Chapter 481: Omega Hope~ – IV |
"So what do you usually do, Meggie?" Hope looked over at Meggie and said, "It's a weekday, right? Do you have a holiday?"
"Nah. I'm on suspension."
"W-What?" Hope's eyes widened. "I-Is it okay for you to be out with me then?! Isn't it a bad thing to skip school?!"
Meggie laughed. "I look like a foreigner anyway, so no one really cares. They probably think we're just sisters or something on vacation. Especially with our hair."
Hope reflexively grabbed a bit of her sky blue hair and then relaxed. "I guess that's... true?"
"Besides." Meggie shrugged. "Dad's got money and he knows the cops. Not like we'll get in any trouble."
"U-Um... What?"
"...Don't worry about it."
'I think I'm VERY worried about it...!'
"Well... Do you like games?"
"I never got the chance to play many... but I do!" Hope smiled. "I'd like to stream a few games when I can..."
"Great. Then there's a limited edition CapsuMon booster box we can win if we collect enough tokens at an arcade." Meggie let out a dark chuckle. "I'm going to clear them out~"
Hope blinked. "Um... CapsuMon? Booster... box? Are we... catching things?"
Meggie paused and slowly turned to look at Hope. "...You really don't know anything, do you? What did you even DO in your spare time?"
"U-Um... I sang? And watched a lot of musicals? I wanted to do ballet a bit too when I was smaller and be a princess, but..."
"...Oh my god, you're a COMPLETE normie." Meggie laughed. "Well, that's fine. Just come on then."
Hope nodded and followed after Meggie as she led them both deeper into Akihabara. "Um... what's a normie by the way? I know you said I'm a normal person, but I haven't heard that... Is it like a weeb?"
"...You know what a weeb is but not a normie?"
Hope blushed. "I-I just heard it used a lot in high school. Since I dyed my hair blue people kept calling me that... I know it's something to do with anime, right?"
"...Wow. I'm genuinely speechless." Meggie stared at Hope. Then she said, "Huh. Do you like... read then?"
Hope's eyes lit up and she said, "Yes! I read a lot, actually! It's the only thing I could really do on my breaks when I worked. I've been really into second chance timetravel stories!"
...It definitely wasn't because Hope fantasized about going back in time and changing things at all. Definitely not...
"Oh, you'd probably get along with my mom then. She's been reading those a lot too. Probably not for the same reasons though..."
"Huh? Miss Yue has been reading those stories too?"
"Mmhm." Meggie nodded. "She's been ranting about this one recently... What was it...? Rewritten Past or something? She's been complaining about how unrealistic that a guy can get sent back in time after commenting on a post. And that the main character is definitely a psychopath pretending to be normal."
"O-Oh. Um... I don't think I've heard that one. I was more thinking along the lines of The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August..."
Meggie gave Hope a blank stare and said, "...Do I look like I'd know what that is?"
"R-Right. Um... I guess you AREN'T a... 'normie' then?" Hope let out a nervous laugh. "What do you do for fun then, Meggie?"
"Play video games, read manga, watch anime... Collect trading cards. Things like that."
"Oh! Um... I have some trading cards somewhere too. I think?"
Meggie paused. "You do?"
"Mmhm!" Hope smiled and reached into her purse. "It's one I got a long time ago from a friend. Here." She opened up her purse, then her wallet, and then she unfolded an old trading card.
Meggie took a look at the card. Then she looked viscerally offended. "You have... a first edition base set... shadowless... and misprinted CapsuMon card. And you folded it. In quarters. Keeping it in your wallet."
"Y-Yes? It's my good luck charm... why?"
"..." Meggie took a deep breath. "No. It doesn't matter. It's fine. It's completely fine. She's a normie, so she wouldn't know."
"Hm?"
"...Just... never look up how expensive a clean version of that card is."
"O-Okay?"
Meggie let out a long sigh. "...Well." She kicked a rock out of the way as they walked and said, "Whatever you do, DON'T fold the cards we're getting next, okay? I'll give you proper top loaders and sleeves for them, so it'll be fine. I'll even get you like an acrylic case so you can wear it if you want. But DON'T fold them."
"...Sure? But um... what's a top loader? Is that like the old DVD players that open up at the top?"
"...Wow. Coming from the midwest America is worse than being a farmgirl, isn't it?"
"Rude! But... not wrong..." Hope mumbled. "...Sorry I don't know a lot."
"It's fine." Meggie sighed. "It's just... Hm. Is this what Dad felt like when we all showed up? I suddenly get why he wanted to go home so desperately... You can't really talk about the stuff you like to people who can't even conceive what you're talking about..."
Hope flinched.
Meggie noticed and shook her head. "It's fine, really, Hope. It's part of your charm... I guess."
"You 'guess?'"
Meggie laughed. "It's quirky. Relax." She paused. "...Why am I the one giving out the advice right now?"
"...Sorry?"
"And stop saying sorry."
"Sorry- I mean... um..."
Meggie sighed. "...Let's get to the arcade already."
===
Games R'Us.
It was a new arcade place in Akihabara run by an Asian American who was clearly going through a mid-life crisis.
Arcade cabinets with classics like Mortal Kombat, Pac-Man, Galaga...
Retro game consoles set up like a display stand from the 90s where you could play through demos of various games...
A DDR machine in the back blasting 90s and 2000's JPop and vocaloid songs...
To Meggie, it was pretty cool. Like, Meggie appreciated the aesthetic and the vibes, but it wasn't REALLY her thing.
But to Hope, it looked like it meant the world. Her eyes were wide in shock and awe as she quietly walked up to an old handheld Mintendo Pocket and turned it on. "...It's like I went back in time."
*Hyah! Hah! Hee-yah!*
The sounds of Lonk swinging his sword echoed from the handheld as Hope stood there in a trance, playing the game.
Meggie raised an eyebrow and said, "You really like that, huh?"
Hope let out a warm smile and said, "I remember this from elementary school. There used to be one in my foster home. The other kids used to fight over it so I never got to play... but it always looked fun."
"...Right."
...Were all Americans like this?
Tsuki didn't really count since she was a half, and her mom was TECHNICALLY European. Not the average American, at least.
But if THAT was how Hope reacted, and if she's at least half-representative of the average American person...
'I guess it would explain Dad and Uncle Gray.'
America must be like a land of great depression or something if this was enough to cheer someone up...
"Anyway... We can play those games later, Hope. The games where we can win tokens are that way." Meggie pointed to an area in the back with proper arcade machines instead of just retro games.
Claw machines where you could try grabbing bundles of tickets, machines where you dropped tokens into a pile and tried to shove the rest of the tokens off when the shifting floor pulled back, skee-ball machines where you rolled a ball up a ramp into the targets...
Hope glanced over and gasped. "It's like Freddy's!"
Meggie blinked. "Freddy's?"
"Yes! It used to be really popular when I was a kid! I heard it got shut down because there was an accident involving some kids and its owner though... But there used to be a lot of fun games like this to play!"
"...I'm starting to understand why Dad insisted on us living in Japan over America."
"Huh? Why's that?"
"...Don't worry about it."
Meggie sighed and said, "Come on. It looks like there are still three booster boxes up to redeem. Let's get as many tokens as we can, then we can have fun opening packs."
"O-Okay! Let's go!"