Neptune couldn't help but take a double take at the building before her. It wasn't actually that much larger than her own home, but way, way smaller than the size of dwelling she imagined Noire ever making herself comfortable in.
The fact that she continually imagined Noire living inside of some sort of palace miiight have messed with her expectations, there.
The Purple-haired Ex-CPU glanced back at her younger sister. "This is it, right Junior? I mean, there's a chance we could be wrong right? What's the map say?" A bit more than a hint of doubt lingered in her voice as she once more looked over the building before her.
Nepgear handed her elder sister her N-Gear. The GPS app, a must when working with someone as bad at directions as Neptune, all but triple-circled the building in front of them. "I'm pretty sure." she stated, voice flat.
Neptune sighed and crossed her arms, frown upon her face. "So this is really where Noire lives now, huh?"
Carefully, she moved her hand towards the cold steel door handle, before her hand retracted. "Maybe she's busy… Should we come back -"
With only a quick exchange of glances, Nepgear surged past her hesitant older sister, and threw open the door with a swish. "Sis, we've already come this far, I'm sure she'll be happy to see us. C'mon!"
Shaking her head, Neptune stepped into the building, and step by step, walked into the depths. Soon enough, they could hear the familiar voice of Noire. With one final gulp of apprehension, Neptune walked closer and closer towards the voice.
Their path lead them directly into what seemed to be a recording studio. An occupied recording studio, at that.
Noire, seemingly in a whole world of her own, spoke into the mic, garbed in flashy, lively colors. Behind her, was several billboards, advertising some soft drinks… ones Neptune had never even heard of.
"Is that really Noire?" both sisters spoke nearly at the same time.
That was definitely enough to get Noire to notice the duo.
"...Speaking of! The people who I was just talking about! I guess today, we've got ourselves a pair of special guests!" chirped Noire, as she clasped her hands together.
Neptune and Nepgear glanced towards one another, bewilderment spread across their faces. Noire NEVER chirped.
And she was getting closer.
"C'mon, you two! Let's not leave the crowd waiting!" smiled Noire, as she seized the two by the wrist and all but dragged them into the recording area.
In a blink, all three were standing in front of the billboards, although of the three, only Noire was fully comfortable in the spotlight. "I'd like to introduce… well… re-introduce Neptune, and her sister Nepgear! C'mon you two, say hi to all of Gamindustri!"
Neptune paused for a second, as she struggled to speak. 'What… what's happening?' she thought, as a cold sweat broke across her face.
Nepgear was the first of the two to regain her bearings. Throwing on a smile, Nepgear replied, "Hey there! My name's Nepgear. It's nice to meet all of you!"
Feeling the momentum shift towards her, Neptune couldn't help but respond as well. "U-Umm… Hello…? I-I'm Neptune… m-manager of a small games store in Planeptune…"
Neptune could feel the embarrassment begin to rise as she stuttered each word. 'Oh goddess kill me now…' she thought, as the camera before her seemed to get bigger and bigger by the moment.
Unfortunately for Neptune, the ordeal didn't end there. Instead, she found herself sucked into what seemed to be a weekly podcast, with questions upon questions being piled upon her. They ranged from the mundane, such as who she was, to the strange… to even a few that implied a romantic relationship between her and the black-haired girl beside her.
Needless to say, by the time the questions finally finished, Neptune wanted to die. Well, maybe not die, but definitely curl up into a hole for a good month or so, and hope that people would forget about her again.
Nepgear received her fair share of questions as well, although she definitely seemed to take it much more in stride.
After what seemed like another century, the spotlight finally deactivated, and the camera turned off with a click.
"Phew…" murmured Nepgear, as she lowered herself to her knees. Neptune, on the other hand, was all but paralyzed in fear, luminescent blush pretty much tattooed across her face.
"Not bad for your first time on air!" smiled Noire, as she helped Nepgear to a nearby seat. "I remember my first time was a mess."
Nepgear shook her head, and retrieved a water bottle from a bag. "I just tried to act like I used to. Man, being positive is exhausting."
Neptune had barely gotten a hold of herself, before she was all-but seized by the ecstatic Lastation Ex-CPU. "Oh, and Neptune! I haven't seen you in so long! How are you?" she asked, arms wrapped in a bone-crushing hug. "I really, really, really miss you, y'know?"
Neptune shook herself back to the present. "I-I'm fine, Noire…" she spoke in a near-inaudible voice. "H-How are you, though?" I'm… assuming you've been… uhhh… making… doing well, if you've got this… recording… thing in your own home…"
Noire loosened her hug just enough to allow Neptune to breathe normally. "Oh yeah! Definitely! I've been getting a ton of viewers, so many that they even offered me licensing deals! I'm a huge sensation all over Gamindustri now, so I'm making tons of money just from ad revenue! Actually, do you want to see my outfits? I'm still having a bit of an issue deciding upon which one to wear next week!"
"I… I t-think I'll pass on that… thanks. Huge sensation though…?" Neptune stuttered, before she blinked, "Wait… I don't think I've ever seen you on television or anything like that…"
"What? Seriously? Have you been living under a rock or something? I'm literally on EVERY radio station, and all over the web, and you haven't seen me at all!?" shouted Noire, as she grabbed Neptune's shoulder. "Wait, you're telling me you've done NOTHING all of these years?"
Neptune just couldn't articulate a response. "H-Huh…?"
Noire seemed to think to herself for a moment, before a mischievous gleam appeared in her eyes. "Alright then! I think I'll take you around Lastation! After all, you probably haven't been out of the house much, right?"
Neptune's face had long since passed FF0000, and was now trending somewhere around the RR0000 area, as she was all-but-dragged out of the house by an excited Noire.
"N-Nepu! S-Someone help me! I never asked for this! I never asked for thiiiiiiiis!" she shouted, unconsciously slipping back into her old mannerisms as she rocketed out of the house.
Nepgear blinked as she watched her sister be all-but abducted. "She'll be fine, right?" she asked herself as she watched the two speed away at top speed. "Right?"
She shook her head. "Man, what's gotten into Noire? She's acting just like Sis used to, after like six or seven Nep Bulls."
A knock on the door drew her attention upwards. "Hey, Noire, you done?" came yet another familiar voice.
The door creaked open, revealing the form of Uni.
"Whoah! You look different, Uni!" shouted Nepgear, as she got a better look at her old friend.
Gone was the old dress Uni had used to wear, and in its place was something Nepgear could only identify as leather body armor as some kind. Adding onto the new picture was an oversized shotgun strapped to her leg…
Nepgear shook her head free of the cobwebs, and jolted up to her feet to properly greet her old friend.
"Oh hey, Nepgear! What are you doing over here? I mean, I was hoping to bump into Sis before she left the house again, but I guess you can't fight fate, huh?" stated Uni, as she took a seat.
"Yeah… she was acting really weird, and dragged Neptune off into the distance. I don't think I'd be able to catch them if I tried." admitted Nepgear, as she gazed towards the shotgun. Immediately her mind was ablaze as she tried to imagine the stopping power of the thing…
It was only after she had mentally converted it to grams per second squared that she realized that Uni was still in fact trying to talk to her.
"Nah, that's just Noire. She's been like this ever since our little place in Lastation went the way of the dodo and we've had to make do. I mean, I'm glad that she's doing what she loves, but man, I wish she's slow down every once in a while."
Nepgear glanced towards the door that the two had left through, which was still hanging half-open. She shook her head as the breeze slowly moved it about with a low creak. "So, yeah, since they're obviously not coming back any time soon… How have you been doing, Uni?"
"Alright." stated Uni, as she lifted her shotgun from its holster and began to spin it around her finger. Blinking at her friend's sudden flinch and dive to beneath a nearby table, the armor-clad girl paused what she was doing with a confused look on her face.
"Oh. Right. Sorry bout that, Nepgear. Don't worry, the safety's on." Uni spoke, once she figured out what exactly had caused the sudden panic.
Carefully, Nepgear returned from her hasty retreat. "That gun looks pretty serious…"
"Well, with Noire doing her own thing and bringing in the money, I've really not had much to do… and since the only thing I ever did back when I was a Candidate was hunt monsters… I guess I just did what I was used to." stated Uni as she scratched her head. "I mean, it sounds sort of pathetic now that I put it like this, but with nothing else to do, I just started picking fights with bigger and bigger monsters."
Mostly recovered now, Nepgear held out her hand. "Can I take a look at that gun? I'm actually kind of curious…"
She didn't expect a shaken head in refusal. "Sorry Nepgear, this thing can do some serious damage if you mishandle it… I think it's better for both of our safeties if I just hold onto it."
"So you're saying you've finally gotten bored of collecting guns, and you've finally started using them?" smiled Nepgear.
"Mostly." stated Uni, as she returned the shotgun and retrieved a pair of pistols. "I mean, different guns for different things, and I still have waaay too many guns, but about half of them are seeing use now."
Nepgear gulped. From what she could remember… "Wow… that's a lot of guns…"
Uni let out a small chuckle. "I still remember the first time I was getting used to carrying around more than two at a time… I managed to fall over with a dozen strapped to me, and couldn't get back up without taking them all out of their holsters. Needless to say, I didn't make that mistake again."
"So yeah, I was thinking of just heading out to go grab a bite to eat… You feel like coming with?" asked Uni, once more pocketing her weaponry. "I mean, it's pretty early still, so I'm guessing you haven't eaten yet."
"Well, Sis had breakfast earlier since she was up before me, but I haven't." Nepgear replied.
"Well, I just woke up myself, so wanna come with? I usually hit a cafe a few minutes away from here."
Nepgear nodded and Uni lead them outside the recording studio.
~Whapish! Supah mode: Perspective Change!~
Neptune glanced about nervously, as Noire skipped happily down the streets of Lastation, grin plastered across her face.
She just simply didn't know how to react. Noire's fame was much harder to avoid on her home city, not to mention the fact that said famous person was right beside her. Neptune had already been shoved aside by over a dozen fans.
And it wasn't just Noire who was getting all of the attention, either: it seemed that the single appearance she had shown up on camera for was enough, if the occasional person coming up to talk to her was any indication.
And while Noire might have been accustomed to all of the attention due to her sudden… Well, maybe not so sudden personality shift, Neptune was in a much less favorable position. While she was more or less fine with the occasional one-on-one talk, she simply couldn't handle it when more than one at a time would run up, or when the topic of the conversation veered towards more personal matters.
She couldn't help herself from hiding behind Noire during such times, although when what she wasn't doing was pointed out to her, it definitely didn't help matters.
"Hey Neptune, you okay over there?" Noire asked, after noticing Neptune's odd behavior. Said Neptune was currently hiding in an alleyway a little bit behind Noire, having finally lost her nerve entirely and having resorted to just hiding. "You never acted like this way back when. Did something happen?"
"Uhh… No?" ventured Neptune, who poked her head out from behind the alley. "You're just imagining things…"
"Alright then." answered Noire, who simply shrugged. "An off day, huh? Yeah, those suck."
"So uhh…" Neptune stated, after gazing both ways down the street. It was clear for now, meaning that she could leave her hiding spot. "You've got a lot of fans now, huh? I mean I knew you had fans but wow this is a lot of them…"
"Yep!" Noire responded, rather loudly. Neptune glanced about in panic, but luckily, no one had noticed the loud girl. "I told you, I'm a huge sensation now. I mean, I do occasionally miss being able to just go out on a walk by myself, but the attention is really nice."
"So uhh…" Neptune spoke, as she watched yet another potentially inquisitive group of people turn the corner before them, "Do you have a plan, or uh… Are we just walking all around Lastation? I mean that's fine if we are..."
Noire seemed to think for a moment, before she nodded. "Yeah, I just wanted to show you how much Lastation has changed. Plus, it's been so long since I've been able to have a walk with you, y'know? Why? Is there somewhere special you wanted to go?"
Neptune paused for a moment, before she murmured to herself, "Well… It would be nice to know what they're selling in the video game shops over here, so I know what's worth stocking…"
Neptune shook her head, "No not really…" but basically retracted her statement by accidentally letting a louder than normal whisper escape her lips, "I mean… I would really like to go to a shop to see what new comic books and merchandise there is… Would help me pick out the really popular series right now and drive the store's profits up…"
Noire let out a sweat drop, "Definitely not the Neptune I used to know at all…" she muttered, leading Neptune along a path that would lead to the type of store she was looking for.
Neptune blinked at the store that suddenly appeared in front if her, "Huh…?" she turned to Noire, "Why are we in front of this store, Noire? I don't remember us walking towards this path or this store ever coming into our view…"
"Well…" Noire trailed off, "You said you wanted to go to a store like this so that you could see what new merchandise you could buy to put in your store, a bit loudly I might add, so I brought you to one!"
Neptune yelped in surprise, "U-Uhh…" she gave a very hasty bow as she rushed inside afterwards, "T-Thank you very much!" leaving Noire with a grin plastered on her face as she casually strolled in after Neptune.
AddendumHey! I know this story is not popular at all in this climate that is Neptunia's FFN community, but at long last this chapter has been resurrected from purgatory! I had originally wanted this to be one huge chapter, but after not figuring out what to do with Nepgear and Uni, I decided that I would instead split this into 2 or more chapters so I don't have to cram everything into one.
Once again, the kind Shattersoul has beta'd this story, and this will come as a surprise to him, but I hope we can keep working together Shatter!
-TMCraze