XIII

Imagine if we never lost BBDW, imagine we actually got Ragna playable in a post-CF world where Juusan is the only one that still remembers him (not counting alternate timelines like Kagura and Mai Alter). Just imagine the fucking whiplash of emotions it would be for her since she is still struggling with her past as Nu-13 while at the same time the memories of Saya still make her cling to him. To hear her call Noel and Lambda, who she said pretty harmful things, sisters.

naoto you surely know the match up right-

“ Pssht. Of course I know that! Just watch this!”

*AGGRESSIVELY MASHES. NEVER BLOCKS. ALWAYS WAKE-UP DP’S BECAUSE YOU LOSE ALL THE SHOTS YOU NEVER TAKE.*

“You really thought rushing the zoner was a good idea. Perish.”

>reads tags

WHO ARE YOU CALLING A BODYBAG!?

SAVE IT. JUST RUN.

 You know you are going to become one, so just STAY STILL WHILE I MAKE YOU A HUMAN PORCUPINE!

>NU

“ Why? Well, the short of it was that there was a war. “ Morgan felt.. something in his chest. Bashful, was it? Perhaps in his mind the idea of retelling such a story about his early glory days felt like bragging of some sorts. Putting himself on some kind of pedestal. But at the same time, she seemed genuinely curious over the events that transpired that resulted in the loss of his eye. He couldn’t help but a small smile as he scratched the back of his head a bit, his eyepatch still lifted up to show the scarred tissue. 

“ … Well, the long of it is.. there was a land called Ishgard. For the longest of times, they thought that the dragons were their arch enemies. But, it turns out that their little feud was built on a bit of an old lie. A really old one. When that was discovered, the current state leader Ser Aymeric–good friend of mine–wanted to try and patch the relations between man and dragon whom.. once upon a time, were actually good friends. “ 

“ But, there was one rather vocal about his disdain for the idea of peace between the two races. The Broodwyrm Nidhogg. Sufficient to say the demon with wings wouldn’t stop until humans were put in their place. He planned an assault on the Steps of Faith, basically a big bridge that acts as the sole entrance into Ishgard. And well.. that’s where your’s truly came in. I was chosen to fight alongside Skysteel Manufactory, a guild of Machinists that wanted to turn the average man into a knight proper with the use of fire arms, turrets and now we even got robots. Who would’ve thought, huh? “

” Anyways, back to long story short. Nidhogg wasn’t too keen on my ability to rally the troops. Cut the head off, body dies? Well, he sent one of his for me. They shot the thing down before it could do much with it.. but in the wyrm’s dying breath he at least got my eye out before succumbing. Kind of a big sight, bloody, kinda messy. I was out of it for a bit but I’m pretty sure there was screamin’ “ 

  A war he says, not the most welcoming of words to retell a past experience. Granted, Nu wasn’t really taken aback by them, she was sort of used to a story starting out like that. The Black Beast, the Dark War, despite it being 100 years apart from her time, it was such an event that marked a before and after in her world. She looks at Morgan with a serious yet interested gaze as he remembers the tales of this Ishgard.

“Someone not willing to accept change and instead tries to destroy everything…” She makes a small commentary about Nidhogg, did she feel reflected in those words? In fact it was what stood to her the most more than an organization pulling a lie for so long to keep their power, much like the Novus Orbis. But then again, that didn’t really matter to her.

“...” Her gaze becomes fixated when the mention of the Skysteel Manufactory developing robots. “A slight of modernity amidst the other jobs such as a knight. Like a sore thumb you stood out.” Sure her comment might sound a bit condescending but she was more impressed that despite the constant feud with dragons, they managed to go as far as to make robots despite what seemed to be a constant struggle for Ishgardians.

“Yes, Nu can assess such a tactical decision was the best in order to take down their enemies, especially if you are as talented leading troops as you say you are.”

“Nu, huh? Red Robin, nice to meet you.”

Nu’s appearance didn’t bother him much- he had seen plenty of people of similar… Strange appearances. Hell, he wasn’t even one to talk. Even if his uniform could be considered one of the more normal looks among his allies. All is in the name of maintaining a good secret identity.

“A missing person?” He questioned. “If you can give me a description, I’ll keep an eye out for them. Have they been gone long?”

She didn’t really meant to ask for help, but she supposed her appeareance wasn’t enough to make him get away, and her voice tone could only make it seem she was more insulted about the fact he found her suspicious than making it clear she wanted to be alone. However, the proposal to help her find that person was one she couldn’t simply let go unanswered.

Makoto smiles at the compliment, and for a moment, she lets herself forget the odd turns of events that’s led to this moment. Snatched away from her home, brought to this city, where she’s had an impromptu meeting with someone who should’ve been an enemy, and now they’re just making cookies together. She’s reasonably certain that this girl tried to kill her best friend, and now…

Nothing wrong with keeping an eye on her, at least.

The breezy feeling brought about by the pleasant winter afternoon is absolutely blown away as soon as Nu starts in on the screen. People =don’t go that fast, and if they do then it never looks so good.

Makoto can only blink a few times at Nu’s designs as the girl turns back to her with a smile. “Oh you d- Wow. I mean, yeah, you did really good! These are… these are impressive, I hope the machine can match up to your artistic skills!”

It was impressive, impressive and just a little scary. At least it wouldn’t be a sheet of only Ragna cookies with a single Makoto.

As Makoto sends the order away to be baked, she steps away from the screen and motions Nu to follow her. “Hopefully it doesn’t take too long, just being in here is making me hungry. Do you when you pick them up, I wonder? I wasn’t really paying attention to that…”

Shrugging, Makoto leans back against a wall. She’s starting to feel a little warmer now, both inside and out; Nu being such pleasant company wasn’t something she’d expected. Maybe a bit of kindness and friendship would reveal another side of her.

“So, how’ve you been doing, Nu?” she says, her voice echoing the chipper feeling in her chest. “City been treating you well? Any plans for Christmas? That kinda thing.”

The thought of how this event started left the PFD’s head a while ago while doodling the designs on the dough. Who knows how would the people who have been targeted by Nu’s blades react to this sight, it was completely out of character, what would Noel's reaction even be if this sight happened in front of her. But that didn’t matter to her, clearly, not right now. This was an experience she didn’t want taken from her right now.

She smiles and laughs slightly at Makoto’s approving words, taking pride in the work she created, possibly the first of many things. Sure it may have not been handmade like she wanted at the beginning but it was a start. 

“Nu hopes so as well, or else…” Her eye looks at the machine as if daggers, but no matter how you put it, Nu was pretty much a normal girl, the most she could do was kick at it annoyed. Tilting her head, she doesn’t take much to answer.

“Nu is going to save some and get them to Ragna.” It was the main objective for coming here in the first place. “Then I guess Nu will eat some that are left.”

Following behind Makoto, she ducked next to her, letting the cloak to cover her legs, closing her eye, trying to let the time go by as the cookies were finally done.

♔ —• It seemed like some kind of profiling that he would be called a Beastkin simply for the matter of him having cat ears and a tail. There were many people here who shared similar physical features but with some key differences, mind. He would cross his arms as he listened to her explanation of them, although curious how she’s seen only squirrels and felines.. squirrels was a bit of a far off one for him, but lizards does get a bit of a reaction out of him, his ears standing on end at that. 

“ They’re not lizards but we got some folk known as Au’ra back where I’m from. Scales, horns, tails, the works. You’d probably confuse them with Beastkin also, but I think they’d prefer the former. “ He’d offhandedly mention with a wave of his hand before listening to her speak about her eye. For some reason.. it feels as if he’s hit a nerve of sorts. He looks down for a moment but hears her ask about his eye patch just to pass the time. He briefly places his thumb under the patch before lifting it up, revealing relatively scarred tissue where an eye should be. Unevenly healed.. but still closed up decently enough. 

“ Dragon did this to me back in the day. Wasn’t payin’ attention, their big boss sent one my way. First it was just holdin’ the head, and then the nail dug in and it dug deep. Dropped me pretty hard after, was a bleedin’ mess for a bit. Patched up, went back at it. … Guess mine does sound a bit more interestin’ in retrospect, huh? “ 

As his ears stand at the mention of lizard-like Beastkin she tilts her head slightly to the left, somewhat curious at the motion they just did. 

“Au Ra. Updating.” A small pause. “Nu will be more careful to call those of said attributes, then.” Being wary was the ideal in a place where she had no way to defend herself, she knew very well that not all people would be calm and easygoing like Morgan seemed to be so far. She wouldn’t even want to end up in a bad spot because of a small misunderstanding. There were examples of such people, like Yuuki Terumi or… ironically enough, herself.

Looking at the scarred tissue with enough attention she easily deducted the gouging of the eyeball with a sharp end, and once he mentioned the word Dragon it all came together, while Dragons weren’t exactly a thing on her place there were many things that did resemble them, that dark beast, for example.

With another tilt of her head, she now seemed to be interested in his tale. From one eyepatched person to another, it would seem like it was sort of a custom in order to feel better, or to remember some sort of oath. Not that hers was any heroic, but quite the contrary.

“Why were you fighting a Dragon in the first place?” Indeed it was more interesting than experimenting on a machine, she nodded slightly to that. 

“What? Me worry? Noooo, nonsense!” says Makoto, making the opposite impression. “I just kinda figured we should take advantage of this stuff while it’s here! We can, uh, we can have a baking party later, alright?” And hopefully no one will need to suffer.

It’s kind of hard to predict how Ragna will react to things, now that Makoto thinks about it. There’s part of her that wants to believe he really would like to see something like that from Nu, some kind of marker that shows the progress she’s made. But there’s an equal chance that he’ll be a weenie about it, so who knows?

“Anyways, yeah, I think he would. I mean, if you want to give them to him, you should,” she says. “’Tis the season for that kind of stuff, right?” Makoto will just text him beforehand so he isn’t too surprised.

Makoto steps over to what she assumes is the control for the whole cookie-crafting shebang. A touch screen, like the one on her phone, looks back at her, so it can’t be too hard to figure out, right? She taps the screen with a finger. “Uhh, you probably just- oh, there it goes.”

At her touch, the screen changes to what passes for a sheet of dough. As Makoto traces her finger along the image, it notifies her that the trail she creates is where the machine will cut.

“Oh hey Nu, it’s pretty easy!” she says, turning back to the other girl. “You just gotta draw it, see? I mean, my artistic skills aren’t amazing, but it should just be like…”

She hums a little to herself as she traces out a humanoid shape. A little tuft for the hair, a pair of ears, a big poofy tail, and can’t forget the cowlick she can’t get rid of… “There, that ain’t bad, right?” she says, taking a step back. “That looks like me, right? Or like, it looks like me if I was backlit. Anyways, you give it a try.”

She watches Nu with bright eyes, wonder if the girl has any artistic merit to speak of, and hoping they don’t end up with a sheet of only Ragna cookies.

“Hm.” Squinting with her non-covered eye as the other tried to hide the worry in her tone, in a very bad way. Whatever, she thought as she nodded, she will make them one day and will drag Makoto to test how they tasted. Once the Murakumo set her mind on something it was very hard to let it go away, a certain Grim Reaper could attest to that.

With Makoto’s words she smiles and gets closer to the machine, looking at the other’s attempts to make the machine work, and once the instructions of the machine are clear she waits for Makoto to finish the design. Once she recognizes the form of the cookie Makoto made she makes a small laugh, remembering that phrase of making cookies in the form of her friends and eating them up at the beginning, she didn’t think Makoto would start with herself.

“It looks pretty good, Makoto!” She takes a moment to look at the small design on the touchscreen. 

“It’s Nu’s turn now.” She looks at the digital layer, putting her index finger on it. Her expression goes cold for a second, muttering to herself in a low tone. “Commencing.” Her finger goes as fast as the eye can see, not leaving a small error go by until the sheet is filled. If Makoto was to look at it, she would see figures looking like a certain Deadspike-san, some like Ragna, one like her the gigantic sword that was her Murakumo and just enough space to fit some Makoto-figured ones following the pattern the other did.

 “ 'Suspicious’ you say.” The girl said looking don to where the masked man was, descending just so slowly from the 10 feet distance from the ground she put herself with her flying ability. There may have been a number of people who may have called her before but she ended up ignoring every one of them save for this one. The way he was dressed just made it seem it would be annoying if she didn’t do so.

In the back of her mind, Makoto wonders how long the baking process might take. Is it an instant thing, or is there some kind of wait period? She simply needs to plan ahead with Nu; the girl is surprisingly normal, but Makoto doesn’t want to see what she does when she’s let off the leash.

“Ragna cookies, huh? I think he’d like that,” she says, smirking. In her mind’s eyes she can see his reaction, but… there’s a chance he might actually like it, if he’s changed as much as she thinks he has.

Makoto watches Nu as she frowns at the cookie-making device. A place like this is probably a best-case scenario for her, isn’t it? In Spirale, she’s free from people who might use her or hurt her, free to just kinda… be herself, whoever that might be. Maybe she just needs a gentle, guiding hand to make sure she doesn’t get all psycho-murder on the poor people of this city.

She’s not Noel, of course, but Makoto can’t deny she’s interested in the kind of person Nu might be.

“Ah, some homemade treats instead, eh? That’s always the best way to show people you care, something you- um…”

There’s a nagging feeling in the back of Makoto’s head. A warning of sorts, a premonition of danger on the horizon. Nu’s probably never cooked before, and while that’s not a bad thing, if there’s even the smallest chance that her cooking might end up like Noel’s…

“S-say!” she says in a strained voice, scooting in next to Nu. “Let’s uh, let’s save the homemade stuff for later, okay?”

“O-or! Maybe! We could let the machine make them and decorate them ourselves? I mean, we came all this way to try out this machine so we might as well do it, right? Otherwise it’s like, why did we even come here? You know?” She forces an extremely ungenuine laugh, knowing that her words could be the only thing standing between this city and a living nightmare.

“You think he would!?” Her excitement shows in her tone, clearly showing that if she was given the chance back then like Mu-12, she would have been given a somewhat normal life. Alas, this place wasn’t Kagutsuchi or any of the Hierarchical Cities. Wheter she takes Makoto’s hand for that really depends on if she wants to change or remain like she is now. But that was a question to do for herself later.

The sudden shift in Makoto’s tone made Nu tilt her head, why’d she step back from her suggestion? It actually seemed pretty nice to the Murakumo Unit, to give it a try at something like that, she would really like to try to give Ragna something like that, just like he did for the cookies he made for her.

 “Nu isn’t as dense to not notice the worry in your face, Makoto.” In fact she looked at her with a mix of confusion and a bit of annoyance. “But very well. Nu will follow for now, but I want to do the cookies myself too.”

Dodged a bullet just so slightly there.

♔ —• Well she seemed to speak like a normal girl.. to some extent. Morgan found himself on partial edge, but decided to play it as calmly and as safely as he could muster. There was a chance that his gut instinct about this girl was right and he had to play this intelligently or risk.. something. It was at least reassuring knowing that she was willing to change the topic at hand towards their respective eye patches. It gave him something to work with to avoid any possible confrontation. 

“ Well, considering I’ve never heard of the term beastkin I could say yeah, I’m a bit different.. but call me curious about it I suppose? “ He would say with an idle shrug as he glanced over at the more mechanical looking design of her eye patch. Some how he just felt that there was something up with it. Something that differed from the fact his only simply hid a rather unfortunate scar. 

“ I mean I’m not asking for a story or anything. If you want to tell me, go ahead. In return I.. wouldn’t mind telling you why I have mine. I’m almost positive your story’s gonna end up a bit more interesting though. “ 

 “Curious about beastkins. They aren’t different from your looks.” She replies, looking at the like ears and the tail that moved behind him every now and then. From what her memories from being inside that fake, Lambda, could take it was like the scientist Kokonoe A. Mercury from Sector 7, a half-beastkin with one of the Six Heroes also being Beastkin. Not that she cared about any of them beyond disgust and that’s if they tried to get in the way of her plans.

“They can vary from different animals, although Nu only has seen squirrels and cats so far. But there’s no evidence to deny the existence of other races like dogs or even lizard-like kins.” Part of her explanation sounded uninterested by it and another a bit more mechanized, as if the voice of a computer A.I.

 “...” Those 4 years in the NOL’s Science Division went as a flash for her, immediately changing topics was better for her.