Many hours had passed since the bottle of champagne was popped, the confetti was thrown, and cheerful voices counted down to the dawn of a new year with thrilled applause and excited, wailing voices.
At the center of all of the commotion, two taurs shared a happy, warm embrace, clinking their wine flutes together and letting out a quiet sigh of relief, one that was lost to the sounds of the party around them, but in their tight confinement, the message behind it with immovable.
It was the start of a new year, a truly new year, and for the first time in the entire lives, Ty and Emily could look to the future and embrace all of the peace that the world had to offer.
A drink into the evening, worries and fears started to subside.
Two drinks in, and the party was just a formality.
By the fifth drink, all thoughts of the agency were gone, and Ty was drunkenly squeezing his sister in his arms, slumping gently against her and watching as the party started to clear out just a little bit, with alcohol and restlessness getting the better of everyone who was welcoming baby new year into their homes.
There was no painful hangover as the friendly, golden beams of the sun started to dance on Ty, tickling his cheek with all of the warmth and gentleness of a mother's caress. The room wasn't spinning, his body wasn't tense, and though he'd known for a while now that he and his sister were free from the agency...for some reason, it didn't set in until that first day of the new calendar year, when he woke up against Emily's side, the extra set of tauric legs from his body gently coiled around her lower back. It was a loving embrace, but a subtle one, as well; even as Ty stirred from the beckoning of Mother Nature, Emily was fast asleep.
It's really over, Ty thought, as he looked around the house that he and Emily had shared so many nights in. Among them were nights where both siblings were covered in the blood of both their enemies, and each other...they'd been dreadful to get out of the carpet, and yet, in the here and now, the only stains were from spilled liquor bottles, from the paws of careless guests. There were no weapons laying out in the open, no broken furniture, no implements used for training...there were just neutral colored couches, a TV, a coffee table, and a pair of taur siblings resting in the midst of all the playful chaos of the night before.
That was the kind of chaos that Ty could get used to.
"They really made a mess of the place," Ty whispered, cautious not to wake his sleeping sister. The bright orange of her fur clashed with the long, flowing locks and tresses of golden blonde, and as they fell around her face, and her eyes started to peek open just the slightest bit, that same contrast made the irises of her eyes shine as brilliantly as emeralds in the summer sun. They were so bright and full of life, even after a somewhat restless sleep, that Ty could see the same thing in Emily that he felt in himself.
She realized that they were truly free from the Agency as well, and just for that, five hours of poor sleep with a restful mind was better than double the amount, with a mind that couldn't relax.
"N-nothing we can't handle," Emily suggested, as she looked up at her brother with a dreamy, sleepy smile. She reached up with a delicate paw and ruffled the headfur between his ears, drawing a quiet giggle out of her brother. His eyes, nearly as bright of an emerald green as her own, met with hers as she relaxed against him, more than content to spend the entire holiday with him in the warm, cozy clutches of his hind legs. "We've had much worse than this before."
"But we'll never have to again," Ty reminded her, wincing one of his eyes shut as his sister decided to be a bit of a punk, rubbing a noogie into his headfur with her paw. "And that's what made this party so special for me..."
The sun was fully overhead of the household by the time the pair of sibling foxtaurs finally tried to move, but there was something so cozy about resting with each other on the carpet that they found it a task as difficult as any mission they'd ever had to complete before. If not for the heavy rumbling in Ty's tummy, they might have literally spent the entire day there...but Emily knew what an appetite her brother could have, and the moment she felt his fangs playfully nibbling at her shoulder, she knew it was high time to drag him into the kitchen. "All right, all right!" Emily protested, her long, flowing hair bouncing as she giggled from the ticklish sensation of her brother's pestering.
Ty refused to let up so easily. "If you're serious about getting away, you'd better have some food in mind!" he ordered, and as much as she regretted leaving his warmth, Emily did finally start to get up off of the floor, shrugging her brother's hind legs from her back as the female foxtaur rolled her eyes at her brother's antics, and his appetite. "And not just a sandwich again!"
There had always been an unspoken playfulness between the siblings, but it was one that they couldn't truly embrace or expand upon during their time in the Agency. Now that they were moving forward with their lives, Ty was working hard to get the right training to become a construction worker, and Emily, for the moment, was content to relax at home and keep her body in fantastic shape, and given the amount of wealth they'd come across for the deeds that they'd committed, she'd have that luxury for quite some time.
She just didn't have the luxury of the grey foxtaur with the white underbelly leaving her alone as she rummaged through the fridge. Even then, Ty was nibbling playfully at her wrist, until Emily gave him a tiny shove toward the table. "Y'know, I'm not inclined to make us anything if you're gonna be that much of a pain in the butt," Emily pointed out. "I could just let you starve..."
Ty worried that she might be serious, but as he started to slink away to the table, Emily turned to give him a tiny wink. She was already holding some leftovers in her paws, but meat and potatoes was a quick way to almost any man's heart, and an even quicker way to appease his stomach. Standing up on her hind legs, Emily used her two front legs to grab a container of juice from the fridge, and a pair of glasses to go with it, saving herself the trouble of making a second trip across the somewhat lengthy kitchen.
"You really had me worried that I was gonna have to go to the drive-thru," Ty admitted, letting out a rumble of content as Emily poured him a glass of juice. Hungover, he was not, but he was definitely a bit dehydrated from the holiday party, and a tall, fresh glass of orange juice was just what he needed to feel revitalized.
Emily scoffed at the thought as she poured herself a glass of juice, and proceeded to put the rest back in the fridge. "A drive-thru on New Year's Day? Good luck finding one that's open!" she pointed out, as she waited by the microwave for the leftovers to cook. It wasn't the best breakfast, necessarily, and not the most well prepared, but it was a good meal the first time it was made, and somehow, Emily had a feeling that Ty would still be able to taste the love. Even in the weeks leading up to this moment, there had been more of a bounce in his step, and a more relaxed personality about her brother that she couldn't possibly ignore...and it made her happy to see it.
"I'm sure there's at least one or two..."
"Mickey D's, maybe, but is that really what you want after a night of partying and booze?"
Ty snickered as he took another sip of his juice. "That's all it takes to soak up the alcohol, right?"
"Yeah," Emily replied, "And then you spend the rest of the day feeling horrible for another reason."
The siblings shared a moment of laughter at the thought of actually going out to get fast food on a day like the one they were sharing, especially when they had a kitchen full of tasty food, and plenty of money to go buy something better, if they really wanted to. Now that they didn't have to be at the very peak of their physical condition all the time, their diets had slumped just a little bit, but the regimen from the agency hadn't faded completely: both Emily and Ty tried to stay on top of daily drills, wanting to keep the rather shapely and powerful figures that they'd gained. The beauty of it all was that now, they'd be doing it for themselves, and just because of that, for the first time, all of the training felt so very right to the foxtaur siblings.
It felt almost as great as the sensation of warm, reheated turkey touching Ty's taste buds as he took another bite of the quickly made leftovers, giving him just that much more satisfaction on a day when he felt like he might be a bit of a hedonist, and yet, he felt no shame for it.
"...Let's go eat in the living room," Ty suddenly said, right as Emily was sitting down with her own plate of food.
She tilted her head at her brother. "Yeah...?"
"Why not?" Ty asked. "Not like we have any parents to tell us that we can't...and I hear that new series, 'The Stalking Dead' is having a marathon today with a special reveal at the end of the last episode! We're not gonna want to miss that!"
Emily rolled her eyes at her brother once again. "That's literally over ten hours away, Ty..."
"Sure it is...but do you feel like going out and being sociable today?"
"Not a damn bit," Emily quickly replied, her voice breaking into a playful giggle. "But I call the blankets!"
Ty was too busy putting another delicate, tasty piece of turkey into his maw when Emily spoke, so it was no surprise that the female foxtaur was able to beat him back into the living room, right to the large, comfy couch that acted as a centerpiece for the whole area. She dove in without a care in the world, and only by luck did all of the food stay on her plate, and all of the juice stay in her glass. She weaseled her body under the thick, plush black comforter that decorated the couch and huddled up in it, keeping it around both her hind legs and her front legs before raising her arms in victory.
"Pfft... like I care," Ty groaned, trying to hide his disappointment in not getting to share the warmth, but as he trudged into the living room, barely able to hide his disappointment, he saw that Emily left just enough blanket to her side for him to share it with her, and she patted the couch, smiling invitingly at her sibling while she turned the wall-mounted TV on.
"We both know you do, Ty...now shut up and snuggle me."
Snickering just a little bit and feeling the lightest of a flush in his cheeks, the grey and white foxtaur made his way to the couch and set his plate on the seat next to him before snaking under the covers and slipping an arm around Emily, taking a solace and comfort in her warmth that he couldn't find anywhere else in the world. His food was getting cold by the time he realized again that he still had it, and the show was well into the third episode straight of running before Emily remembered she had any food at all.
It wasn't the way most people would spend a holiday. Lots of people would say that it was far from perfect, with leftover food, cheap juice, and a messy living room that they would have to take care of later...but those people had to return to the burden of lives that they didn't truly wish to follow, and for the first time in their lives, Ty and Emily didn't. They could get to the mess when they wanted to. They could eat again when they wanted to...and they never had to answer to the Agency ever again.
They had each other, and a bright, wide open future ahead of them...and just for that, it was the perfect way to spend a holiday.
Tyvulpine!
