#silentman

Ever since she was a little kid, Delphinium had the same lucid dream. When she sleeps, she goes into a green meadow with a beautiful blue lake in the middle, surrounded by thick redwood trees. In the distance, there are large white pillars in every direction. Delphinium herself is completely nude, but without nipples or genitals, presumably to protect the innocence of any children watching. We see her sitting quietly by the pond, looking at her reflection in the rippling water. She examines her completely normal hand, and stands up to take a walk.

“Is she okay?”

Na-ri crouches next to the bed that her best friend is lying on, thick metal tubes reaching into her open chest and the back of her head. Delphinium has been cleaned up, but her burnt flesh remains black. Her bones are shining silver metal, revealing to the audience that she is, in fact, a robot.

“Yeah, her brain suffered a little shock but nothing that she can’t handle.” An older rabbit woman, with the same fur and hair color as Delph explains. “I wasn’t expecting her to fight that hard. Not until your parents asked me to open up her strength.”

Na-ri nods, her eyes still on her best friend. “I think that’s going to happen sooner than we thought.”

The older woman’s face is somber. “I was… I was hoping we never would have to. But we don’t really have a choice now, do we?”

The door to the hospital room, larger than you’d expect and with multiple key locks around it, slides open. A larger hospital bed with a thick frame and a gantry frame slides into the room, pushed by several nurses. “Dr. Spur? The frame you requested has arrived.”

Delphinium’s mother nods, and gently nudges Na-ri to the side. “Excuse me, madam.” She waves the nurses over, and moves Delph slightly. “Alright, move the frame closer and we can transfer her over.”

Back in Delph’s dream, she crouches next to the pond, a despondent look no her face. She’s been thinking about what’s happened in the real world for a long time, and is still having trouble processing it. Why did that guy turn to dust? Why did they try to hurt Na-ri? What happened to my body?

The sky begins to grow dark, and a gentle earthquake starts to shake the trees. This has never happened before, and Delph scrambles to her feet, confused. The towers begin to shrink, as though the distant earth is swallowing them up, and the pond grows darker, as though something swims beneath the surface. She looks over to see what it is. The water begins to boil, and with a sudden burst, splashes in her face. An enormous, towering figure looms over her, rising from the water. Then, she wakes up in the clandestine hospital room.

“Nnngh… ugh...”

Na-ri rushes to her side, and looks down on her. “Delphi! You’re awake! Can you hear me?! Are you okay?!” She fights every urge not to hug her.

“Uhh...” Her voice is strange, slightly deeper. She coughs, but it doesn’t change back to before. “Na-ri… Are you… Are you safe?”

The cat laughs, choking back tears. “Yeah, Delphi. We’re safe, don’t worry.”

Delph tries to look around, but it’s difficult. The thick metal tubes sticking out of the back of her head root it in place, but she can still see the gantry arms repairing her body. It also seems to be replacing some of her skin with a thin white substance that she can’t quite place. But she can’t really place much of anything at the moment, as she’s still shaking off her stupor.

Her mother, Dr. Lark Spur, sits down next to the bed opposite Na-ri, and begins speaking with a quiet and reassuring tone. “Sweetie? Can you hear me? I know you must be scared and confused, but you’re safe and okay.” She gently touches her shoulder. “I need you to try to not move around, okay? These little arms are repairing your body. It should be done in a few hours and you’ll be right as rain, I promise.”

Delph closes her eyes, confused. “That’s… that’s not how bodies work. I should be bleeding… right?”

Lark shakes her head. “Sweetie, do you… do you remember when you were 5? And you were in that car accident?”

Delph opens her eyes, and looks over. “Y-yes? That was a dream I had. That didn’t happen, did it? I woke up just fine the next morning.”

Dr. Spur squeezes her shoulder. “That wasn’t a dream, sweetie. And you didn’t wake up the next day, that was 13 months later. We… we had to take… some drastic measures to heal you. And it was thanks to Na-ri’s parents that we could.”

“I’m a… I’m a cyborg? That’s so… cool...” Delphinium closes her eyes.

Dr. Spur and Na-ri both look to the machine that the head tubes were connected to, which has a steady flow of green nutrients flowing in and out of it. “Yeah, sweetie. Cyborg. Cool, huh?”

The next day, Delph stands upright in front of a full-length body mirror. Dr. Spur and Na-ri watch her, holding her casual clothes. Delphinium is nude, or at least as nude as she’ll ever be now. About 40 percent of her body’s flesh was now a thin white fabric, covering her chest, groin, butt, legs and arms. It also has thin white strings stretching between the major lengths of fabric.

“You see, Delph, sweetheart, Na-ri’s family funded your new body with one request. They want you to be their daughter’s bodyguard.” Delph turns and shrugs. “Well, I mean, I’m already kind of her bodyguard anyway. She’s my best friend.”

“Yes, but you’re going to see what’s happening. Or you have, sort of. Na-ri’s family is very rich and very important, and bad people want to kidnap her. Probably for ransom, or something like that. And you know you’ve always been strong, but now you’ll be even stronger. You’ll… probably going to have to give up your dreams of forming that kickboxing club, though. It wouldn’t really be fair to your classmates.”

“And this… white stuff is…?”

“Special heat-diffusing flesh. Your energy core can only take so much before it begins to overheat, so this will dissipate the heat into the surrounding air for you. It’ll also glow red to let you know when you’re reaching the stretching point. You got lucky last time, but who knows what’ll happen if your brain get too hot.”

“Uh huh,” Delphinium says as she rubs her fingers over the flowery and lacy accents around the edges. “And, uhm… these parts?”

“Oh, haha! Those were just me wanting to give you a little bit of...” She waves her hands with a nervous look. She betrays her usual awkwardness outside of the hospital. “Feminine touch! Haha.”

Delphinium turns and holds her arms out. “And you didn’t stop to realize for a moment that it, you know… Looks like fancy lingerie?”

Dr. Lark’s face begins to glow bright red as it freezes in an expression halfway between shock and a smile. “Uh… oh.” She drops her daughters clothes and rushes over to the bedframe, tinkering with the gantry with surprising speed. “Hahahahaaaa oh god how silly of me!! Haha! Geez! I built lingerie into my daughter’s skin oh lord oh me oh my I gotta fix this I’ll just… I’ll fix this right away you’ll just have to lay down on the bed for another hour and I’ll just I’ll fix everything oh god I’m so sorry I’ll just...”

During her mother’s goofy ramblings, Delphinium gets dressed in her casual clothes, which reveal only the leggings around her feet and gloves around her hands. “Whatever, I don’t want to lay around any more, and nobody will see this anyway.” She looks down to her friend, taps her flexing bicep, and continues, “I gotta guard Na-ri, anyway! Nobody’s gonna get past me!”

Na-ri looks back up, and gives a joyful smile, and the end credits start.

Next episode! Bundroid Beauty Delphinium: Don’t look at me like that!

“Okay. That’s cool, I’m in. Start up the next episode, I’ll get some more popcorn.”

THWUMP. A well-toned, gray-furred leg slams into a hanging punching bag, the protective padding on its shin absorbing the blow. It withdraws, before being replaced with two wrapped fists impacting the bag with impressive speed and another leg slamming with an even louder THWUMP. Another angle gives a better angle of the owner of these limbs: Delph, who is wearing a breezy, comfortable-looking kickboxing outfit, although missing its gloves. She dances back and forth, tall on her toes, which eagle-eyed viewers notice that she never stands down from. A gleam in the rabbit's eye shines subtly, and a split-second later she unleashes a rapid flurry of blows from her nearly-bare fists into the bag. When she steps back to take a drink from her bottle, her fists are noticeably unmarred.

“Delphi!” At the doorway to the high school’s gym, Delph’s friend Na-ri waves at her. She’s still wearing her uniform, likely coming out of one of her (frankly far too many) clubs. She’s a meezer cat, with the famous fur markings, and nearly a foot shorter than her athletic friend. Even from her one line so far, any Japanese speaker would immediately recognize her Korean accent. It’s often lost on English speakers, however.

As the cat practically leaps into the bunny’s arms, she is caught deftly. “Aw, hey, Na-chan! You don’t want to hug me, I’ve been working out...”

“Nah! It’s fine, you don’t stink. Are you done punching?” Delph places her down, and explains, “Yeah, just finishing up. Just let me get changed and I can head home with you.” Na-ri does a little spin and curtsy. “I don’t know what I’d do without my beautiful and loyal bodyguard~!”

Delph blushes slightly, wiping herself down with a wet towel before she grabs her track pants. “Come on, don’t say that! Just because it’s cute, doesn’t mean it’s true.” The cat gets pouty, probably as a joke. “We made a deal, remember! You’re the shining knight who protects the lovely princess on her way back home~! If you go back on your deal, then you’ll have to start princess-carrying me everywhere!

Delph smiles awkwardly, her jacket going over her shoulders. “Yeah, yeah. I’ll make sure to protect you in this town, where one person got robbed 3 years ago.” She makes a silly pose, with a dramatic music sting in the background. “You can count on me! In a minute, though. I need to go to the bathroom.”

Later, Delph walks out of the building, her “princess” waiting, leaning against a wall. “My liege~” The sun is setting, a shining crimson orb sliding down beneath the horizon as the clouds lazily float across the sky. A lazy mid-spring evening, the flowers blooming in the fields. As the two girls walk the nearly empty streets, only a few other dark figures are visible. Na-ri pretends not to notice them, while Delph is oblivious.

“Uh, hey, Delphi? Can we walk down by the river, instead?” The bunny keeps walking forward, oblivious to the identical men in dark suits walking toward them in front of them. “Eh, I’m kind of worn out today. Unless you wanna get romaaaannntic~” She makes a playful grabby motion towards the cat, who is visibly uncomfortable as the figures close in on them.

“It’s okay, I won’t tell anyone,” Delph says out loud as she places her hands on her friend’s shoulders. She then leans in, and whispers, “Stay down.” Na-ri takes the advice, and squats down to cover her head with her hands as her bunny companion rears back and delivers a fierce forward jab directly into the face of the figure who was now within reaching distance of the two girls.

She follows it up with two rapid shots to their torso, and then leaps over her friend to plant her toes into her opponent’s chin, followed by a Superman punch in a surprisingly smooth motion. The figure is now prone, and Delph adjusts her floppy ears over her shoulders as she bears down over the man. “Don’t you ever think about touching my friend again! Or else I’ll… Oh, oh no!”

The figure lays prone on the ground, his head now a gray dust spilling out from the neck of his suit. Delph steps backwards, terrified, and then trips over her friend and falls flat backwards. It’s even more terrifying as the suit seems to stand up on its own, as if there was a body inside, and dust itself off.

“Delphi! We need to get out of here!”

The bunny looks around, her limp ears dragging on the ground as she sees the small crowd of dark suits closing in. Their dark visages disintegrate into dust that slides down to the ground, and the empty suits step to the side while the black dust slowly slide towards a singular suit. The dust solidifies, forming a solid gray figure with no features. It cracks its neck once, and begins walking menacingly towards the girls.

“Leave it! We’ll be fine as long as we get to the mansion!”

Delph unzips the front of her jacket, revealing her bright white sports top underneath, and took a stance indicating her readiness to kick some weird smoke figure’s ass. “Let’s dance, creepy.”

She rushes forward, and delivers a left-right-left combo straight into the figure’s chest. It gives way to her strikes easily, almost like sand, before reforming. “Hmm...” Delph says out loud, before stepping back and attacking with a spinning back kick. Its head explodes outward into more dust, but flitters back like a gray cloud. It lets out a high pitched groan before reaching back, a tell-tale sign that it’s about to let out a devastating hay maker. Rookie mistake.

The trained fighter backflips almost effortlessly, and then leaps forward to tackle the dust monster. She grabs its suit, but drags it straight through the cloud of dust. She then climbs to her feet, tosses aside empty suit, and turns to look at the awful, thick cloud of vaguely person-shaped dust. She’s never seen anything like this before, but she’s still not afraid. Not even when a strange, pink circle of energy appears underneath it, and seems to paralyze the figure in place, a solid chunk of dust.

“GO! NOW!”

Delph ignores the obvious meaning of the outburst, and instead interprets it as “Beat up the dust.” She gladly accepts this imagined decision, delivering a rapid series of jabs with blinding speed. It’s like the punching bag, but thicker. More unforgiving to her fists. More satisfying.

“This is what you get, you big ugly dust cloud!”10, 20, 30 jabs to its torso.

“Don’t!” 40 jabs, 50, then a switch over to side blows.

“Touch!” Rapid spin punches, then more jabs. The angry rabbit’s chest begins to start glowing, sweat dripping from her brow for the first time in a very long time.

“My!” She leaps up with no trouble, and begins to bring her shins into the side of the monster’s head over and over, her body staying in the air longer than really feasible. A black smoke begins to pour from underneath her sports top.

“FRIEND!!” She punches, more and more, harder and harder, faster and faster. Sweat is pouring from her face and flying away as her hands and arms are now mere blurs in front of her, colliding with the figure in an intense display. Her top catches fire, and the zipper on her jacket glows bright red. She then pulls back both of her arms, balls her fists in one, and brings them both in on the enemy’s head, which disfigures but is not destroyed.

Delphinium’s chest explodes. Literally. Red smoke and erupting fire reach out in front of her, enveloping the dust figure, disintegrating it completely. “Hah, hah...” she pants, slowly turning to her friend. “Got… ‘em...” Her jacket, top, the top of her pants (but surprisingly, not her panties), and most of her chest are blown away, revealing an empty charred crater in her torso revealing a brightly glowing, red hot orb in the middle of her. She tries to raise her arm and hand in a thumb’s up, but only shows a charred stick, her hand and most of her fur burnt away. She sees her own burnt limb, goes, “Ohh...” and promptly collapses backwards.

“DELPHI!!”

END Part A!

“Wait, that’s it? What happened to her?”

“Well, that’s just the first half, this is where the commercials would be if this was live.”