Luna leads the way to the entrance of the arcade. They notice that since it's a bit later in the evening, the long lines leading inside of the place have died down significantly. There's still a crowd outside, but the line to go inside is empty. They're able to get inside the Guild without any issue. When they reach the inside, Pyra waves them down. Unlike Yuki, who was as warm as an ice cube, Pyra is flames incarnate from her dyed bright red hair, fireball piercings, and leather jacket, down to her attitude and behavior. That said, whereas Yuki was scary, Pyra is chill, confident. They smile towards them and say, "so how was the fight? Did y'all have a good time? Are you Viper from Valorant?"
Viper shakes her head with a smile, “No, I'm not, but I am a chemist so I figured this cosplay would be fitting for my job."
"Hah yeah, that makes sense. Viper was as fuckin toxic as the smoldering bitch asses that play her. That's why I quit that shit," Pyra chuckles, hoping to whatever fire god she prays to that Viper wasn't offended by that. It’s the last thing she needs after the incident. "Right on, so what can I do for ya? Not everyday I get to see the hot threesome together. Hells Below, I didn't even know y'all had a third."
Luna blushes and turns her head away.
Hinata sighs, "Can we hit up the arcade?"
Viper snickers as her face turns a slight pink
"Yeah! It's open. And uhmm," Pyra looks left, right, and then left again, then pulls a card from her pocket, "here, gift from me to you, don't tell an ADMIN I did this." She hands a card to Viper. Looks fancy, gold lettering with a fire symbol on it. "That's a free play card for the arcade. Play whatever you want, just give it back to me after. It's one of the... perks I get from working here, dating Ashley not included." Pyra winks playfully.
Viper raises an eyebrow as she looks between Luna and Hinata as if to say "I don't think she knows." Luna just smiles, "you got it. We won't let any Admin know about this." Hinata nods. "Sure." Then they start walking towards the arcade. Viper follows behind Luna, tucking her Nova access card into her belt, obscuring the name
They eventually arrive at the same arcade Viper, Luna, and Hinata had a date in nearly a year ago. Hundreds of game cabinets of all genres span the rather large starry carpeted floor. There are sections for different genres, for example one section is a bunch of fighting games, another is pinball machines, then beat-em-up games, driving games, sports games, and then music/rhythm games. The games are a mixture of traditional american, japanese, and even some that seem not even from this world. Perhaps they're from The Magickas?
Luna and Hinata are both overwhelmed by just how much there is in there. Perhaps Viper should lead the way. Despite being a Nova Heart stronghold, the scent of Stardust does not persist here at all.
[Pick your poison, Viper, from the hit RIOT tactical hero shooter Valorant.]
Viper looks around as she offers, "We could go to the fighting games? Or the music and rhythm games, I know both of you like music and rhythm games" she's trying to not get overwhelmed herself, though she feels drawn towards the driving games but she knows that wouldn't be fair
Luna looks up at Viper while walking around and responds, "Yeah but we can play music games anytime. I wanna play something you want to play." Hinata agrees "Yeah!"
Viper looks towards the driving games as she smiles, "If you say so" she starts making her way over towards a motorcycle cabinet
They follow and Luna has a grin on her face, "okay. I see what you wanna play." They find a motorcycle game with four bikes placed side by side. It seems the game has connectivity allowing up to four players to play at once. Hinata tilts her head, "I've never used one of these before, but it looks fun."
Viper nods as she explains, "It's effectively the same thing as riding a normal bike, just a little more sensitive" she straddles one of the bikes as she continues "A lot of the racing games are a lot more sensitive then you'd think, it's kinda frustrating"
"R-right, yeah, riding a bike. I've definitely done that before..." Hinata lies. Luna takes to the weird controller like a fish in water. Considering her stance, it seems like she's done this before.
The game starts. Hinata struggles with the leaning mechanics, leaning way too far right or left and keeps crashing into walls. Luna is being a lot more careful, but it's still hard for her to get used to.
Viper is almost perfectly leaning through every corner, breaking at the apex of corners, it seems like she's raced on a bike before, all of it seems so natural to her and while racing she notes that Hinata and Luna are both struggling hard, and comes up with a plan to help them
Clearly they're out of their league here, but they're having a lot of fun regardless. Hinata's never done anything like this, and Luna is wishing she still had her motorcycle. The race ends and it is a clear blowout.
Viper gets off of her bike as she walks over to Hinata "Do you want some pointers? You know you don't have to lie to seem cool, right?"
Hinata freezes when her lie appears, "y-yeah... I know, but I felt weird. It's like... I'm in my 30s and I've never ridden a bike before. Just didn't want to... embarrass myself. But uh sure, can I have some pointers?"
Viper shakes her head, "That's not embarrassing, I know plenty of people that have never ridden a bike before" she thinks for a moment then shrugs as she offers "I could either tell you the tips or I can hop on and show you, either way I don't mind"
"Okay, show me. I'm way better with examples than tips." Hinata nods. Luna watches as well.
Viper climbs onto the back of the bike and wraps her arms around Hinata's chest as she starts explaining "So, leaning the bike literally means leaning bike to one side while you counter balance with your body to keep the bike from fully falling over, like this" she then squeezes the bike tightly between her legs and gradually leans the bike over while using her body to counter balance, gently guiding Hinata into doing the same Hinata squeaks when she feels Viper's arms wrap around her. She is completely broken and blushing from the contact, but somehow despite all that, she's understanding it better than before. There's no words coming out of her other than sounds of irl keyboard smashing.
Luna is just watching... staring even. But she tries to mimic the motions.
Viper snickers quietly as she listens to Hinata squeak and asks, "You alright? You getting this?" She stops leaning the bike as she reaches forward for the handle bars for the next advice.
Hinata manages to squeak out a meek, "y-yeah, keep going.."
Viper nods with a smug smile as she explains, "Trust your tires, as long as you don't slam on the brakes mid turn, you'll be fine and speaking of brakes you should break before a corner and then slowly accelerate through and out of the corner, for example" she pretends to go through a corner as she squeezes the brake lever for a moment then releases it as she starts leaning the bike over, then starts applying some throttle while the bike is leaned over and finally as she brings the bike back up she starts applying more throttle
Feeling the motions instead of just being told them is helping Hinata lots. She looks more confident about driving this thing than before. "ahh okay! That's really cool. You have a lot of experience with this don't you?"
Viper nods as she responds, "Yeah, mostly on the testing track though, I don't actually own a bike" she takes her hand off of the bars and moves her hands back to Hinata's chest
Hinata looks down at the hands wrapping her, "Ah uh, okay." Viper feels her shiver a little bit, but it doesn't seem to be anything negative.
"Cooooool, I got a racing girlfriend." Luna looks starstruck.
Viper snickers as she removes her hands and gets off of Hinata's bike as she looks over at Luna "You know maybe at some point I should sit down and talk about everything i've done, aside from that, do you also want some pointers?"
"Uhmmmmmm.... sure? I used to have a motorcycle back in the other world, but it didn't make it with us on the transition to here." Luna seems more confident than Hinata, but just like her, she's also never ridden a normal bike.
Viper nods as she climbs onto Luna's bike and wraps her arms around Luna's chest, "Assuming you heard and saw everything the only real tip I have is to lean harder if you need to, trust the tires" she starts leaning the bike an extreme amount, counter balancing the bike like she did before
She feels her tremble when the lean goes down that far. "Ah-- Uh. I see. I'll definitely use that to my advantage at some point." No she won't. That was terrifying! Viper holds the lean there as she asks, "Are you alright?" Viper doesn't want to mention that she trembled but she definitely noticed.
"Just a bit scared of going down that far." Luna is at least being honest? "But uhhh I think I can handle it?"
Viper nods as she brings the bike back up as she mentions, "I could stand next to the bike while you two race and be ready to catch you if you fall off" she leans her head forward slightly to rest it on Luna's shoulder.
Luna turns her head to see Viper right there, "Uhmm... sure..Wanna race real quick Hinata?" Hinata nods, "Okay let's do this. We might be able to finally break this tie of ours too."
Viper nods as she gets off the bike and stands next to it, ready to switch sides as she leans as she smugly smiles and mentions "To make sure both of you push yourselves, whoever wins gets....whatever you want, i can't think of anything. "
At the exact same time, it's a problem they still can't break, they respond in the same tone, "Whatever we want?" Then look at each other and sigh. "You're on Luna!" Hinata smirks. "Bring it!" Luna exclaims.
Viper cracks her neck as she prepares to race back and forth between both sides
After steeling themselves, the race begins on Green. Using the basic techniques they were shown, the pair get on a much better run than at first. The first few turns go decently well, though Luna's fear of leaning too far down causes her to lag behind. Hinata's handing things rather well though, focusing on good throttle techniques and strategic braking.
Viper jogs back and forth as Luna leans to one side then the other, making sure that she can be there incase she falls
It doesn't help that Luna is much shorter than her peers so she feels like the bike won't secure her as well, but after making a couple turns herself she feels a bit more comfortable with turning and letting the bike do its thing naturally.
Hinata takes a turn way too wide and slams the brakes causing her to spin out and letting Luna catch up. "Shit! I'm okay okay."
Viper takes note of Hinata's failure as she keeps moving back and forth between the sides
WIth a deep breath, Luna is focused solely on the screen in front of her. Trusting the otherwise stationary bike, she trusts it and focuses on keeping everything steady. Hinata is doing rather well aside from some accidental braking when she's supposed to be throttling. They're neck and neck into the final turns of the track. If you didn't know better, you'd think they were tied. Despite everything though, Hinata is the one who wins the race. On the final turn, Luna crashed into the wall.
Viper smiles at both of them as she cheers, "Good racing both of you, i'd say that was a pretty fair battle, you two were neck and neck for a bit" she turns to Hinata "Alright....what do you want? It can be literally anything"
WIth a tilt of her head, Hinata... clearly wasn't even thinking about that. She just wanted to win against Luna. It takes her a few moments to think about it, but then she finally responds, "Uh-- I-- I don't know. I just wanted to play the game." Hinata then shrugs before squeaking again. Luna just hugs her girlfriend after a well-deserved victory.
Viper shrugs as she mentions, "I owe you one then, if you ever need anything ever then just text me to redeem it" she continues "While both of you did make some mistakes that was some serious improvement you two, i'm proud of you"
They look smile widely and blush. That right there is super effective on both of them. "Thank you Viper. Really had fun." said Hinata. Luna is currently rendered silent, but you can feel her adoration.
Viper nods as she offers "You wanna go home or get a quick round of a rhythm game in? I'd imagine both of you are getting tired by now"
Luna yawns deeply, "Y-yeah i'm feeling a little drained right now. Let's uh get this card back to Pyra." Hinata smiles, "Ready whenever y'all are."
Viper nods as she looks around for any sign of Pyra as she mutters "Where did Pyra go..."
Luna and Hinata lead the way back to the reception desk. When they arrive, they see both Pyra and someone they all recognize as ADMIN Andromeda chatting it up together.
Pyra - "Yeah things are going well."
Ashley - "You realize you have our targets in our arcade right?"
Pyra - "Targets? Those are my friends, thank you very much. Luna and Hinata have done nothing wrong and I won't hear otherwise."
Ashley - "Fine! Don't help me then." She then walks out with the slamming of a door.
Luna's ears flatten from the slam.
Viper raises an eyebrow at the conversation and jolts slightly at the door slamming as she winces and mutters "Oooo...that's probably not good...."
Pyra notices the fiery trio of passion's return and waves them down, ignoring the previous conversation as if it never happened. "Heyyy y'all have fun out there?"
"Yeah! I got my ass kicked and had fun!" Luna smiles and hands Pyra back her card.
Hinata smugly smiles, "I was the ass kicker."
Viper snickers at Hinata's comment, "It was pretty fun, i'll have to come here more often" she then mutters "To get better at the rhythm games so I don't get my ass kicked again..."
"Ayyy right on, always warms the soul to see such fiery hearts game together. Hope y'all have a great night and come see us again! And uh, just." For the first time since you've seen Pyra, she looks almost like her fire turned to ash for a moment, "Just... be careful out there you three. I don't like what's going on out there with Nova. I may be dating an ADMIN, but we don't see eye to eye all the time. I have your back okay?"
Luna nods solemnly, "Thank you Pyra." Hinata nods as well.
Viper's smile fades as she nods, "I'll keep that in mind"
"Alright, I think we're gonna head home Viper, unless you need something else?" Luna asks. Luna and Hinata have joined hands.
Viper thinks for a moment then shakes her head, "I'm alright, i'll talk to you two soon" she silently wishes that she could live in the house with them but that would be a big ask, maybe another time
Hinata nods, "see you then." After muttering the word 'teleport' the pair disappears.
Viper smiles at the two then heads back home in her truck