Duran-kun and Kiyo-chan's Omake Theater

(featuring the Kuga-Fujino and Munakata family pets)

Autumn was perhaps Natsuki's favorite season. The clear blue skies, the crisp, cool air, the relative lack of rain and humidity, they were all pleasant, without the extremes that the other seasons forced upon her.

Besides, she thought, as the scarlet leaves of Japanese maples drifted down to join the dozens of others strewn across the walk, it's pretty.

"We appear to have arrived," her girlfriend remarked with a twinge of regret in her voice.

"Yep," Natsuki agreed, looking up at the glass dome of the building before them. Feeling that something else was needed, she went on to say, "Um, thanks for walking in with me."

"It was the least I could do, since Natsuki's bike is in the shop and it is a forty-five-minute walk. Since I don't have lectures this morning, it only makes sense to keep you company. After all, I know what you can be like when you get bored."

"Hey, I'm not that bad."

The truth of that statement could be judged by the fact that Duran and Kiyohime both looked up from the ends of their respective leashes and between them turned seven faces with seven dubious expressions towards Natsuki.

"And while Duran is a fine companion for a walk, I think he would have trouble returning home on his own."

"Yeah, he might get distracted by a cat or a squirrel or a passing black luxury sedan," Natsuki said, patting the steel wolf's back.

"Besides, there is nothing more enjoyable for me than spending additional time with you," Shizuru added without the slightest hesitation. Natsuki could feel a tickle of warmth forming in her belly at the other girl's words—not to mention a different warmth in her cheeks as she started to blush.

"I don't know how you can just come out and say stuff like that so easily, without even stopping to think about it," she said.

"It's really very easy when it is the truth."

Natsuki jammed her hands into her pockets, getting the right one with the leash snagged as she did.

"Not for me. It's embarrassing. Hell, it's embarrassing just to hear you say it to me."

"Why is that? After all, Natsuki and I have openly moved in together, and everyone who knows you knows that we are a couple."

"I know, but...I'm just not good at talking about love and stuff, that's all. I barely even understand what love is, let alone how to just up and talk about it."

"Well, I have no intention to stop saying such things to you at every opportunity, so you will have plenty of time to become comfortable hearing them."

"And in the meantime you get to see me get all flustered as some kind of consolation prize?"

Shizuru smiled brilliantly.

"Natsuki is very perceptive as well as cute," she said shamelessly. Natsuki just shook her head.

"Idiot."

She took a deep breath.

"But, still, it was a lot of fun having you along. Um...maybe you could come tomorrow, too, if you're free?"

"Of course!" Shizuru leaned over and snuggled up against Natsuki's arm, a gesture that caught the eye of more than one of the other Fuuka Academy students walking by. Natsuki raked them with a glare that was highly effective in promoting tolerance of others' public displays of affection.

"I guess I'd better get going. Here's Duran's leash. Are you sure you can handle him together with Kiyohime?"

"I'm sure he will be a perfect gentleman," she said with perfect assurance, and a bright smile that suggested to Duran that it would be a really good idea if that was the case. He nodded vigorously while several of Kiyohime's heads bobbed as if snickering.

"Okay, then...You know, Shizuru, do you ever get nostalgic, when you come back here?"

"Well, sometimes, but—"

"Hey, come back here, you thief!"

The interrupting shout was echoed by a black flash zipping by at eye level.

"I brought that candy apple for Oniichan!"

Yatagarasu fluttered skyward, the stolen treat clenched in his single claw. Shiho Munakata, her salmon-pink curls bouncing, sprinted after him, shaking her fist at the crow. Unfortunately for her, because she was looking up at him, she failed to take note of where she was putting her feet. Her ankle caught on Kiyohime's leash and she went tumbling over to faceplant squarely onto the flagstones.

Natsuki figured she'd be fine. When it came to hard-headedness, Shiho made Haruka Suzushiro look like a meek softy.

"Ah, screw it," the biker decided.

"What?"

"I don't care if it is the season," she told Shizuru. "I'm not letting another girl fall for you."

And with that, she reached out, cupped the back of Shizuru's head, and pulled her girlfriend's mouth down to hers for a very emphatic kiss, drawing looks of wide-eyed surprise from everyone present, including Shizuru herself.

Even Yatagarasu was so startled that he flew into a tree and dropped the stolen treat, so Natsuki's kiss ended up being only the second-most-shocking event of the morning behind Shiho actually catching a break.

~X X X~

A/N: While often I use aspects of my own marriage to help inform my ShizNat stories, thanks to my very own Natsuki, Tarma, being similar in many ways to her equivalent, this one is all over the place: For one thing, it's she who tends to like to come along with me and keep me company when I'm going places like out-of-town Bar Association meetings the way Shizuru does here—and she definitely does not have canon Natsuki's issues with openly expressing her feelings. On the other hand, the affection for autumn she shows here is definitely hers, as is her reaction to boredom...and as an added bonus, yes, Tarma does share the Kuga Death Glare with Natsuki (as well as its complete lack of effect on her significant other! ^_- ).

Meanwhile, I am seriously ready for fall weather, please and thank you! And I intend to keep using "fall" puns until I get it!