Dissonance
Event XXXIII
The Chapter of Tranquil Evil
A pink haired woman slowly, cautiously, peeked out of her room. Although it was not really her room. Oh shit. Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit. Where the hell am I? I was just with Miyuki in my room and bam. I mean, this is a hotel room and a hotel hallway and that over there is a hotel elevator. So I am definitely not in the Banished Zone. I can guess why I am here. Someone or something must have caused Dream to enter the Banished Zone and it displaced me. There's nothing else I can think of that could have just brought me here. The woman had a moment of enlightenment just before she put her palm to her face. I did say to Rin and Urara that I would love to talk to Dream and thank her for what she did all those years ago. If I find out they dragged her into the zone, they are so toast. Our one big rule is to leave the normal zone alone and they ought to know that. Messing around with the resurrected is fine, but messing with the Cures is just asking for more trouble than we can handle.
Retreating into her room and closing the door, Dark Dream leaned against the door and took a deep breath. Okay, okay, calm down Nozomi. I just need to go and get to the stone plaza. And for the time being… Walking to the closet and opening it, Nozomi found herself relieved. Okay, lets see… ugh, Nozomi, your sense of fashion is pretty bad. I guess this will do… and this. Picking out a black pantyhose, a black and pink skirt, a blouse that fit the skirt, Nozomi got dressed herself in the clothes of her light doppelganger. It's the middle of the night, so this is probably needless worrying and effort, but who knows how some of those other Cures would react to a Dream doppelganger walking around. I am not risking getting blown to bits by some overzealous do-gooder that shoots first, asks questions never.
Peeking out of her room again, the woman stepped outside and nearly silently shut the door behind her. Okay. So far, so good. She hadn't seen any shoes in the closet so she only had her knee-high black boots to wear. The significant heel on them would make it impossible to get away silently so Dark Nozomi walked slowly, careful to keep the heel of her boots just off the ground. Why are hotel corridors so long…? I wish I had my full powers and not just the offensive half. One punch from one of those Cures and I am going to be toast. Sneaking past the final door, the elevator was almost in reach when the door right behind her opened, room 11. Oh, no, no, no. Standing up straight, Dark Dream turned around and looked at who it was. Is that… Reika's original?! What rotten luck! The one woman that almost sounds exactly like me!
"Dream." Reika noticed her right away. "You can't sleep?"
W-What do I do? If I open my mouth and just talk normally, the gig will be up in an instant. I… I gotta go for it. "No." Raising the pitch on her voice much too far, she sounded like a chipmunk with a bad cold. Clearing her throat, she went again, this time a bit lower. "I thought I'd take a walk and clear my head. Too many thoughts keeping me up."
"Did you catch a cold in the ocean cave? Your voice sounds strange."
Bless the gods for misunderstandings! "Y-Yeah. I have- I got a bit of an itchy feeling in my throat and stuff." Dream talks casually, right?
"I am sure it will pass. Do you mind if I accompany you on your walk? There is something I could use your opinion on and I feel someone not in a relationship will have a more objective view of the situation."
Are you bloody well kidding me?! "O-Of course." This is hurting my throat.
Hitting the key for the elevator, Dark Dream waited together with Reika. It's almost like I'm talking to myself. And I am worried sick that Miyuki is gonna lose her temper and come after me. Don't do anything stupid, darling!
"I do not know how much the others have talked. Have you heard about me and Rhythm?"
Who the heck is Rhythm? I mean, obviously a Cure, there's nobody bloody else here 'n if she's asking like that, there's no doubt she and that Rhythm girl went shacking. "It's better to hear it from you." I am not going to make some stupid assumption and give myself away.
"You were already asleep by the time this happened, but during the party on the first day, Rhythm and I happened to sleep together. Neither of us remembered, but the evidence was staggering. I worried about whether it would negatively impact her relationship with Rouge and… how do I say this- Things between me and Nao are coming to an end. Or have ended already."
Slow down, slow down! Rin's original is sleeping with this Rhythm? And you and Nao's original are breaking up? Man, this place is crazy. Stay in your own yard, hunt in your own forest. Although saying that makes me a total hypocrite, I guess. But there is not a thing alive that would be stupid enough to turn down that sexy Miyuki. "That's a pity."
"I think it will work out for us. The situation that Nao was in was… unsustainable. She's not Peach."
Who?! "Peach is special, isn't she."
"I honestly did not think there existed people that could have a relationship with two more people. Although, seeing Heart with Diamond and Joker, I suppose Peach is not the only one."
The elevator finally came and Nozomi just stood there, confused. Wait, wait, wait. This Peach has a relationship with two more girls? Is she a gigolo? And there's another one like that called Heart that has a thing with Diamond and Joker? How do you keep track of who is who in this place!?
"Something wrong?" Reika kept her foot next to the elevator door, preventing it from closing.
"Ah, no, no." Quickly stepping into the elevator, Dark Dream felt overwhelmed with this flood of information. "So, what did you wanna ask me?"
"Earlier, during the test of courage, I happened to be paired with Melody. And you can most likely guess what I am about to say next."
I need a memo pad for this. "Stuff happened between you?"
"That is putting it lightly." Reika's composure cracked as she touched her forehead with her left hand. "To sleep with two girls, both taken, and to add to it, they are partners on the same team. The powers that be must be really upset with something I did."
Wow, we're two peas in a pot. The universe has it out for both of us. "It'll get better. It always does." My throat hurts.
"I would be pretty hard for things to get worse, but I probably jinxed myself now."
So she can talk normally. If I tell our Reika her original is stiff like a board, she's gonna run away in shame. "Anyway, you wanted my opinion on something?"
"Hypothetically, if Rhythm and Rouge were to break up-"
"Oh, no, you shouldn't do that. It's gonna make you look like you slept with Rhythm on purpose to cause drama between her and Rin and then claim her for yourself." Nozomi felt Reika stare at her in surprise and her breathing stopped. Fuck. I totally went off the rails and acted like myself. Don't notice, don't notice! Think lewd thoughts, original of Reika!
"It's unusual for you to call her Rhythm." Reika was as sharp as ever. "Did something happen?"
"Ah, well, you know, you call her that and I guess you rubbed off on me a little!"
Reika smiled gently. "Perhaps. But that is a look that doesn't suit you, Dream."
Dark Dream, actually! And I call her Rhythm because I've no clue what's her real name is! "Is that all you wanted to ask?"
"A very straight forward answer from the very straight forward Dream."
Why does it feel like I am missing some kind of innuendo here. Is Dream too blunt? Is she an idiot? Did she become an idiot? I mean she was kind of stupid, but that's lovable about her. An honest and stupid girl. I ought to stop calling my savior stupid. Even though she's stupid.
"I'm glad I asked. I will go with you anyway, if you don't mind." Reika was not slipping, but intentionally choosing to talk a little less politely than usual.
Reaching the lobby, the two of them found Sasorina asleep in her chair, snoring lightly. That's… what's her name. The one that was fighting the originals of Erika and her ragtag group of friends. Man, Yuri would whack me if I said that to her face. Heading towards the big door that obviously lead outside, Nozomi was suddenly realizing that this Reika would be very suspect of her looking around, for the dark portal, like a scared animal. "Where do you wanna go?"
"The park is probably a bit problematic because the paths are not that clearly defined. I don't mean to offend you, but you strike me as the type that would walk into a tree in this darkness."
Yeah, no, actually, this darkness is when me and everyone else in Banished are up. We feel like frogs on the grill when the sun is blazing! And that totally sounds like Nozomi, walking into trees and stuff. Man, I hope she's okay and Miyuki isn't doing weird shit to her. "Ah, yeah, that happened to me before."
"The beach seems like a good fit." The doors slid open in front of Reika and revealed the stone plaza to Nozomi.
"Let's go around the plaza once, I wanna see if it's too cold, dressed like this."
"You could just transform if you get cold."
Yeah, right, with what powers exactly? "You're right. But I don't wanna walk around as Dream all the time."
Starting their slow walk around the plaza, Nozomi felt her heart beating like crazy. W-Where is the damn portal? I mean, it would be super damn bad if this Reika saw the portal, but it should be here! Hello! System! I'm over here! And I clearly don't belong! But there was no sign of it, none whatsoever. This is bad. Isn't this bad? This is like, really bad. Don't tell me I am stuck here until tomorrow midnight. They are gonna find me out and lynch me!
"You and Miyuki have been getting along, haven't you? I saw both of you wave at each other before and after the test of courage. And you were together when we were forced into the world of Cure Heart and her team as well." Reika didn't miss that Nozomi looked very stressed and was even sweating a little despite the temperatures. Did she catch a fever? Or perhaps... "Do you have any feelings for Miyuki?"
"Oh, I'm in love with Miyuki." Walking a few steps further, Nozomi noticed that Reika was gone. Where did she go? Turning around, she saw Reika just stand there, her mouth open and a surprised expression on her face. What's wrong with her? Did I say something stra- Ah! Aaaaah! Fuck, fuck, mega fuck! "Oh, I, err, I mean, you know, I just, er-" H-How the fuck do I fix this?!
"No, I understand. I heard about your boundless devotion to your previous lover so I know you are worried about the others thinking lowly of you to be in love with Miyuki."
Nice misunderstanding! Dark Dream felt like her heart was going to give in. "Please don't tell anyone I said that. I… haven't told Miyuki either."
"If you won't tell Rhythm and Rouge about what I asked you earlier." Reika smiled a little. "Do you still want to go to the beach?"
"Better I don't. Who knows how many more secrets I'm gonna blurt out. Just kidding!"
Reika smiled. "Yeah, I wonder how many things you are hiding."
Nozomi started to sweat. She's… kidding, right? But that totally felt like a threat. "Maybe I'll go to the beach on my own to clear my head."
"Take care not to worsen your cold." Reika turned about and slowly walked away, raising her hand and waving to Nozomi.
The moment Reika vanished into the hotel, Nozomi stopped smiling and let out a huge sigh. "Holy shit, this is bad for my heart." Walking back and forth on the plaza, creating a lot of noise with her high heeled boots, Dark Dream couldn't find the portal. "This has got to be a joke… I can't be stuck here. They are all awake during the day, they'll figure out that I'm not the real Nozomi the second I shrivel up like a snail in salt water because I went out in the sun." Taking a few steps back, Dark Dream angrily stomped on the ground. "What do I do now? Lock myself in my room? That's gonna make everyone suspicious. Maybe I can run with the whole having a cold thing and just not open the door because of that." Walking back and forth a few more times, Dark Dream tried to force open a portal by using her powers on the fog, but nothing happened. Giving up, she looked distraught and helpless. "At least Reika's original didn't figure out I'm not the real Dream."
"I guess this could have gone worse. Someone that knows Nozomi well would have definitely figured it out that this can't be what she sounds like with a cold. I'm amazed that this Reika just bought my story like that." Squatting, Dark Dream let out a huge sigh. I'm gonna get myself killed. I am so gonna get myself killed. From what Miyuki said, Dream was the only one to ever go easy on her dark counterpart. If I could at least transform. Like: transform!
And with a flash of darkness engulfing her, Dark Dream replaced her normal clothes with the a black leather outfit that very closely resembled the one that she had worn back then. Oh no, no, no! Untransform! Detransform! Go back to start! Level down! Transform cancel! Shit, shit, shit, shit! Looking around like a hunted animal, Dark Dream quickly made a run for it, into the fog.
"What's this nonsense? I couldn't transform in Banished! And what is with this sense of fashion? This is way too skimpy! I can't believe I wore something like that! How did teen me not die of shame!? And spats?! Spats of all things! I'm not 14 years old anymore!" Fidgeting on the spot and unsure what to do, Dark Dream was not very interested in that surge of power she felt. "Okay, maybe- maybe I need to calm down." Taking a deep, controlled breath, Nozomi talked to herself again. "Be like Mirage Moonlight, peaceful, graceful, fearsome." Breathing out, she felt no better. "How can I be calm at a time like this?!" Walking around aimlessly, she didn't know what to do.
Looking around, she finally paid attention to where she was. They really got a bleedin' beach over here? Walking through the underbrush, sticking to the dirt path, Dark Dream was finally calmed by the sound of the ocean. You have to move at running speed for three hours to get to the ocean from our cottage. They sure got it convenient here. So damn unfair. Walking towards the water, her heels suddenly got stuck in the sand and she fell face first into the sand. And unceremoniously, her transformation wore off. Now you decide to wear off. Thanks for nothing!
Pulling herself off the ground and getting on her feet, the heels of her boots sunk right back into the sand and this time she fell on her butt. I hate the beach already. Taking off her boots and getting the sand off her butt, chest and face, Nozomi got back up and walked back towards the fog. So I can transform out here. Not that I really need to. We can use our powers and have super strength, we don't need more than that for day to day stuff. Although I'm sure Miyuki would super dig this leather outfit. It's hella embarrassing though!
Going back through the fog, Nozomi sat down on the stone pavement and put her shoes back on, after thoroughly brushing off the sand from her feet. So if push comes to shove, I can just make a run for it and shout at them until they stop trying to kill me. Walking back towards the hotel, Dark Dream stopped when she reached the stairs leading up to the hotel door. I'm worried about you, Nozomi.
And she had every right to be. Although not in the way that she did. After getting into a fight over who got to ask Nozomi questions first, Bad End Happy, or just Happy, had put down the rather standoffish Mirage Sunshine and the very overeager Bad End Sunny. Both of them were hallucinating and out of their mind, rolling on the floor like cats that were high on cat nip.
Seeing Nozomi watch that with obvious worry on her face, Miyuki didn't want to have her girlfriend chew her out later so she explained what was going on. "I'm putting them into a state where they see their secret desires come real. It's like a wet dream while being awake. They will have one hell of a hangover when they come to, though."
It's so strange to hear Miyuki talk like that… even if I know it isn't really Miyuki. "Could you explain again who you are?"
"I don't think what she said earlier actually counts as an explanation." Mirage Marine, or just Erika, was sitting near the fire, on one of the many stumps that served as chairs. "Boss, you mind if I take over?"
"Go ahead, I need to figure out how to unravel this mess that Rin and Urara got us all into. And you, Dream, behave yourself." Miyuki breathed out, the anger clear even there. "Rin! Urara! Get your sorry asses out of the woods and over here!" Her angry bark echoed through the dark forest.
"This must be so confusing for you." Erika moved over to where Nozomi was and just stood in front of her, her back to the fire. "You know where your alter ego, Rin and so forth came from, right? Leaves Miyuki and her rabble plus us, the Mirage."
"I saw Dark Dream die. The others were all dead, too. How are they alive here?"
"Excellent question. No answer here though. But lemme start with what we do know. Easier to figure out stuff when you know as much as we do, righto? Okay, lessee. Basically, we all arrived in this forest a few weeks back. And wow was that a surprise. Miyuki and co. were all totally fucked in the head and Nozomi's group looked like they just got done having the snot beaten out for them for ten years straight. Didn't take us long to figure out we didn't have all our powers. See, Rin and Akane can make fire and stuff, but no flashy fireballs or stuff to attack each other. Dream is responsible for putting us all to sleep at dawn and Miyuki is our party bar. Everyone got their job. More or less. See that thing over there?"
"The well? It looks really old." Nozomi was trying her best to just take this all in strides. After everything she had seen in her life so far, nothing could really reach a level of I can't believe this anymore.
"Yep. Karen's job is to keep the well alive for example, creating water. But it's too much for just her, so Reika helps out."
"Aren't your powers water based, too?"
"Well, that's an excellent question! I got screwed over in the power distribution. I make saltwater. Not useful for drinking or watering crops. But basically, I work with Akane or Rin to filter the water out and make salt to put on food or stuff. We haven't got anything out here. Just a ton of forest, a bunch of wild crops, some animals to hunt and there's an ocean all the way over there in that direction. Speaking of the ocean, I also go fishing a bunch."
"You said you were suddenly all here a few weeks ago?"
"Yep. Look, we got no idea what's going on out there in your part of this mess. We just learned a few days ago that you're there because Yuri saw a portal and checked things out. We figured, having kinda not parted on the best terms if you catch my drift, we should keep to ourselves. I mean we got crops growing at an insane speed and animals to hunt for some meat, fish to fish and everything. Although it took a while to figure out we had to eat like normal people. Since we're not really normal or people if you wanna see it that way. Would be damn rude, though."
"That's amazing. I didn't know you could use Cure powers like this."
"Amazing!" Erika looked smug. "Ya, it's amazing, isn't it! I totally helped figure it all out and stuff!"
"But that doesn't answer how you all got here or why you're so… different from what I remember. I didn't meet the Dark versions of my teammates myself, but I am sure they weren't like… this."
Erika burst out in laughing. "I bet they weren't! You know, me and the others from my team were basically like guardians of a test to gain greater powers. We just sorta existed in this other area of space, all very philosophical or science-y, so imagine our surprise, boom, we're suddenly real people. Was not nearly as bad as Miyuki and her group though, they were super aggressive and got into a fight with Nozomi right away. Since we only got a bit of offensive power, a clean hit and we're toast, so Itsuki and Yuri went in and knocked them out cold. Took two days of being tied up by Urara and starving until they calmed down enough to get a stern talking to. Nozomi took control of her own group right away and gave them some big speech. Komachi joined her halfway and they convinced the others that it's time to dial down the whole evil bad guy thing that we had going on."
"This sounds like a bad dream."
"Oh, I see what you did there! Dark Dream, bad dream!" Erika slapped her leg.
"Eh?… No, I didn't mean..." Nozomi felt annoyed somehow.
"Nah it's cool, a pun is fine too. But what was I saying? Right, basically, Miyuki and co. mellowed out a lot since then and now they're some of the coolest people here. I am the coolest, though, period. Except maybe Reika, because she's got those ice powers and-"
"Oh my god." Nozomi groaned.
"I see we're on one wavelength!" Erika grinned like an idiot.
"How?!" Nozomi might have been a bit dense and prone to klutzy behavior but this was far too much for her to not comment.
"So, now you know how it all works, right?"
"Who does what exactly?" Nozomi was genuinely curious how these formerly evil alter-egos made life work in some random part of the forest.
"Lemme see. Nozomi uses her power to make sure we sleep through the day. We can go to sleep all normal, but it's kinda tough to stay asleep when the sun is burning outside and you start to sweat and stuff. But yeah, she helps us sleep. Sounds like nothing much, but you'd be surprised how cranky you can get without some good sleep. Like seriously, you don't want to cross a cranky Tsubomi. She'll make you into fertilizer. Rin and Akane handle all our fire and heat needs. Rin is more about heating the cabin and stuff while Akane is more outright starting campfire or boiling water. Urara doesn't really do anything on a daily basis, but ya know, a cabin needs something to hold all that wood together. No Urara and we'd probably be camping out. Komachi protects the crops against critters and bad weather. And the cabin, when push comes to shove, but she gets real tired from that. I already told you what Karen does. Tsubomi handles the whole growing crops thing and Itsuki helps out with the rough work whenever she's not out hunting. Between you and me, there is totally something going on between Tsubomi and Itsuki. I bet they're fucking."
I think I shouldn't mention that Tsubomi is dating Erika on our side. "What about the others?"
"Eh, you really wanna know about all of em? I guess that's fine but man, I thought you'd be bored to tears by now. Yuri does the hunting. Pretty sure that no Yuri and Itsuki means no meat on the table. She's also crazy good at taking apart what she killed. Nao is too grossed out by it. Miyuki, like I said, is what we do for entertainment. She also handles punishment when someone steps out of line. Too much of her power and the hangover after it wears off makes you want to die a hundred times over. Akane, like I said, campfire. Yayoi complains non-stop her power is useless, but lemme tell you, we made a trap basin down at the ocean and nobody fishes like Yayoi. Throw her into the water and bzzt, bunch of fish! Nao is our dedicated cook. There ain't anything we grow, hunt or catch she can't make tasty. Reika helps out with water. And when it gets really hot, she also helps out with air conditioning. And that's all!"
"You have no contact with our side at all?"
"Nope. Well, not exactly nope, but basically nope. Nozomi, Urara and Rin messed around with that blazing hot shopkeeper lady yesterday. Was a good laugh."
There was some really angry shouting in the distance and it sounded like a seriously pissed Miyuki. "Oh boy, Urara and Rin are not gonna get any dinner. Probably."
Nozomi realized something only when she thought about the time of day and that they hadn't eaten dinner yet. "You said you sleep over the day. Why?"
"Because the sun is like a horrible, angry god that sends down its rays of destruction on us. I mean, it just kinda makes us tired as hell and we can't use our powers at all. Yuri tried out staying up during the day and she was down for half a week with a fever after. But honestly, I don't mind the dark. It's kinda cool. Like we're vigilantes or something."
"Where did you get your clothes?"
"They're good, right?" Erika turned on the spot. "During a new moon, our powers get a boost and while Yuri's powers normally do pretty much nothing, she can make stuff from nothing. It's rare so we figured, we gotta use it to get some clothes, soap and stuff. You wouldn't believe how dirty our old stuff got after about a week. You can bathe in a river and get clean that way, but we didn't have a change of clothes. And, hey, evil alter-egos or metaphysical mirages, a girl gotta be fashionable." Erika looked around and got close enough to Nozomi that their foreheads nearly touched. "Between you and me, the stuff that Miyuki's group was wearing is super hot. Like, totally a fetish thing, but super hot."
"Okay..." Nozomi didn't really want to know about that. "How… do I get back?"
"Well, you don't, least not for another twenty hours or so. We're not a hundred percent sure, but right now we only know about that one portal that connects to your side and it opens at midnight only, for about five or ten minutes or so. So you gotta spend the night! You better protect that pink butt of yours. Miyuki and Nozomi are totally doing it and now that her Nozomi went fwoosh and gone, you're gonna be her girl toy. Looks are important and you girl, got the looks."
Nozomi, who was usually very cheerful and optimistic, cringed a little. She had no powers, was surrounded by weirdos in a strange place and there was someone, who looked like her new best friend, lusting after her in a very obvious sexual way. "Maybe… I'll just stay up."
"Well, you'll probably be fine, being from the other side and stuff. Don't blame me if something goes wrong, though!"
"Aren't you worried about why you're here?"
"Nope. I mean, none of us here were really people before, and most of us also didn't exist for very long, least not that we remember. So it's kinda cool to just be around and do stuff. To live. Under appreciated as heck, you know, living." Erika paused, rose up and waved. "Hey, Yayoi, come over for a sec!"
"What is it?" Yayoi looked sleepy and annoyed, her eyes resembling dead-fish eyes. "There is no story time today."
Nozomi blushed just looking at this other version of Yayoi. She wore a skin-tight black bodysuit with a yellow skirt grafted on the suit and yellow markings on her arms and legs, a yellow sphere on her large chest. I think I know what this Erika was talking about. That is sexy.
"You look stunning as usual. Anyway, you hear what happened earlier?"
"No." This Yayoi was rather the quiet type when she wasn't telling tales twice a week.
"Hehe, listen and be amazed. Rin and Urara kidnapped someone from the light side. This ain't our Dark Dream here! This is the genuine article!"
"Okay." Yayoi's lackluster reaction really got Erika going.
"Someone from the light side! Isn't that like, super exciting? We can ask her all sorts of stuff about our originals. What they are like, and stuff. How old they are, like, is my original still this short? I ain't gonna grow or something? And like, you five definitely should like, send your apologies and stuff, over the whole trying to murder your originals thing."
"I'm sure they moved on already. We shouldn't make them aware of us. What if they hold a grudge?" Saying so, Yayoi turned away. "Oh, and Erika, you have laundry duty today." Leaving without another word, Bad End Peace left a strange impression on Nozomi.
"Sure, sure, I'll get to it," Erika shouted after her.
That is the Yayoi of this side? If not for her appearance, I would never guess! "She's pretty different from the Yayoi I know."
"I betcha she is. I mean, they were all berserk and max evil when we first got here. Although I got no idea what the real Yayoi is like, anyway. Erika stretched and then sat down on the stump next to Nozomi. "She's so cool tho. She's even shorter than I am, but damn is she hot looking and she ain't fazed by anything. And she was a bit of a crybaby when we first got here. She's like a goddess now."
I see this Erika has a thing for Yayoi, not for Tsubomi. That's… pretty strange somehow. Surreal even. Nozomi paused her thought. Is that how you use surreal? "Don't you have to do laundry?"
"Hey, you saw what she was wearing. We kept those clothes of course, don't wanna kill Yuri by having her make clothes for fourteen people every new moon. I'm in no hurry to make her switch to something else."
Nozomi couldn't help but feel her thoughts make a leap. "So… is the Miyuki of this side going to wear that, too?"
"Pink highlights, but yep." A devastatingly dirty grin showed on Erika's face. "You wanna get some of that Bad End Happy, don't ya?"
"I'm not… really into girls." Nozomi felt like this was becoming more and more of a shaky statement as of late, even if there was only one person that was causing her to think so.
"Yeah sure. I saw the way you were ogling my Yayoi, you know. No fooling these razor sharp eyes of mine."
"I was not!"
"Hey, it's fine if you can't admit it, but that's not gonna change reality. Anyway, nice to meet you the other Dream. I'm gonna go make myself rare, so the laundry doesn't get done, heh heh. See you later." Erika vanished into the darkness beyond the campfire within seconds, leaving Nozomi by herself.
She tried to think about escaping, but the circumstances made that a pretty stupid idea, she felt. Nozomi couldn't tell how many minutes had passed since Erika vanished and then someone else appeared.
"You going to eat with us?"
Nozomi looked up and right at the face of Nao's doppelganger, wearing the same sexy outfit that Yayoi had worn earlier, her extremely long green hair pulled all the way back and tied into a strict ponytail. Oh… probably so her hair doesn't get into the food.
"I don't bite."
"Oh, I- err-" Nozomi felt taken out of a dream world.
"I'm sorry about the trouble my girlfriend caused. She's not too bright up there. I guess the others would say that about me too, though." Nao smiled a little. "I'm cooking potatoes, carrots, onions, some fish, all in a big stew. I don't know what food you have on your side, but this probably still beats going hungry."
"Thank you. I'll eat with you." Wait… her girlfriend? "Who is your girlfriend?"
"Dark Rouge. Rin. I don't know what things are like on your side, but we since we are all girls here, well, you know- although I actually prefer it this way."
Rin… and Nao?! This place is really weird. "There is a lot of romance going on on our side, too. I guess it doesn't matter if you're a normal, Dark, Mirage or Bad End Cure- liking girls seems to be in our blood." Well, except me. I'm the odd one out.
"That's a relief." Nao stepped away and towards the steaming pot. "If you don't mind me asking, is the Nao on your side dating anyone?"
Nozomi had to actually think about that. "I think the situation with her is a little complicated and she was dating both Akane and Reika at the same time."
"How greedy. Yuri would fight me for Reika if I tried that." Bad End March chuckled. "I'm sorry if that was inappropriate."
Why is this Nao so polite and kind? I get that they're not the same as the girls I know, but… aren't they too different? Am I being presumptuous again? Like that time where I thought everyone had to hate the fighting?
"What are things like on the other side?" Nao stirred the pot and added a bit of salt and some herbs that Tsubomi had grown. I am glad that Mirage Blossom enjoys gardening so much.
"We're split into two teams. We have one battle a day. We earn money by fighting and we're get hotel rooms assigned based on our ranking. I'm… sorry you have to live out here like this."
"Don't be. Think about where we come from and what we were like before. If this is our purgatory, I think we are getting off pretty easy. Don't you think so?"
"If you see it that way, sure."
"You said your Nao is dating that lazy pyromaniac Akane and sleepyhead Reika. Well, that's what ours are like, anyway. But who is with my lovely Rin?"
I think nobody has ever called Rin lovely before. She'd die of embarrassment if she met this Nao. "I think she is dating Cure Rhythm. Kanade."
"I can't say I know who that is."
"She's a bit of a difficult person. Stubborn, not very honest with herself and a bit of short temper, I think."
"You said you fight each other. Isn't that painful?"
"I don't really like it, but some of the others really enjoy it. Even if there are deaths during the fight, everyone is just fine after it."
"For what purpose?"
"Uh… I really wish Karen was here now. It goes a little over my head, why exactly. Basically, all of us Cures were too good at our jobs of defeating our enemies, and because Cures were always warriors of light and our enemies were always using darkness, we kinda got rid of too much darkness on a cosmic scale. So now we're here to fix the balance or something. Although when we went to Cure Heart's time, the world was ending, so we probably overdid it a little."
"That sounds extremely complicated."
"Karen could probably tell you all day about this."
"Our Karen would fall asleep during that. She's a bit of a busybody, always going around and helping out. Although she's not very good at anything that requires more brains than brawn."
"If not for your hair color and that same suit that Yayoi was wearing, I probably wouldn't have recognized you as Nao."
"We're pretty different from our originals, I guess. But I don't think it's a bad thing."
"I didn't mean-"
"No, no, I just said that to tell you I'm not bothered by who I am. Even if we were originally created by a devious monster, we're here now, different, and I found Rin. I couldn't be happier. Well. I could be happier if I had a bunch of spices to work with, like something to make curry. It's strange. I don't even know why I know how to make curry. Maybe it's because the real Nao knew?"
"Ah..., smells so good... Stew?" Bad End Beauty, Reika, appeared from behind Nozomi and walked past her so slowly, she looked like she was staggering. Letting out a huge yawn, she sat down in front of the fire, right in the dirt. She too wore the same bodysuit with skirt.
"Listen to this, Reika. Apparently, the Nao and Reika on the other side have a thing with each other."
"The other me has bad taste. There is only one girl here that is beautiful enough to match my own." Reika warmed her hands and feet near the fire, the burning pile throwing a long shadow of her upper body.
"Sorry about that, Dream. Reika has a bit of an obsession with Yuri."
Yuri and… Reika? The others will never, ever, believe me if I tell them about this place. It's too strange, way too strange! "No, it's okay."
"Sorry to bug you Dream, but could you get some bowls?"
"S-Sure. Where do you keep them?"
"Go into the cottage. The shelf with bowls and spoons is immediately to the right. Thanks for helping out."
After the first trip, Nozomi found that the number of dark and other assorted Cures at the fire had increased. Mirage Moonlight had joined Bad End Beauty, the two of them huddling together, holding hands. Moonlight wore a very big white coat and large black skirt from what Nozomi could see.
On the stumps were also Sunshine and Sunny, both of them groaning and moaning, suffering from a terrible hangover. Both of them were still wearing their normal clothes and in the process of being yelled at by Blossom to go and change so Erika could do laundry properly. Blossom followed Sunshine, caught up, and locked arms with her for the rest of the way.
"Where should I put the bowls?" Nozomi was carrying them in her arms since there was no bucket or basket to hold them.
Nao didn't stop stirring the stew. "Just put them on the stumps and pass them out to those who are already here. Thank you."
Nozomi handed both Reika and Yuri a bowl and left the remaining six on stumps, going for a second trip. She entered the cottage and heard something bonk on wood from the next room. Peeking into the room, she saw Miyuki, rubbing her forehead, half dressed in the bodysuit, the upper half loosely hanging from her body still. Trying to retreat, Nozomi, ever the klutz, stumbled over her own feet and fell.
"Come to peek? I guess good taste is a universal quality among Nozomis." Miyuki looked towards the other room and finished putting on the bodysuit. "This is such a drag to put on. At least Nozomi thinks it's sexy as hell."
It is sexy. Nozomi blushed when she caught herself thinking that for a second time. She was already back on her feet and grabbing the remaining bowls when the other Miyuki came out of the room. Nozomi got all tense when the still visibly pissed off Miyuki walked past her without a word.
She arrived at the campfire as the last of the fourteen that lived out there. Handing the bowls to those that didn't have one yet, Nao whistled a moment later and while there was a lot of chatter between those dark Cures, one by one, they went to get food.
Nozomi didn't notice in the dark right away, but she could see three distinct groups now, based on clothing. Rin, Urara, Komachi and Karen all wore a black outfit that closely resembled the one Nozomi had seen on Dark Dream so many years ago. Yuri and those from her group all wore the same white coat and a black dress beneath it, yet there were some differences. Moonlight had a black skirt, Sunshine black pants while Blossom and Marine just wore the dress itself, reaching over their hips.
Miyuki and her group all wore the same bodysuit, just the color of their markings differentiating each suit. Nozomi got up last, and watched Bad End March fill her carved wooden bowl with stew from a wooden ladle. It's hard to believe these girls were our enemies… they seem like nice people now.
Eating with them in peace, nobody really cared too much about her presence, although Rin and Urara silently apologized to her during the meal from across the fire. The bowls were emptied, and so was the large iron pot, that Nozomi guessed came from Moonlight's ability. Nozomi observed a few of them getting together as couples right after eating, holding hands and cuddling.
"Tsubomi, what time is it?" Miyuki wanted to know.
"Dawn in forty minutes or so." Tsubomi had an excellent sense of time.
"Anyone who wants to get a dose of Happiness go and turn in. I can't have anyone pass out out here."
Nozomi followed Miyuki, leaving behind only Reika, Yuri, Nao and Rin, the four of them preferred to hang out by the campfire. The inside of the cottage was frugal, to put it lightly. A bunch of improvised beds filled the other room that didn't belong to Miyuki and Nozomi. Wooden frames, hay stuffed pillows and covers. The cloth had come from Yuri, everything else the forest had provided.
"I'll just go in order." Miyuki approached the first bed, that belonged to Yayoi, who sat on the edge, the covers pulled back. She didn't have the luxury of undergarments and sleeping naked was not her thing, so she merely slept in her bodysuit. "How much?"
"A lot." Yayoi closed her eyes and waited for Miyuki to whammy her. And then it came. Like a tidal wave of drunkenness, the room started turning in four directions at once.
Nozomi couldn't believe what she was seeing. That this Miyuki could sort of drug people, and that they wanted it at that, was not that disturbing. But how this Miyuki used her power. Her lips glowing in a deeply dark pink, she kissed the girl she was to use her power on. That's… exactly like my ability in the last fight. Is this where I pick that up? Does that mean she uses it on me? But… ugh, I am not good at this whole future and time stuff. I don't think I'd understand even if Karen explained it to me.
Everyone that had turned in early got kissed by Miyuki, who looked really spent and exhausted after she was done. Stopping next to the staring Nozomi, she tried to glare. "What? You got a problem with us using whatever we have for entertainment?"
"N-No. It's… safe, right?"
"If you sleep the aftereffects off like this, sure. You'll have one hell of a headache if you don't, though."
Walking towards the other room, Nozomi followed Miyuki. "Where should I sleep?"
"Where do you think?" Miyuki sat down on the larger than average bed that stood solitary in the tiny room that was opposite of the larger room that housed all the other Cures. "No guest rooms. And I don't recommend sleeping outside. You'll be eaten alive by bugs."
"I think I will just stay up. I don't want to intrude." And I don't want to share a bed with her… it just doesn't feel right.
"Suit yourself. If you get cooked out there, don't blame me." Grumbling, Miyuki lied down, put out the strange amber colored candle next to her bed and pulled the covers over her.
The strange candles in the other room were still burning, yet Nozomi still hit her foot on the wall because she couldn't see enough. Making it outside, where the moon was just starting to vanish beyond the trees, Nozomi nearly bumped into Yuri and Reika, who were just going into the cottage. "Night, Dream." Yuri politely said as they passed.
"Good night!" Nozomi responded automatically and felt silly. The campfire was slowly dying out, with only Nao and Rin still there, and she didn't want to disturb them. I said I would stay up, but… Nozomi yawned. But I can barely keep my eyes open.
===DISSONANCE===
"I had this really messed up dream last night," Erika told Tsubomi, Yami and Yuri over breakfast. "I was in the middle of nowhere, in some forest, eating stew with a bunch of shadows, wearing this really uncool outfit."
Yami paused shoveling cereal into her mouth. "The outfit is what bothers you? Not the rest? Sounds suspicious."
"I had the same dream! I was sitting in a forest, on a small stump, eating stew from a wooden bowl." And I was flirting with Itsuki. Erika will just tease me if I tell her, so I won't, Tsubomi thought.
"That makes three of us. I'm surprised you didn't recognize what you were wearing." Yuri had thought it was just a stream caused by having Yami around and her dwelling on old memories. But if all three of had those dreams, there was something up. "Think back."
"You say that, but do you know how many bad fashion choices I see in magazines and on the street every day? I mean, come on!" Erika looked smug. Thinking back… so when we fought the Desert Apostles? That's the only big back then she could mean.
"Ah." Tsubomi figured it out. "I was wearing what my mirage wore during the test of power."
"Yes." Yuri confirmed it. "I was wearing that as well." And I was awfully close to a blue Cure that was definitely not Miki. Relationship trouble just keeps finding me.
"The what now?" Yami had no idea what they were talking about. Quickly covering her mouth because she was in danger of spilling milk and cereal, Yami prevented a disaster.
"You know, when we fought off Dune, we went through this really easy-peasy trial to get more power. Tsubomi took so long, I was gonna fall asleep!"
"Erika!" Blushing from remembering that, Tsubomi couldn't believe her girlfriend would bring that up at a time like this.
"What? Itsuki and Yuri saw it too."
"How long Tsubomi took doesn't matter." Yuri finished her glass of mixed vegetable juice and ignored the disgusted face that Erika made watching her. "If all three of us dreamed the same thing, and it was so specific on top of that, it means that something is going on."
"Now look where we are. There's always something going on. Deadly concerts outside the base, evil clones trying to wreck us, a time trap, you name it." Erika couldn't count all the happenings.
I thought what my mirage was wearing was really stylish and cool… Tsubomi couldn't tell Erika that.
"Darn, my head is fucking killing me… you sure you didn't kick me or something, Ako?" Urara could be heard all the way over at Tsubomi's table. "And I dreamed about stupid shit, too. Seriously, it's been half a decade. Now I get nightmares about being Dark Lemonade? And I was an idiot, to boot."
"I don't see the difference." Ako stepped backwards and dodged a hit from Urara. "I didn't dream anything strange. And I am sure I did not kick you. Unlike you, I don't toss in my sleep."
"This better not be Nozomi fucking around with her powers again! Friends or not, I swear I will kick her ass this time!"
"Looks like we're not the only ones with bad dreams." If that was anyone else explaining, I'd go bother her to tell me more, but I don't wanna get roped into Urara's nonsense this early in the morning. Erika still didn't exactly have a good relationship with her.
"She said Dark Lemonade. That seems different from what we dreamed about." Yuri didn't know the full story behind that, but a Dark Lemonade had to be some seriously fearsome foe, considering what the regular Lemonade was like. Maybe a violent psychopath that enjoys torturing people? Or it could be the exact opposite. Her violent and rough personality could wrap around into an innocent and very girly person. Yuri covered her mouth to dampen her chuckling from imagining Lemonade acting cutesy. No way, no way.
"So what are we gonna do?" Tsubomi was just finishing up her bowl of rice. She ate western breakfast pretty often because it was simply faster, but now, here, she could enjoy a good, traditional Japanese breakfast.
"Not much we can do. I mean, what, we go and ask Dream if she did something funky with her powers?" Erika didn't see that panning out.
"Cure Dream messing with our dreams. Erika, that's not clever. Zero points." Yami scored the blue haired girl quite harshly.
"Erika is right. After everything Dream went through, I have my doubts she would be this careless. Nevertheless, we should still talk to her. It might be that she isn't doing it consciously." Yuri wasn't going to leave these things up to chance.
"Woah, unconscious Cure power malfunctions? That's super scary. Tsubomi, if you wake up floating on your back and the room is three-quarters submerged, no worries, that's just me malfunctioning."
"You're not a robot." Tsubomi couldn't believe what Erika was saying.
"Are. You. Sure. About. That. Meatbag." Erika moved her arms and neck as robotic as she could.
A few tables over, Reika was already finished with her breakfast and reading a 300 yen novel from the convenience store. Someone had posted a notice at the front desk saying that it was silly to keep calling it favor, and since they were all from Japan, they just adopted the currency.
"Do you mind if I sit with you?"
Reika recognized the voice as belonging to Rosetta and she looked up out of politeness. "Feel free."
Alice carried a tray with her. Despite her looks, she liked to have a plentiful breakfast. Something she came up with because work sometimes demanded she skip lunch, and with a big breakfast, that was less of an issue. "There are a lot of interesting conversations going on. I caught Moonlight's group talking about a dream they all shared. Lemonade was complaining about bad dreams as well."
Reika looked up from her book again. "Why are you telling me this?"
"You slept badly. Even if you are hiding it well, I can tell by looking at you. A small skill I picked up thanks to Mana." Although the circumstances of Mana sleeping badly were very different to just bad dreams.
"You're right. I am not sure why, but I too had strange dreams. I was eating an unidentified type of stew in the middle of a forest at night. And from the way my dream self behaved, I was definitely romantically involved with the Moonlight that was there. Which is strange, since I am not attracted to Moonlight whatsoever. If I had to pick, I would prefer her sister."
"Yuri might not be very appreciative of you, or anyone, trying to date her sister. They seem like they have a lot going on. And she feels like she's the protective type." On the other hand, that could be humorous.
"Another skill that you picked up?"
"A woman's intuition." Alice smiled and started her breakfast. "But you are awfully unconcerned by this shared dream phenomena."
Reika put down her book and covered half of her face with her right hand. "I… am really not. The person I dreamed of being was… a construct of darkness, a perversion of myself that I killed in combat. That fight played part in why I do what I do today, for work. To dream of being her..." Reika looked visibly distraught.
"Now, that's a look unbecoming of a cool beauty such as yourself." Alice covered her mouth. "Pardon the pun."
"You would not believe how many times Miyuki made that exact joke." A long sigh escaped Reika. "What is even more strange than the dream itself was how this evil construct behaved. She was aloof and strangely fascinated with someone by her side. She quietly ate with everyone. None of that fits the memory I have of her."
"So far it seems the shared dream is limited to those with an experience like that. A meeting of yourself and a dark version, created or from within." Alice smiled wide. "I have very good hearing."
"I did meet Dream late at night yesterday. She did sound sickly and was saying some unusual things, but I expected as much from everyone after the test of courage."
Just as Reika mentioned it, the events of that cave caught up with the room. A loud scream disturbed the room, coming from Setsuna of all people. "That hurt!"
"Uh, oh, err, I'm sorry." Regina felt very small all of a sudden, not because she felt guilty, although that helped, but because she heard Rikka disapprovingly grumbling at her from behind.
"Setsuna, are you okay?" Ellen, uncharacteristically for her, shoved Regina out of the way by force and tended to her girlfriend. "Pay more attention! And to begin with, you shouldn't just slap people on the back as a greeting!"
Regina was slapped in the back of her head by Rikka, who subsequently pushed her head forward, making her bow a little. "Apologize properly."
Mana stepped in and calmed the situation down by pulling both Rikka and Regina away. "Now, now, now, no fighting this early."
Ellen was glaring after Regina when she felt Setsuna take her hand. "Setsuna?" Turning around and looking at her partner had a very strong effect on Ellen. Very unlikely her, Setsuna looked meek and embarrassed at Ellen, which caused the purple haired girl to blush like crazy.
"Thank you… for getting mad at her for me. But I'm sure she didn't mean to hurt me."
Ellen went from blushing to pouting in an instant. "Anyone can see clear as day that you got sunburn all over!"
"I think she is being lectured by Diamond already, so let's forgive her." Setsuna had suffered sunburn before, but never all over her body like this. Ellen had stayed with her all night, next to her bed. Sleeping together was absolutely impossible. Just wearing clothes was painful.
"You're too kindhearted, Setsuna!" Ellen was normally not this vindictive. Hurting Setsuna, intentionally or not, set her off, though.
"I didn't know you had a side like this to you."
"Is… that bad?"
"No, no. It makes me happy you will defend me like this. Love is very forgiving, so she would try to smooth things over, so it makes me really happy someone would get angry for me."
"If you say it like that then it's really embarrassing!"
"Morning Setsuna. Ellen." Miki showed up fashionable late for breakfast. "How do you feel?"
"Like a baked potato that has been on the grill for too long." A heavy sigh emphasized just how much she hated her current condition. "Not to jinx myself, but… I would have preferred something else to happen." To the surprise of both Ellen and Setsuna, Miki blushed very intensely for a very short moment before she averted her face. "Okay Miki, you need to tell me what happened to you. Curiosity is going to kill me now if you don't."
Miki regretted talking to Setsuna now. This is definitely something she picked up from Love. That tireless need to meddle with other people. But I have to explain things to Yuri anyway and it will help to get in some practice of talking about it. "Sit with me then. You didn't eat breakfast yet, right?"
"We haven't." Ellen answered quickly. "But sitting down might be a little..."
"At least my butt is fine." Setsuna just had to make sure she wouldn't lean against anything.
Miki was enjoying some coffee five minutes later and once again regretting her choice to try and get in practice. "I was paired with Mai, Egret. We went over a rock bridge and it caved in under us and we fell into a lake that had to be near zero degrees. We both panicked because we couldn't find a way out for several minutes. When we finally got out on a slope, we were so cold we couldn't even walk right." Miki couldn't help but remember everything vividly. "Since we had nothing to warm ourselves up with, we took off our clothes and warmed each other for a while. And when plain body heat didn't work, we… got more intimate with each other."
"I think you're not the only one that shared some necessary intimacy." Ellen didn't think much of being carried by Windy, but she had told Setsuna anyway.
"The others don't matter to me though. Sunny apparently came on to Yuri and was rejected. It makes me feel weak that I had to resort to making out with Mai to stop myself from freezing to death."
"Yuri is a reasonable woman, right? I don't think she'll even hold this against you." Setsuna had opted for Japanese breakfast, something she hadn't had in a while. Eating with chop sticks was a pleasantly nostalgic feeling, even if she had only lived in Japan for a few years.
"She is. Still..." Miki put down her coffee, leaned back in her chair and sighed. "I don't know, I just feel uneasy when I think about telling her."
"Was Mai a good kisser?" Ellen hoped that asking this would come across as funny. It didn't.
"Ellen..." Setsuna looked at her partner and shook her head.
"I didn't pay any attention to that. Even remembering it, I only remember that we got intimate. We were both too scared of freezing to death to really pay attention to how good or bad we were."
"If you tell it to Yuri like that, I'm sure she'll only be worried about you and not mad." Setsuna didn't think anyone reasonable could be mad over something like that. What else was she supposed to do? Die? I can't imagine anyone here saying that. Definitely not to their girlfriend.
Inori spotted Miki and Setsuna together just then and approached them. "Morning you two. And you, Ellen." She had only noticed Setsuna's other-other half the moment she stood next to the table. "Judging from Miki's look, you were either talking about the test of courage from yesterday or that atrocious weather outside."
"The first one. I ended up falling into an iced lake with Mai and we had to get touchy to get warm again." She got a strange look from Ellen that Miki interpreted as why did you repeat it? "I've known Inori for years. Saying it one more time is not making me feel any worse."
"Oh my. For the proud Miki to go through that, I can see why you feel down. But Yuri definitely does not seem the type of person that's going to hold this against you."
"So I've been told already." Miki shrugged, turned in her chair and looked at Yuri's back, half a dozen tables away. "It's still going to suck; telling her, I mean."
"But there really was a lot of falling into holes in that cave. It happened to me as well." Inori was wearing a yellow sweater and pulled up her sleeves. Her arms were covered in light bruises. "I didn't fall very far but got hurt all over. And my swimsuit was completely torn. Luckily Rin was ever the lady and carried me the rest of the way. At least until we were close to the exit."
"Rin is the one that's seeing Kanade, right?" Ellen thought she had that right but wanted to make sure.
"Yes." Inori nodded. "I am going to get myself something to eat. We can talk more later if you want." Leaving the three by themselves, Inori caught wind of an interesting combination sitting together and planned to join them in a minute.
"So what happened to you? I refuse to believe anyone got through that cave without something screwing them over." Miki was not in the best of moods and it showed in her selection of words.
"I cut my foot like a total klutz and Windy carried me the entire way." Ellen paused. "It was pretty boring. She's not really talkative."
"You cut your foot? Did you disinfect it? Show it to me." Setsuna bent forward and accidentally put her legs together. Wincing in pain, Setsuna got back up. "Ow… ah… I hate this… ow..."
"It's totally fine. It was a really shallow cut. Windy overreacted. But those twins are really weird… the way they talk, act and everything."
"Why did I nearly die and you get to be carried?" Miki groaned. "The world isn't fair."
"I don't think we should say that around Heart and her group." Setsuna still felt bad for them.
"Compared to them, we had it pretty good, yeah." Miki glanced around and spotted Mana laughing while Regina fed Rikka some bite sized cherry tomatoes. "I am reminded of Love when I look at this Mana girl."
"Because she has two girlfriends?" Setsuna smiled.
"I don't understand how you three make that work. I'm at capacity being in love with just one person."
Setsuna grabbed Ellen's hand. "I guess it's Love's influence. Ellen struggled a bit with the concept of being also Love's girlfriend at the beginning, though."
Ellen was terribly embarrassed by that and wished she could hide her face, but looking down at her lap had to suffice for now. "Meanie."
In the meantime, Inori had gotten herself a spot at the same table as Reika, Alice and Honoka, the last of those three joining just moments before her. "A shared dream that only those from Nozomi's, Yuri's and Miyuki's team had. That's fascinating." Honoka wondered if it had anything to do with Nozomi herself instead of just her powers.
"I am going to the beach after this and hopefully get a hold of Kaoru. You should ask the others from your team if they had the same dream, Reika. If the other side didn't have any shared dreams, it makes it much more likely it was due to someone's powers."
Alice looked up. "I had completely forgotten that the beach will be a shared place for a while."
"Three days." Honoka clarified the time frame. "I am definitely going myself. To see Nagisa."
"Truthfully, I am not that eager to return to the beach. The events of the cave left quite the impression on me, and I still have to officially break up with Nao." Reika wondered just what exactly she had done wrong that lady luck kept throwing glass on her path.
"Are you comfortable saying what happened?" Honoka didn't want to pry too much, but she was curious.
"Few things stay secret in this place, so I might as well." Reika looked around and spotted Kanade. "I am sure most of you know that Rhythm and I… well, we ended up being intimate during the night of the party."
"Everyone knows you had sex with Kanade." Inori could be very blunt if she had to be. "If you're direct about it, it becomes less embarrassing."
"And as luck had it, I was paired with her old crush and teammate, Melody, during the test."
"Oh, I can already see where this is heading." Alice spoke up in the middle of the story. "Itsuki and I ran into some kind of plant that filled the tunnel with spores that made us succumb to arousal. So you're not the only one that ended up unintentionally having sex with someone."
"You're… surprisingly open about this." Honoka didn't have a good handle on Alice just yet.
"Nothing good is going to come out of being secretive about this. And like this, Reika will not feel as singled out over what happened."
"Lucky you. That Sunshine is really hot," Inori blurted out without thinking and the moment she realized she had said that out loud, and not thought it, she blushed. "I… didn't mean to say that out loud."
"I date Nagisa, I can somewhat relate." Honoka smiled. "Although, if I had to admit to lusting after someone else, I would like to share some time with Karen. But don't you tell Nagisa I said that."
"We won't, we won't." Inori was glad that they were all understanding.
"How did your cave experience go?" Alice hadn't talked to Honoka much, but she forced herself really hard to include herself in these conversations as much as possible.
"Nothing much happened. I stumbled one time and took Komachi down with me. It is a terrible cliché but I ended up with my face buried in her chest. Nagisa will probably laugh it off and ask me if they were soft." Honoka smiled again. "They were."
"That leaves only me. I fell down a slope, got bruised all over and my swimsuit was torn, so Rin carried me the rest of the way. She comes off a little bit like a guy with a really girly voice and breasts in that regard."
"She's gonna punch you if you say that to her face." Honoka joked and all four of them quietly smiled.
An enormous sneeze rocketed Rin's body, who was already at the beach, stretching and getting ready for a run. Locked up in weirdo dimensional space prison or not, she wanted to stay fit. And she wasn't alone. "I am not going for a leisure jog, you know that, right?"
"I got energy to burn. Lots." And frustration. And anger, Akane thought. Yuri's hand print was no longer visible on her face but she could still feel it.
Both of them were in their swimsuits, albeit not by choice. Upon entering the beach, they both felt their powers fade and their clothes were replaced automatically. "It feels like we live in a video game where we automatically swap to a bathhouse model when we come in here," Akane mumbled to herself.
"We… what was that?"
"If you don't play video games, forget it. Just something stupid. Are we going?"
Starting without a signal, Rin started in a slow tempo. Slow for a professional soccer player. A minute passed before Akane caught up, panting already but glad that she had something to compete over. Rin sped up until she was running almost at full speed and still Akane kept pace, at the cost of exhausting herself ten times as quickly as Rin. Only when Akane fell face first into the sand and just barely managed to roll over did Rin stop, hopping in place until she finally just stopped entirely. "What the heck were you trying to prove? That you can run until you pass out?"
Akane could only pant, her breath racing, her heartbeat booming in her ears. She managed to shake her head and was glad that the sand was very fine and dry, despite it being overcast like crazy back on the stone plaza.
Rin put her index finger and thumb to her mouth and whistled, getting the attention of the only other person on the beach. "Hey! Saki! Get your ass over here!"
Saki, doing the same thing as Rin, jogged over there, looking at the still panting Akane with curious interest. "What happened to her?"
"Tried to keep up with my routine. I don't think she even does any sports, much less professionally. Can you keep an eye on her while I finish my routine?"
"I was in the middle of my own, though."
"Fine, fine. I let her join me, I'll take responsibility."
"I think she's gonna be fine if she stays down. Her head is pretty red though." Saki was thankful for the beach. There was a bit more than a kilometer between the cliffs and running along the beach was a nice change of scenery from the garden.
"That's why I called you. I was gonna say, if she gets up and tries to come after me, punch her or something."
"You can't just go around and tell people to punch others."
"We do a lot worse every day."
"In battle. Where we have our powers. If I seriously punched her, or you, you'd see stars for a while."
"Okay, point taken."
"Both… of you… shut up..." Akane wished she could set them on fire. She was still so angry and frustrated, she really just wanted to get off this team, but she didn't have the money.
"Just go. I'll keep an eye on her." Rin figured her routine was still going to be there after she made sure Akane didn't kill herself by running too hard.
Saki headed off without another word and Rin sat down next to Akane. "You're really riled up. I guess that break up with Nao has you on the ropes."
Akane grit her teeth and looked away for some very long minutes until she could finally talk normally again. "I don't get why she just dumped me. She just gave me that cliché It's not you, it's me line and said she wasn't in love anymore."
"You think she wants to focus on Reika?"
"You kidding? She's dumping Reika too."
"Maybe she's got a thing for one of the new girls?"
"Are any of them even single? But I can't imagine that anyway."
"Beats me. If she had dumped you after the cave, I'd have said something happened in there. What about the others that are single?"
"Get real. That's Pine, Bright, Windy, Dream, Yayoi and Miyuki. Even I can tell that Dream isn't into girls, Bright and Windy are over the top strange, Pine is so not Nao's type and Yayoi or Miyuki? If they are who she's going for you can watch my head explode in confusion."
"Guess she's not gonna be dating anyone for the time being then."
"If only Nao didn't suck ass at explaining her feelings."
"Look, break ups are bad. Most of us here probably get that. I mean seriously, look at Hibiki and Kanade. They had one hell of a break up and I'm sleeping with Kanade now. But you're blowing things way out of proportion. You're angry, sure, you're sad, sure, but turning into the human cannonball or running yourself into an early grave isn't gonna make you feel better."
"Then what is gonna make me feel better, smart ass?"
"Nothing. You need to accept that nothing is gonna make you feel better. It hurts, it sucks, and it isn't going away in the next five minutes but you gotta deal with that like an adult and not be a walking time bomb. Everyone is gonna cut you some slack because you got dumped, but that's not a free pass to fuck around forever."
"You are superb at cheering people up," Akane said sarcastically.
"I am telling you what's real, not cheering you up. I'm gonna leave that to some of the girls that have that trademark team leader personality like Nozomi or Miyuki."
Back in the hotel, a large group was heading towards Mamo's store before their next planned stop. "I think Mamo is going to have a heart attack if we all squeeze in there. Itsuki, Saki, Nagisa, you mind being the ones to carry stuff? I will help myself, of course." Makoto was already pretty friendly with most of them. "Everyone else can go to the beach ahead of us, we'll bring enough for everyone."
"Sure." Nagisa responded first and headed into the fog up ahead.
Saki went ahead as well, followed by Michiru, while Itsuki was still arguing with Hibiki. "Come on, you're the one that always has too much energy."
"The beach is not a gym!" Hibiki couldn't believe the long list of exercise that Itsuki had planned for today. "I just wanna be lazy today. Is that so hard to understand?"
"One day's laziness requires a hundred days of work to make up!"
"What is that, a proverb to bully new students at the dojo?"
"B-Bully? You of all people should know I'm not like that!"
Both of them found themselves alone all of a sudden. "Look, everyone just left because you won't just let me do what I want!"
"You're going to get bored of lazing around three hours in anyway, so why even pretend to want to be lazy all day!"
"If you know me so good, why don't you watch me be lazy all day then!"
"Do whatever you want then!"
"I will!"
Staring at each other, Hibiki and Itsuki both turned away in anger. Itsuki stormed into the fog towards the store while Hibiki headed for the beach.
"Argument?" Nagisa spoke to the riled up Itsuki while she picked out a bunch of cheap puzzle magazines and such. "The look on your face says there was one." The plan was to spend most, if not the entire day, on the beach with their loved ones; making the most of the three shared days.
"Ugh. I didn't know Hibiki could be this stubborn. I was suggesting some workout routines and she immediately leaped up and rejected it all, saying she just wants to be lazy. When I tried to compromise, she just got even more stubborn."
"So let her. You have days you don't do anything either, right?"
"I have scheduled down days to rest my muscles, but-"
"She probably reacted stubbornly because you still tried to push the whole workout thing on her." Nagisa was satisfied with her pile of magazines. "I'm not smart like Honoka, but I know what it's like to be stubborn." The kind smirk that Nagisa showed the martial artist worked wonders to calm her down. "Just let her do her thing. You've been stuck with each other non-stop for days, right?"
"I just worry that this is because of what went down in that cave. I didn't want to leave her alone and worry she ends up brooding over it and going back on forgiving me."
"Something happened?"
"Hibiki and I talked about it already and it's a bit… private."
"Don't worry. I get it, I get it. I had some trouble as well."
"I probably shouldn't ask after I just shot you down, but-"
"Got into a fight. I was paired up with Ako and we ran into Saki and Urara and got into a huge cat fight and some bad things were said." Nagisa averted her eyes. "Honoka is probably gonna tell me to go apologize."
"That cave definitely had it out for us. Sentient caves wouldn't surprise me one bit in this place."
"Sentient caves?" Nagisa's expression changed for the worse. "D-Don't say stuff like that. That's scary."
"Nagisa! Itsuki! Get going please!" Makoto shouted and went over her mental checklist. "Towels, sun screen, parasols, snacks… Nagisa, pick up a cheap novel or two!"
"You're really good at organizing things." Bloom was carrying three parasols, a bag filled with towels, sun screen and snacks. It would have been exhausting to carry all of that in her normal form and she wasn't embarrassed at all to use her powers for this.
"I used to handle supplies and rationing and such on our plane. I'm sure there are others that are just as good at it."
"Sword, could you hurry them a little? My shopkeeper sense is telling me that the other team has a group waiting to come in." Mamo still tried her hardest to be nice and forthcoming with the Cures, despite being spooked by Dream two days ago.
"Five minutes and we have to be out!" Makoto's voice made Itsuki hurriedly do her task. "Can you charge the team as a whole?"
"I can, but there is a no returns policy for individual items on that."
"That's fine." Makoto looked at Saki who put stuff on the register, waiting for Mamo to scan everything.
"Going to the beach?"
"Yes."
"I'll drop by later then. I'll have someone that bought instruments keep an eye on the shop. Or maybe just close down for today."
I can see some of the others getting pretty jealous if she shows up in a swimsuit. Makoto was very sensitive about looks and appearances. Taking the plain shopkeeper uniform or the thick winter mantle from Mamo and putting her in a swimsuit would be a bit of a treat. Not for me, though. I have Ange.
The beach had gone from being sparsely populated to being pretty busy over the course of just ten minutes. For a lot of them, the forced clothing transition had been a bit strange but inconsequential since they had already worn their swimsuits beneath their clothes. The loss of powers was much more annoying however.
"Miki!" Love threw herself at her closest friend and hugged her without warning.
"Hello to you too, Love." Miki replied with a bit of amused snark. "If you're looking for Setsuna, she's not coming with how sunburned she is already."
Letting go of Miki, Love sighed very briefly. "I saw her yesterday. I know she isn't gonna come with that much sunburn. Kurumi is not coming either and Hikari is staying behind to look after her."
"But it's good to see you, Love."
"Yeah! We've been stuck on different teams for a while and we didn't really have any time when we went to Mana's world."
"I think you and Kanade are the only ones that are not on the same team as their partners. You should look into switching."
"A bit short on funds there." Love grinned wide. "I see them at band practice every day, so it's not that bad."
"Miki! Love!" Inori was already calling their friends from the distance, accompanied by Alice. When Love came running, Inori side-stepped the overbearing girl. "It's hot. No hugging."
"Have either of you seen Sunshine?" Alice was curious if she had left an impression.
"She's with the shopping crew. They should show up any second now." Love turned about and looked at the path through the underbrush. "There they are. I must be psychic."
"Or lucky," Miki countered. "Inori, who did we leave for shopping? It totally slipped my attention."
"Mana, Regina, Ange and Muse." Alice answered before Inori could. "Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to-"
"It's fine. I actually forgot that Ako was with them." Inori glanced at the various small groups that were forming. "I'll see all of you later. There's someone I wanna see."
Love chuckled. "Kaoru, isn't it?"
"Well, you know with whom to find me then." Inori was not going to act embarrassed when she wasn't.
Alice had vanished without anyone noticing and was already with the shopping crew and helping Itsuki carry things. "Are you without Melody today?"
"We disagreed on how to spend the day." Itsuki didn't feel very comfortable around Alice, not now, not the day right after she had cheated on Hibiki with that woman.
"I hope you're not bothered by yesterday. That was clearly out of the control of either of us."
Itsuki was much more sensible on picking up subtext than people generally gave her credit for. Taking the bag that Alice had taken off her hands back, Itsuki accelerated. "If you want to hit on a girl, find someone else."
Alice was so surprised that she just stopped walking and looked at Itsuki's back. That… didn't go the way I envisioned it. Maybe I caught her at a bad time. Alice didn't want to stay with Mana for purely physical reasons but she very much missed sex with a grown woman. The maturity that Itsuki gave off had attracted her.
The dark side was first to put up parasols, put down towels and hand out sun screen. Several minutes later, Mana lead the charge of the light team shopping crew. The central point of the beach was covered in colorful beach umbrellas now and a number of the girls were just taking it easy in the shade.
Honoka was flat on her stomach while Nagisa was putting sun screen on her back, her swimsuit pulled down to her waist. "Did you behave yourself, alone with Saki and Mai?"
"Mai discovered that she enjoys being a bully. I worry about Saki's future." Nagisa joked and was delighted when Honoka's entire body trembled a little from a suppressed laugh. "No, I am serious! She was making fun of Saki and me. She even joked about temporarily being my girlfriend while you're gone."
"Is that so? I ought to have a word with Mai about pilfering the girl I am engaged to."
"Don't be too mad at her. I think she just enjoyed making me blush."
"Oh, you blushed over her suggestion?"
"I- err, I mean- it's not like that Honoka!"
"Is it?" Honoka covered her breasts with one arm and sat up. "You are awfully red around the nose considering it isn't, Nagisa."
"They're amusing." Itsuki had decided to sit with Tsubomi. Yuri and Miki had been there as well until a few minutes ago but were now taking a walk along the shade of the underbrush. "Aren't you going to play with Erika?"
"Erika has way too much energy." Tsubomi was wearing her glasses, something that Itsuki hadn't seen in a while, and doing a crossword puzzle. "If I tried to keep up with her all day, you would have to carry me off."
"The green haired girl with Erika, that is Yuri's sister, right?"
"Yami."
"She's… different from what I expected." Itsuki couldn't quite figure out what exactly she had expected. Something like a younger, slightly depressive Yuri maybe.
"I think everyone expected her to be more like Yuri. Or maybe the dark, brooding type. Not… like a taller Erika."
"Two Erikas." Itsuki put her hands together in prayer. "May the gods have mercy on us and our souls."
"What happened to Hibiki? You two were inseparable, even on Mana's plane."
"You're the second person to ask me that in the last ten minutes."
"Oh. I'm sorry, if it's a touchy-"
"No, no. I just didn't realize that that was the impression we gave everyone."
"Well, you two did look like you're the perfect couple. Always agreeing, always happy, same interests, super in love." Tsubomi looked up and saw Itsuki being embarrassed. "Uh, I didn't mean to imply- I mean, you look like that, but- I-"
"We do argue. I just make sure it doesn't blow up. Hibiki can be a bit stubborn. Or really stubborn. And once she's got an idea into her head, she refuses to budge from it no matter what."
"She's a bit like Erika then."
"Erika is on a whole different level of willful. Hibiki is like a trained dog, compared."
"I love Erika, but I really worry about our future if Yami turns out the same way as her."
"You and me both." Itsuki laughed playfully and was in a much better mood now.
"Itsuki, this is gonna sound strange, but did you have any weird dreams last night? Like sitting in a forest and eating stew?" And probably ogling me.
"What's with that awfully specific scenario?" Itsuki chuckled. "No, nothing like that. I don't really remember, but lately I dream a lot about food. Why are you asking?"
So it was just our side then? "Erika, Yuri and I had the same dream and we found that really strange. We think Dream might be doing something funky with her powers- Itsuki, what's so funny?"
"F-Funky, you said F-F-Funky." Itsuki could barely keep herself together.
Is that really so funny? "Is there a joke that I'm not-"
"Tsumi!"
The parasol was knocked over by the impact of a dripping wet Erika flying through the air and crashing into Tsubomi. An equally wet Yami was right behind her, out of breath and bending over the second she stopped next to the towels. "How… how the hell… are you so fast… with those short legs… you gotta be… cheating somehow."
"Tsumi~! Let's go and get in the wat- ow! Ow! Itsuki, sto- ow!" Erika was hit on the head and then dragged away, through the sand by her arm by a pissed off Itsuki.
"Your group is very lively." Alice had appeared from seemingly nowhere and picked up the knocked over parasol, fixing it back in place. "There."
"You're… ah… what's your name again? I'm sorry, still trying to remember everyone." Yami remembered all the people that had very distinctive personalities or features, like Mana, Rikka and Urara. But not everyone in her team.
"Rosetta. But you can just call me Alice. It looks like your comrade is being buried alive. You don't need to go and help her?"
"Erika got herself into that mess, let her get out of it on her own." Tsubomi really did love her, but she also really thought she deserved what punishment she got when she went overboard. Her poor puzzle magazine was all wet now.
"In that case, want to come with me?" Alice looked at the dripping wet Yami. "I was thinking of being the first to visit that suspicious white building back there and if they offer something to eat perhaps get an early lunch. My treat, of course."
Yami nodded towards the house with anticipation. "What are we waiting for?"
Tsubomi was left alone all of a sudden and looked after Yami and Alice. She felt a bit worried when Alice, about halfway to the house, grabbed Yami's arm. Did Alice just hit on Yami? Should I call Yuri? Then again, Yuri is a bit overprotective of Yami right now… And someone calm and mature like Alice might have a positive influence on Yami.
Miki and Yuri both had come across Erika, buried to the neck in a big pile of sand, and choose to not save her. "Was it alright to just leave her like that?"
"Erika has a tendency to get herself into trouble and then slink away without consequences. It won't hurt her to sit out the consequences for once. And I didn't want to get sand everywhere." Yuri was just holding hands with Miki and casually strolling along the edge of the beach, where sand, grass and dirt mixed together, the border of the underbrush, covered in shade.
"You look good with that big hat. It's very stylish." Miki sometimes had trouble expressing compliments without letting her usual way of talking slip through.
"I am a model, after all." Yuri responded with a bit of humor.
"A very unique model. There probably isn't anyone else in our business that has a relationship like ours."
"What an awfully convoluted compliment. Where did all that boldness go that you were showing me when you asked me out?"
"Pursuing something is easy, but actually keeping it is hard." Miki tugged on Yuri's hand and got her to come a little closer. "I'm glad you accepted me."
"You were pretty relentless. And a bit cruel. But nothing you said wasn't true. With the current situation, I don't even know if Momoka even knows who I am when we go back to the real world."
"When we go back? After everything that happened, it's more of an if we go back now."
"Tsubomi taught me that giving up hope is the same as admitting defeat."
"Sounds like all our team leaders have similar lessons to teach."
Both of them giggled and squeezed each other's hand. "Nobody will see us if we hide in the underbrush." Miki's voice sounded almost erotic, half-whispering.
"I didn't know you were into risky things like that."
"So you don't want to?"
"I think you need to convince me." Yuri turned to the side, facing Miki, and pushed her a little towards the underbrush.
Far away from the beach the hotel lay silent. Or almost silent. One person was in the dining room, eating like they had been just short of starving to death. Gulping down her eighth glass of juice, she unintentionally let out a loud burp, covered her mouth and leaned back in her chair. "They get to eat this stuff every day? I should have been born as one of the good girls, seriously."
Just sitting there, Dark Dream had patiently waited until everyone had left, carefully staying out of sight. "I still don't get why it locked me out of Dream's room. I think I'm gonna die of boredom hanging out in the stairwell until tonight." Looking at the scarce leftovers on her table, the other Nozomi felt sleepy. I ate too much. But I am not gonna get this chance again. And I probably shouldn't tell the others about the food here or they'll get really stupid ideas.
"Nozomi!" Dark Dream froze up instantly and only turned around when she was called again. "No-zo-mi!" She had no idea who the person was that was waving at her. None whatsoever.
"What?" Trying her best Nozomi impression, Dark Dream answered.
But instead of getting an answer of her own, the unknown girl with short pink hair approached the dark Cure, much to her dismay. Don't find out, don't find out, don't find out, don't find out! "I was wondering where everyone went."
"The beach, silly. I just came back because I wanted some soda to take there." The girl showed off the empty water bottle she held in her hand. "I can't take a bunch of cups, but I can fill a bottle. Smart, right?"
"Y-Yeah."
"You overslept? You don't look and sound so good."
"I think I might be coming down with a cold, so I'll just go back to my room and-"
"Nonsense. If you have a cold coming then there is nothing better than a lot of sun and some exercise! Just leave your stuff, we'll go straight to the beach!" The girl pulled Nozomi by her hand, off the chair and towards the soda dispenser.
"W-What about swimsuits?!"
"The beach automatically changes our clothes, so you don't have to wear them before hand or anything. Neat, right? It's shared space right now so you can say hi to everyone from your team."
I am so fucked. "E-Eh, that's great." I am so done.
Glancing at Nozomi from the corner of her eye while she misappropriated the soda dispenser, the girl smiled a bit less. "You have been looking at me like I'm an alien. Did you forget my name again?"
"A lot has been going on. Sorry." Sorry Nozomi! I made you look like an idiot!
"Mana, it's Mana. Cure Heart."
Never heard of you, sorry! "Right. It was on the tip of my tongue."
Being lead through the hotel, there really was nothing she could think of to get away from this overbearing girl. Revealing herself as Dark Dream was definitely a bad idea. The worst idea. And making up some nonsensical excuse to not go to the beach of all places was going to be really hard to sell. Wait, didn't she say the beach automatically changes their clothes? That didn't happen to me! Oh no, no, no, this is really bad. Think hard, Dark Dream, think really hard while this woman is dragging you to your execution! Overpower her, hide, and hope Dream can explain things? No, no, bad idea. Switch to my Cure form? All that leather is not exactly screaming swimsuit. Pretend I don't know what's going on and say it might be because my swimsuit is in the laundry? Maybe. Maybe. Not a terrible idea.
Mana didn't hold Nozomi's hand or anything, but there was just no stepping away for Dark Dream. "Are you gonna sign up for the battle today?"
"What?" Battle? What is she talking about? Do they have a competition going?
"I mean, you're what, rank 15?"
What is she talking about?! "Maybe. I don't know yet."
"We don't have the rules for today yet, so I guess you're right. But honestly… I was a bit appalled by the fighting. I mean, killing other Cures is just not something I even thought about before I came here. I heard you were really against it too."
Killing other Cures? Are they sure that they aren't the evil ones? "Anyone should be against that. But what can we do?"
"Make the best of it. And… you can't tell anyone I said this." Mana turned around and put her index finger in front of Dark Dream's lips. "I enjoy it a little bit. All out fights that let me go no holds barred is something I never really had the chance to participate in."
D-Damn, she's cool. Nozomi blushed a little and quickly averted her face. "I won't tell anyone."
Mana smiled wide and pulled her finger away. "Very good!"
Battles, rules, this place is nuts! I'm glad we can just live in peace on the other side, even if we get stew on five out of seven days. Nozomi quickly realized she had forgotten something very important. I can't get distracted here! I need to figure out a way to not get killed by all these battle hungry murderers!
Mana didn't slow down and just waltzed right into the fog, leaving her behind. She felt her instinct telling her to run, to make up some excuse, but she couldn't see that working out for her. Even if I get back to Banished like that, they would figure out I was not the real Dream. And then those lunatics that spend their days killing each other, or whatever, are going to come and engage in some dark Cure hunting. Before she could finish her internal dispute, Mana came back through the fog, grabbed Nozomi's hand and pulled her through.
The heat from the sun hit Nozomi like a sledgehammer after a full swing. "So… so hot..." But… it doesn't feel bad. Other than being too hot and bright. I thought I was just fine outside because it was super cloudy, but I guess I won't burn to a crisp on this side? Woah, stop, clothes, clothes! But as she looked down on herself, Dark Dream found herself in a pink one piece that had black stripes. What the heck?
"See you later!" Mana ran off quickly, the bottle of soda in hand, speeding towards a blue haired girl that was relaxing in the shade beneath a parasol. Before anyone could notice Dark Dream, she rushed into the underbrush and hid. I just gotta stay out of sight and tell them I fell asleep in the shade.
Relaxing the moment she was out of sight, Dark Dream examined herself. Where did this come from? I was just fine in normal clothes last night. It is kind of… sexy. A little. Pushing a branch out of the way, Nozomi froze for a second, turned to the side and hid behind an exceptionally large bush. W-What are they doing?!
"Karen… did you hear something? Maybe we shouldn't be doing this out here..."
A lewd, slick sound stopped. "Komachi… Is the excitement getting to you?"
"What if someone sees us?"
"Nobody is going to see us."
For a second, Komachi moaned loudly, then her voice became muffled. "But they will… if you can't keep your voice down."
"Then make me keep it down..." Komachi, her back pressed against a large rock, stuck out her tongue. "If someone hears me… it's your fault."
Dark Dream kept absolutely quiet behind the bush she hid, listening to lewd kissing noises. Komachi and Karen? This side is totally nuts! Another moan interrupted the lewd sounds and Nozomi felt herself get turned on as well. Getting up, crouching, she moved as carefully as she possibly could, away from those two.
The sounds stopped again, this time because of Karen. "What is it?"
"I thought I saw something pink."
"Don't scare me like that…!"
"Why not?" Karen reached between Komachi's legs. "You say you don't like the fear of getting caught… but look how wet you are."
"Hey… was Kurumi okay with this sort of thing?"
"We never tried… and Kurumi is not half as sexy as you are."
Komachi blushed so hard that she wanted to hide her face and promptly kissed her girlfriend and lover, so intensely that Karen nearly lost her balance. Komachi's face was still red when they parted a minute later. "You tease… Someone as plain looking as me..."
"There is nothing plain about you." Karen kissed the side of Komachi's neck. "Your beautifully long green hair. Your curvaceous body. Your great mind. And..." Pushing against her partner, Karen rubbed her hard nipples against Komachi's, causing her to let out a loud moan. "That voice of yours."
"Saying those embarrassing things to me… you've become a worse pervert than Urara..." There were no more words said between them as they caressed each other, kissed, sweating in the hot air of the beach, hidden in the shade of the green all around them.
Far out in the water, on a large inflatable float, was Yayoi, seemingly alone and getting a tan. She was so far from the coast that the other girls looked like ants. Looking up at the perfectly blue and cloudless sky, Yayoi had wanted to go and play with Erika, but said girl had gotten herself buried earlier and had then fallen asleep like that.
Looking into the water next to her, Yayoi became a little worried. "Uhm… Michiru? Kaoru?" Peering into the water with great intensity, Yayoi fell off her float when someone suddenly came up on the other side and then a second person came up right after.
"Did you hear?" Michiru looked at her sister.
"Yeah. She went Kya. I might be dying of cute here." Kaoru was freely floating in the water by using only her legs.
Yayoi on the other hand immediately came back up, her arms reaching over the float. She was not a very good swimmer and the only reason she was so far out was because Kaoru and Michiru had dragged her along. "You two are so mean..."
"We're mean, she says." Kaoru smirked.
"You want to see what being mean is really like?"
"Please don't!" I'm already scared being this far out with those two… what if they drown me and make it look like an accident to silence me? "Wait, what are you doing, stop, stop!" Yayoi struggled against Michiru pulling her away from the float, slowly swimming backwards. "Please, stop! I'm never gonna make it back to the coast without that float!" Yayoi was near tears when Kaoru had pity on her.
"Mai and Saki would never forgive us if we let something happen to you like this. And if we didn't believe you would keep quiet about what we're really like and the Masquerade, you wouldn't be here at all." Swimming next to Yayoi, who was still being pulled by Michiru but had stopped struggling now, Kaoru smiled. "I didn't wanna make you cry, just tease you."
And all of a sudden, Yayoi was let go. The blonde immediately started panicking, with Kaoru and Michiru just evading her frantic attempts to hold on to them. Kaoru looked at Michiru when Yayoi was still desperately trying to grab hold of something to stay afloat after ten seconds. "Michiru, I think she's too short."
Without a word, Michiru dove underwater and stayed there for a few seconds, then came back up. "No, she's just in too much of a panic." Grabbing Yayoi and pushing her down, Yayoi's eyes opened wide in terror.
And then confusion grabbed hold of her. There was something really rough and really hard under her feet and her entire head was still out of the water. "But… we're this far out?"
"There are rock pillars all over the place. We saw them when were diving," Kaoru explained as she swam around Yayoi. "We're taller than you so half our chest sticks out if we stand on there."
Michiru stepped on the rock as well and sure enough, she could almost look right over Yayoi. "See? You scare too easily."
"It's… not that I can't swim, I just panicked." Blushing in embarrassment, Yayoi hid her face behind her hands.
There was a loud splash and when she looked, Michiru was gone. "Kaoru, where- hiya!" Yayoi let out a strange sound when she felt hands slide under her bikini and squeeze her breasts really hard. "K-Kaoru?"
"I can't believe someone so short has tits this big..." The voice came from right behind Yayoi's ear. "You didn't think we just got you out here to go diving, right? We can't risk anyone seeing what we're doing, but nobody is gonna come out here."
"Michiru has a… ah… top floor room… we could just… please, stop… I'm getting… really..."
"Turned on?" Kaoru whispered in Yayoi's ear, squeezing even harder and rubbing her own breasts against Yayoi's back. "But this is way more interesting. We did it hundreds and thousands of times in various rooms inside. It's boring. And the water… feels good on your boobs, right?"
"That's… that's not true at all..." Yayoi's face was flushed red by now and she first thought she was imagining that the float was coming closer all on its own. The moment it was very close by, Yayoi spotted Michiru's dark crimson hair behind it.
"Ah… I could fondle your tits all day..." Kaoru sounded so lustful that it was a turn on all on its own.
"There she goes with her boob fetish. I don't understand it at all." Michiru parked the float, for lack of proper tides past a certain distance to the coast, next to the rock and got right in front of Yayoi. "Although I gotta admit that you are pretty stacked."
Yayoi wanted to say something but nothing but moaning escaped her mouth. I'm so embarrassed… Michiru is just staring at my face, and I'm making these lewd sounds… it's totally different from when I imagine this happening to my characters.
"Michiru, stop staring at her." Kaoru put one arm beneath Yayoi's breasts and kept her other hand under the bikini, still feeling her up. "She's got a super pretty face so at least kiss her. Or I will. You know what-" Kicking herself off the rock and quickly getting around Yayoi, Kaoru now faced her from the front.
W-Wait, I'm not prepare- Hm! Yayoi blanked out when Kaoru suddenly kissed her. The feeling of the blue haired girl's breasts on her own was completely secondary as a turn on. The salty taste of sea water in her mouth, mixing quickly with Kaoru's saliva and her own. This… it's… so erotic. Yayoi only just barely noticed that Michiru dove under again.
And then Yayoi tensed up and started to struggle. "S-S-Something touched me!"
Kaoru knew exactly what was going on. "Oh, where?"
"B-Between… between..." Yayoi's voice got quieter with every stammer. "Between… my legs."
For someone that masturbated to me and my sister having sex and draws so much porn she is really easily embarrassed. It's cute. We didn't get to experience something like her with the NPCs. "Let me check."
Yayoi let out a loud kyah even before Kaoru could touch her. If her face had been flushed before, it was now red like a tomato. "M-M-M-My… My P-Pan..."
Michiru came up behind Yayoi, holding a yellow bikini bottom triumphantly in her right hand. "Look what I found."
"G-Give it back!" Yayoi tried to bolt from Kaoru, to no avail. "Y-You can't strip me naked out here!"
The yellow bikini panties landed on the float and Michiru got behind Yayoi again. "Hey Kaoru, when did we make her our boss?"
"P-Please?"
Kaoru pulled up her arms and Yayoi could do nothing except kick water. Ten seconds passed and Michiru was still fumbling around with the strings of Yayoi's bikini top. "Michiru, what's taking so long? My arms are going to fall asleep."
"That stupid bikini has a whole bunch of extra strings and it sits pretty tight." I am not ripping it off. That's too much, even for teasing her.
Pulling the top, whole, over Yayoi's head after failing to figure out how to properly take it off, Michiru put her arms around the now stark naked Yayoi and kept her in place while Kaoru took the top and held it up. "Oh, I see…" Getting close enough to whisper to just Yayoi, Kaoru enjoyed how much the girl was fretting. "All those extra strings, they're to support those huge melons of yours."
"D-Don't call them melons!"
Kaoru laughed and threw the top on the float, then took off her own bikini. When Yayoi watched her with eyes and mouth wide open, Kaoru laughed even harder. "What, did you think we were just stripping you for fun?"
"We're… gonna do it out here?" Yayoi shivered when she felt Michiru's leg rub against her crotch. "R-Really?"
Kaoru only took off her own top and took back control over Yayoi. "Now, where were we..." A brief kiss to distract Yayoi, Kaoru turned the girl around, hugging her from behind. "How do they feel, rubbing against your back?"
"Soft… and lewd..." Yayoi knew she was not going to get away from this, and as embarrassed as she was, she fantasized about situations like this a lot. But experiencing them was so much more embarrassing. And unlike her fantasies, she was not the one dominating someone else. I didn't… I didn't think just having my breasts fondled in the ocean could feel so… so… "Kyah!" Yayoi looked straight down and could just barely make out the red hair that belonged to Michiru. She was kneeling on the rock beneath them and her face pressed against Yayoi's crotch.
Kaoru felt Yayoi shake and twitch and figured out what was going on. A few seconds later, Michiru surfaced right in front of Yayoi. "Kaoru, what the hell? Kicking me in the face?"
"What's the big idea with licking her? I thought you were into tall girls?" Both of Kaoru's hands rested on the chest of the blonde that suddenly felt like the unknown depths of the water were not such a bad place to be when the alternative was being in the middle of a fight between those sisters.
"I am, but not exclusively! She's hot, even if she's short!"
"So now you want to share her?"
"Why do you care as long as you get to fondle her or press your tits together?"
"Because I like that, but that's not the only thing I wanna do to her!"
They're talking about me like I'm not even here… I'm… relieved for some reason. If they asked me what I'd prefer, I think one of them would definitely drown me.
"I don't care about her tits and she's short, so that leaves just kissing, fingering and licking her."
Kaoru hugged Yayoi a little tighter. "Fine. You can go down on her." Sinking her fingers into the soft tissue of Yayoi's breasts again, Kaoru whispered in her ear. "Do you like it? Two older girls having their way with you. Poor, defenseless Yayoi, molested like this. Her huge tits fondled against her will, a strange woman's tongue between her legs. Her sexy voice, moans just escap-" Kaoru stopped when she felt Yayoi shake and twitch. Did she just come because of my dirty talk? Kaoru felt Yayoi sink a little, back into her arms. Her face was glowing from the orgasm she just had. She really is cute. I might keep her for longer than I thought.
Michiru came up moments later, feeling a bit dizzy. "What did you do to her? She suddenly had a spasm."
"It looks like it's not just her body that is perverted." Kaoru took a deep breath and then dove under together with Yayoi, who immediately freaked out. Twice. Once because she was suddenly underwater, a second time because Kaoru was giving air to her, mouth to mouth.
Michiru appeared under water right when Kaoru went back up and took over for her sister. This… is so lewd… Yayoi was incredibly turned on as she went back and forth between sisters, staying underwater. Four times did Kaoru pass air to Yayoi like that before the blonde was allowed to come up for air herself. The moment she came up, facing Kaoru, Yayoi utterly froze.
"Yayoi, yahoo!"
M-Miyuki?! Yayoi ever so slowly turned in the water, glad that the sun was keeping visibility from the surface below water to a minimum. "W-What are you doing out here, Miyuki?"
"I heard from Saki that those two were going to teach you about diving! You were always bad at swimming so I thought I'd come cheer you on!" Miyuki was sitting on a donut float of her own. "Took me forever to get out here!"
D-Don't let her notice. Please don't let her- hiya! Yayoi didn't dare let out a sound when she felt Kaoru's hands on her breasts again. W-W-What is she doing?!
"She is making acceptable progress." Kaoru faked her old personality.
"You are interrupting our training." Ugh. We need to think of something to get rid of this boring personality farce and soon.
"Sorry, sorry, hehe." Miyuki waved to Yayoi. "Don't give up! Not that I'm one to talk, though." Miyuki smiled, waved again and then slowly paddled away.
Yayoi felt faint. "Thank god, she… she didn't notice."
===DISSONANCE===
"You're flirting with me, aren't you?" Yami stretched her arms, looking down at the beach from the roof of the white hut. She had crawled up there and even gotten Alice to follow suit, despite the former rich girl being a bit wary of doing something like that without her powers.
"What makes you think so?" Alice was amused by the directness of that girl. It was not unlike Mana, but much more centered around herself. She liked that.
"What, you're not? Am I getting false positives here?" Yami shrugged, waited a few seconds and then turned towards Alice, who sat next to her. "So, beautiful, what are you doing up here all alone? You wanna go down and-" Yami was drowned out by Alice suddenly bursting into laughter.
"P-Please stop. Yes, you caught me in the act, I-I was indeed flirting with you." Alice couldn't believe this Yami girl would just turn around and pull out something like that. "I don't believe I have ever been caught off guard like this."
"Feel free to compliment me more." Yami looked happy with herself.
I did not mean that as a compliment, but I won't correct her assumption. "Now that you asked me to, I am strangely at a loss for words."
"Wanna skip the small talk and do something intense then?" Yami looked eager to make her first experiences of being involved with someone.
"Are you sure that your sister will approve of this?"
"What Yuri doesn't know about won't bother her! Erika says so all the time." Yami didn't wait for Alice to come up with any more excuses. Pushing her down, on the white, wooden and flat roof of the hut, Yami crawled on top of her. This is how it went, I think. Let's see what that kissing business is all about.
And Yami was a terrible kisser. She puckered her lips far too much, almost sucked on Alice's lips and was breathing too strongly through her nose. Alice used her entire hand to cover Yami's mouth after a few seconds of enduring that. "I think perhaps a lesson is in order. And certainly a change of location." Gently pushing Yami off herself, Alice sat back up.
"Guess expecting this to go swimmingly for my first time was too much, even if we're on the beach." Yami waited in vain for Alice to recognize and laugh at her pun. The green haired girl jumped down first, landed in the sand and topple over a little but remained standing. "Jump! I'll catch you!"
"That does not sound like a good idea. I will just-"
"Come on! I don't need magic powers to catch a feather of a girl like you!"
If she puts it like that, how can I refuse? Alice made the motions but hesitated twice before she finally jumped and Yami did indeed catch her. And then both of them went down as Yami toppled over.
Lying there in the sand with Alice on top of her, Yami looked smug. "I made no promises about catching you and keep standing!"
"You did not." Alice felt like the control of the situation had escaped her a while ago when it was usually her who pulled everyone's strings. Even Mana didn't lead her around by the nose like this. Getting up and brushing some sand off her butt, Alice barely finished up when Yami grabbed her hand and dragged her away. "Do you have a place in mind?"
"Just out of sight is fine, right? Just so Yuri doesn't get in the way." I love my sister and everything but she is so overprotective. She'd never let me experiment on my own like she did, not in a million years. But I must be sitting on a goldmine of luck if this hot lady has a thing for me.
Alice was terribly out of breath after Yami had dragged her halfway through the underbrush and helplessly gotten them lost. "Please… one moment..." Bending over, her hands on her thighs, Alice was panting and wheezing. "I am not… one of those… that physically excel. Not… anymore..." A long time ago, I could have run circles around her. But my legs still give me difficulty, especially at times like this.
Yami bend over and tried to look at Alice's face. "So, what do you like about me?"
Does she not understand the meaning of one moment please? "I do prefer tall girls and ones that are very confident in themselves." Like Mana and Itsuki. Although, in terms of looks, this is quite a departure from my previous preferences.
"Is that it?" Yami wondered if her being tall and confident was the only thing she had going for her. "Oh, and you know that-" Pulling her swimsuit over her shoulders, Yami shamelessly bared her chest. "I'm not busty like you or most of the others. You did know that, right? No getting disappointed now!"
Alice had finally recovered enough to stand up straight again. "No need to worry. I myself can compensate for any lack of endowment you might have."
"Wow, that sounds kind of arrogant." Yami put her swimsuit back on for no reason other than she didn't want to get stung by mosquitoes and what not. At least not all over her back and chest.
"Does it? I didn't intent for it to sound like that."
"No, I like it. With your looks you can be arrogant."
I can't tell if she is being genuine or not. "Now, first of all..." Alice stepped up, towards Yami, and put her hands on her shoulders. "I suppose I have to teach you from square one. I am shorter than you, so put your arms around my waist."
"Like this?" Yami squeezed a little to hard and Alice's forehead collided with Yami's chin. "Ow… I get it. Less than that." Relaxing her embrace, Yami was glad that this beauty put up with her klutzy behavior. Damn, this is kind of embarrassing. I really should have gotten some pointers from Erika or Tsubomi.
"Now, for kissing, there are some important things. Just don't do anything and let me show you." Alice had to look up a little since Yami was a full 10 centimeters taller than her. Keeping her eyes open, unlike Mana and Rikka she wasn't embarrassed to look right into the eyes of her partner, Alice kissed Yami with such skill that the taller girl immediately tried to respond to it, terribly clumsily. "When I said, don't do anything-"
"How can you expect me to do nothing when I'm being kissed like that? It was like a silk pillow was touching my lips, with just the right amount of pressure to make me shiver and-"
"I appreciate the kind words-" Alice put her right index finger on Yami's lips. "But this was only pleasure for you. First, imagine you are eating soft ice cream. Only pucker your lips as much as you would there." Alice thought of Yami's rather wild nature and revised her instructions. "And pretend you are eating it like a lady."
Yami tried a few times until she thought she had it right. "Like this? It's hard to talk."
Alice covered her own mouth to avoid laughing. "Y-Yes. That is indeed right. It isn't for talking but for kissing, mind you."
"I knew that of course."
Did you now? "To continue the ice cream analogy- my lips are sensitive, so at most, you should do it like this." Alice got on her toes to close the distance between them and kissed Yami again. She learns quickly. She is still responding clumsily, but at least… her lips really are soft and smooth. What was I thinking about again?
"How was that? Good? Great?" Yami licked her lips and was glad that she was taking after her sister. If I wasn't as hot as Yuri, I doubt I'd have this easy a time finding someone that flirts with me.
"Acceptable." Alice couldn't keep standing on her toes and now had to look up again. "When kissing, it is important to not… distract your partner by heavily breathing through your nose and in their face."
"I can hold my breath but-"
"No, you silly girl." Alice took Yami's right hand and placed it gently on her chest. "I will demonstrate. Pay close attention to when I breathe in and out, as well as whether you feel any air on your face."
Yami found that difficult. Alice's kisses sent shivers down her back and excitement all throughout her body. Still she managed somehow. Oh… she's breathing in and out a lot, but really shallow.
Alice stopped again, not because she was finished demonstrating but because Yami's hand was wandering to places it didn't belong. "Shall I take your fumbling around as a sign that you enjoy the touch of my breasts?"
"Anyone that doesn't is really missing out." Yami leaned forward, trying to kiss Alice again, but was stopped short. "What?"
"Did you pay any attention to my breathing?"
"I did!"
"Then let me see if you understood correctly." I can't keep standing on my toes all the time. And I don't think it is a good idea to have her compensate for my lack of height. "But first-" Alice pushed against Yami, slowly making her walk backwards until they were right in front of a large rock that stuck out of the ground. "Sit."
Yami just did as she was told, let go of Alice and sat down with her legs crossed. Alice felt like she was teaching a child. "Spread your legs, silly." And again, Yami did as she was told. She might have been oblivious to many things, but she understood well that the goodwill of a beautiful lady was not infinite. Alice knelt between Yami's legs and leaned forward, putting her arms back on Yami's shoulders. "Much better." She could see eye to eye with her latest acquisition now. Before she returned to kissing, Alice glanced downwards and moved her right hand over Yami's chest. "A peculiar choice of swimsuit."
"Not really my choice. Erika handed it to me and that was probably a joke to mess with Yuri. She probably wouldn't have done that if she knew this place got the worst returns policy in the history of clothing shops."
"So it bothers you then?"
"Hm, not really. Yuri was really pissed. I think she was this close to throwing Erika out of a window."
"Shall I strip you? You won't feel anything like this."
Yami pulled on Alice's hand and squeezed down on her own chest. "I can feel this."
Alice took away her hand and pulled the swimsuit over Yami's arms, all the way down to her waist. "All I could feel was softness I knew to be fake and the fabric." Alice was a little disappointed when Yami did not even blush even a little. "You are not embarrassed?"
"Is it better if I am?"
"If you are leading, no. If I am the one leading, yes."
"Maybe I should take notes." Yami smirked and caused Alice to laugh again. "Your smile is very beautiful. The genuine one, not the fake one you parade around whenever I see you."
"Oh, you can tell the difference?"
"The real one is much cuter."
"I will remember that." Alice thought her smile game was very fool proof. Evidently not.
Yami remembered something she had seen Erika do, reached for Alice's chin and just ever so slightly raised it up. "Can we kiss some more?"
Alice felt a little flattered. This girl is so amusing. I thought that she was just a pretty face that was conveniently single, but this might be entertaining. "I am impressed you can say something like that without blushing."
"I don't wanna be the shy and meek type. I wanna be like you."
"Like me, yes?" Alice licked her lips, leaned forward and kissed Yami. Oh… she did learn. Alice found herself quickly lost in the not quite fiery but clearly passionate kiss. But she has to learn a lot more. Alice parted from Yami when the latter started to breathe heavily again.
"Sorry, I just… can't do the whole shallow breathing that well."
"It comes with experience."
"We better get in as much practice as we can."
"Oh, you prefer to strive for perfection first? I thought of teaching you about how adults truly kiss."
"Screw perfection then."
Alice managed to keep her laughter contained, but it hurt on the inside. This girl... she says the funniest things. "Well, stick out your tongue."
"Actually… before that; can I touch your boobs? I only really know what my own feel like and that's not exactly exciting or anything."
Alice hesitated a moment. She's talks and thinks like a teenager, at best. I believe there was some reason for that, but I can't quite remember what it was."I will make an exception." Alice moved up a little, close enough to put her arms right around Yami's shoulders and reach halfway down her back. "But restrain yourself."
Yami awkwardly first reached, then fondled Alice's breasts. She didn't need to ask to know she was doing it wrong; Alice's awkward and displeased face spoke bonds. "Okay, I confess it. I have no idea what I am doing. Lock me up."
Alice pushed Yami's hands away and allowed herself the luxury of a sigh. "Observe." Grabbing her own breasts from below, her fingertips just barely reaching her nipples, Alice slowly massaged them, squeezing little by little, raising her breasts up as she squeezed. This is less pleasurable than I expected it to be, but given that I wear two bikinis at once, I should have known better. And still, as much as her own fondling left her wanting for more, the intensity with which Yami was watching her turned her own. Her eyes… those blue eyes feel like they are burning a hole through me. Ah… this is terrible, I am getting turned on this much just from having her watch me.
Noticing her nipples started to poke through the fabric, Alice, with a bit of a blush on her face, directed her eyes at Yami. "Do you understand n-" Without warning, Yami kissed her. The green haired girl's right hand behind Alice's head, the left on her chest, imitating what Alice had demonstrated with more than moderate success. It appears she is far more willful than I thought she was.
On a different part of the beach, things were much more peaceful. "That's amazing Mai." Saki, covered in a towel and just having finished a swimming race with Karen, marveled at her girlfriend's artistic capabilities. "That's… the thing, in… southern Europe. Where they invented spaghetti. No, wait, I always confuse the countries. It's that other hot southern country that didn't invent spaghetti, right?"
"You were right the first time." Honoka was below the parasol, sitting like a lady and lending her lap to Nagisa, who had run around in the sun too much and felt all sorts of dizzy now. "The leaning tower of Pisa. It's in Italy. They did invent spaghetti."
"Crud."
"Don't tease my poor Saki so much. She is making fun of you, Saki. Pisa is in Spain."
"Honoka! Why you-!" Saki complained.
"No, it really is in Italy. Don't tell me you didn't know that Mai. I know you do."
"You can pretend all you want that you're right, but at the end of the day, Saki; who are you going to believe? Me, your girlfriend, or Honoka?"
"You're both messing with me, I bet!"
"Oh, she is smarter than I thought." Honoka smirked.
"She isn't all muscle, even if she looks like that," Mai added.
"You're both terrible." Saki started to pout, got up and walked away.
"Did we go too far?" Honoka wasn't sure where Saki's limits were.
"That is just Saki trying to play our game." Mai finished the finishing touches of her wonder made of sand.
"It took you the better part of two hours to make this. But it's impressive."
"Thanks." Mai looked after Saki who was dangerously far away already. "I am going after her. I think I might have teased her a bit much lately."
"I didn't expect you to be the teasing type."
"Me neither." Mai waved briefly and then started into a slow jog, going after Saki, who had put her arms behind her head.
"Lover's quarrel?" Ange stood next to Honoka's parasol. "Mind if I sit?"
"Go ahead. Without your other half today?"
"Which one?"
"Which- You date multiple girls?"
"Oh, no, no. Regina is my other half as well, but more in a sisterly way. I'm seeing Makoto. She's on the other side. She should be back any minute now."
"Toilet?"
Ange just smiled knowingly. "They really should have a bathroom somewhere in this place."
"Well, the hotel is close by."
"It does feel like you are walking into winter wonderland the second you leave the beach. It was terribly cloudy earlier."
"Can you believe we are stuck in interdimensional space and talking about the weather?" Honoka chuckled. "Some things never change, do they?"
"I think it's a sign that we are coping well. I expected this to be much more of a strenuous ordeal, but compared to our lives on the airplane, this is far more tolerable."
"I do miss work."
"You are some kind of researcher, right?"
"It would bore you to get into it, but yes, I'm employed at a privately funded research facility."
"Honestly, I haven't been swimming in so many years that I could do without any battles happening or strange conditions being applied to our daily lives." Ange squeezed the inside of her thigh. "I should go either running or swimming regularly from now on. This… squishy feeling is bad."
Honoka chuckled. "I think if you just participate in battles regularly you'll lose any excess fat you can very quickly."
"I used to think that the fights we had with various terrorist organizations and such were bad, but fighting other Cures is on a completely different level."
"Things can get fairly brutal, yes."
"You're not bothered by that?"
"Not anymore. At first, yes. The thought of fighting people I know and cherish and injure them, hurt them, really bothered me, but we didn't have any other choice. But after seeing that the worst damage we kept was limited to some bruises and being sore all over, I warmed up to the idea."
"Sparring; to the death. With no repercussions."
"Oh, Nagisa is going to sleep on the couch, or the floor, if she hits me, opposite teams or not."
"Hey!" Nagisa had been listening but didn't interrupt until now.
"You are so silly Nagisa. If we end up fighting, we are on opposite teams. We won't have any chance to spend the night together regardless of what happens then."
"How long have you two been together?" Ange was curious.
"Five years," "Six years," The lovers contradicted each other.
"Which one is it?"
"Why do you think it's five? We became Cures when we were 14." Nagisa just added up the years.
"She meant romantically together. We didn't start dating until we were 15." Honoka paused. "Wait… is that right?"
"Sounds right to me? I was definitely crushing on you for a while before I asked you out, thought!"
"What about you and..." Honoka turned the topic towards Ange now.
"Makoto. It hasn't been that long. At first we were both seeing just Mana, but over time, we got closer and eventually, we were meeting in secret on Alice's, Rikka's and Regina's days."
"Mana is quite the personality, to keep six beautiful girls by her side like that." Honoka was impressed, although she couldn't imagine being part of something like that. "I'm happy with just Nagisa. Although..."
"Although what?!" Nagisa looked straight up at Honoka, who used her paper fan to blow air into Nagisa's face and make her look away.
"Although I wouldn't mind having the other Nagisa as well." Honoka smirked and then giggled when she saw Nagisa's appalled face.
"We don't even look alike!"
"Not from the head down, no."
"Hey!"
"You have to admit there is a strong resemblance."
"You and Mai look much more like each other than Saki and I do!"
"I wonder if she would let me pretend to be her for a day."
"Honoka… people would find out right away..."
"Would they?" Honoka cleared her throat and tried her best Mai impression. "Welcome to my gallery. If you have any questions about my paintings, please feel free to approach me."
"Mai sounds nothing like that."
"You became quite the expert in the short time we've been separated."
"You know I would never cheat on you!"
"Oh, I did not say anything about cheating. Do you have a guilty conscience perhaps?"
Ange chuckled by herself. "I can see that you two have been together for a long time. This is exactly what I would expect from a couple like that."
"Isn't Makoto late?" Honoka asked.
"She is."
"Maybe she is consti-" Nagisa had her mouth covered whole by Honoka.
"I will bury you in the sand and leave you for the tide if you finish that sentence, Nagisa. I told you so many times that, as a girl, you need to have a certain sense decency."
"She probably went to the arena to check on the rules. We've been here for a while, it should be past noon."
"Come to think of it, I don't feel any different. Another day rule that just works in battle?" Nagisa rolled to the side, off of Honoka's lap.
"Ange!"
"There she is." Ange got up and stepped out from under the parasol, waving to Makoto. The purple haired girl came running over and was soaking wet and cold. "What happened?"
"It's raining. It's raining cats and dogs out there." Noticing Honoka and Nagisa, Makoto clarified her statement. "Not literally of course. I hope it can't actually rain cats and dogs here. Those poor animals."
"Did you stop by the arena?" Ange just wondered where she had been.
Makoto nodded. "I actually checked the day condition first. Oh, and I have a message for Bloom. She is supposed to come back to the hotel and watch the desk so Majorina can come to the beach."
"So the day condition is what exactly?" Honoka was curious. How long is she going to make us wait?
"We can't transform outside of battle. We can in theory, but you better be ready to deal with the worst allergy that you have ever experienced. It said all Cures are allergic to Cure energy outside of battle."
"That seems rather pointless. There is hardly any need for us to be Cures outside a battle. And we cannot transform here on the beach anyway." Ange didn't really see the point of the beach prohibiting it either way, but now it was redundant as well.
"So what were the rules?" Honoka hoped that it was not another one of those fights that made it impossible for anyone but the close quarters specialists to participate.
"Limited to three people on each side. The rules are The Chosen One, The Super Star and The Hourglass. I don't have memorized what each one does." Makoto sighed. "Rikka probably would."
"You shouldn't compare yourself to Rikka all the time." Ange patted Makoto's head. If only she was a little shorter this wouldn't look so out of place when I do it.
"I can't help it. I still catch myself thinking about all the medical stuff she still has to teach me."
"Rikka is a teacher?" Honoka intruded on their conversation.
"No. She was aiming to become a doctor before our world took a turn for the worse. She did keep studying medicine and various treatments for curse energy infections after things got bad. Until she lost her eyesight. We were pretty worried about her since her dream was basically gone. Even for someone so smart, a blind doctor… that is impossible. But instead of giving up, she asked Makoto if she could take over." Ange just poured an explanation on the others.
"I never spend so much time pouring over books before. And the illustrations turned my stomach."
Honoka smiled knowingly. "I can see why a normal person would have trouble with that."
"What time is it anyway?" Nagisa felt a lot better now. "I mean, how long before we have to go sign up?"
"It closes at two, right? So about an hour and twenty minutes." Makoto paused. "I don't think we will be able to get everyone together to discuss who should sign up."
"I'm ranked last, I am definitely going." Honoka stood up and patted a bit of sand off her butt and legs. "I am going to sign up right now."
"I'm ranked seven, so even if I lose three ranks I will still be in the middle class. And I want to spend the day with Ange." Makoto was not eager to get back to fighting anyway.
"Regina and I are ranked fourth, so we're not going." Ange decided so without asking Regina, but she couldn't imagine that there was anyway Regina would not want to spend the day with Mana on the beach. Rikka might be going, though. She is ranked… tenth I believe.
"If Honoka is signing up, I'm staying. She might joke about making me sleep on the floor, but if I know she's going to be in a battle I can just not go." Nagisa was laying on the ground, on a towel, her arms crossed.
"Are you listening to me?!" Yuri's voice caught the attention of the small group that had just lost Honoka.
"Yuri, leave her!" Yami was trying to shout over her sister.
"You stay out of this! I'm just as mad at you as I am at her!"
"Mad about what? That I'm actually living the life I was given? I'm grateful you brought me back but you don't get to dictate what I am doing or with who I am doing it!"
"Don't shout such obscene things!"
"Stop twisting what I am saying!"
"What's going on over there?" Nagisa sat up, crossed her legs and watched the two Tsukikage sisters fight.
Yuri was back to shouting at Alice, and when she was being ignored, grabbed Alice by her arm and pulled her back. "I am taking to you!"
Alice couldn't put up with this anymore. For the last ten minutes she had just endured that overprotective woman that was making a big fuss over nothing. "Yes, and I was listening. And I just about had enough of you. I don't recall your sister asking me to stop at any point."
"Because she's obviously oblivious that… that intimate things like that aren't just done with a random stranger!"
"Yuri, calm down. You're completely out of control." Miki tried to get between her girlfriend and Alice. "Aren't you a little patronizing towards your sister?"
"If you had a little sister that had the mind of a ten year old and you would catch her with a woman in her mid-twenties, which is completely taking advantage of-" Yuri didn't get to finish that sentence because Alice tried to slap her but Miki stopped her by catching her arm.
"Apologize to your sister. You give her awfully little credit. She was certainly a complete beginner at everything, from kissing to fondling, yet I don't recall her ever being confused in the least about what she was doing." Alice contended herself with glaring at Yuri instead of hitting her.
Miki let go of Alice but her eyes made clear that she was not going to tolerate another attempt to hit her girlfriend. "You have a point, but trying to hit her is not helping your case. And you have to see that this isn't- Yuri, stop." Miki got behind her girlfriend and dragged her a few steps away when she tried to hit Alice herself.
"Wow, I wonder when you three are going to stop talking like I am not even here. Hello, do any of you even care what I have to say?" Yami just about had enough of this argument.
"Do you even realize you've been taken advantage of?" Yuri stopped struggling and looked at her sister with a sad expression. "I kept an eye on you over the last few days because I was worried someone might try something-"
"I am the one that asked her! I'm not as stupid or oblivious as you think I am. What, you think I don't have eyes and a brain? There are gay girls all around me. I would have to be the densest person in the universe to not figure out a thing or two."
Yuri just stood there, opened her mouth and then no words came out. She repeated that twice more before she looked away, embarrassed with herself. "Do what you want."
"I will." Yami stormed past her sister, grabbed Alice's hand and forcibly dragged her along.
"Yuri, what was that? I've never seen you get angry like that. I didn't think you even could." Miki let go of her girlfriend, worried. "I get that you're protective of your sister, but you completely exploded when we walked in on them."
This is so embarrassing and stupid. To blow up like that at my own sister… I didn't even think about the possibility of her wanting to learn about this sort of thing so soon. But now that I think about it… we're all locked up in this place, together. There is not a lot to do other than engage with each other.
"Yuri? Hey." Miki looked worried, even more so when Yuri made a really depressed face.
"Wow, that was a thing." Nagisa was used to things being fairly calm all around. "I didn't know Yuri could be like that." When Nagisa turned around to get a comment from Ange and Makoto, they were already gone. "I'm suddenly on my own?!"
"I thought Yuri would get angry, but not like this!" Yami was still upset over the knee jerk reaction her sister had given her. "Just for the record, I don't think you were taking advantage of me."
"You know that and I know that, and still, your sister must have overreacted perhaps because she has only had her sister back from the dead for a few days." Alice did feel bad about about trying to hit Yuri, but she was not going to apologize for teaching Yami about the pleasures of a woman.
"You… think?" Yami didn't really understand why Yuri had just exploded right into her face, continuously shouting at her while she and Alice hurriedly put their swimsuits back on after getting just a little bit of intimate.
"I am an only child, but if I was given a sister now, I would be very protective of her. I did not expect her to react this strongly, otherwise I would have insisted on a far more secluded location still, perhaps my room."
Yami was still holding Alice's hand. "We could still go there now."
Alice smiled and then pulled her hand away. "I would love to, but your sister, and everyone else, will see that as an immature reaction. I do enjoy your company a great deal, still.." Alice stepped forward and kissed Yami on the cheek. "I will let things calm down between your sister and you. Explain to Yuri that you will not have her dictate who you can see and indulge with in… pleasantries."
"You're… what's the word?" Yami paused. "Shrewd. You seductive, shrewd woman you." Yami smirked wide. "Yuri is definitely not gonna just allow me to come see you."
Alice took Yami's hand and kissed her fingers. "Why, we must meet in secret then."
Yami looked as excited as she had ever been and beamed at Alice. "Wanna meet here tonight?"
"Alice!" Ange was not quite storming but quickly marching towards Alice.
"Ange. If you want to voice your complaints, I am quite tired of hearing about it right now."
"We are new here. If you absolutely must put your hands on someone's sister, can you be a little more discreet about it?" Ange didn't want to really argue with Alice, but as one of the more reasonable ones of the group, she felt compelled to say something.
"We were in the middle of the jungle!" Yami tried to defend Alice.
"The underbrush." Alice corrected her. "Ange, there was such a minuscule chance for anyone to find us there. And I thought you would try to berate me since it has only been such a short time since I stopped seeing Mana."
"That's your choice. I know you weren't as attached to Mana as Rikka and Regina are."
"I discovered that I might have a preference for strong willed women."
"I can't tell if that's a compliment." Yami was still standing there, holding Alice's hand.
Alice smirked. "It is."
===DISSONANCE===
"Not exactly a group that promises great teamwork. At least we know, more or less, what we each specialize in." Honoka was glad that the day condition was out of effect inside the waiting room. It feels strangely… good to be in Cure form. Kind of elevating. Maybe I'll ask Nagisa to meet me on the beach and we can enjoy a little private time as Cure Black and Cure White. Honoka realized right after that that was not going to work.
"I appreciate that you let me be the chosen." Reika created an ice spear in her right hand and let it crumble several times to warm up.
"You seemed like the toughest of us, that's all." Ako adjusted her clothes. Did I gain weight? It's a little tight around the chest and waist. Maybe I should watch what I eat more carefully.
"I specialize in mid-range, Reika is a close quarters fighter and- honestly, I still don't have a good handle on how you fight, Ako."
"If you have to categorize it like that, I specialized in utility and stalling." Ako clicked her fingers and created half a dozen physical obstacles around Honoka. "I could detonate them, send vibrations through them or just use them like a garbage press. None of those have the power that you specialists have, but I can handle any situation because of that." Clicking her fingers a second time, the large piano keys vanished.
"Are both of you clear on the rules?" Honoka wanted to make sure they were all on the same page.
"The hourglass lets us stop any other Cure in time for seven seconds. If we take out someone that hasn't used their time stop, we get an additional charge." Ako had made sure to read up on the rules just before signing up.
"The Chosen doubles my power and will heal me slowly, according to how many of you remain conscious or alive. I am not fully sure if that means my physical prowess or just the amount of magical energy I have access to." Reika understood why White and Muse didn't pick that option themselves. Each of them had a singular obvious flaw to their fighting style that required a teammate to make up for it. "If the chosen is defeated, the entire team loses."
"Don't take out the other chosen until we have all of them worn down. There is no point in winning if we don't get any money for it." Muse thought of the long game.
"Ako, you sound like Urara now." Honoka found that amusing.
"I didn't sound that unrefined."
"What a thing to say about your girlfriend." Reika interjected.
"I can say it precisely because she is my lover."
"Do both of you understand how the super star works?" Honoka brought the discussion back on track.
"A sixty second period of invincibility followed by automatic knockout. Pretty simple." Ako found the rules to be somewhat interesting this time. "I wish they would allow us to pick at least one of the rules. We should use the countdown clock every day."
"I am sure they don't allow that for exactly that reason." Honoka looked at Reika then. "If Rouge or Sunny are on the field, Ako or I will handle them."
"Please do." Reika trusted in her abilities. Still, Cures commanding intense heat were her nemesis. The worst possible match-up.
The gates opened and the three very different Cures stepped out into the arena, which was nothing like they had ever seen. They stood on a massive, at least a thousand by a thousand meters platform that was also at least a dozen meters thick. Beneath them, the sky. Above them, the sky. All around them, also the sky. There was but one exception. Three golden, rotating metal rings were placed around the platform. It all looked like tool for astronomy, blown far out of any proportion.
"Watch ou-!" Honoka shouted and was immediately taken away by a green blur.
Nao?! Reika didn't dare to turn around and instead focused on the other enemy that was right in front of her. And Yayoi? Creating a dozen floating ice spheres in front of her, Reika fired them towards Yayoi at an upwards angle. "Ice Valkyrie!" The spheres turned into entire armories, raining down from above.
Yayoi immediately halted her advance, rubbed her hands together in a hurry, generating countless sparks. "Megavolt!" Firing the electricity up above, Yayoi destroyed most of the spheres, yet not enough to avoid having to dodge. Taking evasive maneuvers, Yayoi found herself quickly in front of Reika herself, wielding a large ice scythe in one hand and a short sword in another. The first swing went right over Yayoi's head, whose lack of height became an asset in battle. The scythe was dropped, burst into pieces and Reika immediately created a more suitable weapon, a second short sword, unleashing a series of slashes, horizontal and vertical both, forcing Yayoi to retreat with each step, focused completely on evasion.
Stomping on the ground, Reika made more weapons appear all around her, turning the path she took into a graveyard of discarded weapons. Yayoi could no longer just evade the attacks and went on to counter. While dodging, Yayoi left behind electricity, charging the air around her more and more. She was helplessly outclassed in a close quarters fight against Reika of all people, but she understood one of Reika's weaknesses. Her weapons had high offensive powers and she could create a near limitless number of them, but they were not designed as a permanent option.
Reika noticed the counter offensive and backed away. A Yayoi sized sphere of pure electricity formed right in front of the yellow Cure just as Reika retreated. "Hammer of Godly Thunde-" Yayoi turned gray and was frozen in time. Ako raced past Reika.
"Cover your ears!" Ako shouted at her teammate and didn't bother to slow down. Instead, she jumped and hit the frozen Yayoi right in the face with a double kick. It felt like trying to kick a mountain. So they're invulnerable while they are frozen in time? Then how about this? Ako clicked her fingers again and created a dozen piano barriers all around Yayoi. "Forti-"
Ako could only catch a glance of a green blur that shot past her and that single moment of distraction became an issue right away. Peach flew over the barriers, her hand glowing pink with an awesome power.
But Peach had to protect herself against a deluge of launched weapons. Reika didn't have the capacity to fire weapons out of thin air, but she could pick them up and throw them. And with her increased power, it was enough to create a virtual hailstorm of ice weapons.
Peace came back to life in the same instant that Peach was forced out of Muse's barrier ring. In her confusion over what had just happened, Yayoi hesitated with executing her attack, suffering a blow, a kick, from Muse straight to the face. Then a second kick to the stomach.
While Muse was battering Peace and Beauty kept Peach at bay with her throwing barrage, forcing her to take a long running charge around the battlefield, Nao was in trouble. Deadly pillars of white energy burst forth all around her, wherever she stepped, as if her enemy could read her mind. Nao was fast but even she could not go from zero to maximum speed without some space to accelerate.
I can't keep this up forever. Honoka had one knee on the ground and both of her palms pressed against the cold stone the platform was made of. If you want a battle of speed I will give you a battle of wits instead. Nobody has spent more time than me refining their efficiency! "199 pillars of illumination!" Honoka fired a massive amount of energy into the ground and Nao was suddenly completely surrounded, first by a singular large circle, then a second circle of energy pillars, bursting forth, and ceasing to be only after the next, smaller circle sprung out of the ground.
Seeing herself faced with an inescapable trap, Nao accepted the damage and ran straight through one of the pillars. It was her entire body was scorched, in- and outside. Bursting through the pillar, Nao was face to face with a devilish smirking Cure White. Oh, shi-
"Ascension!" Honoka clicked her fingers and she herself as well as Nao were completely devoured by a singular gigantic energy pillar that ripped the platform asunder, breaking off a large corner of the structure, wildly turning around itself in seemingly zero gravity.
Reika had forced Peach into a hand to hand fight, weapons versus energy protected fists and feet. For each blade that Peach shattered, Reika had two more. For each time Reika cut her, Love hit her twice as hard. All those broken weapons are sticking around. It's like she is turning the entire battlefield into an ice age. Love was wary of her footing and continuously forced or lured Reika towards areas where they hadn't fought before.
Not too far from them was an almost equally balanced battle happening. Electricity and sound waves were blasting the ground to pieces, each second the number of craters increasing. Yayoi had the upper hand because she specialized in energy warfare, and still, Muse's endless assault and potentially lethal attacks didn't leave her any time to make use of her specialty.
Both Ako and Yayoi let their guard down for just a single moment when something broke straight through the platform between them, March and White, engaged in a furious close quarters fight utilizing everything they had, punching, kicking, energy blasts and razor sharp wind shredding skin.
A white pillar clashed with a sphere of razor wind. Honoka lost two of her fingers on her right hand while Nao had her right ear blown clean off. Both of them crashed into the ground and were staggering when they got up.
Ako positioned herself in front of White and created a set of barrier in a half circle in front of her, set to detonate and emit high frequency sound waves that would be extremely disorienting. "Hey, White!" She didn't dare to kneel down and take a closer look, but she could tell from her distance that White was in bad shape. I hope March is off worse or just as bad, otherwise this is going to be really bad.
"Muse… invincibility… that means we won't die until the timer is up, right?" I can't go up against March a second time. She's surprisingly dangerous up close. My reaction speed can't keep up.
"What are you thinking?" The barriers collapsed under an electric blast from Peace.
"Get out of here." Honoka got on her feet and a sixty popped out over her heard, two white numbers, slowly ticking down.
Nao saw that and knew that this was bad news. "Yayoi, retreat to one of the rings. They have gravity, you can walk on them." She had found that out earlier when one of White's pillars forced her to jump off the main platform.
Peace didn't second guess the green Cure and high-tailed it out of the immediate danger zone. A few seconds after White, Nao popped her countdown as well. Rushing towards White, who just stood there and seemed to do nothing, Nao unleashed hit after hit on her, with seemingly no effect. Tch, invincible or not, I can definitely move her! Kicking Honoka in the face, Nao poured everything she had into hitting her, a flurry of punches so fast that no naked eye could have followed them hammering against White's body. A final kick and she sent White flying, sliding over the ground. And Honoka didn't get up. Did… I win? But isn't she supposed to be invincible? Did I use my star power for nothing?
Lying there on the ground, Honoka started to smile, then laugh quietly by herself. She makes such poor use of this great boon.
Yayoi was running from Muse on the outer ring and was now seeing the underside of the platform and her eyes widened. "Nao, you need to run!" Yayoi shouted as hard as she could.
But it was too late. Honoka got on her feet and right then, the platform started to be pierced by tiny beams of white energy all over the place. There was no name for her attack, for it wasn't something she could do without sacrificing her life many times over.
Reika, Love, Yayoi and Ako covered their eyes with their eyes, turned away, and still it was absolutely blinding. The entire underside of the platform was amass with white energy, now breaking into pillars, piercing the platform, making it all the way to the outer rings and scorching the metal. One after another they broke forth, then by the dozens until there were too many to distinguish by them anymore. Nao had nowhere to go, and invincible or not, the white light consumed her and Honoka alike, sending them into free fall. With a final act, her power to run out, Honoka slapped her hands together.
The platform was shattered into thousands of small pieces by the final explosion of white energy. Blinded and with her time about to run out, Nao desperately clung to one of the floating fragment. What insane destructive power… was the last thing that Nao thought before her timer ran out her consciousness faded, the green Cure falling into the sky beneath, where Cure White had to have vanished to, for she was nowhere to be seen.
This is no time to be impressed. Ako raced towards Peace, protecting herself with floating shields made from piano keys. If I used that power… no, I can't sing Replekia in sixty seconds… But there is a song I can use. Going out with a bang like that must give a lot of points. Running along the ring, which was no more than three meters wide and about two meters thick, Ako was forced to a screeching halt when Yayoi bombarded her from a distance. Forced to surround herself with barriers and continuously create them anew, Ako was suddenly in a pickle. Creating a triple layer and feeling a sharp pain in her chest from doing so, Ako completely hid herself.
And when Yayoi broke the barriers, Ako was nowhere to be found. "Thunder Sphere!" Yayoi created a protective shield around herself that would at least diminish energy blasts and deal contact damage to close combat attackers. I'm glad I got such a convenient power. Looking up and to all sides, Yayoi couldn't find Muse anywhere. She's a black Cure, she has to stick out like a sore thumb against those rings! Think… you wrote shounen manga before, this is just like a battle scene. She has to be trying to get into my blind spot.. which would be… "There!" Yayoi flung around and fired a bolt of electricity into thin air. Huh… that's weird.
Muse jumped out of thin air, as if she had been hiding there, invisible, waiting for a moment like that. Despite Peace's electric sphere burning her skin in places and shocking her to the bone, Muse landed a kick to Yayoi's neck at full power. The yellow Cure slammed into the ground and bounced back up, so strong was the impact. Vomit flew through the air and Yayoi saw four Muse's at the same time when the next kick came, hitting her in the exact same spot, slamming her into the ring again.
Ako was frozen in time the very next moment, with Yayoi on the ground, spitted blood and bile. I'm… I'm done for… She couldn't feel most of her body and she felt more sick than she had ever before in her life. This… is that thing… a concussion. Popping her countdown, Yayoi felt the pain go away and her senses normalized. She still needed so much time to get back up that the next kick of Muse, the third, hit her again, slamming her back into the ground. But this time Yayoi didn't feel any damage and discharged a massive load of electricity.
Ako immediately felt her vision turn red and her thoughts stop. It wasn't just her thoughts that had stopped. The electric blast had stopped her heart. Ako couldn't directly tell this, but she felt she was dying. Hitting her countdown as well, Ako ignored Peace's advanced and retreated, jumping from platform to platform, until she was nearly a hundred meters outside the arena.
RRHA RRHA GUWO Ax GAx PEx GIS A GAx TIE INNx
GIS NA GRAN GAx PAUL NOx TYUNY INI SAASH AR YANJE
That's… that's definitely not good! Yayoi had read more than enough manga to know that if the enemy retreated and starting singing, they were definitely preparing some kind of world ending attack. Creating her sketchbook with her ability, Yayoi rapidly drew something to counter that. A massive cannon, capable of piercing even the earth's core. She scaled it down significantly because she only had about half a minute to fully create and fire it.
Reika and Peach were locked into a contest of raw strength, Love on one knee, with Beauty pushing down on her with two long swords. "Since they have popped their countdowns, I guess it's pretty obvious why you and I have been healing off our damage." Love tried to distract Reika with chit chat, to no avail. She's not even looking in the direction of her teammate. I can't tell if she's heartless or trusts them completely.
Kicking Reika's chin in an attempt to disrupt her balance, Love fell for Reika's trap. Abandoning one of the long swords all of a sudden, Reika pulled a short sword out of thin air and stabbed Love's right leg. But she underestimated how tough the pink Cure was. With a single punch, Love shattered the sword, the blade remaining stuck in her leg. And with that same leg, she kicked Reika in the face and sent her flying backwards.
Reika froze the ground beneath her, creating something for her to hold onto to avoid falling off the central ring. Love pulled the shard out from her leg and blocked the wound with energy. She couldn't heal the way Mana did, but she could stop herself from bleeding out.
Both of them faced each other when their attention was forced towards Yayoi and Ako, both of which had mere seconds left on their clock. Yayoi had finished her device first and was about to fire. No matter if she's invincible. This is going to blow her away so far that nothing she does will matter!
"Finger of the G Emperor, fir-" Yayoi was frozen in time before she could finish the activation.
Amidst the rubble that remained of the central platform was a white mess of torn clothing and black hair. "That… was genius, Reika..." Honoka coughed up blood and passed out for good, her last act, freezing Yayoi when she had just eight seconds left on the clock, her last gambit, pulled off successfully.
How the heck was she still alive? I saw her use her countdown! Love couldn't wrap her head around what had just happened. Yayoi's countdown ticked down mercilessly. At this rate she'll return and pass out at the exact same moment. I need- Love staggered back when an ice sword went straight through her right shoulder. That's right… I can't afford to look anywhere but at that monster in front of me!
Just as Love thought that, Yayoi returned to life, fired her cannon, oblivious that she had lost seven seconds of time, and immediately passed out. The energy blast was massive, many times the size of the largest pillar that White had produced.
Love and Reika were devoured by the light of an explosion, a shock wave so strong it ripped asunder the battlefield, turning to dust stone and metal alike, the light that signaled the end of a planet all around them.
Energy flooded past the two remaining Cures, desperately holding onto the parts of the ring that survived the shock wave, gravity and energy wrecking havoc on the area. There was no sight of Muse, Peace, White or March anymore. The arena was reduced to tiny fragments of stone and metal, floating freely in space, turning around their own axis.
Love was in visible awe over Muse's final attack, but Reika was not. No matter what adversary was in front of her, no matter what catastrophe was impeding, she would be undeterred. Jumping from fragment to fragment, Reika made it all the way over to Peach, attacking her with a singular massive katana, a blade of nearly two meter length.
Is she a robot or something?! Love was not frightened by Reika but she could see that she was not likely to win this unless she abused her time stop and dropped her into the abyss of the sky beneath. Kicking Beauty in the gut and sending her flying, Love could not dodge the thrown katana in time and it severed her right arm. Even through the arena conditions, Love felt the pain and nearly bit her tongue off in response.
Reika was in the middle of a jump between platforms when her time stopped and she started to fall towards the sky beneath. I… won. She should be more careful when the opponent still has a time stop at hand. Love let her guard down for just a moment. Stepping closer to the edge of her own platform, she looked down, the wound where her arm used to be barely being contained by her energy. There is nothing she can do now.
Reika's time returned and as if she had anticipated being in free fall far below the shambles of the battlefield, she smiled. "Sakuya."
Love couldn't hear what she said, but she felt it. Every single blade she had shattered, deflected. Every weapon that Reika had dropped, that was in pieces, came together, forming hundreds of devastatingly sharp and pointy ice shards. And in an instant, they all impaled Love.
While Reika fell and fell and her view arena became more and more distant, Peach could not even activate her countdown anymore. She had died instantly.
===DISSONANCE===
"Ow, ow, ow..." Love pulled up her sweater and looked at her stomach. I didn't expect that saying I got bruises all over would be this on point.
"The power balance between teams is unfair." Yayoi sat in the waiting room and pouted. "White, Muse and Reika? That's just unfair."
"Say Peach, why didn't you use your ability?" Nao was still having trouble seeing clearly and kept rubbing her eyes.
"You use your powers to run fast and Yayoi based her entire fighting style around her powers. Could either of you use Reika's or Honoka's power?" Love didn't get an answer except two quiet grunts. "And I only have about fifty meters range. I couldn't stop Muse and her comically oversized sphere of what even was that?"
"I thought she was gonna blow up this entire dimension." It looked really awesome. I am definitely making my next villain use an attack like that. Maybe add a knight person protecting her while she sings. Yayoi was capable of some tremendous destruction herself, but nothing like what Muse had displayed.
"Come to think of it, what is Muse's ability? I mean I know about most abilities by now. White makes energy pillars, Rouge creates a super hot zone, Lemonade uses chains, Marine can copy others, and so forth."
"She's like Ellen." Love knew not a lot about Ellen's abilities as a songstress. What she did know was that Muse had access to the far more potent songs that Ellen couldn't sing. "Ellen didn't make her singing into her primary ability because she didn't want to use her voice for fighting. The two of you weren't here when she was stuck in exile and sang a hymn that nearly killed everyone. Those songs are really strong."
"So how come she's never used them before?" Nao licked her finger and tried to get some dust out of her eyes. "If I had something like that, I'd use it all the time."
"She probably can't." Yayoi was specialized in energy manipulation, so she understood. "That was way, way more energy than I could make, even if… if I spent an entire day on it."
"The countdown, huh. I really botched using mine. I should have created a tornado or something. Or a super cell."
"Ah! So frustrating I lost to Reika without even getting to use it! I thought I'd pop it if she somehow got back up, and speaking of that, how did she even do that? That has to be against the rules!" Love ruffled her own hair. "I'm not mad I lost, I kinda thought that might happen, but I feel like I didn't just lose to her in a fight!"
"You held out longer than we did." Nao tried to console Love.
"Nao's right. And we would have totally won if White and Muse didn't blow up the entire stage!"
"I couldn't tell what White was doing at all." Nao looked at the ceiling and she was finally able to see properly again. "I would have run her off the platform if I knew."
"It's no secret some of us are a bit smarter than others." Love got a soda from the vending machine and wondered what was taking the evaluation so long. "I didn't think we would get outsmarted like that though."
"Love, what happened to me? I was about to fire my cannon and then my time was suddenly up!" Yayoi didn't understand.
"Honoka stopped you in time." Downing half the can in one go, Love let out a refreshed gasp. "Ah, that feels so good!"
"But she used her countdown!" Nao had been up and close to see for herself.
"Reika used her time stop to freeze Honoka, so she survived her countdown. Honoka used her time stop on Yayoi." Love hummed and tilted her head. "At least I think that is what happened."
"They're abusing the rules!" Yayoi complained.
In the waiting room of the other team, Honoka was disappointed by the results. "Last by 20 points. Unbelievable."
"You sound like Nagisa." Ako found that particularly amusing and smiled from under her mask, just before taking it off. "Maybe I ought to just do something about this long hair of mine so I don't have to wear the hood in battle. It is really stuffy."
"Muse, what was that attack you used? A magical song of some kind, I understand that, but the exact nature-"
"The fourth of the regal hymns passed down among the royal family of Major Kingdom. As the crown princess, I possess the ability to use them. I considered using the second of the hymns, Replekia, instead, but I didn't think I had enough time to make it work."
"A regal hymn, but what does it do?" Honoka was curious now. She had only see a blurry sphere of energy in the sky when she stopped Yayoi.
"It converts my life into energy. It is basically a last resort that has never been used. If my mother the queen were to use it, it would most likely vaporize everything within a five hundred kilometers radius. It would most likely also fissure the earth beneath. Usually the hymn takes nearly four minutes to sing before it takes effect, so I had to cut it short. With my life force alone, in normal circumstances, I could not even create an explosion strong enough to destroy everything within a ten meter radius. The rule of super star prevents us from dying no matter what, which is how I converted my life thousands of times over into magical energy." Ako was glad that she could explain these things without getting any what or wait, explain that again back.
"How many of those hymns are there?" I need to revise my evaluation of Ako. If she has access to powers like that, given the right rules and support, she could be incredibly powerful.
"I know the first, second, third, fourth and eighth one. ReNation, Replekia, Sphilia, Nullascension and Chronicle Key. There is a weaker, more common version of Chronicle Key that only requires a single songstress instead of a royal one with four accompanying ones, but it is far weaker and requires constant repetition of the hymn to retain its function. If you want, we can talk about this in more detail later."
"How many of those can you effectively perform?" Reika was thinking along similar lines as Honoka did.
"None. ReNation is not a hymn designed for combat. Replekia requires many times the energy I have, even if I had Ellen to support me. Sphillia, again, is not designed for combat. I already explained why Nullascension is not workable and Chronicle Key is a sealing hymn. I do know the names of the remaining regal hymns but not the hymnos."
"The what?" Honoka didn't want to make educated guesses when she could just ask.
"The language used to sing the hymns. It's an ancient Major Land language that was crafted specifically for the magical hymns." Ako suddenly let out a sigh. "There are so many dialects to it. I dread the time we go back home and I have to take those classes again."
The doors flew open and Northa angrily stepped inside. "Get your asses going already! You know the drill, the one with the highest score can go and switch sides, so get to it!"
"Yes, yes. Calm yourself, old woman." Ako walked past the now seething mad Northa and left, Honoka and Reika right on her tail.
"I cannot believe I have three more days of work in my schedule now. I would not mind if it was actually real work instead of helping the system employees pass the time." Honoka was annoyed that she scored last, again.
"I am sure you will find a way to make it bearable." Reika turned around to try and smile, an attempt to cheer up Honoka.
"Feels almost like a waste that I ended up being the top scoring one." Ako took off her mask and was making a mental note regarding an outfit change. It was kind of overdue at this point, she felt. "Either of you would have switched I assume?"
"I would have." Honoka couldn't find any enthusiasm. "But alas, I fared the worst of us three."
"Tomorrow is another day." Ako would have transferred her privilege, but that was not an option. "I do feel like the battles have become rather… violent as of late. Even considering how powerful we are."
"We stopped holding back." Honoka thought so. "After the ordeal with Dream, I think everyone realized how important it is to not go against the system." She bent her arms behind her back and her right elbow made a cracking noise. "I really want to research how exactly our wounds are healed. Or in some cases, we are resurrected."
"Any sufficiently advanced technology-" Reika started to cite a famous British writer but Honoka cut off her.
"Please do not quote Clarke's third law in the presence of actual magical girls."
"The two of you hardly seem to be in the age range of magical girls." Ako mocked them a little and quickly stepped up her pace of walking towards the beach. Before she could get there, the atmosphere took a turn for the awkward. March, who had been on the other team until moments ago, walked into the plaza, saw Reika and headed immediately for the hotel.
Reika didn't say anything and headed for the beach instead of the hotel – she wasn't emotionally capable of confronting Nao right now.
Returning to the beach was overwhelming her mood in a way. She caught Nagisa in the middle of hammering down on a white ball that subsequently flew over a net and was bounced back up by Miki. Someone had made a makeshift net and procured a volleyball and things just took their natural turn from there. The current match was Nagisa, Saki, Nozomi and Rin versus Yuri, Miki Kanade and Hibiki. The former team was losing badly despite their superior physiques. The height advantage that Yuri and Miki brought to the game were just too much and no powers meant that fitness and height was all that mattered.
A number of girls were cheering by the side of the match. A particularly strange combination of grown ups was a hundreds meters out from the impromptu volleyball field; Majorina, Mamo and Sasorina were all there, temporarily having closed down shop. But things got weirder still because those three were accompanied by Urara and Regina, both of them feeling well at home with those three.
"Considering how you behave, you're worse than all three of us combined." Mamo mocked Urara and grabbed the bottle of vodka from the shade and refilled five glasses. "The others should be glad that you didn't turn to the side of… whatever you were fighting."
"Given how you behave, no wonder the universe had to turn out all the stops to mess over Heart's group. You clearly didn't get the job done. And little miss turncoat here probably didn't help matters."
"If you're competing about vileness, I served a crazed desert god alien thing that was trying to turn the entire planet into a sandbox." Sasorina couldn't remember how many drinks she's had, but they certainly loosened both her tongue and her inhibitions.
The three villains were all wearing swimsuits, just like the rest of them. Sasorina's was a golden two piece bikini with crimson colored strings. Majorina wore a green bikini that had black see-through fabric covering the top part of her chest, held together by two metal clasps on the back. And Mamo had surprised the other two by turning up in a black and purple one piece with a diamond shaped hole on the back. She had already heard about a dozen jokes of allegedly crushing on Rikka, much to her and Regina's annoyance.
"Bringing up who we work for is not fair. And I am quite sure that an insane desire driven clown lord, manipulated and controlled by a sadistic and megalomaniac jester will be difficult to surpass." Majorina bragged, finished her glass in one shot and felt still empty inside. "Cures sure have it easy. It looks like there is almost a surplus of available girlfriends at any point."
"Nobody is stopping you from asking someone out." Urara sat there cross-legged, the crudest of the five. "You're gonna need a miracle to have one of us say yes, though. Don't get me wrong, going by our standards, you're pretty hot, but if we're talking about dating villains, we got Bright and Windy for freak appeal. Bright has enormous melons, too. If we're talking plain beauty, there's Passion and trying to compete with that is setting yourself up for disappointment. Not to mention she's nice as hell. Taken, though. Who else… I suppose there is Moonlight's little sis. Although that might not be a good idea."
"I really recommend against trying anything with her." Sasorina shook her head really hard and nearly spilled her drink. "She used to be really savage and there is enough emotional baggage attached to her that Moonlight is going to magical nuke you if you try."
"And I'm taken too." Regina wouldn't let herself be counted out of the former villain league.
"I don't think anyone's that desperate anyway. Your other half, sure, but you? Eh."
Regina tried her most aggressive glare on Urara and found her match. The pissed off delinquent look she got back was enough for her to reconsider her priorities. "Holy crap, were you always like this? How do you function in a team with captain happy thoughts over there?" Regina pointed at Nozomi, who was really giving it her all in the volleyball match.
"Keep drinking and maybe you'll hear about it. Although I doubt some little princess is going to last that long." I don't mind talking about it, but why would I make it easy for her? This is bound to get funny.
"Ange's the princess, I'm the evil twin that's going to have machinations running behind the prime minister."
"And you two call yourselves legendary warriors." Sasorina snorted right after taking a sip from her glass and got vodka in her nose, flailing and then rolling in the sand from the burning pain that came with that.
"Yeah, legendary warriors pretty cure. All thirty-seven of us. There's less legendary pokemon than Cures and there's way too many legendary pokemon." Urara earned strange looks from everyone. "Everybody laugh at the delinquent girl that plays pokemon."
"What's pokemon?" Mamo had no idea.
Regina burst into tears and laughter at the same time. Falling backwards into the sand, her legs wildly kicking her, she covered her belly and kept laughing. "T-Tell them." She rolled over and started hitting the ground with two fists because she was just imagining Urara trying to explain this one to those three.
Someone else went down to the sand at the same time. Hibiki had spiked a ball a little too hard and Nozomi had caught it with her face, going down while the ball had gone up. "S-Sorry." Hibiki stayed on her side of the field for a moment while Nagisa and Saki checked on the knocked down girl. "Is she alright?"
"Her nose is bleeding," Saki said and lifted up the injured Nozomi. "That was some receive. Can you stand?"
"I'm… not fine, but yeah." What a brutal girl… I'm glad we don't have someone like that over on our side. Who knows how violent she'd be?
"You shouldn't continue." Her nose is still bleeding. Should I try that neck chop that I read about? "Go lie down." Nagisa was a little worried. Without their powers, they were a little fragile and Hibiki's spike packed quite some punch.
"I'll do that..." Sounding very nasal, Nozomi staggered off the field.
"Short a player?" Love had been watching from the sidelines. "I'm not that good but I know the rules. And I'm good at jumping."
The game continued while Nozomi lied down in the shade of a pink parasol and on top of a large towel. "Ow..." Groaning by herself, she closed her eyes and focused on resting. How did this happen? I was just hiding in the bushes and then this crazy chick… uh.. what's her name? The purple one that's supposedly on Nozomi's team. She just shows up and chews my ear off about how she likes this girl but doesn't want to screw up a friendship and blah blah blah. And before I know it, I'm out on the beach, giving her advice, walking, and then that Hibiki girl showed up and here I am. I get it, I was not a good person in the short life I had, but this is too much.
Someone lifted her up by her shoulders, just enough to put something under her head. And opening her eyes, she found a familiar and pleasing sight. Miyuki. But not my Miyuki. "Aren't lap pillows for couples?" Trying to say it as jokingly as she could, Nozomi did feel better already.
"We can make an exception." Miyuki smiled and put her right hand on Nozomi's forehead, swiping a few stray hairs from her face. "Does it hurt a lot?"
"You're actually very comfortable." Nozomi cracked a small joke and felt her heart flutter when this copy of her Miyuki smiled, giggled even over her stupid gag. "You're beautiful when you smile."
That line gave Miyuki pause and she blushed a little bit. "Thanks. You're beautiful too. When your nose isn't bleeding." She couldn't deliver the line without fumbling her pitch a little and looking away. After her talk with Rikka, she had spent a lot of time thinking how she felt about Nozomi. And the conclusion she arrived at was both frightening and exciting. She's the same Nozomi from yesterday but… seeing her up close like this, on my lap? Don't let her notice how hard my heart is beating!
"Hibiki is really brutal. She could go a little easy on us." Nozomi hoped she could smooth things over with small talk. So far she had avoided detection and there were less than seven hours, give or take an hour or two, to go before the portal would open again. The bleeding had stopped but Nozomi stayed put. This Miyuki is kind of cute. My Miyuki is sexy, strong, but this isn't bad either.
The two of them were a little isolated despite being so close to the volleyball field. Those that were close enough to hear what they were talking about had conversations of their own to listen to or were otherwise engaged. Amidst the chaos and noise, they were alone with each other. Miyuki had enough situational awareness to realize all this. And she had never been one to eat her feelings and bury them.
"Nozomi." Waiting for the girl to look up, it felt like the noise around them quieted down, creating a bubble of silence just around them. And then, the world froze entirely. Everything around them at a standstill, the beach was perfectly quiet.
Miyuki prevented her hair from falling in her face with one hand, the wet pink strands kept at bay as she bent down, her wet lips directly pressed against those of the girl on her lap. A gentle kiss, extending through the flow of time that was halted for all but them. A second stretched on and on forevermore for them, the kiss, their kiss, the first kiss, seemingly lasting forever. And when their eternity was in danger of coming to an end, Nozomi's hand reached Miyuki's cheek, not because she wanted but because she could not go against her desires, her feelings. This Miyuki looked just like her own, but she was different. Nicer, kinder… this didn't her better, just interesting in a different way. Like a new variation of her favorite thing.
Miyuki's face was flushed red when they finally parted. She looked coy, childishly embarrassed and she could not help licking her lips in brief, frantic bursts. "I love you, Nozomi." I said it! I really said it! She didn't want to be the cute friend that lost her chance because she didn't do or say anything.
Now I've done it. There is no way I can just go and say that this wasn't what it felt like. Don't hold it against me Nozomi but I'll have to go for it! "I still need a little time to sort out how I feel but…" Dark Dream grabbed Miyuki's hand, still lying there on her lap. "I liked that."
Miyuki felt faint. I… I was so sure she'd just reject me. "S-Sure. I'll let you think and-" Trying to slowly push Nozomi off, it was clear that Miyuki wanted to get away. Before she could even get on her feet, Nozomi had sat up like a whirlwind and grabbed hold of her arm.
"I didn't say I wanted to sort it out alone." Resting her head against Miyuki's shoulder, Dark Dream was sweating heavily on the inside. This is definitely going to come back and bite me in the ass, but I can't resist that face and voice. I wish I could have both of them, but my Miyuki is gonna roast this one. Probably. Maybe. Hm…
"Did… something happen in the cave? You're so different today." Miyuki glanced to the side, at the girl she had feelings for. What's going on? Is this a dream? If so, let me dream a while longer!
"I can't be the way I was forever." Other Nozomi was just digging a hole for Nozomi at this point. If she's surrounded by so many pretty girls, she should be with one. I needed a push back then, now it's my turn to give her a push.
Miyuki put her left hand to her left cheek, swooning in front of Nozomi. A great smile, her eyes wide with happiness, Miyuki looked lightly down at the sand, stealing glances at the pretty girl by her side. This is too good! Whatever gods there are out there, thank you!
I really need to work on my self-control though. Letting her kiss me and… well, more like kissing back actually. And just sitting here with her… she's not as hot as my Miyuki, I guess it's the attitude. But she is way nicer. Miyuki never wants to cuddle but this Miyuki really seems like the type that would… ugh, this is confusing. Bad Miyuki? Hm, that doesn't seem right somehow. Badyuki? I should hit myself for coming up with that one. Sorry Nozomi but… I kinda want this one for myself. She's all cute and innocent and nice… and I bet she'd make all sorts of amazing expressions in bed. But first I need to figure out how to get back. And maybe set things up so I'm not lynched the second I step out of banished.
"Watch out!" Kanade shouted at them.
The warning came just in time for Nozomi to hold out her hand and grab the ball that flew towards Miyuki's face at what felt like mach speed. The ball bounced off her hand but not without bending one of her fingers a little too far. "Ow! What the hell?!" Flinging her hand back and forth like crazy, trying to make the pain go away, Nozomi jumped to her feet. "Seriously, do you have a problem with me or something?"
Everyone around her looked at her strange and then it hit Nozomi that this was not how the real Nozomi would react. "Sorry, without powers that really hurts." Her finger was starting to turn purple and the pain didn't get better. "It really hurts," she reiterated.
"Kanade didn't bounce the ball your way on purpose." Hibiki stepped off the field. "Kanade, you should still apologize."
"S-Sorry." Kanade had been shocked to have Dream shout at her like that.
With the volleyball game interrupted for the second time, it was called off entirely now. Rin was covered in sand and so was everyone else. The ball was just left by the net and the eight of them went their separate ways while Miyuki dragged Nozomi away to find Tsubomi, who had a healing power.
"Thank you for protecting me." Miyuki wanted to hold hands with Nozomi, but the mood had taken a rather drastic shift. "It's kind of inconvenient we don't have our powers here."
Not like my powers would do anything to help me with a sprained finger. I wonder if this Miyuki likes leather. Although the girl she fell in love with isn't me. I still need to figure out how to make that not blow up in my face. Make her fall for this me. Catching herself thinking that, she felt sickened. I can't believe I am thinking about stealing Nozomi's girlfriend. I'm supposed to be reformed. This is no different from trying to kill Nozomi and take her place. Well, not quite as bad, but still awful. I guess it's easy for former evil to be tempted. Although I am not so sure about the former part anymore.
As night fell onto the beach, the sun vanishing behind the horizon, the atmosphere changed. Many small groups had formed and through the authorization of Majorina and Sasorina, both teams paid a 10000 yen fee that got everyone something to eat at the beach hut. That didn't include drinks; those everyone had to pay for themselves. Outside of buying the odd thing at Mamo's shop and paying for baths, there was not a lot of opportunity to spend money so nobody really minded doing that.
The moon choose to hide behind the cover of clouds down at the beach, which made it difficult to see anyone more than ten meters away. A number of couples used that to their advantage, eating by themselves, enjoying the now cooling temperatures by the ocean.
"So do you know what's your punishment gig is?" Nagisa had finished one plate already and gotten a second out of her own pocket. Individual portions didn't cost that much and Honoka had wanted another drink anyway. They had just returned from the hut, sitting up close by the water, the stronger waves sometimes almost reached their bare feet.
"Keeping Sasorina company, for the most part. I feel that this punishment system wasn't thought out very well." Honoka enjoyed a bottle of strong beer. She wasn't the type that would get wasted on the beach, but she didn't mind some strong brews at all. Being an adult had its perks, even if few of the others seemed to care about the legal drinking age in this magic wonderland.
Nagisa hadn't initially liked to drink anything alcoholic but eventually adopted liking mild beers because she didn't want to be the odd one out when she and Honoka went out with Saki and Mai. "There's been a lot of things since we first got here that weren't thought out well. Too many to count on my fingers." For now, she just sat next to Honoka. "I think I need to go apologize to Dream later."
"What did you do?" Honoka was usually a very elegant woman but she could be very normal and plain when nobody but Nagisa saw her. Holding her bottle with just her fingertips, she looked like a real slouch.
"I didn't do anything directly. But like, things went awry playing volleyball and we hit her in the face with one ball and probably nearly broke her finger with another." Nagisa finished her first bottle and grabbed her second and last. "Was the battle fun?"
"Put the fear of god into me. An angry god that goes by the name of Muse." Honoka knew that Nagisa wouldn't get the double meaning joke there – the Muse were an actual set of goddesses of legend in the real world after all.
"What did she do?" Poking Honoka's right foot, Nagisa used her own feet and shoveled a little bit of sand over her girlfriend's.
"The rules basically had something in them that would let us go far over our limits for one minute without possibility of dying, so she created some sort of planetary extinction event. If Peace hadn't been there to counter it, everyone would have been toast. When she grows up she'll be a really dangerous person." Honoka kept moving her feet to ruin Nagisa's building exercises with a smile.
"She looks pretty grown up to me already." Nagisa got tired of shoveling with her feet and stretched her legs instead. It was too dark to see anyone but the large group that sat at the camp fire, which was quite pleasant. It meant she could steal a kiss from Honoka without worrying about her playing coy.
Honoka sensed Nagisa leaning in for a kiss and turned to meet her halfway. "That's just how she looks. Remember, she's actually… thirteen it was, I think."
"Right. I knew there was something about her relationship with Urara that was kinda disturbing."
"She's more mature than you are, though."
"Hey!" Nagisa bounced against Honoka, making her spill a little of her beer on her chest. "Woops." She sounded completely unapologetic. And before she could evade, Honoka reached over her legs and slapped the bottom of Nagisa's nearly full bottle, spilling a bunch of beer on her legs. "Oh come on," Nagisa laughed.
"Now we both have to go back into the water." Putting her bottle down in the sand, burrowing it in a little so it kept standing, Honoka got up and dragged Nagisa up as well. They only had to go a few steps before they were knee deep in the water. And without warning, Honoka dragged Nagisa further in. The water was still warm after the sun had just set, perfect for a little private excursion.
Nagisa knew her fiancee well enough to notice when she wanted to have some special time alone. Moments after they had gotten into deep enough water that it reached to their shoulders, the two of them got closer together.
"Volleyball, hm… so you were jumping around, bouncing in front of everyone?" Honoka made no attempts to conceal what she wanted and just reached right under Nagisa's bikini top and slowly slid it upwards over her breasts.
"It's fine when I do that. You won't find a dog half as loyal as me anywhere. But if you did that, with that skimpy one piece you got on… I would be pretty jealous."
"It is not skimpy."
"Totally is." Nagisa could easily put her hands under Honoka's swimsuit through the holes on each side of her waist. "See?"
"Your hands have gotten softer since we got here." Honoka looked sly. "And you have gotten more bold." Honoka could feel the warmth of Nagisa in front of her when the strong girl pulled her in. "I miss you."
"I'm right here, though." The salt water washed over their shoulders, making Honoka's long hair float behind her. Nagisa enjoyed seeing that. It gave her partner a mermaid-like appearance in the water.
"You know what I mean. Going to sleep alone at night… I don't like it. No matter how late at night I came home, you were always there in bed. You'd wake up just a little to say Welcome home. You turn around and put your arms around me… it's my anchor to a normal life."
"Should I try to switch teams?" Nagisa felt the romantic mood shift to something more serious.
"I just wanted you to know I feel lonely at night. I don't know why I suddenly felt like telling you that… I guess that ruined the mood."
"When I wake up in the morning and I can't smell you next to me… something that is always there, even if you leave early for work… I feel lonely too." Nagisa blushed a little. "It's embarrassing to admit that though."
"You're so cute." Honoka pushed Nagisa away for a little bit and walked backwards, further into the water. "Come here." Diving underwater as soon as she could, Honoka seemed to be struggling with something when she came back up. "We haven't gone skinny dipping in a really long time, right?"
Nagisa had a much easier time ridding herself of her clothes than Honoka did. "You always have these lewd ideas. Doing it in our school uniforms, in our Cure outfits… before we changed them. Naked in the water… in suits when we attended that wedding."
"You make me sound like a deviant." The stark naked Honoka turned on her back and played dead: "A deviant… I might enjoy that."
"You pervert scientist." Nagisa swam after her girlfriend.
They were not the only ones out in the water. Mai and Saki were both floating way out the water in the dark, playing dead and holdings hands, watching the stars together. "Seeing the stars makes me want to paint again."
"I am sure Mamo could find some supplies for you." Saki understood well how to drift on top of the waves and lined herself so she could glanced sideways at Mai. "This place does have some beautiful scenery."
"The scenery you are talking about is the other girls, isn't it?" Mai smirked and enjoyed the intense blush on Saki's face. "The five prettiest girls that are not me. Tell me."
"Only if you say it first."
She's cute when she tries to tease me back."The five prettiest girls, hm… number five is Nao." Mai could not help herself. "Although she would look better with smaller breasts. Number four is Mana. She just exudes that confident alpha girl aura. Number three is Hibiki. She reminds me of you when you were sixteen. Although she is cuter than you were, but also a bit annoying. Number two… this is hard. Love. She's like Mana but more approachable. And number one is Setsuna. She has this great balance between ladylike exterior and tough interior."
"None of them are like me! Maybe except Hibiki!"
"Of course. I already have you, so I don't need anyone else like that." Mai stopped floating and dove underwater. She was an exceptional swimmer and came up right next to Saki. "Your turn."
"Number five… is Honoka." Saki blushed. "I have a type, okay!"
"Honoka is very pretty." Mai drew her finger over Saki's cheek, the fit girl still floating. "Who are the other four?"
Saki got visibly more embarrassed as Mai pushed. "Inori. I-I like the smart ones! I can't help it. I'm basically married to a woman ten times as clever and smart as me."
"Twice as, maybe. Flatterer. Inori is pretty, but is her smarts the only thing you like about her?"
"I.. like wavy hair. And she is a bit on the short side."
"I am still shorter than you, lucky me." Mai dove under again and came up on the other side of Saki, her long hair sticking to her back. "Go on."
"Number three… Setsuna. I guess we both like her."
"Now I'm curious about the top two."
"Karen. She is smart, a lady, beautiful… she is like you, only a few steps behind in every aspect."
"She is definitely smarter than me and more of a lady. But it's cute how you exaggerate." Mai had no illusions of grandeur. She knew Saki would only ever love her, but she was still curious what kind of girls Saki also looked at. "Who is the prettiest girl beside me then?"
"Reika. She is like a super charged version of Karen. She's beautiful, really smart, super elegant… but she's also really stoic, so I can't even imagine how hard you'd have to try to get through to her. If there even is a different Reika under that ice shell."
"I'm surprised that new girl… Rikka, is not on that list then."
"I don't really know her. She is pretty, but…"
"You can't look at her without pity because of her blindness." Mai didn't need to be able to read minds to know that. "Everyone hides it, but a lot of us feel really bad for her, I think." Mai was very sensitive to these things. Subtle signs such as averting eyes so they didn't make eye contact with someone that could not. "I saw her with her eyes open earlier today." Mai kept herself afloat with just her legs and pointed at the corners of her eyes. "They're all black. It looks almost terrifying. I understand why she keeps her eyes closed."
"I keep thinking that one of us must have a power to heal her."
"Tsubomi couldn't, not even with Hikari's help. Maybe one day there will be someone that can heal her." The mood had taken a severe turn towards being depressing now. "I… kind of want to draw her in her Cure outfit, with her ice mask. Even with everything she went through, she looks almost… royal. No, that is not the right word. Majestic. She looks like there exists not a thing in the world that can break her will."
Saki stopped floating and went underwater for a moment before coming back up. "Do you think the six of them have nightmares?"
"Probably."
Swimming as close to Mai as she could without colliding, Saki grabbed her girlfriend's hand. "Speaking of nightmares… ever since we came back here, I feel like there is something at the back of my head that I am forgetting. Something important."
Mai wanted to fix the mood but she knew what Saki was talking about. "Not just important but… like something bad happened to us. Like we forgot because it was too much to bear."
"When I think about the time loop, that eternal party, I can only remember a few small parts."
"Some of the others, including Honoka, believe that we spent twelve years within that time loop. We repeated the same eight hours for over thirteen thousand times." Mai got close enough to kiss Saki for a brief moment. "But let's talk about something else. That's a depressing topic for being out here."
"For your next painting… maybe a tough girl in the water, beneath the dark starry sky might be nice." Saki looked obviously coy after her suggestion.
"Maybe. I am not so good with drawing people, but if I don't draw you in great detail… I think I should call it My Love of the Moonlight."
"Your love of Michiru?" Saki successfully turned the teasing game around on Mai and she applauded her in the water.
"Oh, clever. Cure Bright, power of the moon. I do love Michiru and Kaoru, the same way I would love a beautiful niece."
"I was worried you'd call them our daughters."
"We're not old enough to have children. One day, maybe."
"Do you think they would inherent our Cure powers? One or both of us would stop being Cures and she'd inherent our powers?"
"You're already assuming we'd have a daughter?" Mai found that entertaining. "If we have a daughter… maybe she could go to school with the daughter that Nagisa and Honoka would have. Maybe she could be her junior."
"Listen to us," Saki laughed. "We don't even know when we will get out of here."
"There is one positive thing about being here. We met all these other Cures we never knew existed and now they're our friends."
"Makes me wonder how many more of us are out there." Saki went back to floating, glancing at Mai. "Even if there are a hundred more, I'll still only ever love you," saying that, Saki blushed fiercely.
She was not the only one blushing. Far away from the water, atop a large rock within the underbrush, where three people; two sisters and their prisoner. Yayoi, forced flat on her back, in the center. To her left, Kaoru, fondling her breasts, engrossed in a kiss with her. To her right, Michiru, caressing and licking her legs, teasing the blonde's feet with her tongue and hands.
Their efforts were almost perfectly synchronized, starting, intensifying and stopping, each transition less than a second apart of each other. Sitting up, both of them licked their lips and let Yayoi rest.
"Most of the other girls would have had enough of being toyed with by us by now." Kaoru was quite pleased with both herself and Yayoi. "I was just intending to entertain myself with you some but.. I quite like you."
"I was surprised how… smooth and silky your legs are. You are so short and still… for me to be able to get so excited." Michiru shared her sister's opinion. "So, here is what we have been thinking."
Yayoi sat up, glad that it had to be impossible to see in this darkness just how soaked her bikini panties were or how much her nipples were poking through her top. Being at the mercy of every whim of those two sisters had become a strange turn on for her.
"We want you to be our lover." Michiru leaned in close on Yayoi, making the short girl face her by putting her hands on her cheeks. "You will be mine."
Yayoi was turned around by Kaoru then, who made her look the other way in the same manner. "And you will be mine."
The two sisters only needed a glance for each other to speak in synchronization. "And both of us will be yours, together."
"Kaoru and I can be the models for those fantasies of yours and let you draw us…" The sister with red hair whispered in Yayoi's left ear.
"Or Michiru and I can help you act out those very fantasies yourself." The sister with blue hair whispered in Yayoi's right ear.
"What about Pine?" Yayoi knew about Kaoru's involvement with the other yellow Cure from before the time loop.
Kaoru bit into Yayoi's right ear, hard enough to leave a mark. "What of her?"
Michiru joined her sister, biting Yayoi's other ear, the poor girl entrapped in the middle wincing from the light pain. "We like you more. Your lewd mind, your lack of inquisition about the why and how."
"Inori asks too many questions, knows the human mind too well." Kaoru was not that great of a fan of Inori anymore. She didn't really have the looks that Kaoru looked for now.
"I would prefer Miki. Those legs that reach almost to heaven..." Michiru stuck the tip of her tongue in Yayoi's ear, causing the blonde to squirm. "But yours… they're short, but so smooth, like a young girl's..."
"I'm an adult!" Yayoi hated being treated like a kid. And she realized she dug her own grave. The skilled hands of Kaoru immediately fondled her breasts.
"Yes, you're an adult up here." Her reactions are fantastic. I could go on with this all day. "But down here..." Kaoru's hand reached between Yayoi's thighs and she blew hot hair into her ear. "Are you an adult here t-" She stopped abruptly and covered Yayoi's mouth with her hand. "Not a sound," she whispered.
Clinging to Yayoi, both sisters didn't move a muscle. "Someone's there." A faint whisper from Michiru who could hear someone walking through the foliage, twigs snapping and big palm bushes being moved.
"Was it okay to leave your girlfriend like that?" A voice, a drunk voice, made its presence known, less than ten meters away. "Don't get me wrong, I appreciate some company, but I feel like the third wheel here."
There was a second voice."If I was a responsible adult, I'd stay with Kanade and make sure she doesn't drink." A moment of silence kept the sisters on their toes. "But I wasn't a responsible teenager and nothing changed since then. Most of us aren't old enough to drink anyway, isn't stopping anyone."
"At least you don't have to sleep alone tonight. Nao is avoiding me like I have the plague and Reika doesn't want to talk to me either." The sound of steps stopped. "I am still so pissed at her, feeding me that stupid line. I wanna know what I did wrong."
Up ahead in the bushes, Rin handed her bottle to Akane. "Every cliché comes from somewhere real, you know?" Both of them were drunk, slurring words and not walking perfectly straight. Rin walked ahead into the bushes, out of sight and squatted down. There was a sprinkling sounds that Akane wasn't even bothered with. "Maybe it really is just her, you know? Maybe she fucked up, trying to keep her two-timing going."
"That doesn't make me feel better at all. You're lucky, you know. You didn't even try and got that pretty blonde." Akane sounded bitter and she was. Smelling Rin's drink, she turned away in disgust. What the heck is she drinking? Smells like rotten lemon.
"Yeah, I'm not so sure it's lucky." Rin sighed like an old woman. "I like her, I seriously do. But whenever I really want something, I can't have it. I play soccer, right? But that wasn't what I wanted to do with my life."
"I'm working the family business. I'm happy enough with that. But fine, I'll bite; what did you want to do?"
"Design jewelry and accessories. Turns out I had no talent. No sense for it. No amount of hard work is gonna make you succeed at an artsy job when you have no talent. I always liked soccer but when I turned a hobby into work… it's not bad, and I'm not unhappy, but… ugh, I don't know. I guess I'm just complaining because I can't seem to get what I want and I gotta settle for second or third choice."
"Second or third choice is still better than most people get."
Rin was finally done and stood back up, pulling up her girl trunks. "We're super powered magical girls. Not exactly most people material."
"She says, with thirty odd something magical girls making out all over the this beach." Akane handed the bottle back to Rin but remained put, leaned against the palm. "I've got no idea what to do with myself. I'm so damn pissed."
"There's a bunch of girls out there that will lecture you until you have blood running from your ears if you blow up again."
"Not that kind of pissed. The kind where you eat fifteen boxes of pocky or three whole cakes, cry yourself to sleep and throw up in the morning. That kind."
"You're talking this breakup hard, huh?"
"Does it get easier?"
"No idea. Probably not." Rin shrugged and shook her bottle. Empty… "You're a top or bottom?"
"H-Huh? That came out of nowhere."
"I'm a top." Rin was fairly open about it. "Wanna get another drink?"
"Trying to get drunk?" Akane got away from the palm and took a few steps forward. "I'm also a top by the way."
"I enjoy being a bit tipsy. No harm in that. It's not like I got a game tomorrow or anything."
Walking through the bushes, the two of them emerged back on the beach, well on their way to the hut that sold food and drinks. "So Nao is your type? The tall, busty, sporty type?"
"The scaredy-cat homemaker." Akane corrected her. "I sometimes dreamed about Nao and me living together, running my family business. And in ten, twenty years, we'd be able to marry. I figured Reika would eventually move on, break things off with Nao because she realizes her whole Japanese Batman shtick is not gonna work out with a relationship. I just kept thinking we would be together." Akane looked down at the sand. "Saying it out loud… man, that's so damn embarrassing."
"Having dreams isn't embarrassing." Rin burst into laughter seconds after she said that. "I've become Nozomi, destroyer of… I don't know. That sounded funnier in my head. So, anyone else you like? I mean, looking is fine. We all go window shopping. I won't tell."
"Really? Window shopping?" Akane laughed a little. "Sure, whatever. Let's see… who do I wanna make out with the most?"
That's not really what I had in mind but sure. "What about Miyuki?"
"Would you wanna make out with Nozomi?"
"Point taken."
Akane thought about it all the way to the beach hut where Rin ordered another drink that Akane couldn't even pronounce because it was some weird sounding foreign name. "That new yellow Cure."
"Biting off more than you can chew already? No way you can handle her."
"And you could?"
"No way. She is super hot though. Who else?" I wonder what you have to eat to grow up like that.
"Black."
"Nagisa?!" Rin looked like Akane had said something hilarious. "She's kinda tall. You like the athletic type?"
"More the tall bit. But thinking about it, I wanna be the tough one. So maybe Komachi instead?"
"From one green to another?"
"Coincidence. I swear." Akane raised up her hands in playful self-defense. And then she saw something really interesting. "You were saying about Miyuki?" Nodding towards the ocean proper, they could see a very characteristic pair of pink haired girls just a little bit off by the side of the campfire. "I guess it's pretty clear who Miyuki and Nozomi have a thing for."
She looks so peaceful when she is sleeping. She's asleep so deeply, it's like she hasn't slept in days. Miyuki sat just far enough from the fire that she and Nozomi were covered in the shadows of those that sat closer. Slowly, with foot prints left in the soft sand, someone came closer and sat next to Miyuki, a bottle of root beer in her hand and then in the sand. "Alone tonight?" Miyuki noticed her coming.
Nao was not just alone, she also felt alone. She sat with Miyuki despite the situation because she didn't want to be alone and surrounded by couples. "Hm. I'm surprised you aren't. I didn't know you even..."
"Liked girls? Me neither." Caressing Nozomi's cheek with her left hand, Miyuki then scratched her own. "I'm not sure I really like girls. I think it's just Nozomi."
"At least one of us is happy."
"Ultra happy." Miyuki smiled at first and joined Nao when she started laughing. "I knew the way I felt about her was different… but I thought it was just me trying to help her. I felt sorry for her because… She had someone she liked and she can never be with him again. I don't think I am taking his place, but I'm happy I am taking a place in her life."
"Who are you and what did you do to the carefree, free-spirited Miyuki that bothered the four of us until we became Cures?"
"That's mean, Nao." Miyuki wanted to prod Nao but she couldn't, not with Nozomi sound asleep on her lap.
"So you two are together now?"
"I… don't know." Miyuki put her fingers together, toying with them to take her mind off her uncertainty. "We kissed."
"Was it good?"
Miyuki nodded and managed to do so without blushing. "I'm glad I gave my first real kiss to her. I talked to Rikka yesterday during that courage test and… that kinda made me realize a few things."
"The four of us always wondered if you were going to find a cute boy. Or girl. Well, mostly girl, since the rest of us were that way."
"Are you okay Nao?"
Even now she puts others first. "I don't know." Nao looked down at the sleeping Miyuki. "I really messed up things with Akane and Reika."
Miyuki didn't say anything and just looked at Nao, waiting for her to open up. Over the years, she had gotten smart enough to know that pushing was not always the answer. Sometimes she had to pull. Or just wait for things to spill out.
"I don't know where I went wrong… it's just… I look at Akane and Reika now and all I see is women that should be my friends. And I messed it up.. I did love both of them but… I don't know if I spread myself too thin or if I went into it with youthful ignorance… it just became really obvious to me lately. I didn't love them anymore. I just wanted to go back to how we were five years ago. But unless one of us comes up with a time traveling power…" Nao paused. "Are we sure none of us have a time traveling power?"
"Fourteen year old Nao would freak out if nineteen year old Nao met her."
"I bet I would." Nao cheered up a little. "But it's just a fantasy. I'm an adult. I have to deal with my problems like an adult now. Although I wanna be the kind of adult that can still rely on her friends."
"Did you apologize to Akane and Reika?"
"This isn't something an apology can fix."
"But it will help! Apologizing is important. Saying it out loud is important. Even if they know you're sorry."
Nao leaned a little to the side and then hesitated for just a moment before she really leaned against Miyuki. She was taller than Miyuki, which made it a little awkward, but she wanted to be close to someone tonight, even if it was just a friend. "Do you think they'll forgive me? Akane was really mad."
"Probably not tonight or tomorrow." Miyuki wasn't bothered at all by Nao leaning against her. "Akane and Reika are good girls, they won't be mad forever."
"I knew intruding on your alone time with Nozomi would be good for me. Do you mind if I stay a little longer?"
"Nozomi sleeps like a rock, so that's okay."
"Is she a good kisser?" Nao smirked a little when Miyuki blushed like crazy after her question. She didn't answer right away because someone walked right past them.
Love had just passed them, carrying six battles, three in each hand. I almost stumbled over the legs of… I can't tell who that is. She would have waved at Miyuki and Nao if she had a free hand. Those two she could tell those two apart from the others by their hairstyles and sizes at least.
There were four people waiting for her on their side of the campfire and she sat down next to two of them. "Delivery!" Love was in good spirits – who wouldn't, after getting free drinks? Putting the bottles down in the sand in front of her, one of the two grabbed two bottles and handed one to the third girl, by her right. "I'm glad you two came down to the beach."
"Ellen convinced me." Setsuna could handle sitting in the now cool sand, despite the bad sunburn she still had all over her body. "Said that you would get lonely without us."
"You promised not to tell!" Ellen sat to Setsuna's right, looked both a little upset and amused at the same time.
"Ellen's a master detective evidently. Detective Kurokawa." Love leaned sideways to bump against Setsuna and stopped just in time. "Did you try asking Tsubomi to heal you?"
"I don't want to bother her with something like this." Setsuna scratched her left forearm a little. She was already shedding the burnt skin and it was itching like crazy. "I wonder if going in the water would hurt..."
"Don't try it." Love used one bottle to open another, a trick she had picked up during her travels. "Sitting here like this reminds me of the time we were in Indonesia. Right, Setsu?"
"I was telling Ellen about our travels together to pass the time." Setsuna passed her bottle to Love who opened it. The legal drinking age in other countries had taught them that it was a matter of responsibility, not age. Being older didn't really make one more responsible automatically.
"That so?" Love was in a good mood. "What do you wanna drink Ellen? I got root beer and some mixed stuff."
"I don't know. Should I even be drinking that?" Ellen was not nearly as friendly with the concept of drinking as her partners were.
Love picked a really light beer that was mixed with orange juice, opened it and handed it to Ellen, behind Setsuna's back. "If you don't like it, I think the shop also sells coke."
Ellen sniffed the drink, then tasted it; and liked it. It wasn't at all like she imagined alcohol tasting. "Now I know why all the adults like drinking."
Drinking together at the beach, in front of a fire after a hot day, Love felt really happy. "One day I will sit at a real beach with both of you."
"You're such a romantic, Love." Setsuna looked happy though. "I'll take care not to get sunburned there."
"No treacherous magic caves in the real world. Lucky us." Love clinked her bottle against Setsuna's and turned around. "Komachi is taking really long."
"You left her behind?" Ellen looked to her right, at the stern girl, Karen, that was asleep sitting up, a towel around her shoulders. "Her date is already asleep."
"We ran into Akane and Rin on the way back and she got caught up chatting." Love was deeply grateful to Komachi for paying for their drinks as well. She was the top ranking one, so she definitely had the money for that. "I love days like this. Everyone together, hanging out. It makes me feel like we're on vacation."
"Even though you were beaten up by Reika?" Setsuna chuckled loudly. "Yes, I heard you lost."
"It was close!" Love pouted a little and hid her pretend embarrassment by greedily drinking most of her beer.
"Was Ako strong?" Ellen was a little curious. Even if Love and Setsuna were her partners, she felt a certain kind of pride when someone from her team really pulled their weight.
"Ako is a cheat code. I'm glad the four of you are a bit younger than the rest. If we had to deal with a twenty-five year old Cure Muse, that wouldn't be a joke or funny or fair." Love didn't miss that Ellen looked happy. "You should fight, Ellen. It's fun. Well, mostly fun. I did get skewered by some kind of ridiculously broken ability that Reika kept up her sleeve."
"It does feel like some of us are much better suited for the battles than others. All of the leaders from the bigger teams are strong but not nearly as strong as the strongest from their team. Like, you and Inori. She's really powerful." Setsuna really wanted to cuddle with the both of them but the itching and the pain from touching something was a good deterrent.
"Because she can hijack someone. In a one versus one, that's basically instant defeat. It's a cheat!" Love complained playfully.
"Everyone is cheating apparently." Ellen tried to tease Love a little but she was not very good at it.
"I should figure out some kind of super move. Other than that thing from a decade in the future."
"Losing two battles in a row is really bugging you." Setsuna finished her bottle and felt refreshed. "Can you open another one for me?"
"We got a strange beer with cherry flavor, wanna try that? We can share." Love opened the bottle when Setsuna had no objections. "And of course it bugs me! I'm supposed to be the bread maker of us three!"
"Even though I usually made more when we traveled?" Setsuna kept on chuckling when Love just looked away and said nothing.
"I'm a little jealous I can't talk about this stuff with you two. My life is kinda boring compared to what you two have going." Ellen was a little startled when someone walked past her, but it was just Komachi, who sat by Karen, carrying just two bottles.
The fire cast shadows that danced over their faces, drawing a beautiful and adventurous smile on Love's face. "Do you want to go travel with us?" Love had leaned forward, looking past Setsuna, right at Ellen. "We'll come back to Japan until you graduate. I wanna meet your family and we'll take you to meet ours. And we can start our travels over. The world is a big place. Although I think next time we'll tour south-east Asia a lot."
"Beach maniac." Setsuna leaned towards her younger girlfriend. "Be careful Ellen, she'll drag us from beach to beach with a boat. We'll get lost at sea and end up marooned on a tiny island somewhere in the ocean."
"That guy in the pirates movie survived being marooned!" Love protested and once again had to stop herself halfway from bouncing against Setsuna. "I hope the sunburn goes away soon. It's kinda annoying we can't touch you."
"Should Ellen and I switch places so you have someone to paw on?" Setsuna understood well how to push Love's buttons.
That much was obvious even to Komachi and Karen, who were watching those three with just a little bit of interest. Sitting close together, holding hands in the sand right below their legs, the couple just enjoyed the atmosphere all around them.
"It has been so long that I could swim like this that I went overboard. My arms are all sore and tingly." Karen was not a big fan of beer, and sadly there was no wine on offer, so she stuck with something plain normal instead; regular cola.
"But it wasn't just the swimming that was exhausting." Komachi felt a little sore herself, even though she had only swum a little bit.
"Will you stop mentioning that?" Karen looked around feverishly, hopeful nobody had overheard them. "I'll die of embarrassment if someone catches on we had sex in the bushes."
Komachi blushed herself. "I didn't say that out loud."
Karen quickly changed the topic, too worried about her own mental well being if she kept going with this. Pinching the little bit of flab that the novelist had on her stomach, Karen teased her. "You should be swimming more, you know."
"Rin, Nozomi and you have the sporty type in our team more than covered. It's all about balance." And I don't think I'll be able to get rid of my extra weight so easily. "This is the fate of all novelists."
"Excuses. You just don't wanna exercise. I dislike exercise other than swimming, too, but I can't afford to look flabby on stage. They always squeeze me in those tiny dresses."
"I know." Komachi rested her head on Karen's shoulder. "I always watched you on TV and bought the recordings."
"Maybe there will come a day when I won't feel bad over being ignorant of your feelings for so long."
"It's fine now. Even Kurumi is better off now. I saw her flirting with Hikari earlier."
"Flirting? That manners deaf Kurumi?" Karen looked a little amused.
"She's been working really hard to turn herself around. I think she had a real moment of enlightenment when you left her."
"I'm glad things didn't escalate like with Melody and Rhythm."
"Speaking of… you know Rin better than me, do you think those two will make it work?"
"Were you always this curious about the romance of others?" Karen chuckled but thought about it. "Rin and Rhythm… it sounds a little silly."
"Why do you still call her that?"
"Who, Rhythm? I don't know her that well."
"And you won't get to know her if you always stay polite like that."
"Rin and Kanade sounds much less silly." Karen paused. "Kanarin."
"Karen, stop."
"I don't know. Rin is… she's not really like Urara, but I feel like she doesn't trust herself to really make things work if she really wants them to work. Almost as if she doesn't dare to go for her number one goal."
"She was pretty shaken when she was outright told that she has no future as a designer. I remember feeling upset on her behalf because they were really rude about it, calling her designs tacky and childish."
"Nozomi helped her a lot through that time. I always thought that if Nozomi would work out her feelings for Coco and move on, it would be with Rin."
Komachi shifted a little and pointed past Karen. "Nozomi is sound asleep getting a lap pillow from Miyuki."
"They have a lot in common, those two."
"You mean because they're both optimistic pink Cures that function as the leader of a five people team consisting of red, yellow, green and blue?"
"When did you become so cynical?" Karen chuckled again.
"I just think it is rather funny that such a similar group was out there. Our reds are kinda similar. Our yellows couldn't be more different though. The greens, too. I'm the bookworm-ish type while Nao is the sporty type. But the blues are alike again, the cool and intelligent beauty."
"You got so good at flattering me."
"I wonder when… It feels like yesterday that I had trouble talking this much, let alone compliment you."
"Nozomi and Miyuki, hm… I had given up on Nozomi ever finding someone else she likes. And after Coco, I was sure she didn't like girls."
"Maybe she is making an exception." Komachi knew what that felt like – liking a single person so much that it didn't matter what gender they were. Or whether they were a small furry fairy creature.
"I'm happy for her anyway." Karen owed a lot of Nozomi, so she wanted her to be happy.
"I want to be happy for Rin, too."
"Rin is probably worried that Kanade wants to go back to Melody." Karen rolled her eyes. "Back to Hibiki."
"Hibiki and Itsuki did seem to have a fight earlier."
"And they played on the same side against Rin during the volleyball match," Karen added and felt a bit worried now. "I hope Rin doesn't get her heart broken."
"When did we become so pessimistic?" Komachi felt a little troubled by that.
"Only positive things from now on until we go to sleep." Both of them were quiet for a moment. "I am surprised Urara is making that crazy relationship of hers work." Karen broke the silence first.
"I feel like we should say something as the oldest two of our group… but I don't think it would achieve anything."
"They seem to be happy. And unless you remind yourself that Muse is not nearly as old as she seems, it is very easy to forget since she does not act her age." Karen listened to the crackling of the fire as she explained what she thought of Urara and Ako. "I feel like Urara has become a little closer to her old self thanks to her."
"She is still quite the delinquent."
"That is probably never gonna go away."
"Our group is full of strange people," Komachi said so with a big smile and put her coke bottle to her lips before she remembered something else. "Everyone here had some kind of wake up call in their life!"
"That is a terrible theme to have as a group." Karen reciprocated the big smile that came from her girlfriend. "It does look like it worked out alright for all of us."
"I wonder if Kurumi came down after the sun set. Setsuna did, and her sunburn was just as bad."
Unbeknownst to Komachi, Kurumi was not very far away at all, sitting close by the water, close enough that her feet reached into the wet sand, the waves touching them every now and then. And she was alone. Staring out towards the dark horizon, Kurumi had wished she could have seen the sunset with Hikari or gone swimming with her. She had made a fuss about Hikari staying with her, even though it would be really boring alone. But she didn't Hikari to suffer boredom just because she herself couldn't go.
Kurumi bolted forward when something cold touched her neck from the back, right into the wet sand on her knees and hands.
"So people really do that." Hikari crouched next to Kurumi and held a bottle of beer in front of her. "I'm sorry to startle you."
"Hikari… I wasn't startled. I just didn't want to disappoint you." Kurumi felt too embarrassed to admit the truth. And beer? You drink beer, Hikari?! But she took the bottle anyway.
Sitting down in the sand, far enough away from the wet sand that the waves would not reach her, Hikari saw the strange look that Kurumi gave her. "I'm sorry. I haven't really been active enough to buy anything for you, so I cleaned out an empty bottle I got from the campfire and went back to the hotel and filled it with juice."
Testing the contents of the bottle, Kurumi found out that it was some kind of fruit juice she couldn't place. "You did all that for me?"
"Tsubomi and Erika saw you come down here and told me." This is your chance Hikari. Remember what you talked about with Nozomi. I had all day to figure out what I would say and think about how I feel, too. And we're watching the ocean at night! Nagisa would complain that I am cheating. "Do you still hurt?"
"Putting on clothes hurts a bit but it itches more than it hurts now. I can't transform either because the day rule conveniently made everyone allergic to Cure forms." Kurumi really put the juice away. "This tastes like some kind of blend. It's really good."
"I'm glad you like it. I wasn't sure what kind you like and I had to get juice because… I don't really drink. It's weird, right? Even though I'm nineteen."
"Karen is a lightweight herself. I don't really like the way alcohol tastes, so I only ever drink it mixed with something really sweet like cola or especially sweet juice." Kurumi put the bottle down, drew her legs in and crossed her arms on top, resting her chin on top of her hands. "I wanted to see the sunset but I got here a little late."
"We can watch it tomorrow."
I don't really need a second sunset when I'm around you, Hikari. God, I'm embarrassed just thinking that! Thank god she can't see I'm blushing because I am definitely blushing. "You're cute in your swimsuit."
The blonde's heart skipped half a beat and she felt hot inside, similar but different from when she messed up at work and was suddenly put on the spot. She had never really had feelings for anyone, not like this, not in a romantic way. And now that she was aware of how she felt, she was over-thinking every little thing. "We fit together then."
Kurumi looked down at her chest and smiled in a way that was just a little somber. "Sometimes I wish I had Komachi's proportions."
"I like you better the way you are now. You're like a princess. Komachi… she would be more of an evil queen."
"Don't let her catch you saying that, she'll cry." Kurumi snorted out a laugh. "But thanks. I wanna say that you look like a princess too, but you're a queen already."
"That job… is on break." Hikari looked a little coy. "Um.. Kurumi, I've been thinking about us… together..."
"Because of the battle yesterday? Yeah, I was wondering about that too. The Queen's Knights: The Soldiers of Light. There is really no way to be any more on the nose than that. I guess you don't put your queen of light job on hold forever. It looks like I'm one of your guardians ten years from now."
"There is another explanation..." Hikari felt a little lightheaded now. She could deal with stress but this was new to her. "Even if I don't become the queen of light again… even if I don't go back to that..." Please don't let me blush or fumble my words! "If we're together, you could still be my knight."
"Together? You mean like we're now?" Kurumi stared out to the ocean, not noticing that Hikari was dangerously close to her now, their shoulders almost touching.
Kurumi felt silly and understood what Hikari meant when the angelic girl put her hand on top of Kurumi's, ever so careful because the knight was still sunburned all over. "I didn't think you even thought of me like that. Considering how badly I blew things up with Karen I didn't think anyone would want to be with me like that anymore."
"I… want to be with you like that." Hikari leaned a little to the side, her hand looking to take hold of Kurumi's and their shoulders touching lightly. "You probably wonder… why now, out of the blue."
Kurumi shook her head ever so lightly. "I can guess. You were paired with Nozomi. She is such a meddlesome girl."
"Is it… a bother?"
"That's my line." Kurumi turned her hand around and trapped Hikari's fingers between her own. "Are you sure you're okay with someone like me?"
"You shouldn't talk about yourself like that." Hikari was so happy that she wasn't being rejected that she knocked over her bottle and didn't care. "You work really hard. You always help me out. And you're really cute." Hikari blushed this time and she was sure that Kurumi could see it.
Digging into the sand with her left foot, Kurumi felt genuinely flattered. "You think I'm cute?"
"That's not the only reason I like you though!" Hikari felt like she was being misunderstood. "It's not just because you're cute!"
"I am definitely not so cute that someone like you would like me just for that." Kurumi stopped staring out at the ocean and glanced to the side, focusing on the blonde angel by her side. "It makes me happy that you think I've been trying so hard that you can like me."
"You're too hard on yourself."
The conversation died down because Kurumi didn't want to argue with Hikari but still doubted herself. The more she thought about Hikari liking her, the greater those doubts became. She hadn't really thought about having another relationship, not seriously, since her breakup with Karen. And now Hikari was the one that made the first move. The innocent, ever sweet Hikari. Holding hands in the dark made both of their hearts beat faster. The crashing waves occupied both theirs ears and eyes, so they would not focus too much on each other.
Kurumi was afraid of messing things up a second time. Hikari was afraid of hurting Kurumi because she knew she had scars. And so both of them just held hands for a while, until Hikari lifted up a rock inside a mind and found her courage hiding beneath it. "I'm sorry this won't sound very creative." Hikari squeezed Kurumi's hand, just a little, and turned to the side, her doing so forcing Kurumi to look right at her, like she was under a captivating spell. "I like you Kurumi. Please go out with me."
She's like the main character out of a shoujo manga. Ah, this is bad, being told that so straightforward is unfair. I do want to go out with her, I do… but what if I mess it up again? Hikari isn't Karen and our circumstances are different now… Just staring at Hikari, deep in thought, Kurumi turned more and more red by the moment.
"Please say something. My heart is going to burst." Hikari was still facing Kurumi, kneeling on the towel, their faces less than two hand lengths away from each other. "If you're gonna say something just to say something, please say yes." Hikari used the kindest of smiles, nearly melting Kurumi on the spot.
"I'll go out with you under one condition." Kurumi used both her hands to hold Hikari's now. "No spoiling. Just don't change anything from how we have been."
"I… was hoping we could kiss. Sometime."
"That's not what I meant." Kiss? Kiss Hikari? Me? Why does it feel like I would be ruining something pure? "I need you to stay by my side, so you can keep me as the good person I want to be." E…. Embarrassing! I can't believe I said that out loud! I never got that corny with Karen!
"Why would I go anywhere else? You're my most important person… together with Nagisa and Honoka, but they're not like you. I mean I'm not in love with them!" Hikari backed away and hid her face behind her hands. I said it! I didn't mean to say it! But I did! "Don't say anything, that just now doesn't count! I didn't want to put you on the spot like that!"
"It's adorable how flustered you get." Kurumi paused and then realized she had said that out loud instead of thinking it. The next moment both of them were equally flustered, just long enough to realize how silly they were, breaking out in laughter seconds later.
Returning to a normal sitting position on the towel, they held on to each other's hands, Kurumi with her right, Hikari with her left. "We're both not very good at this." Hikari felt her nervousness fade, little by little. I was so worried I wouldn't be able to speak my mind or get across what I mean the right way since I've never done this before… but this was not so bad. I'm glad Kurumi is so understanding.
"Have you ever kissed someone before?" Kurumi had experience with most if not all aspects of dating, but she twas pretty sure that Hikari had practically none.
"Only one time. And that doesn't count. I was staying over at Nagisa's and Honoka's place because my flat had a power outage. I was watching a bit of TV before going to sleep on their couch and Nagisa decided to join me while she waited for Honoka to get done in the bath. She was more than half asleep when Honoka came out and I told her."
"She kissed you thinking you're Honoka." Kurumi found that much funnier than it really was. "I can kind of see that happening. And you're right, that doesn't count." She started to look nervous now. So the first kiss burden is on me? No pressure, no pressure… right? She hadn't really spared these things much thought when she first got together with Karen, but things were different now.
The delicate mood was completely ruined when a strange and complex cluster of noises rapidly approached them in the dark. Kurumi and Hikari both dove for safety and walked into the water in the wake of an incoming disaster and sure enough, a disaster it was. Mana, carrying Rikka in her arms, was racing through the sands, swaying a little and openly mocking those behind her, shouting at them. "I hope you know how to pay up because I am winning this!"
Seconds after Mana had passed, two more pairs rampaged past Hikari and Kurumi, the two lovebirds submerged all the way to their shoulders. And what pairs they were. Hot on Mana's trail was Urara, who roared like a tank engine, carrying Regina piggyback, who was shouting supposedly encouraging things at her mighty steed. "Faster, woo! We'll get you Mana!"
"I'm never playing fucking rock paper scissors with you people again!" Urara bellowed and ran as hard as she could, her lungs protesting in pain but the distance between her and that superhuman woman was closing. In third place was an even more unlikely team: Ako and Inori, the former carrying the latter the same way Mana carried Rikka.
"How did we let them talk us into doing this?" Ako considered herself lucky that her transformed state was not canceled out by the beach's No Cure Powers effect.
"Free drinks." Inori was one of the fastest Cures in either team – with her powers. Without them she was rather slow compared to the taller Muse, who seemed to be pretty fit, physically speaking, for a princess.
Up ahead, Urara and Regina put their sinister plan in motion. "Do it." Urara knew there was no way she could beat Mana to that damn beach hut the legit way, so she was going to cheat. Regina put two fingers to her lips and whistled as hard as she could, the shrill tone piercing Urara's ears and leading in the era of destruction for Mana's lead on them.
Mana was faced with tough opposition. Hibiki and Itsuki had been bribed by Urara and Regina to obstruct justice – that was what Regina had called it anyway. Trying to stop Mana in her tracks was much easier said than done however.
"You go right, I go left. If she tries to make a break for it right through the middle we just stop her right there." Itsuki had made up with Hibiki, mostly, over the course of the day. Telling her she was sorry had mostly done the trick and Hibiki had admitted to being overly stubborn as well. Neither of them wanted to be the idiot that blew up a perfectly fine relationship and sleep alone that night out of stubbornness.
But Mana was much more athletic, even as a civilian, than they both anticipated. She couldn't do crazy things like somersault over their head or anything like that, but she was strong and quick enough run right into the water, crushing the waves beneath her feet and advancing like an unstoppable tank. She and Rikka got completely soaked in the process but a lot of money was riding on this.
Itsuki went above and beyond, jumped into the water and grabbed hold of Mana from the back, her arms around the girl's neck. But because it was in the water, she couldn't find a foothold to keep her back. Instead, she was being dragged along but she had significantly slowed her down.
A second whistle came and Hibiki braced herself to stop whoever came their way next. And to her surprise, that had been Urara herself. She only realized this after stopping the girl short by standing right in the way and then colliding with the relentless delinquent pair, all three of them flying a quarter of a meter through the air and landing in the sand in the most unrefined way possible; face first.
Ako and Inori ran past them seconds later, looking smug and self-satisfied. Urara pulled Regina out of the sand and picked her back up, the same way as the other two carried their girls, and made a run for it, not caring in the slightest that Regina was complaining about sand in her mouth and eyes.
But it was a hopeless cause. Urara, out of breath and her head red like a balloon, arrived at the beach hut several seconds after Inori. Their win was beyond reproach. "Shit… you damn… cheaters..."
Mana arrived moments later, out of breath and completely wet, just like Rikka and Itsuki. Hibiki joined the seven of them seconds later as well, still cleaning sand out of heir hair. "What's the big idea running me over?"
Ako looked doubly smug now. "Maybe your signal to interfere should not be something so easily imitated."
"Cheater!" Regina mouthed off and was immediately shut down by Inori's reply, who was glad to be back on her own feet.
"Says the girl that dragged two unrelated people into this and started cheating in the first place." Inori looked to Ako. "We make a good team it seems."
"Maybe I should rethink which yellow Cure I'm dating." Ako said it just loud enough that they could all hear it.
Inori was well aware that Ako was just poking fun at Urara now and she went along with it and grabbed Ako's arm, squeezing it against her chest. "I absolutely would not mind."
Urara could always one-up Ako when it came to things like this. Walking up to Inori as intensely as she could, Urara grabbed the girl by her chin and forced a sandy kiss on her, lasting a little more than an instant. "I'm warning you, things can get a little rough in bed. But this is gonna be my first time doing it with two Cures at the same time." Two Cures, because two girls would be a lie.
"Brute." Ako clicked her tongue but didn't do anything to stop Urara. Inori had to have known that getting involved in this could lead down that path.
"Upon further consideration, I think I'm good." Inori backed off and cleaned the sand from her lips.
"I can't believe I got here last!" Mana let Rikka down who immediately took to patting Mana's head. "Thanks, Rikka."
"You're… inhuman." Itsuki was out of breath just from hanging on to Mana as she waded through the waves and then dashed towards the beach hut again. "She and I together must weigh something like a hundred kilos."
"Mana has always been strong and athletic. Whenever she was not out and saving people, she would train herself so she doesn't have to rely on her powers as much." Rikka didn't talk a whole lot in front of people she didn't know, not anymore, but she was warming up to them now. After she realized they didn't really treat her like she was made of glass just because she was blind they earned her respect.
"No, no, no, I'm strong and athletic. She is superhuman without powers." Itsuki was a bit cold now. "So, who is paying?"
"I guess I am." Mana was a good person but she was not so good that she'd pay for people's drink out of her own pocket for no reason. But she had come in last and that was that.
"Urara is guilty of sabotaging the entire race, causing not only your loss but also her own. I am sure she'll cover half of the cost." Ako really knew how to push the girl's buttons and she did so with pleasure. She would never have admitted it, but she had felt the sting of jealousy when Urara kissed someone else right in front of her.
"You're gonna owe me for this, Ako." Urara accepted but not without demands of her own. Demands that she would make clear a little later at night.
Carrying everything the group of eight bought was a problem of its own. Everyone went a little bit overboard with size and number, the final pay totaling six-thousand yen flat, split half and half between Mana and Urara, rank one and rank three on the dark team.
The campfire was luckily large enough that they could occupy about half of the circle around it without bothering anyone too much, although Karen and Komachi bolted when they saw the group coming towards them. Inori went off as well, to find Kaoru.
Sitting arrangements were about as much in line with their relationship status as the race had been. Regina, Rikka and Mana were challenged by Urara's iron liver while Ako, Hibiki and Itsuki sat by the side, much more peaceful and enjoying their drinks. Itsuki hadn't really objected to Hibiki drinking. She was a stubborn and impulsive girl, but she had to make her own decisions. Ako was the only one that had gone for something non-alcoholic, not because she disliked it or wasn't allowed to drink but because she wanted to be sober later; because Urara definitely would not be.
Because it had been a good deal cheaper, the three rowdy ones and their supervisor, Rikka, had bought stuff in large bottles. Usually that wasn't allowed but Urara and Regina were in a contest to out-delinquent each other in front of the beach hut owner and he just agreed to their demands to get them out of his face. By the time Rikka had finished her first class, bourbon, Mana, Regina and Urara were on their third. Mana could drink surprisingly well but was still not in the same league as Urara, and, surprisingly, Regina.
"They're really going at it." Itsuki was enjoying a cold beer together with Hibiki. She was not a fan of hard liquor, it dulled her senses too much. This is as good a time as any. "Ako, I got a personal question for you if that's alright."
"That has to be about Urara or the way I look." Ako was much sharper than her real age would ever let on.
"I see where the brains of your group lies, Hibiki." Itsuki was punched, hard, on the shoulder and complained. "Ow, hey!"
"You do deserve that." Ako agreed. "I wonder if Hibiki told you about that story where she and Kanade stopped being friends because of a misunderstanding. It was very comical."
"Don't you dare tell her that!" Hibiki nearly spilled her beer and was bright red for a short moment. "That was so long ago!"
"But first, you wanted to ask me something?" Ako was mostly comfortable around Itsuki, even if she was going to ask about her real appearance. As Hibiki's girlfriend, she had to be a good person and nothing she saw from her really indicated anything else.
"You're..." Itsuki almost scanned Ako's body from head to toe. "You're not actually the same age as me, right?"
"That's right. Other than my Cure powers, I can use some magic. Such as making myself older or younger. Making myself older is much more complicated, which is why I can only do so by five years exactly."
"You can make yourself younger too?" Hibiki hadn't known about that. "So Queen Aphrodite can do that too?"
"She could make herself look… the same age I am now."
Hibiki tried to picture that for a moment and stopped when Ako slapped her shoulder. "What?"
"Knowing you like girls I cannot let you fantasize about my mother."
"I'm not doing that! I'm just curious!" Hibiki blushed despite speaking the truth.
"This is probably a bad question to ask you, but why do you make yourself older?"
"Look around you. This is an environment for adults. Hibiki and Kanade are the youngest and even they stick out like sore thumbs at times. I am thirteen. It would be pretty ridiculous. There is another really important reason however."
"That makes sense and what other reason?" Itsuki found Ako to be a pretty interesting person.
"Urara likes me this way alone. And I do think it fits my general attitude better, too." Ako could tell that she was going to blush, or at least make an embarrassed expression, if she didn't hide her face by drinking some of her cola.
"I can understand that." Itsuki sensed that Hibiki was gonna punch her again if she kept staring at Ako, but she didn't care. "So, is this how you think you will look like or-"
"Unless I ruin my body by eating a lot of junk food or otherwise stall my growth, this is what I will look like."
"Hibiki, you gotta have her teach you that magic. I wanna see twenty-one year old Hibiki." Itsuki grinned at her girlfriend and was surprised when she took that seriously.
"Can I learn it?" Hibiki was curious whether that was a possibility. I still remember that time I thought she was using platform boots and stilts to look like this, but in hindsight, there's no way she could have fought like that.
"You're human, so no." Ako just shot her down. "I look exactly like you humans and have the same biological make up but in the most stringent technical terms I am an alien." Ako liked the look on Hibiki's face. "I. Will. Probe. You. Hibiki." Making her voice vibrate a little, Ako realized just how much Urara was rubbing off on her.
"You're not weirded out by dating a girl so much older than you?" Itsuki looked at Urara and then reworked part of the question. "That is technically speaking so much older than you. Between you two I can guess who is the actual adult."
"Urara is more responsible and capable of mature behavior than she lets on." Ako defended her a little. "She does tend to not care about using either of those things, though. I love her anyway. And to answer your question, no, I doesn't really feel weird. I am more at home in my body like this than I am in my original form." In retrospect, I suppose that is why it didn't really bother me much that Urara didn't acknowledge my real form.
"Lots of strange relationships around here. There is something about pink Cures and attracting strange situations, too." Itsuki forgot for just a moment that Hibiki was one of them too. She was thinking of Love and Mana.
"What is that supposed to mean?"
"Well, you did end up in a pretty strange situation with your best friend and then me. Doesn't compare to Mana and Love, though."
"There should be a rule against hoarding girls like that." Hibiki tried to look past the fire, where Love, Setsuna and Ellen had been sitting earlier, but she couldn't see them. "It still feels a bit strange that Ellen got roped into that. Does Love have a fetish for Cures that used to be enemies?" Hibiki joked but neither of the two laughed.
"I never thought about it like that… maybe you're right." Ako considered Hibiki's joke in all seriousness.
"You might be on to something here. Mana better be careful that Regina isn't stolen from right under her nose. She was also like that, right?"
"You two are horrible." Hibiki immediately begun to pout.
The other half of the little party was a lot louder and unhinged compared. Rikka had tried to be a moderating influence but once challenged, Mana didn't back down and neither did Regina. Three bottles of vodka, because it had been cheap and good, in front of them together with three small glasses. They had just refilled their glasses. "Movie by Roland Emmerich in 2004!"
Mana twas not an avid cinema person and 2004 was way before her time too. She had been five years old then. Regina was even worse off, originally hailing from another word. Rikka gave the signal that time was up after ten seconds, making a silly beeping noise. Both Mana and Regina took the tiny shot, refilled their glasses and now it was Regina's turn. But first, Rikka had something to say. "All further questions have to be about either this location, not the beach specifically, or the people here."
"Combine all red and green Cures, how many of them are there?" Regina shot first.
"Four." Urara shot out. "Fuck. I mean five!" Everyone had one do-over in this per round and Urara blew it.
"Six." Mana answered just short of Rikka beeping her out. "Rouge, Mint, Passion, Sunny, March, Ace."
"Seven. Mana, you forgot Black Lily!"
"That's such a misleading name when she's green!" Mana complained and she and Urara both took their shots and refilled. Now it was Mana's turn. "How many Cures whose name start with B? Cure names!"
Urara started counting in her head. "Seven." She was just short of the time limit.
Regina didn't answer in time but right after Rikka timed them out. "Eight!"
"You're too late Regina." Rikka had no mercy on her girlfriend, being an absolutely fair judge. She was excused from the game because she was not a good drinker and the other three felt like she would be winning every round anyway. "Eight is correct though."
"Ah, crud!" Taking the shot, Regina blew air up her face, a single strand of her blonde hair flying off of her forehead and landing behind her ear.
Urara's turn was next. "First one to get taken out in your big intro battle two days ago!"
Regina couldn't even begin to guess and neither could Mana. Both of them just took their shots without even waiting for Rikka. Guessing wildly was not gonna get them anywhere. Regina tried to put up the next question but an emerging burp interrupted.
"Regina, manners!" Rikka felt embarrassed for her.
"Yeah, yeah, sorry 'bout that. Okay, okay. Cure I was paired with in the first battle."
"Sword." Mana shot out the answer so quickly that there was no way for Urara even to think about it. Refill, ready and question. "All seven classes of the old times rule!"
"I'm allowing extra time to answer that one." Rikka knew that just saying seven names out loud in ten seconds was a little harsh.
"Sword, Spear, Bow, Mount, Spell…" Mana couldn't remember the last two.
"Sword, Spear, Bow, Mount, Spell, Dagger, Madness." Urara could not remember the first three on the other hand and just copied from Mana.
More shots were taken and Urara was up again. "Cure with the biggest breasts. Not cup size, breast size!"
"How the hell are we supposed to know that?" Regina didn't see how that was a fair grounds question.
"You got eyes, don't you? And everyone's been walking around in swimsuits all day." Urara justified her question.
Ako had overheard the question and just shook her head, mumbling Pig under her breath. Urara didn't care if that question made her a pig; appreciating the finer things in life was important, like a good drink and nice breasts.
"Rosetta." Mana just guessed. Alice did have the biggest breasts out of everyone on her team.
"Mint." Regina also just guessed.
Urara looked smug and did a strange laugh-snort right through her teeth. "Wrong, it's March." Urara watched them take their shot and then it was Regina's turn, who was looking pretty drunk by now.
"Shortest Cure."
"Yayoi." Mana answered so quickly that it felt like she was on jeopardy. "Least represented Cure color."
Regina groaned. "Red. No, Black." Fuck, there's at least three black ones. I forgot to count myself. Regina was on a losing streak. She had one super question loaded up that would definitely net her a free win.
"Purple." Urara could only think of two and that was already counting the new girl from Regina's group.
"Moonlight doesn't count as white by the way." Mana laughed triumphantly. "She's silver. The only silver one."
"That is fucking cheating. She's either white or blue!" Urara took her shot anyway, even though purple was the right answer if silver wasn't a valid choice. "Since we're getting to the stupid questions, here we go. Girl with the smallest breasts on the beach."
"That's two boob questions in a row." Regina was impressed by how shameless that woman was. I'm gonna drink before I say me though! But I have no idea. I don't go around staring at tits all day! Having seen Hibiki's boobs up close just a little while ago, Regina went with that. "Melody."
"Luminous." Mana felt like Rikka was staring at her but that couldn't be.
"Damn, Luminous is right." Although Ako's probably a bunch smaller in that lil' form of hers. Urara took her shot and the round moved to Regina again.
"Number of Cures that keep their hair color when transformed!" Hah! I happen to remember their names and stuff by their hair color since that's fairly easy!
Mana and Urara were both real stumped by that and tried to do some record breaking mental gymnastics, trying to come up with an answer in time but Rikka timed both of them out. "It's eight, including me."
Urara was impressed by how much Mana could drink without looking fazed. She was noticing a bit of a buzz going on.
I am running out of trivia about the girls here, Mana thought and prolonged putting up her question as long as possible before Rikka got suspicious. "Second most represented Cure color."
"Yellow." Urara just answered without thinking. There's a yellow one in basically every group and I can't be bothered to try and jump through twenty hoops in my head to count.
"Pink." Regina thought that if the question was second most, then it had to be a trick question.
"It's blue. Drink up ladies." Mana was feeling the alcohol far more than she let on and she was really running out of questions to which she herself knew the answer.
"Girl with the biggest cup size." Urara didn't really care about breasts that much, but it was a contest of how long she could keep the boob questions going now.
"That again? March obviously since she's got the biggest boobs." I'm not that stupid, Regina thought.
But Mana was a little more attentive. March is obviously not the right answer. Or… is she? Maybe this is a trick question. But… And then the time was up.
"Cup size is about breast size in comparison to height and weight. Obviously it's not March. She's tied with Komachi actually. They're both H cups, but your Alice is an I cup. You know, we got some really good sizes across the board."
"How the hell do you know Alice's cup size?!" Regina knew it was right but she couldn't fathom how that woman could know about it.
"Urara looked sly. "I have my sources. Your turn." The things you can find in Mamo's notes.
"How many shots have I had?" Regina just nodded after the question and then looked at the other two with expectations.
"Eight." Mana hadn't kept count.
"Nine." Urara went one higher.
"Both wrong, ten." Regina watched them drink and it moved to Mana again.
Mana was really drawing a blank for a few seconds before she managed to think of something. "The exact amount the dark team won in the first big battle."
"Do we look like walking calculators?" Urara already grabbed her glass. "I'm not even gonna try."
Regina didn't bother to guess some six digit number either.
"170,898 yen." The number had only stuck with Mana because she had been so impressed by it.
Urara was struggling to keep the boobs theme running at this point. "How many cup sizes do Moonlight and her sister go up with their swimsuits?"
"You're really getting into creepy pervert realm with these questions." Regina leaned back a little too much and fell in the sand. I'm gonna have to bathe or shower to get all that sand off me. "Five."
"Six." Mana had made no real attempt at trying to guess something like that and just went with Regina's guess plus one. They do end up pretty busty. Urara grabbed her glass in annoyance and emptied it after she confirmed that Mana had guessed right. Wow, six cups. That is some magical swimsuit. If I had one like that I probably couldn't fight or run or do anything right.
"I'm… done." Regina was really feeling the booze now and used Mana like a wall to lean on.
"I was hoping you two would stop soon."
"Sorry Rikka… go ahead and shack up with Mana tonight… I'm gonna keep the bucket company the way this feels." Regina didn't want to admit she regretted drinking so much so quickly, not in front of that damn Urara. "You're a real pervert, Urara."
"Says the girl that's got the hottest blind chick on the planet and a superhuman model as her girlfriends." Urara felt the booze as well and it was making her a bit sloppy with her retorts.
Just a little way off from the drunkard trio were Makoto and Ange, enjoying an evening date under the stars. They had stopped by the hut to get something to drink a little bit after the large group because they didn't want to get dragged into their shenanigans. Makoto was holding Ange's hand and slowly pulled away now after having witnessed some rather childish behavior by Regina and Mana. "Let's not get any closer than that."
"Oh, why not? You are quite entertaining when you're drunk, Makoto." Ange let herself be pulled along without any resistance. "I still remember that time when I had to hold your hair and you started slurring together a dozen different of your songs while hanging on to the toilet."
"Don't remind me!" Makoto looked at the sand below her with laser focus. That one time I let Regina goat me into drinking with her! That stupid alcoholic!
Starting to hum a little tune, Ange made Makoto pay attention to her. It was not one of Makoto's songs but one that they had listened to a lot together when things had become tougher and tougher in their time. Ange wasn't particularly good or bad at singing but this specific song she knew by heart and could sing well. It was a cute little song that was called Alchemy by a band that no longer existed called Girls Dead Monster, a group of girls that toured the sites of curse disasters, bringing a small dose of happiness to people that had lost all hope.
Makoto wished she could have stood on stage with them. Hearing the tune made her hear the song in her head, made her hear the lyrics, she always became a little emotional and starting singing along. Especially one part of the song made her melancholic. I desperately want to live. All of the days that rushed by look like they'll disappear, It was a notion that dominated much of her adult life and one that she tried to pass on to the people she tried to save in Rikka's place.
"Do you think they will exist in the new world?" Ange stopped humming and whispering lyrics, walking arm in arm with Makoto.
"If they don't, I will make them exist." Makoto had pursued a solo career in her old life, but now things were different. "If we get a second chance at life, I am going to focus just on my music. The acting and the modeling is too much to really focus on singing."
"Before that world even exists you already have your first fan in me." Ange could say some really embarrassing and yet encouraging things without feeling any hesitation at all. "You and that yellow Cure that is friendly with Regina are both vocalists in the band group, right? Do you think you'll be able to get along with her?"
"She doesn't look the part but she can actually act like a professional. And thanks. It makes me glad that at least one of my fans survived the apocalypse."
"Speaking of which… you tossed in your sleep last night. Are you having dreams about our old world?"
Makoto's mood took a bit of a dive and she averted her face. "I think I will never not have nightmares about it. Davyi is still..." Touching the crystal embedded in her chest, right above her breasts, Makoto felt an intense sadness weight on her shoulders that was partly lifted when Ange took her into a tight embrace. "Thanks… I can't ask you about your tossing since you are almost as bad as Mana and Regina."
"You really have no delicacy at all when it comes to reading the mood. How did we ever fall in love?" Ange knew that Makoto's defense mechanism just worked like that and her own had adapted to match hers. "Must have something to do with that angelic voice and personality of yours."
"You sound like Mana. Makopi, Makopi, where art thou." Makoto liked to poke fun at how Mana used to talk to her.
"It feels like a lifetime ago that we went to school and she ran around calling you that." Ange lead Makoto further towards the edge of the beach, towards the cliffs.
"Now that we're here, it feels almost like prophecy from back then... do you remember? What I said to everyone when the kingdom became a republic and connected to earth."
"How could I not remember that? When it became true you beat yourself up over it for weeks. And when Davyi died…"
"I hope that they will come back to us in this new world that won't be heading down the path to destruction."
"We always end up talking about this."
Makoto looked a bit depressed. "I'm sorry, it's just that-" Her depression made way for surprise and then comfort when Age put her closely back into an embrace. "I feel like a stuffed bear sometimes."
"We went through a lot, so it's okay for you to be my stuffed bear." Ange didn't really know how to behave like a regular person anymore. How to relax and be romantic. And Makoto knew and understood that because she was the same.
"There aren't many people that can say they survived the end of the world. I'm sure that Davyi is proud of me."
"You… don't suppose she can see us when we're together, alone?"
Makoto blushed furiously at the implication that Davyi was watching her have sex with Ange; with the grown up Aguri. "Now I'm gonna be paranoid about it!"
"She was quite the beautiful woman in her human form."
"Between her and me, who do you prefer?!" Makoto sounded upset but for a former actress, that was easy to fake.
"You of course."
Makoto tried to stare down Ange, trying to make her either laugh or look away embarrassed. But instead it was her who was made to do something. The brunette that looked just like the former princess kissed her girlfriend in the dark, staring right into her eyes, causing her to be embarrassed and look away. "Do you think anyone will notice if I take one of the songs from Girls Dead Monster to perform here?"
She always escape to music topics whenever she is embarrassed. But I know Mako is not the type that enjoys being intimate out in the open anyway. "Which song?"
"Hot Meal."
"You mean Thousand Enemies."
"It's the same music but different lyrics!"
"I was just kidding, Mako."
"To be honest I was thinking about using something that their second vocalist sung because her voice is closer to mine. But Urara has a pretty powerful voice that goes a lot deeper than me. There are two versions of this song, so it might work well if we use it. The others will only have to learn the music once and each of us vocalists will only have to learn one set of lyrics."
"With you at the helm, we would be fine even without Mana."
"You know I'm not a leader like that. I'm only taking charge like this when it comes to music."
"I want to see you on stage again. By the time I was old enough to be interested in you… there were no more stages for you to stand on."
"You melodramatic princess." Makoto felt flattered. "Why did we go all the way to the cliffs?"
Ange cleared her throat. "Dizzily, I reach the road home, And I fall down into the cold room." She smirked when she saw Makoto's surprised face. "I know the lyrics to that one."
"You are awful at hitting the right tone." Makoto took a deep breath and just before she opened her mouth to show Ange how singing really worked she realized why they were all the way out here. So I can sing for her.
Not too far from them, by the underbrush, was a group of four – two of them quite drunk and one of them bent over next to a tree and emptying her stomach. "What were you trying to prove, Kanade?" Rin sat a few meters up front, next to the unconscious Akane, who had attempted to punch Reika in the face for screwing everything up with Nao and was promptly put to sleep by Rin, with a left hook no less, before the team feud could get any worse than it was already. "Being able to drink has nothing to do with being mature. Urara can drink like a sewage system. Doesn't really make her more of a grown up."
"I think she understands already." Reika was holding Kanade's hair out of the way so she wouldn't get something really undesirable on it. Is this where I am supposed to ask if she is okay even though it is abundantly clear that she isn't?
"What were you two doing together anyway?" Rin was exceedingly calm about it. So much that it upset Kanade more than the question would have to begin with.
"We weren't doing any-" A wave of nausea hit her right as she tried to defend herself.
Rin took pity on Kanade, stood up and nodded sideways towards Reika so she would switch places with her. Reika stepped back, letting Rin hold Kanade's hair. "Look stupid, I know you weren't doing anything erotic. There's no reason to think that. I'm not paranoid."
Kanade didn't say anything in return, an uncomfortable look on her face. I know… I just can't help it. The next wave of nausea hit her and finally she felt empty, staggering backwards and sitting down in the sand. "Gross..."
Rin sat down next to her and tried to pat her head but Kanade just skittered away, wanting to be left alone for a moment. I can't believe I let Rin see me like this. Hibiki would point her finger and laugh if she knew. I hate everything. Lying down in the sand, flat on her back, Kanade still felt the entire world turn around her. Just gonna close my eyes for a second… just a second...
Meanwhile, Rin was sitting with Reika, the unconscious Akane between them. "She is gonna be so pissed at me when she wakes up."
"I am sorry that our personal problems are affecting you-"
"This isn't the first time I punched someone out for misbehaving. She can be pissed at me all she wants, she really needs to put a sock in it. Yes, break ups hurt but come on. I don't see you going around and punching people."
"Maybe I should. Perhaps Nao thought I wasn't expressing my feelings well enough and-"
"Don't speculate about this, it's just gonna make you depressed. What were you and my underage drunkard over there talking about anyway?"
"You, coincidentally. As well as Melody, Nao, herself and myself." Reika leaned back a little and looked up at the sky full of stars, something she could never see in the cities of Earth. "We both lost who we loved due to failings of our own making."
Rin joined the solemn looking girl in watching the sky. "That's part of life I guess. For many things, you have to compromise, to settle for the next best thing. And sometimes, you just need to let go as much as possible. You're lucky I had a bunch of drinks, I'm usually not that talkative."
"I don't mean to make you-"
"Shut up and listen. I wanted to be a designer so much. I studied for a while, I tried my hardest and took rejection after rejection. But no matter how much I struggled, things never did look up for me. Eventually I realized that sometimes dreams are just that; things we wish to be but are not attainable. So instead of foolishly refusing to give up on something I had no chance to succeed at before the responsibilities of life caught up to me, I cut my losses. Nao was your first love, right?"
"Not was. She still is. But if she has fallen out of love with me, what can I do? I would only be making her miserable by holding on all on my own. Akane is mourning through her anger, but for me… I followed the path in my life that I felt I had to follow without second guessing it. I never really stopped and had to deal with rejection like this. I was a good student, I was a good Cure and I like to believe that I made a difference in the world through my work. But somewhere along the line, I did not manage to be a good girlfriend."
"You're the type that blames yourself, huh?"
"Are you saying it might not be my fault?"
"Maybe. It's easy to just go and say It's not my fault, it's all theirs. But it is also easy to be all It's all my fault. Both of those don't look at all for what could have gone wrong and focus just on who is to blame. But figuring out what went wrong is important, don't you think? I learned that after Kanade just showed up in my life."
"Yet you said that letting go is important. To continue to dwell on what exactly caused Nao to server her relationship with me and Akane… I might not look the part, but I do hurt like the rest of you."
"No surprise there. Everyone hurts, no matter how tough they act. Heck, the tougher they act, the more they hurt, usually."
"What makes you say that?"
Rin took a bit of a pause before she continued. "That's a story for another time."
"You said that you learned from Kanade, that it is important to learn what caused a relationship to fail."
"I'm sure you at least have a general idea of what's Kanade like. Stubborn, easy to upset, jealousy, a bit possessive. And she's quick to point fingers. For most people that's not easy to be with. And when you add someone like Hibiki, you might get two people that love each other but without the best of conditions, they won't be able to make it work. Kanade figured out that she was the one that ruined her first love. I still don't know if she will ever feel about me the same way she feels about Hibiki, but I'm fine with that. We got together without really knowing why. Without really thinking on whether we should. And before I knew it, I came to really like her. For someone so stubborn, so easily made jealous, she is just as sweet and caring if you can get past that. Maybe we'll break up soon, maybe we'll break up when or if we get out of here. And maybe we won't break up ever."
"You would spend the rest of your life with her?"
"It's wrong to ever think about someone like that because you never know what life is going to throw your way. I had a hard time genuinely caring about someone before her. For a while I was sleeping with Urara simply because we both knew we weren't interested in an actual relationship. But with her, I am more… I guess dedicated is the right word? I never really think about it all that deeply because I just… I don't even know. I end up worrying whether what I said is even true. I mean, how well do we really know ourselves?" Rin snorted. "Crap, now I'm sounding all existential crisis like."
"It's fascinating to see that you were a person like this." Reika had taken her for someone that didn't spend too much time thinking.
"Don't give me the credit just yet." Rin looked back down and Kanade's pretense couldn't fool her. "If you're eavesdropping, get over here. You're empty now, right?"
Reika looked down as well, thinking that Kanade was sure to have fallen asleep in her drunken stupor. But to her surprise, the girl slowly got up and came over, sitting down next to Rin, her knees pulled towards her chest. "How did you know?"
"Kanade is terrible at acting. You can tell right away if she's angry or sad or happy." Putting her left arm around Kanade's shoulder, Rin made the blonde lean against her. "And unlike most, I'm not really deterred by whatever mood she's in. Right?"
Kanade didn't say anything. She had never encountered Rin being drunk before and didn't know how to act now. Probably better… I feel like I might belch if I open my mouth. And still, against better judgment, she opened her mouth anyway. "Rin… I'm sorry about-"
"How many regrets do you think I have, Kanade?" Rin didn't want to hear another apology about Kanade having slept with Reika.
"Huh?"
"Lots. A lot of small ones and way too many big ones too. You know why I'm not bothered at all that you and misses freeze here had sex?"
Kanade pulled in her knees a little more, those words like a sting in her heart. Paranoia and jealousy flared up together with feelings of shame and fear. She couldn't really put those feelings into words, not with Rin or anyone else and maybe she never would.
"Because of how you acted after it happened." Rin poked Kanade's cheek so much that the girl tried to turn her head away. "You didn't freak out like crazy and preemptively break off what we had because of some delusion that I would dump you if I found out. You didn't try to cover it all up, even though it is obvious that covering up something like that would be impossible. You just came clean. And that's why I didn't mind. You fucked up, not by intention but by accident, and you dealt with it like an adult should. Which is more than can be said for a lot of us. Right, Reika?"
"Instead of wallowing in self-pity, I should deal with my feelings, you mean." Reika had listened to their conversation and felt like that often quite rude and brusque woman was wiser than her now. "It's… hard."
"Of course it's hard. Relationships are hard. Life is hard. But you better think about it twice and then again whether you want to give up something like that. I didn't really make much of it the first night I spent with Kanade. She was heartbroken and alone and I knew what that felt like, so I put myself by her side."
Kanade still didn't say anything, too drunk and embarrassed to retort. Instead she just leaned more against Rin, their legs touching now, and closed her eyes. I don't care why or what reasons you had, Rin. You were the only one that cared about me then and no matter how it started, I'm glad we're here together now.
"There's no this is the right way for relationships to start." Rin got a bit loud. "You got to deal with what you can get. If Nao dumped you, who knows if that is forever. Maybe you'll be together again. Maybe not. But don't you think it's important to look at your way forward at the same time as you look at the way you took to get here. You get what I mean."
"Learn what went wrong so you do not repeat the same thing twice. Thank-"
"Don't ever thank me for advice. You're all about choosing your own path, right? You listened to me, so now you gotta think about it and decide if this will work for you. Just like I decided that instead of playing it safe, listening to my brain and turning Kanade down, I'll go with my feelings instead. I guess I'm just well suited to deal with the antics of this munchkin here."
"Don't call me a munchkin! What the heck is a munchkin even?!" Kanade's attitude flared up and she felt very annoyed when she saw Rin's extremely smug look. She set me up. "Rin you idiot."
"The two of you are a strange couple." Reika felt a bit cheered up now, although she couldn't find a distinct reason why. "I am glad that I did not bring a wedge between you two."
"About that. Kanade apologized and all, but you still have to make this up to me." Rin really felt the alcohol now. "Let's see, what could I ask for?"
"Don't be an ass, Rin." Kanade couldn't believe that Rin was supposed to be the adult in this relationship. "She didn't do it on purpose."
"No, Rin is absolutely correct." Reika got on her knees and was about to bow her head to the ground when Rin repeatedly clicked her tongue and waved her free hand. "Who wants you to prostrate yourself?"
"Then what-"
"You're gonna spend the night with us." Rin looked both smug and villainous at the same time. "You already did it with Kanade, right? It's fine if I get a taste too then. And since Kanade is gonna blow a casket if we leave her out of that, you're gonna join us both. Don't worry, I know a thing or two about threesomes. Urara had some wild parties back on Earth."
"I really believe that is not a wise course-"
"You're single, right?"
"Well, yes I am, however-"
"Kanade and I are pretty darn drunk, right?"
"I will not be permitted to ask for another way to apologize, will I?" Reika recognized it when someone was just leading her on and had no intention of ever changing their mind. "Very well..." She couldn't help but sigh.
"You pig." Kanade tried to look genuinely upset and had moderate success. "You give me that speech about it being an accident and what not and you don't care and what not and now you're all Let me have sex with you too? Hypocrite."
"You know what the fun part is about being drunk?" Rin still looked terribly smug. "You can blame things like this all on the alcohol. And judging by what you told me and what I heard, you two definitely enjoyed going at it. So what if I want in on that action?"
"You just-"
"I just what? Want to fuck Reika? Don't care about you anymore? Don't be stupid. You know what I am doing? I am killing that memory of yours that has you sleep with Reika all on your own. I am killing those thoughts of yours that I know will keep bubbling up that I am holding it against you, no matter what I say. I know you well enough now. Deep down, you would never stop worrying about this. So instead of trying to fine chisel the issue away, I am doing what I know will work and take the sledgehammer to it. It's not the most elegant solution and it will probably bother Reika here a bunch but I really don't care."
"Sounds like an elaborate excuse to sleep with two girls at the same time." Kanade still looked mad, yet on the inside she was not. Rin is right.. even earlier, just walking with Reika, I kept thinking that if you would spot us, you'd think I am trying to two-time on you.
"I am not denying that I am going to have fun with no regrets." Rin chuckled by herself for a while, the two conscious girls by her side feeling like they had just been played.
About two hundred meters towards the center, on top of a large palm of all things, was a mildly worried Tsubomi and a very exhausted Erika, who had played around to her heart's content today. The hard palm leaves providing enough support to sit at the tree's center crown, the night wind was blowing much stronger so far up, their long hair flowing with it.
"It's been a while since I had so much fun in one day." Erika was strangely calm now after having spent all of her energy. Sitting her, hands on her knees and enjoying the breeze of the early night hours, she couldn't ask for anything more than she had now. "I think I am finally getting used to being here."
Tsubomi sat a little behind Erika, further towards the center of the crown because she wasn't too keen on falling down. "Even I can't tell when you're not feeling like you belong."
"That's not what I meant." Erika was in one of her rare, more serious moods. "You know nothing really keeps me down. So you're just thinking too hard, Tsubomi. I am what you see! I meant, this place finally feels like it is… I don't know exactly. It doesn't feel much like a prison anymore. Or at all, really. You're here and Itsuki and Yuri are here too. It's not quite home, but it feels close enough."
Slowly sliding forward to be closer to Erika, Tsubomi felt her heart jump in fear when the short girl suddenly pulled her forward so they sat side by side. "It's like we're characters in a romance novel and this is our happy end. Sitting on top of a palm tree at night, watching the ocean painted all black. But I am definitely the protagonist. You can be my heroine."
"What a worrying protagonist." Tsubomi smiled and then assumed the same position as Erika, her knees slightly angled up and her hands on top. "The breeze feels nice."
"It kinda feels like we should be talking about something important like our undying love for each other or something!" Erika smirked and knew that Tsubomi was blushing even without looking. "But we already know all about that, right? We're like super destined together."
"If this really was a romance novel, you would totally ruin the atmosphere, Erika." Tsubomi was all but used to this already. Genuine romantic moments with Erika were just different in nature than most expected. "You're impossible in so many ways."
"Impossible to resist, impossible to be mad at, impossible to ignore, impossible to hate, impossible-" Erika literally counted them on her fingers, her grin getting bigger with each one.
"Impossible to not catch boasting." Tsubomi added and enjoyed the super shocked face that Erika forced. "Sitting here in the dark like this, I'm remembering the dream I had last night."
"I was so lusting after Yayoi in that dream." Erika just blurted it out like it was perfectly normal. "I bet that's because I think she has a thing for me. But don't worry! The only ones I have the hots for is botany loving pink Cures that totally forgot that glasses are charm points!"
"I can understand liking Yayoi. She's cute, has some really amazing powers and she's a creative mind like you." Tsubomi wasn't really bothered by what was going on in Erika's dreams, even if it was not a normal kind of dream. "I suppose there is just a lot of difference between her and myself when it comes to… cushioning." Tsubomi had a few drinks, only just enough to make her drop the harshest of inhibitions. She could still perfectly align two index fingers in front of her face without looking.
"Not a fan of giant cushions. You always lose your stuff in them." Erika joined in when Tsubomi started to laugh.
"I know you won't get mad, so… in my dream, I think I was dating Itsuki."
"Makes sense. If I'm chasing the honey melon, you'd go for the banana."
"You're not going to make fun of me? Since Itsuki turned me down in the past."
"I'm not a heartless!"
Tsubomi didn't ask why it was a heartless. Probably just some weird thing she picked up over the years. "But I wonder why so many of us had the same dream. I talked to Itsuki and she said she didn't have any dream like that."
"Should we go and ask the chaotic five about it? I remember seeing someone that looked a bunch like one of them in my dream. Detective Erika Holmes and her trusty assistant, Tsubomi H. Watson on the case! We will find the treacherous Nozomi Moriarty and reveal her scheme!"
"I think Nozomi had enough problems already."
"You're no fun."
"You have too much fun."
"Having fun is elementary, my dear."
"God, you're the worst, Erika." Tsubomi started chuckling and couldn't stop.
Erika rose up and pointed at Tsubomi, index finger outstretched. "I have deducted the reason for your entertainment! First, let me explain how we first came to be here-!"
Tsubomi shook her head and raised her hands in defeat. "I concede, on great Holmes."
Dropping back down, Erika laid flat on her back, arms and legs stretched as far as she could. "I wonder if tonight we'll get a continuation of that dream."
"You want to see what happens next?" Tsubomi couldn't deny she was a little curious about that herself. She remembered not a whole lot about her dream, only being there, eating and cuddling with Itsuki. Hibiki would probably get seriously jealous. "Erika, no telling Hibiki about dream-me and dream-Itsuki!"
"Aye aye."
"Now that I think about it… Yayoi likes you?"
"Guess so. Although she hasn't acted like it in a few days. I did shoot her down pretty hard. I only have room for the number one and my only number one is Tsubomi! Something like that."
"You could have let her down a little bit easier."
Erika puffed up her cheeks. "Be a little jealous!"
"I know you wouldn't cheat on me."
"Fine, I guess I'll go not-cheat on you with Yayoi then!"
"In your dreams."
"Literally."
Both of them smiled at each other. Tsubomi joined Erika in lying down, letting the still warm wind flow over her scantily clad body. "It almost feels like a vacation now."
"We should do the cooking competition next! We got so many girls that can cook, it would be unfair for them to be locked out."
"You just want to bother them with all sorts of crazy stuff. There is a reason I banned you from the kitchen. I would prefer we do the quest for the public bath."
"Which one was that?" Erika turned over. An even bigger, more luxurious bath would definitely be great.
"A swimming competition."
"The other team got all the sporty Cures!"
"We have Mana and Nao."
"And they have Rin, Hibiki, Itsuki, Karen, Love- They got a whole bunch of them. We'll definitely lose. That's basically girl's manga vs boy's manga here!"
"That's a bit harsh. None of them look like boys."
"Tsumi… that's not what that means." Erika looked more amazed than amused. "All these missions or quests or whatever makes it feel like we're in a video game."
"First a novel, now a video game?"
"You don't think it fits? It's a bit like a role playing game. We build our base, we level up in battle and we earn money by beating up mons- each other."
"I like it. It gives us something to look forward to and focus on."
"No, no, you don't understand! Having it all laid out like that is no fun! We should have to find mysterious items that give us vague clues on where to start the quest!"
"I am taking away your retro consoles when we get back home."
"No! Anything but that!"
"So what would you like we do next?`As a team."
"Winter festival! Winter clothes are super stylish."
"Is that the only reason?"
"I wanna throw snowballs at people."
"You are such a goblin, Erika."
"Troll. It's trolls."
"Trolls are much larger." Tsubomi really enjoyed that Erika stepped right into that one. "See, I can play your game too."
"You have learned from the best. But much to learn you still have, young Tsubomin."
"Tsubomin?"
"It's cute."
"I like it better than Tsumi at least."
"Tsumi Tsubomin!"
"Now it sounds like some kind of ninja ability." Tsubomi raised her hand before her face. "Nin Nin!"
Both of them rolled around on the palm after that gag, giggling and laughing like they were back in middle school.
A similar mood and behavior could have been observed, if anyone had been nearby, in front of the beach hut, which was still open, between two girls that absolutely shouldn't have been there, behaving like that. But Yuri, after getting into a fight with Yami, had hit the alcohol a bit hard and Miki just followed suit – on Yuri's invitation and costs. Now the two of them were pretty hammered and enjoying that they could forget about prim and proper for an hour or two before hitting the sack.
"Okay, your turn." Miki enjoyed the taste of a cocktail whose contents and taste defied all description. They had been telling stories of work related chaos to each other. Miki had just finished her fourth one, earning a childish giggle at first and then infectious laughter.
"You heard of Muse – the idol group, not Ako, right? Bunch of high school girls that managed to make it pretty big."
"Heard of them, yeah."
"I met them. Someone at scheduling messed up and the agency I work at and theirs ended up in the same time slot at the same shooting place. And that wasn't just any old shoot. I was supposed to showcase a line of new exotic dresses, mostly stuff from China and Korea, and they had some kind of event going on for which they had to dress up. Anyway, they just sort of winged it and went Sure, we'll do them at the same time and play it off as a special guest appearance. Because she was under pressure, Momoka basically agreed to it unconditionally just so we could get out of there."
"That must have been total chaos."
"Like you can't even imagine. The labeling for the dresses weren't done so nobody was really sure what they were supposed to wear. Two of them were constantly fighting, one of them was running around being loud and acting like she was Captain Hopeful and another two were constantly making bedroom eyes at each other."
"Oh my god. Which ones were which?"
"The black haired one with the non-existent boobs and the blonde were non-stop flirting."
"What?!" Miki knew their names and nearly bent over.
"No wait, the busty black haired one was making bedroom eyes with the blonde. The small flat chested one was getting into a fight with the redhead over something. No idea what. I was busy in make up. And the real hilarity hadn't even started yet."
"Go on."
"So, by some miracle and without killing the backstage hands, we all got into dresses and were on our way to stage. I don't remember who it was but someone clearly wasn't used to walking in high heels, which were mandatory for the shoot, and fell – domino effect ensured."
"I'm dying."
"It was total chaos from there. I was supposed to spend like two hours there, including make up and shoot, and we ended up with six. The longer we were there, the more they started fighting. They look all friendly on stage but there are definitely rivalries going on there."
"Like what? Spill the beans – full disclosure, I'm a bit of a fan."
"Sorry, I don't think I can still get that together." Yuri shook her head. "Your turn."
"I don't even know where to start. Doesn't have to be about modeling, right?"
"Anything's fine."
"Okay. But you gotta promise me not to tell anyone about this. Especially Love, Inori and Setsuna."
"On my Cure honor."
"I was hired to be a backup dancer in one of those giant animal costumes for a festival. Miyuki signed me up to go because she wanted me to get some varied experience. Not the Miyuki here, the one I work with. So, first of all; I overslept. I don't know why but my alarm clock didn't go off. So I was late right off the bat. Then the train went off right before my nose. The next train wasn't going for another hour so I would be super late at best. There was only one thing I could do."
"Take a taxi? Ask someone to drive you?"
"In hindsight, that would have been an option too."
Yuri's face lit up and she was on the verge of bursting into laughter already. "You did not."
"I found a quiet place just outside the train station and kinda transformed."
"How do you kinda transform?"
"I transformed. Into Cure Berry. We were a bit famous around town, mind you. So using my spectacularly not suited Cure powers, I got to where I should be right after the train got there. I was in such a hurry that I went up ahead and to the location of the job and was just about to transform back when I got caught."
"Caught?"
"One of the staff workers mistook me for a very good Cure Berry cosplay – there was a Pretty Cure event going on like two kilometers away apparently and they had just finished. So without giving me any chance to turn back to normal, they made me strip out of my Cure clothes and made me put on the big animal costume."
Yuri started to silently laugh, hiding her face behind her hands, her whole body shaking for a few seconds before she let out a high pitched laugh. "And you performed like that?"
"I did. I had to be super careful because a little bit too much strength in just one step and I could have crushed the stage. And you know how my hair turns into this really fluffy ponytail that splits in the middle now? That wasn't like that back then. It was still how it used to be, like a really thick and big bread dough that wasn't baked yet."
The silver Cure fell into the sand, nearly laughing tears. "H-How did that end?"
"I was so sweating thanks to the big hair pillow that I couldn't just turn back to normal. I had to go and wipe myself off with all the other girls, still unable to transform back because obviously that would have been a problem at this point. So when we went back on stage, you will not believe who I spotted in the audience."
"Someone you knew?"
"Inori."
"Did she recognize you?"
"I don't think so. One by one, we animal costumed had to introduce our fictitious name and what we represented and when the mic was held in front of me, I just panicked and used this ultra high pitched voice which absolutely didn't fit my costume – a crocodile."
"Cure Crocodile!"
"Please spare me. So when the job was finally done, one of them chatted me up. How I got here and everything and I just said by train and then they offered me to take them back in their car. And because I was so spent I just accepted their offer without thinking."
"You didn't-"
"I did. I got dressed as Cure Berry again and had to lie through my teeth about being at that Pretty Cure event."
"This is the best story ever."
"I wish that was the only instance my rather… personal use of Cure powers had backfired on me."
"Now you're just bragging." Yuri was still dealing with random laughing fits as she imagined the whole thing.
"So, you got any stories about using your Cure powers for this sort of thing?"
Yuri distinctly looked away, so much so that Miki couldn't see her face. "No."
"Let's hear it."
"I'm telling you, there's no such story." Yuri was still looking away.
"It can't be that bad."
"You didn't have Erika as a team mate."
"Okay maybe it can be pretty bad, but let's hear it!"
"Fine." Yuri returned to a normal sitting position and hammered down the rest of her drink. "Gimme another one like this." Taking a moment to collect herself, she already look exhausted just thinking about it. "We were on a sight seeing trip in… it doesn't even matter. Tsubomi, Erika, Itsuki and me. We were visiting a large temple when Erika got herself into trouble for going places she shouldn't be going and pulled us into her mess when the shrine maiden called the priests, trying to chase us off. So before we really knew what was going on, Erika had pulled us inside the temple. They were looking for us everywhere so she came up with this genius idea."
Miki held her stomach. "Transform and put on regular clothes?"
"We had our bags with us at that point because we hadn't checked into a hotel yet. And since none of us wanted to go down to the police station for trespassing, we did it. Each of us took a cover of the room, transformed, stripped and put on new clothes."
"I am sure your perfectly natural bright and neon hair colors didn't raise any suspicion at all." Miki could just barely imagine how this must have looked to other visitors.
"We… pretended to be foreigners. Erika turned into a chatterbox with the most implausible broken English you can imagine. She was chatting up the shrine girls and the priests while we slowly made our way out. Because the stairs and the streets were full of people we couldn't very well just turn back in the middle of a crowd. So we got all the way to the hotel, four Cures in civilian clothes pretending to be foreigners, and thought; finally a break. But Erika had other plans. The inn's mistress casually mentioned they had just finished cleaning the open air bath-"
"So Erika dragged you all in there, Cure form and everything."
"There were other guests so we still couldn't turn back and to be honest, I was starting to not be bothered by it anymore. Sunshine struggled quite a bit with getting her hair free-"
"Yeah, her twin tails. Cure transformation is not made to be that flexible, especially not the hair."
"So sitting in the bath, as Cures, we were sure that the second we were finished bathing, we could go to our rooms and change back." Yuri sighed loudly. "Obviously, the Inn offered rental kimonos that Erika had signed us all up for so we could attend the local festival, which was-"
"Don't tell me. Don't tell. It was at the shrine."
"Ding-dong." Yuri hid her face behind her hand. "So, four kimono Cures went back up to the temple, way too early for the actual festivities but we couldn't exactly transform back now."
"Because the kimonos would be gone."
"Yes. So we had to keep the charade going until the festival started, for the entire duration of the festival and on our way back to the hotel. And finally, you'd think, finally we were back in our rooms and could turn back."
"Yeah. Not even Erika can keep the streak going indefinitely."
"If you had an Inn and the people that checked in were suddenly very differently looking people, what would you do?"
At this point Miki just fell over and rolled back and forth. "H-How long was that trip?"
"Three days, two nights. We were stuck in Cure form right until we got back home. I was exhausted like never before."
Miki's laughter could be heard for over twenty meters easy now and it wasn't stopping. And eventually, Yuri joined her, lasting for almost a minute.
With one Tsukikage right by the beach hut, the other one was as far away from her as possible. And just now, she had her first taste of alcohol and really hated it. "Ugh, how do you drink this?" Holding the small glass, that Alice had given her, in front of her face, Yami stuck out her tongue.
"My mistake. This one was meant for you." Exchanging glasses with a smile, Alice sat in the sat next to Yami, the cliff side just a few meters from there. They had heard Makoto and Ange in the distance earlier so they moved up a little – the waves of the night kissing the soles of their feet on occasion.
Trying the new concoction, Yami found that one to be far more suitable. It was very fruity and didn't have any kind of bitter aftertaste. "Much better."
"I bought the whole bottle." Finally sitting down next to Yami, Alice didn't waste any time, leaning right against her, their bare shoulders touching. "How do you like your first date so far?"
"A date? Is this what this is?" Yami reacted with obvious snark and leaned back against Alice. "I didn't think I would be going on a date with a girl much older than me."
"I am not that much older than you."
"Now, this is a secret-" Yami shushed no one in particular. "But I was actually made by Yuri's dad, my dad, from her DNA. I'm like her evil twin."
"Your father had excellent taste then."
"Wow, gross, he didn't think of me that way. He was under the influence of some alien psychopath. I was all killing machine and no cute."
"Really now? So you're all cute and no killing machine now?" Alice moved her left arm and clinked her glass against Yami's. "Don't worry, if you do end up drunk I'll tell you in embarrassing detail everything we did and said."
"Something tells me you might be a bad influence."
"My, what would you give that idea?" Reaching for Yami's chin, Alice made the girl to look at her, at her expression, clearly promising adult and erotic things to happen to her. "Does this look like the face of a bad person?"
"Who knows? Don't I look like one?" Without being asked to, Yami closed her eyes and tried to close the distance between them. But a single finger, damp and warm, stood in her face.
"Now, now, why would you hide those beautiful blue eyes from me?" Taking her finger away, dark orange eyes firmly fixated on to those of the girl by her side, Alice expertly kissed her. How nice that she learned well. The faint taste of the alcohol on their lips, inside their mouths, mixing and changing as they kept their lips locked together, until Yami broke it off, panting, not from excitement but because she had held her breath. "Silly, holding your breath will not do you any good."
Looking up ahead at the ocean, Yami put on a tough face. "I'll get the hang of it soon." Taking another sip from her glass, Yami was really enjoying the situation. "So is this what you do? Pick the most inexperienced girl around and seduce her? What a bad person you are." She remained full of snark, drinking again and again from her glass while she eyed Alice from the side.
"I am instructing you. Now if I wanted to seduce you..." Alice put down her glass and in a single movement, she pushed Yami to the ground by her shoulders, kneeling over her. "I would do something like this." Her hair hanging down and tickling Yami's shoulders, her large breasts swaying a little back and forth from the position she was in. Forcing a bit of an impish expression, Alice just remained put. "Feeling seduced yet?"
"Yeah, pretty seduced." Yami reached out to Alice, her slender arms going right past the former rich girl's head and around her neck. "How about you? Do you find me hot?"
"Those are not the same thing, silly girl." Alice's position didn't change. "And where might you be staring? Is my face not pleasant enough to look at?"
"You wouldn't understand. You're stacked." Pulling on Alice, Yami got her to lower her body, until the two were close enough for breasts to touch. And then she pulled some more, Alice practically lying on top of her. "I was wondering what this felt like."
"Don't you say I am heavy." Alice smirked, turned her head and went for the right side of Yami's neck. "If you are curious what it feels like to rub our breasts together-" Reaching for Yami's swimsuit as she kept caressing and licking her neck, Alice was surprised that Yami stopped her. Sitting up and backing away, off of Yami, Alice was trying to err on the side of caution. She wanted to sleep with Yami but she wasn't going to force her into it.
Yami got back up herself but remained seated. She didn't say anything about why she stopped Alice, not yet. She wanted to make absolutely sure she really felt this way and it wasn't a spur of the moment thing; fear or hesitance. Alice was alluring to her, she had no doubts about that. That mature, kind aura, the beautiful outside and the pushy but not too pushy personality. She didn't treat her differently from how she would have treated any other girl, and to Yami, that was important. It made her feel normal.
Stretching her legs and looking back at the ocean for a moment, Yami leaned back a little, waving her empty glass in front of Alice. "I'm sure Yuri would be furious if she knew I was drinking. But that only makes me want to drink more."
"A rebellious little sister. Poor Yuri." Alice mixed a bit of vodka with a lot of something else, a thick, almost syrup like juice that completely masked the taste of the alcohol. I started her off with something really light. She could probably drink the entire bottle of juice mixed with vodka and still be short three real, stiff drinks.
Drinking again, Alice moved closer once more, but this time she put her hand on Yami's thigh, sliding up and down over her smooth skin. "I wish I had long legs like that."
"Too~ bad, you can't have them." Turning back toward Alice, Yami didn't want to be pushed down again. "Mood killer question – how do couples sit together?" Saying it with a bit of snark just made it an amusing question instead.
Alice got on her feet, walked two steps and sat down, trapping Yami's legs below her. Spreading her legs and facing Yami, Alice knew that this would have blown a limiter for just about any girl she could have picked up. But precisely because Yami was new at this, she reacted differently. Or maybe she is just naturally very lewd. Now that would be a promising development. "Still no comments about my weight."
"I'm pretty sure I'm heavier than you – and I'm not cushioned like that." Reaching for Alice's breasts, Yami hesitated for a moment. "It's fine to touch them, right?"
"Don't be rough." Bending forward and pushing her breasts against Yami's hands, Alice whispered to her. "The rough play I can teach you later." Feeling Yami's fingers on her bare skin, Alice was a little disappointed with her date's technique. "Lemme give you a few pointers." Leaning back again, Alice tried to showcase how to properly grope someone with large breasts. "Everyone feels pressure differently so you need to go by ear." Alice grinned a little dirty. "By how much I pant and moan for you." Might as well teach her the beginner steps of dirty talk.
Alice's demonstrated ended abruptly when Yami grabbed her by her wrists. "Do it on me."
"How provocative." Alice was amused by how straightforward Yami could be. Most girls would be far too embarrassed to say this."Sure. Let's just get rid of this hindrance and-" Alice understood when Yami stopped her again the second she tried to take off her swimsuit. I don't know if she's jealous or embarrassed or something else, but if she wants me to let her play pretend, I can do that. "Should I make sure you keep your voice down?" I doubt that's gonna be necessary. She's not gonna feel anything like this or get any idea of what I am doing.
But Alice miscalculated. Groping Yami pretty roughly, the girl winced and glared at Alice for a moment. That had the desired effect. Alice backed off, remained where she was, but took off her hands. "You really felt that?"
"I told you before."
"I admit I didn't believe you." Is she pretending still? But why would… well, easy to find out. "One test and I'll fully believe you. Close your eyes." Waiting for Yami to indulge her, Alice slightly pressed just her index finger against Yami's right boob. "What am I doing?"
"Poking my right side with one finger." Yami opened her eyes and looked a bit pissed.
"That's some impressive fashion." Alice tried to defuse the situation with a joke. "I'm sorry for not believing you. But that certainly changes a few things." Getting on her knees and moving forward for a little, Alice sat back down. "Okay then, pay close attention." Trying her utmost to look seductive and sexy, she managed to make the girl with teal hair blush for once. "Save the moaning for later."
For Yami, that was much harder than anticipated. Alice's expert touch robbed her of breath and rational thought alike, making her a slave to the new and fantastic sensation originating from her chest. I so don't care if they're not real. This feels too good to ever give up. Before she knew it, she was breathing heavily, panting and squinting in front of Alice, who just stopped after a little while.
Touching her forehead against Yami's, Alice scolded her in the same tone a couple would tease each other in the bedroom. "You bad girl, you aren't paying attention at all."
"Nah, I think I kinda get it now." Maybe. Reaching out and fondling Alice again, Yami didn't get the desired results – only a pleasured humming. "Still no good?"
"Much better." She licked her lips, forcing Yami's hands away and moving up even closer – close enough that their bodies were touching. "How does this feel, hm?" Rubbing against Yami, Alice had a great grin on her face when she saw the girl's expression. Bending forward, her breasts squishing down on Yami's, she licked the top of Yami's ear. "What a dirty face you're making in public you indecent girl."
"Look who's talking, seducing an innocent girl." Yami returned the grin and didn't give Alice to come up with any kind of retort – sealing her lips with a kiss, still crude and a bit lacking in technique but fierce enough to force color to Alice's face.
They parted with their lips wet and sticky, both of them panting, Yami much more so than Alice. "Much better than before."
"I'm a quick study." Putting her arms around Alice's waist, Yami was hungry for more. "Teach me the rest."
"The rest? Are you sure you're ready for that? There is only one first time and all." Goating Yami into wanting more didn't pose a problem for Alice. "Maybe you should wait for someone else to be your first time. Someone you love."
"I'm all set then." Her snarky confession of love was the perfect lure for Alice.
=== Dissonance ===
Hours before, at dawn
Finding that the sun out there in Banished was every bit the angry god that Mirage Marine described, Nozomi had little choice but to hide out in the cottage. Just five minutes out there caused her to get skin irritations that would no doubt be sunburn in another five. Sitting on the floor was extremely unpleasant, not to mention boring. She had no idea how long she had spent out there, trying to pass the time and almost dying to boredom. And then, without warning, someone kicked the side of her butt pretty hard. Startled and jumping up, Nozomi was face to face with Miyuki, the Bad End version.
"The fuck are you doing? Come to bed already. I'm not telling you twice." Turning about, yawning and walking back to her room, Miyuki couldn't believe she was this bothered by sleeping alone. She had been the very first to pair up with someone. Shit. Nozomi is gonna give me hell for this. Probably.
Nozomi did follow her back into the room, her hands made into fists and resting on her collarbones. "You won't do anything… strange to me, right?"
"Don't be such a prude." Miyuki laid down, groaned and waved at Nozomi. "You gonna sit the next twelve hours on the floor or you gonna move your ass?"
Turning over, showing her back to Nozomi, Miyuki yawned loudly and closed her eyes. And after another minute, she felt someone get into bed with her. Not five seconds passed before she rolled over, opened one eye and looked right into Nozomi's purple eyes. "You look just like her."
"You look just like the Miyuki on my side."
"Well, duh. Anyway, go to sleep. I'm not feeding you for free tomorrow as well. You're gonna make yourself useful." Turning over again, silence dominated the room for nearly ten minutes before Miyuki gave up. "Hey. You still awake?"
Nozomi nodded, making a light hum.
Turning over to face Nozomi a second time, Miyuki looked less intense, less angry now. "Let me cuddle with you. I can't sleep like this. Things are what they are and I'll be pissed through the roof if I can't get some sleep. I'll make it up to you somehow."
She felt conflicted. Cuddling… if it's only cuddling and I can save all the others a really irritated leader… and it's not like I'm cuddling with the real Miyuki. "Just for tonight."
"Of course. Tomorrow we're going to gt you back to your own people." Miyuki got a little closer. "Turn around and don't freak out." Waiting for Nozomi to follow her order, Miyuki forced her left foot between Nozomi's legs, down by her ankles. One arm went below her waist, the other above, pulling the light Cure in close, resting her forehead against the back of Nozomi's head. "You smell a lot better than my Nozomi does..." And within seconds, Miyuki was gone, her hands loosely resting on Nozomi's stomach, her leg just slightly between Nozomi's and her shallow breath just barely noticeable for Nozomi on her neck.
And despite the odd circumstances, Nozomi felt strangely happy, strangely comfortable. Unless she really reminded herself of it, she could simply think of her as the real, the regular Miyuki. And with that thought in mind, Nozomi passed into the land of dreams herself.
Morning was a lot more dark and dim compared to the other side. Three of the girls woke up before Nozomi did – leaving Miyuki, still asleep, in bed, she got out. "Good… morning?" Nozomi wasn't really sure about that.
"We think of it as morning." Mirage Sunshine, or just Itsuki, raised her hand as a greeting. She was holding a tall spear with her other hand and had a wooden bow, self-made, strapped to her back. "I'm going hunting before all the animals go to sleep. As soon as the sun is down."
The other two that were up were Tsubomi, who was using Itsuki like a wall to lean against, and Karen, who was yawning non-stop. "Didn't get a chance to talk to you last night. I'm… well you know who I am, I guess?" Holding out her hand to Nozomi, Karen smiled in a droopy way when she shook her hand. "You mind giving me a hand pulling water? Nao is gonna need something to cook tea." Seeing Nozomi's surprised face, Karen smiled. "Yeah we got tea, thanks to Tsubomi."
"More like, thanks to my self on the other side. I know what I know about plants only because of her." Mirage Blossom, the Tsubomi of Banished, still felt tired. "I wish it'd rain. I could just stay in bed then."
"I hate hunting in the rain."
"So stay in bed with me."
Itsuki noticed the strange look that Nozomi was giving them. "What? You wanna say something?!"
"Itsuki, shut it." Tsubomi stepped right on her girlfriend's foot. "She's staring because obviously the Tsubomi on the other side isn't sleeping with their Itsuki."
Nozomi wished she could just go back to bed. But a fourth girl was just walking out of the main room now – Dark Mint. "Ugh… why are all you fools already awake..." Yawning loudly, Komachi squinted and looked out. "Another dry day, yay… Karen, what's my duty today- oh right, never mind, you have a sifter for brains."
"Komachi shut up." Tsubomi looked at her from the side. "Sorry, usually our Nozomi keeps her in line."
"Right, right… tch." Komachi squinted again and then walked back into the big room while grumbling. "I hope Akane didn't wake up yet."
"Akane and Komachi?" Nozomi said that out loud without thinking.
"So? We don't have to mimic whatever relationships you got going over there- ow, Tsubomi, what?!"
"I keep telling you that you don't have to act like the alpha girl. You remember what happened the last time Nozomi had to put you in your place?" Tsubomi got on her very toes and still had to reach pretty high to flick Itsuki's forehead. "Stupid. Where is this even coming from? You weren't like that when we first got here."
Karen grabbed Nozomi by her arm and out of the cottage. The sun had just now vanished over the horizon line and it was safe to go out. "They sometimes get into an argument like that. Itsuki is kinda… well you saw. The well is over there."
"I asked Erika last night… day… this is confusing."
"It's good morning, good night, and also last night. Just fits. What about Erika? I'll pull the bucket up and down, you switch them out. When we got four full ones, we'll carry em over to the fire. Keep one bucket for the tea the others we'll carry to Tsubomi's field. We'll have to do a few runs."
While Dark Karen turned the mechanism to pull up the bucket from inside the well, Nozomi asked her a few more questions. "How come you're so different from my side's Karen?"
"Hm, I dunno? I guess we didn't really have a lot of time to… what was it… express individuality. So now that we have, everyone ended up a little different from… what was it… specifications." The other Karen smirked. "Our Nozomi called it that. Pretty smart, right?"
Is that really smart? "Yeah." I don't want to be offensive.
A few minutes later, Nozomi ached under the weight of two large wooden buckets, filled to the brim with water. "H-How many kilos is that?" Not having her powers, at least not in the traditional sense, really was inconvenient out there.
"No idea." Karen replied with a smile, not looking too bothered by the weight. And when Nozomi took a closer look, she could see the outlines of muscle on Karen's arms and legs – as if she was carrying around buckets of water every day and possibly all day long.
Tsubomi was already there, plucking weeds that had grown in over the day. It was a large field, almost spectacularly so, considering they were only fourteen people. There wasn't too much of any one thing but a whole lot of diversity. Nozomi didn't even recognize most of the plants. "Hard work, huh?" Tsubomi said this with a smile on her face. "It's not so easy out here and all."
"I'm super impressed with the field." Nozomi got on her toes and tried to get a good look over it all. "I remember hearing about them growing faster than normal?"
"Tomatoes take about ten days to grow in and then they can be harvested every three to four days. It depends on how much sun we get. The rest varies a lot. Karen, grab Nao when she's up to help you with the carrying. Nozomi, I'll show you how to water the plants."
"I had her first." Karen wasn't too happy with that.
"And you'll have her last if you make her carry water all day. Look at her. Her legs are shaking." Tsubomi noticed that Nozomi immediately grabbed her knees to stop the shaking, trying her best to smile.
"I understand." Karen, this one at least, was not one to argue much. "Sorry Nozomi, I didn't think it'd be so hard on you."
"Come here." Waving Nozomi over while Karen made a dash back to the well, Tsubomi grabbed one of the buckets and she was struggling just a little bit with the weight. "Don't think everyone here is a muscle head like her. Anyway, carry the bucket with one hand at the bottom and one at the top. Make it so the water runs over your hand, it makes for better distribution. Watch me for a second." Holding the bucket at an angle, Tsubomi slowly stepped forward continuously as she had water run over the crops. "Like this, see."
Nozomi picked up a bucket and started in the second lane. "Is it hard, all of you getting along?"
"Sometimes. Miyuki and Nozomi keep a real lid on any arguments. Sometimes I help too, although I mostly keep Itsuki and Erika in line."
"I just thought that-"
"Because out of all of us, ten of them were basically evil girl ex machina? I can see why you'd think it'd be hard for us to get along. Truth be told, we were pretty much at each other's throat the first day. But once hunger and thirst set in, and you have no place to sleep, nobody to keep you warm and you're dirty all over? You really sober up from the whole my enemy, my enemy thing. We Mirage are different, we didn't start out evil so we played peacekeeper for the first few days. Miyuki and her crop were a real handful. Nozomi, our Nozomi that is, managed to smooth things over with her lot. I think Komachi came around first, then Karen, then Rin and Urara together. Miyuki and her group took a bit longer and I think it was Yayoi who first called it quits."
"Is everyone else okay with you telling me all this?"
"They don't really have a say in the matter. Telling you this just means there's a better chance that if you do tell someone on the other side, they're less likely to storm in here and kill us all."
"Uh… we are supposed to be the good girls. We don't go and kill people." Tsubomi looked at her with an expression that just said really now? And Nozomi conceded. "Okay, we don't do that if we have any other choice!"
"I think Rin and Urara got disciplined pretty hard by Miyuki so they won't be pulling a stunt like this again. I still don't really understand why you two swapped places anyway."
"Answers to questions like that seem to be super rare." Nozomi finished the bucket and went to get another. She could already see Karen in the distance, approaching with more buckets and ready to collect the empty ones.
"How many of you are there on the other side?" Tsubomi was more than just a little curious.
"Two teams of eighteen."
Tsubomi stopped. "Seriously? Thirty-six Cures? Is there an industrial Cure manufacturing plant somewhere on Earth?"
"Ehehe… It's a lot, right?"
"What do you even fight? I mean the second some kinda evil shows up, they must be like Oh nope, I am out of here, not fighting two dozen plus of you legendary warriors. Right?"
"Oh, we actually were a lot of groups that didn't have anything to do with each other."
"Huh? How do thirty something plus magical girls not find out about each other? Actually, never mind, I think my head will start hurting if I think about this any more."
"Do you do this every day?" Nozomi noticed Karen leave two full buckets and pick up two empty ones. "It looks like a lot of work."
"Everyone has their job. Mine just happens to be farming."
"I heard about this from Marine last night." Nozomi noticed that it was getting darker now. "Isn't it hard to work in the dark?"
"You'll see in thirty minutes or so. You came in late last night, around dinner time if I remember right, so we had put out most of the lights already." Tsubomi finished another bucket. There was still a lot of plants to water.
"Oh, is that Yayoi's job then?"
"We don't have anything so advanced that we can use her electrical powers. Rin and Akane take care of the lights. You noticed the big poles with a bowl on top, right? There's… well you're better off not knowing what's in there. Akane and Rin go around lighting them up as it gets darker. Nao puts them out when they're no longer necessary. And in most nights we got a fair bit of moonlight, which helps. Thankfully it doesn't get that cold around here."
"What do you do for showers or baths?" I kinda need one soon. I think I'm smelling of sweat.
"It's a lot of work for Karen, Reika, Akane and Rin to make a bath happen, so we all get together for a communal bath twice a week. Most of us wash up at the river, about ten minutes on foot in that direction." Tsubomi nodded in the general vicinity of the cottage because she had her hands full. "We got a stone basin that Nao spend a week cutting into shape. So we fill that with water. Akane and Rin heat it up then. After we're done, we let it cool and Reika freezes it the next day. Itsuki breaks it into pieces and we basically throw it into the river that's right there."
"Today doesn't happen to be-"
"You're lucky if anything. Yeah, today is bathing day. Since you don't have a clear job, you're probably gonna help out with everything, here and there. Only those that work, eat."
"I don't mind at all. I'm just not very good with heavy lifting and such."
"You're no Itsuki or Karen, that's for sure."
"I'm surprised that there are actually animals out here. I heard Yuri and Itsuki are the ones hunting them?"
"Yuri is more about hunting small prey, rabbits and stuff, while Itsuki focuses on the larger ones, deer. There's no predators around, like wolves or anything. Come to think of it, I wonder how Erika's pet project is going."
"What's she doing?"
"Literally a pet project. A few days ago, chickens started to show up pretty far out, so she's going to go with Yuri and try to catch a whole bunch. For now, just to eat them. But over the next few days Miyuki wants us to build a cage so we can keep the chickens. We got enough vegetable leftover stuff for them to eat and eggs is something we can't get any other way."
"I think we'd do a lot worse than you if we were suddenly thrust out here." Nozomi stretched, her back hurting a little.
"Speak of the devil." Tsubomi put down her bucket and whistled as hard as she could. "Erika! Hey! Bring back some chicken!" About fifty meters out were Yuri and Erika, who didn't stop or make any detour – they were in a hurry. They were armed with rope and some primitive wooden traps. Erika whistled back and then waved.
"She's a bit annoying but she's good at what she does – if she does it."
"Back on our side, you two-" Nozomi covered her mouth.
"Are a couple? Not my first choice, but I could definitely do worse. She's like a very fluffy cat. You can't stay mad at her for long but it's absolutely impossible to domesticate her. Okay, less talking and more watering now, we're falling behind." Tsubomi looked at Karen, who had sat down by the edge of the field after delivering the next set of buckets and having none to take back.
Focusing on her temporary job, Nozomi spent the next hour just doing that until they were done with the field. I… I can't imagine having to spend all this time carrying buckets. My back is killing me already. "Do you do this on your own every day?"
"Pretty much. I usually water them again before dinner." Tsubomi walked over to a pile of baskets. "I'm gonna check what's good for harvesting now and I can't teach you that. You could go and help Nao with breakfast."
"I'll do that. Before Karen asks me to carry buckets again." Nozomi quickly waved and left – taking about five steps before she came back. "Where do I find Nao?"
"Go back to the cottage. To the left of it, we have something like a kitchen." Tsubomi waved Nozomi goodbye with a smile.
Finding Nao was easy – she just had to follow the smell. And it wasn't just Nao she found. Akane, Komachi and Rin were there as well. The kitchen was more or less an open air area, no real walls, but it had a roof. It consisted entirely of work space, shelves and the odd wooden and stone furniture.
"Here to help?" Nao and Akane were boiling tea leaves in an iron pot, big but not so big that it wouldn't still fit on a stove. Komachi and Rin were baking bread, using Komachi's barrier powers and Rin's heat to bake a bread that defied all common sense in size. "We already finished baking the first bread, so can you take over for me here? I like to cut it while it is still warm."
Nao moved over and Akane just looked at Nozomi for a brief moment. "Morning." After the trashing she had received yesterday, Bad End Sunny had put a lid on all the questions she wanted to ask that other Nozomi.
"M-Morning. What do I do now?"
"Stir the leaves until the color is golden brown. Then let it rest for about a minute, then use the ladle to fill the cups, they're under the work space." Nao instructed the new arrival and then focused on her job. Making a fist first, and then extended middle and index finger, she concentrated her wind powers on just those two fingers and used wind blades to cut the bread. "I could use a knife, but this way the slices are very neat and it doesn't crush the bread."
"I didn't know you could grow all the stuff you need to make bread." Nozomi occasionally glanced over at Komachi and Rin.
"We got the yeast from Yuri. Some of the oil too. Tsubomi is growing sunflowers now, in a different field." Akane was still chatty, even if she wasn't asking any questions. And she wasn't very good at making good on her promises. "So… what is it like? On the other side? Is it true that you live in a futuristic city with flying trays and you only need to open your mouth to eat?"
Nozomi chuckled. "Not quite. It's modern, but not any more modern than what you think of when you think modern. We do have a buffet, but it costs money to eat there. And the only way to earn money is to participate in the battles."
"Battles?!" Komachi was so caught off guard by this that she turned around.
"Koma, focus!" Rin freaked out immediately because the mold for the bread was deforming due to Komachi's distraction.
"Wow, my bad." Putting the mold back into proper form, Komachi still didn't leave that comment from Nozomi be. "What's this about battles?! Tell me!"
Nozomi was a little put off by how intense this Komachi was. "It's a really long story that goes a bit over my head, but the whole reason we, the other side I mean, are here, on the other side I mean-"
"The battles!" Komachi shouted and immediately had Rin sigh in response. "Sorry, sorry." Taking a deep breath, she calmed down.
"B-Basically, we are all here to battle each other. It gets pretty intense. Broken bones, holes in people, sometimes someone ends up dead-" Nozomi noticed how the atmosphere got very tense when she said that. "Oh, nobody gets really hurt! The battles have a lot of special… properties. You don't feel pain as much, but you still feel it. And after the battle is over, everyone is healed or revived. The worst we've seen is a bunch of bruises remaining after someone was basically torn limb from limb and thrown into molten lava."
Nao, Akane and Rin all listened to this with increasing worry – not so Komachi. "I wanna go!" Komachi's eyes were shining. "I need to go! Ask the other Komachi if she can swap with me for a day! I so wanna go!"
Rin sighed again. "She's a bit of a battle maniac. I don't know why."
"It's thrills! The apex of competition!" Komachi got sloppy on her molding barrier again and Rin reminded her of that by loudly clearing her throat. "Sorry, my bad again."
"There is also special rules to each battle… I just can't think of any top off my head. But a few of the others enjoy battling quite a bit. I think our Komachi is actually the top ranked on the light team. I think. Please don't quote me on that."
"Nozomi, leafs." Akane made her pay attention on the pot and that was also Nao's cue to continued working on the bread.
"Does the battling happen a lot?" Nao was just a bit curious herself now.
"Once every day. It's always the same day too. Things are a bit different now than it was before. When we first got to this place it was a lot different, a lot more primitive and simplistic. After Miyuki and her friends joined us, it got a bit better, but it wasn't until Mana and her group became part of… us, that we got to the current level. It's a lot more organized now and all."
"I wish we could visit without everyone freaking out." I know that's a bad idea, but still… "Probably not in these clothes, though." Looking down on herself, Nao judged that the skin tight bodysuits from their past were definitely not a good idea for any first impressions. "Do you think there is anyone that would believe you if you told them about us?"
"Miyuki will definitely believe me."
"Oho? So it isn't just our Miyuki and Nozomi that have a thing?" Akane loved gossip. "Who is the other Komachi dating?"
Komachi blushed fiercely after hearing just that question. "W-What's this about Akane? Am I not good enough for you? You leech."
"No, no, no, I didn't mean it like that!" Akane wanted to step away from the pot but she couldn't just randomly put out the fire. "Rin, help!"
"Don't look at me. I know better than to put my foot in my mouth like that, with my girlfriend right next to me at that." Rin glanced at Nao. "Right?"
"You put your foot in your mouth often enough, Rin." Nao loved the exaggerated dejected look on her girlfriend's face. "Don't even pretend to be upset about that. Who do you think you're trying to fool?"
"Relationships over here are completely different from my side." Nozomi, again, opened her mouth without thinking.
"I am not surprised. We're different people." Nao was smiling from ear to ear. "And we're not bad people anymore."
"I was really surprised! Our Karen is super lady like and a bit high strung but your Karen is really easy to get along with and super friendly."
"And a bit simple." Akane chuckled like a villain.
"On our side, she is seeing Komachi."
Komachi burst into laughter. "Really? Me and Karen?! Your Komachi needs help!" And again, the mold nearly crumbled and Rin cleared her throat so strongly that she started to cough. "Okay, okay, okay!"
Akane saw an opportunity for gossip. "Our Karen isn't dating anyone. Our only singles are Erika, Karen, Yayoi and Urara. But everyone knows Erika has a thing for Yayoi. You know how she's a massive chatterbox, right?"
Nozomi nodded."She was talking up a storm last night."
"Put her and Yayoi somewhere alone and she turns into a mess that can't get a word out." Akane tried very hard to not laugh. "We sometimes maneuver her to be right next to Yayoi when we go take a bath- oh, right we should probably tell you about-"
"Tsubomi already told me. Communal baths, today."
"That's gotta be so exhausting." Rin was already lamenting that. "Akane and me are always worn out like a twenty year old jacket after that.
"Would you rather all of us have to bathe in the cold river?" Nao looked at her complaining girlfriend. "I recall someone always gets very touchy in the bath."
"It's not like anyone minds. They all do it." Rin defended herself with a pout.
"Rin, how much longer until the bread is done?" Nao was noticing that it was getting pretty dark.
"A few minutes I'd say. I am not gonna hurry, you know how easily the bread burns. Miyuki is gonna have our hide if we produce bread hard as rock."
"Akane, can you take Nozomi and do the first light tour? You can tell everyone that breakfast is gonna be soon." Nao was more or less the boss in the kitchen and nobody defied her.
"Tea is done anyway, so that's no problem." Putting out the fire, Akane squeezed herself past Nozomi, grabbed Komachi by her shoulders and briefly kissed her, with enough intensity that the sounds were turning Nozomi's face as red as the highlights on Akane's bodysuit. "Okay, charged on Komachium, ready to go!"
The two of them left the kitchen and Nozomi remained silent for a moment. Akane stopped by the first pole pretended her hand was a pistol, pointed her index finger up and fired a small fire sphere, no larger than the tip of a little finger, up and into the bowl on top of the pole. Nozomi understood immediately. The bowl up there might be made of wood but now that the fire was burning, it was obvious that it was coated with something so it wouldn't burn.
They repeated the process over a dozen times before Akane took a brief break. Looking back, they had covered about a hundred meters between the cottage and the field Tsubomi was working at. "Can you go and check in the cottage for anyone still asleep? Sometimes Yayoi just doesn't get out of bed unless someone kicks her. I don't mean literally kicking, just in case, but you can drag her out by her arm."
"Roger." Nozomi didn't mind doing odd jobs here and there.
It wasn't just Yayoi who was still in there. Miyuki, Yayoi, Urara and Reika were just waking up, the latter three looking a bit hung over. Miyuki was leaned against the frame of where a door should go eventually, making sure none of the three sleepyheads went back to bed. "Got lonely out there?" Looking at Nozomi with a bit of a blank expression, the snark in her voice was obvious. "How did you sleep?"
"Better than expected. It's been a few years since I… cuddled with someone."
"No comment about me and my attitude and cuddling?"
"Everyone likes cuddling."
My Nozomi would have made fun of me and we'd have our usual banter. But this isn't so bad either. "Making yourself useful out there?"
"Helped Karen, Tsubomi and Nao plus her kitchen crew. Oh right, breakfast is just about ready. I'm supposed to go tell everyone. Itsuki, Yuri and Erika are out hunting, right? How do I find them?"
"They always eat before they go out." Miyuki waved the issue off. "Hey! Get going! Especially you, Urara, that chicken coop won't build itself. Nao is gonna cut your breakfast if you keep her waiting." Miyuki noticed the look that Nozomi was giving her and shrugged. "They need a bit of yelling to function in the morning. Speaking of which, go finish your round and get something to eat. I'm don't want to send you back on an empty stomach, we're not primitives."
"Thank you." Nozomi felt strangely comfortable with this Miyuki. When she wasn't angry or sleep deprived, she seemed almost nice.
Akane had advanced all the way to the field, giving Tsubomi the light she needed to work. It was surprisingly warm for being night still, which made Nozomi feel better. And it was fascinating for her how well those former villains had adjusted to their new life. "Tsubomi! Breakfast! And have you seen Karen?!" She shouted because she didn't want to step in the field.
"I'm here." Karen popped up behind Nozomi, scaring her half to death. "Oh sorry. Didn't mean to startle you."
"Breakfast is ready. Should be ready. Any minute now." Where did she come from? "Do you have any duties after this?"
"Need to fill the pot for whatever Nao wants to cook later, and then get to work on filling the bath with Reika. Have you seen her?"
"She was just getting out of bed."
"She's such a sleepyhead." Karen beamed, saying this. "But as fellow blues, we gotta stick together, right?"
"Right." Nozomi couldn't help but feel cheered up, being around a Karen that was like this.
Breakfast was different from what Nozomi expected however. Everyone stood and sat together, mostly on the ground or leaned against the cottage. Slices of fresh bread and tea, with some dried meat as toppings. It wasn't luxurious by any standard, but it tasted a lot better than some of the things she tried at the buffet. Maybe it's because I spent all morning working and actually worked up an appetite.
"Tsubomi, how long until midnight?" Miyuki was absolutely sure that the other Dream had to be waiting in front of the portal already.
"Two hours, give or take a few minutes. Since most of us are here, I wanna talk about something."
"If it's coming from you, it must be about our food supply. Are we running out?"
"No, not at all. But since we are likely to have chickens soon, I want to plant rice. The next full moon will be soon and making rice seedlings shouldn't be difficult for Yuri. I know how to plant and take care of them but I'm going to need a lot of help to make a paddy big enough."
"Rice..." A universal sigh was making the round. When it came down to it, they were all copies or alter egos of Japanese girls, and so Rice was definitely something they all missed in their life.
Akane was the first to speak up. "Nao, do you know how to cook rice without a rice cooker?"
"It is really easy, so I could teach a few others how to do it." Nao was glad that Tsubomi had figured out a way to get a rice supply going. "There are a lot of dishes I can do with rice, especially since we also have access to fish."
"Sushi!" Komachi said what everyone thought.
"Maybe for a special occasion." Nao shot her down with a smile.
"I don't want to make the rice paddy right next to the other crops since it might ruin the ground. I was thinking we could clear out some of the trees behind the cottage and plant them there. We're in need of some firewood anyway and this will keep leafs away from our house." Tsubomi was not just in charge of farming but was also very good at planning.
"Who do you need?" Miyuki was basically in charge while their own Dream was gone.
"Almost everyone will have to do something at one point or another. I'll need Nao, Reika, Karen and anyone else with physical strength to get rid of the trees and then prepare the ground. We'll have to dig that up with shovels ourselves, but Nao, Akane and Rin will be a lot of help to deal with roots and such."
"Tsubomi, I have a question." Nao was sitting on the floor while Tsubomi stood so she had to look up a little. "If you can plant rice, what about a plantation? Sugar and other spices. We're relying on Yuri a lot for those things and if I start to make other dishes than stew, I'm going to need a bunch of things."
"The large space beyond the camp fire might be suitable for that. But we'll need to talk specifically about how much of what you need. With the growth rates of everything around here, we don't need hundred square meters of sugar plants."
While Nao and Tsubomi kept talking, Yayoi approached Nozomi, slowly and avoiding the light of the torch poles. "Psst." Yayoi whispered. "Don't look." Nozomi just took another bite out of her bread and nodded. "If you can… after you get back… if there is a chance… can you throw some novels or books through the portal sometime?"
"I'll try." Nozomi could see Yayoi's expression change a little – but only her mouth. Her eyes remained kind of deadpan and that made her smile a little creepy. "I guess you love stories, just like our Yayoi."
Yayoi was now standing right beside Nozomi. "She likes fiction?"
"From what I heard and saw, she makes manga for work."
"Oh~." Yayoi sounded but didn't look impressed. "She's lucky. I have to tell every story by mouth."
"Is that why you want novels? To read them for the others?"
Yayoi shook her head. "I need time to think of stories. The novels are for the others. So they don't get bored. I'm not that useful except for fishing, so..."
"Is it true they throw you into the water?" Nozomi felt bad, thinking that it possibly true.
"Don't believe everything Erika says. I just stand at the edge and unload electricity into the water." Yayoi's voice really lacked emotion, which threw Nozomi for a loop, since the normal Yayoi was the exact opposite.
"How often do you do that?"
"Twice a week. It takes a long time to go to the ocean. Tires me out. And we have to carry back the fish. We need Reika to cool them. It's a lot of effort." Yayoi finished her food and tea and glanced at Nozomi. "Thank you. For the novels. If you manage."
Breakfast was adjourned shortly after. Karen supplied water for cleaning up cups and the kitchen and then vanished with Rin, Akane and Reika to prepare the bath. Others followed their own routines. Nozomi was left with Nao, helping her clean up.
"It's a pity you can't bathe with us. But the portal will open before we're ready. I'm sorry about that."
"No, I'm glad I can return the other Nozomi to where she belongs. I think your Miyuki needs her."
"It's probably better this way. Your clothes will have to go into the laundry after a bath and the only other clothes we have that would fit you are those of our Nozomi."
"So the same outfit as Rin and the others-?" Nozomi felt embarrassed just thinking about it.
"It's hot, right? I really like Rin wearing leather. It makes her look kinda dangerous." Swooning a little, Nao shook her head to snap out of it. "Sorry about that, I get a little intense when it comes to Rin."
"My Rin is pretty dangerous even without leather clothes." Nozomi grinned. "Not as dangerous as our Urara though."
"Urara? Dangerous? Are you pulling my leg now?" Nao chuckled.
"She had a bit of a rough life after everything that happened to us as Cures was dealt with. Well… really rough. She's a lot more like your Miyuki was last night than you or what I saw of this Urara."
"Really? That does sound dangerous." Nao handed a cup to dry off to Nozomi.
"I was really worried about being here at first."
"I can imagine. If the two Miyuki's had swapped places, I can only imagine how strongly she would have reacted to seeing us here. From what I heard from Rin, we were a lot worse than our Nozomi's group."
"I wouldn't worry about that. Miyuki would see pretty quickly that you're not like that. Should I tell her, just in case she ever does end up here?"
"If you ever find a good time to do so. But please keep it a secret from everyone else. We really just don't want to have any trouble. We still have our rough edges, especially Miyuki, but we're doing fine here. And I don't think we're really intended to interact with your side."
"I'll make sure she doesn't tell anyone."
"Thank you."
"I'm… kind of glad I got to meet all of you."
"Before you go back… can I ask how things went with our Miyuki? We all know she and our Nozomi are very attracted to each other. We sometimes hear them in the other room."
"She asked me to cuddle." Nozomi knew that there was nothing really lewd about it, but she still blushed.
"Miyuki has a really spiky exterior but she's actually kind of a fluff ball underneath." Nao handed over the last of the cups now. "Thank you for your help."
"Thanks for feeding me."
Nao chuckled and beamed like a small sun. "You're very welcome."
"But… uh… do you have a toilet somewhere?"
"Nothing fancy like you're probably used to, but we have a toilet stall just past Tsubomi's field. Karen keeps a few buckets of water next to it, just take one with you inside. If we could get anything modern, it would be a toilet." Nao looked a bit disappointed. "Maybe we'll figure out plumbing eventually."
"Maybe I'll see you later, before I go. But I'll have to go now." Nozomi quickly walked off and left Nao behind.
About ten minutes and a very unique experience later, Nozomi felt a lot better. On her way back to the cottage, she was caught by the hunting party that had come back with a jackpot. Not just four chickens but also a rooster, all carried by Erika. Yuri and Itsuki were carrying a grown deer that still had a metal spear sticking out of its skull. Before Nozomi could even say anything to them, Erika had pushed the rooster, who was still alive and had a rope around its neck, on Nozomi and then quickly took a few steps away.
"Phew, the damn thing was raising hell while I kept it with the chickens! And hey, you're still here! Decided you like it better on this side? Can't blame you, can't blame you. Just kidding of course. Not midnight yet, right? Man, Nao is gonna have her work cut out for her, taking that deer apart. Get it? Cut- ow! Hey!" Erika turned around and rubbed the back of her head. A pebble had hit her.
"I warned you about your puns, Erika." Yuri looked to Nozomi. "Feel free to whack her in the head when she gets too annoying. We all do it."
"Only you do that!" Erika complained loudly.
"This reminds me a lot of how our Erika and Yuri are."
"Your Yuri is a violent brute that has not a single bone of humor in her body as well? Ow! Yuri, stop it!" Erika pulled the chickens with her and put some distance between her and Yuri. "See what I mean?"
"You do resort to violence pretty quickly." Itsuki was smirking. "Only with Erika though."
"Because she deserves it." Yuri threw another pebble and missed Erika just barely.
"Nozomi!" That was Tsubomi's voice, still on the fields. "It's time soon. Go back to the cottage."
Nozomi pushed the rooster rope back in Erika's hands. "It was nice meeting you all. Maybe we'll see each other again. Goodbye!" Making a mad dash for it because Erika could turn on chatterbox mode again, Nozomi arrived at the cottage a couple minutes later. Miyuki was already waiting for her. "Sorry I'm late."
"Not late yet. We got twenty minutes before the portal opens so we can take it slow. That way." Pointing in a specific direction, away from the fields, Miyuki lead the original of her girlfriend towards the portal point. "There won't be time to have any long heartfelt conversations with my Nozomi, just so you know. The portal only stays open for a few minutes."
"When you see her, tell her I am really happy for her."
"I'll tell her you're ultra happy. Does your Miyuki still say that? Ultra Happy?" Miyuki chuckled.
"Sometimes."
"I kinda would like to meet her, just to see what kind of woman she's become. I assume since you didn't say anything about it, we look the same, so we're the same age, right?"
"Your hairstyle is a bit different and your clothes are. But you sound a lot like her and otherwise you look just like her."
"How old is she?"
"Nineteen."
"Five years since then, huh. Now I'm really curious. But my Nozomi probably met her, so I'll ask her."
"I'm happy for all of you."
"How come? We aren't exactly deserving of that, considering everything back then."
"Everyone deserves a second chance and all of you really turned things around."
"Thanks for that I guess. I didn't expect you to think that way."
"How come?"
"My Nozomi was always afraid that in the end, you'd hold a grudge. I heard you saved her, but that might have been a spur of the moment thing. Our group didn't have any saving going on. We were all wiped out. Don't say you're sorry to hear that, we definitely had that coming for us, considering what we were like. That was some awakening, coming to in this place, older and no longer under some psychopath jester's command."
"That sounds like quite a story." Nozomi wondered how Miyuki would tell it, before and after she learned about the resurrection of these former villains.
"You should ask your Miyuki about it."
"I will." She read my mind.
"The portal is up ahead, between the trees. Anyway…" Miyuki stopped and took a slow breath. "You know… you smell nice. Just like my Nozomi."
"Thanks. I… was worried you'd try something lewd with me, but I'm glad you really just cuddled with me."
"I'm not gonna pretend and say the temptation wasn't there, but you seemed pretty grossed out by the thought."
"No!" Nozomi reacted so strongly that she was embarrassed by it. "I mean… I don't think you're gross or that girls together is gross… It's just that there was someone in my life and I think I am still not a hundred percent over it. Maybe I never will."
"Sounds tough."
"Maybe it's because you look just like my Miyuki, but… I'm not a hundred percent sure I haven't started to like her in a romantic way."
"Yeah, you'd react that way if you're put together with a doppelganger then."
"It's not like that either. Ahh! I don't know what it's like actually! I'm so damn confused!"
"You said like my Nozomi now."
"Oh shoot." Nozomi burst into laughter. "It really was nice meeting you."
"Don't go all mushy on me now. We now know you can come back here if you come through the portal – although it seems to kick out my Nozomi so you probably shouldn't."
"I wonder what happens if someone enters that has no counterpart on your side. Like Love or Mana."
"You got a chick called Love over there?"
"Says Bad End Happy." Nozomi chuckled and chuckled for a few seconds.
"Touche." Miyuki shrugged it off. "I think it's time. Look." Pointing at the space right behind Nozomi, it was no longer empty. A large, black swirl of energy appeared, manifested itself right before her eyes. "If logic holds, you stepping out there will bring back my Nozomi. So..." Miyuki stepped forward and put just her right index finger on Nozomi's chin, turning her face a little. "Be well." Kissing her on the cheek for just an instant, Miyuki grabbed the girl by her shoulders, turned her around and shoved her as hard as she could.
The sound Nozomi made as she face first collided with the black swirl was like that of a cake platter hitting the wall after being launched out of a catapult. With a loud groan and drops of blood spraying through the air from her nose, Nozomi fell backwards into the grass while a confused Miyuki just stood there and stared. "Hey."
Nozomi, grunting and sounding very nasal, got on her knees and then back on her feet, her nose looking obviously broken. The pain was nauseating but bearable, and Nozomi tried again to step through, this time on her own power.
It was like trying to step through a solid wall of concrete. "What's going on?" Nozomi hit the swirl with her fists, banging against it. "It's not letting me through."
Miyuki pushed Nozomi aside and tried to pass through – and did so without issue. Vanishing through the swirl, she stepped back through a moment later. "I can pass, so why can't you?"
=== Dissonance ===
Shit, shit, shit, shit. Nozomi ran through the fog as hard as she could, arriving on the plaza. How the fuck did I become so careless? I mean sure, the good food, the good company, the entertainment… I totally let down my guard. I hadn't slept in like twenty four hours either, and that sure didn't help. Where is it, where is it?
Running around the plaza like a headless chicken, looking for the gateway, Nozomi nearly shrieked when someone touched her shoulder. Flinging around, she saw herself face to face with Reika, the light world Reika. "You're still out Reika?"
"I could ask you the same. Most of us have turned in for the night. I saw you suddenly run off, leaving Miyuki behind, so I wondered what was going on. Did something happen?" Reika was not smiling, sounding serious, much like always.
One in the morning? Shit. I'm a full hour late? Goddamn, how am I gonna go another day in this place without getting found out? "No, I just noticed I had lost my key to my room and-"
"Lost it how? You certainly weren't carrying it around on the beach in your swimsuit."
"I mean I remembered I lost it."
"How would you forget something so important?"
"With the beach and everything it just sort of slipping my mind."
"Say, Dream."
"Yeah?"
"What happened to that cold you were talking about last night? I am not seeing any indication of that at all and yet you still sound like it."
"I slept it off. And my voice always dips a little after drink."
"What a curious effect." Reika took a deep breath. "Well, you should notify Sasorina about the loss of your key. Dream." Reika walked past Nozomi, a terribly cold and distant look in her eyes. Walking away, back towards the beach, Reika stopped after a few steps. "Dream."
It took everything Nozomi had to not freak out at this point. "Yes?"
"Good night."
"You too." Forcing a smile that was so awkward and shaky that Nozomi was sure she couldn't have fooled anyone with it, she felt a deadly shiver go down her back. She knows. That woman definitely knows. What do I do now?
=== End of Event XXXIII ===
