Maria and Sheila had reached a consensus. The deal was sealed.
To celebrate, Bokue dragged both mother and daughter back to bed for a vigorous "breakfast."
By the time he finally made it back to the apartment he shared with Kuroka atop Keystone Gate, it was nearly noon.
Key in the lock. Door open. Shoes swapped at the entryway.
When Bokue stepped into the living room, he paused.
Kuroka was at the kitchen counter to the right of the entrance, chin propped on one hand, the other scrolling through her phone. She looked profoundly bored, punctuating the silence with occasional yawns.
To the left, the TV was on.
Ophis sat on the sofa with the posture of a kindergartener on her first day of school: feet together, back straight, hands on knees, face blank. She was watching a perfectly ordinary daytime television program with the kind of rapt focus most people reserved for defusing bombs.
The overall effect was... unmistakable. A neglectful cat-mom glued to her phone while a toddler sat hypnotized by the television.
"Mya?"
Kuroka had just finished a yawn when the sound of the door reached her. She turned, spotted Bokue, and lit up like a Christmas tree.
"Bokue, you're back, meow!"
The cat-eared girl abandoned her phone, launched herself over the counter in a display of feline flexibility that would've scored a ten in gymnastics, and latched onto Bokue like a face-hugger from Alien. Her nose immediately went to work, sniffing him from collar to chest.
"Mmhm, mmhm! You've got the little Nightmare and the Nightmare lady all over you, meow. So it went well?"
"I'd call it a successful mediation."
Bokue chose his words diplomatically.
"Went well" made it sound like he'd been scheming from day one and had finally closed the deal. "Mediation" at least implied everyone involved had arrived at the outcome together.
"Too bad, meow~"
Kuroka sighed and pouted.
"If only my mom hadn't kicked the bucket when Shirone and I were still little. Otherwise, maybe I could've been doing the mother-daughter thing with Bokue too..."
"Ahem."
Bokue coughed pointedly, cutting that thought off at the stem.
He redirected his attention to the sofa, where Ophis continued to absorb daytime television with the intensity of a scholar studying sacred texts.
"Why is Ophis here? Did you bring her over?"
He distinctly remembered settling Ophis into one of the beach villa's spare rooms yesterday along with Chysis and the others.
"Nope, meow."
Kuroka shook her head.
"She showed up on her own this morning. By the time I noticed, she was already sitting there. I don't know how to take care of kids, so I just turned on the TV, meow~"
"..."
Crude, but effective.
It was nearly noon and Ophis hadn't moved a muscle. If regular Japanese programming could keep her rooted to the spot this long, switching to Tom and Jerry would probably pin her down until the heat death of the universe.
"Oh, that reminds me—"
Something clicked. Bokue snapped his fingers, scooped up Kuroka, and carried her to the sofa, settling down beside the entranced dragon god.
"Ophis. Is there anything you need for your room? I've got nothing going on this afternoon, so we could head down to the shopping center and pick up whatever you're missing."
"...Need?"
The word "need" was apparently not in Ophis's active vocabulary. She tore her gaze from the screen, tilted her head at Bokue, and waited for clarification.
"Things you want. Stuff you'd use."
Ophis lowered her eyes in thought. Several seconds of genuine contemplation passed before she looked up again.
"Great Red's head."
"They don't sell that at the mall."
Bokue kept his voice level.
"I mean practical things. Towels, shampoo, that kind of stuff. And clothes. You only have the one outfit, right?"
He gestured at the gothic dress she'd been wearing since the day she arrived. The same gothic dress she wore every day. The one gothic dress that apparently constituted her entire wardrobe.
"Clothes?"
Ophis glanced down at herself, then gave a small nod.
"Only this."
"Then we'll need to get you a few changes. And underwear."
"Underwear?"
"Yeah."
Bokue had assumed Ophis simply didn't understand what underwear was, which was fair enough given her general unfamiliarity with human conventions. He decided against launching into an explanation.
"Given your frame, everything's going to be kids' sizing anyway, so just pick whatever patterns you like when we get there."
"Don't have..."
Ophis murmured something under her breath.
"Hm? What was that?"
"I don't have underwear. So I don't know what underwear is."
The Infinite Dragon God stated this with absolute neutrality, as if reporting the weather.
Ah.
Bokue's eyes dropped involuntarily to the hem of her gothic dress.
"You don't have underwear? So right now, under that dress, you're..."
"Not wearing any."
Delivered with the emotional weight of a tax filing. Ophis then bent forward and grabbed the hem of her skirt with both hands, clearly about to provide a visual demonstration.
Bokue's reflexes kicked in. He caught the fabric and pushed it back down before anything was revealed.
"You don't need to show me."
?
Genuine confusion crossed Ophis's face. Being "refused" by Bokue in this context was clearly outside her frame of reference.
"Bokue Keikain. Doesn't like? When the little Nightmare showed you. You seemed happy."
"That's a completely different situation."
Bokue pinched the bridge of his nose.
At the end of the day, Ophis was the Infinite Dragon God. In certain respects, she was no different from Ddraig and Albion, the pair of Heavenly Dragon women who'd needed similar education on human norms. Ophis didn't even have a concept of gender, let alone modesty or the notion that certain areas of the body weren't meant for casual display.
"Getting real 'dad raising a daughter' vibes here, meow."
Kuroka, still perched in Bokue's lap, leaned close to his ear and whispered with obvious amusement.
"Is Bokue practicing for when big sis finally gives you kittens? Although, knowing you, the 'adopted daughter' thing always fast-forwards to the 'stepfather route' eventually, meow~"
"That's not going to happen..."
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