Okay, so I decided not to re-write literally the entirety of the final 2 episodes (cuz holy moley), so as you'll see I sort of just brush over the scene where all the other girls reminisced and guided Karen (in this case Claudine) down the staircase. It was just too much to record and describe, and it isn't all that important in this retelling anyway.

Disclaimer: I do not own Shoujo Kageki Revue Starlight.

Chapter 4. Grasping Stars

Claudine nearly trips several times in the darkness as she descends. Far ahead, she can see a light shining upon a familiar stage. She never seems to get any closer to it, though.

Eventually, she is forced to walk. As she slows down, she realizes it isn't complete darkness all around her. When she looks to either side, she glimpses memories, almost like footage playing back in a film.

Karen, Hikari, Futaba…

All of them in their revues, their songs, their stories. Things they'd told her long ago come echoing back to her now.

"We are Stage Girls," Nana's voice reminds her. "We can be reborn as many times as necessary."

"We'll keep on fighting," Futaba's voice says. "We won't stop. Not until we've reached our dreams."

"We have an unshakable bond to the stage," Hikari's voice declares. "We are all connected."

Claudine sees them all, in various memories, both on the stage and off. They're in their classrooms, in their dance studio, in their rooms having movie nights.

All but one person.

A soft voice calls out to her.

"Kuro-chan."

Claudine whirls around to find herself facing a projection of Karen. She smiles.

"Go and get her. Please bring Tendo-san back to us."

Claudine's eyes go wide just for a moment before she puffs out her chest and scoffs.

"Bien sûr," she replies. "But of course."

Claudine turns away from the rest of them, and their images softly fade away. She turns back to the stage ahead and struts slowly forward.

"We are rivals, she and I. We are inseparable."

Her footsteps echo behind her, and now she finally nears the stage. There are two things visible there.

The first is a familiar cell phone lying near the center of the stage. As Claudine walks on and draws closer, she recognizes it right away. Her heart clenches, and her hands rise up to cover her mouth to keep back a sob.

The screen is opened to reveal hundreds of messages - from the others, and from Claudine herself. Compiled over half a year. All unread and unanswered.

Claudine sobs softly, but it doesn't shake her resolve.

The other object on the stage is much larger, a door of sorts, a dark entryway caving in from a standing white structure. The image of two twinkling red stars is engraved above the doorway.

Claudine steels herself and steps forward. She's made her wait long enough.

Familiar phrases come to her lips, a script she'd written herself and committed to memory some time ago.

"Everyone has an equal chance to shine…"

She strides across that stage, passing by the lone cell phone.

"So through the dance of love, I shall burn more passionately, and soar on freedom's wings higher than anyone else."

She heads straight for that door, that haunting darkness. Her voice - like her conviction - doesn't waver.

"I am the second-ranked student of the 99th class - Saijou Claudine! C'est moi, la star!"

The shine that Maya had refrained from taking from her. The shine she had refused to take from her. The shine she had sacrificed herself for in order for it to keep on blazing. That shine is what guides Claudine through the darkness now.

"I shall recover her!" she proclaims. "Head of the 99th class, Tendo Maya! I shall take her back, and together we shall show the stage an unmatched, incomparable radiance, the likes of which no one has ever seen before!"

She blinks, and the darkness that swallows her is gone.

Now, a stark, barren desert extends all around her on all sides.

The sky above is a deep, piercing blue, so intense it pains her eyes to look. The sand surrounding her is dry and hard, strangely pink in color. But when she looks closely, she can see something there. A few things, actually.

Red stars protrude from the sand at all angles, as if they had once been unearthed, cast about, and then buried again by the winds. They are everywhere, crusted into the desert itself.

And then, something else comes into her line of vision.

Imprints in the sand.

A trail. A path. Footsteps.

Someone had come before her.

There is no hesitation in Claudine's heart. Only the strongest, most immovable, most unflagging resolve.

She sets out on her journey to follow that path, yet uncovered by the sands of this place, almost as if she'd been meant to find it, even after all this time.

She doesn't know how much time has passed in this place - if it's been six months or six years.

But it doesn't matter. Because whatever this is, it ends today.

She follows those footprints, and it's clear to her by the shape and imprint that they were made by bare feet. Claudine's uniform shoes leave a different mark, one much less vulnerable. She trudges across the wasteland, much less bothered by the elements as her predecessor must have been.

She can't be certain how long she travels for, but eventually her body begins to feel the ache of her journey. Her breath comes harder and shallower, her shoes almost seeming to sink deeper and deeper with every step. The winds try to push her back, knocking particles of sand and broken stone against the bloody cuts in her hands. Her eyes water and sting, and her chest burns with a dull throbbing.

But she persists. She'll keep going, no matter the cost. She won't stop until she's found her and brought her home.

She persists. Farther and farther. Over dune after dune, following those footprints like a guidepost. In spite of all that tries to keep her at bay, she persists.

And finally, standing at the ridge of the next sand dune, she is able to see something out in the distance.

A thin white tower stands there, warped by the haze of the wind and sand. But it's the most genuine structure she's seen since arriving here. And her trail leads straight to it.

So Claudine follows. She follows, ignoring every vision of oasis that tries to lead her astray.

She persists.

Until that tower grows larger with proximity.

Now she can see it isn't the only tower. There is also one of red, much smaller, as though still in construction. It is ragged and worn, and only upon closer scrutiny can she discern it is made from the stars she's been seeing in the sand. It's still being built. By-

Claudine's heart seizes.

She sees her now, hunched over in the sand, covered by nothing more than a thin white dress. Her skin is littered with cuts and scrapes, so arid from this place that another gust of wind could probably make her bleed all by itself.

Claudine had been certain that as soon as she'd seen her after all this time, she would run to Maya and call out to her, throw her arms around her and bring her back home, even if it meant dragging her.

But now, she can't seem to bring herself to do any of those things.

Something is telling her it isn't going to be that simple.

Maya's back is to her, and even as Claudine approaches, she doesn't turn around. She merely continues digging in the sand, unearthing yet another star. She gathers it into her bruised hands and heaves it into her lap. Claudine can tell it's far too heavy for her.

Claudine had had six long months to plan out all the things she'd wanted to say to Tendo Maya if she ever saw her again. Half a year's worth of writing and rewriting that script in her mind. She has no fewer than a million things she wishes to say to her right now.

But somehow, they all evaporate like dewdrops in this desert, until only two words remain.

"I'm sorry."

Still, Maya doesn't move nor turn her head. Claudine wishes she could glimpse her face, her eyes, anything. She tightens her hands into fists at the ends of her skirt, unfazed by the pain it causes her fingers. She knows Maya has suffered much greater pains.

"I'm sorry… Maya," she murmurs. "I didn't understand. You did this… you made this grand sacrifice in order not to take away my shine, nor anyone else's." She takes a step forward and reaches out her hand. "But that's over now. You can come-"

"Who are you?"

Claudine freezes in spite of the desert heat all around her. Her heart feels as though it's been split open by some sharp spike and left to bleed.

"…Eh…?"

She can't breathe. Suddenly it feels as though there are invisible talons gripping her throat, her chest.

Maya is blind to her plight and her suffering. She cradles the star in her lap and recites.

"I don't understand. Your voice, your warmth… The promise I made to you…"

She staggers to her feet beneath the weight of her burden, then finally turns around. Her eyes are dull, without any sparkle or light. She begins to walk toward Claudine-

"I can recall that it was something important…"

-and she walks past her, without so much as a second glance.

"But I don't remember what it was."

Maya passes her by, and for a split second Claudine can almost feel her warmth again - that warmth she's been missing for so terribly long. She recognizes those words, this script.

And she understands. She has a part to play in this, too.

Maya limps past her with her star, drawn by that white tower like a moth to the flame. Claudine whirls around, blurting out an accompanying line.

"Maybe we can get it back! Tonight, at the Star Festival which happens once a year… if I can take hold of that star…" She tries to swallow, but it doesn't go down. "Your memories may come back as well…" Her heart is crying out, but she keeps her voice steady. "Let's go. Together, we will grasp that star… Tendo Maya."

Maya stops on her way to the tower. Claudine waits - prays -for her to turn back to her again.

But after a moment, Maya continues onward, her voice mechanically repeating those lines.

"Tonight, at the Star Festival which happens once a year… if I can take hold of that star… Your memories may come back as well…"

Maya keeps going. Claudine realizes she doesn't plan to come back. So she gives chase.

"Wait! Tendo Maya!" She hurries after her, following her to that tower of red stars. Only now does it register who had built it with her own two hands. Maya continues the play:

"If I can grasp them both, I can obtain an eternal wish…"

Holding the star beneath one arm, she begins to climb. Claudine reaches out to stop her, but can't risk loosening the stars constructing the tower. So she follows her up to the top, heaving herself over the rim. Maya kneels there at the center and gently places her star onto the pile, making the tower just an inch taller.

"Grasping the Star means forgiveness of your sins…"

Claudine can't take it anymore. She crawls over to Maya and stops right in front of her.

"What sins?" she demands. "No one has committed any sins! None of us! Wanting to achieve the position of Top Star is no sin! Wanting to grasp an enteral wish is no sin! You've nothing to atone for, Tendo Maya!"

Maya blinks, lifting her hands to gaze down at them.

"Grasping the Star is a miracle of the night…"

Claudine chokes back a sob. This isn't the Tendo Maya she knows. This isn't her Maya.

She inches closer to her, reaching out to take both of her hands, swollen and abused by this never-ending play. She runs her fingers gently over the calloused skin. Her hands begin to tremble.

"Enough," she whispers, voice laden in earnest. "You've done enough. This is enough, Maya. It's time to come-"

But Maya lifts her hands out of hers and instead raises them to the sky, to the two red stars blazing up above.

"Please take this… the Star you have longed for…"

Claudine looks up to the massive red stars, held up by endless chains. Her eyes widen.

"Grasping the Star…?"

The chains begin to sway.

"A Star… of sin…?"

An explosion.

The stars Maya has striven to reach come crashing down into the tower she'd built with her own two hands. The whole structure shudders and cracks, splintering beneath them as dust and debris blast in their faces. Claudine uses the last of her footing to jump towards her.

"Maya!"

The impact tosses them both high into the air, surrounded by the red fragments of Maya's dream. Claudine strains for her, wincing past the searing pain in her body, the blinding sting in her eyes. She reaches for her hand-

But just before she can touch her, a gust of sand and wind swallows Maya whole. It billows all around her, stealing her away.

Claudine has no choice but to prepare for the landing. She curls herself up, crossing her arms in front of her face as pieces of stone whip against her body. She crashes into the sand, sending up more plumes of sand and dust. It chokes her, filling her eyes, her nose, and her lungs. She coughs with her entire body, until it hurts, expelling the grains of sand back into the desert.

It feels like a year has passed before she can find the strength and breath to push herself up, though she can only manage to sit. Her body is covered in even more scrapes and bruises now, and her hands have started bleeding again. She searches frantically for Maya, and finds her lying on her back, gazing lifelessly up at the sky. Maya's voice comes robotically.

"Our dream will not come to be."

Claudine grits her teeth, spitting out more sand. Slowly, she crawls toward Maya, lying there like an angel without her wings. Claudine coughs, then stops beside her, her eyes filled with sorrow. But she won't allow it.

"I won't allow it." That sorrow melts with her words, transforming instead into something more defiant. "This… is your stage of fate, Tendo Maya? You're giving the shine for all of us, all on your own? Just because you're Top Star? I won't allow it."

Once more, she reaches for Maya's hand. Tears fall freely from her eyes and stain the dust. She reaches for her-

But again, just before she can make contact, Maya pushes herself up, away from her outstretched fingers. She continues reciting her script.

"There is a small village, where the Star Festival is held, where a shooting star falls once a year…" She turns away from Claudine and begins digging in the sand, scratching away until she locates a star.

Claudine watches her, eyes brimming with tears. She shakes her head slowly, unsure of what else she can do.

"You… insufferable woman…" She lifts herself up onto her knees and folds her arms around Maya's shoulders and neck, pressing up softly against her back. "I said that's enough."

She feels Maya flinch.

"Your voice. Your warmth… I remember them…"

"Stop it with that script," she murmurs. "You do remember me, don't you? Your one and only Flora. The only one who can accompany you…" Claudine locks her arms more tightly around Maya's collar. "I am the only one who can stand at your side, am I not? So why…? Why were you all alone here?"

For the first time, Maya doesn't respond with a line from the play. She doesn't reply at all.

Claudine doesn't let her go.

"No matter. That's over now. You aren't alone anymore, Tendo Maya. You've got me. You always have, and you always will."

A silent wind blows, lifting their hair. The ribbon of the blue bow in Claudine's curls flows up and touches Maya's shoulder. Claudine buries her face into the side of Maya's neck, her heart pounding hard against her back.

"Do you remember, Tendo Maya? That first day we met? When I asked you to stretch with me…?"

Maya's only response is to let go of the star in her lap. Instead, she reaches her hands out to cup the sand into her palms. She watches it fall from between her fingers. Claudine holds her tighter.

"Let's go back, Maya. Our "Starlight" hasn't started yet. We need you… I need you."

"You fool."

"Eh?" The next thing Claudine knows, she's on her knees and her arms are empty.

Maya rises to her feet and turns to face her, the star and sand now fallen from her lap. Her lifeless gaze is gone.

Now, she looks down at Claudine with tormented eyes, full of anguish and love.

"You fool… Ma Claudine… why have you come here?"

It's the first time she's spoken out-of-script.

Claudine exhales, steeling herself. She staggers to her feet and stands just a few feet away from her now, facing her with a calmness so forced it betrays the tumult of emotions inside of her.

"I came to bring you back."

Maya falters, as if struck by some invisible force. She shakes her head, and tears drip freely now. But when she next looks up at her, the light has returned to her eyes. She is smiling.

"You fool… if you come to see me, I shall start to miss you, right?"

"Maya…" Claudine wipes her eyes. "That's right. I've missed you. More than you can possibly imagine! Mechante… va! Let's go home, you insufferable woman-"

But the air is split by a booming crack. The white tower behind Maya suddenly fractures, deep black cracks snaking all around it. It shudders and begins to collapse. A tall, familiar figure stands in the pink dust.

"Your lines have stopped…" the giraffe says. "The performance has ended."

"Shut up!" Claudine shouts, throwing her arm out defensively to cover her. "You've kept her long enough! Tendo Maya is guilty of no sin! She is not a prisoner to this stage!"

Claudine makes an effort to reach for her partner, but the sand suddenly falls away from beneath them both, as if a giant hour glass has been flipped. All that supports her now is a platform.

Maya is left standing far away from her, across a gaping chasm. The Top Star Tiara encircles the small circular platform upon where she stands. Maya bows her head sadly.

"Just like the star which Claire and Flora sought, this tiara has no meaning. Its only purpose is to entice new sinners onto the stage."

"Bullshit!" Claudine barks, enraged and terrified. "There are no 'sinners'! We Stage Girls have committed no crimes!"

The platform beneath Maya begins to sink down into the darkness, taking her away. Claudine teeters at the tip of her own ledge, pacing in desperation. She can't lose her. Not again. Her tears fall down into the perpetual depths below.

"Stop! Don't you dare take her from me again!"

But Maya continues to be pulled down, bathed in that red glow.

"I'm sorry, Ma Claudine. I never meant to make you cry."

"Then stop!" she wails. "Don't go!"

But Maya only bows her head again.

"Farewell… Ma Claudine…"

And the darkness swallows her whole.

. . .

. .

.

"Like hell…"

Claudine retreats down the ledge as far as she can, then turns back around.

"Like hell…"

She kicks off running back along the platform, aiming straight for the edge.

"Like hell I'm letting you go, you idiot!"

She leaps, fearing the possibility of losing Maya far more than she fears the harrowing weightlessness of falling. She follows that flickering light down into the darkness.

"Don't you remember?" she shouts. "I am the only one who can keep up with you! The only one who can accompany you! The only one who can stand beside you!"

The air blasts up at her, but she only shouts louder.

"I am the only one who can rival you! Your one and only equal! Second-ranked student of the 99th class: Saijou Claudine!"

She falls, but she can see the bottom now.

Claudine rights her posture and lands on that familiar stage. Her clothes have changed into an outfit she knows all too well. The dull gray of her school uniform has been replaced by navy blues and whites. A red jacket hangs at her left shoulder, and a sword waits readily at her hip.

A steady flow of pink sand falls from above, like a tower sprinkling downward in fragments, drawing her eyes forward. Maya stands there with the Tiara at her feet. She unties the white dress from her shoulders, and when Claudine next blinks, she is dressed in her respective attire. The clothes of her revue costume cover most of the cuts and bruises now. Maya draws her sword, but there is no shine in its gem.

"This is the sinner's stage," she utters. "A stage where I may continue performing all on my own. So I shall not steal your shine, nor anyone else's."

Claudine, too, draws her weapon now. Her sword's gem had been the last of their group's to sparkle. And it had only done so because of Maya, when Claudine had finally decided she was going to best everyone, not just her.

Now her gem shines, but Maya's is dull.

"No one asked for such a stage," Claudine says firmly. "You're being selfish, Tendo Maya."

"Is that not my reward for achieving Top Star?" she asks. "I must have something, after all."

"You truly are an infuriating woman."

The gears crank, the ropes pull, and the curtain is raised on the stage they share.

Both Stage Girls stand apart.

Then they charge.

With everything they have, they run to meet one another, swords drawn and ready.

The second of impact resonates with a deafening clash. They strike at one another, again and again, metal scraping metal, sparks flying.

Everything. They pour everything into this fight. Everything they've ever learned in theater and as Stage Girls.

All of the grace, power, and beauty.

All of the skill, speed, and emotion.

All of it. For each other.

They swing. Leap. Dance. Both fueled by an equal passion, but for different reasons.

One to free a blameless prisoner of unjust rules.

And one to remain captive, so that the other may remain free.

They clash, again and again, channeling all of the anguish of their separation into passion for their reunion. Their love is not one that can be understood by just anyone. Their love is engulfed in the shadows of guilt and sin. But it is also bathed in the lights of pride and purity.

It is merely a matter of which is stronger.

They strike, dodge, block.

Again and again.

Running, soaring, twirling.

Blood, sweat, and tears alike fall in their wake, splattering the stage. The hilts of their swords are slick with red, their skin damp with salt, their faces wet with trails of love.

They come together again - and again are pushed apart.

The giraffe spectates from far above, but Claudine pays him no heed. Maya charges her again with a shout. In seconds she's upon her, sword raised. Claudine lifts her weapon to block, but the blow sends her skidding back toward the edge. She digs her blade into the floor to slow and stop herself, her heel just barely missing the edge. With a voice laden with furious desperation, she tries again to bring Maya to her senses.

"There are no co-stars here! No stagehands or crew! You can't have a performance by yourself!" She uses her sword as a crutch and gets back up, refusing to give up on her.

Maya stands unmoving back at center stage, bathed in the red spotlight.

"I did not want you to experience the torment of loss."

Claudine scoffs.

"Mechante! Then you shouldn't have left me!" She wrenches her sword from the ground, but doesn't raise it at her again. "I've already experienced that, you idiot! So let's go back, Ma Maya-"

A blade comes hissing at her from across the stage. She feels the plunging weight of it pushing mercilessly at her shoulder. The tip pierces the button of her jacket, and it shatters.

Claudine's jacket falls free, and though she tries to gather it again, her hands are shaking too much. It flutters to the floor. More and more crimson spotlights flash on, highlighting her failure for all to see.

"No… no-!"

The platform between the two of them splits, pulling them apart once more. Maya stands there solemnly, with that same lifeless look in her eyes as when she'd first pushed Claudine off half a year earlier.

"I sacrificed my life for this performance, this stage. This is my atonement. My fate."

"Maya-"

Maya is pulled back beneath the spiral of falling sand. She lifts her hands to it, and it slips through her fingers like so many hopes and wishes.

"Our dream will not come to be…"

As the final grain falls, so too does a tear.

The spotlights go out.

. . .

. .

.

Claudine opens her eyes and finds herself in a seat in the audience. She is dressed in her school clothes once more. When she reaches behind her head, that blue ribbon is still there. Before her, on a well-lit stage, a performance is going on.

"Eh…?" Her mind feels fuzzy, blurry, like a screen full of static. She remembers this play. "That girl… that must be Claire… and that one is Flora… and those are the goddesses…" She recognizes all of these characters, all of their lines.

But it's strange. They're all being played by the same person. There is only one girl standing on that stage, all alone, changing positions and lines in order to fit each character…

A name comes to her lips. One she could never forget.

"Tendo… Maya…?"

And then Claudine is back on that stage, back in her revue clothes, sword in-hand - reborn.

Maya turns and meets her gaze, gasping softly. Claudine steps forward.

"You… You were imprisoned the entire time, shouldering all our burdens alone, all this time… weren't you?"

Maya's eyes flash with something Claudine can't quite decipher. As Maya takes a step back, Claudine takes another forward.

"Don't worry. All that is over now. Wait for me, my Claire… Ma Maya…"

Another step.

Closer. Closer.

To her.

"Because I'm going to take you back!"

She advances, but Maya has nowhere left to retreat too. She remains frozen in her confusion as Claudine comes for her, projecting her voice across the stage.

""Starlight" is a play where we must part… But I refuse! I refuse that kind of tragic play!" Claudine struts a little faster, covering the devastating distance that separates them. "Ours will be an ending where we can be together! That's the kind of play I want to see!"

Maya's eyes grow wide, fearful.

"Stop!" she cries, staggering back. "If you do that… the stage I have created will be destroyed! Your shine will be stolen from you!"

"Then they can have it!" Claudine shouts. "They can take everything! I don't care about 'shine' or being Top Star or anything else! I've come here for you! They can take everything from me but you, Tendo Maya!"

She advances, step by step, not faltering even when the stage becomes an uphill incline. She won't stop. She doesn't.

"Even if my 'shine' is stolen from me, it won't disappear! Every stage I stand upon is mine! No matter how many times I fail, I will be reborn!"

At her words, the shattered button reconstructs itself as if by magic, and the jacket returns to her shoulder as if it had never fallen in the first place.

At last, Claudine stops, just inches away from her partner. She reaches out her hand.

Maya drops her sword.

"C…Claudine…"

The stage around them shifts and crumbles, then begins to rebuild itself however it sees fit. But the two of them aren't separated again. Claudine continues offering her hand.

"Stage Girls are brought to life by the stage. To me, my stage is you, Tendo Maya." Her heart is in her words, supporting them with all the trust and love she harbors. She too, drops her weapon. "Without you, my performance can't begin, or end. Without you, I can't be a Stage Girl. You have to be there, or else it's all meaningless. So please…" She bores her eyes directly into Maya's now, and gazes deep into her soul. "Give me everything you have! Tendo Maya!"

Maya blinks, and Claudine watches two more tears fall from her eyes. Maya's hand twitches, but pauses just shy of hers.

"I know this…" she murmurs. "I know this… because it is the same for me, Ma Claudine. You are my stage, my rival, my partner. The only one who can accompany me…" Her voice trembles now, her breath coming out as a stammer. "Ever since the day I met you and we stretched together… I have wanted this. To perform our own "Starlight" together with you." And at last, she reaches out her hand and rests it in hers. "Our own performance. One where we can change the ending however we see fit."

Claudine clasps her fingers around the hand in hers. When she next opens her eyes, they are back in that pink desert, upon a large open stage. There are no curtains; no beginning, no end.

Both she and Maya pull each other's hands, then release. They spin in perfectly-executed steps, matching pace with one another, twirling three, four, five times, beautifully in-sync.

They dance to the ends of the stage, then turn back to the center. They pass each other, and repeat.

When they are farthest apart, both find their swords within their grasp once more. They turn to face one another and raise their blades. Both gems now gleam beneath the faint pale light.

Claudine speaks first.

"Everyone has an equal chance to shine. So through the dance of love, I shall burn more passionately, and soar on freedom's wings higher than anyone else. Second-ranked student of the 99th class - Saijou Claudine!"

Maya returns her line.

"The star of love which shines on the moon… Now, gather that outpouring of light and send it to your heart." She lifts her chin with pride. "Head of the 99th class - Tendo Maya! Tonight, I will show you that "shine"!"

And so they advance across that stage, slowly at first, before gathering speed. They race toward one another, swords raised, eyes shining, hearts aflame.

A strike.

A button is cut free.

A jacket falls loose.

Both Stage Girls relinquish their hold on their weapons once and for all, and collapse in each other's arms. Maya's jacket falls to the stage. She has been freed at last.

"Thank you…"

Maya encircles Claudine in her arms, weeping softly into her shoulder. Claudine embraces her even more tightly and cries just as hard.

"You insufferable woman…" she sighs. "The star you attempted to obtain…"

"It was you," Maya whispers. "I don't need an eternal wish... You were the star I was searching for all along, Ma Claudine."

Claudine's soul comes alive, encompassed by a blooming, blossoming warmth.

"And you were mine… Ma Maya." She reaches up to the blue ribbon still clinging to her hair. Claudine unties it, then brings it out to reveal it to her. Maya's eyes shimmer with affection.

"All this time… you never forgot about me…"

"Of course I didn't. Just who do you think I am?" Claudine loops her arms around her again. She cards through her brown hair briefly, then ties Maya's ribbon back where it belongs. Maya presses close against her, wishing she could make up for all that time they'd spent apart.

"Merci… Ma Claudine… Je t'aime…"

Claudine's heart beats a little faster, a little harder, a little more honestly.

"Je t'aime, Ma Maya…"

The sun sets, and the curtain of night blankets them both.

The next morning, Claudine wakes to find her calendar has somehow been set back six months. Or perhaps, maybe it had never been turned ahead that far in the first place.

She gets dressed, then retreats to her night stand when her cell phone vibrates. She opens up a new message from a familiar number:

'Are you awake yet, my Sleeping Beauty? If not, I can provide a kiss to wake a princess.'

Claudine rolls her eyes and types back a response.

'If you try it, I'll bite you.'

A moment later she receives three heart emojis.

She exits her dorm room just as the door across the hall opens. Maya steps out, also dressed in her uniform, the blue ribbon in her hair as always.

"Oh, good morning, Saijou-san. Did you sleep well?"

Claudine closes her door and smirks.

"I did. And I received a rather inappropriate wake-up text."

"My, I wonder what that could have been about…?" Maya opens one arm invitingly. Claudine snorts; Maya knows she can't resist. Claudine goes to her and kisses her cheek.

"You're unbelievable, making me do this so early in the morning…"

"And yet you seem so eager."

"Shut up."

Maya chuckles and kisses her cheek in return. She's about to move away, but Claudine huffs, wrapping both arms around her shoulders to keep her near.

"Hold on. I never said I was finished…"

Maya smiles, dipping forward into a slight bow against her.

"I beg your pardon."

Tenderly, she wraps both of her arms around Claudine's waist and the small of her back, pulling her up a little closer. Claudine clings softly to her shoulders, taking in her scent, letting it fill her lungs. Maya receives similar comforts, feeling Claudine's warmth spread across her chest, the beat of her heart thumping steadily.

For a moment they are still. They breathe together, let their pulses dance together in a mutual rhythm.

Claudine lets herself be greedy for a while.

Maya certainly doesn't mind. She waits patiently. She'd give her all the time in the world if Claudine ever asked for it.

Eventually, Claudine eases back, as if she hadn't just spent nearly ten minutes intimately embracing a fellow classmate in the dormitory hallways for all to see.

"So," she says, impressively casual. "Karen and the others are having a hot-pot tonight. Care to join us? I'm bringing crab." She offers her elbow. Maya loops her arm through it and pulls Claudine in close to her side.

"I wouldn't miss it for the world."

The two head down the hallway together, toward the place where their friends are waiting for them, toward a future they'll perform together.

A/N: It was kind of tricky to record each line from the episode, but I did it! Though of course I changed what were originally Karen's lines to suit Claudine for this. Her responses are a bit more fiery.

I know this idea doesn't really work since Claudine isn't the 'extra' audience-member character that Karen was, but I just did it for the concept of Maya bearing her burden and Claudine fighting to get her back.

Recording all the lines from the show really made me realize just how gay it actually was... wow.

Please review!