Mai suddenly woke up with a start. She thought that she should be dead. Yet somehow, here she was.

"...I'm...alive...?...wait..."

Then, she immedately knew something was wrong...something was VERY wrong. In fact, the place she was in, she recognized it.

When she sat up, she looked around...and saw..."nothing" for a better lack of term. But she knew this kind of landscape.

The all-white smooth ground...the gray colored sky...and nothing around for miles.

Alone...quiet...empty.

She then tried to piece together the last things she remembered but had trouble filling the blanks for reasons she knew. The battle at Joppa.

"...long time Mai..."

She then looked to her side...and saw herself. Though she was in the black plugsuit that she always wore. Just now "she"...or her other self, wasn't wearing the back helmit with the red visor.

And quickly looking herself over showed that she also was still in her black plugsuit.

But Mai knew better...this...wasn't reality.

This was her mind...and it'd had been a long time since she had last been this deep into..."herself".

"...Seven...", Mai simply said.

"...as I said, it's been a while ma'am...", Seven droned while giving a salute.

Shaking her head, Mai then watched as "Seven" then sat down right in front of her. Mai herself then got into a proper sitting position herself.

"...are we...dead?", Mai asked.

"...no...but your aware what happened the last time this happened...", "Seven" droned in response.

Of course, how could she NOT forget. Her first test run with the Telekenetic system. Her first battle with it in the Setsuka...pushing past her default Sync rate limit...then...this.

"...coma...", Mai said, looking down and trying to control herself.

"...the human brain is quite strange...your self-aware of that ma'am...and yet...", "Seven" droned.

"...how bad was...no nevermind...I'm starting to remember", Mai said, recalling the last moments.

From there, both just sat there...quiet. Perhaps both, in their own ways, were accepting the silence. The solitutde. The..."downtime" so to speak.

But for how long this time? If she remembered right, the pain...taking all those sniper rounds mostly then that one shot from the Cruxi squad...her leg blown off...wings burned and damaged...that buring sensation with the green fire...then the lower torso getting blown off in her last mad dash to take down the remaining two Cruxi.

The last time, she was out for only a day...but...this time?

"..."Seven"...do you think it's time to leave this world?...I'm just...tired...", Mai said rather darkly.

"...negative...we still have work to do...", "Seven" droned.

"...then...you don't..."need" me...do you..."

"Seven" took a long look at her "other half". Even she couldn't comprehend the human soul. But then again, the humans were fighting a rather desperate war. With her mother and her special abilities and skills, she was perhaps the best bet the humans had.

Then, her last moments of "madness" changed everything...being pushed too far due to that same system and the "demands" of others...

That's when Mai was forced to serve being that Maria "Angel" Twilight was her last living relative. Even her home was taken over by the Cruxi. Then...the "Helldivers" division...Caulder and the other pilots.

But some were hoping that she'd also develop the same skills her mother had.

And that's was when "she" came into the world to help Mai cope...to help her "deal" with the horror's of war. Then to the point of completing the missions...to do things that no other pilot can do...to make those hard decisions...to even give up their very lives for the sake of not only the mission...but for the well-being of others.

But what Mai was saying...was that she can have complete control of her own destiny. To make her own path for herself in this chaotic war. To be more than a "drone" sent to go and fight...

To destroy. To live. To survive.

Yet to "Seven", something happened...why did that seem so...heartless?

Why was she hesitating? She could be her own person. She could be in full control of this body.

But for "Seven", she already knew the reason.

"...I can't comply with that order ma'am", "Seven" suddenly droned.

Mai looked up, a look of shock on her face.

Then...tears. Mai started to cry.

"...why...I just...I just want it to end...the fact that your here just shows how screwed up in the head I am!...why Seven?!...WHY?!?!?!"

"...because...seeing you bear all that weight that was "forced" upon you...it just..."

"Seven" then said something that she never thought a "personality" trained to kill would say.

"...it just...hurt..."

Mai had tears in her eyes and took a long hard look at "Seven"...or perhaps, herself.

She then leaned foward...and hugged herself. Crying on her own shoulder.

* * * * * * * * * *

In reality, Mai was still hooked up to the machines like Zim and Serah witnessed before. But sometime later, if anyone were to take a closer look at Mai...they would see fresh tears from her eyes.