54. Mind Games

Abyssal, Kuon and Meica went outside of the S.A.S. Abyssal— with Kuon carrying Meica that is. They were on their way to the infirmary of the supercarrier. The person who was supposed to lead them there were standing right outside the bay, looking into the damaged ship of the Shark class. She analysed the entire ship before bringing her fingers to her chin.

“This ship has been hit quite hard, huh. Actual shells that dispersed into clouds of nanites meant to disrupt enemy ships. Throwaways. So that’s how she was able to detect my location despite me jumping so many times. Hmm interesting, that Crimson Tide destroyer sure has some nasty tricks up her sleeves.” E remarked.

“Eh? What? How did you know by just looking?” Abyssal asked.

“What? You didn’t notice the nanites eating you? Look over there,” E pointed towards her port side, at the edge of where she was hit by the shell from Sensemman.

“The damaged hull over there doesn’t look natural, like there was extra damage apart from the shell. It was most likely that the metal either corroded by acid or you got eaten from the inside.”

Abyssal looked closely at where E pointed and true enough, there was the bent metal that represented where she was shot and there was the extra metal that seemed like it was corroded or eaten apart. It was akin to a piece of paper that was eaten by termites. There was also some sort of vein shaped mark on her hull.

“Uwah, you’re right…”

“There doesn’t seem to be any more foreign nanites. Or at least, ones that I couldn’t detect. I’m surprised you managed to fight this infection without even noticing what it was. As a matter of fact, I’m surprised you are even still alive from being hit by a shell like this. Your ship doesn’t particularly look durable.”

“That’s where you are wrong. It’s an upgraded design that improves hull integrity and allows the ship to take more hits than usual. I wouldn’t be surprised if it could stand a shell from a cruiser or a battleship,” Kuon responded quickly as if bragging towards the carrier.

‘Why do you look so proud when explaining that,’ Abyssal thought to herself as she gave Kuon a blank stare.

‘Still, a nanite shell, huh. So that was that weird sting that I felt even after the shell hit. The enemy was trying to assimilate me. No… it was different, the nanites were not connected to her consciousness, it was just meant to disrupt my functions. Uwah… so I’m not the only one who thought of shooting nanites with my shells too, huh… Also, I can actually pre-programmed them, huh? Should keep that in mind.’

“Well, whatever. That destroyer, man was she giving me quite the trouble back there,” said E.

“Um E, about this destroyer, was she the black ship that was piloted by this girl named Sensenmann?”

“Sensenmann? No idea who that is. But yeah, it’s that weird citadel looking destroyer with the skull symbol and everything. Creepy taste, I tell ya,” E shrugged as she said that.

“I see…”

‘This Sensenmann gave this big shot of a carrier trouble, huh… what kind of person was I engaged to in that battle… scary… her accuracy was terrible though.’

“Still, your ship is in a shitty condition. You need some repair, girl.”

“Yeah. I’m currently on it. It will take a while before I’m fully restored.”

“Hoh?” E gave Abyssal an amused look.

“Huh? Wha- what’s wrong?” Abyssal asked.

E shook her head before giving off a grin to Abyssal.

“No, nothing. Ya need some help with that repair? I got repair drones and some high-quality metals if you want. Maybe some nano-ceramic plate hulls for blueprints, should increase your durability,” she said, her expression maintained the all-knowing grin look on her face,

‘...I don’t like that face she’s giving me… It’s like she found out something about me and I have no idea what… Dammit, I’m lacking common sense in space here.’ Abyssal thought to herself, she then peaked at Kuon for a short while. She was staying composed and was looking at the ship. ‘She looks like she figured something out. Better ask her later.’

“No, no, no. I can’t possibly ask you for help! This is my ship and I should be repairing it for myself! I have all the necessary resources needed for repairs,” Abyssal said to E as casually as she could.

‘It’s actually because I don’t trust you at all and I don't want you to touch me. It would be weird for another girl to touch me right… Also, I don’t want another core to mess up my systems,’ Abyssal shared the real reason with herself.

“Alright, if you say so. Right this way, girls,” E folded her hands and rested them behind her head as she moved towards the lift.

Abyssal nodded and followed after her, but not before giving orders to Abby to close all entrances and continue the repairs of the ship, starting with the warp drives. Kuon and Meica followed behind them. As Abyssal followed E, she could feel herself walking through some sort of membrane. It was just a light force acting upon her body, but she could definitely feel an invisible barrier of sorts.

It was most likely the force field surrounding her ship that E mentioned during her talk with the captain of the ship. As she went through the field, she could tell that her communication with the ship itself— where the rest of herself was— was being interrupted, as if passing through some sort of filter.

‘This feeling, I feel like my thoughts are kinda being intercepted here… Abby, could you do something about this? I don’t really like the feeling.’ Abyssal asked Abby in secret.

[Affirmative. Encrypting thoughts pattern of personality Abyssal.] Abby replied and the feeling went away.

Afterwards, Abyssal looked at E for any sort of reaction, but she had none whatsoever. With small but fast steps, the Living Core taking the shape of a young teenager walked towards the front part of the lift. They waited for quite a while for the lift to arrive. Unbeknownst to Abyssal and Kuon who could only watch her back, her face contained a slightly amused smile.

The open lift came down to their exact floor and the doors and the small gates to the elevator opened up. E walked right into the box before beckoning the others to follow her. With reluctance, the two cores and the human-sized cat walked into the lift. The door closed and the lift moved upwards further into the ship— this was without E pressing any buttons. The lift knew where it needed to go, no questions asked.

Truth be told, Abyssal was a little bit intimidated by E. She was currently entering deeper into the capital ship of a carrier, unarmed and powerless, unable to do anything about the situation other than play along. For the first time in her life, Abyssal truly understood what it meant to be inside the belly of a beast. She was just hoping that the digestive fluids of this beast would not tear her apart.

‘It’s kinda unnerving, not going to lie. Also for some reason, if I listen really closely, I can somewhat hear elevator music...’ Abyssal thought out to no one in particular.

Abyssal could feel the elevator was rising slowly across the giant gaping hole. It seemed that the elevator would take a while to reach its destination as E opened her mouth to enter another conversation with Abyssal.

“I do want to ask. What’s your relationship with Astral? She sent me a small letter saying that a small little fool needed help. She asked for a favour too, which is quite rare coming from her. Can’t believe that girl is harbouring cores without telling me,” E turned to look at Abyssal, on her face was the usual smiling grin.

‘This person… for how friendly she is, she’s quite interrogative…’

Abyssal brought out her best awkward laugh before answering. “I can’t really say that I knew her much. We’ve only met twice and both of it was her beating the crap out of me. She sent me your coordinates and said that she has a friend or something. Then she got cut off.”

“Cut off?”

“Yeah, attacked by... “ Abyssal paused for a moment to think of her words. “That pink battlecruiser. She suddenly attacked me and Astral out of nowhere. She… kinda helped me out back there on that battlefield.”

“Hoooh… So you don’t know Astral at all?”

“Nope.”

“And she sent you my coordinates? Wow, talk about payback. But still, to help out a random stranger in space, huh. She sure has gotten soft,” E said as she lay her back on the metal walls of the elevator.

Abyssal didn’t really know what to answer E so she just kept quiet. That silence didn’t last for long as E started talking again.

“Hey. I know you two haven’t had much contact before, but I just want to know, what are your opinions on the gal?”

“Opinions?” Kuon asked.

“Yeah. Out of the few times you saw and talked to her. What do you think of her?”

“Hmm…” Abyssal folded her arms and started thinking about the answer.

‘This girl reminds me of that character from a game I used to play. That person can read minds or quantum waves or something. They would always ask questions like this to extract information. What a cunning person... Hey, Abby. Are my thoughts fully encrypted?’ Abyssal asked Abby to make sure.

[Affirmative.]

“I can’t say I have much of an opinion about Astral… I guess she’s quite kind?”

E opened her eyes wide at the answer.

“Kind?” she said before letting out a small laugh. “Well, I guess you could say that.”

Abyssal didn’t know what to do, so she just let out a sheepish laugh to match E.

“Kind, huh. Ahhh, this brings back memories.”

“Hmm?”

“You see, I’ve known Astral ever since that girl was a little snob. She used to be this small and always clung to my legs, ahh she was such a cute girl back then,” E said before moving one of her hands to right below her waist.

“Eh?”“Huh?”

Both Abyssal and Kuon could be seen visibly shocked from E’s reveal.

That reaction was ignored as E continued to live out her old days “She used to always say that she would grow up to become my ace pilot. She was always obedient and was such a cutie. Enty! Enty! She would call out to me using that cute voice of hers. A little angel if I ever saw one.”

“No way…” Kuon replied with a flabbergasted tone.“Yeah… I can’t imagine that person ever being that innocent.”

“It’s true! Here, I’ll even show you!” E brought a small device out of the pocket of her clothes. It was shaped like a hexagon and has a small pearl in the middle of it. She pressed a few buttons on the device and a small holographic image appeared out of it.

The image looked to be a coloured photo of a few kids and a few adults— three young girls and three adult women in total. They were lined up in a nice backyard and were wearing nice clothing, the three adults wearing formal military uniforms while the other two children wore formal dresses.

“Here, look at her! She used to be such a cute girl!” E said as she pointed at the middle of the photo.

Right at her finger was an adult woman with long silver-white hair on her knees. She had rather large hips, but her chest was pitiful. Next to the woman was a young girl who was hugging her. She had red flaming hair and eyes. On her face was the most innocent smile a kid could ever have. The woman whom the girl was hugging had a nice smile too. It was a sincere smile, the one belonging to a person who was truly happy.

“Woah… I guess people do change. I wondered how she turned from this into that…” Abyssal muttered out as she recalled Astral’s video message to her all those months ago and her brief communication with her a few hours back— an arrogant, grumpy, unpleasant face came to her mind.

“She lost all her innocence that kid,” E said as she shook her head.

Abyssal gave E a wry smile at the comment. “By the way. Who’s the girl that Astral’s hugging in this pic? She looks awfully familiar, but I can’t…”

“Hmm? That’s me, obviously,” E replied as if it was a matter of fact.

Abyssal let out an astounded look towards the young-looking girl. Abyssal’s eyes rapidly shift from the woman in the photo and the young girl in front of her.

“De-aging drug?” Abyssal said her answer, trying to find logical reasoning.

“No way that exists, idiot. I changed my avatar, obviously.”

“Ehhh???”

*Ding!

A bell ring came out and interrupted their conversation— the elevator stopped and the door opened up.

“Oh, we’re here. Come on, I’ll show you guys around,” E said before bringing the device back to her pockets. She brought her hands back to the back of her head and started walking away.

Abyssal followed behind. However, she couldn’t help but notice a feeling telling her that something was wrong.

‘The woman in the photo… her smile was genuine. But the E in front of me… her smiles are all… fake.’ Abyssal thought to herself.

In the end, she couldn’t help but wonder why E showed Abyssal that photo. Maybe she was trying to be friendly, trying to make an attempt to break the ice in their relationship. Or maybe… she was trying to see Abyssal’s reaction and gauge how much she really knew in her situation.

‘Or maybe E just wanted to show off her good old days? Old people always do that.’