Mori Kida

"What?" I exclaim, as he grabs my hand and begins walking, a bit too quickly for me to keep up with. "Hey!"

"Mori forgot to bring a mask again," he spits.

Adjusting to the sunlight, my eyes can finally make out the tall, stately figure of Mori Kida, hovering nervously by the school entrance. Everyone leaving school eyes her with interest, and if it wasn't for the public photography law, phones would've already been out and she'd be making the rounds on the internet.

She looks like an angel as usual, her straight black hair glowing almost blue in the midday sun, and her long flowy skirt only serving to emphasise her infinite legs.

"Mori!" I can't help but exclaim, waving to her. She looks heart-breakingly terrified, as if she can't decide whether the attention is too uncomfortable or if she wants to wait for us.

"Yoshi!" she exclaims, her face lighting up and her anxiety dissolving when she sees us. She scurries forward to hug me, enveloping me in the sweet scent of Cloud Eau de Parfum.

"Nice to see you too," Hiro grumbles, stuffing his hands in his pockets, but I can tell he's pleased to see her too.

"Hiro," she cheers, leaning down to give him a hug too. "Surprise! I thought it'd be nice to see you guys today."

"Yeah, yeah, nice, whatever." Hiro glares at a passing senior, who looks at Mori just a bit too long. "Listen, let's just get away from here first and we can talk later."

We all pile onto the public bus, wedging ourselves into two rows of seats that face each other. Mori hooks her arm in mine in a natural, comfortable movement (her love language is physical touch, and she never lets me forget it).

"Wasn't it far getting here?" I ask lightly. Mori shakes her head.

"Not really! The train ride only took an hour and I had seats, so it wasn't so bad."

"And your mask?" Hiro taps his face meaningfully.

"Oh!" Mori shrinks in her seat, blushing. "Well, uh, I remembered this time, but then it broke…" Her sentence trails off unintelligibly.

"What?" Hiro and I ask in unison.

"Then I picked up a stray cat and he tried to bite my face off," she says in a rush.

My expression says everything. Hiro bursts out laughing, so loudly he begins to draw the irritated gazes of other people on the bus.

Mori blushes furiously, stomping her feet. "Don't laugh! It was a cute cat!"

It'd been Hiro's idea for Mori to wear a mask whenever she went out, seeing as how the attention always made her uncomfortable and we could never get two steps without someone stopping us to ask for her number - it really made us wonder how she was living up to that point.

Hiro could be surprisingly maternal sometimes, for someone of his temper. Maybe you'd never guess, but he was actually the eldest - he had a younger sister of eight, who spent a lot of time in and out of the hospital due to her heart. His parents spent a lot of time looking after her, but he was never sour about it, instead caring for her as fiercely as a tiger looking after its cubs.

Maybe I do know a lot about Hiro, I think to myself, watching him pull out a mask for Mori, wiping tears from the corner of his eye.

The Dogs had been formed almost by fate - coincidentally, we'd been playing the same MOBA (multiplayer online battle arena) we were just playing last night. There were weekly casual tournaments that you could take part in for some in-game currency, and we'd all just happened to be matched up in the same team, hurtling to victory.

I still remember watching CRIMSON and Blue bicker in chat about who was going to get to play the main damage dealer - ultimately they'd run out of time and the game automatically selected their most played heroes for them.

I never said so, but that night was one of the favourite memories I had, and I still go back to Hachi's channel to watch that stream from time to time.

Afterward, Hachi had been the one to ask for everyone's contact, which was surprising because he'd hardly said anything the entire tournament.

That had been two years ago. Now we were hanging out in real life, going for meals together; or in this case, pancakes.

"When's the last time you ate?" I ask no one in particular.

"Oh… kind of a while, I think?" Mori replies first. "We don't really have human food at home, my parents don't have a lot of time to cook."

Mori was a single child, but since she was bigger now, her mother ran a small local store and her dad worked in an office. They dreamt of moving to a big house and retiring in the countryside, which was a dream I could totally get behind.

"Doesn't matter when I last ate," Hiro replies evasively, hiking up his backpack.

"You had ice cream yesterday, didn't you?"

"Shut up!"

Vampires could eat human food, but not too much or not too often. It was much like lactose intolerance in people - too much accumulated in the body and they'd fall ill. Hiro had the tendency to push those limits (as he did many others), and we had the tendency to tease him about it.

The sky is blessedly cloudy, offering a breeze to make the crowd feel less stifling. Here and there we see flashes of our school uniform, but we avoid them with practised ease - there was something so awkward about meeting people your age in public.

With her mask on, we would have made good progress if Mori didn't insist on stopping every few paces to look at something in the windows.

Summer really was coming; if not evident from the weather, then from the bright colours invading all the clothing stores. Mori had a weakness for pastels, and it was taking everything in my being to come up with reasons to dissuade her.

"You really don't need that," I tell her for the countless time. "You have something like that already."

"You sound like my mum," she pouts, but lets us drag her away without any more complaints.

Through various trials and tribulations, we finally make it to the pancake place. Though I probably have less-than-ideal eating habits, even I have to admit that I'm beginning to feel hungry.

"Hurry up," Hiro snaps, pulling on Mori's arm to stop her wandering off again. "Yoshi needs to eat."

Mori and I exchange a look, then start laughing.

"Shut up!" he growls. "Get in line. I'll go get a menu."

I still find myself giggling even after he hurries off, the tips of his ears red.