Fedora force: And as a family, they will argue with each other like actual siblings! Somewhat, though they do truly support each other.
StrawberryTrapper: Whether they meet each other normally or through circumstances like this, Muse will always be true friends. (and sometimes a little more.) Regarding the other bunkers...you'll find out soon.
chi2lyn: Figuring out how to break bad news (even to characters) is really hard. Like, one of the hardest things to do ever (besides life in general) and leaving them with a false hope wouldn't advance any of their characters. I don't really know why I made Tsubasa a bit of a bully, she just turned out that way when I was planning out the chapter.
Dessert Maniac: The main reason for Honoka telling Maki: It was for the HonoMaki! Also because Honoka's the main character so she gets more lines. I imagine Nico to be more mature when she was younger, before having little siblings make her crave attention. I hope the time skip lives up to your expectations! :D
My plan for writing this chapter went something like this: *something about Yukiho and Arisa turning fourteen* *ignore the schedule* *Umi scolding Honoka (again)* *some HonoMaki* *someone on that time of month* *oh yeah, they have to get out of the bunker now*
And so the chapter was written. Please enjoy.
~Eleven years later (give or take)~
There was a knock at the bedroom door. Honoka, lying on her bunk, lifted her head an inch to look at the door before lying back down. The door opened and Yukiho poked her head in. "Hey, nee-chan? You told us to see you after we've finished eating, right?"
"Ah, Yukiho! Arisa-chan! Come in, come in!" Honoka sat up, her legs dangling over the edge of the bunk. "You've both gotten your schedules for today?"
"Yep." Yukiho brandished her arm, showing the black ink stamped there to her older sister. Arisa did the same. "We're fourteen now, so we have the Range as our first hour."
"Hm~ Lucky~ The Range is really fun! Compared to things like Class now…" Honoka sighed; just thinking about being in class put her in a bad mood.
"So, what did you want to talk to us about, Honoka-chan?" Arisa asked, getting Honoka's attention back on what she was supposed to be doing.
"Yeah! Since you're fourteen, you can totally disregard the schedule! The system can't check if you're following it or not, so you can just avoid things you don't want to do and go where you want to. Except for meals, showers, and the Range. The Range actually scans for your card and schedule, so you can't go in unless you're scheduled to…" Honoka trailed off, wishing that she had the Range on her schedule. Unfortunately, in her mind at least, she didn't for the day. There was no way for her to hack into the system that ran the whole bunker and change her schedule. "But anyway! I just wanted to tell you about that! I was actually going to tell you when I first figured it out, but Umi-chan got mad at me...So did Eri-chan, actually…"
"Of course she would." The ginger flinched as her childhood friend rounded the corner into the doorway. "Honoka, you can't keep skipping class!"
"I can too, Umi-chan!" Honoka grumbled, hopping down from her bunk to face the bluenette. "It's not like we learn anything useful there!"
"We do! It's essential survival skills for the outside world!" Umi retorted, crossing her arms in the face of Honoka's obstinate refusal to attend. Yukiho and Arisa looked between the two arguing teenagers as if they were at a sports game, though neither had ever attended such an event.
"And when are we ever going outside? We've been stuck here most of our lives! It's not necessary and on top of that, it's boring!" Honoka mimicked Umi and crossed her arms. "So I'm not going!"
"Honoka, how many ways have we been taught to purify water?" Umi asked her suddenly.
"Uh…" Honoka drew a blank on the answer, trying desperately to remember what the number was.
"And can you describe the process?" Umi pressured her with another question. Honoka's head hurt a bit, trying to remember. "If you can't even answer that, you need more class. Yukiho, Arisa, what's the answer?"
"There are ten ways, I think?" Umi nodded at Arisa's answer.
"And you can boil it, distill it...and the rest need specific equipment that we don't really have…" Yukiho answered, lowering her head at being unable to remember the rest of the methods.
"See? These two know more than you do, Honoka. So you need to go to class. Come on." Umi grabbed Honoka by the arm and started trying to drag her out of the room. Honoka planted her feet, not wanting to go. "You're the leader of this shelter! We can't have you be slacking off!"
"I am not the leader of the shelter! I am only the representative of Muse when we have a council!" Honoka groaned; Umi was far stronger than her now, especially when it came to arm strength. Her arm felt like it was going to bruise where Umi was holding her.
"Whatever! Everyone here looks to you for answers, ever since you broke the news to everyone years ago!" Eleven years ago, after Honoka had told her friends that their parents were never coming, she had called a meeting of all the shelter girls. It was the first event that hadn't been scheduled by the programs that ran their lives, and she had been the one to speak the truth about their abandonment beneath the ground. She had comforted them as best she could with her words at the time. Umi wasn't lying; the other girls did approach Honoka with questions from time to time, with a respect that Honoka didn't understand. "You might as well be the leader!"
"Having trouble again?" Maki asked, peering into the room. "Oh, good morning, Yukiho, Arisa. Happy birthday."
"Thank you!" The two girls beamed at being recognized on their special date.
"Yes. Maki, do you think you could help out?" Umi asked, still trying to pull Honoka out of the room with little success.
"I would, but I'm busy ignoring my schedule. Honoka, would you like to join me?" Honoka hoped the gratitude in her gaze reached Maki. Umi looked dumbfounded at the younger girl, who most had expected to grow up into a serious type like the bluenette. It seemed that she was taking after her second adopted sister (Honoka claimed her as one after insisting that the nine of them were a family, irritating Nozomi a bit. But they were cool now. She hoped.) instead, treating the schedule as if it were nothing.
"What are you doing?" Honoka asked, rubbing her arm. Umi had finally let go of her in her shock at being turned against.
"Going to the library to get some books, then to the infirmary to learn the medicines I haven't yet."
"And what do I do?" Truth be told, Honoka was less excited about going with Maki after finding out what she planned to do. It sounded just as bad as going to class to learn about surviving outside the bunker.
"Obviously-" A strangely creepy glint came into Maki's eyes. "-you'll be my test subject for whatever I can't understand from the books." Fear of the redhead overtook Honoka. She took off, wanting to put as much distance as she could from Maki for the time being. "...did I go too far?"
"I appreciate the help, Maki, but you could try not freaking out Honoka to get her to follow the schedule." Umi sighed, preparing to give chase after her frightened friend. "Yukiho, Arisa, just...do whatever you want. For today, since it's your birthday." And the bluenette was gone, calling out Honoka's name as she ran through the bunker.
Honoka sat with her head down on the table in front of her. She had gotten so frightened from Maki that she had actually ran to the classroom, and by the time she realized that and got up to leave, Umi and Kotori had arrived. With her friends seated on both sides, she resigned herself to her fate of being lectured to by a robotic voice for an hour. She needed a few minutes to get used to the absence of the toneless voice.
Getting up from her seat-Umi and Kotori had gone somewhere without her now that class was over-Honoka left the classroom and looked at her schedule. According to it, she had an hour of study time at the library now, but she decided to ignore it. Looking around at all the rooms that were now open on the third floor, she wondered what she should do. Going to the infirmary was definitely out, if Maki was still there.
Honoka walked over to the door leading to the infirmary anyway, her curiosity getting the better of her. Maki had her back to the entrance of the room, a thick book in one hand and a bottle of medicine in the other. The redhead was mumbling quietly to herself, so Honoka backed away. She wouldn't get in the way if Maki wanted to learn the medicines, even if she didn't understand why the younger girl wanted to.
She decided on doing a few runs at the Course before going back to her room for a pre-lunch rest and headed down the hall to the room. The Course was a large room filled with obstacles for the girls to practice with. It wasn't as fun as the Range, but doing some physical exercise after stressing her mind would be relaxing. "Oh, Nico-chan, Nozomi-chan, you have the Course right now?"
"Yeah." Nico bounced up and down, prepping herself for the first obstacle. "I don't think you do though."
"No, but I didn't want to sit in the library for an hour." The black-haired girl nodded, then took off running. She vaulted over the first jump with ease, even though the jump was more than half of her height. They had practiced these jumps and dives so many times over the years, that it wasn't that surprising that Nico was able to vault over an obstacle of that size. "Where's Eri-chan?"
"It's that time again. She's lying in our room." Honoka subconsciously brought her hand up to her stomach, understanding Eri's pain even though the blonde wasn't with them.
"Have you brought her medicine from the infirmary?" Nozomi shook her head. "Why not?"
"Eri-chi insisted on us going about our normal day and not to worry about her. I'm pretty sure she wouldn't appreciate either of us skipping training to take care of her."
"Maki-chan's in the infirmary. Why don't you ask her to take Eri-chan the medicine?"
"I'll do that. Thank you, Honoka-chan." The purple-haired girl walked out of the room. Honoka turned her attention to the obstacle course in front of her and prepared to run.
Eri joined them for lunch, saying that she felt much better with the medicine, but the blonde looked shaken up for some reason. Considering her earlier encounter with Maki the mad doctor, Honoka wondered what the redhead did to shake Eri up so much. But when the alarm bells started sounding, all of them were made uneasy. Never in their eleven years of staying in the bunker had they heard such a loud noise. Attention all residents of the shelter. There are no more storm signals. Access to the surface opening.
"Access…" Umi repeated in a stunned voice.
"...to the surface?" Honoka finished, equally stunned as her friend. The sentence was repeated over the dining tables as the announcement sank in. She sprung into action, tripping herself in her hurry to leave the table. She sprinted down the hallway connecting the dining hall to the central room of the second floor. The stairs from the first floor were descending, connecting the base of the second floor. Now a single spiral staircase ran all the way from the top floor to the bottom, something Honoka and the rest of the shelter girls had never seen. War Room has been opened. Please head to the War Room.
Even though the prospect of seeing the outside world called her, Honoka headed down the spiral staircase. Lunch was forgotten as the girls filed down the stairs to the third floor, following Honoka's lead. She had been right. Even though the voice hadn't dictated where the war room was, the only door that had never opened in the entire bunker was on the bottom floor. It was cramped with all of the girls in there though.
"Hello, girls of the Tokyo bunker." Screens showed up on three walls, each showing the same balding man. "If you are seeing me, then the storm has passed. You are now allowed to go up to the surface that you were forced to leave. Congratulations on surviving all these years!" There were unhappy mutters at the choice of words the man was using. "I am the governor of Tokyo, though most of you won't know who I am, or was, depending on when you are seeing this message. You have been training for years without knowing why. You have been training to prepare for a war that is sure to come with most of the world decimated by the storm. You are to join with the rest of Japan's bunkers to protect our nation from invaders. Such has been dictated by the Prime Minister. In the far room, you will find guns similar to the toys you have been training with, along with ammunition. Protect our nation." The man was replaced by a red circle on a white background. It took a few seconds for Honoka to realize the flag of Japan was being shown; she had only seen it in a book before, and never in color. An unrecognizable melody played along with the flag. Even though all of them could understand the words, none of them knew what significance the song had. The screens vanished upon the conclusion of the song and a door at the far end of the room opened.
"I know what the old dude said. Protect Japan, or whatever, right?" Honoka waited for the crowd to die down. Having nowhere else to hold a meeting, the girls were standing on the second floor and Honoka on the staircase slightly above them. "But here's the thing. We can't. Not yet. We need food and water. We need to see what the world looks like. So until we've secured all those things, we will not heed his words. Our first action will be to look outside, but before we do so, I need to set some rules. Umi-chan?" Her childhood friend was no longer as shy, and she willingly climbed the steps to Honoka's level.
"Going outside will mean there are dangers that we have no experience of. That being said, our shelter is our homebase in all operations. You may break off from the shelter if you see fit and live on your own in the upper world, but doing so means you must stay clear of Tokyo territory. Those that wish to return to the shelter for food and water must contribute in some way, whether you bring back water, food, or simply extend our territory. Above all, if you see other survivors, help them if needed, avoid them if not. Is that understood?" A unanimous agreement came from the girls gathered.
"We ascend! From the ground up!" Honoka called out, hurrying up the rest of the staircase to the top floor. The last time she had been up here, she had been five years old. Not frightened of being without her parents, she had sought playmates. And they had become the people she trusted the most. The doors opened as she neared them, opening to a hallway that was dark. Unlike the interior room, the hallways had suffered damage from the storm, with decomposing trash creating a stench unlike any the girls had smelled before. Honoka broke into a run, wanting partially to get away from the smell and partially to get to the above world. A towering city, though blurry in her child's memories, glistened brightly within her mind.
She stepped out onto the cracked asphalt, ascending the last step from the underground. Buildings lay on their sides, knocked over by the force of the storm. Cars were scattered across the street, on their backs, on their sides. One was even wedged halfway into a building. Weeds poked out from the destroyed roads and sidewalks. "So this...this is Tokyo…"
"Nee-chan…" Yukiho had heard Honoka tell tales of the city they descended from, describing it as a shining city, even at night. If Honoka broke down now, the shelter could dissolve into chaos.
"Looks like we have some work to do." Honoka said, smiling. The ginger turned to her younger sister. "What is it, Yukiho?"
"...Nevermind, it's nothing." Of course her sister wouldn't be put down by something like this. That's why she led the base with such ease. Honoka shone brighter than any memory could.
Everything focus on Honoka because Honoka is the main character. The sometimes absent-minded leader of the Tokyo bunker.
Umi is her second-in-command. She's really come out of her shell.
Kotori wasn't mentioned much in this chapter but she spends a lot of time with Umi so just imagine that she's there.
Maki takes after Nozomi and Honoka. Whether or not this is a good thing will come to question later.
Rin seems to be getting along great with Hanayo.
Hanayo didn't get any lines this time around though. (Neither did Rin.)
Eri is the unfortunate victim of that time.
Nozomi cares a lot for Eri, doesn't she?
Nico is not the center of attention.
I forgot what I was supposed to write in this section.
Please review. :D