Chapter 3

The Three Deaths Chapter 3

"It's nice to have you on board again, Zina." Queen Cobo says.

"Thanks. I still can't get over this view, no matter how many times I see it." Zina says, looking out the front viewport of the starship.

"Hey, mom, have you tried orange juice?" Kiki asks excitedly as she walks onto the bridge.

"I have," Cobo replies. Zina could tell she is trying not to giggle at her daughter's silly query.

"Why don't we have any on board? It's fucking awesome!" Kiki says to her mom.

"I'll have your father bring some next time he comes over. How about that? Maybe we can even plant some orange trees?" Cobo can't help but share the same enthusiasm as Kiki.

"That would be so cool!" Kiki says gleefully.

"What else did you girls do?" Cobo turns to ask Zina.

"We went camping, ate marshmallows around a campfire, and the following day, we went fishing and swimming," Zina tells her.

"Did you have fun, Kiki?" Cobo doesn't generally show it, but Zina knows she worries about her daughter fitting in.

"Yeah, I did," Kiki says. "Those marshmallows were fucking awesome!" Zina notices a small smile on Cobo's face.

'Yes, yes they are," Cobo answers.

"So, what did you think of Mushoku Tensei?" Zina asks Cobo. While she finds it cute how much the attentive mother worries about her oblivious daughter, Zina isn't really one for all this mushy-feely stuff.

"I have only seen one other pervert bigger than Rudius Greyrat, and that is your father, Grant," Cobo tells Zina.

"You liked it, though, didn't you?" Zina says, smiling smugly at Cobo.

"I loved it; you know how much I love perverts. I did fall in love with your father, after all." Cobo says, putting her hand on Zina's shoulder and smiling back.

"I'll have to get To Love Ru for you. You're gonna love Momo. She's like an anime version of you." Zina takes great joy in sharing her love of anime.

"I look forward to it, " Cobo says, looking out into the void of space.

"So, why am I here, Cobo? I was on vacation." Zina switches to her serious mode.

"Ah, that. Your father said if I ever needed to borrow The Three Deaths again, all I had to do was ask. I needed your help, so I asked him. He said it was fine. Hence, here you are." Cobo calmly explains to Zina.

"Oh, okay. That checks out. So, what's the mission?" Zina asks.

"Let's wait until Bao gets here. There's no rush," Cobo says with a smile. Zina can't help but feel calm whenever she sees her smiling.

"Well, I've got two hours until she gets here. I'm gonna go get a milkshake and chill in my room; is that fine?" Zina asks Cobo. She sees the alien leader as a surrogate mother and always strives to treat her with the respect she deserves.

"That will be fine," replies Cobo.

Zina turns around and walks toward the corridor.

"Wait for me!" Kiki says as she runs after Zina.

"So, Kiki, any idea of why I'm here?" Zina asks Kiki as they walk down the starship's corridor.

"Yeah, we've got a bug problem on the ship," Kiki tells her.

"That's it? What kind of bug is it?" Zina asks, perplexed.

"The explosive kind," Kiki replies nonchalantly.

"Why does your mom need Bao then? Come on; I can do this by myself. Just stay behind, way behind me, when we reach it," Zina says.

"Okay," Kiki replies without hesitation.

Zina and Kiki run down the corridor toward the residential area. As they head to the room where the bug is, Kiki tells Zina what the bug has been doing.

"Here we are," Kiki says.

"Okay, you stay here. I'll go in and talk to him," Zina says to Kiki.

Zina presses her finger onto the keypad, and the door opens. Grant asked Cobo to ensure that The Three Deaths had full security access to any area of the ship so that they could do their job properly.

She enters the room and immediately spies a purple man with yellow hair staring out the window. He quickly turns to face her when he hears the door open.

"Who the hell are you?! I asked to be left alone," the purple man yells at Zina as soon as she enters the room.

"Yeah; well, the Queen got tired of waiting, so here I am." Zina snaps back just as aggressively.

"So, you're gonna die to make her happy?" The man replies with unearned confidence.

"You can't kill me; I died years ago. You might rip an arm off or something, but that's about it." Zina slowly walks towards him, her confidence rightfully earned through many bloody battles.

"Wait, are you a regenerator?" He asks, confused.

"You'll never live to find out," Zina says calmly, walking ever closer to her prey.

"Stop right there! I may not be able to kill you, but I bet it'll hurt like hell!" Zina could tell that the man was starting to get nervous as his body began to glow red.

"Yeah, I don't have nerve endings; I don't feel pain. I joke about being able to feel pain, though." Zina walks closer to him, enjoying the terror she's instilling in him.

"So, it'll all be for nothing?" The man was visibly shaking at this point.

"Yep," Zina says as she jumps on him and stabs him in the neck with a syringe.

The man falls to the floor as he passes out from the drug. His body goes back to its normal purple color. Zina couldn't help but think that was way too easy.

"Okay, it's clear. Come on in, Kiki." Zina yells toward the corridor.

Kiki walks into the room and sees the unconscious man on the floor.

"Cool. You got him?" Kiki knew how skilled The Three Deaths were, so she wasn't surprised that Zina could handle this on her own.

"Mom? Yeah, she got him." Kiki relays the status of the situation to her mom.

"Okay... Yeah, we'll leave him here." Zina could faintly make Cobo's voice coming out of Kiki's earpiece.

"Okay, I'll let her know," Kiki ends the call and turns to look at Zina.

"Mom says 'good job'," Kiki flashes Zina a thumbs up. "She is sending a security team over," Kiki explains the situation to Zina.

"Fucking Flanders Federations," Zina grumbles as she stands up.

Three blue men with green hair in security uniforms walk in and gather around the unconscious purple man.

"We'll take it from here, ladies," one of them says.

"No problem. It's milkshake time anyway." Zina exclaims with joy. "Come on, Kiki!" Zina grabs Kiki's hand and pulls her out towards the corridor.

"Okay," Kiki obediently follows her zombie sister.

After drinking their milkshakes, Zina and Kiki head back to the bridge.

"Really good job, Zina." Queen Cobo tells Zina as soon as she walks through the doorway.

"Thanks," Zina says to Cobo.

"I really thought the only way he was coming in was dead. You got him without even having to spill any blood. Color me impressed." Cobo says with a huge smile. If Zina could still blush, she would be beet-red by now. She quickly chokes back her feelings and maintains her calm work composure; she doesn't want Cobo to know how much the praise meant to her.

"Thanks. So, how many days have passed on Earth since I've been here?" Zina asks, trying to change the awkward situation.

"Three. I already sent Bao back," Cobo says.

"Well, in my head, I just saw her yesterday. This time displacement shit confuses the hell out of me, though." Zina can't wrap her head around how crazy time worked up her on the spaceship.

"As your father has told you many, many times, time is a man-made construct," Cobo says, smiling at her. While she loved mothering the girls, Cobo couldn't help but tease them sometimes.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's still strange. So, where are we headed?" Zina asks.

"You don't want to go back?" Cobo asks, honestly amazed that Zina would want to stay on board after finishing her job.

"Nah, this is still technically my vacation. I don't want to spend it alone at home. Might as well hang with you gals." Zina says with a smile.

"Okay, if that's what you want. We're heading to Crimonson." Cobo tells Zina. "We need to refuel."

"Oh, the City Planet? It reminds me of Coruscant from Star Wars. Let's go!" Zina says excitedly, pointing towards the viewport of the starship's bridge. She was excited to visit another planet; who else could spend their vacation doing this?

"You heard her, Helma. Create the wormhole," Cobo relays the order to her navigator.

"Yes, ma'am!" The little green man dressed in a black uniform responds and starts setting the coordinates.

Zina looks out into the vast expanse of space and sees a clear, liquid-looking ball appear in front of the ship. It's kind of like what happens in the movie Stargate, just without the machine.

"Heading into the wormhole now," Helma says.

The ship heads into the wormhole. Zina, and the rest of the crew, are suddenly blinded by a sharp flash of white light. After a few seconds, the next thing they see is the City Planet of Crimonson in front of them. The USS Jerry is a Cuck heads into the atmosphere of the planet towards the closest space station. It slowly descends in the direction of the refueling station. The ship stops once it is about five hundred feet above the planet.

"Okay, girls, you've got two days of leave," Queen Cobo states.

"Awesome!" Zina replies excitedly.

After deboarding the ship, Zina and Kiki walk down the streets of Buku Township. It's basically the starship refueling capital of the galaxy.

"Reminds me a bit of Houston," Zina thinks to herself after seeing the big refineries.

"Come on. Let's get one of those Uber thingies," Kiki says to Zina.

"Okay." Zina isn't surprised that rideshare companies are just as popular on other planets as they are on Earth.

These weren't the same vehicles as those back on Earth, though; these were flying cars. They crisscrossed across the sky in a similar formation to a highway back on Earth.

Kiki pulls out her cell phone and fiddles with it for about thirty seconds.

"Okay, there's one on the way," Kiki grins.

"I'm so glad dad was able to make our cell phones work on other planets," Zina says with a smile. Now she wouldn't have to worry about missing the latest anime episodes while she's out and about in the galaxy.

"It's probably Earth's greatest invention," Kiki tells Zina as a purple flying car pulls up in front of them.

"Here we are," Kiki says, opening the door to the flying car.

"How are you girls doing this fine day?" The yellow six-armed cabbie driver asks them as they board. He's wearing a blue and purple jacket with a black shirt underneath. Zina thought it was good to know that blue-collar workers dressed the same all over the universe.

"We're doing good," Kiki keeps up the pleasantries.

"Where to?" He asks the girls.

"We need a hotel," Zina responds.

"Something nice, preferably," Zina explains.

"You got it!" The alien replies as he punches in directions into his navigation unit.

The flying car begins to lift off the ground and joins the rest of the flying cars on the invisible highway. Numerous alien signs are floating to the right of the flying cars. 99.9999% of humans wouldn't be able to read it, but Zina and Kiki knew the language; it's Boontom. The Boontom were the original race here on this planet. Most galaxies have their own unique language or dialect; Zina and Kiki are masters of thousands of them. There are millions of known languages, though. Who knows how many more unknown ones also. Luckily, Grant's company, Shipman Enterprises, makes a communicator that slots behind the ear and under the skin and translates everything for them. They haven't had any problems communicating ever since.

After a twenty-minute ride in the flying car, Zina notices the nice change of scenery. They entered a much nicer and cleaner neighborhood as they make their way to their destination. The town where they landed was pretty shitty, as is customary for huge port cities. Many travelers from across the universe land there daily; not all of them are nice and friendly. Zina was glad to be out of there and in this much nicer corner of the world. There are fewer flying cars around and the buildings are not run down like they were where they landed. Zina could see a bunch of skyscrapers dotting the landscape, as well as some luxury hotels and plenty of parks.

Zina spies a sign in English that reads: "The Grant Shipman Casino."

"God damn it," she thinks to herself. She knows she shouldn't be surprised that her dad has his hands all over this planet, but she still finds it kind of shocking.

"Are we going to the Grant Shipman Casino?" Zina asks the driver, trying to hide the annoyance in her voice.

"Of course! You asked for nice. There's nowhere nicer on the whole planet," the driver says with a friendly smile.

"I guess I did," Zina can't help but sigh.

The flying car pulls up to the front of a large skyscraper with neon lights and a giant hologram of Zina and Kiki's dad, Grant Shipman, smoking a cigar and flashing credits. Zina can't help but lower her head in shame at how gaudy and gauche the entire display is; she only hopes that nobody finds out that she's related to him. She must admit, though, he is a good-looking guy in his 50s with jet-black hair and green eyes.

The flying car pulls to a stop at the entrance of the extravagant hotel. A servant slowly walks up to the car and opens the door for them.

"Welcome to The Grant Shipman Casino. Please put your ID finger on the pad." The green alien with long blue hair does not look too impressed by Zina and Kiki. In fact, Zina feels that he hates his job and he would rather be anywhere else. She notices he is wearing what could be considered a tuxedo back on Earth. She's pretty sure he's a slave forced to work for her dad.

"God damn it," Zina mutters under her breath.

"Get ready," She warns Kiki.

Kiki gives her a look that says, "Yeah, I know."

Zina hesitantly puts her thumb on the pad.

"Thank you," the servant says in his deadpan and uninterested tone as he pulls the pad away and looks at it.

His eyes suddenly widen, and he begins to break out in a heavy sweat. A terribly forced smile slowly appears on his face as he looks up. Zina's pretty sure he just shit his pants.

"Please don't make a big deal out of it," Zina says to him.

"O-Of c-c-course," he says with a trembling voice.

After a two-hour show of respect and constant apologies, Zina and Kiki are finally shown to their room. Of course, it's the best room on the planet; daresay, maybe even the whole galaxy. In fact, it's Grant's Presidential Room, equipped with a giant regal bust of him in the foyer that is easily visible as soon as one enters the room. When Grant comes here, this is obviously his personal room. It's rented out to big rollers when he's not here.

While almost the entire staff was prostrate and apologizing for two hours, Zina was pretty sure she saw the richest alien on the planet dragged out of the elevator by the security staff and kicked to the curb. She's pretty sure she heard gunshots a few seconds later.

"Oh well," she thought. That's just the way the world had always worked for her; the weak were pushed out of the way to make way for the strong.

"Oh, this is nice," Kiki says to Zina. Zina could see that Kiki had put little thought into what had just transpired; if only she could be so carefree.

"Yeah, but they didn't have to kill the guy who was staying in it before us!" Zina exclaims.

"Maybe he mouthed them off?" Kiki just shrugs it off.

"That is probably what happened," Zina tells herself. There was no point in thinking too much about it now; what's done, is done.

Looking around the room, she could see Grant's touch all around. Gold and marble everything, walls, ceiling, floors, counters. It was a celebration of excess and capitalism.

"Let's order some food," Kiki says.

"I think it's mostly Earth food," Zina tells her unfazed sister as she continues to take in the grandeur of their room.

"That's fine," Kiki says to Zina as she plops down on a giant couch that puts her entire house to shame.

"I need to get a milkshake. I haven't had one since... Tomorrow?" Zina says smiling at Kiki. She hates how teleporting to a spaceship docked in the vast expanse of space messes with her sense of time.

"That is the dumbest time displacement joke ever," Kiki says as she can't hold back her giggling.

"Ah, come on. That was funny," Zina says.

"No, no, it wasn't. Plus, when you get back home, it'll be about two hours after you left; if we stay here for two days." Kiki replies.

"Whatever," Zina says. She wants a milkshake-induced brain freeze, not a migraine.

The lights in the room all of a sudden shut off.

"GOD DAMN IT! I WANT A FEW DAYS OFF! IS THAT TOO MUCH TO ASK FOR, DAD?!" Zina finally snaps after everything that had happened today, or was it yesterday?

Because of the ectoplasm running through Zina's body, the darkness didn't bother her and actually made her feel safe. She's like a cat and can see perfectly in the dark.

"You can't get away from your training, Zina." A deep voice crackles through the communication device implanted in her ear.

"Hey, dad!" Kiki yells with joy.

"Hey, sweetie. Are you ready to kill some slaves?" Grant says to Kiki.

"Yep," Kiki says with a smile on her face.

"I'm not. I hate killing slaves. It's not right," Zina argues.

"Oh, be quiet, Zina. Your weapons are on the bed." Grant says to them.

Zina and Kiki walk into the bedroom and see two Samurai swords lying on the bed.

"You are so racist, dad," Zina growls into her com.

"Oh, hush. You're Japanese. I thought you'd like it. Plus, you're from the Shimadzu family, the greatest Samurai family ever. It should be right up your alley." Grant knows that Zina would follow orders and actually appreciate the Samurai sword, even if she sounds disgruntled.

"Fuck you, dad!" Zina yells into her communicator.

"I love you too, sweetie," Grant says with a chuckle.

Zina picks up her sword from the bed and feels the weight of it in her hand. She knows that it is an instrument of death, and by extension, so is she. It doesn't stop her from admiring the quality craftsmanship of the blade and how perfectly it fits in her hands. Kiki picks up her weapon as well, but instead of reflecting on its meaning, all she says is, "Cool."

"Are you ready?" Zina asks Kiki.

"Yep," Kiki replies. She swings the sword around a few times to get a feel for it.

"Stay behind me," Zina warns Kiki.

"Got it," Kiki says, smiling.

"Activate," Zina says into her communicator.

The nano suit Zina is wearing encircles her head and body like a suit of armor. A heads-up display appears in front of her eyes. It must be what Iron Man sees.

"Activate," Kiki says.

Nanobot crawls out from behind her neck like a liquid and covers her entire body in a nano suit similar to Zina's.

"You've got to wear something else, besides the nano suit," Kiki says to Zina.

"I wear pantsuits at work," Zina responds.

Zina and Kiki walk out of the luxury suite and into the hallway.

"I've got two coming up from the right hallway," Zina says while walking toward the danger.

"Got ya," Kiki says as she readies her blade.

A second later, two gigantic humanoid aliens are standing in front of Zina and Kiki. They are twice the size of Kiki and Zina and look like gladiators from Ancient Rome. The one in the lead swings an alien-looking ax at Zina. She and Kiki quickly jump out of the way. Zina pulls her sword out of its saya while ducking the follow-up swing. Zina does a quick turn and cuts through the gigantic alien's arm like butter. The arm with the ax falls to the ground with a loud bloody thump, and the alien cries out in pain as it grabs at the stump.

The second alien clumsily swings a large sword at Kiki as she dodges to the side and slides her sword across the alien's stomach, disemboweling him. His guts plop to the ground as torrents of green alien blood spray all over the hallway. He grabs at his guts and tries to shove them back into his body, but to no avail; after a few seconds, he falls over dead.

"I'm not killing them, dad." Zina angrily says into her communicator.

"Don't worry. That's what Kiki is there for," Grant smugly replies.

Zina turns to see Kiki decapitating the alien with the missing hand.

"You've always got a backup plan, don't you?" Zina can't help but feel used.

"Yep," he curtly replies.

After three hours of combat, Zina is tired, covered in blood, and missing her left arm.

Kiki decapitates the large gladiator alien that Zina attempted to spare.

"Good job, girls," Grant says through the communicator. "I think 66 is enough. They should get the message now."

Kiki walks over with Zina's detached arm and kneels down in front of her. She places the lifeless limb on the bloody stump, positioning it correctly. She then raises her arm and says, "Sugar."

Powdered sugar comes flying out of her wrist, like a diabetic Spider-Man, and saturates the area where the arm is separated. The arm begins to fuse to the shoulder with an audible hiss. The tendons and nerves starts forming new connections, allowing Zina to use her arm again.

"That should hold you until you get some more sugar in your body," Kiki says to Zina.

"Thanks," Zina says as she gets up.

The two of them walk from the pool area back into the hotel. There are bodies littered everywhere. The hotel staff has already begun cleaning up. There were quite a few surprised guests.

"They really shouldn't be surprised, knowing Grant runs this hotel and all the gladiators on this planet." Zina thinks to herself.

Grant is the largest slave owner in the known galaxy. He has enslaved thousands of planets, if not more. Cheap labor is where the money's at, according to him. That's why iPhones are made in China and not California.

Zina and Kiki walk into the Hollywood Cafe, one of the many restaurants at the casino. They are covered in nicks and bruises all over and drenched in blood from head to toe.

"Congratulations on your victory!" A cute grey alien in a blonde wig and a white Marilyn Monroe dress says to the girls.

"Thank you," Kiki says proudly. She smiles at the alien with a face covered in blood; Zina knows there's nothing scarier in the world than someone who enjoys bloodshed.

"Yeah, thanks," Zina says quietly, looking at the ground.

"Are you a re-generator?" The alien asks Zina.

"Kind of," Zina replies. She is in no mood to explain her situation to anyone right now. She needs to get more sugar into her body quickly.

"She's special," Kiki says, pointing her thumb at Zina.

"Well, have a seat anywhere you want. You're the new Champions!" She says with a bubbly smile as she saunters her way back to the counter to grab a few menus for the pair.

After the pair finds a nice booth, the alien comes up to them to take their order. Zina orders seven milkshakes; by the time she finishes the third one, her arm has fully reattached.

After eating dinner, they head back up to their hotel room.

As soon as they walk in, they find Queen Cobo sitting on the couch watching anime.

"Ah, there you girls are," Cobo says.

"Good job with the gladiator slaves," she says as she gives them a hearty slap on the back.

"Thanks, mom," Kiki says.

"Yeah, thanks," Zina says, looking away.

"You still won't kill, will you, Zina?" Cobo eyes Zina up and down, trying to gauge her reaction.

"It's not my favorite thing to do. I'll leave that to others," Zina coldly replies to her.

"I know, it's not for everyone," she says as she walks towards her. She knows Zina isn't her daughter, but she can't hold back the need to comfort her.

"It must feel strange. You are part of the deadliest hit squad in the known universe, and you don't like to kill." Cobo says in a motherly tone.

Cobo is now standing in front of Zina, trying to comfort the confused zombie girl. That's now how it looks like to Zina, though. To Zina, it looks like Cobo is looking down at her from a great height.

"I don't need to. I've got others to do that," Zina says, staring up at Cobo. Her voice is trembling from fear and respect.

"You do know that you're on the bad guy's side, right?" Cobo asks.

"I know. I like being bad; I just don't think I need to kill anyone to do that. I can be bad without it," Zina says.

"All right, if that's how you feel," Cobo says, turning around and heading to the master bedroom.

"You two can take the guest room," is all the girls hear as she takes control of the master bedroom.

"Okay, mom," Kiki says to her, as oblivious as always.

"Fine," Zina says, defeated.

"Make sure to wash off all of that blood from those nano suits in the shower," Cobo says as she closes the door to the master bedroom.

Zina takes her time in the shower; she always feels calm as the water washes away all the blood and her worries. She's had a stressful couple of days, not a great start to her vacation. She knows that there is very little she can do to change her situation; she's not even sure if she would want to. Zina loves what she does and enjoys all the time she spends with her sister and the rest of her family. She just feels that the killing is too much, but deep down, she knows that this is what she was made to do. She takes a few minutes to let the warm water of the shower head pelt her cold dead body and let the stress and worry of her days flow down the gold-plated drain.

After taking her shower, Zina walks into the living area, where Kiki is trying on new clothes. She admires her sister's demeanor to whatever situation she is in, and a part of her is jealous of it.

"Figured we could use some new clothes. You didn't even bring anything," Kiki says to Zina while trying on a t-shirt with Uzaki from Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out on it.

"She's got some big titties don't she?" Kiki says, looking down at the girl on her shirt.

"That's Uzaki. She's well known for her weapons of weeb destruction," Zina says, smiling at Kiki.

"I wish mine were that big," Kiki says dejectedly.

"You wouldn't be able to fight well if you did," Zina points out. She herself isn't blessed with an ample bosom, and she's always been okay with it; she doesn't understand what everybody's obsession with giant tits is all about. Zina knows that all tits are fine, and there's nothing wrong with being part of the itty bitty titty committee.

"Oh, shit; you're right. I guess I'm okay with mine then," Kiki says while putting her hands on her chest.

After two days of rest and relaxation, Kiki, Cobo, and Zina make their way back to the USS Jerry is a Cuck.

Before heading back to the ship, Grant sent word to Zina that her aunt from her mom's side had died and that her funeral was in four days. Zina didn't know everybody from her extremely large extended family, but she knew it was customary to attend a family member's funeral. She also knew that death was never really the end.

"Well, it was good hanging out with you, sis," Kiki says to Zina. Kiki awkwardly embraces Zina in a warm hug. She still wasn't used to all the weird Earth customary greetings and goodbyes.

"Yeah, well, I've got a funeral to attend," Zina reciprocates the awkward hug.

"When was the last time you saw your cousin Rin or her family?" Cobo asks.

"Before my untimely death and rebirth," Zina responds as she leans in for a hug with Cobo.

"They're gonna be in for a shock," Cobo chuckles.

"Oh, yeah. That's for sure," Zina says, laughing.

"Well, I'll send you to your house in Tokyo then," Cobo says as she throws a glance at her navigator to start the process.

"Thanks," Zina says. "It was good hanging out with you two. I hope we can do it again." Despite all that had transpired, Zina had enjoyed the brief few days she had spent with her alien family.

"I hope so too. See ya, Zina," Cobo says as the summoning circle appears at Zina's feet. Zina can see the pair waving goodbye to her as the red lightning bugs appear all around her. She knows what's coming next, and she steels herself for it, but she knows it won't do much to dampen the feeling.

"POW!"

The expected punch to the stomach hits Zina as hard as a ton of bricks. No matter how much she does to get ready for it, there's just no getting used to a feeling like that.

"I may not feel pain, but that is still a fucking strange feeling," Zina thinks to herself as she stands up and sees her dark bedroom. She hasn't been back here in years. She walks over to the light switch on the wall and flips it. The lights crackle for a bit and finally turn on.

"Damn. Dad has been keeping the electricity flowing," Zina thinks to herself. She's not really that surprised; her dad has more money than he'll ever need, so throwing a few yen around to keep her house powered on is nothing to him.

Much like her house back in the states, her room is covered in nothing but otaku stuff. Zina spends a few seconds glancing all over her room, reminiscing about her younger tastes in anime. She then hears something coming from the bottom floor.

"Is that the sound of the TV?" She thinks to herself.

She quietly leaves her room and slowly walks down the hallway toward the stairs. As she heads toward the living room, the noise gets louder.

"That's definitely the TV," she thinks to herself. She steadies her nerves and prepares herself to attack whatever squatter broke into her childhood home.

She walks down the stairs and into the family room. She quietly scans the room and sees the back of someone's head on the couch, watching Susunu! Denpa Shonen.

"Who the hell are you, and what are you doing in my house?!" Zina instinctively yells in English.

The startled person jumps up, knocking over her bowl of popcorn, and turns around in complete shock. "Nantekotta! Zina?"

Zina is surprised to find her little seventeen-year-old cousin Rin standing in front of her.

"Rin? Is that you?" Zina asks, confused as to what exactly is going on.

"Where did you come from, Zina?" Rin asks in Japanese. Her heart is all aflutter from the sudden shock of someone yelling at her while she was enjoying her show.

"It's a long story," Zina replies in Japanese. She relaxes her nerves and lowers her fists.

"Where have you been? Also, what the hell is wrong with your eyes and hair?" Rin asks. Her heart slowly settles down after receiving the fright of her life. She collects the bowl of popcorn off the floor and sits back down on the couch.

"Again, like I said, it's a long story." She settles down on the couch right next to her.