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hyper-lynx · 1 year ago

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Blue Moon Ball: Outfitting

“So what the hell, a ball? A formal ball?” Hemi looked over at Liam, ears ascanse. Liam’s long, clouded tail swished playfully behind him.

“Yep~! That’s what the letter said. The Blue Moon Ball. Two weeks from now on the Wizard Island, planar registry WIS-α-1.”

The lynx groaned and stretched as he stood from his well-cushioned seat. His upper body was wholly unclothed -- indeed, only a pair of trusty cargo shorts girded his tan fur. The tufted tips of his ears tingled a little as the energy current beside this reality shifted slightly. He approached and snatched the letter from Liam’s grasp.

“To Queer Wizard Council MEMBER and Hyper-Lynx, Hemi. Hello Magical Friend~☆…” And the invitation continued. An open bar, festivities, and a formal dress code, all described in impeccable hand-written cursive.

“I see…” Hemi muttered. He regarded Liam, his closest friend -- adorned in his typical flowing skirt and well-fitted vest, tail meandering through the cool air behind him, and wondered for just a moment if he should ask the clouded leopard to take his place. Then, the pride flag mounted on the cavern wall caught his eye, and he remembered his obligations.

“What’s the matter?” Liam asked, ears lowering just slightly. “This should be a lot of fun!”

“I’ve never… been to a big formal party like this, so I… don’t really know how any of it works. I’ve also only been to Wizard Island Island for business before, it’s not really… like, I don’t know my way around there at all.”

Liam chuckled. “You’re not one to turn down an adventure, so I don’t buy that that’s the problem.”

“...There’s also the matter of the dress code.”

“Hm! I figured that was the issue. “ Liam began to pace through the workshop. Pieces of unfinished arcane devices littered the counters, glass containers housed samples from distant realities, and a few piles of boxes were still, after months, residing at the sides of the closed cavern chamber. He stopped in front of the makeshift wardrobe -- just a wooden frame around a bar with various shorts hanging, completely in the shadow of a large mechanical air purifier. “I know your outfit choices are usually pretty… spartan, but this is a big event! Dozens or more wizards will be there, and everyone will have put a lot of effort into their outfit. I don’t think just finding your least dirty pair of pants will help you here.”

“I-- hesitate to ask this, but, what alternative do you have in mind? I’m not likely to fit any of your clothes either…” It was true-- Liam was almost a full head taller than Hemi, so sharing clothes was out of the question.

“Well, then we’ll just have to go clothes shopping for you!”

“...Can’t I just, find a good cheesy wizard hat or something? Cut some ear holes, call it a day?”

Liam’s face darkened. “Well, you could do that. For a ball of wizards, you might not even stand out. But, aren’t you a member of the Queer Wizard Council? Specifically one of the ambassadors of the gay identity?”

“Oh, you’re not about to--”

“I am! Friend, there are Expectations on you, justified or not. I won’t condone you showing up with absolutely no effort in your outfit. It doesn’t have to be like what I wear, I just want you to make a good impression! These wizards are powerful allies -- don’t you want to get to know them?”

Hemi sighed and flopped back down onto the chair he was still next to. “...Fine. We’ll go clothes shopping. But you’re doing the astrogation.”

“Ehe, I knew you’d see things my way! You won’t regret this!” With that, he practically pounced over to the divining orb and began running the numbers.

Hemi had almost fallen asleep by the time that Liam returned to him with a piece of discarded scroll paper.

“Here! A full charted course.”

Hemi sat up and looked it over. It was a pretty straight shot through the phantasmal plane to reach… “Terastra… Is this just an excuse to visit your homeworld, Liam?”

“I mean… no! It’s not. It’s almost spring on my continent of origin, so the blooming festivals will be kicking off soon. They’re tied to the new moon, so I figure the motifs should line up. Plus, if we get lucky with the time alignment, the plaza might already be pretty well decorated.”

Hemi hesitated for a moment, but then stood up again. “Alright. Let’s do this. Better to leap then stay in place, right?”

Liam’s grin widened. “That’s the spirit!”

They both stepped onto the pedestal that formed the center of the entire chamber -- the place set aside for traversal work. The tips of Hemi’s ears sparked and shone with indigo and lavender, bringing a strange vertigo over both of them for just a moment. Hemi traced his claw along the lines of the pattern from the paper, then huffed and crouched.

“Three seconds!” He called out. Liam crouched down too.

Hemi bobbed his head a few times, running the final calculations in his head, and then leapt into the air and sliced outward with extended claws. The air tore open, and from the wound a prismatic light burst onto the chamber. Hemi’s momentum carried him through, and a second later Liam lowered his eyes and leapt into the rift as well.

The void between worlds was beautiful, but in a fleeting way-- when one leaves it, the structure is lost as the story of a dream upon waking. So it was that Liam had almost no memory of the traversal itself when he came to his senses on the surface of his home planet. The air was crisp and cool, but the first tinge of spring’s humidity had already snuck into it. The grass around him was damp with morning dew. He found Hemi’s paw reaching down towards him and took it with a groan as he stood unsteadily.

“Feeling alright?” Hemi asked.

“Yes, sorry.”

“Not at all! It was my bad, I took us close to a turbulent zone. That being said… where are we?”

Liam blinked a few times and found that the two of them were, in fact, not in the plaza of any city, but were in the midst of a great pine forest. The untamed ground sloped upwards towards the gathering light of morning.

“Um-- hopefully, we’re just… next to the city?”

“...What precision did you use in the astrogation?”

“Five places?”

Hemi groaned. “We could be miles away…” He started trudging through the short grass towards the local peak. “Come on, maybe there’s a view over this bluff.”

It was a deceptively long distance to the bluff -- by the time they arrived, the sky was already very nearly blue. But, when they finally reached the top, both were wordlessly taken aback.

The cliff they had arrived at was, in fact, the edge of a great ridge that nearly surrounded the landed side of the vibrant city below. The shadow of the opposing cliffs still cast darkness over the white buildings, but the miniscule impressions of hundreds of people were already milling about in the city center, were the colors of spring had been lavished upon the streets in minuscule strands. Liam’s tail and ears recovered their former, perky status immediately.

“Hmh! Not bad for five decimal places.” Hemi remarked. “I might come back here on purpose some time.”

“I’m still sorry for the trouble. It might take all morning to hike down there.”

“We’ve got two weeks, right? There’s no rush. If you mess up your skirt we’ll be in a good place to get a new one, too.”

“--Right! Okay…”

They sat for a moment to watch the sunrise finish, and then continued on their way. Thankfully, a reasonable series of switchbacks existed to allow the downward voyage to be done without any significant climbing.

“They won’t like-- recognize you here, right?” Hemi asked as they approached the base of the hills. “I know you’ve done some pretty heroic stuff…”

“No, we should be fine on that front. It was a while ago, and I looked different at the time.”

“Damn. Was hoping for some ‘divine messenger’ discounts.”

“Ha!” Liam shook his head. “We should hope they don’t have any ‘divine messenger’ flaming arrows for us. But, again, it should be fine.”

When they finally breached the city walls, both cats were somewhat exhausted, so before they reached the plaza proper, they found a tea-serving restaurant of some kind to relax at. As promised, none of the residents seemed to think the two of them were at all unusual -- the residents and tourists occupied a wide array of distinct species. Mostly canids, it seemed, but felines and the odd cervid could be sighted in the streets.

As Hemi sipped on his (quite good!) cup of green tea, Liam tilted his head, caught by a passing idea. “So, Hemi, there’s one big choice we have to make before finding you clothes.”

“And what’s that?” As Hemi asked, he already had some idea of what this ‘choice’ would be, judging from the mirthful display across Liam’s face.

“Suits or skirts?”

Hemi sighed, but had no immediate response. To tell the truth, he’d been mulling that over the entire hike so far. Suits were, of course, more traditional for masculine-appearing beings, but he was there as a representative of the Queer Wizard Council, so everything would be open to him, but if he looked bad in something, it would be worse than having shown up in just shorts and a hat, and suits and ties all seemed very restrictive compared to what he was used to… it continued spinning around from there.

“I haven’t chosen.” He answered bluntly.

“Well, for what it’s worth, I’m sure you’d cut a dashing look in either. Since you don’t have a strong preference, we’ll have to try out some of both.”

Hemi squirmed a little in his seat, then tilted his head and let his ears fall back as he noticed Liam’s general expression. “You’re enjoying this, aren’t you--?”

“It’s not every day I get to see you, of all people, flustered~”

“I’m not flustered!”

“Yes you are. Don’t lie to yourself, sweetheart.”

“Don’t-- call me that… Damn it. Fine, it’s just not a comfortable thing, okay? Is that such a crime? I probably’ll look stupid no matter what I choose anyway so--”

“What? Don’t say that! I wasn’t joking earlier, I really do think you can pull it off!”

Hemi’s ears were low, and his little nub of a tail was moving back and forth through the cutout of the chair. His posture made him appear to be barely half of Liam’s size, and his voice became quiet but firm. “This is an important event, Liam. I’ve never even seen this many other wizards at once before, let alone-- partied with them. What if I end up making a bad impression? All of this is alien to me, literally more so than actual, like, alien life… I’ve literally been more comfortable climbing a volcano or spelunking a thousand miles under the surface of some rock no one has laid eyes upon since creation began.”

“Those things are physically perilous. That’s completely different then this-- social peril-- you’re feeling. I’m sorry for pressuring you… I, uh, think I got a little too excited.“

Liam was quiet for a moment. “If, you want to go home, this was still a nice day out. You can even discard the invitation if you want, I’m sure they’ve got plenty of attendees.”

“...No.” Hemi’s back straightened, and he took a deep breath in. “No, I need to do this. I can’t just live underground with you alone forever-- no offense. I need to get out there, get out of my own head and be seen by… anyone else. Anything else, then just me and the one writing all this down.”

“Huh?”

Hemi finished his tea and stood up. “I’m ready.”

Liam’s eyes went wild and he quickly finished the last small amount of his own tea as well. “Then, let’s do this--!”

The plaza burst and flowed with vibrant colors and moving bodies of all descriptions. A sea of horns and ears jostled about open-air stalls with perfumes, floral headdresses, fresh-grilled fish, and, finally, a veritable feast of clothes. Gowns, cocktail dresses, suits, ties… a hundred outfits for a thousand eyes. Above it all, streams of paper-made flowers that jostled in the gentle breeze, like candle fire against the immense blue sky.

Hemi tried on a suit first. As predicted, the feeling of his long body fur being constrained by the fabric was hard to stomach, and this particular suit made his head seem disproportionately too large. He tried another -- similar results, but it was a bit looser. Most of the outfits had some sort of floral design, but a few commemorated the moon as well -- unfortunately, each suit that had appropriate theming seemed to have some issue of comfort or price that disqualified it from consideration. Minutes passed, then tens of minutes. Almost an hour. Over an hour. Even Liam had begun to wear down, and that resolve the lynx had kindled within himself could only maintain itself for so long. The crowds kept throbbing and coursing down the cobblestones all the while.

In the distance, Hemi noticed something different as the attendant (a rather friendly coyote) and Liam were helping button together the latest too-tight suit. It was a cocktail dress (of the over-one-shoulder variety), formed from a deep blue-purple that matched the night sky above his home world on a clear night. Across its chest, it displayed a beautiful full moon, and it had a few frills down the sides that would match his face’s lynx-like cheek fur. It stood against a boutique stand that seemed to have little traction.

“How does it fit?” Liam asked of the suit he was already wearing, though he was able to guess given how much Hemi had squirmed while it was being fastened, when he caught Hemi’s gaze and followed it. “Oh~! Did you find something..?”

An invisible barrier formed around Hemi’s words as he was stricken again with doubt. It would be a bold statement -- one his generally not-that-attractive physique would butcher for sure. Liam took the coyote aside and whispered something in their ears. The coyote looked across the crowd, then back to Hemi, and put their paw under their chin for a moment before nodding. Liam’s smile became a gentle smirk.

“Well, what are you waiting for? You won’t know anything until you try it on.”

The lynx looked to Liam with a frightened expression, so Liam put a hand on his still-padded shoulder. “They’re wizards, Liam. Half of them will be wearing bones or slime or something.”

Hemi swallowed and, after another second nodded. “I want to try on that dress.” The words, alien as they might have been to his tongue, brought an electric feeling to the back of his mind. The coyote dutifully helped him remove the suit, and he and Liam entered the other stall.

The dress, once donned, hung loosely around Hemi’s frame. Somehow, his exposed shoulder felt almost salacious, compared to not wearing any shirt at all, but the feeling was a good one. The fabric was smooth and breathable, so it was not unbearable on his fur. Most importantly, the inner structure of the dress emphasized his physique without being explicit-- it was just a little more sensual than normal. He turned around and around in the mirror, while Liam watched on from the side.

“So… what do you think?”

Hemi looked down at himself, then back up at the mirror. “I think I actually like it--! What do you think?”

“I think it’s gorgeous. It fits you really well! The moon might make it hard to use at other events, but that’s the only downside.”

“I’m alright with that. I’m sure if I end up wearing it often I can find some illusion to cast over the moon -- it’s basically a big white disk, right? Perfect backdrop for an insignia.”

“Right! Well-- do you want to try any of the other dresses? Since we’re on this side of the aisle…?”

“...Um. No, no I think-- I like this one. Aha--” Hemi put a hand against the back of his head and gave a soft, genuine smile. Liam quickly moved to find the cashier -- who ended up being some kind of dog with very curly white fur.

“My friend would like to buy that dress, please!”

The cashier nodded. “And why not! Oh, but the moon is out of season, isn’t it?”

“It’s fine, it’s for a different event. Actually, the moon was what drew us over here in the first place.”

“Oho!” The cashier dropped her voice. ”And, your friend is happy in… that kind of clothing? We have a suit with the same design in the back--”

Hemi approached. His large ears made it trivial to overhear the conversation from afar. He’d removed the dress and put it onto its hanger, but was still carrying it. He laid the fabric onto the purchase area. “Yes, I’d like to buy the dress. What’s your price?”

The cashier tapped her claw onto a rune engraved in her desk, and a circle of symbols appeared briefly in the air between her and the lynx. “You are a magician, yes? I will ask for a simple service -- production of some lumen oil for my silkworms to feed on. A cup should suffice as payment.”

“Lumen oil… very well. Do you have a cloche?”

The cashier directed Hemi to her alchemy room, and left him to provide his payment while she packaged the dress gently into a clear garment bag. A few minutes later, Hemi emerged with a small container of glowing golden liquid, formed from pure arcane energy. He wiped the sweat from his head -- he’d have to do a more complete grooming in a moment.

“Pleasure doing business with you.” He set the vial onto the payment section. The cashier tapped a rune, and the sign for equivalence appeared in the air. “Then the outfit is yours. I do hope you enjoy wearing it…!” The cashier announced.

Liam took the dress into his hands. “Thank you!” Hemi nodded in thanks as well, and the two left into the plaza. As midday drew closer, the crows had settled into lines near the food vendors, and it was clearly time to take their leave. Hemi knew the way home by heart, so it was a quick matter to tear open the air again and lead the duo back to their place in another reality.

“You did good today, Hemi.” Liam literally patted the lynx on the back as he groomed.

“It’s strange… I never imagined I’d choose an outfit like that, but-- it really did look alright on me?”

“My friend, I could not have envisioned a dress that would fit you and the occasion better. I know I’m biased, but it’s really nice that you’re taking these kinds of risks now. It was a nice day! When we both get a while off of work, we should go out again -- and not just because I got to watch you try on suits for over an hour this time.”

“Hmph--! I’ll bet that was a real treat…”

“Oh, it was~” Liam said in a tone that made it truly impossible to discern if he was being sincere or just trying to get a rise out of him. Hemi just chuckled and looked back over at the garment bag, now hanging in his wardrobe.

“You should come with me. To the ball.”

“Um-- I’m not a wizard, though?”

“Any good ball allows plus ones. Besides, I know you’ve got some ridiculous giant gown or other in your storage somewhere.”

“I… may, but, I don’t think I’d look-- hey, you don’t get to turn the situation around on me like that!”

Hemi’s chuckle turned into a full laugh. “Revenge really is sweet~ But, seriously, you should come.”

“I’ll think about it. Home’s been pretty busy lately. Tsunamis, droughts-- the people need a nature prophet more than ever. But-- if I’m not actively mitigating some huge catastrophe-- I’ll put on a ‘ridiculous, giant gown’ and come with you to the ball. It’s the least I could do, after today.”

“Thank you.”

“Of-- course.”

The matter decided, each cat went on to enjoy the rest of the afternoon in their own ways.

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