In a dark workshop lit by just two desk lamps with shelves full of model boxes, a teenager was working meticulously on a model of a robot based on an orange wolf with a jetpack with two large wings comparable to those of a blade-sharpened airplane.
He had gray hair, gray eyes and was dressed in a black short-sleeved shirt with a black apron of the same color over it, jeans, a pair of black sneakers and a green earring with gold chains.
While he was working on the model, the door of the workshop opened to show a tall man with black eyes, with his head shaved close enough to look like he had just come out of prison, whose black hair was beginning to grow, dressed in a white T-shirt and jeans with, just like the teenager, a black apron on top and white sneakers.
"How's it going, Damocles?" Asked the man.
"Soon, there are only a few small finishing touches left and it will be ready. Then I can start working on the decor." Said Damocles.
"Cool... sorry to tell you this, but I have to do something nearby. So I need you to take care of the clients while I'm gone." Says the man.
"... you're serious..." Damocles asked in a bored tone.
"Sorry, but it's really urgent." Says the man.
"Pffff... I guess I have no choice... Please make it quick." Says Damocles, gently laying the model next to a Plexiglas box with a small bag of sand with liquid glue next to it.
"Thank you, you manage." Says the man before leaving the workshop at the same time as Damocles, who went to the checkout to take care of customers who wanted to pay for their purchases.
Once that was done, he started taking inventory and putting products back on the shelves when he saw that there weren't many, or none left. Until he heard the door open.
"Welcome!" He says politely without looking in the direction of the door to continue checking and noting down the names of the models he needed to add stock to the shelves.
"Whoa! Gundams! Gundams everywhere! Too good!" He heard a child say in amazement before he saw the robot models behind the windows.
"They are very successful." Says the father before noticing Damocles seeing them admiring the Gundams. "Excuse me, who built them?" He asked the teenager.
"Uh... actually... it's me..." Damocles replied with some discomfort in his voice.
"All of them?" Asked the father with some disbelief.
"Yes..." Damocles replied.
"So that's amazing. Considering how good you are at building them, you must be doing Gunpla Battle, right?" Says the father.
"No... I'm getting by, but... I'm not really a fan of it..." Says Damocles.
"Daddy, what's this Gunpla?" The child asked his father, pointing to a gundam that looked like many other exhibits but with more rounded finishes and a small green ball in the middle of his chest, he was armed with a huge rifle and a white and red abacus.
"I don't remember... can you tell us more?" Says the father, turning to Damocles.
"Of course." Says Damocles as he approached the Gundam that caught the child's attention. "It's the Wing Gundam... unlike other Gundams... it can turn into a Bird Mode... an ultra-fast hunter... In Gunpla Battle it is also used for its good mobility... and its great firepower... if I say no nonsense there is a promotion on this Gunpla at the moment. I'm going to check it out." He says before heading to the section of the store where the Wing Gundam is available for sale and then coming back a few seconds later with a box of this model. "I made no mistake. It has a promotion of -25% off its base price." He said as he showed the box to the child who took it.
"Whoa. Can we get one, Daddy?! Please, please, please, please, please!" Says the child with stars in his eyes.
"Okay. Who knows, if you can build Gunpla like him, you could become a champion." Said the father to his son, who jumped off his cheek.
Damocles drove them to the checkout and finalized the purchase of the father and son who left the store with a smile on his face.
An hour later, the store manager had returned and Damocles was able to finish what he was doing before the store closed when heavy rain fell on the city at that time.
"You can stop making me replace you when you have to go away. I accepted your offer to work here, on the condition that I only do construction and repairs." Says Damocles as he leaves the store with a winter coat but without his apron, which he left in the workshop along with his boss, recalling the conditions he imposed on his boss to agree to work in the workshop for him.
"I know, but this was really urgent. Sorry again." Excused the manager as he closed the store door and lowered the security gate. "And tomorrow we'll have another Gunpla coming in, you'll have to build them to be used as an exhibition model." He said.
"Okay, see you tomorrow." Says Damocles.
"See you tomorrow." His boss said to him before leaving quickly to get back to his car.
Damocles took out his umbrella and opened it before starting his journey home. All went well until he heard the sound of someone falling and leaning against metal. The sound made him turn his attention to its source and see a girl.
A very pretty blonde girl with purple eyes wearing a blue two-tone dress. She was soaked and seemed to be trembling with cold.
Seeing someone in this state made him sad and he decided with some hesitation to go towards the girl who looked in his direction and no longer felt the rain falling on her.
"Are you... are you okay?" Damocles asked hesitantly.
The girl did not answer but rushed to Damocles, leaning against her mantle making her tremors felt in Damocles making her realize that she had frozen to death.
"W... What's your name?" He asked with some embarrassment due to the girl's action.
"S-Stella..." Answered the girl in a trembling voice.
"Uh, Stella... do you have a place to go? "Damocles asked, winning in response to a no from Stella's head.
He then made the rather stupid decision to take this girl home, and once there he gave her a towel to wipe herself and a hot drink is one of his own pajamas so that her clothes can be dried without her getting too cold.
Damocles then went into the kitchen and took out 2 bags of noodles which he cooked in two different pots and gave a bowl to Stella who burned herself a little while eating despite the teenager's warnings.
Once they finished eating, a certain uneasiness began to set in for Damocles.
"I'll... I'll get you a blanket." He said as he went up to his room.
But Stella followed him and on entering her room she could see all the Gunpla that were in her room. There were all kinds of them, two of which caught the girl's attention. Two humanoid robots in a showcase.
One was white, his torso and shoulders were blue while his feet were red, in his back was a pair of mechanical wings reminiscent of a fighter plane and he had blue eyes as well as four small yellow horns forming two superimposed V's.
And another black robot with red and yellow borders, he had a pair of epaulettes resembling two reactors, in his back was a pair of long gray wings with small reactors inside, his feet looked like wolf's feet and he had blue eyes and 4 small yellow horns forming two superimposed V's.
The white robot was positioned on a stand to give the impression that he was flying while holding the black robot in his arms with his left arm hanging down while the white robot had his head down as if he was feeling guilty. The black robot was now by fine threads almost invisible to the naked eye while a transparent display case.
« Shinn… » Dit Stella en regardant les deux Gunpla.
"Are you a Gundam fan?" Damocles asked as he saw how Stella looked at the two Gunpla without receiving an answer before realizing that he still hadn't told her his name. "By the way... my name is Damocles." He says.
Stella looked at it with curiosity before turning her gaze to other Gunpla on display in the room, one still under construction that looked like the white robot in the window with the legs of the black robot repainted to match the color.
"I've been working on it for a while, I just have a few details left to work out and it will be finished." Says Damocles as he pulls a blanket out of his closet.
He stayed with Stella, chatting with her or telling her about the Gunpla she was looking at she listened to him attentively, captivated because he told her.
Then, several hours later Stella ended up sleeping on the couch with the blanket that Damocles gave her. Damocles left a note at the entrance of the house for her mother when she came home from work and went to bed.
The next day, he washed and dressed before going downstairs to see Stella still wearing the pajamas he had lent her with a woman in the kitchen preparing breakfast.
She had gray hair tied in a bun with a fringe hanging down the right side, eyes the same color as her hair and rectangular glasses, dressed in a black shirt under a red sweater.
"Uh... hi, Mom..." He says, preparing for his mother's reaction to Stella's presence.
Without saying anything, Damocles' mother gave Stella a bowl of rice with chopsticks to eat before giving her son an icy look that made him shiver.
She pointed to the garden gate to signal him to go there, which he did while being followed by his mother, and once inside the garden she closed the gate while her son scratched his embarrassed head.
"I-I'll explain everything... Coming home from the store I-I found her in the rain... And I decided to help her by bringing her back here, since she has nowhere else to go..." Damocles explained, stuttering at times afraid of his mother's reaction.
"Damocles..." She says darkly, scaring her son more. "Why didn't you tell me you had a girlfriend?!" Asked her mother with a look of both disappointment and sadness.
"What?!" Asked Damocles, shocked by his mother's conclusion despite what he told her. "Wait, did you hear what I said? I brought her back here because she has nowhere to go and she was alone in the rain." He said quickly, hoping that his mother would understand the explanation this time.
"I heard! And what more beautiful act of love than to collect the loved one when his back is against the wall?!" His mother said to him in a dreamy tone.
"Ok... I'm going to see how she's doing while you're making movies..." Damocles says in a tone of voice annoyed by his mother's way of thinking, even though he's happy not to be argued with.
As he entered the room, he could see that Stella had just finished her bowl of rice. She put the bowl in the lever and when she saw Damocles, she went towards him.
"Damocles... can I have my dress?" She asked.
Without saying anything, Damocles went to fetch her dress and brought it back to her.
"Here..." He then said that she took the dress from him and started to take off the pyjamas but before she could really do so, Damocles took her to the bathroom so that she could change without causing any embarrassment and comforting her mother in her reasoning.
Once Stella was dressed in her dress, Damocles left the house, leaving Stella with her mother who continued to get ideas about Stella.
Damoclès arrived at the store at the same time as his boss who opened it an hour before it opened as usual to prepare the store both in terms of stock and so that Damoclès could more quickly finish what he was doing.
In this case he finished what he was doing with the Gunpla in the effigy of a wolf, which he made into a display that he had not been able to make the day before because of the last-minute replacement he had to make.
The display was simply a rectangle large enough so that if a box of the same size was placed in it, the model would not be touched by the box made of a leg mixing sword and liquid glue sprinkled with a thin layer of dry sand that clung to the leg as it dried, and a stem of a base for the Gunpla with the tip for attaching it to plant while the leg dried.
When he finished the display, he placed the Gunpla on it and attached it to the display with the end of the rod and gave it to the boss who displayed it at the checkout. And after that Damocles began the construction of the display models of the new Gunpla.
A few hours later, Stella and Damocles' mother entered the store with shopping bags.
"I imagine Damocles' surprise when he sees you with this." Says Damocles' mother referring to the contents of the bags.
However, Stella did not listen to him and looked at the boxes of Gunplas in the store and in the window, as if she was looking for a specific Gunpla. Then her gaze turned to the checkout where she saw the Gunpla on the display stand that Damoclès had made before the store opened.
"Are you interested in this Gunpla?" Asked Damocles' mother, winning a nod from Stella.
The store manager saw this and went to see the two girls.
"Good morning, Ms. Noken." Said the manager.
"Good morning, Mr. Shindo. You know, you can call me Hikaru." Says Damocles' mother.
"Oh yes, sorry. You came to see your son? He's in the workshop, I can go get him if you want." Says Mr. Shindo.
"No, that won't be necessary. She was actually interested in Gunplas so I wanted to..." Said Hikaru looking where Stella was to see that she disappeared from where she was to finally see her with a group of children watching from a window a small arena where a fight between two animated Gunplaa was taking place on a small arena that had a desert setting with some rocky area.
The two adults went in his direction and could see that Stellar was even more captivated than the children.
"Do you want to try?" Hikaru asked Stella, attracting the attention of the girl who nodded shyly. "Can you give us a GP Base for her, please?" She asked the manager.
"I'm sorry, but I can't give you that for free like that, and then..." Mr. Shindo began before seeing the look Hikaru was giving him and the dark aura that accompanied it. "But if I deduct the price from your son's salary, I can give it to you without any problem." He said quickly before hurrying to get a GP Base and explained that he gave Stella how it works.
It looked like a kind of white smartphone with a small green LED.
He then suggested that he start by choosing a display model. In response she pointed the model at the checkout.
"Uh... it's quite problematic... Damocles finished it this morning. But I think I can make an exception, at worst if it's a little rundown it will go with the theme of the support and give it a more... veteran look." Says Mr. Shindo.
He removed the wolf model from its support and after a few quick manipulations the model became identical to the black Gunpla that captivated Stella in Damocles' room, but the black was replaced by orange and the red by yellow.
"Are you ready for your first Gunpla Battle?" Hikaru says enthusiastically to the girl she thinks is her son's girlfriend, hoping it will bring them even closer together.
Stella was hesitant, but when the fight was over she entered the room as one of the two fighters was coming out.
The one who remained in the room was a young, frail teenager with white hair and indigo eyes wearing a sleeveless shirt with a black tie and pants in a black student uniform.
"You want to be the next to lose? Okay, I'll do that. But I won't hold back." Says the teenager confidently.
Suddenly a computerized voice seemed to come from the arena.
Please, set your GP Base
The teenager put his GP Base on a designated area and when he saw him do the same, Stella did the same. Once this was done the GP Base displayed Stella's name and the name of the Gunpla she was using and the voice of the field spoke again while all around the field.
Beginning Plavsky particle dispersal
After that holograms seeming to display a snowy mountain with a cave and a snowstorm were diffused on the arena.
Field 04: Mountain
Please, set your Gunpla
Stella understood that it was appropriate to put her Gunpla down and she placed it on a circle just in front of the GP Base while holograms reminding of a cockpit are displayed around her and the teenager with two luminous orbs in front of them. She put her hands on the orbs and prepared to pilot the Gunpla as a cabin appears around her Gunpla and her opponent's Gunpla.
Battle Start
"Sella Loussier, Gaia Gundam, takeoff." She said that her Gunpla began to function like a real Gundam and was propelled by her jetpack out of the hangar to land in the desert setting where she could see everything from the Gunpla's point of view thanks to a screen that appeared in front of her.
She was in awe of it, she really felt like she was inside.
"I advise you to focus on the fight rather than the environment." Says the teenager as his Gunpla was finally visible in Stella's field of vision.
It was a small Gunpla stolen by standing between her and the sun, so she couldn't see exactly which Gundam it was.
Quickly, she pointed her gun at the Gundam and started shooting at it. The teenager's Gundam quickly dodged the shot and began to shoot her in turn.
"I've been lucky, you're a very good shot, but it won't be enough!" Said the teenager before dropping his gun to pick up a sword handle that emitted a purple laser that served as a blade.
The teenager's Gunpla quickly approached the Gaia to attack it. But she quickly did the same and the blade of her sword blocked her opponent's blade while she could see what her Gunpla looked like.
It was a small white Gunpla, he had black torso with accents of blue and red, long white shoulder pads, his feet were white with blue soles and blue and black wings. He was armed with a white, black, and red shield and a black, white, and blue laser rifle. His head was white with two pairs of overlapping horns, one white and one yellow, and he had yellow eyes.
Seeing this Gunpla shocked Stella, who had a kind of flashback, seeing a version closer to a normal gundam than that of her opponent flying in her direction to attack her.
This vision frightened her so much that she preferred to flee the fight rather than win it.
"You will not run away!" Says the teenager as his Gunpla goes after Stella's Gunpla.
At the same time, Damocles left the workshop with one of the new Gunpla models assembled and ready to be displayed in a showcase. He placed it in a showcase before closing the door. He walked to his workshop when he saw his mother at the glass level of the Gunpla Battle room.
"What's up, Mom?" Damocles asked, drawing her attention while getting closer to her.
"Well, I came with Stella, and she wanted to try this. But when she saw her opponent's Gunpla she started to panic." Hikaru explained, pointing to the Gunpla Battle field where they could see Stella panicking as her Gunpla was being chased by the teenager's Gunpla.
Damocles became worried when he saw how scared Stella was, but his anxiety was compounded when he saw his new friend's opponent. And suddenly without saying anything he left in the direction of the shop windows.
Back in the fight, Stella ended up stuck in a dead end inside a cave with just in front of her, the Gunpla of the teenager armed with his sword ready to attack her.
"You're not so smart now that you're trapped." Says the teenager, who doesn't seem to realize that since she saw her Gunpla, she's been running instead of fighting. "Now say your prayers!" He says before his Gunpla runs towards Stella's.
"No... I don't want to die..." Whispered Stella, looking with wide-eyed eyes at the Gunpla going towards her.
Suddenly the rocky walls behind Stella's Gunpla broke and something hit the teenager's Gunpla while pushing it to the edge of the arena before violently ejecting it from the field with such force that the teenager took his own Gunpla in his head.
Stella's Gunpla came out of the cave and showed her what had saved her.
This Gunpla looked a lot like the white Gunpla in the Damocles showcase with the difference that all the blue on the robot was red and what was red on the Impulse force torso was black on this one, its jetpack was smaller and also serves as a storage space for two big swords.
"Shinn..." Said Stella in a reassuring tone.
No sooner was she relieved to see her savior than the new Gunpla quickly approached Stella's and brought her to the edge of the arena until she left the arena, becoming inanimate figurines again.
Battle Ended
The hologram of the arena disappeared and everyone could see who this third participant was which surprised Stella even more than everyone else.
It was not this Shin of which she spoke, but Damocles.
The latter was content with a dark look at the teenager that can easily be translated as: you are not welcome here. Then his gaze turned to Stella and he led her out of the room before putting the Gaia she used back in its original place.
Without a word, he quickly embraced Stella who accepted the embrace, feeling comforted that her friend had helped him.
Once the embrace finished, Hikaru was about to make a new remark on the hypothetical couple that formed Stella and Damocles, but she was delighted to see the look on her son's face.
Her glance then turned towards her employer.
"Mr. Shindo, I'm going to take the rest of the day off." Says Damocles in a cold and firm tone, meaning it was not a request.
"Uh, okay..." Said Mr. Shindo, understanding very well what his employee's tone of voice meant: that he had really pissed him off by letting someone use a teenage exposure model who was still in the Gunpla Battle room, looking at his Gunpla with fear.
Damocles walked towards a box of a Gunpla looking like a cute little yellow bear with a pink ribbon.
"Can you deduct the price of this one from my salary?" Damocles asked his employer in a warmer tone, pointing to the box.
The latter accepted and made a receipt that he gave to Damocles and the latter left the store, followed by his mother and Stella, who remained silent in the face of the Gunpla builder's attitude.