Darling in the FranXX: The Reaper Squadron
Chapter 18: Learning to Live
The Klaxosaur Princess was pissed. Not only had she lost the Star Child, but her daughter and son had abandoned her as well! She specifically told them not to engage in the battle! Yet the moment she turned her back, the two had hopped in their FranXX and engaged Reaper in battle and lost! And they had revealed that they were alive to them to boot! The Princess shuddered as she recalled the display of power that Reaper and his squad displayed. So much power. How were their bodies not torn apart from the energy that they contained? Even H and J were holding back on her! She had never seen that attack she used to call light beams from the heavens, and that last attack 'Heaven's Judgement', the amount of power contained within that combined attack. What were those two? There was no way they were simply humans who knew umbrakinesis.
…
Nana was not happy. They had taken their FranXX, she was sure of it. They were in those repair bays when she left last night. Yet this morning several technicians came running up to her, telling her that Reaper 1's FranXX were missing from their bays, as well as the black and blue FranXX they had recovered. Not only that, but five, five, of their spare FranXX were dismantled as well, nothing left but a few parts and the Magma Energy cores left in a pile. Nothing on the cameras either, not a damn thing! How, in the hell, had they gotten in and out without being seen? This was a secure facility for Papa's sake! How had no one seen 4 large FranXX just walking out the door?!
…
Earlier that night
"Owl, toss me a servo!" Reaper shouted from inside the newly named Narcissus's leg.
He and Owl were fixing and retrofitting Narcissus, the FranXX that James and Havana piloted. Reaper held out a hand and a servo landed in it and Reaper installed it into her leg.
"Reaper, it's not a good idea for you to be doing this. You should be sleeping. If Havana wakes up and you're not there, she is going to kill you." Owl said.
"I'll be fine. This needs to be done now, we don't know when the next battle will be, and we need to be ready. Besides, I got 6 hours of sleep, I'll be fine." Reaper said.
"It's 2 in the morning, Havana is not going to see it that way."
"It will be fine. I'll be back in bed before…"
The elevator door opened, and a pissed off Havana stepped outside along with James. Havana's hair was floating and glowing white.
"Reaper." Havana growled.
"Oh shit." Reaper cursed.
"Reaper, I would run if I were you." James said.
"Noted!" Reaper shouted and jumped down off of Narcissus and began to run.
"Get back here Reaper! Your supposed to be asleep with me!" Havana shouted and began to chase after him.
"James! Help Owl finish!" Reaper said as he was glowing black and running up the side of the spire.
Havana growled, and she glowed white before free flying after him and grabbing him off the spire.
"Havana! I have things I need to do!"
"It's 2 in the morning. Your ass belongs in bed with me. Anything else can wait until the sun comes up." Havana said and flew back into the birdcage.
James chuckled and walked over to where Owl was standing. In the distance, he could see Black Rose and the others guarding the spire.
"So that's where you two went to. I'm guessing that their free movement was due to master?" James asked.
Owl nodded and James wrapped her arms around her and began to nuzzle her hair.
"Its two in the morning and your cold. Can't this wait until morning?" James asked trying to convince her to go back inside and join him in bed.
"Ngggh. Stop that." She moaned. "This needs to get done now, we could be entering battle in the morning and we need all the help we can get."
"The Klaxosaurs suffered a heavy blow. They will retreat for a while, there is no need to rush."
"But the parts…" Owl protested, her resolve was weakening under his ministrations.
James then stored the piles of parts in the shadow realm. "There, taken care of."
"The FranXX…"
"Your FranXX can keep it safe until morning."
"Ngggh." she moaned again. "Fine, fine."
James then picked her up bridal style and carried her inside. All the way back to her room, Owl's face was flushed red.
…
The next morning, Reaper and Owl had finished rebuilding Narcissus. There was going to be a bit of a shuffle, as Reaper and Owl wanted to pilot with their respective lovers. Reaper and Havana now piloted Black Rose while Owl and James piloted Narcissus, both of their Paracapacity scores were just under the max.
When that was done, Reaper Alpha went to Reaper's room to have a discussion as to what happened to Havana and James.
As they each took a seat, Crow spoke. "It is time we shared stories."
A chill swept through the room. A shadowy representation of Death appeared and leaned against a wall in the shadows.
"James, Havana, you go first." Death ordered.
"After that beam fell on us we woke up in a black void, there was no one there but us. It took us a bit, but we soon realized that we had died. For some reason, we did not end up at the Castle of Judgement, instead we ended up in the far reaches of the Shadow Realm. When we realized that we had died we… we didn't want to go." Havana said and hung her head, refusing to leave when it was your time was a great sin in Deaths eyes, and Havana and James waited for what Death would say.
"I'm not going to punish you for wanting to come back. Had you shown up like you were supposed to, I would have brought you back anyway due to the depth of Reaper's sorrow."
Havana's head jerked up.
"Finish your tale. They will explain once you are done."
"After we admitted to each other that we did not want to go we felt a tugging sensation and we were dragged out of the Shadow Realm. When we awoke, Gaia was waiting for us." James said.
"That bitch." Death muttered.
"Gaia?" Reaper asked.
"Gaia is the Klaxosaur Princess, the leader of the Klaxosaurs. When we awoke she told us that she had found us and found that we still had the will to live, so she brought us back. Not in our original bodies, obviously, but to something as close as possible to them. We couldn't reach Master, so we didn't know what to do. She then told us the truth, that humanity was in the wrong. When we believed her, she took us under her wing and proclaimed us her children. We then assisted her in destroying any APE operation that was going on. We kept track of you by accessing the Shadow Network and following the reports of your successful missions." James said.
"Then you disappeared." Havana said.
"Havana searched for 20 years for you after your MIA report came in. Any possible trace of you she went and followed. When command fell, she went through every file they had uploaded to see if you had been given orders to go dark but found nothing. Gaia personally searched for you as well as she was very interested in meeting you but came up empty handed. We spent the following 69 years commanding Klaxosaur forces and trying to destroy APE. That changed a few months ago when you showed up again. Havana was very against sending Colossus after the plantation as she saw it as overkill, but Gaia wanted the plantation destroyed so he went. Then you guys exited your FranXX and completely obliterated him. Why did you do that by the way? He was the only one that you treated that way." James said.
"That son of a bitch was the reason you died. When we first encountered it, it knocked us aside like leaves and the order for limiter removal came too late. That damn thing laughed at us as the support Klaxosaurs ran around our downed bodies and raced toward the city to detonate the core." Reaper said.
"Oh, so that's what happened. Anyway, it was at the conclusion of that battle that I spotted you on the drone camera we sent to observe the battle. Gaia didn't believe that it was you, so she sent several different varieties of Klaxosaurs after you to verify that it was you and you handled them perfectly. We were then ordered to feed you information. All the data that you found in the sub-bases you destroyed was put there by us. The final piece was delivered by Stallion a few days before yesterday's battle. We had been trying for weeks after it was proven to be you to try and talk to you, but Gaia kept telling us no. During yesterday's battle we were given the Ok to observe but not to interfere. When you removed your limiters however, I decided to defy her orders and get us involved. And now, here we are." Havana finished.
Death nodded and stood. "I will leave it to you to fill them in." Death said and vanished.
Crow sighed. "How much of our time here have you seen?"
"Most of your battles as well as Reaper's self-punishment." James answered, Reaper flinched at that last bit.
This reminded Havana of the event and she yanked Reaper's sleeve up and observed the cuts on his wrist, she then slapped him.
"Don't you dare punish yourself for something that was not your fault again, you hear me!" Havana said.
"It was my fault, Havana. I failed to protect you."
She slapped him again. "No, it wasn't! it was not, and will never be, your fault! Stop blaming yourself for something that you had no control over!" Havana said with tears in her eyes.
Reaper pulled Havana into a hug and kissed the top of her head. "I'm sorry for making you cry, my love."
"Baka." She muttered into his chest.
"We've told our story. What is yours? Where did you guys go?" James asked.
"Let's start at your death. After finding your bodies Reaper took them to Master. He begged for two hours for Death to bring you back. When he finally agreed, your souls were gone. When he told Reaper… it broke him. As per your requests, we cremated your bodies and scattered the ashes in your favorite places. Reaper summoned your scythes and destroyed them because he couldn't not bear the thought of someone else using them. For two weeks Reaper tried to grieve. Command never gave him the opportunity as we were being swarmed by Klaxosaur attacks were constantly deployed somewhere. After those two weeks passed, Reaper became Consumed." Crow explained.
"What?" Havana said looking at Reaper, he refused to meet her eyes.
"Reaper attacked any Klaxosaur he came across and destroyed them, the result is the network of scars across his chest and back as he refused to defend himself and was purely offensive. He spent the next two years in that state and it took three squads including us to take him down. After he had calmed down he and Owl spent the next three years in a pit of self-loathing. It was during that time that Reaper got the idea that he should punish himself on the day of your deaths for failing. It was during the fifth year after your death that the Ark Project was started. You do know what that is right?" Snake asked, and James nodded, Havana was still trying to get Reaper to look at her.
"It was at this point that Reaper and Owl were tired. Hell, we all were. We were tired of fighting a war that seemed endless. So, Reaper and Owl went to the commander and asked him to join the project, but he said no, we were too valuable an asset to be frozen. We spent the next three months working on the commander and countering his every argument until he gave in. Knowing that Reaper Command would never go for having one of its most valuable squads frozen, we were given covert orders to join the project. The commander would send in an MIA report 3 months after we were frozen. Then, Ark 03 was completed, and we were interred with the others who had volunteered to be frozen and we slept. Fast forward 89 years and we were awoken by the automated system when the cryopods failed. We awoke, realized that the Ark had failed, and found the world had suffered in our absence. We gathered intel and supplies for two weeks before we were found by Plantation 13. They took us in, tried to indoctrinate us and failed, gave us our FranXX and paired us with Squad 13. We dealt with a Gaia class worm type before the operation in which you found us occurred." Raven said.
"There is one more thing. Did you see the battle that occurred 4 weeks ago?" Cypress asked.
"Cypress." Reaper warned.
"She has the right to know, they both do." Cypress replied before turning to Havana and James.
"No, we didn't see that one. What happened?" James asked.
"Don't." Owl pleaded but she was ignored.
"Then I have the obligation to inform you that, 4 weeks ago Reaper and Owl were Consumed again."
"What!" The two shouted and looked at their respective lovers.
"Reaper had terrified the children earlier when one had the gall to call Reaper a coward and ask him what he knew about loss. Owl coming to his defense didn't help matters so during the battle they decided to ignore their orders." Crow said.
"Those fools." James said, and Cypress nodded.
"They became Consumed and tore the Klaxosaur to shreds with a modified Rampage mode and tried to attack the kids. We were able to stop them but not before sustaining severe injuries and having to run the two through."
Havana felt something drip onto her hand and saw that Reaper was crying.
"Reaper?" Havana asked softly.
"Twice I let my temper get out of hand in one day, and twice I nearly kill a child. I am a monster." He said.
Havana pulled his head in between her breasts and patted his head as he cried.
"You are not a monster, love." Havana said. "Where is this boy? I'm going to beat some sense into him."
"No need Havana. He did not know the circumstances, he does now. Master evidently gave them a dream of what happened to you guys and they came and apologized for acting out of line." Snake said.
"Now that we are all caught up, let's see what the others are up to." James said.
…
Time skip: One month
One month had passed since the Battle of the Gran Crevasse occurred, and things had taken a turn for the worse within the Birdcage. When the massive hand crushed the plantation it also damaged the water supply lines to the Birdcage causing fresh water to no longer be circulated in. Electricity had also been cut. Reaper and his squad were able to build several solar panels, but they provided an extremely limited supply of power, so lights were only turned on at night and only for a few hours. And to top it all off, the invisible caretakers had vanished leaving food at the elevator once a week but that was it.
Reaper and his squad had come up with a chore schedule so things like dish and clothes washing got done fairly. As well as setting up bathing times and who was going on water runs. But things were about to get even worse.
Mitsuru knelt down next to the stream and took out a glass of water.
"No good, the water here is starting to go foul too." He said.
Hiro, who was standing nearby, knelt down as well. "Yeah. It might be drinkable if we filter it though."
"How do we do that?"
"I don't know. Reaper and his squad might know something though, they seem to know quite a bit about situations like this."
"That being said, how long can we last like this? The water supply to this area could stop at any time."
They then heard a banging sound and Zero Two appeared from around a tree.
"Found you. Come on, its breakfast time. Havana made something called pancakes." She said.
Havana seemed to have replaced Nana in terms of being a motherly figure. She did most of the cooking, along with Kokoro, as well as settled any arguments. Reaper replaced Hachi in terms of who was in charge. If ideas or orders were needed, they often went to him for help. He always seemed to have a favorable solution.
"Hey Ikuno, are you feeling better?" Havana asked as she walked into the room.
"Yeah, the fever is still there but I'm used to it now." She replied.
Havana walked over to her and put her hand on her forehead, cheek, and neck. "Your temperature is normal but don't push yourself ok?"
The Child Fever had been running rampant through the Manor starting about 2 weeks ago. At one point everyone was down except, oddly, Reaper and his squad, who insisted on being called Reaper Alpha for some reason. While the children were down with the fever, Reaper and his squad ran the place themselves, doing all the chores and handling the sick children without complaint.
"Zero Two, moderation." Havana chided, stopping Zero Two from dousing her food in honey.
"Sorry Havana."
Havana had been trying to break Zero Two of dousing every inch of her food in honey. She was making progress, but it was slow going.
"What's the matter Futoshi? Not feeling well?" Hiro asked.
"No, I'm just dieting. I need to lose weight." He said.
"Futoshi, I understand if you want to lose weight, but starving yourself is not the way to go about it. You need to eat or else you are going to end up sick again." Reaper said.
…
"It's been one whole month. How long will we have to be on standby?"
Goro and Hiro were in the storeroom sorting through the food supplies that they had.
"Do you want to get back into the FranXX already?" Hiro joked.
"You know, when you are fighting in battles in which you could die at any time, but not fighting makes us fidgety too, huh?" Goro said.
"It's called an adrenaline rush. Piloting the FranXX has made you into a thrill seeker." Snake said from the doorway.
He walked in looking at the two.
"You shouldn't live your life looking forward to the next battle. Instead look forward to moments like these. Moments where there is peace, and conflict is but a distant memory."
"Your acting strangely philosophical Snake." Hiro pointed out.
"I try."
…
The girls were out bathing in the lake. Havana was washing Zero Two's hair while the girls talked about Mitsuru's haircut.
"Did you see Mitsuru's hair?" Miku asked looking at Kokoro.
Kokoro looked worried.
"So, it was you who cut his hair Kokoro. You did a good job." Havana said.
"Thanks." Kokoro said.
"I'm the one who manages Reaper's unruly locks, so I know how hard it can be. Speaking of which, I need to cut his hair soon, it's getting too long. Snake's too, he's starting to look like a girl." Havana began to mumble to herself.
"Is there anything that you don't do?" Ichigo asked.
Havana looked at her. "Well the boys are more mechanically inclined than I am, so there is that."
Zero Two saw a fish go by.
"Fishie!" she cried and lunged forward.
"Get back here." Havana said tugging Zero Two back.
"Your hair is so pretty Havana." Raven said.
"It's almost the same color as Ichigo's." Ikuno said.
"No," she replied, "I think that Ichigo's is a bit darker than mine, but it matches her quite well."
Ichigo thanked her for the complement.
Havana released Zero Two and looked toward Ikuno. "Ikuno, your turn."
"I'm fine." She responded.
Havana raised an eyebrow at her.
"Really I'm fine."
The eyebrow went higher.
"Honestly, I'm good"
The eyebrow went even higher. At this point, Ikuno was beet red and was doing her best not to look at the naked Havana.
"Oh fine." She said and stripped and entered the water.
She walked over to where Havana was and sat down and allowed her to wash her hair.
"There is no shame in liking someone of your own gender." Havana whispered in her ear.
Ikuno turned redder if possible. "Your already taken though." She muttered. "And so is she."
"Is she? Has Goro actually come out and said he loved her? I don't think he has." Havana said back. "And if she is, Snake seems to have his eye on you as well."
"Snake?" Ikuno muttered.
"Yep. Of course," she whispered huskily in her ear "I'm sure Reaper wouldn't mind if you borrowed me for a night or two."
Steam was damn near coming out of Ikuno's ears and Havana was trailing her hands down Ikuno's body. Havana straightened up and continued to wash Ikuno's hair like nothing had happened. Zero Two was chasing Miku around the pond.
"Be careful you two, you will slip." She said.
Havana then noticed something in Ikuno's hair.
"Huh?" she muttered. "White hair?" She pulled out the strands of hair and noticed that there were several more hidden under her hair.
She hid her discovery from Ikuno and continued to wash her hair. She needed to tell Reaper ASAP. Once she was finished, she let her go, but not without one last comment.
"My offer does stand." She whispered in her ear. "I think a few nights with me would be…educational for you. Maybe get Reaper involved as well, show you what it is a man can do."
Ikuno turned pink and walked away, Havana stared at her figure the entire time. "Not a bad figure. I would definitely like to have fun with that."
…
Ichigo drew an x on the map of the Birdcage.
"We have around five sources for drinking water. And two of them are only usable by filtering."
"Reaper, is it possible for you to repair the circulation system?" Ikuno asked.
Reaper shook his head. "Even if we cannibalized the other systems, we don't have all the parts necessary to make the repairs. We can easily make shadow constructs of the missing parts, but constructs don't mix well with material objects in the same machine."
"Why?"
"They exist on two different planes of existence. If you put them together, it will cause infighting, resulting in the material objects breaking all the faster." Snake said.
"What about a complete shadow construct?" Miku asked.
"Impractical. To make one big enough to work for what we need, it would take too much energy to make and maintain. A localized machine that only had to move a few thousand gallons an hour I can do. One to move a few million gallons an hour, that is beyond my abilities." Reaper said.
"Why don't we just send a letter to Papa and ask him to fix it?" Zorome asked.
"Zorome, if Papa could have fixed it, don't you think he would have already?" Cypress said.
"Man, I never realized how much we relied on our invisible caretakers." Miku said.
"Yeah, they always made sure we had clean cloths and hot food." Kokoro said.
Havana looked insulted.
"I know that you have been doing your best Havana, but for us to be doing all the work is strange." Kokoro said trying to appease Havana.
Havana cooled and looked at Reaper.
"They have lived a sheltered life all their lives. This is all new to them." Reaper whispered in her ear.
"What would become of us if they stopped delivering food, too?" Miku wondered.
All was silent for a moment, before Reaper answered.
"That's easy, you hunt for your own. The lakes are stocked with fish, so they should last us a while."
"But none of us know how to cook fish." Miku said.
"We were never taught how." Futoshi said.
"Well fortunately for you, we have a professional chef in our squad." Raven said.
"Professional Chef?" Goro asked.
"Yup, I was trained to be a cook for our squad for missions where we had to hunt for ourselves. I can cook anything from simple deserts to a filet mignon to pufferfish, although I doubt any are around anymore." Havana said.
"Pufferfish?" Hiro asked.
"Type of fish, obviously, considered a delicacy to many, myself included, it was quite the feat to be able to cook one properly as they contained poison and could easily kill you if cooked wrong." James said.
"Goro, if I recall correctly, you received several fishing rods a few months ago. Do you have any other fishing equipment?" Reaper asked.
"Yeah, bobbers, hooks, and several different types of bait. Why?" He replied
"Well, why don't we try cooking our own food tonight, instead of what they provide us with?" Reaper suggested.
"I would like to try it." Ichigo said and several of the others nodded.
"That's great an all Reaper but what will we do when we run out of fish?" Zorome asked.
"Zorome, with the number of fish in the lakes I highly doubt we will be here long enough to run out of fish. But in the off chance we do, we simply pull you guys out and make someplace that has food." Reaper said as he pulled out an Eden disk.
"Reaper, where did you get that?" Havana asked as James's eyes narrowed at the sight of the disk.
"We found it in one of our cashes early on. There were only five, so I doubt they were replicated." Reaper said.
"What is that?" Mitsuru asked looking at the disk, to him it just looked like a disk.
"This is an Eden disk, a miracle of science created by me. With one of these, we can make a living zone with food and water to provide us, should we need it." Reaper said.
"Now then," James said. "who wants to go fishing?"
…
"Zero Two, what are you doing?" Reaper said cracking an eye open.
He, Hiro, Goro, and Zero Two offered to go fishing and had arrived about 20 minutes ago. Goro only had three rods so he set up himself, Hiro, and Zero Two with fishing rods. Reaper was using a shadow rod to fish, when he heard the sound of cloth rustling.
Looking over, Reaper saw that Zero Two was halfway undressed and was looking at him. He calmly closed his eye and leaned back against the tree he was sitting against.
"Why are you stripping?"
"What?!" Goro sputtered and quickly turned then looked away his face red.
Hiro looked over to see what the commotion was about and began to stare at the half naked Zero Two.
"Hiro, I know that she is your girlfriend, but it is not polite to stare at a half-dressed woman. Goro, would you like me to purge the image from your mind or cast an illusion that makes her appear fully clothed? Your rod is twitching…both of them."
"How is this not affecting you Reaper?!" Goro complained.
"I've seen my fair share of naked women, hell, I've had them throw themselves at my feet and beg for me. Also, because I am married." Reaper said unconcerned. "You didn't answer my question Zero Two.
Reaper cracked an eye open again to look at Zero Two and saw that she was only wearing her panties at this point and Reaper quickly cast an illusion over Goro's eyes, so he wouldn't become more flustered. Looking back at Zero Two, Reaper saw that she was now completely naked and was approaching him.
"What? Don't like what you see?" she asked and sat on this lap and placed her hands around his neck.
"I will say it again, Zero Two. I am a married man. You do not tempt me. The only thing you are doing is making Hiro more jealous by the minute. Although to most of the parasite your assets are mind-blowing they don't affect me, though I do give you credit for trying. You might want to get up before Havana comes out here to check on us and finds you attempting to take me from her."
"You, are no fun." She pouted and stood up.
"On the contrary, I've been told I'm quite fun to be with, you just couldn't handle me."
"Is that a challenge?"
"If you think it's a challenge, take it up with Havana. You will lose however, she has a lot of experience, you do not. Although not without lack of trying it seems."
By this point, both Hiro and Goro had passed out from the amount of innuendos flying about. Zero Two humphed and dove into the water. "*sigh* this is going to be a long day."
…
"Welcome back." Ichigo said as they returned.
"We're back!" Zero Two shouted.
"Wow, what a haul."
"I caught eleven!" Zero Two said with a smile.
"What about you Goro?" Miku asked.
"Two less than Zero Two."
"and Hiro?" Ichigo asked.
"I didn't catch any." Hiro said a bit embarrassed.
"What about you, love?" Havana said from the stove.
"Fourteen." Reaper said.
"Showoff." Zero Two muttered.
"You didn't cheat, did you?" Havana asked, lifting a wooden spoon threateningly.
"No love, I did not."
"Good."
The others clamored around Zero Two wanting to go fishing next and she explained how to fish. Reaper sighed.
"Something wrong hun?" Havana asked.
"No, this just reminds me of better times." Reaper said.
"Yeah, it will be nice to have children of our own someday."
"Someday love, not now. I don't want our children to be raised in a world like this one."
"I know, we have eternity to figure out when we want them. Come on, dear, help be clean and gut these fish."
"Yes, ma'am."
…
"We are incredible!" Zorome said. "We actually cooked for ourselves!"
"Didn't you slack off at first?" Miku asked.
"Now, now Miku, everyone helped in their own way." Havana said.
"The question is how will it taste?" Kokoro said.
"Havana made it, it will taste delicious. Everything else she has made has." Mitsuru said.
"Aww, thanks Mitsuru!" Havana said.
"Take a seat everyone." Ichigo said.
"Don't bother. If we did the work, why should we pray to Papa? Let's eat!" Zorome said.
As the others began to eat Reaper and his squad quietly said their prayers to their master before beginning to eat as well.
"What's the matter Futoshi? Is yours not done right? I can always make another or cook it for a bit longer." Havana asked when she noticed that Futoshi wasn't eating much.
"No, no it's good I'm just… not hungry."
"Futoshi, starving yourself in order for us to have extra food is not helping matters." Reaper said. "You need to eat to live. So, eat."
Zorome then stood up from the table and walked to the breezeway.
"Zorome?" Miku asked concerned.
"Why, why?" Zorome's voice was cracking. "Look at us. Why isn't Papa getting in touch? Why isn't he coming to get us? Do you think he cast us aside?"
…
That night, Reaper Alpha did the dishes and cleaned up while Squad 13 was out on the breezeway have a talk. As Reaper was washing the dishes Havana walked up next to him and began to help.
"I'm worried Reaper." She said.
"About what?" He replied.
"About them. I've never seen so many children have such abandonment issues."
"This needs to happen love. This is breaking the glorified image that they have of Papa as a god. They need to know that he doesn't care about them like they are told he does. They need to see that they are being treated like pawns and that he doesn't care. It is painful but necessary."
"That's not the only thing I'm worried about."
"What else?"
"When I was washing Ikuno's hair this morning, I found several white strands in her hair. She is too young to be going white from stress."
"Shit. I'm going to have to tell snake to speed it up."
"What are you talking about?"
"The children have Yellow Blood Cells in them, you know that, right?
"Yeah, what about it."
"A side effect is that over time they will experience accelerated aging. Let it go too long and their hair will turn white and they will become frail."
Havana gasped.
"We have found notes leading to a possible cure, but they were incomplete. I've been having Snake work on it in his off time but wasn't too concerned as they had shown no signs of accelerated ageing. Now that they have, I'm going to have Snake make that a top priority."
"How long?" she asked.
"If they stayed out of a FranXX, 10 years. Continuing like they are however, they have about a month or two."
"Does Snake have anything?"
"He has gotten a temporary measure, but it won't last more than two weeks at a time and does more harm than good at the moment. We don't want to tell the children because we don't want them to panic."
"Come on, let's go listen in."
"…What do we do if Papa has cast us aside?" Miku asks
"If your old family abandons you, you make a new one." Reaper said.
"If your Papa has indeed abandoned you, you already have a new family waiting for you. They are right here." Havana said gesturing around, as Reaper Alpha came out of the shadows nearby.
"Should you feel alone, we are here." Owl said.
"Should you need a friend, we are here." Crow said.
"Should you be lost, we are here." Snake said.
"Should you need support, we are here." Cypress said.
"Come heaven," Havana said.
"Hell," Reaper said.
"or high water." Raven said.
"When you need us, we will be there" Reaper Alpha said.
A/N: And done. Well the illusion that Papa ingrained on them is starting to fade and the children are starting to learn how to live on their own, for the most part. The next chapter is when the 9s show up and Reaper and his squad do not take kindly to their arrival. As always, reviews and criticism are greatly appreciated, and flames will be used to roast marshmallows. Ciao!