In five years time we might not speak

Dawn was surprised to see Rose and Vivian at her door that morning. Her ears twitched and she adjusted her glasses to get a closer look at the two of them, wondering what they could want with her this early in the morning.

“What’s up?” She asked, cocking her head to the side. “You guys need something?”

“We do, actually,” Rose said, nodding.

“How would you like to go horseback riding today?” Vivian interjected.

Dawn stared blankly at her, not sure if she heard properly. “…What? Horseback riding?”

“Uh-huh!” The heiress said excitedly. “It’s a lot of fun! I figured as an animal lover, you’d be super psyched to-”

“Vivian, that’s not why we’re here,” Rose interrupted her, shooting the heiress a piercing look. “Actually, Dawn, I came here to find Morgana. Vivian is just, well, hanging around and following me.”

Rose meant it as a playful joke, but Vivian looked a little hurt. The blonde bit her lip. “I mean… I am fine with going horseback riding,” she clarified. “If you would like to, Vivian. But Morgana is the main priority here, remember?”

“Sure, I can get behind that!” Vivian said, nodding excitedly in agreement. “So what do you say, Dawn? Want to help us find Morgana, then all of us can go riding horses together?”

Dawn didn’t even know if there were enough horses in the stable for that; plus, she had never ridden a horse herself, and she was almost positive that Morgana never had, either. There were quite a few flaws in Vivian’s proposal, as fun as it might have sounded.

More importantly…

“I don’t have a clue where Morgana is,” Dawn said, shrugging. “You check her room already?”

“You don’t?” Rose asked, frowning. “We already checked there, she’s not home.”

“Don’t you have that psychic connection with her, though?” Vivian asked, tapping the side of her head. “You two are in communication constantly this round after Gina’s party, right?”

Dawn shook her head immediately, already suspecting that’s where the two of them were going with this. “It doesn’t work that way,” she replied, calling up a screen to show them the wording of Morgana’s boon. “I can’t initiate the call, only Morgana can. So no, we’re not in ‘constant contact’, see?”

Phone a Friend: At any time in the round, the contestant can consult with another contestant for advice, developing a telepathic link with them. This link can be changed, but must be established with the consent of both parties. Only the contestant with the boon may initiate the telepathic conversation, not the chosen friend.

“Ah, I didn’t know that,” Vivian said, scratching her head and laughing sheepishly. “In my defense, when the boons were being passed out, a lot of stuff happened that day and gave me a bit to think about, so it slipped my mind…”

Dawn nodded in understanding. Out of everyone, it made sense that Vivian would have forgotten that, given that her date with Nick (which had ended in disaster) had come right after the prizes were handed out.

“Speaking of which, you haven’t used your prize from the sleepover either, have you?” Rose realized, tapping her chin thoughtfully. “What was it again…?”

Dawn made a twitchy face, and sighed. “It’s this one,” she said, begrudgingly pulling up the text of her own boon.

Gacha Girl: For the rest of the round, the contestant will have the option of rolling three temporary transformations for themselves, chosen at random. They can use all three of their rolls at once, or spread them out through the week. The transformations will last for 24 hours or until the end of the round, whichever comes first.

Vivian whistled when she saw it. “Well… that definitely has its uses,” she offered with a playful smile. “I know how I’d make use of it myself, right, Rose?”

Rose nodded. “Definitely,” she agreed, cracking a grin. “Seems worth it to me, Dawn! But I think you got something similar last round too, right? As a bounty or something?”

The actress thought Dawn was pretty fortunate, getting to experiment with all these temporary transformations to tempt Nick with.

Dawn herself disagreed.

“That’s exactly why I’m hesitant to use it,” she griped, shaking her head. “Last time I got a bunch of random transformation rolls, I ended up being split in half! And it was on my date with Nick and everything, too! My memories are still one big jumble from that whole mess!”

Now, Dawn could admit that the result of that little bizarre transformation spree had not been as bad as she was presently making it out to be. She could admit that. But if she was being honest with herself, it still made her feel a little uneasy and out of sorts.

More importantly…

“Plus, my night has already passed,” she reminded them both. “A boon like this is most useful when you have a date with Nick ahead of you, so you can maybe get something to appeal to him. But for me, who’s already used more than my fair share of time with him? I’d be better off saving it for the challenge and hoping that it’s useful there.”

“Who cares about a fair share?” Vivian asked bluntly. “If you want to spend more time with Nick, then just go and do it! If you’ve got a cool new transformation to appeal to him, I say give it a shot!”

Dawn squinted at her, her tail flicking behind her. “…Of course you do,” she sniffed, rolling her eyes. She could tell that Vivian didn’t have any malice behind her statement, but for someone like Dawn who cared about others and had a sense of fair play, just strong-arming her way into the Master’s Suite (for the THIRD time that round!) seemed like a little too much.

“This is why we should find Morgana!” Rose clapped her hands together. “The two of you are super close! She’d be thrilled to let you into the Master’s Suite with her, don’t you think?”

Dawn turned to Rose and gave her an incredulous look. But honestly, she should have expected something like that from the actress.

“…Don’t you think Morgana would rather have Nick to herself for the night?” Dawn pointed out tiredly. “She was one of the first girls last round, and one of the last this round. She’s waited a long time for her night with him.”

In spite of Dawn’s claim about not being in constant contact with Morgana, the goth had spoken to her several times since getting her boon. Mainly to talk about her anxieties and worries about her upcoming day with Nick, and her feeling like she didn’t know what to do with him.

Morgana wasn’t exactly someone who planned out dates, and Nick was so busy that both girls weren’t certain he would be giving the shy girl as much time and space as she honestly needed.

Of course, trying to explain that to the two women in front of her would be a fool’s errand. Dawn doubted that either one of them had any semblance of an idea what it was like being in Morgana’s shoes right now. Rose and Vivian were both the kind of girl who tackled things head-on and pushed forward on their own.

Morgana, for as much as she tried her best, the sweet girl, couldn’t navigate a date with a road map drawn up for her.

“Well, why don’t we find her and ask her?” Vivian said bluntly. “That’s the solution right there, innit? See what she thinks. And hey- at worst, we can still lend her some helpful advice and support, don’tcha think?”

Dawn wondered just how sincere Vivian was. In her eyes the heiress tended to slingshot back and forth between “Not sincere at all” and “OVERWHELMINGLY SINCERE ABOUT EVERY SINGLE THING SHE SAID AND DID.”

Luckily the gymnast was so flexible, because spending time with these two was liable to give her whiplash otherwise.

“We still return to the original problem, though,” Rose pointed out to them both. “We don’t know where Morgana is.”

Dawn scratched her hair, taking care to avoid brushing against her ears, and sighed. “Well, I suppose I could help you look, at least. But keep in mind that while I might be Morgana’s friend, that doesn’t mean I’m at all equipped to finding her.”

Just because Dawn knew the goth girl kind of well, that didn’t mean she knew where she’d hang up her witch hat. 90% of the time if Dawn wanted to find Morgana, the place to look was in her bedroom.

There was a reason Morgana and Nick didn’t spend as much time together as Nick spent with other girls in his harem.

“Oh, it’s alright, your company is more than enough,” Vivian smiled. “Besides, I have an idea of where we can find her anyway!”

“Oh?” Dawn raised her eyebrows curiously. Was there an anime store in the Shopping District or something?

“Sure, no sweat!” Vivian sauntered back into the lounge area and headed back towards her room. “We just need to order some room service, that’s all!”

Rose and Dawn glanced at each other. Room service? They thought at the same time.

Vivian wasn’t talking about food. Or even drinks. In fact, the faerie she called up to her room looked rather annoyed that she wasn’t in the mood for either.

Of course, when Vivian told her what she was looking for- or more accurately, who she was looking for- the energetic little pixie was happy to help.

“Oh, you want to find one of the other contestants? Sure, I can track her down for you!” The faerie chirped, nodding.

“Wait, you can do that?!” Rose’s jaw dropped.

“Strange, it didn’t say that you could use the faeries that way in the rules,” Dawn said, adjusting her glasses quizzically.

Vivian laughed. “Well, sure, it’s not mentioned in the rules I imagine! But you gotta read between the lines on this stuff. If you can use the faeries to order food, and pass messages and invitations to other contestants, that means they know where everyone is as a matter of course, right? So finding one of the other contestants is as simple as calling up a faerie and asking for directions, yeah?”

Dawn nodded in agreement, realizing how accurate Vivian’s statement really was. It made total sense! Why hadn’t she thought of that before?!

“That’s brilliant!” Rose laughed. “Great, this is perfect!”

Then she paused, and her pleasant expression disappeared. “…Wait, if you could do that the whole time, why did we even have to go see Dawn in the first place?” She questioned Vivian suspiciously.

Vivian smiled innocently. “Well, the more the merrier, that’s what they say, right?” She pointed out with a cheesy grin. “Now Dawn can come horseback riding with us, too!”

Rose rolled her eyes and Dawn had to smile. It was nice to be invited, even if it was to something that she’d never considered before.

But before Vivian could get her way and they could go horseback riding, they would need to track down Morgana.

And where was their goth friend?

Well, long story short, it was a good thing that Vivian had chosen to ask a faerie for help, because never in a million years would Dawn or Rose have thought to look for Morgana in the place where they actually found her.

The cheerful faerie informed the girls that the aspiring witch was in the kitchen.

When they smelled something burning, they knew they were close.

“Oh darn it…” Morgana muttered, looking down in defeat at the smoldering black substance clinging to her frying pan. “These don’t look like eggs at all…”

“Hey, they’re goth eggs!” Holly joked, holding her sides with laughter. “Just consider them a special brand!”

Morgana looked at her with a seething expression and puffed up her reddening cheeks. “Holly! I’m trying my best here!” She wailed. “That’s not-! …Oh, wait, what are you guys doing here?!”

Embarrassed, Morgana hastily tried to conceal the evidence of her crimes against cooking from the three women who just entered the kitchen.

“You’re cooking?” Rose asked with surprise. Her eyes landed on Holly. “And you got Holly to help, I’m guessing?”

Morgana’s blush deepened and she nodded sheepishly. “It-it’s not… it’s not like… I’m going overboard or anything,” she mumbled. “I was just trying to make something simple…”

“Why not get some cooking tips from Mary?” Dawn questioned. “She’s still helping us learn how to cook, right?” Dawn didn’t take many of her lessons herself, but she knew Morgana had taken part in a couple, and the results had gone well enough.

Evidently she’d started to slip, though.

Morgana chewed her lip and glanced down, a sheepish expression on her face. “W-well… I tried, but, um…”

“I think I know what’s up,” Vivian said, glancing at Holly for confirmation. “You asked Holly because Mary’s a little too good, right?”

“Huh!?” Holly grimaced. “You’re saying Mary is a better cook than I am?! That’s… okay, it’s true, but it’s still hurtful!”

Holly was fine being compared sexually with Mary and coming up lacking. But denigrating her cooking!? That was a low blow.

“It’s not because Mary is better!” Morgana protested hastily. “She just, um… it’s… it’s a little too much to ask Mary for, um, help like this…”

She looked desperately to Holly, too embarrassed to explain herself.

“Morgana here is feeling a little nervous about her date with Nick tomorrow,” Holly said, flashing a sly grin. “She wanted to do something special for Nick to start things off on a good note, so she asked me to help her cook some eggs. And Mary, well… …Apparently Gina and Dani have spoiled Mary’s mood when it comes to eggs, for some reason.”

Morgana nodded sheepishly. “Mary said she’d help, but… I thought that since she’s already been helping teach us so much cooking… she deserved a break. Holly volunteered instead, and, well…”

She glanced sullenly down at her frying pan, and the noxious substance encrusting it.

“…I’m just hopeless in the kitchen I guess.”

Dawn rolled her eyes. “Don’t be too hard on yourself, Morgana,” she said gently, walking over to her friend and patting her on the shoulder. “We all have things we’re good at and things we’re bad at.”

“She’s right, you can cook, I’ve seen it before!” Vivian asserted. “You made a nice hamburger for our beach party, right?”

“I know… but I guess I just got a little carried away,” Morgana mumbled.

While Dawn and Vivian were comforting Morgana, Holly scurried over to Rose to give her the real inside scoop.

“Actually, what happened is I turned the burners to the max,” Holly whispered to the blonde.

Rose shot her a confused look. “Excuse me?”

“The burners, I burned it,” Holly said again. She shot a furtive glance towards the goth girl. “See, the seasonings she used… …Well frankly, whatever she was trying to make, it wasn’t scrambled eggs. It would probably have given Nick stomach issues.”

Rose nodded, understanding what Holly meant. “Ah. Better to destroy all the evidence then, rather than risk humans consuming it. I understand.”

It may have been cruel, but sometimes you needed to make the tough choice to save as many lives as you could.

“For the record, those were her creative choices and I tried to discourage her,” Holly clarified. “Still… I feel bad, you know?”

Rose blinked. “…You’re capable of that?”

Holly jammed her heel into Rose’s foot.

“OWW!”

“Whoa, hold up, everything alright over there?” Vivian swiveled her head towards Rose and Holly, looking at the two of them in alarm.

“We’re fine,” Holly grumbled. “Rose here was just being a smart ass.”

“Sorry Dawn, I think I stole your job.” It was the sincerity and humility in Rose’s voice that really sold it, and Dawn glared at her.

“I’m sorry for messing up the kitchen,” Morgana said again, already descending into one of her usual downward spirals. “I really wanted tomorrow to be good… I thought if I could cook Nick breakfast, it would… well…”

“Yeah, don’t worry, we totally get what you were aiming for here,” Vivian said, patting Morgana on the shoulder. “Still, maybe you just need to try a different recipe? I know Octavia has plenty that she can show you.”

“Or you could just give up the whole cooking thing altogether instead,” Rose suggested, to everyone’s surprise.

Everybody looked at her.

“What?” Rose jumped from one skeptical face to the next. “Morgana, let’s face the facts here, you’re not the kind of girl to hover over a stove and cook food.”

Morgana shrank back. She didn’t sense any malice in Rose’s words; the other woman was sharing her sincere opinion.

That honestly made it sting even more.

Rose softened her voice. “Look, I’m not trying to be mean here,” she said gently. “But Nick has plenty of girls that can cook, including me. Is that what you want? To be just another cook for him? You’re more the type to lean over a bubbling cauldron than a bubbling pot.”

Now that Rose pointed it out, maybe she was right. “Well… I just wanted a nice date…” Morgana said glumly.

Rose nodded. “And that’s a wonderful thing! But you’ve gotta think about your strengths, Morgana. What are YOU good at? What can you give Nick that nobody else can give him? Because a frying pan of burnt eggs… I don’t think that’s going to cut it.”

Morgana crossed her arms over her chest and pouted. Did Rose think she wasn’t aware of that!? “I know I should be trying to stand out more!” Morgana groaned. “I’ve hardly gotten to spend any time with Nick this week… it’s not fair!”

“You guys could always just spend the whole date inside!” Holly suggested excitedly. “Just think about it, wouldn’t that be special? You two just spending the day in bed together, ehehe…”

She started to drool, and Dawn rolled her eyes. Morgana’s face turned red, and it looked like she was seriously considering the possibility.

“Maybe… maybe as a last resort…” Morgana said with the manic look in her eyes of someone who had run out of options so they decided to rob a bank.

“No, don’t listen to Holly, you’re just going to be led astray!” Rose warned, not liking the idea of “Morgana and Nick just have sex all day” in the slightest.

“Then what should I do for my date?!” Morgana wailed. “I just know that Nick and Ella are having a bunch of fun today, because she’s so sweet and adorable! Once Nick’s captivated by her shyness and light, what’s left for me!?”

She cared about Ella, she really did. But comparatively, Ella just had way more going for her than Morgana felt she had. And her old self-esteem issues were starting to creep back in…

“Oh, no need to worry about that!” Vivian said, shaking her head. Her eyes twinkled playfully at the flustered goth. “We’ll help you plan out the perfect date, right, ladies?”

“Yeah, exactly!” Rose nodded in agreement.

“Uh-huh, the perfect date!” Holly agreed as well, hearts flashing in her eyes.

“…Sure. Yeah. Why not…” Dawn, in contrast to the others, could already see the massive mess this was shaping up into.