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I slipped out of the office, and quietly contemplated what my counselor said. He had some good points. Ugh, I hated to admit that. He had some really good points though. Between him and Akito, my kinetic trainer, there was so much to think about recently.
“How was it?” Mira asked. She casually slung an arm over my shoulder and pulled me into a side hug. “Didn’t press you too hard?”
”No, he didn’t.” For a moment, I thought about shoving her off of me. Then Aaron’s, the counselor’s, words came back to me. I litteraly just left his office and hadn’t even gotten out of the building yet. I could try to follow what he said for at least a couple hours. “It went fine.”
“Oh, is my little Shiro sulking?” She stuck out her tongue and poked my cheek with her other hand. She fully encapsulated big sister energy, and I couldn’t even put into words how much it pissed me off.
A groan escaped me. First Vulpes—no, I should call her Vulpie like Fox did, shouldn’t I? If she was going to call me Sulky Shiro, then… Vulptous Vulpie? That felt weird. Vixen Vulpie? Viral Vulpie? Ugh—that was somehow worse. I could work on it.
I slammed my boot onto Mira’s toes. “Not you too.”
“Yeow!” She shot back and grabbed at her foot. The halo over her head pulsed rapidly, and her golden hair caught it just right. It was back to its pre-savant length now. “Little Shiro’s got some fangs!”
The air charged with tension—more accurately, with my Kinetic ability. “And I’ll start biting if you call me little one more time.”
She dropped her foot and lifted up her arm. “Look! Actual goosebumps. You’re getting pretty good at that.”
I shook my head and moved for the exit. I’d be lying if I wasn’t a little happy to hear I was getting better about it. Akito went hard on me today, and it felt like I’d regressed more than anything. I just—it felt like I wasn’t getting anywhere with it. It was a bit of an annoying feeling, to be honest.
“You weren’t too busy to come to this with me? I know you’re busy getting everything set up.” I did appreciate her coming to these counseling sessions. Especially today… I felt a little less lost then when I went in, though that was thanks for the small goal I had planned today.
”Nah, just waiting for a client to pop by.” She followed me to the elevator and hit the button for the bottom floor. “You should totally stop by my office. I just got it all set up.”
“Now?” I had some other plans… but I could totally scrap those. I was just going to build bikes and mope around my workshop, anyway.
”Now’s fine. Now’s totally fine.” She ran a hand back through her hair and leaned against the wall of the elevator. “It’s not anywhere as nice as your speakeasy. Go easy on me?”
“I’m sure it’ll be fine…” I likewise leaned against the wall and stared at the much taller girl. “You, uh, you still planning to move into the building with me?”
”If I’m invited,” she said carefully, like she was worried about poking the bear. “My office is only temporary so I can get some work. Have you thought more about it?”
”Chek.” I was just about to get 15 million rayn, so I’d been thinking quite a bit about the apartment building. I was tempted to just buy it under the Cold Moon banner, and then turn it into a corporate office of some kind. I didn’t really want to just kick out everyone that lived there, though.
The ideal way of handing it would be to pay the denizens a couple months rent each and kick them out so I wouldn’t feel so bad. That, or call the Fang in. I saw back when I went to that lawyer just how good they were about removing residents. They owed me a couple favors, anyway.
That’d be along the lines of a big corpo, though, and Kuzo’s words came back to mind. He was wrong. I wouldn’t become the same person he was and hurt people because it was easier. With what I’d learned, was learning, and gaining from the interface, I’d prove it. That started with what I wanted to do at the apartment buildings, though.
’Course, there was always the other option of doubling down on the apartment side of things. I did have the idea of making the apartments better, and attracting new blood into it. Mira could take the top floor like she talked about, and I could have the basement regardless. The apartments would be some nice passive income, too.
Now, I had a few issues either way. I’d have to pay quite a bit to get some remodeling work. I could probably figure out how to do it myself, and get some kind of bots slapped together to build it up automatically. I was getting to a certain point, though, that I was nervous about moving in the light. I just needed one Raijin runner to take an interest in what I was doing for it to all go down.
It wouldn’t be surprising if they already had a finger on my pulse after pushing out the Roughriders. Everything was close to chest now, and I’d rather it stay that way. I’d have to be a bit careful, but I could definetely get a construction company to come through and fix up the place. That’d fix a couple things.
The elevator dinged, and we slid out of the building. Mira pulled out her phone to call a cab, and I swiped it from her hands. “Hey! Shiro—“
”You won’t be needing this anymore.” I dangled the phone in my hand lightly. “I got you something.”
A flash of confusion crossed her face, and then it faded into an ecstatic, dog-like grin. ”Is it… is it what I think it is?”
I tossed her phone back and flicked around toward the parking garage I parked at. “C’mon. Luna helped me fly it over.”
Luna helped me get the Roughriders to most of my destinations, actually. She’d been indispensable so far. I felt a little bad asking her to work on stuff or me, but it did seem like she appreciated the break from searching for Kaynis. Not that she didn’t want to find her brother. I don’t know aobut her, but I could only take so much disappointment.
”How’s she?” Mira stepped up beside me. Although she asked, it looked like she was trying to hide her budding excitement behind a distraction.
”Sick.” I left her at home and directly escaped into the Aether. She was weirdly good at petting me when I was a fox. Last I saw her, though, I’d gotten across the message that she needed to just sleep and take it easy today. Hopefully, she’d be up and att’em. Especially with the little boost from Perfect Donor.
“Ah, she caught a virus.” Mira chuckled and nudged my arm with her own.
”I made the same joke.” I nudged her back and swiftly dodged a swipe at my hair. “You’ll have to be quicker than that.”
”Just wait till I get speedware.” She lifted her hand and dramatically glanced at it. “This? This is going all over that soft head of yours.”
”Whatever you say, weirdo.” I turned around and walked backward just in front of her. “You should let her take a crack at your phone. See if she can’t upgrade the ICE and stuff.”
”I have no doubt she can. I just—eh, why not?” She tossed me her phone. “Not like I have anything important on there, anyway. Just get it back to me soon.”
I lunged forward and barely caught her phone. It disappeared into one of my pockets a moment later. “What am I? Her keeper?”
”She’s living with you, no?” Her head tilted sharply to the side, and the halo dropped to a low glow.
”Touche.” We slipped into the parking garage and headed up to the top floor. Really, I could start parking in flyer bays. I just liked parking garages, though. They felt… safer? They obviously weren’t, but I was just used to them. Hard to beat the security in a flyer bay.
I dangled a set of keys from my finger to get her attention, and then flicked them to her. “It’s on the other side of mine.”
For Mira’s Roughrider, I’d spared no expense. It had the full suite of stealth features, including active camo using holograms and sound suppression. Not quite to the level of a big corp’s stealth tech, but I hadn’t sat down and figured out true active camo yet.
‘Course, it also had my Hex-Spring armor. A fifty cal and an arc cannon were mounted on the bottom of it. I would’ve liked to get rocket pods set up, but I ran out of time. Not to mention I had yet to get around to making rockets.
Mira ran a hand along the bike and then dropped down to hug the handlebars. She looked up at me through her wildly splayed hair. “I love it! Thanks, Shiro!”
”No problem.” I straddled my own Roughrider and flicked it on. “Want to go for a ride?”
”I’d love to!” She didn’t waste a single moment ripping out of the parking lot at way too fast of a speed. I barely managed to follow along behind her. Is this okay? Why’d Past Shiro think it was a good idea to give her, of all people, something so fast?
Thankfully, I only half filled her tank with AE3. I was loaded now, ‘course, but there wasn’t a point spending more money than necessary. My stingy—ahem, frugal foresight proved to be the best. Instead of racing across the city, we instead headed for her new office on the north side of the Ryu Container Yard. It directly overlooked the yard, much like my old apartment used to. Speaking of, it was ten or so blocks away from my old place.
Mira directly touched down on the roof, and I landed just behind her. She hopped up to the ledge, saluted me, and then fell backwards off of it. “See ya!”
”Mira!” I raced over the ledge—and found her laughing her ass off at the bottom of an alley.
“I’m good!” She pointed up at me, and then toward her back. The Drop Chutes I’d given her still glowed a faint purple shade.
I jumped down after her—woah, I guess there’s the answer to the age old question. If my friend jumped off a cliff, I would indeed jump off too. “You bitch!”
“Chill, bestie.” Mira slung her arm over my shoulders once more and dragged me toward the building. “If I was actually going to jump, I wouldn’t do it in front of you.”
”That’s not making me feel any better.” I was going to throw off her arm. Instead, I just blankly stared at the halo floating over her head. “You’re going tomorrow, right?”
”Yeah, yeah I’m going.” Her grin faded and she straightened up. “I’ll keep my promise, don’t you worry.”
”I wasn’t worried, but—“ I cut myself off and instead changed the subject. “Your eighteenth birthday’s coming up in a couple days. Want anything?”
”A billion rayn?” She laughed and shook her head. Her arm shot out and brushed my head. “I have everything I could want. I mean, it’s not everyday your best friend give you a flyer.”
”Surely you want something more than that, right?” I had a couple other things planned, ‘course. Her armor was about done. That was the next goal on the tiny list I managed to make after speaking to Nael.
“Um… how about… how about we go get some dinner at a really fancy establishment? Oh! And we wear matching dresses! I always wanted to match dresses with you!” Her face lit up brilliantly. It took me a little off guard.
”Fancy establishment?” I could totally do that. Maybe… probably? I might be able to figure that out. As for dresses—eh, I’d rather not. If she wanted to… maybe I could suffer through it just this once. Maybe I could get some at Crystal Aesthetics? I might be able to sweet talk that nut, Maser Telos, into making one for us?
I’d have to think about it a bit more. I’d have a bunch of rayn coming in soon regardless… dunno how I felt about spending all of it on Mira. Seemed like a way to stay broke? Like, being broke 101 was immediately buying expensive things, wasn’t it?
”Yeah…” Her peppiness died a bit, and she shrugged with a slight blush across her nose. “I always wanted to do something with you like that. Even back before… well, we just never had the time. And then never had the money.”
“I get it.” I shook my head softly. ”Let’s go check out your apartment.”
Mira took a moment, and then put on that bright, energetic smile she usually had on. “Follow me!”
“Chek. I’m right behind you.” I hesitantly followed her into the building. Thankfully, it looked like the elevator was in working order. That was already a step up compared to most places.