Oscar's world has come crashing down with the revelation that Misato may be thinking and acting in ways that run contrary to her programming. What will he do with that information? And what IS driving Misato, anyway? How does Will feel about all this? And what is he going to do for Misato's welcome-home present, anyway? It's a good thing she doesn't have a birthday he has to shop for…

KedharS: I agree, that would be pretty nice, wouldn't it?

Arbiter8991: Misato doesn't get upset, she's a Mechadoll. She doesn't experience emotions. But she may be unsatisfied with the line of thinking Will used to determine the gift he would give her, and disagree that the gift matches her expectations to any degree of statistical significance.

Hyphenman: Feelings don't just grow on trees though.

Pokemon Academy: Beginning of Beginnings

Chapter 1267

Once Oscar got all the materials he needed to finish Misato's repairs he made a move to leave the store. But Will stopped him on the way out.

"Hey, Oscar," he called. "Can you do something for me?"

"Hmm?" Oscar turned to him, intrigued. "Do what?"

"Well, like I said before, I need to get Misato a gift," Will said. "But… I really don't know what kind of gift would be good to give her, you know? So I was hoping, well… maybe you would have some idea of what I could get for her."

Oscar shook his head. "Look, Will, I'm not exactly that good at figuring stuff like that out. I don't have very many friends who aren't pokemon," he admitted. "So even buying gifts for regular people isn't something I have a lot of experience with."

Will frowned.

"Not to mention that, as a Mechadoll, I'm not sure what sort of gift Misato might even want from you," he added. "Considering you're supposed to be her fake boyfriend and everything. But you did say you wanted something to help with her data storage?"

"Yeah," Will nodded. "See, because she's always absorbing so much data, right, and I was just thinking that…"

"…Fine." Oscar set down the stuff he'd gotten and dug around in his pocket. He took a flash drive out and handed it to Will.

"A flash drive? I was expecting something a little bigger than this," Will said, not sure if the older boy was pulling a prank on him.

"It's a prototype from Silph Co.," Oscar said, shaking his head. "An advanced drive known as the Rainbow Drive."

"Why'd they call it that?" Nikita asked, leaning in and staring at the drive. "It's not rainbow colored." The flash drive was mostly silver and black, with a few lines of red LED.

"Don't ask me why marketing does what they do," Oscar said, shrugging. "But anyway my point is that this drive is much more powerful than an ordinary flash drive. It's capable of storing an incredible amount of data."

"Huh…" Will turned it over in his hands curiously.

"Market price would put it somewhere in the couple thousand dollar range."

"SHIT!" Will nearly dropped the damn thing he was so shocked by that. "Are you fucking serious?!" He said, staring at Oscar in shock.

"It was a prototype the company designed, but not something that they decided to put into production," Oscar explained. "Because a portable storage device for that much data, with that much of a price tag to create, wouldn't be useful for the general public. So they shoved it into storage somewhere."

"So why do you have it?" Nikita asked suspiciously.

"Same reason I gave it to you," Oscar said, shrugging. "I acquired it for Misato. But it sounds to me like it would be better if it came from you instead of me."

"Of course, Will could just steal it," Nikita said, staring at him suspiciously.

"Why would I do something like that?!" Will exclaimed.

"It's not like that thing has any commercial value," Oscar shrugged. "Even if you kept it, I doubt you'd be able to sell it for very much."

"Still, you're just… giving it to me?" Will felt as suspiciously about that as Oscar.

"Consider it a thank you for the insight you gave me into Misato's processing decisions," Oscar replied. "This is really important, and I'm grateful."

"…Okay then," Will said, slipping the flash drive into his pocket. "Thanks."

"I'll be done with repairs in another day or so," Oscar said, turning towards the door for real this time. "I'll send her your way after that."

And with that, he was gone, leaving Will and Nikita with the flash drive.

This is… the right thing to do, right, father? He wondered briefly, feeling a stab of sadness as he thought about his dad.

Meanwhile, Nikita was brimming with curiosity.

"So, are you really going to give that to Misato?" She asked excitedly. "Shouldn't you, like, take it apart first, maybe? See how it works? Maybe you could make more!"

The unbridled greed in her eyes was clear as day. But she didn't want the flash drive for the sake of money. She was just imagining what she could do with the ability to store a ton of data. Oscar might not have said how much data could fit on the drive, but it had to be a lot, right? If it was that expensive, then it had to be way more than what could be done commercially.

If she could take it apart and find some way to use that for computers, then…

"…Weren't you the one saying I couldn't be trusted with this?" Will asked, staring incredulously at her. "Seems to me like YOU'RE the only one that can't be trusted here."

Nikita pouted, giving him a dirty look.

"Hey, come on now," she shrugged. "I'm just playing around. But I think it would be pretty cool to take it apart and analyze it, don't you?" Her gears as a scientist were already working.

"Neither one of us is an engineer," Will reminded her. "There's no way we'd be able to do something like that."

He pocketed the flash drive. "Besides, I already told you and Oscar what I'm planning to do with it, remember?"

Nikita sighed. "Yeah, yeah… still seems like a waste to me."

"Besides, this gives us more time to look for your present for Reiner," Will reminded her, which caused her to do a complete 180.

"Hey, good point! Yeah, screw the flash drive then!" She chirped. "Let's go find something that he'd like!"

Will followed her as she headed deeper into the electronics store. The flash drive was burning a hole in his pocket.

I have no idea if this is the right present for her, he thought. But it's certainly important. Hopefully she'll know what to do with it.

Reiner met up with the others for a late lunch at the food court.

"No luck?" Nikita asked, seeing his dejected expression.

"Of course not," he grumbled, sitting down at the table with them. "How the heck am I supposed to come up with a good present for a Mechadoll? It's impossible."

Nikita and Will shared a glance.

"Actually, I already found one," he said.

"Oh?" Reiner perked up. "What was it?"

"Nah. No way am I going to tell you, it's a secret," Will smirked. Reiner scowled at him.

"Okay, fine, then I'll ask Nikita. What did he get?" He asked, turning to his girlfriend. He knew he was being petty, but he couldn't help but be curious.

"Nope," Nikita shook her head and zipped her lips. "Sorry but my lips are sealed!"

That made Reiner's scowl deepen. But ultimately, he didn't care that much. So he sighed and began eating his burrito.

Will nudged Nikita under the table and she checked her phone.

Will: Are you going to give it to him?

Nikita: Not right now! You're right here! I'll give it to him later, once we split up.

Will looked at her incredulously and she shrugged, staring at her phone.

Will: Okay, I can leave right now, then, since we're done.

Nikita: NO! No, that's fine. I'll tell him later. Tonight. When we're alone. I'm too nervous to do it right now!

Yeah, real girls are really annoying, Will thought. But now that the idea was in his head, Mechadolls weren't much better, either.

Maybe he was just pissed off by people.

"So since you finished finding your gift, I guess we're good then, right?" Reiner asked. He could sense a tense mood in the air, and while he wasn't sure what the cause of it was, he figured it was better if they all went their separate ways.

"That's okay," Nikita said quickly. "We can still hang out together, you know? Just the three of us? Spend some time as friends? It's been a while since I got to see you and Will, so…"

"…Oh." Reiner seemed a little upset at that, much to Nikita's confusion.

"Are… is that bad?" Nikita asked cautiously.

Reiner forced a smile onto his face. "No, no, it's fine, it's just… well… no, never mind."

"No, come on, tell me!" Nikita pleaded.

Will sighed. He couldn't believe she was this dense.

"He's saying that he would prefer to just spend some one on one time with you," Will clarified for them both. "Probably since he missed you a lot while he was in Hoenn."

"What?!" Nikita's jaw dropped in shock and her eyes widened behind her glasses. She stared at her boyfriend. "For real?"

Reiner's cheeks flushed a little and he glared at Will.

"It's not serious or anything," he muttered. "I just thought-"

"Well, I think it's time I take my leave," Will said, scooting back from the table before Nikita could object. "After all, I already got my gift. Thanks you two, you were a lot of help!"

"Wait! Will-!"

"You guys have fun!" And with that, he disappeared into the food court, leaving behind a petrified Nikita and a very confused Reiner.

Nikita slumped over and sighed.

"…You wanted to hang out with him that badly, huh?" Reiner said sullenly.

"Wh-What?! No, it's not that!" Nikita protested, shaking her head rapidly. "It's just I… well…"

How could she say it? How could she tell him that she'd picked out a present for him, but was too embarrassed to actually give it to him? She couldn't, that's how.

And yet she needed to. It was a present for him, after all, she should at least be able to work up the courage to give it to him herself.

…Later tonight, she promised. I'll give it to him later tonight.

"So, um… what did you want to do?" Nikita asked, trying to bring the mood back. But Reiner had entered a bit of a funk.

"Look, Nikita, it's just-"

"I want to hang out with you, too!" She blurted out, startling him.

"Wh-What?"

"I do, I really do!" She said, nodding rapidly. "It's just, well… without Will here… then it's like… we're on a date."

Reiner didn't know what to say to that.

"…We're boyfriend and girlfriend, remember?" He asked dryly. "We're ALLOWED to date."

"Y-Yeah, I know," she mumbled. "But still, it's just… it's embarrassing."

"Going on a date with me is embarrassing?" That didn't seem to do much for his mood.

Nikita shook her head again, starting to panic. "No! You're not embarrassing at all! It's just, well… when we're on a date…"

She sighed, and hung her head. "Today was fun because we were just hanging out," she admitted. "With Will here, it was like I could be myself. I didn't have to try so hard to be your girlfriend, you know? It was so… casual, I guess."

Reiner was confused. "So you have to try to be my girlfriend?"

"No, try isn't the right word," she shook her head, trying to figure out how to say what she meant. "It's more like… when I'm going out as your girlfriend, I have to get into a certain mental state, you know? Like on Valentine's Day. I needed to prepare for stuff like romance, and whatever, but… I'm always so self-conscious because I'm bad at that sort of stuff."

She stared at her food, too embarrassed to look him in the eye.

"I can figure complicated stuff out no problem. Science, math, even history and literature, all of those things are easy to see through and develop a solution. But when it comes to emotions and how I feel…" She held her hand over her chest and winced.

"There's no guidebook for what I'm supposed to do, no instruction manual I can follow to make everything okay," she explained. "I just want there to be, like, a sequence of correct steps I can take to do the girlfriend thing, and have that be the end of it."

"Yeah, I don't think any relationship works that way," Reiner said, shaking his head. "If they did, things would be a lot easier."

"That's for sure," Nikita said, nodding glumly.

"But hey, isn't that why we're in this together?" Reiner asked. "So we can figure that stuff out for ourselves?"

"I-I guess so…"

But it feels like you're the one who does the romantic stuff all the time…

Reiner had wanted to hug her when she got back, but she'd dumped an essay into his arms instead. That wasn't how you treated a boyfriend. No wonder half of campus thought their breakup was imminent, she wasn't behaving like a good girlfriend was supposed to behave.

Well, she'd fix that. She'd do whatever it took. That was the reason she'd gotten this gift for him in the first place, after all.

"So what are you thinking, then?" Reiner asked. "How about we just spend the rest of today hanging out? You don't need to feel any pressure to be particularly 'girlfriendly' and I'll just do what I always do?"

"You mean make fun of me?" She asked sarcastically.

"Yeah, that was the plan," he nodded. She chuckled a little when he said it, and that made her relax some more.

"Yeah, that… that would be fine with me," she agreed.

So they finished up their meal and went to spend the rest of their day together hanging out in the mall and doing stuff.

It was a wonderful time. They didn't really buy anything, of course, they mostly just bummed around. But they checked out the different shops and had conversations about how their respective breaks went. Nikita even got to unload on Reiner about how frustrated she was that her egg STILL hadn't hatched yet.

All in all, it was a wonderful time. The sort of thing their reunion the other day SHOULD have been like, had it not been for Nikita's obsession with doing her schoolwork.

But Reiner didn't begrudge her. He'd gone on the improvised "date" with her all the same, and they'd had a wonderful time.

And then the date was over, and they were headed back to their respective dorms. They would be splitting up any second now.

"Um, Reiner…"

"Hmm?" Reiner turned back to her. "This isn't the part where you give me a goodbye kiss, is it?" He laughed, knowing how Nikita felt about public displays of affection, even if there was hardly anyone else around.

He turned serious when he saw the serious expression on her face, however.

"Hey, what's up?" He asked. "Everything okay?"

Nikita shook her head. "I… I felt really bad. About before."

"About what? You hit me all the time," Reiner said, trying to laugh it off.

"No! Not that… okay, well, yes, that too, but that's not what I meant," she said, shaking her head frantically.

"Oh, then about how you ditched me for Will? Nikita, I was kidding, I didn't really mind that," he assured her.

"No, it's not that either! It's just…" Damn it, why couldn't she just say it?

Nikita was stubborn. She wasn't used to being wrong, and even less used to admitting when she was wrong.

Which made this whole mess so much more difficult.

"Look, it's just… how do I say this…"

She practically pulled her hair out trying to figure out the correct thing to say. It was too damn hard! Finally, though, she managed to blurt it out.

"I'm sorry for taking advantage of you! Before!" She cried, pausing for a few seconds to catch her breath. Saying that had taken a lot out of her.

Reiner gasped, holding his arms over his chest. "You… you did things to my body?!" He asked in mock horror. "How could you?!"

She could just scream. Why didn't he take any of this seriously?! Why did he have to make jokes all the time?

And why couldn't she stay upset with him when he did?

"No, that's not what I meant!" Nikita said. "I mean before. With… with my essay. You just came back from a long trip, and I… I just forced you to help me."

"…Oh, that," Reiner said, frowning. "Yeah, I guess that did kind of suck."

"I know it did," Nikita sniffled, shaking her head. "It wasn't fair to make you do that."

"Hey, come on," he reached out and placed a hand on her shoulder. "You know I'm always fine with helping you out!"

"…I know," she nodded. "But you shouldn't be. And I shouldn't have asked. You were so happy to see me, and I just… I spoiled it."

"Hey, that's a little-"

"No, I did," she said. "We should have been doing all this stuff yesterday, instead of today. But we didn't, because I put myself first."

She dug into her pocket for her gift.

"So I… I made you this," she said, shoving a pile of cards into his hand.

For a second, Reiner thought they were flashcards. It would have been a very "Nikita" type of gift, the gift of studying. But on closer inspection he could see they weren't.

"…Favor Coupons?" He read.

Nikita nodded her head up and down. "There's 10 of them. They're a coupon that you can redeem for one free favor. If you give it to me, I'll do anything you ask, alright?"

Reiner raised his eyebrow incredulously. "Anything?"

"Within reason!" She asserted. "I'm not going to let you copy my tests answers or do your homework for you or anything! I mean, like… you know, dating favors. Like, if you want to go somewhere when I would rather study, you can… well, you can give me a coupon, and then I'll have to do what you want."

She smiled shyly.

"I-I know I should be opening up a little more on my own, without these things, but I guess… I guess it's just an easy way to get started, maybe. So soon I'll be more comfortable with doing those things without coupons.

She wanted an instruction manual for how to be a good girlfriend, but there wasn't one. So if there wasn't, she would make one. This way, Reiner could help her become a better girlfriend to match his needs.

That was the hope anyway.

"Okay, well, what if I wanted to kiss you?" Reiner asked, moving in closer and smirking.

"Wh-What?! Why would you use a coupon on THAT?!" Nikita exclaimed, her face heating up. She hadn't expected that from him at all.

"What about stuff besides kissing?" He taunted, enjoying how flustered she was getting.

"I SAID WITHIN REASON!" She screamed. "I changed my mind, gimme those back! You can't be trusted with them!"

"Not a chance!" Reiner laughed, holding the coupons out of her reach.

Nikita was upset, but also happy. She felt like this was a step in the right direction.

Aw, it's nice to see that these two are still finding ways to make it work. The coupons were a nice touch, and hopefully Reiner won't abuse them TOO much… As for what's going on with Will and Misato, well, that's a little more complicated. Coupons won't fix all the issues in that relationship, I'm afraid, so we'll have to see where they go from here.