Better Safer...

Zero is standing on the edge of a rooftop staring up at the stars. Scanning each star until stopping on one, watching it flicker out and back into existence. The dome worked well for people who hardly looked up or paid any amount of attention to their surroundings. For Zero though the first half of life consisted of nothing but nature's splendors, endless gut-wrenching survival training is vastly different than Neon City's endless night.

Even the birds above are procedurally generated, being surrounded by all of the artificial set in a feeling of unease in Zero. Dropping attention to the street below, filled with people from a festival going on, joy and excitement flowed through the streets. Women dressed in traditional kimonos complimented by beautifully crafted prostheses fluttered the streets like cherry blossoms.

This city had a staggering three to one-woman-to-men population. So that meant that women made up the majority of the workforce and political participation. One man caught Zero's eye, the catfish on the back of his kimono made him resemble a fish swimming upstream even more as he pushed passers-by aside. He protected two ice cream cones as he pushed harder through the crowd, predicting his path, Zero noticed the goal that kept this man so determined.

a woman standing in the center of three others that stood on the left side of the road was being cleanly skirted around by other passersby. The woman in the center had flawless features that were augmented by porcelain metallic enhancements and finely stenciled with beautiful patterns. Her hair, a bun being held by two metallic sticks, is a cherry blossom pink accented by white highlights.

Zero looked over the three women surrounding her and assumed they were her triplets until further observation. Their features were young and all cosmetic prosthetics were done the same, twins tend to volunteer for cosmetic prosthesis if another has to get one for medical reasons, and more often than not it's matching, but with such heavy prosthesis and differentiating enhancements or replacements means their similarities are due to being custom protection droids.

The man closed the distance to his goal.

"I hope you didn't wait long, the line was enormous." The man approached the woman in the center arm outstretched with cone in hand. At a closer look, the woman loomed over him, she was tall, but her slender frame gave the illusion she would be smaller. Even the triplets who were shorter than her loomed over him. She politely shook her head no.

"It wasn't long at all." She smiles as she takes the cone from him, taking a lick of her ice cream she purrs in enjoyment.

"It's just vanilla, is it really that good?" He chuckles to himself watching her forget her surrounding and blissfully enjoying the cone.

"It's simple, and out of all the endless complicated luxuries of today, vanilla is still vanilla, plain and sweet." His eyes widen at the innocents of the answer, the purity he found in her, which he loved and cherished.

"And that is what makes you special, and me love you." The blush almost beamed through the porcelain metallic of her cheeks.

"I love you too Toshi." A pleasant smile lingers on her face from Toshis reply.

The Japanese-style roof tiles clattered under shifting weight as Zero Jumped from the roof top landing instantly and silently behind the brightly colored fish kimono-wearing man. The three guardians were stunned by the speed of their aggressor, Zero with no hesitation unsheathes a red blade from underneath their crimson kimono slicing diagonally across the fish pattern on his back.

Expecting a thump and a pool of blood, but instead getting a swift kick from one of the sisters into a stall, Zero looked up to see Toshi in the porcelain woman's arms. She was quick enough to Pull him forward before the attack could land deep enough. The crowd of people was now alive with panic, everyone scattering away from the middle of the street.

"Mia? What's happening?" Mia looked down at her hands spots of blood traced over her fingers.

"Nothing... Our, guest here made a grieves mistake of bumping you a little too hard." Her face stayed truthful to her words, but her voice betrayed her.

He grabbed her hand and squeezed. "Then as a mistake, it can be forgiven." He smiles meekly laying his head against her chest, eyes shut with labored breathing.

"If he isn't dead he's pretty close." Delta appears standing in front of the collapsed Zero in the vendor's stall.

"gonna just wait it out?" He turned and looked over his shoulder, the three triplets were now disrobing their kimonos to show smooth metallic bodies. One twin a dull red crisscrossed by dull grey veins all over her body that fed away and too a white circular pod on her chest stepped forward. Clenching synthetic muscles a bright amber-colored liquid began filling the white pod, once full the pod ejected the amber liquid throughout the dull grey vascular system. Dull red metallic plates and synthetic muscles bulge as they emit a brilliant vermilion warmth, waves of heat distorting the atmosphere.

The second twin a cerulean color with a slender body equipped with exhaust pipes running the length of her back, arms, and calves. She took the runner pose as a cool teal emanated from the end of the exhaust pipes. The third a absinthe-esque color quickly sprouted emerald insect-like wings and took to the sky.

"Looks like they're ready for a fight." Delta stepped aside as Zero pushed over the wooden planks as if to dodge any kicked-up dirt or scuffing of shoes.

"That red one packs a punch... Definitely an offensive type build." Zero brushed off the rest of the debris, quickly assessing the situation.