"Out...of...function..."
Still mumbling under her breath, Nepgeo was dragged into the shop by a very angry IF. Rei winced at the sight. She really shouldn't feel bad for the person who stole money from her workplace and got her into trouble, but Nepgeo sure looked pitiful at this moment, with her bangs all messed up and her back in a slump.
"Mr. Biz-chu, I've caught her." IF held up a bundle of bills in front of the rat, who had been anxiously pacing around the counter for a while now. "Here's your money. Whatever she hasn't spent, that is."
"Chu, Miss IF, thank you so much! I'm honestly not expecting to get anything back." Biz-chu let out a deep sigh, after he took the money. "We really need better security, chu. And better employees. But I just can't afford to fire anyone at this point."
"Hey, mister rats..." Nepgeo waved at them. "I'm like, super sorry for pranking you guys. Have mercy on this poor girl here, and say some nice things about her in the juvenile court, please?"
"Oh, cut it out. You weren't sorry at all when you were running away from me." IF said. "Now, say your apology to Rei, before I take you to the police station."
"Geez, just send me to jail already." Nepgeo was smirking, but it felt a little forced. "At least they give me free meals, and mom won't make me date perverted Nepgear fanboys for money while I'm in there."
"Um." C-Sha, who was sitting right beside Rei, gave her a very concerned look. "Iffy, maybe we should call her parents and have a talk with them?"
"Are you pitying me, nerd?" Nepgeo sneered. "Come on. It's not like these losers have the guts to lewd me or anything. Oh, and mom's either gambling or drunk at this hour, so she won't answer ya'."
IF gave her a stern look. "Watch your tongue. I'm not letting you off the hook just because you have a difficult life."
"Why should I say sorry if you are still throwing me in jail?" Nepgeo muttered, before making a half-hearted bow in Rei's general direction. "Sorry for messing with your pizza boxes. You probably suck as a delivery girl, but I might have been too much of a troll back there."
"It's okay. Y-You aren't wrong about the delivery girl part, really." Rei let out an awkward laugh. She could have said something harsh to the girl, and no one would blame her. But she was just too tired to get mad at this point.
"That's not an apology, Fakegear. That's an insult."
"And Fakegear isn't an insult?"
"Am I wrong about that? It's not like Nepgeo is your real name," IF paused, "Tommoka."
Nepgeo took a step back, like she had just been slapped in the face. "Screw you. Don't call me that. It's so cutesy and yucky."
"You know what's even cuter?" There was suddenly a mischievous glint in IF's eyes.
"Why are you looking at me like that?"
"Oh, I'm just thinking, maybe letting you spend a few nights in a cell is too easy on you," IF said. "If you like that mascot suit so much, how about doing a few weeks of community service in it? This place could really use some good advertisement, handing out flyers and such. Right, Mr. Biz-chu?"
The rat nodded, to which Nepgeo responded with a look of sheer horror.
"Y-You can't be serious! You are gonna make me into the Ultimate Nerd, the Furry?" She gasped. "But I refuse! You'll never take me alive!"
She broke free from IF's grip on her uniform collar and immediately lunged towards the door, but within seconds, IF had caught up to her and pulled her back inside.
"WRYYYYYYY—!" Nepgeo made a weird noise as she was tackled to the floor.
"Wow, Fakegear, you really are just discount Underling. Using your fellow delinquent's fashion style for some good deeds can't be that big of a deal, right?" IF smiled and dragged her up from the floor. "Now, Mr. Biz-chu, let's get her ready for work!"
"And you are pure evil! I hope you get run over by an ambulance!" Nepgeo yelled, before she was pulled all the way into the backroom.
Rei shuddered at the screaming and cursing that ensued. If this was how a normal community service session looked like, IF had really been too nice to her. Then C-Sha and Blanc turned to look at her, and she started shaking even harder.
"So, u-uh, what do you want from me?"
Blanc took a small device out of her large sleeves. With a ping, it lit up, projecting a holographic screen into the air. Rei clenched her fists underneath the table when she saw the images displayed.
"...This girl you brought back. Who is she trying to revive?" Blanc pointed to the screen. The intense seriousness in her eyes made Rei gulp a little and quickly look away. "Had she told you anything, when she asked you to help her break into Lowee's archive?"
"Chillax, Blanny. You're scaring her." C-Sha put a hand to Blanc's shoulder, and added, "Just so you know, Rei, we won't drag you back to Lowee's jail, or make you lose your job over this. But we do wanna know what's really going on here. Would you please tell us the whole story?"
Straight to the point. Rei closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and began to talk.
"Okay, i-it was a week ago, and I'd just finished my extended community service..."
"I...What?"
Rei was not sure if Lynka had even heard her in the pouring rain. But she was still kneeling there, holding that shard out in front of her, and Rei didn't feel like taking it. Not after the...previous incident, which also involved strange powerful CPU stuff being offered to her against her will. Or so she was told.
"You must've mistaken me for someone else..."
Rei bent down, trying to help Lynka get up. Her limbs were painfully stiff, and it soon became apparent that she was not going to move on her own.
"I-I'm so sorry for not being 'Lady Cyan Heart'!" Rei lowered her head, before grabbing Lynka's outstretched hand, "But I really don't know what to do with this...thing, I'm just a regular human now, and an especially useless one, too—"
"I'm dreaming again." Lynka whispered. "Of our human weakness...that must be conquered, right? But I can't, Maria. I can't."
Rei could barely see her face now, with all the water running down the lens of her glasses. The quiet resignation and despair in that voice still made her chest tighten, however.
"Even if it is a dream, Lady Cyan Heart," She looked up again, with a painful hope in her eyes, "if you can bring me back, in a world not of my own..."
"With your power that bends the fabric of reality, and transcends the boundary of time and dimensions..."
That other Rei's power could probably do something like that—which she didn't have, didn't remember using, and never wanted to touch again. Rei cringed at the faint burning sensation in her stomach.
"Will you listen to your successor's prayer, and exchange my life for hers?"
Rei didn't have a response to that. So she just hurriedly caught Lynka when she went limp and fell forward, like a puppet with its strings cut. The shard dropped out of her hands, and into the puddle of water below. For a moment, it just lay there, its blue light rippling through the water.
"Are you...alright? Can you hear me?"
Her eyes were closed. There were no answers. But she was still breathing in a shallow rhythm, as Rei set her down on the pavement with trembling hands. Rei picked up the shard and put it into her pocket. She still felt a little bad for making the girl lie on wet ground, even though there wasn't a single dry spot left on both of them at this point.
With a sigh, Rei lifted the girl onto her back. Guess she wasn't done with carrying heavy weights yet tonight.
"You just took her home like that?"
"I-I'm sorry, IF, but it's really late! If I called the police or the Guild, they were going to bring her to a hospital, and I was scared that once they checked her and found out she's not human, they'd throw her in jail, or..."
"Well, you ain't wrong about that, nerd! Cops suck!"
"Mind your own business and go back to work, Fakegear. I still see plenty of flyers in your hands."
"...I hate you so much."
There was a dull pain in Rei's head when she woke up. As she stared at the plastic clock hanging on the opposite wall, under the dim light of her run-down apartment, she was still hoping that what happened four hours ago might all be a bad dream.
Four hours. She let out a deep sigh. That was all the sleep she was going to get, after taking a bath—
Oh no. She hadn't just taken the girl's wet clothes off and bundled her up in an old blanket and left her on the sofa, had she? Other tenants hardly came back here on the weekends, but if they did, she was going to be in so, so much trouble.
Rei leaped up from her bed. She was shivering in her thin pajamas as she opened the door, and started walking towards the shared living room. Her gaze was completely fixated on the floor during her walk. Only when she looked up again did she see the pair of glowing scarlet eyes, floating at the end of the corridor.
Rei let out a high-pitched shriek. She would have woken up every single person in the apartment, if they were there. And, if the sounds of a broom handle banging against the ceiling were not imaginary, she sure woke up someone on the floor below.
The eyes blinked and moved away from her, towards the wall. The next second, the light in the corridor was switched on. Rei snapped her eyes shut at the sudden bright light, but when her vision returned to normal, no one was standing there. Her legs were on the verge of giving out under her, and it took all of her courage not to start screaming again.
"H-Hello?" She whispered, after finally inching her way into the living room.
"My apology." A weak voice came from behind the sofa. "I shouldn't have used that."
Slowly, Lynka stood up. Rei winced when she saw the blanket draped over her. She had brought all of their wet clothes to the public laundry room outside, right? Please tell her they weren't lying in a heap inside her bathroom. Please.
"Is that...you?"
She made a small nod. "I've gone out of my body again. I do not wish to scare you, but I can understand that you may want me to leave—"
"N-No! I'm not chasing you out of the house!" Rei shook her head. "Of course, if you really don't want to stay here, you can leave at any time, but..."
Her voice trailed off when she caught sight of the crystal shard, lying on the living room table. Did she just put it there like it was a bag of take-out food? Goodness, she was completely out of her mind tonight.
"Just asking, you aren't going to do anything...not good with that crystal, right? Like...trying to destroy the world with it? I mean, if you are some powerful ancient Goddess brought back to life, I can't stop you and you'll probably k-kill me anyways—"
"No." Lynka shook her head, before she sat back down in this painfully formal posture, clutching the blanket to herself. "The Shares in there are only enough to keep me alive."
"Again, I-I'm not your Lady Cyan Heart. But would you please...tell me what's going on here?" After a long silence, Rei finally mustered the courage to start speaking again.
Seeing the girl clutching the blanket even tighter, Rei added, "S-Sorry! You don't have to if you don't want to, and it's really stupid of me to ask something so personal—"
"I don't remember when I wake up." She whispered. "But the moment I flew up, and looked down, I knew something was wrong. There was nothing left. War could change the land in seconds, and I thought a thousand years must have passed since Tari's destruction. But entire mountains, lakes, and marshes are just...not there."
"No. It's like they've never been there at all. And nothing could wipe away the impact of the Great Shock, not even the First Goddess itself." She was shaking now, as if she was about to burst into sobs at any second. "Tari never exists in this world, does it? I should've known. But before I saw the cities, the new divinities...I didn't want to believe it."
"I'm...so sorry about that." Rei lowered her head. It was a really stupid thing to say—she couldn't probably wish a nonexistent nation out of thin air or anything, just for this girl's sake.
"It's a much better world, too. More quiet and beautiful than I could ever imagine." She said. "But I shouldn't be the one seeing this. If anyone deserves a second life, it's not me. It's my sister."
A pause. "I promised her that, if we were going to die, we'd die alongside each other. And I couldn't keep my promise."
"...What is that freaky eyes thing?"
"That's her ability, isn't it, Blanny? Going out of her body as a phantom?"
"R-Right. I don't know how, but she can...link to things and affect them in that state." Rei said. "I-It takes a lot of tries when it comes to more complex stuff, though. And when she succeeds, she's pushed back into her body."
"Huh. So the basement door, and the fire alarm..." C-Sha put a hand to her chin. "That's why she still needs a keycard? It doesn't work well on electronic devices?"
IF moved her sight away from Nepgeo, who was still standing outside in her mascot suit, waving limply at pedestrians with all the enthusiasm of a roadkill. "Another world? I think I know when that happened."
"Huh, Iffy? What do you mean?"
"Histoire had sensed a dimension anomaly two months ago, near the old Graveyard area. We'd checked it by drone and found nothing, but it must've cracked the surrounding rock layers and caused a cave-in. There happens to be a dungeon underneath, and the monsters in there got out. That's what Nep & Co are dealing with now."
Blanc took a deep breath. "What the hell happened to the Tari of her world?"
"She said it was destroyed by...Pana-something? Sorry, she'd brought up a lot of names, and I haven't heard any of them before..."
"Please don't tell me she's trying to rebuild Tari here." IF said. "It's more productive than destroying entire worlds and dimensions, but it's still a trouble we can do without."
"T-That's not what she wants!" Rei blurted out, before quickly covering up her mouth. "Sorry for yelling. It's just a feeling, but I don't think she...likes her own nation very much."
Neither did Rei, for the majority of her life. That hadn't changed much, even after a certain incident. A crushing bitterness hit her squarely in the chest, and she gripped the tablecloth just a little tighter.
"Has she told you anything about her sister?"
"A little, b-but not a lot. She did say she had failed both of them as a Candidate, and that if anyone should be given another life...it should be the one person who never has a chance to enjoy her life, before it was cut short."
There was a long, uncomfortable silence after she finished her sentence.
"Forgive me if this sounds harsh," IF finally spoke up again. "But how do we know that she's telling you the truth? I want to believe that it's true, too, but one can't never be too careful."
"Even if she's not trying to resurrect someone dangerous...she has still broken into Lowee's archive," Blanc sighed. "And I need to hold her responsible for the damage she caused. Do you think you can convince her to turn herself in?"
Rei shook her head. Later, maybe later, she was telling herself, but if she didn't spill everything out right away, she wouldn't be able to say anything at all when the fear started choking her up.
"Lady Blanc, if your own sisters were...you know, and there was a chance to bring them back..." Rei closed her eyes. "Wouldn't you be willing to do anything for them? Would you give up, just because someone tells you it's wrong?"
"...Of course not." Blanc was visibly shaking, before her voice raised from whisper to a barely suppressed yell. "But that will NEVER fuckin' happen! As long as I'm still breathing!"
"A-Ah! I'm sorry, I-I shouldn't have—!" Rei nearly toppled over in her chair when she leaned back in a panic, before C-Sha reached out and grabbed her.
"Please, Blanny. I know that's not a happy thing to think about, but..." C-Sha's voice trailed off. Finally, with a sigh, she turned back towards Rei.
"Rei, I believe you have the best intention in mind, when you agreed to help her. And I believe the same goes for her. But people can do bad things by complete accident, and what she had taken from the archive...You've found it inside the museum catalogues, right?"
Rei nodded, still trembling a little.
"You haven't returned the specific book yet, but from what I've seen in the library, it's about ten years out of date. And, after ten years, the archive staff only have the vaguest idea of what it does, and still don't know if it actually works."
There was a really serious look in C-Sha's eyes, as she leaned forward. "The best result is that she doesn't succeed, and nothing happens. The worst? None of us knows. Anything can happen when it involves Shares. It could be a Heart Dimension scenario all over again."
"Please understand, Rei. We don't wanna be the bad cops, but we just can't risk it."
The ringing sound echoed through the room for a few seconds, before the paper door slid open, revealing a girl in a white kimono and high-waisted red skirt. The heels of her black boots clicked against the wooden floor as she walked up to the tea-table, and reached for the boxy telephone.
"Greetings. This is the Tendo Uemura Playing Cards Co. What can I help you with?"
"Tendo girl! Haven't heard from you in a while!" A rough male voice came through the receiver.
"Mr. Esaka? You aren't asking me to lend you credits again, are you?" The girl adjusted the giant red and gold ribbon on her head.
"Gah! No! I've turned over a new leaf now. No more drunken pleas for money towards all my contacts..."A sigh. "Sorry. That's not my proudest moment."
"It's alright. Please forgive me for my presumptuousness. What do you need?" She said, smiling. "I haven't been in contact with the detective firms for years, though, so my knowledge won't exactly be up to date."
"Neither do I!" A pause. "Well, even if I want to go back, it's...not in business anymore."
"I'm so sorry about that."
"But enough of this depressing stuff already. You wanna come over to my arcade and have a drink between old friends, Tendo girl?"
"Oh, I'd love to."