Curiosity killed the... [open]

[wildguardian]

Who: Zhao Yunlan & OPEN
When: The second week of February
Where: Far Shore - the library, near Ebisu's temple, the Western District; Near Shore - the ruins of a burned-out department store
What: Exploring, unwisely.

Library

[Zhao Yunlan is becoming a regular sight at a corner table in the library; he's accumulating a stack of books, filling them with bookmarks, taking copious notes in a cheap black notebook, swearing at them and not putting them away again when he leaves.

Research! He hates it. He needs an assistant who will do it for him, but in the absence of that helpful whoever, he's stuck hitting the books himself. It's going to age him posthumously.

Hopefully, no one minds the fact that a largely useless pile of books keeps being renewed on the corner table, and filled with paper scrap bookmarks that have to be removed before they're put away.]

Ebisu's temple

[Since he's died young regardless, Zhao is seriously considering switching from lollipops to cigarettes. There's something enticing about the smell of burning tobacco, and, besides, importantly: smokers can take smoke breaks. As a non-smoker, he's having to find some other excuse to sneak outside and see the sun every once in a while during his workday.

His excuse today is picking flowers. He doesn't recognize the flowers sprouting from the grayish soil clinging to cracks in the temple's modern-looking concrete courtyard, but they're bright, colorful, and have a non-zero chance of brightening the day of the poor white-collar workers typing their fingers to the bone on either side of his temp desk. Fresh flowers, an important part of office feng shui: or something like that.

(He's considering bringing in a houseplant. Those also make great excuses to take a break.)

He nips off the stem of a bright red daisy-looking thing, considers it, and turns with a shameless grin. Whoops, there's somebody, has he been caught skiving off?]

Here! It goes with your eyes.

Western District

[It's late on the night of the 12th, and Zhao had been working his way back home to Bakugou's place after a long day doing accounting and a few drinks out afterwards, except, annoyingly, his stomach is killing him. All right, so he'd skipped breakfast, and lunch, and dinner, and: all right, the last time he ate something was yesterday when Bakugou'd made breakfast. But it's not like he ever gets more or less hungry no matter what he eats! He'd thought it was no big deal.

Apparently even dead men can get heartburn from strong liquor on an empty stomach, he reflects, and slumps down onto a comfortable rock at the edge of the road, indulging his solitude with a wince as he bends over and puts his head on his knees.

This is really embarrassing. He'll just give it a few minutes, and once he feels a bit better, he'll just drag himself back home to bed....]

Department Store

[Mysteries abound. These mysteries, though, don't look like they're going to be solved anytime soon. Zhao ducks under plastic disaster cleanup sheeting and looks around the dripping, ice-cold, smoke-blackened floor of the unlucky department store, and shakes his head. Any clues that might've once been here are long since gone. If the fire hadn't gotten them, the months of abandonment and subsequent investigation would've.

Maybe he can sneak in and pull the investigation files somehow. Shinki do tend to go unnoticed, so he's willing to bet he can shadow a cop into any police office he wants. Getting keys to get into their files might be a little trickier, of course....

Sighing, he turns to go, just in time to spot a pale, whitish, sheet-like thing that's not plastic lashing out towards his ankle across the debris-strewn concrete floor.

With a shout, he jumps back, landing in a puddle. Filthy water splashes everywhere, and the sheet rears up like it's been possessed by a cobra, striking out at him again. The edge of it brushes his hand as he scrambles out of the way, raising an instant, aching, purplish welt.

Well, fuck. He's just found his first ayakashi all on his own, he realizes, turns, and bolts for the stairs with a possessed sheet in hot pursuit.

This is making a lot of noise.

Hopefully someone's passing by.

Help?]

Comments

[erogappa]

[ Sunday night, and he's finally heading home. Last night's... he doesn't want to call it a party. Last night's event at the bar really wiped him out -- those guys have some stamina! It was nearly noon before he was able to kick them all out, and it took most of the afternoon and well into the evening to get the place set right again.

He really should have taken a nap, after everyone left. Pushing through and getting the job done had sounded responsible and impressive at the time, but here it is, the middle of the night, and he's been awake for so long he's not actually sure what day it is anymore. He shuffles along, mentally cursing Goku's temple for being so far out in the wilds... and he doesn't see the guy at the side of the road until he's standing in front of him.

Looks like somebody's having a worse night than he is. ] Oi. [ He keeps his hands stuffed deep in his pants pockets -- it's cold out here! -- instead reaching out to lightly kick the other man's shoe. ] You dead?

[wildguardian]

Technically!

[Ugh, ow. Zhao uncurls just enough to squint at the stranger kicking his shoe. Tall, lanky guy, hair that's shaggy and dark in the midnight gloom; there's just enough moonlight to pick out the lines of a nose and jaw, not enough to make out his expression.]

Just not buried yet.

[He tries to shove himself up to a less might-be-dead posture, and gives up as his guts clench and send him face-down on his knees again.]

I'll be fine, it's just a stomachache.

[erogappa]

[ Gojyo scowls at the dim shape, then tilts his head back and sighs. He can't very well walk away now, can he? Dammit. ]

You'll be fine. [ Can Zhao hear the eyeroll that goes with that dry-as-hell comment? It was a pretty loud eyeroll. ] You blighted, or just sick?

department store

[wingsofaid]

[Mysteries certainly do abound. Petra seldom strays to the Near Shore alone but after getting a close, personal look at just how unsafe Heaven can be, her reservations about visiting the Outside as she's come to think of it, have lessened. They haven't disappeared completely, the reluctance to move freely is too deeply ingrained but she, too, has been slowly reading up on events before her arrival.

It's pure coincidence that today happens to be the day that Petra decides to visit the site. The ruckus draws her curiosity.]

Hello? Is someone here?

[Zhao will spot a petite redhead in pastel winter clothing looking around by the stairwell and utterly oblivious to any threat of ayakashi. But there is a hefty looking two-by-four not too far from her feet.]

[wildguardian]

Watch out!

[He's bolting towards her at top speed: it's kind of dark down here in the basement, even with plenty of holes in the flooring above letting in light, and he doesn't know if she's spotted the thing at his heels yet.]

Ayakashi -- run!

[wingsofaid]

[Ayakashi? Petra doesn't see anything that looks like an ayakashi but then again, she doesn't really know what an ayakashi looks like. The giant ape had turned out to be a god. So she'll take the man's word for it and run - after she kicks the board so it skids toward him.]

Try to stun it if you can!

[Then she ducks back into stairwell. Every second counts during a chase though and running's too slow so instead of taking them normally, she takes a couple of steps and leaps to the top instead. Once she's at the top, she just keeps going to keep without a glance back to see if she's being followed.]

Western District

[dredefulchilde]

“Well, you look like shit.”

Joscelin had been out for a late night walk, bundled up against the cold, when he came across Zhao. Now he’s crouched next to the man, head cocked curiously to the side like a particularly demonic puppy.

“Are you going to die? Er, again?”

[wildguardian]

Zhao cracks one eye open to see the knife kid, and manages a pallid grin. Great, just what he needed.

"Not unless shinki can die of stomachache," he informs Joscelin, and doesn't move. "I'll be fine after a good night's sleep."

Unless he freezes first. It is pretty cold out here, especially with the icy stone leaching the heat out of his body.

[dredefulchilde]

“I’m sorry.” He doesn’t sound the least bit sorry.

“It’s odd that we can still get those, despite not having working digestion, isn’t it?”

The boy’s face gets even closer to Zhao’s. “You might get hypothermia if you just keep sitting there, though. Where is your temple?”

library

[kokuyoyo]

[Bad news: someone does mind.]

[Debatable news: it's the ghost of a teenager who sometimes lurks between the shelves and probably does work there.]

[Definitely bad news: his solution to this affront to his senses is to drop a book on the back of Zhao's head. If there's any good news about any of this, it's that the book at least isn't that hard... but it is a thick bodice ripper, so.]

[Zhao can take that as he likes.]

[wildguardian]

Ow, what the fuck?!

[--is how he takes it. He swings around, hand on the back of his head, glaring. The book isn't as big or heavy as it could be, but it had been dropped, and that weird lurking teenager he's been seeing around is tall.

It'd gotten up to a pretty good speed.]

What was that for?

[kokuyoyo]

[If Chikusa fell apart at every person that glared at him- well he'd probably be living a different life. With a different personality. Possibly one that isn't inclined to so much shit, or hanging around with various shit-starters.]

[Right now, however, his current personality is that of a feral shit teen, and such an occupation in life comes with the bonus of not caring what sort of looks people give him. He meets Zhao's gaze squarely.]

Clean up.

guess

[chibisu]

Oh, thank you.

[...Says the person who is technically Zhao's boss, at least in a professional sense.]

[This does not stop Ebisu from accepting the flower anyway, which absolutely doesn't match him at all, and he turns to hold it up to his apparent caretaker of the day. Aomi is only half paying attention, apparently focused on texting with his phone on something Very Serious (probably), but still takes the effort to flash a smile down at his god and take the flower stem inbetween the fingers on his phone. The other is, of course, holding onto Ebisu's hand.]

[Just in case.]

[With that done, Ebisu turns his attention back to Zhao.]

Did you have to leave early?

[wildguardian]

[Oops, caught by the boss himself. Zhao grins, spreading his hands wide with a flourish of the bouquet.]

Nope! I'm taking my tea break to improve the office feng shui. See, having live plants around really boosts the energy of the room, so I figured short of houseplants a nice little fresh bouquet'd do.

[This is absolutely a responsible employee's behavior, right? Right?

(He's probably not going to get away with it, but what the hell, he's gonna try.)]

[chibisu]

I see.

[Ebisu beams over at Zhao- ]

You're very bad at lying!

[-and totally doesn't buy it, as predicted. Aomi sucks in a sharp quiet breath, mouth twisting in on itself as he tries not to smile too much. Or, you know, laugh too much.]

But if you like that sort of thing, would you like to be moved to a new office?

Ebisu's temple

[unlucky7]

[There's far more leeway for the part-timers at the temple than those under Ebisu's permanent employ. Still, as one of the newest full-timers around and one of the most physically agile, Ginia has become one of the resident gofers. She doesn't mind; it's a chance to get away from her desk for a little.

Ginia is bounding back toward the temple with the long, slow-drift leaps shinki can do when she spots Zhao picking flowers. Turning her angle mid-air, she lands next to him, looking at the flower in his hand and smiling at the comment. She slides the bag slipping off her shoulder back up and takes out her phone.]

I bet you're saying that to everyone.

[wildguardian]

[Zhao laughs, and leaves the flower in his outstretched hand for her to take.]

Only the ones with the prettiest eyes. Have they got you running errands today?

[He's lucky: Ginia might tease him about skiving off for a few minutes, but she's unlikely to actually get him in trouble.]

[cloakedinruins]

[ Shen Wei loved researching. A part of it was the puzzle, of searching down just that one bit of information that would open a whole new angle that would prove enlightening. Another part was that it was the farthest away from a battle field that he could get. True that inside these books were ways to challenge a whole method of thought, that some of these people had destroyed countless others with their writings, but the blood did not flow along the floors and the screams were not caused by weapons.

A war of words and ideas was never the same as a battlefield full of broken bodies and sightless eyes.

The only problem with tracking down books was that the one book he wanted was missing off the shelf and when he politely inquired if it was going to be returned soon, he was told it had never left the building. Which meant that Shen Wei had to sneak around looking for a book that might be currently in the hands of another person.

And that is how he ended up at Yunlan's corner table, one eyebrow raised in a silent challenge as his eyes narrowed behind his glasses. Forget the fact that he was going to avoid the man for his own good. Shen Wei was in the middle of research and he was so not in the mood to play with Yunlan and his lazy and messy ways. ]

Are you quite done with that book? [ His voice had a chilly edge to it even as he nods at the book in question, the faded blue spine peeking out from under the pile of books. ]

[wildguardian]

[Zhao Yunlan is in fact in the middle of flipping through a different book, but the icy tone in a voice he definitely does know almost makes him drop it. He stares at Shen Wei, blinking, for a few seconds before he reaches over to tug the blue book free from its spot in the pile.

The pile wobbles, but doesn't collapse.]

This one? -- There were a few things I wanted to check...

[Yikes, that look. Well, professors do take books seriously.]

But if you need it that's fine!

ebisu's temple

[galrarm]

[ Walking the various temples at least a couple times a week has become something of a ritual for Shiro. It allows him time to think, and besides, there are a lot of temples. Too many to see in one walk.

He's deep in thought when he sees Zhao, and he gives a quiet chuckle. He approaches the other, and he takes the flower, considering it. ]

You sure? Red was never much my color.

[wildguardian]

[Well, then: Zhao sorts through his bouquet, and produces a blue spur of blooms instead, holding it up as if to check the color against Shiro's face.]

Hmm, no. I think the red suits you better.

[That important decision made, he tucks the blue flower back into his handful and tosses the other man a grin.]

What brings you out this way?

wildcard text

[abgrund]

[ definitely not orbis. Ain has gotten cat #2, it seems. ]

text

[wildguardian]

That's one real fucking smug cat. She's a cutie, too.

How's Orbis getting along with her so far?

[cleansingstrike]

[Agrias is doing much of the same, really. Information was often the key to victory on the battlefield, and while not currently engaged in any combat, she would still have herself be as informed as possible.

And, you know, she's doing all of this while still dressed in her full suit of armor.

It's a coincidence that she happens to be sharing a table with Zhao, though the growing pile of books does not go unnoticed by her.]

Have you... any need of assistance?

[wildguardian]

[He'd noticed the person in armor reading across the table -- it's hard not to notice a full suit of armor in a library, especially if it's on a person and not on some kind of display stand. Her offer still takes him by surprise, though.

He glances up, blinks, and waves a hand at the pile of books.]

I wouldn't mind a hand. Aren't you busy, though?