Shinko giggled, “Aww! Of course you can have my autograph!” Although
she couldn’t recall if she had ever written in cursive before, she still
managed to sign the notepad before giving the items back to Cat
Slime. “Here you go! And, actually… would it be okay if I took a picture
with you?”

Crystal shook her head, smiling at seeing how Shinko was enjoying
herself. “Mostly getting acclimated. Still need to show Shinko a few
places before I set her loose on exploring. I’ve been mostly keeping
busy working at the police station. But since we’re in a small town,
that means it mostly involves watching out for certain people if they
get into trouble…” she replied, glancing back at Belial, who narrowed
their eyes in return.

Cat Slime clutched the notepad tightly with his ear-like nubs, squeaking gleefully. He gasped as Shinko asked for a picture with him, and his green eyes took on a definite star shape as he nodded enthusiastically, squeaking for the Repairman to get a camera.

The Repairman, it turned out, was one step ahead of his pet, and was busy setting up an old-looking camera on a tripod.

“All right,” he said, twisting a dial, “you have ten seconds before it takes a picture. And…” (pushing a button after a moment’s thought) “you should get ten photos from this, so do a bunch of poses!“

He noticed the tension between Crystal and Belial, and hoped he could do something to at least distract one of them for a moment. Besides, he needed something.

“You wouldn’t happen to have any meringue, would you?” he quietly asked Belial. “I kinda promised Cat Slime over there some…”

Click. Photo #1 was taken, and was whirring out into a handy little tray. The timer began ticking for another ten seconds.