Chapter 10: Fowl Play

With her weekend over, Chou returned to the office to continue writing her novel. She felt she was about halfway through the first draft – about halfway through her “relationship” with Fumihito. She stood with her bottom poking out and elbows on her editor’s desk, a familiar sight.

“Usagi, er, can I call you ‘Chou’?” Mister Fox handed the rabbit girl’s manuscript back to her – a welcome departure from throwing it in the trashcan. “This ain’t half-bad! I thought you said you couldn’t write romance.”

“Well,” Chou sheepishly chuckled, rubbing the back of her brown hair, “I had a little help from Fumihito.”

“Huh, Inugami? I hope he didn’t ghostwrite this. You know we don’t allow collaborations.”

“Oh, no! He just helped to inspire me! He’s sorta like… my muse?” Chou explained.

“Oh, yeah, you two are dating now, right? Inugami told everyone.”

“Yeah, I heard,” Chou sighed.

“But I thought you were aromantic, or whatever? Does Fumihito-” the editor asked.

“Yeah, he knows,” Chou replied. “Leading him on like that would be a dick move!” she chuckled. “Once the novel’s done, we’re going back to just being friends.”

“I see.”

“Well, if all you called me here for was reviewing my draft, I’ll be on my way,” Chou said, turning around to leave the room.

“Er, Chou… Actually, I was wondering if you could do me a solid?”

Chou stopped in her tracks, looking back over her shoulder at the fox. “Mm? What’s up?”

“You remember your first day? When Inugami showed you around?”

Chou nodded. She wasn’t sure where Mister Fox was going with this, but she knew better than to get on his bad side.

“Well,” the vulpes vulpes continued, “we have a new author transferring here from the rival literary agency today. I want you to show ‘em around.”

“It’s not Tepes, is it?”

Mister Fox laughed. He disliked Raluca D. Tepes just as much as Chou did, if not more! “No, it’s not Tepes,” the editor smirked. “You’ll know ‘em, when you see ‘em.”

What was that supposed-to mean? Before the bunny had time to ask, she was being shoved out the doorway and into the warren of cubicles to face whatever animal came in through the elevator. Mister Fox said something about being out of time, but Chou didn’t quite catch it. Chou’s jaw dropped as the elevator doors opened to reveal the new colleague she was supposed-to be showing the ropes.

Long legs clad in leather knee-high stilettos and fishnet stockings hanging from the garterbelt attached to lace black bikini-cut panties which matched the padded DDD-cup brassiere that adorned the chest of the newest animal on the company’s payroll. This was certainly one bold bird!

“Hey,” the peacock’s deep voice said, “you know where I can find a ‘Chou Usagi’?”

“Yeah, that’s me,” Chou groaned. “And you are…?”

“Well, it seems we’re on the same playing-field, then? I’m Tye Hen.”

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Both authors had already gotten off on the wrong foot by indicating they didn’t recognize each other. For celebrities, that was nothing short of social suicide! Chou knew now that she would have a long workday ahead of her.

“Tye Hen, huh? What’s your penname?”

“H. Tye. And yours?”

One of Chou’s eyebrows twitched in annoyance. “Chou Usagi.”

“Oh, that’s kinda lame,” the peacock said. “If you’re gonna be famous, you may as well create a persona! Take me for example! Do you think I dress like this when I’m at home?!”

Chou squinted at the peacock. “Uh… yeah? If anything, it looks like you forgot to put on a dress or something before you came here.”

Tye stared blankly at Chou for a few seconds before fanning out his tail-feathers. “…You DO realize that I’m a man, right?”

“Oh, um, ok? What’s that got to do with anything?”

“A cisgender man.”

“Oh, I see. You don’t normally dress like that, then?”

“Of-course not! This is my pervert ensemble!”

The lagomorph wasn’t sure she even wanted to ask a follow-up question. She considered just turning her tail to Tye and walking away. But she didn’t want to piss off Mister Fox again, so she decided it best not to do that. Chou sighed and pinched the bridge of her button nose. “What’s with the ‘pervert ensemble’?”

“It’s sorta my brand,” the Indian peafowl explained, “I write porn.”

Chou was taken-aback by the casual way in which the bird had stated he wrote pornographic novels. “Uh… ok???”

“Oh, is this the new guy?” a voice called out.

Fumihito? No, that would’ve been too fortunate given Chou’s shitty luck. The bunny gritted her buckteeth as she turned to face her least-favorite coworker.

“Heeey, Komeiji…” she fake-smiled as she was reminded that however little she enjoyed Tye’s company, things could always get worse. “Hey, maybe you could take Tye here off my paws, I’m kinda busy.”

“No can do! But I betcha wanna hear a joke, right?”

This had to be the worst day of Chou’s life! Anything would beat having to deal with both Goro Komeiji and Tye Hen simultaneously! She’d sooner take accidentally flashing her panties to her editor or being threatened with a knife by Parker than dealing with those two nincompoops!

 

And so Chou spent the rest of her day playing the escort mission from Hell while interacting with a clearly very glitchy comic-relief NPC! The long-eared lagomorph could only hope that she wouldn’t be stuck on that level for much longer and that she could level-up the rest of her week in order to ultimately clear the game of writing a best-selling romance novel!

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