Pruned Trees Re-Sprout!! ~ Ragazza Volpe Magica ~

clack clack clack clack clack

The incessant tapping of fingernails gliding over plastic-capped keyboard keys was what drew Taika from her slumber on this Saturday afternoon. The room was dark, save for the glow from Pacifica’s computer monitors. The owner in question being the source of the clacking. Taika’s ears twitched; Pacifica had her headphones on and was listening to some music, loudly.

Rebecca and Shouri weren’t present, presumably still sleeping in the other two guest rooms. Not etuding overnight with their Maestro certainly affected her energy level. Taika was finding it quite difficult to find the strength to get out of bed today.

However, that might also be due in part to the bombshell he had dropped on them at the end of their last job. Closing her eyes, the events of the morning played on a slow loop in Taika’s head.

“G-girlfriend?” Taika’s heart sank instantly upon Shouri’s revelation of his relationship with Lina.

“W-w-wait! That doesn’t make any fucking sense!” Rebecca shouted. “She said you haven’t been in contact since you got out of school!” the fire Resonator barked.

“That was-” Pacifica paused to do some mental math. “-three years ago?”

Shouri hung his head shamefully but nodded in the affirmative to Pacifica’s inquiry. “We dated while we were in school, but never actually broke up.”

“You ghosted her?!” Pacifica gasped. She could sense the extreme shame and guilt practically dripping from her Maestro, but still found herself shocked nonetheless.

“Girlfriend?” Taika asked again with a sad whimper.

The Maestro remained quiet, refusing to face his three clearly jealous Resonators. “I don’t want to talk about it,” he mumbled.

Taika stepped forward and extended her hand out to her precious Maestro – she was his willpower, perhaps she could-

SMACK

Her eyes widened. He had taken a firm hold of her wrist. “No,” he whispered. “I don’t want you to interfere.”

Taika trembled slightly, failing to understand. “I’m slime,” he spoke with a breath. “And I need to feel this way.”

Pacifica shook her head. She too approached her Maestro, reaching out to start an etude. “No, Sho, that’s not right you-”

Releasing Taika’s wrist, he stepped backward, dodging the otter girl’s advance. “No!” he spoke more firmly this time, halting her. “Let me feel this. Don’t-” A pause, and a withdrawal. “-just don’t.” He refused to look at them.

Turning, he began to walk. The three concerned Resonators could do nothing but offer each other baffled looks before quietly heeding their Maestro’s orders and following at a small distance.

Even on the bus ride back, Shouri kept a seat to himself, while Taika, Pacifica, and Rebecca all shared a seat in absolute silence. They had no idea what to do. Even the situation regarding his past with Mila didn’t prepare them for this.

It was confusing, weird, and just plain uncomfortable. But what concerned the three Resonators the most was: how did he feel about Lina?

The silence persisted all the way to their stop. Once the bus came to a halt they disembarked without a single word to one another, walking into the gated community and down to Pacifica’s parents’ house. It was roughly around seven or eight in the morning.

Priscilla spotted the group entering the house but kept her mouth firmly shut as Shouri whipped by her. She kept her head down, focusing on making her morning coffee as the three Resonator girls passed by.

It wasn’t a metaphorical cloud hanging over them, but a whole damn hurricane with how turbulent the group’s emotional state was. It threw the senior Maestro for a loop. What happened out there?

By the time the three Resonators reached the bend in the hallway, the right-side guest bedroom was already shut and occupied. Rebecca moved before her two counterparts, taking the second guest bedroom for herself, with a firm shutting of the door.

“Come on Taika, you can use my room,” Pacifica mumbled. Even her optimism had breaking points, which only served to further dishearten the lunar fox.

Gradually, Taika returned to the waking world once more. However, this time she found herself alone in Pacifica’s room. She couldn’t even really tell what time it was thanks to the amazingly effective blackout curtains.

She sat up, her body aching from her extended time in bed. No effort was made to stretch her sore muscles and joints – she just felt terrible all around. Sliding out of bed, she left the confines of the bedroom and found the other two guest rooms were still locked tight. The television was on in Shouri’s room, and she could hear the faint sound of his breath. He was probably asleep, utilizing the TV as white noise.

From Rebecca’s room, Taika could hear movement. Steps and small grunts, air being moved and displaced. It took a good minute or two of listening for the lunar elemental to figure out what her fire counterpart was doing. Exercise, specifically physical combat drills. Punches, kicks, and the like. Taika had a certain familiarity with that kind of training. All it did was bring back some phantom pains for her, so she departed the hallway to find her otter friend.

Instead, she ran into the elder otter of the house.

“Ah, Mister Jack.” Taika gasped, almost running square into the man as he left his bedroom. “Permesso,” she apologized with a short bow before scuttling around him.

“Wait, Taika was it?” he spoke up, stopping the fox in her place.

“Yeah,” she hesitantly replied, turning back.

“Is… everything alright?”

Taika considered just dropping the usual “yeah, everything’s fine” line and darting away, but she knew the man was only worried about his daughter. “Not really.”

Jack nodded, already suspecting that. “That’s what I thought,” he spoke quietly. “She tries to hide it, but my little pup is hurting badly. What happened?”

Taika’s expression hardened, eyes darting to the side of their sockets as she avoided his pleading gaze. “We learned something we don’t like,” she finally found the words. “I don’t want to say anything else,” the lunar followed at a mutter.

The elder otter sighed. “That’s what I thought,” he repeated, lower. “Go, my little pup needs her friends right now. It doesn’t seem like it, but she’s very sensitive,” the man urged Taika along.

The lunar fox remained rooted in place for a moment, mulling over the elder Resonator’s words. Hesitantly, she turned and resumed her trek to the living room.

Pacifica lay on the couch, the television remote resting in front of her. A hand rested atop the device, occasionally applying pressure to the channel up key. Taika approached the couch at a slow pace. “Paci,” she finally spoke.

The otter-girl rose with a start, shedding some tears as she did so. “T-taika.” Quickly, she rubbed her face with her forearm. “Wanna watch TV with me?” she asked quietly, trying to hide the grief in her voice.

With a nod, Taika sat next to her friend. They remained in silence, the uncaring television playing a local news story.

“What do we do?” Taika braved asking.

“I dunno,” Pacifica replied.

More silence. “I wanna talk to him,” Pacifica spoke up again. “I want to understand what he’s feeling and why,” she trailed off, lowering her head. “But he won’t talk to us.”

Another pause. Pacifica ground her fists against her temples. “Why am I so stupid?!” she suddenly hissed.

“Che?” Taika was confused.

“I should have realized he had something more going on sooner. Stupid! Stupid!” the otter girl berated herself.

Taika didn’t know what to say and just let her friend continue to admonish herself. “I feel like an idiot accepting Lina’s offer like that!”

Finally, the fox had enough. She reached over and turned the other girl towards her. “Ma dai, non sei stupido,” she spoke with a glare on her face. Pacifica blinked, pushing the tears down her face. “None of us were his Resonator at the time, we’ve only known him for like two months.” Taika maintained her glower. “Stuff about his past is gonna come up. We’re just gonna have to deal with it.” Her grip around her friend’s shoulders tightened. “Even if we don’t like it,” she spoke through her teeth

Pacifica digested those words. The unease in her heart didn’t fade, but her self-doubt about her actions slowly disappeared.

“Taika…” Pacifica pulled the fox girl into a hug, earning a squeak from her as the otter laid down with her friend still in her grasp.

“P-paci?” Taika gasped out in surprise.

“Just let me hold you… for etude.” Pacifica briefly pondered how believable that was but ended up just rolling with it. “Yeah,” she breathed out, holding Taika’s head just under her own chin and stroking the other girl’s hair.

“P-paci…” Taika gulped, submitting to her friend’s whims. Slowly her eyelids began to droop. She had just woken up, why was she so tired then?

No, she wasn’t tired, just… relaxed.

“Paci…”

“Taika…”

Everything was so hazy. Atop a flower-covered hill crowned by a single large tree, a pair of animal-eared girls found themselves. Under the tree an otter girl and her fox-girl companion lay in each other’s embrace.

“I’m so glad I met you.”

“Me too.”

The rays of the bright yellow sun rained down upon them, covering them in a gentle warmth that made the idea of moving an alien concept. Pacifica wrapped herself around the smaller Taika, who giggled in sheer bliss, running her hands around the otter girl’s vest to touch the bare of her back.

Neither cared how long they lay there. They both felt heavenly, pure unadulterated joy; perhaps even pleasure.

Pacifica slowly opened her eyes, her lips slowly descending. The bright yellow orb of light that warmed them to their cores began to shrink. It was gradual, but it was apparent that the phenomenon was not a trick of the eyes. “Taika?” Pacifica sat up.

“Mmrgh… Paci?” The fox girl sat up. Her attention turned to the orb in the sky which Pacifica was pointing to.

“What’s happening?!” Taika clung to her dear friend. At that distressed shout, dark clouds began to move, bringing a harsh, bone-chilling wind. The two girls uttered a cry in surprise, holding one another tighter.

The gusts began to grow in strength and intensity to coincide with the rapidly darkening of the sky above until finally the pair was lifted off the ground.

“TAIKA!”

“PACI DON’T LET GO!”

THUD!

“Owie…” Pacifica whined, rubbing the back of her head which had been introduced to the hardwood floor by gravity. Her attention though was diverted to the fox-girl whose face was planted firmly on her chest. “T-taika wake up,” Pacifica urged; face flushed.

“Should I uh, come back after your… etude?” a tired voice asked.

“Rebby! No! We just- EEP!” Pacifica squealed as Taika tightened her grip and nuzzled her face into the soft warmth below her. “Get off!” The otter pushed the clingy fox off her to address the other snide fox in the room.

“Buongiorno Paci, cuore mio…” the lunar fox said with a groggy smile on her face, tail slowly swishing behind her.

Pacifica’s reddened face only intensified in shade as the vixen’s affections, but in a strange twist, she could feel… jealousy, from Rebecca?

Speaking of, Rebecca shook her head, focusing herself by averting her gaze from the flirty fox and otter. “Shouri’s gone.”

“WHAT!?!”

Rebecca flinched, ears folding back. “As in he’s not here,” she retorted sarcastically.

“Where did he go?!” Taika scrambled to her feet.

“You think I know? I just woke up from a nap and couldn’t hear him anymore!”

“You were closest to him, why didn’t you keep a better watch?!”

“How is this my fault?!”

“GIRLS!” Pacifica shouted over the pair of angry vixens, causing them to jump from the sudden booming volume of the otter’s voice. “That’s enough!” she barked, thoroughly silencing the two. “Our Maestro is missing; this is no time to be at each other’s throats.” The otter girl rose to her feet, standing over her counterparts.

“We were all asleep, so either we’re all to blame or none of us,” she kept her voice firm, trying to establish some sort of authoritative presence over the two catty foxes.

When the two shirked back and averted their gazes, Pacifica sighed in relief. They would listen to her, at least for now.

Taking in a deep breath, Pacifica tried to think through it logically. It wasn’t her strong suit by any means, but she was Shouri’s Resonator – this was a matter of pride. “Let’s check the guest room,” she calmly decided after some thought.

“Why?” Rebecca tilted her head.

“There might be a clue or something that will tell us what happened,” Pacifica reasoned out.

“That makes sense to me.” Taika nodded in agreement.

The trio quickly made their way to the guest bedroom Shouri had been sleeping in. Without an ounce of hesitation, Pacifica stepped in first; Taika and Rebecca stood outside by the door.

The blankets and one of the pillows lay on the ground, the television continued playing mid-day dramas at a low volume. The curtains had been drawn shut, and while they weren’t black-out curtains like in Pacifica’s room, they still blocked a significant amount of the outside light that normally shone through the tall windows. Next to the bed, a nightstand proudly sat, with a little lamp and an alarm clock, along with a pair of tuners: one red, one blue.

“Huh.” Pacifica picked up her tuner from the nightstand, then Rebecca’s.

“What is it?” Rebecca decided to brave stepping into the room. Once more her eyes were drawn to the various awards and trophies proudly displayed in their cases, but there wasn’t any time to be distracted by that.

“Only our tuners are here. Not Taika’s.” Pacifica and Rebecca looked at the lunar element.

The lunar Resonator in question lowered her head, brows knitted. “Now that you mention it-” she hummed, gently biting her bottom lip, “-I’ve been feeling a tug on my rhythm since we woke up.”

“What do you mean?” Pacifica questioned.

“Well, it’s like-” she paused; mouth open. It snapped shut after a moment of thought. “Hrmmm…” the vixen hummed, folding her arms across her chest. “He’s pulling on my willpower,” she spoke, unsure of how exactly to convey the odd sensation.

“Oh!” Rebecca suddenly exclaimed. “He’s using the tuner to etude.” She understood the idea. “So he can have the strength of will to do whatever it is he’s up to.”

Pacifica lit up. “Rebby you’re a genius!”

“Stop, my weak stave is knowledge,” the fire Resonator chuckled.

“He didn’t abandon us,” Taika sighed in relief.

“Not in the traditional sense,” Rebecca huffed.

“Oh, stop it,” Pacifica chided the fire-fox, whilst wagging a disapproving finger at her.

“He wouldn’t abandon us,” Taika asserted in Rebecca’s direction.

“Unless he had a good reason,” Rebecca grumbled.

“Rebby!” Pacifica barked.

The fire fox hugged herself tightly. “Sorry,” she mumbled, ears folded back, tail wrapped around her legs. Taika huffed and refused to acknowledge the other fox. Pacifica quietly sighed.

“We need to work together. Our Maestro is who knows where and is defenseless,” the otter attempted to rally the other girls. “Despite being the plan guy, this sure was a stupid decision on his part,” she commented offhandedly.

Rebecca exhaled sharply through her nostrils, glancing around uneasily. “What the heck do we even do?” she asked quietly.

“That’s where I’m stuck. Sho’s the plan guy.” Pacifica’s brows drew together, her line of sight cast towards the ground as if the answer was written there.

“Why?”

Pacifica and Rebecca looked at the Lunar fox. “Why what?” Rebecca questioned.

“Why did he leave?”

There was a moment of silence as the gears turned. Suddenly, Pacifica began to chuckle. “Why am I the stupid one? Taika, you’re a genius!” the otter triumphantly cried out.

“Che?” Taika tilted her head.

“If we can figure out why he’s gone, then it’ll be easier to find out where he’s going,” the otter reasoned out.

“Oh! That’s a good point!” Rebecca exclaimed

Taika frowned, bringing a balled-up fist to her lips. “But why did he leave?” she repeated her question.

Rebecca shrugged. “Well, that’s easy – it has to do with that Lina chick, right?”

“You think so?” Taika questioned.

“Isn’t it obvious? The only reason we were all in separate rooms was because of that bombshell he dropped on us this morning,” the fire fox replied.

Pacifica slowly took in the information being passed between the pair of foxes, her eyes on the tuner in hand. As she focused on the tuner, the conversation her friends were having began to become muffled, white noise even. With the device in sleep mode, she could see the screen was polished to a shine, which usually ended up getting marred by her fingerprints whenever she took possession of it. She never noticed until now, but Shouri must clean them frequently.

With a small shake, the device was pulled from its power-saving mode, displaying a default menu screen. Blankly staring at the screen, Pacifica’s eyes rested on a particular option.

“Apps on linked Tuners”

She must have read those four words about twenty or so times before the flicker of an idea came to mind. Tapping that button brought up two options

Taika

Rebecca

“Huh?” Pacifica tapped the Taika option and a couple more applications invaded the screen. Specifically, a text messaging app and a map app.

Without really thinking, she tapped the text messages, and it immediately brought up a conversation between Shouri and…

“Lina,” Pacifica breathed out. By this point, Taika and Rebecca had ceased their conversation and looked to the tuner-wielding otter.

Me: “Lina?” 1:45 PM

Lina: “Shouri! I’m surprised you remembered my number! What’s up?” 1:45 PM

Me: “Where are you staying currently?” 1:47 PM

Lina: “Downtown Canolapra, we’re at the Harcourt Tower Apartments.” 1:47 PM

Me: “I’m coming up there.” 1:57 PM

Lina: “Not that I don’t want to see you again, but why so suddenly?” 1:59 PM

Me: “We need to talk, and I want to do it in person.” 2:10 PM

Lina: “I understand.” 2:10 PM

Lina: “Let me know when you’re here, I’ll come down.” 2:11 PM

Pacifica shook her head, swiping the app away. She felt like absolute slime for reading her Maestro’s private texts without his consent. “He went to go see Lina.” What’s done was done, but it didn’t ease the unrest in her heart.

“We-” Rebecca paused, licking her lips nervously. “-were right then?” The fire fox gulped hard, balling up her fists tightly.

“Y-yeah.” Pacifica slowly nodded, her free hand finding its way to her gut. She backed up and sat on the bed behind her.

Silence.

Both Rebecca and Pacifica had no reason to feel the way they did - they were just his Resonators, right? There wasn’t anything special they could do for him, right? They couldn’t be more to him…

Right?

“Let’s go,” Taika spoke up, the others raising their heads.

“What?” Pacifica finally got out.

“Come on. Let’s go to him. He’s going to need us,” the lunar urged.

“But-” Rebecca gritted her teeth.

It was so strange, Taika felt no despair, no defeat, no hopelessness. The way her eyes glowed fiery blue – she was determined. Nothing was going to keep her away from her Maestro, that much was made abundantly clear to Rebecca and Pacifica.

The bus ride to the apartments their Maestro had gone to was quiet. The three girls shared a seat, with Pacifica separating Rebecca and Taika as usual. Though perhaps this was an unneeded gesture on the otter’s part as all three of them were hopelessly lost in thought.

Why did their Maestro go out of the way to do this? Alone at that.

It hadn’t even dawned on them that they were even allowed on the bus without a Maestro. No one batted an eye since the funds were just taken out of the tuners that were in Rebecca and Pacifica’s possession.

Sometime during the trip, a thunderstorm had moved into the area, assaulting the bus with a torrential downpour of rain.

Taika let out a fearful squeak as a clap of thunder shook the bus slightly. All the more reason to keep her head down and lose herself in her thoughts.

“Now stopping at Harcourt Tower.”

Pacifica snapped to at that moment; the name of the building in Shouri’s private text messages seared into her mind out of a sense of culpability. “Wait!” she shouted as she bolted up from her seat. “This is my stop!” she barked at the driver. The otter roused her companions out of their ruminations.

The trio shuffled out of the seat and began walking towards the open door at the front of the bus. The rain pounded the vehicle hard being carried by a strong wind that made even the large bus sway slightly. With this severe weather, naturally, there weren’t any pedestrians out and about.

That was…

…except him.

As soon as the trio of girls spotted that familiar green jacket through the bus windows, they rushed off without any thought about what they would be subjecting themselves to. Instantly all three Resonators were totally soaked; however, that didn’t matter - because Shouri stood there alone in the rain, just as drenched as they were.

“Sho!”

Only the trio of worried voices snapped him out of his daze. For a moment, he stood in silent shock that they were there.

“How did you find me?” he asked, voice cracking.

Pacifica instantly was stabbed by a stake of guilt. “I read your texts, I’m so sorry.” The otter threw herself onto the sword of admission.

“Paci.” Shouri lowered his head – she could feel the guilt radiating from him. It was a dangerous feedback loop where they dragged one another further into despair simply by co-existing.

“Sho I-” Pacifica tried to say something but-

“I broke up with her,” he cut her off at the pass.

For just a moment, they stood in silence, the uncaring rain continuing to mercilessly pound them.

“Wha-?”

“I came here to talk to her; put these demons to bed. I made a mess of my life up until now by running away from things. I wanted to at least do this under my own power.” It was a bit of a white lie, as his fingers continuously caressed the black tuner at his waist. “She figured we had broken up after I ghosted her but appreciated the gesture.”

Pacifica was taken aback for a moment before she warmed to a smile. “You did good Sho.”

He pushed his soaked bangs back, looking the otter girl in the eyes for the first time since the conversation started. “Thanks.”

Though their happy reunion was thrown upon the rocks of hardship: “Sho! Something’s wrong with Rebecca!” Taika suddenly cried out, as she held her fellow fox up.

Rebecca had gone limp, her face devoid of color, and labored breathing. Shouri realized what was happening in an instant and it caused his blood to run cold and his heart ache with fear. “Come on, pull her into the lobby – Pacifica, call your mom!”

Taika and Pacifica didn’t think, they just acted on their Maestro’s orders.