thenearshore | Curiosity killed the... [open]

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?]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Right. If you want to make people happy, money's not everything. Money's not even anything to most people-- what really matters is what money means to them.

Good food, good times, security, comfort for your family, all that.

[Right? Right. Maybe he's jumping ahead too far here, but he's keeping a close eye on the kid's face, looking for comprehension.]

The meaning behind it...

[It's definitely a little bit of a jump, but... he thinks he gets it. Maybe?]

It's... definitely important to make sure that money gets passed along... or else it doesn't have any meaning at all. And the only way that can happen is if the things bought are even more important.

[That makes sense... Still clearly working through it, he looks up at Zhao.]

Right?

[Zhao sits back, grinning.]

More or less, more or less. The point is, it's not just the money, it's the feelings too.

I see...

[This is going to be a lot to digest, and Ebisu crosses his arms. It's a very mature action, he swears.]

I thought if people had money... Then it would take care of the things needed to make them happy. So it was the best solution for anything...

[He's not arguing with Zhao, of course. It's just, he wants to explain how his own thinking has come around to be.]

See, boss, I don't even disagree with you on that one. There's a lot of problems that money can solve, and unless you're a saint, it's real tough to be happy when you don't have enough money.

[He nods at Ebisu, granting the point as the kid crosses his arms. It looks like a thinking pose more than a sulking one.]

It's just that there are problems money can't solve.

So it's not a complete solution...

[Which makes it harder for someone in his position, he supposes. Then again, there wouldn't be as many gods as there are if only one could solve everything. Still... Something occurs to him and he looks up at Zhao again.]

Would it be alright if I could ask for an example from you? I understand the point of the first one, but I would like to make sure that my understanding isn't faulty.

Sure. Say you got into a fight with a friend and they cut ties with you. You're not going to be able to fix the fight by just throwing cash at them.

[There's a lot of examples he could go with -- as the song puts it, money can't buy you love -- but he figures he'll stick with a simple one to start out with.]

[Something about the way Ebisu twists his mouth inwards hints that he really wants to say something- and that something might be "Are you sure"- but he's holding it in. He's going to learn, dammit.]

...Do you know what to do in that case?

Sure -- you'd have to deal with whatever the fight was about. Say they thought you weren't spending enough time together, you'd have to work that out.

[He shrugs.]

I see. That makes things very difficult sometimes, doesn't it?

[Because then... The solution requires so much more work. It can't be something that's merely bought, or exchanged in a simple trade that requires, at worst, some simple math work.]

But then.. I suppose that's why it's good? [He tilts his head to the side.] Or maybe that's wrong thinking as well.

I don't know if it's right or wrong, but that's how I'd think of it. The kind of problems money can't fix are the kind of problems where you need to put more work in.

Mostly.

[Some of them just can't be fixed, but those are beyond the scope of this conversation for sure.]

And more work can make it more valuable...

[Whups, that slipped through. Still, he's getting there, bit by bit. It can take a little bit, especially now that he doesn't have Iwami with him to guide him.]

I'll have to think on this further. It seems like it's a lot.

Sort of.

[Ah, still counting by money. Well, he's working on it, it seems. After a minute, Zhao breaks into a wry grin.]

You know, this is the kind of thing you need a philosopher for.

[He's doing his best... Although that has him knock one knuckle against his chin.]

I guess... But what makes a philosopher different from a regular person?

[Maybe he should ask Tenjin.]

Same thing that makes a rocket scientist different from a regular person. Learning!

[Zhao spreads his hands wide.]

And philosophy is all about learning how to answer questions like "what matters most in life."

[Opens his mouth.]

[Closes his mouth.]

[Takes a long pause.]

I see.

[Was his first response going to be 'money'...? Listen. Maybe.]

That doesn't sound like the kind of thing you can learn easily from books, unlike a rocket scientist.

Kid, you would be amazed at the number of books written about it.

[Also, he's not convinced that it's easy to learn rocket science from books, either.]

Anyway, philosophers are the experts, and I'm pretty sure I'm not one.

Isn't that just the natural route of humans?

[If you have a thing, let that thing go on long enough, and it will get crossed over with all the things. That applies especially to money, his forte, but he's found it true of books, movies, video games... Humans are interesting like that.]

Besides, even if you're not a philosopher, Zhao-san, you've been extremely helpful to me today!

What, overthinking things? You may have a point.

[He laughs easily, and shifts his weight, getting ready to stand.]

But I'm glad I could help out. Anyway, I should get back home -- see you in the morning?

[He nods at Ebisu, and looks up to offer another inclination of his head to Aomi.]

Yes. Thank you for sparing some of your time for this conversation.

[He's gotten a lot more information now, even if not the exact answers... but information paves the path to such, so he's sure he'll manage it someday. For tonight, he just waves one hand with a smile, and Aomi nods his own farewell to him.]

Have a safe trip home!

Take care, kiddo.

[Smiling, he gets to his feet, brushing down his jeans, and turns to go.]

Curiosity killed the... [open]

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