She walks out, revealing a small transparent plastic mask with a big fan behind it, and a long, thin battery under that fan. "So, the way that it's supposed to work is that this fits inside the snout, and it blow a stream of cool air across your face and exhales the air down and through a filter." She clips it onto the plastic frame of the fursuit head, the mask fitting loosely around Emily's nose and mouth, without significant pressure on her face. "I'm testing it to be sure that it doesn't blow any air not through the filter." After pushing gently against the fan, it starts whirring and creating a stream of air over Emily's face.

She blinks, adjusting to the new sensation. Does the stream of air blow in her eyes? And how loud is the fan?

A few gusts blow into her eyes, once in a while. The fan is relatively quiet, making a slight background hum.

She blinks when the air touches her eyes.

"Sorry, I'm not sure — is the air supposed to stay in the part that goes over my nose here?" she asks, pointing. "Or is it supposed to circulate everywhere?"

"It's supposed to circulate everywhere, but it's more important that it goes over your mouth and nose."

"Is there a way to not have little puffs going into my eyes?" she asks. "Just ... sometimes when I shift like this, there's a little puff, and I don't like the sensation."

"I can try a redesign? Ideally, the airstreams should work so they never send any puffs over your eyes like that... but I think that expanding the mask so it also covers your eyes would be the best way to protect you from that while still cooling off the rest of your face. And then you could get better, more powerful cooling without worrying about the stream getting in your eyes. You know what, I'll get the battery-free ventilation option, and you can try out how well that fits your head while I try printing out the new mask design for the active ventilation, and we can go from there."

Emily has no real idea of what any of these options entail. And she was dubious on having a forced-air system anyway.

"... sure," she agrees. "I mean, I guess it's not a big problem, but I would like it if it didn't."

"I'm getting the passive system, now." She comes back with a small block of plastic; there's a pair of plastic tubes on top of it. "The way that these tend to work is that you have these tubes that let you breathe through your nose, that are meant to go along the snout of the mask so you're breathing air directly." It also clips to the plastic frame, and the tubes end up just barely in front of Emily's nose. It feels a bit awkward and strange, certainly less stuffy than not having anything in front of her face.

She wiggles her nose, and tries taking a few breaths.

It is more stuffy, but on the other hand seems less liable to dry out her eyes.

"This is alright," she agrees. "Will this work for being sick in, though, or does that require a fan?"

"It doesn't work for being sick in, no. Designs that are battery-free and wearable when ill do exist, but they tend to become so uncomfortable and unbreathable that you basically have to take them off before the battery wears out on the ones with batteries. Also, I'm glad that you liked the passive option; there's also a version where it's designed to basically plug into your nostrils, and those work very well, but a lot of people don't like how they feel. Do you think that it might be interesting to try one like that?"

She shudders at the idea of putting something inside her nostrils.

"No, I think that would be worse than occasionally getting a blast of air in the eye," she replies.

"Ahh, I see. So... we've got the passive system covered, and now it's just to wait to try out the new active part? Printing is fast, but there's a limit to how fast it can be done. So... it'll be another 30 minutes, I think? And then I'll come back with it, and then I'll be ready to just mail you the finished design, so you can get that nice surprise factor, if you like it like that."

"A wait is fine," Emily agrees, patting her book. "And so is mailing it to me."

If it's mailed to her, that means she doesn't need to leave the apartment without a mask on possibly ever again, unless she feels like it.

She smiles.

"Sounds great to me. Just wait for the print to be done, double-check that you like how it fits, and then I'm ready to mail you the whole thing once it's done."

"Thank you," she says.

She pulls out her book, but she doesn't stop smiling.

The 30 minutes go by, and Emily gets a new mask with mini-goggles that cover her eyes and stop any puffs of air from flowing over them. She can also adjust the fan to make the flow more powerful, to cool her face down even further without worrying about any streams of air going into her eyes.

Oh. She wasn't expecting the goggles. This is perfect!

She experiments with settings, and rolls her neck and moves around, and everything feels comfortable.

She twirls in place for a moment.

"This is perfect," she tells the mask-maker. "Thank you so much!"

"And it's not even fully finished, don't forget! You're going to be so happy when this shows up at your door and you can start wearing it all day!" She smiles back at Emily.

She nods. "It's true," she agrees.

She pulls off the partially completed mask with a happy sigh, and hands it over.

After another day of waiting, a bright blue fursuit head, with colors reminiscent of a peacock, waits within a black package left outside of Emily's door. It even comes with a pair of plastic packages that fit flawlessly within the snout, letting Emily breathe easily enough that she won't have to worry about needing to take it off, or even cooling her face and stopping her from catching or spreading any potential illnesses if she were to ever get sick.

She unpacks it reverently, running her fingers along the material.

It's just in time — her rescheduled examinations are tomorrow — but she has to try it out before that.

She slips it over her head, settling it into place, and grabs her backpack from its place by the door. The elevator is fast, but it's speed is no match for her impatience as she heads down to the ground floor.

She's hung around in the library a few times now. But when she steps out of the elevator this time, there's an important difference: nobody can see her.

Or, well, they can see her, obviously. But nobody can see her face. Which means she doesn't need to think about how to hold it, or how people are going to interpret where she chooses to look. It means she can open her mouth and wiggle her tongue side-to-side, just to see how it feels, and nobody will look at her weirdly. It means that when she smiles, it's just because she wants to, and not because anyone expects her to. It's wonderful.

She has a mask and done enough studying. She wants to take a second stab at adventure. What's going on in the nearest park?

There are children climbing in trees, running on the paths, swimming in small ponds, diving in small ponds, swordfighting with foam swords, and what looks like a few teenage furries taking pictures in front of a beautiful patch of flowers.

She was already interested in the swordfighting. But on the other hand, it might be novel to have her photograph taken ...

She makes her way over to the swordfighters, and checks to see whether they seem to have any spare swords, this being a deciding factor in whether it's worth asking to participate.

There's a few foam swords sitting around on the ground. The swordfighters, a few more boys than girls, take a moment and look over at Emily as she approaches them. "Just take one", one of the boys say.