Booze-Slut (1)
A hole tore open in the sky twelve years ago.
At first I thought it was a composite. Word was some black crack had split between the clouds, but the internet was already drowning in videos like that. A friend sent me one, and I wrote back asking if it wasn't just a movie promo.
Then the schools shut down.
The news cut the regular broadcast for a breaking report. Bottled water and canned goods vanished from the marts. My father filled the car with gas. I never found out where he meant to go. Back then, nobody knew where was safe.
People took to calling that hole a Gate.
What came through first were monsters. Bugs that crawled the roads, beasts that flipped cars. The army deployed, and the explosions rolling in from far off kept me awake all night.
Next came people.
More precisely, things shaped like people.
Long ears, tails, horns thrusting up from their heads—they crossed the Gate fleeing the monsters, weapons thrown away, both hands in the air. There was a woman sobbing with a child in her arms, and a man carrying an old man with a wounded leg on his back. For days the news ran footage of them collapsed in front of gun muzzles.
The other world hadn't been in good shape either, by the look of it.
Everything after that took a long time. It started with whether they could understand speech, then where they would live, what work to give them, and which law would punish them if they caused trouble. Every single day, the people shouting to send them back right now fought the people asking what they were supposed to do when they had nowhere to return to.
And through all of it, the Gates kept opening.
Some poured out monsters. Some joined up with perfectly intact cities. Among those who crossed were people already used to fighting monsters. With their help the ground around the Gates was secured, and exchange began—things we made went over to their side, and their technology and resources came over to ours.
Twelve years, like that.
The department head at my company is an orc.
The first time I saw one on the news, I thought he looked like he could tear a person apart with his bare hands. In person he was sharp, and remarkably kind. Besides that, a dwarf couple runs the laundromat in front of my place, and the night-shift part-timer at the convenience store is a beastkin. Last month the elf next door put food waste in a pay-by-volume trash bag and got chewed out by the landlord.
Calling it the result of mutual understanding and harmony would be a stretch. We just kept living, and this is how it turned out.
I'd been finding my own small after-work pleasure in there, too.
Until today.
"You were talking fine a minute ago. Why'd you go quiet?"
I looked up at the convenience store roof.
A blonde woman was glaring down at me with a phone in her hand. A glowing ring floated above her head, and white wings grew from her back.
An angel.
I'd seen one. Only on a screen. So few of them had crossed that the moment a post went up claiming someone had seen the real thing, people demanded proof. And I was looking at that rare thing now, in the flesh, because of a parent insult I'd thrown.
"'Does your father even exist.' You ran your mouth just fine in there. Say it to my face."
"I'll say it looking you in the eye, so come down a little. I'm about to snap my neck."
The woman narrowed her eyes. Then she lowered the hand gripping the phone and stepped off the edge of the roof.
I threw my arms up on reflex.
I thought she was going to fall. The wings on her back spread, and her body stopped in midair. The wind tore through her hair. She set down lightly in front of me and stared at the hand I'd stuck out halfway.
"You were actually going to catch me?"
"......Forgot you had wings."
I dropped my arms.
Up close, her face came clear. The face showing through the blonde hair was small and pale, and the teal eyes were still fierce. Honestly, she was pretty as hell.
Until she opened her mouth.
"I'm down. Now keep going about my dad."
"I was wrong about that. I was fighting with you and dragged your father into it for nothing."
Admitting it straight only seemed to leave her with nothing to say. The woman who'd shut her mouth for a moment lifted her chin again.
"......Then delete the comment. Other people can see it."
"I'll delete it. I'll apologize for what I said about your father. In return, you apologize for treating my dinner like trash."
Her eyebrow twitched.
"I said it because you were happily eating a dead chicken soaked in oil."
"Did you really have to come all the way over here, while someone else is eating, just to say that?"
"Humans always get mad first, even when you tell them something true."
Ah.
That way of talking. The exact way of talking I'd seen in comments a hundred times over.
I picked up the cigarette at my feet, tossed it in the trash, and turned around.
"If you're that damn great, we settle this with drinks, fuck."
The woman's eyes went wide.
"We were in the middle of an apology. What drinks?"
"A minute ago you said humans who drink are idiots. Drink some yourself, then brag about how superior you are."
The mouth that had been snapping right back without a pause stopped.
She looked at me, then flicked a glance inside the convenience store. Past the glass, the liquor fridge showed. Her gaze hung there a moment and came back.
"I came to get an apology. I didn't come here to drink with you."
"Yeah? You talked so much shit I figured you had the nerve."
I pulled my phone out of my pocket.
"Well, apology received, so we're done. Get home safe."
"Who said I was leaving? Don't talk like I got scared just because you feel like it."
"Then have a drink. Whoever says they can't drink first writes an apology post on the gallery."
The moment I opened the gallery, she took a step closer.
"Wait. Are you writing a post right now?"
"Showed up, so I ought to leave a review."
I tapped the empty title field and read it out loud.
"I never said I can't drink!"
Her voice came out pretty loud.
The part-timer inside the convenience store looked up. The moment her eyes met theirs through the glass, she clamped her lips shut, then closed in on me and dropped her voice.
"Then I'll drink. But if you lose, don't start making excuses."
"Apology post?"
"Put my nickname in the title. And that you were wrong."
The answer came fast, but the look she gave the fridge was anything but pleased.
I slipped the phone back into my pocket.
"All right. What do you want? Pick whatever you usually drink."
"Give me what you're having. I don't want to hear later that I lost because of the liquor."
"I'm drinking beer. You fine with that?"
"......That much is nothing."
Her eyes slid off to the side.
A little suspicious, but I didn't take it to mean she'd never had a drink. Would someone who couldn't even drink have lectured other people about their drinking like that?
I opened the convenience store door.
"Then come in. We'll get them cold."
She hesitated in front of the door a moment, then folded her wings. Even so, the tips of her feathers caught on the frame, and she had to twist her body sideways to get through. Coming in after me, she tapped my arm.
"In person, call me Artinel. Not Moon Rabbit."
"A second ago you told me to put it in the title."
"Is reading it in a post the same as you saying it out loud?"
Artinel stood in front of the fridge and lifted her chin.
"Artinel. Remember it properly. You ought to know whose name you lost to."
Time passed like that.
"Ms. Artinel."
No answer.
"You said it was the name for the apology post. What am I supposed to do if you won't answer yourself?"
The head resting on my shoulder slipped. I hastily shifted my arm and caught her, and blonde hair spilled in a sheet past my elbow.
The angel in my arms half-opened her eyes, and her lips moved.
"Didn't...... lose."
"Yeah. Sure."
"You...... still left in the cup......"
And she closed her eyes again.
I stopped in front of the bedroom door and let out a sigh.
On the small table sat torn-open snacks and beer cans. More than half was still left in Artinel's.
Right.
This angel couldn't even finish a single can of beer.
More precisely, a few mouthfuls in she got talkative, and when I saw the color of her face and took the can away, she braced herself on the table and got angry. Then she stood up insisting she'd prove she was fine, and toppled straight into me.
"Fold your wings a little. They're catching on the door."
"Mmnn......"
Luckily, she understood. The wings hanging limp drew in a little behind her back.
Back when we'd picked the drinks, I hadn't imagined it would come to this. They don't allow drinking out front of the convenience store, so we'd moved things to my place nearby, and before we started we'd both talked big. Whoever admitted first that they couldn't drink would post an apology on the gallery.
I should have checked her tolerance properly back then......
I walked to the side of the bed and bent my knees. I turned her onto her side so the wings wouldn't get pinned under her back, and pulled free the hair caught at her neck. Artinel pressed her cheek into the pillow.
"Next...... round......"
"There isn't one. The match is over."
I stood beside the bed a moment and looked down at her lying on her stomach.
......Ha. I'm so fucking hard.
And no wonder. Her body was ridiculous—enormous breasts, and a firm, taut ass on top of them. Carrying her on my back just now, those breasts had pressed into me the whole way, and I'd felt that soft give over and over. And now she was lying there completely unguarded....
"Hoo......"
I drew a long breath and shoved down the instinct rising out of the bottom of my chest.
But right then—
"Mmm... cock..."
Artinel muttered it, small.
"Put it in..."
What?
For a second I thought I'd misheard.
But.
Schlick... schlick, schlick....
Somewhere in there, eyes closed, Artinel had started masturbating. Fingertips rubbing over the spot where her clit was, and little by little a clear fluid ran out between her thighs.
......An angel whose drunk habit is getting herself off.
Ah.
This is not going to work.
Smack—!