Chapter 7: Elsa

Kish was walking through the Elsa, lost in thought.

How am I going to do this? I hope Shion has some idea what to do, because I won't be much help she thought, slightly depressed. Well, here goes nothing. And with that, she stepped forward and entered the room.

Once the door opened, the many smells of cooking foods assaulted her. And there was Shion, standing in the middle, already beginning preparations for the meal.

"Umm…Shion?"

"Ah, Kish. Good timing. Here, come help me with this" Shion seemed to be taking charge already, and Kish was perfectly happy just to do as told. After all, she had very little cooking experience. She had worked as an assistant in a bakery a while back, but that dealt with breads and pastries; not likely to be any help now.

After a while of cooking food, Kish got the impression that Shion definitely was not new to this. So she decided to ask;

"Hey, Shion. You're a pretty good cook, aren't you?"

"Well, how good I am is more a matter of opinion, but I used to work in a café a long time ago, and was able to pick up a few things" Shion replied.

To say the Realian was impressed may have been an understatement. "So, you're a cook, a researcher in one of the largest organizations in the galaxy, the developer of humanity's ultimate weapon against the Gnosis, and you do Realian Psych support." She began to list off. "Anything else? Or rather, what aren't you good at?" she asked with a half teasing, half exasperated tone.

"Oh, I think you're exaggerating quite a bit. I'm not great at anything; just know how to do a bit of many subjects." Shion was always the humble one, Kish decided after that answer.

"So, you're kind of like chaos; a 'jack of all trades, master of none'? Actually, I don't know if there is anything chaos is especially good at, since I don't really know him…" she trailed off, speaking more to herself than to anyone in particular. As she finished talking, the door slid open.

"I think I'm best in protecting the ship and crew, although I hardly get the chance to." chaos stated, embarrassing Kish in the process. She had just been talking about him behind his back, and he had heard it.

"Oh, hello chaos. Need anything?" asked Shion, ever polite, and slightly amused at Kish's predicament.

"No, no. Just making sure everything's alright in hea-" he was cut off as the Elsa shook from a stray laser blast. Kish and Shion began scrambling to make sure none of the food fell, then Kish told Shion to go ahead while she secured everything in place.

"You sure? Alright. Just make sure you hurry back to the bridge once you're done" and they took off. A few moments, and many near accidents later, Kish headed to the bridge as well; only to run into Shion, chaos, and KOS-MOS heading to the elevator to the lower levels.

"What's happening?" she asked them as soon as she caught up. There had been a lot more hits while she was putting food away, causing many of the near accidents.

It was chaos who answered; "A small ship was under attack. We got caught in the crossfire, and the Captain relented. Shion managed to catch the small ship with the claw, and brought them aboard."

At that, Kish looked at Shion expectantly and stated; "Another 'trade', eh?" Shion only smiled.

"Either way," chaos continued with a hint of amusement "the occupants of that ship are down there now."

A quick scan of the lower levels brought some confusion and worry. "Exactly how big was this ship? Cause there must be more than 20 units down there."

"The pursuing craft were Auto-Techs" he said simply. "Can you help somehow? With Hilbert, maybe?" His question was met with discomfort in the small Realian.

"Well," she began, "It'd probably work, quite well in fact….but my area of effect, it's too small." This time, it was KOS-MOS who spoke up; "Then it would be best if you stayed on the bridge. Were you to accompany us, you would only get in the way."

This just got her mad. "Hmph. Just because I can't use the Hilbert Effect, doesn't mean I can't help" she all but yelled, and took out the pistol she picked up on the Woglinde. "I'm not too bad a shot." In truth, she wasn't too confident in her accuracy, but there was no way she was gonna be called useless; the 100-Series had already bestowed that title onto her and her 98 sisters. If they were still alive.

"Good. Well, lets get on with this" chaos said; dispersing the tension while moving into the elevator.

--------------------

"Two semi-biological units approaching from the right hand corridor." Reported Kish as the group made their way down to meet the occupants of that ship and to eliminate the Auto-Tech units. The fact that these two signals were not fully mechanical, meant that they could quite possibly be the ones they were looking for.

Something had been bothering Kish. Ever since the first laser impact, she had a strange feeling. Something was there that shouldn't be, or that she didn't agree with. It only got worse as they pressed on. On top of that, she still had no idea what it was.

"Alright. Let's meet our visitors" said Shion, and the group waited at the intersection for them. While standing there, Kish picked up some strange signals ahead, and her curiosity was piqued. Beginning to investigate, she glanced back to catch a look at their guests.

Rounding the corner at that precise moment, they all caught sight of an unlikely duo. The first and larger of the two had mechanical parts, marking him as a cyborg. The other one made Kish freeze. She now understood what had been sending wavelengths that made her upset. It was a 100-Series, but with a different uniform…and pink hair. It was MOMO; the prototype, and the reason she was almost never born at all.

(chapter 7: end)

AN: well...that was kinda short. uh, sorry 'bout that. Normally, I'd give ya another too, but I still have to rework Chapter 9. Decided to completely change and re-write it, and I haven't gotten far. Of course, I haven't really been focusing on this recently so...anyway ttyl

Disclaimer: I do not own any part of the Xenosaga games or Xenosaga: the Animation.