“Your enemy?” Eva exclaimed, scrambling onto her feet. The digitized trio glared at her, ferociously, accusingly. “What do you mean?”

“Are you really this ignorant?” Ceno scoffed. “It doesn’t matter. If you’re not already in league with him, then he’s obviously trying to get you on his side. Why else would he have rescued you?”

“What?” Eva blinked, confused.

“The Shadow Virus,” Ceno snapped, hatred curdling his voice. “He’s a monster. He lives for destruction, for suffering. He’s already laid waste to five cities, and 75505 will be his next victim. He’s hunting the three of us down, you see, as we move from place to place. We think he’s most likely working for the Cyber Initiative. He may be digitized, but he’s not like us. He’s been… corrupted.”

“What are you talking about? He didn’t seem corrupted when he helped me, when he spoke to me…” Eva protested. Emotional conflict squirmed through her chest. She glitched and stumbled off-balance. An odd pain throbbed in her stomach. “What do you even mean by ‘corrupted?’ How do you know—”

“He is the fourth one,” Iyanna growled. “The fourth to be digitized.”

“But…” Then something clicked. “You said your eye was destroyed by malware?” she asked Ceno.

“Yeah,” Ceno nodded. “The same malware that destroyed Nikolai Naren, better known as the Shadow Virus. He’s the physical embodiment of the virus that attacked me in cyberspace. He’s literally corrupted. It’s awful, what happened to him, but... it’s awfully hard to sympathize, when all he wants to do is infect and kill us. If you’re telling the truth, if he really did help you escape from the Initiative... then he must want you to help him somehow.”

“But… but I won’t help him, if he really does want to kill you!” Eva rapidly shook her head. Her outline wavered, and with a sickening jolt, she found herself teleporting forward, dissolving into light. She barely managed to stop herself from crashing right into Ceno. “I’m not a- a bad guy! I just don’t understand how this Shadow Virus could be so terrible, I mean, he saved me—”

“I just told you! He only saved you because he thinks you might be useful to him, dammit!” Ceno shouted. His skin jittered and shuddered, and he winced. He lowered his voice, attempting to control his emotions. It only made him sound more menacing. “Anyway, how on Earth are we supposed to believe you when you say you’re ‘not a bad guy?’” Confusion and fear flashed across Eva’s face, and he smiled coldly. “Before you woke up, we took a scan of your face, searched for it in a few regional databases. Found some interesting footage. Turns out you’ve done all sorts of things the Shadow Virus would approve of.”

Eva flinched, remembering her ‘field tests.’ She had always suspected that they were illegal, immoral. How come no one ever tried to arrest her, or the researchers?

“I didn’t want to!” she burst out, glitching quite painfully. “They made me do it! I never wanted to hurt anyone, I swear!”

“You’re no better than he is,” Ceno snapped.

“Where is this footage? What did you see?!” she shouted, hands and legs shuddering and glowing, etched with code.

“I can’t show it to you now. It was deleted while we were still watching. Creepy, isn’t it?” Ceno half-smiled, eyes glinting coolly.

“Well, maybe the Shadow Virus is being influenced by some organization like the Initiative! Maybe they’re forcing him to tear down those cities!” Eva balled up her fists, pixelating indignantly. “Maybe he's not actually a terrible person! Did you consider that?”

“Maybe he’s infected you,” Ceno said. “We can find out.”

In unison, the hostile trio approached Eva. Her eyes darted to each of their angry faces. She was in danger. She was going to have to pixelate. She was going to have to use her abilities against them. 

But if she did, how would she be able to convince them that she wasn’t their enemy?

“This is going to hurt,” Ceno informed her. “Zvez? Go ahead and scan her.”