We Are Similar

Identity

"I'll re-introduce myself then." Hugo said, taking off his glasses to wipe them. "My name is Hugo Mechael Avalstone, A.K.A. Hugo Mech."

"'Avalstone'?" Takuya recalled. "You can't mean... It's that Avalstone?"

Hugo let out a small nervous laugh. "Yeah. Eric Wilde Avalstone is our father. Karen 'Ollyn', now known as Karen Avalstone, is our mother." He made his way over to Eva to pat her head. "And this is Evangeline Hope Avalstone."

"Hope...?" The younger sibling repeated.

"I don't get it." Ran said. "Why is the name 'Avalstone' so important?"

"'Avalstone' as in 'Aval-Tech'." Kousuke recalled. "They were on par with Kamiya Craft as one of the world's leading heavy-duty machinery manufactorer. Until it suddenly went bankrupt one day eleven years ago."

"That happened three months after Eva and I moved from N-City to Tokio." Hugo continued. "I made a promise to my father to protect Eva no matter what happened to them. After I found out what actually happened, I did what I had to and erased any data of our parents having kids. I changed our last names into 'Mech', which is an alias I've always had."

"Why do you need an alias?" Gouda asked, scratching the back of his neck.

"Better yet, why change your name at all?" Sendou pipped in.

"I was getting to that." He turned to the adults with a sheepish smile. "It was so that people will know I got all of my achievements without my parents' help. When you live under the name of a huge company, it's tough to get a job relating to your own skills. Those employers would only want connections and sponsors to be used at any given time. That's why, even when I was Profesdor Oozora's student, I didn't give her my full name. Same thing for Professor Yamano when he scouted me to help on his research." He turned to the rest. "Don't get me wrong. I love our mom and dad, but I want to be recognized for the things I do, not for who my parents are."

"I think I understand that feeling pretty well." Ban said, looking at his father.

"Right?" Hiro nervously glanced at his mother.

"If you don't mind me asking," Kirito cut in. "How exactly did a company as big as Aval-Tech go bankrupt just like that?"

Hugo turned to the adults. "Uzaki Takuya-san? Would you like to answer this one?"

The man seemed to be in a spiral of thoughts, before nodding his head. "By then, Kamiya Craft already had a connection with the Innovators. Because they saw Aval-Tech as a threat, Kaidou Yoshimitsu sent spies in to repeatedly sabotage their most expensive creation. The VR-Mind."

"By the time dad noticed what was actually happening, the Innovators already had a firm grip on the company." Hugo continued. "He sent us away to Tokio, where we ended up under the care of Uzaki Yuusuke-san."

"Oh..." Eva silently gasped. So that's how he knew me...? She thought back to that time in Akihabara when he gave her a smile and a pat on her head, despite her thinking for sure she had never met him before.

"I think we had just about enough on explainations about the past." Yagami stated. "What about what you were going to say earlier? About Eva's body?"

"Oh right, sorry." The blonde boy turned back to the computer, showing the blueprints and charts he mentioned about earlier. "This is the plans that they used to put the Optima and AI into Eva's brain, meaning that there should only be that one spot where foreign substances are located. But this is what a full-body scan showed." He pulled up the results of younger Eva's scan. The image zoomed into a small red dot on her shoulder.

"What's that supposed to be?" Niara asked, turning from Eva to the screen.

"I remember that." Prof. Oozora nodded. "But we thought it was just some sort of glitch and never investigated further."

"Only one way to find out then." Hugo signaled Sirius over. "You know what to do."

'Affirmative.' A red light began scanning over the now older Eva. She stood still, not because she wanted to, but because she was still in shock about everything.

The results appeared on screen and once again, the red dot appeared in the exact same spot. 'It appears to be some sort of nano-sized device.'

"So someone placed something like that inside Eva before Kaidou even found her?" Prof. Yamano summarized.

"But who could do that? And why would they?" Yuuya had been intently listening until this point.

After a moment of thought, Hugo made a decision. "First step to finding out would be getting it out of Eva." He turned to his little sister. "Are you afraid of needles?" She slowly shook her head and he nodded. "Alright, that's good news. Bad news is I don't have a needle so..." He turned to the adults. "Know anywhere that would have one?"

~~~~~

They made sure to fit in the two cars and drove to Tiny Orbit. Jin's butler bid them goodbye at the front entrance, heading off to wherever he lived now. Hugo changed out of his white uniform and into a hoodie. He switched out his glasses for contact lenses too, saying that it was still too early to let the world know he was still alive.

It was in the afternoon when they arrived. Takuya ordered everyone to take a break while Eva, with Mizel on her wrist again, Hugo and the professors went to work on extracting the item.

It was a swift process. Eva didn't squirm or complain when the needle pierced through her skin. They took out about half a vial of blood from her and ejected it into some kind of machine. They dismissed her and told her to rest, which she silently obliged to.

She walked down the corridor, not uttering a word as she slipped past the empty halls, making sure she's not spotted by any of the staff members. When she reached the lobby, she sat in the corner, below a staircase and stayed hidden from anyone trying to find her.

Are you alright? Mizel asked through their link. He was still in the form of the watch.

Eva shook her head and closed her eyes. She's had enough excitement for one day.