Work Text:
Mizuki firmly believes in the power of a proper work-life balance.
She shows it, too: all day work shifts, coupled with all night gaming sessions. Video editing, then shopping for cute clothes. Crunch time and sweet treats.
Balancing one’s work and life is a saying that Mizuki lives by, imparts upon others (“what's the life part of your balance, An? It's Kohane? Okay—”), and thinks would change the world permanently for the better if only everyone followed it to the tee.
Unfortunately, with every devout believer comes a handful of doubters. The ones for whom the two-to-three word doctrine goes in one ear and out the other. The skeptics.
Mafuyu, for example.
Nursing is a difficult task, Mizuki concedes. More often than not, she'll FaceTime Mafuyu at ungodly hours and hear about how she had to spoon feed a kid orange Jell-O with one hand while changing another patient’s IV with the other, then forcefully sedate a screaming man while packing another guy’s head in ice ten minutes later.
Then, Mafuyu will turn her dead, dead eyes on Mizuki and ask her how her day went.
Woke up at 11. Edited a few videos. Got dinner with Ena. Let's circle back to the head in ice?
The point is that Mafuyu has had no time for a social life. Colleagues don't count. Mizuki genuinely thinks that she and Ena are the only friends that Mafuyu has made outside of work for the past half-decade.
No girlfriend, either. Mizuki almost feels bad telling Mafuyu about her dating life, knowing that while she and Ena were out on movie nights and romantic candlelit dinners, Mafuyu was fighting inner demons and multiple Code Blues.
Almost. But nothing, save the supernatural, can sway Mafuyu from her wholehearted destruction of the work-life balance.
So Mizuki’s solution, to pull her dear friend from the pits of workaholic despair and out into the green grass and sunny skies of people who possess a life?
Enlist the supernatural, of course.
Recent Search History:
“what is the best supernatural entity to have as an s/o”
“which supernatural entity has to abide by a contract”
“can demons be attentive girlfriends”
“how to summon a demon wikihow”
Perfect!
She asks Ena to make the date, but all she gets back is a hurried “sorry, busy with work” text and a promise to come by later.
Busy? In the middle of the night? She thought Ena didn't—well, it doesn't matter that much.
A demon can be summoned just as easily with two people as three, anyways.
1. Choose something specific to ask the demon for.
“Are you sure we should be doing this?”
“Absolutely,” Mizuki says. “Desperate times call for desperate measures.”
“Desperate—” Mafuyu blinks. “I'm not that unapproachable.” After a few moments of silence, she tacks on a quiet, “I think”.
Mizuki shrugs. “Eh. The ritual probably won't work, anyhow. I just want to try summoning a demon at least once in my life, and if it gets you a girlfriend—great!”
Mafuyu raises a brow. “And if it summons a demon that takes our souls and leaves us to rot?”
“Um… don't overthink it. Just choose.”
“Fine.” Mafuyu whistles out a breath through her teeth.
A sudden breeze blows through Mizuki’s curtains, and Mizuki watches as a dilute white beam from the moon lines itself up against Mafuyu’s face.
“I wish…for warmth. Someone who understands. Stays.”
Mizuki lets out a soft sigh. Oh, Mafuyu.
She leans over and ruffles Mafuyu’s hair, noting how the other girl leans slightly into the touch. “Don't worry too much. No matter what, I'll be here for you.”
“Thanks, Mizuki.” A pause. “I'll ask them to take your soul first.”
“Hey!”
2. Find a quiet place where no one will disturb you.
“The living room is fine, right? It's three in the morning (the most suspicious hour, by the way), who’s actually going to disturb us?”
Mafuyu’s posed in a death position on the couch, eyelids shut and limbs half-stiff. Before Mizuki’s eyes, she lets out a soft snore.
Mizuki almost feels bad for waking her up. But she knows that Mafuyu has a few days off tomorrow (by Mizuki’s desperate urging), so Mizuki walks to her kitchen, brews up a full cup of coffee (with four shots of espresso—good luck Mafuyu) and pulls out a can of Monster. She swigs the Monster and sets the coffee on the table next to the couch.
Mafuyu awakens. “Coffee?”
“What else?”
Mizuki watches in awe and slight horror as Mafuyu downs the entire cup—still burning hot, by the way—in three seconds flat.
She licks her lips languidly and fixes her eyes on Mizuki. They're still dead. “Do you have anything stronger?”
3. Draw a pentagram.
All the rugs have been removed, both Mizuki and Mafuyu’s hands are covered in a thick layer of chalk, and Mizuki thinks that her property value’s gone down in some way shape or form.
But finally, the pentagram—a messy, smudging shape that threatens to break down and die if someone even looks at it wrong—is done.
“Whew! Not so bad, right?” Mizuki places her hands on her hips—taking them off immediately after, but too late, her clothes are already stained with powdery white sediment. “Do you have the candles?”
Mafuyu takes out five candles from a box, each off-white and thinly-shaped with a small dip where the fuse is. “This feels like a fire hazard,” she murmurs, taking out a handheld BiC lighter after.
“Not if we're careful,” Mizuki replies, taking the candles from Mafuyu. She scuttles across the floor and places them at each corner of the star in the pentagram. Chalk scuffs and blows up her nose. She sneezes.
“Please don't make me redo this,” Mafuyu says. Looking down, Mizuki finds that she's broken up the lower half of the pentagram’s circle.
“Oops.” She hastily shoves the dust back into the right places. “Light, please!”
Mafuyu snaps the BiC aflame.
4. Use the demon’s summoning sigil.
Mizuki scratches her head.
“Each demon has its own sigil that binds them to the mortal world for a short period,” Mafuyu reads from her phone. She looks up. “Do we have one of those?”
“Um.” Well, no. Is there a sigil that means “GF wanted”? Mizuki looks around the room, covered in chalk and various snacks. One catches her eye—a cylindrical cup of ramen, top and sides plastered with bright colors. Mizuki reaches out and grabs the snack.
“Mizuki?”
Mizuki places the ramen in the middle of the pentagram. “You want someone warm, right? Ramen is warm. Understands you? Ramen’s basically the pinnacle of workaholic food. Stays? It saw me through every major college exam.”
Mafuyu stares at her. Mizuki’s jaw falls open.
“The bottom’s also circle-shaped.”
Mizuki is suddenly, painfully aware of how stupid she sounds. Mafuyu’s eyes are blown open in disbelief, and Mizuki fully expects Mafuyu to turn away, continue staring at her with those corpsey eyes, or clean up the pentagram entirely and suggest another activity.
What she doesn't expect is for Mafuyu to relent. “If you say so.”
Mizuki’s jaw—and mouth—stays flopped open. “Really?”
Mafuyu shrugs. “If it keeps us doing this, and not other things.” She lets out a small smile. “Drunk calling your exes, for example.”
“That was one time! And Minori doesn't even count as an ex, we dated for like a week, and—are you walking away? Hey, wait, get back here—ow, the stupid pentagram—Mafuyu!!”
5. Enter a trance by meditating.
“Close your eyes.”
Mizuki pricks one eye open to look at Mafuyu. Her face is contemplative and serene.
“Speak for yourself.”
Mafuyu sighs and closes her eyes. Mizuki follows suit. She hears Mafuyu shuffle into a different position.
“Now, we have to visualize the sigil.” Mizuki can't see it, but she knows Mafuyu’s grimacing. “The cup ramen.”
The aforementioned ramen was warmed up in between steps 4 and 5, and now Mizuki fights the assaulting smell of sodium and dehydrated vegetables that fans out over her and Mafuyu and burns their noses in tandem.
Mizuki thinks about noodles, slightly yellow and sagging from heat. Melting white cup. Microplastics.
“Focus.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Mizuki squints into the void, willing a demon into existence. Please be nice. Willing to work on Mafuyu’s disgusting work-life balance. Shorter than her? Oh, and a girl. She's lesbian.
Mizuki knows that she sounds like a disgruntled worker, shouting directions in a metaphorical Build-A-Bear (Build-A-Demon?). But Mafuyu’s been on her own all this time, throwing away everything for her job.
Mizuki and Ena can only do so much, bringing her meals, forcing her to hang out with them, trespassing into her home and picking her up when she passes out on the stairs to her bedroom. But Mafuyu seems determined to nurse others until she dies from overwork. Ironic, isn't it?
Mizuki only prays that someone breaks down Mafuyu’s walls and saves her from herself.
One moment passes. Two, then three. Four, spent in uncomfortable silence.
She thinks she hears chewing—probably Mafuyu, sick of the idiotic act and getting some food in before she spends the rest of her break sleeping the day away. Preparing for work.
Mizuki opens her eyes, schooling her face into some semblance of humor.
“Ah well, didn't work, guess there's always—”
Mizuki stops.
Because there's a girl in their pentagram, chewing on the cup ramen and surveying them with a curious expression.
The person slurps up a noodle and tilts her head at Mizuki. The top of her head touches her shoulder—farther than humanly possible.
For the second time of the night, Mizuki’s mouth falls open.
What the fuck.
6. Communicate with the demon.
She's tall, with mottled blue scales etched onto her face and a weave of floor-length white hair. Her hands are clawed—she snaps the chopsticks embedded in the ramen in half and sighs sadly at the mess. Intricate swirling patterns of silver and blue race and blur the rest of the demon from view.
Mafuyu’s face is frozen, and Mizuki’s sure she's just as terrified as her, and—is that blush?
“Who are you?” The voice that Mafuyu intones in is higher-pitched, nervous.
The demon shifts so that she's facing Mafuyu. A set of guttural syllables fall out, impossible to replicate by the human tongue, “or you can call me Kanade. Nice to meet you, Mafuyu. What do you need from me?”
And wait. Mizuki’s pretty sure neither of them have told Mafuyu’s name to “Kanade” at any point of this summoning. They also haven't specified that Mafuyu was to be the receiver, though Mizuki’s already in a loving relationship and wouldn't be interested anyways. Mizuki says these points aloud.
Kanade blinks. “Oh, I thought E—hm. I'm sorry, please give me a moment.” And in a sputter of bright light, the top half of Kanade’s body disappears.
Mizuki screams. Mafuyu’s eyes widen.
A few seconds later, waist-up Kanade reappears. She surveys the room and lets out a shrug and apologetic smile at Mizuki and Mafuyu's horrified faces. “Sorry if that was sudden. I had to speak with the other realm. To answer your questions—I was briefed.” She stoops down and offers one clawed hand to Mafuyu. “I would like to get to know you better, if you'd be willing.”
Mizuki can see Mafuyu’s senses short-circuit and reboot in real time, and though she's suspicious of the entity, Mizuki wants to cheer her on until—
“Wait.” Mafuyu looks down at Kanade’s hand. “Is this a contract? Are you going to take our souls?”
Kanade’s brow furrows. “No—I’m not in the soul-stealing business. Also, we only offer contracts if a person's wish falls under one of the seven deadly sins. I don't think yours does, unless,” her cheeks pinken. “Wait. Are you…”
Mizuki gains a sudden interest in the far wall, away from the two. Mafuyu hastily shakes her head. “No. I mean—probably not. Not yet. No.” Mizuki visibly relaxes and swivels back to watch the scene.
Kanade sighs. “That's the easiest for everyone involved.” In a puff of blue smoke, she becomes a white-haired, soft-eyed girl. She sidles up to Mafuyu. Mizuki notices that Kanade’s about half a head shorter (the ideal height difference for couples).
Kanade tilts her head—normally, this time. Mafuyu’s face is a full and glowing red.
Mizuki smirks. “Get out of here, lovebirds.” She pauses. “Do I need to do anything with the pentagram?”
Kanade shakes her head. “Not really. Just leave it, and it'll disappear in the morning. I'm technically on break right now, so the rules of entry and exit don't apply to me.”
Mizuki nods. “I'm going to bed, then. See yourselves out.” She winks at Mafuyu lasciviously. Mafuyu lobs a pillow at her head.
“Oof.” The last of Mafuyu and Kanade that Mizuki sees from her place on the floor is them stepping out the front door, hand in hand. Kanade’s wearing a kind smile and Mafuyu's eyes—well, they're less dead than before.
Immediately after they leave, Mizuki gets a text from Ena.
(Friday, 3:50 AM)
Enanan:
DID MAFUYU GET HER GF
The timing is oddly exact.
Amia:
YES
she's
trigger warning…???
a demon
but she seems nice I think
btw aren't you busy rn ??
Enanan:
um
i just got off of work
coming home with curry and
french fries
piping hot !
Mizuki decides not to think too hard about it.
Amia:
thx love you sm bbg
what would i do without you
come home soon
avoid the pentagram and candles in the middle of the living room we were busy
Enanan:
…okay