"Hmm, this isn't gonna work..."
With a petulant sigh, the brunette slowly stood up, dusting a few of the more noticeable clumps of dirt off of her knees and skirt. The resulting appearance was still unabashedly scrappy, what with her noticeably blackened knees and the odd smudge of dirt running squarely down her nose, but there was no mistaking the cheery glow in her eyes as she wiped a few residual beads of sweat off of her forehead.
"Aw, is the sun already setting?" Glancing at her handiwork out of the corner of one eye, Ayano's words did indeed ring true; the shadows cast by the building behind which she stood, along with the orange glow illuminating her surroundings could only mean one thing: Curfew was approaching.
Even if she didn't have to be back in her dorm by 10 PM, Ayano was quickly realizing that without the sun's assistance at her back, there wasn't much she could do. Although she had only noticed the sky's darkening moments prior, individual shapes were becoming more and more difficult to distinguish by the second. With her defeat admitted, Ayano had no choice but to begin packing up her supplies.
The sound of footsteps causes her to pause, about halfway through her cleanup, and she raises her head. After carefully dropping her shovel into her supply bucket, Ayano slowly stands up, a small paper package still idly held in her hands. In an equally slow motion, she turns to face the source of the footsteps, taking care to hide the package behind her back as she moves. The resulting effect, augmented by her oddly crooked posture, may as well be the equivalent of holding up a neon sign saying, "I'm suspicious!" Apparently oblivious to (or just uncaring of) her thoroughly unnatural appearance, Ayano carefully adjusted her oversized scarf with one hand as she bent her body at an even stranger angle.
Was she trying to hide the bucket behind her legs and scarf? Or maybe she was just trying to look even more shady. If it was the latter, she was passing with full marks.
Although her posture was only becoming more and more lopsided as she tilted her head and craned her neck to get a better look at her fellow late-evening skulker, the tone of Ayano's voice remained fairly calm as her eyes scanned their way across the darkening expanse.