Uzi awoke to an unfamiliar ceiling, in an unfamiliar bed, with the familiar annoying ding of her system telling her she was fully charged and could unplug herself. When she lifted her arm to do so, she couldn't help but notice how pristine it was. Last time she had seen it, or any other part of herself, it was dinged up and filthy from a solid week camping in and around the spire. Setting traps, dismantling traps, pushing, pulling, lifting, climbing; bit by bit everything took its toll.
But it was all worth it because she had succeeded! After so many attempts, so many failures, she finally got her hands on him!
'...So why are they empty now?' Uzi thought morosely. That is, until she realized that there was really only one way she could have gotten back to the bunker with a drained battery. "N? N?!"
"No, just me," a soft voice answered from the girl's right.
Though the tone was unfamiliar, Uzi immediately recognized the voice of her most relentless bully.
"...Where's N?" Uzi asked/demanded after taking a moment to decide whether to talk to the blonde girl at all.
"No one knows," Lizzy answered calmly. "He dropped you off and ran."
"But...the sun was already coming up..."
"Yeah..." Lizzy looked away with a wince.
If you had told Uzi that one day she would cry in front of her greatest enemy, the best you could've hoped for was for her to laugh. While kicking your ass. But then again, if you had told her N would one day abandon her, you probably would've gotten worse.
So to say that neither of them saw Uzi's emotional outburst coming would be an understatement.
"FUCK! FUCK!! FUCK!!! FUUUUUUUCK!!!!" the purple-haired drone screamed her artificial lungs out, though the last one was more of a wretched sob, which led into another, and then another. Soon she was bawling her eyelights out like her mortal enemy wasn't sitting about a meter away.
Then, just as suddenly as it began, it stopped and Uzi just laid there, staring blankly up at the ceiling.
"Uzi?"
"That's why you're here, huh?" Uzi said flatly as her tears continued to flow freely. "You must have months-worth of material stocked up, so let's hear it."
"..."
"Come on, you've been saying it for years: I'm too much of a freak to have friends. Even a Murder Drone can't deal with me."
"..."
"Did you lose the betting pool? I guess you never imagined it would last as long as it did. Sorry about tha-?!" Uzi was entirely unprepared for Lizzy to grab her shoulders and pull her up into a hug. But shock soon gave way to anger. "Let go of me. Now."
"No," Lizzy replied, squeezing even tighter.
"...Just about the only thing you haven't done over the years is put your hands on me. So as a courtesy I'll give you one more warning before I put mine on you. Let. Go."
"I won't. Not again."
Uzi's eyelights hollowed and she started to struggle out of Lizzy's surprisingly strong grip.
"No, you don't get to do this! Not after everything!"
"I'm sorry," Lizzy whimpered, "for all of it."
Despite her best efforts to stop it, her mind took her back to the last time she'd heard the head cheerleader in such a state.
They had gotten the news in just about the worst way: through gossip. Three people had been killed. Or was it two? They were scavengers. Or were they photographers? Their bodies had been dragged back by a colleague. Or was it their daughter?
