Command and Conquered: Nep on Invasion

Prologue

Things were not well in the world as the players gathered for their final and most desperate struggle against the cruel hand of fate…

Ok that was too dramatic, but things were still bad!

Each CPU and Candidate exchanged looks at the tables that had been set up in neutral territory as per the request of the Oracles of each nation. None knew why they were there but each suspected it had something to do with the sky that was currently a deep purple outside the tent as it had been for days now all over the world

Earlier that week Nepgear and her sister had been the first to spot something was wrong while having a picnic just outside the Planeptude city limits.

"What the goodness?! Sister look!" Nepgear had shouted out while pointing to the sky.

"Oh my god! Giant flying sheep!" cried Neptune before realizing her mistake "Wait...those are just clouds. Clouds?! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" she yelled collapsing into faux hysterics

"The other thing!" said Nepgear point at strange artifact floating in the sky

"Oh, you mean that giant doom portal made of hate and the blood of puppies in the middle of the sky?" guessed Neptune rather nonchalantly

"Yes!"

"Is Noire in town by any chance? I'm pretty sure that's what happens when they sell out of her favorite cakes before she can order one at the local sweets shop..." shuttered Neptune

All further recountings of this story left that little detail out whenever Noire was around...

Soon enough the whole world could see the strange portal and purple sky and looked to the CPUs to deal with whatever it was before it could cause trouble. Despite Neptune's hopes that it was harmless and she could just ignore it Histoire had reported it was anything but and that it's current rate the world could be destroyed if they couldn't stop it. After several failed attempts to blast it to bits by the Goddesses the Oracles did what they always did and began to search for a way to stop whatever it was. Most of the work had been on Histoire as she was the keeper of history but Mina, Chika, and Kei did what they could as well. A few days later the shaken Oracles had returned to their respective CPUs and requested them to meet in a neutral location with their bags packed for a long "relocation" as Histoire had said it.

"Still such a weird way to phrase it" pondered Noire with a hand to her chin as Neptune playfully tossed and caught a ball over and over again next to her out of boredom

"Yeah that's Histy for ya, really those four have been all phantom ops about this whole thing!"

"Why make us pack? We can fly and use our HDD if we really need it so what's the point of the luggage?" commented Noire finding that request the oddest of all

A meeting to discuss how to stop whatever was trying to rip the word apart? Ok. Pack for an extended trip to an unknown location whey you could fly anywhere in the world in less than a few hours? Not normal.

Neptune continued to toss her ball into the air playfully "Think our world is super doomed and we're going to be fleeing to Plutia's to crash on the couch for a millennium or two?"

"They'd tell us if it was that bad...right?" Noire asked sounding uncertain

"I don't think that's the case" said Vert who was sharing some tea with Blanc "They told us to only pack for us and never once mentioned our friends. I'd like to think they'd never ask us to leave them to die while we turned tails like cowards and fled"

"Vert's right and I'm sure-PSSSTT! Holy HELL! What the shit is this garbage?!" Blanc took one ship of the mysterious tea Vert had brought and spat it all over the table forcing Noire and Neptune to relocate their puddings before they got soaked

"Oh? It's a new blend I prototyped myself that combines all the glory of high grade tea with refined gamer fuel" Vert took a sip of her tea and sighed peacefully "It's called Les Moutain of the Dews, wonderful isn't it?"

Blanc peered into her cup suspiciously "That explains why it's neon green at the very least…" she said with disgust

"Here let me get that for you lady Vert" said Nepgear as she rushed over with a few paper towels to clean up the spilt tea

"As always it's wonderful to have you around Nepgear!"

"It's no problem!" With the mess cleaned up Nepgear returned to her and other candidate's table where they were playing something on their handhelds together. Behind them sat the giant pile of suitcases each had brought for the still unknown reason. Answers were coming however as Historie floated over with a shaken group of Oracles who gave their respective CPU's a saddened look before parting ways, each took off for their own nations leaving only the Tome to brief the girls on what was to occur.

"What was that all about Histy?" Neptune asked after seeing the strange looks from outside the tent

Histoire let out a sigh and took up a position at the head of the CPU's table in front of a large picture of the "giant doom hole" as Neptune called it still swirling above her heads. She stood on top of her book and began to cycle through the pages to find the relevant passages about the problem and it's solution.

"I will be brutally honest you eight, this is bad. I ask you right now if you want all the details or just the most important parts"

Neptune finally stopped playing with her toy ball "Give us the Nep Notes Histy. How do we stop this thing and what happens if we don't?"

"The long and short of it is that we have 24 hours to stop it and should we fail the world will be destroyed. The good news is that the method to stop it we have discovered requires all of you, almost no additional items, and can be completed in as little as five minutes" Histoire summarized sounding stressed the whole time

"Aw heck yeah! We can beat this thing and be home in time for dinner!"

"Right, home…" Histoire gave the girls a saddened look

Neptune caught this and was worried "Histy?"

"Y-You see there's a catch…"

Noire titled her head to the side "What kind of catch?" the Lastation CPU asked finding it suspicious that she would sound so pressured by what was supposed to be a simple matter.

"I need to explain this much at the very least" Histoire told herself as the pages of her book began to spin revealing a passage in gold ink, she really didn't want to have to explain this but her duties called for her to be the voice of reason here.

"I won't explain what that hole is or why it's even here, such a thing wastes time we do not have, but I will explain how to stop it. In order to halt this calamity the Console War must end" the blond Oracle looked at the four friends and shuttered

"I thought we did that already Histy?" asked Neptune who distinctly remembered a bunch of peace agreements she didn't read before signing them at her desk "It was basically one giant DNF"

"We declared a cease to the open fighting but the war never really ended with alternate methods being employed to gain shares over the competition. What we need to halt the destruction of our world is a winner"

"Oh…" Neptune now saw the problem "Um, how do we do that?"

It was clear this explanation was hurting the fairy-like guardian but she tried to keep her cool and explain the most important parts "We could hold a giant contest of some type in accordance with the rules set by the original goddess but such a thing would take at least a week to be official"

"And you just said we have 24 hours" Noire chimed in

"Correct, also CPU's are not allowed to just surrendered in order to keep them from abandoning the war and their people. In such a time sensitive situation the only method to find a victor in a way that would count is a battle"

Vert almost looked pleased as she thought of the girl's old battles "A chance to finally have an ending to things? This could be quite fu-"

"To the death…" finished Historie as she waited to inevitable reaction

The room froze as everyone processed what she had just said. She wasn't just talking about one of their normal fights! She was talking about a full "kill your enemies on the ground and loot their corpses" battle battle!

"Is this a joke?!" Uni slammed her hands down on the table in a rage startling both Nepgear and the timid Rom "You mean to tell me we all have to go out there and kill each other right this second to stop that thing!? Did we bring our bags to take them to hell with us or something?! Forget it! We'll fight it together like we did the Deity of sin! I'm NOT killing Nepgear, Rom, or Ram!"

If she had been paying attention she would have seen a soft smile cross Nepgear's face which, knowing Uni, would have sent her into a flurry of blushes.

"And you won't have to" claimed the Oracle before the candidate could run off and try to destroy the problem by herself to spare her friends "The official rules for the console war merely state that you fight, and I quote "With your lives on the line" in this final battle. This can be interpreted many ways"

"Um, nope….Not seeing how that means anything other than killing" said Neptune plainly

Without a word Histoire decided it would be better to show the girls the next part of her plan as she used her magic to conjure up a set of small gold collars made of some stretchy material like rubber "Please put these on everyone" she instructed.

With the prospect of killing each other being their only other option each did as they were told and clasped the collars to their necks where they took on a different color based on their homeland. Neptune and her sister wore purple, Vert green, Blanc and the twins white, and Noire and Uni had on black.

"Now I feel like a dog" bemoaned Blanc before letting out a subdued "Woof...woof…"

"Good Rom! That's a good Rom!" joked Ram as she pet her sister on the head

"Ugh…! I'm not a puppy Ram!" cried the blue sister as she felt her sibling's hand rub against her hair

"While this would be a nice piece of gear for some roleplay in one of my adult games how do these things help us?" Vert tugged on her collar several times while speaking, she could feel the magic in them and having something like that strapped to her made her feel a little nervous.

Histoire watched the girls examine the collars and felt a profound sense of guilt over what she had just done to them without properly warning them, even so she carefully measured her words to explain things without causing them undue stress "These are part of a sealing ritual meant to replace the killing aspect of the "Lives on the line" clause of the Console War's rules. In essence these will allow you to fight for your life without actually risking it, with that out of the way it should be a simple matter of fighting till only one of you is left standing"

Truth be told it was the "left standing" part that worried Histoire internally, the CPU and CPU candidates were all strong and they only had 24 hours left so if they stuck to their pride the battle could easily go on for much, much longer…

"Neato! Are they like a auto-phoenix item or some other cheat death tool? A dead ringer maybe?" Neptune asked while inspecting Nepgear's

Ok, here it was thought Histoire; it was now time to drop the bombshell "Neptune those are archaic and divine slave collars" Histiore could already see the girl's faces go pale as she spoke "Once you lose this fight with those collars on you will be forever bound to be the winner's slave. You will fight "With your lives on the line" in a different sense. I'm asking you eight to fight until you either win for your nation and enslave the rest or lose and become the wining side's property. At the end of the battle one nation will be victorious and their Goddess or Goddesses will have total domination over the CPUs and Candidates of the other nations and will be free to do with them as they please for the rest of eternity"

Silence…

Author Note: I'll admit I have no idea where I'm going with this story. I came up with this idea after reading another fanfic that mentioned the idea of Vert winning the console war and turning the defeated CPU and CPU Candidates into her own little sister harem. That gave me the idea: what WOULD happen if one side was forced to win and conquer the rest? This should be a fairly funny and not serious story with a bit of romance on the side just exploring the concept. No idea how far I want to go with this.

Please leave a review if you want to see more, I want to gauge how much people like this story before I continue.