I kinda talked with Nanya on AIM about this certain aspect, and I came to this frightening conclusion: Hayate/Reinforce is a canonical couple.
Reinforce left her "genetic" information in Hayate's Linker Core, where it sat for awhile until Hayate later gave birth to Rein Zwei. Reinforce is the daddy and Hayate is the mommy! (Or Rein Zwei has two mommies, for you more PC people out there :P) If two people have a child together, doesn't that make them a couple?^^
Add to that fact that apparently Reinforce met/talked to Hayate numerous times when she dreamed.
Except that Hayate keeps on forgetting when she wakes up.
Yeah sound stages...
__________________
I do not like Kansai-ben, but I do like Hayate-chan!
Also, Canadian here, not actually Japanese.
Location: Somewhere over the rainbow, in a house dropped on an ugly, old woman.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Nagumo
Add to that fact that apparently Reinforce met/talked to Hayate numerous times when she dreamed.
Except that Hayate keeps on forgetting when she wakes up.
Yeah sound stages...
Heh, I remember that. Of course, now that makes me want to write a fic...
Shamal: "Vita, you look horrible! Didn't you get enough sleep?"
Vita: *rubbing her eyes and grousing* "Hayate kept grabbing me hard and moaning all night. I have no idea what she was dreaming about, but it needs to stop. I think I need my own bed!"
Heh, I remember that. Of course, now that makes me want to write a fic...
Shamal: "Vita, you look horrible! Didn't you get enough sleep?"
Vita: *rubbing her eyes and grousing* "Hayate kept grabbing me hard and moaning all night. I have no idea what she was dreaming about, but it needs to stop. I think I need my own bed!"
I was thinking more "Inception" when it comes to dreams. You know, one that seems to last years and years, where Hayate grows up with her happy family and Reinforce.
I mean, I would think it would be relatively easy for Reinforce to do, after all it's a dream and Hayate will never remember it.
It might explain why Reinforce had left such an elaborate video messages to describe her perfect dream life to Rein Zwei in the other sound stages
__________________
I do not like Kansai-ben, but I do like Hayate-chan!
Also, Canadian here, not actually Japanese.
Location: Pennsylvania. It's sort of like a real state.
Age: 39
Quote:
Originally Posted by DezoPenguin
For both of you (Hah! I kid; I can count four! ) waiting for the second half of the Shadowverse two-shot...here it is!
Spoiler for Running Through Shadows--Chapter 2:
Durward Brantley V gripped Lutecia's hand with surprising strength. Though his features were easily recognizable from the case file despite the three-year age gap, the change was immense. There were no signs of the pampered, cosseted darling of wealth and privilege who had been raken from the Olympic. This child was thin, wiry, hard; he'd been toughened by privation and by the trials he'd undergone.
He reminded Lutecia of herself when she'd been a couple of years younger than he was, except that where she'd buried her emotions beneath an unnaturally dissonant calm, he wore his on his face, a desperation that was nearly feral.
She pulled, and he half-fell, half-sprang out of the car towards her. Garyuu had sent the Night Breaker reaching for the boy sprawling. The man didn't get up; without a Barrier Jacket to protect him from the insect knight's blades one blow had been more than sufficient. One man fired at him, while another, huge, rushed in close, some sort of magical blast gauntlet on his fist glowing with an armed charge. Lutecia recognized the weapon type; it allowed Belkan-type magically-enhanced physical strikes so long as its ammunition held out.
Lutecia couldn't sit and watch her summon's fight, though, because she had her own problems. The other two gang members, the woman and the tattooed bald man, came at her on the side away from Garyuu. They leveled their mass drivers and she swung Ward behind her. The impulse to protect him bodily cost her; she didn't get a shield spell up until the first shot hit her in the abdomen. She winced in pain, but luckily the weapon wasn't a military-grade linear rifle that could penetrate a low-end Barrier Jacket; she'd get a bruise out of it but no worse. Three further shots were stopped by her Panzerschild.
"Schattenstechen," her Boost Device, Asclepius, said his jewels flashing. Three missiles like elongated diamonds streaked from her palm and homed in on the two Night Breakers, cutting them down. She whipped back around, but Garyuu's armored shell and fighting skills had been more than enough to leave his two opponents sprawled in the dust. He tipped his head to one side, multiple rows of eyes gazing at her in an almost chiding fashion, as if her were saying, "And you doubted me?"
"All right, then. Let's get going. We need to move fast."
"Why?" the boy asked. "If you're with the Bureau, then aren't I safe now?" He glanced around. "You took care of those guys."
There was an almost plaintive note in his voice, which Lutecia understood at once. After all his experiences, his time in Conall's custody as well as his flight through the streets, he wanted more than anything to be told that it was over, that it was safe.
She wanted to give him that reassurance. Wanted to but couldn't.
"Those Night Breakers were just street-level punks. You're attracting attention from people bigger than that. Your family's company is pan-dimensional, dealing with multiple Administered Worlds, which makes you big business to them until you're safely at home. The TSAB isn't the only party that's after you."
He gulped and nodded.
"Like Angharad," he said. "They'll be hunting me to get me back." His eyes widened and he added, "I...I could be a witness against them! They have to find me!"
Lutecia didn't answer him at once. How could she respond when a child looked at her and announced that he'd realized he was under a death sentence?
She then shook her head. It was time for action, not sentiment.
"Don't worry. I won't let them get to you. But for now we need to get out of the city." She started looking over the parked cars, seeking one that would suit her needs.
"Why?"
"I'm a long-range teleporter, so I can take you directly where we need to go, but the background 'noise' created by all the magical technology in the city, from communications to magical barriers, makes teleportation magic difficult and unreliable," she explained.
Ah, that one will do, she thought, spotting a car that suited her.
She dismissed Garyuu, then opened a summoning gate and called upon a half-dozen of her wasp-like Insect summons. She aimed them at the car she'd picked and watched as they dashed in, merging with its computer systems and taking them over. Most of the cars in the lot were junkers or just old, with mechanical systems her summons couldn't possess, but this one was new enough for her to take over utterly, ignoring things like theft-control systems, locked doors, the need for an ignition code, and other pesky impediments to grand theft auto. The front doors of the sand-hued sedan popped open.
"That's our ride; let's go."
She flicked a magical shot towards the gate to blast off the chain, since she had neither the time nor the inclination to hunt through the dead guard's pockets for the padlock key. Lutecia and Ward got into the car, she had her summons start it, and they moved smoothly out into the street.
"Ms. Alphine?" Ward asked while she used the car's new system to combine with Asclepius's map of the mana-field patterns in Kyas to plot the quickest route for an exit strategy. "How did you find me?"
"We know that Conall had custody of you, so we traced the activity of his operators. He's a pretty well-known name here on Lucence, but his business is based on high mobility with a small work force so we didn't have to worry about global operations with multiple facilities. We tracked his people from there." She flicked a glance at the boy, then smiled at them. "Now honestly, did you follow any of that?"
"A little..."
"If we'd been a little faster, it'd have been me coming through the flophouse room door instead of those Night Breakers. I'm sorry."
"Why? You saved me from them."
"You shouldn't have had to see the guard killed, or had to get away from those thugs in the first place." She shook her head. "It's not fair that you had to go through all of that."
He stared at her as if he didn't quite know what to say. That was fair enough. She couldn't say that she really knew, either. Concepts like "fair" didn't seem to apply to a child who was victimized by criminals, anyway. Talk wouldn't change that.
She was expecting something to go wrong all the way through the city, but it didn't. No cars full of armed criminals, no hostile mages descending from the skies. She pulled to a stop, leaving the car in a parking slot and not bothering to find the meter. After all, if the police towed it, they'd at least be able to get it back to its owner.
"Almost there. It's just this way."
She led Ward to a staircase in the sidewalk about two blocks away from where she'd parked, surrounded by a wrought-iron frame and blocked off by a chain and a sign reading, "Danger." They didn't even bother removing the chain, but just ducked under it, leaving tracks in the dust.
"What is this place?" Ward asked.
"It's an abandoned metro-rail station," Lutecia explained. "This area of the city must once have been mixed in type, but now residential and commercial buildings have been torn down and there's just industrial parks."
"And you can teleport from here?"
"Uh-huh. It'll take time for me to set it up instead of working right away, but less time than it would take to drive anywhere where it would be easier."
They descended the stairs and entered the dim cavern of tile and concrete, illuminated only by a minor light spell Lutecia conjured. The summoner would have expected to see signs of human habitation, where the homeless might have taken advantage of the shelter, but there were none. Maybe Lucence, or just the city of Kyas, took their charitable obligations more seriously than most worlds.
Lutecia raised her hands and the pale violet rune of Belkan magic swelled into being beneath her, not the four-pointed version of her summoning but the more usual Belkan triangle associated with her other magic. She hadn't been exaggerating; she had to concentrate hard to make the teleportation spell begin to form. It took nearly ten minutes for the link to be made and she'd burned as much mana as if she'd been in a reasonably strenuous mock battle. It was almost with a sigh of relief that she dropped her hand to Ward's shoulder.
She pressed the tips of her index and middle fingers to the back of his neck.
"Schattenstechen."
The sudden jerk his body gave was no more than a reflex of electrical impulses and muscle failures. Ward could have had no idea what had happened; the spell had snuffed out his brain functions before he was even aware it had been cast, which was the advantage of a contact shot.
His body was already starting to glow as it toppled forward, a dead weight crumpling.
The violet light of the teleport spell surged up, and a moment later Lutecia was alone in the stillness and silence of the abandoned terminal.
~X X X~
Eight hundred miles away from Kyas, has a lizard or small mammal chosen to lift its head towards the sky over the Kaku Desert, it would have seen the blast sphere of golden light, a raging storm of magical power a hundred yards across, so that its lower edge just brushed the ground and cut a perfectly-shaped curve of the sand and rock.
Then it was gone, and the day continued much as before.
~X X X~
Lutecia leaned back against the bulkhead, watching through the port as Lucence receded beneath them. Soon, the cargo hauler would make the shift from physical to dimensional space.
"Would it be too much to ask for the powers that be to get us a nice comfy ride on a TSAB vessel instead of shipping on one of these rustbuckets?" Victor Stormhawk asked.
"It'd have raised too many questions," Lutecia told her fellow Naval Special Intelligence Service agent. "The Enforcers are only a day behind us, and when they find Conall and his outfit dead and the boy missing, they might start asking questions."
"I suppose," Victor agreed with a shrug. "Still, operational security won't stop me from a little recreational complaining. Plus, my shoulder's going to hurt for a week; Conall's bodyguard tagged me a good one. Ah, well, Celica likes my scars. Says they make me look manly."
He waited a beat.
"Come on, Alphine, this is the part where you say 'well, something has to,' and I wince like my ego notices such things. It's all scripted out."
Lutecia just sighed, and the smile vanished from the face of her fellow Shadow.
"Is this because you had to kill those gang members? I know you hate having to eliminate anyone besides the target, but you know as well as I do that the Enforcers will be all over this, and that they'll probably trace Conall's goon to the slums like we did. If they found and questioned those Night Breakers...well, there aren't as many hot purple-haired female mages with giant bug friends as you'd expect. And let's be honest, those guys were dirt. They were fresh off a murder—two, with that parking-lot guy—and in the middle of a kidnapping when you caught them. They're not worth losing sleep over."
"That's part of it, but...honestly, not that big a part."
Victor looked measuringly at her.
"Alphine, you aren't talking about the target, are you?"
A little smile, one which had nothing to do with humor or happiness, played around her lips.
"The 'target.' Operational jargon certainly makes it easy to talk about murdering a twelve-year-old boy."
Victor slammed his palm against the bulkhead. "Dammit, Alphine, you did not murder a twelve-year-old boy. You disposed of a three-month-old tasked biological killing machine."
"He didn't know that. He thought he'd been held captive for years and had managed to finally get home to his family. He didn't know that he was a clone of a boy who'd died three years ago, subliminally programmed to be a suicide bomber. I wonder, was the target his father, or one of the dignitaries that he'd naturally encounter in his family's social circle?"
Victor glared at her.
"They aren't his family. They're Durward Brantley the Fifth's family."
"He didn't know that!" Lutecia shot back. "He didn't know what he was programmed to do. How does that deserve death as a punishment? We could have taken him into custody, kept him isolated from the target, maybe even found a way to remove the conditioning."
"I'm sure we could," Victor agreed. "And then what?"
Lutecia blinked.
"And then he could live a normal life!"
"By giving his parents an exact copy of their son and passing him off?"
"How about by telling him the truth and letting him live his own life, like my friend Erio?"
"So he lives a nice, peaceful life, with proper counseling to help him cope with the fact that most of his memories are somebody else's. And then he gets hit by a car. Or knifed in a street crime. Or gets sick. Or lives to eighty-four and dies of old age. And takes how many innocent people with him? The 'suicide' part was just how the bomb was to be triggered: a corrupted Linker Core that, upon death, would link and discharge its maximum possible mana load all at once. You know, the whole reason you had to be the one to dispose of the target so that you could teleport the body somewhere where the explosion wouldn't kill anyone?"
"But—"
Victor sighed and laid a hand on her shoulder.
"No, Alphine. It was ugly, but we did the only thing that could be done. They're the ones who are the monsters, making a weapon that could think and feel, but in the end that's what they made: a weapon, created by magical science gone mad for the purposes of destruction and given a personality because having one made it more likely to accomplish its maker's goals."
Lutecia brushed away his hand.
"That sounds like you're describing my girlfriend," she snapped fiercely, then spun on her heel and stalked away from him.
Victor shook his head sadly.
"It's not the same thing at all."
He wondered how long it would take before she could admit it.
~X X X~
TSAB Bureau HQ, One Week Later
"I just...I feel so helpless, Val."
Admiral Chrono Harlaown paused in his march down the corridor. It was the sound of his sister Fate's voice, and from years of experience he was aware that the ace Enforcer was seriously upset.
"I know the feeling," Valentine Yaris answered the other woman. "I read your field report, of course, and I can understand why you'd feel that way."
The two women were sitting in a little atrium at the bend in the hall up ahead, a small, circular area with couches, potted plants, and a nice view of the ships coming and going outside the massive colony. Chrono paused, waiting quietly instead of marching forward and announcing himself.
After all, as the director of the NSIS, he was the Bureau's chief spy. Eavesdropping was almost an obligation.
Fate let out a heavy sigh.
"It's just...we went into the mission, my team and I, with a primary goal of protecting the boy. If that meant launching a rescue, we were ready for that. If it meant sitting back and letting the deal go down between the family and Conall Viper, then we were prepared for that as well. We knew—I knew—that we might have to make some hard choices and let criminals get away for the child's sake. I'd accepted that."
Chrono couldn't see Yaris's face at the angle he was at, but saw the head of gray-streaked blue hair bob up and down slowly.
"But you didn't even get the chance to make those choices," the Enforcer Captain said carefully.
"Before we even reached the site, we found that Conall's operation had been torn apart. He and his men were dead, and his data files had all been purged by programs created by a very skilled hacker. Our computer specialists gave it up as a lost cause after three days. We found traces of a boy accompanied by one of Conall's men in the slum district of Kyas, but the man was apparently caught up in gang violence and killed, and the boy vanished without a trace." Fate sighed, her shoulders sagging. "Val..."
"I know. Heaven knows that even after all my time in the service, this is a lesson I've had trouble learning, but sometimes there's nothing that we can do. It hurts, I know, to realize that there are some situations we're utterly powerless to affect."
"It just seems that there should be something. If we'd arrived at Lucence even one day sooner, we might have done something to save the boy."
"Fate, I know that there's nothing worse than this kind of situation. It's even worse in some ways than trying and failing, because at least if there was the chance to succeed then there was hope, and hopelessness is worse than regrets. But you have to learn to accept it, that some things just aren't in our power to change. Now, I know you'll never accept that going into a case—even if you are nearly thirty, you're still that kid I remember from way back—but after it's done, you should be able to tell the difference. Regretting your failures is one thing, but guilt over what you never had the power to control will kill you."
Fate smiled wanly at the older woman.
"I guess..."
"Tell you what; I know you're not supposed to go off HQ shift for two more days, but I'll pull some strings. Go home and see that wife and daughter of yours. Being with family's the best way to clear your head I know of."
"Thanks, Val."
"No problem. Us moms have to stick together."
The women stood, shared a quick hug, and Yaris walked off, thankfully away from Chrono instead of towards him. The admiral hesitated, but then kept on going forward.
Fate was his sister, after all.
"She's right, you know," he said, entering the atrium.
"Oh! Niisan...you heard?"
"Yeah." Chrono nodded. "There was really nothing you could have done."
"I know," Fate said softly. "I know. It just takes a while to get my heart to accept it."
"If it helps, you weren't a day late. It was three years."
"What?" Her burgundy-red eyes went wide.
Chrono nodded.
"Durward Brantley V really did die when the kidnappers' shuttle crashed three years ago. I know the family still holds out hope and conspiracy theorists really love this case, but...honestly, that's all there is to it."
"Then what was going on on Lucence?" Fate asked sharply.
"Someone was running a game. Like I said, the Brantleys want to believe. It makes them vulnerable."
Fate didn't ask how the NSIS was involved in the business or on what side. She knew Chrono wouldn't tell her; he was breaking enough rules just by saying what he had. And truthfully, she probably didn't want to know the full details.
So she asked only the one question that most concerned her, personally.
"What about the boy?"
Chrono met her searching gaze directly and told her something that, although certainly deceptive in its was, was also at the heart of it, the truth.
"There was no boy."
Spoiler for Author's Notes:
Credit for the linear rifle type of small arms that the Night Breakers aren't using, much to Lutecia's happiness, goes to synaesthetic (aka cori.writes.stuff) from her Shadowverse story, False Light. General credit for inspiring me to write the story, though, goes to Fuyu no Sora, for an ongoing discussion on the morality of the NSIS's existence and operations. Fun stuff, these gray areas.
One of the nice things about writing Nanoha fanfiction is that when using child characters, I can err on the side of understanding and maturity, since they all tend to be wise beyond their years. Ward in this story tends to be a bit quick on the uptake for twelve, but given the setting (and other obvious factors) I'm hoping that it didn't jar.
The reason why Lutecia can't teleport away directly is totally fanon; mostly it's an internal justification for me why RF6 doesn't go teleporting people into battle in StrikerS, but instead deploys by helicopter and personal flight (and even Lulu doesn't teleport directly away after the first RF6/Numbers engagement, but has to make her escape later, after the battle).
The Night Breakers are named after motorcycle models, Conall Viper after the Dodge Viper, and Durward Brantley the Fifth after the Aston Martin DBV. Bonus points if you can identify the source of the place names!
Spoiler for Auctorial ramblings:
I considered adding a subsequent fight scene where Lutecia has to protect Ward against a more adequate enemy (something along the level of the guys from "Within Our Own Shadow"), both to show the contrast between her fighting to protect him and the finale and to add to the action, but ultimately decided not to. On the one hand, this story isn't supposed to be about zaptacular action scenes, and on the other, I figure that if enough pyrotechnics start getting flung around, it won't be believable that the Shadows could hide the traces of their presence from Fate's Enforcer team.
Sorry it took me so long to get around to reading this, Dezo. I usually jump on your works so quickly!
And... er... I'm sort of sorry I got around to reading it, since I was already having kind of an off day and now I'm well and truly depressed . That ending was just evil, man. Still... well... Shadowverse. Pretty much par for the course where Lutecia is concerned.
All told, a very good piece. And nice to see Val again! Though she didn't get enough screentime. Never enough!
Reinforce left her "genetic" information in Hayate's Linker Core, where it sat for awhile until Hayate later gave birth to Rein Zwei. Reinforce is the daddy and Hayate is the mommy! (Or Rein Zwei has two mommies, for you more PC people out there :P) If two people have a child together, doesn't that make them a couple?^^
Spoiler for The Erebus Effect; Chapter 4 - Assassination:
This was the first solo mission she would carry out ever since she joined Erebus. She sat on the roof of a small building in a suburb of Cranagan, thinking her plan through. Her mission was to assassinate a local politician, who, according to Erebus had supplied terrorist cells with insider information. Wallachia wasn’t sure if it was true or not, but the information she had received looked solid. Not that she would have a chance to look it through and confirm it, but she barely cared.
It would be another few minutes until the convoy of three cars would pass beneath her on the street and she would take them out. She spent the time wondering about the message she had gotten during her last maintenance and the possibilities of who could have sent it. Though she already knew the answer, she couldn’t see how it was possible. She searched for other options instead, putting the obvious aside. Though fruitless as the search might have been, she insisted.
The part about lies was equally intriguing. What lies did it refer to? All she had seen of Erebus so far stood to confirm what Due had told her, not to mention the work she had been conducting. Besides, she was happy with Erebus. She got to kill and maim. She even got to eat. There wasn’t a need to make such a great symbiosis go down the drain in exchange for what some called ‘justice’.
She stood up and took a different version of her Chainer out of her pocket. Such a fascinating little thing. So much power in something so small. She pressed a button and watched it unfold and slid neatly into her hand. She looked at it, turning it this way and that.
Her Chainer from the previous job had been upgraded with a larger version, called the Stormer. With armor-piercing, high caliber rounds it’d be perfect for breaking through the cars’ hull. If that didn’t work she had also received a new type of weapon; a miniature Milkor MGL firing 40mm HE grenades. With these weapons, she doubted she would need to make it personal. Though she would still salvage what she could of the bodies, of course. She couldn’t let such a feast go away.
A comm channel beeped, catching her attention and she opened it.
“Two minutes until the target arrives. Be ready,” a voice said and the comm channel closed. It had been a mistake to say she was completely alone on this mission. Erebus was always watching. At least she would get to do the killing.
She pulled up the file on the target to remind her of his appearance. He was quite fat with a balding head. He would be wearing an expensive business suit and other accessories. If his bodyguards looked like any other bodyguard, it would be an easy task to single him out.
She could hear a car now, approaching from a few blocks away. It wasn’t moving fast judging from the engine’s noise. The driver was taking it through the street in a slow pace, probably wary of potential ambushes. Which was better for Wallachia, since it would ease up her aim. The only problem as far as she could see was if she didn’t manage to block the street with her first attack. The cars behind the first would just speed away and leave her in the dust. She knew Erebus wouldn’t like that very much. She shuddered at the punishment she might have to endure.
She now saw the first car as it turned around a corner. She went down on one knee, but kept herself back so she wouldn’t be spotted. From her position she had a clear view onto the street below and she followed the first car with the Stormer, aiming down its barrels. Virtual triangles appeared on her vision and locked on, sending information back to her with the speed and measurements of the cars, among other trivial information.
The cars kept their speed, unaware of the threat. It took them a few more seconds to reach the optimal location. When they did, Wallachia let the Stormer loose.
The armor-piercing bullets increased the recoil, but she was prepared for it. The first rounds hit the lead car in the engine block and she aimed towards its tires and fired away. They exploded and caused the car to lose control, as she had hoped it would. It skidded to a halt, blocking out half of the street with its length. The men inside got out and drew their weapons, but they looked around in confusion, making it obvious they didn’t know where the gunfire had come from. Smoke bulged out of the car’s engine compartment, further obscuring the view.
Wallachia aimed the Stormer at the second car, which was supposed to have the target inside it. Firing there and now would give her position away, but she couldn’t let the car get away. She would deal with the others once she was sure that car could no longer move.
She fired at the engine first, disabling it. Then she led the hail of bullets upwards, towards the driving seat, then the back seat. The car’s chassis bounced and shivered under the force of the projectiles. She let the rounds penetrate the entirety of the back half of the car before moving to the passenger side, making sure no one would be left to breathe inside.
Magical rounds suddenly flew through the thick smoke and past her head. She pulled back before they could get a better lock on her. The remaining bodyguards, including the last car, had discovered where she was. Wallachia got out of their sight and moved to a new position, further to the side. From there she could see them all, but they were still firing at her previous location.
She checked the supply of bullets to the Stormer before firing. The rounds threw up dirt in the air as they hit the street, until the dirt changed to blood as the rounds maimed and mangled the bodyguards. Her aiming assist plotted the targets in rapid succession with red triangles and she moved on to the next victim after another. The roar of the Stormer blurred everything else out and she focused only on firing it. The empty casings flew out and pinged when they hit the ground, slowly building a small pile at her feet.
She let the Stormer fire until it ran out of bullets. The street was a scene of massacre, strewed with mutilated bodies and the three cars were riddled with holes. Smoke rose from all of them and small fires had broken out. She let the Stormer go back into storage mode and jumped down on the street.
All the bodyguards had been taken out. There wasn’t a groan or shriek of pain. Just silence. She approached the middle car, hoping to see the target inside. The windows were bathed in blood so she couldn’t see inside. She opened the door and was greeted by a fat body falling out, terror on its face. Wallachia grinned.
“Hey, fatty.”
She bent down and retrieved a syringe from her pocket. She stuck it into the dead man’s arm and drew some blood, then put it back in her pocket. The blood sample would confirm her kill. The mission was done. She wasn’t, though.
She scoured the bodies, looking for one that looked young and strong. She turned some bodies over until she eventually found one to her liking. The rounds had penetrated his stomach and thighs, so he had bled to death. The rest of his torso and head was undamaged.
Wallachia straddled him and ripped his jacket open. There was a faint hint of blood that had sneaked upwards inside the jacket when he’d fallen down. She put a finger in one of the holes that the rounds had made and dug around a bit. She pulled it out and licked her finger clean from the blood. A satisfied smile grew on her face. She inserted two fingers and widened the hole. Then she pulled and ripped the man’s abdomen apart.
A smorgasbord of deliciousness opened itself before her and she grinned widely. It had been a while since she’d had a dinner like this. What a splendid ending to a successful mission.
To Luis's credit, if had been aware that Nanoha knew about his bracer, he did not make any unusual moves to further highlight that fact. “I understand that your father would have told you of my visit, Ms Takamachi?"
Nanoha looked back at his face, then gave a sign. When he replied with the correct counter¬sign, she made a quick bow of her own, then accepted the offered hand and said, "Please, call me Nanoha.”
Luis took a seat but, the three noticed, did not allow himself to relax fully, but took a furtive glance at the small inverted dome containing the security camera and quickly scanned the premises. He looked through the menu and ordered a sandwich and capuccino before saying, "Did Shiro tell you the purpose of my visit?"
Nanoha looked pensive for a moment before saying, "Dad only mentioned that it had to do with our ancestral clan."
Luis nodded. "You could say so. You are aware of what the Fuwa did?" It was Nanoha's turn to give assent. When she had reached an appropriate age, her father and siblings had taken her aside and told her of the family business, which included bodyguard duties, ninja work and the occasional wet op. It had been on one such run that Shiro had barely escaped with his life from a bombing. If he had been just a bit slower, he would never have made it. The thought still gave her shivers. Things would have turned out quite differently in that case, she knew.
“What he wants me to inform you of is that things went deeper than that The Fuwa were a part of an ancient and noble order-" he looked down at his smartphone again, then back up at them. "They were Assassins."
The three started visibly, though Nanoha was the first to recover and ask, "Why couldn't Dad tell me himself?"
Luis took another discreet glance around the cafe and said, "That brings us to the other half of the matter - our ancient enemies, the Templar. They were the ones who orchestrated the attack that nearly wiped out the Fuwa clan. Even today, they wage a shadow war with us." He paused. "You will not believe who-they-counted amongst them or the extent of their reach."
Nanoha looked at him intently. "These... Templar. Weren't they wiped out in the Middle Ages?"
Luis shook his head. "The Knights Templar were a public face and they went underground after the supposed purge. Now, they have many catspaws to do their work."
Nanoha looked down at her cup and considered this. "Then the massacre of the Fuwa by the Clover terrorist group..."
Luis took a deep breath and looked her straight in the eye. "They too were pawns of the Templar... I'm sorry."
Nanoha turned away. She had not been born yet when the terrorists had struck that fateful family reunion and thus had tenuous links to the relatives who had lost their lives that day, but she could tell from how her father and siblings reacted when it was brought up that it had left mental scars. To learn that the perpetrators were really working for a higher authority... "Does Dad know this?"
Luis nodded grimly. "Of course. That brings us to why I was sent here - we believe that they know about Shiro's survival and are try-" He turned abruptly to see a group of people dressed in the uniform of Cranagan's police force approaching the entrance of the cafe. His eyes gleamed briefly and the three noticed him stiffen visibly. Turning back to them, he said, "Are these friends of yours, Nanoha?"
"I don't kn-"
"Captain Takamachi?”
The four curiously regarded the newcomer, who bore the insignia of a police inspector. His nametag read "J A Ronc". There was something odd about the uniform he wore, as did those of the constables with him, for their shirts seemed to bulge. The constables' hands hovered a little too closely to their sidearms and nightsticks and their faces seemed to shine with perspiration.
"Yes, Inspector..."
"Ronc, ma'am. I'll need you to come with us."
Nanoha and her two friends looked at each other, confusion written on their features, before Nanoha said, "What's going on? What have I done?"
"Ma'am, if you'll please come with us," Ronc pressed.
"Wait," Fate said and pulled out her identification. "I'm Enforcer Harlaown. I haven't received any word about this."
An experienced operator would have caught the glances the constables exchanged though Ronc had no visible reaction. "Ma'am, this is a local matter, not Enforcer business. This is under our jurisdiction. Now, Captain Takamachi, if you pl-"'
"Hold on!" Yuuno said. "Do you have a warrant?"
Ronc's lips started to curl downward into a frown, but then changed back into a neutral expression so quickly that one could not be sure it had been there. He reached into a pocket and pulled out a holographic display pad that projected the relevant information. After looking it over, Yuuno pulled out one of his own and began searching for something. After a few tense moments, Yuuno looked up and shook his head. "I'm sorry, Inspector, but the system has no record of the warrant you showed us with that serial number."
"Is that so," Ronc said, "Mr... Mr... Forget it. Captain Takamachi, I was warned that you might be uncooperative. Resisting arrest will only hinder your case." There was a loud fizzing sound and as the cafe's occupants looked around to see the security camera give off sparks, Ronc's hand went for his holstered gun.
***
A/N: I am still not too sure where I am going with this. If I have made any mistakes regarding TH3 canon, please do tell. As to whether the Templar have underestimated Nanoha... We will see, will we not? The bit about Ronc not knowing Yuuno was a deliberate jab at his being left behind by canon.
I think you want to set the cafe scene in Uminari, correct? Then, why is the Police wearing a Cranagan uniform? Otherwise, why are they meeting someone from Earth in Cranagan?
If you fix that, do remember to remove their Bureau ranks as well, since no Police on Earth should know them.
So, um... yeah. I don't know what to make of this. This is titled the prologue, but I honestly don't know if I'll continue. It's an odd concept, even for me.
That he had to die. That I had to kill. That he was meant to smile so beautifully as he died in my arms, that her blood was meant to stain my hands. I have to believe there was no other way it could have ended, that my escape wouldn’t have been possible under any other circumstances.
The darkness of the forest was absolute; not even the weak morning rays could pierce through the tightly woven branches. Huddled against the trunk of a massive tree, the blonde girl in white gazed quietly ahead at nothing. The white dog at her side curled tightly against her, sleeping peacefully; the first honest nap he’d had since they’d escaped the castle. It was a perfect image, the white girl and her white dog.
Both stained red with blood.
Absently, she brushed her fingers through his fur, making him rumble softly. His soft white fur was marred by bandages she had wrapped around his wounds to stop the bleeding, dirty strips of cloth she’d torn from the arms of her outfit. It wasn’t much, but she hadn’t wanted to spend another moment in that damned castle. Being lost in the dark woods was preferable to staying in that place waiting for help.
She knew, though, that they couldn’t stay like this forever. While there seemed to be no immediate threat of danger in the forest, there was still the worry of food and water, and they needed to travel when they could. She remembered there was a road by these trees; no doubt if they kept walking, eventually they’d reach that road. If they followed the road, it would probably lead to a town.
A long, winding road that never seemed to end; she enjoyed the mystery of it. In front she saw her mother smile and laugh, resting a hand over her father’s, and while she couldn’t see his face clearly, she heard him chuckle and felt her chest warm, delighted to be in the presence of the two she loved most.
She shook her head furiously, clearing the image. Taking a deep breath, she slowly got to her feet; beside her, the dog twitched and whined, opening dark, tired eyes to look up at her. Feeling her heart break at the clear exhaustion written in her guardian’s expression, she knelt down and gently hugged him. “I know,” she whispered. “I know you’re tired. I promise you, we’re close. We’ll be safe soon, and you can sleep all you want.” She pulled back, and he released a great sigh, shifting and slowly getting to his feet. To her relief, the movement didn’t start any new bleeding; his bandages stayed firmly in place.
She lifted her eyes to the sky, but couldn’t see it. She wasn’t discouraged, though; anything was better than that place. Here, at least, they could get out. Here, at least, they could find a way to start over when they left the woods behind.
She just hoped they’d find a river soon. The bloodstains on her hands were faded, barely noticeable by now, but she still desperately wanted to wash them.
“Let’s go, Hewie.”
He barked, as he had a habit of doing; his way of letting her know he was right beside her. Smiling softly, relieved that much at least had stayed the same, Fiona Belli started to walk.
It didn’t matter which direction they went. In the end, they’d still be free.
The mystical elixir sought by alchemists from the beginning of time, a substance compared to the philosopher’s stone. A drink that could grant immortality, kill the fear of aging, the inevitable death. A substance produced naturally within the Belli family, among only a select few, that carry it within their womb. It was this elixir that the madman sought, and it was this elixir that drove him to kill his brother and almost rape his niece.
The nightmare is over now. The azoth is beyond his reach; for even in death, a madman cannot grasp something physical, something carried by another mortal that isn’t his to take. Her father is dead, as is her mother, but the girl is safe.
But…
Who is to say, that her uncle was the only madman to seek the azoth?
She couldn’t explain why. Perhaps it had to do with that voice she had heard in her head, frantically calling for help, weakly asking for her to listen. Perhaps it had to do with the dreams she had had last night, of a young boy collapsing in the woods, a red gem gleaming at his side.
No, she certainly couldn’t explain why she felt so strange, even with those occurrences; her body tense and almost ready for some kind of confrontation. A girl of only nine years old wasn’t meant to feel this nervous, this tense; as if she was anticipating something, even if she didn’t know what it was.
“Nanoha-chan? You’re falling behind.”
She blinked, snapped out of her thoughts by her friend’s soft voice; looking up, she saw Suzuka’s worried gaze, and smiled. “Nyahahahaha, sorry, Suzuka-chan,” she murmured sheepishly, rubbing the back of her neck. “I guess I didn’t sleep well last night.”
It was a weak excuse, and she knew it; Suzuka clearly didn’t buy it, and judging by the glare Arisa was aiming her way, the green-eyed girl didn’t, either. Nanoha winced and shifted from foot to foot, realizing that they wanted an honest explanation and wouldn’t back down until they got it. She slowly lowered her hand.
“Well, um… the thing is—“
She never got to finish.
A blinding pain exploded in her head, making her yelp and clutch desperately at it; a brilliant flash of white light exploded from the trees, blazing over the whole area and bathing it in white. The ground seemed to rumble beneath their feet; Suzuka and Arisa cried out, clinging to each other tightly, and somehow Nanoha managed to keep her footing.
The light faded. Stunned, the three girls slowly relaxed. Nanoha timidly lowered her hands, wondering what that had been about.
“Help me.”
The voice sounded in her head again, the same she had heard last night; weak, pained, a desperate plea to anyone who would listen.
Nanoha didn’t hesitate this time. Never even looking at her friends, she plunged headlong into the trees, heading right for the spot where the light had erupted.
The bright flash blinded Fiona; the whipping winds started to suck her into the vortex. She screamed and struggled, but she couldn’t escape, caught in the heart of the whirlwind and completely at its mercy. With a snarl, moving in a blur, Hewie surged to his mistress; Fiona winced when she felt his teeth dig into her wrist, but even the dog’s best attempts couldn’t save her.
She didn’t know if Hewie was even trying to save her at all, or if he was just grabbing on to ensure that wherever she went, he wouldn’t be left behind. Then she thought no more as her consciousness plunged into darkness. The last thing she heard was her dog snarling viciously, even through his grip on her wrist.
Snarling? But there isn’t an enemy…
The vortex closed silently, leaving only drifting leaves in the air to mark its presence. With the loss of the girl in white and her white dog, the dark forest of Belli returned to its calm, unchanged state.
What if, in another world, another madman sought the use of the azoth?
What would happen to the girl, then?
Spoiler for Author's Notes:
1. So, yeah. Crossover with Haunting Ground. I don't even know why. I just wanted to write a fic focused on that universe, and then I had an idea for a crossover with season one... assuming I get farther along with the story than this prologue.
2. As for the azoth, I admit right now that I'll be playing loose and fast with the definition of how it works, as well as how, exactly, Fiona carries it. In the game, it's never exactly clear as to how Fiona has the Azoth inside of her; I know it's related to her womb, the game makes that abundantly clear, but it's never fully stated as to how she has it or if it's an entirely separate thing from her womb, or if it's inside her womb.
3. This is set in season one, obviously. Hopefully I'll be able to pull it off... if I post another chapter.
Hayate groaned as her eyes slowly opened up. "Ugh... Did I..." She trailed off as she saw the small girl floating in front of her. "...I guess I didn't..."
"Hi, daddy." Reinforce Zwei smiled at her. "I'm here to help the Guardian Knights where mommy can't."
Reinforce rubbed her head, wondering why she had such a troublesome child. "What Zwei means is, I'm worried that the Chaos that touched the two of us would have negative effects on the Guardian Knights and I asked Mary to help make Reinforce Zwei so they could have a Unison device help them."
"Oh." Hayate sat up and looked at Zwei. "So... You're my daughter?"
"Yep, yep!" Zwei grinned at her "father". "You can call me Rein or Zwei, it's up to you."
Hayate nodded and looked at Reinforce, who shrugged, then at Mary, who shook her head. "Don't look at me, she's your daughter." Really, this was a lot of fun.
Nanoha was about to say something, when her cellphone rang. "Huh?" Answering her phone, she nodded. "Uh huh, uh huh, yeah, Raising Heart's finally fixed. What? Sure, okay, bye mom." She hung up her phone and looked at Yuuno and Fate with a confused expression. "Mom wants to see us about something."
"You better go then." Lindy nodded as Nanoha, Fate, Arf, and Yuuno left, with Arisa and Suzuka following right after them. "I do have a question, Mary."
"Hmm?" The scientist looked at Lindy. "What?"
"If Reinforce says that she doesn't want to unison with the Knights because she's worried about what happened after she came into being, and with how Zwei came into being, how can Zwei unison with the Guardian Knights and Reinforce can't?"
"Even if she was born from the two of us, she seems to lack the Chaos energy that Hayate and myself have." Reinforce spoke up. "Or, at the very least, it doesn't manifest with her powers as much as it does with mine or Hayate's."
"Right, the two of you have black-tipped gold wings, don't you?"
"Yay!" Rein threw her tiny arms into the air. "I'm helpful!"
Hayate stared at her for a few moments, before giggling, grabbing Rein out of midair and hugging the tiny girl to her. "Welcome to the world, Reinforce Zwei."
Rein smiled and hugged Hayate tightly even as the others smiled at the heartwarming scene.
(---)
"You wanted to see us, mom?" Nanoha asked as she, Fate, Arf and Yuuno walked into the house. Arisa and Suzuka had left to their homes along the way.
The four stopped as they saw Lina sitting at the table with a woman in a suit. "Mom?"
"Ah, here they are." Lina smiled and motioned for them to come to the table. "This is Ms. Tanaka, a lawyer who specializes in family affairs." Lina then pushed some papers across the table. "Fate, I want you to read this carefully."
The girl blinked her red eyes and picked up the papers, reading them slowly, before her eyes widened. "You..." She put the papers down. "You mean it?"
Lina nodded and handed her a pen. "If you want to, just sign your name at the bottom." As Fate took it and started signing, she blinked as the girl stopped and looked confused for a moment. "Fate?"
"Um, I don't think Takamachi is a good name for me. Can I have your maiden name?"
"You want to be Fate Inverse?" Lina blinked a few times and looked at the lawyer, who shrugged at that.
"She can choose any name she wants, but she'll legally be your daughter."
"Fate Testarossa-Inverse." Fate said with conviction and nodded as she finished the paperwork before handing the papers back to Lina, who wrote down on them before handing them to the lawyer.
"Mmhmm, mmhmm, mmhmm... Everything looks in order." The lawyer smiled as she stood up. "I'll just go and file this, but she is now your daughter legally." She bowed to the family before leaving the house.
Fate was blushing as Nanoha hugged her tightly, still, she did enjoy the hug, she liked it more when Arf shifted to her human form and pulled her up into a tight hug. "Thank you."
Yuuno looked at Lina in confusion and the woman smiled at him softly. "Fate, despite everything else in life, you need a family, people you can fall back on." Arf put Fate down as Lina continued to speak. "Regardless of how you're born or come into a family, it's incredibly painful and hard when you find yourself without friends and family." Lina sighed as her eyes became unfocused. "I remember how bad it was for me when I crashed onto this world."
"Really?" Nanoha was curious now, her mom never talked about her past. "What happened?"
"Well, when I first got here, I was unconscious." Lina chuckled softly. "Plus I came from a world that was at least two centuries behind this one in terms of technology."
*Flash*
"Ugh..." She groaned as she woke up. Her left eye hurt, badly. It felt like Zelgadis decided to take the hilt of his sword and smack her a few times. "Where am I?"
"Dad!" She opened her right eye up to see a little boy turning to look out of the room. "She woke up!"
Sitting up, she groaned as her eye throbbed. "Ugh... That's the last time... Next time I go up against a Mazoku like that, I'm going to shove a Ragna Blade down their throat."
"That sounds like it could hurt." She looked up as a black-haired man walked into the room. "Are you okay?"
"My left eye hurts, feels like someone took a sword hilt and tried breaking my skull."
"Let me look." He knelt down and moved her hand from her head. "Well, I don't see any indication of someone trying to use a hilt to kill you." He blinked as she opened her left eye. "I've never seen someone with red and gold eyes before."
"Gold?" She asked, surprised. "Can't be, my eyes are red."
He frowned slightly and turned to the boy. "Kyouya, can you go get me a mirror, please?"
"K, dad!" The boy ran out of the room as the man turned back to her.
"My name's Shiro Fuwa, you met my son Kyouya. What's your name?"
"Lina Inverse." She muttered and got slightly worried when he didn't react to her at all. "Never heard of me?"
He shook his head. "No, I haven't."
"Dad!" Kyouya ran into the room with a small hand mirror in his grasp. "Here!"
"What did I tell you about running in the house?" Shiro sighed as he took the mirror and handed it to Lina. "Take a look for yourself."
Lina took the mirror, before gasping, her eyes wide as she saw her face. "But... That's not possible." Suddenly her eye throbbed and glowed brightly. "Ugh!"
"Neat!" Kyouya smiled as he saw her eye light up. "Hey, dad, can you do that?"
Shiro shook his head, helping Lina up and out of the room, where she gasped as she saw the various electronics. "What's wrong with her, dad?" The four-year-old had never seen anyone react the way she was reacting.
Seeing the way she was looking, Shiro guided her back into the room she had been in, where she slowly calmed down. "I think that you could use some explanations..."
"Please." Lina nodded at him.
*Flash*
"Wait, you're not Kyouya-nii's mother?" Nanoha blinked and Lina shook her head.
"Not biologically, no. But he is my son, and your brother." Lina sighed as she leaned back. "Took me over a year to get used to all the technology around me."
"How did you end up married to dad?" Nanoha blinked at Lina, who smiled at the memory.
"That was... About three years later." Lina smiled in remembrance. "Before that, I spent a lot of time doing various odd jobs, mostly helping your father on various body guard duties. One mission in China was especially interesting."
"What happened?" Arf asked, curious.
Lina had a dry smirk on her face, that had been an interesting time. "Well..."
*Flash*
"Dammit!" Lina cursed as she dodged out of the way of another blast of energy. "Shiro! The next time your client is being pursued by the local Demon King, make sure to find out BEFORE we're nearly killed!"
"Got it!" Shiro yelled as he stood between the creature and the client, who was begging for them to protect him.
The creature in front of them was large, fire surrounding its body as the skull on its head cackled at them. "Do you think you can defeat me in my own domain?! I'm the Demon King of this land!"
He looked down as his legs were encased in ice. "Do you really," he broke out of the ice with ease, "think that a little ice can stop me?"
Lina snarled at him, man what she wouldn't have given for a Dynast Breath or Zelas Brid at that moment. "I've fought worse. Elmekia Lance!" A yellow spear of energy lashed out at the creature, who engulfed the thing in black fire, destroying it.
"Just hand the fool to me, and I shall let you live."
"Don't think so." Shiro glared at him and rushed forward, dodging the flaming chains that the thing summoned up, parrying any that got close to him, before slashing at the thing's arm, only to gasp as his body was wrapped up by chains.
"Fool." The demon squeezed the chains, causing them to cut into Shiro's body.
"SHIRO!" Lina yelled, the talismans glowing brightly as she froze the chains covering him, allowing him to break free. "That's it!" A blue ball formed in her hands. "Shiro, get him out of here, I'm going to kill this asshole."
"Right." Shiro nodded and started to move.
The demon glared at her. "Die!" The demon's chains moved and snapped straight for Lina.
"MOVE!" Shiro grabbed Lina and pulled her away from the chains, only to gasp as he felt his side punctured.
Lina's face went pale as she saw that. "You..." Her hair started to float upwards. "Will not survive this."
"You think you can stop me?"
"I won't know until I try. Here we go!"
A black circle appeared under Lina as energy crackled around her. 'Please, L-Sama, let this work, I'll be dead if I'm wrong about this.'
"Master of the Dark Sky, you who dwell upon the Azure Abyss.
Oh, ruler of the paths of Life and Death.
May the souls of those that oppose us be swept
upon the maelstrom of thy wrath!
Let the fools who stand before me be destroyed, by the power you and I possess."
Energy blasts fired by the creature splashed against Lina's barrier harmlessly. "What are you trying...?"
"Nemesis Breaker!" Lina screamed, the spell complete, the blue ball was fired forward and engulfing the creature, destroying it and the mountain that was right behind him.
"Wh...What?" The clinet gasped as he saw Lina, her hands glowing white, covering Shiro's body. "What did you..?"
"The strongest spell I could come up with." Lina said softly and smiled as Shiro groaned and woke up. "You dummy! I have a barrier around me when I cast my spells!"
"Heh, sorry." Shiro smiled at her. "Just couldn't let you get hurt. Kyouya likes you too much."
"Dummy." Lina felt tears in her eyes for some reason. "What would he have done if he lost you?"
"Called you mother." Shiro said chuckling softly.
Lina sighed softly at him. "Dummy." Still, he was a sweet-heart. "Don't you ever do something that crazy again, okay?"
"Heh..." Shiro smiled at her and cupped her face. "Careful, you're sounding like a wife who's worried about her husband."
Lina sighed, she had been on this world for three years now. "Maybe..."
*Flash*
"Shortly after that, I ended up marrying Shiro." Lina smiled as the kids all looked at her in awe. "That was the first time I ever used the Nemesis Breaker. Boy, the Chinese were sure upset when they realized that the exploding mountain took out part of the Great Wall."
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My fics Due to certain things, I am not here, find me over on TFF.
"Ugh..." Vita groaned as she and the others got home several hours early. The sun was barely up, but she was so worn out that all she wanted to do was crash on a bed for a few hours.
Well, that and she had to glare down, before turning back to Signum, who looked at her with a slightly tired expression. "How do you... Put up with these things?!" Her chest was sore, tender and she really missed the days when she didn't age at all. To be honest, she couldn't believe that she was actually missing those days now.
"You barely have anything there." Signum rolled her eyes at Vita. "They're still growing, so, it's going to be sore and tender for awhile."
Vita grumbled as Shamal patted her head. "Don't worry, Vita-chan, you'll get used to it soon enough. Just be careful around Hayate-chan for a bit, otherwise you'll find her groping your chest all the time."
Vita turned away, grumbling, though her face was red at the thought.
"I say we let Hayate have at her breasts, so she knows what you and I have had to put up with." Signum smirked as Vita turned back and glared at her. "I wouldn't glare like that, otherwise Hayate will think something's wrong."
"Ugh, I think something is wrong, my body feels weird more often and I feel all cranky and yucky." Vita grumbled as she walked into the house.
"Shamal, make sure to double our supply of Midol soon."
"You think she needs it?"
"Don't know, but better safe than sorry." Signum thought as the group walked into the house as well. "Reinforce?" She blinked at the tall silver-haired woman, who was wearing casual clothes and a green apron as she worked on making some food. "It's been awhile."
"Yes." Reinforce nodded to the rest of the family. "Would you come to the living room, you need to meet the newest member of our house."
The Wolkenritter blinked as Reinforce put some sandwiches on a tray, some glasses and walked out of the kitchen, before following her into the living room.
On the couch was Hayate and floating around her was something that had Vita scratching her head in curiosity.
"Reinforce? Why is there a small you here?" Vita asked as Reinforce put the tray on the table.
"Vita, Zafira, Signum, Shamal, I'd like you to meet Reinforce Zwei." Reinforce motioned to the small girl, who floated up to them.
"HI!" She grinned and waved her hands at them. "So you're the rest of the family, huh? Mommy and daddy have been saying so much about all of you!"
"Mommy and daddy?" Zafira blinked as he looked at her, then at Reinforce.
"You're confusing them, daughter." Reinforce said softly. "At least explain who's who."
"Sorry, mommy." Rein pouted at them. "Anyway!" She floated back to Hayate. "This is my daddy!" She hugged Hayate, or tried to, since she was so small, it was hard for her to wrap her arms around anything on Hayate's body.
"Wait... Daddy?" Vita twitched, what was that about? She... The little thing couldn't be serious, could she?
Hayate pouted at Reinforce. "You shouldn't pick on me so much."
"Sorry, daddy." Reinforce said softly from behind a glass as she sipped from it. "But you're our daughter's father, you can't deny it."
Zwei sniffled. "Doesn't daddy love me?"
"I do!" Hayate waved her hands back and forth as Rein started pouting at her. "I'm just not used to being called "daddy". That's typically saved for boys! I'm a girl!"
"Sorry, daddy." Rein pouted at Hayate, who shook her head.
"Never mind."
"What do you MEAN "mommy" and "daddy"?! Devices can't get pregnant!"
"That's what I thought too..." Reinforce muttered as she explained how Reinforce Zwei came into being, during which time, the Knights took various places around the table in the living room. The rather stunned looks on the Guardian Knights faces was rather amusing. "I can tell you, being pregnant was not very fun." Reinforce sighed and shook her head. "...Even if I got someone like her out of it." There was an... Odd smile on her face as she looked at Zwei, who was trying to eat a sandwich that was as tall as she was. "Here, let me cut that."
"Why are you up so early?" Vita asked Hayate from her position on the couch.
"Couldn't sleep." Hayate yawned softly. "Zwei couldn't get to sleep and I wanted to stay up with her."
"I think that we should get some sleep though." Shamal smiled as Zwei finally seemed to be running out of energy and her eyes were drooping as her body slumped. "We can all talk more when we've had a few hours of sleep."
Reinforce nodded and walked over to Hayate. "Come along, dear."
"Hey!" Vita yelled at Reinforce as the taller woman picked up Hayate. "What's that about?!"
Reinforce turned to Vita and raised an eyebrow. "Mothers and fathers should sleep in the same bed. Otherwise their children get confused and upset."
"...I think Reinforce is having too much fun with this." Zafira muttered as he watched them walk off.
Picking up Zwei, Signum nodded and followed them. She didn't know where to put Zwei and she was going to find out before going to bed herself.
__________________
My fics Due to certain things, I am not here, find me over on TFF.
"Ugh..." Vita groaned as she and the others got home several hours early. The sun was barely up, but she was so worn out that all she wanted to do was crash on a bed for a few hours.
Well, that and she had to glare down, before turning back to Signum, who looked at her with a slightly tired expression. "How do you... Put up with these things?!" Her chest was sore, tender and she really missed the days when she didn't age at all. To be honest, she couldn't believe that she was actually missing those days now.
"You barely have anything there." Signum rolled her eyes at Vita. "They're still growing, so, it's going to be sore and tender for awhile."
Vita grumbled as Shamal patted her head. "Don't worry, Vita-chan, you'll get used to it soon enough. Just be careful around Hayate-chan for a bit, otherwise you'll find her groping your chest all the time."
Vita turned away, grumbling, though her face was red at the thought.
"I say we let Hayate have at her breasts, so she knows what you and I have had to put up with." Signum smirked as Vita turned back and glared at her. "I wouldn't glare like that, otherwise Hayate will think something's wrong."
"Ugh, I think something is wrong, my body feels weird more often and I feel all cranky and yucky." Vita grumbled as she walked into the house.
"Shamal, make sure to double our supply of Midol soon."
"You think she needs it?"
"Don't know, but better safe than sorry." Signum thought as the group walked into the house as well. "Reinforce?" She blinked at the tall silver-haired woman, who was wearing casual clothes and a green apron as she worked on making some food. "It's been awhile."
"Yes." Reinforce nodded to the rest of the family. "Would you come to the living room, you need to meet the newest member of our house."
The Wolkenritter blinked as Reinforce put some sandwiches on a tray, some glasses and walked out of the kitchen, before following her into the living room.
On the couch was Hayate and floating around her was something that had Vita scratching her head in curiosity.
"Reinforce? Why is there a small you here?" Vita asked as Reinforce put the tray on the table.
"Vita, Zafira, Signum, Shamal, I'd like you to meet Reinforce Zwei." Reinforce motioned to the small girl, who floated up to them.
"HI!" She grinned and waved her hands at them. "So you're the rest of the family, huh? Mommy and daddy have been saying so much about all of you!"
"Mommy and daddy?" Zafira blinked as he looked at her, then at Reinforce.
"You're confusing them, daughter." Reinforce said softly. "At least explain who's who."
"Sorry, mommy." Rein pouted at them. "Anyway!" She floated back to Hayate. "This is my daddy!" She hugged Hayate, or tried to, since she was so small, it was hard for her to wrap her arms around anything on Hayate's body.
"Wait... Daddy?" Vita twitched, what was that about? She... The little thing couldn't be serious, could she?
Hayate pouted at Reinforce. "You shouldn't pick on me so much."
"Sorry, daddy." Reinforce said softly from behind a glass as she sipped from it. "But you're our daughter's father, you can't deny it."
Zwei sniffled. "Doesn't daddy love me?"
"I do!" Hayate waved her hands back and forth as Rein started pouting at her. "I'm just not used to being called "daddy". That's typically saved for boys! I'm a girl!"
"Sorry, daddy." Rein pouted at Hayate, who shook her head.
"Never mind."
"What do you MEAN "mommy" and "daddy"?! Devices can't get pregnant!"
"That's what I thought too..." Reinforce muttered as she explained how Reinforce Zwei came into being, during which time, the Knights took various places around the table in the living room. The rather stunned looks on the Guardian Knights faces was rather amusing. "I can tell you, being pregnant was not very fun." Reinforce sighed and shook her head. "...Even if I got someone like her out of it." There was an... Odd smile on her face as she looked at Zwei, who was trying to eat a sandwich that was as tall as she was. "Here, let me cut that."
"Why are you up so early?" Vita asked Hayate from her position on the couch.
"Couldn't sleep." Hayate yawned softly. "Zwei couldn't get to sleep and I wanted to stay up with her."
"I think that we should get some sleep though." Shamal smiled as Zwei finally seemed to be running out of energy and her eyes were drooping as her body slumped. "We can all talk more when we've had a few hours of sleep."
Reinforce nodded and walked over to Hayate. "Come along, dear."
"Hey!" Vita yelled at Reinforce as the taller woman picked up Hayate. "What's that about?!"
Reinforce turned to Vita and raised an eyebrow. "Mothers and fathers should sleep in the same bed. Otherwise their children get confused and upset."
"...I think Reinforce is having too much fun with this." Zafira muttered as he watched them walk off.
Picking up Zwei, Signum nodded and followed them. She didn't know where to put Zwei and she was going to find out before going to bed herself.
... Picturing Rein trying to eat a sandwich bigger than she is heals all the stresses in my mind and makes the world seem peaceful.
I think you want to set the cafe scene in Uminari, correct? Then, why is the Police wearing a Cranagan uniform? Otherwise, why are they meeting someone from Earth in Cranagan?
If you fix that, do remember to remove their Bureau ranks as well, since no Police on Earth should know them.
The idea was that by meeting on Mid-Childa, the Assassins were hoping to minimise the chance that Templar agents would be present to eavesdrop or take other undesired actions. Unfortunately, as you can see it does not seem to have worked.
The problem is, are the Assassins mages? How did they find their way to Mid Childa? And why are Nanoha and Fate acting like nothing's out of the ordinary for someone they didn't expect to know about other worlds to meet them on said other world?
And why are Nanoha and Fate acting like nothing's out of the ordinary for someone they didn't expect to know about other worlds to meet them on said other world?
Ah yes, I've noticed this too. You'd think that Nanoha would be more 'inquisitive' towards the man over the revelation.
Sitting at the table, Lina looked at door as she heard a knock on it. "Huh..." Putting down her coffee, she walked to the door and opened it up. "Lindy? Chrono? What brings you two here so early?" She let them in and guided them to the table, where she gave Lindy some coffee and tried to give Chrono some food, he shook his head, stating that he already had some food.
"Well, I was wondering if you ever thought about going back to your home world."
Lina sighed softly. "I thought about it, a lot. But I got married, had Nanoha, I have kids, responsibilities, I just kind of... Settled down." Heck, now that she thought about it, it wasn't too different from her own parents. They had wandered around a lot before getting married, settling down in Zephilia before having Luna and then herself.
Lindy nodded at her. "All things considered, I'm not surprised, really. Being on a world so different than your own, with hardly an magic users around, and if there was any, none of them could open a dimensional portal back to your home."
"No offense, but even your world is in the same universe as this world."
Chrono scowled a bit at that and Lindy chuckled and nodded. "Oh, yes, of course, at the distance we were away from your world, it might as well have been a whole dimension away." Seeing Lina shrug, she smiled softly at the other woman. "We may have found a way to your world."
Lina stared at her. "...You better not be lying to me. It's been... Sixteen years now." She sighed and shook her head. "Even so, I can't just go back and say "hey, how's it going?" to them, I mean, sixteen years, I was sixteen when I left, I can't imagine what they've been up to since I left." If they were even alive, but she didn't want to think about that. Lina chuckled softly, wondering what her friends were up to. Amelia was probably the Queen if her grandfather and father weren't around, though she doubted it. Maybe Zelgadis had found a cure finally. Gourry probably forgot about her. Maybe Slyphiel managed to get him to marry her. 'I hope so, they're good people.'
Lindy raised an eyebrow at her. "You don't want to go?"
Lina laughed at her. "Oh, if you had asked before I got married, I would have said sure and jumped on it." She looked at her cup, before taking a small drink. "But... I don't know if I could just go back there."
"Even for a visit?"
Lina stared at Lindy blankly. "...A visit?"
Lindy chuckled at her. "There's no guarantee, and we're just doing some testing, but getting to your world, it shouldn't be too hard."
"Are you sure, because the way that people spoke before, they made it sound like Mid-Childa was on a whole different dimension and..."
"Who said that?" Chrono interrupted her. "I don't recall anyone saying that Mid-Childa was on another dimension."
"...Wait, you're serious?" Lina looked at him and frowned. "Damn, I wish I had a book or something, it would be so easy to just flip back and re-read explanations."
Lindy smiled at her. "We can get to other dimensions, we just tend to not do anything unless there's some sort of dimensional disturbance. We have enough problems patrolling this universe."
Lina laughed. "I can imagine that."
"Say..." Chrono frowned thoughtfully. "I was thinking... You don't seem to be too bothered by the fact that you're stuck here."
Lina chuckled at the kid. "Well, at first, I was, because all the technology, lack of magic and the fact that there wasn't things like dragons, demons and the like running around freely made me feel like I was a fish out of temporal water."
"But, there are demons and the like running around in this universe." Chrono pointed out and Lina smirked at him.
"Yes, but they aren't that common." Lina shook her head. She didn't know how many demons were running around in the world, most of them that did kept their heads down and didn't try to do too much anyway, humans were more than capable of killing each other off these days anyway. "It's like that Men in Black movie, but while there are aliens on Earth, there's also some demons too."
"Men in Black?" Chrono blinked and Lina felt like slapping her forehead.
"Sorry, forgot that you probably never saw it. Movie made awhile back in the United States, pretty decent, though they made it sound like there was nothing else in the universe." Lina chuckled at that, oh that movie was fun to watch though.
"Well, just so you know, we may have a lead, and we could probably get to your world in a few days at best, a couple of weeks at worst."
Lina nodded to Lindy and leaned back to think about it. "Sounds fun." A quick trip, taking her current family to see her mother, father and sister? That was something that she could enjoy.
Maybe her sister found someone and she was an aunt. She then thought about it and shuddered a little. A miniature Luna? That was a scary thought. Then again, the thought of ten Naga clones all laughing like she did was still the scariest thing she had ever heard in her life.
Spoiler for Comments:
I never said that they couldn't travel to another dimension, I just said that the Bureau was on the other side of the Universe. Also, yes, time has moved forward, so for Lina, it has been 16 years since she left.
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My fics Due to certain things, I am not here, find me over on TFF.
"Yay!" Rein laughed in glee as she splashed around in the bath tub. "Baths are fun!"
"Be careful." Hayate tried to warn her. "You don't want to bonk your head."
"Okay, daddy." Rein smiled as she splashed around. "Whee! Big waves!"
"Yes, very big waves." Reinforce said as she removed her towel and slipped into the water, sliding close to Hayate. "Are you okay?" Hayate nodded and sighed as she rested her head against Reinforce's chest. "Hayate?"
"Mmm... Your breasts are so nice." Hayate giggled and Reinforce sighed, before yelping as Rein jumped on her unoccupied breast. "Zwei?"
"Mommy's really soft here!" Rein snuggled up to Reinforce's chest and the taller Unison device sighed heavily, before gently rubbing Rein's back and hugging Hayate with her other arm.
"What a family I have." Reinforce was slightly red in the face as Hayate took that moment to squeeze her breasts. "I'd prefer if you didn't do that when our daughter was here, dear."
"Mouuu..." Hayate pouted, but relented, before Rein let go of Reinforce's chest, turned and did a cannonball into the bathtub, giggling as she started to swim around. "Rein, be careful, okay?"
"Okay, daddy!" Rein took a deep breath before ducking under the water for a few moments and erupting out of it with a splash. As she out from under the water, she giggled and blinked as her body was in a fairly large bubble. "Hey! Lookie! Big bubble!"
Reinforce rolled her eyes and reached over, popping the bubble, causing Rein to let out a yelp as she fell back into the water. Reinforce smiled softly as Rein spluttered and looked up at her. "Bath time isn't for playing around so much, Zwei."
"Moouuu... Okay, mommy." Rein pouted but conceded that point as she went back to just swimming around the bathtub.
Reinforce nodded as she settled back down in the tub. She blinked as Hayate moved to sit in her lap. "Hayate?" Her face turned slightly red as Hayate leaned her head back against her chest. "Hayate?"
"Warm pillows." Hayate giggled and spluttered as Reinforce splashed her with water.
"You shouldn't sleep in the bath tub, dear." Reinforce said flatly.
Before Hayate could say anything, she and Reinforce found themselves splashed. "Splash fight!" Zwei giggled as she splashed her "parents" with water. "Eeek!" She had to cover her head as Reinforce flicked her wrist and splashed her back.
"I think that's enough." Reinforce said as she stood up with Hayate. "Come on, we should get ready for the day. I'm sure that the Knights will be up soon and hungry."
Hayate pouted, but nodded as Reinforce carried her out of the bath, wrapped a towel around her, and around herself, before getting a tiny towel and helping Rein get the towel around her body, before the three went back to their room to get dressed.
About half-way to the room, there was an ear-splitting scream that came from the room. "Vita-chan!" Hayate gasped as Reinforce hurried up to get to the room, only to find Signum and Shamal at the door looking into the room, Zafira, in wolf form, right behind them. "What happened?" Hayate asked Signum, who shook her head and everyone looked into the room as Vita sat on the bed, trembling and tearing up.
"I'm bleeding!" Vita cried out as she looked down. "Blood doesn't come from there!"
Signum sighed and hung her head. "Shamal, go check on our Midol supplies." She then stepped into the room. "Reinforce, you may want to change the sheets before going to sleep later." She walked up to Vita and pulled the girl off the bed. "Come on, let's get you cleaned up."
"What's happening?" Vita whimpered, she just felt so... Disgusting at that moment, and she was bleeding, she shouldn't be bleeding! Especially from between her legs like that!
"Just your first period." Signum shook her head. The house was going to be hell for the next few days.
Zafira wondered if maybe he should shift to that puppy form Arf preferred and hide under the couch for the next week.
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My fics Due to certain things, I am not here, find me over on TFF.
2010-11-16, 20:20
Author
. That ending was just evil, man. Still... well... Shadowverse. Pretty much par for the course where Lutecia is concerned.
) waiting for the second half of the Shadowverse two-shot...here it is!
