(Rose)
We sailed all day long at maximum speed toward the next island, if any.
Hopefully the thing that was after us gave up and remained on its territory.
We should still have enough food for a few days, but I'm not sure that's sufficient.
Then we spotted another land in the end, a little further East, and sailed for it.
We reached another abandoned island, with visible vineyard and villages in ruins along them.
It was deserted, and clearly without dolls.
Only a profuse amount of grapes to harvest, lucky us.
Scouting the island soon after, we found a wine factory and a warehouse filled with empty glass bottles.
Since we had this luck, we didn't let it go to waste.
We spent three days there, killing our hands and back, harvesting all we could and pressing it into bottles.
We couldn't work the sealing machine for the bottles, so we used sticks of wood and sap from a few trees we cut, to seal our rapidly growing stock of grape juice.
Always good at finding things I wish she didn't, Bleue found in a cave, a real barrel of wine that was not spoiled.
R - You want to take this two hundred litres barrel, no less?
B - Pretty please?
R - Urh... We'll die before we finish it...
B - But we could bath in it...
R - Bath?
B - Could be fun.
I guess... Her ideas always tend to have a slightly worrying side for me. Especially if alcohol is involved. And I can't follow her imagination, or kinks. But well, why not.
We packed most of the preserved grapes in the ship that day.
And around the campfire of the night, we began to drink some of the wine merrily.
It tasted much sweeter than I expected. French wines I tasted always had this bitter and sour taste to me, making me bewildered at how an entire country could make and drink things like that.
But tasting a nice one here, it's pretty good, sweet and light.
It may be a little too light and easy to drink I notice, because Bleue got herself drunk before I had a chance to stop her. She is laughing loudly to the tears to now everything we're now saying. She is in that ridiculous state now of hilarity. Quite a funny show.
Of course I get contaminated by her merry time, and repeated invitations to drink a little more to join her.
I get drunk too before I realise it. And afterwards, it got weird.
Really weird.
~
The night goes on as we doze off around the fire, wake up in a sudden jolt, drink more and burst in more laughter.
Sometimes together, sometimes while the other still is asleep.
The night gets fragmented and incoherent, with short blackouts following each other. Our glasses keep being filled by one of us, and it goes on, between lulls and moments of hilarity and amusement.
The three of us spend the night like that, trying to sing, failing, laughing, burping, drinking, dozing and repeating this chaotic pattern all night long.
After a few glasses refused, because my stomach is telling me very loudly I should seriously stop this downpour, I begin to notice there's something odd.
I try to count us. In the current state I'm in, it takes all my lingering brain power to do so. I count you and her, which makes us two. Two is normal, alright!
Wait.
I try again. Me and you. Okay, all good. Wait no. I should have counted her too. One, two, three?
Some of my drunk brain cells do realise there's something I should investigate seriously, but others don't see anything wrong. We've been having fun for so long it feels like forever now.
I do manage to sober up slightly by focusing on that oddity I kind of realise is happening.
I still feel dizzy and drunk, but I recovered some of myself.
I look at Bleue. Okay she's a mess, but she's been like that forever, nothing queer there.
I look at our old mutual friend. A woman with delicious smile and eerie white hair. She's beautiful, I want to touch her neck.
She's laughing with Bleue as usual. She's been enjoying the time with us since... Since when again?
Some lost thoughts and intelligence do manage to click together what's really happening, but it's not a moment of pride. Still, I draw my sword and point it at our old friend.
They both react as if it was a drunkard's game. I repeat my question over and over, but all they do is laugh at me.
R - Who are you?
They keep laughing, because I'm barely standing and look ridiculous. To them I'm acting like I'm in some sort of delirium.
Our friend laughs stronger and splashes my face with wine. Bleue laughs even louder without any manners.
My brain hasn't found how to react to the situation. Dead end.
I trip over my own foot and fall over them.
I manage to hold our guest down, barely, and repeat my question that my brain is stuck with.
I don't really understand her reply. Her voice is soft and feels nice in my ears. That's all I remember of her answer.
I'm really about to fall asleep there, uncouth and over her or the ground.
I try to stand up but she pulls me back against her breasts, still laughing. She smells nice like fruits.
~
As I wake up with a headache so painful I almost scream, I try to put the pieces back together.
My hands still rest on a human chest, with a heart beating inside.
I call out Bleue, while I'm still unable to see anything around me. Her reply comes from many steps to my left. A sleeping grunt only though.
My sight comes back. My eyes fall into clear blue eyes of the most beautiful woman I've ever seen.
A little shocked, I lose my balance and fall aside. I then try to stand up. I fall back with a strong vertigo.
My brain hurts so much...
I can't figure out anything that's happening to me. What did we do last night?
I try to yell at Bleue to wake up, but my throat feels so sore I can't do more but a choked whisper.
Our friend sits up with a grin.
She grabs a cup and fills it in the fallen drum. She drinks it in a single gulp and then sighs in a pleasant, satisfied manner. She's happy and fresh.
She fills the cup again and brings it to my lips. I cough the wine away. It makes her giggle.
I barely stand, but I do. I whisper the same question as the night before. Brain... Stuck...
G - I'm your friend. You said it yourself Rose. Your best pal!
R - Friend... What... What are you? You're not human... Are you with the fog?
G - Ah ah. We already discussed that. No I'm neither. I'm just your friend.
This is going nowhere. Where are we?
R - What do... What do you want?
G - The same thing I always want.
She raises her cup and drink its entire content straight.
G - To enjoy life with you merry two for a while longer; drinking as much as we can mostly.
What the hell have we stumbled upon?
Before I realise it, she's making me drink from a cup. I spit most of the wine over her, again. She brushes it off with another laugh.
She's having fun alright.
My brain has a sudden and probably last spark of intelligence.
R - Where did you get this body?
G - Ah ah... Caught me. I made it from leftovers scattered around the island. But it's mostly plant made, from grapes wastes you left behind! See, I'm extra sweet.
She says so as she puts two of her fingers into my mouth. She does taste sweet like a fruit. Wait. Stop that!
Bleue saw us and looks a little horrified, or jealous, I don't know anymore.
As our friend Grape giggles about it, she goes toward her.
G - Here, there's enough for you too, no worry.
Bleue is given the hand to taste before her brain manages to react. I see Bleue's intelligence suddenly shutting down from the shock and surprise, it's weird. Her eyes don't focus on anything anymore and she stops reacting for a moment.
Grape is laughing her ass off, and then crouching down to the collapsing Bleue to hug her with a lot of familiarity.
G - I'm so glad I met you two! Ah ah ah!
I'm falling in a sitting position too, too shocked to manage to react to anything. Bleue isn't looking any better in our old friend's arms.
What...
~
As we got ourselves back together from the hangover, Bleue and I began to realise we had unwillingly adopted a new pet last night.
Grape wasn't really human, nor really a daiûa in full power.
More like... A faery.
A wine faery...
Bleue is a magnet to weird things I swear.
But Grape is now sticking with us because of our drunken stupor from last night. What a proud moment for us. We'll reflect on our behaviour, after the hangover symptoms finish withdrawing...
Grape doesn't only drink and makes others drink, she also doesn't mind answering questions, so we quickly learn a little more about her.
She resided as a shapeless thing over this island, and concentrated her existence in its grapes.
Working them over the last days, we somehow brought her into existence. Or eased her way as a daiûa toward the light and materiality of our world.
She materialised herself bits by bits over the island as we worked, and drank.
She's like an embodiment of our drunken laughs together, as if the shared memories of it had been extracted from us, turned into a human equivalent, body and mind, and animated there.
What kind of mysticism does that?
She built herself with what we discarded, with what we were there, physically and in mind, and in drunken attitude...
B - So... She's going to stay like that now?
R - Yup, it's her natural state. She's one of us. She is us, as we were yesterday...
Grape was lasciviously hugging me, kissing my neck as I said that. I feel ashamed in more ways than one now.
She punctuated that thought with a long gulp from the bottle of wine she keeps holding at all time. Goodness...
Yeah, I'm beyond shame now. I just want to hide.
Bleue seems more happy about it though, mostly when she saw her displays of familiarity and affection.
B - I quite like what we are then... Though yes it is quite embarrassing to see it from outside.
R - I feel so embarrassed... And we can't really leave her here now that she is... well, alive really...
G - Eh eh eh, I'm coming with you my dears! But let's make sure we collect all the remaining bottles first.
B - Aren't we... Less fun for you, now that we've sobered up?
G - Goodness no! I still love you!
Grape followed her statement with a laugh, and a jump to Bleue's side to rub her cheek against hers, and giving her a strong uncouth kiss on the cheek as well. Now I'm making the gawking face that Bleue did before. Bewildered, flabbergasted, embarrassed.
So shameful, now that I know we were the models.
B - Oh yeah, she's just like you!
R - No she's not!
I sigh deeply and feel like I get older by a few years by the end of it.
It was such an easy tease from Bleue, and I fell for it.
Bleue and Grape are laughing together at me now. Yes, they're good pals alright...
Goodness... Why? I sigh again a few years of my life away, as both of them come to hold one of my hands as we'll head away.
~