[IC] Fateful Convergence

[Vocalia]

"Sounds good. Besides, I think we should let them be for now," Hayley replied with a smile, glancing back as Eryn cheered happily after beating Sean in yet another round. "Oh my! I thought you would have hit me first!" Eryn said with relief and threw herself onto the couch. To her, it didn't matter if she lost to Sean more often than she won. She was just happy to be able to spend time with him and help him alleviate his grief. Seeing his energetic expression made her heart flutter, for some reasons she didn't know, yet she found the sight to be one of the most beautiful thing she had seen.

[Daxam]

Sean groans and sits back on the couch, panting as if he were the one who was fighting, not the character. "I should've seen that counter coming," he complains, although a wide grin practically split his face in half. "You're really good at this!" Looking down at Eryn, he sees the smile on her face and feels his heart skip a beat as her beautiful face ingrains itself into his mind. Blushing slightly, he clears his throat and asks, "So, uh...now what do you wanna play? Or do you want a rematch?"

[Vocalia]

"We've spent quite a bit of time playing against each other. I-If it's alright with you, I'd like to play a game where we can play alongside each other," Eryn replied, sounding at ease and cheerful around the wealthy and powerful man, despite being a commoner. "I don't know too much about good games in this console with co-op multiplayer mode, so I'll let you choose. I can always learn as I play along and I don't mind anything that's a bit violent."

[Daxam]

Sean smiles and says, "Alright, give me a second." Standing up, he ejects the game they were playing and replaces it in its case before looking for another game. Finding one, a futuristic first-person shooter, he slips it into the console and sits back down next to Eryn, a bit closer than last time. "This is one of my favorite games," he says as he selects his character class, one that was focused mainly on damage and durability.

[Vocalia]

After having a brief look through every character class available to her, she decided to compliment Sean's choice by picking a support class to back him up from a distance and set up traps for her enemies. "Looks like I'm ready. I've never played this game before... I've seen the announcement trailers and walkthrough, but other than that, I don't know quite a bit about this game, so I would need time to get used to the controls," she said, not wanting Sean to be upset about her possible poor performance.

[Daxam]

"No worries," Sean says as the intro cutscene plays. "I'll be on the frontlines the whole time, so all you'll have to do is pick them off from a distance and heal me if I need it." Soon, they were in a large firefight, outnumbered five-to-one. Sean's character easily blows the enemies away with his twin shotguns, dishing out massive amounts of damage, even so early on in the game. "Watch out," he says, "there's a big guy coming on the left!" As they play, Sean, unnoticed by him, had moved closer to Eryn, their arms and legs now touching as they play.

[Vocalia]

"R-Roger!" Eryn replied and turned her sniper scope onto the direction indicated by her radar and, with Sean's help, she managed to spot an elite unit being deployed into the map. Using her trap skills, she tried to divert its attention away from Sean until he finished dispatching the foot soldiers, by which the elite unit had lost a bit of its health while she was still relatively intact. "I have its aggro focused on me. I'll try to hold him down!" she said and used the immobilizing skill her character had to keep it still.

[Daxam]

"I'll finish him off," Sean replies as he uses the remaining time on his character's skill to blast away at the tougher enemy with his explosive shotguns. Soon, the enemy falls to Eryn's sniper round, netting her the bulk of the experience, while Sean moves on to complete the objective. As he returns his character to Eryn's character's side, he says, "You play about as well as someone like me, you know. If I didn't know better, I think you put in as many hours as I have!"

[Vocalia]

"I guess I just have a knack for learning quickly," Eryn replied with a soft giggle. She looked around and noticed something popping up on the screen. "Oh! Looks like we've found a hidden quest of sorts..." she mused, looking very interested. "I wonder if it's because we managed to defeat that big enemy. It was particularly challenging..."

[Daxam]

Sean quickly reads through the quest and grins. "Well, the reward's pretty sweet: two thousand experience, some money, and a new weapon! Let's go for it!" As they play, Sean slowly leans against Eryn, resting his head on top of hers, completely relaxed, even though they were fighting through a multitude of enemies. There was just something about spending time with Eryn that completely relaxed him, that felt completely and utterly right. In fact, he was so focused on dwelling on this fact that he didn't notice how low his health was getting and ended up going down. "Whoops," he says with a sheepish chuckle. "Could you revive me, Eryn?"

[Vocalia]

"Alright. Hold on!" Eryn replied, using her revive skill to bring Sean back into battle. "There are a lot of enemies here. Perhaps we should pull a few and divide the aggro between the two of us," she suggested, unaware of the real reason why he was killed in battle. Of course, she was having so much fun just playing with him that she didn't seem to mind the lack of distance between the two of them as they navigated the area with their characters.

[Daxam]

"Nah," Sean says as he activates his skill. "I'll take them all on." This time, having acquired one over the course of the game, he pulls out his shotgun and an incendiary rocket launcher as he charges the enemies, blasting away. Almost half an hour later, they complete the quest and Sean sighs, setting his controller down. Lifting his head off of Eryn's, he says, "Let's take a break. Want me to grab you anything from the kitchen?"

[Vocalia]

"Umm... If you don't mind me asking, do you have anything sweet, like a pudding or candy?" Eryn asked, showing a trait she and her twin sister shared: a very sweet tooth. "Ah! I-I mean, I-I wouldn't mind some fruits as well. I-It's just that I... have a bit of a penchant for anything sweet. My sister and I seem to be born with a bit of a sweet tooth. I found out about it when we both end up finishing a plate full of churros and emptied the chocolate dip."

[Daxam]

Sean chuckles and stands up, saying, "I'll be back." A few minutes later, he returns with a plate of melon wedges, a bag of cookies, some candy, a couple of bottles of soda, and a bowl of barbecue chips. Sitting down, he sets everything on the coffee table and says, "Go ahead and help yourself, Eryn. We can start back up when we're ready."

[Vocalia]

Oddly enough for a studious woman like her, the first snack that Eryn reached for was the bag of cookies. "Thank you very much, Sean. I know I should probably go with the melon first, but I guess I can't help myself," she said and opened the bag, offering Sean to take some for himself. Her kind smile and generous personality was a rarity in the harsh reality of the world, a sign of a seemingly incorruptible pureness.

[Daxam]

Sean looks at Eryn for a moment, a bit thrown off by her seemingly shining smile. Then, smiling as well, he takes a cookie, saying, "Thanks." Sitting back, his controller on the armrest of the couch, he munches on the cookie as he starts thinking about a question that had been plaguing him for months. Finally, he asks, "Eryn...what do you think of me?"

[Vocalia]

"Hmm? What do I think of you?" Eryn hummed softly, trying to gather her thoughts and arrange them in order of relevance. "Well, first of all, I think you're a generous and knowledgeable person. You seem to know a lot of things, yet are more than happy to share your knowledge and whatever you have if it could help others you care about. Secondly, you're very protective of me and caring, even though we've only known each other for a few months. Lastly, even though you're very smart, powerful, and wealthy, you don't let what you have get over your head. Despite all those powers you have, you have always been... human, in a way. I guess a good way for me to sum up what I think of you is that I truly like you as a person and I'm forever grateful to have known you," she replied with a shy smile, silently wondering if she was actually rambling instead of answering Sean's question.

[Daxam]

Sean smiles softly and says, "Thanks...but, that wasn't quite what I meant..." Looking away, now, his face flushed, he takes a deep breath and, afraid he might be pushing things, shyly asks, "Do you think...that if things were different, or even at times like what we're going through now...do you think that you and I might be...a couple...?"

[Vocalia]

The moment the word finally sank into her mind, Eryn's face turned a bright shade of red. As much as she tried to hide it, she found herself to be quite fond of Sean, so much that she was starting to hope, just slightly, that they could be more than just good friends. She really had no idea that he shared what seemed to be a mutual feeling and silently berated herself for being oblivious to the signs he was showing. "Ah, well... I-I hope I don't sound rude a-and, if I do, I sincerely apologize... I, umm... Perhaps you could say t-that... well... I could see us being... romantically involved in that situation..."

[Daxam]

Hearing Eryn say that she thought it was possible, Sean's face reddens a little more, although a smile now crosses his face. "R-really?" he asks, hoping against hope that he heard her right. however, he doesn't give her a chance to reply as he turns to her and asks, "W-well, could we start that now? I mean, it probably won't get much farther than hugs, cuddling, and hand-holding for now, but I'd...I'd still like to be more than friends with you...if that's alright, of course."