Chapter 19; The Upgrade

A week passed after they had returned from the island, and the Academy had been repaired enough to start having the students return. Although classes weren't going to start again for another few days, the campus grounds were still lively as students and staff returned and took stock of what had been lost. The day before the campus was reopened, those closest to Maylin held a small funeral in a private area of the park on the southern part of the island. It was short and somber, with most of them unable to find any words. Kneeling before the headstone, Simon carefully dug a small hole in the ground before taking a locket out of his pocket. It had been one of her few possessions and it was clearly the most precious. What had been an intricate design had been worn smooth from continuous handling, the picture inside slightly faded from age. Placing it in the hole, he covered it up before saying, "Sleep well, princess."

The next day he was out with Ichika and Laura, giving the reconstruction crews a hand with the repair work. The fact that they had their own IS lent itself to heavy lifting quite nicely. The next few days were spent doing idle work around the grounds and spending time with his friends. Simon had also made it a point to spend more time with Cecilia, since she hadn't let him forget about how cold and distant he had been not too long ago. It was 'interesting' the first day or two and they had to weather some good-natured teasing from their friends about their relationship. But neither of them was ashamed about it anymore, and it wasn't uncommon to see them holding hands or just sitting together.

Then the day came when the Academy officially resumed classes, and the groan could have been heard on the mainland. Despite the circumstances, everyone had grown used to the lack of classes and work, and now it was back. The only real silver lining, at least in Simon's opinion, was that he would have something to keep himself occupied instead of dwelling on what he was being forced to do. He and Cecilia had been agonizing over the fact that they were lieing to their friends. While it wasn't an all-out, bold faced lie, it was still a lie by omission and that was bad enough. But Chifuyu had been clear; they were not to tell anyone else about the true nature of their enemy unless it was absolutely necessary. "And how will we know when it's necessary?" Simon had asked, already trying to work out a loophole. "If it's a life-or-death situation, then you're clear to tell them if it keeps them alive," she had responded. No room for interpretation, no argument, nothing.

After a grueling first day of classes, Simon was stretched out on the roof of the cafeteria, trying to massage his headache away. He had forgotten that there was so much else that they had needed to learn, and now he was paying for it. If I had known it would be this hard to get back up to speed, I'd have actually studied he thought with a groan. "You look like your head is about to explode," he heard. Opening one eye, he saw that Rin had joined him on the roof, and was taking some kind of pleasure in his pain. "Please, for the love of everything good, don't start today, Rin," he begged, closing his eye and going back to massaging his temples. "Did the brave knight have a tough day?" she teased as she walked around him, smiling. "Not nearly as bad as you're going to have in five seconds, pipsqueak," he responded, causing her smile to turn just a little sour. "Why you…"

Down in the courtyard, the students milling around only heard a yell of surprise and an explosion. Anyone that had been around long enough knew that it was one of the shorter tempered students. Anyone that hadn't looked up to see that Rin had summoned her IS and was currently chasing another IS across the sky. "Just hold still and I'll make it painless, Simon! I promise!" she called out as she fired another salvo. "I know what you consider painless, half-pint. No thank you!" Simon responded as he dodged most of them. He didn't dodge the flying kick he took to the back, however. When he hit the ground he slid for a bit before he managed to flip himself over and land on his feet. Rin landed not ten feet from him, looking an interesting combination of amused and pissed-off. Before they could actually start a fight, Chifuyu appeared seemingly out of nowhere and scowled at the two of them. "Would you care to explain yourselves?" she demanded as they destructed their IS and proceeded to look guilty as hell. That particular day ended with them repairing the damage done to the roof, by themselves.

When Simon had finally dragged himself back to his room at around 10 o'clock, he opened the door only to be met with a rather interesting scene. Houki had apparently come by for a visit, and was now lying on top of Ichika. They appeared to have been in the process of Frenching, maybe, when Simon entered the room and caused them to break off and stare at him with a deep blush. "Uh…um," Houki stammered. "Simon, this isn't what it looks like," Ichika said as he got up. Closing his eyes and taking a deep breath, Simon responded with, "I just spent the day fixing a roof, I'm tired, and I would like to sleep without having to listen to that, please." Houki just rushed past him quickly, although she stopped long enough to whisper, "You talk about this, you die," to him. Electing to say nothing, he waited until she had closed the door and he heard the click of the lock.

"You two didn't waste any time," he said as he walked over and flopped down on his bed. "It's not like that!" Ichika protested, sitting up and still blushing rather badly, "We were only talking, and-" "I don't think it's possible to talk clearly with two tongues in your mouth," Simon said, causing the blush to turn darker, "Dare I ask what would have happened if I had arrived latter?" Before Ichika could answer that one, Simon's façade cracked and he burst out laughing. "I don't see what's so funny," Ichika said, mortified, "From what Rin told me, you two already seem to be leaping ahead in your relationship." "Despite what shorty may have told you, we only shared a bed. We didn't actually sleep together, thank you," Simon responded as he got up and began to change. He was damned tired, after all. When he had finished and was about to pass out, a thought occurred to him. "So, what are you two going to do?" he asked, looking at Ichika seriously. "I'm…not really sure, to be honest," Ichika answered, smiling sheepishly, "What about you and Cecilia?" "I think we all know the answer to that one."

The next day, Simon was cornered on his way out of the dorms by a surprising visitor. "Si-kun, I need you," Tabane said, grabbing his hand and dragging him out of the building. "Well, I'm flattered, but I think I'm already spoken for," Simon replied, trying and failing to break her vice-like grip, "Mind telling me what this is about?" This question just met silence as Tabane dragged him across campus, ignoring the looks and whispers they were getting. Even though most people didn't know her by sight, enough knew that word of her presence on the grounds was spreading. That and her mechanical rabbit ears made it rather hard for her to blend into any crowd. After almost detaching his arm, she finally stopped as they entered one of the stadiums. Releasing her grip, she turned around and said simply, "Please summon your IS, Si-kun."

"After you tell me what this is about," he responded, crossing his arms. With a sigh, she pulled a pair of bracelets out of a pocket and put them on. Walking up to him, she touched his watch briefly and forcibly activated his IS. "Wha-? You…how?" Simon stammered as he looked at it, astonished. "I built those cores, remember? You really think I can't control them?" she responded, smiling sweetly before turning around and waving a hand before her. In another flash a small lab setup appeared before her. Sighing, Simon walked over and stood to the side while she prepared some equipment. When she turned back, she had a few tools in one hand and one of the upgrade modules in the other. "You're not about to…?" he began. Before he could continue, she waved a hand and he found that he couldn't move. "Don't worry, I'll be gentle," she said as she walked up to him. "You've been spending too much time with Tatenashi, I think," he observed as she opened the blade port on his right arm, "Care to explain to me why we couldn't do this with the IS deactivated?"

"Because I want to leave as few things up to chance as possible," she responded as she fiddled with some of the wiring to make room. "I didn't think you were that superstitious." "I'm not, but I realize that you can't always account for everything. Seriously, what part of 'genius' don't you understand?" she asked, sounding a little offended. "Maybe it's the part where you remind me of a kid hyped up on sugar," he answered. Tabane just puffed her cheeks out in annoyance before turning her attention back to attaching the module. After reattaching the cover, she stepped back and waved her hand over his IS again, releasing him. "Now, we're going to see just how well this thing works," she said as she picked up a tablet and typed in a few commands to bring up several targets. "I assume you talked with Chifuyu about this beforehand, right?" Simon asked. "Hm? Oh, yeah, sure I did," she responded without looking up. Before he could press her for details she pressed a button and started the targets moving, and firing.

Reflexes kicked in at that point as he brought his sword out and launched four fangs. Taking off, he quickly lashed out with his fangs and cleared four targets at once. Moving methodically, he cleared the rest of them without taking too many hits before landing before Tabane and looking rather pleased with himself. "Average," she said as she examined the results. "What the hell kind of standards are you grading me by?" Simon asked, shocked. Damn it, he had cleared those faster than he usually cleared targets in training, and it was average? "Maybe target practice isn't enough," Tabane mused, ignoring the boy. "Okay," he said after he calmed down, "So, what do I actually need to do to trigger this thing?" "Maybe you need to be in a real battle, against another person," she said before her face lit up, "I have the perfect person in mind. Stay right here." Before he could dispute the point, she waved her hand again and froze his controls as she left the stadium to go find her 'recruit.'

While he waited, Simon triggered a self-diagnostic to see for himself just what this thing was doing. It was supposed to be an immediate upgrade, or at least that was the impression he got when Tabane had explained it. Instead, it was just sitting in his arm, not doing a damned thing. Well, that wasn't exactly true; it was consuming a small amount of power, and he could tell that it was observing and recording every bite of data that ran through his IS' systems. As for what it was doing with them, it was anyone's guess. A forced upgrade to 4th gen specs, that's going to be interesting to see he thought with amusement as he continued to wait. After a few minutes, before he could really start to get stiff from the forced lack of movement, Tabane returned with not one person, but four. Rin, Cecilia, Houki and Ichika trailed after the woman and looked a little surprised to see Simon standing where he was.

"Was it really necessary to bring all of them?" he asked. "Well, I had hoped to only bring Ho-Chan, but they were with her. Besides, what can I say? I'm a big softy," she said, smiling as she released him from the forced lock. Sighing in relief, he proceeded to stretch some of the kinks out and heard a few joints pop. "So, what's the plan here? Am I supposed to arm wrestle one of them?" Simon asked, all sarcasm. "No, just fight," Tabane answered, deadpan. Waving her hand over the four of them, she triggered Rin's and Houki's IS. "Wait, two on one?" he asked as the two girls tried to get over the forced activation of their IS. She just nodded, causing the blonde to sigh as he took his sword off his back. "Well, I never got a chance to spar with either of you," he said. "Are you sure this is okay?" Houki asked.

Before anyone could answer, Rin brought out her swords and charged Simon, yelling, "This is for the other day, idiot!" She slammed straight into his shield and caused them to slide a few meters before he stopped them. "Sorry, half-pint, but you need to try harder than that," he said, grinning. With a grunt, he threw her aside before he charged, bringing his sword down towards her. Before it hit, however, Houki blocked it with one of her own while she swiped at his side with her other. Taking flight, Simon backed away from the blade and brought his shield up just as Rin opened fire. As the two girls came at him again, he launched his four primary fangs and targeted them on Rin while he focused on Houki. With the blades taking her attention completely, Rin was out for a little while, although Simon was using them as a distraction and not a weapon. Blocking a strike from one sword with the shield, he deflected the other with his own sword as they continued to circle each other.

And then Houki decided to go all in. As her blades began to glow, Simon gulped as he realized what she was planning. His reflexes, however, weren't fast enough. The single energy attack was easy enough to avoid, but the scatter blast wasn't and he caught a few shots in the side. Glancing at his shields to see that they were still in a good range, he unfolded his wings and triggered an Ignition Burst and was immediately in Houki's face. Bringing his sword up in a slash, he almost managed to do damage, that is until Houki reacted and brought one of her swords down and blocked his slash with the hilt. Breaking away from her, he brought his left foot up with the blade deployed for another slash. This one hit, although the second he completed his own attack a pair of shots from Rin hit him in the back and sent him towards the stadium wall.

Flipping around, he landed on the wall with his feet and bent his knees to absorb the impact. Before he launched himself off the wall, Simon launched his remaining fangs. Rather than as a distraction, they were now going for damage, and Houki and Rin realized this too late to dodge the first few bits. Houki launched her own pair of bits, but they weren't enough to keep up with Simon's hailstorm of attacks. And before they knew it, he was back among them. With a kick he sent Houki flying in one direction before he turned to Rin and fired a pair of canisters into her face. She was prepared for the smoke, however, and fired at where Simon had been when he launched it. The nature of her Shock cannons made it easy for her to dissipate the cloud, however her shots didn't hit what she had hoped. Giving her a moment to try and figure out where he was, Simon cut his flight system and landed a kick on her right wing from above. The full weight of his IS, and him, sent her falling towards the ground. Turning and focusing on Houki, he saw that she had managed to destroy two fangs.

Recalling the remaining ones, he prepared to take her on when an alert popped up on his screen. The others watched in astonishment as Simon's IS began to glow, softly at first but quickly working its way towards blinding. The legs of the IS shifted and became much slimmer, the blade ports on the sides becoming more compact. The wings had their feathers multiply and a pair of small cannon barrels appeared that floated independent of them. The main body of the IS shifted and became more streamlined and lighter, the crystal on the chest changing into more of a V shape. Its arms had the most dramatic change; the shield on his left disappeared altogether, while the blade ports becoming squarer in shape with a disk mounted in the center. The fingers also grew blockier, while the palms grew in size. Finally, his helmet shifted so it was lighter and more streamlined as well, with the neural plug realigning with the port.

Altogether, it was an impressive change, and Simon watched in awe for all of three seconds before the shit hit the fan. One moment, he was watching his IS shift and thinking this is so freaking cool, and the next a searing pain lanced through his skull and knocked him out cold. There wasn't even time to cry out in pain; he was conscious one second and completely out the next.

Looking around in utter surprise, Simon tried to figure out where he was. It was a beach somewhere, with the sun setting over the water in the distance. Turning away from it, he only saw cliffs stretching up to the sky. Taking a deep breath to stop the panic that was starting to rise, he went over what he remembered. He had been in Stadium 2 at the Academy, conducting a test when the module activated. His IS had undergone its shift before something happened and he was knocked out. He noted that his IS had seemingly destructed, leaving him standing on the beach in his pilot suit. Remembering the pain, he quickly felt around at the base of his neck and checked that the plug was intact. Must have been some kind of feed-back from the shift he thought as he verified that it was at least in one piece and not bleeding.

'It's about time you showed up,' he heard from somewhere. Actually, it was more accurate to say he heard it from everywhere. He couldn't even tell if it was in his head or actual words. Sensing some kind of presence behind him, he turned around and took a step back in shock. The figure standing before him in the surf was vaguely familiar, but he couldn't place it. It was human in shape, as tall as him, made from what looked like pure light and had a pair of wings folded behind it. Despite what it was made from, he didn't feel like his eyes were going to burn up when looking at it. Must be some kind of weird dream he thought as he looked around to see if there were more. 'No, this is no dream. At least, not in the conventional sense,' the being responded, taking a step forward. "H-how could you know that?" Simon asked, taking another step back. For whatever reason, there was something about this being that unsettled him. 'I know because I am already in your head,' it told him as it approached, 'I have been for a while now.'

Turning around, Simon looked to see if there was any way up the cliff. Instead, the being appeared before him and took another step forward. 'Running won't help you. I'm already inside you.' Next, he tried to summon his IS, but again achieved nothing. 'You're IS won't save you know. In fact, it is because of it that you are mine,' it said, laughing. For some reason, that laughter sounded familiar. However, when he tried to remember a sharp pain lanced through his head and stopped him. 'Come now, we can't have any of that, now can we?' it said as it got closer. "Wh-who are you?" Simon demanded. For whatever reason the closer it got to him, the harder it was to stand. 'I am your reckoning, Simon Felix. And I will not be denied,' it said as it reached forward and laid a hand on his shoulder. The moment it made contact more lances of pain shot through his head like tendrils. He cried out in pain, but the being just responded by laying its other hand on him, holding him upright as his legs collapsed. The pain racked his body, and he could feel himself falling into some kind of black void. 'You belong to me now, Felix. To me.'

After his shift had completed, Simon lost consciousness and plummeted to the ground, his new IS destructing in a flash of light. Thinking quickly, Houki blasted forward and caught him before he could hit the ground. The others quickly rushed over as she landed and set him down. The look on his face was pained and he had a fine coating of sweat on his skin. His breaths were also somewhat labored, and when Cecilia touched him he felt like he was burning up. "What's wrong with him?" she asked, on the verge of hysterics, "What happened?" Tabane had immediately called for paramedics the moment Simon went unconscious, and she now stood before the boy, feeling incredibly guilty. Is this my fault she wondered, did I not check the module thoroughly enough? Rin was standing there and trembling slightly. Finally, she couldn't hold her peace any longer.

"What the hell is wrong with you, idiot?!" she demanded, kneeling down and shaking Simon, "How many times are you going to keep doing this? How much more do we have to suffer?" Cecilia, meanwhile, was almost on the verge of tears. She couldn't believe something like this would happen, not now. "It's not fair," she mumbled as she squeezed his hand. She had finally gotten him back, they had admitted their feelings. They had even started talking about going on actual dates once classes calmed down. And now this happens. And as far as the others around her were concerned, she was right; it wasn't fair. They had already lost a friend, come close to death at least once, probably twice, and now another one of their friends was hurt. And from the looks of things, it was serious pain.

The paramedic team arrived in less than two minutes and quickly examined Simon. "What's wrong with him?" Cecilia asked as they transferred him to a stretcher. "Not sure," one of them answered, "It's not a concussion and there are no obvious signs of serious trauma. It looks like he just fainted." Without another word they picked the stretcher up and carried him off to the medical center. For the moment, Cecilia was clinging to anger as a support, although her grip on it was threatening to fail at any second. Instead of following, Cecilia walked up to Tabane and asked, "What did you do?" "I was just conducting an experiment," she responded, looking down, "We were trying to figure out how the upgrade module worked." "You didn't test it first? Check for viruses or traps?" Cecilia demanded. "I ran complete scans on every part of that module," Tabane answered, finally meeting Cecilia's gaze, "Everything from the programming to the hardware to the case. Chifu-ni told me to make absolutely sure that nothing was a threat. And I did."

"Then why is Simon… why is he hurt?" she asked, her voice finally cracking. Rather than answer, Tabane just looked away. She didn't have an answer, and she wasn't about to venture a guess until she examined his IS. Instead of letting her continue to badger Tabane, Rin walked up and took her arm. "Come on, Cecilia, let's go," she said as she led her away. Hanging her head, Cecilia just nodded as she struggled to control the tears. Houki left with Ichika a moment later, leaving Tabane to stare at her computers. There has to be a reason for this she thought as she brought up what she had recorded. She couldn't stand the thought that she had caused that boy more pain, not after everything he had gone through already. Switching one of the screens over to a different setting, she placed a call to Chifuyu. "Oh, hello Tabane, how goes the test?" she asked after the call connected. "Not good, Chifuyu," Tabane answered, getting her attention with the use of her full name, "Not good at all."

At the medical center, Simon was laying on one of the cots in the intense care unit while they examined him. Cecilia and Rin were seated in one of the waiting rooms, anxious to hear anything about their friend's condition. A few minutes later, Houki, Ichika, Laura and Charlotte joined them. About ten seconds behind them were Tatenashi and Kanzashi. "Is Simon alright?" Tatenashi asked, her sister still a little uncomfortable with people. "We're not sure," Rin said, "All they told us was that they were examining him." They waited in silence for what felt like forever before one of the doctors came out to see them. "I take it you're all his friends?" she asked, smiling and trying to lighten the mood. "What's his condition?" Cecilia asked as she stood up, her hands clenched in worry. "As far as we can tell, he's only unconscious. There wasn't any major internal damage, and his neural implant didn't show any signs of damage, either. There was however, something troubling."

Stopping to clear her throat, the doctor continued, "We were told that he was undergoing a shift in his IS when it occurred?" Cecilia nodded, already dreading where this might be going. "Well, this is only a hypothesis, but it's possible that the shift in the IS caused feedback through his neural lace. We won't know the extent of the damage until he wakes up." "Can we see him?" Ichika asked, receiving a nod. Cecilia and Rin were the first through the door into his room. He looked like he was sleeping peacefully now, and the look of pain was gone. Walking over to his side, Cecilia took his hand and tried to fight down the tears that were returning. "Please be okay, Simon," she begged. As if hearing her, he opened his eyes and looked over at her. They all looked overjoyed to see that he was okay, although Simon looked confused. "Hey there, can I help you with something?" he asked, looking at her. "It's okay, Simon," she answered, the tears finally starting to come to her eyes, "You just need to get better." "I'm sorry," he said as he sat up and pulled his hand from hers, "Do I know you?"

The first upgrade has been tested, and the priced has been proven incredibly high. Or is it? What was the being Simon met? Why did the upgrade react to him like it did? And what the hell happened to his memory? Till next chapter.

Da da daa, plot twist! While this chapter makes me feel like a total ass, it is necessary as far as resolving the final confrontation. Will he ever recover his memory, or is Simon doomed to forget his friends and his love forever?