Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Squid! Tuna! Octopus-face!” Momo Ayase grumbled to herself, kicking a discarded can across the pavement. It clattered a satisfying distance, but did nothing to dispel her frustration. Not only had her first-ever boyfriend just dumped her earlier that day, but she hadn’t even gotten to kick his ass for it! Or hurl a decent insult. Talk about unfair! She’d been wallowing in angst since that morning, and her friends’ I-told-you-sos had not helped at all.

Now that school was out, she was supposed to be heading home, but she just knew that her granny would be as unsympathetic as her friends. So she was aimlessly wandering the streets, trying to find a way to work off her anger.

A sound caught her attention. She looked across the street to see a couple of guys, probably around her own age, chucking paper and other bits of garbage at… another kid? A skinny shape in black that looked like a teen boy, at least. He was sitting on a bench, kinda hunched over a… book? Maybe a tablet of some kind? He looked over at the guys chucking garbage at him, adjusted his round sunglasses with one hand, and curled further into himself, trying to ignore them.

“What’re you lookin’ at, ya loser?” Momo heard one of the guys drawl, and saw the glint of sunlight reflecting off a glass bottle in his hand. His arm came up to throw the bottle, but he squawked and dropped it when the shoe Momo had thrown connected with the side of his head.

“How does that feel, ya asshole!” She cried, crossing the street at a run, scooping up one of the bits of discarded junk they’d thrown and chucking it at the second guy. “Littering is fucking gross, you tools!”

Both guys screamed at the sudden attack, fleeing like the cowards they were. Momo huffed out a breath, scooping up the shoe she’d thrown.

“Bunch of jerks,” she muttered, slipping it back on. “There’s nothing but scum in this world.” She walked on, completely ignoring the boy on the bench, who gaped after her in wonder.

Momo ground her teeth as she stomped down the street. That little encounter had only served to piss her off even more. If she didn’t find a way to blow off some steam, she was gonna hurt somebody, for real!

“Miss! Miss, Miss, Miss, um–”

“What?!” Momo hollered at the annoying voice behind her. The boy in black from earlier flailed back, startled.

“Uh, uhm, Miss…?” He trailed off into a questioning tone.

“Momo Ayase,” she grunted, crossing her arms, waiting for the weird skinny guy to get on with it.

“Miss Momoayase!” He exclaimed, rushing her name into one word. “I am to be– Or, to say, er–”

“Spit it out already!”

His eyebrows drew together in clear confusion. “Spit…?”

“Say what you wanna say!” Momo wondered if the guy was foreign. It would explain his awkward speech.

“O-Oh. I want to say…” The boy bowed deeply. “Thank you.”

Momo waved him off, feeling suddenly awkward. “Yeah, well, don’t read too much into it. I wasn’t trying to be your friend or anything. Just forget it.” She turned to walk away, but the guy followed her, stuttering out something else.

“You deaf or something?!” Momo yelled into his face. “I just got dumped, I don’t need some stringy little nobody following me around! Now get lost!”

The boy froze. Momo turned her back on him, huffing. As she walked away this time, he did not follow.

Shame curled in her belly. That had been a huge overreaction. She stopped walking.

“I’m sorry. That was me–” She turned to face the boy again, but there was nobody there. He’d vanished, as if he’d never been. Momo stared at the empty street for a moment. Then she groaned. Great, now she was upset at herself, too. Was there no justice in the universe?

She stomped away to go find something to break.

Well, this day officially could not get any worse.

After raging at herself and the world some more, Momo had stumbled upon the abandoned remains of a hospital building, just as the sun was beginning to set. She’d figured there was plenty of stuff in there nobody would mind if she smashed, so she’d slipped inside. Karma must’ve decided to bite her in the ass though, because the very last thing she could have ever predicted happened.

She’d been abducted. By fucking aliens.

Who said they were going to take out her organs.

What the fuck, universe.

The Serpo-whatever-they-were-s were using their freaky mind powers on her, and she struggled against the pressure bearing down on her, somehow from outside and inside her skull.

“You are resisting our psychokinesis. You have a strong will,” one of the aliens said, emotionlessly. It grabbed her knees in its freezing cold hands. “However, we shall begin.”

“No!” Momo screamed. “Stop!” She did not want this, she did not want to see, god, she did not–

BANG!

The alien froze. Momo’s eyes flew open.

BANG!

The whole room shuddered, the air around them flickering somehow, like a faulty television.

“Someone with incredibly bad timing is attempting to enter our laboratory,” said one alien, striding towards the wall.

BANG!

A panel flew through the air, striking the alien head-on. The force from the blow threw it backwards and embedded it in midair somehow. The space around its limp body flickered and blinked, revealing… screens? But Momo’s eyes were glued to the thing clawing its way through the new hole.

A dark mass with spindly limbs clambered into the room, covered in some kind of black… fur? Feathers? Momo could barely make any details out in the flickering lights. It straightened up once fully inside, towering over Momo’s captors. Two round, glowing red eyes locked onto them. It spread huge, moth-like wings and let out a blood-curdling scream.

“A Virbilaetian? We did not know there was one in this sector. How did it get in here?”

They know what it is, Momo thought. So it’s some kind of alien?

“Attention, Virbilaetian,” said one of the remaining Serpos. “You do not have permission to enter this place. Leave at once! If you do not…” The Serpo grabbed the sides of its face and tore it to pieces, revealing the hideous true form underneath. “We shall take your banana organ!”

“Ew!” Momo exclaimed.

“Six senses!” The Serpo exclaimed, gesturing in the newcomer’s direction with its four-fingered hand. The alien took flight at once, going so fast that Momo could barely track it. Whatever power the Serpo used left craters in its wake, but its target was left unharmed.

“It is too fast! I cannot train my psychokinesis on it!” The Serpo exclaimed, right before the dark mass slammed into it. Both aliens went flying, flailing and fighting on the floor, before the winged creature ended up on top.

Momo could see it a little clearer now, but kind of wished she couldn’t. The creature had gruesome-looking black jaws (mandibles? Pincers?), which it wrapped around the Serpo’s creepy robotic member and tore the thing straight off its body.

“Our precious banana organs!” The remaining Serpo exclaimed. “You banana thief! Serpo-grammatry!” It crossed its arms into a T shape, and an invisible force slammed into the winged alien. It hit the wall hard enough to put a crater in it, and hung there like a butterfly pinned to a board.

“We have never met such an aggressive being as you before,” said the Serpo as its captive struggled against the force that held it. “We came here to study the reproductive functions of the humans, but your strength and speed could benefit us greatly. You will give us your banana organs!”

“Re… lease… her…” the trapped alien ground out in a raspy voice. “Release… Miss Momoayase… Don’t you… hurt her…”

Okay, what?! It talks? And it knows my name?! Had it come here to save her? But why?

“Fie!” The Serpo said, and the crater the winged alien was pinned in deepend. It groaned in pain. “You are in no position to make demands. I shall proceed with the arousal.” Using one hand to hold its opponent, the Serpo turned its other hand toward Momo, and the crushing pressure in her head returned.

As Momo struggled and screamed, she thought of her grandmother. Of the ritual she’d taught her, made her do every day on the way to school.

(What had she last said to her grandma?)

She remembered the other kids pointing and laughing at her, of one boy in particular whose mocking caused tears to prickle at the corners of her eyes.

(Had she told her she loved her before she went to school?)

She remembered yelling at her grandmother, telling her she hated her, that she was a fake.

(She didn’t mean it. She’d never hated her grandmother, not once. She’d just been embarrassed…)

Firm up the muscles in your tummy…

(What if she never saw her again?)

Now picture your ki shooting up out of the top of your head…

(What if she died here?)

No.

She could not die here. She would not.

Warmth and light and power flooded every part of Momo’s body, flowing from every cell. Her eyes shot open. She was no longer tied down to that horrible chair, but floating midair in a sea of teal stars.

“She’s not a fake,” Momo’s relief and amazement almost made her laugh and cry as she spun a panel from the walls with nothing but her will. “My grandma’s an honest-to-god medium! Thanks, grandma!”

Her gaze locked on the remaining Serpo. “Now I’ve got the power to take these creeps on.” She struck out with her leg, catching the alien’s hand as it tried to block her, but she put every ounce of power and righteous anger she could muster behind it. “And send ‘em flying!”

The Serpo spun through the air and punched straight through the wall. The impact caused the entire room to shudder, panels flickering and going dark. The room began to rock and sway, like a ship caught in a storm.

“Oh, shit!” Momo realized. “I’m in a real UFO!” And it was coming down! She had to get out of there!

She stumbled to her feet, trying to see if there was a way out, a door or something. Suddenly she remembered—

“Oh, right!” She ran over to the wall where she’d last seen her mysterious savior (attempted savior?). The Serpo’s psychic power no longer pinned it to the wall, and it had crumpled in a heap on the floor, unmoving.

“Hey!” Momo crouched down next to it. “Hey, you!” What had they called it? Verbo-something? “Alien guy!”

It did not respond. Momo reached out and shook its shoulder(?), noting distantly that the black fluff it was covered in was quite soft to the touch. “Dude, wake up, we gotta go!”

“Mmrrghg,” was all the reply she got. She groaned. Stupid alien! Maybe she would be better off just leaving it, saving her own skin, but–

But she couldn’t. This alien, for whatever reason, had tried to help her. She owed it the same courtesy, at least.

The UFO had stopped swaying randomly, and instead started heading in a direction that was definitely, steadily, terminally downwards.

They were running out of time.

Momo tried to remember everything she’d heard about surviving an airplane crash while frantically scanning their surroundings. There weren’t any seats around to strap themselves into. The chair she’d been trapped in before had been smashed to bits when her powers awoke–not that she really wanted to get back in that thing anyways. “Stupid goddamn aliens and their stupid fucking spaceships!”

Wait. Her powers!

Momo looked down at her hands. She could still feel the warm current of her ki, reaching for it now was as easy as breathing. Maybe she could…

Taking a deep breath, Momo pictured her ki forming a protective teal bubble around the two of them, cupping them like a giant pair of hands. She held it together as explosions rocked the room and showered sparks down on them. Nothing could touch them so long as she kept it up.

Hold it… hold it…

With one last ear-shattering crash, the UFO finally went still. Momo peeked one eye open. The room was nearly unrecognizable after the crash, but at least they were still alive. It had worked! Momo dropped her ki with a groan, suddenly feeling bone-tired. That sucked! She couldn’t stay here, though. Small fires still burned inside the ship, and sparks occasionally flew from the walls.

She looked over at the alien beside her, still unconscious despite the ruckus. She sighed.

Dragging an alien at least twice her size out of a wrecked UFO ended up being surprisingly easy. Despite how tall it was, it turned out to be very light. Once Momo figured out where its head was, she grabbed under its arms and pulled, trying to be mindful of its huge wings.

Her ki made quick work of the wall, and she dragged the alien outside and away from the wreckage. Once they had a good amount of distance, she laid it down with a groan. It might not have been very heavy, but dragging it around sure was awkward!

She examined her attempted savior in the new light of the moon (and the burning spaceship).

It was not completely black like she’d first thought. Streaks of red and even some white ran through its hair (feathers?) and formed eyespot patterns on its wings, which were about as big as its entire body. Two long black antennae, tipped in white and red, sprouted from the top of its head.

What she’d assumed to be enormous eyes were actually goggles (glasses?). Between those and the enormous black jaws that took up the bottom half of its face, she could see hints of pale skin. In fact, looking at the rest of its lanky body, it even seemed to be wearing clothes made of black fabric.

Most of its height came from its ridiculously long limbs, nearly twice the length of Momo’s. Its hands were sort of grayish in color, tipped with wicked black talons, the same on its birdlike feet.

Pretty weird, thought Momo, but honestly not nearly as frightening as those Serpo freaks. Especially since this thing had tried to save her. Hopefully not to harvest her organs for itself.

Well, if it tries anything, I’ll just kick its ass with my new amazing powers, Momo thought. Heartened by that, she knelt down and tried nudging the alien awake again.

“Yo, moth-dude. You still alive, or what?”

The alien groaned in response, shifting slightly. It made some weird creaking noises as it did so. Which continued.

Oh, wait, shit, is it shrinking?!

Momo watched in horror as the alien transformed. Limbs shortened, hair receded, wings shrank, the huge black jaws went… somewhere, until what was left was–

“Whaaat the fuuuuuuck.”

It was the boy from earlier. The one she’d shouted at.

He’d been a freakin’ alien the whole time?!

He still didn’t look totally human, now. His wings and antennae were still there, as was some black fluff sticking out of his shirt collar, and his feet still looked weirdly birdlike.

He stirred as Momo gaped at him, opening bright red eyes.

“Miss Momoayase!” he exclaimed, sitting up. “You’re okay!”

Momo pointed at him, mouth still hanging open. “You. You’re an alien, too? Just how many aliens are there on Earth, huh?!”

The boy adjusted his glasses with one hand (hadn’t he been wearing sunglasses earlier?). “Oh, uh, I don’t–”

“Nevermind, that doesn’t matter!” Momo waved her hands. She fixed Alien-boy with an intense stare. “You tried to save me from those Serpo-things.”

“Serpoians,” he corrected.

“Whatever! Why’d you bother, huh? Wait, how’d you even know where I was?” She gasped and pointed an accusatory finger. “Were you following me?!”

Alien-boy’s wings fluffed up at that. “N–! Well, yes, I was! I-I was trying to apologize properly, a-and then I saw you go into that building the Serpoians were occupying! I wanted to warn you, but I was too late. They’d already taken you.”

“So, what, you just decided to break into a spaceship and rough up a bunch of aliens for somebody you just met?” She still had a lot of questions about that. Namely how he’d done it. He’d looked like a monster in there.

He seemed to deflate. “They were going to kill you. I couldn’t let that happen to… to the first person who ever stood up for me.”

Momo stared at him. That was… kinda sad. That he’d risk his own life to help her over the smallest kindness. Well, barely even that, she had yelled at him, after all. Guilt stirred in her stomach at that thought.

“B-but if I’d known you had such strong spiritual powers,” the boy said, “I wouldn’t have been so worried! You saved yourself, you didn’t need me.”

She laughed humorlessly. “I didn’t even know I had those powers. I’ve never been able to do anything like that before today.”

“Really?” The boy leaned forward, adjusting his glasses. “Fascinating! Perhaps the stress of the situation combined with the Serpoians manipulating your brainwaves granted you access to your chakra!” He reached into his shirt and withdrew some kind of tablet and stylus, and began scribbling notes. “Was that the first life-threatening situation you’ve ever been in?”

“Guess you’re feeling better!” Momo laughed. She got to her feet and held out her hand to the boy. He stared at it like he didn’t know what to do with it. Rolling her eyes, she took his hand and pulled him to his feet. He was the same height as her.

“Thanks for trying to help me. And,” she said, suddenly feeling awkward. “I’m sorry about before. For shouting at you. I was in a bad mood, and I shouldn’t have taken it out on you. So. Yeah.”

“Ah, don’t be!” Alien-boy reached up to tug at his antenna. “I am sure I made a social blunder when I spoke to you. I’ve been studying human behavior, but… I’m an awkward guy.”

Momo’s heart leapt in her chest. She silently told it to pipe down. So what if he said one of Ken Takakura’s lines by coincidence (and so what if he was nice and brave and cute, even with the alien features)?

She plastered a smile on her face. “Uhm! So, I didn’t get your name, before.”

“Oh, right. I am Kentakakura! It’s very nice to meet you.”

Momo gaped at him while the spaceship exploded behind her.

Chapter Text

Kentakakura was having an… odd day.

Maybe not quite the worst day of his life, yet, but it was up there.

And now Miss Momoayase was yelling at him again.

“Liar! No way is that your name!” She looked angry at him. Again.

He didn’t understand what he’d done wrong this time! He’d said the greeting like he’d heard humans do it a hundred times! Maybe he should have bowed? Humans didn’t have antennae to rub together, so…

“Why would I lie? My name is Kentakakura!”

Momoayase fell to the ground, rolling around and screaming, “No way! I don’t wanna hear it!”

Kentakakura yelped and rushed over to her, worried that she’d somehow been injured after all and the effects were only just now surfacing.

He froze, feathers fluffing when Momoayase suddenly pointed a finger in his face.

“New rule!” she said. “You’re never to say your name again.”

“But–”

“Nah!” She waved her finger at him. “Let’s see… You’re an alien, part of all that occult stuff, so… Your new name is Okarun. You say that other name, and I’ll kill you.”

Kentakakura shrank back. “Ok... arun?” He tested it out. Well, if it kept Momoayase from killing him… and he had no doubt she could. “Okarun,” he repeated, with more conviction this time. He had a nickname! Given to him by his first friend! Well, more like forced on him. Still, he couldn’t help smiling a little.

“You look pretty happy about it, Okarun!” Momoayase grinned. Then she sighed, wrapping her arms around herself. “So, what do we do now?”

“Er…?”

“Thanks to those assholes I’ve lost my clothes, my wallet, my phone… It looks like we’re on the outskirts of Kamigoe, so I could just walk home, but… Urgh, if anybody sees me like this, I’d just die!”

Kentakakura made a startled trill. She’d die?! He had noticed she was wearing a lot less than was typical for humans, but was it really that severe? This was an emergency, then!

Quickly, he began stripping off his top garment. Momoayase noticed, and demanded to know what he was doing.

He held out the fabric to her. “Here! So you don’t die! It’s nanoskin.”

“It’s skin?!” she exclaimed in horror.

“No, no! Nanoskin.” He sometimes forgot humans hadn’t even invented things that were so ubiquitous on his home planet. “It will respond to your thoughts. Here, put it on, and picture how you want it to look.”

Cautiously, she got to her feet and took the nanoskin fabric from him. She closed her eyes, wrinkling her nose in concentration, and the fabric began to lengthen, turning a soft pink color.

“Whoa, cool!” She exclaimed, holding up the nanoskin when it was finished—he believed the article of clothing was called a sweatshirt. She pulled it on, the garment falling down below her hips. “It even feels just like the one I have! Hey, thanks a lot, man!”

“You’re welcome… man.” Kentakakura replied, shaping his remaining nanoskin so it covered his chest somewhat (he really hoped she hadn’t noticed how much baby fluff he still had. So embarrassing!).

“No, you’re a man. Or, kid, maybe? Guess aliens could work different that way. How old are you?”

“Uh…” Kentakakura had to do some quick math.

“What, you don’t know how old you are?”

“I know!” He snapped. “Earth years are different! …And I am seventeen.”

“Hey, same! You’re a teen like me!”

“A… teen?” He tilted his head at the new word.

“Yeah, teen. As in, teenager. Not a kid, but not an adult yet.”

“Oh, yes. I am a teen-nager!”

Momoayase made a happy noise–human trills sounded different, but he thought it was called a giggle. She just looked at him, smiling. Kentakakura smiled back, tentatively. At least she didn’t seem mad at him anymore.

“So what’s your deal, anyways, Okarun?” she asked.

“Um… my deal?”

“Yeah! Those Serpoians were here to harvest my organs or whatever, so what about you? You’re not gonna try and steal my organs, are you?”

“Wh–?! No! I-I don’t need anyone’s organs for anything! My species can reproduce perfectly fine!” His wings ruffled in indignation.

“Alright, alright, no need to get all huffy! But what are you on Earth for, then? Are there more of you guys here, somewhere?”

“Oh, uh, no it’s just me. And I’m here to study.” Just me…

“Study what?”

Kentakakura’s antennae perked up. Finally, someone to share his research with! “Spiritual phenomena, of course! The human ability to leave behind remnants of the soul in the physical world after death!”

“So… ghosts?”

He nodded excitedly. “But not just ghosts! The creatures born from spiritual energy–what you call yokai. Even the precious few other species in the universe able to harness spiritual energy have nothing like that. It’s completely unique to Earth, as far as I can tell!” He pulled his data pad out of his back pocket and expanded it to show her his findings (completely forgetting that all his notes were written in Thurellian and thus impossible for her to read).

“An alien who studies ghosts, huh?” Momoayase chuckled.

Kentakakura halted, feeling suddenly self-conscious. “I-is that weird?”

“Nah, not at all! My grandma’s a spirit medium, she deals with ghosts and stuff all the time.”

He was a little unclear on what the word “grandma” meant. Was that a human term for a caretaker?

Before he could ask, Momoayase exclaimed, “Aw, crap! Grandma! I gotta get home or she’s gonna chew me out for being out so late!” She turned away and began speed walking down the road. Away from him.

Kentakakura panicked. His first friend was leaving, and he’d barely gotten to know her at all! He hadn’t even gotten to share the really fascinating parts of his research with her. In a flurry of limbs, he started to go after her, but stumbled into a hole in the road and pitched forward, landing flat on his face.

Momoayase looked back at the undignified squawking sound he made. “Okarun! Are you okay?”

He scrambled to his feet. “I will walk with you! To your grandma!” That was normal, right? Humans walked around with their friends all the time!

Wait. Maybe Momoayase did not think of him as her friend? Had he jumped to conclusions? He had read all sorts of stories about humans becoming friends after surviving a perilous experience together, which they had! But perhaps he was missing something, had skipped some crucial step. Now Momoayase would be mad at him again! Stupid, stupid, stupid-

“Yeah, okay.”

Kentakakura looked up in surprise, letting go of the antenna he’d been tugging on. Smiling in relief, he hurried to follow his friend down the road.

“So you got a spaceship stashed away somewhere, or something?”

Kentakakura bit his lower lip. Their conversation as they walked through Kamigoe City had so far been very pleasant, with Momoayase asking him excited questions about what space was like–which he did not understand. Space was boring and empty. Planets were actually interesting–and he in turn asked her about her experiences with spiritual phenomena.

But this was a subject he did not like to think about.

“No, no spaceship.”

“How’d you get here, then?”

“I was on a–” he paused, trying to think of a good word. “It was like that!” He pointed at a train passing nearby. “A big ship with a lot of people aboard. Public transportation. I was going to a school quite far away from my own planet. But, um, something went wrong during the journey.”

Commotion had woken him from restless sleep. A blaring klaxon and flashing lights. He scrambled out of his cramped sleeping space to find the corridor outside swarming with beings. No one spoke a word of Thurellian, but he got the gist: something was very wrong.

“We all had to leave very quickly.”

He’d only half-stepped out of his quarters before being swept away by the crowd. He tried to fight it at first, go back and get his bags, at least. The only things he had on him were his datapad, which he’d fallen asleep reading, and the clothes on his back. But he soon realized it was either follow the crowd, or be trampled underneath it.

“I was put into a… a much smaller vessel. Very small.”

He had been shoved into the escape pod by a robotic crewmember, trying all the while to ask it what was happening, to ask if he could go back for his things, but the construct either could not understand him, or did not care.

“It left the ship, I think it was supposed to take me somewhere else, but it ended up on this planet, somehow.”

He was hyperventilating. He knew it, but logic could not stop the panic. The pod was small and cramped, even more so than where he’d been sleeping back on the ship, and he had no way to control it–or the faintest idea where to go even if he could. All he could do was cling to the belts that strapped him in and pray that it would be over soon.

It wasn’t. And it got worse.

“It got me to the surface safely, but it’s… broken beyond repair.”

As he was flung to and fro by what he later learned was entry into Earth’s atmosphere, he began to cry. He cried like he hadn’t done since he was very small, not even when he’d left the creche behind for good, the only home he’d ever known.

He screamed and prayed and called out for someone, anyone, to help, to make it stop, and suddenly, it did.

“…And now here I am.”

On an alien world. All alone.

He felt a gentle touch on his arm. Momoayase was looking at him, her brows furrowed.

“So you’re stuck here?” she asked. She sounded so sad.

“It’s not bad!” He scrambled to reassure her. And it wasn’t—after winter had passed, anyways. “I’m learning so much here!” And I’m not alone anymore, he added silently.

He hurriedly changed the subject so Momoayase would stop looking sad at him.

It almost didn’t work, but luckily something else distracted her: the rising sun. His lenses began to darken automatically to protect his sensitive eyes.

“It’s morning already?!” Momoayase shouted in disbelief. “How long were we in that spaceship?” She slumped forward. “Ugh. No way am I getting out of a lecture now. Oh, well, we’re almost there anyways. Come on.”

Kentakakura eagerly followed.

Momoayase’s home was very nice. Kentakakura thought so, anyway.

He had yet to see the dwelling itself, but the surrounding area was just gorgeous. The noisy, smelly vehicles humans liked to ride around in were almost totally absent, and they had passed rows and rows of green growing things on their way here.

When they reached a large stone gate of a design that he had seen many other places on Earth before, they stopped.

“My grandma’s really strict about boys in the house, so be careful,” Momoayase said. “She almost killed my last boyfriend.”

Kentakakura had several questions about that statement–mainly about how he could avoid being killed by this grandma–but they flew from his head the moment he crossed through the gate.

It was like getting an electric shock all over his body, but somehow also cold. The pain lasted less than a second, but made him gasp sharply and left him tingling all over. He also sensed a strong pulse of spiritual power that had emanated from… the gate?

Kentakakura leaned in cautiously to examine the stone gateway. He spotted a strip of paper stuck to one pillar, with neat rows of script and a drawing of a humanoid figure printed on it. More curious than wary now, he touched the paper gingerly. He felt an echo of that same power that had shocked him earlier. Fascinating! He continued to poke at the paper strip, lifting up one corner.

“Okarun!” Momoayase called, startling him. He jumped, and the paper strip came with him, tearing away from the pillar. Oops. “You coming, or what?”

“Oh, y-yes, coming!” He turned to see her step through a door in the main building on the property. Sighing, Kentakakura followed her.

Well, the paper didn’t appear damaged, at least. He’d apologize to Momoayase for messing with it and ask her to help him put it back.

No harm done.

Chapter Text

“Grandma!” Momo called as she stepped into the house. No response. She looked around, calling out a few more times. “Guess she’s out…”

Oh, well. Not like she’d been looking forward to her grandma sighing loudly and complaining that her antics were drying her skin out-Granny’s version of saying she’d been worried. Although it would look worse for her if she was discovered hanging out at the house with a boy. Alone.

Speaking of…

Okarun was still standing in the doorway, staring around with wide eyes. His antennae waved around, and Momo wondered if he was using them to smell the air, like Earth bugs did.

“It looks like my grandma’s not here right now,” she told him. “I’m gonna go upstairs and change, just make yourself at home.”

“Okay,” he replied, examining the maneki-neko doll on the hall table like it was the most fascinating thing in the world. She chuckled and left him to it.

After getting up to her room and changing out of the–what had he called it? Something-skin– things Okarun had leant her and into her own clothes, Momo looked herself over in the mirror. She felt a sudden, slightly hysterical laugh bubble up in her chest.

She’d actually brought an alien home with her. There was an alien in her living room! An alien she’d met after she’d gotten abducted to have her organs harvested and, quite by chance, awakened her psychic powers and crashed a UFO! What even was her life now?

After getting herself under control, Momo went back down the stairs with the nanoskin shirt draped over one arm. She peeked into the living room where she’d left Okarun, but he was nowhere in sight. Where had he gone off to?

“Mo–” She whirled around with a shriek. Okarun, who had appeared behind her from nowhere, leapt backwards in fright, wings flaring and fluff standing on end.

“Dude! Don’t do that!”

“I’m sorry!” He reached up and adjusted his glasses.

Momo sighed. “Nah, it’s alright. You just startled me. Make some noise or something when you move! Here,” she handed him the nanoskin sweatshirt. He took it back gratefully, and the fabric fluidly crawled over his torso, turning back into the black shirt he’d had on before.

So cool, she thought. Shame Okarun used probably the most useful thing ever to dress like a schoolboy. Maybe she could invent some excuse to borrow it again later…

“Thanks for letting me wear it.”

“Of course! I couldn’t let my first friend die!”

Momo laughed at that, then stopped at the earnest expression on his face. “Oh no, I wasn’t really gonna die, I would’ve just been embarrassed is–” Wait. Back up. “‘First’ friend?”

Okarun reached up to tug at an antenna. “You are! My friend–uh. Aren’t we? Friends?”

“Well, yeah!” They’d mopped the floor with a bunch of alien creeps and crashed a UFO together. Plus, he’d walked all the way home with her, and she still had every intention of introducing him to Granny. That made them friends, at least in Momo’s opinion. “But, what did you mean by ‘first’? Don’t you have friends back where you come from?”

Okarun seemed to curl in on himself at that. His antennae drooped down past his ears. “...No. I don’t. Even my other creche-mates, they… kind of just ignored me, when they weren’t tormenting me for fun. That’s why I was going to school so far away. I figured, if no one at home would be friends with me, maybe an alien would? That’s why I was so desperate to talk to you yesterday. No one’s ever stood up for me the way you did.”

Momo stared at him. She’d only just met the guy, but she already knew he was nice and brave and really smart–he’d patiently answered her every question while they walked home. What the hell was wrong with his people, if they couldn’t see that?!

She was opening her mouth to tell him so when the doorbell rang.

A chill ran up Momo’s spine. She’d never heard that chime before.

“Um, what is–” Okarun began, but Momo shushed him.

“I think we might be in trouble,” she whispered. “My grandma told me once that we have two door chimes. One’s for humans, and the other is for evil spirits.” Crouching low, she tried to get a peek at the door. A shadow loomed on the other side.

Okarun made a nervous chitter from where he was crouched beside her. “It looks huge!”

“I don’t get it,” Momo whispered. “There’s supposed to be a barrier against malicious spirits around the property. Grandma puts a new talisman on the torii gate every week! How did this one get past it?”

“Um. Does the talisman look like this?” He held up a strip of white paper. The same kind of paper that had been stuck on the torii gate every day since before Momo could remember.

“Why the hell do you have that?!” she demanded, grabbing the front of his shirt.

He squawked. “I-it was an accident! It shocked me when I walked past it, and I was just trying to see–”

“You dumbass! Haven’t you ever heard of ‘look but don’t touch’?!” She shook him around for good measure.

“I was going to put it back!”

Momo groaned and released him. “Whatever! Let’s hurry and put it up on the gate. Maybe it’ll get rid of the spirit. C’mon, we’ll go out the back door.”

She picked her shoes up from the entrance hall, then led him through to the other side of the house. She gingerly turned the knob on the back door and eased it open, trying to avoid alerting any evil spirits that might be lurking around to their presence. She stuck her head outside.

“What the hell?” It was dark. Very dark. Like middle of the night on a new moon dark. But it was only a few hours past sunrise!

Momo exited the house fully, Okarun close behind. A thick black fog swirled around their ankles.

“What is going on?” Momo’s chest was feeling sort of tight, like just breathing was taking more effort than normal. Must be the evil spirit doing this, she thought. The sooner they replaced the talisman, the better.

They made their way cautiously around the side of the house. Momo peeked around to get a view of the front door, but there was nothing there. The torii gate was just barely in sight, though.

“C’mon.” With Okarun at her heels, she rushed over towards it, talisman in hand. She stopped dead once the gate came fully into view.

It was embedded in a stone wall.

Momo whipped around, but now she could see through the fog that the walls enclosed the entire property in a massive box.

They were trapped.

“Shit,” Momo hissed. Would the talisman even work with the torii like that? She looked down at the strip of paper in her hand and noticed some strange dark blotches. What the…?

She wiped at one with her thumb, which came away wet. Is this…?

Momo’s hand flew to her face. Her nose was bleeding!

“Momoayase!” Okarun was crouched on the ground, hands covering his face. Streams of red escaped between his fingers. “I’m bleeding!”

“Shit!” Momo knelt down beside him, covering her face with one hand. “It must be all this black fog doing this. I need to put the talisman up, or we’re screwed!”

As she rose, a sudden crash shook the ground. Momo looked up, gaping.

A massive figure had landed between them and the torii gate. The giant was humanoid, but had strange lines running up and down its body, as well as an oddly shaped hood around its head.

“I have found you,” it boomed. Slowly, it raised one massive fist. “You are bad humans. You did not keep your promise. Give me your banana!”

The fist came down, and Momo reacted on instinct, shoving Okarun away from her. She lost her hold on the talisman, but at least she kept them from being pounded into a pulp!

As the giant’s fist withdrew, Momo and Okarun made eye contact across from the crater it had left in the ground. Then, like a well-oiled machine, they turned in unison and ran away screaming.

The giant swung a massive arm in their direction. It just barely missed them, but the wind generated in its wake knocked them both off their feet and they slammed hard into the wall of the house. Momo hoped the crack she heard was the window and not her spine.

No time to stop! The giant tried to swat them again, and she pulled Okarun along with her as they fled. She winced as she heard wood and glass shatter from the blow.

“Give me your banana!” the giant roared, lifting one leg and bringing it down hard, generating a shockwave. They barely dodged it, sprinting behind the house.

“What kind of evil spirit is that?!” Momo panted. “Wait. Banana?” Hadn’t those Serpoians been demanding her “banana” too?

“It’s not!” Okarun said, trying to catch his breath. “It’s an alien!”

“Huh?!”

“W-well, I don’t know what they call themselves,” he said. “But they’ve had contact with humans before. You call them ‘Flatwoods Monsters’. There’s no mistaking that hood!”

“Then how come it set off the doorbell for evil spirits?” Momo asked, peeking around the side of the house. The “Flatwoods Monster” seemed to have lost track of them. It kept clapping and slamming its feet down in random directions. Something about its movements was almost familiar…

“It must be able to manipulate spiritual energy! The doorbell reacted to it like an evil spirit because their auras have something in common! Maybe.”

“‘Maybe?’”

“Well, it’s only a theory! But if I’m right, then putting the talisman back on the gate will get rid of the Flatwoods Monster the same as if it were a spirit.”

As Momo watched, the giant opened its strange, hinged mouth, spewing more black smoke.

“Well, if we don’t do something about it soon, that fog will kill us.” Her head was already starting to feel heavy, and her breaths came in gasps. She had the feeling trying to use her powers would be harder as well. “We need to get the talisman back.”

The only problem with that was the Flatwoods Monster between them and the torii gate.

“I can try and fight it,” Okarun said, a determined look on his face. “If I distract it, you can get the talisman and put it back on the gate.”

“You think you can do that?”

“If I change shape, I should be fast enough to evade it.”

Momo remembered how monstrous he’d looked while aboard the Serpoian ship. It was kind of hard to concede that image with the twiggy boy in front of her now. But it wasn’t like she had a better plan. “Ok, if you’re sure.”

Okarun nodded, and closed his eyes. His limbs began to creak and crack, lengthening.

“Give them to me!” the Flatwoods Monster roared. They were out of time.

“Here it comes! Can’t you go any faster?!”

“I don’t do this very often!” Okarun snapped. The black mandibles came out and encircled his mouth. “It takes practice to do it fast!”

The Flatwoods Monster lifted one leg and slammed it down, generating a shockwave that roiled towards them. Momo tried to brace her ki into a shield, but something grabbed her around the waist and lifted her into the air.

She gaped at the demolished house in front of her while she flew, then was deposited gently on her feet.

Okarun towered over her, red eyes glowing behind his glasses. His wings flared out behind him, stirring the air. He looked kinda badass in this form, actually.

He looked at her and adjusted his glasses. “You okay?” Even his voice had gotten deeper.

Momo managed to nod. Okarun nodded back, then crouched low and darted towards the Flatwoods Monster.

Shit, he’s fast! She was starting to feel like they could actually pull this off!

While Okarun dodged and weaved around the giant in the air, Momo took off running to where she’d last had the talisman.

The sound of an impact and a screech from behind made her look around. The Flatwoods Monster was staring down at the remains of the storage shed. It slowly raised one leg.

Okarun! It was going to squish him!

Momo reached out with her power. There! A little red flame under the rubble. She grabbed it with her ki and yanked. Okarun came sailing out from under the debris, and just in time! He skidded to a halt beside her.

“Okarun!” Momo rushed to his side. “You okay?!”

He groaned, and the mandibles relaxed, revealing his normal mouth. Momo caught sight of fangs in his mouth before he coughed up blood.

“I can’t do this,” he groaned. “That thing’s slower than me, but way stronger.”

“I was almost at the torii gate,” said Momo. “Just give it another shot!”

“I don’t know how much longer I can keep this up! It might kill me before you get the talisman.”

Momo groaned. He was right. Swinging at it blindly was not working. They needed a plan before–

She stopped, staring at the way the Flatwoods Monster was crouching with its hands cupped in front of it.

“Is that a… sumo pose?”

“What?”

Momo’s mind raced. “I have an idea. If we can get its hand to touch the ground, we might be able to beat it. Go for its leg this time, and I’ll use my power to trip the bastard!”

“Alright,” said Okarun, getting to his feet. “I have enough strength left for that.”

They charged it together. When the giant slammed its foot down again, Okarun yanked Momo out of the shockwave’s path, then flapped his wings hard to take off and plow straight through the Flatwoods’ knee. It groaned, teetering, and Momo grabbed onto it with her power.

“Take this, ya lard-ass!” She yanked with all her might, and the giant’s hand slammed to the ground, evaporating into a white light.

“All right!”

“You’re a genius, Momoayase!” Okarun hooted.

But their victory was short-lived. Two legs sprouted from the Flatwoods’ back, saving it from face-planting.

“No! You’re kidding!” Momo turned to run when the giant’s eyes fell on her, but it lashed out with a fist. She wasn’t going to make it!

“MOMO!”

A black blur dove in front of her right before the alien slammed her into the stone wall. All the air was knocked from her lungs, and for a panicked second, she couldn’t inhale.

But then her lungs remembered how to expand, and she gasped. Fucking ow. She was sitting in a crater in the wall, right underneath the torii gate, with–

“Okarun!” He’d flown in front of her and taken the brunt of the blow. Now he hung limp in her arms. “You cheating scumbag!” she snarled at the Flatwoods Monster.

That was the last mistake it would ever make. Momo thrust out her hand, locking onto the talisman–it was exactly where they’d left it, in the crater now right in front of her. The slip flew through the air, and the second it made contact with the torii gate, the Flatwoods Monster burst into white flames.

It roared as it burned, white light blinding Momo. She shut her eyes and squeezed Okarun tight.

Then everything went silent.

Momo cautiously opened one eye. The sunlight was back. The Flatwoods Monster was nowhere in sight, and–

And her house was completely unharmed! All the damage the rampaging giant caused had evaporated like a bad dream.

“We did it! Everything’s back to normal!” She shook Okarun slightly in her excitement.

“Oh, yay,” he croaked. When she let him go, he began to shrink back into his normal form. Blood was crusted around his nose and the corners of his mouth, but he seemed okay otherwise.

“Shit,” Momo groaned. “For a second there, I thought we were goners!” She made a move to stand up, but her leg buckled underneath her. Her head swam, and blackness edged the corners of her vision.

“Crap,” she muttered as she passed out.

“Momoayase!”

Kentakakura lunged for her as she fell. He was far past his limits, though, and she hit the ground before he reached her. Panicking, he took her face in his hands. His antennae could feel the air movement from the shallow breaths she was taking.

He laid his head against her chest, listening to her heartbeat. Steady and strong. He sighed in relief. Still alive.

Overuse of spiritual power could kill, in extreme cases.

Kentakakura fretted over what to do. Should he try to carry her back to her house? Maybe he should go look for another human for help?

His antennae perked up a moment before an explosion of spiritual energy sent him flying.

He was thrown into the stream, coughing and spluttering. He dragged himself upright to see a tall figure with huge flapping wings standing in the road. It brandished a weapon, saying something he couldn’t make out over the ringing in his ears. But one thing was clear: they were being attacked.

And this being was between him and Momoayase.

Kentakakura bared his fangs and flared his wings in a defensive display. He began to shift, ignoring how his muscles screamed in protest. He would not let this person hurt his friend!

He finished his change and straightened to his full height, then promptly vomited blood all over the ground. Oh no.

His vision swam as he collapsed.

“Don’t hurt… Momo…” he ground out before darkness dragged him under.

Chapter Text

Momo sat up with a gasp. Her heart hammered in her ears, fear still snaring her throat. She threaded her fingers through her hair, trying to steady her breathing.

I’m home, I’m safe, it was just a dream.

She wasn’t on that spaceship anymore, they’d made it out, they were fine–

Momo froze. Then she leapt out of bed.

“Okarun!” she called as she ran down the stairs.

Her grandmother lounged in the living room watching television. The sight was so ordinary, Momo almost wondered if the whole thing had been a dream after all. She shook away that thought.

“Have you been home this whole time?!” she demanded.

“Pipe down,” Granny drawled, “I’m trying to watch Bakatono, here.”

“I’ve got more important things to talk about!”

Granny peered over her shoulder, raising an eyebrow. “Things like that yokai you brought home?”

“Yokai?” What could she–? “Wait, did he look like a guy with moth wings? Wearing glasses? What did you do to him?!”

“What do you care?” Granny replied. “Thought all that stuff was just a bunch of make-believe. I’m a fake, remember?”

Anger flared in Momo’s chest. “How long are you going to hold that against me?” she demanded. “Can’t you just give me a straight answer for once?!”

“Here’s one: don’t believe in that stuff. I’m a fake medium, that’s all there is to it.”

Momo clenched her fists, then relaxed them. Taking a big breath through her nose, she knelt on the ground.

“Grandma,” she said. “I’m sorry. I was wrong, and I admit it. Now please, what happened to the boy with the glasses?”

Her granny stared at her for a long moment before saying, “Go to the main shrine.”

“You old bag!” Momo bellowed, leaping to her feet and running out the door. “If you’ve hurt Okarun, I’ll never forgive you!”

All he wanted was a friend, she thought as she ran to the shrine, emotion snaring her throat. And all I’ve done is put him in danger. It’s my fault he got hurt. I’m sorry Okarun!

She threw open the door to the shrine, and there he was on the floor, sound asleep.

He was sprawled out on top of a futon on his belly, wings spread out around him. Instead of snoring, he was making a low hooting sound on each exhale. His antennae twitched slightly every so often. Someone had considerately placed his glasses next to the futon within his reach.

Momo sagged against the door frame in relief. She raked a hand through her hair.

“If you were awake, I’d be kicking your ass for making me worry,” she informed him matter-of-factly. What a pain…

“So is running with monsters a new thing, or were you always doing that,” came a voice from behind her. Momo jumped.

“Gah! Don’t scare me like that,” she hissed at her grandma, trying to keep her voice down. She closed the shrine door as quietly as she could. “And for your information, he’s an alien, not a monster.”

“Aliens aren’t real,” said Granny dismissively. “Looks like a shinchū, to me.” She paused. “A baby shinchū.”

Momo sighed. She couldn’t really blame her grandmother for being skeptical. Hell, before she’d gotten abducted, she hadn’t believed in aliens either!

“Not the worst yokai you could’ve fallen in with, though,” Granny continued. “They eat demons and evil spirits that spread disease, so he might be useful to have around. Better than that stupid tuna you brought home before, anyways.”

Momo’s cheeks went scalding hot. “It’s not like that! Okarun’s just a friend!”

“‘Okarun’?” Granny raised an eyebrow. “That’s his name?”

“Yup,” Momo said, deliberately not thinking about that other name he’d said. She needed to change the subject, fast. “Why’d you put him out in the shrine, anyways?”

“He was in pretty rough shape when I found him,” Granny said, taking a drag on her cigarette. “The spiritual energy here is strongest at that shrine. It helped him heal faster.”

Huh. Now that she thought about it, Momo was feeling pretty great for someone who’d been punched into a stone wall by a gigantic alien just a few hours ago. Had the spiritual energy healed her, as well?

“Something happen you wanna tell me about?”

Momo grimaced. She gave her grandma a… very abbreviated version of the past day’s events. “--And now I’ve got psychic powers,” she finished.

Granny merely hummed, not looking surprised at all. “Sounds like the kid was a big help to you. S’pose I should make him dinner, as an apology.”

At the mention of food, Momo’s stomach took the opportunity to remind her of just how long it had been since she’d eaten. “Wait. ‘Apology’? Did you do something to him?!”

“I saw a strange yokai hunched over my unconscious granddaughter. What was I supposed to think?” She turned and began walking back towards the house. “See if you can wake him up. Dinner will be soon.”

Oh, she definitely whacked him with her bat, Momo thought, watching her go. Then she sighed heavily and turned back to the shrine doors. Pulling them open, she found Okarun exactly how she’d left him. She knelt beside him and poked his shoulder.

“Okarun? Time to wake up.” She shook him gently.

“Weurgh?” he mumbled, cracking open one red eye. He sat up and yawned, exposing many sharp teeth. “Momoayase?” he asked, rubbing at his face. Then he stiffened, fluff standing on end. “Ack! Momoayase, I think we’re in danger, I was attacked–!”

“It’s alright, we’re fine!” she assured him. “That was my grandma. She misunderstood the situation, but I explained everything to her, so we’re all good!”

“We’re… all good?”

“Yep. C’mon, she wants to apologize. She’s also making dinner.” Sure he would be sufficiently tempted with the promise of food, Momo stood up and walked down the shrine steps. She got a few feet away before she noticed he wasn’t following.

“Okarun?”

He had stood up and wrapped his wings around himself like a blanket, but remained inside the shrine.

“I’m sorry,” he said, addressing his feet.

“Huh?” What the hell was he apologizing for this time?

“I put you in danger.” He still didn’t look up at her. “That Flatwoods Monster hurt you because of me. A-and I was useless trying to fight it. Just like on the Serpoians’ ship! I’ve brought you nothing but trouble. I’ll apologize to your grandma, then I’ll leave you alone. You won’t ever have to see me again.” He curled in on himself, and Momo heard him mutter, “I should’ve known better…”

“Hey.” Momo walked back up the steps towards him, but he still refused to look her in the eye. “Don’t say stuff like that. I don’t want you to leave me alone. Who am I gonna talk to about alien stuff, huh? And didn’t you say you didn’t have any other friends?”

Okarun hunched further into himself, not responding.

“Say something,” Momo prompted, giving him a couple of pokes.

“...Idiot.”

“The fuck did you say?!” Momo bellowed, seizing the front of his shirt.

Okarun squawked but did not back down. “I don’t want you to be friends with me out of pity!”

“I don’t pity you, jackass!” She shook him around for emphasis. “I wanna be friends because I like talking to you!”

His eyes widened. “Ah… You do?”

“Yeah!” She released him with a sigh. “So what if you made a dumb mistake? So did I, walking into that hospital. And you weren’t useless.” Honestly, she might not have made it out of either alien encounter if he hadn’t been there. But she didn’t want to think about that possibility too hard.

“Look. Friends forgive each other for doing dumb stuff. And we are friends.” She glared at him until he nodded. She smiled and bumped her shoulder against his. “Now let’s go! My granny wants to meet you properly. She’s an amazing cook, too.”

Linking their arms, she led him out of the shrine, pretending not to notice how he wiped his eyes.

Kentakakura could smell something delicious coming from the house. This wasn’t the longest he’d ever gone without eating, he knew, but the gaping hole that was his stomach still complained like it was.

Momoayase led him into the main room of the house, where a low table now sat.

Oh! This was his chance to observe human dining practices! Up close! That was almost as exciting as eating.

Kentakakura startled as a figure stepped into the room. It was the person who had attacked him before–apparently Momoayase’s “grandma”. The huge wings from earlier were gone (maybe exhaustion had been making him hallucinate?), but she was no less intimidating now. He resisted the urge to puff up and make himself look bigger.

The grandma merely stared at him in silence. Kentakakura wondered if he was meant to say something. He fidgeted anxiously with the hem of his shirt.

“My grandma wanted to say sorry for attacking you before,” Momoayase said finally, breaking the silence. He frowned. She didn’t look sorry (but human expressions were so hard to interpret without antennae).

The grandma hummed a neutral tone. “Dinner’s ready. Have a seat, shinchū.”

Shinchū? He didn’t know that word, but he sat down next to Momoayase at the low table (it seemed like they were all going to eat together? Huh).

“I keep telling you, he’s an alien. From outer space!” she said.

“Lepidoterra,” he corrected.

“Huh?”

“My planet. No one’s from outer space.”

“Yeah, well, my granny thinks you’re a yokai.”

Really? Kentakakura didn’t think his aura was strong enough to be mistaken for even the smallest yokai he’d seen, never mind the bigger, sapient kind. Maybe he needed to gather more data. Unfortunately, every yokai and spirit he’d stumbled upon since coming to Earth had either been very shy or very aggressive, which made actually studying them… challenging.

Maybe Momoayase would be willing to help him out with that…

Kentakakura was startled out of his thoughts by the grandma setting down plates full of food that smelled like sheer paradise. His stomach growled, and he tried not to drool.

“Eat up, kid,” said the grandma. “You look like a strong wind would knock you over.”

Needing no further encouragement, he reached for the nearest plate. It was full of white balls made of a sticky grain–rice, he remembered. Too hungry to worry about manners, he ate most of the ball in one bite, delighted to find a salty pink meat inside.

It was the best thing he’d ever eaten.

“Here, try some of these,” said Momoayase, after he’d devoured two more of the rice balls. She passed a different plate to him, in between bites of her own food.

“You’ve got a healthy appetite,” the grandma said. “That’s good. Have as much as you want.”

After he’d sampled something off of every plate, finally easing the gnawing ache in his stomach, Kentakakura finally had brain power enough to spare on something other than food. Namely, to consider the human seated across from him.

The grandma didn’t look like an elder, and there were no signs that any other humans lived in this house. Maybe she wasn’t Momoayase’s caretaker after all?

She’d mentioned her grandma being something called a “spirit medium”, back when they’d been walking to her home after the Serpoian ship had crashed. Maybe “grandma” was like “master”, and Momoayase was her apprentice? That would make sense…

But there was a similarity between the two that spoke of a longtime familiarity. They shared habits and speech patterns, and even Kentakakura could see their physical resemblance. Genetic relatives, maybe?

Oh, well. It was something to ask Momoayase about later. He was feeling sleepy and more full than he had in… in a long time.

Momoayase got up and began clearing dishes from the table. He stood to join her–this was a ritual he recognized, at least–but the grandma waved a hand at him. “Sit down, shinchū.”

Kentakakura obeyed. She leaned back and removed a slim cylinder from a small box. She used another tiny object to light it, and breathed in deeply. When she exhaled, he could smell a chemical tang in the smoke, the same scent that blanketed most of the house.

They sat like that in silence for a while, until Momoayase had taken all the dishes into the other room, and Kentakakura could hear water running.

“Momo told me how you helped her out earlier,” the grandma said finally. “I’m grateful. My grandkid’s been nothing but trouble lately.”

“O-oh, well I didn’t do much. She ended up saving me, really,” said Kentakakura, tugging an antenna.

She waved a hand. “Decent of you to step up, anyhow. Now then. What’s a shinchū like you doing hanging around here among humans?”

“I’m studying humans and spiritual phenomena.”

The grandma raised one eyebrow. “What for?”

He paused. What for? What a strange question. “Because I don’t know anything about it, and I want to. I like to learn.”

She seemed to consider that, exhaling more smoke. Tentatively, he said, “Momoayase told me you are a spirit medium.”

“Sure am.”

“Could… could you tell me about your work?” When she said nothing, he hurried on. “I tried doing my own research, but what I’ve found is really vague and contradictory, and it would be much better to learn from an expert!”

“Butter me up, why don’t you?” Kentakakura did not understand that sentence, so he said nothing. The grandma gave him a once-over. “Where are you staying, kid?”

His antennae drooped. “Um. I had a place, but… I had to leave.” Strange humans had started hanging around the abandoned building he’d been sleeping in, so he’d left it rather than risk discovery. He’d been trying to find somewhere else to hole up in when Momoayase had found him.

She stared at him for a while, expressionless. He laced his fingers together to keep from pulling on an antenna under her scrutiny.

“I see. Well, then,” said the grandma. Momoayase came back into the room, drying her hands on a towel.

“You’re not giving him a hard time, are you grandma?” she asked.

“I’m raking him over the coals,” she drawled. “But if you’re done in the kitchen, you can help Four-Eyes here clean out the guest room.”

Four-Eyes? Was that him? But he had two eyes? Or maybe that was in reference to the eyespots on his wings…

“Oh cool, you’re staying the night?” Momoayase asked him pleasantly.

“He’s staying for a while.”

“What?!” Kentakakura gaped at the grandma, but she wasn’t even looking at him anymore. Momoayase looked surprised, but not nearly as much as he did.

“Oh, and Momo, you’ll need to go shopping with him tomorrow. Kid needs school supplies, and you need a new uniform, anyways.”

“You’re making him go to school?!” Momoayase demanded, at the same time Kentakakura said, “I get to go to school?!”

But he shook himself. “Wait, but I couldn’t! I’ve been nothing but a bother to you, I–”

“You said you wanted to learn about humans too, didn’t you?” she interrupted. “What better place to do it than where humans go to learn? And I guess I can teach you a bit about spirit stuff, when I’m not too busy.”

Kentakakura was floored. He could only stare at her. What was he supposed to say? “Thank you” felt too… simple. Too small.

“I promise,” he said, bowing his head, “to learn all you have to teach me, master.” It was a slightly clumsy translation of an apprentice’s acceptance in Thurellian, but it was all he could come up with at the moment.

She scoffed. “Just ‘Seiko’ is fine, kid.”

“Hey, cool,” said Momoayase, nudging him. “We get to be roomies!”

“You’ll leave doors open when you’re in a room together, I’ll have no funny business in my house!”

“Grandma!” Momoayase’s cheeks went red. She stormed out of the room in a huff. Kentakakura rose to follow her. He did not know what “funny business” meant, but he made a mental note about the open door rule.

“Oh, and kid,” Seiko said. “What’s your name? Your actual name, I mean. I’ll need it for formwork, or whatever.”

“U-um, it’s…” he glanced over his shoulder to make sure Momoayase was out of earshot. “Kentakakura.”

She stared at him in silence for ten whole seconds before bursting into laughter.

When she finally calmed down, he asked, “I-is my name… bad?” Did it mean something vulgar in their language? How embarrassing!

Seiko wiped a tear from her eye. “Nah, kid, your name’s just fine.”

“But Momoayase said–”

“That’s just Momo being Momo. Don’t worry about it.”

“Hey, what’s so funny?” Momoayase demanded, poking her head back into the room. Seiko snickered. “Whatever. Hey, Okarun, come help me with this, huh?”

“Coming!” He hurried to follow her up to the guest room. His room.

In his new home.

Chapter Text

“--moayase?”

Something was poking her in the arm. Momo swatted at it.

“Momoayase?” Now it was shaking her shoulder. She reluctantly cracked open an eye, prepared to tell off whoever-it-was and go back to sleep, only to be met with a dark, looming figure with red eyes–oh, it was just Okarun.

“Dude, what?!” she grumbled when her heart rate settled. She was pleased he was staying with them, but he might actually scare the life out of her at this rate. “Haven’t you ever heard of knocking?”

“I did knock! You didn’t answer.” When she rolled over and yanked the covers over her head, he continued, “Seiko said to come downstairs for breakfast.”

“Be there in a minute…” Her eyes were already drifting closed. Then, something grabbed her by the ankles and yanked her right out of bed!

She squawked in outrage, limbs flailing. She ripped away her cocoon of blankets in time to see the backside of Okarun as he fled, the bastard!

“Come back here, you punk!” she bellowed, tearing after him. By the time she got down the stairs, however, he was already sitting at the table with a plate full of food in front of him.

Granny stepped in front of her before she could tackle him. Traitor.

“Good morning, sleeping beauty,” she said. “Gotta say, I’m impressed. That took what, five minutes? Usually takes me three times as long to get her up in the morning. Good job, Four-Eyes.”

“So you put him up to it,” Momo accused.

“I may have said breakfast wouldn’t be served until you were awake, and implied it might take some creativity to get you upright before noon. Besides, I didn’t let you bunk off school so you could lay around, you two have got things to do. Now, go sit, your food’s getting cold.”

Momo gave Okarun the stink eye as she sat down. He just blinked innocently at her, the little shit. Whatever. She’d have her revenge.

Breakfast was really good, though.

Once they were finished and the dishes were clean–with Okarun helping this time. He ended up needing only minimal instruction. Guess dishes still needed doing, even in space–Granny gave Momo a list and her card.

“I expect receipts back,” she said. She eyed Okarun. “I’m assuming you know how to pass for human.”

He nodded, and as they watched, manipulated his nanoskin clothes so he could fold up his wings and tuck them away. He made shoes to cover up his weird bird feet, and tucked his antennae down into his hair.

He looked exactly how he had when Momo had first seen him–a totally normal teenage boy, albeit one with no fashion sense. She would have to fix that.

The only remarkable things about his appearance now were his fingernails–completely black, and not glossy like they would be if he were wearing nail polish, so she assumed they grew that way–and his sunglasses. That last one might be a problem once he got to school.

“I have to wear them, though,” he said when she mentioned it. “Earth is so bright, and my eyes are sensitive.”

“I’ll write him a doctor’s note,” Granny said. “Just say you’ve got a medical condition, if anyone asks.”

With that, they were shooed out the door.

Okarun hummed to himself as they walked down the road. There was no particular melody that Momo could recognize, and he’d been doing it on and off all morning, so she assumed he was just happy.

Kinda weird to be so excited for school of all things, she thought, but he seems like the nerdy type.

“So, what’s school like in space?” she asked.

“I don’t know, I’ve never been.”

“What?” She gaped at him. “For real?” The excitement made more sense now.

“For real,” he said, repeating the phrase carefully.

“So you got like, homeschooled, or something?”

“Home-schooled,” he said, considering the word. “Yeah, I did. Everyone does, until we’re old enough to leave the creche.”

“Huh.” She paused, then asked, “What’s a creche?”

“Oh, it’s uh…” he considered his words. “The group of children a household raises, that’s a creche. Mine was pretty big, there were eleven others besides me.”

Momo gawked at him. “You’ve got eleven siblings?!”

“Creche-mates,” he corrected. “‘Sibling’ is… a little strong for what they were to me.”

“What do you mean?”

Okarun looked away, rubbing the back of his neck. “W-well, I just… We never really… close. None of them ever really liked me, I guess. I was the smallest, so I got picked on the most. I ended up avoiding them most of the time. Went off by myself to read, or something…”

Momo was floored. When she was younger, she’d longed for a brother or sister. Someone to play with all the time, who’d always be there for her. Someone who understood her. And here was Okarun, with eleven whole siblings, and he’d never had any of that.

It was… pretty shitty.

“Your parents never did anything to stop them picking on you?”

He made a quizzical sound. “What do they have to do with anything?”

She stared at him. “Your parents? Everything, don’t they? I mean, if they saw you getting bullied–”

Okarun actually laughed. Like she’d made a joke, or something. “Oh! No, no, we don’t, uh. My parents didn’t raise us. Virbilaetians don’t bring up their own children.”

“...Huh?”

“A household is made up of elders. When a Virbilaetian has a child, they bring them to a household that has room, and leave them there to be cared for.”

“Why?” Having a baby but not raising it? Momo just could not wrap her head around it. “Don’t they… didn’t they want you?”

“It’s not like that,” he said, running a hand through his hair. “Sorry, I’m… I’m not using the right words, I think. I’m still learning.” He took a moment to gather his thoughts.

“Our parents–our genetic relatives–don’t bring us up, but it’s not because they don’t care about us, or anything like that. See, we have a lot of natural predators on Lepidoterra, especially younglings who can’t fly yet. It’s much safer for us to be taken care of by elders, because they’re way more experienced. They know how to survive. Plus, young adults typically move around a lot, and elders in a household are settled down already. A caulder trying to take care of themselves plus younglings would be in twice as much danger.”

“‘Caulder’?”

“That’s a… it’s the people you live with. Friends or creche-mates or partners. People you love, and have a connection with. Your family.”

Momo tried to absorb all of that. It was funny, despite the wings and antennae and everything, it was easy to forget that Okarun wasn’t human. She supposed it was kinda weird of her to assume that people from a completely different planet did things the same way that humans did. Hell, even humans from different places did different things.

“Is it really so dangerous on your planet?” She was picturing a dark, humid jungle full of like, giant frogs or something, poised to leap out and devour unsuspecting moth-people.

“Well, not so much anymore,” he admitted. “Especially not where I grew up. We have the technology to keep the things that eat younglings away from our homes. And the only real danger to adults is extinct now.” He tugged on an antenna. “Sorry, I’m not explaining things well.”

“Nah, you are. It’s really interesting, actually! It’s just… super different from how most humans do things.” In fact, she still had more questions about it. “So do you like… talk to your birth parents at all?”

“Oh sure, they visited sometimes. U-um, what about you? What are your parents like?” The sudden deflection did not go unnoticed, but he had answered all her questions so far, so Momo obliged. Even if this was a sad subject.

“Actually, I don’t remember them very well. They both died when I was young.”

“I-I’m so sorry,” Okarun said, looking actually devastated.

She bumped her shoulder against his. “C’mon, don’t get all sad and mopey on me now! Anyway, Granny raised me all on her own. So I guess we were both brought up by old biddies, huh?”

“All by herself?!” he exclaimed. “That must have been hard.”

“Hey, what’s that supposed to mean?” She bumped him playfully again, laughing.

“N-no, not because of you, or anything! I just mean, it’s a lot, raising even one youngling, and without a household to share the work…”

By this point they’d walked far enough into Kamigoe proper that they were starting to pass other people quite often. Okarun got noticeably quieter, slouching more than he had been before, like he was trying to make himself smaller.

Momo nudged him. “They don’t care what we’re saying,” she assured him. “They’ll probably assume we’re talking about some RPG or something, if they overhear.”

“Arrpeegee?”

“It’s–oh, it’s not important.” Momo dug around in her pocket for the list Granny had given her. It was fairly lengthy. “C’mon, this way.”

Shopping was not typically a chore Momo relished, but she couldn’t help smiling at Okarun’s fascinated reactions to everything he saw. She felt like a tour guide, answering his questions, even pointing out some notable landmarks that she walked past every day without so much as a second thought. It was… nice, to get this view of her home from his excited eyes.

“I can’t believe you write on this stuff all the time,” Okarun said while they were at the school supply store. He held up the lined notebook he’d been flipping through. “Digital files are so much better than… tree pulp sheets.”

Momo looked up from her perusal of the backpacks (getting the right style for him was vital, as she’d explained, and he’d gladly surrendered to her superior knowledge. She was trying to decide between gray, the safe option, or the more daring red).

“You’d have to go to a fancier school than mine for that,” she said.

Later, when they were in the uniform section–which he’d had all sorts of questions about–she got him to take some reference pictures of the boy’s uniform with his tablet-thing. What he was wearing at the moment only needed a few minor adjustments to pass.

Then they spent nearly a whole hour picking out writing utensils. This was mostly Okarun picking up pens and making little doodles on the sample paper, delighted at all the different colors. Momo admired his drawings–he was quite the artist.

“Tree pulp sheets aren’t so bad, huh?”

“No, I guess not,” he admitted.

When midday rolled around, they stopped in a corner store she knew for lunch. She’d thrown in some onigiri to have along with their meals–not quite as good as the ones Granny made, but he’d seemed to really like the salmon ones last night–and after checking out, she spotted Okarun reading a magazine by the wall. She didn’t immediately recognize it, but the blurry pictures of UFOs on the cover gave her an idea of the contents.

“You actually read those?” She couldn’t help laughing–a real-life alien reading kooky occult magazines!

He looked up, shrugging. “Most of it is wrong, but some of the theories are surprisingly insightful! And, it’s nice to know what humans are saying about us.”

Momo hummed thoughtfully. Maybe she’d check them out herself, if he liked them. Maybe.

They took their food outside and sat on a low wall to eat. Okarun practically inhaled his–she was right, he’d been delighted at the onigiri–and just sat back to watch the people walking by. He’d started quietly humming again.

Definitely a happy noise, Momo thought as she finished her food.

After their last stop–groceries for dinner that night–they lugged their haul home with some difficulty. Okarun was definitely flagging hard. He yawned hugely as they walked under the torii gate.

“All tuckered out?” Momo asked.

“Out of… what?”

“It means you’re tired.”

“Oh. Yeah, I’m not normally awake during the day.”

That made sense, considering what he’d said about his eyes being sensitive. So what did he do before this? Not like Kamigoe City had much of a nightlife.

“Well, go take a nap, then,” she said. “I can put the stuff away.”

“Really? Thank you!” He drifted up the stairs to his room.

Granny watched him go, then eyed Momo. “That was awfully nice of you.”

“Don’t sound all suspicious! I’m just trying to help the guy out.” Then she turned around so Granny wouldn’t see her evil smirk.

Kentakakura woke with a screech of alarm as his body hit the floor. He flailed wildly, trying to locate the danger, and became aware of a sound other than his frantic heartbeat.

Momoayase was laughing at him. “And that’s for this morning!”

He sat up with a huff. She’d yanked him out of bed the same way he’d done to her. Well, guess I did have it coming, he thought.

Momoayase stopped laughing and helped him to his feet. Then she tugged at the hem of his shirt. “Is this what you wore out today? You’ll make your sheets dirty that way.”

“Nanoskin cleans and repairs itself,” he said, smoothing out the wrinkles with a single brush of his hand.

“Still. We ought to have gotten you some pajamas or something, while we were out. Oh, and dinner’s almost ready, by the way.”

Humans are strangely obsessed with clothes, Kentakakura thought as he followed her down the stairs. Maybe because of how little hair they have?

It made sense that a species with so little to insulate themselves with would always be cold. And Earth temperatures did fluctuate a lot more than on Lepidoterra. But Momoayase always felt so warm whenever they touched. And from what he’d observed, humans wore a lot of clothing even in temperature-controlled environments. So maybe there was a cultural reason?

He was distracted utterly from his musings by the smell of dinner.

Seiko set huge bowls full of broth and the long pale things he believed were called noodles onto the table.

“Oh yeah, ramen night!” Momoayase exclaimed as she sat down.

By Kentakakura’s bowl were a pair of thin wooden sticks like ones he’d seen humans use to eat many times, but hadn’t gotten to try them himself yet.

His attempts were… clumsy, if he were being generous. He tried copying the way Momoayase and Seiko held their sticks, but he couldn’t keep a grip on the food once he’d picked it up.

“Here, like this,” Momoayse said, correcting his grip.

“Thanks,” he said. He quickly got the hang of it after that.

After dinner was finished and the dishes were clean, Kentakakura sat out on the porch, looking up at the night sky. He had watched a little of the shows they had put on the television, interested even though he didn’t understand most of it. Then Seiko had taken out her little smoking sticks, and the smell had started to get to him, so he’d gone outside for fresh air.

Besides, it was a clear night, and he could see so many more stars than he could in the city. Earth’s one huge moon hung half full in the sky. It was pleasantly cool but not cold. A perfect night.

“Hey,” Momoayase said, joining him out on the porch.

“Hi.” He scooted over so she could sit down next to him. Through the half-closed door, he could hear Seiko cackle at something on the television. “You aren’t watching anymore?”

“Nah, Bakatono came on, and only Granny likes that.” She propped her head on her fist. “You excited for tomorrow?”

He nodded. “Yes!”

She smirked and prodded him with her strange human toes. “Are you nervous?”

“U-uh, maybe a little,” he admitted, rubbing the back of his neck. “I don’t know how I’m going to fall asleep.”

“Ah, you’ll be fine,” she assured him. “And if anybody gives you trouble, you just kick their asses!”

“I don’t think I could do that!”

“Why not? You were pretty rad, in that fight against those aliens.”

“R-rad?”

“Yeah!” she said, grinning. “It’s like, awesome, impressive. Super cool.”

“Oh.” His cheeks grew hot. Nobody had ever thought he was rad before. “Thanks.”

“So is that like a thing all your people can do? Transform like that?”

He nodded. “It’s a defense mechanism. We get stronger and faster, but it’s exhausting, especially if we do it too many times without rest.” He’d never actually done it with the intention of fighting anyone before he’d seen Momoayse get abducted by those Serpoians. After fighting the Flatwoods Monster and trying to fight Seiko, he was pretty sure attempting to change more than twice was past his limit.

“Does it… hurt?”

“No. It feels a little odd, but it doesn’t hurt.” Unless I’m overexerting myself, he added silently. It was excruciating, then.

“Oh good, ‘cause I wanted to ask…” she trailed off, looking suddenly unsure.

“Yes…?”

“I wanted to ask if you would take me flying.”

Kentakakura’s eyebrows rose. He hadn’t expected that. But of course, for a species with no wings, flying must seem like a novelty. And she trusted him to carry her. That made his insides feel warm.

“If you’re too tired, then–”

“No!” he interrupted, just a bit too loudly. “I can! Yes! I’d love to. When?”

Momoayase’s smile lit up her whole face. “Right now?”

“Okay!” He got up from the porch and walked a few feet away. His gut felt… fluttery all of a sudden, at the idea of her watching him change. She’d seen him do it before, of course, but they’d been in mortal danger at the time!

He shut his eyes and tried to ignore her staring at him while he changed.

When he opened them again, the world had come alive.

Auras in every imaginable color danced in the air before him. Everything had an aura, of course, but this place seemed so much more vibrant than the city. Even more so than his old home.

Momo put it all to shame, though.

She was luminous to his eyes. Like a star in her own right. Her teal aura outshone everything around her, so bright it would have hurt to look at her, if the light were not just spiritual.

Momo stood up and approached him fearlessly. He appreciated that–he knew how frightening he must look to her, even if he was small for his age, and still covered in baby fluff.

Making the conscious effort to relax his exterior jaws, he asked, “Ready?”

She bounced excitedly on her toes. “Yeah! So how do we… do this?”

He tilted his head. “I don’t know. I’ve never carried anyone in flight before. I could just pick you up?” He was picturing cradling her in his arms, close to his chest.

“Um… What if you carried me piggy-back?”

“Eh?” He tilted his head in the other direction at the unfamiliar phrase.

“If I got on your back and you carried me that way. Would that work?”

“Let’s see.” He knelt down and held still as she clambered onto his back, wrapping her arms around his neck. He rose experimentally, supporting Momo with his arms, and flexed his wings to test his range of motion. “Yeah, this works.”

He felt her fingers brush the edge of his wing, and couldn’t help the reflexive twitch away.

“Sorry, is that not–?”

“It’s okay,” he assured her. He relaxed, letting her touch his wing again.

He was surprised to find that he meant it. It was a big show of trust, letting someone touch your wings. And he did trust Momo. With his life, even.

When she wrapped her arm back around his neck, he asked again: “Ready?”

“Uh huh.”

“Then hold on.” With that, he began to run. As he picked up speed, he spread his wings. Just a few meters away from the torii gate, he pushed off with his powerful legs, flapped down hard, felt his stomach swoop as gravity tried to pull him back down, and–

They were airborne.

Momo gasped and then yelled, a sound he recognized as nothing short of pure joy. His heart swelled as they climbed, then levelled out, soaring high above the ground.

He trilled at the feeling of wind whipping through his feathers. When was the last time he’d flown, not to fight, not to escape, just for the joy of it? Too long ago. He’d nearly forgotten how much he loved it.

The sound of Momo’s giddy laughter reached his ears before the wind snatched it away. She sounded like she was having the time of her life.

Time to show off a little.

He began a steep dive, then levelled out so close to the ground he could have dipped a talon into the rice paddies they flew over. Then he began to climb again, catching a thermal and soaring up, coasting among the clouds. He dipped and turned–nothing too crazy, just enough to make sure Momo was enjoying herself.

Eventually he turned them back towards home, coasting calmly along, watching the lights spread out underneath them. When he spotted the house surrounded by trees, he circled lower, choosing a convenient branch on the biggest tree to perch on.

His talons dug into the bark, the thick limb taking his weight easily. He took a moment to steady himself. He was tired, but in a satisfied way.

“That was amazing,” Momo said giddily.

“Yeah. It’s been too long since I’ve flown like that,” he said, his heart still singing. He looked out across the moonlit landscape–the view was nothing short of magical.

“Thanks for this.” Momo rested her head on his shoulder, warm cheek brushing the hard carapace of his external jaw. “It’s so beautiful up here.”

“Mmhmm,” he replied, watching the way her aura seemed to dance just under her skin. Eventually she noticed him staring.

“What is it?”

“I’m really glad I met you, Momo,” he said. The way her cheeks went pink made his insides squirm again, for some reason.

“You big sap,” she muttered. “I’m glad I met you too, Okarun.”

Chapter Text

Kentakakura glanced around at the adolescent humans surrounding him. None of them seemed to be paying him any attention, their eyes passing right over him if they happened to glance in his direction, but he couldn’t help the way his stomach squirmed with nerves.

It wasn’t the first time he’d gone out among humans in broad daylight, but this was different. He was about to be in an enclosed space with hundreds of them for nearly the entire day. Was his human disguise good enough? What if someone saw straight through him and the shady human government he kept reading about showed up to take him away and dissect him?!

He felt a warm hand pull on his own, making him let go of the hair he’d been tugging on. He looked over at Momoayase. She gave his hand a firm squeeze.

“You’ll be fine,” she said softly. “Just walk around like you know exactly what you’re doing.”

Easy for her to say! But he took a deep breath, straightened his back, and let her pull him the rest of the way to the school building.

They entered an area full of what Momoayase called footlockers. While she changed her shoes, he huddled next to her and mimed her motions so it would seem to random onlookers like he was doing the same, just like they’d practiced the day before. He was actually manipulating the nanoskin on his feet so it looked like he’d changed shoes (Momoayase had not had a satisfying answer when he’d questioned why the charade was even necessary. But honestly, he didn’t really understand the whole shoes thing in the first place, so he let it go).

He stuck close to her as they walked through the halls up to her classroom. So far no one had walked up and demanded to know what he was doing there, so it seemed like he was doing an okay job at being a human student. Yay!

“Ayase!” someone said. An older-looking human walked up to them, looking directly at Kentakakura. His stomach dropped. “So this is the transfer student? Ken Takakura, isn’t it?”

Ah, right, his human name. He ignored the weird strangled sound Momoayase was making and gave a very stiff bow.

“Y-yes, that’s me! Um…” What honorific was he supposed to use with this person?

“And I hear you’re from America, is that right?”

“Yes…” Another thing they’d gone over the day before. They’d decided to say he was from this America place because, as Seiko had put it, “Everyone over there’s so weird they won’t think twice if Four-Eyes gets things wrong.”

“Yes, yes, wonderful to have you with us. We’ve decided to put you in Class C, as the teacher there speaks fluent English.”

“Wait a sec,” Momoayase protested, recovering from her weird fit. “How come he can’t be in my class?! Wouldn’t that be easier, since he’s staying with me?”

“Class B is already scheduled to take another transfer student next week, so they’ll be quite full. Class C still has room. Come with me, Takakura.”

What was he supposed to do?! He shot Momoayase a panicked look.

“Hey, don’t worry,” she said. She raised both her fists at him, with her thumbs pointed upwards. “It’ll be all good. I’ll see you at break!”

He hesitantly returned the gesture. “A-all good…” Then he turned and followed the older human to his classroom.

Augh. His first day, and things were already going wrong…

When they arrived at Class C, a young human greeted them at the door. Kentakakura assumed, based on the uniform and high voice, that she was a girl.

“This is Rin Sawaki,” the older human said. “She’s the representative for Class C. Miss Sawaki, this is our transfer student, Ken Takakura.”

Miss, he noted. Definitely a girl, then.

Miss Sawaki bowed and said, “Welcome to Class C. If you need anything at all, please let me know.”

She had a very pleasant voice, and kind eyes. Kentakakura returned her bow.

“Thank you. It’s nice to meet you.” Maybe being in a class without Momoayase would be alright, if the humans were nice like Miss Sawaki.

Another older human–the teacher, he assumed–approached him as he was following the class representative inside, and said something completely unintelligible to him.

Ah, he thought, this must be the “English” that other human mentioned.

“Thank you very much,” he bowed, trying to disguise the fact that he had no idea what they’d just said, “but I’ve studied Japanese very hard, and I would like to practice.”

That was true enough. The teacher–a girl as well? No wait, fully adult humans were women. Urgh, this was so hard to keep straight–seemed to accept it.

“Your Japanese is certainly very good,” she said. “But please let me know if we’re going too fast, or if there’s anything you don’t understand.” Then she turned to address the rest of the class. “Everyone, this is our new transfer student, Ken Takakura. Please do everything you can to help him feel welcome.”

Oh moons, they were all staring at him now. He felt his cheeks heat under the attention.

“Go ahead and take a seat, Takakura. There’s a desk available behind Sakata.” She indicated a round-faced human–a boy, by the uniform–sitting in the center of the room.

Sakata looked up at him as he passed by, two fingers pushing his glasses up his nose, and continued to stare as he sat down.

“H-hello,” Kentakakura said, feeling very awkward under the scrutinizing gaze.

“Hm,” was the only reply. Sakata turned back to the front of the room.

Um. Okay…?

While Kentakakura tried to work out if that was meant to be insulting or not, the teacher was beginning the lesson.

Momo stared out the window, wondering for the fiftieth time if Okarun was doing okay.

She wasn’t worried about him being able to pass as human. But he was nerdy-looking, skinny, and nervous, and she knew all too well that there were scumbags in the world who liked to pick on kids like that to make them feel better about themselves.

Also… she just really wanted to talk to him!

She wanted to ask him more questions! Like, what sort of animals were on his home planet? Had he been to other planets before coming to Earth? What other sorts of aliens had he met? What kind of food did they eat? Did he think the Serpoians wore underwear?

…Did he wear underwear? Wait, no, she wasn’t gonna ask that.

She rocked her desk back and forth in frustration. Lunch break couldn’t come soon enough!

“Momo!”

She jumped, opening her eyes. Who was calling her name?

“Geez, girl,” said Miko. “You were hard-core zoned. What’s with you?”

“Yeah, and you totally bailed on school the past two days!” Kei added. “We were super worried!”

“Uhm…” There was no way she could tell them what had really happened. Alien abduction, psychic powers, UFO crashing, Okarun… “Yeah, sorry. I kinda… lost my phone. And then this whole thing happened…”

“Ugh, you didn’t hook back up with that scummy dude, did you?” Kei narrowed her eyes.

“Huh?! Of course not!” Honestly, she hadn’t so much as thought about that tuna fish. “Look, my grandma decided to host this foreign transfer student, and I was helping him settle in!”

“Foreign transfer student?” Miko raised an eyebrow.

“‘Him’?!” Kei zeroed in like a shark smelling blood. “Oooh, what’s he like? Is he cute?”

“Well, he’s–” Momo’s cheeks went hot. Okarun was kinda cute, in a scruffy kitten in a cardboard box sort of way. “He’s a nerdy lookin’ dude, real skinny.”

Ririna leaned over in her seat. “Hey, is this the guy you were walking to school with this morning? The one who was holding your hand?”

Momo groaned as Miko and Kei squealed in unison. She had done that, hadn’t she? In her defense, she’d been trying to make sure the guy didn’t rip his own hair out and leave a bald spot. She knew how bad the first-day jitters could be. And this was Okarun’s first day ever. Twice as bad.

“Yeah, he’s a big nerd,” Ririna continued. “Glasses, the works. He ain’t bad-looking, though. Not my type, so don’t worry, Momo.”

“There’s nothing to worry about! It’s not like that between us!” There were probably, like, rules or something against it, even if she was interested. Which she wasn’t!

Would he even consider that with her? Come to think of it, she’d been waltzing around in her underwear in front of him for a while there, and he genuinely hadn’t seemed to notice!

Also, she’d seen him without his shirt, briefly. He was covered in feathers! Really soft black fluff around his neck and chest, then sleeker-looking ones on his belly and–well, she wasn’t going to speculate on where else!

His wings had been soft, too. Momo recalled her surprise at finding them made of very tiny feathers, instead of dusty scales like actual moth wings. Plus, they had cool patterns that looked sort of like a face with red eyes and fangs when he spread them out.

She probably looked weird and bald to him…

But none of that mattered, because they were just friends! Miko and Kei wouldn’t be so easily convinced, though. She needed to nip this in the bud before the rumor spread through the whole school!

“Oh, please! Like I’d ever go out with a loser nerd like that!” Her gut twisted with guilt immediately.

“Well anything’s better than that blockhead you were seeing before,” Miko said. “So c’mon, spill the deets. What’s his name, where’s he from?”

Momo groaned, letting her head thump down onto her desk.

“Takakura?”

Kentakakura looked up from his backpack to see Miss Sawaki standing by his desk. She gave him a small smile.

“If you’ll follow me, I can show you to the library and we can pick up your textbooks.”

He straightened. A library? Fantastic! The library in Kamigoe was where he’d learned nearly everything he knew now about Earth, humans, and yokai. Hopefully the school library would be just as helpful.

“Y-yes, that would be great.” He got up quickly and followed her out of the classroom.

The hallway was absolutely packed with students. He stuck close to Miss Sawaki as she navigated the crush of humans, calling out, “Excuse me! Please excuse me,” in a loud, clear voice.

He did envy her confidence. Being loud and noticeable had never been something he was comfortable with.

Once they left the main halls it became significantly less crowded.

“I wish we had time for a full tour, but I don’t want to cut too much into your lunch break,” Miss Sawaki said. She did point out notable rooms they passed on the way to the library (Kentakakura hoped he never had reason to enter the music room. There was a… malicious energy coming from in there).

Once they reached their destination, Miss Sawaki went off to find the librarian, leaving Kentakakura to browse the shelves. It was much smaller than the Kamigoe Library, but there was something about the enclosed space smelling of paper that put him more at ease. He was probably going to end up spending a lot of time here (hopefully he wouldn’t need to sneak in after hours, like in the city. That had been kind of a pain).

While he was distracted by the books on the shelves, some human knocked him in the shoulder as he passed, sending him crashing to the floor. His glasses flew off his face, and he heard the human snicker as they left.

Great. He shouldn’t be surprised that there were bullies here, too. He fumbled around, searching for his glasses while squinting in the harsh artificial light.

“Oh, Takakura!” A blob of colors that sounded like Miss Sawaki knelt in front of him. “Are you alright?”

“Y-yes, I just… My glasses…”

“Here they are,” she said. He smiled gratefully, as much as he could while squinting. “Oh!”

She froze, hand still outstretched. He took his glasses back from her, now able to clearly see her face. She was staring at him, wide-eyed.

“V… vampire…” she muttered.

“Um, what?”

She squeaked, a pink flush spreading across her face. “Y-your eyes…”

Oops. She must have noticed his eye color. Decidedly not typical for humans.

“I h-have a medical condition,” he explained quickly. “My eyes are extremely light-sensitive, so I have to wear tinted lenses, even indoors.”

“Oh! Oh, I see. My goodness, how rude of me, I’m sorry!” They got up off the floor and she bowed apologetically.

“It’s alright,” he said, not entirely sure what she was apologizing for. “But, um, Miss Sawaki?”

“Yes?”

“What is a vampire?”

There was a moment of stunned silence. Then she began to stammer, “I-it’s um… a creature who drinks b-blood, and… Oh, please just forget I said that, it was terribly rude!”

“So, it’s a sort of yokai, then?” Kentakakura asked, curiosity piqued.

“I… I suppose you could say that. Why?”

“I’ve been studying spirits and yokai. It’s a fascinating topic! Could you tell me more?”

Miss Sawaki blinked in surprise. “Oh! Well, I don’t pretend to be an expert, but…. Certainly!”

She turned out to be very knowledgeable, in fact, even directing him to some excellent reference material there in the library.

“Ah,” she said suddenly, “I shouldn’t take up much more of your lunch break. Here,” she retrieved a bag full of his textbooks for him.

“Thank you. And, thanks for telling me about vampires!”

She blushed. “O-oh, you’re welcome. I don’t really talk about them with other people much, so… any time!” She waved to him as she left the library. When she turned around there was–

He blinked. For just a split-second, he could have sworn he’d seen something clinging to Miss Sawaki’s back… Well, there was nothing there now. Maybe he was imagining things?

Kentakakura rubbed his eyes, then realized–talking about shared interests was a common bonding activity. Had he just made another friend?! He smiled to himself as he shouldered the heavy bag and left the library.

He was lost.

Kentakakura had tried just retracing the route he and Miss Sawaki had taken to the library, but he must have taken a wrong turn or three, and now he had no idea where he was. He managed to find a door that led outside, and was now walking around the building in the hopes he could locate the main entrance and find his classroom from there.

As he rounded the corner, he saw a handful of students grouped together, holding those foul-smelling smoking sticks Seiko was so fond of. He froze, debating whether to just turn around and go the other way or not. He really didn’t want to call any attention to himself, but he was pretty sure he was close to the school entrance, so he steeled himself, and walked by the group as unobtrusively as he could.

Until he caught a snippet of what they were saying.

“--mo Ayase? That girl in Class B?”

“Yeah,” said a deep voice. “She dropped her skirt for me so fast. Little slut. But she was a shit lay, so I kicked her out.”

Kentakakura froze. He didn’t understand the meaning of some of those words, but he recognized the mockery in them. He looked over at the group, quickly identifying the speaker–a tall male human with hair shaved close to his scalp.

Something hot and sharp began burning in his chest, spreading into his limbs.

“Good riddance, honestly. Her and her granny, batshit old bitch almost–”

“What did you say?” The student jumped slightly when he noticed Kentakakura standing right next to him.

“Huh? What d’you want, dork?” he sneered.

Kentakakura reached out and seized the boy by his shirt collar. How dare he speak that way about Momoayase? About Seiko? Distantly he could feel his limbs begin to creak and lengthen slightly.

“Hey, shithead, who the hell do you think–?” He shut the boy up by dragging him down to his knees.

Baring his fangs in his own sneer, he growled, “Don’t you ever spread such lies about Momo or Seiko again. Understand?”

The human in his grip was shaking, eyes wide with fear. “I-I–”

He shook the boy roughly and rasped, “Say you’re sorry.”

“F-fuck! Sorry, I’m sorry!”

As if a switch had been flipped, Kentakakura suddenly realized what he was doing. He was standing there in broad daylight, halfway transformed, inches away from attacking a random human!

And he’d wanted to. He’d wanted to reach into the human’s mouth and rip out his tongue for daring to insult his friend.

His adrenaline fled in an instant, leaving him feeling sick and shaky. He hastily released the boy, wincing at the small tears his budding talons had left in his red shirt, and fled.

What is wrong with me?!

He’d never transformed without meaning to before. He’d never been so angry, except maybe when he’d seen Momoayase strapped to that horrible chair in the Serpoians’ ship. Rage had just kind of… taken him over, then, and he’d started attacking blindly.

But his caretakers had warned him, back when he’d started hitting puberty, that transforming made your emotions much stronger. Well that was certainly true!

Even last night, when he’d told Momoayase how happy he was to have met her? He’d never dream of saying something so… so vulnerable to her normally! Out loud, at least.

Moons, how was he supposed to even face her now?!

Lost in his thoughts, Kentakakura didn’t notice the human in his path until he smacked face-first into her.

“OW!” Momoayase cried, stumbling back and clutching her mouth. “Okarun?! Where the hell have you been?”

“Momoayase! S-sorry, I didn’t see you there…”

“Yeah, clearly! I think you cracked one of my teeth!”

Shame curled in his stomach. He slouched further. “Sorry…”

“Anyway, where were you? I’ve been looking for you everywhere!”

“You have?” Ah, right, she did say she’d see him at break…

“Yeah! I thought you were avoiding me…”

She what?! “N-no! No, no, never! I-I was in the library getting my textbooks and then… I got lost,” he finished lamely.

I can’t tell her what that boy was saying about her, he thought. Or how he’d totally lost his temper and almost blown his human cover. Not after everything she and Seiko had done for him. He couldn’t disappoint them like that.

“Oh… Well,” Momoayase thrust out her hand to him. She was holding the tin container Seiko had given him that morning. “You forgot your bento box. Better eat it quick, ‘cause lunch is almost over.”

“Thank you,” he accepted it gratefully. Eat it quick, huh? Normally he preferred to savor his food a little, but if she said so…

Kentakakura unhinged his jaw with a click, dumped the contents of the box into his mouth, and swallowed.

After he relocated his jaw, he noticed Momoayase staring at him with her mouth open. “What?”

She pointed at him slowly. “...Don’t ever do that again.”

“But you said–!”

“Don’t! Now come on.”

“Okay, okay!” He sighed, following her as she began walking back to class. There were some things he was just never going to understand about humans…

Chapter Text

While they walked back to class, Momo tried to distract herself from the memory of the… thing she had just witnessed by asking Okarun about the classes he’d had so far.

“Math was easy! All things I’ve learned before. Um, Japanese class, I d-didn’t really understand… The teacher gave me assignments to take home and help me catch up.”

Homework on his first day? Yuck.

“We can do it together when we get home, if you want,” Momo offered. She had her own stuff to catch up on, after all.

“Okay!” He seemed genuinely excited about it. “Oh, and Miss Sawaki took me to the library and helped me get my textbooks. Then we talked about vampires!”

Huh? “How the heck did that topic come up?” Who's this Sawaki chick?

“Well–”

“Oooh, is this him?”

Momo groaned. They’d been found. She turned to see Miko and Kei poking their heads out of her classroom.

“Oof, Ririna was right,” said Miko. “He’s a big nerd.”

“Eh?” Okarun cocked his head.

“Can’t you two mind your own business?!"

“C’mon, Momo, we’re just scoping out your new bae!” Kei said. “Funny, he doesn’t look foreign.”

“Like I said,” Momo gritted out, “he’s not my boyfriend, damnit!”

Okarun made a small, distressed noise behind her. “I, uh… Aren’t we…? I thought… I thought we were friends…?”

Aw, shit. Dude sounded an inch away from tears.

“Yeah, we’re friends,” Momo hurried to assure him. “But a boyfriend is something different!”

“Oh,” he released the lock of hair he’d been pulling on, looking relieved. “That’s confusing. What’s the difference?”

“Girl, you’ve been slacking on his education!” Kei exclaimed. She waltzed over and slung an arm around his shoulders. “Y’see, uh…” She paused. “Sorry, dude, what’s your name again?”

“Oh, I’m–”

“His name’s Okarun,” Momo interjected. She would never, ever, ever hear the end of it if they found out his actual name.

“Y’see, Okarun, a boyfriend is someone you go out with.”

“‘Go out’?” His eyebrows drew together. “Momoayase and I have gone out to shop for school supplies and food. Is that the same?”

“Nah, nah,” said Miko. “It’s someone you’re dating.”

“‘Dating’?”

Oof, this was not getting them anywhere.

“Dating is when you get together and do romantic stuff,” Momo finally said, just to get the conversation over with. Wasn’t lunch break nearly done, already?

Something finally seemed to click. “Oh, so it’s like courtship!”

“Um…” How in the hell had he learned that word before “boyfriend”? “Yes.”

Seeming pleased now that he’d made the connection, Okarun asked Miko and Kei more questions about dating terminology until the lunch break officially ended and people began to file back into their classrooms.

Relieved, Momo tugged Okarun out of Kei’s grip, saying, “Whelp, that’s the end of break, better get back to class now!”

“Oh, okay. Thank you for the lesson, it was very informative!” Okarun waved to Miko and Kei.

“Any time, Nerd-boy!” Miko cooed.

“See ya later, Okarun. And if you ever get tired of Momo, you can come hang with us, ‘kay?”

Okarun made an offended noise. “I could never get tired of Momoayase!”

Momo nearly choked on her own tongue. Who the hell just came out and said things like that?!

“Ooh, sweet talker!” Miko and Kei squealed in unison.

Cheeks burning, Momo practically threw Okarun back towards his own classroom, shouting, “See you later okay bye!” Then she spun around and marched away, stubbornly ignoring the way her friends were grinning at her.

His back was on fire.

Kentakakura bounced his leg to try and distract himself, but it did no good. He wasn’t used to keeping his wings tucked away for this long, and his body was letting him know it was not happy.

He needed to go stretch out somewhere or he might cry.

Silently reciting the phrase he’d heard another student say earlier in the day to himself, he raised his hand and asked to be excused. The teacher had barely finished nodding before he was out the door, ignoring the chuckles that followed him.

He scurried down the hall, nearly colliding with a pink-haired human who shouted, “Hey!” in his haste to find somewhere he wouldn’t be observed. He ducked into the first dark room he came across–he believed Miss Sawaki had called it the science lab.

He glanced around to be sure he was truly alone. There was an eerie sculpture in the corner that resembled a human with half its skin missing–weird–but no actual humans in sight.

Groaning in relief, he let his wings out. He really should have done this during the lunch break…

While he stretched them to their fullest extent, then stirred the air lazily, Kentakakura looked around the room again. There were plenty of interesting things to see (he was pointedly not looking at the creepy sculpture), and he wondered if his class might get to use this room soon.

Something shifted. Kentakakura whirled around. He hadn’t bothered turning on the lights in the science lab, as he could see perfectly fine in the dark, but there was a window in the door that threw a thin rectangle of light onto the wall. And just for a second, a shadow had blocked out the light. Like someone was looking into the room.

Kentakakura stared hard at the door. Nothing there, now.

Nobody could have… seen him, right? It was dark in the room, and humans had terrible night vision! It was probably just someone passing by out in the hall. He was being paranoid… right?

A sound from the other side of the room made him jump. He whipped around, eyes falling on the half-skinned sculpture that he’d been trying very hard not to look at. It still stood motionless in the corner. But had its arm… moved, slightly?

Kentakakura stared it down, heart hammering in his ears.

Its mouth. Opened.

He bolted from the room with a shriek.

“Momoayase, I think the school is haunted!”

Momo froze. She heard snickers from her classmates.

Class had only just ended when Okarun stuck his head into the room and said… that.

Hurriedly, she slung on her backpack and said, “What? I’m sure you meant to say something else!”

“But—“

“Dude, don’t go saying stuff like that in front of normal people,” she hissed once she reached him. Normally she didn’t care what people thought of her, but like, it was his first day. He didn’t need to be deemed crazy straight off the bat.

“Most people don’t believe in ghosts,” she continued as they walked down the hall.

He made a shocked sound. “What?! How?”

“They can’t even see supernatural stuff, normally. Heck, I’d never seen a ghost or auras or anything paranormal, ‘til I got my powers. You’ve gotta be sensitive to it, like my grandma is.”

Okarun hummed. “That… that actually explains a lot. Sorry.”

She nudged him. “Nah, it’s fine. Just don’t go shouting about it again. But hey, what makes you say the school’s haunted?”

He recounted his experience in the science lab. Momo shivered. The anatomical models were creepy on their own, but the thought that one might be able to move around by itself seriously wigged her out.

“We can ask Granny about it, when we get home,” she said. Also, she needed to think up a solution to Okarun’s problem with his wings…

“Of course your school’s haunted,” Granny said, lounging in front of the television. “What about it?”

Momo blinked. Not the reaction she’d been expecting… “Um, shouldn’t we do something? You’re a spirit medium!"

“Yeah, and? If it ain’t hurting anybody, then there’s no reason to get involved.”

Momo sat back and pondered that. It was true, the living model hadn’t actually done anything (besides give Okarun a heart attack).

“Look, kids, the first thing you gotta know about the supernatural world is that it ain’t separate from ours. It’s all around us, every day, and always will be. Most folks can’t see spirits at all, and in turn, spirits mostly can’t interact with them. We stay away from them, they stay away from us. The living don’t disrespect the dead, and the dead don’t attack the living. That’s how we coexist.

“So you two just keep your heads down and ignore the supernatural in your day-to-day lives. Especially you, Momo. Nothing gets a spirit riled up like attention.”

“Why especially me?”

“Because you’ve got those powers now. You look more interesting, especially to malicious spirits.”

“It’s true,” said Okarun. “Your aura is very bright.”

Momo blinked at him. “You can see auras too?” He hadn’t mentioned that before.

“Uh, not normally.” He rubbed the back of his head. “But when I’m in my other form, I can. Yours is the brightest I’ve ever seen. Like a star…”

Momo’s cheeks heated, which she immediately felt silly about. He probably hadn’t even meant it as a compliment!

“Anyways,” said Granny, “just ignore the model tomorrow and it’ll probably ignore you back. Now go get the table set up, I’m about to make dinner. We’re having crab tonight.”

Momo whooped. “Hell yeah!”

“What’s crab?” Okarun asked, getting to his feet to help put out the table.

“You haven’t had it yet?!”

He shook his head.

“Oh, just you wait,” Momo said. “Crab is the best thing on Earth.”

Okarun, as she had predicted, loved the crab.

The downside? Now she had more competition.

“Don’t go taking all the big legs, damnit!”

“You still have two on your plate!”

“Yeah, and they’re both smaller than the ones you’ve already–aha!” Momo smacked away the hand attempting to sneak onto her plate while she was distracted. “Don’t even think about it, old hag!"

Unfortunately, Okarun took the opportunity to steal a claw, the sneaky bastard. She leapt at him, but was blocked by the foot he stuck out.

“You little shit, get your freaky-ass bird feet off me!” She tried again to snatch the claw, but he just laid back and stuck his other foot out, keeping her back with both feet at her stomach. She gave a shove, but he went stiff as a board, so she only ended up making him slide around on the floor while he cracked the shell open with his teeth. She didn’t know whether to be impressed or horrified.

They ended their tussle only to gang up on Granny, who was stealing the legs they’d left unattended for herself.

Once every scrap of crab meat had been devoured, and the dinnertime carnage cleaned up, Momo and Okarun went up to her room to do their homework.

It ended up sucking way less than usual. Normally Momo had a hard time getting the motivation to do work outside of school. It wasn’t hard, just felt pointless. But she didn’t have that problem, helping Okarun.

He was pretty good at math, and the literature stuff he didn’t understand, he quickly grasped with her to talk it through.

“Momoayase?” he asked during a quiet moment while she wrote some stuff down.

“Hmm?”

“Who is this person on your walls?” He was staring at her posters.

“That is the greatest actor in the world,” she said. “Ken Takakura.”

He looked over at her. His antennae curled in a way she was beginning to recognize meant he was amused, and he smirked. “Is that why you won’t say my real name?”

Momo spluttered. “W-well he had it first! And anyways, you keep calling me ‘Momoayase’.”

“Ah. Well, it took me a while to understand how human naming systems work.” He paused. “Does it bother you, when I call you that?”

“Nah.”

“Oh. Good.” Another pause. “It doesn’t bother me, either. Your nickname for me.”

“Good, ‘cause it ain’t going away!” She smiled while he laughed. “So how do names and stuff work where you’re from? You don’t have family names?”

“Kind of? It depends on where you are in life.”

“What d’you mean?”

“Well, when you’re young and living in the household that raises you, you have a suffix after your given name, sud, which means um, ‘raised by’, basically. But once you leave the creche, you take on a vren when you join a caulder. That’s your adult name. And then once you get old enough to settle down into a household, it’s issan.”

Momo’s head spun, trying to keep all that straight. “So… so you can’t use your sud name once you grow up and leave?” That would be like her no longer being an Ayase once she moved out after she graduated… What an unsettling thought.

“Um, it’s not that you can’t use it. It’s still part of my name, part of my history. It would just be inaccurate for someone to call me sud Attacus, because I don’t live in that household anymore. You’re supposed to update your files every time you change caulders, and each name remains on your records. Some people’s legal names are quite long!”

“So like, the government keeps track of who you’re living with?”

He nodded. “There’s a registry anyone can access that has everyone’s full names and records. It’s an important resource, especially since it keeps track of everyone’s genetic relatives. Prevents crossing bloodlines.”

Momo made a face at that thought. “So what name do you use now? Your… wren?”

“Vren. And… I don’t have one, since I’m not part of a caulder at the moment.”

Oh. That seemed sad to her. Lonely.

Before she could come up with something comforting to say, Granny stuck her head into the room and said, “That’s okay, kid. Maybe someday you can have Momo’s!”

Face burning, Momo turned and hurled a pillow at the nosey old bat, which she dodged easily.

Okarun frowned. “What did–?”

“We-still-got-a-bunch-of-work-to-do-focus-on-that!” she said breathlessly, then stared down hard at the paper she was writing.

+++

The next day at school went by like normal, thankfully. Momo was still eager for the lunch break to come so she could meet up with Okarun, but she didn’t feel like every minute took two hours to pass anymore.

“So how’s the bae settling in?” Miko asked while she did her makeup.

“Just fine,” Momo replied, then added, belatedly, “And he ain’t my bae, damnit.”

“Aw, why not?” Kei asked.

“I think he’s a good dude,” Miko said.

“Yeah, he is… Wait, what makes you say that?” They’d only had one conversation with the guy!

“Oh, just some chatter yesterday. Apparently your ex was saying some shitty things about you. Your boy found out and totally went off on him. Word is, the dickhead ran away crying!”

Momo blinked in shock. Okarun hadn’t said anything about that yesterday! Although, he had been looking a little shifty after the… teeth-banging thing.

She didn’t care what rumors that stupid tuna-face spread around, but the thought of Okarun–normally so timid and shy–getting up in his face to defend her made her insides go all fluttery.

She squashed the feeling immediately. They were friends, of course he’d stood up for her! She’d have done the same for him, no question. And for Miko and Kei, too, of course!

The bell finally rang to signal the lunch break, and Momo popped up to go find Okarun before he could wander off again. She saw him immediately when she peered into Class C–he was talking to a cute girl with glasses and pigtails. They were both smiling.

Who the heck is that?

Momo hesitated in the doorway, wondering what she could do to get his attention. Okarun, however, noticed her on his own, and said a quick goodbye to the girl before hurrying over to meet Momo out in the hall.

She noticed a couple of guys in his class staring at them, so she slung an arm around Okarun’s shoulders when he reached her. Yeah, he’s with me. Got something to say about it?

“Classes going okay?” she asked.

“Yes! Doing the Japanese homework with you last night helped a lot!”

“You sure got popular.”

“Huh?” His eyebrows drew together. “What do you mean?”

“That girl you were talking to…?”

His eyes widened in realization. “Oh, that’s Miss Sawaki! She was recommending some reading materials, to help with my research.”

Right, the vampire otaku chick, Momo thought. Of course he was talking to her about his research. Wait, were vampires even real? Hell, they could be. Why not, at this point?

Quickly changing the subject, Momo asked, “And how’s your, uh… back feeling?”

“...A little sore,” he admitted. The way he adjusted his glasses and avoided her eyes made her think that it was more like a lot sore.

Removing her arm from his shoulders, in case that was making it worse, Momo said, “C’mon, I’ve got an idea.”

She led him through the halls, up a flight of stairs, then paused by the entrance to the roof, to be sure they weren’t being observed.

“Are we allowed to be up here?” he asked as she beckoned him through the door.

“Not technically,” she said. “But that just means we’ll have privacy.”

Once they were outside, she did a quick sweep to make sure they were alone, then turned back to Okarun with a thumbs-up. “All good.”

He still looked a bit unsure, but unfurled his antennae and let out his wings, stretching them to their fullest extent with a groan.

“Better?” she asked.

“Much. Thank you.”

They sat and ate their lunches, chatting about nothing in particular. Okarun trailed off at one point, staring off into the distance.

“What is it?” Momo asked. In the sunlight, his glasses were pretty much completely opaque, and she couldn’t tell what he was staring at.

“On that big field,” he said. “Do you see it?”

Did he mean the soccer field? Momo looked down at it, but it was empty–wait! Just for a second, she’d caught a glimpse of a figure in red standing on the field. As soon as she blinked, it was gone.

“Huh! I saw it for a second.” She tried to find it again, concentrating. The figure flickered in and out of focus, like something on an old film reel. “Weird. What do you think it is?”

“Almost certainly a spirit of some kind,” he said, his excitement audible in his voice. “I know Seiko said to ignore them, but… getting a closer look couldn’t hurt, right?” He looked over at her hopefully.

Momo had to admit, his eagerness was infectious (and downright adorable). She was curious to see a proper ghost for herself, too.

“Yeah, just looking is probably fine,” she agreed. But when they stood up, the bell rang. Momo groaned. “Well, we can try and find it again after school lets out.”

Okarun nodded in agreement.

Kentakakura fidgeted while he waited for Momoayase by the footlockers, trying to control his impatience. From what he’d observed, spirits tended to stay within a certain area, so it wasn’t likely to have left the school grounds. But on the other hand, they didn’t normally appear during the daytime, so maybe this one was unusual in other respects as well.

“Excuse me,” said a soft voice beside him. “You’re Ken Takakura, right?”

He turned to see a human girl staring straight at him. One finger twirled through strands of her pink hair.

“Um, y-yes, that’s me.”

The girl breathed out a sigh. “Oh, thank goodness! I really need your help!”

Kentakakura blinked in surprise. “Me?” What could she possibly need his help with? He looked around again for Momoayase. “Um, I’m supposed to be meeting someone…”

The girl got very close to him, laying a hand on his shoulder. “Please. It’s super urgent. I need your help right away. Just you.”

She blinked rapidly. Did she have something in her eye?

“O-okay… What’s the problem? What can I do to help?”

“It’s easier if I just show you,” she said, curling a hand around his wrist.

The girl seemed very emotional about it, so Kentakakura allowed her to lead him out of the building.

She took him quite a ways away from the school, to a run-down building full of abandoned construction materials. He was starting to feel uneasy about this, but pressed on. Maybe this had something to do with the spirit they’d seen earlier that day?

The girl came to a sudden halt once they were fully inside the building.

“S-so what did you say the problem was?” he asked. She said nothing, dropping her bag to the ground.

As if on cue, Kentakakura was tackled from behind. He squawked as he went down, struggling, but his attackers pinned him to the ground and bound his hands. He thrashed wildly, but the girl who had led him there sat on his back (ow).

“Die, you demon!” she bellowed, pressing a small object that absolutely reeked to his face.

“What are you doing?!” Kentakakura cried, trying to buck her off. His attackers–two other girls, he could see now–grabbed his legs and held them down.

“Return to the pits of Hell!” the pink-haired girl continued.

“What are you talking about?!”

“Don’t play dumb,” she said. “I saw you. I saw your demon wings!”

His heart dropped into his stomach. She must have been the shadow he’d seen in the science lab door.

One day. He couldn’t pretend to be human for one day.

Why did he have to be so bad at everything?!

“HEY! What the hell are you skanks doing to Okarun?!”

Kentakakura’s head shot up. “Momoayase!” He was saved!

The pink-haired girl twisted around to see her. “An accomplice? Or maybe you’ve got her under your thrall, demon?” She pressed the stinking object into face again, forcing his head back down.

“Get off him, you bitch!” Momoayase cried, throwing out her psychic power. She caught the girls holding his legs down in her spectral hands, throwing them against the wall with a crash.

His remaining captor gasped. “What the–?!” She was cut off by another teal hand swatting her off of Kentakakura.

“Okarun! You okay?!” Momoayase rushed over and helped him into a sitting position.

He groaned, more out of despair than pain. “I’m sorry!”

“Huh?”

“She saw me. In the science lab, she saw my wings…”

“Forget about that! Are you hurt anywhere?”

“No, I don’t–” He caught a flash of movement behind her. “Mo–!”

It was all he could get out before a pale limb slammed into him, sending him rolling across the ground.

When he came to a halt, he looked up to see a tall figure in a red dress clutching Momoayase.

“How dare you hurt my little Aira?!” it demanded, its voice echoing strangely from inside its mask-like face.

The spirit from the field! Now that he had a better view, Kentakakura noted its long, silky hair. That, combined with its graceful movements, and he was pretty sure he was looking at an Acrobatic Silky.

“Hey, what the hell’s your problem?!” Momoayse demanded, struggling in the Silky’s grip. “That skank attacked Okarun first!”

The spirit shrieked in rage, winding its arm back and hurling her into the wall. “Watch your mouth, you trashy little girl!”

“Momoayase!” They were in real danger now! Throwing caution to the wind, Kentakakura began to change, ignoring how the tie around his wrists bit painfully into his skin. The pink-haired girl screamed at the sight of him, but he ignored that too.

Bending over backwards, he stretched his neck out to its full length, retracting his exterior jaws so he could bite through the plastic strip binding his hands. He straightened and spat out the slightly bloody tie, just in time to see the Acrobatic Silky lunge at him. He leapt into the air, over the spirit, and darted towards where Momo had been thrown.

She was already getting back to her feet when he landed next to her.

“What the hell is that thing?!” she demanded.

“An Acrobatic Silky,” he said distractedly, scanning her for any obvious injuries. Seeing none, he turned his attention back to the spirit, who was… completely ignoring them.

It had picked up the pink-haired girl and was twirling around the room with her.

“Finally!” it cried. “My Aira, I have you back! I’ve been waiting and waiting for so long, until you could see me again! Your Mommy’s right here, love!”

“A-another demon?!” the girl–Aira?–exclaimed. “Are you in league with Takakura?!”

The Acrobatic Silky stopped twirling. “Are you crazy? I’m your mother, Aira! Don’t you remember when you called me ‘Mommy?’”

Kentakakura glanced over at Momo in confusion. "What is going on?"

"Hell if I know, man! That Acro-Silky thing is clearly crazy, though, so we better get it away from her."

He could see the logic in that (even if that Aira girl had attacked him). He lunged at the pair, grabbing for the human and missing as the Acrobatic Silky flipped away from him.

“Silly little creature,” it said. “Are you trying to take my Aira from me?”

Huffing, Kentakakura turned sharply in the air and dove for her again, only for the spirit to catch him by the leg! It slammed him down, and he cried out as his head cracked against the ground. He hung in its grip, dazed, as the mouth in its mask-like face swung open. The Silky dangled him above its gaping maw, shocking him back to reality as he realized what it meant to do.

No, no, no! He struggled futilely as he slid down the monster’s gullet.

Chapter Text

“Okarun!” Momo exclaimed in horror as the Acro-Silky tried to eat her friend. She immediately reached out with her ki and grabbed hold of his legs, though with how wildly he was kicking it was hard to get a good grip.

“Quit eating him, you b—!”

The Acro-Silky whipped around and slammed a leg through her psychic arms, breaking her grip.

Yeowch! That hurt!

Momo barely had time to register the phantom pain before the leg was coming for her. She braced her ki into a shield, but the blow still sent her flying into a pile of debris.

The Acro-Silky tilted her head back and swallowed Okarun whole.

How the hell did she manage that, Momo wondered morbidly. Okarun was a good seven feet tall transformed, and the Silky was maybe ten? He shouldn’t have been able to fit in her stomach!

Chalking it up to weird spirit bullshit, Momo got to her feet, interrupting whatever conversation the Acro-Silky had been having with that Aira skank.

“Hey, you,” she shouted. “Give Okarun back! Didn’t anyone tell ya attacking the living is against the rules?!”

“How about you shut your mouth? We are trying to have an emotional reunion over here!” 

“What’s going on here, Ayase?” Aira demanded. “What is this thing?” Her eyes widened in realization. “Wait, if you’re fighting it, then it’s your enemy! Join forces with me, and together we can kill this demon!”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” This girl was really getting on her nerves. Tying up Okarun and making imperious demands…

“I was chosen by heaven because of my angelic beauty,” Aira shouted at the Acro-Silky, waving some kinda… cross at it? “It’s my duty to rid this world of monsters like you!”

Oh great, she’s just as delusional as the ghost lady. What a pain. Momo was nearly tempted to walk away and let the psycho spirit eat her too!

“Aira, dear… What did you say?”

“I said, I kill monsters like you! I’ll bring peace to th–!” With two gulps, the Acro-Silky devoured Aira whole.

“Fuck, I didn’t mean it!” Momo shouted. 

The Acro-Silky rounded on her, some kind of… white goop leaking out of her eyeholes. Gross.

“You turned her against me!” she accused. “Aira was good until you made her a delinquent! She called me a monster!” The spirit began to tremble with rage. “It’s your fault she hates me!”

Black hair like the tentacles of some malevolent sea creature shot out in every direction, wrapping around steel beams, support struts, everything it could get a grip on. Momo ducked, using her powers to knock away a tendril headed her way, but another replaced it faster than she could blink.

It wrapped around her neck and yanked, reeling her in towards the Acro-Silky like a dog being dragged on a leash.

Momo choked and gasped as she was hoisted by her neck at eye level with the spirit, clawing fruitlessly at the rope-like hair. 

“For starters, I want an apology,” the Acro-Silky demanded.

Like hell. This bitch had stomped into their business, no way was Momo apologizing to her!

“Say you’re sorry you made Aira hate me. Say it!”

“Fuck you,” Momo rasped.

With a snarl, the Acro-Silky flung Momo around by her neck, smashing her into walls, piles of debris, and the ground. She’d covered her eyes with her hair, so Momo couldn’t brace herself against each blow. Not that it would’ve made it hurt any less.

When it was over, she was hauled back up by her neck, the noose of hair tightening unbearably. She could barely follow what the Acro-Silky was saying, the lack of air was making her dizzy, but she thought the spirit wanted her to… call her Mommy?

“Fuck… you…” she managed to gasp out.

She was barely aware of being hoisted upwards, before the Acro-Silky’s teeth clamped around her torso and she was swallowed like a pill.

+++

In hindsight, not her finest moment.

Shouldn’t being eaten alive at least be warm? Acro-Silky’s stomach (esophagus? Whatever) was as cold as the grave. Momo could literally feel her heat being leeched away as she slid down the freezing tunnel of the ghost’s throat.

And to make matters worse, it was wet. Eurgh. 

She bumped against something yielding and came to a halt in her disgusting journey. Felt like… shoes? Must be Aira…

There also was something with hard plastic edges pressing against her face that smelled absolutely awful. And, weirdly familiar…

Groping blindly, Momo caught hold of the plastic thing, feeling around it to find what she really, really hoped was there, and–yes!

Momo held the lighter against the noose of hair still wrapped around her neck.

Eat this, bitch.  

+++

Ow shit, ow ow fucking ow!

Turned out lighting yourself on fire really fucking hurt! But it had the desired effect. The Acro-Silky panicked and started screaming–or maybe that was her?

Momo was yanked by the neck out of the spirit’s stomach, coughing and choking. She hit the ground with a bone-jarring thump.

“You almost burned us alive!” Okarun screeched. 

“Hey, don’t go complaining!” Momo retorted, sitting up. “We’re out, aren’t we?” She turned to glare at the still-smoldering Acro-Silky. “Time to knock this bitch sideways!”

The spirit threw her head back and roared, shaking the building’s foundations. Momo got to her feet, crouched into a fighting stance, but something hooked around her waist and pulled her straight off her feet.

She landed on Okarun’s feathery back with an “oomph” . He had scooped up her and the unconscious Aira and was hauling ass away from the furious Acro-Silky.

“Hey, this is no time to be running scared!” she protested.

Okarun swiveled his head around a full hundred and eighty degrees to look at her (she managed not to flinch at that). “Momo, that thing just ate us! Of course I’m scared! Now, hold on.”

“We can take her, though!” she argued. “We beat that big alien, before.”

“We had the talisman then! And I’m at a serious disadvantage in this enclosed space. Our best chance is to run! Besides, I’ve never actually fought before!”

“Huh?!” Momo cried. “Then what were you doing on the Serpoian’s ship?!”

“Panicking!”

Once they made it out of the dilapidated warehouse, he turned sharply and began clambering up the wall, Aira cradled in one arm. Once he had enough height, he threw himself into the air. They dipped alarmingly before leveling out, and Momo tightened her hold on him with a yelp.

“Aira’s weighing me down,” he said. “I can’t go full speed.”

“Well, that’s just– watch out!”  

Okarun swerved just in time to avoid the steel beam hurtling through the air at them.

“AIRAAAAAAAA!” The Acro-Silky wailed, “Give her back to me, you filthy pigs!” The enraged spirit was chasing them, skittering across the ground like a spider on legs made of crispy hair.

“We need… a plan…” Okarun gasped. Momo could feel him panting from the effort of trying to carry both her and Aira and keep enough altitude so the Acro-Silky couldn’t snatch them. She scanned their surroundings, eyes alighting on a half-finished building.

“Try and lose her in there!” she said, pointing. He obeyed, swerving towards the looming structure. He tucked his wings in and dove through a gap in the wall where a window would go. He landed with a clang on the building’s scaffolding and scrambled across the iron skeleton. They tucked into a shadowy corner just as the Acro-Silky burst through the wall.

As the spirit swung her head around to locate them, Momo saw Okarun’s aura do something… weird. It sort of stretched out, as if straining to cover them in a protective veil. Was he… doing something to try and hide them?

Whatever it was, it seemed to work. The Acro-Silky screamed in frustration and began to climb the scaffolding, away from them. Cool.

Once she was out of sight, Okarun crawled out of their hiding space and leapt out the building, taking flight once more.

“Can you make it back home?” Momo asked. They’d be safe once they were inside the torii gate.

“I’m going to try,” he answered. 

+++

They nearly made it before she caught up to them. 

“Give me back my Aira!” the Acro-Silky howled, picking up a garbage can and hurling it at them. Momo managed to deflect it with her powers.

“She’s gaining on us!” she yelled. “Give it all you’ve got, Okarun!”

Okarun didn’t reply, but he inhaled deeply, and a white steam began to rise from between the teeth of his mask-like jaws. Red streaks that glowed and danced like small flames appeared in his feathers, though they weren’t hot to the touch. He flapped his wings hard, and Momo yelped and tightened her grip as the landscape around her blurred with his sudden burst of speed.

It didn’t last long, though. She could feel his sides heaving as he slowed, obviously whatever he’d just done had taken a lot out of him. But the torii gate was in sight now! They were going to make it!

Momo was nearly thrown straight over Okarun’s head as his momentum was suddenly arrested. She looked over her shoulder to see a ratty rope of black hair wrapped around his ankle. They’d been caught!

“Got you,” the Acro-Silky snarled. Okarun was flailing and kicking to try and get away, but they were being reeled in like a fish on a line.

“Hang on,” said Momo, “I’ll–”

She was cut off when Okarun grabbed the back of her shirt, then flung her and Aira away from him. They hit the ground and rolled, Aira still limp as a doll, straight through the torii gate. 

Oh, I’m gonna feel that tomorrow. 

Momo groaned as she sat up, then gasped. “Okarun!”

He’d hit the ground, clawing at the dirt with his talons as the Acro-Silky dragged him towards her.

“Let go of him!” Momo was on her feet and running.

“What’s all this noise?” someone–Granny?–shouted from behind her, but Momo ignored it. She ran towards the writhing mass of black hair. Okarun had managed to get his mandibles around the Acro-Silky’s throat, and was hanging on for dear life as she thrashed, hammering at his back and head with her fists.

“Momo, get back inside the gate!” Granny called. 

Like hell! She reached out with her spectral hands to take hold of the Acro-Silky’s wrists. She didn’t know how long she could hold it, with the spirit struggling savagely in her grip.

Something small sailed through the air from behind her, followed by the glint of sunlight reflecting off of metal, and flames bloomed on the Acro-Silky’s back. She screeched, and Momo released her psychic grip in surprise.

Her grandmother’s back appeared in her vision. She had her bat in one hand, the wooden writing tip extended. 

“Stay in the barrier,” she ordered. Momo glanced down and noticed a thick black circle drawn on the ground. She looked up in time to see the Acro-Silky kick away spindly black mass, which landed in the rice paddies with a splash. It did not resurface.

“Okarun!” Momo shouted, reaching out for him with her powers. She grabbed his red aura and pulled. He landed next to her inside the circle, spluttering. 

“You okay?!” Momo asked, taking hold of his soaking wet shoulder.

“Still alive,” he wheezed. 

“You wretched hag!” the Acro-Silky howled. “How dare you interfere?!”

“You attack kids under my protection outside of my home, and you want to talk about daring?” Granny retorted. “I really hate hypocrites. But I’ll give you one chance to back off and forget about this. You won’t get another.”

“I’m going to kill you!” the spirit screamed, black hair rushing towards the group like a tidal wave.

“Pity,” Granny said, reaching one hand outside the circle and dropping a huge metal nail, point-down. “Buh-bye.”

The Acro-Silky exploded into flames.

+++

When the screaming finally stopped, Momo cracked open an eyelid. The Acro-Silky lay crumpled on the ground in a charred heap, nearly unrecognizable.

“Damn, Grandma,” she muttered.

“Seiko, you are super cool,” Okarun added. Granny just hmphed, and strode over to inspect the remains of the spirit.

“And you!” Momo exclaimed, smacking him on the shoulder, making him jump. “Nice work back there! You ran away so good!”

Okarun tipped his head back and let out a groan.

“Hey, you sure you’re okay?” The Acro-Silky had roughed him up pretty good, and his clothes were a tattered mess.

“I’m all wet,” he lamented. Momo sighed. Well, if that was his biggest complaint, he was probably going to be fine. He did look pretty pathetic, though, sitting there in a soaked heap.

Getting to his feet with a pained grunt, Okarun stripped his nanoskin completely off in one go.

“Dude!” Momo exclaimed, throwing up her hands to cover her eyes. He couldn’t give her a little warning before getting naked?!

“Why are you doing that?” he asked. 

Momo peeked at him through her fingers. He was in the process of wringing his clothes out like a dishtowel, staring at her like she was the one being weird. 

And… huh. He was completely covered in feathers, all the way down to his knees (or were those, like, ankles? He was about eighty percent leg in this form, she couldn’t tell). Even all wet, nothing was showing.

Or… wait. He was an alien. Did he even have…?

Momo forced her mind away from that speculation and looked over at her grandma.

“Is she dead?” she asked. 

“Not quite. But she won’t be going anywhere for a while.” She rounded on both of them. “Didn’t I just tell you little turds yesterday to keep away from the supernatural? What the hell did you do to piss her off?!”

Momo shot to her feet in indignation. “It wasn’t our fault! That skank just attacked Okarun out of the blue, and then the Acro-Silky leapt in after her for some reason!”

She jabbed a finger at Aira, who was still lying on the ground, exactly where she’d fallen. That was… starting to worry her a little, actually. Shouldn’t she have woken up by now? They hadn’t exactly been quiet.

Granny raised an eyebrow. “What’s wrong with her?”

“I don’t know. She’s been out since Acro-Silky ate her.”

Granny’s bat hit the ground with a clatter as she ran to Aira’s side. 

Dread coiled in Momo’s stomach. Her grandma never ran unless she had to. She exchanged an uneasy look with Okarun, then hurried after her.

She was kneeling beside Aira, one hand at her neck. When she sat back, every line in her body was tense. Momo went cold.

“Granny…?”

“She’s dead.”

Momo felt like the ground had been yanked out from under her feet.

“Dead?” she repeated dumbly. Her limbs were heavy, her mind slow.

“A regular human will always die when eaten by a yokai.” How could she sound so calm about this?!

“But–! But we got eaten, too, and we’re fine!”

“Nothing regular about you, not with those powers. They shielded you from being snuffed out immediately. And Four-Eyes, well…” She just gestured mutely at the alien.

“There has to be something we can do!” Momo protested. “I-I can massage her heart with my powers, get it pumping again! Granny, you call for an amb–”

“Momo.” Granny stood and put a hand on her shoulder. “She’s already gone. I’m sorry.”

“Airaaaa…” said a creaking, distorted voice. “My little Airaaaa…”

The Acro-Silky had gotten to her feet and was shambling up to the torii gate.

“Damnit, can’t you just stay down?!” Momo shouted. Anger was good, she could do something with anger. It was much better than that sick, helpless feeling, staring down at Aira’s corpse.

Okarun crouched beside her. “I’ll lead her away, you stay here with–”

“I know a way to bring her back,” said the Acro-Silky. “Give my aura to her.”

Momo froze. “What?”

“Like a motor, life can’t run without a battery. An aura is like a battery to living things. Hers is fading fast, but you can replenish it with mine.”

Momo glanced back at Aira. She could see the faintest spark where her aura should be, like the last ember left on a burnt-out candle wick. She turned back to the spirit.

“Why should I believe a damn thing you say? You just want to eat her again!”

The Acro-Silky took hold of her own head and ripped . Blood sprayed onto the ground in a crimson arc. Momo reeled back in horror. Okarun puffed up like a startled cat, mandibles clattering together.

“Now I can’t eat anyone,” she wheezed, despite her jaw dangling from her skull by only a few thin strips of flesh. “But if you still don’t believe me, simply have that spirit medium set me on fire again.”

Momo drew in a shaking breath, glancing at her grandmother. She was staring up at the Acro-Silky, expression unreadable.

“You’d give your aura up willingly?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“And you know what the consequences will be?”

“I do.”

Granny looked back at Momo. “Choice is yours, kiddo.”

“Wait, you mean I can actually take out her aura?!”

“If she’s giving it up, then yes. You can recharge the girl’s aura using hers.”

Momo looked at the Acro-Silky, then at Aira. She drew in a deep, steadying breath.

“I still don’t trust you,” she said. “You make any funny moves– any –and we take your ass down!” She glanced over at Okarun. “Get ready. Don’t take your eyes off her.”

He nodded, then fixed his gaze on the spirit.

“Okay then. Let’s give it a shot. How’s it work? Tell me what to do.”

“Using your psychic power, you’ll have to create a link between my aura and hers. It’s the same idea as a jumper cable.”

Momo studied her aura. It roiled, a black and magenta mass. Inhaling, she reached out with her spectral hands, grabbing Aira’s fading spark in one and the Acro-Silky’s in the other.

Energy jolted through her, and the world went white.

+++

Kentakakura jumped when someone gasped behind him.

Aira was breathing! Choking a little, but alive! Momo had done it. She–

She’d fallen to her knees with a gasp. 

“Momo!” he knelt beside her, hands hovering uncertainly. “What’s wrong?! Are you okay?” 

She didn’t reply. Tears ran down her cheeks as she let out a broken sob.

Rage boiled in Kentakakura’s chest. “You went and did it,” he snarled at the unreactive Acrobatic Silky. “You hurt her. Now I’ll hurt you.”

“No!” A warm hand grabbed his. He turned, surprised. It was Momo. “Leave her alone! I’m good.”

He knelt back down at her side, curling his long fingers around her hand, while Seiko rubbed her back in soothing circles. 

“I’m so sorry, Aira,” said the Acrobatic Silky. A thump made Kentakakura look up at her. Her arm had fallen off! In fact, the spirit’s entire body seemed to be disintegrating! “I was supposed to protect you, but in the end, all I did was hurt you. I couldn’t control my emotions, and  my rage and sorrow turned me into a monster.”

“W-what’s going on? Why’s she falling apart like that?” Momo exclaimed. “Grandma?!”

“It’s like she said. An aura’s like a battery,” Seiko said gravely. “And without it, you die. She doesn’t have much time left now.”

“Huh? But, what’s gonna happen to her? Where’s she gonna go?”

“She became a malicious spirit because of regrets she carried over from life, so most likely she’ll end up in the void. Nothingness.”

“But–! But that’s not fair!” Momo protested. “Can’t we do something?!”

“If she can let go of her regrets, maybe she’ll move on to the afterlife. But that’s up to her, now. We’ve done all we can.”

The Acrobatic Silky was murmuring to herself as her body continued to fall apart. Her hand came up to her face, water streaming from her remaining eye.

Fresh tears began to roll down Momo’s cheeks, and Kentakakura desperately wanted to say something to comfort her, to pull her into a hug, but–

Someone ran past them. Aira was up on her feet! She embraced the crumbling Acrobatic Silky. The spirit stared down at her, as if in shock.

“Mommy,” Aira said, through her own tears. “I love you.” The Acrobatic Silky laid a trembling hand on her back.

“I was happy, the happiest in the universe,” Aira continued. She held on until the last of the spirit’s form crumbled into dust and blew away in the wind. 

As they watched her remains disperse, Kentakakura heard Aira murmur, “Please, take away their pain. Grant them peace. Guide them both to a kinder world.

“I won’t forget. I swear.”

+++

After several long minutes, Seiko walked back into the house and returned with flowers, sticks that smelled very strongly, and a can full of some kind of liquid. She and Momo stood with their hands pressed together–some kind of ritual? Aira continued to stare up into the sky in silence.

Kentakakura hovered nearby, not knowing what to do and feeling very awkward about it. 

“You two go get yourselves cleaned up,” Seiko said finally, lighting one of her smoking sticks. She walked over to stand beside Aira.

Feeling like the danger had finally passed, Kentakakura began to change shape. Only to immediately drop to his knees once he was done. He felt like a tree had just fallen on him!

“Okarun!” Momoayase exclaimed, rushing over to him. “You good?”

“I’m good,” he groaned, managing to get back to his feet. “Just tired.” His stomach chose that moment to growl. “U-um, and hungry.”

She exhaled a soft laugh. “Yeah, me too. You can shower first, but don’t take too long!”

“Okay.” 

+++

Kentakakura sat at the desk in his room, wings wrapped in several towels (how did humans manage without mist baths and drying chambers?). Putting down some final lines in his notes for the Acrobatic Silky, he sat back and sighed.

He felt like he was still missing several big pieces of the picture. Something had happened when Momoayase connected Aira and the Acrobatic Silky’s auras. Something that completely changed their attitudes towards the spirit. 

He wanted to ask her about it. Not just for his research, either. He wanted to make sure she was okay, but… he also didn’t want to make her cry again.

She probably didn’t want to talk about it anyways…

What would a good friend do?

A knock on his door pulled him from his thoughts. He got up to open it, revealing Momoayase on the other side. She smelled clean and looked much refreshed.

“Hey,” she said, stepping into the room. She gave him a once-over, then looked over to his bed, where he’d spread out his nanoskin so it could repair itself. “Your clothes okay?”

“Oh, yeah, they will be,” he said. 

“Man, that’s so useful. Meanwhile, I’ve gotta buy another uniform again. But, um, I came in here to give you something.” She held up a length of loose green fabric–a sweatshirt.

He took it. The material was quite soft, and smelled like her. “This is… for me?”

“Yeah! Here, look.” She turned the shirt around to show him the back. Two holes had been cut out of the back, between the shoulders. “For your wings! These used to be mine, but I don’t wear ‘em whole lot, so…”

She’d cut up her clothes for him?! “I–! Y-you didn’t have to–”

Momoayase waved away his stammering. “I wanted to! You gotta have more than one thing to wear! Dinner’s soon, anyways, and I don’t think Granny would be cool with you at the table without clothes on.”

“Um, why?” It was still warm, and they would be inside.

“Uhh…” Her cheeks went pink. “W-well, I mean, you’re covered in feathers, but it’s still… Humans don’t go around without clothes on! It’s… we just don’t!”

Oh, so it was a cultural thing. And now he’d gone and embarrassed Momoayase with his carelessness! He should’ve been more considerate of his hosts! Stupid, stupid, stupid!  

Kentakakura buried his swiftly-heating face in the sweatshirt, squeaking out a “Sorry!”

“Nah, it’s okay. Like I said, it’s different for you. We humans are mostly bald, if you hadn’t noticed.” 

He had. He’d found it pretty alarming when he’d first come to Earth. The lack of feathers and wings had stopped looking strange by now, though. 

“Anyways, put the shirt on, tell me if it’s comfortable. Oh, these too.” She handed him a pair of grey pants of a similar material to the shirt.

Pulling the clothes on, Kentakakura noted with appreciation that they were even softer on the inside, and the holes Momoayase had cut were more than wide enough so that they didn’t chafe against his wings.

There she went again, taking care of him. Giving him things. Her friendship, food, a place in her home, and now clothes. Clothes that used to be hers, that she’d modified especially for him. It was almost like…

He shook his head to forcefully dispel that thought. It’s not a courtship gift! 

Momoayase was not Virbilaetian, she would not read the same meaning into these gestures! She’s my friend! Stop thinking about that right now, you jerk!  

“So, how do they fit?” Momoayase asked, interrupting his mental chastisement.

“Yes!” he squeaked, then cleared his throat. “I mean, good! They’re very comfortable. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” Her hand came up to rub idly at her neck. There were still lingering bruises there, even with spiritual power accelerating her healing. The sight made his insides twist.

“Um, Momoayase? Are you… okay?”

“Huh?”

Kentakakura fidgeted with an antenna. “Just… After you recharged Aira’s aura, you were crying. Did something happen…?”

“Oh.” Her gaze went distant. “Well, when I linked up their auras, I… saw something. Memories, I think. Acro-Silky’s, and even a couple of Aira’s, too. I saw the person Acro-Silky used to be, before she died. She was… she was just a mom trying to take care of her daughter. She didn’t want to become an evil spirit, she didn’t deserve–”

Before he could second-guess himself, Kentakakura stepped forward and wrapped his arms and wings around her. She went still in surprise, but returned the hug before he could pull away in embarrassment. 

They stayed like that for a few moments, before Momoayase pulled away, sniffing and wiping her eyes. “Thanks,” she murmured. Then she forced a smile onto her face. “Now, come on, dinner’s nearly ready.”

She tugged the sleeve of his sweatshirt. “This suits you.”

“Yes. I like it!”

He followed her down the stairs, still warm all over from their hug.

+++

What Momoayase had failed to mention was that Aira was also joining them for dinner. He froze when he caught sight of her sitting at the table, but thankfully she didn’t pay him any attention as he sat down next to Momoayase.

Seiko’s cooking was delicious as usual. There was silence (besides slurping) as they dug in, but he couldn’t seem to devote the usual attention to his food. Tension hung over the room.

Or maybe it was all in his head…

“Hey,” said Momoayase. He and Aira both looked up. “We need to sort things out, so I’m gonna start. Now, I’m not looking to be besties, but I don’t want to be enemies. If you apologize to Okarun for attacking him for no reason, we’ll be cool. Okay?”

“...You must think I’m some kind of idiot, Momo Ayase.” Aira said. “I came after Takakura because I know he’s a demon, and so are you!” She pointed her chopsticks at them for emphasis.

“Huh?! How the hell did you get that in your head? We aren’t demons!”

“Well then what the hell is he?! ” Aira demanded, pointing at Kentakakura, making him nearly spit out his noodles. “He’s got wings and claws, and I saw how he looked when he fought the Acrobatic Silky! He looked just like a demon, you can’t deny that!”

Kentakakura squirmed in discomfort. It probably would have been best to correct her, but he wasn’t really comfortable with Aira knowing his actual origins.

“None of your damn business what he is,” Momoayase growled at her when he said nothing.

“And her,” Aira continued, pointing at Seiko. “Something’s up with her, ‘cause she can’t be your grandmother. She’s too young and way too hot!”

Oh, so it wasn’t his imagination that Seiko looked too young to be an elder.

“What was that now?” Seiko demanded. “You’re awfully sweet. And Momo is a demon.”

“Shut it, you old bag,” Momo exclaimed, shooting to her feet. “Why do you gotta complicate things?!” 

Aira got to her feet as well. “I knew it. Takakura and your hot granny are demons, and you’re the big boss demon in charge of them. And you’re gonna use your demon powers to destroy the world!”

Kentakakura no longer had any idea what was happening. He watched as Aira and Momoayase traded (mostly unintelligible) threats over their noodles. 

They weren’t… about to duel, were they? They certainly sounded angry enough to start trading blows any second. What was he supposed to do? Should he back Momoayase up?

Not that she needed his help. She was way tougher than him, after all! And he’d feel bad fighting Aira, an ordinary human. But he’d feel even worse about doing nothing while someone attacked his friend!

Momoayase and Aira circled the table while he sat, eating his noodles and wishing the floor would swallow him up.

Aira suddenly put down her utensils and said, “Thanks for having me over. The somen was super yummy, Auntie!” Then she ran out of the living room.

“Oh no you don’t!” Momoayase called after her. “Get back here!”

“You go, Aira,” said Seiko. “You’ll kick Momo’s ass one day. Auntie Seiko’s rooting for you!”

While Momoayase shouted at her grandmother, Aira came back.

“Takakura?” she asked. “Even though you’re a demon from Hell, you risked your life to save me a bunch of times. Why?”

Wow, really? Sure, she’d attacked him with no provocation, but he wasn’t heartless! 

“It’s ‘cause he’s not a demon!” Momoayase exclaimed.

“I did what anyone would,” Kentakakura said. “If someone’s in trouble, you try to help, right?” That was what he believed, anyways. 

“Yeah, well, that’s a good sign,” Aira replied. “There’s still a bit of human left in you.”

What in the world did that mean? “Um, no? I’m not–”

“Whatever hold she’s got on you, I’ll free you from it!” she exclaimed, ignoring him completely. Then she just stared at him for a long, uncomfortable moment, and ran out of the room again.

“Okay, what was that?” Momoayase demanded.

“I have no idea.”

Humans were so weird.     

Chapter Text

“Thank god for the weekend!” Momo exclaimed, sprawling out in the living room after breakfast. “This past week’s felt, like, two months long or something!” 

Hard to believe she’d gotten abducted and met Okarun only five days ago. So much had happened since then. She fully intended to spend the next couple of days relaxing! Maybe they could go into the city and do something fun…

“Now’s no time to be laying around,” said her Granny, coming to stand over her. “You’ve got chores to do.”

Momo groaned. Seriously?! They’d fought off a malicious spirit yesterday, didn’t they deserve a break? “Right now?” she whined.

“If you finish them now, you can do whatever you want for the rest of the day. Now come on. You’re sweeping the house. Four-Eyes, you’re with me, we’re cleaning out the storage shed.”

+++

Dragging a rug out onto the porch, Momo looked over in the direction of the shed. Granny and Okarun were not working, but standing beside the door, bent over something. 

Dusting off her hands, she wandered over to them. “What’cha looking at?”

Okarun looked up, a broom in his hand. “Pictures of you.”

Momo froze. Sure enough, Granny was holding a thick album devoted to her baby pictures. 

“Granny, he doesn’t need to see those!” she protested. Especially not all the ones that featured baby her naked in the bath!

“Ah, here’s a good one,” Granny said, ignoring her completely. She tapped a photo Momo could recognize even upside down. It showed her at age four, attempting to cuddle a grey-striped cat that looked completely miserable about the whole situation. While she didn’t remember the cat specifically, she’d looked through the album enough times with Granny to know its name had been Mochi. And that the leg in black slacks and shoes visible in the background belonged to her father.

“She was always trying to grab that damn cat, it’s a miracle it never scratched her.”

They flipped through the rest of the album, despite Momo’s protests. In response to her pouting, Granny said, “Oh, let an old woman reminisce a little. You were much less trouble at that age.” She closed the photo album and walked back into the shed.

“They were cute pictures,” Okarun said, smiling.

She rounded on him, still flustered. “Payback time! You’ve gotta show me your baby pictures now!” 

Okarun fluffed up slightly, trying to protest.

“Don’t tell me you don’t have any,” Momo said. She knew his space tablet could take pictures, and even she’d had pictures of herself as a kid on her phone.

Reluctantly, Okarun pulled out his space tablet (or datapad, as he called it) and handed it to her. 

“This is you?” she asked incredulously. The image he’d pulled up did not immediately register to Momo as a baby. Or as a living thing at all, actually. It looked like a round lump of black fluff sitting on a blanket.

“Right after I hatched.” Okarun confirmed.

“‘Hatched’?” she parroted. “Like, from an egg? You lay eggs?!” He did look like a bug/bird-type thing, so that kinda made sense.

He gave a trilling laugh. “Not personally, but yes, Virbilaetians lay eggs. Here, this one is about an Earth year later.” 

The next photo prompted a loud “Awwww!” from Momo. He was still completely covered in fluffy black down, obscuring most of his facial features besides his absurdly large red eyes. But this version of him was more recognizably person-shaped, standing up on his little chicken feet. Even his wings were visible in this picture, though they were clearly too small and delicate to do any flying.

“So fluffy and cute!” she cooed. 

“O-okay, that’s–” he attempted to take the space tablet back from her, cheeks going red. 

“Are there any more?” Momo asked, holding it away from him.

“No!” 

That was clearly a lie. She fiddled with the tablet while dodging his attempts to take it back, eventually figuring out how to scroll to the next photo. This one was totally hilarious, featuring baby Okarun wearing the sort of goggles they gave to young children with bad eyesight. They made his already large eyes look enormous, and the straps left indents in his fluffy face. Momo couldn’t stop giggling at it.

“Give it back!” Okarun squawked, feathers puffed up in indignation.

Granny poked her head out of the storage shed, interrupted their scuffling to tell them both to get back to work. Momo slapped the space tablet against his chest, then ruffled the fluff sticking out of his shirt collar. She ran away laughing while he spluttered, face crimson.

+++

When the chores were finally done and lunch was eaten, Momo and Okarun sat in the living room debating what to do for the rest of the day.

When she brought up the possibility of going into the city again, her grandmother interjected, “Just be sure to be back by five, if you’re going out. I’ve got a job this evening, and Wonder Nerd is coming with me.”

Couldn’t she have mentioned this earlier?!

“You’re taking me to see your spirit medium work?” Okarun looked so damn excited, with his antennae sticking up from his head like a pair of fuzzy exclamation points, Momo couldn’t hold on to her annoyance for long.

“It’s a simple haunted house, nothing too complicated. There’s plenty of leftovers in the fridge for you, Momo.”

“‘Kay. You two have fun without me.”

“Oh, you’re not coming with us?” Okarun asked, antennae drooping just slightly.

“Nah. I’ve seen Grandma do her spirit medium thing plenty of times before.” Having the house to herself for an evening would be nice. She’d marathon Ken Takakura films in the living room with the volume turned up as loud as she wanted.

Since it would be dumb for them to go out into the city, come back, and go out again, Momo spent the rest of the afternoon playing video games with Okarun. He was much more interested in the ones with an actual storyline over the fighting games. She ended up just watching him play through a puzzle mystery, smiling at the happy trilling noise he made whenever he solved something (he really was so cute like that).

When five o’clock rolled around, Momo waved Okarun and her granny out the door, then went off to find her DVD collection.

+++

Kentakakura fidgeted with the strap of the bag Seiko had given him to carry while they waited on the train station platform. Excitement and nervousness churned in his stomach, making it impossible to stand still. While he was eager to observe Seiko’s work, he felt wildly underprepared.

“So, um, where are we going again, Seiko?” he asked.

“There’s an old house on the other side of the city, supposedly a ghost started kicking up a fuss. And call me ‘Teacher’ when we’re out on a job. It’ll sound better to the clients.”

“Yes, Teacher,” he said immediately. He liked that, actually. It made him feel like a real apprentice. “What kind of spirit do you think it is?”

Seiko shrugged. “Dunno. The client was sort of vague. Heck, might not be anything supernatural at all. Haunted house jobs often have mundane explanations. Drafty windows, black mold, rodents in the attic, that sort of thing.” 

“What will we do if there isn’t a spirit?”

“Then we’ll let the client know his house is just busted all to hell. We’re getting paid for coming out, ghost or no.”

Ah, right, paid. Because Earth had an economy , like many other places outside of Lepidoterra. He’d learned about those systems, but he couldn’t say he entirely understood them. Why didn’t humans simply trade freely with each other? Life was hard enough without having to worry about made-up things like money.

“We’re lucky, the house is just within the city border, or else I’d be useless if there is a ghost.”

Kentakakura tilted his head. “What does being inside the city matter?”

“My powers aren’t like Momo’s. I honor the god of Kamigoe City and maintain their shrine, and in return, I can borrow their power for barriers and such. But go outside the city, and I’m powerless.”

“So you have a territory, like a spirit.” How fascinating! He’d read some accounts of the power of gods and their human devotees, but like most literature humans considered folklore, it was hard to verify their accuracy. 

“Yup. The trick is to play home games, never away games.” Seiko snuffed out her smoking stick as the train pulled up. “Now come on.”

+++

Kentakakura stared up at the large house in front of them. It was quite tall, and built differently than the other houses he’d seen in the area, though he didn’t know enough about architecture to say how, exactly. He scrutinized the building, trying to feel for any malicious energy. It did look slightly menacing, but maybe that was just the setting sun at its back, throwing it into shadow.  

A fat human man waited on the porch, coming down the stairs to greet them. He looked old to Kentakakura, the hair on his head thinning and gray. “Santa Dodoria?”

“Yes. And you’re Tatsuo Yamada?” Seiko replied. Both humans bowed in greeting. 

“Thank you so much for coming,” said Tatsuo. “I’ve seen your appearances on television. Your predictions recently, with that idol–just amazing! Oh, please, come inside.”

He led them up the stairs, into the house. It looked very different from the inside of the Ayase house, Kentakakura noted with interest. There was quite a bit more furniture, patterned with floral designs. Small lamps and very delicate-looking figurines cluttered the many side tables and shelves scattered around, and he tucked his elbows in close, afraid to accidentally knock something over.

“This is my older brother, Seiji,” said Tatsuo, gesturing to a human man sitting on one of the couches in the center of the room. Unlike Tatsuo, he was stick thin, with a bushy gray moustache. He did not get up to greet them.

“Evening,” Seiko said. “I’m–”

“Save the pleasantries, Miss,” Seiji interrupted. “I’m only here to make sure you don’t take my brother for everything he’s got.”

Kentakakura frowned. He might not have understood that phrase completely, but his tone had been pretty rude.

“Seiji, please,” Tatsuo sighed. 

Seiko didn’t seem phased at all. “Just here to do my job, Mr. Yamada. Now, can you describe to us exactly what you’ve experienced?”

“Well–” Tatsuo began, but Seiji cut him off. 

“Who’s this ‘us’ you’re talking about, woman? Don’t expect me to start speaking to imaginary spirit guides, or whatever such nonsense!”

Seiko blinked at the man, then moved slightly to one side, indicating Kentakakura with one hand.

Tatsuo jumped. “Oh! Oh, young man, I apologize, I didn’t see you there at all! My eyes must be going… Ah, and you are?”

“K-Ken Takakura,” he answered, glancing nervously between the two humans before bowing. Sure, he was used to going unnoticed, but it was almost as if the men hadn’t seen him at all…  

Seiko stared at him for a long moment, expression unreadable, before turning back to the men and saying, “He’ll be observing and assisting me.”

Seiji muttered something under his breath that sounded like “accomplice”. Kentakakura was starting to seriously dislike him.

As Tatsuo invited them to sit down on the couch opposite from Seiji, he caught a flash of movement from the corner of his eye. Turning his head, Kentakakura spotted a small human peeking at them from one of the hallways leading out of the living room. Once they noticed him looking, they gasped and quickly ducked out of sight. He hadn’t seen much of them, but assumed them to be a young child. One probably up past their bedtime.

“Now, the reason I called you here,” Tatsuo began, “is because I believe there’s something, well… evil in this house.”

“And what makes you think so?” Seiko asked. She held up the box containing her smoking sticks. “Do you mind?”

“Not at all,” he replied, and Seiko lit one. “Well, for nearly a year now, I’ve felt a sort of… unease, every time I come here. This isn’t my house, you see, it belongs to my mother. She’s ninety-four, but still looks after the place almost completely by herself. Usually Seiji and I make every effort to see her as often as possible, especially after our father passed. Our children as well, even now that they’re all adults themselves. Everyone has such fond memories of this place. Seiji’s daughter just became a mother herself recently, and of course loves bringing her son to see his great-grandmother, except…” He trailed off.

“Boy starts crying the second they walk through the door, and doesn’t stop until they leave,” Seiji finished. 

“We can’t figure it out! Little Haruko is normally such a cheerful baby, but for some reason he can’t stand to be in this house. And nobody, including us, wants to spend the night here, because of the nightmares.”

“Nightmares?”

Tatsuo nodded. “Every single time I sleep here, I have horrible dreams. And it isn’t just me! I’ve asked everyone, my children, Seiji’s children, they all have nightmares every time they sleep in this house!”

“...Even I’ve had them,” Seiji admitted reluctantly.

“What sort of nightmares?” Seiko asked. “Is it the same every night, or…?”

Tatsuo shook his head. “No, the dreams are always different. Sometimes I’m reliving my worst memories, sometimes I’m running away from something chasing me, sometimes terrible things happen to my loved ones… But they always feel so real, it’s–” he broke off, shuddering. “It’s awful. I can’t stand to spend a night in my childhood home anymore, and… I’m worried for my mother. She refuses to move, but I just can’t leave her in this house when I know something horrible is here.”

Seiji harrumphed. “I agree there’s something wrong with the house, Tatsuo, but it’s no ghost. It’s gas or something.”

“But we’ve already checked for that,” Tatsuo argued. He turned back to Seiko. “We’ve had people in to check carbon monoxide levels, checking for mold, fungus, pests, checked the windows, the walls, the basement, everything we can think of! There is no explanation for what’s happening, and that’s why I’ve called you. Seiji doesn’t believe in the supernatural, and that’s fine. But I know that there’s something evil in this house. We need your help, Santa Dodoria. I’m worried for my family.”

Seiko took a long drag on the stick, then exhaled a cloud of smoke. She tapped the ash into a small bowl on the table, seemingly designed for this purpose. “Your mother, what does she think? Where is she now?”

“She’s here,” Seiji said. “Like Tatsuo said, she refuses to leave, no matter what we say. She–”

He was cut off by a peculiar noise. A rhythmic thumping, almost like footsteps, but with another, heavier extra beat.

“Boys,” said a voice from the hallway, scratchy and low. “Why didn’t you tell me our guests had arrived?”

If Kentakakura had thought the brothers looked old, then the human who thumped into the room was ancient. She–because he knew that this must be the mother–was stout and bent with age, silver hair pulled into a bun at the back of her head. A sturdy wooden cane was gripped in one gnarled hand, the other holding a colorful shawl around her shoulders. 

Seiko stood, and he copied her. “Mrs. Yamada?”

“Yes, that’s me,” said the old woman, “but please, young lady, call me Kiriko. You must be the Santa Dodoria my Tatsuo’s been going on about.”

“My name is Seiko Ayase. This is Ken Takakura, he’s assisting me tonight.”

“It’s very nice to meet you, ma’am,” he said, bowing.

“Ken Takakura, eh? Like the actor!” Kiriko placed a pair of spectacles hanging from a chain around her neck onto her nose, peering at him. “And such nice manners, too. Well, please make yourselves comfortable while you’re here. I’m sorry you’ve come out all this way, but I really think my sons are making a fuss over nothing.”

“Mom, I–” Tatsuo began, but his mother waved him off. She made her way over to a plump chair and very slowly sat down, with a good bit of creaking and groaning.  

“Tatsuo was just telling me about what he’s been experiencing,” Seiko said, sitting as well.

“Yes, yes, they’ve been going on and on about nightmares and bad feelings. Well, I’ve not been having any nightmares at all!”

“And Haruko–” Seiji began, but Kiriko interrupted again.

“Babies are sensitive things. There’s some smell or noise in the house he doesn’t like, is all. There's no reason to start fussing about gas and mold and ghosts. Or trying to put your mother into a nursing home.” She frowned over at her sons. “My father built this house, I’ve lived here my entire life, and the only way I’m leaving is feet first!” She cackled loudly.

“You haven’t experienced anything strange?” Seiko asked.

“Only how my children and grandchildren are acting. No, this house has always been my haven, I’ve always felt safest here, that’s never changed. But you two feel free to look around all you like. I’ve never seen a spirit medium at work, and at my age, novelty is rather hard to come by!”

Seiko stood up, and Kentakakura did the same. “I appreciate that, Kiriko. Now, how many people are in the house tonight? Any staff, other relatives?”

“I have people in sometimes to clean what I can’t manage, but no, we’re all that’s here.”

“What about the child?” Kentakakura balked as every eye turned to him.

“What on Earth are you talking about?” Seiji demanded. “There are no children here, haven't been for a while.”

“But… There was…” Kentakakura pointed at the hallway where he’d seen the little human peeking at them. “There was a child standing there just a few minutes ago.”

Silence. Then Seiji broke it with a scoff. “Oh, now this is preposterous! Mother, I cannot allow these charlatans–”

“Seiji, please.” Kiriko said. She peered at Kentakakura. “A ghostly child, eh? Well, I’m having a good time already!”

+++

“Please forgive my son’s attitude,” Kiriko said as she led Kentakakura through the other rooms of the house. “He’s always been so serious, ever since he was little. And he worries so much over his children, I’m afraid this situation with the house has him quite tense.”

“It’s okay,” he said. “Most hu–most people can’t see spirits at all, so they don’t believe in them.”

Seiko had instructed him to go with Kiriko and see the other rooms on the ground floor, while Tatsuo showed her the upper levels.

“Keep an eye out for that ghost, too,” she’d said. “Try and talk to it, if you can. Be polite, this is most likely its territory, and the ghosts of children can be especially temperamental. If that is what it is…” And with that ominous statement, she’d followed Tatsuo and Seiji up the stairs.

Kiriko guided him into a room much smaller than the living room. A couple of  squashy chairs sat in the center of the room, in front of a cubby in the wall where a cheerful fire burned. Bookshelves lined every wall, full to bursting with volumes of every size and color. A personal library.

“This is where I spend most of my time these days,” said Kiriko. “It was my father’s study. He built this place for himself and my mother, after their honeymoon touring Europe. It’s a very Western style, as I’m sure you noticed.”

Knowing absolutely nothing about architecture, Kentakakura nodded along anyway. The room had a cozy atmosphere, if a little stifling with the heat from the fire. In fact, he felt more comfortable in this room than he had since they’d arrived at the house. It had been such a subtle thing, but Kentakakura had felt uneasy ever since he and Seiko had gotten here. It was only in this space that the feeling lifted, and he could separate it from his own natural anxiety.

Was that the bad feeling Tatsuo had been talking about before? Yet another point in favor of the house containing a malicious spirit…

“So, young Mr. Ken, how does a boy like you end up looking for ghosts in an old lady’s house, instead of having fun with your friends? Going to the cinema, or whatever it is kids do on Saturday nights nowadays?”

But he was having fun. He was already excited at the prospect of seeing–maybe even talking to!–the ghost again, and Seiko had already taught him so much in the short time he’d known her. And, yes, Momoayase being here too would be nice, but he knew he was going to see her again later. He was sure she’d love to hear what he’d found out about the spirit that lived here.

“...I've wanted to learn about spirits ever since I came here,” he said eventually. “Miss Seiko took me in and is teaching me about her work. She’s been so kind to me… I’m really grateful to her.” 

More than he could ever say. He had no idea how he could even begin to repay her for everything she’d done for him…

“Hmm… You’re a good boy, young Mr. Ken,” Kiriko said, then reached out and pinched his cheek.

Kentakakura, more than used to this treatment from elders, was caught entirely off guard when pain lanced through his chest.

En Makoku used to do that all the time. I hated it but… I didn’t realize how much I’d missed it.

The reminder of his favorite caretaker made his eyes prickle. He turned around, pretending to inspect the walls of Kiriko’s library while he tried to breathe through the sudden heartache. 

Did his old caretakers miss him? Surely they must be a little worried, at least. He hadn’t sent any messages since he’d left. Did they know anything about what had happened to his transport vessel? Were they… thinking about him at all?

He bit the inside of his cheek. No time for that now, he scolded himself. He would be totally useless to Seiko if he broke down. Focus…  

Kentakakura’s eyes landed on a photograph framed on the wall. It showed two adult humans with two small children. 

"Mrs. Yamada,” he asked, “who are the people in this photograph?”

Kiriko placed her spectacles on her nose, peering at the picture he indicated. “Oh, that’s my father and my mother, this little girl is me, and that’s my sister.” 

“Your sister?”

“Yes, my older sister. Her name was Aiko. Aiko Kitahara.”

“What happened to her?”

Kiriko gave a big, long sigh. “Oh, it’s sad, really. She died not long after this was taken. She got very sick very quickly. My father took her to a fancy hospital in the next city over–Kamigoe was not nearly so built up in those days, you see–but they couldn’t do anything for her. I was too young to really understand what had happened, why Aiko never came home. But my parents were never the same after that… Why do you ask?”

Kentakakura stared hard at the photograph. The image was in black and white, but the faces were still clear. 

“Because Aiko Kitahara is the ghost I saw.”

+++

He wasn’t sure what he’d expected Kiriko’s reaction to be when he told her he’d seen the ghost of her long-dead sister. Shock, maybe? But the old woman merely hummed a neutral tone.

“Shall we move on, then?” she asked. Then she must have seen the look on his face, because she chuckled. “When you get to be my age, young Mr. Ken, nothing much surprises you anymore. Honestly, if this house has a ghost, it makes sense that it’s Aiko. Come along, now.” She thumped out of the room.

Human elders really are something else, Kentakakura thought, following her.

Nothing dramatic popped up in other rooms they went into. He didn’t see the ghost of Aiko Kitahara again, much to his disappointment.

He did notice, however, that the feeling of unease returned as soon as they left the library. Sure now that the sensation was not his originally, but came from whatever entity was responsible for the nightmares, he tried to pay attention to it as they walked through the rooms. As far as he could tell, it remained consistent everywhere besides that one room.

Maybe if I tried to see the house’s aura… Kentakakura considered and quickly discarded that idea. He could only see auras in his other form, and he’d never tried doing only a partial transformation. If he was going to try something like that, it was better to wait until he was alone, or with just Seiko. He didn’t want to frighten Kiriko, as unflappable as the elder seemed. 

When they returned to the living room, they found Seiko and the two brothers waiting for them.

“See anything?” she asked. Kentakakura related what he’d discovered about the ghost’s identity, as well as the manufactured feeling of unease.

“Teacher,” he said, while Seiko mulled over what he’d shared, “if the ghost is Aiko, then she’s been lingering here for… a long time. Why would she start giving the living humans here nightmares now? And why is Mrs. Yamada unaffected?”

“Both good questions,” she said. “We need more info, I think. But first, come with me a second, I want to test something out.”

Kentakakura dutifully began to follow her to the stairs, only to be stopped by Seiji. “And just where are you two going?”

“Upstairs,” Seiko said.

“To do what?”

“We’re taking a look at something.”

Seiji scoffed. “Off to plant speakers and smoke machines, more like it! No, I’m coming with you, you two shouldn’t be wandering around unsuperv–”

“Mr. Yamada, with all due respect, you are not my client and this is not your house. If you want to accompany us, that’s fine, but please keep quiet and don’t get in our way.”

He spluttered in outrage, and Kiriko cut in, “Oh, let the young lady do her job, Seiji. Stay down here and spend time with your mother for a while.”

“You can leave the bag down here, kid,” Seiko said, and Kentakakura gratefully unslung the heavy bag from his shoulder and placed it by the stairs (he wasn’t sure what all it contained, but he was willing to bet her metal club was in there).

“Don’t take it personally,” she told him once they were out of earshot of the family. “There are plenty of con artists out in the world who won’t hesitate to take advantage of scared and desperate people. He’s right to be cautious.”

“...Okay, Teacher,” Kentakakura said. He still didn’t like how rude Seiji was being to her. He was about to ask her something else, but as soon as they came to the top of the stairs, Seiko stopped. Then, very carefully, turned and began counting her steps under her breath.

Baffled, Kentakakura watched her, keeping his distance so he didn’t mess up… whatever it was she was doing.

Suddenly, Seiko stopped again, turned to her left, and pointed at the wall. No, wait –it was a door. Plain and unobtrusive, he probably would have walked straight past it had Seiko not been paying it such special attention.

“What’s through there, Teacher?” he asked, coming to stand next to her.

“Oh good, you can see it,” Seiko said. “Tatsuo and Seiji walked past this door three times while we were up here and said nothing about it. Had no idea what I was talking about when I mentioned it. Hell, the only reason I know it’s there is because I’m experienced enough to notice when my attention is being diverted.”

“Diverted?” he echoed. 

“Yup. Something really doesn’t want anyone to know it’s there. But ya can’t sneak anything past this old lady, so you just remember that, Kentakakura!” She pointed at him emphatically.

“Huh?!” Where had that come from? “Teacher, what–”

Seiko sighed. “Oh, come on, kid. I ain’t mad or anything. Just know that trick doesn’t work on me. You’re not very subtle with it, anyways.”

He was seriously confused now. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Seiko stared at him. “Are you being for real right now? You don’t even know you’re doing it?”

“Doing what?!”  

“When we got here, Tatsuo and Seiji didn’t even notice you until I pointed you out to them. Why?”

“W-well, I’m just quiet–”    

She groaned, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Swear to god... You were using your aura to push their attention off of you. Apparently completely subconsciously!”

Kentakakura opened his mouth to refute her, then closed it. Had he been doing that? He would’ve noticed if he were using his spiritual power, though… right? He thought back to all the times people’s eyes just moved straight past him without seeing him. Hadn’t that even happened to Momoayase once? Back when she’d brought him home for the first time, he’d snuck up on her in the living room. She hadn’t noticed him until he said her name, even though she’d looked right at him!

Wow. That was… so lame!

He couldn’t have developed a power that was actually useful, like telekinesis or manipulating fire?! 

Actually, maybe not that last one, he thought, cringing at the memory of how many times his creche-mate Arri had used their power to singe his feathers when they were growing up.

“We’ll continue this later,” Seiko said. “Right now, we need to figure out what’s behind that door.”

“You shouldn’t go in there,” said a voice from directly behind them. Kentakakura whirled, heart pounding.

Aiko Kitahara–or rather, her ghost–stood in the corridor, frowning at them.

“Why shouldn’t we go in there?” Seiko asked, sounding as unphased as ever. “What’s through that door?”

“You two don’t belong here,” said Aiko, crossing her arms over her chest. “You better not be here to bother my little sister.”

“We don’t want to bother anybody,” Kentakakura said, completely honestly. 

“I’m sorry we have to intrude in your home, Aiko, but we’re here to help Kiriko.” Seiko crouched down to be closer to the girl’s eye level. Her voice had taken on a smoother, gentler tone, like an elder soothing an emotional hatchling. “You are Aiko Kitahara, right?”

Aiko nodded, still eyeing them with an exaggerated frown.

“My name is Seiko, and this is Ken. Tatsuo called us here because he’s worried about Kiriko.”

“I’m taking care of Kiriko,” the little girl said. “She’s my little sister, I’ve gotta look after her.”

“I see. Is that why you stayed here so long? To look after Kiriko?”

She nodded, uncrossing her arms to fidget with her clothing. “Mommy said a big sister’s gotta take care of her little sister. So I did, even after Mommy and Daddy left.”

“Well, you’re doing a really good job, Aiko. I know Kiriko really appreciates it. But something’s been happening in this house lately, and we don’t want anything bad to happen to your sister, okay? Can you–”

“You can’t take Kiriko away!” Aiko exclaimed. Kentakakura felt the air pressure in the room shift, making his ears pop.

“Nobody wants to take her away,” Seiko soothed. “We’re trying to make sure that doesn’t happen, Aiko. She wants to stay here, too.”

The girl sniffled, and all the lights flickered. “They w-were talking about it…”

“I know. But I think we both know nobody can make Kiriko do something she doesn’t want to do. Your little sister’s pretty tough. Now, I meant what I said. We want to help Kiriko stay here, and I think you can help us with that. Can you answer a few questions for me, Aiko? To help your little sister?”

Aiko nodded. “O-okay. What–”

“What on Earth is going on up here?!”

Seiji’s shout made them all jump. He stomped up the stairs, staring around wildly. “Are you fooling with the wiring?! Making the lights flicker like that, to scare my poor mother?”

Seiko groaned, heaving herself up from her crouched position. “Yamada, did I not just tell you to keep out of our way? We were making good progress, until you barged in.”

It was true, Aiko had vanished when he started shouting.

“Progress?” This was from Tatsuo, who had followed his brother up the stairs. “Do you know what’s causing all of this, then?”

“I have some ideas,” Seiko said. “I’d like to discuss them with you and your mother, but first I have a question: do either of you know where this door goes to?”

Both men blinked at her in clear confusion. 

“What door?” Tatsuo asked. He strode over to her, looking at the wall.

“This door.” Seiko leaned over and grabbed the knob, but did not turn it.

“Oh. That door. I… was there always a door here? I can’t seem to… But it must… Yes, I think it goes up to the attic. Right? Yes, that’s right! How could I have forgotten about it?"

“Of course it does. Right then, let’s go back downstairs. I need to talk to Kiriko.”  

Chapter Text

Kentakakura watched the patterns the rising smoke made in the silent living room. Seiko, Kiriko, and Seiji had all lit smoking sticks while they summarized their findings so far.

“So, let me get this straight,” Seiji said finally. “The ghost of my dead aunt has been haunting this house for over eighty years, and has only just now decided to make herself known by giving everybody besides my mother nightmares? And you expect me to believe this?”

Seiko exhaled a cloud of smoke. “Let’s not jump to conclusions, Mr. Yamada. I’m only telling you what we know for sure. The spirit of Aiko Kitahara inhabits this house, yes. And something is giving the people who sleep here nightmares, though whether that’s Aiko’s doing, I couldn’t say for sure. Maybe if we’d had more time to talk to her…” It was clear her patience with Seiji was wearing thin after he’d interrupted them upstairs.

“You don’t think Aiko’s responsible for the nightmares?” Tatsuo asked. 

“She could be. It’s certainly within the power of a well-established spirit in her territory. But your brother actually brings up a good point: why now? You said the nightmares started a year ago?”

“About… ten or eleven months ago, I think?” Tatsuo rubbed the back of his head. “I couldn’t tell you the exact date they began.”

“Ghosts aren’t like living people. They adapt very poorly to any kind of change. And even though she’s lingered in this world for so long, Aiko’s still an eight-year-old girl. For her behavior to suddenly shift like this, it makes me think something major must have happened. We figure out what, and we’re a lot closer to solving your nightmare problem.”

“What will you do then?” Seiji asked. “Exorcise her?”

“No,” Kiriko said sharply. “I don’t care if she’s a ghost, or what she’s doing. Aiko is my sister. You don’t get to throw her out of my house.” This out of everything seemed to be what finally upset the old woman.

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Seiko said, putting up her hands in a placating gesture. “We still don’t have all the information here. Like you said, Kiriko, this is your house. I won’t do anything here without your permission.”

Mollified, Kiriko settled back into her chair. She puffed on her own smoking stick, exhaling heavily. “I admit, I’m not surprised to find out Aiko’s been here all along. I have many memories of playing with her, even though I was only six years old when she died. I think I was seeing her ghost, but… I stopped eventually. And I’ve always felt safest in this house, no matter what. I can’t believe my sister would hurt me, or anyone else in this family.” 

Seiko nodded. “It’s likely that you were seeing Aiko. Children are often sensitive to spirits, but many lose that sensitivity as they get older. Ghosts linger in this world due to their regrets most of the time, but I don’t think that’s the case with your sister. She told us very specifically she was here to look after you. Aiko stayed because she loves you, Kiriko. I want to help the both of you as best I can.”   

Kiriko wiped at her eye and sniffled. “So,” she said, with her usual enthusiasm, “what is the next step, Miss Spirit Medium?”

“Can you think of anything that’s changed in the past year that might have upset Aiko? Something moved into or out of the house? Anyone who died?”

“No, nothing that I can think of,” Kiriko replied thoughtfully. “My husband passed away over a decade ago, and all my children moved out long before that.”

Kentakakura perked up, remembering. “Aiko got really upset when she thought you might be leaving, Mrs. Yamada.”

Seiko nodded. “Right. You mentioned your sons suggested putting you in a nursing home? That might be what set her off.”

“Well,” Tatsuo began awkwardly, “yes I did suggest that she stay in assisted living, or even come to my house with me and my wife, but only after this thing with the nightmares started. We knew good and well she wouldn’t agree, but if this was being caused by gas or something, I didn’t want her exposed to it.”

“If we never suggested she leave until after this started, how could it have upset your supposed ghost?” Seiji added.

“It was only a theory,” Seiko said smoothly. “There’s also the attic to consider.”

Seiji’s eyebrows furrowed. “The what?”

Kentakakura stared at him in surprise. Had he forgotten about it?

“The attic, Seiji. You were all just upstairs talking about it.” Kiriko could still remember it existed, at least.

“Yeah, that’s exactly what I’m talking about,” Seiko said, snuffing her smoking stick out in the bowl on the table. “Something is doing its best to make sure nobody goes into the attic, and I wanna know why.” 

She picked up the bag Kentakakura had left by the stairs, opened it, and withdrew her metal club.

“What are you going to do with that?” Seiji demanded. 

“It has a surprising number of uses. C’mon kid, you’re with me. We’re going up to the attic.”

+++

Back up the stairs again, but this time they had Seiji and Tatsuo in tow. The latter seemed eager to witness Seiko working, the former looked suspicious as usual. Kiriko had wanted to come too, but said she couldn’t manage the stairs anymore, what with her bad knees.

Seiko had Kentakakura lead them to the attic door, since he seemed to have no problems perceiving it. The four of them stood around it in a loose circle, not speaking. 

If he let his concentration waver, he could feel something trying to subtly push his attention away from it. His eyes would want to move to the carpet, a picture on the wall, anything except the door. Almost like two magnets with the same polarity repelling each other. But whatever was trying to distract him couldn’t hold up if he turned his full focus on it. 

This was not the case for Seiji, who was asking for the third time what they were doing up here.

Seiko just sighed, shouldering her club–or “Nessie”, as she’d referred to it. “Just open the door, please.”

Huffing, Seiji stepped forward, grasped the knob in his hand, and rattled it. “It’s locked.”

Kentakakura peered at the knob. It was smooth, and there was no keyhole in the door.

“Are you sure?” he asked.

“Well, it’s stuck, then!”

“Let the kid try.”

Seiji moved away to let him, seeming glad to put distance between himself and the door. Kentakakura took his place and opened the door easily. It swung open with a creak to reveal a staircase that clearly hadn’t seen much use recently, judging by the thick layer of dust on the steps.

He stepped through the doorway and shivered. “Teacher, it feels much worse in here,” he said over his shoulder. The unease he’d felt since they arrived doubled in strength. 

“Scare tactics,” said Seiko. “It’s not really your feeling. Keep going.”

He knew it wasn’t real, but he couldn’t shake the sense that if he went up those stairs, something awful was going to happen. Taking a deep breath, he steeled his nerves. I can’t let Seiko down. 

“Wait, the stairs might not be safe,” Tatsuo said as he put one foot on the first step. Kentakakura froze. 

Yes, what if the stairs break underneath me? But he shook that thought away. It’s not real, it’s just the fear talking. He continued slowly, taking the stairs one at a time. They creaked under his weight but seemed stable enough.

As he ascended the last step and stood fully in the attic, the fear suddenly… lifted. Kentakakura straightened in surprise.  

“Like a barrier…” he muttered. Then he called down the stairs. “Teacher, it feels normal up here!”

Seiko joined him in the attic. She’d gone up the stairs faster than he had, but he could see a drop of moisture slide down her temple as she came to stand beside him. 

Kentakakura stared around the attic. Moonlight from the one tall window illuminated a space about the same size as Kiriko’s library. Large white sheets were draped over various shapes–furniture, maybe?–scattered around the room. 

Loud panting drew his attention back to the stairs. Seiji appeared to have powered through on sheer stubbornness. He straightened up, his forehead glistening. “There. Nothing unusual up here at all!”

Kentakakura sighed quietly. “What now, Teacher?” 

“I have a theory. This house might have a ghost, but I’m not so sure Aiko Kitahara is the one doing the haunting.”

“You think it’s a separate entity?”

“Yup. Remember what I said before? Pests in the attic. Something’s got into the house, and with that layer of fear on the stairs, I’ll bet you anything this is its den.”

Kentakakura glanced around nervously. While the moonlight from the window was more than enough for him to see by, there were still plenty of hidden nooks where something might be hiding.

“Are you so sure we should be up here, then? If we confront it, it might turn aggressive.” Nothing liked having its home invaded.

“Meh, we’ll be fine. Things that mostly rely on mind tricks like this are usually physically weak. Coming at it head-on is our best bet. What all does Kiriko keep up here?” This question she directed at Seiji.

“Souvenirs, mostly,” he said. “My grandparents liked to travel, and so did Mother and Father. They brought back lots of things from their trips abroad. Furniture, artwork, and so on.”

“Anything from the past eleven months?” 

Seiji frowned. “No, they stopped going on trips a while ago, before Father got sick. Although… I don’t know, maybe Tatsuo or one of our children brought something in from a vacation?”   

Tatsuo had yet to join them up in the attic. Seiji called down the stairs to him. It sounded like they were having some sort of argument.

“He won’t come up,” Seiji said, baffled. “He says the stairs might be unstable, or the floorboards might break. This is so unlike him…”

“Leave him. The fear around that staircase is pretty potent.” Seiko grabbed ahold of the nearest sheet and pulled. A wooden chair was revealed, decorated with intricately carved patterns. She gave it a once-over before dismissing it.

“What are we looking for, Teacher?” 

“Eh, we’ll know it when we see it.” She moved on to the next covered piece of furniture.

That’s… vague. But Kentakakura was quickly beginning to understand that this was just how Seiko operated. Following her lead, he moved to the other side of the attic and began peeking under white sheets. Even Seiji joined in the search for… whatever it was. 

Most of what he uncovered was furniture. There were chairs, couches, and other curious things he would have liked to examine more closely, like the wooden carving of some kind of hooved animal. But nothing stood out to him as being supernatural in any way.

A sudden explosive noise from behind made him jump. He whirled, heart pounding, to see Seiko rubbing her nose. 

“Are you okay?!”

“Relax, kid, I just sneezed. It’s dusty up here.”

Sneezed? Was that a normal thing humans did? It sounded like it’d hurt!

Kentakakura looked around. Between the three of them, they’d uncovered everything in the attic. Nothing really stood out to him as a yokai’s hiding place

“This is pointless,” Seiji grumbled.

“Check again,” Seiko said. She opened a door on a large wooden dresser. 

Huffing, he did what she said, looking over each item he’d uncovered more thoroughly. Kentakakura was about to turn around and do the same when a thought struck him. Instead of checking furniture himself, he watched Seiji carefully.

The man went through his side of the attic methodically, checking under cushions on chairs, looking inside boxes, picking up a pile of books stacked on top of a chest and putting them back down, then moving on to the next–

Aha!

“Teacher, over here,” Kentakakura said. Seiji had completely overlooked a squat trunk shoved against the wall, partially covered by a white sheet. Even as he stared at it, he could feel the magnet-repelling sensation, trying to redirect his attention. 

“Nice work, kid,” Seiko said, coming to stand beside him. He straightened, warmth spreading through him at her praise. 

“So… what do we do with it?” Whispering was probably pointless, but being right in front of where the entity likely kept its physical body made him nervous. He could think of several yokai off the top of his head that this thing could be, and none of the possibilities were anything he wanted to have to fight. Hopefully Seiko had a plan.

“I wanna draw a barrier around it, for starters. Drag it away from the wall.” She lifted Nessie and extended its wooden writing tip.

While Seiji vehemently protested her marking up the floorboards, Kentakakura pulled the white sheet away from the trunk. It was a faded blue color, scuffed from years of use. He reached for one of the handles on its side.

A scream tore through the air.

“Okarun!”  

+++

Kentakakura barely missed slamming straight into Tatsuo as he nearly flew down the stairs.

“Young man! What was–”

He ignored the human, looking around frantically. It had been Momoayase who screamed, he was certain. He’d know her voice anywhere.

“Momoayase, where are you?!” he called.

“Okarun! Help me!” 

He pivoted in the direction her voice had come from and tore off down the hall, deaf to Seiko calling to him from the attic.

“Kid, wait, that’s not–”

“I’m coming, hold on!” he shouted. He had to get to her, he had to help her, he couldn’t–

“STOP!” A strong hand grabbed a hold of his shirt collar and yanked him to a halt. He flailed wildly, not caring who it was, only that they were preventing him from getting to Momoayase when she was in danger and needed him–

“Kentakakura!” Seiko grabbed his face in both hands and forced him to look at her. “Listen to me. That’s not Momo.”

How could she say that?! She was still calling him, crying out for help, how could Seiko be so heartless–?!

“Okarun! Help me!” He tried to pull away again.

“Hey, hey! Look at me. Calm down. Think.” Seiko’s voice was low and even. She gripped his shoulders, the contact anchoring him to the moment. “Momo didn’t come with us. We didn’t tell her where we were going. How could she be here?”

“I– I don’t–”

“Take a deep breath.”

He did, obeying even though Momoayase was still screaming. He fought off the urge to push Seiko away and tear the house apart to get to her. Another deep breath. 

“Okarun! Help me!”

It was the same, over and over again. The same words. It’s not really her.  

“It’s a scare tactic. Like the fear on the stairs. This thing is messing with your head, kid.”

And he’d fallen for it easily. Stupid, stupid, stupid!

“I-I’m sorry, Teacher, I…” Shame curled in his stomach. He’d really messed up, no way would Seiko want him as her apprentice now.  

“Hey, don’t beat yourself up about it.” She pulled his hand away from where he’d been yanking on his hair.

The entity was still screaming in Momoayase’s voice. Kentakakura covered his ears, but that did very little. The sound still tore at him, even though he knew it was fake. Seiko kept her hands on his shoulders. Her expressions were always difficult for him to read, but he thought she looked… sympathetic? 

How many times had some malicious spirit used a loved one’s voice against her? How many times had she had to hear Momoayase scream like she was dying?

The sound cut off abruptly, and he sighed in relief. 

Seiko squeezed his shoulders before letting go. “You good, kiddo?”

He nodded. Anger had stoked in his chest, replacing the shame, and he let it. How dare this thing reach into his mind and use his best friend’s voice against him? His resolve hardened. They were going to get rid of this creature, make sure it would never hurt anyone like that ever again.

“What in the hell was that all about?” Seiji demanded, apparently having followed them out of the attic, Tatsuo right behind him. “Who was screaming?”

“That was your pest,” Seiko replied. “Lots of things have the ability to mimic voices. I’m pretty sure now that you’ve got some kind of fear-eater living in your attic.”

“A fear-eater?” Tatsuo asked. “What’s that?”

She raised an eyebrow at him. “Fear-eater. It eats fear. There’s a bunch of different kinds. Rakshasa, boggarts, baku. Some of ‘em can even be helpful, but not this one. That trunk it’s made its home in, the blue one. When did it last leave this house?”

Tatsuo furrowed his brows in thought. “Blue trunk… Oh, yes, I took it with us last time we left the country, we went on a cruise. That was almost a year ago!”

“Bingo. The fear-eater must’ve hitched a ride at some point, made itself cozy in the trunk. Then when you brought it back here, it really sunk its claws in. It soaked this house in an aura of unease, and then when the inhabitants fall asleep, it gives them terrible nightmares, gorging on their fear.”

“Except for Mrs. Yamada…” Kentakakura said. Then he realized, “Oh, because of Aiko! She’s protecting her!”

“Why only her?” Seiji asked.

“She’s a ghost . They tend to have tunnel vision. But yeah, that’s why Kiriko seems immune to the unease and the nightmares.” She sighed. “Anyways, now that we know what it is, getting rid of it will be easy. We’ll bind the trunk and remove it from the house. I’ll take it to some acquaintances who deal with creatures like this all the time. Go get the bag, kid, and meet us back in the attic.”

Kentakakura nodded and obeyed her immediately, eager to make up for losing his composure. 

He was halfway down the stairs when the lights went out.

+++

He froze immediately, letting his eyes adjust. The darkness wasn’t really a problem for him, but for the humans upstairs, it would be debilitating. 

“What did you do?” demanded a voice from behind him. Aiko Kitahara stood at the top of the stairs, glaring at him. She emitted a very soft light all around her.

“Aiko!” He rushed back up the stairs, stopping when he was about at her eye level. “What do you mean? I didn’t do anything.”

She scowled and stamped her foot. “You made it mad!”

By it, he guessed she meant the fear-eater. Had it turned the lights out? Another scare tactic, most likely.

“Oh, uhh, I’m sorry. We’re just trying to–” 

“You need to leave, before you make it worse!” She sounded like she was on the verge of tears.

Kentakakura bit his lower lip. He really had no experience talking to children of any kind, but…

“Aiko,” he said, trying to mimic how Seiko had spoken to the ghost before. “I know it’s scary, but… This house is your territory. You can make the fear-eater leave, if you want to.”

It was something of a long shot. Spirits were supposed to be at their most powerful inside their territory, and the house had been Aiko’s long before the fear-eater had shown up. In theory, she should be able to drive it out.

She fidgeted with her clothes, looking away from him.

“Here, I’ll go get Seiko. Maybe she can help.” He moved around Aiko and into the hall where he’d left the humans. It was empty.

“Maybe they’re up in the attic already…” he muttered to himself, trying to ignore the lump of dread that settled in his stomach.

He made his way over to the attic door, trying the doorknob. It wouldn’t open. He pounded on the door, fear snaring his throat.

“Teacher? Are you up there? Anyone?” Silence. 

Taking a deep breath, trying not to panic, he turned back in the direction of the stairs. “Aiko, can y–”

But she was gone.

He was alone. 

+++

Don’t panic. That’s very important. Do not panic.

Kentakakura stood rooted to the spot in front of the attic door, trying to control his breathing. 

Focus, Kentakakura. What do you have?

Nothing. No, that’s not true! You have your knowledge, you have yourself!  

This creature was a fear-eater. It relied on tricks and mind games. All this was an attempt to scare him (it was working). 

He slapped his cheeks. No, no think! Remember what Seiko said!

Yokai who relied on tricks like this were often physically weak. The creature’s body was in the attic, in the blue trunk. If he could get to it, if he could kill it, all this would stop.

The attic door was just wood. He could break through it. He could do this.

Taking a fortifying breath, Kentakakura prepared to change shape.

A sound made him freeze. A rattling, wheezing groan. As though from a being whose every breath caused it pain.

His whole body prickled. It came from down the hall…

As if time had slowed to a crawl, he turned. The end of the hallway was bathed in shadows that not even his eyes could pierce. But the more he stared, the more he became certain that something was moving.

He could hear it, too. An arrhythmic thumping, dragging sound. And that awful breathing.

It came into view slowly, horribly.

First its pointed face, maw gaping open. What few teeth remained were yellow and rotted. Viscous gobs of saliva dripped onto the floor as it wheezed. Four eyes rolled in their sockets, but they were glassy, sightless.

The thing’s bulk almost didn’t fit into the hallway, the top of its horribly bent back scraping the ceiling each time it moved its gnarled forelimbs. They might have been wings once, but the leathery flesh had long since rotted away, leaving only bone and claw that reached out and dragged it slowly, inexorably forwards.

Terror, bone-deep and primal, rooted Kentakakura to the spot. He couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t tear his eyes away from the horror approaching him.

Then his lungs remembered how to expand, and he was running.

+++

When Kentakakura had been very young, his caretakers had brought him and the rest of his creche-mates to a museum. There, he had seen a taxidermy specimen of the enormous creature that had once ruled the skies of Lepidoterra, the hypsu.   

It had not been preserved very well. Its fur was patchy, its skins stretched to tearing over its skeleton. A pathetic shadow of the former apex predator. 

But to Kentakakura, it was the most terrifying thing he had ever seen. He’d had nightmares about it for years afterwards. Time and his young imagination had warped the memory of that sad, dead animal into something unnatural, monstrous.

And now it was real.

No!

Kentakakura slumped against the wall, panting. He’d bolted down the stairs and ended up in the living room. He shook his head to clear it.

That thing was not real. The hypsu were all extinct! His own people had stupidly killed them off centuries ago (and almost driven themselves to extinction as a result). And anyways, he was in a completely different solar system now. There was no possible way a hypsu could be on Earth. It was just another scare tactic. His own literal worst nightmare, turned against him.

He needed a plan. 

I wish Momoayase was here… She was the genius. The real brave one. 

“Oh! Young Mr. Ken.”

The scratchy voice snapped him out of his spiralling thoughts. Kiriko stood before him, holding her cane in one hand and a lit candle in the other.

“Mrs. Yamada!” He got to his feet quickly. Relief spread through him. He wasn’t alone!

“Did the power go out?” she asked. “I could have sworn I heard someone screaming a few minutes ago… Where are the others? Still up in the attic? ”

Kentakakura winced. Right, Seiko and the brothers were missing. Possibly trapped in the attic, or… No, he couldn’t think like that. 

First and foremost, he needed to make sure Kiriko was safe. He’d take care of that, then… then he’d think of what to do next.

“We figured out what’s causing the nightmares,” he said. “But, um, it’s more aggressive than we thought. I think it’d be best if you waited outside the house for–!”

Pressure slammed into him, making him drop to his knees. He trembled under it, gasping for breath, heart pounding in his ears. The unease he’d felt since arriving had suddenly increased to nearly unbearable terror, squeezing his chest, making him shake.

“Mr. Ken!” Distantly he could hear Kiriko talking to him, her grip on his arm. With extreme difficulty, he got to his feet.

“I… I’m okay…” He wasn’t. He could barely think like this. 

And then he heard it. The rattling breaths of the hypsu. It was coming for them.

“What’s that noise?”

No, no, no! He couldn’t let it get Kiriko too! But with the artificial terror pressing down on him like this, he was useless. What they needed was…

“Li… library…” he gasped.

“What?”

 “We need to… get to the library.”

It was the one place in the whole house the fear didn’t touch. Gritting his teeth, he took Kiriko’s arm, and together they made agonizingly slow progress towards her private library. Once inside, he slammed the door shut, and the pressure bearing down on him finally eased. He sighed in relief.

“Just what on Earth is going on?” Kiriko demanded. 

“Urgh, it’s hard to explain,” he said. He looked around the library for any possible exits. There was a single window, but it was definitely too small for either of them to fit through. They were cornered.

“Okarun!” called Momoayase’s voice from the other side of the door. “Help me!”

“Who’s that?” Kiriko asked. 

“It’s not real. The creature can imitate voices.” He glared at the door. “That’s not going to work on me again!”

In reply, something slammed against the wood, making the whole wall shudder. It was trying to get in.

“Stay behind me, Mrs. Yamada!” he said. Maybe if he held the creature’s attention long enough, she could slip past them and escape.

It slammed against the door again, the wood beginning to splinter.

A metallic scraping reached his ears, and he turned and saw Kiriko beside the fire cubby, brandishing a thin, black length of metal ending in a blunt point. There was a flame in her eyes, a burning eagerness. 

“Oh, please. I may be an old biddy, but that doesn’t mean I’ll go down easy! This thing came into my house and hurt my family. It’s not getting away with that!” 

He smiled. She was so brave. Like Seiko, like Momoayase. Maybe like he could learn to be, one day?

The door was caving in, he could see the false hypsu ’s claws scrabbling on the other side to tear it down. No time left, he needed to change now.

“Thank you, Kiriko,” he said, hearing his voice drop as his limbs began to creak and lengthen. He turned away so he couldn’t see her face while he transformed, focusing completely on the fear-eater as it brought the door down.   

He just hoped she wasn’t too scared of him after this was over. 

The door gave way before he was done, but he lunged at the creature anyway, not letting it get fully into the room. He wasn’t a fighter, not really, but latching his exterior jaws around the Acrobatic Silky’s throat had seemed to work before, somewhat, so that’s what he aimed for.

Thankfully he didn’t try to bite it with his mouth too, because if this thing tasted as bad as it smelled… 

The creature wailed, and he lashed at its face with his talons, trying to gouge out its eyes. It reared, then slammed into the floor, crushing the air from his lungs. He cried out, losing his grip on it. Once more it pushed itself up, aiming to body slam him again, but he rolled out of the way. 

On all fours, he prepared to lunge at it again. There was a shout from the side, and before he could react, Kiriko drove her metal spike into the creature’s eye.

It shrieked, flailing wildly, thankfully missing Kiriko as she hurried backwards, but smacking Kentakakura with its skeletal wing. He was slammed into the wall and slid down, dazed.

Distantly, he could see the hypsu snarl at Kiriko, a black ichor oozing from its wound. She raised her cane at it threateningly as she backed up.

“Don’t you dare hurt my sister,” said a new voice.

A small figure had appeared between Kiriko and the creature, glowing faintly.

“A-Aiko?” the old woman gasped.

The hypsu bared its teeth at the newcomer, but she didn’t flinch. Light began to gather around her form, growing brighter by the second.

“This is my house,” Aiko said. “My territory. You don’t belong here. Now get OUT!”

A miniature supernova exploded as the hypsu lunged, whiting out everything in existence for a moment. When it faded, Kentakakura lowered his hands from his face to see a pile of ash on the carpet. There was no sign of Aiko. Kiriko stood frozen against the wall, shocked but unharmed.

“Whew,” he sighed, then slid sideways as darkness engulfed his vision.

+++

He was probably only out for a minute or two this time, but he’d shrunk back into his usual shape by the time he came to.

The lights had come back on, and Kiriko was shaking his shoulder. “Ken! Ken! Are you alright?”

“I-I think so,” he replied, adjusting his glasses. All this passing out probably wasn’t good for him, though. 

Before she could say anything else, though, Seiji burst into the room, followed closely by Tatsuo and–

Kentakakura scrambled to his feet. “Teacher!”

Seiko gazed around the room, shouldering her club. “The hell happened here?” 

He explained as best he could while she inspected the pile of ash and the brothers fussed over Kiriko. 

“Are you okay?” she asked him.

“I’m fine!” he said. A little bruised, but he’d had worse. “Are you okay, Teacher? Where did you go?”

She tsk-ed. “Aiko stuck us in an endless hallway. Typical ghost trick. Her way of protecting us, I guess? Then there was a bunch of light, and we could leave.”

He glanced over at the Yamadas, then asked in a low voice, “Do you think she’s okay?”

“Aiko? Oh yeah. She might not have enough energy to materialize for a bit, but it takes more than that to burn out a ghost as strong as she is. I don’t think she’s going anywhere until Kiriko does.”

There was not much left to do after that. Seiko did a cleansing ritual on the house, and gave Tatsuo and Seiji very specific instructions for disposing of the blue trunk (there had been nothing left but ash inside of it).

Before long, they were standing on the porch of the house, saying their farewells. Even Seiji was thanking Seiko, though not as profusely as Tatsuo was (from what he could glean, he was giving Seiko a lot more money than what they had agreed upon. Surprisingly, Seiji didn’t protest at all. It seemed like getting trapped in an endless hallway and seeing the destruction in the library had cured his skepticism).

Kentakakura stood by awkwardly. He’d been avoiding Kiriko’s gaze the whole time, not wanting to face her reaction, now that she’d seen…

But the old woman surprised him yet again. She stomped straight over to him, looked him in the eye for a long moment, and smiled. 

“You’re an extraordinary man, young Mr. Ken. Take care, now.” Then she pinched his cheek and strode back inside the house.

Human elders are something else… He rubbed his cheek absently as he and Seiko departed. His spinning thoughts ground to a halt as a wad of paper bills was shoved into his face.

“Here,” Seiko said. 

He spluttered in protest. “B-but I didn’t really do anything!”

Seiko shot him an unimpressed look. “Shut up and take it, Four Eyes.”

“Yes, Teacher.” He folded the money and put it in his pocket. 

There was silence for a while as they walked to the train station. Then Seiko said, “So what do you think?”

“Hm? About what?”

She lit one of her smoking sticks and took a drag on it before answering. “You said you wanted to learn about my work. Well, this is the way I know how to teach. Tonight was a little more intense than I expected, but that fear-eater was still small potatoes, compared to what else is out there. This work ain’t for someone with only a passing curiosity. If I’m gonna be your teacher, I need you to understand that.”

Oh. This was a test. “I do! I want to be your student.”

Seiko stopped walking to look him in the eye. “Do you understand? People die in this line of work, kid. It’s damn dangerous out there. I’ve lost students before, good, smart people. Experienced colleagues, too. If you want to come with me, you will be in danger. That’s all I can guarantee.”

“I understand.” He had been in danger already, being a stranger to this world, scraping by with what little knowledge he’d scrounged. But with Seiko’s help, he had a chance. He could get stronger under her guidance, strong enough to protect her and Momoayase, repay them for all they’d done for him.

Also… it had felt good, being thanked by the Yamadas. Knowing he’d played a part in helping them, however small. Looking into Kiriko’s eyes and knowing she wasn’t afraid of him.

It had felt like he’d found something he was meant to do, finally.

He met Seiko’s gaze, unwavering. Then she nodded, and started walking again. “Alright then. Tomorrow, we start your training.”

“Training?” he asked, hurrying to catch up.

“Learning to harness your spiritual power as a medium is about honing not just your mind, but your body. God knows you’re gonna need a lot of work in that department, you’re like a damn twig! I’ll also teach you how to shield yourself better, keep fear-eaters and them from looking into your heart and finding your weaknesses. Might as well practice your distraction abilities, while we’re at it. They’ll come in handy, once you figure out how to use them intentionally.”

Kentakakura ducked his head in embarrassment at the reminder of the power he hadn’t even realized he had. “R-right.”

He couldn’t help the smile he wore the rest of the way home, though.

+++

Kentakakura slid the front door closed and paused, tilting his head to listen. It sounded like the television in the living room was on.

He peeked into the dark room. There sprawled Momoayase, fast asleep. Her limbs were spread haphazardly around her, tangled in a nest of blankets and pillows. Her mouth hung open, and she was making that snorting noise he’d heard sometimes from sleeping humans.

Something in him unclenched at the sight of her. He just stood quietly in the hall, absorbing the scene. She looked so peaceful…

Until Seiko turned the lights on. “We’re home!”

“Bwugah?!” Momoayase flailed upright. Then she focused on him, rubbing her eyes. “Oh, hey, you’re back. How’d it go?” she asked around a yawn.

“U-uhm…”

She blinked up at him, sleep-rumpled and soft. Something swelled in his chest at the sight, clawing up his throat, wanting to spill out of his mouth and… And…

He was just standing there staring at her. That probably looked really weird.

“I-I’ll tell you about it tomorrow,” he said finally. “I’m gonna go to bed now goodnight!”

“Oh, uh, okay? Goodnight.”

He practically fled up the stairs to his room and put a great deal of effort into not slamming the door behind him. Then he laid his forehead against the wood and sighed.

What was that?!    

His hand came up to his chest, clenching into a fist over his pounding heart.

Kentakakura, you big dumb dummy!

He really should have seen this coming. He’d been too caught up in the joy and excitement of making his first friend and having a human life and now…

Now he was falling in love with Momoayase.

He groaned, pushing away from the door and stripping off his nanoskin like it had personally offended him. He’d kind of wanted to take a shower, but the possibility of running into Momoayase in the hall drove that right out of his mind. 

Arranging his pillows and blankets, he tried to argue with himself. Maybe it’s not… that. Probably just… infatuation. Yeah… We’ve been through a lot together, and all this is just hormones or something…

He flopped down onto the bed and sighed. Who was he trying to fool?! Was it just hormones responsible for the way his insides squirmed every time she smiled at him? For the way he wanted to know what she thought about everything, even the most inconsequential details? For the urge he’d had downstairs to wrap his arms and wings around her, pull her close and never let go?

He really was an idiot for entertaining these ideas, even for a moment. Nothing would ever come of it. 

Why would Momoayase ever think of him that way? She was incredible. Brave, funny, strong, smart, beautiful… She could have any human she wanted (and, oh, something ugly inside him snarled at that thought), why would she bother with someone like him? 

He knew she thought he was weird. Everyone thought he was weird. Moons, even he thought he was weird sometimes.

But if she did… If she maybe ever felt that way about him…    

He shook his head violently. Here he was, laying in the dark, agonizing over his feelings, when he should be focusing on what was really important!

Tomorrow, he would throw himself into training with Seiko, and stop torturing himself over impossibilities. 

Just forget about it, Kentakakura. It’s never going to happen.    

Chapter Text

Momo woke with a shout when her nice, warm blankets were cruelly ripped away from her.

“Up and at ‘em,” said her grandmother. “Breakfast time.”

“The hell?!” Momo squinted at the alarm clock on her bedside table. “Seven a.m?! It’s still the weekend, you old bag!”

“Tough titties. Four Eyes has training, and I’ve decided that you’re gonna join him. I’ve let you slack off in your lessons, but if you’re gonna be dragging home yokai every other day, that’s gotta change.”

Momo rubbed her eyes, feeling like she was missing something. “You’re training Okarun? For what?”

“He didn’t tell you last night?” Granny raised an eyebrow. “I’ve officially taken him on as my apprentice.”

Momo blinked. No, Okarun had not told her that. He’d gone to bed pretty much immediately. And he’d had a weird look on his face…

But it was clear Granny was dead serious about this, so Momo very reluctantly rolled herself out of bed and got dressed for the day, throwing on some light athletic clothes. She supposed it wouldn’t hurt to start their workouts again. It did seem like they’d been attracting a lot of trouble recently. 

Maybe Granny would have some ideas about how to train her psychic powers, too. She remembered how strong they’d been when they’d first awakened onboard the Serpoian’s ship. It had felt like anything she imagined became reality. Since then, her powers felt much more… limited. They were still awesome, no doubt about it, but she no longer felt invincible like she had then. 

Momo made her way downstairs to find Okarun already at the table in his usual plain black outfit (she seriously needed to teach the boy how to dress).

“Good morning!” he said when she sat down. Something about his cheerfulness felt… off, somehow. Like he was trying too hard. 

“Morning.”

He practically inhaled his food, but that was normal. She thought, suppressing a shudder at the memory of that incident on his first day at school, that it might even be what his version of eating slowly looked like. 

“So, how’d the job go last night?” Momo asked. 

Okarun perked up and began blabbering all about it–the Yamadas, the little ghost girl, the fear-eating yokai that lived in their attic. He went off on several winding tangents, like he always did when he talked about things that interested him. Despite all that, Momo couldn’t shake the feeling that he was leaving something out…

“You two join me in front of the shrine when you’ve finished cleaning up,” Granny said once she was done eating. 

“‘Kay,” Momo replied. Once Granny was out the door and they were clearing the dishes, she said, “So, what’re you not telling me?”

“Huh?!” he exclaimed, far too high-pitched. 

Knew it. “There’s something you’re leaving out, I can tell! Spill it.”

He avoided her gaze, focusing way too hard on rinsing dishes. “I-I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Liar.” She bumped her shoulder into his. “C’mon, tell me.”

“It’s nothing!”

“Aha, so there is something!” 

He actually squeaked, cheeks going pink. “N-no there’s not!”

“Then how come you won’t look at me, huh?” She leaned harder into him, but he turned his head away, the stubborn jerk. Alright, if that’s how you wanna play it…

He squawked as she put him in a headlock. “Hey, let go!”

“Not ‘til you tell me what’s wrong!”

“No!”

They struggled for a while, Momo sure she was about to win, until she felt the wet drag of his tongue across her arm.

“Eww! Friggin’ nasty!” She immediately released him to wipe his spit off. “The hell was that for?!”

“You wouldn’t let go!” He was clearly pissed, his neck fluff had gone all spikey, but at least he was looking at her now.

“‘Cause you won’t tell me what’s wrong!”

He opened his mouth to retort, but suddenly deflated. His gaze dropped back down to the floor. 

Momo sighed. Not again… She crouched down to meet his eyes, but he looked away, tugging at an antennae.

“Whatever it is, I promise I won’t laugh at you.” She poked him in the leg. 

“...When we were in the Yamadas’ attic,” he muttered eventually, “there was a moment where we found the fear-eater’s hiding spot, and… Well, Seiko could have dealt with it right then, but I messed it all up.”

That’s it? Momo stayed silent, sure there was more to the story.

“The fear-eater threw its voice,” Okarun continued, “made it sound like… someone was screaming, and I ran out of the attic. Seiko chased after me. If I hadn’t… if I’d just… Everything was so much more difficult because of me–”

“Hey,” Momo interrupted. She straightened up and put a hand on his arm. “You got scared, that’s all. Granny’s not gonna hold that against you.”

He rubbed the back of his head. “I… Well, it did scare me, but it wasn’t because… It was…”

“Augh, just spit it out already!” Momo groaned, getting impatient.

“It was you!” he blurted.

“Huh?”

“I-I mean,” he stammered, hands waving as he began to speak in a rush. “It wasn’t really you, the fear-eater was just mimicking your voice, but when it started screaming I thought it was you and I panicked–”  

His mouth clicked shut, face going red. “...It was stupid of me, I know.”

Momo could feel her own cheeks heating up. Geez, that’s what he got so worked up about? 

Like she wouldn’t have reacted the same way, hearing his voice screaming out like that… Or, uh, any voice! Not just his!

“It’s not stupid,” she said eventually. She looked away from him, pulling on her own bangs. “That… probably would’ve freaked me out too, so… Don’t worry about it.”

“O-oh…”

They just stood there in the kitchen for a painfully awkward moment, not speaking. Finally, Momo couldn’t stand it anymore and bumped him with her shoulder.

“And hey, Granny wouldn’t have offered to teach you if she didn’t think you couldn’t handle it, right?”

“I… I guess…” He was smiling a little, at least. A real smile. 

That’s more like it. Satisfied, she went back to the sink. “C’mon, let’s finish up before Granny comes and yells at us for being slow.”

+++

Momo breathed in deeply, filling her lungs. It was such a nice day out, the perfect temperature. Clouds occasionally passed in front of the sun, carried on a light breeze. 

She, Okarun, and Granny sat in front of the shrine. The old woman hadn’t spoken so far, hadn’t even lit a cigarette yet. She simply held seiza position in silence, eyes closed.

“As you know,” she said at last, “my powers come from my connection to the god of this land. I tend their shrine, make offerings, and in return I am granted access to their power in order to keep the balance between the humans and spirits of this world. That’s how I do my job as a spirit medium, but it’s not the only way. You–”

She broke off. “You don’t have to take notes, kid.”

Momo glanced over at Okarun and held back a snort. Sure enough, he was sitting with his feet pressed together–toes clasped, like a human might link their fingers together–stylus poised over his space tablet. 

“I don’t want to forget anything!” Nerd.

“...Okay. As I was saying, not every spirit medium works the same way I do. Forging a bond with a god takes a lot of time and dedication. Not everyone has what it takes to keep that kind of commitment. Honestly, I don’t know that my god would accept you, even if you were to pledge yourself to their service, so we’ll skip that part of your training.”

“Is it because I’m not human?”

Granny shrugged. “Some gods are picky. I’ve heard rumors of yokai being gods’ servants, but I’ve never actually met one.”

Momo sighed through her nose. Would they ever be able to convince her that Okarun was an alien, not a yokai?

“Like I said, it’s not a requirement. Many spirit mediums choose not to tie themselves to any god. There’s pros and cons to my arrangement, as you know. I pack a bigger punch than your average medium, but I need to stay within Kamigoe City to do it. Lots of my colleagues rely on their own powers to see them through.”

Momo blinked in surprise. “Their own powers? Powers like mine?” Maybe another medium out there had psychic abilities like she did!

“Eh, it varies. Some do have innate spiritual abilities, some collect magical artifacts to give them a boost, some just know the lore really well. I haven’t come across anything quite like what you can do before, but who knows? We–” 

She broke off again, and sighed. “You don’t need to raise your hand.”

Momo couldn’t contain a small snicker this time, seeing Okarun with his hand in the air.

He shot her a frown before asking, “Well, I was just wondering… what’s the difference between a spirit and a god?”

Granny raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean?”

“Well, they both have territories, right? And I’ve read about humans who became gods! Like how some human spirits can become yokai. So… How do you distinguish? Is it a matter of power, the size of their territory?”

Huh. Now that he said it, Momo realized that there were a lot of similarities between gods and yokai, at least in the stories Granny had told her. Both were powerful, both were dangerous. Both could be helpful or harmful to humans on a whim. 

Where exactly was the line between the two… if one even existed? 

“Ehh… that’s a very philosophical question, kid,” her grandmother said. “I don’t know if I’m the right person to ask. Sorry.

“But we’re getting off-topic. What I’m aiming to do is teach the two of you how to better understand and harness your spiritual abilities, and to train the spirit, you need to also train the body. Get up.”

They did so, and Granny eyed Okarun’s all-black outfit. 

“You might wanna change, Four Eyes. We’ll be working up a sweat today.”

“Oh, uh…” He glanced between her and Momo. “What should I…?”

Granny waved a hand. “Whatever’s most comfortable. Don’t overthink it, kid, you’re not gonna scandalize us.”

With that, Okarun stripped off his nanoskin entirely, leaving it and his space tablet on the porch. Momo tried not to stare at him as he jogged back over (the fact that he was technically naked now was still weird to think about), but couldn’t help noticing that his feathers had a slight iridescence in the sunlight.  

“Alrighty, then.” Granny stood, hefting a large paper fan. “Let’s get this show on the road.”

+++

Okarun, as it happened, did not work up a sweat. It didn’t seem like he even could sweat. What he did do was pant rapidly when he started exerting himself. Sort of like a dog, though with less tongue-lolling. But his skin remained totally dry.

Momo could not help but be a bit jealous, adjusting her sweat-soaked sports bra. She hadn’t thought she’d been that out of shape, but she must have lost a lot of ground when she quit training for the track team.

Either that, or her grandmother was trying to kill them.

“Stand up straight!” Granny exclaimed for the thousandth time, snapping her paper fan against Okarun’s shoulder. 

“Yes, Teacher!” he yelped, for the thousandth time. 

Pushups, situps, squats, jogging. Granny had been putting them through their paces without mercy, aggressively correcting Okarun’s posture whenever he began to sink into his usual slouch.

“Pathetic,” she declared. “I’ve really got my work cut out for me. Alright, take five.”

“Five of… what…?” Okarun wheezed.

Momo managed to gasp out, “Means… take a break…”

They collapsed to the ground in unison.

+++

Granny finally called off the physical training after a short lunch break. Momo, more puddle than person, flopped onto the porch in relief. Okarun was not much better off. He was faster in general than her, but didn’t appear to have a lot of stamina–when they weren’t running for their lives, at least.

“So dramatic,” Granny sighed. “I’m not being half as hard on you as my teacher was with me.”

Momo just groaned, unable to come up with a snarky response as she tried to melt through the wooden boards.

“Sit up, Four Eyes,” Granny said, sitting seiza next to him.

“Yes, Teacher,” he said, mimicking her posture as best he could. To his credit, he hadn’t complained a single time–not about the gruesome training, or being constantly smacked with Granny’s paper fan whenever his posture started to slip.

“I want you to try activating your distraction ability on purpose.”

His what?  

“What’s this now?” Momo demanded, lifting her head up to look at them.

“Oh! Um, well, last night I discovered that I can push people’s attention off of me with my aura.” Okarun rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. “Mr. Tatsuo and Mr. Seiji didn’t even realize I was there until Teacher pointed me out.”

Momo stared at him. “So it’s like… invisibility?”

“Not quite,” Granny said. “More like unnoticeability. People still see him, but their attention slides right off him. Like the fear-eater in the attic. If you can master it, even people looking right at you will have no memory at all that you were there.” 

 Momo considered that, running through certain events in her mind. “...Huh. I guess that explains it.”

“Explains what?” Okarun asked.

“Well,” she said, sitting up, “remember when we were running away from Acro-Silky, and we hid in that building? I saw your aura kinda… stretch out, I guess? And she didn’t find us, I figured you did something to help us hide. I meant to ask about it.”

“Why didn’t you then?!” His feathers fluffed out in disgruntlement.

Momo shrugged. “I forgot. Oh, don’t give me that look! A lot of stuff happened after that!”

Okarun settled back into seiza posture, still pouting. “Well, I wasn’t doing it consciously. And I have no idea how to make myself do it.”

“But if you figure it out, it’s like you’ve got a built-in stealth mode! That’s pretty cool!”

The last of his frown smoothed away at that. “You think so?” 

“Totally!” Half formed schemes of the cool sneaky spy shit they could pull off flitted through her mind. 

“Hmm. I have some idea of where to start,” said Granny. She guided Okarun through focusing his ki, a familiar ritual Momo had done throughout childhood.

“Now I want you to put yourself back in the moment you were running from the Acrobatic Silky. Remember how you needed to hide, remember how your lives depended on not being seen.”

A crease appeared between Okarun’s eyebrows. As Momo watched, his aura flared, and began to stretch. She experienced a moment of vertigo as her eyes wanted to drift away from him. She blinked, but the feeling persisted.

Eventually, his aura wavered, then returned to its normal shape as a red flickering flame. His eyes blinked open. “Did… did I do it?”

“You definitely did something,” Momo confirmed. “It was like… you know when you look at an optical illusion, and your eyes go all wonky? It felt like that.”

“Uh…” It did not look like he knew what she was talking about.

“Keep it up,” Granny said. “You’ve got the feeling. Try and maintain it.”

They repeated the exercise several more times, until Okarun slumped over, panting. “I don’t think I can take any more, Teacher.”

Granny stood up and stretched. “It’s a start. You’re on the right track now, it’ll only get easier with time and practice. Just keep in mind that yokai and spiritually sensitive people will be much harder to divert than normal humans, even once you do master your abilities. Now go clean yourselves up, dinner will be soon. You two did well today.”

Momo crawled over to where Okarun lay sprawled. “You good?”

“Yeah, just tired.”

“Then I get to shower first!” Momo said, popping up to run inside. If Okarun made any protest, she didn’t hear it.

+++

Momo was pleased to see that Okarun changed into the sweatshirt and pants she’d given him after they were both clean. The green really did suit him. 

After dinner, she was too tired to do anything even remotely active, and she figured he felt much the same (a total bummer. She wanted to go flying again!). Granny immediately took over the living room TV to watch Bakatono, so she suggested watching some movies in her room. 

“I uh, I don’t know any human movies,” he said, when she asked what he wanted to watch. “What’s your favorite?”

Momo lit up. Oho, he’s in for it now!

Time for some important cultural lessons! But they had to do it right. He needed the full experience. 

She instructed him to bring some pillows and blankets from his room while she grabbed some candy from downstairs.

“Like a… nest?” he asked, eyes going strangely wide when she told him what to do with them.

“Uh, yeah sorta? Just spread ‘em out on the floor so we’ll be comfy.”

His neck feathers fluffed out at that, his wings fluttering slightly, still with that weird look on his face…

Momo was just starting to wonder if she’d said something wrong when Okarun suddenly exploded into motion, hurrying towards his room.

“Uh…” Feeling like she was missing something, Momo went down to the kitchen and retrieved a (somewhat) reasonable amount of snacks. She got them back up to her room to find Okarun in the middle of arranging pillows. But he got all huffy with her when she tried to help!

“I’m not finished yet!”

“Okay, okay!” Momo threw up her hands in surrender. Leaving the weird bug-bird to it, she sorted through her Ken Takakura DVDs. She eventually settled on 47 Ronin to watch first. It wasn’t her favorite, the political stuff was honestly kind of dry. But Mr. Ken was great in it, of course, and she knew she wouldn’t get annoyed if Okarun kept interrupting to ask questions.

By the time she’d made her choice, Okarun had finally finished with the blankets. He stood beside his creation, hands clutching the front of his sweatshirt. He stared at her expectantly, like he was waiting for her approval.

Momo tried not to laugh. It was honestly cute, how serious he looked. Like he was going to be graded on how well he did a movie night. He was like that about most human experiences he tried.

She gave him a thumbs up. “Yeah, good job.”

It must have been the right thing to do, because he straightened up with a big smile (always close-lipped, though. He hardly ever showed his teeth. Maybe he worried his fangs would creep her out? They were the least weird thing about him, honestly). 

After she put in the DVD, Momo turned off the lights with her powers and flopped down onto the pillows–and yeah, he had done a good job, it was super comfy. While she explained the basics of the plot, Okarun settled himself down very carefully beside her. 

As the opening credits played, he sampled some of the candy she’d brought. Momo burst out laughing when he tried a sour gummy and his entire face scrunched, even his antennae.

“Is it supposed to taste like that?!” 

She nodded through the lingering giggles. “Yeah! What, you don’t have sour candy on your planet?” 

He shook his head. “ ‘Sour’. ‘Spicy’... Only humans would think to eat things that make your mouth hurt on purpose.”

Man, if that was true, then alien food must be boring as hell! No wonder he got so into his meals. Dude was seriously deprived. 

“Want some more?”

“Yes.”

+++

Momo knew 47 Ronin well enough that she only needed to pay it half her attention to answer Okarun’s questions–and she was right, there were a lot.

He didn’t understand the feudal system at all. The concept of lords and emperors seemed completely alien-ha!–to him. Momo had the feeling he wasn’t going to like the end of the movie very much. Oh well.

She interrupted herself mid-explanation when Mr. Ken came on screen to point him out, excitedly tapping his foot (the skin there was gray and scaly, like a bird. He also only had four toes that each ended in a curved talon–three facing forward, one facing backward).

As the movie progressed, he asked less and less questions as he got absorbed in the plot. Momo took the opportunity to just… look at him.

His red eyes reflected the light of the screen back, like animal eyeshine. Spooky, but also kind of cool. 

He sat with his hands in his lap, knees elevated slightly, very close to her but not quite touching. His wings were tucked in against his sides so he wasn’t sitting on them. Something about his posture seemed rigid. Like he wasn’t fully relaxed, even now.

He was a jumpy guy. Always twitching, eyes and hands and antennae almost constantly in motion. Always on guard. Was every Virbilaetian like that, or was it just him?

But the whole point of this movie night was to relax after such a grueling day. She wanted him to be comfortable!

Maybe if I…

Okarun, for all his jumpiness, never objected to physical contact. He never shied away whenever she bumped into him or slung her arm around his shoulders, or held on tight when he flew with her. His body was a bit cooler than a human’s, she’d noticed. 

He clearly had no problem with touch. But he was never the one to initiate. Maybe he was just shy? Unsure? Not wanting to cross a human boundary he didn’t understand?

Very casually, Momo leaned forward to grab some candy, then scooted herself over as she leaned back, closing the distance between them.

Her shoulder found his, her arm tucking in next to his wing (they were, surprisingly, the warmest parts of him), her knee bumping his leg.

Super casually.

He stiffened at first, and she saw him glance at her out of the corner of her eye. But then, he relaxed. Really relaxed. Even leaned into the contact, just a bit.

(She gave herself a mental fist-bump. Mission accomplished. )

Soon, she became aware of a small noise, separate from the movie sound effects. It was coming from Okarun. Unsurprising, really. He made a lot of weird noises.

Trills, chirps, chitters, clicks, shrieks. He even hooted while he was sleeping. This one was different from the other sounds she’d heard from him, though. It sort of rolled out from deep in his chest. She could feel the vibration of it through his arm.

Maybe like a… coo? If that was the right word? Whatever it was, it sounded nice. Content.

It grew louder as she nuzzled in closer, and she smiled.

+++

Kentakakura felt lighter than air, buoyed through the next day of school by the golden glow of perfect happiness in his chest.

He hadn’t felt this good since… since… Well, ever! Certainly not since coming to Earth. 

It was hard to believe that just a week ago, he’d been barely scraping by, completely on his own. And now? Seiko had officially accepted him as her apprentice! He was one of them now, part of the family, for an apprentice always joined their master’s caulder. Sure, most young adults left after their apprenticeships were done, but it wasn’t unheard of to stay with your master’s caulder. Seiko wouldn’t mind, he was sure, if he made himself useful enough.   

For now, though, he was Kentakakura vren Ayase! Even if he only called himself that in the privacy of his own head. Just thinking the name made him want to trill with joy! 

He was so happy, he couldn’t even complain about the ache in his limbs he’d woken up with from the previous day’s training session. 

Momoayase could, though. And she had. A lot.   

A goofy smile spread across his face at the thought of her. 

Logically, he knew she couldn’t be aware of what it meant, asking him to build her a nest for just the two of them. And then to just sit there all night, leaning against him in a way that would barely be perceived as friendly, in his culture? Coming from another Virbilaetian, it would have been a snub at worst, horribly teasing at best. 

But sitting so close to her last night was wonderful. A soothing balm to the lonely ache in his chest.

Even though it hadn’t meant… what he wanted it to mean.

Still, he tucked the memory of that night into his heart, treasured and secret, just for him.

He knew humans didn’t touch the way his people did. Even for humans friendly with one another, physical contact was limited, and they didn’t seem to groom each other at all. They seemed so… cold and distant, sometimes.

Momoayase was an anomaly, in this instance. In a good way, of course! He liked whenever she bumped his shoulder, or slung her arm around him. It made him realize how much he missed being touched.

Maybe, now that they were family, it would be okay to initiate more physical affection? Ask her to preen him, even? That would be amazing, even though she didn’t have feathers, so he couldn’t reciprocate in exactly the same way. He could brush her hair, maybe?  

He just… he wasn’t sure what the limits were. He didn’t want to make her uncomfortable, like with the clothes thing. The idea of crossing some line, of making her pull away, was terrifying.

He would figure it out, though. There was time. He would work hard, learn how to be the best friend he could for Momoayase, the best apprentice for Seiko.

For his caulder, his family, he’d do anything.

+++

When the lunch break came, Kentakakura rose from his seat, eager to find Momoayase and go up to their usual spot on the roof.

As he stepped out of his classroom, however, a flash of pink from the corner of his eye caught his attention. He turned, and his good mood popped like a bubble.

Aira was walking in his direction, scanning the crowd of students as though looking for something. Or someone.

He cursed silently. What was she doing over this way? She couldn’t be looking for him, could she? Him, or Momoayase? Something to do with her strange delusions about them trying to destroy the world, or whatever it was? 

Moons, he really did not want to deal with that right now.

Maybe he could sneak away, then circle back around and meet Momoayase on the roof? 

Oh, and it would probably help if he…

Reaching inward, to his spiritual energy the way Seiko had taught him, Kentakakura focused on his need to go unnoticed. It didn’t really make him feel any different, but each time he tried this yesterday, Momoayase had told him his aura stretched out like what she’d seen when they’d been hiding from the Acrobatic Silky–even if he couldn’t seem to avert her attention anymore. Not that he would want to! 

He moved carefully through the halls, being extra careful not to bump into anyone, since they couldn’t perceive him. 

Once out of the main hallway, he risked a glance over his shoulder– augh, she was still following him! Apparently he wasn’t very good at this distraction thing, yet.

He picked up his pace, all but running through the halls in an attempt to lose her. Only when he got outside and around the side of the building did he stop, peering around the corner to see if she’d followed him.

No sign of her. He sighed in relief. He’d lost her.

“Takakura!”

Kentakakura shrieked and whirled around. Aira had somehow gotten behind him!

“O-oh, Miss, uhh…” He realized he didn’t actually know her surname. 

“...Aira,” he finished lamely. “Um, is there something I can help you with?”

“You’re a demon,” she said, approaching him. 

Oh great, not this again.

“I’m not a demon,” he said, but she continued on like she hadn’t heard.

“And yet, I’ve seen that you still have some good left in you. Some small piece of humanity.”

“No, because I’m not a human either. Look, I really don–” He squawked as she grabbed his shoulders.

“So it’s your duty, Takakura!”

“Huh?!” He struggled, but she had a very firm grip.

“It’s your duty to humanity! You must tell me what Momo Ayase is planning!”

“What are you talking about?! We’re not demons, she’s not planning anything!”

Aira closed her eyes, still not letting go of his shoulders. “I see. Her spell on you is just too strong.”

She opened them again, her expression full of determination. “Don’t worry, Takakura! I’ll free you from her seductive enchantment! Just hold still…”

Aira’s hands moved from his shoulders to his cheeks, then closed her eyes, leaning her face towards him, lips slightly parted.

Oh, ew! Was she trying to do that face-biting thing humans did sometimes?! 

Kentakakura shoved her head back, unable to contain his cry of disgust. No thank you! That was one human experience he could live without!  

“Wha–?! What’s the matter with you?” Aira demanded, holding her face as she regained her balance.

“What’s the matter with me?! You’re the one trying to… to… attack me!” He backed away, but she just got closer.

“I’m trying to break this spell that Ayase has you under! It’s obvious that she’s used her evil powers to seduce you over to her side. But everyone knows that true love’s kiss will break all evil curses!”

“‘True love’s’…? What?!” This human had lost her mind. And she kept following him when he tried to back up. Honestly, he could just fly away if he really needed to, but he was worried about someone else seeing him.  

“Takakura… I know that I’m a human, and you’re a demon, and you’re trying to destroy the world for Ayase…”

“I’m not!”

 “I’ve been trying to deny it, but… I’ve never felt like this before! And I can tell you feel the same!”

“No, I don’t!”

Aira lunged for him, trying to grab his face again. “Quit resisting and let me kiss you! The guy has an obligation to accept after the girl confesses!”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about! Have you been possessed, or something?! Please get ahold of yourself!”

They grappled for a moment, until Aira swept his leg out from under him. He squawked as they tumbled to the ground. Somehow, he ended up on his hands and knees above her. She stared up at him, then closed her eyes and puckered her lips.

Kentakakura grimaced and cringed away. A sound caught his attention, and he looked up to see Momoayase staring at them, open mouthed.

+++

What. The. Fuck.    

Momo had been looking high and low for Okarun after he’d gone and wandered off again, even bought some pampy for them when she passed the school store, and what had she found?

Him, making out with that Aira Shiratori skank behind the school!         

“You… little turd.”

Not her best insult, but it was all she could get out past the lump in her throat and the ringing in her ears.

Okarun leapt up from where he’d been hovering over that pink-haired bitch, stammering, but Momo couldn’t stand to look at his stupid face anymore. She turned on her heel and marched away, not even bothering to pick up the cartons she’d dropped.

“Momoayase, wait!” Okarun called, but she kept walking.

“If you wanted to go make out with that skank, you could’ve at least given me a heads-up so I didn’t waste time looking for you,” she snapped. 

Yeah, that was why her throat felt tight and her eyes were prickling. Not because of… 

“I-I wasn’t, we–she–”

“Oh, save it! I don’t want to hear your excuses!”

“But I–”

“I said, shut it! You wanna ditch me, you go ahead!”

“No, I don’t want to–to ditch you, I–”

Momo scoffed. She couldn’t stand here anymore, couldn’t listen to him, couldn’t look at him. “Whatever. Go have fun your skank girlfriend, I don’t–”

“Momo, will you please just listen to me?!” He caught up with her and grabbed her hand. “I can explain everything, but you need to let me!”

She yanked her hand away. “What’s to explain? I don’t care why you were making out with that skank!”

Okarun threw his hands up in exasperation. “I don’t even know what that means!” 

“What? Skank?”

“No! The other thing!”

Her rage stuttered. “...Making out?”

“Yes! I don’t know what that means, and I don’t know why you’re angry about it!”

“I’m not…” Momo shook her head. “It means you were kissing her.”

Okarun wrinkled his nose. “Is that the… face-biting thing?”

Momo gaped at him. No way. He’s joking… right?      

“You don’t… You don’t know what kissing is?” Oh god. Oh god, oh god, ohhh god I am such an asshole!

“I mean, I’ve seen humans do it before… And I think Aira tried to do it to me, but I didn’t want her to!”

“You… you didn’t kiss her?” Her brain kept catching on that crucial detail, for some reason.

“No! It looks unsanitary.”

“Jerk!” Momo exclaimed, with a hint of hysterical laughter. “It’s nice if you do it with someone you like! And there’s no biting!” Usually…

She covered her burning cheeks with her hands. “God… What were you doing back there with her anyways?”

Okarun told her how Aira had come looking for him during break, how he’d tried to avoid her, and how she’d cornered and tackled him.

Yeah… she was gonna have to kill Aira Shiratori if she ever saw her again.

“Dammit, she’s still on that demon thing?” She tugged on her bangs, staring at her feet. “...I’m sorry I yelled at you. I… that wasn’t cool.”

“O-oh it’s okay. I’m just glad… we can move past it and be friends again…”

It wasn’t okay. Geez, Momo knew she had a temper, but that had been… really bad. It made her feel gross. She wanted to forget about it as soon as possible.

“So…” she said, looking up at Okarun. “Virbilaetians don’t kiss, huh? What do you do, then?”

“Um, what do we do… what?”

“Oh, you know! What do you do to show somebody you like them?”

She laughed at the blushing, stuttering mess he became at that question, then grabbed his arm and pulled him along so they could finish the lunch break at their spot on the roof.         

Chapter Text

Kentakakura moved his pencil aimlessly across the page of his notebook. He was supposed to be taking notes, but he just could not make himself focus on the lesson. His mind was… elsewhere. To the events of the lunch break, specifically.

He was confused. Momoayase was being confusing. 

She’d gotten really angry when she thought he and Aira had been doing that kissing thing. It was almost like… like she’d been jealous that he was sharing a romantic gesture with someone.

But it couldn’t be that. She had told Miko and Kei very firmly that they weren’t romantic partners. And he was fine with that! Just being her friend, enjoying her platonic affection, was enough for him, really! 

It was hard, though, because by Virbilaetian customs, she’d been courting him almost since they met. Sharing food, giving him gifts, defending him when they were in danger, asking him to make a nest for them… And that one time she’d pressed her cheek against his—well, to his exterior jaw. Close enough.

Sure, they were doing things completely out of order–they hadn’t even preened each other yet! Even casual acquaintances preened. Though he was sure any tsire would probably be utterly charmed by the sheer force of her personality, despite the clumsy wooing.

He kept trying to tell himself that she didn’t know what she was doing, but his heart didn’t care. Couldn’t be satisfied with what he already had. It just devoured every scrap of affection she gave and selfishly cried out for more.   

The right thing, the honest thing, would be to come right out and tell her. How he felt, how she kept making it worse by flirting with him, intentionally or not.

And then she’ll get uncomfortable and never want to touch me ever again.

The point of his pencil snapped, and he sighed. There was the crux of his problem–he was too much of a coward to tell her the truth. The slightest possibility of going back to how it was before–untouched and alone–made a vise of panic close around his chest.

But… he didn’t know how long he could keep this up. Lying to her… and to himself. Pretending that this longing in him would go away, if he just pushed it down hard enough.

He’d promised himself he would be the best friend he could, hadn’t he? And best friends were honest with one another. If he couldn’t do that, he didn’t deserve to have Momoayase as his friend in the first place.

He just hoped she wouldn’t hate him after–

Something in the air shifted, and Kentakakura stiffened a split-second before the lights went out.

+++

Momo had gone into the science lab absolutely determined not to look at the living model at all. And she was successful–but only because the damn thing wasn’t even there in the first place!

“Yeah, didn’t you hear?” Miko said when she mentioned it. “It went missing over the weekend. The teachers think one of the upperclassmen stole it as a prank, but so far nobody’s fessed up.”

More like it up and walked away on its own… Maybe Okarun had spooked it just as much as it had spooked him.

But man, not having a phone anymore sucked. She missed being able to text her friends after class, and she was missing out on all the juicy gossip! Maybe she ought to get a part-time job and get a new one… But, ugh, with the training Granny had them doing now, a job would take up what little free time she had left! Lame!

Momo tried to put her woes aside and focus on the lesson. They watched a video about mantis shrimps, and she covertly stuck a ruler into the tank of the live specimen, jumping when the little creature punched it hard enough to leave a spider web of cracks in the plastic. Cool.

“Man, I feel ya, little guy,” she said to the multicolored crustacean. “Sometimes I feel like I gotta haul off and punch something, too.” There’d been multiple instances of that feeling in the past week, especially. 

“Girlfriend’s talkin’ to the shrimp…” Kei muttered.

Momo’s face went hot. Whoops, she’d said that out loud.

“You seem kinda distracted, Momo,” Miko said, leaning in close so the teacher wouldn’t hear them whispering. “Did like, something happen with your bae again?”

“No,” she hissed, a little too quickly. They didn’t need to know about that incident with Aira behind the school. Thinking about the way she’d overreacted still made her insides twist. She added hurriedly, “And for the last time, Okarun and I aren’t dating!”

“Uh huh,” Kei said, raising an eyebrow. “Okarun, who you’ve been spending every lunch break with lately, even though you literally live with the dude, is not your boyfriend. Sure.”  

“That’s–! He, he just doesn’t know anyone here yet, is all. He doesn’t have anybody else to sit with.”

“And that’s why you two sneak off alone, instead of bringing him to eat with us?”

“I… It’s…”

The reason they went up to the roof by themselves was because Okarun needed to stretch his wings out, but of course she couldn’t tell them that. A good excuse wouldn’t come to her though, so Momo said nothing. Her cheeks burned while her friends smirked, taking her silence as an admission. Huffing, she turned back to the video, trying to ignore a twinge of guilt. She never used to keep things from Miko and Kei before…

It wasn’t that she didn’t trust them. She did! But Okarun’s whole alien deal was his business. So, for him, she had to go on letting the girls think they were canoodling in private.

What a pain, Momo thought as her stomach fluttered.

Kei patted her on the arm. “Don’t worry, girl, we–”

She never got to hear how that sentence ended, because Kei blinked out of existence. 

“The hell?!” Momo nearly fell out of her chair in shock. She jumped up and looked around. The entire classroom was empty! She ran to the science lab door and flung it open.

Darkness.

The windows were all pitch black, the hallway just as empty as the lab.

“Shit,” Momo muttered. The whole situation was familiar in a deeply unpleasant way. She approached the nearest window and attempted to pry it open–no good.

“Damn it!” She smacked the window pane in frustration, exhaling a plume of white fog. “Huh?” 

Is it getting colder?

It wasn’t just her imagination. The temperature had definitely dropped since she’d left the classroom, making goosebumps appear on her exposed legs. 

“Wonder if Okarun’s dealing with this too,” she said aloud, just to fill the eerie silence with something. “Or maybe, I’m the only one…”

Well, standing around was getting her nowhere. She needed to find Okarun and figure out how to get out of this weird empty place. But as Momo turned to make her way back to her classroom, a sound from the end of the hall made her pause.

It was a slow, rhythmic creaking, followed by a heavy thump. Like the footsteps of something huge.

The sound was growing steadily louder, and Momo ducked back into the science lab, peeking around the doorframe to try and catch a glimpse at whatever was approaching. She seriously doubted it was going to be something friendly.

A hulking humanoid shadow came into view, each movement accompanied by that almost mechanical creaking noise. It shambled down the hall, and as it came to a halt, it turned in her direction.

Momo ducked back, tucking herself down against the wall. Had it seen her? She’d glimpsed a pair of white lights in its head where eyes would be, framed by shaggy hair. Just what was this thing?

A hum began to build in the air, a vibration Momo felt in her teeth and down deep in her bones. All the hairs on her body stood up, and she threw herself flat on the ground seconds before a beam of white light exploded through the walls. It went on forever–or just several seconds–before finally dissipating. 

The heat was scorching, and Momo gagged on the smell of burning plastic, wood and metal. She didn’t dare move. Eventually, the creaking footsteps started up again, thankfully getting further away from her.

She waited until she could no longer hear them before she pushed herself up off the floor. Gawking at the destruction the creature’s laser had left, Momo couldn’t help but wonder where the hell Okarun was.

+++

A high-pitched scream sounded from somewhere outside the classroom, and Kentakakura threw open the door and ran into the darkened hallway.

“Hello?!” someone called. “Where is everybody?!”

“I’m here!” he answered, rushing over to find– oh. It was Aira.  

“Takakura?” she gasped. “What’s going on? Where’d the sun go? Why is it so cold?”

She was right, it had gotten colder since he’d left the classroom. Their breaths were steaming in the air in front of them. 

He considered her. Honestly, he was still kind of upset with Aira after the kiss incident, but she looked so scared, he couldn’t bring himself to just leave her.

“Hang on–did Momo Ayase do this?” she asked suspiciously.

Kentakakura sighed. Maybe I should reconsider that…

“Come on, let’s go find her,” he said, rather than argue.

They made their way to Class B, and he slid the door open. 

“Momoayase? Are you in here?” But there was no one. 

He grimaced. The missing people, the darkness–he had a sneaking suspicion he knew what was causing all of this. 

A sound like an explosion made him and Aira jump. It shook the building’s foundations, then died away.

“Wh-what was that?” Aira asked, voice shaking.

“I don’t know…” Something bad, he was sure.

“Okay, you need to tell me what’s going on. Is this some kind of trap you and Ayase set for me?”

“Of course not!” Kentakakura exclaimed. Why did she assume everything was about her? Well, like it or not, Aira was involved now. As reluctant as he was, she should know the truth. “Momoayase and I have experienced something like this before, though. The sky went black, and a huge wall appeared, trapping us.”

“What did you guys do to get out?”

“Oh, well we had to kill the alien, but then everything went back to normal.”

“Alien?” she repeated, raising an eyebrow. “Is that a joke? Are you messing with me right now?”

“No!” He sighed, adjusting his glasses nervously. “Aliens are very real. I should know, because…” Oh, this was awkward. He’d never actually had to directly tell a human his origins before…    

“Huh? Because why?”

“...Because I am an alien.” 

Aira blinked at him. “You… But… Then… Then are you and Ayase about to invade and take over the world?!”

Kentakakura groaned. This was going very poorly.

“We don’t want to take over the world! I don’t even think these aliens want to do that. They usually just abduct humans to experiment on–”

Movement from beside him made him break off. A figure had appeared beside them, with muscular limbs and a wide upper body. Two short antennae sprouted from their dish-shaped head, and they were shifting from foot to foot, arms held in front of them defensively.

“Chiquitita, you have a dream…” they hummed. They darted forwards, lashing out at them–fast, but Kentakakura was faster. He grabbed Aira and leapt backwards, already halfway through with his change (he was definitely getting faster at it, at least).

The hostile alien settled back into a defensive stance, still singing to themself, and Kentakakura could see eyes on the end of their antennae glaring at him. He hissed in response, a cloud of white steam pouring out from behind his mandibles.

This is such a… what’s the word? A “drag”? Yes, such a drag.  

Still cradling Aira, he turned away from the alien and took flight–not easy in this cramped hallway, but every bit of speed he could muster counted.

“W-wait, we’re running away?!” Aira demanded.

Kentakakura clicked in irritation. What was it with Earth rhetsire being so eager to fight things that clearly wanted to kill them? She didn’t even have any powers to back her up!

“Can’t fly well in here, Aira,” he replied. “You’re weighing me down. And it’s still getting colder.”

“Hey, don’t comment on my weight like that! And don’t go using my given name so casually!”

“I don’t even know your surname! What else am I supposed to call you?” he snapped. Then he sighed. He shouldn’t speak to her that way, no matter how annoying she was. “Look, we need to find Momo and–” 

Something struck him, sending him crashing to the floor. Aira flew from his grip and rolled, crying out. Kentakakura tried to rise, but an invisible force held him in place, crushing him.

Just like on the Serpoians’ ship… I can’t move at all! He managed to open his eyes, and hissed at the three figures standing around him, with their bulbous heads and eerie smiles, all identical besides their eye color. 

“Not you again,” he groaned. He hated being right.

“Nice to meet you, Virbilaetian,” one of the Serpoians said.

“H-hey,” came a shout from out of Kentakakura’s view. It was Aira. Why was she still here, and not running away? “Leave him alone! Face me, if you dare!”

“Aira, run!” he ground out. “They abduct humans to experiment on!”

One of the Serpoians gestured in Aira’s direction, and she was sent flying down the hall by psychokinetic force. She did not get up.

“This void is calibrated so only beings with high spiritual power may enter.”

“Is the apparatus malfunctioning?” 

“We have returned for your banana organ, Virbilaetian,” a Serpoian informed him, the one with green eyes. “We want it.”

“We want it. We want it,” the other two intoned.

Kentakakura hissed as he struggled. “What do you want with mine?!”

“We have long been aware of your kind’s mastery over spiritual energy. But since you always travel in groups, an opportunity to study you has not arisen.”

Meaning an opportunity to abduct one of us, he thought bitterly. Serpoians were so infamous for their vile experiments that even Virbilaetians, who enjoyed friendly relations with most everyone, avoided them at all costs.

“But you are an anomaly. You are all alone. We wish to secure your abilities.”

“We will experiment on you.”

“And transplant your abilities into ourselves.”

“But my powers are weak! I’m a runt, my only skills are hiding and running away!” It pained him to admit, but it was true. And he wasn’t even good at that –the Serpoians had still caught him.  

Heedless of his protests, the Serpoians used their psychokinesis to lift him into the air. His nanoskin melted off him and pooled on the floor.

“Hey! I need that!” 

“Let us proceed.”

“And perform the operation.”

“We will now gently extract your banana,” Multiple mechanical arms wielding surgical tools emerged from their trousers.

Kentakakura screeched and struggled in midair. He’d had nightmares about this scenario. “No! I don’t want to be dissected!”

Suddenly, a whirlwind came out of nowhere, and the Serpoians were restrained by something long and sinuous and… pink?

Kentakakura yelped as he hit the ground, and stared up at the figure with long pink hair and a mask-like face before him.

“It seems I was correct,” they said in a strangely familiar voice. “I really am the chosen one.”

The mask retracted to reveal…

“Aira?!” he gaped. 

“Master Takakura,” she said, turning away from the downed Serpoians to face him. “Are you hurt?”

“You have the Acrobatic Silky’s powers,” he said, shooting to his feet in excitement. “How is that possible?”

Aira shrieked and covered her eyes. “You’re naked!”

“Is this because Momo used the Silky’s aura to revive you?” He craned his neck to examine her long hair. “Does this mean you’re a yokai now?!”

“This can only mean one thing,” Aira said from behind her hands. “You want to take our relationship to the next level!”

“Eh?” What was she saying? He’d stopped paying attention.

“Very well!” she exclaimed, revealing her face, now fully covered by the Silky’s mask.

“Pardon me, female human,” said a Serpoian, who was now back on his feet. “The only way you can enter our void is if you have significant spiritual power. We will take your banana organs too.”

“Back to work,” said the burly alien, rushing them.

Oh right, we’re being attacked. He could examine Aira and her new powers later. 

Grabbing his limp nanoskin from where it had fallen and tying it around his waist so it wouldn’t be in the way, he said, “Aira, let’s get–”

“Oh, I can handle this, Master Takakura,” she said, running to meet the gig worker.

“Wait, you don’t–!” He broke off. Amazingly, Aira was dodging around the alien’s punches with a dancer’s grace. Had she known how to fight like that before? Or did the Acrobatic Silky’s power affect more than just her body and voice? 

Aira leapt straight over her opponent’s head and ran towards the Serpoian. 

“Serpo-grammetry!” he exclaimed, and Aira was sent flying–straight into Kentakakura.

He grunted as they hit the floor. Serves me right for just standing there, he thought.

Aira squealed and leapt away from him. “How shameful! Lying across a nude man like that!”

“We have more important things to worry about than your hang-ups!” he snapped, getting up. 

“Ah, quite right, Master Takakura. Forgive me for becoming distracted by your nakedness.”

“Please stop calling me that.” It was deeply weird to be addressed as “Master”. He had done absolutely nothing to earn that title.

He clicked his mandibles thoughtfully. The Serpoian and the hired gig worker seemed to be arguing with each other, and the other two aliens were still unconscious. If they were going to attack, now was their chance.

“Excellent thinking, Sir Takakura,” Aira replied when he said as much. “I shall occupy the brutish hireling. Wait for an opening so you may attack its dishonorable leader.”

That was… not a bad plan. He knew he was fast enough to dodge their psychic attacks, especially if the Serpoian was focussing on Aira and the gig worker.

Kentakakura nodded, and hung back while she leapt into the fray once more. It was honestly incredible, watching her dodge and weave around their attacks. 

“Typical Virbilaetian, don’t want to get your hands dirty?” The Serpoian taunted from across the hall.

That’s awfully hypocritical, he thought. Wasn’t he also hanging back while the gig worker actually fought them?

Speaking of the gig worker, things were not going well for them. Their blows clearly had a great deal of power, but they couldn’t land a single hit on Aira. The Serpoian attempted to strike her, but she merely shielded herself with the gig worker, who cried out in pain.

“Now, Sir Takakura!” she shouted, and Kentakakura launched himself at the Serpoian.

He was less than a meter away when the same crushing force from before sent him crashing to the floor.

“You’ve been caught, Virbilaetian,” the Serpoian informed him smugly.

Aira cried out from behind him, and Kentakakura could just barely see that she had been pinned to the floor as well–by the other two Serpoians.

“I c–I can’t transform,” she groaned.

The Serpoians continued to gloat over them, going on about harvesting their reproductive organs and something called “the Awesome Zone”, but Kentakakura was barely listening, putting all his effort into trying to stand.

Until something struck him in the head, making bursts of light explode before his eyes. It came again, and he tasted his own blood in his mouth. The gig worker, apparently able to enter the Zone without being pinned, was repeatedly beating him over the head.

“Stop!” Aira exclaimed. “You’ll kill him like that!”

The blows kept coming, and he was powerless to stop it, until–the pressure suddenly lifted!

Kentakakura caught his attacker’s gloved fist in one hand. Glaring up at the alien, he seized their arm, and with all his strength, hurled them into the wall. The impact left a sizable crater, and the alien slumped to the floor, stunned.

Kentakakura nearly collapsed again, but managed to stay on his feet.

“He broke right through the Awesome Zone!” one Serpoian exclaimed.

“No, he did not! It seems our psychokinesis is being repelled by another.”

And then, a voice like music to Kentakakura’s ears.

“You dumb bastards!”

+++

“Momo! I missed you.”

Momo’s cheeks went hot. “Yeah, well, sorry it took me so long to find you.”

Apparently Okarun had been protecting Aira against three Serpoians and a… shrimp alien in a speedo? Why the hell was that dumb skank even here?!

“Well lookie here,” she said to the Serpoians, who were cowering appropriately. “I remember your dead buddies.”

“We told it to keep the female human busy.”

“Until we harvested the Virbilaetian’s banana organs.”

“What is it doing? Sleeping?”  

So they were responsible for that freaky laser-shooting thing that tried to barbeque her earlier. Why the hell couldn’t these assholes just leave them alone?!

“That you have rescued me annoys me to no end,” said a strange voice. Momo blinked in shock as Aira stood up and suddenly grew meters of hot pink hair. A very familiar mask snapped in place over her face. “But we need your devilish skills.”

“The hell? You got Acro-Silky’s powers?!”

“I know,” Okarun said, feet doing an excited tippy-tap dance in place. It was… unreasonably adorable. For a seven-foot-tall bird-thing. “Isn’t it incredible? She’s like a… a half-yokai, or something!”

“Don’t sound so excited,” Momo snapped. Damn, this must have been a side effect of reviving her with Acro-Silky’s aura. They were never gonna get rid of this bitch now, were they?

“I’ll cooperate with you, but I’ll never let you have Sir Ken Takakura!”

Ack! She said the name!

Momo’s concentration slipped, and Aira and Okarun collapsed under the Serpoian’s psychic powers.

“Momo!” Okarun grunted, squirming on the ground.

“What are you doing?!” Aira demanded, now in her usual form. “You’ve gotta keep their powers off of us!”

Momo managed to recover herself, getting back on her feet. “Don’t you dare say that name again, you dumbass!” 

One of the Serpoians was doing something to the unconscious shrimp person. A huge needle on a tube extended from the Serpoians crotch and injected something into the other alien.

“No!” it cried. “Not that!” 

Momo could only stare in horror as the shrimp alien began to mutate. Its skin bubbled and turned pasty grey, its eyes bulged hideously, and its limbs began to jerk and convulse. When its transformation was complete, it stood up. Bizarrely, it was singing, something about fighting for twenty-four hours, moving and flexing its new limbs. It looked… oddly familiar. Like those mantis shrimps from class, what felt like hours ago.

“Gig worker, beat that female human senseless,” one of the Serpoians commanded.

“Oh no, he will not,” Aira declared. “He shall deal with me first!”

She charged the Mantisian, aiming a kick to its head, but it blocked her with its dish-shaped limbs. 

“Salary… uppercut!” it declared, and suddenly Aira’s head was embedded in the ceiling. She grunted in pain, legs hanging limply.

“Whoa! I didn’t even see it hit her!” Momo gasped. Whatever the Serpo had injected it with had made it incredibly fast.

“Mantis–” the alien made to strike Aira again, but there was a black blur, and Okarun was suddenly behind it, clutching Aira.

“I can see you,” he growled. When the Mantisian lunged again, he dodged, swinging Aira around so that her foot connected with its head. It groaned, white goop spurting from its face.

They continued to nearly dance around the alien, until the repeated blows to the head it was taking caused it to collapse.

“I am one with Master Takakura!” Aira declared, draping herself over him in a way that made Momo’s blood boil.

“Don’t stand so close together, dumbasses!” she yelled. “You make an easy target that way!”

“Jealous, much?” Aira purred.

“Bitch, please!”

“Ah, thanks for the advice, Momo,” said Okarun. “I need it. I’m an awkward guy, after all.”

“Jerk!” Momo yelped. Her concentration slipped again, and the psychic force pinned them to the ground again. 

“Never say that line again!” she shouted, hurriedly shoring her defenses back up.

“What line?” Okarun asked.

“Would you get a grip already?!” Aira cried, jabbing an accusatory finger at Momo. 

“You are a useless employee,” one of the Serpoians was telling the Mantisian, who had gotten back on its feet. “You will receive a sixty percent pay cut!”

Yeouch. Momo couldn’t help feeling slightly sorry for the guy, even though it was trying to kill them. Well, that’s what you get for working with those jerk-offs.

A mote of white drifting past her eye caught her attention.

“Huh? It’s snowing now?” Sure enough, fat flakes had begun falling from the ceiling–how in the hell that worked, Momo had no idea. 

Creak…. THUMP.

Creak…. THUMP.  

“Uh oh,” Momo said. It was that sound again. “It’s here…”

She felt all the hairs on her arms and legs stand up as a familiar hum built in the air.

“Get down!” For good measure, she used her powers to push Okarun and Aira to the floor, and just in time!

A beam of bright white light sliced through the air, straight over their heads. When it dissipated, Momo looked up to see the shaggy humanoid from before standing at the end of the hall. She could see it a little clearer now, though wished she couldn’t.

It was built like a gorilla, all bulging muscles and hunched posture. Its reddish-brown fur was interrupted in places by the glint of metal. Some of its limbs looked completely artificial, welded to the rest of it with little care. A round light in the center of its chest burned with a white luminance before two sheets of metal folded over it, obscuring it from view. Its whole body steamed in the cold air.

Directly in front of it was a pair of pale grey stumps that smouldered for a moment before toppling over–the remains of one of the Serpoians who had been unlucky enough to be caught in the blast.

“You imbecile!” shouted one of the remaining Serpoians. “You’re supposed to be attacking them, not us! Sixty percent pay cut for you!”

“It’s a yeti!” Okarun exclaimed.

“Oh, he looks so excited…” 

“Who the hell cares what it is, we gotta get outta here!” Momo shouted. 

“Hey, who put you in charge?” Aira demanded. “I’m the lea–” She was cut off by Okarun scooping them up, one under each arm, and tearing off down the hallway while the Serpoians shouted after them.

“It’s a cryptid that’s said to live in snowy, mountainous climates,” Okarun said as he skidded around a corner, though how he had enough breath to run and talk, Momo didn’t know. “It’s thought to be a distant evolutionary cousin to humans, but, ah, judging by the level of technology it’s using, it’s almost certainly an extraterrestrial.”

“Why do you sound disappointed?” Momo demanded. She was not a fan of this being carried under the arm thing.

“I thought it might be some sort of yokai,” he said. “The human civilizations around where it’s said to live worship them as guardians.”

“You’re so knowledgeable,” Aira gushed. Momo wanted to gag.

“How do we beat it?”

“Uh… Don’t know,” he admitted. “That one is a, um… A… Oh, what’s the word? It’s partially mechanical.”

“Cyborg?”

“Yes! It must take an enormous amount of energy to power itself–especially that laser weapon. I wonder if that light in its chest is some kind of power core…”

“Power core…” Memories of every video game boss battle she’d ever played flashed through her head. It’s risky, but… “Okarun, I’ve got an idea! But we’ve gotta get close to that yeti.”

“You want to do what?!” he cried. “No, bad idea!”

“It’s all I’ve got right now! I need you to trust me.”

He slowed to a halt, looking her in the eyes. “...I do trust you, Momo. Okay, tell me what to do.”

“Got you!” exclaimed a voice from down the hall. The Mantisian had caught up to them, the two Serpoians close behind. “Not quite so fast on those legs as you are in the air!”

“Dude, are you for real?!” Momo shouted. Okarun set her and Aira down, and they settled into fighting stances. “That yeti’s blasting your bosses to dust and you’re still chasing us? There’s no way you’re getting paid enough to deal with this! Give up already!”

“No can do,” the Mantisian replied. “Gotta make a living for my–”

It cut off with a squeak when another laser blast tore through the wall and bisected one of the remaining Serpoians.

“Oh, come on!” the last Serpoian standing exclaimed.

“Goodbye,” Okarun said, grabbing Momo and Aira again and leaping out of the giant hole in the wall.

+++

It was snowing outside of the school building, too. Biting wind whipped through Momo’s hair as they shot across the courtyard, and she cursed how much skin was left exposed by her uniform. She also wished Aira would quit screaming.

They landed… much less gracefully than she was used to, Okarun skidding to a halt on the snowy ground and toppling over.

“Ack!” Momo sat up and wrapped her arms around herself. “You okay, dude?”

Okarun had begun to shiver violently. “It’s th-the c-c-cold. M-makes me s-slow.”

Damn. That’s a problem. “We need to finish this fast, then.”

“You will finish nothing, Momo Ayase,” said a booming voice from behind them. 

A hulking figure slowly became visible from out of the blizzard. It loomed over them, glowing red eyes on short stalks peering down. It stood on hunched over, supporting itself with shaggy arms like tree trunks. Two other appendages with dish-shaped fists lay tucked close to its chest, which was covered in metal plates. It grinned, revealing flat, white teeth in its rectangular head. Its skin, where visible beneath metal plating and reddish-brown fur, was pale grey, striped with black.

Oh, my god, Momo thought. Somehow, the Serpoian had fused itself with the other two aliens, creating this nightmare before them. 

“Make it fire its laser,” she instructed the others. “I need to get to its power core.”

“Allow me,” Aira said, transforming, and slinging her hair like a whip towards the creature’s face. It blocked with one huge limb, then lashed out with one of its Mantisian arms, sending her flying straight through the wall behind them.

“Aira!” Okarun exclaimed, but before he could make a move, the arm came down, swatting him like a bug into a snowdrift.

“Oh, fu–” Momo only had time to brace her ki into a shield before the arm came down on her, smashing her into the ground.

“Ow…” she groaned. 

“You are a very dangerous human,” said the Serpo amalgam. “We were going to experiment on you, but perhaps it would be more prudent to simply kill you. We will still harvest the organs of that other female human and the Virbilaetian, after all.”

Momo spit blood onto the snow, then looked up into the creature’s red eyes. “Bring it on, you ugly motherfucker.”

With a cry of rage, the metal plates in the Serpo monster’s chest retracted, exposing the glowing white energy core. Momo’s hands shot out, her teal ghost hands reaching for the orb and grabbing on. Heaving with all her might, Momo tore the core straight from the creature’s chest. 

It shrieked, limbs spasming as arcs of electricity shot out of its now empty chest cavity. 

“What have you done?!” it bellowed. Its legs crumpled beneath it, smoke pouring from its mechanical parts.

“You shouldn’t have fused with something that leaves its heart exposed, jackass!” Momo took the power core and shoved it down the monster’s throat, gagging at the scent of burning flesh and metal.With a horrible cry, the creature lunged for her, bleeding and burning and dying. She threw her arms up in front of her face, but something wrapped around her waist and yanked her to the side, out of the way of the falling monster.

A warm body covered hers, pressing her against a wall while the awful wailing slowly faded away.

Cautiously, Momo opened one eye. She could see sunlight, and… pink. Aira was tucked up against her, still in yokai form.

“Hey,” said Momo. “Hey, I think it’s over.” 

All the damage they’d caused to the school building had vanished, just like last time. They were sitting pressed up against a wall in the courtyard, Okarun flat on his back beside them.

“It’s over?” Aira asked, dropping her transformation. “Oh, thank goodness! Is that the kind of thing you two normally get up to?!”

“God, I wish I could say no,” Momo sighed. “But I bet those Serpo jerks will think twice before they mess with us again, right Okarun?”

No response. Momo looked over at him. He lay very still, not moving at all.

“Okarun?” She scrambled over to him, pressing a hand to his ice-cold cheek. “Okarun!”                        

Chapter Text

“Towels, get towels! As many as you can carry.”

“I—“

“Don’t argue with me, just do it!”  

Momo didn’t tear her eyes away from Okarun to see if Aira did what she said, cradling her friend in her ghost hands as she ran down the hall. He was so still… He was never this still normally, not even while he slept.

Dry him off. That’s what you do for hypothermia, right? Get him dry, then warm him up slowly.

Or maybe he needed something different. He wasn’t human, she didn’t know, all her knowledge of hypothermia came from movies and books, what if it was already too late—?!

No. No, he’s still breathing. I still have time.

They came upon a supply closet, and Momo poked her head inside. If she removed a few things, like the mop cart, she’d have enough room to lay him out flat on the floor. She did so, doing her best to keep him level, almost forgetting to untie the length of black fabric from around his waist (his nanoskin? It was soaking wet, like the rest of him). 

Thankfully, it seemed like everybody was still in class, so they hadn’t encountered anyone in the halls. But at this point, Momo couldn't care less who saw them now.

She took down some rolls of paper towels from one of the shelves. They were crap, but they were what she had right now. Tearing off several sheets, she began patting down his face and hair. His antennae twitched away at the contact.

“Sorry,” she muttered, gently trapping the little appendages to make sure they got dry. “I’m sorry, Okarun.”

She should’ve done better. He was clearly more sensitive to the cold than she was, she should’ve gone after him when the Serpo monster punched him into that snowdrift, this was all her fault—

“I got towels from the nurse’s office!” Aira said as she burst into the closet.

“Good. Now we gotta get him dry, but don’t rub them on him. Pat him dry.”

It took forever, even with Aira’s slightly hesitant help. When at last they’d gotten as much of the dampness out of his feathers as possible, Momo began to peel off her shirt.

Aira actually squeaked. “What are you doing?!”

“We need to warm him up, and my uniform is soaked,” she replied, all business. Taking one of the least damp towels, she wiped down her front (still with her bra on. She couldn’t bring herself to take that off in front of Okarun, even though she knew he likely wouldn’t care).

Gently, she used her powers to manipulate him into an upright position. She wrapped her arms around him, tucking his freezing face into her neck, doing her best to maximize skin-to-skin contact.

“Now you,” she told Aira when they were situated. “Strip.”

She sputtered, going red. “Wha– Y– I’m not taking off my clothes in front of a boy until my wedding night!”

“Take a fucking hike, then!” Momo shouted.

She was cold, she was tired, her best friend might be dying in her fucking arms, and she had no patience left for this prudish child.  

“What a way to repay the guy who’s done nothing but try to help you,” she couldn’t help muttering, couldn’t help twisting the knife. She was just… just so fucking angry. At herself, at everything, and maybe Aira didn’t deserve it, but Momo couldn’t bring herself to care. 

Aira stared at her, wide-eyed. Then she began wordlessly removing her clothes. Like Momo, she kept on her underwear. She sat down, back-to-back with Okarun, taking a few towels and draping them over the three of them as best she could (a good idea, Momo had to admit).

“Up against a naked boy like that…” she heard Aira mutter, still more than loud enough to be heard. “Knew the rumors were true…”

Was she trying to call Momo a slut? She almost laughed. If Aira wanted to hurt her feelings, she’d have to try a lot harder than that!

“You dumbass, do you seriously believe everything you hear?” Momo asked. 

Aira stiffened, as though she was surprised she’d said anything. Then she scoffed. “E-everybody knows you’ll sleep with anyone. It’s been going around the school for days!” 

“Oh, please. My bastard ex started those rumors ‘cause I wouldn’t sleep with him. Don’t you know how shitty a dude with wounded pride can be? Though, I guess someone romantically awkward as you are wouldn’t know the first thing about it.”

“Whuh–How dare you?!” But Momo didn’t stop.

“Would’ve thought a girl popular as you are didn’t have to throw herself at dudes just to get a kiss. What, none of those meatheads you always got trailing after you like goldfish turds wanna pucker up for you?” 

“That’s–! Shut up! And don’t call me romantically awkward!” Aira exclaimed. “You don’t know anything about my love life!”

“And you don’t know anything about mine, Shiratori. My ex said I’m a slut ‘cause he wanted to hurt me, and you idiots lapped it right up without a second thought. Nobody bothered to ask me my side of things, before spreading that rumor around.” 

Why was she even saying this? It wasn’t like she cared what anyone but her friends thought of her. She certainly didn’t care what Aira thought of her. The rumor would be forgotten about by this time next week, anyways.

Aira’s mouth opened and closed several times. 

“...Sorry,” she muttered eventually.

“Whatever.” She stared at the back of Aira’s head, thinking. There had been a fragment of memory she’d seen, when she’d connected her aura to Acro-Silky’s. 

Aira’s mother was dead. She had died when Aira was very young. She hadn’t had the chance to teach her all the things a mom was supposed to teach her daughter. 

Just like…   

Momo focused on Okarun’s breathing.

In, and out. In, and out.

She thought she might have been able to feel his heartbeat from where they were pressed together. It felt different from hers, the rhythm slightly off. She had no way to know if that was normal or not. 

Don’t you dare die on me, you bastard, Momo thought fiercely, squeezing him a bit tighter. Like she could physically keep the life in his body if she just held on hard enough. It’s not allowed, got it? I’ll be so pissed off if you kick it, you don’t even know…

He kept breathing. His heart kept beating. And they sat in the dark little closet, silent. 

“There’s something I don’t understand,” said Aira suddenly. Momo just barely stopped herself from replying with something nasty.

“What’s that?”

“If you and Takakura are aliens—“

Momo burst out laughing. She couldn’t help it! It was just so… random. And the situation at hand may have made her a little hysterical. When had Aira figured out what Okarun really was, anyways? Had those Serpoians said something? 

“What?” Aira demanded, craning her neck around to look at her. “What’s funny?”

Once she got herself under control, Momo said, “I’m not an alien! Where the hell did you get that idea from? I mean, it’s better than demon, I guess…”

“But Takakura said—“

“Okarun’s an alien, yeah. But me, I’m one hundred percent human.” So he’d told her himself? That was surprising.

“Well if you’re not a demon and you’re not an alien, then how come you can do that—“ she gestured wildly with one arm. “That hand thing? That’s not normal.” 

Momo shrugged one shoulder. “Dunno.”

Aira stared at her. “You don’t know?”

“What? It’s not like I got an instruction manual, or anything! They just kind of… woke up when I was in danger. When those Serpoians abducted me for the first time, in fact.”

“When was that?”

“Last week.” She paused, then said, “Hey, speaking of. How long have you been able to go all Acro-Silky, huh?”

“Only since today. It’s like you said, they switched on when I was in danger. Which makes total sense. Heaven chose me to be the Pretty Guardian Protector of Earth, after all.”

Momo groaned and rolled her eyes. “Your lame title keeps getting longer. You’ve got those powers because I used Acro-Silky’s aura to bring you back after she ate you.”

There was a beat of silence. Aira turned back to face the wall. Then she said, “They’ve been after you for a whole week?”

“Sorta. After me and Okarun trashed their spaceship, they sent this big sumo alien after us, and now that Mantisian dude just today. We must’ve really pissed them off. Well, I must’ve. Okarun was only there ‘cause he was trying to help me, even though… Even though I acted like a huge jerk to him when we met…” 

The Serpoians wouldn’t have even known he existed, had he not followed her to that hospital, trying to apologize for doing absolutely nothing wrong.

He wouldn’t have gotten hurt if it weren’t for her.

…This is all my fault.

Something tickled Momo’s neck, snapping her out of her depressing thought spiral. Okarun’s antennae were twitching. His breathing had changed, his head shifting where it lay on her shoulder.

“Okarun?” Momo asked, hardly able to breathe through the hope swelling in her chest. “Hey, you with me?”

“M...Momo…?” he rasped, lifting his head up like it weighed a hundred pounds. His eyes blinked open, squinting at her. “What…? Where are…?”

Oh, right, she’d taken off his glasses. He probably couldn’t see anything. 

Delirious laughter bubbled out of her chest as she picked up his glasses from where she’d put them on the floor. Thankfully she managed not to poke him in the eye, helping him put them on with shaking hands.

“How’re you feeling?” she asked. 

He seemed a little out of it still, his movements lethargic. He looked at her, apparently noticing for the first time that they were pretty much nose-to-nose.

“Um…”

It looked like he’d gotten some color back into his cheeks. That was good.

“Now you have to accept responsibility, Takakura!” Aira exclaimed, standing up. The damp towels fell off of them. “You have to propose, because you saw me in my lingerie!”

Okarun looked up at her, confusion written all over his face. “Er… propose what?”

“Ugh, don’t worry about it,” Momo said. “Put your clothes back on. We gotta figure out how to get out of here without–”

She cut off as the door to the storage closet opened.

+++

Kentakakura stood in silence, staring at the back of the chair behind the desk. The absolutely terrifying human that had found them in the closet sat in it, rhythmically slapping some kind of short… whip… thing into one hand.

Thankfully, when the door had opened, Momoayase had jumped up and commanded the human’s attention long enough for him to wrap a towel around himself so his human disguise wasn’t compromised. He’d then sneakily put his nanoskin back on under it while the human–apparently her name was “Queen Sensei”?–had demanded to know what was going on.

He didn’t think the lie Momoayase had told about a “sprinkler malfunction” had been believed. But it wasn’t like they could tell the truth.

Queen Sensei had then demanded they tell her if they were being bullied. They’d said no (even though he supposed what the Serpoians were doing could be counted as bullying. Again, not that they could tell her that).

After that, Queen Sensei had marched the three of them down to the school infirmary, all wrapped in towels. Student’s had gawked at them in the halls, whispering to each other and pointing.

He’d felt shame curl in his gut. They were probably in very big trouble, all because of him.

“You better not be playing games with me here,” said Queen Sensei, snapping Kentakakura back to the present. “I’ll ask again: is someone bullying you?”

“No ma’am,” they said in unison. Momoayase and Aira had changed into alternate uniforms, rather than put their soaking wet clothes back on.

Queen Sensei, apparently not satisfied with their answer, continued to interrogate them until someone poked their head into the office and informed her that she had a phone call.

She left–after shouting and using that whip on the person who interrupted them–and Kentakakura shuddered. That was a human whose bad side he hoped never to be on.

Once the door shut, both Momoayase and Aira began screaming in anguish, making him jump.

“Everybody’s totally gonna think we were getting it on in the storage closet!”

“I can kiss my pure image goodbye,” Aira wailed. “And my popularity!”

Kentakakura was very unclear on what the problem was. They were being extremely dramatic, despite the fact that they weren’t being punished, but he decided it was safer to leave the humans be than try to comfort them. He sat on the couch and waited for them to calm down.

“Those damn Serpoians,” Momo growled, throwing herself down next to him. “Don’t they know when to give up?! I don’t know if I can handle another run-in with those frog-faced bastards! First they send that big sumo Flatwoods to my house, then they almost friggin’ freeze Okarun to death!”

“O-oh, I–!” Kentakakura stammered. Had she really thought he was dying? He felt even worse, now. “It wasn’t that serious! The cold just sent me into a hibernative state, that's all.”

Both humans looked up at him sharply.

“Huh?” Momo asked. She didn’t look any less confused while he stuttered through an explanation about torpor and diapause.

“Are you telling me if we hadn’t stripped down half-naked you would’ve been fine?!” Aira demanded angrily.

He blushed, remembering how he’d woken up in Momoayase’s warm embrace, surrounded by her scent. “Uh… W-well the body heat… helped me come out of it faster… probably.”

Aira groaned, throwing her hands up into the air. “My popularity, all that work, gone! All for nothing!”

Kentakakura brought both hands up to his glasses and stared at his shoes. He didn’t know why, exactly, but it seemed like this incident had done significant damage to Aira and Momoayase’s reputations. They were very popular among their peers, unlike him, and now the other humans would think less of them. And it was all his fault.        

The heavy ball of shame in his stomach grew, threatening to choke him. He didn’t care what the humans at school thought of him–well, he cared what one human thought. And the knowledge that he’d hurt her, however unintentionally… It was unbearable.

How could he even begin to make up for this?

“I’m sorry…” he said.

“I know,” said Aira, appearing not to have heard. “I’ll say you forced me to take my clothes off!”

“What?!” Momoayase demanded.

“Okay, you didn’t actually force me, but you were being very aggressive. You want to go with that, Takakura?”

Kentakakura just stared at her, too shocked for words. How could she possibly think for even one second that he’d agree to just shift all the blame onto Momoayase like that?! 

“I– Wha– No!” he finally managed.

“Fine, say whatever you want,” Momoayase groaned. “I have officially stopped being able to care.”

“What? But–” Aira would do even more damage to her reputation if she went around spreading that lie! 

“I’m so tired of making up excuses. So just–”

The door burst open, making them all jump. Kentakakura recognized the two girls who rushed in to fuss over Aira–they were the ones who helped her pin him down in that abandoned building, back when she still thought he was a demon. He was not pleased to see them again.

“Ayase and Takakura!” one girl exclaimed, pointing at them. “This is all your fault, isn’t it?!”

Momoayase just held up two fingers, not denying it.

“Give it up, it won’t make any difference,” she said while Kentakakura tried to refute their accusations. The girls dragged Aira from the room and slammed the door behind them.

“But they’ll tell everyone this whole thing was your fault!” He couldn’t let them accuse Momoayase of something she hadn’t done!

“I so don’t care,” she sighed, flopping back down on the couch. Then she looked up at him with an unusually serious expression. “You had me really worried, you know.”

“Ah… I’m sorry.” Not just for making her worry. She was in this mess now, because of him. He looked away, unable to hold her gaze. “I’m sorry for… everything.”

“Okarun…” she began, then stopped. He glanced at her. She was running a hand through her bangs, lips pressed together, as though trying to decide what to say. Her eyes met his again, and she opened her mouth–

And Miko and Kei burst into the room. “We found ya!”

They both jumped. “Don’t scare me like that,” Momoayase exclaimed, getting up from the couch.

“Now you know how we felt! Girl, what happened to you?! You just disappeared from class, and then I heard from Kana that you were found buck-naked in a storage closet with Okarun and Aira Shiratori! What the hell’s going on?!”

“Uh, well it’s kinda hard to explain,” said Momayase. “But, something weird happened, and now here we are.”

Kentakakura glanced at her. “That was beyond vague…”

“Ohhh-kay?” said Kei.

“I’ve got it,” Miko exclaimed, one hand pressed to her temple.

“Tell it, girl.”

“It’s obvious. You, Okarun, Shiratori… are all involved in a love triangle!”

“Drama…” gasped Kei.

 “Two women, at war over love,” Miko continued. “And the only way to settle it was through nude gladiator combat!”     

Kentakakura had no idea what was going on, and Momoayase’s blank expression wasn’t giving him any clues.

“Momo was acting all weird in class today because she was jealous that Shiratori was trying to take her man!”

“Shut the hell up, you idiot!” Momoayase shouted. “I ain’t jealous of that dumb skank!”

“And the culprit is you!” Kei shouted, pointing at Kentakakura.

“Eh?!” He was the “man”? They thought she and Aira had been competing over him? Nothing could have been further from the truth! “Th-that’s not it!”

“I can’t listen to this anymore. We’re going back to class now!” Momoayase grabbed Kentakakura’s arm and dragged him out of the room.

She did not let go as they marched through the halls, and Kentakakura couldn’t find it in him to protest.

“Can’t believe… How could they think… Why would I be jealous of Aira?!” she grumbled.

“You shouldn’t be!” Kentakakura said. “You’re amazing!”

Momoayase stopped dead. “Uh… Yeah, well… Yeah.” Her cheeks had gone red.

She seemed to finally realize she’d been dragging him around by the arm and let go. He straightened his glasses. They both just… stood in the middle of the hall, not speaking.

“Guess I’ll… go back to class now,” she said.

“O-oh, yeah. Me too.”

“See you later, then.”

“Yeah…” 

They both started walking again, but since their classes were in the same direction, they ended up walking together, not talking. Until Momoayase mumbled something that sounded like “bathroom”, and turned around to practically flee down the hallway.

He watched her go, and sighed. Why did he have to be so painfully awkward all the time?

+++

Several hours later, Kentakakura was staring down at the gig worker who had attacked them. They were heavily bandaged, laying on a futon in the middle of the floor. 

Momoayase had run into his class right at the end of the day, telling him she needed his help with something. It sounded really urgent, so he’d hurried after her, ignoring the murmurs of his classmates that followed them.

She had led him to the courtyard to find Aira standing guard over the bleeding and unconscious alien.

So, obviously, they’d brought them home. 

“That right there’s an alien!” Momoayase said to Seiko, pointing at the gig worker as they stirred. 

“Hmm. Doesn’t seem all that alien. You sure it ain’t a kappa?”

“You gotta be kidding me,” Momoayase groaned, and Kentakakura privately agreed. Sure, the gig worker had a dish-shaped head, but otherwise did not resemble the drawings he’d seen of the aquatic yokai. Why was it so hard for Seiko to accept the existence of extraterrestrials? 

“You literally live with an alien! Now there’s another one right in front of your face, and you still don’t believe it?!”

“Yeah, that ain’t no alien. It’s definitely a kappa.” 

“Whatever he is,” said Aira, “what are we going to do with him? He might try to attack us again.”

The gig worker stared up at them, then got to their feet. Everyone except Seiko tensed, ready to fight.

“Easy, dude,” said Momoayase. Kentakakura peeked at the gig worker around her shoulder. “You don’t want my grandma getting angry.”

The gig worker took a small step forward, then noticed the plate of curry and glass of water they’d placed next to their futon.

“Oh, that? Well, we weren’t sure what you ate, so we made you that. It’s curry. But it’s cool if you don’t want it.”

The gig worker knelt down on the futon, trembling slightly. Droplets of water began to leak from their eyestalks. Were they… crying?

“This is the first time someone’s given me proper medical attention, or been so kind to me,” they blubbered. Pulling the plate of curry onto their lap, they began to eat. “I swear on my life, I’ll never try to hurt you people again!”

+++

Seiko had really outdone herself. Dinner that night was sushi –Kentakakura had been surprised at first, he hadn’t thought humans could handle eating raw meat. He was delighted to be proved wrong, though.

If there was one thing humans were really good at, it was food. No wonder they put so much importance into social bonding over shared meals. They made the biological necessity into an experience. Even putting the extra effort into making the food itself look nice!

He hummed in delight as he took care to sample a little bit of everything. Ooo, this one has crab in it!  

A sudden crash made him look up from his food. Seiko had the gig worker on the floor in a headlock. Momoayase and Aira stood off to the side, shouting and shoving at each other’s faces.

“You ungrateful turds!” Seiko exclaimed. “I’ll be damned if I ever feed you sushi again!”

…Kentakakura quietly piled more sushi onto his plate.

+++

“My son is very sick,” said the gig worker. He was kneeling on the floor in the living room while he explained himself, wearing some clothes that Momoayase had leant him (they fit… very poorly). “If he doesn’t get a transfusion every day, he’ll die.

“I couldn’t make money on Ra-ahib, it’s a warzone so there’s no jobs. I left home, figuring I could bring back cash from another world. Most us Rabinabchs are pretty dang strong, you know? We’re perfect for jobs like bodyguards and raaglugs and stuff like that. But I’m kind of weak. They don’t hire shillsskles like me for the cushy jobs. So I got into risky gig work for criminals.”

He began to sob. “I’m a loser. I couldn’t save my wife, because I’m so weak and stupid. Every day my son worries he’s gonna die. I caused trouble for you good people. I’m so pathetic! I’m useless!”

Kentakakura’s heart ached. He’d only attacked them because he was trying to provide for his family! If it was him in that situation, for Momoayase and Seiko, he’d do anything to help them.

“Is there something we can do to help?” he asked. “If I gave you my reproductive organs, would that help you save your son?”

The Rabinabch looked up in surprise.

“Huh?! What the hell are you saying?” Momoayase demanded. 

“What? If it would help him get the money he needs, then I’ll do it.” It wasn’t like he was using them.

“You can’t just give your nuts to some random alien!”

“Er…?” Kentakakura tilted his head in confusion. What did nuts have to do with this conversation?

“Look,” said Momoayase, “he said his kid needs a transfusion every day, right? How many of those do you think your dingus is gonna buy? I feel bad for the dude, but he needs a steady income so he can pay for the treatments.”

“But he hasn’t been able to get a good job, that’s why he’s here in the first place! He’s told us the kind of trouble he’s in. I can’t just pretend I don’t know about it now. I have to help him! I want to.” 

He felt sympathy for the Rabinabch, and also… recognition. They were the same, in some ways. On an alien planet, far away from their homes, because they weren’t like the rest of their people. Just… trying to get by in the only ways they could.

“Okay, okay. I get how you feel, but…”

“What Momo Ayase said is right,” said the Rabinabch. “I need a proper job to save my son. Kentakakura, I appreciate you wanting to help.”

He stared up at the alien, ignoring the fit Momoayase was having on the floor. Was there really nothing they could do?

“You’ve been so kind to me, but I don’t want to bother you with my problems. I won’t come back and bother you again, I swear. Thanks for your hospitality. I will get going now…”

“Hold up,” said Seiko, blocking his way to the door. “Your blood’s gotta be the stinkiest I ever smelled.”

“Seiko!” Kentakakura screeched, thoroughly scandalized. “Y-you can’t say things like that!” 

It was the height of rudeness to comment on another species’ natural odors. And after he’d just poured his heart out to them!

“Oh, calm down,” she said, grabbing the Rabinabch’s head and sniffing. “So all that white goop you’re leaking, that’s your blood? I think I know where I smelled that kind of smell before.”

She poured some white liquid– milk, it said on the carton–into a glass. “Suck down some of that.”

They all watched as the Rabinabch drank, then exclaimed in amazement.

“It’s just like our blood! This is the same!”

Kentakakura smelled the now-empty glass curiously. He’d been a little leery about the concept of milk. Sure, he knew humans nursed their young on fluids from their bodies–several species did the same. But to take the mammary secretions from another animal and drink it well into adulthood? It was just really weird, even for him.         

But the Rabinabch drank the whole carton of milk without issue, so… maybe he should try it? Humans knew what they were about when it came to food, after all.

“I know a dairy farmer in town,” said Seiko. “I’ll see if you can have one of his cows. I think it’s gonna sort out all your problems. Take care, big guy.”

The Rabinabch began to cry in earnest, and Kentakakura couldn’t help but smile. It seemed like Seiko had saved them both, too.

+++

Seiko left the room to make a phone call, and they were left with the emotional former gig worker.

“So,” he said, once he’d gotten himself back under control. “How did a young tsire like you end up all the way out here by yourself?”

Kentakakura just looked at him, too surprised to reply right away. 

“Er… You are a tsire, right? Been a while since I met a Virbilaetian, so…”

“Oh! Yes, I am. Sorry, I just… didn’t expect you to know that.” He knew nothing about the Rabinabch’s people, and had assumed the reverse would also be true. 

He chuckled, curling his eyestalks in a very good imitation of antennae. “I spent some time on Lepidoterra, when I was young. Stayed with a very nice caulder while I worked there. It was a long time ago, but I still remember some things.”   

“Eh? What’d he call you?” asked Momoayase. “‘Sear?’”

“Tsire,” he corrected.

“Ts-ear.” She wasn’t getting the whistle on the vowel, but it was close enough. “What’s that mean?”

“It’s what I am,” he said. “Like, you’re a girl, I’m a tsire. It’s a gender.”

“Wait, I thought you were a boy!” exclaimed Aira. Momoayase looked equally shocked. “You’re saying you’re not?!”

“Well, no?”

“So–” she stammered. “So are… But you’re not… male?”

“I’m not human.” 

“Well, yeah! But boys have–” She gestured mutely downwards. 

“Not always, dummy,” said Momoayase. 

“Yuh–Yes, I know, just… Most of the time…”

Kentakakura just squinted over at them in confusion. What were they speaking in riddles about now?

“Many species base their genders on their reproductive roles,” the Rabinabch told him. He was probably trying to be helpful, but only succeeded in confusing him further.  

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“Er… some would say a lot.”

“What, so you don’t get to pick?” That was ridiculous! 

“Of course we do,” Momoayase said. “I mean, some people make a big deal out of it. But plenty of humans change their gender.”      

“But if it’s not based on… that…” Aira still seemed stuck on that point. “Then how do you… know?”

“I… just do.” He’d never really thought about it that hard. Being a tsire just seemed right. He certainly didn’t like the idea of being all loud and flashy like a rhetsire. “For Virbilaetians, you just pick whatever feels right whenever you think you know. Some people stay neutral, some people switch every so often.

“But to answer your question,” he said, desperate for a subject change, “I was on my way to a school off-planet, the ship I was on malfunctioned somehow, and my escape pod brought me here.”

The Rabinabch blinked. “All by yourself?”

He nodded.

“Sorry, just… You seem awfully young to have left your creche.”

Kentakakura flushed. “I-I’m not! I’m of age!”

“Really? You still have a lot of down feathers, there.” He pointed at Kentakakura’s chest.

“Th-that’s–!” Why did he have to point that out?! “I-I just molted late, that’s all!”

“Wait, so all that fuzz is like, baby fluff?” Momoayase laughed.

There goes the last of my dignity, he thought. Cheeks burning, he tugged the collar up on his nanoskin shirt so it covered his neck fully. 

“Aw, don’t pout! It’s cute how fuzzy you are.”

“Don’t make fun of me!” He crossed his arms, wings ruffling indignantly. His entire face was red now, he was sure.

“I’m not! C’mon, don’t hide.” She tried to tug his collar back down, but he scooted out of her reach. This, of course, incited her to start chasing him around the room.   

“Quit running away!” 

“I’m not running!” he screeched as he ran.

“Ayase, stop pestering Takakura this instant!”

“Oh, look who’s talking!”

“Will you little shits pipe down?!” Seiko shouted. “I’m on the phone!”   

+++

The dairy farmer was more than willing to sell one of his cows to the Rabinabch, who, surprisingly, already had human currency ready to make the purchase. The cow was delivered to the Ayase house within a few hours, so he could pick it up in his ship and be on his way home that very night!

Before he left, the Rabinabch took Kentakakura aside.

“You know, I’d be more than happy to drop you off on Lepidoterra, if you want.”

“What? But, isn’t that far out of your way?” He was only guessing, he had no idea where the two planets were in relation to Earth, or each other.

The Rabinabch shrugged. “It’s no trouble! You’ve been so kind to me, after all. Taking you home would be the least I could do.”

Kentakakura was momentarily speechless. 

Two weeks ago, he would have said yes without a second thought. He would have left this confusing and dangerous planet behind and never looked back. But now…

He looked over at the three humans standing a short distance away. Momoayase was petting the black and white cow, teasing Aira for refusing to go near it. Seiko was smoking one of her pungent little sticks, unreadable as ever.

“That’s really kind of you… Oh,” he realized. “I’m sorry, I never asked your name.”

“Ah, it’s Peeny-Weeny!”

“Mr. Penny-Weeny. That’s very kind of you to offer, but… I am home.” 

Peeny-Weeny gave him a long look, then nodded. “I see. Well, young Kentakakura, I wish you luck.” He patted his shoulder with one gloved hand.

“You too. And for your son!” Kentakakura bowed.

He watched Peeny-Weeny as he left to go start up his ship. Despite the cold beginning to creep into the night air, Kentakakura felt warm.

+++

They waved the ship off as it left the planet–a spectacular sight from the ground!

“Well, Grandma, believe in aliens now?” Momoayase demanded.

“Nah, that was totally a kappa.”

Kentakakura shot her a bewildered look. How could– wait. He could have sworn Seiko wore a small smirk as Momoayase growled in frustration, before smoothing over it with her usual unimpressed expression. 

Was she… pretending to not believe in aliens to mess with Momoayase?!

That… was hilarious, actually! Kentakakura had to cover his mouth to hide his quiet laughter.

As they walked back to the house, Momoayase nudged him.

“Hey,” she said. “You know… you could’ve said something, about me calling you the wrong thing before.”

“Uh?” Oh, was she talking about him being a tsire? “Um, I’m sorry–”

“No, don’t apologize!” She rubbed the back of her head. “I just… I don’t want to make you uncomfortable, y’know?”

His chest felt suddenly tight. “Oh… Well, it… doesn’t bother me, when people assume I’m a boy. You can call me that. Besides, your language has completely different pronouns, anyways.”

“‘Kay. Just… I still… feel like I don’t know a lot about you and… I want to. So just let me know when I’m doing something wrong, alright?”

“Okay.” I should tell her now… He took a deep breath. “Um… Momoayase?”

“Yeah?”

Another deep breath. Tell her.

“Th… Thank you.”

Coward.

Momoayase smiled at him. “Yeah, of course.”

He smiled back, while guilt tried to swallow him whole.

+++

“We beg you!” Momoayase exclaimed from where she knelt between Kentakakura and Aira. “Buy us new school uniforms with your Dodoria money!”

Seiko stood over them drinking a glass of milk. “How many times do I gotta buy you numbskulls new uniforms? It’s getting old.” She glanced at Kentakakura. “Four-Eyes, why are you even begging? You wear that magic suit thing everywhere.”

“Um… moral support?” he said from the floor.

“We’ll be super careful with the new ones, we promise!”

“Why’re you dragging me into this?” Aira hissed.

“Oh, I’m sorry, do you have any money? Times like this, you swallow your pride and exploit the wallets of the adults.”

“She’s done this three times already,” Kentakakura put in.

“Okay, I’ll buy a uniform. For Aira,” said Seiko.

“Huh?! Why only her?! I’m your grandkid!”

“I don’t like them shifty eyes of yours. They give off a ‘let’s exploit the adult’s wallet’ vibe.”

Kentakakura suppressed a laugh. It seemed like Seiko knew Momoayase far too well.

“You want a uniform?” Seiko threw a tiny pink thing on the floor. “Do a Hiroshi impersonation.”

“You gotta be kidding me!” Momoayase exclaimed, jumping to her feet. “I ain’t making a fool out of myself for you!”

But Seiko wouldn’t budge. So, grumbling, Momoayase scooped up the pink thing–a hair tie, it turned out. She pulled all her hair up to the top of her head, squared her shoulders, and affected a deep scowl.

Aira burst out laughing at the sight of her. She did look a bit silly, but also… kind of cute. Though, Kentakakura didn’t know who she was meant to be impersonating.

“That’s so half-assed,” said Seiko critically. “Commit to it!”

The doorbell rang–the normal one, luckily, not the one for evil spirits.

“Answer that–in character!” Seiko demanded.

Kentakakura, tucking away his wings and antennae, leaned out into the hall to watch Momoayase answer the door while she grunted something about rocket engines, or something. She pulled the door open to reveal a tall human with short red hair. About their age, if Kentakakura had to guess.

“Hey there, Momo,” the human said. 

“Jiji?!” she exclaimed. Oh, so they know each other? She stepped back to let them into the house.

“It’s about time,” said Seiko. “Your mom let me know you were coming over.”

“Wait, why is he here?” Momoayase demanded, pointing at Jiji.

“Who is this person?” Kentakakura whispered to Seiko.

“He was Momo’s best friend when they were younger,” she replied. Then, almost as an afterthought, “Her first love, too.”

Kentakakura’s heart dropped into his stomach. This human is her first love?!

He examined the newcomer while he spoke to Momoayase. He sure is… tall.  

He thought about the movies he’d watched with her, the ones with that actor who had a similar name to his. This human… probably acted like that, if Momoayase had been in love with him. Tough. Cool.

Jiji inhaled deeply, then struck a pose. “Momo! You’re still a kyoo-tay! And that lame impression was, what’s the word for it? Priceless!”

Kentakakura stared in surprise. He glanced at Momoayase and Aira. They were both staring at Jiji with dull expressions. Was this… how a cool guy behaved? That didn’t seem right.

“I haven’t seen you in forever,” Jiji continued. “Gimme a big, fat hug!”

“Could you be any more annoying?” Momoayase sighed. 

“You hear that? She called me annoying!” Jiji exclaimed, spinning around and jabbing at the air with his hands for some reason. “One more! Give me one more!”

“Okarun, help me murder this guy, would you?” Momoayase asked, and he jumped. She was joking… right?

He stared at Jiji while he greeted Seiko. She still hadn’t explained why he was there, if he and Momoayase hadn’t seen each other in a long time.

Speaking of Momoayase, she was apparently having the same thoughts, because she demanded to know what was going on.

“Ain’t it obvious?” Seiko sighed. “He’s moving in with us.”

“HUH?!” Kentakakura and Momoayase screeched in unison.        

Chapter Text

“Are you friggin’ crazy?!” Momo bellowed at her grandmother. “No way! No, no, no, I refuse!”

Jiji, her former crush and childhood best friend, living with them? Absolutely not!

Said ex-crush was doing a dumb little dance beside her, oblivious to her tantrum. He clearly hadn’t changed much. 

“I’m a-home!” Then he seemed to notice Aira and Okarun for the first time. “Heya! You guys Momo’s pals?”

Okarun stammered and fidgeted with his glasses, seemingly still in shock over having a new housemate foisted on them. Momo could relate. 

“As if,” Aira sneered. “We’ve joined forces against a common enemy for now, but that does not make us friends.”

“Cool!” Jiji replied, as if that weren’t a patently insane thing to say. “Well, any friend of Momo’s is a friend of mine! Name’s Jin Enjoji, but you can call me anything you like, pretty lady!” 

He winked and shot finger guns. Aira recoiled, a disgusted look on her face.

“Don’t we get a say in this?!” Momo demanded.

“Have you eaten yet, Jin?” Granny asked, completely ignoring her. “I’ll whip something up for you.”

“That’d be amazing!” Jiji replied. “I’m starving!”

“Hey!” Momo followed her grandmother into the kitchen. “Granny, he can’t stay here!”

“Oh?” She turned and arched an eyebrow. “So you can drag in random yokai off the streets, but I invite your dear childhood friend to stay with us while his parents are in the hospital, and it’s unacceptable?”

“That’s–! Wait, what?” Jiji’s parents were in the hospital? That sucked. They were super nice, from what Momo remembered. She shook her head, dropping her voice to a near whisper. “Well, what about Okarun?”

“What about him?”

She groaned. How did Granny not see the problem here? It was like she didn’t care at all about Okarun’s secret! 

“Jiji can’t room with him!” And he sure as hell wasn’t rooming with her!   

“Jin will sleep down here. Oh, that reminds me, will you put the futon in the wash? It probably smells like kappa blood.”

It was clear Granny wasn’t going to budge on this. Sulkily, Momo did as she asked (the futon did still have a lingering milk smell).

She trudged back into the living room, only to get nearly pulled off her feet when Aira grabbed the front of her shirt.

“Gah! The hell’s your problem?!”

“Know this, Momo Ayase,” she growled, leaning in so they were almost nose-to-nose. “I might not have figured out what your plans are, or what that boy has to do with it, but rest assured, I will discover your wicked schemes. I’m working with you now because there’s aliens trying to kill us, but once they’re out of the way, I’m coming for you!”

“For fuck’s sake, you’re still on that?” Momo groaned. When is this crazy bitch gonna let it go?

“I’m off to prepare for the coming battle,” Aira said, releasing her. “See ya!” And she ran out the door. 

“Until next time,” Okarun called after her, bowing.

Jiji peeked out the still-open door. “Well, she’s energetic!” Like he can talk!

“Someone get me out of this nightmare!” Momo exclaimed, pulling her hair.

+++

“Something’s funny here,” Momo grumbled, washing dishes beside Jiji. Okarun and Granny were in the living room, Bakatono playing on the TV.

“Who, me?” he asked, striking a pose.

“Funny like weird funny!” she grumbled. She still didn’t understand why Jiji was even here, rather than staying with relatives or something. 

Were we ever that good of friends…? She hadn’t so much as spoken to him since he’d moved away.

“Remember how I used to make fun of you in grade school?” he asked. Momo blinked in surprise. She didn’t think she’d ever heard him sound so serious. “Well, I do, and I regret it. I can… sort of see ghosts now.”

“Huh?!” How the hell had that happened?! “Did–did it start after you developed weird powers? Or got abducted by aliens?!”

“Aliens?” He raised his eyebrows. “Is that a joke or something?”

“Uhm… nevermind.” She rubbed the back of her head. Guess not…

“Yeah, well,” Jiji continued, “remember how I moved, right before middle school started?” 

He took out his phone and scrolled through some pictures, telling her how he’d felt that something about his new house wasn’t right. How eventually he had started seeing the entity itself, how his mysteriously sickening parents had hired spirit mediums to exorcise it, and how–most disturbingly–three of the mediums had committed suicide.

“So that’s why you’re here… The old bag should’ve told me what was up!” Momo directed that shout toward the living room, but Granny was probably too busy cackling at the TV to hear it. “She couldn’t even be bothered to tell me you were coming by or anything! Oh, well. It’s good you came over to see her.”

“Momo,” said Jiji, bending forwards into a bow, taking her aback. “I’m sorry.”

“Huh? Why? This ain’t your fault, you don’t have to apologize!” It was weirding her out, how solemn he was being. Not his usual goofball self at all! It was clear this whole situation had him genuinely frightened. 

“I do, though,” he insisted, rubbing the back of his neck. “For making fun of you back then, and now for dragging you into this mess.”

“Don’t apologize for asking for help. And don’t worry,” she assured him. “My grandma’s a tough lady. She’ll beat that ghost’s ass, no sweat.”

Jiji stared at her for a moment, mouth open. Then his brows furrowed. “Wait–was I hearing things, or did you just call her your grandma?!”

“Uh, yeah? Didn’t you already–”

“I ain’t doin’ nothing,” came Granny’s voice from the living room. All eyes turned to her, surprised.

“What?” Momo demanded. 

“I can’t use my powers outside of Kamigoe City, remember? That means you and Four-Eyes have gotta handle this case.”

“What?!” she and Okarun said at the same time.

“But–But I don’t have nearly enough experience for something like this, especially not by myself!” he protested. “I’ve never even seen a real exorcism before!”

“I dunno, you did alright at the Yamada’s house all on your own. And Momo will be there to back you up.”

“How the hell am I supposed to do that?!” she demanded.

“Experience is the best teacher, sometimes. Learn by doing! Oh, and Momo, if you take this case on, I’ll buy you uniforms for life. Now, go blow that cursed house down.”

That was probably meant to be a very inspirational pep-talk. It wasn’t.

“You guys are spirit mediums too?” Jiji asked, looking between Momo and Okarun. 

“...Kinda? We’re sorta… in training.” Not that they’d actually gotten much training. But… Well, she couldn’t leave Jiji hanging, could she? “Alright. I’ll go.” She looked over at Okarun.

“Oh! Y-yeah, me too.” Momo had to admit, she already felt much better about the whole thing, knowing he would be there.

“Okay then! When do we leave? Tomorrow?”

“You’ll go this weekend,” said Granny.

“Hah?!” That meant Jiji would be staying the whole rest of the week! 

“Oh, don’t give me that look. You’ve missed enough school already. Jin, too. He’ll be going to your school while he stays with us.”

Momo’s mouth fell open. There was no way this was real. “You’ve gotta be kidding me!”

“Nope!” Jiji exclaimed, striking a pose with his usual energy. “We get to be study buddies!”

He did another stupid dance while Momo screamed.

+++

“Hey, where’s Okarun?” Momo asked once they finished cleaning the kitchen. She glanced around the living room, now conspicuously empty of her friend.

“He said he was turning in for the night,” Granny replied, not looking away from the TV.

Oh. I guess that makes sense. It was a long day, after all…

Momo couldn’t help the niggle of worry in her chest, though. She couldn’t shake the image of him laying cold and still in her arms, even though he’d ended up being fine. It was totally irrational, she knew it was, but she just… needed to lay eyes on him. Make sure he was really okay.

She went upstairs and stopped at his closed door. The light was off–that meant nothing, though, his room was always dark. She was pretty sure Okarun hadn’t touched the lightswitch a single time since moving in.

Raising a hand to knock, she hesitated. Maybe… he’s already asleep. Maybe he just wants to be alone right now . Jiji was nice, but he was also… a lot. And Okarun wasn’t a baby, he didn’t need her constantly checking up on him!

Momo lowered her hand, sighing. “See you tomorrow,” she said to his door, and made her way back downstairs.

+++

Kentakakura sat in class the next day, putting all his effort into taking notes on the lesson. But it was no good.

Her first love, too.

Seiko’s words kept echoing in his head. Jinenjoji, Momoayase’s first love, was currently living with them. He’d be staying for the rest of the week. Just thinking about it made him want to hiss. It was like the universe was punishing him for getting too comfortable! 

And the worst part was, he knew he had absolutely no reason to be feeling this way. Jinenjoji had come to Seiko for her help as a spirit medium. His family was in danger from a malicious entity in their home (he’d pretended to watch television with Seiko so he could eavesdrop on their conversation in the kitchen, even though he knew it was impolite). There was no reason to think he was being dishonest about his intentions. Even Momoayase herself seemed unhappy about the whole thing. 

So what was this ugly, acidic sensation that bubbled up in his chest whenever he saw the two of them together?

He was jealous. And he had absolutely no right to be. Momoayase wasn’t really courting him, despite the completely inappropriate comfort he took in pretending that she was. He was too much of a coward to tell her how he felt about her. This… possessiveness was totally unwarranted.

He needed to focus on the real issue–the entity that was haunting Jinenjoji’s family. The sooner they figured out what it was and how to get rid of it, the sooner everything could go back to normal.

… As normal as it ever got for him and Momoayase, at least.

When the bell for lunch rang, he headed straight to the library. Honestly, the size of the section on folklore was not promising, but it was what he had to work with. Maybe he could go to the city library after school? Ah, but Seiko would probably want to train them when they got home… Well, he could still go, even if he had to wait until after dark. He knew for a fact that the library staff never locked the windows at night.

Taking a seat with several books he’d pulled from the shelves, Kentakakura took out a pencil, opened his notebook to a fresh page, and began to read. The research absorbed him soon enough, and he almost–almost–forgot about his worries, until–

“There ya are!”

He shrieked, and slapped a hand over his mouth when the librarian scolded them to be quiet.

“Momoayase!” he whispered. “Um… is there something I can help you with?”

She raised an eyebrow. “Dude, it’s lunchtime. Don’t you want to eat up on the roof with me?”

He did. He really, really did. This morning, he’d barely gotten to say a word to her, with Jinenjoji commanding her attention during breakfast and the walk to school. But…

“Um, well… This research is kind of—” he cut off with a gasp as Momoayase hooked her arm around his and dragged him out of his seat. “H-hey!”

“The books will still be here when you get back,” she said, ignoring the librarian glaring at them as she marched him out into the hall. “You gotta eat!”

He put up pathetic resistance while she pulled him up to the roof. Annoyance at her interruption warred with the warm fluster at her insistence on taking care of him, like a proper rhetsire would . He pushed the feeling down.

“C’mon, stretch out your wings,” she told him once they had privacy. “I know you haven’t been able to since before we left this morning.”

He scowled, but did so. That… did feel much better. 

Momoayase handed him his bento box before sitting down herself, and he took it, settling down next to her. As he began to eat, his earlier irritation vanished entirely.

“...Thanks,” he said eventually. 

“No prob’. God knows I’m way crabbier before I get something to eat.”

“Crab… ier?” he asked, tilting his head. Was that good or bad?

“Yeah, it’s like, grumpy.”

“Oh.” Whoops. She’d picked up on his dark mood, then. “Sorry.”

“S’okay. I know this has gotta suck pretty bad for you, having Jiji in the house now. The old hag should’ve warned us he was coming!”

Ah. Momoayase thought he was upset over Jinenjoji’s presence because he now had to hide his wings in the house as well as at school. And yes, that was part of it. He resented having to wear his disguise at home now. At least she hadn’t guessed the other reasons for his unhappiness…

“So what’re you researching?” she asked.

“Well, I’m trying to figure out what might be haunting Jinenjoji’s house,” he said. 

“Any ideas yet?”

“That’s the problem–there’s too many possibilities. I don’t have enough information yet to really narrow it down.”

“Hmm… Well, whatever it is, we’ll kick it’s ass, for sure!”

Kentakakura couldn’t help but smile. He loved her positive attitude, her complete faith in their abilities, even against a threat they knew nothing about. It was infectious, he had to admit. With her, he felt like he really could take on anything.

“You went quiet. Whatcha thinking about?” Momoayase asked.

“U-uhm… It’s going to rain later!” 

She glanced up at the sky, currently blue and mostly cloudless. “Really?”

“Yup!” He could smell faint traces of it on the breeze. Trying to think of another topic of conversation, he opened his mouth to say something else, but the door to the roof suddenly opened.

Panicking, he reached for his spiritual power, desperately hoping that he could divert the intruder’s attention away from him before they saw him. Luckily, Momoayase was between him and the door, and she leapt up to further shield him from view.

“Jiji! What the heck are you doing up here?!” 

Oh, of course it was him! Couldn’t he leave Momoayase alone for a few minutes? They hadn’t even finished their lunches! 

“Yo! Diggin’ the sweet lunch spot, Momo! Why’re you up here all alone?”

“She isn’t,” said Kentakakura, having fixed his clothing. He stood up. 

“Oh, hey! Okarun, you’re here, too! Party on the roof, woo!” 

He resisted the urge to bear his teeth at the casual use of Momoayase’s nickname for him–he had to remind himself very firmly that Jinenjoji was only trying to be friendly (and it wasn’t like he had formally introduced himself, either).

“Thought you’d be off eating with Miko and them,” said Momoayase.

“Aww, someone’s jelly-welly! Too cute!” Jinenjoji exclaimed, pointing at her and doing a little shimmy. Kentakakura felt a prickling across his skin as his feathers bristled under his clothes. He was always dancing around Momoayase, flaunting and showing off. Didn’t he know how desperate it made him look?

“Check it,” he said, digging around in the plastic bag on his arm. He produced a small carton like a grand prize. “Yogurt-flavored pampy!”

Momoayase lit up. “No! For real?! Dude!” She rushed over to him, gushing in excitement.

Kentakakura watched them, his gut sinking in despair. So that was that. Jinenjoji had brought her a food she clearly loved, and she accepted it– him –with obvious enthusiasm. His previous hopes that everything could go back to the way it had been shriveled up and died.

Momoayase would surely start spending all her time with her new partner. She wouldn’t want to eat lunch on the roof with him anymore. She wouldn’t want to talk about the paranormal anymore.

She would forget all about him. 

…He couldn’t keep watching this.

Quietly, so as not to interrupt their moment, he made his way towards the door. He’d go back down to the library. He’d spend all his spare time training with Seiko or doing research, so he wouldn’t have to watch Jinenjoji court her any longer. So he could pretend it wasn’t ripping his heart straight out of his chest to see them so happy together. It would be better that way… for both of them.

He had the door halfway open when a piercing cry made him pause. That… hadn’t sounded like a noise a human could make. More like a… bird? He turned in the direction the sound had come from. A shape with an enormous wingspan cut its way through the air towards them at speed, something hanging beneath it. A large bag, and dangling beneath it was some rope–no, it was a net! 

On its current trajectory, it would hit the humans dead-on. They had seconds to react.

“Momoayase!” he shouted. “Watch out!”

She looked over at him in surprise, then up to where he was pointing. “What the–?!”

At the same time she stepped back to get out of the way, Jinenjoji grabbed her arm to pull her in the other direction. “Momo, look out!”

“Hey, let–!”

Kentakakura began to run. He’d push them down himself if he had to! 

He was too late. Momoayase managed to step out of the net’s path, but Jinenjoji’s flailing limbs became entangled, and he was dragged off his feet by the flying creature.

“Oh, shit! Jiji!” She reached out and grabbed him with her powers, bracing herself, but her weight didn’t even slow the creature down. With a yelp, she too was dragged into the air.

“Okarun!” she cried. He was already throwing himself off the roof after her.

+++

Oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit!

It turned out flying was a lot scarier when she had nothing to support her but her ghost hands. Don’t look down!

Momo kept her eyes locked on Jiji, where he dangled in the net–she couldn’t risk closing her eyes, for fear of losing her grip and plummeting through the air to hit the hard, unforgiving–

“Oof!” A familiar feathery shape came up right beneath her, interrupting her concentration and nearly knocking the wind out of her. 

“I’ve got you!” said Okarun, his arms coming up to support her.

Oh, thank fuck! She wrapped both arms around his neck, clutching his feathers gratefully. He kept pace easily with Jiji’s captor–whatever it was.

“What the hell even is that thing?!” It was difficult to tell from this angle, but the creature looked avian, covered in brown feathers with a few white patches. It had six limbs–arms, legs, and wings–a bit like Okarun, actually, though this thing had bird wings, not moth wings.

“A tengu, I think,” he replied. “What a powerful flier! Your weight didn’t even slow it down…”

“Yeah, be impressed later! We gotta get Jiji out of there!” 

“Oh! Right.” He put on a bit more speed and came up right beside where the boy hung. The wind really picked up, whipping Momo’s hair into her eyes

“Another monster!” Jiji yelled. “I’ll save you, Momo!”

Save her? From Okarun? He could not more clearly be trying to help her! And just what the hell did he think he was gonna do, caught up in that net? Although, on closer inspection, it was less of a net and more a chaotic mess of ropes hanging out of the huge sack the tengu carried.

Swinging his one free arm wildly, Jiji barely missed clocking Okarun right in the face.

“Hey, cut it out! It’s Okarun! He’s on our side!” Momo had to shout to be heard over the wind. She sent a mental apology to her friend, but the cat was kinda already out of the bag at this point. Also, she worried Jiji was going to end up falling right out of the net if he didn’t stop squirming around like that.

His eyes bugged out. “Wha…? No way!”

“Just hold still, we’re gonna get you out! Okarun, can you try and untangle him?”

“I think so. Keep a grip on him, in case he falls.” He seemed to be exerting more effort than normal to keep them steady–was it normal for the wind to be so strong at this altitude? She felt like they were in the middle of a storm!

Momo released her grip on Okarun’s neck to sit up slowly on his back. Reaching out, she cupped her ghost hands around Jiji once more. Once he was surrounded by her power, Okarun grabbed the nearest rope in one hand. His mandibles parted and then snapped down like the jaws they resembled, severing the thick cord.

Damn, okay.

He cut several more lengths of rope that way, working his way gradually towards the ones entangling Jiji, until–

“THIEVES!” came a harsh screech from above them. Shit, seemed like the tengu had finally realized what they were up to. “I won’t let you stop me!”

“Thieves? Us?!” Momo demanded, though how much of her shouting the creature actually heard over the gale-force winds, she couldn’t be sure. “You’re the one who stole Jiji, you overgrown–!”

Before she could finish the insult, the tengu twisted its body and beat its wings in their direction. A wall of air slammed into Momo, and she was blown straight off Okaun’s back!  

“MOMO!”

She tumbled end over end, sky and ground blurring as she fell until she could no longer tell which was which. It went on forever–or maybe only a couple of seconds–before strong arms encircled her and her face was suddenly pressed against something soft.

Okarun! He’d caught her yet again. But she could feel that they were still tumbling through the air, he was beating his wings desperately to right them, but– 

CRASH!

Everything came to a bone-jarring stop.

Fucking ow…  

Momo was still wrapped tight in Okarun’s arms. She could hear his heart pounding from where she lay sprawled across his chest, so at least he was still alive.

Lifting her head cautiously, she looked around. It seemed like they’d crashed through the roof of someone’s storage shed. Oops.

Okarun groaned, then sat up with a gasp.

“Momo, are you alright?!” He cupped her face, one talon gently brushing her bangs away from her eyes.

“I… I’m the one who should be asking you that!” she exclaimed, furiously ignoring the butterflies that erupted in her stomach at the tender gesture. He was the one who’d wrapped himself around her, taking the brunt of the fall.

“I’ve had worse landings,” he said. 

“Seriously? Yikes.”

“Learning to fly is hard!”

Well, he didn’t sound like he was in pain, at least. They got to their feet, brushing the debris off of themselves, and swiftly exited the shed. She felt bad about the Okarun-shaped hole in the roof, but what could they do about it? They still needed to find Jiji!

“Where’d that thing go?” she muttered to herself as she scanned the skies. No sign of the tengu. She prayed Jiji had still been secure enough within the net that he hadn’t been blown out like they had. The alternative was unthinkable.

Okarun straightened up to his full height beside her (and sheesh, his neck was long!). He looked around, antennae twitching.

“That way,” he said eventually, and crouched down so Momo could get on his back.

“How d’you know?”

“He smells like saltwater,” he replied. She figured he meant the tengu. And damn, he could smell him from all the way down here? 

“Don’t worry,” Okarun said, straightening up once Momo was situated. “He’s not getting away with this.”

+++

They didn’t have to go too far to find him. There was a park in Kamigoe–nothing too special, just lots of trees and a couple walking trails. Okarun touched down in the middle of the park, letting Momo down off his back before looking around to catch the tengu’s scent.

“Over there.” He pointed to a dense cluster of trees. As they approached it, she began to hear voices–one low and urgent, one loud and screeching.

“Jiji!” Momo pulled aside some branches, and there he was. Still tangled in rope but looking otherwise unharmed, Jiji stood facing the tengu in a small clearing. 

The birdman himself was a bit shorter than him, mostly brown with a few white patches, his startlingly orange beak clacking as he spoke. He wore some kind of tunic dyed a soft blue color, with what looked like intricate patterns sewn on the trim.

“Momo!” Jiji exclaimed when he saw her. “You’re okay!”  

“And so your accomplices return to finish the job!” The tengu pointed a clawed finger accusingly at Momo.

“I told you, man, that’s not it!”

“Just what in the hell are you talking about?” Momo asked.

“He thinks we’re trying to steal from him!”

“Who sent you?” the tengu demanded. “Was it my father? Well you can tell him I’ve made up my mind! I’m never going back, never!” His beady yellow eyes narrowed, and he took a step in her direction. “Or are you merely common thieves, after my–”

He was interrupted by a rattling hiss from somewhere behind Momo. 

“Back off,” Okarun growled, straightening up to his full height to loom over the tengu. His feathers were standing on end, making him look even bigger.     

“You tried to hurt Momo,” he said, his voice low and raspy. He took a few steps toward the tengu. “You could have killed her.”

“I–” the tengu stammered, almost tripping over his own feet as he backed away. “I was just–”

Okarun’s glowing red eyes narrowed as he leaned in close. “Just what?” 

If she weren’t still super pissed about the whole blowing them out of the sky thing, Momo would’ve felt sorry for the birdman. She couldn’t pretend she wasn’t enjoying watching him squirm, though. Turned out Okarun could look pretty damn scary when he wanted to.

“I’m s–I’m sorry. Truly,” said the tengu, ducking his head.

“I’m not the one you should be apologizing to.”

The tengu turned to Momo, and bowed so low his beak almost scraped the ground. “I apologize for endangering you, my lady. Please, forgive me.”

“Yeah, well, just pay attention to what’s going on around you,” Momo grumbled. “We weren’t even trying to steal from you. My friend got caught up in your net, we were just trying to get him out.”

The tengu blinked, straightening up from his bow. It was kind of hard to read his expressions, but she thought he looked embarrassed. “Er…”

“Pallas?” said a new voice. “Is that you?”

The tengu–Pallas?–whirled around, feathers fluffing. “Kanta!”

Seeming to forget all about them, he rushed towards the far edge of the clearing, where a small brown animal had appeared–a tanuki, by the look of it.

There was a burst of white smoke, and where the tanuki had been now stood a fat young man in a plain t-shirt and pants. Round ears twitched on top of his head, and a ringed tail swished behind him. His shaggy hair was the same brown as the tanuki’s fur, and there were mask-like markings around his eyes.

“Pallas, what are you doing here?” he asked. When the tengu reached him, he clasped their hands together, mindful of his long talons.

“Kanta,” Pallas sighed. He leaned forward and pressed his forehead against Kanta’s, somehow managing to avoid poking him in the eye with his beak.

“Uh… what’s happening now?” Okarun asked.

“Not sure…” Maybe they ought to leave? This seemed like a private moment.

“Why did you come back?” Kanta asked. “Your flock’s leaving soon, aren’t they?”

“They’ve already left,” Pallas replied. “And I’m not going with them.”

Kanta gasped. “Pallas–!”

“No, I’ve made up my mind! I want to stay with you forever, if you’ll have me.”

“That’s… We…” Kanta seemed to be having trouble getting words out. “Pallas, you said yourself, we’re from different worlds. It’ll never work between us! How could you go and give up your whole life, your family and your prospects, just for me?”

“Because I love you, Kanta! None of the rest of that–the status, the expectations, none of that matters to me. Before I met you, I was just slogging through life, doing what my father expected of me. But that’s not really living! 

“You opened my eyes, Kanta. You showed me a whole other world I never even knew about! Whatever our differences, whatever difficulties this world throws at us, we’ll figure it out together! Thanks to you, I understand now, what I really want, who I really want to be.”

He reached his hands up to cup Kanta’s face, one talon brushing the bangs out of his eyes.

“You see me, Kanta.”

Tears began to pour down the tanuki’s round cheeks. “Oh, Pallas… I love you too!”

The couple embraced, then leaned back for a kiss. Except… Well, Pallas had a beak, so him kissing Kanta really just looked like he was trying to eat his face.

Yeah… Momo didn’t need to watch that anymore. She leaned over to Okarun to suggest that they go ahead and dip while the couple was wrapped up in each other, but stopped.

He was staring at the embracing yokai, back straight for once. One hand was gripping the front of his gakuran. She couldn’t see the lower half of his face because of his mandibles, but his eyes were wide and shiny.

Momo sighed fondly. You big softie…      

"Aww… That’s actually super sweet,” said Jiji.  

The two yokai broke apart, finally seeming to remember that they had an audience. Pallas helped Jiji untangle himself from the net, apologizing profusely for the trouble he’d caused them. Momo couldn’t bring herself to be annoyed at him anymore, though.

It turned out that the tengu came from a very traditional family, who didn’t like that he’d fallen in love with a tanuki. Kanta’s family, in turn, did not trust the tengus, and would shun him if they stayed together. 

“Where will you go?” Okarun asked, all earlier anger at Pallas forgotten.

“There are places where the people are much more open-minded,” Kanta said, taking Pallas’s hand. “We’ll manage.”

The tengu hefted his sack (with the net safely tucked inside). “I have some friends along the coast. We can fly out there tonight!”

As soon as he said that, Momo felt a cold drop of water land on the top of head. It seemed like Okarun had been right about the rain. Shame she’d left her jacket back at school…

Okarun made a sound of disgust as the rain began to fall on him too, shifting his nanoskin so it formed a big hooded cloak that covered him completely. He looked pretty silly, with just the tips of his antennae and mandibles poking out. Though, it was a little ominous, how his eyes glowed in the shadow of the hood. 

“Whoa, how’d you do that?” Jiji asked, clearly impressed.

“Oh, c’mon you big baby,” Momo teased. “It’s only a little water.”

He grumbled in response. “I can’t fly if I get wet, you know!”

Oh. She had not known. That explained a lot, actually.

“A bit of rain won’t slow me down,” Pallas declared, puffing up in pride. He spread one wing, holding it over his boyfriend’s head to shield him from the weather.

BOOM!

A clap of thunder made them all jump. The rain began to fall in earnest, and Momo squealed.

“Let me in under there,” she demanded, tugging at Okarun’s raincoat.

“You’re already wet!” he protested.

“Let me innnnn!”

He sighed heavily, then opened the coat so she could tuck in next to his feathery side (she experienced a brief moment of embarrassment–she’d sort of assumed he would be wearing something underneath the coat. Ah, whatever. She’d already been all pressed up against him in less than this. No reason to let it bother her now).     

“‘It’s only a little water,’” he repeated, and she could hear the smirk in his voice.

“Oh, shut up!”

“I don’t think you dudes should be flying in this weather,” Jiji told the couple, having draped his jacket over his head. “Do you need somewhere to stay tonight?”

“Um…” Momo began. He wasn’t about to volunteer her house, was he?

“Oh, if it’s not too much trouble,” said Kanta.

“I don’t think Seiko would mind, if it’s only for one night,” Okarun said.

“Well… Yeah, I guess it couldn’t hurt to ask.”

They waited for the downpour to subside a bit before heading out. 

Okarun changed back into his regular form, much to Jiji’s amazement. He separated some of his nanoskin so Momo could have her own raincoat, and was talking to Pallas about his abilities–apparently tengu could manipulate the air currents around their bodies while in flight–happy as a clam.

“Your friend over there,” said Kanta, coming to stand next to her. “He’s not from around here, is he?”

“Yeah, no, he really isn’t.” She glanced over at the tanuki. He had a boyishly handsome face, making it difficult to guess his age. He could’ve said he was the same age as her, and she would’ve believed it. She wondered how much the yokai knew about the existence of aliens.

“Well, he seems very nice.”

“Yup. He is.” What was he trying to say here?

“So, what’s his deal?” Jiji leaned in to ask, jerking a thumb at Okarun. “Is he the same kinda thing as Pallas is?”

“How could you think that?” demanded Pallas. Oops, looks like they heard that.  

“We look nothing alike,” Okarun agreed.

“I mean,” Momo said. She could understand how Jiji had confused them. “You do, a little. When you’re in full-on Moth Mode.”

He squinted at her. “What did you just say?”

“You know! When you’re transformed. Moth Mode.”

“That is not what it’s called!” 

“Oh okay, what is it called, then?”

“It’s–” he said a word that started with “R” and ended in a chittering chirp.

“Yeah, I don’t… think I can pronounce that. Moth Mode it is.”

“Momoayase, I am not a moth! Or a tengu. Any resemblance I have to Earth animals is entirely coincidental.”

“Huh? What d’you mean, ‘Earth animals’?” Jiji asked, looking back and forth between Momo and Okarun. 

“O-oh, uh…” he adjusted his glasses, looking suddenly shy. “I happen to… not be from Earth, actually.”

Jiji’s eyes bugged out. “Hold up, hold up! You’re an alien?! Aliens are real?! Dude, that’s so epic!”

Momo smiled, watching Jiji pelt Okarun with excited questions. It was about time someone appreciated how cool her friend was.         

+++

Momo knelt in the living room before her grandmother for the second time in as many days.

“Please, let them stay here!” she begged. Pallas and Kanta sat behind her, also kneeling.

“Momo, I ain’t running a hotel here,” Granny said. “I can’t take in every yokai who bats his big, sad eyes at you.”

That was unfair on multiple levels! Inviting Okarun to live with them had been her idea in the first place (also, inviting was generous. She’d basically forcibly adopted him. The fact that he’d been cool with it had seemed like a minor consideration).

“It’s only for one night,” Okarun said. “They have nowhere else around here they can stay!”

“Nobody else can help because nobody else has your big, big heart!” Jiji put in.

Granny groaned. “Fine. Just for tonight.”

“Thank you so much, ma’am,” Kanta said.

“We’re forever in your debt,” added Pallas. 

“Yeah, yeah,” Granny said, waving off their gratitude. “You two go out to the storage shed and get my extra futons. Momo, get the table set up for dinner.”

“‘Kay.” 

“Momo, you’ve got some crazy awesome powers!” Jiji told her. “And Okarun, that transformation was so sick! It was so badass! No wonder Miss Seiko trusts you guys with helping me out!”

“Um… bad ass?” Okaru asked, tilting his head to the side.

“It’s a good thing!” Momo said, carrying the table into the room. 

“Man, I wish I had some kind of amazing power like you do!” Jiji continued.

“Oh, um… I don’t know if I’d call it amazing. It’s something all my species can do. I’m not even that good at it…”

Momo sighed. Man, Okarun really needed to hype himself up more! He was awesome, he needed to acknowledge it!

“Outta the way,” she told Jiji. “I’m putting the table down.”

“Lemme help you with that,” he said, and then proceeded to pose and make goofy noises–the opposite of helping, basically.

“Why are you like this,” she sighed. What a goober.  

“Oh! Momo, hold still.” Jiji leaned in real close, and picked something off her head. “You had some lint in your hair.”

“Huh? Oh, thanks, I guess. Now get out the way!”

“Thank me again, and I will!”

“You’re lucky I thanked you at all!” She couldn’t help chuckling at his antics, though. Jiji always knew how to make people laugh, lift the mood, no matter what. Even when he was being annoying, Momo really was glad he was here. She’d missed him since he’d moved away.

“Momoayase, you had lint!”

Momo jumped at Okarun’s exclamation. She hadn’t even realized he was standing right there until he said something. He was so damn quiet all the time!

“Uh. Thank you.” Now he was just standing there, staring at the floor. “You okay?”

“I’ve decided I won’t hold back anymore,” he muttered. “I’m going to take a stand and fight!”

“...For what?” What was he talking about?

Instead of answering, Okarun grabbed the table from her, set it down, and began to… say something. She didn’t understand the words, though. Was this his language?  The words had a melodic flow, like a song. Momo listened intently. She so rarely got to hear him speak his native tongue.

He also began to move his wings in some kind of pattern, hopping around in front of her. It was sort of hypnotising to watch, though Momo could not for the life of her figure out why he’d decided to do this… whatever he was doing in the middle of the living room.

Jiji, delighted by this new game, began to copy him, shouting out the words to some love song. Okarun seemed startled for a second before he doubled down, and soon the two were hopping in circles around Momo, who just stood there, baffled.

“Would you two chill out!” Granny shouted from the kitchen. “You’re kicking the dust up!”

“Sorry ma’am!” they called out in unison.

…Well, at least they seemed to be getting along?  

Chapter Text

Dinners were always lively at the Ayase house. Her grandmother took food very seriously, especially when they had company over. That night was no different. Granny had put together a great spread, even catering to their guests’... more unusual tastes.

“The eyeballs are the best part,” Pallas was saying as he pulled a whole raw salmon from the platter in the center of the table. 

“I’m pretty fond of the eggsack, myself,” Okarun replied. 

Momo tried not to shudder. Okarun could claim he wasn’t a bird all he liked, but he and Pallas had been deep in conversation about which organs were tastiest the entire meal. She didn’t know whether or not she preferred this to watching them swallow fish whole. Granny had smacked the tengu over the head with a wooden spoon when he tried that.

“This fish is top-quality, so slow down and actually taste it!” she’d yelled. Pallas quailed under the assault, apologizing profusely. 

“Soooo,” Jiji said, leaning over to Momo. “What’s the story with Okarun, huh? He’s not really an American transfer student, is he?”

“Hmm? Oh, nah. That’s just what we tell people.” She glanced over at the alien in question, still focused on his discussion with Pallas. He’d barely even looked at her and Jiji since his little performance in the living room, in fact.

So he was probably too distracted to notice if she embellished things. Just a little.

“Space pirates?” she heard him exclaim several minutes later. “That’s not what happened, you’re making that up!”

Momo glanced over at him, a mischievous grin tugging at her lips. Took him long enough. His grumpy expression was so funny, she wasn’t even annoyed that he’d interrupted her recounting how he’d gotten to Earth to Jiji. “Aw, c’mon. It could have! You said yourself that you don’t know why you had to evacuate.”

“It was not because of pirates,” Okarun huffed. “A mechanical malfunction, maybe.”

“But it makes a cooler story if it was!”

“That’s not the point—”

They continued to bicker, Momo reaching for the bok choy dish to refill her plate, only to cry out in betrayal as Jiji stole the last portion for himself.

“Bastard! I wanted that!”

He only shrugged apologetically as Granny said, “You snooze, you lose, kid. Dinnertime is a battlefield!”

“Um, you can have the rest of mine, Momoayase,” she heard over the grinding of her teeth. She looked over at Okarun in surprise. All annoyance at her taking liberties with his story seemed to have evaporated. 

“Huh? You sure?” She was surprised he had anything left on his plate, he usually ate so fast. 

He nodded. “I already had a lot, so…”

“Thanks!” She eagerly held out her plate. He scraped the remainder of his bok choy onto it, then glanced away almost shyly, pink spreading across his cheeks. 

Momo devoured the bok choy with gusto, and happened to glance up at Kanta. He was staring straight at her, a knowing smirk on his face.

What the hell’s that about?

Before she could think too hard on it, Jiji started asking her questions about their run-ins with aliens, and she was swept back up into the raucous conversation with her friends.

+++

Kentakakura didn’t know what to do. 

Since his secret had been revealed, Jinenjoji had barely left him alone. He would repeatedly approach him and ask questions, and seemed genuinely interested in his answers! It was expected things at first—what species he was, what planet he was from, why he’d left home.

But once Kentakakura mentioned his research, Jinenjoji wanted to know about that, too! He was a little reluctant at first. The few humans who had tried to talk to him at school quickly grew bored and either changed the subject or stopped speaking to him completely. No different from back on Lepidoterra, really.

He kept expecting the same thing to happen with Jinenjoji, but… it never did. The boy had seemingly endless enthusiasm. No one besides Momoayase had ever paid him so much attention. It was… nice.

Which left him feeling conflicted. He didn’t want to like Jinenjoji. He was a rival for Momoayase’s affections, it should feel wrong to enjoy talking to him!

But Jinenjoji was nice. He thought Kentakakura was cool. He said as much, while they were walking to school after saying their goodbyes to Pallas and Kanta.

He called Kentakakura his friend.

“We… we’re friends?” he asked in surprise.

“Aren’t we?!” Jinenjoji exclaimed. 

“U-uhm…” He didn’t know what to say. The intricacies of human relationships still escaped him—heck, his Virbilatian relationships hadn’t been much better. Even in his creche, he’d always been the outsider.  

It felt at times like everyone around him was dancing to music he could not hear. Playing a game that no one had bothered explaining the rules of.

They all had something that he… just didn’t.

But Momoayase, and now Jinenjoji, made him feel like maybe that didn’t matter.

“You really want to be my friend?” he asked.

“Of course! You’re so cool, Okarun, and you know so much! Who wouldn’t want to be friends with you?”

Kentakakura’s mouth opened, but no sound came out. He gripped the sides of his glasses, looking away. “...Thank you, Jinenjoji.”

“O’ course, Oka-bro!” He slung his arm around Kentakakura’s shoulder. “But if we’re friends, you gotta call me Jiji, ‘kay?”

“O-oh,” he stammered, flustered at the sudden closeness. “Okay… Jiji.”

He smiled the whole walk to school.  

+++

Momo waved to Okarun as she and Jiji stepped into their classroom. It definitely wasn’t her imagination that he was standing up straighter than normal as he waved back. Or that he walked down the hall to his class with an extra pep in his step.

Good.

She was so glad they were getting along. Okarun didn’t have any guy friends, and someone as relentlessly positive as Jiji was sure to be good for his self-confidence.

“Girl, where the heck did you go yesterday?” Miko asked as they sat down.

Momo suppressed a groan. Right, they’d totally ditched school the day before. Not that they’d had a choice! But she hadn’t prepared an excuse for their disappearing act.

While Momo mentally flailed, Jiji said, “We were totally kidnapped off the roof by this giant bird monster! It was mega scawwy!”

Momo rounded on him, preparing to tell him off for dropping the truth so casually, but her friends just giggled, dismissing the story as a joke outright. Jiji started goofily posing and flirting with Kei, and they didn’t bring up the subject again.

Huh. Maybe the goober could be cleverer than she gave him credit for.

+++

The rest of the day passed in typical monotony. Momo actually invited Jiji up to the roof for lunch this time, but he sheepishly declined. Apparently he’d already made plans to hang out with some of the soccer players over break.

“Don’t you go gettin’ jealous on me though, Momo!” He shot finger guns. “You’re still number one in my heart!”

“Yeah, yeah,” she chuckled, waving him off. She found Okarun—he hadn’t wandered off this time, thankfully—and they spent the break eating and talking about some cryptid he’d been reading about. 

Well. He talked, she listened to him blab and occasionally asked questions. She was interested, despite the fact that a typhoon with human facial features just blowing around in it seemed extremely far-fetched, even to her.

Classes dragged on, and Momo leapt out of her seat when the day finally ended. 

“Got a hot date with the bae?” Kei asked with a smirk.

“No,” she huffed. Then she paused, considering. It was probably harmless to tell them the truth. Part of it, anyway. “Actually, Granny’s been training me to take over her spirit medium gig.”

“Really?” Kei’s eyebrows shot up. “Cool! What do you even like, do to train for that?” 

“Oh, it’s lots of work. Apparently, ‘to train the spirit, you must train the body’, or whatever. A bunch of working out and then meditating, basically.”

“I’m glad you two are getting along again,” Miko said. They both knew how special her grandmother’s work was to Momo—and how hard that period of barely speaking to each other had been for her. “But we gotta plan a girl’s night out sometime!”    

“Oh, we definitely will!” She’d missed her fellow gyaru girlfriends. They were a bastion of normalcy in her insane new life. “Catch you later!”

“Do you think Auntie Seiko would train me, too?” Jiji asked as they made their way out into the hall. 

“Huh? What for?” Jiji was the fittest person she knew. Why would he need training?

“For ghost stuff! Y’know, since I can see them now. Auntie Seiko said that my natural spiritual energy is really high.” 

“Eh? What’s that even mean?”

Jiji opened his mouth to reply when all the lights went out.   

+++

“Oh come the fuck on!” Momo shouted into the now-empty hallway. Couldn’t they have one day without stupid paranormal bullshit? Was that too much to ask? “Fucking Serpoians…”

At least they’d waited until the end of the school day to pull them into this weird empty void space. How considerate… not!  

“Let’s get this over with,” Momo grumbled. She and Jiji had been halfway to the footlockers to meet up with Okarun, as his last class of the day was halfway across the school. If she started heading in his direction, maybe she could meet him—or Aira, I guess—and thrash whatever alien gig worker the Serpoians had thrown at them this time.

Momo considered trying to sneak through the halls but—ah, fuck it. It was likely the aliens already knew where she was. Better to speed through and find Okarun as fast as she could. So she began to run.

She got up a good rhythm—thank you, track training—almost making it all the way back to her classroom before the hall doors in front of her slammed closed on their own. 

Momo skidded to a halt just in time to avoid braining herself on the metal door. She grabbed the handles and rattled them fruitlessly. Locked.

“Like that’ll stop me!” She summoned two ghost hands and dug them into the metal, intending to rip the doors right off their hinges. 

There was a sudden, sharp noise from behind her, and a bright light flared in the corner of her vision a moment before the back of her right hand burned. Momo yelped and her ghost hands dissolved. Her real hand was unmarked and the pain was fading fast. Did something hit my ghost hand?

Momo whirled around to face the empty hallway. Her eyes couldn’t detect any movement, and she could hear nothing over the sound of her own pounding heart. 

The mechanical bark came again, and a beam of green light appeared, headed straight for Momo’s head. 

“Shit!” She hit the deck just in time. Sparks rained down and her nose caught the scent of burning metal. Someone’s shooting fucking lazer beams at me!

Momo scrambled to her feet and took off down the hallway to her right. She risked a glance over her shoulder—nothing was behind her. Nothing she could see, anyway. 

Then don’t look with your eyes.

Concentrating, Momo focused on her aura sight—though with it, she didn’t need to rely on the physical eyes in her head. Everything looked normal, except—there!

Once, when she was young, Momo had placed a fridge magnet against the television in the living room, just to see what would happen. The result was a warped, discolored patch in the middle of the screen that persisted for days. Granny had been pretty upset about it.

The indistinct shape that kept steady pace behind her reminded her of that distortion on the TV screen. She’d never seen anything like it. 

Two more bolts of green energy shot out at her, and Momo had to swerve to avoid them. It was tough looking ahead of her to run and keeping her aura sight on the thing chasing her. She reached out with her ghost hands and ripped a classroom door off its hinges. Hurling it back at her pursuer, she put on another burst of speed.

Have to get to Okarun!

The thing was persistent, and occasionally let out a burst of lazer fire or made doors slam shut, making Momo have to change direction. As her lungs began to burn, she had the unpleasant thought that she was being herded.

Sustained lazer fire suddenly erupted from behind her, and Momo yelped in pain as one of the bolts grazed her arm. She dove through the nearest classroom door with a half-formed plan of jumping out a window.       

Orange filled her vision, and Momo slammed into what felt like a solid wall. She bounced off, her back hitting the ground as she clutched her smarting nose.

“What the hell?!” She sat up. Light pulsed all around her, encasing her in a dome.

A cage.

She was trapped.

Immediately, Momo was up on her feet. She aimed a kick at the dome. Orange light rippled outward from the spot she struck, but it was like kicking concrete. No give at all. She summoned her ghost hands and slammed them against the wall. Again, no effect. A tingle ran up her arms each time she touched the light with her power, like a weak electrical current running through her limbs. It was deeply unpleasant.

“Don’t waste your time,” came a rasping voice from behind her. Momo whirled around, fists raised. “Then again, please do. It’ll be so much easier to transport you after you’ve exhausted yourself.”

At first, she could see nothing past the barrier that trapped her. She could hear heavy footsteps, though, coming closer.

There was a ripple in the air beyond her cage. Something she couldn’t see was distorting the air around it as it approached her. A brief shimmer of light, and suddenly Momo’s captor was in full view. 

It was a… dinosaur? 

That was her first impression, anyways. The creature was reptilian, covered in scales in various shades of green. It stood upright on two large, clawed feet, spine slightly hunched. A tail extended out behind it for balance. It wore pants made of rough brown fabric, and over its flat chest was some kind of harness covered in small, winking lights. In its arms it held a very large gun.

It came right up to Momo’s cage, and she was treated to an uncomfortably close view of its creepy face. Somewhere between a human and a snake, there was no nose or lips, just slits. Yellow eyes with vertical pupils stared at her, unblinking. From the top of its head sprouted a large green frill, giving the vague illusion of hair. 

“So much trouble,” the alien rasped, “for such an ugly little thing.” A long red tongue slid out of its mouth and came up to lick both its eyeballs.

Momo recoiled. Nasty! “Right back at you,” she said, shuddering.

Bursts of short hisses came out of the alien’s mouth. Its expression was hard to read, but Momo thought it might be laughing at her. Two clawed fingers came up to the side of its head and touched a small black square stuck there. 

“The first target has been captured.”

Dread coiled in Momo’s stomach. The first target… But maybe that meant Okarun or even Aira hadn’t been caught yet! She couldn’t just wait around to be rescued, though.

The big lizard alien turned its attention away from her to fiddle with the weird harness it wore. Momo took the opportunity to examine her cage more closely. Just outside of it, she could see several small boxy shapes on the floor that surrounded her in a loose ring. It looked like they were the things projecting the weird light barrier. Maybe she could break one and get free? But the dome blocked her powers as well as physical blows… 

She glanced over at the alien. It wasn’t looking right at her, still messing with its equipment, but it was facing towards her. Even if she managed to break her cage somehow, Big Ugly would just shoot her. What she needed was a distraction.

She didn’t have to wait long.

Lizard Alien looked up suddenly and said, “About time.”

Momo followed its gaze to the doorway she’d come from to see a new figure step into the room—and man! If she thought the lizard was ugly, this alien took it to a whole new level!

Her first thought was that a giant caterpillar had just walked in. Multiple stubby limbs ending in clawed digits moved in tandem to propel its long, fat body. Its skin was greyish-blue in color with mossy green splotches. Five small eyes set in its squashy face blinked at random intervals. Yellow tusks curved down from its puffy overbite, putting Momo in mind of a walrus.

“They’re a quick little bugger,” it said in a high, almost flutelike voice.  “But the darts worked an absolute treat.”

Momo’s stomach squeezed into a hard little marble. Who was it talking about?

“Of course they did,” the lizard replied. “Now let’s contact the client and get off this miserable little rock.” It pulled a brick-shaped object with a small screen out of a pants pocket and began to tap at its buttons.

“She didn’t mean it like that,” the caterpillar alien said to Momo. “Your little rock seems very nice.”

But she wasn’t listening. While the alien spoke, it unslung a dark, spindly shape from across its back and placed it on the floor. It lay there, completely still. Dread froze the blood in her veins.

“Okarun!”  

Two antennae twitched up at her exclamation—oh thank god, he’s still alive—but he didn’t move otherwise. “Momo? Are you okay? Where are you?!”

“What the hell did you do to him, you big blue turd?!” she demanded of the alien, slamming a fist into the barrier wall for emphasis. 

“A simple paralyzing agent,” it replied. “Immobilizes from the neck-down. But don’t worry, there will be no lingering after-effects! We are professionals and we take bounty safety very seriously.”

“Not that it’ll make any difference, where you’re going,” the lizard grumbled, not looking up from its—her?—device. “Serpoians… Why Blisztook ever agreed to do business with those creeps, I’ll never know.”

“Please don’t bad-mouth the clients on the job, Rreshaa. It’s bad optics.” It turned back to Momo. “Speaking of, would you be willing to fill out a survey to help the Guild of Bounty Hunters achieve higher client satisfaction?”

Momo saw red. She lunged at the alien, slamming her psychic and physical fists repeatedly against the orange light. “Survey?! Are you fucking kidding me?! How dare you!? Once I get outta here I’m gonna kick your ass so hard you’ll fold like a damn accordian, you hear me?!”   

“They’re never gonna want to take the survey, Nik.”

The alien apparently known as Nik gave a whistling sigh. “Yes, I know. We still have to ask, though.”

“Whatever. Clients have been notified. Go ahead and restrain the Virbilaetian, would you? And watch that beak.”

“It’s not a beak,” Nik said, sounding exasperated. “They’re flexible mandibles that form an exterior jaw. And I don’t need you to tell me to watch them, they already got a few hits in.”

Momo felt sharp satisfaction as the alien showed off several gouge marks on its back. At least Okarun had made it hurt before going down. 

The lizard alien—Rreshaa—sniffed at the bloodless wounds. “Better go put some ointment on that. Let me deal with the restraints.” She stomped over to Okarun, still immobile on the floor. He hissed as she approached. “Who knew these weirdo hippies could get so feisty?”

“You’re going to make us have to re-take the cross-species sensitivity training module if you keep on like that,” said Nik disapprovingly.

Rreshaa hissed at that. “Bah! All this new-fangled sensitive customer service crap is what’s ruining the bounty hunting industry, if you ask me! This gig used to be simple. It used to be, we only had to focus on the important things. The chase, the capture, the thrill of the hunt! Now it’s all client satisfaction this, bounty safety that! Nobody used to care whether or not the target still had all its limbs attached, back in my day. And an upstanding establishment like the Guild would never have done business with slimy cheapskates like the Serp–”

“The targets have been contained?” came a new voice, cutting the lizard woman off mid-rant. Every head turned to the Serpoian standing in the doorway. He squinted purple eyes at Momo and Okarun. “These are not all of the targets! There is another human female with significant abilities we wish for you to capture.”

They didn’t have Aira yet! She’d resent having to be rescued by that cow, but Momo would take any good news she could get.

“There were only two targets listed in the contract,” Nik said. “A Virbilaetian and a human female with psychokinetic powers.”

“You are costing us a fortune! We want the other human female, too. Catch her, or we will cut your pay!”

“Hey now,” Rreshaa growled. “That’s not how this works. We’re professionals, not hourly mercenaries, you hear? Your bosses signed a contract with my bosses, so you ain’t cutting nothing. Not unless you want us to leave with the down payment we already received and turn these targets loose. You don’t want that, right?” She laid a scaly hand on the barrel of the very big gun hanging from her shoulder.

The Serpoian grimaced. “...No. We do not want that.”

“If you want us to procure another target, you must draw up another contract,” said Nik pleasantly.

“...I will confer with my superiors,” he grumbled, stomping out of the room.

“You do that,” Rreshaa sneered. “...Damn stupid… didn’t even read the contract, I bet. How could Blisztook do us this way, eh?!”

“I admit, this sort of client seems… beneath our skill level,” Nik said.

As Rreshaa continued to grumble under her breath, Momo’s mind raced. Okarun was paralyzed. She was trapped. Aira was still loose, but might not be for long. These two were clearly a different caliber of goon than the Mantisian and the yeti. And they were about to be beamed up or whatever, possibly far away from any hope of rescue. She needed to act now.

There was a single spot in the dome of light near the floor Momo had noticed that flickered at regular intervals. A weak point, hopefully. If she hit it in just the right spot at the right moment, maybe she could free herself and take the goons by surprise. 

…The goons with guns and darts and who knew what else.

Okay, it was a long shot, but it was all she had! 

Glancing up to be sure she wasn’t being observed, Momo readied her ki. Wait for it…

“This one’s kinda small, aren’t they?” Rreshaa said, peering down Okarun.

“Not every species is a monolith, dear,” Nik sighed.

Small? Momo thought. If Okarun was small, how big was the average Virbilaetian?! Stop getting distracted, dummy! she scolded herself.

“And lookit all this. These here, these are down feathers, aren’t they?” She reached down and tugged at Okarun’s fluffy chest. He made a screeching, chattering noise in response.

“There’s no need for that kind of language,” Nik chided, coming to stand next to Rreshaa.

Is he cussing them out? Momo thought. Good!

Nik made a warbling sound. “Mm, you know, I think you’re right. Virbilaetian, are you at or above the age of majority for your species?”

“I—” Okarun began angrily.

“Why do you care?” Momo cut in.

Both aliens turned to look at her. “We care,” Rreshaa hissed, “because if the Serpoians hired us to hunt a kid, then it would be a serious breach of contract. We’re professionals. We take our contracts very seriously. So. You a kid, or what?”

“N—”

“We are,” Momo interrupted again. “Both of us. We’re kids, we’re still in school.” 

“Son of a shillsskle,” Rreshaa growled, her frill standing on end. 

The Serpoian chose that moment to walk back into the room. “I have conferred with my superiors, and—”

“You. Did you know about this?!” the lizard woman snarled.

The Serpoian blinked. “About what?”

“This target of yours is a damned fledgling!” Rreshaa bared her fangs as she pointed a claw down at Okarun. “You slimy vakkentiks hired us to hunt skrrikking children!”

“This goes directly against Guild policy,” Nik added, crossing multiple pairs of arms. “We will need to have a word with your superiors.”

“Wh— You—” the Serpoian stammered. “You are refusing to complete the job?”

“You’re damn right we are!”

“You can’t do that! You signed a contract! You have to complete the job or… or we will leave a bad revie—” That was as far as he got before his head was blown off.

“Consider our contract terminated,” Rreshaa hissed as the body toppled to the floor. She blew away the smoke still leaking from her massive gun’s muzzle before slinging it back over her shoulder. 

“You should have said that before you shot him,” Nik observed drily. 

“Oh, leave me alone.” She stomped over to stand in front of Momo’s cage. “You. Ugly human kid. You gonna try and kill me if I let you out?”

Momo blinked at the alien, mind still reeling at the sudden turn of events. “...Are you?”

She snorted and licked her eyeballs. “Nah. This wasn’t personal, you understand? Just business.”

“Our bounty contract has been rendered null and void by this… oversight,” Nik added. “Rest assured, we will be making a full report to our higher-ups. The Serpoian Conglomerate will be blacklisted from any further business dealings with the Bounty Hunter’s Guild. We have a zero-tolerance policy about this sort of thing!”

Well, they seemed earnest enough. “...Okay.”

The second the barrier came down, Momo was on the ground beside her immobile friend.

“Okarun! Are you okay?!” She cradled his head and leaned down to look directly into his wide red eyes.

“No,” he groaned. “I mean, I’m not hurt, I don’t think. But I can’t move at all!”

“Please accept our deepest apologies for this incident. And this,” Nik said. It stretched out one stubby limb towards Momo, some kind of clear plastic card in its clawed grip. 

“Uh…” She leaned away from it, wary.

“Compensation for your troubles,” the alien said, explaining absolutely nothing.

“How about an antidote for this paralysis thing?”

“Oh, that’ll wear off on its own in a few hours.”

“A few hours?!”

“Babe!” Rreshaa called over to them. “Come on. We’re dissipating the void and getting out of here.”

“Hey!”

Nik placed the card on the floor in front of Momo and made its way over to the lizard woman. “What nice kids.”

“Hang on a fucking second!”

“Doesn’t it make you want…?”

“No,” Rreshaa interrupted. “You’re just hormonal.”

Momo leapt to her feet. “You can’t–!” 

She threw her hands up at the sudden blinding light, the image of Nik huffily crossing its arms seared onto her eyeballs. When Momo lowered her arms, they were back in the real world, in an empty classroom.

“God. Dammit!” she bellowed, kicking a chair across the room. That felt really good, so she did it again. 

“…Momo?” Okarun’s quiet voice cut through her rage.

A sudden rush of guilt froze her in her tracks. What the hell was wrong with her? This was no time to be throwing a tantrum! Her best friend was lying completely helpless on the ground! He needed her right now. 

“I’m sorry Okarun!” She knelt back down in front of him. “We’re gonna figure this out, okay?” 

Somehow. At least, due to the timing of the attack, they were completely alone in the school right now. Small mercies.        

“I’ll, uh… I’ll carry you home in my ghost hands!” They might get weird looks, but whatever! Okarun could use his distraction-thingy, they’d be fine! 

“That would be great,” he said when she suggested that to him. “But…”

“But what?”

“...I can’t change shape. And I can’t reach my power, either.”

“...Aw, fuckity-fuck!”       

Chapter Text

“You doing okay there?” Momo asked Okarun. She gently lifted his limp body in her ghost hands. 

Déjà vu, she thought humorlessly. At least he was conscious this time.

“Yes,” he replied. “Probably. Maybe? I can’t actually feel anything below my head, so I don’t know!”

Momo suppressed a sigh. She reminded herself to be patient with him. He’d done a good job of not freaking the fuck out so far. She couldn’t say she’d be able to keep so calm, if it were her in this situation. 

“Okay. I’m just gonna carry you like this up to the roof and we’ll wait this thing out. Alright?”

“Alright.” His eyes fell to her feet. “You should probably pick that up.”

“Huh?” She followed his gaze to where the weird card Nik had tried to give to her lay on the ground. It was octagonal, roughly the size of her palm, and covered in black geometric designs. She bent down and picked it up. “What is it?”

“It’s—ack!”

“Shit, sorry!” While she was distracted, Okarun’s head and neck had slipped off her ghost hand and hit the floor like a damn Slinky. At least he hadn’t fallen far… “Sorry!”

“It’s okay.” Once she maneuvered him back into position, he said, “That Eaucledelphii said it was compensation, right?”

“The you-what-now?”

“Eaucledelphii. Oh, what was her…? Nik! She said it was compensation. It’s probably money.” 

Momo’s eyebrows rose. “Really? How much?” She held it in front of his face so he could get a good look. 

“...I can’t tell,” he said, squinting at the markings. “My Kliptorigan’s really rusty, sorry.”

She barked a laugh. “Dude, it’s fine. I couldn’t even tell it was writing! Doubt we could exchange it for yen anyways.” She still tucked the card into her jacket pocket. Bad idea to leave alien junk just lying around, probably. Also, the idea of having space money was kinda cool, even if it was useless to them.

Momo poked her head out of the room. A quick sweep of the halls confirmed nobody was out there. Making sure to keep all of Okarun’s limbs securely in her ghost hands, she snuck up to the roof.

She breathed a sigh of relief once the door closed behind them. 

“Okay, so… How d’you wanna do this?”

She’d thought before that she could just lay him out on one of the benches. But looking at them now, there was no way his gangly ass could fit on it comfortably. His whole lower half would be hanging off!

“Just lay me down on the ground,” he sighed.

“...Yeah okay.” Not like there was a better option. 

“Not on my back!” he protested when she began to lower him. “My wings will be pinned.”

Very awkwardly, she managed to flip him over and get him laid out on his stomach. In a moment of inspiration, she folded up her jacket and placed it like a pillow underneath his chin so he’d be as comfortable as possible.

“...Thank you,” he murmured when she was done. 

“‘Course,” she replied. Then she laid down next to him and sprawled out on her back like a starfish. “Man, that sucked!”

“Mm…”

She looked over at him. He was staring straight ahead, eyebrows furrowed. His antennae drooped so much they nearly touched the ground. She couldn’t even see the lower half of his face, but he still looked gloomy as hell. Not that she could blame him, really.

What could she say to cheer him up? Or distract him for a while, at least. Momo scratched idly at her arm, hissing when her nails accidentally raked across the small burn there.

Okarun’s antennae shot up at the sound. “Momo? What’s wrong, are you hurt?”

“Nah, it’s nothing, really,” she assured him. “Just a little burn from when that lizard alien was chasing me.”

He didn’t even bother to correct her on the alien’s name, just made a grumbling, growling noise that sounded indescribably frustrated.

"Hey, you okay?" Momo asked. The feathers on his neck were standing up like the back of an angry cat.

"No," he ground out.  

"You… wanna talk about it?"

Okarun was quiet for a beat before saying, "…We almost died today."

Wow, okay.

"Those bounty hunters had us. I wasn't fast enough to avoid those darts. It was just luck that they didn't hand us over to the Serpoians. And all I could do was lay there and be useless—"

"Hey," Momo interrupted. "Don't say that. I hate it when you talk like that."

"But it's true!" he shouted, taking her aback. She'd never heard him sound like this—so explosively angry. Even when he'd gotten mad at Pallas for blowing her off his back, he'd never raised his voice like this. And it all seemed to be directed inward, at himself.

He seemed to realize that his volume had startled her, because his next words were quieter. "I hate that I couldn't do anything to help you. I hate that they only let us go because… because they thought I was a child. I hate being so small and weak."

Shit.

Momo had noticed before that Okarun got really… in his feelings when he was in full Moth Mode. Like his emotions got dialed up to eleven. Was this how he actually felt? How he saw himself?

"Hey." Momo shuffled around, laying on her front with her fists tucked under her chin so she could look him in the eyes. "You're not useless, okay? We've been fighting these creeps together this whole time! Yeah, today sucked, but we got through it."

"But what about next time? Those Serpoians aren't giving up."

"Next time we'll kick the asses of whatever else they throw at us."

"You will," he said. "You're the strong one. You beat the Serpo-fusion creature, and the Flatwoods Monster. Even that first night on the Serpoians' ship, I tried to help you but I couldn't. If your powers hadn't woken up, we would've been done for."

He sounded so frustrated, it broke her heart a little. It was like he could only see his own failures.

"…But you were there," she said. "You could've walked away back then, but you didn't. You came to help me, and you didn't even know me. And I'm glad you did. I'm glad I'm not alone in this."

Biggest understatement of the damn century. Momo couldn't even imagine how screwed she would be, trying to fight all these aliens and yokai on her own.

Okarun's eyes had gone big and shiny behind his glasses. "…Even if I'm not strong enough to protect you?"

"Dude, shut up!" she exclaimed. He blinked in surprise. "So you don't have, I dunno, sonic punches like Mr. Mantis Shrimp, so what? You're pretty awesome all on your own, you know. You can fly, you're super fast, and you know stuff! Like, you knew what Acro-Silky and the Flatwoods Monster were right away! And I wouldn't have thought to take out the Yeti's power core if you hadn't told me what it was. I don't know jack about alien crap."

"I… I guess…"

"You guess. It's true! I'd be screwed without you. So no more moping about it!" She reached out to poke his cheeks, but his mandibles were in the way, so she poked at those instead. She wasn't sure if he could feel it, though. They were hard and smooth, reminding her a bit of fingernails.

"Okay…" Okarun said. "I'll try. Thank you, Momo."

"Yeah, 'course. We're a team, right?"

"Right." This time, she could hear the smile in his voice.

+++

It took more than a couple of hours for the paralyzing agent to wear off, despite what Nik had said. By the time Kentakakura could finally stand up again, the sun was dipping below the horizon line.

Waiting it out hadn't been so bad, though. Momo asked him to tell her more about the Eaucledelphii, and he gladly obliged—they were such a fascinating species! From there, the conversation wandered to many different subjects. If it hadn't been for the unpleasant prickling sensation as his body slowly woke back up, he would've been content to lay there with her forever.

He felt lighter, after their talk. It wasn't enough to chase away his insecurities completely—he doubted if anything could do that. But hearing Momo say how glad she was to have him with her, despite his many shortcomings, it…

It made his heart feel too big for his chest.

"Ohhhhh man," Momo groaned, stretching her back out while Kentakakura stood and shook the remaining stiffness away.

"I hope Jiji and Aira weren't too worried about us…"

"Meh," she replied. "I'd be more worried about Granny chewing us out for being late. Man, the trains're gonna be all crowded too at this hour, it's gonna take us forever to get home…"

"Well…" Kentakakura said, and she looked up at him questioningly. "I could just fly us home. That would be much faster." It was dark, and reaching for his spiritual power was even easier in this form. No one would see them, he was sure.

"You're not too tired?"

"Nope!" In fact, he was restless, buzzing with energy, despite having been transformed for so long.

A grin spread across her face. "Well, what're we waiting for? Let's go!"

He knelt down so she could clamber onto his back, then leapt off the roof once she was secure.

The night air carried a satisfyingly cold sting as he climbed higher and higher. He leveled out once they reached a good coasting altitude, gliding in the direction of home. Momo said something to him, but the wind snatched her voice away.

"What?" he asked, turning his neck all the way around to look at her.

"I said, I know you can go faster than this!" she exclaimed, her smile wide and toothy.

Oh, she was asking for it! Kentakakura pulled his mandibles away from his mouth and bared his teeth in a mime of her human smile, gleefully accepting her challenge. "Hold on tight!"

Momo shrieked with laughter as he put on a burst of speed. The last couple of times they'd flown, they had been too focused on the danger at the time to really enjoy it. But now, it was just them. No danger, and no reason to hold back.

So Kentakakura began to really show off. He tucked his wings in and dove, then snapped them back out and executed a series of dips and turns that had Momo screaming with joy on his back.

Laughter spilled out of him as he rose high again, pulling off several loop-the-loops in the air. When the urban sprawl below them gave way to dirt roads and trees, he turned to Momo. "Want to try something really fun?"

The wind whipped through her hair and made her cheeks flush a lovely pink. "Yeah!"

He began to climb—higher and higher, until the landscape became an indistinct blur beneath them and the air started to thin.

"Trust me?" he asked, vibrating his wings rapidly to hover in place. He'd never tried this with another Virbilaetian before, let alone someone who couldn't fly. But he knew they could pull it off, if she could put her faith in him.

"Of course," Momo said. No hesitation. Oh, that did things to his insides. He removed one arm from where it supported her backside and wrapped his hand around her wrist.

"Okay. Here we go!" Kentakakura stilled his wings, and they began to fall.

Momo shrieked as they plummeted, her lower body leaving his back. "Ohhhhmygod what the hell, Okarun?!"

"Spread out," he shouted back. He put his arms and legs out to demonstrate, and she screamed, screwing her eyes shut. She clutched his arm in a death grip with both hands. "Hey, I've got you! I won't let go!" He'd never let go of her.

She cracked an eye open to look at him. Then, reluctantly, she removed one hand and spread out her limbs like he had. His grip never loosened from her arm, and she clutched him just as tightly.

They were high up enough that they could fall for a while, the wind resistance making it feel as if they were floating. He watched Momo as she looked down, wonder lighting up her expression as she took in the expanse of the ground far, far below. She let out a whoop of joy and excitement, and Kentakakura beamed with pride. Her light put everything else in the sky to shame.

So brave, my star.

Eventually, he pulled her in close to his chest and spread his wings to slow their descent, turning their fall into a gentle glide. He cradled her that way the rest of the short distance home, and perched on the torii gate to catch his breath.

Momo was giggling, giddy from the leftover adrenaline rush. "That was crazy!"

"But fun, right?"

"Yeah! I think you've spoiled me for rollercoasters forever, though."

"What's a roller coaster?" he asked, hopping down from the torii gate to flutter to the ground. He set Momo down gently, supporting her arm while she wobbled momentarily.

"Oh, it's—" She was interrupted by the sound of the door sliding open. Seiko leaned against the doorframe, a smoking stick hanging from her teeth.

"Do I need to start setting a curfew for you two?" she asked. Kentakakura shuffled guiltily. Their impromptu joy flight had probably kept them out even later than taking the normal route home would have. He couldn't really bring himself to regret it, though.

"Finally," came Aira's grumbling voice. She stuck her head out to glare at them. "What took you two so long? That weird void-thing went away hours ago! And Auntie wouldn't start dinner until you got back."

"Who the hell invited you to dinner, skank?!" Momo demanded.

"They're back?!" Jiji emerged from the house as well. "Guys! What the heck happened to you?! Once sec, we were in the hallway, and then Momo just vanished! I was totally freakin' out!"

"Ugh, yeah sorry." Momo started explaining about the bounty hunters. Kentakakura listened with only half an ear, noticing that her hair had become wild and wind-tossed from their flight. He reached out a hand to fix it.

"Uh… wh-what are you doing?" she asked, glancing over at him.

"Your hair is a mess," he informed her, gently undoing a stubborn tangle with his talons.

"Wha—like yours is any better!"

"Oh? Well, then you can—" Seiko cleared her throat very loudly.

"If you two are done, dinner will be ready soon."

He wasn't done, but Momo ducked out from under his hand anyways and speed-walked into the house. Aira huffed loudly and stomped in after her, while Jiji just stared at him, for some reason.

"Go get yourself cleaned up, Hikoboshi," Seiko said before she and Jiji went indoors as well.

Kentakakura cocked his head to the side in confusion. He was used to Seiko's many nicknames for him, but that one was new.

Ah, whatever. He changed shape—managing to only wobble a little as the resulting wave of exhaustion washed over him—before following the humans inside.

+++

The next couple of days passed surprisingly quietly. No hostile alien attacks, no yokai interrupting their school day. It almost made Kentakakura nervous.

But, very slowly, he began to relax. Maybe the Serpoians finally had given up. He had very little time to worry about it, between school-work, training, and research.

Their weekend trip to Jiji's house was fast-approaching, and he wanted to be as prepared as possible.

That didn't mean it was all they talked about, though.

“Whaaaaaat?” Jiji exclaimed one afternoon at school. They were waiting by the school store for Momoayase to join them for lunch. “You’ve never had coffee?”

Kentakakura shook his head. Even after almost an entire revolution on Earth, he’d only just scratched the surface of the human experience. 

“Well you’re tryin’ it right now!” Jiji declared, buying two black cans and shoving one into Kentakakura’s hand. He smiled to himself as they began heading to the courtyard. He was so lucky to have friends who were eager to teach him.

Opening the can, he extended one antennae a bit to smell the dark liquid. Eugh, bitter! But he’d never been steered wrong with human food before. Even flavors that seemed unpleasant at first, like those sour candies, he’d ended up enjoying.

Kentakakura took a quick swig of the coffee, cringing at the horrible taste. But once the shock of the flavor passed, a warm relaxation bloomed in his chest. 

“Ooo.” He took another drink, and the wonderful feeling grew, spreading into his limbs. Before he knew it, he’d finished the whole can. 

“Pretty great, right?” Jiji asked, opening his own. 

“Mmm yeah…” he sighed. His body felt heavy, but pleasantly so. Like he was wrapped in a huge blanket, dulling the harsh sensations all around him.

Jiji must have seen the covetous looks he was giving the coffee in his hand, because he handed his undrunk can to Kentakakura. 

“Here! I’ll go get another.”

“Really? Jiji, you’re so nice!” He downed the second beverage only a little slower than the first, humming in bliss as his body relaxed.

What an amazing substance coffee was!

+++

Momo perked up as she finally caught sight of Jiji. He was tucked back into a secluded corner of the courtyard, like he was trying to hide, for some reason. And, ugh, what the hell was Aira doing with him? Where was Okarun?

"Yo," she called as she jogged over to her tall friend. Maybe if she ignored the skank, she'd go away.

Jiji's head turned, distress written all over his face. "Momo! I'm so sorry, I had no idea!"

Before she could ask what the hell he was talking about, a black blur slammed into her, nearly taking her right off her feet.

“Momooooooo,” cooed a voice in her ear. “I missed you.”

“Uh–?!” She startled backwards, but only succeeded in dragging the alien boy with his arms wound around her like a vise with her. “Okarun? Wh-what’s gotten into you?”

Something tickled against her ear. Momo resisted the urge to swat at his antennae as they brushed against her face. What is he doing? 

“Y’smell good,” he mumbled, his words slurring together. He almost sounded as though…

“Are you drunk?” she demanded. Incredulity wrestled with her fluster at the compliment.

He trilled a laugh in response. “Funny word…”

Oh my god, he is absolutely hammered!

Okarun started that low cooing noise, nuzzling his cheek gently against hers. Momo couldn’t smell any alcohol on him. There was, however, a very familiar scent on his breath. 

"What happened?!" Momo demanded.

“He had coffee,” said Aira. “And this is the result. He’s been clinging to Enjoji since I got here.” Momo took solace in the fact that she looked and sounded wildly jealous. “Did you know this would happen?”

“How in the hell could I have known?!” God, all the ridiculous shit she’d seen Okarun eat without issue, and it was coffee that did something weird to him! Fucking alien biology…

“I mean, I don’t even think Okarun knew this would happen,” said Jiji. “He said he’d never had coffee before…”

“Coffee’shgood,” Okarun offered, before he resumed cooing in Momo’s ear.

“What are we gonna do?!" she demanded to their clueless faces.

Despite the terrible embarrassment scalding her cheeks, she couldn’t say she was uncomfortable. Okarun wasn’t all hot and sweaty like a lot of boys she’d been this close to. And his grip on her was solid without being too tight. It was a really nice hug, all in all…

“Okay, Takakura,” Aira said, “I think you can stop clinging to Ayase now.” 

She took hold of his arm and tried to pull him away, but before Momo could snap at her to back off, Okarun actually hissed at her!

Aira's mouth fell open in shock. "Takakura!" she exclaimed, sounding thoroughly scandalized. He just growled and buried his face back into Momo's shoulder.

She fought down a triumphant cackle. Much as she would've liked to rub that in the skank's face, they had to figure out this latest problem.

"Okarun," she said.

"Mmm?"

"Could ya let go of me for a sec, bud?"

His response to that was a completely pathetic whine, but he unwrapped his arms from around her and stepped back. His head lolled to the side, antennae hanging limply. Even from behind tinted lenses, she could see his eyelids were droopy, his pupils hugely dilated.

He looked, in short, completely blitzed. Fuck. There was no way he could go back to class looking like that.

"How do we sober him up?" Momo asked. Okarun listed sideways until his head met her shoulder, and he hummed in contentment, one hand coming up to grip the sleeve of her sweater. She stubbornly ignored the fluttering in her stomach the completely adorable sight set off.

"Uhh… dunk his head in cold water?" Jiji suggested. Another sharp hiss came out of the alien in question.

"Oh, so you are listening. Okarun, how long is this… thing gonna last?" Momo demanded.

He hummed in response, then shrugged without moving his head off her shoulder. "Dunno… neverrr happ'n'd b'fore…"

She sighed. Great. Just great!

"What do we do, Momo?" Jiji asked worriedly.

She chewed her lip in thought, considering. It looked like the only effect was intoxication, but… shit, she didn't know if it could get worse!

"I better take him home," she decided. "Keep an eye on him, just in case. Jiji, if anybody asks, say he had, uh, an allergic reaction or something."

"If he were having an allergic reaction, why wouldn't we take him to the nurse's office?" Aira asked.

"Because I obviously can't do that, skank, they'd figure out he was drunk right away and probably expel our asses!"

"I'm just pointing out the holes in your story, Ayase—"

"Then you come up with a better lie, I don't care! C'mon, Okarun, we'd better get outta here before break ends."

"Mmmokay." He took her hand as she began to walk away, raising his other arm in a half-hearted wave. "G'byyyyyye…"

"'Bye, dude," Jiji said, obviously fighting off laughter. "Hope you, uh… feel better soon?"

+++

It was ridiculously easy to sneak off school grounds when you had psychic powers, it turned out. Okarun followed her without complaint, clinging to her arm the whole way.

They got most of the way home without incident, aside from some weird looks. Though, whether it was because they were two students obviously skipping class, or because of Momo's snuggly arm accessory, she couldn't tell. Her face burned the whole time, whatever the reason.

At least things were going smoothly. Right up until they hit the main road home, when Okarun came to a sudden halt.

"Dude," Momo said, tugging on his hand. "What're you doing? Come on."

"Don't wanna," he grumbled. "'M tired… Carry me?"

"Are you friggin' kidding me right now?! No!"

He pouted. "I carry you all th' time."

Momo yanked a hand through her hair in frustration. "Fucking… fine! Asshole!" She turned around and grabbed his legs, heaving him onto her back with a grunt.

She was being slightly over dramatic. Okarun wasn’t quite as much of a scarecrow as he had been when they’d first met, thanks to Granny’s training (and Granny’s cooking). He was still absurdly light for someone his size, though. She didn’t know if it was because his bones were, like, hollow or something. Whatever the reason, carrying him like this was surprisingly easy.

Not that this is gonna be a regular thing! 

Okarun hummed, wrapping his arms loosely around her neck and resting his chin on her shoulder, cheek pressed to hers. Momo pointedly ignored the warm tingles spreading through her chest and started walking.

Stupid adorable alien bastard… Thank god there was nobody around to see them like this!

"You owe me big time," she grumbled. His only response was to start hooting softly, almost like the noise he made when he was…

She glanced at him. Yup, the little fucker had fallen asleep! Momo silently raged about stupid aliens and their stupidly long, pretty eyelashes the whole rest of the way home.

+++

Granny was being supremely unhelpful. She burst into laughter as soon as Momo explained what had happened.

The obnoxious cackling made Okarun stir. "Ssssseikooo…" he cooed. "Heyyyyyy."

"Hey, kid," Granny said through a snort. "How're you?"

"M'great," he replied, swinging his dangling legs.

"Alright," Momo said. "We're home, time for you to get down."

"Nnnn. Don' wanna…" He sighed, snuggling against her cheek. "Comfy."

"I'll drop you," she threatened. When he did not reply, Momo was forced to put her money where her mouth was, and let go of his legs.

But he just… hung there. Like a fuzzy barnacle.

Granny burst into further laughter while Momo raged at the alien stuck to her back.

"Nggg, loud," Okarun complained.

"Fucking let go of me then, shithead!"

"Nnn."

"Go put him upstairs, Momo," Granny said. "Let him sleep this off. Get him some water and a bucket, in case he pukes."

With that lovely mental image, Momo stomped her way towards the stairs. As she passed by Granny, Okarun suddenly lunged for her, nearly sending all three of them crashing to the floor.

"Yerrr s' nice t' meeeee," he hummed, wrapping his arms around Granny's shoulders while simultaneously clinging to Momo with his legs "'Nk you…"

"Uh… You're welcome, kid," Granny, not really a hugger, reached up and patted his arm.

They eventually managed to pry themselves apart and set Okarun back on his feet. He adamantly refused to let go of Momo's arm, though, and clung to her the entire trudge up the stairs to his room.

"Okay, dude," she said as they reached his bed. "You really do have to let go of me now."

"…Just a little longer," he murmured. "Please?"

Momo bit her lower lip. God, he sounds so…

"Okay. Just a little bit longer."

They sat down on his bed, Okarun wrapping his arms loosely around her waist and resting his head against her shoulder. He'd started that cooing noise again. Momo just watched him in silence.

She could half-remember reading some article somewhere about something called touch starvation. Apparently, if a person went too long without physical contact, they developed a craving for touch.

Was this clingyness just an effect of the coffee? Did Virbilaetians also get touch starved?

Okarun had never specified just how long he'd been on Earth before they met. And he'd said he didn't have any other friends, before coming here. Just how long had it been since someone touched him?

Being so completely alone like that… she couldn't imagine it.

Momo wrapped her arm around his shoulder, rested her cheek against the top of his head, and held him until his coos petered off into hooting snores.

She used her powers to lower him down on his bed, then crept out of his room. Before she made her way to the kitchen to get him some water, she made a stop in her room to change into comfier clothes.

As she pulled off her sweater, something small fluttered to the floor, catching her eye. She stooped to pick it up. It was a black feather, about the size of the top joint of her thumb. Okarun's feather.

…It would be weird of her to keep this, right? Like keeping a lock of his hair, or something. That wasn't something friends did. Momo blushed at the thought, rubbing it against the pad of her finger. It was cool, though, and really soft.

Before she could psych herself out about it, she grabbed a random book off her shelf and stuck the feather in between its pages, then laid it on her nightstand.

Once she was changed, Momo went downstairs to get her dumb drunk best friend a glass of water—and something to be sick in, just in case.