Fresh, legally purchased, not-stolen clothes were the first item on the agenda, and they quickly found an outfit that had Shouyousei whistling as he exited the changing room. With his black hair and dark skin, black denim looked good on him. He picked out a similarly black shirt decorated with jagged, abstract colors, the kind of ensemble just edgy enough to fit in with the general population.

“I still don’t see why plain clothes were a problem, Shou. I’m trying to avoid attracting attention, remember?” He looked ill at ease just out of the changing room, but he cut a sharp figure. A good haircut and a little cologne and she’d have to fight to keep women away from him.

“That’s the thing, ya goof,” she chided with a smile, “Plainclothes don’t fit in nowadays. Now you need to stand out to blend in.”

He gave her a properly quizzical look, as such a comment deserved, and shook his head. “I’ll give you that flashy clothing seems to be the norm, but this just seems a bit… attention grabbing?”

She took his arm in hers and led him to the counter. “Well, maybe I just want to be seen around town with a handsome stranger on my arm. You look great, you know.”

The haircut was a harder fight to win. He was steadfastly against getting his hair cut short, while Shou insisted that he’d be properly dashing once it was off his shoulders. It took both her and Kalokin’s best arguments to convince him to do something bold and new, and even then he grumbled through the entire haircut.

When the barber stepped away though, he couldn’t help but admire himself in the mirror. She’d cut it short on the sides, but with enough length on the top that Shou could still run her fingers through it; she’d specifically asked for that much length at least, when Khaesho was in a different part of the salon. With new clothes and a fresh haircut, it was time to move on to the afternoon’s main enjoyment.

“So, this festival,” Khaesho started, as they walked towards the fairgrounds. “What are you celebrating, exactly? Or is your culture of consumption so far sunk into the lap of luxury that you can afford to throw parties for no reason?”

She sighed and elbowed him playfully. “Nothing wrong with having a good time! Besides, you’ll approve of this one, I think. Most cities have some kind of fall festival, but here they always schedule it so that it’s the weekend closest to the Equinox.” She smiled coyly rather happy that today of all days, was the day he could spend with her.

“Oh!” He looked properly guilty at that. “I apologize, I didn’t know you still celebrated the turning of the seasons in such a way. Back home, we hear legends of how ‘modernized’ everything is… It’s a pleasant surprise to hear you still celebrate the earth’s movements.”

A happy laugh escaped her as they rounded a corner and the festival came into view. “I thought you’d like that bit. Even now, fall is known as a season of harvest, and even up here in the mountains, fall festivals are themed around the harvest.”

And this one was one of her favorites. It was equal parts down-to-earth harvest celebration and seedy, carnival style entertainment. There was a strength tester right next to the pumpkin vendor, there was apple bobbing and dart games, and face painting by a ball toss, with everything themed around scare crows and candy corn and straw. There was even a petting zoo off to one side.

And Khaesho’s eyes fell immediately to the carnival games. He started at the dart toss; partially filled balloons were taped against a wood bored, while a wickedly smiling carney offered him a few darts. “Pop a balloon, win a prize! Three tosses for two dollars, whaddaya say?”

Shouyousei knew that most of these games were rigged; this one, for instance, the darts weren’t near as sharp as they should have been, but there was a wicked look in Khaesho’s eyes as he looked back over his shoulder. He mouthed ‘trust me’, before turning back to the carney. “Nah, I’ll pass.”

No sooner did he turn to walk away than the carney jumped up and called after him. “Whatcha scared of? It’s just a little game, a few dollars ain’t any skin off your nose. C’mon, win your girl a cute plushie!” He glanced conspiratorially at Shou and smiled. “Looks like she could use sommat comfy to hug.

Khaesho paused, grinning where only Shou could see it before turning back to him. “No, she’s got me for cuddling, thanks, but how about a wager? I’ll bet you I can pop three balloons, hit one with each dart. You get ten if I lose, I get twenty if I win.”

The carney backpedaled, placing a hand over his heart. “Whatchu’bout, govna? Just a friendly game, is all. I’ll bet you even, ten for ten.” He was sharp though; when he backpedaled, Shou saw him grind the tips of the darts against the wood, dulling them even further. She almost opened her mouth to say something, but Kalokin whispered quietly into her ear. “Wait.”

She had almost forgotten he was there. She reached up to stroke him as he whispered. “Take me off and put me in your purse so I can dissipate. Khaesho -loves- a good hustle, and it’s been a while since I conned a conman.”
Off went the earring, vanishing into her purse. With her hand still on it, she felt it vanish, and a hazy blue aura of magic surrounded the desert wanderer as he continued bartering.

“How about ten against thirty, but I throw them all at once?” Khaesho smiled wickedly as the carney balked.

“No way, ye can’t be serious.” The carney looked half caught between suspicion and half eager to make an easy ten dollars.

Khaesho reached into his pocket and pulled out a crisp Hamilton that certainly hadn’t been there earlier, which he slapped on a post. “Call me a liar, but I do love a good gamble.”

Greed won out over caution and the carney handed over the darts. “Ay, your loss mate. Easiest tenner I’ll ever make.”

Khaesho eyed up the targets, picking a trio reasonably close together. Gingerly, he gripped the three darts between the four fingers of his left hand, sliding into a balanced position. As he dramatically wound his shoulder back. Then, there was a brief, quiet flash of magic, just barely large enough for Shou to notice with her newly-focused vision. Then, he tossed, the three darts sailing in a lazy arc to strike the dead center of three different balloons, each popping with a satisfying thwap.

“No fookin way! Nobody’s popped a balloon all day, those darts should have been way too dull for that soft a throw!” While he stared in disbelief, Khaesho casually reached past him and helped himself to the cash locker, almost successfully counting out his winnings before the carney noticed and spun around, clapping a hand on his wrist. “The hell you think you’re doing?”

Khaesho just leaned closer and hissed, mouth split in a cruel grin. “Taking my share of the winnings. Or, if you’d rather, I could report you to the authorities for illegally gambling, and for intentionally setting up an impossible game.”

The poor carney, caught now between greed for his money and fear of reprisal, battled with the thought. There was another faint flash of magic, no more remarkable than a twitch of a finger, and he relented. “Take your thirty and get out of my sight, ya miserable git.”

Walking away with thirty dollars’ worth of crumpled bills in his pocket, Khaesho was quite pleased with himself, even more when Shou poked him in the ribs. “Alright Kesh, spill the beans. I saw you do something back there, and I don’t believe you honestly got that miracle shot. You didn’t even have a ten when you walked up to him, fess up.”

He grinned smugly, basking in the glow of her suspicion for a few moments before relenting. “The bill was an illusion. Kalokin proper may not have much raw strength, but his control and attention to detail are phenomenal, and illusions take the least amount of raw power. Then, the darts. You know I’m good with fire. I crammed head into the head of each dart. Not a lot, but hyper focused, enough to melt a hole in each balloon instead of popping it. Then, when he was about to welch out, Nikolak leaned on his fears juuuust a bit. She’s the one who made the terror field, back when we first met? She put just a pinch of doubt, a pinch of fear in his mind, then my cold stare and poker face was enough to make him back down.”

He tucked the bills into his pocket with a grin. “If nothing else, I’ll always be a gambling man. That works out though, because Kalokin can always cut odds in my favor. He never loses, you know. Legend says he’s never lost a bet, and if you want to hear some legends, there are plenty about all the ways his Vash’s have tried to rig games against him.

Shou gave a wry grin; she’d lost her fair share of money to carnivorous carnies, and she wasn’t about to oppose him hustling a few of them. “But how’d you hit the balloons? Left handed, at that?”

He ran his hand through his hair- his RIGHT hand, which he’d been using predominately, since she met him- and smiled. “Kalokin can control any part of my body, from conscious muscles to subconscious things like my heart or my stomach, but if I try to move, it messes him up. It’s an indescribable feeling, having your muscles move involuntarily. Anyways, with the years of free time I had, I taught myself to be ambidextrous. I’ll always prefer my right, but Kalokin has better control over my left hand, specifically because it’s still my off-hand. Then… well, like I said, he has impossibly fine control. I’ve seen him make enough impossible shots that I just take it on faith that if its physically possible, no matter how unlikely, he’ll land it.

Khaesho managed to pull the same hustle on a man idly tossing a baseball; knock down a set of 9 bottles to win a prize. Instead, Kalokin found a perfect spin, sending one bottle flying sideways to topple two sets of bottles, netting Khaesho a clean fifty dollars from the astounded carny. By the time he went to try a third time though, word had spread through the carnival, and none were willing to gamble for anything. Two dollars, and you get a prize if you win, and no cajoling or wheedling could move any of them to a real gamble. So, he won her a stuffed snake, colored bright blue with black and white stripes, almost reminiscent of Kalokin’s patterned back.

They toured the more innocent attractions then, and without Kalokin’s guidance, Khaesho had quite the adventure attempting to bob an apple using just his teeth. She caught him glance at the setting sun though, and decided that the afternoon had moved on long enough to go grab dinner. “Come on, Kesh. Let’s grab dinner, I know the best place.”

He looked back west, to where the sun balanced between two peaks. “Shou, I don’t know… It’s been a blast and all, but I should really-”

“Come on, I don’t want this day to end just yet. Let’s grab dinner, and then you can retreat back to your cave, okay?” She had no intentions of letting him slink off like that, but it was too soon to broach the subject of him staying.

He looked torn between concerned fatigue and an earnest desire to spend more time with the city dancer. Kalokin, apparently willing to back Shou up on this, whispered into both their ears. “Come on Khaesho, she promised you alcohol. You know how disastrous your attempt at building a distillery was, and I hear their bars have liquors from all over the world.”

With a sigh and a smile, Kesh turned his back to the sun and fell in step with Shouyousei. “I suppose a good meal would suit me nicely… I should warn you though, I’m an infamous lightweight, and I hear you easterners like your drinks strong.”

Shou smiled to herself and gave her serpent earring an appreciative stroke. It was hard to tell if Kalokin was playing as her wingman, or as Khaesho’s, but she didn’t want to say goodbye just yet. She still thought they were wrong about her soul, she could feel it. If they called her an empty sponge, maybe she just needed to spend some time with them… they both clearly had magic to spare, if she could just soak some of that up to use for herself, she’d be dandy.