I was hoping to have the seventh chapter up by Christmas, but that seems, now, to be out of the question. Well, I'll just continue posting these chapters up as soon as possible. I hope you'll coninue to enjoy...

Comedy: 70 pt
Drama: 10 pt
Descriptive: 20 pt

Also, I'm urging you to go watch The Phantom of the Opera. Even attend the original musical, just go watch it!

Happy Smile

Always, man seeks for what he has not. In Rei's case, these were non-chaffing clothes.

The leather of her pants creaked as she walked, a sound that makes anyone uncomfortable just hearing it. And despite being indoors, the black also made her uncomfortably hot underneath. Her top was so tight, she had a more difficult time breathing her little breaths. The only piece of her new set of clothes that didn't bother her was that black flat cap.
And so, Rei made her way to a shop that offered more relaxed, comfortable clothing. At least something that didn't chaff her so much.

What Kaworu had suggested and Rei had insisted was the type of clothing known as 'sweet'. And the shop they consequently had to land on was the shop known as "Happy Smile". The furigana helped in their pronunciation as they stood outside, facing the shop, reading the name and looking at the marshmallow-sweetness displayed behind the big panes of glass.

"And so," Kaworu commentated, "we find ourselves standing outside, facing this shop, reading the name and looking at the marshmallow-sweetness displayed behind those big panes of glass. Let's hope you find what you're here for."
"The shop seems to project a type of child-like amusement park atmosphere around itself," Rei remarked.
"Sure. And I can just hear the happy, piping music, too."
"You're exaggerating."
"No seriously, listen..."

Rei let this go, and walked to the entrace where a shop assistant blocked the way. The woman - chubby, friendly, mid-30s - smiled an extremely large, happy smile and greeted, "Irasshaimase...!"
Rei, with her typical emotionless face, said nothing, waiting to be let in.
"Well," the shop assistant went, "what's with the glumy-ness? Now, you know, I can't let you in till I see your happy smile. Let's see your happy smile..." The woman's face was at tearing-point with a major smile stretching across it. She seemed to be doing so as a demonstration for Rei. "Where's that happy smile...?"

Kaworu was taking aback. His own award-winning smile was no match for this. "Alright, I'm not so sure if you should smile, Rei. Last time you did that, this happened." He gestured towards Rei's problematic outfit.
This is the only 'sweet' store in the city; if I don't enter, I will not be able to find any 'sweet' clothing easily elsewhere.
"Yeah, but who said 'sweet' was for you?"
I must enter, Rei replied.

Taking a deep breath, Rei smiled just enough to be admitted into the store.
"Welcome to Happy Smile," the shop assistant congratulated, her smile tightening beyond general imagination.

Nimbly, Rei dashed in and grabbed as many dresses and skirts as possible, and right into the dressing rooms.
There, she tried them all on, and all of which looked fine. It was that last one that she became particularly fond of, and all else slipped away from her mind.

It was a neat, bleached pink cotton t-shirt, with a light imprint of a large frangipani flower. The turtleneck of it draped snugly, but loosely, around her neck. And also, there was the skirt. It reached down low, almost to the floor. It was a dark, purple-blue; not too saturated to outbalance her upper-half, though. All in all, it was absolutely pretty, and absolutely 'sweet'.
There was a true smile on Rei's face, now, spinning around, looking at herself through the mirror.

She went out to show Kaworu, who - although was nowhere in particular - was outside, watching out for anyone suspiscous enough to sneak on Rei whilst she was trying out her clothing.

The curtains parted, and Rei spun out with the 'sweet' outfit. The style, there, was somehow reminiscent of the Old-Vietnamese era. Kaworu was in awe. "Oh, my! This is truly marvelous! If we fix your hair up for this, you will be one hell of a Sweet Rei!"

The others of the store's occupants thought so, too. All the women who were around crowded around Rei, squealing delights of awe and affection. "Kyaaa! Kawaii!" ("Ahhh! So cute!") Rei responded by soaking up all this with a Happy Smile.
She enjoyed this attention, all of a sudden.

At this moment, another moment was probably needed for Kaworu to fully contemplate the implications of Rei's behavior. Rei was dancing around amongst a crowd of friendly shoppers in a "sweet" outfit. It wasn't that he hadn't spent that long with Rei, he probably already had more contact with her than any of her other peers in their lifetimes; Kaworu probably was wholly ignorant.
The fact was, this was inexplicably not the Rei everybody knew.

The excitement, finally calming, allowed Rei to approach the shop assistant. "I'll take these!"
"Oh! Yes, of course! That will be ¥180,000!" The shop assistant said, showing her to the counter.
"Great. Oh, can I walk out with these on?"
The shop assistant's mood then changed. "No! You must change to these elsewhere."
"What?" Rei's mood also change. "But, but- I'm only just starting to enjoy these non-chaffing clothes! Why?"
"I'm sorry, store policy."
"How-?"
Rei was allowed no further questioning. She grumbled and went back into her changeroom.

She next walked out with those chaffing, black clothes, again.

When Kaworu turned around, he suddenly had a feeling that something was not right. Rei's red eyes seemed dulled by her absolutely placid and, yet, evidently tense face. It seemed to read, "I'm not in the mood," as Rei walked out wordlessly with the clothing in one arm and the black bag in the other. Simply, Rei seemed to be as she always were.
Kaworu was about to remark on this, but couldn't find the words nor logic to what he felt. He was able to detect Rei's current cold attitude, yet he totally did not notice Rei acting all - in a word - normal just before. But the sudden switch back triggered alarm bells at the back of his mind.
Kaworu continued to think as he went down with Rei.
"Well, we'll find a restroom, somewhere, then?" Kaworu suggested as Rei reached the checkout counter.
"Yes, that will be ¥180,000." The checkout lady said, also having a Happy Smile.
All Rei had to do was take out ¥180,000 in cash and hand it over, and she could go off and enjoy her new 'sweet' clothes. Rei pulled up her black bag and opened it up. Her head peered down into it...

It shot right back up again with shock, disguised as a happy smile. Her eyes told otherwise, and Kaworu pseudo-bent over to take a look.

Kaworu was able to say, "Holy...!"

The checkout lady held still with the Happy Smile still on, waiting. "Yes?"

Rei won't be pulling any 180,000 yen out soon, as the black bag was full of porn magazines.

"Hm..." Kaworu pondered whilst his nose was under high blood pressure, "I wonder if there're any ones featuring guys cosplaying, too..."

Situations like these were always awkward, and always happening at the worst of times.
What are we going to do? Rei pseudo-whispered sideways.
Rei was trapped, once again. The outfit of her dreams were held for ¥180,000, and all she had were porn magazines in the bag. As Rei was well aware, she had taken the wrong black bag from the porn shop.
"Rei," Kaworu said, "desperate times call for deserate measures..." There was a pause. "Let's run."

They ran.

"Stop!" The checkout assistant panicked, and tapped the button under the counter repeatedly. "Theif!"

Sirens screamed. Lights spun.
The entire security team rushed out and the mall that Rei ran through suddenly became a blizzard storm of people and panic.

Rei had to lose them.
"Rei, we gotta lose 'em!" Kaworu cried.
She hoped it wouldn't be too hard.
"It can't be too hard!" Kaworu continued. "There's already enough confusion, everywhere, as it is. Let's just get out, and we'd be safe!"

Rei dashed through the mall. Security guards were among the crowd, though, and it was only a matter of chance for Rei to bump into one. Chance was that unforgiving when Rei bumped into one as she was just about to go through the emergency exit.
All the guards knew who to look out for. The quick description they got over the radio was simple. "Badass albino girl with blue hair!"

"Ah! You!" The guard caught her right away.
With lightening speed, Rei threw a magazine right into the guard's face. Stunned for a second, Rei used the time to smack the guard unconscious with the whole bag, itself, leaving it, and run out.

The air, outside, had never been so refreshing. The two o'clock sun shone down on Rei like she was a goddess brought to life. Rei leaned against the barrier of the roof she was on, trying to regain some breath.

"An emergency exit to the roof?" Kaworu muttered to himself.

The black of her pants heated her under the sun, and her tight top disallowed her to take very deep breaths. Very soon, Rei became very discontented with her situation, and especially with her chaffing clothes.

"Say, Rei," Kaworu said as he psuedo-regained his breath, "I had a thought whilst we were down there at Happy Smile. When you were coming out of the change rooms... Um, something made me think you had changed when you came out... Er, I don't know what it was, though... Did you, Rei?"
Rei didn't move, but said in her neutral tone, "Of course. That's what you do in change rooms: change."
Kaworu almost smacked himself for being so ambiguous, whilst wondering for a fleeting moment how that pun could work in both English and Japanese. "No, that's not what I meant. I mean, when you came out, you were all... like you are now...? Quiet? Cool? Can do some serious kung-fu butt-kicking?"
Rei still did not move. "I don't think I was ever not so."
Kaworu had regained his breath by now, and was certain there was something going on. "No, Rei, there was something about you just before that..." With each word, Kaworu grew in certainty as the near-past seemed to make itself clearer. "You were acting... different before then. When you were in those 'sweet' clothes... You were... dancing around!"
Now Rei did move. She turned her head to look Kaworu in the pseudo-eyes. Her face was blank with a question mark on it. "I don't remember that..."
Kaworu got up, pointing and shaking his pseudo-finger at Rei, all the while looking transfixed at her. "But I do..."

After that, Kaworu couldn't say any more. There was nothing more to say, and the matter was mutually abandoned.
Butfact was, Kaworu hadn't forgotten the idea that popped into his head, then, which was this: Rei had just jumped from one personality to another when she saw herself dressed in 'sweet' clothes. The idea didn't entirely gel, but Kaworu knew he was thinkingin the right direction.

After a moment of silence, Rei announced. "We will go home. I'll have to change to my 'sweet' clothes there, and that will be that."
Kaworu still had other ambitions, however. "No we won't. We'll still be left with some problems, anyway. For one, we can only get off this roof through where we came - back down through the mall. And another, you haven't gotten yourself a wardrobe, yet! And most importantly, we have to get back my money."
"My money."
"All the more reason to! We need it back. We can't let it fall into the hands of whichever bastard was lucky enough to get it." Kaworu clenched his pseudo-fists. "We must regain our honour!"
"Then..." Perhaps it was Kaworu's way of speech that made Rei submit and realize she had to do it. "Then, where will we look?"
"I think we have no choice," Kaworu faced Rei with shining eyes, "but to start from where we last saw it."
"No," Rei shooked her head weakly, pleadingly. "Not the porn shop..."

"We must. It isn't that bad. At least we didn't lose it at Manga 'R' Us. The creepiest of all who we can ever encounter are the otaku. Hell, if we were an anime, I bet they'd written over 4,000 fics in English about us right now! Half of which would be about me, of course..."
Kaworu was quite wrong, luckily.
"We will need a disguise to get through the main hall, again," Rei interjected.
Kaworu thought for a moment, then got it. "Right, you see that brown paper bag, there? Put it on. And a draw a face on it. A man with glasses and a moustache."
"This is ridiculous..."

"Well, then," Kaworu huffed, looking at Rei, "what have you got?"
Rei looked at what she had. "I have this... no."
This can't be.

"Of course!" Kaworu jumped. "The bunny suit!"

Next time:
Rei wears a bunny suit! Looking for the lost bag money, Rei and Kaworu enter the mysterious realm of The Porn Shop! But just as frighteningly, Rei gets taken into a dark room, now alone with a stranger. Will she be able to find her money, even if she escapes from the man? And what are the outcomes when Rei bumps into a certain someone after the ordeal?
Prepare for another thrill ride in the next, moving chapter: Star-crossed
Fan service? Yes, sir; three bags full, sir!

(Can you work out how the "change room" pun can work for both Japanese and English?)