Journey Of Fate ~ mayakuro

•Honk Honk•

Light filtered through the window, illuminating in a gentle light a small hotel room with one queen size bed lying in the center. The current resident of the bed let out an irritated groan and pulled the covers over her head in an attempt to block out the brightness. Even with the thick duvet obscuring her vision, the light still managed to pass through the not entirely opaque fabric, ruining the woman's attempts to fall back asleep.

With a sigh, Claudine resigned herself to her fate and blearily got up. As she rubbed her tired eyes, she listened to the rumble of cars and the general hustle and bustle of traffic outside her window. What they said about New York City never sleeping certainly appeared to be true. She had come to America recently to take part in a reunion reboot of Starlight with the 99th class. Starlight had been discovered in America last year and quickly became popular, which prompted Nana, now a famous producer, to gather up all the active members of the 99th class in an attempt to relive their old high school days and to bring it to a new audience. When Claudine got the invitation from her friend, who was she to say no? She was really excited to meet all of her friends again, and although she would never admit it openly, she was most excited to meet a certain brunette again. Their first performance, which had taken place in New York, went off without a hitch. Even after not having seen each other in person in years, having only corresponded occasionally via various communication apps, everyone was able to fall back in sync easily, just as if they had never left high school. Despite the distance and time, their first performance as a team together was even more refined than the one at their last year at Seisho. Karen and Hikari gave an outstanding performance as Flora and Claire, even though Claudine was sure she and Maya could do better. 

Maya... she had been shocked to see her after those 6 years apart. Being Maya's rival, Claudine had been keeping up with her social media accounts. Although she had scored plenty of her own lead roles in various prestigious productions, Maya, of course, had scored more. The brunette had just finished playing the lead in a performance in Japan, so Claudine hadn't expected that she would be able to answer Nana's summon on such a short notice. But, Maya had somehow managed to pull it off. Claudine supposed she shouldn't have been surprised. She and Maya would practice nearly all day back in high school. This was probably nothing for the seasoned actress. Claudine was pleased that the two of them fell back into their roles. It felt almost as though she was reliving her high school years. However, there was something off there. Whenever Maya looked at her, there was this kind of fire in her eyes. Claudine wasn't sure what to call it, but the intensity of it unnerved her to no end. She could've sworn that wasn't there when she was in high school, but then again, that was 6 years ago, so she could easily be mistaken. 

Claudine stretched with a sigh. No use thinking about Maya's weird gaze. She had a whole two weeks to herself now. With their closing performance in New York finished, Nana had given them two weeks of time to themselves. Their next performance was two months away in San Francisco, so they'd need to get there a month and a week before the first performance date. Until then, the 99th class was welcome to explore all that America had to offer. While Claudine wouldn't have minded if they all went together in one big group, it seemed that the small inner circles of friends in their already small circle wanted to pair off and do things as individual groups. Karen, Hikari, and Mahiru had decided to go down to the National Baseball Hall of Fame for a while, and then they were going to try to visit as many aquariums as possible per Hikari's request. Junna and Nana were traveling down to the nation's capital to visit all the various museums. Futaba and Kaoruko were... well to be honest, Claudine had no idea what they were doing. Probably Futaba driving Kaoruko around on her motorcycle to wherever the blue-haired woman wanted to go. Hah, Futaba was so whipped. That left just her and Maya in New York City. While Claudine had a temptation lingering in the back of her head to invite Maya to do something, she resisted. She didn't need her rival to babysit her and go to plays with her. Besides, she and Maya always had the same observations about plays anyways, so it'd be like talking to herself. She'd just enjoy this time for herself... she didn't need Maya! It wasn't like she could handle standing in Maya's bizarre intense gaze for more than 5 minutes anyway.

The blonde stood up and wandered over to the kitchen area of the small hotel room. She could have gone for something more luxurious, but rooms in New York were quite expensive and she didn't see the point. Once at the counter, Claudine reached for the coffee pot and filled it with hot water. She removed one of the small instant coffee packets from the container and ripped it open. She poured its contents into the liquid and stirred with a plastic spoon. Honestly, the instant coffee that the hotel provided as room service kinda of tasted like tree bark, but she wasn't nearly awake enough yet to go downstairs and to try to find a Starbucks. This would have to do for now. The blonde tiredly poured the drink into a mug and was about to take a sip when a loud car honk from outside startled her.

Almost dropping her coffee, which would've probably given her 1st degree burns, Claudine angrily set the mug on the counter and stormed over to the window. She ripped open the blinds to see an empty street, not the traffic jam that she had been expecting.

'Huh?' She stared at the street, scanning up and down for the offending car. She could have sworn that that honk sounded close to her complex, but maybe it was just because it was early in the morning. She turned around and strode back to the counter. Now she could finally drink her coffee. Just as she raised the mug to her lips, the loud honk sounded again, this time twice. With a growl, Claudine slammed the mug back down and stomped back over to the window. There was still no one in the street! However, the car honked again and this time Claudine realized it was a beat-up small white sedan sitting in one of the parallel parking spaces that was making the noise. The vehicle honked again for no obvious reason and Claudine had had it. She was going to go down there and murder whoever was driving that damn car. People who were honking their car for no reason at 7 AM had forfeited their right to live, she reasoned.

Grabbing her room key and wrapping a robe around herself, the blonde left her hotel room and all but sprinted down the stairwell. She rushed out of the lobby, ignoring the confused look the receptionist gave her. There were more pressing matters to attend to, such as murdering this moron who was interrupting her perfectly fine morning. Pushing open the glass doors, Claudine was met with the chilly winter air of New York City. The cold instantly bit into her skin and she was barely able to suppress a shudder. She definitely should've worn more layers but, in her rage, she had forgotten that it was the dead of winter. Whatever, it was all this driver's fault and when she was done with him, she could go back inside and enjoy her nice hot coffee without the obnoxious honking. Claudine approached the vehicle and was about the knock loudly on the window, until she noticed who was inside the car. Long brunette hair, silver hair pins, a blue bow. WAIT.