These next posts are probably going to be shorter. Anyways, onward to the next part!
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Saki sighed sadly as she looked at the WIRED network over a borrowed phone. While she had a sneaking suspicion as to what she'd find regarding her idol status, to see such rejection in front of her eyes was still hard for her to stomach. Everywhere she looked, former fans were denouncing her as a monster, her previous managers and sponsorships had dropped her and wanted nothing to do with her, and she even bore witness to videos of people burning her records and merchandise, or simply tossing them in the trash. Even here with the survivors, she was taken aback with how a few of them treated her with hostility, especially after so many of them had cheered for her and Haruto saving them in the nick of time.
"All that I worked for.....now thrown away like some sort of disease-ridden plant" she thought sadly. She struggled to hold her emotions as the fact that she had been used like this brought pain to her heart.
"...No" she said to herself, clenching her fist.
"If that's how the world sees me, then I'll just have to fight even harder! I refuse to let it bring me down! This world may reject me, but I'll stay on the path, especially for Haruto!.......Haruto....
"I thank you for supporting the decision to give me a second chance" a male voice piped up. Saki turned to the source, only to narrow her eyes at it.
"A-Drei..." she spat, clearly not in the mood to see the one that caused her reputation to tank. "Again, I only supported it because Haruto did so. If you think that makes us friends, think again."
"I'm truly sorry for everything you went through Rukino Saki."
All he got in response was another glare. "Yeah, thanks. You weren't sorry when you captured me, nor were you sorry when you delivered me to be executed and tortured."
"Please.....I'm not that person anymore." he pleaded.
"I know you aren't. Shame that it took until now to see the error of your ways."
Not wanting to be in the presence of him for much longer lest she start to feel sick, Saki then left the hallway.
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Having been rebuffed, A-Drei sadly walked to the storage section of the ship. All the way there, he had to come face-to-face with more of the survivors. Every time he did so, he received more of the same sort of treatment.
"Murderer!"
"Dorssian scum!"
"You deserve to be shot!"
"I lost my friend thanks to you!"
"You shouldn't still be here!"
Indeed, everywhere he went, the hatred and contempt the surviving students of New-Jior and ex-Arus soldiers was palpable. Some even went so far as to spit in his face, and he even bet that he would've received worse had L-Elf and Haruto not made it clear he was still needed alive.
Speaking of L-Elf, his former friend had also refused to allow A-Drei to see him. He claimed it was because he still needed to work on his plan, but given how he had allowed Haruto and Shouko to speak in private with him, he had his doubts. Especially given the defiant look that was thrown his way.
"L-Elf.....am I still to be a part of your revolution?"
Eventually, the disgraced agent had finally made it to the storage room. Not even bothering to turn on the light, he entered it and collapsed against the far wall, burying his face into his knees, regret filling every vein in his body.
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Akira smiled as she watched Shouko enter the observation deck with Haruto, having given the former a reassuring grin through her phone. At the very least, she had high hopes that her close friend and fellow pilot would be able to be on good terms once more.
Just then, she heard the sound of her stomach growling. Realizing that she hadn't eaten since the rendezvous, she looked around the cockpit of Unit 06, only to find that she had run out of snacks.
"Oh no" she thought, panic beginning to set in again.
"Am I going to have to go out amidst all these people?"
True, she had gotten better at interacting with others. But she was still not completely comfortable with it. Looking at the camera feeds, she also saw her brother was busy helping the wounded with Takahi and Rion, and she obviously did not want to intrude on Shouko's conversation with Haruto.
As her stomach continued to growl, Akira groaned as she realized that she had little choice, less she want to starve. Placing a cardboard box on her head, she opened the cockpit hatch and floated out of her Valvrave.
Based on everything she saw from her camera feeds, she knew the location of the closest storage room. She only hoped that one-eyed Dorssian agent wasn't at it just yet.
It took a bit for her to get to the room, as her view was obstructed by the box she was wearing on her head. Not to mention how she had to get past a whole bunch of ex-ARUS soldiers, many of whom were flabbergasted at the sight of a girl wearing a purple pilot suit with a cardboard box on her head.
Luckily, she finally reached the storage room. Quickly getting inside, she took off the box, turned on the light, and began looking through the food supplies. To her delight, it contained her favorite brand of potato chips, along with the chili sauce that Shouko showed her went great with them. She quickly grabbed a couple bags of the chips, along with a can of the sauce.
Unfortunately, just as she grabbed the latter, she looked to her right. To her horror, there was the one-eyed ex Karlstein agent, the man who had captured Saki and was responsible for the massacre, sitting with his back to the wall and his arms around his knees. Without the box covering her face, she was completely exposed to his sight, leaving her to panic and nearly drop her snacks.
"W-What do I do?! H-He saw my face!"
Trying her best to stifle her screams, she made a break for the exit.
"Scared of me huh?" A-Drei suddenly said, looking up from his knees. "Honestly I don't blame you. Everyone here is either that or hates me."
At that, Akira froze. While panic did have a part in it, as the agent was now looking right at her face, it was also confusion. Apparently, he didn't know that she had this reaction to pretty much everyone that she didn't consider a close friend.
"No matter, it's the most I deserve after all. Given everything that's happened under my watch. And all because I didn't trust my friend enough. Being an outcast both here and in Dorssia was inevitable I suppose."
Akira turned to look back at him. From his posture, she was reminded of how she would often curl into a ball when inside her hacker cave and even in her Valvrave cockpit when she was feeling nervous or upset.
Seeing as how she wasn't leaving, A-Drei continued. "You ever heard about the Karlstein Institute?"
Akira nodded. It was, after all, one of the places she and Saki had been sent to infiltrate while on Earth. She found herself moving over to take a seat by the agent.
"It's where L-Elf and I first met. We couldn't be any different. I was a former prince, and he had been an escapee from a Dorssian concentration camp. Yet we both agreed that the country needed to be changed. You may not know this, but Dorssia was initially meant to protect and defend its people before anything else. Beyond that, it did so with honor and compassion, as decreed by the royal family."
"Everything changed after Red Thursday in my country" A-Drei continued. "That was when the Royal family was overthrown by Amadeus and his forces. Myself being a prince, I too was cast out. Imagine, going from a life of comfort to having to struggle to survive. The Karlstein Institute has a huge death rate after all. They even start the training when the recruits are simple children. You wouldn't believe how many I had to see die right next to me."
A-Drei felt his eyes tearing up, as the images came racing back to his mind. Not at all helped by the children who's lives were lost in the massacre that he inadvertently helped facilitate.
He took a moment to collect himself. "But both myself and L-Elf managed to survive, ranking as the top students, with multiple kills and successful missions under our belts. After all, if we were to return Dorssia to its honorable ways of the past, we needed to survive to make sure that happened."
"Finally, we both, alongside X-Eins, H-Neun, and Q-Vier were sent to your Module. Our mission was to infiltrate and secure the Valvrave unit. However, both me and L-Elf actually planned to use it to turn against the others and start our revolution. Course, since it only works with you Jiorians, it would've been a fools errand, but we didn't know that at the time."
He chuckled bitterly. "Course, then L-Elf was hijacked by your ally Haruto and I lost my eye. Could you imagine how much it hurt to not only be betrayed by your closest friend, but to have them blind you?"
Akira simply shook her head.
"So after that, I swore to put him out of his misery. If only I knew that he was still on my side. But every time I encountered him after that, he only reacted with hostility, especially since he was going about it with that pilot of yours by his side. Only furthering my desire to punish him......what kind of friend am I to think that way huh?"
He began to get choked up as he continued. "Then of course as you know, it all led to the incident on Earth. I still wanted to believe in L-Elf, as that dream of a reformed Dorssia is one I never gave up on having. That's when I finally had someone at gunpoint, Rukino Saki, who could tell me once and for all what he was truly doing when he shot out my eye."
The guilt once again started to overwhelm him. "E-Every part of my soul was telling me, no, b-begging me to just ask her then and there. I saw the n-note L-Elf had left her after a-all. If she escaped with the R-Royalists, L-Elf's true reason for the revolution may have been fulfilled."
Akira was shocked to see a few tears roll down A-Drei's cheek. "B-But I was still doubtful. A-And more than a-anything, I s-still was c-conditioned to follow orders. D-Dorssian Code Of Conduct was to treat p-prisoners with respect a-after all, and I thought she'd be t-treated better than what s-she got. D-Dorssia hiring a PMC like T-Taurus Company w-wasn't what I was e-expecting."
He closed his eyes in sadness. "And you know what happened n-next. L-Look at what's happened since then. I-I ruined the life of the youngest of you p-pilots, cost L-Elf the chance to be with L-Lieselotte, and you all hate and o-ostracize me f-for good reason, as so many are d-dead. All b-because of me!"
At this point, his tears were flowing. "I-I hoped to revolutionize D-Dorssia with me a-as its p-prince to p-protect innocents. Y-Yet a-all I-I've done is take them."
Before he could stop himself, he buried his head Akira's shoulder, much to the latter's panic.
"B-By w-what r-right do I have to r-rule as a p-prince......BY WHAT RIGHT?!"
With that he broke down sobbing, repeating those last three words over and over.
Akira was startled, to say the least. This was the second time as of late that she found herself as the one a grieving person was leaning on for support, and this time, it wasn't even a close friend of hers.
Yet she couldn't help but be reminded of something similar now that she heard all of his story. Indeed, she herself had tried to do something to help her brother through hard times via hacking into those servers, only for it to backfire and result in her ostracization and her brother receiving more grief.
Feeling a surprising bit of sympathy for the agent, she awkwardly wrapped her arms around him, allowing him to let out all of his grief.
"I-I don't know i-if I can h-help you." she stammered. "B-But just know that I-I know what it's like to be shunned. No one deserves that."
A-Drei looked up at her, surprised to hear her say that. ".....Not even me, the one who caused you all so much grief?"
Akira shook her head. Remembering how Shouko would cheer her up, she then opened up one of the bags of chips and chili sauce containers. Dipping a chip into the sauce, she offered it to A-Drei.
"H-Here. It's tasty together."
Slowly, A-Drei accepted the snack. His eyes lit up slightly as he ate it, as it was indeed tastier than he thought.
".....Thank you pilot."
"M-My name is A-Akira" she said with a smile.
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Yep, and with that A-Drei has found a new friend.
I admit, the idea of him and Akira becoming friends is an idea that came from reading other fics where that happened. For some reason, it just feels right. Heck, I'd much prefer it to pairing him with Saki (why on Earth that pairing gets the most fan art is beyond me), which is also why I made it clear here that any chance of him being with Saki is flat-out never going to pan out.
Thoughts?