Servant Caster slowly formed into being after she had realized the intruders coming into her home out of nowhere. They had tripped the wards she had set up around the perimeter and invited themselves inside of her home without even asking for permission. How rude! And by the time they realized that they've been duped, it was already too late, and the two of them suddenly found themselves inside a second room floor with no one else
Tamamo-no-Mae slowly poured a few cups of tea for her esteemed guests, two members of the well-recognized Rias team Toujou Koneko and Yuuto Kiba. On the one hand, their snooping around her home to confirm their suspicions of some sort of hypnosis or geas having been applied to their
"I hope you could explain why you have been snooping around my master's home for so long…" Tamamo began. She tapped impatiently on the table, raising an elegant eyebrow at their plead for forgiveness. "I do hope you've realized by now, but it's late at night during a Saturday of all times, and he needs all the sleep he needs for the exam next week."
"And what did you do?"
"We snuck inside of your house to confirm our suspicions… Miss Rias wasn't budging at all when we asked her about the details behind her and your master's meeting a few days ago." Kiba raised his head from the floor. "We were worried when we felt a little magic pouring out of her eyes, so we had to act in some way to make sure that she wasn't being hypnotized." Koneko looked at him for a moment from her kneeling position, then continued her observation of Haru's so-called Servant.
"Good. That was all you needed to say. That said," Her eyes lidded dangerously. "You don't think you could have asked us directly? Honestly, it wasn't that big of a deal. Just a mutual geas to ensure neither of our secrets were leaked by accident without the consent of the other." Though I have my doubts that a pornographic magazine should truly be considered a major secret on her part, she thinks to herself, considering the myriad of other skeletons just waiting to come out of her closet.
"Ah, Tamamo-san, if you wouldn't mind, could you please tell us where Haru is the entire time? I know you've been telling us this entire time that he needs his beauty sleep to prepare, but it's almost like he's never been home the entire time we've been here." One of the two asked, but she wasn't taking care to identify either of their voices this time around with her eyes closed.
"Oh, that's very simple, Mikon! Just watch." She snapped her fingers and her body and eventually the whole room was enveloped in a bright light. Her lean and slender physique turned rougher and more masculine, turning into a picture-perfect copy of Namikaze Haru in his school uniform.
"Ah." They both blinked, looking at the transformation with not much else, though just afterwards she had transformed again into Tamamo-no-Mae. "I'm to guess that you're filling in for Haru-san then?"
"In a way, but it's only during situations like this. I can guarantee you that you wouldn't see me most of the time because he does this kind of thing better than me." She grinned with both of her arms propping her face up.
'So, he's busy right now and can't interact with us himself? Tough luck, honestly.' They thought inside, but still accepting of the hospitality given to them by their host. They waited for whatever she had to say next.
A moment of silence came afterwards. None of them interacted in the slightest, even with Tamamo's disarming smile staring straight at them. Kiba awkwardly took his cell phone out of his pocket to see the time, and felt dejected to see it's only been 5 minutes since then. Opening his mouth, he began.
"So…" Kiba began. "Are we done here?" Tamamo smiled maliciously under her breath at the question, both of their expense, and prepared to counter whatever she had with whatever they could still get their hands on.
The tension dropped dramatically when instead of a weapon, she had brought out a half a glass baking dish's worth of lasagna from underneath the kotatsu. It was covered with a piece of cloth and, despite looking like a day old, it still looked palatable and edible, which made both of them think that she had in some way preserved the food presentably. Presumably using some kind of magic, but it was better than nothing.
"Do try to eat as much as you can, okay? I cooked a little too much the other day but despite my attempts to make it smaller, it still ended up being too much." She pushed two plates at them with forks and knives, and offered them to eat. The two looked at each other momentarily, eating slowly despite the absurdly sweet taste of the sauce used. It was good, but it was too sweet to be pasta.
After a while…
"We'll send the message to Rias-sama that we've worked something out. You can expect an invitation to the club in just the next week. So until then," Koneko brushed her hair out of her face. "Do take care." She smiled, an emotion enough for Kiba to look at her in turn.
"We'll be seeing you!" Kiba shouted, looking back at the home while facing the rising sun. They both walk away from the front door and Haru sighs.
He takes a broom out of the hallway closet and sweeps the floor of any dirt and debris that may have been left over, whistling a cheerful jingle all the while. A few steps rang down the staircase, signaling that his parents were arriving now, queueing his morning routine of making breakfast for the whole family. With mastered multitasking, he washed the dishes, cleaned the floor and cooked breakfast for all of them at the same time.
It wasn't the life the real Namikaze Haru would have been capable of doing, but she would still do her best to try. She smiles melancholically as she sees it all front and center, even as her parents compliment her on her diligence and cooking skills. The fact that she wasn't him 100% anymore was irrelevant from that point onwards, because as far she could tell?
They were still home.