“What Now?”

After they had separated,
They all have gone down
through different paths.

Paths that leaded them to a different life.
A new beginning they never wanted to start.
Emily “Lily” Venus is now known as the
“Crystal Star” and is publicly known as “Crystal”.
While Ai Mikaze has recovered from his “pseudo-amnesia”
and finally got back together with his band, Quartet Night.
When he had disappeared, they had called it,
“The Disappearance Of The Lonely Android”
They had nicknamed him an “Android” for his
logical thinking similar to a “Robot”. None of
them would’ve known he was actually a robot.
By the time he came back, he earned the title,
“Cyan Star”. Coincidentally similar to Lily’s.
Fans from both sides think they looked similar
to the point of suspecting they may be related,
or they suit each other as a couple of lovers.

A/N: Lily’s appearance is somewhat identical
to Ai. For example, the way she ties up her hair,
and how they are styled. (P.S I had changed the
character design of Lily, I will post it sometime.)

Today is day-off for Quartet Night.
Another coincidence, it is Lily’s day-off as well.
At home, all alone, Ai stares out the window.

“What am I doing with myself?”
He asks himself. “Why do I even ask?”
Another question. “Why do I even wonder?”
Followed by another question. He stares down
to his wrist, where he wears a watch. “Where
did this even come from?” He continues to wonder.
“I don’t know what this is… there’s something inside…”
He feels something nostalgic, but he doesn’t notice that
he feels that way and he doesn’t know what it could mean.

His conversation to himself was interrupted by someone’s
voice as that person knocks on his room’s door.

“Ai, are you awake?”
Aine asked calmly.

“Brother? Yes, I am.
  What do you need from me?”
Ai asks straightly. No other expressions
or emotions involved. His feelings are dead.

“I was gonna ask you about something.
  Can I come in?” Aine’s tone of speaking
still remained calm and laidback.

“Okay.”
Straight answer, Ai gives him.

Aine walks in and gently closes the door.
He walks up to Ai and shows an album CD
to him. “What do you think about this?”
There’s a cool smile on his face as he asked.

“This? I don’t know. I still haven’t listened
   to any of that artist’s song. Hold on, I will
   look it up online and process all the data
   I can gather as fast as I can so I could give
   you a useful feedback in a day or two. My
   calculations predicts I may spare time for it
   by next week therefore it may take longer.”
A long, detailed, logical response from Ai,
He has sounded more of an android now more
than before. Also, he has grown colder and frank,
not the same old innocent, warm Ai before.

“Ah…” A tiny drip of sweat rolled down
Aine’s forehead. “It’s okay, you don’t have to
think so hard about it, I just thought you knew
about it. It’s alright, there’s no more need for
you to spend time trying to figure this out.”
He laughs with his one brow raised on him.

“Okay.”
Ai left no room for any further conversation
not even a room for an argument.

“Yeah…” Aine averts his eyes and glues
it to the ground, feeling awkward. “So,
I’ll be leaving now. Sorry if I bothered you.
Bye~” He returned his look on Ai and
smiled as he walked out of his room.

“I don’t mind.”
Ai answered absentmindedly.

Now left alone, he returns his attention
to his computer. He checks his emails and
he finds another email consisting a proposal,
an invitation for him to become an actor.
Some TV channels are desperate to recruit him.
He doesn’t know why, but he doesn’t seem to be
interested in becoming an actor. But there’s just
something about music, something about singing
that he can’t leave it alone.

“Who’s this?”
Ai wondered as he scrolled down the message,
he saw an image of a pretty young woman whose
hair is as pretty as snow to him, like a shiny crystal.
“Crystal?” He said her public name as he read it.

Not noticing that he’s already drawn by curiosity,
he searches her up and looks down through all her
photos. “There doesn’t seem to be anything wrong
with her.” Ai suddenly comments as he scans through
her photos. “But why do I even bother?” He seems to
be annoyed at himself based on his tone of voice.

Then it had finally come down to the point where
he read the part where their fans “ship” them together.
Not all, but some of their fans want them as a couple.
Ai raises a brow. “What is this? I’m not even connected
to her. This is even only the first time I knew about her.”
He continues to speak by himself. “Ship us together as
a couple? As lovers? What do lovers do anyway? They
just walk around holding hands and kiss and hug and
all that sort of stuff. I don’t understand human logic
sometimes.” He questions how couples or lovers
act and that human logic doesn’t seem to be fitting to his.

After doing some online surfing and other stuffs,
Ai sets himself to sleep mode. It’s not very effective
but Ai can set himself to “Sad” mode. “Depressed”
mode. “Happy” mode. But since he doesn’t know
or understand what or how those works and how
can he apply it to situations, he barely uses those.

However, at Lily’s place…
She’s sitting on her bed,
Her hair tied up in a bun.
With some chips on her mouth,
Her laptop on her lap,
Lily spends her time online-surfing.
Though it may be bad for an idol like her,
For there might be negative comments
on her that may affect her emotionally,
She doesn’t really mind nor care, all she
ever does is play some guys or look at some
photos, self-study or do some random blog.
She’s more like of a teenage-shut-in that way.

Lily randomly stumbles upon a fan page for
her and Ai’s shipping. It’s full of supporters
but still consists of some haters. It only had
come to her recently that they were being
shipped. At first, she was totally shocked,
Later then, she felt sad, broken once again.
Because Ai probably thinks he’s being shipped
to someone he doesn’t even know or care about.

“This needs to stop. What if Ai remembers me?
   Everything will happen again, it will be endless,
   He’ll have to go through hardships and suffer
   again because of me, but that also seems impossible..
   I doubt he’ll ever remember me. I’ll just… pretend
   I never knew about this. Yeah.” Lily nodded and
  closed her laptop. She drops her body to her bed
  and finally lied down completely. Her arms are
  outstretched and she stares at the ceiling.

“What now?”

Suddenly, her phone beeps and she immediately
takes a look at it. A message saying that they have
a new job for her and it won’t stress her out much.
She raises a brow while reading it for she was wondering
about what kind of job are they talking about.
As she finished reading, just in time, her doorbell rang.

“Ah what is it now?” She sighs and rolls her
eyes as she lazily walks off to the door and opened
it immediately. Her eyes widened as she laid her
eyes on her visitor.

“Reiji..?”
Her mouth was left hanging
open a bit as she stared at him.

“Lily-chan!”
Reiji’s eyes became watery and
almost to the point of crying. He’s
a true friend to Lily and Ai. He throws
his arms around her and gave her
a friendly hug, as the mark of their reunion.
“IT IS YOU!” He sobs and as they separated,
he wiped off his tears and gave out a warm
smile, a sign of relief.

“Reiji… It’s been so long. I’d like to forget but…
   I have to admit I have always wanted to see
   you guys again… how long have I restrained
   myself from doing so… and that now you’re
   the one who came to see me, when I’m the
   one who’s supposed to approach first since
   I’m the one who ran away, who hid. But wait..
   This doesn’t make much sense, does it?”
She felt herself about to burst out into tears as well.
The warm presence of an honest friend after a long
time of absence just feels nice.

They walked in inside and she let him sit
down anywhere he like inside her room.
“Please make yourself feel at home.”
She humbly spoke to him as he sat down.

“Wow, Lily-chan, I didn’t expect you to be
   living in a hotel! I thought you would already
   have bought your own house, after all you’ve
   been doing very well as an idol!” Reiji meant
  no offense, that was his honest feelings of amazement,
  not being able to believe she lives in here.

“Ah, I know. I’ve always had the opportunity
   to buy my own house but… my contract manager
   told me to stay here until my current contract expires.
   She owns this hotel so that must be why…”
Lily explained calmly with a bit of “tiredness”
in her tone of voice.

“Ohh.. I see. Anyway Lily-chan… I’m happy to see you,
   and I’d like to stay longer to chat about life and other
   things but there’s actually one main reason why I really
   had to come and see you.” Reiji’s expression became
  a serious one.

“W-What is it…?” Lily gulped and asked.

“……..” There was silence first.
“PLEASE BECOME OUR COMPOSER!”
Reiji’s silence broke and his voice burst
out too loudly and he had suddenly knelt
on the floor with his palms entwined together.
He looks up to Lily as if he was begging.

“WHAT?!”
Surprised by his actions and most
of all, his request, Lily exclaims out loudly.

“I know it’s HARD but at least it’s not impossible!”
Reiji tries to convince her. “Look… We’re having trouble
 with our new songs now… we all have different tastes
  in music but only your music can bring us altogether!”
He continues begging for her help.

“Heeey get up there! Stop kneeling! And I’m sorry
   I can’t help with that! My contract manager will kill me!
   I’m not allowed to accept other jobs for now. Besides,
   I told myself I’ll never be involved with.. with him…again…”
Lily begins yelling at first but still there’s still an attempt of
trying to reject his request in a nicer way. Then by her last
sentences, her loud yelling voice slowly faded into a murmur.

“Lily-chan…” Reiji stops and looks at her.
“Yosh~ I know that was so hard to do and that will
  just break you again… I’m so sorry, Lily-chan!!!”
He bows his head to the floor as an apology.
He gets up and smiles apologetically at her.
“But remember, you can always ask me for help!
  And I’ll come back to ask for help again, but I’ll
  make sure it’s something you can really do!~”
He hums thoughtfully with his plan.

“Okay… I’m sorry for yelling too.
  And thank you for understanding.
  You’re really a great friend, Reiji-kun.”
She smiles at him as a sign of peace.

Later then, Reiji is now about to leave.
But before he did, he went outside for
a bit and came back to her room with
a box in his arms.

“I’m sorry about this Lily-chan…
  You may not want this but…
   She has nowhere else to go.”
Reiji spoke as he looked at the box,
Lily wonders as Reiji opened it.

When he did, Lily heard the sound
of a meowing cat. She figured it was..
“Lily!” She jumped out of excitement
and carried out the cat from the box.
“Thank goodness you’re still alive!”
Relieved, Lily embraced the cat.

“The professor wanted it out since
   you left. I volunteered to take it..
   I planned to give it to Ran-Ran but
   unfortunately, he already had too
  much cats in his house that he can’t
  feed them all anymore!” Reiji’s expression
is filled with sympathy for the cat.
“So in the end I had to take care of it,
  but it doesn’t seem to be happy…”
His face showed sadness this time.
“But look now! She looks so happy!
  Her tail won’t stop wiggling!”
Then a face with a very happy expression.

“Yes… I think she is.” She smiles warmly
at the cat as she nods in agreement to Reiji.
“Once again, thank you so much, Reiji.
  You had taken care of this precious cat.
  Though she may carry some memories..
  Her life is even more important.
  I’m very thankful you had kept her alive.”
Lily’s smile won’t fade since Reiji’s appearance
after a long time of separation had kept her at ease.

“Oh, it’s nothing, really!” He smiles shyly
and rubs the back of his head. “Anyway,
I’ll be going now. Honestly, THAT CAT is
the REAL reason why I came here! Now
I can go home without worries, now that
I know she’s in the right hands!” Reiji sends
off a cute salute as he walks away from her
room. “Bye-bye, Lily-neko! See ya again, Lily-chan!~”
He waves as he slowly walks further away.

“See you!” Lily smiled and made
the cat Lily wave at Reiji as well.
Once he disappeared in the corner,
she closed her room’s door immediately.

She went back to her bedroom with
her beloved cat and lied down with her.
“You’re so old now, aren’t you? But that’s
  great, you gotta live longer for me. I think
  I’m gonna grow old as a lone-cat-woman
  without any husband.” She laughed at herself
as she jokingly thought about not marrying anyone.
“Ne, Lily-chan… What should I do now…?
  I have countless opportunities of meeting
  him again, seeing him again, but I just can’t.
  I can’t even bring myself to face him, I feel
  bad for leaving him even though he probably
 doesn’t know that now. Every day, my mind is
  filled with thoughts about him. Yet I know he
 probably doesn’t even know me anymore. I
 keep worrying about him, thinking about him,
 everything, it’s just about him, Ai Mikaze.
 I want to do so many things with him, there’s
still so much more, our promises. I wanted to
go see the fireworks every time with him.
I always wanted to wait for the snow with him.
All the things… I want to do with him…
Yet all I ever ask myself is, ‘what now?’.”
She talks to her cat but mostly it’s like as if
she was talking to herself.

Back there at Ai’s place,
he had finally made up his mind.

“I’ll accept the offers.”
Ai said straightly while talking
to someone over the phone.

“REALLY? THAT’S GREAT NEWS THEN!!!
  I’LL INFORM EVERYONE ELSE NOW!”
The person who seemed to have offered
something to Ai excitedly said and then
hung up the phone call.

“Well?” Aine was sitting in the corner
of his room while reading a book when
he asked Ai.

“I’ll be starring as the main character of
  a certain movie and that would lead to
  even more movies for me to work for.”
Ai put back the phone in his pocket as
he spoke to Aine.

“Hmm? That’s great then. You know I always
  hated you back then. But you made me realize
  how wrong I was in my outlook for life. So, this
   is random but, thank you. I’m glad you are doing
   well in your own life as well. But now, you gotta
   leave it in my hands whatever you left behind before.”
Aine smiled as he heard the news, his smiled never faded
while thanking Ai. He stood up and walks up to the door.

“What do you mean?”
Ai had lost his memories.
He clearly had no idea what
Aine was talking about.

“Don’t mind me, I was just blabbing out random things.
  But believe me, I am thankful.” He smiled again as he
exited Ai’s room and gently closed the door.

“I wonder what he was talking about.”
Ai mumbles as he stared at the door.

Right now, Ai can feel “curiosity”. However,
he really can’t notice it right now nor understand
what it is. He still doesn’t know yet.

As Aine walks around the place, he’s holding
the phone on his ear and talks about business.
“Yes, I think I’ll accept the offer now.”
He cheerfully told his caller.

“Thank you so much Mr.Kisaragi,
  We would like to see you tomorrow
  in our office to discuss about it.”
The caller had noted him.

“Sure, I’ll be there.”
Aine smiled and then hung up.

While at Lily’s…

“I have decided.”
Lily sits up and grabbed
her phone from the edge of her bed.

She dials a number and while
waiting for someone to answer,
she plays with her hair. Twisting it,
twirling it. A sign of impatience.

And finally, someone answered.
“Hello?”

“Hi, this is Crystal.”
Lily answers in a formal tone of voice.

“Oh! Miss Crystal!!! Have you finally
  thought about it?” The person excitedly
asked her.

“Yes, I accept it”
Lily looks all over her place while
talking, she nodded when she spoke.

“Thanks so much! Please come tomorrow!”
The person sounded really pleased and
hung up the call.

“Phew.” Lily sighed and stroked
her cat’s fur. “Now… WHAT?”
She smiled. “But today… I’ve been
able to show genuine expressions.
Ever since I had to leave for him,
My feelings, my emotions had died
once again. I barely have a real expression
left. But really, today, I smiled again.
For real. So thank you, Lily-chan, Reiji-kun.”
She embraced the cat gently as she thanked
it and her friend Reiji.

Chapter 25 -
“What Now?”