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 Posted: Sat Dec 12, 2015 3:58 pm
Normally, Elsa tended to patrol and energy drain directly after classes - but during Hanukkah, obligations kept him home until much later. So it was already well and dark out when the Senshi of the Wendigo left his apartment and headed downtown.
The good thing about the holiday season? There were plenty of people out, even late, shopping and talking, and his fuku was subtle enough to not draw too many eyes. He could walk down the street and have no one the wiser to him being magical.
Or he could, as he had chosen to do, sit on a bench, snack on sufganiyot he'd picked up from his favorite bakery, and let his wraith do all the draining work.
Nice.
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Posted: Sat Dec 12, 2015 5:26 pm
A little part of her still felt guilty for patrolling alone. She'd drilled it into her head to at least call one of the other Asteroids before powering up, that to now not even do that felt... wrong. But out she was, a jacket and hat thrown over her uniform to allow her to walk more openly around other people. It was a test really, to see what would happen if she was so visible.
As of yet? Nothing happened.
People might have commented about her outfit, but they were polite about it. She could feel the energy signatures of other powered individuals out and about, and that made her feel more... secure really. No youma in the area at least. Something she'd been concerned about, considering the amount of people in some of the districts shopping.
She did feel a... strange aura however. One she'd not really.... well no, she had encountered these signatures before. She just hadn't had a chance to exchange words with the ones responsible.
So Metis wandered through the late night crowds, following that signature. A... feature drifted through her vision at one point, and the Super Senshi paused. A... static had crossed her vision, through the waves that bounced from the people that walked and talked and seemed none the wiser. Uneasy, she pressed on, until she spotted someone seated on a bench and... deduced the connection to the signature. "I do hope you're not up to any trouble," she said in a chipper tone, as if addressing an old friend. "It's such a nice night after all..."
She was being nice. She wasn't attacking. In fact, she gestured to the empty part of the bench. "May I sit..?"
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Posted: Sat Dec 12, 2015 5:47 pm
Elsa could feel the Super Senshi approaching - and could see her, soon enough. Her outfit looked too fancy, too perfect, to be anything but magical. So he called back his wraith, because he wasn't going to risk it being damaged and all its energy lost. And having to present himself, awkwardly, for a new one.
Not fun.
He gave her his most winning, polite smile. "Who, me? No, not at all," he said, and then he scooted over to give her room to sit down, as the wraith slid back into his mirror shard and he tucked it away. He could keep draining later.
"You're welcome to sit. Doughnut?" He offered, holding up the bag. He could have called them by their proper name, but unless she was Jewish, it wouldn't have made sense - and doughnut was descriptive enough.
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Posted: Sat Dec 12, 2015 7:05 pm
The static wasn't moving across the copper waves that lit up the inanimate world around her, and Metis frowned lightly. Did she just make a mistake? Seeing things? Flicking the frown back into a polite, cheery smile, she bowed her head to him a bit and sat down at his word. "Thank you. I love wearing heels, but they're only so fun to walk in for so long," she laughed before tilting her head towards the offered bag.
She sniffed the air, using her other senses rather than the magical. It wasn't exactly useful for this after all--and she didn't use it twenty-four-seven like she did everything else. "Oh thank you." Energy echolocation didn't do much to help her pinpoint inanimate objects like bags. But she was able to carefully grasp it with one hand while the other felt for the opening carefully to avoid ripping anything, and grab what he called a doughnut from within. Smiling to him, she took a small bite. "This is good! What kind is it?"
Leaning back a little in the seat, she wondered... how bold she should be. She hadn't exactly met a Chaos agent who was willing to sit and chat--never mind offer her food. Deciding she could... be nice, she offered the non-food hand towards him. "I'm Metis, of the Third Eye. Thank you for the bite, I don't usually get to patrol and snack." Her voice was kept a bit softer for her introduction, meant to not drift much further than the bench.
His energy was... strange. He felt like a senshi yet... not? Chaos yet... not Negaverse. For a moment, she wished ********* was there to tell her what she was missing, but she pushed that aside with in inward sigh. She hadn't seen the feline in a while, though she assumed she must be busy helping Iris.
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Posted: Sat Dec 12, 2015 8:02 pm
"Oh, man, I can only imagine," Elsa said, companionably. "My sister has these crazy ice heels? I have no idea how she hasn't broken an ankle, or something." He had absolutely no desire to ever have to deal with that, even if it would give him some height.
He couldn't help but be a little pleased, when she expressed appreciation. "They're raspberry. Sufganiyot, not regular doughnuts -- from the kosher bakery on Tenth?" Send her in their direction, drum up a little business for a nice little place.Maybe she would actually buy some. He pulled out another for himself, and bit in. Yeah,t he idea of taking snacks on patrol in the future sounded like a really good one.
"Elsa, of the Wendigo," he said, between bites, taking her hand and shaking it. This really wasn't too bad - and if he'd gone straight for aggression, he would have missed out.
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Posted: Sat Dec 12, 2015 8:16 pm
Metis had to cover her mouth as she found herself laughing, trying to remain polite even with her mouth full of the tasty treat. Swallowing, she chuckled, bewildered, "Ice? Heels are bad enough, but that can't give her very good traction, poor thing." She could picture someone slipping around all over the place on certain terrains, and her sympathies went out to the girl. It was a miracle she hadn't gotten hurt by her shoes alone then, by the sounds of it. "I hope she stays off the rooftops with those." She'd been about to mention how she recently saw a crime show where an icicle had been the murder weapon, which had been almost impossible to find... but decided it was probably for the better to not joke about murder tactics when she did feel that Chaotic part of his aura.
Was his sister then as well?
Her eyes went a little wide to hear what he called them--that was a first time she'd heard such a word--but when he mentioned it was from a kosher bakery, she gave a soft ah! and connected some dots. "What's the name of the bakery? I'd have to Google it to make sure I was going into the right place. These are delicious though... I'd love to stop by some time and get more." As it was, she had a preference for spending money in more local places if she could--and any place that was recommended by others. For all she knew this was a chain but hey the doughnuts--sorry, the sufganiyot--tasted amazing so hey... Credit where it was due. "Can I ask what else they have? Sorry, I don't don't expect you to know the menu but figured it didn't hurt to ask."
Tempting though it was to ask if they sold anything canine-friendly, she opted against it.
More and more eye-widening surprises. Metis blinked a few times at his sphere. Wendigo? "The... Native American beast, isn't it? Eats people?" She flushed a little, realizing how bland that sounded. "Sorry, I'm not well-versed in lore from the Americas, only general snippets here and there." My though... spheres really did come in a range, didn't they?
Metis shuttered a bit though, imaging what his magic must be like. Probably for the better she didn't jump to attack like she had in the past...
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Posted: Sat Dec 12, 2015 8:44 pm
"I'm guessing the only way she gets anywhere is because magic," Elsa said, "or they're not literally ice and just look like it?" It wasn't as if he'd ever asked, specifically, but he supposed that at some point Lav would have mentioned if her toes were freezing off in ice shoes.
He lit up, a little, at her interest. "It's called Shalom Bakery," he said. "Not hard to find at all, but you'll want to specify for Destiny City - it's not that it's so much a chain as there are a lot of places in a lot of cities with the same name." He laughed, a little. "They've got all kinds of stuff - specialize in pastries, but they do sandwiches too. You can get lunch and dessert and everything."
This was really, really nice, all things considered, even if she did look a little alarmed at his sphere.
"Yeah, yep, that's the one," he sighed heavily. "I couldn't have gotten something nice, like bunnies, or gentle winter snowfalls, or whatever. Nope, horrifying cannibal snow monsters." Her description was a little bland, but bland was just fine with him. "So how does the whole Third Eye thing work? That sounds interesting."
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Posted: Sat Dec 12, 2015 9:25 pm
"If her shoes survived the warmer weather, I would think that'd be to thank for a few things," she laughed, amazed by the extents that magic attire could go apparently. "I never heard of uniforms having such things way back when I first awakened... I think the cosmic designers have gotten more creative." Metis couldn't help but laugh at her own 'back in my day' line, but... really? They all sounded relatively similar, give or take some details. Yet now the uniforms for so many people were... so heavily varied. It was... amazing really.
She felt someone could do an entire study just on the uniforms alone...
"Shalom Bakery," she repeated, then nodded when she felt she had it committed to memory. "Oh I'll definitely need to stop by at some point. It sounds like a great place to stop in at any time." She wasn't entirely sure if she'd stop there for patrol snacks... though it certainly was tempting as she finished off her pastry.
Metis shook her head, expression taking on a thoughtful edge as she rested her elbow on her leg and pressed her chin into her palm. "A teammate of mine, Sailor Iris, is the Senshi of Rainbows. Those rainbows can cut things to pieces, including people." Though she wasn't... too upset to think about when she'd witnessed a decapitated lieutenant, she left that alone as she continued, "Just because a sphere sounds nice and sweet, does not always mean the actual magic is so. Take that as a word of warning to never judge a sphere, I suppose." Not that Wendigo sounded so sweet and cuddly, but still. She wanted to ask more about his sphere, but when he directed the question back to her, she smiled. "Well... hm. It started with blinding someone for a short period, but now I... well. I've been told my magic causes strange, jumbled visions of sorts. Though I've... yet to find out if any of them hold true," she admitted, even as she thought of those... phantom dreams of a future she hoped would never pass.
"So the Third Eye is... clairvoyance, I suppose? To put it in another term?" Nodding to him, she bounced the ball back to his court. "Would you feel comfortable telling me about your sphere?"
She'd just told someone with a Chaos aura what her magic was.
"And... forgive me for being rude but... what are you? I'm... afraid you're the first I've met that... feels the way you do. I apologize for being so blunt, I'm just at a complete loss here what to make of that." Her smile slid into a frown, brow creasing as she thought of how... strange it was to be speaking so openly to someone from a faction she was sure she should consider an enemy.
Yet he wasn't hurting anyone. Offered her food. And was being extremely polite. What on earth...
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Posted: Sat Dec 12, 2015 10:29 pm
Elsa laughed. "How long have you been a Senshi?" He asked, interestedly. Her comment seemed like the type of thing that came from someone who had been around a very, very long time. Most Senshi had been at it longer than him, but he was still curious.
He took his last few bites of food while he listened to her talk about powers. Part of him sort of longed for magic slicer rainbows, oddly enough, because at least then it would be visceral and violent and done rather than creeping horror. At the same time, that also sounded absolutely terrifying and hard to control. He wondered if this teammate of hers had ever done serious damage to someone with that attack by accident.
He wondered if it had haunted her, the way his magic had haunted him.
Metis couldn't answer those questions for him, so he didn't ask, but he wondered.
"Clairvoyance, huh?" That sounded interesting enough. "Sounds like fun, actually. Jumbled visions and all." Better than what he had to offer. He coughed, briefly.
"Wendigos - like you guessed - they're a Native American legend. Iroquois, specifically. They used to be people, once upon a time, or so the stories go - see, the Iroquois have a really strong taboo against cannibalism. 'Starve before you do it' strong. It's said that if someone breaks that taboo, he will inevitably become a wendigo, cursed to wander cold and hungry forever. Worse - you can get possessed by a wendigo spirit and become one that way." His expression quirked into a grin, briefly. "My magic makes you feel like you're being hunted by one. I had someone turn it on me once - it was pretty ******** awful, to be completely up front with you."
And there was another question, which was a thoroughly interesting one. "I'm a Dark Mirror Senshi," he said. "There aren't a lot of us, and you'd have to ask one of the older Dakr Mirrors for the jazz on how we came to be and all that - I sort of didn't pay a lot of attention to the hows and whys. We're not Negaverse, but we're not Order either, and everybody wants to kill us."
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Posted: Sat Dec 12, 2015 10:48 pm
His question made her sigh a little as she thought about that. "Well let's see here... I was awakened in... October... 2009... yes that's it, I'd just moved to Destiny City for school." Frowning a little in thought, she did quick math and winced. "I've been a senshi for six years since October. And there's still so much I don't know." It was hard to not feel... a bit self-conscious about that. But it didn't hurt to try and fill in the blanks now, right? Still, she laughed and smiled. "Things really have changed so much. At the time, the only powered people running around were guardians, Negaverse, and Senshi. Just learning about corrupt senshi was alarming enough..."
And now the Negaverse had half-youma, knights were around, Cavaliers and Parallels had come and gone... though she'd never met a lot of them herself, she'd heard the stories from ********* and Iris, and it still... baffled her.
Six years of the Asteroids... and now she found herself mostly wandering alone.
Trying to shake that idea, she focused on what Elsa was saying, smiling politely as she listened. Not that her smile stayed, it flickered and faded into a look of amazement as she listened. Not only from his information--clearly he'd done his research, or knew of the source material from before all this, she guessed--but just its... use. It's effect. Metis visibly shuttered at the idea of suffering under the illusion of being hunted by such a creature. "That... sounds horrifying. I'm sorry you had such a thing used against you, though I suppose in... concept, it's good to know what your magic is capable of." Magic only got stronger with time... it made her blanch a little to think of what his magic might be capable of.
"Have you gone to your world? Have you seen any memories connected with this... this magic? I'll admit, I'm horribly curious if they might have had similar lore... if not maybe the actual creatures there." Horrible though that was to think about, she couldn't help but be fascinated by it.
Dark... Mirror? Metis frowned. Well, she guessed that explained the Chaos aura, but he said they're not the Negaverse..? "Well your... energy does have the same... Chaos-sense to it that the Negaverse does, so I'll admit I was... apprehensive about speaking to you and not just attacking," she admitted, head bowed in sheepish shame. "Though I'm glad I didn't! Truth be told, I largely didn't to keep anyone around here from getting caught in the crossfire, something I am a bit grateful for now." Yet it would explain why at least Order wouldn't be exactly happy to have these Dark Mirror Senshi around. Were they tied to the Negaverse at all? "Do you know the names of any of the older Dark Mirror Senshi? I am curious now about your... well, group."
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Posted: Sat Dec 12, 2015 11:20 pm
Six years. Damn, that was a long time to be fighting. And he couldn't help but agree that corrupt Senshi were alamring - he still remembered the holes in Ochre's chest and forehead. Creepy as s**t. "Yeah we're...kinda recent, as I understand," he said, shrugging his shoulders.
Comparatively, at least.
He didn;t like thinking about the time he'd had his magic turned on him. It made him want to retreat again, to stop fighting, and he'd just barely gotten used to using it again. "It stopped working, for a while, after that. I got myself knee-deep in a lot of trouble because I didn't have it - was too scared to use it." He'd realized that, after the train. That it wasn't something wrong with his magic, it was in him. "I think I've gotten past that, but it's still not...my favorite thing."
And he looked immensely sad when she mentioned his world. "I haven't. I can't. None of us can." He said, and his voice was soft. That was where he stopped, though. She didn't need to know that the Court was trying to change that - that someday they would be able to get to space. Until it was a reality, he didn't need to let that too far out of the bag. "So I dunno - maybe they did?"
He did laugh, just a little. "I'm glad you didn't attack me, obviously," he said. "Um, I know Remarque, and Leto - they're our Royals. Montaka, Tantlaus, Damocles," he tried to recall some of the other Eternals from the meeting. "Acubens, Lesath." Surely they would have more information for Metis. "I'm sorry there's not more I can tell you, I just...I mean, I've been in this for a year, but I still feel like I'm tripping over my own feet finding my footing."
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Posted: Sun Dec 13, 2015 12:01 am
Recent felt like an understatement in some context, and she found herself laughing. "I feel like I've been under a rock for the last few years... can't say I'm too surprised to have missed some things."
As Elsa talked about his unease about his magic though, she felt her heart go out to the young man. It... was a rather scary magic--even against an enemy, she supposed she could see the concern and weight on one's mind. Again her mind drifted to Iris... and she sighed a little. "I can't speak from personal experience, mind you... but you're not the first senshi to have doubts about their powers, never mind using them against people." Frowning a little, she... hesitantly placed a hand against his upper arm. A gesture she hoped was comforting. "There are other ways to fight, but for a senshi... and I assume this is the same for a Dark Mirror... our magic is our strongest part of us. If the choice becomes the life of an innocent person, your own life, the life an ally... versus using that magic... A Negaverse lieutenant once had my starseed in his hand, and was about to kill me. I'm here... and he's not, because an ally of mine was willing to take that burden. Soon after that, our team adapted a code to not kill if we could avoid, though I'm not sure the extent to what costs we'd be allowed to let it go." There were no simple answers. It was a war. There were never any simple answers for anything.
She hoped she at least assured him he wasn't alone, instead of being on some lonely island. It was a decision many had to make. She got the easy part with having a magic that was non-lethal.
From one blunder into another. Metis cringed as she heard this... rather sad news. "I'm so sorry," she murmured, face flushed. "I... had no idea. I'm so sorry." So they were like the Negaverse then--barred from space unless brought willingly? That... was a rather sad idea to her, in this moment. "I... know it wouldn't be the same... but if you ever want to go with me to my asteroid, I could take you." She at least felt she owed him the offer, after bringing up the subject...
Instead of focusing on that, she made mental notes about the different names he mention. "No no, you're fine! Like I said, I've been doing this for six and there's still a learning curve at times..." Laughing a bit, she hoped to lighten the mood a little. "Sort of keeps things... interesting, I suppose? I know some people have gotten jaded, but I can't help but find it... well, sort of amazing." And now she had more people to look up and try to speak to... see? More to learn every day.
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Posted: Sun Dec 13, 2015 12:46 am
It was surprising, how much her reassurance helped. He didn't like the image of a dead Lieutenant, and he would absolutely be passing on his new knowledge of Iris's powers because that was dangerous as all ********, but it was still sort of comforting to know that he wasn't the first or the last to struggle with his magic. "We don't get the physical boosts, or the magical chest-fisting thing, so yeah, our personal magic's about what we've got. It's gotten easier - I realized that I can either keep getting my a** kicked or I can suck it up and use the magic." At least it didn't do real damage.
But her offer had him nodding. "I'd like that, a lot." It would be a long time before he got to set foot on his own homeworld, but he could see hers - could see what space was really like.
The Senshi stood up, scooping up his bag of sufganiyot, but not before he held it out one last time. "Want another? I should probably be getting home, it's heading into finals and I've got papers out the a**." Probably the only really good thing about his major was that he could claim hours spent listening to the Hamilton soundtrack as Real Legitimate studying.
"But, yeah - there's always something new to see." He paused, briefly. "Hey, so - we don't have homeworlds, but we do have Mirrorspace. I can't go on my own, yet, but when I can - maybe I can show you? Not for long, and we'd probably have to avoid anyone else in the Court since I don't think they'd like me bringing an outsider in, but it's something you've probably never experienced before."
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Posted: Sun Dec 13, 2015 1:10 am
...magical chest-fisting thing. Metis had to laugh at that one. Painfully accurate, though it was...
She smiled and was at least a bit relieved she seemed to have been some form of help. "It's only in their head. It's not much solace, but it's something." It... was a good thing though, that he was aware of it all. Far more than any of the Negaverse agents she'd encountered anyways. A good sign in and of itself, she figured.
When he stood, she realized they'd been talking for quite a while--funny really. And here she'd first thought she'd have a battle on her hands... Nodding, she happily accepted another of the sufganiyot before she sighed. "Same here actually. Papers, finals... there's times I can't decide if school is worse than being a senshi or vice versa." School always won out though as being the best deal. A life after senshi-dom, she hoped.
Standing herself, she listened as he mentioned... Mirrorspace? Eye wide, she slowly grinned. "I'd really like that, if there's ever a chance to see it. And I was honest in my offer to take you to the asteroid. Maybe if we both have less papers to deal with next time," she offered, laughing. Nodding her head to him and giving a slight bow of respect, she smiled. "It was a pleasure meeting you, Elsa. Good luck with your papers, and thank you for the sufganiyot." She really was going to check out that bakery... would be a shame to not after already deciding she liked at least one of their products. Besides. She didn't need to meet Elsa again and have to say she hadn't yet gone there herself.
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