This is a giftfic for mysterousguy898, who requested Ar Tonelico or Definition of an Android.
Despite using some expanded universe info, this For Want of a Nail AU is set in Ar Tonelico 1 game canon, and reserves the right to ignore later info and retcons. Normally I'm quite obsessive about researching my fandoms, so I totally understand if you come across some detail that makes you go 'wait that's wrong' and it puts you off the fic, but I can't look into the expanded universe material without finding some new thing that makes me want to punch the developers every damn time.
However, if you're one of the people who replays AT1 for the heartwarming every so often and wishes you could recc this series to people without them going Eww, I hope this manages to capture the reason you love this game.
Well. Half the reason.
You have to love the music.
"Spica!" she heard her mother yell from downstairs.
Looking down at the lock she was working on, she pursed her lips, but knew she shouldn't try to call back. It would be hard for her mother to hear her over all the clanging equipment. Also the earplugs. Everyone on Firefly Alley had to wear them while the construction was going on, or else they'd lose their hearing and then where would they be when some monster ambushed them on an expedition to the depths of the tower.
Spica had learned from her mother and her companions that the most important rule of expeditions to the tower was Finders Keepers. Being able to get through locks and blow open doors meant that she could find more things, when she was older and they let her go places where there were things to steal. Salvage.
Tenba Corporation's labs and Grathmeld Development Council had been on Firefly Alley for ages, but her mother's expeditions into the tower and inventions made a lot more people want to move there to study the materials and work on new discoveries. When Spica was born the island held ten thousand people on market days, but they were expanding to have places for a hundred thousand people to live, and maybe even more!
"Remember how you asked me for a little sister!"
That made Spica jump to her feet and run over to the stairs, clanging her way down.
Her mother smiled when Spica made it to the arbitrarily-designated 'ground' floor of the Elduke House, or the Presidential Mansion or whatever it ended up being called. "Brought home one of each," she said, indicating a black-haired girl in what must have been an elaborate dress before it was torn and a boy in training armor that look like it had been expensive before it got scorched and scratched. "Found them in the tower, so if you like them they're yours."
Spica frowned at them, folding her arms, then smiled. "Do you want to learn how to pick locks?"
The girl's eyes brightened. "Would I!"
"I take it your attempt to infiltrate Tenba and take over one of their town defense groups failed?" Bishop Falss asked Bourd. "After all your training," and the expensive grathmelded armor and crystals, "I would think you'd be strong enough to win the duels to qualify."
"That white-haired girl knew my last name." Meaning she knew he was from the church? "I was winning until they put me up against this tiny blond kid."
"…the President's son," Falss realized. "The Grathmelding prodigy." The boy with the same name as Leard's father… but that had to be a coincidence. Falss had survived his fall only with the help of the agent Mir had loosed into the world. No matter how deeply Ayano Elduke ranged into the sealed, secret areas of the tower, it wasn't possible to reach Platina on foot!
"Whatever he built into his armor, I couldn't scratch him. The first time he got a hit in, I hit the wall." Bourd snarled. "If I ever catch him out of armor…"
"Tenba's scavengers," 'tower explorers, "and grathmelders are very loyal. If they recognize you as someone with a reason to hold a grudge against the President's family, if those wild reyvateils don't murder you the human workers will find some way to recycle your body." Just tossing biomass off the edge of the tower was unthinkably wasteful.
He remembered how once upon a time, he'd just wanted to restore lost technology, restore the glory days. Once upon, he'd had dreams, and if the young Kyle Clancy had found Firefly Alley… but then he'd been cast out, made his bargain with Mir, and now all that mattered was revenge.
"I'm working on a device that will let humans use song magic!" And a flamethrower, and she liked going fast, but the President had heard about Krusche's idea with Parameno crystals and said that since she had some people who knew how hymmnos worked, if it was combined with a version of hymmnos that people could used without it being programmed into their cosmospheres?
Krusche had her own place now, and free run of Firefly Alley, and all the materials she could use! This was her dream, so she'd do her best to grant the President's dream! Some of the other young engineers Tenba was gathering were really cute, too.
Like the one who'd just been flown in from Nemo. "My dream is to someday build an airship that can get past the blastline and explore the top of the tower," Luke said excitedly. "See if the Goddess and the legendary apostles of Elemia really exist."
The President's son Regulus clasped his hands together. "If you get up there, you have to promise me something."
"Sure, what?" Luke wondered, expecting the president's son to want to come with. He could use a fighter, with that dragon up there.
"Bring me back funbuns."
Once the port had appeared on her body, it should have been all over. Without diquility she would die, and that meant the Church or Tenba.
Reyvateils were dangerous, and their songs were weapons, and someone had to be responsible for keeping Claire under control.
She didn't want to be under control. She wanted to sing, for Songs to be something other than weapons.
The Church… the church would not have been happy with that, for her to reject her goddess-given role. When she was younger, Tenba had only hired reyvateils for the town defense forces and tower explorers. She'd planned to join and tried for an exploration team, so at least she wouldn't have to use her songs on people, and although she wouldn't have been paid, at least her room, board and diquility would have been provided, and Tenba didn't care about what reyvateils did in their free time. She could have kept studying grathmelding, busked in Firefly Alley and hoped to be noticed.
Then one of the reyvateils she was rooming with saw what Claire was doing with the materials she was allowed to keep for herself from the tower trips.
Tenba was hiring reyvateils as grathmelders? She would still get diquility, she could still keep her Tenba affiliation so people would know she wasn't a rogue, dying and desperate to get diquility no matter the cost, cursing the humans around them because the humans got to live?
She was a Class-B reyvateil, there was no way they'd let her leave combat duty… but they had.
Pochoma and the rest of the department made her pass a proficiency test, but she was making instruments.
Then the President's son passed her a flyer. Because he thought she should… Try out. For his sister's band. Denebola, no, Deena, friends of her brother were supposed to call her Deena was going to be touring the tower, and just, just singing.
"Deep breaths, Claire, deep breaths," Aurica coached her as the musicians around them tuned up and got ready to go onstage.
"Yes," she said, looking down at her lute. The change in altitude coming to Firefly Alley had thrown off the tuning on most of the competitors' instruments. Touring all over the tower, that would be important, wouldn't it?
The lute Claire had grathmelded didn't need to be tuned.
Yes, maybe, yes. She could do this.
Ayano lowered her sword and sighed. "One of these days, I'll build a robot that doesn't go berserk. Thanks, kids." For showing up when she let them know that she was booting it up today. One of these days, this would end in Tenba unveiling its first robot for exploring hazardous areas of the tower remotely instead of her kids helping her take it apart.
"You owe me those Dokkoi Sets," 'Denebola' reminded her.
She sighed, sheathing her sword at her hip when the last of the robots' parts stopped twitching. "Sharper than a serpent's tooth is an ungrateful stepchild. Come on, let's go hit the bar. Coming, dears?"
"Of course, Mother," Spica replied serenely.
"I could have sworn we fixed the problem this time," 'Regulus' said, crouching over the remains of the robot and trading his sword for his toolkit.
"I'll have them deliver some pastries," Ayano told him. He nodded absently. Lyner had his sweet tooth, even though according to him nothing the bakers made or he grathmelded equaled the taste of the funbuns of his childhood.
She doubted that anything could be that good, even the funbuns themselves. Not when they'd come to symbolize the home, family, country he'd lost, by stealing Lady Shurelia's armor for Misha and finding a lift to take them into the mysterious depths of the tower.
If she asked him, she knew that he'd say he didn't regret a thing and it would be the truth, but every so often something would remind him of Platina and he'd vanish into the grathmelding labs only to emerge carrying platters of pastries and handing them out to anyone who would eat them so his latest failure to recapture the past didn't waste food.
It was one of Firefly Alley's unofficial holidays, along with whenever 'Denabola' held a concert and her proud mother would understand perfectly if anyone liked 'Deena's' singing so much they just had to miss work to come listen.
"So. They tell me that you're an Apostle of Elemia," Ayano said, sitting at her desk with a hand just casually on the hilt of her sword.
"Yes," he said, smiling. "My name is Ayatane Mishitaka: I'm honored to meet you, President Elduke. I've been sent to the Lower World to find something, and I'm told that Tenba Corporation can get its hands on anything."
"We do have that reputation, yes. But just what is it you want?" she asked, learning forward and noticing his complete lack of reaction to what her corset didn't cover. Drat.
"A song crystal containing Exec_Purger," Ayatane said.
It was hard for him not to notice how the air of menace instantly vanished. "Really, is that all?" From that smile, it had better be.
"I don't plan on taking anything else back with me, no. Our city is under attack: this isn't the time to shop for souvenirs." Especially not the Star Singer. Lady Shurelia sending him to find the crystal that was her only hope of fighting Mother's other viruses was a stroke of luck he had no intention of ruining by letting her find the Star Singer.
So this was how she'd remained hidden all these years: Firefly Alley was in range of the tower, so she wouldn't drop dead, but it was an independent structure, outside of the limited amount Shurelia could sense from the Tower's systems. Yes, Misha had visited the Wing of Horus several times, but she'd moved around so much Shurelia couldn't localize where her songs were coming from.
The Barsett heir's attack of conscience was all so very convenient, Ayatane might almost have to thank him if they ever met. Not that he would reveal himself to a human.
Ayatane, Harmonica – 'Jack,' since the Teru searching the Wings of Horus for the Star Singer were supposed to be incognito – and Aurica arrived at the crashed airship to find a blond in a white coat lined with tool pouches.
"So, you're the engineer Tenba sent?" Jack asked, swaggering up.
The blonde looked up and smiled, looking over the three of them. "Yes, I'm Regulus Elduke, and you must be…" A familiar expression appeared in blue eyes when he looked at Ayatane.
He must be very attractive, apparently. It came from being programmed to look like a character in his mother's novel.
"Um," Regulus said intelligently, staring at Ayatane a moment longer before he blinked and pulled himself together. "The Apostle! And you're Claire's childhood friend, and Spica said you're a Ter-, um, that you're definitely not a Teru spy," he babbled, and winced. "…can I start over?"
"Everyone's heard that Tenba's Vice President of Marketing has a good intel network," Jack said, with a tilt of his hat. "Pity we can't tell her why we need to track down a reyvateil."
"No, we're not handing over reyvateils to anyone. I mean, it's against company policy. Reyvateils are very important to the future of the tower, can't get anything done without them," Regulus said, something about his intonation suggesting that he was quoting his mother as he went back to staring at Ayatane. "Sorry for staring, I've never seen anyone like you before. Do… all apostles look like you?" he managed.
"No," Ayatane said, smiling. "I would think you'd remember, Young Master Lyner Barsett."
"Regulus Elduke!" Lyner corrected him, and the blushing might even be as much as half because he was lying.
He didn't even seem to register that Jack's gun was pointed at his head. "Lyner Barsett? As in, the traitor who kidnapped the star singer?"
That got Lyner's attention. "My father was locking her in… she wanted, she needed to get out of there! Not that I have any idea," he glanced to the side. "What you're talking about… I knew this was a terrible idea," he said, wincing. "Spica knows I can't lie. She knows I can't lie, so why did she talk me into this?" he looked up to ask the goddesses. "Should have sent Krusche." He reached into his coat absently: Jack watched with hard eyes, but it wasn't his sword hand. Just a screwdriver he started to fiddle with. "Couldn't send Luke, it got past the blastline with a live passenger, he'd take it to thoroughly catalogued pieces. Of course I couldn't impersonate an airship engineer, I mean what do I know about them, compared to Krusche, and Luke, and the actual Airship Division-"
Another twitch of his hand, and the screwdriver flew out, knocking the barrel of Jack's gun up so Lyner could duck and come in underneath. Ayatane could see Lyner move, but he doubted either Jack or Aurica had managed to track the movement that ended up with Jack on the ground and Lyner's sword at his throat. That wasn't human speed: grathnode crystals. While the war raged, Shurelia programmed kinds of crystals that would make humans obscenely powerful. Tenba didn't quite control grathmelding technology in the lower world, but close. Dropping the Wing of Horus would take out the regional town defense posts, but the bases for tower exploration weren't on the wing, and Firefly Alley had its own engine for generating lift. He would probably need to take that out, before or after the Plasma Bell.
"I'm on the diquility project. I know why reyvateils die young. I know why Misha would have died young, when she could have, when she can live longer than me! If you kidnap her, I don't care what you have in your armory: if Misha starts singing, Tenba will end it. And that," he said, looking up at Ayatane, "Is why my last name is Elduke. I won't have any part of a legacy that sacrifices reyvateils. Anyone, but especially reyvateils, so everyone else can live in peace and not even know!" He glared. "I thought, I thought we were supposed to protect people! To make everyone's lives better! That's the family I thought I was a part of. That's the family I am a part of."
Spica being Ayano's daughter is one of the few supplemental material bits I'm adopting hard because it's actually awesome. Ditto that device Krusche made, which is the reason there's a hymn sung by Spica.
Spica is one of the stars in the Southern Triangle. The other two are Arcturus and either Regulus or Denebola. At first I was thinking Arcturus and Denebola, but doing Regulus and Denebola would make the two of them a set.
Also Regulus would be a Tears to Tiara reference.