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The door to the Team Canopus clubroom opened with a crisp click.
Royce stepped in, a clipboard tucked perfectly under her arm.
As one of the designated keepers of the clubroom keys, it was their duty to perform the bi-weekly inspections. A responsibility she shared strictly with Dictus to ensure the room didn't look like a bomb dropped on it.
"Good afternoon!" Royce announced, her voice even and clear. "I am here to conduct the standard inspection!~ Please ensure all personal belongings are clear of the primary pathways to avoid any-"
"A TRAGEDIA! An absolute crush of the soul!"
Royce paused mid-sentence, her gaze instantly snapping toward the center of the room.
In the center of the clubroom, Earth was collapsed onto the sofa in a pose of theatrical despair. She had one arm thrown over her eyes, her legs draped dramatically over the armrest, whimpering with the intensity of an opera singer performing a tragic aria.
Sitting on the floor nearby, Turbo was holding a piece of broken wood, circled with strings that seemed to be from a familiar instrument, her eyes wide with panic.
"I didn't mean to! I was just showing Earth how I did the final corner at Fukushima! Vroom! And then bam!" Turbo yelled, waving her arms around frantically.
"And then Earth's music-box went flying! Turbo is sorry!"
"It was not your fault, mio dolce Turbo," Earth lamented, lifting her head from the sofa cushion just enough to look at the ceiling. "It was the tempest of our shared passion! We were reaching for the grand crescendo of tactical discussion,
and my hand... my foolish hand swept through the air like a wild conductor's baton! And then... the silence occurred so loudly.."
Natie sat at the counter, rubbing her temples with a heavy sigh. "She’s been like this for forty minutes, Royce.
Turbo was mimicking her final spurt, Earth got too into character trying to match her energy, and she knocked her violin right off the shelf. The bridge snapped completely in half."
"The structural breakdown is severe," Ikuno noted from her desk, not looking up from her laptop as her glasses caught the light.
"I have already cross-referenced the technical repair parameters. Because it is a vintage Italian instrument, a standard commercial adhesive will compromise the acoustic resonance. A certified luthier workshop will require approximately ten to fourteen days to set the alignment and bond the component."
"Two weeks?!" Earth let out a soft groan, clutching a throw pillow to her chest. "Fourteen days of echoing silence? How am I to sing the song of my heart?”
“How am I to greet the morning sun without a sonata to paint the sky!?"
Royce stood completely still by the doorway, her grip tightening slightly on her clipboard.
She looked at Earth. Even in her comical despair, there was a sadness in the droop of Earth's ears. She loved that instrument more than almost anything, it was how she expressed her affection, how she communicated her romantic view of the world to everyone around her.
To force her into two weeks of silence felt like an absolute crime.
Then, Royce's eyes drifted to the broken parts in Turbo's hand, and her mind began to brainstorm.
Ten to fourteen business days?
Royce thought, her eyebrows knitting together behind her glasses. A standard luthier operates on an incredibly inefficient queue system. It is a completely unoptimized timeline..
A sudden spark of determination flared in Royce's chest.
She wanted to outperform the professional workshops.
She wanted to prove, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that she could provide the absolute best care for her partner, just by fixing the instrument that could put her cries into melodies.
"Fourteen days is a highly sub-optimal operational window," Royce stated calmly, stepping forward and gently taking the broken piece from Turbo's hands.
She examined the clean fracture line, "Earth. Do not despair. The situation is... being evaluated."
Earth peeked out from behind her arm, her eyes softening instantly the moment she looked at Royce. "Amore... even your beautiful voice cannot mend a shattered symphony.
The soul of the wood is fractured.."
"It'll be sorted out, trust me." Royce murmured. She turned back to her clipboard, making a completely unrelated mark on her inspection sheet.
"..I will complete the facility check now. Please ensure the broken pieces are stored in the velvet casing before the clubroom locks for the night."
Turbo cheered, completely missing the underlying tension. "Royce knows everything! She's the boss!"
Royce’s cheeks warmed to a subtle pink at Turbo's comment, but she kept her composure.
She would need to place an emergency order for high density organic resin. She would also need her calipers, a vacuum seal clamp, and a variable temperature heating element. And most importantly... she would need to wait until the entire campus was completely empty.
She caught Ikuno's eye across the room. She gave her a knowing nod, casually sliding the clubroom master keys across the desk.
"As co-keeper, it is your turn to lock up the facility at precisely nine tonight, Royce," She said. "Please ensure all lights are extinguished and the deadbolts are fully engaged."
"Alright," Royce replied, pocketing the keys with absolute precision. "And all of you should go to bed early either way, you need rest if you want more fans.~"
She stole one last glance at Earth, who was now sighing against the cushions, looking entirely tragic..And surprisingly beautiful.
Your symphony will not remain silent for long.
Royce thought, a smile tugging at the corner of her lips.
.
.
.
The face of the digital clock strapped onto Royce’s wrist shifted to 21:00.
Royce sat beneath the heavy shadow of a tree, multiple bags of the needed equipment sat next to her. She adjusted her glasses, her eyes tracking the precise movement of the campus perimeter.
Right on schedule, the main lights of the training building flickered off, signaling the official end of operational hours.
A moment later, Natie and Turbo emerged from the side exit, Turbo still sleepily clutching the giant arcade bear from their shopping trip, with Ikuno trailing slightly behind them to ensure the heavy door clicked securely shut.
Royce drew back into the darkness, her breath held, remaining entirely quiet until the trio’s footsteps faded down the main pavement toward the Tracen dorms.
The campus was officially clear.
...
Now came the true test of endurance. A less disciplined mind would have stormed the building immediately.
But Royce was a strategist.
"Thirty minutes," Royce whispered to herself, her fingers lightly tapping against the digital clock on her wrist. "Or, more precisely, one thousand eight hundred seconds."
She closed her eyes and began to count.
One hundred...The wind rustled.
Five hundred...She visualized the internal blueprints of the Team Canopus clubroom.
One thousand two hundred...She reached into her pocket, her fingers brushing against the cold ring of the master keys Ikuno had slid across the desk earlier.
Her heart gave a thud against her ribs.
Breaking campus curfew was a direct violation of academy regulations, an act that ran completely counter to her reputation. If she was caught, the repercussions would be severe.
But then she pictured Earth slumped on the clubroom sofa, her elegant ears drooping, her beautiful voice reduced to a broken whisper about the silence of her heart.
The memory just couldn’t be ignored.
One thousand seven hundred and ninety nine. One thousand eight hundred.
21:32. The security patrol had officially moved to the eastern stables. The optimal window had opened.
.
.
.
Royce moved like a shadow across the moonlit courtyard. She reached the side door, slid the key into the lock, and turned it.
Click.
The sound echoed like a gunshot in the dead silence of the building. Slipping inside, she closed the door behind her and navigated the room entirely by memory, trying not to make any sound.
When she stepped into the clubroom, the scent of Turbos leftover snacks greeted her. The room felt massive and eerie in the dark, stripped of its daytime chaos.
Royce dropped her bags onto the table and pulled out her equipment:
A highpowered LED desk lamp with an adjustable clamp.
Her micro calipers.
And the emergency ordered package of resin that had arrived at the mailroom just an hour before lockout.
She unlatched the velvet casing resting on the shelf. With care, she lifted Earth's fractured violin and laid it across a soft cloth under the desk lamp.
"Turbo really did screw it up," Royce murmured. She pushed her glasses up her nose, her eyes narrowing as she picked up the broken pieces of the bridge shortly after. "This can’t be that hard.. I’m Royce, I can practically do anything!"
The beam of the LED lamp turned the atmosphere into an operating room.
The air was dead silent, save for the rhythmic, steady ticking of the wall clock.
22:14.
Royce adjusted her glasses, her eyes narrowing as she locked her calipers around the fractured edge of the bridge.
"If the alignment is off by even 0.02 millimeters, the acoustic vibration will scatter, muffling the register of the E-string." Royce murmured to herself.
“I need another approach with some of these steps, or she wont be able to tune it properly..”
She set the calipers down with a soft clack and picked up the tiny mixing tray.
Royce had spent her entire afternoon researching molecular bonding agents until she found the perfect material, an organic resin used in acoustic engineering.
Using an applicator, she mixed the resin. One drop too many, and the compound would become brittle, one drop too few, and it wouldn't withstand the crushing downward force of the strings.
"This is such a weirdly shaped instrument.." Royce exhaled, her fingers steady as she applied a microscopic bead of the clear resin along the fractured wood. "But the bond must be absolute!"
With precision, she brought the two broken pieces of wood back together.
Her breath hitched.
She held the pieces in place, her eyes fixed entirely on the seam. The wood grain matched seamlessly, the clear resin disappearing completely.
Keeping her hands perfectly still, she slid the clamp over the bridge, tightening the tiny brass screws until the pressure meter hit the exact threshold she had calculated.
Now, she had to wait.
Royce leaned back slightly in her chair, rubbing the bridge of her nose, her shoulders tense.
After a short while, she looked past the glare of the lamp to the velvet lined case where the rest of the violin rested.
She remembered the way Earth’s fingers moved across those strings.
It was with a grace that defied all structural logic yet somehow produced the most breathtakingly beautiful melodies Royce had ever heard.
‘You are my steadfast anchor, amore,’ Earth's lyrical voice echoed in her mind.
Royce’s chest tightened suddenly. She looked down at her hands, still dusted with a faint trace of resin from testing out the texture.
"I am simply... executing an optimal maintenance protocol," Royce whispered to the empty room, her cheeks warming to a faint crimson under the desk lamp.
Click.
The timer on her phone vibrated silently against the table. The ten minutes were up.
Royce carefully loosened the clamp and slid it away. She held her breath, gently pressing her thumb against the joint of the bridge.
The seam didn't budge, thankfully. The two pieces had fused, the fracture line completely invisible to the naked eye.
"Well, that wasn’t so hard," Royce breathed, a small, fiercely proud smile finally breaking across her face. "Now I’ll actually have to be careful.."
Using a sound post, she reached inside the violin's f-hole. With a steady hand, she aligned it beneath the treble foot of the bridge.
Then came the dangerous part, tensioning the strings.
One by one, she hooked the tailpiece and began to turn the pegs.
Tighten.
Check the alignment.
Adjust the bridge angle.
Tighten.
The wood groaned softly under the immense pressure, the strings stretching over the newly repaired wood and pegs.
Royce unlocked her phone, opening a digital tuning application that can be used for any string instrument.
(Fun fact, most physical tuning devices don't work for bass guitars and violins..)
She used her thumb to gently pluck the G-string.
The digital needle on her screen jumped, wavering before settling perfectly in the center. A green indicator flashed on the screen: G3 (196.00 Hz).
Pure Resonance.
She moved to the D-string.
Pluck.
D4 (293.66 Hz). Perfect.
The A-string.
Pluck.
A4 (440.00 Hz). Flawless.
The E-string.
Pluck.
E5 (659.25 Hz). Absolute.
Royce let out an exhale she felt like she’d been holding since nine.
She set the violin down on the cloth, her eyes reflecting the light of the lamp as she stared at the perfectly restored instrument.
She checked the clock. 03:14 AM.
Her eyes were heavy, her fingers aching. But as she carefully wiped down the violin's varnish with a towel, a sense of contentment washed over her.
She reached into her breast pocket, pulling out a sticky note and grabbing a pen from the cup filled with all sorts of pencils and markets.
Uncapping her pen, she wrote a small note:
'Your silence is officially terminated, my love.'
— R&R. ♡
She stuck the note carefully inside the lid of the velvet case, right where Earth would see it the moment she opened it.
Royce packed her tools back into her bags, turned off the lamp, and slipped back out into the dark corridors of the academy, leaving the restored symphony waiting for the morning sun..
The morning sun shined over Tracen Academy in gold.
Inside the Team Canopus clubroom, the atmosphere had completely gone back to its chaos, cause none of these fuckers can be taken seriously.
"I’m hungry! Turbo needs victory pancakes! The ones shaped like stars!" Turbo yelled, vibrating in her chair as she kicked her legs back and forth.
Natie was sitting on the table, holding a bag of a new snack they found with Tannhauser. "Turbo, please, it's barely eight in the morning. Let the rest of the world wake up first.."
Ikuno sat next to her, however she has more manners to actually sit on one of the chairs, her eyes scanning the room.
She noticed the subtle lack of dust on the table, and her gaze drifted intentionally toward the instrument case sitting on the shelf.
Maybe Royce just cleaned up before she locked the room.
Her thoughts were cut short as the door swung open.
Earth stepped inside. The bright summer morning seemed to completely bounce off her, her head bowed and her long ears drooping so low she practically looked like a bunny.
"Good morning, my beautiful ensemble," Earth murmured, her voice fragile. "Though, alas... how can the morning truly be buono when the silence in my chest remains so absolute?
..The world moves in a joyous allegro, yet my soul is stuck in a permanent, weeping adagio.."
"Aw, Earth is still broken," Turbo whispered. "Like a popped tire.. Turbo is sorry again.."
"Earth, the repair workshop hasn't even opened yet," Nature said gently, trying to offer a voice of comfort. "Maybe if you go down to the district today, they can speed up the-"
"No, dolce Nature, do not give me false hope," Earth sighed dramatically, gliding toward the shelf with her hands pressed over her heart. "I have come merely to gaze upon the hollow shell of my artistry.
To look upon the scattered remnants of my silent companion one last time before it is sent away to a cold, unfamiliar clinic.."
With a trembling hand, Earth reached out and unlatched the clasps of the velvet case. She took a deep, preparatory breath, bracing herself to see the snapped pieces of wood.
She lifted the lid.
Earth froze.
The words of her next tragic monologue died instantly in her throat. Her eyes widening at the sight.
Resting securely within the box, the violin was completely assembled.
The bridge stood perfectly upright beneath the strings.
The strings were perfectly tuned.
And resting right inside the lid, stuck perfectly straight against the fabric, was a neatly lined sticky note.
Earth picked it up with trembling fingers, her eyes locking onto the words.
A gasp escaped Earth’s lips. She clutched the note against her chest, her heart thumping rapidly.
Right on cue, the clubroom door opened with its signature, crisp click.
Royce walked into the room. To anyone else, she looked exactly like her usual structured self. But if one looked closely, there were faint, dark shadows beneath her eyes.
"Good morning," Royce said, her voice sounding tired as she tried desperately to mask with her formal, yet cheerful tone. "I have arrived to verify that the morning attendance metrics are—"
"ROYCE!! ♫"
Before she could even finish her sentence, the very happy-go-lucky Earth blurred her vision.
Royce barely had time to widen her eyes before Earth threw herself entirely into her arms. The impact sent Royce stumbling back half a step.
Earth wrapped her arms fiercely around her neck, burying her face into the crook of Royce’s shoulder.
"Earth-! Please, exercise proper velocity control!" Royce stammered, her face instantly turning into a reddish pink as she felt the weight of her partner crushing against her.
Her hands hovered awkwardly in the air for a fraction of a second before she finally gave in, her arms wrapping securely around Earth's waist to hold her steady. "You are... you are disrupting the structural balance of my posture."
"You magnificent, beautiful, foolish commander, ♪" Earth laughed. She pulled back just enough to look into Royce's face, her eyes shimmering. "A midnight heist? Breaking the sacred academy parameters? Working through the dark, quiet hours just to mend the strings of my heart? ♫"
"I... I have no idea about what you’re talking about," Royce muttered, frantically looking everywhere in the room except at Earth's adoring face, her cheeks burning hot. "It was a logical necessity. "
"Oh, listen to her! A logical necessity!" Earth cooed beautifully, a breathtakingly fond smile breaking across her lips. She reached up, her slender fingers gently tracing the edge of Royce's jaw, forcing the blushing strategist to meet her eyes.
"You can hide behind your beautiful face all you wish, amore, but the music does not lie.
The resonance is perfect. You..You poured your entire soul into this craftsmanship! ♩"
"Wow! Royce fixed it?!" Turbo shrieked, sprinting over and jumping up and down to get a look inside the case.
"Royce has super-builder powers too! Just like a robot!"
"Turbo, please, do not use such absurd unscientific terminology," Royce scolded weakly, though she couldn't pull away from Earth’s touch.
The exhaustion from her sleepless night seemed to completely melt away under the absolute warmth of the others’ gaze.
Earth leaned in closer again, the scent of light perfume washing over Royce as she pressed a soft, lingering kiss against Royce's flushed cheek.
"Thank you, my beautiful anchor, ♩" Earth whispered into her ear, her voice dripping with sincerity that belonged entirely to the two of them. "The symphony is restored, and every note I play from this day forth... shall be a song of love for you."
Royce’s breath hitched, her heart hammering a rhythm against her ribs.
She let out a sigh, her shoulders relaxing entirely as she tightened her grip around Earth, burying her face slightly into the older girl’s shoulder to hide her incredibly proud smile.
"Just... ensure you do not wave your hands so recklessly during your future monologues," Royce murmured softly. "I do not have unlimited reserves of organic resin, you know!?."
Earth let out a laugh, pulling out one hand to get a firm grip on Royce's chin - lifting it, planting another kiss on the brunette's lips, melting into the others embrace as their faces refuse to let go.