Alexia: It's beautiful.
Selenia: Isn't it just? :black_heart:

The next day, I was back in Eversummer Days, snuggling with Alexia virtually as I showed off the new model. It met with her approval, as I expected; I'm looking forward to when we get to play with it~ All those players will never know what happened to them...

Well. This isn't the main event, now, is it. I may have primed Kolya for it virtually, but now it's time to make it manifest.

Alexia: I really wish I could stay and we could play this out, but I don't have very long at all. I'm seeing my little sister on the Delmar boardwalk soon.
Selenia: What a coincidence! I'm meeting my older sister later!
Alexia: In your Akane costume, right? I wish I could see that...
Selenia: Maybe I'll send you pictures later. ;)
Selenia: Or...maybe, you'd like to meet up with me sometime?
Alexia: Ah! Ah...
Alexia: It's a bit early for that, but um...maybe? Maybe. It might be nice.

I grinned to myself before the glow of the screen.

Kolya couldn't resist herself, after all. Choosing to find fulfillment behind a silver screen. Imagining a world where she could be glorious. And given the slightest chance, falling in love - hell, not even just with me. That Cao Cao friend of Alexia's on the server, they're pretty romantic together - Cao Cao is even jealous of me! Aw, how sweet~

But this is the response I expected. Telling herself she's a boy, just playing at being a lesbian. That she can only appreciate this from afar, and she's already crossed a line. Even though she can only enjoy yuri and she can only love girls - perhaps justifying on some level that a girl with a stamen 'doesn't count' - she believes it's a world she can never touch. Even as she longs for it, from me saying that my older sister didn't know she was a sister until now...

I'll save you, Kolya.

Selenia: I love you, Alexia. *kiss*

I love you, Kolya.

Alexia: I love you too...!

And you'll love me too. 🖤

---

Delmar's quite a ways away from the Verwest district, one of the vacation districts on the shorelines (natural or otherwise). Arcades, amusement rides, beachgoers, all the entertainment you could ever want...with an adding helping of existential dread from rising sea levels! They already have had to move Delmar back a few feet. Maybe someday it'll be underwater like Miami or something.

But that doesn't really matter anymore.

The world isn't going to be the same as it was my first time around. I'll be there to change it, with those I love - and I want Kolya to be by my side!

Waiting by the Kavinsky arcade, I carefully adjust my wig and glasses to be certain I'll be recognized. After all, Kolya was probably imagining someone her age, not her little sister. Surely, she's thinking all about Alexia and Selenia, with her head in the clouds and old Muse albums blasting her eardrums, dreading the possibility she might have to interact with our father. Or maybe she's thinking of the bullying, of whoever it is who hurts her, and grateful for a single moment's reprieve from that darkness with the little sister who will smile just for her.

She could never imagine this.

The moment I spot that messy mop of spiky, slightly-oiled hair, I just stand there smiling next to the OutRun 2 machine - Kolya's favorite, naturally, and our usual meeting spot - and sure enough, her eyes pass me by, not able to easily recognize her sister under such a cunning disguise.

She walks around a bit, thinks I'm not there, spends a bit on the crane machine, grabs a nice little plush kaiju from it, walks around again, passes by the OutRun machine, and...

she squints.

She blinks.

A girl there, in that purple hoodie, those cracked glasses, wig that same lavender shade Percy wears, smiling ear to ear.

She takes off her glasses, wipes them, and stares dumbfounded for the briefest of moments before realization dawns on her, and turns to horror.

'Selenia', the girl she's been roleplaying with, said she was going to see her older sister, wearing an Akane Shinjo costume. Meanwhile, Kolya is going to see her younger sister, and said younger sister is now wearing an Akane Shinjo costume - highly unlikely for someone so young, short, and flat to be wearing - which would thus make her...

"L-lera?" she squeaks out, shuddering in terror. Poor, poor thing, who can't even embrace herself...

Let me fix that.

I rush forward toward Kolya, and leap up, hugging her tightly and kissing her right on the lips, right there in the arcade!

"Kolya!" I said, as I pulled away, still holding onto her tightly. "I've been waiting so long to see you again!"

I've been waiting so long to save you. 🖤

"L-l-lera, what are you wearing?" she stammered, frozen up. Her fate I saw with that kiss...aah, poor thing. If Kolya had survived, then Vesta would never have had to suffer, huh? "It's supposed to be clear skies all day, shouldn't...um, isn't that jacket hot?"

The image of Kolya's bully is clear to me now. We can sever that thread, together, however we have to.

But for now, Kolya is all that matters in the world.

"It's my Akane Shinjo costume!" I said, not letting her turn away from it. "I said I was going to wear it when I went to see my big sister, right?"

"I - but -"

I smiled. Ear to ear.

"You're my big sister, Kolya."

With a father who was alternately neglectful and abusive, prone to bursts of anger and disdainful toward the mother of his child he abandoned without remorse, Kolya supported me when no one else could. I had Mona and Rana, to be sure, but that could never be the same. She and Vesta thought poorly of one another, fighting over me by proxy, but...well, what do you know, their fate should be to come together in love~

Her fate, before it was severed, was to choose womanhood. To embrace it. I could never have seen it back then, of course - I was never in a position to. I knew much more about Kolya than I let on, than she might've even known about herself, but that wasn't something a girl my age could know.

"Selenia, was, that, you -"

I hopped off of Kolya, and took her by the hand.

"I said we would go shopping today, didn't I?"

And I tugged her by that hand, and she followed - terrified, but helpless to resist. She fell in love with 'Selenia', she longed to be a girl to not disappoint her, and if it was her sister, well...

My other lover is a goddess! What's a little incest between friends~? 🖤

---

The first thing to do, of course, would be dealing with her hair. That messy black mop has got to go.

"Hey there, welcome to First Cuts! I'm Aoi," the hairdresser at the counter said as I pulled Kolya in, the girl nearly as tiny as I am. "Oh, right, it's you! Don't worry, don't worry! I've done this a lot; just leave it to me and I'll have you looking great!"

"I, uh...um." Kolya fidgeted, but Aoi interpreted it as just being first-time nerves. (Well, that and 'girl hot'...seriously, though, girl hot.)

"It's okay, we can take this as slow as you need," she said, and big sis couldn't find it in her to refuse. "Sunset's new hair extensions will amaze you! It'll be like your hair was always this long."

"Uh, sure," Kolya said, as I held her hand when she was placed into the wash basin. She was blushing a lot - Aoi was pretty, so it's only natural, even if it was hard for her to see past her lack of glasses.

I could tell.

Her heart pounded.

She wasn't a girl, she thought, I'm sure. She couldn't be. She should never have pretended. She's been seen.

But I wouldn't let her be too afraid, so long as I held her hand.

"So, what's your name?" Aoi asked, her hands sweetly running through that hair and cutting through everything.

"N-nikita." Kolya was bewildered by everything, but she still tried to push through...

"Ooh, how mysterious! I'll have you looking like a femme fatale in no time!"

...right, people always were saying Kolya had a girl's name, right? Guess for the first time, that comes in handy~

As Kolya's hair was washed, Aoi rubbed something over her face, and with it washed away her stubble. Her blush at a cute girl's touch was so cute! "We've got a full range of waxing, electrolysis, and laser hair removal courses. If you want, we can take you in the back for some of that after this."

"T-that might be a bit much for me," Kolya stammers. "I'm just a student, so..."

"It's fine, our dad is paying!" I gleefully showed off the credit card. "But I don't think we have time for that. It's a big day."

"You're lucky, Nikita. It's not every 'candidate' that gets such a cute little sister to help her 'tell the Goddess her name'." (Huh, the whole 'Lost Girl' thing probably explains the horns, thinking about it. Gotta be a long commute from Delmar to the Electric City, though!) "Alright, now that we've done that wash, I'll just dye your hair to match. What color?"

"Uh, I, um, didn't think about it," Koyla said. Which, of course, is true.

"What if we make it white?" I grin, and understanding dawns on her. Understanding that, well...

What was once just a fantasy will become her new reality.

Kolya and Alexia will become one and the same.

Aoi deftly ran that Sunset dye through Kolya's hair, bleaching it stark white, running a blacklight over it and then running it through her fingers as she trimmed it here and there. I remember how much trouble Mom used to have just dying her roots, while I can just have blue hair with a quick shower; zaibatsu science really is something...

The hair extensions are new, though.

I'm not really clear on how they work, honestly. Kolya's hair is quickly pressed into some kind of big machine, and it seems like the process is a bit painful; she has trouble keeping herself still.

"Don't worry about it. This always happens on this machine." Aoi smiles sweetly. Ah, I didn't really pay much attention to where I took Kolya, but she really is nice! "I'm not giving you a lollipop though."

"I-it's fine," Kolya says, breathing, as she tries to get through it. Well, she can't say no to her little sister, right?

Soon enough, we take her out of the machine, get her back into the chair to brush through her hair, tug just a few stray hairs away, and...

Yep.

She's stuck staring in the mirror, until she gazes at herself...

"Huh. I'm pretty jealous. You've got naturally pretty features. Goes well with your pale skin, I'd say. I think it's missing a little something though..."

I grinned, and got out some black lipstick Mona prepared for me! I quickly pressed it onto my lips, got up again, and...

mwah.~

One smooch later, and her lips are painted black. Forever. 🖤

"I, uh -"

"Oh, that's it! Little sis knows best, huh?" Aoi giggles. "I'll give you a coupon for next time, darling Nikki. Just ask for me, yeah~?" Aah, she's so nice! (Aoi probably would've objected normally, but, y'know. I'm used to warping people's common sense by now~)

"o-okay," she manages, just barely.

...anyway, I let Kolya sit there for a while.

And stare.

She's still worried, isn't she? About her body. About whether she'd look good in clothes. And maybe she feels like she should have Alexia's amazing tits?

We'd better fix all that, then~!

---

"I don't really get it," Kolya said, once we settled onto a patio for a parfait. (Somehow it's still slang for 'lesbian date' in my time.) She's been swiveling her head to and fro, and even she can notice people are looking at her differently. "I mean, it's like, it's nice, but -"

"Two thousand hours."

"...what?"

I smiled, having long since removed the Akane costume, it having served its purpose. (It's really not the same without her chest, y'know?) "Two thousand hours. That's the time you've put into roleplaying as Alexia over the past couple of years. And that's only counting playtime in Eversummer Days; I bet you and 'Cao Cao' have been doing it elsewhere too."

"Lots of people roleplay as the opposite - mmf."

"'Opposite sex'? That's such a Heisei expression!" I giggle as I push a spoon into Kolya's lovely lips. I always wanted to do that~

"...are you really Valeriya?" Kolya blinks, swallowing down that parfait. "I thought Dad banned computer games."

"I'm definitely your little sister! You wouldn't believe the truth yet, though." I took my own spoon and started to dig in. "Let's get down to business. You're being bullied at school."

"Y-yeah, but it's no big deal -"

"Kolya."

With both the power of a little sister and the firm iron of someone far older than her body, I pressed the issue. No matter what happened here, if this bully was determined enough to drive her to suicide - and get away scot free, far as I can tell - I wouldn't let her toss it off like that.

"Yeah..." Kolya sighs, looking aside. "Yeah. It's bad."

"It's not Roza, is it?"

"No." Kolya shook her head. "Thankfully, no. If it were her, I'd probably already be dead." A sigh, as she settled her spoon down and looked out toward the shore as the sun descended in the sky. "Her name's Marciel. Maria Celia Tupas y Dimayuga."

"That name...Filipino?" I quickly got out both my phones, Kolya squinting at them as I scrolled through. With a name, I could actually make some conclusions.

"Yeah. She's on the swim team with my friend Arleth."

"Oh, the pinkette you have a crush on..." I giggled as I tapped through my search results on Solarflare. "Maybe she'll look at you differently now~?"

In the future phone, Marciel is...well, all I found was a generic business profile, really. Ma. Celia, insurance assessor at Sunset Financial Services. You could hardly tell her apart from anyone else in the field, really.

In the present, she's fairly preppy. Selfies with friends, complaints about school, pictures of food. Again, it'd be hard to tell her apart from any other high school girl.

There's one thing both the past and the future Marciel have in common: she seems...

normal.

I don't know what I was expecting, really. But maybe that's the point. Maybe, someone who looks normal, and fits into Sunset's plan, could easily get away with murder if she says the right things, and the person who she kills is undesirable enough. If she'd met Vesta early, then she'd have someone who could -

mm.

I swallow down my discomfort. It's not important. She can do nothing now. Anything Kolya wants her to be, she'll be. My gift to her, in honor of her girlhood.

"Anyway, two thousand hours. As Alexia." I continue with my parfait, giggling a bit as people try to catch a look of Kolya.

"Lots of people RP as a girl as guys. Especially on servers like that. That doesn't mean I'm a 'candidate', y'know?"

"How many guys do it so much they neglect everything else? Their studies?" Kolya winces, and I shake my head. "No, I'm not trying to shame you. I don't care about school anymore, you know?" More to the point, I already did it!

"Is it really that uncommon? At least I'm not playing a gacha game."

"Then what's your relationship to Cao Cao?" Fun fact - Cao Cao's player is a friend of Vesta's, a newhalf named Ai! What are the odds, huh? "She probably doesn't even realize you're 'actually a guy, honest'. You're basically girlfriends."

"It's nothing like that, it's just RP..." Kolya fidgets more - she's lying. That relationship is very close. Neither of them might acknowledge it, but they're all but girlfriends.

"And then you fell for me!" I grin, and lick off some parfait from my face. "Honestly, I was almost tempted to wait and see if you'd actually go for it and meet up. I just didn't know how long it'd take, so I didn't wanna risk it. I couldn't lose you." (Not again.)

"Risk it?" Kolya blinks. "What would..."

And then she realizes.

I know how bad Marciel is getting to her.

"Hey."

I take Kolya's hand in mine, and kiss it. And then I get some polish out of my bag, and paint her nails the same color as her lips.

"...she's gonna do it harder if you do this," she muttered, even as she stared, transfixed.

"Nah. I'll protect you, Kolya. I promise."

...I don't know if she could believe it. I still looked like the Lera from the first goaround. There would be nothing I could do even if I knew, besides give her all the love I could.

But at the very least, she didn't object, when I fed her the rest of the parfait as her nails dried.

---

"...I'm not that unhappy," Kolya says, as we walk up to a clothing store. "Like. I don't cry because I'm a guy. I'm not, uh...what's the word. Dysphoric?"

"Are you happy, though?" I'm firmly holding her hand, tugging her through the aisles. In the images of her fate, I saw things I want to make happen.

"I, uh, I guess not, I suppose. I might be happy if Marciel wasn't around." Kolya shakes her head. "It's just a fetish, though. It's not like, it's not real..."

"Autogynephilia is well-documented in cisgender women," I say, adopting a faux-formal voice. "Why are all your excuses from the Heisei era, anyway?"

(I knew the reason, of course. Sometimes I wonder why Dad didn't just stay in Mother Russia if he was going to get upset at anything the slightest bit queer.)

"Just because someone likes being a girl, doesn't mean they're trans! Think of all the guys who write gender bender porn and stay guys -"

"Are you listening to yourself?"

I needed to make it happen.

Going through aisles and racks like a storm, I picked out everything I thought I'd need. Size didn't matter, I'd make it fit. We'd need a lot to make a whole wardrobe, and I loved the way Kolya looked so bewildered by it all~

Shoving us both into a changing room, I quickly tossed off her Gridman t-shirt and started to go to work.

"Wait, what happened to my body hair -"

"Don't ask stupid questions!" I puffed my cheeks out cutely, Kolya naked from the waist up. I quickly wrapped a corset around her, compressing it rather tighter than she'd probably expect, lacing it up and tying a cute bow in the back as I wrapped a strapless bra around her chest. Like I said, I'd make it fit.

She just let it happen as I started to press clothes to her body. As I showed her what she could be, what she could become. Every time I did, she changed just a little bit more.

She watched, dumbfounded. She probably didn't even notice the changes. She was just thinking, 'wow, could this really look good on me?' for the briefest of moments before depression and repression both weighed upon her again.

Anything that was worth keeping - nearly all of it - was put aside, until I found what I was looking for. What I'd use against her.

In the Heisei era, they used to make jokes about pastel stockings - but pastels didn't suit my dearest Kolya. Someone as pale as her needed to be painted black. So I tugged up those stockings, wrapped a garter around her hips, and gave her some nice high-heeled shiny boots...she'd get used to walking in heels in no time.

A pleated skirt, just long enough to not be totally scandalous, and a thick studded belt to hold it on, tightened over Kolya's girly, sexy hips. A nice black choker to properly accentuate her smooth, almost deathly pale skin.

"Lera, are you sure we can afford all this?" Aah, now her objections don't make any sense~ It really is nice to mess with girls' heads - and I hope Kolya will know the same pleasure, soon.

"Close your eyes," I whispered, and she obeyed. I got to wrap her in a silky long-sleeved blouse, one that would hug her curves as they formed, and tugged on some fingerless gloves so she could handle a riding crop if she so chose. She definitely looked the part now, like a classy dominatrix~

Finally, I popped a nice big 'officer'-style hat on Kolya, and grinned. "Open up~ Let's see how you look!"

And Kolya did.

Kolya stared. Transfixed.

With just a little love, care, and attention - more in this evening than she probably had in her entire life, perhaps - and a tiiiiiiny bit of magic, she looks every bit as gorgeous as the Alexia she wanted so badly to be. Her breasts fill up that bra and that shirt perfectly, showing that tantalizing bit of decolletage. Her lips are shiny and so easily let her express herself. Her glasses are gone, showing off her pale, icy blue eyes.

Kolya surely must think that I've made her into Alexia. That I've turned her into her roleplay character, the one she envied, the one she fantasized about endlessly. The one who looked like she wanted to look, fucked like she wanted to fuck, and was everything Kolya is not.

And even that would probably be enough, to convince her of the truth.

I didn't pull this image, this outfit, this look from Alexia, though.

This was something I saw in her fate. A possible future. Her potential, if she had the chance to grasp it, one way or another. Be it through a supernatural power or her own strength, if someone was there to save her when she needed it most.

Kolya wanted it, so badly. All her objections failed her in this moment, save one:

she was afraid.

People would just see her as an ugly guy, pretending at womanhood. No one would accept her. Mother would reject her. Liliya's big sister Roza would push her away. She could never grasp anything like Alexia with her own power. She would be forced to struggle against Marciel alone, with an all new avenue to attack - and even in the late Reiwa era, there would always be people who hate her for what she desired most.

To admit that she was a girl, in truth, would be a path that brought her great hardship. And if she took that path, she would be all alone.

But that's the thing.

Kolya is not alone. Even now, she has Arleth, her very best friend, defending her from Marciel. She has 'Cao Cao', or rather Ai, whose days are made brighter because Kolya is in her life. And somewhere in the ouroboros of time, she had Vesta, too...

and both then and now, she has me.

"A certain friend of mine named Cibele said something once like...'you can be a girl too'," I whispered, over Kolya's shoulder. "You can, will, and are. All it takes is wanting it."

Kolya said nothing.

She just stared at herself, at the beauty she could claim.

"...here." I grabbed a small bottle out of my purse, filled with a black liquid that so greatly resembled the glistening oil. "If you drink this, your voice will change to match! I don't have an antidote, though."

Mona could easily make one, but that wasn't the point.

The point was that, in this moment, I would not force anything on her. This would be her choice, and if she drank that bottle, there would be no going back.

She held it in front of her, for only the briefest of moments.

And then she swallowed it as if it were her very life.

"...this is..." She marveled, at the change in sound - again, something she could've achieved herself. "Lera..."

"You're my big sister, Kolya. Nikita Ilyinichna Ivanova. And I love you."

"...I am..." I saw, just the faintest sight of tears in her eyes..."Oh, Goddess, I am."

And now? The only thing I could do now that I'd given Kolya her voice, is to silence it with a kiss.

She took me into her arms, and I wrapped my legs around her. I, ah...I could feel it...she wanted me. Well, it wouldn't be the first time, and it wouldn't be right, but who cares! I'm asking it of her, and with all I've done to her without letting her even stop and think about it, the least I can do is offer my love to her.

It wasn't the most romantic time or place for her to desire me. And Vesta might snicker a little about it. But maybe that's what made it romantic.

Besides. That 'possible future' Kolya makes a living on sex. That whole dominatrix thing isn't just for show~

We kissed, with tongue, as she pressed me to the mirror and I held her tight. Her hat flew off in the flurry as we expressed our feelings without words. It didn't really matter what the rest of the world would think - I'd waited twenty years to come back here and save her, found myself drawn in by her inner self and darkest desire, and I would give Kolya all that I am.

(And I didn't put panties on her for a reason. I kinda thought this might happen, y'know?)

She kissed me hungrily, like her life depended on it. (Maybe she thought it did.) I returned it, as much as I could. Taking breaths whenever I could steal away.

Since the Akane costume was basically a school uniform, I'd been wearing a nice short skirt; the pantyhose really didn't matter in the scheme of things. I'd been so wet this whole time; every little bit of Kolya's transformation made me feel more and more...

I didn't need sex to do it. But I admit, Kolya is awfully tempting.

"Hehehe. This is my first time," I whispered to her as I pulled away panting. Ooh, it feels so good..."Kind of, anyway. First time being filled, at any rate."

"You really have no sense of right or wrong, do you?" Kolya teased, finally embracing herself. She didn't need Alexia! (Or maybe, they're now one and the same?) "You've been a naughty girl, Lera."

"I have been." I giggled eagerly as I spread my legs open, grabbing onto some of the hooks on the wall so she could tug off my panties, ripping right into my hose. "You're my big sister. Doesn't that mean you should punish me~?"

"Is it a punishment if you enjoy it?" she whispered, licking my cheek, breathing hot against me, awakening just as Vesta had. A-ah, her fluids tingle now; I get the feeling Marciel might not be such a problem..."What a troublesome girl!"

"That's right, I'm very troublesome." I giggled, and allowed her to embrace me.

To fill me.

It was an altogether different kind of feeling than all I'd experienced before. Kolya filled me. Her passion was eager and visible as she abandoned her sense of propriety and gave in to a proper lack of common sense. Pushing me against that wall again and again, and no one even tried to knock...

She'd been pent up. She'd been hurt. She'd held a nameless longing. I think, perhaps, she held on as long as she did only for my sake - to protect me from our father, however she could.

But no longer.

Now, here, she could love as she'd always wanted. Be as she always dreamed. Kiss me as I demanded.

She could

fill me

as much as she wished, with something that tingled and burned inside me, something that anyone else would surely feel inside them, crawling through them like a parasite...

and finally, I'd done what I'd set out to do.

I'd saved Vesta. I'd saved Kolya. I confessed to Mona. I claimed Rana. I'd even defeated hated Liliya, though even I couldn't have predicted how.

Now, with all things resolved, the future was clear before us. And with our magic, no one would be able to stop us...

well, okay.

Maybe there's one loose end I should tie up first.

---

"...so. Who are you, really?"

We had barely said a word after we left the clothing store, hand in hand.

(We did clean up first, though. We're not monsters.)

Now, here, in a ferris wheel far above the Delmar boardwalk, staring out toward the sunset of a southern sun, Kolya could finally ask the obvious question that was on her mind the whole time.

"I'm Lera. I promise, I'm really Lera."

"And I'm...just supposed to go with all this?" She chuckled, but she smiled - she smiled in a way that I'd never seen before now. "Really? I mean, I won't complain, but..."

I laughed. "When I say I'm Lera, I'm...not the Lera you know. Not entirely." I sighed and looked to the sun, sipping on the slush I ordered on the way. "I'm from twenty years in the future. More like twenty-one, really."

"Do you know next week's lottery numbers?"

"Chaos theory, Kolya! They'll be useless by now!" I grinned. "But, um...in that future, you died, you know? Because of Marciel. Honestly, I didn't even know about this," I said as I gestured to her...her, "I just hopped onto Eversummer Days to check things out, and you kinda swept me away. I didn't plan on kissing you!"

"So you haven't been having fantasies about genderbending me for twenty years?" She snickers, and aah, even that is just so sexy now. I outdid myself!

"Nah. That's just a bonus." I leaned against the glass, and looked into Kolya's eyes - and it means a lot, that she accepted that, an act to her of impossible intimacy. "I didn't need you to be a girl to want to save you, when you'd done so much to make me happy when you were alive. I wanted you to be a girl, because that's what made you happy when I saw you right now.

"In that game, in that moment, I saw you happier than I'd ever seen you. How could I not want you to be my big sister, and make you that happy in real life?"

Kolya nodded in agreement, eyes fluttering tenderly as she felt the euphoria of being her true self. She sipped on her own slush with shiny black lips, reclining somewhat in that silky outfit of hers that showed off what she'd become. (Really, with how people were staring at her, they should probably be charged extra for getting a look.)

"'Dream of who we were, and of who we have become'," Kolya whispers to herself, humming some tune I couldn't place...

and then she bared her teeth, turning to me with eager glee.

"...and the Akane Shinjo costume?" she asked.

"You're basically her, right? Maybe not with the garbage bags, but everything else. Including the 'super gay and infinitely desirable' part!"

"Soooooooo..."

Kolya quickly pecked my cheek, and licked up some of the slush, at the apex of the wheel.

"What you're saying is, we need to make that costume for me next time."

"...I like the way you think, Kolya.~"

---

Once we got out of that Ferris wheel, hand in hand, the person I was waiting for was already standing there. She was expecting me, after all, and I was right on time.

Even if she was distant from her flame, Vesta still bore the beauty a goddess deserved. And when she looked toward me, she saw who I was with, and...

"...Lera, I know you can handle yourself, but you really shouldn't just drag in strange women from the boardwalk," said Vesta. "Look at her. Don't you think she's thinking perverted things?"

"Hey, who died and made you Queen Bitch of Delmar?" said Kolya, moving in front of me to shield me from this girl she, before now, had only seen in pictures. And she was never great with faces. "Why are you talking like you know her? Have you been stalking her? Lera, just tell me and I'll deal with her."

"Deal with me?! Are you trying to kidnap her? Lera -"

"Ssh."

With a single word, I silenced them both, and walked between them. Kolya's hand in my left, Vesta's hand in my right.

"Kolya, this is Vesta Ilustrada Imanis. Vesta, this is Nikita Ilyinichna Ivanova."

And, as they both realized just who they were, eyes wide with surprise as the the gears turned in one another's heads? I kissed both of them on the hand, and pressed them together tight so they could hold each other's!

"And you're both my big sisters!"