destinystrings | Autumn Festival (OPEN)

Entry tags:

Autumn Festival (OPEN)

Who: EVERYONE
Where: Virgo Ward
Summary: Autumn Festival Log! You're all invited!
Warnings: MELONS
Ahh Autumn. The time for harvest, and the normal national holiday that falls on the 24th and 25th. Demons? Angels? Magic? Well nothing's been put on pause, but even the Anoli need to relax once in a while...

With that free time, what's a newcomer like you to do?

Well Hinoto-Ri has much to offer! As they seem to be the only standing city in...well, anywhere, they've tried to merge and adapt as many festivals around the world as they can.

Ergo this Fall festival is a mixture of everything the world could offer. Corn on the cob, Pumpkins, Yaki Imo (Oven-Roasted Sweet Potatoes), Ramen stands, Falafel, caramelized apples...

A giant dragon is tied down in the middle of the waters. At night, you can see a few pixies hover close to it, keeping other monsters at bay. The streets have been decorated as well.

But most importantly, the upper Virgo Ward has been turned in a giant festival area...even more so than usual! Now the millions of stalls don't just try to sell things to you, they sell things to you thematically with this fall! Giant pumpkins and fresh produce made in Libra and Capricorn..did you know that Capicorn has an amazing giant apple orchid, protected by the office of Wands and Swords? Try out some free samples! One taste is enough to convince you that having Persona to irrigate the fields ass a crispness to the fruit..right? Winter outfits...hats are in this year! Listen to some of the new music groups, and get pumped for the upcoming movies!

There is giant mooncake in the middle of all the tents and stalls. Don't worry about the money! Everything's free today! It is a time for sharing and family and...

...being thankful for what you have. No matter how small it might be.

For a city of survivors, Hinoto-Ri is certainly trying to have a good time.

You should join them.

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...wait a minute. She was feeling her cheekbones a lot more than before. And her hair color was different...she pokes at the sides of her waist and...

"You've lost some weight?" Oh my gods, she knew that the whole Nyx thing had been stressful for everyone, but dang!

Despite what she'd told Shinjiro earlier, when she continued thinking about it, one goldfish wasn't enough. If she got a decent-sized tank it would be too lonely for Akihiko all by himself. She needed a few friends for him - maybe a Mitsuru, and a Shinjiro. That would be a good assortment.

And so, when he heads off to get them some food, she sneaks back to the goldfish stand. ...A goldfish stand. She couldn't bring herself to go back to the first one.

Either way, the random shouting of someone else's name doesn't get her to turn around. She has her eye on a maroon-colored fish that looks perfect to add to her collection.

...And then she's nearly dunked into the water tank, yet again. This time by a hug instead of a little boy.

Minako has no time to dodge, but fortuately Miki doesn't manage to get her wet. What she says, though, does get a reaction.

"Ex...cuse me?!"

Did a strange girl just run up to her, tackle-glomp her, and then call her fat? Or say she'd been fat. Either way, Minako is pretty certain she's been slim all her life! She works hard to maintain this figure! She tries to twist to see this person better because the voice is not ringing any bells.

"...wait."

Minako got her wish a few seconds later, as Miki releases the girl as violently as she had grabbed her. It wasn't just the hair color or the lack of baby fat in her sides and cheekbones, no, it was much more than that. The way she was reacting to her, it was like a complete stranger.

One hand stroking her chin, Miki tilts her head as her mind screams everything is wrong. When she finally speaks, the girl's tone is confusion...but not without a hint of anger. It was like doppelganger wearing her best friend's skin...

"...Who are you?"

When the girl releases her, Minako isn't any less confused. White hair, blue eyes, much taller than her... She's very certain she's never seen this girl before. She stands out too much. And yet, something about her is familiar. ...Was this really some student from their school she'd forgotten about? Someone from before Gekkoukan?

But the stare she's getting is really weird. The question with its obvious angry undertone makes it stranger, and throws all those theories out the window.

"..I was wondering the same thing. Do I know you?"

And that spans her right back into utter confusion again. Miki idly tries to adjust the sleeves of her kimono to give her time to think of what to say.

"...you don't?"

Wow, that sure was super riveting and completely helpful for the both of them. Now she wasn't sure if she wanted to tell this person her name.

. . .

Minako shakes her head. Clearly this was some kind of mistake.

"...Let's try this again. My name's Minako. And- let me help you pick these up."

She means the apples rolling all over the ground in front of the fish stand, which has a rather irritated owner glaring at them both. She flashes him a disarming smile and kneels to start trying to place the fruit back in the bags.

"Minako..." Well, that ansers that question. "You could be the twin of someone I know." She sighs. Never did she imagine she could be dumb enough to have thought a perfect stranger was her best friend. Granted, she could pass off as a movie stunt double, but that still was unforgivable! If Minami heard about this, she'd never let her hear the end of it...

"My name's Mi--" she stops just as the other kneels to help out. "Wait, hold on, let me help you with that." They were hers, after all. She starts to do so herself, then realizes that the geta are in the way. Removing one off normally, a slip causes her to accidentally kick the other off, and it flies in air, off into the crowd. After a small gasp of surprise, she groans and looks at Minako sheepishly, rubbing the back of her neck.

"Oh...woops. I should go get that..."

Minako has to giggle at that, but only in a good-natured way. Now that the girl isn't calling her names or glaring at her, she doesn't seem like such a bad person.

"Don't worry, I've had worse accidents today! I'll pick these up while you go find it."

This wouldn't mark the first time Shinjiro's had a geta try its damndest to kill him. Perhaps he should've seen something like this coming, but he hadn't.

All he has is a split-second to react when the geta in question comes flying into his area of vision, and given the festival's current congestion, he doesn't exactly have a lot of room to move. The plastic bag full of taiyaki he's carrying narrows down his options to almost nothing.

Which means, naturally, the shoe hits him in the face—off to the side, nearer his cheek bones, leaving in its wake a long scrape of red, irritated skin, and a promise of a small bruise come morning, with a few disorienting seconds of pain. Two long seconds later, he picks up the geta that's fallen to the ground, and expects he knows exactly who the geta's owner is.

Which, naturally, means he's dead wrong.

His eyes search for Minako as he comes closer to the goldifsh stand, finally spotting her kneeling on the ground, apples scattered around her knees. He weaves through the crowd, holding aloft the geta with his free hand once he's close enough. His voice is as rough as it always is, a single note in its tone lightly accusing. "I think I found your—"

Except then he notices the other girl, the one who's mysteriously missing a single geta. He doesn't know who the younger girl is, but he guesses this means Minako can clear her conscience of any dumbassed wrongdoing.

"Really?" Giggling is contagious, and Miki can't help herself. Despite the fact she doesn't know her, there's almost a strange feeling of comfort, once she's past the weird twin thing. Or maybe it was due to the weird twin thing. "I'd like to hear them la-"

She freezes at the sound of the nearby voice, her eyes widening as her heart skips a beat. Without warning, she tips over and falls, making the bags spill out even more. She doesn't see them. Or the crowd. Or the noise. Nothing. It was as if the entire place had slowed down, become silent.

There's just. No way.

She had to have heard that wrong. But as much as Minako's tone was slightly different than Minamis and had been part of the reason she had realized the other wasn't her friend, Shinjiro's rough voice was as clear in her head as the day he...he...

He had died...

Miki had always prided herself in being able to put a wall and to stand up to even the most bizarre of situations. The talk she had had with Strega's Ken about Shinjiro's death had made her stronger. She had accepted he has passed on, just like her brother had all those years ago. Yet now, she finds herself unable to breath properly, and takes in deep grasps of air, unable to even look in his direction to confirm. As much as she WANTS to calm down and put all those years of teachings to good use, she can't. He can't be alive. It's impossible. Even if she was brought here from another world, she could accept that, but this...this...

Her voice is muffled through her hands, so low that Minako is probably the only one who hears it.

"Shinjiro?"

For Minako, the voice just tells her how small the universe actually is, or maybe that it picks certain people that it really likes to play jokes on. And sure enough, when she looks up he's sporting a bright red mark on his cheek. "It's actually not mine this time..." Really, she's not that clumsy! ...Usually!

But her smart remark fades away as the girl suddenly reacts bizarrely again. Only this time it looks more like fear, or sadness, than anger. A look... close to how she'd felt when she'd first seen him again in Hinoto-ri. And then the whispered name?

"Huh...? Do you know him?"

He shoots Minako a look. He can see that.

He's about to bark out a response when Minako says something else, and his expression is almost bewildered for all of two seconds as he approaches, his eyes slowly wandering over to the girl. She... knew him or something? He searches his memory, but finds nothing to show for the effort—except for the vague, nagging sense of something that might be familiarity, but he can't place it. Maybe he had seen her around Port Island or in school once, but—

Well. All he knows is that, whoever she is, she doesn't look okay. She looks like she's five seconds away from hyperventilating and having a goddamn panic attack.

Striding forward, he finally reaches the two of and kneels down. He stares at the girl for a few seconds, wondering if maybe he shouldn't have come closer at alll. She wasn't scared of him or something, was she? Well shit, maybe she was. Maybe she had a brother or something who was one of the punks he ran into on the street, though she didn't look like she was from that type of crowd. He had never looked for a fight, of course, but there were times when he had had to swing his fists once or twice to defend himself.

"Look—" he hesitates, not sure of what the hell to even say. Instead, he carefully hands the girl her geta, in the same, slow way he might offer something to a cornered, frightened animal. He sighs. "I think this is yours."

Edited 2012-09-28 07:51 (UTC)

Frightened animal was certainly a fitting analogy. She felt she was having an out-of-body experience, watching him as he came near her. None of this felt real. None of this could be real. And yet...the nagging voice in the back of her head that grew louder at each passing second.

What if? What if this was real? What if this wasn't a dream? After all, everything about her brother looking at down at her right now was too perfect to be a mere memory, down to how he acted, his voice, that damn bright coat of his and...she didn't even care if he didn't seem to recognize her or not.

At first, she doesn't look up and nods, starting to reach out for the geta with a single trembling hand. Then without warning, it is pushed aside as she falls into his arms, holding him into a hug she couldn't give when he laid in a pool of his own blood.

This wasn't a dream. This is real. He is here.

"Y-....you're. You're alive..." Her voice cracks, and she breaks into sobs.

He doesn't have a manual for this.

He feels the girl's sudden weight against him and leans back a little bit, body going rigid, but doesn't quite pull away, as utterly surprised as he is. He can't just shove her away, can he? He doesn't even know how to handle this sort of thing in the first place. Girls aren't supposed to cry—no one is. Not Aki, not anyone. Not over him. There's not an inch of him worth crying over. And he still doesn't know how the hell she knows him, or why she'd even bother to get so attached. He only knows that, whatever had happened, whoever he was to her, she had thought he died, which sounded plausible enough, given the circumstances. Doesn't know why a girl like her would care, though.

"Shit. I don't—"

know who you are

But he pauses then, remembering the night he had come here. Plenty of people hadn't remembered things they should have been able to remember then either. But that was something they couldn't help, and couldn't be at fault for. The world here was strange. And someone else's memories didn't necessarily match someone else's, even when, perhaps, they should have.

Perhaps there's a better question to ask. Carefully.

"...You know me?"

Strange enough as it is, his physical reaction just adds even more into the realization that she isn't dreaming. Of course he'd do that. He'd always hated physical contact (which is why she'd always tried to be a pain about it in the moments he least expected it). The sobs continue, as she cries both from happiness and relief. Despite moving on and accepting his death, she isn't going ignore this second chance she's been given...

At least, until he mentions that he didn't remember her. Time stops again, and it feels like she was given a new punch to the gut. Miki can only think back to when Chidori's memories of her time in Strega had left her once she had come back to life...but that also meant she didn't remember any of them. Was her brother in a similar situation? Junpei had tried to help her too, right? Maybe that's what she needed to do now. Granted, this was trying to tie faulty logic at best since it still didn't explain Minami's twin standing close by, nor why he was alive at all. But a Sanada never backed down from a challenge. When she releases him, Miki uses her kimono's sleeves to wipe her nose. Screw attempting to look dignified at this point. She slowly nods, and manages a small smile for him.

"I hope so. We grew up together."

She fights back all urges to just add Jiji to the end of that right there and then. Thankfully, even her subconscious knows it isn't the right time.

It takes a few seconds for her answer to reach his ears, and a few more seconds for his mind to process and interpret what she had told him. When the realization of who she is hits him, it's like electricity is suddenly trying to carve a pathway through his nervous system, searing through his heart, his arms, his brain, jolting through his body like something meant to kill.

And then he just looks at her, stares her down with suddenly wide, disbelieving eyes, like she was some sort of ghost that had just waltzed across his vision—sees the resemblance to her brother in her face and in her eyes. And that's all the confirmation he really needs.

No, he knows you, it's just been a very long time.

She's not exactly how Shinjiro imagined her, the shy, lonely little girl that followed he and Aki around until the sun set. He's had plenty of time to play what-ifs. Like if he had been quicker, hadn't allowed her to stay in her room that day. Had just stopped the cause of the fire, cutting off the flame's life before it had the chance to take hers. For the rain to fall down, or to suddenly live in a world where there's no such thing as fire. But those are all what-ifs, and most of the time, when he imagines her, he doesn't imagine her older at all. He imagines her exactly how he last remembers her the day before she died: and that her is criminally small compared to the woman she is now.

As much as he can hardly believe it, he's more than glad to put his heart into accepting the existence of world that allowed her to grow up, like the universe had finally realized the mistake it had made and set to correcting it—because no one can tell him that dying wasn't one of the biggest mistakes life itself could make. He never wanted to see her brother like that again.

But when he also looks at her, he also sees the fire. The fire that engulfed their childhood and caused life as they had known it to die. He remembers their caretakers holding Aki back, and him standing by him, because he knew, though he wanted nothing more than to rush in and pull her out of that burning building, that he could never do it. He wouldn't make it for one, and he couldn't just leave her brother alone. Her brother meant the world to him, too. Somebody had to look after him now that his sister was gone.

He also sees her broken body they tried to hide from the both of them. It's easy to remembers how angry and sad and crushed he felt when they said they didn't want he and Aki to see her, even though he knew they meant well. They just didn't understand.

All those memories and a host of split-second others come rushing back into him in the space of seconds. Everything around him is suddenly bright and surreal and the noise of the festival is rough and far away in his ears. It's like no one else currently matters, and where they are doesn't either. These few long moments are theirs, and forever will be.

"You idiot," he says, meeting her eyes, hearing his voice rise and break, like someone's cut the strings to a marionette and let it tumble down to the hard, unforgiving earth. Makes a noise at the very back of his throat, like he's trying to reclaim the voice that he's lost, and can't find it—has to make due with this messed up one instead. Then all he does, after setting the bag of food carefully on the ground, is grab her by her suddenly not-small shoulders and pulls her to him, like maybe in a moment he'll wake up from whatever bizarre dream he's having, and realize when he opens his eyes that she had never died in the first place. Or worse, that she had. He's dreamed dreams like this before. "...the hell took you so long?"

Why did you take so long to come home? You were supposed to, didn't you know? You were always supposed to come back, no matter where you ended up or how far away you had gone. They had never stopped waiting for you.

In the background, Minako's expression since Shinjiro knelt by the girl has gone from this to this to just plain shock as she processes the scene in front of her.

This girl knows Shinjiro well enough to break down on seeing him again.
Shinjiro didn't recognize the girl.
The girl and Shinjiro grew up together.
Now Shinjiro does recognize her, and is hugging her like he'd just seen a ghost.

A... ghost... White hair... 'My name's Mi-'

Slowly, still clutching the filled bag of apples, she rises to her feet. This isn't a scene she should be intruding on any longer.

It is this moment when Minato happens to show up. Though he spent a fair amount of time at the karaoke tent or enjoying some of the tasty foods being offered, he has also been casually looking for his sister or any of his friends. He's already exchanged silence with Shinjiro, but hanging out a bit with family at someplace like this seems quite appealing - that is, of course, if Shinjiro will part with his date for a little while. Thus, while scanning the crowds he meanders through, Minato is primarily focused on finding Minako, and when he sees her standing up with a bag of apples through a gap in the throng, he quickly makes his way over.

Although he's wearing neither a festive kimono nor a school uniform, he still manages to stick with a blue theme with jeans, a t-shirt and a hooded jacket whose hood he is totally ignoring except as a place to rest his headphones, when he pulls them off, which he does now. Comfortable, practical things with a dark blue theme ~~just like himself if he were in Strega~~.

He makes an elaborate greeting. "Hey."

Quirking an eyebrow at the sight of Shinjiro hugging someone he absolutely does not recognize, Minato shoves his hands back in his pockets and glances sideways at his sister, questioning.

"W-wha-" Oh gods, now she is right back thinking she is dreaming. As he grabs her into an embrace, it is Miki's turn to flinch and stand upright at the touch. Shinjiro did not do physical contact in any circumstance (that she knew about, anyway). Yet it just takes a few seconds for her to snap out of it - she doesn't know why he's doing it, but she'll take her hugs when she gets them.

She puts on a brave face; the same one he always told her to take whenever anything really bad happened. The sight of him breaking down like he's the one seeing a ghost is confusing, and for a split second she is wondering if she herself died, but that doesn't makes sense.

The last three hours haven't made much sense actually. But...they are nice. Real nice. She bites her lip down as it to a check to see if she is still alive, and the pain shoots in her lip. When she speaks, her voice is a little more level than before, but it's still trembling.

"Y-you're the idiot..."

It was the best she could muster under the circumstances. Maybe if she'd been here for longer, she would have known about the alternate worlds, and the different outcomes in each one; but that, unfortunately, was still too soon.

Maybe if she had, her reaction to the new arrival would have been different.

WHAAAAAAAT.

Suddenly, the mood is ruined by the appearance of the last person she had expected. The stranger (Miki, thank you very much!) in question looks at Minato in a way that could only be described as a mixture of mild annoyance with a what are you doing here. You can't just be this...casual, greeting them like this was some normal thing. What was next? Ken and Jin popping out of the water and doing a Strega conga line? At this point she wouldn't have even bat an eye.

"...Hey."

She sounds about as friendly as her look. You might have saved the world...and saved your sister....alright okay you did do nice things and sure she appreciated all those, but you were still Minato, leader of Strega. You had killed a bunch of people! ...granted you had saved everyone too but still!

Stupid ~~sexy~~ Strega Leader.

Pouty face.

There's still a sense of surreality to everything around him. Time is moving a bit slower than it should—gives him the seconds he needs to slowly begin to piece together the jarring differences between the little girl he remembers and the girl who's in front of him. There's an inner part of him that almost laughs at the absurdity of it—as someone would when driven to the point of exhaustion—at how strange it sounds to hear her talk, especially in a way he's entirely unused to. There's nothing scared, shy, or really all that hesitant about it. She had grown up. She would have never called anyone an idiot—let alone him—back then. But he's also not thinking as clearly as he should, stuck in some limbo between the past he remembers and the now he's experiencing. He then wonders where Aki is.

And then Minato's greeting cuts in, and upon hearing his voice, Shinjiro raises his head and looks around him. He notices the odd look on Miki's face and pieces together that there's something between the two he can't even guess at, the colder greeting evidence of something he'll deal with later. Near him, Minako's standing, seeming like she's seconds away from leaving.

And then—abruptly—the festival suddenly roars back to life, no longer a dull, muted background noise he can easily ignore. The lights are bright and people are everywhere and he feels like he's had the emotional wind knocked out of him by a sledgehammer.

He shouldn't be here. He can't be here.

It takes him a few seconds to feel the stinging redness in his eyes as he pulls back. "We need to talk."

He lets go of her and stands. Picks up his bag as his body tries to compartmentalize and smother everything, force his body to run on some sort of emotionless autopilot, but at the moment it's doing a really shitty job.

He looks at the Arisato siblings then, suddenly relieved that Minato had decided to show up, and wonders, in a way, if this was what the both of them felt upon seeing each other again. He eventually walks over to to the two of them, holding the bag of taiyaki out to Minato. "Take it."

And then his attention drifts over to Minako, and he halfway wonders if she's already figured things out, just as he did. His voice comes out as a rasp, quieter than it should be. "I need to go."

Edited 2012-09-29 03:54 (UTC)

This is one of the strangest atmospheres Minako has ever been a part of. Shinjiro looks like he's on the verge of tears. The girl - Miki - is... pouting? And Minato...

Well, Minato looks about the same as always.

Minako had already planned to slip away, but the tone of Shinjiro's voice confirms that's a good idea. She smiles brightly (and slightly forced for once, but she's trying to inject some cheer back into this bunch) and slides over to her poor, unsuspecting brother. He probably has so many questions right now. "Come on, Minato, I need your help buying a tank for A-- the goldfish I won." Mentioning Akihiko's name probably isn't the best move right now. "...We'll see you later, Senpai."

And she latches onto Minato's arm to steer him away.

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