Kevin Date 1, Part 3: Sleight of Hair

Gaia

“Tegan was glaring at you strangely during dinner,” Teach notes, “almost like she was trying to make sure you ate.”

The two “older ladies” of the harem decided to go for a little girl time after dinner, with Andromeda once again skipping the meal, Craig stomping his way to the Media Room for some reason, and Tegan stomping her way to hunt down the elusive Host for bonus point retribution. Tessa almost wanted to hunt down Andromeda, but ultimately decided to give her some space.

Gaia scratches the back of one of her (temporary) kitty ears. The terrorist replies, “Yeah, she made me eat some innocent animals after the rest of you finished lunch. I guess finding out that she was slowly starving herself to **** made her really care about people not skipping meals?”

Tessa considers it. “That makes sense. You okay about that?”

“Kinda? Not really? I don’t know. Throwing up this morning while trying to eat my usual breakfast wasn’t fun. I see her point. It’s nice that she cares? Just wish there was a solution that didn’t involve me giving up my principles.”

“They did mention upgrades would be available next week. Maybe they’ll be one to let you eat as you like, despite the biology of your current form?”

Gaia muses about that as Tessa opens the door to their apparent evening destination: a spa. The tinkling sound of tiny sleigh bells cause Gaia’s temporary kitty ears to perk up. Inside, the waiting room is warm and dark in an inviting way. The walls and floor appear to be marble and other stones, polished to a shine. Strings of fairy lights line the walls near the ceiling and a number of comfortable chairs line one of the walls, pushed far enough out to recline slightly, if the sitter wants it.

Opposite the chair wall, a large mural is painted. A lilac-skinned woman with elven ears caught in midstep. She has silver hair, flowing down to her ankles, strands placed just so to cover up anything scandalous. The sword she wields is long, straight, hilt encrusted with blue stones that match her twinkling eyes. She has a knowing smirk on. Surrounding this figure is a ring of silver fire as she seems to dance for the open night sky.

At the receptionist desk is a bunny-girl getting rear-ended by a hu-cow male. She is out of it enough that it takes her several beats to realize that potential customers have arrived. Once she does, she turns beet red and begs, “Please don’t tell my boss!”

A woman enters the lobby, clad in silver lingerie, a cupless bra, pasties, a thong, and stockings held up with a garter belt. Her hair is flaming red, her eyes like inlaid obsidian, glowing with internal light. Her skin decorated with embedded chunks of obsidian that faintly glow red, especially thick from her elbows and knees down. Her body is toned, but lithe, a body of a dancer. She proceeds to yank the male out of the bunny-girl by one of his head horns and growls, “Moonsey, stop fucking your girlfriend while she’s at work. Get.”

The hu-cow pulls up his pants and hurries past the two of them, dripping white fluid on the floor as he goes. The obsidian skinned woman then turns her eye on the bunny, who is quivering behind her podium. “Flopsy, what did I say about sex on the clock?”

The bunny offers, “It’s okay?”

“Only on breaks and only in the staff break room. Go get your belt.”

The bunny begs. The obsidian-skinned woman remains resolute. The bunny relents, looking downcast. The woman then turns to Gaia and Tessa, “Sorry about that, ladies. Welcome to the Glittering Moonfire Spa. I am Scarlet. Are you interested in complementary Hotel services or are you looking to spend some BP for the good stuff?”

“We get free services from the Hotel?” Gaia asks, “Why would we get free stuff outside the Hotel?”

“Because,” this Scarlet replies, “some of us do not want to close up our regular businesses for an indeterminate amount of time just to do the same thing on the amenities floor. Just makes sense to have you come to us.”

“Gym is the same way,” Tessa adds.

There is a gym? I guess a Hotel would have a gym of some sort somewhere. Gaia nods, accepting the logic of the situation.

“Something free, for now,” Tessa decides for both of them. Gaia is fine with doing a free spa thing, whatever that would entail. The rock-girl spins around and expects them to follow. Gaia shrugs and jogs a few steps to catch up. Tessa sounds a slower, but she’s coming. I’ve never done the spa thing before. I bet this will be fun!

Kevin

“Whee!!!”

Kevin is carrying Mona up the stairs, who is carrying her prizes. Two mundane Tyalangan plushies from the claw machine and magic Josie doll (the doll’s tongue turns into a sex toy if you touch its abs; it’s also magically stain resistant). Mona was nice enough to let Kevin keep all the tickets. All couple hundred or so of them. The prize counter can keep track of his ticket total for him, so he doesn’t have to. I’m still going back there as Caoimhe and playing some skee-ball for real!

Kevin: +2 XP (Princess Carry the Mistress)

Mona: Daily Bonus Objective complete! No teleporting +10 BP

Still, they are cutting it close. Kevin barely gets Mona in the Suite before curfew starts.

Craig: +10 BP (cage w/ Mona holding key)

Kevin: +5 BP (cage w/ self holding key)

“Hey, Ophie! I got you a present!” Mona attempts to squirm her way out of Kevin’s arms. Kevin lets her. This Ophie is apparently the maid of the Suite and looks a lot like the Host.

Sounds like a sardonic version of her, too, “Oh, great, a plushie of The Queen. What I always wanted.” Kevin notes she doesn’t turn it down, though; in fact, it looks like she gives it a tight squeeze when she thinks no one is looking.

Mona declares, “I’m going to go get ready for bed. Kevin, entertain Ophie!” then scurries deeper into the Suite, the other stuffies in hand.

Kevin is left alone with a strange blue elf-woman. He doesn’t quite know what to do here.

The elf answers by loading up Mugen. “You did reasonably well against Mona, but I bet I could beat you.”

Kevin plops onto the couch and gets ready. “I guess you were watching us?” He selects Lucian.

“Of course,” the snarky sea elf declares as she hands off fight sticks, “Dates are the day’s highlights, outside of challenge days. I bet The Queen is watching me get ready to own you right now.” Ophelia selects Tyalangan. Man, they must have a weird relationship.

It becomes quickly apparent that she really plays this game (and this character) a lot. Kevin can put up a fight, but it seems a losing battle. His best attempt got Tyalangan down to about a third of her health.

“Yeah, switch to Cam.”

“Who?”

“Angel guy over there. Similar enough in fighting style to ol’ Lucy that you’ll adapt quickly, but without the demon tag. The Queen has some built in advantages against certain Host types.”

Next few fights are much more even, once he gets the hang of the new character. Ophelia’s damage output went down dramatically. A combo that would take off a third of Lucien’s health lead to Cam taking about half of that in damage. The passive health recovery seems to work, too. If Kevin was interested in picking a fight against the Host, this would be the start of some valuable intel. He isn’t particularly wanting to muse on which of the implications of the fighting game’s system apply to real life. He even wins the occasional round. Never a match, but a round.

After what feels like too long, Mona pokes her head back out from the bedroom. “Hey, Kevin. Ready for bed?”

Bed? Oh, yeah. The awkward ‘have to sleep in Mona’s bed’ rule. It shouldn’t be that bad, even if she looks a little nervous. Kevin stands. “Sure, Mona. Time for a platonic friend sleepover thing.”

Mona gives him a nervous grin. Ophelia chortles and gives him a wink. Hmm... odd.

Tyalangan

Tyalangan is taking Tegan to the firing range. They aren’t going to practice shooting, but something else.

She lets her thoughts leech into the feed. Now astute perverts in the audience will remember that I technically don’t have a Sleight of Hand proficiency, but a Sleight of Hair one. So, hair, ready to have some fun?

An image of herself giving herself a thumbs up appears in her mind.

Remember the plan?

An image of her hair stealing bras off of Tegan with the fox-girl unawares appears in her mind. The Host silently snickers.

They are at the range and Tyalangan quickly grabs a short bow and a couple of bowstrings from the armory. She pulls out a basic long bow and string she keeps in her inventory, unstrung, just in case.

“Alright, Tegan, we are going to practice the most important fine motor skill you need as an archer that wasn’t in your Olympics training, namely, how to string a bow quickly and without looking.”

Tegan nods. She remembers Mattie’s lesson about compound bows.

“Okay, first few times, I want you to look at what you are doing. In an ideal world, you’d use a stringer, but, on the battlefield, you may not have time. This is called the Step Through method. First look at your string. You’ll notice that one loop is slightly bigger than the other. Place the small loop into the bottom arm’s notch.”

The angry archer does it. The Host is pleasantly surprised that Tegan is not grumbling.

“Great. Next, use your left calf to brace the bottom arm and step through between the string and upper arm with your right. The upper arm should be sticking out behind your leg. Now, pull the upper arm toward your front and catch its notch with the bowstring loop. This loop will have a tightener to get it snug.”

Tyalangan demonstrates with her much heavier pull long bow as she watches Tegan struggle. The Host knows that Tegan has the strength to do this now, but the motion is specific and somewhat awkward. Then she talks her through unstringing it.

Now Tegan complains, “Why would I unstring the bow? We didn’t have to do that with the compound bows!”

“The bowstring puts stress on the bow proper. Keeping it strung for too long can lead to fractures in the wood. Fractures in the wood lead to snapped bows when you draw. So, unless you know you are going into combat soon, leave it unstrung.”

Tegan grumbles, but complies. Then, a few more rounds of stringing and unstringing to make sure she’s got the motion down. More grumbles, but she is getting it.

“Now, for the real lesson. In combat, you need to be able to do this quickly while trying to find your first target. That means eyes up, scanning the environment, not watching what you are doing. You have to rely on hand / body coordination to ensure that you did it right. Practice and pay attention. We wouldn’t want you... distracted.”

And practice Tegan does. Tyalangan waits a few attempts before letting her semi-sentient strands start some sneakiness. Tegan is, of course, wearing three of the bras she stole from Andromeda’s wardrobe, one on top of the other. They are comically too big. That gives her hair advantage on at least unclasping the things, as the vicious vixen is probably used to them sliding around under her shirt. A braid of hair slips down the back of Tegan’s shirt. It is a simple enough thing to unclasp the outermost bra and then carefully undo the straps. Tyalangan lets the partially disassembled bra slide and snatches it with another braid as it falls down the front of her shirt. She takes the borrowed brassiere and places it just sticking out of her locks, wondering if Tegan will notice.

Tegan looks up suddenly, snarling, “Is that what this is, freak? A lesson in mocking?”

“No, Tegan. Everything I said is true. I never said what the distraction was going to be. You noticed quickly, I will give you that. Now, the sleight of hand lesson you actually wanted. Get your stolen lingerie back. And do it without me knowing.”

A sly grin appears on Tegan’s face. She looks for the bra in the sea of the Host’s Viking braids. Espying it, Tegan lunges. That was a poor decision.

Tegan doesn’t notice the sea elf’s braids slipping under her shirt and pulling the same trick, because, while the fox grabs the bra in the Host’s hair, the Host’s hair grabs back.

“Hey, let go!” Tegan hisses.

“You think someone would let go if they catch you trying to steal from them?” The second of Tegan’s stolen underwear is pulled into the series of braids.

“No.”

The Host Misty Steps back a few feet, keeping both bras in her hair, and smiles. “Try again. Maybe don’t just charge me where I can see you?”

Tegan growls. Tyalangan just strings her long bow and starts to take some casual shots at the targets (courtesy of some practice arrows she keeps in her inventory). She sees Tegan seethe with jealousy at her shots. But, she does go for it. Tyalangan grabs Tegan’s wrist with a particularly large braid.

“Okay, stealth is not a strong suit yet. Now, I am going to let you go and start firing again. One more shot. I won’t react until I feel you.”

As promised, the Host goes back to drilling targets with arrows. Tegan finds the bra she was looking for, but not the one she hasn’t realized she lost yet. The sea elf’s braids slipping lets Tegan walk away with her prize.

Tegan: Success – Sleight of Hand skill training (5 XP / 5 XP)

Tegan: +7 XP, Perception skill proficiency, Sleight of Hand skill proficiency (Training)

Tyalangan casts Invisibility, then starts to collect her arrows. I guess I should return the liberated bra to Andromeda, huh? Wonder how long it’ll take before Tegan realizes...

The vicious vixen has just stomped back, growling, “Of course the freak has already gone. I will get her for this **** on my dignity!” Then, with an especially irritated flick of her tail, Tegan stomps back to the Hotel.

The Host silently chuckles as she finishes collecting her arrows. I should check on the date now. If there is going to be a problem bit, it’s going to start soon.