thenearshore | 34 - Love is in the Air

34 - Love is in the Air

Who: Everyone!
What: An enterprising pair of shinki is trying to spread love throughout the Far Shore with exciting blind dates.
When: February 14
Where: Hot romantic spots throughout Tokyo
Summary: Blind dates on Valentine's Day? Sounds like fun (or possibly a disaster, but everyone needs some good disaster stories.) That's not all that's going on, though. Ayakashi are looking to chow down on the negative emotions that a romantic holiday can generate, and those who aren't busy with their own dates might be sucked into helping out followers who need help to make the day go well.

The Dates

Blind Date Matchups

Date One: The Romantic Brunch.
Couples will find themselves with reservations (and pre-paid coupons for the prix fixe menu) at a swanky French restaurant with a wide balcony overlooking the lake in a central Tokyo park. They can dine on dainty pastries, sweet milk coffees, bowls of grapes and hothouse strawberries, and a selection of fancy chocolates and petit-fours-- plus, some of the trees in the park are blooming in holiday-appropriate red and white!

Date Two: The Aquarium.
Couples scheduled for this date have tickets to a rooftop aquarium in Ikebukuro: brightly colored fish, animals including penguins, seals and pelicans, a small petting zoo and plenty of shadowy, secluded nooks to cuddle in make for a fun lunchtime date. The tickets even include admission to the one o'clock penguin and seal show!

Date Three: The Amusement Park.
This date sends couples to spend the evening enjoying themselves at a seaside amusement park. Ride the roller coasters! Take selfies with the costumed attendants! Share an overpriced ice cream cone while you watch the fireworks after sunset, then wind up the night with a ride on the colorfully lit Ferris wheel with a romantic view of the Tokyo skyline.

Ayakashi Menace

dove

shadow

teddy bear

need

Praying for Love

Wild Card

In Summary:

Enjoy your dates
Fight some ayakashi
Make sure to answer prayers for a good Valentine's Day
Have fun~

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[The waitress looks towards the sound of Gojyo's clap, visibly surprised that they're still there, and bustles their way with a couple of menus. Hakkai takes his own hand back, sitting up, and takes the opportunity for a few minutes' distraction.

Yes, thank you, another beer; the two-person grilling platter, he adds, with a glance at Gojyo to make sure that's all right. Water for both of them, too. It can't hurt. She's heading away again to the kitchen before too long, and he glances back at Gojyo.

It's more difficult than he'd expected to be direct about these things. It makes him feel fifteen again, awkward and secretly terrified.]

I like spending time with you, too. Talking about anything, or just being together.

[And not fighting, at least not with each other. They've been better about that lately. But -- being together, making time for each other, that Hakkai certainly can do. This might have been a bit much, to start with; it might have set Gojyo's expectations unfairly high.

(Those clothes are suited for something much less casual than Hakkai had imagined, certainly.)

But he thinks he can learn how to do this, if he tries.]

[ Talking. He likes talking. Gojyo feels a knot of despair rising up, threatening to choke him, and with a huff of disgust he mentally shoves it away. If Hakkai wants to talk, if Hakkai wants to sit quietly together, if he needs to be friends, then that’s what Gojyo will be for him. And if the only kind of love Hakkai’s able to give is the occasional smile, then he’ll learn to love those smiles. He doesn't need more -- he doesn't deserve more.

Besides. There’s far more important things for them to be worrying about, isn’t there? Now that he knows that this date isn’t really a date, now that he’s completely embarrassed himself and upset Hakkai, again, then it’s definitely time to take advantage of their privacy and change the topic. ]

Speakin’ of... [ He glances quickly around the room, confirming one more time that they’re the only heavenly bodies in the place. ] Wanna spend some time with me and go see if we can find Votelli? [ Sure, he could just sneak away and head back up the mountain to try and find her again, but it upset Hakkai when he did that, last time. He wanted to be involved, so here’s Gojyo with an olive branch, offering him a chance to be involved. ] I’m getting’ worried about her.

[There's something wrong-- Hakkai feels a sharp pang for a moment in his chest, and looks up at Gojyo with concern-- but it's fading, and Gojyo's firmly changing the topic.

He almost insists on going back to rehash it, but what he'd said before is still true. He doesn't want to fight. If they're moving on, talking about Votelli instead, then he's willing to let it go as long as Gojyo is. They can talk later.

He nods.]

Yes, let's. In fact, about her and her Sensei...

[He leans forward, crossing his arms on the table.]

I have some footage from security cameras around the area that I collected after all that mess happened with her forest. Did she ever tell you anything about her Sensei taking her into town? Because I think we have some pictures of him. They're not good, but they're something to go on.

You've got pictures? [ All annoyances and heartbreak forgotten, Gojyo leans forward too, his suit creaking as he moves. ] From security cameras. That was smart!

[ He never would have thought of that! His brilliant idea to find Sensei was to keep going up the mountain to talk to Votelli... not that he was able to find her most of those times. ...In fact, he thinks wryly, if Hakkai was looking at more than just a few days worth of security camera footage, he probably saw Gojyo on one of his trips to see her. Maybe more than one.

But this is good. This is really good. ]

I didn't think he'd do that. He wants her isolated, she said, doesn't want to risk any of us seeing her. [ Why would he take her into town? What's in town that he needed her for? It has to be something magical, right? Gojyo can't imagine that he was taking her out to eat, or, or shopping. ] Do you know where they were going?

The one I found where Votelli was with him was from a diner camera.

[Taking her out to eat -- perhaps. Or just explaining things to her in a more comfortable environment than the gloomy forest where she seems to live. Hakkai frowns, thinking.]

I don't know why he would have taken her there. It looked as though he took her to eat and spoke to her for a while. No sound, of course.

I don't get it.

[ Gojyo rubs a hand over the back of his head, trying to make sense of Hakkai's words. ]

Why would he take her out in public where somebody might see them? [ Granted, only very few people from heaven have seen Votelli (more now, after her picture was posted everywhere, but Sensei doesn't konw that), but it was still a huge risk. ] If I was keepin' somebody prisoner, I sure as hell wouldn't take them out for ramen.

[ Mmmm. Ramen. ...Where the hell is their food? ]

I'm not convinced he's keeping her a prisoner. Although he's manipulating her, certainly...

And most mortals can't see us at all. It might be that he assumed the Heavens wouldn't be talking to any of the living.

[Much less pulling surveillance footage. Hakkai doesn't have a high opinion of the Heavens' willingness to investigate things; if they can't understand things from a medieval perspective, they seem to ignore them. If they can't punish a god -- or, at least, a shinki -- they don't seem to recognize that there's a problem at all.

The waitress reappears with a platter: little cups of side dishes, in a remarkable variety, their water, the refill for Hakkai's beer. He picks up the chopsticks and starts tasting side dishes.]

[ She's not actually a prisoner, no, that's true. Sensei's just been telling her that everyone wants to kill her so she wouldn't wander off.

Although, he might not have been wrong. ]

When was this? [ The food is... all in little bowls? Huh. Okay. It sure smells good! Gojyo goes methodically down the line, trying a bite of each bowl he can reach. ] When he took her out to eat. Was there a date on the video?

[ If there was just the one sighting, and it was before he set up her shrine, then... then something. Then that probably means something. But if she was still with him after she started collecting new followers, then that's a whole other story.

He pops a bite of delicate pork in his mouth, and it melts on his tongue. Wow. ]

You have to try this one!

[Gestures of affection can manipulate as well as fear. Better, sometimes. Hakkai leans forward, trying a bit of the pork Gojyo'd grabbed, and makes an approving face.]

That is good. Very slow simmering, I think. With soy sauce and... star anise?

[Ah, right, Votelli. He abandons (or, at least, shelves) his reflexive attempt to work out how to recreate the dish to return to the previous topic.]

It wasn't long after the kidnappings.

[ Does he just want the one bite? Becuase Gojyo's going to take the rest, otherwise. It's really good! ]

Okay, that makes sense. That was before I got her shrine set up.

[ He pauses, a bite of pork halfway to his mouth. He didn't tell Hakkai about that, did he? ]

Oh, right. I set her up a shrine to get her more followers.

[ Yum. Star anise. ]

You built her a shrine? [Hakkai sounds genuinely alarmed: declaring his sympathy to Votelli in public, around a group of new gods and shinki that Hakkai only mostly knows, is dangerous. But it's no more dangerous than things other people in the same room had done. It's not tangible support; it's nothing that might link Gojyo to her in a way that will take him down if the Heavens find her.

But he suspects that building a shrine is the sort of thing that, in the Heavens' sideways thinking about loyalty, is second only to accepting a name.]

-- Is anyone worshiping there yet?

[ Hakkai sounds mad. Gojyo doesn't set his chopsticks down, doesn't really react, but there's a decided set to his jaw as he reaches for another bite. ]

Dunno. I didn't want to risk anyone followin' me so I haven't been back.

[ Should he admit that Goku helped? ...No, he dragged Goku along, the kid didn't volunteer. Hakkai can be mad at him, not at the shrimp.

Oh, speaking of... mmm. Shrimp. ]

[Gojyo's jaw sets mulishly. Hakkai's lips flatten -- of course, he should've realized that being worried about the risks Gojyo's running on behalf of a child would only annoy him -- and he moves briskly ahead, picking up a bit of something that looks like carrot and seaweed.]

It'll need human attention if it's going to do her any good. We should ask her, when we meet.

[Which they are still going to do, even if Gojyo's decided to get defensive again. Aren't they?]

[ Damn right they are. She needs help, and Gojyo's come to accept that he can't help her by himself. ]

I'm not stupid, you know. [ It'll need human attention, come on. ] I know it needs humans around. That's the whole point.

[ Pettily, he helps himself to the last bite of that wonderful pork. ]

I did my research.

I know you did. I'm just not sure if something built by a person from the Far Shore will get mortal attention.

[Ah, there's the sound of Now you're calling me stupid! again, lurking in Gojyo's voice. It's more that Hakkai's afraid it'll draw the wrong sort of attention, and if the shrine doesn't have any human traffic concealing the signs of a shinki's hard work--

-- then will they be able to track it back to that shinki? Will he be able to defend Gojyo against Amaterasu again? He isn't willing to trust his God of Fortune title too far. Ebisu had been executed, after all.]

Sure it will.

[ Look, there's a lot of issues with his plans, and he can't be mad that Hakkai thinks he didn't consider all the options. Amaterasu's people will probably find the shrine, eventually, and they'll probably be able to tell he's the one who set it up. He's accepted that risk from the first. But the idea that humans might not see it? That doesn't make any sense. ]

Heaven didn't have a human go set up your shrines, right? [ Actually, he doesn't know the answer to that, but he'd be really surprised if any humans had been involved. ] Plus, the book I found, it was instructions for gods to set up shrines for themselves. No mortals required.

[ He is right about this. Isn't he? ]

There have been humans caring for my shrines for as long as I've been a god -- longer, I suspect. I've never heard of a god making their own shrine.

[He shakes his head, slowly, frowning in thought.]

But just because I haven't heard of it doesn't mean it's impossible. I know they often fail to notice things we do, though, as well as not noticing us.

[Online postings, for example, seem to elude the living even when they're not just on the Heavens' bulletin board.]

[ Humans caring for his shrines? Aw, shit. That's different. Gojyo's face falls. ]

Th'book didn't say anything about that.

[ Or maybe it did -- it's not like he got to finish reading the section, what with some asshole interrupting him and throwing books at his head. ]

Shit, what if it's not working? [ This is actually serious. ] If she doesn't have any other followers besides this Sensei guy, she could vanish at any time.

[ He looks up, meeting Hakkai's eye with his best let's go break shit grin. ]

Want to take this date on the road?

[Hakkai checks his watch, looks up and around for the server, shrugs slightly, and tosses a crumpled few bills on the table. It's too much, but they can come back once they've checked Votelli's shrine.]

Let's. Where is it?

[His smile is a little sharp-edged as he adds:]

As soon as we're sure she has a few other followers, we can do something about that 'Sensei.'

[ Gojyo's mouth goes dry, and he makes a mental note to find other excuses to get Hakkai to smile like that. Maybe they don't need to cuddle much. Maybe they can just kill people. ]

It's next to that big gardening store, on the north side of town. [ He's not really dressed for this adventure, but at least his coat is warm! ] You know where that is?

[ Can we teleport instead of taking the bus? is the real question there. ]

I think I do. [He knows of a big gardening store on the north side of town, at least. He steps around the edge of the table and offers Gojyo a hand. They can teleport-- which means, if this doesn't take too long, they might even get back in time to finish dinner.]

Shall we?

[ Hakkai holds out his hand so casually, and Gojyo takes it without hesitation. It's just so they can teleport, he knows. No need to make a big thing about it. ]

Let's do it.

[ The gardening store Hakkai was thinking of is the right one -- it's big, big enough to carry small trees and pallets of brick and stone, and not just the little houseplants and bug traps that some of the other shops in the area offer. Big enough to have its own parking lot. Around the side of the building, where the parking lot wraps around, is one of those heavy plastic gardening sheds, just big enough for a person to stand inside, and it's this shed that Gojyo had turned into a shrine.

To his amazement, it's still intact. There's the bell that he stole from Kali's shrine, the carefully painted TORIMOTO down the inside of the doors, a scrap of curtain across the back. There's even water -- the shrine is pushed up against the wall where a spigot juts out, and there's a hole cut in the plastic back of the box to let it poke through, over a (thankfully empty) basin. The donation box is missing, of course, but that's to be expected. The body of the shrine is still here, and maybe that's enough. ]

[It's in one piece, at least; and it looks like a real shrine. The bell, the name, the water basin, the name written down the shrine doors--

Bird forest? Hakkai blinks at it.]

Where did you get the name?

[He takes out a tissue, running it lightly over the top edge of the empty basin, and checks. There's a smudge of dirt visible against the tissue, but not too much.]

-- I think someone must be coming in here.

[ After an initial and very brief once over of the shrine, Gojyo's instead been watching the streets around them. There's plenty of people out, but they're all on the street, driving up and down. Nobody's paying attention to a box store that's closed for the night, and that's a good thing. Gojyo's just going to keep an eye out and make sure it stays that way. ]

She suggested it. The name. [ Although, would he even know if they were being watched? If one of Amaterasu's shinki stumbled out from behind a tree, maybe, but she's not that sloppy. ] Can you tell if it's been working?

[He nods, and continues wiping down the basin as he looks over the shrine. His own shrine has a certain atmosphere, something that even his chi training can't help him parse out but that he's learned to recognize; he hasn't felt it in other shrines, though, and he doesn't feel it here.

Which doesn't mean it's not working.]

If people are visiting it, then they're doing something. I don't see any offerings, though...

[After a moment, still frowning, he shakes his head.]

I think we'd have to ask her.

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