Esmie the Calamity Chapter 4 (Patreon)

“I think I’m high,” I blurted as we walked down the street.

“Um, why?” Lyn asked in alarm.

“Because, I’m just really damn happy, and I can’t figure out why,” I told her even as I frowned in thought, trying to trace back and remember if I’d accidentally eaten any mushrooms.

“Maybe you’re just happy to be playing a game in VR with your best friend?” she asked playfully, giving my shoulder a little poke.

“Maybe… I don’t know about that though, because I got even happier seeing you. I think I’m probably just being silly, I’ll try to calm down,” I said, taking a few deep breaths.

Then I felt a finger flick my ear, and I gave a squeak, jumping into the air. Once I’d landed with a wobble, I turned and glared at her. “What was that for?”

“Nothing, just letting you know you’re being silly. No need to calm down if you’re happy, right?” she giggled softly. Her cheeks were red again, was she embarrassed? Probably embarrassed for me and my sudden promotion to complete ditz.

"Okay, okay… I won't try and sabotage my own happiness. But only because you say sooo," I smiled sideways at her.

"Yup, good," she nodded, then went quiet, her eyes glued to her feet.

We walked in silence down the street for a bit, and I meant to ask her what was wrong, but I became distracted by my squish jiggling around. Every time my foot came down, a bunch of me just… jiggled. It felt very funny.

“So um, where are we going?” I asked, finally breaking the silence.

“Oh, we’re going…” she said, suddenly looking up and spinning around. The spinning made her big ears flop around a little like mine, and I noticed that they were actually furred, it was just very fine, almost downy fur. Mine were much fluffier.

“Shit,” she swore softly. “We walked past it. We’re going to a quest board in one of the local inns.”

We turned around and wandered back the way we’d come, and I decided to ask a question. “So what have you been doing since high school?”

“Ugh, what have I not been doing?” she asked with a weary sigh.

“Um… Tap Dancing?” I jokingly guessed.

“It was considered, trust me,” she groaned. “Well, it started when I agreed to be an actress for a friend’s student short film. It was this competition thing. Not the one that got the pods though. Anyway, it turned out I was pretty good at it. Someone noticed and got in touch, some manager chick who likes to ‘find talent and nurture it’ as she put it.”

“No way! You got a job? As an actress?” I asked incredulously, then grabbed her arm. “That’s so cool! Wow! That’s exciting for you though.”

“T-thanks,” she stammered, staring at where I had my fingers wrapped around her bicep. “It’s… um, it’s not as great as it sounds. I mean… I get money and stuff, but I’ve only done commercials so far, I can’t seem to get through any auditions, it’s so stressful.”

“And I guess your manager lady is on your ass to land a role?” I asked with a wince.

“Mhm,” she nodded despondently.

“Aw, Lynlyn,” I said sympathetically, pulling her arm into a hug. Just the arm, because that’s what I was holding onto at the time.

My hug brought us both to a stop, and Lyn stared down at me, her face going redder and redder. I let go quickly, crap, had I done something embarrassing again? I could never tell. Social interaction was hard and I always messed up.

“Thanks,” she said after a moment, turning away and looking at her shoes again.

Oh I had totally messed up! We were standing in the middle of the street and awkwardly staring away from each other now, and it was making me feel really anxious. Why were things so weird between us now? We used to hug and poke each other teasingly and stuff all the time, and now it was all odd. I wish we’d kept in touch, gotten that apartment together like we’d planned… because now things were weird and I wanted my friend back.

“Uh, let’s go get a quest,” Lyn said after a moment, giving me a smile that let me know we were still good. Phew! She was like, my only friend left these days. All the rest had buggered off.

“Yeah, let’s do that!” I nodded, glad that we were moving on from my awkwardness.

As we walked, I asked her what her build was, and that got her started like nothing else. She’d decided to make a rogue, that much was obvious, but she wasn’t the typical sneaky stabby kind, no she’d gone for a duellist build. She was all about destroying a single opponent. It meant we were a little lacking on the crowd control front, but hopefully we could find a way around that.

"So yeah, I will totally duel anyone who tries to besmirch my little fluffy companion's honour!" she jokingly exclaimed and reached out absently with a hand to pat my head.

As she drew her hand away, she gave one of my fluffy ears an absent-minded scratch at the base. Oh fuck, oh dear sweet fuck. That felt so damn good, like… seriously good. I almost tripped over my own tiny feet, it felt so good.

"Y-yeah," I said, having completely forgotten what she said.

"Oh, here's the inn!” Lyn said, pointing it out and making a beeline for it.

I wandered along behind her, getting very excited by my first time going into a medieval fantasy inn. Was there going to be like, a shady guy in the back with his hood pulled up, and a big jolly barkeep? This was why VR was a thing, right here!

When we entered, it was less smokey and gross than I thought it would be, and I was a little disappointed by that fact. The ceiling was higher than I’d thought it would be too. Wait… no, I was just shorter than I was used to being now. Otherwise, it was all just as I had hoped, including the shady guy in the back. I waved to the shady guy. He nodded back like we’d just passed some signal. Oh gosh, am I in the thieves guild now?

You have gained a quest: Join the Thieves Guild of Loury.

You have been noticed by a member of the Thieves Guild in the Town of Loury in a positive manner, is this a chance to join the infamous vagabonds of the night? (They also operate during the day.)

Oh I didn’t actually expect… wow, okay! I guess that was an option if I wanted to take it?

Distracted as I was by my new in status with the local pickpockets, I bumped into Lyn as she stopped to look at the quest board.

“Sorry,” I mumbled, and moved to stand next to her.

The quest board was pretty simple, many boring kill and fetch quests, with the odd hunt down a dangerous named beastie quest. Standard fare if you were used to daily quests in any mmo ever.

“Let’s take a few,” Lyn said after a moment. “Maybe a boss quest and then a kill quest?”

“Um, are we going to do them at the same time because that seems like a bit much,” I said, looking worriedly up at her.

“Uh, no… I was thinking we do the kill quest on the way or something, then if we’re feeling confident, we try the boss quest,” she explained, giving my big fuzzy ear another flick.

Damn ear flicking. I reached up and flicked her ear right back, we both had big floppy ears here after all! However, her reaction was… a little different to mine… she squeaked, jumping about a foot in the air.

“Don’t do that!” she exclaimed, her face going red with embarrassment.

“No, you don’t do that!” I frowned back at her, then poked out my tongue for good measure.

She flicked my ear again, and poked her tongue out in response to mine. Oh, she was on. I reached up and flicked both her ears, and was rewarded with a gasp.

“You…” she growled menacingly, then she jumped at me.

Her leap turned into a trip when her foot caught on a plank that was a little too high, and suddenly she was on top of me, and we were both on the ground. Strangely enough, I wasn’t feeling all that hurt, it was like the squish had cushioned me or something. Having her on top of me actually felt really nice, like before when I fell on her instead. Having my squish pressed on her was nice. I was going to get back at her in a truly evil way, I decided, as she stared down at me in surprise.

I grabbed both of her ears and started playing with them, rubbing, twisting and pulling on the huge, soft and fuzzy things. She shuddered and gave a very different type of gasp, and I laughed with glee as I kept torturing her. She was at my mercy! She went limp and started making high pitched squeaking sounds after a few moments of this. Wait, was I hurting her? She wasn’t struggling or anything, but she was making noises that sounded like she was in pain.

“Are you okay? I’m sorry if that actually hurt!” I asked worriedly.

“N-no… um… it’s… let’s get up and pretend that never happened,” she coughed, wriggling off of me.

I stared up at her from the ground, noticing she was really red now, the reddest I’d ever seen her, like… ever. Wow, it looked… wait, she was pretty like that! I’d never thought someone was pretty before, I’d always thought that was just something for other people and not me… but wow… pretty! My heart was beating a little funny and everything, just like the descriptions!

“Are you going to get up?” she asked, looking away from me with a pout.

“Nah, you squished my squish into the floor. I live here now,” I giggled, then raised my hands and made grabby motions. “Pull me up, since you knocked me down.”

“Fine, but you’re not allowed to ever touch my ears... ever again,” she grumbled, still looking very embarrassed.

“Only if you…” I started to say, then remembered how nice it had felt when she scratched behind my ear. “Only if you give me scratches sometimes!”

“What?” she asked, her eyes going very wide.

“Earlier, you scratched behind my ear and it felt nice, so I want more,” I demanded. “Otherwise I’ll squiggle your ears again!”

“S-squiggle my ears? I… no! We’re not calling it that!” she yelled, throwing her hands up in the air.

“Two ear scratches and it’s a deal,” I grinned evilly. “Two ear scratches or I call it squiggling.”

“What? No? That’s… what are you?” she asked in consternation.

“Squiggle squiggle!” I taunted, giving her a mischievous grin.

“Stop!” she demanded petulantly.

“Squiiiiiggglllleeeee,” I smiled, drawing the word out extra long, like mozzarella that just refuses to break even when you’re like halfway across the room.

“Fine!” she blurted in defeat, reaching forward to scratch both my earsss attt onnnceeeohmygod.

Bliss, pure, happy, amazing… all of those words. This was so great, I needed more. From now on, I was going to haggle every single ear scratch I could out of her. She had no idea what she was in for. It was all training for joining the thieves guild, I was going to become the sweetest haggler they ever had, making sure all their stolen goods would fetch good prices!

“Now that… that’s over,” she said, her face still pretty damn red, she turned to the board and plucked two quests at random. “This one is for… Zraggs, whatever those are, and this one is to fight a boar named The Chomper.”

“Cool, sounds good to me!” I nodded, not really minding what fetch quest we did.

With our quests chosen, we turned to leave the Inn… and found everyone staring at us. Oh no… I think we made a scene. Time to run away and never come back! Hermit time.