The Random Housemate

[Yanaike]

No footsteps could be heard as Yanaike ran on all fours over the narrow gravel pad leading uphill. She took a couple of quick glimpses behind her. Were they still following her? How far were they behind her?
The dark druids had been tracking her down for about a week now. Yanaike was fast and she'd been able to shake them off time after time. But somehow they kept coming back, day and night, and they by far outnumbered Yanaike. She didn't have a lot of sleep last night as she had to keep moving.
Eventually they would surround her and to prevent that, Yanaike knew she had to hide. There was only one safe place Yanaike could think of. 'The other world', books spoke about, was a world without any native magic. Without a natural source of magic the druid wouldn't be able to track her down.

While Yanaike reached the top of the hill, a large gothic-like structure revealed itself. Its large wooden doors were open and allowed access to an enormous ballroom. Yanaike entered the room and as she walked over the marble floor she looked around to the endless amounts of mirrors of different shapes and sizes that covered the walls of the hall. Thousands reflections of herself, thousands of eyes staring at her. It made her feel small and a bit shy.
"I-I'm sorry to disturb the silence but I need to leave this world for a while," she apologized.
There came no response.
Not a lot of people knew about the real purpose of this room: its function as a portal to the other world.
Yanaike rapidly chose one of the mirrors. She just hoped the books were right and the spell would work. From one of the pockets of her leather jacket she grabbed a ragged piece of paper. Written on it was a magic spell. Without hesitation Yanaike started reading the words aloud. While she did, she moved her right hand closer to the mirror. As soon as she touched it, the doors of the hall closed with a slam and the light in the hall dimmed immediately. Started, Yanaike looked around for a moment, but she quickly continued. The reflection of herself in the mirror had faded, and purple smoke was coming out of the mirror as Yanaike moved her hand through it. Purple smoke was filling the space around her, but Yanaike bravely continued and slowly moved her whole body through the mirror. Moments later the purple smoke started to clear and as sunlight appeared again, Yanaike now found herself in a bedroom.

"H-hello?" she exclaimed as she ventured through the unfamiliar room. "I'm looking for the innkeeper? I like to rent a room please. I-I don't have any money, but I can do little chores in return for my stay?"
No response.
Yanaike walked through the building and reached a narrow hallway which led into a study. Her eyes were drawn to a pile of papers on the desk.
'Test', it said.
Did she have to make a test to stay in this realm? Great! She loved doing tests.
It looked like a quiz with a couple of questions that had to be answered to claim her reward. Luckily for her, it wasn't a physical test. She know how to do these kind of tests. She had a lot of knowledge and if there were any questions she didn't know the answer to, she could just bluff around it.
'Question 1, who discovered America?'
With a puzzled face Yanaike looked down on the words. 'America'? She had never heard of that before. Was it like a place? But who did discover it? She feared she had to guess the first answer.
"Uhm… the j-jack of spades?"
No response. Maybe she had to be louder? And more confident too?
"The jack of spades!"
Again, no response.
Maybe she had to write the answer down in the blank space beneath the question? She looked around the desk, searching for a tool to write. She ended up with a small tube-like thing in her hand. It had a button on it, and Yanaike quickly figured out that it allowed her to write after she pressed the button. She was amazed how ink flowed out of such a small thing. She quickly wrote down her response.
'Question 2, who were the original inhabitants of America?'
Again, Yanaike had to guess the answer the question. She was about to write down her answer when suddenly she heard a clicking sound coming from below. Yanaike dropped the writing tool on the desk and cautiously returned to the hallway, trying to figure out where the sound was coming from.

 

[Galaxi]

James had to stay behind today, he had locked himself in his classroom after all the little brats left and put some music on. After opening one of the windows he sat down in his chair, spinning around once with a big sigh. There was a large stack of papers on his desk all waiting to be graded. He grabbed his red pen along with the first test on the pile and began flicking through it. He got through the first few quite quickly, mostly because half the things written in there were absolute crap. Before he knew it two hours had passed and he was half way through the pile. Eventually he took a deep breath as he pushed his chair away from the desk, turning towards the nice breeze that was coming from the window. The sun was slowly heading down and James decided he had enough for today. He got up, closed the window and packed the rest of the tests into his bag. Walking out of the school building with his head down, last thing he wanted to be stopped by one of the other teachers who were staying late, they always nagged so much.

The man got into his old Toyota Yaris and the car spluttered to life as James turned the ignition key. He revered out the parking lot and headed towards home. It was finally Friday so for the next 48 hours he planned on sleeping, drinking and not giving a shit about the lectures he'd have to prepare for Monday night. That seemed to slowly become the norm for him, especially since he took up the night classes at the university. Teaching kids was one thing, they weren't bothered and all too needy but the students at his university demanded that every detail be perfect. He knew it was going to be a step up from his current way of teaching but this was completely different, James always tried to cover everything and be ready for any question but someone always took him by surprise and made him the fool. It was getting tiring but he couldn't quit, he was barely making ends meet with just the day teaching job and the head of the university promised him a raise if he can get a 80% pass rate in his class. Of course currently that was not looking favourable but he had to at least try.

On the way home James stopped by the grocery store to pick up some cheap snacks and alcohol to last him the night. From there it was just a quick few turns till he pulled up in his driveway. The man got out, holding his bag in one hand and the grocery bag in the other, he managed to press the lock button on his car keys, the orange light of the car lights briefly lit up the driveway, he began to stumble up to the door trying not to drop anything. Once at the door, it took him a few tries but he eventually managed to get the key into the front door and turn it all the way. The lock clicked and the door groaned lazily as he pushed it open with his side. After he got in James shut the door and dropped all the stuff onto the sofa in the living room before his gaze looked around the room. He quickly spotted the small fluffy figure he was after as it ran across the room towards him, its meowing very demanding.

"Hello to you too Fluffers, hungry huh? Sorry, I had to stay behind at work..." he began before stopping himself. Yup, he was talking to his cat. James sighed and fed the cat first before putting his own food into the microwave. While waiting he took off his tie and threw it to the ground, grabbing the bottle of whiskey he picked up at the shop and half filling a glass with ice. That's when he thought he heard a noise coming from upstairst....footsteps?

"Probably just the ca....." he stopped half way through as he looked at the black cat greedily eating from his bowl. "The fuck..." he muttered, heading to the hall way where the stairs were.

 

[Yanaike]

From above the stairs Yanaike carefully looked down below. It appeared the sound was coming from the door. Someone was opening the door, someone was fiddling with the keylock.
Quick! She had to hide...!
In a burst of alertness she jumped a few steps back.
But... she hadn't done anything wrong yet?
Out of curiosity, she sneaked a little closer again.
But... maybe there was a criminal!
Yanaike was about to jump back again when the door slowly opened. A man appeared in the doorstep. From her hiding place at the top of the stairs, Yanaike could barely see his face, but based on the bags he was carrying, she figured he must be the innkeeper. Almost immediately, Yanaike wanted to rush down to introduce herself, but then she realised that she hadn't yet finished the test.
No, Yanaike... First the test, then you can stay!
"Hello to you- ... -hungry, huh?" Yanaike was flabbergasted. How did he spot her? She was one of the greatest spies of her realm. "Sorry I ha-..." She could barely hear the man's voice, as he was going deeper into the rooms below. Maybe he hadn't seen Yanaike after all. Maybe he was just talking to... someone else? She did a few steps forward in the hopes of hearing him better. She leaned for over, and stumbled. She quickly regained her balance though and managed not to fell off the stairs
"The fuck...", the voice came from below.
Great! Yanaike knew he had heard her, and a bit later he came back into the hall below.

The walk down the stairs felt rather awkward. With each step down, Yanaike was shrinking in size. From the person above the stairs who could oversee everyone's faces below, to the tiny person down the stairs who had to look up to see anyone's face. She kept her head down, uncertain what the innkeeper would think about her. Only when Yanaike was back on ground level, she looked up for a moment into his dark brown eyes. After that she circled her own tail around her witch hat and took it off as a sign of respect. "My name is Yanaike" she said followed by a deep bow. "Are you the innkeeper?"

 

[Galaxi]

James watched the young girl walking down the stairs with the most confused expression. He wasn't exactly sure what to expect here but this definitely wasn't on the list of the possibilities. He figured it would have been an intruder, a thief or something....then again, who's to say she wasn't a thief. He scowled at her, crossing his arms over his chest. Was it another dumb student prank? He remembered once a student found out where he lived and broke into his house at night for some stupid reason. In confusion he knocked him out before realising who it was. Though... this girl didn't look familiar at all.

That was when he saw the strange tail like thing appear from behind her, it lifted her hat off her head. He furrowed his brow at this. Was it some weird elaborate trick? His thinking was distracted by the beeping of the microwave. His stomach, as if on queue, grumbled causing him to look towards the kitchen doorway then the girl. "Right... if you took anything just give it back and leave. Alright? I'll let you off and won't call the cops as long as you put it all back." he said with a stern voice, walking towards his front door and opening it. He had no idea what she meant by inn keeper but he had no intention in finding out. James wanted a nice quiet evening with a store bought lasagna and whiskey, it was already not going as planned.

 

[Yanaike]

Yanaike shied at the weird noise coming from deeper inside the building. From that moment on, Yanaike was more focused on the source of the sound than what the innkeeper was telling her. Something with 'cops'? Yanaike didn't know what those were anyway. As soon as the innkeeper turned to his front door, Yanaike sneaked deeper into his house, in the hopes of investigating the sound.

The beeping continued and Yanaike traced it to a weird metal box with a door and with a couple of buttons on the side. By the looks of it, there appeared to be something inside of it. There was text next to the buttons: 'start', 'stop' and a couple of numbers too. Yanaike hesitated, but then quickly pressed the 'start' button, followed by a little nervous giggle. Nothing happened though. The beeping continued, and Yanaike concluded that the machine might have been started already. Maybe the beeping was too indicate that it stopped, or maybe it was alerting for some kind of error?

Yanaike looked around the room, hoping to find more clues about the strange machine. The room looked like... a kitchen? A very weird kitchen. A kitchen full of unknown machines. She wagged her tail in enjoyment, thinking about the amount of time she could spent here investigating the strange kitchen machinery.

 

[Galaxi]

James turned around, opening the door but by then the girl was already missing. He frowned in confusion and looking around. With a defeated sigh he closed the door and went into the kitchen, glaring at the stranger. He side glanced at his cat, who did not seem to care in the slightest as it continued to inhale its food. "Right... I'm giving you ten seconds to leave before I throw you out, alright?" He said with a serious tone as he walked up to the stranger in his kitchen. He noticed the weird tail again, raising his left brow at it in confusion. It must have been some weird clip on thing, it was moving very realistically though.

He tapped his fingers on the table as he began to loudly count down from ten, watching the girl carefully. "Ten....nine....eight... I'm waiting." The man said, starting to get agitated by her presence. He wondered how she even got in, did he forget to lock the back door? Maybe he left a window open somewhere? He made a mental note to make sure his windows and doors were locked before leaving next time.

 

[Yanaike]

Only the thought of being thrown out, made Yanaike frightened. People had always been teasing her because of her weight, lifting her in the air like a little baby. It was like people could tell just by looking at her that she hadn't much weight and was easy to lift. And now the innkeeper was even talking about throwing her! She didn't want to be thrown!

"No, please!" Yanaike said as she kneeled down before him. "I have to hide! If you sent me away they'll find and kill me! I don't have any money but I will finish the test tomorrow! And I can do chores around the house... If you give me a broomstick I can sweep the house, I'm good with broomsticks! ...Oh, and I can investigate what causes the beeping sound!"

Yanaike felt quite hopeless at the moment. The only thing she could do was to beg that the innkeeper wouldn't set her out. If he would, Yanaike had to look for another tavern, and the next town might easily be a few days' walk from here. Yanaike wasn't sure if she would have that time though.

 

[Galaxi]

He raised an eyebrow as she pleaded with him and sighed deeply. His hand ran through his brown hair before falling back down to his side. This was a nightmare, all he wanted to do was spend a peaceful evening getting drunk and watching dumb movies. Why did it always have to be him? The man shook his head then looked around the kitchen briefly. He turned to the glass of whiskey that he put on the counter beforehand and gulped it down in one go.

"Alright I guess.... but first thing in the morning I'm taking you to the police station." he said. As much as he'd like to just kick this weird stranger out she did say she'll be killed...but wait, does that mean he's inviting danger to his house? He made a mental note to set the alarms tonight. "You can stay the night, if you have to, but you're sleeping on the sofa. And don't touch the cat." he said with a stern voice, pouring himself more alcohol and grabbing his food out the microwave then going to sit on the sofa, switching the TV on. He didn't know why he was so accepting of this but something, call it a gut feeling, told him to let her stay. At least for now.

He began skipping through the channels in an attempt to find something interesting to waste time on. Eventually he stopped on one of the channels where an horror movie was being played. He began shovelling the store bought lasagna, breathing sharply through his mouth after realising it's still too hot to eat, the cheap tomato sauce scorching his mouth.

 

[Yanaike]

The cat...? Yanaike hadn't seen any animals in this house yet. She looked around in curiosity, when suddenly she spotted a little red furball in a corner of the kitchen, munching from a bowl filled with cat food. Yanaike's tail wagged around in cheerfully. As soon as the innkeeper had left the kitchen, Yanaike walked to the cat and kneeled down next to it.
"Hi there, little kitty-cat" Yanaike said, as she caressed the creature at his head and neck. The cat seemed to enjoy it, as for a moment it stopped eating from his meal. Yanaike had always been good with animals. She shared a special bond with them that few humans understood. In a way animals felt more familiar than any regular human. And sometimes, Yanaike could even communicate with animals, at least that was what she imagined.

Yanaike pulled her hand back from the cat's fur, giving the animal time to eat. The way the cat was inhaling its food, made Yanaike a little bit hungry too. The innkeeper hadn't offered her anything though. Was it supposed to be like self-service? She swiftly went to the cabinets, trying to find something eatable. She ended up with a metal cylinder in her hand. 'White Beans' it said, with a picture of white beans. But besides the picture it looked nothing like actual beans. How was Yanaike supposed to eat this?

Then she remembered the metal box with the buttons on the side. She turned to the strange object. The innkeeper got his food from the metal box. Maybe the metal box was a way to turn useless metal cylinders with pictures of food into actual food? Well, it couldn't hurt trying! With her full weight, Yanaike hang on to the handle of the metal box and opened it in that way. She placed the cylinder inside and closed the metal box again. She pressed 'start' but nothing happened. Maybe she had to press a few numbers first? So she did, and after she pressed 'start' again a clock appeared on a little digital screen on the side of the metal box. Time? What had time to do with food? Yanaike just randomly pressed '3' and clicked start again. At that point, lights inside the metal box turned on and she saw how the cylinder started rotating. The display on the side seemed to be counting down.

Maybe the machine was like a campfire-in-a-box? Then the time was supposed to indicate how long you want to keep the food on the campfire? And the numbers before she determined the time... some sort of measurement of power? The amount heat or fire that the campfire releases, maybe?
"I know what your metal box does" she yelled in excitement into the room where the innkeeper was sitting. She wildly wagged her tail around. "It's like a campfire! And if it starts beeping, that means that it is done!" She looked back to the campfire-in-the-box. The expression on her face changed quickly as she noticed the buzzing sound now coming from the metal box and she saw how little lightning was striking the metal cylinder inside of the box.
With a nervous expression on her face, Yanaike turned her head back into the living room. "Uhhmmm... is this supposed to happen?" she asked, slightly panicking.

 

[Galaxi]

James was mostly ignoring the presence of the stranger, he was far too busy trying to forget his busy day dealing with the brats from his class. One of the kids decided to stab the boy in front of his desk with a pencil which surprisingly went right through his skin. After that mess was dealt with he had to calm the little idiots down again which is a task in itself. On top of that so many are flunking the basic tests it hurts his head. He couldn't decide which was worse, the high school or the university students. Both have their ups and downs so it was definitely hard to choose.

As he was having a silent debate of which job he hated more he heard they girl saying something. Snapping back to reality for a second he looked over to her, sipping from his glass. When the girl turned back to the microwave his attention turned back to it, his eyes opening wide as he jumped from the sofa. His plate went flying off his lap, landing on the carpet, the lasagna splattering all over the area. James nearly leaped towards where the girl was standing and towards the microwave. He nearly tripped over the cat as it was walking past, ignoring the complaining hiss that came from the creature. Once he reached them he grabbed the cable of the microwave plug and pulled it, unplugging the device from the mains. The light in the microwave went down, the light show stopping. He took a deep breath before turning to the woman and frowning. "What the fuck are you doing!? Holy shit... even a five year old knows not to do that..." he scolded her, his brow furrowed. He had no idea whether that was on purpose to irritate him or if she really didn't know how microwaves worked but either way it angered him. "Just...go sit down and don't move from that spot. Alright?" he sighed at her, opening the microwave, foul smelling smoke pouring out of it.

The man shook his head grabbing a cloth and trying to remove the can from the microwave, it was covered in scorch marks but thankfully didn't have enough time to really heat up and do any real damage. He decided to just feed the girl, that way she would hopefully be too busy to cause trouble. After looking in his fridge though that idea went right out the window, all that there was left there was some mouldy fruit and most likely out of date milk. James muttered under his breath before grabbing the phone and dialling a number. "I'll... I'll just order pizza. Alright?" he said before turning his back to her, waiting for the phone to finish dialling. He ordered a large pizza for the two of them to share then turned to the mess of lasagna on his carpet and began cleaning that up. "So where are you from?" he asked, trying to strike up a conversation.