2045/99 Bottles of Time On The Wall

99 Bottles of Time On The Wall
Date of Scene:	17 April 2015
Location:	Njorun Station - Cafeteria
Synopsis:	A discussion about heroes and time.
Cast of Characters:	2, 415

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Kazusa Ujikane (415) has posed:
    Even if it's a busy time of the evening, it's not hard to find Kazusa. There's something about her that just absolutely screams bookworm, and she's also the only one packing away food like... well, a teenager. It's not quite the feast of most Elites, but it still tends to draw the eye. It helps that it's just as easy to hear her voice; she seems to be lost in some daydream or other, staring into her food and eating on pure autopilot, and every now and then there's a little giggle that sounds completely unmistakable.

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    As expected when you call someone whose specialty is time, Homura's appearance is unannounced, sudden, and without indication. One minute there is no one there, the next she is sitting across from Kazusa, sandwich in hand. The Puella Magi's clothes are semi-formal-- a white dress shirt with black pants, her hair in a ponytail, tied by a red ribbon, and her glasses are on.

    She deposits an empty glass jar, Zelda-style, on the table.

    "Ujikane Kazusa, yes?"

Kazusa Ujikane (415) has posed:
    Kazusa does not notice Homura is there until the magical girl speaks.

    At that point, she just about jumps out of her chair. "UWA-?!"

    Several pieces of popcorn chicken are scattered onto the table. She drops the piece she had in her hand. It takes the poor girl a second or two to recover, at which point she reaches up and straightens her glasses in an attempt to look utterly calm and unflappable. "Oh, um, yeah! Yeah, that's me. Kazusa is fine! I'm-"

    That's when she notices the glass jar, and then starts to stare. "...oooooh. Is that it? I mean, that's what we're going to use? Ooh, does it have some kind of special coating that allows it to trap and hold chronitons? Or is it made of a special temporal-elemental crystal, or..." It's entirely possible she'll keep going.

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    Chicken everywhere. On this day, popcorn chicken was wasted, and the Colonel's fury would consume at least two planets, condemning them to eternal darkness and chickenless meals.

    Homura shakes her head slowly at the questions. "It's... just a glass jar. I figured we should start with that before trying something more expensive and rare. Ah, but... what do you need this for? I can't even guarantee it'll be useful for anything but putting on a shelf and bragging about."

    If even that much.

    She's not ultra confident about her ability to succeed on first try.

Kazusa Ujikane (415) has posed:
    "Oh." Blink blink. Just glass. "That makes sense." Kazusa almost sounds disappointed.

    At least until she's asked for the 'why'. "Well, I don't think it really needs to be useful for anything! I'm not sure. Mostly I need it because, I was here in the cafeteria a few weeks ago, and I ran into this girl with silver hair, I think she was actually sitting right where I am now, come to think of it. And she's eating a /lot/, right?"

    Well, she is definitely good at going into fine detail. Fine... boring... detail.

    "...tells me she's something called a 'Servant', right? And that's apparently the spirit of a hero from the past, and she's a sword-user so she's a 'Saber', and I'm sitting there thinking 'Wow, it'd totally be cool if I could have adventures with someone like that', and she just kind of looks at me and, uh. I don't want to say 'I think I know what she is', but she looked at me and she gave me an Impossible Request, if you take my meaning, and said that if I pulled it off she'd hear one request from me, so now I need a bottle of time because that's what she asked for."

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    "Ah, I see. Yes, I know what Servants are. I have a secondary contract with one of the Assassins, Jack the Ripper. Her primary master is Shoutan Himei, but that segues into a long story," Homura answers, before considering the situation.

    "I suppose it makes sense. Proving yourself is an important part of most mythological stories, and these Servants are usually straight out of them. I guess there's no harm helping you, then."

    Homura considers the jar.

    "I take it you'll ask to accompany her on adventures, if this works?"

Kazusa Ujikane (415) has posed:
    Kazusa actually kind of stares at Homura for a second. "...Didn't you ever read the story of Ka-" That's when her hand suddenly goes right over her mouth. "Oop I probably shouldn't say that, if someone hasn't guessed it, huh..." Ahem. Hem. Nomf. "But, um. Yeah, something like that. Or have her accompany me sometimes, I guess, since I'm sort of doing those things now. What I'd really like is to be her Master, but I dunno if that's possible. I don't really do magic, except for maybe my cards I guess. So I'll... work something out with her? I think?"

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    "Oh. Oh, I see, you were being literal. Yes, the tale of the Bamboo Cutter is familiar, but I don't know it off the top of my head. I'm afraid I can't really help you with matters of being or not being a master, but if your cards are magical you might be good enough." She wouldn't know for sure, though. But magic is a very broad term and Servants seem... vaguely compatible with most forms of it? Again, kind of uncertain, so she'll avoid saying anything that makes her sound certain.

    "If I remember, the requests were to choose a suitor, though, not an adventuring partner. Are you certain that is a responsibility you are ready to shoulder?" Intentional jabbing. She does it sometimes.

Kazusa Ujikane (415) has posed:
    Homura points out that the Impossible Requests were in regards to suitors.

    It takes a second or two to sink in.

    And then Kazusa is beet-red.

    "A-a-ah, well, um, I-I mean, not that I see anything /wrong/ with that, b-but, ah, th-that's not, I wasn't even, uh, I-I'm too young to be married, hopefully she'll just hear out my request?" And then she starts eating again. Even faster. To cover her embarrassment.

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    Homura smiles gently. "I was teasing. I'm certain she didn't mean it that way. But, perhaps, keep ready just in case she did," she says, indicating she does in fact have a sense of humor. Even if there's a reason to be careful underneath the joke.

    The Puella Magi focuses on the jar now, lifting her hands to wrap them around it. "Now, let's see. Stopping time is one thing, but making time something that can be kept in a bottle is... probably the strangest thing I've tried. This might be unpredictable."

    Flashes of purple light begin gathering in the jar! This takes several minutes. They spin, spiral, gather in orbs, and eventually make some sort of vague rainbowy hue confined to the inside of the jar. Nothing explodes.

    "I... think I did it? I wouldn't want to put my hand in there to test. Maybe throw in a piece of chicken?"

Kazusa Ujikane (415) has posed:
    "O-oh. Ahahaha..." Kazusa manages to settle herself down a little, in time for Homura to begin her attempt. And, despite how talkative she's been the entire time, the bookworm manages to be entirely silent for the entirety of the attempt. Though she does get pretty wide-eyed as the effects start to take more concrete shape. "...ooh..." she finally murmurs, once it's become a /cohesive/ nebulous light show, only to look up at Homura with a concerned expression. "Won't that, like, pollute it or something, though?" she asks; but she's already in the process of picking the last of her popcorn chicken up and dropping it into the jar.

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    "Well, there's no way to know what's in there without seeing what happens if you... put things in there," Homura answers, exactly as uncertain as Kazusa is. First time doing this, and all. She watches as the chicken enters the jar.

    The piece of chicken starts rapidly going backward and forward in time at complete random, which involves occasionally reverting to its base ingrediants (raw chicken, further back would be a chunk of egg), or going forward and rotting into nothing, and then just going back to being popcorn chicken.

    "I... think that's what is supposed to happen?"

    Well, test number two. Homura picks the jar up and turns it upside down. The chicken falls back onto the table, unfortunately raw now. The rainbow hue remains in the jar, at least, so she sets it back onto the table.

    She produces a lid to put on the jar.

    "Good enough, I guess. This is probably a bit better than what I thought would happen. I figured it'd give you a jar that stops time for a bit when opened and then does nothing ever again since the time's gone."

Kazusa Ujikane (415) has posed:
    Kazusa adjusts her glasses one last time, beaming. "That's really cool! ...I'll kinda miss that last bite of chicken, but I have fries too I guess." She reaches out to grab the jar without thinking, only to stop at the last second. "-oh, uh. I should probably..." At that point she takes a napkin and uses it to carefully wipe her fingers down. "It would be kinda silly if I did something like reaching out to grab it then drop it right on the ground, huh..." She finishes wiping, sets the napkin aside, and then...

    ...snaps her fingers. "OH! Oh, before I forget. Stay there a second."

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    "I don't know what'd happen if the jar broke. I guess the bubble of time would wander around and mess things up until it's out of energy? I doubt it can sustain itself, I'm not that good. This might last a couple of weeks, more if you don't do anything absurd with it to drain it," Homura muses, before glancing towards Kazusa again and nodding.

    "Sure?"

Kazusa Ujikane (415) has posed:
    Already, the younger girl is rooting around in her purse, and after a moment she comes up with a pair of odd-looking cards, about half again as wide as a playing card and twice as long. Both are black with a simple image on the face; one displays a gnarled wizard's staff, and the other a bared set of bestial teeth. She stands up and steps around the table, holding them out with their backs to Homura as if waiting to see if they do anything...

    And then a look of surprise washes over her face. "...they're /both/ reacting..."

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    Well, when presented with the obvious choice between a beast and a magician, Homura would have to admit preference for the magician imagery.

    "These are your cards, I take it? You never explained what they do or how you use them. I'm afraid I've been a bit out of touch. Is it good multiple are reacting?"

Kazusa Ujikane (415) has posed:
    "It's never happened before," Kazusa replies, sounding a little amazed. "I, uh. Basically I've been holding up the cards to people, and usually one of them will kind of shimmer, and I'll... 'feel' it, I guess. And then I ask if I can borrow their powers, and the front changes to their weapon. Later on I can use the card, and it... it sorta turns me into them, but still me? It's hard to explain. When I copied Priscilla, I got her scales, her tail, her outfit, her hair color, and I kinda got her personality too. But I was still me." A shrug. It's hard to describe.

    "These are the only two I haven't used up yet, though. The Magus, and The Beast. I think The Beast is stronger, but it... kind of feels ominous, somehow. Like, that's the sense I get from it. I've never had two react to the same person..."

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    "Ah. I see."

    Two and two is four, and all.

    "Best put that one away. You would not like its results. If you are asking me if I mind lending you my power, I suppose I do not, so long as you use it for good reasons. Magus, though. The Beast is a bad idea for me, sorry. I'd rather not explain."

    At least, not right now. If there's a cause to later, she'll talk, but right now it's not really a priority. "I should probably warn you that I'm not exactly what you'd picture when you think of a magician."

Kazusa Ujikane (415) has posed:
    Kazusa looks between the two cards for a moment, and then nod-nods. "Got it!" The Beast card is quickly shoved back in her purse, and she comes back around again, holding the Magus card out expectantly. For the briefest moment there seems to be nothing at all happening, and then...

    It's like an impression. A brief 'idea', nebulous and unformed, without any sort of definition that could properly be called words. It exists on a more basic level than that. But if words could be put to it, it would be something like:

    O learned sage, will you lend your wisdom to this brave soul?

    There is then a silent sense of expectation. Kazusa does not actually seem to know it happened at all, though.

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    Homura gives her consent, or at least does her best to convey that feeling. However you communicate with cards. It's magic, so surely it doesn't have to be too complicated.

    If the cards really take on the weapon of the user as their symbol, Homura's would probably be a handgun and a bow both, all things considered.

Kazusa Ujikane (415) has posed:
    There is no further response to Homura as such, but almost immediately, the face of the card changes. A little ripple of 'shimmer' passes across it, and the magus staff is replaced by a bow with a nocked arrow of light. Kazusa looks between it and Homura a few times, before murmuring, "...that's a little weird for a mage, but it looks really cool."

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    "I'm a bit weird, yes," Homura says, looking at the card before mentally filing the matter away, since it's concluded. "Hopefully it'll let you save a few lives more than you could have normally."

    Glancing around, the Puella Magi rises from her seat, slowly. "If that's all, I have things I need to get back to. But if you need anything else, you can always ask for me, I try to keep an open ear."

Kazusa Ujikane (415) has posed:
    Kazusa stands up straight and nods - or, rather, bows, with an enthusiastic reply of, "Of course! Thank you sooooo much. For both things!" She happily scoops up the jar of time and turns to go.

    It takes her about ten steps before she turns right around and comes back for her purse. "...ehehehe..."