Something… something wasn't quite right. Something weird was going on. Was she… had she just… Did it just look like she'd taken a picture of the guy she'd stalked and forgotten to turn the shutter sound off?

Was that really what was going on in her life right now? Because that seems a little strange. That stupid purple app wasn't supposed to take a picture, it was supposed to… supposed to… do something else! Not oust her as some kind of, she didn't even know, amatuer paparazi?

There was only one thing to do now, and luckily she was almost there already. Like a little wooden person in a cuckoo clock she spun clunkily on her feet and started to take a step when all of a sudden…

"Hey!"

Someone seemed to shout at her. And she stepped off her heel with a larch, practically falling through the bathroom door and reeling around to secure it behind her. She'd manage a sigh of relief before the panic started setting in. He had 100% noticed. But maybe he didn't recognize her. It had only felt like years had just passed for her, it was probably only a second or two actually.

And maybe it had been the suspicious way she'd reacted that really set him off and stuff but there was no other way to react. She couldn't just wave it off. What if he HAD recognized her and thought she was following him was up to some kind of... thing! Which okay, maybe that was still a reality but she was now in the safety of… a bathroom. Not the first time she'd been huddled up in one.

Five minutes, maybe ten, and she'd sneak out and leave, but as long as she was being cautious she might as well figure out why the damn app had betrayed her like that. It wasn't supposed to… to… to get her into something like this, which she wasn't blowing out of proportion at all, of course. And it wasn't her fault for listening to the sketchy eye on her phone either, it had tempted her.

"Alright, so what was THAT?! Could you maybe tell me it's going to do something like…" She had started venting towards her phone as she was pulling it out and clicking on the App, but instead of the usual icon that pulled up a low charge graphic covered her screen, the battery like display nearly empty and a warning that the system was at 3% charge.

Okay that's new. The charge level wasn't the same as her phone’s power icon, so it was measuring something else. Some kind of in program power level? But… why would it be different from the phone’s? Was it something to do with how the quest had messed up.

While pondering this Hitomi had sat down in one of the stalls. Better to be off her feet than standing around waiting. She tried to open the app a few more times but it only went to the charge icon, none of the previous screens it had been to.

Well, if the… whoever it was, was going to be out of the loop now of all times, maybe she could waste 10 or so minutes on an actual game. So she launched something and settled in for the long haul. Better to be SURE the guy had given up and left.

She was just getting started when the doorknob rattled and the space became less impregnable than she had hoped. She quickly closed the door to the stall she was in and pretended to be just another occupant when it got worse.

"Yo, mushroom girl or something, right?" Oh so much worse. But, it was a girl’s voice. A bit low pitched, a bit wheezy and snarky sounding, but a girl’s voice. That meant… He'd sent his date in to flush her out like hounds digging up a fox den! How could… how could he be so vicious!

She raised her legs up so that maybe she wouldn't see her in the closed stall and assume… Hitomi didn't know what she was hoping for, maybe this girl would assume she stopped existing? It was a long shot but it was possible.

"Geee, I wonder where she could be, maybe she crawled out through the air ducts? Or there's a secret passage somewhere she escaped outta, or maybe…"

Bang!

"...she's in here?!" The walls of the stall Hitomi was in shook like there was an earthquake! Or, well, they shook a little. Like someone had pushed their foot up to it and gave it a little kick, but it was still startling! And then a prattling of knocks started on the door. "Mushroom, open up! Open up, I know you're in there! Hey, come on out, let's talk a bit!"

Hitomi's heart skipped a beat. This was beyond anything, absolutely everything she had ever feared! There was literally nowhere to escape to and a psychopath was pounding on her door. The stall door. The one she was using as a defensible position.

"I-I don't know who you are but s-stop please, I'm sorry!" Begging for forgiveness in a bathroom stall was a new one for Hitomi, but it wasn't beyond her willingness to avoid confrontation.

"Ha, so you are in there! Come on, open up, I just wanna talk!" The banging she was doing to the door made Hitomi feel like she wanted to do a bit more than talk.

"N-no! Look I'm sorry but I don't know what you think happened but it wasn't whatever that was! I wasn't doing anything, p-please leave me alone!"

"Oh come on, just open up. It's not like I bite, just lemme see your face or something!"

Her face? Dear god this was a category of trouble Hitomi had never before experienced in her life. "I-I, n-n-no, I'm really sorry about whatever I did to your date b-b-but I really, really don't want any tro-"

The girl outside burst with laughter and the thin walls around Hitomi shook more than they did before, like something larger than a knuckle or shoe banged against them. Between the visceral, rolling laughter beyond the stall door the girl was trying to talk. "Oh my gawd, ah-ha ha ah haaa, that, ha oohaaaha, that's what you, jeez that, that's, oh holy shit, that's great. Hey, look, come on out girl, ha, haaaa, I'm not mad."

The shaking stopped and Hitomi, still traumatized like a deer at a headlight convention sat huddled on the ceramic seat. The person on the other side stepped away from the stall, but wasn't making her way to leave.

"Wooo, boy, hahaaaa. Look I'm really not mad. Just open up, alright. We can be friends and shit if you come out."

… What?

"W-what?" Hitomi asked weakly.

"Yeah, sure, I don't see why not. I'll pal with anyone that sets my brother off."

…

WHAT? That… what? Just out of surprise Hitomi opened the stall door enough to peer through and take a look.

And that was when she fainted.