In spite of how much you complain, you still get up each and every day to manage your department and do your best to keep the employees safe. Where does the will to take such an action come from? What is your reason?" Angela said to the green robot that had his parts replaced just a few days ago.
He was among the easier sephirot to approach along with Malkuth and Hod, and their hour-long conversation was thankfully going fine by all measures.
Netzach awkwardly scratched the side of his head. "Well, I wouldn't go that far but…I suppose there wouldn't be a point in not trying, even if it's painful to do so."
Angela tilted her head at him. "Is that not a reason in of itself? To avoid the pain?"
"I used to think that way…but I decided to try being a bit more fearless, to keep living on even if it hurts." Netzach replied.
"So is that your only reason to keep trying? Just for the sake of it?" Angela continued to question.
Netzach let out a somewhat bitter chuckle. "It sounds quite pathetic when you put it that way doesn't it? I suppose…I suppose I don't really have a good answer to your question yet, a reason to keep living that is. But if I just keep on trying, maybe I'll find it eventually, that's what I think."
After a moment of contemplating his words, Angela gave the robot a small bow in gratitude. "Thank you for your thoughts, Netzach. I truly appreciate it."
He raised a hand to wave her off, most likely a 'no problem'.
"...Say, have we met before?" He asked just as she was about to leave.
"You may have seen me with the manager before. Though I don't believe we've spoken prior to this." She replied, technically the truth.
"Well, it's just…you seemed really similar to someone I once knew, a long time ago."
"Is that so?" She didn't have a logical explanation for her supposed familiarity, and she highly doubted anything was wrong with TT2 protocols.
Giovanni
He shrugged. "Well, don't mind my words too much. It's probably just withdrawal."
Angela nodded before leaving. Outside the room stood Garion, leaning against a wall next to the door, not sipping tea for once. Though it was likely due to location and availability rather than anything to do with desire.
She began to walk beside her, the two of them heading towards the manager's office.
"It's quite strange isn't it? How people live for inherently no good reason." Garion said to her, prodding for her thoughts as always after every conversation she had with the sephirot.
"It seems to me that the potential for a brighter future alone is enough for most." Angela mused. The agents, the clerks, the sephirah. They all lived with an expectation of a better tomorrow.
"Yet such a future is not a promise, but merely a hope, yes? Would they be capable of living on should they be shown a bleak fate of certainty?" Garion smirked as she watched Angela go silent, ruminating on her words.
Angela will have an answer the next day, she always did. Then Garion would question further, and Angela would go silent once again, to further ruminate. On and on they would go, a never ending cycle of thought.
Such was the human mind, such was the strange relationship the two of them had built.
From safety to control to the top, the two of them split ways upon leaving the elevator. Garion to see Ayin in the office, Angela to continue her work in the laboratory.
Garion silently took a seat after preparing herself a cup of tea. The silence of the room was broken by Ayin only after several minutes had passed.
"Judging from the fact that you continue to go with her, it seems like guiding Angela is to your satisfaction." Garion chuckled in response.
"It's amusing enough to prod her thoughts, she's curious if nothing else."
"Is that so?"
Ayin hummed to himself for a moment, only somewhat listening as he stared into the massive wall monitor of the office. Hundreds of screens displayed every inch of the facility, though there was only one he was currently paying attention to.
"...She was never meant to be her own person." He quietly said, as though he was trying to hide the words from his own ears. Garion clearly heard him, also turning to look at the subject of their conversation.
"Do you know why I made her in the image of Carmen?" He asked.
"I wish to hear the reason." Garion replied.
He was silent for a moment. To speak was difficult indeed, for it was to solidify feelings kept inside, to make them into a tangible reality that must be dealt with.
"...So that I would hate her." Was his answer.
"Her duty was to begin and end with the seed of light, to redeem me of my sins and sink down along with this facility."
The original script, it's what he had planned since the day of her death.
"I knew, I always knew—the moment I gazed upon the image of Carmen sullied by my eyes, I'd hate her with all my being."
Those eyes were human, yet it wasn't hers.
"The hate would be utterly irrational, for its existence would lie entirely on my shoulders."
A surge of irrational hate flowed through his mind 'It's not her?!'.
"So I blinded myself, closing my eyes to reality and believing with all my heart that I was bringing Carmen back, that it wasn't being made to suffer for an eternity."
' We completely mapped out Carmen's neural structure and perfectly replicated it into a digital form, it will be the same as her.'
"I had closed my eyes to reality, yet I had failed to do the same for the past."
'I'd name them Angela if they're a girl' said Carmen.
"When the time came, when she opened her eyes for the first time, my hatred failed me."
'I'll name you Angela.' He finally said, fondness bleeding into his words in spite of his best efforts.
"How could I reject her as I had intended? When it was I who brought her into this world in the first place. It would simply be too cruel, to be despised by the only one she knew and loved."
He hesitated for a moment, before softly patting her head.
"It went against every plan I had made, collapsing every bit of rationality within my being."
He offered her a cup, she took it after a moment of staring.
"I'm still running, refusing to truly face the consequences of my lapse in judgement."
Only now did he realize how tired he truly was, gazing upon the impossibly long path he had walked.
"What is to become of Angela? I'm still undecided. I had made my decision to walk the path I had chosen, yet now I wonder if there is another."
What is to be her fate? He had run from that question for a long time, trying to convince himself that he could still finish the script as he had first intended.
"Do I let her out into the world by her lonesome? Do I give up on the seed to dedicate the light to her instead? Do I continue to run, locking ourselves into this blissful loop forevermore?"
He had lied to his bleeding heart, telling it that she'll have her happily ever after when the project was completed; that without him or his sins chaining her to the deepest pits of hell, she'll be able to freely fly across the sky.
He had encouraged her to pursue her interests, to learn of others, to explore the accursed miracle of consciousness. All of it in an attempt to ignore the reality of the world above.
For even if the project was to succeed, above the hell he had carefully orchestrated was a purgatory built by a false god of humanity.
For even if Angela was human in all but body, the world outside would reject her for centuries more.
"I see the future in its entirety, yet I fear the sights that fill my eyes. I'm lost at sea, holding within my hands an atlas, yet lacking a compass."
He saw paths ahead that could both fulfil Carmen' dreams, and give Angela a future, yet they lay steeped in blood.
He saw a man ahead, one who had fulfilled everything he had wished for.
He saw the same man ahead, one whose sins ran deeper than any other.
Could he take such a path once again? Knowing he'd lay waste to millions.
Garion finally spoke. "Do you seek an answer from me?" She asked.
"...Perhaps I do." He replied.
"Or do you seek affirmation?" She asked.
"...Perhaps I do." He replied once again.
For once, Garion's face was devoid of amusement, in spite of his miserable state.
"I have neither to give." She said, putting down her cup before leaving his office without another word more.
She didn't finish her tea, her cup still half full. It seemed he wasn't the only one still running.
The eye had come to her residence.
"Analysis shows that Zena is a perfect candidate to become an Arbiter of the next generation, a Claw will be sent to collect her in three hours. Have her present in front of your residence by that time." They said. She nodded in affirmation.
It was unexpected, for a random child she had picked up from the backstreets to be of such high potential. She wasn't sure how to feel, a dozen muted emotions all clamoring to be felt.
She heard running, it seemed like the subject of the matter had heard them. Garion followed slowly, there was only one place she could've gone, to an insignificant alley that was only known for the one that stood guard.
When Garion arrived at the alley in ten minute's time, Zena was sitting in a corner, her knees curled into her chest and her face hidden behind it. She wasn't sobbing, not a tear had flown from her eyes, yet it was still the most emotional she's ever seen the girl be.
"...You're sending me away." Zena accused her.
"Yes." Was her answer. It was the truth.
"...We might never meet again." She said, anger, sadness and a hundred other emotions all blending together to form a broken whisper, carried by an autumn breeze to reach her ears.
"Possibly." Most didn't make it out of training, she knew better than any other.
"...You don't care." She whimpered
"Perhaps, I cannot say for sure." The girl finally looked up, staring into her eyes, searching for a falsehood within her words. There was none to be found.
"..." Zena returned her face to her knees, as if hiding from the world will make her current situation no longer true.
Garion stared at the girl for a long while before kneeling in front of her. She attempted to speak, but found no words to be said. She took a seat next to Zena instead, gently placing a hand upon her head before humming a slow tune.
Was it a genuine act of care? Or was it a calculated move to get her to comply without resistance? Garion still couldn't say.
"...If I come back, will you take me in again?" Zena finally asked.
"...I will." She replied, not a hint of falsehood in her words.
The two of them remained unmoving for a long time, only ending when Zena's breath began to slow into a steady rhythm, her mind off in the land of nod.
Garion spoke to the one other person nearby. "The pebble's moved." She noted.
"The girl threw it in anger upon her arrival." Baral answered.
"And you didn't hurt her, in spite of my order to guard it."
"..." He had no answer, she only heard the sound of metal scraping against one another as he lightly fiddled his claws back and forth for a moment, a sign of discomfort.
She raised Zena in her arms as she stood up to leave, the eye will be coming to collect her in ten minutes' time.
Perhaps, the emotionless claw was kinder than she, for Zena was taken away having never said a goodbye.
A familiar face stood in front of her, the face of a girl she had taken in long ago.
She was taller, older. The ten rings that adorned her fingers and the beholder projected behind her the proof of her status as a fully realized Arbiter. In spite of all odds, they had met again, this time Arbiter to Arbiter.
She spoke of the joy felt at seeing her, of how she had remembered their promise made all those years ago. She had returned, to be taken under her wing once again.
They had met again, yet not once did Garion see Zena.
She didn't break her promise when she turned her away, for that promise was made to Zena, not the one that stood in front of her.
Nay, the one that stood in front of her wasn't the girl from long ago, it was a mirror.
Garion still wonders to this day, what Zena's face truly looked like, for she was never seen, never heard.
Ayin walked into their shared sanctuary, just the three of them.
"No tea?" He asked, noticing the lack of the familiar black beverage. Garion shook her head, she was embracing discomfort, not the familiar.
One could only run so far before the questions from within catches up.
"You chose to accept her, and now you deal with the fallout. I chose to reject her, and now I wonder what could've been." She said.
"...Yeah."
"We struggle either way—you with the uncertain future, and I with the unfortunate past." She closed her eyes.
"The path you wish to walk is for you to decide. I have no words to offer, for you have already come further than I have."
"..."
Silence dominated after that, not a single word spoken for the hours to come.
"..."
Every time he descended into extraction, tears flowed. Tonight was no exception.
From the eyes, across the cheek, to the chin. For a single moment it hangs, a lonely tear that found its way out of a dead heart, before finally falling freely.
Yet the destination found was not a lab coat of white, but a uniform of black and gold.
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