Chapter Text
For a length of time he couldn’t properly quantify, Enzan clung to both his Navi’s final instruction and the information Millionaire had been so sure he’d forget, the ceiling spinning above him and his arms heavy at his sides.
Occasionally, he would remember with jolting suddenness that Blues had been plugged in. He needed to lift his hand to grasp the PET, to give assistance. Yet he felt as if he was staring up from the bottom of a silent river, drowning under invisible stones weighing him down. His awareness of what was happening would slip away, and then it would come crashing back, and every time felt like the first.
“Enzan-sama. Enzan-sama!”
Was he dreaming?
“You’re still awake, Enzan-sama,” Blues said, before a cacophony erupted from the PET’s speakers.
“You’re… fighting. Blues…” Enzan felt the plastic casing of the PET in his hand, even though he didn’t know how it had gotten there. Had it fallen from his chest? Had he managed to move his arm?
“Don’t worry about me,” Blues urged. “Keep moving. Use the wall beside you, if you need to.”
Low, rumbling laughter sounded from somewhere above Blues. What was Enzan doing, lying here? He had to get up. He shot back upright, only for the room to fragment and twirl around him. Faintly, he heard the clack of the PET hitting the wall hard, then realized he’d fallen sideways.
He hadn’t lost his grip on the PET. “Slowly, Enzan-sama.”
It took him long enough, but Enzan managed to get onto his feet with Blues’s encouragement, leaning heavily on the stone wall of the old barracks for support. The audio seemed to cut out whenever Blues was finished speaking. Enzan couldn’t remember why that didn’t feel right. “Good. That’s the way.” Gingerly, he pushed off the wall to reach the doorway, but almost collapsed against it as a wave of nausea swept over him, again. Blues’s voice remained patient and soothing with the forgiveness he couldn’t muster for himself. “Take a moment, and regain your balance—”
Enzan’s head swam. Helplessness and frustration tangled together in his mind. The way Blues kept cutting his audio off seeded an indistinct fear in his mind. He knew he had to move if he wanted to Operate Blues, but his certainty that this was a situation he’d brought on himself kept him frozen in place.
If only he’d left Millionaire’s office to find Anetta. If only he’d insisted Meiru come along.
“Breathe through it, Enzan-sama. Regain your bearings.”
If only he’d fought outright against Mercer. If only he’d bothered to empathize with Julienne in time.
“Enzan-sama!”
Enzan squeezed his eyes shut. He had to pull himself together. He was making Blues worry.
“Enzan-sama… I'm not worried.” Blues sounded pained. Had he said that aloud? “I know you’ll make it, so just focus on yourself.”
He had to keep moving. Slowly, embarrassingly attached to the wall, Enzan shuffled out of the doorway and into the dark hallway beyond.
Surely Meiru knew by now what had happened; surely Anetta wouldn’t have been so ashamed as to keep it to herself when sense dictated otherwise. And he had to remember what he’d seen, that Millionaire was behind the High Rollers’ Club and they were looking for a creature called the Resident, or it all would have been a waste.
After the mistakes he’d made to get this far, a waste was the one thing he couldn’t abide the entire day becoming.
“Enzan-sama, I can guide you out. The system I’m in receives feeds from the security cameras set up in this basement.”
Enzan felt a wave of sheer desperation; someone already knew he was trying to escape…
“We can use them to our advantage as well—” The audio suddenly went silent. Enzan wasn’t entirely sure of what that meant, preoccupied with keeping himself moving and keeping the one important memory fresh; Millionaire was behind the High Rollers’ Club that was looking for the Resident.
The wall he’d been clinging to disappeared abruptly. It was a corner. A branching path swam into view across from him. “—the left, Enzan-sama!”
“You’re still fighting,” Enzan dizzily realized, lifting the PET his hand was clamped around with a shaking arm. Blues had been muting his feed so that Enzan didn’t hear what was happening to his Navi. “Blues… Blues…!”
But the PET remained inert; the disembodied voice that had been guiding him didn’t return. Blues’s absence seemed physically palpable to Enzan, like he’d had someone walking next to him that was suddenly gone. He at least had the presence to hold onto the message for Meiru—Millionaire, behind the High Rollers, searching for the Resident—refreshing himself on it in fear that it would slip away at a moment’s notice.
The left. He had to go to the left. He couldn’t stop here, or Millionaire would have won. He had to keep moving…
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Despite the energy she’d started out with, the vagueness of Meiru’s directions rapidly caught up to her. She was somewhere none of the party guests were supposed to be, when she wasn’t supposed to be at the party to begin with, and instead of one room to search there were several. The old fort seemed to be full of towers and attics to climb into and search, and none of them seemed to have anyone inside them.
Yet another room she’d spent time getting into was small and empty; she clenched her dress’s skirt in her hand as she walked onward. Could she even trust the word of Enzan’s fiancée? Much less whoever this Mrs. Millionaire was to not be following her at that moment. Meiru whirled around on instinct, but there was no one behind her.
“Meiru-chan, calm down,” Roll quietly soothed. “Nobody’s figured us out yet. Just keep looking, okay? Take a deep breath.”
Meiru did so, finally managing to release the yellow fabric bunched under her hand. Enzan was counting on her. She had to keep moving.
Two more empty rooms followed before Meiru found herself looking down a dark stairwell. “He can’t be… down here, can he?” she wondered nervously, feeling her breath become shallower at the thought. Before Roll could tell her to calm down again, she shook her head. “No, if he’s anywhere it’s got to be in here.” Under her breath, she told herself, “I’m a Net Savior. I can do this.”
“That’s right!” Roll agreed, fully unsticking Meiru’s feet from the stone floor.
She had to hug the wall on the way downstairs. It was dark, and her eyes had yet to adjust from the brightness of the gala. Immediately upon reaching level ground and managing to regain her vision, she realized that Enzan had to be down here. The path split into two opposite directions, and Meiru could see another fork in the road to her left. “It’s a perfect place to hide someone…”
“Huh?” came Roll’s voice from her side. “The signal wasn’t reaching the upper floor, but there’s definitely a network here!” Meiru scanned the corridor for herself before noticing the camera positioned overhead.
“If there’re enough of these that you can tell me where to go, they’ll be perfect!” Meiru said. “Plug in, Roll! Transmission!”
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It wasn’t the control panel, robust as it looked, that immediately grabbed Roll’s attention once she’d touched down in the security system’s network. Instead, it was the state the computer was already in. The area was small, with a pile of what seemed to be junk data fencing off the far side. But even with such a small space to work in, numerous patches of the floor had been corrupted, the nonsense data producing what seemed to be random results. Even worse, the pile of junk data kept flickering and fluctuating as if it was alive, the objects in it changing size and type and shifting the others around them. “What sort of a battle was this?”
Roll had to jump across a void in the floor to reach the control panel at the center, but it thankfully seemed to be unscathed. Dozens of feeds opened up on windows around her. “Enzan’s kinda far away from you,” she reported after a moment. “But I don’t think he’s unconscious. And the other good news is, there’s another exit that leads straight out into the grounds.”
“But if you’ve got ‘good’ news, does that mean you have ‘bad’ news?” fretted Meiru.
“Well…” Nervously, Roll explained, “Snakeman’s patrolling the basement, too. He must be in a Copyroid.”
“There’s no time,” murmured Meiru. “I don’t even know if we can reach Rush from here…”
“Don’t worry, Meiru-chan. I’ll guide you so the two of you don’t cross paths,” Roll explained. “Take the left path for—“
A piece of the junk pile behind the control panel shuddered, then detached itself, revealing itself as a massive Navi towering over Roll’s head. “Stoneman…?” wondered Meiru as memories of the N1 flooded back to Roll. After another moment, she realized, “A Syntheroid?!”
“Unauthorized guests will be crushed,” boomed the Stoneman looming before Roll. “Just as your comrade was before you!”
“As my…” It didn’t take Roll long to connect the dots, looking from Stoneman to the oscillating rubble behind him. “Blues is under there?!”
“In your dreams!” Meiru retorted to Stoneman’s statement. “I’ll back you up, Roll!”
Roll bravely shook her head. “Meiru-chan, I can hold off Stoneman for now. You need to get to Enzan, right away!”
“But…”
“I’ll still be able to get directions to you,” Roll said. “And I can evade a couple of Stone Cubes no problem! I’m a Net Savior, after all!” She urged, “Down the left path, then left again at the next fork. Trust in me, Meiru-chan!”
Despite Roll’s bravado, the battle against Stoneman would clearly be no cakewalk. “How foolish,” proclaimed the massive Navi. “Without your Operator, your only option is ṫ̶̞ó̵̯ d̴̥̅̄ǐ̵̠̜̗s̵̮̤͋a̸͉̒̑̐p̶̧̥͑̕p̸̗̭̱̔ḙ̷́̽a̵̬͔̝͝ř̵̥̝͓̊—̶̾ͅ”̷̦͇͔̋͒ As he began his attack, his speech seemed to become more garbled until Roll could barely understand what he was saying.
What materialized in the skybox above were the Stone Cubes Roll had been expecting. But instead of their usual gray, they were the perfect black of objects without any texture assigned to them. They soundlessly rocketed toward the ground, prompting Roll to dart out of the way.
She didn’t dare let up on her sprinting pace, even to look back. “̴͎̼͋̓͗G̶̠̈o̸̱̫̓͑̍k̶̛̪̐͜—̷̹͙͊͋̉ͅg̴̹͉͍̒̒o̵̯̽k̵̺̋̋—̴̲̥̆̍͂͜!”̴̢̝̊ But the choked sounds of Stoneman attempting to say something, coupled with the way the skybox flickered overhead, made it clear the attack had ceased for now. With the opportunity at hand, she stopped to regain her bearings.
Roll wasn’t even sure of how Stoneman’s strange cubes had done what they had. But it was now clear what had caused the area to fall into such disrepair. A mangled mess of textures now separated Roll from Stoneman, colors the security system couldn’t possibly produce on its own flickering where the Stone Cubes had landed.
In addition, some of the camera feeds had cut out, the damage obviously too great for the system’s integrity to hold. But Meiru was still visible, approaching a larger room with multiple exits, and so was Snakeman approaching from the other direction. Roll unmuted her feed. “The rightmost one, straight ahead!” she called.
She’d made the right choice in not broadcasting what was happening in the security system; Meiru didn’t hesitate to follow Roll’s directions. Snakeman entered the room a short while later, but left down the wrong hallway. That in itself was strange. Had he not heard them? Or had he heard something else?
Roll looked around for Enzan, and was surprised to see him on the move. She thought it through while she had the chance; Meiru would need to start working her way toward the center.
“̴͎̙̖͆S̶̭̎̍̓t̵̯̱̅̾̕ö̴̦̱́̚͝n̷̞̠͓͋̒ḛ̸̔̈ ̷͇̘̻̍̃͛C̵͔͂̒u̷͍̼̿̓̓b̸̬͇̿e̸̜̳̒͝!̵̜͕͌̅͠”̷͈͔̽ Roll felt the system churn under her feet as more of the black Stone Cubes hit the ground. Pieces of the battlefield warped into lava, while others shot into the air, held aloft with spindly, deformed geometry.
“You’re crazy!” she gasped. “If you keep using that attack, this system’ll crash with all of us inside!” She risked another glance at the windows out and wasted no time reopening the feed. “Meiru-chan, straight ahead!”
“̵͎̜̬͑͆̈́S̴̨̖̊͑̕͜ẗ̵̞̠̔͊ǫ̶̛̰̓͠n̸̲̼̙̑͝é̸̮͐ ̵͇̯̆̆̃C̷̮͑̂u̵̮͖͗̾͋ḅ̶͗̔͜è̶̘͙̓!̶̜̭̉͛͠”̶̖͂̾̉
“Roll?”
Roll staggered to a stop, narrowly avoiding the chasm the next Stone Cube attack had opened in front of her, and focused onto the security feeds once more. “I’m okay, Meiru-chan! Just focus on finding Enzan—this hallway’s winding, so next you’ll take a right!”
“…Okay!”
Roll wasted no time muting the feed. The chasm was too wide to cross, and the lava glitch behind her was only spreading with time. She was cornered.
"̶̩̋G̷͉̐ŏ̵̱ḱ̶̡͚̭̚—̷̞̟̹̽̊g̷̺̕o̵͔̙̝͆̋͗k̶͕̫̆k̶̩̀k̴͔̓̕ ̷̨̓ỳ̷̖ơ̵̘̊͆͜ú̶͓̐ ̶̡͒͋̿f̶̡͔̓̆̉ò̸͈o̶̟̕l̷̠̬̙̆͑͠,̴̛̛͖͖́"̸͙̓͂̕ came the near-incomprehensible taunt from behind her. Her view of the skybox was blacked out with the insane number of glitched Stone Cubes Stoneman summoned over her head. "̴̛͜N̶͔̺̑͗͘o̴͉̐̔͠w̴̢͚͇͋̂̀,̶̧͓͆ ̶͈̰̉͑y̸̘͓̝̔̾̏ö̵̧̯̥́̈͘ṵ̸̥͊̊͆ ̷̛̮̑̓w̴̡̳͖͆̈́̏i̷̺͔͈̅̀͘l̴̲̙̯̊̒͝l̵̫̘̰̇͐—̷̖͍̈́g̷͚̈͑ǒ̶͔k̵͔͙͆́—̴͛̽̌ͅv̶͖͛̉ă̴̠̚n̶̲̩̓ǐ̶̢͝i̶̧͔͈̔̑ȉ̶̤͎̽͠i̶͖͎͚̐s̶̲̮̏̍h̴̲͠—̶̟̩̀́͒"̷̦͆
There was a strange unfamiliarity to the way Roll was whisked off her feet. She looked up to see Blues’s visor, the two of them sailing over the broken and glitched floor with ease. But as Roll continued to observe her partner, she realized that Blues’s frame was already scuffed and cut. She gasped, “You’re already at your limit…”
“Keep going straight, Enzan-sama,” Blues said, clearly on the line with Enzan. “Meiru is looking for you. You’ll meet with her soon on this path.”
"̵̪͇̖͠S̶̹͍̚t̴͓̣̗͆͘ò̷̧̰̻n̸͙͕̒e̶̘̕ ̸̛̜͎̔̓F̶̡͇̋̎͠a̵͓̐̅͜l̸͓̞͝l̷̟͆!̵̗̏̔́"̴̯͌́͜ Blues didn’t set Roll down, instead shooting under the boulders Stoneman summoned. Roll looked up in fright as the skybox blinked again—not because it had been blocked out by objects, but because of how rapidly Stoneman was corrupting the space.
“Don’t worry about me, Enzan-sama,” Blues urged his Operator. “Keep moving.” The boulders struck the ground, and the entire system produced an unearthly whine, the skybox failing completely and exposing the static and nonsense of the unallocated space beyond. “Keep moving!”
Now that they were out of danger, Blues set Roll down. “The original Stoneman’s frame was surrounding an entirely separated core object, and that seems to also be the case here,” he explained to her. “My attacks have had no effect. I doubt we can break through to it without Battle Chips.”
“Then all we can do for now is survive,” Roll realized.
“Roll, what’s going on in there?” she heard Meiru ask before her window winked to life. “What in the world—"
"̸̰̇͐̚Ś̷̻̮ẗ̵̰͙͋̊ỏ̶̳͆̈́ǹ̸͙͎̼͒͠ë̸̢́̀̎ ̵̪͉̋C̵̦͔̕ǘ̵̢͉͓̓̀b̷̦̆̊ê̷̤̳̩!̵̱̝̺̀͑"̷̧͖͛̈́̍
“Battle Chip: Reflector!” Without thinking, Roll shot her hand forward to summon the shield. She saw the dome light up with each impact of the glitched Stone Cubes, and then heard a burst of static that might have been a shout.
When the Reflector dissipated, it was clear she would only have an opening for so long. Stoneman was reeling, but she could see where the Stone Cubes had been blasted back into him; they had fused themselves to his body, granting him even more armor. For now, with Stoneman in between attacks, Roll gave her own operator a shouted round of directions. “Meiru-chan, take the next left. Enzan’s in the big room!”
“Got it!” came Meiru’s whispered confirmation before she gasped, “No!”
Roll couldn’t pick out what was happening at first, but Blues’s horrified shout of “Enzan-sama!” made her focus on the proper windows in a hurry.
Meiru, sprinting toward the central room at top speed; Snakeman, brandishing his weapons at a pale Enzan. “Enzan!” Roll cried out. “Meiru-chan!”
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Even in his altered state of mind, Enzan knew the sounds he was hearing behind Blues’s encouragement were abnormal. System’s losing integrity, supplied a thought that managed to escape the haze. But the urgency of Blues’s last shout got Enzan’s feet to stumble forward yet again. He knew with agonizing clarity that he should have been sending Battle Chips to Blues. But even the frustration over how useless he was had to be set aside; he couldn’t keep anything else in his mind besides his message and the need to keep walking. He staggered on.
His legs wobbled, and he stopped to lean against the wall of the seemingly endless corridor. Once his tunnel vision had receded, he realized that he’d reached a larger room. In this state, he really was in danger of forgetting even something as important as what he’d learned about the High Rollers.
In this state, the ribbonlike creature in front of him seemed like a fever dream instead of a Navi.
“You keep winding up in Millionaire-sama’s way, don’t you?” mocked the thing winding in the air in front of Enzan. “Little boy who fancies himself an adult.”
“Won’t… forget,” Enzan managed to gasp in defiance.
“Pluckiness only gets you so far, you know,” the green ribbon lightly remarked, raising its arm. “Millionaire-sama didn’t say I couldn’t give you a little help, so long as I don’t hit anything central…”
There was no way for Enzan to run. He could only stare at the buster pointed at him, gulping down air in an attempt to stay on his feet.
“Snake Arrow!”
Enzan felt the world spin as something slammed into his left side, his vision going white for a moment as he hit the ground hard.
“Meiru-chan!” came a girl’s desperate scream.
“So, that’s what these weapons do to a human,” he heard the winding creature—Snakeman—murmur.
Enzan looked up to see a red-haired guardian angel above him, her teeth gritted, sweat beading on her brow. “You’re okay,” she whispered, though her face still seemed pained. “Thank goodness."
Far too close to them, a camera blew out in Snakeman’s face, shrouding him in smoke. “Meiru-chan, through the far doorway! You’ve got to get out of there!” came the frantic disembodied voice again. Meiru hauled Enzan to his feet and half-carried him to the far end of the room, her face grim with concentration.
“You fool,” hissed Snakeman behind them. Meiru didn’t so much as hesitate, an unworldly presence in a yellow-and-red dress.
“If you dare to ignore me, I’ll c̵̱͆r̶̪͝u̸̘̍s̶͍͗ḧ̶͙ ̶͕͌y̷̹͆o̸͇̍u̷̜̓,̸̲̈́"̸͍̀ rumbled a far different voice.
“Don’t worry about us, Meiru-san, Enzan-sama,” Blues urged.
“We can’t beat this guy, but we sure can slow Snakeman down in here!” added Roll.
It was at that moment that Enzan remembered that this person hauling him toward the smell of fresh air was the one he was meant to relay something to. “Millionaire—High Rollers’—Resident,” he managed to gasp. Meiru nodded, but didn’t turn her head to acknowledge him further. Had she gotten the message? He could barely remember what he’d been trying to say, just that he had to remember it.
The racket behind them only seemed to get louder as Enzan struggled not to force Meiru to fully drag him down the corridor, which was easier said than done. It felt as though this uphill stretch was much longer than the rest of the distance he’d managed to cover. Was Snakeman still pursuing them? Why hadn’t he caught them by now?
“Meiru-chan, you’re close, I promise!” pleaded Roll. For a reason Enzan couldn’t place, she added, “I’m sorry…”
“It appears your pursuer has been recalled by his Operator,” Blues informed them, far calmer. “But you need to keep walking. Plug us out at the doorway.” Inexorably slowly, Enzan continued to half-stumble toward the door. He had thought the energy had already left him, but it continued to drain out of his limbs, until he couldn’t even feel his legs dragging on the ground.
“Come on,” Meiru murmured. It was hard to tell who she was saying it to. Enzan felt the world lurch uncomfortably as she adjusted her grip on him. “Almost there…”
Enzan felt his eyes drooping shut. He felt certain he was dreaming when he next saw a dizzying night sky overhead. “There’s Anetta.” With that observation, Meiru’s eyes seemed to come unfocused. She collapsed under Enzan, sending him falling to his knees as well.
“Meiru!” came a horrified shriek.
The dress, Enzan’s mind supplied, was supposed to be yellow.
Snakeman’s weapon had partly cauterized the wound, so the edges of it were all that were slowly soaking into the cloth. What Enzan had taken to be the ‘red’ part of the dress was where it had been shot away, leaving a huge, angry welt taken out of Meiru’s side. His head swam; he swore he could see one of her ribs through the blood and burnt flesh. He fell face-first to the ground next to her, spinning further and further away from reality, but he could still sense her next to him. Just like she had been for this entire mission.
Everything was so wrong. Here was his partner, the one who had taken a hit for him and pushed on, the last person left in the world that he could trust completely; but he was expected to cast that bond off like it was nothing, in favor of living in close quarters with someone else?
“I don’t want to get married,” Enzan croaked as everything went black.
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The nurses had been so very kind to Meiru, letting her sob when the doctor told her the wound was going to leave a nasty scar thanks to how much skin had been taken off, being patient while she dried her eyes. “It sounds like you were very brave, if you got this saving your friend,” one of them told her. “It’ll be okay.”
“There are lots of cute one-piece swimsuits out there!” said the other. “Nobody’s gonna know it’s there, honey. So long as you keep up with the topical cream the doctor gave you, you won’t even feel it once it’s healed.”
But they didn’t need to hold Meiru there any longer. She could get dressed and leave to wait by Anetta’s side, since the other girl had brought along her usual clothes. It was simple enough to pull her skirt on, but she had to be careful with her shirt. The bandages covering the wound wrapped from underneath her bra to her waist, and she knew disturbing them would leave her in crippling pain.
More than that, the knowledge of what a sight was underneath the bandages, and that it would be there forever, left Meiru staring at her own reflection in numb silence. It felt like the girl in the mirror should have been a ghost, not Meiru herself, but her head spun whether she tried to accept reality or not.
“I’m sorry, Meiru-chan,” Roll said, every bit as mournful as Meiru felt. “I should’ve been able to protect you, somehow…”
“No, don’t be sorry. You did everything you could,” Meiru was quick to reassure her. “And so did I.” It would have been worse not to go to find Enzan; not to have tackled him out of Snakeman’s trajectory. Even though she knew that, tears still welled up in her eyes the longer she stared at herself.
“I don’t want to get married,” she’d heard Enzan’s voice say as her consciousness had faded out.
That suited her just fine. Neither did she.
She wiped one eye, then the other, until her vision was clear again. Then, carefully, she began to lower her shirt over the bandages. “All of this is who I am now,” Meiru murmured. “So I can’t cry about it changing me anymore.” She looked at herself one more time now that she was fully dressed, only her own willpower keeping the tears from reforming. “My fate… is to battle on.”
Roll didn’t say anything, just stared back at her with sad eyes. There was nothing to say, anyway. This was—had always been, whether the full meaning of that had sunk in for Meiru or not before now—all she truly had left. The days of far-fetched dreams were over, leaving only a single path behind to follow.
“I’ll keep going,” Meiru whispered to herself. She gathered her belongings, gingerly putting it all back into place around her waist. Then, she left the room at a steady stride. What was done was done, so she couldn’t falter now. She had to be brave—
“Meiru?” asked Anetta from behind her. She whirled around, startled. “There’s only the emergency exit that way.”
Meiru could only think of one reason for Anetta to be here. She couldn’t help a sigh of relief. “Enzan’s awake?”
“Well… no,” Anetta admitted. “The doctor said it’ll still take a while for him to sleep it off.”
“Oh,” Meiru said, deflating. “And… are you okay? I’m sorry about your mom’s car.”
Anetta cheekily flashed a peace sign. “It’s all good! I mean, I’m definitely in huge trouble for giving Mom such a scare, I can’t try a stunt like that again for a while. Or, uh, much of anything, I’m probably super grounded the minute you guys leave. But other than that, we’re fine, so it was totally worth it.” Awkwardly, she finished, “You didn’t… bleed too much, on anything.”
“I guess the Snake Arrow… seared most of the wound closed,” Meiru mumbled in response. “The doctor said he’d never seen anything like it, but it… probably saved my life.” She wasn’t entirely sure if she’d been trying to make a joke or not by divulging that, but Anetta’s face seemed to crumple a bit in empathy.
“I… was here to talk to you, actually,” Anetta said. It was clear that it was a difficult subject; her eyes flitted from place to place, her fingertips sliding against one another. “About, well…”
“You don’t need to say sorry,” Meiru assured Anetta, nearly certain she knew what the subject had to be. “I know how important—”
“I think Enzan’s idea of love is different from how you or I would think of it,” Anetta began over Meiru’s attempts to avert the entire conversation. “But he feels it the most when he’s fighting next to you.”
“Huh?” wondered Meiru, not having expected this angle at all. “What… what are you saying?”
“I mean, I can’t lie to a friend like you. Of course I’m frustrated! Enzan cares so much, and he’s so pretty, you’d have to be crazy not to be swept off your feet! And I’m totally the sort of girl he likes! I’m brave, and helpful, and funny…” Anetta shook her head. She’d clearly meant it when she’d said she was frustrated, yet she was smiling wistfully when she glanced back at Meiru. “But I can’t do all the things you’ve done to stand next to him. I can’t even Netbattle. And I think that’s what he needs. Someone who can be right there next to him, that he can trust completely.”
“Oh…” It finally sank in. Anetta was giving Meiru her blessing. “No, wait, I’m not going after Enzan! That’s crazy! We have to work together, we’re partners—“
“A partner can be a romantic one, too, you know!” Anetta said teasingly.
“I just don’t think I can do that,” Meiru insisted. “I’ve got other things to worry about, and so does he.” More than that, it just didn’t seem fun anymore. Daydreaming about the potential of a date with Netto had made Meiru so happy. But all she felt thinking about a relationship now was dread; at stealing someone else’s hopes away, at potentially losing a friendship over a nebulous and childish dream, at the idea of someone else seeing that scar. (“There are lots of cute one-piece swimsuits out there!” echoed in her head as the sad excuse for comfort it was.)
Anetta looked at her with mournful eyes. “Just… don’t give up, okay?” Meiru had forgotten how perceptive she could be. “You’re amazing. Even if… if you feel like you’re not beautiful, you still are. And it’s because you were brave enough not to run away.” Meiru felt her eyes fill with tears again. Part of her wanted to hug her friend and cry over the contradiction in her mind, between just how horrifying the scar looked and Anetta’s conviction that the opposite was true.
But she’d already sworn to herself that she was done crying. She was a Net Savior. She could handle this with the grace that responsibility asked of her. Her face found a gentle, calm smile to show to Anetta. “You’ll be the first to know when I’m ready again, promise,” she assured her. “But… I think you’re incredible, too. We couldn’t have made it to the party without you. If you hadn’t gone and gotten me so fast, I don’t wanna know what might’ve happened.” It was obvious that Anetta was still not entirely at ease, so Meiru added, “I don’t want you to give up, either.”
“Well…” Anetta needed a moment to think it over, an abashed look on her face. Then, a determined smile settled onto her face as she looked into Meiru’s eyes. “That means you’d better make a move someday, so nobody has any regrets! Got it?!”
Her eyes wide at the reversal of her reversal and all it implied, Meiru stammered, “Wh-wh-whaaaa?!”
“For now, I wanna go check in on Enzan. I bet he’ll be awake any time now.” Anetta clasped Meiru’s hand in her own. “Follow me!”
Sure enough, by the time they got to Enzan’s room, they were informed that they’d need to wait to visit; he had just woken up, and the doctor was checking on his mental state. “It’s really uncommon for a kid his age to turn up with that kind of stuff in his system,” the nurse guarding the door pointed out. “We just want to be sure he’s okay.”
It was bizarre to think that Enzan wouldn’t be okay, after everything else he’d been through; still, Meiru said, “Thanks.” From there, the wait was characterized more by impatience than anxiety. It seemed like she and Anetta had been standing around outside for a small eternity by the time the doctor stepped out and they were admitted in.
Thankfully, that dazed look that had been on Enzan’s face when Meiru had found him in the fort was gone. Even confused as he was, his eyes were back to being sharp and clear. “What happened?” he asked them as soon as they were seated. “The last thing I remember is… attending that ridiculous gala with Genoise. And then, nothing.”
“She drugged you to make you sleep,” Anetta recalled furiously.
“You said, ‘Millionaire, High Rollers’, Resident,’ when I found you,” Meiru added.
Rather than give an immediate response, Enzan stared back at her, his empty expression quickly turning to frustration.
“You don’t remember it at all?” Anetta wondered.
“It’s an effect of the drug they found in my bloodstream,” Enzan explained. “I believe you.” With some effort, he reached for his PET, sitting inert on the bedside table. Between the time in the dark tunnels of the fort and a room as dark as Enzan’s hospital room, it seemed the PET’s usual ability to charge off of solar energy had been useless. Meiru realized that for it to lose power so quickly, Blues had probably been watching over Enzan since she’d returned him to his PET, despite what had been visible frame damage.
She felt a pang of worry for him, hanging in limbo with no knowledge of how Enzan had fared. “Anetta brought a charger from home,” Meiru immediately supplied, scrambling to get Blues’s PET connected to power.
The three humans and one Navi waited for Blues’s PET to boot back up in expectant silence. “Enzan-sama!” was the first thing out of Blues’s mouth as he reappeared on his landing page.
“I’m okay, Blues,” Enzan was quick to reassure him.
“I can see that for myself, now,” Blues said, quietly but audibly relieved.
“…You were fighting?” Enzan realized, looking over the damage to Blues’s frame with fresh concern.
“He doesn’t remember anything,” Meiru explained for Blues’s sake. “Do you?”
“Of course,” was Blues’s immediate response. “You were drugged by Mrs. Millionaire, one of the leaders of the High Rollers’ Club, while you witnessed a keynote mainly delivered by Mr. Florin, its other leader. What Millionaire had to say afterward implied that she intended to show you said keynote, only for you to fall unconscious and lose your memory of the evening while I was deleted by the Syntheroid Stoneman. Naturally, I wouldn’t dream of forgetting such important information, or of falling to such a foe.”
Enzan was visibly relieved. “Thank you.”
“Then, what was the Resident?” wondered Meiru.
“Regretfully, that I’m less certain of,” Blues admitted. “I only know that the target of the High Rollers’ Club is called ‘the Resident’, that it’s located somewhere in Densan City’s cyberspace, and that they plan to make their final move at a New Year’s Ball.”
“They certainly aren’t lacking in theatrics,” Enzan commented, unimpressed. “That’s our next direction, then. We need to find out what and where the Resident is, and how the High Rollers plan to enact this final move.”
“If it’s at home, then we’re better off looking for clues there,” Meiru added. “I’m not sure if I’d want to search in Brand City, anyway, since that’s right under Millionaire and Florin’s noses.”
“And everyone with a stake in finding the Resident, too,” Anetta pointed out. “Just how many people had warned Millionaire and Florin by the time we came to them…?”
“Blues, you’ve done well. Rest now,” Enzan ordered.
“Of course, Enzan-sama,” Blues answered, before disappearing off the screen.
With that, Enzan looked to Roll. “If I could ask you to secure us two tickets for the next available flight home?”
“No problem!” Roll replied cheerfully before disappearing off of Meiru’s shoulder.
Anetta sighed, “It’s coming to an end already…”
“Not right away,” Meiru pointed out. “Enzan might be in a hurry to get out of here, but who knows whether the doctor’ll sign off on it. We’re counting on you to keep us company.”
A bit sadly, Anetta smiled. “Next time, let’s all go to that breakfast place,” she invited. “I’m really glad I got the chance to see both of you guys again, but, seriously… I can’t believe we have to spend our last day together in here!”
“It’s okay,” Meiru said. Her soft smile still felt a bit like a lie—goodness knew she wished the circumstances were different, too—but it felt more comfortable the more she used it, and it seemed to set Anetta a bit more at ease. “I’m just glad we got to see each other, too!”