A Welcome.. I Mean, Unwelcome Visit

Chapter 1: A Familiar Face

It was a cold spring morning. Streams of warm light shone through the blinders of his window. Even then, Connor was in a deep sleep. The sun may have risen, but not the monke. That is.. until the alarm suddenly blasted in his ear.

"..Fucking hell. Why's it.. so. Loud." He mumbled inaudibly turning the damn blaring sound off.

Connor had been grinding the whole month on video shoots for his channel, many planned streams and speedruns for rage games. He exhausted himself so much that he'd pass out by the end of the day. That's why this weekend, he was planning to get the rest he absolutely needed. He may be a workaholic but even he knew his limits.

Thus, Connor very reluctantly pushed away the need to drink 3 cups of coffee, as per his daily routine. He turned over.. pulled up the duvet and attempted to go back to sleep. After a while, he drifted into sleep once again.

Of course, that is.. until the doorbell rang.

"..What the.." He groaned, it's like fate or something really wants to get in the way of his rest time. Either way, he puts on a shirt. Tiredly, he swung his front door open.

"No one's.. there?"

"Down here, dummy!"

He looks down to see familiar bright pink hair with strands of purple, along with horns. It was Ironmouse, one of his best friends, at his doorstep.

The girl was visibly flustered standing at the entrance. She wore a wool scarf, puffy jacket, a skirt to match and platform shoes. And even with them, she didn't look any taller.

"Connor, are you okay.? "

He'd been staring at Mouse for a full minute, in awe and disbelief that his online friend he had been friends with for years was right in front of his eyes.

"Did you not get the memo that I was coming-"

He just forgot. As to avoid annoying Mouse just as she arrived in Tokyo, he cuts her off. "Mouse!! I seriously can't believe you're here, how was the trip? Are you okay?" excited gasps filled the air as he knelt down to hug her.

"Pft dummy! I'm fine! The flight was long but they had a bunch of cool stuff."

Connor continues, "That's good, that's good. You wanna come in? We'll talk more."

"Sure!" Mouse says excitedly.

Suddenly, Connor realises Mouse's state. Both her hands carried huge suitcases. Holsted on her back was a backpack which looked just as big as she was.

".... Mouse did you carry all that here? By yourself?"

She was silent for a bit. "Well., Mori helped me bring them into the taxi but I uh, carried it all here.." her confident tone lowered to a whisper.

"Are you serious? You should've called me!" He goes to carry her things. She annoyingly pushes his hand away.

"Hey! I've gotten stronger recently, I can do it!"

He retorts, "Mouse, nobody should try to hurt themselves by bringing all that stuff once."

Mouse only pouts at this. Without words, she accepts his help anyway.

Mouse looked around the apartment, surprised. "Connor, your house looks so.. clean. Remember your 'Moving In' video? It looked like a trainwreck before."

"Oh yeah.. everyone freaked out back then, like damn bitch you live like this?"  Mouse giggles as Connor leads her to a spare room.

"Well it's nice to see you keep this new place tidy, especially since I'm visiting~" Mouse says matter-of-factly. As of this moment in time, Mouse is still susceptible to illnesses. Her condition improved in the past few years, especially with the medical advancement of portable plasma shots. Despite this, she still had meds to take daily and getting sick is a problem with her complications.

Still, Ironmouse is living a better life now. Anything is better than being stuck at a bed all day.

Connor wouldn't admit it, but he'd deep cleaned his whole apartment a few days earlier, (by himself) just so that Mouse wouldn't have any problems staying there for a while.

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"So this is your room. How do you like it?"

Mouse drops her things and cheerfully walks around the room. "Woah!!! It's so nice! Nice desk. I can have my st-ream setup! A double bed? Is that. A CINNAMOROLL. on the bed."

Connor gets whiplash as Mouse's squeaky gasp goes down to a low-tone inquisition.

"I- yeah it's from the new series. I thought you'd like it."

"..Thank you, you didn't have to." Mouse whispered, hugging the plush.

Connor laughs at her complete change in attitude ."Gh- don't laugh at me!" she whined, giving flustered punches to his arm. "Alright, alright! It's just funny, y'know. You never change." He says, closing in on her.

"Teasing a guest, you're as mean to me as ever!"

"Pfbt, I'm never mean to you."

"You are! You say I've never changed, you've never changed either!"

He raises his voice, "You know what, maybe it's a good thing, Mouse, alright? At least I still have my hairline! At least that didn't change!"

"...I don't know about you but I see a bit of balding.."

"That is too far. " Connor says dramatically as Mouse giggles.

"Oh right Mouse, you're here for the Hololive singing competition right? What's that about?"

"You mean the 'Holo-Live Event'?" She says, moving her suitcases.

"Hmm.. well, lots of vtubers, either in companies or indie are coming to Japan for a singing competition held by Hololive. A kind of celebration for their 10th anniversary."

"Training starts a week from now so the other girls from VShojo should arrive soon. It's good Mori helped me at the airport yesterday. I had to meet Hololive's manager anyway. "

"That's good, sorry I couldn't help you. I was way too busy finishing up video shoot stuff."

"I could tell! You looked like you just woke up when you opened the door earlier."

Well.. maybe it was because Connor had just woken up.

"That reminds me, I am totally deprived of coffee right now, I'm gonna go make one. You want one?"

"You! I already told you I don't like it.." Mouse says loudly.

"I'm just teasing you." He responds, sigma walking away.  Gremlin noises can be heard in the background, but he decides to give her some space to unpack and settle in.

He drank his just brewed coffee sighing to himself. It's going to be a long few weeks ahead. He only realised now that although this could be a lot of fun, it could also be a lot more tiring than he anticipated. Welp, so much for a weekend of rest.