2022-02-14: Familiar Unknown Horizon
- Log: Familiar Unknown Horizon
- Cast: Sousuke Sagara, Anti
- Where: Tsutsujidai.
- OOC - IC Date: 2-14-22
- Summary: Sousuke Sagara takes an unplanned trip to an area he's only read about. While there he encounters a person with a familiar fate.
<Pose Tracker> Sousuke Sagara has posed.
Sousuke Sagara has had a few disappointing deployments over the course of a few days. He's not particularly pleased with himself, his performance, or the device he blames it on. And to top it all off, that trip to Huffman Island was a personal one, so he couldn't get a ride home from the TDD. Which leaves him arriving at the airport, like a normal person, and taking the train, also like a normal person.
And falling asleep on the train, more like a normal human than anything else. He woke up with his heart pounding in his ears, having to swallow a state of panic. Falling asleep? In public???? That's how you die?!?!
After navigating getting off the train while in the grip of Strangeness, Sousuke has taken to navigating the area. He remembers the data from the Gridman Alliance. Tarabaman S...so this is your home...For now, with a bit of time, an area to explore, and no particular reason not to poke around a little, Sousuke just walks through the neighborhoods, silent kaiju looming on the horizon, and chewing on a CalorieMark bar.
<Pose Tracker> Anti has posed.
Meanwhile, there's a kid scrounging through the trash.
Which is to say: there's one of those nice, orderly trash cubes on the street. It has a covered canopy and slots on each side to toss the trash in. The trash is concealed beneath the painted walls of the cube. It's very tasteful.
And there's a kid just straight BURIED up to his waist in one of those slots, and digging noises from him rooting around in there.
His clothes are pretty dirty, too, so this probably isn't a one-off thing.
There is just a kid in the trash can.
That happened!
<Pose Tracker> Sousuke Sagara has posed.
Well ain't that a thing. A normal person would studiously ignore Anti, or perhaps inquire what the devil he thinks he's doing.
Sousuke walks up, chewing on his fruit-flavored CalorieMark, and watches for several long seconds with a thoughtful expression.
"I see," he says, not actually to Anti but in no way trying to be quiet, "so even here, scavenging for supplies is crucial to survival...the reports didn't mention that."
<Pose Tracker> Anti has posed.
Scrounge, scrounge, scrounge. There are furious digging noises and none of them acknowledge the fact that someone is watching this shameful trash cat display in the slightest.
Finally, a voice, all gruff-gravel and muffled by, like, a paper bag or something: "... it's not here."
Wriggle, wriggle.
The boy tries and fails to evacuate the trash can.
With a grunt, he props his feet up on the side of the painted panel, and braces his arms, and PUSHES --
and a young teenager goes --> one way while the contents of the trash can are kicked clean out of their housing to go <-- the other way.
All in a heap on the other side of the path, Anti looks up, and blinks. So he can tear the trash out of the trash home... that would definitely be easier.
Also there is is a man right there, and Anti might certainly seem like he's looking at him in the wake of all that.
<Pose Tracker> Sousuke Sagara has posed.
Sousuke watches this unfold with profound intellectual curiosity. What a peculiar thing.
"Such ravenous need," Sousuke muses to himself. "It's unusual to see someone reach this state in urban areas."
And then Anti yeets himself out of the trash can using a frankly impressive amount of main strength. Sousuke has fully stopped and is now just watching this happen like an absolute jerk.
He looks from the trash to Anti. Now he's curious
"What's not here?"
<Pose Tracker> Anti has posed.
Oh, Anti realises, far too late. When that man was making noises, they were about Anti.
And now he is making noises at Anti, rising tone. A question.
Yellow-red sunset, his eyes fall on Sousuke, focusing. A hand still pressed behind him to catch himself, he rolls his weight onto it, so he can push himself up.
"Lunch," he replies, with all the roiling intensity of informing Sousuke that he has killed his father and he must now prepare to die.
This is the point at which his stomach growls.
NOTE: Autointelligence kaiju have stomachs which growl just like human stomachs. It's not, like, a giant monster screaming. It just goes grrrRRRRGL.
<Pose Tracker> Sousuke Sagara has posed.
Sousuke tends to be more on the 'inanimate carbon rod' end of the emotional spectrum, in that he can appear less than friendly but he's mostly just kind of, like talking to a stone.
But it's a stone that has food, as he reveals when he eats the final section of his CalorieMark, eyes never leaving Anti.
"I see," he says, seriously. "To be reduced to scrounging so for scraps is extremely common. I sympathize. You would do better searching near restaurants and public walkways. Although, be cautious, as some of them poison food to discourage exactly this."
... ...
He feels, for some reason, that this action is incomplete. He tips his head, considering what the people he knows that he considers more versed in social etiquette would do. Hm. Hmmmm.
Ah, of course. He produces another CalorieMate cookie stick, and... holds it out.
"One or two sticks is usually sufficient for a meal," he says. "You'll want water, to increase the feeling of fullness."
<Pose Tracker> Anti has posed.
One might expect this kid to protest Sousuke eating the rest of his chalk (that's chalk, right? this guy is definitely eating chalk) right in front of him, except --
Anti just kind of keeps staring at him with that same default boiling intensity and doesn't even blink.
Sousuke has advice for him, though, and Anti watches him, intent, as he relates his experience on what bins to scrounge through.
"All right," Anti says, turning away. Is he -- going to find a restaurant right now?! He pauses, looking back and forth, as he tries to remember where he last saw people eating. This happens to be just enough time for Sousuke to remember how to be slightly more of a human person.
Anti, who is not a human person, didn't really mind, but he does turn back, when Sousuke speaks up again.
He looks from Sousuke's hand up to Sousuke. He is very still for about, oh, four-point-five seconds.
And then he scrambles forward, grabs the stick, and hops back. He tears the wrapping off the stick, and then just -- buries his face in his hands and goes CHOMP. Gnash-gnash-gnash.
Has he... never eaten a bar-based food before..?
<Pose Tracker> Sousuke Sagara has posed.
Blink. Blink blink.
Huh. Well ain't that some shit.
Sousuke doesn't blink at Anti's rapid grab, because he apparently doesn't feel threatened currently. Don't worry about it. He's like that sometimes.
Sousuke produces a second stick, because he did say two, after all. This one he holds rather than presenting it for taking, though. "Pacing is important in an environment with uncertain supplies," he says. "The discipline to reserve supplies for later can be the deciding factor in a life-or-death situation."
It's not entirely clear if he expects Anti to remotely listen to him, but he does present the next stick afterward.
<Pose Tracker> Anti has posed.
GNOMPH gnomph gnomph gnomph.
"Uh," Anti grunts, face all full of caloriemate crumbs, as he lifts it up to look at Sousuke. And then he licks his hands clean, like they're a plate, which technically they sort of are right now, but he was just digging through the trash --
He looks up, again, now he's ACTUALLY eaten all the food bar. He looks at Sousuke. He looks at the second bar.
Anti scampers forward to take that one, too. And doesn't bother to put quite as much distance between them when he exits Sousuke's melee range this time. Does he realise that from this distance, someone like Sousuke could totally just lunge forward and grab him?
Probably not. Kid's not even a month old yet.
He glares at the bar, as if it could unlock the secrets of what Sousuke just told him.
The bar doesn't say shit. It's a caloriemate. It doesn't have opinions, only despair.
"Discipline," Anti says, finally. He looks back to Sousuke. The conclusion he draws is: "So I eat it... later." Was that supposed to be a question? Anti completely forgets to actually lift his voice to a query at the end of it. It flies like a brick.
He thinks of the food Akane used to like to eat. He asks, just as bricklike: "If I reserve it, I'll get stronger."
<Pose Tracker> Sousuke Sagara has posed.
Sousuke lets Anti grab the second one, too. He does have a rough sense of this young man's fighting abilities, he thinks.
'He turns into a 70 meter demon lizard' is not really a thing Sousuke factors for but otherwise he's pretty much not feeling worried here, even with Anti being nearly feral. Some people...have circumstances. This he knows well.
"Yes," he affirms. Eat it later. "If you reserve it, your strength will last longer. Then, you can use that strength when it counts the most. And, you will get better at reserving it at the same time. So, you will get stronger in two ways."
Sousuke feels like he's talking to someone from long ago. Strength, how to keep yourself alive...he had to be taught these things in the field, too. The people who forged him certainly weren't overly interested in details like that.
<Pose Tracker> Anti has posed.
"So that's why she doesn't eat... I understand." Anti considers the bar for a lo-o-o-o-ong moment more, just long enough for a ticker-tape announcement to scroll over the bottom of the screen:
JUST IN: HE'S TOTALLY STILL THINKING OF EATING THAT
But Anti has learned a valuable lesson today, and so... he slips the bar into his pocket. And his hand lingers there for another moment, before he pulls it out, sans wrapped bar, and folds his arms as he considers Sousuke.
(Note: Anti has a very cool flowing scarf which is just a little tattered at the edges. It is pretty dirty but it is still an entire look. Circumstances!)
"..." He says, which is really more a statement that he's still staring, still standing there, and maybe he was going to do something cool, except the seconds keep ticking over and it may become clear that...
... actually...
... he's just awkward.
This kid is SO AWKWARD.
"How do you tell," he asks -- 'asks', his tone's still flat as a flounder at low tide -- "when there's... uncertain supplies."
It might be a strange question to ask, but that's just because Anti hasn't given half the context a normal reasonable human person would.
<Pose Tracker> Sousuke Sagara has posed.
This is why Sousuke baited him with the power of self-control! Imagine how strong he'll be when he realizes he can just kill Gridman like, next time.
Well, maybe let's not ask for miracles.
The scarf is awesome. Sousuke thinks his comrades at school would find it interesting.
He has apparently resolved to continue interacting with the weird young man, because he also just...stares back, for several long seconds.
Well, he might have decidfed to leave eventually, but before that can happen, Anti asks a question. "Ah," Sousuke says. "An astute question. There is a good deal of science to it." He retains eye contact. "But, roughly, it is when you do not know whether you will eat again in the next day."
That's extremely rough, of course. But even Sousuke can tell this kid will check out the millisecond he says the word 'calories.'
"Water, and a place to sleep, are also essential. With food, water, and shelter, an operation can continue indefinitely."
<Pose Tracker> Anti has posed.
Shaking his big dumb claws shouting 'NEXT TIME, GRIDMAN!!!' the whole time, no doubt.
Anti decides, in these long, silent moments, that he likes whoever this man is, because apparently the both of them perfectly understand standing and glowering in silence.
Anti definitely doesn't understand when to break eye contact, so he's just been staring at Sousuke this whole time. Which is normal. It's fine. It's totally cool.
(He definitely doesn't know what the word calories means.)
"The next day..." So, Anti thinks, it's about hope. He's not nearly as poetic a person as to say that -- the idea he forms of starvation linked to hopelessness. The way he ties hope, in turn, to certainty.
He nods, sharply, once.
"Food, water, shelter. All right. I understand." His mind grinds, as he tries to place where he can shelter, in a place near those other two things.
The park, perhaps.
"I can't stop," Anti says, which is really the sort of alarming thing a young teenager like him shouldn't be saying, "so I'll do that."
<Pose Tracker> Sousuke Sagara has posed.
Sousuke's movements are not nearly so sharp, as polished as the young man is. Still, he feels like he is dispensing valuable advice to someone who actually listens and that's...pleasing. Yes.
He nods to Anti's stated understandings. "Excellent," Sousuke says. It's a hard life to lead...but, perhaps he will have helped this young man in his own way.
The last thing...definitely is something someone else would find more alarming. Sousuke knows very VERY well what it's like to have something you Have to do. Like survive. Or save somebody.
"Good," he says, with an affirmative nod. "Whatever your objectives, the first goal is keeping yourself alive and healthy enough to complete it. That way you can take your opportunity when it arrives."
...he seems to just be intent on continuing to speak. Perhaps he feels a certain kinship as well, to this person with such focused eyes.
<Pose Tracker> Anti has posed.
Anti looks down, at himself, after Sousuke says his first goal is staying alive. (Not during. He waits for him to stop speaking before he breaks his stare.) After a moment, he grunts, and nods, returning his gaze to Sousuke.
He does blink! Once. One whole blink.
(Does that mean the cat trusts him..?)
Let us note here that Anti and Sousuke are just standing over the pavement, and everyone else who wanted to pedestrian around are forced to route around what is clearly a very intense conversation made mostly of staring. Not one person has been brave enough to walk between them and break their eye contact.
Which is probably wise, really.
"I'll take the opportunity," Anti repeats, or perhaps promises, head dipping in half a nod. "Without a doubt."
Anti lapses into silence, again. His scarf whips around him in a narratively-convenient summer breeze.
Finally: "You have absolute orders too, don't you." His head cocks, sharply, to the side. "And you figured it out." How to follow them without dying on the way, presumably.
Orders never come with instruction manuals, in Anti's experience.
<Pose Tracker> Sousuke Sagara has posed.
Sousuke shifts his weight. Just slightly. He's very used to standing with a fixed stare for extended periods. He keeps his awareness of the surroundings, of course. But the crowd parts for them easily, and he hears nothing unusual. The young man with the cagey demeanor demands the most attention.
Sousuke should worry about what he's just wrung out of Anti, but he doesn't know to. Instead, the breeze blows past, and Anti...Anti asks him a question.
And Sousuke finally blinks his gaze away. An absolute order...he doesn't even like to think about those days. He barely can; it's so hard to remember, hazy and indistinct. The question drills into him in a way he wasn't prepared for. He had been thinking this young man little more than a desperate homeless person, because, Sousuke's an idiot sometimes. But. But.
"Once," he says, in answer, his thoughts visibly distant. Kill the warlord Majhid...the place where his life began.
<Pose Tracker> Anti has posed.
Sousuke has two answers for Anti.
The first is breaking his gaze; the second is a word, held on distant shore. Past tense.
Anti's tense, too.
"... so you keep living, after." He puts a few things together, between Sousuke's evident experience, and the fact that he's still here to give it.
That kind of certainty -- what he fashions as hope -- it's...
If there's any variation to his words, he might sound a little spooked. Or maybe those are just the ghosts, lurking around.
"I..."
Does that mean there's a life for him, if he disobeys those orders?
Does that mean he can cling to life until he fulfils his objective?
Does that mean --
"... believe you," Anti finishes his thought, molasses-slow.
This probably won't fool Sousuke when Anti turns around and darts off lightning-fast, though. Bounding down the street, up a shop facade and over a rooftop, he flees in an instant.
Sousuke... helped..?