To continue writing as much as I have until now, I ask for your support. Even tweeting about it helps.
Become my Patron on Pa treon dot com/Kuugenthefox
There are perks and you might even get me to continue writing a discontinued fic!
Disclaimer: You donate for me to have time, not directly for fanfics but I use my time for fanfics.
Dissonance
Event XXVII
Vanishing Truth
Standing out in the cold hallway, Saki left her head hanging, facing the ground. Leaning against the door to Honoka's room, she knew that going back in there was only going to make her feel worse. The last hour inside had pretty much shown her that trying to ignore the truth was only going to hurt herself and those she held dear. No matter what she felt, she couldn't shake off the guilt.
"You can tell, can't you?" Laying behind Honoka, Saki just couldn't find peace. In her memory, she had spent hundreds of nights with her like this, but there were so many discrepancies that she knew it wasn't right. Honoka's scent was different from the one in her memory. The feeling of her skin didn't match. Her posture, the way she kept her arms and legs, her tone of voice in bed. It were just little things
Letting go of Honoka, Saki got out of bed, turning back into a Cure just as Honoka sat up, looking depressed. Her memories were altered but it was far from perfect. Saki was much more muscular than she remembered. The thickness of her arms was slightly different. The way Saki's breasts pushed against her back when they snuggled up. Both of them felt attracted to each other, they could tell that they loved each other. But at the same time, they realized that those emotions were not really directed to who they looked at.
"When I think about the past, there are so many things that don't make sense... How we met, what we did, back then, what we went through. I look at you and it feels right, but I know it's not." The scientist slowly exhaled, looking up at the ceiling. "And that's not all... the more I think about the past, the more I realize that I've been not quite myself for a long time. Work conditions, the expectations of sponsors, the jealousy of colleagues... thinking back on it, I should have known better than to let it get to me." Her memories told her that she had been very strict on Saki, teasing and scolding her too much. She didn't have any excuse for venting her piled up stress like that.
"I'm not any better." Saki crouched down and shared Honoka's anguish. "The last few years, I've been trying so hard to find something I can be as successful at as... Mai." Her memories were messed up. Honoka was not a painter, despite her memories telling her so, she knew that much. "I don't even remember why. I think I just started out, trying to be on equal grounds with her, and somewhere along the line things went too far... I didn't realize that we were never on different ground to begin with. I put so much work into sports and my training... I spent less and less time with you, I mean, with Mai." It was still hard for her to consciously use Mai's name instead of simply talking to Honoka. She hated the way she felt guilty every time she used Mai's name, despite her being the girl she really loved. "I guess we're both a bit screwed up."
"I want to go back to normal. And even more than that, I want to go back to being happy just having... Nagisa at my side." Being locked up in some sort of dimensional prison hadn't exactly improved her condition. But realizing how bad it had gotten... that it had changed the way she lived her life and treated her partner... Honoka didn't want to continue like that.
Saki turned around, sitting on the ground, her back leaned against the frame of the bed. "That sounds like a good idea. I wish it was that easy for me." Stretching her arms for a few seconds, Saki rested her head against her knees. "I'm not even sure how to fix things. I like doing sports and I wish I could just go back to playing softball."
"Why don't you? Professional softball is not a bad choice. I think it would suit you." Honoka felt bad for Saki. Japan didn't have many professional sports leagues. The closest thing to a softball league she knew of was the V-League for volleyball. But that wasn't the only reason she felt guilty.
While she found it easy to at least realize what she wanted to do to get things back to normal, Saki was struggling. Petting Saki's head while covering herself up with the blanket, Honoka went through her own memories. Looking for memories that were about Nagisa, she knew that it was really Saki. "You used to be more... I suppose refined is too strong a term. Cute? Feminine? I think that works."
"You think so?" Thinking about herself and how she was acting now compared to when she hadn't started doing hardcore sports yet, she saw right away what Honoka meant. During training, there was no sense of being girly or manly. All that counted were the results. And considering how much time she had spent doing it... how the time she had spent with Mai was gradually getting less and less as she tried harder and harder... "You're right... I didn't even realize that." Looking at her legs, she started to regret her past. "But it's a bit late for that I guess. I'm even more muscular than Nagisa or Michiru. It would just look weird if-" Saki twitched when Honoka gently slapped the top of her head.
"You're so silly, Saki. Just because you've got some muscles doesn't mean you can't behave the way you did before becoming obsessed with training. It wasn't what I remember but... it didn't feel bad when you held me." She couldn't help but blush, saying it. She tried to resist it, knowing that Saki belonged to Mai and not her, but her feelings rejected that notion right away.
Smiling and blushing at the same time, Saki slightly turned her head, looking at Honoka in the dark. "Thanks." She would try. Hopefully, Mai would be happy too... when... if they got back to normal. "I hope we won't stay like this. Right now, I just want to crawl on the bed, hug you and nibble on your ear. But I know it's not you who I really want to do that too."
"Saki... I feel bad asking you this but can you sleep in your own room tonight? We both know that we're not a real couple. I don't want to make things even more complicated than they are." It wasn't that she disliked Saki. She just didn't want to lose two friends when everything went back to normal.
"You don't need to feel bad. To be honest, even when I think about the memories that have Mai in them, I keep thinking I wouldn't mind being that girls partner. If I had never met Mai and you never met Nagisa..." Saki was interrupted when a few strands of long hair tickled her neck and a single finger sealed her lips.
"Don't make things even harder than they already are." Before she realized what she was doing, Honoka kissed Saki on the cheek and backed off. "We should go to sleep."
Just nodding, and feeling guilty for bringing it up, Saki got up and sat down on the bed for a moment, taking Honoka's hand. It was something she had done with Mai when they were younger... something she had forgotten until now. Four of their fingers intervened with each other, Saki kept playing with Honoka's index finger, the white Cure going along with it, a love struck expression on her face. "Good night, Honoka."
Refusing to let go, Honoka got up and opened the door for Saki, letting her out. She had to gather all of her self-control to finally stop and close the door, leaving Saki out in the cold hallway.
"I wonder how Nagisa is doing..." Slowly walking towards the stairs, Saki felt miserable. Despite being somewhat aware that her feelings were real but misdirected, it hadn't hit home until now. Hopefully, things would go back to normal soon.
Reaching her own room, the only one inside was Pine, sound asleep. Berry's bed was empty. Saki felt a little bit jealous. Getting under her blanket, so it completely covered her, and turning back into civilian form, Saki laid down, feeling a bit lonely.
And she wasn't the only one. Nagisa and Mai experienced the same thing. Having lived with their partners for so long, they intuitively knew that something was amiss. They hadn't gone to bed together. Even before that, Mai had asked Nagisa to stay separated. Both of them were laying in their own beds, unable to sleep, dwelling on memories.
Most of Nagisa's recent memories were full of Mai getting angry with her. Knowing it was really Honoka who got angry, and thinking back on what she had been like when they still attended school, Nagisa wondered what had triggered the change in personality. Honoka used to be strict when she had to be but also forgiving when she could. It was a very nice balance, Nagisa thought. But lately, Mai... Honoka, had changed quite a bit. Maybe the reason was that she often worked overtime... Nagisa hadn't even bothered to think about it until now. That realization by itself showed her another issue.
Herself. Thinking back on it, ever since Honoka started working, she had become a little thoughtless. Whether it was just forgetting to put away her dirty clothes after a shower and hang up the towels, clean the sink after brushing her teeth, forget to cook dinner when Honoka was working into the evening... The less she saw Honoka, the more she started forgetting those little things. It wasn't that she didn't care. Her feelings were as fierce as they had been years ago. So why did she forget?
Was it because she still hadn't found a job she truly wanted to do? It bothered her, yes, and at times, she felt unhappy with her life. Honoka worked long hours and sometimes she only saw her when waking up to get to work early, and when Honoka came home, hours after Nagisa had finished working. The one thing she really had wanted to do, play lacrosse professionally, was a pipe dream. Only America had professional leagues for it, and that was a long, long way from Japan. Even if Honoka came with her, surely able to find work at a private or public laboratory in America, she would have to leave behind all of her friends and family. Back then, Honoka had suggested joining an amateur club, but she had been reluctant. It meant spending even less time with her partner.
Turning over, Nagisa peeked out of her bed and up, curious of Mai had fallen asleep. It was hard on her, being in the same room as the girl she loved or at least was made to feel that way, but unable to sleep next to her. "Mai?"
A muffled sound, asking what she wanted, came from under Mai's blanket. It was impossible to fall asleep with Nagisa sleeping in the bed right below her. No matter what she knew and thought, her heart was still aching, telling her to give in and fall into Nagisa's embrace.
"In your memories... what am I doing? Was I happy with our life?" Prying into the relationship of someone else wasn't something Nagisa did often. But she wanted to know how Saki dealt with her life.
Getting out from under the blanket, Mai laid on her side, facing the wall that was closer to her bed. "Maybe. Lately, I don't know what... Saki is thinking. We don't see each other much and she changed a lot. She used to be really thoughtful, always looking out for me, sometimes just watching me draw for hours. Now... I need to constantly remind her of things she would have done by herself. Maybe it's because she is training by herself so much. I always tell her I'd support her no matter what she wants to do... but I really want her to just be there with me. I understand she wants to feel accomplished... and I think that's a good thing, but she could do that without picking something so extreme." Mai was surprised how easily all of those things came out. Talking to Nagisa seemed so easy... maybe because she saw her as her partner.
"I'm sure Saki would understand if you told her this. I felt the same. I wanted to do something with my life. Achieve something. Honoka is really smart and could easily support us both, but I would feel horrible, not doing anything." Pausing for a moment, Nagisa sat at the edge of her bed. "I've been wondering if I should pick up Lacrosse again. I could only play in amateur clubs as there are no professional, paid leagues. I've only been working part time at a gym, but the hours there are pretty silly and I've been seeing you, I mean Honoka, hardly at all."
Mai turned over and waited for almost a minute before she responded. "Don't you think Honoka would be happier, too, if you weren't worried about what you're doing with your life?"
"Maybe you're right. When we get back to normal, I'll talk to her. You should talk to Saki, too." Letting her feet touch the cold ground, Nagisa felt a little bit better but also weird at the same time. Mai was, in her heart, still the girl she loved. Honoka was just a friend.
"What do you think of Saki? You've known each other for a long time, and you're not living with her, so it should be easy for you to tell if she's any different." Mai knew very well that the girl in her memories was Saki, and not Nagisa. That the behavior she recalled was Saki's. She just needed confirmation that she wasn't exaggerating it inside her head.
"She lost a lot of the charm that made her fun to be around. I remember you commenting on this about a year ago. You said that Saki had become too focused on what she is supposed to do. That she lost track of enjoying her life with her caring partner." Nagisa recalled the rest of the conversation as well but she didn't know if she should tell Mai. It was a bit personal.
"Honoka also talked about you. When we last met, you were constantly correcting Saki. Honoka thought you were trying to compensate for the way Saki had changed by changing yourself." Considering Mai hadn't left out any details, Nagisa didn't want to keep this from her.
"Maybe so. I can't imagine life without y-, without Saki. I'd do anything to stay with her. No matter what she does, I'm not going to leave her." Nothing of what she said was exaggerated. For Mai, being with Saki was the very epitome of being happy. Although lately, that epitome had been tarnished a bit.
"After this is over... or at least when we get back to normal... I hope we can all go back to things as they were before." Getting out of bed and peeking over the frame of Mai's bed, Nagisa reached out and took the white Cure's hand. "Until then, I'll at least try to be a better person for you. Even if you're not the girl I really love, you're still one of my best friends."
Mai wanted to pull away her hand but didn't. "Stop it... what if I really fall for you?"
Grinning and smiling, Nagisa let go. "I think Saki would hit me pretty hard. But you're right. I'll go to sleep." Getting back in her bed, Nagisa felt a lot better now. "Mai?"
"Weren't you going to bed?" She couldn't help but smile a little. She could see what Honoka liked about her. "What is it?"
"Thanks for talking. I feel a lot better."
"I do, too. Thanks for listening, Nagisa."
=== Dissonance ===
Her breath was racing, a warm liquid dropping from her mouth and chin, sticking to her hands like glue. Kneeling over the corpse of the girl, she licked her teeth, stained red with the lifeblood of her victim. She liked the taste, if only because she could taste the fear of the girl in it. She hadn't even seen it coming.
"How do you like my present, Dream?" Her own voice was just barely making it to the edges of the room. Slowly getting up, wiping the thick blood from her hands on her black sleeves, she leaned down and grabbed the right arm of the corpse, slowly pulling her up. The expression of the dead girl was frozen in surprise and horror, her throat torn open by violent bites. She had suffered lethal damage before she knew what happened.
Nozomi could not even close her eyes for she was forced to witness everything her Nightmare did. Pulling the dead Miyuki up, the corrupt Cure's expression exploded in a grimace of sadism, suddenly pulling the arm out of it's socket, blood spraying all over her own body for a few seconds. Throwing the arm away, she grabbed the body again, lifting it up, grabbing Miyuki by her destroyed throat. "You hate her, loathe her, don't you? She makes you remember. That fur ball creature you love so much. That he will never be yours. Because she acted just like him."
"You hated her, didn't you?" Nightmare's words echoed in Nozomi's head. It was a lie. It was a complete lie. She had felt the opposite. Seeing Miyuki protect her despite only getting to know her recently had left the same kind of impression Coco had left all those years ago. She didn't hate her!
As Nightmare opened her mouth, Nozomi could feel the dark mud rise up from her throat. They didn't share the body but she could feel everything Nightmare did. "Now watch."
Shoving two of her fingers into Miyuki's mouth, Nightmare forced open her jaw. Nozomi could feel the still warm lips on her own when Nightmare forced a deep kiss on the corpse, dark mud pouring into the dead body of the innocent girl. With every second, more and more of Miyuki's costume turned to black and her throat started regenerating. It wasn't healing her. It was corrupting her, turning her into a puppet of Nightmare.
"Nozomi!"
The scene changed drastically from one moment to another. Looking up, towards the ceiling, she could tell that she was lying down, on a bed. Looking up, she saw Miyuki's face, worry written all over her face. "Are you awake now? You were screaming in your sleep."
Nozomi tried to call down. Had it just been a dream? Had she cracked under the pressure of guilt and hiding it? It seemed that way. It had to be that way. "Miyuki... thanks for waking me up..."
She couldn't possibly tell her what she had just seen in her dreams. She couldn't tell anyone. Just like she couldn't tell anyone that she had caused the reflections and the recent events. Closing her eyes briefly, breathing a sigh of relief, Nozomi gasped for air when two hands suddenly grabbed her throat. Her eyes flung wide open in fear, she knew it hadn't been a dream. A dark Happy, her costume tainted black, her eyes full of hatred, was choking her violently, her body restrained by binds. It was the same! It hadn't been a dream!
"You will pay, Dream! Pay for our suffering!"
With an ear-piercing scream, Nozomi woke up a second time, facing Miyuki yet again. She couldn't believe her own senses anymore. To begin with, how would Miyuki even get into her room? "Suffer!" With a single lightning fast move, Nozomi put both of her hands on Miyuki's throat, her eyes wide open, twitching wildly. Before the pink Cure being attacked could defend herself, Nozomi snapped her neck. "Suffer! Suffer! More! Suffer more! Pay for your sin!"
Grabbing her own throat, Nozomi started laughing as she started choking herself. And just as the room around her faded away, she woke up another time. Simply screaming, she jumped out of bed, flung the door open and ran without looking where she was going. Hitting the wall, unable to even decide if she should go left or right, Nozomi got on her knees, frightened to death of her own room.
And just when she thought it couldn't get any worse, the door to Miyuki's room opened, the pink Cure coming running out and towards Nozomi. "Stay away!" Screaming as loud as she could, Nozomi raised her right hand. "Dream Blast!" Firing roughly in the direction Happy was at, Nozomi couldn't think straight anymore. She couldn't take another scenario of her killing Miyuki. "Don't come!" Nozomi tried to get up but her legs didn't quite obey her. About to launch another attack against Happy, her body gave in to fear and fright, her consciousness fading.
=== Dissonance ===
"Can't we go a single night without someone going completely bonkers?" Urara, sleep deprived, pissed off, and also on Ako withdrawal, was keeping a completely hysteric Dream locked up so tightly that she couldn't even move a finger. The pink Cure resembled a big ball of chains. "Why is Nozomi going crazy the moment one of us gets near her? Pine, you can pry into her mind, can't you?"
"That's not what Domination is made for." Inori knew that she didn't have a whole lot of choice in this matter. The state Dream was in was catastrophic, to put it simple. The moment she saw anyone, she started screaming, trying to keep them away. It was especially bad when Happy got near, turning Dream into a screaming, crying and hysteric mess. The pink Cure was devastated, being treated like that. Using two daggers and a large piece of cloth, Beauty had forced a full face blindfold on Dream, getting the situation somewhat under control.
As Inori looked at the back, she saw Happy sitting at the stairs, depressed, Beauty trying to console her somehow, with no success at all. "Kaoru, if I start behaving even a little weird, hit me with Stormflair." She didn't trust anyone else to knock her out, no questions asked. She had never considered the possibility, but after taking over Bloom, she had felt the anger, wrath and hostility. If Happy hadn't put Bloom under her spell, Inori was afraid what might have happened.
"I will." Turning to Berry and Moonlight, both of them observing the scene, the former very much worried about Inori, Kaoru addressed them directly. "Berry, can you take care of Inori when she falls?"
Inori thought it was sweet of Kaoru to be worried. But as a Cure, just hitting the ground after going unconscious wouldn't put as much as a scratch on her. "I've never taken someone over with the intent of just peeking at their thoughts..."
"I'll help." Hikari, despite Kurumi trying to stop her, put both of her hands on Inori's back, using her special ability, channeling it entirely into Pine. The yellow Cure could feel that all her senses were heightened.
She was afraid. After having seen what was inside Bloom and White when Beat and Muse purged them, she was afraid. Confusedly looking at her right hand, Kaoru was holding it. "This is what people do when they aim to provide mental support, right?"
The awkward gesture and explanation put a tiny smile on Inori's face. Looking at Dream, who was still blind folded, Inori took a deep breath. "Domination!"
She stench of decay was overwhelming. Finding herself, half-translucent and floating, in the middle of a wasteland, Inori couldn't believe she was inside the mind of Dream. The idealist that had saved them from Nightmare. The ground was burning hot and slightly sticky, pools of blood boiling in the distance, large charred trees littering the landscape. The sky was covered by pitch black clouds, burning hot winds whipped up the stench of decay even more. It was a perfect depiction of what she imagined hell itself would look like. Moving herself into one direction, Inori stopped, feeling something extremely familiar but also extremely alienating behind her. Turning around, she saw something that sent a chill down her spine.
Turning around she stared right into two deep orange colored eyes. Eyes, filled with incomparable contempt and hatred. Backing off and getting a good view on what she was looking at, it was a copy of herself, the costume pitch black with golden linings, the hair a bright silver. It looked a whole lot like she was wearing the same things as Setsuna had worn back when she was Eas. She wasn't moving, just staring at her.
Inori couldn't move. Just like prey that was being stared down by a snake. Considering the mental link, if she died right here and now, she would likely die in the real world as well. Cold sweat was running down her back and forehead. She always liked to be prepared, but there were some situations that voided all contingency plans, no matter what. Blinking, the stoic expression on her clone changed into a creepy smile. She knew. She could smell Inori's fear. Taste her fright. Hear her heart beating wildly against her chest. And Inori knew that her copy knew. Trying to cut the link, she couldn't find the way out. Getting into a mind and getting out was both similar to finding an open door in a room with a dozen. Usually, most were open, but this time, she couldn't find an exit at all. Unable to avoid blinking any longer, the copy instantly vanished without a trace. Rapidly turning and checking every direction, Inori made sure that she was really gone.
And she still couldn't cut the link. Something was blocking her, keeping her in. She had jumped into a dark pit with a rope but there had been superglue at the bottom of it. And she was standing knee-deep in it. Looking around, she could spot three points that seemed different from the rest of the wasteland. A storm cell in the sky. A several dozen meter high fire pillar. And the source of the stench.
Inori headed towards the fire pillar first. If she couldn't leave, she had to find out what was going on inside Dream's head. But whatever it was, Inori knew it wasn't just Dream having a bad day or nightmare. Something was violently mutating her thoughts.
=== Dissonance ===
"I don't like the color of her face." Kaoru was still holding Inori's hand, ready to forcibly shut down her consciousness at any second. "Her body temperature has fallen as well." Kaoru felt a tightness in her chest. She knew she wasn't confused about feeling worried. She had a pretty firm grasp on that. But she couldn't get a single moment of peace. Inori was leaned against the wall. Both she and Dream had gone entirely silent.
Hikari was still keeping the energy link open, Kurumi by her side, having brought a blanket so Hikari wouldn't feel cold. Honoka and Saki had joined the group by now. "This... isn't our fault, is it?" Standing right next to her fake partner, Saki was worried that whatever had possessed them was now attacking Dream.
"It's possible. I asked Miki and she said that the shadow was targeting Dream, crying her name in anger. I hope Pine is doing okay." Honoka could see that everyone was worried. Not a single Cure of the light team was asleep. Even Marine and Blossom had shown up.
"Anyone need a drink?" Urara sat down at the wall opposite to where Nozomi was. Using some of her favor to get a few assorted bottles of alcohol, she settled down, expecting a very long night. "The way I know Nozomi, this is going to take a while. If something is strong enough to make her go bonkers, we're in for the real deal."
Miki stared her down. "Don't you think it's pretty damn inappropriate to start drinking when your team leader is in god knows what condition?"
Getting up and staring back, Urara's tone changed drastically. "So, little miss perfect, what would you have me do? Hold her hand and hope she doesn't randomly blast it off? Get closer and drive her even more insane? Worry my ass off and end up in a super shitty condition when she snaps out of this, just so she can feel bad about it?"
Grabbing Miki's hand and pulling her away, Yuri put an end to the argument before it got out of hand. Noticing how tense the atmosphere was, Urara didn't pursue the issue either but instead took a big mouthful of her drink, straight out of the bottle. She didn't need to have that overgrown smurf stick her nose into this. She was worried enough as is.
"Yuri!" Miki complained about being pulled away. "Don't tell me you're on her side."
"I'm not. You didn't look at her hands, right?" Yuri had a keen eye for these things. Primarily because she knew exactly what it meant to be worried sick. "The bottle in her hand was constantly shaking." Miki looked back at Lemonade, who was peering at Dream constantly while taking a mouthful now and then.
"What do you think Bukki is seeing in there?" Miki was more worried about her friend than about Dream. Using Domination while being the sole benefactor of Luminous' buff had to be close to a mind dive.
"Going by what Dream is acting like? Hell." Yuri didn't mince her words. And she couldn't shake off the fear that this was all related to Eclipse somehow. "I hope Bloom and White don't have any kind of relapse into going crazy after this. We're all on edge as is. I hope Beauty keeps an eye on Happy."
"I'm going to keep an eye on Bloom and White, just in case. You should get some rest, Yuri." Taking her partners hand, Miki could feel that she was nervously shaking a little bit. "Although I guess that's not really an option while all of this is going on. Want to lay down on my lap while I hold your hand?"
Yuri looked at Miki like she was an alien. "Miki, you can't be serious about that." Yuri would rather end up with no sleep whatsoever than do something that embarrassing. She liked having Miki by her side, but the blue Cure was constantly pushing it. Trying to put a damper on that had been largely futile, too.
"I'm dead serious. I'll sit down and you can use me as a lap pillow." Grinning, knowing exactly that Yuri wouldn't agree to that, Miki liked to tease her a little. The fun came to an abrupt end when a chill ran through Miki's body. Looking at Yuri, she could tell that her partner had felt it, too. The smell of something burnt was in the air.
Looking to Dream the most likely source of it, Miki hoped she was just hallucinating things from being sleep deprived. Several large, black and translucent tentacles had formed on Nozomi's back, slowly feeling their surroundings. Miki's face was distorted in disgust. "Can you see that, Yuri?" Slowly backing off, Miki was ready to unleash a blast at full power.
"Yeah..." Facing the same shadow as a few hours ago, a distortion of her own shadow, Yuri felt every single hair on her body stand up in fear. Was that thing immortal? Didn't they completely obliterate it? How was it still here? Why was Eclipse still here? Her teeth hurt from gritting them too hard, her hands were clenched fists. She couldn't deal with this again. It would just possess someone else anyway! Slowly taking a step back, the proud and usually fearless Moonlight wasn't able to see any hope of winning.
Everyone around Dream was having the same reactions. Slowly backing off, getting some distance between themselves and the now black Cure, they couldn't convince themselves to get any closer or even stay their ground. Luminous, Rose and Windy remained with Pine, those three seemingly unaffected.
But it was Pine that was affected the most.
=== Dissonance ===
She couldn't even avert her eyes from what was happening. A pot, as large as a pond, seething blood inside, a fire that seemed to burn even the air raising from it. And inside the blood were innumerable parts of humans and animals alike. That alone was horrifying enough. What froze her in place were the care takers of the pot. Dozens of copies of herself, tasting, stirring and adding ingredients.
Standing there, in one synchronous move, all the copies stopped their activities, turning about and facing her, their orange glowing eyes like those of a predator that had spotted it's dinner. Her legs didn't obey her. If she moved, they would undoubtedly catch her and throw her into the pond.
Blinking, Inori almost screamed when every single copy had advanced a dozen meters towards her, standing completely still, staring at her. The fear of being slaughtered, cooked and devoured ripped her out of her trance. "Diamond-"
Just as she launched her attack and blinked, the copies were all gone. The pot was gone. The seething blood and the flames were gone. The stench in the air, the thunderous roar of the sky, those were still there. Feeling something dangerous behind her, Inori spun around, facing another copy. But this time, she knew it was different. Her labyrinth clone was walking, slowly circling around Inori, not saying a word.
Inori wouldn't bother asking where she was, what the clone was or why she was being questioned. Those questions never resulted in any favorable answers. "What is happening to Dream?"
"Punishment." The eyes of the labyrinthian Inori were completely fixated on the Cure. She didn't blink, nor did she have need to breathe or open her mouth to speak. There were no foot prints on the ground where she stepped. Her breasts didn't bounce, no matter how big a step she took. She was completely detached from physical and biological laws, from Inori's point of view.
Before she could say anything else, the scenery around Inori changed drastically. It showed a small room. And she could her Dream's voice. "I wish that we no longer need to fight each other." What happened next explained a lot of things for Inori. As the events unfolded before her, the wasteland returned. the clone now standing right in front of her.
"Payment." Inori couldn't fight back when her clone grabbed her arms and forced an ice cold kiss on the Cure, the copy's tongue sliding into her mouth. The body was not truly alive. It was cold as stone, and there was no emotion in it. Feeling a stinging and unfamiliar pain in her whole body, Inori fell to her knees when the clone dissipated into black particles, vanishing into thin air.
Feeling sick to the bone, Inori couldn't hold it in and threw up, right on the ground. What she saw scared her enough to make her scream out, flinch and hastily crawl backwards from the pile. Black mud and blood. Looking at her body, she still felt normal. She wasn't cold and her costume hadn't turned black. She now knew why Dream was being punished. She was the one responsible for creating the reflections.
Inori wasn't surprised that keeping something like that a secret would eventually cause stress or even hysteric behavior. But nothing like what she was experiencing now. She had to keep going. Slowly getting up, she didn't notice that there were dozens of her copies staring at her from the distance. What they saw was what Inori couldn't. Silver hair and orange eyes. Inori had paid for knowledge with part of herself.
Heading towards the storm cell next, Inori wasn't sure what to do with the knowledge she had gained. Revealing it to everyone would undoubtedly and permanently cast Dream out. Nobody would want anything to do with her. Nobody would be able to trust her ever again. And it wouldn't solve anything. Even if they had known all along that Dream was responsible, there was likely nothing they could have done to prevent the current events.
The closer she got to the storm cell, the more she got the feeling that something was watching her. But no matter how much she tried to keep a clear view on the area, there was always at least one blind spot. It felt difficult to breathe and her head had started to ache. Finally reaching the area beneath the storm cell, she was looking at a bizarre and disgusting scene. Pieces of human bodies were littered all over the area. She could make out at least three separate people just based off clothing and skin color. To her surprise, there was no smell of death or decay, only the grotesque scene. Getting closer to the absolute center, Inori witnessed how a large crux materialized. It only got more bizarre when Moonlight was both standing in front of it and nailed to the crux.
Getting close enough to take a look at their faces, Inori stepped back the second the crucified Moonlight glared at her. Those eyes no longer belonged to a sane human. There was only rage, contempt and hatred in it.
Blinking once, Inori found the same copy as before walking out from behind the large crux, both Moonlights simply staring at each other. "Rejection and Hatred." The copy was different now. Both hair and eyes were the same color as Inori's. "A cast off shell."
The copy just stood there after saying her lines, observing Inori without blinking or moving at all. "Are those... Eclipse and Moonlight?" Inori had no idea what exactly happened between the original and the copy. Moonlight had been in a coma when they recovered her from exile. Eclipse had been in the same state.
"No" Walking towards the two Moonlights, the copy stopped at the first. "Restraint. Imprisonment." Continuing on to the crucified one, both of the silver Cures completely ignored the clone, as if she didn't exist. "Resentment, Hatred, Revenge, Guilt." Stopping at the second one, the scene changed. A third Moonlight appeared, slowly walking towards the first one. "Half became whole. And half was discarded." The first and the third Moonlight joined hands, glaring at the crucified one. With one powerful outburst, the crucified Moonlight had a long silver blade driven through her chest, letting out a powerful wail that shook Inori to the bone.
She didn't like that at all. "Moonlight was split into half after her exile? A part of her was created that kept the exile under control? And that part was completed by Eclipse? Then what happened to the remains of the hate filled Moonlight?"
"Termination." The scene changed yet again, the crux going up in flames, burning the impaled Moonlight who kept screaming. With a final glare, filled with a level of hatred that Inori had never seen before, the burning Moonlight spat at her original. Black ash rose into the sky from the burning cross, the remaining Moonlights slowly vanishing. "Payment."
Inori took a step back as the clone approached but she was immediately grabbed by a multitude of hands. Looking behind herself, six copies each were holding each leg and arm, another six holding on to her torso, two forcing her head in position. Her heart was racing badly. Despite there having been no effects, she was still horrified by the act.
But no kiss came. The clone stood in front of her, completely still, until it suddenly turned translucent and walked straight through her. Inori felt like she had fallen into a pond of water much colder than ice. The sensation stuck. Her whole body felt cold as the clones let go and dissipated. And this time, she realized right away that there was an effect on her. Falling to her knees, she could see strands of silver hair falling over her shoulder. Large parts of her costume were black. To her own surprise, she barely cared. She needed to know what else happened, what caused the situation to turn into this. She couldn't stop now.
=== Dissonance ===
"Move." Urara's eyes had a glint of danger in them. Bloom was blocking her way of getting to where Dream and the other four she had infected were. Their costumes were showing large black blotches and none of them even seemed to realize what was happening. Getting them out of there by force was Urara's sole idea.
"You don't know whats going to happen if you pull them out. What if you infect everyone else?"
"That is going to happen anyway at the rate this is going. Move." Urara created several chains. "Or I'll move you." Forcing her way past Bloom, Urara had no other Cures oppose her. White was on other side of the hallway for now, and the air was dangerously rich with black particles the closer one got to Dream.
"Lemonade, stop it!" Grabbing Urara's right arm, Saki immediately let go again, the yellow Cure glaring at her with eyes that were completely hostile. She didn't go along with most of them but she wasn't about to let them become fodder for some kind of evil whatever. About to launch her chains, she saw Happy walk right into the zone towards Windy.
"The fuck you're doing? Get out of there!" Launching her chains at Happy instead, Urara missed, the chains flying straight into the walls instead. Whatever the particles were, it was messing with her ability. Not only that, but she felt sick the moment, putting her right hand on the wall, just trying to stand. Her vision was getting hazy. "What's... whats going on..." She could taste iron in her mouth just before she passed out.
Walking through the particle infested area, Miyuki witnessed Lemonade shouting at her and then doing nothing, simply standing there, frozen, not even blinking. Reaching Windy and looking into her eyes, she was in a trance. Gathering her strength, Miyuki put her palm right over Windy's eyes. "Once Upon A Time!"
Her ability worked in such a way that it took as much energy as necessary to induce the dreaming status. Miyuki felt like someone had ripped out part of her lungs. Starting to cough and falling on her knees, the pink Cure could already felt drained. But she had to keep going. If she managed to shut all five of them into a fairytale world, no matter what kind of mental influence they were under would be broken. Ignoring Pine, Miyuki held her hand over Rose's eyes next. "Once Upon A Time!" This time, there were physical repercussions. Several cuts appeared on her arms and legs. She wasn't bleeding much, no more than a really bad scratch, but it still was a lot worse than she expected. Going after Luminous next, she had heard from Reika that shutting her down would likely have catastrophic results if she didn't shut down Dream right after that.
"You can't do it." Miyuki's heart stopped for a second as she heard a very familiar voice. "It seems you have finally reached the end of this little adventure. It is time for you to reset again." Right in front of Miyuki's eyes materialized Joker, the same one she and her team had destroyed years ago. "I've seen your dream of beating me and Lord Pierrot. What a foolish vision! Mere humans couldn't possibly hope to overcome his Lordship! Let me let you in on a little secret." Leaning down and whispering in Miyuki's ears, the unpredictable jester started to laugh.
"No... that can't be... I remember breaking out... with everyone... we beat you and Pierrot..." Miyuki could feel the anguish. Was he right? If he wasn't, then how could he be here? Was everything she had experienced, all the hardship she had gone through since then... had it all just been an illusion inside an illusion? "I won't let you-" Miyuki could feel the force of the glacial weapons flying past her, tearing the Joker in front of her to pieces instantly. Looking back, she saw Reika, summoning even more weapons.
"Shut them down, Miyuki!" Reika couldn't see what Miyuki saw, but she could very well tell that Miyuki was seeing something. It was just her hypothesis, but the way everyone reacted, it seemed to put them into a trance like state that made them hallucinate something they were truly scared of.
Grabbing Luminous and pulling her closer to where Dream was, Miyuki could hear Joker's voice echo in her head. But she trusted Reika. Focusing on what she was doing, it took her what felt like a minute to pull Luminous the few meters to Dream. Putting her right hand on Nozomi's face and her left on Luminous face, Miyuki felt scared. Considering how much energy it had cost her to put both Windy and Rose into trace, there was the possibility that... her ability could kill it's user. But if she didn't shut them down now, they could all die.
"Once Upon A Time!" A violent shock ran through her entire body. Without warning, Miyuki vomited a large amount of blood. The red liquid was running from her nose and mouth as she lost consciousness and fell over, skin bursting open in large wounds all over her body.
Several seconds passed with Miyuki seemingly dead before her body violently twitched under the extreme drain. At the same time, the dark particles completely dissipated, as their sources were cut off. Completely and utter silence dominated the hall. Miyuki, laying wounded among the five infected, didn't move at all.
"Tsubomi, heal her!" Erika was already pulling Tsubomi's hand, both of them having kept away from the particles as far as possible without going out of sight. Getting there as fast as they could, Erika could already smell the blood that Happy was losing.
"She's really badly hurt! Reborn!" Using her special ability, Tsubomi starting to convert her own energy into life force and pour it into Happy's body. Succeeding in closing most of the major wounds, she wasn't going to be able to replace the lost blood and life energy on her own. "If only Luminous was able to help..."
Kneeling down next to her partner, Erika put her hands together and focused. Healing was far from her specialty, so she really needed to block out all other thoughts. Copying Tsubomi's ability, she focused as hard as she could. Even for Erika, the situation was a little bit too serious to crack a funny line. "Reborn!"
Reika rushed to Miyuki's side the second she thought it safe. Not bothering to ask any questions, she knew how important it was for those that were providing medical support to focus on the task at hand. Checking on Pine and Dream, Reika hoped that they would find a way to contain it. She put Miyuki up to using her ability on them, in an attempt to stop any further spread. Once established, she could simply continue to keep them dreaming for close to a day and half.
It was likely best to wait a few hours before waking any of them. One of the problems that presented themselves now, was what to do with the unconscious Cures that had their own room. Both Happy and Dream were on the second floor, the same floor they were on, and nobody could open their rooms. Rose was with Lemonade, the latter having snapped out of her trance, while Luminous had her own room. Windy and Pine posed no problem.
Violently coughing and spitting blood, Miyuki was returning from being nearly-dead. Both Blossom and Marine were burning themselves out to bring her back. It was complete luck that they had those two on the team. Without them, Miyuki would have died, and the dream trance with her, causing a catastrophic end.
Without any warning, Pine started to cough as well. Everyone but Blossom and Marine focused their attention on the yellow Cure when a high pitched scream escaped her lips, hurting her throat. Inori's eyes wide open, she rolled over, coughing even more than before, fear written on her face.
"I'm... I'm back?" Inori didn't have her bearings yet, still conflicted on what was real and what wasn't. Plucking a hair from her head, she gave it a close look and was relieved to find out that it wasn't silver. Her costume wasn't pitch black. Thankfully, she remembered everything she had learned in Dream's mind. The source of the reflections. What happened when Moonlight and Eclipse merged. What was infecting Dream this very moment. Someone helped her up, lifting her by her right arm. Taking a look, she saw one of her oldest friends. "Miki... where is Happy?"
The blue Cure was confused why the whereabouts of that girl would be Bukki's first question. If she asked, that meant there had to be something meaningful to it. "She is being healed by Blossom and Marine." Getting Inori up on her feet, the yellow Cure was still shaking slightly.
Taking a look around, Inori figured that they would only have a few minutes before things got bad again. They had exactly two options she could think of. Use Happy's ability until it eradicated even the last bit of the infection. Or kill Dream. The latter option was something she didn't even want to think about.
Finally able to stand without support, Inori walked over to where Blossom and Marine were, both of them looked exhausted, finally having finished healing Miyuki. "Can you wake her up?"
"Pine! You're okay?" Noticing the grim and distraught look on the yellow Cure's face, Tsubomi answered her question. "She should rest for a few hours. Healing magic doesn't provide a complete recovery, even if it looks that way from the outside."
"We don't have that long. Right now, Happy's ability is fighting the infection inside Dream's mind. It's doing well, for now, but it won't last." Inori had seen the forests, castles and clear sky violently take over the wasteland in the distance. But the infection was fighting back, corrupting the forests so the fairytale had to convert it again. "We need her. Kaoru won't be able to get rid of the infection with her Stormflair, and I can only do so much." She felt sick. If they didn't stop this now, things would get very bad, very quickly.
Taking a quick look around, Inori was grateful that everyone needed for the plan was actually present. Happy, Luminous and Kaoru. "Miki, wake up Luminous please. We're going to need her to help Happy. I'll wake up Kaoru. I don't know how long we have before the infection completely beats out Happy's ability and starts to take over Dream again."
Kneeling next to the unconscious blue Cure, Inori felt bad about being rough but she didn't have much choice. Shaking her really hard, Kaoru opened her eyes after a few seconds, quickly looking around, trying to make sense of the situation. "There is a problem, right?"
"I'll explain in a second. Miki!" Turning around, Inori faced the back of her friend.
"She's coming to." Pulling Luminous up, Miki didn't like up force people into things when they were clearly not ready for it. But the current situation didn't give her a whole lot of alternatives.
"Happy. Happy! Wake up!" Tsubomi tried to wake up the pink Cure, with no success at all. "Erika. Wait, don't-" Tsubomi, focused on getting Happy back to her senses, had not noticed Erika doing some extremely suspicious stretched right behind her.
"Marine Spark!" Firing a very weak energy shot at point blank range into Happy's chest, the pink Cure startled to scratch the spot like crazy, immediately waking up, rolling over the ground for a few seconds before the energy dispersed completely. "Pine! Your order is ready. One Cure Happy, awake and ready for takeout!" Erika tried to ignore Tsubomi's 'we will talk about this later' look as well as she could.
Gathering the three Cures together, Inori didn't want to go into full detail. For now, they had to act swiftly and decidedly. "I'll give you a full explanation later. Just trust me for now. Happy, I need you to apply your ability to Dream constantly. Luminous, you need to support Happy the same way you supported me. Kaoru, before she starts, I need you to shut down Dream's mind. Don't worry, I'll watch over you."
The blue haired girl felt her heart beat accelerate slightly. She couldn't quite place how, but Inori was causing her to feel reluctant to say anything as she couldn't find an acceptable choice of words. Simply nodding, she would have to think about it more at a later point.
"What are we doing this for? What is wrong with Nozomi?" Miyuki wasn't one to blindly follow orders. Even if Reika had asked her to just do it, she would've asked for an explanation.
"You like Dream, don't you?" Inori was going out on a hunch with it. "If she means anything to you, don't ask, just do it. If we wait too long, the Dream you know will be gone, forever." Those lasts few words were enough to convince Miyuki. The thought of losing Nozomi just because she insisted on an explanation was unbearable.
Taking point behind Kaoru, Inori took a deep breath. She really, really hoped that it would work. The theory was sound but magic and things like that were very hard to properly predict. "Kaoru, do it."
Barely a second passed before the blue Cure forced an overload of Dream's mind. "Stormflair!" Her own body going completely limp, she could feel the immense conflict that was going inside the pink Cure's mind in that tiny moment she connected to her on a mental level to shut her down.
Catching Kaoru and slowly putting her down, Inori watched Luminous and Happy kneel in front of Dream, the former supporting the Cure whose ability was likely their only chance to put an end to the situation.
Miyuki wasn't sure what the effect would be if she used 'Once Upon a Time' on someone that was unconscious. She felt no resistance from Dream for several seconds. Then, she did feel something. Something that scared her so much that she could neither retreat nor advance in overriding her consciousness. She had fought Pierrot, was trapped in a warped world and dealt with Bad End Happy. But despite all of that, she had never touched upon fear quite like this.
Her arms were shaking as every single hair on her body rose up, trying to tell her mind that she was in incredible danger. Her tongue felt numb, her eyes hurt with every blink. She felt cold and hot at the same time, breaking out in cold sweat. She couldn't talk and only one distinct thought was dominating her mind. What kind of unspeakable terror was inside Nozomi's mind? Her body wanted to flee, survival instinct driving her to break off her use of her ability. Willpower and the desire to help Nozomi was all that amounted to stalling that.
"Happy, don't be afraid. As long as you're fighting it, it can't touch you!" Inori didn't know if that was really true, but considering that the landscape had drastically changed and all of her clones had suddenly turned to dust, she theorized that whatever Happy was doing, it was hurting the infection very badly.
Looking at Nozomi's pale face, Miyuki ignored how much she was shaking, ignored how weak she felt as her energy was pouring into Nozomi. She wanted to help her, protect her. Focusing the best she could, Miyuki advanced instead of treading safe ground. She advanced into the territory of the unspeakable. And she realized that its only weapon was fear. And now that she was pushing it back, she could tell something else.
It was afraid of dying. She was killing whatever abomination was infesting Nozomi's mind. Keeping going, Miyuki started to bleed from her nose, a horrible stinging pain in her head. She could tell that she was driving, whatever it was, steadily back, against a wall.
Miyuki's mind froze for a few seconds when Joker appeared before her again, the other generals of the Bad End Kingdom randomly appearing in the hallway in front of her. Telling herself she was just imagining them, Miyuki increased her output to a level where it was actively hurting her body. A steady stream of blood was running from her nose now. She could taste blood in her mouth as well. Small wounds all over her body was breaking up again.
Letting out a single, courageous cry, Miyuki poured her last bit of energy into Nozomi, knowing that there was only a tiny little bit of the thing inside of her was left. She had never truly wanted to kill something before. The desire felt alien and disturbing, but she never once had considered something so vile and malicious as the thing she was fighting now.
Fainting and falling right on top of Nozomi, the hallway was eerily silent. But the silence didn't last long. With an ear piercing wail, a massive mass of black mist erupted from Dream, pouring out right of her skin. Forming an human but unidentifiable black mass in the air, it roared in pain, obvious to anyone who could see it. No intelligible words came from it, only screaming and howling as the black mist slowly disintegrated. With a final, hate filled look, the creature looked at Pine. "May the secret rot your mind." And it was gone. No trace remained of it. Nobody exhibited odd behavior. It was finally over.
=== Dissonance ===
Nobody had quite been able to sleep. Dream and Happy remained unconscious, but Pine had confirmed that Dream was merely in the world of fairytales. Kaoru had recovered, but Luminous had passed out and Rose had put the blonde into her own bed on the third floor. Blossom and Marine were both barely staying awake, waiting for Pine to explain what exactly had happened.
She still wasn't sure how much information she should disclose. Part of it would merely instigate a witch hunt against Dream. The other parts would kindle the fear of the exile. But at the same time, it would hopefully prevent any more events like this happening. "I'll start at the beginning."
Sitting in the dining room, at the long table, Inori herself was a little pale, Miki and Love openly worried about her. "When the reflections were absorbed by Nightmare, and Dream killed Nightmare, she took in part of Nightmare. It was just a little part, nothing that could have possessed her. Merely a leftover fragment that remained dormant in her mind. The real problem starts there." The part where she explained that Dream had been responsible for the creation of the reflections would remain unspoken forever. She didn't want Dream to be ostracized. She had suffered plenty already to pay for her mistake. "That by itself was not doing any damage. The problems begin when Moonlight and Eclipse were merged into one being." Looking at Yuri, she couldn't think of a way to talk around it without completely lying to everyone. "I'm sorry Moonlight, but this something I have to tell everyone. I hope you understand."
Pausing for a few seconds, Inori continued. "Moonlight, when she was in exile, was already split in half." Waiting for the confusion to yield from their faces, she explained more in detail. "She was exposed to an uncontrolled exile for a very long time. By the time a group of us found her, she was mentally divided into two. Pure hatred, contempt, a thirst for revenge, malicious thoughts for those that wronged her. And her willpower, her ethics of what was right and wrong, her desire to be just. The latter was keeping the former in check, but just barely. A part of her was lost completely to the exile, which is why the Moonlight we know now is slightly different than the one we knew prior to the reflection incident."
"How do you know all of this, Bukki?" Miki was sitting next to Yuri, the silver Cure taking it in with an expressionless face. "I want to believe you since you wouldn't lie about something like this, but if even Yuri herself doesn't know, how do you?"
"I'm getting to that now." Looking at Yuri, Inori felt bad for laying bare as much as she did. "When Moonlight and Eclipse became one, they cast out the hateful part of Moonlight. That was the wail and the outcry we heard when the mirror burst. It first hid in Berry, deep in her subconsciousness, unable to grow because it was just a shadow. From there, it jumped from person to person. The first victim was Happy. Attacking Nozomi, she was the source of her injuries when she supposedly fell down the stairs. It was strong enough to briefly take a person over, but not strong enough to permanently alter them. Not yet. When it found Nightmare's remains in Nozomi's mind, they merged and deeply rooted themselves into her mind."
"That explains why you would know about Yuri's state of mind. Whatever was forced out of her ended up in Dream..." Miki didn't feel good about that at all. But at least they were getting some closure on the matter.
"It gets worse from here. After merging with the leftovers of Nightmare, their combined hatred enabled them to grow on Dream's guilt. She was struggling with the knowledge of having brutally killed Nightmare with her bare hands when the monster was already on death's doorstep. It was something inside her, something that had overtaken her ideals and reason, that frightened her."
"That's just like Nozomi. I'd have tied her up and wrenched every single drop of blood out of her, crushing her body until I was sure there was no way of her getting back." Urara couldn't understand how her leader could still feel sympathy for monsters like that.
"It gets worse from here. The attacks on the others, all of them came from Dream. Her Utopia usually makes people lose the will to fight. But when she was infected, it became corrupted with her. It allowed her to create a vision of fear in her target. At first, it was just a weak effect, similar to a hallucination. Memories didn't match up with what was happening. But it became stronger very quickly, feeding off Dream's guilt."
"Someone write this down. If we turn this into a horror story, we're all rich." Urara needed to make the joke. Because she herself felt scared, hearing what happened to Nozomi. Thankfully, nobody retorted on her comment.
"This brings us to White, Black, Bloom and Egret. The shadow had begun to grow exponentially and couldn't hide itself in just Dream anymore without openly corrupting her. It split off a part of itself and looked for suitable hosts. Cures that felt negative emotions such as guilt, fear, anxiety. I don't know what the source or what kind of negative emotion those four felt, but they were suitable hosts. The infection spread and rapidly took them over. We all saw what that ended in. it distorted their minds and behavior. When the infection was purged, we didn't truly kill it. We simply removed it. What we saw back then, up there in the dome, when the shadows died and vanished, that too was merely Dream affecting us with her corrupt Utopia. All of it went back to Dream in the end, playing us for fools. But even Dream wasn't powerful enough to resist the now critical mass. Her mind bent under the massive weight of the infection. It was in the process of completely taking over and remodeling her mind when I dove in. What we fought... were the leftovers of hatred and contempt for all of us. Once I knew all of this, I also knew how to kill it. The only way to truly destroy it was either to kill Dream while the infection was limited to just her, and even that would be just a gamble, or to forcibly overwrite the infection while it was vulnerable. Shutting down her mind to agitate the infection and then forcibly overwrite it with Happy's ability was the only way I could think of to keep Dream alive and kill the infection. Luckily, it worked."
An awkward silence filled the room as Inori finished her explanation. Kaoru was the first to speak up after about half a minute. "Inori, are you hurt?"
"Physically? No." Inori looked at the blue Cure and sighed. She felt somewhat relieved that Bloom would be in the same room. She didn't know if she could handle sleeping alone tonight. Being inside Dream's mind had been horrifying in many ways.
"I think we should all go to bed. And possibly avoid sleeping alone, just in case." Honoka suggested this as a precaution. After listening to everything, she wasn't sure if Dream was really freed. Even if it meant staying with Saki, she much preferred that to being paranoid. Looking at her fake partner, the girl seemed to realize what was going through Honoka's head.
The others agreed unanimously, getting up as soon as White had suggested it. Everyone was tired out, if not from the day, then from the recent events. Blossom and Marine were both sound asleep in their chairs, heads on the table, hands locked together. Love took it upon herself to wake them up, or if all else failed, carrying them to their room.
Inori, finding herself realizing that both Bloom and Miki would sleep in the room of someone else, grabbed Kaoru's hand, holding her back. She knew that making it look like a 'lesson' would be a lie, so she was honest instead. "Keep me company tonight, please." She didn't need to think up any superfluous reason. Kaoru agreed with a completely neutral expression.
Returning to her room, Kurumi walked with Beauty. "What are we doing about Nozomi and Happy?" The answer to said question presented itself when they reached the second floor.
"Reika... can you give me a hand?" Miyuki wasn't feeling very good, but she didn't want to leave Nozomi out in the hallway, alone and cold. She was worried about what would happen when Nozomi woke up and nobody was around.
Leaving Rose's side and walking over to her leader, Reika took over, carrying Dream to Miyuki's room. As the pink haired Cure opened her door, she had to hold on to the wall to not fall over. "I'm just a bit tired..." Miyuki had caught the worried leer in Reika's eyes.
"You should sleep in to recover. There doesn't appear to be further danger from Dream, so there should be no issue with her staying with you." Reika felt tired as well, but she was doing an excellent job at hiding it. During her work, she had dealt with having to stay awake for up to three days in a row without any sleep.
Nodding and forcing a smile, Miyuki let Reika into the room. "I'll do that. Just put her on the bed." Miyuki didn't look forward to Nozomi's messy sleeping habits, but she hoped that the exhaustion would let her sleep sound enough to ignore it altogether.
Putting Dream down, Reika gave her a critical look. She felt there was something odd about the explanation Pine had given. Like it was the truth but not all of it. People had secrets they didn't want to share. She did, too. Remembering a particularly unpleasant job, Reika turned about and left. "Good night, Miyuki."
"Good night, Reika." Trying her best to wave after Reika, Miyuki closed the door and almost fell on her bed. Her expression was one of being in severe pain and she could barely move anymore. Putting up a tough front so Reika wouldn't worry too much had just barely been a success.
Everyone else was going to sleep as well. Nobody felt particularly excited about that night's dreams, but they needed to rest. Miki was staying with Yuri, Hikari with Kurumi, Honoka made an exception and let Saki stay with her. Kaoru occupied Miki's bed, with her permission, to keep Inori company. Tsubomi and Erika were both fast asleep in Blossom's bed, where Love had put them.
The complex was completely silent then, the horrors seemingly finally gone.
=== Dissonance ===
When she first woke up, Kurumi couldn't see anything but yellow, couldn't smell anything but a faint scent of vanilla. And it was tickling her nose really badly. Sneezing and turning over, she realized what the yellow thing was. Hikari's braid. She hadn't reverted back to her normal form and just slept as Luminous. Right around Kurumi's waist, Hikari was sound asleep, curled up in bed, just like a kitten.
There was no way Kurumi couldn't smile at the image she was presented with. After last night, smiling that hard was almost painful and her head felt like it was about to pop off. Gently poking Hikari's cheek with her index finger, the blonde made an incredibly cute noise, making the purple Cure stop in awe, blushing a little. "It... has to be illegal... being this cute."
Looking at Hikari, Kurumi felt sleepy again. She had no idea what time it was or when she had gone to sleep. And she really felt like rectifying that. Summoning her pouch, she focused on wanting a digital alarm clock. And without any noise, one materialized right in front of her, in the air. Catching it, it was a brand new, black alarm clock, shaped like a rectangle, with four red letters announcing the time to her.
It was six-thirty in the morning and much too early to get up. Carefully reaching over the bed and putting the alarm clock on the small desk next to the bed, Kurumi laid back down. Trying to go back to sleep, she kept fidgeting around, unable to find her inner calm. Resigning herself to what she had been thinking about, she grabbed Hikari's braid and kept it close enough to her pillow that she could smell the faint vanilla scent.
Urara was witnessing the entire scene, pulling a displeased face. Just how disgustingly adorable could those two get? But seeing Kurumi get an alarm clock made her realized that she had simply never thought about getting one, because there didn't seem to be any real time of day in this place. Imitating Kurumi, her alarm clock turned out to be an exact copy. "They should hook this system into Amazon or ebay or something." Talking to herself, she felt really bad. Not because of what she did to Kurumi the day before but because she hadn't been able to sleep well. The whole thing with Nozomi had shaken her a bit. She wasn't exactly best friends with her anymore, but after listening to Pine, she had truly felt sorry for what Nozomi had gone through.
Going for an early shower, Urara planned to go back to bed afterward and not move out of it until the clock was showing a solid twelve. She really couldn't be arsed to do anything. Not after getting so little sleep. Hopefully the rules that day would actually be not horrible and let her fight.
Leaving her room, she saw a rare event. Beauty, as civilian, was leaving her bathroom, two long towels wrapped around her body, another long one wrapped around her hair. Urara didn't feel bad about staring. For once, there was a Cure that really held up to what her name promised. Beauty completely ignored her and returned to her room. "Gotta figure." Heading into her own bathroom, she really hoped Kurumi wasn't going to keep Luminous around. She already felt like she was getting diabetes.
Closing the door and simply changing back in civilian form, Urara stepped into the shower. She wasn't the type to really enjoy soaking for long. She might make an exception if Ako was also in the tub, though. Turning on the hot water, Urara felt sore all over. Thinking of Ako, Urara grinned. "Beauty wasn't bad, but she can't stand up to Ako." The grin quickly turned into a depressed face when she realized just how long it had been since the last time she had gotten laid. "I'm getting over there. And if I have to barricade the fucking door."
=== Dissonance ===
Reading a novel, Karen deep asleep right next to her, in bed, Komachi was feeling rather satisfied, but also very tired, after last night. Looking at the sleeping face of her partner, she was just a little thankful that Melody and Sunshine had been so loud. If not for that, she might have been too embarrassed to make a move on Karen while there were others in the room. But Melody was loud enough to easily cover the meek moaning of the blue Cure.
Komachi woke up, in what felt like the middle of the night, to the noises of Sunshine and Melody having sex. The latter's moaning was loud enough to force a massive blush on the face of the green Cure. Sleeping next to Karen, Komachi naked, her partner in underwear, she started to get horny just from listening to them. Sex with Karen was passionate, too, but she wasn't the type to get loud.
A particularly loud moan from Melody made Komachi slip further under the blanket, her arms going around Karen's waist. To her surprise, the blue Cure immediately responded by slightly turning her head towards Komachi, but not saying anything.
Komachi wasn't sure how hard she should push Karen. The blue Cure was a little reserved when it came to being intimate. If she had to guess, Komachi would've said that Kurumi had always been the dominant one in their relationship when it came to sex. She didn't mind taking that role. Karen was smart and beautiful, but at times, she over-thought things.
Moving her right hand over Karen's flat stomach, the novelist used her left hand to move Karen's hair out of the way, kissing her neck gently twice. A barely noticeable trace of sweat, a slightly salty taste, Komachi used her tongue to create line of saliva on Karen's neck, going slightly towards her front. She loved the feeling of Karen's smooth skin, the sound of Karen's breathing going faster as Komachi moved her hand towards her partners chest, slipping a single finger under Karen's bra before the blue Cure showed first signs of resisting.
"What if they hear us?" Whispering, knowing full well that the other two likely wouldn't have heard anything regardless, Karen was both reluctant and excited to let Komachi continue. She longed for her partner's touch and care, but her pride of being a lady had her worried over being seen or heard.
Smiling, amused that Karen seemed embarrassed, Komachi pulled on her love's bra and moved it up, over her breasts. Fondling her right breast, carefully so her nails didn't hurt Karen, she had missed the feeling of touching that smooth skin, the firmness of her breasts. Playfully nibbling on Karen's earlobe, Komachi slowed down, using her free hand to pull Karen closer, pushing her own breasts against the bare back of her partner. "They can't hear us." Taking a deep breath, not to calm down but to smell Karen's hair, Komachi wanted her to turn over, face her. She loved seeing the flushed face of the girl she had adored for so many years, able to get lost in her eyes.
Karen knew full well what the novelist wanted from her. Reluctantly freeing herself and turning over, she ended up almost on top of Komachi, their faces close enough to feel each others breath. Before anything else, Karen kept a long strand of hair from falling in her face, closing her eyes in anticipation, moving in for a loving kiss. She almost pulled back when instead of lips, she felt a tongue touch her skin. Opening her mouth, the disappointment of no kiss following only holding for a second, Karen obliged Komachi's request, both of them letting their tongues dance with each other.
A small and thin stream of saliva ran from the corner of Karen's mouth as she kept going. It felt hot and sticky on her chin, her breath was starting to race a little and thoughts of reservation and trying to keep calm were evaporating in her mind. The taste of Komachi's saliva was, just for her, comparable to nothing else. A sweet taste she couldn't quite put.
Grabbing her partner's hand, Komachi could tell that there were inaudible moans of her partner as she kept erratically breathing and pushing out air hotter than normal. Karen's body was burning up under Komachi's touch, longing for more yet, wanting to be full ablaze with passion. Putting her hand on Karen's shoulder and pushing, she forced the blue Cure into a new position, next to her but close enough to feel her body warmth. Sliding her right leg between Karen's, she got close enough to make her nipples collide with Karen's, the heat from their breasts merging as they pushed against each other.
"Mint?"
Lovingly playing with her partner's feet, Komachi's lust reached it's peak when she made out Karen's embarrassed face. She loved the sight of it so much that she didn't want anyone else to ever see it, something that she treasured and wanted to keep to herself. Kissing Karen, letting her tongue rest, it was a calm but still passionate kiss.
As Karen moaned into the kiss, Komachi felt a tingling sensation run through her entire body. She loved Karen's voice and she loved how meek she sounded when they were sleeping together. Pushing against Karen a little more, she moved her hand over Karen's stomach, drawing random lines over her hot skin, enjoying how the blue Cure was shaking, excited to be touched.
"Hey, Mint."
Dragged out of her memories, Komachi needed a moment to calm down and collect herself. Looking around, she saw Sunshine peek around the corner of the dividing wall. Just going by her inner clock, it was still early in the morning. What did she want, so early? Transforming would wake up Karen and getting out of bed naked was absolutely and completely impossible. Covering Karen with the sheet and transforming nonetheless, the blue Cure slept through the flash of light. Relieved, Komachi cautiously got out of bed, careful to not wake up Karen after all.
Seeing Sunshine in her civilian form, wearing a jump suit, Komachi lamented that, of all people, Marine had to go and swap with her. She loved Karen's blue dress and wanted a matching one, but with the designer up and gone, she would have to wait or pay a lot more. "It's early. Did you need something?" She didn't want to be rude and just tell her to come back later. She would have preferred to stay in bed with Karen and read, but keeping good relations with her new roommate was important, too.
"Hibiki and I got a little carried away last might." Itsuki could see the look on Komachi's face when she said little. "Really carried away." Her expression slightly awkward, Itsuki felt the need to apologize. It must have been awkward for those two to listen to their sex sounds. "We were fooling around last night and before we knew it, were going at full steam. I'm sorry if it kept you up or made you feel awkward." She just hoped that Mint wouldn't insist on Hibiki staying in her own room.
"It would've been nice if you could have kept it down a little." Komachi didn't feel so much bothered as she found it a nice gesture that Sunshine would come out and apologize. "I got something out of it in the end, so you two don't have to feel guilty. Just... maybe try to limit the volume a little next time."
"I was worried you'd ask me to make Hibiki sleep in her own room." Letting out a relieved sigh, Itsuki genuinely smiled at Komachi. "Thanks for understanding. And sorry for getting to you this early, I just wanted to deal with this before I go and shower or Hibiki wakes up."
"Don't worry. I don't mind if you let Melody stay. Karen is with me, too, after all." Komachi felt that she would get along fine with Sunshine. "Oh, and you can just call be Komachi."
"Call me Itsuki then. I'm off to shower, then. I'll be done in twenty, maybe thirty, minutes in case you want to take one, too." Walking to her wardrobe and taking a towel out, she waited a moment at the door, just in case Komachi had anything else to say.
But the green Cure was just patiently waiting for Itsuki to leave. She couldn't transform back unless nobody was watching, after all. Watching Sunshine leave, Komachi turned back into a normal human and slipped under the warm covers of her bed, picking her novel back up.
Two floors below them, Mai was abruptly woken up when Nagisa fell out of bed, the loud noise her landing made taking Mai out of her dreams. "Nagisa... are you okay?" Looking down from her bed, the white Cure looked at the comical position Nagisa was in. Legs in the air and half on the bed, head touching the floor, it looked like she had messed up trying to get into bed with a somersault.
"I... think so." Wide awake after hitting the ground, Nagisa rolled over and got up, just wearing her underwear, a black sports bra and matching panties. Transforming, as she felt a little bit cold with just underwear, she looked up to Mai. "How did you sleep?" Fake feelings or not, she still liked Mai.
"Not too bad, all things considered. Thanks for asking." Smiling and having the smile returned by Nagisa, Mai crawled back into bed and transformed as well, her long hair pushed off the sheet. Sitting on the ledge of the bed, she looked at Nagisa. "Did you sleep well?"
"Minus a dream that made me horny really badly, I think I slept pretty well. At least I don't feel tired." Realizing that Mai likely didn't want to hear about her being horny, Nagisa put her right hand behind her own head and grinned. "Sorry, force of habit."
"It's okay." She realized the change in behavior right away. "It's cute that you're trying to be considerate. Is this because of last night?" Mai was trying the same thing. "I really mean cute." Trying to clarify, she smiled wide.
"That easy to tell, huh?" Laughing briefly, Nagisa nodded. "Yeah, I thought that maybe I should try and be a better person. I've really been a little beside me lately."
"How do you feel about me?" Mai wanted to know if the situation had changed any. It was hard to tell, just by herself.
"I'm having less trouble keeping my thoughts in check that tell me you're not really my partner." Taking a few steps back, so she could look at Mai easier, Nagisa wondered for a few seconds where March had gone, since she wasn't in her bed. "I do kinda wanna kiss you, though. But don't worry, I'll live even without it." Grinning and gesturing in an exaggerated way, Nagisa tried her hardest to follow what she thought of the night before.
"Would on the cheek do?" Mai wouldn't mind that much. And she wanted to go back to being more relaxed and easygoing. A lot of that depended on her partner, but it wouldn't hurt to try.
"Don't force yourself, Mai." Nagisa really wanted to, but even she knew that it was likely a bad idea.
"No, it's really okay. It's not like we're complete strangers. I'm sure this happened before." Jumping down from her bed, Mai walked up close to Nagisa, blushing a little. The more she actually thought about it, the more embarrassing it got. She felt her heart skip a beat when Nagisa really did kiss her on the cheek at the end. Taking a step back, cautious of her own emotions, Mai turned to the door. "Geez, this is really bothersome. I feel a bit giddy just from that." Smiling at Nagisa, she thought it was a step in the right direction though.
In the room next to them, Akane and Nao had just woken up after Yayoi simply walked into the door, more asleep than awake. The loud thud made them curiously peek at the yellow Cure, who was standing in front of the wooden construction, befuddled why she couldn't pass through. Taking a few seconds to figure it out, she opened the door and walked outside, wearing a shirt that might have been able to serve as a tent for her, reaching all the way to her knees.
"I didn't know Yayoi was like that in the mornings." Getting out of bed, Akane and Nao had simply slept naked, Akane stretched, transformed and let out a loud yawn. "Want to go and make some breakfast? I'm starving after all that exercise last night."
"Don't call it that." Following her partner, Nao got up, transformed first and then stretched, kissing Akane on the cheek. "You're so greedy, Akane."
"Don't call it that. Call it... loving!" Something light hit Akane's back. Yayoi had come back from the bathroom and walked straight into the red Cure. "Morning, Yayoi."
Not a single word came out of the yellow Cure's mouth. Instead, pulled a grimace and crawled back into bed, completely hidden beneath the cover
"Eh... is she angry?" Akane hadn't seen Yayoi in the morning for a long time. She was caught off guard by how quiet and out of it the tiny girl was. "Did I do something to make her angry?"
"Considering how loud you got last night..."
"Whose fault do you think that was?" A smug grin was on Akane's face. "And you were just as loud."
"And whose fault do you think that was?" Wiping the grin off Akane's face by kissing her, Nao sighed, feeling a bit guilty over keeping Yayoi up. "We should really try to get one of the single rooms. If the rules are decent today, I'll volunteer. You should, too."
"Eh... but I was in it yesterday." Akane wasn't too keen on making it a daily thing. It already did sound like very uncomfortable work. Turning around and opening the door to the hallway, someone crashed into the door. Going out and looking at the victim, who sat on the ground and rubbing her nose, Akane could already feel that this wasn't her day. "Wow, sorry Black. My bad."
Watching the scene from the distance, Ako rubbed her eyes. She was still tired. In the middle of the night, Rouge had finally come back. Not caring enough to try and be quiet, Ako woke up from the sound of the door being slammed by Rin. She didn't really need to guess what reason the red Cure had for getting back that late. Carrying Kanade in her arms, the white Cure holding on to Rin so tightly that it looked like she was glued to her, Rin transformed back and tried her best to get at least Kanade's boots, gloves and whatever rest of her costume could be taken off, off her.
Ako was worried about Kanade, but at the same time, she knew that she likely wouldn't be much help. Trying to get back to sleep, she could hear Kanade weep softly from time to time, keeping her awake. She couldn't tell what Rouge was saying, but every time the weeping started, it took only a few seconds before it stopped, quiet murmuring from Rouge being the source of whatever got Kanade to stop.
Turning over, facing the wall, and putting one of her pillows over her head, she was grateful and pained at the same time that Urara wasn't there right then. She could have used some company, but she also feared that she would've tried to make a ruckus over Kanade keeping her up. Spending the night like that and getting little sleep, she found Rouge looking extremely exhausted, still holding on to Kanade, the next morning. Leaving her room, taking a shower that did little to improve her mood, and leaving for the dining hall, Ako was playing with the idea of using her powers to nullify all sound around her when she was trying to sleep.
Seeing Sunny and Black in such high spirits wasn't exactly an uncommon sight but given the situation, she had expected Black and Egret to be really down in the dumps. They were emotionally stronger than Ako had given them credit for. Reaching the dining hall, she found Peace on the ground, either passed out, sleeping or, most likely, being random, like Marine. The yellow Cure was laying in the middle of the way and Ako couldn't be bothered to deal with anything that morning. Jumping over the body and simply walking away, she found the kitchen to be abandoned.
Looking through the shelves and finding enough things to at least make coffee, Ako patiently waited until it was done. Peering through the window on occasion, she witnessed Black pick up Peace, who was apparently in a state of complete lack of sleep.
"What happened to you?" Carrying Peace to the nearest seat, Nagisa was a little worried about the tremendously big black rings under the yellow Cure's eyes. "You look like you haven't gotten any sleep."
"Didn't get any..." Yayoi was still unable to close her eyes and not immediately start Erika related scenarios in her head. The imagination she was using to make some money on the side was now working against her at full power. If she had drawn every single scenario, she could have filled a full anthology book with just Erika x herself. And no matter what she did, she couldn't get it out of her head. She knew Erika was taken, she knew she'd have no chance even if she tried, and she didn't even want to try, because she didn't want to force Erika into a bad situation. And despite all that, her mind was constantly turning to thinking lewd things about her.
Resting her head on the table, Yayoi was at least partially relieved that Erika wasn't actually around. Seeing her right now would have triggered all kinds of bad flags. She didn't want the whole thing to turn into a yandere scenario. Having read so many yuri doujinshi, she expected to have come up with a solution by now. But the only thing that really came to mind was to find someone else that left an even stronger impression. Someone that made her even more crazy. It didn't help that practically everyone else was in a relationship.
"What day is it today?" Thinking about doujinshi and stuff, she wondered how much time she would have to prepare for winter comiket.
"I don't know. It's been something like three weeks since we got here, I think." Staying with Yayoi, while Sunny, March and Mai went to the kitchen, Nagisa wondered if she should, at a later date, ask the yellow Cure for a doujinshi of Mai and Honoka together. There was no harm in just comics, after all.
"Oh..." Opening her hand, summoning her pouch, Yayoi hoped it wouldn't get too expensive. "Calendar." With a sizzling sound, her pouch got marginally lighter and a large calendar for twenty-twelve showed up on the table in front of her. Flipping through it, the actual calendar didn't help at all since she didn't know what day it was. "Date." Not having the energy to formulate any complex wishes, she simply thought of it. A single coin vanished, turning into smoke that formed two a very clear numbers. The third of September.
"Eh? That was actually an option?" Nagisa was slightly confused that it had worked. Creating her own pouch, she focused for a moment and was even more surprised when a completely new wrist watch was laying in front of her, showing an actual time of the day. It was seven thirty. Most likely in the morning. Eager to take the news to the others, Nagisa left Yayoi behind, the yellow Cure despairing over deadlines for her manga. She was already more than two chapters behind at this point.
=== Dissonance ===
The news of finally being able to get an accurate time of the day spread like wildfire. It was something everyone was used to from their real lives, something that had been missing since they started living in the complex. Most settled for having a wrist watch, there not being any real need to have an alarm clock. Erika, expecting a lot of business on the new team, had sponsored a very large, regular, clock that now hung in the dining hall.
Being finally able to tell what time it was, most went straight back to bed, still exhausted from the night before. Honoka and Saki were one of the very few that remained up, both of them venturing to the kitchen. Taking the clock issue to the next logical step, Honoka had already hung a calendar at the entrance of the dining hall. Luckily, her wrist watch came with a function to show the current date as it was a slightly more fancy model than some of the others had.
"I didn't think we've been here for that long. They're turning twenty now, right?" Looking through the shelves in search of a bowl to use for the dough, Honoka talked to Saki. Upon seeing the current date, Saki had made a small fuss, saying it was Michiru's and Kaoru's birthday.
"Yeah. Well, to be honest, we don't really know. Considering their history, their real birthday is probably something else, but we thought today was a good date, seeing how they became Bright and Windy on that day. Their birth as Cures!" Saki wasn't an expert in making cakes, but she always made them when it was the birthday of one of her close friends or someone from her family.
"Listen Saki..." Honoka didn't want to leave any room for misunderstandings. "I appreciate you staying with me last night. We were all on edge because of Dream and Nightmare. But today-"
"Don't worry, I'm not that dense, Honoka." The big smile on Saki's face revealed that she wasn't offended at all. "I think the same. It's better if we don't sleep in the same bed. When I woke up, I did feel a bit weird, hugging you, so I think my memory is coming back."
"It helps a lot that you understand. My memories still haven't budged at all. I feel a bit guilty..." Honoka finally found a bowl that was big enough. "I didn't know you could bake things other than bread, though."
"When I'm home and off training I actually cook for Mai and myself all the time. Doesn't Nagisa cook?" Taking the bowl from Honoka, Saki measured the flour on the scale. "Thanks."
"Sometimes. You and I, I mean-" She was still occasionally struggling with the memory issue.
"I know. Just keep going." Grinning, Saki could feel that Honoka was making a slightly embarrassed face behind her back.
"She's not that good a cook, but I really appreciate it when I come home and dinner is ready. Or the bath." Taking the milk from the large fridge and putting it down next to Saki, Honoka went to look for the sugar.
"Or her?" The look Saki gave Honoka spoke thousand words.
"I saw that one coming a mile away." Not commenting further on it, she very much enjoyed herself, just helping Saki out and talking to her. Suppressing the urge to hug and kiss her had become relatively easy by now. "I can't find the sugar. Do you know where we keep it?"
"Oh, you were looking for sugar? Sorry, I already got it here." Holding up a white pack filled with similarly white goodness, Saki sheepishly grinned.
"Well, I could turn the kitchen upside down and not find it then." About to fall into bad habits again, Honoka quickly steered away from the scolding tone she was getting into. "Are you going to be fine on your own? I'll go and look for Pine. She looked pretty much stuck to Kaoru last night."
"Don't you think they look cute together?"
"I don't know Pine that well but she seems fairly intelligent, so at least they match well there."
"Kaoru deserves a nice partner. If it's another Cure, there will be less problems in the long run. Honoka, stop." Calling the white Cure back just before she left, the door already open, Saki grabbed the very long hair tube. "You got flour in your hair." Giggling, Saki removed the white trace from Honoka's hair. "Don't want the others to think you're getting gray hair, dealing with me."
"Why, you." Petting Saki's head, Honoka couldn't help but laugh. "Thanks. I'll be back once I find Pine. And somehow unstuck her from Kaoru, so I can actually tell her about the cake. Maybe we should talk to the others and throw a little party."
"If it were you, or me, that would be a great idea. But I'm not so sure Kaoru is comfortable with a big party. It would take our mind off things, though." Getting back to her dough, Saki thought about it for a minute. "I don't mind either way. Maybe ask Pine and see if she can get something out of Kaoru. I'm good here, by the way. Quick, go, before the flour attacks you again."
"Already gone." Out the door, Honoka came across a zombie. It took her a second to notice it was just Yuri. "What happened to you?" She had never seen the silver Cure in a condition that bad. Even now, having gotten very little sleep, Honoka still looked aeons better than Yuri.
"Considering I've spent years sleeping in the same bed as my previous partner, I really should be more used to this." Yuri didn't want to go into specifics about it. Not with Honoka. She was impressed by how quietly Miki slept and how little she moved. Despite all of that, Yuri couldn't fall asleep with Miki hugging her, she was simply too excited, and a little bit worried that Miki might try to take advantage of the situation.
But nothing like that happened, and now, Yuri felt both guilty and exhausted. The former because she didn't trust Miki, the latter because she hadn't gotten any sleep. "I'm just grabbing something to drink, then I'm going back to sleep, at least for a little bit." Even Yuri had her limits. She had pulled through a full day of work in similar states before, but only if absolutely necessary.
Watching the silver Cure's back for a few seconds as she walked past, Honoka decided to not be nosy and ask her about it any more. Passing around the corner, Honoka almost collided with Blossom. She barely recognized her with the different hairstyle, hair color and regular clothes. Short, black pants, a pink and white dress with a big heart printed on it in front and pink pumps. Honoka had to admit that she looked really cute.
"Morning, Honoka." Tsubomi bowed politely and walked around the white Cure. She wanted to get some coffee for Erika, who had started working non-stop ever since she woke up three hours ago.
"Tsubomi!" Calling out to the girl, Honoka didn't want to go after her. "Is Marine opening up her shop later?" She obviously knew about the blue Cure's latest idea. The other team hadn't exactly kept it a secret.
"Maybe in the evening." Erika was abusing her Cure powers, again, to work and produce clothes with superhuman speed and ability. Tsubomi was helping as well, as Cure, after being talked into it by Erika. She had stopped keeping track of how many times Erika had talked her into ridiculous things years ago.
Honoka really wanted to have some clothes she could feel at home in. She had never stayed as White that long before. It wasn't bothering her to stay in Cure form, but it just wasn't as comfortable. A lab coat, sleeveless top and pumps would really make her feel at home. Or at work, more specifically.
Just next to Marine's shop, someone else was feeling very much at home. Spending the remainder of the night swaying between snoozing off and just barely staying awake, keeping her ability ability running nonetheless, Miyuki had finally been beaten by her exhaustion and was fast asleep in Dream's arms.
She knew what had transpired. She was watching, all of it. From the moment Nightmare's remains had taken over to when Miyuki carried her into bed, killing any and all possible leftovers of Nightmare in her mind while watching over her. Petting Miyuki's head, playing a little with her hair, Nozomi was sitting up, the other pink Cure resting her head on Nozomi's lap.
Nozomi had always been one to stand up and risk her own life for others. In return, they did the same. But with Miyuki... it had been Miyuki protecting her over and over in the last few days, despite barely knowing her. She couldn't tell if Miyuki was too trusting or just incredibly nice. She couldn't put her appreciation of what the girl had done for her in words anymore. No amount of thank you would ever make up for the lot she had gone through.
Her whole body was hurting all over the place and she couldn't get the taste of charcoal out of her mouth. Just petting Miyuki's head was painful already. But she wouldn't stop. Doing it seemed to put the girl at ease and into a peaceful sleep, so she would keep it up until she woke up on her own.
It would give her time to reflect on what she had been doing the last two weeks and what it had brought upon everyone else and herself. She had tried to solve the fighting by pure force, resisting it by putting everyone under the effect of Utopia, forcefully freeing their wills. But all she had managed to do was put them through pain, seeing that they were not participating against their will. They had come to accept the battles. It was simply part of the ordeal they were experiencing. All she had achieved with that attempt was to inflict suffering, pain, uneasiness on the others... and caused them to ostracize her.
A failure. She had believed in herself, believed that they would see things the same way, that they would fight the situation. But actually fighting it ended in disaster. The system forced them into a battle that was a slaughter fest. That alone proved that simply resisting going to battle or fighting would only end with huge repercussions. Reduced to wild, brutal animals, they would still fight, but that time, it was something truly concerning. If they had resisted at the beginning and were forced into multiple battles like that, how many of them would still be alive? Did they accept or at least tolerate the situation because they feared the repercussions of fighting something they didn't understand? She couldn't really tell. All that mattered was that back then, she had been even more focused on bringing an end to the situation, so that a brutal battle like that might never happen again.
Using the system against itself proved to be ultimately futile as well. Creating the reflections had brought unspeakable terror over everyone. Risking her life, prepared to die for what she had unleashed, Nozomi knew that if they would ever learn that she was responsible, they would truly cast her out. Rin and the others were her friends, close friends, and they had gone through a lot, but... she didn't believe their patience and understanding to be endless.
And even after the she had thought to have cleaned up her mess, her actions kept putting people through a lot. White, Black, Bloom and Egret... what if they would never return to normal? What if she was responsible for ruining the lives of four people? She wasn't naive enough to think that being possessed by Nightmare wasn't her own fault. After all, Nightmare was her own creation and it had been her hatred of Nightmare's evil deeds that made her kill the abomination with her own, bare, hands. Everything she had done since being brought to this place had caused nothing but suffering to everyone else.
It was painful. It hurt. It hurt so much that she could barely bear it. That her ideals were merely that, ideals. No matter how powerful she was, no matter how hard she tried, she still failed. Knowing that she might one day be responsible for killing someone because she refused to accept reality as is... it hurt. Silently, tears ran down her cheeks, wetting the blanket. Why was it this way? Why did things have to end up like this? What had she ever done to deserve this?
Wasn't she always trying to be a good friend? Wasn't she always loyal to the one she loved? Didn't she always try her best at everything she did? Why did the world trample on her ideals? Why did people reject her help? Time and time again she had tried her hardest and yet she would be rewarded with pain and suffering.
"Nozomi... it hurts..." Miyuki was barely awake, Nozomi's right hand buried into her hair, tears running down her cheeks. "What's wrong?"
Spending years without being able to truly confide in anyone, Nozomi couldn't bear it anymore. She had endured so much that she couldn't go on alone. "Miyuki... It always... it always ends with me and those around me being hurt... what am I doing wrong? Why can't I... why can't I be happy? I fought so hard... and in the end, the peace I achieved took Coco away from me... I tried so hard to patch things up when my team was drifting apart... only to make everyone drift away even further. I work hard, I do my best and I never... I never get rewarded."
Getting up and hugging Nozomi, Miyuki didn't know what to say. The girl only really started to cry then, clinging to Miyuki, crying loudly.
"Every time I try... to help... it just ends... badly. I tried to stop people... from fighting... and only hurt... them. I tried... I tried to get us out... and... and... I don't know... It just made them... and they hurt everyone... I didn't know what to do... I don't know... what to do... I'm scared... that everyone... will hate me." Blurting out her big secret, Nozomi just couldn't handle it on her own anymore. The pain of being left alone to deal with the heavy guilt had become too much. Clinging to Miyuki so much that she was hurting the girl just a little, Nozomi kept on crying, letting out all the pent up sadness and despair she had been feeling for a long time now.
Miyuki knew that nothing she could say would help. Nozomi didn't want to hear pretty words or be told that everything will be okay. She wanted someone she could trust. Someone that could help her go on without being crushed by guilt and anguish. She wasn't sure what Nozomi was talking about at the end, but whatever it was, she knew Nozomi was practically a mass of good intentions. Whatever had happened, she wouldn't blame her.
"What... what if someone... someone had... died because... because of me?" Nozomi was afraid of that. Ever since the reflections had first started to attack them, deep down, she had been afraid of it. What if, some day, someone ended up dead? The thought was so heavy, so terrible and horrifying, that she was slowly being crushed under the weight of it.
"Nozomi." Trying to calm her down would be difficult, but she had to try. "I'll listen. Whatever you wanna say, you can tell me and I won't tell anyone else. I... know you always mean good. I could feel what kind of person you are when I drove out whatever took over. So... you can trust me."
Resting her chin on Miyuki's shoulder, their heads close together, Nozomi took a deep breath, calming down just a little, her body still being rocked from her outburst. If her secret was safe with anyone, then with Miyuki. The way she stood up for her, protected her, cared for her... it reminded her a bit of Coco. She truly wished he was there.
"I made the reflections." Her voice was guilt ridden and heavy, as if she committed an unforgivable crime. "I wanted... to stop the fighting... I didn't want... to see people get hurt... so I made a wish..." Holding on to Miyuki, subconsciously searching for any reaction that looked like Miyuki was rejecting her now, Nozomi confessed to the chaos she had caused. "I got everyone involved... Nightmare showed up... and many other bad reflections... they hurt my friends... hurt the other Cures... hurt me... and even after... even after I was prepared to die and faced Nightmare... killed her... it still haunts everyone..."
"Does anyone know about it?" Miyuki couldn't imagine what kind of guilt something like that would put on her. After hearing about it from some of the others, after seeing her fight against Nightmare, Miyuki understood why she was so tormented now. If Nozomi had unleashed a menace like that and lived with the knowledge of that until now all on her own, it was no surprise she was desperate to confide into someone.
"I can't tell anyone... you weren't there, you didn't... you wouldn't understand how hard it was. If... if they knew it was me... that I'm responsible... they wouldn't ever talk to me again." Nozomi was so incredibly scared of being all alone and shunned that she could barely process the thought of it happening. "You can't tell anyone... not even your friends." Holding Miyuki as tightly as she could, Nozomi's voice changed for the better for just a moment. "Promise me. You won't tell anyone. You won't..." The pained and desperate look in Nozomi's eyes could tell what a thousand words could not.
Miyuki would have never expected the strong and cheerful Dream to be capable of showing such weakness. But just as Dream put up a tough and cheerful front, Miyuki had her own secrets. She knew what it was like to put in a lot of effort in vain. She could connect with Nozomi in a way she couldn't quite put in words because of it. And she knew one thing. "I'll tell no one. It'll be our secret." Putting her own forehead against Nozomi's, Miyuki didn't smile or grin for those things were inappropriate right now. She couldn't take away Nozomi's pain, nobody could, but she would do her best to shoulder part of it. Because she knew how important it was to have someone that supported you.
Words couldn't properly express her gratitude so she didn't even try, she just nodded, making a happy hum.
=== Dissonance ===
Sleepily yawning without bothering to do as much as covering her mouth, Ellen felt incredibly sluggish. With all of the recent stress and things hopefully finally calming down, she was overcome by a rush of fatigue. Spending the morning in the garden with Setsuna, she absentmindedly poked around in the pond with a long stick she had picked up.
Watching Ellen from a few steps away, both sitting and resting on one of the benches, of which she could have sworn there were more now than back then, Setsuna was resisting the fatigue to the best of her ability, fighting a perpetually losing battle. The imprisonment, meeting Ellen, the exile, establishing a new state of her relationship with Love by accepting Ellen into it, the mirrors, the aftermath of the mirrors... it was just so much without as much as three days of daily routine. "Take care not to fall in."
Nodding her head to show she had heard her partner, Ellen lost balance, crouched down next to the water mass, and landed her butt in the soft grass that grew happily all around the pond. "Can't we go back to sleep?" Ellen compared the feeling of exhaustion to when school had just started again after summer break and she felt completely drained of all motivation.
"Bear with it." Setsuna truly just wanted to do the very same, going back to bed and lazying around all day to combat the fatigue she was feeling, yet she couldn't just do that. She was pretty far down in the ranking so she really needed a boost. After switching teams, she wanted to have enough to ask Marine for a few more clothes.
"You say that... but you're half asleep, too." Ellen looked over her own shoulder and smiled at the girl with dark purple colored hair. Falling backwards and laying down in the warm grass, Ellen almost couldn't believe how much of a difference there was between the garden and the rest of the complex.
"I'm bearing with it, too." Trying to avoid nodding off, Setsuna got up and walked over to where Ellen was laying down, sitting down next to her, arms around her knee, head rested on the same, she watched her partner from the corner of her eyes. "Those two are worn down, too. And they haven't been here for as much as a week." Nodding in the direction of the flower hill, Setsuna had noticed March and Sunny, sitting back to back, both of them seemingly asleep or very close to. There was just something incredibly pleasant about the atmosphere in the garden. A gentle breeze made March's hair flutter past her sides, giving her a magical vibe.
"So peaceful..." Ellen turned towards Setsuna, laying on her side, using her right hand to flatten the grass in front of her face a little, as it was tickling her cheeks. "If it was like this every day, this place isn't so bad..."
"So true..." Setsuna took up playing with one of the longest strands of Ellen's hair to keep herself from dozing off, with only marginal success. Getting lost in her own little world doing so, Ellen had fallen asleep right next to her, the warmth of sunlight finishing her off and putting her soundly to sleep.
The garden was highly popular that morning. A faint, gentle breeze was only occasionally rustling the tree's leaves and it was very warm. With the development of Marine's shop, most were able to spend some time out of Cure mode, able to enjoy the scenery like any normal person. Not everyone was completely exhausted though, such as Melody and Sunshine, both of them sluggishly jogging laps around the garden.
Hibiki was lagging behind by just a little bit, each step on the soft ground only further enhancing her desire to spend her time off being lazy for once. Noticing that, Itsuki slowed down until both of them were merely walking quickly and, a good minute later, taking no more than a casual walk while holding hands. "I love the weather in here. It would be really humid, hot and unpleasant in Japan this time of the year." Itsuki couldn't agree more. She liked training, but she could really do without the humid summers that got her soaked in sweat within minutes.
Taking the lead and pulling Itsuki towards a bench that stood conveniently in the shadows under a couple of large trees, Hibiki sat down and leaned back, enjoying the coolness of the location very much. The wood of the bench was hard but comfortable enough, the back just high enough to easily support Itsuki as well. Single, lone leaves were littering the space around the bench but mysteriously, not a single one had remained on the bench. "Looks like we're not the only ones to take it slow today." Pointing in the direction of a particularly large tree, whose bark appeared almost ancient and rugged, Itsuki had to lean against Hibiki to see what she was pointing at. Strands of her brown hair were teasing against her partner's cheek while she did.
Mai was taking a walk to free up her mind, just passing by the path that had both Ellen and Setsuna off to the side. Smiling at the tranquil scene, Mai had to try hard not to laugh when she saw Passion's face. She was completely off in her own world.
Hearing a whistle from across the pond, it took Mai a few seconds to spot Melody and Sunshine in the shadows. Without the flashy costumes and in their track suits, they were hidden pretty well. Waving to them and deciding to drop by on her way back to the entrance, she continued her walk to the flower hill, towards where Sunny and March were. She didn't have any business with them, though. She just happened to want to go there.
The sound of the dirt path beneath her, each step causing the satisfactory noise that confirmed she was taking a walk in nature like a completely normal person, did wonders for her mood. Taking a deep breath every other minute, standing still and just admiring the good weather and scenery, Mai felt like sketching it sometime. Passing by Sunny, who was drooling on her chest, and March, who had a lot of leaves stuck in her long hair, Mai didn't feel like waking them up. She could understand well why they were relaxing like this.
If Saki was around, she would have wanted to spend the morning like that as well. Her memory issues were getting better, but she wasn't quite over the hill yet. Spending so much time thinking about her past, and, by chance entirely, coming across Mint, who had gotten hold of a calendar, she realized it was Michiru's and Kaoru's birthday.
There was a little bit of history to how the third of September came to be their birthday. She wondered if Saki had remembered. One of the hardest things every year was to pick a present for each of the sisters together with Saki. They knew them so well that they knew equally well that there was really nothing suitable to give to them. Last year it had been a very fancy portrait of both of them together from Mai and a twelve session lesson in playing an instrument of their choice from Saki. She knew that those two didn't have any expectations of getting presents but were happy nonetheless. She had trouble figuring out something this quickly.
Deep in thought, Mai almost walked past Sunshine, who was playing around with Melody, keeping her awake by occasionally poking her cheek. "Worried about something?" Itsuki, finally leaving Hibiki in peace, whistled again, catching Mai's attention. "That's a lot of focus. Or maybe daydreaming rather? Are you worried about something?"
"It's the birthday of Kaoru and Michiru. Bright and Windy if you didn't know their real names. I spend a few days every year trying to find something to give to them but they're hard to surprise."
"Bake them a cake and throw a party. We'll help, right, Hibiki?" Poking her girlfriend out of her almost-sleep, the girl sat up straight for a few seconds, nodded with half-closed eyes, started swaying again and dozed off, resting against her love's shoulder. "I'll get her to ask Kanade for a cake. I'm sure it'll be fun to get everyone together. I'll try and see if I can get whoever does negotiations to keep the fighting to a minimum today so people won't be all out of energy when the party goes live."
"Wait a moment, I didn't agree to-" Mai felt suddenly very overwhelmed.
"You're against it?" Itsuki knew well how to handle the thoughtful type. Years of experience.
"That's not the case, but I-"
"Then it should be fine, right?" Grinning brightly, Itsuki could tell that Egret was either not used or very weak against someone pushing her into things like this. "There isn't anyone who isn't happy about a party thrown for them by their friends."
Sighing hard, Mai giggled briefly before just going with the flow. "I'll spread the word then. Please take care of the cake. We're a lot of people so maybe more than one would be nice."
"Roger that. I'll get heavyweight here right on that."
"You're not getting any of those cakes." Hibiki's growl didn't reach all the way to Mai but Itsuki could understand her.
"I can live with that. Can you live without sex for a week?" Itsuki was confident that being blunt and direct with Hibiki was the easiest way to tease her.
"Why, you!" Still sleepy, Hibiki tried to grab Itsuki by her sleeve, missed, and landed face first in her lap. "I hate you." The words came out muffled as she didn't even have the energy to get her face out of Itsuki's lap, the track suit doing it's best to make her line unintelligible.
=== Dissonance ===
"They say 'as those things go' but isn't this a little too much?" Honoka was helping out Saki, who was almost head to toe covered in big blotches of flour. Looking through the kitchen window, she kept an eye on Rose and Hikari, the two of them hanging up some decorations made from scrap cloth that Marine had sponsored happily. Blossom was adjusting the tablecloth for the third time while directing Peach on where to put dishes and cups. "Marine overheard me talking to Pine. I don't think this will be much of a surprise."
"What did Pine say, by the way? Oh, what time is it?" Checking the oven, Saki figured the cake had to be done soon. Even after all the years she had known Kaoru, she wasn't sure what her favorite food was. Or even if she had one. Asking about those things usually simply ended in questions on why they were being asked for educational purposes. So she made several smaller cakes, all of them different.
A quick glance on her wrist watch and Honoka gave Saki the time of the day. "It's ten past eleven. Negotiations should be up soon." It was quite handy to finally have a sense of time passing in this place. From the days before, she assumed that negotiation happened somewhere around eleven thirty or noon flat but she didn't know a specific time. "Inori, she said its fine to just call her by her name, liked the idea and told me she'd keep Kaoru busy as long as she can, so probably either until the battle or after."
Hearing a loud crashing noise, Honoka looked through the window again, seeing Peach kneeling on the ground and picking up something. "Setsuna would so scold me if she was here." Laughing while saying that, Love knew that it was no big issue to replace a dish. Or a dozen. She wasn't really a klutz by any stretch but she could sometimes behave like one. Noticing a curious look from the other pink Cure, Love quickly waved her hand. "I'm fine, Tsubomi, just keep going. Oh, but you could get me something to pick up the small stuff and dust."
Going to the kitchen, Honoka already stood ready with dustpan and brush. "Here." Handing them over to Tsubomi, Honoka walked to the back of the kitchen and sat on the lone chair that stood there. "I wonder what Inori is doing to keep Kaoru busy. She doesn't seem like the type to be easily interested in something."
"It's the complete opposite. As soon as you make something look interesting, she wants to know it in and out." Saki broke out in laughter when she remembered just how easily Kaoru got sidetracked into full blown research over the silliest things. Trying to evaluate the scientific probability, pros and cons of a proverb was just way past normal curiosity.
Saki would have been weirded out by what Kaoru was actually doing. After seeing Inori do a mental dive with support from Luminous, she had become immensely interested in the finer workings of her special ability 'Domination' and what other uses it could possibly have. Berry was there as well, serving as both a third party to note observations of a neutral source and help out with the research.
"Conclusive evidence therefore proves that intrusive or forceful changes to the cerebral cortex are relayed via the mental link at a near zero delay time span. Actions overriding the ability of the cerebral cortex to accept neurons however prove to be non-transmitting. In conclusion, the-" Kaoru was rambling on about scientific theory that even Inori had trouble understanding. Miki was lost entirely. Seeing their confused faces, Kaoru tried to put it in simpler terms. "To put it simple, Domination does not disrupt or suspend neurons traveling to the cerebral cortex which is largely responsible for thought, perceptual awareness and the consciousness. That means, any one receptor of your ability simply loses command over their bodily functions while remaining in control of their mental state. Berry's My World in contrast severely limits neuron travel to the cortex. It is my assumption that the ability impedes a self-suggestive filter that prevents neurons unrelated to perception and awareness of Berry from reaching the cortex or being processed. In hindsight, it would be entirely possible for a dominated victim to be under the effect of My World and yet be able to move as their state of mind is unrelated to their bodily functions and thus-"
"That is simple?" Miki was holding her forehead. She had an headache already just from using her ability repeatedly. Windy's explanation was not helping. "I still don't understand what this is for." Miki almost took a step back when Windy turned to her. The cold look in her eyes, devoid of any humanity, were those of a machine, calculating and processing data. Inori had made her swear she would keep all of this a secret but she was really weirded out by Windy.
"The more we know about each other's abilities, the better we can plan and act accordingly. I thought you to be aware of the importance of teamwork." Kaoru still wasn't satisfied by the results. She had to find a way to properly test the junction effects of Stormflair with the abilities of those two.
Miki made a mental note that teamwork also meant trusting each other and that included not prying every last little detail out of someone. She didn't say it out loud since she expected Inori to get mad if she picked a fight with Windy. "Are we finished? I'm kinda tired out, and there wasn't even any fighting."
"I would like to test-" Kaoru felt how someone grabbed her hand. Looking to her side, from the corner of her eyes, she saw Inori, very slightly shaking her head. "Yes, we are done. I'm grateful for your help."
Miki figured that Inori had a long way ahead of herself to turn that girl into someone... normal. Or at least more normal than she was now. "I'll go take a nap. Don't break your head with all that science stuff. There's no Nobel prize here." Walking away, they had been just outside the base in the labyrinth, Miki felt almost as mentally tired as after the whole mirror mess a few days ago.
"I didn't say anything because I thought it would be useful, but Kaoru-" Inori scolded the blue Cure with just a look. "These abilities still belong to people. You seem to be in the habit of focusing on just the research and forgetting that."
"What exactly is the issue with focusing on just the research? Isn't it the most efficient way to go about-"
"Humans are not efficient beings. We waste a lot of time doing things for personal reasons or no reason at all, we create more waste than we can clean up, both physical and mental, and there are many more examples. I understand things like this are what interests you most, but you need to keep in mind that more often than not, it is others putting up with your selfish desires for knowing more."
"Selfish? I am?" Kaoru was intrigued by the concept. She had never really thought of herself like that. "I need to analyze-"
"You're selfish. We all have a selfish drive to us. Even if there are some people who volunteer to help others or give all of their time to improving society or the planet, that is still something they want. It is normal to be selfish, but it is also part of us to keep it in check and not let it run rampant."
Kaoru understood the explanation but had trouble arriving at a workable solution. Seeing her perplexed look, as Kaoru wasn't used to not being able to put a theory to work, Inori put it in even easier terms. "Everything in moderation. Think of what I would do in the same situation."
"I will need to be with you for a longer period of time to have a sufficient staple of examples to-" That day, Kaoru just wasn't allowed to fully complete her sentences.
"Just assume what I'd do. That's what almost all of us do. Miki was clearly bothered at the end. You could see that, right?"
"I noticed a change in attitude which leaned towards annoyance, yes."
Inori had expected it to be hard but only now was she starting to grasp how hard exactly. Kaoru had specific ways of acting ingrained into her mind so deeply that it would take practice and time to correct those things. She felt bad making the comparison but she was a little like a bad dog that gnawed on things, barked at people and did it's business inside the house. To train that out of her would be hard.
But she could see the potential. Kaoru was extremely smart and while her interest and curiosity was very misplaced at times, she would be a great person if she got a hang of acting like a normal person. "I think its time to continue our conversation from last time. Would you mind going to the garden?" Inori put her right index finger on her cheek, a signal that she was testing Kaoru.
Two thoughts ran through her head. One, that it was inefficient to change locations for a conversation that did not rely on locational specifics to be held. Second, that her first thought was exactly what Inori was trying to correct. She concluded that she should find a more normal thought before responding. "I don't mind. I like to spend time there since it's very relaxing." It wasn't a lie. She simply probed her own mind for reactions and thoughts on the location itself and converted it into a reason to agree going there for her own purposes.
"Almost good." With a smile, Inori took the lead and the two of them headed towards the base.
=== Dissonance ===
"Where is everyone?" Yayoi, after spending most of the morning drawing up names, preliminary pages that were guidelines for the printed version, for her Manga in an attempt to be ready for a mass release once she got out of this place, was wandering the base and not finding a single person. Nobody in the hallway or the dining room. She finally found someone in the kitchen. Rhythm and Melody, glaring at each other, ready to spit acid.
"You're the baker! It's your job to figure out how many ingredients you need!" Hibiki's face was only centimeters from Kanade's.
"I did my job just right! A certain someone kept messing up my estimates so now we're short!" The girl with dirty blonde wasn't going to take those accusations.
"Of course it's my fault again. Funny how it's always the fault of someone else when you mess up baking!" Hibiki was getting on her toes and tried to look down on Kanade.
"Because someone is always there to screw with it!" Shoving her finger in Hibiki's face, Kanade didn't want to put up with her bickering.
Grabbing a bag of flour, Hibiki was about to throw it at Kanade when she saw a flash of yellow to her right. Thinking it was Itsuki, she accidentally threw the bag, hit a shelf and made the bag explode. Both Kanade and Hibiki launched into a coughing fit immediately, their clothes and hair covered in flour. Only then did she realize that the yellow was much too short to be Itsuki. That, and that she hadn't been hit on the head yet.
"Look what you did!" Kanade was shouting in-between coughing and grabbing the next best thing to throw in the general direction of Hibiki. She managed to procure a bowl with dough that promptly covered most of Hibiki's face and hair.
Twitching, Hibiki snapped. Grabbing a second bag of flour from the shelf, she turned into a Cure and fired the bag at Kanade, shouting "Take that!" knocking the girl over and causing the flour cloud to become more intense.
"Now you've done it..." Kanade got up, turned into a Cure as well, sliced off the top part of a glass of cherries and proceeded to awkwardly launch the content at where Hibiki's pink was visible. A splash was the signal that she had hit her.
Only a few seconds passed before Kanade's face was completely covered in dough, creme and fruit, Hibiki having smashed a cake into her face. The dust cloud was settling and Kanade could finally see Hibiki's anger-distorted, as well as dough-, flour- and cherry-covered, face. Grabbing a plate with already cut apples, she shoved as many of them as possible into Hibiki's mouth the moment the pink Cure opened it.
"Stop!" "Stop it, you idiot!" Two voices called out to them from the door. In the heat of the moment, neither Hibiki nor Kanade realized who it was.
"Shut up!" A single coordinated throw of whatever was at hand, dough and the remains of the cut apples in this case, made them face the intruders. Hibiki was, at this point, covered in all manner of ingredients, just like Kanade was, and sitting on top of the white Cure, pulling her hair.
Within five seconds, the kitchen felt like it had turned into one big oven. The heat was painful enough to make the two arguing girls focus on who the intruders actually were. Hibiki almost shrieked when she looked at Itsuki, hair and face covered in dough, with Rouge, literally on fire, right next to her. Kanade really wished she could actually faint on the spot to avoid having to explain herself.
A good twenty minutes later, both Hibiki and Kanade were working diligently and quietly to get done. Rin and Itsuki were seated right behind them, keeping watch. The pink Cure as well as the white Cure could feel the pressure exerting from their partners.
"I told you to get along with Kanade, not pick up old, and most of all, bad habits." Itsuki was genuinely mad at Hibiki for once. That she had gotten hit by dough and apples was partly responsible. She had acted as a limiter on Rin since she was up and about to kick both of their butts through the entire base. Kanade didn't dare to even squeak or sigh when they got lectured. Washing the remains of their fight off in the bathrooms on the second floor, both of the younger girls were very worried about what was waiting for them after the party.
"This is all your fault." Hibiki whispered towards Kanade.
"Like you're miss innocent." Kanade whispered back.
Both of them felt something very heavy push them down from their backs. It was the combined glares of Itsuki and Rin. Hibiki loved Itsuki a lot, but she was struggling a lot to not fight with Kanade. It was simply how they naturally acted!
The same was true for Kanade and loving Rin. She still felt attracted to Hibiki whenever she did something that could be interpreted as suggestive, but she was no longer struggling as much. Her exile had both been extremely horrible and an eye-opened to her. At this point, she would make everyone, including herself, happier if she could let go of any lingering feelings for Hibiki.
"I'll go and help Black move the benches so we can all sit together." Itsuki stood up and flicked Hibiki on the back of her head. "Behave yourself. I'm not responsible if Rin grills you."
"Yeeeees." Hibiki could feel the pressure from behind. Looking to Kanade from the corner of her eye, she wrote 'truce' into the dough, getting a quick nod from Kanade. Neither of them wanted to get Rin any angrier than she was. If not for Itsuki, she might have really set them on fire.
Up in the garden, Nagisa was lifting up yet another bench, butting in next to the others. Using the large space between the pond and the flower hill to make a spot for everyone to sit, eat and drink, it had turned into quite a big thing.
Mai had been tasked with keeping Bright out of the way and, so far, that had been a great success. They didn't have much in the way of decoration, yet, but Yayoi had already promised to supply lamps and all sorts of devices to keep the area lit, once evening sat in. Everyone was fully prepared to make the rest of the day very relaxing. Everyone was throwing in some coins so they could get something interesting for Bright.
Sitting up in a tree and binding branches together so leaves wouldn't fall onto the food, Nao had a great view from up there. "Akane, stop looking up my skirt." It was getting slightly embarrassing because of how openly and brazenly the red Cure was looking up, leaned against the tree. She had offered to help with the serving of food and drinks later, as she had experience doing that. So right now, she was free. And decided to peep at, and bother, her partner.
"It's not like I can see much. You and your stupid magic skirt. It's an abuse of powers!" Akane was grinning all the way through. Noticing that Mint was waving at her, she left one green Cure to her own devices to go and check what the other one wanted. "Need me for somethin'?"
"Yes." Wearing a happy smile, Komachi enjoyed the situation a lot. A party, for good reason at that, was just what everyone needed to forget about the few gruesome days before. "Peace was offering to put down lamps later, but I'd like to supplement the artificial lighting with a few torches. Do you think you can cover that? Mostly for the stairs and such."
"No problem." Waving her hand, Akane wanted to make a human torch joke but missed her chance. Mint was grabbed by her partner, Aqua, and taken away, talking over the arrangement of the benches and tables.
"I'll be back later. Muse wanted to stay here so I'm going to handle negotiations. The system has been as quiet as a mouse, so it should go over pretty easy today. Can you keep things under control here?" Just as Karen asked, both of them were distracted by a loud scream and an even louder splash. Black was sitting in the pond, a wooden bench, turned over, next to her, the water reaching all the way to her chest. Looking at the curious looks that everyone was giving her, Nagisa closed her eyes and smiled. "Ooops?"
"Go, I'll take care of things." Komachi was about to laugh out loud when Black tried to pick up the bench, slipped, and landed face first in the pond again.
Seeing the debacle, Itsuki went to Nagisa's rescue, taking off her boots and stepping into the pond. "Take my hand and take care not to fall." Her hand stretched out to Nagisa, Itsuki helped her up. "Let's carry the bench toge-" Her words turned into squirming when something touched her ankle and she basically jumped at Nagisa, who was unable to balance both herself and Itsuki on the wet ground. The third splash was even bigger than the first. Akane was on the ground, laughing so hard that her face closely resembled the color of her costume. A sudden splash of water cooled her down very quickly. Itsuki, hair hanging over her face and soaked to the bone had enacted revenge for laughing. "Get in here and help us haul that bench out of here."
For all their magic and powers, the simple act of carrying a bench, and furthermore getting said bench out of a pond, was proving to be as difficult as any battle. Ako, who had promised to help out Ellen with some musical business for the party, was slowly shaking her head as three adults started to fight in the pond over who was a klutz and who laughed inappropriately and so on. "And I'm supposed to be the youngest here."
"Did you say something?" Setsuna was just a few meters away and thought that Ako had talked to her. "Sorry, I wasn't paying attention."
"No, just talking to myself. I'll go and check if Kanade and Hibiki have gotten themselves killed, by someone else or each other, yet."
Getting up and walking towards the exit, Ako turned around and took a large detour by picking one of the corner paths, avoiding the pond. She wasn't going to let them turn her into another cliché victim.
=== Dissonance ===
At point twelve, the gates had opened for negotiations. "So you're doing the same over on your side? That's convenient." Miki had gone to the negotiations. Keeping it simple and small was the motto of the day and she didn't object to that at all. "Any plans, Karen?"
"The new room assignments are today so technically a big battle would've been good. But everyone is tired of fighting for now and there is the birthday of Bright and Windy. If possible, I would skip the battling entirely, but I don't think that's possible."
"How does a one versus one sound? That way we minimize the time it's gonna take, too." Miki was going to volunteer since she was at the very bottom of the ranking. Something that didn't sit well with her at all.
"That's fine with me. Do you want to pick any special rules?" Karen picked a few terrain rules that seemed to promise decent spoils but not cause too much trouble. "What about this for the terrain?"
"Let's see..." An ancient mountain cave. Not much in the way of a bonus at fifteen percent, but it was a good location to have a quick one versus one fight. "Sure, why not. How about rules two, twenty-seven, thirty-eight and eighty-eight? That will make one heck of a quick beat down. It's limited to people who are good at melee, but I'm sure that's acceptable."
"Chained Link – Enemy mode, Explosion Hit, Chaotic Risk and Silent Sight? It'll be like hitting each other with some of these oversized clown hammers but filled with dynamite and with a blind fold on." Karen wondered if there was anyone on the team that would be up for that. Someone quick, sturdy that could dish out lots of damage. "Agreed. I hope the two can still get some cake later. I hear Rhythm grew up in a bakery and she's making cake. I can't wait."
"Lucky you." Miki wondered if anyone on their side would bake some tasty goods. With all the exercise she was getting, and all the worrying she was doing, she could sin a little. Or even a lot, depending on how tasty the goods were.
Both of them left, the entire negotiation only having taken a few minutes, and the doors closed behind them. Back in the base, Karen was greeted by a, to her, mostly unsurprising situation. Beat and Passion, Beat's teammates Melody and Rhythm hiding behind those two, were trying to deflect the literally burning wrath of Rin.
"Rin, what did they do this time?" Karen joined her teammate and looked at the worried face of Beat, who looked like she was about to melt.
"Isn't that obvious?" Rin glared at Karen and as a few seconds passed, she sighed and bowed slightly, showing off the top of her head to the blue cure. There was hardened dough stuck to the top, as if someone had tried to bake a bread on her head.
"But I didn't do that on purpose! I slipped because of some spilled flour and the pot just landed on your head!" Hibiki defended herself, quite intimidated that Rouge might actually grill her.
"Is that right, Rin?" Karen thought she would try to calm the red cure.
"It looked that way but you can't tell with those two!"
"Nah, she is telling the truth." Itsuki appeared from seemingly nowhere and pulled Hibiki's cheek. "The right corner of her mouth always twitches when she lies."
Melody, Rhythm and Beat were all surprised to hear that and looked at Sunshine in confusion. Upon being stared at, the yellow Cure just shrugged. "What, you never noticed? Especially you, Kanade."
Rin was getting tired of the whole thing. Turning around, she walked a few steps before stopping. "There better be an extra big slice of cake for me later." Her words had an or else tone to them.
Kanade and Hibiki both exhaled deeply and slowly after getting off the hook. The peace only lasted a second. "That was totally your fau- ow, ow, ow, Itsuki, stop, ow, you're hurtin-, ow!" Hibiki had no time to start an argument because she was being pulled away by her ear. "I get it, ow, Itsuki, ow, I get it!" Only after they were halfway down the hallway, Rin was long gone now, did Itsuki release her.
"No picking fights! But if Rin unjustly wants to lynch you, you should stand up to her. Just don't demolish the kitchen, alright?"
"You'd think she wouldn't be so hard on Kanade since they're... they're together, aren't they?"
"Probably something like that. Rin seems like a pretty complicated person, despite her looks and short fuse."
"Excuse me for having a short fuse." A voice, directly behind Itsuki, responded.
"Eavesdropping, Rin?" Itsuki turned a little and looked at Rin, who had both arms crossed in front of her chest, not a hint of ill-will in her voice and expression.
"Not really. I was thinking of going up to the garden and help Sunny put up some lights. So those two are your lot and problem now." Waving and leaving without giving Itsuki a chance to respond, Rin felt like making Kanade sleep in her own bed. But she also knew that this feeling would pass in a few minutes and acting on it now would just get her sour grapes all around. She didn't want to be Urara.
Further down the corridor, Karen was talking to Passion. "So the battle will be one versus one. I was thinking of asking Black to participate unless someone else wants to volunteer."
"I'm sure she'll happily take the offer. She's in fourteenth place after all." Setsuna peeked to the side, where Ellen was asking Kanade about her relationship with Rin, causing the red cure to smile.
"Do you know where she is? The battle won't happen for another hour or so but there is also still the exile run. I think everyone will want to start partying right after that's over with."
"Up in the garden, probably still in the pond and also probably in need of a shower." Setsuna felt a yawn coming, covered her mouth and slightly turned away from Karen, unable to stop her body.
And it was contagious. Ellen was the first to follow, with Kanade and Karen right behind. "I wish we could sleep in." Karen said in jest, not knowing that her words were a carefully thrown rock that was hitting the delicate balance of the system.
=== Dissonance ===
"So you're going?" Yuri was in the dinning hall, reading a book, ready to stop and go help Luminous and Rose should they require any help. She wasn't a star in the kitchen but pretty good. Bloom was helping out too, though, so there wasn't much for her to do. Miki had joined her after returning from negotiations.
"I'm good at close combat and I need to improve my ranking." Stopping for a moment and thinking about what she had just said, words that had simply come to mind naturally, Miki sat down next to her now-girlfriend. "It's odd, isn't it? It was such a big deal three weeks ago, but now, with the new system, the whole mirrors ordeal and everything, I can't help but just think of this as a competition."
"Just don't let your pride force you into thinking you have to be at the top. With Erika doing her business that's impossible." Yuri was ambitious herself but competing with Erika never turned out well unless it was something the short girl absolutely couldn't do, like modeling.
"Don't worry, I won't." Miki knew well enough that some people shouldn't be challenged. "I think Luminous is calling you. She's waving through the window." At this point, Miki could tell who was who simply by parts of their costumes. In this case, just the pink glove from Luminous costume.
"I wish I had some fancy clothes to wear." Fling.
"I wish I could take you out to dance." Fling. Getting up, touching Miki's shoulder as she walked past, Yuri walked into the kitchen. She was to their taste test. And they passed with flying colors. "If this was for sale in a shop, I would buy it every week." More often than that and she would get fat. She was pretty delicate as far as food was concerned although it didn't hurt her physical condition at all to be a bit on the thin side.
Hikari, looking so happy over Moonlight's praise that she had let her guard down for a moment, noticed that Kurumi was unusually quiet and standing a good meter away from her. One look at the prototype cake told her everything she needed to know. "No snacking, Kurumi!"
The purple Cure almost jumped in the air and slowly turned around, her face resembling that of a hamster, her cheeks so puffed out, her mouth so stuffed full with cake, that she couldn't even take and just look apologeptic.
"No more snacking okay? If you like cake so much just tell me and I'll bake you one." Hikari's gentle smile returned and so did Kurumi, hugging the pink cure, lifting her up and whirling once round.
"They're so sweet together, it feels like the cake is completely unnecessary." Saki commented with a smug grin. Yuri smiled a little but didn't say anything in response. "I wish I could see smiles like that every day." Fling.
"If I saw this every day I would get diabetes." Yuri said to Saki's bemusement. Both of them were surprised when there was a very weak quake, so weak that Hikari and Kurumi didn't notice at all. Some of the bowls shook a little but they also did when someone hit their knee on the table. "Did I imagine that?"
"No. Maybe they're doing something to keep Windy busy?" Saki shrugged but couldn't shake a certain level of curiosity. With everything that had happened, the ground shaking was a bit suspicious.
"I hope so." It would do everyone some good to be able to relax and just live an easy life for a while. After having that thought, Yuri stopped thinking for a moment. An easy life? Here? Looking at it, food was relatively easily provided, most of the day was free activity and now that they had the garden and knew they could create new rooms, it wouldn't be long before they would create other places. Most of all, there were no jobs to wake up to, no schedules and appointments. There were drawbacks too, a lot of them, but if nothing unusual happened it really was a kinda safe and easy life.
But there were two who didn't have an easy life at all. At least not at this very moment. Nozomi needed Miyuki's help to even stand. Fatigue had caught up with her and she felt like she had run a hundred-thousand kilometer marathon in sprinting tempo. "Maybe you should stay in bed." Miyuki wasn't in top condition either so the two of them formed a shaky combination, ready to fall any time.
Nozomi's stomach growled so loud that an innocent bystander might have mistaken her for a wild beast that was starving. Now, starving she really was, and she didn't want to bother Miyuki with even getting some food for her. They had spent the night together but not together. Nozomi liked Miyuki but she didn't feel romantically attracted. Maybe it just wasn't in her to like a girl. She wondered if she should feel disappointed as Miyuki was a really nice, cute and caring girl, but that too didn't seem to be in her.
"You... won't tell anyone about it, right?" Nozomi was still worried. Miyuki hadn't seen the whole carnage the reflections had caused and some Cures were suffering from the aftermath even now.
"That you toss around in bed like a wild animal? I won't." Miyuki winked at Nozomi, indicating that she knew what the older Cure was talking about. "You were saying 'Coco' a lot while you slept. Do you like coconut milk a lot?"
Nozomi burst out in laughing. It only lasted for two seconds before her body told her 'no' and she started to cough instead and calmed down. "Coco is my... ex-boyfriend."
"I thought all Cures liked girls. It's like that on my team at least." And all the other teams I saw, she thought to herself. She hadn't figured out which way she was swinging yet. "I wonder what it's like to be a couple."
"You've never dated anyone?" Nozomi thought it odd that such a friendly, helpful and cute girl would not get tons of love letters.
"Akane said it's because I always have my head in fairytale books and because I'm the world's greatest klutz." Miyuki sighed. There was some truth to it, she knew that, but even if those things weren't true, she didn't know if she wanted a girl or boyfriend.
"Rin often told me I'm a klutz, too. We're kinda similar, aren't we?" Nozomi smiled and Miyuki smiled back.
"Maybe you could be my practice girlfriend!" Miyuki started laughing but stopped when Nozomi didn't join her. The older cure was making a pretty depressed face. "Ah, I was just kidding! I'd make a terrible girlfriend!"
"I'll think about it." Nozomi grinned and flicked Miyuki's forehead. With her stomach growling again, Nozomi looked at Miyuki. "Before I eat you, we should get something to eat." Nozomi wanted to smack herself for the unintentional innuendo.
Miyuki, the innuendo completely flying over her head, just nodded. Helping Nozomi to the door, Miyuki opened it and stopped. "Do you smell this?"
Nozomi took an intense whiff and her stomach immediately growled again. She was smelling grilled chicken and all other kinda of tasty goods. Were they preparing a banquet down in the kitchen?
And she was not the only one smelling it. Out in the labyrinth, Inori and Kaoru were with Love, who was demonstrating her ability, as a gift to Windy, who was just completely consumed in researching Peach's ability.
"You two brainiacs suit each other." Love whispered to Inori just as she started to smell food. A few seconds passed where Love was just deeply breathing in the pleasant smell. "I want to marry whoever is cooking today."
"I'm telling Setsuna." Inori threatened with a smile.
"Can you two smell this as well?" Kaoru took a deep breath through her nose and her expression changed to confusion. "I wasn't aware that we had the ingredients for roast chicken, Pasta Carbonara, Seafood Pizza, Mapo Tofu and-"
Love laughed and earned a glare from Inori. "How do you smell all that?" Upon seen a spark in Windy's eyes, Love put up her hands. "Actually, don't tell me. It'll make a great mystery for me to solve on my own." Love was very kind but Windy's dry and long winded explanations had tired her out already.
Inori and Love figured that whoever was working in the kitchen was cooking up a banquet for Windy. But it was still odd that the smell reached all the way out in the labyrinth.
=== Dissonance ===
"Where does this stench come from?!" Ako was so disgusted that she felt like throwing up. The entire complex was smelling like, what she assumed they smelled like, an old sewer. The cooking in the kitchen was put on hold, and so was pretty much everything else.
Muse, Bright, Aqua, Mint and Egret were standing in the dinning hall, all of them pinching their noses. Everyone else was trying to find a place where the smell wasn't omnipresent with less than no success. It just got stronger the more they ran around.
"It seems to come from everywhere. More important than knowing where it comes from is finding a way to get rid of it." Komachi was at her limit. She was fairly resistant to stuffy air, as it often got stuffy in her apartment when she spent extended periods of time inside and without letting fresh air in, but this was the smell of nightmares.
"Should we try using the system to clear this up?" Karen felt that this was the most reasonable course of action.
"Don't. What if we break it and we'll get another disaster." Mai still hadn't recovered from the reflection thing so she didn't want another catastrophe.
"It is physically not possible for a smell like this to be equally strong in a complex this large and have no clear source." Michiru commented. She had been in the sewers before but they hadn't smelt that horrible.
"Scientists would say the same thing about us using energy blasts to beat each other up." Ako was not in any mood to listen to scientific explanations of anything.
"Has anyone checked if the other team is also smelling this?" Karen knew the dome was not a stench-free zone. Rin had already tested that.
"I just went. They're having the same issue over there but instead of sewer stench, they inexplicably smell a banquet." Itsuki walked up to the others, Rin, Hibiki and Kanade a few meters behind her, staying out of the dinning hall.
"Did you ask when it started?" Michiru hated having to breathe through her mouth. It was ineffective and inconvenient.
Itsuki nodded. "It started about fifteen minutes ago and no matter where they go, they can smell it. White said it is pleasant at first but then becomes overwhelming really quickly as there is no actual food."
"How long are we going to wait before we try to do something about this?" Muse looked at Aqua. "Did you set some weird conditions in the negotiation?"
"The setting is an ancient mountain cave. Even if the smell we have here came from there, it makes no sense for the other team to smell a banquet." Karen shook her head. "Maybe the system is cleaning itself up. I suggest we bear with it at least until the battle is over to be absolutely sure."
"When is it starting?" Itsuki wanted to know.
"Should start any second now. Nagi- Black is going." Mai wondered how much longer she would have to deal with these feelings.
=== Dissonance ===
Miki stepped through the gate and found herself immediately in intense darkness, unable to see anything, even her own hand right in front of her eyes. She had known the rules but she didn't think that Silent Sight would be like this. Something was dangling from her left wrist.
Someone was on the other side of that chain and only a mere ten meters away. For any normal person it would've been difficult to tell just how far ten meters were in total darkness, but for Miki, it was second nature. Using her right foot to feel the direction of the chain on the ground, Miki took the first move.
"Spade Crush!" Destroying the ground in front of her with a stomping attack, a massive explosion illuminated the, as far as she could tell, endlessly large cave, for just two seconds, revealing both her opponent's identity and her position. Grabbing the chain and pulling as hard as she could, Miki found that the other end had her beat in pure physical strength. But that didn't come at a surprise.
Nagisa had seen who her adversary was. Cure Berry, someone who was proficient in close combat attacks. Resisting the pull on the chain, Nagisa decided to play her trump card right away. "Blacklight Current!" Forcing her own personal cure energy through the chain, acting like a conduit, Berry didn't see the attack coming until she felt it.
But as it wasn't a physical attack, the damage it did was limited. Able to shrug it off with some minor burns, Miki jumped ahead, to the right of where Black was, holding the chain in both her hands and using her full force upon landing, lifting the black Cure right off the ground. Whirling her through the air faster and faster, she knew that letting go would pull her along.
Slowly shortening the distance between her and Black, pulling the chain in as she kept spinning it, Miki carefully put her foot on top of the bit of chain that was on the floor. Thank god she was wearing boots with heels. They proved to be rather useful in securing the chain in the ground. Instead of just letting go, Miki pulled the chain in the opposite direction of where it was going, creating an intense backlash at the other end of it.
Black's outcry was proof that she had caused considerable damage to the enemies wrist. But she didn't account for just how tough Nagisa was. The floor under her vanished as she was force off her feet. Laying on her back for a second, Miki jumped up, landing on her feet only to see a series of explosions rapidly approaching her.
Nagisa was using the explosion rule to make each of her steps into a stomping attack that caused an explosion that created enough light to make her see Berry. Suddenly in front of the blue cure, Nagisa aimed straight for her chest. Miki crossed her arms in time but the impact was like trying to stop a small moon from crashing into you. "Blacklight Devastation!"
The explosion threw both of them high into the air, uncontrolled, whirling around each other. Miki's clothes were scorched and she spat a large amount of blood before she regained her sense. Nagisa on the other hand was grabbing the chain with both hands, slowly pulling closer to Berry despite being still in the air.
Meeting an incoming punch with a kick, Berry was more proficient with those after all and she needed every bit of an edge she could get, both of them were blown away by the explosion again. But the chain prevented them from going too far. Recoiling and forcing both of them back together, Nagisa used her injured arm and wrapped it around Berry. "No escape."
Hitting Berry's face, each punch causing an explosion equivalent to a piece of dynamite going up, Nagisa took damage from the explosions as well. And then Berry countered. Grabbing Nagisa's free hand, she headbutted the girl as hard as she could. The explosion nearly forced them apart but Nagisa was so incredibly strong that she could hold onto Miki. A second headbutt did the job and forced them apart, both of them wildly flying through the air again.
Unable to see where Black was, Miki resorted to abusing the rules. Punching the chain itself, indestructible as it may be, she created enough light to see the chain going downwards. Or upwards, depending on whether they were still ascending or descending, it was difficult to tell.
Putting the chain around her arm, Miki got closer and closer until her hand touched Black. Both of them had reduced the chain length even further by wrapping it around their body. Berry around her arm, Nagisa by wrapping it around her waist.
The first punch came from Nagisa and hit Miki's chin, whose ears started ringing and her senses became disorientated. But with the enemy so close, she didn't need senses. Unleashing a furry of kicks blindly in front of her, a barrage of explosions enveloped Black, scorching her from every side at once, the attacks hitting her everywhere.
Gritting her teeth and trusting her luck, Nagisa wildly grabbed with both arms where the next kick she thought would come from. And on the fourth try she got Berry's leg between both of her arms. Her left wrist was no good anymore but she didn't need it.
Hammering her knee against the blue Cure's leg, Miki screamed in pain as she felt her bone break in half on the inside and nearly lost consciousness when Black hammered her knee in a second time. The explosion from the impact gave up enough light for Miki to see where exactly Black was looking. Using her teeth to strip off her long glove, Miki used her sturdy nails to create a set of five painful scratches on Nagisa's face.
By reflex, Nagisa looked to where the attack had come from. And in that same moment, Miki hit herself with her other hand, creating a light source. "My World." It was just enough exposure for Nagisa to fall prey to the attack.
Letting go of Berry's leg, the blue Cure untangled the chain from her arm and Black's waist. The effect wouldn't last long like this so she had to be quick. Starting to swing Black around, close enough that she could still reach Black with a kick, Miki waited until she felt she couldn't go any faster with risking that her entire arm would be torn off by what was to follow.
Letting go, Black immediately flew away in one direction, pulling Miki with her. Stretching out her health leg and focusing all her energy into it, Miki crossed her arms in front of her face and endured the pain of her broken leg.
"Grand Spade Impact!" The moment Black hit a wall, or it might have been a large stalagmite, Miki caught up to her and smashed into her back. The explosion was so strong that Miki couldn't see or hear anything, the heat strong enough to burn her clothes and skin.
A moment later she found herself on a extremely soft bed, with the worst muscle ache in her leg that she had ever experienced. And a thousand things struck her as odd and wrong right away. For one, she wasn't Cure Berry anymore but just Miki. And she wasn't wearing regular clothes.
There were numerous other things she noticed right away. There was a lot of talking going out somewhere close by, there was music playing, music from a festival even, the air smelled of food and wine, cologne and perfume. And looking down on herself, she was wearing a fancy blue dress, something that belonged right in the Renaissance or even the middle ages. Wearing shoes that matches the outfit, she wondered what was going on. Something was on her face as well.
Touching it, she felt finely crafted silk. It was easily removed and upon looking at it, it was a mask in the shape of a butterfly, decorated with tiny jewels and made from blue dyed silk. Getting off the bed, she noticed that this wasn't her room. It was three times as spacious as even the biggest rooms in the complex and looked like the private quarters of a baron, something one would see in cliché movies.
"What is going on?" A little unstable on her feet, Miki walked to the door and listened. From the volume and diversity of the voices and things being talked about, it was impossible that there were only twenty-nine people out there. Opening the door just a little, it was heavy and made from solid wood, Miki snuck a peak.
She looked into a hallway that was extremely well furnished. A large group of fifteen women were just passing by, all of them dressed in similar dresses to the one Miki was wearing but all with their unique cuts. No, that wasn't quite true. Two of them looked exactly the same and as Miki peeked out of the room entirely, she saw that they both wielded the same paper fans and even had the same hairstyle as well.
But the weirdest thing was that she thought they were all people she knew. Stepping out, Miki was almost scared to death when she suddenly felt the presence of someone behind her. Turning about, she looked in her own face. Even behind the plain, white, wooden mask, she could tell. The color of the girl's hair, her eyes, the shape of her neck and shoulders, everything was exactly the same. But she was wearing what was clearly servant clothes. "Milady, you shouldn't take off your mask! It is against the Queen's rules!" The girl, Miki herself, was whispering to Miki, before she quickly turned tail and walked away, picking up a tray with drinks and heading in the same direction as the well dressed women had gone.
Putting the mask back on in a trance, Miki followed herself. The light at the end of the hallway was almost blinding but only once she could see did she felt truly blinded. Standing at the entrance to a massive hall with four floors, large winded staircases separating each floor, there were dozens of well dressed women standing around and talking, drinking, eating, with servants hushing between them and attending to their needs. And in each corner, at each staircase, stood another woman in full armor, holding a halberd in her right hand, a sword at her thigh.
"Where am I?" Where indeed.
=== End of Event XXVII ===
