This one's also written for the 2017 Secret Santa project initiated by ProfAllister.
Victim: QuietlySomething
Prompt: My prompt is a fic about Shizune and Lilly from their early Student Council days, trying to work together to organize a project or festival (or something to that effect).
Festival
L
[We. Will need. 20 more stalls.]
I feel her fingers digging emphatically into my palm. She doesn’t need to do that; my hands are sensitive and responsive enough to catch a butterfly without squashing it. Talking with Shizune always hurts, and yet, she’s family. Without the Hakamichis, I wouldn’t have a home outside the school, and I wouldn’t have a place in this school.
I gently turn her hand over and let it go, to signify that I’ll be replying. It’s a tense little hand, and when fully open, it gives off the scent of passionate stress, as if it’s been clenched for far too long.
In my mind and body, I feel the space between us fill with possibility. I move my hands, I shape meaning. It’s almost like making love. I don’t have to see my hands to know that I’m communicating.
[You’ll get your 20 stalls. My classmates are more hardworking than those in any other class.]
My hands, suddenly free, have perhaps been a little too free in expression. My cousin will probably take that as a sharp rebuke. There’s a little of that, I must confess. I hadn’t meant to put quite so much in, though.
I hear her sigh. It’s like a pent-up bubble of sadness and fear and anger has suddenly burped its way up from where it used to hide in the depths of her skinny waist. She seizes my hand, as she always does—I must have developed additional forearm muscles just from the incidental resistance training—and resumes her assault on my palm.
[I. Am not insulting. Your class. I. Only want. To show others. New members of Student Council. Are capable. Are worthy successors. To. Outgoing Student Council. Who did not do much.]
It’s my turn. Gently again, turn and release. Shape the space.
[I understand. I’ll fill out the requisition orders for planks as well. Here are the accounts for the month just past. You can show them to the outgoing President, if he’s still interested.]
Grabbed. I’ve learnt to go with her actions.
[We. Don’t have to show. Documents. To anyone. We. Are in charge. Now.]
I suppose we are. Her hands are warm and twitchy. Is she upset? Have I made a mistake? It’s always so hard to be Shizune’s friend. The cousin bit I can’t avoid.
I hear, in the distance, the skip-scuff cadence that belongs only to one person in the school. Mentally, I dial down my hearing acuity. There’s no point listening hard when everyone two rooms away can probably feel the vibrations. The door clunks open and I prepare for a new kind of onslaught.
Clearly, my cousin senses this through our hands. Shizune’s body makes a half-turn toward the door, and I feel her muscles tense. She lets go of my hand before I can do anything else.
“Shicchan! Richan! Sorry I’m late, I went to get extra buns with the red-bean filling and also with cream and some fried octopus balls with cheese sauce!”
It’s always been a mystery to me quite how Misha manages to sign intelligibly with what must be both hands full of food. But she has the skill of communicating with both of us simultaneously. I get audio, Shizune must be getting video. I can even hear things swishing through the air.
She closes the distance quickly. I can smell the strawberry fragrance she uses, clashing with the wild-apple scent of her shampoo. Anyone else would think Misha’s a fluffy girl who likes giving hugs. I’m quite sure the fluffy part is a façade, and she actually is very protective of her body space—unless it’s my cousin. For some reason, she has a thing for Shizune’s sharp little elbows.
Contemporary accounts tell me that they had some sort of bust-up just before I transferred into the school, but that they became the best of friends again. I have long since stopped doubting Natsume Ooe, who likes ‘setting the record straight’ but will not otherwise opine on current affairs.
I do, however, wonder what that was all about. Perhaps it was a communication problem. Misha is likely an inaccurate translator, from what I can gather, but she is fast and effective on the fly. I suppose it’s a trade-off, and maybe she thinks it’s something like artistic license.
“Hi, Misha!” I say brightly. I point my face at her and smile. Positive vibes, I tell myself. I have to keep telling her to call me ‘Lilly’, even though it’s a lost cause for many of my schoolmates. I will always be ‘Riri’ to them. Misha, on the other hand, wants to speak English like an American. She’ll have to learn to give ’em L.
*****
S
My cousin infuriates me. She is unfailingly positive, especially in the assumption that slow and gentle action will lead to hugely successful outcomes. This is not always the case.
Communication with her has always been a problem. To be honest, this is as much my failing as hers. I am not good at projecting meaningful sounds in a way that is pleasing to me. The air comes out of my mouth and feels all wrong. I can see people flinch when I speak, and worse, they fail to understand anyway. So I do not. They can flinch when Misha speaks. She does not mind.
Speaking to her is literally only within the reach of my arm. Then I can grasp her wrist firmly, and she will open her hand as she has been taught, and I can speak to her through her palm. I can tell she does not like it. Maybe I use my nails too much, but in my opinion, it makes for greater precision.
Today, I feel I have successfully conveyed the shortfall in the number of stalls for our next school event. She is right. Her class works hard, so she deserves the credit for their efforts, as class representative.
The problem is that working hard is not always working efficiently. Most of the people in that class are visually impaired—that is true. But I know for a fact that visual impairment does not mean they cannot make the stalls the same shape and size. Yet, that is what they fail to do.
Having different-shaped collapsible stalls is inefficient. If they are not the same size when collapsed, it is hard to calculate how many we can store in each standard storeroom, and it always means there will be odd stalls we have to put in temporary locations like the music rooms. I once stored one in the archery range, and some fool thought it would be funny to use it as a target. Storing another one in the track and field shed just led to other difficulties.
And here is Misha, just in time. I am starving. It takes a lot of effort to be patient with my cousin, even though I have had a lot of practice doing so.
[Shicchan! Richan! Sorry late! Extra buns red-bean also Hokkaido cream! Fried octopus balls! Cheese sauce!]
I observe that she is somehow able to convey meaning while swinging food around like a crazy person. Over the months of our friendship, I have learnt to read her distinctive motions. It helps. But she could just have shown the food to me. Maybe she is signing as a courtesy while telling my cousin all about it.
[Hi Misha. Thanks for bringing all that food.]
[Is the meeting over already?]
I sigh. I do that a lot. [Not really. We are just addressing a shortfall in resources.]
[How come we have a shortfall?]
Because we listened to your stupid suggestion to have a big Christmas party, that’s why. Immediately I feel guilty for thinking it, and apologise to Misha in my head. Of course, I do not let any of that appear in my hands.
We all agreed. And it felt like a good idea. It was a good idea, actually, until some of the lighting got caught on a stall and the wiring got exposed. It was my cousin who caught the scent of burning first. She has an almost supernatural sense of smell.
We had not a large number of stalls in the first place, so this shortfall we are discussing is just larger than otherwise. It has very little to do with Misha.
[Well, we never had many collapsible stalls in the first place, so now we should stockpile them, because our Christmas party was a small one, compared to the schoolwide festivals we are going to have.]
I put a lot of enthusiasm into my signs, so that Misha will not think back to Christmas and worry about whether it was her fault. It is one of the things I must do because she is my friend, and because we had a past misunderstanding that was very painful to her. I cannot afford to do that to her again.
[Shi’chan! You’re so ambitious!] She grins and somehow manages to drop all the food onto various convenient surfaces. All the while, her mouth is delivering what must be parallel commentary to my cousin. It must be some sort of gift, to be able to multitask somewhat effectively while acting like a dizzy schoolgirl.
Wait. With her vertigo and all, she is a dizzy schoolgirl. The corners of my mouth twitch before I manage to fully suppress my laughter. Misha would want to know the joke, and this is yet another of my insensitive moments. Bad Shizune!
*****
M
I’m Misha. It’s so hard being Misha!
But I tell myself everyday that I deserve to be a fun person, I deserve to be a good person! I’ll get food for everybody because that’s what a good person does.
Look at Shicchan. She’s skinny and neat and eats like a horse. Me, I look at cheesecake and I grow an extra layer of fat cells. She, one bucket of KFC later, is just about full and will be hungry again for dinner. I don’t begrudge her that! It’s part of the fantastic person she is!
Look at Lilly. She tries to be easy-going about being teased. She tries so hard not to feel offended when I call her Richan instead of Lilly. Everything with her is control, down to her daily tea ceremony. But on the outside, she always looks so calm. It’s kind of sexy. And she’s so tall!
I know I’ll be late for the meeting. But face it, Misha, those two don’t need you to get stuff done. What they need is someone to remind them to eat, someone who can distract them from the stuff they dislike about each other. They’re cousins! Family shouldn’t fight! Family should work together.
“Hi everyone!” I exclaim, signing badly because my hands are full of food. “I’m late (but you don’t need me anyway) and I got lots of good stuff for you to eat!”
I can see the burning light in Shicchan’s eyes. She gets so passionate, especially when she sees good takoyaki. And of course, she loves desserts too, and I have a couple of Hokkaido cream buns. I got two because Lilly loves those too, and she’s tall enough to eat them and not show it. True enough, I can see her sniffing the slightly fermented bread yeast fragrance.
They need the extra food! There’s a lot of work coming up, and I think it might be because we didn’t have many collapsible stalls to begin with, and I went and got some of our stalls burnt in an electrical fire. Silly Misha!
They’re probably unhappy at being landed with extra work, I think it’s 25 stalls and Shicchan and I will probably make five just by ourselves in the carpentry shop behind the main block. It’ll be hard work, but it’ll be fun!
I have to keep telling myself that because otherwise I’d be sad. On a bad day, I realise I don’t really have anyone who loves me. But on a good day, I realise I’m still young, and there’s always a good chance that someone will like a short, fat, happy girl…
Meanwhile, I compliment Lilly on her accounts, which she’s thoughtfully placed in the in-tray, and I compliment Shicchan on her ambitious ideas. Sometimes it’s hard to keep two conversations going at the same time, sometimes it’s relatively easy. Sometimes, you also have to keep track of the interpretation you’re putting in the conversations, just in case people get the wrong idea.
On a bad day, I think people hate me for being such a scatterbrained idiot. But on a good day, I’m doing so many things at once that I must be some sort of genius.
My real wish is that some day, when we graduate, we’ll be able to take a picture, just the three of us. It’ll show us celebrating, the most successful Student Council executive committee in our school’s history! Yay Misha! And also Shicchan and Lilly of course.
I put one of the cream buns in Lilly’s open hand, and a box of takoyaki balls in Shizune’s. “Enjoy!” I tell them.
Then I stuff bad-day Misha inside where she belongs, and feed good-day Misha a red-bean bun. “There’s enough for everyone!” I say brightly, through the thick sweetness in my mouth.
=====
alt index
Alt Dreams [One-Shots] (#73—'Stripping')
Alt Dreams [One-Shots] (#53—'Festival') (S8)
Post-Yamaku, what happens? After The Dream is a mosaic that follows everyone to the (sometimes) bitter end.
Main Index (Complete)—Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/Akira • Hideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of Suzu • Sakura—The Kenji Saga.
"Much has been lost, and there is much left to lose." — Tim Powers, The Drawing of the Dark (1979)
Main Index (Complete)—Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/Akira • Hideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of Suzu • Sakura—The Kenji Saga.
"Much has been lost, and there is much left to lose." — Tim Powers, The Drawing of the Dark (1979)
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QuietlySomething
- Posts: 123
- Joined: Thu Feb 23, 2017 4:29 am
- Location: Flavor Country
- Contact:
Re: Alt Dreams [One-Shots] (#53—'Festival') (S8)
I really enjoyed this! And thanks for going out of your way to write for the prompt; I thought it was a shame that it seemed it would never see the light of day.
You added a lot of little touches that I thought added atmosphere really well- the way Shizune's speech is all broken up from Lilly's perspective, the fact that Misha can't pronounce Lilly's name. The fact that Shizune and Misha both scold themselves in the third person, lol.
Overall you captured the sort of scenario I was envisioning when I suggested the prompt. I enjoyed the perspective switching as a way to focus the story primarily on all the characters' internal monologues and reactions to each other.
Nice job!
You added a lot of little touches that I thought added atmosphere really well- the way Shizune's speech is all broken up from Lilly's perspective, the fact that Misha can't pronounce Lilly's name. The fact that Shizune and Misha both scold themselves in the third person, lol.
Overall you captured the sort of scenario I was envisioning when I suggested the prompt. I enjoyed the perspective switching as a way to focus the story primarily on all the characters' internal monologues and reactions to each other.
Nice job!
Last edited by QuietlySomething on Sat Feb 24, 2018 1:54 am, edited 1 time in total.
Re: Alt Dreams [One-Shots] (#53—'Festival') (S8)
You're very welcome, and thank you for all that positive feedback!QuietlySomething wrote: ↑Thu Feb 22, 2018 11:02 pm I really enjoyed this! And thanks for going out of your way to write for the prompt; I thought it was a shame that it seemed it would never see the light of day.
You added a lot of little touches that I thought added atmosphere really well- the way Shizune's speech is all broken up from Lilly's perspective, the fact that Misha can't pronounce Lilly's name. The fact that Shizune and Misha both scold themselves in the first person, lol.
Overall you captured the sort of scenario I was envisioning when I suggested the prompt. I enjoyed the perspective switching as a way to focus the story primarily on all the characters' internal monologues and reactions to each other.
Nice job!
I was trying hard to capture the fact that the three have obvious and profound differences, but also subtle (and less-subtle) similarities. I hoped it would work!
Post-Yamaku, what happens? After The Dream is a mosaic that follows everyone to the (sometimes) bitter end.
Main Index (Complete)—Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/Akira • Hideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of Suzu • Sakura—The Kenji Saga.
"Much has been lost, and there is much left to lose." — Tim Powers, The Drawing of the Dark (1979)
Main Index (Complete)—Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/Akira • Hideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of Suzu • Sakura—The Kenji Saga.
"Much has been lost, and there is much left to lose." — Tim Powers, The Drawing of the Dark (1979)
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Mirage_GSM
- Posts: 6148
- Joined: Mon Jun 28, 2010 2:24 am
- Location: Germany
Re: Alt Dreams [One-Shots] (#53—'Festival') (S8)
Very nice story, but [insert my usual reaction to the vertigo running gag].
All characters are spot on, though I especially liked Misha's interior monologue ("I’m Misha. It’s so hard being Misha!")...
Somehow it reminded me of some god wearing an elephant mask (not sure how many people will know what I'm talking about...)
Also I updated the index - we're slowly getting towards completion...
All characters are spot on, though I especially liked Misha's interior monologue ("I’m Misha. It’s so hard being Misha!")...
Somehow it reminded me of some god wearing an elephant mask (not sure how many people will know what I'm talking about...)
Also I updated the index - we're slowly getting towards completion...
Emi > Misha > Hanako > Lilly > Rin > Shizune
My collected KS-Fan Fictions: Mirage's Myths
My collected KS-Fan Fictions: Mirage's Myths
Sore wa himitsu desu.griffon8 wrote:Kosher, just because sex is your answer to everything doesn't mean that sex is the answer to everything.
Re: Alt Dreams [One-Shots] (#53—'Festival') (S8)
Ha, sorry about the vertigo thing. My take is that Shizune believes it's true but Misha does it to disguise something else...Mirage_GSM wrote: ↑Sun Feb 25, 2018 4:47 pmVery nice story, but [insert my usual reaction to the vertigo running gag].
All characters are spot on, though I especially liked Misha's interior monologue ("I’m Misha. It’s so hard being Misha!")...
Somehow it reminded me of some god wearing an elephant mask (not sure how many people will know what I'm talking about...)
Also I updated the index - we're slowly getting towards completion...
Post-Yamaku, what happens? After The Dream is a mosaic that follows everyone to the (sometimes) bitter end.
Main Index (Complete)—Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/Akira • Hideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of Suzu • Sakura—The Kenji Saga.
"Much has been lost, and there is much left to lose." — Tim Powers, The Drawing of the Dark (1979)
Main Index (Complete)—Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/Akira • Hideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of Suzu • Sakura—The Kenji Saga.
"Much has been lost, and there is much left to lose." — Tim Powers, The Drawing of the Dark (1979)
Re: Alt Dreams [One-Shots] (#53—'Festival') (S8)
This is wonderful little story. if I have any complaint, it's that it's too short. I would have loved to see more of this. There's just so much personality you've packed in such a small space.
Not Dead Yet
Re: Alt Dreams [One-Shots] (#53—'Festival') (S8)
That's a great compliment! I wrote it to blend in with AtD, so in a sense there's more of it. But I realise this has a much more upbeat mood, and I'm glad you like it. I suppose one reason it is so short is that I wrote it under time pressure, in about an hour before I had to run off and do something else. Perhaps someday it will get expanded.
Post-Yamaku, what happens? After The Dream is a mosaic that follows everyone to the (sometimes) bitter end.
Main Index (Complete)—Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/Akira • Hideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of Suzu • Sakura—The Kenji Saga.
"Much has been lost, and there is much left to lose." — Tim Powers, The Drawing of the Dark (1979)
Main Index (Complete)—Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/Akira • Hideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of Suzu • Sakura—The Kenji Saga.
"Much has been lost, and there is much left to lose." — Tim Powers, The Drawing of the Dark (1979)
Alt Dreams [One-Shots] (#54—'Night Terrors') 20180830
Night Terrors
Aaaaaah!
What did they do… ? Where… am I? I won’t go down without a fight!
Quick look around. Nobody can defeat Kenji, whose eyes have seen what no man can see.
Oh. It’s dark. I can’t see anything. But I can’t normally see normal things anyway.
They took my arms away! Like they did to my fellow agent! And my legs! They might be turning me into a fembot like the other one!
I turn. I try to stand, but I can’t. Then I know. Okay, that’s good. I’m only tied to a chair. I’ve still got legs and arms and those feminist Catholic yakuza Scottish mafia sympathizers will not defeat me!
Once I get free, that is.
The door opens. Dammit, you’ll never take Kenji alive! You won’t be able to make me speak! It takes a while to realize that I’m not speaking anyway, there’s a gag in my mouth.
No. Nononono. It’s her! It’s Nemesis. It’s…
She sits on top of me. I can feel her warmth. I can smell her. Terrible things are about to happen. I know it. Moonlight gleams off her spectacles. It’s the full moon! That’s even worse!
She shifts her bottom a bit. And then a bit more. After a while, I can’t stop myself. Terrible, terrible things!
*****
Aaaaaah!
I shoot up from my bed. I’m sitting with my back against the wall. I’m always with my back against the wall. That way nobody can stab you in the back.
It was a dream, that’s all. A bad, bad dream.
It’s dark. I can’t see anything, which is just the way I like it. Too many spycams. Cautiously, I reach for my black-light lamp and goggles. I hope the damage this time isn’t too bad.
Quick look around. I will have to send my sheets for cleaning two days early.
*****
Aaaaaah!
I muffle my scream. In this house, you can’t make too much noise. It can have dire consequences.
My heart calms down. That's good. What a horrible dream. It’s enough to turn your stomach, dreaming you’re Kenji, and dreaming that you’re Kenji dreaming he’s you. Or something like that.
“Mmph?”
I look down at the small, dear body of Shizune Hakamichi, concealed by the pile of bed-linen, blankets and all, that she is always mysteriously able to drag over to her side of the bed.
I pat her gently on the bottom. It seems to reassure her and she lets out a soft and slightly erotic sigh before burrowing back into the blankets.
I freeze and listen for a while. You never know when a sword-wielding father is lurking around gathering evidence that you might be mistreating his daughter.
It’s about three in the morning, as the bright blue digits on her bedside clock indicate. I yawn softly and carefully tug back on the blankets till I have enough for myself.
As I go back to sleep, I can’t help but wonder: What if I wake up and find I’m really Kenji?
=====
alt index
Aaaaaah!
What did they do… ? Where… am I? I won’t go down without a fight!
Quick look around. Nobody can defeat Kenji, whose eyes have seen what no man can see.
Oh. It’s dark. I can’t see anything. But I can’t normally see normal things anyway.
They took my arms away! Like they did to my fellow agent! And my legs! They might be turning me into a fembot like the other one!
I turn. I try to stand, but I can’t. Then I know. Okay, that’s good. I’m only tied to a chair. I’ve still got legs and arms and those feminist Catholic yakuza Scottish mafia sympathizers will not defeat me!
Once I get free, that is.
The door opens. Dammit, you’ll never take Kenji alive! You won’t be able to make me speak! It takes a while to realize that I’m not speaking anyway, there’s a gag in my mouth.
No. Nononono. It’s her! It’s Nemesis. It’s…
She sits on top of me. I can feel her warmth. I can smell her. Terrible things are about to happen. I know it. Moonlight gleams off her spectacles. It’s the full moon! That’s even worse!
She shifts her bottom a bit. And then a bit more. After a while, I can’t stop myself. Terrible, terrible things!
*****
Aaaaaah!
I shoot up from my bed. I’m sitting with my back against the wall. I’m always with my back against the wall. That way nobody can stab you in the back.
It was a dream, that’s all. A bad, bad dream.
It’s dark. I can’t see anything, which is just the way I like it. Too many spycams. Cautiously, I reach for my black-light lamp and goggles. I hope the damage this time isn’t too bad.
Quick look around. I will have to send my sheets for cleaning two days early.
*****
Aaaaaah!
I muffle my scream. In this house, you can’t make too much noise. It can have dire consequences.
My heart calms down. That's good. What a horrible dream. It’s enough to turn your stomach, dreaming you’re Kenji, and dreaming that you’re Kenji dreaming he’s you. Or something like that.
“Mmph?”
I look down at the small, dear body of Shizune Hakamichi, concealed by the pile of bed-linen, blankets and all, that she is always mysteriously able to drag over to her side of the bed.
I pat her gently on the bottom. It seems to reassure her and she lets out a soft and slightly erotic sigh before burrowing back into the blankets.
I freeze and listen for a while. You never know when a sword-wielding father is lurking around gathering evidence that you might be mistreating his daughter.
It’s about three in the morning, as the bright blue digits on her bedside clock indicate. I yawn softly and carefully tug back on the blankets till I have enough for myself.
As I go back to sleep, I can’t help but wonder: What if I wake up and find I’m really Kenji?
=====
alt index
Last edited by brythain on Mon Dec 31, 2018 12:13 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Post-Yamaku, what happens? After The Dream is a mosaic that follows everyone to the (sometimes) bitter end.
Main Index (Complete)—Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/Akira • Hideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of Suzu • Sakura—The Kenji Saga.
"Much has been lost, and there is much left to lose." — Tim Powers, The Drawing of the Dark (1979)
Main Index (Complete)—Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/Akira • Hideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of Suzu • Sakura—The Kenji Saga.
"Much has been lost, and there is much left to lose." — Tim Powers, The Drawing of the Dark (1979)
Alt Dreams [One-Shots] (#55—'Clubbing') (S9)
This one’s written for the 2018 Secret Santa project initiated by ProfAllister.
Victim: Riakai
Prompt: The clubs of Yamaku are in the process of meeting (in their respective club rooms) only to be snowed into the school late at night.
I’ve not written for a long while (which I also said last year), and it shows. And I’m late as well. Sincere apologies. Life has a way of tripping one up. Also, my muse was very demanding this time round.
Clubbing
She had graduated, or thought she had, from Yamaku in the spring of 2008. Since then, spring had come and gone thirty-six times. She wasn’t very good with numbers, but squares were fine. She liked squares when she needed things to behave themselves. Not like rainbows, or emperors, or trees. Life was funny. It cracked her up.
Sadly, she looked at her feet. Cracked up. Yes. Life was like that. In the year soon to be over, she’d said goodbye to her beautiful companion, and her handsome cat, and the mother who wasn’t really her mother, but someone else’s whom she’d already said goodbye to. The one thing she had was memories. And nano-particulate clay impregnated with nanites, and a talent for fine hand-sculpting. Three things then.
If you said it in English, it sounded like an appropriate seasonal song. Or maybe Scottish. “Wee three things,” she whispered. But she’d lost the thread. Which was the point. Threads were good. They made cloth remember. She remembered.
It was easy to make her way to the school. It was snowed in for the first time in a long while. Something about saving the world from global warming. Her globes were always cold, and that night, they felt even colder. If she’d had globes, that is, her journal-brain reminded her from its seat in her left hand. It sounded like the cat, but she’d left the cat. For a short moment, she hoped it was all right.
Her right hand readied its weapons. Doing so always reminded her of tangerines. She wondered if she’d have to goodbye anyone. It always made her feel empty inside, like having a blank spot for a word that nobody had used for a long while.
There was movement in the school in the frosty light after lunchtime. She watched for a while. The principal’s office was dark, which was a surprise, until she remembered: that one’s not the principal anymore. Clubs were still going to have meetings, but the snow was not yet thick enough for her purposes. She wondered idly if the eye in the sky could be petitioned to help out, like a dandelion, or a potato.
She had work to do, anyway. The clay was important, and her hands needed exercise to keep them warm. There were presents to distribute. She remembered the Tree. She remembered the back gate. Her smile was sad, and nobody who hadn’t known her from before would’ve recognized it as a smile. Ghostly, she found her way around the perimeter. Even Nakai Foundation security wouldn’t find her. She knew that, just as she thought she knew why. The implants helped.
She’d make sure that she could see the fun.
*****
Chikako looked hard at her tall snub-nosed friend. [Bad weather is bad excuse!]
“The snow is dark and deep, or something very much like that. And I’m still training my left leg.”
[School depends on Student Council keep things going. Festival supplies…] —her hands were seized and held tight.
“It’s Saturday night! We’re the reason the clubs are meeting, we’re the reason everyone’s snowed in!” Mayumi’s green left eye flashed defiantly as her braids tossed like uncoordinated pendulums. Chikako fought to free her fingers.
[We must get things right. Is our responsibility.]
A klaxon sounded.
“What’s that?”
[Storm shutters, I think.]
“We’ll be cut off from the rest!”
[Not good.] Chikako’s shoulders slumped. [Hope everyone has supplies.]
“I’m going out to take a look.” Mayumi shut her left eye firmly to switch signaling off, then blinked and triggered her right eye as she exited the room. It flared red as she engaged the longer wavelengths.
*****
“I call the late-solstice meeting of the Underwater Basket Weaving Society to order.”
Not for the first time, Akitoshi thought that his club president was absolutely presiding. Straight-backed, like a judge with haughty demeanour. He could hear the air rise up her windpipe and vibrate her vocal chords without impediment. It would be so terribly off-putting, except that she smelled so beautiful.
Of course, he had rivals, of all genders. He did his best to rise above the pack. Even now, as his fellow club members whispered in unmannerly ways, he coughed gently to draw their attention into silence.
He could hear Yukio smiling at him, from the sound of her lips parting. Clearly, she supported his subtle efforts. He smiled back.
“So, time to get our end-of-2044 report done for the Student Council. Let’s begin with Crop Circle #1.”
A klaxon sounded.
Aki could feel the emergency shutters going down, far away down the corridors. He summoned a local geography into his mind, just as somebody opened the club room door.
“What’th that?” he heard a soft, breathy voice say. Probably little Miyuki, who was always digging around in the weirdest corners of the weird stuff their club liked to investigate. Aki was surprised. How could Miyuki not know about the storm shutter system?
*****
Zensho stalked athletically through the corridors, swishing zeir tail. Ze had considered the effect of having two tails for a while, before dropping the extra idea. The Bioengineering Club sponsored by the Intimidating Dread Pirate Mz Nakai (as ze liked to think of zeir role-model) was for serious minds.
Ze stopped just outside the seminar room. Something was wrong. Ze could sense a perturbation in the force, not only bad weather. Whatever it was, it was a large mammal. But ze was late for the annual report meeting forced on them by Evil Chika’s Student Council, so ze knocked on the identity panel for luck and entered by retinal scan.
Everyone looked up at zem.
Zensho smiled nonchalantly. “Sorry. Late. Was checking supplies since we’ll be here a long…”
A klaxon sounded.
In the distance, something descended with a boneshaking thump. Zeir friend Kenichi grimaced, forcing gaunt rigour upon an otherwise striking face. “Look, you’ve done it now. Causality bends around you! That’s an emergency alert, and now we’ll all be locked in and locked down.”
“Well, as long as you don’t make more Schrödinger-type jokes, I’m fine. By the way, did you know that something is prowling around out there?”
*****
“In honour of our founder-ess, the great and wonderful Deus Ex Ms Shiina, it’s parfait time for everyone!”
Reverently, following the established rituals of the Most Gentle Parfait Nightclub, Noriko lifted nearly-exact spheres of coconut ice-cream into the pewtered-glass chalices in a circle around her central station. With bated breath, the club members watched her layer on thick black kuromitsu syrup and chestnut paste, topping each serving with slices of canned peach and quartered raspberries.
Noriko was known to make the syrup and paste herself, in the old traditional ways, and delicious odours of the caramel and molasses type had been wafting from the kitchenette on her level for days. For her friend Sumiko, it had been torture, helping to make tasty ingredients for the winter solstice meeting without being allowed, by the club charter, the opportunity to actually taste any of those ingredients. Sure, the molecular gastronomy rig could be told to produce samples on demand, but that would’ve been cheating.
Sumiko could feel the saliva well up in her mouth. She could just about feel the tingles all over. Just as Noriko placed the last raspberry piece on the last parfait, the lights flickered on and off.
A klaxon sounded.
A rattling clangor vibrated down the hallways outside. A slice of peach slid sideways and down into its chalice. On any other occasion, it would’ve been a serious breach of ritual. Everyone stood parfaitly still.
*****
Just because she’d left the school in 2008 didn’t mean she had forgotten where everything was. After all, she’d even stayed in the staff quarters for a short while. The mural was gone, though, long painted over with other murals. She wondered if anything survived elsewhere. Through her feeds, she looked at the Art Club, who were now debating the right colour for winter and getting the Prussian Blue all wrong. She looked at the Tea Club, but saw nobody remotely Scottish.
How much had she learnt over the long years! She let her breath turn into turnips and finished her last gifts.
Then, she spoke to her hand, and her hand spoke to the Tree, and the Tree told the eye to close. The snow began to settle, deep and dark and even.
*****
In the morning, the storm shutters, no longer under pressure, relaxed and opened up. Tired, weary, relieved or otherwise, the students of the Sendai-Aoba Mountain District Academy (commonly just called ‘Yamaku’) piled out of their slightly stinky meeting rooms to greet the new day. It was almost unbearably bright and frosty, a temptation to the senses.
But before they could move outside into the fresh air, there were presents.
*****
“What’s happened?” Akitoshi murmured. He could sense the surprise, and was hearing the excitement.
“Thith!” said little Miyuki. “Everyone’th got one!”
Aki scented her before she grasped his wrist. “Meri-kuri!” whispered Yukio, pressing something into his hand. It felt like a little ceramic piece.
Some distance away, Zensho had found traces near the Tree. Thoughtfully, ze tapped the beautiful little black, indigo and white object in zeir hand. Someone had made a little snow angel under the Tree, where drifting snow would not have covered it up. But this angel had four wings and a funny head-dress… Oh! Of course. Zen twitched zeir tail, thrilled.
Sumiko belched quietly into her hand, but not the one holding a mysterious gift. Outside every meeting room, one had been left for each person in attendance. Nori’s looked a little like quarters of raspberry with a slice of peach.
Mayumi had found Kenichi. “What colours do you have?”
He grimaced, the unfamiliar act of smiling distorting his stony face. “Yellow and pink. You?”
“Something that matches both my eyes.”
“Nothing could match your eyes!”
She laughed and turned to Chikako. “At least nobody’s complaining about supplies today. Meri-kuri!”
*****
Not very far away, but certainly where none of the students could see her, the lady with the long red hair folded her black and silver arms. Then she put them away in their box. Rin had always loved butterflies, and she also believed that everyone should have a butterfly to love them back.
There was one carved into her arm-box. It was orange and brown, with dark purple lines. “Meri-kuri, Mother,” she whispered. Then she got into her pod and vanished into the bright blue sky.
=====
Notes:
1) The protagonist comes from her own arc, here.
2) A couple of the clubs are mentioned here.
3) Mz Nakai has her own arc (sort of), here.
=====
alt index
Victim: Riakai
Prompt: The clubs of Yamaku are in the process of meeting (in their respective club rooms) only to be snowed into the school late at night.
I’ve not written for a long while (which I also said last year), and it shows. And I’m late as well. Sincere apologies. Life has a way of tripping one up. Also, my muse was very demanding this time round.
Clubbing
She had graduated, or thought she had, from Yamaku in the spring of 2008. Since then, spring had come and gone thirty-six times. She wasn’t very good with numbers, but squares were fine. She liked squares when she needed things to behave themselves. Not like rainbows, or emperors, or trees. Life was funny. It cracked her up.
Sadly, she looked at her feet. Cracked up. Yes. Life was like that. In the year soon to be over, she’d said goodbye to her beautiful companion, and her handsome cat, and the mother who wasn’t really her mother, but someone else’s whom she’d already said goodbye to. The one thing she had was memories. And nano-particulate clay impregnated with nanites, and a talent for fine hand-sculpting. Three things then.
If you said it in English, it sounded like an appropriate seasonal song. Or maybe Scottish. “Wee three things,” she whispered. But she’d lost the thread. Which was the point. Threads were good. They made cloth remember. She remembered.
It was easy to make her way to the school. It was snowed in for the first time in a long while. Something about saving the world from global warming. Her globes were always cold, and that night, they felt even colder. If she’d had globes, that is, her journal-brain reminded her from its seat in her left hand. It sounded like the cat, but she’d left the cat. For a short moment, she hoped it was all right.
Her right hand readied its weapons. Doing so always reminded her of tangerines. She wondered if she’d have to goodbye anyone. It always made her feel empty inside, like having a blank spot for a word that nobody had used for a long while.
There was movement in the school in the frosty light after lunchtime. She watched for a while. The principal’s office was dark, which was a surprise, until she remembered: that one’s not the principal anymore. Clubs were still going to have meetings, but the snow was not yet thick enough for her purposes. She wondered idly if the eye in the sky could be petitioned to help out, like a dandelion, or a potato.
She had work to do, anyway. The clay was important, and her hands needed exercise to keep them warm. There were presents to distribute. She remembered the Tree. She remembered the back gate. Her smile was sad, and nobody who hadn’t known her from before would’ve recognized it as a smile. Ghostly, she found her way around the perimeter. Even Nakai Foundation security wouldn’t find her. She knew that, just as she thought she knew why. The implants helped.
She’d make sure that she could see the fun.
*****
Chikako looked hard at her tall snub-nosed friend. [Bad weather is bad excuse!]
“The snow is dark and deep, or something very much like that. And I’m still training my left leg.”
[School depends on Student Council keep things going. Festival supplies…] —her hands were seized and held tight.
“It’s Saturday night! We’re the reason the clubs are meeting, we’re the reason everyone’s snowed in!” Mayumi’s green left eye flashed defiantly as her braids tossed like uncoordinated pendulums. Chikako fought to free her fingers.
[We must get things right. Is our responsibility.]
A klaxon sounded.
“What’s that?”
[Storm shutters, I think.]
“We’ll be cut off from the rest!”
[Not good.] Chikako’s shoulders slumped. [Hope everyone has supplies.]
“I’m going out to take a look.” Mayumi shut her left eye firmly to switch signaling off, then blinked and triggered her right eye as she exited the room. It flared red as she engaged the longer wavelengths.
*****
“I call the late-solstice meeting of the Underwater Basket Weaving Society to order.”
Not for the first time, Akitoshi thought that his club president was absolutely presiding. Straight-backed, like a judge with haughty demeanour. He could hear the air rise up her windpipe and vibrate her vocal chords without impediment. It would be so terribly off-putting, except that she smelled so beautiful.
Of course, he had rivals, of all genders. He did his best to rise above the pack. Even now, as his fellow club members whispered in unmannerly ways, he coughed gently to draw their attention into silence.
He could hear Yukio smiling at him, from the sound of her lips parting. Clearly, she supported his subtle efforts. He smiled back.
“So, time to get our end-of-2044 report done for the Student Council. Let’s begin with Crop Circle #1.”
A klaxon sounded.
Aki could feel the emergency shutters going down, far away down the corridors. He summoned a local geography into his mind, just as somebody opened the club room door.
“What’th that?” he heard a soft, breathy voice say. Probably little Miyuki, who was always digging around in the weirdest corners of the weird stuff their club liked to investigate. Aki was surprised. How could Miyuki not know about the storm shutter system?
*****
Zensho stalked athletically through the corridors, swishing zeir tail. Ze had considered the effect of having two tails for a while, before dropping the extra idea. The Bioengineering Club sponsored by the Intimidating Dread Pirate Mz Nakai (as ze liked to think of zeir role-model) was for serious minds.
Ze stopped just outside the seminar room. Something was wrong. Ze could sense a perturbation in the force, not only bad weather. Whatever it was, it was a large mammal. But ze was late for the annual report meeting forced on them by Evil Chika’s Student Council, so ze knocked on the identity panel for luck and entered by retinal scan.
Everyone looked up at zem.
Zensho smiled nonchalantly. “Sorry. Late. Was checking supplies since we’ll be here a long…”
A klaxon sounded.
In the distance, something descended with a boneshaking thump. Zeir friend Kenichi grimaced, forcing gaunt rigour upon an otherwise striking face. “Look, you’ve done it now. Causality bends around you! That’s an emergency alert, and now we’ll all be locked in and locked down.”
“Well, as long as you don’t make more Schrödinger-type jokes, I’m fine. By the way, did you know that something is prowling around out there?”
*****
“In honour of our founder-ess, the great and wonderful Deus Ex Ms Shiina, it’s parfait time for everyone!”
Reverently, following the established rituals of the Most Gentle Parfait Nightclub, Noriko lifted nearly-exact spheres of coconut ice-cream into the pewtered-glass chalices in a circle around her central station. With bated breath, the club members watched her layer on thick black kuromitsu syrup and chestnut paste, topping each serving with slices of canned peach and quartered raspberries.
Noriko was known to make the syrup and paste herself, in the old traditional ways, and delicious odours of the caramel and molasses type had been wafting from the kitchenette on her level for days. For her friend Sumiko, it had been torture, helping to make tasty ingredients for the winter solstice meeting without being allowed, by the club charter, the opportunity to actually taste any of those ingredients. Sure, the molecular gastronomy rig could be told to produce samples on demand, but that would’ve been cheating.
Sumiko could feel the saliva well up in her mouth. She could just about feel the tingles all over. Just as Noriko placed the last raspberry piece on the last parfait, the lights flickered on and off.
A klaxon sounded.
A rattling clangor vibrated down the hallways outside. A slice of peach slid sideways and down into its chalice. On any other occasion, it would’ve been a serious breach of ritual. Everyone stood parfaitly still.
*****
Just because she’d left the school in 2008 didn’t mean she had forgotten where everything was. After all, she’d even stayed in the staff quarters for a short while. The mural was gone, though, long painted over with other murals. She wondered if anything survived elsewhere. Through her feeds, she looked at the Art Club, who were now debating the right colour for winter and getting the Prussian Blue all wrong. She looked at the Tea Club, but saw nobody remotely Scottish.
How much had she learnt over the long years! She let her breath turn into turnips and finished her last gifts.
Then, she spoke to her hand, and her hand spoke to the Tree, and the Tree told the eye to close. The snow began to settle, deep and dark and even.
*****
In the morning, the storm shutters, no longer under pressure, relaxed and opened up. Tired, weary, relieved or otherwise, the students of the Sendai-Aoba Mountain District Academy (commonly just called ‘Yamaku’) piled out of their slightly stinky meeting rooms to greet the new day. It was almost unbearably bright and frosty, a temptation to the senses.
But before they could move outside into the fresh air, there were presents.
*****
“What’s happened?” Akitoshi murmured. He could sense the surprise, and was hearing the excitement.
“Thith!” said little Miyuki. “Everyone’th got one!”
Aki scented her before she grasped his wrist. “Meri-kuri!” whispered Yukio, pressing something into his hand. It felt like a little ceramic piece.
Some distance away, Zensho had found traces near the Tree. Thoughtfully, ze tapped the beautiful little black, indigo and white object in zeir hand. Someone had made a little snow angel under the Tree, where drifting snow would not have covered it up. But this angel had four wings and a funny head-dress… Oh! Of course. Zen twitched zeir tail, thrilled.
Sumiko belched quietly into her hand, but not the one holding a mysterious gift. Outside every meeting room, one had been left for each person in attendance. Nori’s looked a little like quarters of raspberry with a slice of peach.
Mayumi had found Kenichi. “What colours do you have?”
He grimaced, the unfamiliar act of smiling distorting his stony face. “Yellow and pink. You?”
“Something that matches both my eyes.”
“Nothing could match your eyes!”
She laughed and turned to Chikako. “At least nobody’s complaining about supplies today. Meri-kuri!”
*****
Not very far away, but certainly where none of the students could see her, the lady with the long red hair folded her black and silver arms. Then she put them away in their box. Rin had always loved butterflies, and she also believed that everyone should have a butterfly to love them back.
There was one carved into her arm-box. It was orange and brown, with dark purple lines. “Meri-kuri, Mother,” she whispered. Then she got into her pod and vanished into the bright blue sky.
=====
Notes:
1) The protagonist comes from her own arc, here.
2) A couple of the clubs are mentioned here.
3) Mz Nakai has her own arc (sort of), here.
=====
alt index
Last edited by brythain on Tue Jan 01, 2019 4:21 am, edited 1 time in total.
Post-Yamaku, what happens? After The Dream is a mosaic that follows everyone to the (sometimes) bitter end.
Main Index (Complete)—Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/Akira • Hideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of Suzu • Sakura—The Kenji Saga.
"Much has been lost, and there is much left to lose." — Tim Powers, The Drawing of the Dark (1979)
Main Index (Complete)—Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/Akira • Hideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of Suzu • Sakura—The Kenji Saga.
"Much has been lost, and there is much left to lose." — Tim Powers, The Drawing of the Dark (1979)
-
PKMNthiefChris
- Posts: 67
- Joined: Sat May 12, 2018 9:35 pm
Re: Alt Dreams [One-Shots] (#55—'Clubbing')
The future of Yamaku is very interesting indeed.
-
Mirage_GSM
- Posts: 6148
- Joined: Mon Jun 28, 2010 2:24 am
- Location: Germany
Re: Alt Dreams [One-Shots] (#55—'Clubbing') (S9)
Interesting and confusing...
That one guy/girl talks with an accent even in his/her internal monologue? Even when it's told by a narrator sometimes?
That one guy/girl talks with an accent even in his/her internal monologue? Even when it's told by a narrator sometimes?
Emi > Misha > Hanako > Lilly > Rin > Shizune
My collected KS-Fan Fictions: Mirage's Myths
My collected KS-Fan Fictions: Mirage's Myths
Sore wa himitsu desu.griffon8 wrote:Kosher, just because sex is your answer to everything doesn't mean that sex is the answer to everything.
Re: Alt Dreams [One-Shots] (#55—'Clubbing') (S9)
I took that one from real life. Sometimes people who don't define their male/female binary gender use 'ze' for he/she, 'zeir' for 'him/her', or some such. Usage varies from place to place, but this is one example.Mirage_GSM wrote: ↑Wed Jan 02, 2019 2:38 pm Interesting and confusing...
That one guy/girl talks with an accent even in his/her internal monologue? Even when it's told by a narrator sometimes?
Post-Yamaku, what happens? After The Dream is a mosaic that follows everyone to the (sometimes) bitter end.
Main Index (Complete)—Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/Akira • Hideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of Suzu • Sakura—The Kenji Saga.
"Much has been lost, and there is much left to lose." — Tim Powers, The Drawing of the Dark (1979)
Main Index (Complete)—Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/Akira • Hideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of Suzu • Sakura—The Kenji Saga.
"Much has been lost, and there is much left to lose." — Tim Powers, The Drawing of the Dark (1979)
-
Mirage_GSM
- Posts: 6148
- Joined: Mon Jun 28, 2010 2:24 am
- Location: Germany
Re: Alt Dreams [One-Shots] (#55—'Clubbing') (S9)
Ah okay, for me it looked like some particularly weird kind of Russian...
Emi > Misha > Hanako > Lilly > Rin > Shizune
My collected KS-Fan Fictions: Mirage's Myths
My collected KS-Fan Fictions: Mirage's Myths
Sore wa himitsu desu.griffon8 wrote:Kosher, just because sex is your answer to everything doesn't mean that sex is the answer to everything.
Re: Alt Dreams [One-Shots] (#55—'Clubbing') (S9)
Some of these are really weird indeed, many from SF.Mirage_GSM wrote: ↑Thu Jan 03, 2019 1:07 pm Ah okay, for me it looked like some particularly weird kind of Russian...
Wikipedia has a good summary of some existing variants here.
Post-Yamaku, what happens? After The Dream is a mosaic that follows everyone to the (sometimes) bitter end.
Main Index (Complete)—Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/Akira • Hideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of Suzu • Sakura—The Kenji Saga.
"Much has been lost, and there is much left to lose." — Tim Powers, The Drawing of the Dark (1979)
Main Index (Complete)—Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/Akira • Hideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of Suzu • Sakura—The Kenji Saga.
"Much has been lost, and there is much left to lose." — Tim Powers, The Drawing of the Dark (1979)
-
ProfAllister
- Posts: 509
- Joined: Sat Jun 16, 2012 12:49 pm
Re: Alt Dreams [One-Shots] (#55—'Clubbing') (S9)
A fic that only Brythain could write. Whenever I read one, I'm reminded that I need to eventually get around to reading *After the Dream* in its entirety.
As it is, it's Sci-Fi Christmas Katawas. What's not to like?
As it is, it's Sci-Fi Christmas Katawas. What's not to like?