The Holidays Can Get a Little Batty Ch. 04

"Know something, Miri? I really, really love being wrapped up your wings like this." She offered just loud enough to be heard over the music.

"Guess they've got some use then. Most of the time they just get in the way, though. I can't even go to Kohl's to buy a regular t-shirt like any other guy." Miri spoke back quietly, in just a tiny bit bitter of a joke.

But Noelle just hummed so soothingly against his chest, that the tiny bit of resentment instantly faded. "Trust me, they're not in the way right now. I guess that just means this is exactly the right place for them to be."

Once the slow song ended the music gradually started to pick back up into something a little faster paced, but while many of the kids around them just went with the flow and started to pick their own dancing back up Miri and Noelle just parted, or at least let each other go while still sticking close together. They were both a little tired after that initial explosive bit of excitement, so with a satisfied grin and nod of her head Noelle let Miri know he was off the hook for now and she started to lead them off of the dance floor.

Out of the crowd now Miri felt like he could finally take a breath. Discomfort aside, they had been dancing for a good while, and it had gotten pretty damn warm with so many bodies moving around them, so the young Bat was plenty ready for a break now as Noelle led him towards one of the refreshment tables. Grabbing a couple solo cups of punch, Noelle handed one off to Miri who graciously accepted and didn't hesitate to start drinking.

"Bet you were hoping someone spiked that, weren't you?" Noelle teased as she toyingly brought her own cup to her lips.

Miri barely flinched at that, but Noelle's eyes still glowed just that little bit more at the reaction.

"I Knew it. You just want me nice and tipsy so I'll be easy for you, huh?" The vixen teased even harder.

"Oh yeah, you know me so well." Miri just sarcastically grumbled with a roll of his eyes; Noelle knew full well how much he disliked the idea of drinking.

But Noelle seemed happy enough, giggling a bit before actually bothering to enjoy her own drink. While they took a moment to just catch their breaths and refresh themselves, Miri's eyes wandered around the Prom grounds. Things were still plenty vibrant as the sun was setting slowly on this warm, early summer night. There were still a good number of people on the dance floor, but many more were breaking off now, getting drinks and snacks like them, heading inside the school to check out some other festivities, but Miri's eyes was specifically caught by the line leading to the photo set, where many of the similar young couples were having their pictures taken already. Still, at this moment there was enough else going on that the line was not too long, and Miri realized it'd probably just be getting longer for the rest of the night.

"Hey Noelle, the line to get our photo's not too bad. You wanna head over now before it gets any worse?" The Bat asked innocently enough, but the strangely long pause Noelle gave caused him to turn a curious eye towards her. He was a little surprised to see she didn't really look all that excited by the prospect.

"Truth be told, I didn't really want to get our picture taken like that."

"R-Really?" Miri stammered, genuinely not expecting that answer and not immediately knowing what to make of that.

But Noelle merely shrugged and looked down at the cup in her hand, swirling the punch that was still left. "I mean, we got plenty of stiff, formal pictures taken by our moms already. I guess it just seems kinda dumb to wait in line for one more stuffy, pre-posed picture."

"Haha, yeah I guess I see your point." Miri offered with a slightly forced little chuckle.

Sensing the tiniest bit of disappointment in her boyfriend, Noelle quickly worked to correct that. Setting her cup aside Noelle suddenly sidled right back up to Miri's side, the brilliantly mischievous smile back on her face in a flash.

"Don't look so down. I'm sure we'll find plenty of opportunities tonight for much more interesting pictures! For example..."

"Hey what?!-"

Noelle's hand slickly shot into Miri's trouser pocket and pulled his phone out. Not a second later Noelle had her arm wrenching around the little Beast's neck, pulling their faces closer together and spinning them so their backs were to the dancefloor.

"Smile!" She sang as she raised Miri's phone up and captured them both in the selfie-camera. Noelle of course put on a perfect smile for the picture, but Miri was merely left in wide-eyed surprise at the sudden flurry of action.

The girl released her brief death-grip on the Bat's neck and turned the phone to inspect their photo, humming in apparent satisfaction. "Yep. That's much better."

A pleased little 'did-nothing-wrong' grin on her face, Noelle handed Miri's phone back to him as he just shot her a mildly annoyed look. "You know you could at least give me a heads up for the next picture."

"Maybe. You're cute when you smile Miri. But you're much cuter when I'm messing with you."

Another grumpy grumble from Miri was simply music to Noelle's ears, and with another happy giggle she started to lead him off again to see what other fun photo ops they could find around the school.

*

7:53 PM

*

Miri and Noelle wandered the school grounds in search of more "interesting" chances to grab a few selfies together, although now Miri was a much more aware and happy participant. They danced their way back into the crowd around the main stage, getting as close as they could to the platform and managing to snag a picture of themselves with the DJ and numerous colorful lights close by in the background.

Afterwards the two finally decided to head inside the school to check things out, finding a few snack tables and a handful of more questionable "fancy" finger foods. An unignorable dare from Noelle earned her a wonderful picture of Miri nearly gagging on the snack as she laughed at his disgust.

But Miri earned a more gentle respite after that one, and deciding that at least one sappy, cliché Prom moment was acceptable, Noelle led them to the massive banner that had been hanging in the main hallway promoting the evening. With all manner of glitzy script and eye-rolling Prom phrases filling up their background, Noelle took Miri in a gentle, romantic kiss before capturing their image in the boy's phone one more time; and the sincere, love-struck puppy-dog look Miri gave her afterwards... well, it wasn't him brooding after one of her pranks, but it was still pretty good.

"Awww, well it certainly looks like Miri and his chew toy are having a good night so far."

Miri and Noelle had been completely lost in each other, but with barely a moment's notice both had been violently torn back into the wider world and back into a much less comfortable situation. The couple's good mood was immediately shattered as they turned to find the Satomura Twins had intruded on their private moment, both smiling so malevolently. Noelle's face instantly soured at the sight.

"What do you two want?" Noelle merely asked through an exasperated sigh. She had been in such a good mood the entire night up to this point, but she outright did not have the patience to even keep up the usual veneer of civility with them.

"Oh Noelle, no need to act so hostile." Rin began, barely even feigning hurt. "We just wanted to pop in and say hi is all."

"Don't tell us you're that unhappy to see us? No one's ever unhappy to see us." Riko joined in aggravating smugness.

Miri was certainly no happier to be dealing with the Twins than Noelle was, but when he saw Noelle' lips twitching, just knowing she had some sort of snarky response lined up that would just elevate the situation he quickly but calmly took a hold of her arm, drawing her attention back to him. A small shake of his head and a frown was all he had to do to discourage the girl, and she was clearly not happy but still bit her tongue and kept her mouth shut. He hated this situation, but he just wanted everyone to part ways and be done with it; nothing more.

"Well, you've said hi. So thanks for that, but we really should be going to find our friends now." Miri, maybe for the first time ever in these spats, spoke on Noelle's behalf. He was perfectly polite, though far from warm with the Sisters. He simply made it clear he wanted to separate as peaceably as possible.

"Oh come on, Miri, we've been looking forward all night to seeing you two all coupled-up for the big dance! And you didn't disappoint." Rin offered an insultingly fake attempt at friendliness.

"Noelle your dress is soooo pretty! It must've taken you weeks to find one that could actually show off your figure like that. Of course, there wasn't much to start with, but that's just even more impressive." Riko gushed through her plastic smile even as she continued to make small snubs at the Blonde.

"And you did such an amazing job with your hair! I mean considering it's obvious it was self-job and not a professional one, that's just honestly incredible!" Rin was next to add to the barely concealed insults.

"Rin, Riko..." Miri tried to cut in again, but having their venomous attention focused right back on him did not do anything to boost his confidence.

"Oh, sorry Miri, we didn't mean to make it sound like we were ignoring you." Rin cut off Miri's voice as easily as she might've cut through gift wrap.

"Don't worry, we think you look like quite the dapper little guy tonight. Like the top shelf prize at a carnival game." Riko filled in, giving the Bat his share of their biting attitude.

"But to be honest, I'm a little sad to see you two aren't matching more. I really expected you two to show up in full matching colors and everything. It just seemed the kind of thing you'd want him to do for you, Noelle." Rin was next, turning her cold smile back on the increasingly frustrated girl.

"Well let's be fair, Rin. If they had done that it just would've been that much more obvious how they couldn't stack up to us. I mean, let's be honest, no one in this whole town makes a matching pair like we do" Riko bragged with a sickening degree of narcissism.

"You're right as ever, Riko." Rin matched her sister's disgusting sneer.

Miri could practically hear Noelle's teeth grinding at this point, and knew her pot was incredibly close to boiling over; hell, he was almost surprised he'd managed to keep her from lashing out this long. But he'd already failed to break them away once, and if he didn't succeed soon his girlfriend might really be going off the deep end tonight. Still, as the Beast cast a disapproving look towards the two self-absorbed Twins, and though he was utterly loathe to admit it, even he couldn't deny the Sisters were right about one thing. The two were absolutely drop dead gorgeous tonight, each of their individual beauties magnified just by the presence of their mirror image, and unfortunately they knew damn well that was the case and flaunted it aggressively.

The Japanese Twins (unsurprisingly) wore nearly identical dresses. Strapless, hugging tight and low on their modest chests and falling down in a couple of elegant curtains that barely stayed above the floor. While their shoulders were bare, both Sisters sported a pair of long gloves that covered their arms from fingertips to just below the elbow. Each girl also wore a large, bow-like sash cinched around their waists and tied at their backs, similar to a Japanese yukata's sash. The only real difference between the two was the fact that their dresses had inverse color patterns; Rin's dress was mostly a bold crimson with dense highlights in oriental flower patterns, while Riko's dress was black at the base with deep red floral patterns.

All that said, even though almost any other girl who looked like that would've had Miri nearly frothing at the mouth with the urge to rut, the Bat couldn't ignore who these girls were at their core, and hot or no he just wanted them to leave him and Noelle alone.

"Listen, we got the message, alright? Maybe you two should just go find your own dates now. I'm sure they must be waiting for you to get back to them." Miri attempted one last diplomatic approach, trying as hard as he could not to come across as begging the two. Somehow, he still managed to be surprised when the Twins let out an actual scoff at that idea.              

"Please. We might've given Chris and Dean the honor of letting us arrive on their arm, but that doesn't mean we wanted to be tied to them all night long." Rin stated abrasively.

"They're easy on the eyes, and I can think of boys that'd be much less interesting to hang around..." Riko paused her dismissive rant to give Miri specifically a mocking look. "...But tonight, we're here for us, to have our own fun. Chris and Dean were lucky enough to at least entertain us for the pre-game."

"Super..." Noelle finally piped back in, scowling hard and barely able to maintain her composure even with Miri casting desperate glances out of the corner of his eye. "...Then how about you go have your 'fun' somewhere else and just leave us alone."

But at her ire the Twins just gave them a giggle that was like nails on a chalkboard to Miri and Noelle.

"Oh don't you worry, we will." Rin promised haughtily.

"Well, I suppose we should find someone else a little more worth our time. As always, Noelle, it's been a treat." Riko said through a smile that was no more friendly than a brandished knife.

"Who know, maybe we'll all see each other again before the end of the night." Rin offered unconvincingly.

"But at the very least, you two will definitely see us again when we get crowned as the Twin Prom Queens. I mean, that's pretty much a certainty." Riko said without a hint of irony.

"You know, it's just too bad the Prom election doesn't run on dog show rules. Otherwise, you two would be a shoo-in." Rin's smile turned even more hurtful as she mockingly lamented for them.

"Oh for sure. Miri could jump through hoops and bark on command like he's been trained to do all his life..." Riko teased the little Bat through the most mean-spirited smirk he'd ever seen in his life.

But it was Rin who had an absolutely sadistic grin as she locked daggers with Noelle. "...And I can't think of anyone who could beat Noelle out for best bitch."

Noelle's face finally broke into utter disbelief twisted alongside blind rage. A noise escaped her throat, an infuriated, mortified sound like Miri had never heard from her before. Her face was practically as purple as her boyfriend's fur as the Twins pinned her with their venomous sneers.

Miri had never before been so thankful for having such fine attuned senses, otherwise he might never have caught the way Noelle's arm was tensing just as she started to make a blatantly confrontational step towards the Sisters. But thanks to that he had just the split second he needed to quickly put himself in front of her, firmly taking hold of her shoulders, steadying her, and forcing her to look directly into his face and his alone.

"Noelle..." His voice wasn't soft, but it wasn't angry, he just needed her to focus on him more than anything, and when he saw that her attention was solely on him he allowed his face and his touch to soften, now wanting just to reassure her. "They're not worth it."

Noelle's expression didn't change, and for a few tense moments her glower was aimed right on Miri, but this was one time he wasn't flinching away from her. But having her beloved Bat right there to ground her fury, Noelle's glare did start to fade, at least slightly. She wanted so bad, worse than ever before to give the Twins exactly what they deserved, but Miri wasn't going to let her; he wasn't going to let them ruin this night.

Noelle took a deep, heavy breath, feeling Miri's hold on her loosen. She allowed herself to cast one last evil look past his shoulders at the Twins, but before she could let that consume herself any more she aggressively grabbed on to Miri's jacket sleeve and turned to storm off in the opposite direction of the two, dragging the once-more-hapless Bat along.

Miri was only briefly taken aback by Noelle's sudden shift, but quickly managed to find his footing as she pulled him along. He was certainly glad they were finally getting out of that situation, and a part of him kinda wished he had simply done this himself from the start. However there was one reason he wished he didn't have such sharp senses, as even while they ran off, even over the dull roar of dozens of other students filling the halls, Miri was still able to hear the Twins' grating little snickering follow them long after they'd left their sight.

Eventually the pair started to get away from the crowds and the decorated hallways they were obviously meant to stay in, finding themselves in the more abandoned parts of the school. But still the irate Noelle refused to slow her pace and just kept dragging Miri further and further.

"Uh, Noelle? Where exactly are we going?" The increasingly anxious Beast timidly asked.

"Somewhere quieter." His girlfriend tersely responded.

They had made it almost all the way to the opposite end of the school before Noelle abruptly stopped them both, turning on her heels and forcefully pushing Miri against a wall, just beside a classroom door. The look she pinned him with was still incredibly pissed, but at the same time wanting, needy even. It was definitely a new look for Miri.

Noelle didn't give the Bat any time to really compose himself, and very quickly was pressing her face to his muzzle and locking him into a frantic kiss. Miri barely showed any shock before falling back into old habits and passively accepting his girlfriend's agitated lust. When he tried to raise his hands to take hold of her, Noelle caught his wrists and just forced them back against the wall along with the rest of him, practically growling against his tongue as she did so.

The incensed girl broke their manic kiss every few moments just so she could snarl out her lingering frustration.

"Those two... those fucking bitches... make me so mad... I can't stand them... the way the treat us... I'm so sick of them..."

Miri really couldn't do anything except let Noelle vent her anger, her heavy gasping words falling across his lips before she plugged her writhing tongue back into his mouth for a few more tense seconds. But eventually this strained make-out session started to have its' intended effect, and the Bat could feel his girlfriend slowing down, calming down as she hastily used up all that pent up energy.

By the time she pulled away from their last kiss Noelle was totally out of breath, panting heavily, her face read and her eyes much more tired. That said Miri wasn't looking much better since the girl had forced his own tongue to work just as hard the last few minutes. But as her breathing started to slow, when he could see that most of her fevered anger had subsided, the little Bat pulled himself together and offered her as soft and reassuring a smile as he could manage.

"Just tell me what you want." Miri gently told her.

Noelle's own expression finally softened almost all the way, and she let her head slip forward to rest on Miri's chest. Her arms lost their own strength and dropped from the wall, and the Bat didn't hesitate to wrap his girlfriend up in his big, enveloping wings. She let out one last exasperated sigh, followed by a tiny, weak bit of laughter.