Side story 5.2: Interpenetration, Side: B

Edited by Bunny, Arthur300000, Deathbricks, and ArchmageNaoki

*WHAM* A loud noise in the middle of the night. *WHAM* Another scary crash came from the hallway which made me jolt up in a panic.

[Let me control your body.] My second tail urgently told me. I know that he's better than me in this kind of situation, so I let him do it. However, instead of calling the police like what an ordinary person would do, he picked up a gun and a buckler instead. I almost took back control of my body, but I was too scared to do it as another loud crash shook my house and made the lights flicker.

After that, things passed by in a blur. The unbelievably savage fight between my little body and an enormous hairy monster. I felt a sense of accomplishment when my tail slew that monster. However, it was shortly followed by an earth-shattering explosion, and my apartment collapsed on me.

"Oh, no... I just made the down payment." Is my last thought before my consciousness slipped into the abyss.

It felt like an eternity had passed when I was awoken by something. It was warm, bright, and gentle. My vision was blurry at first and all I could see was a black shadow. Is it another monster!? I tried to jump away from it, but my head hit something hard.

"Ouch!" Damn it, that hurt!

"It's alright, I come in peace." I heard the voice of a girl. My vision slowly cleared, and the black shadow turned into a human girl. An adorable one to boot. I absentmindedly followed her outside, but what greeted me was a nightmare. Everyone lay dead in a grotesque manner, some of them I recognized. That was Uncle Benjamin from two blocks away. Didn't I just greet him before I came home? It felt like he was bragging about his children only a moment ago.

"A-Are you alone?" There should be some survivor besides her, right?

"Yes." The girl answered with a serious face. Oh, no... wait!

"Where is the military or police? The elder said that I have to hide until the military came." I told her about the announcement before my apartment collapsed. We won, right? There must be someone left. I hope Nina is alright.

"I don't know, but I found a military car over there. Do you want to go check it out with me?" I looked at where she pointed, but all I saw were dead bodies and gore. Something was fishy about her. I looked back at what was left of my house... How did she dig me out by herself?

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Against all common sense, I ended up following the girl out of the village. She was suspicious, but I have no choice. It’s either follow her or be left alone in a burning village, so I chose the former. I tried to look for other people, but it seems there was no one left alive. *Sniff* I wanted to cry, but I can't. I have to stay strong. There is still much more to do.

Kuro, the human girl who rescued me, is strong. We met with a pack of rabid rats along the way, but she took them out in a fraction of a second. The problem is she treats me like a child. I hoped that she would stop it because I'm quite sure that I'm much older than her. Before I could tell her this, she took out some strange food again. *Nom Nom Nom* This one is more delicious than the hot dog she gave me; it's pure meat! Maybe she's not a bad person after all. I wonder where she bought these. They must be imported stuff from a human settlement. I wish I had enough money to travel there to shop. Hmm, how much does a sky ship ticket cost?

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"What!? But she is still a child!" The girl suddenly exclaimed out of the blue. I stumbled backward in surprise.

"Oh, sorry. I was talking with Skynet." She pointed at her pretty backpack. "Good afternoon" it spoke a with beautiful synthetic voice. It's an AI assisted device! Wow, this is the first time I’ve seen one.

Wait, Skynet… What is this… I remembered a scene about a strange explosion and people reduced to skeletons. A whole army of mechanical humans. Then several movie posters featuring the exact same guy… Arnold something. No, these aren’t my memories. Where does it come from…

[[Right! The Skynet! The name of a homicidal AI from the movies!]] My second tail and I realized it together. Then his memories began to flood into me. This process was supposed to be one way, my tails always had access to my memories. Not the other way around. This time however, I could read his memories like a book, and it felt disorienting. I relived that scary experience of the monster fighting moment again as my tail. Then the ceiling collapsed. Then Cocoa disappeared. Wait, me? Did I disappear from him? B-But I was here all along... Oh...

“Pfft, Hahahaha!” I laughed like mad when I realized this. This must be what my moms told me about. My tails always live with me. There is no fusing, absorbing or devouring like I used to think. It’s just that we are so much in synch that we couldn't even tell our movements and thoughts apart. And when our minds thinking the same, there are no 'I' anymore. I wish I could see my first tail’s reaction when my body fought with that scary monster. Would she be scared senseless like me? Yup, she must be because she and I are the same after all.

I looked at Kuro, and she looks at me strangely. She must be thinking that I'm out of my mind. Well, that can't be helped, so I only told her one side of the truth.

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"You came from a different world right?" I told her. She won't understand the true reason anyway.

[Welcome back.] I greeted my second tail. Always with me or not, I missed him all the same.

[No, welcome back, Cocoa. I thought you were gone. Please don’t scare me like that again. ] He answered. I could feel his relief.

[It’s alright. No matter what happens, I’m always with you.] I cheered him up. I could relate to what he felt. When my first tail disappeared, I cried for three days straight.

[Heh, you’ve become weird.] … I think I worried about him too much.

My second tail seems to be happy about Kuro. I could feel his giddiness through our connection. It is understandable though, he met someone from his homeland. Now, he’s praising each of Kuro's expensive looking equipment non-stop.

Kuro also seems to be interested about my second tail, and she asked about him quite a bit. They also confirmed that they come from the same world with secret codes like Obama, Bill Gates, Shakespeare, and Elvis Presley. Her gaze toward me also seems to have changed since then. At least she doesn't look at me like a child anymore, but somehow she tends to stare at weird places, and sometimes she mumbled something like "Yipee, it's legal." I don't understand how my second tail is related to the law though.

Oh, right, speaking of the law, I should plan what to do when we get to the next settlement. All I have left are my pajamas. They’ll most likely draft me into the military when they learn of this.

[You should at least have grabbed my purse.] At least I would still have an employment contract and some money that way.

[Uh, sorry, I didn’t know that the house would suddenly collapse.] He answered apologetically. I'm sorry, I shouldn't blame you, I also didn’t know.

Still, the thought of me in the military scares me. I don't want to fight. It's a miracle that we managed to kill that monster. Thanks to him I got out of there alive.

"Cocoa, hide behind that rock." Kuro whispered to me urgently. I reflexively duck behind the boulder. Maybe it was his reflex, but it should also be considered my accomplishment since we are like two sides of the same coin.

"Ohh~" The sound slips out of my mouth as her gigantic rifle drives my second tail crazy.

"It's cool, right?" She winked at me and proudly smiled.

"Yeah, I've never seen a weapon that requires bullets before." I told her.

["Be amazed then, Cocoa! All the guns in my previous world used bullets!"] My tail told me as Kuro began her one sided slaughter. The adventurers from their world must be filthy rich to pay for both cores and bullets. No, that's not it. I began to flip through my new memories. Right now I could view his memories as much as I like, but to view all of them would take a lot of time. Oh, this was what he meant when he was talking about those secret codes, huh? Damn, I felt so stupid when I realized what he meant when he said he owned a canal.

Oops, I got distracted. Now, I should decide what to do at the check point. I know that Kuro has helped me this far out of kindness. Would it be too much to ask her to hire me?

[Go for it.] My second tail suggest.

"Uhm, I can help you process those corpses. Also, I can cook, clean, and do the laundry. Will you hire me?" I timidly asked her. At the moment, I’m willing to do anything to avoid being drafted into the military. Disassembling a monster corpse is a lot better than fighting one, and I had already done that at my previous job when someone in that department took sick leave while things were getting busy.

"How much do I need to pay?" I tried to hide my smile when I heard this. Anyone with selling experience knows that when the customer says those words, there’s already an 80% chance that they will buy.

"Not much. 1,000 gems a month?" I told her my previous salary. But she seems to be surprised. Maybe it's too much for her.

"Uhm... 800 gems." I tried again. However, my tail suddenly interjected: "And can I keep this spear?" It surprised me a bit because he’s not supposed to take over my body without my consent. But I let it go because now is not the time to make a fuss.

I was focusing on getting the best deal out of it, but strangely, it feels like all Kuro wanted is to just touch my tails and ears, even when I tried to bargain for extraordinary terms like three meals a day and room and transportation fee to be covered, but she didn’t seem to care and accepted. Maybe I should ask for more, but because I'm the one who offered, I can't change it anymore.

I also tried to push my conditions further by including my health care in the contract, but that became really difficult. I had to add a lot more jobs into the contract including strange terms like helping her bathe to make her accept. I can't fathom the reason for a teenage girl like her needing someone to help her bathe though. Did she have some kind of injury that rendered her unable to clean her back by herself?

Finally, the contract was finished by Kuro's childish handwriting. There are some strange contents that I would like to point out, but those are only minor matters. It’s not worth it to make my new employer write a new contract. I signed both copies.

With my new contract, we entered Fort Greyjaws without a problem. However, it seems that Kuro needs to have a private conversation with the fort commander, so I offered to book a hotel for her.

"Will you be alright alone?" She seems worried about me. She’s such a worry wart. She even gave me a gun and a communication device. It's very safe inside the military fort, doesn't she know that? Anyways, that just means more equipment for me to review in my next video, so I have no complaints.

I tried to walk quickly to the town hall because people kept staring at my shiny new equipment. However, there were too many distractions along the way. The weapon shop here has a lot more selection than where I used to live. Oooh, isn't that the new device from that advertisement?

I eventually reached the town hall where I asked the government officials to issue me a new ID card. Nowadays, it took only ten minutes to get a new one. I have to pay 20 gems for that, but it's a lot better than ten years ago where I had to wait for two weeks.

[Cocoa, are you still there?] While waiting, my second tail asked worriedly.

[Yeah, I'm here, why?] I answered him.

[Why do I feel like I've been in control of your body for quite a while?] As he said that, my hand was raised and made several gestures. I tried to resist, but I was unable to do so. Yet, it didn't feel like my right hand was moving on its own. It’s hard to describe, but it felt more like I was doing it subconsciously.

[I don't know. It seems you got some control over my body since that happened.] I raised my left hand to hold my right hand, stopping him from repeatedly making rude gestures in the town hall. No one seems to be looking, but I would be in trouble if someone did.

[This is weird. I felt like my left hand did it subconsciously.] He also felt the same, huh?

[Yeah, but I don't mind.] I told him.

[You don't? If I were you, I would begin to freak out. Did the same happen with your first tail?]

[Nope, she just suddenly disappeared, and my body grew.] I told him the truth. But isn't he supposed to be able to read my memory?

[Right...] Then he goes silent.

Days following that, strange occurrences like those kept happening. However, I don't mind that much because I have realized that no matter what we are going to end up as, we are still the same person, and none of us are going to disappear.