10:15. The café had been closed for an hour already, but a short woman had just locked the doors and began on her way home just in time for the Christmas Season. They had closed for the next two days, and it was a welcome respite considering the holiday rush the café had gotten from the folks with a lonesome holiday to look forward to.

Vanilla was out walking across the rain laden streets of the city, her work "uniform" tucked neatly in a bag over her shoulder. It was a tad bit humiliating to be stuck wearing maid attire all day for work, but she had vowed never to really set foot out of this place inside of it. Despite being the assistant manager for the better part of two years, when push came to shove and somebody needed time off or couldn't come into work that day, it lead to her wearing this thing. Vanilla wasn't exactly the kind of woman that blended in with the crowd, so having something that made her stand out even more seemed like a great way to get some unwanted attention. She looked down at her phone to see her roommates' group chat popping off. A flick of the thumb was all it took to see a picture of Thomas' cat with its head shoved all the way into his cup of water. A smirk flowed over her face before she'd reply in kind, her shoes going down the slick streets.

vkingsley: "Sorry being running late. I messed up yesterday's till count. I'm on my way home."
tomass: "finally. u missed out on the pizza, V."
ness1e: "I saved you some slices of urs that Barry thought he could swipe. ; ) "
b4gold443: "she knows that my weakness is Supreme! Besides, Nila usually gets the Hawaiian."
tomass: "how do u even eat that stuff on pizza?"

She rounded a corner with phone in hand, walking down the subway stairs and going to reply to it in full. Vanilla did have to hold herself back though, as the last time she had answered a question related to food, the entire chat room was filled to the brim with a dissertation about the stigma against pineapples in today's society. So she'd keep it brief. Her nails tapped against the screen protector as her short legs moved at a mile a minute to go and catch the subway on time.

vkingsley: "I told you that last time, pineapple pairs well with savory dishes or foods. So when put on pizza, the salinity of the tomato paste or the spiciness of the other toppings will only cause it to be better than it is by yourself."
b4gold443: "pls don't get her started again, thomas..."
tomass: "i know. rhetorical question. we r waiting on you 2 get home. its Christmas movie night, and nessie chose last night."
ness1e: "So ur up. cya when u get here!"

It was still so hard to imagine such a welcome from her family's house, a place that she could look forward to going home to instead of finding ways to stay after. Vanilla had often taken overnight shifts and work to avoid such a fate, having developed a sense of dread that arrived whenever she would step foot into that house. It was a bit of an ironic fate that she had. The very place where her dreams had been created had now become a prison that exhumed such negative feelings the moment her feet took a step near. But ever since she had moved into with Vanessa, or Nessie as she had wanted to be called, Thomas and Barry had been a bit much to grow used to as roommates. With one being a bit of a messy gamer and the other finding pleasure in his cat making a mess of things than it was to clean up. But at times, they were one big dysfunctional family, but in the good sense. Another stray ping took her mind off of things and-

Oh.

ness1e: "u should come home really fast before I get out of this~ xo"

Vanessa had taken a selfie with one of her many ugly christmas sweaters, but this one was the one she knew Vanilla enjoyed for more than one reason. It was...er, it was one of the sweaters that certainly wasn't suitable for being worn inside of the café. That was about as much as her mind could really piece together. But the little otaku did recognize it from some of the serial chapters of shojo that they had been binge reading together. How dare she tease her like this! Vanilla furrowed her brows in defiance, though silently would find herself going back to the picture in question. Her cheeks glowed a bright red color as the light pierced the empty, dimly lit subway hall as she stood and waited for the train. Another pip rang out as Vanilla raised the phone to her face again. Another text message? But this time, it wasn't from the group chat. It was by somebody outside of her contact list. An Earth-chan? A finger moved to swipe the phone and unlock it, opening the message.



"Huh?" Vanilla was confused. Was this some kind of prank or something? A way of bugging her that one of her gacha games (that she really should have quit long ago) had been left untouched for far too long? Such a strange text. She sighed and moved to deleted the text from her phone, but it slipped from her hands. The woman let out a shocked exhale while the phone began its descent into the cold and waterlogged ground of the train tracks. "Augh! My ph-Whoooa!" Her foot was slipped on the edge of the platform and become airborne. This had her on the collision course with the train tracks with her phone. Out of instinct, her hands outstretched to grab the phone, fingers clasping the sides as her thumb moves across the way as she brought it towards her chest. Her eyes widened in horror at the incoming train track in horror. Her arms raised themselves to shield her face and wait the impact from the hard, buzzing touch of the track.

But when she did hit the ground, it felt softer...wet. Vanilla tumbled down and down, rolling across the way with her bag following after her. Her world went around in circles, going down and down and down until after a few seconds, she'd finally stop as she lay on the ground underneath her, Her face viewed the stormy sky as her eyes twirled about while trying to gain a footing on the tumble. That was one hell of a fall, but she wasn't dead! So maybe the train hadn't come and she could crawl back up to the platform before anybody would-

Wait a minute, the sky?!

Her eyes widened as the realization hit her in the face. "TH-This isn't the train station!" Vanilla pushed herself up on her feet while looking around the landscape. It was a grasslands, sort of. What looked like a pretty nice place for a village was actually the remnants of one. "Where am I?..." Builds lie in ruins, holes blown into the sides and overgrowth creeping along what remained. The grass was yellowed and carried the wind across it as she stood in the middle of it all, between the ruins of what appeared to be a larger, two story building. The roof was exposed and its innards had been revealed to all for quite some time now. These buildings continued every so often as the woman would look down back down at her phone to see another message from Earth-chan.




"Unlocked what?" Vanilla asked her phone, shaking it as if it could have possibly given her answers. "Will you just tell me what's going on?! Stupid phone..." There was no response besides another message in blue appearing before her. She looked up at it in confusion



Vanilla cursed to herself, looking around for any of the supposed beasts, but nobody appeared to be present. Maybe it was just some kind of mistake? Still, the idea of ending up as something's snack didn't sit well with her, so she'd just have to make due for now. She'd just have to stick this out and somehow find that portal when it was time. The girl quickly hurried towards the broken interior of the buildings and slowly got her bearings together. "This can't be happening, r-right? I'm not dead, just knocked out on the train tracks. Or...something."