magic

“I don’t think this is going to work, Tanaka-san.”

“You worry too much, Tsukishima!” Despite the enthusiasm in Saeko’s voice, the other boy still has an uncertain expression as she guides him to sit in front of the table. “I’m sure it’ll be fine!”

Tsukishima hums dubiously but lowers himself to the ground anyway. Saeko watches his face – the lines there betray every single one of his worries. Despite his blond hair, the older Tsukishima could not be more different from his younger brother Kei. Saeko is sure that she and Ryuu share a lot more similarities.

She pats his back before moving to sit at the other side of the table. She wasn’t expecting any visitors today, and she has to nudge a few cluttered items out of the way before she can sit. “You wanted help with your magic, right? This will definitely help with that!” Saeko leans across the wooden surface to wave a sheet of paper in front of his face.

Finding out that Tsukishima has been having trouble with his magic was purely coincidental.

Watching their brothers duel another team side by side, Saeko had asked him why he hadn’t continued along the same sort of path. What she hadn’t been expecting was the awkward smile he gave her, and the excuse of, “It doesn’t work properly.”

Saeko isn’t sure what the problem is. Plenty of people have issues with their magic, but normally that’s just because of ignorance or lack of experience. Tsukishima doesn’t seem like the type for either.

Back in the present, an unmistakable blush starts to spread across Tsukishima’s cheeks, and he takes the paper from from her. His mouth thins into a flat line as his eyes dart over the blocky script on the page. “Can you even read this? I don’t recognise the language.”

“Of course I can!” Saeko snatches the spell back, eyeing it with more trepidation than she allows to show on her face. “My friend taught me.”

Tsukishima still sees through her. “And they just gave it to you.” It’s not even a question.

“We’re really good friends.” Saeko shrugs noncommittally. Maybe she found the spell lying around. Maybe she took it without asking. Maybe she doesn’t want to tell Tsukishima that. “She’s a lot better at this sort of thing than I am. It’s a spell to help aid your magic.”

(Saeko only recognises ‘magic’, ‘amplify’ and ‘help’ in the title on the page, but she knows that Alisa would never leave anything dangerous lying around.)

That reassurance, more than anything Saeko had said, seems to settle the hunch in Tsukishima’s shoulders.

“OK,” he grins, and Saeko’s heartbeat trips, “I guess we could give it a try.”

She approaches the ritual of the spell with the same pose she uses whenever she has to perform in front of a crowd – the one that imbues her with confidence. Saeko doesn’t have to stand, she’s sure, because spells are meant to be simple. It should work no matter what she does.

It doesn’t work.

Saeko probably should have worked that out when she couldn’t read one of the letters. At least, she thought it was a letter. She’d let her tongue twist into the sound it most reminded her of anyway, and added in a few dramatic arm gestures for good measure.

It was probably the mispronunciation that had screwed everything up.

Waving a hand to get the bright green smoke out of her face, she ends up coughing as well. Oddly enough, it smells like apples. She doesn’t know enough about external magic to understand why.

“Tsukishima!” She can’t keep the panic from tinging her voice, and it’s well-founded once the smoke clears enough to see.

Tsukishima has disappeared.

She’s about to let out a terrified gasp when a bemused, “I don’t think it worked,” reaches her ears. The sound comes from almost below the table, and Saeko practically flings herself across the surface to make sure Tsukishima is OK.

What she finds isn’t at all what she was expecting.

Tsukishima’s brown eyes are wide with surprise as he he looks up at Saeko. He seems fine though, which is the main thing. His clothes have disappeared, but he’s lot smaller than he was previously, so it doesn’t really matter.

He’s also turned into a cat.

Tsukishima lifts a paw up tentatively. “I take it this wasn’t supposed to happen?”

“Uhhh…”

---

All things considered, Tsukishima takes being a cat pretty well.

It takes him a few stumbling steps to get used to having four legs instead of two, but he’s not at all perturbed about the fur. It’s pale, almost golden – much like his hair – darkening into black at the tips of his paws, ears, tail and nose. When Saeko offers him a mirror, he uses the time she spends cleaning up after the spell to admire his new whiskers.

“It’s not all bad, I suppose.” His dark nose twitches as he speaks. “I’ve never been a cat before, you know. My illusion magic isn’t nearly powerful enough to actually transform me, even on the rare occasion when it does work.”

He’s not at all annoyed with her, but that doesn’t stop the tips of Saeko’s ears flaring red with embarrassment. She falls to her knees on the floor in front of him – once she’s managed to clear it of the fine, green powder that the smoke left behind. She figures it’s probably impolite to just pick him up, even if he is currently a cat.

“I’m so sorry, Tsukishima!” Saeko goes the full mile and touches her forehead to the floor. At this point she doesn’t care what someone will think if they walk in and catch her performing the dogeza in front of a cat.

A soft paw taps her head a few times until she raises it. Cats can’t really smile, but his bright eyes make Saeko think Tsukishima might be trying to. They don’t sit quite right on his feline face – too human in their expressiveness.

“Don’t worry about it, Tanaka-san – I didn’t actually think it would work. I’m just glad it didn’t turn me permanently invisible or something.”

Saeko sits up straighter, reassured that Tsukishima doesn’t blame her – because he definitely should – before poking his little cat-forehead. His fur is so soft.

“I can’t believe you had so little faith in me!” He was right to be sceptical though.

His tail flicks from side to side at her touch. “You can fix this though, right?”

“I…” Saeko bites her lip and glances to one side. She’s definitely not talented enough to revert the mess she’s already made. Time to call in her losses.

“I probably can’t – but I know who can!”

Saeko gathers up her things quickly – throwing on her favourite jacket and the first pair of shoes she finds next to the door – making sure to pick up the spell paper on the way out. Tsukishima follows her to the main door, tail twitching.

“Uh…” Saeko stares down at him, one shoe half-pulled on. She hadn’t really considered how they were going to do this. Tsukishima could walk next to her, sure, but his small cat-legs would slow them down. But she doesn’t feel particularly comfortable about carrying him the entire way there either.

(Part of her thinks Tsukishima wouldn’t agree to that anyway – he’s still a human, whatever his current form.)

She makes sure she has both shoes on before crouching in front of him. “Do you want to sit on my shoulder whilst we walk there?” It’s not much of a compromise, but it’ll have to do.

Tsukishima’s dark ears perk upwards at the suggestion. “Sure.”

Saeko blinks at him as he makes an awkward attempt at a jump-climb onto her knee, and then to her shoulder. She’d expected more of an argument from him.

“Sorry about this, Tanaka-san.” Tsukishima digs his claws into the shoulder of her coat, perching precariously next to Saeko’s neck. She can feel them prick slightly into her shoulder as well, so the fabric is probably ruined.

“Oh, honestly, I just turned you into a cat – call me Saeko.”

“Saeko-san, then.”

“Saeko, Tsukishima.” She rolls her eyes at him. He’s never once batted an eyelid at her lack of honorifics with his name, but Tsukishima is a lot more stringent with their usage.

“Then please call me Akiteru, Saeko.” The tip of his tail wraps itself around her neck, like a small, soft scarf.

Saeko grins at him, cheeks warming, and begins to feel like they’ve finally crossed the invisible barrier of politeness between them.

Being a cat is fun.

Akiteru can honestly admit that becoming feline was never one of his aspirations in life, but it’s definitely an experience.

His new senses are overwhelming at first, meaning Akiteru’s head darts from side to side when they first get outside. His ears swivel in every direction, catching up more background noise than he’d ever thought possible. His eyes seem to have improved the most, but it’s his nose that suffers. It wrinkles with every unexpected smell they pass by in the street.

“This is the place.”

He doesn’t recognise the front of the shop that Saeko leads them to, but he does recognise the name. “Haiba Spells and Solutions,” Akiteru reads the name aloud. He’d overheard some of the guys at his work talking about this place, and, when Saeko opens the door, it’s just as… niche as he’d expected.

A clear ringing noise accompanies the movement of the door and chimes through the store with its opening. An echoing warmth resonates with the sound, radiating straight through to Akiteru’s chest. He begins to feel more at ease, even though he was fairly relaxed to begin with.

To be fair, the inside isn’t quite as cluttered as he’d heard.

At the far end of the room is an empty counter, but one half of the shop is blocked by a messy pile of cardboard boxes. They are labelled in an unfamiliar language – though it seems similar to the one on Saeko’s spell sheet. The entire right wall is dotted with scrolls and books that look far too old to be so casually displayed.

Akiteru glances up at the ceiling curiously, only to find a mess of floating bottles in twisting shapes and sizes. Round, glowing balls of light interspersed between them gently flicker in alternating colours. The overall effect is very calming, and – if he’d been able to – he would have cracked a smile at the differences in health and safety regulations once magic gets involved.

The entire place is intriguing – magic can be so capricious in nature, but Akiteru’s own is much more intuitive. He’s never had the chance to experiment with external variables – potions, spells, enchantments – before today.

“Alisa! Are you there?” Saeko walks up to the counter like she owns the place, Akiteru still clinging tightly to her shoulder. “I have a bit of a problem.” The last part she mutters much more quietly.

He curls a little closer to her neck. It’s not her fault, whatever she thinks. Akiteru’s magic has always been temperamental. That’s why he’d accepted her help in the first place.

Glancing down at his new paws, Akiteru admits that might not have been one of his smartest ideas.

The quietness of the room is broken by a fresh sound – the faint jingling of beads overhanging a door behind the main counter.

A girl that can’t be any older than he is walks in from underneath the shimmering beads. Her eyes are an odd hazel colour, made all the more prominent next to her pale hair. Both mark her as distinctly foreign, but her slender form fits right into the quirkiness of the store.

She doesn’t seem at all surprised to still find Saeko standing there, and her polite smile immediately widens into something much more natural when she meets Saeko’s eyes. “Saeko!” Alisa’s own eyes light up in a way that Akiteru is all too familiar with.

He’s sure he does the same every time he sees Saeko too.

---

They end up in the back of the shop as Alisa shuffles around the room. She pulls out a simple tea set – the kind that only relies only relies on magic to keep the cups warm.

Saeko sums up what had happened a lot more quickly than he would have thought possible. Akiteru thought he’d understood what they were attempting, but obviously not.

He paws at her face – claws carefully retracted – to get Saeko’s attention. “You told me you could read it!”

“I can!” Alisa raises an eyebrow at her, and Saeko scratches the back of her head. “Mostly.”

Akiteru makes an odd noise in his throat that he supposes must be the feline equivalent to a sigh. He’s still not annoyed with her, but he’s getting close.

“You shouldn’t have taken Lev’s spell from me without asking, Saeko.” Alisa sighs. “He still hasn’t worked out all of the kinks with it yet.”

Unlike Saeko’s nervous handling of her, Alisa has no qualms about helping him down from the other’s shoulder. She picks him up with the familiarity of someone used to handling cats as Saeko groans and rubs a hand over her face.

“I didn’t realise it was one of his …”

The last of Akiteru’s vague uneasiness trickles away with Alisa’s touch. In any other context, he’d worry about a stranger having such an affect on him, but he recognises the scent of magic in the air. How, he’s not quite sure, and counts it as one of the better side effects of being a cat.

There’s something about Alisa that relaxes people – probably a handy talent to have when you work in the business of selling products.

“Tsukishima-san, was it?” She settles him down on the counter with a smile and bows ever so slightly. “Nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you, Haiba-san.” Akiteru hadn’t heard Saeko call her that, but he has no doubt she belongs to the family that owns the store.

“Just Alisa is fine, Tsukishima-san. I’m guessing you’re not always a cat?”

“Of course he’s not!” Saeko’s sharp voice cuts through the space between them like a blade with a honed edge. “Akiteru is usually even taller than I am, and he has blond hair, not fur and –“ She cuts off, pink starting to dust her cheeks.

Akiteru isn’t sure what to make of that outburst, but Alisa simply pours out the tea to fill in the silence. Akiteru gives his own cup a lengthy consideration before licking at it awkwardly. He hopes his stomach is more human than cat.

“Is there any particular reason why you wanted that spell, Saeko?” Alisa pours her own cup last, mouth creased with consideration. “I would have given you an appropriate one if you had asked.”

Akiteru freezes mid sip, hunched over his cup. His ears flatten back uncontrollably, and he stares at Saeko with wide eyes.

Her reaction is much the same, though she covers it up much better. Her eyes only widen for a split second, and then her face crinkles into a much more composed expression. Despite that, her words are floundering. “Well. I wanted to help Akiteru out and, I, uh, thought it might help?”

Alisa hums as she takes a sip of her own drink, staring at Saeko’s face impassively. Akiteru glances curiously between them – grateful that Saeko hadn’t revealed the flaw in his magic, but sure that he is missing something.

Saeko’s face reddens again, but she blusters onwards anyway. “Can you fix him?”

Akiteru’s dark tail whips back and forth at that. He’s hoping Saeko’s confidence in her friend wasn’t misplaced either.

“Sure.” Alisa smiles easily at both of them, and they simultaneously let out breaths of relief.

The pale-haired girl puts a hand to the side of her face, considering. “These things take time though.”

---

‘Time’ turns out to be more than a few days.

Akiteru makes his excuses to his work and family (Saeko helps him with that – paws aren’t the best for dialling phones, it turns out), and hangs out around the Haiba Shop in the meantime.

Saeko comes to visit every day. It’s probably partly out of guilt, but Akiteru likes to think she enjoys his company as much as he enjoys hers. But despite the time they spend together, he only gets a true confirmation of her magic after nearly a week.

“I have a performance in the festival tomorrow!” Saeko points a confident thumb at her chest before leaning towards Alisa. “You’re coming, right?”

An amused smile is already tugging at Alisa’s lips. “Of course.”

“Akiteru!” Saeko’s head whips back towards him. “You should come too!”

He blinks, ears flattening slightly. “As a cat?”

“Sure!”

She sounds so enthused by the idea that of course Akiteru finds himself tagging along with Alisa the following day.

Alisa leads the two of them to a paved square not too far from the entrance of the shop. During the hustling noise of the street festival, everything becomes overwhelming for a few moments until Alisa notices his distress. She takes him to a more sedated spot – close to some girls dancing with fire and a stand selling glowing flowers – to watch the festivities.

“What nature are you, Tsukishima-san?”

The question catches him off-guard, but Akiteru would have answered her honestly in any case. “Innate.”

Alisa nods thoughtfully, as though expecting that. She turns to him, and, close up, her strange eyes are piercing, like a cat’s. “What form?”

“Illusion.” Akiteru decides not to note how particular his magic can be.

“How wonderful,” she coos. From anyone else, the words might sound patronising, but Alisa is sincere in her tone. “That’s quite a rare form.” She smiles again, a soft expression.

Akiteru opens his mouth to reply, but then the vibrations hit his chest and feet.

The large crowd of people in front of them parts to make room for an approaching cacophony of sound. At the front of the procession are a group of drummers – their large instruments hovering just above the ground as they move. Behind them, a group of trumpets (and probably other instruments too – Akiteru had never been too great with their names) blast waves of sound into the air. They quieten as the drummers settle into place.

Each hit against the massive drums resonates through the air. Akiteru can almost trick himself into believing that the sound waves are visible, but then they really are.

The fiery girls pause in their dancing as their flames take on new shapes in response to the music. Some of the crowd gasps, but the dancers laugh delightedly. They try to weave their bodies through the twisting forms that their fire is taking.

One of the drummers steps up onto a raised platform that Akiteru hadn’t noticed forming. They stand before the crowd confidently, face etched with concentration. To his utter shock, Akiteru realises it’s Saeko.

She strikes her drum with enough force that Alisa almost takes a step backwards. She looks glorious – fit to lead an army with the rhythm of her strikes. Her blond hair is held back by a band tied around her forehead, and her traditional clothing is loose over her shoulders.

With each successive hit, the fur along Akiteru’s back stands up. Despite the intensity, it’s easy for him to be swept away by what’s happening in front of him.

Just when Akiteru feels himself getting completely lost in the music and the sight of Saeko showing off her skills, Alisa’s gentle voice somehow cuts above the drumming.

“She’s wonderful, isn’t she?” She watches Saeko, and her eyes are as wide as the smile on her face.

“Yeah. She has quite a talent.” He hadn’t known that Saeko had Sound magic, but it matches her perfectly.

Alisa remains focused on the drummers – the rest of which are starting to rumble back into existence – as she speaks.

“She wasn’t always as good though. Sound magic takes unpredictable shapes, and – the first time we met – she made my little brother cry with her drumming.” Alisa gives an embarrassed half-laugh. “Although you wouldn’t think it now though. Saeko’s practised a lot since then – she has much better control.”

Her voice rings with sincerity, but Akiteru can’t help the small breath of disbelief that escapes his mouth. Half of him wants to believe Alisa’s words, but the other half needs more convincing when he can still feel the ripples of confidence echoing across from Saeko.

Alisa seems to sense this, and continues with an airy. “Quite a lot of us struggle to get a handle on our magic at first.” She pushes her pale hair back with one hand as Akiteru glances at her.

He opens his mouth, then shuts it again, realising he has no idea what he wanted to say.

Saeko’s drumming begins to fade into the background of the other drummers, but a few final, strengthening beats vibrate strength into his chest.

After a while, the words come to him. “I know the feeling.”

Alisa should probably have reprimanded Saeko a lot more for stealing one of the shop’s spells. Stealing one of the shop’s unfinished spells.

Lev is the most imaginative in their family when it comes to stringing spellwords together creatively. But it takes him months at a time to finish off a new spell completely. Alisa has no idea what he was trying to do with this one, but he shouldn’t have left it lying around.

Then again, Saeko shouldn’t have taken it from the shop either.

Alisa knows that, but it’s hard to stay mad at Saeko.

Tsukishima obviously feels the same, because he seems more content to remain as a cat – until the effect can be reverted, at least – than Alisa had initially expected. He sits on the counter as she deals with customers, brown eyes reflecting back the ambient magic in the store.

He doesn’t speak in front of anyone except herself and Saeko, pretending to be a normal housecat. Thankfully, no one tries to pet him – Alisa is sure Tsukishima wouldn’t appreciate that.

And he’s besotted with Saeko, of course.

Alisa doesn’t notice at first, at least partly sure Tsukishima’s slight awkwardness around Saeko is due to the mess she had made with the borrowed spell.

But Alisa isn’t blind or deaf, and the way Tsukishima’s dark ears perk up and he starts purring – before he catches himself – when Saeko enters the shop are rather obvious.

“Saeko helped me with the charm on the door, you know.” Alisa is unpacking new stock when she decides to bring up that titbit of information. A new box of enchanted bottles had just arrived, and a gentle run of a finger over each of their sides sends them floating up to join the others.

Some are just for show, reflecting the glowing lights she has arranged to carefully accentuate the depth of colours in the glass. Others though, Alisa sends floating high above to reach of most to prevent the unpredictable events that can come from magical accidents.

“The charm?” Tsukishima’s curious voice floats over to her. A quick glance in his direction lets her see how his tail swishes from side to side as he lets it hang over the side of the counter.

“The one that calms people when they open the door.” Alisa smiles, pleased that Tsukishima hadn’t noticed the charm. Or maybe he had, and was too polite to mention it. She feels how his eyes don’t move from the side of her face as she speaks. “Saeko helped me adjust the frequency until ringing the door chime stopped relaxing customers so much that it sent them to sleep.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Alisa can see that Tsukishima’s head still rests on his two front paws. “That’s a rather subtle use of magic.”

Alisa sends the last of the bottles swirling up towards the ceiling before turning to him with a small smile. “Isn’t all magic subtle?”

Tsukishima laughs at that – an odd sound halfway between a mewl and a hiss. Then he stands up and arches his back in a fluid motion. His pale fur ripples with the movement. He really does make a fine cat.

“I don’t know about that,” he says as he sits down on the counter again, head cocked to one side. One of his ears twitches. “If you could see some of the things that my brother’s teammates can do, you wouldn’t call their magic subtle.”

She picks up the empty box and moves it behind the counter. “Yours is though.”

He hasn’t spoken much about his own magic since first arriving at the store, and Alisa hasn’t seen him try to use it to break the spell either. Someone more powerfully equipped with Illusion magic would have been able to snap free of the spell on their own.

Tsukishima nods a little stiffly. “And so is yours.” He meets her eyes.

Alisa blinks, honestly a little surprised that he’d noticed. “…That’s right,” she says after a moment. What else can she say?

They stare at one another for a few moments, an odd tension in the air. After a while, Alisa begins to realise what is at the centre of it. She sighs.

“It’s very subtle, my Charm. It doesn’t work on everyone the same way, and sometimes it doesn’t work at all.” She watches the way Tsukishima’s fur settles out as she speaks. Alisa hadn’t even realised it had risen.

He doesn’t say anything, however, shifting his gaze to one of his paws instead.

Alisa sighs again. Honestly. She has to do everything.

“Does Saeko know you like her?”

All at once, the pale fur directly above Tsukishima’s haunches bunches up like it’s been sparked with electricity. His head jerks up, ears flattening. Surprisingly, he remains quiet.

At least, until his fur has settled a little once again. And then he shatters through Alisa’s calm façade with a pointed, “Does she know you like her?”

Alisa can’t help the fierce redness that starts to paint her cheeks with a blush – she’s never had someone point it out quite so bluntly before.

“Of course.” Even without eyebrows, Tsukishima is definitely raising one at her, so she tacks on, “As a friend.”

His tail swishes again. “Right.”

---

It’s less dramatic than either of them were expecting, Alisa thinks, when she walks out from the back room to find Saeko and Tsukishima. The beads overhanging the door shimmer with their usual melody, but neither reacts to her entrance. Certainly, it takes the two of them a while to move away from their hushed whispers to one another, even after Alisa’s joyful, “I’ve figured it out!”

Saeko seems to click on to what she is saying the quickest. Her head snaps round to face Alisa. “You have?” Tsukishima’s smaller head does the same, ears swivelling to catch her response from where he sits on the counter.

Alisa nods, feeling warmed by the way Saeko’s smile lights up her face. Her cheeks warm even more when the older girl sweeps her into a hug.

“That’s great!” Saeko turns back to Tsukishima, her face riddled with smiles. “We can finally get you back to normal! I’m pretty sure your family think I’ve kidnapped you or something.” She scratches the back of her head with a sheepish smile.

“It’ll be nice to reassure them that that isn’t the case.”

Alisa is getting the hand of cat-expressions now, and she’s almost entirely sure that Tsukishima is smiling. Despite that, it’s a little awkward around the edges.

“So,” Saeko faces Alisa with a toothy grin, “what’s the solution?”

“Well, it’s actually very simple.” She doesn't mention how long it had taken her to read through Lev's convoluted, messy spellwork notes. Alisa has absolutely no idea why or how Lev managed to work that into the spell. He’d always had a talent for simple solutions though. “A kiss.”

There’s something too entertaining about the way Tsukishima’s fur spikes up so erratically at that one word. Although, Saeko is doing a fine (human) impression of it herself as well. Alisa has never seen her friend look so flustered before.

The pale-haired girl resists hiding a smile behind her hand as Tsukishima shifts uncomfortably. Neither of them look at one another.

“What?” Saeko’s cheeks are rapidly turning the darkest red Alisa has ever seen them. It really makes them stand out next to her blonde hair. “Are you serious?”

Alisa can’t help the warmth that bubbles up in her chest at the expression Saeko wears. Attraction suits her  Alisa decides, admiring the flushed look on her face.

“Yep!” The admission doesn’t bother her in the slightest. It’s just a kiss after all, and she hasn’t elaborated any further than that.

Besides, Tsukishima is currently a cat.

The other two finally glance at one another nervously, before looking away again almost immediately. It’s such a charming display of bashful nervousness that Alisa finds her own stomach fluttering with butterflies for them.

“Just a kiss on the forehead will do,” she says happily, taking pity on their awkwardness. “That’s OK with the two of you, right?”

“Of course -”

“Why wouldn’t it be -”

Saeko and Tsukishima speak in tandem, mouths closing abruptly as they quickly realise the other is speaking too. Tsukishima's whiskers twitch, and Alisa really does giggle this time.

“I’ll go fetch a blanket,” she announces, turning away again to re-enter the storeroom. She thinks she’s seen one tucked into a corner somewhere.

“A blanket?” Tsukishima’s dazed mewl carries itself to her ears.

She turns back to smile at him gently over her shoulder. “Well, you’re not wearing any clothes, and I don’t think any of us have the right kind of magic to sort that out.”

Saeko bursts out into unexpected laughter at that, and even Tsukishima gives the impression of a smile with his ears and whiskers. “I could give it a try.” His tail swishes from side to side with amusement, the awkward tension in the room broken.

Alisa thinks he probably could - if he had a little more faith in his Illusion magic. But she still heads to fetch the blanket anyway.

She just barely catches Saeko’s, “As much as I’d love to see that - please don’t.”

The two of them are still smiling when she returns - heavy fabric in her arms. It’s one of the rarer kinds, stitched with fire and light into the seams so that it shimmers like candle-flame in the dark. But with Saeko focusing on scratching Tsukishima behind his dark ear tips, neither of them notice.

“I’m almost going to miss this,” Saeko notes with a smile as he purrs. She moves to scratch underneath his chin instead, grinning wider as the purring increases. “It makes me want to adopt a cat.”

“I’m not sure how I’d feel about that,” he admits as soon as she stops.

Saeko gives him a quizzical look at that, only broken when Alisa speaks.

“Are you two ready?” She slips behind Tsukishima, just to wrap the soft blanket around him carefully. She’s not sure how tall he is as a human, but that should do the trick. She scratches him between the ears in much the same way as Saeko had, knowing that it will be the last time. He doesn't purr for her - not that she'd expected him to.

“I think so,” he murmurs, and Alisa steps back from the two of them. She glances at Saeko.

The other girl shakes her head free of whatever thoughts had been swimming in it. “Yeah, I’m ready.” She’s still staring at Tsukishima with an odd look in her eyes.

There’s a certain formality in the air as Saeko leans down to press a soft peck to the pale fur between Tsukishima’s ears. All of them are silent, and Alisa wonders if this is what it had been like the first time, when Saeko had cast the original spell.

Only moments after she pulls back, a puff of green smoke explodes into the air - reaching even Alisa where she stands to the side of them. Saeko herself is coughing, trying to clear her lungs of the fresh-smelling, green powder that has settled over her shoulders and hair. Apples?

There’s a sneeze from the middle of the green cloud, and then a new figure makes itself apparent. Tsukishima is taller than Alisa thought he would be, but the blond hair doesn’t come as a surprise. And his brown eyes frame the same expression she’d become used to seeing on a cat’s face.

He sneezes again before trying to wipe some of the dust from his face. He glances down at his hands and legs, wiggling his toes from where they peek out of the edges of the blanket. “I don’t remember being quite so green the first time.” He grins at Saeko, patches of green still on his nose and cheeks.

Saeko rushes him into a firm hug, heedless of the mess that surrounds them. “Akiteru! You’re back!” She squeezes him tightly around the neck, before seeming to remember that the two of them are still covered in green. Saeko quickly releases him then. Both of their cheeks are flushed, much to Alisa’s amusement.

Tsukishima makes an odd, fluid-yet-jerky motion with his hand, like he's forgotten he doesn't have paws. He frowns at his fingers. His amused, "Guess I probably shouldn't try to lick myself clean any more," has the other two giggling.

Alisa feels more than sees how Saeko latches onto her amusement immediately. She at the pale-haired girl with a wicked gleam in her eye, and Alisa knows exactly what she's thinking of doing to her green-free clothing. “Don’t you dare.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Saeko moves closer - slowly, deliberately - slipping past Akiteru, who is still trying to remove the dust from his hair. “I just want to thank you for all your help!”

She grabs Alisa just as the other girl tries to manoeuvre around to the other side of the counter again, pressing an apple-scented kiss to the side of her face. "Thank you." She sounds sincere, so Alisa accepts her messy fate.

Soon enough, all three of them are covered in green and laughing.