Something was beginning to change. Iris was starting to fritz out, the smell of circuits burning staining his nose. She was walking in zigzags before collapsing on her back. Zero, watching this happen, crawled next to her coughing form. He knew that this was the ending of the hallucinations, and he knew that Iris wouldnt just disappear. He knew that this virus would dig in hard and try to prolong its stay there.

"Why couldn't you just leave us to ourselves?" Iris growled out, her voice wavering. Zero gripped his head, trying to ignore her voice, and tried to ignore her and searched out a comfort familiar to him, but when he looked around he was alone with iris. A small gem appeared in from of him. Zero touched it and a shock ran through his entire body. Zero groaned and clamped his eyes closed.

Reaper was not doing as well as Zero. Her skin had long lost all its lively color, her breathing was erratic and her hair lost its glow becoming stringy and was turning white. She had her eyes open, but wasn't looking at anything. She made small sobbing sounds, choking on air. Bass was stumbling, holding his stomach, which was leaking oil.

"I'm solar powered, so this oil," He took the hand and shook it, spraying it all over the floor, "is keeping my Joints working, so while reploids, or robot masters, whichever the fuck I am, don't have blood, we can bleed out." He let out a barking laugh. Then his leg locked up in a straight line and the arm cradling his stomach snapped back straight so fast and that it broke and fell off, the arm dissolving into nothing. In her mind, she screamed, in reality, she let out a pitiful whimper.

Bass began screaming in pain, half laughing. He looked right at her, his bright red, animalistic eyes, bore into her fading green. Tears pooled down her face and she groaned.

Zero was surrounded with suffocating darkness the only light he had was emitted by that clear purple box, all that was left of Colonel. Iris's last precious artifact and the cause of her death.

"I tried to stop it, I really did. I'll have to live with the fact that you died, and was wrongfully accused of being maverick. I have to live with the fact that despite you begging me not to kill your brother, I did." Zero felt tears falling down his face, his voice cracking and his whole body trembling.

Iris made a unique expression. Confusion, surprise, and anger were visible on her face. She cursed her lips and went to open her mouth, but no sound came out, so she closed her mouth and cocked her head to the side. A white light engulfed her, the visual effect of the sparks of her circuits melting making contact with the oil in her systems. When everything cleared, he looked around and blanched.

"Veronica!" Zero gasped and ran to her and cradled her. She was alive, that was good news, but she was unresponsive, which was horrible. She almost looked dead, her skin pale and her eyes were dull. Zero wiped tears off of her cheeks and counted the breaths until she woke up.

Reaper felt a numbness rush over her, against her face and rubbing against her cheek. Bass's maniacal laughter seemed less overwhelming and the numbness was warm and inviting. She went to float back into it but was yanked back.

With all of his internal systems fully functional, Zero could see that her vital signs were getting stronger, but she just kept jerking in his arms.

Reaper herself was screaming at bass in her mind.

"Stop, you went against him knowing he would lose. You left me with him." She sobbed against Zero's chest in reality, Zero trying to soothe her.

Bass raised an eyebrow, his vocal box having blown out. He gave her a small smirk and finally started to seize up and combusted.

Reaper gasped awake in Zero's arms. Zero helped her to her feet and walked to the exit of the room. Relief extremely apparent on their face and in their body language. X greeted them with a sleepy smile. They smiled back at him and agreed to a quick check up in the med bay.

After the visit to the med bay, they calmly went back to the little apartment they called home. They got cleaned up and got changed, but weren't quite ready to go to bed. Instead Reaper opened a window and grabbed to boxes that Zero recognized, one box of cigarettes for him and one for her. Zero smiled and followed her up the fire escape.