[Bishop-chan's notes: Finally cleared this doc manager backlog... ]
Never Enough Peanuts
by zero0hero
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Having survived the very worst that more than one world could throw at him, Kirigaya Kazuto, Kirito, thought that there was nothing left that could surprise him. He was wrong.
The Black Swordsman of Aincrad did his best to keep from gaping as he surveyed the damage in the Kitchen of the Kirigaya family home. Though Yui had the basics of cooking down pretty well, she was still a child, and still just clumsy enough that she inevitably made a bit of a mess when making something to eat. And she'd certainly been busy while he and Asuna had been gone.
He shook his head. That wasn't the problem, messes were made to be cleaned up, and Yui would just have to take responsibility and help put everything back when she was done. In fact, the problem came from an entirely different source.
"Is she going to be alright?" Yui asked, voice filled with dread as she leaned over the rooms other occupant.
Curled up on her side in clear misery, the girl laying on the tiled floor of the kitchen would have drawn attention, even on the streets of Arrun. She was beautiful for one thing. Young, cute, her light blue hair, highlighted white, would have made a lot of Undine's envious. She was garbed in a simple white sundress, thin straps hanging from her slender shoulders, leaving her shoulder blades exposed. They had to be to give space for the two glossy, blue feathered wings that stretched from her back and now hung limply, twitching feebly in sympathy with the girl's twinges of pain.
Deciding that he wasn't equipped for this, Kirito did the logical thing and turned to his wife. "Asuna. Why is their an angel in our kitchen?" Kirito asked casually.
"I don't know." Asuna said stupefied. "Wait . . . Pina-chan?"
'Pina?!' Kirito thought, head snapping around. The pieces started to click together as he recalled their most recent run in with Sylphied, no, Irukwukwu. From what Silica had said, the two dragons had gotten along famously from their first meeting and almost seemed to be converse whenever they met. Combined with the larger dragon's true identity as a Rhyme Dragon and this all started to make a disturbing amount of sense.
"Just what happened here?" Asuna asked, leaning over the girl to feel her temperature.
"Tummy ache . . ." The girl on the floor groaned, pulling her legs up close to herself.
Yui shifted, looking distinctly uneasy at the question. "Well . . . uhm, she showed up on the porch this morning after you and Papa went to work saying she was looking for 'The Person Who Fights with Two Swords' and the 'The Person Who Makes the Mashed Peanuts', she said it was important, but when I took her to Arrun tower, neither of you were there and Caramella-san said you were really busy."
That was right, they'd been locked up all afternoon in a secret strategy meeting with Lord Mortimer. Kirito frowned, Yui knew to go find Suguha or Klein if there was something she couldn't handle.
"She said she really needed to talk to you both, so she decided to wait here, and then she got hungry." Yui fidgeted as if worried that her parents would be mad at her.
"Yui-chan, just what did you feed her?" Asuna asked, concerned, as she tried to make Pina more comfortable. Unfortunately the rather more physical wings meant laying her out on her back wasn't an option.
"Uhm, well, since she likes peanuts," Yui reasoned, "I made her a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and then a peanut butter and banana sandwich, and then a peanut butter and peanut butter sandwich, then salmon glazed in peanut oil, and then a batch of peanut butter cookies."
"She ate all of that?" Kirito asked in disbelief, turning back to the girl. Where exactly did she have space to put it all?
Asuna sighed a little, smiling with relief. "It's okay then, she just had a few too many peanuts . . ."
Reaching out with one hand, Pina feebly grabbed at Asuna's arm, tugging for attention. "That's . . . impossible . . . " She moaned softly before her head fell back the floor.