Hyperdimension Neptunia belongs to Compile Heart, Idea Factory, Sega and whomever else worked on it.

I should have waited a few hours yesterday before posting, I bet some people didn't realize that I had updated. XD

One year later...

Purple Sister grimaced as she, White Heart and Black Heart faced off against Yellow Heart. What made the whole situation worse was, in her opinion, those horrible monsters that were in the surrounding area.

"This sucks!" White Heart growled in annoyance, between the loss of shares and the fact that those monsters were once human girls, it was hard for her to actually muster up enough will power to keep fighting.

"At least they aren't drooling and disgusting anymore." Black Heart muttered as she looked at those monsters. 'To think that could have been me if I hadn't been compatible with a CPU memory. We really need to develop some way to find out who is and isn't compatible with those things.' Her white twin tails fluttered in the wind and she returned her attention to Yellow Heart.

"Go away!" Yellow Heart glared at the three CPUs. "Just leave Eden alone! I wanna live with my mommy, daddy and big sister here!"

Purple Sister bit her lip lightly and floated down so that she was closer to Yellow Heart. "Please, I don't want to hurt you. But I want to see Nep..." She stopped as Yellow Heart narrowed her eyes in anger. "I mean Purple Heart. Please, she's important to me too."

"You just want to steal her away!" Yellow Heart growled and rushed forward, her clawed weapons connecting with Purple Sister's gunblade. "Mommy and daddy told me that you're bad people who want to take everything away!"

Purple Sister wished that she knew what to do in this situation, but the most she could do was parry the attacks that Yellow Heart sent her way. 'Neptune, where are you?'

Thankfully Yellow Heart was knocked away by White Heart. "Thanks, Blanc." Purple Sister sighed in relief, Yellow Heart's strength stat was no joke and she felt that her arms were going to fall off due to blocking those attacks.

White Heart nodded as she, Black Heart and Purple Sister took a stance against Yellow Heart, who glared at them.

(-)

Inside the base...

"Wakey, wakey..." Anonydeath said as Purple Heart, who was wearing a robe around her body, slowly opened her eyes. It wasn't that he hadn't enjoyed the free show of Purple Heart's naked body in the past year, he had, but he actually felt bad about looking at her naked body so much and had gotten a robe that he could fit around her body.

"I feel..." Purple Heart said softly as she put a hand on her head, "tired and light headed..."

"You've been in HDD for a year." Anonydeath pointed out to her, causing her eyes, which he noted were now purple, to look at him sharply as she reverted to her human form.

"Much better." Neptune said, her tone and voice were similar to what she sounded like in HDD. She took a step forward and staggered, feeling a wave of dizziness. "What's going on?"

"Ah, you were badly injured in your last battle." Anonydeath explained to Neptune, who looked at him and he noticed that her eyes were dark and slightly glossy in her human form. "If you feel around the back of your head," he watched as she did so, "there was a device I had to put onto you because otherwise you would have died."

"I see." Neptune nodded as she could feel something on the back of her neck at the base of her skull. "I take it that this is what's making me feel weird then?"

"Yes." Anonydeath was a little surprised at how calm and collected the other CPU was being. While the device allowed either him or Rei to take control of Neptune at any time so that she would only see enemies in front of her if needed, he had decided against completely stripping away her personality.

Neptune panted and put a hand on her forehead. "Urgh, I feel ill."

"A year in HDD would do that for any CPU." Anonydeath answered her. "From what I understand that form is really draining for a goddess."

"Yes, it innnngh!" Neptune suddenly jerked and stiffened as Rei walked into the room, holding a small remote in her hands.

"My, this works really well, doesn't it?" Rei asked as she walked in front of Neptune and waved a hand in front of her eyes and noticed that the CPU didn't respond in the slightest. "Let's see... Neptune..." The short-haired CPU slightly lifted her head upwards. "There are three enemies outside fighting Yellow Heart. Go deal with them."

Neptune turned and staggered off, stumbling and weaving from side to side, her arms hanging down loosely by her sides.

"Hurry up and transform and fly out there already." Rei snapped.

Anonydeath sighed as he watched Neptune turn into Purple Heart and fly off. "Rei, you need to let her rest."

"I... I just want the other CPUs to leave us alone." Rei stuttered and walked off, leaving Anonydeath alone.

"Then why do I feel like you're enjoying seeing her suffer?" Anonydeath asked no one in particular as he returned to some of his projects. Most of his projects were simple trinkets and items, but this one was really special to him. 'Mr. Badd, your research isn't wrong, but you lack information needed to fix things.' Then again, so was he.

As he looked at the data he had gotten from from Purple Heart and Yellow Heart over the past couple of years, he grinned behind his mask. 'So that's how it works, huh?'

Who would have thought that having two CPUs would accelerate his work in this area by years?

(-)

White Heart let out a cry of pain as she was knocked away by Yellow Heart. She watched with some satisfaction as Black Heart and Purple Sister managed to combine their attacks to blast Yellow Heart away. The red-eyed CPU took a quick glance around the battlefield and noticed that most of the monsters were staying back and away from the fight, she was pretty grateful about that, the last thing she wanted was to accidentally kill an unfortunate girl who failed at becoming a CPU. "And those monsters were kidnapping girls just to find one who could become a CPU..."

Not far away, Yellow Heart grinned at the other CPUs. "Okay, time to..." She trailed off as digital swords flew through the air and slammed into Black Heart and Purple Sister. Gasping in delight, Yellow Heart turned to see Purple Heart flying out, a dead look in her purple eyes. "Purple!"

Yellow Heart's enthusiasm died when Purple Heart didn't respond and several more swords formed in the air around her and launched themselves at Black Heart and Purple Sister. "Big sis?"

Purple Heart didn't respond as she walked towards the other CPUs, a katana in her hand as she looked at them with a dead-eye stare.

"This isn't good." Purple Sister muttered softly, in all the years she had known Neptune, she had never known her to have a look like that. What made it worse was the fact that her eyes were purple, not blue, when she was in HDD. "Noire, Blanc, we have to..." Whatever they had to do was cut off as swords were launched at them at high speeds while Purple Heart rushed for Black Heart. The Lastation CPU was able to block the attack from her sword, only to cry out in pain as two of Neptune's energy swords slammed into her legs from behind. "Noire!" Purple Sister cried out as she and White Heart rushed at Purple Heart to get her away from Black Heart.

Purple Heart said nothing as she twisted away from Black Heart, spun and blocked Purple Sister's attack before grabbing Purple Sister's arms and pulled, causing Purple Sister to let out a yell as she was thrown off balance and towards the ground. Purple Heart then twisted to avoid a downwards attack from White Heart. When the Lowee CPU swung her axe to the side, she watched as Purple Heart not only effortlessly blocked it, but with a twist of her wrist, she effortlessly disarmed her, sending the axe flying through the air harmlessly. "You never could defeat me by yourself, Blanc." Purple Heart whispered, her eyes narrowed in anger. Her sword started to glow and she slashed downwards before slicing back upwards, hitting White Heart with two energy waves in a V shape before she spun around and launched a third wave at White Heart across the top of the energy, which then exploded, sending White Heart tumbling through the air.

"The hell was that?" Black Heart groaned as she finally removed the energy swords from her legs.

Laying on the ground, White Heart groaned as she tried to sit up, her processor torn in several places and White Heart knew that if she had larger breasts that she'd be exposing her chest to every pervert who was looking if there were any around.

Purple Heart bent over and a circle formed under her feet before she launched herself at the injured Black Heart. The Lastation CPU had only a moment to block. "Not this time." She growled as her sword started to glow. "Tornado Sword!" With a grunt, she pushed Purple Heart away from her. "Dammit..." She groaned in pain and looked down at her bloody legs. 'Shit, she really is going for lethal here.'

Purple Heart said nothing as she held her sword high in the air and Black Heart could only watch in horror as energy built up around the blade. "Neptune Break." Purple Heart whispered softly before rushing forward.

Black Heart let out a cry of pain as Purple Heart slammed into her over and over again.

"It's over." Purple Heart whispered softly as she seemingly disappeared and Black Heart was slammed into over and over again from all sorts of angles before a strong blow sent her flying to the ground below where she slammed into the ground next to White Heart. Looking up, Black Heart twitched before passing out from the pain, her body reverting back to Noire.

"Wow!" Yellow Heart flew up to Purple Heart, who didn't look at her. "You're so strong, Purple!"

"Let's end them." Purple Heart said as she turned to look at Yellow Heart. "HDD Yellow Heart!"

Yellow Heart's eyes started to sparkle at that. "OKAY!" Her body glowed as she turned into a gauntlet. "NNNGH!" She cried out as Purple Heart's fist entered her. "Purple, this feels really weird!"

White Heart stared in horror as she found herself unable to move. "N...No..." She could feel her body trembling as Purple Heart pointed her fist at her.

"Rocket..." Purple Heart whispered.

"PAAAAAAUNCH!" Yellow Heart finished as she was launched at the downed CPUs.

"NO!" Purple Sister rushed in and slammed her blade against the large gauntlet. "Peashy! Stop this!"

Above them, Purple Heart was groaning and panting. "This..." A screen suddenly formed in front of her. "You are Anonydeath, yes?"

The person on the other end nodded. "Listen, sister, I've been monitoring you, you need to come back."

"Our enemies are still alive." Purple Heart shot back, before stiffening as her vision went red.

"Return to base, bring Yellow Heart, the other CPUs are beaten." As Anonydeath said that, HDD Yellow Heart over-powered Purple Sister and blasted her in the stomach, which sent her flying into the ground as the gauntlet returned to Yellow Heart. "You can do it willingly or I'll force you to."

Purple Heart nodded, turned and flew back to base.

"I gotta go, bye bye!" Yellow Heart turned and caught up to Purple Heart and helped her back to base.

Nepgear, having transformed back after that attack, groaned and slowly sat up. She noticed that one, she was alive and two, the monsters that had been bothering them weren't around. "Well, that's good at least." She groaned and flopped onto her back. "I'm just going to rest for a few minutes."

Still, she couldn't help but cry softly. They had failed to not only get into Eden, but they had failed in saving Neptune. 'We need a plan.' Brute forcing their way to a solution just wasn't going to work.

(-)

"You could have killed the other CPUs." Mr. Badd, a balding, middle-aged man in a black business suit, pointed out to Anonydeath as Purple Heart was laid in a pod and reverted to Neptune before he closed the door on it. "So what are you going to do now?"

"First of all, Badd," Anonydeath turned to his associate, "while Purple and Yellow Heart could have killed them, Purple Heart wouldn't have lasted another thirty seconds out there. I know you don't know, but HDD takes a LOT out of a CPU to stay in it for too long and she was in HDD for a year straight. If anything, she's going to need a few months of resting to be back to normal strength."

"And that's why you have her in the pod?" Mr. Badd asked as he looked at Neptune. 'She really does look like a child.' He knew she was much older than she looked, but he still couldn't help but feel like a horrible person for what they were doing to her.

"I'm going to flood her with shares so her body can recover faster." Anonydeath answered him. The power armor looked at Mr. Badd, "and I want you to watch over her."

Mr. Badd jerked in surprise. "Why me?"

"Because Little Rei doesn't like dealing with you." Anonydeath answered him. "Just make sure that she gets plenty of rest, that's all you need to do."

"Sure." Mr. Badd nodded and watched as Anonydeath floated off. Turning, he sighed as he saw Neptune resting. "...This is all sorts of wrong. We just wanted a nation of our own to prove that humans don't need CPUs."

Mr. Badd couldn't help but wonder why things were going the way they were.

To be continued...