I just left them. Brett followed me out. "Fuck! I screamed out to the sky." Brett pat me on the back. "We've all had them. NPC friends that died in front of us. Horrible." he said with a smirk. He was joking now, but he had to have had a similar feeling once. 03 came out and held me from behind. His head was buried in the center of my shoulder blades. I could not see the expression on his face. "Thank you for saying what you said. I did not know that any human could care about a cyborg like me." he said. "You can't die, 03." I said. "I won't die. Don't get all sappy on us. We still have to kill those symbiotes." I shook my head. "You can't go. 01 can't either. I forbade it and I still stand by it." I said firmly. 03 knocked his forehead repeatedly into my back. "That is not how this ends! I can't let Leader do it alone. I won't let it happen that way!" he yelled at me. The clan leader said "He's right you know. He knows the code and I am going to kill those bastards myself. And anyone that who gets in my way." I scoffed. "If you fought half as hard for 02, he would still be here." I said bitterly. I was angry.
Lashing out did not make me feel better. He did not even flinch. "Are you done yet? Is 03 coming or not!?" he snapped. I shook my head. I got on my phone. Chad at the receptionist's desk answered the phone. "Volition Clan is coming for Blue and Brown. Get Volt out the building and allow them to take the symbiotes out of the clan building." I told Chad. I was going to go off on my own. I needed to be alone. "I am just heading out. I'll have Lola handle it. She knows where everything is. I can't wait to build my X-frame." I nearly forgot. "Yeah. I'll give it to you and see you off." I said before hanging up. "Last stop?" Brett asked. I understood what he was saying. It was a common trope of the genre for people to quit the game when their lover or NPC child died or something similar. That was not me. I was the type to just move on to the next one. "Until I get my head right." I said. Brett said "It isn't a bad thing if you never come back. We can handle the guild from here. We'll still be friends at school." I just sighed. "Who knows what you'll get up to. We just have to go home." I said. Volition Clan left.
Brett and I left the gym behind. When we got to the cab depot, Chad was already waiting for us in the clan building. I gave him the 06Mx X-frame model. It was the most prestigious that we had. He trembled with the blueprints and the money for the parts in his hands. Like classic fashion, he got in a cab and drove off. I watched the car until it was gone from sight. It was more that time for me to log off. I was about to go in my apartment for that when all the AEP units came back. Both teams had finished with their missions. Caleb, Cameron and Ava found the hiding place for the new Water Clan. The rest finished with the infiltration and breaking the crucial material out of the research facility. They were making cockpits for mechs to fight the X-frames. That certainly was not good. I looked at them and told them not to report these findings until I returned to the clan building. "I'll be back soon. I lost a friend tonight and I need to go deal with it on my own." I said as I stepped inside the building. They all went to their apartments as well. I entered mine and flopped on the bed. I logged out right away.
