Original Stories Fan Fiction ❯ Synthetic Emotions ❯ Phase 05: To Protect ( Chapter 5 )

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Synthetic Emotions

By: Melissa Norvell

Phase 05: To Protect

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'Another day successfully survived by yours truly, thank God to that…As long as Eros doesn't give himself away, but I know I can't hide this forever. Someone's going to find out and Chacha is already suspicious.' Aroura thought to herself as she walked down those same familiar roads she had for so long. Eros followed at her side, the two of them never getting too far from each other.

"It's nice outside," Eros said, breaking the long silence that had been going on for a good 10 minutes between them.

"Yeah…" Aroura seemed a little distant.

"Are we going to Himemari's house?" Eros looked to the black-haired girl in question.

"Do you want to go?" The girl asked in turn, not thinking that the Syntacom wanted to go to a person's house that he had barely knew. That and she didn't want him to accidentally expose himself as a machine.

"I don't know anyone," he replied simply.

"They're all my friends…Well," a look of annoyance crossed the young girl's features, "except Kyoui, but never mind him."

"Everything is so new…" Eros looked around at the outside world around him. "It's a lot of information to take in."

"Don't over load yourself or you'll fizzle out," Aroura smiled, warning the robot not to over work himself and crash his system. Since he didn't remember anything, there must have been so much that he had to recover and doing it all at once wasn't a good idea. At least computers at school were like that. If a computer tried to upload too many programs at one time, it had a tendency to freeze up or shut itself down and she didn't want to deal with another wave of amnesia.

"Right," Eros agreed, "we should just go home."

"Don't worry about it. I won't be sad. Since you just got here, according to them, I'd want to spend more time with you, especially since you have a condition."

"Sounds plausible."

"See? So don't worry about me so much, okay?"

"Alright."

"Let's just head home."

"My first day of school was confusing," Eros replied, finding it hard to fit in with the other students. He felt odd in that type of atmosphere and had been laughed at and stared at in odd ways that made him feel uncomfortable. Eros felt alone in Hishada High, it was as if he had stepped through a portal into a different world where no one spoke his language or knew who he was.

As if he was foreign.

"It always is," Aroura reassured him with a smile, "even if you're just going up a grade."

"So many people," he robot trailed in a contemplative voice.

"Yeah. Hishada High a pretty big school. If you just stick to me, it'll be fine."

"What if your friends don't like me?" The dark headed robot asked, turning his head towards the girl with the red streak.

"I have a lot of friends; some of them have to like you. At the very least, Hima-Hima will like you," she replied as a dark figure looks from a nearby building a short distance behind them. The figure stared intently at the two as they walked down the street. The shadow noticed that Aroura had a medium-sized green purse under her arm that bobbed up and down when she walked, after eyeing this object for a few moments, the figure darted off.

"Huh?" Aroura felt as if she were being stared at and looked behind her, her long, black and red hair spinning around with her gaze as she did so. She stopped and peered down the nearby ally, but saw nothing. Eros started to stare down the alley shortly after she did, wondering what she'd been glancing at.

"What is it, Aroura?" He felt a little tension coming from the girl's form.

"Nothing, I thought I saw something," she replied, a slight show of fright in her eyes. "Guess I'm just seeing things."

Dark eyes stared at the ally intently, almost as if he knew something that she wasn't sure of. 'I sense a human presence nearby.'

His master inched closer to him, almost as if she were seeking his protection. Her expression was unnerved, as if something was bothering her, something dark and ominous. It was almost as if it's very presence sent chills up her spine. She looked over her shoulder at the ally way once more, making sure that she hadn't seen something before. The light caught her red eyes, causing light to bounce off of them in an array of different types of shine.

"Let's hurry and go home," Aroura's voice sounded unsure and slightly quivery. "This place is creeping me out."

"Right," Eros' eyes also transfixed on the ally. After a few moments, they began to walk again. Something was wrong and Eros knew it. He felt uneasy letting Aroura stray too far away from him. After all, there was another human presence nearby and it was definitely not a good force to be dealing with. Reaching out, he grabbed the girl's bicep firmly and pulled her close to himself.

Aroura blushed in response to the protective action Eros took.

"Wh-What are you doing?" She stuttered, feeling that same array of emotions that she felt when he was licking the sauce from the corner of her mouth. She didn't know why she felt those feelings. She shouldn't feel this way towards a machine. She shouldn't think of him as if he were human when he clearly isn't…Or was it so clear? He looked human. He sounded human. Even some of his emotions were humanesque.

"There are weird vibes around here. Stay close to me," Ero's voice sounded more emotionless than usual, and even a bit cold.

"Right,” Aroura nodded. If Eros was feeling uneasy, then something was definitely wrong. 'I wonder what Eros is so apprehensive about. Whatever it is, I'd better stay close by.'

XI.

On the other side of the ally, Asagi and Mariko were walking past the opening. They were engaged in conversation, talking about their quirks and annoyances. The two of them, knowing each other only a short time, found it easy to talk to each other. They felt strangely comfortable with one another, considering their relationship thus far. However, there was a little tension between them and if they dared to say something the slightest bit out of balance, it would throw off their harmony and begin to fight again.

The sun's glare caught Mariko's green eyes as she looked to the sun, which was setting in the sky. "It's a nice sunset," she commented, creaking away from their normal wavelength of conversation.

"Well, at least it's not glaring in my eyes," Asagi complained.

"Are you okay?" Mariko knew about his headaches and wanted to make sure that they still hadn't been bothering him. He could at least make it to her house in one piece…Or so she hoped.

"Why do you care?" Asagi narrowed his eyes at the woman and sounded defensive.

"I don't," the blonde's features shifted into those of annoyance, "I just don't want you randomly fainting on me."

"Like it's my fault," the spiky haired man argued.

"Hey," the short-haired girl's voice seemed interested now, as if she were going to ask him a question.

"What?"

"Why were those Syntacoms after you?"

"None of your business,” Asagi replied coldly.

"If you live with me, then it is my business," Mariko pressed.

"Don't worry about it. You won't be in any harm."

"How do I know that?"

"Just trust me," Asagi replied, his voice irritated and on the threat of arguing with the blonde again as the dark shadow darted through the ally way once more.

Dark eyes seemed to lock onto his form momentarily. 'He's still around…'

The figure continued to dart around a corner near the end of the ally. Aroura could hear someone's footsteps. Their feet hit the ground at a fast pace, as if someone had been running. She turned to see someone's leg dart around one of the ally corners.

'Okay, now I know someone is here.' She thought, scooting even closer to Eros, who remained silent.

From the opposite side of the ally, a man was walking towards them. He wore a light jacket, jeans and a grungy-looking green baseball cap. His pace was slow and his tall, thin figure stood out among the trashcans and other inanimate objects in the ally. He turned the corner as Mariko and Asagi walked past the beginning of the walk way. Lime-green eyes shifted to the suspicious-looking form as he passed the spiky-haired man.

"Is it me, or did that man look suspicious?" Asagi asked the tomboy.

"Men all look a little suspicious," the tomboy replied with a shrug. She didn't really care about the man, as long as he didn't hit on her, he could just keep on walking.

"But there was something disturbing about his mannerism," Asagi noted, turning his head and staring at the beginning of the path for a few moments before his thoughts warned him not to get involved. 'Well, it's none of my business anyway.'

"Ugh!" The spiky-haired man winced, putting a hand to the side of his head. He tried to ignore the pain as he kept walking. It was a good thing that Mariko didn't see him do that. This way she wouldn't question his actions.

XI.

The figure was now approaching the two from the opposite end of the ally. Dark grey eyes narrowed upon sight of him as Aroura prayed in thought.

'Please don't come over here. Please don't come over here. Please don't come over here.' Aroura prayed as hard as she could, hoping that this would be enough to ward him off as his form grew in size with his approach. Feeling nervous, she clenched her purse tightly in her hand and clenching her eyes shut, almost as if she were bracing herself for an explosion.

Eros noticed her expression and decided to question her about it. "Something wrong?"

"That guy scares me," Aroura replied, fear evident in her voice now. Turning his sights back on the direction that the man was coming at them from, Eros noticed that he was now gone. It was almost as if he had vanished.

"Huh?" The robot questioned softly as he heard a commotion close to him.

"Stop it!" Aroura screamed.

"Give it to me!" The unidentified man yelled in a commanding and gruff voice, attempting to rip the purse away from the girl.

"No stop!" She shouted in dismay as she held on to the strap with everything she had, not about to give it up at any cost.

"Aroura!" Eros shouted in shock. While he wasn't looking, the man had snuck up to them undetected and was attempting to steal her purse. He watched the two play tug-of-war with the purse before Aroura jerked on the strap harshly, causing it to pop off and sending the girl tumbling backwards. She fell on her butt a few feet away, eyes widening as she looked at the broken strap in her hand as the man ran off wildly with her purse, determined to get out of their sights before he was caught.

"No!"

"I'll get him," Eros replied simply, taking off after the man with great speed. This caused a gentle breeze to be produced that caused the girl's hair and clothes to dance in the wind.

'He's so fast…' Aroura thought, watching him with interest from her position on the ground. The man was now at the other end of the ally, about to make his way out on to the street before he was cut off by the robot, which seemed to appear right in front of him in a blur of black and red.

Eros was face-to-face with the crook, staring him down with cold eyes. "I think you have something that belongs to my friend."

The man drew the purse back to his body protectively and sneered at him. "You'll have to pry it from my cold, dead hands."

"That won't be a problem."

"Come on!" The man shouted competitively as he attempted to punch the robot, throwing his fist forward as fast as he could, in order to build up speed and really slug him. His hand was caught a few inches from Eros' face as he glared the man down.

"I'm warning you," Eros warned stoically.

"Go fuck yourself," the man shot back.

"That is not logical."

The man rushed at him once again, pulling out a knife. If he couldn't slug him, then he'd try and cut him. "I'll kill you!" He shouted, but it was short-lived as his head moved forward before coming to a forced stop. Spit and blood flew from his mouth as he was spun-kicked effortlessly by the Syntacom. The green purse flew into the air as the man's body shot back into the wall, slamming into it so hard that the brick around his form cracked and his body made a human impression before his limp form fell to the ground, motionless.

Aroura put a hand to her mouth as awe overcame her. Her mouth was unable to move as a million thoughts rushed through her mind. 'Oh my god! That was amazing! I've never seen anyone kick like that, not even members of the martial arts club…He just took that guy out in one hit and didn't even put any effort into it!'

Her gaze shifted to the short-haired machine, which was walking towards her to check on her condition. 'Is this the Syntacom's true power? I can definitely see why his type is unknown…' Her thoughts ended as a jade green purse was shoved in her face.

"Huh?" She blinked a few times, as if regaining herself and recovering from the shock. "Oh…Thank you." She finally told him, taking the purse from him gently.

"You're welcome," Eros replied. "You're not injured, are you?"

"No, I'm fine," the girl replied, then turning her gaze to the man. "Is he alright?"

"No, his body slammed into that was at a high speed. No doubt he's dead from impact and if not he's in a severe coma," Eros noted from his analysis. He wanted to make sure that this man would never assault Aroura again and the only way to perform that function was to kill him.

"You didn't have to kick him that hard," the girl replied, a worried look etched on her face. She never intended on the man to die. A normal kick would have sufficed. This was the first time she'd seen anyone die in a grim manner, or die in general for that matter. Even if the guy just took her purse, she didn't believe that he should have died for it.

"He was assaulting you," Eros stated emotionlessly, as if he could care less that a human being had just died.

"I don't want you to go to jail, Eros," she replied, taking his hand and leading him out of the ally, before anyone saw the two of them. "Come on, before we get caught."

"Get caught?" Eros looked slightly confused. "But no one saw us."

The black-haired girl said nothing, just frowned and hid her eyes behind her bangs. Her facial features were clearly upset. At this point in time, she had thought about how it seemed like she underestimated the robot's capabilities and was just now learning of what he was truly capable of. This was only a small amount of potential at that. What could the true potential be? She hated to think of it. It was almost ghastly to the girl.

'What am I thinking? There is no way I can handle something like him.' She clenched her broken purse tightly, her knuckles turning white. 'He's strong…and so humanesque.' She glanced at him through her red streak. 'I have a feeling that I can't have him for long. He just killed someone, in the snap of a finger and totally disregarded their life. At times like these, I can really see that he's just a machine and not a human.'

"Something wrong?" The dark-haired boy asked, the light reflected off of his cold eyes in such a way that made it seem like he was concerned about her. Was it real concern or was the light simply casting an illusion? She didn't know anymore.

"No," she smiled falsely. "I'm fine."

"Did I scare you?" Eros asked, wondering if that was the reason the girl had been so quiet. He didn't even think about how it would make her feel or even if she had witnessed anything like that before. He had indeed been out of line.

"A little…"

"My apologies, I didn't mean to kill him," Eros sounded a little sympathetic and his voice was soft and low.

"You're probably not used to fighting humans," Aroura tried to make an excuse for his actions, even though she was still troubled.

He could tell.

He could still tell that something bothered his master. "I screwed up, didn't I?" He asked, almost as if he were being punished with her silence.

"Well…Not exactly," the girl sweat dropped.

"I flipped your friend," Eros reminded her of the Hisaka incident. "And now I killed someone…I annoy you, don't I?"

"What do you mean?"

"Perhaps, I should go back to the ally."

"No," Aroura's voice was strong as she looked up, balling her fist by her face. She couldn't let Eros go back to the ally. She wanted to protect him and she liked his company. She looked at him with pleading eyes, as if he'd take back his comment. He simply stopped walking and looked at her.

"Really, it's fine. It's just a little hard to adjust to. You see, I'm an only child so I'm not used to having someone else in my life. I can't just automatically be fine with it, so please bear with me," Aroura explained.

The boy nodded. "Yes, I understand."

"And Eros?"

"Yes?" The Syntacom turned before he began walking again.

Aroura held a happy anime face with a sweat drop. "Humans are a lot more fragile than Syntacoms, so please don't throw us around and slam us into things, okay?" She wanted to make sure she got this point across, because she herself didn't want to end up like the man who had just tried to steal her purse.

The girl knew how impulsive Eros could be and that would be fatal accident that she didn't want to think too hard about.

"Sorry."

"Let's go home, okay?" She asked as he agreed and they disappeared down the sidewalk as the sun set on the ending to a long and stressful day.

….However….

Aroura just couldn't get the murderous scene out of her head. It depressed her and she became quiet and withdrawn. She mulled things over in her mind, trying to figure out how to react to it and how to handle Eros. Should she get close? What if she makes him mad? Would he just act on impulse and kill her? In this light, he didn't seem much better than that lowly crook…

XI.

Her friends, however, thought differently.

"Really?"

"How cool!" The twins, Hisame and Kisame seemed very impressed with Eros' fight with the crook. Of course, this was given the fact that Aroura conveniently forgot to mention that he had killed the man. She didn't think that little factor would blow over too well with her classmates. In fact, that would precisely be the thing that you'd want to hide at all costs.

"I don't know how to feel about it really…" Aroura glanced at Eros, who seemed engaged in conversation with Tetsumaru and Hisaka a few feet over across from her. The three of them looked so stern together, like identical bookends.

"And he got your purse back," Kisame said in excitement.

"All that with Amnesia! Pretty impressive if I do say so myself," Hisame bragged.

"You guys just don't understand," Aroura was a bit dejected. She didn't see what was so heroic about the situation and she really didn't think that the twins should try and glorify it. The events played in her head over and over again, like an eternally skipping record. Eros had killed and truth be told, it frightened her.

"What is there not to understand?" Hisame's facial expression a little annoyed at the girl. "Your cousin just beat up a crook for you and you can't even be grateful. Any girl would love it if a man stuck up for them like that. You don't find many like that these days." She told her. Honestly, Aroura acted as if she didn't care about the fact that he had saved her from getting robbed, beaten or even raped. Hisame thought that it was pretty insensible of the black-haired girl to act in such an ungrateful manner.

"I am thankful," Aroura replied. "It's just that…Never mind." She stopped herself from saying anything further, knowing that it would be stepping into dangerous territory to dare say anything more. She wanted to let the twins know how she felt, but she didn't want anything to cause tension between them and Eros and this was definitely something that would considerably alter their opinions of him. "You wouldn't know or understand…"

"Well, we can't if you don't give us the chance," Kisame reasoned.

"He seems like a good fighter. Is he in any clubs?" Hisame asked, trying to change the subject. She knew that this was getting them nowhere.

"No, he isn't."

"Ever thought about entering him into the SayaTouya Martial Arts Club? If he likes to fight, he'd love it there!" Kisame offered, always in the mood for a new member in a club that she was a part of. It would definitely be cool to fight with someone like Eros.

In Aroura's mind, the event played yet again.

The man's body flying into the wall.

The thud of his corpse as it made impact.

Blood and spit sprayed into the air.

His limp form falling to the ground-dead.

The look in Eros' eyes as he spoke to her of the incident.

"I don't know…" Aroura didn't want this to happen to anyone in her class. This was definitely not a good idea in her book. If he killed a student…Then the cat would definitely be out of the bag and far worse circumstances awaited them.

"Oh come on," Kisame pressed, putting her arm around the girl's neck and smiling at her. "I'll go ask him for you." She replied and walked off towards the direction of the robot.

"What?" The now-confused girl commented as if everything had computed a few seconds behind its normal pace. "Hey! Wait!" She cried, finally having the information sink in as she ran to catch up with the spunky girl.

"Hey Eros!" Kisame greeted the Syntacom kindly as she approached him. The group of three all turned their attention to the twin.

"Oh, hey there Kisame," Hisaka greeted.

"Hi! Oh Eros, Aroura was talking about how you beat up some crook for her!" She commented, seeming all too happy and anxious about the incident.

"What?" Hisaka blinked in confusion.

"Yes," Eros answered all too calmly.

"That means you can fight pretty good huh?" Kisame replied.

"I know several styles of martial arts," the Syntacom replied.

"So cool! You really should join!" The tomboyish twin beamed.

"I will if Aroura wants me to," Eros looked over his shoulder at the girl who stood only a few feet behind him with a frown on her face and her hair shading her eyes.

"I don't mind, if you really want to," Aroura told him in a distant voice, seeming detached from her answer.

"Yes, I do," he replied with a nod of his head.

"First you have to pass the initiation," Kisame stated, knowing the standard procedures of the initiation process.

"Initiation?" The robot questioned, although his voice only held a hint of curiosity to it.

"I'll inform Asagi," Hisaka noted.

'Asagi?'

"I'll alert Chacha of this incident. I'm sure she'd like to attend," Tetsumaru informed.

'I hope he'll hold back his powers…If he doesn't I'll be thrown in jail…' Aroura thought momentarily, then decided that she needed to discuss something with the Syntacom. "Eros…"

"Yes, Aroura?"

"Excuse me," she told her other friends as she pulled Eros a few feet away from the others so the two of them could discuss what to do on the matter. The school girl wanted to inform him on not killing her classmates. "Promise me…" she pleaded.”Promise me that you won't kill anyone."

"I promise," Eros replied, actually sounding sincere.

To Be Continued…

Songs Listened To While Writing This:

Love Rollercoaster- Red Hot Chili Peppers