Hyperdimension Neptunia is owned by Sega, Idea Factory and Compile Heart and whomever else worked on it.

Chapter 2

As they followed Neptune and watched as she greeted people, stopping to help an old lady cross the street with a large bag of items before Neptune pulled out a shopping cart that could hover a few inches off the ground, which greatly helped the old lady get to where she was going.

"You know..." IF spoke up while Compa and Nepgear looked at her curiously. "It's weird when I think about it."

"Think about what, Iffy?" Compa asked, curious as to what was on her friend's mind.

"Nep said she was gone for a thousand years..." IF trailed off and both Nepgear and Compa nodded. "I don't get it."

"Huh?" Both Nepgear and Compa asked at the same time.

"Well..." IF scratched the back of her head beside her left ear. "A thousand years, as a number it makes sense, but that's a long time, I can't comprehend it." Seeing their confused looks, she decided to elaborate. "A thousand credits, a thousand people, even my stats if they get above a thousand, those are easy to understand and comprehend, I can see them in front of me. But a thousand years?"

"But it still makes sense, right?" Nepgear asked, wondering what IF was getting at.

IF gave her a deadpan look. "Gear, you, Nep and the other CPUs were sealed in the graveyard not even a decade ago." She nodded as both Compa and Nepgear's eyes went white and blank when they realized that she was right. "And that sometimes feels like a long time and other times it feels like it was only a few months ago, right?"

"Well, sometimes, if I just say a random year, I then get surprised by how long ago it was." Nepgear admitted and rubbed the back of her head. "But I kind of get what you mean now... What's Neptune doing?"

The three looked as Neptune walked into a restaurant.

"You think Nep Nep was just hungry?" Compa asked, knowing Neptune could get easily distracted when food was involved, especially pudding. "It's really a good thing our enemies never tried to use poison pudding cups to hurt Nep Nep."

"Don't say that!" Nepgear's eyes went white and blank as she thought about that. "If Neptune ate that and recovered, she'd be really mad."

IF sighed before tilting her head in confusion as Neptune came out of the restaurant with a big smile on her face and humming a tune that IF couldn't place. It was pretty nice though.

The three followed after Neptune as she walked down the street, high-stepping with her arms spread wide. At one point she stopped at a corner and kept humming a tune while waiting for the traffic to pass and then she ran across the street, only to go into a building none of them recognized.

"Amy R's Beach Imporium..." IF muttered as she read the store front's name and the three went to where the window was and looked in. They saw a lot of swimsuits and beach towels on display. "...So what's with this place?"

"Maybe Nep Nep wants to go to the beach?" Compa asked as they watched Neptune talking to a sales clerk while the two looked over some books and computer stuff.

"I dunno..." IF looked at what Neptune was doing in confusion. "I can't see her needing to go to the beach."

As the minutes dragged on, all three girls were starting to get bored watching Neptune and the clerk talking. Before IF went into the shop, Neptune and the store clerk ended their conversation, both smiling and Neptune quickly left the store. "Huh?" Neptune blinked as she saw IF, Compa and Nepgear standing outside the door. "What are you three doing here? Oh! I know! Histy sent you because she was worried I'd get lost, huh?" Neptune smiled at them. "Silly Histy! Sure, I don't remember where anything is, but I'm sure that I can figure it out pretty quickly."

Before they could say anything in rebuttal, a grumbling noise was heard and everyone looked at Compa, who blushed hard.

"I'm sorry, it was so busy today that I didn't get anything to eat."

"Well, that's no good." Neptune looked around and spotted a place not far from them. "Oooh! Burgers! I hope they have real meat in them! The synthetic meat works, but it's so bland compared to real meat!"

"Huh?" The three gawked at Neptune, who rubbed the back of her head, chuckling softly.

"Sorry, sorry, don't worry about it." Neptune just gave them a big smile and ran towards the burger place, causing the other three to sigh and follow after her at a more sedate pace.

"Even after all this time, she's still Nep." IF said as they entered the place, which wasn't too full, as Neptune was already at the counter and apparently paying forher food. "I bet she only ordered for herself." IF sighed and prepared to go to the counter to order when she saw a rather large reciept and had to sign on it. "...Maybe she didn't?"

Neptune stepped away from the counter and waved her sister and friends over to a booth.

After sitting down across from Neptune, with Compa next to her and Nepgear next to Neptune, IF gave her friend a curious look. "...Nep, I need to know, what's with the beach place and the other restaurant?"

"Hmm?" Neptune gave IF a confused look. "Well, I figured that people would like to know that I'm back, right?" The others nodded. "And I've never liked formal announcements because it's like "give up your day, listen to the people in charge and go about your business", it's no fun." Neptune shook her head and grumbled something about stuffy jerks in business suits, making the others sweat-drop as Neptune started to say something about stuffy suits, a portal gun and making all of them fall into the sun. "Anyway," Neptune shook her head, "I'll have Histy put an announcement out tomorrow morning. I want to keep me returning a surprise for most people until the right time." Neptune winked at them.

While they waited for their food, Neptune answered some general questions about the dimension she had been trapped in for centuries.

"So there's a Noire, Vert and Blanc over there, huh?" Nepgear asked and Neptune nodded. "What about me, Uni, Rom and Ram?"

Neptune sighed and shook her head. "If there were, I never met any of you. Heck, I didn't even meet another me from there." She smiled as she remembered the older version of herself that she had met in Zero Dimension. "If I knew I'd grow into such a bombshell, I would have waited a few years before becoming a CPU again in that world."

"Huh?" Nepgear had a confused look on her face. "What do you mean?"

"Well..." Neptune tapped her chin. "See, CPUs in that world were actually human at one point. There's this item you need to find that'll turn you into a CPU."

"I bet wars were fought over that." IF muttered, but when Neptune shook her head, she looked confused. "There wasn't?"

"Nope." Neptune shook her head. "See, the item spawn rate is really low. Sometimes they don't show up for years or even lifetimes. The spawn point in Planeptune only put out like five more in the entire time I was there."

"Well... That's a convenient way to keep the number of CPUs down." Nepgear conceded. "But they still were formed, so..."

Neptune shook her head. "Nah, see, there's a big risk with using the item. If it doesn't like you, you get turned into a baby bug monster for the rest of time." The other three at the table all stared in mute horror at the thought of being forced to live as a monster for the rest of time. "But you aren't wrong, Iffy. There were people who wanted to create their own CPUs. A lot of little girl orphans were kidnapped to see if any of them could become CPUs and it only stopped when one little girl was finally found. We found a way to undo what happened to those little girls who were turned into monsters though."

"So what did you do with the items that can turn people into those monsters?" Compa asked, horrified about the thought of spending the rest of time as a monster, even if they could be turned back to normal.

"We put some policies and laws into place." Neptune said. "There were a couple of other girls over the centuries that became CPUs..." She trailed off, a sad look on her face. "But they had... Really bad attitudes in HDD," and that was compared to Iris Heart even, "and they suffered when they transformed." The others looked on as Neptune's face became sadder and sadder. "...In the end, they asked us to kill them, because they were suffering so much."

"Did you?" IF asked and Neptune shook her head. "But..."

"We told them that we wouldn't kill them, so we put a seal on them so they couldn't transform anymore. That lasted about..." Neptune tapped her chin as she thought about it. "Fifty years before a new baddie found a way to undo the seal and then brainwashed those two to fight for them."

"What did you do?" Nepgear asked.

"After we beat them..." Neptune shook her head. "I didn't want to kill them, but Noire, Blanc, Vert and Plutie all agreed that it was too risky. I pointed out that we let Rei live and she was just as bad when her powers went out of control."

"Rei? As in Rei Ryghts?" Nepgear asked and Neptune nodded. "We made her clean up the mess she made and then we exiled her to her own island. She gets supplies once a week now."

"That's good." Neptune smiled at her. "No, we put Stadia and Ouya into stasis and made sure that they were sealed away so no one would find them."

"Nep Nep..." Compa said softly. "I'm glad you didn't kill them."

"I couldn't imagine it was easy to convince the others not to kill them." Nepgear said and Neptune nodded. "Can't you return them to normal?"

"No, the method for turning the monsters back to normal girls doesn't work for CPUs." Neptune sighed softly. "None of us wanted to take the risk of creating a way to reverse it for CPUs and having someone using it on us."

"Makes sense." IF said and blinked as someone called out a number that made Neptune get up and walk over to get the food.

"Here we go!" Neptune smiled as she brought the food and some empty drink glasses over to the table and put the tray down. "Sorry, Nepgear, but I forgot what kind of foods you like, so I got you a basic combo."

"That's fine." Nepgear smiled, touched at the gesture none-the-less.

After handing Compa and IF their food, Neptune sat back down and started eating her burger while the others did the same with their burgers.

"Um, Nep Nep..." Compa spoke up, a confused look on her face. "Does this have mayonnaise on it?"

"Huh?" Neptune blinked. "Yeah, you like mayo on your burgers."

"No I don't." Compa pouted at her. "I'll eat it though."

"Um, Nep..." IF frowned and looked at her burger. "While I don't mind pickles and mustard, there seems to be a bunch extra on here."

Neptune had a confused look on her face as she looked at them. "But, you two always liked your burgers that way." She whispered to herself.

"Nep!" A voice that sounded like IF echoed in her mind as Neptune swore that she was looking at a young IF and a young Compa sitting across from her. "Pickles are yummy!" IF grinned and took another big bite of her burger. "Mmm! Mustard too!"

"I like mayonnaise!" Compa smiled as she ate her own burger. "Thank you, Nep Nep!"

The images changed, with the two as teenagers and while not as enthusiastic as they were as kids, they were still eating their burgers the same way. The images changed again with them as young adults, older adults that had thinning hair and even streaks of gray in it, to finally them needing walkers to get around.

But no matter what, no matter the age, the two ate their burgers in the same way.

"Nep... Nep... Nep!" IF yelled and shook Neptune, who blinked several times in shock as she saw Nepgear, Compa and IF around her, looking at her in concern. "You zoned out on us for a few minutes there."

"...Huh..." Neptune looked at her burger and sighed, putting it on the tray and getting out of the booth. "I'm going back to the Basilicom."

"But what about your burger, sis?"

"I'm not hungry right now." Neptune said and walked off.

IF, Compa and Nepgear all looked at each other in shock. Unless it was eggplants, Neptune never left food uneaten.

Hope you liked it.