Chapter Text
"Does this checklist go on forever?"
Momo despises every second of this day. Always did when it passed by every year back then. It sounds like this day should be all about her, but unsurprisingly, it isn't.
Is it her birthday?
No. She doesn't even know when hers is.
It's Valentine's Day.
And unfortunately..
"No," a teen in a toga, Dahyun, says, "but there's about a few hundred pairs left."
Momo's eye twitches at the number.
"Oh! There's one pair there, onee," Dahyun points at a pair of high schoolers, munching peacefully in a convenience store front, "Miyazaki Kagura and Sawamura Daisuke."
Momo tiredly grabbed the golden bow on her back for the—she couldn't keep track of how many times at this point.
Her arms felt sore from holding the bow in this awkward position for hours on end; although as far as she knows she can't get physically exhausted, days like these really does prove otherwise.
Momo pulled on the bowstring and as she does, a vivid white glow appeared out of thin air and soon revealed itself as a golden arrow, ready to be fired.
She lets go, the arrow piercing through the air as it reaches for the schoolgirl's chest.
The arrow went through square in her heart, and for a second, while looking at the boy, she froze.
A glowing red string looped around her ring finger, but she doesn't seem to notice it.
Momo pulled on the bowstring once more and another arrow summoned, this time aiming for the boy.
She lets go and pierced the boy's heart, a bright red string looping around his ring finger.
The strings then started to elongate until it reached each other and intertwined in a flash.
The two looked at each other and shared a smile they've never shared before.
It's not even the highest the sun has reached but Momo already wants this day to be over.
"I want a break," Momo slouched from that intimidating Archer stance, "who's next?"
"Um.. please hold on, it's still sort of a blur," Dahyun squints at the lengthy scroll in her hands, "Yoo Jeong—oh, nevermind, it's.. Im Nayeon and Myoui Mina."
Momo still believes it's only right for the Archer to get quality rest on the day that's dedicated to her.
A thousand vermillion threads dangle all around her from the wooden ceiling beams.
The strings are gleaming, some brighter than the others in the dark room, waiting for the Matchmaker to braid their lives with another's.
Suddenly, all the color in the room disappears except for two strings glowing brightly across the room.
Sana made her way towards those strings. She grabbed their small wooden bobbins and read the glowing characters engraved in the wood.
Miyazaki Kagura and Sawamura Daisuke.
She deftly twirls the bobbins, something she had more than mastered over the centuries, making the strings intertwine.
But no matter how much she had mastered this craft, of course it's not going to be perfect.
She runs her fingers on the braided strings. It's a little bit rough down the line, like almost every other braid she paired.
Besides, it's not her love, so who is she to judge?
She lets go of the braid and as soon as she does, it dissipates into vermillion sparks and the thousand strings in the room continue to gleam.
And all of a sudden, the threads lost color once again, but the light coming from the strings behind her singlehandedly lit up the room.
It's not every day Sana comes across love this fierce, so this certainly caught her interest.
So when she turns around, she is reminded of what shock feels like again.
There were three strings, each of them equally blinding.
Sana sighs, at times like this she questions why mortals can't just figure this out by themselves, and not involve a higher entity to be trapped in a dark wooden room, having her make these decisions.
She reaches out for the leftmost string, the glowing carving in the bobbin reading Yoo Jeongyeon, and the middle string reading Im Nayeon.
Sana holds her breath as her fingers juggles the bobbins in a pattern she'd followed all her life now.
She couldn't believe what she braided.
It's perfectly intertwined with each other. She reached out for it, and it felt as smooth as silk.
Her eyes actually burn at how bright the braid is glowing.
But as perfect as it is, it doesn't feel right.
Sana sighs as she untangles if not the greatest braid she'd made.
Though, she really can't help the fascination when there's another string to entangle it with.
She grabbed the bobbin on the rightmost side, reading Myoui Mina in glowing characters.
Sana's breath hitched for some reason.
She began braiding it—no, she felt like she wasn't even doing anything. It's as if the threads were uniting on its own will.
If the former braid was perfect, then there's no word to describe this at all.
Sana is convinced their strings are of the same thread.
She was about to send it to the Archer, but then, the weirdest thing happened.
The lone thread of Yoo Jeongyeon began to squirm about and glow even brighter.
What's weirder?
Im Nayeon and Myoui Mina's braid started to flicker.
What's even weirder?
The most vivid vermillion light Sana had encountered suddenly flashed from the other side of the room.
"One day, you're gonna take my place," Momo says to her trusty cherub as they walk down the streets to find their next target.
"Hm? I want to be more like Sana-onee," Dahyun answers, "your job is too exhausting."
Momo giggles, her trio of cherubs have stuck with her for as long as she can remember, so knowing every inch of them is something that just comes naturally.
"We both know there's a better reason than that," Momo playfully nudges the blushing cherub's arm.
"What are you talking about?" Dahyun couldn't meet Momo's gaze.
The Archer giggles, "You better hurry, I'm sure Tzuyu is on her way to give Sana something right now,"
Dahyun stops in her tracks, "..She isn’t?"
Momo shrugs, “Who knows. Maybe you should check it out.”
The pure hope in Dahyun’s gaze actually overwhelms Momo, “Can I really..?”
Momo smiles and nods once, "Happy Valentine's, Dahyun."
She'd be better off not going through Valentine's Day the Archer way.
Momo snapped her fingers and the cherub Dahyun disappeared in a flurry of feathers.
"Chaeng," Momo calls.
A smaller teen in a rather eccentric toga popped out, along with feathers.
"Myoui Mina and Im Nayeon," Momo said.
The way the first name rolled on her tongue felt different.
After a while of walking they come across the high school of the two girls.
Perfect timing, they're going out of the campus for lunch.
Thanks, Destiny. This makes it a little easier.
"Watch and learn, kid," Momo says to Chaeyoung, whose eyes seem to be fixed on one of the girls.
Momo grabs her golden bow once again and pulls on the string.
Once the arrow formed she lets it go flying towards the Japanese girl's heart.
The red string faintly glowed in Myoui Mina's pocket where her hand was.
She pulls on the bowstring once more. She sees a taller, boyish girl running towards the pair.
Mina seems to notice Momo from a distance, most probably weirded out by Momo's awkward way of stretching her arms.
Well, this is better than seeing a golden bow loaded and targeted at you.
Momo makes sure the arrow doesn't accidentally hit the taller girl; then, she lets go.
Then, the weirdest thing happened.
The golden arrow bolted towards Im Nayeon's heart, until it didn't.
Sana shields her eyes from the immense light as she makes her way to it.
She’d never seen something like this in her centuries as the Matchmaker.
Oh, wait. She did.
It was the first memory she can remember.
Sana reached for the bobbin to see just who this thread belongs to.
As soon as she reads the characters, the wooden bobbin falls from her hand.
She hears a rubbery fabric struggling. Sana twists her gaze across the room and sees the braid untangling.
She could only do nothing as she hears a whoosh next to her ear, a crash and see a blazing light.
Sana doesn’t know what just happened, but now, there’s a burning white braid on the floor and a burning white braid where Yoo Jeongyeon’s string was.
And one of those strings belong to Hirai Momo.
Momo blinks. That’s as simple as it gets.
And the next second, she sees the arrow pierce through her own heart.
Figuratively? Yeah.
Literally? Oh, yeah.
She stares at it like it’s more preposterous than her full-time job of shooting people with arrows.
Well, it is.
Headlines, the Archer Hirai Momo gets pierced by her own arrow.
She feels uncomfortable in her chest area, but at the same time, it felt.. nice.
For as long as Momo has been the Archer, she felt content making idiots fall in love.
Not be the idiot in love. At least not with someone else than..
Reality washes in when she feels a burn around her ring finger and looks at its blinding vermillion glow.
In the other realm, Sana's finger twitched.
She followed it as it extended to meet with Myoui Mina's red thread.
As ironic as it sounds, Momo hears something snap when their threads meet.
"Chaeng, what.. what just happened?" Momo looks at Chaeyoung, who looks just as petrified as her.
The cherub gulps, finding her voice, "We—we need to report this to Destiny, immediately. We never expected this to happen, right?"
Momo raises her hand in front of her face, wriggling her fingers. She sees the string wriggle with it.
Her eyes follow the string and sees the girl in the other line, offering a cute smile and waving her hand at her.
She felt a tug at her heartstrings.
Great.
Hirai Momo, Archer, officially got Lovelaced with a complete stranger.
She deadpans at the sky, pretending Destiny is above there, but Momo knows too well she isn't.
She sort of takes back the gratitude she gave to her earlier.
But, oh well.
“Thanks, Jihyo.”