Chapter 30: White Prism

Charlotte kept staring at the messed-up projection. She brought back her memories, seeing in her mind the other times she had seen it. All those times, it always traced a perfect circle, a perfect sphere. Even when there was no obvious obstruction or transparent structures, as it was with the air, there could be seen an obvious boundary of the dust not being showed after that boundary.

She thought after a while of staring blankly at the distorted space. Smirking, she decided to try something.

"Hey! Prism! Try to extend your range to… My body's front!"

After a while, she could see how it was expanding, albeit slowly. It looked as if Prism was having some trouble doing it.

"You're drunk, right?" She said before 'taking her hands to her mouth'. "Heheh, I didn't know you could get drunk… You can also taste food, right?"

The more she learned about Prism, the more she considered it a living being. It could somehow understand her intention, make some kind of phenomena happen and now it could eat! Understanding, moving and eating, if anything could do that, then by definition that thing was alive, if not, then what is that definition! Right, the only missing thing was reproduction.

"Heheh, but you're still a kid!" she said after stopping her giggles. "Don't ever drink that again! At least not until you're grown up! Heheheh."

She talked to the colorless space as if it was a little child. She now firmly believed they could communicate as it had stopped for a moment when she was giggling.

"Huh? Then that means…" She paused at that thought. "I'm, your mom?! Oh, my… I became a mother…"

She started having conflicting thoughts, in one part she was happy to be called a mother and that all her efforts were rewarded like this. On the other, she felt she was too inexperienced for that kind of thing! Even if it was not even human, it was still hard to instill the character to the little ones. Those rascals were also impossible to placate!

"Huh… No use thinking about it now. Let's see where this ride takes us, eh, little Prism."

Seeing how the projection continued to go up and up, she noticed something. The projected space she around her body was diminishing. It was quite a sight as her toes were getting cut, even if everything was white, she still felt it on an emotional level.

"Oh, so that's it. It conserves the volume of the space it can project. Ok! Stop for now! Make it how it was before!"

Getting the projection back to 'normal' took less time than stretching it, she decided to try to speak with Prism for the first time, or at least, interact with it. Though the projection was still messy, it was a little better than before.

"First of all, cancel the projection... Now, what to do… In this space cannot be created anything, and the voice… How's it even transmitted?"

Without air, there shouldn't be any sound. In the Crystal's Space there was no air, there wasn't anything to begin with. It was a problem she hadn't thought of before. She always thought she was speaking aloud.

"But maybe, I never actually spoke… Right, I have no mouth here. Heh, so stupid."

She switched her thoughts. If she couldn't 'speak' here, but could be understood, that meant.

Grasping the nature of the colorless space, she 'grinned'.

If it could understand things, then that meant that it had a mind. And in one's mind was everything one could understand, everything one wanted to achieve, everything.

<Let's start doing it then, Prism!>

First, she tried to come up with ways to explain what she wanted: a circle, a line, a square. But nothing worked. She then thought of something she hadn't tried before.

<Hey, can you make two projections?>

After asking that, the first projection was made, confirming that her thoughts were indeed being read. After waiting for a while more, she saw there was being constructed a second projection, albeit a bit slow and faded away. She then noticed a problem, the first projection was losing quality. She frowned.

<Can't it be kept still? Yeah, like that, huh?>

The first projection suddenly gained all its definition and the second one was constructed instantly as well.

She started to look at the two from afar. After looking at the two carefully, she discovered what was the new change, she saw that her body on the first projection wasn't moving. It wasn't breathing!

She panicked a little thinking that she had died but calmed down when she saw herself on the second one breathing, realizing what was happening. She grinned.

<'Kept still', was it? So that's what's happening. Perfect.>

Before, it was trying to come up with two projections at the same time, keeping them updated all the while.

<Hey! Prism! When I ask something, if it's affirmative, show me two 'images', if it's negative, show me only one! Ah! An image is one like this.>

She said while showing her the image of the projection.

Suddenly, a new projection appeared in front of her, startling her.

<Woa! Perfect! It's possible! Such an intelligent girl! Hehe.>

Why did she call it girl, she didn't know, but being obedient and cute were always the good points of girls, of good girls, that is.

She smiled at the new progress she had made. It was always better if one could communicate. She started to show Prism the things around the projection. Always asking if she understood what she meant or if there was a more exhaustive explanation required.

After spending all morning with Prism, she went back to reality. She had shown figures and the objects that could be seen around her body. When Charlotte started to teach Prism about the human body, she started to feel tired.

Giggling to herself, she stood up.

"I see your mood has improved." Gut said at the moment she stood up.

"… And now it's gone, thanks."

Hearing Gut talk made all her good mood go awry, she gave him a glare and went to the bathroom.

Seeing her not moving at all during the morning, he thought she had given up and wasn't willing to keep on living. Even if she was mad at him, it was still better than some empty cask losing its will. He smiled wryly at her and continued doing his things.

He was reading news regarding the general world. The U.S.A.'s president had made an open talk this morning, he said that if Gercia couldn't find the hacker girl and send her to them in a month's time, a war was going to start between the two countries. U.S.A. was charging Gercia of the girl

While Gercia could only hope to find the girl to avoid any unnecessary conflict, it was obvious to him U.S.A. was only using this as an excuse to attack. Charlotte was a fugitive who was going to Paversia! Almost every governing power should know about it already, so they should place the hopes of catching her near Paversia.

Even if there were skirmishes all around the globe, none ever escalated to a full out war. U.S.A. was the world's most powerful country, but Gercia wasn't that much behind. It was part of the most powerful alliance, after all.

*****

"A war, huh? All because of her? That can't be… What outrageous thing did she find to make the world go after her like that?"

Dordives said while frowning when she saw the news concerning her friend. From what she had found, Charlotte never stole any information from Necox. She had used their machine to compute something no one has been able to decipher. And the problem was in the way she used it without anyone noticing until it was too late, and though it was still a pretty grave crime, after spending some decades in prison and paying an astronomical sum, she would be free of charge. She didn't want that for her friend so she approved Charlotte running away.

It has been more than two weeks since she last saw Charlotte. In that outing of them, Charlotte was the most cheerful of the lot. She kept dancing, drinking and talking non-stop, as if that was the last thing she was going to do.

She was too happy that night to notice it. It was a happy goodbye party, if she thought that way.

"… What're you up to now? How do you feel about what you incited…?" she said to no one in particular, leaning her body on her notebook.

Dordives started to study seriously after Charlotte left. She couldn't be left behind like that, she had to somehow catch her and make her explain what she'd done. She wanted to know what drove her to do this kind of thing!

"Canceled, huh? Your flowers are going to waste, you know? Heh."

She chuckled at this other change of hers. Her marriage was cancelled, not because of her or her family, but because of her fiancé.

They were having dinner in a fancy restaurant. At some moment of the night, he had said in a joking manner that he didn't want his future wife to be friends with a criminal, something that she took as a joke and answered as such, but in a confrontational way. After that things kept escalating until they started insulting each other. At the end, he derided her, saying that she should just shut up and accept everything he said as she was just his 'woman', and that women didn't have a right to talk back to their 'owner'.

Hearing how he thought of women, she stopped thinking straight, making a call, she told her father their engagement was over and hanged up her phone without answering any of her father's subsequent calls. The man's face turned ashen white after hearing her call, and almost fainted when she left without any other word.

Dordives hadn't seen him since then.

*knock knock

"Yes?"

"My lady, there's a package to you." One of her house's servants opened the room's door, answering her question.

There was nothing on him, so she raised a brow in wonder.

"Oh? What's it?"

"It's a bouquet," he paused "a big one. So, I wasn't able to bring it here alone."

"Who sent it? If it's from Carl, I don't want it, burn it."

She said while frowning, if he wanted to apologize, he should first come in person and then pledge to not treat her like a commodity, and then she would consider accepting his apology. She never told her father about her ex-fiancé's attitude until arriving to her house that night, because it would worsen the relationship of the two families. After canceling it, though, she told her father everything. He agreed with her decision and asked her why she hadn't done so before. She blushed at his words without knowing how to answer, she was still behaving like a kid.

"No, it's not from him, but from your gone friend, Charlotte." The servant answered while keeping a composed face.

"Uh? I thought I said to cancel that bouquet as the engagement was forfeited?"

"Yes, but they said that it was bought with a lot of money, so they could only do what was asked. It seems your friend emphasized on getting it brought to you."

"… Sigh, really, that girl always do what she wants. What am I gonna do with it anyway, do we have a place for it?" Dordives put a hand on her forehead, even without being here, she still did unreasonable things.

"We can arrange it."

"Good, show it to me then." She stood from her specially made for her chair.

"If you'll follow me." The man turned back, and allowed her to go out, closing the door after she went out.

Dordives walked behind the servant, following him to the first hall of the house.

What she saw left her speechless. It was work of art, in a unique way, almost reaching a meter high and the same amount on the sides.

The bouquet consisted of various kinds of flowers, having the little ones at the outside and the tall ones in the middle. The tallest one was a big sunflower. Around it were some tall white and red roses, along with daffodils and calendulas. On the outer circle were all types of flowers, ranging from dandelions to lilies.

Even though the flowers all over the place and looking no more than a mesh-up arrange, they still held some kind of harmony.

"Really… She was never one to choose things based on schemas but on her feelings…"

She took out her phone and took a picture of this strange yet beautiful bouquet. It was the parting gift of her beautiful and cute friend, and she would consider it a precious one while it lasted.

<I'm gonna do my best to go after you.>

Once it was brought to a proper place, she went back to her room to continue studying. If she was to inherit her father's business, she needed all the knowledge she could obtain!

*****

"A magic show, uh? Now that's something I wasn't expecting."

James said when he saw Gut's report, he hadn't seen it before as he was busy with other things.

After he finished constructing the machine that Charlotte had devised, he wasn't able to make it function as Gut described it should work, at all. It only made some noise and stopped moving altogether. Even after improving the materials used and getting purer elements, it was still useless. It wouldn't make things disappear. After he heard of its function, he couldn't help but marvel at its prospects. That was the most interesting thing he had heard in a while.

Making things disappear, even at the cost of the machine, even without harming any human was as good as it could be.

If it was used under the supporting pillars of a building, the building would collapse and there would not be any evidence.

Placing it in front of a safe's door would make entrance easy without much hassle, after all, there was no sound!

It had so many usages he was convinced it could revolutionize the way wars were played.

Yes, wars. If one could make a big enough machine it could render useless a big armed force.

That was the reason he had instigated this war, to see if it was possible!

He had told the U.S.A.'s government that there was a new machine that could render everything in an entire battlefield useless. And So, he needed a 'playing' ground.

Now, however, he wasn't sure if that was possible, the machine didn't work as expected and Gut wasn't making any progress regarding the girl, even saying strange things.

"… Was it a mistake to send Gut? He's a little soft, although he always completes the job… I should have sent someone to torture her and make her spill it all, even at the cost of not having her genius with me…"

He wondered if he could still do it.