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Only Human (Goddess of Victory NIKKE SI)

Reader mode
Cinderella really do be proving why she's so fucking awesome, huh?
Don't get me wrong Red Hood is still my favorite Nikke girl, if only Shift Up would give her a cowgirl fit that wasn't effectively assless chaps because I'd pay so much money for that, but Cinderella is not lagging far behind in this fic.
 
Oh hey, long time no see! Hope life is going okay.
Damn, of course Emma summons emotional tension so thick you could barely cut through it with Nikke grade chainsaw, classic
Thanks for the chapter!
 
Chapter 98 - A Leaking Dam and A Commander's Burden
===
Chapter 98 - A Leaking Dam and A Commander's Burden
===

"It'll be fine, Rapi," Emma attempted to assure the smaller blonde as the trio made their way out the front door of the Command Centre to make way for the dedicated Armoury. "Eunwha just needs to hear from you that your time with Absolute is done. Then, we can move on and stop feeling stuck in this awkward fugue state."

Vesti spoke up next. "Ingrid has a big upgrade package for us ready to go, but Eunwha has been refusing to accept it… I think she's been hoping to wait until you come back, so we could all undergo the upgrades at once, together."

The strawberry blonde's gaze fell, her lips drawing into a taut line. That made Rapi feel even more guilty than she already did. But, it would have only made it worse if she'd said anything.

After a few moments of silence—only the sounds accompanying their travel being the three women's heeled feet click-clacking against the sidewalk alongside the distant sounds of constant construction work happening—Emma let out a sigh before continuing.

"Rapi, please stop clamming up and locking us out," the comparatively towering woman pleaded. "You've always been so explosively expressive. Loud, proud, so eager to excite and hype us up, make us feel like champions and heroes before, in the middle of, and after every successful operation…"

"Even though it was always you that did the most work at the end of them…" Vesti added quietly, wringing her little hands together. "I'll never forget that first time you got Eunwha to start actually accepting your fist bumps. How even she couldn't help but start smiling and laughing along with you."

Emma lit up like a Christmas tree at that. "Grumpy Eunwha, smiling, laughing, cheering and pumping her fist when she broke her own record! Bragging about how 'Absolute means nothing less than perfection…'" Smiling broadly, she set her cheek on the palm of her hand. "She hasn't smiled since you left. She's been so prickly, so standoffish… And you've changed so much too, Rapi," she noted, turning to face the smaller woman with a concerned frown.

Rapi's frown deepened exponentially at that. The way she'd behaved back then—like Red Hood. Like… Herself, in retrospect. Flippant, unserious, treating everything like a joke even as she ran ahead of everyone else to lead the charge. The type of behaviour that caused Goddess so many headaches, that culminated in her mistreating Joe the way she had. That ultimately wound up resulting in her… Killing a civilian, and not caring. Because she'd grown arrogant, and tired. Sick of everything, sick and tired and weighed down by the knowledge that she'd been a monster in her past life.

Yet, that knowledge had been a lie. The entire time, she had saved both the Ark and mankind alongside Joe in performing the actions that resulted in her Mind Switch. That knowledge, it had resulted in her breaking a second time, presenting a mask to Absolute to hide who she thought she really was, only to discover… The mask she'd been wearing, that personality, was who she really was, and always had been.

All of this was the result of that initial lie. If not for that lie, she… Could have just been. She'd still have been with Absolute. She'd have never been put in the position to hurt Eunwha in the first place. She wouldn't have been worn down, had her mindset broken to the point of being annoyed at her killing a human, even if unintentionally.

That lie. That damned lie. If not for that damned lie, she'd have just been herself, but not conditioned herself into believing that she was wearing a mask, a mask that weighed heavy with a lie that she'd done some great evil she had to repent for. Decades. Decades she'd carried that weight. Decades that lie coloured the way she'd thought…

But, even still, what was she supposed to say? Apologizing, trying to explain her point of view, it only made things worse. It would only make things worse.

"Rapi…" Emma continued in a saddened tone. "Please, talk to us. Why did you leave? Why did you grow so cold, so distant, so gloomy? You used to light up the room with your presence alone, that little lopsided grin you'd wear everywhere you went. So cocksure, but with the skills to back that self-assurance up. You just… left one day. We only found out when Eunwha asked Ingrid where you were, and picking you and your new squad up in the city was the first time since then we'd seen you at all."

"You were even still wearing the squad uniform too…" Vesti added quietly, a forlorn expression finding purchase on her features. "I thought that maybe you meant to come back after… Whatever it was you were doing. But, now I don't know what to think. I don't know why you left. I don't know why you stopped wearing our uniform. I don't know why you aren't coming back…"

Rapi grimaced outright at that point. She couldn't apologize, it would just make everything worse. But… She didn't know what she could do to make it up to Absolute. It was actions that mattered, but what action could she take here?

Emma sighed heavily, frustration growing in her chest, but gentle soul that she was, that frustration would never manifest or show in open anger. Instead her voice merely hardened, even then, only ever-so-slightly. "Rapi, say something. Anything. We don't want to assume the worst, but when you seem to just refuse to even offer so much as an explanation…"

After a few moments, feeling her chest tighten exponentially, Rapi, before she could logic her way into stopping before she started, blurted out: "I couldn't stay," in a strained voice.

While Emma perked up, sharply turning to Rapi with rapt attention, Vesti spoke up again. "W-wait," she interjected somewhat guiltily. "E-Eunwha should hear this too…"

Though that did cause Emma's frustration to spike, given that it seemed like they'd just made a breakthrough with Rapi… Vesti had a point, and Emma recognized that she was probably pushing a bit too hard without Eunwha present, given that she was the most terribly affected by Rapi's sudden and unexplained departure.

Thus, the far larger blonde sighed and relented. "You're right, you're right. Rapi, please, once we're with Eunwha, just… Talk. Just like you did right there. Just, please, stop holding it in. Just let it out. Please, just let it out."

Rapi's heart was going like a jackhammer. Just, let it out? Speak without thinking, like she used to? Like when she was Red Hood? Like when she was still back home with her mother-?

Rapi's eyes went as wide as dinner plates, her breath hitched for a moment even as her legs carried her forward, seemingly on autopilot.

Her mother. Her mother. Her life, her life before she was a Nikke, a piece of it, however small, however fleeting and almost phantasmal, had returned to her.

Her name, her face, her voice, all were still gone, she still couldn't see or hear them in her mind's eye… But a flash of the feelings, the emotions all came rushing back at once. Rapi had a mother. A mother she'd cherished, loved more than life itself. A mother that had given her everything. A mother that had taught her to read, to be brave, to be strong, to fend for herself in a cruel world, to be honest and loyal to those who earned her loyalty, to never tolerate disrespect from those who dared to disrespect her when she put her best foot forward. To respect those who were deserving of respect…

A mother that had loved her, picked her up when she was at her absolute lowest, whispered 'my little baby girl' in a voice Rapi couldn't remember as she clutched a helpless little girl that had been left behind into her chest when she was still so small and so slight, almost weightless…

Pressure started to build up in the back of her throat, and behind her eyes. Rapi fought to keep her composure, to control her emotions. She remembered that she had a mother. She remembered that she loved her mother, and was loved in turn. But she could remember nothing more than that. She couldn't remember the face or the voice of the woman she owed everything to. The woman that gave her a life she'd thought she'd never get to live, even if it had wound up briefer than it should have been…

And here she was, being marched right into a confrontation with Eunwha.

Why, Rapi wondered, did every emotional interaction she had with the people around her have to go like this? All the time, no matter the life she was living…

No matter what, it seemed, no matter how far she travelled, even a million miles away, after becoming an entirely different person, there, waiting for her so terribly persistently, she'd find herself. Just as broken and malfunctioning as she had ever been.

What a terribly cruel world.


Joe stared blankly, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath, already feeling utterly exhausted by the situation as it was. "Why?" He asked, dreading the answer.

"Why what?" Drake inquired in turn, brow furrowing in confusion. "Wait, no, I'm the one asking the questions here! So again: can you drive?"

"Yes, I can drive," he answered honestly. "So again, why- AH!" the Commander yelped, hand shooting out and barely managing to catch the keys that were whipped right at his face by the so-called villainess.

"Then you drive!" Drake declared, already marching around the fancy bright red high-speed low drag supercar adorned with a carbon fibre roof and white racing stripes on the sides she'd led him to upon arriving in the Ark proper. The thing only came up to her waist. Quite the departure from the big ol' pick-up trucks you had to climb onto and into the backwoods country Canadian boy was used to, to say the least.

"Why do I need to be the one to drive your car?" He asked, examining the keys engraved with the Missilis logo.

"Because I'm not allowed to drive anymore!" Drake declared as she popped open the passenger side door of the low-profile two-seater. "Court order," she added matter-of-factually in a way that totally wasn't incredibly concerning. "Also, Maxwell's busy doing stuff in the armoury, so she can't drive, and Laplace can't drive because she can't see over the dash, or can't reach the pedals when she uses a booster seat and she doesn't like platform boots for 'being dishonest.' So come on!" she said as she slapped the roof of the car before climbing in. "Those family-sized Mustang Fried Chicken buckets aren't going to go and order themselves!"

Indeed, everyone rooming in the Command Centre barracks wound up unanimously deciding that they wanted chicken (or simulated chicken, at least, not that one could tell on account of how stupidly malleable Nutrium was) for dinner. Given that Tetra Line was hilariously over-represented in the Outpost, the girls all wound up talking about how long it had been since they'd had apparently beloved Mustang Fried Chicken…

Long story short, Joe wound up being saddled with travelling down to the Ark to place the order and bring it back. The reason being that Drake affirmed that she had a car in the Ark, so they could save on delivery fees, on top of Joe's being a Commander meaning they'd get the much venerated Commander's discount by having him go in and work his magic. Which was to say, be recognized and surely have the benefit foisted upon him without his consent.

Joe wasn't Andersen; he didn't much care for special treatment and would rather remain generally anonymous if possible. Yet, Drake had a point about saving money. Even if they were kind of swimming in credits right then and there on account of Shangri-La's general absurd output in terms of mission performance—even regarding automated dispatches Joe wasn't really involved in setting up or overseeing—Lord only knew when they'd find themselves short on cash. Best to save wherever they could.

Thus, the man found himself fumbling with the controls of the vehicle, though only momentarily, considering Drake was quick to point out to him where everything was and all that. It was rather remarkably like something out of Cyberpunk 2077, meaning that it was sick, even if Joe didn't understand how the thing worked under the hood, aside from being electric and having a big radiation hazard symbol printed on the engine block, visible through the rear window that only seemed to be there to give a view of the engine.

"You don't look very confident for someone that knows how to drive," Drake mused while giving Joe a wary stare with her beady eyes. "What, you never driven a car like this before?"

"No," the man flatly declared as he hit the power button, which produced an underwhelming thush-whirr rather than the roar that accompanied most gasoline-powered vehicles back home. All automobiles in the Ark were electric, after all. Some electric engines were just more powerful than others. "This thing is a bit beyond what I'm used to driving."

"Heh. Well get ready to get impressed! You should see the airtime this thing can get when you ramp it off of something juuuust right!" Drake pantomimed a car hitting a ramp and soaring through the air with her hand, producing an explosion when it hit… Something indistinct.

Joe just stared blankly at the white-haired woman. It suddenly made sense why she wasn't allowed to-

"Oh, don't worry," Drake started, waving off some perceived concern. "That wasn't this car going 'boom' when it hit the thing. You wouldn't believe how sturdy Missilis built the Drakemobile to be! I've slammed right into the side of those Armoured Personnel Carriers the Ark Central Police Unit parks around the Government district before. Barely even got a scratch! You'd think that the car was totalled with the way Syuen and Maxwell reacted, though," she scoffed with a roll of her eyes.

-It suddenly made sense why she wasn't allowed to drive anymore. "And why, exactly, were you driving in a way that facilitated you crashing into an APC in the middle of the Ark in the first place?"

"Chasing down Heavenly Ascension with Laplace," Drake replied bluntly. "Infinity Rail only just caught them trying to blow up another train. Wasn't going to let them get away with that, trying to hurt civilians again."

'…Heavenly Ascension.' That was a name Joe hadn't heard in a while. Since his first and only mission to the surface with Marian, in fact. Terrorists that use the mistreatment of Nikkes as an excuse to hurt people, while not actually doing anything to help Nikkes achieve the same rights that everyone else had, to his understanding. "Did you catch them?"

"Not me," Drake shrugged. "Laplace kept going though. Was launched right at them when the car suddenly stopped, and she crashed through the back of their getaway vehicle like a brick. Whole dang thing wound up rolling down the street when she went at them while the van was still moving. It was kind of gnarly."

Joe blinked very slowly, taking a deep breath with both hands gripping the wheel of the unmoving car. "This happened in the middle of the street of the Government Sector?"

"Yeah, crazy they went there of all places, right? Apparently they started panicking the moment they recognized us, as they well should have! I'd be terrified to know that the Villain of Villains Drake had my number too!" She leaned back, chortling upwards into the roof of the vehicle's cabin.

Holy shit, Joe couldn't believe how irresponsible that was. Yet, somehow, he knew that his words would fall upon deaf ears were he to vocalize such thoughts, and so he just took a deep breath, focusing his gaze forwards as he prepared to drive-

The man yelped in shock when the entire vehicle jostled with a loud thump emerging from the roof, along with- "Onwards! Towards the dastardly villains that infest the Ark!" Laplace declared from the top of the car.

Joe did respond to that. "Are you out of your damn mind!?" He called out, reaching up and smacking the underside of his fist against the ceiling. "Get off the damned car!"

"What is she supposed to do then?" Drake inquired, leaning over and giving the Commander a dubious look. "There's only two seats in the Drakemobile, and Laplace always rides on the roof anyway!"

The man turned aside to give the stark-haired woman an aghast look. Then he paused, glanced backwards, and- Yeah. There were indeed only two seats. Yet… "So have her like, sit on your lap or something!"

"Hey! She's not that small!" Drake declared. "Plus, the last time we tried to fit everyone in here at once, we wound up flipping the car in front of the main police station. It's safer if she rides on top of the cabin. Plus, she enjoys doing it anyway!"

The Commander pursed his lips, and after pondering the situation for a moment, inquired: "If you have a car of your own, why doesn't Laplace? If Missilis is custom building these things for you, her size shouldn't even be an issue to begin with, right?"

"They did build something for Laplace," Drake started matter-of-factually. "The Laplacecycle got built so that she would fit on it properly and everything! But they forgot to ask if Laplace actually knew how to ride a motorcycle the first time it was ready to ride, and she shotgunned the throttle all the way open and rocketed full-force into the wall on the far end of the engineering bay back at Missilis HQ, so it's currently in the shop being overhauled and rebuilt to be tougher while she takes motorcycle driving courses in the meantime."

Joe just stared blankly at Drake, his horror reaching new heights as he just knew somehow that she wasn't fucking with him, and was telling him the God's honest truth. Jesus Christ, how terrifying. But, in an attempt to get his mind off of that particular thing… "First, the 'Drakemobile,' then the 'Laplacecycle…'" the man paused and clicked his tongue. "What next? The Maxwelltruck?"

"Maxwellcopter," Drake corrected him without missing a beat. "When the eggheads at the Missilis Engineering Corps asked us all what sorts of personal vehicles we wanted, I asked for the Drakemobile, Laplace asked for the Laplacecycle so she could 'get around anywhere and everywhere a car couldn't so evil doers could never get away,' and Maxwell really sarcastically asked for a helicopter with her face on it."

Drake rubbed her nose with a light sniffle as she continued.

"I don't think the head engineer understands sarcasm, though, because they actually went and built it for her. The whole cabin is built to look just like her face, and the inside of it is panoramic with a damn near three-hundred-sixty degree view of everything around it! It's wicked sick! Maxwell doesn't actually know how to fly a helicopter though, so Syuen is making her train in her time off using Missilis Flight Simulator until she's competent enough that we can deploy in it. She's almost there, but I don't think we'll be able to like, take it to the surface for this current mission or anything like that, so don't go getting your hopes up just yet."

Again, Joe just stared at Drake, who stared back at him, though she was casually blinking, in stark contrast to him.

"What?" The black-bedecked woman asked after a few moments. "I got something on my face or something?"

He was getting increasingly worried about the notion of actually going out into the field with these girls, he had to be honest-

"Hey!" A voice in Joe's left ear caused him to jump. Whipping his gaze around, he was met with Laplace's upside-down visage, the diminutive woman having dropped to her belly to hang her head over the side of the vehicle and peer into the driver's side window, her golden blonde hair streaming off of her head with her twintails in particular likely actually touching the ground at the base of the car. "What's taking so long? Didn't we order the chicken ahead of time? It's gonna get cold before we get there at this rate!"

"Yeah, the chicken's gonna get cold at this rate!" Drake asserted, harshly pointing at the steering wheel. "So move it or lose it! Nobody wants to have to eat cold chicken!"

Taking a deep, bracing breath, Joe clicked on the racing-style full safety harness, adjusted his grip on the wheel- Or, was it still called a wheel when it had spade grips? Bah, he adjusted his grip on the controls before moving to shift out of park.

Notably, doing this caused the entire cabin to suddenly seem to disappear, which caused Joe to jump as he could suddenly see Laplace leaping to stand on thin air above them, dramatically posing like a Sentai character on top of the about-to-move automobile. The whole damn vehicle's roof was evidently covered in micro-cameras that projected onto the massive screen the entire ceiling was made of, thus granting the visual advantages of a convertible, without actually needing to withdraw the vehicle's hard, protective roof.

It was sometimes shocking how easily Joe forgot that he was living in a bone-fide cyberpunk future, apocalyptic war or no. He'd also never driven a car like this before. The only thing he could remember driving lately (relatively speaking, from his admittedly skewed perspective) was those ruggedized military vehicles back when he'd started working for Andersen Solutions and Andersen didn't quite know what to do with him yet, beyond assigning him to logistics work.

At any rate, with a sigh, the car started to back up out of its parking space with a loud recurring 'beep' once the brake was released as Joe kept his eye on the rear view camera. Thus, the Drakemobile, currently decorated with a dramatically posing wannabe Sentai superhero on its roof, started off to fulfill its noble duty of providing hot fried chicken to a small army's worth of emotionally neglected cyborg super soldiers.

What a heavy burden he bore.
 
LordAxel20 said:
>Rapi: Being really close to have an emotional breakdown
>Joe: Slapstick comedy on his way to get their order of (NOT!) KFC
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God Almighty help Rapi and Joe , they both are taking sanity damage from two different directions yet the end result is still suffering for both of them,yet rapi might still take Joes place if she could maybe.
 
VH777Dragon said:
God Almighty help Rapi and Joe , they both are taking sanity damage from two different directions yet the end result is still suffering for both of them,yet rapi might still take Joes place if she could maybe.
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Worse: Put them both together, and I'll bet you anything that the two types of SAN DMG will friggin' cancel each other out – leaving no one else able to see how thoroughly they've both suffered.
 
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Ace of Scarabs said:
Never mind Joe, Snow White would never let Laplace or Drake take the helm in the Wings of Victory :D
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Remind me if I'm mistaken here, but ain't that giant airship currently stuck somewhere in the ground? Still *mostly* sky worthy?
Because if yes, I could imagine Anderson and Ingrid wanting its crashsite to be made into an 'outpost' while repairs are covertly carried out
 
YoRHa_42s said:
Remind me if I'm mistaken here, but ain't that giant airship currently stuck somewhere in the ground? Still *mostly* sky worthy?
Because if yes, I could imagine Anderson and Ingrid wanting its crashsite to be made into an 'outpost' while repairs are covertly carried out
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Sora would need to find the crash site first. (Grave might know about it, but she hasn't appeared in OH yet and it's been a century since then so she's probably already forgotten it)
 
Chapter 99 - Absolute Imperfection
===
Chapter 99 - Absolute Imperfection
===

The Armoury was about as expected: a single-story drab, fireproof, bombproof concrete and steel bunker, with multiple layers of security to deny easy access to the weapons within… Layers of security which were never active in the first place, because all firearms were biometrically locked to their assigned users and couldn't be used by anyone not flagged to use them any ways, and because if any Nikkes really wanted to get to their guns, a series of steel bars weren't going to actually do anything to stop them.

Slow the MPs down, maybe, if they were having an 'off' day. But even layabout Anis could just destroy a cell gate's multi-ton locking gear systems by forcing it open with her bare hands if she actually wanted to. A Nikke was a Nikke was a Nikke, and even Goddessium would fail before the driven claws of a truly determined Goddess of Victory.

Instead, for the sake of expediency given the Outpost's proximity to the surface and by extension the Raptures, the Commander had simply assigned a basic check-in, check-out system and mandated that it be audited daily, barring extenuating circumstances. Shockingly, none of the guns that were unusable by anyone not registered in Shangri-La's Identification Friend or Foe system had gone missing—save for Neon's, who frequently forgot to turn her firearms in at the end of deployments on account of being an airhead.

Regardless, aside from the evidence of Snow White's having made the entire building her dominion via her usual 'carefully managed' heaps of shit everywhere, Eunhwa had claimed a corner and was performing weapons checks on Absolute's guns… And Maxwell of Matis was set up on the table across from her, the short-haired blonde having all three of her squad's weapons laid out in various states of disassembly.

That almost caught Rapi off-guard, until she recalled mention of Matis being involved in the upcoming operation. That was bound to be… Interesting.

Regardless, Maxwell wasn't the reason they'd come to the Armoury. Rather, Eunhwa was, and lo, Eunhwa had noticed their approach. Noticed, and seemed caught flat-footed by Rapi's appearance. The most distinctive aspects of her old uniform, her beret, jacket, and necktie done away with in favour of a seemingly brand-new cherry red leather jacket, scarf, and a high ponytail. After a moment of staring at Rapi as she neared, Eunhwa scoffed and refocused on what she was previously working on, with a noticeably higher degree of force than was necessary.

Rapi's immediate instinct was to turn tail and leave, avoiding the intensely discomforting interaction to follow. But Emma's hand was suddenly firmly planted against the small of the shorter blonde's back, pressing her on wards. So, she was being denied the means to flee. Thus, it was all Rapi could do to just take a deep breath, and brace herself for the discomfort to follow.

As the group neared the immediate working area, Emma slowed down and addressed Maxwell before reaching Eunhwa. "Maxwell. Would you mind allowing us a moment of privacy? We're about to-"

"No problem," Maxwell cut her off, however, immediately setting down Drake's partially-dissembled energy scattergun, pulling off the gloves she was wearing and making for the door. "Good excuse to go get myself a coffee any ways. Sit down and enjoy a rare moment of peace with those two idiots distracted by someone else for once…" Thus, with little aplomb whatsoever, the sniper of Matis left Absolute and their former ace to themselves, seemingly making a point to make things as painless as possible for them.

"...Hm," Emma hummed as she started pressing Rapi on again. "Always appreciate how cooperative Maxwell is."

"Y-yeah…" Vesti added her voice to the sentiment, however small it was.

At any rate, the group quickly stood across from Eunhwa, who continued to work on Emma's minigun, visibly agitated by Rapi even as she made a point to not acknowledge her presence.

After a few moments of extended, awkward silence, Emma sighed and acknowledged that she had to be the one to get the ball rolling. "We've been talking to Rapi, Eunhwa. She has something to tell all of us." She punctuated her statement by patting Rapi's back, as if to lightly push her forward into the spotlight.

Rapi felt every muscle in her body tense. Unless like, an alarm suddenly went off, there wasn't much of an out for her to take. This was gonna suck.

After another uncomfortable pause, Rapi eventually worked up the will to force herself to speak, and she just said it like it was. "...I'm not coming back to Absolute."

It was like Eunhwa was punched in the stomach, with the way she suddenly locked up and snapped her eyes shut. The silence that followed was palpable, downright oppressive. Following that deeply unpleasant beat, the violet-eyed woman replied with what borderlined on a whisper. "Why?"

Rapi so desperately wished she could just dead-sprint for the door, but that wouldn't end well, so she just stood there, shifting about in place awkwardly.

In the midst of yet another stall in the interaction, Emma spoke up again, pressing her former squadmate. "Rapi, come on. Just tell us so we can all move on from this already."

Another stretch of silence, punctuated by Vesti speaking up in what was very nearly a whisper. "Rapi, please…"

No small amount of guilt panged through Rapi's chest at the pleading tone taken on by the diminutive silver-haired woman. Just enough to cause Rapi's mouth to outpace her mind for once. "I can't come back," she sputtered out before she could think.

Eunhwa turned and narrowed her eyes at Rapi, while Emma and Vesti shifted to stand slightly closer to her. It was Vesti that directly responded to that. "You can't come back? I… Why?" She asked, visibly upset by the notion.

Rapi's breath just hitched in her throat, averting her gaze to stare at one of the legs of the workbench Eunhwa was sitting at. It wouldn't make anything any better, it would just make it worse if she tried to explain herself.

Emma felt the weight on her shoulders redouble at the smaller blonde's hesitance to just explain herself, so that Eunhwa wouldn't be trapped believing that her best friend had just abandoned them for no reason. "Rapi, please." She repeated herself in an openly pleading tone.

After yet another period of Rapi just standing there, wavering in place as she wore an increasingly tortured expression, Eunhwa spoke up next. "Why?" She sharply inquired, staring intensely at her former companion.

Rapi looked like she was fighting to not talk.

This, unsurprisingly, immediately agitated Eunhwa more than she'd already been. "Why?" She angrily repeated herself.

Rapi actually bit down on her bottom lip even as she pointedly avoided the collective gaze of Absolute, making it very clear that she was actively refusing to just explain herself.

"WHY!?" Eunhwa actually and with her frustration boiling over, finally shouted as she forcefully slammed Emma's partially-disassembled minigun into the surface of the table she'd been operating at, which actually and loudly dented the solid steel workbench outright.

Needless to say, Vesti jumped in place and looked about ready to break into tears, and while Emma winced heavily and grimaced at the display…

"Because I'm broken!" Rapi finally cried out without thought, her voice, for the first time since Absolute had met her, breaking. This, needless to say, elicited silence from the Armoury's current inhabitants.

"...What?" Emma started, gazing upon Rapi with intensely worried eyes, her body language betraying no small amount of extreme concern. "Rapi, what do you mean by that?"

Vesti, meanwhile, warily reached out, and though slowly, took a gentle hold of her larger fellow's hand, staring up at her with eyes that were rapidly growing intensely glossy with unshed tears.

Eunhwa just stared, little more than her expression having twisted into one of confusion indicating that she'd processed Rapi's words.

There was no way she could get away from this now. Unless a Rapture incursion through the surface tunnel occurred…

…

…A long, awkward silence suggested that there would be no convenient emergency to break her out of this situation. So, with Absolute just staring at her, waiting, a shuddering breath escaped Rapi's lips before she just thought back to the admission she made to Joe regarding this very issue. Just get it out, just get it out, and get it over and done with.

"I… That mission," Rapi started, her voice deeply uncharacteristically dry and scratchy compared to what her former squadmates had ever heard from her. "That mission where we were deployed against Heavenly Ascension in the residential sector… The one where-" she took a deep, shaky breath. "-I killed a human…"

Emma reached out, gently encircling her fingers around Rapi's slim elbow. "Rapi, that wasn't your fault-"

"I didn't care." Rapi cut her off, her voice once more barely registering as a whisper.

There was a long pause, Emma, Vesti, and Eunhwa looking more than a little taken aback and unsure of how to take that declaration.

The dam, regardless, seemed to have broken, given how Rapi just continued. "I killed a human and didn't care. I- I didn't just not care… I was annoyed. I was mad at that person because of the paperwork I'd have to do at the end of that operation because of the friendly fire. I killed a civilian we were there to protect, and I didn't care. I was annoyed. I met their gaze as they laid there dying and was mad that they'd gotten in the way of the grenade I threw back…!"

Breath coming in heavy, borderline gasps, the pot had boiled over, and at this point, there was little Rapi could do to stop it as she kept speaking.

"A Nikke's purpose is to protect mankind, at any and all costs. Nikkes exist to shield humans from the monsters that would kill them. Nikkes fight and die, sacrificing everything for the sake of ensuring that what's left of humanity can live comfortably in the Ark, as though the world itself never ended. You all… You all kept looking at me like I was a hero, like I was the Ark's hope for the future, telling me I gave you strength, that you felt unstoppable with me around… Me, a murderer. Me, an uncaring killer of humans! Me, a soulless weapon that just tricked you all into thinking I was something more than an empty machine!"

Breath hitching, there was no satisfaction or relief in admitting it all aloud. What did it change? What did it accomplish? She'd still deceived Absolute, misled them into believing that she was something she wasn't. She was just a cold-hearted killer-

At once, Rapi remembered: it wasn't as bad as she thought it was. That entire conversation she'd had with Joe… She'd gotten caught up in her own illogical feelings, forgotten that the Sealing Day massacre was justified, and necessary. No innocents had been harmed, they were the reason humanity wasn't extinct in the modern day.

Yet, here she was, still trapped in these festering emotions. Even if she was still right about the incident with the grenade… Why couldn't she move past this headspace? Why was she stuck thinking this way? She didn't understand it.

After an extended beat, Eunhwa broke the silence. "Why didn't you say anything?" She asked, her voice low, quiet, still tinged with no small amount of anger. "Why didn't you tell us any of this?"

Rapi damn near scoffed. "What would it have changed?"

"Everything!" Eunhwa snapped back with a shout, her brow furrowing heavily and her teeth gritting together.

Rapi's eyes went wide as she couldn't help but meet Eunhwa's amethyst gaze, burning with a sharp intensity that would cause most to wither away in response.

Shocked still, nobody spoke up before Eunhwa continued. "It would have changed everything!" The ravenette asserted, her eye and lips twitching in that way they did whenever the woman felt personally slighted, if not outright betrayed. "We've been your squadmates for years upon years. We've fought and bled alongside you for so long, we've accomplished so much for the Ark with you. We've trusted you, we've put our lives and those of the people we protect in your hands so many countless times, and you've never let us down. Not once, not a single time did you ever give us any reason to not know that you were the greatest, truest friend and comrade we could ever have. For as high as Absolute has climbed, it soared with you. If there is any Nikke in the Ark that would resemble a member of Goddess Squad, it would have been you."

Eunhwa sharply inhaled as she continued speaking.

"Yet, despite all that, at the end of the road… You just… Leave. You don't even try to talk to us about this? You don't even let us know, we find out by going to Ingrid and being told about the transfer request after you were already gone? Did all of it mean nothing-?"

"No!" Rapi cried out immediately, no small amount of dismay present in her voice.

"Then WHY!?" Eunhwa repeated herself, clenching her teeth and snarling as a frenzied wolf might. "Why don't you trust us!? Why don't you consider us worthy of your companionship!? Why didn't you even consider just talking to us!?"

It was, however, Emma that interjected, stepping forward to place herself between Rapi and Eunhwa while addressing the squad's smallest member. "Vesti, take Rapi elsewhere, emotions are too high right now and everyone needs time to calm down."

"Ah-" Vesti glanced about in surprise and unease, but, after glancing Eunhwa's way and seeing how her chest was heaving, nostrils flaring and brow furrowed into a steely knot, she quickly acquiesced and went to pull Rapi away from the ongoing tableau and back out of the Armoury.

It would be no great surprise to note that Rapi did not put up a fight, and in fact, felt the vice that had found purchase around her chest loosening with every step taken away from Eunhwa, and at once, it felt like she could breathe again; even more so once they passed through into the streets of Shangri-La proper.

Emma remained rooted right where she'd been when she sent Rapi and Vesti off, taking several deep, centring breaths for a good half-minute. Once she felt her own heartbeat slow into something approximating normalcy, she turned on her heel to face the squad leader.

Eunhwa had her hands planted flat on the stainless steel surface of the workbench, leaning over heavily, shoulders shaking as she inhaled past tightly gritted teeth. For as cool and collected and unflappable as Absolute's leader seemed to be to those who might not know better… Eunhwa was a very emotional individual, and had been especially hurt by Rapi's unannounced departure.

"Eunhwa," Emma started, approaching the squad leader to settle a palm over her hand-

Only for Eunhwa to sharply withdraw the limb as she spun on her heel and bent over Emma's minigun once more, immediately returning to fiddling with what would have been a vehicle-mounted weapon a century prior.

It was all Emma could do to let out a bone-deep sigh. For as much as she loved her companions, holy mother of Christ could they be frustrating to deal with. It was saying something that Vesti—the little unhinged berserker that put the fear of God into anyone that saw her throw her weapon aside and jump on the nearest Rapture to tear it apart with her bare hands—was far and away the most stable and easiest to actually deal with on an interpersonal level.

The comparatively tall blonde had long since accepted that her role in the team, squad automatic fire aside, was that of the resident cat herder and cat whisperer. If she didn't put in the work to sort out everyone's issues and make sure everything was copacetic, nobody would. Not for a lack of will on Vesti's part, but… Vesti was just not built for that sort of thing.

Regardless, Eunhwa, for as much as she preferred to be left alone when in this sort of mood, was a mess and would only stew and fester in her own maluses if allowed to.

So, Emma closed the distance between herself and the ravenette, and simply set her hand between the much shorter woman's shoulder blades—her fingers lightly pressed against the frame of the Harmony Cube receptacle implanted in Eunhwa's spinal column for a moment before Emma shifted her palm a little lower to settle on the soft of her back instead. Physical contact of any kind, it mattered so much more than many would like to believe or otherwise convince themselves.

As demonstrated when Eunhwa, despite going incredibly tense for a few moments at the contact, unwound so much that Emma felt it in her musculature even through her jacket. Following a heavy sigh from the black-haired woman, Emma stepped in even closer, and wrapped her arms around the violet-eyed beauty.

"...Must you jump on every possible excuse to invade my personal space?" Eunhwa asked, audibly grimacing in exasperation.

"The hugs will continue until morale improves," Emma replied in a playfully warm tone.

Though Eunhwa went slightly limp, sighing once again, she didn't protest further. "...If she had so many issues, why wouldn't she have ever said anything to us?" She instead inquired, anger having subsided mostly in favour of quiet dismay and dejection.

"Maybe she's been trying to hide just how… Sketchy, I suppose, her past really was behind the unstoppable super hero mask she wore when she was with us, and she doesn't actually know how to handle any of her issues? Rapi clearly has more demons than any of us could have imagined," Emma noted sadly, continuing to hold the smaller woman with a wan smile—not just for Eunhwa's sake, despite appearances. "Even with Commander Pholus… It turns out that they're old lovers, and had been estranged for an incredibly long time, seemingly off the back of their old relationship having ended poorly."

"...Emma," Eunhwa started, her voice becoming more than a little terse. "Are you seriously taking the opportunity to gossip like a hen right now?"

At that, Emma squeezed Eunhwa just a bit harder than was strictly necessary. "I'm telling you that Rapi has kept a lot of history from a past life to herself, a lot that clearly still haunts her. Even with her current Commander, despite being happy with him, she has long standing issues. Issues that run so deep that when I accidentally poked at an open wound just trying to tease them, I swear you could hear the click of a landmine bounding off the walls for minutes afterwards. It seems like she has a habit of just… Not facing her demons, sweeping them under the rug and just… Refusing to acknowledge that they're still there."

There was a long beat before Eunhwa replied to that. "...So you're saying that Rapi's, what, the kind of woman that creates as many problems as she solves, then just… Runs away from the issues she makes when they become too much to ignore?"

Emma hummed, sighing through her nostrils. "You did use to say that she seemed too perfect back in the day, didn't you? She was 'too good to be true,' 'what's the catch?' 'Nobody is that flawless…' Well, turns out she really wasn't 'perfect' after all, huh?"

After a few moments, Eunhwa seemed to start trembling, though it only took a second for Emma to register that the smaller woman was just soundlessly laughing, a chuckle without mirth. She eventually stopped, and replied in a bitter tone. "I think I'd have preferred to have been proven wrong in this case."

Emma's expression fell, her joyless smile painting her sadness with the situation clear across her features. "I think we all would have preferred that you'd been wrong this time too."

Scoffing, Eunhwa replied with a forced grin. "Too bad I'm always right, then."
 
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Yay a new chapter!
Honestly surprised things didn't escalate more though, I guess we should thank the lucky stars the rest of Absolute was there as well haha
Hope you're doing well and that you have a great rest of your day, cheers!
 
Chapter 100 - Winner Winner, Chicken Dinner New
===
Chapter 100 - Winner Winner, Chicken Dinner
===

Something Joe hadn't previously noticed about the Ark's fast food joints, was that they didn't have drive-through windows. Given how few and far between privately-owned vehicles seemed to be, that actually made sense if one stopped to think about it. Most just used public transport to get around the city.

That did, however, mean that they actually had to park the car and get out to go inside and get their order. On its own, Joe was fine with that, he didn't have problems talking to randos if he had to. The issue came from the fact that he had failed to account for the fact that Matis was the most famous Nikke squad in the Ark as Laplace and Drake followed him into the ostentatious golden building.

To say nothing of the fact that-

"Holy moly! Is that the Commander of Counters with Matis?"

"What! The Tyrant Breaker wouldn't- No way- No way, it really is him!"

"Is he the Commander of Matis now? Wasn't the squad he was the boss of already totally busted as it was?"

"They must be getting sent to a super serious mission to put together that kind of team!"

Joe didn't pay attention to social media, or even really news of any kind to speak of. Meaning he had absolutely no idea in the least that he and Counters had very quickly built up a very particular reputation, and he was likely never going to be able to step into the Ark without being noticed again.

And-

"HA HA!" Drake suddenly crowed out, throwing her head back as she chortled like a deranged super villain. "That's right! Tremble and fear the power of Villainy that has beset this humble establishment, here to take all of your fried chicken for the purposes of Villainously eating it all to ourselves! Villainously!"

"Foolishness, Drake!" Laplace interjected, planting her fists on her slim hips as she assumed a generic heroic Superman pose meant to emphasis a heroic build, more than a little diminished by the fact that she barely came up to the man's clavicle and was a skinny little thing besides. "We're here to fill our bellies for Heroic deeds in defence of the Ark! A Hero does not work on an empty stomach and not without supporting small local businesses!"

Joe almost dryly pointed out that Mustang Fried Chicken was a Tetra Line owned and operated business, thus making it the exact opposite of 'small,' but all he could do was manage a small sigh.

While Laplace and Drake started bickering about whether they were villains or heroes, and particularly whether Joe himself was a 'Dark Overlord' or a 'Heroic Icon,' the Commander ambled over to take their order while the two idiots were distracting the whole-ass entire rest of the restaurant that had started to congregate around them.

With every minute that passed, he understood Maxwell's soul-deep exhaustion more and more.


Joe was tired as they drove back towards the elevator to Shangri-La, still labelled as leading to 'the Outpost,' given that the Ark was run by ever-incompetent bureaucrats that couldn't work their way out of a wet paper bag without getting six unanimous votes in a row to begin the process of voting on getting out of the bag.

The man was tired not just because of Drake and Laplace's bullshit, but because he had been beset upon by people that wanted his autograph and shit while waiting for their food to be prepared, because despite Drake and Laplace's assertions to the contrary, they hadn't actually placed their order ahead of time. Andersen would have been in hog Heaven had their positions been switched, but Joe was not Andersen. He was not one for public attention.

"You get tired easily, huh?" Drake asked as she peered over the top of the comically large, golden bucket of chicken emblazoned with Mustang's face set between them on the console between the driver and passenger's seats. "You should have ordered a coffee or energy drink or something."

"Probably," Joe agreed as the car silently rolled down the sparsely-trafficked streets of the Ark, coming up on an intersection. Coming off of a highway, they were actually going fairly fast. "Don't care for attention. And put on your seat belt!"

"Man, you picked the wrong job to be good at then," Drake declared as she was about to finish wolfing down her chicken burger (Joe wasn't going to call a meat patty between buns a 'sandwich'). "Counters is getting really popular really fast. You have any idea how rare it is for some fresh rookie to survive an encounter with a Tyrant at all? And Gravedigger at that! I heard that people are starting to make bets on how many Tyrant kills Counters will have by the end of the year. It's usually just us and Absolute that get talked about that way, you know! A few real confident ones are even betting that you'll get Stormbringer to your name by New Years too!"

Notably, she didn't listen to his demand to put on her seat belt.

Glancing up at the ceiling of the cabin at the mention of Matis' reputation, the Commander nearly balked at the idea of the girl sitting with her legs crossed on the roof of the car—eating her chicken nuggets as they rolled along—being one of the most famous and successful warriors of the Ark's armed forces, and by a wide margin, no less.

The light on the intersection stayed green, so Joe didn't slow down as they neared it, gaze drifting down the street to the left of the vehicle. "So-" He started, only to be cut off as Laplace suddenly leapt to her feet with a loud thump, which caused the man to jump on top of-

"STOP!" Drake shouted at the top of her lungs, face whipping around to fixate on the opposite end of the street Joe had been looking down.

Joe complied instantly, slamming his foot on the brake which was SHOCKINGLY more effective than expected, given the harsh g-forces suddenly imparted on the man's body as the vehicle's racing harness locked him in place and the car stopped way more efficiently than a modern man would have expected.

Emphasized by, firstly, Drake, who had refused to put on her seat belt, flying forward and violently slamming face-first into the vehicle's dash and windshield. Joe's heart leapt into his throat at the sight- and rocketed into the Heavens above as the law of momentum asserted itself upon reality by, secondly, launching Laplace off the roof of the vehicle and into oncoming traffic.

The little blonde was struck by a speeding van, horrifically rag-dolling over its roof and continuing into the next lane, where she was hit again by a utility truck that came to a screeching stop as she bounced off of the grill of the vehicle and came to a boneless rolling stop on the asphalt street.

There were no words to describe the mortification that washed over Joe as the first vehicle that had hit Laplace didn't do much as slow down, rocketing down the street at full speed just as a pair of cop cars came screaming after it, the second Ark Central Patrol Unit patrol vehicle coming to a screeching halt at the site, likely on account of what had just happened to a horrifyingly still Laplace.

Then Laplace suddenly leapt up, landing square on her feet as though nothing had happened- "Evildoer!" She cried out while dramatically pointing after the van. "You will not escape the long arm of the law pursuing you with the aid of the legendary hero Laplace! Hiyah!" She then proceeded to Naruto run down the street at a speed that actually put the other cars around her to shame, her twintails and greatcoat dramatically billowing behind her as she went, clearly moving fast enough that she was obviously going to catch up to the perpetrator.

Joe just blankly stared ahead into the ether. The man's mind was full of fuck as he struggled to process everything that had just happened, and-

"That looked like one of those old, obsolete utility vans that Heavenly Ascension uses to sneak into Government and business sectors before everyone realizes they aren't supposed to be using them anymore," Drake casually declared as she slid back to resettle on the backrest of her seat as though nothing had happened, rubbing her reddened forehead aside. "Heh, those criminals are in for a rude awakening now that they have Laplace going after them! The little nutbar is persistent, if nothing else!"

She turned to Joe, who had shifted and started blankly staring at her again.

"...What?" She asked as the doors to the parked ACPU patrol car opened up. "I got mayo on my face or something?" The silver-haired woman started wiping her face, entirely nonplussed by the fact that she'd just slammed her face into the car's dashboard and windshield hard enough to have probably killed a flesh-and-blood woman.

Joe wasn't going to be able to take much more of this.


Liter stared at the ringing phone at the front desk of the Command Centre foyer. She stared, and stared, and stared some more. As ever, the front desk was unattended, yet the phone rang, and rang, and rang. She knew, she just knew some bullshit was going to follow her answering that phone, though she knew damn well that if she didn't answer it, no one would.

She knew this because the Commander was nowhere to be found. She'd texted him, went up to his office, and even poked around the officer's quarters he had Goddess Squad situated in. She just needed to confirm if Mighty Tools was actually allowed to start work on that 'night club' that was actually just a front for an obvious sex dungeon Wardress was petitioning to have built.

Granted, the Commander was obviously a pervert given the sorts of women he surrounded himself with, so the Foreman doubted that he'd protest the idea, but she was a professional and wouldn't act without official confirmation, damn it!

She was also looking forward to patronizing said establishment herself, given how stressed she'd been lately and how nice to look at Yuni and Mihara were. Doubtlessly doubly so to touch, but they'd get to that when they got to that. For now…

The phone continued to ring, with no signs that anyone else was going to come along and answer it, it only figured that it came to Liter to be the only reasonable adult on-site. So with a heavy sigh, she walked around to the back of the desk, reached up to grab the receiver and lift it from its cradle, and set it to her ear. "Shangri-La Command Centre, can I help you?"

"Oh jeez, 'Shangri-La?'" A girlish voice whined on the other end of the line. "I was supposed to call the Outpost, Poli's gonna get mad at me again, I better-"

"'Shangri-La' is the Outpost's proper name now, Miranda," Liter very dryly cut the young woman off before she worked herself up into a tizzy over nothing, as she usually did.

"Oh- Oh? Liter? What're you doing answering the phone at the Outpost? You aren't the foreman of Mighty Tools anymore?" The airheaded young woman quizzically inquired.

"There was nobody else around to answer the phone at the front desk, and I figured that it was up to me to be the only responsible adult around again, especially since I can't find the Commander," Liter answered with a heavily lidded expression and thoroughly exasperated voice. "Now, why is the ACPU calling the Outpost, Miranda?"

"Huh?" Miranda paused for a moment, seemingly to allow her mind a moment to spool back up and get refocused. "Oh! Right! The Commander!" She cleared her throat before restarting. "Hello, this Deputy Miranda of the Ark Central Patrol Unit! We are calling to get in contact with the second-in-command of the Outpost regarding Commander Pholus having been detained alongside the Supervillainess Drake for aiding in violating the Supervillainess Drake's lawful restriction of access to the Drakemobile! And also being potentially indirectly responsible for a traffic accident involving the Hero Laplace having been projected into oncoming traffic and an ongoing police chase!"

Liter just blankly stared into the distance for a long few moments, her face entirely bereft of expression before she closed her eyes and took a very deep breath in and out through her nostrils.

"...Um, hello? Liter?" Miranda continued warily. "Did the call drop or-?"

"I'll be there right away," Liter declared with only the type of exhaustion an overworked, elderly woman could despite her youthful countenance. "Is Laplace being held too?"

"Oh, no, Laplace is helping Poli and Triangle capture Heavenly Ascension right now!" the young officer cheerfully declared. "Poli's probably going to bring her in too once they're done though, since she was with Commander Pholus and the Supervillainess Drake when the traffic accident occurred!"

"Miranda," Laplace started with palpable weariness. "'Supervillainess' and 'Hero' aren't actually Drake and Laplace's titles, you don't need to call them that."

"Oh," Miranda paused for a moment again. "Okay! So, you'll be here soon?"

"Yes. Don't let Drake or Laplace go until I'm there," she instructed the officer, given that as their elder both as a Nikke and as a Missilis operator, she had to tear into them for getting the Commander in trouble—not that he wasn't going to get a piece of her mind for going along with their obvious idiocy as well, but he was the sort of guy that had to go along with a pretty face like a smitten puppy, dipshit that he was. "I'm leaving right now."

"Okay! See you soon, Liter!" At that, the line was cut, and upon setting the phone back down on its cradle, the little yellow-clad blonde just quietly settled her forehead on the edge of the desk and sighed.

She was far, far too old for this sort of shit.


Joe sat quietly in the ACPU station they were being held in, a building that looked the part of pretty much any common North American police station would have. The man's head was in his hands and his lips were drawn into a tight grimace. Both because Drake had thoughtlessly dragged him into becoming an accomplice to her casual violation of her court order to not access her car, at all, and because-

"Commander Pholus?" One of the officers started as she came to a stop in front of the barred cell the man and Drake were stuck in while waiting to be bailed out. "Miranda says that Foreman Liter of Mighty Tools is on her way to act as your second-in-command, can you sign off on her taking such a role?"

"Provisionally," Joe replied, being willing to potentially need to do some damned paperwork later on to clarify the matter if it meant getting out of jail faster, peeking out from between his fingers at the officer-

"So acting second-in-command then…" She noted, writing something down on a tablet where she stood. "This situation is a bit more common with Commanders than you might think, so it shouldn't present any issues, especially since Liter is well-respected and has a lot of pull as a long-time Missilis representative with a spotless career record."

Joe nodded and did his best to not turn and openly gawk, given-

"Officer Quiry!" Drake started as she leapt to her feet, still protectively clinging to the comically large bucket of chicken that had somehow left the earlier situation entirely undisturbed. "Hold me if you must, but the Commander is innocent! I could never call myself a true Villain if I allowed someone else to take the blame for my mistake! Let him go!"

If nothing else, Drake at least immediately owned up to her error and did her best to get the ACPU to let Joe off, given that she had technically misled him into unknowingly violating her court order. So the man would give her that.

That aside…

"We need to make sure that someone in his chain of command is aware of this incident and signs off on it in person so it can be officially noted regardless, Drake," Quiry said with a small, apologetic frown. "He can go as soon as Liter has confirmed everything."

Joe was actually not as mad about the situation as he might've been, because oh God why, hot cop.

If the man were being honest, Quiry hit all of the same buttons that Privaty did. Short, 5'0"/153cm in two-inch/five-centimetre platform shoes, meaning she had all of an inch on teeny-tiny little Privaty. Her long, flamingo pink hair was tied up into a pair of gorgeous flowing twintails with simple dark ribbons and a blossoming flower hairclip flanking a cute little officer's cap. Her big emerald eyes were framed by those same locks, simple glasses, and a fair-skinned face, an expression closely resembling a near-perpetual pout was worn on her girly button features.

She was curvaceous, built similarly to Privaty, yet her form was subtly exaggerated by the fact that she wore a dark tactical corset adorned with a chain that looped under her arm, with pink laces over the stomach. What made a corset 'tactical?' Well, the fact that it didn't quite terminate at her bosom, but had an integrated tactical harness that looped over her shoulders, the straps of which which were connected across her collarbone, which served to frame and emphasize her ample chest.

The violet necktie hanging from her cute short-sleeved polo with cutely ruffled shoulders was the only thing distracting from that emphasis. Notably, said shirt was excessively long, and seemed intended to be zippered up at the side to hug the wearer's figure, and given how it wasn't zipped up, it created an interesting bit of asymmetry where she had what looked like a single loose shirt tail draped over the side of her dark, pleated miniskirt which was itself adorned with a single white stripe that hovered around the rim of the hem.

Of course, she was wearing white thigh-highs that terminated in black elastic bands that produced no small amount of squish, and worse yet, she wore a pair of utterly redundant garterbelts that disappeared beneath her skirt, with said garterbelts being connected to the socks by pink heart-shaped rings. Then, were the aforementioned platform shoes. Pink bodied with violet platforms and crisscrossed straps…

Top-to-bottom, she was painfully cute and also gorgeous. If Joe hadn't been forcefully beaten down by sheer overexposure to stunning beauties in the Ark, he'd have surely made as much of an ass of himself the first time he'd met Privaty. Luckily, he was at least mostly acclimatized to being in the presence of unreasonably attractive women by now, and so he was able to restrain himself into only occasionally stealing glances at the girly beauty, rather than gawking outright.

"-I apologize for this, Commander," Quiry turned to look at Joe, her big emerald eyes locking on him causing the man's heart to skip a beat. "We'll sort this out as quickly as we can, then get you back up to the Outpost- er, Shangri-La within the hour!" She shifted her gaze to Drake momentarily, a regretful look finding purchase on her features. "Your chicken's gonna be totally cold by then, though… Sorry about that."

God she was so pretty, what the fuck.

"That's what the microwave is for," Drake waved the concern off. "Or the oven. I like the oven more because the microwave makes the bottom of the chicken all soggy and stuff," the black-clad woman said as she sat back down, still holding onto the giant bucket of chicken as if her life depended on it.

"Oh, well," she then gave Joe a big, closed-eye smile that made his heart skip a beat. "There you go Commander, no big problem, right? Everything works out in the end!"

Joe took a breath in an attempt to steady himself before replying. "Y-yeah. No harm, no foul and all that…"

"I'm sure that Poli won't hold it against you!" Quiry asserted, continuing to beam. "Anyways, Foreman Liter should be here soon, so just sit tight for a bit, okay?"

Joe just nodded quietly.

With that and a little encouraging nod of her own, Quiry returned to her desk, swapping her glasses for a second violet-rimmed set as she started typing away at the work terminal. Multiple sets of glasses she hotswapped on the fly? Bad eyes? In the Ark? With the kind of medical technology they had? Hell, even if she were a human, couldn't they give her the same kind of cybernetic eyes Nikkes used?

Strange, that, but, hardly Joe's business, so he just sighed, turning to Drake, and presenting her a lidded look.

"...What?" She asked, popping an eyebrow before she glanced at the ginormous bucket with her eyes momentarily widening. "Oh! You want a piece? Well, it's all cold now, but go ahead if you don't mind that."

Of course, she totally missed the fact that he was annoyed at her for having gotten him detained by the goddamned cops. Though… Well, it wasn't like there was anything else to do, so with a shake of his head, he reached over and grabbed a big juicy leg, biting into it, and-

Finding himself shocked by how crispy, and juicy it was, even after cooling down as much as it did.

Shit, did Mustang know how to make some good fuckin' fried chicken.
 
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I have this feeling that, one day, Joe is just going to hear something that drives him too far. He'll grab First Affection off the wall and proceed to use it to solve his problems.

Quite possibly by chasing various Nikke around, screaming incoherent gibberish.

He'll also likely shoot Anderson at least once. Somewhere non-fatal but extremely painful. Just to ensure that his displeasure has been made Very clear.
 
BakaSmurf said:
Then Laplace suddenly leapt up, landing square on her feet as though nothing had happened- "Evildoer!" She cried out while dramatically pointing after the van. "You will not escape the long arm of the law pursuing you with the aid of the legendary hero Laplace! Hiyah!" She then proceeded to Natuto run down the street at a speed that actually put the other cars around her to shame, her twintails and greatcoat dramatically billowing behind her as she went, clearly moving fast enough that she was obviously going to catch up to the perpetrator.
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Naruto

Also goddamn. Liter actually makes sense as a second in command given how batshit everyone else is.
 
DeathShade said:
Naruto

Also goddamn. Liter actually makes sense as a second in command given how batshit everyone else is.
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Don't kid yourself. Liter's just as batshit as everyone else – the only difference is that her mania actually synergizes with everyday society.

That, and her advanced years means she's had a lot more time to learn how to hide it.
 
YOOO, the big 100 congrats!!!
Joe as usual has no control over the train wreck he's leading and I'm loving every bit of it.
BLESSED BE CHAOS OVERLORD DRAKE!!!
Can't wait for you to suddenly hit us with a darker chapter with Dorothy or Marian, front and center, I have a feeling we're close to something like that
Thanks for the chapter and once again, congrats o/
 
NooneImportant said:
If you think Joe's popular now with two Tyrants under his belt, watch Joe stocks explode after the Kraken.
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For the ending of Beauty Full Shot, Canon Commander has a promo photo of the girls gathered with him, everyone in their beachwear, with the wreck of the Gold Kraken in the background. He's not even taking down the Tyrant with a combat squad, he explicitly has 3 Bad Girl Squads (Jackal's from Exotic, Guilty's from REAL KINDNESS, and Sakura's from Underworld Queen) bring down the Kraken (with Jackal and Guilty ripping apart its armor with their bare hands and teeth), and he even assists Sakura with the killshot.

If Joe does anything near that crazy during one of the potential beach episodes and the photos ALSO make it into a Tetra Line magazine (Mustang has the photo with him in the ending), his media cred will explode harder than TT Star.
 
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