Prompt: The CPUs meet past CPUs.
"Milady, are we really...clearing out the entire armory?"
Vert turned back to the old soldier, who was looking at the neatly arranged rows of old uniforms and trophies with a pained expression on his face.
"Yes. Oh my...until that giant moth attack, I don't even know this place exists on the map. " Her face scrunched up a little, as she eyed the burnt cocoons and egg husks, scattered all across the floor.
Leanbox's military could be so old-schooled at times, despite the rapid advancement of technology. It was totally their style to keep a warehouse unattended for decades, just for the sake of "preserving tradition".
On the bright side, maybe she could turn this old armory into a convention hall for the next G3 Expo?
The old soldier gave her a solemn nod, and gestured towards the squadron outside. Vert sat down on a nearby bench, while the men began to remove stashes of clothes and molding sandbags from the warehouse, before dumping them into the mobile incinerator outside.
She had almost fallen asleep, halfway through the cleaning process—one unfortunate consequence of accepting a quest right after her longplay session, until a yell from the backroom abruptly snapped her back to reality.
"Get your grubby hands off that!"
She quickly stood up, and made her way across the corridor. The same old soldier was towering over a young corporal, who was holding a lavishly decorated army suit, with a bewildered look on his face.
"H-Huh? But Lady Vert says we are throwing out everything—"
"Lady Vert doesn't know jack s—"
The old man put a hand to his mouth, as he caught sight of her, standing right behind him. After an awkward pause, he finally coughed, and made a deep bow.
"Forgive me for my disrespectful words. I'll report myself to the disciplinary committee right away."
"Please don't." Vert held up a hand. "I have no idea what was going on here. Would you like to tell me your side of the story first, young sir?"
"Uh, yeah." The young man scratched his head. "So, I saw this thing hanging on a shelf, in the middle of the room—"
He gave the suit a shake, creating a small cloud of dust in midair. " I was about to take it to the incinerator when General H suddenly came in, and start shouting at me."
"...Newbies these days. Never even learned to read the insignias." The old man snatched the suit out of his hands. "Treating the Spear Crest like it's just a funny cross—"
Before he could finish his sentence, a shiny disk fell out of the suit pocket, and onto the floor. Vert's spear was out in an instant, and she let out an embarrassed chuckle, when it became clear that no monsters was spawning from the disk.
"Hmm. What is this?" She put her weapon away, and bent down. "I sure hope it is a—"
The moment her hand touched the disk, a white light enveloped the room, and when the light faded away, a translucent human silhouette was floating in the air. Vert unwittingly took a step back from the hologram, while the old man made a salute at the sight, almost out of reflex.
The hologram, judging by all the fancy medals and crests on her uniform, was wearing the same army suit in the old soldier's hands. She adjusted her beret, cleared her throat, and started speaking.
"So, hey there. Uranus said that we should leave a note or some shit, just in case we didn't come back. Could you believe that? If anyone's not coming back, it sure ain't gonna be me. These mainland CPUs are just a bunch of pussies who won't know friendship even if it bites them in the ass, and now they wanna be friends, because they are afraid that Leanbox would stab them in the back while they're busy fighting that ancient evil thing. Like I'm ever gonna step down to their level."
"But...well, if you are seeing this, you're my successor, and I'm dead."
"...Shit, where's my motivational speech when I need it? You'd be like, my kid, right? How do I talk to kids? Yeah, my soldiers did joke that I'm General Mother Hen sometimes, but these are grown men who know what they signed up for, and...you know what? Fuck it. Let's just get straight to the self-introduction part."
"I'm Viridi, CPU of Leanbox. My people endured the long journey across the ocean, and built Leanbox into the military powerhouse it is today, because they are different, and they are proud of it. Lastation's navy can't chase us back to the PC Continent, and we've survived and thrived, despite everyone from the mainland calling us uncultured peasants who came from some backwater shithole that they've never heard of before."
"Ha, just showed you what a bunch of narrow-minded pricks they are. They still play games through some old-ass telephone cable lines, but hey, they have history and culture, so they're clearly better than us. Pfft."
"As my successor, your job is to make Leanbox the NO.1 of Gamindustri, and show these arrogant bitches who's the real boss. I command you to go forth, kick ass, and never let anyone hold you down! "
"Blanc!"
"It's bed time now! Aren't you brats tired or anything? Go back to your room!" Blanc buried her face in her palms, after slamming her laptop shut.
"You aren't asleep either, big sis." Ram stated cheekily, followed by another round of loud banging on the office door. "So open up! We have something to show you!"
"I'm...working!" Blanc hastily shoved the newest edition of Fiction Writing for Dummies under the table. "Whatever it is, it can wait until tomorrow!"
"B-But it won't play on our console and DVD player..." Rom said, in a barely audible voice.
"It's probably scratched or something. I can't fix that," Blanc replied. "Wait, what the hell did you find?"
"A shiny disk thing!" Ram cheered. "We were getting crayons from the basement, and found it inside a purple paint box!"
"...It's a really fancy paint box. With cute dolphins on it, too."
After staring at the office door for a few seconds, with a conflicted look on her face, Blanc let out a deep sigh, walked over to the door, and opened it.
"Okay, fine!" She huffed when she saw the twins' huge grin. "But if I can't fix it, you two better not throw a fucking tantrum, and go back to bed—"
A blinding white light burst out from the disk when she snatched it out of their hands. Eyes still closed, Blanc hurled the disk away, before grabbing the twins and pulling them into her arms. No scorching waves of pain or heat hit them, however, and soon, they opened their eyes again.
Blanc's jaw dropped as she saw the translucent hologram, floating in the middle of the room. Despite her frilly purple dress, and the cartoonish sun crest on her painter hat, she was...well-endowed. Almost on Vert's level.
"...The fuck are you?"
Her shocked whisper was met with a tired, sad chuckle from the woman.
"Greetings. I am Delphinus, Lavender Heart, fifth CPU of Lowee."
"...I shouldn't dump my bitterness on you, but I'm not coming back after this. I'm going to die a heroic death, against a deity created by the sins of our predecessors, which isn't a bad end for the least fitting Goddess of this nation."
"You will be an adorable little girl, with a petite, undeveloped body and a divine innocence that will make people flock to you. And I can't help but hate you a little for that, as well as hate myself for these irrational feelings."
"It's not your fault that you are the ideal Loli. It's not my fault that I'm this busty, gross old woman, either. The people's faith makes us this way, though in my case, I can never understand why they'd create a Goddess that is so unsightly to half of them. "
"Maybe that's why I'm such a failure. I can't even look at my own people without thinking about how much they hate me, and how they must be snickering at me for dressing up like some cutesy little girl, like that will earn me any acceptance.
"So I just hide in my room all day. Except when I'm committing vandalism against the city property by covering them with graffiti. Least fitting Goddess, remember? At least washing off my own artworks can be part of my daily duty now, as well as put my water magic to some good use. I'm terrible at drawing, too, if their laughter at the 'masterpieces' I left behind every night is any indications. So, good riddance."
"I can imagine the outrage if they ever discovered the truth, but even if you decided to expose my dirty little secret, I'd be long dead by then. Speaking of which...I really don't have a lot to say to you.
"But, whoever you are...I hope you'll never hate yourself as much as I do, and you'll be loved by all of Lowee's people. Farewell, and good luck."
"What is LS-X?"
Uni looked up from her laptop. She lowered her head after a long silence, with a bashful look on her face.
"I...don't know. But don't worry, I'm going to start looking it up, right this instant!"
"No no no." Noire shook her hand, before holding up a huge Ziploc bag. "I just find this thing in Kei's old office. The label says 'Password to the LS-X database is EmotionEngine', and I've never heard of that."
"I...haven't, either." Uni frowned. "That doesn't sound like an active database. Never seen it come up in my paperwork before."
"Huh. Let's see what's inside, then." Noire unzipped the bag, and winced a little at the smell of dust and yellowed paper. "Goodness, how long has this bag been lying there?"
She reached her hand into the bag. "Paper, paper...wait, what's this thing—?"
Both of them reflexively shielded their eyes at the white light that suddenly burst out of the paper bag. Uni whipped out her sidearm, after the bright spots in her vision had completely faded away, and aimed it at the silhouette floating above the desk.
The young teenage girl was clad in a slick, ceramic-white suit, and the only color on her person was the azure ribbon on her chest. Her face was as stiff as a wooden mask, and even as she started speaking, there was no hint of emotion in her voice.
"This is Atra, second bearer of the Black Heart title, CPU of Lastation."
"I don't have any sentimental last words, because I don't intend to die. In fact, the first thing I'll do, after getting back from the Gamindustri Graveyard, is destroying this disk."
"But, in the rare case that I do die in action, because of some unforeseen development, I have three things that I believe you should know, as my successor."
"First. Leanbox is a threat. Reinforcing our coastal defense is going to be your top priority at the beginning of your reign. I have left extensive guidelines and plans under the database entry LS-X222, and it will be in your best interest to consort them first before making your own decisions."
"Second. Despite the animosity that led to Lastation's independence, and the birth of our first Goddess, Lowee is no longer a worthy opponent. Their current Candidate, however...just keep an eye on her, for intel's sake, since Delphinus is being so tight-lipped about her existence. Again, details on accessing and utilizing our surveillance network can be found in the aforementioned LS-X database."
"Third. If you ever gain a Candidate, treat her well. Play games with her, read stories to her, do whatever a good big sister should do and let her have a happy childhood. I always scare the kids. Maybe that's why I never have a Candidate of my own, no matter how much Shares Lastation has."
"Work hard, and be the best CPU of your generation. Atra, out."
Just a stray idea about the previous generation of CPUs leaving some kind of messages for their successors, before they went off to fight the DoS and died in the graveyard.
These three represented the 6th Gen consoles—XBox, GameCube and PS2.
All of their names are in Latin: Viridi is Latin for "Green", Atra is the feminine form of "Ater", which can mean "dull black" or "gloomy", and Delphinus is a constellation that means "dolphin", as a homage to the GameCube's codename in development, "Project Dolphin".