009 | Where Your Demons Hide

[godsoffortune]

Who: Everyone!
What: Emergency demon fighting
When: Late May 5-Early May 6
Where: Just outside of Tokyo
Summary: The demon from the school has reared its ugly head again and needs to be taken down.



On the evening of May 5, the Heavens suddenly receive an influx of prayers from people in and around a certain town just outside of Tokyo. There seem to be a lot of people in the area that have suddenly stopped responding normally (or at all). The situation continues to spread as the night goes on until not only is the whole town suffering from this malady, but the neighboring towns are starting to become affected as well.

With so many gods and shinki on hand - including new ones that have just appeared - the Heavens have issued a request for any available gods and shinki to go investigate what might be happening down on the Near Shore. New gods and shinki will be given the low-down on what's happening, but not much more than that.

The situation will continue to expand until just a little before dawn, when the demon finally has enough power to revive.



Drained Humans

Many humans in the affected areas are walking around despondently. Oftentimes, they are just walking into things or getting hit by things. There have been a few car-related incidents as well. Anyone who was present for the high school incident will recognize these symptoms as something that was happening to people in the school. The glazed looks, the spiritless responses and reactions. So this should be fairly familiar to some.

No One's Safe

Unfortunately, being in the town will start to wear on anyone who is there. Gods and shinki alike will find themselves growing more despondent the longer they spend in the town. All of their energy will be slowly sapped from their bodies, and shinki in particular will feel almost like their existence is draining away.

Hellish Circle

There is a large park in the center of the town. Drawn all around this park is a magic circle, large enough to encompass the whole park. There are candles around the edges of the circle, and in the center there is a cup filled with blood covered by a mask with a swirling eye pattern on it. Stepping into this circle will not only make you extremely tired and suddenly drained, but it will also bring bat-like ayakashi bearing down on you.

The Demon

The Demon itself rears its ugly head just a little before dawn, springing out from the center of the magic circle and looking right pleased with itself. It stands about 5'8" tall, so it is largely unimposing, but there is an aura about it that makes it undeniable that it is powerful. The demon will gladly fight anyone who comes at it, though most he will just shove out of the way without a second thought.



In Summary:

• Help the drained people
• Try not to get drained yourself
• Be careful about being corrupted
• Fight the demon
• Have fun~

Comments

[maskeddragon]

[That sounds like maybe the answer is yes and she just hasn't fully grasped what's happened yet. Shin-ah can hardly blame her. It seems like that aspect must be easier for shinki, who have no memories of a past existence to compare the present one to. You used to be alive. Now you are here, and this is how it is.]

Gods and shinki are here... It isn't a dream.

[somebodysdaughter]

Oh.

[He's probably expecting more from her than that.

[Gods are here. Shinki - that word again. She feels nothing, not even confusion: it's like she's so high on complete bafflement and horror that she's gone numb. It's got to be that she can't get her head round it, and why would she, anyway? It's... it's not like any of this is even reasonable! Hi, Aya, nice to meet you, your parents are dead and your brother is gone, your home is a smoking ruin oh and by the way you're a deity. Have a nice evening. And happy birthday.

[An hour ago, she'd known none of this. If she stops to think about it, if she does absolutely anything that isn't just turn the whole immense, impossible mess of it over and over in incomprehension, Aya thinks she'll probably go under completely. Any single piece - her brother, her parents, her life - would be enough to overwhelm her, but the whole?]

I... was kind of hoping it was.

[Keep it together, Aya. You can cry tomorrow.]

[maskeddragon]

[What would she wake up to, Shin-ah wonders. Shinki don't remember what they came from, but gods do. It must be a nice life she came from, to want to go back so much. But the real point is whatever she came from, she can't go back, and that means she needs to find her temple.

On the other hand, if she doesn't even know that it exists, she probably can't begin to guess what it looks like. That's going to make finding it more difficult. If she had a visual cue to work from, he could simply search for it... But with neither of them knowing what to look for, it may be a waste of energy to go to The Far Shore looking just yet.

But perhaps he can at least convey to her that it's not the problem she thinks it is.]

Every god has a temple... it's your home.

[somebodysdaughter]

Temple?

[The logical part of Aya wants to start laughing. God? She's not a god. She isn't. If she's any kind of god, then why is she out on the streets in a stranger's pajamas?

[The child in her wants to pout and shake her head; it wants to say, no, it isn't. Aya's home is back where she came from, it's where Ran is, it's where her--where she last saw her parents. It's sitting in the grass in the garden with a glass of juice and a magazine spread over her lap; it's helping mama in the kitchen, it's picking recipes from the family cookbook and learning how to make miso. it's her bedroom, her desk and her chair, her school uniform in the closet and Miss Kitty face-down on the bed. It's a million and one little things - the floorboard in the hallway that creaks when you step on it, the patterns the sun makes when it slants low through the windows in the evening, the funny furry smell in the closet where they keep the winter coats, and papa's shiny work shoes in the hall - and all of them lost and gone forever.

[The part of Aya that's cold and frightened and desperate for anything else to wear, the part that just wants to know where she can rest her head tonight, is nothing but grateful.]

But - I don't know where that is. How can I live somewhere I've never seen before?

[maskeddragon]

[Indeed... who would be able to tell her where to find her temple? Is this something Zeno would be able to tell her? How had he known where to find his? Having arrived as a shinki, these were the sorts of god things that Shin-ah simply did not know about.

But it seems strange that someone wouldn't have told her, because she's right: how else could someone live somewhere they've never seen before? There must be some process...]

What you thought was a dream... was there anything there?

[A mental image, someone giving her a location or a description, anything that might help her find it would be useful.]

[somebodysdaughter]

Anything else?

[For a moment she can't imagine why it matters, then she decides she doesn't care. It's something else to think about, and she seizes on it gratefully.

[She works backwards. She woke up here, or thought she did. Before that, there'd been the dreams. Okay, but the last one - what was that about? Aya tries to focus, to strip away the stars and the Gymnopédies: a large white room and someone speaking - about dreams, about dreaming, about her. He - she? She can't remember - had told her she was a God--

[No. That's too large and too ludicrous to touch. She thinks about where they were: about the room and the bed, which hadn't had Miss Kitty on it. There'd been light slanting in through the windows, there'd been the sound of water. Then - then a staircase and other rooms, all white and light and airy, all high ceilings and long, low furniture, a dream house, not a place that anyone lived. The sound of the sea. The house is white, too, perched neatly at the end of a long, long sweep of grass: there was the whisper of leaves and, almost out of sight, a fountain giggling and chattering endlessly to itself. She - Aya can almost see it, if she focuses.]

Um. A white house, I think. A house by the sea. There's a fountain...

[It's a bit like something from Sailor Moon, but then a boy wouldn't necessarily know that.]

[maskeddragon]

[A white house by the sea with a fountain. That's something they can work with. Shin-ah has no way to look for it from where they are now, but after she goes back to The Far Shore, then he would be able to see it, confirm its presence, take her where she belongs.]

It exists. It's yours...

[A statement of faith, but that must be it. It just has to be.]

[somebodysdaughter]

But--

[But what, Aya?

[It makes about as much sense as anything else she's heard, which is to say it makes none at all. Aya wants to protest that it doesn't work that way - but she's not sure that's true any more. It doesn't work like that at home, that's all.]

But I don't-- I'm sorry. I know I'm asking a lot right now. I just... well, I know I saw it. I'm just not sure where it was.

1/2

[maskeddragon]

[Shin-ah ponders that for a few moments. Should he take her there himself? She might not be ready to go. And he doesn't want to frighten her with anything sudden. But if it's there... he should be able to see it, right? White house by the sea with a fountain...

Right. He knows what he should do.

Shin-ah looks around until he sees a bench for a bus stop, and leads her over to it. After seeing she's seated, he takes off the large furry pelt that sits atop his head and tucks it around her like a blanket. Nice and cozy, yes, that will do.

Then he holds up a finger as though asking her to wait, and dashes off without explanation.]

2/2

[maskeddragon]

[Shin-ah races quickly to the nearest shrine, his search aided by his special vision. He teleports over to the Far Shore and uses his sight to scan far and wide, surveying the land. He sweeps along the areas by bodies of water for white houses. And then he sees it: a large, white, stately home by the sea with a fountain in the front yard. That must be it.

He takes care to note its location relative to the rest of the Far Shore before he teleports back to the shrine and runs back to the girl on the bench-- or rather, to the planter just behind. He scoops up a large amount of soil and dumps it on the pavement, spreading it out into a loose sheet of dirt.

And he begins to draw.

He draws a rough big shape for the land and places the main hall as a landmark. He draws the coastline and a few wavy lines to indicate the ocean. And he draws a rectangle with a circle in front of it. Then he looks up at her and points at the rectangle with the circle.]

[1/2]

[somebodysdaughter]

[If it wasn't for the... the whatever-this-was, the furry cape thing he'd left with her, Aya would almost have thought that the young man had given up completely and she wouldn't have blamed him for it for a second. She'd have been getting pretty frustrated with herself, if she was the one having to deal with a stranger who asked as many questions and acted - well, who acted like she'd been acting. Especially since he didn't seem to actually want to talk to her...

[But then there's the furry cape thing (it's warm, and Aya wonders where he found it and if she could get one too) and that means he's planning to come back, right? Nobody would abandon a perfectly good huge fur.

[She hangs on to that. And she waits.

[It's not like she's got anywhere else to be.]

[2/2]

[somebodysdaughter]

[She must be tireder than she thought, because she's slipped into a doze by the time he comes back. It's the sound of footsteps that has her stirring, and Aya blinks and watches in bleary-eyed confusion as he scoops handfuls of earth from a planter, spreads them on the ground and (what is he doing?) and starts, she realizes, to draw.

[Aya stirs, and pads over to him, and gazes at the lines he's sketching in the earth. At first she has no idea what she's looking at - patterns, shapes - and then, just like that, she does: it's a map. He's drawing her a map.]

You... found it?

[It must be real, then. Which means that everything else must be real, too.]

[maskeddragon]

[Shin-ah had hoped to convey with leaving his fur that he was coming right back, and it was a useful thing to do anyway since she's not wearing anything heavy enough to guard against the cold. He doesn't want her to be cold while she waits. Being cold is the worst.

So it's gratifying that this strategy worked and she's still there when he returns. At her question, he nods once. Yes, he found it, and this is where it is.]