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She liked being the surpriser, not the surprised. It was for this reason why Himiko nearly screamed when she felt a light jabbing at both sides of her torso, nearly making her drop the metal cage she had been carrying.
“Nyeh –! Stop it, Kokichi!” she cried, trying to get away as her boyfriend poked and prodded and tickled her belly. “I’ll turn you into a newt if you don’t. I’m warning ya!”
“Okay, okay, jeez!” he said, snickering and snorting, as the damage had already been done. “Did you finally find the fancy schematics for this spell you wanted to do?”
“Not exactly, no,” she admitted. “But we have all the right pieces. The only thing left is the Familiar of BorderHopping.”
“Who where the whatzit?” Kokichi asked, his nose wrinkled in confusion.
“It’s the final piece!” she reiterated. Looking through the contents on her desk, Himiko eyed a crate with a few holes in it. “I’m pretty sure this is where it’s at.”
As Himiko went on to remove the top of the crate, Kokichi kneeled down to try getting a look through one of the holes, but he couldn’t make anything out. “Kinda weird that the person who gave you this familiar thingy would drill holes into the box. Almost like they want the package to flip out of the box while shipping, heehee!”
“Uh…” Himiko glared at him. “Do you not know what a familiar is?”
“Of course! It’s familiar to me!” Kokichi proclaimed, his cheeks dimpling as he grinned.
Himiko’s eyebrow twitched at that comment. “Yeah...right…” Right after speaking, she knocked the lid onto the ground and reached into the crate to pull this familiar out. Kokichi, meanwhile watched, breath still, no idea what to anticipate until Himiko finally turned around to reveal the familiar in her two hands. “Ta-daa!”
Kokichi thought he could feel a rock drop in his stomach. Caught between his girlfriend’s hands was a large, brown, fluffy bunny – one that was just big enough to fit inside her big wizard hat, looking almost a little too common and nonmagical to be used for whatever Himiko was planning to use it for.
“So, uh...it’s a bunny,” Kokichi commented.
“It’s my bunny familiar,” Himiko corrected. “I’ll be doing all sorts of magic with him. I don’t know what to call him yet, but I’ll think of something maybe.”
Kokichi continued staring at the rabbit as if he had never seen one before. “Interesting…” he said.
Seeing how his demeanor had changed, Himiko couldn’t help making a comment. “What’re you acting like that for, huh?”
“Like what?”
“You know what.”
Kokichi sniffed. “I just think bunnies are interesting creatures! Like, what other kind of animal hops around as their only means of traversal?”
“Kangaroos?”
“And yet bunnies don’t have pouches to store things. How sad!”
“Right…” As she said that, Himiko placed the rabbit familiar on her table and then proceeded to pull a carrot out of a lunchbox she had on her table. The rabbit smelled the carrot in her hand before munching on it bit by bit. “Oh, good; he’s already getting along nicely.” She started running her hand down the rabbit’s back as it continued munching on the carrot.
Himiko looked up at her boyfriend to see him rubbing his nose. “You wanna pet him? He’s super soft!”
“Uhh – no thank you,” Kokichi said with a sniff.
Himiko paused. “Hey, what’s going on?”
Kokichi closed his eyes for a little longer than a regular blink, then proceeded to blink a few more times and sniffle again. “Nothing’s going on,” he proclaimed. “Jeez, Himiko; it’s like you want to stir up -snf- drama.”
“Kokichi, seriously,” Himiko said. “If you want me to get you a tissue—”
“I don’t need one!” he lied.
“Then quit sniffing.” By that point, the rabbit had just finished munching on the carrot – at which point Himiko proceeded to take her hat off. “I wanna see if I can get this to work,” she went on.
“Get what to work?” Kokichi asked. As he spoke, he held a finger under his nose, rubbing the underside gently.
“I said he was the Familiar of BorderHopping, yeah?” she said. “So if he’s really destined to border-hop, he should have no problem getting out of my hat.”
“Wait. This is just that old rabbit-in-the-hat trick magicians always do.”
“Except this time it’s actually magic,” Himiko corrected. “Now – prepare to be blown away!” The girl looked like she was about to start beaming with energy when Kokichi interrupted her.
“iiIIT-k’SHhooo!!!”
Himiko flinched, holding her hat on her head she used one of her hands to point at Kokichi. “A-ha! I knew something was up with you.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Kokichi sniffed.
“You just sneezed.”
“So?” he challenged. “Don’t people sneeze like all the time?”
“Don’t play dumb; I saw you acting all weird a minute ago.”
“Cause a bug or something flew up my nose, okay?!”
Himiko blinked. “What a weird thing for a bug to do…”
“Can you just show me the magic please?” he went on. “Pleeaseeee, Himiko? I’ve been dying to see your magic!”
Eyeing him suspiciously, the mage suspected some faux attempt at flattery. “How about I put a little spell on your nose so it doesn’t feel sneezy?”
“Erm... What did you say?”
“I just put a spell on your nose,” she reiterated. “And you won’t need to sneeze for the next hour. I just have to kiss it.”
“You’ll kiss my nose. And that’ll activate the spell?” he said, then paused. “Yeah, sure, whatever. Go for it.”
With a quick nod, Himiko stepped forward, closing her eyes the moment she got just close enough. And in a motion too quick for her to predict, Kokichi wrapped his arms around her waist and stood up just high enough so that her lips missed the tip of his nose and instead pressed up against his lips. Her eyes initially shot open in surprise when she realized what he was doing – but within a matter of seconds, they closed again. For as much of a little turd Kokichi could be, those moments of genuinely surprising romance were enough to win her over. The matter of this spell seemed to vanish from her mind completely as he took her in, holding her close, kissing her over and over.
When he pulled back, Kokichi looked at her with a warm smile – a gesture more genuine than anything he had ever offered anyone else he was forced to be in regular contact with. He then proceeded to touch his forehead to hers as their breathing started to go perfectly in-sync with each other.
Himiko spoke softly, smiling as she did. “You know, my spell isn’t going to work now unless I kiss the right spot.”
“Oh well,” Kokichi snickered. “I think my nose will be fine, anyway.”
“Yeah, probably.”
Again they pulled themselves closer together. It was just as they did when the rabbit in Himiko’s hat slipped out, kicking its large hind feet as it attempted to grab onto something – and of all things, it decided to climb onto the top of Kokichi’s head.
Kokichi yelped, stepping away from Himiko, almost seeming to wonder where the rabbit had gone by the time it perked itself along the top of his head.
“Nyeh?!” Himiko took a step toward her boyfriend. “Get off of his head now!”
“Oh god, so it is on my head,” Kokichi whimpered. “Get it off!”
Hoping for some cooperation, Himiko once again took off her hat and flipped it around so the rabbit could get back inside it. “Come on. Hop inside.”
“It’s not getting off,” Kokichi noted, his nose twitching like the bunny’s.
Himiko attempted to step closer. “C’mon, bunny—”
Before she could get any closer, Kokichi pushed her back with his open palm, his nostrils visibly flaring as his chest filled with air. He pressed a hard finger under his nose, but at that point his breath had already stilled.
“hHHIIT’CHh! IIT-t’SHheh!! HhAT-t’SSHOOo!”
After enough rocking from Kokichi, the bunny finally hopped of his head and onto the floor, immediately prompting Himiko to go after it before it dashed right out of the room, out of reach. “Oh, dangit,” she mumbled. It was only after speaking when she looked up to see Kokichi’s nose was running. “Oh...dang.”
Kokichi tried to sniffle, but could barely do it. “Ehh…” he murmured, taking a cue from Himiko.
Almost able to read his mind, Himiko pulled out a handkerchief from her sleeve. “Hey,” she said, poking his shoulder. “Here.”
Pinching his nose, Kokichi looked over his shoulder to see her holding the handkerchief to him. Hoping not to gross her out, he promptly took the cloth from her and turned away to blow his nose.
While he wiped his nose, Himiko thought out loud partly to herself. “Nyeh...maybe I should get a frog as my familiar, instead.”
“Why? It’s not like I’m allergic to your rabbit or anything.”
“Oh, shut it!” she declared. “Face the facts: you’re allergic to bunnies.”
With that, Kokichi sighed. “Yeah. You’re right. I was lying. But my nose wasn’t lying.”
“That reminds me.” Not bothering to warn him, Himiko stepped in to kiss the tip of his red nose, just light enough to make it slightly tickle. “There. Now you’re safe!