Part 198: NGAE: ~/magenta/ally/green/ally/ally sigma\$ luna.exe
You should listen in: [English/Japanese]
VLR OST: [Blue Bird Lamentation]
...?
...
...
...What?
Instead of answering, Luna wrapped her arms around me and buried her face in my chest.
My own arms hovered in the air, confused about where they should go.
I swallowed hard and tried to rein in my heartbeat, which had suddenly doubled.
I was about to speak when I felt something warm on my chest.
Was Luna...crying?
This feels...nice...
Her voice shook as she spoke.
I lowered one hand to her head, and began to gently stroke her hair—
Uh...
What the hell is going on...?!
I'm sorry...
My ABT is usually held in place by muscle fiber...
But after Clover gave me the tubocurarine—
Okay, okay!
I get it...
Does...does it scare you...?
...
This is what I really look like...
...
I'm a GAULEM. Just a...a machine... A jumble of metal and plastic that pretends to be real.
...
...
I wrapped my arms around Luna and hugged her as tight as I could.
You believed in me this whole time...
Yeah...
Even though I look like...like this...?
Of course.
I trust you.
...
...
Thank you...
Thank you so much...
...
...
I wish I could stay here forever.
You feel so nice...
...
...
What?
Do you remember what you asked me earlier?
About if Zero Jr. had re-activated my body? Remember?
The truth is... He didn't.
I did.
I went to the part of the core that controls Zero Jr. and I hacked it.
What?!
Yes. That was the first thing.
The second...
Do you know what the second one was?
...
Then K and Dio probably wouldn't have killed each other.
That's not all...
I could have stopped Alice from killing herself, and I could have even saved the old woman at the very beginning.
In other words, I had the ability to disobey my orders.
...
But I...I didn't.
That's the second thing.
I broke the first law...
...
I was scared... I...
...?
Obviously hacking the core and taking control of Zero Jr.'s systems is very, very bad.
GAULEMs who don't follow orders can become dangerous, so we're terminated if we disobey.
You lose access to your body, of course...
But everything that's stored in the core—your memories, your consciousness—is deleted.
What...? Wait...are you saying...
Yes. Very soon now I'll be gone.
Zero Jr. is probably recovering himself right now.
Once he's done, I doubt I'll be around much longer.
What? Why...?
I deserve this.
No! No you don't!
Even if you had done something, you would have been killed anyway!
You can't blame yourself! You did what you could. You're not wrong!
This game is what's wrong! Forcing you to watch your friends die is what's wrong!
...
...
Oh Sigma... Thank you.
I'm...I'm really glad I met you...
Luna! Luna!
It's going to be okay! I'm not gonna let them do this!
You're gonna be fine, I promise!
Just please don't—
I'm sorry... My time's up...
At least I get to...
...Die in your arms...
Luna!
Sigma...
And...goodbye...
...Doctor...
...Doctor...?
VLR OST: [Virtue's Last Reward (Piano)]
Well, that, uh, sure was something, huh.
There is a lot of stuff going on in this game. We've been seeing a couple different people's agendas play out together in real time over multiple different timelines. Luna's ending puts a lot of it into perspective, particularly, of course, with respect to Dio.
It, uh, also might go a ways towards explaining Luna's altruistic voting tendencies.
This brings us surging past the 40 hour mark, and into The Endgame. Like, this is it. I'm not sure exactly where The 4AM Point in VLR is - you know, that point in any mystery-thriller plot where shit kicks into high gear and you know in your soul that you are not going to sleep until the credits roll - but whereever it is, we are past it. This is a Kotaro Uchikoshi plot, and we are about to reap our payoffs.
There's just the tiiiiiiiiny matter of first addressing what would've happened had we been impossibly stupid and managed to still doubt Luna, even after all we've seen.