Ayana really isn't dressed for staying out late at night. Bare feet, spanks, and a pink tanktop are not cold-weather proof, even if Spring is rapidly approaching. Worse still, she didn't bother to hide her ears and tails again as she rushed away from the Hisakata house. At least she lept for the roofs, rather than just running along the ground.
Ayana doesn't really keep track of where she's running, or how long. It was midnight when she got in her fight with Sora; it's probably several hours later before Ikiko really notices that she's missing.
By this point, the kitsune has rushed tot he bayside theme park, and climbed to the very top of the ferris wheel. There she sits, atop the highest car, staring out at the ocean as the thin sliver of the Witch's moon casts its judgement on her from above.
Prism Keeper Orange is in the sky! Flying over the Theme Park right now, actually, dipping pointedly up and down as she sings~ "Oh when I think of you, my heart is all a flutter~... o/~" she sings out. "Oooweeee o/~" sing the backup koi following her around. "And when you think of meeee----". she looks down and blinks a bit as she stops mid song--- and--- there's someone on top of the Ferris Wheel? This late!? Are they stuck? Do they need help? She can't see who it is at this distance.
She spirals downwards and comes to a soft flutter-hover as she blinks a bit. Oh! Ayana-chan!~
"Ayana-chan! Hi!..." pause. "What are you doing all the way up here?" she asks.
"All the way up hereeee o/~" sing the backup koi~
Orange doesn't make them pop away.
Cute Wolf Tsukiko had been doing patrols this evening, so she missed the fight at home and Ayana's subsequent rush away. But when the wolfgirl arrives home and Ayana is gone without her cellphone, Tsukiko became worried, and started looking for her wayward girlfriend.
The search had been going slow; Tsukiko is only a mediocre tracker in the best of times, and Ayana's rooftop bounding made the trail even harder to follow. She was starting to become extra worried when she spotted Orange fluttering along at the theme park -- an extra set of eyes to help look!
(Or more, if you include the koi.)
The wolfgirl starts bounding up to the top of the Ferris Wheel to ask for help, when she sees why Orange had come in for a landing.
"Ayana~!" Tsukiko calls, covering the remaining distance with a pounce to (carefully) glomp the kitsune. "What happened? Are you okay?"
She's not ignoring Orange intentionally, but the wolfgirl's focus is very clearly on her girlfriend.
Ayana blinks at the sound of warbling coming in her general direction. She glances up just in time to see the careening Orange girl, then sniffs not-amusedly at the fish. (She's not amused, she's not amused, grr, she's not amused!)
"Being alone," Ayana sulks at Reiko, "Or I was unt--hrk!"
Pounced from behind, Ayana barely has time to react before Tsukiko haas wrapped her in a squishy hug. The car she's sitting on rocks under the sudden shift of weight, and Ayana sits very, very still until it settles, eyes wide.
"Geeze, you dumb dog, are you trying to get us both killed?!" Ayana snaps at Ikiko once it's settled. Still, she puts her arms around Ikiko, pulling the (for now) slightly smaller girl into her lap and hugging her like a plushy.
"I'm fine, I just wanted to be alone tonight," Ayana tells them both gloomily.
Prism Keeper Orange head tilts and blinks. She keeps hovering as she goes to speak and suddenly WOLF GIRL! She sort of eeks and flails because this happens so suddenly that she thinks Ayana is being attacked--- but that changes quickly when she realizes who it is. She calms down...
"That was clooooose!~ o/~" sing the koi.
She whews. She sighs. "Okay what's wrong?" she asks with a smile suddenly.
"Don't be so glooomy~ o/~" sing the koi.
Orange sighs. "Sorry, I was singing before I came down and they're still in the mood." she says sheepishly.
Cute Wolf Tsukiko is perfectly happy to be Ayana's hug-plushie! She snuggles into the kitsune's lap, kissing her on the cheek and resting her head on Ayana's shoulder. "Sorry about the unexpected hug, but you left without your phone," the wolfgirl mentions. "So I figured that something was wrong, so I went looking for you. But you're very good at hiding when you want to!"
The corners of her mouth quirk upward at the koi backup singers. "They're singing voice is pretty good," Tsukiko nods to Orange.
"It's annoying," Ayana counters Ikiko gloomily. "And I left my phone because I don't exactly have any pockets in this outfit," Ayana points out to her girlfriend, glancing down at her tight shorts, lack of shoes, and tanktop. Joggers are known to wear more clothing. "There's nothing wrong, I just wanted to be alone." Yeah that's a complete lie.
"Tell your fish to stop singing or I'm going to use them for target practice with my foxfire," Ayana tells Reiko grumpily. "I don't want to be sung to. It's not cute and it's making me cranky." No, she was already cranky, it's just making it hard for her to stay that way.
Prism Keeper Orange huffs and places her hands on her hips! Her wings are still keeping her afloat. "Well I have a lot to be happy for!" "Sheeee doooooes~ o/~" sing the koi. "Right now at least..." she says with a blush as she bites her lip and sighs some. Still she removes her hands from her hips and crosses her arms.
"So what's wrong?" she asks. "Somethings gotta be wrong. Cuz the last time you played keep away it was when you were still dark energy powered n' all that!" she says.
"Baddd times~" sing the koi.
"Yeah! Those times!" she says to her koi. Then she blinks. Ugh is she talking to her koi. >,>
She looks back. "Is someone giving you trouble? Imma go bop em in the nose!"
"Right in the faceeee~ o/~" sing the koi. "Kaaapooooww~"
"No phone, and no message left that you had gone out," Tsukiko retorts with a frown, then smiles gently. "It's hard to not be worried when I'm not sure if my lovely girlfriend is safe, you silly fox," she murmurs, lightly kissing the kitsune on the corner of the mouth.
The wolfgirl starts skrtiching Ayana's ears. "So, what's got you so intent on having grumpy alone-time?" Tsukiko inquires.
Ayana glowers at the fish, and then flicks her wrist towards them. A completely illusory flicker of black-purple fire streaks towards fish. It can't possibly hurt them, but it sure looks scary!
Huffing, the fox looks back to Ikiko just in time to get her mouth kissed. That deflates some of her anger. The earscritching does most of the rest of the work, until soon she's leaning heavily on the girl in her lap, chin on Ikiko's shoulder, ears drooping ever so slowly downwards in pleasure.
"I got in a fight with Sora-baka," she finally admits. "She started it," Ayana is quick to point out. "Called me all sorts of names and then started saying mean things about Inari, and then she said she wanted me to leave.
"... so I told her she'd have to make me," Ayana admits a little guiltily. "And we fought, and that was okay. She's not a very good fighter. But then ..." Ayana trails off and sighs. "Then she grabbed my starball, and I was helpless. I couldn't even whine. I couldn't move. It was like my whole world just came down to her and it was terrifying. She didn't do anything with it, and she seemed to realise I wasn't lying. She even offered me a chance to 'earn' her trust, whatever that means. But now I'm scared she's going to try and use it against me or something." The curse of the Kitsune: so easy to control if someone knows what you are.
The koi seem scared. "Oh noooo!~ o/~" they sing out. Then they're engulfed!---and nothing happens. Reiko eeks-- her koipals are kind of magical and she knows that but still, she huffs. "H-hey!" she says. "They're just emulating my good mood, s'all!" she says.
"We're okay!~" sing the koi.
She huffs. "Oh.. Sora again." she sighs and sits down on the side of the ferris wheel.
"Sora is a jeeerrkkk~ o/~"
"Yeah..." she says with a softer frown and crosses her arms. "That's a jerk thing to do. Is there someway you can protect it? Like. Can you keep it in your pocket or does it need to be on your person...?" she asks softly.
"Also.."
"Shouldn't this be something to tell your mom about...?" she asks glancing over to Ikiko. "I don't mean like.. tattle.." she huffs. No one likes a tattle tale! "But.. if she's doing that... she should be aware?..." she asks.
"Unless the adults don't get involved like that.." she says softly.
"Nobody likes a tatttttle~ o/~" sings the koi. Reiko shoots then a side eyed glance.
Cute Wolf Tsukiko winces sympathetically. "Sora... ugh," she says, shaking her head. "She's doing what she thinks is right, like she thinks I want her to help me. But her kind of 'help' is the type that makes people say 'stop helping me!' And her know-it-all attitude... ugh."
The wolfgirl pauses for a moment as she thinks about the events of the day. It's not like there had been any indication of a fight today between the two before she had gone on patrol, which means...
"Wait a minute... when did this fight take place?" she asks.
"No!" Ayana says to Reiko, eyes widening again. "No, they can't know. They'd kick me out if they knew I was fighting with Sora-baka, and besides I don't want them to know about my soul being stuck in a stone, either. Then they'd probably learn about Tsukiko and ... and it's just .. no. They can't know," she reiterates unhappily.
Then she sighs and looks to Tsukiko with a shrug. "She called me a know-it-all, too. I probably do have a big mouth. Anyways it was ... a few hours ago? Earlier tonight. She was late getting home and I was just sitting on the roof waiting for you to come home."
"Ohhh noo~" sing the koi.
"Yeah..." sighs Reiko with a sigh. "So you can't tell them that stuff. But.. they know your some sort of foxgirl right I mean. They gotta know the lore already don't they?" she asks head tilting. She shrugs a bit as she sighs and scratches her head.
"Okay but.. still. If you're in danger..." she says.
"Let Ikiko-chan know..or I know.. or-- anyone else you trust because that's dangerous."
"Don't let yourself be hurt!~ o/~" sings the koi.
"Yeah that." she says softly.
"Because if she knows and she doesn't like you..." she pauses.
Cute Wolf Tsukiko frowns slightly. Why would her 'cousin be out that late? She didn't think the tutoring sessions ran that late, and Sora's too straight-laced to be a delinquent. So why the late-night arrival?
Bah, not important right now. "Whatever she tries to do, I'll be there to help you," the wolfgirl says to her girlfriend. "No matter what. You're that important to me, and if it's a choice between your safety and my secrecy... I'll protect you first, and worry about the rest later."
"I'm not in trouble," Ayana whiningly retorts to Prism Keeper Orange. "It's fine, I just wanted to be alone. She's being nice to me now, so I really don't think there's anything wrong, I just ... I don't like having someone do that to me," she says quietly. "Because ... well ..." she reaches up to grab the stargem, then says, "Well! It's scary. I mean, it might be fun if Ikiko grabbed it and told me to do something I wasn't expecting, but not her."
Prism Keeper Orange listens and crosses her arms. "Are you sure?" asks with a frown-- then Ayana says something and she /blushes/ with a huff!
"W-well! Indeed, but!-- if it's an issue..." she says. "We're just worried Ayana, if it's making you feel uncomfortable.." she says silently as she looks down.
She sort of glares at her koi and they suddenly dissapear before they open thier mouths and sing what's currently making her blush. Also.
She doesn't want them belting out some rendition of 'kiss the girl' or something.
That'd be just embarassing.
Cute Wolf Tsukiko gives Ayana a hug. "Nah, I value your free will more than that," she remarks. "I wouldn't use your stargem to force you to do things that you wouldn't want to do, even if we'd think they'd be fun."
A sly grin crosses the wolfgirl's face. "On the other hand... I'd be willing to give this a try!" she giggles, then she leans in and gives the stargem a very tender kiss~!
Ayana starts to turn and give some sly and possibly not-quite-age-appropriate response to Cute Wolf Tsukiko, but then the werewolf is wrapping her lips around the stargem, and the foxgirl just seems to stop moving altogether. The words are caught in her throat, and her eyes are rolled back in her head, and she just seems to very slowly be melting onto the cart she's sitting on.
There are really no words coming from the fox-girl right now. She'll be back later, when her soul is not practically in another girl's mouth.
Prism Keeper Orange goes to say something-- and then Ikiko goes ahead and kisses Ayana's starball and then Ayana seems to be sort of settling down into the cart and then her mind sort of segfaults a moment into a hard blush and then she says the first thing that comes to her mind.
"Oh my god Ikiko, stop eating Ayana!"
Then she pauses.
Then she blushes.
"I mean! Stop--- eating--or...kissing or---or--or--or--or--"
Koigirl.EXE has crashed.
Cute Wolf Tsukiko finishes the kiss, then cuddles with Ayana, giving the kitsune a quick peck on the cheek. Her point was made, possibly a bit more thoroughly than she had intended to!
The wolfgirl looks over at the stammering Orange and smiles warmly. "You might want to land before you crash from confusion," Tsukiko giggles, finding amusement from inadvertently breaking the minds of two of her closest friends. Love really is the most powerful force!
She idly skritches Ayana's ears for a few moments, letting everyone regather their thoughts in relative silence. "Feeling less upset?" she finally asks.
When the werewolf finally stops kissing her starball, Ayana begins to blush. She swallows, takes a breath, then immediately starts hyperventilating before she manages to catch her breath. "I can't even think when you do that," she mumbles to her girlfriend. "It was just simultaneously pure emptiness, just me and you, and ... bliss beyond what I have ever known, I guess because of the intention. Oh god, I feel um." The blush grows a little stronger before she sits upright very suddenly. "Sorry, Reiko-chan," she whines. "I didn't ... you shouldn't ... uh." Now she's bright red like a cherry tomato foxface.
Prism Keeper Orange sort of just blushes and snaps out of whatever freeze frame mind fart she entered and mentally becomes aware again herself as she huffs! "W--well! No worries!" she suddenly says bright red faced still herself!
"I shouldn't hang out with my friends if they're girlfriends if they also goingtokissalotorsomething!" she says softly blusteredly and fast. She sort of bites her lip as she stares.
"Sorry about that, you two," Tsukiko replies sheepishly. "I, uh... I kinda figured that kissing the starball would be sensitve, but I didn't expect it to have that kind of reaction!"
She nuzzles Ayana nose, then kisses the tip of it before looking at Orange again. "And don't worry, we'll try to keep the kisses down to a light amount when we're out among friends," Tsukiko reassures her younger friend.
Ayana takes another few minutes to recover, then hugs Ikiko gently. "Sorry, Reiko-chan," she mumbles again. "I guess it wasn't clear. Touching that thing puts me into a like ... comatose state or something. Except I can feel everything and it's like I'm trapped. I can't do anything. And then I guess intentions get transferred because ... um." She trails off, then squeezes her eyes shut. "Sorry," she mumbles again.
Then she takes a deep breath and changes subject very very suddenly back to, "So Sora-baka is a jerk, but I guess I have a chance now to earn her trust. I don't know how to do that, though. And I don't know if I should even bother trying. It kinda feels like a setup or somethig."
Prism Keeper Orange huffs. "It's fine. But." she says. "Sora-baka..." now she's saying it. "Sounds like a real jerk." she frowns. "If she's giving you a chance, you should take it I guess, but if she's lying, then I don't know, you should tell someone-- Ikiko or me or anyone else you trust!" she says softly.
"Just don't let her push you around, else we're just back in this situation where you're letting yourself be pushed around by a big /jerk/." she huffs!
She's already sitting on a ferris wheel's cart end thankfully.
She just huffs and seems all meek.
Cute Wolf Tsukiko hugs Ayana, then rests her head on the kitsune's shoulder. "I've mostly haven't done much with her outside of events involving the entire extended family, so I don't really have useful advice to give," she admits. "Having her trust would probably reduce how much trouble she causes, but my immediate family trusts you, and that's the important part."
"They probably shouldn't," Ayana mumbles, then sighs. "Anyways, I just wanted to be alone, and now you're both here. So ... did you bring me food? Cause I'm hungry after running to get up here. I didn't even Henshin. I probably shoulda."
Prism Keeper Orange perks up, okay that's something she can help with. She snaps her fingers and a koi appears holding a bag of jerky that'd normally be in her pocket where she just regular old Reiko. She takes and it dissapears. She opens the package, and offers it with a smile. "Always~" she says with a giggle.
"Well. When I'm not a mess..." she looks down.
"They trust me, and I trust you," Tsukiko points out. "And I have some cash; we can stop by a certain burger stand on the way home. The usual late-night guy is somewhat used to magical girls stopping by for food, and with you along I shouldn't have to worry about certain misunderstandings."
She reaches over and gives Orange a small hug. "And don't forget: asking friends for help when you need it applies to you, too," the wolfgirl points out. "Even if it's just needing someone to talk to while you think out loud."
Ayana snatches the bag of jerky out of the fish's fins and tears into it, hastily stuffing her mouth full of the food. So couth, so suave, so none of these things. She barely chews before she swallows, then licks her lips happily and works a bit more sedately for the second mouthful. She even chews two whole more times!
The jerky doesn't last long before Ayana is nodding her head agreeably. "Sure, burgers sound good. I could eat like ten maybe." Pause. "Hey, Reiko-chan, why were you singing anyways?"
Prism Keeper Orange blinks. "Singing?" she then blushes quiteeee hard.
"Oh--I..um. Har--Haru said he'd go out with me to Midori-ya for a snack..." she mutters. "--and--I talked to Hunter too and.. Haru and-- I did art for both of them! And--- they both like me back!" she says with a slightly more heated blush.
"S--so yeah! That's why!" she says with a nervous smile as she swallows. "Burgers..?" she asks at Ikiko.
"Can I come along?" she asks. "S'okay if no~ I know you two wanna be alone sometimes too~" she teases.
Ayana stares at Reiko for several very confused moments. Then, very gently, she reaches up and grips the girl with both hands on shoulders. "Reiko-chan," she notes. "I am not an expert on these things, but I think you will find it very, very challenging to have two boyfriends and a girlfriend. You should probably choose just one or two."
"I'm fine with having you along, if Ayana's okay with it," Tsukiko smiles to Orange. "We can get a late-night snack, then all three of us should probably head to our respective homes and get some sleep."
The wolfgirl stares at her girlfriend's read of the sitation with Reiko, Hunter, Haru, and Misa, then gently facepalms and giggles.
Prism Keeper Orange sort of stares at Ayana-- then blushes again! "Misa..is--is just a friend!" she says probably unconvincingly from Ayana's standpoint. Ikiko can probably hear the confidence in her voice when she says that though--- Reiko isn't second guessing herself, as for the two guys...
Ohhh the scandlized mischief...
"Well. I'm dating both." she crosses her arms. "And they both know that! They say--- the best man shall win!" she insists.
Ayana opens her mouth, closes it, then opens it again, then just shakes her head and sighs. "Right," she grunts out, then turns around and drops off the edge of the cart. "Last one to the burger joint pays!" she calls, not even bothering to Henshin as she begins 'cheating' with twilight steps towards her destination.
Cute Wolf Tsukiko laughs, then bounds after Ayana. The kitsune certainly sounds like she's feeling better, and that makes Tsukiko feel less worried. And while she has the money needed to pay for their meal, the wolfgirl isn't one to turn down a bit of friendly competition!
Prism Keeper Orange acks! "Hey!" she says as she flutters off into the air and then proceeds to cheat too. By flying after the group as fast as her wings will take her!