please be well,
Mrfipp