[[ NINE ]]

A commander’s eyes fluttered open; alert, now that his senses had come back. A young man of late 20-something age, hazel eyes so dark in tone they bordered on simply black, a head of manageable brown hair, clean-kept facial hair and of basic body build. Toned, but not busting through his uniform. Essentially, he looked like every other average commander, as though to serve as some sort of blank slate… As he looked down to his desk, some sort of shock overtook him.

“... Huh? Huh?”

…

“Wha???”

“... Commander, is something the matter?”

A voice sounds to his right, and a white-haired male NIKKE in a mechanized wheelchair is leaning slightly, purple eyes inspecting their now sweating commander with thinned lips.

Huh? Commander?

… Commander?

He willed himself to stay silent in the moment that he considered his confusion, leaning back in a somewhat rickety chair as he considered his next move.

“... Commander?”

The silence wasn’t serving well. So instead, he wills himself to shut his eyes tight for a moment, and says the first thing that comes to mind.

“Guess I was dreaming,” he says, and his voice has a nice tone. One I’d always kind of wanted. I… That was me, speaking. I was this person, right? The Commander opens his eyes once more by will, and looks at the white NIKKE’s expression. They’re still worried, but sated by the answer.

“I see,” he says.

Once the male NIKKE finishes his response, things begin to click, just like they do when one wakes up from an intense dream, forgetting who they are. I began to understand, slowly now, that the eyes I peered through were of a commander’s living in the future, where the world becomes served and saved by creations called NIKKEs -- essentially, robots… with human brains in them. This NIKKE’s name was Clear… And he was the commander’s -- no, my -- project for rehabilitation. A unique case of desynchronization; the brain in his robotic body refused to move his legs, making him wheelchair bound. I sat in the commander’s office, at his desk, in his body… And I was him, the commander.

Let’s take things slowly here. I kind of… can’t deal with this?

I leaned back in my new, rickety chair and sucked in a slow breath. Although the room I was in was metallic and allegedly clean, there was still a musty smell to it. Strangely enough, knowledge was coming to me at a rate that, rather than making me panic, calmed me down a great deal. I was a NIKKE commander -- just like in my game from before I woke up here. I wasn’t in the year 2023 anymore. This was the future, and I lived in the Ark with a squad of my own. I didn’t have a partner and generally had a lot of time to myself. That was the commander’s life I had jumped into. Really, understanding that, it was kind of like a dream come true in a lot of ways, right? A small smile appeared on the commander’s lips -- a smile that was mine entirely.

“Heheh…”

My voice sounded great! It was jarring, but… I kind of always had dick envy, right? So being a male here was starting to sound really fun. Clear was still staring on, an air of concern emanating from him. Oh, yeah… I had a male nikke beside me. Why was that? Male NIKKEs were unheard of; in the world I came from, this was simply because nobody was interested in seeing male ass in a game geared towards a certain audience, but in the NIKKE world itself, why was it that I had such a rare model of NIKKE? Well, I guess I had already gotten my question answered; I was rehabilitating him.

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“... Clear,” I said, and my voice still gives me goosebumps. It’s obvious I’m unused to it, because Clear arches a brow lightly but says nothing of it.

“Yes, Commander,” he replies, his wheelchair whirring softly to position him a bit more dead-on facing me. I stare at him for a moment, and he is just wildly pretty. Nope, focus.

“... Do you think there is any surviving documentation of an old book series called ‘Land of the Lustrous’?”

Clear draws a blank. In fact, he’s a little stupefied. I am too, but I’ve got to know. I’m in an era past 2050, right? Surely the author of Land of the Lustrous finished her masterpiece before the raptures came… If the series doesn’t exist in this world, I’m done being here. Not that I know how to return. I stare Clear down, determined to hear a good answer.

“As you likely know, little documentation survived the First Rapture Invasion, and all items recovered from the surface are property of the Central Government. We could ask the Central Government for access to their libraries, but…”

… Ah, I knew it. It was pointless. I’ll never know how it ends. I’m dead inside.

I slump in the commander’s body, which is steadily becoming mine as time goes on. I’m an honest person -- I find myself wishing I could explain myself to Clear, but I don’t know him well enough… Maybe his commander knew him better before I took over, but now that he’s gone, I’ve got his knowledge and none of his memories. At least, that’s how it’s turning out. I never got to go to college but this guy did and I’m barely any smarter… Is that really how this works?

Geez…

“Commander, were you listening?”

Ah, he was still talking while I got lost in my despair. I clear my throat and look at him. He looks a little fussy. Does he not like being ignored that much? I should be careful, he actually looks offended…

“Apologies. I, uh, read about the series somewhere, and realized it might have been a good read. However, it was only a passing thought.”

“That dream you had…”

“... Already forgot about it,” I lie plainly, unwilling to talk to someone I just met about getting straight-up isekai’d. I don’t want to know what this place’s psychiatric wards are like. The old commander may have not been privy or may even have been entirely ignorant to it, but I have at least some idea of how corrupt the Ark is. Clear doesn’t seem satisfied; in fact, I may have just put him in a downright rotten mood, but so be it. There’s little time to reconcile when the clock apparently strikes closing time. I recall my office hours are ending; muscle memory pushes me away from my desk, and I stand from that rickety chair with a stretch. Beside me, Clear does not speak. His wheelchair whirrs to life and he navigates out of the room, the door sliding open automatically for him before shutting closed, presumably headed for his dorm.

I, on the other hand, have to dig to remember where the hell I’m going. While I’m trying to remember, I look along the walls of my office; there are various frames encapsulating certifications, achievements and other things the man who owned this body achieved before I came along and stole the show. He wasn’t some nobody, apparently, but he certainly wasn’t as popular as the main commander I played as in my old world. On there, the commander I played as was named NINE, but I’m sure he had an actual name I didn’t come across. NINE was often my web persona, so I held some reservations about some famous commander traipsing around with my alias on his nametag… I hoped the guy wasn’t named NINE.

… What was his squad called? Counters?

… What is MY squad called?

…

Purem?

So my squad’s name is Purem. I have met Clear, but I don’t know the rest of my squadron. My standing is good within the Central Government, but I don’t seem to have any good ties with notable charact-- people like Shifty… My operator is someone called Koda, and I haven’t received a mission to go on the surface in about a week. Was the commander taking some sort of vacation?

This was all too much to handle, really. I felt exhausted. Did sleeping in the future feel any better than it did in the past?

It came to me while I was ruminating where I lived. It was an apartment complex just outside of the shopping district; swanky digs, really, considering what little history I remember of the Ark. My new feet carry me on muscle memory to the little flat, and once I get the door open to my new place, exhaustion takes over my body and I’m immediately in bed. As far as I’m concerned, nothing is different compared to the past. The bed isn’t any more special than one from the 2020’s, but I’ve always been a professional sleeper. I’m out in seconds.

[[ CHAPTER 01 END ]]