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The Perk, Wednesday Afternoon

After being at the carnival on Saturday, Kira had booked the first portal home and followed Derek's advice by talking to her mother. Having her dad explain the birds and the bees hadn't been as awkward as the kitsune conversation, and Kira was almost grateful that she had the excuse of "finals" to get back to Fandom quickly. Driving bumper cars around wasn't exactly a typical final, but it was better than sitting in her house knowing that there were probably more things her mother wasn't telling her.

Now that she was done with her workshop for the day, she was looking for more distractions, and an iced mocha with more whipped cream than any one person should have was currently doing the trick, along with looking through the pictures on her phone. At least foxes were kind of cool?

[Open!]

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"Hey, little sibling," Flick said, wandering into the Perk after deciding he wanted to mope elsewhere. "Made it through a semester, huh?"

Kira gave Flick a small smile. "Does physically being here at the end count as making it? That seems like kind of a low bar. And I have two days left," she said.

"Counts enough for me. Sometimes being physically present is all you can do," Flick said, raising an eyebrow. "Everything okay?"

Kira thought about it for a moment, and then shook her head. "Not really? But it's kind of a long story."

"I've got some of those myself," Flick told her, nodding. "You wanna talk about it? Cool if you don't but just know I'm around if you need it."

On one hand, Kira wanted to just kind of hide and not tell anyone what happened, but on the other hand, maybe practicing on understanding people would help her figure out how this should go. "You know how there are people here who can do weird stuff, and there are people who are totally normal? I thought I was in the normal camp but apparently I'm not."

"Oh yeah?" Flick asked, raising an eyebrow. He came a little closer to the table and took a seat across from her.

Maybe he should have asked but he didn't. He wasn't that nice a guy, sorry Kira. "I know a few people like that." Isabelle being the main one right now. "How not normal? I can tell you how I thought I wasn't normal too, if you want."

Hey, Kira was nice enough for the both of them - at least she hoped she was. "Um, I don't know if you've ever heard of a kitsune? It's like a fox in Japanese folklore, and apparently in reality too because I'm one. Sort of. It still doesn't make a lot of sense," she said. "How did you think you weren't normal?"

"Never heard of a kitsune, no," Flick said, shaking his head. "But, that makes you a fox? Is a super powered fox or just some fuzzy, non rabies laden fox?"

He half smiled at the little joke before continuing. "And back home, there was this guy who thought I had a gene that would make me a predator. That he could just flip it and turn me into a sociopathic killer."

"Whoa, that sounds awful," Kira said. "I'm assuming he was wrong? Or, you know, it didn't work? As for me, it's kind of about super powers, I think? I kind of got struck by lightning and didn't die so... you know, that was good."

"He didn't get a chance to try so could be wrong, could be right," Flick said, shrugging. "I don't really want to find out, you know? Anyway, super powers, huh? That's not too bad. Be good for protecting yourself, at least."

"I guess. It's just... weird. And unexpected. Except my mom apparently expected it and didn't say anything. But now I get to stay here for at least another semester, so that's an up side, right?" she said. "It has been pretty cool being here, for the most part."

"Last weekend notwithstanding, I can pretty much say my time here's not been terrible," Flick agreed. "And I thought I was gonna be here maybe a month before leaving. Now, I'm about half a year or so from graduating."

"Ooh, scary," Kira said genuinely. "Do you have plans for after graduation or are you just going to wing it?" He struck her as a wing it kind of guy, if she was being honest.

"No plans," Flick said, shaking his head. "I don't have any family left so nothing keeping me to one place. Maybe I'll go to Europe or something and check out France or Amsterdam or something."

"Going to Europe would be totally cool! I bet you'd learn a bunch of languages--and you'd get to drink! Legally, I mean, not that anyone seems to care here," she said.

"I'm not much of drinker," Flick said, chuckling lightly. "Not of alcohol, at least. I'd probably go to Europe for a change of scenery. There's a lot of bad memories here so maybe just fixing that'll do me some good."

Kira frowned and gave him a sympathetic look. "I hope it works. You deserve to feel good," she said. "You probably don't need me to say that but I figured I'd put it out there just in case."

"Thanks," Flick said dryly. "I'll make it work. Can't feel like crap for the rest of my life."

Or he would and just go crazy with it all.

"Did you talk to her?"

God damn it, Derek. Stop creeping.

"Okay, you seriously need to wear a bell or something," Kira said, once her heart calmed down a little. "And yes, I talked to her. I was really hoping you were kidding."

"Yeah, not so much."

Kira sighed. "My mom said she had a hunch this might happen, but she didn't know for sure. Apparently, missing out on all the chicken pox epidemics when I was a kid kind of sent up red flags."

"Sometimes it skips over family," Derek replied with a shrug. "One of my cousins was human."

"Yeah, but don't you think I should have known this was a possibility?" she said. "Like, 'Hey Kira, just so you know, sometimes people in our family turn out to be monsters, just FYI in case anything weird happens!'"

Derek gave her a look. "You're not a monster."

"That's what my mom said, but I'm pretty sure I can't trust her anymore," Kira said. "Do you know a lot of nice kitsunes who aren't mean tricksters?"

"You." Totally counted. "What you are isn't who you are."

"That's both pithy and kind of reassuring," Kira said, sighing softly. "I thought I'd maybe be going home after the summer, but my mom says I'm better off here. I think she knew a little about what this place was like when she sent me here, but she still seemed kind of surprised when I described the carnival. I'm just glad everything's back to normal now."

Derek rolled his eyes like a pro. "You'll be fine."

"I guess. I hope so." After a moment, she smiled and added, "And hey, if I turn into something bad, maybe a hug will turn me good again."

She was kind of sad she'd missed witnessing the Pinkie hug, to be honest.

"Try to avoid it anyway."

HE'D HUG GRUDGINGLY.

"I'll do my best," she promised. "Thank you for, you know, dealing with me in freakout mode and being so nice and helpful about all of this. I don't know what I'd be doing right now if I was dealing with this by myself."

Derek shrugged like it ain't no thang. "Someone needed to. You didn't need to deal alone."

"And if I have more questions in the future, maybe I could ask you? In case you know the answer?" Kira said, like she'd totally be okay getting shut down because clearly, he had better things to do with his time.

"I might not be able to answer everything," Derek hedged, possibly a little too hopeful about this. Because he was a freak like that.

"I know. But you definitely know more than I do." Like how she needed to go straight to her mother. "You could probably at least tell me whether or not my question is silly, or crazy."

"Ignore a least half of what you find on the internet."

At least half.

Kira laughed. "I think that's a life lesson in general."

Derek smirked at that, nodding before he turned serious. "Be careful. It's--there are people out there who don't consider us human enough to live."

Oh, that was totally reassuring. "That doesn't surprise me. But it's not a problem here, right? I mean, there are so many not-human-enough people here that regular people are kind of outnumbered."

Well, it was better than assuming things were flowers and puppies!

"Here." He made a face, thinking about Barton. "You'll be fine."

Yeah, that Barton guy was kind of a jerkface.

"Then it's good I'm sticking around for a while. It'll give me more time to get used to all of this, so I can be extra careful later." Saying it meant it would totally work out that way.

Derek sighed. "We can test your reflexes later."

Which meant run around and fight each other.

Meanwhile, that got Kira to perk right up. "So, practice my reflexes so I don't embarrass myself, got it."

At least she didn't need to worry about flipping out and murdering people. Which was nice.

"Find me when you're settled."

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The Perk, Wednesday Afternoon

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