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 Posted: Fri Jul 19, 2024 12:32 am
Order auras meant trouble. Figuring that out had hardly even deserved to be called “figuring that out,” in Ilmari’s opinion, in light of how it had been as good as spelled out in the training guide. Feeling one of said auras flare up while he did a few rounds through Ramsett Park, siphoning off energy donations from single civilians here or there, Ilmari could not help but roll his eyes, already exhausted with whatever he would find.
Because it was a truth universally acknowledged that Order auras meant trouble for a (mostly) honest, hard-working Negaverse senshi. Whether the aura that popped up on his senses belonged to a Knight or to one of the senshi held in thrall to the utter disaster area that Order seemed to be, they would surely put up a fight against him doing his job and Ilmari didn’t want to get caught on the back foot. Giving them any room to steamroll over him, showing them anything that resembled weakness—any of that was tantamount to failure.
And failure, as always, was unacceptable. A prime opportunity to learn and improve, certainly, but something that could, instead, just as easily be avoided.
Of course, approaching them was a double-edged sword, no matter how much Ilmari tried to hide amongst the assorted trees and bushes that decorated the park. What else was Ilmari supposed to do, though? Only one option existed to avoid letting the Order sycophant detect Ilmari in turn, and it was equally unacceptable. Powering down would have counted as a surrender. No, he needed to simply accept the risk of being caught, and face it head-on, with the nerve and determination that the Negaverse expected of its senshi.
He only gave himself a moment to pause upon finally spotting the likeliest source of the aura, out underneath a lamp that sat pretty near to the sidewalk. At that, only one thing made Ilmari halt, peering at the target from behind a tree and wondering what, exactly, he was looking at. Sure, there had been distinctly non-human senshi up at Almadel’s museum, in the business with the kosopods last month, but none of them had looked quite like the one Ilmari found himself looking at now.
Dark skin with a sort of bluish-purple tone to it. Brightly colored hair. Elf ears and a lean figure. Ilmari would need to try and remember these details. However things went from here, the alien senshi was quite beautiful. He would have made a lovely model, if not for Order senshi being so unnecessarily bigoted toward senshi who were different from them.
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Posted: Fri Jul 19, 2024 1:17 am
Pyrrhus felt...dizzy. The lights and sound and crash of the city--for it was definitely a city; even if it had been millennia since he'd seen one, he still recognized it for what it was--were disorienting after so long alone in the dark and quiet of the deep caves below Pyrrhus.
It was an assault, to be amidst so much life all over again--to hear insects singing and a distant, unidentifiable mechanical rumble and whoosh, and--not very many signs of people, so perhaps this was a mostly-diurnal world? Ugh, terrible, of course he'd managed to find a world like that.
But ti was a world, and a world alive, and that meant that he was not going to simply disappear, or continue into eternity alone in the dark.
So, already, his situation was looking up.
Except--hew felt something. Sharp and cold, and familiar-but-not, and--
Chaos.
It crawled up his spine, and made him turn, seeking out the source, and his eyes landed on something strange.
Something that surely could not be the source of the Chaos aura he felt, because that something was most certainly a Senshi--in black, yes, but perhaps that was just an oddity of this world and this time. And yes, the Senshi's hair was too long, and there was a strange crack in their forehead, and--
Pyrrhus's mind rejected the logical thing before his eyes. Because it simply could not be.
Senshi could not be taken by Chjaos. It was unheard of. Surely, if it could happen, it would have happened to him, when he shattered that awful crown--
He stormed over to the blond in black.
"What are you," Pyrrhus demanded, with no mind for the Senshi before him being much taller than him. "You shouldn't exist."
His voice felt raw from disuse. Everything felt strange and wrong and new, all at once. And yet his first instinct, upon seeing another person, was to confront.
Some things, he could imagine Heibing saying, never change, do they, Rylafein?
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Posted: Fri Jul 19, 2024 1:36 am
……Well, this social situation wasn’t entirely going how Ilmari had imagined.
Not that he had imagined terribly much, having never personally dealt with one of the senshi who’d outright come to Earth from outer space, rather than having been born here via some quirk of reincarnation or whatever. But getting stormed up to and snapped at in such a manner left Ilmari frowning bemusedly and wrinkling his nose because……people? Generally did not act this way? Not in his experience?
Moreover, people generally did not accuse other people of not being able to exist like this.
“That statement makes no sense,” Ilmari pointed out, not quite gently but also not entirely from a place of hostility. Order senshi were trouble, he realized, and if things went badly, he was more than adequately prepared to either pull hair and scratch at eyes, or to throw his magic at this space-senshi and make a quick getaway. But at the same time, the other senshi was easily a nine—probably a ten when he wasn’t getting in someone else’s face unfairly and maybe had time for a nap—and he seemed like……maybe? He wasn’t entirely in touch with reality? “Think about it logically: something is telling you that I shouldn’t exist. But I clearly do. I’m very real and standing here in front of you? See?”
Touching a person who wasn’t entirely in touch with reality sounded dangerous, for both of them. So, instead, Ilmari held out one of his hands, palm up but not moving to do anything with it. Motioning for the other senshi to touch him and verify for himself that Ilmari was real.
“My name is Ilmari,” he said, “senshi of chastity. And I am not a figment of your imagination.”
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Posted: Fri Jul 19, 2024 1:55 am
Alright. Well. The Senshi in front of him did have a point. Pyrrhus frowned, and reached out, poking his chest, which was very solid and objectively kind of nice. Had his heart not been torn from him a thousand years ago, he might have thought this Senshi was quite pleasing to the eyes, even if his existence was confusing.
He withdrew his hand, because feeling around wasn't going to do anything, and shook it out a little, still frowning. That hadn't really been the issue, but....it was nice to confirm that this was, indeed, real.
"You don't understand. Senshi aren't supposed to be Chaos. That's not how it works." He shook his head, briefly. "Obviously, you're real, and you do exist. But you shouldn't. Not as you are."
He huffed.
"Pyrrhus. Of Nihility. Explain to me how a Senshi can be infected with Chaos." Followup, he wished he could ask, explain how I'm not, but he doubted Ilmari of Chastity knew the answer to that question.
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Posted: Fri Jul 19, 2024 2:25 am
……Okay, well, getting poked in the chest instead of the hand was different, but at least they were making progress! The senshi before Ilmari—Pyrrhus of nihility, or so he said, and he probably didn’t have the wherewithal to lie right now, or at least he didn’t currently seem like he did—he was acknowledging Ilmari’s existence. In the hopes of maybe keeping things moving in a positive direction, Ilmari reached into his subspace for a bottle of water and held it out in offering. Pyrrhus’s voice sounded……less than great. Like dehydration might have been an issue, perhaps? What did Ilmari know? Nothing, but he was going to make an effort anyway.
“Well, that is how it works here and now, actually,” Ilmari said, simply but without judgment, shrugging a bit as if to ask what Pyrrhus would have had him do. “There are three different kinds of senshi in this city. Order senshi such as yourself, Negaverse senshi like yours truly, and Dark Mirror senshi, but you might not see them very often. Mirror senshi don’t really care about taking an active role in protecting the Earth, as far as I’m aware. They mostly flit in and out of mirrors to go play around in their Mirrorspace realm. As to how it works……”
Ilmari shrugged again, this time meaning to say that he wasn’t entirely sure how else to explain things. “The Mauvian who found me took me to one of our faction’s leaders and he awakened me. I’ve heard that Dark Mirror senshi get shoved through a magic mirror or something to awaken how they do? This is just……how things are?”
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Posted: Fri Jul 19, 2024 2:49 am
Pyrrhus regarded the offered bottle suspiciously, for a moment. It seemed unwise to take something from a potential enemy, and it wasn't as if he hadn't had a chance to drink from that eerie, cold lake--but also, maybe refusing would be rude. And he didn't have to drink it, just take it.
"Thanks," he said, and this was definitely the most surreal interaction he'd ever had, which said a lot. Well, the most surreal one he could think of in the moment.
He listened, and the expression on his face didn't change, as he took in this new information. Whatever Chaos lurked here, it was so strong that it could change people into its servants---that was new. And upsetting.
Pyrrhus wasn't sure he liked this new place he had come to.
"It's not how things used to be," he said, and the more he talked, the less rusty his voice sounded, which was good. "Chaos couldn't infect people. It didn't do that. So you'll forgive me for being a little confused." And bad at interacting with people. "I've been out of touch for a very long time, though, so it seems things changed." He exhaled. "What planet is this?"
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Posted: Fri Jul 19, 2024 3:12 am
“Huh,” Ilmari said in response to the idea that Chaos senshi didn’t just…… always happen to exist. He said it without judgment, and without really questioning what Pyrrhus had to say about all this. Mostly. it was just a stray expression of Wow, we have such different experiences, yours sure is interesting and not what I expected. Maybe he’d need to consult the training manual again later? Or spend some time in the castle’s library, when he next hopped a ride to Negaspace with a higher-ranking officer?
Honestly, Ilmari probably wasn’t going to bother looking into the history of all this, if any records of it existed. It sounded potentially interesting, but he also had other work to do, and his parents seemed to really like the idea of him finding some housemates so he wasn’t staying at the townhouse by himself. So, like, maybe he’d get around to it? But maybe he’d put it off until he didn’t remember why he’d cared anymore.
“Well, this is Earth,” Ilmari explained. “I don’t know if you had a chance to come here before or not? But the year is 2024 on our calendars, and……” I mean, I don’t feel particularly infected, and that seems like a pretty judgmental thing to say about somebody, he thought but kept firmly to himself. “I don’t really know how you could get in touch with somebody who isn’t quote-unquote infected, and maybe find a place to stay? But you guys with Order do still have Mauvians, so if you run into one of them, they might know?”
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Posted: Fri Jul 19, 2024 3:28 am
This entire situation felt incredibly surreal. Here Pyrrhus was, and the first person he'd met in a thousand years was some Senshi who was apparently so brainwashed by Chaos that he didn't even realize the state he was in was unnatural and wrong. Obviously there was something very wrong on this planet--
On Earth.
"Huh," Pyrrrhus said, softly, taking a moment to digest his location and the date.
2024.
He wondered if they were still using the same calendar he remembered, because if they were, he remembered it being 10-something the last time he'd checked an Earth date. Which would mean.
"A thousand years. That....is longer than I thought it had been," and shorter, somehow, too. It had been forever and also no time at all, down in the dark.
"Well. This has been very informative," he said, "but it seems I have a lot of catching up to do."
He turned on his heel, very prepared to just walk away.
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Posted: Fri Jul 19, 2024 3:39 am
That comment about Pyrrhus having a great deal to catch up on sounded like an understatement, but it also felt like Pyrrhus probably didn’t need Ilmari to tell him so. All in all, this experience could have gone a lot worse? But as he watched the other senshi turn to leave, Ilmari also felt……like he really wanted to go home, put his Spotify on shuffle (starting with his personal song of the summer), and take bubble-bath. Once he was feeling more clear-headed, he could figure out how best to report on Pyrrhus to the intel database, and clean up any reports that Albite needed to submit so he could do so.
“Good luck finding a Mauvian,” Ilmari called after Pyrrhus, and then turned back into the park.
He had an entire walk home, and no doubt, he’d run into several civilians between here and home. Plenty of energy to drain, and nobody was going to give him a hard time about it. How unexpectedly lovely.
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