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 Posted: Wed Dec 19, 2012 9:26 pm
Sailor Irene was lost. Not physically; she knew that she was in a fairly popular shopping area, where the windows were decorated and there was a tree in the central plaza flashing with multicolored lights. It was probably a bit too popular an area for her to need to patrol in, and certainly too well-lit, but she couldn't think of anywhere else to go, or even what to do. Was there even a point to powering up and taking a stroll? Last night it had turned out to be a terrible idea. Why was she pursuing a terrible idea, other than out of habit?
"This is how I got into trouble the first time," she scolded herself, and was about to give the whole thing up for the night when something flared at the edges of her senses. Something dark and unpleasant. A youma, probably, not too far away or she wouldn't be able to feel it at all. This left Irene in a pickle. On the one hand, she wasn't fighting anymore, so there was nothing she could do. If she went to check it out and ended up getting angry, she could make a bad situation even worse. On the other hand, if she abandoned someone with no chance of survival, wouldn't that be the worst case scenario?
For several precious moments she thought about what the right answer was. When she realized there was none, she took off in the vague direction she thought the youma was. With any luck, it would be a weak little thing, and nobody would be in its path that evening.
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Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 12:26 pm
Steven Bitre really should consider just staying in his apartment at night, with the doors locked and no other sinister presence besides his guinea pig and the looming responsibilities of chores and homework.
But he had not.
At all. The green haired HITS student was bumbling around the shopping center, trying to fix the order of a stack of papers that had gotten shuffled when he tripped moments earlier, completely oblivious to the fact there were dangerous things in the near vicinity that would do him any harm.
In fact, he saw the senshi before anything. Purple hair, white bodice. The very sort of senshi Remarque had told him very specifically not to talk to. Although, it might've been frowned upon he was talking to Remarque in the first place, and Steven had serious problems believing people to be evil right off the bat. Or, usually at any point in time until they were nearly killing him.
He didn't know what to do! His first instinct was to say hi, but he kind of stopped and gripped his papers a littler tighter while his mouth twisted in this awkward expression of confusion.
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Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 12:54 pm
Before she found the youma, Irene spotted the last thing she wanted to find: a normal, ordinary person. She stared at him as he stared at her, crippled with guilt and confusion. This was bad. She had no idea where the youma was other than somewhere nearby, and now someone had seen her and was looking at her like she had two heads or something. It was enough to make her pat her shoulders gently, just to make sure there was only the one neck there.
"Um... good evening." When in doubt, politeness was always the right way to go. "Forgive me for making sudden requests when we don't know each other, but you should leave. Now."
Then she seemed to forget about him, looking around for someone- or something- that was lurking nearby, trusting that he would take her advice and leave. Which was pretty silly, considering the reputation senshi had among ordinary people.
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Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 5:35 pm
Well! She was very polite! Which did not help Steven's outlook of 'well I was warned but she's just so nice so I must' train of thought.
"Hello!" He said, but quickly found himself frowning at her unsettled tone. "Why should I leave?" He asked, noting that she said him and not the both of them. And if there was going to be something bad happening that he had to leave, why wasn't she coming too?
"I uh... I mean," Then again he was arguing with an alien who had mystical space powers and could probably beat him up even without space powers.
He was really easy to beat up.
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Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2013 9:28 am
What, he wasn't gone yet? Irene looked at the guy again, frowning worriedly. She had honestly thought that if she told him to leave, he would. She wouldn't have tried giving him such an order if it wasn't for a really good reason. The more he stood around arguing about it, the greater the chance that they would both end up as youma food.
"Because..." What could she tell him? If he didn't know about what really went on in Destiny City, he'd never believe that a monster was lurking nearby, or that she was a hero. At this point she wasn't sure she herself believed the latter part, not anymore. And 'because I said so' would sound commandeering, and he'd never listen to that.
While she tried to come up with a convincing argument, a huge blob of orange jelly landed on the pavement in front of them. For a moment it just seemed to seep into the sidewalk, raising Irene's hopes. Maybe someone had gotten marmalade as a holiday gift and just really didn't like it. Then it gathered itself in and surged up, revealing two red eyes and a maw full of what she assumed were teeth.
Irene sighed, assuming one of the stances that Iris had taught her. "That's why."
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Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2013 3:03 pm
Steven was not convinced. Not that he was trying to stand his ground and not be convinced, but he was obviously not picking up on some signals. He mirrored her worried frown and raised one eyebrow at the 'because'.
And then something hit the pavement and he just about jumped out of his pants.
And when it revealed it had eyes, well...
He suddenly stopped being a worrywart over the fact this little girl was an alien senshi creature in a dangerous area at night and ended up exhaling an embarrassing noise as he moved to get behind her. Because she was the superpowered alien, here.
"Oh god, more aliens?" Well it's not like anyone explained youma to him. Everyone's answer to everything was 'it's weird because space.'
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Posted: Sun Jan 13, 2013 6:30 pm
The youma blobbed in place, seemingly unsure which victim to go after first. Irene tried to take advantage of this moment of confusion by kicking it in what she assumed was it's back. The only result this had was her losing one of her shoes in its gooey mass. "Ewwww," she said reflexively, shaking goop off her bare foot, the guy nearby temporarily forgotten.
It was kind of hard to hurt a monster that seemed to consist of orange marmalade, plus eyes and teeth and one purple high heel. It was not nearly as hard for the monster to hurt others. It lashed out at Irene with a tentacle, which she might have normally been quick enough to dodge. She had forgotten that she was on uneven feet without her shoe, and tripped over it instead, landing on her butt with a yelp.
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Posted: Sun Jan 27, 2013 4:56 pm
Steven held up his bag in front of him like it could dream of being a shield even in an alternate universe. Running felt wrong, since he wasn't sure if she'd follow, and just leaving her there felt so wrong.
And then she fell and his brain completely locked up.
"I... I-- Miss?! Are you okay?" He asked, making the beginning motions to run towards her only to be spooked into stopping by one of those tentacles. He was soooo far out of his element.
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Posted: Sun Jan 27, 2013 5:49 pm
Irene rubbed her tailbone and groaned. This was so not going the way she had planned. But at least she had gotten someone else out of the way first. Even if she ended up being swallowed by orange goop, she would go out heroically. That had to count for something.
Except that the guy hadn't run like she'd told him to. For some reason he was staring at the monster instead of doing the sensible thing and fleeing for his life. It looked like he was trying to help, which was sweet, but since he wasn't actually doing anything, she really wished he would just leave her to this already.
Slowly she lurched back to her feet and, after a moment's thought, kicked off her other shoe. "I'm fine," she called back, hating the lie but knowing it was necessary. "I can handle this." Another lie. "Please go; I don't want you to get hurt, and..." And I don't know if I can protect you. That was the absolute truth.
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Posted: Sun Feb 10, 2013 12:47 pm
"But what if you get hurt?" Steven felt awkward. He didn't want to argue or play the hero. He didn't mean to be obstinate about not running away because he very much wanted to run away, but leaving her there was not a good feeling.
He wanted to offer a solution too but he had none because he didn't even know what was going on.
So he did the least helpful thing ever which was act like he was going to explode and yelp, "What is even going on?!"
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Posted: Sat Mar 16, 2013 9:49 pm
This wasn't working. The guy, while nice, was just not listening. He was confused, and Irene couldn't blame him for that. What she could blame him for was not following simple instructions. How hard was it to run away and not look back?
It was hard. Very hard. To leave someone behind and pretend that was okay was nigh impossible. So, there would be no blame games going on. As the monster closed in, Irene knew that she had to make a decision. She could fight it, not knowing whether or not she could win, or even if she could protect the person who was trying to help her. Or she could run away, and ensure that he was safe.
Neither option was particularly alluring, and Irene was casting around for a third when the monster threw its blobby self at the green-haired guy. In that moment, her choice was made. "Run!" she shouted again, throwing herself at her would-be savior. Moments before he would have been swallowed by goop, she grabbed his hand and yanked him down a side street. "Come on, we have to get out of here!"
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Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 7:21 pm
Things were happening very fast, much faster than Steven could process. One minute the creature was flying at him, and the next his hand was firmly gripped by alien-girl.
Okay now he could run, even though he was stumbling to keep up with her at this point.
"See! That wasn't so hard!" He shouted, and tried to laugh, but he was way too out of breath and focused on keeping his feet moving beneath him for that.
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Posted: Wed May 29, 2013 5:58 pm
Lives could change in the blink of an eye. Irene knew that, but this was the first time she could recognize one of those watershed moments when it was happening to her.
The Sailor Irene who looked for meaningless battles was gone. She'd been dwindling all week, ever since her fight with Ellie had gone so terribly wrong. For a long time, her definition of "senshi" had been "magic person who fights monsters." It made sense: "senshi" came from Japanese, she knew, and roughly translated to "warrior" or "soldier." Warriors were fighters. They were powerful, and they used that power to hurt, and even kill, others. Irene had never been big on fighting, especially with her friends, but she thought that as a senshi, she had to.
In that moment where she decided to run instead of fight, another possibility had been born. It was true that Irene would likely have to fight at some points. But that didn't have to be her mission. It was more important to her to keep people safe and calm, rather than to work on hurting or demoralizing her enemy. That was also valuable- or at least, it was to her. She hoped that the guy she'd rescued felt the same way, even though he seemed to think that the whole thing had been easy.
For once, the strong choice had been running away. If she had been weak, and succumbed to her desire to prove herself, both she and the other guy would have gotten hurt. She had already gotten hurt a little bit; her back ached from landing on it, and her feet were sore from running without shoes. But considering what could have happened, they were both in pretty good shape, because she had prioritized life over power.
This was what being a senshi meant to Sailor Irene. This was what she had been searching for all this time.
She looked around, almost surprised to see the green-haired guy, despite the fact that she'd dragged him to this spot. "Are you okay?" she asked, still slightly out of breath. He looked fine, but it was hard to tell. "I'm fine, so if you are also fine, then I will leave you to your business."
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