Some of you may not have known this, but if you look back on my profile you will see that I have uploaded a couple of oneshots using non-mainstream Bandori pairs back in March for the Saten Ruiko Day Countdown and EN server release celebration. I felt like doing that once again and so here we are! The only difference between then and now is that I actually hand-picked the characters-of-focus of today's oneshot… and that this oneshot features more than just the two characters-of-focus… and that today's oneshot is significantly longer than those oneshots… but none of that is important, right?
Word of warning and before someone comes at me with pitchforks and torches and whatnot: this oneshot is an AU so it may or may not match up with canon too much.
Disclaimer: I do not own BanG Dream! Girls Band Party, nor do I, in any way, shape or form, intend to pretend that I do.
"Come on…" Rinko muttered darkly to herself, the clacking of the keys on her keyboard resonated in the room as Rinko's eyes were strained on the monitor. Rinko probably didn't even realize how loud she was being; the music that was blasting through her headphones was dampening all the other sounds in her room.
It was late at night, the first week of the long-awaited summer break and the seventeen-year-old Shirokane Rinko was spending it like she normally would.
Rinko and her good friend Udagawa Ako had found a new online game that they could play together at the end of the previous month, but they had refrained from playing it due to their academic workload that had started to pick up since then. Now that school was no longer an issue for either of them, the two friends were playing it like no tomorrow. And with how much the two of them had been looking forward to it, they were not showing any signs of stopping anytime soon.
Rinko's in-game avatar, a fair-skinned elven warrior handling a three-pointed spear and wearing a crimson-colored robe, was hacking and slashing at the hordes of monsters that were coming her way in the hopes of dethroning Rinko from the throne. Little did these monsters know that they would stand no chance again Rinko, but they would surely find out soon enough.
After a long, twenty-minute fight, Rinko made her character jump back a few steps into the safe zone where she took her time to recover the health that she had lost. As she watched the red bar go up quickly, Rinko turned to look at how her friend was doing.
Ako was not doing very well, to say the least. While her swordswoman had yet to take a threatening amount of damage from the enemy monsters, it was clear that Ako had her back against the wall when she was starting to get surrounded. It would not last very long until it would be too much for even Ako to get out of.
"Ako-chan!" Rinko cried out when one of the monster's claws narrowly missed Ako but succeeded in pushing Ako against the tree behind her. With nowhere that her friend could run to, Rinko knew that she had to act quickly so she dashed out of the safe zone to try and help.
Only… it wasn't her in-game avatar that managed to save Ako.
Much to both Rinko's and Ako's surprise, a third figure jumped down in front of Ako, brandished a snow-colored rapier in their left hand. When this did not succeed in deterring the oncoming wave of monsters, they dashed forward and cleanly took care of them all.
As the monsters started to vanish one by one, Ako's savior sheathed their rapier back in place before turning around and walking off calmly. Before Rinko could help herself or knew what she was doing, she had already called out after their mysterious savior.
"Thank you!"
The mysterious rapier-wielding person merely nodded in response to Rinko's cry before they disintegrated into nothingness, a sign that they had logged out of the game.
With the dust settling and not a trace of any of the monsters to be seen anywhere, Rinko went over to where Ako was and looked at her worriedly. From where Rinko was standing, she could not see if there was anything wrong with her friend, but Rinko still wanted to make sure.
"Ako-chan, are you all right?" Rinko asked as she watched Ako consume a couple of potions to recover the health that she had lost. Much to Rinko's relief, Ako did not seem to be hurt too much and was already standing before she knew it.
"Ako is fine, Rinrin, thank you," Ako said with a curt nod, sheathing her weapon back to where it belonged before looking in the direction of her mysterious savior before thinking out loud, "Who was that…?"
Rinko did not answer her friend directly, instead deciding to think things over for a bit as well. Raking her brain to think of anything that may help her, anything at all that could help her identify who that person was, Rinko sighed in defeat and acceptance when she drew a blank.
'Perhaps one day we will meet again," Rinko thought with a disheartened look on her face before turning around and following Ako to the next hunting grounds.
Several days had passed since Rinko had been playing this new online game of hers together with Ako and she had yet to touch her computer again since. Much of this lack of gaming time was attributed to the fact that Rinko had been roped into band practice starting the morning after. It was not that she had minded the extra practice hours, but Rinko could not wait to head back home after the three-day training camp exhausted everyone on her band.
Rinko had not been able to focus too much on the band practice as her mind was still focused on that mysterious rapier-wielding person who had saved Ako. Even after all this time had passed, Rinko had yet to find out who that person was which started to gnaw at her from the back of her mind.
"This is my stop," a familiar voice by Rinko's side said before the girl with light teal-colored hair stood up and picked up her guitar case. As the tram ground to a halt and the guitarist looked around to make sure that she had not forgotten anything, she turned to Rinko and added, "Enjoy the rest of your day, Shirokane-san."
"Y-You too... Hikawa-san…" Rinko quickly muttered, not having expected to be addressed. With an almost forlorn look, Rinko watched her bandmate step out of the tram and walk off into the sunset before the vehicle started moving again. With nothing better to do, Rinko was about to look for her headphones and notepad before she was interrupted when somebody had tapped on her shoulder.
Stopping with what she was doing, Rinko looked up in surprise to see a girl with short ivory-colored hair standing in front of her, a guitar case on her back that was not unlike the one that Rinko's bandmate had. Before Rinko could ask what the girl could possibly want, the mysterious girl was pointing at the seat beside Rinko that was now empty and asked, "Sorry to disturb you, but is that seat empty? The rest of the tram is full."
Upon hearing this, Rinko couldn't help but look around her to confirm this. Much to her surprise, she found that the girl's words were right: the tram was packed and not a single seat was available aside from the one beside Rinko. As she silently wondered how the vehicle got so full, Rinko meekly motioned to the seat beside her and shuffled a bit so she could make room.
Muttering a grateful few words of gratitude, the girl sat beside Rinko and gingerly placed her guitar case in front of her. The moment that she had made sure that her guitar case was safe, the girl took out a paper bag from seemingly out of thin air, took out what looked like a cheese roll and began munching on it happily.
The tram continued on its way as Rinko divulged herself in her notebook and silence returned to the inside of the tram. Every so often, Rinko would look to the side to see what the girl beside her was doing; Rinko was sure that the girl had just taken out her seventh pastry already.
A sound resembling that of a bell reverberated through the tram and Rinko looked up to see the words flash by on the announcement screen. It was her stop, so she reluctantly gathered her things and waited for the tram to come to a halt before standing up. Much to Rinko's surprise was that she was not the only one to be getting ready to leave when the tram started to slow down as it neared the station.
"Oh, is this your stop too?" the girl who had been sitting beside her asked her, wiping away the breadcrumbs that remained on her face with the back of her hand while picking up her guitar case with the other. Not waiting for a response from Rinko, she added with a grin, "I wonder if we have to head home in the same direction as well~."
Hearing this, Rinko was at a loss for words and simply walked to the doors, feeling that she was being followed. Rinko shrugged this feeling off by convincing herself that the other girl also had to leave the tram and they just happened to need to walk in the same direction.
The only problem with that being…
"So we really did need to go the same direction~," the same girl that had been trailing Rinko for the last ten minutes cheered happily.
Rinko had been walking at a pace faster than what she is normally comfortable with and yet this mysterious girl still managed to keep up with her. Their walk together, or walking in the same direction at the same time with one trailing a few steps behind, had been a silent one for the most part as Rinko did not know how to break the silence.
"Say, since we have been together for all of these… thirty minutes and five seconds…" the other girl began, quickly returning her phone back to her pocket and hoping that Rinko had not seen it before trailing off slightly. These words did catch Rinko's interest, however, and it was enough to make her turn around to look at this girl curiously.
This was seemingly exactly what the other girl was aiming to get from the start.
"My name is Aoba Moca," the girl, now identified as Moca, said as she raised her hand in Rinko's direction as a form of greeting. It took Rinko a few seconds more than she would have liked to admit that she understood what Moca was trying to do, and by the time that Rinko finally did Moca had already added, "And what is your name?"
"U-Um… well…" Rinko stammered, looking around her for a potential way to escape being put in the spotlight like that. Unfortunately for Rinko, such a thing did not exist and she was slowly but surely starting to get pushed back.
"Not wanting to say it, all right…" Moca muttered to herself as she closed her eyes while contemplating something. Rinko, who was watching Moca do this, was starting to feel really bad because Moca did tell Rinko her name, but before Rinko could say anything Moca was already digging through her bag. Moments later, she pulled out a paper bag identical to the one that Moca had been eating one pastry out of after the other.
Rinko thought that Moca was hungry again and that she wanted something to eat. What Rinko was not expecting was the fact that Moca was now offering the bag to her.
"If you tell me your name, you can have this one," Moca said with a smile, pushing the bag a bit more towards Rinko's way before adding with a brighter grin, "I'm sure a cute girl such as yourself would have a cute name, right~?"
'Cute?' Rinko thought to herself as she started to feel the blood rush to her face. Of all things Rinko had expected to be called, she was really not expecting to be called cute, and the fact that she was made her brain short-circuit. She did not know what she should say in response and the only thing that the flustered girl could do was hide her face in her hands to try and hide the tomato-like complexion Rinko knew she had.
"So… will you tell your name to Moca-chan now~?"
It took Rinko several minutes to regain her composure and another few to properly control her breathing again. At long last, and somewhat motivated to do so because it was starting to get cold out and Rinko was feeling bad on making Moca wait, she nodded.
"S-Shirokane… Rinko…" Rinko muttered softly, her voice becoming even less recognizable by the fact that it got muffled by her hands so much. Rinko was starting to worry that she would have to say her name again when she saw, much to her relief, that Moca was nodding.
"Moca-chan was right, you really do have a cute name~," Moca said with a grin and unintentionally making Rinko even redder. Something else had caught Moca's attention as she was digging in her pocket for her phone before she put it back again.
"I'm sorry, Rinko-san, but Moca-chan has to go," Moca said with an apologetic smile, gathering her stuff again and about to run off before she seemingly remembered something. Gently putting her guitar case back on the ground so it wouldn't get in the way, Moca pushed the paper bag that she had been holding in Rinko's hand and nodded, "There you go, as promised. Have a safe walk home, Rinko-san!"
And with that, and before Rinko could do or say anything else, Moca picked up her guitar case again before slinging it on her back and walking off in a hurry. This left Rinko all alone in the streets with only her belongings and the paper bag that she had just received to keep her company.
A handful of minutes went by in silence as Rinko recovered and relished the fact that she was no longer put in the spotlight continuously. Rinko was about to continue making her way back home when she heard her stomach growl and the scent of warm bread spread from the bag in her hands.
Rinko looked around her to make sure where she was and, after regaining her bearings, hurried over to an empty wooden bench not too far from her to sit down. Once seated, the starving girl opened the bag and took out a warm croissant from it.
"How is it still so warm… if Aoba-san had this… for so long?" Rinko thought out loud but couldn't help herself from relishing in the warmth and comfort that this one pastry managed to give her.
It took Rinko a long while before she remembered that she still had to eat the pastry. Reluctantly raising the croissant to her mouth while holding it gently in both of her hands, Rinko accidentally knocked over the paper bag and it fell off the bench and on the ground.
Rinko bent down to try and pick the bag up when her gaze fell on something else that was in the bag that she had not seen before: a slip of paper. Curious, Rinko picked it up, smoothened it out and read it in the dim moonlight…
…only for Rinko to feel the same feeling that she had felt when Moca had called her 'cute' earlier.
On the paper was a string of numbers and four words:
"Call or text me~"
'And can you believe that Hii-chan made us all do it? Sometimes I don't know what that girl is thinking, making us do that cheer of hers…'
Rinko was lying on her bed with the phone's brightly lit screen illuminating her face, the text that had just arrived shown clearly on the phone. Reading over it again made Rinko chuckle slightly and she was already thinking of a way to respond.
It had been four months since Rinko had first met Moca but the days seemed to fly by; so much so that Rinko could not even recall a time when she didn't know Moca. Most of her free time had gone into chatting with her new friend, and while Rinko was feeling slightly guilty that this meant she had less time with Ako, Rinko was feeling something when she was chatting with Moca that she hadn't felt with anyone else.
She felt at home.
With a smile, Rinko held her phone tightly in her hands and started to type out her reply. Within seconds she was done and, with a satisfied nod to herself, pressed the send button.
Knowing that it would probably take Moca some time to type out a response herself, Rinko swung her legs off her bed and made her way to her desk. More specifically, to her computer on top of the desk that had exploded with notifications from another friend of Rinko's.
Rinko decided that she may as well look through them all while she waited for her conversation with Moca to continue and saw that most of the notifications were from Ako. Curious, Rinko opened them only to see that they were all messages of apology that Ako couldn't come online to play games with her. Something about a ritual and a kilo of smashed tomatoes.
'Ako-chan's so cute,' Rinko thought to herself before typing out a quick reply that it was all right and that Ako should focus on cleaning up the mess at the Udagawa household instead. Rinko had just made sure that Ako had received her messages when Rinko saw that her phone had lit up. Rinko was holding her phone in her hand in less than a second after, curious to see what Moca had said.
'Shirokane-san, tomorrow's practice is canceled because Udagawa-san got grounded. We will have our practice session next week instead. Enjoy the rest of your day, Shirokane-san.'
Rinko lowered her phone back to her lap dejectedly after reading that message three times over and realizing only then that it was not from Moca. It was only then that Rinko realized what was happening and she quickly threw her phone onto her pillow.
"W-Why…?" Rinko muttered softly to herself as she eyed her phone with wide eyes, "Why am I… so upset to see that Hikawa-san… sent me message… instead of Moca-chan? Was I… really looking forward to Moca-chan… that much?"
As Rinko was drowning in her own thoughts and her own little world, she did not notice her phone lighting up yet again until several moments later. Now a lot more hesitantly so than when before, Rinko reached for her phone again to see who had sent her a message when her heart skipped a beat.
'Sorry for making you worry like that, Rinko-san; Ran was being all Ran-ey again and Moca-chan had to save her before she would hurt herself. Forgive poor little Moca-chan?'
Rinko let out a sigh of relief when she saw Moca's explanation and apology, silently wondering how Moca knew that Rinko was worried about her. Rinko was about to type out a message when her phone vibrated in her hands to tell her that another message had just arrived.
'I know you're right, but it is still annoying for Hii-chan to be dragging all of us into doing her thing as well…'
"Do you want to play that online game again to help blow off some steam, Moca-chan? I think that a new event is going on right now," Rinko muttered as her fingers typed out the message that she wanted to send her friend, correctly remembering that today was event day. However, Rinko was not fast enough at sending the actual message as by the time she had finished writing everything her phone had vibrated again.
'Anyways, Rinko-san, do you have some time to play that online game with Moca-chan again? Moca-chan needs to kill some stuff and today is event day, right?'
Upset at the fact that she had written out a long message for nothing now and impressed that Moca was thinking the exact same thing that she was, Rinko quickly sent an affirmative and confirmation that she could in Moca's direction before heading back to her computer. It didn't take Rinko very long after that to find, open and log into the online game that she had been playing with Moca as of late.
While she waited for the game to boot up properly, Rinko made a quick run to the refrigerator downstairs to pour herself a nice glass of milk before going back to her room. When Rinko opened the door to her room, she was met with the comforting music of the game's main menu music. Something about the music really helped calm Rinko down and it almost elicited a grin on Rinko's face. Almost.
"I am online," Rinko said as her character materialized in the virtual world of the online game, hoping and praying that Moca had heard her. Looking around her, Rinko found out that she was alone in the area, much to her disappointment. Deciding that she might as well do something somewhat useful while waiting for Moca to log in as well, Rinko went over her character's design once more.
For this fantasy-and-supernatural online game, Rinko had decided to create a character of the Sarjes clan: a clan of pixie-like people of diminutive stature; so small, even, that Rinko was sure that even Ako would tower above their heads. This was something that Rinko knew she could never tell her vertically-challenged friend. For the sake of the game's playability, however, those choosing to create a Sarjes character were raised to a decent height.
Thanks to the insistent urgings of Moca, Rinko had allowed Moca to help gather the clothes for her character. Rinko was, admittedly, hesitant to let Moca do this at first, but looking back at it now Rinko was happy that she had eventually relented. The pristine snow white-colored dress matched Rinko's avatar a lot better than Rinko thought it would.
A familiar sound coming from Rinko's left brought Rinko back to reality as another Sarjes character entered the area, this one clad in nothing but dark colors. Rinko recognized the person immediately and broke out into a happy smile.
"Welcome back, Moca-chan," Rinko said with a smile as the newcomer straightened her clothes and adjusted the staff on her back. Rinko quickly took a moment to make sure that her staff was securely fastened to her own belt as well before turning back to Moca and saying, "Shall we go?"
"Lead the way~," Moca replied cheerfully without a shred of doubt, following behind Rinko as the two girls made their ways to this game's version of a hunting ground.
"So is that what you will be doing tonight as well, Moca-chan?" Rinko asked as she eyed the thing that Moca was working on. A weird-looking device that Rinko could not recognize or identify, but Moca was tinkering with it as if it was something she did on a regular basis. Rinko knew that, because it was Moca, it probably was tinkered with it on a regular basis.
"Yup~ Tomato—I mean, Tomo-chin asked me for help with this one as she was busy running errands or something like that," Moca said without taking her eyes off the foreign object for even a second. After wiping away some stray dust on the top of it, Moca wiped the sweat off her brow with the back of her hand before turning to Rinko, "I'm sorry, Rinko-san, but I won't be online much tonight, either."
Rinko nodded solemnly, a bit upset at finding this out but knowing that there wasn't another way. Not wanting to show her worries to Moca or even make Moca grow even more worried about her, Rinko instead decided that she should support her friend as much as she could.
"That is okay, Moca-chan, please work hard on this," Rinko said with a small smile, watching Moca work her magic but not knowing what else to say or do. And then it hit her what she should have said from the beginning, "If there is anything I can do for you, you will tell me, right Moca-chan?"
"Of course!" Moca nodded before a look that Rinko recognized only all too well crossed her features; a look that indicated that Moca had found an opening and that it was too late for Rinko to try and run. Sure enough, Moca smirked a knowing smirk before saying, "Since Rinko-san did offer… we in Afterglow are going to be performing this weekend, do you think that—"
"I will be there!" Rinko said with a determined look on her face, unintentionally cutting in on what Moca was trying to say. Then, in a significantly softer tone, Rinko added, "I will be there, Moca-chan."
Rinko was about to say something else to try and reassure Moca that she would be there when she felt something she had not felt in a long while from anyone. Moca had just thrown herself at Rinko and pulled her into a tight embrace that kept the words stuck in Rinko's throat. Rinko didn't know what to do or say, but if there was one thing that she knew… Rinko knew that she did not dislike it.
Much too soon for Rinko's taste, something that she knew she could not tell Moca any time soon lest she be bombarded by Moca's teasing, Moca let go off Rinko and took a couple steps back. The silence that followed was long and dragging, but Moca made sure that it was broken as fast as possible.
"With Rinko-san coming, Moca-chan will make sure that Moca-chan is the star of the show~!" Moca said with a grin. An infectious one at that as Rinko couldn't help but smile herself when she saw Moca as cheerful as she currently was. What Moca said next brought Rinko back to the present as it shook her awake, "Say, Rinko-san… not that Moca-chan doesn't like you being here or anything, but it's getting late and your last tram home leaves in twenty minutes. Shouldn't you… go and get on that tram while you can if you want to be home before midnight?"
Surprised to hear this piece of information, Rinko took out her own phone and saw that Moca was right. Looking around her in a flustered hurry, Rinko tried to get all of her stuff only for Moca's voice to ring in her ears yet again.
"Are you perhaps looking for this, Rinko-san?" Moca asked with a tone that managed to sound both gentle and teasing at the same time. When Rinko finally turned to look at Moca she saw that Moca was holding the one thing that Rinko had been looking for. With a small smile, Moca handed Rinko's purse over to its rightful owner and said with a small smile, "Have a safe ride home, Rinko-san."
"Thank you, Moca-chan," Rinko said as she clutched her purse close to her before slowly walking to the door behind her. Before she left, however, Rinko turned around to look at Moca once more and smiled a radiant smile, "I'm off, Moca-chan."
Without wasting another second, in part due to the fact that she did not have any seconds left to spare, Rinko left the Aoba household in silence and was back outside where the cold yet comforting evening air embraced her. Once outside, Rinko knew that she had to head to the tram to head home, but instead she did something else.
Rinko leaned against the front door of the Aoba household, clutching her right hand with her left as her gaze slowly traveled to the only lit window of the house: Moca's room. Unsurprisingly, Rinko could still hear Moca working away from out here which made her wonder why she didn't realize how loud it was when she was right next to it.
"I couldn't say it…" Rinko muttered to herself as she lowered her head and hid her face in her hands. She remained in this position for several seconds until she remembered that her tram was going to be leaving her behind if she didn't hurry.
Quickly going over her belongings to make sure that she didn't leave anything behind her again, Rinko was about to finally head to the station when she decided to look back at Moca's room once again. Rinko was now a lot calmer and more determined than she was before, and nothing said this more than the words she uttered next, "But one day I will… please wait for me, Moca-chan."
With her mind made up, Rinko turned around and started to make her way to the nearby tram station, silently hoping and praying that she would make it in time. All the time, the same thought never left her mind as Rinko took the step towards the future; her future.
Rinko knew that it would only be a matter of time until she could be open and honest about her feelings to the one person it mattered to the most. What she needed to do now was to stay strong and gather the courage to say it when that day eventually rolled around.
Little did Rinko know that she was being watched by a certain someone who was thinking the exact same thing as Rinko was.
And that wraps up today's oneshot! I hope that you all enjoyed this oneshot, please leave a review telling me what you thought, and I hope you all have a wonderful day/afternoon/evening/night!