There’s no way those are real. She must be messing with the settings.

Reiko was very much unimpressed by the antics of this woman who claimed to be the best hacker in Japan; the older woman was just as much of a creep as she had thought the person who sent that message would be and Reiko just considered herself luckily that she had decided to grope those two and not her. The idea that this was the person who had been spying on her, watching her, taking pictures or doing who knows what in the process made her skin crawl.

The others gathered in the cathedral raised their concerns first, most saying that they didn’t want to join a group that did bad things though the one girl’s Digimon raised an excellent point about why most of the recruits seemed to be young and attractive girls. For Reiko’s part, she couldn’t exactly claim any moral superiority over the hackers group, not when her hobby was most definitely illegal by anyone’s standards; that said she only did what she did for fun and maybe a desire to be a little rebellious, certainly not for money or for any ideological reason. She had nothing to gain from joining this group that she wasn’t already getting by herself.

She should just leave right now, before this ‘Miss Manaka’ switched targets; she’d only come to hear what they had to say and now that she’d heard it, and had no interest in it, she should leave. “Why should we care about helping you with your revenge?” As soon as she had finished giving this woman and piece of her mind, at least. “Your old group was taken out by someone else and now you want revenge. Big deal. What does that have to do with any of us?”

@Pyromania99

Manaka seemed surprised by all the pushback she got. It was most obvious that she did not expect everyone to disagree with her so much. "Wha!! Hold on, hold on! One question at a time!" The woman said, trying to get all the questions in her head. "Geez, I was hoping you all would be happy enough to learn from the best Hacker in EDEN..." Manaka muttered to herself before looking over everyone. "Alright, first thing first. I'm not an "old lady" like I think I heard from someone in the audience. Repeat offenders are subject to heavy penalties." She said, glaring at the direction of the gun toting Digimon.

The hacker cleared her throat and continued. "Now then. I'll address that question first. I actually sent out more invitations, but all the males aside Issei decided to not show up." She shrugged and moved on. "That aside, I suppose you don't know the behind the scenes of Hackers? I vetted you all very hard, I'm sure you all figured out. Do you all realize how much of an iron grip that Thor has on the major hacking groups and the higher tiered hackers?" She looked to the faces of her perspective members. "I can't just pick up anyone. Thor has their hands in way too many cookie jars. I'd rather not have a spy in here. The only reason this place is safe is because I have more than a couple of measures to make sure it was tough for you all to get here and this place was forgotten even by EDEN's programmers."

She sighed a bit. "Anyway, I'm more than sure you all wouldn't betray me for any small reason." Then she looked at Harumi and Shion. "Now, you have some issues with us being "evil" was it?" She then looked to Issei, "You as well, right Issei?" She added, remembering he said that as well. "Well, what can I say? Good, bad, Evil... They're just human concepts aren't they? Back in the day, some members of Jormungundr did some account raiding and other things, I snuffed that light out as soon as I figured it out. I didn't do that out of some sense of justice, I just didn't want other hackers to group up and beat us down. What good that did." She chuckled to herself. "I won't lie, I've done some less than scrupulous things in my day as many of you have." In particular she looked to Harumi and Ruruka as she said this.

"I'm not too worried about those sort of things though. Do what you want, that is what it means to be a hacker. Freedom. Even at the expense of others. Right? Well, Thor intends to regulate us all and put us under their thumb. Wouldn't that be terrible? Duchess, what if Thor got on you and forced you to dig up information on the Prime Minister and blackmail him to commit injustice?" She looked to the Duchess with a smile. Then to everyone else. "And this comes to Reiko's question. Why should you help me? Freedom. I mean, you also get to learn from the best hacker on EDEN and you can get a bit of money while working."

She hoped this would be enough to convince them. To be fair, she was a little hyperbolic. Thor would likely never do something like that, but things happen when people let power get to their head. "And before anyone asks, I'm sure we can win this time. We lost last time because of one deciding factor." With that, she brought up a terminal. Terminals were something familiar to any hacker. Much like the menus available, Terminals were what hackers used to bypass security and other things. The Sistermon seemed worried for a little until Manaka finished and nothing major seemed to happen. The woman put her hands on her hips as something fell from the ceiling and landed behind her. After that, something else slowly fell from behind the group and touched the ground.





"Say hello to my friends, Ophanimon and Raguelmon." She introduced them. "Digimon. When Thor did their takedown on Jormungundr originally, they had Digimon. It was a mass of confusion. We didn't know what hit us. Now though, with some Digimon at our side, we can win. Of course, we need to build our support and strength. I doubt that we could just go in guns blazing and win. The first thing we can easily do is hit their vassal groups and destroy or turn them."

In an attempt to not seem too threatening, Raguelmon waved at the group and gave them a smile. Ophanimon seemed a bit bothered with the entrance. "Manaka, don't you think that was a bit too dramatic?"

The woman looked at the Digimon and rolled her eyes. "Just go with it." She then looked back to the group. "Anyhow, what do you all say now? Are you with me? Or are you against me? Or are you in the group of not caring one way or another?"

Harumi's body tensed up when Manaka looked at her. Of course she knew what Harumi did. It was in the invitation. She listened carefully. Thor restricting hackers would make things harder. But hackers would do what they did best: find loopholes in the virtual realm, and exploit them to hell and back.

Harumi stayed silent for a moment, processing the information. She leaned against Rexy's leg. "I couldn't care less about what's right and what's wrong," she said. "While I'm certainly against someone restricting my ability to do my job, I can't 'fight the good fight' for free. I would assume some of us have that luxury— and I'm sure I can tell whom just by checking everyone's cosmetics— but I don't.

"It's not that I don't want to help," Harumi finished, "it's that I want to afford a place to sleep and food to eat."

@Pyromania99

Issei wasn't sure what to do after hearing Manaka's speech. If Thor did indeed go as far as she claimed then they had to be stopped and preferably beforehand. But he had no way of knowing if she was telling the truth about or about putting an end to the account raiding. One of the girls spoke up in a way that she might agree if she would be paid for it, but unlike the girl who had been talking to him and seemed to be hired she claimed that she needed the money which if true he wouldn't judge her for.

Manaka showing of her two Digimon and going on about how they would at least against Thor with their Digimon didn't help to convince either. However Issei had gotten curious and if she was beng honest than he didn't want to be on the sidelines. "All right, I'm willing to give the benefit of the doubt, but if I ever feel like we're going too far I'm out."

Jormungundr Cathedral
@KingOfTheSkies

---

All of this talk was getting rather boring, honestly. Were these people really that idealistic? Or were they simply giving Manaka a hard time? Silly, either way, wasn't it? They were all hackers, even if they were Certified Ethical, it wasn't like they didn't have their own secrets as the woman herself pointed out. There at least seemed to be a more mildly reasonable person here, though of course, money was always the question, wasn't it?

She'd investigate the new digimon once she had a bit more time.

"Well, this is certainly an interesting proposal." Ruruka airily replied. "I am assuming we will get paid by the job with varying amounts depending on the time and supposed difficulty of it?" Fairly standard stuff, if she were to be honest. Similar to how she ran things in Rashomon, but unlike it her employees got a bonus for doing a job while receiving a steady, if minimum income needed to ensure a decent quality of living, among other things to ensure employee loyalty. Something Manaka seemed to not really be quite the expert in.

"...Harumi, was it?" Ruruka said, turning her gaze towards the shorter girl. It would be a shame to let something potentially interesting die so swiftly. She walked closer to Harumi so she could gauge her reaction a bit better. "Don't be so quick to dismiss. Manaka did say we would be making money, though she didn't exactly specify the amount...but if you are in dire need of money, maybe you should get some better hacking skills? My home is rather spacious and I myself, am rather skilled."

There was definitely what sounded like an insult mixed with what sounded like an offer of some sort.

"So your best argument is that it's the lesser of two evils? That-" Shion was cut off by Ludo.

"Even so, this could be a good chance for us to get stronger. We'd have to fight a lot of other digimon, right?"

Shion paused. It was true that hackers tended to fight more with digimon than happened in the legal servers, and raising her digimon to their full potential was one of her few goals in life. "May-"

She was cut off again, this time by Zuba. "Those are some sharp digimon she's got with her. She can't be all bad if she's raised them that well."

Shion sighed. In the end, it looked as though her digimon were going to make the decision for her. "... Fine. But I'm not doing anything bad to other people unless they deserve it, got it!?" It seemed that Shion was the first to join Manaka's side, despite being the first to protest.

@Pyromania99

Harumi was perfectly willing to listen to the other girl… until she questioned Harumi's skills. "So I need better skills?" she said. Harumi's tone had become quite cold. And even though her expression didn't change, her tone and aura seemed to make the air around her drop a few degrees. "So being able to remotely hack into a PC with government-level encryption isn't good enough?"

Okay, so it was a bit of an exaggeration— her contact had opened a back door for Harumi to infiltrate— but this Ruruka had touched on a nerve. Harumi's skills were one of the only things that couldn't be taken from her. It was the one thing she was proud of. Harumi could feel Rexy's body lean down, the Digimon's nostrils twitching as she sniffed.

"This one smells tasty. Can I eat her?"

Harumi could tell the big Digimon was joking. Besides, while it would probably hurt, it would have no effect on Ruruka other than that. "No, no eating her. She might taste funny or give you a stomachache."

@Rune_Alchemist

Freedom.

Reiko clicked her tongue in annoyance. It was frustrating just how much that word resonated with her; a single inconsequential word in the middle of Manaka’s efforts to convince them to join, but it had so much of an effect on her. It was her entire reason for doing what she did, why she started ‘hacking’ in the first place, and the ridiculously-shaped woman probably knew that from her investigations. For her to use that word in particular had to have been deliberate, the language carefully chosen to appeal to her, to all of them, but just knowing she was being manipulated didn’t mean it had no effect on her.

Manaka didn’t try to deny that Jormungundr was evil or try to convince them their actions were for some greater good. She didn’t paint Thor in a good light either but from the sounds of it all the rival group wanted to do was recruit them as well, albeit in a more sinister sounding way. The hacker wasn’t trying to convince them this was a fight between good and evil, instead pitching it to them as a fight for their own freedom to continue doing what they were already doing without interference.

It was annoyingly effective. One by one the rest of the people in the room gave in and agreed to join the pervert’s crusade and against her better judgement Reiko felt her resistance failing as well.

“I’m in the ‘group of not caring’ as you put it.” Reiko crossed her arms across her chest and stared Manaka down defiantly. “I’m not a hacker, not a good one anyway, and Thor’s never bothered me before. If they come after me now… I’ll just quit.” Even as she said it, it sounded weak to her own ears; she couldn’t give this up without going insane from trying to keep up the façade on a daily basis. “But for now… you said I could learn from you, so I’ll stick around for a bit. As soon as it looks like things are getting dangerous however, I’m gone.”

@Pyromania99

Jormungundr Cathedral
@KingOfTheSkies

---

"Oho, the last person who attempted to 'eat' me, actually found it to be quite pleasant." The only change to Ruruka's expression was a subtle widening of her smirk. Whatever it meant was left up in the air, but judging from the confidence with which she spoke she herself believed whatever it was to be certain.

"Ehe, Ruru-chan's still bad with making friends." Of course they were listening through the Digivice. "Hey hey, lemme talk to her! I can show her just how cute you are!"

"Ahem," Clearing her throat, Ruruka completely ignored her digimon. "Some would say that the governments security isn't even worth writing home about."

"Come on, come oooon, lemme meet 'em, pleeeease! You're really bad at showing concern, lemme do iiiit!"

"I suppose I can't force you, but I was hoping my co-worker wouldn't mind spending a little quality time together, hm?" She took a few steps closer to Harumi so they were now fairly close to each other.

"...Togemooooon! Ruru-chan's ignoring meeeee and totally flubbing her chances with this probably cute girl!"

"Don't hug me you weed-!"

It seemed like Manaka had actually managed to convince most of the people to join her, even if not everyone was happy about it. Issei had to admit that took some skill and even wondered if it might somehow be more impressive than her finding them all. Before he could think too much about it though he was thrown off by what would normally be just a strange comment by flower girl but given the context and her smirk was probably meant exactly the way he interpreted it.

Luckily Issei didn't get a chance to make a fool out of himself thanks to all the Digimon arguing. "Come on, let me show them who is boss, boss. "Why do you always wanna fight? So far these Digimon don't seem to be actually hostile." Issei thankfully used the distraction his two Digimon offered and took out his Digvice to talk to his two Garurumon directly."Reg's right Shadow, there is no need to fight."

@Rune_Alchemist@KingOfTheSkies@Pyromania99


So many "white hat" hackers here. How curious. I suppose she has no intention of recruiting the bad ones? Or is it just mere coincidence?

Thus were her thoughts as one by one the others voiced their objections. Well, it wasn't like it was a bad thing. In fact, quite the opposite. She only did hacking in the name of justice after all, though that justice was obviously her own, and not of that of society.

"You said that there was a chance of Thor doing something like that to me," she spoke, referring to her previous statement. "I certainly couldn't disagree that such a possibility existed. After all, you managed to track me down. How many others could do the same?" she said begrudgingly. "However, that would not be enough reason for me to preemptively attack somebody. I do know how they have been monopolizing all the top class hackers, which, certainly gave me enough reason to investigate them further. Thus..." She paused for dramatic effect.

"I would join your little group, if I would be allowed to use its resources and manpower to thoroughly investigate Thor's motives and goals. And if there weren't any shady things in the resulting report, well, I'll be leaving, naturally."

After that, the woman proudly displayed her two Digimon. Hmm, certainly quite high-level ones. Far more powerful than my own, in fact...

Hmph, if only they would grow stronger quicker... she lamented.

She chuckled a bit at the shade Ruruka was throwing at Harumi. "I surely hope you're not suggesting of stealing money through hacking, do you, Kozuki-san? I wouldn't be able to work with you if that were true, for you see, I despise scums like that." Her intonation was half-threatening, as if she was poking the hornet's nest, so to speak.

Manaka smiled as everyone agreed to join her in her self-righteous crusade against Thor. Well, for now at least. Half of them were goody-goody two shoes as she had expected. Really, virtual space was at stake and they were worried about inconsequential things like "Morals" or "ethics". Well, whatever worked for now.

She looked at everyone, thinking about how to keep them with her. Ruruka would be the easiest. A bored rich girl? Never been easier to keep interested considering all the interesting plans she had.

Reiko seemed similarly easy so long as their goals of freedom remained. Though her threats of quitting if it got dangerous were concerning.

Issei was a crap-shoot to say the least. So far he seemed to be in so long as it didn't seem too... Fishy.

Shion seemed up to it as long as it served her sense of justice. Strength also helped some.

Harumi seemed easy enough to get a handle on. Let her make some money and she'd be happy. Nothing makes you want to help more than survival apparently.

Kotoki was the most likely of them all to be an issue. Unlike Reiko, Issei and Shion she wouldn't be the type to quit if Manaka did something wrong. She'd likely go full power to shut her down. Little girls like her were no problem of course, but that could serve certain complications.

Well, regardless, "I'm glad to have you all on board with me. I'm sad little Ruruka beat me to inviting Harumi to come live with me. We could have so much fun bathing and watching scary movies an--" Before she could continue, Raguelmon poked her in the back of the head.

"You're saying way too much, Boss." The giant cat humanoid digimon said with an embarrassed look on it's face if anyone could actually tell. "I think you should just stop before you say something wrong."

Manaka glared at the Digimon who reciprocated it. There was a small stand off until Manaka blinked, winning the match for the Digimon. "GAH! Fine." The human whined before turning to her new team again. "Anyhow, as long as you work with me, I can make sure your account is secure and no one will get into it." She seemed to be thinking. She then smiled and brought up not just one but two terminals. A feat of sorts. While it wasn't impossible, it was quite impressive to bring up to and seem to use both without problem.

"Well them everyone, the day is still young. How about we see your Digimon in action? I have JUST so happened to a perfect training ground for you all." The woman said as she did a couple of last taps on one of the terminals. On the party's UI they'd notice a display message.

You have joined the group chat, Manaka's Daring Six.

"Yay~ Now we can all keep in touch if we want. Just don't clog it up with chatter too much. We don't want it too difficult for me to give you information." When she was done with that, she went to the other terminal and seemed to be closing in with that. "Alright gang, this is a test of your skills. One warning. You WON'T be able to win against the Mega-level threat so find another way around it. Good luck!"

With that, the floor disappeared below everyone as the fell into something. Anyone that knew anything about EDEN would know what that was. A Direct Link, but where to?

It was a falling start as everyone landed in a pile. "Sorry about that. I've been working on this for a while and that was the only way I could get you in without alarms." As group got their bearings, they'd notice something was a bit amiss. There was only two others with them! Well, two humans and their digimon if they were out originally.

---

Shion would find herself sitting on Kotoki and Issei under her. The area they were in was fairly bland save for some weird posters on a wall, old promotional ads for Yuzurin before she formed KuroYuri. She was about fourteen in this promo. Another featured a singer in some KISS type make-up. Along with those were some other bands that have gone defunct. The weird thing was that the pictures had a X through their picture, all except the last one which was the current KuroYuri. The man in the kiss make-up, if anyone had knowledge on pop figures, was fairly popular for a couple of months until it was revealed that he was a total creep. All of these other bands and groups seemed to have for some reason or another fallen out of grace for some reason or another.

Beyond that, there was a door that led out to what looked like a kitchen of sorts on one side. Which was weird considering there was no need to eat in EDEN, at least for humans. Oddly, there were a couple of trees in the corner of the room with... Meat hanging from them. Some thing that tended to appear on Digifarms. This certainly was not a Digifarm though.

The other side seemed to be a monitoring station of sorts. There were a lot of monitors but none seemed to be powered up with no obvious way to turn them on. Beyond those two parts of the room, there were two doors that seemed like they would lead out to somewhere else in whatever this place was. Whatever the case, there didn't seem to be any immediate danger to the group.

---

In another room, Ruruka found herself on the ground laying across Harumi and Reiko's bellies. They seemed to be... In a prop closet of sorts? There were instruments and other things of the sort all around them. "Oh my, I'm sorry... I might have gotten you guys a bit too close to somewhere you shouldn't be. Please be careful you three~" Manaka said, not sounding too concerned. If they listened, they'd hear cheering. "-ren. S-. -iren." What they could hear even more was the heavy metal noises of an electric guitar and what could only be described as guttural screaming.

If they looked outside the door, they'd notice that they are in the back of some giant stage. Up front was an odd sight. An Etemon playing Guitar and a Sukamon on drums. On stage was a girl in a very exaggerated Punk Rock outfit. The source of the screaming was her. The cheer was for her it seemed. "Siren."



"Force out the illusionary sound!" She sang as the Digimon played their instruments. It was pretty loud overall. "Sail the ship to the shores! Crash! Crunch! IT IS NO MORE!" One thing was sure... They should not get caught here! There seemed to be some hoodies with an emblem for "Muse" on it. And a door that was on the opposite side of the stage from them. Luckily, there were curtains that could obscure them to the other side from the audience.

Jormungundr Cathedral
@KingOfTheSkies@King Cosmos

---

"You know, sometimes when someone accuses someone else of doing something, they themselves are the one doing it, miss Kotoki." Ruruka offered the girl a small smile, but didn't get a chance to say much else or even get much of a reply from Harumi. Manaka did something exceedingly unnecessary. She opened a Direct Link beneath them to somewhere without any warning. Ruruka would have thoroughly berated her for it had she not been too busy reeling at the sudden loss of floor beneath her feet. At least she landed on something rather soft and...warm? Kinda felt like it was breathing...her hand lightly squeezed and groped whatever it was she was laying on, totally not having any idea of what she was touching, of course.

Deciding to finally turn her head, she met Harumi's gaze as her hand thoroughly groped her boob in a totally accidentally and non intentional manner. "Hnn...Thanks for breaking my fall you two, and I apologize, Harumi." Despite the apology, her tone of voice was most certainly not apologetic. With that she rolled over off Harumi and was now laying directly on top of Reiko. "I don't believe we've had a moment to properly meet. Ruruka Kozuki, if you can hear me over whatever that horrendous noise out there."

---

Harumi clammed up as Ruruka got closer. The other girl had a certain confidence that irked Harumi a bit. Closer again, close enough to detect a "natural" scent, so to speak. Was that cherry blossoms? Before Harumi could speak up, another girl— Tanaka, I think, she thought— proceeded to try and push Ruruka's buttons.

And then, she was falling.

Or, it felt like falling, anyways. Damned Direct Links. Harumi landed hard on her back, and something fell on her stomach. If they'd been IRL, that would have knocked the wind out of her. She felt something touch her chest. A light squeeze.

"Hnn...Thanks for breaking my fall you two, and I apologize, Harumi."

Harumi felt embarrassed, and fought the urge to cuss the other girl out like a sailor. Ruruka certainly didn't sound sorry. Okay, stomachache or not, Rexy gets to chomp her later. Where were they now? And who was making that racket?

@Rune_Alchemist@King Cosmos

Before Issei could even proces the invitation to a chatroom Manaka changed topics to a test of their Digimon and a mega-level threat they would have to avoid, the last part was kinda redundant in his mind since the group only had Champions as far as he could tell. He didn't get the time to mention that as the floor disappeared underneath them and they all started falling.

When they finally landed the first thing Issei noticed were the two girls on top of him. Part of him wanted to make a joke about how it wasn't the best scenario but he quickly decided against it. It was only a bit later that he noticed that half of the group was missing. The posters, kitchen and monitoring station went unnoticed by him for the most part due to his line of sight from the floor. "Not that two cute girls on top of me is a nightmare, but do you think you could get off?" He hoped he didn't offend them but also felt that a joke might break any tension after what just happened.

"Great. At least the landing was soft." Shion said as she looked down at the other two.

Cute? Really? Whatever. Shion brushed off Issei's comment and looked around as she stood up. She immediately went to the kitchen and took down a piece of meat, bringing it back to her digimon.

Unfortunately, Zuba and Ludo didn't have the easiest landing. They both took their time getting up before Shion came over, holding out the meat for Zuba to try.

"I'm not sure that's the smartest thing to do..." Zuba said before taking a bite.

"How is it?"

Rather than respond to Ruruka with any of the many, many things she wanted to say, Reiko simply pushed the girl off of her and got to her feet. Crossing her arms over her chest, she looked around the room they had been unceremoniously dumped into; it was small and cluttered, filled with various objects in a way that made her think it must be some kind of storage space. The objects in question had a definitely musical theme to them. Were they in an auditorium or a theatre?

“Where did that woman send us?” It had barely been a minute since she had agreed to join this little group and already Reiko was starting to regret it; dropped through a direct link without so much as a warning or anything and to somewhere dangerous as well? “Once I get out of here I’m going to wipe that smug look off of her face.”

Speaking of getting out of here, Reiko walked over to the one door in the small room and opened it a crack, the noise coming from the other side growing in intensity as she did so. From her vantage point she could see that they were backstage somewhere, with a heavy curtain to one side and the various riggings and ropes and other things hidden from the audiences eyes on the other. Through a gap in the curtains she could see who was currently on stage, a punk rock ‘singer’ providing the screaming lyrics along with two Digimon playing instruments, but the audience themselves were out of sight; given the performer they were here to see however, they probably weren’t the friendly type.

Having seen enough, Reiko slowly closed the door and turned back to the others. “We’re backstage at a concert or a gig somewhere; the singer has Digimon with them.” Given Manaka’s warning, this wasn’t a place where they wanted to get caught and having seen the kind of people they were dealing with she was inclined to agree. There was a door on the opposite side of the stage from where they were and the curtain would hopefully hide them as they made their way to it, but if they were seen or heard they would need to be prepared to run or have a really good excuse for being there. “We should go. Put on one of those hoodies and we’ll make a break for the exit; try to act like you belong here.”

@PsyBlade@Rune_Alchemist

@Duthguy


"Urgh..."

Kotoki groaned as she felt the effect of the sudden fall. What is wrong with that woman?!

At the very least she had something--or someone--to cushion the fall. However, being sandwiched between two people like that was never a pleasant prospect to her, so she quickly wiggled and freed herself from them.

"Oh, shut your mouth! I was just about to do that!" she replied back to Issei's comment, blushing a little from the "cute girls" part. Thankfully for him, she was completely ignorant of the fact that she just might have been pressing her breasts to the back of his head for the short time she was in that position, though with their size, he might not notice either.

She stood up, and looked around at her new surroundings. "What is this place?" she asked to no one in particular, folding her arms under her chest.

And then she noticed them. All the posters on the wall.

She never cared about idols and singers and such, so she didn't know anything about them other than the fact that they had appeared in commercials and such. But she knew enough that whatever she was looking at, it was not normal in the slightest.

"Gives me the creeps..."

Speaking of creeps, as she was still standing right near where Issei was laying down, if he were to look up, he might just catch a glimpse of her black panties as her skirt only ended midway down her thighs.

She then noticed the monitoring station. She walked there at once, took a seat, and began typing on the terminal to try to extract any information she could get from the machine.

Only that the terminal wasn't turning on in the slightest.

"Oh really?"

She groaned. Is this huge hunk of junk broken or just turned off?

She looked around for the electric cord, even to the point of crawling down under the terminal itself, allowing anyone to see up her skirt in the process.

Nothing. Not a single electrical cords or plugs around.

"Bah. What a waste of time." She patted her skirt once she were back up on her feet.

"Hey you two. Got anything?" she asked them.

Siren Stageshow
@PsyBlade@King Cosmos

---

The other girl didn't even say hi before she pushed Ruruka off of her, sending her rolling onto the floor with a quiet oof. Ruruka sat up, rubbing her side a bit. So rude, and she was being perfectly helpful. Standing up, she finally took a look at the place.

"Jeez, Ruru-chaaaaan! You had us worried there!" Sunflowmon's voice came over her com. "What happened? You got like, shot into a new server. Need good 'ol Heli to back ya up?"

"No, I do not." Ruruka replied to her Digimon. "I'll call you if I need anything. Just remain on standby with Cecil." While she had the brief chat with her digimon, it seemed Reiko was quick to asses their situation. Ruruka poked her head out the door, frowning slightly. Huh. Well, this was indeed, troubling. Siren was a small time hacker group. Rashomon considered them to not even be worthy of their time, but it was always prudent to keep tabs on even small groups. She almost got the feeling Manaka wanted them to get caught. Judging from Manaka's personality, she half expected the older woman to be watching them and giggling at their misfortune.

"Hmm...you all do that. I will make a distraction so go whenever, hm?~" Disguises? What was she, a child? She could handle herself, and no way in hell was she wearing such dingy looking clothing. If she was gonna dress in punk rock, she'd at least do it well. In fact, maybe she should actually come dressed as such at some point? There was a certain charm to the style, hm. So ignoring the others, even if they had a protest, Ruruka walked out on stage...right up next to the punk rock girl.

"Ahem..." She cleared her throat a bit before joining the shouting. "SI-REN! SI-REN!" She'd continue this until she had everyone's undivided attention. A single arm rested just under her chest, while the other elbow was resting on her hand, angled upward so her hand was in line with the corner of her mouth. "Ahem, cough, ugh, I should work on my vocals a bit more..." Ruruka began, mouth curling into her usual small smirk. "Aha, that aside...Hello, everyone. I'd apologize for interrupting your lovely show, but that would be a lie." She glanced out over the audience. "Now, I seem to have gotten a bit lost with a direct link. Could the colorful girl in front of me be kind enough to show me the exit, hm?"

---

Harumi stayed quiet, examining her surroundings. It looked like a supply closet, and smelled like one, too. She didn't like dark, confined spaces like this. It made her feel trapped and that frightened her. It was why she would sleep under a bridge before sleeping in a capsule hotel. And then Ruruka did something very stupid.

For God's sake, she thought. Harumi facepalmed before her Digivice beeped.

"You okay, Harumi?" came Heri's voice.

"I'm fine," she said. "Dropped into a broom closet, but fine."

"Glad the old lady didn't hurt you. Do you need us right now?"

"Maybe. I'll need you on standby just in case things go south."

"We're oscar mike!"

Harumi ended the call, whispering to Reiko, "The hell is she doing?"

@Rune_Alchemist@King Cosmos