"Just die already!"
With a strike of 2B's heavier sword, Virtuous Treaty, right in the eye of the round machine before here, A2 watched it fall apart before her.
A2 stared at the white greatsword for a moment longer, recalling that, just like Virtuous Contract had been for her so familiar, this one had been Number 4's faithful weapon until the end.
YoRHa could not have left their weapons to rest, at least the ones of the dead, couldn't they? They needed to disacrate their memory too.
Damn them, and damn the machines… she cursed in her mind.
Despite everything, she knew she was in the right place right now, and like hell she'd waste the opportunity to get rid of the abominations or die trying, like she should have done long ago with the others. YoRHa had already paid the price, though not enough.
But if she hadn't survived, then what would have been of Robin, would YoRHa still have turned her into what she became?
Would they have tormented her even more than they did hadn't she deserted to protect her?
"Just stop thinking and move forward, you idiot." A2 told herself.
This was not the time to get lost in thoughts.
So she willed her legs to move, heading out from the other door of this fake library full only of data that would only keep hurting her the more she read… about Robin's fate and how her own model had been used and abused.
Though she had already guessed that part of the story, knowing it was true didn't make it any easier to bear.
2B was quiet, she'd been the one pointing out the data too, and A2 didn't blame her for it, she too wanted to know, and now she was probably just trying to come to terms with it all just like her, in her own way.
But as inclined to silence as her twin model was, A2 knew that 2B felt the same way about things. They may have changed how the Number 2 personality acted, but some things were always destined to be the same.
They both felt the same way about how YoRHa used them all, them two, 9S, Robin, A2's former comrades…
All sacrificial lambs for someone else's pleasure.
Outside the other door, there was an elevator, and A2 didn't like how nervous it made her feel, and how similar this all was to the mission at Mt. Ka'ala. Almost felt like the machines were planning this all along.
She didn't get to do more because as soon as she touched the panel of the elevator, she was swept away into her own mind.
These damn things… they had hacked her…
What she heard next was a voice she was never hoping to ever hear again… or rather… there were two voices…
"We meet again, Number 2."
"Or should we call you A2 now?"
Drawing the white sword, it took all her might to look at the girls in red in the eyes, when her entire body just wanted to tremble at the sight, but she didn't want to give them the satisfaction to see her cry and cower, not again…
If she could slap her old self back in that server room she'd do it immediately, just for how she had acted.
What a baby she'd been…
Instead, she took courage and charged at the two doll looking machines, slashing through them with all her might, only for them to reappear before her a moment later.
"Haven't we told you?"
"You can't kill us."
She knew that, and still refused to believe it. Everything that could live could also die, it was how it had always been, for humans, for androids, for the aliens and for every machine she killed and watched die.
So it had to be true for them too, she just had to find a way.
She tried again more times, maybe if she was quick enough she could land a hit, just like Robin had told her how it went down in the fight between her and Adam, how she'd managed to hurt him.
This was a similar enough situation.
And yet…
"You are an obstinate android."
"We machines are superior to you, and yet you still keep fighting."
She didn't care of her words anymore, she shouldn't have let them get to her the first time either, but she'd been so stupid…
"You've lost much, don't you just want to give up and join them all?"
These words however, made her stop in her tracks. An electric orb hit her square in the back, and yet, she didn't move, she could barely feel her skin sizzling from it.
What?
What the hell were they saying?
But in the end wasn't it true?
She wanted to see the people she loved again more than anything… but like hell if she went down without a fight!
She'd waited so many years to this moment, and now, the two that had ended those lives were in front of her once more. She could taste the feeling of a righteous revenge, and she was not going to let said chance pass by right under her nose.
"We saw them."
"Their final moments."
So what? Even if they did, she knew the same thing too.
Or did she? No… there were still gaps to fill…
"That machine is heading straight to the elevator!"
"What do we do now!?"
"There's nothing else we can do…"
She knew these voices, it had been the group that had stayed behind while the rest entered the elevator hall in the mountain, and a giant machine she now knew was named Engels flying in the direction of the mountain.
Gerbera, Lily, Daisy, Dahlia, and if it was them then it meant…
"Don't worry, if I overload my fusion reactor sending the energy through my weapon, the shot should be powerful enough to take that machine out."
Number 16… so that had been her plan then?
No… more like a last resort.
"Even if you're new models won't be able to handle the pressure, even if it's just a little, you'll explode!"
"This dumb plan can't work!"
"I know that!"
Too distracted from the voices, A2's own yell joined the one of her former comrade, those bloody dolls were using the last moments of her comrades to hurt her, and to hurt her body too, as they kept hurling more spheres.
No matter how hard she tried, she just couldn't avoid listening, and neither could she avoid being hit more times still.
"As long as Number 2 and the others make it to the server, then it'll be okay if I die. You guys run!"
And the more she did, the more she felt herself breaking, beyond the hits she was taking to her body. Her staggering wasn't just from physical pain alone.
"You can't ask that from us!"
She didn't need to imagine what they did, and the sound of it was of a reactor crackling, or rather four of them, and Number 16's plea to not do that, words that had fallen to deaf ears.
"Number 16, please give me access to the weapon and your reactor. We'll end this all."
"You guys will die too…"
"But… running is not an option!"
"We'll connect all of our circuits for maximum output."
"Your reactors will explode too!"
"Enough! We're all in this together!"
Like family… like Rose had told her… One last hug shared between Lily and Daisy…
The four of them holding on to Number 16 to support her until the end…
And then… the explosions, one after the other…
Again, A2 had screamed with them as yet another orb hit her leg, stumbling, she fell on the white floor of the hacking space.
With trembling hands, she picked herself up again.
How dared they use those memories like this? How dared they stain these last moments of these brave soldiers?
"How dare you use their voices?" she yelled back, but all she got was a laugh of pure mockery.
"What's wrong, Number 21?"
"The machines have protected the elevator, but I can hack it."
"See? Easy."
How had she failed to notice how much she was trying to hide how much she was shaking, and how labored her breathing was? And how hard she was covering her eyes, even pulling up the hood so no one could see.
She should have known…
"Number 21, aren't you coming with us?"
"I need to stay behind to keep hacking the elevator or it won't move."
"We can't leave you here!"
"The enemies are coming, hurry!"
Number 21 barely ever lost her calm, barely ever raised her voice, unless… unless when someone's life was on the line…
How hadn't she noticed something was wrong at all?
She remembered well the conflicted look of Number 4 right beside her, as she shook her head at her comrade and her decision to stay behind, before Anemone decided to step out in front of them.
"I'll stay behind and protect Number 21, you head to the server room."
When the doors of the elevator closed, it had been the last she'd seen of her, as she hid herself away from them covering her head with her trusty hood.
She was kind of glad that at least Anemone hadn't left her to die alone…
"How long has it been?"
"... So you noticed… but I'm not opposed to it…"
"I thought you could cure the virus."
"So did I… but the machines learned my patterns…"
"This means that you…"
A2 could hear Anemone's voice almost breaking at the realization that Number 21 couldn't cure herself. Hearing this now made it even more of an effect knowing her Resistance friend had loved her comrade.
"I'm glad you're here with me… When the elevator reaches the server…"
The click of a gun loading, slow and reluctant…
"Then I'll give you peace."
She'd known this from Anemone's side of the story, though she hadn't told her the exact exchange, just hinted at what had happened, but she would have rather have had her friend telling her all this…
And she didn't want to hear any longer.
"Number 21, the elevator has arrived yet?"
"Just a little more… please… wait…"
It was already a miracle she was able to speak in that condition.
"I made it…"
Just as Number 21 stumbled and fell, unable to support herself on her legs any longer, A2 fell once again too, the irony of it all…
She should have fallen together with them long ago…
"Please… while I'm still myself…"
Her eyes were so damn red, as she took off her visor, and she was shaking so much…
How much pain must have she endured just for the sake of getting them to the server room, just out of sheer willpower?
A2 wished she had just a small portion of that will that day…
"Any last words?"
"Even if I did… who will I pass them to?"
"I'll listen, even if I'll join you soon."
A2 hadn't known of that promise, Anemone had kept that fact hidden from her, and now these machines would stain that thing too. She would have wanted to hear it from her friend's mouth, not like this!
Perhaps she would have never even told her, and it would have been okay. Everyone had something to hide in the end.
"I'm glad I met you… these memories… are real…"
Because none of them had any real memories, just training sessions at the Bunker, and those false ones that had been implemented into their mind, that should have driven their personalities. But no matter what, they weren't theirs, they didn't belong to them.
"Thank you…"
Another shock and A2's body was trembling almost the same way Number 21's was, or how much Anemone's hand was shaking as she pointed it to the Scanner's head.
And all that Number 21 could do… was to leave with one sincere last smile…
One that only Anemone had the luck and the misfortune to witness, because just now A2 realized that her former comrade had never smiled at anyone before.
How she wished she would have lived long enough to keep smiling that way…
But as the shot of Anemone's gun rang, it reminded her that it had been too late, and Number 21's body fell motionless on the ground.
And then… she watched Anemone point that same gun at her head…
However she was still alive today, so it meant…
"She's quite the coward."
"Coward like you, Number 2."
"Why are you doing this?" she demanded, as Anemone's desperate cry of rage and sorrow resonated in the air.
She had failed to keep her end of the promise to Number 21, but if A2 could allow herself to be selfish, then it had been better this way, at least someone was still there. Knowing that brought a little comfort when she'd come to know about it.
Again she received no response. If these things thought she'd mock Anemone for fearing death then they were wrong, not when she'd been just the same, and yet she'd been craving it all these years.
If anything, she understood the feeling.
What did these girls know about having feelings anyways? All they could do was laugh, without even knowing the meaning of it!
Again, the images projected shifted, but this time it hadn't been nothing that A2 didn't know herself, and she dreaded the moment they'd show that.
She didn't want to sit through this again!
She wasn't going to watch, she wasn't going to listen, she wasn't going to cry!
With all the strength she had left, she picked herself up yet another time from where she was lying, picking up both swords in her hands, she resumed slashing at the entities, as they kept throwing electric spheres at her, and also, kept showing things and voices around them.
She'd ignore all, she decided.
She would ignore their mocking voices, she'd ignore the sound of Margaret sacrificing herself, blowing up with a bomb, to destroy those machines that had seemed invincible at the time.
She'd ignore Rose's cries as she bravely put an end to her fellow comrade that had been infected, she'd ignore her rageful screams and all the gunshots she fired to the two dolls when she lost it all.
She'd ignore the sound of the Resistance Leader's neck snapping as she fell dead like everyone else. She'd ignore her own cries as she and Number 4 were forced to kill more Resistance members that had been infected, and Daisy right after.
But she could no longer ignore Number 4's small voice as she too fell victim to those two entities…
"I'm sorry… Number 2… I can't do anything right…"
"No! It's my fault, this is all my fault for dragging everyone in this…"
"You're wrong, Number 2… we're all here because we chose to be here… Thank you, for giving meaning to my life..."
These words… what kind of meaning she could have given to someone's life if they were all dead now!?
More pain and mockery had followed, along with the realization that they had just all been created to be mere sacrifices and nothing more, that they all had been nothing more than simple toys in someone else's hands with no worth.
She remembered quite vividly how much it hurt to cut her own chest open and getting rid of that bomb, so that White wouldn't have set it off whenever it tickled her fancy, and waste everyone's efforts by killing her with the simple press of a button.
"Number 2… live…"
She listened to her own desperate scream when Number 4 set of her own bomb, the last thing she recalled doing was reaching for her, before everything burned away. She hadn't been conscious through the whole fall of the server, but when she woke up, there was nothing more than a smoking crater, and herself, broken to pieces but alive.
Lost in reminiscing she hadn't noticed the barrage of spheres coming at her until they hit her.
Falling backwards, her body spasming with foreign electric currents running through it, she waited for it to end.
How ironic that she would die to the same people that killed Number 4 after all these years…
She closed her eyes as more spheres were thrown at her, and yet… the pain of it all never came.
"That's enough!"
When she dared to open her eyes again, before her stood 2B, she'd destroyed those attacks directed at her before they could kill her…
"I don't know who the hell you are, and I don't know what you want, but I will not sit back as you torment my friend any longer!"
2B's glare was directed to the two machine lifeforms, and while she didn't know the whole thing, or anything much, she could only assume those had been A2's old comrades, she was not going to watch them torture her.
"How amusing."
"Another Number 2."
A2 attempted to get up again, but she fell back down, her legs wouldn't support her, and 2B noticed it.
"I'll take care of this." the older android wanted to argue, but 2B's confident nod made her desist.
And as if wanting to join her, Pod 042's voice chimed in.
"Proposal: do not destroy the enemy."
"What? Why?" why wouldn't they want to destroy these things? How else were they supposed to kill them?
Pod began explaining something in big terms that A2 couldn't understand, but apparently 2B could, something about saturating the enemy's consciousness.
"Can you run?" was all 2B asked.
A2 nodded, but again she struggled to stand, so the younger android moved to hold her up.
"Bear with me for a bit."
"Won't they hurt you too?" but 2B simply shook her head. "I'm just a mere consciousness, no body to hurt anymore, but you, they can."
Together, they danced around the barrage of shots that only kept increasing the more of those dolls spawned around them, and A2 watched as 2B demanded to her Pod to back them up and shoot the orbs so they couldn't reach them, as with her free hand, 2B slashed away the ones that came too close.
But, weak she may have been, but hell if she let her younger twin do all on her own, so she did the same thing, earning a nod from the other android.
Just when everything was threatening to overwhelm them, it stopped…
The two could only watch in wonder and confusion, as the seemingly inseparable machine entities turned on each other, for what reason they didn't quite understand but it didn't matter anymore, as the entities destroyed all the clones.
And subsequently their own selves were left, so, 2B dragged A2 closer, and with a look of understanding, they slashed down one of the dolls each, terminating them.
Just like that, A2 was hurled back into the real world and the Tower, and 2B went back to just being a simple voice.
"Thanks, 2B." she couldn't have gotten out without her. "I couldn't just watch them torment you like that, and besides, I have a promise to keep." to Robin, and her last wishes.
"Those people were your friends, right?" A2 just nodded.
"Now you see why I was so afraid of losing her too?" struggling a little to stand, A2 picked herself up.
Those machines had done a number on her, but her body was still working, and besides, most of the damage hadn't been physical.
"I never realized how important they all were to me, until they were no longer there…"
"Sometimes you can only realize how important someone is to you when you lose them." and 2B knew that kind of pain well too.
Slowly walking forward, she reached the terminal of the elevator, lightly tapping the button to begin the ascension towards the top.
"Are you sure you can deal being with me should we meet 9S again?" she didn't want to speak those words out loud, but both knew that if he wasn't willing to listen to reason, then they'd have to fight.
And there was not telling how it would end up being.
She may even have to…
No… try all she might she would do everything in her power not to kill him.
"I have no choice…"
If she, no, they could save at least one person…
It was not too late for him, not yet.