destinystrings | (no subject)

Who: Misery, OPEN
Where: The Rooftop of Libra, at night. May result in a 13th Hour Thumping session later, if desired.
Summary: Even talented witches need to clear their heads.
Warnings: Potential Misery snideness.
It was all well and good to talk about doing something, but Misery has been forced to admit after a few days of this that she's mostly just going in circles.

The astrology stuff hasn't helped. Certainly, there's no easy "snap your fingers" solution to the effects of the zodiac on people. Normally, one could probably cut off the effects by just not believing in it, but a fat lot of good that had done back during that night considering most people weren't even aware their birth signs were related.

The search for baku wasn't working too well either. She'd been out and about blasting demons, but none of them had looked like the one she was looking for, and none of the components she'd found seemed to have any effect on the subconscious mind. Which had meant far too frequently dreams forcing her to think about days she'd rather not think about.

That's not really an issue tonight. She can't sleep.

She sits on the edge of the building she lives in, looking out over the city. So many buildings. Mother had told her the island had been like that once. Full of buildings, bustling crowds, life. All destroyed in a night. Such power had fascinated her once. Now she just wants to forget she had anything to do about it. And her own brain isn't even letting her do that.

"Blast it all, what will it take to be free for real," she mutters under her breath.

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She sighs in frustration. "Not even remotely. I thought that Narumi Detective Agency might help, but so far they've been perfectly useless." She grunts. "A pity. Such a creature would be a great advance for my research."

Mostly by getting her brain to shut up so she can focus on it.

"How about you? How goes your own investigations?"

"The astrology stuff?" Atsuro pauses before glancing down towards his messenger bag and flipping it open. After a few moments of digging around, he hands Misery a gossip rag.

"Here. This pretty much sums it up." ...It was too dark to see, but she could probably guess what was covered inside. "I'm like, totally gonna fall in love with a Taurus cause their rock-hard stability balances out the melancholy of a Capricorn under Venus?"

She blinks, and flits through it. "Oh my, how scandalous. I didn't think this was your sort of reading material! Oh deary deary me." She smirks, and passes it back. "Although I suppose you're commenting that there's some sort of compability issue related to the astrology signs."

"Yeah, actually." Atsuro nods as he shoves the magazine back into his bag.

"Someone suggested that the people who were affected had compatibility issues with the Scorpio sign. From what I've been able to tell, it's hard to get a clear picture of which signs are supposed to go with which - the Chinese zodiac is a lot more blatant about this kind of thing."

He shrugs. It was still a lead to follow up on, anyway. "I'll try to find more definitive books later."

"Hmm. Could be significant. It may also allow us to understand if we see anybody else besides the upcoming birth zodiacs acting strange. Though it would be better if we could block the effect altogether." She looks out. "Ridiculous, isn't it? To lose control simply by the fate of the stars. What cruel God of this world decided THAT, hmm?"

"Maybe that's the wrong way to think about it." Atsuro still isn't courageous enough to sit on the edge of an ungated roof, but he'll sit on the ground just shy of it. "There's something out there that's responsible for this; no doubt about it. And they chose the Zodiac as... as a vehicle for their plans. Maybe it had to be the Zodiac, but still..."

He allows his thoughts to settle in the still night air as he leans back to gaze up at the stars. "We've got to believe we can gain control, right?"

She stares at him, for a bit. And then... laughs. "Ho ho ho! You're absolutely correct! I knew I kept you around for a reason!" You might get the feeling you've increased her trust in you. Just a little. "The question is, what IS the agenda? Hard to know where to begin looking on that."

"...?"

Atsuro sits up and blinks at Misery for a moment. ...Apparently, he had said something correct there.

"The only coordinated enemy we've got here is the Anoli. The agenda there is to make a world for only Persona users, right? This doesn't seem up their alley..." A frown as he considers. "I don't think it's butterfly-mask testing us, either... It's a little too extreme for that."

"How positively obnoxious. Life would be so much easier if we could simply find the root and extract it." She sighs. "Always more work to do, I suppose. No rest for the wicked, eh?"

"Or the shining virtuous heroes of light, either." Atsuro shrugs good-naturedly as he turns his gaze back upwards at the stars.

"Eh, I don't think I'll be making any fantastic breakthroughs in the next fifteen minutes, anyway. Work can wait for the morning."

"Fair enough, I suppose. Although if we're not careful watching the time, we'll be putting in overtime anyway. Ho ho."

She looks up at the stars. The temptation flits through her head, briefly, to talk to him about something more. But... no, such things are better left to oneself. Makes you look less weak. Still...

"Hmm. What do you make of this world, anyway? Rather fascinating, isn't it?"

"The novelty's worn off a little by now." Atsuro shrugs to himself. "Wake up, go to work, play some games, fight demons or go to bed early on alternate days. ...You can get used to anything if you give it enough time."

He continues after a brief pause. "But yeah. ...Fascinating is right - apart from history and astrology, there's still a lot of questions to ask. Both about this world and about... why we're here. ...What did that guy see in us? We've got these powers that are representative of... something, but what does it really mean?"

She looks at her nails. "Hard to say, really. Whoever it is doesn't seem to be particularly picky. Who really understands what goes on in the heads of the powerful? I swear there's not an organized thought in their brains."

She shrugs. "Power's a fool's game anyway."

((Sorry for the wait! I went on mini-hiatus for a bit. Feel free to ignore if you'd rather drop the thread!))

A brief frown as he considers Misery's response.

"Yeah... I can't disagree, but... I was thinking more along the lines of... something else."

It was hard to express how he felt about the situation. 'But what does it mean?' was as clear as he was going to get, and he figured Misery would get sick of that question pretty quickly.

"Anyway. I guess a part of me is ready to go back home to my nice normal world by now."

"Who cares about meaning? It puts far too many worry lines in one's forehead." She shrugs.

She looks out over the city. "Yes, well, personally I needed a relocation anyway." She adds, almost to herself, "Didn't have much at home anyway."

He considers, for a moment, venturing some hypotheses about her world and her background based on what he's gleaned out of conversation with her. After a few moments, he decides that he would prefer not to spend the rest of his time here as a frog if he could help it. Best to leave it be for a moment.

"...Yeah. This has to be a new beginning for some of us here. ...I've met a few who've died at home, you know. This is all they've got left."