21 - Vignette- Reaper's Game - Week 1 - Day 7
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Calm Before the Storm
They had the whole day. There wasn't a time limit.
This was their last day.
By now they had crushed countless Bigbanfrogs, pulverised Garage Wolves, and shot down Decadravens, and they were finally ready to end this.
There was one last battle. Only one to go.
"Neku...I'm hungry. Can we go grab a bite?"
She did not just ask that.
"Are you kidding me?" Neku groaned in exasperation. After finally having accepted Stalker as someone who was 'alright', she had to go and ask that. "We're about to cross the last bridge to getting our lives back and you want to eat."
"Hey, you know we can't fight on an empty stomach. We've been fighting for half the day to get ready for 'the final showdown' but we won't be at our best if we're hungry," she reasoned. The plush cat/piggy thing seemed to be nodding along in agreement with her.
Neku would have dismissed her idea in a heartbeat if this had been a week ago. He had to admit, though, that he was feeling a bit hungry. Throughout the week, they discovered that food strengthened them somehow, not just in their ability to fight but in spirit as well.
"If we really have to," he said, and Shiki took that as an optimistic response and suggested that they head over to the hotdog place.
Neku found that a strange choice but decided to go along with it.
Shiki was having a great time munching down on the food, and Neku wondered how she could eat so much yet be so stick-thin. He wasn't the most built up person himself, but that was because he chose not to eat.
Oh right, she was in Eri's body at the moment. He assumed that Shiki, being the fashionista that she was, she would undoubtedly want to keep a slim figure and would be pretty skinny too.
She caught him staring at her. "What's up, Neku?"
"Nothing. I was just trying to imagine what you would look like," he said with a shrug, having already finished his food by now.
"Oh." Shiki put down her half eaten hot dog. She started to look uncomfortable and shifted in her seat.
"Don't think too much about it. I don't care what you really look like." ...somehow that sounded like it came out wrong. "What I meant to say is..." Damn, he wasn't used to this yet.
"It's alright. I understand what you're trying to say," she said with a smile.
She resumed eating and Neku could only shake his head at her.
"I wear glasses," she said suddenly.
"...Hm."
"Was that a good 'hm' or a bad 'hm'?"
"It's just that I thought people with glasses were meant to be smart." He earned a smack to the back of his head for that.
"That's being so stereotypical," she said, pouting.
Neku could tell that she wasn't genuinely upset. He was glad that he had been here with her for the past few days. If he hadn't, Shiki might still be insecure. Right now, she knew she was different from Eri, but she was okay with that. The game really changed her.
"Maybe. Even so, I think that you'd suit glasses."
Woah, where did that come from? Shiki must have been thinking the same thing, as her face showed a certain aspect of shock at the sudden (sort-of) compliment.
"Really, why?" She peered at him, her face moving closer to his, probably to make sure he meant it.
He turned his away instinctively as he felt a foreign heat rise to his face.
"Just a feeling I got."
Maybe, just maybe, the game managed to change him too, even if only by a little bit.
A/N: Tadaa! This is the result of not having done a lot of in-game drabbles/vignettes for them. I need to do more x3 Also, Noise have seriously cool names xD
