Archive of Our Own ^beta

The irony of Kai’sa leading Seraphine through the rail stations of Taipei wasn’t lost on her. She stood on average a full head over the crowd, long and strong, and while nobody gawked at her--this was the capital, foreigners were here all the time--their wary regard of her lay thick on her skin. Familiar and heavy, almost tangible on her in her light zip-up jacket and leggings.

By comparison, Seraphine looked like the local, not her--the right height, the right features, even cutely dressed in an oversized sweater and shorts like so many of the locals were. When she accidentally bumped into passerby, she even knew what to say in Mandarin to apologize, and to escape a closer look. But she didn’t know where they were going, and Kai’sa did.

Almost a year’s worth of Taiwanese high school had left its mark on her, and her feet still remembered the steps through Zhongxiao Dunhua Station: the most economic path from the staircase up from the platform to the fare gates--

--the smooth pull of her transit card against the gate’s reader and back into her pocket in one fluid motion, without slowing--

--around bank kiosks and corners--

--quickly onwards to avoid the stream of businesspeople merging into the flow and onto the street from the underground shops.

Kai’sa had gotten this train routine down to a science by the time her father had called her into their kitchen with that pinched, anticipatory look. The apologetic white box of sweet buns, little and lovely, had already been on the table for the announcement of their next move.

“Our next adventure!” he’d always spin it. She tried to be positive about every move, but after a few years, she stopped putting on a show about it. It invited trouble.

She didn’t realize she’d left Seraphine behind on the glass-enclosed stairway up onto the street until she heard her calling up at her.

“It’s so early, Kai’sa,” Seraphine wheezed, half a staircase between them as Kai’sa waited for her at the top. She was half-distracted, trying to tuck her card into her sweater’s pouch as she navigated her steps. “Is this really going to be so important?”

“Most definitely.” Kai’sa was energized, almost bouncing in place, eager to pluck their prizes and bring them back to the hotel the group was staying at. “They run out of these bing so fast.” Kai’sa glanced back at Seraphine. “You’re ready to sprint back with bags of hot food, right? A light spot of morning exercise?” she teased.

“Kai’sa!!” But Seraphine was smiling, if still panting and now breaking into a trot after Kai’sa’s long, lean strides. She was game.

Seraphine was always game, actually. Whether it was Kai'sa insisting on another run of the choreography with just a slight tweak, or a visual Kai'sa couldn’t leave alone, she was as enthusiastic as Kai’sa to see things through. She didn’t even necessarily see what Kai’sa saw, sometimes (her nose would scrunch up, Kai’sa could see her doing the calculations and turns in real time to reach wherever Kai’sa was),but she always wanted to see what Kai’sa was talking about.

Kai’sa returned that energy right back. Seraphine's lyrics were so heartfelt and evocative--she could instantly fit movement to her words, and even got up in the middle of writing sessions with everybody to try it out, right there. The first time she'd done it, their very first session together, Seraphine had almost dropped her guitar, mouth agape. But then she'd burst into a smile, and they'd gone the rest of the session writing all over each other's notes, back and forth.

The two of them could bandy a shiny new thought between them for forever, it felt like. They fed each other, effortless.

It was so rare to have somebody fall into her groove the way Seraphine did.

Her feet slowed--a bit of respite for the poor woman who’d poked her head out of her room when Kai’sa was pulling on her shoes and had immediately asked to come along to help. It was early. “Kidding,” Kai’sa said, “kidding. Though, nothing compares to them fresh, and since nobody else came along…” Kai’sa winked at Seraphine before she could process her reflex. “You’re the lucky one today.”

Seraphine wasn’t even looking at her. She was taking a moment to finally absorb the rush of Taipei in the morning: the steady thrum of mopeds threading the needle around taxis and buses, the yawn of metal awnings as people set up their stalls and kiosks on the sidewalk to bag business, the clatter and bang of a city changing colors in the hot sunlight. While Kai’sa felt a confusing hollowness for not catching her eye, she still swept a gaze across Seraphine’s face, resting a beat on how wide her eyes were, taking in the sights of the city with wonder.

Without turning, Seraphine stated, matter of fact, “You’re always saving the best for me, even though I’ve only been working with you guys for a few months.”

One second. Two. Seraphine was wrapped up in the waking of the city, still. She almost whispered, “Feeling like a princess here.”

Kai’sa had to look away, too. At anywhere else.

At the folks crossing the street catty-corner to them--at students beating feet to make the first bell, at suits hurrying along to tall buildings--at couples strolling into bakeries for breakfast before they had to say goodbye to each other for the day.

Quickly: anything else.

Kai’sa cleared her throat. “Do princesses get pulled into gopher work?”

Without missing a beat, Seraphine waggled her fingers in front of her mouth and chittered, and Kai’sa couldn’t help but laugh as she swept ahead.

-----

Seraphine had done well and only burned herself on the first dan bing--rolls of egg with scallions folded into a soft dough and griddled fresh. (A moan: “You’d think I could have seen this coming, Dad brings these back from Alhambra all the time when he visits my place.”)

But brave faces only went so far, and at Taipei Main Station, Kai’sa gestured her into a different corridor than the main one spilling out of the station once they came out of the fare gates. At Seraphine’s questioning look, she replied simply, “Finding a drink for that scalded tongue.” She continued as Seraphine trailed behind her, “There are underground malls under Main Station here that go on for ages, it’s mad. Anything you want, you can find here.”

In the span of seconds, they walked past: a sprawling entertainment shop, loud advertisements for the latest online role-playing game spilling into the passage; an open-air massage salon, chairs primed for walk-up customers and half already being used; a private clinic; several restaurants in succession, each trying to outdo the other with signage; and a storefront awash in odds and ends, including, hilariously, what looked like bootleg K/DA merchandise.

Only a glancing look, there. Seraphine kept step with Kai’sa as she smoothly walked by standees of the band. K/DA loved their fans, but it was too early in the day to be feeling generous with photos.

Seraphine truly looked like she couldn’t get enough of it all. She would walk a few steps, then turn one way and then the other to get a look at everything--then jog back up to a patient and amused Kai’sa, as if remembering what they’d come here for.

Case in point--she was idly holding one of her bags of bing now, hefting it. “Aren’t the rest going to be grumpy? We’re bringing back breakfast.” Seraphine’s eyebrows were knotted up, worried, and Kai’sa felt the impulse to smooth them out with her thumb. But her hands stayed where they were.

“I guarantee you, Akali was only awake long enough to beg for food and then she knocked out again. Ahri’s definitely okay with just her shake until at least 10, and Evelynn has yet to stir.” Kai’sa pulled a hand across her eyes, drawing in a deep breath, and Seraphine sputtered back a laugh at the pantomime of Eve in her sleep mask.

“We won’t dawdle, but a detour won’t kill them. And anyway,” she continued as she walked down the narrow corridor with Seraphine in tow, “you can blame me.” She drew herself up--flexed two arms full of bags carefully, keeping them out of traffic.

She got a snicker for her efforts. “Gallant,” Seraphine half-sang. “Throwing yourself in the way like that. I wouldn’t want any of them angry with me.”

Kai’sa quirked an eyebrow. “I thought you were settling in with everybody well. You’re still freaked out by them? They’re not going to eat you.”

“Far as you know.” Seraphine crossed her arms. “Maybe they’ll get me when you aren’t looking.”

“You just haven’t been around them as long. They’re not scary, I swear.”

“I guess.” Seraphine’s lips were pursed.

She didn’t bite it back for long. Bracingly, she started, “But, like… I don’t know… They’re stars! It’s one thing to be able to hold a conversation with them, but sometimes I can’t get my head around how wildly, like, beyond me they are. You know? They’re not like you and me!” Seraphine was beside her now, and she had one hand held high--stars--and one tucked against her chest. “Wasn’t it weird for you, Kai’sa? When Ahri and Evelynn approached you?” Seraphine stepped ahead to turn and look her in the eye. “I mean, two big shots just showing up? You weren’t intimidated by them at all? They’re intense.”

What a trip. Kai’sa swung the bags of bing, remembering. Seeing them turn around and wave to her in front of her studio’s doors... “Hmm. I was, but just a little. I knew them like most people knew them--famous, pretty, dedicated idols. In my little studio in my little corner of the world, they didn’t reach quite so far.”

Seraphine still darted her eyes elsewhere when Ahri and Evelynn were talking to her for too long, now that she thought of it. Call it new girl nerves.

“...It’s got to be different for you, huh?” Kai’sa realized. “You already knew of them, and then they reached out to you with some impossible chance.”

A scoff. “Knew of them? Uh, yeah! I still have posters of the both of them! And then they were talking to me on my phone, Kai’sa. Them! On my phone! On my phone, while I was looking them both in the face on my wall!!” She had her face in both hands, like she was being transported back to the moment. “Oh my god, it was weird.”

There were artists and dancers Kai’sa would get sick over meeting. She was starting to see Seraphine’s side of it. “Singing is everything for you. They’re at the top of that game.”

The blue waves of her hair bounced as she nodded. “Exactly. I didn’t want to disappoint them. I still don’t, actually,” she confessed.

Kai’sa bumped one arm’s bags against her back. “You’re not going to. I can tell.”

Seraphine sighed, long and low. But when she turned to look at Kai’sa again, her eyes were clear. Her smile held. “Why the confidence in me?”

The smile was infectious. “You’re an incredible talent, and you’re creative but still flexible. I’m seriously blown away by the songs you’ve already written, and it’s so exciting to know you’re only going up from here. You going in with Akali on that verse in the group track? Inspired.” She emphasized the point with another pat on the back. “And you’ve got a drive that just happens to have drawn the gaze of four top-tier artists, so. I know you’ve got it in you.”

She blinked--catching up. “Wait, you said ‘like you and me’ earlier.” Kai’sa’s grin widened. “I didn’t make the star cut? Am I at least a comet? A satellite? A little asteroid?” She pinched with her finger and thumb.

Kai’sa got to watch Seraphine turn red in real time--quick, like ink in water. Poor her. Seraphine’s hands were immediately alive: waving, gesturing, crossing in front of her like she could bar herself off. “Oh, oh my god! No! Kai’sa, you’re amazing, too!! You’ve been all over, I’ve heard your songs, too, and I’ve seen so many of your performances, you studied in Seville--”

She was laughing heartily now as she waved Seraphine down. “I’m sorry, I’m being mean, I knew what you meant!”

But Seraphine was in a full wail now. “--Beijing, and, and, Chennai, and no, you’re right! Ahhhh, that’s just-- You--”

She turned, sharp--facing Kai’sa full-on. “It’s different with you!”

In the space after the outburst, Kai’sa’s chest squeezed, once.

She was taking too long to respond. Seraphine was looking up at her now.

She jerked up a hand. “Wait, wait… How did you know all that?” Kai’sa studied her, but she simply stared back.

Surely not. “Did you make flashcards on us?” she tried.

Seraphine rapidly nodded. “Oh, absolutely.”

Dead space. “What?”

Seraphine rushed to fill the silence after a few seconds, while Kai’sa was trying to remember how to work her jaw. “I just wanted to make sure I knew my stuff about you all! And I didn’t want to embarrass myself.”

That got Kai’sa back on track. She stepped in front of Seraphine, hands up to stop her. “Alright, wait. I mean...that was seriously a lot of work to do. But now that this is a whole conversation, you don’t have anything to prove.”

The wag of a finger, when Seraphine tried to interrupt. “Aht, aht! Seraphine, seriously: we’re all people, too. We’re not going to bite your head off if you, I don’t know, have our entire discography or whatever memorized. That would be wild.” She flashed her a smile. “We’re just cool people, making art with another cool person. We love your ideas. And you’ve been impressing us from day one, anyway. Impressing me.”

Seraphine let that in with a deep breath. “I’m… Okay, yeah. I’m absorbing that. I, I think. It’s just taking a little bit. Still getting over the shock. My good luck. All that.”

“I get that. It is good luck.” Kai’sa could feel her smile soften. “We’re lucky we found you.”

They’d stopped walking sometime during all this. Now Seraphine started down the corridor again, going slowly, backwards, holding Kai’sa’s eyes. One clever finger wound its way around a blue curl. “Can I confess something else?”

The rush of Kai’sa’s blood in her ears--like they were at the studio, creating together. Kai’sa started walking towards her, steps heavy and deliberate. “Yeah?”

She caught the edge of a grin as Seraphine turned around again. “I was most nervous to meet you.”

Oh, she wasn’t getting away with this. Kai’sa caught up to her in a burst, teeth flashing in a wide grin, hunter-happy. “Explain yourself!”

Seraphine skipped away, just out of reach. She laughed, “Everybody else had a reputation, you know! Even if I was scared out of my mind to work with international popstars, I kind of knew what to expect.” Seraphine started rattling off her findings, counting them off with both hands. “Ahri was probably going to be no-nonsense. She’s the leader, and ever since coming back onto the scene, she completely redid her, like, cheerful idol image. And from all the viral footage of her, Akali was going to be wild; I’m sure there’s a beat in Seoul Metro that would love to pin her down for tagging up the place. Evelynn was going to be intense with a press track record like hers. Full stop.” Check, check, and check.

“But you!” She turned on her heel--punctuated with a finger jabbed accusatorily at Kai’sa’s nose, just tickling her, which backed her up in place. “Sure, I chased down your stuff online, but you don’t have an online presence! I had no idea what you were like! And you were going to be, like, the dancer and main visuals, too, on top of also writing. I was so curious.”

Kai’sa licked her lips. “And?”

Belatedly, she realized Seraphine was in her space--when had that happened?

Seraphine held her gaze--waiting for something, or...mulling over her words. Then she tapped Kai’sa’s nose, once.

“Even if I didn’t know you, all your songs, your choreography… Even that first writing session, something in you spoke to me,” she breathed. “All of your ideas--they all came from someplace in you that was reaching out, and… and wanted people to reach back. I get that. I feel that. I thought… We were a lot alike. And then I actually got to meet you, and...

“I’m most glad I met you.”

-----

They didn’t have a chance to dig deeper. From behind them, a cracking squawk: “Seraphine?”

There were a group of boys behind them--high school, maybe from the Jianguo boys’ school, from the dusty khaki of their uniforms. When Seraphine turned to look at them, the same boy whooped, thumping a close-by friend in the chest. “I was right!” he crowed.

Kai’sa winced, and out of the corner of her eye, she saw Seraphine do the same. He was loud and close, bless him. The teenagers were always their own special sort of excited. Everything had been in Mandarin so far, thankfully, so Seraphine could understand him; Kai’sa remembered snags of Taiwanese, but just enough to get around.

“I can’t believe it! Seraphine, you’re here. I love your music so much. Terribly embarrassed, but would you,” he searched for a word, “would you… ‘Autograph?’ ” That word was in English, and he was clearly pleased at remembering. He was already fumbling for something in his bag.

Seraphine had stiffened up at the surprise, but was fully smiling now, the picture of welcoming. “Of course! I’m so flattered. Didn’t expect to run into a fan here.” She drew a lock behind an ear. “What’s your name?” Full warmth in her voice. And for some kid that had run them down in an underground mall on a breakfast run--Kai’sa wondered, not for the first time, about the size of her heart.

He was beaming. “Kendrick!”

“Kendrick, nice to meet you.” Seraphine thrust a hand forward. He paled, but took her hand in a firm shake.

When he extended a marker and--oh boy--his phone, she took them readily, but faltered as she uncapped the pen. The reflection of his phone’s screen flashed in her eyes in the tunnel light. “Are you sure?”

He puffed up--nearly knocked himself off balance with his vigor. “Please! ‘Autograph!’ On my phone! Thank you so much.”

A sweet huff of laughter. “Then you got it.”

As she put the felt tip of the pen to the case, that broke the dam. Some of his friends that had been standing behind him stirred--some turning out their pockets, some rifling through their own bags, all looking for signature fodder as well. Soon, she was cycling through a whole closet of items, and Kai’sa was helping the conveyor belt along.

Unfortunately, though, the excitement and cries of the boys chummed the waters. Soon, more faces were peering around the boys, drawn to the spectacle. They jammed the narrow corridor, making the growing crowd bigger, and bigger, and bigger. A storm was building.

Kai’sa was an old hand at this game. There wasn’t going to be a path out much longer.

Above the roiling of the people around them, somebody yelled, “Kai’sa! From K/DA!” and her stomach dropped. Now they were both made.

Stepping in front of Seraphine, who was swiping the pen against the last few items and tossing the pen back to a starstruck Kendrick, Kai’sa pulled her ace out of her sleeve--the scant Taiwanese she still remembered. She grabbed Seraphine’s shoulders before she could think too hard.

“Phái-sè, phái-sè!” The boys gaped at her pardoning her way like a local, frozen. The shock let her wedge her shoulder past, and she pulled them through.

Breaking through the mass of shouting, jostling people that had now flooded the corridor still took a minute, despite Kai’sa’s efforts. Once free, she and Seraphine started a brisk walk down the corridor, Seraphine’s shoulders in her vice grip.

A squeak from Seraphine. “Oh god, this is new.” It wasn’t like they’d never been stopped by fans before. But Ahri was typically with them on outings, and she had an otherworldly knack for routing--whether to avoid people or to be seen. If she’d been here, the boys would never have had a chance to begin with. And even if they’d been stopped, Ahri had a way of arranging every bit of her to make you let her by: the angle of her head, the soft dip where her lips met, maybe a well-placed, cooed, “Oh?” Weaponized allure.

Kai’sa’s face was still frozen in a neutral, pleasing expression as she hurried along with Seraphine. Ahri. How would she fix this? She would have scoped this area out first, to be sure, and would have kept moving. Or wouldn’t have stopped in the middle of a closed corridor, at least.

Closed corridor.

She muttered, low, “Keep pace with me, and when I push you, go with me.” She felt Seraphine nod against her chest even as the tail end of the crowd turned, following them, trying to work out for themselves what the commotion was about and what the two women had to do with it; there were always some people that couldn’t leave well enough alone, even if they had no idea what was going on.

She didn’t run, but she did make time with Seraphine. Straight down the next corridor, and the next--and she screwed up her eyes and prayed her memory was right, the sounds of too many people behind her trailing still. Kai’sa knew looking back would be a mistake. She had to do this as casually as possible. Running would only attract attention.

In the next corridor--yes, it was a four way junction like she remembered. She turned with practice to the right--let muscle memory bring her and Seraphine up along the left. The storefronts had been scraped raw and refitted with new branding, but the pattern of the columns here was familiar. Still on the trail.

Another few hallways, and Seraphine’s hands were on her arm and were tight. God, walls were claustrophobic when you were being followed. She was going to--

There. There was the space, a brief flash of color in her peripheral, and Kai’sa had the distant thought as she shoved Seraphine through the space between the pillars and then leapt in afterwards that this would look extremely strange, if anybody was looking.

She hurried her out of the eyeline of the opening, pressing tight against Seraphine. Kai’sa heard plastic rattling against metal as she backed Seraphine--soft under her hands--up against the machines. She stood to her full height and held herself in front of her, warding. Kai’sa hoped they’d moved and turned quickly enough to escape the rush of the people following them.

One wave of human curiosity bled past the opening in a jumble. She could hear two friends arguing whether or not it’d been movie stars or internet stars as they swept past with the crowd, then nothing but a whirlpool of noise.

As the tide of footsteps faded away further on down the hallway outside, Kai’sa finally let go of Seraphine’s sweater and stepped back.

This weird little cave of vending machines had caught her eye earlier. In the time since she’d been living here, the machines with their little treasures had all migrated into actual dedicated stores. They were bigger, brighter spaces, with doors and chimes, manned by bored-looking university students who were mostly there to make change.

Except this one: this one was like she’d remembered, a little wild space in the hallway tiled with clicky-clacky boxes stacked on top of each other in wherever a franchiser could reach. The place had probably been a storage area for common-use chairs in a past life, or the home of some arcane row of utilities-measuring machines for the stores around here. It raised the hair on her arms, honestly--the lights had even blown out in this section, and she saw a rare scattering of trash in the corners of the room in the dark, so this really was a forgotten place. If she hadn’t looked closer, she’d have thought it was just a recess in the wall for a generator, or a hollowed-out, narrow storefront.

It probably hadn’t been touched since she’d been a student in Taipei, actually. She was looking more closely at the machines now in the light streaming in from the hallway into this corner.

What a thing to find here, of all places.

She sighed, the tension of the chase bleeding out of her. It sagged her forward into Seraphine, who still had her hands fisted into Kai’sa’s jacket.

Kai’sa pointed a hand over Seraphine’s shoulder, and mouthed “look”.

When her attention wasn’t forthcoming, Kai’sa glanced down at her--really looked at her for the first time since pulling her in here.

Who’d let her have eyes that blue?

They were wide, looking up and into Kai’sa--boring into her.

She realized Seraphine was holding her breath, even as her heartbeat pounded under Kai’sa’s thumb from sprinting up into here: a telegraph she couldn’t decipher.

Mesmerizing.

Kai’sa was constantly being distracted by her. She kept it together during practices and team meetings, but she hadn’t gotten to where she was in her professional life without developing a whole-body awareness. “Propioception” had been the term used, when she was at university for her dance degree. The way she moved was her life. Kai’sa had to monitor how every part of her felt, and divine from that how she looked--had to feel how others were seeing her second to second, even without the luxury of a mirror. She was always in total control.

So: “disorienting” didn’t begin to cover what it was like to be around Seraphine. Kai’sa went somewhere else entirely when she was in the room. She’d catch herself in the middle of acting, without realizing what she was doing: carefully plucking at Seraphine’s hair when it was messy, trailing the nail of a finger along the wall outside the band’s guest’s room at the hotel, slowing her steps to allow Seraphine to catch up to her before her brain registered it. A million little things.

Her body bent towards Seraphine, whatever the situation, wherever they were.

Didn’t the sun pull the planets around itself? Gravity. Something like that.

She wrestled herself, forced herself back to the moment--tapped a finger against the glass of the machine a second time and worked her slack mouth into the word again: “look”.

Seraphine had been somewhere else, herself--maybe back there, in that corridor with that crowd--and she literally jumped in place, to disastrous effect. Kai’sa was laughing soundlessly even as she continued to point at the machine, her other hand rubbing her barked chin.

Once she stopped flapping her hands in self-flagellation and finally did as Kai’sa had asked, Seraphine joined her in quiet laughter. There, behind scratched and yellowed plex, a rounder-faced, exuberant Ahri looked back at them, mid-jump. It was a machine full of stickers and other small ends for her, in another life as a teen idol. Right above that machine, perched opportunely like a predator, was a younger, leaner Evelynn with hands outstretched, a flagrantly flirtatious quote emblazoned across her body.

Kai’sa whispered, “Go and blame me.”

She didn’t need to say more. They were both immediately jingling in their pockets for change and coaxing capsules out, Kai’sa running up the Siren machine and Seraphine ducked to handle the Foxy machine. Their mirth shook them as they spilled their treasures into the bags of bing designated for their two costars.

-----

Breakfast was a distant memory, now--the day’s brightest spot of joy, definitely, compounded by Akali’s whoops of laughter and Ahri and Evelynn’s collective, thin-lipped exasperation as they’d uncovered their unwelcome reminders mixed in with their food.

It’d been their one chance for laziness, rolling around on the floor of the common area between their rooms, cobbling together a breakfast from food stall fare and what Akali had scrounged up from the convenience store at the base of the building once she’d been properly awake.

Then business had begun. They were in Taipei for mere days--enough time for them to meet some potential and curiously high-bidding investors. Ahri was still adamant that nobody and nothing would have K/DA in the palm of their hand. That she was entertaining offers from anybody at all, much less two groups outside of Seoul, was a testament to just how much money was on the table. Even more shocking was that the money seemed, to all appearances, to be no strings attached. Everybody was in agreement that it had to do with strait politics, and that it was worth at least a look.

The hours bled into each other: a string of cars stopping in front of high rises, a parade of creative directors and board members in suits, a carnival of enticements. As ever, Ahri had speartipped discussions. Her incisive questions sliced through vague aphorisms, and Evelynn’s predator eyes cross-examined arrangements before hands could even be offered for a shake. Akali had her role in playing tough to get--her swagger shook out true natures when she refused their glad-handing. And Kai’sa and Seraphine brought out the rear, testing their artistic visions against the hard limits of their suitors’ generosity, which Ahri and Evelynn then were eager to jump in on.

Work on the EP couldn’t stop even though they were on a business trip, though. Now it was 11 PM that night, and Kai’sa was fidgeting, stretching her arms and swiveling an ankle against studio flooring as she coached the current run of the stage choreography.

While the songs for the EP were very much still in progress, they’d locked in melodies and enough backing tracks for Kai’sa to have created a skeleton for the new single’s choreography. Now she was in her domain. Ahri wouldn’t accept anything less than the bleeding edge for the group, and Kai’sa was the same. She was going to push them all to peak performance, one version of the movements at a time. If they familiarized themselves with the tracks and the base moves now, embellishing and polishing them for the final, live performances would be simple.

She shouted over the training mix, “Now here comes the-- Roll!-- Know I got it so he-e-ere you go--’Kali, round out the bounce, you can’t just jackknife back up.”

Akali, a flash of color in a loose hoodie and sweatpants, smoothed out her movement. Kai’sa called out areas of improvement at a clip, half singing along with the track.

“--More, and Eve, really lean here, your head needs to drop a level--” A crack of her hand, dropping it from head level to her chest, demonstrating, while Evelynn sank backwards, in a full sweat as she balanced on her heels-- “Who-o-o-oa…”

Kai’sa wasn’t done. “Yeah, I got more--‘Ri, grind it in, sell it!” Ahri was already adjusting, sinking her hips. as she continued her hawk-eyed review.

“--up and away, you know I got it like, bomb b-- Sera!” She pointed an imperious finger--flicked up. “You gotta punch, sharp, you head-butted me harder than that this morning!” The memory had her smiling as they finished the chorus, and Seraphine’s mouth was tight, stifling a giggle. “You know I got it-- like-- all day, all the-- yeeeees!”

Her little clap of delight at the end was genuine. She rushed the women, gushing, “Okay, I know I’m rattling off a lot of finetunes to deal with, but seriously, you all are pulling it together so well already!”

Seraphine, jelly-legged, could only flash a thumbs-up her way. When she looked up and caught Kai’sa’s eye, she mimed chucking her head back. Their smiles were twins.

Ahri’s face was lost in the sweep of her blonde ponytail over her face as she doubled over to catch her breath. “We... Have… Such a good teacher, it’s only natural,” she gasped. Her eyes were bright, though, and she reached out to pat Kai’sa on the arm as she walked past.

Evelynn wasn’t doing much better. She had her pride to keep, and Kai’sa could see her trying to steady her breathing enough so that she wasn’t panting out of her mouth. Still, she was far from being the tabloids’ favorite villain in this moment: bent halfway to the floor, hands on her knees, holding on by just her grip.

Akali had no such reservations and was already spread-eagled on the floor. She blew a bleached bang out of her mouth, complaining, “It better be smooth. We’ve been at this for four hours just tonight. Goddamn.” Her arm was flung over her eyes, tongue out in a fit of pique.

Kai’sa nudged a gentle foot underneath Akali’s back. “Good reminder--time for another break, everybody. Definitely get some water.”

Before Kai’sa had finished the words, Ahri was already halfway to the other end of the studio, squeezing water into her mouth from a bottle and waking her phone with a practiced thumb at the same time. Evelynn came to Akali’s rescue and brought a bottle over to the incapacited woman, who made a silly show of thanking her with her hands clasped above her hand before accepting a splash of water into her mouth. And Seraphine had drifted to the back as usual. She sat on the floor a short way from Ahri with contentment, hugging a sweater to her for comfort.

Kai’sa was warm with excitement, even just watching her teammates in practice. This really was going to be so good.

Of course, it could be even better, if Kai’sa had her way with it. “Ahri,” she started.

She didn’t even look up. “The next album, Kai’sa.”

Kai’sa sighed, crossing her arms. “I mean, I understand. It’s an EP, and we’ve got dedicated tracks, and a group track for Seraphine to feature on. But I really think we could spice up the choreo, at least in the group one. We’re all doing the same thing at the same time right now, with just some fancy grouping and transition work to make it exciting.”

It was well-trod territory between the two of them, at this point.

Ahri countered, “And I don’t think it makes sense to overly complicate the choreo on the one group track on the EP. It’s a united front. Besides,” she waved towards Seraphine, who perked up at the acknowledgement, “we’re highlighting our guest. We’re going to make this star shine.”

Kai’sa wasn’t about to argue that. “Of course,” she sighed. “I just…”

A wicked light entered her eyes, knowing where exactly to hit Ahri. “Well, good luck stopping me when I get the chance to dream up choreo for pair work. God, Ahri. You think all the vague statements and cute photos on the account online right now are stirring the pot? I can guarantee 50% more engagement on clips of any one of us slinking around the other during a performance on purpose.” She snapped her fingers, emphasizing.

A flicker of movement at the corner of her eye--Seraphine’d propped a hand up under her chin. She leaned forward, intent on the conversation. Her big blue eyes were on Kai’sa. Soft. How long had that been happening?

Ahri had a twist of a smile on. She looked like she wanted to tweak Kai’sa’s cheek from all the way across the floor--or her ear. “Oh, baby, you’re talking to an ex-idol. I know. I’m banking on it.” She slid her eyes back to her phone--scrolled with her thumb once.

“I really think Kai’sa has a point.” Seraphine did a great job not choking, despite all eyes turning to her. For the briefest of seconds, she looked to Kai’sa. She nodded back at her, once--encouraging.

Seraphine’s voice was steady. “I can see what Kai’sa’s getting at. It’s like if, if…” Her hands fumbled at the air, grasping for what she was thinking. “If all of our backing tracks were carrying the same tune as whoever’s singing, and playing at the same time, I guess. It’s really flat, and gray. We’ve already got such elaborate sets and instrumentation lined up, so it’s a little weird to have samesies choreo.”

Kai’sa shook a finger at her emphatically. “Yes! Seraphine gets it.” In turn, she got a bubblegum grin from Seraphine.

“And honestly,” she continued, “it would also just spice it up for us, too. I know the music video’s going to have all sorts of other scenes cut in, but I promise it’d be so much more fun to make the choreo more complex.” Kai’sa clasped her hands together. “I promise it’s not just because I personally would have so much fun dancing with any of you.”

Evelynn chuckled. “I’m sure it doesn’t hurt, though. But while we’re here: can I throw my hat in the ring about the statues?”

The glare Ahri cut her was practiced and almost audible, but it seemed to bounce right off of Evelynn. She even looked a little more self-satisfied now, after drawing Ahri’s ire. Years together climbing out of the industry back-to-back gave the two of them a bond Kai’sa could hardly wrap her head around some days. “Don’t start.”

The look she gave Kai’sa was decidedly softer. Ahri spread her hands apart, beseeching. “Kai’sa--and Seraphine,” she added quickly, looking between the two of them, “I definitely hear you. And Kai’sa, I respect your vision for the choreography. You’re our steal-the-show dancer, and we brought you on because we knew if we let you loose, you’d stun the world over and over.

“But,” She held up a finger, adding, “I really think once we get some suppliers finalized for the visuals like we talked about last time, get the trackwork hammered out, you’ll understand the utility of doing unified choreography for this project. I promise you, you’re gonna have your interesting group choreo soon. Once we get to the next album.”

That was a thumbtack in the topic. It wasn’t like Ahri’s points didn’t make sense; Kai’sa could feel how itchy she was going to be, knowing that there was a way she could have put even more shine on the choreo. But, Ahri had carried them through their meteoric single years ago. At any point in time, she was doing the calculus, constantly, to make them look as good as possible.

So she let it go. Kai’sa closed her eyes and started rolling her head in circles slowly, ironing out the stiffness there from craning her neck around her costars for hours and walking circles around them without any actual dancing. She focused on the dark behind her eyes and let her body tell her where it was taut.

Behind her, she could hear Evelynn call Seraphine over to her as she walked back to join Ahri at the back of the studio. The long squeal of fabric across the floor was probably Akali making the worst sort of beeline towards the three of them, dragging herself.

“Oh, hell yeah.” She could hear Akali grinning, just from that. There was a clap--probably Akali giving Seraphine a high-five. They’d had an immediate kinship there that had sprung, fully formed, from even just the car ride over to the K/DA house in Seoul. Being the newest person in the group had to be something to bond over. “Ahri’s not so tough, huh?”

“I’m right here, ‘Kali.”

Evelynn joined in, too. “Good, Seraphine. You’re only going to get what you want out of this if you speak up. Just...like...that.” The last words drew themselves out, smoke curling away into the air. Evelynn’s voice was rich with satisfaction--was heavy and soft, something you wanted to pull around your shoulders and be lost in. But also, it was something you could suffocate in, the sureness of a python’s embrace just before the crush. Kai’sa could only imagine Seraphine’s face right now. “Understood?”

“I--Yes. Yes!” There it was. Seraphine’s voice squeezed at the end.

“Call her a good girl like you want to and let everybody move on, Eve,” Ahri cut in, flat.

A round click--Eve’s familiar sunglasses, probably being toyed with. “How dare you,” she declared. “I take accusations of impropriety seriously. I’m over here providing sound career advice. You heard what I said.” Her delivery was impeccable, the image of sincerity--which is how Kai’sa knew she was laughing, inside.

Seconds of silence. Ahri must have rolled her eyes. “That’s the problem. We heard you extremely loud and clear.”

Evelynn’s laugh was silky--completely unshaken. “Attacked by my own group--there’s no safe place on earth.”

“--From you,” Akali slid in, playful.

“Akali, don’t rev her up. And you. Be nice. Behave.” Ahri probably had put herself between Evelynn and Seraphine, if she had to bet. “I should have left you with the last group of people we visited today. You could have gotten your fill of toying with people then.”

About to spring to Seraphine’s defense, Kai’sa was surprised to hear Seraphine pipe up first. Ever the angel, she promised, “Oh, guys, it’s fine! I’m good. I get that Evelynn’s being her version of friendly.” A beat, and then another surprise: “Eve needs to try way harder to get anything tasty out of me, anyway.”

She could hear one amused little puff of a laugh from Evelynn. Akali’s voice carried over that, cackling with delight first before curling with mischief: “On the flip side: get your giggles in now while you can, Eve. I have a feeling once Sera’s relaxed around you, you’re gonna wish to have this peace back.”

Seraphine’s voice was tight. “Akali, what are you--”

“I’m just saying! Girl’s a whirlwind.”

Kai’sa was smiling, eyes still shut, even as she threw her two cents in over her shoulder, trying to make her voice serious, “Still, you are laying it on a bit thick, Evelynn.”

It had been a bridge too far. She could hear that Evelynn’s next bit was directed right at her. “Oh, bokkie, that’s rich, coming from you.” Her voice was dark now, fathoms deep.

And somewhere in there, a hook glinted. Her skin prickled--her heart leapt. Kai’sa wasn’t about to take the bait, but Evelynn dangling it in front of her sounded alarms in her head.

She knew exactly how to stop this line of questioning and fix her aching, actually.

Kai’sa opened her eyes with one last pop in her neck--drew out her phone from her joggers’ pockets. She dialed up a playlist on shuffle and slid into center stage, wanting to take a moment and move, herself. She’d been demonstrating isolated movements and then watching the team go at it for hours, and now she wanted to dance. Nothing soothed her as well as dancing.

A glance behind her: Akali was propped on her elbow between a preoccupied Ahri and a now reclining Evelynn (who looked like she was letting Kai’sa have her way for now, save for her mocking raised eyebrows), and Seraphine was just a meter away, hands on the floor, sweater forgotten.

On cue, Akali started yelling from the back of the studio. She heckled without any real heat: “Show-off! Fuckin' Humble-Brag City limits! Running us ragged and then putting on a show.” The rapper screwed her face up in a mockery of outrage. “Typical!”

She threw Kai’sa a grin, though, with a pointed look to Evelynn even as she patted the same’s leg placatingly. (“Trust Evelynn to single you out, yeah?”) Bless Akali for sliding in and helping her steer the situation away.

In response, Kai’sa stuck her hip out back at her jauntily, and she got a wolf-whistle for her efforts. It had to have been from Evelynn--truly, quick turnaround--because Akali was too busy belting a laugh.

Akali gave her one last, wry, “Go on, girl, give us too much!” paired with Ahri’s full-throated, “Knock ‘em dead!”

God, she loved them.

She’d never formally choreographed to any of the songs on shuffle, so she went back to basics: felt out the BPM, the count structure, any immediate rhythm bits going on. Kai’sa eased herself in with slow, ruminating gestures, gliding from one to the next as the artist herself slid through the intro with throaty runs. The first verse hit like a strike to her body, and she responded with stronger movements: the squeeze of a fist, squeal of outsole on wood flooring as she twisted a knee in, trail of a hand across her body as she drew back.

The bridge sat back on its chords, stripping back the drums: she paused, velvetine, and strutted towards the mirror, a hand ever so gently tugging at one lip for flavor to mirror the singer’s flirtations.

“Oh shit, she’s coming,” Akali laughed, absolutely gleeful with anticipation. Freestyling dancer, freestyling rapper--they both lived for that moment of payoff.

When she could feel the singer hit the chorus, she exploded into it--posing, stepping, sweeping as quickly as she could think of the images, chasing the feeling of striking gold, of fitting moves to the music so well that she wanted to yell.

For their part, the rest of K/DA was the best audience she could ask for: Akali was ready with well-placed encouragement (yells of “I see what you did there! Hey, ‘ey, ‘ey!”), Evelynn peppered in sly, welcome compliments (the hiss of “big money on how far a coin could bounce off of that ass”), and Ahri was purely delight, whooping or gasping with excitement as Kai’sa milked a particularly languid movement in contrast to her earlier hard hits.

She didn’t even look at herself in the mirror, shutting her eyes to really let the music wash over her.

When they fell silent, Kai’sa didn’t give it a second thought; it was hard to keep up feedback after the first chorus in any freestyle circle.

It was Ahri shushing one of the others under her breath from behind her that took her out of the zone and turned Kai’sa’s head mid-step. She almost elbowed Seraphine in the process--Seraphine, who’d snuck to her from the back wall. She was poised now beside her on tip-toe, arms out to her sides like a doll, looking for all the world like she’d been caught in the process of knocking on the door.

Her hesitancy was written all over her face: her pinched eyebrows, the narrow squint, the way her jaw was set. But she almost vibrated there, tipping forward uncertainly towards Kai’sa.

Her energy was unmistakable, though. It thrilled her, the question there. Kai’sa answered--invited her in with one hand, waving her closer.

Seraphine, like the rest of the group, wasn’t practiced in freestyling. She swayed, jittering, letting beats tick by, before she screwed her courage to the sticking place. Her first movements were abrupt, jerking. Seraphine immediately froze--must have felt that it didn’t fit the flow of the singer’s voice.

Then Seraphine swallowed, and, smaller now, started herself off again. Kai’sa slowed herself down to match.

For all of her fumbling, she had the important thing, though. She was trying, and she was feeling the music herself and bringing to it what she was feeling. As Kai’sa watched, even half a minute made a difference. The other woman was relaxing--reacting to the cadence of the lyrics, the lilt of a backing vocal, beginning to anticipate a chorus in the way she was timing a movement to the close of an eight-count. She caught Kai’sa’s eye as she twirled, the beginnings of a grin on her face.

Oh, Kai’sa wanted to swoop in and pick her up for it.

With a quick turn on her heel, Kai’sa faced her. One hand out to her side, like a bird in flight, and the other extended towards her partner. Seraphine brightened and flung one daring hand into hers--whatever the medium, she recognized an invitation to jam.

So easy. Kai’sa, switching tacks from her earlier style, started them on a circuit around the floor, bringing Seraphine towards her, leading her body with half a thought and nothing more towards than a brief press of hands or a squeeze on her waist. To the other woman’s credit, Seraphine was a quick learner, realizing after a few missed passes when touches were quiet suggestions and when they were just steadying.

While she didn’t have the finesse of a skilled dancer, she had the enthusiasm of a great one. And she was enjoying herself like a great one, too--when Kai’sa gently pushed her into a shuddering spin, Seraphine threw her head back in the whirl, blue hair turned quicksilver, laughing without a care.

The last chorus pealed out of the speakers and oozed into a fade-out, and the two of them were a fit of giggles, still drunkenly wobbling around each other on the floor as the adrenaline left them. She couldn’t recall how her arms had ended around Seraphine’s shoulders, and she couldn’t care. Kai’sa gave them a squeeze, before stepping back--but Seraphine wouldn’t let her go.

Quick hands grabbed her around the waist. Seraphine was still riding out a laugh as she pressed her cheek to Kai’sa’s chest.

“Wow,” Seraphine breathed.

A telltale shutter sound broke Kai’sa’s attention, and she snapped a look up. Akali, caught, still played at casually sliding her phone into her hoodie’s pocket, batting her eyes cartoonishly at Kai’sa as if it’d excuse her.

She didn’t have the composure to chide Akali, though, because Ahri’d taken a step forward. She was regarding the both of them--no, she was regarding Kai’sa--like somebody at certification. Every quiet line of her body bent with evaluation’s efforts. Sweatpants and sports top be damned--she was the very image of the group leader from this afternoon, towering above everybody in the conference suite at her 160 centimeters.

Even with Seraphine pressed against her, Kai’sa was chilled in her skin at being under her attention in such a way. She had the irrational thought that Ahri could see how her heart was jumping in her chest.

The clack of her heels on the studio floor as she approached them wasn’t even particularly loud, but the room had suddenly sucked up all other sound. “You’ve made your point, Kai’sa.”

When Kai’sa could only raise an eyebrow in answer, Ahri continued, “Dancing with each other. You’re right.” She turned a familiar strobelight smile on them both. It was usually aimed at dishonest contractors while Ahri fashioned the best way to hollow them out publicly. Kai’sa didn’t know what she was using it to hide this time. “You’re gonna create something that’ll really grab fans later. Pairwork looks very striking.”

“Though,” their leader sighed, genuinely melancholy for just the moment, “it’s a shame Seraphine won’t be around for when we get that far. The two of you looked so good.”

Kai’sa could almost see herself, body outside of her body, as she gently unwrapped Seraphine from herself--stepped away, just the smallest bit, even when Seraphine unconsciously still leaned towards her. Could see her lips shape themselves as she replied, evenly, “It really is a shame.”

-----

Kai’sa wasn’t one to abuse a studio. She grew up in them, had been raised in them, knew better than to wreck a home even in the wrings of frustration. But, when needs must, she could throw an impotent little rage and thrash about on the floor harmlessly.

It was inelegant, and silly, and a little horrible to witness. She did it anyway, and let out one scratchy scream for good measure.

It’d been three days since that night in the studio. None of them had counted, though, because she’d hardly seen her teammates or accomplished anything in that amount of time.

They’d staked out these days for music development before the trip had even been booked. At this very moment, the other four were neck deep in notebooks, scraps of lyrics, and demos right now in their recording space halfway across the city. Pushing their nascent EP to go further, echo farther.

Kai’sa was supposed to be there with them. At noon the first day, though, she’d stood up from their little writers’ nest in the recording studio and begged off, saying that after last night’s practice, she knew she could make the choreo they already had even better.

Every single fucking posture was wrong, though. Nothing she was coming up with topped the draft choreo as it was. It didn’t even fit the training mix.

Even when she admitted to herself that this wasn’t working and did old POP/STARS choreo as a refresh, she was gummy. Irritating.

Objectively, she wasn’t doing anything badly. Even watching herself in the mirror, or playing back footage of herself--everything was there. The timing, the angles, the force, the transitions--everything. It just didn’t work. Something about her didn’t work.

She had to look pathetic, lying there huffing with her ponytail every which way.

At least Kai’sa had one more night to bang out the dents and warps and make this work. She hadn’t even eaten breakfast with everybody this morning--had only stopped in the common area long enough to grab a bottle of water and some fruit, and had announced that she wasn’t coming with them to relax at the night market tonight. Citing her “need to dance!” usually got her off scot-free, and she’d turned and left quickly after chirping her excuse, not meeting anybody’s eyes.

She’d left feeling watched, though.

Had it been Ahri? Something had been brewing behind her eyes since that night in the studio. Even after having worked with her these years, Kai’sa sometimes couldn’t read her. Kai’sa was in tune with her body as the dancer of the group, but Ahri was a magician with hers after her early years in the crucible of the idol industry. She knew how to give a speech in three seconds with a slide of her eyes and a disdainful hair toss. Withholding her thoughts was just a matter of redirecting people’s eyes with something they wanted to see. Whatever Ahri was thinking, Kai’sa would only find out when she wanted to let her know, and not a second sooner.

Unbidden, an image of Seraphine watching her leave--quiet, breakfast untouched--made her absolutely still, lying there on the floor.

God, god, god. And this was why Kai’sa hadn’t been able to bear being around her these last few days.

Kai’sa hadn’t even been able to walk into her room (her room bordering Seraphine’s, sharing a wall) for very long the last few days. She’d danced until strange hours, then caught a cab back to their suite and laid down after she was sure everybody was asleep. When the sun rose, she’d be first up and out again.

Dread dogged her every step, an unwelcome guest that she thought she’d finally been rid of. It’d been years since she had last felt it this strongly. In fact, it had last been when her father had quietly announced their next, and last, move, looking sorry as he always did, like he could see her immediately go out like a light when he said the words.

Her eyes were hot against her palms as she squeezed them against her face. She felt animal. She felt like she wanted to snarl, or whimper, or lay dead in the road.

Whether she had always been aware that Seraphine’d squeezed up and into a space next to her heart, she couldn’t say. But these last few days, she’d finally glimpsed it, just under the surface of her, like the glint of a coin; she could only see it now that she was looking back, out of the corner of her eye.

But having given that glow in her chest something like a shape and a name, old dread rose alongside it, roaring a challenge.

Kai’sa was caught--her body, even now, trying to turn in the direction of what she wanted, and terrified even doing that would ruin it.

A bang like a gunshot--the studio door hit the wall like it was meant to go through it. Kai’sa nearly shot half a meter off of the ground from a complete lay.

She hadn’t even begun to scramble upright before the clack of heels told her who’d entered, and in the reflection of the studio mirrors she could see herself look up at Ahri, dressed to the nines for a night on the city. Everything on her body was armor--her barely-there makeup, her perfectly waved hair, the constructed casualness of her chambray button-up and tucked tee-shirt. It felt silly, to be cowed by the image of somebody going out to eat street food, but here she was.

The first thing she could think to say was, “I’ll have it ready by morning, Ahri.”

Ahri shook her head. “Bokkie.” She set a duffel bag on the floor.

“It’s the last thing I want,” Ahri began, “to try to control the life of anybody in the group. I left the industry so I wouldn’t be under anybody’s thumb ever again.” She was resolute. Her eyes could have chipped ice, on that last mention. “K/DA is our way of being completely free. Together, we have no limits. We can do anything.”

“But.” Ahri stooped, squatting in her heels and putting her hands on her knees to look Kai’sa in the eye. “Kai’sa, sweetheart. I’m trying to be here right now as somebody who loves you, not your team leader. And as that person, I can’t let you hurt somebody else, or yourself.”

Kai’sa immediately asked, “What the fuck do you mean?”

Ahri reached out a hand to Kai’sa’s own, splayed on the studio floor. “Bokkie, you swear so much when you’re spiraling.”

"Bullshit," she spat--winced.

Now, on even terms like this, Kai'sa could see what Ahri's proud bearing had been hiding: tenderness in her eyes, and in her hands. She grabbed both of Kai’sa’s hands between hers. "On the POP/STARS set, we didn't know you'd sprained your ankle until we wrapped."

Kai’sa blinked. A bit of a trip back in time, there. “Yes.”

Ahri was rubbing warm little circles on the tops of her hands now. “I was so scared when you fell down while we were walking to the car. You were so quiet; we almost left you there because you didn’t say anything. You didn't want us to know. And when we did find you, you were still smiling and waving it off, lying on the parking lot in the dark. We had to use a cell phone to see how swollen your ankle was under the boot by that point.” Ahri’s voice was low, unnaturally even. “Big dummy. Almost 190 centimeters of you. The three of us had to work together to put you into the car. Do you remember what I spent that whole ride back with you doing?”

How could she forget. “You were playing with my hair, trying to distract me. But you were so mad you were shaking, and Eve kept telling you to keep your voice down, even though you were just saying soothing nonsense to me. Akali was ready to fight you, or grab me. Something. I thought the lights in the car were going to blow out from your rage, somehow.”

Ahri squeezed her hands. It wasn’t entirely all kind. “I was mad, but at myself. I didn’t like thinking I’d made the sort of environment where you’d be afraid to talk to me.” Kai’sa started to protest, but Ahri squeezed again, softer. “That wasn’t it. I know that now. More importantly, I was worried. And I made you promise me.”

“That I wouldn’t do that again.”

“That you’d talk to us,” Ahri corrected. “That, no matter what, you’d talk to us. Even if it didn’t make sense at the time. That we could work on it together, whatever it was. And you did--remember?”

There was an expectant pause.

Kai’sa sighed. “Ahri, I--I can’t just tell you what’s going-- What’s--” She tried to flip it. “There’s noth--”

“Do not,” Ahri breathed, “try to lie to me. This isn’t nothing. You’ve been over the moon for her and then wallowing about it for weeks, back and forth.”

Kai’sa didn’t have mental peace enough to be embarrassed that it had all been so obvious. She sat up straight, wild. “What? Am I supposed to just, what, diagram what’s going on for you? Are you going to give me a five-stage plan for my personal fuck-ups?” Quick like a snake, she pulled her hands out of Ahri’s grasp. “What happened to not being a tyrant, huh?”

A warning gleam shone in Ahri’s eyes. “Again--here because I care about you. And about Seraphine, too.” A pause. “You know, she’s been absolutely gray the last three days, without you in the room with us.”

Kai’sa eased a foot underneath her. A warning growl: “I think we’re done talking.”

Ahri shoved her. Hard.

Kai’sa had a moment to register being flat on the floor before Ahri was posted over her, on her hands and knees. Gossip rags would bleed themselves to see Ahri the way Kai’sa was seeing her now: face alight in fury, teeth flashing, hackles raised.

“Listen to me! That’s right! Kai’sa, I am not the person you need to be talking to!” The studio lights shining through her hair lit her face like fire, and her eyes were perfect musket-ball flint. Her voice brooked no argument.

Her anger steamed off, halfway doused. Flat on the floor, held in the vice of Ahri’s quivering stare, Kai’sa drooped. She was right. Kai’sa had been avoiding Seraphine in the worst of ways.

Kai’sa’s breath left her in a wheeze.

Ahri wasn’t a monster. Her hard eyes swept over Kai’sa, and softened as she melted underneath her. “Oh, bokkie.” She brought a hot palm to Kai’sa’s cheek and held it there. “You got it bad, huh?”

Kai’sa could only nod, as best as she could, lying on the floor. Ahri’s hand on her was steadying.

“I think, then, it’s even more important you two talk.” Ahri was rubbing the same little circles against her cheek, now. “And whatever happens, Evelynn and Akali and I, we’re right here for you. Nothing could keep us away.” A funny little catch to her voice. “Hell, even Akali left and came back. See? Things are better.”

A heavy sigh, above Kai’sa--not that of a star, but of somebody dear to her, and in pain that she was in pain. “I’m not saying you can’t be afraid, but… This isn’t going to work out with you just holding this all in. You’ve got to talk to her, Kai’sa.”

Her voice still had a burr to it. “I know you’re right. I know you’re right. I just…” Kai’sa closed her eyes tight. “I’m going to do it.”

Ahri leaned down--brought them together, forehead to forehead. “That’s my girl.”

Kai’sa let herself enjoy the moment--one minute, breathing the same air, letting Ahri’s clarity flow into her.

She nuzzled up, once. (“I’m sorry.”)

Ahri huffed. (“Forgiven.”)

Reaching up, Kai’sa braced Ahri around her waist, arms flexing, before tightening, shooting up, setting them both upright on the floor in one fluid motion. Ahri yelped, regardless. “Shit, it’s so easy to forget how strong you are.”

Kai’sa pulled one corner of her mouth tight. Not quite a smile. “We’ll see how true that is after tonight.”

Ahri inclined her head in the direction of the forgotten duffel bag. “You’ll feel plenty strong in that.” She grinned, sheepish. “I tried to pull together one of your signature fits. Let me know how I did.”

Kai’sa pulled out the clothes, a fresh little spot of warmth in her chest lighting up with each familiar item: a skintight black drop-shoulder crop top, a flowing set of trousers in russet, wicked knife-tip boots, and a necklace Akali was always calling collateral damage because of the way the sharp crystals there flew when she danced. Ahri was always looking out for all of them.

Then it was Kai’sa’s turn to be sheepish. “Ahri?”

“Yeah?”

“I’ve been dancing non-stop for days.”

“...Yeah?”

Kai’sa turned to her, demonstrating the problem. When her arms got higher than her shoulders, she winced, her whole upper body unable to ratchet past how stiff it was. Her top was trapped, stuck over her head. “I’m so sore, Ahri.”

Ahri fully rang with laughter. “Oh my god. Three penalty photos, and then I’ll help you.”

-----

While she’d bailed on them this morning, Kai’sa had helped everybody winnow out the perfect night market to hit up tonight. It was a perfect balance of things: enough of a tourist trap to have a healthy number of foreigners in the mix to mask the group, close enough to a university to entertain a number of languages out loud without drawing attention, and still busy enough to have spectacles that would draw eyes off of five preternaturally attractive women.

The other three were lingering just outside of it, just paces away from where the noise, lights, and spirit of the streets bloomed in flower-box grids of nighttime bustle. The stretch of apartment buildings above cradled the fireworks spark of the market that wound its way between them.

While everybody had dressed down--to everybody’s definitions of what that was--they still caught trailing looks as people streamed in and out, arms laden with their finds.

Evelynn must have taken Seraphine and Akali out for a day shopping trip. Kai’sa could see Evelynn’s touch, even at a distance. Seraphine's usual swipes of pastel color had been muted, and she thought she saw dark color on her lips.

Ahri called their names, and Evelynn heard her first, raising a hand in greeting. Akali was the first to reach them, though, by bounding over in excited strides. Grinning, she yelled, “Incoming!”

Kai’sa knew what this was--swung one shoulder to avoid Akali’s playful punch, artlessly thrown. She shoved back, half a smile on her face. Akali got awfully cooped up when writing, even if it was artistically fulfilling. She’d been ecstatic when Kai’sa started to playfight back when she was blowing off steam. Now, it was just the way they greeted each other.

After a few childish blows exchanged, Akali drew back, wiping her brow. The humidity in Taipei made any effort a sweaty one. Laughing, she said, “Good--Ahri chased you out of the studio!”

Kai’sa shrugged. “I was just working, like everybody else.”

Akali’s incredulity splashed into the set of her shoulders as she fully dipped her head and body to the side, mouth wry. “Could have fooled me. It really felt like you thought you’d die if you were stuck with us and not in there.” Straightening, she rolled her eyes. “Real slick.”

Oof. Kai’sa winced. “None of you guys bought it for a second, did you?”

Akali didn’t pull punches. “Not at all. But!” She pushed one of Kai’sa’s shoulders, encouraging. “You’re here tonight.”

Ahri had already walked away from them, hailing Evelynn and Seraphine who’d been making their slow way towards them, heads put together. They were finishing up some hushed conversation.

When had this developed? Seraphine was at ease, walking in lockstep with Evelynn, the very image of two souls that knew the bounds of each other. She was even under Evelynn’s arm, head placed ever so lightly against her shoulder. Her mouth was in some sort of a twist, but Evelynn, eyes sharpening, declared something with an emphatic thrust of a nail plate to Seraphine’s chest, and her mouth relaxed.

“Kai’.”

Akali was level with her, now, arms crossed. Her playfulness was gone. “You gotta be straight with her. She’ll appreciate it.”

More surprises--but Kai'sa figured she couldn't be shocked that her three original bandmates would have talked between themselves. Her heart caught at the thought of them worrying about Seraphine, and about her.

“I know--” Akali started, then paused, seeming to turn the words over. She found the angle she liked quick, though--wordsmith magic. “I’ve never seen you do anything half-assed. You’re world-class. Really, you go too hard in the paint, if anything.” A quick toss of her head, as if to shake off a nagging thought, and a scowl. “Even when it hurts you.”

Akali reached over, gripping the rounds of Kai’sa’s broad shoulders. The smoke and clamor of the market curled over them both as she looked Kai’sa in the eyes, fixing her to the spot. “I know you can go loud here, too, Kai’.” Here was the spitfire herself, standing strong, so sure. She almost glowed from it. She said everything she needed to in swift strokes, decisive, almost a challenge.

Kai’sa straightened under her grip, feeling her top strain against her shoulders with every movement. “I’m trying to, ‘Kali.” Then, grateful: “Did she talk to you? Thank you, for whatever you said.”

Akali’s mouth hung open for just a second, and then she snapped it closed again. “About time your head caught up, ha. I was wondering if you’d just been off in a cloud the last few weeks.” She nodded, stiff, acknowledging. “Yeah, of course.”

She looked aside, back towards the others. “I want both of you to be happy here, you know? Seraphine’s so great, and you deserve a break in your luck.”

The press of something small and scratchy into her palm was a surprise. “Akali?”

The gleam of a dragon’s smile, proud. “Just some recon--from a break during writing today.”

It was the corner of a notebook page--Akali’s lyrics book, she realized. There were even the edges of some half-thought-through lines around the edges (“rainbow” “pelt” “last of its kind” “don’t blink” “I’ll make you extinct” “what cat? tiger lion jaguar puma” “Ducati roar” “settling scores”). Scrawled in the center, though:

Seraphine

Ice cream

Prize plushes

Chicken (who just says “I like chicken”? Jesus, you know she’s a freak)

Baked sweets

Kai’sa didn’t give Akali time to respond. Quick as a thought, she’d wrapped her up hard into a hug, squeezing. Kai’sa was so much taller than her and used that to her full advantage--nearly bowed her backwards.

“Thank you,” she repeated, warm through. Akali at any other time might be tempted to call her a sap, or awkwardly paddle her back with a palm, but tonight, she made fists in Kai’sa’s top and hugged her back, clinging.

Just as Kai’sa saw Evelynn imperiously hook a finger in their direction, Akali broke away, smile crooked. “C’mon, champ.” She spun them both around to catch up to the group.

-----

Walking into the night market, Kai’sa and Seraphine were automatically on translation and ordering duty--one because she’d lived here, and the other because of the sacred tenets of new-girl duty.

(It was especially apparent because really, only Akali was completely shut out linguistically here, but made due with her smartphone translating and some truly emphatic pointing. Ahri and Evelynn’s idol upbringings had involved extensive language training in many Asian languages as part of their appeal. But Evelynn pointedly kept tapping Seraphine on the shoulder to do it for her, boldly pulling rank. For her part, she looked happy to do it, though--even teased Evelynn about being careful about not messing up her lipstick as she handed her a chipboard container of shengjian bao. Evelynn looked delighted--shot back that she “wasn’t afraid to get it all over”.)

A few streets later, Ahri had pulled Akali and Seraphine away, down to the end of this row--if Kai’sa was guessing, they were headed to the drinks stand she could barely see with a standee of a vibrant blue-purple drink. Akali was animatedly gesturing at Seraphine’s hair, so close in shade; she was giggling, in return.

When Kai’sa started off to follow them, though, she felt somebody pull her top from behind. She looked over her shoulder--Evelynn stood there, defiant angles and commandant air setting her apart even in the whirligig lights of the street. She had one nail plate hooked in Kai’sa’s shirt.

One smooth dip of her head had Kai’sa following her off the main street, into a residential alley--cooler by a margin, and quieter. Closer.

Once they were far enough away from the noise, Evelynn stopped Kai’sa with a hand pressed to her chest. The edge of a nail plate slid up against the base of her neck.

Using that hand as an anchor, Evelynn began a slow, liquid walk around her. Her hand dragging across Kai’sa’s skin as she made her trip ‘round, she used the other to tug and pick at Kai’sa’s outfit. Kai’sa shifted uneasily--what…?--but when Evelynn took both hands to unroll a small section of her shirt that had rolled into itself, she realized what she was doing. Evelynn was shaping her up.

Bit by bit, Evelynn pulled her into perfection. A stray lock; a flipped hem; a rogue pleat. Her movements were small and sure. Her vision was unerring.

When she came back to front, Evelynn didn’t break her rhythm. Her hand drew a single lipstick bullet from a sleeve--specially placed there. Kai’sa had just seconds to process that it was a sister of the one Ahri had used to finish her look, earlier in the studio.

She re-drew Kai’sa’s mouth--smooth pressure on her bottom lip, then the top. The scrape of a claw against the sensitive skin around her mouth stung as Evelynn willed a sharp border into focus.

As if she was commenting on the weather, Evelynn dropped, “What exactly do those delicious legs do, if you aren’t using them to run after what you want?”

Kai’sa waited for her ministrations to finish. She didn’t want to ruin Evelynn’s handiwork.

“It’s hard to discuss fear with you, Evelynn.”

“Oh?” An arched eyebrow.

Kai’sa couldn’t help a wry laugh. “You eat it for breakfast.”

Evelynn took hold of her jaw--turned her face this way and that, admiring her efforts. A rolling chuckle pooled out of her. “You know better than anybody that that’s an exaggeration. I’m only afraid of the big things, is all.”

Evelynn swept her fingers and claws slowly, until her hand was turned so that she could cup Kai’sa’s chin. She continued, “You’ve scared me before, in fact.” It was just a mention, but the flatness of her voice gave her away; she was holding herself close, like any drop of what was underneath that even keel would ripple through Kai’sa, scatter her. She could relate.

Kai’sa turned her head, sank her cheek into Eve’s grip: half apology, half reminding her she was here with her, now. She got a quiet “Kai’sa” in response, almost lost to the dark of the alley.

It could be hard to talk to Evelynn, yes. She moved at her own speed--breakneck--and she didn’t compromise. Journalists wrote about her like she was a wraith: always on the blurry edge of photos, constantly in orbit around catastrophe, never fully in the light. Her tongue lashed, her tongue laved. She smiled like she knew what you looked like under your clothes, and when and how you were dying.

But Kai’sa knew that anything admitted to her, under cover of her dark, was better than safe. So she let drop what she couldn’t tell everybody else: “Eve, it feels like she’ll disappear the moment I open my mouth. Something’ll take her away.”

The feeling of her metal claws against Kai’sa’s cheek was harsh, but there was no judgment. No derision, no disgust. “She might,” Evelynn replied. “And she might disappear if you don’t talk to her, too, Kai’sa.”

A bitter laugh. “So, ‘just do it’, huh? What a revelation.”

“I’m not done.”

Her head was tipped up in degrees. Evelynn’s eyes were so warm, up close. “Baby, this here, with Seraphine. This is one of those ‘big things’ I was talking about earlier. I know you’re scared, but you gotta grab this with both hands. Or you’ll let her slip through your fingers.”

-----

Barely an hour into their excursion, Ahri wheeled the group around in front of a large, colorful sign coaxing walkers-by to the night market. She raised her phone--everybody immediately took their places, intimately familiar with her penchant for snapping photos everywhere she could. As usual these days, everybody cajoled and pulled Seraphine until she was center stage, her protesting the whole way (“you guys, we’re gonna have to take a normal photo at some point”--but they were excellent hosts).

The phone was barely stowed again in her purse before she announced, “Right! Well, Akali and Evelynn and I are taking off.”

Kai’sa blinked. “Oh--”

A megawatt smile. “Earlier, while we were writing, Seraphine was telling us that she wanted to see more of the city before we left. The four of us have been here before on the POP/STARS tour, and you gave us the VIP takearound then.” The perfect timing of the tilt of her head here could have closed billion-won deals. “So I know she’s in good hands.”

Kai’sa knew she was staring, but she couldn’t help it. Akali and Evelynn were already breezily moving away, towards Ahri, phones both alight. Akali scratched her head, saying, “We’re still a little early, but that gives us time to pregame before we hit Taboo. So actually, yeah, it’s the perfect time.” The punch she gave Kai’sa’s arm in passing was softened by the little smirk curled into her cheek. “Have a great night, yeah?”

Evelynn drawled, “And don’t wait up for us. We’ve got a full night booked, and I have every intention to make the most of my time tonight.” She had no inhibitions whatsoever about throwing a tight-lipped Kai’sa and suddenly-still Seraphine a shameless look up and down. Whatever she was looking for, she found. The sigh that left her glimmered with promise. “The two of you have three days of each other to catch up on, anyway.”

Then they were gone, quick as fish slipping into the streams of people walking through the night market. She might have imagined the ghost of a smile on Ahri’s face before she turned around and led them off.

Kai’sa had no words for the quick change in her fortune. Neither did Seraphine, apparently. They stood there, side by side, not quite touching and not quite looking at each other.

Her mind kaleidoscoped through a hundred different openers, fishing.

One deep breath, for luck.

Then she turned to face her. “Yooou...haven’t eaten.”

Seraphine hadn’t been expecting that, evidently. Her hand, pulling a curl, froze where it was. The little arch of her mouth curled tighter as she thought. “What? No, I had a… Wait, I got Evelynn those skewers, and…! Well, then I got her a cong zhua bing, she was a terror, she was just plucking at it with her claws still on… Oh, and then Akali demanded one of those swirly potatoes… I… Hmm.”

Her face slowly slid into disbelief. “There’s no way! I handed them all that stuff, did I not…?” She even started counting off on her fingers, like she’d remember some morsel if she laid them all out.

“Oh, darling, poor you.” The warm little word was out of her mouth before she could wrest it back. But, she thought she saw Seraphine’s lips part, just barely.

Kai’sa took her first little chance--held out her hand.

She was a little dazzled that Seraphine immediately grabbed it--looked up at her, ready, even if she was still biting her lip, halfway in a thought.

Kai’sa gave her hand a tug--began walking with Seraphine deeper into the night market. Something about her hand in hers put a suredness in her step. “C’mon,” she laughed, “let’s take care of you. You were too sweet, indulging Evelynn like that and forgetting to eat, yourself.” Kai’sa held up a finger in warning. “The woman really will run all over you if you give her an opening, I’m warning you.”

“I just spent all day with her and Akali. You don’t have to tell me twice, ha ha.” Seraphine mimed being pulled along by her sleeve, grimacing performatively; Kai’sa could immediately see Evelynn in negative, strutting along with her hapless victim.

A thoughtful hum, behind her. “...Hey. You figured I hadn’t eaten. Were you...watching me?”

There wasn’t a way to feint that one, but also: maybe dodging wasn’t worth it anymore. Kai’sa took it on the chin, and hoped her voice wouldn’t wobble. “...Yeah. I was. A lot, actually. You’re always really cute, but tonight...” Over her shoulder, she looked at Seraphine--really looked at Seraphine--for the first time that night, and for once let herself have the luxury of lingering.

Evelynn really had gotten into Seraphine’s outfit. An airy, puffy gauze top in plum, twinkling underneath its surface like stars reflected in a pond, just barely let her peek at the black camisole it covered, and her black pencil pants were banded across her thighs in strips of leather. There were even a pair of new mary janes on her feet, doe-nosed tips still smooth and unscuffed. Evelynn's practiced hand had sharpened the points of Seraphine's face, too--tight wings on her eyes, a sunset burst shimmering around them, and wine-dark lips.

All of the vineyard shades were coaxing a new depth out of Seraphine’s eyes--the forever of the sky at dusk. It was arresting.

But also, strangely familiar. Kai'sa slowed up--started walking backwards, pulling Seraphine in towards her, slow, making sure of what she saw. (And trying not to scare Seraphine, now that she was being clear with herself about what was happening here.)

Still, her chest turned over at the way Seraphine held her breath as she drew close.

Well, there it was. She chuckled, a hair's breadth from her--willed her hand to not shy away from tucking a blue lock back behind Seraphine’s ear.

"I can't believe them. Ahri and Evelynn dressed us up to match."

They were color-blocked perfectly--her black top to Seraphine’s pants, Seraphine’s plum sweater to her trousers. The shades chosen were uncannily close, even. What a synthesis of Ahri and Evelynn’s prowess, honestly; the line between deliberate spectacle and sweet coincidence was one Ahri walked constantly, and she could almost see Evelynn’s hands sunk deep in the sumptuousness of the materials on Seraphine.

Even more, their lip colors were the exact same. The image of Evelynn doing up Seraphine's lips in the same intimate way, with the same lipstick bullet, shot a little thrill down her spine.

Seraphine blinked, the news seeming to wind its way through her head. She pored over Kai'sa herself, and Kai'sa couldn't help cocking half a smile as her gaze stuttered over Kai’sa’s lips.

Kai'sa nearly knocked over a stall in a fit of laughter when Seraphine, after a second, glibly promised, "I'm buying and putting a bunch of snails in Evelynn's bed, I swear to god.

"No, I'm serious!" she assured Kai'sa, the faintest hint of a blush rushing across her face. “Do you want snails for Ahri, too?”

Waving off the offer, Kai’sa wheezed, “No! I’m good. Are you really?”

"Yes!! I was--well, I was super nervous to see you tonight, and Evelynn said she'd dress me up to take my mind off of things, but wow!! It's something else entirely when it turns out they set us up this good!!" She was laughing, too, though--even did a tight turn, on the spot, just to watch the way her sheer top settled on her, glinting like a dragonfly wing.

"I know," Kai'sa got out, still managing giggles, "They’re all going to get it from me another way. Them just walking off like that? Let's see how long they go without me cooking breakfast when we get back to base in Seoul.” Her voice dripped with glee, portending.

Her hand in hers--a brand, sparking bright. “...You were nervous, too, huh?” Kai’sa wondered.

She envied the way Seraphine only had to turn it over in her head a moment before answering, shoulders set high but voice clear. “Yeah.”

“I want to talk, I do.” One heartbeat of a squeeze of their hands.

“But first, though, you need to eat," she reminded her--back on track.

Seraphine squeezed back. "How about… You handle that for me," she said, flush still high in her cheeks. She licked her lips. "Show me a good time."

The exhilaration that shot through Kai'sa could have powered a city. She couldn't contain the grin that bubbled up, hungry at its edges. "Princesses get what they want."

They were scraping the bottom of the barrel of Kai'sa's Taiwan knowledge this far into the trip, but she was determined to get every last drop out of it. Nothing halfway down this row of stalls drew her eye though--all common fare. She cast about, using her height to full advantage to hunt down something appropriately special.

Kai’sa was so bent on finding something good that she almost missed her first big break. They passed by a student delicately holding a huge fried chicken cutlet aloft, tucked almost comically into a square of parchment paper nearly too small to contain the corner of it. It was fully the size of a face. It was monstrous.

Kai’sa caught Seraphine’s eye--pointed to a teeming stand, steam rising in billows behind it. “I think you're going to like this.” Then she was pulling her through the crowds of the night market, navigating to the zha jipai stand, thumbing an appropriate amount of coinage.

When she turned to Seraphine with her own unreal fried treat held high, her jaw dropped. A fluttery, helpless little sound puffed out of her. "What is that."

The wonder in Seraphine’s eyes was already fully worth having her three bandmates abandon them to force the situation.

It was thoroughly enjoyed--Seraphine savored the cutlet with a full-body sigh and the unique relief of somebody getting their first bite of the night. Kai’sa had the stray thought that back in Seoul, she was going to start making breakfast for Seraphine separately--specially for her.

They weren’t even done with the row before Kai’sa heard another little gasp behind her--an inquisitive, “Oh my god. What’s this?”

She had to raise her eyebrows, herself. The tall stand was outrageously at odds with the hot and humid climate of Taipei. There was fake snow and little ski figurines glued to the stand walls. The decal of a cartoon snowglobe sparkled merrily in the street lights. And being carried away from the stand, one by one, by no small number of laughing families or excited couples, were huge snowglobes, bursting with ribbon-thin slices of cream ice, fruit, sweet beans, and cookies.

Ahh, a remix of an oldie. “They’ve got chhoah-peng in snowglobes the size of fishbowls. Amazing.” Kai’sa moved in and handled the change swiftly, and as she was handed her own spectacle of a dessert, she asked over her shoulder, “Share with me?”

“Like I’d be able to finish this thing--Oh my god, don’t do that!!” Seraphine dove forward to catch the gently-lobbed snowglobe. Even when stable, she needed both hands to keep the snowglobe upright, eyes round.

Kai’sa palmed her phone--framed Seraphine on its screen. “Quick, make a face to make the others jealous.”

Seraphine’s voice rang high, still tight in panic. “How about you stop throwing food around, first?” But she was already sticking her tongue out impetuously, snowglobe held tight to her chest like a treasure, picture-perfect. Kai’sa clicked away--realized quickly that she wasn’t going to be happy with just one photo of Seraphine that night.

It was one thing after another, after that: Seraphine wasn’t shy about what caught her eye, and Kai’sa dutifully dove into the fray around each stall to grab what Seraphine was craving. Every new bauble or bite she handed to Seraphine made her light up inside. Seraphine was insistent on thanking her for each thing: looking up at her through long eyelashes, posing sweetly and giving Kai'sa a veritable photo roll of moments from tonight, offering particular little bits or sips of whatever she was holding to Kai’sa under the pretense that they couldn’t very well stop to pass the food between themselves, they had to keep walking!

The more traditional fare really grabbed Seraphine. The less familiar she was with the food, the more excitedly she spun Kai’sa around to take a look at it. Kai’sa remembered enough to be able to order a steaming bowl of ô-á mī-sòaⁿ, plump oysters and pork offal stewed in with vermicelli noodles, with only a little trouble and some good-natured smiling from the vendor.

But when Seraphine pointed through a plastic display at jelly-looking rounds slathered in thick sauce and topped with cilantro, she stopped short. Every indication at the stall--the thick sheen of oil on the griddle, the sharp smell of black vinegar--indicated something savory, but the rounds were mysteries to her. She simply saw a price displayed on the stall, too. Kai’sa was well and truly out of her depth.

“What’s this? Do you know?” Seraphine was watching her with bated breath.

Kai’sa couldn’t help the smile on her face. “No idea,” she admitted. “But that’s not going to stop me from getting us one." A squeeze of Seraphine's hand--she was getting used to the feel of it in her own. "Let’s figure it out together, huh?”

(The bah-ôan turned out to be delicious: a huge meatball in soft, crystalline dough, rich in sweet sauce.)

They wended their way through the night market like that, stopping at their leisure. Kai’sa was new to this--the open sweetness, the long looks shared, not shivering away anytime she accidentally brushed against Seraphine. Still, neither of them fully broached the subject. She was ever a professional, though--knew how to turn-take in a dance, and waited for that perfect pocket to act in. She prayed she’d stick it, when it came up.

It wasn’t long before the soft heat of Seraphine’s hand in her own was replaced by her full weight in Kai’sa’s side as she hung off of Kai’sa’s arm. “Okay,” she laughed, bright like a bell, “this is officially ‘feeling like a princess’ treatment. I take back what I said before.”

Kai’sa smiled. “What, being a sweetheart and volunteering yourself at odd hours for errands isn’t royal behavior? Not feeling like Princess Diana anymore?”

“Say that again.” Seraphine held tighter to her arm, and wouldn’t look away.

Her eyes really did look different tonight. “Wh… You...being Diana?”

Seraphine’s lips parted, soft. “Back up a little more.” Maybe it wasn’t just her eyes that were different tonight.

“...Sweetheart.”

The press of Seraphine’s gaze across her face--forehead, to brow, to cheek, to eyes--felt like a touch. “Before tonight,” she explained, “you never called me anything but my name. I’m deciding what cute thing out of your mouth is my favorite.”

Kai’sa wasn’t sure what wild thing her body started forward to initiate, but it didn’t matter--she stopped as Seraphine’s mouth twisted. “Ow. Hold that thought.”

It was hardly an effort to catch her when she sagged, since she was already on Kai’sa’s arm. Every nerve was on alert in a second.

Kai’sa took a quick look around--helped her over to a bare curb. “Hey, Seraphine, talk to me.”

“Oh, you’re gonna laugh,” Seraphine huffed. She bullied the buckles of her mary janes apart. No longer hidden by straps, the battlefield of bandaids she’d wallpapered her ankles with just under the lip of the shoes peeked out. Still, those brave few around her heel were dark through.

Kai’sa hunkered down with her, making soft sounds. “Now, why would I laugh about you being hurt?” She cradled one ankle gently, fingertips just pressing. Seraphine felt hot to the touch.

“Well, new shoes for a date just sounds like a bad idea, but here I am anyway.” Seraphine’s eyes flashed, fever-bright, just saying that much aloud. “I joked about bending back the, the backs there, in the store, and I thought I was going to shrivel up on the spot from the way Evelynn looked at me. Like, pure ‘I’m putting you on a spit’ vibes. I shouldn’t be surprised Akali had a pocket full of bandaids, ha ha.”

She shifted so Kai’sa could have a better look. “I just… Really wanted to impress you, I guess. And then you called me cute earlier, and whoosh, I completely dropped the idea of switching out of them. Oof, those hurt, too, yeah,” she wheezed, as Kai’sa accidentally brushed the balls of her feet in changing her position. With a second look, she could see the blisters forming.

Luckily, all things could be had at the night market. “One second,” Kai’sa promised, and she was off like a dart after carefully arranging Seraphine. Flip-flops were almost literally a dime a dozen here, in the humid climate of Taipei, and she had a pair triumphantly in hand as she came back up to Seraphine.

She was curled up now, though, arms wrapped around her drawn-up knees in a full funk.

“Tonight’s gotta end here, doesn’t it? I can’t walk anywhere like this, even with changing shoes.” She was drawn up so tight, and looked so small. You could almost just pick her up and put her in your pocket.

There was a thought. “Not if you’ve got a good grip.” One knee to the ground, she offered her back to Seraphine. “Your chariot awaits, princess.”

Seraphine’s “oh my god” came out with a puff of laughter, but she clambered on, shoes in hand.

There were advantages to carrying her around like this--she could hear every muttered comment, like Seraphine’s little squeak when she bounced her on her back, settling her in for the haul, or her barely-there “wow” when she felt a squeeze on her shoulders.

“Jesus, Kai’sa, you’re jacked.” Seraphine didn’t need to raise her voice, this close to Kai’sa.

“I keep hearing that,” she laughed.

-----

Streets later, Seraphine was cozied up against Kai’sa’s back with a sigh. She was incredibly soft and warm, there. “The imitation night markets back home really are trying, but there’s nothing like the real thing. Wow.”

“Isn’t it wild?” Both of their arms were strung with a rainbow of plastic bags full of small treasures: some more bites, kitschy gifts that couldn’t be walked away from, an umbrella to ease Kai’sa’s mind about the dark sky despite no signs of the weather changing. Seraphine even had a bag of cooked snails in hand from a stand--was intent on making good on her promise for Evelynn.

“Mmn. Though, the lights and the music are starting to get a little old.” Seraphine nosed up against Kai’sa’s neck, and she tried to play off a shiver as a cough.

“Let’s get out of here,” Seraphine sighed. Kai’sa didn’t know if it was the proximity, or the length of their night so far, but her voice was thick--inviting.

A beat. Kai’sa swallowed. “If you’re not opposed,” she directed upwards, “I know a good park around here. It ought to be quiet enough. It was a good place to be alone when I lived here, and I can’t imagine it’s changed that much.” She hoped she’d imagined the way the word “alone” had rung in the air.

She could feel Seraphine hum an assent against her back, and after a glance about, tacked to the edge of the night market. The lights faded quickly, but the music clung, misty, as Kai’sa walked across the border between the metal and glass of the city into a lush city park.

Residents were still walking and taking their ease near the park’s perimeter, but as Kai’sa carried Seraphine deeper in, they disappeared, leaving the two of them in manufactured wilderness. Camphor trees reared up along the paths, yawning their boughs over their heads, while grass ran to the horizon, uncannily green in the muggy Taiwan air. She could feel Seraphine crane her neck, tracing some fairy path between the trees.

Seraphine took such care to not dig her chin into the crown of Kai’sa’s head when she set it down. “Taipei really left an impression on you, huh? You remember so much about it.”

Kai’sa’s steps kept a cadence as she thought. Half speaking to herself, she remarked, “I think every place I lived did. I genuinely loved every place we moved to.”

Seraphine swung her feet idly. “Why move, then?” she asked, breezy.

Ahh. “I didn’t get to choose that. Dad’s work… Dad’s work needed him to be flexible. We moved, I don’t know, every year and a half on average?” Another few steps. “He tried not to punt us in the middle of a school year, but sometimes it couldn’t be helped.” Even as neutrally put as she could manage, Kai’sa felt each word like a dangled weight.

When she told most people this part, they usually began wishing out loud that they could have had such excitement growing up, or wondered aloud at the intricacy of Kai’sa’s dad’s work.

She got a squeeze about her shoulders, and a quiet, “Ahh, geez. I’m so sorry, Kai’sa.”

That by itself almost made her stop walking. “...it wasn’t all bad. I did get to see so many things. No kid at any of my schools had a passport like mine.”

She could hear the way Seraphine’s eyebrows were bunched up, just from her voice. “But it sucks you didn’t get to have anything permanent! If I’d been hot-potatoed from place to place… I can’t imagine.”

The pavilion had a fresh coat of paint now--looked much fresher than she remembered. But it still stood lonely, flat roof a dull slab holding up the dark sky. Given another eight hours or so, Kai’sa was sure they’d see old folks here limbering up for early-morning aerobics. But for now, in the haze of a Taipei night, it was empty.

Setting Seraphine down gently at a picnic table bench was second nature--lifts for dance were in her repertoire. But, she couldn’t ignore the way her body ached through the dismount.

She laid down, heavy, the tiled floor of the pavilion pressed into her palms. Turning onto her front, she couldn’t escape the moan of relief that steamrolled its way out her mouth as she raised herself up on her palms, stretching herself out.

Seraphine’s voice had a funny catch to it. “Hey. Are you alright down there? Come up here and join me.”

“Just-- One second. I’m just working all this out.” When she reversed her stretch, sitting back on her legs and bringing her body flat to her thighs, there was an audible series of pops up her back. Kai’sa groaned, low in her throat. There was a band of muscles in her back she hadn’t realized had been tightening up as she’d palanquined Seraphine around. She was becoming one big knot with the way she had overexerted herself the last few days and was only pushing the envelope now.

Seraphine had scooted to the edge of the bench now, watching her. “Wait, you didn’t overdo it carrying me, did you?”

Kai’sa sat in her stretch, silent. Every possible response that flitted through her head wasn’t going to land the way she wanted.

Seraphine, somewhere between cooing and alarm: “You did. Oh, Kai’sa, you could have let me down sometime! We could have stopped somewhere.”

“I…” Kai’sa laid on the vowel, drew it out while her mind ran. “...didn’t want to put you down, honestly. I wanted to keep holding you.”

At the top of her reversing the stretch to sit back up, she went still. Weight back on her heels like this, she was level with Seraphine, who’d lain down on the bench on her front.

Seraphine played with the edge of a wave of her hair, eyes following her finger. “...Hey, Kai'sa.”

A roaring in her ears, when Seraphine turned her eyes to her, searching. “What are we doing here?”

The urge to be playful in response died in her throat as Seraphine--with those great, blue eyes--looked to her for her response, breath held. Her finger on the bench paused. Every part of the woman in front of her was still, straining to hear her answer.

The taste of her dread, old and familiar as a family grave, filled her mouth all at once.

Horrible seconds passed.

“...Kai’sa?”

The hum of her Taiwanese apartment’s lights tickled at her ears. Beneath her, linoleum. The waft of the sweet buns past her face. She couldn’t help herself--looked to the table attached to the bench, expecting to see the white bakery’s box that dripped into her dreams sometimes, stark white against her father’s tan hand.

Seraphine’s voice was still holding onto a spark, but it was fading fast. “Kai’sa? Over here. I’m waiting for an answer.”

Her father, quietly holding out his hand for her copy of the keys.

One more good thing being ripped out of her grasp. Kai’sa, spinning in emptiness.

The dread surged--she closed her mouth tight against its escape.

Seraphine was up and away in a blink, back turned to Kai’sa.

So quiet, so low she almost missed it: “Forget I said that.”

The entire night was turning on its axis, a ship capsizing. Kai’sa felt like she was being thrown off of it. But every sound tumbled back down her throat, lying wasted in the pit of her stomach. And the dread was pushing, now, straining against her teeth.

Ever since she’d touched down to meet them, Seraphine had been an unstoppable force, pouring herself into the group’s work cheerily and without a complaint. It had been something out of a movie. Here, the young ingenue whose boundless curiosity and cheerfulness would propel the already star-tier pop group to new heights.

But Seraphine wasn’t magic. Too late, Kai’sa was remembering: Seraphine was human, and her heart was strong, but it wasn’t invulnerable. It could bruise. It was bruised, she was realizing.

Seraphine wouldn't face her. Her back, a column. She asked, to the air, to Kai'sa, faint, “What is this, Kai’sa?” The words stung. “I get… I--I’m a grown woman. Fuck. I…”

She shook with the breath she took in. Then, quieter, “This has been fun, but. If this-- If this isn’t serious for you, or I’m not good enough, Kai’sa, just say it. I can take it. I just… I need to know.”

That wasn’t it, at all. “Wait!” Kai’sa’s voice was skewered--the effort of forcing the sound out of her when her whole body was caught tight.

Kai'sa finally responding was the first crack in the glacier. All at once, Seraphine spun around on the bench, and every word out of her mouth was another ice pick in it. “Kai’sa. Waiting? How much more waiting? Like, I can, I can wait, I guess, but I…”

Ice-chip eyes. “I’m getting so many messages from you. Like I said before, I was nervous to meet you, but I was also thrilled just to meet an artist who felt so much like me.

“And then we did, and, like, bam! Rookie shit! I’m instantly crushing on you! But, you smiled at me so much? And jammed with me? And laughed when I made bad jokes, and watched me so long when I walked across the room?? What the hell?” Seraphine was pulling her hands through her hair, bunched up into herself.

She blew a rush of air out--pressure, escaping. “But you never let it get past a point. I was bummed, sure, but I was, like, well, that was fun. But then you’d start it up again! You’d fix me treats just for me, or wait for me when everybody else had rushed ahead. And then we’d go back and forth like this. Again.”

Hearing the past few weeks, flipped around to Seraphine’s perspective, stole the heat from Kai’sa. She’d been in her head so much the past few weeks, she hadn’t even considered what it’d looked like.

“And god, you can make me feel special, sometimes.” Seraphine still flushed a little, admitting that. But she continued, “But… I can’t have just that.” She sat up fully on the bench, looming over Kai’sa. “I need more.”

Seraphine, looking her full in the face, severe as she’d never been before.

Kai'sa thought she'd been biding her time in the wings, looking for her entrance. But she’d been missing her cues this entire time. What a disappointment.

Talk to her.

“Seraphine, shit. I’m so sorry. I--” Out with it. “--I was afraid.”

The air, already thick with humidity and only further thickening with the silence, weighed on Kai’sa. The woman in front of her was so still. She thought Seraphine was about to try to walk off, ruined feet be damned, but finally Seraphine replied.

“Why?” It was a blank question: functional.

“I...It’s not great. It's not an excuse.” Kai’sa held up her hands.

How to bottle up her fear, put it on display so it could be understood? What could be said about the way she had floated through her childhood, making herself invisible to escape the notice of what prowled for her?

Simply was the only way to do it. “If things are going good in my life, I get so scared. If I admit I’m invested in any way in something, I get it...taken away? It’s,” Kai’sa breathed, “always been this way.”

It still sounded hollow, out loud. Was there anything more embarrassing than admitting something irrational to somebody? “I say something nice about where my dad’s moved us to, we’re on to a new place. I complain about my challenging new school, I have to get used to a new one the next month, on a new continent. You’re right, Seraphine--I never got to have something permanent.

“All my years like this, Seraphine. From when I could remember, to when I finally broke and moved out. My dad was so proud of me, but I don’t think it escaped him that the first place I landed a gig was where I first grew up.”

A steadying breath. “Dance is the only thing I’ve been able to keep constant. Dance--I can dance anywhere. Any studio is like any other studio the world over. And I,” Kai’sa jabbed a finger into her chest, “damn it, I’m in control of an audition. It’s just me and my body, my practice, my sweat, my blood and tears that matter. Nothing else. Fucking nobody can take that from me.”

Seraphine sat in the quiet, moon eyes watching Kai’sa. In repose, her hands caught in a grip, her mouth set, her eyes intent: she was a statue of a saint, or some fairy tale thing. Something unreal.

The dread boiled in her mouth. Her smile felt carved in. There wasn’t any stopping her now. “Here’s some tasty gossip! I almost ruined POP/STARS with my bullshit, actually!”

Seraphine opened her mouth...then closed it again. She tried once more--nothing. On the third, she croaked, “What?”

Kai’sa threw her hands up. “One of the takes with the car! I mean, ‘with the car’--that was cut in, the safety coordinator would have fucking killed me themself rather than watch me actually attempt the jump while Eve drove at me. But yes!” Her tongue felt thick--her body buzzed. “I slipped on the landing, and sprained my ankle. Take four. We did eleven. I didn’t let anybody know because--because things were going so good. I didn’t want to say goodbye to everybody. Shit.”

She was on her feet--was fully pacing, now. The nervous energy had to go somewhere. “I didn’t tell anybody. I don’t know, I thought the police would come take me away and, and then the Supreme Court of South Korea was going to disband K/DA for grievous fuckin’ negligence. Some fucking thing. My dad’s firm could uproot us with a phone call, growing up.”

Kai’sa could hear the trees sighing in the wind picking up around them. Somewhere in the back of her head, she registered that Taipei’s temperamental weather was shifting--something was coming.

Kai’sa wheeled about on the traitor ankle, as if to remind herself that it’d healed. “I still had two more scenes to shoot, too. Akali and Evelynn had a duo shoot for the rap break, and I was supposed to be visual backup for Ahri in the washer room. She was going to fan out the tails, and then I had a dance solo on the washing machines behind her before we’d FX in me blowing up the place.”

Ahri’s hands in her hair, in the car. Ahri, making her promise her. “Ahri was shaking, in the car to the clinic, and I was going to throw up from the nerves before we made it there. Surely, she was figuring out how to cut me out of the project altogether. But, she wasn’t mad I’d messed up the shoot. She was worried that I didn’t tell them something was wrong--because I thought I’d jinx it. She made me promise to not keep things to myself like that anymore.”

The horror of realizing she was oversharing was dripping in, but she couldn’t very well stop now. She turned her tired eyes to Seraphine. The woman’s mouth was a tight line. “Time is a flat fuckin’ circle! Here I am, making the same mistake again.”

“Mistake,” Seraphine repeated, quietly.

Oh, no. Absolutely not--she couldn’t let that seed be planted. “Not-- Not you. I’m… I can’t believe I got to meet you, Seraphine.”

Let it out. “You’re amazing. You’re brilliant.”

It wasn’t enough. It wasn’t all of it.

Kai’sa looked at Seraphine. She tucked the image of her, here, in the before, into her memories--alongside every home she’d loved and lost.

“I like you, Seraphine. I like you so, so much.” Her fingers were clammy in the island air. “So much, that I was too worried about messing it all up to realize I was fucking it up, anyway.”

Finally released, the dread poured over her, alive at her admission, slicking over her skin.

She forced her voice to hold on. “I’m sorry for making you wonder, all this time. I didn’t mean to play you. You didn’t deserve that. And I want,” Kai’sa bubbled, “to make it up to you. If I can. If you’ll let me.”

The silence stretched. Kai’sa had expected that, at least.

Seraphine was all one line, rigid. She was a woman about to snap in half.

The thick, seething thing was going to swallow Kai’sa whole, at this point. Seraphine’d had enough. She was going to get up and walk away. She’d blown her chance.

Chance.

“Let me audition for you.” Kai’sa blurted it out, desperate, before her brain could catch up.

Seraphine stared at her.

She continued, “I’m too late to tell you how I feel. But I can show you. Show you how much you mean to me.”

Seraphine’s eyes were tundra-blue under her running mascara. She’d tightened her hands against the park bench’s edge. But when she sat back against the tabletop, legs crossed, and crooked one finger, Kai’sa felt flames.

Her chipped voice: “Okay, Kai’sa. Prove to me how serious you are.” Her frustration still shone on her, but there was something else there, too--an anticipation, a coiling wait with a howling that she was just now hearing.

Kai’sa could feel herself flush under Seraphine’s gaze. The warmth seared at the dread--shot it through with heat, lancing, and while it still grabbed onto her, Kai’sa no longer felt bound by it. Her breath came freely to her.

Her heart beat triplets. Every bit of her skin prickled.

Alright. An audition. This, she knew how to do.

Go loud.

Her phone woke at a touch. Kai’sa didn’t even look at what playlist was open; she just hit “play”.

Beyond them, Taipei’s skies opened. Sighing, the rain came all at once down in thick sheets, the clouds relieved of their burden. Thunder rolled. In seconds, Kai’sa and Seraphine were curtained from the world entirely. It was the most intimate stage she'd ever been to.

On habit, Kai’sa pulled her feet together. Standing straight, chest out and shoulders squared, hands held behind her, she cracked a stage-ready smile even as her nerves shook her. She announced in demo-tape theatrics, “Dancer number one. Kai’sa. Here tonight, to show you, Seraphine, that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you since that first time we jammed.” The truth dropped from her lips, ripe, long held close and finally free.

Seraphine’s chest hitched. Her eyes warmed just slightly, and her eyebrows bunched up, and while she was still tight as a fist on the bench, a high pink blush bled through. She was just beginning to realize what was in store. Kai’sa reveled in the feeling.

The intro thudded tinnily out of her phone’s speakers, a copper heartbeat bleeding into dreamy synths as her pulse began keeping time with the song.

Start slow.

Kai’sa’s hands dragged against her trousers, nails pulling at the fabric as she raked upwards, winding her hips to the flow of the synths.

The importance of eye contact during a performance couldn’t be overstated. Whatever impressive feats she performed with her body, Kai’sa knew that it was that connection between dancer and audience that left them reeling. Practiced, she pinned Seraphine to the bench with a half-lidded gaze--watched her watch the way her shirt rucked under her searching hands.

They tangled in her hair, grasping. At the singer’s first pleading words, she started forward towards Seraphine, hips sunk deep in every step, the swing and pitch of her body a hypnotist’s dream.

Heavy, meaningful strides. Aching, thoughtful--until her knees brushed the bench.

She did an about-face and plunged her upper body, then reeled it back up in a serpentine wave. Over her shoulder, she could see Seraphine’s eyes widen as she traced the curvature of Kai’sa’s chest, bent like a bow for her. The echo of the movement as she straightened out had her snapping her hip back with an audible kak of her heel against the tile. Her heart was louder still, beating a tattoo in her chest, her ears.

Neat as a pin, she turned about to face Seraphine again. Kai’sa slid one knee onto the bench, between Seraphine’s own, close enough that their pants caught on each other. Hands posted on the bench, she leaned in to Seraphine, could feel her breath--catch that it was quickening.

“One second, I promise,” she whispered, rough-edged.

In one movement, she pivoted to heave herself up and over onto the table behind Seraphine. By the time the woman understood what was happening and had turned around, Kai’sa was laid out on her back, hips bridged up.

She lowered herself back down to the flat of the tabletop, one centimeter at a time. Then, one fist at her side struck the table as she rolled her body back up into the bridge, then soothed it back down again--again and again. She was scant centimeters from Seraphine. That space between spectacle and watcher was electric.

God, Seraphine was looking at her like she’d never had before. Her stormy eyes roved over Kai’sa, hungry--Charybdis. She could see the tip of her tongue sneak across a lip as she followed the ebb and flow of Kai’sa’s body.

Kai’sa fell back to the tabletop again, sliding her hands back up again. The exaggerated rise and fall of Kai’sa’s chest in time with the music dragged Seraphine’s attention up, back to Kai’sa’s eyes. She bit her lip, her real delight glowing at the edges of the show--tipped her head back as she dragged one hand over her throat, under the jut of her jaw.

Seraphine stood to get a better look, and Kai’sa was away again, rolling off of the tabletop and landing on her heels on the other side.

She planted her hands. They were eye-to-eye across the table.

Over the drumming of the rain, the singer continued, oblivious, words promising the world if only you’d let her as the beat hammered on.

A snort from Seraphine, sounding halfway between irritated and excited. “If I didn’t know better, Kai’sa, I would say you were still avoiding me,” she breathed. Her chest heaved.

“Angel, I’m teasing you,” Kai’sa purred, voice pouring over her tongue, liquid, molten. “But, you sit back down again, and I’ll make it worth your while." Kai’sa leaned forward, body heavy with promise.

Slowly, Seraphine sank back onto the bench.

Kai’sa swirled one magician’s hand.

Hot, in her mouth: “Other way, sweetheart.”

Seraphine complied, but not without a hastily-thrown, “Still don’t know if that one’s my favorite.” For all her joking, though, her voice rasped.

Something rolled in Kai’sa’s stomach as she admitted, “Don’t worry. I haven’t tried out all the ones I want to use on you yet.”

A shiver scattered across Seraphine’s shoulders. Kai’sa had to smile: good. She wasn’t the only one being flustered tonight.

She levered herself back onto the table, above Seraphine. A question, barely audible above the music: “Can I touch you?”

A laugh sputtered out of Seraphine. “I’ve been waiting weeks to hear that.” Then, low: “Yes.”

Facing Seraphine’s back, Kai’sa spread her hands across Seraphine’s shoulders, warm, savoring the feeling, kneading. Working her way back in, she dragged them up, across the soft skin of her neck. Lightly, one hand wrapped around Seraphine’s chin.

Like she had been days before, Seraphine was good with cues. The bowing of a branch--she tipped her head back fully onto the tabletop, eyes searching Kai’sa’s, sighing.

The feeling of skin under her hands was nothing new to Kai’sa. Dressing rooms and studios were close quarters as a rule. Yet, feeling Seraphine, being allowed to touch her without reservations, had her head swimming in seconds.

Kai’sa wanted more. Shaping her hands along Seraphine’s hot cheeks, she traced one thumb along a lip, and was rewarded by the novelty of Seraphine’s high voice guttering into a moan.

“God, you’re sweet,” Kai’sa whispered.

When she pulled away this time, Seraphine shot her hands up and into her top’s slick fabric. Her breath came in huffs, and her flush had bled into her ears and her neck now. She whined, “Kai’sa, you cannot do this to me. ”

Kai’sa drew one hand through Seraphine’s ocean-blue hair, a momentary balm. She was adamant, though. “Absolutely one second this time.”

“Oh my god.” The despair was playful, but something in it rang true, too.

Gently, she broke Seraphine’s grip. Despite her pleading, she went willingly, hands folded to her chest gently.

Kai’sa rounded the table again--planted herself in front of a dazed-looking Seraphine, who followed her movements with fevered eyes.

Grab it with both hands.

This time, she slotted in her knee against Seraphine’s hip, hugging it.

Her other knee, bracketing Seraphine’s hips now. Her arms, anchored on the bench, brushing Seraphine’s shoulders.

Kai’sa lowered herself, achingly, into Seraphine’s lap. One of them took a breath in, sharp--she couldn’t keep track anymore, they were both panting. Her hips ground down on twisted thighs, full press, four-wheel skid, to the slip of a groan. She welcomed the burn in her body from the effort.

Gripping one of Seraphine’s hands, sure, in hers, she placed it high on her chest, on the flat plane of muscle under her collarbones. Over her heart.

“I want,” Seraphine hissed, steam-kettle pitch, “to touch you.”

The ghost of her lips, across Seraphine’s forehead. “Free reign, princess. You’ve been so good.”

Seraphine’s hands ran along the border of her shirt, tracing it in wonder, her fingers stealing underneath the crystals of Kai'sa's necklace. She dragged them down, down, down the middle of Kai’sa’s chest. As in a dream, unbelieving, her fingers trailed on Kai’sa’s skin like hard pressure would wake them both.

Encouragement was needed. Kai’sa met the press of her hands on her stomach with a slow, deliberate roll of her torso, muscle flexing under the other woman’s hands. Gratifying: the sharp sound of Seraphine's "fuck".

Sure hands wound their way through Seraphine’s hair again, and her head dipped back willingly, following their pull. The last slip of her self-restraint was burning through, and she only barely began to ask, “Can I--” when Seraphine, animal-sounding, pulled Kai’sa bodily onto her.

It was an entirely graceless kiss. They were so hungry for it. Weeks’ worth of tentativeness and dancing around each other in their words and their hearts--it all burst in a swoop as they crushed themselves to each other in compensation for time lost. Lips and teeth and tongue as Seraphine gripped her close enough to crush, as Kai’sa pulled her head back to get at anything and everything she could reach.

When she dragged her mouth away, hot thrill flooded her as Seraphine cursed and gripped her jaw, urging her for another kiss. Kai’sa bent to her, eagerness flooding her limbs and sparking along her skin.

Even with her size working against her, Seraphine was ravenous herself. Pressed up against Kai’sa’s hard body, she ran her hands anywhere she could reach, searching for any way to make Kai’sa sigh.

It was hard for Kai’sa not to win this battle, though, with the strength and stamina dancing had given her, and she folded her arm underneath Seraphine, between her and the table edge, so that she could press her whole body into her, insatiable, as unstoppable as a wave breaking. A whine buzzed against her lips as Seraphine arched, pliable and willing.

Seraphine wasn’t sitting back and letting Kai’sa get away with things, though. Her hands snagged against Kai’sa’s shirt, roaming to her back. When she pressed her nails in and raked them forward, against her skin, Kai’sa ground against her, unabashed, shuddering.

She could feel Seraphine curl a smirk against her lips, and when she felt Seraphine’s thigh arch up against her, she broke a hot sigh against her mouth.

“That’s it, Kai’sa,” she exhaled, rich with want. “Come on, babe.”

With the invitation, Kai’sa let herself indulge, leaden head dropped against Seraphine’s shoulder. “You’ll tell me if I’m hurting you, right?” she gasped.

Seraphine pressed a line of kisses to Kai’sa’s forehead. “I’ll tell you. I wanted this for so long--oh, yes, please--”

Kai’sa was already palming Seraphine’s chest, lips trailing up her neck. She felt her way--found exactly how hard to press to have Seraphine roll her head back, prayerful. Her gauze top and camisole weren’t thick at all, and when she rubbed her thumb across it at the right spot, Seraphine was fully writhing under her, sounding broken. Kai’sa wanted to hear that more.

But--

Seraphine’s face lit in white--

Their black shadows suddenly in blinding relief--

Then a deafening chest-deep klaxon of thunder, splitting the sky.

They shouted over each other, nearly falling off of the bench in their panic. “Shit!!” “Fuck!”

The heavy, incessant knocking of the rain faded back in with their hearing. A breath apart, they stared at each other, wide-eyed, slack-jawed. Then, laughed--Seraphine started it.

“Look at us. We’re really out here making out--stealing second base--in a park--during a storm. Rough riders.” Seraphine was sober for just a moment, then fell back to giggling.

Kai’sa also wanted to hear that more.

The shock of nature reminding them of their surroundings had brought some matter of higher-level thinking back to Kai’sa, and even as she pressed another needy kiss against Seraphine’s jaw, she was asking breathlessly, “Did I convince you, then?”

Seraphine snuck another open-mouthed kiss to Kai’sa’s neck. “Oh, I don’t know,” she exhaled, smiling against Kai’sa’s ear. “I might need you to do some callbacks.”

It was the work of a second to drag Seraphine’s hands down from around her waist and lay them flat against the seams of her thighs. Kai’sa pressed into Seraphine’s hands, kneading her fingers against her ass. “Oh? Nothing I can do to convince the director?”

Seraphine’s eyes glimmered as she barked a laugh. “Oh, my dad warned me about you showbiz people!”

Hearing her family mentioned brought Kai’sa fully back into the world, though--Taipei, torrential, near midnight. She didn’t draw away, but she slowed, hung heavy over Seraphine, leaning most of her weight forward on her elbows against the table to keep herself from crushing the small woman underneath her. It put her within nuzzling distance of Seraphine’s face, though--an opportunity she gladly indulged in. Her cheeks were cupped by small, warm hands, and she moved to nose along a thumb.

“Are you…” Kai’sa licked her lips, trying to think through the fog that exhilaration had wound about her head. “Are you okay? With all this, everything tonight." The vice of her dread squeezed her, once. "I’m sorry, again.”

Seraphine stroked one cheek with the back of a hand.

“Yeah, I think I am." Simple as that. Kai'sa really was never going to be used to the depth of her gentleness.

"I had thought… Well, I thought you weren’t really into me, so I was kind of going through it, thinking that you were just humoring me or something.” A wavering stroke of the same hand, through Kai’sa’s hair now. "I was wondering when you would just let me down easy,” she admitted, voice low.

Kai'sa, brimming with apologies, opened her mouth to speak. Seraphine was a step ahead of her--brought one hand against Kai’sa’s lips, which she kissed dolefully. “Hey. One second, huh? I understand better what was going on, now, after you told me all that. I feel way better about it all. Thank you for trusting me, by the way.” Her arms reached past Kai’sa’s neck, and she arced up to hold her.

Kai’sa wanted to curl up into her embrace--turn small and precious, and be held.

She could feel Seraphine shiver with a giggle. “Ooh, I am gonna milk this whole mess for what it’s worth, though. Weeks, Kai’sa!! Had me sitting up in bed recording all sorts of rambling voice notes! You were about to be another song, woman!!”

One flash of cold shame through her, utterly unfitting for the tropical rainfall around them. “I am going to make it up to you, however long it takes,” she declared, solemn.

“Oh, wait. Kai’sa, hold up!” Seraphine did her best to shake her, with her arms about her neck, but it was mostly lost to Kai’sa’s size and the dampening effect of Kai’sa’s arms on the table. “For real. Maybe a week of special treatment,” she joked, “but otherwise, please, don’t sweat it." Another kiss, gentle.

What grace.

After a moment, quieter, more steadily, she promised, “And Kai’sa? Nothing’s going to take me away--not if I can help it.” Head tucked in under Kai’sa’s chin, she breathed, “Does that help you?”

Even through all this, the dread hadn’t completely dropped away. It pooled even now, on Kai’sa’s skin, weighing her if she thought about it.

But maybe it had always been there. When your whole life ran in terrible orbit around some dark thing, it didn’t matter if it was in eyesight or not. It still had a grip on you.

And she’d fought it, too, in her way. Every achievement, every printed accolade, every acceptance call--a horn calling in the darkness, declaring her triumph over a fear that wanted to smother her life.

And. If she really had been carrying that weight around all this time and had still ended up here, tonight, in Taipei, working on a second release with K/DA with everybody she loved, and in Seraphine’s arms--well.

Kai’sa said, gratefully, “That’s all I need, Seraphine,” and meant it.

-----

Ahri pushed open their suite door with the ghost of a touch. She froze even midway through her first step, though, and when no apparent reason for doing so was forthcoming, Evelynn and Akali both brushed their heads past the threshold.

The breadth of Kai’sa filled the enormous couch in their shared common space. She was deeply asleep, with Seraphine tucked into her side between her and the couch cushion like a book. Their hair fell over the edge of the couch, crinkled after laying down wet.

Akali was instantly on the offensive with her phone, snapping frame after frame.

“I can’t wait to see them kill you,” Evelynn whispered.

Akali was still tapping away, but lobbed over her shoulder, “Watch your own back first, Miss Paper Dolls.”

They crept in, thieves in their own suite. After ruffling Akali’s hair, Evelynn slipped into her room. Ahri made a beeline for the fridge, rummaging quietly for her breakfast shake mix. For her part, Akali unceremoniously dumped an armful of bags of food stall gains next to another jumble of similar treats and baubles from Kai’sa and Seraphine’s night.

Alarmed, Ahri shot her a dagger stare, but on a second glance, the two women on the couch were still asleep after the racket.

Akali muttered, self-sure, "Guarantee they're out. Look at them."

It was hard to argue that. Seraphine couldn't look any less conscious, drooling on Kai'sa's chest the way she was. And Kai'sa--Ahri tilted her head, as if to see her better. The peace on Kai’sa’s face was a new look for her.

Thoughtfully, almost to herself as she stirred, Ahri remarked, “God, they look cute.”

Akali nodded, already popping some dumpling or the other in her mouth in one go. “It’s sickening.”

High, piercing, an animal on the run--Evelynn’s scream from her room jarred everybody in earshot, including the two sleepers. “Fucking Christ!! Why are these here? Why are they tucked in.”

They were instantly awake. Kai’sa had just the moment to sneak a smile to Seraphine, who was already stifling a sleepy yawn with a grin. They twisted, tucked into each other, to see what trouble they were in together.