Survival Of The Fittest

"Yup. That happened."

Oh, and Fiyori was there too. She must have blended into the shadows while Cris was making his way up. His attention was more on Junko and her story, and his brow furrowed as he described Raina's adventures. The question of exclusivity was up in the air, and they certainly had both their on and off periods - how many girls had Cris continued his escapades with despite the existence of this "relationship"? He couldn't really complain about Raina doing what he'd done himself, now could he? In fact he'd have been incredibly surprised if she'd never looked at another man in their time together.

And yet the fire wasn't the only reason he was suddenly feeling uncomfortably warm. Wayne, huh? The name sounded vaguely familiar but it wasn't someone he'd had much if any experience with. His brow furrowed and a frown of concentration formed, as he let out a little "hm" at Junko's tale. Did it even matter, in the long run?

"Raina's tough, I'm sure she can handle it. If things get bad she'll just call me or whatever. Anything else fun happen?"

If not, perhaps he'd have to make his own.

Well, they took it well, at least? Aiden had walked up next to Fiyori to talk. Junko guessed that whatever the hell he and Johnny were talking about, it was about Fiyori. Doing things to Fiyori, if we had to be accurate. Or something. They were making suggestive hand gestures when they talked, of course. But yeah, it seemed like it wasn't as awkward as it looked. Seemed, at least. Hopefully whatever it was blowed over quickly? Whether it was boning or something else.

Raina was tough, yeah. She was… no-nonsense. Sure, she liked Miku Hatsune enough to look like her, but she wasn't a pushover. Darius got a firm reminder in the form of a beer can earlier. Lesson: even if someone looks like a Vocaloid, that doesn't mean that they're automatically okay with any singing. Wait, maybe she just fully understood drunk Darius' logic here. Miku equals singing equals let's harass her with music. Made sense, if you looked at it with the assistance of substances.

For a moment, Junko noticed that he made a "hm" noise. As if in thought. Maybe he thought that Wayne was… you know. She was still sure that they were in the off-stage right now. She was pretty damn sure, the more she thought of it. To be honest, it'd explain why they hadn't come back yet, though. Aside from, you know, Darius' antics. But the thought slipped out of focus.

"Yeah. I think she's the kind of person to, like, kick Darius into outer space or some shit if he tried that again" she said, laughing.

Wait, did anything else happen? Well, Michael and Jonathan were starting to make-up, it looked like. Maria got pissed at her because somehow she wasn't invited. She still needed to figure out how that happened, honestly. Johnny had pulled out some secret agent abilities to hide weed. What else happened?

"It's been pretty quiet otherwise. Most of the craziness happened because Darius. Though… apparently I didn't invite Maria? She magically showed up all pissed. I need to figure out if I forgot or what later."

She wasn't sure if she should bring up Jonathan and Michael. It was kind of their personal argument, you know? Did Cris even know about that to begin with? She knew about it, but it wasn't sure if it was something he knew or should know.

"You could always ask her?"

Seemed simple enough. Of course, it also seemed simple enough she'd already tried it. Maria was... odd. He didn't have a problem with people just showing up places whenever they wanted, he did that, but she could certainly be a little strange now and then. He was staring through the fire, not ignoring Junko, his mind just elsewhere. Wayne, huh? Worm food, just like him, just like Raina, but even though they seemed to be in an off period and it was incredibly hypocritical of him the name sent a little jolt up his nerves.

Especially since this Wayne and Raina had headed off together and were yet to come back. Hm. Desert heat and the crackling fire sent tiny trickles of sweat down his forehead, but he paid it no mind, lost in his thoughts.

"I feel like a dick, only showing up when all the excitement is over."

He would listen to whatever Junko had to say to that, but then felt a vibration in his pocket. His mobile phone going off, now? Hm. He'd let Junko talk - if she chose to - before giving her a quick "oh, excuse me" and checking it.

"You're weird."

Fiyori licked her teeth clean of any meaty remains and made sure that even the last bit went down her throat.

"I mean, you always are. But in general now you're even weirder."

She looked over towards Aiden, gazing into his eyes over the edges of her glasses. She noticed the ever-dimming fire breaking along the rim of the lenses. She'd find it beautiful, but her mind was focused on Aiden for the moment.

Fiyori leaned to the side, placed a hand on the seat next to her and began to pat it gently.

Alright, all fine, no problemo at all. Whole situation had been defused before it even got armed. Fi apparently hadn't overheard too much of Johnny's shenani-nanigans, nothing to worry about. Well,  nothing besides the fact that he was gettin' lotsa ideas in his head again - chick just had to go and lick her teeth like that, did she? Man-eater and all that.

Nah, he still had this. so he did. Just had to try and not look over at her too much, just sit there and chillax, easy peasy. Yeah, relaxin' sounded like the best he could do for the rest of the night, already pretty much used up all of his energy walking to this place. Fine with him.

He walked over to the spot next to Fiyori, then immediately dropped down on his ass. "Guilty as charged, your Honor. I confess to the heinous crime of weirdness." He chuckled, then leaned back a bit and turned his head, now staring directly into the campfire, smiling a little. "Wouldn't have it any other way."

His skin heating up was more than welcome, awesome feeling and shit. Aiden felt like he could have just sat there all night long. Company helped too, of course. Especially someone who was all around chill like Fi. He'd work that little problem of his out with her eventually, not tonight though, nope. Not the time, place or - something, to discuss that. Some other day.

"Besides, you never said you didn't like me being weird." Didn't know if he meant it seriously or as a joke, probably both. Not like it mattered now. As long as that fire kept burn burn burning, he'd be a happy man.

((Aiden Slattery, end of pregame))

((Jane Madison, technically Sadies Start))

Should she or shouldn't she? Cris was probably already all sorts of busy on that party. Fuck, why didn't she just go with him in the first place? Could have avoided all of this shit.

Jane sat on the edge of her bed, rubbing her temple with one hand, holding her phone with the other. It wasn't too late, just that one little message and everything would look better for her, probably. If only it wasn't that fucking selfish.

She wasn't sleeping any time soon though, that was for sure. Ugh, why'd she have to feel all tense like that? Even cuddling her plushy little babies wasn't doing shit for her. Worst thing of all was, she couldn't even tell why she was like that. Nothing had really upset her earlier, Sadies had been pretty decent and all. Eh, trying to wrap her head around it wasn't gonna help, she had to try and deal with it somehow.

Yeah, she had to be selfish here, fuck it. Better than spend all night slowly going nuts. She'd make it up to him some time. Or maybe they'd just have a good time and there'd be no need for making up. Either way was fine, as long as she got to distract herself somehow.

Jane  slowly lifted herself off the bed and pressed the 'Send' button.


To: Cris

Hey
Feel kinda on edge, can't sleep, tried tea and everything. Rlly bored now
Wondered if u could come pick me up? We can drive around or smth, idc, anything works for me
Would reaaally love it if u could do that. I'll let u choose our next hiking location again if u do, deal? ; )
Don't take too long pls, already running in circles here
Ur the best!

"I guess I did ask her about it? But she just showed up, and acted as if I forgot. It was weird, man."

Junko shrugged. She'd look into that later.

"Don't feel too bad. At least you didn't have to listen to Darius mangling rock songs in Japanese. I mean, yeah, say what you want about the dance, at least the music's better. Probably"

She laughed. Though, again, if he had shown up earlier he could've wrangle Darius a bit and make him back off of Raina.

Oh, his phone? Didn't he have a date? Did they want to text him about the evening? Cris had a lot of people he knew, and… who was his date again? Something else she needed to look into. She looked at the fire, noticing that it was becoming dimmer.

"Ah, I need to feed the flames, huh?" she muttered, mostly to herself.

Damn it, fire needs food. Food, as in, wood. Things to burn. That. She had some things like that to keep it going.

Hopefully it'd be enough for the rest of the evening.

K. Be down soon, party's winding down.

He'd sort of popped in and was planning to pop right back out, which felt unpleasant deep in his gut, even if he'd done so with other parties in the past. Cris' eyes roamed up and down Junko's body while she fed the fire and the last embers of the party flickered around them, and he pondered what to do.

The whole thing seemed lame anyway, as much as that was probably his fault for being so late. Darius showed up and ruined everything by what Junko told him. With a shrug, he trotted up to stand before the fire next to her and tossed a few twigs into the flames to help. They were eaten by fire just the same as his fleeting youth.

"Hey, looks like things kind of died down, and I'm needed. Sorry to cut out like this, how about I make it up to you sometime?"

He really did feel bad. Cris would let Junko reply, lean in to offer her a kiss on the cheek or lips depending on what she felt like obliging, then head off with a wave. On the way, Raina would get one little text:

Hey, who's Wayne?

((Crisanto continued elsewhere?))