Mimic is put to sleep for the surgery. The doctor explains it all before she goes under - what he's going to be doing is removing her broken eye from the socket, and then attaching a cybernetic one in its place, which will look like her real eye and function like one, too.

The last thing she sees before she goes into a medically-induced sleep is Shuseki's cold, unblinking stare as the doctor gets his medical supplies ready.

She wakes up groggy, and opens her eye. She's so used to her other eye not opening with it that she doesn't open it immediately.

"I've finished the surgery," the doctor tells her. "Try opening your left eye. The cybernetic eye should work just like your organic eye."

She's nervous - not just because Shuseki's still there, apparently having not moved from his spot at all - but she does as the doctor says and opens her left eye.

The light startles her. After so much time with only half her vision, she's almost blinded by the sudden sight in her left eye - and she's surprised at how . . . natural the cybernetic eye feels, even though it's new and it's, well, it's basically a robotic eye.

"That's odd," the doctor murmurs, and her heart drops to her stomach.

She can see out of the new eye just fine. Why is he saying that? What could possibly be wrong with the eye?

Shuseki stands from the chair he's sitting on, and her mind goes blank as she watches him approach.

He peers at her, eyes narrow, and then turns to the doctor with a scowl.

"What the hell happened?" Shuseki snaps. "You said the cybernetic eye was meant to look like his real eye."

What?

Mimic blinks - with both eyes, holy shit she has two eyes again, even if there seems to be a problem with one of them - and glances at a nearby mirror.

Of course she sees Chaud, and she almost looks away because she's still not ready to face the hate she knows he has for her, but then she catches sight of her new left eye and she freezes in place.

It's not blue, like her real eye. Instead, the colour is so dark it's almost black, and the light reflects off it so weirdly it's almost like it flashes. It's as dull as her real eye, at least, but that eye is only dull due to sleep-deprivation, so whether the cybernetic eye is dull for the same reason or for another reason is something she doesn't know. The angry red scar where Shuseki had cut open her skin above and below the eye only makes it look even weirder.

What the hell?

"Cybernetic eye surgery is still a relatively new practice," the doctor mutters, as he takes ahold of Mimic's chin so he can shine a light in her cybernetic eye, and then the real one. "Hm . . . it reflects light differently to his organic eye. That's odd."

"What went wrong?" Shuseki demands.

"There may have been a fault in the cybernetic eye," the doctor says, letting go of Mimic's chin to step back and peer at her until she's uncomfortable under his gaze. "That could have caused the colour to change, but I'm not sure why that eye reflects light so differently . . . It's almost like tapetum lucidum, in a way . . ."

Mimic has no idea what 'tapetum lucidum' is, but Shuseki doesn't care.

"If there's a fault in the eye," he says, "then take it out, fix it, and put it back in."

"I can't," the doctor replies. "Once the eye has been fixed in place, that's it. It's attached to his nervous system now - taking it out would just blind him on that side and leave him with a hole instead of an eye, because his body won't take another one in the same socket. It'll work like any other eye, anyway. Isn't it better to have a son with an oddly-coloured eye rather than a son with one eye and a gaping hole?"

Shuseki growls, but he doesn't lash out at the doctor like he does with her. It's only her - only Chaud - that he treats like that anyway. Probably he's aloof but nowhere near abusive to his employees, and while this doctor clearly knows what's going on, he's obviously not even thinking about talking to the police. Nor is he using this as blackmail, Mimic thinks, because otherwise she's pretty sure Shuseki would have his name dragged through the mud for ever thinking about blackmailing him.

He's the kind of powerful man who only gets away with horrifically abusing his only child because he's rich, connected, and cold-blooded.

"Fine," Shuseki barks, and she jumps. "The black eye stays." He turns his attention to her and she shrinks away from him. "The next time you decide to talk back to me, it'll be your other eye. Maybe you'll even get a new faulty cybernetic eye that'll match the one in your empty head right now. So don't give me an excuse."

She nods. There's no other way she can respond to that, aside from throwing up out of sheer terror and getting in trouble for it.

"I think it looks cool," Arcadia says, when she's back in her bedroom and sitting on the bed once again. "Plus, you've got two eyes again - so you don't need to worry about eyepatches or stitches ever again!" He deflates a little. "H-hopefully . . ."

"I believe the doctor was correct," ProtoMan comments, tilting his head as he considers her new eye. "Tapetum lucidum. The way that eye reflects light is exactly like it."

"What's tapetum lucidum?" Arcadia asks, before Mimic can sign the question herself. It's probably a good thing he does, because she doesn't know how to spell those words.

"Have you ever seen images of animals such as cats? With the eye shine?" ProtoMan asks, and continues when they nod. "It is what allows those kind of animals to see in dim light - essentially, it is what gives them good night vision. Tapetum lucidum typically reflects light back through the retina, which is what allows nocturnal animals such as predators to hunt in the dark. I believe it is also present in some species of spiders, and deep sea fish. A visible effect of tapetum lucidum is the odd reflective nature of the eyes when light hits them at the correct angle, such as when a photo is taken or when they are in dim enough light." He gestures to Mimic's cybernetic eye. "I am uncertain as to how this happened, but perhaps this means that eye has the same function?"

[can test later] Mimic decides, and ProtoMan nods.

"What does Chaud think of it?" ProtoMan asks, abruptly.

Mimic startles, hands going still as she stares at him - with two eyes, this time, not just one. It's still odd to think she has two eyes again.

"You obviously saw your reflection," ProtoMan goes on mildly. "Which means you saw him. So, what does he think of it?"

I don't know, Mimic thinks, because I'm a coward and I only looked long enough to see a faulty eye and I didn't even look at his hands.

"You will have to speak with him at some point," ProtoMan says. "Avoiding him will not make this go away, Mimic. You cannot avoid your own reflection."

Watch me, is what she wants to say. I don't want to talk to Chaud, she wants to tell him.

But, of course he's right. He's pretty much always right. And Arcadia's nodding along, too, and no doubt Chaud probably agrees as well, but-

Talk.

Mimic pauses.

She feels the desire, from deep in her mind. It's not her - she wants to do the exact opposite and hopefully never speak to Chaud again, because she's stupid and scared and she's fucked everything up, but . . .

That hadn't been her. She'd felt something like this before, a few days ago - before they'd saved MegaMan. It was when Lan found out about her - about Chaud - being the vice president of IPC, and Mimic had gotten some odd feeling, a thought that very much wasn't hers.

Maybe she can hear what Chaud thinks. Or enough that she knows what he wants.

That's not happened in the entire time she's been here before the N1, but it's happened twice in the past couple of days, and it's definitely not just sleep-deprivation making her hallucinate. Mimic's not sure what that means. Is Chaud getting stronger? Strong enough to send thoughts to her, or something? Was he even weak in the first place?

It could have something to do with the Program Advance synchronisation stuff, with ProtoMan. Chaud had been able to do the Program Advance with him, before - and now she can do it with ProtoMan, too. There was never any explanation in the anime about whether or not someone other than a NetNavi's operator could perform a Program Advance with that Navi, but this is a special case anyway because it's still Chaud's body even though she's not Chaud.

Whatever. She's not an expert in transdimensional body possession.

Talk.

The thought is more insistent this time. Yeah, it's definitely not her.

Fine.

Mimic gets up, much to the satisfaction of ProtoMan. She doesn't take the PET with her when she drags her feet over to the sliding glass doors. Hopefully they understand - this isn't a conversation she wants them to see. She'll tell them she can apparently pick up random thoughts from Chaud, but after this.

After she's talked to a boy who probably hates her for ruining his life.

Mimic sits in front of the sliding glass doors, and stares at the floor. She almost can't work up the courage, but she sees Chaud waving his hands in her sight, so she drags her eye - eyes, need to get used to that - up to meet his.

Chaud doesn't look like he hates her. He looks a bit impatient, but only because it's taken her this long to actually look at him properly.

[I don't hate you] he signs, and wow he's gotten better. Guess all that practising alone paid off, for all that she's the only one who can see him do it.

[you should] Mimic replies. [I ruined your life]

[don't care]

Mimic blinks.

Chaud continues signing, pressing on while she's still. [no blame you can't help what happens I know that]

Before Mimic can even start signing a protest to that, he keeps going.

[you're scared hurt afraid it's not okay you're not okay] Chaud tells her, in that blunt way of his. [I'm the same I understand so I know what's it like and what you feel this was my life too you know]

. . . Oh.

Chaud nods, like he knows exactly what she's thinking - and maybe he does. They should probably sit down and talk about this mind-reading thing that's apparently going on between them.

[I don't hate you] Chaud signs again, and this time it actually means something to her.

Mimic can't think of anything to say to that. What can she say?

Chaud doesn't hate her. She's . . . lighter, somehow, with that knowledge. And she actually believes him, so that helps a lot, too.

She leans forward into a bow. It's the best thing she can think of doing, since she can't think of anything to say.

When she looks up, she sees Chaud is copying her. Their eyes meet, and they share a tiny smile.

Chaud doesn't hate her.

She spends the rest of the day in front of the sliding glass doors. If ProtoMan and Arcadia have any objections, they don't voice them - and she doesn't think they do anyway, because she can hear them talking to each other from where she left the PET on the bed.

Mimic and Chaud discuss the weird mind-reading thing. There's not much to discuss, really, so that conversation only takes a few minutes. Chaud's not sure how he does it. He can't really explain how, he just does it. Mimic tries, but Chaud gets nothing from her, so at least they've figured out it's a one-way connection. It's nice to know there's a way for Chaud to communicate with her - however simple that communication may be - when she's not standing in front of something that shows her reflection.

Now if they only they can figure how to do it at will. He's done it twice - technically three times, but he was pushing the same thought twice the second time so it might not count - and that was when he was feeling particularly strongly about something specific, so maybe that's something to do with it.

When they're done talking about the potential telepathy-mind-reading-whatever-the-fuck-it-is, Mimic teaches him more signs. He's still a fast learner, and that practise he's done has helped a lot, so he's almost fluent now and there's not really much she can think of to teach him. It's not like she can ask ProtoMan or Arcadia to help, since they can't see Chaud signing and therefore can't judge how much he has left to learn.

Probably doesn't matter anyway, because she can understand him easily. It's not like she was never learning either.

Mimic starts to get listless halfway through the evening. Chaud notices - it's hard not to notice when she's been sitting with him for nearly the entire day - and tells her to go to sleep. They argue until he wins (this kid is just as stubborn as Lan, no wonder they clashed so much at the start of the series), so she trudges off to bed and falls in.

She actually manages to go to sleep. It's a bit surprising, given that she'd been more or less incapable of going to sleep - unless you count blacking out occasionally - for the past few days, but maybe it has something to do with the surgery. It could've tired her out more, sapped her energy to the point where she's finally able to sleep properly for once.

The next morning, ProtoMan and Arcadia figure out a way to pass the time.

Mimic knows Internet City should be a thing at some point, but so far neither of them have mentioned it, and she hasn't heard anything about it from literally anyone, so it's not really an option just yet. They could just go through the training program in her - Chaud's, whatever - computer, but even ProtoMan would get bored of beating up dummy Navis eventually.

As it turns out, Arcadia still has the ball from the Do-re-mi restaurant. He'd sort of accidentally stolen it (more like he'd forgotten he still had it), and had just dropped it in her PET for lack of anything else to do with it and had then promptly forgotten about it.

Until ProtoMan steps on it and ends up falling on his ass.

Mimic nearly laughs herself sick, while Arcadia looks torn between laughing or helping ProtoMan up. He settles for just standing there shaking with repressed laughter, and ProtoMan gets the idea to take the ball, start up the training program, and set up another game of high-speed don't-let-the-ball-touch-the-floor.

They should probably name the weird not-catch game they're playing, if only so they don't have to say every single word of that phrase every time they wanna play it. Mimic leaves it up to ProtoMan, since he technically invented the game, but he has no ideas at the moment so they leave it be.

The unnamed game is interrupted when Mimic gets an email on her PET. ProtoMan opens it up on the computer screen for her, and it's from the tournament officials.

"We are sad to hear that you cannot attend your prize trip," he reads. "We will be happy to give your prize to the first-place winner Lan Hikari. However, we feel that you should still be given some sort of prize for working so hard in our tournament, so we have attached battle chip data to this email for you to download and use at your own discretion."

ProtoMan takes out no less than four separate pieces of data from the email file. He studies them curiously, and almost drops them.

"What is it?" Arcadia asks, leaning forward to have a look for himself. "Wh- are those . . ."

"I was not expecting this," ProtoMan says, voice strained.

[PROTO] Mimic signs. [what]

"These are Mega Class chips," ProtoMan says vehemently. "We only have one of these ourselves, and- and the officials have just sent no less than four of them!"

Mimic blinks. [what are they]

He puts the data up onto the screen, naming them as they appear.

"Muramasa," ProtoMan lists, "Gaia Blade, Anubis, and Salamander. The one we have already is called Hero Sword, but these are all . . . I was not expecting this."

Wow. Okay, so, that's something. From what she knows, all four of those battle chips are ridiculously hard to find in the game - she personally has never actually gotten any particularly powerful chips in Battle Network 5, but she's looked up different chips in the other games and has definitely read about those ones.

This is . . . actually a pretty damn decent prize for coming in second place. Or at least, it's a decent 'take this instead' prize because they had to decline the original prize.

"Can-" ProtoMan cuts himself off. He's practically vibrating with excitement, something that Mimic's never seen before. "Can we- I mean, that is, if you want to-"

[do you want to try them out] Mimic asks him, unable to stop an amused smirk from spreading across her face.

"Y-yes!" ProtoMan actually bounces. Holy shit, he's definitely excited.

This is adorable.

She laughs quietly, and goes to collect four empty chips from a folder that's absolutely full of them for this exact purpose. She's lucky Chaud has so many, really, and the four that she takes hardly make a dent in the amount that's there.

ProtoMan has a blast testing out the four Mega Class chips. The Muramasa one is a bit odd, because it only works if he's been damaged, so Arcadia has to scratch a few of his hit points away before it'll do anything, but it functions more or less the same as Arcadia's Avenger's Arrow (aside from being unable to use it without taking damage first, and also being a close-combat attack rather than long-range). Gaia Blade is . . . also odd, because it feels like it should be more powerful for a Mega Class chip, but ProtoMan thinks it has some sort of hidden function they don't know about, so they decide to look it up on the internet later.

Anubis, Mimic decides, is immediately her favourite - it materialises an odd purple cat-like statue thing that blasts out poison all over the battlefield, which will be extremely useful if they're still going to be making use of her sadism. The final chip, Salamander, she already knows about because she's seen it used before in the anime, but it's still fun to use anyway because it cloaks ProtoMan in a fiery dragon and he spends a good few minutes getting into a firefight with Arcadia's Holy Fire.

All in all, this is . . . a surprisingly okay day.

The only thing that puts a damper on it is the lack of food from outside sources, but she takes a bit from Chaud's stash to fend off the hunger while ProtoMan's getting into a fire-dragon battle with Arcadia (who can apparently make illusionary creatures with his fire, but he can't use them for attacks, just for amusement or to scare people to death).