The following months seemed to follow a pattern. Several days of marching. The occasional skirmish with small bands of Daein soldiers. Large-scale battles were rare. The mercenaries had moved out of Gallia and into the more civilized nation of Begnion, an ally of Crimea who was very hospitable to the resistance. The other soldiers seemed impressed upon entering the capital city, Sienne, although compared to Konata's memories of Tokyo it wasn't very densely populated at all. Still, the architecture was beautiful - the Tower of Guidance was visible from virtually anywhere in the capital, seeming to touch the sky.

They stayed in Sienne for a while. Ike was given command of the newly-formed Crimean army - mostly troops loaned by Begnion - in the war against Daein, uniting the beast nations with the humans. Konata had seen all this before. She concerned herself mainly with the daily lives of the soldiers, the kind of stuff you didn't get to see when you played the game.

Rei still showed up occasionally. She fought in probably half of the battles, maybe a few less than that. It was always a help when she showed up. She was continuing her act as the "mysterious cloaked figure," at times giving a really melodramatic performance if she remembered to stay in character at all. And she was carrying a spellbook now, just to fit in when she used her lightning spells, although she didn't actually use the book to cast them. Mostly, Konata enjoyed having Rei talk about going to school, it was like having a link to the modern world. Even if Rei was from several years in the future from Konata's "modern world."

And, speaking of links to the modern world... Jason still got the occasional phone call. He had to keep his phone silenced during the days, or on nights when someone unaffiliated with Eclipse was on watch with them, but it never seemed to be a problem. Kagami called most often, Tsukasa had called on a few occasions... Even Miyuki had talked to him once.

As the months went on, news from the Lucky Star universe had gotten better. Konata had trained her mind to stop referring to it as "home." From what Jason told her, her friends all seemed to be moving on as well. They rarely mentioned Konata anymore, but that was understandable. It was better if they weren't just moping around. And - this was the part that Jason seemed a bit annoyed by - they had started asking more about his own life.

"So what have you been telling them?" Konata asked one day. "Obviously you can't tell them what you're really doing right now."

It never snowed this much in Tokyo. It usually didn't snow this much outside of Earth's polar ice caps, as a matter of fact. They had crossed Daein's borders a few weeks ago, and apparently it was the dead of winter here. With Daein being the northernmost country, it was bound to be cold year-round, but this was the worst of it.

"That's true," Jason said, nodding. They were sitting around a fire, one of many in the camp, this one away from the others where most of the soldiers had gathered. "I try to make up stuff based on where I used to live. I'm trying to think how things would have been now if I hadn't left..." There was something reflected in his eyes, something deeply melancholy, but then he laughed. "So now you see why I always avoided talking about home when I was going to Ryoo with you guys. It's so hard to lie this much."

Konata remained straight-faced, appearing thoughtful as she stared at the burning firewood. "So what was it like where you came from, anyway? You've never really told me."

"Hm? I guess not... I put it all behind me. I'm sure you can understand why I'd do that."

"Of course." Other than his reports from his phone calls, Konata was at least making an attempt to forget about everyone from her own past. "But I just thought I'd like to know what you were like before you were with the Organization. It seems like this work is pretty much everything to you. I can't imagine what you'd be like before it."

Jason had turned back to the fire and away from her. You could stare into those flames for hours, their movement was entrancing. "If you really want to know..." He paused. "I've been meaning to go back, actually. I don't know how things turned out."

"What?" Konata was shocked. "Wouldn't you... You know, lose your job if you went back? You're supposed to have died, just like I did, aren't you? It's the same way for both of us..."

"Not exactly. I doubt there's anyone left to care if I went back there or not." Konata turned to him, confused, but still just listening. He went on. "It's... I'm really not sure how exactly it is, but I can tell you it's not pretty. Trust me on this. You really don't want to see it." He continued to look down at the fire.

Konata, on the other hand, was now leaning in even closer towards him, interested. "Of course I want to see!"

"Once we've won the war... It'll probably be a few days after that before the next assignment is ready. It's a special request, I don't know the details yet, but we'll have some time. I suppose you could come see where I used to live... You're absolutely sure?"

"Yeah. How bad could it be?"

"Honestly, I don't know. That's why I'm going. To tell the truth, it's been on my mind a lot lately. And you really want to come along..." He sighed. "It's fine, I guess. Your choice."

They heard Ike yelling orders, and saw some of the troops start to douse their fires and pick up camp. They were on the move again. Jason had finished talking about that subject, and switched back to lighter, easier topics of conversation as Joshua helped gather their personal supplies.

Chapter 17

Come On Down and Meet Your Maker

It was in this way that, several weeks later, Konata found herself standing in the middle of a street in suburban America, looking very different from anything she had imagined it would.

They were both wearing modern-day clothing now, having changed right before leaving. Konata found she was no longer used to such light clothing, just a T-shirt and shorts, like she would have worn on weekends back home - back in Lucky Star, she corrected herself. It was also a little disconcerting to not be in a two-dimensional style anymore, her blue hair had returned to normal... This world appeared in what most people called "reality."

It was a very harsh reality, however... The lawns were all unkept. A layer of dead leaves covered each one, the overgrown grass poking out through them. There was garbage all over the street, mostly old yellowed flyers and empty bottles. Some of the houses had the windows broken. And there were no people. Birds were singing, there were a few squirrels dashing around, but no people anywhere.

"This... This is where you came from?" she asked, her eyes wide in shock. "You never told me... any of this."

Jason had had his head down, eyes closed. He turned to look at her. "Can't really blame me, though, right? I knew it would be awful. I still kind of recognize it... This had started a little bit before I left, but I should have expected it to be like this..."

The enthusiasm Konata had for learning about this world had vanished. But as much as she wanted to leave, she'd stay here just a little bit longer. "What happened?" she said.

"I want to find that out myself." He was looking around still, and there was a lot to see.

"Was it like this when you left?" Konata asked. She was still having trouble believing this could happen to a world. Out of all the things she had seen... This was the apocalypse, no doubt about it. This world had died.

"Not yet. I'm not exactly sure what was going on when I left. There was a lot of confusion at the time. Rumors everywhere. All I know for sure is that the end of the world really was coming, like so many people had started to say. And I guess that's why when Eclipse showed up, I didn't hesitate to come with them."

"And... That was when you first joined."

"Six years ago. I never had the experience of working part-time, like you did. They said if I didn't leave here forever, I'd be dead within a month. Like everyone else."

Within a month? Konata couldn't believe that. "W-what? So... what did it?"

Jason had turned his attention to all the flyers on the ground. If the landscape hadn't proved what they said, they would appear to be shoddily-written propaganda and conspiracy theories. Some of them read THERE IS NO CURE! THE GOVERNMENT HAS BEEN LYING TO YOU! And yet another bunch read, SUPERFLU WAS CREATED BY THE U.S. MILITARY! Picking up a dirt-covered pill bottle, a few capsules still rattling in the bottom, he could read that it claimed to be the "only true cure for the Captain Trips virus."

"Apparently, people got sick. That did seem to be one of the more popular stories, anyway. There were other ones, too, about nuclear radiation and judgment from God. But in the end, it turns out people were just getting sick..."

Konata couldn't believe it. She had left her own world behind simply out of boredom. Because her life wasn't as exciting as the ones she read about, or saw in games. There hadn't been anything to "escape" except the threat of living a normal life. Here was something that really did warrant running away.

"So did you even have to fake your death, anything like that?"

"By that point, there was so much panic that people were disappearing all the time," Jason said. "I wonder if any of my friends even noticed that I was gone."

Dropping the pill bottle, he started walking down the street. Konata followed. But if there was a virus...

"You're sure this isn't in the air, still, right? The virus?"

"I already called someone from Eclipse to ask if this was okay. They did a report for me. It's not an airborne disease. Everyone that could be affected from it died when this all started, and the virus eventually died out with them."

There was a group of lots where houses had once stood, now reduced to some charred framework if anything still stood. A fire had broken out here, or maybe even intentional arson. Without an active fire department, it had just burned itself out. At least ten houses seemed to have been caught in the blaze.

Later they passed a car, a green pickup truck. Someone was sitting in the driver's seat. Neither of them wanted to take a closer look, but it was obvious that this person had suffered the effects of sitting dead in a car for several summers and winters.

Konata really couldn't say anything about all of this. It was all so silent. It actually wasn't unlike being back in the medieval, not-fully-civilized world of Fire Emblem again, in one of those remote areas away from the towns where it was only nature, untouched by anything manmade. Except here, nature had simply retaken what had once been civilization.

"There it is," Jason said suddenly. He had stopped in front of a house, two stories, the windows (like all of the other houses) had been smashed, the white rocking chairs on the porch knocked over, the shrubs in the front yard grown out of control. "This is where I used to live."

So this was the house that everyone thought they were calling him at... Konata imagined their reactions if they could see what it really looked like.

"Last time I was here, I had just finished sixth grade. I was twelve years old, I lived with my parents... and my brother Brandon..." Jason's face showed the pain that remembering them brought. His whole family, dead. He had abandoned them. "I used to ride my bike around town a lot... I played basketball on the school team. Didn't think much about the future. I just lived in the moment." He hesitated, staring at one of the second floor windows, which was still unbroken. "I guess I still do."

Konata was amazed at how he was able to deal with all of this so well. True, he never did talk about it until just now. If something like this had happened to her when she was in middle school, would she be able to forget it? She wasn't sure. "Want to go inside?" she offered.

"No... Definitely not," he said. "Who knows what we'd find in there?"

"You're probably right..." she agreed. They kept moving.

As they entered town, there seemed to be even more destruction. Not all of this could be natural. This was what happened when people abandoned their government as it died off, and regressed to anarchy in their final moments. And there were bodies. They had almost completely decomposed, but it didn't change the fact that people had been dying where they fell. And left there. She had seen plenty of dead bodies, but those had been soldiers. These were innocent people. And it had happened to everyone on Earth...

"Wait, here's something." Konata stopped at a machine that was selling newspapers. This one wasn't broken into yet, it still had some issues left in there. She kicked the dusty glass in, shattering it like the others had been.

The old, yellowed newspaper was called the Stovington Citizen, and it was dated July 19, 2010. The front page was a special report on a patient who had escaped the disease control center... which was right in town, as it turned out. A quote from lead biochemist Ronald Faraday called the incident "a possible threat to the health of the local area." Possible greatest understatement of the millenium...

"You had a disease research center in your hometown... when the world ended due to a plague?" Konata said. "That's a really tough twist of fate, don't you think?"

Ignoring her, Jason was looking at the date. "July 19? That's still a few weeks after I was gone... They were still publishing the Citizen then..."

"And it's... 2010? You were from five years in the future the entire time you were going to school with me?"

"Technically it's 2016 now."

"But still."

Jason had started reading the article more attentively, taking in all the details. It was the last record of his home world, after all. Konata turned her attention to some graffiti on the brick wall of a coffee shop. It was done crudely in red spray paint, the stylized image of an eye, the pupil just a swirl. 1000 WORLDS DYING AT ONCE, it read underneath. ALL HAIL THE CRIMSON KING!

"People were really going crazy, weren't they..." Konata muttered. Something about that really disturbed her. What did it mean by "a thousand worlds"? Surely nobody knew about other universes, did they? And... For this to happen to so many worlds at once?

Jason had looked up, and was examining the strange graffiti as well. "That's all it is, though. People going crazy. If there was anything like that... This Crimson King, or whatever... Eclipse would've made him a priority. Don't let it bother you."

"Yeah." Konata let out a breath. Why had it worried her so much? Something about that eye still gave her the creeps. She tried to ignore it. "So... Tell me more about what you did before I met you. After you joined Eclipse. What kind of missions did you do?"

"I was all over the place," he said. "You mostly focus on worlds that you recognize. Anime, games. But I didn't really care, I just wanted to be away from here. Not all of them were worlds I'd heard of before, just whatever missions were available. I wanted to learn a variety of skills."

"You weren't tempted to go somewhere just because you saw it in a movie or whatever?" Konata asked. "I thought that was only natural." The mission listing often did have plenty of options of worlds that she'd never heard of, but she just turned a blind eye to those. She liked being familiar with a place. That was another reason why this world was so scary to her. It was totally unfamiliar.

"I put everything I had into Eclipse. Really, it was all I had left," Jason said. "I think I told you about meeting Kamina, Joshua, some other guys. I did do a few missions in anime, video games, but there wasn't really a pattern to it. I didn't have any preferences."

"And when you came to Ryoo..." Konata said. She looked up at him. "What made you do that? And you said you never went to school in all that time, since middle school. Must've been hard."

"Coming to Ryoo..." He seemed to be searching for the memory. Konata wondered why it looked like he was having difficulty with it. Wasn't that more recent than anything else? "That was... It wasn't my choice, actually. They said they'd been watching you for possible recruitment, and I was in the right age group to get close. Honestly I didn't even want to go at first."

"What? Why?" Konata said. "What's so wrong about my world?"

"Aren't you the one who left it?"

Konata couldn't say anything to that. He had a point.

"Uh... sorry."

"So, um..." Konata was reaching for some other topic of conversation. She was done with this place. Time to get out. "So what's our next assignment? You said they had it chosen for us already?"

"Right, that. Well, if you don't mind going back to school..." Jason was grinning.

Floor 379 - Interuniversal Supply Delivery.

Like the rest of the Eclipse headquarters, it was lit by soft blue light from some unidentified source set into the black marble walls. It had the elegance of traditional magic with a simultaneous hi-tech sheen. But all of that couldn't really change the fact that Floor 379 was, at its heart, a mail room.

Konata stood in line as she waited to approach the counter. The line, although extremely long - at least a hundred people, in what reminded Konata of a wide variety of cosplay outfits - moved quickly. The packages were all somehow stored in a computer system that would cause them to materialize into existence with just a few keystrokes. There was no storage room for the attendants to hunt through. Talk about convenience.

She watched as people took their packages. Most of them seemed modern, they had regular stamps and postmarks on them. Apparently, they were all sent to locations in one world, where someone from the organization would pick them up and bring them here for delivery. The system fascinated her.

Konata was here to pick up a package for her next assignment, which would take almost an entire year to complete. The delivery was going to be her new school uniform and course information for her senior year at Gekkokan High School, on Tatsumi Port Island. It was a large city that didn't even exist where she was from.

A whole year of acting normal, going to school, making friends with regular students her own age... And, at night, summoning a Persona and fighting Shadows to prevent the end of the world. Persona 3, a blend of Konata's two favorite kinds of game - a turn-based RPG with dating sim elements. And she was going to live there. This kind of thing never stopped exciting her.

"Next, please," a voice called, and she was snapped back into the moment. She had already reached the front of the line, and the attendant was waiting for her to step up to the counter.

"Hi, um... I'm supposed to get a package addressed to..." What was it? It was something nearby her old address, but not the same. "It should be somewhere in Saitama, I forget what they made up for me, actually," Konata replied. She did remember one detail that she hoped would be enough. "It'll be from Gekkokan High School."

The attendant looked at her - what was she thinking? Konata wondered. Trying to imagine what I'd get something from a high school for, or... wondering if I'm old enough for high school? Sometimes it was depressing, being this short and undeveloped.

"This should be it," she said finally, handing Konata a small cardboard box, with just a bit of weight to it. That would be the information papers and the uniform.

"Thanks." Konata glanced at the label. "Looks good."

The address was alright, but whose name had it been sent to? She had expected it to at least have the family name of Izumi on it.

Floor 586 - Cafeteria #10. Yes, Eclipse actually required several floors of cafeterias in their headquarters.

Before coming here, Konata had gone to her room on Floor 2692 - not even close to the top floor - and dropped off the package. She had tried on the new uniform. It was different from the Ryoo sailor uniforms. Completely black, with a white undershirt and a red bow at the neck. A small red, white, and black circular emblem was on the left side. She couldn't wait to see how she would look in it once she was back to her blue-haired anime self.

Also in the package were some notes on her new backstory, some forged records she would need to take with her, although most of the information Eclipse had produced was already slipped into the systems in the Persona 3 universe. She'd have to study this. Most of it was close enough to the truth that it wouldn't be hard, but there were some other details. Both her parents were supposed to have died when she was young, instead of only her mother. She had gone to Kasukabe High School, not Ryoo. A few other minor details. There was also money. 300,000 yen - Konata couldn't help but wonder how they had gotten that, or if it was legal.

And, although Jason would still be working with her, she was not supposed to know who he was. His story was identical to before. An exchange student, coming from Stovington, Vermont... which was still supposed to be a thriving community. This was his first-ever year in a Japanese school. He'd have to throw out everything he had gotten used to at Ryoo, and act almost entirely oblivious to Japanese culture.

Jason had already gone to the new universe. He was getting his temporary apartment set up. Coming in at a different time as Konata would be more realistic than them showing up together. She was to arrive in the city just a single day before classes started. So what's it going to be like as a transfer student? she wondered.

Konata hoped this was the first step in getting to transfer to a certain other school. Joining a certain brigade, led by a certain girl who shared a voice actress with herself...

But for now, she was here in the #10 cafeteria, a large room twice the size of her old school's gymnasium, the rows of long, white-marble tables stretched across nearly the entire length of the space. They had just about any kind of food you could want. Konata was thrilled to get a choco cornet again, but also ordered a large bowl of ramen. After eating army rations for so long, it was heaven.

"Wow, you look pretty young to be working here," someone said. She looked up, it was a man with blond hair, probably in his twenties or early thirties. He wore a white lab coat with the Eclipse emblem on a patch, with a black T-shirt underneath. "They start some of you off so early..." The man sat down next to her and unwrapped a sandwich.

What did he know about starting young? Hadn't Jason started when he was all of twelve years old? She stared at him for a while, the possibility that he might have special interests crossing her mind. But the obvious signs weren't there, he was even sitting across the table instead of getting up close, right next to her, like those kinds of people usually did.

Ignoring that for now, Konata asked, "Uh... who are you?"

"Name's Nick Barrett. I'm with the research division," he said, giving her a smile. "Don't mind me, I didn't recognize anyone I knew here, either. Thought I'd meet someone new. And you are?"

"Izumi Konata. And I'm not really that young, I'm eighteen."

"You're Izumi - ? Sorry. I didn't realize!" He was scratching the back of his head awkwardly.

That was an interesting reaction. Now Konata wanted to know more. "You've heard of me?"

"Um, no. I mean - I..." Nick was acting strange. But apparently he knew something about her, so Konata resisted the urge to just stand up and leave. "I've... heard your name around, different places. From friends, coworkers, you know. What division are you in?"

How fascinating. Here she was, in what was pretty much the restaurant at the center of the multiverse, and someone had heard her name before. Was she famous? "I'm in the combat section, mostly."

"Ah." Nick nodded as he opened up a can of soda, some brand Konata didn't recognize called "Skist."

"So what does 'research' do, exactly?" Konata asked. She'd never spent much time at headquarters, but this seemed to be the place where members from all different assignments converged.

"We've been working on the servers, mostly. Number RD-19 hasn't been functioning properly, it's been sending people all over the place. Really messy situation. I've only got a half-hour for break." He smiled weakly, it was obvious that he was exhausted.

"So you're the people who work on the servers for the Talismans? Nice," Konata said. "I've always wondered how they work." She could tell he was nearly about to start a long, complicated, and very scientific explanation, so she quickly cut him off. "No, it's fine, you don't need to tell me. It's fine."

It had never occurred to her that the system wasn't always perfect. It had always taken her to the universe and specific location that she requested. It sounded like a security issue, Eclipse was extremely secretive to non-members. They were always instructed to travel only in secluded areas, away from any potential witnesses. If the server was acting up, who knows where you'd get dropped?

"Forsythe has really been on our case about this," Nick continued. "Can you believe that guy? He's in charge of the entire organization, but he never shows up in person, even when something like this is a 'matter of grave importance' or whatever. I don't imagine you've ever seen him in person."

"From what I've heard, he doesn't even speak to most members. Nobody I know has ever even heard his voice," Konata said.

"Yeah. We've heard his voice, that's about it..." Nick's voice trailed off. Konata was getting the feeling maybe it wasn't such a good idea to criticize their boss while in his headquarters. Apparently Nick was thinking the same way. Changing the subject, he said, "So what kind of work do they have you doing?"

"I'm going to high school starting in four days." Konata couldn't believe it herself. That seemed so far away.

Nick almost choked on his sandwich, trying to hold back laughter. "In the combat division? What's that all about?"

"Yeah, I'll be fighting demons at night, but during the day I'm supposed to be a normal student. It's going to be so cool!" Konata said.

"Ah. Let me guess, this is from some weird Japanese video game or something like that?"

"Of course." Konata happened to love weird Japanese video games. It was like celebrating her culture.

"So Konata, you're pretty good at what you do, right? It's never been much of a challenge for you?"

She stopped. Had it ever been a challenge?

Thinking back to those early missions... She had screwed up a few times. Gotten killed once, but as luck would have it, got better. That mission with the Evangelion unit had seemed nearly impossible, but it had turned out fine. Everything always seemed to go her way...

"Yeah, I'd say I'm good at it."

"Wow. You really do never know who's cut out for this kind of thing, do you... It's been good meeting you."

"Same to you."

"Really makes me wonder how Recruitment picks people out..." Nick said, not to anyone in particular, more to himself. But Konata had to agree with him, it did seem like a mystery. Did she ever think she'd be cut out for this sort of thing before it happened?

But there would be time to consider her purpose in life once this ramen bowl stopped being so delicious.