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"Y-you're sure your girlfriend is alright with this?" Harper's voice trembled as she stared at the bunny girl in front of her. Nikki's hands were braced on the bathroom wall above the toilet, her jeans and wet panties shoved down around her knees. She looked over her shoulder at Harper, those stunning, violet eyes sparkling with lust. "Please, Harper," she whimpered. That sweet voice sent a shiver right down Harper's back and caused her cock to surge in her grip. She looked down, realizing she was holding it tightly, pre-cum glistening from its tip. She looked back up at Nikki, who thrust her little rump backwards needfully. Harper watched as the bunny's tailhole clenched fiercely around nothing and wetness glistened in the bright sunlight as it dripped from her lips. Nikki's lips parted again but she only made a soft, strangled sound, as if she were on the verge of choking. It was queerly, intensely erotic, and Harper found her free hand moving to the girl's hip. How was she supposed to resist, with the girl presenting like that, nearly begging? The girls' bathroom was thick with the smell of cherry blossoms and the bunny's scent. The tip of her cock touched the girl's lips. The sensation was like fire. The lips parted easily around her and with an involuntary jerk of her hips, she buried herself in the bunny's wet snatch. They both cried out at the same time, the knot of Harper's petite girlcock thumping against Nikki's tight entrance. Trembling, her other hand fell to Nikki's hip as well. Harper opened her mouth but no sound came out. How could she make a sound when she was buried knot-deep in the hot, perfect bliss of that perfect bunny's girlhood? She hunched over, her body practically beyond her control, pressing against Nikki's back, fingers squeezing into her hips. Her hips slid back and she pummeled them forward with more force than she intended, her knot hitting the girl's entrance and stretching it threateningly. Nikki squealed, body arching as her internal muscles gripped Harper's thrusting member as tightly as a fist. Already feeling her belly begin to tighten, Harper shifted one of her hands hurriedly, sliding it over Nikki's hips and down the seductively sexy line of where her thigh joined her crotch. Her fingers slid around the bunny's throbbing cock and she gripped it tightly. In response, Nikki murmured her pleasure, egging her on. Harper stopped trying to restrain herself. Her hips twitched once, then she pulled back again and thrust forward, this time beginning a frantic rhythm of pumping her hips into the bunny's vise-tight snatch, her own fist stroking the girl's cock in the same tempo. Nikki's head rolled forward and her mouth opened as if to scream, but she made that same half-strangled sound that Harper loved so much. She could feel her scrotum tightening as her pace increased and knew the girl underneath her was nearing orgasm as well. Her thighs slapped against the girl's rump, fist pumping wildly on Nikki's cock. Her back arched as pleasure exploded inside of her.

~~~ Harper's hips jerked, her cock pulsing so powerfully that it woke her up, her shaft emptying her seed into her hand and her sheets. Her eyes fluttered open. The room was pitch black. She couldn't stop herself. Humping the bed lewdly, she beat her hand up and down her throbbing shaft as cum poured out of her. She bit the pillow to hide her desperate, satisfied groan. Her shaft surged three, four more times in her hand, shooting out the thick ropes of her cream until the orgasm finally released her, leaving her panting and limp in a pool of her own cum in the bed. This wasn't the first time this had happened. In the four nights since seeing her two lesbian classmates in the park, she'd had six wet dreams featuring Nikki. After those two incidents on her first night, she'd filched a towel to lay on, saving herself more embarrassing laundry duties. It had been half a week and she hadn't even been able to shake herself out of the daydreams. Nights were far worse, her eager body at the complete mercy of her vivid imagination. The first pussy she'd ever seen, the vision of Nikki with her legs spread, collar pulled chokingly tight, was etched permanently in her memory. Her body squirmed, still needful, her slick lips burning for attention. Her hand slid down her body on its own, brushing between her two small breasts and down her tummy. Her fingers smeared through the mess of cum in her fur at her crotch and continued downward. She shivered as she brushed her semen-coated scrotum for a moment before finally letting her fingers continue. She groaned as she pushed her sticky fingers inside her needy little cunny. She never felt truly satisfied after a single orgasm. Her other organ, regardless of which it was, always demanded equal attention. She lifted her other hand out of the sheets, the one she'd used to paw off in her dreams. She brought the spunk-covered fingers to her lips, beginning to lick them clean as she pumped the fingers of her other hand in and out of her pussy. The taste of her own cum was something strangely erotic and addicting to her, something she'd never been able to stop herself from since the first day she'd discovered masturbation. She enjoyed the taste of both her own genitalia, but the slow licking of the salty, sticky liquid from between her fingers was almost an erotic ritual by now. Cooling, some of her semen dripped from her fingers down her chin as she arched her hips off the bed. As riled up as her dream had gotten her, she didn't take long. She let out a soft gasp into the still darkness of her bedroom then shoved her salty fingers into her mouth to quiet herself. She trembled, toes curling to grip the sheets as her hips pumped into the air, her tight muscles clenching rhythmically around her fingers. Her mind filled with images of Nikki's hips bucking the same way, jerking with a lewd desperation as if fucking an invisible lover. In her mind, she was that lover. She came just as the warm memory of Nikki did. She couldn't restrain her soft cry as all the muscles of her body clenched and her pussy spasmed around her fingers, pleasure cracking through her like lightning. Her bed shook as her hips bucked under the sheets, though she'd long since pulled it discretely an inch away from the wall so it wouldn't thump. She pictured the glistening arch of Nikki's squirt spattering the path as her own girlhood twitched in sympathy. The mattress squeaked as her butt fell back onto the bed. She lay there trembling, panting for breath. She raised her other hand to her lips and lazily licked away the sweeter taste of her feminine sex, her body shivering with lingering arousal. Hands cleaned, she lifted her butt and carefully gathered up the towel, folded it over the pool of spooge in the middle, and used the sticky bundle to get the worst of the mess out of her fur. Nude, she slipped out of bed and buried the towel with similar ones in the back corner of her closet. She hoped the bunny would stop terrorizing her dreams soon, so she could start adding the towels to laundry loads discretely without raising too many questions. Filled with the warm glow of satisfaction, coupled with her deep humiliation and lingering frustration, Harper sat on the edge of her bed and sighed, her body feeling limp and spent, but not at all tired. She glanced at the clock. It was only just past 3am, but she knew she'd never get back to sleep. She stood, paced for a moment, then went to sit at her desk, clicking on the lamp. Any hopes of drawing to get her mind off of the bunny were dashed away as she looked at her most recent page of drawings, seeing Nikki's cunny sketched there in loving detail, filling the page, with sketches of her half-choked expression doodled in the corners. She blushed deep red and slammed the sketch pad back into its drawer, wincing as she made a great deal more racket than she intended to. With a sigh, she clicked off her lamp and wiggled the mouse of her computer, filling the room with its artificial glow. Maybe saving Tyria a time or two would get her mind off of that perfect, glistening, twitching cunny.

***

Elena sighed, tearing somewhat mindlessly through another group of minotaurs. She couldn't sleep. She wasn't even sure what time it was, and she was getting to the point where she was too afraid to look. The guild's Ventrilo was almost silent, which was surely a very, very bad sign. There were only three school days left until the Spring Fling and no one had asked her to the dance. Homecoming, the Winter Ball, now this. She was going to go her entire freshman year without being asked to a single dance. Everyone she knew was going--except her cousin Ross. Of course, knowing that Ross was deliberately avoiding the school dance didn't comfort her any. Her cousin had hooked up on the same day she had moved to Marblecliff. And Elena. . .Elena hadn't even kissed a boy! . . .Or a girl. She shied away from the thought, blushing and narrowing her eyes, focusing on a particularly vicious combo as she finished off the last kill of her quest. She smiled as she leveled up again. She'd never been this high level in any game before! She squirmed, deeply frustrated, trying to avoid her own thoughts. She desperately wanted someone to ask her to the dance, but with only a few days left, anyone who might ask her now would only be asking as a last resort. She had wanted to be swept off her feet, at least a little. Some charming boy to stop her in the hall, all blushes and stammers. She in a pretty dress that maybe showed off her budding breasts, at least a little, and him in a suit that didn't fit quite right. And yet, a part of her also kind of wanted the thrill of having a girl ask her out. How exciting and scandalous such a thing would be! Her parents would probably faint straight away if a girl came to pick her up for the dance. Everyone at the dance would be whispering about them, the same way they whispered about Ross. She'd be the center of attention. Maybe they'd even kiss, right there in front of everyone. Elena shivered at the thought, blushing, and realized her character had been standing motionless, getting wailed on by a wandering minotaur. She executed it with grim efficiency, then started running back toward town. It was too late for her to think about the dance. She'd already agreed to accompany Ross on her drive down to Roosevelt City. She wasn't exactly sure what she was going to do there, but anything would be better than sitting around the house while everyone else she knew went to the stupid dance. She'd decided that it was beneath her to accept any last minute invitations. She didn't think of herself as stuck up, but she did think of herself as better than that, at least. Her subconscious wouldn't shake the wild fantasies about what could have happened, though. She'd found the last few weeks horribly distracting, her eyes straying to every cute boy--and girl--she came across. It was more distracting than her heat, even though it was less physically demanding. Her eyes constantly wandered to the bare butts of the girls in the shower after gym. She kept scolding herself, telling herself that it should be boys that caught her eyes, that if she was caught staring like that she could be taken to the principal's office, but somehow, all of that just made looking all the more exciting. Besides, why should two girls together be any different than any other couple? She'd never quite understood, though the bias in Marblecliff was rather suffocating on the topic. Her cousin Ross was in one of the only openly non-hetero couples at Chimera Prep, and Elena knew it was difficult for her. And even then, Ross and Megan weren't strictly lesbians--not quite. Megan's hermaphrodism made the relationship both more and less scandalous at the same time. Elena screwed her face up a little as Megan entered her thoughts. Hermaphrodites were just. . .weird. Ross had scolded her more than once on the topic, but Elena had never been able to shake the thought. Megan had all the curves and beauty of a girl, except with the added equipment of a boy. Already aroused at the thought of kissing a girl in public, Elena shivered at the thought. Even with no one to see, she blushed a deep red. She'd never quite thought of it in just that way before, and all of a sudden, her body was telling her it wasn't such a crazy idea. She'd been thinking of a hermaphrodite as not quite male or female, an impure, genetic oddity if one were to listen to the more vocally biased members of the Marblecliff community. She inhaled slowly, her mind racing with thoughts of hermaphrodites as both male and female, rather than neither. Was that so bad? Her body certainly didn't seem to think so. Was she being a hypocrite? Damning Marblecliff's bias against bisexuality, but embracing their bias against herms? She frowned, squirming in her desk chair, mind racing. She tried to analyze everything she was feeling and thinking. Elena stepped back mentally, trying to be objective. Her body was clearly acting irrationally. Even though she had two weeks until her next heat, she was obviously a little pent up, resulting in the thought of a hermaphrodite suddenly becoming arousing. In the state she was in, she'd probably find two suggestively situated oranges arousing. She tried to analyze her mental bias against hermaphrodites. Frowning slowly, she was forced to come to the realization she wasn't thinking rationally, either. If she truly analyzed what she was saying, she could trace back her thoughts on herms to other people, things she had overheard or been told. With brutal efficiency, she made an effort to discard her bias and make a new judgement based on facts only. She only knew one hermaphrodite. Megan. She was friends with Megan, which suggested that, at the very least, she wasn't a horrible person. Megan was just as sweet and friendly as anyone Elena had ever met, male or female. Did she find Megan attractive? She squirmed, blushing again, as she forced herself to think the question through dutifully. Yes, she decided. Megan was more developed physically than many other girls her age, and yet her body retained a certain physical svelteness related to her bat heritage that Elena found very attractive. Even when she forced herself to consider the girl with a penis in addition to all the other parts--something that was difficult, with her limited experience--she still found herself attracted to the batgirl. And very attracted to the concept of a hermaphrodite. She huffed out a shaky breath. She owed Ross an apology. And Megan. Especially Megan. She suddenly realized how ignorant she'd sounded those times she'd confronted her cousin. She'd been parroting close-minded values without even realizing it. "Harps!" said someone in her ear, making her yelp. "Hey, Harps!" "Wow, Harpsie, you're up late." "Couldn't sleep?" The guild's voice server burst into activity as one of the officers, Harpsichord, logged in. Elena smiled happily. "Hi, Harps!" she chimed in, holding down her push-to-talk hotkey. "Kaaylee?" came the girlish voice over her headphones. "Yep!" "GIRLPOWER!" the two yelled at the same time before breaking into giggles, generating groans from the other voices on the server. In a guild of over a hundred, there were four girls around their own age, including Elena's cousin Nini. Everyone else seemed, as far as Elena could tell, to be gross middle-aged guys who never seemed to log off. She, Nini, Harpsichord, and Melissandre always shouted "girl power" when they met up on the voice server. It was one of the few things that made Elena actually feel welcome in the guild. She'd only joined after Nini had begged her to, since Nini had joined to spend time with her boyfriend, Alex. "Seriously, aren't you girls up way past your bedtimes?" "Shut up, Steele." Harps quipped easily. And Steele shut up. The other members of the guild respected Harps, even feared her a little. "Wow, Kaaylee. Six levels! I don't think I've seen you level up that much in a whole week, much less one night! Good job!" "Thanks!" Elena said, cheeks burning with pleasure at Harps's praise. She knew she was a lowly peon to most of her guildies, only there as the friend of the girlfriend of an officer. To have a maxed-level officer even notice her felt good for some reason, even though she normally didn't care what happened in the game. Harps's comment even sparked off a round of congratulations from the half dozen other guildies still awake, and Elena blushed brighter, feeling giddy from the recognition. An unfamiliar ping came over her headphones and she frowned, confused. It pinged again. Minimizing her game window, she found an alert in the Ventrilo window she'd never seen before. Harpsichord was inviting her to a separate room. She'd seen other guildies flow en masse to other rooms before for groups or events, but she'd never been in one herself. The main room was for general chat, which was all she ever did. Burning with curiosity, she followed Harps in to the new room. "Hey," Harps said, sounding uncharacteristically shy over her mic. "Hey," Elena replied awkwardly. "Did you, um, need something?" "I just wanted to talk, you know, without everyone else listening in. You're just up awful late, and you're obviously way more into the game than usual. I was worried something's wrong." There was a long silence. Elena bit her lip, staring at her screen as her character, Kaaylee, destroyed a few marauding centaurs. "You tell me first," she blurted suddenly, followed by a nervous giggle. "What?" "You're up, too! And you're even younger than me, I'm pretty sure. What time is it anyway? It must be crazy late by now." "Past three, where I live." Elena frowned curiously. "Where's that?" "Riverview. Just outside Roosevelt City. Eastern time." "Oh, cool! I'm going there this weekend!" "Wait, really?" Harps asked, sounding a little flustered. "Yeah. Nini lives there, as you know, and her big sister lives here. She's driving back this weekend to introduce her girlfriend to the family, and I decided to come along. It's, um, kinda related to why I'm up so late." "Which is?" "No! You tell me first." Elena giggled. Over the mic, Harps sighed. "You really wanna know?" Originally, Elena hadn't. She'd only said what she had as a delaying tactic. She really wanted to tell someone what she was thinking, but she didn't want to sound like a friendless dweeb who couldn't even get a date to a dance in front of someone so confident and popular like Harpsichord. But the shy waver in Harps's voice made her curious. "Tell me," Elena nearly whispered. "I was asleep. I, uh, kinda woke myself up. On accident." Elena frowned a little. Harps said the words as if Elena ought to know what she meant. She mused, trying to figure out how one might accidentally wake themselves up. Nothing seemed to make sense. "You. . .wet the bed?" she asked dubiously, sure that wasn't the answer but unable to think of anything else. "No!" Harps said, giggling but sounding a little offended at the same time. "At least, not exactly," she added after a pause. Elena could practically hear the blush through her headphones. Not exactly? She wondered. Then she gasped. "Oh! A dream! Wow, that must've been some dream!" Elena blushed as she pieced together Harps's shy admission. She squeezed her thighs together, her mind instantly imagining Harps waking up to an orgasm. The pretty, younger foxgirl had a photo posted in the guild's forums. Her overachieving imagination easily summoned an image of her nude body squirming and gasping amid sheets. She took her finger off the push-to-talk button so she could groan quietly to herself at the image. "You could say that," Harps said into her ear, sounding a little breathless. Both girls giggled nervously into their microphones. "Your turn," Harps said, using her the same commanding tone she'd used on Steele earlier. "I'm angry," Elena admitted with a soft sigh. "And frustrated. And distracted. And some other things, I guess. No one asked me to the dance this weekend. No one's asked me to ANY dance this whole year. My cousin says I intimidate the boys, but I don't know how! I try to be sweet and casual and joke with them, but none of the boys ever get close to me at all, not really. And to make it worse, I'm constantly thinking about GIRLS, too, and I can't stop! It's the middle of spring and all I see in the hallway are pretty butts swaying every which way and it's just horribly distracting. Ross got a girlfriend the DAY she moved here and I just don't know what I'm doing wrong!" She huffed, panting softly. She sheepishly took her finger off the push-to-talk button, blushing deeply at her rushed, stammering admission. Harps was silent. Feeling hopeless, she thumped her head onto the desk, trying not to cry. "You like girls, too?" asked a shy voice in her ear after a long pause. Elena was silent for a long moment. She wasn't quite sure how to answer that. "I don't know. I guess so? It's so scandalous to be a lesbian where I live. Sometimes I think I just like to think I like girls, for the thrill of it. Then I realize I forgot to take any notes for AP Geography because I spent the whole time staring at Miss Granger's boobs." Both girls giggled shyly into their microphones. "I've been thinking about a girl, too. . ." Harps admitted, sounding incredibly shy, completely unlike the perfect confidence she typically displayed on the voice server. "We're hopeless," Elena said, trying to break the tension a little. "I've even found myself daydreaming about herms and I just don't know what to think!" Harps's mic fell silent. Elena practically held her breath, desperate for the other girl to say something. Had she admitted too much? She should've kept her mouth shut. Ross claimed that hermaphrodites were more accepted in Roosevelt City, but she could've just been saying that to prove a point. Judging from the silence, she'd surely disgusted Harps irreparably and ruined the conversation. Why wasn't she saying anything?! Elena's forehead thumped against the desk again. This time, she wasn't able to keep the tear from trickling out of the corner of her eye. "Kaaylee?" said a soft voice in her ear. "I'm a herm." Elena lifted her head with a soft squeak. "What? Really?" she blurted before she could stop herself. "All my life," Harps said with an awkward giggle. "That's. . .is that okay? You said you've been daydreaming about herms but it also sounded like that was bad because you think we're gross or something." "No!" Elena said with a squeak. "I don't!" Her mind danced and swirled. It summoned forth the image of Harps cumming to a wet dream, the same scene she'd imagined earlier. Except now, the Harpsichord in her fantasy had a stiff penis gripped in one hand, the other hand buried between her thighs. Her imagination fell short, not having enough experience to know what an orgasming male organ would do, but the picture was intensely erotic nonetheless. "I mean. Well. I guess I used to." "Yeah," Harps said softly, sounding deflated. "I get that a lot." "No!" she blurted, desperately wanting to salvage the conversation. "I mean it's just. . .people aren't open-minded around here. Like, at all. I saw a gay couple get asked to leave the restaurant my family was eating at a couple months ago. I never really thought about how I'd picked up prejudices without realizing it. Not until my cousin Ross started dating a herm." "She did?" Harps asked softly, curious and a little less dejected. "Uh huh. And. . .well, to be honest, I still thought it was really gross. Like, really gross. Sorry. I know it's stupid, but I also don't wanna lie to you. But part of the reason I'm up so late tonight is because I was thinking about exactly that. About herms. And if they're actually weird or gross or if I only think that because that's what I've been told." Elena held her breath. At some point, she'd squeezed her thighs together and kept them there. The fur of her inner thighs, bare under the oversized shirt she wore, was warm and slightly moist. Her arousal had been a rollercoaster all night, and right now it was rising toward a peak, thinking of Harpsichord, hoping to be given the opening to admit her attraction. Harps's mic clicked in her ear. She could hear the fox's nervous breath for a heartbeat before she asked, "And?" Elena shivered, delighted. "And I've decided that they're actually pretty sexy," she whispered. "Harps, do you wanna meet up while I'm in Roosevelt City?" There was a soft beat of silence. "You mean. . .like a date?" Elena blinked, blushed, and shivered all at the same time. She hadn't met like a date. Harpsichord was sweet and easy to talk to, and Elena was finally over the inherited prejudice that always made her friendship with Megan slightly awkward. Selfishly, she had wanted a chance to prove to herself that she really could be friends with a herm, with no reservations. Plus, Ross would be busy with her sisters and Megan, so Elena desperately wanted something do other than hang out awkwardly by herself in Aunt Dianna's house. But now that she thought about it. . . "Yes, like a date," she blurted breathlessly before she lost her nerve. "Yes!" Harps stammered out just as breathlessly. For a moment, the Ventrilo channel disintegrated into a sea of nervous giggles before the two girls calmed themselves. "Wh-when are you gonna be here?" Harps asked, her voice nervous and bubbly. "We're leaving after school on Friday, but it's like twelve hours down there or something." "So Saturday?" "Yeah! Uhm. . .a movie?" "Can we do lunch? There's a. . .a school thing that night. I don't think I'm gonna go, but just in case." "Okay!" Elena practically squealed. "Okay! 12th Street Cafe at 1? It's not actually anywhere near 12th Street. It's in Wardenclyffe. Your cousin should know where that is." "Is that a shopping center?" Elena asked. "Yeah. Riverview's premiere shopping center, so all the billboards say. It's really trendy." "That sounds awesome," Elena said earnestly, practically bouncing. "Maybe we could go shopping after!" "Oh! I guess so," Harps said, sounding surprised. "I didn't really think of that. I've only been on a couple dates with boys before, and shopping is the last thing they'd want to do." "Hehe. Girl power! Oh! My real name is Elena by the way." "Mine's Harper. Not real original, I know. I like your character's name, though. Do you watch Firefly?" "No. I heard Nini mention the name Kaylee one time and thought it sounded pretty. I had to add the 'a' since Kaylee was taken. I guess in a way, I'm named after someone you go to school with." "Oh," Harper said, sounding a little sad. "I always kinda hoped you were named after Kaylee Frye. Well. I'll just have to show you some time!" Elena had no idea what Firefly was, but the thought of seeing it with Harper made her shiver. "Harper," she said sadly, "I should probably go to bed." "Yeah," Harper murmured into her ear with a sigh. "Elena. . .thanks for talking to me. I can't wait to see you." "Me either! And thanks for not, um, not judging me for judging you. I feel really bad about some of the things I've been thinking the last couple of months." "You'll just have to find a way to make it up to me," Harper said with a giggle, her voice taking on a teasing tone, though it was obviously not a way she talked very often, a little awkward off her lips. "I will," Elena said sincerely, grinning. "Good night, Harper." "Wait! Elena, how will I recognize you?" Elena mulled over the question. She had no doubt that she'd recognize Harper, especially with the new imaginings the night's conversation had conjured up. But Elena didn't have any pictures on the forum, so Harper had never seen her. "I'll be wearing a red rose in my hair," Elena said, half jokingly. "That's so cheesy," Harper replied, giggling. "Yeah, so?" "No so," Harper said sweetly in her ear. "I like cheesy. Good night, Elena." "Good night!" Elena closed out her game and chat clients, only to realize belatedly that Kaaylee was standing in the middle of a hostile area. Well. That'd be fun next time she logged in. She switched the monitor off and, nightblind from the electronic glow, stumbled carefully from her desk to her bed. She rolled into her sheets, shivering again, her thoughts filled with images of Harper and the sweet sound of the herm's voice in her ear. Elena squeezed her legs together, amazed by the wetness there. The next three days of school would be hell, she knew. She'd probably be able to imagine Harper's face on every alluring curve she saw for the next three days. She smiled. At least she didn't have to worry about the dance. She had a date. *** A dragon roared overhead as Mori pushed open the door to the Pike & Polearm, signaling his entrance to the store's owner. Valentine sat behind a glass counter, feet propped up on it. The black-furred chipmunk smiled as he walked by. "Hey, Mori," she said, brushing a strand of blue hair off her face. She made a point to know the names of all her regulars. With the Pike & Polearm being Riverview's premiere gaming store, and one of only four in all of Roosevelt City, that was a lot of names to remember. But she'd known his from the second day he'd poked his head in here. "I like the hair. Did I inspire you?" She gave him a jaunty grin. Mori brushed his hand through his hair. He and Val matched in many ways, despite him being a mutt and her being some rare offshoot race of chipmunk. They both had dark, nearly black, fur, and flame red hair. Mori had just added purple to his, much to his parents' dismay, but he loved the way it emphasized the illusion of fire. Val's hair color changed every month, and this week it was bleached in streaks, then re-dyed a bright blue. Mori cocked his head with a sheepish smile. "Huh, I guess you did. I didn't really think about it." Val smiled. "Well, color me flattered." Mori stopped at the counter, peering in at the dice and pre-painted miniatures, not that he had any intention of buying either. He couldn't resist the temptation to spend time with Val, even though she wasn't the real reason he was here. "How are Cherry and Ryker?" Val tipped her grin again and pointed to the floor next to her. Mori, not exactly the tallest kid in his class, had to stand on his tiptoes to lean over the glass case. On the floor, two chipmunk siblings were quietly and very intently battling each other in a game of Magic: The Gathering. The girl, younger of the two, was obviously winning. Mori landed back on his paws and grinned. "Chips off the ol' block," Val said proudly. She dropped her feet off the glass case and leaned forward closer to him. Mori blushed a little at the implied intimacy, and his eyes couldn't quite help glancing toward the chipmunk's breasts, though Val conspicuously avoided wearing anything even remotely revealing to work. "By the way, loverboy," she said, voice slanted in a teasing tone. Then she jerked her thumb over her shoulder. Windows behind the counter looked in on the adjacent space, which Pike & Polearm owned to keep their gaming room separate from their merchandise. A dozen tables filled the space, and clumps of people surrounded several of them. Three were set aside for people to build models or paint miniatures. Mori's eyes went directly to the real reason he was here. Harper O'Neill sat by herself at one of the painting tables, bent over a miniature. Mori stared for a second, an unbidden sigh escaping his lips. Val giggled at him and he blushed so dark red that it showed through his fur. The chipmunk reached over the glass and slapped his shoulder so hard he half-stumbled. "Go get'er, tiger," Val whispered before dropping back into her seat, boots thumping back up onto the glass case. Mori opened his mouth to protest, then snapped it shut after standing there gape-mouthed for a moment. Still blushing, he pushed his backpack up further on his shoulder and ducked his face, Val still giggling as he headed for the other room. He wound his way around an animated group huddled around a map playing Dungeons and Dragons. Plenty of people were at the art tables painting, but luckily Harper was alone at hers. Mori slung his backpack to the floor and perched himself on a stool. "Hey," he said, getting barely a 'mmm' in response from the girl. She was bent over a set of miniatures from the new X-Wing game. The miniatures came prepainted, true to the movies down to very fine details. Harper, however, was the reigning store champion, and insisted on giving them her own paint job. She was currently in the process of painting Darth Vader's TIE fighter gold and pink. "Pink?" he asked, unable to contain his curiosity as he bent over and unzipped his backpack to pull out his own paints. "Mmm," Harper said again. Then she lifted her head from her work, rubbing the back of her neck. "It makes their humiliation that much sweeter." She grinned a wicked grin. "I'm going to paint all my figures something like this. I'm thinking purple and silver for Luke. Just to remind everyone that they're getting their asses handed to them by a middle school girl." Mori shivered, grabbing a bag of unpainted mini's from his bag. "You're vicious," he said, intending for it to sound like a compliment. Harper took it that way and flashed him a smile. "Thanks," she said, bending back to her work. He stared for a while, wondering what was wrong with him, second guessing himself. He'd been pining over Harper ever since the first day she'd slinked in shyly after moving here a year ago. He vaguely remembered feeling confident and popular in her presence. Of course, she'd been new and shy back then. She was still shy, and, like him, younger than most of the other people who hung out at the Pike & Polearm, but she'd long since grown out of needing him to show her the ropes. Now she, if anything, was more of a fixture in the store than he was. He frowned at himself. Was he really going to let a stupid thing like popularity stop him from asking her out? Well, at school. sure. You never asked anyone outside of your popularity circle out at Griffin Heights. That was a recipe for humiliation. But at the Pike & Polearm, they were equals, right? Val nursed an atmosphere of acceptance in her store, and for many, it was the only place they could come to feel normal. Plus, he was one year ahead of Harper in school. Being a dashing, older boy in high school had to count for some points in his favor, right? "You're frowning at me." "What?" Mori asked, blinking in surprise. "You were sitting over there, frowning at me. Do I have paint in my fur? What's wrong?" Harper's tone went from accusatory to worried, and for a moment he heard her slip into that sweet, shy voice he remembered. "No! You look great!" He blushed. He hadn't meant to say that! He stammered for words. "No, I meant. . .well, not that you don't look great. . .I just. . .I didn't mean to, uhm. . ." Harper blushed, her ears perking curiously and her head cocking to one side as she stared at him, tail drooping. She opened her mouth to interrupt him, but he pressed on, words tumbling out of him until he finally found the right ones before his courage flagged. "What I meant was I was trying to figure out how to ask you to the dance. Could I take you to the Junior High Spring Fling, Harper?" Harper made a surprised little squeak, her eyes flitting around at the other people in the gaming store. Belatedly, Mori looked around too. Not everyone was looking at them, but enough were that Mori blushed a dark red. He could even see Valentine watching through the window in the separating wall, waving off a customer who was waiting to pay as she gave Mori a quick thumbs up. He turned back to Harper, his own tail drooping as he slowly realized what a mess he had probably just made of things. Harper's cheeks and ears burned red through her crimson fur. She grabbed him by the shirt collar and pulled him right off his stool, dragging him over behind the soda machine. "Listen, Mori, you're sweet and I know we hung out when I moved here last year, but you barely know me." "But that's okay! We can--" "No, it's not okay! Look, there's. . .there's stuff you don't know about me, okay? Trust me, if you knew, you wouldn't be asking me out. Boys never ask me out." Harper crossed her arms, frowning and looking embarrassed. "That's stupid," Mori said bluntly. "You're cute, and you can kick my ass at any game in this store, and you love Firefly, and you're a bitching painter, and I like talking to you and being with and just. . .I like being around you more than any other girl I've ever met, Harper. That's why I'm asking you out, and I don't think any dark, mysterious secret you could reveal is going to change that." "That's just it!" Harper hissed, lowering her voice. "I'm not a girl, Mori. I'm a herm. Herm. Aff. Row. Dite. Okay?" Mori stared at her, more than a little dumbfounded. Then, slowly, he found himself smiling. His tail started to wag as he crossed his arms over his chest. "Ha. Told you so." Harper blinked, cocking her head, confused. "What?" "I told you. That still doesn't change the reasons I asked you out." Harper rolled her eyes. "You're just saying that because you still think of me as a cute girl. You wouldn't for half a second even consider going out with, like, Bill." She gestured at one of the guys around the D&D table. "He can kick my ass at any game in the store, but he's not cute. You are." "Fine. Art." "Cute, but he's been eliminated in the first round of every competition this store ever held. Plus, I once heard him say he thinks Firefly is 'overrated.'" "He what?! Nevermind. Okay. . ." she said slowly, scanning the room with narrowed eyes. "Corbin," she concluded, triumphantly. Mori glanced back into the room. He turned back to Harper, blushing, tail wagging. "Corbin? Do you think he'd go out with me? I mean, he's in college so the age thing would be kinda scandalous but. . ." Harper scoffed and pushed his shoulder. Then she looked between him and the young man she'd picked as his hypothetical date. She paused. "Really?" she asked, sounding skeptical. Mori shrugged and looked down at his feet with a sheepish grin. "I'd much rather it were you," he said. "I don't know," Harper said slowly, still uncertain. "I did mean what I said. About us barely knowing each other." An idea popped into Mori's head and he smiled, regaining his momentum and fearlessness, at least for the moment. "A date, then," he said. "What?" "Hear me out. Let's go on a date. Saturday afternoon, before the fling. Get to know each other, you know, as someone we might go out with? Then if you think you can stand me for a whole evening, let me take you to the dance. If you still think it's a bad idea, I won't bother you about it. Okay? Just a date?" Mori held his breath, tail wagging, anxious and desperate for what the girl--the herm--would decide. Harper looked a little stunned and a little confused "Saturday afternoon?" she asked, sounding as if she was searching for something. "How about 12th Street. At 1. Will you be there?" Her eyes widened a little. He didn't quite understand the reaction, but it still wasn't a no. Not yet, anyways. "I'll be there, but--" "Great!" he interrupted, too thrilled by her agreement to let her finish. He beamed, tail wagging. "You won't regret it, I promise!" He bounced away from her and the soda machine, sweeping his forgotten painting supplies back into his backpack haphazardly. Shouldering it, he flashed her his best smile. "Saturday at 1!" He repeated, then practically bounced out of the store.

Harper stared after the young mutt, mouth hanging open, trying to tell him to wait. She watched him fistbump Val at the counter before triggering the roaring dragon as he dashed out the door. A few of the guys nearby chuckled at the stunned expression on her face. She even saw a brief flash of jealousy on the faces of one or two of them, though they were old enough that the jealousy was creepy. Her shiver of distaste for them struck her out of her stunned pose. She glanced through the glass at Val, who grinned big at her and gave her a double thumbs up through the window. She sighed and returned sheepishly to her table, her cheeks and ears glowing with her embarrassment, tail drooped with worry. She bent back over the TIE Advanced, delicately painting in details in pink over her gold base. This time yesterday, she'd been looking forward to a weekend with no obligations. She'd long since planned on blowing off the Spring Fling, and she tried to deny the small part of her that had desperately wanted to pounce on anything that half asked her to go with them. She'd had all day Saturday and into Sunday morning pegged for guild events on GW2. She'd even had her mom pick her up a case of Mountain Dew in advance. And now, somehow, she had not one but two dates. At the same time. A cute high school boy, and a honey-voiced high school girl, both of whom were at least a little into the same sort of games she liked. Plus, they both knew she was a herm and they seemed to be excited rather than turned off by the prospect. She shivered, pulling her brush away from the miniature she was painting as her fingers trembled. She'd desperately tried to play it cool when talking to both of them, but truthfully, she already found herself completely enamored with Mori and Elena both. She quivered with excitement at the thought of her first real date on Saturday. With both of them, her some distant part of her brain reminded her. What had she gotten herself into?