Nar Yakushi

The smell of cheap Neighpanese takeout fills the tiny living room of a two bedroom apartment. Sat on the couch of the small living room, with food laid out on the coffee table in front of them, Nar sits with his new friend, Aki. A plasma TV sitting atop an entertainment center displays scenes from some sort of shonen anime. After finishing his plate of curry, and rice, Nar leans back into the couch with a contented sigh. Aki doesn't seem to notice, as she's fully invested in the anime they're watching. Nar remains silent for a few moments before he shifts to sit up. "Oh yeah, I forgot." Aki turns her head to peer at him with one eye poking out from between her hair. She watches as Nar opens up his satchel, and gingerly removes two objects from within. On the bottom is a laminated sheet of stickers depicting characters from the exact anime the two are watching. On top is a folded set of long, fluffy socks. "I wanted to get you a gift to welcome you to the city, but I wasn't sure what you'd like.CI just went with the best suggestions some of my friends gave me." Nar offers a smile as Aki takes the gifts from him. "O-oh. Thanks." She smiles back as best she can, then reaches for the TV remote to pause the show. She opens up the sticker pack to flip through the pages before stopping on one page in particular. She seems to focus in on one particular sticker. Nar peers over to see which sticker she's looking at, but only catches a glimpse of it before she flips to another page. If she was looking at the one he thinks she was, it was of a character that kind of resembled him. Glancing up at Aki's face, Nar can see a light blush across her cheeks. Well, this is probably as good a chance as he'll get to shoot his shot. "Y'know, Aki, I've been wondering. Are you seeing anyone?" Aki looks over to Nar, not quite seeming to grasp the implications of what he just asked. "I mean... Other than my online friends? Just you." Play it cool, Nar. Play it cool. "I mean, as in, dating." Aki's face turns a bright red. Smooth, Nar. Real smooth, dummy. "N-no... I-." Aki pauses, suddenly seeming quite embarrassed. "I've never dated before." Hold on, maybe Nar hasn't fumbled this. Yet. "Well, how would you feel about us becoming a thing? I know we only really just met, but honestly? I really enjoy spending time with you. I usually like to take things really slow with people, but I feel like there's a connection here that I haven't had with anyone else in a long, long time." Nar's words hang in the air for some moments. Aki appears to mentally shut down. Nar opens his mouth to speak again, but is cut off as Aki finally responds. "You mean... Be your girlfriend?" Nar's response is a simple nod, and a soft. "Yeah." "I-... I'd like that... A lot." No other words are spoken. Nar simply slides over to wrap an arm around Aki's shoulder. In response, she nestles herself up as close to him as she can. There, the two remain cuddled up together as they watch anime well into the evening, reluctantly breaking the cuddle when the sun starts to set, and Nar needs to head home. For some reason, Nar thinks he hears the voices of his old friends from the Northern Adventure League cheering for him in his head.

With the sun reaching it's peak over the sky of Vanhoover, the city was beginning to come alive in full swing. Everybody is winding down from Mandy's party the day before, with many nursing the worst hangover they've ever had. Despite this, the city is still plastered with Attack on Mango merch, and decor. Seems the city's going to milk their cash-cow for as long as possible. As Nar skates through the streets, he looks around at his face plastered all over, alongside those of his friends. On the side of one of the tallest buildings in the city, he can see a banner hanging, calling Vanhoover "Home of #1!" With one of the band's album covers pictured beneath it. Their faces are plastered all over the city, and while Nar's bandmates are getting the full celebrity treatment, nobody even seems to recognize him. All fine by Nar. He'd rather not get swarmed during his frequent skate sessions. Nar turns onto a much more secluded street to take a shortcut to his favorite breakfast spot. As he does so, he spots what looks to be a group of stallions/men surrounding someone against a wall. They're too tall, and large for him to see who they're accosting at first, so he removes his earbuds, and drops them into his shirt pocket. "What's the matter babe? Never seen this much man before?" Nar nearly gags at the first words he hears from the stallions. As he gets closer, he begins to see what looks to be a head of black hair in the middle of the three men. Looks like a woman/mare, a good head or more shorter than the guys accosting her. Upon closer inspection, Nar notices that she actually has her head turned away, and has shrunken up against the wall. "Hey!" Nar shouts as he approaches. "Knock it off, assholes!" The group turns to face him, with two of the men stepping forward, while the third places an arm beside the woman's head to keep her from running. Nar lifts his arms as he prepares for a fight. "Hey, hold on a sec." The man next to the woman calls out. "Ain't that they guy who kicked the shit out of that gryphon on TV?" One of the two men approaching Nar leans forward, squinting. His eyes then go wide, and he stands up straight. "Oh shit, it is!" He then turns, motioning for the others to follow him. "C'mon! This ain't worth it!" The three men quickly slink off down the street. Nar skates up to place himself between them, and the woman, watching them until they retreat around a corner a block down. He then turns back to look over their victim. She looks to be a young adult, earth pony, around his age. She has a VERY long, messy, black mane/hair that goes down nearly past her hips, and covers her eyes completely. The black sweater she's wearing is a little too big on her, and her hands don't even poke out of the sleeves. Her jeans seem a little dirty, and her sneakers are old, and worn. All in all, it honestly looks like she's been wearing this outfit for a few days now. Doesn't smell like it though. "Hey." Nar offers her a warm smile, but makes sure to stay a comfortable distance away. "Are you alright?" The only response he gets is quiet mumbling he can barely hear. He leans in a little closer, and thinks he can just about make out her words. It sounds like she's speaking neighpanese. Nar shifts from Equestrian, to Neighpanese as he asks "Oh, you can speak Neighpanese? That's cool. I'm fluent. We can use it if you're more comfortable with it." At this, the woman raises her head just enough, and she brushes some of the hair out of her face, revealing one of her eyes. There are... quite a few bags under it. In a quiet voice she squeaks out a "Sorry", in neighpanese. "Hey! Don't be! Those guys were accosting you! I wasn't just gonna sit by and let them do that!" Her head begins to fall, and she goes silent, leading Nar to break the silence. "What's your name? I haven't seen you around her before." The response he gets is a quiet "Aki." "Well, it's nice to meet you Aki! I'm Nar! Are you from here?" She shakes her head, slowly. "Oh? Just visiting, or did you just move here?" "I... Just moved here..." Jeez, she's frozen stiff. She can't even seem to look him in the eyes when she talks. Must be pretty shy. "Hey! Vanhoover's a great city! Did you move here from Neighpan?" Nar continues to exude energy, while Aki only nods in response. "That's awesome! My dad moved her from Neighpan a long time ago! He lives in Ponyville though." Nar pauses, hoping for a response. It doesn't come. "So, what are you doing out and about?" "Groceries... I got lost..." "Well, would you like some help? I know the city like the back of my hand! I know a grocery store close by, and I could go with you so you don't get accosted again!" Aki gives a nod, and a hopeful "Y-yes please." Nar motions for Aki to follow him, then waits for her to walk beside him before he begins to skate down the street. For the rest of the afternoon, Nar helps Aki as she shops for groceries. At first, the sheer size of the store he takes her to overwhelms her, but eventually, she starts to get the hang of things. By the end of the trip, Nar notices that she's bought a suspiciously large amount of cup noodles. Like, enough to eat for every meal for at least 2 weeks. Afterwards, he manages to convince her to go get lunch with him, where he takes her to the band's old stomping grounds. Shifty Sais. Turns out, she's a pretty picky eater, but she really seemed to like the cheese nachos, so Nar's happy with that. The two converse the whole while, with Aki growing more, and more talkative as they do so. She seems to warm up to him fairly quickly. By the time Nar gets Aki back to her apartment, she seems hesitant to go inside. Nar stands behind her as she fumbles with her keys. She seems to drop a piece of paper from her purse, just before she manages to get inside, and slams the door shut behind her. Nar picks up the paper, and goes to knock on the door. "Hey! Aki! You dropped-" He stops when he catches a glimpse of what's on the paper. "Thank you for showing me around the city. I had a great time. Please text me at some point. I'd like to be friends." Followed by a phone number. Ooooh! Sly! She dropped that paper on purpose! Probably just too shy to actually ask him in person. Oh well. He'll shoot her a text after he gets home later. Nar begins to descend down the stairs of the apartment complex with a big, goofy smile on his face. It felt good to make a new friend!

Getting stood up on a date, and ghosted by the mare who asked you out in the first place, really stunk. Nar COULD feel sorry for himself... OR, he could- oh hey! A text from his friend, Spins! Meet up for pizza? Hell yes! Nar quickly begins to draft a reply, excited for some pizza with his friend whom he hasn't seen in quite a while. As Nar exits the little park he'd just been in, he stops to complete his reply to Spins. However, he can hear a sounds quickly approaching him from down the street. It sounds like... Skateboard wheels on concrete! Nar stops texting for a moment to look over his shoulder. He looks just in time to see a talon swipe towards his face. Quick reflexes save Nar's eyes from getting clawed out, and he ducks to the side as a gryphon on a skateboard flies past him. The gryphon quickly powerslides to a stop, then turns to stare Nar down with a death glare. As Nar's head snaps back, he briefly catches a glimpse of a camera crew nearby, filming the two. (https://youtu.be/rJj0OuBbUaI?si=zPjqIZLw4TsOtE4x) "Any time, any place, bitch." The gryphon growls, with a smirk. Nar shifts his stance. "Alright then. Let's dance!" The motors in his skates whine to life, as Nar goes to return the favor of a blitz attack. The gryphon manages to evade the punch, despite not moving off of his skateboard. Nar continues on past the gryphon, causing him to turn to give chase. Back at the hotel, Asuka's phone buzzes as it receives a text. Looks like Juno sent a text to the band's group chat. "Channel 2. It's going down." With that, Asuka flips the channel on her suite room's TV to channel two, and is greeted with an isometric view of Nar, and the gryphon guitarist of Def Metal skating down the streets of Manehatten at breakneck speeds. All the while, they throw punches, kicks, and other attacks at each other. Even worse? It's being broadcast to the whole country. Asuka begins to scream at her television at the disgusting lack of safety gear either of the two are wearing. "" A slashing talon barely misses tearing a chunk out of Nar's left arm. Nar attempts to retaliate with a punch of his own, but he can't turn his body to punch effectively. There isn't as much power behind the punch as there would be if he was punching to his front. The position Nar finds himself in is really starting to frustrate him. He has to face forward to keep moving, but the gryphon can still face him, while moving forwards. Because of this, Nar has already taken quite a beating, but the gryphon is largely unscathed. A punch knocks Nar to the side, causing him to stumble slightly. He regains his balance before his face has a catastrophic meeting with the sidewalk. With a frustrated grunt, Nar initiates a hop up onto a railing, hoping to get some sort of advantage. He throws out a quick kick, which the gryphon ducks under, then retaliates by trying to grab Nar's other leg. Nar re-chambers his kick, and goes for another, causing the gryphon to disengage momentarily. His wing flashes out, and Nar barely manages to hop over it before it can knock him off the railing. As Nar brings his foot back down, the gryphon's wing flashes out again. Nar manages to hop just in time again, but his landing is shaky, and he wobbles a bit before finding his balance. If he does that shit ONE MORE TIME, Nar is gonna break that fucking wing! Sure enough, the wing comes out again. This time, Nar hops up, but quickly slams his feet back down onto the rail. The gryhpon quickly retracts his wing, but Nar catches a good chunk of feathers under his skate, ripping them out of the wing. This seems to set the gryphon off. He cries out in pain, then growls a low growl. "Fucker! I'm gonna smash those skates of yours into pieces after I beat your ass into the pavement!" A flurry of punches, clawing slashes, and wing strikes follow. Nar barely manages to avoid getting knocked off of the rail, but his legs take a beating. At the end of the rail, Nar hops back onto the pavement, and pushes the motors in his skates to their limits. He tears down the sidewalk towards a plaza full of modern art pieces, leaving the gryphon in his dust. The gryphon's shout is drowned out by the wind in Nar's ear. As he enters the plaza, he spots a large art piece of a bunch of concentric, metal rings in the very center. He has an idea. The gryphon looses sight of his quarry as it passes into the plaza. With as much speed as he can muster, the gryphon barrels into the plaza, roaring his anger. The bystanders in the plaza watch in confusion, and fear as this seemingly feral gryphon on a skateboard screams obscenities into the sky, promising an 'ass whopping of the century' to some unseen person. The gryphon's head jerks erratically as he searches for his quarry. For a moment, he thinks he can hear the sound of metal grinding on metal. He looks to the central art piece in the plaza, but can't see anything. His head jerks to his right, then, up, and to his left. He sees a split second of Nar's foot swinging towards his face, then, The gryphon's skateboard continues on it's path, as the rider slams onto the concrete of the plaza. Nar lands two feet away, and quickly skids to a stop. The skateboard slams into a bench, and comes to a halt. The gryphon lays on the concrete, out cold. Nar cringes, hard. "Oooooh shit. He hit the back of his head, really hard." Immediately, Nar pulls out his phone. He scrolls off of his drafted text to Spins in order to dial emergency services, and call for an ambulance. Around two minutes later, the unconscious gryphon is loaded into the back of an ambulance as the camera crew assures Nar that as long as the damage isn't permanent, he's covered by the waiver. Thankfully, no police are called, and Nar is free to go about his evening after having won his fight in the Battle of the Bands. That just leaves Asuka to win her fight, then... Attack on Mango is the number one band in Equestria! After the ambulance pulls away, Nar pulls out his phone once more, and finishes up his text to Spins before sending it off. "Hey! Sorry for the late reply! I'm sure you saw why. If not, battle of the bands stuff. Anyway, pizza sounds awesome! I'll send a text in the band group chat and see if the others can come! Cookie's spending some time with her grandparents in Ponyville right now, so she won't be able to join. Just send me an address, and I'll have everyone meet you there!"