Strive to Be the (King of Fighters) !

Job:

It was a dark and stormy night.  Leah was lying awake in bed, reading a ghost story, when Hero Yamamoto-

Just kidding.  Let me start over, you can un-cue (is that a word?) the scary music now.

The sun shone brightly into her eyes even as the girl yanked her hat down even further to separate the burning star from her irises.  Gods, what's even the point of this thing if it won't block the light? she thought irritably before snatching the stupid baseball cap off her frizzled red hair and tossing it over her shoulder.  Even though the thing was made of cloth and the mage expected there to be grass growing on the earth behind her, (probably vibrant green, too, considering this was the one of the only well taken care of parks here on the Phoenix Isles), she still waited for the soft thump of the article hitting the ground.  The fact that there was none should have cued the girl to get the hell away as soon as possible, to put it frankly, before turning around or trying to do any neat detective stuff that she had dreamed about as a kid.  

Unfortunately for Leah, however, she didn't pick up on these things that quickly unless it was a life and death sort of situation.  So the girl turned around and met face to face with a little girl wearing a bright yellow dress like the center of a daisy.  What only made it worse was the fact that she had red hair and green eyes, all so violently vivid that each hue competed for an onlooker's attention.  Was this how I looked as a little girl? she wondered with a slight cringe, but the female pasted on a smile anyways as she had noticed that the child held her cap in two hands.  "Hello there," she greeted with the same smile that didn't reach her eyes.  Thankfully, the kid didn't seem to notice and was instead gaping at her.  That wasn't much more reassuring than say, an abrupt accusation of how fake her expression was, but maybe she could say it was a little bit better as long as the redhead managed to get away without any further flummery.

Of course that wasn't what happened.

"Mom!  It's a mage from Golden Phoenix!  Moooom!"  The emerald eyed mage couldn't resist pressing her lips together tightly as she squeezed out another smile at the little girl before she jumped up from the park bench and waved swiftly to the kid.  "Yes, it's... it's a mage from Golden Phoenix?" she managed to choke out before quickly escaping with a Shunpo. Not any more, though, she finished inside her head from a safe distance of several meters away and hiding behind a tree in the most obvious way.  So obvious, that hopefully what with being caught up in her excitement at seeing a mage (but really, why was the child hyped about that anyways?  This was basically the home of everyone from Golden Phoenix), the little redhead wouldn't notice Leah.  And lo and behold, the stars had aligned and the female's luck was good for once in a thread (wait what?) and the player wasn't torturing her favorite redheaded mage (WAIT WHAT?) and she stopped breaking the fourth wall as Leah went unnoticed by the youngster and her mother, who soon appeared with a frazzled expression on her face.

"Leah, don't go bothering the mages, they're busy people," she heard before the young woman did a double take and almost fell to the ground spluttering.  Wait, what the hell??  This kid was named Leah too?  Without another second of thought, she leaped out from behind the tree and tried to jump magnificently to land in the middle of the park trail.  Of course, the stars were finished aligning by now and instead of having a grand and awe inspiring entrance, the attempt fell flat as she also fell flat on her face in the dirt of the path.  Instead of making a fuss, she hoped for the best and jumped to her feet, dusting off her clothing quickly before smiling at the two strangers and greeting them with a quick, "I'm not busy right now, but I'm sorry for disappearing on you!" she directed the last part of that statement towards the child.  "My name actually happens to be Leah as well; I'm glad that you're excited about magic..." the mage trailed off uncertainly when she realized that she actually had basically no experience with interaction with real people outside of her guild and what was necessary for work.  "And if you, uh, work hard, then you can be great someday, I'm sure," she finished gently before poofing away with embarrassment.  Crouched panting behind a tree with the effort of being social, the redhead moaned slightly at her incompetence.  Hopefully nobody I know sees me like this, she could only think.

822/10,000 Words.