cityofhex | (no subject)

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After certain things go not at all as planned, Ryoji is a little bit exhausted. That's not as emotionally and physically draining as going to the Underworld would have been, but he's certainly in no shape to try after that or he may very well get stuck down there. Which would be very, very bad.

He is actually going to look for whatever might make people more 'real,' even if he's got no clue what that actually means. He knows something's off, can feel he's forgetting something, but for the life of him he can't figure out what it is or if it's even relevant to the current issue. There's some vague wanderings to the park, and he stops by the coffee shop for a desperately needed pick-me-up, and he goes to the library to get in touch with the Twilight Network. Looks like no one has a clue what he saw, but at least some people offered to keep an eye out for him.

Wherever you find him, though, there's one constant. He looks exhausted.

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"...You said that it might have said that you had more of it. Maybe you were especially alive? ...How did it know you?"

Oh, so that's another common knowledge that they either don't know here or that isn't true. Uh. She is. No historian. Or scholar. Or, well, somone who knows anything about history past some super basics. But mana is very important to what she does, so she at least has some rudimentary theoretical knowledge. "Mana is ...the stuff that lets things be magical. It's like... the spirit of the universe." No, that doesn't sound right. "If there is a lot of mana in the air people become trolls and such and can do magic and the dragons wake up and so on. And if there is less in the air everything becomes more mundane. But you can also knock people out with mana or build barriers that spirits can't walk through. And mana storms are dangerous."

"Yeah, but I still died once and have a geist hanging out with me." That's probably a too casual way of referring to his geist. He doesn't care. "It didn't know me. Whatever it was, it could just... tell, I think." Unless it did know him and he didn't know it, which might be worse.

"I... see." He doesn't see at all. He's pretty sure her home is just... weird.

"...What exactly did it call you?"

Okay, that tree had to have been somewhere around here. Fairly close to the campus buildings. She starts looking around while they walk to not miss it.

"I don't know. I didn't understand the word. Other than I was real." He looks around with her, trying to spot where they're going. "What are we looking for?"

"There's a tree with gears in it nearby. You couldn't see them before, but maybe you can see them now."

She spots the picnic table in the distance. Ah, yes. That should be it.

"In here?" ...Hm. Yeah, Ryoji doesn't remember seeing any gears. And as they draw closer to the tree, he shakes his head. "No, I still don't see anything..."

She frowns and then grabs his hand. Maybe if she pushes his fingertips against the gears - in a way that they won't be crushed if the gears move, of course - he will feel it?

Unless he resists, she'll run his fingers over the gears, letting him feel instead of see what of them stands out far enough to be reached.

When she puts his hand against the tree, his eyes widen. That... that is not bark.

"I can feel it," he says, voice very, very confused, but fingers tracing over the gears, "There are gears, but why can't I see them?"

"I don't know. They are all over the city, though. ...Sometimes they are cables and bridges and weird things that look two hundred years old and let off steam, too.

...You shouldn't reach in there, they move sometimes." She lets go of his hand as soon as she's certain that he has felt the gears, though. His responsibility.

Oh, right. That would probably hurt. He's got enough of an idea now, at least, pulling his hand back. "That's really weird. I've never seen anything like that." Maybe he'll be able to notice it now, but he still can't see these.

"Most people here seem to be unable to see it." Which is really weird. "And it looks like what you described, just that it doesn't talk the wrong way around."

...She wonders if she could ask the guy in the cafe or Nogee about this. But she's not quite sure if she trusts either of them, and doesn't actually have a means of finding Nogee. Aside from running into him by chance, which seems to happen rather often.

"Huh." That really doesn't make any sense. "I don't understand any of this." He knew there were things hidden from most people in this city, but this is severely throwing him. Why is the person who literally just got here able to see it?

"...There's someone who might know more that I can ask, but I don't know when I'll see him next." And she'd rather not risk Nogee or the coffee shop guy knowing who the person with the experience was. "Could you type a description of what you saw into my commlink, so I can show him?"

It doesn't answer why he cannot see the gears, but maybe it can help with the answer.

Edited 2016-12-04 17:52 (UTC)

"Yeah, I can send you something." Though really, any description he can come up with doesn't do it justice. He does appreciate the idea of sending the description, though... he doesn't know who she's going to take it to, but this isn't the kind of thing he wants random people to know he saw. "Thanks."

"I won't mention that you were the one to see it."

She probably should have clarified that earlier. Even if he didn't demand it, it's important. He's nice, and useful, and she doesn't want him to get hurt because he got involve in things that aren't dead people.

"Thanks." It's good to have it out there, at least. Ryoji doesn't know what's going on, and he would take the risk of having his name out there if he had to, but... if he doesn't have to he doesn't want it to be. "...You been doing ok?"

"A friend got me a better place to stay," or well, at least a more permanent one. Also not necessarily a friend, but the closest that she has to one here, and she uses 'friend' for all people that are important to her, anyway, "and I figured out how to get food easily."

"That's good!" Both of those, even if he's not sure how legally she's doing much of anything. It probably doesn't matter. "Where are you staying? It's going to be getting cold soon..."

"There."

She points into the direction of the tent city in the park, or where she assumes it to be - in other words, into a direction that could mean anything or nothing.

"Nearby the friend who got me the place."

At this point, Ryoji hasn't run into Tobias yet, so he has no idea whom she might be talking about. "Oh. That's pretty nice. Do you have enough blankets and stuff?" That was more his point.

Can you ever have enough blankets?

"Not really. Why?"

Though she figures that people will try to nick some if she has too many.

Ryoji shrugs. "I can try and get you some, if you need. Unless... I don't know, how much warmth do you need?" Since she's a shapeshifter and all. Maybe she can be a bear and hibernate.

Assuming she sleeps the way she is now, which she usually does? "As much as anyone else in a thick coat."

More or less. She'll heal mild hypothermia or minor frostbites quickly enough that it will be uncomfortable but not dangerous, but she'd really rather not.

"Oh. ...We'll find you some blankets." Somehow. It's probably best if she doesn't freeze to death, after all.

"Why are you trying to give me stuff?"

The guy with the sister's little speech didn't help with her assumption that unless there is an obvious reason for it to not be the case - like it being a soup kitchen - people will always want something in return. And she already owes him two favours.