The next day came, and suddenly there was no movement anywhere in the house. All the Louds has drowned in their own emotions and fallen asleep, unable to catch the noise of van opening up and releasing the proper authorities, all women, to their property. One of them tore off the electric doorbell and knocked on the door, which woke up Lori and Leni.
"AAAAA!" Leni screamed, "We're being robbed!"
"No, we're not," Lori groaned, "We're being moved."
"Oh...AAAAA! We're moving robbed!"
"That's it," Lori couldn't take it anymore and dragged Leni by the ear. She used Leni to open the door, and the people outside just stormed right in, "Wait, huh?! What are you doing?!"
"I'm sorry, but we are behind on time," one of the women said, "We must go now," and escorted her out.
"Wait! Not even a goodbye?!" Lori shouted, "I forgot my suitcase! I need my phone!"
Leni panicked, "HELP! WE'RE BEING MOVED!" Her scream woke almost everyone up and alerted them to the women in black suits entering their rooms. Lana was still out cold and had to be carried in a giant van.
But Rita, Lily, and Lynn Sr were jolted awake. They turned behind them and saw a familiar face.
And Lynn Sr didn't like it, "You..."
"Me again," Tomoya waved.
"Is this your doing?!" He shouted, "Are you trying to tear my family apart?!"
"We're trying to keep your family alive," she responded.
"Oh, don't give me that pow dung! Give me one good reason why I shouldn't walk out of here and run!"
"Where will you run to?" She pulled out her cellphone and showed him several reports of potential attacks, all of them relatives of the Loud house, "All ten of your daughters showed astounding IS compatibility. Phantom Task has already plotted revenge, and decided to go back after your relatives."
"No...it can't be...what about this Ichika person?!
"They can't go after Ichika because his immediate family is already dead, and his only sister is your son's instructor. If you run now, you'll be in your own."
Lynn Sr was visibly shaken. Lily crawled over to his feet and tugged his pants, but got no reaction.
Rita suddenly muttered, "What about Lynn? Is she coming?"
"She'll be traveling separately until she wakes up," Tomoya said.
"No," Rita stood up and demanded, "I want her in the same vehicle as us."
"That's impossible. She needs the equipment-"
"GIVE HER BACK TO ME!" Out of pure instinct, Rita grabbed an umbrella and lunged at Tomoya.
Tomoya stepped inward and struck Rita's wrist, flinging the umbrella out of reach, then upercutted her, effectively knocking her out.
"Mom?!" Lola and Luan saw that and broke out of someone's grip. She rushed to her side, "Mom?! No! Wake up!" Lola glared at Tomoya, "What did you do the her?!"
"She refused to move," Tomoya said, "I have to move her now." That scared the two sisters into backing off. Tomoya carried Rita out of the room, "I suggest you all move, or we will move you as well."
As the women packed the Louds' belongings in the van, the sisters struggled to make sense of what was happening. All they knew was they didn't like it and they suddenly wanted out. They were warned of the consequences of staying behind; it already happened to Lynn, and that same fate would befall them if they stayed. That was all the reasoning they need to have their minds changed. Eventually, they were all put inside separate vans, Lily and the parents in one, and the sisters in the others, van and driven away from their home, with another familiar face as the sisters' driver.
"What's gonna happen to our house?" Luna asked.
"Two and a half hours from now," Akane said, "it will be destroyed...replaced with a new house."
"WHAT?!" Everyone screamed:
"You can't!"
"Are you stupid?!"
"You're horrible!"
"Haven't we suffered enough?!"
Akane promptly silenced them, "You honestly think I liked that idea?! I asked them if we could at least renovate it, but no! All traces of you have to be erased!"
Everyone gasped.
"Besides, I know about the war, too," Akane continued, "Y'all made way too much noise and got the whole world talking about your little stunt. Now, local skirmishes are popping up all over the damn community."
"We just wanted to support each other!" Leni said.
"Ain't nothing wrong with a little family party, right?" Luna added.
Much to Akane's disdain, "Would Lincoln have wanted to party like that?"
The family sat silent. They knew that Lincoln was on board with them, but they never considered whether or not he actually wanted it. Just then, the entire van buzzed.
"Yo! What's happening?!" Luna freaked.
"Feels like an incoming transmission," Lisa guessed.
"Almost," Akane activated the van's incognito mode, "It's a live video feed from IS Academy," she clicked several buttons, "Secure channel established. Connection in 3...2...1..." once she showed the feed on screen, she regretted it, "Oh Jesus no..."
"Lincoln?!" Everyone shouted.
"Hey, guys..." Lincoln held up a camcorder, "How's it hanging?"
"Uh...it's hanging alright..." Lana said, "How about you?"
"It ain't," he said, "I've been throttled, ransacked, I've throttled and ransacked, and it costed me Lynn and Margo! They're both out cold! I don't know if they can be revived!"
"What do you mean, Margo can't be revived?!" Leni shrieked.
"You know, Margo, Lynn's BFF..." Lincoln growled, "...person who tried to kill me because of something Lori did?"
"What?!" Everyone reacted.
"What did I do?!" Lori snapped, "What could I have possibly done to-"
"Oh, don't play coy with me!" Lincoln snapped, "Does the name Kenneth Roberts ring anything to you?"
"It does," Lisa suddenly butt in, "He is Margo's brother...He's also the person who quote-unquote beat you into amnesia."
"Correct," Lincoln said, "And do you know why?"
Lisa turned her gaze to everyone who was older than her, "I wanna hear it from Lori."
Lori, Luan, and Luna jumped in their seats.
"Lori?" Lola reacted, "What does she know?"
"What would she know?" Lucy jumped in, "She forgets things from years ago."
"Doesn't mean it didn't happen," Lincoln interrupted, "And it doesn't mean it left her subconscious!"
"What do you want me to say?!" Lori shouted, "What should I tell you to make you happy?!"
Lincoln cracked his knuckles and let it all out, "That you, Luan, and Luna teased Kenneth to no end! That your antics seeped into the middle school mold for years! That after you three left, they still permeated and affected Lynn, too! That because of you, he punched my memory out, rattling Margo! THAT YOU THREE ARE THE REASON THAT THOSE THREE ARE UP A CREEK WITH JUST A SHOTGUN! HAVE YOU EVER THOUGHT ABOUT THAT?!"
The entire sisterhood sat shocked. Not one knew what to say. Lucy, Lola, Lisa, and Lana were astounded over the stunned silence of their older sisters, who had their memories joggled. Except Leni, who was completely absent during the triggering events.
But Luan, Luna, and most of all Lori...they remembered.
Bobby never attended Royal Woods Middle School, so he never got to bare witness to Kenneth's victimization. He communicated with Lori via cellphone, which meant that Lori was free to hide the truth however she wanted. She didn't say anything about Kenneth, and only did she find out that Bobby was attending a neighboring high school did she start to forget about Kenneth. By the middle of her freshman year, she had forgotten about him altogether. Luan and Luna kept up the teasing and rumoring Lori created until they advanced to high school and got bored of it, and then they too forgot about Kenneth. But their younger friends certainly didn't. They kept it going until Lynn happened among them. When Kenneth snapped, Margo harbored a secret resentment for Lynn and Lincoln for somehow getting Kenneth's childhood ruined, and it blossomed into an evil fruit once Lincoln entered the IS Academy and received so much attention. And the rest was history.
Literally. Lori was just plain speechless that Lincoln was able to piece together everything about the past, "Lincoln... I just...I didn't-"
"Yeah, you didn't think it'd be this bad because you forgot, right?" Lincoln angrily said, "Was it the same for everyone else, too?!"
"Nope," Lisa said, "I was never informed. Lucy, Lola, Lana, and Lily were kept in the dark as well. I've only pieced together our elder sisters' involvement five seconds before we departed. And I can assume our parents only knew half the story~~~"
Lucy, Lola, and Lana has their jaws dropped as Lisa spilled everything she knew, which was nearly word for word what Lincoln saw in IS sub space, save for Kenneth's disorder.
"And that's the word of the day," Lisa finished, "Luan, Luna, did I neglect any hidden details?"
Luan and Luna didn't know what to say, so they just sat silent.
Lincoln took their silence to mean that the full story was uncovered. "Alright, then answer me this..." he demanded the ultimate sacrifice of truth, "What did you hope to gain from keeping it from me, and possibly everyone else? Why did you sweep this whole thing with Kenneth under the rug?"
They had no excuse. They quite literally forgot. Luan scrambled to put together a plausible explanation, "We just wanted to protect you, bro. We didn't want you-"
But it was quickly shut down. "Protect me from what?!" Lincoln got angry, "From Phantom Task?! From your past mistakes literally biting my pelvic regions?! Well, clearly that didn't work!"
"Calm down, little man!" Luna snapped, "We just wanted what's best for you!"
"Then, what is it?! What is your reasoning for keeping a secret from me after all these years?!"
Leni looked at him. Then, he looked at her sisters. Her feeble mind was trying to make sense of the entire story, but nothing was connecting with her. Lori turned to Leni, who just shrugged. Luan and Luna couldn't bring themselves to look at her, mainly because they were right along with her throughout the debacle, but also because they didn't have a reason why they kept it a secret. They just did it on a whim. They don't even have a reason why they forgot.
Lori, however, did...sort of. And it all had to do with outward appearance. She looked down and muttered through her teeth, "I didn't want you to think anything else of us..."
Lincoln went completely pale, "...what...the hell...does that mean..."
"It means, we all make mistakes," Lori had to squeeze the words out of her diaphragm, "Stuff we didn't want to admit...We kept it secret because we wanted you to look up to us, because if we told you, you'd hate us for it."
Lincoln was done, "Ha...ha ha ha...you're joking-y-you gotta be joking..." Hearing that explanation told him that they learned nothing. Hearing that explanation told him that they put him on a pedestal very early on, and they were using him as a benchmark for all the boys they came across. Bobby was over the benchmark, so Lori latched onto him easily. Kenneth fell far below that benchmark, so he was ripe for the picking. And the reason no one told him about that fight... was so he could stay the way he was. And Lori, Luan, and Luna convinced everyone not to tell, even the doctor; they rushed to him and begged him not to allow anyone to talk.
In other words, in his mind, Lincoln was being used before he was used.
"Oh my god..." he finally lost it and disappeared from the camera, "...that has got to be the most...bullshit excuse y'all have ever vomited!..."
"Lincoln?!" Lori panicked.
"Hey, hold on a sec!" Luan tried to hold him over, but the feed cut off. She slumped back in her chair, "Oh my god, he knows...he knows everything now..."
"I'm sure it's all just a phase for him," Luna said unenthusiastically, "He'll understand when he's older."
"Pfft! Get real, sister," Lola scoffed, "With a performance like that, who'd want to go anywhere near you?"
"How about when you sent the sisters against him for using the Noise-B-Gone buds?" Lisa rubbed.
"That was different!" Lola protested, "He came around!"
"Probably better he hadn't..." Lana suddenly murmured, "Did you forget last summer?"
"He still let it go! I remember!"
"He did it out of whim," Lucy said, "Out of a wish that this would miraculously go away." She turned her hair to her older sisters, "Clearly, that failed."
Lori buried her face in her knees, unable to comprehend what feeling of shame had just overcome her. Luan and Luna backed away to the farthest corners of the van in order to control their rage. All three shut their minds and locked down hearts from their immediate environment in order to prevent themselves from breaking down completely. Because they couldn't say anything.
Or rather, there was nothing to say. Everything has already been said. The truth had been discovered.
"Sorry about that," Akane said, "I really thought that was Miss Orimura."
"Does that thing say who's it from?" Lucy wondered.
"No," Lisa shook her head, "Only the frequency and location."
"Oh, just wonderful," Lola pouted when she looked at the dejected faces of her older sisters, "How can it get any worse?"
"Well..." Akane nervously pointed to the rear view mirror.
Lola looked behind her and saw a similar looking van with another familiar face, "You can't be serious..."
Their parents witnessed it all through a secret camera. They were able to see and hear Lincoln's full emotions, as well as the sisters' reactions. Lily didn't fully understand, but she could already tell that the family dynamics were going to disintegrate. Lynn Sr and Rita sat motionless. They just heard something very disturbing, something that was kept hidden from them. In their minds, their own children orchestrated Lincoln's demise.
If only they told him...If they told him, then he could've changed his future. Instead, they told him nothing, and he found out the hard way.
Back in Japan, Lincoln couldn't take it anymore. He hurried to the hangar and retrieved his IS.
"Lincoln?" Charlotte happened upon him on her way to her room, "Are you ok?"
He didn't bat an eye while suiting up, "I'm fine...perfectly fine." Then, he powered up his IS.
"Wait, where are you going?!" Charlotte screamed, "Lincoln?!"
"TO SEE KENNETH!" Lincoln blasted off into the sky. He waited until he was out of Japanese airspace to deal in an ally, "Counter."
Card Counter materialized on his back, "You called? Again?"
"Where's Kenneth Roberts?"
Card Counter took out her tracker and looked him up, "Kenneth Roberts, Kenneth Roberts, let's see...sent to Hazeltucky Juvenile Center during the middle of his 6th grade first semester. Because of his decent behavior, he will be released in eight months."
"I see," Lincoln increased speed, "I'm gonna need you and High Card to help me."
An hour and a half later...
A gruff male teenager was walking out of his cell, wearing a tattered coat atop his skinny jeans and baggy shirt. Just one gaze from his eyes was more than enough to repel anyone who would ever think about walking in his direction. He sat by himself at lunch table with the standard lunch meal, when a staff member approached him.
"Mr. Roberts?" The staff member said, "You have a visitor."
The boy raised an eyebrow. There's only one person who would ever visit him, and she's been taken to a hospital. Who would ever bother with someone like him? He had to see. He got up and threw his tray in the trash. Then, he followed his superior to the visiting room.
"You're doing a lot better, Kenneth," the person commented, "No obtuse outbursts for the entire morning." He stopped Kenneth at a door, "You remember what we talked about yesterday, right?"
The boy scoffed and shoved the door open, for the most part in control of his emotions. And not two seconds after he saw the beloved did he feel his control slipping away. He saw a blonde girl with a light blue tank top, brown cargo shorts, blue slip-on shoes, blue eyeshadow, and pearl earrings. The very description of the person who ruined his life. He wanted to pay her back so much, but he stopped when he saw felt his supervisor's gaze pierce through a hidden window. He walked towards the table she was at, and she seemed to recognize him.
"You must be Kenneth?" She said.
"I am," He growled, "What about?"
"I could tell by your unsettling snarls."
Kenneth cautiously took his seat across from the woman, "So, you're the one visiting me?"
"Yep," she nodded, "Name's High Card."
"High Card..." he repeated, "What kind of name is that?..."
"A name that literally means, card that rules all," she responded, "So, I hear you're gonna be set free next year."
Kenneth didn't say anything; he was still very disturbed by her outfit.
"Hm?" High Card took notice, "Oh, this...Yeah, I know about the woman who put you in here, so I thought I'd try a little confrontational therapy."
"Therapy? You?" Kenneth didn't believe it, "What are you getting at?"
"Closure," High Card opened an app on her phone that displayed a photo of Lori at her heyday, "Let's start with a simple exercise."
"Wh...what?" Kenneth stared at the photo, "What you you want from me?"
"I want you to say whatever you want about this woman," she shut her phone off, "Pretend I'm really her, cuz I'll be doing the same. What do you want to say?"
Kenneth couldn't believe his senses. He was given the chance to confront the person who ruined him. For years, he was told to keep his emotions in check, yet this woman was telling him to fire them up and let out his frustrations.
And he didn't pass it up, "How could you?"
High Card changed personas and literally became Lori, "Uh...huh?"
Kenneth banged the table, "HOW COULD YOU?!"
"How could I what? You're literally talking noise here."
"Noise like you?! Noise like the static I've been hearing for years now?! Do you have any idea what I had to go through because of you?!"
"Of, course I do. I was the one who put it all into motion, or are you really that stupid?"
"DON'T GIVE ME THAT HIGH AND MIGHTY CRAP! I WENT THROUGH YEARS OF TORTURE, YEARS OF DIRTY GOSSIP BECAUSE OF YOU! MY MOTHER IS IN WEEKLY THERAPY SESSIONS DOING GOD KNOWS WHAT! I HAVEN'T SEEN HER AT ALL SINCE THAT DAY!"
"Good. You don't need her. You got everything you need right here."
Kenneth grabbed her head and slammed it on the table, "I oughta take you to the cave right now and wind you out of your head!"
HIGH CARD — SHIELD 18/20%
"Right..." she said, "Like you did Lynn and Lincoln?"
"What?!" Kenneth was caught off guard, "What are you talking about?!"
"Hello? Buck-teeth? Farty McStinkface? None of them ringing a bell?"
It rang, alright. They were the people he beat down, out of a pure lust for any kind of payback. He tried to deflect it, "Shut up! What do you know?! You're their sister, so you're gonna make them do the same thing to me!"
"Uh, that's impossible," she said, "You just met them. How do you know that they'd turn out like me?"
"I just do! You're whole family is nothing but asshole-ry from the get go!"
"Well, Lynn is an asshole...but only because you made her into one."
"SHUT UP!" Kenneth banged her head again, "YOU KNOW NOTHING!"
HIGH CARD — SHIELD 15/20%
"Oh, but I do..." she murmured, "Poor old Lincoln was walking down the street when he just happened upon you and Lynn. He couldn't stand the thought of his own kin being beaten up for no reason."
Kenneth struck her cheek and made her fall to the ground, "I HAVE A REASON! FOR BEING YOUR STUPID SIBLING!"
HIGH CARD — SHIELD 12/20%
"Well..." she struggled to get back up, "I mean, if you call going to school stupid...All she did was ask where her class was."
Kenneth remembered clearly. By opening the floodgates to his emotions, he also opened the door to his memory. He remembered picking on Lynn just because she was a Loud. That's it. That's all there was.
"And poor Margo," High Card continued on, "That's Lynn's BFF. What kind of monster are you? You took out Margo's best freaking friend. Is she next?"
"SHUT UUUUUUP!" Kenneth slammed his fist against High Card's head.
HIGH CARD — SHIELD 6/20% (WARNING)
"SHIT UP SHUT UP SHUT UUUUUUUUUUUUUP~~" Kenneth wailed, "I DIDN'T MEAN TO DO THAT, OK?! YOU WERE JUST SO AGGRAVATING THAT I COULDN'T TAKE IT ANYMORE! YOU WOULD NEVER LEAVE ME ALONE, SO I HAD TO DO SOMETHING! ANYTHING! I DIDN'T CARE!"
"And this was your big hoorah? Swinging your fists at those two numbskulls?"
"No it's not!" Kenneth panted, "It wasn't!...It's not supposed to be...I could've done right...I could've done something else... but you kept coming to me...Why?!...Why can't you just leave me alone?!..." and then he burst into tears, "If only...you just...shut up...for one goddamn second..." He suddenly felt himself being cuddled into a girl's chest.
"You wouldn't have been such a prick..." High Card returned to normal, "I know..."
On instinct, Kenneth wrapped his arms around High Card and let it all out. His anger, disappointment, and broken dreams, all dirtying High Card's tank top. He spent a good ten minutes shouting everything he wanted to say into her chest. Afterwards, they sat down and shared one last heart-to-heart.
"I hear your dad died in Afghanistan," High Card said.
"Yeah..." Kenneth nodded, "Tough as nails, he was. He really liked Hazeltucky because of all the people he talked to. But when he was gone...so were the friendlies."
"That's gotta be hard...Your mother didn't take that kindly?"
"Nope...she done put me up for adoption the moment I fumbled with Lynn. No one's come to pick me up..."
"Must be a whole other road for you," High Card said, "My man used to be a family man until recently...now he wants what you've got."
"Dude's friggin' pale as all hell," Kenneth commented, "I don't understand what he's thinking about."
"Family, definitely," High Card gave him a bag, "It can make and break you...Well, it made, then broke Lincoln."
"Well, what does that make me?" Kenneth opened the bag and pulled out a Double Burpin' Special, "No way..." that was his favorite thing to eat. He looked on in shock. He couldn't comprehend why anyone would go out of their way to help him express himself.
"Well, since they've literally broke you," High Card winked, "maybe someone else can make you proper now."
Kenneth didn't look up, or show any emotion on his face. He just enjoyed his burger, grateful that he was able to spend quality time with a friendly face after so long.
Completely unaware that he was being guarded by an invisible barrier generated by Card Counter, "Shield integrity shows no change. Not even people can phase through it."
SAVVY SUITE — SHIELD 98/137%
CARD COUNTER — SHIELD 9/11%
"Good," Lincoln nodded, "Bring it down when he's had his fill."
"This is highly irregular!" Kenneth's supposed counselor said, "We're trying to control his behavior, not exhibit it!"
"And he hasn't spoken a single decent sentence since his arrival," Lincoln glared.
"No! No, we cannot allow him to leave with that-"
Lincoln held a card to the counselor's neck, "She's done a better job in ten minutes than you did in five damn years. His sister's conked out. His mom's lollygagging in Kingdom Come. Are you trying to make him incompatible with society?"
The counselor and nearby staff members thought about ways to rein him in, but they would all lead to a massive fallout of secrets, and possible destruction of the facility. Even though he's only a minor, he's still an IS pilot. The media was on his side. It would only be a matter of time before he manipulated it against them
"Alright..." the manager begrudgingly offered his services, "What do you want?"
"I want him in a regular house before the new year," Lincoln demanded.
"Do you realize how impossible that is?!" Someone shouted.
"Is that so?" Card Counter raises an eyebrow while displaying all the information about Kenneth, already downloaded onto her wave function flash drive, "Then, I'll tell everyone what you've done to him."
"Can we please talk about the terms of this ridiculous engagement?!"
"You've done that for how many years now?"
The staff tried to negotiate the terms, but Lincoln and Card Counter would have none of it. They saw High Card leave and followed her outside, into a massive media bungle.
A woman in a yellow blazer emerged from the pack and pulled out a microphone, "Excuse me, Mr Loud?"
"I am he," Lincoln stepped forward.
"Katherine Mulligan of the Royal Woods Local," the woman said, "We were all wondering why you made a surprise visit back to your stomping grounds."
"To tie up a loose end left behind by my own family," Lincoln said, "and to expedite the release of an innocent teen."
After spending fifteen minutes explaining that ginormous backstory, and over an hour making sure none of it could be taken down, the trio flew back to Royal Woods. They sat on the sidewalk across from the Loud house while watching a wrecking ball plow through Lincoln's room, finishing what little remained of the second floor.
"Funny," High Card said, "Normally, you'd be up in arms about seeing my one and only home getting utterly butt raped."
Card Counter shut her ears and eyes.
Lincoln winced, "Ok, that came outta nowhere."
High Card laughed, "Brood."
Lincoln shook his head and watched the construction workers clear out the rest of the lot. Nothing was spared, not even the giant tree that housed some of the best hide-and-seek games the town has ever known. The sandbox, baby swing-everything was taken to five trash collection vehicles to be incinerated.
"Well?" High Card nudged him, "Any last words?"
Lincoln thought about it. What to say to the place that has always been his hideout, bed and breakfast, playground... but there were no words he could muster. All that came to him was one final, symbolic gesture. He walked over to one of the workers and asked for pen and paper. Then, while the workers were on lunch break, he walked onto the porch and gave it one last rub.
After all was done, he wrote the word Loud on the paper, held it to the sky, and ripped it to shreds.
The next day...
Lincoln sat by himself on the dock of holding area 3-4 basking in the moonlight. He had his mind scramble for what to do now that his wish to halt the cycle has been rendered moot, when Laura approached from behind.
"Back to brooding, are you?" She asked.
"Well, yeah," he answered, "My entire life has basically been upended, so... I don't know what to do."
"Why not?" Laura sat down beside him, "You have always been sure of yourself, whatever the predicament."
"About that... I made a decision to not return to my family. I didn't know they'd be coming here."
"Clarissa and Mentor told me everything. Apparently, your eldest sibling had a major hand in this."
"Understatement of the century."
"The past is the past," Laura said, "There's nothing that can be done about that since it already happened. The only thing we can do is focus on the present."
"Whoa..."
"I mean it. If you're still hung up on the past, you can take actions to reconcile with it, and then go on with your life. I don't know how long that would take you, but you shouldn't have to be restrained by such a complicated past."
"Holy..." Lincoln did not expect to hear that from Laura, "What beer did you drink out of?"
"The one you persisted on."
"Huh?"
"You peered into my past, and you still insisted on treating me as a person. Not as a weapon."
"Of course, I would. An artificial human is still a living, breathing thing."
Laura momentarily peeked at his facial expression. He seemed a bit forlorn from the days that lay ahead of him, so she thought of a line that might distract him, "I mean, you're the one who taught me that."
Lincoln swerved his head, "Really?!"
Laura turned to face the sky, "Was that your reasoning for shielding me from that blast at point blank range?"
Lincoln turned away. He remembered that part. When his lookalike took over, the first thing they saw was Laura fending off the Gospel by herself. All it took was a slash of its wings to break her AIC to make him snap. He momentarily regained control and hurled himself towards the Gospel, and knocked her out of harm's way. That was all that mattered to him back then.
"No," he simply said, "I didn't have a reason. I just wanted to."
Neither of them responded after that. They let the silence speak for itself.
Ichika lay on the grass under a tree with a squirrel on his chest. He reflected over everything that happened within the past few days, how he had grown and how much room was left for him to develop further into a worthy pilot, especially the battle of the Gospel. Throughout the fight, he successfully turned a one-hit kill sword into a shield to protect several people. And in that final instance, he was able to restrain himself long enough to avoid any casualties.
"I did it, little buddy," he said while petting the squirrel while it was teething on his bracelet, "I protected my comrades."
"Ichika?" Houki approached him from behind.
"Hey, Houki," Ichika responded, "You came here to relax?"
"Yeah, I just wanted to clear my head a little bit," Houki sat behind him and watched the reflection of the moonlight bounce off the school's windows, "So, I guess you had the same idea?"
"More or less," Ichika said, "So, what did Chi-uh...what did Miss Orimura say?"
"We're off the hook. She met with the council the day after she questioned us, and they decided to write it off as an international terrorist incident. Each and every one of us knew what we were doing, and they were the ones that gave Chifuyu the kill order, so they can't say anything about it anymore."
Ichika shook his head, "Haha, those old geezers..."
"You can say that again," Houki smirked.
Ichika nodded, then he realized, "By the way, how's your hair? It got burned in the attack."
"Oh, it'll grow back. It's no big deal," Houki said, "And as for the ribbon, well... I got a new one."
"That's good to know."
A brief moment of silence, mainly due to the ribbon and hair reminding Houki of her mistake of being distracted by the poaching vessel. She still wasn't over it, so she had to wonder how he was able to move despite enduring such a grave impact, "So...are you feeling ok? You got hurt pretty badly..."
"Huh?" Ichika's memory was momentarily jogged, "Oh, I'm fine. My injuries were nothing major in the end. And everyone got back safe and sound, so you don't have to worry."
"But I do. I do have to worry," she protested, "It's my fault you were injured in the first place. Another wrong move, and you would've been killed, so...so..." She looked down.
Ichika's eyes ran to Houki's downtrodden expression. It was clear to him that she needed some sort of acknowledgment of her feelings, but he didn't know how. At first, he sought to provide her some relief, "You don't have to beat yourself up for this, Houki."
"What?"
"You already redeemed yourself in the fight after that, with everyone by your side."
Houki nodded, but she didn't change her expression, which told Ichika that she wanted someone to correct her errors. A sort of punishment was needed.
He cringed at the idea, but he believed it was the best option, "But if you insist..."
Houki saw him standing up, "What are you doing?"
"Your punishment," he said.
"Punishment?!"
"Yes, punishment," he said with a slight hint of sarcasm, which Houki didn't pick up on.
"But..." she tried to protest, but she immediately lost her will. She needed something to take away from the fight that could remind her of the stakes of being a pilot, "...ok, I guess I deserve it."
"Let's see..." Ichika thought hard. What would be a suitable punishment for someone who was prideful in both her triumphs and mistakes. Suddenly it came to him, "I got it. Remember those after school training sessions you had me do?"
"Yeah?..."
"You're gonna do two a day, one before breakfast, and one before dinner, against a team of two pilots each time."
"Two?!" Houki flinched, "That's not fair!"
"Well, so is begging for punishment when you've cleared redeemed yourself," Ichika scratched his head, "so you need to be punished for that as well."
Houki slumped. She thought he would rub it in her face until she says something to ward him off. Then, she figured she could use the opportunity to get fully acquainted with the Akatsubaki. On that notion, she surrendered, "...fine. I'll do it."
"Good," Ichika patted her shoulder, "We'll start tomorrow morning."
Houki pouted. She kept that look until Ichika went inside. Then she sighed in relief, and smiled. She was happy that Ichika acknowledged that she made a mistake, even if she made one a few seconds ago. She could relax now that she was about learn what carrying around a heavy burden means.