Hello, everyone! after dealing with real life and the other nonsense of living, panny and i have decided to bring back war of change. give a round of applause. we’ve worked through all of the information and hopefully improved coherency and cohesion; however, tell us if we missed something. eventually, we’ll announce an event to celebrate the re-opening, so look out for information on that. -RAIDNE, THE HEAD ADMIN
From the moonless night, screams of terror and fear resound, spreading across the world and infecting the masses; however, those sleepless nights occurred years ago. A new era began with the fires of war, and with no end in sight, the residents of Selene Isle trudge through life, basking in the momentary peace. Despite their prayers for continued monotony and peace, a storm brews, stirred to life by the continued presence of Rapture and Wraith. And as we set our sights on the seemingly peace laden isle, we must ask: how shall this tale end?
As the years passed, the number of true pairs increased; however, they continued to live in the shadows, catering to the whims of the mundane. Seven Moons kept watch over them all, instructing them and assisting them, but for many, the attitudes and ideals of the organization were smoldering, suffocating. With Seven Moons and the mundanes, they could not grasp the freedom, the power dangling before their eyes. In the beginning, rebellion was a dream, a fantasy, a figment—developed by the repressed and carried forward due to the nature of humanity. No one expected the call to sound, and no one expected the call to be answered. However, it happened.
With one finally click the door was securely locked and Zakuro was free to let out a sigh of relief, honestly she was going to have to get more cashiers in this place because if she was forced to work another single night because no one wanted a job well it wasn’t going to be good that was for sure. Flipping the stores sign to closed Zakuro turned to look back at the slightly darkened store, sure she hated working and the idea that she had to run this place but in the back of her mind one small part of her though it was well rather cool. But she was never going to admit that to anyone ever “ OH MANAGER “ she hollered suddenly through the store. It was just she and Aubert tonight as it was with many of the nights that the store was so utterly swamped that just one person couldn’t do it alone. For the most part she always left Aubert to run the place as unfair as it was he was paid pretty handsomely for his time and as far as she knew he never had any complaints about it.
Locked away in the back office doing the needed paper work and inventory logs Zakuro was sure she would find the hopeless boy staring at the screen before him with a look of dread on his face. Much like how she found him almost every night they worked together, he wouldn’t answer her no he would only ignore her and hope she would leave and allow him to do his job the one she failed to do daily. With a smirk on her face her body slide through the door and with a quick turn her arms found themselves draping over his shoulders. Even sitting his back was still far to long for her chin to sit upon his head so as a compromise she rested her chin upon her own arm and frowned “ I was calling for you and here you are ignoring me again, how shameful”
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The spread electronic spread sheet was half filled by the time he heard the electronic chime on the front door serenade Fire and Ice's final customer of the day, and on the the chime's downward note he let out a sigh of relief. The seasonal rush had taken a turn for the hectic and the man had found himself at the mercy of his work schedule for the past few weeks. Not that this job had ever been a comfort to him, considering the girl who owned the establishment knew nothing about the finer points of business and remained unwilling to let the shop inconvenience her personal life. Prior to his employment under Zakuro, Aubert had been told by many individuals that he had been spoiled, but could never quite understand what witnessing such inherited irresponsibility looked like; the girl had changed all that.
Working as her manager felt like a special level of hell. Not that Aubert believed in any form of afterlife-- if he had possessed the spiritual, moral foresight for such things he would not be in Selene tugging at crooks for a chance to slide his way into the good graces of Synister-- but coexisting with the rich(er) young woman often tempted him to look into divine punishments he could wish on her.
It had taken him a few interactions with the irresponsible girl to adjust himself to her awful mannerisms. The high and forced sweetness in her voice that could shift, with the drop of a coin, to a brattyness that showed her age. The caution-to-the-wind approach to everything that would compel her to abandon her post because she knew she could heap it onto his shoulders. The constant touching and prodding, which he considered the worst of her "quirks". He loathed human contact but Zakuro's made him feel even more filthy so that he would shower and scrub himself down after every horrible shift.
He shuddered at the thought of her small hands, only to flinch as the teen draped her slender arms over his bony shoulders. His hairless ears flattened despite his attempt to hide his discomfort (his aversion to touch often made individuals like his boss want to annoy him more). Resting her smug face on his arm, the girl spoke, her tone suggesting a power over him that made his stomach lurch,
“I was calling for you and here you are ignoring me again, how shameful”
"My apologies," he ground his teeth together, trying to keep himself from shaking the heiress off, "I didn't hear you."
He wanted to kill her, though the thought of doing so without the proper alibi or support system was too coarse to entertain for more than a moment, but the urge manifested as a new stiffness in his shoulders that spread to his stubby tail. His stomach flipped. He had to get her off before he did something regrettable.
"I'm only getting started on this," his voice rising into an agitated whine, "And I really should get it done tonight."
So get the fuck off me, you pathetic little succubus, before I--
"Isn't there somewhere you'd rather be than here, Zakuro? After all, I don't need much assistance with this. You could go home early."
Forcing a grin that came out as a grimace, he flexed the shabby muscles in the arm she'd planted her chin on, hoping the shift would cause her to bite her tongue.
He was nothing more than skin and bones to which Zakuro was unimpressed with, really for someone who was getting paid like a mob boss couldn’t he afford to eat a little better? Though she was sure that the stress of this place was surely getting to him and that eating wouldn’t help to gain weight. However if the man was to do his job correctly he would have hired more workers by now and left himself to do nothing but paperwork and leave early for the day, instead she found that the two of them spent more time in this place more so then each of them would have liked. That in turn left the fact that they both were forced to spend time with each other which as anyone could have guessed neither liked the idea of , partly because of their boss servant relationship and well mostly if not all because Zakuro dropped the ball on her duty as owner ninety nine percent of the time. She was just a child after all and how anyone could of expected her to actually take on the role of a business women was unknown. Zakuro was not the type of girl who took things like this seriously because she knew that someone would always come to her aid and fix everything.
“ we both know that’s not true” she blatantly told him before releasing him of her grasp, she was quite aware of her darling Al’s hate for touch but well she was just so amused by how well he played off the whole “ I don’t care touch me if you want” part that Zakuro couldn’t resist the temptation of it all. Lifting herself to sit up on one of the desks beside his she couldn’t help but inwardly laugh at his ability to fake a whine about his work, clearly if he wanted to quit all he had to do was walk away. It was that mere thought that kept her from treating him any differently as their relationship had been the same for well over a year now. He had time to watch and learn that Zakuro was never going to get any better or change and yet as the days ticked by he still took the punishment. “ and leave you here all alone , besides I know you can get it done in a snap and walking out to my car in the dark is scary” she pouted her lip out to him, they both knew she had a driver who was clearly sitting outside waiting to open the door for her and yet here she sat bugging the living life out of him.
“besides now that it’s quite don’t you want to spend a little time with your boss? I mean we could always be friends outside of this place” she was well aware that he wanted nothing to do with her but any chance she could to annoy him to holy hell and back well Zakuro just couldn’t pass up the chance.
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Aubert had told himself he wasn't going to respond when the girl finally removed herself from his arm, but he could not stifle the sigh that rose in his throat. He did resist the urge to dust any invisible trace of Zakuro from his arm. At least now he could focus on managing the hints of hatred in his voice without feeling the threat of vomit in his gut.
He was certain if he possessed any friends they would have inquired as to why he continued to endure what was abuse of any and all forms of professionalism. But Aubert did not have friends and perhaps, on some level, he was fueled by the negativity he felt for his employer. "Fire and Ice" was one of the most frequented shops on Selene and was stocked with essential goods as opposed to any of the niche shops in the city. Aubert was certain he would find a link to Synister here, which was worth anything the pipsqueak bitch held over him-- or onto him as the case often was.
At least he knew that the girl was somewhat dependent on his services; no one else would put up with her constant maltreatment. Their interactions were constant verbal and physical battles for "control" and Aubert liked to consider himself the victor of most, neglecting to account for the fact that he was competing with a 15 years old. As such, he decided to ignore most of what the girl said and insisted, his smile forced and stretched,
"No, really, this is my job and I work best when I'm alone."
“...Don’t you want to spend a little time with your boss? I mean we could always be friends outside of this place.”
The bile rose into his mouth again and he felt his face visibly fall. To engage in any more "quality time" with Zakuro held the same appeal as getting teeth pulled. Squinting at the screen, he pretended to puzzle over an arrangement of sales, turning an appropriate answer over his tongue a few times until he managed,
"I'm afraid the age gap doesn't really make any relationship outside of work appear," a beat, for effect, "Appropriate. Besides, I'm sure you've got all sorts of people foaming at the mouth to eat up your mon-- I mean, you're time."
Feigning a clock check, he smirked at his own cleverness. tagged: @rora notes: otz otz i'm sorry its so rushed. i just didn't want to put it off any longer
It didn’t matter how many times her phone rang and how many party invitations she received for the weeks end, when it came to having fun Zakuro found no greater pleasure then when she found herself alone and bugging the living hell out of Aubert. Sure in the beginning he had been a rather nice fellow, his alter motives for joining were some that Zakuro still hadn’t figured out but for the most part she had someone to do all the work for her and that was really all she needed. The game had not started until later on in the season when a few phone calls to numbers she didn’t know and a few book numbers came up wrong that Zakuro had taken an interest in Aubert. Though he found her young and naïve Zakuro as part of the bright future of a long line of money, had been forced to take business classes as part of her “future plan” in life. Though she had thought them stupid and fanned the illusion that she knew nothing about how any of the systems worked as to avoid any times of Aubert asking for her help Zakuro knew exactly what she was doing when no one was around which probably would have surprised him if he actually cared to know. However in her findings she found nothing suspicious and found that he wasn’t actually stealing from her, he had only messed up a few numbers and had called them in a rather noble and unexpected thing to do.
Aubert had been the focus of her fun when Zakuro had realized he wanted nothing to do with her or her money, it had surprised her but well impressed her all at the same time. She was aware that they would be people in this world that hated her or just flat out didn’t like her and she was ok with that fact however it always puzzled her why he stuck around to highly when she was nothing but cruel to him. As a reward for the amount of time he lasted Zakuro would raise his pay every so often just as a little joke between them, even if he wasn’t aware of it. Sort of a raise for dealing with her. Zakuro was sure he was going to snap one of these days as the last few months he had started losing control of his ability to actually keep his little hits at her hidden. At best Zakuro was only able to figure out he wasn’t playing with her but throwing jabs at her once every month or so give or take how hung over she was from the night before. Now it seemed that he was just losing his touch with everything he tried, even as she pulled herself from his body she could see his tensing as he tried to avoid scrubbing the spots where her body had been.
If they were on any other terms she would have come out and asked him about it, however she was a lazy girl and if she pissed him off enough the boy was libel to just walk out on her and leave her with all the work, something Zakuro was highly allergic to. “ I suppose being alone is your best attribute isn’t it A-kins” she mused at him the tone of her voice bored and uncaring of the situation. Zakuro couldn’t help but smirk as he mentioned the age gap between them as though that was something that actually bothered anyone, he had been with her for almost a year now and if the fact that she was younger then him hadn’t been mulled over yet well the poor man was just living a lie. Once again he had almost lost his cool composer and said something mean to her again, she watched his face as it turned to grin while he pretended to look at the clock. “ if age was a problem half these contacts in my phone would be in trouble” she laughed and slapped his shoulder before hoping down from the desk and heading to the cabinet behind him “ im sure one day will loosen up your old lady bones and get you back to your proper age”
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