Urban Fantasy RP

Dremlin, in response, merely shifted his feet into iron to weigh himself down. He also turned his hand to iron for a moment, as it continued on it's set course, knocking over the ice cream.

"Now we're even." He said, walking back to the table and sitting down. "Nice wind trick, by the way. So, newborn phoenix, huh?" Interesting stuff."

"Nah, just pulling your leg." Anna chirped out as Shujiko attempted to hurry from the cafe. "First timers get free food."

"Dear... visitor..." The latter word was stressed, for Dremlin was not a customer, nor a person Spring would want to give the slightest respect towards. "You... do not waste food in this establishment. Especially not someone else's." The dragon maid boy stated, catching the ice cream. His face did not change at all, though steel could be sensed.

"I am sorry for the trouble." Spring said, turning around and bowing down to the others who simply wished to enjoy the fare, setting the ice cream near Merlin again. This time though, he stayed near the treat and looked something like a guarddog about to spring.

Glaring at the rather idiotic shapeshifter, the minute female was too angry to realize he was performing magic. "Get out of my cafe... now." She all but spat out, her hands clenched and face flushed with anger. One does not get to behave like that in her place...

Shujiko froze in place at Anna's words, disbelief etched in her face. As was her swiftly reddening face. Honestly, it should have been obvious she was kidding, and now she went and embarrassed herself.

"...I... was playing. Along." Shujiko muttered. She struggled to turn her head and meet Anna's eye. "Um... but what about the money? I still ca-"

Shujiko was interrupted by the sound of someone yelling. Finding the source of the noise, Shujiko watched someone approach... herself? No, her young companion? She didn't quite catch what had happened, what with all the incredibly quick action, but what Shujiko did notice was the attempt to knock that girl's ice cream from her hand.

Staring in disbelief as the guy nonchalantly returned to his seat, anger boiled within her blood. How dare he? That was completely unprovoked! As far as she knew! And she was a child! And that had actually been free! How the maid actually caught it, she would never know, but...

"I agree, you should leave!" Shujiko declared to that mean person. "What kind of monster tries to rid a child of their ice cream!"

------------------------------

Seeing the limbless girl flop onto Ami like that was a fairly odd sight, and one Cyndy tried not to stare at. Didn't want to be rude, after all. Still, they sounded like Ami actually had a chance with Emiko. Heh, what an odd couple, they would make!

...Well, Cyndy didn't know nearly enough about either of them to base that off of, but it seemed the logical conclusion to her.

"Oh, thank you for the food!" Cyndy said gratefully. "Surprisingly edible! N-not that your cooks suck! It's just..." Cyndy giggled nervously. "I still say I never mash food up like that normally!"

Well, the Carefree Witch was now sure that her decision in walking away from the shapeshifter was right. He was mean! Horribly, horribly mean! Mean mean mean! She took a step away from him, seeing that he was now sprawled on the floor, and moved her arm so that the fairy was gently brushed behind her. It could easily look inconsequential to observers, and like an accident to the fairy. Hopefully, the fairy would think that not paying too much attention to her would be the result of nearly having her ice cream destroyed.

"That... mean!" the Carefree Witch cried, half-faked and half-real tears welling up in the corner of her eyes as she pointed to the shapeshifter on the floor. "Calling me names and trying to smash my ice cream... you're mean!"

Aki opened the wardrobe to reveal... rows and rows of perfectly ordinary clothes. Well, mostly ordinary clothes anyway.

"These clothes are from my experimentation with attempting to create self-repairing clothes," she said. "I'd call them a success, but they kind of eat up magical energy when damaged,"

--

Meanwhile, in Germany; Gerulf was watching the video of his defeat for the hundreth time that day. As painful as it was to watch his greatest defeat over and over again; he was determined to figure out Aki Watanabe's weaknesses.

He winced a bit as he watched himself get hit with what his enemy called an "Ocean Grenade". He determined that that was the point of the fight when he was screwed beyond a shadow of a doubt. Unfortunately, the store owner had decided she wasn't done with him; and used some weird weapon to pull him out of the colossal orb of water she'd trapped him in.

He turned off the tv at around the point where she pulled out the cannon. He didn't feel it was necessary to watch himself begging for mercy.

"That 'child' demonstrated some pretty impressive lightning magic a couple blocks over." Said Dremlin, rolling his eyes. "As for what kind of monster wastes food and makes a 'child' cry..." The changeling turned, for a moment, into a faceless monster with a horribly wide grin, before changing back to normal.

"The dark, scary kind."

The very moment Dremlin decided to change his face in a cafe full of people, a rather dense puff of smoke covered his face long enough for his grotesque change to go unnoticed. There in the doorway was a purple haired young man with a silver haired child. The young man, took another drag from his cigarette, handing over what appeared to be a wallet to the smaller girl.

"Get your ice cream, I have some trash to take out," Kemuri stated gruffly. He wasn't here to see the whole scene, but the fact that this shapeshifter attempted to ruin the masquerade, potentially ruining any chance Hotaru would have a semi-normal life... to say he wasn't happy, was a vast understatement.

While the shapeshifter was still probably hacking on the lingering smoke, Kemuri grabbed the scum by the scruff of his neck, and attempted to drag him out the cafe. He wanted to take him somewhere they could talk "privately".

"Kemuri-nii.. try not to get too messy," Hotaru warned offhandedly as she headed for the counter. She seemed completely unfazed by her brother potentially beating the shapeshifter to a bloody pulp.

"First time is free." The smile came back onto Anna's face as the ruffian was dragged out by the scruff of his neck by someone else. Heaving out a visible sigh for at least five seconds, the girl recomposed herself and smiled at Hotaru. "You don't have to pay."

"When your chaperone comes back, tell him that the bathroom is on the left side of the counter. We've just restocked our selection of imported handsoaps." Spring stated with a matter of fact tone. Though his expression was the same as ever, people could feel a kind of... black humour radiating from the crossdresser.

"But I don't want a girlfriend!" Keiko said plaintively, flailing a little, "That would mean dates and stuff, and I don't know how to date!"

Emiko gave her sister a weird look. Since when was she attracted to girls, anyway? Best not to ask and just leave the little girl to deal with the person best equipped to associate with strangeness.

"This food's all pretty much mashed up to start with."

---

Sariel smiled pleasantly at the girl, deciding to give her a visible indication that draining magical power wouldn't be an issue. Defences off... and an entire shelf of detectors promptly exploded before she had chance to get them back on.

"How much would an entire outfit cost?"

---

Morgan, annoyed at being pushed backwards and not being able to see what was going on, moved for a high spot where she could get a good view: Merlin's head.

"Uh, lightning magic?" Shujiko asked with confusion plainly written across her face. Obviously, with everything that followed afterwards, Shujiko found herself unable to comprehend much of anything. At least the rude guy was gone, though. As long as nothing criminal was going to happen to him...

"Hey, are you okay?" The teenager merely sighed, facing her young companion. "I think your ice cream's been juggled to safety, so..." Shujiko looked at the little thing on her head for a long while. "...Was... that always there, by any chance?"

-------------------

"I guess..." Cynd laughed softly at Emiko's statement. She glanced at the limbless girl, who sounded like she needed dating tips.
"Oh, dating? totally easy" Cyndy, the girl who lacked all experience with this, announced. "All you do is pick a nice place to eat, talk all mushy-like, hold hands and maybe sit together to watch the sunset and then agree to do it again some time!"

Cyndy looked rather pleased with herself for a few seconds, before it slowly dawned on her just who she had actually directed that advice too, and began blushing furiously as she hastily attempted to rectify her mistake.

"N-no, the holding hands thing isn't really necessary! J-just kiss or... or something! That's all! Love is all you need, right?"

Aki looked slightly annoyed at the destruction of the detectors. However, she wasn't annoyed at Sariel as much as at herself for not making sturdier detectors.

"Well, for a whole outfit; I'd say about 1000 yen," she said.

It was... kind of working! This was a reaction different from what Amitiel normally got, at least... That was good, right? Keiko didn't seem all that pleased, though... maybe that was just part of the process. Not knowing how to date was fine, anyway.

"I'll teach you," Amitiel replied, with confidence. Ignoring the fact that she had no idea how to go about it either.

----

Hisako couldn't help it. When the detectors exploded along the wall directly next to her, she let out an involuntary cry of fear and immediately covered her head. It had just been so out of no where, and... well, things suddenly exploding were rather frightening anyway.

In any case, it was unlikely that they didn't know she was hear any longer.

----

"Ahhh... eh? Something on my head?" the Carefree Witch blinked. Of course, she knew about it, but letting the fairy know she knew about it...? At least, here, that wasn't the best idea. She had to keep the fairy hidden, though...

"Ishi-neesan," she said, addressing Shujiko, now, "I have to go to the bathroom, can you watch my ice cream?"

And with that, she dashed off into the bathroom. Once she got there, the Carefree Witch attempted to remove the fairy from her head. She was cute and small and stuff, but she had to be made aware of magic's secrecy! Even the Carefree Witch only showed off to people she knew for sure knew about magic already.

"Huh... well... umm..." Keiko said, appearing to consider the option as Emiko looked on in disbelief, "What about Emi-chan? She has no-one to keep her company, at least not yet! Should we go and see if we can find some friends from school?"

Emiko fought the urge to facepalm and gathered up the plates, carrying them to the sink and rinsing them. Now that an idea was in Keiko's head, they were bound to go through with it.

---

"Only that? I thought a full set would be more expensive," Sariel remarked, continuing on as if a person hadn't just made a noise somewhere amongst the shelves behind her. She'd never been able to work out why half the magic users were set on no-one's knowing they could use magic... surely it would be better to help people?

---

"... Why are we in the bathroom?"

Cyndy, still feeling foolish for her earlier remark, piped up, "Uh, well, I could always keep her company! So you can... you know, call me in or something..."

certainly an odd offer to make, but hey, Cyndy might get a small raise for it. Plus they were pretty nice people.

----------------------

"Uh, sure..." Shujiko replied uncertainly, taking the ice cream into her hand, where the little girl promptly bolted off to the bathroom.
Is it me, or does this cafe make everything weird? Shujiko wondered. Jerk ass customers, a bunch of stuff that felt almost like an attempt to hide something, tiny people, maids that joked about selling poorer customers off...

Reddening slightly at that last one, Shujiko gave the ice cream a small lick and grimaced. She definitely preferred strawberry over this...

Amitiel blinked. Find people from school the sisters' school...? Hey, maybe she could turn this into a party! With a lot of cute girls, and stuff! Clearly, this sounded incredibly promising to her. In fact, it was the best option out of everything possible.

"I like that idea, let's go!"

----

The Carefree Witch placed the fairy on the sink, then flailed her arms.

"Magic is secret!" she said, eyes shut tightly as she flailed, "You have to be careful and stuff so that people don't see you! That's important and things and stuff like that!"

Dremlin coughed a bit, before being dragged out of the establishment.

"Well, someone's keen on keeping secrets, eh? Ah well, I'm not one for fighting, so I guess I'll get lost now and find someone who's more fun to annoy. Ciao!" Dremlin then turned into a crow, escaping from Kemuri's grasp in the process. He flew off, never to be heard from again, though a newspaper somewhere in the southwestern U.S would later report a hunter having been flattened by a small deer that apparently turned into an elephant.

Mysteria's eyes grew wide. "A-A changeling and a phoenix?" The look on her face then turned into a dreamy expression, though there was a creepy leer on her lips too. Actually it looked less dreamy and more like it fit on the face of a psychopathic homicidal maniac. "Tyky, think of all that magic, that untapped potential... the experiments." She was definitely drooling now.

Mystyk just sighed as his sister went off in her fantasy land of experiments and he gave Ryoichi an apologetic look. "Sorry. She likes... experiments," he said lamely, looking a little embarrassed.

He reached over and flicked his sister on the forehead, letting a little shock jump from his fingertips. Mysteria let out a yelp of pain and she rubbed at the sore spot on her forehead, cursing under her breath.

"Jeez, taser me much?" she whined.

"That was hardly a taser," Mystyk said calmly.

Mysteria just pouted and muttered, "Felt like one..."

As the scene played out in the cafe, Ryoichi was a bit overwhelmed. He was also a bit insulted, since Phoenix were forced so much into secrecy and yet here's this shapeshifter causing problems. Someone took him outside though, maybe they'll set him straight.

Well, ignoring all the strange events that just happened for now, Ryoichi decided that things were a bit too hectic around the Cafe and turned back to the Twins, "Eheh, no worries... you two are rather interesting yourselves,"

-----------------------

In Germany, in a hidden room of a seemingly unused building...

"But sir, he gave his life for that, and said that it should belong to me. Surely you can understand this," a man said, calmly but with clear anger on the little his face showed in this low lighting.

"You forget your place, Disciple," Answered a strong and sturdy voice, "Your job is specifically to provide us with more miracles, and you specifically to provide ME with more miracles. They are not to go to you,and if those were truly the final words of your partner before his death, then he died miserably, turning away from his True Purpose in life. Now, you are dismissed," The last part was said with disdain as it was clear the disciple was about to protest.

The kneeling man closed his mouth, and bowed his head, before vanishing back into the shadows.

Mysteria's muttering quickly morphed into a grin. "Aww, you hear that Tyky? Ryoichi-kun says we're interesting!" she gushed, clearly excited about the fact that a phoenix seemed to be interested in them.

"I heard," Mystyk said dryly.

"Well, you're interesting too Ryoichi-kun," Mysteria said, standing up and taking the seat next to the young phoenix and slipping her arm through his. "We've never met a phoenix before and there are so many legends and myths going around about you guys! I'd love to know if they were true or not."

When Mysteria slipped her arm through Ryoichi's, Mystyk lost his polite demeanor towards the phoenix and was now narrowing his eyes in suspicion. "Teri, don't push the man," he said in a rather frosty yet still polite tone of voice.

"Ah, uhm," Ryoichi was a bit confused by this. He never thought that telling someone he was a phoenix would result in them reacting this way... wait was Mystyk mad about something?

"Well, I can tell you some stuff, but I'm kind of sworn to secrecy on a lot of things, eheh," He scratched his nose with his free hand, not really sure what to do with his other arm. He had never had someone suddenly grab his arm like that, it was different, but not uncomfortable.

Free? Now that was a word that Hotaru could really learn to love. She was pretty sure that Kemuri would love the word as well. "Well then, I'll have a double fudge sundae with a cherry on top."

Hotaru didn't bother to look around the cafe. The other people were inconsequential to her. All she wanted was her ice cream, then she'd take her leave.

----

"Fucking shapeshifter," Kemuri cursed under his breathe as he watched the shapeshifter fly off. It would be too troublesome to follow him. And besides, he couldn't let himself get too far away from Hotaru.

He tossed his cigarette to the ground and crushed it under his feet. He probably wouldn't be allowed to smoke in the cafe anyway. Better to get inside with the fire spirit. So, he went back into the place, looking a tad more grumpier than before. But that was nothing new for the smoke youkai.

Mystyk narrowed his eyes even further when Ryoichi didn't even try to push Mysteria away.

"Aw darn," Mysteria said with a pout. "Aw well, I respect your secrets. It won't stop me from trying to find out of course."

Rolling his eyes, Mystyk stood from his seat, mumbling about having to use the restroom, and he stalked away, nearly bumping into a grouchy looking guy that had just entered the cafe. His sister watched him with mischievous eyes and once he was out of sight she slid back to her own seat.

"Ah Tyky, so clueless," she giggled.

"Eheh, good luck," Ryoichi said and then Mystyk got up and left.

"Is he alright?" Ryoichi asked. He seemed upset about something, but Ryoichi couldn't possibly figure out what.

"Um, you ok?" said Aki, walking towards Hisako. She'd be a bit upset if someone got hurt in her store. Though she wasn't worried about lawsuits; having customers get injured on her first day in town would be a bad omen.

"Sorry about that; still trying to make magic detectors that don't explode when they come into contact with high levels of magical energy," she said.

"Emi and I need to get dressed first!" Keiko protested, flailing a little, only to be picked up by her sister.

"And we're going to."

The sound of the bedroom door's being locked would doubtless upset Amitiel.

---

"It's a trade-off you have to make for sensitivity," Sariel said, closing her eyes as if remembering some magical law or other, though in this case it was more a scientific one, "If you wish to measure a small quantity, you lose the ability to feasibly observe larger ones. In this case, the detectors explode."

Though any detector made would probably explode in this instance... it would be a thermometer in the sun.

---

"... Give me a minute and I'll return to human size. Will that satisfy you?"

"...I think she likes you." Cyndy commented to Ami when the sister's left. Turning to face the younger looking girl, Cyndy smiled brightly. "So, sorry for kidnapping you and nearly running you down and stuff. As you may have heard, name's Cyndy! Best Delivery Girl ever!"

---------------------------------

Shujiko, placing her shopping bags next to a free table, sat as she awaited her cohort, taking another tentative lick of her ice cream. She swept her gaze around the place. She was slowly becoming aware of a weird atmosphere around this place... something almost otherwordly about this place and its inhabitants... what was it?

Ah! Of course! Shujiko realised. These are all regualrs who see this place like a second home! Truly, this is an atmosphere of a cafe full of regular customers!

Satisfied with her idle deduction, Shujiko took another lick of the girl's ice cream. She really had to stop stealing ice cream she really didn't like all that much...

Amitiel almost immediately ran to see if she could open the door... and indeed it was locked. Dismayed, she walked back over to Cyndy and sat down heavily. "Damn it... I heard your name. I'm sure you heard mine, right?

----

The Carefree Witch stopped flailing. Her arms hung limply at her sides, and she nodded quickly. That was satisfactory, it meant that the fairy would look normal. "Yes!"

----

Hisako took a step back. She wasn't supposed to be found out! "A-ah..."

Not good. At all.

"He'll be fine," Mysteria said with a smile. "He's just being his usual anti-social self." She took a bite out of her cake, chewed it, and swallowed before saying, "Mind if I take a few feathers from you? And blood and tears too?" with a grin on her face.

It was said that a phoenix's blood, feathers, and tears, given willingly, were very potent potions ingredients. There were many recipes she had that needed them but they were just so damn expensive to get in the magical market that she never tried making them. Well, that wasn't true. She did try to make them with substitutes, but it ended up with exploding cauldrons or, on one occasion, summoning some strange yellow rodent creature that had a penchant for electrocuting people it didn't like.

The sound of Keiko's protesting about something could be heard through the closed door but the solid wood, regrettably, muffled it to the point that there wasn't much that could be made sense of amongst the limbless girl's rambling.

Emiko's 'no!' was pretty easy to hear, though.

---

In under thirty seconds, the fairy became a busty woman leaning against the sink in front of Merlin and cocking her head to examine him. No... even from this vantage point, she couldn't work out who they were, but they seemed so familiar...

"Ami, right?" Cyndy asked confidently. "'Course I did!"

The delivery girl glanced at the locked door. "They're nice, huh? Kinda feel bad for Keiko, though... I can't imagine... well, y'know..." She blinked in surprise when she heard a shout. Was that Emiko? She wondered just what exactly was going on behind there.

"Um... oh, yeah, maybe I shouldn't count this as that freebie I offered!" Cyndy declared, returning her attention to the girl before her. "Wouldn't really be fair, would it?"