Anri was right, she didn't like this but she was most certainly amused when Maho unironically slipped a document into the old man oracle's paperwork
And the unassuming document legally allowed Maho to travel to Gamindusti proper without opposition from the Basilicom as they are legally bound to the terms of the document
What Anri didn't like was the fact that in the unassuming document it states that Anri was to be Maho's handler for the duration of the trip
Anri sighs, as much as she's annoyed at Maho for pulling this off without her consent
What concerned Anri the most was that she basically holds the position of Oracle for the PC Continent for the duration of the trip
Meaning that anything that would under normal circumstances would require a lengthy call with the PC Continent Basilicom (those old fossils would prefer to 'negotiate' things into their favor) can be circumvented by her making decisions based on her judgement
Maho must truly trust her a significant amount for the pink haired girl to just make her the Oracle by proxy
Location: LAN castle - Hidden basement area
"Digita Laser!" four holographic screens formed next to Maho and each fired a relatively powerful laser beam at the last of the monsters in front of her
"So remind me, why are we here?" Anri asks
"So, you know how I have issues?" Maho asks back
"Your De-Sync?" Anri asks, "you said you had that 'kinda, sorta, fixed'"
Maho hums, "getting my De-Sync fixed isn't something I can do right now and I hate that I can't say much about why"
The pink haired girl sighs tiredly, "we're going to collect a piece to Re-Sync Gearsy" Maho says with a giddy giggle
Anri looks at her, "if I didn't know you like I know you, I'd say you're going to use this as a bargaining chip"
"But you do know me better than that~"
Anri hums with a nod
The pair of them walked in a comfortable silence for the rest of the way
Location: Planeptune Basilicom - guest room
The first thing that Uni noticed when she woke up was that she wasn't in Lastation Basilicom
"Good morning Sleeping beauty" she heard someone say from her side, "welcome back to the land of the living"
Uni sits up in the admittedly really comfortable bed and rubs the sleep out of her eyes
She looks to the side and sees Brin seated on a chair next to the bed
"Where… am I?" Uni asks sleepily
"Planeptune Basilicom"
"Why am I here?" Uni asks
Brin chuckles softly, "you were clinging to lady Nepgear really hard, we barely managed to get you to let go of her clothes"
Uni blushed a bright red upon hearing that, she was about to say something when her stomach started protesting loudly which caused her to blush even harder
Brin giggles, much to Uni's dismay, "come on, Magi should be done with breakfast"
Location: Planeptune Basilicom - kitchen/dining room
"Good morning" Uni greeted the group having breakfast
At the table are IF (whose in a wheelchair), Compa and Planeptune's diminutive oracle Histoire
All of them are having breakfast, there's a spread of bacon, eggs and pancakes on the table
Although, for some reason miss IF's eyes started sparkling at the sight of Brin
"good morning, Uni-uni, did you sleep well" Compa says with a sweet smile on her face
"Yes, I did" Uni answers with a small smile of her own, she looks towards the Oracle, "does Kei know that I'm here?" She asks
Histoire takes a sip of her tea, "I've informed her not long after you arrived" Histoire said, "although, I had some difficulties explaining to her that you were asleep since everyone was insistent on keeping silent about it"
"O-oh…"
Histoire giggles, "it's no issue, would you like to join us for breakfast?"
Uni nods and takes a seat, "umm, where's Nepgear?"
"Gear's in her lab, something about blueprints and projects" IF answered
Uni took a bite of one of the pancakes and she froze as her eyes widened
In her time alive, Uni has gone to a number of fancy restaurants when her sister took her out to eat for any kind of private celebration the pair of them had
So it's safe to say that Uni has a fairly refined palette when it comes to food, so why, why was this simple pancake out do almost everything that she's ever had in her life
The only things that she can think of that can put do this pancake is (in her opinion) curry
"That good huh?" IF asks with a grin
Uni slowly looked up to the brunette
"Don't worry about it, we all had the same reaction to Magi's cooking"
Location: Planeptune Basilicom - hallway to Nepgear's Lab
After that near food-gasm inducing breakfast, Uni was led to Nepgera's lab by Histoire
"So you're waiting for Miss IF's burns to heal up before going to Lowee?" Uni asks
Histoire nods, "yes, while i trust Nepgear to be able to handle things herself, she sometimes has a tendency to go off on her own tangent"
"So you want someone to keep her focused?" Uni asks with a small amused smile on her face
"Yes, yes I do"
Location: Planeptune Basilicom - Nepgear's Lab
Histoire had escorted Uni to Nepgear's lab before she left to do her own work
Uni didn't know what to expect when she stepped into Nepgear's lab but neat and tidy was not it
The lab is a calming blue between the tiled floor, the reinforced metal walls and the entire room being lit up by a multitude of LED light strips
Its big too, her gun workshop over in Lastation Basilicom is the size of four of her bedrooms put together, while that is admittedly a large space, Nepgear's lab is basically the entire floor
Uni can see the robots, machines, gizmos that she's never seen before and even blueprints in what she can assume is Nepgear's workshop area. All around the Lab are robots and vehicles that she assumes that either Nepgear built or is refurbishing for parts
On one of the far corners of the Lab is a futuristic looking simulation room like she's seen in some games and anime, right outside the door to enter the simulation room are weapons
There was everything that anyone would want to practise with from swords like katanas, odachis, great swords, short swords, etc. to polearms like staves, spears, war hammers, scythes, axes, etc. even thrown weapons like, throwing daggers, chakrams, Kunai, Shuriken and the likes
Heck there's an entire assortment of guns from pistols to assault rifles to sniper rifles to shotguns to grenade launchers to rocket launchers
'Oh goodness is that a minigun!' Uni squeals in her head, 'and are those custom made plasma guns?' Uni thinks with stars in her eyes. It took all her willpower to tear her eyes away from the weapons rack by the sim room
Over on the other corner of the same back wall is a dojo like area where Nepgear is meditating in the center
Uni takes a deep breath and walks tentatively towards the meditating Lilac haired girl
…
Uni stood off to the side of Nepgear, completely silent as she contemplates what to say to the other girl
…
"I'm sorry…" Uni finally says out loud
Nepgear lets out a questioning hum
"For lashing out at you and yelling at you and… a-and freezing when we were against that man"
"it's not your fault" Nepgear says calmly, "when you lashed out and yelled at me you were under a lot of stress and emotional turmoil regardless of how you presented yourself"
Nepgear opens her eyes and looks at the ravenette, "as for freezing, we all have our insecurities, things we silently berate ourselves for" she says
Uni purses her lips, "even then! It's no excuse for…" she started to say before she was cut off by the lilac haired girl
"Uni, you went into shock" she says with a piercing look, "that is more than enough reason to not hold it against you"
Uni looked like she wanted to protest only to be stopped by Nepgear holding up her hand
"The fact that you pulled through as quickly as you did is something to be celebrated" Nepgear says, "Uni, I've known people, people whom I thought were unstoppable, and unexpectedly they went into shock" she looks down as though the blame for this fall firmly onto her shoulders
"Sure, most of them recovered from it, some of them took weeks, some months and other years" Nepgear says
Uni caught onto something, "you said 'most'" she was almost afraid to hear what happened to them
Nepgear gave her a sad, broken smile, and shook her head "their still alive, if it could even be called that"
Uni was stunned to silence, 'that… that could have been me…' tears started to well up in her eyes
Nepgear cups Uni's face gently, "I firmly believe that one must never ever fault someone for their recovery"
Uni lightly chews on her bottom lip
Nepgear pulls away, "you know, we are our own worst critic" she says as she walks towards the sim room, "and when someone says out loud, the negative things we say about ourselves, like it's fact, it will effect us all regardless of how strong or capable we are"
Uni looks to the lilac haired girl with clear determination in her eyes, "i want to get stronger"
Uni clenches her fist, "I don't want to be a burden and…" Uni grabs her arm and looks down, contemplating whether or not she wants to say the next part
"and I want to be able to use the the things my sister taught me without feeling uncomfortable* Uni looks up at Nepgear again
Nepgear's lips curve up into a small smile, "I can help you with the first part, the second parts going to be a bit of a work in progress"
Uni didn't care much, Nepgear was strong, extremely so, and since the lilac haired girl was willing to take her under her wing (no matter how temporary it may be) Uni was going to throw herself into it with as much vigor as she did when Noire had taught her
Location: Gamindustri Graveyard
Kneeling in front of CFW Magic is a dark grey mouse. It has red eyes and two white whiskers on each cheek. The coloring from its shoulder to its hands are black. It has small maroon wings on its back, though due to its size compared to its wings, it is doubtful if it is capable of flight. On its chest is a red and yellow broken heart design. It has a thin, black tail that has something similar to a big, black, broken heart in the end.
"And you are absolutely certain that CPU Purple Sister didn't transform?" Magic asks the little monster
"Yes chu, she didn't transform chu" the monster, Warechu, answered, "in fact she was struggling a lot the longer the fight went on"
"Interesting" Magic muses, "it appears that Brave was correct in his assessment of her"
Magic chuckles, "truly interesting" her sharp gaze falls back onto the rodent, "Werechu, go to Lowee and help Linda with her tasks there and do stay out of the twin's way if you value your lives"
"Y-YES CHU!" the little rat scurries off like the rat it is
Location: Planeptune Basilicom - Nepgear's Lab
"KYAAAA!" Uni screamed as she was sent to the ground again by Nepgear's superior combat capabilities with a sword
Nepgear hums softly, "another dud, then"
Nepgear had gotten a pair of shinai and the pair of them moved over to the dojo area to start helping Uni with her request
In the beginning Nepgear tried to get Uni to take a stance that felt comfortable for her but that didn't work
Nepgear had taken it upon herself to show the ravenette the multitudes of stances that she's familiar with, but again none of them clicked
Following that Uni suggested straight up sparring, Nepgear would obviously hold back to Uni's level however even this was turning out to be a dud
Of course all of this happened over the course of the last three hours
Uni groans and sits up, "why does this feel like one step forward and three steps back?"
"Probably because its reaching that point" Nepgear says
The lilac haired girl thinks to herself for a moment, "if the traditional and conventional ways aren't working, maybe…" Nepgear starts to say and trails off
Uni's breath hitched, 'is she going to tell me that i'm a lost cause?' her insecurities started bubbling up to the surface
Nepgear shakes her head, "...maybe it's time we took things in a non-traditional and unconventional way"
Uni blinks in confusion at that, "what do you mean by that?"
"What do you think about energy based firearms?" Nepgear asks instead of answering the question
Uni raised an eyebrow, "i… don't mind them, personally I prefer regular firearms and the lingering scent of gunpowder, why? What does this have to do with my question?"
Nepgear's lips curve into a smirk
If anyone asks about Uni about this particular day later down the line, Uni would swear up and down that the silence between them was suddenly drowned out by some background music that spontaneously started playing
The type of background music that belongs in a really good boss fight that you would look forward to when you play a game