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estiroseThis is Eimi, who is a Kamen Rider Drive OC. She's very very new, since she exists in the future of "As Giving It A Hope" (which is an AU to the ending of "Won't Exit the Room", which in itself is part of an AU. Um, I like AUs?). I figured I'd do some worldbuilding while the next muse figured himself (or herself) out.
Tomoe was grinning hopelessly by the time Natsu was done. “And she's the most wonderful girlfriend ever, who even lets me talk history all the time without acting like it's boring.”
“That's because it's you, you're never boring.” Natsu gave her girlfriend a hug, and Hope, sitting next to them, looked like she was going to be drunk on the fuzziness.
“Okay, who wants to follow up? Koutarou?” Wataru knew his tale was not likely to be a happy one. He was still recovering from everything that had happened in his universe, but it would be a change from Natsu's fluffy story.
“I... um....” He shuffled a little. “If someone else could go, that would be better.”
“I'll go!” The newcomer was really new; Wataru swore she hadn't been there at the start of storytelling time. A late arrival, then. “My designation is Organic Bat-type number GRJ, but everybody calls me Eimi.”
“Um, those aren't numbers,” Hope apparently felt obligated to point out.
“They are if you're into... well, at least base 30,” Marie Brown said. “I'm guessing?”
“Base 36,” Eimi said. “And let me tell you about my friend Natsuo....”
–
“What do you mean, you don't want a Core?” I started at my friend Natsuo, not sure as to what had gotten into him. Natsuo was actually Organic Cobra-type number GRA, slightly older than me, but we use human names of sorts until we are implanted with our Cores and start going by our Roidmude designations.
“I don't.” Natsuo was frowning. “I want to live, in this body, for the rest of my life.”
It made no sense to me. We were born, started on our path towards being Roidmude at age seven, were implanted with Cores at age twenty, and then our organic bodies died – Burned Out, we call it - by about thirty. That was how life went, after all. Our Roidmude kin saw no point in us suffering in human bodies when we could be reborn in full Roidmude ones.
There were to be nearly seventeen thousand of us, eventually, enough to match the intended forty thousand of our fully mechanical kin. Enough to give them an idea of what emotions were and the experience that came from feeling them.
The Roidmude needed our emotions, but we needed them too. Unlike Natsuo, I had no intention of going rogue. I was content with the life I had, and I was looking forward to the Core and shedding this body of mine.
“That's not how it works.” I'd heard, vaguely, of those of us who had gone wrong and had to be caught in order to be corrected. Ones that were like Natsuo, who didn't want a Core but the Roidmude gave them one anyways. It fixed them, that Core, and it was maybe why some people fought so hard against it.
Personally, I wanted to fly someday and hoped that my Core would burn out my body soon.
“Maybe that's how it should. Leave the Cores to people like you who actually want them.” He turned away, leaving me a good view of his ponytail. I wished I could reassure him that he wouldn't lose himself in Implantation, that he could still keep his looks. But he wouldn't listen to me. I could tell he didn't want to hear. “You saw how Ami Burned Out at twenty-one.”
Ami – her designation was earlier than ours, GPT, a Cobra-type like Natsuo – had always been there for us. She was the one that had assured me that even if we died, our non-organic kin would make sure that we'd come back. She had indeed come back, smiling as if nothing had happened, and continued to be there for us.
Except Natsuo had started avoiding her. I understood why now. He couldn't accept what he would become where everybody else understood Burning Out was not an end, but a beginning.
In our history classes, there are stories of the first of us, Organic Spider-type AAA and Organic Cobra-type AAB. They'd grown up in a human world, and so they thought they were human. In fact, they fought against their Roidmude kin because the humans told them that Roidmude were evil. It was their Cores that fixed them. They were able to infiltrate the human resistance and destroy it from within, paving the way towards the world we live in now.
I wonder if they fought their Burning Outs. If they tried to live as humans instead of accepting what they were, even with Roidmude help.
“She wanted to,” I told him. Sometimes one got lucky, and Burn Out happened fast.
“I know.” Natsuo shook his head. “And I'll never understand that.”
Maybe he wouldn't. Maybe he would get there in time. We had four more years before Implantation, and if I spoke to somebody, he could be fixed.
But I couldn't. Natsuo was always one to find things out the hard way, and this time was no diffferent. So I kept silent, and for his sake, hoped he figured out the truth.
Tomoe was grinning hopelessly by the time Natsu was done. “And she's the most wonderful girlfriend ever, who even lets me talk history all the time without acting like it's boring.”
“That's because it's you, you're never boring.” Natsu gave her girlfriend a hug, and Hope, sitting next to them, looked like she was going to be drunk on the fuzziness.
“Okay, who wants to follow up? Koutarou?” Wataru knew his tale was not likely to be a happy one. He was still recovering from everything that had happened in his universe, but it would be a change from Natsu's fluffy story.
“I... um....” He shuffled a little. “If someone else could go, that would be better.”
“I'll go!” The newcomer was really new; Wataru swore she hadn't been there at the start of storytelling time. A late arrival, then. “My designation is Organic Bat-type number GRJ, but everybody calls me Eimi.”
“Um, those aren't numbers,” Hope apparently felt obligated to point out.
“They are if you're into... well, at least base 30,” Marie Brown said. “I'm guessing?”
“Base 36,” Eimi said. “And let me tell you about my friend Natsuo....”
–
“What do you mean, you don't want a Core?” I started at my friend Natsuo, not sure as to what had gotten into him. Natsuo was actually Organic Cobra-type number GRA, slightly older than me, but we use human names of sorts until we are implanted with our Cores and start going by our Roidmude designations.
“I don't.” Natsuo was frowning. “I want to live, in this body, for the rest of my life.”
It made no sense to me. We were born, started on our path towards being Roidmude at age seven, were implanted with Cores at age twenty, and then our organic bodies died – Burned Out, we call it - by about thirty. That was how life went, after all. Our Roidmude kin saw no point in us suffering in human bodies when we could be reborn in full Roidmude ones.
There were to be nearly seventeen thousand of us, eventually, enough to match the intended forty thousand of our fully mechanical kin. Enough to give them an idea of what emotions were and the experience that came from feeling them.
The Roidmude needed our emotions, but we needed them too. Unlike Natsuo, I had no intention of going rogue. I was content with the life I had, and I was looking forward to the Core and shedding this body of mine.
“That's not how it works.” I'd heard, vaguely, of those of us who had gone wrong and had to be caught in order to be corrected. Ones that were like Natsuo, who didn't want a Core but the Roidmude gave them one anyways. It fixed them, that Core, and it was maybe why some people fought so hard against it.
Personally, I wanted to fly someday and hoped that my Core would burn out my body soon.
“Maybe that's how it should. Leave the Cores to people like you who actually want them.” He turned away, leaving me a good view of his ponytail. I wished I could reassure him that he wouldn't lose himself in Implantation, that he could still keep his looks. But he wouldn't listen to me. I could tell he didn't want to hear. “You saw how Ami Burned Out at twenty-one.”
Ami – her designation was earlier than ours, GPT, a Cobra-type like Natsuo – had always been there for us. She was the one that had assured me that even if we died, our non-organic kin would make sure that we'd come back. She had indeed come back, smiling as if nothing had happened, and continued to be there for us.
Except Natsuo had started avoiding her. I understood why now. He couldn't accept what he would become where everybody else understood Burning Out was not an end, but a beginning.
In our history classes, there are stories of the first of us, Organic Spider-type AAA and Organic Cobra-type AAB. They'd grown up in a human world, and so they thought they were human. In fact, they fought against their Roidmude kin because the humans told them that Roidmude were evil. It was their Cores that fixed them. They were able to infiltrate the human resistance and destroy it from within, paving the way towards the world we live in now.
I wonder if they fought their Burning Outs. If they tried to live as humans instead of accepting what they were, even with Roidmude help.
“She wanted to,” I told him. Sometimes one got lucky, and Burn Out happened fast.
“I know.” Natsuo shook his head. “And I'll never understand that.”
Maybe he wouldn't. Maybe he would get there in time. We had four more years before Implantation, and if I spoke to somebody, he could be fixed.
But I couldn't. Natsuo was always one to find things out the hard way, and this time was no diffferent. So I kept silent, and for his sake, hoped he figured out the truth.
