//Sae: FR3NZY

Sae was waiting in the doorway when she heard screams coming from inside the house.

Were Ahn and Ava being attacked?

No, that wasn't it. There weren't any shots being fired - the only sounds present were the mournful wails echoing off of the walls. Ava must have seen something horrible.

Sae made her way into the room that Ahn and Ava were in, taking in the gruesome sight. To her, and, she thought, probably Ahn too, the scene wouldn't have any emotional effect on them. She felt nothing seeing things like this. She was often the cause of such gory displays.

She looked at Ahn, about to ask what they should do about Ava, but froze. Why were his eyes so deeply blue? He didn't know Marvin, and they had only met Ava less than an hour before. What could have possibly provoked such a strong reaction from him?

"Ahn," she called out softly. He didn't respond.

'Ahn,' she repeated, this time with her thoughts. He didn't move.

She walked over to him. Maybe he was injured - it wasn't unlike the casino to leave traps for those who attempted to investigate the killings that were all too common in District 5.

She looked more closely, seeing no damage. Ahn still didn't move. What was wrong with him?

"Ahn." She said it more loudly this time, putting her hand on his shoulder, then quickly drawing it back. The contact didn't hurt her, but an unexpected movement caught her off guard. Ahn was softly trembling, she realized, but was trying to keep it in.

Sae had no idea what to do. Ahn had never acted like this before.

Ahn drew in a shaky breath, then spoke for the first time since Sae had entered the room. "Do you know why your serial number is different than mine?" he asked.

Sae had never thought about it. She never had a reason to. It was a tag, a series of numbers and letters, nothing more. There was no hidden meaning behind it. So why was he bringing it up now?

Sae didn't have the chance to ask.

Ava's wails abruptly turned into a shrill shrieking sound, suddenly changing from sorrowful to hateful. Sae knew this noise. She had heard it around the time that she arrived at EDGE for the first time. This was the sound of a frenzied android. The cause of the crisis not so many years ago.

She had walked into the shiny white hallway of EDGE to a rather bizarre spectacle. An electrician android was wielding a heat blade with twitchy movements, letting loose high-pitched screams frequently. It looked something like an alien trying to control a human's body for the first time. Or, more accurately, an android's.

Enforcers surrounded the frenzied android, a man in a lab coat shouting orders at them. "Don't worry about nonlethal force! It's already gone! Just kill it, it's worthless to us now!" This was the scientist known as Dr. Samuel.

The Enforcers, after a moment's hesitation, had complied, opening fire on the unfortunate android facing them. Even after its head had been blasted off and its body was covered in burns from a constant stream of plasma bullets, the android kept moving, emitting the ear-piercing shrieks with a now automated sound, as its vocal port had been damaged. It now looked like a doll that had been torn apart by an animal, yet remained standing long enough to impale the closest Enforcer with its sword before it finally collapsed to the ground, the cries slowly dying down with a similar effect to a radio being unplugged while it was playing something.

These frenzies only occurred when an android was either poorly made or under intense emotional stress.

Sae was reminded of that scene as Ava moved sporadically around the room, stepping through the entrails and further spreading the bloody mess, letting loose angry screams as she did so.

Ahn unfroze, dodging as Ava threw random furniture around the room with enough force to shatter a wooden chair she had thrown at him on the wall, splitting it with a loud crack.

His motions, Sae noticed, weren't as sharp and concise as they usually were. He was still faster than most androids, but was moving sluggishly by the ANGELs' standards.

Ava, having run out of furniture to throw, reached for the heat blade lodged in the floor, ripping her master's severed head off of the hilt, spraying more entrails onto the reddened floor. She jerked the blade up, then proceeded to swing it around in no particular direction, looking for something to destroy, or, alternatively, for someone to kill.

Sae went to grab for her own swords, but was reminded that she wasn't able to recover them during their fight with EDGE, cursing herself for not retrieving them before they fled.

She raised her hand, morphing her fingers into the deadly blades that had cut down many opponents over the past three years. This wouldn't be a challenge to do here, either, even if she had to shred the frenzied android beyond recognition to properly take it down. Ava was no longer there. What stood in front of her was no more than a malfunctioning machine.

She ejected her fingers, ready to end the threat, but was surprised as they were stopped midair, a blue hexagonal pattern forming in front of Ava.

Didn't Ava say that she had no combat capabilities? How did she have an [RIS] system?

'Don't,' Ahn's firm voice in her head startled Sae.

She looked at him. His eyes locked with hers, a serious expression on his face. The blue was now fringed with red.

'She's gone,' Sae replied, not knowing where Ahn's sudden emotions had come from. 'The best thing we can do is put her down.'

Ahn shook his head. 'At least...let me try to bring her back. I don't want her to…' he trailed off, his attention going back to Ava, who was rushing at him.

She kicked him onto his back, roaring, then raised the sword to finish him off.

She was actually trying to kill him.

That thing couldn't be called "Ava" anymore.