“There’s the welding torch calling the exhaust thrusters hot,” Darrick chirped. Alex glared at his friend, but he couldn’t really deny that since he’d done the same thing to Kazekiri just minutes ago.
Gabrielle’s hair, long and silver tresses that went all the way down to her hips, trailed along the floor as she knelt before the unconscious doctor. Her current outfit was a pink, sleeveless dress with a frilly hem, which showed off her wonderfully lean legs. Because she was crouched, Alex could see her strong thighs and calves. He could also see the white panties she had worn that day. Because her skin was healthy and fair, the dress complimented her nicely.
While her inhuman beauty caused heads to turn, two other features made Gabrielle different from other girls. Her ears and wings. Long and pointed, the girl’s ears wiggled up and down, and her wings, jutting from a pair of holes cut into her dress, were each about half a meter in length and covered in feathers of the purest white. They, more than anything, denoted Gabrielle’s status as an angelisian.
“Oh, Alex!” Gabrielle chirped. She let go of Dr. Gideon and stood up, letting him fall to the floor.
Crack!
Alex winced as the man’s head smacked against the tiles. He didn’t like Dr. Gideon. The man was a pervert who ogled and inappropriately touched women under the pretense of being a doctor and was not to be trusted. However, being kicked through a wall by an overpowered angelisian was something that no one deserved.
“I’m glad to see you!” Gabrielle beamed at him. It was such a sunny smile that Alex couldn’t help but notice the small trail of sweat running down his temple. “Have you finished whatever it was you were doing?”
Alex’s lips involuntarily twitched. “If by ‘whatever I was doing,’ you mean ‘am I finished waiting for you?’ Then yes, I am.”
“Yay!” Gabrielle pumped a fist into the air. “I’m done with my physical examinations and you’re done with whatever you were doing, which means we can finally leave this place and go have some fun with Alice and Selene!”
“Right.”
“By the way, why are you holding Kiri-Kiri?”
“Mm?” Alex looked down at Kazekiri, and then back at Gabrielle. “I ran into her on the floor above us. We were talking, and she passed out from exhaustion.”
“No,” Darrick said, shaking his head. “I don’t think that’s why she passed out.”
“Hush, you. Anyway, I couldn’t just leave her after she passed out like that, so I decided to bring her to the medical wing.”
Darrick wiped a tear from his eyes. “That’s Alex for you. He’s always showing kindness to others! It’s the manliest thing a man can do!”
“Stop talking about how all my actions are manly!” Alex tossed a glare at Darrick, who whistled innocently and looked away. Sighing, he directed his gaze back toward Gabrielle. “Anyway, can you tell me what happened here? I’d really like to know why you kicked this man through a wall. He might be a lecherous bastard, but I’m not entirely sure he deserved that.”
Gabrielle had the decency to look embarrassed. “Ah, well, he used this Taylor-thingy to test my reflexes. He did this thing where he tapped my knee with it to see how strongly I reacted and, well…”
“You kicked him straight through a wall.” Alex deadpanned.
Gabrielle bonked herself on the head in what he guessed was embarrassment, though she didn’t look the least bit embarrassed.
“Tee-hee.”
He sighed. “‘Tee-hee,’ she says.”
Alex suddenly felt really old. He liked Gabrielle. He liked her alot. If she were a little less naive and they weren’t pretending to be engaged, he would have probably asked her out on a date by now, but sometimes, this girl made him feel like he’d aged by several decades.
Is this what everyone else feels when they’re dealing with me after I blow something up? If so, I’ll have to apologize to Karen and all of the other people I’ve wronged.
That meant he’d be making a lot of apologies. Alex couldn’t even begin to guess how many people he’d wronged. Just how much property damage had he caused in the last two years anyway? It had to be a lot.
“Anyway, let me just find an empty room to put Kiri-Kiri in, and then we can leave.”
“Why don’t you just put her in the room I came from? It’s empty now.”
“Good idea.”
Alex walked through the large hole in the wall and set Kazekiri down on the examination table. He felt a little uncomfortable about leaving her in a room that anyone could just enter, but he consoled himself by promising to call for a nurse to watch over her.
Once he was back outside, he stood before Gabrielle. Darrick was kneeling next to Dr. Gideon, poking the man’s face and watching it twitch.
“All right.” Alex clapped his hands together as if removing imaginary dust. “You ready to go, Gabby?”
Gabrielle pumped a fist into the air. “You bet I am!”
Seeing her so excited caused him to smile. Her enthusiasm was truly contagious.
“Okay, then, let’s get a nurse over here and head off!”
“Right!”
As Alex and Gabrielle cheered, Darrick decided to burst their bubble. “I hate to be the one to ruin your excitement, but, uh, what are we going to do about him?” he asked, pointing at the still unconscious doctor.
“Uh…”
“Um…”
Alex and Gabrielle looked at each other. They couldn’t just leave Dr. Gideon there, could they? That wouldn’t be right. Unfortunately, neither of them knew what to do. The examination table was already taken, and they didn’t know where else to put him.
“Maybe we can just set him on the chair?” Gabrielle suggested, cupping her chin in a sage-like manner and nodding to herself.
Alex also nodded. “That could work. We’ll just set it up so that it looks like he fell asleep while sitting on his chair. He’ll never even realize that you kicked him through a wall.”
“Do you really think that’s going to work, Alex?” Darrick asked. “I mean, discarding the fact that I doubt he’s going to suffer a random bout of amnesia, there’s still that really big hole in the wall.”
“Be quiet and help me put the good doctor in that chair, Darrick.”
“The way you said that just now was so manly!”
“Seriously, stop that already!”
3
Selene Metronome watched as Alex’s little sister, Alice, kicked her feet back and forth underneath the table. Caught between her upper lip and nose was a stylus. With her fists tucked underneath her chin and her gaze turned toward the ceiling, the 14-year-old girl looked downright bored. Sitting on the table in front of her was a tablet.
“Aren’t you supposed to be doing your homework?” Selene asked as she wiped down the countertop. “I’m pretty sure your brother wouldn’t approve of you just staring off into space like that.”
With her long brown hair waving around as she swayed in her seat, Alice turned to stare at her with doe-like brown eyes that were half-lidded in boredom. The girl, dressed in simple pants and a light-yellow T-shirt that went past her knees, eventually stopped staring and dropped her head onto the table.
“Who cares? My brother is troublesome.”
Selene resisted a sigh. Alice never did anything unless she was either forced to or blackmailed into it... or offered sweets as a reward. She was quite possibly the laziest individual that Selene had ever met, which struck her as odd because her brother was probably the most motivated person in the entire galaxy. He was so gung-ho about his desire to become a hero and inventing that he caused property damage. How a pair of siblings could be so different was beyond her.
“You shouldn’t say such things about your brother. You know that he works very hard to make sure you’re happy.”
“I guess.”
“Alex is a really good person. He’s always looking out for others. I remember when he saved me from that strange alien monster three weeks ago.”
Selene
still didn’t know everything about that time, only that she’d been kidnapped by an alien. Karen Kanzaki had told her, in confidence, that there were some aliens living among them. Most apparently tried to blend into human society and were therefore harmless, but there were a few who came here so they could commit crimes without the galaxy at large getting in their way.
She was still shocked to learn that aliens existed.
“I guess.”
“His dream is to be a hero like his father. I think it’s wonderful that he’s now one step closer to following in his father’s footsteps, don’t you?”
“Not really. I think it’s troublesome.”
Selene dropped the rag that she was using to wipe the plasteel display, crossed her arms, and huffed. “Is ‘troublesome’ the only word you know?”
“I also know mendokuse.”
“I don’t even know what that means.”
“It means troublesome.”
Selene found her right eyebrow twitching, but she stopped it, knowing that revealing her frustration wouldn’t help anything. Alice was a stubborn individual. Selene had never been able to make the girl do something that she didn’t want to. Alex could, but he had some kind of magic power over Alice, and he was her brother.
Ding!
Just then, the double-door to her parent’s sweet shop slid open. Selene turned her attention away from the lazy girl. A smile appeared on her face as Alex and Gabrielle wandered through the doors and stepped onto the black and white tiles.
“Alex, Gabrielle. It’s nice to see you two!”
“Hey, Selene.”
“Selene!”
Laughing as Gabrielle rushed up and pulled her into a hug, Selene did her best to ignore the way her bones creaked and groaned as she hugged back. Gabrielle was really strong. This was something that Selene had discovered after they started spending time together. Her hugs felt like they could bend durasteel bars.
“How was your check up?” Selene asked as Gabrielle broke away.
“Boring,” was Gabrielle’s immediately reply. “I had to sit around for several hours while some old guy poked and prodded me. It wasn’t fun at all.”
“He didn’t touch you inappropriately, did he?” Alex asked suddenly.
“No,” Gabrielle answered, and then she paused. “At least, I don’t think so. What would be considered inappropriate?”
Even though she didn’t know Gabrielle that well, she could tell from the confused look on the other girl’s face that Gabrielle was asking that question in all seriousness. She glanced at Alex. His resigned smile and mild blush told her a lot about what he was thinking.
“Selene?”
“I’ll field her question,” Selene assured her friend. His grateful smile warmed her heart. That said, she had no intention of actually answering Gabrielle. She hoped the girl would forget about it soon once she distracted her giddy friend with sweets.
Alex walked over to Alice and placed a hand on his younger sister’s head. “How’s your homework coming along?”
The expression on Alice’s face, which was best described as “I’m screwed”, seemed like an apt demeanor for her. Selene wondered if it was right of her to feel slightly vindicated at the look on the young girl’s face.
“Um, it’s going well enough… I guess…”
Alex glanced at her tablet, which Alice tried to hide from him. Judging from the dry expression on his face, she hadn’t succeeded. Selene hid her smile.
“You know that there won’t be any dessert for you if you don’t finish your homework, right?”
“I know, I know.” Alice groaned. “But homework is so troublesome.”
“Keep using that word and there will be no more strawberry cheesecake parfaits in your future for at least a month.”
“Urk!”
“Hey, hey, Selene. What sort of touching is inappropriate?” Gabrielle asked.
This girl was really going to make her answer that, wasn’t she?
“Um… I’ll tell you later.” Selene tried to keep her smile in place. “When there isn’t a boy around to hear our conversation.”
Gabrielle tilted her head, and Selene was taken aback by how cute the girl appeared. Her eyes were sparkling with inquisitiveness, her lips were pursed in a way that even Selene found seductive, and the way her long, silver hair swayed was truly eye-catching.
She could see why Alex was so enamored with her.
“Is talking about this around a boy bad?” asked Gabrielle.
Selene nodded. “Yes. It’s very bad.”
“Oh.” Gabrielle paused, thought about her words, and then accepted them with nod. “Okay.”
Selene sighed in relief. Potentially embarrassing crisis averted.
For now, at least.
4
An excited Gabrielle was a sight to behold. Her smile was inspiring, and the enthusiasm she displayed never failed to make him smile in return.
After picking up Selene and Alice, they headed for the shopping district. Gabrielle had been begging him to take her shopping. He’d asked her why she couldn’t go with Selene, Ryoko, and Sarah, his assumption being that she’d have more fun with her girlfriends than she would with him. Her answer had surprised him.
“Because you’re the person whose opinion I care about the most.”
Those words, more than anything, had been the deciding factor in his decision. He wanted to make Gabrielle happy. If going shopping with her and offering his opinion on her clothing—he would admit to knowing nothing about fashion—made her happy, then that was what he would do.
As they walked into a large store, Gabrielle grabbed his hand. He felt a jolt. Her hands were so soft and warm. It was still surprising. She worked on machines with him for hours every day, but while his hands were covered in callouses, hers remained softer than memory foam.
“Come on, Alex! Let’s go, let’s go!”
“I’m coming. Stop dragging me.”
Alex nearly stumbled as Gabrielle dragged him through the store. Footsteps behind them let him know that Alice and Selene were following them. He looked at Gabrielle, whose bright expression radiated a joy that few could match and smiled.
Well… so long as she’s happy.
5
Alice followed her big bro and Gabrielle at a sedate pace. Selene walked beside her. Glancing at the girl out of the corner of her eye, she zeroed in on the dark-skinned woman’s resigned and somewhat sad expression.
“Aren’t you going to catch up to them?” she asked, even though it was troublesome. Not saying anything would have been more troublesome.
Selene appeared startled. “Excuse me?”
“Why are you walking back here with me? You should be up there with the two of them.”
She nodded at the pair. Gabrielle had dragged Alex into the dress section and was asking for his opinion on strapless red dress with golden rhinestones along the hem. Alex’s face was red as he tried to stutter out his opinion to the enthusiastic girl.
He probably doesn’t know what to say. My bro is an idiot when it comes to anything that doesn’t involve fighting and inventing.
Selene’s smile seeped sadness like a cracked fuel line. “I think I’d just be in their way.”
“Are you saying that because you actually mean it, or are you just trying to distance yourself from my bro because you love him and don’t want to get hurt now that he has Gabrielle?”
“H-how did you—I mean, what are you talking about?” Selene asked, trying to conceal her blush.
“That was a terrible attempt at hiding your feelings.” Alice deadpanned.
Selene winced, then, in a low voice, she asked, “how long have you known?”
“Since my bro graduated,” Alice answered. “Every time I’ve seen you, whether it was in the hallway or when he’d take me to your parent’s shop, you’ve always had this look on your face. When he’s gone, you’re not smiling as much. When he’s with you, you’re a lot happier.” She shrugged. “Doesn’t take
a genius to figure out why.”
Silence elapsed between them. Gabrielle grabbed several more clothes and, taking Alex by the hand again, she pulled him along behind her. They were probably going to the changing room.
“I think Gabrielle is a better match for Alex than I am,” Selene admitted at last.
“Hm… I won’t deny that my bro and Gabrielle are a truly troublesome match, but Gabrielle apparently doesn’t have a problem with polygamy, so it could work out if you’re open minded.”
“Huh… that’s interest—hold on. What was that?” Selene looked at Alice in shock.
“Gabrielle… she apparently doesn’t see a problem with other people being in love with Alex, according to Jasmine, though she seems to think Gabrielle was trying to trick her. Anyway, let’s go. I’m sure Bro is waiting for us to rescue him from his troublesome predicament.”
Alice walked off. After several seconds, footsteps rushed up behind her.
“You were kidding about that polygamy thing, right? You weren’t serious, right? Come on, that’s not funny, Alice. Tell me you were joking.”
Alice didn’t answer.
It was too troublesome.
6
Alex stood outside of the changing room, trying to look as inconspicuous as possible. He wasn’t jittery because he was going clothes shopping with a girl. Certainly not. He just wasn’t used to being stared at so much. Alex could practically feel the eyes of everyone on him, laughing at him, teasing him. They were probably having fun at his expense, the jerks.
“Alex!”
Gabrielle suddenly pulled the curtain open. Alex turned around.
“Are you already finished getting—what the heck are you doing?!”
“There’s something missing from this outfit,” Gabrielle said.
“Never mind that! Close the curtain!”
She wasn’t wearing any clothes. Bare as the day she had been born, Gabrielle’s breasts were fully visible. Her large chest was truly magnificent. Alex had once heard the term blaster cannons and felt they were an apt description. Like two great mountains rising from her chest, they were capped with light pink nipples.
A Most Unlikely Hero, Vol 4 Page 3