Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Damn it. God damn it!

The thought echoed in Craft's head ad nauseam as he fled the scene, only just having caught the flash of light as X and his subordinates warp in in his rear view. He wasn't sure he could push this bike any faster without the risk of overheating. He didn't really know where he was going other than away.

Damn it!

They were nipping at his heels and showing no signs of letting up. Even after he pinged a few down with a couple well aimed shots, Phantom's infantry and supplementary policemen would replace the fallen soldiers. It was like cutting off the heads of a hydra. He just had to keep driving.

It felt like the air was pushing back at him at these speeds, squeezing him flat against his bike. The raindrops felt like a million tiny needles against his face. He was fucked and he knew it.

He had one task, and he blew it. He let X have Zero. Not only did he fail Zero, but now the entire world thought he was a terrorist and a kidnapper who beat X's partner into obedience. Sure, Brise had acted amicably towards them, mostly out of spite, but Craft doubted there were too many like her.

Bullets flew past him, bouncing off stretches of road around him. He had to go back for Zero, even though he knew he had to have been taken away by now. Even when a glance over his shoulder revealed a wall of soldiers trailing him who were told to shoot to kill, Neo Arcadia's military might bearing down on him. He needed to go back. The only reason he was alive was because Zero needed him. Now what was there to do? He was only one man, and no matter how extraordinary he was, he couldn't be the sole saviour Zero needed right now.

Deafening muzzle flashes ignited the open alleyways, disturbing the darkness with bursts of white light. He had to go back, but he couldn't. What good was he for Zero if he was dead? He opened up the throttle and accelerated away like a racehorse feeling the prick of the spur. Neo Arcadia had the canonical transerver system on lockdown, that was true, but dead spots would appear from time to time. A hole in the inhibitory network had opened up nearby, close enough for Craft to exploit before it could get patched back up.

A grenade had been thrown in his path. He could pump the brakes before getting caught in the path, and he did, but coming to a complete stop at those speeds almost threw him off the bike. It took a second for his organs to shift back into place.

Soldiers piled into the alleyway, clad in military power armour that made even Craft feel small. Opaque masks robbed them of their own faces, as though there was no man within. Their voices boomed through their exterior speakers, distorted and harsh. Craft didn't quite catch what they were saying, nor did it matter. It was nothing good. He turned his bike around, swerving to evade a hail of gunfire sent his way.

When his mind was racing like it was, the streets no longer made sense. They wrapped around and converged on themselves, shapes and forms all blending into a smear of colour. The walls of alleyways were closing in on him, as though they were the veins and arteries of one massive living thing constricting around him. Escape was steadily slipping away from reach as soldiers barricaded each and every street, every intersection and junction, herding him into a box until he was bouncing back and forth between roads and going nowhere at all.

A drone came howling overhead, veering around in a razor sharp turn and flying into his path, sending a flurry of bullets into his trajectory. Craft tried to stop, tried to swing his bike around and run, but he was slowing down. It hurt.

A bullet pierced through the armour at his wrist, and the pain was immediate and sharp, enough to throw Craft off balance. He toppled from his bike, his ride chaser wavering from his path and skidding to a stop. He tumbled to the ground, asphalt shearing sheets of armour and flesh from his body. A thousand different injury warnings flashed on his HUD, and though he couldn't quite catch what they were saying in his logical brain, Craft could feel every single one of them.

He breathed in hard through his teeth, gripping at his side where the bullet had run through him. His shoulder had been dislocated, as had his ankle, maybe his elbow and a couple fingers for good measure. It didn't really matter, Craft's mind was growing so light, it all conglomerated into one ubiquitous agony. The drone disappeared into the clouds as the same soldiers in colossal power armour moved in, the sound of their heavy steps, marching in tandem, slowly intruding on the ringing in Craft's audial.

They were speaking in some Outer Sector reploid creole that Craft was struggling to piece together. He slowly stood up, rubbing his head over the back of his helmet where it had smacked into the asphalt. Blood had streaked through his hair, coating his palm. He tried to force his secondary systems into a reboot, but his primaries refused to let himself be vulnerable. He stood up unsteadily, let his joints and hydraulics slide back into place and raised his arms weakly over his head.

"W-Warten Sie!" Craft started, but bit down before his vocaliser could betray his better interests. He knew it didn't sound right, but the wires in his brain were too crossed to figure out why. They said something back to him, but he couldn't figure it out. His proprioceptive system was still coming back to him, and so even if he tried, he wouldn't be able to find his cannon quick enough to save him. There were voices behind him too now, speaking orders in a language he didn't know.

"Oy, en el floor al'armas takk!"

"Laamove tus, haa? 'Aw we blow off head takk, sadicki."

Craft shook his head and closed his eyes tight. "Ich weiß nicht, was ihr da sagt!" he yelled back, too confused to say anything else. It did nothing to diffuse the tension hanging in the air, and they set fire upon him. At that moment, he felt like nothing more than a cornered animal. There was nowhere to run.

So he attacked. He lunged at the soldiers with arms splayed open like a linebacker going in for the tackle, slamming into the reploid stood in front of him. The confines of power armour made it impossible for them to move side-to-side too quickly, and so the reploid could only brace himself before the warbot crashed into him. Craft wasn't sure what he was even doing, acting purely on instinct as he pinned the soldier down and drove his fist down on the power armour's face mask over and over, cracks splintering across the thick plastic covering.

Thoughts swirled in his head too quickly for him to hold onto any one for too long. He was in pain, he was probably concussed, and more than anything else, he was mad. Mad at X, mad at his army, mad at himself. All he could really think about was Zero. This was for Zero. It was supposed to be for Zero.

Craft's vision was too obscured with blind rage to realise he had broken through the soldier's facemask and was just short of completely rendering his head into sheet metal when their comrades finally managed to tear him from their body. His systems were running red hot as his parasympathetic network took over. He would rip himself from their grip, bullets ricocheting from his armour as he threw fists and kicks haphazardly, mauling the armoured soldiers without a shred of grace or reason.

He was supposed to protect Zero. That was the only reason he was alive. He was supposed to protect Neige. He was supposed to do a lot of things. He could only think about his failure and the feeling of his hands ripping and tearing into wiring and synthetic flesh. It was so natural.

Suddenly, everything was quiet, and the hands that were on him fell limp around him. Craft lifted himself from the ground, hands, chest and face almost fully covered in blood like a lion having just torn apart its prey. His gaze was too wide, too wild, mouth hanging open slightly as thick viscera dribbled from his stubbled chin. The people around him had fallen to the ground all at once.

Someone was walking towards him. They were speaking, it sounded familiar, they looked familiar, but their face was unequipped with a name. Craft bared his teeth and made low, rumbling bellows from the pit of his pulmonary sac. Any attempts at threat assessment returned an error that, at current, Craft didn't have the cognitive capacity to interpret. The stranger put his hand on Craft's helmet and spoke a string of words that might've made sense individually, but were incomprehensible together.

And then everything made sense again. It was like his mind and body had reunited after being sheared into two.

"Get up," the stranger said, "you need to go."

"Wh-what did you do to me?" Craft stammered. Despite having come back down to Earth, the stranger still made no sense. He couldn't describe what he looked like because his visage seemed to change almost instantaneously as soon as the information reached his processor. "Who are you?"

"Doesn't matter. Run," he insisted. "You're running out of time."

That warp point was going to close up. Figuring out whatever this person was had to wait, and Craft got up, running over the bodies in his path to reach his bike. He looked over his shoulder at the stranger before speeding off, but he wasn't there.

The rain was beating down, never letting up. The blood washed off from him, cleansing him of the remains of the fracas. He opened his wrist terminal to gauge the borders of the inhibitory deadzone and entered the coordinates to the Rebellion Safehouse. He swallowed hard, struggling with the decision to run. At this point, there was no reason to turn back around. Zero was long gone, his Halo ID had disappeared from transmission range.

He hooked himself and his bike into his warp drive and started up the initiation protocol, feeling the iron grip of gluon stabilisers overwhelm him. This was it, he was escaping. He was safe. He had to live, and it didn't feel good. The warpdrive ripped him away from the alleyways before reinforcements could catch up with him.

Zero wasn't a human, but he knew that there were many things that he and humans had in common.

One of those things was a sort of emotional limit everyone possessed. When he was younger, he came to realise that with Iris.

When she had died, Zero vowed to stay at her side until he had no choice but to go. For the first few hours, he had spent them cradling her body as she faded away, shivering in place and hyperventilating because he was unable to cry. He begged her to come back, knowing he wouldn't get an answer. He weeped, he pleaded and he banged his fists on her body, waiting for her to get back up.

By the time it was 2 in the morning, Zero had gotten bored. He was exhausted. Waiting did nothing to really soothe the pain. It was then he realised people couldn't bear feeling just one thing for so long. People got bored of monotony, even if it was the gut-wrenching, awful monotony of standing vigil over the dead body of someone he loved. It was shameful, but X had confided in him he knew what it was like. When he was young, it happened to him with a dog that had been gifted to him by Cain. A labrador, golden and friendly and soft, good for children and good for a new life. When he slowed down, no longer able to run alongside X on walks in Abel City's park, X didn't really understand. The vet came back with bad news, and X, like Zero, vowed to stand by the dog's side until he passed in the night. Until the tears dried up, and X felt nothing.

Zero was feeling the same sense of emptiness as X dragged him back to his room in the citadel. He had screamed and thrashed, he cried, he tried to make himself heavy and limp and immovable, but nothing worked. They were so much stronger than he was, and there were so many of them. He was angry, he was miserable, but he could only feel that way for so long until he wore himself out.

The hallways of the citadel were wide and airy, colonnades letting the wind thread through the tower. The open stoae provided a degree of freedom not offered by the claustrophobic corridors of the resistance base, where necessity dictated it. Workers littering the halls made way for X, growing mum when they passed them by. Their gazes were fixed on him, faces blank, though Zero didn't look up to meet their stares. X didn't say a word, though Zero knew tension was simmering violently beneath his skin, bursting at the seams, but he contained it. Leviathan was at his heels, her stoic, unfeeling expression looking entirely foreign on her face.

He hoped Leviathan would break and fight back against her father and save him. He hoped she could be better. Whenever he looked into her eyes, she returned only a fleeting glance before looking away again. Maybe she cared about his plight and her hands were tied, maybe she couldn't care less. Whatever she truly felt, she did nothing but walk him through the tower.

They closed in on X's room in the citadel without speaking a word, without any fanfare upon the rescue of their kidnapped saviour. Zero could tell X wanted to say something with the way the corner of his lip twitched. X threw Zero forward, the warbot groaning with effort as he fell to knees with his arms still shackled behind his back.

"Leviathan. Go check on Harpuia. And check if there's any word back from Fefnir and Phantom while you're at it," X commanded. "The rest of you are dismissed."

The soldiers were a chorus of affirming calls, obediently all saluting at the same time before scurrying off into the citadel. Leviathan's eyes lingered on Zero for a moment until she too departed. Despite what Zero hoped for, she didn't stay, didn't do anything to help him. Perhaps it was stupid, Zero thought, to believe she would do anything for him. X grabbed him by the crook of his elbow and pulled him upright, punching his passcode into his room and providing his biometrics for secondary authentication. Zero was tired of fighting back at that point. It was better to let X do what he wanted.

They passed through the several gates leading to X's quarters. It was still the same as Zero remembered it when he had last braved its four walls. The door slammed shut behind them and X threw Zero to the floor. Finally alone together. X dropped the act.

"Why do you do this to me?!" He yelled, all the tension and fury in his heart erupting all at once, like lightning striking all around. "Why do you have to make it so hard? Talk to me, Zero."

Zero felt his mouth grow dry, a bitter copper taste rising from the back of his throat. He tried pushing himself away on the floor, but X just closed the distance he made between them, looming over him with a shadow oppressive and vast. The words didn't come too easily, not when fear wringed Zero's core. X's lips were curled back, teeth grinding and bared, the space between his eyebrows creasing and wrinkled.

"You hurt me, you know that?" X was almost growling. He never used to speak like that to him, and remembering that made things hurt even worse. Zero closed his eyes and looked away, as though shielding himself from an impending strike. "Look at me. Tell me, why do you do this to me?"

Zero sealed his lips shut, and he shook his head. This couldn't be real. Maybe it was a nightmare. Maybe he'd wake up in an alleyway in the Outer Sectors at Craft's side, cradled in the safety of the tarp he wore like a poncho. Maybe the rain finally stopped.

"I don't like doing this. I don't like how you keep just– pushing me to be this way!" X continued. He was pacing back and forth in front of Zero, systems running hot. "Just stop, okay? Stop all of this."

He wasn't waking up. Zero wasn't sure if there was anything he could say that would suffice a good enough answer. X let out a sharp sigh and stopped in front of Zero.

"Why don't you tell me now. Are you done? Done playing maverick?" X asked coldly. "Did it feel good? Being bad? Getting worse? Because I'm fed up with dealing with you."

Zero swallowed, struggling through the acrid taste in his mouth and the lump in his throat. He tried to answer, but all he could manage was a broken stutter. X set his jaw, letting the question die without an answer.

"You just can't help yourself, can you? You just can't let yourself be happy with what you have. What you've been given. Do you know what I've given you? I've given you a place in this world. Could it hurt you to be grateful for once?" X said. Zero tried to shuffle away, the shackles at his wrists clicking together with the motion. His wrists were sweaty and chafing where the plastic grinded against him. "You can be really selfish, Zero. Do you know what your little maverick act cost us? You put hundreds of innocent lives in danger. Redirected our efforts to rescuing you instead of doing things to make this city safer. You kill my men without a second thought, you humiliate my son, you destroy my city, and now you want to act like you're an innocent little victim, now you want to make a scene? Think, Zero. For once in your goddamn life! Stop running away when things get hard and just talk to me!"

The memory of Bosaso in ruins, the old city rendered to piles of rubble returned to his mind. He could still hear the sounds of survivors trapped under fallen buildings, begging for help that would never come. Still warm bodies crushed under debris, torn in half, missing heads, melted into their clothes, disfigured to the point they would never be identified. The smell of death and smouldering ashes thick in the air, concrete debris smeared with the blood of the deceased.

X was a hypocrite, and that made him furious. Zero snarled at him, straightening his posture.

"Then what about Bosaso?!" Zero finally spoke up, raising his voice to meet X's own. "I saw it all, X. You killed those people. You took away their homes, their family. Every single one of those people had a life and you stole that from them. You left them with nothing. You can't hide that from me anymore, X."

"Oh please." X was laughing, only worsening Zero's ire. "Those people were dangerous, Zero. We were targeting terrorists. Terrorists that kill innocent civilians to fulfil their own selfish desires. Terrorists that hold people like you hostage. You're just too ignorant to understand that," X said, circling the room like a tiger psyching up his prey. "You have no idea what kind of inhumane evil they commit, Zero. You don't see it when they strike down aircraft with civilian scientists on board, you don't see it when they blow up key infrastructure and send entire sectors into lockdown. You don't see it when they steal, lie, cheat and destroy the city I built, hurt the people I swore to protect. So I suggest you stay out of this fucking conflict and just… just do what I fucking ask of you for once!"

Despite shackles binding him, Zero unsheathed his claws, his snarl deepening in its intensity. "So were the children terrorists, too? The mothers? What about the ones you left disabled for the rest of their lives? Their pets? Were they all terrorists, X?"

X laughed again, intentionally patronising. Zero hated that smirk on his face. It wasn't him. At least, it wasn't what he was. "You don't get it, do you?"

"No, X. I don't."

There wasn't an immediate response. Instead, X opened his hand terminal and unlocked the cuffs around his wrists. They fell to the ground in a heap. He was free, but X was standing squarely in the way.

"So answer me, how much more damage can they do before we get to defend ourselves? How many more people can they kill with impunity before we start shooting back?" X drilled. "What are we supposed to do?"

"You made it this way, X," Zero spat. "If you'd just leave them alone–"

"There is no leaving them alone! The world isn't so large anymore, Zero. This–" he gestured wildly out the window, "this is all we have left. Every maverick attack is an attack on all of civilization as we know it," X yelled back, his volume ever rising.

"You can't just enforce punitive measures like this. You would've been punished–"

"By who?! Do you see the UN? Do you see the Hague? They're all gone. But I remain. I'm all that's left keeping our people from descending into anarchy," X said. "What about the children and mothers murdered by the terrorist militia? Should we just let them conquer Neo Arcadia? What makes you think they'd be any better than me?"

Zero was too furious to even speak. He shook and breathed hard and fast, claws drawn. X's gaze flickered downward to see that they were.

"What, are you going to attack me?"

Zero couldn't answer. X harrumphed.

"You won't do it."

Maybe in the past, X would think twice about testing Zero like that.

"X, you need to stop this." His voice was a little more breathy than he would've liked.

"Why should I? They're mavericks, Zero."

"Because I can't let you escalate this any further. If you let this turn into a war, you idiots will kill everyone left on this fucking planet!" Zero yelled. "You need to compromise!"

"There is no compromising with those people."

"They're not those people. They're just people."

"Easy for you to say." X's voice was thick with revilement. "Look, Zero. I don't know what Craft did to you but–"

"He didn't do anything–!"

"Shut up. Shut up and let me speak. I don't know what he's led you to believe but these people are mavericks. If we let them win, we'll let them destroy everything we have left. I am a Maverick Hunter, so were you, and I will not stop until I turn those terrorists into nothing but dust. You know why?"

He leaned in until only a few inches parted them. "Because that is my job."

Zero acted before he could even think of acting. He swung his claws at X, aiming for the throat. X caught his wrist before it could make contact, holding it still with an iron grip that made Zero wince.

"Don't. Don't do that."

He threw Zero's hand aside like he was swatting a fly. Zero stepped away, expecting retribution, but it wouldn't come. X crossed his arms and shook his head. "I'm giving you a chance, Zero," he said instead. With a deep breath, Zero settled himself, claws sheathing back into their sockets. He balled his fists tightly, teeth still clenched.

"I know exactly what you are, X," Zero murmured, raspy and low. "At first, I thought this couldn't be you, that you would never do this. The thing is, I get it now. You spent your entire life fantasising about doing these things but you knew you couldn't. But now you have an excuse, you can finally do good on every terrible fantasy you've ever had." Zero's brow furrowed. "I know what you are. You're a killer, X."

For a moment, X didn't say anything. His lip was twitching, running through the words in his head.

"And you aren't?"

"I never said I wasn't," Zero replied. X hummed an exasperated sigh.

"I just don't know what I'm gonna do with you now." He walked away, shaking his head and kneading the bridge of his nose. "I know you hate hearing this, but everything I'm doing, it's for your own good, Zero. You just don't understand, and look, you can't. You just can't. Buddy, you weren't here. You haven't seen what they've done."

"Don't buddy me. I can't stand you."

"I know you can't, but just hold on," X insisted. "Listen to me. You were asleep for a century. A lot of things have changed since then. This isn't a 'two sides' situation, Zero. We're long past that. You just… you stay out of this. Please. This isn't something you can grapple with, you hear me? This is just not something you can understand or solve."

Zero narrowed his gaze. "What is that supposed to mean?"

"It means you're ignorant, Zero," X answered. It was so blunt, so aloof, Zero flinched backwards like he had just been punched in the gut. "There are some things you just don't get. If you could just accept that, we wouldn't be having this conversation."

He was speaking through gritted teeth. Zero didn't realise it, but he was backing away slowly, up until his back hit the wall. He slid down until he was on the floor again, eyes fixed at the ground.

"Hey. Eyes on me," X said. His tone had softened, warm and low, but the command still held a chill to it. X got to his knees and took Zero's hand, looking over his injuries. He was covered in crusted over, dried blood, the oily substance iridescent in the early morning sunlight. "See? You're hurt. I asked you to stay out of this for this exact reason. Now look at what happened to you."

X's other hand cupped Zero's cheek, caressing his skin with a feathery touch. There were a lot of things brewing in Zero's head- there were rebuttals to his arguments, there were curses, wishes and hope that someone would come save him, but it wasn't worth speaking any of those things. It was a time where Zero was better off not saying anything at all.

"Can we just… talk like we used to? I still love you, Zero," X said. Zero wrapped a tentative hand around X's wrist, pressing his hand against his cheek. This man hurt him. He hurt a lot of people. Yet, it was still X, and despite everything, Zero still found comfort in his touch. His mind was in all sorts of knots trying to make sense of his feelings. He hated him. He missed him, too. He knew X had hurt him. He knew he didn't have to accept his abuse.

"Oh, Zero…"

He pulled Zero into his arms and overwhelmed him with his embrace. Fear and comfort tangled within him until he didn't feel anything at all. He just let it happen to him.

"I'm sorry," X whispered, resting his chin where Zero's neck met his shoulder. He fit so perfectly in that crook, and the moral part of his conscience resented that. "I wish it didn't have to come to this. Please, just let me take care of you. Can you let me do that?"

No, Zero thought, but he wouldn't say it. No, I can't do that.

After a wordless moment X released him, giving him some space. "I've called for a nurse to look at your injuries. You should have a shower. You'll feel better after one."

Zero remained quiet. He pulled his knees to his chest and leaned against the bed.

"I'm sorry, but you're going to have to stay here for a while. I hope you can understand."

He wouldn't, not really. It wasn't worth fighting him anymore. X sighed, turning his back on him and looking out the window. "There will be two guards outside my room. If you want to leave, just give them a call on the intercom and someone will be with you."

Zero's throat felt tight. Nothing had changed. He was trapped in X's grasp again, and there was little he alone could do about it. He nestled his face in the crook of his arms and closed his eyes, hoping it would change anything.

"...I need to go now. I'll be back soon. Everything you need should be in here."

With nothing more to say, X walked away, leaving through the doors and leaving Zero on his own. Too often these days, Zero lamented, he wished he could cry too.

Craft gasped as everything reformed around him once more, his atoms torn from the stormy alleyways of the South-East comms district to the safety of Rebellion territory.

He hit the brakes, bike skidding to a halt before he could flatten himself against the wall of the abandoned warehouse he warped into. LADAR revealed no one in the vicinity, and he sent out an exploratory query over the airwaves that no one responded to. Craft wetted his lips nervously, slowly dismounting his ride chaser and kicking out the bike stand. Even now, miles away from the soldiers chasing after him, his processor still raced, his energy core running as hot as a furnace.

Closing his eyes, Craft took in a deep breath, filled his lungs and held it, counted to five, and let it go slowly through his dorsal vents. He shook himself down, spraying rainwater in all directions like a wet dog. Blood still coated his armour, seeping into all the divots and seams of his plating. When he tried to wipe his face dry, it smeared down his face, meeting the old blue steak of colour Ciel painted from his temple down to his chin.

He stared blankly at his hand, opening and closing his bloodied fist. I messed up, Neige. I've become someone I don't like. Someone you don't like. Someone who turns fear into violence.

Sunlight was streaming through a hole in the ceiling, dust dancing in the rays. The rain clouds had begun to clear out as the morning crept in. The disparity between the time his chronometer offered and the perpetual darkness of the storm had muddled his sense of time until it felt like he was trapped in an eternal night.

The skin on the back of his neck tingled. Someone's sensors were bouncing off him.

"Oi!"

Craft tore around, holding up his arms in surrender. A reploid, a humanoid model, clad in old Neo Arcadian power armour that was about five versions out of date, tentatively approached him, pointing a rifle straight at him. The power armour's helmet had long since had its visor punched out, revealing the man's light, sandy brown skin and stern expression. After his run in with the soldiers, Craft's first thought was to turn heel and run, but his logical half told him that'd just end with the man opening fire.

MeReAD stated he was a civilian model, but he had the natural demeanour and stance of a soldier. "Stand, stand, fifteen metres, buddy. State your reason for being here."

The Neo Arcadian emblem had been haphazardly pried off his armour, a piece of scrap welded over to cover the gash in its plating.

"...I'm a friend of the cadres," Craft tried. The man squinted, looking him up and down critically, before his eyes opened up in realisation.

"Ahh. I knew I seen you before, you's the maverick from the TV," the man said, his tone softening as he lowered his rifle. "I thought you looked familiar. Sorry 'bout that."

"I need to talk to your boss," Craft said, kicking his bike stand in and walking away without waiting for an answer. The man hurried over to meet his stride.

"Woah, hold on, brother. I still ain't know why you're here."

"It's not any of your business."

"Sort of is. Boss man is busy."

"Too bad." Craft shouldered through the warehouse doors into a cold storage room. Vehicles of different condition were hidden unconvincingly under tarps, shoe boxes full of ammunition and explosives sitting around on shelves gently setting Craft's threat assessment off. He called on his cloud connection protocol and sent out a search query.

[Hello, Vile Victor-Alpha-Victor-Alpha-Fiver-Fiver, this is Craft Kilo-Niner-Echo, if you read please squawk IDENT.]

"Say, you's was with Zero. Where's he?" the man prodded.

[Victor-Alpha-Victor-Alpha-Fiver-Fiver. Thought you'd never come. Give me a minute, will you? I'm sending the XO down.]

[Make it quick.]

[Not a miracle worker.]

Craft made a percussive grunt. The man was still matching his footsteps. "Hey. Did you hear me?"

"The first time, yes."

"Then…?" He leaned in front of him, expecting an answer. Craft pushed him aside with his side, taking a tarp from the wall and throwing it over his bike.

"Look, buddy, I've had a pretty shitty day," he said without looking at him, "so if you could turn around and walk away before you piss me off and make me do something stupid I'll regret, that would be great."

The chatty man suddenly had little to say. He raised his arms and bowed his head.

"Shit man, sorry. I'll be outside."

The heavy steps of power armour shifting and hissing with every motion grew further away, until the door to the storage room shut behind him. Alone again, Craft made a sigh, taking off his helmet and tucking it under his elbow.

[Hola. Craft Kilo-Niner-Echo. Dynamo Mike-Three-Sierra here, squawk IDENT if you're reading, si si? Meet you in the tunnels.]

[Craft Kilo-Niner-Echo] Craft said again. [I'll see you there.]

The connection closed momentarily. Craft searched the room for a hatch door covered by a metal shelving unit, shoving it aside.

Craft kept thinking about Zero. He was supposed to be with him. Supposed to be his little shadow, supposed to be the one sliding in through the tiny gap of the hatch door into ancient bomb shelters before him. There were two reploids loitering about the entrance, a handsome she-wolf reploid and a humanoid man with dusty brown hair leaning against the wall and wordlessly nodding and smiling at one another, no doubt shooting the shit in Standard. They stole a glance at Craft as he entered, making his aggressive impulses flare, but they were dampened when he caught the OSA armband on their persons.

Leaving them behind, Craft ventured further into the tunnels, pulling up navigations on his hand terminal. A few dots littered the grid, yellow for the reploids Craft hadn't met, red for the Neo Arcadian officers above ground, and green for Dynamo, who was shuffling his way down from the surface.

Craft had thought over what he was going to say to Zero about Dynamo. What exactly he was going to say to make Zero even a little receptive to the idea of getting help from someone he had reason to distrust. It didn't matter now, he didn't have to say anything. When he looked to his side, Zero still wasn't there, doing a light jog to keep up with his longer strides. Not prodding him about his decisions with a tongue that hadn't quite lost its barbs yet. Wasn't leaning against him, too tired to keep himself upright.

He shut his eyes and gritted his teeth, sending his fist into the wall with a frustrated grunt, a web of cracks splintering in the wall.

"Woah-ho-ho, easy there, boss."

An equine reploid was walking up to him, patting the air in a soothing but abundantly patronising gesture. He had a silvery blue mane and a grin that made Craft feel like bugs were crawling beneath his armour.

"The tunnels are about 200 years old, you know. I really don't feel like dealing with a cave-in right now."

"Give me a break. I've had a terrible past couple hours," Craft snapped back. He was so much larger than the reploid in front of him, but he barely moved an inch when he began approaching, even with armour plates flaring and making himself look more intimidating than he already was.

"What, you think that makes you special? Come on, before you break anything else around here. You look awful."

"Thanks."

"Anytime."

The reploid walked off, but stopped in his tracks before he could make any distance. He looked over his shoulder and cocked his head.

[Where's Zero?]

It was about time Dynamo brought up the elephant in the room. Craft sighed, smoothing his hair back and shaking his head. Eventually, all he could do was laugh.

[I fucked up] Craft said, looking away. [They got him.]

Dynamo's eyes widened, raised brow appearing from behind his red wrap-around visor. [Oh. Craft…]

[I know. I'm mad at myself too.]

For once, Dynamo had nothing to say. [Shit, man.] He paused and pursed his lips. [Let's just get a move on and we can talk later.]

[Good idea.]

They spent the rest of the short walk through the tunnels in silence. Eventually, they reached a ladder leading up through a trapdoor. Dynamo reached into a jacket pocket and pulled out a folded white scarf with a litany of black embroidered patterns all over its surface and tossed it to Craft.

[I suggest you cover up. You're kind of a celebrity these days.]

[Great] he grumbled, wrapping the scarf around his face. He followed Dynamo up the ladder and out the trapdoor, surfacing at the back side of Vile's apartment. They entered through the firescape, making their way to the lobby. Dynamo gave the elevator key a couple urgent presses and waited.

[What's the OSA doing here? I saw them back there] Craft asked in the meantime.

[Spider had to evacuate the branch in Bosaso. We're dealing with them until they figure out what to do about them] Dynamo explained. The elevator rattled to the ground floor and they entered to slowly make their way up.

[Didn't know Vile was doing humanitarian work these days] Craft said.

[Hardly. He needs the extra hands on deck] Dynamo clarified. [Vile's good at racking up goodwill like that.]

The elevator crawled to their destination, coming to a stop with a shudder, and the doors creaked open. Vile's apartment was unremarkable, just another door amongst hundreds to anyone who didn't know what to look for. Dynamo punched his passcode in and the door unlocked with a click.

Despite having met Vile and Dynamo, Craft had never actually visited the heart of the Rebellion. Vile's apartment was entirely innocuous. Messy, very much so, but nothing inside struck Craft as unusual. It fit the Rebellion's guerilla tactics and general absence of any real organisational structure. Their roommates, people who very likely had nothing to do with the Rebellion, lounged on the couch, but they paid him so little mind he may as well have not even been present.

[You could go for a shower. You're leaving tracks] Dynamo pointed out.

[Place's plenty filthy already] Craft said. [I could go for a nap.]

[Just stay out of my bed.] They stopped in front of a row of lockers pressed flush against the wall. [Give me a hand.]

[Sure.] Craft and Dynamo shuffled the lockers aside. [I wasn't planning on getting under your sheets either.]

[Shame.]

Craft shot him a sour look, but wisely decided not to prod. The lockers, cast aside, revealed a hatch door they wasted no time climbing through. Craft grabbed a welded-on handle on the back face of the lockers and pulled them back into place and shut the door behind him. The secret room was nearly pitch black, save for the single dim light at a workbench. Pieces of scrap paper scrawled all over with notes and basic design ideas littered the walls and ground until Craft couldn't even see what colour the room had been painted.

[C'mon stilts. Vile wanted to speak with you about something] Dynamo said, gesturing him over while letting his new-type disguise go. He'd barely changed from what he looked like in centuries-old police reports. Even the artificial skin on his face had hardly sagged.

[Not surprised] Craft said. The man of the hour was hunched over a workbench, fussing over the details of the barrel of a weapon that must have been about as big as Craft. History said he'd been a master weapons engineer in his past life, and that skill had barely waned.

"Sorry to hear about Zero," Vile said without looking up from his work. "I was sort of hoping I'd get to see the look on his face, having to come to me for help."

"Save it. I've already beat myself up enough about it," Craft said, venom creeping into his voice. Vile set down his tools and got up from his seat, joints cracking and locking back into place.

"So, what do you plan on doing now?" Vile asked, crossing his arms. "Still headed to Tabula Rasa?"

That was the sole reason he was here. He mirrored Vile, crossing his arms and cocking his head back.

"Can't," he said curtly. Dynamo made a sly chuckle.

"'Course you can. I could fire up the Tugboat right now for you," Dynamo said. Craft shook his head.

"I need to go back for Zero," Craft insisted. Vile turned his covered nose up at the idea.

"Not happening," Vile said. "You got out of Neo Arcadia the first time on dumb luck. X is not gonna let you even sniff a hair on Zero's head."

Craft looked to Dynamo for his opinion, but he just shrugged with open hands. Sighing, he turned back to Vile, knowing full well he was correct.

"I promised him we'd get out of here together," Craft continued, steadfast in denial. "I'm not leaving until I get him back."

Vile couldn't help but laugh. "That's cute, but still. I can't, in what little good conscience I have, let you do something that stupid."

"Then I'm staying," Craft concluded. "I'm not going without him. I don't know how I'm going to do it, but I'll find a way. I have to."

"Your funeral," Vile said, letting his arms fall to his side. "So now what? Thinking of heading back to the Resistance?"

"I'm not gonna run away," Craft answered. "If there's even the slightest chance I can do something to save Zero, I need to be here to take it."

There wasn't a face he could look at to prove it, but Craft knew Vile was staring at him like he'd grown a second head. He was being unreasonable and he knew it, and Craft didn't really know why he was acting that way either. "There's no changing your mind, huh?"

"No."

"Then I won't bother." He pulled his seat back under himself and sat down. Vile took a pen from his bench and started walking it up and down his fingers. "I suppose it could be worthwhile. Zero's always been his weak point."

"It's not like there's no strategic significance in getting him back. It got X off our asses for a bit, you kidnapping him, I mean," Dynamo said. Craft furrowed his brow.

"He went with me willingly–"

"I know, I'm paraphrasing."

Engaging with Dynamo probably wasn't the best idea. Vile leaned forward and looked aside, leg bouncing vigorously. "Throwing X off his game has its merits, yeah. It's just not feasible with what we have right now. We barely have the munitions to handle one major operation, much less one that takes us into Central. We're idiots, but we're not suicidal."

Entirely understandable, but Craft didn't like hearing it. He could only wait and see if an opportunity presented itself. Maybe see if the Red Sea parts while I'm at it. He scratched his cheek, stubble sounding like rubbing sandpaper, and pressed his lips together in a slight grimace before finally, begrudgingly, deciding to drop it.

"Dynamo said you wanted to speak to me," Craft said.

"He did?" Vile cocked his head, shooting Dynamo a glance. "Well, I do. I expected you wouldn't be leaving Zero behind when I heard the news."

"Did you?"

"Zero has that sort of effect on people like you," Vile said. Craft had the thought to ask what that meant, but let him continue. "You thinking of staying with the Rebellion?"

"Not sure where else I can go."

"Great. And I'm sure you're aware I'm not running a charity here."

Vile leaned back in his chair and crossed his legs. Craft squinted. "What do you want from me?"

"I need your big ass to hold this railgun and fire it at a max security prison." He banged the back of hand against the barrel of the gun he was working on. Craft knitted his brow.

"Why would you want to do that?"

"Because we have a guy we need to break out," Vile replied. It hardly convinced Craft of anything, so Vile continued. "Ciel and I have been working on a thing. You ever heard of Supra Force Metal?"

Craft bobbed his head side to side ambivalently. "Rings a bell."

"It's some sort of epidemensional material that was supposed to bring us into a new age of enlightenment, but bureaucracy got in the way. Typical government bullshit," Vile recounted briefly. "It could've given us access to a dimension of unlimited possibilities, if research hadn't been suspended thanks to some Maverick incidents. Thing is," he leaned against his work bench, "none of the research was ever published, safety concerns and all that. All of it got wiped and they put the rest of the stuff in a box somewhere, like it's smallpox or some shit. We've actually managed to get a hold on some, but that's about as far as we can go. Using it raw is far too wasteful and dangerous. Just… progress is slow. Way too slow."

"And?"

"We haven't figured out how to actually channel that potential into something we can use," Vile said. "There's a guy in Ceres Prison who was experimented on. From the first Rebellion. Shadow, think his name was. We get him out, we can reverse engineer how they translated the raw material into something usable. Sustainable. Could solve a lot of problems."

"No kidding."

"No shit, yeah. So, what do you say? I hate to be the type to come to someone only when I need a favour but…"

"But here we are." Craft glanced over to Dynamo, who seemed to translate Vile's covered face into a visible expression he could decipher. His eyes were hungry with expectation. "I did come to you first."

"That's true," Vile said. "Well?"

With options waning, Craft didn't need too much time to chew on the proposition. "Sure, whatever. Beats sitting on my hands all day."

He couldn't be sure, but when Vile's posture lightened, Craft wondered if he was smiling. If there even was a face under there. "Great. I'll make it worth your time," Vile assured. "In return, you can live here until you figure out what to do with yourself. Deal?"

Vile offered him a hand to shake. Craft pushed out his lower jaw. "You aren't gonna pull a fast one on me? No tricks or nothing?"

"I'd be pretty stupid to piss off a man as big as you," Vile said. Tentatively, Craft gently took his hand and shook it.

"So…"

He reached into a storage compartment and fished out a carton of cigarettes. "You mind if I light up?"

Vile laughed without mirth. "Get the fuck out of my office and take a shower."

Although he eventually woke up, Zero didn't remember falling asleep.

He remembered a nurse had come by X's room and introduced herself, but her name slipped his mind. The autodoc scanned him and promptly injected him with a cocktail of pro-remodelling drugs that lit up his HUD with a full novel of alert messages. After giving the drugs a moment to stabilise in his systems, the nurse gave his wounds a proper clean before sending him off to shower.

Next thing he knew, he was awake, lying naked on the bathroom floor wrapped in a damp towel.

An acrid, bitter taste pervaded his dry mouth and his insides churned with nausea. His head hurt, like his processor was too big for his skull. His joints were stiff and resisted when he tried to move. Though his chronometer told him he had been out six hours since he was last online, he was hardly rested at all. He had passed out.

He wetted his lips and stiffened himself, hoping the subsequent relaxation would ease the tension affecting every inch of him. It didn't, but he forced himself off the cold tile anyway. X mustn't have come back, because everything was exactly as he left it. Zero quickly got dressed before he could freeze into a block and entered the living room.

There was still no sign of X. It was sometime in the evening, the exact time didn't matter. It wasn't like there was anything for him to do.

With a heavy sigh, he sat down on the edge of X's bed and leaned forward, putting his chin in his hands. He tried to reach out to Craft, but the distance was far too large for his cloud connection protocol to function without spitting back an error. It was ridiculous to hope, but he left the gateway open, hoping he'd be hearing Craft's voice in his head any time now.

That voice never did come. He didn't even know if Craft was alive. Maybe he was dead in those alleys, or taken prisoner and X had been gone so long because he wanted to kill him himself. Maybe he had escaped and reached Vile and Dynamo's safehouse. There was no way to know, and it drove him mad. Zero heaved himself to his feet and found a television remote.

It was set to a newsfeed. The anchor man was an older South Asian human with dark skin, ghostly white hair and a level cadence. Zero has caught the tail end of whatever he was saying before he handed it over to a colleague reporting from on the ground. She was a reploid, but Zero could see how she could've been mistaken for a human too. She had a gentle face framed by a light sandy brown hijab. All behind her, army green trucks trundled down gravel roads into the rubble Zero could pinpoint as the ruins of Bosaso. She nodded, wetted her lips and began speaking.

"-That's right, Mitch, ah, the military have just given us the greenlight to enter the Bosaso strip after the anti-terrorist airstrikes on Monday. I'm here at Southbound Bridge C2 at the military checkpoint and I understand we've not been permitted to move any further, but from what we can see and what we've been told, it appears the military operation here has concluded. Just behind me, uh, the State Rescue Services have just begun moving in with much needed relief, they've been working around the clock to deliver food and medicine to the residents here. Now, we've just gotten word from the Secretary of Energy," she looked at her hand terminal for a quote, "they've just sent out a statement saying the conflict has compromised the energy grid, and they're warning residents of the Eastern Sector may experience power outages until further notice. I'm here with Chief Gardiner from the SRS–"

Zero switched the channel. He didn't want to remember Bosaso. Another newsfeed was reporting on a recent statement from X. A human spoke over footage from the South-East border where Zero last remembered seeing Craft. The area had been cordoned off with yellow tape, police and soldiers milling around.

"-A manhunt is underway for known terrorist Craft Fenrisúlfr following the rescue of Master Zero from a highly publicised hostage situation that left countless of soldiers and officers dead and spurred on the response in Bosaso. Fenrisúlfr, who was believed to be implicated in Zero's kidnapping, was last seen escaping police pursuit around the South-East Outer Sector Border, officials say. The suspect is still on the run, and police are appealing for help to track him down–"

Zero turned the television off. He didn't realise before, but his hands were shaking, his free hand balled into a fist at his side. He let the remote fall from his hand and clatter on the coffee table.

Craft was still on the run, so he had to still be alive, that was good. All he needed to do now was get out. With X gone, Zero was comfortable taking a few risks.

He tried the door. There was a biometric lock, a halobrain ID lock and passcodes with prompts that made no sense to Zero. Unsheathing a claw to its fullest extent, long and razor sharp to the point of looking like a needle, he tried messing with the lock mechanism. It didn't do anything. He tried scratching and ripping at the door, but even if it did do anything besides scrape the paint, there were a series of additional gates awaiting him. There was a window, but that too was locked. Running into it just sent him stumbling back, and he felt like an idiot for even contemplating it.

It was a prison cell. Quite a nice cell. Large and boasting all the creature comforts of a luxury hotel, but it was a cell.

There were guards outside who X insisted would answer to his beck and call. Zero had no weapons on hand besides tooth and claw, but perhaps he could make them let him out and then he could strike and run. He doubted he could get very far, but there wasn't anything else he could do. He looked to the kitchen, finding a block with a full set of knives. Trying to rip it out by the handle was futile, it was locked in place by biometrics. X had dotted all his i's and crossed all his t's, and Zero was going nowhere.

With not much else to do until X came back, Zero collapsed onto the couch, curled into a ball, and stared at nothing until he was too tired to keep his eyes open.

The sample of Supra Force Metal, though Ciel just resorted to calling it SuFM these days, was sitting idly in its chamber, taunting Ciel with the idea of a breakthrough while being just perplexing enough to stop her from realising it.

It flickered in and out of her dimension in its storage cylinder, cusped by a rim that shifted through every wavelength of colour, bathing the room in its iridescent glow. Ciel sat at her desk, paralysed with inconclusiveness, swivelling her office chair back and forth. It felt like everytime she came close to figuring it out, she'd uncover a new variable or property that totally contradicted her existing model, and she'd have to rip the page out of her notebook and toss it aside. Eventually her desk was covered in discarded notes, like a sheet of fallen leaves on the forest floor in autumn, incomplete flowcharts and equations scrawled across every inch of their surface.

There was something she was missing. Maybe something she didn't have access to, or she just hadn't considered it yet, or maybe all her theories were wrong and she should just start over. Maybe it was a little bit of all three. The SuFM just eluded her. It was like its properties contradicted itself in parts.

Ciel tapped the end of her pen on her chin. Its tricky nature shouldn't have come as a surprise. It was an inherently alien substance. A material of infinite potential, a gateway to that realm of possibilities from which the reploid race derived its haloencephalon. It could evolve into anything and proliferate endlessly like a totipotent stem cell, if only she could just get a handle on manipulating it. It could solve the energy crisis. Make lithium. Food. Firearms.

And that was infuriating.

They had managed to harness it before. They used it for a weapons project, because it was as though humans simply couldn't envision a future without warfare. That was a long time ago now, sometime before the birth of her great-grandmother. The research was gone, the ones who remembered were few and far between. Ciel wondered if the civilisation who had first refined it was still alive. Had an alien society somewhere made it, or was it a miracle of the natural world? They weren't alone in the universe, that was for certain, but it seemed as though the third planet of the third dimension was no longer a place worth visiting.

"Ciel! Ciel!"

Ciel startled upright and blinked rapidly. Neige came barreling into her room on a mission. Ciel swivelled in her chair in her direction. "What's going on?"

"Turn the TV on, any channel."

With Bosaso still fresh in her mind, she dreaded the worst. She found the remote for her box television and flicked it on to whatever channel it defaulted to. X was standing on a dais, leaning over a podium with Neo Arcadia's flag draped over its body.

"-As you may have been aware, Master Zero of the Neo Arcadian Government had recently been kidnapped and held hostage by maverick extremists. It is my pleasure to announce we have rescued Zero and he has been brought home safely. I must extend my thanks to the brave soldiers of the Neo Arcadian military and police force, and, of course, the civilians who sent in crucial information. Unfortunately, the man who took Zero hostage is still on the run. That, along with increasing terrorist activity in the Outer Sectors, has brought us to the decision to prolong the curfew imposed on the Middle and Outer Sectors indefinitely. This decision was not an easy one, but it was the right one. Until the power grid has been restored in the Eastern Outer Sectors and the maverick issue resolved, all residents beyond the wall must report to their curfew officer by 10pm or face incarceration.

"I repeat, the man who kidnapped Zero is still on the run, and it is imperative that he is brought to justice before the Neo Arcadian State Supreme Court. His name is Craft Fenrisúlfr, he is a caucasian male with medium-length black hair, a scar on his face, and he stands at seven foot, seven inches. Do not, for any reason, approach him. He is a highly adept combat reploid and member of a known terrorist cell. Any and all reports should be sent to 1-200-TERRORWATCH." He looked directly at the camera, red glare sending a shudder down Ciel's spine. "Once again, I must thank you, the people of Neo Arcadia for your cooperation during this trying time. May peace prevail. Thank you."

X left the stage shortly thereafter, followed by a round of applause. Ciel turned the volume down and turned to face Neige, hoping she had something to say, because she definitely didn't. Neige just shrugged.

"I don't know what to do now," Neige admitted. "I mean… fuck me, right?"

"That's what I was thinking," Ciel said. "What can we do? We can't launch an assault on Central just to free him again. X is gonna have the city on lockdown for the foreseeable future."

She put her head in her hands. Neige joined her at her side and patted her shoulder, offering assurance that wasn't at all sufficient. Perhaps it was naive to think it would be so easy.

"I should've sent someone out with them," Ciel mused. She slowly closed her eyes and sighed. "Maybe it was too soon. I don't know."

"We couldn't wait. The military was at our doorstep," Neige said. "We had to let him go. X wasn't going to let us off the hook no matter how long we waited. I wish it didn't have to be this way but we did what we had to. And we have to keep doing what we have to do, even if it means we couldn't save Zero."

"I know, I know…" Ciel leaned back in her chair. "It was what I had to do… I can't save them all."

"We can't. But we have to do what we can to save as many lives as we can," Neige said. Ciel hated the thought, but it was true. She had to mourn the dead and gone and fight for the living. It was the Resistance mantra. It's what Axl would've wanted her to do. "We can't do anything more for Zero. It's up to him. Between you and me, I believe, if anyone could do it, it's him. He's Zero, Ciel."

He was, but he wasn't the Zero spoken of in stories and history books. Still, it was Zero's heart in his chest, no matter what his body had become. "I hope you're right, Neige. I really do," she said. "Sometimes I just wonder if I'm making the right choices here. I'm doing all I can, but it's not the same without Axl."

It was a sentiment that was shared throughout the Resistance, but no one ever said it out loud. Neige stood by silently, staring blankly into nothing. "We're still here. That's something. And you're working towards something that could make things better for everyone. That's progress, isn't it?"

Progress, it was, but it was agonisingly slow. Time wasn't something Ciel had too much of. Her hand terminal chimed with an incoming video call request funnelled in through the transerver network through maybe a thousand layers of encryption. She checked the sender, finding Vile's anonymous callsign in her inbox.

"I gotta take this."

"It's good. Want me to leave?"

"Shouldn't be a problem. Close the door, maybe."

Neige did as told as Ciel pulled up the message on her computer. On her monitor, Vile, in his native state, leaned back into his chair from where he must've been turning on the camera.

"How's life fairing, doc?" he asked. Ciel grimaced.

"Not great. How about you? You heard the news?"

"Everyone has. Shame, shame, really. Hate seeing X get what he wants."

It's a shame that Zero is trapped with an abusive tyrant, actually, Ciel thought. "Right. Why are you calling me? Have you heard from Craft? Neige is here."

"Neige?"

Neige walked into frame. Vile loosened his shoulders, the memory coming back. "Oh yeah. You. One of the good softskins."

"Thanks, brother," Neige said.

"Well, Craft is safe, I can assure you that. We've got him some place safe. Took a pretty hard beating getting away from the cops n' shit but he's fine."

With a heavy sigh of relief, Neige threw her head back, the weight finally lifting from her shoulders. "Wallahi, he kills me sometimes."

Ciel crossed her arms and cocked her head. "When do you plan on getting him past the wall?"

"That's the thing. He ain't leaving," Vile said. "And Ciel? You and I need to talk."

"I figured."

"I'm almost done with that railgun." He reached for an E-can off-camera, lifted his helmet just enough to reveal his chin, took one sip and set it aside. "And now I got someone who can fire it solo."

It took a moment for Ciel to put the pieces together. "Vile, now hold on. You're not saying you're actually going to do that thing you were talking about a while back."

"Oh, I'm doing that thing all right. You and I have been looking into this Supra Force Metal for who knows how long, and where has that gotten us? Look, Ciel. Someone has harnessed this stuff in the past. They had the means to figure it out. They had research equipment we just don't have. They were free to dedicate every waking hour to finding all the ways they can control Supra Force Metal's power. We don't. I'm working out of a cabinet in a shitty apartment. You're stuck in a big ass Faraday cage who knows where. We're dealing with the fallout of Bosaso. We're trying not to die of starvation. And there's literally one guy in the entire world who's still reaping the benefits of Supra Force Metal, and he's stuck in the Ceres Max Security Prison getting shot up with so many drugs he probably doesn't even know his own name. I'm taking the initiative. We need to. We can't fight X with what we have. We're one assault on Neo Arcadia away from a solution."

Ciel opened her mouth, but she failed to find the words. "Vile, I don't think that's a good idea."

"Why not? This'll change everything for us. We'll finally have the means to take X down. We'll have energy, we'll have materials. We'll have weapons. With such an invaluable asset, Neo Arcadia will have no choice but to fold to our demands. We'll be free."

"I know that but… things are tense, Vile. Bosaso was a warning. If we do anything too extreme right now, X isn't going to show us mercy. We've been skirting the line for far too long. We can't risk exposing any more innocent people to Neo Arcadia's wrath."

"People may die, but this is a war, Doctor. That's the price we have to pay," Vile insisted. "We can fight back now and end this, or we can wait, and let the reploids out here suffer. We need to do something. The OSA agrees with me."

"But–"

"But what? Keep letting X kill us until he gets bored?" Vile snapped. "We cannot just sit back and let him get away with this. We must speak in displays of power. Power is the language of the oppressor, Ciel. We must speak their language, or we will just be ignored."

There were some things Ciel just couldn't understand about Vile. It was why they weren't one unified movement. "Vile, I implore you to reconsider. He'll take retaliatory action on people who weren't involved if you give him the reason to. You're going to make it worse. The Resistance can't handle caring for any more refugees right now."

"X was going to kill us regardless of the actions we're willing to take. He doesn't care that you told me to stop, or that you're one of the good ones. We're all just mavericks to him. This is something we have to do. I wish you the best, Ciel. We'll speak later."

"Wait, Vile–"

Vile leaned forward and shut off the feed, and her screen turned to black. Ciel groaned and collapsed back in her chair, the backrest recoiling with her weight. She kneaded the bridge or her nose.

"He's gonna do it. He's breaking into Ceres," Ciel grumbled. "Oh my God."

Neige stuck her hands in her pockets and whistled a sinking tone. "Rough. What are you thinking, boss?"

Ciel rested her cheek on her palm and turned to Neige. "Oh, I'm thinking a lot of things."

"I bet. Should I piss off?"

"That'd be great."

Neige began backing up until she stood in front of the door, grabbing a hold of the handle. "Sir, yes sir."

"Thanks for coming by, Neige."

She left into the corridors, shutting the door behind her. Ciel deflated with a long, deep exhale. The refugees of Bosaso were getting worse before they were getting any better. They had injuries their self-repair just couldn't fix. Things on the surface were too tense for any Resistance officers to risk purchasing the spare parts. Zero was stuck in the citadel. Craft was safe at least, though she couldn't say how long that would last. Now Vile was launching an all out attack on Ceres Prison on account of a vague rumour, all but guaranteeing a war between the Outer Sector movements and Neo Arcadia.

Ciel hadn't slept in over fifty hours. Her exosuit had been injecting her with a steady stream of amphetamines and ephedrine to keep her on her feet, but she was starting to feel the imminent stimulant crash creeping up on her. She wiped her face down and sniffled.

There were so many people relying on her. She couldn't let them down, she had to be there for them.

Ciel switched the light off and fell onto her bed, her eyes getting too heavy to keep open. In the darkness, the SuFM glowed dimly, multicoloured rays of light splitting from the storage cylinder, hitting her ceilings and walls like it was a sky full of rainbow stars. It was the last thing Ciel remembered looking at before her eyes fluttered shut.

They already figured it out. The solution is out there, we just need to rediscover it. I hope Vile knows what he's doing.

Then she was gone.

Zero slept, and when he slept, he dreamed.

Zero was walking down the corridors of the citadel which was, at the same time, halls of the Maverick Hunters headquarters back in North America. It was just as he remembered. The walls were lined with greyish-blue plastic and fibreglass panelling, the halls far too thin for three people to walk shoulder-to-shoulder comfortably. There were people walking by, but their faces didn't make sense to him. They weren't anyone he could remember.

Something was rising in his chest, like urgency that was erring into the side of fear. He had to be somewhere, but he didn't know where, or what he was even supposed to do. The meeting rooms were empty. And now he had to file some forms before his deadline or they'd all be lost in a fire somewhere. In a room, Signas and a governor from the Tri-State Shared Interest Zone were speaking. Signas was waiting for a certificate to come in the mail, and it was taking too long. When he spoke, Zero instantly forgot what he said.

He found the files somewhere. He looked at the text, but everytime he looked away, the words changed. He tried to sort them anyway. Signas was gone when he looked over his shoulder. When he turned back to the files, the folder fell out of his hands and the files scattered everywhere. Even though he was indoors, a gust of wind swept the papers away, and when he tried reaching for them, they slipped out his hands like they were covered in oil.

Then he was laying down in the large bed in X's room. X wasn't there though. Someone touched his shoulder. He had been naked, and he hadn't even realised it. It was Craft, but he didn't look exactly like him. He had both his eyes still, and his skin was a little darker than it was in real life. His head was laying in Craft's lap, thighs broad and thick like redwoods. He was naked too. He would've been embarrassed, but it felt nice. Then his hand was on his breast and he–

"Zero. Zero, wake up."

His eyelids felt so heavy. It felt like a lead brick was weighing them down. He scrunched his nose and stretched his arms out over his head with a groan. He had to have been awake for over 24 hours before he passed out on the bathroom floor. The light stung his optics and when he opened them, all he could see was white until his eyes adjusted. He yawned so hard his jaw hurt.

When he woke up, Craft was gone, and X was in his place. He was still lying on the couch, and had been on for so long, the cushions and seams had made marks in his synth-skin. X was sitting next to him.

He should've been scared. Maybe he was deep down somewhere. Yet, when he looked into his hollow crimson gaze, he felt a sort of relief wash over him. His nightmare had come true. He didn't have to dread it anymore. He was here, with him, this was his reality. X put his hand on Zero's head and gently stroked his helm.

"How are you feeling?"

Zero shook his head and grumbled. "Feeling better."

"That's good."

There was still an air of unease between them. Zero doubted it'd ever go away. Their conversations were so fragile, every word, no matter how innocuous, seemed dangerous. X laced his fingers in Zero's hair, and Zero didn't stop him.

"You should eat something. You've been running on 3% for a while now," X said.

"Don't scan my vitals…"

"I can't help it." It was true, even before, when X was good. "It's my job to worry about you."

That position had been firmly taken up by Craft those days. Zero could still feel how his skin felt against his own in the dream. The fortified wall of a man. He grit his teeth and his head lolled back limply. Zero missed Craft.

"What do you want?" Zero asked, heaving himself off his back and sitting upright. He felt so stiff, every movement happened in sharp jolts. "You better have a good reason to wake me up so early."

"You always used to wake up at this hour," X reminded him.

"Used to."

"Zero, it's a special day tomorrow," X said, ignoring him wholeheartedly.

"Don't make me guess."

"Tomorrow marks the day the Maverick War ended." He grabbed him by the shoulders. "It's an important day for us. There'll be a parade. Citadel will be hosting a dinner party in the evening. I'd like you to be by my side."

Zero's eyes flickered across X's face. "Are you giving me a choice?"

"I'd like to believe I am." His hand found Zero's, and Zero didn't fight it. "You've been through a lot. I want to treat you to something nice."

"You could start by letting me go."

"Can't do that."

At least he tried. "Then let me go to sleep."

"At least sleep in our bed."

"Your bed."

"You'll need a new suit tailored for the evening function." X put a hand on the small of his back, hoping to coax him onto his feet. "A lot of important people are going to be there. You haven't met them yet."

"I'm sure there will be." Zero slouched forward and looked away. X made a melancholy sigh.

"It'll make you feel better."

"You're trying to make me forget about things, aren't you?" Zero asked, voice flat but rich with bitterness all the same.

"Come on, Zero. It's not like that."

"Seems like it is."

X's lips formed a line. "Don't start this again. Please."

Without saying a thing, Zero turned to X, glaring at him with narrow eyes and a knitted brow, before looking away.

"I know what you're thinking and–"

"You don't."

"Oh, I do, Zero. You can be happy if you just let me take care of you."

"I won't."

"You will. Just trust me," X insisted. "Help me help you. I can make things right again, Zero. I always have, haven't I?"

X stood up over Zero. When he was swathed in X's shadow, Zero realised, in his absence, he had forgotten the X that existed in his memories wasn't the X who was standing before him right now. He'd worked on himself. He was huge, a little bigger than he was, broad-shouldered, well-muscled. Imposing. Threatening without effort. Everything he did made Zero feel weak. He smiled, but it did nothing but stir up the same fearful urgency he felt in his dream in his gut.

"We can make this work, Zero," X said. "But you just have to trust me. Please. Don't run away again."

A hand was offered for Zero to take. X's hand. He'd taken it with his own a thousand times before. Zero looked up at him, feeling his vocalizer seize-up when he met his eyes. He thought about the thousands who died in Bosaso, the toys of children lost in the rubble, lives gone in the blink of an eye with a press of a button on a ground control station worlds away. The people holed up in apartments barely larger than a single bathroom in the citadel, waiting to starve or die at the hands of the thugs they call police officers. The reploids who go missing in the night. Harpuia writhing on the floor, willing to die for his nation built on bodies and stolen land.

Selfishly, he thought about Craft, too. Thought about escaping with him, of vagrant life's joys and finding domesticity in exile together. Hoped he would stay alive long enough for them to reunite when– if he managed to get out of this.

Zero took X's hand and let him lead, taking him from his quarters and through the citadel into the streets of Central Neo Arcadia. Soldiers carrying rifles against their chests followed in their wake. X offered him luxuries, things to make him feel like he belonged there. A white suit, almost the same one he wore as a Maverick Hunter on special occasions. A human man dressed him, fastening a golden lapel pin that looked like a blooming flower to his suit pocket. He was ecstatic that Zero was back in Central again. Safe with X. Away from the enemy.

A taste of freedom, the cage's door was open, but Zero couldn't walk out. People made way for him, they spoke in hushed tones in his presence.

And a hundred times a second, he reached out, hoping to catch Craft calling out to him too.