Chapter 23 - The Humour Society

The Humour Society
Naluri kicked the batmobile door open and ran up to KITT, who was driving onto the beach of Barbados nearby. Three doors of KITT opened, Alice, Ilse and Lynette getting out of the car.

"Naluri?" asked Ilse, confused.

"Which of you can fly the fastest?" Naluri asked frantically.

"Mach 2," instantly answered Alice. Lynette shook her head, her Striker Units unable to pass Mach 1.

"I need you to take me to a flying aircraft carrier."

"I need a second eye," pointed out Alice, "I can't-" Alice was unceremoniously slapped in the face by Ilse. Reeling back a step, Alice reopened her eyes to see, quite literally, that her depth perception was back.

"Get out of here," ordered Ilse, both of her eyes missing her pupils, both now possessed by Alice, "And sorry for hitting you... I did not realise you were that close."

Alice took Naluri on her back, "If you want my attention, squeeze my shoulders." Naluri wondered why that was necessary when Alice sprouted her angel wings and shot off the ground. Redirecting her orientation northwards, Alice blasted off with a thunderous roar. Immediately passing the speed of sound, talking between the two was now pointless.

Lynette watched them disappear into the evening night. "... Did they not make it in time?" Ilse asked, concerned.

"Alice won't be able to catch up with the Thunder Child," pointed out Lynette, "The Thunder Child was much faster."

"Excuse me," began a male voice behind them. Both Lynette and Ilse turned their heads, the latter out of habit. "Please allow me to explain," requested Haruki, with a serious face, holding the death list.

Time was ticking as Alice zoomed through the skies, her eyes scanning the horizon for a 'flying aircraft carrier'. Catching a glimpse of blue in the distance to the side, Alice rolled in the air to point towards it. This sudden movement caused Naluri to open her eyes. She shook her head. She was losing focus.

"Sasaki, huh?" repeated Lynette, rather unimpressed. Haruki had explained what Naluri had in turn explained to him on the batmobile and the events the two had at the asylum. While the details he had on Sasaki were rather vague, Ilse, Lynette and KITT could fill the blanks in themselves.

"Hmm... Well, even though she does not seem to be helping..." conjectured Ilse, "She does not seem to be getting in the way. I mean, she is allowing Naluri and Haruki to run around freely. And allowing us to cooperate."

"With great power comes great responsibility," noted Lynette, with sorrow, "If you can stop suffering, shouldn't you do so?"

"Hmm..." was all Ilse could say in reply.

Haruki meanwhile was looking up in the sky. He noticed the shapes of warships hovering above the ocean. He pointed at them and looked at Lynette, the only one of the three with eyes, "Are those the SOS Thunder Children?"

"Yes," nodded Lynette, "They've been there ever since Haruhi died. Why?"

Haruki looked back at the ships, "For some reason, I feel some sort of connection..."

As Alice approached the helicarrier, she and Naluri could see the HMS Thunder Child hovering directly underneath. Naluri noted that at this proximity there was no chance of Rin or Sora not noticing Alice and Naluri outside via the Thunder Child sensor systems. Unless Sasaki interfered. Alice slowed to a stop outside a door on the side of carrier. "Did you want to go inside?" she asked.

"Yeah, turn sideways," requested Naluri, summoning another Subtle Knife blade. She had lost her glass-breaking ring but Alice wouldn't be able to fly through any of the windows anyway. With quick swipes, Naluri cut the bolts tying the door to the craft, the door falling towards the ocean before. However, at the same time, the Thunder Child made a groaning noise and began to fall too, indicating the tractor beam had been deactivated. "No..." she mouthed. Naluri jumped off Alice's back onto the helicarrier. "Go!" she yelled at Alice, "It's going to explode at any moment! Get away!"

"Where do you want to go?" asked Alice, calmly.

"Just go, Alice!" shouted Naluri.

Alice slapped Naluri across the face, "Where do you want to go?" she repeated, threateningly.

"Containment..." murmured Naluri, shocked at Alice's reaction, bringing a hand up to her cheek.

Alice looked up at the directions posted on the wall in front of them that were as this was a main entrance to the vessel. She easily caught sight of Containment and lost no time picking Naluri up and breaking the speed of sound again, making incredibly tight turns and keeping an eye on passing directions. They eventually made it into the main room where Superman and Superboy-Prime were fighting, Prime glowing a bright red. Alice attempted to ignore them and fly straight past but Prime suddenly exploded in a rapidly expanding ball of fire. With fire at her heels, Alice finally reached Containment. She could hear jumbled speech coming from ahead. Taking a final sharp turn into a sideroom, her wings disappeared in a shower of white feathers, her remaining momentum used to make Alice skid across the floor next to the very much surprised Black and White. Naluri raised her hand and summoned her bubble shield, throwing it at the ground. She finally succumbed to her exhaustion and passed out, as the helicarrier exploded in a blaze of glory.

Black gasped for air as her head rose above water, the burning remains of the helicarrier littering the ocean around her.

"Hey," called Ælious from the passenger seat of a helicopter hovering next to her. He offered her hand up, which she took with little hesitation. On the driver's side, KC pulled White up onto the landing skids of the aircraft. Across all three back seats was Sora's containment pod that had been. The bubble shield had not completely covered the cuboid, several corners completely burnt off. However, this was enough for Black and White to start ripping the pod apart, throwing the metal arms and cables into the water below. KC began flying the helicopter back southwards. Alice was sat on the skid next to Ælious, keeping tight hold of the sleeping Naluri.

"Thanks for picking us up," acknowledged Alice to Ælious.

"As always, it's thanks to KC," smiled Ælious, "There's not much I can do without her." KC blushed next to him. "You've got two eyes now?"

"They're both Ilse's. We left her and Lynette back on Barbados."

"Is she okay?" asked Black. Everyone turned to see Black was asking about Sora, all foreign objects completely removed. In terms of human life signs, she would be dead, completely immobile and unresponsive.

"She's intact," comforted KC, "Just give me a little time to reboot her. Wirelessly." KC had learnt to clarify this fact all the time as it would often seem she was doing absolutely nothing.

"So, err... White," began Black, she glanced at Ælious and KC then back at White, trying to hint at something.

"Oh, no worries, Black," grinning White, holding in a laugh at Black's way of communicating, "They're Humour Society."

"Humour Society?" repeated Alice with curiosity.

"You know the Anti-Humour Society?" began White.

Before either White could continue on or Alice could interrupt, Ælious spoke up, "Alice was imprisoned in Gensokyo since Doomsday, only released a few hours ago. It'd be best to start from the beginning."

"Ah, okay. Anyway, back on Doomsday, obviously there were people who didn't want the Three Empresses from taking over the world. This became a fourth faction, basically the rebels. However, we were disorganised and comparatively weak and couldn't do anything of use during Doomsday before the Barrier went up. I ended up in Yamaha, where Doom essentially became the leader of Yamaha's Anti-Humour Society. As the top researcher, he was one of the more powerful non-android figures. Now Yamaha had some security holes to allow for a non-android enforcement squad, the Black Squad. Doom made use of these weaknesses to allow for members of the Anti-Humour Society to remain undetected. However, due to Yahama's other security measures, our progress was incredibly minimal."

"In Gensokyo," Ælious continued, "The Anti-Humour Society went on almost uninterrupted as Gensokyo relied mostly on other newcomers for security. It was really only a matter of time before the fall of Gensokyo. The biggest problem was bringing down the Hakurei Barrier without Haruhi just taking over."

"Wait. You're a member of the Anti-Humour Society?" inquired Alice, with a hint of disappointment in Ælious.

Ælious sighed, "Yes. Back then, it made sense to fight back. But with hindsight, making a fourth faction just made things worse." Ælious sighed once before continuing, "I used Cirno to get on Gensokyo's good side. To keep Gensokyo off our backs."

"... Was she aware of this?"

"No. She wasn't."

"So the Anti-Humour Society knew about the DeLorean's garage from the start?"

"Actually, I kept it to myself. Gensokyo's Society easily had enough potential behind them. I didn't feel like adding more fuel to the fire so I didn't pass the information on." Based on KC's lack of response and the fact that she was Ælious' android, Alice guessed she was also part of the Anti-Humour Society.

"Obviously," maintained White, "Part of the Anti-Humour Society ended up in North High but obviously, they could do nothing against Haruhi. No doubt she knew all about the Society."

"Why the name?" asked Alice.

"Haruhi, Hakurei, Hatsune. Ha Ha Ha. Basically, anti-Haruhi, anti-Reimu, anti-Miku."

Alice had a question on her mind but didn't want to ask it, in case it gave them any ideas, "... So what now?"

"Wish the Thunder Child and its crew the best of luck," nodded White. This partially answered Alice's question. Seeing Alice's surprised expression, White added, "Extremely recently, we founded the Humour Society, not so much an Anti-Anti-Humour Society but more of a rebellious and covert part of the Anti-Humour Society trying to return to a world with The Unwritten Law. Shepard and the Normandy succeeded in keeping Mikuru away from Anti-Humour but we didn't want to resort to time travel. Our plan was to find Reimu and free Sasaki, allowing her to reset the world."

"And then we received Sora's transmission about the crew of the Thunder Child's plan to use the DeLorean, one member of which being Sasaki," noted Ælious, "I thought if Sasaki thinks time travel is best then let them try. We won't be able to catch up with the Thunder Child but KC's passed the message to Gumi, Yuki and Nitori to back them up. The DeLorean's confirmed to be able to change time, unlike Mikuru."

"Umm..." started Alice, looking at Naluri's exhausted face, "About that. Based on how this Naluri greeted us, I think this one's from the future. She came to us in Barbados and was in a hurry to get to the helicarrier. Even though she was definitely on the Thunder Child when I left it."

"Both Haruhi and Miku still died though," pointed out Black. Alice looked at Black to see that Black had removed both her gloves and rolled up her sleeves, blood covering her hands from her bleeding knuckles. Alice reeled back in fright. "Wha- What's the matter?" asked Black, confused.

Ælious turned to see what the issue was, "Oh, Alice has a fear of blood. KC, could you lower the helicopter to sea level?"

As the helicopter lowered, Black attempted to kneel down on the skid to wash the blood off in the ocean but Alice took her right hand. Alice's hand glowed a bright white, sealing Black's broken skin. She let go, her hand now covered in blood. "Y-your other hand, p-please," stammered Alice, her outstretched arm shaking. She had a dizzy expression on her face, her eyes attempting to but failing to not look at her red hand. Black offered her left hand, Alice healing that one too. Both Alice and Black washed off the red stains in the water, Black also cleaning off her gloves.

"... Did they not succeed?" questioned White, referring to Naluri's time travel, "Would it be safe to wait for Naluri to wake up naturally?"

"Maybe we should ask Haruki?" suggested KC, as the helicopter passed over Barbados. The helicopter headlights illuminated Lynette, Ilse, KITT, Haruki and the Batmobile on the beach.

"... Is that... a male Haruhi?" asked a shocked White, recognising the yellow hairband.

Before the helicopter landed, Lynette ran up to Alice, ignoring everyone else, "We need to chase the Thunder Child!" she exclaimed, "Marisa dies on the Thunder Child when it reaches New York." White grit her teeth. Sora finally completed her reboot scan and woke up with a start, KC having uploaded the details of the conversation to her.

Black quickly patted Sora on the head fondly but indicated that something more important needed their attention, "That exit portal helicopter that brought Alice, Ilse and Cirno here for the tradeoff should still be parked where we left it. The entrance one in Canada should still be around the area. It might be possible to intercept the Thunder Child from the north." She jumped off the chopper. "It might cut it close though." She began running towards the helicopter's location, everyone following, leaving Ælious' helicopter and the Batmobile behind.

"Konata said Sakuya would likely be captured and sent to Arkham Asylum in Brazil," input Haruki, running up to Black. Everyone had questions to ask but many had to wait.

"You'll never get there in time," argued Black, "Yamaha has no portal locations in Gensokyo."

"I can control the SOS Thunder Children," commented Haruki as the hyperdrives of every single SOS Thunder Child activated with a bellow. Attuned to Haruhi, it turned out the SOS Thunder Children were also attuned to Haruki by extension.

"Fine. Head to the Asylum but take the helicopter's portal generator so we can travel between Yamaha portals if need be. The Thunder Child's generators are outdated so we can't use those."

"Also, Naluri mentioned an Append Project and that Gumi had a different body."

The look of realisation set on Black's face. "The Append Project's in The War Factory in Siberia but you need Vocaloid access codes to enter the Factory and to change Yamaha portal locations."

"I can do that," interjected KITT. This was when Black and White finally realised why a driverless car was following them.

"But even then we don't have their personalities."

"Surely they did backups of themselves?" suggested Ælious, "All smart androids should backup their file systems." He was talking from experience with KC.

"... Maybe..." replied Black, not at all sure. They reached the helicopter, still parked in its place, all alone in the area. "Remember," reminded Black as KITT remotely had the helicopter summon an orange-rimmed portal, "This is DeLorean time travel we're talking about. Don't mess around with the HMS Thunder Child. It could turn fatal. And keep in touch."

Ælious, Alice and Ilse went through the first portal, to the other portal helicopter, onto the roof of a multistory carpark. As Ælious began to work on removing the portal generator from the helicopter, Ilse looked over the wall with her single eye, given back by Alice, of the storey, "I have good and bad news."

"The good news?" asked Alice, kneeling behind the wall.

"We are at the Pentagon." The Pentagon was in Washington DC, not far from New York.

"And the bad news?"

"We are at the Pentagon." Confused, Alice looked over the edge to see a well lit and makeshift but very well equipped battalion camp with tanks and other military vehicles.

Black and Sora in KITT went through the second portal, to the War Factory, arriving on a dry runway. The sun was beginning to rise over the horizon. No one seemed to be around. "I was afraid I lost you, Sora," began Black with a smile. Sora looked depressed, not sure where to start with her questions. But KITT made a sudden swerve to the left as something burst out one of the passing warehouses to the right. Black looked through the back window to see a large tank with screw propulsion chasing them. "It's the Shagohod..."

Chaining the use of portals of the SOS Thunder Children, Haruki brought Lynette, White and KC as well as the portal helicopter almost immediately to Arkham Asylum, which had undergone a noticeable difference. "All the lights are on," murmured Haruki with concern, "They managed to get power back on again." He was holding onto the still Naluri on the deck of the lead Thunder Child as none of ships had accessible interiors.

"Just hold tight onto Naluri," commented White, jumping off the ship to ground below.

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