(New Leaf) Canicular 15 (Patreon)

AN: I will be posting a canon omake tomorrow or Thursday

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Koneko
(Hours later - Tuesday morning, July 31st)

I was pulled out of a deep and blissful sleep without any obvious sign of a cause. I was awake enough to be aware that I was awake, my tired body protesting that change in status, but still asleep enough that nothing mattered yet, so I didn’t– couldn’t– think about anything other than how little I wanted to think about things. Sleep was all that mattered.

My cheek began warming up like the rest of my body, as rays of morning sunlight crept up my face. The soothing heat radiated deeply into my skin, giving off a feeling of lazy comfort even in the unfamiliar bed. I shifted as I woke up and felt the silky sheets sliding along my legs, having been unconsciously kicked away at some point in favor of the warmth of direct sunlight, a thing that was pretty normal for me to wake up to.

I nestled between heated pillows while a familiar sensation rhythmically pulsed through my head, keeping my mind all relaxed and fuzzy. Warm air gently blew periodically onto my ears, while my tail was draping over the edge of something round and smooth, and–

Oh, right. My tail.

It’s full length swished across the surface with an almost-numb, dull ache spreading out from where it had been severed, filling the reattached half.

That meant that my “heated pillows”, the smooth skin and wide hips my tail slid across, the arm that wasn’t mine but draped over my chest–

I let out a still-tired yawn and tried to sit up without disturbing my big spoon, actually waking up now that my mind was running enough to recognize my surroundings.

With our mansion being heavily damaged and the security measures that still worked being basically useless against our enemies, that left two places in town that had strong defenses while still being big enough to house two peerages. The Sitri group home, and the old school building. 

After everything that happened, Rias and Sona agreed to have everyone gather at the ORC’s main base to rest and recover, instead of returning to Sona’s place. There were a bunch of reasons for this, but it really just boiled down to two big ones. First, if an attack did come, it was a lot more remote. There was way less civilian traffic or houses in the area, and the battles of last night had already caused a ton of property damage and over fifteen dead, with dozens more injured.

‘It’s going to be a nightmare to cover this up later,’ I thought. If the town even continued existing past the coming night.

I ignored the ice that shot through my veins at the thought.

From the texts Naruto sent us last night after the explosions stopped, it sounded like the head honcho himself was going to be making a visit to Kuoh today. And even without knowing what that new barrier did exactly, it was a pretty safe bet that a barrier made by angels would be able to stop Devils as inexperienced as us from skipping town.

The second main reason we relocated to the club house was Gasper, and not just because we didn’t want him to be on his own if the Fallen attacked him at the school without us there.

If Gomeisa woke up and broke free from his restraints? Forbidden Balor View. If we were attacked and overrun by numbers? Forbidden Balor View. If the worst case scenario happened and we couldn’t beat Kokabiel with our own strength? Forbidden Balor View– to stall, give us an opening to attack, run, whatever.

Sure, he’s a little wimp who can’t control it at will, but a good scare always had a good chance for him to trigger it on reflex. And in my experience, as long as there wasn’t a bunch of complex theory involved, making progress with difficult-to-control abilities was way quicker in the heat of things than in training, or flat out ignoring the problem for years like I also did.

Not exactly the best backup plan, but better than just not making a plan at all that made use of his Sacred Gear.

So when my eyes finally cracked open, it was to find myself in one of the many spare rooms in the old school building, one that had been retrofitted to be a backup bedroom for especially late-night work days. Looking around, I saw a wall clock hanging above the door with the hour hand sitting most of the way there towards the twelve, with the minute hand a bit behind it near the ten.

‘Eleven-fifty… I was out for what? Six, seven hours?’ I let out a breath. ‘Not the best, but good enough.’

It was about time I got up. While they’d probably wait until nighttime because that was just the general common sense of the supernatural world, the Fallen could technically launch their final attack at any time now, so it was probably best to have everyone who wasn’t dead tired get to prepping.

‘If we aren’t good enough…’ My tail ached at the spot where it had been cut and reattached.

I reluctantly pulled my head from Akeno’s boobs with her breath tickling my fur, and began wiggling out from her weakly clutching arms, pulling an actual pillow behind me to replace me as her hug toy.

It was hard not to take glances at the [Queen] when I finished crawling out of bed and stood up. Because devil healing magic worked best with as much skin to skin contact as possible, and I’d fallen asleep mid-session, She’d obviously decided to join me immediately after finishing, because we were both still in our birthday suits. Her resting expression and slightly parted lips, the swell of her curves as she slowly breathed in and out, her legs shifting slightly as her body unconsciously curled up around the pillow that had taken my spot– Akeno was ridiculously attractive.

Akeno was also one of my most precious people.

The layer of sweat coating her skin, the slight furrow in her brow, and the feverish warmth her body gave off, all told me that she had pushed herself past her limits last night. She might not have been significantly injured or even all that pressed in her fight, but withstanding the amount of extra power that she did for as long as she did, and then when it ran out, continuing on to use the rest of her energy and stamina to begin patching me up… 

She would need a good couple more hours of rest before she could wake up without feeling like a zombie, and I didn’t want my finally-active puberty hormones to lead me into disrespecting her by taking advantage of the eye-candy, so I quickly ducked into the bathroom to take a much-needed shower to clear my head and finish waking up.

No matter how weird it was that even this room had an attached bathroom after Rias’s renovations. 

‘Shower-obsessed weirdo,’ I idly thought of my nudist master with amusement as I began washing my tail. My fingers ran through my fur as the water rained down, pulling away globs of caked on blood and pinkish suds that began sticking together when the water made contact.

I paused as I felt skin-on-skin contact for a split second while lathering, and pulled a hand back to trace the spot. I twisted around and looked down at my butt and tail, and saw the thick ring of exposed scar tissue at the mid-point of the appendage where no fur grew. Just a fleshy stripe breaking up the red-stained white.

I felt as numb as the tip of my tail as I traced the beginning of the dull ache to that scar.

All it took was a single mistake, and I was permanently marked; maybe even for the rest of my life.

However short that might be.

A sick feeling in my stomach seemed to knock the air out of my chest when the thought hit me, the idea that some of us, or even everyone, might not make it through the battle. That it might be the end.

The sheer relief and happiness on Rias’s face when we celebrated breaking her engagement, the late night conversations Akeno and I have had about coming to terms with our suppressed heritages, Kiba, Asia and even Issei… eating lunch on the roof at school with Mitsuri and Norika, where the only worry was passing the next set of exams… My lazy mornings with Shiro… Naruto-kun…

All my friends…

My nails bit into my palm, the water dripping from my fists turning pink.

All gone…

My heart was pounding in my ears as I sucked in air in short, sudden gasps, finally remembering to breathe again.

Despite deciding to get up and be productive, start getting ready for the struggle ahead, I ended up taking the better part of an hour to collect myself and finish up my morning ritual.

I recognized what had just happened to me from a story Naruto had told me about an incident in his own past, so I was conflicted that I still hadn’t gotten to see him since before everything went down.

By the time he had decided to regroup with us instead of heading to one of his “safehouses” last night, Akeno had already begun treating my wounds with an equally exhausted Asia assisting her with my tail, and Rias had made sure that no one could enter the room to distract either of them in our tired states.

I passed out before they were even finished, meaning he never got a chance to see me in such a pathetic state. It was relieving, because I didn’t want him to get worried about my injuries, but it also bothered me, because I knew he’d be worrying no matter what, just from getting the details from the others.

By the time I got out of the bathroom and began pulling on my panties, the only clothing I had on hand that wasn’t blood-stained, Akeno had begun stirring. With a small towel draped around my neck, I opened the window and looked out at the school house’s still-carefully maintained grounds, taking a deep breath of the fresh air that swept in to clear out the steam from my shower. I just barely picked up on the approaching scent of mineral oil-based blade polish through the gaps in the door, approaching from down the hallway and mixing in with the still-strong scent of blood in the room.

Not yet.

I focused on the latter, glancing down to my ruined uniform and bra laying in a corner of the room. ‘Still need to get fresh clothes. I’ll teleport home, feed Shiro, then come back fully dressed.’ I nodded to myself, stepping over to an open space in the room.

Right as I began the casting process for a teleport, a Gremory magic circle forming beneath my feet, three carefully soft knocks rang out on the door.

“Koneko-chan? Akeno? Either of you up yet?” He asked through the door with a low voice.

I reflexively hid my tail– painfully aware of the partial loss of feeling in the end half– and chose not to answer, pretending to be asleep so he’d go away for now; I needed to actually get some clothes to cover up with before he could see me.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t the only one in the room, and despite how quiet he was for our sake, even regular reincarnated-devils had much better hearing than humans.

Naruto

“Mmmnnnn… C’miiinnn” I hear Akeno groan sleepily on the other side of the door. I pushed it open

“How are you two doing, I heard- Gah-!!” My eyes widened and I snapped my palms up to cover them. “S-sorry Koneko! And what the hell Himejima, why didn’t you tell me you both were naked?!”

Akeno had been yawning, in the process of pushing herself onto an elbow while tiredly rubbing one of her eyes with everything from the waist up on display. Koneko stood frozen like a scared cat on a magic circle in the center of the room with even more skin showing than Akeno, but at least had the most important bits covered.

“Hmmm…?” Akeno hummed questioningly. “Oh… sorry Ko-” she yawned again, “-Koneko-chan… My bad, eheh.”

“You…” Koneko bit out, voice trembling.

I reflexively peeked through a gap in my fingers to check if she was talking to me.

The magic circle was gone, and Koneko’s hands were clutched into fists while her shoulders shook with fury, her head lowered with her hair covering her eyes.

She took a step towards me.

“Eh?” I let out a nervous mutter. “E-eh? Koneko-chan? K-Koneko-chan, now hold on, let’s just calm down and talk this over-!”

A tiny cat girl was lunging at me with probable murder in her eyes, so I did what any reasonable young man would do in my place; raised my arms defensively, closed my eyes, and hoped for the best. 

(30 minutes later)

The three of us stepped through the door into the main club room where a bunch of the others were gathered and talking, while a trio of serving carts off to the side of the room filled the space with the faint smell of bacon and french toast and syrup.

I already had some of it when it was fresh, because Kiba was an awesome cook and there was no way I was gonna miss a hot breakfast made by him, but I very clearly heard Koneko’s stomach growling like a lion, and knew she was struggling not to just leave my side and rush over there immediately. Akeno probably thought the same way, going by her chuckle.

I enjoyed the cute little blush that appeared on Koneko’s blank face when I gently nudged her toward the food with a smile, and she took the hint to go fill up.

After our talk, Koneko had gone and changed into her standard training outfit, which was just her school gym uniform (a white t-shirt and blue bloomers), while Akeno chose her “Thunder Priestess” robes that she apparently magicks up whenever she fights.

They just looked like regular miko robes to me, the normal kinda stuff we even had back home in the Elemental Nations, but apparently it was like a ‘brand thing’ for her in the underworld. According to her, ‘the [Queen] of Lucifer’s little sister’ was recorded hunting strays with it a couple years ago so now that’s the look the rest of Devil society has when thinking of her. In reality, it was just the clothing style she was most comfortable wearing in her early years as a Devil after being raised as a shrine maiden. So even after adjusting to a more normal clothing preference from her years under Rias, she has an image to maintain now.

It was interesting hearing a little bit more about her while waiting for Koneko to return with her own clothes, but it just made me glad that I could throw on one of my orange tracksuits and call it a day if I ever needed to deal with that sort of thing.

Easy, comfortable, practical.

Akeno led the way to the others, and two girls from Sitri’s peerage– Meguri and, uh, Momo I think her name was?–  shifted to the side to make space on the couch for Akeno and I to sit down. Sitri, Saji, and the two exorcist girls were also here and sitting across from us, with everyone else either in other rooms getting some sleep of their own, guarding the two captured Fallen, or off to the side eating after waking up like Koneko.

“Welcome back, Uzumaki-kun,” Red nodded my way. “Did you have a good sleep, Akeno?

“I did. It was refreshing, if a little short. Have I missed any updates on the situation?”

“We were just discussing the details of the Light barrier around town,” Sitri said with a nod. “From my studies of tactics and our history of warfare against the other factions, I’ve determined this is a somewhat modified and updated version of a barrier that was commonly used during the Great War to ambush and decimate small to medium groups of high-class devils. Maintained by a group of low-to-mid-tier Angels pooling their power, the barrier is invisible to the basic senses and only becomes visible when it’s actively preventing escape attempts. Its most basic effects are to act as a scrambler to prevent standard dimensional travel or messaging spells from reaching out of its bounds, and being a reactive defense that surges with concentrated Light energy wherever dark-aligned beings attempt to cross its boundary.”

The white-haired girl, Hanakai Momo, chimed in to mention that her father was a high ranking member of a telecommunications company associated with the Sitri clan, and that he’d confirmed that internet and phone signals routed out of Kuoh through their optical fiber cables were being interrupted by ‘anomalous disruptions’ at the barrier’s edges.

Xenovia didn’t understand what that meant and asked for clarification, which I totally didn’t need myself.

“Essentially, calls, texts, and the internet cannot reach into or outside of Kuoh,” Momo explained. “Modern digital communications work through signals of pulsing light, and the barrier is scrambling those signals.

“To add to that,” Sitri took over again, “While humans and other light-aligned beings can freely pass through the barrier, the fallen maintaining it from the outside have managed to intercept all of the human agents we have sent out, along with most of the government and clan-aligned sorcerers that have tried to get out to call for help.”

I scratched the back of my head. “Maybe the Fallen have a list of known agents or something and have their phones tapped? The guys I worked with last night believed our comms were compromised somehow. Hell, they could just be watching the main roads and trains out of town for your people. In my experience this past year, other humans involved in the supernatural aren’t subtle at all.”

I glanced at the so-far quiet blue-haired exorcist, who was wearing a skin-tight armored bodysuit and cloak, with Excalibur Destruction wrapped up in a ‘sealing cloth’ and hanging off her back.

Apparently, she and the similarly dressed Twintails next to her had arrived at the train station in town exactly like that.

“That’s… fair, honestly.” Red caught my glance and nodded in amusement. “The bright side is that the Japanese government is aware of the issue, thanks to one of their agents being able to make it out and back unnoticed. Word has made it back to the Kyoto faction, and reinforcements will be on the way to try and disrupt the Fallen soldiers maintaining the barrier within the hour. I’ve also requested they try to contact our siblings in the Underworld for us, since we’ve been having problems on our end that they don’t have, but that will take a couple hours because they have to go through official channels.”

The student council president explained that while the barrier didn’t require any sort of ritual setup or physical anchors that could be targeted and destroyed, it would theoretically require around fifty low-tier angels actively and continuously casting it to maintain cover over a town-sized area, a weakness that Devils during the war had attempted to exploit by baiting ambushes for counter-ambushes so they could attack the Angels occupied with maintaining the barrier.

It also was also speculated that it took too much energy to maintain for much longer than the length of a full battle, so for it to remain up for hours like it has, the Fallen were probably taking rotating shifts with upwards of a hundred or more of them tied up powering the thing or resting, assuming they were as strong as the average two-to-four-wing Fallen.

Koneko joined us shortly, squeezing herself between Akeno and I to the point she was practically sitting on our laps, and offered the older girl one of the two food-stacked plates she held.

We continued discussing what the plan for the situation was as a couple of the other student council members plus Mittelt showed up, but for the most part, it basically just boiled down to ‘rest up and prepare for a fight while we wait for Youkai (and maybe Devil) reinforcements.’

With Akeno apparently going toe-to-toe with an eight-winged Fallen other than the one I escaped, only Boosted by Issei a few times and not really struggling that much against her opponent, the safest bet for taking out the enemy leaders would probably be to have him Boost Koneko or Red to fight the head honcho while the rest of us dogpile Procyon, leaving the rest of the Fallen soldiers to the clans and youkai.

Akeno was still recovering from the strain of being boosted, but Red and Koneko were just built differently when it came to power and stamina in the first place. Red was apparently actually ridiculously powerful for her age, but before her Rating Game, she was greener in an actual fight than I was before the Wave mission. She could handle huge amounts of power just fine, so Boosting her to take on the biggest bad guy wouldn’t bea problem for her.

Koneko on the other hand, was easily the most well-rounded, solid, vicious and experienced fighter of the group with high defense, stamina, and powerful chakra to back it up. Only the [Knights] and Akeno were faster than her, and only Kiba was more skilled than her, but she had more depth to her skillset that meant if Issei hit her with a Transfer with just four Boosts, even still recovering like she is, she could probably stomp that Procyon guy into the mud!

I didn’t actually see enough of what he could do to back up a statement like that, but I’d say it anyway, because she was strong and I believe in her.

“What about Genshirou-kun?”

We all looked at the newcomer to join the conversation, the same girl that was always with Saji whenever he patrolled the school halls, Nimura Ruruko.

“What about him?” Meguri asked.

“His Absorption Line!” The brown haired girl waved her arms energetically from behind our couch. “What if we have Hyoudou-san Boost Genshirou-kun’s Sacred Gear, then he could drain the barrier and do stuff with the energy! Like, like, make the enemy overload and explode, or power up Akeno-senpai?”

The [Queen] beside me hummed and the rest of the devils showed considering looks, while I blinked in confusion. I still didn’t know crap about most of the Sitri peerage’s abilities, but one of them apparently had an energy stealing ability?

“... That’s certainly an option worth considering,” Sitri commented after a moment. “But it will take considerable setup, positioning, and perfect timing. Can you wake Saji-kun if he isn’t already? His input might shed some light on the viability of such a tactic. For now, let’s discuss how we’re going to involve the Clans in the defense of the town.”

I stepped through the door with my shoulders straight and expression as serious as the topic still being discussed behind us. The heavy wooden door clicked shut and I made it about five steps before my shoulders dropped and a big sigh escaped me. 

“Couldn’t hold it in longer?” The shorty walking beside me asked boredly. “Amateur.”

“Ahh, shut it ya midget,” I grumbled, twisting my arm away from the threatening poke of retaliation. “I’ve never been good at the ‘sitting still’ thing or making detailed plans. Being unpredictable and making stuff up on the fly has always been my bread and butter, and I already spent like two hours discussing stuff about last night with them before this second meeting.”

“Mm, that’s true.” Koneko hummed. She reached up to pat my shoulder patronizingly. “Goodo jobu.”

She suppressed the Language ability to deliberately say it in English.

I snatched her hand off me, my grip circling her wrist before she could pull away. There wasn’t really a plan for what to do next so we ended up just awkwardly staring at each other for a few seconds.

… Most likely, she let me grab her in the first place. Her reflexes were definitely fast enough to react in time.

Either way, my heart beat faster at what I was about to do, looking down at her and watching her reaction as she watched me back. I shifted my grip, and slowly began lacing our fingers together. Letting our hands lower to settle between us.

I grinned like an idiot at the red blush that spread across her pale cheeks, her golden eyes shimmering as we held eye contact.

The door slammed open a ways behind us.

“Gah!”

“Ah, Uzumaki-san, Toujou-chan! Wait up for us!”

I jumped and spun to face the sound, totally startled out of the moment as the more bubbly of the two exorcist girls came jogging up to us with her partner close behind.

“What do you want?”

I cringed at the extra flat tone Koneko used, but forced myself not to glance at her expression. She did not sound happy at the interruption.

Or maybe I was just better at understanding her tones and expressions? The exorcists didn’t seem to notice the coldness in her voice. Twintails’ bright smile didn’t twitch at all as she walked up, and Xenovia was following with a solid, serious look on her face.

In the end, they just wanted to officially thank us ‘properly’ for helping them with their retrieval mission, and specifically returning their personal Excaliburs to them. Twintails for Koneko, and Xenovia for me.

Last night was kinda a mess, and there was never really a moment where any of us were free to interact without something else going on that was more important to settle.

Like, for instance, Red getting Tsubaki to seal Destruction’s holy aura without me dropping Transparency’s cover, so that we could pass it on to Xenovia without practically shouting “Hey, Excalibur Transparency’s right here!” to anyone paying attention. Fallen, or the exorcists in question.

Somehow, I managed to not reflexively reach for the hilt of the thing when Xenovia bowed almost ninety degrees to me, thanking me for honestly returning the property of the church. I might have started sweating a little, though.

It’s not like I was gonna keep Transparency for myself forever. I did plan on handing it over, eventually.

Just… not yet.

Until this Fallen thing was over and dealt with, I still had a use for the sword.

With that whole thing out of the way and the two church girls heading the other way down the hall to meet up with Issei (who was apparently Twintails’ childhood friend?), that left me and Koneko free to continue on to our destination.

Koneko unlocked the sealed door and led the way into…

… possibly the pinkest room I’ve ever been in.

‘No wait, that’s not true. The toad stomach jutsu from Pervy Sage was pinker.’

Gasper’s room was definitely the girliest room I’ve been in before though, and I’ve been in Sakura’s room once.

A mental montage of Sakura getting pissed at me, Sai, or dog-boy and threatening violence played in my head, and I sweatdropped.

‘Okay, maybe she’s not the best example of a girly girl for comparison.’

With pink and white-striped wallpaper, thick, cream colored carpet, and stuffed animals of every size lying around on practically half the available surfaces in the room (including the floor), I would have never guessed this was a teenage boys room in a million years-

“Suck my dick, loser! Trash! Filthy casual! Get dumpstered!”

-If not for the small blond kid yelling all kinds of crap into his headset, sat in a swivel chair at a computer desk with multiple monitors and a first person shooter game running.

Despite the girly voice, there was something distinctly ‘male’ about the sheer enthusiasm involved in the trashtalk. Even the tiny side glimpse of the Kuoh girls uniform he wore didn’t make me second guess what I knew, just convinced me this was another ‘Haku’ situation.

“Hey Gaspy, we’re here,” Koneko greeted the boy.

“Dogshit excuses from a dogshit player! You carried your team straight into building up my killstreak, you feeder!”

A greeting he completely ignored, or didn’t hear, too focused on winning his online argument.

Koneko shrugged, walked up behind his chair, and reached for his head.

“Boo.” She said blandly as she pulled his headset off his pointy ears.

“Eeeeeeek!!”

The chair swiveled around, the room’s colors washing away into blacks and whites in a sudden sweeping wave.

I saw Gasper’s face for the first time.

‘Damn, it really IS another Haku situation. He really does look like a girl, I can barely even tell.’

Straight blond hair cut just below his chin, a small nose and mouth, and glowing pink eyes.

“A-auuuh, awww, n-not again Koneko-chan! You know I… I can’t control it…” The startled boy whimpered, putting his face into his .

She didn’t respond, and I walked up to her and poked at a floating strand of her hair. It shifted, barely, but didn’t fall, and looking at her expression showed no change. She was in the middle of stepping backwards, one foot still in the air and both her hands holding the headset up. It was an awkward pose, and without chakra to stick in place, she normally would have tilted over backwards if she didn’t adjust her balance.

“Huh,” I muttered, looking around the room and seeing a clock with its hands frozen in place.

“Waaaahhhh!” Gasper jumped, startled again. “What the- w-who’s there?!”

“Woah, chill out there Gasper! It’s just me, Naruto.”

“E-eh? Naruto-san? Where are you? Why can’t I see you?”

I looked down, and saw that my body was partially see-through, the sign that Transparency was actively working on me, instead of just hiding itself like I usually left it.

“I guess my sword activated by itself and made me invisible, because I can see you just fine.”

“Waahhh, don’t look at meeee!”

I shrugged– not that he could see it– and ignored the request as he threw his arms up around his head. “Is this the Sacred Gear you have trouble with? Stuff you see freezes in place, or something?”

“T-time stops, actually…”

It took a little bit for him to calm down and explain in some more detail how his ridiculous power worked, and why he had to be sealed away for everyone’s safety. It was only after about two minutes that color returned and Koneko took two steps back, the clock continuing to tick again.

She turned her head and spotted me leaning against a wall, Gasper’s favorite box sat by my feet.

It sucked that he felt the need to hide from us, but it was the only way he was willing to talk about his power so soon after messing up with it.

Koneko rolled her eyes at the sight. “I’m fine, wuss.”

“Welcome back,” I said simply, before smirking. “Turns out Transparency has some tricks of its own.”

“Nice.”

After a bit of chatting while we waited for Gasper to become more comfortable again, we got down to the main reason we were here right now. It wasn’t exactly the best set of circumstances to have our first group hangout together right now, after all.

“So, Gasper, I was told by Rias that there’s a strong Fallen prisoner sealed up over here,” I asked seriously. “Can you bring us to him? I’d like to ask him some questions, see if I can’t get to the bottom of some things that have been bothering me.”

Gasper hesitantly agreed with a strange awkwardness.

I don’t know what I was expecting when his box shuffled over to his closet, but opening it to see some middle-aged guy wrapped up head to toe in glowing bondage gear and hanging down from the clothes rack in a hog tie, it definitely wasn’t that.

“-MMMMPH! MMPH, MMMPH!”

The man’s eyes met mine in a desperate plea for freedom, before bright arcs of electricity visibly pulsed across his body to cut off his gagged cries.

“Maybe…” I cringed, getting a whiff of the smoke rising off of the limp man. ‘Maybe someone other than Akeno should handle Fallen prisoner accommodations…” I suggested.

“Yeah, probably.” Koneko agreed, holding her own nose. “Kalawarner should be fine. But fuck this guy in particular. He can stay like this while we call for Tsubaki.”

I caught a glance of her scarred tail swishing back and forth while she glared at him.

“Um,” Gasper chimed in, “Actually, it was Rias who did this… she really didn’t like the part he played in Koneko-chan getting hurt.”

Oh. Understandable.

Have a nice day.

We shut the closet and ignored the elephant in the room to play cards to pass the time. I’d ask my questions when Rias was free for a bit.

Koneko
(Hours later)

The sun was setting, already more than halfway below the horizon. The trees swayed in the light breeze, a natural pine scent carried on the wind.

There had been a couple more strategy meetings since the one I had listened in on this morning, after more of the others had finished resting up and gotten involved in the planning. A few of us had specific roles to play in the defense of the town, but for everyone else, there wasn’t much we could do without a target to point us towards as a group. Anything that stretched us too thin would just have us picked off piece by piece when Kokabiel finally attacked.

And we’d actually confirmed that was what was happening, at least.

Gomeisa gladly spilled the beans, seeming like he took more pleasure in describing how everything up until now was just a game for them to amuse themselves with while waiting for their lord to come and destroy the town himself, than the relief he got from Rias relaxing his bonds in exchange for the information, grinning the whole time. He probably would have told us everything even if all Rias did was ungag him, just so he could have the satisfaction of knowing that we knew what was coming.

My fist clenched.

Naruto-sensei’s palm dropped down on my head, pulling me back to the present.

“That’s enough for now,” he said with a small smile from right next to me. “Save the rest of your mental stamina for later. Push any harder right now, and you’ll just fill up your head with distractions.”

I let out my breath with a sigh and nodded, allowing a tension I hadn’t started out with to drain out of me alongside the potent natural energy that I’d been struggling to take in. Something that I had only really put together in my mind recently, was the contradiction of Kuoh’s natural energy being “gone”, and the fact that I could absorb natural energy anyway despite that. It was obvious, and had even been mentioned briefly by Akatsuki with her shitty jelly-donut analogy.

There was natural energy in Kuoh; it was just drawn to and concentrated around one spot. That spot being a person, Naruto-sensei. Or Kurama.

Same difference, really.

Wherever he went, it all trailed after him.

So in the end, the closer I physically was to him the easier it would be to access that power. This close, I barely had to try at all after the accidental breakthrough I’d had last night. I could practically just breathe it in, easy as that.

The real difficulty was in only taking in a small amount, little enough to not immediately begin losing my mental control.

“Mm” I hummed, leaning into his side and watching the horizon. “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it.” His arm wrapped around my shoulders.

We sat in silence together on top of the club house’s clock tower, watching as the sun finally disappeared. After almost an hour, the remaining light began being overtaken by the night sky, and Naruto began to stand up with a stretch.

A hint of artificial lavender mixed in with the regular smell of nature

“It’s about time for me to go,” he announced unnecessarily. “Everyone else should already be prepared, so I should get in place too.”

“Mm.” I stood with him.

We looked at each other, staring into each other's eyes for a long moment.

“You better keep your promise,” I told him with a threatening tone I didn’t feel. “I’ll be mad if you don’t.”

He just smiled, his whisker marks shifting with his cheeks.

“I don’t run away, and I never break a promise,” he said. “That’s my Nindō, my ninja way.”

“Idiot.” I was smiling as I said it.

He grinned, saluted as he took a step backwards off of the tower, and vanished into thin air.

Just as I always seemed to be able to tell when he was around before he ever revealed himself, I could still feel his presence as he dashed away. The way the air invisibly parted around him, the way it carried his scent.

The person behind me was tracking all the same little signs.

“I guess that means this morning wasn’t a fluke,” Akeno said coyishly as her feet settled onto the slopped tower roof. “You beat me to the finish line. I’m seriously happy for you, koneko-chan… though I hope you realize, that doesn’t necessarily mean the race is over just yet-”

“Akeno-senpai.”

She paused at my interruption, and I turned to face her fully.

My second closest friend was beautiful. She had everything as a woman that I was lacking. A full figure, a great sense of style, an alluring voice, and the confidence to flaunt it to get what she wants. On top of that, despite the sadism kink and her trauma-induced bias against certain groups who’ve wronged her, she really is one of the kindest people I know.

That just made it even more painful for me to have to say this to her.

“When are you going to stop half-assing this?”

She blinked, taken aback. “What?”

“It was never a race, not really,” I continued, shaking my head. “You just kept treating it like a game the whole time, like we were competing against each other. But that’s wrong. I was never your competition. Naruto is.”

Her playful expression slowly dropped as I spoke, the way she held herself closing off defensively

It was sad to me.

We were devils. More than that, we were both hybrids, Nekoshou and Fallen. The idea of polygamy wasn’t just “accepted”, it was the normal for us. If we both like the same person, and neither of us have a problem with each other, then the expected outcome is that we both pursue that person. Even years in the human world hasn’t changed that common sense for us, even if we are more on the fence than a full-blooded devil.

But Naruto is a human, through and through. To him, even if he enjoys the attention Akeno gives him as a hot-blooded male, in his mind, he’s already pursuing me, even if neither of us ever made it official. As it stands, he can’t reciprocate Akeno’s advances.

And she knows this, even if she hasn’t acknowledged it yet.

If we really were racing, then she was still back on the practice track. The entire time I’d been deepening my bond with Naruto and growing closer, she’d spent most of it cementing herself as the ‘flirty’ friend, rarely pushing much further than that.

I saw the understanding in her eyes as she looked away.

“This isn’t something you can get just by playing around. You have to build it.” I took a step closer and wrapped my arms around her in a hug, one that she reciprocated with trembling arms. The smell of her lavender shampoo was much stronger from this close. “Figure out what you really want first. If you still want it then…” ‘Give it your all.’

We’ll see what happens, then. After.

The last of the light bleeding over the horizon disappeared after ten minutes.

Less than five minutes after that, a star descended on Kuoh for all to witness.

____ᓚᘏᗢ____