Scene #8125: The Library

Owner	Pose
Timespace Riders	September 17, 2014 Twin Peaks, WA Twin Peaks Public Library 1:20PM The library in town, much like many other buildings, businesses and locales, speaks to a town with much more population than this one. The days of Twin Peaks being a giant of industry are long gone, even if the lumber mill still makes up a substantial amount of the town's revenue. Two stories, white brick, with ionic pillars at the front and a circular atrium for open-air reading. The plot it occupies is home to a well-kept garden, with a walkway framed on either side by seasonal flowers. The patronage falls short of the grandeur--it'd have to, for a town this small. But, the people who do come here seem to enjoy it, old and young alike. A notice board by the front door, sheltered from the elements by the roof and a glass case, holds bulletins from members of the community and announcements for events to be hosted at the library. It doesn't seem like anything's going on today, but there are weekly reading sessions for kids, book club meetings every month (led by Deputy Briggs, of all people), and even a small tabletop group.
Hamada Haru	A harsh wind blows, and with it comes Hamada Haru. He doesn't come on either motorcycle or with his camper home-- there is simply a moment when he has arrived, and that is all there is to it. He stands before the bulliten board, reading the entries on it -- he's not surprised to see the meeting led by Briggs -- before he moves towards the doors. Even for the Twin Peaks of old, he thinks, this place is rather grandiose. It's no wonder that they were called to look at it in particular. "I've seen worse answers," he says to the wind, quite probably spooking anybody coming by who is passingly ordinary. It's the open-air atrium that he ends up finding his way to, because it 'feels' the most like the person that he's quite certain is responsible for all of this. The rows of books are one thing, but the place to read them just stands out more.
Xion	Xion didn't want to go to the library. The library was a place that contained Certain Memories for the Nobody. Libraries were hard for her. She preferred people. She read them easier, at least. And she had spent too long looking at the spines of books she'd never read. So it is duty that brings Xion to the Twin Peaks Public Library, a bittersweet need and a convenience of action. Haru comes across Xion as soon as he enters the library doors, Xion standing at the bulletin boards posted describing the events and scheduling. She wears a black tank top under her normal (for Twin Peaks) open-buttoned plaid flannel shirt, jeans, black belt with silver clasp, and heeled black boots. She runs her fingers above the printed lettering on the page for Book Club, fingers against glass and eyes glistening. Then, she turns to the man who came like bad news - mysterious and abrupt. "Hey, Haru." Xion greets while she wipes her eyes with the sleeve at the side of her wrist. "Looking around for clues?"
Timespace Riders	The library is really well-stocked. There's an oddball occult section off on its own. Poetry is very well represented here, as well, and if one cares to visit those sections it's not hard to find donations from a certain someone. The open-air atrium has a series of treated wood tables arranged around its perimeter, each with space to seat four or five comfortably. There are a few people reading outdoors today, most notably an old man on an oxygen tank, with a strange, stitchlike scar on his forearm. His flannel shirt is rolled up, and with his knit cap, he looks like he'd be more at home on a wharf fishing than here at the library. His back is to Haru and Xion. Occasionally, he looks up from his book, across the way to the center of the atrium. There, an island of poured cement flanked by seasonal flowers hosts a plaque. A bronze plate boasts a relief of someone reading to children. The closer one gets, the easier it is to see-- 'This atrium, renovated in August of 2013, is dedicated to the memory of Mr. Itsuro Takuma. Mr. Takuma was an avid lover of poetry, gave many a Saturday afternoon to the library, and exemplified the beauty and nobility of the human spirit. The Twin Peaks Library board regrets that Mr. Takuma did not live to see this renovation, but it is our most sincere hope that future generations may learn from his generosity and love of expression.' "It's a nice old thing, isn't it?" drawls the old man.
Hamada Haru	"Xion. No. I don't have an important role with regards to clues at the moment, and that's not what I did the best when I was here before," Haru replies to Xion, pausing to turn and look at her. He starts getting invisibly uncomfortable instantly, which he can't meaningfully hide from her because he's fucking telepathic. Goddamn cheating Nobodies. He shrugs, "I only came because somebody said we should, and because I can put context clues together and work out that Takuma was chiefly involved in this place." He half-turns towards the old man, considering the question. Then, he says, "It's sad. And for something that's sad, it's nice. And there are nice intentions behind it. But you can only cushion a kick so much."
Xion	She didn't want to go. The grave would have been easier. She didn't want to know. Her imagination was safe. She didn't want to go. Because if there was no trace of him it would hurt, too. She didn't want to go. There was no way to win. She didn't want to go. She arrived. Haru, mercifully perhaps for him, gets a forgiving weak smile while the Nobody plants a thumb against her collar. "Me neither." Her hand drops quickly after. "What you did best... was save people by talking to them. People are alive because of you. People lived because we talked to them, so... If we have time, and no better ideas... Maybe we have to face it." So they face it. The short path to the relief and plaque in the atrium causes a dimming in the Nobody, her steps locking to Haru's footfalls on the approach, until she reaches it. Haru turns. Xion does not, the noirette reaching out again with tremoring fingers to touch the plate, fingers feeling the inscription bare like braille. Her other hand clutches a fistful of tank top as her expression twists. "Yeah. . ." Xion gasps, rattled. "It's . . . nice." It does not feel nice. Hand to the plaque, she finds the feeling in the etching and pouring and laying, and finishes with a palm flush to the negative space. "He really did it."
Timespace Riders	The old man, his round face wrinkled with the compound forces of age and hard work, smiles sadly. "He really did," nods the man in agreement with Xion. He seems to notice her distress, and sighs. "Don't think I ain't still a little sour at that four-eyed cuss," he says. "Goes to all of the trouble of saving my life," he says, tapping a gnarled finger against the stitch-like scar on his forearm, "Then up and dies. Yes sir... I was already gray by the time he came into town," the old fellow muses. "Don't seem right, me outliving Laura and him." "How about you kids have a seat, huh?" The old man moves his oxygen tank aside, and pats the space beside him on the bench which encircles his table. "Pete Martell," he says, by way of introduction, offering a callused hand to Haru and Xion in turn. Pete places a red bookmark between the pages of his selection, and closes the book. "I suppose it is a kick, ain't it, young man," Pete opines, staring hard at the statue. His white mustache looks like a broom as he works his jaw. "But here we all are, still standing, even if we gotta hold our guts 'til it stops hurting so much. I figure that counts for something." "How did you know him?"
Hamada Haru	"Right. So I came here to look, and talk," Haru says. It was the people, in the end, that he had moved around the most. He doesn't know if that's going to work this time. Probably. Thinking about it too much probably isn't going to help, and he isn't really emotionally equipped to help Xion right now. This isn't a problem that can be beaten to death in a duel in a suspiciously convenient quarry. His attention swings to Pete Martell. A little reluctantly, seats himself and shakes the man's hand when it's offered. "His body was more aged than yours was, even if it didn't look that way. And yes. It is a kick. That's all it could be." //How did you know him?// "He was a Kamen Rider. I was a Kamen Rider. That's all," Haru says, as if that explains everything.
Xion	Xion does not take any of it 'well', but eventually manages to compose herself enough and wipe at her eyes and pull away from the plaque. Her hand peels off, adhered by feeling and stubbornness and a a tacky lift off of sun-warm metal. She retreats to the bench and settles, deflated and slouched. Her eyes hang partially lidded and wavering-gazed, but she is present. When it comes time for her to shake, she shakes, gingerly pumping the old man's hand. She doesn't really have an answer for a moment - until Haru speaks. Prior, she has the interested look of listening, but doesn't connect thoughts to actions. "I asked Itsuro Takuma a simple question: Would he be a good man, at any cost? Could he choose that?" It is not 'could he still'. The results were in. At the end of a life, scores tallied. Did it match up, credits to debits? Could any ledger be balanced? "... He didn't surprise me, with his answer, but I paid attention."
Timespace Riders	"Yep," nods Pete at Haru. "Orphenoch thing. I know--when that nutjob tried to blow up the bank in '92, that old cuss Takuma yanked me and Audrey clear. Hurt like a kick from a Montana mule, but..." He chuckles. "Suppose it's better than the alternative. I think about that, when I come here." Pete places a hand on Xion's shoulder. "There was a young lady Itsuro would talk about, when we'd go fishing." Pete smiles fondly, reminiscing. "I got him into it, you know! And he got me reading stuff other than the Sunday funnies." Looking at Xion, "I think that he wanted to choose that for a long time before he came over here. Bein' a good man, I mean. But that Briggs boy will tell you it's awful hard to be good when you're surrounded by bad. No, ma'am, I wouldn't wish that kind of life on anybody. When you have even a little good in you, it's like walking on nails being bad--but what else can you do, when that's all you know?" His hand gently slides from her shoulder. "Anyway, he told me once, when I got to yellin' at him over burning the candle at both ends, that young lady gave him the chance, and by granddaddies, he was gonna take it." Pete looks back at the plaque. "Wherever she is, I hope she's doing good. That little lady put a lot of good into this place."
Hamada Haru	For a long moment, Haru contemplates in silence. He doesn't have the hurt inside that Xion does; or perhaps more accurately, he's worked himself too numb to show it. But in a way, this is just how Kamen Riders end, sometimes. It makes him think of his mentor, and how she went, and that makes him more mad than sad. He rises from where he was called to sit and moves back over to the monument. Pulling back his jacket, he exposes the slagged-out remains of a belt and pulls it loose, dropping it on the ground. The Tetra belt lands with a clatter, inert, long useless. He turns, and sits back down. "I'm not surprised," Haru says. "I'm not surprised that he took up fishing, even if somebody had to introduce it to him. That's the sort of quiet space people like him exist in. It's the same as this one, even though it's different." "That's why you're here, right?" He asks.
Xion	It's hollow, hearing it. The physical workings of the things Xion feels are violently felt, her body in a vile revolt. Under chemical attack. The comforting story quiets her, moving her to a mostly-still set of head-bowed sniffles. "It's better than the alternative. It's... It's giving other people the same chance he got, isn't it? That's... nice." "I hear it's nice." She sits, with Haru up and motioning, and her eyes down. "I hope she's doing good, too. This place wasn't just her effort." She adjusts, and lifts her eyes when Haru sits back down. She looks, past, to the belt on the ground, and then back to Haru. "Are you going to--" She tries again. "Are you able to put that down, now?" A moment further, of dazed confusion. "Is... that why we're here?"
Timespace Riders	"I suppose it is. We both liked the quiet, me and him. I was the foreman at the lumber mill for... gosh, feels like forever. Years before Ms. Rook thought to buy it, and years after. It was good work, mind. But there was nothing I liked more than going to the lake on a Saturday morning. There are days out there it feels like the whole of God's creation stands still." Pete looks up. "It sure seems like those days are slimmer and slimmer out in the rest of the world. So, after I got to know him, I figured he might like that too." "As it turns out," the old man fondly notes for Haru, "Getting lost in a book can make you feel the same way." Yep--that's why he's here. He takes a deep breath--as deep as he's able, given his condition, gnarled hands squeezing the bench beneath him. Not in pain, but almost like making sure something good is still there. "Every time I drag these old bones out here," says Pete to Xion, "It hurts a little less. One day, I'll be able to sit out here and smile with all my heart, knowing that all the gizmos and weirdos and who-knows what else out there in the Multiverse turned and twisted just right for me to make a friend like that in my silver years. I think maybe that is why you kids are here." "And I think he would be real happy to know that good kids like you still think about him. Here," he says, fishing in his pocket. He procures a golden ring for Xion, and a small bottle of what appears to be soil for Haru. "Log Lady told me I'd know what to do with these. I think they're for you."
Hamada Haru	//Are you able to put that down, now?// "Tetra died twenty seven years ago. If I feel some urge to reclaim it, I'll do it in twenty seven more years," Haru answers Xion. He pats his transteam gun by way of indicating that he is far from disarmed. There is simply an ending here, and he took it. He reaches out and takes the bottle of soil, having no idea what it really is or what use it might have, but thoroughly certain that there is nothing insignificant in this place. Least of all given as a gift from somebody called Log Lady. For a long moment, he stares at it. Then he looks back to Pete, and says, "Ode to Melancholy, by John Keats. If he didn't already recommend it to you." He rises from his seat, plucks a business card from his coat, and puts it on the table. KAMEN RIDER TETRA has been crossed out, and not replaced. The number remains the same. "If anything strange should pass. I'll be around here a little longer." Then he turns, and wanders the library. But not everything in Twin Peaks is strange, or supernatural. Haru doubts that many hostile things dared intrude on Takuma's space, besides. He doesn't expect to find anything extraordinary. Just normal library things.
Xion	Xion knew, without the indication, that Haru wasn't disarmed or helpless... But the Tetra belt meant something else, too. It was a sticky burden, hard to shift or release. A weight that rested, now, against the ground. And it was just that. A weight. Ruined, and dispelled. "In twenty-seven more years, huh?" Xion pulls her sleeves up to wipe her face mostly clean, a little grin remaining after that on her rosy cheeks. "I hope it's overtaken by flowers and roots, and something colorful grows from it. If it stays here long enough, it might. Do you think twenty-seven years will be enough?" Xion joins Haru in accepting the offering, taking the ring in her hand and drawing it close on her palm, looking down at the gold circle. Her hand closes around it, and her idle eyes come up to Pete. "You know? I usually get things from friends." And tracking to the rising haru, leaving a business card. "Haru gave me some things, too. A good number of them." Xion's smile remains, as she presents the ring in her hand back to Pete, holding it with thumb and forefinger. It rotates between her fingers slowly. "And now you have too. So it's official, even if we only met for a day."