Chapter 11B: A Terrifying Event
Walking into the arcade, the girls looked around, eyes wide. This arcade has a space theme to it… or was it a night time theme? I say this because there a ton of stars, auroras and comets everywhere. Alright, I guess I should get some tokens for them while they're preoccupied with the view. Heading over to a nearby token exchange, I pulled out my wallet.
Alright, let's see here….
One hundred credits is four tokens… and there's Neptune- I mean, Neptuna, Un- Yuni… Nep- Ge-Ge and Ra- I mean, Tee. This'll take some time to get used to. We only have an hour so let's do some math…
I've got forty-thousand credits and there are four girls.
Hmm… ten thousand each? No, that's too many. How about two thousand…
Let's see here. Two thousand divided by four is… five hundred credits for each of them, which will be,... twenty tokens each.
Yeah, that's should be enough.
Putting the money into the machine, the tokens spilled out into the dispenser. Taking out and sorting the tokens, I returned to the girls, who were still enamored by the background. Yeesh, talk about easily distracted. Makes me worry about Nepgear… and Uni… and Ram… I wasn't that unfocused as a kid… Right?
"Alright, girls." Handing each of the girls twenty tokens, I grinned at them. "You have at least and hour, but these should last only for thirty minutes. Now, I'm only giving you this much so I can order some curly fries and sodas if you get hungry, okay?"
"Yes~!" The girls dispersed, leaving me to find a table to sit down at.
Ah… some peace and quiet…
"Oh, right. The snacks." I headed towards the concession stand. "Hello, can I have three medium curly fries and five regular sodas…" Wait, is that… Pudding bite sized snacks!? "...And one of those please."
Man, that was delicious…
I wonder what Blanc's doing? Nah, she's probably still out cold or something. Yeah, probably. Unless she's awake and she's eating my pudding…. Again! ...No, she'd normally tell me that she did.
Huh? My phone…
It's a message from Blanc. What's it say…
Hey Neptune. I got hungry so I ate one of your puddings. -Blanc
Ah… dammit.
"Excuse me, your food's ready." Huh, that was fas- Woah! With the expertise of a waiter, the part-time worker brought all of our food and drinks to the table. Wow… this is why I don't want to work with food. Don't wanna drop that and get in trouble. Kudos to this guy.
Well… I guess I should find the girls. Oh, wait. I need to look after the food.
"Um, sir?" Oh, yes? "If you need to leave the table unattended, you can place this balloon here and write the names of the people that are supposed to sit here.
"Oh, thanks man." The part-timer bowed and left the balloon with a Harpie marker. Okay…
G.E.-G.E.
Y.U.N.I.
N.E.P.T.U.N.A.
N.E.P.T.U.N.E.
Aaaaaand…
T.E.E.
Now to look for them. Finding Yuni and Ge-Ge won't be hard, if they're like my sister and her wife-girlfriend-I stopped caring at this point cause they're practically married, then Yuni would still be on a gun game, probably still on her first try with Ge-Ge by her side, probably out of tokens and cheering her from the side.
Neptuna… now what would I do in an arcade if I was a preteen goddess who had the attention span of a hamster?
"Yeah! Take Maria! Sonia's the best racer there is!" ...Racing a kart, okay then. Might as well start with her.
"Hey, Neptuna." As soon as she crossed the finish line, I leaned my arm on her head. Oh hey, I can see he blink on the screen's reflection.
"What's shakin' bacon?" That's such an old phrase… but whatever.
"Food's ready, so you can head over to the table that has a balloon with our names on it." The girl threw her arms up- Ow- in celebration and hopped off her seat.
"Alright! Yummy food, here I come~!" Neptuna began to run down the before turning around and… is she gonna-Hopontopofme!? Oof! "Hey, hey!" Phew, I didn't fall over and break something.
"Yeah?"
"Why did I have to change my name? After all, I am the main character, so why my name?" Uh… What.
"We'll Noire when we meet up, my Noire." Content with my answer, Neptune dropped out of my arms and ran towards… "Wait, the table's that way!"
"Okay!" Alright, now to find the others.
"Go for it, Yuni!"
"Take this!" ...Why was I right?
As I had guessed, Uni was playing a gun game that was very close to the entrance, Planet Disaster 5, a timed shooting game made for two players. Un-I mean, Yuni was using the red rife… and when she pressed the pedal in front of her to dodge; the girl would actually duck out of the way. Talk about immersion.
Meanwhile, Nepg- Argh! Ge-Ge was standing in front of the stand that had the blue rife, but it was placed back into the stand with "Game over" on her screen. The girl that was basically my sister when she was younger stared at Yuni's screen, looking like she was the one playing as her hands shook with each movement and she kept her lips closed tightly.
"Almost got him…"
"Go Yuni go!" How did she get used to those names so easily?
"Uh…"
"Oh, Mr… Neptune." That sounded uncomfortable. I guess she's still not comfortable with a guy having the same name as her sister. "Is there something you need?"
"Oh, nothing really. But the food's ready and your sister already headed to eat. You should go before she eats more than ninety percent of it." Nodding her head, Ge-Ge turned to her gunner companion, who just finished the game with- THREE MILLION POINTS!? How… When… Ah, forget.
"Okay, thank you for letting me know."
"I need to look for Ra- Tee! Tee, I meant Tee." Yuni put her rifle away when Ge-Ge grabbed her by the arm.
"Come on, Yuni! I need to see my sister eat!"
"What!? Bu-But I haven't got my fill of gun games yet…" Yet? You just beat a game. How have you not had your fill yet? ...Beats me.
Now where can I find Ram… Ah forget it. Where is the smaller Ram?
She's not in the fighting game section…
Not in the racing section…
Definitely not in the gun section.
"Where is she?"
"Ah! Not again!" That was her voice… and it sounds like it was coming from the crane game section. "No, I had it!?" Okay, one hundred percent sure that she's there.
"Ra-Tee?" I found the smaller Ram standing in front of a crane game, trying to hook a couple of straps, which were miniature versions of Rom and Ram when they were kids. They had one of Nepgear too. Mom has one of her… and somehow one of me, on her phone. I asked her one time but she wouldn't tell me. I even baked her a lemon custard pie!
"Ah, Mr. Neptune!" The girl immediately refocused on her attention onto the crane game, failing once more. "Oh poo!"
"The food's ready…"
"Yeah, yeah. I just wanna get this…" Ah, she missed it again. Tee reached into her pocket and pulled out one token, frowning and staring at it in despair.
"Last one?" The girl nodded. Hmm… I don't want her to go back upset. "Here, let me try."
"Huh?" Taking the token gingerly from her hand, I dropped the golden coin with a mouse's face on it into the machine. Hmm… the claw's arm is actually strong, but the problem is that the holes that we're supposed to get them is too small. So if I try to get more than one…
"Aaaand…"
"Ah!" The crane lifted up the prize that Tee wanted alongside the other prize and dropped them into the prize chute. "You did it~!" Taking out the prize, Tee held up the prize into the air before looking at the other one. "Ah, look!" Huh, oh. It's a mini-Nepgear and… me. Huh, they really are selling straps of me. I guess it's because I'm related to an idol… and married one too. Although that's weird considering I'm not apart of the idol industry... not explicitly.
"I'll take that one, okay?" The girl smiled happily and nodded. "Come on, we got some food to eat."
As we approached the table, Tee and I could hear voices other than the other girls.
"Hey, come on cuties!" Oh god, please no.
"No. We're fine, really!" This is some strong deja vu.
"Hey, Mr. Neptune. Who's that?" Tee pointed to the three guys surrounding the table. They all dressed to look like they were 'in' or whatever kids called it. I don't care. What I do care is that they're bothering the girls- And they're eating our food!
Ah… do I really have to?
"Excuse me," I let Tee gather Yuni and Ge-Ge and bring them to Neptuna, who was blissfully eating some fries. "But are you bothering these girls?" The one that looked like the leader leered at me.
"What's to ya, old man?" Really? I would be hurt by that, if it wasn't such a common insult. Besides, I'm not even in my forties yet.
"Oh I don't know, I'm basically they're guardian." By the way, where's the part-tim- Hey! They put him face first into a trash can!? How disrespectful! Back in my day, they'd put the trashcan on people, at least they won't have the blood go to their head!
Rolling his eyes, the leader looked towards the girls.
"Come on hotties, ditch this old fart and go have some fun with us." Wow, serious deja vu right here.
"Alright, I'm gonna stop you right there." The dude narrowed his eyes and crossed his arms.
"Oh yeah, and who's gonna make me?" His two buddies stood by his side, one cracking his knuckles and the other stretching his neck. I looked at the girls, smiling.
"This'll take a second." Even if I haven't fought since the time I took a baseball bat to the head, multiple times…
"Hey, what's that on your nose?" The leader focused on his nose.
"What?"
Immediately, I sucker punched the guy in the face, causing him to stagger backwards. Surprised, his two buddies stepped backwards, allowing me to grab their leader's head and bash his against mine, dropping him to the ground.
"Hey!" The other two guys rushed me. Ducking under one's clothesline, I shoved my hands into my pockets and hopped onto the table, kicking off and roundhousing the other guy in the face. As his buddy fell to the ground, I pulled my hands out of my pockets and held my assaulter in a chokehold, making the guy gag and squirm in fear.
"Hay is for horses, kiddo." The part-time returned, trash in his hair and with security in tow. With security's help, we threw the guys out of the arcade.
Phew, that ended without too much trouble. In all honesty, those three were weaker than those guys from that time... I guess it helped they didn't have metal bats on them this time.
Thanking the security guard and the part-timer, I returned to the table, where Ge-Ge, Yuni and Neptuna were snack- Wait, where's Tee?
"Wha- She was just with us!?" Suddenly, the sound of a car horn could be heard.
"Move ya brat!" Uh...oh.
"Nyeh, nyeh, nyah, nyah, nyah!" Double uh oh.
I rushed out of the arcade to- WHY IS SHE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE STREET!?
"Move!" Tee stuck her tongue out, angering the leader. Okay, first of all, why does his car have spikes in the front? This isn't an arena! That's dangerous… Oh… Oh, he's not gonna…
"Oh that's it!" The engine revved up. There's no way he's gonna…
"H-Hey, come on. She's just a kid…"
"Shut up!" The wheels screeched to life and…
OH HELL NO!
Move move move move move move move move! MOVE!
I wrapped my arms around Ram and held her close, staring the car in the face.
Remember when I said I don't like seeing people getting hurt, goddess or not?
"Oh… d! So...ne ca… th… pit...al!"
Yeah… I meant it.
"M...ep...ne? He… w-wa...p…"
Plutia, I wonder if she's sleeping like a log, an adorable squishy log.
"Wh...he...ood...s!?"
Noire… I hope you got those clothes for Plutia…
"...ir...an yo… ar… me?" Barely…
Getting sleepy…
"...ep! He..Nep..!"
Can't feel my arm, or my leg either….
Blanc, you better finish that manuscript… I didn't let you stay there for nothing…
Noire…
Noire…
Noire…
…
…
…
Noire…
…
…
"Neptune!?"