Thanks again to
@LegacySC for beta.
XxXxXxXxXx
[x] Well, it's not a plan, exactly; everything you've seen from Anna says that she'll probably take whatever plans you come up with and casually snap them over her knee. There are things you can keep in mind though.
-[x] No missiles, she'll just shoot them down.
-[x] Going by what you've seen of her so far; she not only doesn't have any blind spots, she can see through solid objects as well. Any attempts at setting up an ambush are futile.
-[x] You've seen that clip of her playing tag. She's fast, but a close-combat frame like yours can probably outpace her, and Yukari looks like she has the means to do the same with her boosters.
[x] In short: Work together, box her in, and either you or Yukari will try to score a hit. You'll have to wing it for the most part.
-[x] And take this seriously. Anna's not going to be happy if she thinks you're not giving it everything you have.
XxXxXxXxXx
You take a moment to think your plan over.
"Well, this isn't really a plan," you start off, reviewing what you knew about Anna.
"First things first, she'll probably shoot down any missiles we launch, so we can't rely on them too much..."
"Will she engage in intercepting fire? She did say that she would only dodge," Yukari objects.
Huh. That's right… best to ask to make sure. You switch on a public channel so Anna would be able to listen in.
"Anna, when you say dodge, do you mean just flying or will you use intercepting fire as well?"
Anna stays silent for moment, then tilts her head slightly as she answers.
"Intercepting fire means shooting, I will just fly."
That left quite a few more options open for you then-
"Intercepting fire is more defending than attacking. I think you should do it Anna, it wouldn't be realistic if you didn't shoot at all."
"… Right. I will be doing so then, if no one minds?"
Dammit sis. Well, winning this scenario really wouldn't mean anything if Anna went out of her way to make things easier for you.
"Fine with me," Setsuna says.
"Go for it," you confirm, switching back to private comms to continue outlying your plan-
"Koji, you're such a dork, I can't believe you didn't even ask her if she would be using intercepting fire or not."
Setsu, why.
"W-well, you know, it was a reasonable guess, after seeing how good she was at target practice and that first time with squadron forms," you throw out, trying to salvage your pride.
"Please let Koujirou continue Setsuna," Yukari gently intercedes before the argument gets out of hand.
"Anyways, there's no way we'll be able to ambush her, and she can see through walls, so getting close is pretty much the only way right? I've got a close quarters frame so I can outpace her, and sis probably can too with her boosters."
"That's a rather confident Koujirou, have you used V-max yet?" Yukari interrupts.
… What's that?
"What? V-max?"
"It's shorthand for maximum change in velocity. Acceleration in other words. Valkyrie Frames have safeties in them that prevent you from using the full power of your thrusters until your inertial control is good enough that you can survive the acceleration. Anna and Valkyrie Kravala had both pushed their frames to V-max quite a few times from the looks of the video, so have you been using your frame at V-max?"
Um.
"I uh, am not sure? Did you use it yesterday?"
"I didn't see a need to use it last night," Yukari replies, then hums for a moment in thought.
"How fast is your zero to five? Can you make zero to five under ten?"
Oh hey, you knew… some of those words…
"Um-"
"Zero to five kilometers per second. How long does it take you?"
What. That wasn't an exercise you had tried before. The squadron formation thing where you needed to run the course then get back had you putting some kick into your frame, but not nearly that far. You don't think you've even broken mach 6 yet, let alone mach 15. Not to mention pure speed wasn't what Yuka-nee was talking about here, getting to 5 kilometers per second under 10 seconds?
So accelerate at more than 500 meters per second squared for at least 10 seconds?
"Uh- … I never tried?"
"…I think its safe to take that as a no."
…Dammit.
"W-well, it's still the best plan! We need to box her in then try and land hits in close range!"
"Focus on closing in then. I suppose it's as good an plan as we can make right now."
"Hah… nothing for it really. I hope we get to see some of her tricks. This is going to be good."
Setsuna actually sounds pretty eager. You remembered she was always pretty enthusiastic about being a Valkyrie, but she was particularly fired up to go up against Anna for some reason.
At that, Yukari sets up the simulation, quickly flicking through the menus to define the rules.
>3rd Year Cadet Rokusabe Yukari proposes new simulation<
>Custom Scenario Selected<
>Group 1: Rokusabe Koujirou, Masaya Setsuna, Rokusabe Yukari<
>Group 2: Anna Sanchez<
>Custom Deathmatch<
>Time limit: 02:00<
>Group 1 Victory Conditions: Dealing non negligible damage to Group 2 Impeller Field<
>Group 2 Loss Conditions: Dealing non negligible damage to Group 1 Impeller Field<
>>Accept?
>>1/4
Wow, those rules could be pretty much summed up as "heads I win, tails you lose."
You and Setsuna accept quickly, but Anna takes a moment, then adds another rule.
>Group 2 Loss Conditions: Taking any damage from Rokusabe Koujirou<
>>Accept Addendum?
>>FOR: 1
>>AGAINST: 0
>>ABSTAIN: 0
Wow. Rude.
Setsuna snorts and accepts the change, and even Yukari giggles slightly.
You really were getting no respect. Even if Anna wasn't going to hit you physically, she was still giving your pride a real beat down right now.
Any damage? Any at all? You could fly by her and if you were close enough, your shockwave would probably trigger her Impeller field, and that would be that. Well, if she wanted to make things harder for herself…
You accept the change with a slight shake of your head.
The world goes grey as the simulator resets.
>>4/4
>New Scenario Startup
>>Custom Deathmatch
The simulation space unfolds once again in the dust outside Perth Academy. Immediately, you see Anna's dark Valkyrie Frame hovering at a neutral 10km distant.
Yukari and Setsuna are both within a few hundred meters of you, already in the displaced triangle formation that small flights were pretty much forced into. Your frame thrums as its thrusters rev up in preparation for a charge, but before you can do anything else, Yukari snaps up her arm and a bright white lance of laser fire reaches for Anna, the dust in the air tracing the beam's path.
You're not exactly sure what happens next, but there is suddenly a white dome of expanding water vapour around where Anna's frame was. It quickly disperses, revealing Anna, apparently untouched by the shot. What the heck did she just do to block that shot? Yukari doesn't hesitate and a dozen weaker bursts of laser fire follows the first attack as the three of you rush forwards to close the distance, the roar of Valkyrie Frame engines shaking the air.
Anna simply begins matching your pace, flying backward, not dodging at all. What was she thinking?
However, there was no victory chime. Apparently Yukari's laser attacks were simply doing no damage to Anna, or at least not enough to register as more than negligible.
How the heck? You squint at Anna's frame and your sensors kick in.
Maybe it was the distance screwing with your camera, or the sim was hiccupping or something, but there seemed to be a faint black mist surrounding her frame, expanding like it was bleeding into the air around it.
"She has some form of energy dynamo on the surface of her frame! She's just letting the laser attacks through her Impeller! That's insane!" Yukari gasps over the comms.
Say what?
Well since the lasers apparently weren't working, you raise your arm and snap off a burst of hypervelocity rounds. The 4mm spikes practically detonate the air around them, tracing white lines of vaporised metal along their path as they scream forwards at Anna, finally forcing her to dodge off course. Your own flight path shivers a little until your recoil compensation software manages to correct your thruster outputs to negate the recoil of the cannon fire.
A series of proximity rounds from Setsuna bracket where Anna would be-
Suddenly, a bright flash of white envelopes Anna's frame-
[Radiation Warning]
Then she was flying in a completely different direction altogether, a snarling, boiling trail of exhaust firing out behind her frame. The proximity rounds bumble in her wake and detonate, cooking off from the turbulence, never even coming close to touching her with their payloads. Your rad detector ticks for a moment and you blink. From what?
Shaking the thought away, you grimace at the sheer speed Anna was showing in dodging as the trio of you close further. Was this V-max? Your sensors white our briefly when her thrusters point your way while she makes distance. That was way brighter than the video. How much do the Higgs barriers around the Academy Arenas filter out exactly?
Setsuna fires more proximity rounds into the air around Anna as you and Yukari both open up, you with your hypervelocity cannon and Yukari with her particle projector, trying to force Anna into the ground with simultaneous barrages.
She obliges and swings into a dive, easily avoiding the ballistic weapons. Pulling just short of slamming into the ground, Anna levels off into a ground hugging path. Almost immediately, a huge plume of dust rises, kicked up by her powerful engines, denying vision of her. Brief flashes of thruster wake are quickly covered by more dust as the simulation's arid ground is churned up.
Yukari quickly pulses a datalink over TACNET, conjoining the sensors of all three of your Valkyrie Frames.
You accept the request and combined telemetry pours in as the three of you break off the approach to circle the expanding dust cloud.
Your Valkyrie doesn't even manage to pull enough data for a proper analysis before static fuzzes your field. Noise snarls the various bands of your sensors that could penetrate through the thick dust as they are almost immediately detected and jammed. Your ECCM suite starts up and tries to clean the noise without much success, even while networked with two other frames also working against the jamming. None of your sensors were getting anything.
"ARMs," Yukari orders as the jamming continues unabated.
Missiles erupt from both
Nue and
Kousenjoubi, fanning out like an enormous claw to sink into the dust cloud from every direction.
There's a moment of silence as the three of you wait, then huge detonations briefly scatter and flatten the clouds of dust before the blast wind sucks even more dust up.
There is a very conspicuous area where there were no explosions at all.
Anna flies, almost leisurely, up and out of the cloud, a swarm of inert missiles orbiting her frame.
"That's-! No way," Yukari splutters out before she regains her composure, "Set missiles to non-networked mode."
"Holy crap, she managed to jack our missiles without warning," mutters Setsuna.
Yukari fires another bright white lance of laser fire and a series of explosions flare up as several hijacked missiles are used as ablative armour. The laser attack foiled, Anna begins dodging the slower attacks, easily sliding under a particle stream, reacting so fast it was like she dodged before Yukari fired.
You begin firing at the same time as Setsuna while Yukari recharges her weapons, hypervelocity rounds racing around slower plasma mortars. There was something wrong with your predictive targeting software though. Anna simply refused to be where your reticule predicted she would be. In fact, she was barely inside the sphere of probability half the time. You squint and see her frame constantly shifting, expressing then retracting components constantly, changing her acceleration without changing her thruster output, spoofing your targeting software.
"She's faking out my targeting by messing with her frame, we need to get closer," you call out.
"Form missile boxes, marking danger zones," Yukari calls out.
"Missiles on proximity trigger," Setsuna agrees.
Again, missiles fly outwards from their frames, roaring forwards in a net over the battlefield. Spheres and bars of space light up bright red on your HUD as the mines reach their preset locations to hover in the air, ready to ignite at anything breaching their trigger zones. Anna's particle cannons shift and form a strange ring, glowing along its outer edges.
[Radiation Warning]
"Close in! Go!" yells Yukari, thrusters glowing bright white. Anna breaks her cannons apart and stores them, her own thrusters burning the air around her white in response as she backs away.
You push your frame as hard as you can to close the distance.
[Acceleration Beyond Inertial Control Capabilities!]
[Pilot Health Warning! Reduce Thrust!]
You gasp as what feels like an enormous anvil presses down over your entire body, crushing. Your vision darkens and
you can't breathe-
[Safeties Engaged]
You gasps, you vision snapping back into focus in time just to see yourself diving towards the ground.
"-rou! Koji! Koji! Are you okay!?"
Setsuna rapidly gains on you on an intercept course, before pulling up as she sees you stabilise.
You try talking only to cough. It felt like someone had drop kicked you right in the chest and your eyes watered from an ache somewhere behind them. That wasn't something you were eager to try again.
"Y-yeah. No worries. H-hurts less than your kicks."
Setsuna gives an outraged huff at that, "Well smartass you're clearly fine, so lets hurry and support Yuka-nee."
Yukari was already kilometers ahead, a bright white dot, the gossamer lines of her Impeller Whips trailing behind her.
The two Valkyries, brightly glowing from their thrusters and plasma formed by the speed of their travel, race this way and that across the sky. Smoke rises from flaming scars in the landscape, craters and lines marking the ground from missed weapon discharges. Anna for her part was keeping Yukari at arm's length, never allowing the other Valkyrie to close into zero range, while Yukari was barely even managing to stay in close range. Another one of those airbursts shatters an Impeller whip as it comes too close and Yukari slows slightly to manifest a replacement.
You and Setsuna both fire simultaneously as Anna approaches a mine corridor, attempting to force her into the trigger zones. Anna maintains her course and fires one of her stolen missiles towards a mine. The hovering mine merrily clicks its seeker onto the other missile and chases it, setting off a minor chain reaction as it maneuvers through another trigger area on its way.
Wow.
That was probably why Anna wasn't shooting down the minefield, she didn't even need to.
With the mines relatively near to Anna cleared out, Setsuna launches a series of guided cannon rounds to attempt direct hits, then gives up with a huff of disgust as Anna pivots and races out of the round's target cone, Yukari following her. Your hypervelocity cannon wasn't even in range to make an attempt as the two of you fall further behind. Both of you were practically useless against Anna back here.
Yukari kept up the pursuit gamely though, attempting to herd Anna back towards you whenever she had the chance.
Another lance of high power laser fire fails as it is disrupted by the plasma wake trailing behind the Valkyrie, the natural phenomenon during high speed flight forming a passable defense against lasers, whatever bleeding through splashing against Anna's dynamos without effect. A particle beam from Yukari punches right through Anna's wake, but again fails to hit Anna, the other Valkyrie again dodging even before the beam fires.
You were pretty sure now that Anna was aim dodging by predicting when Yukari was going to fire just before she did. How she could still see so much through the plasma envelope that surrounded her frame though, you had no idea.
But speaking of the plasma around her frame from her high speed flight, it was strange. At the speeds they were going at, both Valkyries should have been much further away.
Ah, that's right, the simulator could only simulate distances of twenty kilometers accurately. Even as you watch, a slight dissonance ripples through the simulation space. Your cannon rounds flying through the distortion warp and stretch, before snapping back to normality, far ahead of where they should have been.
Anna abruptly slows down.
A chance!
All three of you fire weapons systems at Anna at once. Missiles, cannon rounds, and plasma race at her, blocking her from every single direction as Yukari races in.
Anna's frame flares, brighter than any time before it and Yukari shudders, her thrusters cutting out briefly.
Even as far as you were, a squeal of static washes across your channels and even your HUD, the elements destabilising.
[Sensors Overloaded. Rebooting…]
Your HUD clears up to see Anna rapidly closing in, unharmed once again. What the heck?
Setsuna reacts faster than you do by an instant and a hail of plasma and cannon races forward to meet Anna. You barely start raising your arm to try and get a bead on Anna before she thunders past, somehow managing to find a way through Setsuna's weapon fire. Running into her shockwave felt like running into a wall even through your Impeller Field, knocking you right out your flight path and sending you tumbling towards the ground.
The ground and air blur into a dizzying kaleidoscope, turning over and over as you spin, blue, red and black blurring together while fires draw lines across your vision. You throw both arms out wide to stabilise as taught but your spin barely slows.
[Pilot Health Warning. Orientation Control Engaged]
You finally straighten out and gasp, nauseous. The world still spins around you and you wallow drunkenly before it stabilises.
"Koujirou, Setsuna, are you alright?" Yukari's voice says, flecked with static from interference.
"I'm okay. Koji took a bit of a tumble though," Setsuna gasps out.
You take a few deep breaths before answering, "Yeah, fine. Bit shaken up."
"Right. Thirty seconds left. Anna in close quarters," Yukari clips out brusquely, her voice strained.
You turn and see Anna and Yukari, corkscrewing and tumbling around each other in a close range battle barely 4 kilometers away.
A bright flash lights up the sky as Yukari discharges some form of powerful lightning weapon, but the bolt swerves off target and crackles through the air pointlessly before grounding itself on one of Perth Academy's radio towers, melting the structure.
You take another moment to recuperate and look around, wincing slightly as the abused landscape around you. Thick choking dust and smoke glow a sullen red, rising from bright grass fires and molten red soil, the Valkyrie weaponry igniting the shrub and sheer energy briefly forcing the dirt itself to burn. Your sensor range was seriously hampered in this smoke but even so, it was impossible to miss Yukari and Anna as the two continued their cat and mouse game. Their engines shone brightly, even as the air around them burned from the sheer power of their exhaust.
"This is probably as close as I can get Koji! Hurry!" calls out Setsuna as she again begins firing missiles and plasma, trying to suppress Anna's movement with the sheer volume of projectiles.
You glance at the timer, with only twenty or so seconds left.
You rush in as fast as you can, aiming for Anna.
[Acceleration At Inertial Control Limit.]
[Pilot Health Warning. Limit Further Thrust!]
The acceleration pushes at your body and your frame rattles, shaking as you shoot through the air, almost all of your Impeller Field focused into cancelling impulse from your thrusters on your body. You clench your teeth and force more out of the frame, forming plasma around your frame as you speed up even more, lighting up everything you see through an orange veil. You aren't sure how much of the roaring was the sound of the wind being cut and how much was the sound of your blood pounding through your skull.
Around you, cannon rounds scream past with another wave of missiles. You barely see out of the corner of your eye Setsuna's icon flashing, indicating low missile reserves.
You finally enter close range, cutting the distance down to a single kilometer. The missiles and cannon rounds form a funnel around Anna, forcing her to remain on her heading as you close on her.
You could do this, you had maybe ten Gs of acceleration on her. Any damage, any at all-!
You try to raise your cannon, but a shrieking alarm from your flight assistance software cuts the motion short. Shifting out of your pose would cause an almost immediate catastrophic tumble for you, one that you knew you would not be able to pull out of in time. Taking long enough to rebalance thruster loads properly would allow Anna to create distance again.
Fire now or later?
… A flicker of a plan forms in your head and you redouble your efforts. Your vision blurs around the edges and you grit your teeth.
[Frame Heat Warning.]
[Pilot Health Warning.]
Just a little longer.
Anna's particle cannons snap up and point right at you-
[Severe Radiation Warning! Ensure Impeller Integrity!]
Before she retracts them even as red pin points of light appear all over her frame, immediately heating up to a silver blue, and-
Lasers explode out.
The sky flares actinic white as what feels like every single piece of ordinance on the battlefield detonates at the same time.
You wince as the combined lights from her lasers and all the exploding ordinance blinds your sensors before your Impeller field cuts in automatically, polarising to prevent further light exposure to your frame. Setsuna yells out something, incomprehensible through the wail of radio noise polluting the battlefield.
[Sensors Overloaded. Rebooting…]
Your Impeller clears up before your HUD elements reappear-
Anna was right there.
Barely seven meters distant and almost completely still relative to you. She was ahead and to your right, but you won't be able to train your hypervelocity cannon on her-
[Frame Heat Warning!]
You wouldn't be able to fire even if you wanted to. No matter.
Now!
You extend your melee halberd to full extension, overriding frame safeties as you do. Almost immediately you start to go into a spin as thrust imbalance forces you off course. You sword begins an arc to cleave into her black frame. A single vertical cut.
Time slows and the world empties.
There was just you, and the goal.
You blade arcs towards Anna.
Just half a meter-!
Closer. Her frame thins, all components recessed back into storage, giving her some space.
Not enough to avoid you!
Twenty centimeters.
Closer.
Ten centimeters.
Shouldn't you have hit her Impeller Field by now?
Closer.
Five centimeters.
Stop.
Five centimeters.
Further.
No.
Further.
Ten centimeters.
How?
Further.
Twenty centimeters.
You had her! How?!
Further.
Half a meter.
Further.
She was out of range.
The exhaust erupting from her engines look more like a plasma weapon than reaction mass, blinding your sensors once again before your Impeller field darkens, cutting off your view of her.
She had been flying along your blade arc, accelerating fast enough that she outran your swing. She had been holding back the whole time. She could have ditched all her extended components then played keep away forever.
She had not even turned her head to look at you once through the whole encounter. No, she doesn't need to look at anything. There was nothing down in this banal world that reflected in her eyes. What need is there when she has skill so prescient, so overwhelming, that it is transcendent? Anna was beyond quantification.
Hahaha.
Hit Anna? Like you could.
…
Dammit, not even one single hit-
You spin past her and the world blackens-
>01:54<
No.
A chill settles over your mind and the world comes back into focus. Simple and clear.
You can still do this. She was just barely out of reach, if your right arm could not make the swing, your left will.
You push all power into your right leg thrusters as you transfer your melee halberd to your left hand.
[Frame Strain Beyon-]
You override the safeties. These limiters, they only were in the way.
[Oh?]
Pulling a pinpoint turn even tighter than Anna's you smoothly launch back at her.
She twitches slightly in surprise and turns to face you head on.
With a slight flex of her wrist, she is holding a blue spear, four and a half meters long, that rips right through Yukari's Impeller whips. A melee halberd of some type. You didn't know she had one. In the same instant, a shrug of her Impeller Field gathers the plasma surrounding her frame around her head, where it scatters another laser attack. You really needed to learn those tricks. In time you will, but now?
You feel the heat suffusing through your frame, through Kandakara, and gather it.
Expelling the energy gathered in your frame into Ame no Murakumo, you contain it with your Impeller Field.
Ame no Murakumo? The world shakes as distant amusement that threatens to shatter your emptiness. Seriously?
No matter the name, you will rely on this for this single strike.
Distantly, you hear the software grafted onto Kandakara scream as you exceeded every single preset tolerance there were and several that were not. In contrast, Kandakara itself felt eager.
Your vision narrows and colours completely fade. No matter, Anna's frame was black anyway.
Again, you raise Murakumo. The heat around the blade boils and froths, and you feed it more Impeller to sustain and pacify it. Distantly, you wanted to unleash it now, but the heat was just a forge, preparing a strike greater than any other.
A count rang through your head. Strike when it was ready and at no other time.
Too soon and the blade would be soft.
Too late and the blade would be brittle.
Not now.
Anna readies her own melee halberd as you charge- then throws it away with a spastic, jerking motion.
Not yet.
Her hands clench at her sides and her Impeller field condenses.
Almost…
Anna shifts slightly and her thrust direction changes, but cannons rounds and a particle beam, this time barely dodged, prevents her from backing off.
Thank you Setsuna, Yukari.
Now.
"KOTE!"
Thrusters on your wrists fire and the last of your Impeller Field pushes, granting your strike unmatched speed. A horizontal strike, just over the elbows. A combination of steel, heat and spirit.
Your arms shift oddly upon extending for the strike but it was inconsequential. You will get Anna. It will be a perfect strike halfway down the blade. Anna can't dodge this one.
Anna raises one arm, fist clenched as Murakumo closes-
Then there is a thunderous crack and Murakumo's blade flies over Anna's head. Energy roars outwards, carving a white hot trench that corkscrews on the ground behind Anna, exploding the moment after.
>Simulator Safeties Engaged<
>02:00<
>Time Limit Reached<
>Result: Group 2 Victory<
Anna floats in front of you, one arm raised, thumb extending skywards.
[...Alright.]
You simply blink, trying to process what had just happened. Your vision swimming and darkening even more at the edges didn't help.
… Did she just break Murakumo and avoid your strike by
flicking and breaking the blade at its base with her thumb
as you were swinging?
Anna glances down at her raised arm then back up at you thoughtfully, before raising her other arm to mirror the gesture, giving you a double thumbs up. "…That one counts. You won. Good job."
Bullshit.
You pass out.
XxXxXxXxXx
You are Anna Sanchez.
You are vaguely proud that Koujirou managed to land a strike on your frame, even if you avoided the majority of the attack.
You catch Koujirou as he starts falling from the air, becoming moderately alarmed when your gauntlets dig into metal rather than an opposing Impeller Field.
He managed to lose his entire Impeller Field? Did he use it all up into that strike at the end there?
You quickly descend to the ground and scan him- and choke at the results.
Both shoulders dislocated, pelvis fracture, bruises up the entire length of both arms- you cut the information feed and scan his head.
His brain was… unharmed. No burst vessels, blood pressure, pulse, flow, all normal. You check over his internals. Digestive track intact, all major circulatory vessels intact. You hiss out a sigh of relief.
Koujirou's frame retracts back into storage at that, thin rivets of blood running from the corners of his eyes and from his nose, skin pale.
-It was too unreal-
He looked like a- a corpse. You hands jerk and clench, trying to find something to do, you had to do something,
you didn't carry any medical components. What are you going to do? You had to do something. What are you going to do? You had to do something. What are you going to do? You had to do something. What-
Yukari crashes to the ground a dozen meters away, the other Valkyrie barely managing to land on her feet before sinking to her knees, her frame retracting.
"What, what happened?" she gasps out, hobbling over, "Why did his Impeller collapse?"
Yukari catches sight of Koujirou's face and her voice dies in her throat. Her own face pales and eyes widen, her hands come up to clap over her mouth.
"I-"
You're cut off as the simulator space fizzles then twists.
>Emergency Termination<
You are dumped out into the simulator projection room, still holding Koujirou on your lap, alongside Yukari and Setsuna, who was on her back and gasping for air.
The door to the corridor slams open and Instructors swarm inside.
"-afeties are called
safeties cause they keep you
SAFE, doofheads! Who was it?!"
The Instructor yelling at the lead, Parks from her nametag, wasn't one you recognised, but she extends a medical trolley and you immediately send her the results of your scan.
She flinches slightly and stumbles before running over with the trolley wordlessly, expression tight. Several other Instructors lift Koujirou off your lap and onto the trolley with their Impeller Fields.
Two extend frames and you feel the ripples in space as a very careful teleport begins.
"Wait-!" yells Setsuna, struggling onto her elbows, "Is he alright?"
"Nothing permanent, he'll be right, give him a day," clips out Instructor Park as she also extends her frame and teleports away with a crack.
Yukari had regained her feet and begins striding towards the door before another Instructor pulls her over, talking quietly. Instructor Meyer throws you a concerned look before moving on to squat down next to Setsuna, talking with her too.
Instructor Leonhart comes to a stop next to you and kneels down.
"Anna… that wasn't your fault."
You flinch at the words.
"No, Anna, listen. I reviewed the record on my way down here. Koujirou chose to push himself far as he did himself. You didn't hurt him."
"I-"
The Instructor runs your hesitant sentence over, "There should have been no way Koujirou could have disabled the safeties by himself. The blame lies with us for not assessing his Valkyrie Frame correctly."
She grabs onto your shoulder, sparks racing under her fingers and stares into your helmet, for a moment, her eyes widen, then she sets her expression and continues talking, "Anna, trust me, Parks never lies no matter what circumstances, and her diagnostics are always spot on. Koujirou will be awake by tomorrow evening. It wasn't your fault that he was injured, and he's not really hurt."
She glances sideways and you see Setsuna being carried out of the room, apparently passed out.
Another Instructor had joins the one talking with Yukari and the two sit next to her. Yukari had curled up, pressing her knees to her head.
You shake your head slightly, then pull up access of the medical clinic. To your surprise, the intensive care rooms are isolated from outside network access. You briefly consider forming a bridge anyway but decide against it.
"He'll be okay?"
Instructor Leonhart faces you, stating frankly, "Anna, you performed the initial scan, do you think he will be alright?"
Yes
Yes. No damage to CNS. No damage to vital organs. Damage concentrated to extremities. Limbs, dermis, minor skeletal distortion. Damage is contained.
"Yeah… he should be okay."
It wasn't something that would even kill a normal human. A Valkyrie like Koujirou should be fine.
He should be fine.
"Good. The clinic generally doesn't allow for visitors during… the first few hours of their stay. By tomorrow morning though, you should be allowed to visit. Go get some sleep. You can take leave from class tomorrow if you want to."
Instructor Leonhart tugs at your hand and you stand up, allowing yourself to be led back to your room.
XxXxXxXxXx
Instructor Leonhart finally lets go of your hand as the two of you reach the door to your room.
She faces you, looking up straight at you again, staying silent for a moment, "Koujirou will be fine Valkyrie, but you need to fix your eyes. Don't greet him with that kind of face. Make sure to get some sleep."
She turns away at that and you wonder briefly what she was talking-
Oh, right. You quickly set Durga to repairing your eyeballs, then retract your frame when you are done.
You stand in the middle of your room, slightly at a loss as to what to do.
It was early still, only slightly past 18:00.
For the others, you supposed the high intensity simulation would be tiring enough that they would be able to sleep from it.
You were slightly tired too, those were some of the most difficult minutes of flying with Durga that you had ever experienced, and holding yourself back from attacking back had not been something that you've ever needed to do before and it had not been easy.
Even so, it was a mere two minutes of flight time. Far too short to tire you, as much as you wished that it did.
You sit down into your bed, but even the comforting softness of the quilts and mattress don't help with the leaden weight in your stomach.
You stand up jerkily and pace in your room, restless.
-By tomorrow morning though, you should be allowed to visit-
Morning, 06:00, nearly twelve hours away.
You pace back and forth, wearing a trail into your carpet. Waiting away the hours.
...
You glance at the clock. 05:31.
Still another twenty nine minutes left.
You again query the clinic but the details given to you are just as frustratingly vague as before.
>Rokusabe Koujirou: Condition Stable, Under Observation<
05:31.01
Twenty eight minutes, fifty nine seconds left.
…
XxXxXxXxXx
What will you do today?
[]Breakfast: Visit Koujirou, see if he is okay.
[]Breakfast: Write in.
[]Morning: Write in.
>[]Go to class and study?
[]Lunch: Write in.
