Once the group finished their meal, Jason springs out of Anthurium’s lap. Going over to the bag that the cookie’s had been pulled out of. The boys impatience about playing their new game getting the better of him, as he bounces in place looking up at it, cursing the fact it’d been put on a shelf just too tall for him to reach.

Nix crawls over to the edge of Celosia’s lap, looking at Jason’s bouncing form. “Wow Jason, and I thought I was the one who had the energy drink.” She snickers trying to climb off of her owner’s laps to figure out what this new game is, and why it’s got Jason so excited.

Jason begins looking at the instructions for a moment before frowning. “Mistress, I think this game is supposed to be played with an affini on one team, and the sophonts on the other.” The game cover looks like some sort of space marine that Nix couldn’t quite place, in front of a metal base, while vines and flowers came in from the sides.

Anthurium giggles a little. “Well, I figure you can handle playing the sophont team on your own. Pearl and Nix should be perfectly capable of playing the affini team. By the way girls, the goal of the game is for the affini to dismantle, and capture, the sophont team. The sophont team needs to study the affini and maintain a level of independence against overwhelming odds. It took me a while to be happy with adjusting this one from the base games we looked at. Right now I’d still call this a ‘beta’ of sorts, I want to add a few extra teams on the sophont side to play uniquely.”

Pearl snickers, as herself and Nix are placed down on the ground next to Jason. “Guess you’re going to be getting a taste of your own medicine today.” She playfully nudges him, while they walk into the living room as a group.

Anthurium carries the massive box, putting it down next to the coffee table, and starting to quietly set all the pieces up. A clear satisfied smirk on her face while they work. 

“Yeah, we’re gonna crush- I mean domesticate you! And this time you won’t make me run away from the game crying, right?” Nix leans into Pearl’s side, grabbing the entire book of rules for the affini forces. Which are not only significantly stronger individually with a host of special abilities, but also come at a far cheaper cost to have as part of the starting team.

“Yeah, I’m pretty sure he won’t do that again.” Pearl kisses Nix on the cheek, pulling the girl into her lap and starting to read over her shoulder. “But don’t get too ahead of yourself Nix, even if there’s a clear slant in the rules. We do have our own disadvantages, that I’m sure Jason will be able to exploit. After all, he’s been playing against affini rules for years now!”

Jason looks at the booklet about the terrans, smiling and beginning to set up his base, and starting units. “You both have a good chance to win, but I won’t go down without a struggle.”

Sola watches a little bit before scooting over to Anthurium and switching to affini. “Hey, this looks a little like a terran war game I saw when researching them. Is there a reason for that?”

Anthurium nods and cuddles up to Sola. “Oh I built it off of some war games, I just needed to figure out how to ‘affini’ it up, before getting everything together. I played a few practice games of the old one, and beyond the premise, I think it was pretty fun, I’ll be showing you the other sophont species I’ve been working on later.”

“I’m sure that doesn’t remind us of anyone in particular.” Pearl snickers, planting several kisses on Nix’s cheek. “Now let’s see, the commander options are…” She flips over to the commander pages, finding several affini who are very blatantly Sola, Celosia, and Anthurium. Each with separate bonuses that would make the different win conditions easier. 

“Oh come on, I wasn’t that bad was I?” Nix groans, looking at the Sola page. Noticing that several of her buffs involve diplomacy and avoiding combat, while Celosia’s page focuses on intel gathering, and finally Anthurium is a more hardline response. 

Anthurium grins, looking down at Nix and Pearl. “Remember girls, you only get one commander, so pick wisely!”

Jason’s side of the board is all put together. “If they get multiple commanders to choose from, I think we will need to come up with some more specialty commanders for each sophont species to make each of them a little more unique, maybe a few fun twists on the basic builds.”

“Oh don’t worry, I made three options for you as well, petal. Although I’m pretty sure what one you’re going to pick.” Anthurium pulls out three pieces that everyone in the party can recognize from a simple glance. The first is just Jason wearing some light body armor, giving him a more tactical appearance, the second is Pearl who’s piece has the dragon turned up to eleven, giving her both a tail and claws. Then finally there’s a piece that looks like Nix’s ideal form, still having a flower replacing one of her eyes. 

Turning to the page in the rule book, Jason’s piece is good for movement, giving extra spaces every turn for his pieces. Pearl’s piece adds extra damage dice to attacks, and Nix’s piece, while not giving a direct constant upgrade like the first two, has the bonus of letting the player take two turns at the beginning of the game, due to anticipating the affini. 

Jason grins while staring at the three before taking his own piece. “Why thank you Mistress, I am sure the girls will enjoy their own turns on this side of the board with such detailed pieces.”

Pearl huffs while looking at the commanders. “Nix, do you feel strongly towards any of the commanders? I could go with any of them.”

“Well I think…” Nix taps her chin, before getting a sudden grin, leaning in to whisper into Pearl’s ear. “Each affini commander is built to counter each Floret commander, Mistress Sola counters you, Mistress Celosia counters me, and Miss Anthurium counters Jason. Therefore we should pick Anthurium as our commander. It’ll be super funny to watch Jason squirm around trying to beat his own owner.” She snickers, pulling the massive Anthurium piece out of the box and putting it down on their edge of the map. 

The map itself is by far taking the most time to set up, mostly due to its three dimensional nature. The pieces obviously made to be able to be shuffled around to create a different map for every game. This time being very obviously set up to appear like the exterior of a military base, for the sake of simplicity. 

Once set up, Jason begins to move his bike units up and around cover, intending to test what kind of resistance Pearl and Nix would give him.

Nix hums, putting small circular markers around the maps, representing the vague areas of their affini. Having Pearl roll several times, and only having to place down one full affini piece as visible on the board. “There we go, with my tactical mind, and Pearl’s ability to throw rocks. You’re going down!”

Pearl nods a few times, holding their commander sheet up and pointing it over at Jason. “Given you’ve officially spotted us, we will announce that our affini commander is Anthurium Syrium, seventh bloom!” She smirks, leaning in against Nix’s side. “Meaning your units within 30 inches of the revealed piece, have to roll a four or higher, or suffer a fear response. If they do not break this with allies’ help within three turns, your pieces will be rendered imobile, and if an affini comes into three inches, docile!”

Jason frowns, grabbing a d6 for each of his 5 bikes and rolling them into his die mat, grumbling when only 2 broke the effect, his other 3 remaining feared. “Oh that is very sneaky, luckily, I have my snipers.” He moves his sniper pair into position. “If I roll any 6’s for my snipers, your affini are stunned from approaching for one turn, and I will have both target mistress!” He rolls, huffing a little as he gets a 4 and a 5. Next he moves one of his bikes to support one of the feared bikes. His infantry steadily move up before Jason ends his turn.

“Well that’s one point of damage, given your snipers are using ballistic rounds. Dealing impact damage rather than scorching, along with our leaders +1 health recovery per turn.” Nix takes their commander backing her up a few inches behind more secure cover. 

“And then we will move our pieces.” Pearl rolls several times, one more affini becoming visible on the map, and popping out next to the group of feared bikers. “Activating this unit's ability, we will be activating some nice airborne class Z xenodrugs!” 

Drawing a little cone around the area, three of the bikers who were stunned along with the one who’d arrived to help are within its radius. “This means unless your units are designated as wearing gas masks, you must roll a three or higher, increasing in difficulty each turn they spend in the radius, to not fall asleep!”

Jason quickly rolls 4d6 for his bikers, having bad luck and getting 2 2s, a 3, and a 4. “Well played, I’m having one of my bikers recover from their fear, and both my awake bikers retreat from the zone.” He moves the pair as far back as he can, switching to bringing a pair of flamers with gas masks forward. “These two should have no problems for your class Z trick my dear friends!” He puts the pair in a defensive position, knowing they need to get closer to be effective, before having his snipers take shots, getting another 5, but the other roll was a 1.

“Well then it looks like it’s time to get your cute little bikers out of dodge.” Nix plucks the sleeping units up, and has the affini near them take reduced movement in order to carry them along with it.

“And thank you for lining those two up for us Jason.” Pearl grins, as the last of the affini forces finally are revealed on the map. Having positioned themselves on the backsides of the flame units. “Now I’m going to have both come out from behind, and try to disarm your units. Are there any bonuses you have to counter that, if not it’s a baseline three or higher to attempt to inject them with one xenodrug mix of our choice.”

Jason looks over his available units, deciding to just take the roll, and letting out a groan as both flamers got a 1 and a 2. He uses the rest of his turn to bring his 2 bikers and 3 marines up, while repositioning his snipers. He manages to roll mostly 4s and 5s for his shots against the approaching affini.

Nix marks down the damage on each of the affini. Removing the weapons from the flame units, and starting to carry them away, not taking reduced movement due to only holding one at a time. “Well we’ll regroup our party outside the gates, placing all of the florets to be right here.” She taps on the point that Anthurium has been holding down.

“Then we will finally move our commander onto the field!” Pearl has the Anthurium piece walk up through the front gates. “We will activate her second and final special ability, once per game, as long as she is still above three fourths of her overall health. She can take double movement, moving vertically by unraveling her body allowing her to climb any structure.” She takes out a tape measure, making sure that the amount of movement is within the allotted amount, and having the Anthurium piece drop down in front of the snipers. “Now to take those precious snipers of yours!”

Jason looks over the info on his snipers, gritting his teeth as he lets them be taken. “Alright, I’m bringing my bikes, and infantry, to the back and taking some long range shots, giving my units a minus 1 to hit.” He rolls getting one 6, and the rest split between 3s and 4s, only getting one hit against one of the affini soldiers, but not putting any fire towards ‘Anthurium’.

“Oh is this a weak spot I detect?” Nix gets a diabolical grin, as she moves the Anthurium piece back to the rest of the affini. Rounding all of the incompacitated units up, and having the majority of the affini troupe fall back, leading the Anthurium piece standing in front of the remaining units. 

Pearl just watches as Nix makes this play, leaning back to actually check on how Jason’s doing emotionally right now. While getting a bit of payback about all the times he’d beaten them is fun, she still doesn’t wanna see him get genuinely upset about the situation. “Yeah, are you okay Jason? You could have pretty easily pushed the unit back, by using your commander bonus to have the snipers disengage fire with their flares, which have a high chance of stunning, and do slight burn damage.”

Jason groans and rubs his temples. “Look, I know, but just… come on, I know even in game neither of you would want to attack your owners. Anthurium like, hard counters me super bad on more than an in game level.” He huffs a little bit before looking back with a smirk. “However, I get it, a little payback for our previous games.”

“I’d be able to!” Nix snickers a bit, rubbing her hands together. “Okay, maybe not Mistress Sola, she’s just too nice and I wouldn’t wanna make her sad, but I could at least play fight with Mistress Celosia!” She leans in peeking over at the affini sitting and watching over them, and whispering to Jason. “I think she likes it.”

“Yeah, well you’ve always been a trouble maker Nix, but I’m firmly in Jason’s camp. I don’t think I could bring myself to even play at fighting an affini that looks like Mixtress Resin.” Pearl nods to herself, giving Jason a massive hug. 

Jason gives Pearl a hug back before returning to the game. “Point being, next time I’ll have to mix it up so you can’t have such an advantage against me. Also Nix, how about you try playing on this side of the board against Celosia controlling her own unit. I bet you would struggle so much.” He struggles to suppress a laugh at the thought. “Mix in that they will probably cheat when facing us.”

“Yeah we all know how me playing a board game against Mistress Celosia goes. Even if she got some outside help from my lovely girlfriend.” Nix looks over the board. Figuring no matter what this game is going to only last one or two more rounds. “This is a sad state of affairs though, do you wanna just surrender this round so we can have time to play one more? Maybe actually going through with having me play against both you, and one of our owners of your choice.”

“I wouldn’t mind switching spots, and working together with Nix to try and play against you, and one of our owners.” Pearl gives a thumbs up, while she goes back over to cuddle into Nix’s side. “Or I could just start distracting Nix during our turns.”

Jason laughs a little bit before nodding. “Alright, I surrender, and we should change it up. Good job you two, you got me.” He begins looking over the affini pieces, deciding how he will want to play this round. “I think I’m going to take a little more time figuring out what I want to do.”

“Then I will give you planning time!” Pearl grins, pouncing on top of Nix. Knocking both of them onto the ground with a kiss, her hands starting to trace down Nix’s sides. Watching as every little movement evokes a shiver of desperation.

Celosia breaks away from conversation with Resin, as she notices Pearl and Nix fall down on top of the plushy duplicate of herself. Snaking down to the ground, she kneels next to Jason in particular who’s cleaning up the first game. “Do you want any help, Petal? I noticed that Nix was getting a little wild during the last round, and it seems some things will always remain, in one way or another. Including Nix attempting to win through clever tricks.” She laughs to herself, eyes tracing over Nix’s prone form. “I would offer Sola, but I fear she may hinder you rather than help.”

Jason grins a bit at Celosia. “Sure, I wouldn’t mind the extra help. That, and I think you will help turn the tables just enough without going overboard on them. I may like winning, but I don’t like making my friends cry.” He shudders a little bit. “Don’t want a repeat of some of our earlier games on that front, but with you, I think we can win without it being too bad for Nix.”

“That’s actually what this game has been helping with the most, from my perspective.” Celosia sits down on the ground behind Jason, quickly picking him up, and pulling him into her lap. Starting to shuffle the building pieces around, to build a new map for the second game. “This has been pushing her to talk, and be confident in her actions. If I’m being honest she’s acting more like herself, than we’ve seen since she woke up. It has been quite a relief to Sola and I.” She starts casually petting Jason, while she flips through the different rules. Looking up her captain's abilities in particular. 

After a few more moments, Pearl pulls herself up off of the ground. Nix slowly slides back up with her, and looks over the new map that Celosia has built. This one appears to be imitating the interior of a base. 

“I guess no bike units this time… but we will take my commander please!” Nix grabs the terran instruction manual, having significantly more trouble reading it in comparison to the affini version, due to the restrictions based on the size of the map. “Mistress helppppp.” She frowns looking up at Sola, showing off the booklet, pointing out several units that she doesn’t recognize. One in particular that’s drawing the most ire due to her complete inability to grasp being the Jump Specialist. Who is only built for ship games, but she found herself getting caught up on despite that due to confusion. The rest of the units that are confusing her also have some level of obvious relation in roles to the cosmic navy specifically aboard the Free Spirit. “I don’t recognize what they do… Can you explain this to me?”

Sola begins reading through the booklet before smiling. “Well Nix, they are fictional characters, and your commander unit was given a ‘specialist’ roll like Jason’s. He has never been in the military, so what reason aside from giving him a fictional roll would there be for his commander’s roll. The Pearl commander has a bit more of a purpose chosen roll, but that did lead to you happening to have your commander getting this one. Yours is built for handling ship interiors and subsequently, I would think yours would be good on controlling a ship in a focused setting as well.”

“So… my one is like a space pirate?” Nix snickers a bit, putting her unit down in the captain's quarters, starting to intermingle the rest of the units across the ship. “That’s cool, so I’m a space pirate, Jason’s a mobile unit, and Pearl…” She looks over the units built for Pearl’s faction. “She’s good for big damage?” 

Nix is quickly passed a marker by Pearl, taking the units for her section of the booklet. Quickly marking out each of their old names, and replacing them with names she found more understandable. Her pirate Captain piece, her second mate, which despite not getting the bonuses from doing so she uses Pearl’s custom piece for. Two ‘Carpenters’ who are placed in the engine room. A single ‘boatswain’ who gets command bonuses in a group, A pair of ‘Helmsman’ units in a room with all the ship's controls. A cook unit to make sure the crew's morale is high. Then three ‘swabbies’ patrolling the halls. 

“Boom! The Heart Flower Pirates are born! If I had time I’d draw them all outfits, but I think that would take all night.” Nix flips through her pages in order to show off to the party. “We only take the amount of resources that we need, because we are trying to preserve an ancient code.” She leans in against Sola’s chest. “It’s morse code Mistress.”

Celosia’s form tightens up a bit, starting to pet Jason just that little bit more intensely. Trying to avoid the urge to lunge over the table, and scoop her floret up into her vines. “Those are wonderful changes Nixy, ones that I’m sure we will add in the next version of this game.”

“Absolutely, I’m sorry for the confusion Nix. We will have new figures and a whole new book, by the next time we get together to play. We are planning to make all three of you copies, but that will take time and testing, that now that you’ve all played together, Jason will be allowed to help me with.” Anthurium smiles and nods, taking a few pictures of Nix’s changes to the rule book. Starting to think up new rules, and skills, for this change.

Jason grins and nods, excited to begin. “Yeah, this is the first playable prototype of a game after all the work Mistress did building it from scratch. When we are done, how about we go over all the units in the game, come up with a wider variety of themes, and if you want to help, I’d love to have some art help on them all!”

"Those aren't really my kinds of art… so I don't know if it'd be any good." Nix shakes her head while Jason starts setting up his pieces. Checking the rules for the space pirate map layout. "It looks like this is a kinda time attack mode for you. I need to do several tasks around the ship to escape, and you need to capture the crew before I can." 

"That's how ya know its fiction. If an affini ships got you in its sights there's no way you're escaping anywhere except for into their vines." Pearl pokes Nix on the cheek, and gives her a kiss on the neck. 

Jason giggles a little bit as the setup is finished. “Well, there is more to art than drawing. How about this? For your command style, I want you to just write down some notes, maybe find a few examples on the overnet, and send all of them to me. Mistress and I will make custom work from there, and then we can also refine the gameplay as I won’t be restricted from playing any more.”

Nix nods, starting to move her pieces around. "Alright, I'm gonna just take my first two turns then." She has every unit split into two teams, the bridge crew because they need to hold it to end the game, and the repair crew who are going to sweep the ship. The sweep team turning out to be far more powerful than home base, due to stacking buffing units all together. 

Arriving at the interior tunnels, Nix sends in one of the carpenters. Starting to roll for repair, only getting a two, and failing the check despite not making things worse. "Damn."

Jason whispers to Celosia, before making a roll, getting a 6. “Alright, your ship shudders, you have been boarded by a team, and they are preparing for their next strike, you better find them fast, or your ship won’t last much longer Nix.”

Nix takes another roll at repairing the pipes, getting a three this time. Which is barely enough alongside the units bonuses to complete the task on the second try. “Alright, then I’ll pull my group here.” She has the carpenter come out, closing up the vent and moving her group down the hall in a circle. Once she’s out of movement, using the boatswans ability, she puts the group on overwatch. “If any unit comes into view of my group, they will fire, with a plus one to accuracy, and damage, thanks to the command buff.”

Jason rolls a 5 and checks his chart before laughing. “With this roll, we begin pumping a gas into your ship. All units without being in a sealed room, or wearing a gas mask will suffer a -2 to hit.” He then has one of the airlocks burst open with a vine piece, placing two affini on the field. “And with my affini, they will begin moving in to subdue your little cuties.” He rolls a pair of 4s for the units. “I will target one of your carpenters and your boatswan. If you roll lower than a 3, they will be restrained. When restrained you will need to roll a 4 with any of your units to free them, or a 5 with the restrained units. If you fail that, they will be injected with some Class Zs.”

Nix looks over her units, making a note of the boatswain and carpenters who are both in gas masks, while the swabbies are not. She then rolls for the overwatch damage, landing two of the shots, one from the boatswain, and one from a carpenter. Missing with the rest. “Well you’ve taken four ticks of damage on the left affini.” 

Pearl then takes the dice, rolling for the grapples. Failing on the carpenter, but managing to barely avoid the boatswain being grabbed. “And then we will move the extra carpenter back, having them start to go toward the next room for repairs. While the boatswain who was just missed, will attempt to free their comrade.” She rolls again, failing to free the carpenter. “Darn.”

Celosia hums, starting to move a few pieces in the background while Jason and Nix deal with the scuffle in the hallway. Her commander unit silently moving ever closer to the helm of the ship. 

Jason smiles and pulls back the injured affini, taking the opportunity to pull the captured carpenter back into the vine coming through the airlock. His other affini he moves back as the vine seals, bringing her out of sight of Nix’s defenders. “Alright Nix, it is your move.”

Nix looks over her remaining group, continuing the rush towards the jump room. “As long as I can get this next repair finished, I’ll be able to jump away.” She grins, moving the group into the jump room, sending the remaining carpenter to start rolling in order to do repairs to escape. “I can really see why I was given two turns at the start of the game, this map wouldn’t be possible to win at all if you didn’t.” She chuckles, rolling for repair and barely failing the roll once again. “And I should have said possible if you’re not me, stupid rocks!”

Pearl giggles, having the group in the helm of the ship move around randomly. Her piece always kept directly adjacent to Nix’s, both for the buffs the pair have together, and also because she’s having fun with making them nuzzle together. “I’m sure you can pull through, even if today proves that no matter what, you will always suffer at the hand of dice.”

Jason chuckles and rolls 3d6, smiling as he gets a 4, 5, and 6. “Well Nix, while you were working on that repair, two more pipes burst and a third looks like it is clogged with plant matter, a flower, and some roots, are even poking out as more gas fills the room. This time any units not wearing gas masks will find themselves almost touch starved, every little movement bringing a great need within them. Every time you roll below a 3, affected units will not do what you planned, and will waste their turn as they look for anything to help them.”

Nix sighs, rolling the saves for the rest of the non masked units. Only managing to not lose the turn on one of them. “Man and I thought I wasn’t playing fair last round! Mistress hasn’t even been helping you!” She giggles, gesturing up to Celosia who’s been sitting quietly, and watching over the group.

Pearl grabs the dice. “Here, I’ll roll to try and repair with our three remaining units in the jump room.” She rolls, actually succeeding on two of them, thanks to the bonus from the boatswain combining with the carpenter to boost the rolls up high enough. “There, now we’re… back to square one.” She chuckles to herself.

Jason chuckles, leaning forward a little bit. “Oh, Miss Celosia has been helping me quite a bit. I think you will be seeing the results very soon.” He moves his units around, stationing them outside the door and rolling another 5. “Well, the gas gets more intense, your units that failed now need to roll a 4 or higher, and if they fail, they will drop to the ground making all sorts of cute noises, reaching out for any contact as they can no longer keep hold on their equipment.”

“Yeah I figured it was something like that.” Nix peaks over at the helm of the ship a few times, watching as Pearl continues to quietly mess with the pair of units. “At least I only need one more, then we can focus on the helm and winning this game.”

Pearl rolls for the units again, losing the last of the non masked units to the comically high rolls required. “Well that’s them I guess.” She rolls again with both remaining units, managing to get a success on the final jump room repair. “And that’s that!”

Jason laughs a little bit. "Oh no, whatever will we do?" He rolls two 4s as his pair of heavily armored affini burst through the door, their hulking figures blocking the exit. "I hope your remaining units can stand up to this Nix, because my assault affini can grapple two terrans at a time, and if you don't out roll them, you will be injected with some nice class Zs."

Nix bites her lip, looking over the entire list of affini, and still not seeing the Celosia piece. “Honestly, I feel like those two aren’t even the biggest threat.” She rolls, and actually manages to resist being grappled on both units. “Alright, now I can activate my commanders ability, escape artist, if she’s avoided being grappled in round she gets to have the two turn buff to herself.”

Pearl playfully has the cook get sucked up into the left armor affini’s mass. “Oops, looks like we’ve only got our units left here now.” She then starts having the remaining two pieces from the jump room scuffle, start rushing away from the affini. Knowing that Jason has to prioritize actually capturing the disabled units.

Jason begins having his affini grab the disabled units, making sure to protect the terrans from any incoming attack by shifting them around. "You may be onto something Nix, who knows." He then rolls a 6, chuckling as Celosia puts gas effects in the bridge. "Oh no, a potent xenodrug gas is being pumped into the bridge, whatever will you do?"

“Nothing? I mean, my units I have there are both in masks.” Nix shrugs, having her commander rush to the controls and starts rolling to initiate the escape. Succeeding the first of the three required checks to end the round.

Quickly pivoting, and continuing to rush the hallway units back towards the bridge of the ship. Only about one turn of movement away from arriving.

“I’ll put myself in front of Nix in order to protect her!” Pearl moves her unit in front of Nix’s, providing cover and preventing attempts to grapple Nix. Firing a few shots into the affini who isn’t holding their other units.

Celosia smirks, and moves her own unit onto the bridge. "Now little ones, I can't have you risking your lives by jumping in this situation. I'm having my affini scouts charge your helmsman." She casually rolls a pair of 6s. "Oh no, looks like a swift action has removed their masks, being held like this, looks like no more helmsman as they fall asleep due to the xenodrugs."

Nix looks at the dice that Celosia is using, almost recalling seeing them somewhere once before. Maybe one of the other times she’d played with Jason? That sounded right enough, still those dice have an ominous aura to them. “We must continue the jump! The sanctity of our documentation can not be compromised!” She rolls again, getting another success on powering up the jump. 

An affini scout rushes in and grapples Pearl, Celosia rolling another 6. "Well, it looks like Pearl is in danger, and no longer in my way." She moves her commander up to Nix, before reaching across the board and brushing Nix's cheek. "So sweetie, do you want to try anything? Or are you going to surrender, or go for a roll?"

“I’m going to roll obviously!” Nix rolls against Celosia, actually getting a 5, but still failing under the 6 required to escape. “Noooooooooo…” She swoons to the side, pulling Pearl against her. “Our precious code!”

Jason gives Celosia a high five, before cuddling into her grasp.

Celosia chuckles and carries Jason around the game table, pulling Pearl and Nix into a big hug. "Well, that was really fun, did you both enjoy this round? We didn't go too hard did we?"

“Nope, it definitely feels like this game mode is a lot more rigged in the affini’s favor, but that’s just the reality of being in a ship against Affini!” Nix giggles, leaning into Celosia’s arms. Rolling around in order to effectively burrow herself into her owner's foliage. 

"Very true, but you could have used your bonus turn to have all of your units put on their gas masks." Anthurium carefully picks Jason up out of Celosia’s lap. "I'm very happy you are all having so much fun with this."

Jason cuddles into Anthurium with a big smile on his face. "Well, we are just playing games together, it is so fun to just enjoy playing like that. Also you did a really good job on the game, so we all felt like we could do things regardless of the team."

“Agreed, I was considering a realism mode, which would be far less fair, but also be a lot of fun to have when playing against Jason.” Anthurium gives him a small squeeze, while she starts to put the game back in its box. “But that’s for once I’ve fully finished designing the base, watching these two practice matches has given me a ton of ideas for additions, and balance changes.”

Nix nods a few times, yawning as she is easily pulled all the way against Celosia. Her owners form shifting to properly support every inch of her body. “Thank you so much for letting us play. It was really fun, even if Pearl goofed off the entirety of the second game.”

Pearl rolls her eyes, kissing Nix on her cheek. Starting to slowly pull away, given her partner is pretty obviously getting tired. “Hey, you and Jason are the super board game rivals. I’m just here to cuddle my girlfriend, and maybe mess with Jason during the rounds, which was far easier during the first one.”

Jason giggles, and gives Pearl a thumbs up. "What can I say, we are polar opposites when it comes to the math rocks. Also I enjoy any game with both of you. I'll make sure to message any big changes we make, so you both can come in and not get caught off guard."

“Thanks Jason, and maybe someday I’ll have decent enough luck to beat you. Without resorting to entirely valid, and clever tactics like using your owner against you.” Nix snickers to herself, getting a few pets from Celosia in response. 

Anthurium pets Jason as he lets out a long yawn, before standing up. "We should start heading home, today has been quite a bit of excitement already." She smiles at Nix. "It has been nice seeing you up and active Nix, we will see you again soon."

“Bye Miss Anthurium, bye Jason!” Nix gives a little wave, Celosia rolling her around so she can watch as her friend leaves.

“I must agree, seeing you up again has been incredibly pleasant.” Resin picks Pearl up fully out of Celosia’s lap. “But I am going to follow Anthrium’s lead, and bring Pearl home now. I’m positive your owners are biting at their roots, for more alone time with you.”

Nix goes quiet, watching all of the guests quickly, and quietly, shuffle out of the hab. Pearl being put on some of her class M’s, and Jason being entirely distracted with whispering to his owner about different modifications that they can make to the game.