They spent the entire night training. Edward showing Natalie all he could about using her alchemy along with as much of the martial arts training they could manage. They even went through all of the various uses of the pactio card from Edward’s transformation to the teleportation feature to the telepathic linking. Hopefully they hadn’t missed anything. It was six in the morning and the sun was coming up when they’d finally decided that they were as ready as they were ever going to be. They had twelve hours until they had to be at the World Tree Plaza.
Both of them had pretty much passed out once they’d returned to the apartment and slept soundly until about three in the afternoon. Natalie had been the first to get moving. She’d already transformed into Sailor Charon and was standing in the bedroom looking into a mirror when Ed knocked on the door.
“It’s safe,” she said as he pushed the door open.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m trying to make my costume a little more heroic looking. I know it doesn’t matter as far as the battle itself goes but we also have a part to play that the civilians need to believe. You already look pretty heroic and seeing as we’re partners I thought I better beef mine up a bit. I don’t want you showing me up.” She grinned at him.
He just crossed his arms and grinned back at her. “I don’t know, I think that outfit is pretty impressive as is.”
She just stuck her tongue out at him. “Now you’re just being fresh Ed but seriously, do you have any constructive ideas?”
He rubbed his chin a bit thinking. “Well it’s gotta be something that won’t get in the way. The last thing you want is to have something get wrapped around the staff since that’s how you use your base power.”
“You’re right,” she put her hands together and then placed them on the ends of the bow on her chest, extending them so that they drifted around her. “Hey Ed, can you get the one on the back?”
“Sure as long as you don’t call me fresh again for doing it,” he said laughing as he did what she’d asked him to. He looked at the symbol on the back of her dress, it gave him another idea. “Do you mind if I try something?”
“What are you going to do?”
“Just watch,” He clapped his hands together and put them on her back. The black symbol turned white and the white parts of her dress turned black. He then changed the color of the bow on her back to the same red as his jacket so that it stood out against the darker crimson of her skirt. “I’d do the front one too but…”
Natalie laughed. “Very wise choice Ed,” she said as she took her cue from him and changed the color of her front bow. “You know, I actually wish this color scheme sticks every time. I like it better this way.”
“Well considering the symbol appeared there and hasn’t left since, it very well might stay this way.”
Natalie took one more look over the costume and nodded approvingly. “Much better. Now you, turn around and let me braid your hair.”
“Why does my hair need to be braided?”
“Because it looks better with the pactio card outfit.”
“I can do it myself you know. I did it for how many years before you showed up?”
“Yeah and? I want to do it and that’s that. Now turn around,” she said with a laugh.
Edward sighed and shook his head but did as she asked. She quickly brushed it out then started braiding it. “You always get what you want don’t you?” he asked, chuckling.
“Not always, just when it really means a lot to me,” she replied finishing up. “There, all done. Activate the card and we’ll get going.”
“Adeat,” he said as he took the card out. In an instant he was in costume complete with his automail arm. “Feels like the old days, this should be fun,” he said flexing the arm with a grin.
“Except now you’re taller and can really rock the look instead of being a tiny, little pipsqueak who looks like he’s just trying too hard to be tough,” she said with a laugh getting ready for him to blow his top.
Right on cue, he did, “I was not a tiny little pipsqueak and I wasn’t trying! I WAS tough! Still am!” he argued through gritted teeth, his fists clenched. He’d never hit her but he REALLY hated being called short or small or any other variation of it even if someone was referring to the past.
Natalie almost lost it laughing. She was still laughing when she grabbed her staff and ran by him figuring it would best to get moving before he could retaliate. He ran out after her still whining and yelling about the pipsqueak crack. He didn’t give it up until they’d gotten to the train.
When they arrived, people were gathered in mass at the plaza. They were all dressed in robes and had various magical items ranging from simple wands to bazooka-like weapons. As they made their way up to the World Tree, Natalie noticed that Asuna and Setsuna were already there.
“So is it just the four of us that make up the Hero unit here at the tree?” Edward asked.
Setsuna nodded. “Yes, for now anyway, we should be alright though considering we have the largest group of civilian fighters.”
“Here they come!” yelled someone in the crowd.
“They’re early,” Asuna said.
“That’s OK, we’re ready for ‘em,” said Natalie.
The loud speakers came alive with reminders of the rules and the command to make the items work. It also encouraged that players should work with the Hero Units to get bonus points for prizes after the event. It continued with reminding players that if they are disarmed they had to leave the field of play until they could rearm themselves.
“That’s our cue,” Natalie said looking over at Edward. “Ready?”
“Bet your ass I am, let’s do this!” They both clapped their hands together and put them to the ground. Under them a large stone pillar rose up lifting them into the air so they could see everything.
“Hey! Wait for us!” Asuna said as Setsuna let out her wings and flew up, grabbing Asuna as she did. They landed beside Natalie and Edward.
The final announcement came over the loud speakers, declaring the event open. It took less than a second for the bursts of magical energy to start flying at the smaller, more humanoid robots in the front.
“We’ll handle the big spider looking ones since our attacks can be more ranged and pack a more explosive punch,” Natalie said to Asuna.
Asuna nodded. “Sounds good to me. We’ll go help the players then.” With that Setsuna grabbed Asuna and they flew off.
Natalie turned to Edward. “I’ll stay here for now. My Spatial Rift will work better from here. If I need to then I’ll come down.”
“Alright, I work better up close anyway. Just be careful OK? It’s going to hurt if you get knocked down from here,” he said as he clapped his hands and transmuted his blade from his automail arm.
“Don’t worry about me,” she said with a smirk. “You be careful too.”
Edward winked at her and jumped down off the pillar sinking his blade into two robots as he came down. Natalie took her staff in hand and started aiming Spatial Rifts at the spider like robots, blowing off pieces of them with each hit. They were too big to take out with one hit, she hadn’t counted on that but she was making enough of a dent to slow them down.
Laser blasts were flying in response to the magical ones. When a blast hit, the robes of the players hit flew off. Natalie saw it from her vantage point. “Those must be the naked rays. Need to make sure to stay away from those,” she said to herself as she let off another Spatial Rift.
Meanwhile, Edward was down in the fray creating spikes from the stone that came up under the spider robots spearing them through. One of the humanoid robots tried to grab him and taking the blade of his automail arm he punched it through the face of the robot. “I don’t think so asshole, no one sneaks up on me and gets away with it!” A moment later, what sounded like a bullet went flying past his head. He turned around in time to see it hit a player and wrap her in a black sphere that quickly disappeared. “Crap, they’ve pulled out those weird bullets Natalie told me about.”
Seeing this though, the other players freaked out a bit. Edward quickly explained to them that that was supposed to happen and that their friend was safe but that they had been taken out of the game. It had thankfully been enough because they went back to firing away at the robots.
Setsuna backed up into Edward by accident while fighting a humanoid robot. They almost took each other out with their blades before they realized who it was. “These bastards just keep on coming,” Edward said. “Choa’s not messing around is she?”
“No she’s not and at this rate I don’t know how long we’ll be able to hold them off. The civilians are getting picked off left and right all over the school by those bullets. Luckily we haven’t lost any Hero Unit people yet but I think even that may just be a matter of time.”
Edward nodded agreement. “Where’s Asuna?”
Setsuna pointed to robots flying through the air. Edward couldn’t help but laugh. “Asuna is holding her own. That sword of hers is an impressive artifact and her combat skills are a little rough but still impressive as well,” Setsuna answered.
As they were talking one of Natalie’s Spatial Rifts went flying by over their heads. “Seems like Natalie is still holding up too. Good. Time to get back to work,” Edward said.
Setsuna nodded and flew off to another part of the battle ground. “Alright you hunks of junk, come get some!” Edward exclaimed as he went back to fighting.
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