The purple-haired girl looked the four of us over, but her eyes lingered on my small kitsune girlfriend for a moment before she rephrased her question, "Why do I have a pack of werewolves and a tiny werefox spying on me?"
"What makes you think we're werewolfs?" Cerys demanded with a frown as she stared at the purple-haired girl.
Then with a dangerous edge in her voice the blonde werewolf added, "And if we are, don't you think you should be more careful? Seems to me like you're taking a pretty big risk, considering you're all alone here in the woods with the four of us?"
The girl just smiled, "I'm not alone in the woods with you and your pack. You four are alone in my woods with me. And I hate to break it to you blondie, but you're not that scary. I happen to know when you shift you're more 'big happy puppy' than 'scary dangerous wolf'. Cute collar though."
"You're a bit more serious as a wolf," she added to Melanie. Then she looked at my girlfriend and added, "I have no idea what to make of you, apart from the fact that you're tiny and cute."
She finally looked at me and said, "And you just seem really shy to me. Too shy to even have your ears and tail out, unlike the rest of your pack."
"I'm Violet by the way," she added. "Violet Andersen. Me and my friends live around the block from you and your packmates, but I'm sure you already knew that. Our backyards share a fence."
I wasn't sure at first how to react to any of that. She was acting calm and confident, and even if she had some of the details wrong about me and Kaylee she at least seemed to know what she was talking about when it came to our two wolfgirls.
Then Melanie demanded, "What do you mean 'your woods'? We've been coming here since long before you even moved into town. If anything this is our conservation area, not yours."
"Not really," Violet replied with a shrug. "I've adopted these woods, and they've adopted me."
She added, "That's how I know about you and your girlfriend by the way? The trees told me all about you two, coming over here on the full moons to run around and play."
There was a sceptical tone in Cerys's voice as she asked, "You talk to the trees? Are you some kind of druid or something? Or a dryad?"
Violet shook her head, "I'm not going to say anything else about myself. I'd like to get to know you four better first."
"She's anthousai," I heard myself say, which caught all five of us by surprise. Then I felt that calm confidence settle over myself, that told me my other self was active again.
Not-me added so our friends and I would know what she was talking about, "That's a kind of forest nymph. Flower nymph to be precise."
"How'd you know that?" Violet demanded.
My other self replied calmly, "I'm not a werewolf, or any other kind of were. I am the goddess of chaos."
"Oh crap," the girl mumbled as her eyes widened. Her face went a bit pale and she even took a step back. Then she responded, "Um, I don't mean any disrespect or anything ma'am? And I hope this doesn't cause any trouble, but I should maybe mention that I'm under the protection of Artemis, Goddess of the Hunt, Nature, the Moon, and all that stuff?"
That in turn caught all of us off-guard, not that other-me let it show. Our friends all exchanged some worried glances though.
Then I heard myself respond, "In that case I suggest all five of us try and talk things out in a civil and friendly manner? We didn't come here looking for a fight, we came to determine what you were doing with the woods and the reservoir."
Violet agreed, "I don't want any trouble either. As for why I'm here, it's like I said? I adopted these woods and the woods adopted me. It's a nymph thing? Being bonded to nature and the land and stuff?"
"So you're not trying to poison the reservoir?" Cerys asked. "You're not working on some nefarious plot?"
The purple-haired girl blinked and gave our club leader a funny look, "What?! What in the world made you think I was doing something like that? All I do is come over here once a day to meditate and spend time with the plants and trees!"
Melanie groaned as she gave her girlfriend a look, "I told you so!"
Then the ravenette wolfgirl added, "There's a bench back that way, how about we all go back there and talk this out in comfort? Can you commune with the trees or whatever from alongside the path?"
"Sure," Violet nodded. "Or we can go across the highway and talk in the coffee shop. Or one of the restaurants if you want to grab some lunch?"
We all agreed with that idea, then as the five of us started heading south out of the woods and back towards the trail our older werewolf spoke up again. "My name's Melanie by the way, Melanie Caetano. And since you already seem to know anyways, yes I'm a werewolf."
"This is my girlfriend Cerys Ainsley," she added as she wrapped an arm around the blonde werewolf's shoulders.
My girlfriend went next, "I'm Kaylee Holt. And I'm not a werefox, or a foxgirl. I'm actually a demon."
Violet almost stumbled as she turned to stare at Kaylee for a second. "Seriously? You're a demon, and you're girlfriends with a goddess?"
Other-me had already disappeared again, and without her I just blushed slightly and shrugged. "I don't like to talk about the goddess stuff that much, especially not in public? And um, my name is Cass. Or, Cassandra Underwood, but everyone calls me Cass."
The plant nymph frowned at me for a couple seconds, and I was positive she'd noticed that my confidence was gone again. Like she already knew I was shy and stuff, then she saw not-me act all bold and goddessy, now I was back to being quiet and timid again. Fortunately she didn't ask about it or comment or anything. She just nodded as the five of us left the woods and continued south along the trail.
"So Melanie, Cerys, Kaylee, and Cass," Violet finally responded. "And you have a few more friends who live with you back at your place too, right? Same here, I've got two friends and housemates back home. Or I mean, they live with me but they're both working so they aren't at home right now."
Melanie gave her girlfriend another look as she replied, "Yeah me and Cerys should be at work today too."
There was more smalltalk as we continued along the trail back to the entrance and the highway. We learned that Violet originally lived in the suburbs north-west of the city. Her parents were still there, but thanks to her patron goddess she got the house around the block from our place and was able to move out on her own. Then she invited her two best friends to come and stay with her.
We didn't say anything about Club Luna, but we did sort of say things were similar for us. Like how I owned our house and invited all our friends to stay there too. And as we got closer to the exit both the wolfgirls switched back to their fully human forms, but my girlfriend continued to attract loads of extra attention like usual.
Eventually the five of us ended up at a burger place alongside the highway. It was busy this time of day, but we managed to get a table. And over the course of lunch we got to know Violet a bit better, she got to know the four of us better, and in the end it felt like we were going to be friends.
"How about you and your two girlfriends come over to our place tomorrow evening?" Cerys suggested. "We'll do a BBQ, and we can all get to know each other better? Since we're backyard neighbours and everything? And it sounds like we've all got stuff in common."
Violet smiled, "All right Cerys. I'll mention it to them tonight when they're home from work, but I'm sure they'll agree."
"Just uh, maybe don't mention all the supernatural stuff to them?" Melanie asked. "We usually try and keep that stuff secret, and I'm sure you do too."
"Or most of us try anyways," she added, with a glance at my tiny demonic kitsune girlfriend.
• • • • •
"So this is my friend Jade," Violet said as she introduced the attractive athletic green-haired girl on her right. Then she gestured to the small cute grey-haired catgirl on her left as she continued, "And this is my friend Sage."
"Hey everyone," Jade greeted us all with a friendly smile and wave. She was dressed in a pair of cargo shorts and a tight white t-shirt. She had some loose beige work boots on her feet, and was wearing a short-sleeve plaid shirt overtop of the tee.
Sage seemed a little less outgoing but she was just as friendly. She was wearing flip-flops, a pair of navy blue shorts, and a pale grey-green short-sleeve tunic top. Her tail was hanging down but her ears were perked up as she smiled, "Hello everybody."
And Violet was in a knee-length green skirt and a loose pink blouse, with some sneakers.
The three of them had just come around the house and into our backyard, after walking all the way around the block. It would have been a lot easier to just come straight across from their backyard into ours, but there was a five-foot-tall chain-link fence and some bushes in the way.
And out of the three of them, only Jade looked like she'd be able to scale that without much difficulty. I knew I definitely couldn't, last time I tried to climb a fence was with Cerys when we were dealing with the witch hunter. And I ended up on my butt in the bushes.
Meanwhile Cerys was doing the introductions on our side of things, which was taking longer since there were a lot more of us. Nina and Willow had come for the BBQ and to meet the neighbours, and so far everything seemed to be going well. Nobody mentioned anything supernatural, like when Violet introduced Sage she didn't say anything about how her friend became a catgirl. And when Cerys introduced the rest of us she didn't mention anything about what we all were. Anyways Kaylee was the only one on our side who was obviously not normal. Sasha's pure white hair stood out too, but at least that could be explained as some sort of fashion thing.
After all the introductions were out of the way our guests grabbed some drinks from the cooler, then everyone sort of relaxed and started to mingle and talk and stuff. We had some music playing, the BBQ was heating up, it was the last Friday of July and it was a beautiful summer evening.
Violet ended up talking with Sasha and Willow, while Sage got into a conversation with Nina. And Jade drifted over to the BBQ to chat with Melanie and Cerys, who'd just got a load of ribs cooking on the grill. Meanwhile Kaylee and I carried out some bowls of chips and pork rinds for people to snack on, then we also brought out some salad and rolls to go with the ribs.
With that done my girlfriend went to join my sister and the small catgirl, while I ended up hanging out near the BBQ with Jade and the wolfgirls. They were already talking about stuff so I just listened in at first.
"...jobs at the grocery store on the south side of town?" Melanie was saying. "It's another big-box plaza kind of place, and as much as I complain about the manager they've been pretty good about giving Cerys and I matching shifts? So we can walk to and from work together, keep each other company and stuff."
The blonde wolfgirl smiled as she added, "It's a safety in numbers kind of thing? So neither of us has to walk home alone at ten o'clock after a late shift."
Jade nodded as she had a sip of her cola, "That's cool, I'm glad they're flexible about the hours. I know the place you mean, I got a summer job not far from there? I sometimes grab lunch at the shops in that mall. I work at one of the factories in the little industrial area just east of there. I'm on the shipping and receiving team, which is mostly boring to be honest. Best part is I just got my forklift certification, which gives me more options."
"Not that I plan on working in a warehouse or factory forever," she added. "Me and Vi and Sage are all going to the local college come September? I'll be taking an arts program and also working on getting my welding certificate. That's my real passion. I'm an artist, I make sculpture out of scrap metal."
"That sounds really cool," I said as I finally joined the conversation. "I'm actually going to the local college too, and my cousin Sasha's thinking about it as well. Maybe we can all walk over there together? Uh, assuming you three are walking?"
Jade grinned, "I don't know if we'll walk in the winter, I have a feeling we'll take Vi's car when the weather is bad. But that's cool, it's good to know we'll have some friends there already."
The four of us talked a bit more about school and stuff, Melanie and Cerys told her they were still in high school for one more year then they didn't know what they were doing after that. Which made me think I should talk to them in private at some point. If they wanted to go to college or university I'd make sure they could afford it.
When the food was ready Melanie let everyone know, and we all helped ourselves to the ribs and stuff.
I ended up sitting in between Kaylee and Sage, and I couldn't help noticing the small catgirl seemed a little uneasy around me. It left me wondering if maybe Violet told her friends about me being a goddess or something. Except if she did, Jade certainly didn't seem the least bit bothered by that information.
Then Sage leaned closer and quietly asked, "Is it true, are you Kid Chaos? You're the one who created the enchanted plushies?"
My eyes widened and I glanced at my girlfriend, who gave me a guilty look.
"Sorry Cass," Kaylee apologized. "I assumed Sage already knew, after you told me and your moms about her when she moved in?"
I'd forgotten all about that, but it sort of came back to me when she mentioned it. Except I couldn't remember if that was really me, or maybe Cassandra was the one who talked about that stuff at the time.
For now I looked at Sage again then replied quietly, "Yeah it's me, but I'd rather keep that secret if you don't mind?"
"Of course," the small catgirl nodded. "I just want to say thank you. That magic plushie probably saved my life. If not for you I'd be stuck in the closet, living with my transmisic parents. Now I'm living with my two best friends, my life is great, and I love my body and who I am."
Hearing the emotion and feeling she put into it as she said all that hit me harder than I expected. Both me and not-me were kind of moved, and I smiled back at her.
"You're welcome Sage," I told her quietly. "And stories like yours are why I do it. I'm glad you're happy, and I'm glad you've got such good friends."
~ End of Episode Sixteen ~
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The purple-haired girl looked the four of us over, but her eyes lingered on my small kitsune girlfriend for a moment before she rephrased her question, "Why do I have a pack of werewolves and a tiny werefox spying on me?"
"What makes you think we're werewolfs?" Cerys demanded with a frown as she stared at the purple-haired girl.
Then with a dangerous edge in her voice the blonde werewolf added, "And if we are, don't you think you should be more careful? Seems to me like you're taking a pretty big risk, considering you're all alone here in the woods with the four of us?"
The girl just smiled, "I'm not alone in the woods with you and your pack. You four are alone in my woods with me. And I hate to break it to you blondie, but you're not that scary. I happen to know when you shift you're more 'big happy puppy' than 'scary dangerous wolf'. Cute collar though."
"You're a bit more serious as a wolf," she added to Melanie. Then she looked at my girlfriend and added, "I have no idea what to make of you, apart from the fact that you're tiny and cute."
She finally looked at me and said, "And you just seem really shy to me. Too shy to even have your ears and tail out, unlike the rest of your pack."
"I'm Violet by the way," she added. "Violet Andersen. Me and my friends live around the block from you and your packmates, but I'm sure you already knew that. Our backyards share a fence."
I wasn't sure at first how to react to any of that. She was acting calm and confident, and even if she had some of the details wrong about me and Kaylee she at least seemed to know what she was talking about when it came to our two wolfgirls.
Then Melanie demanded, "What do you mean 'your woods'? We've been coming here since long before you even moved into town. If anything this is our conservation area, not yours."
"Not really," Violet replied with a shrug. "I've adopted these woods, and they've adopted me."
She added, "That's how I know about you and your girlfriend by the way? The trees told me all about you two, coming over here on the full moons to run around and play."
There was a sceptical tone in Cerys's voice as she asked, "You talk to the trees? Are you some kind of druid or something? Or a dryad?"
Violet shook her head, "I'm not going to say anything else about myself. I'd like to get to know you four better first."
"She's anthousai," I heard myself say, which caught all five of us by surprise. Then I felt that calm confidence settle over myself, that told me my other self was active again.
Not-me added so our friends and I would know what she was talking about, "That's a kind of forest nymph. Flower nymph to be precise."
"How'd you know that?" Violet demanded.
My other self replied calmly, "I'm not a werewolf, or any other kind of were. I am the goddess of chaos."
"Oh crap," the girl mumbled as her eyes widened. Her face went a bit pale and she even took a step back. Then she responded, "Um, I don't mean any disrespect or anything ma'am? And I hope this doesn't cause any trouble, but I should maybe mention that I'm under the protection of Artemis, Goddess of the Hunt, Nature, the Moon, and all that stuff?"
That in turn caught all of us off-guard, not that other-me let it show. Our friends all exchanged some worried glances though.
Then I heard myself respond, "In that case I suggest all five of us try and talk things out in a civil and friendly manner? We didn't come here looking for a fight, we came to determine what you were doing with the woods and the reservoir."
Violet agreed, "I don't want any trouble either. As for why I'm here, it's like I said? I adopted these woods and the woods adopted me. It's a nymph thing? Being bonded to nature and the land and stuff?"
"So you're not trying to poison the reservoir?" Cerys asked. "You're not working on some nefarious plot?"
The purple-haired girl blinked and gave our club leader a funny look, "What?! What in the world made you think I was doing something like that? All I do is come over here once a day to meditate and spend time with the plants and trees!"
Melanie groaned as she gave her girlfriend a look, "I told you so!"
Then the ravenette wolfgirl added, "There's a bench back that way, how about we all go back there and talk this out in comfort? Can you commune with the trees or whatever from alongside the path?"
"Sure," Violet nodded. "Or we can go across the highway and talk in the coffee shop. Or one of the restaurants if you want to grab some lunch?"
We all agreed with that idea, then as the five of us started heading south out of the woods and back towards the trail our older werewolf spoke up again. "My name's Melanie by the way, Melanie Caetano. And since you already seem to know anyways, yes I'm a werewolf."
"This is my girlfriend Cerys Ainsley," she added as she wrapped an arm around the blonde werewolf's shoulders.
My girlfriend went next, "I'm Kaylee Holt. And I'm not a werefox, or a foxgirl. I'm actually a demon."
Violet almost stumbled as she turned to stare at Kaylee for a second. "Seriously? You're a demon, and you're girlfriends with a goddess?"
Other-me had already disappeared again, and without her I just blushed slightly and shrugged. "I don't like to talk about the goddess stuff that much, especially not in public? And um, my name is Cass. Or, Cassandra Underwood, but everyone calls me Cass."
The plant nymph frowned at me for a couple seconds, and I was positive she'd noticed that my confidence was gone again. Like she already knew I was shy and stuff, then she saw not-me act all bold and goddessy, now I was back to being quiet and timid again. Fortunately she didn't ask about it or comment or anything. She just nodded as the five of us left the woods and continued south along the trail.
"So Melanie, Cerys, Kaylee, and Cass," Violet finally responded. "And you have a few more friends who live with you back at your place too, right? Same here, I've got two friends and housemates back home. Or I mean, they live with me but they're both working so they aren't at home right now."
Melanie gave her girlfriend another look as she replied, "Yeah me and Cerys should be at work today too."
There was more smalltalk as we continued along the trail back to the entrance and the highway. We learned that Violet originally lived in the suburbs north-west of the city. Her parents were still there, but thanks to her patron goddess she got the house around the block from our place and was able to move out on her own. Then she invited her two best friends to come and stay with her.
We didn't say anything about Club Luna, but we did sort of say things were similar for us. Like how I owned our house and invited all our friends to stay there too. And as we got closer to the exit both the wolfgirls switched back to their fully human forms, but my girlfriend continued to attract loads of extra attention like usual.
Eventually the five of us ended up at a burger place alongside the highway. It was busy this time of day, but we managed to get a table. And over the course of lunch we got to know Violet a bit better, she got to know the four of us better, and in the end it felt like we were going to be friends.
"How about you and your two girlfriends come over to our place tomorrow evening?" Cerys suggested. "We'll do a BBQ, and we can all get to know each other better? Since we're backyard neighbours and everything? And it sounds like we've all got stuff in common."
Violet smiled, "All right Cerys. I'll mention it to them tonight when they're home from work, but I'm sure they'll agree."
"Just uh, maybe don't mention all the supernatural stuff to them?" Melanie asked. "We usually try and keep that stuff secret, and I'm sure you do too."
"Or most of us try anyways," she added, with a glance at my tiny demonic kitsune girlfriend.
• • • • •
"So this is my friend Jade," Violet said as she introduced the attractive athletic green-haired girl on her right. Then she gestured to the small cute grey-haired catgirl on her left as she continued, "And this is my friend Sage."
"Hey everyone," Jade greeted us all with a friendly smile and wave. She was dressed in a pair of cargo shorts and a tight white t-shirt. She had some loose beige work boots on her feet, and was wearing a short-sleeve plaid shirt overtop of the tee.
Sage seemed a little less outgoing but she was just as friendly. She was wearing flip-flops, a pair of navy blue shorts, and a pale grey-green short-sleeve tunic top. Her tail was hanging down but her ears were perked up as she smiled, "Hello everybody."
And Violet was in a knee-length green skirt and a loose pink blouse, with some sneakers.
The three of them had just come around the house and into our backyard, after walking all the way around the block. It would have been a lot easier to just come straight across from their backyard into ours, but there was a five-foot-tall chain-link fence and some bushes in the way.
And out of the three of them, only Jade looked like she'd be able to scale that without much difficulty. I knew I definitely couldn't, last time I tried to climb a fence was with Cerys when we were dealing with the witch hunter. And I ended up on my butt in the bushes.
Meanwhile Cerys was doing the introductions on our side of things, which was taking longer since there were a lot more of us. Nina and Willow had come for the BBQ and to meet the neighbours, and so far everything seemed to be going well. Nobody mentioned anything supernatural, like when Violet introduced Sage she didn't say anything about how her friend became a catgirl. And when Cerys introduced the rest of us she didn't mention anything about what we all were. Anyways Kaylee was the only one on our side who was obviously not normal. Sasha's pure white hair stood out too, but at least that could be explained as some sort of fashion thing.
After all the introductions were out of the way our guests grabbed some drinks from the cooler, then everyone sort of relaxed and started to mingle and talk and stuff. We had some music playing, the BBQ was heating up, it was the last Friday of July and it was a beautiful summer evening.
Violet ended up talking with Sasha and Willow, while Sage got into a conversation with Nina. And Jade drifted over to the BBQ to chat with Melanie and Cerys, who'd just got a load of ribs cooking on the grill. Meanwhile Kaylee and I carried out some bowls of chips and pork rinds for people to snack on, then we also brought out some salad and rolls to go with the ribs.
With that done my girlfriend went to join my sister and the small catgirl, while I ended up hanging out near the BBQ with Jade and the wolfgirls. They were already talking about stuff so I just listened in at first.
"...jobs at the grocery store on the south side of town?" Melanie was saying. "It's another big-box plaza kind of place, and as much as I complain about the manager they've been pretty good about giving Cerys and I matching shifts? So we can walk to and from work together, keep each other company and stuff."
The blonde wolfgirl smiled as she added, "It's a safety in numbers kind of thing? So neither of us has to walk home alone at ten o'clock after a late shift."
Jade nodded as she had a sip of her cola, "That's cool, I'm glad they're flexible about the hours. I know the place you mean, I got a summer job not far from there? I sometimes grab lunch at the shops in that mall. I work at one of the factories in the little industrial area just east of there. I'm on the shipping and receiving team, which is mostly boring to be honest. Best part is I just got my forklift certification, which gives me more options."
"Not that I plan on working in a warehouse or factory forever," she added. "Me and Vi and Sage are all going to the local college come September? I'll be taking an arts program and also working on getting my welding certificate. That's my real passion. I'm an artist, I make sculpture out of scrap metal."
"That sounds really cool," I said as I finally joined the conversation. "I'm actually going to the local college too, and my cousin Sasha's thinking about it as well. Maybe we can all walk over there together? Uh, assuming you three are walking?"
Jade grinned, "I don't know if we'll walk in the winter, I have a feeling we'll take Vi's car when the weather is bad. But that's cool, it's good to know we'll have some friends there already."
The four of us talked a bit more about school and stuff, Melanie and Cerys told her they were still in high school for one more year then they didn't know what they were doing after that. Which made me think I should talk to them in private at some point. If they wanted to go to college or university I'd make sure they could afford it.
When the food was ready Melanie let everyone know, and we all helped ourselves to the ribs and stuff.
I ended up sitting in between Kaylee and Sage, and I couldn't help noticing the small catgirl seemed a little uneasy around me. It left me wondering if maybe Violet told her friends about me being a goddess or something. Except if she did, Jade certainly didn't seem the least bit bothered by that information.
Then Sage leaned closer and quietly asked, "Is it true, are you Kid Chaos? You're the one who created the enchanted plushies?"
My eyes widened and I glanced at my girlfriend, who gave me a guilty look.
"Sorry Cass," Kaylee apologized. "I assumed Sage already knew, after you told me and your moms about her when she moved in?"
I'd forgotten all about that, but it sort of came back to me when she mentioned it. Except I couldn't remember if that was really me, or maybe Cassandra was the one who talked about that stuff at the time.
For now I looked at Sage again then replied quietly, "Yeah it's me, but I'd rather keep that secret if you don't mind?"
"Of course," the small catgirl nodded. "I just want to say thank you. That magic plushie probably saved my life. If not for you I'd be stuck in the closet, living with my transmisic parents. Now I'm living with my two best friends, my life is great, and I love my body and who I am."
Hearing the emotion and feeling she put into it as she said all that hit me harder than I expected. Both me and not-me were kind of moved, and I smiled back at her.
"You're welcome Sage," I told her quietly. "And stories like yours are why I do it. I'm glad you're happy, and I'm glad you've got such good friends."
~ End of Episode Sixteen ~
PurpleCatGirl If you're enjoying our work and you'd like to support us, please consider joining our patreon & get early access to new chapters, bonus chapters, and more! Patrons have already read chapter 137 and you could too!
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