Reunited

Niko's head getting whipped violently back and forth was... not how he planned to start his morning. He screamed out as he was shaken from his frankly horrible night of sleep, his eyes flickering back onto his screen as he tried to register just what the hell he was waking up to. Above him was a familiar face, bright green LED eyes and a big smile meeting Niko's yellow and pink. He pulled away from the construction drone infront of him, his uncovered eye wide as he sputtered.

  "Th- Thad?! Wha- how-- how did you get here?!!" Niko questioned, turning his head to look around. He was still on the top floor of the abandoned skyscraper on his sad, falling apart excuse of a bed. Uzi's soulless screen still staring at him from behind Thad who just started laughing. Niko was crushed into a hug, a choked wheeze coming from him as he awkwardly hugged Thad back. Uzi tilted her head at the display.

  "That's... definitely one way to answer, I guess?" He said, Thad pulling back and holding Niko by the shoulders.
  "I saw V on the roof outside, I came in here to go chase her down but here you are too!! Aren't I lucky?! I've been looking everywhere for you guys!" He said, standing back up. He pulled Niko up by the arm, of course pulling him around like he weighed nothing. Niko just steadied himself as he stood, straightening his back as he thought about the nightmare he just woke up from. Ugh... his spine still ached. His head still pounded from the grating sound of the glass shattering and thad shaking him awake.

  "V d-didn't see you come in??" Niko questioned, his hands squeezing and unsqueezing as he watched Thad walk over to the nearest boarded up window. He peeked through the boards, the sun was setting... Niko had slept all day, obviously a poor choice on his part now that Thad had caught up. He could feel the sweat icons on his screen watching the construction drone starting to wander towards the nearest staircase.
  "I got pictures I've been trying to send to you guys but V wasn't reading any of my messages. Where's your phone?" Thad asked, niko tapping his thumbs together as his unbandaged eye looked anywhere that wasn't at Thad.

  "Uhh... I guess I lost it?" Niko said. He couldn't remember where he put it, no doubt it was sitting back at the bunker or long gone and dropped somewhere outside. Thad just gave a snicker, taking his own phone out.
  "Damn, mine is almost out of battery. I spent a few hours this morning sitting in a busted up car waiting for the snow to ease up," Thad frowned, opening his photo gallery. He trotted back to Niko, handing him his phone. Niko looked down at the images, his face growing increasingly worried as he saw J shredding blue prints in camp 98. The closer photo of a shredded blueprint had niko even more worried, the pink on his screen quickly overtaking the yellow that was there.

  "H- how did you... get these? Did she see you?" He asked, staring at the photo of the blueprint. It was a print for the ship, instructions on how to repair one. His eyebrows furrowed in confusion though. Why would J have blueprints? The only logical reason was Cyn. That pod was sent so it could break, it wasn't meant to survive the landing and be used again... this must have been another something J was hiding from them. Of course. He looked at Thad, who just shrugged.
  "Nope, I was able to snap these and get away. That's why I've been looking for you guys, you said you were helping look for uzi too, right?" He said, grinning wide. He pointed his thumb at himself, puffing his chest out confidently.
  "I figured I could bring these and we could team up! I mean, it'd be way easier to find answers that way right? And maybe J will know something!" He said, taking his phone back from Niko. Niko just gave a hesitant nod.
  "Uhh... yeah... I guess that's a- a good idea..." he said, staring down at his feet. His chest was tight, his head reeling as his eye scanned around the room for anything that could make Thad somehow change his mind and go home. Before he could though, he was getting grabbed by the wrist and dragged towards the staircase to the roof.
  "Come on, we gotta tell V! If all three of us go to J then she'll HAVE to tell us what she knows, right? Three against one is hard to beat after all, I think she'd totally shred me if I went alone," Thad said, Niko staring at his face as they headed up the stairs.

Thad was always so positive, a bright green light a lot of the bunker looked towards when spirits were low and hope was dim. Honestly, it made niko consider confessing everything. He killed uzi, couldn't even remember why or how and... now him and V were just running away. The sinking guilt returned when he thought about it more, his lips pressing together in a silent effort to keep himself quiet. Thad was dense but for how long? Would he even forgive him? Would this be the last straw after Brad and Chad??

Too many questions were going through his mind as they neared the rooftop doors. Each step they took felt slower than the last, his body felt like it was falling backwards despite the fact they were going forward and up. Thad's hand reached towards the doorknob to open it when Niko suddenly yanked away, visibly shaking when Thad looked back at him.
  "Hey, hey, are you alright? What's the big deal, you aren't suddenly afraid of heights are you?" He teased a little. His light hearted smile dropped when he saw Niko's expression, the subtle fear and the way he kept staring at the door. Thad looked back at it, then at Niko. His eyebrows furrowed, stepping away from the door and towards his friend.

Niko looked down at the floor, more tears poking the digital eye on his screen.
  "Thad... I- th... there's... something I- I haven't... been telling you..." he started, the pink on his body smothering out all the yellow. Thad just stared at Niko, his own expression growing darker.
  "Okay... well what is it? Better hurry up before V decides to fly off or somethi--"

  "Uzi is gone because of me."

The silence in the room that followed was icy. Thad's core felt like it stopped, but soon he banished the silence with a hard laugh. A forced one.
  "Y- you mean I was right about an argument? Did she run away or something??" He said, his own limbs beginning to tremble with the look Niko was giving him. The pink all over him was bright, almost red. The disassembly drone was trembling hard, audibly struggling to intake air with his hands pulling at the jacket he wore.

  "Niko... she just ran away, right?" Thad spoke, subconsciously taking a step back from his friend. Niko didn't answer, a whimpering choked up noise coming from him that Thad couldn't even identify. That response was all he needed to confirm his fears though. Right there at the top of the stairway it felt like he was falling all the way back to the bottom, the landing being the hard-hitting reality of what really happened to Uzi. Niko could feel her cold form looming over him, not understanding a word of what was going on. She never did anymore.

Here Thad was, staring right at the brutal truth of Uzi's disappearance. He was staring right at the cause of Khan's anger and Nori's self-isolation, he was staring at yet another disassembly drone that took away the things he cared about most. It was a sour reminder of why his father spent so long trying to kill them all. Niko was dangerous, nothing could deny that now. Thad couldn't convince himself otherwise now, not after this.

He had spent long enough trying to be their friend.