WISH Broadcasting Network!| Welcome to My Hero Academia RPG. We hope you enjoy your visit. You're currently viewing our forum as a guest. This means you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use. If you join our community, you'll be able to access member-only sections, and use many member-only features such as customizing your profile, sending personal messages, and voting in polls. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free. If you are seeking help, come into our Discord! https://discord.gg/CrJPdtj |
- Pages:
- 1
- 2
| (SL) Cyber Delights and Dimmed Lights; Gale Prism & Karakuri Shiori | |||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tweet Topic Started: Aug 27 2016, 12:19 AM (1,085 Views) | |||||||||||||||
| ZetaAzuel | Aug 27 2016, 12:19 AM Post #1 | ||||||||||||||
![]()
|
Usually sleep was something that came to Gale naturally. Long nights of working on gadgets and machinery would usually have him simply face first on a desk and in a pool of drool. He would have dreams of grandeur and success in both the realms of love and in the industry of technology. Yet as Gale laid on the bed facing the ceiling sleep had eluded him like the many girls he would try to talk to in his life. It was strange, he was exhausted and yet no matter how hard he would close his eyes, no matter how he would bury himself in his hotel sheets, no matter how he tossed and turned in his bed sleep wouldn't settle into his mind. Part of him was happy that he hadn't gone to sleep. He was always a dreamer, he would write down his dreams in a notebook, heck he had even become rather good at knowing when he was in a dream and would enjoy lucid dreaming all the time. But he was afraid that he wouldn't dream that night, not after the horrifying bloodbath he had witnessed earlier in that day. It was startling enough having to watch such a cute young woman shoot a mans guts onto the floor and then slice open a mans eyes and then eviscerate their throats. If he were to dream something like that it would be surreal... magnified... perhaps even more terrorizing than the real experience. His eyes rolled over to the clock, he had been watching the hours pass by as he found no sleep that night. 3:00 4:00 5:00 6:00 He gave up, figuring that if exhaustion was going to make him pass out it was going to have to wait until the next night. He sighed as he pushed himself out of bed, rubbing against his defined cheek. It burned as he touched it again and yet he still rubbed it. That psycho had stolen away his first real kiss... and the look she gave doing it only burned the moment into his memory evermore. He had been rubbing, scratching, and washing his cheek ever since and it was starting to wear on his skin as a rash had formed on his pale white skin. He walked into the hotel bathroom, washing his face in an attempt to rid himself of the sleep deprivation. He still had a day left in the country, he ought to enjoy himself. Try and just drown out the horrible things that happened last night and make himself forget about it. If he did manage to forget about it would be best for everyone. He wouldn't have to worry about some woman peeling off a facemask and stabbing him in the back... or in the front. He pulled out his phone and googled up some hots spots in the are. He felt like he would be safer if he were in the city where everyone could see what was going on. That he couldn't be kidnapped and taken to some hideout in the countryside and executed. Akihabara seemed like a nice enough place to go. A highly populated place full of stores catered to otaku culture. Gale himself wasn't a huge fan of anime but he certainly had a few favorites. He remembered watching some fun mecha shows when he was a young boy. Nothing as quite as enthralling as watching three robots combine in different ways to make colorful awesome super robots. Of course his tastes had changed as he grew up and had found that he adored romantic comedies. Especially ones that involved harem situations. He shuffled through his wardrobe to something that didn't smell like blood and death. A plain blue T-shirt and jeans would suffice for the day. He held his head as he shuffled his feet out of his hotel and off to the streets. The ride to Akihabara wasn't long but Gale still found himself exhausted from the small trip as he began to walk through the streets. Rubbing his cheek on reflex once again he winced as the burning sensation warned him to let go of the trauma and yet he still irritated it. His eyes were saggy despite moving around and noticing the crowds that were going in and out of stores. It was usually at his point where he would try and pick out a few girls from the crowd and charm them. Yet his inability to speak the language fluently kept him from initiating a conversation... plus after his run in with that psycho he felt a hesitation in his heart that he hadn't experienced before. It tore at his very being, taking away an activity that he had enjoyed for years now, flirting and talking ith girls was never a problem before. Yet after one bad night and one tainted kiss he found the act almost foreign and hostile. Girls faces weren't as inviting as they used to be, and his usual gutsy romantic tongue had coiled in the back of his throat nd kept him silent. It was all too much for the poor Englishman to bear. Wasting opportunity after opportunity to talk to someone rended his chest as he stumbled through the crowds. Wandering to an alleyway to catch his breath. This trip had gone from an exciting technological venture into a nightmare that would likely affect his being for days to come. Maybe longer if he couldn't actually understand why he couldn't overcome this annoyance. His attention was taken as he saw what looked like a young japanse woman sifting through garbage. a pity, women should'e have to trawl through garbage for any reason. He looked around, the alleyway was empty aside from the two and people were passing by without much notice to him or the woman who was digging through the trash. His spine shivered as he felt as though he was just in a similar situation. Yet while his mind said no, his heart was saying yes. A conflict on intrest that kept the boy locked in place rather than fleeing or approaching. His eyes then spied on something rather interesting, the girl's arm was cybernetic. And from what he could discern it was of a decent quality too. Though it would take a closer look to get a better sense of detail for the work. Intrest overcoming fear made him take a step toward the girl, his mouth opening but once again no words coming out. He knew what he wanted to say, he knew he could amn well say it! It wasn't like his tounge had transformed into something he didn't know how to use. Yet despite it all he just couldn't speak. He grunted, feeling like a foolish animal as he wondered how to comunicate with the girl. Luckily his answer was in his pocket. He pulled out his phone and began typing. He dind't know japansese but his phone could do a decent translation job. He took another hesitant step toward the girl, he had to be confident, he had to be sure of himself. He had to convince himself that the crazy girl he met last night was just one shark in the school of beautiful fish. Tapping the young woman's shoulder he presented his phone the words on the dimly lit screen liiuminting in her face if she turned. "Morning, I couldn't help but notice the fine piece of work that was on a fine piece of work. Did you make that cybernetic arm yourself because it looks like it's well crafted and maintained. Truly a feat that matches both your beauty and intellegence. Surley you don't need to spoil such a pretty face and a pretty arm by sifting through garbage no?" Edited by ZetaAzuel, Aug 27 2016, 04:11 AM.
|
||||||||||||||
![]() |
|
||||||||||||||
| Tenka Mikazuchi | Aug 27 2016, 05:03 AM Post #2 | ||||||||||||||
![]()
|
While there was a distinct flavour of freedom to life on your own that was still exciting and new to Shiori, life without adults with money to take care of you had it's downsides too. For one, things didn't exactly come for free in a big city like Tokyo unless you got creative. But in the mecca of electronics and crazy fandoms an enterprising young woman could make due if she tried. This very need was in fact what had driven Shiori to dig through the dumpster in an alleyway behind a rather large electronics chain. Big companies were fast and loose with warranties and shipping broken items back was often more expensive then just sending a new product out to the store to replace it. It wasn't glamorous by any means, to be searching through a dumpster. But she needed the parts and well... She COULD go sell another pair of used underwear to that creepy place dealing in real school girl worn clothes that was a few blocks from here... They paid well but it was probably best not to think to much about where that used underwear went. Besides, she only really needed money to buy food, she couldn't get enough money to buy the parts she needed by that method to begin with. So there was this option, see what the big retail stores threw out with the trash. Sure the employees would take most of the stuff that still sort of worked, but Shiori had found that she had a way with machines. Maybe it was because a piece of her WAS one. Maybe it was that the necessity of maintaining that piece had forced her to learn or maybe it was just that machines were just far less complicated the humans. Your toaster might break, but it wasn't gonna betray you and slap you in the face because it was in a foul mood either. Machines in contrast were simple and straight forward. She wasn't looking for the stuff that still worked no she was after the parts that came from broken things. Parts were literally the best well.. part of a dumpster hunt like this. Taking broken pieces and putting them together into something new, something that functioned of a sort. Well that's kind of a metaphor what she herself was wasn't it? something broken fixed up with parts into something that could at least emulate the function of what was expected of it. She wasn't pretty, nor were the things she made, but they all worked and maybe that made them just a little bit more precious to her. She was digging through the stacks of battered cardboard and the remains of employees lunches and plastic coffee cups, digging for the treasures literally hidden beneath the trash. A glimmer raced across her eyes as she tiptoed up to get a better look inside. Almost... just a bit more... One small hop and she was hanging halfway into the dumpster but she emerged with her prize. An electronic heating plate with a cut cord that was missing the plastic buttons on the front. But the metal casing was good and the heating plate itself didn't seem damaged. That might come in handy! She dropped to the floor and got her head out of the dumpster. There were already a bunch of other broken down appliances and a few damaged and box worn pieces of merchandise piled up in the nearby shopping cart she was using to take along all this stuff. But the spoils of her dumpster dive weren't the only things in this particular ally. She hadn't noticed the guy sharing the alley space with her before. His clothes were to nice for him to be here hunting for trash himself so what was this foreigner doing here? The answer it seemed didn't take long. The Japanese that his cellphone displayed wasn't the most accurate or coherent message she ever saw but she got the gist of it. More surprising though was the fact that he had presented her with his phone to read his message Normally it was Shiori herself to start a conversation in that manner. She looked him over briefly, weighing how much of the actual flirtatious seeming nature of his message was his own inflection and how much of it was the poorly translated text. She decided that at least some of that flattery was his own doing, not even a dodgy translation program would make it THAT apparent. For a moment she didn't know how to respond to that. She wasn't all that pretty. She was tall and chubby and in the words of the last foreigner she met an amazonian beast as she recalled. The sensation of being flattered on her looks was not entirely new but at least this person didn't seem like he had the physical power to use some flattery to soften her up and then take advantage of the situation. Being earnestly complimented was ... new and a little embarrassing. It was an emotion she wasn't very familiar with and one she did not know how to respond too. She twirled a lock of her hair around her finger while hiding the broken appliance she had fished out of the dumpster. She suddenly felt keenly aware of the fact that she had been staring at the screen of his phone and by extension him for a while now. She thought to herself that her eyes were usually the the first thing to put people off and so she averted her eyes with a slight rosy blush colouring her pale cheeks. She didn't know what to do with this desire to make a good impression on someone she barely knew but she did understand that this was not a very flattering situation to be found in. She opened her mouth but words never made it out. After a second she put her lips back together and let the broken cooking plate sip through her hands as casually as she could, lowering it to the ground by the broken cord and then pushing it back away from her with her foot with as much subtlety as one could present in doing something such as that in plain view of another. She realised with a small start that she should respond at the very least, the whole moment had taken her by enough surprise to momentarily stun her. As her wits found her again she pulled her own phone out of her pocket and turn the on screen keyboard to English. He looked like a foreigner she reason, and with his Japanese text as poor as it was and seeing as how the rest of the items on his screen had been in English she was fairly sure that would suit him better. She held the screen out towards him, not daring to look him in the eye and keeping her eyes trained on the ground in embarrassment as her cheeks slowly started to turn the shade of bright ripe tomatoes.
Edited by Tenka Mikazuchi, Aug 27 2016, 05:42 AM.
|
||||||||||||||
![]() |
|
||||||||||||||
| ZetaAzuel | Aug 27 2016, 05:53 PM Post #3 | ||||||||||||||
![]()
|
Gale smirked slightly as the young lady blushed, often an early sign of success even if it was fleeting. She began to write out something on her own phone just as he had. The fact that she didn't simply reply in what he assumed would be some form of Japanese surprised him but then again if he had communicated the fact that he couldn't understand it then he sure as heck wouldn't know why she'd do it either. His eyes squinted as he read the message that the girl left which was much to his surprise in English. That would make his lines much easier to say and would come out clear with their purposeful meaning without getting muddled by the translation process. He cleared his throat as his mind began to race with the perfect response for such an adorable flustered young woman. "Well call it a passion, call it a necessity, call it an instinct. But I believe that all women should know that they're beautiful in their own unique way. After all, flowers can grow in mountains, in deserts, in plains, in the sea, and in the city." He paused as he made a wink toward the girl, flashing his eyes to make them a brilliant blue. A contrast to his usual clementine color, though it was as usual a means to show off rather than to actually scan the young ladies quirk. "So why not find beauty in women who may traverse in dark areas? Beauties liiiiauuuu..." His tongue felt numb as he was about to deliver the hook that would either get him slapped or adored. He calmly held his hand to his mouth as if to cover up for the sloppy delivery. "Pardon me... my mouth must be a bit dry." He tried to recover from the stumbled speech before attempting it again. "As I was saying, though, whether sunlight, moonlight, starlight or shade, there's always means to find something lovely in a lady. And I can clearly see all the things that make you one very loooouuuugh..." An awkward silence filled the already stagnant and garbage scented air. "Haha... well I guess the Lidocaine hasn't worn off yet..." Despite the rather soft hearted laugh Gale's expression visibly soured into something alike distress and worry. His hand had reached for the sore rash on his right cheek. It burned as he rubbed it once more but his mind was racing on the most pressing matters like why he couldn' finish a damn statement without his tongue giving out? Was he losing his charm!? The very essence that made him who he was!? Perhaps a less romantic approach would make his body get back to its normal state. "Well point being that no matter where a lady is they deserve to be praised for being beautiful in their own unique way." His finger pointed to Shiori's cybernetic arm. "For example, some people might say that having a prosthetic limb is a limiting thing. Something that can't carry the warmth or tender touch of a real human arm. Of course, in some ways they're right but just like humans can create flesh, we can create cybernetics that keeps us functioning as if we still have human arms. And we wear them well, and you, in particular, look like you've taken care to maintain it and keep it functioning. Because of that, it's fair to say that with your beauuuuuuu..." He wanted to punch himself! How hard was it for his tongue to just make out the word beauty!? "Excuse me... just a moment!" He had said it so many times before why was it so hard now!? He turned away in frustration for a moment. "Beauty, beauty, beauty, beauty, beauty..." he could say it. He could say it just fine and he felt normal. So then why... why the hell was it so hard to say now? No... no, it couldn't be. The exhaustion, the fact his body was being hesitant, his tongue dying in the mid of a romantic speech. All of this was happening because of the incident form the previous night. Damnit it all! Was it that kiss!? Did that girl have more powers than he had checked? No, he didn't spot anything... so then... was his body just acting wierd because of some strange psychological impact!? No, he wouldn't believe it! He had trained years, taking slaps to the face, kicks to the groin, sodas to his eyes, he was not going to let one bad night ruin who he was! A romantic with words that could swoon an effeminate Genghis Khan. He turned to face Shiori, he'd have to use her for a test. A shame too, he didn't want to have to make her feel like he was objectifying her but he just had to know. "I'm sorry but... can you just bear with me for a few seconds?" He pleaded as he stood tall and took a breath to steady himself. "Your eyes are sharp, they could pierce through one's soul with the intensity of an arrow crafted from the plasma of the sun. Such an intensity that sets my heart ablaze and captivaaaaauuu-DAMNIT!" He cursed as a growing frustration had begun to boil into anger. He pinched the bridge of his nose as began to knead his cheek once again. "I've seen many women who've surpassed me in captivating charm, eloquent manner, and intellect! However none have managed to match me in height, you are the first to surpass me in all realms and being able to wear such height with g-g-grrrrrrrrraaaaaaaaaaaaa..." The poor boy's eyes seemed to be welling with tears as he realized that his words wouldn't come out as his mind had carefully organized. "Ha... ha... I've lost it. I've lost it all..." he pulled his arm over his face to hide the shameful tears that began to run down his face. "I've lost it..." His body quivered as he tried rubbed his arm cheek to watery cheek. "My body is afraid to compliment girls... how am I ever going to live with myself?" His voice shrunk as whatever confidence had shriveled away into a bawling mess. "Your cybernetic arm is cool... that's all I wanted to say..." Well at least he could manage to say that. "Sorry..." he meekly apologized without ridding his arm from his face. He never had to consider it, how his confidence was tied to how well he could speak. Yet here he was whimpering like a baby because he couldn't muster words out without sounding like he was having a stroke. This was the worst vacation ever... |
||||||||||||||
![]() |
|
||||||||||||||
| Tenka Mikazuchi | Aug 27 2016, 09:15 PM Post #4 | ||||||||||||||
![]()
|
The smirk with which he responded to her at first gave her pause. but after a moment she realised it was not an ill intended smile. It seem more like he was pleased about something in her response. That probably meant that he had overlooked the eccentricity in her behaviour to some extent right. Well it must have been something to that effect, Shiori decided, as he soon launched into what she could only describe as a scene taken straight from a male host club. Well it wasn't like she had ever actual BEEN to one of those, but she had seen enough anime to recognise the cliche. The flattering lines, the bright smile, the dramatic praise and then finally the suggestive wink. She wasn't quite sure if he was mocking her or merely flamboyant in his mannerisms. However, even as she pondered to herself which category he should be counted in, it seemed that he... well to but it in the proverbial sense; swallowed his tongue. Right in the middle of that awkward and out of place praising of features Shiori wasn't even sure she actually possessed, he suddenly paused like he bit his tongue. He tried again after assuring her that his mouth was still dry but once again he lost the thread of his praise half way into his overblown dramatic delivery. She was starting to think he was making fun of her, choking every time when he was about to call her something actually nice and though she was still red she was starting to have an angry look on her face. But then she saw the look on his face, a look she recognised quite easily. That look of absolutely hating yourself for what you were doing. Or rather, for what you failed to do. Her expression softened from an angry blush to one that seemed to have somewhat lost the plot. She wanted to say something after he excused himself to take a moment to gather his resolve. Well she wanted to interject something at the very least and had already started to type a message on her phone when he asked her just to bear with it for a while longer. She lowered her phone in an amazed sort of reaction. Nodding with the automatism of someone so lost in the plot they probably didn't even realise they had agreed to do something. But she obliged him all the same, she had stopped typing and looked expectantly at the stranger as he gave it yet another earnest effort but ended up just as tongue tied as in his first few tries. She didn't mean to laugh at him but she couldn't contain herself any longer. After this many tries his tenacity was admirable but blissfully unaware of the underlying seriousness of what was affecting him she covered her mouth with the back of her hand and turned her head to look away as from between her lips a soft chuckle escaped. A small if accidental jab at the ludicrous nature of this situation. "Ehehu ehehe ehaha haaa~" She was shocked then to see that he was taking it much harder then she had thought. The tears welling up in the corners of his eyes made her raise her hand instinctively to try and reach out and comfort him. But she shied back just before putting a comforting hand on his shoulder as he went to pieces over his inability to say what he wanted. Her lip trembled slightly. She wanted to comfort him in some way but she didn't dare to touch him. Instead she walked over towards the shopping cart she had loaded with her prizes and pulled a still sealed bottle of off brand water from out of a tattered bag standing in the corner of the cart. She could hear him mumbling through his bawling sobs but only the last few words directed at her came through clear enough to make out. It made her blush as he said it so earnestly and uncomplicated. That he thought her arm was cool. It wasn't as eloquently worded as everything else he had tried to say, but the shocking sincerity of that tear filled delivery made it much, much more convincing in it's impact. She hugged the bottle of water she was holding against her chest as she looked like she was about to say something then took a step forward and pushed the bottle towards him, keeping her eyes trained towards the ground in the half bow she made towards him. After all he had said his mouth was just dry right. She wasn't looking at him, but she opened one eye to look at him gingerly after he had not taken it after a moment. He looked as stunned as she had felt a moment before. Somehow the sight of his tear stained face coupled with that look of shocked surprise made her smile. A genuine comforting smile that said, go on, take it. She unscrewed the top of the bottle and held it out with one hand in a more comfortable, confident manner as she used the other to type a message on her phone that she held out towards him with a bright, wide smile that was clearly meant to put him at ease.
|
||||||||||||||
![]() |
|
||||||||||||||
| ZetaAzuel | Aug 28 2016, 12:08 AM Post #5 | ||||||||||||||
![]()
|
True despair couldn't be more real! A man who took pride in his charming words, who practiced in front of a mirror and ladies alike. How was he going to explain this back to the women of his country? They would be shocked! Horrified! He'd be lower than low! If he didn't have his words what else did he have!? Maybe some gadgeteers expertise but it would be hard to bring in a flock of just women with that... right? His thoughts was interrupted as he had a water bottle thrust into his chest. His tear stained face looked bewildered at the gesture. He tried to wipe whatever tears were left on his face as he took the water bottle. Was she giving this to him out of pity? Pity water was the worst type of water. "Thanks..." He looked at the water before taking a few chugs. He did say that his mouth was messed up so he might as well play the part. His eyes seemed to wander with depression as his mind still was coming to terms with his apparent flightlessness condition. How was he going to deal with it now? His eyes finally managed to stop on the phone that Shiori had held up to his face. His face seemingly lighting up like the screen's brightness as he read the message. She was cool with it!? She preferred his frank means of speaking!? In a way he was somewhat disappointed because it meant that all that work he went through apparently was for naught. But the end result was what was important and what was important was that the girl was smiling and she was smiling because of something he said. "O-Oh... uh I mean." He seemed to be getting back into his groove. "It's just... I invent things so I've got an eye for that kind of thing. So..." He tried to steer clear of any enlongated compliments about the subject. Something that while he could do, it didn't come to him naturally in the form of a conversation. "Yeah that's that... oh I never really got the chance to introduce myself. I'm..." This was usually the part where he would go on a long bit about Gale Winds, Prism Lights, and lighting up a maiden's heart. But if history had shown things to him then he was just going to sound stupid. Best to go with plain, flat, and simple. Even if it went against everything he stood for. "Gale Prism, I'm from England." Ugh this was terrible! But he would just have to endure it... for her sake. He turned his attention to the shopping cart full of electronic parts. His curiosity began to pique as he scanned the parts. "Huh... are you by chance collecting parts to make something?" That would certainly explain why she was dumpster diving. People threw away all sorts of cool stuff, or sometimes they threw away junk. But even junk could be made into something useful. Now she was interesting more than in her distinct beauty, but he didn't know many women that shared his passion in inventing things. Whether useful or not, he couldn't just let an opportunity like that fall away from his fingers. "Would you... mind if I joined in? I came here actually to look for some nice parts but uh... stuff happened." His mind flashed with that psycho ladies blood smile. He shivered from the thought as he tried to contain his reaction to the memory. |
||||||||||||||
![]() |
|
||||||||||||||
| Tenka Mikazuchi | Aug 28 2016, 12:59 AM Post #6 | ||||||||||||||
![]()
|
Seeing him chug the water like a parched man made her feel at least a little uncomfortable. Not because he seemed thirsty but even she had money for a bottle of water so.. If he was this thirsty she wondered just exactly how bad things must have been for him until now. She was feeling an emotion well up inside that she didn't quite know how to place. It wasn't quit pity nor quite compassion but she did feel kind of sorry for him right now. She took a deep breath to steel her nerves and gingerly patted the dejected Brit on the head. It was awkward and her hand trembled slightly at making such close physical contact with another human being. It was an off putting and slightly nauseating feeling but even so it felt rather nice for a fleeting second to be able to extend a slight bit of human warmth to another person. She wasn't quite sure what to make of it though and the fact that he seemed to be feeling better after his drink of water was quite nice in it's own way. He actually seemed to catch on to the fact that he hadn't made his introduction yet. So he was from England then, her face visible clouded over a little at hearing that. The last Englishman she encountered failed to impress her. To put it mildly. Even thinking about that encounter made her clench her fist and the strain of doing that made her cybernetic arm emit the angry hum of over-torquing electric motivators and the hissing of strained hydraulics. Then as he mentioned that he liked to invent things she snapped back to the reality of the current moment and ran her hand through her hair with a sigh. She shouldn't get that worked up about the past, there was way to much shit in her past to keep dwelling on it. The past should stay in the past or else she was just gonna break down and cry again. So the question of whether or not she was building something proved a welcome distraction and she nodded enthusiastically in response. The question about whether he could join her though was bit unexpected. She was a bit reluctant to take a guy along she only just met but then he didn't really seem that dangerous. It was a gamble to trust in human nature but he was still young he might still be one of the people that believed in his own inherent good nature. And she could use someone who was good with mechanics to give her a hand. After all if she was gonna work on THAT project she would have to open up her arm and if she was going to be down to one set of digits well... an extra pair of hands would be quite welcome. Worse came to worse she'd deal with it somehow so after looking him over with a thoughtful expression for a moment she typed up a response on her phone and showed it to him with an apologetic expression on her face.
|
||||||||||||||
![]() |
|
||||||||||||||
| ZetaAzuel | Aug 28 2016, 02:08 AM Post #7 | ||||||||||||||
![]()
|
A small wry smile grew on Gale's face as his head was patted. His tall height usually prevented people from bing able to reach without him lowering his head. Not that anyone really had patted his head before, the only people who ever did was his father and step-mother when he was a really young boy. Perhaps that's why it felt so warm and comforting, it stirred up those comfy feelings of being coddled between his parents and having their tender touch on his head relieve any stress upon his young childlike heart. For a moment though Shiori looked slightly distressed or disturbed as he mentioned that he was an Englishman. Was there a problem with being English? Did she have a bad run-in with someone from England? What he wouldn't give to give whatever hoolagin messed up hi countries name would have to take a spray from his glove! Though she seemed to clear up after awhile... Well, he ought to give her a good time in the name of England. After all, it as his duty as a patriot of the country and as a gentleman. As he read her message he couldn't help but feel a little sorry. Having to scrap for sappy seconds rather than buying the best materials? Granted sometimes the fun in inventing came from looting bins for trash and garbage and finding out ways to put them all together. Yet for serious projects scraps ought not to be used. Still, though he ought not to judge, if yo can't afford it you just can't afford it. Plus... He had been invited to a woman's home! I mean he kind of just invited himself but the fact she said yes was a step in the right direction, wasn't it!? His heart was beating rapidly as his mind began to dream of the various scenarios that would occur there. He could imagine it now, a beautiful little place where they would bond over the joys of machinery and metal. His eyes seemed to glitter as his fantasy played out in his head. "S-Sure! Of course, I don't mind! I mean I can work with anything. Just have to be creative is all!" The elation on Gale's face couldn't be more pronounced as his body seemed to swing from side to side from excitement. Though one thing kind of pulled his attention away from the fact. The girl was constantly talking or rather communicating through the use of her phone than with her vocal chords. Could she talk? Mute? Would it be wrong to ask? "Just out of curiosity... do you speak? I'm only asking cause it would be easier to than having to use your phone to tell me stuff." |
||||||||||||||
![]() |
|
||||||||||||||
| Tenka Mikazuchi | Aug 29 2016, 12:27 AM Post #8 | ||||||||||||||
![]()
|
It was obvious that the topic of why she was using her phone to communicate was a sore one, even if she typed out the message quite frankly. In fact that might even be a little to much information if one were honest. The scars on her arm were a likely testament of the harsh times that were implied by the way she literally shrunk back a bit after being asked the question. It had not been intentional, in fact she herself had hardly noticed she did it. But when he asked her about her usage of her cell she had flinched for a moment and her shoulders had dropped. It was as if unconsciously she was making herself as small a target as she could. Some of the scars on her arm looked like they had been made by box cutters, but there were a few ark rings there of the kind you might have after a broken bone healed back without being set entirely right. Like bruises that never quite faded. Even so it didn't seem like the mood had entirely soured, at least not for Shiori. After Gale had shown his support for what she was doing, she picked up the broken heater plate she had recovered from the garbage. Yes, the one she had so futility tried to hide not that long ago. She picked the battered appliance up and heaped it onto the considerable pile on the shopping trolley. She motion Gale with her hand to follow her as she pushed the trolley out of the alley they were in. There was a much wider alley behind the store, that she headed into. It was really more of an enclosed street then an ally. Supply trucks normally used this to stock the stores on either side of this inlet street without having to drive out onto the busy streets where the store fronts were located. But at this time of day the trucks had already come and gone and it was a deserted stretch of road that she pushed the cart down. Some time walking later.... Chiyoda ku - Marunouchi - Akihabara Back Streets They had been walking through back alley's and shortcuts for a while now. It was not exactly the side of Akihabara most people coming there to shop would ever see. One missed most of the crowds and loud garish advertising by taking this route but it was almost destitute and lonely in comparison. While this suited Shiori just fine, it might be a little at odds with the reason why gale came to that part of Tokyo to begin with. It was like they were in a whole other part of town. It was quite obvious that these supply routes had never been meant for the eyes of the general public, there was the dirt, grime and the general destitution of the less pristinely maintained alleyways here. But more then that, the further they went you could see the occasional crumbling brick wall and other signs of general decay. Even though the solitary gloom was still lit up by functional if not very pretty lighting for most of the way. The parts of town they were crossing now had the occasional flickering light, or sections of lighting that were not working at all. Strange shadow plays sometimes occurred in these places, where the light of the starry sky filtering down here through a cloudy sky and by bouncing between tall walls only made it so the darkness was not absolute. In fact that just made it more surreal and spooky. There was enough light down here to see shadows in the already dim darkness that prevailed. Once or twice this was only compounded by shapes and sounds moving in the dim light. Things that as they passed turned out to be no more then common rats scurrying back under a dumpster or such as was now the case a stray cat coming up towards the tall cyborg. She halted the cart in one of these patches of dreary darkness, the broken light affixed to the cracked concrete wall above them flickering only once every few seconds in it's desperate attempts to come to life. She squatted down next to it with a smile and reached down to scratch the white and black spotted animal behind it's ears with a gentle smile. The moment might seem endearing at most other times, but right now it seemed that the few moments she paused to pet the cat stretched into agonisingly long minutes in the mind of what was likely an already disturbed gale. When finally she stood back up and pushed the cart forward, it's wheels produced a high pitched screech that cause the cat to wince and scurry back into the darkness. They had finally moved out of the dark alleyways and onto a proper street. There were people moving hastily about the sidewalks now, but even then the massive crowds someone had been hoping to blend into were absent. The area they had entered now was filled shops that seemed to not be quite as fancy or as garishly decorated as the main streets of Tokyo's electronic wonderland. Here there were shops specialising in second hand PC parts, old pieces of merchandising and some shops that advertised things that one really wondered if they should be sold publicly. The area itself was also not without it's scars. Many of the buildings carried signs of decay and there were small dips in the street where concrete had been hastily poured into cracks and broken sections on the street. These were the leftover signs of a battle between quirk powered individuals that might not lie in recent memory, as most of the damage had at least been patched, but it seemed this area was not considered important enough to hide those parts of the state of modern society with fancy new construction projects to replace the old and scarred ones. It was one of the buildings most heavily affected by whatever happened here that she pushed the cart towards. An old and dilapidated movie theatre. The titles of the movies displayed on it's facade had been new perhaps years ago but they would hardly seem familiar to most. None of the light on the building worked at all, even the name on the building was something grand from an older era. The neon letters on the facade named it the Ak ba Metr lex, with some of the letters conspicuously missing altogether where there were large holes in the buildings facade. If Gale wished that she was not walking up to this of all places, his wish was in vain. Shiori pushed the cart right up towards the steel shutter that had been pulled down in front of the glass doors giving way into the buildings innards. At the very least she used a key to undo the two large heavy padlocks that kept the shutter locked down onto two big steel chains that seemed anchored directly into the concrete of the sidewalk. She lifted open the steel barring their way to give a glimpse into the buildings innards. There was a ticket booth with shattered glass right behind the shutter and two sliding doors that had been boarded up where the glass from those had also been shattered. Despite the fact that the glass in it's frames was broken, there were no fragments of glass left on the ground, someone had seemingly swept this entryway clean a while ago. She pried apart the boarded up sliding doors with her hands as it did not seem there was any power going to them. She pushed the cart inside and looked towards Gale with an encouraging smile, motioning him to come inside so she could lock the shutter behind them. Through the now opened sliding doors, one could see into the lobby of the cinema, none of the lights inside were working either and after only about 20 feet , the sparse light coming in from the outside was swallowed, leaving the faded red carpet that lay across the floor as a path into the cinema proper to seemingly disappear into an inky black darkness... Edited by Tenka Mikazuchi, Aug 29 2016, 12:28 AM.
|
||||||||||||||
![]() |
|
||||||||||||||
| ZetaAzuel | Aug 29 2016, 03:57 AM Post #9 | ||||||||||||||
![]()
|
Gale's face seemed to whiten to a chalky pale upon reading the text message on the phone. Self-silence due to a troubled upbringing? He could only avert his eyes as his mind began to make sense of it. Taking a more detailed look at the lady her arm was scarred with cuts that could have come from any vile machinery or simple blade. He grabbed his own arm imagining the excruciating pain that had to come from taking such wounds as well as having them heal into permanent reminds of such a traumatic experience. He silently followed behind her as she pushed her cart through the alleyway. A spectacle for anyone who's known the boy, keeping his lips sealed around a lady for more than five seconds seemed to be a new record that he begrudgingly kept tracking up in his mind. Words likely wouldn't comfort her, if anything they'd likely open searing wounds that hurt more than the scars that were on her arm. And perhaps that's what bothered the Brit more than anything, that he couldn't say something to lift her spirits on the subject. No combination of honeyed words or Shakespearean speech as she put it would be able to change her mindset on something so catastrophic as an abusive childhood. The thoughts had begun to fester in his head, like a rotten soup bubbling with the stench of his own past troubles. Not nearly as severe as what Shiori seemed to insist by any means, but that sense of dejection. Of being looked down as a nuisance and a burden more so than a human. Perhaps sharing a similar tale of sadness and dejection would somehow lift her spirits... or at least make it seem that he could understand where she was coming from. Yet he kept his mouth silent, an unsettling pain in his heart keeping his mouth clamped and his steps short as he kept a close pace behind Shiori. Though it seemed that his steps became more rapid and he began to inch himself closer and closer to Shiori as they walked through the back streets. He had enough of the dark sketchy back alley for this one trip in Tokyo. Especially considering it had bee less than 24 hours since the last time he was their suspect criminals had been on the prowl. "I guess that not many people come around these parts..." His eyes looked around the lonely corridors "I mean I'd prefer it that way really. Just you... me... no deadly face stealing psychos ready to leap out of the shadows!" He twirled around as if expecting someone to be stalking them, and yet only darkness and it's cruel sense of humor greeting him. He tapped his temple and then began to rub his sore cheek once more. Was he imagining things again? Was he dreaming? Perhaps he would wake up in his hotel and everything would have just been what it had been a dream. But if it were a dream then the dream girl in his head must've meant something... something deep in his subconscious. Of course, he might've just been going crazy. He quickened his pace to catch up once again to Shiori, resisting his urge to hold onto her shoulder like a frightened child would a parent cling to their guardian's leg. Instead, his eyes shimmered blue as he scanned the darkness around them as they walked. Though his eyes seemed to strain as flickering lights would briefly blind him as he tried to acclimate to the dimmed lighting. He cursed the poorly maintained lighting as he imagined how simple it would be to fix a few of the light fixtures in the area. He saw movement in his peripheral, like a giant shadowy beast leaping from his weak spot to gore him to his doom! He yelled as he kept leaping backwards and falling flat on his butt as he skittered away from the shadowy horror that was... His own shadow. Well technically it was his shadow, Shio's shadow, and the shadow of the shopping cart all amalgamated into what looked like some horrid form of a beast. Yet it was just an illusion that had preyed on his fear, his natural paranoia of dark alleyways, and of course his own cowardice. He watched in humility as a stray cat came out from the darkness, almost as if the world was out to taunt him. He sighed as he brushed himself off of alleyway garbage and dirt as Shiori gave the animal pets of affection. He waited patiently or at least imitating what patience looked like as his blue eyes scanned from side to side like a turret on guard. He wasn't much of a cat person, cats never looked like they showed affection or that they cared about anything you did for them. You could get a read on a dog much more than a cat, and a dog at least looked it was smiling half the time. The sudden screech made him bolt up as quickly as the cat had fled back into the darkness. A dog would've stayed loyally by your side in times of danger like that... but a cat would jut bail out when things got tough. "S-Shall we go on then?" Gale insisted his fear getting the best of him as he tried to push Shiori along the route. Wait... where did she live anyway? From the looks of things, she was taking him through back corner alley through side street shortcuts. She said that she was poor, or at least that she didn't have much money but... surely she didn't mean that she actually lived in one of these dusty old decrepit buildings. ...Right? His fear flared up as a familiar situation presented himself. A suspicious alleyway filled with suspicious electronic merchants that probably were armed to the toenail with weapons that were ready to go berserk if a deal went south. His feet stopped moving, his bodies instincts telling him to walk away- no runaway. Don't get involved in this shit again after what happened last night! His eyes strained as they went from seller to seller, checking their quirks for who was most lethal. Not that it mattered, a gun or knife could kill just as easy as any quirk. He saw it first hand after all. "H-Hey can we take a different way? One with people who probably won't turn me into roadkill if I look at them funny?" He laughed for only a second after the delivery of his words but he stepped back and terror grew on his face as he recalled how terribly his last venture out to these parts had landed him. His cheek itched again, scratching it on reflex he jerked his hand back as he realized he had drawn blood from irritating the spot so roughly in the last few hours. "Of course..." He mumbled as he pressed a finger against his cheek to stop the small wound from flowing any more blood. Shiori seemingly strolled through the area without as much as a hesitation step. "Ah, Shiori hold up-" He took a step to chase after her but the terror that the mere shop owners sent to him made his cheek flare up in pain again. He had to hold his arm down just to keep from wiping away the blood clot that was starting to from on his cheek. "Damn... why does everything have to be so difficult now... why can't girls just like being in the sunlight where it's safe?" He walked with shaky steps that would probably get him more confused looks from the many patrons and shopkeepers of the area than if he had just walked through it with confidence. Yet it was all he could do to keep himself from standing paralyzed with fear or from tearing off his cheek from his face. Just going step by step, breath by breath, inch by inch, following the sound of that creaky old shopping cart like a lamb would Sheppard. His head would turn from side to side, his eyes till blue from his quirk to make sure that no one had decided to target him with some foul intent. His eyes starting to burn from the pain of having kept his quirk active for so long, yet almost like a defensive measure, he couldn't turn it off. Like a broken damn with an endless flow of water, his paranoia fueled his turning head as it glanced from side to side as he had nearly caught up to Shiori's side. Only when he was mere inches away from her did his arm loosen, his eyes begin to calm, and his breath begin to slow. His fingers still twitched as he released the grip on his arm, his head naturally following the glow of the blinking neon signs for what had to be one of the saddest and decorated theaters he had seen in a long time. It looked like it had been looted from the inside out, then from the outside in, and for fun, shot with canon balls and dynamite just to make it seem unstable. Well, at least it was locked up, meaning that it probably was already condemned and barren of any life... save maybe some squatters that found ways inside. Then Shiori pulled out a key. "Y-You don't really live here do you? Haha I mean that would be..." Then she unlocked the padlocks. "That would just be... you know..." And she opened the shutters. "It would... I mean..." And she opened the doors. And she smiled at him, motioning for him to follow her. To follow her into that seductive darkness that could only leave the imagination to what was lurked inside. "I... I can't." His legs felt heavy as his eyes dilated watching Shiori smile. That smile, that bloody smile, ladened behind the darkness. An empty darkness that his nightmares would fill with horrors and delusions that would terrify him. It was too familiar, a scenario far too similar to the bloody gore-ridden mess he had seen hours earlier. He knew it wasn't real, just his emotions running wild. His body trying to protect itself, just an illusion from not getting enough sleep. And yet he couldn't pull himself out of it. That twisted Psycho's face had mushed over Shiori's face. Her smile the only feature staying true, save for smears of blood that had bubbled from beneath her skin. "It's not real, it's not real, it's not real." He spoke the mantra to himself as he closed his eyes and tried to make some alternate reality to perceive. But all he could do was see that bloody smile, that bloody smile, that damn bloody smile! His cheek burned again as the urge to scratch it began to overwhelm his senses again. "She's not here... that's not her, that's not her." He struggled to take a step forward. His mind and body warring over control of the Brit's actual perception is eyes seemingly going wild as they would flash between orange and blue. The boy seemed to be at a literal standstill, Shiori was certain to notice the boy's rampant twitching as he held his arm close to his side. Keeping it from gnawing at his bloody cheek, he feet clawing at the ground to step back or to step forward. A standing contradiction of his usual persona and the unsettling psyche within him. |
||||||||||||||
![]() |
|
||||||||||||||
| Tenka Mikazuchi | Aug 29 2016, 04:05 PM Post #10 | ||||||||||||||
![]()
|
Shiori had noticed the trepidation growing in the boy following her through the dark back way streets. Well, that might even be an understatement, he was acting like a scared little mouse jumping at shadows. Shiori on the other hand liked the calm and the dark. The daylight is where the monsters hide out, wearing the faces of men and pretending to be normal, to be things they are not. The saying might be that in the cold light of day what was scary in the dark looked only mundane but that was only true of the things that a scared mind created out of the shadows that lived on the edge of your vision when the darkness was being lit by the tiniest flicker of the light. The real horrors hid themselves in plain sight, the darkness and solitude were what peeled back the disguises of the real monsters living in the world. They only acted when they felt the eyes of the world weren't on them. But more often then not that just meant they searched for places to hide from the light to do horrible things during the day. The night supposedly belonged to monsters, but in all honesty there was little to fear of the darkness itself. Because the people who genuinely wanted to hurt you, were probably just as scared of getting hurt by someone or something more twisted then they. Pretty faces only turned monstrous when you were already caught in their trap during the day, but at night you could see them for what they were, because they stopped pretending. Shiori watched him slowly lose it as they got towards the end point of their destination. The old theatre was perhaps not the prettiest sight to behold, but once you got to know it it was a safe place. Theatre's were made so you could only get in one way, to avoid people sneaking in for free. All of the emergency exists were heavy ponderous flame retardant doors that opened only from the inside with a mechanical lock that you could open just by pressing on the large crossbar handle from the inside. There wasn't really an easy way to open them from the outside though. The ones that didn't function properly anymore because they had been damaged had been welded shut into solid pieces of steel by Shiori a while ago. For most people, even most quirk users, the dilapidated old theatre was actually more akin to a fortress if you wanted to get inside. Shiori had moved towards the reception desk. She had put some things behind it that she generally needed when she came inside. She ducked behind the counter and pulled out a very old looking candle holder that had maybe once been copper coloured, but was now stained with the greenish colour of oxidisation over most of it. She also had retrieved a hand full of candles and a pack of matches from under the counter and a small garishly orange box that just seemed to fade into a dull grey because of the faint light coming into the entree way from the outside. She put one of the candles into the stand and struck of one of the matches with the soft hissing pop that came from the ignition. The small flame came to life in a soothing flicker as she held it against the candles wick and lit it. The soft glow emanating from the candles warm flickering flame lit up the entree way in a new light, quite literally. There were still a few cardboard cutout for old anime movies standing around in the corners, faded by time and some damaged by debris that had since been cleared away. The walls showed some cracks and damage from whatever calamity had damaged the building as it had been but a fair few of the old movie posters on the wall still looked quite nice where water damage or tearing walls had not gotten to them. There was a sense of old wounds starting to heal because of someone taking the time to clean up the biggest sources of rubble and it looked like the entree way had been swept clean of debris. It was a lot less scary in the light from the tiny little flame. Shiori put the candle down on the counter with a soft mellow tapping sound in order to open the orange box she had produced from beneath it. From inside she removed a small bottle of brownish glass filled with a clear liquid. She dripped some of it onto peace of cotton she had taken out of the box and using a pair of scissors cut into a thick brownish ribbon of some kind. She then turned to gale with a determined look on her face. Her metallic hand seized the panicking youth firmly by the shoulder and she pressed the piece of cotton to his bleeding cheek wit a quick and merciless strike. Even though her touching the cotton to his cheek was tender and a look of concern was plastered over her face she was holding onto his shoulder with the steel arm with surprising force. A searing blistering pain emanating from his cheek might be enough to shake Gale out of what one could only call a panic attack. As the cotton ball came into contact with his cheek, the iodine soaked into it reacted with the open wound in what could only be considered agonising efficiency. She did not allow him the time to respond or even come to terms with that mind numbing pain through, putting the brown piece of ribbon between her teeth she quickly peeled of the two white flaps on the back of the large piece of band aid and slapped it on his cheek, a big enough piece to cover the entire irritated part of his skin so he wouldn't be able to scratch at it any longer. She let out a soft sigh after it was done and patted him on the head with her human hand softly, even a bit affectionately but she did not let go of his shoulder just yet. Expecting a panicked response, she though it best to restrain him for a while longer. With a stern look in her eyes and a pout on her lips she held her phone up in front of his face, the words on the screen chiding him for his behaviour.
Edited by Tenka Mikazuchi, Aug 29 2016, 04:09 PM.
|
||||||||||||||
![]() |
|
||||||||||||||
| ZetaAzuel | Aug 29 2016, 11:52 PM Post #11 | ||||||||||||||
![]()
|
This was a living nightmare, or rather he was living a nightmare. He knew that this couldn't be real, that this was just some extreme reaction to the foreboding darkness that was ahead of him. Yet he couldn't pull himself out of it, he couldn't enjoy or change it like a normal dream. But obviously this wasn't a dream, this was some horrid hallucination but knowing that fact didn't make it any less horrifying. The theater had begun to shift itself into that bleak warehouse again. That familiar bandit clutching his innards that had been blown out of him, the shrilling cries for help that quickly became a gargled frothy mess of speech. Two bodies dead on the floor in front of him and the psychotic murderer with that crimson red smile was only a few steps ahead of him. His body felt tight and paralyzed as if some higher power were forcing him to relive the event in all it's gory layers. Though perhaps the worst part was watching as what he assumed to be Shiori moved about the warehouse with the same guise that his sickening assailant had. It was twisted in his mind to have placed her image onto Shiori who may have been creepy in her own weird way she certainly didn't seem like a remorseless killer that played with people's emotions. Watching her move in that seductive sway toward him made him flinch. Watching as she placed a hand on his shoulder with that sickeningly sweet smile. The worst part was coming, the painful that made him scratch and tear at his cheek for nearly a day. She closed her eyes, puckering her blood stained lips as she leaned into him and stood on the tips of her toes to reach his stature. The soft pressure burned his cheek, a flashing burning pain that flared from the base of his wound to the nearby muscle like a rampant infection. Yet the pain has blurred his vision, almost snapping him back into the reality that his eyes were used to and not the nightmare his brain was subjecting him to. Though what seemed to fully end the terror in his mind was the soft pats against his head. Each one knocking his senses back into place as his muscles loosened from their tight and paralyzed state. He blinked for a few moment, his eyes irritated and burning still from the overuse of his quirk and his cheek felt like it was on fire. He lightly grazed over his cheek feeling that there had been some simple patch job over his injury. He winced, clearly any small irritation was going to make the pain flare up again but the bandage work would at least give him a conscious remind to stop making it any worse than it already was. His confusion only seemed to get worse upon reading the message that Shiori had sternly placed in front of him. From the looks of it, he must've seemed crazy and insane. Just going into a panicked state because of some darkness. "I mean I'm not scared of the dark. Maybe I was once when I was a baby but this hasn't happened before! Honest!" He put one of his hands up as if to try and become defensive about the entire situation. "I'm not trying to be difficult alright! This is pissing me off more than it probably is you!" His voice grew and he frowned as his mounting frustrations mixed with his passing bout of fear had stormed up wrathful feelings of hatred in head. "First it was the cheek, can't sweet talk girls, now I'm hallucinating in the darkness. What's next? Are my eyes going to start rolling in circles in my sockets? Or maybe my arms will just start punching me in the gut for fun!?" He was sounding hysterical, but anyone going through this much mental stress in a single day would probably be feeling like this too. He placed his palm over his face, taking a moment to calm down and just try and recover from whatever trip his mind had sent him too. "Alright... alright I'm safe now. I'm okay... it's just you and me, and a creepy abandoned movie theater that probably doesn't even have anything good in stock." He tried to put on a smile "I'll just try and enjoy myself. Not like it can get any worse. Unless you lured me here to chop off my body parts in some weird twisted horror experiment." He laughed but then frantically turned his head around as if making sure that their weren't tools or bodies hanging from the ceiling. "R-Right haha... you said you don't like hurting people so I'm trusting you on that. Literally trusting you with my life! As in I could very well die if my judgment was completely off the marker!" Maybe not everything was screwed in right, but it was better than being paralyzed in that warehouse nightmare again. |
||||||||||||||
![]() |
|
||||||||||||||
| Tenka Mikazuchi | Aug 30 2016, 09:34 PM Post #12 | ||||||||||||||
![]()
|
She brushed a wayward strand of blond hair behind her ear as she showed him the message on her phone. If she was upset by his outburst at all her face didn't show it. Her eyes were not exactly the most suited towards calming someone down, but she was doing her best to seem calm and gentle towards someone who obviously had his own crosses to bear. This boy, Gale, he was obviously in some ways broken. She didn't really know what had happened to turn him into a mess like this but she knew a thing or two about never feeling safe, about always seeing your biggest fears made manifest as horrible vivid illusions born from your own nightmares even during the day. Shiori more then most knew what it was like to stand in his shoes, she had spends months fighting her demons alone. A battle she still wondered if she ever really won. She wasn't afraid of the dark anymore, but then she wasn't really afraid anymore to begin with. Nothing could hurt you if you welcomed the pain as the sole reminder of the fact you were still alive. Whatever happened she'd either survive it or not, the outcome of her fears turning real wasn't even something she cared about anymore. She'd just put up an empty smile and see where things ended now. There was nothing to fear if you just let the world happen to you and did not care. But that was about herself, she cared about other people. She hated humanity as a whole, all the stupid stuff they did to each other, this planet. Nobody ever thought about consequences and just followed the stupidity like a herd of sheep following the first of their number into a river to drown. She had no compassion to give to her species of liars that said one thing and did another, but it was different with people. If you stopped heaping the actions of people as a group onto everyone's shoulders, and looked at people individually sometimes there was something worth looking at. Someone worth having compassion for, caring about. This she supposed was hope. She hesitated for just a moment as she held out her hand towards Gale, her cybernetic hand that is. He was in a bad place she could tell, he wasn't lashing out with his words because he was angry at her but because he was lost and didn't know what to do to find himself again. This she supposed is why people needed people. Someone to stand there and smile despite their own worries, despite their own pain to just hold out a hand and help you up. Alone you'd just drown, but even if the hope that extended hand offered was just a pipe dream, just an illusion cast by someone as lost as you to seem confident. Then maybe.. maybe hope was an illusion worth holding on to after all. An illusion worth extending to someone else. So she held out her hand. To help him go forward. Maybe that was just the thing she needed to. Someone broken like her to fix her, even if it was just a little band-aid on a big seeping wound. For the smallest moment it felt nice to forget and help someone else do the same.
Edited by Tenka Mikazuchi, Aug 30 2016, 09:38 PM.
|
||||||||||||||
![]() |
|
||||||||||||||
| ZetaAzuel | Aug 30 2016, 11:01 PM Post #13 | ||||||||||||||
![]()
|
Gale raised an eyebrow with skepticism as he looked at Shiori's next message. Was she some amateur psychologist? Granted she had a decent point, he wasn't really afraid of the dark. After all, he had spent countless nights with limited visibility working on whatever came to his mind when he worked in his lonely workshop he called his room. So the same question had been placed in his mind again. Should he trust her? His livid instincts that were still on high alert told him to flee. Don't even answer the girl and just leave this accursed tomb and just go back to his hotel. And of course, his chivalrous heart insisted that he stayed, touched by the kind gestures that not many people offered the lonely soul. He was sure that not many people would be willing to help a man distressed by fear with the courage and patience that she had, especially ones who he'd usually failed to court with his sugar sweet words. "Even if you say that you have to see where I'm coming from..." He seemed to pull back for a second, avoiding the cybernetic arm that had been presented towards him. "It's not like... it's not like I can just tell my body to stop being afraid. I know that it's fake, I know that what I'm seeing isn't real." He held his arm as if to keep it from moving toward his cheek again. He grew silent as he looked at Shiori with exhaustion on his gaze. There was still a glint of hope seeking refuge from the chaos in his mind, perhaps seeing Shiori's simple offers as a castle against such horrors. He turned and looked toward the exit, it wasn't too far off. He was sure that he could retrace his steps back to the street he met her on and get back to his hotel one way or another. That would be the easy way out at least, a straight run through the darkness to the comfortable light he knew as "civilized society". He could go back home by the end of the day and just go back to treading through the London streets for someone who would bring comfort to him. Like the good ol' days... And then it clicked, like a switch that had been flickering between darkness and bright light. How could he say no to a girl who offered to comfort him? How!? Was he truly going crazy? To think that he was going to turn down a pleasant time with a chick just because of some nightmarish visions!? Well... that was a good enough motivation too but she had clearly meant him no harm. It was just to two of them, after all, what did he have to fear? What did he truly have to fear from the woman? That's what he told himself in his mind and he slowly turned back to Shiori. His mind and body were perhaps still at odds with the decision, but not so much so as to keep the young man from taking Shiori's cybernetic hand. "Alright... lead the way." He said, starting to let his worries fade away into the dusk around him. The only thing to fear was what his mind would be willing to conjure up, but to his knowledge, the android wasn't going to harm him. For once he found someone willing to lend him a hand than the other way around. |
||||||||||||||
![]() |
|
||||||||||||||
| Tenka Mikazuchi | Aug 31 2016, 03:10 AM Post #14 | ||||||||||||||
![]()
|
Siori could understand where he was coming from alright, trusting people was hard. But trusting strangers seemed to be somehow easier then it used to be. From her reckoning at least, people didn't show you how horrible they really were until you knew them better. People didn't shatter that fragile ray of hope until after you had a good long time to admire the mask of decency they wore in public. They had to make sure you wouldn't be in a position to tell anyone after all... She shook her head softly to get rid of that intrusive thought. The touch of his hand on her cybernetic one was a weird sensation, the fact she shivered only from her shoulder up equally unsettling. The pressure sensors in her fingers and hand palm were there so she could sense how much power she was using, they were rudimentary things meant to keep her from shattering the thing she held because she couldn't tell how hard she was squeezing. They had nothing like the sophisticated sensory perception of flesh but they were still hooked into her nervous center. She could feel it and at the same time she couldn't. She did not like to be touched but the sensations from her cybernetic were different. Maybe it was because they were so rudimentary that they didn't even really feel like a touch, or maybe it was just because this time she was the one that reached out to touch someone else she wasn't quite sure. She broke the contact between the metal fingers and the skin of his as she turned away with a blush. She tried to hide her embarrassment at that fleeting moment of a connection by picking up the candle holder and walking back towards the front door. Reaching up to a handle on the inside she pulled down the shutter with a the sound of metal runners being rushed over old and squealing ball bearings. With a quick motion she pushed down the deadbolt at the bottom of the shutter. It was connected to a rolling rail that extended a row of steel pin that extended into the side of the concrete wall all at once, looking it securely in place from the inside. It prevented people from coming in from the outside very easily, but all you had to do to get out was flip the deadbolt open and raise the shutter. She smiled towards gale and held up the candle in front of her. With the shutter shut the darkness inside had at once deepened and made less severe at the same time. The softly flickering flame of the candle lit the theatre's entree way in a softly orange glow that seemed to have become more intense and warm when the cold light of the streetlights out in front were shut out. She gave her guest a singe concerned glance to see how he was holding up before she motioned him to follow her as she in turn pushed the cart of junk she had collected down the faded red carpet that was guiding them both deeper into the old theatre. From the entree way they made their way into a small lobby, to the left were doors that led towards the toilets and to the right was a pair of double glass doors that led towards a small bar area. There were clear signs that this place had been looted and that Shiori had never used it herself. All of the glasses and the bottles that might have been there once had been either taken or smashed and nothing had been cleaned up. The doors had been shut with a chain through their handles and a rusty old padlock kept them shut. She moved past there through what looked to be a short hallway with movie posters across the walls, and some empty spots where even those had been taken. Then the hallway opened up to a large open room with a massive glass ceiling. Much of the glass had been broken and some translucent plastic tarps had been placed over some of the holes but most of this room had been open to the elements for some time. The moonlight was falling through the open roof lighting it up in clear pale hues. The damage here was the worst, parts of the collapsed ceiling and walls were lying in the middle of the floor in chunks of concrete and mangled steel far to large to move. A soft breeze made the candle's flickering flame as Shiori moved passed the confectionery lane in the middle of this room, but here too signs of looting were plainly evident. The popcorn machines were gone. Vending machines were smashed and their contents long gone, some empty places showed that some of the machines were taken in their entirety. The cash registers were smashed and broken. Glass doored refrigerators that might have hold chilled beverages were smashed or their doors ripped off. Soda fountains had been destroyed. You could look nowhere here without seeing destruction and desolation. Except that in the very centre of this large open space there were a couple of toppled over vending machines, likely the ones missing from the confectionery lane, that had been gutted and filled with sand. The tarps suspended from the ceiling above it at once shielding it from the harshest parts of then sun and forming tiered wedges that were filled with water. They were angled slightly so that water was dripping down from one into the other and finally into these sand filled vending machines. They had been placed in such a manner that caused rain water to gather when it rained and drip down into these makeshift flower beds. There were herbs growing here, tomato plants and vegetables too. Most of then plants looked like they had been harvested of their bounty a while ago but some of them were blooming with flowers. It was a surreal sight to see such a small garden amidst the devastation and desolation but it was right there in the centre of the room. Behind it there were once grand stairs leading towards the second floor. There were doors in either opposite wall of this room, leading into the theatre's themselves, and the stairs likely reached up towards the balconies for those theatre's. Shiori did not stop to admire the plants, instead leaving the shopping cart behind there and heading up the grand staircase, dodging holes in it that had been created by falling debris. She did not turn towards the doors leading up to the balconies, instead she unlocked a small that said something in Japanese Characters that Gale could not read. Behind it was another set of stairs, very narrow ones that led up into the projector room for theatre number 4. There was a projector positioned here at the far wall. in front of a small window. It was turned off but it looked to be in surprisingly good shape. Racks against the walls were filled with DVD masters for old anime movies and a small collection of toys, most of them of obscure robots from certain of those anime. It was not a very big room, but it was big enough for there to be a fold out couch in the corner, There were actually pink bed sheets lying neatly folded on top of the sleeping couch along with a large number of pillows on one of which sat a teddy bear. Shiori put the candle holder down on the bedside table, next to a very old fashioned wind up alarm clock and pointed Gale towards the chairs standing in the middle of the room. They had clearly been taken from one of the theatres and were standing next to a small Kotatsu, one which had very obviously been made out of a blanket and pieces of material scavenged from elsewhere in the old theatre. She walked over to a door in the side of this room. When she opened it it was obvious that it ha once been a toilet but the toilet had been removed and instead there was a small refrigerator standing there next to a gasoline generator and a pile of old car batteries that had been wired together to keep the fridge running even when the generator was off. She opened the small window in the toilet and hung a pipe outside that would vent the exhaust from the generator outside before she pulled the starter cord and with a deep sputtering sound. Once the generator was running the lights in the projector room turned on bathing it in the glow of the electric lights that after the darkness they had braved to get here might well seem blinding for the moments it took for one's eyes to adjust. Shiori was already holding up her phone towards gale when his eyes finally adjusted to the light now filling the room. She was slightly red in the face but was trying very hard to not seem as embarrassed as she felt.
|
||||||||||||||
![]() |
|
||||||||||||||
| ZetaAzuel | Aug 31 2016, 05:05 AM Post #15 | ||||||||||||||
![]()
|
Gale had dealt with metal before, an interesting property of it was that you could get it very hot or very cold very quickly but that it wouldn't be able to hold the heat as long as say... something like water. Embracing a metallic hand that felt cold was unsettling at first, but just looking at ti would remind him that simply because it felt cold and was made of metal didn't mean it wouldn't hold human warmth if he kept it locked on for long enough. Perhaps that's what kept him from panicking once the doors to the theatre had been closed shut, effectively locking the two of them in the dilapidated theatre. She turned away from him once she pulled her hand away from him. Carrying the only light source through the dark halls that he was being lead through. It was eerie at first, he had heard stories of children and adults being carried away to their doom by attractive figures, and he had heard stories of people being lured by enticing lights that seemed to dance with the wind. Here he was, being lured by both. When Shiori turned to see if he was okay she would see that he was holding himself up well, his face not showing fear but curiosity as his head would turn to see what the light had revealed. Despite his earlier reaction Gale had a strange... fascination of buildings like this. They were like giant castles that were meant to be explored, meant to be left alone, and meant to be enjoyed in silence and solitude. He could imagine the fun and excitement of walking through and making what was likely a ransacked movie theater into something livable. Even if the general appearance would suggest otherwise. But the fact that the floors had been swept and maintained, that there had been measures to keep it safe from potential threats, even flowerbed in the center of the room was a beautiful touch that made Gale question why he had been so fearful int he first place. Sure the theatre told stories of how it had been looting before and that it was clearly not in the shape it used to be when it was likely an active area of entertainment. Yet that was the beautiful charm that caused Gale to lower his guard finally as he took a moment to look at the flowerbed she had managed to create. His hand grazed over some of the sand, feeling the wetness of it before Shiori moved along. His mind raced with the image of the young woman taking the time and effort to place the vending machines in their proper place and filling them with sand likely from bags. Going out of her way to see to it that this hellish part of the city had been made into a dark yet inviting haven. He only had a moment to admire the thought as he carefully followed Shiori up the grand staircase and leaving the shopping cart behind. Watching his step as he followed behind her he imagined what else the girl hauled with that mere shopping cart? Did she always scrounge up for food and supplies with it? Was she taking it near and far to collect whatever essentials she needed? Maybe he was getting a bit deep about it, but for a man who spent most of his time either alone in his room or out trying to hit on girls the thoughts were a liberating experience that had a soothing effect on him. Though what seemed to be more touching to Gale was what lied behind the mysterious door with the odd Japanese characters that lead to Projector Room 4. It might as well have read "Shiori's Room" because that's what it was. A cutesy little room with all sorts of detail that he expected from a little girl's room or maybe a teenager. Stacks of robotic merchandise and dvds clearly showed where her enthusiasms were placed. He couldn't help but make a parting shot at her arm wondering if the decision to get ti was influenced mainly because of the mecha's or not. When he was instructed to sit he almost seemed surprised as he was taken aback by the state of the room. but without a word he sat down, watching as Shiori moved to another room while his eyes continued to get a look at the room. His eyes widened seeing what looked to be a generator of sorts and once it began to sputter there was no doubt in his mind of that fact. When the lights flickered he had to shut his eyes closed for a moment, he had almost gotten completely accustomed to the darkness by now and the sudden flash burned his eyes a little. It took him a few blinks to adjust to it as Shiori pulled out the phone to send him another message. Normally Gale would take advantage of a blushing girl's embarrassment but it seemed that all the small touches this theatre had begun to strip away some of his usual tendencies. Rather than speaking immediately he looked contemplative, almost as if he were trying to think of a response that wasn't littered with Shakespearean language. He swiveled in his chair taking in the room once again before turning back to Shiori. "You've done a lot to this place. It's kind of like a... like a zombie house." He paused knowing that would make no sense to her without context. "Let me explain, when I was a kid sometimes I would come to my house and the lights were always out and it was dark and quiet. I used to be scared of it because I thought that zombies might be there." He paused as he seemingly sighed from the recollection. "But eventually, I found it kind of fun, imagining that even though it was dark, and quiet, and... lonely... that it was safe. I used to imagine that there were zombie attacks outside at night and that I was safe inside my little 'zombie house' so to speak." He put on what probably was his most genuine smirk as he seemed to blush himself from telling the story. "So I can see how much you care about making this your home you know? It's special... in a weird of kind of way." He turned away still blushing as he spoke the words. He never really talked this earnestly with most people, save his siblings and parents he found it way easier to speak with flare... but now it felt like finding honest words was more difficult than making up famed speeches. "Haha, I didn't think this would be the way I'd end up in a girl's room for the first time either. The first girl I invited into my room was only for business stuff... and my first kiss was... a monstrosity so having something like this is..." he smiled earnestly as he spun around in his chair. "Unexpected but expected, I thought it would be all cutesy with pictures of boy bands and floral carpeting and... all the stuff yous see in movies and books." He stopped, he must've been sounding insensitive right now. "But I think that this is better. It's got a nice cute charm too, and a lot of heart and work put into it. So I think that makes it better than anything I've seen or read." His heart began pumping quickly as he wanted to get off the subject as if to make it sound like he was at least a decent human being and not some mega creep. "S-So what kind of DVD's do you have? I'm guessing you've seen a lot of movies since you live here and you've got that collection. Mecha stuff I'm guessing?" How long had it been since he was genuinely flustered? Edited by ZetaAzuel, Aug 31 2016, 05:06 AM.
|
||||||||||||||
![]() |
|
||||||||||||||
| 1 user reading this topic (1 Guest and 0 Anonymous) | |||||||||||||||
| Go to Next Page | |
| « Previous Topic · Tokyo · Next Topic » |
- Pages:
- 1
- 2












3:26 PM Jul 11




