Yuri Worlds
[113] Farewell
After dropping all her bags off, Yuka and Care flopped down on their massive king bed. The tension in the last couple of days with urgently going every moment to provide lasting, beautiful experiences for her wife had left Care with a dust-kindled cough and a sinus headache that crunchy rotations of her head in slow circles hadn't done much to alleviate.
Despite the massively swollen, soft mountain tops when she looked down, the girls hadn't fostered any back pain, electric tension, or divot marks from her bra straps. And the fact that her little sister didn't have any complaints on any of those points either made her wonder if the magic of human energy went towards the megalithic lifting of their weights.
Maybe all of that would come for her someday, when she least expected it. Maybe her self, who had and should've occupied this life, prepared her with just the right amount of adjusted support that she had been slipping into without wisdom or expertise. Still, she worried that maybe there was some sort of muscle stretching and exercise she was supposed to be doing to keep everything comfortable and repel the cruelty of gravity. Maybe she didn't need to be creating problems.
Yuka delighted in their little kitchen and view of the wilderness. She had been partially relieved and disappointed that the hinted American mythology of Bigfoots, Skinwalkers, and UFOs were not only rare sights but practically impossible to track down, especially around here.
Sure, she was learning that a quick search on the Internet turned up a wide array of questionably legitimate, breathless tales from people who had an uncle or a friend of a relative who saw something when they were young. They would smell strange, nauseating aromas deep in the trees, like rotting flesh full of disease, and then the entire wilderness would go silent, as though a vicious predator was lurking just out of sight. Yuka fashioned a provisional plan that she might turn into a massive black blob monster with huge eyes and go stomping around looking for all the supernatural sights. It immediately occurred to her that she would then probably swiftly become a creature of legend herself.
Instead of flaunting all that outside, where she might accidentally terrify some innocent kid, she practiced her capabilities in the privacy of their suite. They made sure there were no secret cameras planted. If there was anything, they didn't find it.
The first round felt like warm-up stretching before proper exercise. She loosened the dimensions of her limbs and shifted their colors around the gamut of the rainbow. Care felt a pang of jealousy that Yuka could so simply cast off her human appearance along with all the human aches. She had no mutable bones or muscles; she was still bound to her shape despite being host to a limb's worth of that dark potentiality.
Like playing the strangest game of charades, Yuka asked her to throw out different forms for her to attempt. Instantly, Care's mind was void of all suggestions. The first thing that collided with her thoughts, like a stray particle collision lighting up an experimental darkness, was to see if she could replicate her appearance from the other world with a gently exaggerated color palette.
This was a simple task for Yuka, but it also challenged her to do something even more playful. After softening her features to the pinnacle of anime quality and shifting the oil paint back into a proper pastel, she gave a hint of purple to her locks and tinted her eyes a brilliant shade of lavender before fashioning the rest of her body after the Misaki mold so painstakingly reconstructed in miniature.
Surreal felt like too frail a word for Care to grapple with the fact that her reflection from a week ago was standing separately and smirking out of her control. And it wasn't long before she was hugging herself. And Yuka felt even more snuggly as her—an unreal amount of snuggly—to the point that Care had to question whether her wife was presenting her form honestly or making it extra squishy for the sake of fun.
She raised an eyebrow and asked the question. Yuka blinked. She hadn't intentionally done anything to make herself softer. They experimented, and even when Yuka returned to her regular form, she retained a certain velvety, squishy presence over and beyond her typical contours. More than that, Yuka relayed with fascination that the pain and discomfort she felt with trying to assume a different form previously were now absent. It still required a certain level of concentration, but not active resistance, for her to maintain it.
After messing around with the variables, the only conclusion that made sense was that part of it had to be something the company did to push against her. And the rest of it seemed to draw from pressure and nerves. She was so deeply relaxed and sedate on this trip, and that emphasized all her gently squishy contours. Pouting, Yuka attempted to slip into Cerberus mode and brace herself all big and tough like Fiona did with her muscles. But insidious tickling and the most loving embrace from Care immediately softened her into a giggling, squishy pile verging on happy goo.
They stretched back on the bed together and snuggled atop the covers. Yuka's eyes were lost in Care's radiant gaze. The sweet smiles they shared with one another beamed brightly until Yuka's slowly dimmed. Her muscles trembled, and her lips quivered as tears started to form around her eyes and leak sideways against the bed. Care gently asked her what was wrong.
"I wish it were different. If we could just be… Just be like this and not be so afraid. I don't want to be afraid. I just want you to be happy, and maybe I could share in it. That's all I want. But it's too much to ask. Why...why... why can't we just have happiness?" Care stroked her cheek gently, and Yuka coughed behind her hand. The cloudy sentiment soon cleared with the possibilities of the weekend—hours that could wash away fears of the future. They had time, a little bit.
Challenging herself further and wanting to show some toughness in front of her wife, Yuka knew it would be too easy to bring up the hardened protection and blades from before. She instead focused her thoughts and intentions around what she gleaned from their three male forms, along with passing snippets of others she and her companion selves noticed dimly out the window as they raced to escape Travel Anywhere. Her experimental efforts provided a solid foundation to project boyish Cerberus more confidently.
Her hair darkened in spots while adding a polished sheen. It poked up in places, hovering between unkempt and stylized. Her eyes broadened but didn't grow. The dark qualities, bordering on pure blackness, surrounded and washed over all other traces. Care had to admit the look was a little bit spooky. It hovered towards an unintended, bad boy feeling. And she adopted some of the sharp, dark eyeliner qualities that Care felt uncertain about because of the goth impression. Excessively moving, undulating jet-black hair crossed her shoulder and probed the developing suit she slipped into.
The detailed qualities of the suit fluctuated with Yuka's uncertainty. At some points, it was just a single black piece, more like a drape buttoned together to keep it organized with an ivory swath divided by a black tie. In other moments, the collar piece looked like a shinier version of the rest of the outfit before brightening to a flat, matte silver. Yuka played around with the specific lean, jutting qualities of her nose and jaw, clearly wanting them to look more pronounced and dignified, but not quite getting everything how she wanted. Between the shaping of her accentuated, boyish form, she gave the smallest burp.
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The form that she settled on for the moment without any major changes retained a stark, slightly off-white shell-toned collared shirt with a black tie and matching hair rising and fluffing across her boyish face; the back trimmed away her neck protectively. As with her previous suit as body efforts, getting it to lay right just didn't quite translate. It was an awkward, puffy bag in parts while feeling stretched taut in others. From around behind her, little snake-like ropes of braided hair wandered up like they were being charmed. Pausing his efforts, Yuka presented his Cerberus self and asked with a voice casually evocative of Franklin's, "Well? What do you think?"
Care smiled and had interesting thoughts for this form of her wife. It was the same mystical allure as in the forest. This was Yuka, as she chose to present herself rather than the body she had been planted in. She wondered about the fact that they had been pushing away the goth thing, but Yuka had wholeheartedly embraced it. That earned a playful little head wiggle from the boy as he admitted that there were aspects to embracing the darkness that made her feel relaxed.
Though he may be cute, soft, and adorable with gentle care for the one he loved most of all, there was still more to him under the surface. He was a dark entity. That didn't mean evil; that didn't mean a monster in human flesh. Those were labels that the company decided to impose upon the worlds between worlds. As his dear friends and beloved reunited with their true aspects, he was still searching for his reclaimed truth. It was scary, and he didn't want to become something he fundamentally was not, but he needed to understand the full honesty of himself.
But Yuka also needed to know that if anything about his presentation bothered her or made her feel the least bit uncomfortable, because he would immediately return to more comfortable skin for her sake. Carrie smiled warmly and pulled her puppy close. "I love you. Whatever makes you happy also makes me happy. Be yourself as much as you possibly can this weekend. I embrace all your faces as your true face. And I'm so happy to share in all your aspects. Don't be afraid to be soft and cute and handsome and spooky and mysterious and smoky and brooding and surprisingly taller than me and everything else that is you, my beautiful Cerberus."
Despite how manly and cool he projected himself to be, cute squeaks and joyous whimpers flooded his presence like a dog returning home after an eternity of loneliness. He was just Yuka and Cerberus. And their weekend was full of this interesting combination of selves.
When Silvia and Fiona came over from their room, they put the new boy through his paces with notes about voice, body language, how the external apparatus should situate and feel, and getting that suit to look classier. The lodge had plenty of indoor activities to keep them occupied, but Cerberus and Care focused their time out in the wilderness, amidst the cool temperatures and traces of snow remaining this late in the season. Some of the slopes created snow overnight and still had enough for playful trekking.
The weekend flew by with puffy jackets, wobbly skis, aching tumbles, and quiet moments sitting and watching the alpine edges soften to verdant pleasures. Care was sure that the landscape had once been practically the same shade as the patches of rough desert where she lived, but the ground burst forth with bright and vibrant life. She hoped the blossoming continued.
Cerberus, between sneakily shifting on and hiding away her secret face, actually dropped into bed more than any other excursion or activity. She looked so overwhelmingly exhausted despite the perky vibrance of everything around her and her brimming enthusiasm. She could've again lamented the fact that she was tossing aside even more precious minutes and hours, but every one of those restful moments was spent clinging close to Care. It did leave them with full nights of practically camping out, watching the skies with only the faintest traces of spilled light from the big city feathering the edges of darkness.
Eventually, inevitably, they arrived at Sunday evening, with just the drive back to the house and one night remaining. Care expected Cerberus to twist with stress and fear, but instead, a monumental droopiness spread over her. She hung as loose and limp as boiled pasta. Whatever headaches she and Care had accumulated lately finally passed. Cerberus was proud of most of the external aspects of her boyish presentation, and she refused to let her wife go.
Upon their return to the house, she practically went with Care to every restroom visit, and they essentially slept that last night together in the same skin. The edges of temptation practically pushed them to give in to the magnetic pull of their compatible essences. But they resisted just enough.
Morning, breakfast, waiting. Goodbyes and tears had already been shed and were repeated quietly and achingly with fervent energy and resigned simplicity.
"I love you. A thousand years. Ten thousand years. Whatever it takes. Together, always." It could've been said with more elaborate, lyrical flourishes to make Kosame weak in the knees, but that was enough. Quiet, personal words softly shaped.
Silvia gave the biggest hugs possible, wielding as much softness as she could swing around, sad to be losing a sister. Fiona challenged her by squeezing just as tight. Yuka regretted that they hadn't made it to the comic book shop, where Silvia worked part-time, to sample all the joys her imagination fostered. But there were a dozen, and there were a hundred likewise missed opportunities and moments that slipped away in portioning out the hours into what felt best.
Every ounce of emotional goodbye drained out as the minutes slipped to noon. Soon, after the hour chimed, there was a modest but insistent series of knocks on the front door. Mercifully, Yuka's escort wasn't the shell of Maharu but a nondescript delivery girl, picking up their obligation.
"Ready?" The anonymous girl pointed out that Yuka was allowed a small travel bag with changes of clothes, personal items, and books if she so wished, even though that wasn't explicitly noted in the contract. Fortunately, she had put together such a bag, held by Fiona depending on whether they were allowed. It felt like such a small, barely carry-on item to take with her. She hugged it tight to her chest and smiled at everyone before resting her eyes warmly on her wife.
"I love you. I will always love you, no matter what happens. I'll see you again soon. Please take care...Care..." The Care-full repetition had been a recent, delightful discovery, which they used playfully at every moment possible. One last hug, one last embrace, before Yuka drew back, saving her Cerberus side within and coldly announcing to the girl in white who arrived to pick her up, "I'm ready."
Without any more drama than that and barely a whisper of sound, both of them wafted away like smoke caught in a sudden breeze. Care, who had managed to hold it together through the entire proceedings, instantly tumbled to her knees and fell even further on the hallway tile, having no energy to support herself as tears forced their way from her eyes. Every sad song, every happy song, and every melody that she could conjure up from the void tossed and wrestled through her thoughts as the strongest spell and most mournful lament.
If she could break down the walls and blast away the nefarious forces with the simple fervor of the songs she wished in her heart to spill, feel, and echo for eternity, she would do whatever it took. But every possibility and every hope felt so desperately, achingly out of reach. There was nothing to do but cry.