Nathan chuckled after a couple seconds of processing what Alexis had said. Not caring about their friendship, the thin balance they had kept throughout the years of knowing each other, he hugged her tightly.
"Wha-!" Alexis exclaimed, taken completely by surprise by his hug. "What are you doing?!"
Ignoring her yell and not letting her go, Nathan had quickly noticed that, despite her complaint, she was not really trying to get away from him.
"Thanks, Lexis." He said calmly, his eyes shining with a feeling he had not been able to show before and that he couldn't properly explain. "I appreciate those words a lot."
Alexis took note of his strange behaviour, realizing too that that was the first time she had ever seen Nathan take the initiative in establishing physical contact with pretty much anyone, family included. The fact that it was a hug, of all things, made her feel even more shy, her natural complexion stopping her from hiding her blush-tinted cheeks and ears.
"It's nothing, you big dummy." She responded quietly, taking advantage of the situation to hug him back. It was, after all, a very rare occasion.
"Everyone, they hugged! They hugged!" A random student yelled from behind them. In their little world, they had forgotten they were in a public space. "Nathan took the initiative to hug Alexis!"
Quickly letting go, they both coughed. Not even their acting training and expertise would allow them to pretend they weren't embarrassed by the moment they shared. Fortunately, neither cared about rumours and, besides, they were mostly harmless. The first one to recover his composure was Nathan, who was naturally the calmer of the pair.
"Come on, let's get to class, Lexis!" Nathan said, grabbing Alexis' hand and pulling her forwards, towards their first class of that day.
*
"She was so damn cute today..." Nathan said while laying in his bed. The entire day he hadn't been able to properly focus on his classes because of what had happened with Alexis. Every time he tried to focus on something, her face would appear in his mind, and he would be reminded of the feeling of that one hug they shared. The way her small build fit against his body, the smell of her conditioner, her blush covered ears, the way her small hands clung to his back. "No... she's always been that cute... I just never wanted to see it."
"Aaaaah!" Nathan yelled against his pillow. "I need to distract myself."
Without a second thought, Nathan grabbed his phone, intent of drowning his thoughts in any piece of social media crap he could find. Instead, his attention was caught by a notification he hadn't seen.
"Wait... it's done!" He exclaimed, a different kind of excitement bubbling in his heart. That day he would remember as the most exciting he had ever lived... for the time being.
[New member "Substitute Shinigami" has joined!]
[New member "The Fool" has joined!]
[New member "1-Star Gourmet Hunter" has joined!]
[Substitute Shinigami: What the hell is this weird chat group? A notification suddenly appeared on my phone saying it could help me rescue Rukia, so I joined, but it didn't explain how it could help! Hey, someone explain it to me already!]
[The Fool: My circumstances are very similar... it said I would be able to solve the injustices of society. How does this chat group relate to my situation?]
[1-Star Gourmet Hunter: Haah?! How can this weird app help me find better and rarer ingredients?!]
Seeing the confusion of the new members of the Multiverse Chat Group, Nathan was able to quickly surmise that the Group hadn't given any explanation to them before inviting them to join, unlike him. This was probably because the MCG expected him, as the designated Administrator of the group, to explain the new members the ropes of how the group chat worked. Without wasting a moment, Nathan grabbed the notes he had written down on how the MCG worked and started typing a message.
[Pragmatic Admin: Hello, everyone! Welcome to the Multiverse Chat Group. If I'm being honest, I'm quite new to this whole thing, but since I did receive an explanation of how it works, I'll try to explain it as well as I can. This chat group apparently connects many universes through a weird chatting app. Its objective, as stated to me, is to aid us, the users, to achieve our goals through different missions, which will net a reward according to the our level of contribution. Also, since I'm the Administrator of the group chat, I am forced to take part in every single mission, which gives me some bonus percentage of the rewards I earn. I don't really know how the rewards are calculated, but I assume we'll learn when the time comes.]
There was a short period of silence in the chat group, probably around a minute or two, which seemed to stretch into a really awkward moment.
[The Fool: My first instinct is to deny the possibility of a simple app connecting multiple universes... but with what I've seen the past few days, I', not all that surprised.]
[1-Star Gourmet Hunter: I'm a bit iffy on the multiple universes thing myself... but Nen is quite a weird thing so it is quite possible.]
[Substitute Shinigami: I wish I could say I'm the last one with common sense in this group chat, but I'm in the same boat as the two above.]
Nathan was quite surprised about the answers given by the members of the MCG, who seemed to be taking the whole situation calmly. Since everyone seemed to be quite accommodating of the MCG, Nathan decided to continue with the introduction. He somehow felt like the people he was talking to were anything but ordinary, so he thought that introducing himself first would be for the best.
[Nathan: Well, now that that is out of the way, I would like us to introduce ourselves. I'm Nathan Holloway, student at SCAD and an up-an-coming actor.]
[Ren: Wow, so we're talking to a celebrity of sorts! What is SCAD, btw? I just googled it and nothing appeared. Oh, right! My name is Ren Amamiya, high school student from Japan.]
[Ichigo: I'm Ichigo Kurosaki, also from Japan. I'm currently serving as a Substitute Shinigami... Shinigami are sort of the one's who send the dead to the afterlife peacefully.]
[Menchi: I'm Menchi, a 1-Star Gourmet Hunter from the Six Continents, specifically from the Yorbian Continent.]
[Nathan: Well, while Japan is a country in my world, I guess Menchi confirmed the MCG's validity. What year is it in your worlds, Ichigo and Ren?]
[Ichigo: 2001]
[Ren: 2016]
And that finished confirming their doubts. Nathan was currently living in the year 2025, while the other two people who seemed to live on Earth couldn't find anything about SCAD on google, which is very easy, and they also lived in different timelines.
[Nathan: Well, I guess all we can do now is wait to see how this group chat actually works. Meanwhile, we could share information about our worlds in order to prepare for the missions.]
[As the MCG has now become active with enough members, the Missions are now also active! Since this is the first mission of the MCG, all members are required to participate. The mission starts in ten minutes.]
[Ren: I think we won't have enough time to prepare though, Nathan-san.]
[Time left: 9:59]
[Nathan: F*ck.]
[Ren: Oh, looks like the MCG has a censoring function.]
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What do you think of the members I chose? I don't think I need to share images of them, right?