Notes:

+ For yatoriweek dot tumblr dot com. The prompt was "Bound!"

+ Sequel-ish to my other fic Tail & Roof. ;D Please read that one first or parts of this may be really weird-sounding

+ Takes place after that one Shuuishu chapter where everyone goes to Capyper Land and (spoilers?) Yato tries to find real capyper and is shocked when all of them have zippers :'D

+ This is the clean version that complies with FFN's guidelines. For the original version, google pseudocitrus archive of our own and see the story by the same name.

+ Also, props to you if you know what awful pun I made for the title haha 3

Capybari

When Hiyori arrived, Yato was clinging to Yukine's arm.

"Come on, Yukine," he wailed, "just one more time. Once!"

"No way! I'm never going back to that place with you!"

"Where?" Hiyori asked, and they looked up at her.

"Capyper Land," Yukine growled.

"Capyper Laaand!" Yato wailed. "Hiyori, you'll come with me, won't you?"

"But didn't...didn't we just go?"

Yukine buried his head in his hands, a little awkwardly, since Yato was still hanging on to him.

"He wants to go again."

"I want to go agaaaain!"

"Just once!" Yato continued. "Come on! Come on! Come on!" he howled, and after the third day of him hovering over her and filling up her Twitter notifications, Hiyori finally had had enough.

"Fine! But just one more time, okay? And don't go undoing the zippers on all the park people again," Hiyori said.

"Of course!"

"You promise you won't?" Hiyori asked that weekend, nervously, as they approached the booth to buy their tickets. Yato had been fidgeting in line, making her anxious. He nodded vehemently.

"That is definitely not what I plan to do this time," he answered, and her brows furrowed. His...plan? This time?

"What do you mean, plan?" she asked, but it was too late — the booth person had taken her money, and was handing her tickets — and Yato had snatched his, and was racing for the gates.

Her heart dropped into her stomach. Oh no.

"Yato! Wait! Slow down!" she shouted, but she was too late — he had gone way ahead of her — in front of two large families who glared when she appeared to be attempting to cut past them in line. Hiyori laughed nervously and made apologetic motions and went to the back of the line, heart racing.

Please, she begged, please, please don't do anything weird —

She chanted it to him silently, fists clenched as the line inched forward. When she finally made it inside the park, she found herself only mildly relieved that she didn't see any children screaming, or anything on fire.

On the other hand, she didn't see Yato either, and she wandered around for some minutes before grimacing and searching for a high, relatively quiet place beside a fountain, where she could close her eyes and inhale in peace. It took a couple breaths before she could sort out the odor of chlorine and popcorn and cotton candy from the scent that she was searching for, and she followed it carefully, tipping her head back up whenever a breeze knocked her off course.

His scent led her to a door marked Employees Only.

No. No way. No, no, no...

The knob turned; Hiyori jumped out of the way as a capyper trundled out of the building. Along with him came a blast of air that smelled quite distinctly like Yato.

She groaned. She searched around, but it was lunchtime and all the bathroom stalls were full, and none of the park's foliage was dense enough for her liking. Finally, she snuck past the barrier of the haunted house, laid her body beneath a witch's cauldron, and leaped out of it.

She waited until she was sure no one was looking before opening the Employees Only door, glad that it wasn't locked. From there, it was a fairly simple matter to find Yato, not just because of his smell but because of the quiet sobbing that led her straight to one of the uniform rooms.

He was kneeling on the ground, facing away, shaking, burying his face into an empty costume.

"Yato," Hiyori said with relief, and frustration, and Yato looked up at her.

"Hiyori! Look what they've done!"

He stood and held up the empty costume to her, knuckles white. His face was stricken.

"They...they skinned a capyper!"

Now she wanted to weep. "How?" she asked, voice shaking.

"I don't know! I have no idea! They must have — used some kind of evil —"

"No," Hiyori cried, "how can you be this ignorant?"

"W-what...what are you...what do you..." His voice was shaking; his grip was loosening. Hiyori grabbed the costume from him before he dropped it, and then winced. The costume was heavier than she expected. And positively huge.

"Look," Hiyori said, holding up the costume by the shoulders with some effort. "Zippers. Fake fur. And in here, there's a whole fan thing to keep the head cool! No matter how you look at it, this is definitely a costume."

And when his eyes remained teary and confused, she sighed. "Maybe...maybe the real capyper...are somewhere else, you know? People just dress up like them here, so that the real capyper...can...you know. Live their lives in peace. In the wilderness."

His eyes brightened. "Oh," he said, "yeah. Yeah! That makes a lot of sense."

"Does it? I'm so glad," Hiyori sighed. Her relief became panic when she heard heavy footsteps down the corridor.

"Oh no. Hurry — hurry! Hide!" she hissed.

By the time the employee arrived at the dressing room, it was empty. "Koichi?" he called. "I thought I heard…hmm." He leaned into the room, glanced back and forth. There was a capyper foot sticking out of the costume closet and he nudged it back in with his toe, shut the closet properly, and continued on.

"I think he's gone," Yato whispered after a moment.

And then, "Hiyori, you know that no one can see us, right?"

Hiyori grimaced. "Yeah...I know."

"So we didn't really need to hide in this costume. Much less go so far as to even zip it up and —"

"I know, okay?! I just panicked and forgot! Let's just get out of here," she grumbled, and tried to raise her right arm. The costume arm stayed put, and she sighed. "Come on! Lift up your arm too!"

In her confusion Hiyori had forced them both into the huge capyper costume, their arms and legs stuffed together inside of it. The arms wouldn't move unless both of them lifted it together, and they did so, awkwardly, rapping the padded capper fist against the closet. After thumping against the closet a couple times, Hiyori groaned. She couldn't believe it.

The closet wasn't opening.

"I think we're trapped," Yato murmured.

"There's no way!"

"We are," Yato said, after pounding on the door for five more minutes didn't work.

Hiyori was panting with the effort it took to attempt to break the door down. She took a deep breath, trying to conceal her panic. It was getting really hot in here. She knew these costumes were supposed to be hot in the first place, and it didn't help that she was trapped her with someone else — with Yato. Suddenly she was quite aware of the fact that the costume was forcing their bodies fairly close together. Her chest was right up against his, each fast breath pressing it closer. She felt his chin brush against her forehead as he looked down at her, and she stopped breathing completely.

Yato swallowed. Her body was soft against his — uncomfortably so. Well, not too uncomfortably. But she was definitely going to — notice something — if this kept up.

"I'm going to try and wriggle out," he said, and for another couple minutes they struggled inside the costume as Yato tried to pull his arms out of the costume arms.

"Ouch!"

"Sorry —"

"Careful!"

Once he was free of the costume arms, he fumbled around, feeling for the costume zipper. He found it easily enough, and pulled, and they both gasped in relief as the gap in the costume's shoulder widened and let in some cool air.

"Well, what are you waiting for?" Hiyori asked. "Unzip the rest of it!"

"It's..." Yato coughed. "It's stuck."

"It's what?"

She could hear him tugging the zipper over and over, could hear that it didn't budge. Hiyori groaned and if her hands had been free she would have buried her head in her palms.

"I think," Yato whispered, "we're going to be stuck here for a while."

Something about the way he said it made her face warm.

"I...I see..."

"Is there anything you want to do? In the meantime?" he asked, and she pursed her lips.

"Not...really..."

"Really? You could at least free your arms too," he pointed out.

"Ah! Right," Hiyori agreed, flushing, but no matter how much she thrashed, she couldn't twist her shoulders enough to let her arms free.

"How did you do this earlier?!"

"Pretty easily. Maybe you're just not as flexible. Try pulling harder," he suggested, "I'll hold the sleeve down," and Hiyori closed her eyes, thought of Tono, and pulled as hard as she could, twisting her hips to get as much force as possible.

It didn't free her arm. But she did manage to upset their balance and cause them both to fall over in the closet.

Hiyori winced as she crashed on top of him. They were now in a sort of leaning position — precarious — probably on top of a bunch of crumpled costumes. Yato shifted and she heard hangers rattling outside.

In this position, she was sort of lying on top of him. She took a deep breath, glad that in the darkness he couldn't see how red her face was.

"Well," Yato said, after trying the zipper again, "we're still stuck. Hey," he said when Hiyori groaned. "It's not that bad."

"We're trapped inside a Capyper costume! What isn't bad about it?"

"Well, we're together." That made her blush again.

"And," Yato continued, "even if we can't escape, there's still a lot of things we can do, right?" He reached his arms around her, and she jumped when they settled and ran down her shoulders — the small of her back — and finally, carefully, the base of her tail, fingertips nudging into the ethereal fluff of it.

Hiyori gasped; a warmth charged up her spine and her body shook with the echo of it, costume arms shaking.

"Yato!" she hissed, and she could hear the smile in his voice when he replied.

"No?"

He withdrew, quickly, lifted his hands away from her. Far away, not touching at all. She bit her lip. For a while there was just the sound of them breathing, shifting in the costume closet.

She listened harder, as best as she could. No matter how hard she strained, she couldn't hear anyone in the hallway.

"Okay," she mumbled. "Fine."

"Huh? What did you say?"

He always made her say it.

"Touch it."

"'It?'"

"Me," Hiyori amended, and added, in a mutter, "please."

"Your wish has been heard loud and clear. I'll take the five yen later," he said, and Hiyori nodded, trusting he'd feel her chin bumping against his chest.

He lowered his hands onto her back, rubbing up and down before once more moving lower. Unlike before, however, his hands didn't return immediately to her tail — instead, they inched beneath the hem of her skirt.

He paused, fingertips curling. He hadn't really meant to do that — go beneath her skirt — but before he could overcome his own embarrassment enough to retreat, he heard her whisper against his collarbone.

"K-keep going."

Now it was his turn to blush, and be glad for the lack of light. He swallowed and continued, fingers curving around her bottom, thumbs pressing against her cord, petting, prodding into the boundary of it. He'd perfected his rhythm and the pressure, and she felt pleasure blooming across her skin. Her body tingled and rippled and shuddered all over like a puddle in the rain. Her muscles stiffened — thighs tensing, shoving against him — he felt her body arch against him.

She struggled to keep breathing, sipping air sharply through her lips and exhaling, as quietly as possible, through her nose. Even in the dark, he could tell she was trying to keep quiet.

"No one can hear you," he reminded her, "even if they were actually here," and she huffed. He felt her turn her face away, and pressed his mouth against her ear. His next words made the hairs rise on her neck, made her spine shiver.

"Even if it's me you're worried about…well, I'd love to hear you." He laughed. "Especially if you said something like 'Yato-sama!'"

She remained quiet. Well, he was just teasing her — he didn't really expect her to say anything — but then she turned back toward him, leaned up, aligning her body with his.

"Is that so?" she murmured. "Yato-sama?"

It was dark, but he still blinked at her in shock. Her voice had been so low — had been so sleek. In an instant it had wrapped around him and made his throat catch. "U-um —"

"Um," he repeated when he felt her inching higher, struggling against the costume legs. The costume arms lifted, gripped at the other costumes behind them to steady her. Her mouth was searching for his — he felt her lips graze his scarf — the sensitive area of skin beneath his chin — his cheek. He raised one hand away from her and placed it on her face, his thumb caressing her until it found her moist mouth. He hooked the corner of it, opened it. Her tongue flicked against it, and he pulled her toward him, pressing his open mouth to hers. They kissed, deep and messy without the guidance of light, his tongue lapping against hers, her teeth, her lips. They kissed for just as long as her breath would allow and when she pulled away she was gasping loudly, her worries of being overheard gone.

She fought to catch her breath. The smell of him was filling their narrow quarters — intoxicating — her favorite smell, a smell that made her head light and fuzzy, a smell as comfortable and alluring as her own clean bed. She wanted to relax, wrap herself up all around him. Her fingers loosened and clenched over and over the insides of the capyper fists.

He felt her struggling against the costume to get closer to him, pawing uselessly, and he moved his hands beneath her skirt again and tugged her against him, setting her weight against the tension between his legs. With her limited motion she couldn't do much, but it didn't matter — he could move quite a bit. He reached down toward her again.

:::

Afterward, her head was hazy, and it felt like it took forever for the staticky fog to roll out from her brain, though she understood later that it might have just been a minute or two. As her head cleared all she heard was her own panting, Yato's panting. And then, she heard a crash as the closet door was forced open.

Light poured into the gap in the costume, burned her eyes with white. Hiyori screamed, and vanished, and when she sat up she banged her head against the witch's cauldron.

:::

"Hey, did you hear that Capyper Land is looking for more part-timers?" Yama-chan asked the next day during their lunch break. "And for the summer too!"

"What, really? I thought all those positions were already taken!" Ami-chan said in surprise, and Yama's eyes glittered.

"They were! But there were a bunch of openings all of a sudden. Do you want to try for an interview?"

"Of course! I bet it would be fun!"

"Right? I thought so too! Hiyori, how about you?"

"No thanks," Hiyori muttered, lifting her drink to her face to hide her blush. She'd be happy if she never saw a capyper costume again, probably, and had told Yato as much when he had suggested buying one. Her head still hurt from hitting the cauldron.

"Did Capyper Land say why they had so many openings? Do they have a new attraction or something?" Ami-chan asked, and Yama-chan smiled.

"Well, apparently a bunch of them suddenly quit. They said…" Yama-chan cleared her throat, lowered her voice. "Well, apparently parts of the amusement park are haunted."

"Haunted?"

"Yup! For example, this weekend, some of the employees heard something really strange coming out of a closet, like this thumping noise, and when they opened it they heard a girl shriek — but there was nothing in the closet but capyper costumes!"

Hiyori spat out her drink.