You take one last look at yourself before heading out. Yukata? Check. Pocky for the bus? Check. A lovely singing voice for the karaoke machine you knew would be there? ... Debateable. No matter. You swipe the invitation off your table and head out.

You get a few strange looks on the bus. You grin and stick a Pocky in your mouth. For once, you're not curious about the theme of the party; Geeky finally included it in the invite. An Asian-themed party... You had to admit, you were pretty intrigued, if not excited.

Your bus arrives at the stop, and you hop off. The whole evening and its prospects have you feeling pretty cheeky, so just as the doors are closing, you call out the words that echo within many a weeaboo's heart. "Arigato, Driver-san!" As it drives away, you have to laugh at the image of the man's face as he mulls over what exactly that means.

With a little laugh in your stride, you start walking the rest of the way to the appointed place. As you make your way, you can tell exactly which ones in the rest of the downtown crowd are heading to the party too. Their motifed silk and cotton stands out among the bar-goers and late night workers like an evergreen tree in a forest of deciduous ones in winter, except the evergreen tree is covered in rhinestones and glitter. Yeah, that's an accurate analogy.

By the time you pull your head out of thoughts of bedazzled trees and pushing it back to realizing where you are, you're in front of... Not what you expected. In fact, it's...nothing like what you expected. The past parties had been held at huge mansions, banquet halls, even an entire block of a downtown area. So when you find yourself in front of a hole in the wall sushi shop wedged between a hat shop and a cafe, you actually check the invitation. Twice. Seeing that it really is the right location--or, at least, the one on the card--you open the poster plastered glass door and duck inside.

Immediately, you notice that it's a bit bigger than what you expected. That being, said, the original size you imagined wasn't exactly substantial, and the actual size isn't too much more. The next thing you notice is the amount of unmistakable sound of a party going on. Your eyes follow to the source of the music, and the presence of a hall that you either didn't notice or assumed was leading to the kitchen makes itself known. Not thinking, you head towards it. The waitress standing by it takes one look at your outfit and lets you through, tired out from doing much of that all evening.

Along the walls of the hallway are beautiful pieces of all sorts of art, from decorated plates to painting. The people and scenes all seem familiar... Looking closer, you realize... It's all fanart? You chuckle. Typical Geeky. Still, they're very nice paintings...

The music gets louder the further you go, and soon, you're at the doorway and following a small path of silk screens, also decorated with fandom images. The path opens up, and you finally see the party.

The room is much bigger than you ever thought the small shop you saw at the beginning would have. Dance Dance Revolution battles are being waged all around, and you can sometimes hear those at the karaoke machines. Servers are frantically trying to keep up with all the requests for sushi and drinks, weaving in and out of colorfullly dressed partygoers lit by beautiful paper lanterns strung across the room.

One particular partygoers catches your eye with her grin and wave from behind a table that has equal piles of empty and full plates of sushi. Brown hair styled into an orange-blossom decorated bun at the side of her head, her orange yukata's sleeve flaps around as she waves, nearly hitting her green-clad companion. You laugh and walk over, grabbing yourself a seat.

"Nice yukata!" she says, looping her arm around the tousled-haired man's again.

"Same to you," you reply. You look a bit closer. "Lilacs and lillies?" She taps her nose.

"You have no idea how much research on flower language I did for this. Orange lillies are for passion, yellow's for happiness, and lilacs are for gratitude!" She reclines slightly, resting her arm across the back of the couch behind Stahl. "Gratitude... Man, ypu guys have no clue how grateful I am for you. I mean... Five hundred chapters. You guys have been by my side so much, made me laugh so much. You've given a gift that I just can't thank you enough for." You have no words, so you lift up your glass.

"To us, and everyone here, then."

Geeky knocks her glass against yours. "I can drink to that."

~~~

Okay, this us a chapter I can't pass up roleplaying the crap out of. But really, guys... We made it to five hundred. I don't think I'll ever be able to express how grateful I am!