Phase 6

Phase 6
Volume:	1
Chapter	6
Japanese title	テレビのスイッチを切るように
Romanized title	Terebi no Suitchi o Kiru Yō ni
English title	Turn the TV Off!
Total pages	30
Released	2001
Story Arc	Tiphares Arc
Chapter Navigation
previous Phase 5	next Phase 7

Turn the TV Off... is the sixth chapter of Battle Angel Alita: Last Order.

Cover

Alita

Summary

Sechs explodes after getting struck by Alita

With Alita using Nova II as a human shield against Sechs, he tells them that he does not matter, but the F-Box that he is holding contains 'the most precious substance in the world'. Elf and Zwölf jump down from the balcony to see what Sechs will do. Alita spins Nova II out of the way as Sechs attacks with the Titan Blade. She blocks a rapid series of jabs and Sechs kicks Nova II out of the way. Alita is able to strike Sechs' chest with the Hertza Haeon, forcing the latter to jump away. Sechs claims to have defeated it and transforms her Solenoid Quench Gun back into an arm. However before she can counterattack, her body explodes. Alita explains that if she had been using her prior TUNED body, Sechs would have defeated the Hertza Haeon, but the Imaginos Body she is now using is in a class by itself, requiring only the slightest touch for the Hertza Haeon to be effective. Alita then asks Elf and Zwölf if they are next, but they play innocent. When Sechs asks her how she won, Alita replies that she only knows an immature form of Panzer Kunst from her past, as she lacks the memories of Mars that Alita has. She does not finish Sechs off and tells her to live free.

At the Medical Inspection Bureau Core Block, Jim Roscoe is making his way despite his injured foot and cursing his dead companions' inability to buy him enough time. Casey and his men are following him and talking about the joys of killing, suggesting that they will make blood sports legal in their new Tiphares. Jim enters the core, where he finds a vast array of fetuses inside storage tanks, the Mother Machine. He also finds the DNA Organ and DNA data bank. Jim discovers that the latter has complete records of everyone born in Tiphares for the past 200 years. It can even predict what kind of person will be born depending on their DNA, and periodically added a surface dweller's DNA into the gene pool to maintain its diversity. He decides to look up Desty Nova's history and comes upon a startling revelation.

Nova II invites Alita to Ketheres

Nova II explains to Alita that the corpse back in his lab was indeed him. When he returned to Tiphares, the first thing he did was perfect his backup using codification technology to implant his body's compositional information, including his memory, into the molecular motion of the atmosphere itself. The information can be extracted at any time and is immediately activated when his physical body dies, creating an exact duplicate of himself as he was prior to his death. Essentially, he has become the closest thing to immortal in history. When Alita declares that she has not forgotten what he did on the surface, Nova II responds that he would not want her to as this is free will. He then invites her to join them when they head to Ketheres. Despite wanting to return to Mars and see Erica and Gelda again, Alita declines, as she still has to find Lou Collins. Nova II tells her that they will go ahead to the M.I.B. Core and to join them if she changes her mind. As soon as they leave, Pam Mahan and Nola Lafargue eagerly emerge from hiding. Deckman 100 however did not leave with Nova II and reveals that he was reprogrammed to serve Alita. She is initially skeptical, but when the Deckman says that he has spare Imaginos cells and can repair her damaged arm, she acquiesces.

Back at the core, Casey and his men see Jim, who appears on a ledge above them. Jim says that he has discovered the truth behind Tiphares and screams that it is a trash heap, making all of them garbage and that they should die. Something suddenly bursts from the floor behind Casey's group and is revealed to be Sachumodo. Jim tells it to destroy Tiphares just before he is shot through the throat with a bow and arrow by one of Casey's men and falls.

Debut appearances

Characters

• Sachumodo

Technology

• DNA Data Bank
• DNA Organ
• Mother Machine

Trivia

• It is later revealed by Super Nova that the F-Box contains Alita's brain.
• Alita's mention of "memories of Mars" is a reference to Gunnm: Martian Memory.