InaDan: Flower of Courage

Dropped

"Hey, are you okay?" She approached the one in the corner slowly.

She faked a smile. "Yeah, no... I don't know. I'm... confused."

She chuckled. "Don't worry, me too. My name's Gouenji Kimiko. You?"

"... Evangeline Mech."

"Oh, your name sounds like your family's into techs!"

"Well, my brother...s are."

"What's with that tone?"

"I... have a really complicated family."

"Oh, same!" Kimiko smiled slightly. "My brother and cousin are both soccer players, the latter running some shady organization to boot, his younger sister is... his secretary, I think? And to top it off, I'm adopted and just a couple of months ago, I found out I'm not even from their timeline!"

Eva blinked. "I... don't know how to respond to that."

"Tell me your story. Make it short and have no explanations. The weirder it is, the funnier."

"Why do you want to know about me? We've only just met."

"Isn't that all the more reason to get to know each other? We're going to be stuck here a while, I think, so we might as well be productive and be friends. Besides, I'm a pretty good judge of character, so I know you're a nice person, Evangeline."

Eva smiled at that. "Thank you... You don't seem all that bad either. You can call me Eva, by the way."

"Then you can call me Kiko or Miko. Whichever one you like more."

"Okay then, Miko. My family is like... Well, I never knew my parents, while my brother was a technical genius, or so they say. He died in an incident, and one thing led to another, but an android attacked our city, proclaimed us siblings because we have the same AI creator, but he disappeared after my friends defeated him."

Kimiko blinked, but a smile quickly grew on her face. "You're right, that's some complication you have. But see? It's funny when you recap them like that."

She chuckled. "I guess. What happened to you, though, if I may ask?"

"What do you mean?"

"Why did you come flying through the wall like you did?"

"I was on my friend's bike, going on full speed, when he suddenly disappeared on me."

"Oh no... You must've had a scare."

"I did, but I was more angry. This is exactly the kind of stunt he'd pull! Only this time... He didn't." She began to frown. Thinking back, all of a sudden, the streets were empty, and Fei and Saru's wagon was nowhere in sight. This was something to worry about.

"Same here." Eva let out a shuddering breath. "My friend was just suddenly gone. And he isn't the type to do this kind of thing."

"I swear if this is another space-time crisis..."

"Another what?"

"Stuff happened before." Kimiko shrugged, before something clicked in the back of her head. "No wait, actually...this might be exactly that." She looked around the room with a glare. "Professor Aruno! Are you there?!"

"Who is-"

"Right now? He's probably our only hope of getting out of here. Professor Aruno!"

"Why is that?"

"He has weird powers. Well, I do too, but its a different kind of weird."

"You have powers too?"