Eat, Drink and Be Merry [Open to the Non-Mission Folk]

[ghost_bait]

There was lots of things to do after waking from her Snake and Holly curse. Like, being hugged until she was breathless by Tess, taking her first real sleep without the threat of a nightmare looming over her head (which, incidentally, made her sleep right through Stacy's all-call) or figuring out how to make okayu with the food provided. This was

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[craaazyisland]

Steve sat out of this mission. He didn't particularly feel in the spirit of any kind of holiday, so he figured his presence would just be counterproductive. Christmas in particular held some painful memories for him. He had no family to spend it with anymore. It was only days after the fact that he died, and any holiday he spent at Rockfort Prison had a tendency to lose its luster

[craaazyisland]

"Oh... that's kind of nice," he said thoughtfully. He wondered whether or not they could hear you when you talked to them. Steve wouldn't have thought so before, but after getting to know Miku he wasn't exactly sure anymore. "To have something like that in your house, I mean. It's a nice thought."

Miku grabbed him by the hand and tugged her after him, and he felt a little weird all of a sudden for some reason. Her hand was still cold, curse-free. Was he really running that high of a fever, or did Miku have some circulation problems or something?

He marveled at the darkroom. He'd been in the one at school, but that had been messy and disorganized from dozens of high schoolers using it every hour of the day. This one was neat and professional. "It's so cool to have one of these at home... I guess it'd be sort of like having an office in your house, huh?"

[ghost_bait]

Miku nodded, "That's right. But instead of being a salaryman, Rei has a dark room instead of an office." Still, it was such a tiny room, she couldn't see Rei trying to push a desk in here, or one of those big, expensive computers.

She let go of his hand and peeked her head out of the dark room. "And down there is a closet. But nothing important inside it except the kotatsu and some extra blankets." She stepped out of the room and up at Steve. She'd held his hand.

Why had that made her chest twinge in a funny way? Weird.

"So, that's this side of the house."

[craaazyisland]

"That's really cool. The neatest room at our house is probably the closet," Steve joked, and followed her back out. He turned around and took care to turn off the light before following her out.

When her hand let go of his, he reached up and brushed the hair out of his eyes. The house was starting to smell like something was cooking in the other room. Man, it was creepy how realistic this sensorium could be sometimes. "Does your cat always sleep in the window there?" he asked.

[ghost_bait]

Miku shook her head, "No, not always. Sometimes she sleeps on the couch, or in bed with me. Wherever she wants to, really." She turned and looked at Ruri, still firmly putting the ignore beam on the two humans.

[craaazyisland]

Steve smiled at that. "She's really cute. We didn't have any cats, but we had a dog. A big black furry one. Her name was Shadow." If he'd known you could put animals in the sensoriums too, he might have had her visit him at the airfield. Maybe next time he came in.

He followed her back into the living room. "So all the bedrooms are upstairs, huh?"

[ghost_bait]

"That's right." It seemed wrong to show him a girl's room, though she'd promised. Well... maybe if she just showed him her room quickly. "Let me check on the okayu." She said and ducked into the kitchen again. It looked almost acceptable, and she stirred it again to keep the rice from sticking to the bottom and burning.

"What breed is your dog? Ruri's just a tabby." Well, congratulations, Steve. They'd finally found a subject that wasn't food or dancing around their families.

[craaazyisland]

Hurray! At last!

"I'm not sure. I think she was a mutt. We got her from the shelter when I was 10. She was... part Irish Setter and part Black Lab," he said. "She was really a sweetheart. She'd get up and sit on the couch with you while you were watching TV." Steve thought the idea of that in this impeccably clean house might give Miku a stroke.

[ghost_bait]

Miku brightened, "That's so cute!" Though... she was a lot bigger than Ruri... and the thought of a big, wet dog on her clean couch did make her want to die a little.

It wasn't even her couch.

"Was it hard to train her?" Cats were sort of self-sufficient, after all. Food here, litter box there, and the cat was half-trained. You just had to keep her from clawing curtains or sharpening her nails on things.

[craaazyisland]

"It's hard to train them when they're little puppies, but if you work hard then they behave when they're grown up. Shadow's a really good dog," he said. "Though she gets excited and jumps up in people's faces when she meets them for the first time. We're... working on training her out of that."

He leaned against the bar again and watched Miku moving around in the kitchen. "I might bring her up in the sensorium sometime now, so you can meet her." He wondered if animals were brought aboard in the pods as well. Some had been... so maybe Shadow was in there somewhere too. That thought was actually pretty comforting.

[ghost_bait]

"Oh, I'd like that." Miku turned and stood on tip-toe to reach into a cabinet for some glasses. The clinked together as her fingers slipped. "We were a little too busy to have a dog, but I like them." But really, she was more of a cat person.

Just like at home, where everyone else was taller, the sensoriums hadn't forgotten the fact that Miku was shorter than the other residents in her home. "Ooh..."

[craaazyisland]

"I didn't know you could put animals or people in these sensorium things... I still don't know if I'd put a person in, but it'd be nice to see my dog again."

Steve watched her attempted to reach up, then sat up and rushed around the doorway into the kitchen. "Oh here, I'll get it." He almost made a joke about tall people but he wasn't exactly tall... it was more that Miku was tiny. He brought down two glasses and set them on the counter for her. "Got any pictures that need to be hung up while I'm here?"

[ghost_bait]

Miku tipped her head backwards to look at him. There were sirens going off in her head, screaming about how this was improper, even as another part of her mind was telling her to thankhimthankhimthankhim instead of just looking up at him like an idiot.

"...Ah." Words, use your words. "No, no pictures."

[craaazyisland]

"Do you need anything else while I'm in here?" he asked, oblivious as ever of her current panic as he stepped out from behind her. "I can help you out if you need it." Steve really did like to be useful. And he didn't see any stepstools around here, so he would be nice and offer the services of his average American height.

"You must be a really good cook. It smells great already," he added.

[ghost_bait]

"Oh! Um..!" Words, words, Miku. You could use them like any other grown woman! "I... the bowls." She pointed lamely to another cabinet. "If you could get the bowls?"

She scurried away to the refrigerator and stared at the bottles of Cheerio Melon as if they would give her something more to say that didn't sound like, YOUWERESTANDINGTOOCLOSETOMEANDNOWMYHEADISFUNNY.

Silly. She was acting silly. Steve was only being helpful, and her brain was jumping to conclusions. Miku snatched up two bottles of the green melon soda and closed the fridge. No reason to act silly when someone was helping you. "Thank you, Steve. For helping."

[craaazyisland]

"Sure." Steve opened up the indicated cabinet and pulled out two bowls, setting them on the counter and taking a moment to see what else was in the cabinet before closing it. He set the bowls down next to the stove and then stood off to the side so he would be out of the way while Miku worked to get things ready.

"You're welcome," he added. Jeez, she kind of did look like a little mouse all of a sudden, scrambling around almost nervously. What was up with that? "So you said this stuff was kind of like chicken soup, like you eat it when you're sick?"