Undisclosed Symbiosis

Opening:

The session opens with the Pizza Party back at home. Kate and Moki are just exiting Katrina's truck.

Moki dismisses her minor illusion, still shaken as she gets off the truck. Kate offers her a hand. Moki takes it. Kate comforts Moki, helping to talk her down from her fears. Moki explains why she's so scared -- she, like Katrina, is held together by magical means.

Katrina shoots Moki a glare of silent determination, acknowledging what she feels, but then switches to a more cheerful persona as she approaches the mall. She also informs Moki that there's a happier ending to the story than she understands.

Kate asks if the group wants to make a dramatic entrance or a subtle one. Moki passes the choice on to Kat, who attempts to kick the door in, but the automatic door opens and she misses.

Kate yells out "Sup fuckers!" and draws the attention of Circeth, who notes Moki's new 'additions', Moki replies that there are multiple parts of her, and that she can swap between them. Circeth finds this interesting and says they must talk later.

Usagi wakes up and calls out for Moki. Kate asks Moki if she wants her to come with. Yokai Moki says yes, and they both head in.

Usagi rubs her eyes and is about to reach out to Moki, but stops. She asks what happened, and Moki is confused. Usagi gestures to Moki's horns.

Moki is shocked, before coming out of her own stupor, and then explains, she didn't realize that she never got a chance to explain. Having been in combat after combat and then being pushed onto the route, they were unable to explain what happened. Usagi asks when this happened. Moki struggles to remember how long it's been due to the time dilation between the route and the regular world -- where they were on route 66 for about a week, but in actuality, was 6 months for everyone else.

Usagi keeps asking why, mentioning that it's so much easier to just be human. Katrina feels a wave of disgust when Usagi says this.

Usagi is not taking the split well. Kate, who has been listening in tries to help defend Moki. Regular Moki summons a magic mouth to communicate with Usagi directly. She apologizes through the magic mouth. Usagi says she needs to sleep on this and that she's not mad -- but Moki can tell she is.

Moki silently steps out of their room, apologizing before leaving. She heads out front and breaks down crying. Yokai Moki follows suit. Silently nodding as she leaves. Rushing out to hold Moki.

As Kate is about to leave, time seems to freeze, and she gets a call on her sword. She picks up and Lorelai, standing with her head half-way through the blade speaks, asking about animes to watch as they're having an anime night at the domain and Sebasios mentioned that Kate's a nerd. Kate replies and before Lorelai heads off, she pushes herself out of the sword and walks around the room in this frozen time, spotting Usagi, who she points out is clearly starving. Lorelai asks if Usagi is a succubus, which Kate says yes, and then hesitantly asks if there's anything she has to do. Lorelai says no, outside of bringing Usagi to them. It's not the first succubi she's met. Kate mistakenly assumes Lorelai is one of the others, but is quickly corrected by Claire and Audrey who show up through the sword and specify that they are too.

Eventually Kate mentions that it's probably not a good time to move Usagi now as emotions are high and a lot of bombshells have been dropped. Claire, Audrey, and Lorelai agree, Claire saying that she'll come up in a few days to help explain everything. The call ends and time returns to normal.

As Kate leaves, she breathes a sigh and takes in the fact they may have a break, and manages to rest easy. She looks at her sword briefly and laments, saying she wishes she could have an anime night. Usagi cries herself to sleep.

In her sleep, she is given a pamphlet that introduces her to what being a succubus is about, and mentions the idea of working for Lorelai, and noting Claire as her potential supervisor.

Out smoking close-by is Green, who asks what's up with the two of them. Yokai Moki responds while Moki cries, saying that they've seen a lot today, and then mention that Usagi was not aware of the split Moki experienced. They also mention that it's not something they really had a choice in -- and it's not like either of them are going anywhere. They still are a part of one another. Green sighs and responds: "Take it from me, but don't tell nobody else. It takes time to see someone else wearing your loved ones face." before finishing his smoke and heading off into the night.

During this, Circeth is watching from the shadows, trying to read the lips of both. They pick up that Moki is lamenting about how much went on during the day, and that she doesn't know what to do now.

Circeth quickly makes their way up to the Moki and mentions their own situation, what the role the spores have. Telling Moki that without them, Circeth, the person, would likely live a month of agony, or a year under lots of medical attention. They also draw a connection to their own life with family, as their family did not agree with their plan. Though the mushrooms didn't opt to communicate after since they didn't want to deal with drama.

Eventually Circeth leaves and paces around inside, mulling over the information they've acquired from Moki and attempting to parse it. Eventually it gets late enough their pacing is disturbing the others, and they're told to continue outside. Circeth paces around the parking lot. The Mokis head to a tree, cut it down and Yokai Moki searing smites the tree, lighting a small campfire. Late in the night, Skab heads out on his own, he walks into the parking lot. Yokai Moki notes this, Circeth skitters up to him. He does not respond. His lamp is a different shade of yellow than normal. Circeth continues to try and talk, to him. He does not respond.

Yokai Moki points Skab out to regular Moki. Skab looks up at the sky, Yokai Moki looks at him, regular Moki looks on at the sky, where he looks. The sky is relatively cloudy with a few stars peeking through. Circeth casts lesser restoration on Skab, only to have greater restoration returned back to them. They reply in a robotic fashion, "Error, lesser restoration is illogical on this unit. Greater restoration is better suited to your wounds."

Circeth keeps trying to push on for responses, changing her speech to be more robotic. The unit seems to respond to commands and instructions. Eventually they ask if the unit is aware of a soul. It responds that it is not authorized for information. The light on Skab's head changes to a more divine color as it responds.

Skab asks Moki if she has ever communicated with her shard. Moki replies that she hasn't, and didn't know she could. He then asks if the sword ever reached out to her. Moki says no, but corrects herself, mentioning the vision they saw. Skab responds that it did actually communicate to her. He then mentions that the communication goes both ways. He also then mentions that it's somewhat dangerous as everyone with a shard becomes aware of this. He then mentions that this is what he did when Kate and Moki were fighting Gil. He bargained himself to try and save them.

Eventually Skab says it's best to turn in. The Mokis agree, but try to ask about Skab's body seeming to go autonomous. He responds that they'll all figure it out, and goes into a sleep mode.

Yokai Moki sits against a wall on the roof, regular Moki leans on her. Yokai Moki holds her and keeps her sword on top, guarding her, and they fall asleep.

The next morning, everyone is woken up by a gong ringing. Katrina calls everyone for a team meeting where she mentions she doesn't have jobs for everyone, so they're going to do a team-building exercise. Katrina brings out a large mat, similar to the one Kate and Moki had fought on previously for Monday Night Combat. Green has not shrunk down and he watches from above. Katrina mentions to Usagi, Kate, Moki, and Nathan that this is the first time they've done this. Moki questions, asking if that was true as they had just done this. Katrina responds that they had done it to become official, but it's the first time they're doing it to work for her.