E-UNIT: The Blue Angels of Death.

Chapter 110: Living Minerals.

V O L U M E F I V E

Chapter 110: Living Minerals.The Highway Leading to Raisin Heights. 20:00.

"Where exactly are we?" 02 asked, with Tau sitting across her shoulders. "We've been avoiding every city for days now."

Among the G-Bots, Tau, Pi, and Beta had always been the shortest, Pi edging them out by only a few millimeters.

The highway stretched ahead of them, empty in both directions. Nothing approaching, nothing following. Just the two of them, the fresh asphalt under 02's feet, and flat green plateaus rising gently on either side. Altea ran cold for most of the year, but the fields stayed green regardless, it was just the way things were here.

"We have to," Tau said, her eyes drifting up toward the sky. Out here, away from any industrial zone, the stars were sharp and unobstructed, the kind of sky that felt almost dishonest given everything happening beneath it. "If they catch us, I'm probably dead on the first shot. But they'd take you alive. And whatever they'd really be taking is your power source."

"What about it?"

Tau folded her arms on top of 02's head, settling in. "I mean that literally. We are sentient rocks, in some capacity... or at least we exist inside crystal. Father never fully explained the mechanics of it, but it's one of two things: either we naturally exist within the crystal structure itself, or he discovered that the crystal can hold data. Either way, at a fundamental level, we are living minerals."

02's pace slowed for a moment, then steadied again. " Natural materials don't store data. How does that work? And what actually happens if they take the power source?"

Tau's expression shifted. "First question, I genuinely don't know how we function at all. If we're just refined natural resources, why doesn't every country have their own version of the G-Bots by now? The answer to that worries me." She paused. "Second question, if they pulled your power source, you'd still be aware. You'd see everything they did with your energy. You just wouldn't be able to stop any of it."

Her hands tightened slightly. "S-Since we're partially unlimited power sources, you'd witness whatever they chose to do with that. To living beings. Using you. Forever."

02 shook her head. "Then I won't let that happen." The captain tone came through cleanly, no buildup needed. "Anything that approaches you with bad intentions gets erased. My captain is not a battery."

"They already have my power source."

"What?"

"I'm blocking their access by keeping this copy running." A small smile crossed Tau's face. "Think of me as the administrator. They can see the drive, they just can't open it."

02 went quiet. She glanced to the side of the road where the hills layered over each other in long green folds, one after the next, disappearing into the dark. "Is Reaper really that dangerous?"

"Y-YES!" Tau grabbed 02's head with both hands and physically turned her eyes back up toward her. "Do not engage with him. Not under any circumstance. He can erase you, c-crash your externals, pin you completely, r-reshape your frame, p-pierce through you without limit, pull you apart… piece by piece… until there's nothing left holding your internals together—"

"...Captain?"

A cold gust of air moved through the silence between them.

"S-Sorry." Tau straightened herself. "Triple S threat. Do not engage. That's all."

"Understood." 02 looked toward the horizon, eyes adjusting. "Captain, city spotted. My data identifies it as Raisin Heights. One hundred and eighty kilometers west of Metromania."

Tau's eyes sharpened. "We need cloaks before we get anywhere near it. They'll have registration scanners."

"Roger!"

"What do you mean ro—ah!"

02 surged forward. Tau flew backward and grabbed on. Each step cracked the road surface faintly beneath 02's feet, the blue glow of her frame cutting through the dark as the highway disappeared behind them.

They had reached Raisin Heights minutes ago. 02 moved across the rooftops with Tau on her shoulders, blurring between buildings fast enough that the mechs working the streets below never looked up. They had their own concerns, the city was being converted into a staging ground, a secondary storage point to support the coming conflict with the Western side while keeping Theria's infrastructure untouched.

Crates double the height of the mechs carrying them were being hauled through the roads. Trucks and armored vehicles of every size, piloted by much smaller units, rolled in steady convoys toward the borders.

"02 stop!" Tau hissed, trying to keep her voice below a shout while simultaneously being thrown backward by the speed. She grabbed on and pulled herself upright. "We are going to get spotted!"

"Roger!" 02 peeled off and ducked into a rooftop E-UNIT charging station, old, abandoned, the door rusted at the hinges. She pulled it shut behind them.

The place had seen better days. The white-painted metal had given way to rust across most of the surface, and the charging chairs were worn down to the frame. They still worked, though. The moment 02 sat in one, the Omega symbol on her chest lit up. She set Tau down beside her.

"What were you thinking?!" Tau's voice finally came out at full volume in the enclosed space. "You are a 1.7 meter android that glows blue when you run. You might as well be a cursor on a blank screen. You are the least invisible thing I have ever seen in my life."

02's expression shifted, the first real change in it since the forest. "We have a larger problem."

"What could possibly be larger than—"

"You." 02 stood. "I'm done. The only thing you have contributed to this entire operation is complaining about our situation and second-guessing the decisions that have kept us from being shot at. Twice."

"Being trapped out here with you IS the bad situation!" Tau climbed onto the charging chair to close the height gap. "You execute instructions exactly as given with zero interpretation, it's like working with software from eighty years ago! And stop calling this an operation, we aren't working for anyone. I told you we needed cloaks. Why did you run straight at the city?"

02's tone leveled out entirely. "Oh, that's actually why. There are two cloaked figures heading toward this station right now. I thought we could ask where they got them."

Tau spun to the small window beside the chair. She recognized the cloak design immediately, the same cut as 11's unit. "Those are from the enemy side. What have you done?"

"You told me to think," 02 replied, face completely still. "They have the same facial sensor configuration as us. Same design language. That means the same creator, which means we're aligned under the same broader objective."

Tau grabbed 02 by the neck and started shaking. "Stop calling it an objective! And no, they are significantly more dangerous than the soldiers we dealt with before!"

02 removed her hands without effort. "First, we don't breathe. Grabbing my neck accomplishes nothing, much like most of your input so far."

Tau went rigid.

"Second, if you're identifying them as a threat, then this is an operation." She stood, and the captain's expression settled over her features like something clicking into place. "Next target: the cloaked figures."

She walked out of the station before Tau could form a response.

P143 was mid-sentence when she noticed. "I'm telling you, I watched Captain 11 clear an entire platoon alone at the western border—"

"I believe you, but... who is that?"

Both E-PHONEUS dropped into fighting stances simultaneously. P143's voice came out clipped and controlled. "Identify yourself."

02 kept walking. No answer, no change in pace. Her eyes burned blue, the Omega symbol blazing on her chest as the distance between them closed.

The two stepped back. P120's voice came out thin. "That's… that's Omega." She turned. "Warn the—"

Clang.

02's hand closed around P120's face and lifted her off the roof entirely, legs swinging free. "I'd recommend against finishing that sentence, P143." She turned to the second assassin without releasing P120. "And if I see your mouth move, I won't let the first word out."

P143 went still. Her feet began edging backward. "Warnin—"

Clank.

02 drove P120 into the concrete rooftop. The impact was clean and final, P120's face dented into the shape of 02's grip, jaw seized, sealed shut. She couldn't move it in the right way. The warning died in her throat.

02 turned to P143. "I gave you a fair chance to stand down." She shifted her weight forward slightly, coiled and ready. "Send anyone else after us and you'll be sending them to the same place you're going right now."

P143 ran at speed.

Metal on concrete, rooftop to rooftop. "This is P143, we have—how!" The comm cut out. She glanced back without breaking stride. 02 hadn't moved. Still in that same forward lean, completely still.

‘What is she doing?’

02 released everything she had been holding back.

The sound that came out of her thrusters rolled across the rooftops like a thunderclap. She crossed the distance to the already-sprinting P143 in fractions of a second, calculated the arc, and shot past her, 02 reversed direction mid-air exploding backward, arm extended.

CRASH.

P143's head stopped against 02's palm. The rest of her body didn't, the momentum tore her apart at the middle, the lower half continuing forward and spilling across the rooftop in a trail of exposed internals and flickering electricity.

02 turned and walked back toward the pinned P120, the upper half of P143 in one hand, expression unchanged.

P120 had been fighting the concrete the entire time. Forward, backward, left, right, nothing. She was planted deep. She kept trying until the sound of 02's footsteps and the drag of P143's internals reached her from across the roof.

02 set what remained of P143 down beside P120 without ceremony.

P143's eyes were dimming. She found the words slowly, each one costing something. "Don't… say anything. Not… a word. For Elysium."

P120 pulled her in without speaking.

"Your solidarity won't be required." 02 reached down and pulled P143 back by the collar. "As I've been telling my captain, information is the most valuable thing on the field." She pressed two fingers to the side of P143's head and forced the SSD housing open.

P143 flickered as the drive was pried loose, then went dark.

"Stop! You'll kill her!" P120 lunged against the concrete, getting nowhere.

"Stay quiet." 02 didn't look up. "Or the SSD disappears entirely."

P120 pressed both hands over her face, still pinned, shaking.

02 worked the drive free, slotted it into her own housing, and began scanning. Her eyes went bright, blue-white, sharp, moving through the files at a speed that made the light pulse. "Elysium…"

She pulled the SSD, crouched beside P120, and placed it carefully into her hands. "Now you have some understanding of what your king did to my squad." She stood. "Call your support team. Show them what mercy looks like when it comes from the other side."

Tau edged out of the charging station, eyes wide. She had been watching the whole time from behind the door. "02?" Her voice shaking.

"We're moving." 02 was already at the roof's edge.

"Y-Yes, Captain!"

02 dropped from the rooftop. Tau scrambled after her.

Behind them, P120 opened her comm line, the half of her sister still held against her chest.

"This is P120." Her voice came out unsteady, stripped of everything professional. "We have… a problem."