A Freakish Occurance

[Some Old Guy]

Just a random idea that came into my head. It involves Emi and Rin having an "out of body experience." Just throwing this down for fun, and hopefully you like it.

===

Emi looked down at her legs. She hated this dream. She hated it more than anything. It always stuck with her for the rest of the day. But she didn't cry this time.

"Screw it. I'm going to enjoy it, just this once." Her voice sounded a little heavier than usual, but whatever. It wasn't going to stop her from taking over this dream.

She stood up, making fists with her toes, feeling the carpet. She had a soft smile on her face. She had almost forgotten what it felt like to be bare-foot. Some small part of her mind must have held onto it for all those years. It's funny, the things that you can get nostalgic about. She bent her knees, going up and down, then started to do lunges. She moaned softly as she felt herself stretch out, and her smile got a little wider. She even giggled a bit. She wasn't going to let this get on top of her, not today. Yeah, maybe she'd get a little sad when she woke up, but it wasn't going to dominate her. She was eighteen years old; it was about time she kicked this thing to the curb.

She stood up, bouncing on the balls of her feet. She cracked her neck, and then went to grab her foot with the opposite hand, looking to hold it behind her while she stood and stretched her thighs.

She missed.

"The hell?" She tried again. She missed again.

"Oh, come on," she grumbled, "just as I was getting the hang of this." She went to brush the red hair out of her eyes. She missed.

She grumbled some more and shook her head, looking to clear her vision, but she caught sight of an annoyed looking Rin. She gave her a nod, "Hey, what's up?"

Rin pantomimed her perfectly, but didn't say anything.

Emi rolled her eyes. This dream started sad, got uplifting, and now was just plain weird. She decided to just go with the flow until she woke up. She walked over to Rin, saying, "Hey, lookie what I got!"

Rin pantomimed her perfectly, but didn't say anything.

Emi narrowed her eyes, annoyed herself, "I'd figured you'd have arms or something. This is just kind of boring. And childish."

Rin didn't answer.

Emi was actually a little upset. She went to give Rin a light shove. It was just a dream, anyway. Heh, maybe now was her chance to grab Rin by the shoulders and ask her to stop being so weird. Nah, if Rin didn't act weird, she wouldn't be Rin; she'd be no fun. She still went to shove Rin, though.

She never reached Rin. Rin pointed a stump at her.

Now Emi was somewhat concerned. She went to rub the sleep out of her eyes. She missed. She looked closer at Rin. Rin was in a window. No.

Rin was in a mirror.

Rin's eyes were getting really wide. So was her mouth. Rin was stammering something at the same time Emi was. Funny, it sounded a lot like Rin.

Then Emi heard Emi yell, and it was followed by a thud. It sounded like it was coming through the wall. Emi ran to the door, and tried to open it.

She missed. She kicked the handle. It opened, but only because the handle got stuck in her pants leg, ripping it somewhat as she pulled back. She didn't stop to think about it, and ran into the hallway. She could hear a muffled moan coming from behind a door, and she stepped up to it. She briefly glanced at the room number, but figured she was seeing things. It couldn't be that number, it just couldn't.

She hammered her head into the door to knock, then wondered why she just didn't kick it.

Emi heard her own voice, albeit rather monotone, answer her, "Emi? Is that you?"

"Um, yes! Who is that?"

"Me. Talking to me. But me says Emi. I'm rhyming now, and I think I swallowed a whole bunch of helium in my sleep. Also, I've fallen and can't get up."

"Hold on!" Emi kicked at the door, but almost fell over when the handle wouldn't budge. "Dammit! Rin, the door's locked!"

"Oh. When did I do that? And when did I paint this room orange? And get really bad taste?"

"Just open the damn door!"

Rin, or, Emi, or, Rin? Rin was on the other side of the door, so Rin grumbled something, and then there were sounds like something slapping at the floor. Rin asked, "Do I just turn the little thingy in the handle?"

"Yes!"

"Alright, alright, calm down." The handle was jostled as Rin slapped at it. When it stopped, Rin said, "Okay, the good news is that it's unlocked. The bad news is, I have no idea on how I'm going to open this. My feet look all weird n' stuff."

"Stand back!" Emi yelled. She kicked at the door, and missed horribly. All she managed to do was land on her back and yelp in pain.

"Emi?"

"Um... I've fallen and can't get up."

Rin sighed. "Hold on, I have an idea." Rin let out a few grunts, and then said in a strained manner, "...okay, I hope this works..."

The door slowly swung open, and Emi just stared, wide-eyed. She saw herself doing a hand-stand, pushing the door open with the stumps of her legs. Hand-stand Emi then locked eyes with Emi, and blinked a few times. They stared at each other like that for a few moments. A girl walked past them, shaking her head.

Hand-stand Emi then spoke, "Freaky."

Emi gritted her teeth, "Well, can I come in?"

"Yeah, I guess. Well, you better. Your shirt's open." Hand-stand Emi dropped to the floor and rolled inside.

Emi yelped again when she saw that her shirt was indeed open, and rolled inside herself, kicking the door shut behind her.

[griffon8]

Good grammar, clear story structure, humorous and outrageous story. I approve.

[Some Old Guy]

Thanks, griffon.

Part 2!

===

They just stared at each other.

Rin, through Emi's mouth, said, "Huh, so that's how it looks."

Emi, speaking through Rin's, asked, "What looks like what?"

"My hair." Rin cocked her head to the side, "I don't get what the big deal is. It looks fine. Actually, it looks good."

Emi raised an eyebrow, "Don't you look in the mirror?"

Rin's usual uninterested sleepy face looked strange when worn on Emi's, "No."

Emi rolled her eyes, "Then why don't you get rid of it?"

Rin moved her arms, "I can't pick it... wait." She looked seriously at Emi, "Pick me up, let me ride on your back. I need your help to do something."

Emi narrowed her eyes at Rin, "Put your legs on and do it yourself."

Rin took a long look at Emi's prosthetics while Emi finally managed to get herself in a sitting position. Emi smirked, "It's actually not that hard..."

And then, she realized something. She drew a sharp breath, "Oh, crap, practice!"

"Practice?"

"Track! What am I going to do?" She looked at Rin nervously.

Rin shrugged, "Um... call out?"

Before Rin knew it, Emi surged towards her until their faces were only a few inches apart, "You have no idea, do you? No freakin' idea on how hard I work for that squad, do you? I can't take a single day off."

Rin blinked, "Uh..."

"You're going to have to do it."

"What?"

"I'm serious, Rin. There's a big meet soon, and if I slack off for even one day, I'm screwed. I'll be damned if I let you ruin my body."

"So... this is friendship?"

Emi leaned back, and had a nasty smirk on her face, "Oh yes, looking out for each other? Damn right. And you're eating today. You're going to eat everything I put in front of you."

"Okay. But don't touch it. Make one of your own."

Emi cocked her head, confused, "What? Well, yeah, I'm not going to steal your lunch..."

"And don't eat it. You like to eat. Don't eat it. It probably wouldn't be good for you, anyway."

"Huh?"

"And don't be too nasty to Nomiya."

"Wait, Rin, what are you talking about?"

Now Rin was smirking, "If I go to track practice, you have to go to the Art Club." Emi's face went blank, and Rin continued, "I'd just call out, but the Art Club has stuff I need. Paints, canvas, brushes, whatever. Sometimes Nomiya gets mean when I don't go for a while, says stuff like, 'Well, Rin, Art Club materials are for Art Club members.' So you gotta go."

Emi looked down at her feet. "What... what the... what am I supposed to do there?!"

Rin shrugged, "Think of something yourself. He's going to want you to work on what I was working on, but...," and then Rin threw herself at Emi until their faces were only a few inches apart, "If you ruin my painting, I swear, I'll run down to the Shanghai and start eating cake. And I don't know when I'll stop."

Emi was still breathing hard when Rin backed away. She looked at her feet, "Rin? What if we don't switch back? What are we going to do?"

Rin closed her eyes and leaned her head back. She started to take deep breaths through her nose, letting them out of her mouth. Her face became peaceful, zen-like, and sagely. After a few moments, she leaned back forward, slowly opened her eyes, and locked them on Emi's, who's mouth was agape with anticipation.

"I don't know," Rin said.

Emi crawled over to her prosthetics, sighing, "Lemme show you how to put these on."

[AntonSlavik020]

This is likely the strangest thing I have ever read.

[griffon8]

"I don't know," Rin said.

I absolutely knew that's what she was going to say. Perfect.

[KeiichiO]

Interesting...

Keep it up! That is, if you're planning on continuing this story. If so, KEEP IT UP!

[Mirage_GSM]

Well, it goes without saying that the story is extremely strange, but even if we take the premise as a given, your Rin is speaking like a normal person. She's not a bit Rin-like...

[KeiichiO]

Well, it goes without saying that the story is extremely strange, but even if we take the premise as a given, your Rin is speaking like a normal person. She's not a bit Rin-like...

Rin wasn't a normal person to begin with? What is she, a xenomorph?

I think he's doing a pretty good job at portraying Rin. It's not perfect by any means, but it's good. I'm sure there's times where Rin isn't at her Riniest, and let's just pretend that's true in this piece.

[Mirage_GSM]

If you read my post carefully, you'll notice that I never said Rin wasn't a normal person.
I said she doesn't normally speak like one. She does here. Without other clues she could be a second Emi...

[Some Old Guy]

I shall conduct more research (Rin-search? Okay, I'm sorry, that was bad...) on Rin. It's been a while since I've gone through her route. She's actually really hard to write, much harder than I thought. She struck me as impulsive, always just saying what's on her mind most times (obviously not all the time, hence the giant flood of text she spews occasionally at Hisao). Thanks for the input, though! I'd rather take my time and get it right then just breeze through this.

[Some Old Guy]

Damn, posting is making me nervous.

Anyway, Part 3! (split in two because worried post size would break the space-time continuum)

She was confused. The sky was nothing but blue, and everyone seemed pleased about it. It just looked boring to her. Nothing was going on, just predictability. Nothing to guess at, no random chance of rain, no sudden cloudiness. Nothing but the sun to look at, and it didn't want her to look at it; it kept hurting her eyes.

"Um, Emi?"

"Shhh."

"Are you...?"

"One second." It was shining so bright, the center of attention, but it didn't want anyone to look at it. She narrowed her eyes, watching as her lashes extended towards it like fingers. But if her eyes closed too tight, she wouldn't see anything. There was no grabbing it. Maybe it wasn't on purpose. Maybe the problem was with her. She couldn't comprehend its brightness. Maybe it was hiding something. Maybe the problem wasn't her. Maybe it was just really attention grabbing and obnoxious, and just as empty as the sky around it. Maybe that was the secret.

"So, yeah, Emi..."

Rin brought her head back down quickly, and the rash movement caused her neck to crack so loud the boy in front of her flinched and started to look ill. The boy's face was purple; actually, everything was smeared purple for a few seconds. She blinked, and saw that the darkness behind her eyelids was tainted with green. For better or for worse, the sun's brightness had affected her. Mostly in an attention grabbing and obnoxious way. Like a really loud person in a crowd, but when you walked up to them, they had nothing to say.

The boy tried again, approaching Rin as if she were an animal trapped in a corner, "Are you okay?"

Rin shrugged. She was serious; she had no idea on what to think of the lonely sun, and why it was hurting her so much.

The boy straightened up, but still looked tense, "Are you going to run today?"

The green behind her eyelids suddenly looked similar to Emi's narrowed green eyes. She thought about her painting. "Yes. I will run with you. Over there. And... run." She nodded at the track. "There will be running."

The boy slowly nodded, and started to back away from her, "Oh, okay, well, let's... let's just go to the others, okay?"

He seemed to like saying okay a lot. Maybe that was their thing. "If that's okay with you."

"Yeah," he said, and started to the track. Rin watched him for a moment, then started to bounce over to the track team. Bounce, because she was walking on Emi's blades. At first, Rin had been really put off by Emi's prosthetics. She didn't really stumble about; it didn't take too long for her to get used to them, but she had still been walking much slower than usual. She hated not feeling the ground beneath her feet. She felt like she was cut off from the rest of the world, like she was just orbiting above it, unable to make any real contact. That train of thought had been dogging her the entire day; it hit too close to home for her.

But then, the blades. Oh yes, the blades. The bouncy, bouncy blades. Her arms were held straight at her sides, her eyes were only somewhat open, and she had a smile. It almost looked really, really sly. She hadn't taken a single step with the blades. She had taken over a thousand bounces. One foot would be on the ground, and the other would be held up in the air with the knee bent. Then once she was airborne, she would quickly (and even somewhat mechanically) stomp one blade down and piston the opposite knee upwards to hold the other in the air. Every once in a while, she'd let out a tiny giggle. Bouncy, bouncy, bouncy, bouncy, bouncy, bouncy...

"Ibarazaki?"

She stopped perfectly still, threw a tired glance across the entire team, and gave an uninterested sounding, "Hello."

Everyone else turned back to the person standing in front of them all, the lanky track captain. The captain couldn't tear himself away from Rin, though. Rin looked right back at him. Nobody said anything. After a few moments of this, the team looked back to Rin, then back at the captain, and continued to go back and forth between the two like they were watching an invisible game of tennis. The track captain licked his lips and gulped. What was she staring at? Well, it only made sense that she was looking at him. He was filling in for the coach that day, who had come down with a really nasty summer cold. It was something about that look that unnerved him. It wasn't particularly intimidating, but at the same time, it was. It was hard to explain. It wasn't the hard look that someone would give you when they were trying to make you submit without saying a word, as if you didn't forfeit they might slug you; like when you and a brutish person walk up to a line at the same exact second. But he still felt like curling up in a ball, not even just averting his eyes. She seemed to be looking through him, around him, and at him all at once. A weird proverb, that the eyes are the window to the soul, popped up in his head. Was that what was going on? Had he done anything to Emi over the past few days? That would be awful if it upset her that much and he couldn't even remember it, throwing it away as trivial. What the hell was he thinking?! They were all still just standing there! Say something! Anything! Nothing is happening!

He nearly fell over backwards when Rin said again, "Hello."

The track captain collected himself, or tried to, "Uh, yeah, hello Emi! How are you?"

"I'm okay."

"Well, then, erm, why don't you take a knee?"

[Some Old Guy]

Part 2 of Part 3!

Rin nodded, and then sat down on the grass with the rest of the team, albeit in the far back. The track captain shook his head to clear it, and then launched into why he was leading practice that day, and about the upcoming meet. Rin just looked back and forth over the team, eying the backs of their heads. She caught sight of Miki, who looked like she wanted to say something, but then turned back forward, thinking better of it. They were all visibly excited, barely able to keep still. Not all of them were smiling, though. She wondered why that was. Maybe they were just nervous. She cocked her head to the side, thinking that was weird. They were all weird people. She understood doing something because you wanted to, but when that included being better than other people she was suddenly stumped. Why did Emi run, anyway? Because of her dad, she had told Rin, and that was it. Rin pursed her lips and furrowed her brow. Emi was her "Emi-est" when she ran, but Rin had watched her run by herself, and Emi was no where near as "Emi" as when she was running a meet. She had seen all these other people, but they didn't seem the same as Emi, but they were, at least a little bit. Maybe.

The track captain clapped his hands together, "And that's it! Any questions?"

"Yes."

"What is it, Emi?"

"What are we doing?"

The captain deflated a bit, "Hills, Emi. Today we're running hills. Any other questions?"

There weren't any, so everyone stretched, and jogged over to one of the hills on the grounds. There were absolutely no trees around, so the sun pressed onto their backs with no restraint. Rin didn't feel the least bit tired, though. Emi's body didn't seem to know when to quit. It could also hold it's breath for five minutes. At least, when she picked herself up off the rooftop and regained her senses, she found that five minutes had passed. She had laid back down right after. At least she was refreshed. Sky looked a bit less blue, though.

It wasn't until she saw the team heading back down the hill towards her that she started up herself. Her arms stayed locked at her sides, and she started to jog up the hill. She teetered side to side, unsure why she was unable to keep her balance, but she kept going, managing not to fall. The sun looked like it was directly in front of her. She climbed towards it, focusing on it. But when she reached the top, she had to turn back and start heading down, trying even harder to stay up. She almost flung herself down the hill, nearly unable to control her speed. Her turns were long and not tight at all, the blades falling well outside the path the team was beating into the grass. She got a few worried looks. It annoyed her, so she surged back up the hill, now in the middle of the pack.

Up to the sun, away from the sun. Up to the sun, away from the sun. Sweat was breaking out across her. Even Emi's body had its limits. She kept going. Up. Still out of reach. Down. Over, and over again.

Practice ended, and the track captain called them all together for a quick wrap up after a cool down lap. Rin kept her eyes skyward, watching the sun retreat behind the horizon. No way to catch it, now. She didn't show anything in her posture, but her face might have been slightly wistful.

The track captain sidled up to her, being they were the only two left, "Hey, is something wrong?"

Rin reflected on his words, then turned to look up at him, "Why do you run?"

"Me?" He looked taken aback, but not entirely, "I don't know. I'm kind of good at it, I guess. I also like the way I feel. Both when running and, well, health-wise. Nothing really takes the wind out of me these days." He looked at the sunset, "I kinda feel like I accomplished something every time I come out here."

"Hmm."

"What does 'hmm' mean?"

"It means 'hmm.'"

He only barely stopped himself from rolling his eyes, "Why are you asking, anyway?"

Rin shrugged, looking at the sun, "I just wanted to know." She yawned.

"Tired?"

"Not really. Your answer was kind of boring."

Now he really was taken aback. "Well... okay, if that's it then, we should start heading back."

"Okay."

The captain just shook his head and walked off. Rin watched the sun set, then walked back to her room before the chill from her sweat could really get to her.

[BlackWaltzTheThird]

This isn't exactly what I expected when I read "out of body experience". I'm glad I was wrong. I look forward to seeing how the rest of this plays out.

[Mirage_GSM]

Don't worry, that post size is nowhere near enough to break the forums. Just look what passes for a chapter in Helbereth's and Scissorlips' stories.

Oh, and:

Then, once she was air-born,...

I had fun visualizing that for a moment, then it occured to me that you probably meant "airborne"

[Some Old Guy]

I had fun visualizing that for a moment, then it occured to me that you probably meant "airborne"

...and fixed. Also, deeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeerp.

I gotta stop writing right before I go to sleep. And trusting the spell-checker.