usedlaserbeam | 012 | Cianwood City | Text / Video / Action;

Entry tags:

012 | Cianwood City | Text / Video / Action;

GROUP TEXT MESSAGE
SELECT GROUP: [Teammates]

Defeated the Cianwood Gym. Lady made quick work of Chuck's team; it seems mind does win out over matter, after all. We're flying out tonight — should be back to the house by morning.

Have you heard the recent rumor about a magnet train to Saffron City?

MESSAGE SENT TO:
Contact: Jackal Kuwahara
Contact: Kirihara Akaya
Contact: Marui Bunta
Contact: Niou Masaharu
Contact: Sanada Genichirou
Contact: Yanagi Renji
Contact: Yukimura Seiichi

ERROR: ID Number not found.
Contact: Yanagi Renji

TEXT MESSAGE
SELECT CONTACT: [Yanagi Renji]

Yanagi-kun?

MESSAGE SENT TO:
Contact: Yanagi Renji

ERROR: ID Number not found.
Contact: Yanagi Renji

[It's a pretty dreary day for the beach; the air is cold, the skies are gray...did we mention it's really cold? Which means it's pretty deserted down there by the waves in Cianwood City.

Deserted, that is, save for one small stretch of beach that Yagyuu appears to have claimed as his own. He's bundled up tight in coat, gloves, and a scarf wound snugly around his neck and mouth, his full attention focused on his Pidgeot, who is waiting nearby. And there's a bit of bright blue scale obscuring one bit of the camera here, so it seems his Dratini is getting up to mischief again, this time playing with his Pokegear while he's not paying attention.

Oblivious to this, Yagyuu climbs onto the Pidgeot's back with unmistakable determination, situates himself, finds a handhold, mumbles a command—and she proceeds to rocket into the air, sending him crashing back down into the sand as he loses his balance and slips from her back.

A minute later she comes flapping back down, returning to her trainer's side as he pushes himself to his feet, shaking his head as if to clear it as he dusts the sand from his coat with mild displeasure. A minute after that, he's on her back again, and they try it again with the same unfortunate result—but this time, there's a Ditto parachute to ease his fall, letting him drift down to land on his feet rather than impacting harshly against the sand.

Again and again, with single-minded determination, he repeats the process: they fly, he falls, he gets back up again. And there's an odd sort of tension in his persistence, in the way he refuses to let up even for a breather, in the way he relentlessly pursues this goal he's set for himself with seemingly little care for his personal limitations. This is Yagyuu on a mission, and if there is one thing he hates more than anything else, it's conceding defeat.

(There's another thing he hates, too, but there isn't much he can do about that one. Particularly not today.)

And then, at last, when his hair is mussed well out of its usual neat style and his coat is dusted in sand and the ends of his scarf have come untucked from where he'd shoved them—at last, one time, he climbs onto the Pidgeot's back, finds his handholds, and they take off.

This time, he doesn't come crashing down again.]

[OOC: Cianwood badge is mod-approved!]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[They were all together. All of them. And Yanagi-kun, of all people--if anyone had stood a chance of figuring this mystery out, of finding a way for them all to escape together, it would've been Yanagi-kun.

And now he's gone, and there's a hole in their team again. Seven members.

Seven members comes with too many painful connotations attached.]

You met Yanagi-kun, didn't you?

[He doesn't say anything else; not what he suspects has happened, not that their data master is gone. But a question like that, in the mood that he's in--no, reading between the lines should be as simple as if he'd said it aloud.]

[ oh. Rise's gaze flashes understanding - not pity, he wouldn't want it, and she doesn't offer it - and then she lowers her eyes. ]

The first time a teammate disappears...

... well, I say that, but it never gets easier.

[ biggest understatement, isn't it, Rise? ]

[He doesn't relax at that, nor does the tension leave his shoulders, but there's a touch of acknowledgement there, too. Things like this are easier when he doesn't have to spell them out, and thereby dwell too much on them in the process.]

The first time. Should I expect others?

[Sanada? Yukimura? Niou?]

It's a possibility.

[ she won't mince words, which is actually a huge indication of Rise's comfort level around Yagyuu. A month ago or so, approximately, she would have scolded him for a pessimistic-seeming question. ]

But that's a bad way to think... it'll just weigh you down. I mean... no one really knows how long we'll be here, or when we're going back, or if someone'll come back or not, and if they do, whether they'll even remember...

[ a pause, and then she sighs. ]

I'm still here.

[The funny part is, it's not even the disappearance that bothers him so much as it is his own helplessness to prevent it. It's not as though they hadn't gone months without Yanagi-kun around before. The breaking of the troika is upsetting, but he's still a step removed from that, free from being affected the way that Yukimura or Sanada might be. It's not as though Niou had gone. And it's not as though he isn't likely better off, anyway, back in Kanagawa where they all arguably belong.

It's funny because it's the helplessness that bothers him, and he and Rise have had this conversation before, not so long ago, with the roles reversed. But they do say it's much easier to give advice than to take it yourself.]

It's useless to get attached to this world, anyway. To think that way, wanting someone to return--shouldn't the perspective be relief that they've escaped, and eagerness for the day we'll manage it ourselves?

[Isn't it dangerous, growing complacent here, and risking forgetting what all they'd left behind?]

If you're asking me, doesn't that mean 'should' isn't always the case of what actually happens?

I think it was more of a rhetorical question than a directed one. Much as I'd like an answer, in this case I don't think there really is one.

Not one anyone'd be happy with.

Mm.

[He turns his eyes back to the water, and the blue noodle dragon that is yet again playing in the waves, and for a long time he doesn't say anything--until at last he remarks aloud, almost absently, as though he's talking as much to himself as to Rise--]

Have you ever just wanted to set off a fire alarm, Kujikawa-san?

[ a pause. ]

... You don't really know how hard it is until it's right there and you can see it every time you turn your head.

No, it's not that it's hard, I don't think. After all, that sort of thing isn't what idols do, is it?

Not at all.

Most idols don't care about calcium sulfate, either.

...The coagulant?

-- Yeah! I've seen it in a lot of the tofu they sell these days, along with glucolactone.

[...Kujikawa Rise, what are you even.]

And that's something you keep track of.

[ what this is totally normal-- ]

Well, yeah. Even if they say it's made with the natural stuff, most of that's just magnesium chloride! There's a definite difference.

[...And for a minute he's legitimately not sure whether he finds it painfully unsettling that this is the sort of conversation he'd picture himself having with Yanagi, or completely unmindful of his previous sulkiness because wait whoa what the hell.]

And you've made an extensive study of the coagulants commonly used in tofu...why, exactly?

[ she pauses at that, with a little noise-- like an "oh" of realization. ]

It doesn't come up that often, but my grandma runs a tofu shop. I've been helping ever since I was little, and I just got interested in learning about it, especially considering the more traditional taste versus the stuff you'd get in most groceries. It's really not boring at all!

Boring wasn't the word that came to mind, no.

[ a trace of a grin now. ]

Unexpected?

I might've gone so far as 'impressive'.

-- Seriously?

[ no, really, she's surprised. Unexpected, she would have seen coming. She's well aware of the connotation idols can get, especially with the reputation 'Risette' had going for her. It didn't fall under ditzy and air-headed. ]

Expertise is generally worthy of being called impressive. Moreso when it's the unexpected variety.

[Moreso still when it's yet another glimpse of something beneath the surface that he's succeeded in drawing out.]

Good to know I can surprise you!

That's not the only thing you've succeeded at, I imagine.

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