After making sure everyone else had eaten their fill, Andrew quickly finished the last of his breakfast and wiped his mouth in satisfaction.
Having a big appetite had its perks; you never had to worry about leftovers.
Belle and Nicole began clearing the table, taking the bowls and chopsticks to be washed, while Andrew and Anby herded the rest of the Silver Squad, who were eager to watch videotapes, towards a large room deeper inside the building.
Pushing the door open, the twelve medical pods Andrew had moved from the research institute came into view.
To recuperate the Silver Squad members' bodies to the point where they could live like normal people, Ann's data indicated they needed to sleep inside the medical pods for about twelve hours a day.
As for how long this treatment would take, that depended on the difficulty of their individual physical recovery.
In video game terms, it was like they'd spent too long in a miasma, and their max HP had been drastically reduced. But since it wasn't a status ailment, it could only be restored over time.
Currently, every member of the Silver Squad, except for their captain Anby, had to undergo this daily restoration.
Anby, being the most physically perfect and complete individual, didn't require continuous maintenance and repair from a medical pod.
And Soldier 11, as the most recently created clone, hadn't suffered as much damage, so she needed far, far less time than the others.
As for the rest, they'd just have to be good girls and stay in their medical pods.
Between the life force contained in Andrew's healing potions and the continuous improvements from the medical pods, the Silver Squad's recovery was just a matter of time.
This was also why Andrew had specifically agreed to let Anby join the Cunning Hares. After all, Anby could already experience a normal life; she was just a little lacking in common sense.
Fortunately, the restoration process could be interrupted at any time. Otherwise, with Anby gone, the base's security would become a major question mark.
So Andrew divided the Silver Squad into two groups. After their shared eight hours of sleep at night, they would take turns doing the remaining four hours.
The girls' feelings were easy to read. The group that didn't have to go in immediately cheered and ran happily towards the video player, while the other group dejectedly climbed into their medical pods.
Watching them cheer, he felt they were already much livelier than when he'd first met them.
With the Silver Squad girls sorted out, it was time to find himself a suitable ride.
Ever since seeing that Caesar's beast of a motorcycle was still gasoline-powered, Andrew had been interested.
Andrew had seen motorcycles in the city before, but the ones powered by Ether engines felt less like motorcycles and more like electric scooters.
It wasn't that they were slow. It was just that, without the signature roar of a real bike, Andrew felt they were missing that special something.
That satisfying shudder fed back from the engine when you twist the throttle, that roar from the exhaust pipe when you accelerate... now that was a real thrill to ride.
An Ether engine motorcycle with no exhaust and no roar? Nah, didn't know her. Just another piece of scrap on the side of the road.
He pulled out his phone and sent Caesar a Knock-Knock. In less than a second, the status under Caesar's profile picture changed to "Typing...", as if she had been waiting for his message for a long time.
[MeowscularAreCutestInTheWorld: Caesar, you free right now? I was hoping you could help me pick out a motorcycle.]
[Undefeated Legend of the Outer Ring' to 'Outer Ring's Undefeated Legend: My friend, my friend! Leave it ta me! I'll be waitin' for ya in Blazewood! No rush, I'm comin' to get ya right now, wait for me!]
A familiar mess of typos, but at least it was understandable—which was more than you could say for all the English acronyms you saw online.
Back in the day, seeing all those confusing acronyms online always made Andrew feel like he was back in the era when Martian Language was popular.
No, actually, even Martian Language was easier to understand than those acronyms. At least with Martian Language, you could try to guess the meaning from the symbols.
Andrew had only been lost in thought for a moment when the faintly familiar roar of Caesar's motorcycle reached his ears.
He opened the door, and there was Caesar's uniquely styled bike. When Caesar saw Andrew, she just grinned and scratched her head, though he wasn't sure what she was so happy about.
"Yo, Caesar. Long time no see."
Hearing Andrew's words, Caesar remembered she hadn't even said hello yet and hurriedly replied:
"Hey there, Andrew! But... didn't we just see each other last night?"
Caesar couldn't help but raise the hand she'd just lowered to scratch her head again, puzzled by Andrew's greeting.
"As the saying goes, 'a day apart feels like three autumns.' A whole night has passed, so that's a day, right?"
If Andrew had teased anyone else like this, he might have gotten a variety of reactions. But with Caesar, it just left her looking completely bewildered.
"Huh...? What?"
As a certified Outer Ring illiterate, Caesar had absolutely no idea what Andrew was talking about. After a moment, though, she managed to guess the literal meaning of his words, even if her understanding was a little... skewed.
She cheerfully slapped Andrew on the back and said boisterously:
"Hehe, I also feel a day... that what-cha-ma-call-it three autumns for you, Andrew!"
Caesar, no! Forgetting the middle part completely changes the meaning of that sentence!
But Caesar was oblivious to the problem with what she'd just said. The moment her palm landed on Andrew's back, she realized that in her excitement at seeing her new friend, she hadn't controlled her strength.
By the time she realized it, it was too late to pull back completely. Luckily, Caesar's reflexes were sharp, and she managed to hold back a lot of the force.
Still, based on past experience, a hit like that would most likely leave a massive bruise. She immediately reached out with her other hand to steady the potentially injured Andrew.
"Are you okay, Andrew? Did I hurt you?"
But as soon as the words left her mouth, Caesar saw the person she thought she'd hurt staring back at her with a look of pure confusion. His perplexed eyes clearly conveyed a single question:
Caesar, what are you suddenly talking about?
"Huh...? Huh??"
Confusion filled Caesar's somewhat empty head.
Only after insisting on lifting his shirt to confirm he was really okay did Caesar breathe a sigh of relief and say:
"Sorry, Andrew. I'm really strong, and sometimes I accidentally break things without meaning to. But I haven't accidentally hurt someone in years."
Caesar was a little embarrassed. Sure, she'd occasionally smash her pinky toe into a table and chip off a leg out of carelessness, or accidentally tear her favorite manga to shreds while rereading it.
But when she was around people, she was always careful, so things like this rarely ever happened anymore. And yet, it had happened again today.
Was it because she was just too excited about making a new friend?
Last night and this morning, too, she kept unconsciously opening Andrew's Knock-Knock chat screen, even though there were only two messages in their history.
And then she'd gotten a message from Andrew this morning, which had gotten her so worked up that she'd left a bewildered Burnice in the dust and sped right over.
______
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