Dazed and Confused [semi-closed]

The bright popping graphics and crunched down 16-bit blips and boops were doing wonders for her hangover. Evelyn rubbed at her eyes, leaning over the console where a taunting game over message scrolled down the screen. That went the last of her pocket change. "Jeez..." she mumbled. She'd never been any good at this type of thing.

Bombed, again. Her head was swimming. Evelyn slumped against the cabinet, sighing into the joystick.

The DDR machine had been hogged non-stop for the past half-hour, although it had felt like forever to the girl. She'd tried to wait in earnesty, taking a seat, tapping along to the music, and watching on as the man who'd gotten there before her either didn't get the hint that she had yearned for a turn - or didn't care. With a resigned huff, she decided to drag her attention elsewhere and keep an eye out. Hopefully, once he left, nobody would steal her turn.

Unfortunate as it was, there had to be some other games to play, weren't there? Or people to talk to. She thought back to her vampire admirerer, or the girl from the meteor shower, as this seemed to be her type of haven. Ishiko tossed around her small coin purse between her hands: white, fluffy, bunny shaped, and filled to the brim with tokens. Once one old game finally had caught her attention from across the room, she was disappointed to make out that someone had beaten her to it, yet again.

"Excuse me," She called out from behind. "Is it okay if I had a turn?"

How long had she been standing there, half-dead against the cabinet? The sound of another voice, and the lilt of an accent, made her shoot up, blinking and turning, eyes blurred. It took a few seconds for her vision to focus, center, an Asian girl with short black hair and the cutest bunny purse... Pretty. Evelyn blinked again before her brain caught up with her, and she nodded her head (a little too vigorously), sliding away to let her through. Her pitiful score still blinked against the screen, mockingly. "Um, y-yeah, rrright..."

Yeah. This wasn't really her turf.

Evelyn pinched her nose, propping herself up against the side of the cabinet. She couldn't say why she didn't leave, other than she wasn't really sure if she would've been able to keep her balance. She swooped her fingers through her hair, tucking a few stray stray stands behind her ears, a clumsy attempt to clean up a little in the presence of another person, even if she'd probably forget her the moment she took her eyes off her and focused on the screen.

Silence...

Shouldn't she say something?

Evelyn swallowed, drumming her fingers against the side of the cabinet, still, for some stupid head-spinning reason, not leaving. "Um... I l-like your purse..."

Her face brightened up as the other girl so willingly stepped aside. It was such a breath of fresh air compared to the other guy, whom as far as she could tell, was still hogging up the dance floor... machine, thing. "Thank you!" Ishiko stepped up to the machine looking over the buttons and not paying too much attention to the flashing across the screen. Perhaps she was slow about it, but she'd brought up her purse carefully, her eyes narrowed as she unclasped the small metal pieces holding it closed together. She must have looked somewhat stupid, but it wouldn't have been the first time she'd broken a purse before by pushing two hard. The metal would twist and get all tangled together.

She'd almost forgotten the other girl was there.

"Thank you, again! It's so cute, huh?" She set the cloth bunny into the palm of her hand, holding it up for the girl to see and then pushing it forward in offering. "Take some coins. This game is two player." The word rolled off her mouth a tad uncomfortably, but she was sure to get the point across, smiling and holding up a pair of fingers.

She almost didn't understand at first. Evelyn glanced down at the purse, and then up to her face, and quickly back down to the purse again, twisting a lock of hair around her finger. "Oh, a-a-are you sure...? I m-mean, i-if th-that's okay..." Even while she tumbled off excuses, she reached down, slow and deliberate, like the purse might snap her hand off at the wrist if she made any sudden movements. The Winter pulled out two coins, the metal pinched between her fingers, and shot the girl an uneven, uncertain smile.

Well, what could one more game hurt? She could use one last shot.

Evelyn took her place awkwardly beside the other girl, sliding the coins into a slot and clicking into the game with a push of a button. "I'm, uh... E-E-Evelyn, b-by the way..."

The thought hadn't snapped back to her until she'd set her little purse down, pinching two small tokens of her own and pushing them into the machine. Her new friend's moments were so awkward and seemingly uncertain, like she couldn't manage to balance on her own too feet for long, and her clothes seemed a bit of a small mess. Even so, those weren't the biggest things that the Summer had noticed. Her eyes, they were so pretty, warm and cool shades of blue and violet against the bright arcade lights, and she nimbly noticed the girl's hair curl around in a sweet manner... it was cute, no other word for it.

"Yes! Just try your best!" She offered the brunette her best smile and a little wink for good measure.

Hey, she could be cute too.

The game before them clicked to life, a few pixelated spaceships flashing across the screen. "Michib- ah," she froze, quick to correct herself. "Ishiko, I mean." The girl laughed a bit at herself, low and under her breath. It'd been a few years since she'd been home, but even still, old habits seemed to die hard.

Soon as the story scene had met it's end, she kept her gaze bored into the screen, clicking away at the buttons and firing off at the helpless alien invaders. "Ever-," she stopped again, chewing away at her lip. "Eve-aah..." Her cheeks began to burn red. "Eva - ... Eva? Is that okay?"

Just keep playing the game, don't let her see your face.

It was something so small and so casual and it so easily almost knocked her off balance. Just one wink. Evelyn smiled, nodding, a curious burst of heat to her cheeks. She turned her gaze back to the screen, not daring to look her direction again, her head swimming, blinking as the game revved back to life, pixels flaring across the screen. Ishiko. That was... unique? Pretty. Pretty unique. At least, where she came from... There weren't too many immigrants back home in Montana.

She let out an uncertain chuckle under her breath as Ishiko struggled with her name. Eva... Eva? Eva nodded. "Y-yeah, d-d-definitely... Th-that's okay..."

Ishiko. Ishiko. Ishiko. Evelyn absentmindedly fiddled with the joystick, thumb rubbing over the top. She had to make sure she didn't mess that one up, at least.

Eva snuck a glance at her out the corner of her eye. She hadn't realized she was looking too long until she heard that ugly crunched down death sound, a pixelated explosion that jolted her back to her senses. "Sh—... sheesh...! Dang..." She winced, gripping the joystick with new resolve and a sharp exhaling breath, catching herself before she dropped any... uh, indelicate language. One life already wasted... Way to make her look like an idiot, especially after she let her play with her own money... With her free hand, weaving past pixel bullets with her other, she reached into her jacket and slid out a silver flask, swigging back a discrete sip before re-capping it and pushing it back into her coat. "Sorry..." she finished, ignoring the slow burn down her throat.

Alright. She had this. She wouldn't mess up again.

Ishiko found herself chewing away at the inside of her cheek, her new partner's life fizzling away at the edge of the screen. She couldn't find it in herself to judge the girl all that harshly, not while she was silently struggling on her own. It took careful practice to just tap ever-so-gently over the small button, not to press to hard or end up busting her finger through the bottom of the machine. It wouldn't have been the first time that happened. Sometimes, she just got so excited playing that she got carried away with herself.

Warm eyes flickered over as the dim gleam of silver had caught her eye. She didn't look for long, gaze blued back to the screen. "Eva-chan?" the Summer whispered under her breath, holding the name close to her as their game set off into action once again. "Get that power-up!" Towards the top left of the screen, a small fruit-shape ship floated around. She could survive without and it'd be enough to win them the level. "I'm counting on you!"

The boss would be coming up any moment now.

Eva-chan. The corner of her lip twisted up, amused. That was too cute... But Evelyn didn't linger on it, eyes darting to the power-up drifting listlessly down from the corner of the screen. Alright. She had to get her head in the game. She couldn't mess up twice in a row now—that would've been something too embarrassing to handle. Evelyn jerked on the joystick, a hard right that sent her little ship banking across the screen, spraying little pixel pellets all over. "G-got it!" A light glow washed over her sprite with some triumphant fanfare.

The flashing lights across the screen gleamed in her determined eyes as she shot down small ship after small ship, one after another, clearing the path for Evelyn to rush in and grab hold of the power-up just in time for the boss to appear. Getting a bit too excited and ahead of herself, she leaned up on the tip of her toes, making a conscious effort to not shove her nose into the screen - she at least had to make room for her partner to see what she was doing. "There it is! Get it!" With rapid taps of the buttons, she fired away, taking small bites off of the boss' health.

She'd been shot at. Attacked. Watched the school burn. So it was a little embarrassing that seeing this 16-bit boss edge across the top of the screen made her heart leap the way it did, made her palms sweat as she jammed the joystick back, banking away from a sweeping hail of pixel bullets. Evelyn slammed her finger down on the button, bullets streaming out in a chorus of pip-pip-pip-pip-pip!s that chipped away at the boss like the rapid rattle of machine gun fire, and oh-so-embarrassingly, she could sense her eyes starting to light up as she watched that health bar begin to crash from green to yellow between the two of them.

Evelyn had never been a gamer, but she was starting to see the appeal.

She was starting to get ahead of herself. Ishiko knew it, but in her own excitement, she found it hard to care. Bit by bit, the bosses' health trickled down from it's high yellow bar to a dangerously low flashing red; they were doing so well, and if she were being honest, she'd never gotten this far into the fight on her own. Her brown eyes hooked onto her new friend's for a mere moment, absolutely beaming. "We're going to make it!" The Summer was on the verge of laughing, ready to unleash her strongest attack - she brought up her palm and slammed it down onto the button...

A little harshly...

Or far too harsh, perhaps.

The attack button cracked and caved in, an ugly bar of black and green blaring up on her side of the screen, blocking out half the entire game. She paused, staring and taking in her own mistake. A nervous smile touched her lips. "O-otto..." Ishiko shot a quick glance behind her and took a step back, to be sure no one else had seen. "I didn't mean to..." She looked back at the broken machine, cheeks ablaze.

They were so close. They were so close! Evelyn put all she had into this, in a way she hadn't put effort into anything in... well, a long time. There was a flare of excitement bubbling up in her chest, in her throat, a wide smile carving across her face, ready to burst out in a yell of triumphant laughter as that last tick of health was about to be blown away, and—...! CRACK. "W-waghhh!" she yelped, pushing away from the machine with some uneven stumbling as the screen flickered, the heart-pumping music flatlining into an ugly one-note broken blaring out from the machine... Oh. Shit. Evelyn glanced around, from the machine, to the bar, to the other patrons, and back to Ishiko.

She clasped her by the wrist and started tugging her away, making for the door. "W-we should g-g-get... o-outta here, o-o-okay?" Evelyn kept her voice light, as if they hadn't just destroyed a good thousand dollars of machinery...

As if her embarrassment weren't enough. Ishiko flinched as her new friend was almost shrill in her surprise, so seeing if her cheeks could possibly burn any more than they already were. Her brown eyes shot to the front counter, seeing the owner waver in suspicion and feeling a chill run down her spine. Great. How was she supposed to explain...? What would she do -

"What?" she muttered, distracted despite the sharp tug. She did it again. The summer should have known better. Why did she have to get so excited? Ishiko bit her lip, finally bringing herself to look back at the girl as they stumbled through the arcade.

"Christ!" A voice boomed from the back of the room. "What did you do?"

Her eyes went wide. "Right! Going now! Sorry!" Ishiko near squeaked, making a sudden rush out the door. In the back of her mind, she felt her wrist slip free of it's restraint. She was quick to recover, grasping onto Eva's hand instead and making their escape down the street.

She wasn't much of a runner these days. Back before Beata, and bleeding into her early years here, she'd kept up a light schedule to keep fit. Nothing crazy, just some morning jogs so she wasn't just curled up with a book in her arms day after day. Mother's idea—or more accurately, mother's orders. Then when it sank in she didn't have to, she'd stopped. There wasn't any conscious decision about it, she'd just skipped a few runs here and there and eventually it just wasn't something she did.

The point was, she wasn't much of a runner.

More to the point, she was flushed and gasping for air twenty feet down the street, chest tightening, heart thumping against her ribs like it was trying to squeeze through the gaps. There was a burst of speed out the door, adrenaline kicking her into high gear, and for a good five or ten seconds she was Barry Jackson with the wind in her hair. Then all at once it was like hitting a wall, her little bit of stamina drained, and then she was flagging behind, pumping arms that felt like lead, the muscles in her legs straining with effort.

That's when Ishiko's hand clasped around hers. And fuck if she didn't have a solid grip. She shouldn't have been surprised by the girl who'd just smashed open fifteen hundred dollars of heavy equipment with her fists, but she was. Evelyn let her take the lead, more focused on keeping up than on where they were going.