Fifteen, 404, and 1225 sidled up to the crowd on the field. A few of the Phaetons tried to ask about the machine 404 was carrying, but the captains just shushed them.
“…Do you really think it was okay to just send that Medic Phaeton to help Hundred?” 1225 asked. “I mean, all evidence currently points to the idea that Ten can use the Exhaust to attack people…that sounds like a job for all of us…”
“Don’t worry, I have a plan. I told 112 exactly what to say,” 404 replied. “With any luck, Ten will listen to her, and leave her to take care of Hundred.”
“Assuming Ten hasn’t killed Hundred already,” Fifteen said solemnly.
“Have some faith. It’s…really all we’ve got left right now.”
Just then, Ten came out of the building, smiling her usual smile.
All eyes were on her as she crossed over to the field, jauntily strolling along until she reached a spot a few yards away from the crowd. She glanced at the captains and 404, who nervously but determinedly returned her gaze.
Then she cleared her throat. “…Thank you all for waiting for me,” she began, using her ‘preacher voice’. “Your patience will soon be rewarded. I’ve got quite an announcement for you~.
“Today, true life will return to the universe. It is the gift that I have brought back with me from my travels, and it is the gift that I will share with all who believe in me: humans AND Phaetons. You will all live freely…that is, you will once we get rid of that thing.”
She pointed at the generator core. “Those who are afraid of change refuse to let go of the vestiges of the past. That machine is used by the Administration to control us. It fills us with the life-like energy that holds us back. We cannot be Revitalized until it is destroyed.”
The crowd turned to 404, staring and murmuring.
404 stamped her foot. “Don’t listen to her!” she cried. “She’s only telling half of the story; she’s just trying to pit you against us! We need this generator core, and no one is going to destroy it on my watch!”
“Is that thing really controlling us…?”
“The Management captain doesn’t seem to want to let it go…I bet it is.”
“But what about true life??”
“I want to be a Living One…”
“We wouldn’t have to fight anymore if we were alive. Right?”
The Phaetons whispered to each other, and a few started to glare at 404.
“I think Ten has the right idea!” 86 called out. “You all don’t know this, because she only told us captains…but she’s the answer. She can protect everyone from the Exhaust with her powers, and I think if we do what she says, we can do the same!”
“You’ve got it backwards: Ten is controlling the Exhaust! And she could send a bunch of firewheels after you whenever she wants!” 1225 yelled back.
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“Ten wants to turn us, the Phaetons…into murderers! And you humans are nothing but food to her!” 404 cried. “I-It’s a bit hard to explain, and I don’t know the whole story yet, but if you just listen—”
“What are you even talking about?” 911 asked. “If you’re going to make up slander about Ten, you could at least come up with something that halfway makes sense. Does it really bother you that much that she knows things you don’t??”
“That’s not what this is about, and you know it! You guys, 911 was Ten’s first victim! She’s only saying that stuff because she’s been brainwashed!”
“I’m not a victim! I’m Revitalized!” 911 stepped out from the crowd and joined Ten at the front. “I’ve been keeping it a secret all this time, but…Ten already gave me the gift! I’m one of the first Phaetons ever to be energized by real ‘life’!”
The crowd gasped. Some of the humans began taking pictures.
“I can prove it to you,” 911 went on. She materialized her armor, and pointed at her hilt. “Look: no incinerator light! That’s proof that I’m not under their control anymore! No matter what happens to my body, I can hold on until I’m really and truly dead…and then I can be reincarnated…!”
“We don’t know that for sure!” 404 protested. “All you have is Ten’s word that this is actually life!”
“Well, all we have is your word that it isn’t,” a random audience member remarked.
“She really doesn’t have an incinerator light!”
“Would they actually let her into the Reincarnation system??”
“I want to try!”
“How does this ‘Revitalized’ thing work…?”
“You just have to disconnect from the ‘life-like’ energy,” 911 said, answering the last question from the crowd. “And yes, that means what you think it means. But either we all kill ourselves individually…or we just destroy the generator and go in one fell swoop.
“It’s not as scary as it sounds,” she continued. “It’s just like going to sleep and waking up again. You can trust Ten…and me, I’ll still be awake to look after you. Now, are you going to stand there and make up cowardly excuses like 404 and them? Or are you going to take the leap and do what’s best for yourselves…for all the Phaetons—”
“That’s enough,” said Fifteen, stepping forward to speak for the first time. “There are true things on both sides of this issue. 404 may not like to hear me say this, but I believe Ten really has found ‘life’. And I believe she can give it to you.
“But you should be aware that she’s said things in front of us that she didn’t mention to you in her little speech. They’ll probably just sound like more nonsense and lies coming from us, so I won’t bother repeating them. But know this: I don’t trust her. Ten is my oldest friend…and I don’t trust her anymore.” She turned and looked Ten dead in the eyes. “I refuse to take part in whatever she’s planning,” she concluded.
The look of shame and annoyance returned to Ten’s face. She turned away from Fifteen’s gaze. “…All I’m planning to do is restore balance. Right wrongs,” she said, more quietly than before. “This is what the universe has been waiting for all this time, and I am going to make it happen. With or without the approval of so-called ‘friends’.”
Fifteen bit her lip, but said nothing.
“…Well, now what?”
“I still want to be a Living One…”
“Okay, but I’m not gonna slit my own throat. Someone has to make them give up the generator.”
“We don’t have to give it up! We can just…leave,” 1225 suggested. “When it’s disconnected like this, it can only keep you alive if you stay in its range. So if we go far enough away...you’ll all get what you want.”
“Everyone who agrees with Ten can stay here. Everyone who agrees with us can leave. Is that fair?” she finished.
The crowd murmured its agreement. 404 sighed ruefully, but nodded in the end. Slowly, she began to walk away with the generator, heading for the front gate. 1225 and Fifteen followed…along with a few apprehensive-looking Phaetons. The vast majority of them stayed, huddled around the humans in the field.
The dark clouds over the gate parted, letting in a few rays of light from the outside world. The dissenters turned to look back at Ten.
“…I’ll let you go. But only because I know how sorely you’re going to regret this,” Ten said. The smile returned to her face. “How are you planning to survive out there, tied to that little hunk of metal? I bet your precious Administrators will come along to round you up…and I don’t mean to rescue you. You think you’re choosing freedom, but you’re just choosing to become fugitives. But don’t worry: you can crawl back and beg me to Revitalize you whenever you’re ready. I’ll be waiting~.”
Fifteen looked over her shoulder. “…You’ll be waiting a long time,” she said.