Another late night for Kou in the Eagle Jump office. Everyone else has gone home already, so it's just her, as usual. Having already removed her pants, the artist sits back in her chair. She stayed because she was more work to do to meet the next deadline, but she's also worked all day already, so she's beginning to slow down. Drawing is her passion, but everyone needs to takes a break from time to time. And right now, Kou is a bit fed up with drawing. Now she needs something else to do, something that will keep her awake so that she can get back to work afterwards.
For a few minutes, she browses the internet on her phone, but she quickly gets bored of that. Getting up from her chair, she decides to walk around the empty office. She does a few laps around the area, mostly just thinking about the deadlines she needs to meet. On one lap, she goes over to Umiko's desk and looks at her airsoft guns for a bit, before continuing her walk. Eventually she gets bored of walking too, and starts to head back to her desk. But as she passes by the desk of Aoba, she glances at it and sees some concept art for Sophia, the NPC that Aoba recently designed for Fairies Story 3. The one that Kou herself tasked Aoba with creating. Kou picks up a piece of concept art for her and looks at it. She takes it back to her desk and sits back down.
Kou examines Sophia's design closely. Her lively circus dress, her cute little hat along with her blonde twintails. She thinks it's a shame that Sophia is set to die in the story, because her design is great, but that's the fate of some characters. Sometimes they have to kick the bucket. While she may not survive the story, the fanbase is sure to love this character and "keep her alive" through things like fanart and cosplay. Kou recalls multiple dead characters from previous Fairies Story games getting similar treatment. Seeing the love for them years after she originally designed them makes her happy.
She begins to think about how Aoba will react to the love from the fans. She'll definitely be happy about the characters she designed being gushed over online. Kou can picture it now, Aoba scrolling through social media and seeing fanworks about Sophia and her other NPCs, all with a big smile on her face. As she thinks about Aoba, she has a funny thought. She pictures Aoba coming across some lewd fanart of Sophia, and freaking out about it. She'd scroll down a page looking at the regular art, and turn red when the next picture is of a under-dressed Sophia. Maybe she'll be wearing a bunny suit, or lingerie, or a micro-bikini. Heck, even some art of a dressed Sophia with a larger than normal chest might get a good reaction from Aoba.
Still not wanting to get back to work, Kou gets an idea. What if, she were to draw Sophia? Specifically, what if she were to draw her in a lewd manner? She's alone right now, so it'd be easy to do, and it'll be fun too. She's not going to show this to Aoba of course, or to anyone for that matter, it's something for Kou's eyes only. It's still drawing, but it isn't exactly related to her current tasks, so it can still be considering "taking a break". Kou puts the Sophia concept art on her desk, pulls out some blank paper, and begins to sketch. This isn't the first time she's drawn not-safe-for-work pictures in the office. She's done it a few times when she's alone and needs a break. It's always of her own characters, whether they were made for Fairies Story or are just a random original character she comes up with. Something about drawing a character from another IP while in the workplace makes Kou feel uneasy.
Kou starts off with a torn clothes sketch. She imagines that Sophia had a small run in with some monsters. An encounter that was light enough to not give her any injuries, but one that did rip her clothes. Her chest and belly button are exposed, her shoes are missing, and her socks and one glove are torn off. Her face has an embarrassed expression on it. She's both flustered from being attacked and from the viewer seeing her body. The next drawing is of Sophia washing herself in the bath. She's scrubbing her arm while sitting on a stool. She's covered in suds that conveniently block out the good stuff, because sometimes less is more. Kou puts a few small musical notes near her mouth to indicate that she's humming a tune. Sophia's just relaxing in a safe environment this time. Kou thinks about doing a follow up where she's stepping into a bathtub, with a focus on her rear, but decides to go in another direction with her third picture.
All of her clothes are off again, except for the little hat. Sophia is now sitting with her legs spread, and you can see everything. The nude girl smiles at the viewer with anticipation, like she's waiting for you to begin. Kou tries to imagine what Sophia would sound like while she begs you to get on top of her. The artist is really into it now. Sophia's a really cute girl who's fun to draw, especially like this, and these sketches have come along nicely. She'll take them with her the next time she goes home and add them to the secret stash of porn she has that not even Rin knows about. Maybe-
"Yagami-san, are you-"
Kou freezes. With no warning, Aoba is suddenly walking up to her. She reaches Kou's desk, and immediately sees the three drawings of Sophia. The ripped clothes one, the bathing one, the pre-coitus one, Aoba sees them all. Her reaction... is about what Kou predicted. Her face turns bright red, and her speech turns into gibberish. Kou begins to scream, and quickly pushes the papers off of her desk, in a vain attempt to hide them. This is bad, the blonde thinks. Her coworker just caught her drawing porn when she's supposed to be working! Aoba, still blushing hard, averts her eyes. "I-I-I-I forgot something at my desk! I came back to get it! A-And I thought I'd check up on you too since I saw that your light was still on!" she yells out.
Actually, this is REALLY bad, because Sophia was based on Aoba, and now the real thing has caught her leader drawing lewd sketches of "her". Anyone else seeing this would be bad enough, but for Aoba to be the one to catch her...
"I-I-I'll be going now! Sorry to bother you!" she yells, before attempting to run off. But Kou jumps out of her chair and calls out to Aoba, who turns around. Kou then pulls out a 10000 yen bill from somewhere on her desk and drops to the ground. She places the bill in front of her on the floor and bows.
"PLEASE NEVER TELL ANYONE!"
"EEEEEEHHH?"
Kou keeps her head down on the ground, as she's afraid to face her. Aoba meanwhile stares at her in a stunned silence. She doesn't exactly know how to respond to this... bribe. But seeing her friend on the ground begging like this somewhat removes the embarrassment on Aoba's side. She doesn't like seeing her like this. "Yagami-san, please raise your head..." She also asks that she put the money away. Kou hears her, and reluctantly rises from her bow. She sits on her knees, but does not look Aoba in the eyes. She looks to the left, towards her own desk. Aoba looks to the three drawings on the floor. She kneels down and picks them all up. Kou notices this, and almost swipes them away, but stops herself from doing so. Aoba examines the lewd sketches of Sophia, her face turning a bit more red, especially after seeing the third one. While they may be a type of drawing that Aoba typically doesn't consume, they're still artwork made by the one she looks up to.
"They're nice."
Kou is caught off guard. "They're made by you after all." says Aoba, as she hands the drawings back to Kou, who promptly puts them out of sight. She appreciates the compliment, but it's still a bit embarrassing. "Thanks." Kou replies. Aoba smiles at her. She's not a judgemental person, and doesn't think less of Kou for drawing not-safe-for-work stuff of Sophia. The smile does make Kou feel a bit more at ease too, as it reminds her of how nice Aoba is. She tries to explain herself now.
"I was just stuck with my work, so I started to doodle a bit to do something different..."
"And why Sophia?"
"Well.. her design is cute. You did a good job with her, and I decided to draw her. That's all."
Kou has already praised her for Sophia's design, but hearing her do it again makes Aoba's smile even brighter. Kou goes on to try and explain that she was thinking about how much fanart the character would get, which led to her thinking about what Aoba's reaction to lewd fanart would be, which then led to her drawing Sophia herself. She also says that she never intended to show these pictures to anybody. They were simply sketches made for fun. Aoba thinks about it a bit.
"You were just drawing fanart? So, Yagami-san, does that in a way make you my first fan?"
Kou giggles. "I guess it does."
The conversation turns more casual over time. The two girls are no longer that flustered about the situation. Aoba claims that she actually did call out a 'hello' when she walked into the office, but Kou obviously didn't hear her. When she didn't hear a response but saw that the light was still on, she thought that Kou might have fallen asleep at her desk. Knowing how lightly she dresses when she's alone, Aoba wanted to make sure that she wasn't at risk of catching a cold from being uncovered. Speaking of sleep, Aoba yawns. Kou tells her that she should head home and get some sleep. They then look at the time, and realize that by now the trains have stopped running. She spent too much time coming back here to retrieve what she forgot, and too much time talking with Kou. The blonde now feels guilty, and apologizes for wasting so much time. Aoba however says that she probably wouldn't have been able to make it anyway because of the distance to the train station.
Still, Kou feels bad about how things turned out. Aoba then decides that she will stay here tonight too, and try to get some more work done. But Kou points out that she's clearly tired, and that overworking herself will not help anyone. And since she doesn't have her sleeping bag, it's not a good idea to sleep here. Kou then picks up the money from the floor. "Take a taxi home." she says, while trying to get Aoba to grab the cash. The sleepy girl once again turns down the money, saying that it's too much and she can pay for the cab herself. Kou insists that she be the one to pay though, and starts looking for a more reasonable amount. Once she has it, she hands it to Aoba.
"Go rest, and please... keep this between us."
Aoba smiles. Kou's so determined to pay because she feels guilty. And on top of that, she's still trying to bribe her to keep quiet... with the worst part being that this isn't the first time one of her coworkers has tried to bribe her after she accidentally saw something... Still, Aoba takes the money this time and thanks her. It's still a bit too much cash, but she figures that she can buy Kou some food with it tomorrow.
"I won't tell anyone. I'll be off now!"
Kou gives a smile back, and waves goodbye as Aoba exits the office. Alone again, Kou goes back to her desk and sits down. That was embarrassing, but at least it's over now. The blonde takes solace in the fact that Aoba will definitely keep it a secret from everyone else. She thinks about what would have happened if someone else had caught her. The worse options are possibly Rin and Umiko, she thinks. Rin would tease her forever, and Umiko would probably shoot at her for drawing porn instead of working. Now that she thinks about it, this isn't even the first time Aoba's walked in on something lewd in this office. There was that funny misunderstanding involving a pant-less Rin too. Kou thinks that maybe she should strive to be less careless at work...
After all that, Kou doesn't feel like drawing right now. She takes the three drawings of Sophia and hide them in her bag. They will be going home with her tomorrow night. She also decides to take her own advice. Turning off her computer and light, she lays down under her blanket. Time for some sleep...