Soundtrack: N/a
In an empty, sterile testing room, three onlookers from the observation above hurriedly prepped the last minute checks and settings for the coming test.
Lady Leizi was in check on the coms, making sure the three participating members of Justice Unlimited were ready, and if there were any last minute complications.
Behind her, on their own consoles, making sure the automated systems of the empty testing room were working correctly and would react perfectly to any strikes or blasts the three down below would perform, was the father and daughter duo, the Ibis's.
The other hero members of their organization sadly couldn't make it. It was getting busy with emergencies today, requiring most of their crew to set out and get those handled.
In truth, LL wanted to cancel the test, but Ellie and Massive, the two who had worked together to prove that the theory behind today's test subject was possible in practice.
The test subject?
As Leizi gave the all clear for the three members of her team to enter the testing room, a door below the observation deck opened wide.
Stepping inside was Black Swan, Doctor Silver, and Valiant Silver, each of them dressed in their usual uniforms.
Well, except for a few changes.
Swan and Silver both had headsets on, wires flowing like hair as metal clamped close to their heads. Mona didn't exactly need it to be there but her power broke a lot of rules about reality already, so it still would work.
On the back of Ellie's suit, sticking up into the air with its long antennae and sticking a bit out like a backpack, was an ugly bare set of machinery, made to resist damage but not streamlined or made to look appealing.
Why shorten the long attentats, neaten out the wires, compress the machinery to fit flush with the suit, if this was a prototype?
Yes, the test subject for today was the prototype for a new Module into EXCEED-BEYOND.
Inspired by the fact that (currently) the most common side effect of using Ambrosia was sensitivity to psychic field's and the talks about giving EXCEED-BEYOND new modules after facing the copycat Valiant, it was Ellie who proposed this idea.
And for no other reasons.
Definitely.
As the three individuals tasked with giving their current working model of Module "Thread" a stress test entered the center of the empty testing room, walls bare gray and without a single piece of furniture or likewise in sight, the door they entered in shut close as Mammoth Ibis activate the room's special features.
Cameras faced them from every direction and all were wired up to projectors hidden in the walls, firing up as the visual data was processed in real time to keep track of the condition of the room.
Soon, holographic goons, made to look like cartoonish gangsters leaning towards realism appeared around them. They weren't made with hard light or anything of the sort, but the cameras tracking their movements and actions allowed the central computer running it all to make these fake criminals react as if they were real.
Sure, they couldn't actually hit the three heroes, but this test didn't need them to.
Lady Leizi held a hand up to the headset she was wearing, speaking clearly into her mic as she kept an eye on the stability of the room's holographic systems.
"Everything seems to be in order. Silver, could you step out and let Swan and Silver have first go?"
*"Right, we need to make sure linking up after the initial activation actually works. I'll step aside, you two have fun playing tango."*
Both young girls gave sounds of denial at the remark, only making Doctor Silver smirk before he stepped off to the side of the room to wait his turn to join in.
"Right girls, remember, keep to low power attacks. If you break this room the repair costs are coming out of your paychecks."
They both gave affirmatives, getting into position back to back, each facing roughly half of the artificial goons.
She should really thank Massive, Lady Leizi though as the three overseeing the test gave a final check of everything.
She really is a prodigy, able to take what was only an idea and have a working theory in a week's time. It took a long while before they were able to get to this point though, but it's still impressive what she was able to do for this project.
Had Nora ever thought they would do this? Add a new Module into EXCEED?
The framework for changing forms was there, and she had left them with everything they needed to repair and rebuild the armor, so adding something new wasn't impossible but…
After the incident involving Ellie fully inheriting Exceed, there was always this constant fear of 'What else did she forget to include? What else did she forget to say?'
Were they making a mistake? Break some unknown balance built into the armor by installing new Modules?
As the free light for getting the test fully underway was given, Lady Leizi put those fears to the side.
If there was a risk, they would figure it out. Worst case they would simply have to give up improving the armor and let it stay as it is…
Hopefully.
Light flashed down upon the testing floor as Ellie began to activate the prototype attached to her suit, a wave of psychic energy expanding out from her and into the air surrounding her.
At the same time, Mona pressed a button upon the headset she was wearing, the moment she did Ellie and her flinching in union, a good sign.
The wave of energy was hopefully unneeded in the final design, but here it acted as an authentication key and connection for the headsets, allowing them to link up to the prototype, and by extension, Ellie.
As both girls down below moved their bodies slowly, feeling out what the prototype module was enabling, LL ordered a hologram gangster to strike at Ellie.
Even though Mona shouldn't have noticed it, with no sound to signal its approach, she turned her head at the same time Ellie did, both reacting accordingly and dodging out of the way.
Mona's back, exposed to another hologram, had Leizi order it to strike.
Even though she shouldn't have been able to notice, she had dodged out of the way anyways, all due to Ellie staring in her direction when the hologram had moved.
And then another moved to strike Ellie out of view.
Then another for Mona.
And soon enough the test truly began, with both fledgling heroes beginning to strike back.
The holograms, due to the nature of the room, reacted as if they had been physically struck, flying back as a new one spawned to take its place.
One hologram fell from above, only to be punched by Ellie when Mona had noticed it, the girl yelling about Ellie 'kill stealing' as she moved to roundhouse kick a hologram behind her that Ellie had seen.
Back and forth, they danced, bickering at each other as their minds slowly got used to the prototype module's function.
To allow EXCEED to share senses with its wearer and another, and to allow them to function like one.
The dance continued, as both of them dodged and blocked and parried blows they wouldn't have seen coming, as more and more light made goons appeared to attempt to 'strike' them.
And just at the brink of them being overwhelmed by the mod of modsters, John pressed the button on the side of his headset.
Instantly, something shifted.
It was first a flinch, more prominent in Silver then Swan and Valiant, which left the latter two scrambling to keep up momentum, but soon, as the heroic doctor jumped into the massive mob of 'villains', it began to shift back in their favor.
The three of them began to settle into a new dance, Mona creating a blast right above Ellie to ward away a hologram, Ellie who in return punched away a mobster beside John, who then blocked an attack on Mona with a barrier.
But the most important part? The one they hoped would work when John entered the sudo gestalt?
His sixth sense.
Ellie and Mona could both pick up on it too.
They didn't actually have it, so had to account for where John was, something they would have to add in for the module to do automatically when it was finalized, maybe with a framework in place to allow for more other senses to be automatically handled, but still- it didn't matter now!
As the test wound down, the three heroes acting as one 'finishing' off the last of the hologram goons, Massive was squealing about the success as Mammoth cheered his daughters victory on.
But when Ellie tried to turn it off…
It didn't.
They would need to fix that wouldn't they?
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Module "Thread": Ally Empowerment, Sense Sharing, Central Processing Unit, Overclock
Design Notes: Module Yarn allows Valiant Gold to Sync with someone else with Psychic Sensitivity, allowing the two or more fighters to act as one in the field, sharing each other's senses and becoming extensions of each other. Using EXCEED-BEYOND's technology to act as a central processing unit, it not only offers everyone who is linked to Valiant Gold Mental Manipulation Immunity but protects the connected Egos from merging. This Module has downsides however, as those mentally linked together share pain with each other and if they gain distance from each other the shared experiences will begin to cause disorientation and unsteadiness.
Overclock allows for all connected minds to temporarily speed up, allowing for a sort of "Chain Attack" to occur, allowing for each hero linked together to fight in perfect sync, chaining their attacks together to most effectively take down their foe. (Get an Overkill and Drop-rate and EXP will jump way up!... Joking of course this isn't Xenoblade)
