"My, that was a close call!" Sayaka said with a laugh as a plate of food was placed in front of her.
"Yes, if Sayaka hadn't smothered Kyoko-chan with that bathrobe, the whole place would have burned down!" Madoka said cheerily, setting down plates of food in front of Kyoko and herself. Sayaka and Kyoko were now wearing matching white bathrobes, although the one Kyoko was wearing was now blackened from putting out the flames.
"Yeah, well. Shut up." Kyoko said through a mouthful of food that she had immediately started stuffing down her throat.
Sayaka was scrutinizing Kyoko. "That was a pretty big fire. Isn't it weird that you're conveniently unharmed?" she pointed out.
"What are you talking about? My hair is a bit singed!" Kyoko said, tugging at a lock of hair.
"It must be because she was already wet." said Madoka as she broke apart her own chopsticks.
Kyoko scoffed loudly. "Figures the only luck I had today was that Sayaka made me really wet." she grumbled.
"Wha-?" Sayaka's face blushed heavily. "Wha-wha-what?"
"Oh, that reminds me!" Madoka exclaimed, getting up and disappearing into the kitchen.
"How does that remind you of anything?" Sayaka yelled in a flustered tone while Kyoko laughed. Madoka reappeared with bandages in her hand.
"When you blushed, your eye really flared up." Madoka explained as she used scissors to cut the bandage to the appropriate size. She scooted over to Sayaka and reached for her face. The shorthaired girl moved her head back automatically as the foreign object came close to her eye. Madoka frowned and wagged the bandage insistently. With a sigh Sayaka offered up her face with eyes shut.
The small girl carefully placed the square of bandage under Sayaka's blackening eye. "There you go!" Madoka clapped her hands together like a proud mother. "See, that wasn't so bad!"
"These," Sayaka said slowly, hissing at the coolness against her swollen face. "Are really nice." She could already feel the swelling going down as the coolness seeped into it.
"Ah, they're the new partially alive ones. It'll fall off when you're healed." Madoka explained as she put the bandages away.
Sayaka opened an eye to peer at her. "So you just carry high-grade bandages around with you?" she commented with a teasing smirk. "I knew you were clumsy, but not that clumsy."
"My mom gave them to me, geez!" Madoka said, suddenly self-conscious. "Would you like some too, Kyoko-chan?"
"Hm?" Kyoko had a mouthful of noodles dangling from her lips and onto her chin. Her cheeks were full as she regarded Madoka as if she had forgotten she was there in the face of her meal.
"Saving up for winter there?" Sayaka remarked, gesturing to her own cheeks. Kyoko narrowed her eyes at her and slurped up the noodles loudly and swallowed everything up in one gulp.
"Are you hurt anywhere?" Madoka asked Kyoko again to gain back the attention the redhead was giving Sayaka.
"Ah," Kyoko's hand unconsciously went for her head. "I have a bump on my head that hurts like a bit-, I mean, it's really painful." Kyoko had held herself back from swearing because Madoka was looking at her as innocently as a child that never heard such words in her life.
"Could you show me where?" Madoka inquired with a polite smile. Kyoko seemed reluctant to put her chopsticks down, but she eventually did before she pointed to the back of her head. Madoka scooted over, bandage in hand.
"I don't think the bandage will go since I got a lot of hair. And if you suggest cutting it, I'll cut you instead." Kyoko let Madoka know casually. Madoka paused as Kyoko's words registered.
"Oh, ah, okay." Madoka was visibly deflated and scared. Sayaka glared at Kyoko and was about to tell her off for scaring Madoka, but the pigtailed girl perked up when she had a thought. "I just remembered I have something for that!"
Sayaka and Kyoko watched her with a 'the heck is she carrying around with her?' look as Madoka rifled through her school bag. She pulled out a small bottle with a proud grin on her face.
"These are pills that can help with that." she informed them, looking happy that she was able to be of use to someone.
"I don't think so," Kyoko looked skeptically at the bottle. "Last time someone offered me pills, I wound up thinking I was a magical girl for a whole night, swinging an umbrella around because I thought it was a spear, and attacking what I thought were 'witches' when I was actually charging into an elementary school playground."
Blue and pink eyes stared at her blankly.
"True story." the redhead said with a sip of water.
"You'd make a terrible magical girl." Sayaka said.
"What are you gonna do, shoot me with a blast of friendship and justice?" Kyoko responded with a look that dared the shorthaired girl to challenge her.
"Oh, for crying out loud!" Madoka shouted in exasperation, lunging across the table and popping one of the pills into Kyoko's mouth. Both Sayaka and Kyoko appeared stunned by the smaller girl's actions. "I, I'm just trying to help…" Madoka shrunk, her sudden boldness dissolving in an instant.
Kyoko stood up from her kneeling position angrily. "Hey, what the hell are in these pills anywa…" Before she could finish yelling, her eyes rolled up into her head and she tipped backwards.
Sayaka responded quickly and was there to catch the girl before she hit the floor. Holding Kyoko's limp form in her arms, she looked incredulously at Madoka. "Holy crap, did you kill her?" she asked in alarm.
Madoka was on the verge of tears as she waved her hands hectically. "No no, no! They're only nanobots that target damaged areas! I don't think this was supposed to happen!" Madoka cried.
"You mean you don't know what's supposed to happen!" Sayaka yelled frantically, trying to jostle the redhead in her arms awake.
"I'm sorry!" Madoka buried her face in her hands, bawling.
"Kyoko! KYOKO!" Sayaka brushed red hair off of the girl's forehead and ran her hand over her face, trying to illicit a response. "C'mon, stay with me, Kyoko!"
"You know, I would say something dirty right about now," crimson eyes opened groggily. "But I think you two are funny enough as it is." she remarked. Her eyes focused on Sayaka's face and she suddenly blushed as she found herself in the other girl's arms. "You didn't, like, do mouth to mouth on me or anything weird did you?" she stammered, periodically looking from Sayaka's eyes to her lips.
"As if!" Sayaka exclaimed, unceremoniously dropping the redhead to the floor and standing up with a furious blush on her face. "Geez, you had Madoka going there for a minute! Look, you made her cry!" Sayaka was yelling heatedly, gesturing to the girl who was now crying tears of joy at Kyoko's sudden revival.
"Kyoko-chan, are you okay?" she asked in over concern. Kyoko was sitting up and rolling her shoulders.
"Yeah. Actually, I feel pretty damn good right now!" she said with a curious look on her face. "My headache is gone and I feel like I just had a really nice nap!" Her face suddenly fell. "I wasn't attacking school children, was I?" she looked around her, noting that she was still in the same place as when she passed out.
"Oh no!" Madoka laughed in relief. "You were only out for a few seconds." Madoka looked down at the floor and rang her hands together. "I'm sorry I forced you to take those pills, Kyoko-chan." New tears formed in her eyes. "I just wanted to help you."
Kyoko stared at Madoka, feeling the need to be furious, for some reaction to burst out of her fist and into the sniffling girl's face for that little stunt she pulled… But she just felt too goddamned refreshed to be angry. And Madoka looked a year's worth of apologetic.
"It's okay, it's not like I was hurt or anything." Kyoko murmured uncomfortably. She didn't know how to deal with crying girls outside of telling them to suck it up and deal with it. "And stop crying, will ya? It's not a good look on you."
"Thank you, Kyoko-chan!" Madoka beamed gratefully at her as she wiped at her tears.
"Uh-huh." Kyoko said uncomfortably as she grabbed for her chopsticks to resume eating, not accustomed to having unadulterated happiness aimed in her direction.
Sayaka ran a frustrated hand through her hair and heaved a tired sigh as their interaction finished. "I think that's my cue to put our clothes to wash." she said as she stood up and headed for another room of the apartment. She entered a small closet-like room next to the bathroom where they had thrown their dirty clothes away and closed the door behind her.
On the wall was an opening of a clothes chute that went all the way down to the basement where the clothes were instantly cleaned and jettisoned back to their original rooms in a matter of minutes. Sayaka tossed their clothes down the chute and stood leaning against the wall with her arms crossed to wait for their short return.
Now alone with her own thoughts, Sayaka swallowed thickly and thumped her head against the wall in irritation. "Just a little longer," she whispered to herself. "Let me not think about him for just a little longer until they leave…"
Kyoko glared in the direction Sayaka had disappeared in. "That girl really needs to stop shoving that stick up her a-," Kyoko paused when she noticed Madoka smiling at her with such a genuine 'good girl' aura that Kyoko nearly bit her tongue. "I mean, she needs to chill out…"
"Oh, she was just really worried about you." Madoka chuckled. Kyoko scoffed in disbelief and slurped up a large helping of noodles. "No, really!" Madoka insisted at the redhead's disbelief. "She can be hotheaded, stubborn, and she can get into a lot of arguments," Madoka trailed off a bit as Kyoko gave her a deadpan look. "But she's a really good girl! She's kind, she's brave, and she always tries to solve everyone's problems!"
"That's the damn problem!" Kyoko exclaimed. She pointed at Madoka with her chopsticks. "Listen Madoka, to survive in this world you gotta forget about that fairness and justice bullsh-, crap. If Sayaka just goes around with that naïve way of thinking, she's going to get herself hurt. Be it physically or mentally."
Madoka looked a little shaken. "I, I don't think I can forget about fairness and justice…"
Kyoko shrugged as she stuffed a piece of bread into her mouth. "You go ahead and stay just the way you are. Some people just don't need to know. But this Sayaka chick needs a wake-up call."
Kyoko held out her now empty bowl to Madoka, asking for seconds. The pink-haired girl happily obliged and filled the plate to the brim. Kyoko snatched the bowl back eagerly and resumed talking.
"If it wasn't for Sayaka's white knight delusions, we wouldn't have gotten hit by Tonka trucks or whatever!"
"Garbage trucks," Madoka quietly corrected.
"Yeah, well, the point is!" Kyoko waved her chopsticks around in the air as if to illustrate her point. "That she rushed head-long into trouble and would've been killed if I wasn't such a fucking saint!" She finally gave in to her urge to curse as she got worked up just thinking about the other girl's dumbassery.
"But in your own way, you're worried about her, right?" Madoka asked, surprisingly unfazed by Kyoko's outburst. "You brought her back and you want her to stay out of the way of Tonka trucks."
"Garbage trucks," Kyoko mumbled around a roll dipped in sauce.
"The point is," Madoka mimicked Kyoko's earlier act of brushing the other off. "That you're both really nice girls and should try to get along better."
"Hey, you're right!" Kyoko said sarcastically. "That means I should get the hell out of here when I finish eating. Then I'll never have to see her again!" She grinned at the thought. Madoka sighed resignedly.
"It's not very nice to talk about people when they're not in the same room." Sayaka announced her presence uncaringly. Madoka smiled guiltily while Kyoko continued eating unapologetically. Sayaka carried their washed, steamed and dried clothes that were neatly folded as if they had been freshly ironed. She dropped Kyoko's neat pile of folded clothes next to the girl.
"Whoa, that was fast." Kyoko commented as she eyed her clothes that looked brand new. "This city has got it made."
"Glad to see my food hasn't been swiped when I wasn't looking," Sayaka half-joked with a pointed look in Kyoko's direction. The accused girl shrugged in unconcern.
"I admit I was tempted." was Kyoko's honest answer accompanied by a slight smirk. "A growing girl's gotta eat."
"At other people's expense?" Sayaka retorted, finally picking up her own untouched plate of food.
Kyoko rolled her eyes at Sayaka restarting the same argument. "Damn it all, you are not ruining my first nice meal in days with this shit." As if to punctuate this point, the redhead started cramming food into her mouth at a faster pace, pointedly ignoring Sayaka's look.
The blunette looked about ready to snap, when a few choice words caught her attention. 'First nice meal in days?'
"Kyoko, I was wondering," Sayaka spoke with a thoughtful expression. "Are you homeless?" she inquired with simple curiosity.
The addressed girl froze mid-chew at the question. Glancing up at Sayaka, the girl resumed chewing with an air of underlying irritation, letting Sayaka know she didn't appreciate the question at all.
Madoka looked uncomfortably between the other two. "Hey, Sayaka…" Madoka said quietly in warning. But Sayaka wanted to hear the answer from the girl's own mouth and waited.
Finally swallowing, Kyoko lowered her chopsticks and looked into Sayaka's eyes defiantly. "If they say home is where the heart is," with a hand she crossed out her heart over her chest. "Then I got rid of that a long time ago." she stated. An uncomfortable silence settled over the table.
"Kyoko-chan…" Madoka said in sympathy.
"So, you are?" Sayaka confirmed with an annoyed expression. "Why didn't you just say that, instead of adding to it? Trying to sound cool or something?"
"What the hell is with that reaction!" Kyoko yelled in extreme frustration, slamming down her eating utensils.
"Because I don't believe that crap about getting rid of your heart for one second!" Sayaka shouted back, silencing a stunned Kyoko.
Kyoko's fingers curled into a tight fist and her voice shook. "What did you say?" she said threateningly.
"If you didn't have a heart, you wouldn't have helped me back there. Making yourself believe something so ridiculous, aren't you just forcing yourself to be lonely?" the shorthaired girl unwaveringly said.
Crimson eyes widened briefly at those words before she looked away, gritting her teeth. "Now who's trying to sound cool?" she bit at the words as if mad that she didn't have anything better to say in response.
Then the atmosphere was broken by Madoka's ringing phone. "Ah, I'm sorry!" Madoka apologized to the whole room, worried she had ruined an important moment. Perhaps she had. "Please excuse me for a minute." The girl bowed politely before stepping out the door to take the call in the hallway. Leaving Kyoko and Sayaka to stew in the awkward atmosphere as a result.
The tension had not left Kyoko's body and she gave the impression of repressing herself from running out of the room herself. Sayaka had the thought that maybe she shouldn't have said anything. Then she dismissed it. She always was very open about her opinions.
"You don't know anything."
"Hm?" Sayaka leaned forward, not quite catching what was said.
"I said you don't know shit." Kyoko growled at her, making Sayaka flinch back. The hostility in those red eyes being directed at her was unmistakable and Sayaka felt the prickle of nervousness on her neck. "Your superiority is pissing me off." The wooden sticks in Kyoko's hand looked about ready to snap inside of her grip.
"Yeah, I stole food from you. So the hell what? I could have been a hell of a lot worse, selling my body, doing drugs, or any number of things. So I'm tired of you looking down on me like I'm the scum of the earth when you've never been down here yourself!" Kyoko's words were chilly with venom and left Sayaka reeling from such intensity.
"I," to her surprise, Sayaka's voice came out hoarse and she paused to take a deep breath. "I'm sorry. That wasn't my intention." she apologized softly. The girl across from her chuckled humorlessly.
"And what, pray tell, was your intention?"
A silence fell upon the pair as the blunette quietly considered Kyoko's question. When she reached a conclusion she answered Kyoko's fierce look with one of conviction. "I want you to stay with me, Kyoko."
"Huh?" was Kyoko's thrown off response. For some reason Kyoko wasn't aware of, those words struck a deep chord inside of her conscience and she experienced a rush of feeling she wasn't prepared for.
"Those guys from earlier are after you, right? You aren't safe out there. I'd feel a lot better if I kept an eye on you myself." Sayaka reasoned. Kyoko stared at her incredulously.
"Are you kidding me?"Kyoko asked when she recovered from her earlier shock. It was clear Sayaka wasn't. Kyoko looked heavenward. "Baby Jesus and Oprah, this chick is for real. She's going to jack off tonight to the idea that she rescued a damsel in distress." Kyoko mock-prayed, much to Sayaka's chagrin.
Suddenly Sayaka snorted in suppressed laughter and Kyoko narrowed her eyes at her questioningly. "I just tried to picture you as a damsel in distress, and I couldn't." Sayaka smiled behind her hand as her imagination converted the rough girl in front of her into a demure and cutesy girl surrounded by too-fluffy paraphernalia. Her attempt to hide her amused grin was unsuccessful.
"Er," Kyoko didn't know whether to be put-off or take the comment as a compliment. "Whatever. I'm just saying that I'm not taking comfort in your charity one bit. I'm not here to satisfy your delusional sense of 'peace of mind'. When I'm done eating, I'm out."
"Charity?" Sayaka scratched at the bandage under her eye, not quite accepting the term. "I wouldn't call it charity. More like… A distraction?"
"Distraction?" Her eyes demanded Sayaka explain.
Sayaka suddenly appeared shy and looked down at her hands as she blushed the pretty pink of a girl in love. "When you're here, I feel like I can forget about my own issues," she self-consciously tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. "Or something like that?"
Kyoko openly gawked at her. 'D'awww, what the fuck is with this sudden cuteness! And was it always so hot in here?' were her thoughts.
"Why're you drooling? That's disgusting." Sayaka deadpanned when she noticed the other girl's blank stare. Kyoko quickly knuckled the drool off her chin.
"Shut up! Madoka's food is just so freaking delicious, that's all!" Kyoko yelled in embarrassment.
"Geez, is food all you think about?"
"Naturally!" Kyoko noticed Sayaka's untouched plate of food. "Are you gonna eat that?" Her chopsticks were already moving of their own accord toward Sayaka's plate. A different pair of wooden sticks stopped them right when they were about to reach the bowl.
"Hey, that's my food." Sayaka flicked Kyoko's chopsticks away with a flick of her wrist.
"Oh?" Kyoko smirked and went for the food again but Sayaka's chopsticks blocked her own. "You think you can stop me?" Kyoko flicked her chopsticks apart and split apart the opposing sticks, allowing for an opening to reach for the food. However Sayaka managed to close down her own pair onto Kyoko's wrist and changed the direction of her hand. Kyoko's chopsticks missed the bowl by an inch.
"I think you misunderstood me!" Kyoko laughed as she twisted her arm out of Sayaka's chopstick grip. "I take what I want!"
"Not if I'm there to stop you!" Sayaka declared with a smile of her own. Their eating utensils clashed against each other and locked as they tried to overpower each other through sheer hunger!
"Um, what are you two doing?" Madoka asked awkwardly as she stood over them. The pair froze mid-chopstick battle and turned their heads toward Madoka.
The pink-haired girl gestured to her phone. "That was my dad. Apparently my mom got drunk at work and she ordered an entire circus called Walrusburgerz to come to the company. They say there a lot of circus animals running around the city and it's the end of the world as we know!" Madoka explained as she hurriedly started packing up her belongings into her schoolbag. "Or that's the impression I received over the phone."
"Your mom sure loves her job!" Sayaka said with an understanding smile.
"Yeah," Madoka laughed unenthusiastically. "Will you two be," she gestured at them vaguely. "Okay?"
Sayaka and Kyoko glanced at each other warily. "Probably." Sayaka answered.
"Nah." was Kyoko's nonchalant response.
Madoka frowned.
"Promise me you won't fight anymore, okay?" Madoka demanded. The two in bathrobes looked reluctant to tell Madoka that that would be nearly impossible. Madoka's pink eyes widened to impossible sizes as they shone with tears. "Even dogs and cats can get along if they tried!" she sniffled.
"Okay, okay!" Sayaka shielded her eyes and waved her friend away. "We won't fight!"
"Yeah, I'll behave!" Kyoko promised as well.
Madoka looked reassured as she put her shoes on. "Alright, then. Please enjoy the food, Sayaka-chan, Kyoko-chan!" Madoka bowed quickly before she ducked out the door.
"Be careful on your way home!"
"See ya!"
Kyoko and Sayaka stared at the closed door for a moment, now alone with each other.
"So, have you tapped that Madonkadonk yet?" Kyoko asked with a sly fanged grin.
Sayaka turned a blazing eye on her. "You really want me to break that promise so early?" she growled eerily.
"I'm kidding, kidding!" Kyoko held up her hands in surrender. They resumed eating in silence, Kyoko quickly claiming Madoka's portion.
"You never answered my question." Sayaka eventually pointed out.
"Hm?" Kyoko was busy scraping any scraps from her bowl. "You mean the whole staying here bit?" Sayaka nodded. "Ah. Yeah, that's still a 'hell to the no'."
Sayaka frowned in thought. "I'll feed you." she tentatively offered.
Kyoko paused mid-scrape. "I'll take the couch."
Sayaka grinned uncontrollably at how easy that had been, which annoyed Kyoko to great lengths.
"You don't even know me, though. How do you know I won't stab you in your sleep or something?" Kyoko asked with grudging curiosity.
"Oh, ah…" Sayaka scratched at her head. "I guess it's because I saw you naked."
Kyoko slammed her forehead against the table. "What the hell is with this anti-climatic reasoning of yours!" she yelled through gritted teeth.
"Hey!" Sayaka tried to defend her own logic. "If two people see each other naked, it's like they don't have anything to hide from each other, right?"
Kyoko looked pleadingly heavenward again. "Good Lord and Aya Hirano, this chick is just asking for it!"
"Oh, shut up!" the blunette snapped in embarrassment.
"Are we gonna lay bare everything to each other now?" Kyoko tightened her hands around her bathrobe as if protecting herself from the other girl. "So that's why you asked me to stay. You could've just asked!" the redhead said sarcastically. Sayaka fumed to herself as Kyoko laughed it up at her expense. "Well whatever." Kyoko finished laughing and she stood up. She started untying the bathrobe around her waist.
"Hey, what are you doing?" Sayaka exclaimed in alarm and held her hands up over her eyes. Kyoko blinked at the reaction.
"I'm going to change into my clothes." she stated slowly, removing the bathrobe from her shoulders and letting it drop to the ground, leaving her completely naked before Sayaka.
"Here?" Sayaka stammered, glancing at Kyoko before renewing the defense of her innocent eyes.
"Yeah. What's the problem?" Kyoko asked with a raised brow. "Whatever happened to 'I already saw you naked, so we got nothing to hide' stuff you were spewing earlier?" The redhead was obviously beyond amused as she placed her hands on her hips cockily.
"That was in the bath, this is different!" Sayaka claimed, turning increasingly red in the face.
"Oh c'mon, why're you scared for?"
"Scared? Scared! You mean of the girl who mugged me earlier today getting naked right after I asked her to sleep over out of the goodness of my heart? What reason would I have to be scared?" In her exasperation, Sayaka uncovered one of her eyes to glare Kyoko. What she saw was the picture of smugness.
"You're shy." the redhead's sickly sweet voice hit Sayaka's nerve repeatedly.
"What did you say?" Sayaka lowered her hands completely and spoke threateningly.
Kyoko grinned her fanged grin. "You're. Shy." she emphasized. The gauntlet was thrown down.
"I'll show you shy!" Sayaka took up the challenge, standing up and removing her own bathrobe with a flourish. And just when the white article of clothing fluttered to the ground the front door opened and Madoka stepped sheepishly through.
"Sorry, I forgot my pho- WHY ARE YOU NAKED!" she shrieked when she spotted the two nude girls staring each other down. Sayaka whirled around and attempted to cover up her vital areas with her two hands.
"Madoka, it's not what it looks like!" she gasped in panic.
"Oh yeah, it's not what it looks like!" Kyoko sidled up behind Sayaka and wrapped her arms around her waist and rested her chin on her shoulder. "Sayaka here just begged me to distract her and make her forget all about Kachijou!" she said with a wink as the girl in her arms froze up like a statue.
"Kamijou." she corrected with a growl. "And I never said that! Well, not in that context!"
Madoka had her eyes shut tight and was feeling around for her phone with her hands. "Don't mind me, I'll just be out of your way in a second!"
Her hand closed around her phone and she exhaled in relief, whirled around and tried to sprint for the door. However she missed by a foot and ran into the wall instead. "I'm okay! I was never here!" she cried in a muffled voice. Her hands finally found the door and she managed to hurriedly make her way out.
Sayaka was shaking with suppressed rage as Kyoko busted out in laughter.
"Oh my god, did you see the look on her face?" Tears were being squeezed from her eyes as she buried her face in Sayaka's shoulder and clung to her for dear life. "I haven't had a good laugh in a while!"
"Kyoko." Sayaka's voice rumbled.
"Eh?" Kyoko lifted her head up in time to see murderous rage rolling off Sayaka in waves.
"What color…" Sayaka slowly turned her head to reveal her shadowed face. "What color…" Kyoko was only able to clearly see the deranged smile on her face. "WHAT COLOR IS YOUR BLOOD?"
Kyoko quickly jumped away when Sayaka grabbed for her, a breathless smile of excitement on her face. "Hell yes, naked wrestling!" she exclaimed just before an elbow was jabbed into her windpipe.
"Die, pervy-scurvy one-touchy!"
A/N- Hey, there had to be naked wrestling some time in the story! Also, I referenced a couple of anime there at the end, extra points if ya know 'em!
