'Ah, its hot...'

Tsune was half lying in the chair in the main hall. While she was watching TV, she thought about one of the few advantages her previous world held over this one. Easy access to home air conditioning.

She could go to a public or even the school pool, because the new student card unlocked the senior part of the academy. Or she could ask her parents for money and go to any of the public entertainment venues with an artificial environment. But as a good student, the girl chose to spend the day on something useful.

In the attempt to stave off the heat, the blonde started to flap the hem of her long shirt. The relief lasted for quite a while, until the damp cloth accidentally met her sweaty skin. The cool feeling was instantly gone, replaced by a nasty sticky sensation.

Involuntarily cringing, she peeled the shirt away from her stomach and reached for the TV remote as the previous show has ended.

The new program showed the last year's free to join tournament. Many new pilots fought in a *two out of three* format for a sizable money prize and wide-reaching popularity.

Or to be precise, the program wasn't just a recording, it was a rebroadcast done in an entertainment format. The difference being that, when she pressed the pause button, she received a list of commands that the mecha on the screen would follow.

She could limit herself to a single command and, if she was clever enough for that choice to matter, watch the butterfly effect unfold itself over the course of the tournament. Or she could continuously change the recorded battles, treating the robots like fighting game characters.

Drawing from a huge amount of content and supported by the major industry players, this was one of the main ways TV attracted a sizable portion of its audience.

But unlike games that put the player first and foremost, the list of possible actions was based on what was likely and/or physically possible. As determined by the main tournament's *Intelligent Logic* tier assistant device.

Additionally, many higher ranking teams disliked the format because many would try to figure out how to make them fail.

Even a non pilot could do that through trial and error and then release the recording to leech off their fame. Or worse, reveal their weaknesses for their competitors. Therefore bigger teams often asked the tv stations to filter the list of received actions and turn it into preset branching routes.

On the opposite end of fame, the lesser ranked teams regarded the fan changes as an invaluable opportunity to both improve themselves and discover the weak points of others. Sometimes they even paid the tv stations to include custom actions and record a wider range of feedback. Which is why she decided to watch this recording in the first place.

Fiddling with the remote to find the option she wanted, the girl turned her attention to a graph overlay, with the battle itself relegated to the corner of her eye.

That was the ranking of all of the actions taken by the viewers in real time under the *Most efficient* filter. Not many non pilots could understand that interest, but having your choices be judged by the tournament's assistant device was a good way to better your skills.

-

'Tsune, your phone.'

When her father spoke, the blonde looked to the right. He was on the other side of the hall table, working with the holo screen that had multiple layers of hologram pages above it. Some had nothing but text, some were full of math and some bore only graphs with every color imaginable.

Gesturing across the controls to start the save procedure, he made the pages fall into each other.

First they created 3d models of mechanisms, then those attached themselves to steady rows of electronic plates inside of a robot's internal part. Some pieces of the part were still missing or flashing red, but that was expected of a work in progress.

'Your phone is still under me. Didn't I tell you to leave nothing in this chair?'

'Sorry, dad.'

The girl stood up and reached the other chair with single lazy step. To her surprise, it was a voice call from a number she didn't know yet. Then again, the only numbers she did know were of her parents, Rhodes, who was in the blacklist, and Blade.

-

She walked to her room, just in case it was Rod trying to pull something. When her parents no longer could hear, the blonde accepted the call and an unknown voice assaulted her ear.

'Hello. Am I speaking to Tsune?'

Multiple brief guesses went through her mind. They crashed one after another until they turned into coherent sentences.

That was a girl, therefore it couldn't be romance related. Unless her new appearance on the day of the 3rd year ceremony left even a maiden's heart aflutter. She tried to remember if anyone paid a lot more attention to her, but couldn't. Therefore it couldn't have been anyone from her class.

Thinking about it from another angle, it could be one of the unknown relatives. She never learned more about the Red family or even their daughter's past, so she'd have to get the other side to introduce themselves first

'Hello?'

The caller ran out of patience and repeated the question slightly annoyed.

'It's me. Who am I talking to?'

'Well, isn't this rude. You barge into our team, but never bother to leave your number, or even your name. Or even remember what my voice was.'

Closing the door behind her, Tsune realized that while this definitely wasn't a relative, it was still someone she was wary of. And hurriedly apologized before it could develop into team trouble.

'Sorry, I was so excited, I forgot.'

'This is common courtesy, you know. I had to ask around for the number of *that senior year blonde with biggest boobs* for hours!'

'But may I know why are you calling?'

One exasperated sigh later, her question was answered.

'Our team leader is arranging for a sea vacation in a week and asked you to go with us. Call me back when you decide. Bye.'

-

Looking at the finished call screen, Tsune felt a slight chill run alongside her spine. The internal balance that she created only a month ago was once again in danger. Danger of showing cracks between her previous world memories and the current life.

There was no way she could refuse the invitation. if she lost this place she risked repeating the lone wolf experience from the past year.

If she tried her hardest it was possible to persuade her way into a different team. And if she stepped outside of what was comfortable, she could do it fast enough to avoid an impact to her studies. But being a fresh combiner mech pilot carried an additional risk.

If she was teamless for longer than a week long parole allowed, the academy would automatically send her to the next best course. In her case it would be the majin mech course. And that meant she would fall in line with Rod's script, which she absolutely couldn't allow.

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Even if he didn't know who Tsune really was, there was no way she would give him even a chance to gloat over how right he was in both worlds.

"So, I just need a swimsuit then."

-

After a shower, she returned to her room to put on the summer outfit. First went the underwear and shorts, then the thin sports bra that was followed by the sleeveless shirt that left the sides open. Finally the silk shirt, with a deep cleavage cutout covered by fine fishnet, flowed over the other layers.

Clasping the hooks from the outer shirt to the shorts, so it wouldn't just hang down from her chest, she moved to the next step. The shopping trip could go in several ways and she had to choose the best one.

The first option was to simply ask for money and buy the swimsuit by herself. She already knew the correct sizes and if she would judge her figure as an outside observer, she was confident she would look good.

But recalling all of the times she went to the beach as Lyle, she could count the modest swimsuits on one hand.

And even those weren't much better than those that left nothing to the imagination. They often accentuated every curve and line they could reach.

Feeling the tension from the onslaught of the previous beach experiences, Tsune suddenly felt her lips dry up. Even if she forced herself to go through with this, she would take so long to find the perfect option that just giving up on the trip would be preferable. Therefore the first option was no good.

The second choice was to ask her mother, but Tsune suspected that she never really believed that her daughter had a completely innocent reason for not wearing a bra. So it would mean another long trip to multiple shops, huge bags full of clothing and necessities, as well as another trip to a beauty salon. And probably a parental speech about modern dangers for a teenage girl.

She could ask her father, but from the looks of it, he still had his hands full. Moreover, having her father help her choose a swimsuit would be unsettling and her feathers were rustled as is.

All that remained is one person.

-

'Hello, your name is... Airy, right?'

Drawing a sharp breath the other side prepared to say something in high emotion, but after a slight pause gave an exasperated sigh instead.

'Listen, if you want us to be friends, remember that Aery came from *Dedicated passion*, not *Air*.'

'I'll remember for sure. But I called because I don't have a swimsuit.'

'Good. Nobody banned wearing clothes on the beach.'

Dropping the sudden statement that left the blonde guessing whether it was a rejection, or not, the other girl continued in the same nonchalant tone.

'And look, Den said that this a chance for us to get to know you before the year starts, but you can skip it if you want. Nobody will think less of you for not going on a trip with people you don't know yet.'

'No, I mean, I don't have a swimsuit yet. And I don't really want to go, but...'

Tsune's cheeks were flaming red as she spoke, her voice revealing more emotions than normal. She would lie if she said she never tried to do any poses in front of a mirror, so she expected to have some resistance to it. But the image of herself under the sea breeze was too livid to remain calm. And if she wanted to follow Rod's unintentionally good advice and leave her identity conflict behind, then revealing clothing could help with not seeing a stranger in the reflections.

'... at the same time I really want to! But I don't how to chose one that's not too embarrassing.'

Aery breathed out with a laughter, letting go of whatever negative emotions she had and continued. Her voice was now normal, almost friendly.

'You are more innocent than I imagined. Okay, I'll help you. Meet me at the Z cafe in an hour.'

With the call now over, the blonde put the phone away and left the room. And was instantly met with her father's stern look. Her last answer was too loud.

'Why, why are you looking at me like that? It was a girl from my team. They are planning a trip to the sea and invited me.'

Feeling the silence growing heavy, but still far from judgmental, Tsune decided to rush through with explanations.

'I don't need a talk about being cautious with strangers, I'm a grown up already. And I don't want to ask mom, because she would go with me and probably buy things I don't want. And you are busy, so I called her.'

-

Tsune arrived to the fashion shop an hour and a half later, its display cases welcoming her with a lot of summer wear. Her teammate was standing near the entrance as promised, wearing a green summer dress and a straw summer hat that mostly hid her black hair.

'Sorry, I'm late. My father got a bit mad.'

A shadow of concern covered Aery's expression. She, and probably most of the academy, knew that the last time her father was worried for his daughter, he gave her an *Intelligent Logic* device. Just to help with her studies. So the girl decided to ask.

'Should I be worried? I mean, worried for Den, or myself?'

To her relief, Tsune waved her worries away.

'Nah. He might be scary sometimes, but he's a reasonable man. I'm more worried about my mother, but she never went over my head when it came to people I know.'

"All two of them."

'Then let's go, princess. I don't have all day, you know.'

'Princess?!'

The blonde's indignation fell on the death ears, as the short haired brunette pulled her through the most of the shop, to the swimsuit section.

When they arrived, Aery pushed her into a fitting booth. With the blonde in front of the mirror screen, she took over the controls to access the customer profile.

'Now, let's see what we can find.'

First came a bikini, a simple high cut bottom and a top that showed a bit of cleavage. Both parts were done in a blue and silver pattern that remained as default.

Tsune scrutinized her computer generated reflection. In her memory a bikini was barely a napkin worth of material that left everything visible. But despite her best efforts to prove this one was ridiculous as well, the mirror couldn't break the impression of normalcy. All she saw was a good looking girl in a bikini.

Suddenly, the image changed and the bikini was replaced by a one piece leotard.

Lacking any transparent, or even demi-transparent parts, its cups were almost rigid. Additionally, multiple vertical lines ran inside of the swimsuit's thick material. Each line had a wire inside to support her upper half, much like the shirt she wore to the third year ceremony.

'Hey, what was that for?'

The other girl shrugged and turned off the controls.

'You told me to choose a swimsuit for you. And I'm not letting you to wear a bikini near Den. Besides, your back needs all of the support it can ever have.'

Without even waiting for the answer, the brunette walked out of the fitting room.

'Now that we are done, I have places to be. I'll call you when we decide on the hotel.'