Do vaporwave kitsune count technicolor sheep? - 6. Chapter 6

Cracking my eyes open, I see a cheery fire crackling in the fireplace of my living room. Someone is running their fingers through my hair and it feels simply heavenly. Long silver white hair that glows like strands of moonlight cascades down across my skin. Who…?

“Asleep on the sofa again? Would you like me to carry you to bed?”

His voice warms my insides like the finest sake sliding smoothly down my throat but I don’t know who it is. My voice has deserted me and I just barely manage a mewl of disappointment when their fingers disappear from their duty of tenderly stroking my hair.

“Or perhaps you were waiting for me to get home and this was closer to the front door?”

The hopeful intonation in his query twists a little knot in my heart. Even without being able to see his face, I welcome the curtain of hair that obscures my vision as his head lowers to press the softest of kisses against my cheek.

“I love you, Moon. Across all time and space, I love you.”

Jumping awake I can feel the harsh rasping breaths heaving in and out of my chest as I look around in a state of panic. It feels all too real, the feeling of warm lips that kiss me all too tenderly. With every passing second I can feel the memory of the dream evaporating from existence. Who…

What was I just dreaming about?

“Moon?”

My name makes me jump and I look down to where Kemuri is stirring beside me.

“What’s wrong?”

“A dream...odd really. It woke me from a dead sleep but now I can’t seem to remember what it was…”

“Again? Maybe you really are getting old.”

Any other time I’d have snapped at his impudence but the words are wasted on me at this moment. Forcing my ragged inhalations into some semblance of order, I look up at the still blood red sky and wonder how many hours I’ve actually slept.

“Well since we’re awake now, would you like to hear my bright idea?”

With every passing moment I’m awake the dream becomes just that...a dream. Gone are the phantom thoughts, and I give Kemuri my attention.

“While exploring yesterday I saw several signs in the more industrial part of town for a place called Top Notch Loans.”

“We’re two talking foxes with no ID...how are we supposed to get a loan?”

“No credit, no problem?”

Almost as though it is chiming in agreement, my stomach lets loose another horrendously loud growl.

“Okay, entertaining this crazy scheme...how do we go about this?”

“My human guise is the more credible of the two of us.”

“Your human guise looks like the lead singer for Sleeping With Sirens...AND what exactly will I be?”

“Well seeing as you get to be the Amethyst One, I thought you would allow yourself to be my highly intelligent trained pet.”

“PET?”

“C’mon Moon, I’m an assassin highly trained in the art of subterfuge. You said you trust me.”

“Of course I trust you. Pet though?”

“I think you are more than capable of playing the part to the fullest and I bet that we can manage to come up with the funds that we obviously need to make a go of it in this world. We don’t know what kind of currency is accepted here and you have to admit that we have to start somewhere.”

Even in the dark of blood red night I’m sure he can feel the cut of my very unamused gaze.

“I’ll let you wear my collar…?”

If anything my eyes narrow even more and I can see him scooting back out of the safe range of my teeth.

“Fine.”

I say this in the decided tone that this is most certainly NOT ‘fine’ but I’m going with it out of the sense that I did say I trust him but this is not cool. Together we set forth towards the nearest outskirts of Gatsby. Kemuri led the way amid large warehouses and gated factories until finally pausing.

“Here is as good a place as any to change. Just a moment...Oh and over there is the place we’re heading towards.”

I wander over to a billboard uplit by fancy marquee lighting.

TOP NOTCH LOANS AND FINANCE

NO CREDIT, NO PROBLEM

2803 BRUSLY AVENUE

The sign’s background is a rich royal blue and the letters and filigree border are a very important looking gold. When I turn back around Kemuri has finished his transformation and in place of the twin tailed kitsune is a man standing at 5’5. He looks like the front man for a screamo Japanese rock band. Silver bars pierce through his left eyebrow as well as the hoop that hugs against his plump bottom lip. Half of his head is shaved close and the other half hanging long against his cheek is black and steel grey ombre. His irises are so light a grey that they appear almost mercurial. The elegant strokes of his name in hiragana are tattooed in black letters across his neck.

Chunky black combat boots tied tightly partway up his calves manage to swallow the also black pants with chains looping around his thighs from pocket to pocket. He pauses in the act of pulling his hair back into a ponytail as he notices me looking at him sideways.

“What?”

“ You wear THAT to apply for a loan? How is that more credible?”

He pirouettes in a little circle and smiles down at me.

“I look completely human, unlike a certain someone who can’t quite get rid of her mystery daddy’s dragon horns.”

“My horns are gorgeous.”

“And very not human.”

“Is that really the best you can do?”

“Do you have any idea how expensive these boots alone are?”

Reaching up he begins to unfasten his collar and with gentle hands wraps it around my neck, partially burying the opalescent pendant into my violet ruff. For a moment he tries to scratch me behind my ears like a dutiful pup and I almost manage to bite his hand before he pulls it back and tuts at me.

“Now does a good well trained pet bite her master?”

From deep in my throat I growl at him loudly, shaking from the very depths of my belly.

“Expected that answer. At least I don’t have a leash, so do behave and stay by my side like a good girl.”

We set off deeper into the industrial area, but at least now I can see the sky once more beginning to lighten its way back to sakura petal pink.

In what must be the wee hours of the morning, the city is bereft of both automobiles and the general crush of pedestrian masses. For a precious short time it was as though we were the only two to exist in this rose tinged world. I watch with no small amount of fascination as my surroundings change around me, painting a much more detailed map in my mind.

The outer realms of Gatsby where we currently found ourselves, full of factories and what appeared to be a much more standard fare of living arrangements. Here and there more of the posters proclaiming ‘Are you ready for the end?’ and ‘Become saved before it is too late.’ are peeling off what were once sterile white painted walls at one point, but over time the effects of the factories have dimmed their glow. Other than that things are relatively neat on the sidewalks.

Through the darkness of the disappearing morning we continue onwards, following the spiraling streets ever onwards. Sure enough the further we walked the nicer things gradually became. Soon I began to recognize the same area I’d ventured into the previous day. The apartment buildings here sported little wrought iron fenced in gardens and happily bubbling fountains. It appeared to be a small luxury to have even this small buffer of verdant green to separate you from the masses.

Every now and then a window would glow to life as we passed on by, someone waking up to face the world. Someone with their own bubble of life passing by alongside our own. Here there were certainly less industrial buildings and the upscaling in living quarters was instead accompanied by the appearance of dimmed and currently shuttered boutiques and shops.

Poshly dressed mannequins fronted the window of one store, lulling me to a stop before the shining glass. Sumptuously appointed in vibrant layers of ruffles and lace, they reminded me of the gaily laughing ladies passing me by in the automobiles. In contrast I looked at my own reflection beside the elegant display.

A vixen with fur the color of twilight ceding to the dark hold of night stared back at me, my ears, feet, and seven tails tipped in violet black. Onyx horns that I truly never have been good at concealing curve from my temples to end in delicate sharp points beside my cheeks. I do look like some creature of legend and suddenly the pretty dresses seem terribly out of my grasp.

Kemuri pauses in his steps, looking back at me over his shoulder.

“Moon?”

My name seems oddly loud in these quiet hours, and as he murmurs it in a soft undertone, flashes of my forgotten dream fleetingly pass once more through my memories.

“Sorry. My mind was wandering.”

“You good?”

Lifting my gaze to his, eyes like foxglove meet mercurial grey.

“Yeah, I got this. Just hungry. We should keep moving before someone catches Emo Lord standing on the street talking to his horned pet. Then they’ll definitely have questions.”

“Come along, pet.”

Don’t bite him. Don’t bite him.

Head high I walk past him, and leaving him behind I can hear him scoff.

“Well I’m not the one who stopped to look at pretty dresses.”

The sky above is growing brighter and brighter, blushing like a woman being told something delicious by their lover. Trotting along with my tails waving behind me, we appear as no more than a man walking his slightly exotic dog in the early morning hours. Kemuri chuckles somewhere directly behind me as I have him literally jogging to keep up with me.

I try my best to catalog away the names of the various streets as we pass them by. Small details catch my eye. There are less apartments here, giving way to modest houses with petite yards that veritably overflowed with much of the same local fluorescent foliage they’d seen in the forest.

Just ahead of us there is a curve of road blocked by the wrought iron fence so prevalent in the area. Wandering over my breath is stolen away by the view presented before me. The curve drops off to a cliff face and the entirety of the lower entrance to Gatsby spreads out below. Stacks from factories sporadically puff clouds of smoke to float up past us to hang against the pink sky.

The criss-cross of roads that actually leads off from the main curving thoroughfare look like capillaries and veins branching out. From here you could see just how much it made up the nervous system of this city.

Looking ahead I could see more and more high end businesses and I had a feeling that we weren’t far off from what we sought. The houses leading up to the looming gateway to lush luxury were positively palatial in comparison to those they’d passed so far.

“There’s another sign for it. It must be around here somewhere,” Kemuri speaks up beside me, “Just remember to let me do the talking. Play the pet part to the fullest. You don’t have to do anything but sit and look pretty, Amethyst One.”

His words rankle something in the pit of my stomach and I nod with deceptive meekness. Kemuri is no fool though and stares me dead in the eye for several minutes before slowly turning and beckoning for me to follow.

Following the curving road ever higher into the city, this time the change in atmosphere is anything but subtle. As we reach the advertisement for Top Notch Loans, we notice that the golden paint has become accented by gold glitter that fervently shines beneath the pulsing yellow neons that point us just down the road past a columned spa and fancy eatery with lacy umbrellas.

Featuring an actual parking lot and potted flowers in great stone planters, the gleaming glass front to the red brick building sports hand painted letters in rich royal blue proclaiming it as Top Notch Loans complete with a fancy golden flourish beneath.

Almost as though sensing our approach, a pair of gaslight lamps flutter to life on either side of the mahogany door and I hear the decided click of a lock sliding free. Barely ajar, the door opens only far enough for a pair of slanted violet eyes to appear.