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Week 4.
WEEK 4 Backtracking may not seem like an ideal situation, especially not given the situation on Sunday morning, but it isn't without reason or merit; after all, Lake Valor is within a reasonable distance, and perhaps more importantly, there's reason to believe that something may be there. Whether it's one of the Guardians you seek or something else entirely has yet to be seen; there's only one way to know for sure, however. So back onto Route 213 it is; you should reach Route 214 by Tuesday afternoon, and the entrance to Lake Valor by Thursday night; you may want to wait to explore the lakefront proper during the morning, however. Who knows what you may run into... You've seen at least some reasons to not give up hope as you left Pastoria; for the time being, let that hope give you strength. POKEMON AVAILABLE: PLAINS/FOREST / MOUNTAINS/ELEVATED AREAS SUNDAY | MONDAY | TUESDAY | WEDNESDAY | THURSDAY [OOC: Welcome to week four of Azume; feel free to make as many top levels as you'd like and tag out to other characters! This post is for all of your interactions this week... at least until the weekend. Don't forget that a write-up is due next weekend!] |
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Still pretending, in this world you could play football as much as you wanted, to your heart's content, but you could never tell anyone about it. Not your friends, not your classmates. No one would come to your games, either.
How would you feel?
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I had to hide my identity when playing football at first...but that's not nearly the same thing. The whole point of hiding my identity was to make a mystery identity that would draw attention to our team, after all...
[He looks kind of sad, reflecting on that. Sena can't help but think about what the Chairman of the high school football association had said at that speech. The only thing that mattered in football was...winning. That meant...]
...What's the point, if you can't share your victory with everyone...?
[Why would you even play? What kind of joy was that supposed to bring?]
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The other players, too. In this pretend reality, the word "team" doesn't suit them. You play together, but it's not really...
[A pause.]
You're not on the same side. Not really. You fight for the same goal, but no one would bat an eye if they replaced you tomorrow.
Would you still want to play?
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That...that sounds like some teams that I've heard of. They want players of the best ability, so they...
[He looks distant. The Yuuhi Guts...that team had really been in a sorry state. A team made up of nothing but replacements...]
...They don't have any heart, when they get rid of experienced players simply because they don't have enough skill...It feels like they're missing something important. I could never...I couldn't play in a team like that.
[He looks at her quizzically.] Is...being a mage really like that?
1/2 I just keep giving you novels, I'm sorry
At first, she'd just been trying to illustrate the situation in terms he could understand. It had felt like a stretch to her, but to hear him relate it to some of his own experiences... And with such a visceral reaction?
She knows the ideal she had in her head of a cold, pragmatic mage doesn't suit her. Witnessing glimpses of Archer's past in her dreams, and seeing Shirou's struggles, it was impossible not to take a critical look at herself, too, and see she was hardly better. That kind of life wouldn't make her happy in the end, so she decided to do things her own way.
Having made that decision, Rin thought she understood her heart a little better now. But hearing Sena talk, she can see she still has blindspots.
"It feels like they're missing something important."
It's her analogy, but she has no idea what that could be.]
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It's just an analogy. [Her voice is shaky, but it sounds somewhat more like herself again.]
In practice, there's big differences. Mages are more common in Europe; there's hardly any in Japan to begin with, and even less in my city. Until six months ago, I didn't have any teammates to speak of in the first place. The Association doesn't call unless they have a bone to pick with me, either.
But aside from that, I think my comparison gets the right feelings across, at their simplest level.
[She'll leave out the (literally) bloody details.]
good thing i love reading
[He says that, but it's hard to put his feelings about it into words. It's like trying to imagine the world of pros in the NFL: some kind of mystical land one hears about, one can see, but can barely know the true scope of things inside. And the way it made her sound, how she still doesn't look completely herself when thinking about it...]
...Being a mage sounds really lonely, Tohsaka.
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You said it, not me.
[But he's not wrong, and she doesn't correct him. She smiles wide, because she knows if she doesn't, she might cry.
Yeah. She's always been lonely. Rin has a blunt personality and will plainly admit most things, but that's one thing she can't admit to. Describing it like this was the best she could do, because if anything it downplayed that ache. It only scratched the surface.
The loneliness Rin grew up in isn't one most people can understand. That's not even melodramatic teenage angst; there's maybe only one person in the world who could relate, and they've barely spoken to one another in ten years. She hasn't even told Shirou or Saber.
So yes. Rin smiles.]
And that's why I had to cut back. That's the difference between you and me, Kobayakawa-kun. Unlike you, even now I do want to keep playing. Magecraft is a messed up sport, but that's how much I love it.
I'm not stupid, though. I know now how badly that would end for me, so I've compromised by abandoning a lot of those rules. The Mage's Association would balk, but I live my life as I please these days.
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[He can't imagine having such a lonely past-time. But who knows? Maybe if he had a natural aptitude for it and was introduced to magic in the same way he had to American Football, would he be the same way?
Maybe. Maybe not. He'd never know. What he does know is that he and Tohsaka live in very different worlds - literally so. And maybe...maybe he knows that the smile on her face doesn't quite add up. The way the skin crinkles around her eyes...it's the same as when Yukimitsu wasn't chosen to be a starting player, the same way he screwed up his eyes and convinced himself that it would be fine, he could continue to help on the bench, that it was fine that he would likely never run a game...
There's a lie somewhere in there, but he can't see what it is. He's not sure if he wants to.]
You think you can get away with that?
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But if someone gets too big for their britches and really has a problem with me... Enough to act on it?
[Oh, this grin is genuine, and honestly a little scary.]
I have the most powerful familiar in the world on my side. [Hair blowing in a sudden breeze, her eyes spark with an inner flame as she clenches her fist, unafraid.] If they want to start a fight, they can try.
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But the more she speaks, the more he realizes...this is her way of freeing herself. Making magecraft her own thing. Maybe even...being able to truly enjoy it. She's not going to let anyone take that away from her.]
...You sound like you could take on the world. [Not unlike a certain demonic quarterback. He thinks the man would approve of this kind of resolve.]
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[Yes, she's definitely looking much more like herself now, animated with her gestures, and comfortable in her own skin. After stretching her arms high above her shoulders, there's a spring in her step when she drops them back to swing at her sides.]
But you know, every person you meet has a smaller "world". Like their very own personal bubble, filled with the things and people they value most.
That's the only world that matters to me. There's no point for me to take it on, because I already rule it.
[It's as simple as that, but Rin's always been that sort of person. She's never done anything she didn't want to do, and it seems that applies her too.
It's not even that she'll fiercely protect what's important to her and her own decisions, though that should go without saying. No—she's so self-assured that the scenario Sena presented strikes her as so unlikely, to her it's not even a concern.
It's her happiness, after all. She smiles at him.]
I'm sure you feel the same way sometimes, when you're on the football field.
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[That sounds a little more like the Tohsaka he knows. No wonder she's so self-assured. Or seems to be, at any rate. The past few minutes have shaken him of that preconception. Not that she isn't, but he can't help but wonder if she's like this because she feels like she has to.
Maybe he's overthinking this.]
You might be right about that...when I run on there, it's just me, and whoever I have to get past. At that point...nothing else seems to matter.
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Is football the only sport you play? It's not often you come across American football teams in Japan, so I assumed it's something you picked up in high school. With that kind of spirit, though, I wouldn't be surprised if you had other athletic pursuits.
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[So...not very long. Huh. He actually looks embarrassed and...almost a little ashamed of himself when he speaks again.]
I didn't...always have that kind of spirit.
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[She looks surprised, though not at his embarrassment. That just strikes her as strange; why is he getting so shy all of a sudden? If he didn't participate in sports before joining the football team, that's kind of impressive.]
Then how did you get into it? It struck me as such a niche sport, I was certain you had to be a member of the track team or something similar, and then met a player from another sports club who poached you. If that's not how it went down, I'm twice as curious to hear the real story.
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[His eyes look a little distant, clearly reminiscing. It seems to be a mix between embarrassment and a fond memory.]
Just running away.
[Ah.]
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For a moment, she worries she's stumbled on what could be an uncomfortable subject for him, but that expression he's wearing...]
I can't tell if I've hit a nerve on not. [Hmm.] But the look on your face is so pleasant, whatever's going through your head can't be all bad.
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Be less shy about it, then! Geez. [She points her nose in the air.] For a moment you had me going. I thought I'd accidentally said something offensive, and wounded your already frail constitution.
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[Really, he didn't mean to be so dramatic about it! Really.]
No, no...it wasn't anything like that. I was just, er...bullied a lot, when I was younger. I was always getting taken advantage of and made to run errands for other kids...and sometimes Mamori-neechan would step in on my behalf, which made people tease me for being weak even more often...
[He shakes his head, as if clearing his mind.]
Just your average grade school bullying.
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In hindsight, this story explains a lot of Sena's mannerisms. When Rin was in primary school, for a brief time she had a friend like that, a girl who was frequently bullied. He's probably the kind of guy who learned to be more sure of himself when he got in his element, but still questions himself when he's standing outside that bubble, too used to things going wrong if he speaks up.]
So in other words... [Hm.] Your talent was honed by all those years of carrying out errands from them, or trying to run and hide when they were around. Am I following that correctly?
[She sounds neither judgmental, nor pitying. It sounds to her like Sena has already accepted that chapter of his life and moved on from it, so commenting on it further would be unnecessary. (note: she's not always the best read on people)
Instead, she's just trying to connect the dots. This is his origin story of sorts, so she's trying to piece how that lead to a high school career in football.]
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[She's not wrong. Sena's nature is just to do things for other people when they ask, bullying or no. It just makes it that much easier for bullies to take advantage of him.]
I mean, Riku also taught me how to run - he plays American Football too, but that was after he moved away - but he taught me that to fight back against bullies, and I just ended up using it to run more errands. But running through crowds all day - [Rin lives in Japan, she surely knows how crowded the streets can be.] - and running fast enough to make sure they were appeased...that's a lot of where my running skills came from, I think.
[But that doesn't explain how he ended up in football, of all things. You'd think he'd at least make it to the track team first.]
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I'm shocked someone got their claws into you before any other teams or clubs. At my school, I often eat a lunch with some of the girls on the track team, and they're always looking for talent like that.
Heh. [She grins to herself, thinking of how mad Kaede would be in a a situation like this, where a girl with Sena's skill got poached from right under her nose.]
I guarantee someone's sore for missing their chance to recruit you. Either the old you was so inconspicuous that they missed it, or the person who poached you first had sharp eyes.
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[Look at him. He's pretty much the epitome of "average Japanese high school student" other than being small in stature. Completely inconspicuous.]
But Hiruma-san...he kinda, sorta...forced me to play at first.
[Aha. There it was.]
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