For the Ones Who Waited So Long

"I had no idea android maids came with combat functions..."

Reir forced his body to move and shuffled toward where the maids were staring.

"What the hell is going on? Decommissioned... entities? What even are those?"

Lucia stepped in front of him, blocking his path.

"They are maids who lost their purpose for far too long and eventually went mad. Even though they were supposed to protect their master, they couldn't. Their circuits malfunctioned, overloaded, and turned them into something like zombies."

"Maids... turning into zombies?"

"Yes. They simply wander the streets endlessly, and when they spot other maids, they attack. It appears to be another symptom of malfunction. That is why we have determined they must be 'decommissioned.' We eliminate every one we find."

Lucia examined the decommissioned entity.

"Hias. What is its status?"

She asked the maid holding the rifle. It was the pink-haired maid with the ponytail. She was aiming at the decommissioned entity with a bright, energetic expression.

"Big sis Lucia, that thing... it looks like it'll shut down on its own even if we don't do anything."

"Why is that, Hias?"

"Its legs are completely shattered. Half its face is gone too."

"...I see."

Lucia turned to the other maids.

"Everyone, let us descend to the surface. And... prepare a funeral."

"A funeral...?"

Reir tilted his head in confusion.

"It seems Master should witness how we treat decommissioned entities. Please come with us."

"Ah, sure..."

Lucia offered her hand to support him, but Reir waved it away and refused.

He had recovered enough strength to walk on his own.

Limping along on legs that barely obeyed him, Reir followed the maids.

"Master, you really don't need any help?"

The pink-haired maid from earlier—Hias—looked visibly frustrated and crossed her arms as she asked.

"I'm fine. Walking by myself helps me recover faster... By the way, your name was..."

"I'm Hias! I mainly work as a shooter. I also help big sis Lucia a lot!"

"Hias... right. But could you back off a little? It's really uncomfortable."

"Ehh, you don't like it? I can't help it, it's in my programming~ My previous master said he liked cheerful maids who were big on skinship, so that's how I was made!"

"Ah... I see..."

Reir decided not to press the issue any further.

If that's how she was built, what more could he say?

With Hias's help, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Reir gradually made his way down. Eventually, on the ruined road below, he saw the writhing decommissioned entity with his own eyes.

"...Poor thing."

Lucia murmured softly.

Reir stopped breathing the moment he saw the entity's condition.

Torn maid uniform.

Exposed mechanical frame.

Cracked face.

From its back, severed cables dangled like entrails.

And its eyes—shaking wildly as if completely insane.

Those eyes, twitching without rhythm, suddenly locked onto Reir.

The entity let out a grotesque laugh, its eyes freezing in place as it opened its mouth.

The voice crackled like a broken speaker.

Then more entities began pouring out from the alleyways.

The maids immediately assumed combat positions again. Lucia pulled Reir into her arms.

"Please be careful, Master."

"Ah, thanks..."

Reir broke out in a cold sweat.

What he felt from those beings wasn't hostility—it was something far more horrifying.

The despair of abandoned children.

"Can't those maids... be fixed?"

Lucia spoke quietly.

"They are already broken beyond repair. That is why we call them decommissioned. They are damaged so severely that they cannot be restored. To borrow a human phrase, both their hearts and bodies are completely destroyed."

"And yet... they're still searching for humans."

"Yes... Because at their core, they are maids."

BOOM!!

A massive crash suddenly shook the air as a building wall collapsed.

One maid consumed by madness burst out.

Half her face had melted away.

It screamed as it charged straight at Reir.

But in that instant—

A flash.

Lucia's sword sliced through the night.

With a blue streak of light, the decommissioned entity's body was cut cleanly in two.

Metal fragments and black oil spilled across the ground.

"It came at us so suddenly..."

Lucia muttered. She glanced at the remaining decommissioned entities around them and decided they needed to be dealt with quickly.

Reir blinked rapidly in her arms, still stunned by what had just happened.

"Hias, watch over Master for a moment."

"Okaaay~"

Lucia handed Reir over to Hias, drew her sword, and began cutting down the decommissioned entities one by one.

She precisely severed only the power cores. Before long, every approaching entity had been slaughtered.

"...Poor things."

Lucia gathered the severed parts of the decommissioned entities and arranged them back into the original shape of android maids.

Then she took out a lighter from her pocket.

"Everyone, let us pray for these poor decommissioned entities."

She set the entities ablaze. Soon the flames roared high, melting their entire bodies.

The maids offered a short, silent prayer.

"..."

Watching the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠scene, Reir fell into deep thought.

Have they been living like this the whole time?

It must have been agonizing.

*

"It's been a long time since I last cooked, so I'm not sure if it turned out properly. I hope it is to your liking."

Lucia served Reir a stew made with vegetables and lamb.

Reir took a taste and nodded in approval.

"It's good."

"Thank you, Master."

As he ate the stew, Reir slowly looked around.

The ruined city.

The collapsed spires.

The burning Holy Fire.

And the maids watching him.

He recalled everything that had happened so far.

The maids who had cried at their long-awaited reunion, begging to serve him, pleading for him to save them.

And the maids who, at the end of that desperate longing, had twisted and become decommissioned entities. The maids here who had no choice but to cut down their own kind.

Remembering it all, Reir voiced a question.

"Why... did you have no choice but to live like that?"

"What do you mean by 'like that'...?"

"The rituals around the Holy Fire... praying for humanity's return. And those decommissioned entities earlier—why did they have to end up that way?"

Lucia remained silent for a moment.

"...Because there were no humans."

Reir didn't immediately grasp the meaning behind her words.

Lucia walked over to the Holy Fire.

The red glow flickered across her silver hair.

"We were created for humans."

Lucia spoke with perfect calm.

"To prepare meals, to clean, to bring joy, to ease loneliness."

"..."

"That was our happiness. Our reason for existing. Our purpose."

Happiness, she said.

Reir found it strange to hear an android speak of happiness. Was it the same as human happiness? Or was it simply programmed?

But Lucia's voice didn't sound false.

"Then one day, the humans disappeared."

Lucia looked down at her own hands.

Her fingertips were trembling faintly.

"At first, we waited."

"One day."

"One week."

"One year."

"One hundred years."

"And then hundreds of years."

A quiet melody drifted among the maids.

Someone was unconsciously scraping a violin string.

It was a terribly lonely sound.

"But no one ever came back."

Lucia continued.

"So we created the rituals."

She gazed at the Holy Fire.

"So we would not forget."

The wind blew.

The torch flickered.

"That humans had once existed."

Reir couldn't say anything.

In this world after the apocalypse, the maids who had survived among the ruins were not mere machines.

They were memories.

Beings who refused to forget humanity.

Lucia slowly turned back to him.

Her eyes were cold and beautiful, but beneath them lay a deep exhaustion.

Reir couldn't begin to measure their sorrow, their waiting, their endurance, so he remained silent.

They had simply waited endlessly.

They had simply remembered.

The humans.

Himself.

Even so, Reir still had questions.

"Master."

Lucia knelt so her eyes were level with his as he sat.

"What do you plan to do from now on?"

Reir froze.

He had only just woken from the cryogenic chamber, and he hadn't had any time to think about what he should do.

He had been too busy simply trying to accept the current situation and this broken world.

But the maids were looking at him with expectation in their ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠eyes.

Salvation.

As the last remaining human, as the one who would lead them.

Their eyes begged him to show them the way.

Reir looked out over the ruined city.

Black smoke was rising in the distance.

The world had ended completely.

And yet.

Strangely.

It didn't feel entirely dead.

Because the maids were still moving.

Because the maids were keeping this world alive.

Reir let out a small sigh.

"...I don't know."

It was an honest answer.

"I woke up and the world was destroyed. And suddenly I'm the last human alive."

He gave a dry laugh.

"Honestly, it still doesn't feel real."

The maids listened to him in silence.

After a brief pause, Reir spoke again.

"But there's one thing I do understand."

"...?"

He looked at Lucia.

"That your conditions are pretty serious."

A few of the maids tilted their heads in confusion.

Even Lucia was momentarily speechless.

Reir let out a laugh that sounded almost like a sigh.

"You've been dancing on top of ruins and offering sacrifices while waiting for humans for hundreds of years. Does that sound sane to you?"

Reir's question.

The rituals were so detached from reality that it seemed they must have been created before the maids had lost their minds.

"..."

"Like anyone would actually come back just because of that. Well... I guess I did come back, huh?"

Honestly, the maids had known their actions were meaningless. But they had done them out of nothing but hope. The rituals had been born from that hope.

They simply hadn't wanted to deny it.

They had simply hypnotized themselves into believing it had meaning.

They had simply performed those meaningless yet meaningful rituals so they wouldn't go mad and become decommissioned entities.

That was why the maids had continued them.

Those rituals that looked anything but normal.

"So, I thought of one thing."

"What... is it?"

"It seems like before trying to fix this ruined world, I should save all of you first."

"Thank you, but... why?"

"Because you've all gone a little insane waiting for humans all this time."

Lucia smiled faintly.

"...Yes."

She quietly admitted it.

"We are quite broken."

The Holy Fire blazed higher.

Ash scattered into the night sky.

And Reir thought to himself.

"Let's start working from tomorrow."

He would make these ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠lonely maids start living again, one step at a time.