In the morning, that had as per usual been relaxing for Lei, Yu really struggled to get up. She saw all those pages, scattered around her room, full of potential songs and already finished pieces, as well as half finished ones, and was desperate to run them with her band. 

However, she had to attend so many courses today.

Usually, she felt very excited to go to university...and attend her courses, yet, her mind was filled with the woman, who she had met just last night. 

Yu really yearned to see her again, at the same time. she wanted to use this burst of creativity to write two songlists, or three. 

To be honest, she was probably brimming with inspiration so much, that she had enough material to weave an entire wall of notes. 

She had started to scrawl notes, already, and that over pieces of papers deficient of note lines... 

She ought to get more music sheets soon.... Since she had run out a while ago. 

But usually the store was not on her way or she was in such a hurry she passed it, and only remembered about the task, once she had arrived at the other destination and did not want to return the same way.

Yu got up from her pillows with a headache pulsing at her temple. The cause were her eyes, which had been forced open by the glaring sunlight. 

She was not a morning person and had never been one. By the earliest, she would wake near noon, if she had nothing to do.

Still, the moment she could open her eyes, she was already leaning against the counter and drinking cold, fruited black tea and saw a notification on her phone screen. It was from Lei. 

'How can this be a good morning, if you woke up so early?', Yu inquired, she had seen the time the message had been sent and was horrified, but still a smile spread across her face - and as if it had been a coat, her tiredness was peeled off of her. 

'I was up by 4 and took a long shower, before meditating a bit. It also takes me a while, before I'm fully awake =). 

I noticed that the sun was up, when my coffee was ready. 

I take it that you are more of a night owl?', Lei was smiling, while she wrote this and held her script in hand. 

As she was tapping away at her phone, she was imagining the panda circles below Yu's mesmerising eyes. 

She also thought of the moment Yu might be awoken by someone, at the time that Lei usually left her bed, and could not hinder a giggle from escaping her, as this image flitted through her mind.

The giggle that had erupted from her, echoed through the penthouse, before she needed to cough and then she continued memorising the script.

'Scary ...', it had taken a bit, before Yu had replied, she had had a bath with a mix of essential oil that would soothe her muscles, but also waken her mind. 

Now she ran late again, though, and hurriedly put on a rosé coloured flowery dress, beneath which she wore pale tights. 

She continued to put on her chucks and really couldn't resist writing Lei again. 

About what she liked to eat for breakfast, and what she had to do today. 

A bun in her mouth and the jacket half on, she jumped and ran as fast as she could to catch the bus - this time. But as if cued and as if to oppose her plans, a fox flower popped up out of thin air and floated on the ground before her. 

"Mum....?", she bowed down and found a paper butterfly tugged between two sheets of paper full of the elegant handwriting of her parents. 

To our little fox - It's time. These words were written on top of the envelope. 

As she proceeded to unfold and read the letter, she found a list of ingredients, an explanation, about the purpose of the butterfly and the reasonings, as well as happenings, which had led to her parents need to return to the timeline. 

Still, as both of them wrote very thin there was even more content and each nook and cranny of the paper had been put to good use.

The butterfly had been folded from red paper, and Yu could sense the spell inlaid in each fold. This was a time-splitter. 

If Yu activated it, she could relive the day at a later moment and leave the timeline now, only for a short amount of time, to buy everything and bring it to her parents. 

According to the letter, it would still take until the next lunar eclipse, before they would enact the ritual, but she hadn't visited them much, and so the letter scolded her for her lack of filial piety, which was why there was a lot of emphasis on her need to visit them today. 

And so she broke the wax seal hidden in the middle, to activate the spell. 

Everything around her halted, and she stepped out from where she had been standing. The bus had been in front of her, doors open and inches away from the duplicate of her body. 

It was always strange seeing herself like this, since it was not a mirror image. 

Yu exhaled softly and looked at the clock on her wrist that now had a timer set on it, which ran down. 

She made her way to the city and to other stores that she knew would provide the ingredients she needed. There was a lot on the list, but luckily her Illusions bordered transformation spells and thus she could shrink anything and put it into her bag as if they were mere toys - miniatures even. While she was at it, she also bought the music sheets.

About her buying, while time was halted, well technically it wasn't. 

To put this in simple terms, her life was halted and a certain radius around her, but only for her perception. 

In reality everything continued and since not all of the town was within her near future, she could visit each store normally. As to why her perception was blocked, while one part of her already experienced the future, she was about to have had, that was because she was not to change it, not intentionally at least, and thus her perception of it was blocked. 

Of course there were time-splitters, where she could watch herself do certain things, but why use such an intricate spell? They needed to store their abilities and the butterfly they had sent, should be sufficient, for the shopping trip they had sent her on.

Lastly, she went to the 'Magick Courtyard', where the community sold not so normal ingredients, and since it was also near her parent's home, it had been chosen as the last spot to go to. 

It also had been the more sensible route in her opinion, as she didn't have to backtrack. 

When she was done and the things, regardless of their shrunken state started to get heavy, she continued to her parent's house. 

Well, more where her parent's house would be, but now the spot was empty, covered by a very thick layer of glamour that simulated the present state of the house, which was an illusion for the reality and looked like it was soon to be looking, when the timeline of her parents converged with the one of the Now.

 

The moment she passed the entrance, her foxshape appeared and long plushy ears and tails flopped out of her body. Her dress transformed into a mostly white kimono with a lot of red mixed into the design and letting her skin seem even more pale. 

Her fur was only partially white and still a bit grey. It had started out dark grey, almost black and even though she had gotten her 9 tails rather soon, she had not evolved fully into her final form yet. 

Not the final form of a Kitsune in general. However, not every Kitsune was with white fur, but as she was sort of a multitude with her Gumiho heritage, Kitsune traits and Tamamo no Mae origin, she was a bit of a special case. 

That on the one hand did entail her great magical ability, but to ensure that it didn't overwhelm her, it took a while and grew steadily, instead of in spurts of growth, which might've been more common in other magical beings. 

It wasn't made easier, due to her father being a witch. 

This just brought in her knack for spells and attunement with the moon and connection to water. At the same time, it also gave her much more to learn and hone, since witchcraft was a skill and not only an inherent ability.

Yu was actually even stronger, than she should be, but she never bragged about it. 

She didn't need to, and hid some of her natural abilities and intuition within spells or charms - as in: She made it seem that they didn't stem from within her, but were from the charms and spells she carried, and, or, performed. 

It made it easier to get by, without raising the suspicions of other's. Because no one knew, why she was so strong. 

Yes, she was of a rare breed, but still. She also didn't like the pressure that came with it, so she hid it and she and her family preferred to keep to themselves... so.

Her home smelled like it usually did: The scent was rich with the fox blossoms, which were in the garden and across from those stood a magnolia tree, which was in full bloom. Additionally, patterns of these two flowers were strewn everywhere; on the floor, on the walls, and strewn around as accessories, or in paintings. 

She respectfully greeted her mum. 

She was taller, and her hair was curlier than her own and a lighter shade of brown. "Where is father?", she inquired, while unpacking and helping her mum putting everything away. 

She also helped her clean up the mess, her father had probably caused.

"When will he ever learn... How many plates do I need to create for him to read them?" - "Well, maybe post-its will do the trick.", this got Yu a gaze of confusion. 

Right, it was 300 years in the past, just after her breakup with the ‘Geisha’... She had left the pocket dimension after a hundred years. Her parents had stayed.

"Never mind you will see. Do you have enough food? There was not a lot written on the list...", her voice was worry ridden, but her mum smiled and shook her head. 

"The energy of the tree is flowing again. Your father had been working on it for 650 years and finally the peaches are growing again. I was so worried that the seedling from home had rotten already, but the moment we rearranged.... I see this is boring for you, right?" - "No... I'm just no gardener.... or cook... but as long as dad has made use of it... Oh, also the present day neighborhood has really closed in on our house... Maybe before we accelerate the time again, dad should build a fence?", the suggestion seemed sound, however it seemed her father had had the idea already, as he stepped in and proclaimed that he was just done with it. 

"Stop doing divination darling, the council forbids it. You don't have much magic left." - "Yes, I know, but it was such an easy bowl divination... and the tea was right there... And our little fox here wasn't.", the warm voice was enveloping them and still there was a faint scolding in the vowels. 

"Well you could've not had me, then this little fox wouldn't annoy you so much, father" - "Nonsense. I gave birth to you and I will scold you", he slapped the back of her head gently.

After catching up she let it slip that she had met Lei, and even though she had waited until the last possible moment, to say this, her parents gave her a silky satchel and made her vow to use it. 

As if her mum could sense that they would have a date.

Yu went back to her frozen frame and stepped back into it, breaking the seal in the other direction and through this mending it again. She stepped into the bus, her bag empty now, except for university utensils and she had the lavender satchel hanging by her waist. It was good if no one paid particular attention to how suddenly a satchel had appeared on her, because this was such a miniscule detail, which made Yu think that using an illusion would have been a waste of magic.

Even if she had wanted, this satchel wouldn't have been easy to get rid of. 

On the bus she proceeded to write with Lei, a bit exhausted again, but as Lei responded, the energy came rushing back. By the time she reached her lecture room, she was bold enough to ask her out. 

Not for a dinner date, but for coffee. 

The lectures were back to back and at least sometimes she wrote along, attentively, or if she didn't need or want to, she drew on her notepad. She had lived a lot of the history herself, of course she would remember a lot of it. Still, it was always nice to hear about regional sub varieties or techniques that were scarcely used. And or things that had their origin somewhere outside of Nihon and now influenced the art of it. As well as it was interesting for her to learn about techniques that existed, but had never influenced her home country.

The moment that classes ended, she was so exhausted, it felt like her brain was fried and because of this she stuffed herself with the food in her bento, she had brought and forgotten in her bag. 

It was a wonder that she still had time and the lecturer hadn't overdrawn. 

So, she went home for a quick shower and then a bit hesitant, she looked at the satchel. 

She didn't want to use it or open it at all, but she had given her word. 

A silvery cloud enclosed her, and she felt like her parents had been, too excited for this... she was absolutely overdressed for a coffee date.... 

Nonetheless, she made her way to the cab, she had ordered, and bravely got to the coffee shop that was owned by Ai-chan’s family. 

She looked for her favourite spot and sat down, nervously playing with her dangling jewellery and looked outside. 

On the window, there was a glass painting made out of fractured mirror pieces and coloured in soft blue, purple and silver shades. This created a sparkly reinterpretation of the moon, whose light seemed more vibrant today. 

Yu sat near it, and so when Lei arrived, the reflected light, fragmentedly illuminated the fox spirit in front of her and made her skin glitter like the nightsky. From Yu’s point of you the light dancing on Lei’s skin and QiPao danced like tiny faeries.