A/N: Wait! Don't say it. We're already a week into 2018. But what if I told you this story isn't 7 days late—it's actually 358 days early?
Get better at cooking, learn electronic engineering, read more books...
Noire walked through the Lastation streets at a brisk pace, one of many in an intermittent community of late-night workers and young urban professionals relishing the nightlife. Lamp spheres lit her path, casting a warm golden glow like candlelight over the road at every interval. The light glinted off metal tiles lining the walkway, producing a lurid glare that made the city seem brighter and more crowded even nigh to midnight.
Finish those games I still have to beat, play the ones I haven't, check out the ones recommended to me...
Despite the list of tasks scrolling through her head like news headlines, figuring out a good way to fit them all into her schedule was the last thing on her mind. Going around today and making her rounds before the new year had been exhausting, not so much physically as mentally. It seemed like there was so much to do these days, and taking care of what was most important was still only the tip of the iceberg.
But she was done with work for today. All she wanted right now was to sprawl out on the couch, grab a bottle from the fridge—alcoholic or non, either would do—and wait for midnight while playing games and eating tiny chocolates.
Master those advanced sewing techniques, talk to Neptune, Blanc, and Vert more...
A vaguely familiar face, probably a business associate, smiled at her as she passed. She barely managed a perfunctory wave back before pretending to yawn and looking away so she did not have to say anything polite. She lived in an environment where she was expected to be formal and personable, but at times like this when she was not feeling very sociable, she much preferred to avoid those kinds of interactions with other people.
Upon turning at the next corner, the base of the Basilicom came into sight. Close to home, Noire's mood brightened, and a swiftness entered her step. The lethargy she had felt earlier left her, replaced by the sudden remembrance that it was New Year's.
Maybe Uni feels like going out, she wondered, humming as she stepped up to the entrance and held up her hand for a fingerprint scan. The doors slid open, and the warmth inside the building melted away the outside chill. A little further inside, Uni stood with her back against the wall and her hands behind her back. Her gaze was fixed intently on some invisible point on the other side of the room.
"Good evening Uni," Noire called out, drawing the girl out of her trance. Uni blinked and shook her head slightly before greeting her elder sister with a little wave. "Hey, wanna go out and celebrate?" she continued, wearing her nicest smile. "It's New Year's. If you don't have any plans, I know a few places we can go to have a little fun."
Granted, a few of those places are bars, Noire confessed to herself, But you're old enough now, and I'd rather your first time be with me than a bunch of strangers.
"Um..." Uni rubbed her shoulder and looked away for a few seconds. "If you don't mind, can we celebrate at home? I don't really want to go out. I'm okay with just watching TV or playing games with you."
Noire had to stop and make sure that she had heard correctly. Uni usually jumped at the chance to go out, especially if it was something social like this. But even though she was surprised, Noire smiled anyway. She sent Uni upstairs ahead of her to set up the TV with whatever game or movie she liked, while she went to the kitchen to grab drinks and that box of chocolates she had been saving for tonight.
Uni's finally telling me what she wants, she thought happily. Despite being family, sometimes it seemed an impossible task for them to be straightforward with the other. Noire had always thought she was doing an alright job of making it clear that Uni could ask her for anything, but even at the best of times it was still a guessing game.
Noire reached the end of the hallway and turned into the kitchen, already thinking about what drink she wanted for the occasion. But she stopped in her tracks when she saw that the refrigerator door was open and someone had gotten there before her. Most surprisingly, it was a person she had never expected to see in the Basilicom again, especially with so few hours left in the year.
"Kei?" she blurted, unable to stop herself. Kei Jinguji turned around, holding a bottle of rose-pink liquor by the neck, and her face lit up in recognition.
"Ah, Lady Noire," the ex-Oracle greeted easily and politely, as if no time had passed at all since the two of them had last met. Yet there was something changed about her that Noire could not quite explain.
They talked for a while. Kei, being the shrewd operator she was, had completely reestablished herself since she had worked with Lastation. With a shining new business plan and plenty of prospective success on the road ahead, she had figured it a good time to visit the Basilicom and let her former employers and friends know that she was doing well.
"That would be the reason you've caught me in the middle of putting this into your fridge," Kei said, gesturing with the bottle of rosé. "I expected that you and Uni would be celebrating, so I planned to leave this here without your noticing. I guess I'll just have to give it to you directly."
Noire accepted the gift and gave her thanks, eying the label. Whatever it was, it looked expensive; leave it to Kei to pick something so stately and sophisticated. There was a professional-looking note on waxy paper tied around the neck of the bottle for her to read, but since Kei had summed up most of it already, Noire only glanced over it and smiled. Out of courtesy, she asked Kei if she had any plans for the night, but the implied invitation was turned down by a gentle shake of the Oracle's head and a polite "Thank you, but I'll pass."
Kei gave Noire a friendly smile, and Noire realized what it was that had seemed so different earlier. There was a natural ease to her that had not been there before, a naturalness that could only be developed through being in the company of others and actively trying to get along with them.
"You should spend this time with Uni," continued Kei, "I'd only be getting in the way."
Even though Noire insisted that it was not true, she knew Kei was right. This meeting should never have happened in the first place. The rest of the night would only be awkward if Kei joined them upstairs, despite being a face they both knew. It was too abrupt—too late in the game for a new party member to join, so to speak.
Kei wished Noire well and excused herself. Succinct as ever, Noire mused as the young woman disappeared into the hall. Nothing else left to do, she rummaged through the fridge and retrieved a small golden box. Thanks to Kei, drinks were already covered, so she grabbed two glasses and the bottle and headed on up.
When she got to her room, she found Uni with a handheld in her lap and the game of her choice already loaded on the widescreen. "Ready?" she asked, setting the food on the floor between them.
"Ready," Uni declared. She picked up the controller and started to set up. In the meantime, Noire sat down and opened both the chocolate and the champagne. She filled her own glass a little over halfway, and Uni's a little under—not being completely sure of her younger sister's alcohol tolerance was a mixed blessing. Then, after moving the bottle to the table so it was out of the way, she sat back and waited for the game to start.
A Noire New Year
"There it is," Uni said quietly, a distance behind Noire. "On your left."
"I see it." As soon as the words had left Noire's mouth, the withered forest around them trembled as a bolt of gold and green shot into the air. From it unfurled a pair of huge, powerful wings that seemed to catch the sunlight and hurl it back. Iwaoropenelep, or Iwaopeln, "the beak that cracks boulders," hovered in place for a moment before folding its wings and hurling itself in a dive at the forerunner of the two hunters that had dared enter its territory. At the last second it shot out a glinting talon—
"Kraaaaw!"
—Before screeching in pain and veering away, struck in the neck by an exploding shell. Unable to gain height, the huge feathery body had nowhere to go but crashing down, plowing a rift into the ground and launching a cloud of dust skyward.
"Good shot, Uni!" Saying nothing more, Noire drew her weapon and ran to the downed giant, readying a devastating swing at its vulnerable backside. Her axe cleaved off its tailfeathers as if they were nothing. Then she hit a trigger on the handle of her weapon and slid the head of her axe right off, switching effortlessly into sword-and-shield mode, before repositioning and using her blade to slice at her target's side. Iwaopeln gave a furious cry and tried to find purchase on the sandy earth. Lightning fast even on the ground, it whirled around and retaliated with a flint-like beak the size of a hand.
Struck in the shoulder, Noire stumbled backwards and grabbed her shoulder. Though her skin had not been pierced, the area around where she had been hit grew cold and numb. Petrification, she thought right before the bird hopped up into the air and knocked her down with a buffet of wind from its beating wings. Noire tried frantically to recover as the air started to crackle with energy. But rather than finish her off, Iwaopeln tucked its wings in and soared over her head, headed straight for the slower of the two who was still reloading.
"Wait, no"—Noire heard the sound of rapid fire from Uni's heavy bowgun, then the booming crash of a thunderbolt—"Aw, frick!"
She turned around to look at her partner, who was not lying fried on the ground but was sitting crosslegged on the bed, staring hopelessly at the quest failure screen. Uni idly rotated the control stick, her eyes fixated but her mind clearly elsewhere.
Noire placed her controller down and leaned back on her palms, saying nothing. When Uni finally noticed, her eyes widened and she hastily followed suit in unhanding the game. Sheepishly, she caught her sister's eye and asked if something was wrong.
"Nothing's wrong, but you seem a bit out of it Uni. It's not like you get carted this quickly."
Uni automatically tried to apologize but stopped when Noire shook her head. After a moment of quiet, she started to speak. "I'm just thinking about something someone said to me. It was just a conversation, and I don't really let this kind of stuff get to me, but I can't stop thinking about it. It's kinda frustrating."
Uni sighed and picked up the controller to turn it over in her hands.
"I know exactly how you feel," Noire said with a empathetic frown. "I've been there before."
As inconsequential as a lot of her own conversations tended to be, there were plenty of things that were trivial but for some reason always stuck, like a compliment that still made her smile, or an insult that still made her seethe. "For me, sometimes it helps to just vent about it," she continued. "Get everything out of your system, you get me?"
Uni listened quietly and nodded to her words. She looked down again and bit her lip after Noire finished, seemingly to consider the silent invitation that hung in the air.
"Do you think I'm too clingy?" she asked shortly, glancing at her sister with a worried look.
"Clingy?" Noire tilted her head in thought. That was hardly a word she would have used to describe Uni. Stubborn maybe, or guarded, but not clingy.
"Yeah, see? Even you think so!" Uni made a face when Noire gave her opinion. "I'm not clingy at all, but Nepgear and Ram keep saying I am. I know they're just joking, but sometimes the way they play it off is just so—ugh! It's stupidly annoying."
Uni plopped her chin in her hands and tapped her cheek with a restless finger, the frustration apparently unbearable.
"Why were they calling you clingy?" Noire queried, already taking mental notes. She almost hoped Uni would defend her friends well enough so that there was no real reason to take disciplinary action. Neptune and Blanc would not be happy if she took matters into her own hands, but there was hardly a chance that they would see fault with their siblings' behavior if Noire were to bring it up to them in simple conversation. But she would stand up for her own family first and worry about their opinions later.
Uni wet her lips, looking ever-so hesitant to explain. "We were talking about our resolutions for this year, and since everybody else already said their stuff, I was the last one... But it's not that they forced me to share or anything like that," she added hastily after seeing Noire's face. "I wanted to share mine, even if it was a little personal. I felt that it was only fair."
Despite knowing it was a serious moment, Noire hid a smile at the level of maturity in Uni's voice. My input isn't really needed, she thought, filled with pride. She's mature enough to deal with these small things on her own.
Having gotten a conclusive answer from Noire, Uni seemed satisfied to let the conversation end there. And Noire would have agreed, if not for one thing: the rude curiosity that made the things left untold seem so much more desirable.
Noire tried her best to find the balance between giving Uni the right amount of space and being distant. She wanted to build a relationship out of mutual respect, and also to teach Uni how to do the same, but that was impossible if she was either too attached or too detached. Yet there were times when she wanted to close that respectful distance between them and be close like family should be, and this was one of those times.
Noire cleared her throat to grab Uni's attention and asked. "Your resolution," she pressed when Uni looked at her in confusion. "If you told them, you should be able to tell me, right?"
Glancing down at the bed, Uni slowly nodded in agreement like a child grudgingly accepting their parents' logic. She bit her lip and was quiet for a short while. Noire averted her eyes out of courtesy, not wanting to make her feel too pressured. A few pieces of chocolate were left in the box, most of them dark. Uni preferred the sweeter ones, so the remainder practically belonged to Noire.
While she was weighing the choice of whether to eat some now or save them for later, she saw Uni's head bob up in the corner of her eye.
"I want to hang out with you more," Uni said when she had her older sister's attention. "You just seem so busy all the time, and it feels like you don't get to relax or play as much as I do. So I want to be more helpful, I guess, and..." Face flushed, Uni's voice fell to a murmur. "And be a better sister in general."
Noire found that she had been holding her breath the whole time Uni had been speaking. She breathed out, trying to assess the emotions that were floating about in her chest: a twinge of pride at having such a selfless sister, a stab of guilt for not having enough time for family, and a hint of remorse from the realization that a lot of time had passed—time enough for Uni to grow up almost without her noticing. Like the chocolates she had eaten earlier, the reflection was bittersweet.
For a while, she was happy to just sit and bask in the warmth that her feelings created. But the truth was out, and Uni was waiting; it was her turn to go.
"Then let's make it a New Year's resolution," she said, getting up. Ignoring her sister's confused look, she sat down on the bed and unabashedly hugged her. Caught unawares, Uni tensed up in surprise. At first she was unsure what to do with her hands, but after a moment she put her arms around Noire, who gave her a reassuring squeeze and went on. "I'll spend more quality time with my sister, who's gonna make sure to have my back whenever I get too busy with work. Deal?"
Noire pulled back so they could see each other's faces, knowing her own was probably redder than a plumber's cap. Something glistened in Uni's eye, but she wiped it away quickly and took a breath before raising her chin with an unaffected smile.
"Deal!"
This is my resolution, to the better person I want to become this coming year. Cheers.