[X] Have a nice time at the Sports Festival
An upbeat melody plays over the PA system, announcing the start of Shirome High's sports festival. Someone's voice announces the arrival of the first-years, but you aren't paying attention. Instead, you've got your eyes trained for a certain someone bound to be marching onto the track with the rest of her class. That's when you see her. You jostle Minako on the shoulder and say to her "Look, there she is," before waving to Kirika and calling out "Hey!" Kirika turns her head slightly, but doesn't break rank to wave or give response.
Beside you sits Caren Ortensia, who faintly smiles and gives a brief wave in passing as Oriko marches past, but whether she's doing so out of obligation or because she actually cares for her cousin is a mystery to you. Oriko's eyes light up as she catches sight of Ortensia waving to her, but she keeps her head firmly fixed ahead as she leads her class to the designated rally point.
"We athletes hereby pledge to honour the spirit of good sportsmanship," says the head coach as he leads the year in reciting their pledge; "And compete fair and square with everyone until the very end!"
"... Until the very end!" the year recites back.
You and Minako keep your cheering subdued for as long as Kirika or Oriko aren't competing, mirroring the politeness of the rest of the crowd; but all bets are off as soon as you hear the announcement "The next event will be the three-legged relay between all classes!"
"Whoo!" Minako cries out beside you as Kirika takes her place on the line with her running partner. "Go Kirika!"
"You can do it!"
The girl tied to Kirika's leg isn't Oriko; a shame for her, given the dirty looks Kirika is shooting at her. But unlike Oriko, Kirika's running partner is around the same height as her, so perhaps the rest of her class chose to partner them with each other rather than potentially losing the event by sticking them with their taller classmates. Oriko also takes her place at the line, looking coolly away from her partner, a boy her height who looks quite pleased that he's been paired with such a beauty. If only they knew. The starter pistol fires, and Kirika and Oriko take off. For Kirika in particular, you can see the difficulty her partner has in keeping up; Oriko's partner is in a bit of trouble as well, but unlike Kirika's partner he manages to keep up for the length of the entire race. Kirika falls behind when her partner isn't able to keep running at speed with her, and Oriko and her partner are the ones who end up taking the medal for their class, a respectable fourth place against the rest of the year.
"You had that one in the bag, Kirika!" Minako calls out. "Don't go so fast that your partners can't keep up with you!" A few rows down, you can hear another set of parents berating their daughter for failing to keep up with her partner; they must be the parents of Kirika's partner, if you had to guess. All the other girls in Kirika's class managed to keep up with their partners just fine.
The next event doesn't involve Kirika's class, but the event after that does, and the man on the PA system announces "... The scavenger hunt!" for all classes. Kirika races off to grab her paper from the desk, quickly unfolding it and dashing off before the rest of the competitors have even had the chance to look at their items yet. You see Kirika race over to Oriko, grabbing her by the wrist as she drags her girlfriend over to the judge before presenting both Oriko and her piece of paper to him. The judge looks over Oriko and Kirika's paper, before declaring "Yes, okay!"
You have no idea what was written on the piece of paper Kirika turned in, but her intuition was correct, and the crowd goes wild. "Great job, pumpkin!" you and Minako both cheer in unison, while beside you Ortensia gives another polite clap for her cousin. But the biggest set of cheering voices all come from Kirika's classmates; not just from her incredible scavenger hunting prowess, but also from the show she gives to them as she kisses Oriko. The boys in their class seem especially enthused by their victory celebration.
A jump-rope contest is next. You and Minako do your best to cheer on Kirika - Oriko has plenty of cheer being thrown her way by many of her male classmates, much to Kirika's obvious chagrin - but it isn't until the next contest that things get really interesting. "Our next event will be the girls' cavalry battle!" is what the man on the PA system announces. The sun glinting off Kirika's pearly whites is blinding as she takes her chance; before anyone else can claim her as their partner, Kirika has immediately hopped onto Oriko's shoulders, posing with her girlfriend like Napoleon atop his famous horse.
"Go Kirika!"
"You can do it, pumpkin!"
An unenthusiastic "Yay, Oriko," accompanies your cheers; but it doesn't even look like Oriko and Kirika needed the help. Together, they demolish the competition. Even after their other classmates have fallen, the two of them continue to tear through the opposing classes until it's just the two of them standing tall and victorious.
The rest of the first years' program follows in similar fashion; Kirika and Oriko dominate the competition individually or whenever they can work together, but fall behind - Kirika in particular - when they are forced to go at the speed of a partner who isn't their preferred one. Together, Oriko and Kirika account for the vast majority of their class's wins against the rest of the year, putting their class in second place overall; they would have been first, were it not for their unfortunate first event.
It's not time for the final event in the first-years' program; a relay race. You know Kirika is fast; even without her magic she's the fastest puella magi on the team; And when she does use her magic... Watch out. You hope she's smart enough to know not to use it to give her the edge here; but her class is so close to winning. If they can take first place in the relay race, Kirika's class will have enough points to win the first-years' program entirely. You see Kirika and her classmates discussing the race beforehand, and you wonder what their strategy is.
Their strategy is a little unusual, to say the least. They've chosen some of the more athletic boys - and Oriko - to lead the charge, and stuck the less-athletic students in the class in the middle in descending order, with the slowest girl in the class taking up the second-to-last spot. 'What are they doing?' you ask yourself, until you see Kirika bringing up the rear, and it all makes sense.
Their plan goes off without a hitch. Oriko and the boys plow through their competition to create a fairly large time gap between them and the other classes, before using that gap as a cushion so the less-athletic students don't have to worry about holding their classmates back. But it's close; the other classes are able to catch up, slowly at first, but they catch up faster as each student after is progressively slower. For a brief moment, it almost looks like Kirika's class isn't going to win. But then the girl behind Kirika hands her the baton...
"Go Kirika!"
"You can do it pumpkin!"
"Fight on, Kure-san!" A parent of one of Kirika's classmates joins in your cheering. "Kure!" Followed by another. "You've got this!" Another. Soon, every parent of one of Kirika's classmates is cheering for her. One by one your daughter passes her competition, until she's running neck-and-neck with the fastest boys in her year. You can see the sweat rolling off Kirika's brow as she pumps her legs, and she makes one final push.
A triumphant "Goal!" is shouted as Kirika crosses the finish line, and the crowd erupts. But rather than drink in the energy by herself, Kirika makes straight for Oriko, kissing her deeply in celebration, before breaking the kiss and holding both their arms up high.
"You were amazing out there, pumpkin."
A break is called for between years, and you, Minako, and Ortensia have found a nice, quiet place under a barren tree to sit with your girls. Kirika, still basking in her triumph, doesn't respond to Minako's praise until after she accepts the cookie which Oriko has offered to her. "Of course I was!" Kirika proclaims as she swallows. "There's nobody in that school who's faster than me!"
Oriko smiles, feeding her girlfriend another cookie from the lunch boxes you brought. "You really were something to see, dearest," Oriko says, kissing her girlfriend on the cheek. "I'm so proud of you."
Ortensia smiles as well, but offers no compliment to Oriko in turn. At least, not unless you count "I never knew how popular two were with the boys in your class," as a compliment. Oriko doesn't appear to think so, her face turning a bright red as she stares in any direction other than that of her cousin. Neither does Kirika, silently glowering at Ortensia, but saying nothing.
Your phone vibrates in your pocket; it's Rin. "Hey Archer, can we talk?" she asks, her voice sounding as though she just woke up. Knowing Rin, she probably did. "It's about that lumpy Grief Seed you left me, and... Well, it's kind of important. Like, 'ruin your day' important. You got a minute?"
Do you
[ ] Talk to Rin, and address the problem as she presents it
[ ] Talk to Rin, but don't let the problem ruin your day
[ ] Tell Rin to call back later; you won't let this ruin your day
[ ] You'll call Rin back as soon as you've seen Homura compete
[ ] Other (write-in)
