Gles
Well-Known Member
05日 9月 YE 46
YSS Kaiyo II
Fabrication Bay
"Looks like all of the connection ports are operating. Can you feel this?" Aratani asked Molli just after double tapping on the new palm of the newly fabricated cybernetic arm she had just seen affixed to the Nepleslian's arm. It was a powerfully capable cybernetic arm but the look on Aratani's face was cloudy and grey despite such.
Aratani was sitting cross-legged atop an operating joint for one of the robotic arms next to a table that she had laid out several sized wrenches and small screwdrivers. Though it wasn't necessarily Aratani's job to oversee the creation of a new arm for Molli after the Enhanced Mishhuvurthyar had all but eaten her last one, Aratani's passion for the project couldn't be quelled and she had helped the engineer and armorer every step of the way with eager interest.
Molli had been lying atop the table as Aratani worked, trying to contain her apprehension throughout the surgery. She couldn't feel any pain given that she'd deactivated the simulated nerve endings in her shoulder, but it was uncomfortable to be conscious during an operation on a missing limb all the same. As Aratani worked and patiently kept reminding her to relax, Molli found herself doing just that, and the sounds of whirring machinery soon became white noise. It turned out that replacing a metal arm was less stressful than a back alley slum doctor installing a fresh one where flesh had been.
Once that shiny new arm was connected to the proper ports, diagnostic windows flashed across Molli's irises. Everything looked green, so she glanced down at her new limb and slowly clenched her fist. It wasn't exactly like the one she'd had before -- the Yamataians knew how to make anything sleek, but it didn't feel wrong. If anything, having a piece of the Empire's technology grafted on made the young soldier feel more like a proper citizen.
"Nah, sec..." Molli looked ahead, her eyes lighting up, before looking back at Aratani. "Yeah. Ken feel it jus' fine," she smiled softly, "Thankya. Was gettin' tired've th'looks." A part of her felt that behind the sympathetic looks and comments was resentment, even a little embarrassment. Of course the little human got herself injured that badly, Molli imagined they'd think to themselves.
"Seeing the raw connection ports is really cool, no wonder they were looking!" Aratani said before realizing Molli had for the most part worn her duty uniform with full sleeves, just the empty one tied into a knot. She drew a finger to her mouth as she thought, then leaned back on her sort of seat atop the robotic mechanisms, making her silver hair splay out in an iridescent wave behind her.
"Or not," Aratani added. "But I mean, they'll definitely see you for your full potential now! Our red panel and I concealed some odds and ends in there, some of them should even connect to your neural pathways in the same way it does to give you a touch sensation."
Somehow, Molli had doubts that the entire crew of the Kaiyo had the same fascination for connection ports as Aratani, but the Nepleslian didn't want to dampen her surgeon's optimism. "Y-Yeah..." she replied, running her new hand through her hair to further test its ability to simulate touch. Sure enough, the feeling of hair strands brushing past her fingers came through as naturally as it would to a flesh and bone hand. "S'just like m'old arm!"
Except the old one was pitch black, while this one was more of a blood red, with fingers that came to points like claws. Why that was eluded Molli, but she couldn't deny it looked damn cool. "Full potential...?" she raised an eyebrow at Aratani, "M'not sure they think ahm important. S'just bad soldierin' if y'got one arm."
Aratani opened her mouth to speak, but her amethyst-colored eyes went to the door before any words came out. Seeing the captain standing there with a placid smile, Aratani realized she had let her jaw drop a little more than she had meant.
"If you can do more with one arm than the enemy can with all however many appendages they have, you're important in my book," Captain Taiyou Hoshi said when she realized Aratani wasn't going to reply to Molli.
The Captain's voice was immediately recognizable, and Molli's head practically swiveled as she sat up and turned to face her, a process that was made awkward by her back being to the door. "Hoshi-Taisa! What're-" Molli would've stood at attention, but given that her legs still felt like jelly, that seemed like a terrible idea. She settled on bowing as low as she could from a sitting position.
"Ah...Th'kalamari arms helped..." she couldn't help but correct Hoshi, in spite of her compliment, "S'just luck." Knowing that her effectiveness had hinged on a decision that she wasn't sure would pay off had put a damper on any supposed 'success' she'd found. "Um, why're y'here, Taisa? Thought y'had leader...things..." Things to do that were more important than personally visiting one of the rank and file, for instance.
"This is a leader thing," Hoshi flapped her hand as she explained away the soldier's query. "Making sure one of the wounded is back on her feet is important. An arm's an arm. But I did think we could check out the power armor bay and see how your Mindy callibrates with your new arm."
"Taisa, I'd like to be there for that!" Aratani said with an. uncontainable excitement.
"Later you can check up on her." With a smirk, Hoshi pivoted. "Care to show me to the power armor bay, Byrne-hei?"
Molli gave her legs a few pats, then swing them over the table and wiggled her toes. "R-Right," she had to remind herself that it was Yamatain to get called by your last name. Frankly, it was one of the few things she didn't like about their culture. Her father always used her last name whenever she was in trouble. "Been eager t'get back in th'suit," Molli said, standing up and heading for the door. If there was anything that she'd like more than piloting a Mindy, she hadn't found it yet.
Hoshi didn't need directions to any part of the ship, probably, but Molli recognized it as the courtesy it was. "'Preciate th'visit," she said as they moved through the ship's halls, past the personnel who were busying themselves as always. "Ent every day y'get one from th'Taisa," she sounded appreciative, and a little embarrassed. "Th'vacation was nice too."
"Maybe I should change that," Hoshi said as she led herself out of the room, leaving a disappointed Aratani alone to tinker with something much less interesting than a cybernetic arm. "Not a lot to do between Aiko-sama handling any paperwork and the long journey home, at this point. As eager as you are to get back in the suit, that's how I feel about giving you guys good reason to fight in them again."
A smile crept onto Molli's lips, she had a difficult time imagining a larger than life person like Aiko doing something as mundane as paperwork. Likewise, it felt odd to be the focus of anyone important, given her rank and inexperience. "Careful, y'might be spoilin' us," she said, with a small chuckle, "We're headin' home?" Molli seemed especially eager to hear that.
Home had been the easiest thing to re-contextualize after she'd fled Planet Nepleslia, as Yamatai had been more welcoming in her first year than the former had her entire life. As lonely as it had been to leave everything behind, it was still better than struggling to survive day by day. About the only thing she missed was her family, but Molli hoped that the portion of her pay she anonymously wired to her father's account every month could change things.
"Mmmm, yeah," Hoshi murmured, wistfully thinking of home as Molli was. "What's your favorite part of Yamatai, if that's even what you mean by home?" Having dropped into the zero gravity passageway at the end of the hall, Hoshi was floating to the bottom deck of the ship. Her light blue and white hair floated around the darker indigo of her crisp Type 35 jacket's shoulders and made her bangs lift above her cheerful face. Eventually, she set down near the ground but still floated as she embarked on deck five's hallway.
"Course it's what ah mean," Molli replied, with a hint of indignance that she could've meant anything else. "Th'cities're nice," If a little unfriendly towards motorists, given how robust the public transport system was, "Th'food..." She never would've imagined raw fish could be so delicious, "Their bikes're real good," Molli was getting pretty excited as she rattled off more than one favorite thing about the planet, even as she followed Hoshi down the zero gravity passageway.
In contrast to Hoshi, Molli's short hair didn't billow nearly as much, save for the tiny ponytail at the back. She felt lucky to have at least been in a type-22 uniform and not a surgery gown, but Molli would've preferred a few more layers like a pair of cargo pants and a jacket. "What's yours?" she asked after touching close to the ground and trailing beside the Captain.
"Man, you made me realize there's more to it than I've been seeing lately," Hoshi said. "Fresh pair of eyes is always nice. For me, though? Well, I really want to get back to my ranch on Tami where I have some livestock and just got a bunch of chickens in the coop before I left so now my turkey's got a flock to protect. Forgive me rambling about animals, but having that sort of relaxed way of living interspersed with the Kyoto culture that's always doing something new and eventful is nice for me. I wouldn't want one without the other."
"S'fine, ah get why y'like 'em," Molli had only ever seen an animal on a television, "Ahm hopin' to see one m'self someday."
"Sorry that I don't know off the top of my digital mind, but are you respawnable?" Hoshi asked as the door to the power armor bay opened as she stepped before it.
"Ah signed up for it, I think?" Molli replied, rubbing the back of her head, "Try not t'think about dyin'. They won't...put me inna Neko body if ah do, will they?"
Looking back at Molli with one eyebrow raised on her pink face, "What if we did? That would be pretty messed up! No, no, you'll be brought back according to your latest ST backup, so basically your body and your brain and all the rest—well, not your arm. We'd have to do that whole process again." Hoshi said, waving her hand towards Molli's arm. "Aratani might like that, though. You're getting a zesuiaum model when we get to Yamatai, yeah."
"And m'eyes," Molli pointed to her bright red irises, which seemed like normal eyes at a distance, but the glow of their circuits gave them away up close. "S'gonna suck t'wake up blind..." she murmured, though the knowledge that she'd be getting an upgrade to a fancy zesuiaum model helped distract from that unsettling thought.
As she asked this, Hoshi's volumetric uniform disappeared as she turned towards her Mindy. The armor was hard to tell apart from the rest of the crews and didn't stand out. Despite its ubiquitous appearance, Hoshi's hand patted it lovingly all the same as the torso opened up. The little floating captain very gently lowered into the legs of her Mindy 4 and waited for Molli, contemplatively standing with the chest piece of the armor still opened up.
"So how did your first mission go, Santo Hei? Or should I say Nitô Hei?" Hoshi remarked on the promotion she had to let Molli know about.
Molli was already leg-deep into her Mindy when Hoshi broke the news, and it made her look over to the Captain with wide-eyed surprise. "They're promotin' me?" Molli asked, her voice brimming with unconcealed happiness, before realizing that she'd been asked a question. "I-I mean, it went...dece." The mission had been the last thing Molli wanted to think about, given all that happened. "Didn't die..." That was the best she could muster to diplomatically describe her feelings on it.
"Decent's not bad," Hoshi said as she let the Mindy consume her, going over her pink body and head. She strutted towards the starboard side door that exited into space. She passed the glittering orange force-field before she went on to ask, "Worst part of the mission?"
Molli's uniform hadn't disappeared like Hoshi's, but it didn't make the process of being consumed by the Mindy uncomfortable. After she ran cursory diagnostics through her helmet's UI, she joined Hoshi in walking out into the void of space. "Too many," she said quietly, with the uncomfortable silence of space as the only accompaniment. "...We fried a buncha Mishhu slaves," There was no point in trying to hide her feelings from the Captain.
"I see," Hoshi said as she twirled around in the void of space. Distant stars seemed to stay static in the tapestry of velvety darkness while those closer slowly lulled past the ship as it moved with the pair of Mindy safely inside of its CFS bubble. "It wasn't the most humane treatment or way to deal with their Mishhuvurthyar masters. Rather than free them of that suffering by letting them live on, we ended their chances at freedom and lives in one foul swoop. Emphasis on foul."
A more tacit way to put disintegrating a ship full of slaves; Molli would've used more colorful, and cruder, words. She wasn't focused on how she floated through space, and her armor ended up inverted relative to Hoshi's. "Couldn't've saved 'em," Molli said, the vaccumless void made her bitterness more audible, "There were loads, 'n we barely got out after doin' what y'wanted." It was Molli's way of letting Hoshi know that she wasn't angry at the decision.
"It would have been nice, though," Hoshi said. "Not just nice, that's not the word, but it would have been humane like I said earlier. Justifying a handful of civilian lives in the context of a third war with an unknowably awful enemy will always be difficult, but I'm hoping future missions give us more of an opportunity to save lives in the moment rather than hoping for the long-term benefit alone. If that makes sense."
"Yeah," Molli said, "Ah do too." It was naive to go into war and expect to save lives, but she wanted to try nonetheless. "Um... You askin' this ent cause of how ahm actin', is it?" Molli's voice was filled with trepidation, "Ahm still good t'serve on th'Kaiyo, right?"
"No, no, you're good," Hoshi said immediately, then took a long breath in as she mused quietly, watching the stars that passed and those that stayed affixed far off. "You know, I used to just do what was asked of me, not worrying too long or too hard about anything beyond what could take down the enemy fastest. Now is a little different and I wish I could tell you why. Maybe it was the long time away from home and command during the Kuvexian War, maybe it was not having a break for those years and then getting time to reflect on Tami."
"But whatever it was, it helped me see that to look back at what I've done, I need to be able to think about what I would want to do better in the future. Sometimes life is just lucky and you did everything exactly as you should have and you get the best results possible and that's cause for celebration. Did we have a celebration after this mission, Nito Hei?"
"Ah had drinks wiv th'team," Molli said, "S'good we got through it, ahm happy none've us died." She took a moment to reflect on her actions that day, before continuing, "...Di'n't celebrate. Ah made a lotta mistakes, could've done better."
"William throwing around his Nepleslian whiskey again, huh?" Hoshi asked. She would have rubbed the bridge of her nose if she could. She moved towards the starship's hull towards its upper decks, "Follow me. What I'm saying is we didn't have much reason to celebrate last mission but we survived and we helped others survive. Sometimes, that's the bare minimum to call it a success."
Sometimes it wasn't enough to simply succeed; a racer couldn't brag if they won by sheer luck and circumstance. "We helped those guys that shot at us," she said, gently powering her wings to trail behind Hoshi, "Killed a buncha guys who shot at us." It was like a bad joke, but Molli laughed all the same. "Guess yer right. M'just glad it weren't all for nothing."
"Still, ah...wanna do better. Don't wanna let anyone down."
"Good thing they were shooting Mishhuvurthyar, too, huh," Hoshi noted, then thought about what Molli had said as she landed on the ship, just over the zero in the IRN. She in her Mindy was tiny in comparison to the Hinomaru next to the numbers "501" and she looked to it, then to Molli.
"It's better to go into the Star Army wanting to do better as a santo hei—nitô hei now—than have to learn after a dozen plus years. We're not a resupply ship or some reserve fleet vessel, either. We've taken on difficult tasks, this ship, too often to let anyone down. You're doing great if that's the mindset you have."
There was time to reflect on Hoshi's words on the way towards the ship's hull, and landing on it to behold its grand scale seemed to put a lot of things into perspective concerning her personal issues versus the enormity of her responsibilities. "We're doin' th'hard jobs cause it's what needs t'be done," she mused aloud, "Lots of people trust us, so...we can't let 'em down, right?"
It was a lot of pressure to have on your shoulders, but also, in a way, reassuring to know that she was part of something bigger than herself. Wallowing in self-pity and guilt seemed irresponsible with that in mind. "Thanks, Taisa," Molli faced Hoshi and bowed low, until she was staring at the hull. "Th'crew's been good t'me. M'happy t'be here with 'em."
"Thank you," Hoshi said, deflecting the appreciation back to where she believed it belonged. She walked forward a bit, standing in the swathe of crimson red that surrounded the large stylized Mindy painted on the ship hull and sat down so that she could look up at the stars. It seemed for a moment that she was going to simply stare off at the view and lay down like as she became absorbed with the ever-present night of space. Suddenly, though, she spoke up out of her reverie.
"We need to test that arm of yours. It's calibrated up with your armor, yeah? Moving with you? You know unlike a bike or a mecha, you wear a Mindy. You're not piloting it with your mind alone like Aiko does inside her Kirie but wearing it. So if you move it should move with you. If you engage the forearm pulse cannons on that arm, what happens?" She quickly added, "Shooting into space of course. Boss can repair the CFS bubble, but just shoot one."
Molli had joined Hoshi by the massive Star Army emblem, and was content to sit in silence until the Captain reminded her of the purpose of their excursion. "Right," she hadn't thought about how her arm was working, because it seemed to be just fine. Now that she was focused on it, however, Molli noticed that her arm was moving just slightly slower than her brain was telling it to. "It's still integratin' with my nervous system."
At Hoshi's request, Molli raised her right arm at the CFS, "Hope it ent too much work t'fix," she murmured, before engaging the forearm cannon. A burst of aether silently shot through space like a comet, before dissipating against the CFS bubble like a fizzling fire. "Little delay, but it'll fix itself soon. Sa primo cyber-arm."
"We'll let Aratani know to check it out before we get back aboard, I guess." Hoshi said as she watched the shield of her starship was poked by the forearm cannon's blast. Talking on something else she had been worrying about, she asked, "The work is worth it. How's it been working alongside Nepleslians as one yourself?"
"Y'mean wiv Will?" Molli wished Hoshi could see her smiling under the helmet, "He's..." she was struggling to think of a cant-word that described him, there were too many negatives in her vocabulary. "He's great. Good shooter, saved m'rear in that spire, an-" she snorted, "H-He's good cover. Why d'you ask? He like workin' wiv me?"
"A bit, yeah! We have a lot more where he came from in the legion so I bet there's more experiences to come to see just how good they are. But William, he's a cut above. You know I was almost up shit creek without a paddle recently, as you Neppies say, and he had my back just as much as any Neko would. I think you can look at how much we trust and rely on him to be able to see that the Nekovalkyrja on the Kaiyo can be every bit that warrior maiden we were made to be, but we know Nepleslians didn't have to be constructed in a lab to have the same fortitude for war as we do."
"S'funny, ah had this idea in m'head about Nekos when ah decided t'become a citizen," Molli double-checked the safety of her forearm blaster before continuing, "Super-soldiers from a lab sounded scary, but... Most've you're nicer t'me than anyone from m'old home. Ah had a lotta harsh instructors, but they made me a better soldier. Ah'd probably be dead wivout 'em."
"I guess ahm tryin' t'say, er, nobody's makin' me not feel welcome." As far as how she felt, that was a slightly different story.
"That's good to hear." Fully relaxed, Hoshi leaned back and put her armored hands behind her helmet. Out of her visor, she could no longer see the cargo they were hauling that was making the trip back so slow, just the stars alone.
"Anything we can do to make your stay more welcome, just let me or whoever you're comfortable talking to know. And if you move on to a different posting, don't know if that will fly as much. Other captains will ask for chain of command to be adhered to in daily life like it's a combat situation. Kaiyō's been out in deep space and her captain's had too much time on her hands for too many years to be too strict about enlisted asking her for what they need." She tilted her head back, a smile under her helmet as she noticed she had spoken in third person.
Somehow, asking the Captain herself to accommodate her seemed wrong to Molli, but she didn't want to just dismiss the offer. "Ah feel pretty welcome," Molli said, "If y'need me to do somethin', ahm glad t'step up. H-Honest, I could be a little more uncomfortable, s'really good around here." Before, she might've aired out about feeling useless compared to the Nekos, but having her efforts on the last mission acknowledged went a long way towards boosting her self-confidence.
"That's good to hear," Hoshi said, both pleased and content as she enjoyed the view from the top of the hinomaru on the ship hull. "Suppose we can't stay out here forever, Aratani's going to want to look over that arm for ya, Molli. but it was a nice excuse for a space walk all the same."
Molli stood up, "Yeah, she's keen on it. Y'think she'd never seen a cyberlimb before," there was an exaggerated tone of annoyance that drove home how little the attention actually annoyed the young soldier. "M'glad y'got me back in this suit, Hoshi-Taisa. Ken ah test th'Mindy's engine next time?" Her way of obfuscating a thinly-veiled excuse to go flying through space as quickly as humanly possible, or at least as quick as regulations would allow.
"We'll race next time," Hoshi said, amused by the imagery Molli's words elicited. "Even if it's not a fair fight, it'd be a fun matchup to see."
JP by Gles and Ametheliana
YSS Kaiyo II
Fabrication Bay
"Looks like all of the connection ports are operating. Can you feel this?" Aratani asked Molli just after double tapping on the new palm of the newly fabricated cybernetic arm she had just seen affixed to the Nepleslian's arm. It was a powerfully capable cybernetic arm but the look on Aratani's face was cloudy and grey despite such.
Aratani was sitting cross-legged atop an operating joint for one of the robotic arms next to a table that she had laid out several sized wrenches and small screwdrivers. Though it wasn't necessarily Aratani's job to oversee the creation of a new arm for Molli after the Enhanced Mishhuvurthyar had all but eaten her last one, Aratani's passion for the project couldn't be quelled and she had helped the engineer and armorer every step of the way with eager interest.
Molli had been lying atop the table as Aratani worked, trying to contain her apprehension throughout the surgery. She couldn't feel any pain given that she'd deactivated the simulated nerve endings in her shoulder, but it was uncomfortable to be conscious during an operation on a missing limb all the same. As Aratani worked and patiently kept reminding her to relax, Molli found herself doing just that, and the sounds of whirring machinery soon became white noise. It turned out that replacing a metal arm was less stressful than a back alley slum doctor installing a fresh one where flesh had been.
Once that shiny new arm was connected to the proper ports, diagnostic windows flashed across Molli's irises. Everything looked green, so she glanced down at her new limb and slowly clenched her fist. It wasn't exactly like the one she'd had before -- the Yamataians knew how to make anything sleek, but it didn't feel wrong. If anything, having a piece of the Empire's technology grafted on made the young soldier feel more like a proper citizen.
"Nah, sec..." Molli looked ahead, her eyes lighting up, before looking back at Aratani. "Yeah. Ken feel it jus' fine," she smiled softly, "Thankya. Was gettin' tired've th'looks." A part of her felt that behind the sympathetic looks and comments was resentment, even a little embarrassment. Of course the little human got herself injured that badly, Molli imagined they'd think to themselves.
"Seeing the raw connection ports is really cool, no wonder they were looking!" Aratani said before realizing Molli had for the most part worn her duty uniform with full sleeves, just the empty one tied into a knot. She drew a finger to her mouth as she thought, then leaned back on her sort of seat atop the robotic mechanisms, making her silver hair splay out in an iridescent wave behind her.
"Or not," Aratani added. "But I mean, they'll definitely see you for your full potential now! Our red panel and I concealed some odds and ends in there, some of them should even connect to your neural pathways in the same way it does to give you a touch sensation."
Somehow, Molli had doubts that the entire crew of the Kaiyo had the same fascination for connection ports as Aratani, but the Nepleslian didn't want to dampen her surgeon's optimism. "Y-Yeah..." she replied, running her new hand through her hair to further test its ability to simulate touch. Sure enough, the feeling of hair strands brushing past her fingers came through as naturally as it would to a flesh and bone hand. "S'just like m'old arm!"
Except the old one was pitch black, while this one was more of a blood red, with fingers that came to points like claws. Why that was eluded Molli, but she couldn't deny it looked damn cool. "Full potential...?" she raised an eyebrow at Aratani, "M'not sure they think ahm important. S'just bad soldierin' if y'got one arm."
Aratani opened her mouth to speak, but her amethyst-colored eyes went to the door before any words came out. Seeing the captain standing there with a placid smile, Aratani realized she had let her jaw drop a little more than she had meant.
"If you can do more with one arm than the enemy can with all however many appendages they have, you're important in my book," Captain Taiyou Hoshi said when she realized Aratani wasn't going to reply to Molli.
The Captain's voice was immediately recognizable, and Molli's head practically swiveled as she sat up and turned to face her, a process that was made awkward by her back being to the door. "Hoshi-Taisa! What're-" Molli would've stood at attention, but given that her legs still felt like jelly, that seemed like a terrible idea. She settled on bowing as low as she could from a sitting position.
"Ah...Th'kalamari arms helped..." she couldn't help but correct Hoshi, in spite of her compliment, "S'just luck." Knowing that her effectiveness had hinged on a decision that she wasn't sure would pay off had put a damper on any supposed 'success' she'd found. "Um, why're y'here, Taisa? Thought y'had leader...things..." Things to do that were more important than personally visiting one of the rank and file, for instance.
"This is a leader thing," Hoshi flapped her hand as she explained away the soldier's query. "Making sure one of the wounded is back on her feet is important. An arm's an arm. But I did think we could check out the power armor bay and see how your Mindy callibrates with your new arm."
"Taisa, I'd like to be there for that!" Aratani said with an. uncontainable excitement.
"Later you can check up on her." With a smirk, Hoshi pivoted. "Care to show me to the power armor bay, Byrne-hei?"
Molli gave her legs a few pats, then swing them over the table and wiggled her toes. "R-Right," she had to remind herself that it was Yamatain to get called by your last name. Frankly, it was one of the few things she didn't like about their culture. Her father always used her last name whenever she was in trouble. "Been eager t'get back in th'suit," Molli said, standing up and heading for the door. If there was anything that she'd like more than piloting a Mindy, she hadn't found it yet.
Hoshi didn't need directions to any part of the ship, probably, but Molli recognized it as the courtesy it was. "'Preciate th'visit," she said as they moved through the ship's halls, past the personnel who were busying themselves as always. "Ent every day y'get one from th'Taisa," she sounded appreciative, and a little embarrassed. "Th'vacation was nice too."
"Maybe I should change that," Hoshi said as she led herself out of the room, leaving a disappointed Aratani alone to tinker with something much less interesting than a cybernetic arm. "Not a lot to do between Aiko-sama handling any paperwork and the long journey home, at this point. As eager as you are to get back in the suit, that's how I feel about giving you guys good reason to fight in them again."
A smile crept onto Molli's lips, she had a difficult time imagining a larger than life person like Aiko doing something as mundane as paperwork. Likewise, it felt odd to be the focus of anyone important, given her rank and inexperience. "Careful, y'might be spoilin' us," she said, with a small chuckle, "We're headin' home?" Molli seemed especially eager to hear that.
Home had been the easiest thing to re-contextualize after she'd fled Planet Nepleslia, as Yamatai had been more welcoming in her first year than the former had her entire life. As lonely as it had been to leave everything behind, it was still better than struggling to survive day by day. About the only thing she missed was her family, but Molli hoped that the portion of her pay she anonymously wired to her father's account every month could change things.
"Mmmm, yeah," Hoshi murmured, wistfully thinking of home as Molli was. "What's your favorite part of Yamatai, if that's even what you mean by home?" Having dropped into the zero gravity passageway at the end of the hall, Hoshi was floating to the bottom deck of the ship. Her light blue and white hair floated around the darker indigo of her crisp Type 35 jacket's shoulders and made her bangs lift above her cheerful face. Eventually, she set down near the ground but still floated as she embarked on deck five's hallway.
"Course it's what ah mean," Molli replied, with a hint of indignance that she could've meant anything else. "Th'cities're nice," If a little unfriendly towards motorists, given how robust the public transport system was, "Th'food..." She never would've imagined raw fish could be so delicious, "Their bikes're real good," Molli was getting pretty excited as she rattled off more than one favorite thing about the planet, even as she followed Hoshi down the zero gravity passageway.
In contrast to Hoshi, Molli's short hair didn't billow nearly as much, save for the tiny ponytail at the back. She felt lucky to have at least been in a type-22 uniform and not a surgery gown, but Molli would've preferred a few more layers like a pair of cargo pants and a jacket. "What's yours?" she asked after touching close to the ground and trailing beside the Captain.
"Man, you made me realize there's more to it than I've been seeing lately," Hoshi said. "Fresh pair of eyes is always nice. For me, though? Well, I really want to get back to my ranch on Tami where I have some livestock and just got a bunch of chickens in the coop before I left so now my turkey's got a flock to protect. Forgive me rambling about animals, but having that sort of relaxed way of living interspersed with the Kyoto culture that's always doing something new and eventful is nice for me. I wouldn't want one without the other."
"S'fine, ah get why y'like 'em," Molli had only ever seen an animal on a television, "Ahm hopin' to see one m'self someday."
"Sorry that I don't know off the top of my digital mind, but are you respawnable?" Hoshi asked as the door to the power armor bay opened as she stepped before it.
"Ah signed up for it, I think?" Molli replied, rubbing the back of her head, "Try not t'think about dyin'. They won't...put me inna Neko body if ah do, will they?"
Looking back at Molli with one eyebrow raised on her pink face, "What if we did? That would be pretty messed up! No, no, you'll be brought back according to your latest ST backup, so basically your body and your brain and all the rest—well, not your arm. We'd have to do that whole process again." Hoshi said, waving her hand towards Molli's arm. "Aratani might like that, though. You're getting a zesuiaum model when we get to Yamatai, yeah."
"And m'eyes," Molli pointed to her bright red irises, which seemed like normal eyes at a distance, but the glow of their circuits gave them away up close. "S'gonna suck t'wake up blind..." she murmured, though the knowledge that she'd be getting an upgrade to a fancy zesuiaum model helped distract from that unsettling thought.
As she asked this, Hoshi's volumetric uniform disappeared as she turned towards her Mindy. The armor was hard to tell apart from the rest of the crews and didn't stand out. Despite its ubiquitous appearance, Hoshi's hand patted it lovingly all the same as the torso opened up. The little floating captain very gently lowered into the legs of her Mindy 4 and waited for Molli, contemplatively standing with the chest piece of the armor still opened up.
"So how did your first mission go, Santo Hei? Or should I say Nitô Hei?" Hoshi remarked on the promotion she had to let Molli know about.
Molli was already leg-deep into her Mindy when Hoshi broke the news, and it made her look over to the Captain with wide-eyed surprise. "They're promotin' me?" Molli asked, her voice brimming with unconcealed happiness, before realizing that she'd been asked a question. "I-I mean, it went...dece." The mission had been the last thing Molli wanted to think about, given all that happened. "Didn't die..." That was the best she could muster to diplomatically describe her feelings on it.
"Decent's not bad," Hoshi said as she let the Mindy consume her, going over her pink body and head. She strutted towards the starboard side door that exited into space. She passed the glittering orange force-field before she went on to ask, "Worst part of the mission?"
Molli's uniform hadn't disappeared like Hoshi's, but it didn't make the process of being consumed by the Mindy uncomfortable. After she ran cursory diagnostics through her helmet's UI, she joined Hoshi in walking out into the void of space. "Too many," she said quietly, with the uncomfortable silence of space as the only accompaniment. "...We fried a buncha Mishhu slaves," There was no point in trying to hide her feelings from the Captain.
"I see," Hoshi said as she twirled around in the void of space. Distant stars seemed to stay static in the tapestry of velvety darkness while those closer slowly lulled past the ship as it moved with the pair of Mindy safely inside of its CFS bubble. "It wasn't the most humane treatment or way to deal with their Mishhuvurthyar masters. Rather than free them of that suffering by letting them live on, we ended their chances at freedom and lives in one foul swoop. Emphasis on foul."
A more tacit way to put disintegrating a ship full of slaves; Molli would've used more colorful, and cruder, words. She wasn't focused on how she floated through space, and her armor ended up inverted relative to Hoshi's. "Couldn't've saved 'em," Molli said, the vaccumless void made her bitterness more audible, "There were loads, 'n we barely got out after doin' what y'wanted." It was Molli's way of letting Hoshi know that she wasn't angry at the decision.
"It would have been nice, though," Hoshi said. "Not just nice, that's not the word, but it would have been humane like I said earlier. Justifying a handful of civilian lives in the context of a third war with an unknowably awful enemy will always be difficult, but I'm hoping future missions give us more of an opportunity to save lives in the moment rather than hoping for the long-term benefit alone. If that makes sense."
"Yeah," Molli said, "Ah do too." It was naive to go into war and expect to save lives, but she wanted to try nonetheless. "Um... You askin' this ent cause of how ahm actin', is it?" Molli's voice was filled with trepidation, "Ahm still good t'serve on th'Kaiyo, right?"
"No, no, you're good," Hoshi said immediately, then took a long breath in as she mused quietly, watching the stars that passed and those that stayed affixed far off. "You know, I used to just do what was asked of me, not worrying too long or too hard about anything beyond what could take down the enemy fastest. Now is a little different and I wish I could tell you why. Maybe it was the long time away from home and command during the Kuvexian War, maybe it was not having a break for those years and then getting time to reflect on Tami."
"But whatever it was, it helped me see that to look back at what I've done, I need to be able to think about what I would want to do better in the future. Sometimes life is just lucky and you did everything exactly as you should have and you get the best results possible and that's cause for celebration. Did we have a celebration after this mission, Nito Hei?"
"Ah had drinks wiv th'team," Molli said, "S'good we got through it, ahm happy none've us died." She took a moment to reflect on her actions that day, before continuing, "...Di'n't celebrate. Ah made a lotta mistakes, could've done better."
"William throwing around his Nepleslian whiskey again, huh?" Hoshi asked. She would have rubbed the bridge of her nose if she could. She moved towards the starship's hull towards its upper decks, "Follow me. What I'm saying is we didn't have much reason to celebrate last mission but we survived and we helped others survive. Sometimes, that's the bare minimum to call it a success."
Sometimes it wasn't enough to simply succeed; a racer couldn't brag if they won by sheer luck and circumstance. "We helped those guys that shot at us," she said, gently powering her wings to trail behind Hoshi, "Killed a buncha guys who shot at us." It was like a bad joke, but Molli laughed all the same. "Guess yer right. M'just glad it weren't all for nothing."
"Still, ah...wanna do better. Don't wanna let anyone down."
"Good thing they were shooting Mishhuvurthyar, too, huh," Hoshi noted, then thought about what Molli had said as she landed on the ship, just over the zero in the IRN. She in her Mindy was tiny in comparison to the Hinomaru next to the numbers "501" and she looked to it, then to Molli.
"It's better to go into the Star Army wanting to do better as a santo hei—nitô hei now—than have to learn after a dozen plus years. We're not a resupply ship or some reserve fleet vessel, either. We've taken on difficult tasks, this ship, too often to let anyone down. You're doing great if that's the mindset you have."
There was time to reflect on Hoshi's words on the way towards the ship's hull, and landing on it to behold its grand scale seemed to put a lot of things into perspective concerning her personal issues versus the enormity of her responsibilities. "We're doin' th'hard jobs cause it's what needs t'be done," she mused aloud, "Lots of people trust us, so...we can't let 'em down, right?"
It was a lot of pressure to have on your shoulders, but also, in a way, reassuring to know that she was part of something bigger than herself. Wallowing in self-pity and guilt seemed irresponsible with that in mind. "Thanks, Taisa," Molli faced Hoshi and bowed low, until she was staring at the hull. "Th'crew's been good t'me. M'happy t'be here with 'em."
"Thank you," Hoshi said, deflecting the appreciation back to where she believed it belonged. She walked forward a bit, standing in the swathe of crimson red that surrounded the large stylized Mindy painted on the ship hull and sat down so that she could look up at the stars. It seemed for a moment that she was going to simply stare off at the view and lay down like as she became absorbed with the ever-present night of space. Suddenly, though, she spoke up out of her reverie.
"We need to test that arm of yours. It's calibrated up with your armor, yeah? Moving with you? You know unlike a bike or a mecha, you wear a Mindy. You're not piloting it with your mind alone like Aiko does inside her Kirie but wearing it. So if you move it should move with you. If you engage the forearm pulse cannons on that arm, what happens?" She quickly added, "Shooting into space of course. Boss can repair the CFS bubble, but just shoot one."
Molli had joined Hoshi by the massive Star Army emblem, and was content to sit in silence until the Captain reminded her of the purpose of their excursion. "Right," she hadn't thought about how her arm was working, because it seemed to be just fine. Now that she was focused on it, however, Molli noticed that her arm was moving just slightly slower than her brain was telling it to. "It's still integratin' with my nervous system."
At Hoshi's request, Molli raised her right arm at the CFS, "Hope it ent too much work t'fix," she murmured, before engaging the forearm cannon. A burst of aether silently shot through space like a comet, before dissipating against the CFS bubble like a fizzling fire. "Little delay, but it'll fix itself soon. Sa primo cyber-arm."
"We'll let Aratani know to check it out before we get back aboard, I guess." Hoshi said as she watched the shield of her starship was poked by the forearm cannon's blast. Talking on something else she had been worrying about, she asked, "The work is worth it. How's it been working alongside Nepleslians as one yourself?"
"Y'mean wiv Will?" Molli wished Hoshi could see her smiling under the helmet, "He's..." she was struggling to think of a cant-word that described him, there were too many negatives in her vocabulary. "He's great. Good shooter, saved m'rear in that spire, an-" she snorted, "H-He's good cover. Why d'you ask? He like workin' wiv me?"
"A bit, yeah! We have a lot more where he came from in the legion so I bet there's more experiences to come to see just how good they are. But William, he's a cut above. You know I was almost up shit creek without a paddle recently, as you Neppies say, and he had my back just as much as any Neko would. I think you can look at how much we trust and rely on him to be able to see that the Nekovalkyrja on the Kaiyo can be every bit that warrior maiden we were made to be, but we know Nepleslians didn't have to be constructed in a lab to have the same fortitude for war as we do."
"S'funny, ah had this idea in m'head about Nekos when ah decided t'become a citizen," Molli double-checked the safety of her forearm blaster before continuing, "Super-soldiers from a lab sounded scary, but... Most've you're nicer t'me than anyone from m'old home. Ah had a lotta harsh instructors, but they made me a better soldier. Ah'd probably be dead wivout 'em."
"I guess ahm tryin' t'say, er, nobody's makin' me not feel welcome." As far as how she felt, that was a slightly different story.
"That's good to hear." Fully relaxed, Hoshi leaned back and put her armored hands behind her helmet. Out of her visor, she could no longer see the cargo they were hauling that was making the trip back so slow, just the stars alone.
"Anything we can do to make your stay more welcome, just let me or whoever you're comfortable talking to know. And if you move on to a different posting, don't know if that will fly as much. Other captains will ask for chain of command to be adhered to in daily life like it's a combat situation. Kaiyō's been out in deep space and her captain's had too much time on her hands for too many years to be too strict about enlisted asking her for what they need." She tilted her head back, a smile under her helmet as she noticed she had spoken in third person.
Somehow, asking the Captain herself to accommodate her seemed wrong to Molli, but she didn't want to just dismiss the offer. "Ah feel pretty welcome," Molli said, "If y'need me to do somethin', ahm glad t'step up. H-Honest, I could be a little more uncomfortable, s'really good around here." Before, she might've aired out about feeling useless compared to the Nekos, but having her efforts on the last mission acknowledged went a long way towards boosting her self-confidence.
"That's good to hear," Hoshi said, both pleased and content as she enjoyed the view from the top of the hinomaru on the ship hull. "Suppose we can't stay out here forever, Aratani's going to want to look over that arm for ya, Molli. but it was a nice excuse for a space walk all the same."
Molli stood up, "Yeah, she's keen on it. Y'think she'd never seen a cyberlimb before," there was an exaggerated tone of annoyance that drove home how little the attention actually annoyed the young soldier. "M'glad y'got me back in this suit, Hoshi-Taisa. Ken ah test th'Mindy's engine next time?" Her way of obfuscating a thinly-veiled excuse to go flying through space as quickly as humanly possible, or at least as quick as regulations would allow.
"We'll race next time," Hoshi said, amused by the imagery Molli's words elicited. "Even if it's not a fair fight, it'd be a fun matchup to see."
JP by Gles and Ametheliana
- OOC Notes
- This was an enjoyable first JP for me. Thanks for that, Ame.
