harmonize_rpg | (no subject)

Who: Mirai and Taue.
Where: Sugi Dorm, Room 618.
When: Monday 24th April, night.
What: Training discussion.

Mirai came inside after visiting the bathroom with his dirty clothes bundled underneath his arm. He was wearing his dark blue nightclothes and his hair was wet and stuck to his face. He slung closed the door to the room. His eyes and lips were thin with fury, his cheeks swollen and his nose up somewhat defiantly.

He was clearly not at all happy about the extra demands on his time. The water on his face seemed to billow off him like vapour. His eyes slanted towards the roommate sitting on his bed. This probably explained the way he felt. He was utterly tired of everything.

"If you ask me," he said, moodily dumping his uniform in a pile beside the foot of his bed. "It looks like our friends can hold their own."

He bent to pick the blazer up and place it on the back of his chair. He was lying about what he thought for a purpose - probably there was no better way about learning what his roommate thought about things than when he was raising his voice. He knew he could not hide much from his roommate. In the hectic pace of training, he had grumbled while everyone brought wind to life and blew those targets to the moon.

But when he finally put his spirit to task he had felt some power that showed him there was another way to have a good time. He blinked water out of his eyes and relished the thought of an argument. Then he calmly climbed into bed, where he turned on his elbow and stared at Taue. "What did you think of today?"

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After his discussion with Chloe, Taue had absconded back to his dorm room for some peace and quiet -- which hadn't lasted anywhere near as long as he'd wanted due to the return of Mirai.

Deep down, though, for once he was actually glad of the presence of his roommate. It was someone to talk to about, well, *everything* that was happening. If he'd really wanted quiet, Taue knew, he'd have gone back to the Estate to sleep.

"Seems so," he agreed, non-commitally as the other boy re-entered the room from his shower. "Maybe for short bursts at a time, but overall, yeah. Training's not going to be much fun, I don't think."

Reclined back in his bed in his pajamas, Taue was basically done for the night with anything productive -- talking with Mirai rarely counted as anything productive. Tonight, though, might be a bit different.

"Today sucked," he replied, easily enough. "Just like the day before, and the day before that. I'm a soldier for glorious Nippon fighting a war against enemies out of a science fiction novel. Long as that's true, there's a limit to how happy I can be, you know?"

Mirai saw it was time for some meaningful talking. He thought of all the answers that would give at least some annoyance to the scientists if they learned they came from him.

"Yeah, I know. But at least we're still allowed out, right?"

A little humour first, he thought. One funny thing. For it was now at that point in the situation when even he would have to drop the act and focus, simply because life was the only gift he had. It was responsibility he did not want. How long would he have to work before he could even be rid of it?

"And, curious guy that I am, I'm wondering about these things," he continued, gesturing at the Evoker on the desk. "For certainly we weren't the first, right?" He was almost gleeful about making things worse for them. "What did they have to do to learn about all this?"

"Oh, we're probably allowed out, but I imagine they won't make it /easy/," Taue replied, chuckling a bit. "They don't have much of a choice in the matter. You think they'd keep either of us around if they didn't have to? We're not exactly model soldiers -- Hell, with a few exceptions, Rules-kun in particular, we're almost nothing those scientists probably want."

It was a happy piece of irony for Taue, Kobe's contrarian prince.

"Beats the Hell out of me," Shinichiro shrugged, as Mirai continued his curious wonderings. "We can't have been the first, but I really don't care about how they found out about this. I mostly just care that it's our reality now. It's not just a bunch of scientists blowing smoke -- we've seen too much. SOMETHING deeply fucked up is going on, Mirai. Something important enough that they're stuck with a bunch of misfit, talented kids as their only hope."

"... Hmmmm."

Mirai rolled over and rested on his back. The relief it gave him to lie down was cut short by worrying about the mess the scientists had to be in to draft the help of teenagers. Had a couple of army folk making sure they were trained. Because, from then on, he was obviously going to have his life regimented. To give whatever help they ordered. He sighed.

He stopped worrying, frankly sick. Luckily, Taue and he seemed to see eye to eye for once. He turned the conversation to it too, changing the subject.

"Well then, your comparison's the first thing we have in common. It's the strangest thing I've ever heard of."

"Yeah," Taue agreed. "If they made a movie out of it, no one would believe it. Too ridiculous...which is why I think it's gotta be true. It sucks, don't get me wrong, but..."

Taue, too, began to wander mentally to that question of *just what the Hell was going on?* His reaction was similar, a sigh and a shake of his his head.

"Thinking about it'll send me to the grave earlier than whatever's gonna be thrown at us. So, what's up, Mirai? How's Ikebana?"

Small talk was not Taue's strong suit, at all, but both he and Mirai seemed in need of some good old fashioned discussion about nothing tonight.

"Fine," said Mirai, but he said it too casually, turning back onto his side again. "I love their smell, you know. Flowers are a wonderful thing. They are beautiful to look at. But they don't make a scary face. And you don't have to worry about their tears."

His head bobbed as he took a relaxing sink into his pillow.

"I'm sorry. I guess I'm boring you. But it's strange that you should ask so openly about a bunch of flowers though, Taue. Are you searching for something to give the most precious of your ladies?"

"That may be," Taue replied, with a wry smile on his face, "but they're not very much fun to make out with."

Still, he wondered what exactly Mirai was getting at. The would-be casanova probably had girls all over campus -- Miyume was the only one he knew of, so assuming he'd had a falling out with her was no sure bet.

"No precious ladies," he replied, heaving an overdramatic sigh. "In the middle of a self-imposed dry spell for the time being. Got to get used to this place and its...uniqueness before I start going out again. Classes are bad enough without magical headgod training adding to it. Guess I just...wanted to make conversation, really. I don't know."

Not enjoying an idle conversation as much as Taue likely thought of him, Mirai was lying stretched on his back, staring ruminatively out at the ceiling above. He kept imagining he was in his bedroom back home, wondering what the conversation would turn to this time. He heard strong opinions, angry voices and all sorts of information. It made him as quiet as Taue was.

His eyes in the most curious and nervous way went to his roommate. Cloudy white thoughts began to cover his mind. He found he could not think of anything else to discuss.

"Don't you have a home you can go to, Taue?"

"I do," he admitted, "but I spend two nights a week there as is, if you haven't noticed. "Dad thinks I need to be on campus more and meet my fellow future of Japan, or some nonsense like that."

Home did have better food and furnishings than the dorm, but the company, especially when his dad was on one of his "future of TaueCorp" kicks, was roughly equivalent.

"Besides, bad idea to go home when I've got all this headgod shit stuck in my head. What about you? Your dad's pretty important, I hear."

Mirai groaned. He thought about the training. He thought about his Persona. He could not think about Ryouya now.

"No, he isn't. He's just my father."

Anyone could come in here and ask him about his old man and find his reaction the same. If Taue was to try and find a bitter one, he would be displeased. In fact, he was simply indifferent. He got up and seated himself portentously on the edge of the bed. The thought of discussing this issue so underwhelmed him that he turned his gaze heavenward and chose to address the issue, regardless of his reservations. This was something he could handle in his sleep.

"But yeah. I guess so? The old man had to pull some big strings to rush me in here. Your dad's pretty famous, right?"