A Long Fix

In the middle of the night a shriek made itself known waking up anyone within its circle of influence. Alban flinched her head up from the desk upon hearing the shriek, it didn't take long for her to connect two and two together to know whom belonged that voice. Standing up from her work space she tiredly walked towards the chamber where they housed the pink haired girl.

Upon rounding the corner, she finally saw the girl who was on the ground unmoving, while it was too dark for her eyes to see, the erratic breathing pattern told her that the patient was hyperventilating. She crouched down and grabbed her prone position, still carrying her she walked towards the spare bedroom that Bench had prepared in the event that she wakes up. When she entered the room's, sensors detected their heat signatures and turned the lights on.

With the lights on she could finally see the patients face, she looked around in a panic as she tried to get her bearings. When their eyes locked she glared at them, though to Alban it might as well looked like a Pit looking at her when you dangle a treat on top of it. To be frank it was a cute sight.

"Don't worry, you're safe," She said.

The girl seemed to do a double take, "H-how can I understand you?"

"That? Oh, we installed a neural chip in the back of your brain, that chip the language of Banscroft. You should get some rest, you were in a very critical state when we found you,"

"What do you mean? I was just at the [Tristain Magical Academy] trying to summon a [Familiar]… did you kidnap me!? And what do you mean by that last statement,"

"I don't know what [Tristen Magus Akamedy] or [Femiliar] means… there seems to be a bug in that chip we put in you… other than that what makes you think we kidnapped you? And for your second question… you were having a severe case of nuclear fever, while it was curable we didn't know if our treatments would work on you as you were a flesh-skin,"

"Nuclear fever? Flesh-skin?" the patient asked.

Alban gave her an incredulous look, "You've never heard of Nuclear fever? Have you been living under a rock?"

The patient glared at her carrier in anger, "How dare you insult me, a [Noble]!"

"Yep definitely a bug in the chip," she muttered, "Anyways get some rest and by tomorrow you should be all better," she said completely deny what she had said.

"Wait, you never told me that a flesh-skin is," the patient called out.

"Good night," Alban said while waving one of her back arms at her

While this seemed like a normal gesture to Louise it wasn't even the slightest bit normal. After all no one sprouted metallic arms from their backs and waved as if it was an everyday thing. She reached out her hand and tried to grab he but then noticed another detail that rocked her entire world; for what reached out to Alban was not a hand of her own.

She moved it to the left and it followed, right, left. Then she traced the whole metallic arm all the way down to its base – the lower she reached the more her heart raced. When she finally reached the place where her arms were what she saw was a metallic socket that was attached to where her normal arm should be.

Another shriek was heard in the workshop.

=LINE BREAK=

Cattleya de La Fontaine looked outside her carriage, worry etched on her face. Beside her Eleonore sat up like a proper noble woman though if Cattleya looked closer she could tell that she too was uneasy. Across the carriage sat their strict mother, reading a book. Just ahead of them was another carriage that was still owned by them but housed a rather important figure – the princess of Tristain, Henrietta de Tristain.

A week ago, Karin was having a peaceful tea with the princess when all of a sudden, a messenger interrupted their tea with a letter courtesy of the Headmaster of the school where the Valliere's youngest studied, usually letters that came from that academy were rather long and winded its as if the letter was trying to soften you up before hitting you with something important. This time around though it was different and that was the first sign that told Karin that something was wrong, next was content of the letter.

Karin of the Heavy Wind, please come to the academy, something has happened to your daughter.

-Old Osmund

She immediately called out to her daughters and bid farewell her husband telling them that they were leaving as soon as asked questions but the curiosity lingered around the family. Just as they were about to leave, Henrietta told them that she too was coming. If it was any other day she would have told Henrietta 'no' but since there was no time she had no choice but to agree, with that decision made up Henrietta's body guards borrowed one of the carriages that belonged to the Valliere household. And now here they are waiting for the carriage to reach their destination.

"Mother, is something the matter?" Eleonore asked.

"This," Karin said while handing them the letter she had received three days ago.

Cattleya leaned to the side to read as well, "What happened to Louise?" she asked with worry.

"Patience, we're about to find out," their mother said.

True to his word the walls of the academy were now visible to them but there was one thing that stood out the most – the large hole in one of the walls that made up the perimeter of the academy. Now, more questions raced all over the Vallieres' and Henrietta's head, wondering as to what caused such damage to the prestigious academy. A few minutes passed and the academy entered the front gates of the school. What should have been a beautiful courtyard was now reduced to nothing more than a battlefield; craters littered the dirt the once lush and green flat area where students would mingle around.

During this time Cattleya had to bite her lower lip and wonder – what happened here? And how could Louise be a part of it? The carriage stopped and the door opened allowing the whole family to come out, already waiting outside were some of the staff that ran the place all lined up nicely. The one who escorted them out of the carriage was Old Osmund – the one responsible for sending them the letter. The second carriage stopped as well and the one who welcomed the passenger was Colbert, he had to do a double take as the princess emerged out of the carriage.

"Princess Henrietta, what an honour to be in your presence!" Colbert said while kneeling down in front of her.

"You may rise," she said while giving a sweet smile to the old veteran.

"We must say, we never expected you to come today. We apologize that you have seen us in our worst condition yet," Old Osmund said while bowing down.

"It is quite alright, it was decided for me to come here in the heat of the moment," she said. "Now, I believe there's a reason for us to be here isn't there?"

"Yes, please follow me," said the headmaster.

The group of nobles left the area and walked with the old man, as they were walking they noticed that the halls of the academy were too quiet to be normal. When Henrietta asked about this the headmaster gave a tired sigh.

"There are things that are happening that even I can't explain, Your Highness. A week ago we've been attacked by a large golem,"

"A golem you say?" Eleonore asked.

"Yes, a golem. Its skin was black in colour with intricate lines all over the body which glowed a deep red. At first, we thought that it was just a harmless golem but we were proven wrong when it started to go on a rampage in the school,"

"Is this golem the one responsible for the destroyed wall?" Karin asked.

"Unfortunately, no, that would be your daughter's doing," Osmund said.

Karin scoffed, "Surely you jest Old Osmund, while I know of my daughter's incapability to perform magic properly, I'm quite confident that even her spells, destructive as they are, couldn't destroy a wall that's extremely thick and is enchanted with some enforcements,"

"Yet here we are looking at the destruction that she made," Old Osmund said.

An awkward silence reigned on the group. Deciding to break the thick ice Cattleya asked another question, "In the letter that you sent us… what has Louise done?"

Old Osmund seemed to flinch slightly at the mention, "I-it's complicated,"

"What do you mean?" Eleonore asked.

"Before I tell you anything else I would like all of you to please keep an open mind about this, Miss Valliere's situation is… outlandish to say the least,"

The group looked at each other with varying expressions of worry any confusion, they all looked at him again ready to hear the news.

"From what I have gathered something or someone changed young Louise's as her body looked similar to those of the golems that had attacked the academy," He paused and looked at them, trying to gauge their reactions. While they were giving him some incredulous looks they didn't say anything so he continued.

He told them what he heard from Guiche, Montmorency, Tabitha, Kirche and even Professor Colbert. The more he talked about it he too also noticed how it almost sounded like he was going senile. By the time the story was done they all looked at him like her had definitely gone senile, he gave tired sigh, from the looks of it they will need some proof to believe his words and thus he stopped just a few meters in front of the wooden shack where Jean Colbert would work on some strange devices.

"Beyond these doors is where Louise reside,"

"If what you say is true, shouldn't she be in the medical ward after fighting that golem?" Cattleya asked.

"Like I said… it's complicated, and like I said earlier please keep an open mind,"

The door to the shack opened and the first thing that they all saw were shocked them to their core, there hanging on some sort of stand was none other than Louise and in her damaged state. Cattleya had to put both of her hands on her mouth as sobbed quietly, seeing this Eleonore immediately comforted her younger sister. Henrietta for her part tried to look indifferent but when her best friend's hanging on something while missing an arm and two legs she couldn't help herself but look in horror at her condition. Finally, there's Karin, she was pissed, while she didn't show it she truly loved her daughter so when she saw her daughter's current state... she restrained herself, while repeating the mantra 'Rule of Steel' in her head.

"I-is that L-Louise?" Eleonore asked. To which Old Osmund gave a sombre nod.

"What caused this?" Karin asked barely containing her anger.

"Something that Louise called a 'Ravager'"

"What's that?" Henrietta asked.

"She told me that it was some sort of golem that adapts to its surrounding and she also told me that the longer it lives the more powerful it gets," Osmund explained.

"Where is this Ravager then?" Karin asked.

"Louise had already defeated it already, singlehandedly"

Even Cattleya's sobbing paused upon hearing those words, "Make no mistake Duchess Valliere, the field that you saw was the result of the battle between you daughter and the Ravager,"

The entire shack silent after that statement, if what the headmaster was true then by judging the damage to one of the walls Karin could tell that Louise required a lot of power so that also tells her that this Ravager is a powerful golem if what they saw in the field was the result of them fighting. While she thought about this Cattleya approached the broken Louise. She reached her hand and was about to touch her.

"Miss Fontaine I don't thi-"Osmond warned but then another voice joined in.

"DON'T EVEN LAY A FINGER ON HER!"

The sudden loud voice made her flinch and they all turned to the owner of the voice.

"W-what are you?" Henrietta asked looking curiously at the floating pod.

The pod never answered instead it looked at the headmaster, "I thought I told Colbert to tell you that no one is suppose to go in this shack?"

Osmund was about to answer when Bench left the entire conversation while still grumbling "I swear, are all flesh-skins like this? They see one thing that they don't recognize and immediately they have the urge to touch it,"

"I-I'm sorry but could you please explain to us why I can't touch my little sister?" Cattleya asked currently forgetting her sadness.

"Your 'little sister'?" Bench asked.

"Yes, we're her family members, so step aside golem," Eleonore said while glowering down at the pod.

"I can't do that,"

"What do you mean?" Karin asked trying to reign her anger due to the amount of disrespect that the golem is giving them.

"I mean I could always leave Louise here to die,"

"So, you're the one in charge of healing her?" Henrietta asked.

"Not heal… repair, Jesus get the two words right, she isn't exactly human anymore," he said while mumbling the last part

All thought processes came to a grinding halt as they all gave Bench the look of asking for elaboration, "I'm not the one who should tell you that, let Louise do that. I'm only here because Louise decided that it was really smart to activate her overdrive and disable her limiter,"

"Now as to your question about not touching her," Bench said while turning to face Cattleya. "Louise is in a pretty critical state right now and any sort of contact with her body could only do more harm than good,"

Then as if to prove his statement Louise's broken body started to spark, seeing this Bench gave a curse and shot a beam down which turned into a cube that encased the young Valliere. Pink lightning came out of her body while she gave a blood curdling scream, the only thing that was preventing the lightning from escaping was the walls of the cube that Bench had assembled just in time.

"AAAAAAAAHHHHHH!" Louise shrieked.

Cattleya backed away from the cube, just like how the pink lightning appeared, it stopped instantly.

"Louise!" shouted Cattleya in worry.

"W-what was that?!" Eleonore asked.

"That, was an ED," Bench said while disabling the cube.

"ED?" asked Old Osmund.

"Energy Discharge," Bench replied.

"Is she alright!?" Cattleya asked.

"Like I said, she's in a very critical state, Energy Discharge happens every time, its when the amount of energy that she exerts on her body is equal to the discharge is gives off later, I'm pretty sure you all saw the big hole-in-the wall as you walked here right?"

All heads nodded, "The amount of power that she used to obliterated that wall is only getting discharged now, if the discharges are in small amount then she wouldn't even be feeling it but since she activated her overdrive and removed her limiter all the discharge that comes later will be guaranteed painful, to the point that it is deadly,"

While they didn't understand the terms of 'overdrive' and 'limiter', they understood what Bench was trying to tell them; the concept was similar to when they cast magic, if their willpower is low then they become very tired and if it runs out there was a chance of them dying.

"Will she be alright?" Henrietta asked.

"For the time being? Yes, but the more we prolong her condition the lower her chances of living, if you could let me do my job that would be appreciated," Bench said while over taking Cattleya.

Bench floated towards the smoking Louise, "You can scream at me later once you wake up Louise but right now I need that arm of yours,"

A blue beam of light came from Bench's dome head and it hit the only attached limb left. Like earlier when Louise had an energy discharge the area where Bench shot the beam a rectangular prism encased the entire limb. With one quick tug the entire arm was wrenched free from its owner.

"Why did you do that?!" Eleonore asked anger welling up.

"I'll answer your question when you're calm," Bench said while floating away from the conversation.

Eleonore was about to call the bot out when a hand landed on her shoulder, looking at the owner she saw the worried face of Cattleya. She shook her head, "We just have to trust that it knows what it's doing," she said.

Eleonore clicked her tongue in annoyance. Bench called out and told them to follow him, the group followed and were eventually led to the corner of the shack, there on the corner sat the body of a golem with a massive hole in its chest area. While the others looked curiously at the golem Karin immediately recognized what the golem was.

"Is that the so called 'Ravager'?" She asked Bench.

"Yep," He said while giving an emphasis on the 'P'.

"What is it still doing here?" Asked Cattleya.

"Initially I was going to scrap it for parts,"

"Initially?" Henrietta asked.

"Follow me," Bench led the group towards a wooden table.

On the table sat a red orb that was slightly pulsating, when they asked what it was Bench replied with, "A heart of a devil,".

When they asked for elaboration all they got were terms that were completely foreign to their ears, just when they were about to get a migraine Henrietta decided to cut his entire lecture and asked for a simpler explanation. Bench grumbled and gave a comment about how flesh-skins were so weak to understand detailed lectures.

"The simplest explanation that I could give would be that I'll be putting the Ravager's core in Louise's body. If the core is the one in charge of shifting the Ravager's body to adapt to its surroundings by putting it inside Louise then she should be able to control the nanomachines of the Ravager,"

"So where does that lead us?" Eleonore asked while rubbing her temples.

"Louise would be able to self-repair and like a Ravager, she would be able to adapt to her surroundings!" Bench yelled enthusiastically.

"So, you're telling me that you're going to put a heart of a devil inside young Louise?" Karin asked

"Well, she already held that title for seven years straight, I suppose by jamming the core in her would make her something equivalent to a baron of hell," Bench mumbled. Noticing that he's going back to his rant he stopped himself and looked at Karin, "Uh… yeah I suppose, you might be against this but you need to remember that this core is the only thing that's going to save her life,"

Silence reigned over the group, they all looked at each other – especially the Vallieres as they contemplated on whether they should go through with the operation or not. "Would there be any lingering effects?" Cattleya asked.

"None that I can think of," Bench said while completely missing out the words 'this is my first time handling a Ravager core after all,'.

"Then do it," Henrietta said.

The group looked at the bot and nodded all giving their consent to proceed with the operation.

It had been a few hours since they had started the operation, Karin had decided to leave while Henrietta told them that the castle needed her leaving Cattleya and Eleonore to watch the pod-bot connect the final tube that was coming out of his back to Louise's chest.

"And that should be the last tube, alright we can start on putting the core," Bench said.

"Finally," Eleonore muttered.

Bench left the room to get the core while leaving a trail of tubes, meanwhile the sisters looked at their youngest with worry, Bench might have told them that she was alright though to be frank they find it hard to believe especially when her arms and limbs were not attached to her and were completely torn off by some golem that managed to trash the entire courtyard, Osmund did say that they should keep an open mind. With that in mind they just waited in apprehension.

"Alright here's the core and here's the leg of the Ravager," Bench said while lifting up the two items using blue beams that encased them in cubes with the leg glowing a slight orange to where it was cut courtesy to the heated blade she 'borrowed' from Louise.

Eleonore looked at the pod-bot with confusion, "That's going to be her leg?"

The eldest of the sisters had to flinch when the reply that came back were a series of beeps that sounded aggressive.

"I'm not so dumb as to give her a disproportionate leg! Once I jam the core in, it should recognize Louise's body and from there a lot of math and algorithms are used to make sure that her new leg would be fit for purpose," Bench scoffed, "flesh-skins,"

Eleonore would've taken her wand out and casted a powerful wind spell at the bot were it not for the fact that the same bot that was aggravating her is the only one who knows how to fix Louise. Bench placed the leg just in front of Louise and turned his attention at the patient, a blue beam landed on Louise's chest area. The chest bisected and opened like double doors revealing a burnt-out ball that was sitting on the centre of the chest. The smell of something burning wafted through the sister's lungs, they covered their nose while looking at the amount of smoke that was coming out of Louise's chest.

"Yep, that core is definitely burnt out," Bench mumbled. When Cattleya asked about the burnt ball he explained. "What you're looking at right now is – well more like was, Louise's core. In flesh-skin terms… it's her heart,"

The sisters now looked at each other worriedly, while they didn't know much in the medical field – just bits and pieces it was common sense that a heart, no matter how mechanical it may be, shouldn't be black in colour. Bench took the burnt core out and placed the Ravager core in. Surprisingly the core of the Ravager had fit like a glove. in the compartment small appendages from the side automatically attached to the core and began the long process of recognizing the new core. To further secure that nothing was to happen Bench monitored the entire procedure checking the numbers that the new core is giving, making sure that it doesn't grow out of the general chart. Meanwhile the sisters waited with bated breath.

"You know… she talked a lot about all of you… in her logs that is," Bench said out of nowhere. The sisters gave an incredulous look at the robot.

"What does a tree have to do with us?" Eleonore asked.

Bench gave a groan of annoyance, "Not that kind of logs! You know, kind of like a diary,"

"So, what did she say?" Cattleya asked.

"She complained about all of you faults of course but for every log she made the words missed and love was always there," he said, the atmosphere suddenly got sombre, "I'm a bot, I was built artificially, love is a foreign concept to me so I don't know how to deal with that part of her problem, I don't know what's happening within your family – and I'm not going to pry but from old medical records I had taken from my memory, emotions like that are usually because she's being ignored,"

They were quiet, contemplating on the words of the bot. Out of nowhere the Bench made a surprised beep sound catching their attention, the once red orb slowly changed its glow to a light pink, once the glow finally reached its peak it died down. A few more seconds, Bench turned around and addressed the sisters.

"I can safely say that she will be alright,"

The girls gave a huge sigh of relief. The sound of something rattling reached their ears, they traced the sound eventually they looked down to see the torn leg rattling, then it slowly broke down into tiny particles that may as well have been sand. To their astonishment the black sand moved towards the hanging patient – slowly making a thin tower of sand towards the stub that was her leg. Cattleya gave a soft surprised sound when, Bench looked at her to see that there were more sand particles that were approaching Louise but it wasn't from the leg, following the trail of sand he discovered that the fallen Ravager had started to break down rapidly. Floating back to Louise he was shocked at the rate of how the nanomachines work.

The left that was completely blown off is now replaced by a leg that was not only smooth but it was also polished. The nanomachines of the Ravager was like a grape vineyard the black sand that was coming from the Ravager was coiling itself upwards the stand that Louise hanged on eventually making it to her face, the trail of sand dismissed her face and made a line towards the arms and started to rebuild it similarly to the legs. Upon closer inspection Bench could also spot some of the sand entering the gaps of her old body. The plates that made up her old body fell off, similar to how a snake would shed its skin and what replaced them were chrome black plates that looked more like it was a skin rather than an armour plate that was placed there.

A minute had passed and Bench, Eleonore and Cattleya were shocked at the new body of Louise. Gone were the metal plates that made up her chest instead it was a chrome black that seemed to shimmer despite the moon being up and at the centre of it and between moderately developed breasts, courtesy of the nanomachines, was her core proudly glowing pink, the legs and arms were no longer 'mechanical' instead they looked as if Louise had worn a skin tight suit, there were no small gaps where the lights would usually glow, instead it glowed inside of the suit. Bench observed the composition of her new body, to say the least he was shocked.

The nanomachines compressed themselves on Louise with great pressure – creating this sort of extremely thick armour that not even the infamous rail gun could scratch. A twitch made Bench look at the hand of Louise. Another twitch, looking up he saw Louise's eyes slowly open.

"How do you feel Louise?" he asked.

A moment of silence before she locked eyes with Bench, "Like I've been thrown in a grinder, regurgitated and thrown again,"

"In other words?" Bench asked in mock obliviousness.

Louise rolled her eyes, "I feel like shit – can you get me down this thing already?"

A/N: There you have it folk I have rewritten this chapter, why you may ask? It's simple really, the previous version just sounded forced and if not for a my first reviewer: Robo Reader 21 I would never have changed this chapter into something better (At least I think it's better than the first one) so kudos to him!

Anyways I hope you all enjoyed this rewritten chapter and with that I bid you all adieu

Peace~