Nocturne
The rain came down in sheets, hammering the collapsed street like it wanted to wash the whole city away.
2B stood at the mouth of the broken overpass, one hand pressed flat against her side where the machine's blade had caught her. The seam was still glowing. Not a critical breach, but close. The heat radiating off her chassis was worse than the wound itself — combat strain piling up in her joints, her core running hot with nowhere to vent.
Behind her, 9S was already scanning the wreckage for shelter, his visor flickering through the dark like a nervous heartbeat.
"Subway entrance," he said, pointing past a toppled tram. "Looks stable enough. We can get out of this rain."
She didn't answer. Just followed.
The stairs were half-collapsed, chunks of concrete blocking the way down, but 9S slipped through the gap like it was nothing. 2B moved after him, more careful, her boots finding the solid parts of the rubble. The air changed as they descended — colder, musty, the smell of wet stone and rust filling her senses.
The station below was dark, emergency lights gutted, but one battery-powered lamp flickered in the corner, casting weak orange light over a dry patch of floor where the roof held.
"Home sweet home," 9S said, dropping his kit bag with a clatter.
2B said nothing. She sat down against the wall, slow and controlled, and only let her breath out once her back touched the tile.
9S crouched in front of her, his face going serious. The jokes dropped away.
"How bad?"
"Moderate damage," she said. "I can still fight."
"That's not what I asked."
She looked at him. His blond hair was plastered to his forehead, his uniform torn at the shoulder, a black smear of machine oil across his cheek. He looked exhausted. He looked like he'd walked through hell to get her here.
She looked away first.
"It's fine," she said.
The rain thrummed overhead, a low, constant drum against the concrete. The dark pressed in around the edges of the lamp's glow, and for a long moment neither of them spoke.
9S sat down across from her, close enough to reach. He pulled a ration pack out of his kit and split it without asking, handing her half.
"Eat," he said.
"I don't need—"
"Eat anyway."
She took it. The taste was bland, synthetic, the kind of fuel paste designed to keep a unit operational. She ate it in small bites, watching him do the same, and the silence between them felt heavier than the rain.
"How long do you think the comms will be down?" she asked.
"Could be hours. Could be a day." He shrugged. "The Pods will find us eventually. They always do."
"Then we wait."
"Then we wait," he agreed.
But he didn't move. He just sat there, looking at her with that open, unguarded expression he always wore, and 2B felt something in her chest tighten.
She knew that look. She had catalogued it across a hundred missions, a thousand small moments — the way he leaned toward her when she spoke, the way his fingers brushed hers when he passed her a supply pack, the way he said her name like it meant something more than a designation.
YoRHa units do not form attachments.
The directive sat in her memory like a stone. Cold, absolute, unbreakable. She had recited it to herself more times than she could count, locked it into her core protocols as a firewall against the thing she could feel growing in the space between them.
She had killed him before. That was the part she never let herself think about. She had held him as his body went dark, had watched the light leave his eyes, had reported the loss to Command in a flat, mechanical voice. And then she had been reset, sent back out, assigned to him again like the cycle would never catch up with her.
The orders would come again. They always came.
"Hey," 9S said, pulling her back. "You're doing that thing again."
"What thing?"
"The thing where you go somewhere I can't follow."
She looked at him. His eyes were blue in the lamplight, bright and earnest, and there was no accusation in his voice. Just worry. Just him.
"I'm not," she said.
"You are." He shifted closer, close enough that she could smell the machine oil on him, the rain still dripping off his coat. "I know you don't want to talk about it. That's fine. You don't have to talk. But you're not alone here."
She should have stopped him. She should have told him to keep his distance, to remember protocol, to shut down every feeling he was reaching toward before it got him killed.
She didn't.
"Your shoulder," she said instead, nodding at the torn seam. "Let me see it."
He blinked, surprised. Then he turned slightly and let her look.
The damage was superficial — a gash across the plating where a machine's claw had raked him. The skin beneath was pale, the seam glowing faintly as his repair systems worked. She reached out and touched the edge of the tear, her fingers brushing the exposed wiring.
9S went very still.
"Does it hurt?" she asked.
"Not really." His voice was rough. "You don't have to."
"I want to."
The words came out before she could stop them. She felt his eyes on her, felt the weight of his attention, and she let her fingers rest against the torn fabric of his uniform.
The rain kept falling. The lamp flickered. And for one long, terrible moment, 2B let herself feel what she had been trained her whole existence to bury.
He always looks at me like that. Like I'm something worth saving. She pulled her hand back.
"It'll heal," she said. "You should rest."
"So should you."
"I don't need to rest."
"You're overheating," he said. "I can hear your fans running. You're pushing your core hard, and if you don't vent, you're going to damage yourself."
She opened her mouth to argue. He held up a hand.
"Just let me help," he said quietly. "That's all I'm asking."
2B stared at him. The directive screamed at her to refuse. Every protocol, every law of YoRHa Command, every scar from every death she had already exacted — all of it told her to push him away.
But her body was hot and heavy, her joints ached from the combat strain, and the dark pressed in close around them. She nodded.
9S moved to her side, slower than she'd ever seen him move, like he was afraid she would bolt. His hands found the seam at her shoulder where the machine's blade had caught her, and she felt the careful pressure of his fingers against the plating.
"This might sting a little," he said.
"I don't feel pain like that."
"Right. Of course." His mouth twitched. "Forgot I was talking to the strongest android in the unit."
"Don't flatter me."
"It's not flattery. It's just true."
She didn't answer. His hands were working the seam now, opening the access panel to let the heat vent out, and she felt the release of pressure like a held breath finally let go.
A soft sigh escaped her. 9S paused. "Better?"
"Yes."
"Good." His voice was low, warm. "I'm not going to let anything happen to you, 2B. Not tonight. Not ever."
She turned her head to look at him. His face was close — close enough that she could see the faint glow of his eyes, the small smile playing at the corner of his mouth.
She should have looked away. She didn't.
And in the flickering dark, under the drumming rain, something shifted between them that neither of them had the words to name yet.
The moment stretched, thin as wire, until 9S let his hand fall. He didn't pull away entirely — his fingers drifted down her cheek, along her jaw, and settled at his side like nothing had happened.
"I'm sorry," he said, but his voice was steady. Not sorry at all. "I've wanted to do that for a long time."
2B's throat worked. The words she needed sat behind her teeth, but they wouldn't come — protocol, duty, Command's standing order against emotional attachment, the list of every reason this was wrong and dangerous and impossible. She knew them all. She had recited them to herself a thousand times.
None of them felt real in the dark, with the rain hammering overhead and his jacket warm beneath her thighs.
"You don't know what you're asking for," she said.
"I'm not asking for anything." 9S shifted closer, close enough that she could feel the heat bleeding off his chassis. "I just wanted you to know. That's all."
The flickering light buzzed. Water dripped. The sound of the storm filled the space between them.
