20. Abyssal’s Identity Crisis and her Attempts at Remodeling

Within the captain quarters lies a map. A star map that was almost the size of the room's wall. The map contained all sorts of information and the locations of various systems. It was confirmed by Kuon herself to be valid and accurate; though she cannot be sure whether or not it was still accurate at that moment. It seemed that she had hibernated within the cruiser for quite a bit of time, several decades to be exact.

Abyssal stared at the map with such an intense glare. So intense that it may even bore a hole through someone. She was looking at the map with the intent to actually find out her location once and for all. With the help of Abby and Kuon, she may be able to chart the stars manually and figure it out.

Or at least she was trying. 'Why did I cry? Ahhh that's so embarrassing now when I think about it. Kuuu…' again, only silly thoughts filled Abyssal's mind.

Abyssal couldn't help but recount her memories of when Kuon explained her past to her. Yes, Kuon's story was sad and tragic, but she didn't expect to feel so attached to it. To feel so… emotional.

'Back when I was a man I would never cry out and be so emotional like that!' Abyssal thought to herself.

Abyssal had noticed, for quite a while now, regarding the irregularities within herself but didn't think too much about it back then. She realised that she started to— unconsciously—  do more 'cute' and 'feminine' stuff as time went on. Things like finding something to be cute or actions like shouting out 'Kyaaaa' and the way that she giggled. Her past self would never do such a thing.

Bringing the subject to mind, she started to think of reasons as to why she would do such a thing. Change in hormones perhaps? It can't be, ships don't have such a thing.. Or maybe she has called herself a 'she' for so long that her soul started to change as well? Was she slowly turning into a maiden?

'Or perhaps, my soul is a maiden all along? Could it be that I just so happened to have A's memories?' Abyssal thought to herself.

According to Kuon, the personality of Living Cores are installed. She never mentioned anything about the memories being transferred.

'What if… I'm not actually who I think I am…?' Abyssal thought to herself, feeling anxious about the matter.

'If that's the case, just how did my memory, 'A', get into Abyssal in the first place?' Abyssal felt some tight feeling in her chest as she continued to dig deeper into the matter. Something just didn't add up. Though she didn't linger around the subject for long.

'Ah well, nothing I can do about it anyways. Besides, being a girl is not so bad. Why am I thinking so hard about this?' Thought the carefree Abyssal before pushing the matter to the back of her mind.

Wanting to take her mind off her identity crisis, she started to think about another matter. It was something that disturbed Abyssal to her core.

The inability to find herself, or more specifically, her Living Core within the ship.

Abyssal had known for quite a while now that she had a core and said core was within the ship somewhere but once again, she never really paid much attention to it.  Back then, it didn't really seem like an important thing to care about, so she just pushed the matter to the back of her mind.

It was a habit of Abyssal. Anytime she couldn't solve a problem or thinks that something was too complicated or not worth thinking about, she would just push it to the back of her mind. Sometimes it's a good thing as it was this habit that allowed her to keep doing things without being bogged down by unnecessary thoughts. But as could be seen here, it could sometimes be a bad thing.

Kuon mentioned that she has never seen a ship-girl who doesn't know where their core was. Most Living Cores will instinctively know where it is after all. It's like the centre of where everything works! It's as if a person said that they don't know where their brain was.

Both self-aware ships searched the ship high and low to find Abyssal's core. The cockpit, the control panels, underneath the charging station, behind the bookshelf in the captain's quarters and more. Alas, all that effort bore no fruit as they couldn't find a single trace of it. Wherever it was, it was well hidden.

The only thing they knew was that the core was somewhere on the ship. Kuon suggested that they may have to deconstruct the entire thing to find it at this rate. Abyssal shivered a bit when she heard Kuon say the word 'deconstruct'. Abyssal hoped that when the time comes, it would be a painless endeavour.

'Talking about Kuon…' Abyssal peeked at the edge of her view, the sight of a drone cleaning up the place could be seen. The mess that was caused by the dogfight between Abyssal and Astral had long since been cleaned. Kuon was really just there for her daily cleanup, tidying over her sloven Master. Things like putting back the books on the shelf where they belong and other small stuff— like making sure things were at their right place and ready to be used at a moment’s notice.

Kuon was what they say, a clean-freak. She has some sort of insatiable need for everything to be clean and tidy. Abyssal wondered if this was simply her personality as a maid or something more than that. Was it a habit that she was born with or obtained through her long years serving as a maid in New England?

“Is something the matter, Master? Is my presence disturbing your concentration?” Kuon asked as she spotted Abyssal looking at her.

“Ah! No! It’s nothing. I’m just looking around for inspiration. Ha ha ha…” Abyssal responded.

“Understood. Please let me know if you need any assistance,” Kuon gave a bow before leaving the room.

“Um, yeah. Sure!”

Abyssal let out a sigh as she went back to look at the star map. 'What was it that I was doing again?'

* * * * *

Abyssal would be lying if she said she wasn't a little bit disappointed at the reveal of her abilities. Not to say that it wasn’t awesome or anything. Things like assimilating or controlling an entire ship were cool, but she kinda expected more from a super-advanced AI computer core. She was especially disappointed in the reveal of the Type-two nanomachines.

‘Whoever thought that most of my functionalities as a Living Core would be locked behind a paywall. What is this? Some sort of mobage? Is Zenatonium some sort of premium currency for Living Cores?!’ Abyssal yelled out internally.

How Abyssal wished she could just swipe her credit card and purchase these Zenatonium metals so she can actually repair her damn ship. Just like how pay to win mobile games work.

Although she says it was disappointing, it did nothing to dampen Abyssal’s excitement on experimenting with the Type-one nanomachines. Abyssal was far more interested in the Type-ones than the shittier pay to win nanomachines. When Kuon told her that she could use her nanomachines to modify how her hull looks, she was instantly smitten with the idea of remodelling her ship. Within her consciousness, was a slew of imaginary papers containing the various interior designs of the ship that she wanted to try out.

Abyssal’s favourite thing to do when playing space simulator games back on earth was the ability to customise and model your ship however you want. How happy she was when she found out that she can do just that thanks to the power of nanomachines!

Before she could attempt on a real remodelling, she needed to see the extent of how far she can actually modify the ship. Her goal, for now, was to see if she can add a totally new room or enlarge the size of it. Her end goal, of course, was to see if she can slowly turn this fighter corvette into a deadly battleship one day.

"Ehehe…" Abyssal let out a creepy laugh as she imagined herself as a sleek battleship cruising through the depths of space.

As a result of this, Abyssal has done nothing but perform experiments these last few weeks.  Her experiments consisted of her constantly changing, deconstructing and reconstructing a small part of the captain’s quarters—  the bathroom. What use is a bathroom for two Living Cores that can’t eat or sleep?

Her experiments gave her the results she needed and she found out that she can indeed modify the ship.

Extensively.

She found out that as long as she had the resources, the nanomachines and the energy required, she could change and modify her hull however she liked. This included everything, the interior and exterior of the ship. There were limits, of course. She has to think about the overall structural integrity and the setup of her components carefully before attempting a remodel. One wrong mistake and the hull could collapse or she could deal irreparable damage to her components. It wasn't like in the games where you can undo and redo your steps.

"Incredible..." Abyssal muttered out as she observed her creation, a metal statue of Kuon's maid form.

'So I can use my nanomachines to even do this, huh… I wonder what else I could do with it…'

Abyssal started to think of the various ways she could use this ability to remodel herself. She could move components around to more safer parts of the system, she could expand her cargo hull, she could move her weapon points to wherever she wanted on the ship and many more. The possibilities were endless. The best part of it all was that she didn't need to be at a dry-yard or a dock to do any of this.

"Master, pardon me for disturbing you when you are in a state of deep concentration. It is—" Kuon came into the captain's quarters to ask Abyssal something before being stunned by the appearance of a weird statue in the shape of her Avatar. If she had a mouth, it would be gaping wide right now.

"Hmm? Oh no! You aren't disturbing me or anything," Abyssal replied.

Kuon, however, didn't respond and continued to look at her 'Avatar'. Bar a few minor details and the colouring, it was an exact replica. The only thing she could critique was the weirdly erotic pose the statue was in. It was a pose that accentuated all the curvy areas of Kuon's avatar. A pose where Kuon was leaning forward and raising her skirt up high in a bow.

"Master… this is…?" Kuon asked.

"Ah! Do you like it? I was trying to see how dexterous I can be with the Nanomachines. How does it look? I modelled it after you!" Abyssal said excitedly while nodding to herself, proud to have done a great job.

"It is… quite a copy…" Kuon said, unable to think of anything to say about the matter.

"I'm quite surprised, you know? I have only seen your avatar once but I could remember it so vividly!"

"I wonder if Living Cores have perfect memory or something… but then again, I always seem to be forgetting things..." Abyssal muttered to herself. "Oh, sorry about that I got a little bit sidetracked there, what is it that you want to tell me?"

"Ah!" Kuon snapped out of her stupor.  "Yes, this is about the distress signal that we received the other day. You hadn't spoken anything about it, so I am curious at what our actions are going to be regarding the matter. I remembered you said that this would be our key to escaping our situation?" Kuon said as she gave a curt bow.

"Eh?! What distress signal?! When did we start receiving it?" Abyssal yelled out.

"...about seven days ago. Were… you not aware of it, Master?"

"Of— of course I am aware of it, silly you. Ha ha ha," Abyssal replied with a sheepish laugh.

'Ehhhhh?! Why didn't you tell me about this, Abby?' She yelled internally towards her logical-self.

"Personality Abyssal requested to not be disturb during the experimentation of nanomachines," Abby replied.

'I didn't mean it that way! Arghhh!' Abyssal did an internal facepalm.

It seemed that Abyssal and Abby have quite a few things to talk about before they can become a proper duo.

Ignoring her machine-self for now, Abyssal immediately went over to the communications device, Kuon followed behind closely.