Scene #8898: Healer's Visit

Owner	Pose
Tamamo	'That which is "wrong..." well, I do not know. I have not seen this thing you claim, this unright transformation. I do not suppose you would show it to me? I am, after all, a healer of some notable skill. It would only be sensible, no? If it is embarrassing, you are due soon to forget it, in any case.' 'N-not here. P-please don't ask me to, right now, r-right here.' Just as requested, Tamamo asks for neither 'here,' nor 'now.' An invitation instead comes for 'later' and 'elsewhere,' together with a promise that no one else will be involved. The notion that Meika doesn't want it to be seen is enough for her to ask no further questions. Meika, however, might have questions about the directions she's given. It starts with a street address, but that's followed by an eight-step process that includes lines like 'walk straight toward the burnt-out streetlamp in front of the convenience store,' 'turn and walk the way you came when a cat crosses your path,' and 'take the first alleyway to your right.' The cat, intent on swiftly being somewhere else, ignores her. Following the instructions fully arrives at a completely ordinary park, with a pond, though there are no animals in sight. In fact, the only living being here, if one doesn't count the plants and the possibility of fish, is Tamamo-no-mae, herself. The surrounding town, which certainly had been ordinary on arrival, can't be heard at all, though the buildings and their lights are still visible from here, in the twilight of the setting sun. Tamamo's sitting on a bench. Her jeans-and-blouse outfit might have fit, here, but she's back in her formal dress. Blue silk overflows, and the inner black-and-gold layers are pulled past one wrist to allow her to write -- something, not visible from an approaching angle, on a pad of paper.
Meika Kirenai	"... What's that you're writing?" Interrogative off the bat. It's not particularly polite of her, and very far from restrained, but if Meika hadn't been having trouble holding her tongue lately, she wouldn't even be here. Getting 'here', though, is a task of its own. Misplaced words over radio lines resulted in Kayoko taking out her anger on Meika's phone, leaving it a sparking husk and leaving her to have no choice but communicate through still-extant train station payphones, awkward and hastily jotting down instructions she's too worn down to question. At least leaving Kagoshima is easy. As far as Meika knows, maybe she, as herself, won't ever find her way back. It'd be impossible for her to put words to why she'd even bother to show up, here, why she didn't just back down and deny everything, why the chance for someone else to see this, with all consequence fated to be washed away, feels like some sickly sort of relief. Not having the words, or the bravery for them, doesn't stop that she did, she didn't, and it does. Standing, now, in the midst of the park, Meika, with a little shuffling motion, circles slowly in place to picture the surroundings, and stumbles back a half-step, unsteady from exhaustion. The dark circles under her too-red eyes are awful, and in the worst way, Meika does look like she fits in an empty park at dusk, the kind of up-to-no-good teen nobody really wants to have hanging around. "Oh. Right. Um.. thanks for- I hope everything's alright. Was that cat on the way, yours..?" It's still on her mind, the way it barely noticed she was there. She's kind of thankful for that. "... I kind of expected wherever something like that all would lead would be more-" A small shrug. "Weirder? Than... a normal park. But- but something's up, right..?" Unsteady foot-shuffling, a gaze that won't land directly on Tamamo, her nerves are tangibly jittery. She clutches her opposite arm, tight, through jacket-sleeves. It's so quiet. It's nice, but that's not right, right? "... Right. Sorry. That's not important. I- I guess I was thinking, a little, on the way, why... why you're even bothering, Chevalier Tamamo-no-mae. I'm going to forget, I'll be- I'll be different, and... you're a healer. I don't think I'm hurt."
Tamamo	'... What's that you're writing?' "I thought I might draw something, but I fear I am not so skilled with this sort of thing." It hadn't been possible to tell, with the way she's moving the pen. Many little strokes. "That aside, thank you for coming, Kirenai-san. No... should I still call you Vermillion, in this form? It is a bit different for myself, and so, I may not be well-versed in such things. Those who put a show of placing on their masks tend to prefer the distinction. Though I may wear a mask, as well, and have been called by some few names, I have never done the same." She lowers the paper. As she said, there's a drawing of something taking up most of the page, but it's hard to tell what she was going for. A fox mask? Drawn in ink, with every mistake left in, drawn over rather than avoided or crossed out. And there are plenty of them, as if made by someone whose fingers wouldn't move quite as they willed, though no other motion by the bunrei, in her gold and silks, gives that impression of clumsiness.
Meika Kirenai	'No... should I still call you Vermillion, in this form?' "I'm still the same- the same me, in or out of costume. Transformed or not. It still works. I still like it." A little shrug follows. There's far less distinction with her than with her sister, even if the names still carry different connotations. "I guess it's not like I'll be hearing it much again, right? I- I kind of notice, anyway, that people choose that one less, now. Even while it's still sort of mine. Even if I- I can't really be her, anymore."
Tamamo	'I'm still the same- the same me, in or out of costume.' Tamamo gives a small nod, before moving on to the other questions. "The cat...? Ah, no, it was a stray. I merely knew you would encounter it, walking that way. 'Meetings' can make convenient guideposts." 'But- but something's up, right..?' "It is quiet, no?" Tamamo looks toward the west, then glances off to the line of taller office buildings, far over toward the opposite side of the park. "I expected you to wish for privacy, and so, this is 'another side' of a very ordinary place. Here, we will bother no one, and be bothered by no one. It is convenient thing, is it not, to have someplace that is apart from all others? Ah, but you need not be troubled in leaving it. Merely walking far enough from this spot will be enough to leave it behind." Even if it's 'not important,' it's easy for her to talk about, and she appears to be in no rush. When Meika gets to the main point, however, Tamamo claps her hands together. It's soft, really, but sounds louder for the park's stillness, until the open space absorbs it. She spoke as if this were somehow like a closed off room, but there's not the echo that walls would give. "Why, indeed? That is a good question. I suppose it would be unsatisfying were I to call it 'intuition.' I have not taken the vows of a physician, to help all I may, nor would I call this an offer of charity." 'I don't think I'm hurt.' "You may be uninjured, but you are... aware that you are badly worn, yes? These are also matters of concern to a healer, though I did not call you here to discuss your sleep and nutrition. Lilian suffers from the same, when she pushes herself further and further. All humans do, I suppose." Lightly added, "Others burn in other ways." But that's not the main point, either. "No, though we may think otherwise, when we learn more, for now, let us say that there is nothing 'hurt.' There is nothing wrong 'with you.' And yet, you said that your transformation 'comes out wrong.' In that case, where does the fault lay? Whence comes the misstroke? There is some contradiction. Which of the things we understand is mistaken? We can begin here, and perhaps something will be learned." Tamamo pauses, paper set aside, on the bench, and folds her hands together, eyes focusing on Meika, even if she won't meet them. "Lilian has sometimes spoken of 'those like us.' That is the reason, I suppose. It is not as if I am merely doing this for her, but I am drawn by some of those same threads. 'Monstrous,' you called yourself, and it caused me to wonder. Do you know the old stories, Vermillion? I refer to those stories of great and terrible monsters, 'Tamamo-no-mae' among them." Bitterly, "I could hardly forget them, myself, since I learned how the last thousand years has left my memory, and those of my name, on so many worlds. 'Monstrous.' I have ever strived, since then, to avoid... startling, and frightening others, in the way the sudden appearance of 'something inhuman' so often does." Steeped in it. A sudden switch to accented English, thankfully perfectly understandable, here in the Multiverse. "I'll show you mine if you show me yours." Followed by a moment of complete stillness. "That is how the modern phrase is used, yes?"
Meika Kirenai	The explanation of this as 'another side' of somewhere, familiar yet fundamentally seperate and detached, brings a visible relaxation to the magical girl's expression. Like being told whatever's within the walls of this confessional will stay there, and nowhere else- or, more accurately, it's like being placed in a bomb squad's controlled detonation chamber. "It's quiet." She repeats, hands jamming themselves into her coat's pockets, loosely flaring the sides of it out with a small swinging motion. "... Convinient. Yeah. I used to linger, sometimes, in the places Temptations had destroyed, for how... distant, I guess, they were. Awful, but- but quiet in a way other than noise. I don't know." She shrugs. The breath that catches in Meika's throat is silent, when Tamamo's hands move. Loud, compared to the silence, and louder still, to her. Even the magical girl's sharper, surprised motions can be so seamlessly unheard, amidst the air-hanging lightness. When she startles, it's almost like watching a stitched-over animation than a real, flesh and blood person. Only her words break the illusion well. "I- sure. I guess I'm worn." An understatement, half-denied, impossible for her to stare straight at. It's a lie that Meika says she's even 'uninjured', even if she hasn't been fighting. "I've handled worse. That's good enough. Give it a few days, and... it's not even really me who'll be hurt, right? She deserves it." 'There is nothing wrong 'with you.' And yet-' Meika's hands clench, tight, within her jacket's pockets. "... If nothing's wrong with me, it's- it's just because I'm wrong. I- I know that's why. That fixes the contradiction. I just am. I just always was. I knew that, before." More direct and open with it, than the other day- but not by much. That formless, unsaid wrongness, clearer in her mind than any word she'd know how to say. "I guess God didn't. Or maybe He thought I could be better somehow, anyway. Like- like it's a challenge. Like if I try hard enough to be someone else, it'd matter. I don't think it did." The little shrug in her shoulders is a downplay to the bitter feelings burning a hole through the base of her throat. Like it's fine, it doesn't matter, it's just worth brushing off. She's not that resigned at all, with the scowl she's trying hard to keep off her face. ''Monstrous,' you called yourself, and it caused me to wonder. Do you know the old stories, Vermillion?' Quietly, silently she shakes her head. "... Some, maybe. Everyone hears some. Fairy tales and- and all that. I-" There's a quiet little pause, eyes widening just slightly, scanning around more, even hesitantly meeting Tamamo's. As she continues, Meika shuts hers tight. Oh. The bitter tone is tangible. In an awful way, comforting to Meika- halfway to an affirmation, unsaid, that something about hiding it is supposed to burn the way it does, is supposed to feel less-than-bearable, be that intended or not. Thoughts echo words- "Oh."
Meika Kirenai	'That is how the modern phrase is used, yes?' Meika pales, half-grimacing, half unsure she heard right. It's like cold water splashed to the face, the roller-coaster shift of tone and meaning. It's hard to know whether to be horrified, to laugh, or to flinch- Meika doesn't really do any. "I- I don't think that's what it means. I think it means something else, I- I don't want to say-" A backpedal. She's shifting her weight from foot to foot, and her hands finally come back out of her pockets, a slight openness in posture. "... I know what you mean, though? I- yeah." A steeling inhale punctuates the air with the first non-word sound she's allowed herself to make. There's an expression halfway between a grimace and a smile on her face, eyes unfixed on anything at all. "I can. I'll forget, anyway. So it's- yeah. Okay. To hell with it." Clinging to some shred of momentum, she hasn't even stopped talking by the time she's f-f-flickering at the edges into a triplicated haze.If Tamamo has been privy, through Lilian or otherwise, to Lobotomy Corporation's reports on a similar incident with her, the term 'cloud of thunder and knives' might come fresh to her mind, and if not, it still might- like a muggy smear on this twilit park, stormlike peals of fuzzy thunder burst into being, painted across the soundscape in familiar hues of red. It's like an attack to even witness- achingly loud, nothing to track with the eyes in any easy sense, stray leaves caught on the wind pinned-through in vibrant needles and held motionless midair, crickets drowned out, tree branches creak in a shaky timbre as a few shatter just from proximity, and the pressure of the air itself seems to vanish on all fronts but the pounding inside a head. There's no words that pierce the din, but it feels like even a whisper could be louder than it all. 'Inhuman' is an apt word to keep on hand- in the magical girl's place is nothing of the sort, where she stood is smudged-out streaks of hazy, dusty somethingness, swirling and coalescing every which way. The only sense of a static figure feels too close to pareidolia, like seeing shapes in clouds, or a face in the moon. A shape defined more by indefinition than otherwise, and quickly, quickly fading back to- It's only really been a few seconds. The look on Meika's face, when there's a Meika again, is horrified- shame worse than she predicted, the last flashes of resigned weightlessness and how free it felt crashing back in the few seconds it took thoughts to catch up with action. She doesn't stay on her feet-- she has those again --she barely catches breath-- she has to again -- and she's covering her face up with shaky hands, scooting back away over mulch, as if she's not caught out in the open enough to be unable to hide.
Tamamo	'I- I don't think that's what it means.' "Oh. English is difficult, after all. I will need ask Lilian." Mercifully, Tamamo takes Meika's range of reactions as having more to do with the main topic than her phrasing. Her serenity remains untouched. That doesn't last long, of course. She's watching, carefully, with those golden eyes of her -- and something more. She's hearing, too, with those tall ears of hers. Little golden bells make the slightest sound, hanging from chains, suspended from her hair pins, when her head turns, though not by the motion of her ears alone. It's over too quickly, as much of it that did happen, for a long reaction -- rather, she hardly did react. One hand rose, and her hanging sleeve half-covers her mouth when she says, "Oh, my." But Meika's already covering her own eyes, rather than looking. "Hmm, and so, it was like that... Vermillion?" Tamamo's still seated, while Meika backs away. With a note of concern, "Are you listening? You did not have an experience of being unable to see yourself, did you?" That's curiously specific. There are several other questions she has to ask, but those can wait for a few moment.
Meika Kirenai	There's a fragment of a lead stuck in Meika's hair, and dirt clings to her palms, small pebbles indenting skin in a way that'll itch in a few minutes, but barely seems noticed yet. She backs away just enough to feel distant, like she shouldn't approach, and deflates into the shell of her letterman, pulling it close. 'Are you listening? You did not have an experience of being unable to see yourself, did you?' Wide-eyed, quiet, Meika blinks, and stares back for a moment as the words feel like they're crashing around her. Her eyes fix on Tamamo's face, trying, scrambling to see an expected reaction that she can't seem to find, delaying any response for a long, long moment. She doesn't even slowly nod her acknowledgment that she's hearing anything until almost too late. It feels less than natural for Meika to make words with her mouth, and there's a difference when she does- that whisper trick, unheard beyond an intended recipient, and utterly useless in a group of just two, still comes easier in its dial-tone-free clarity. {"I don't know. I don't even see, like that."} She's fairly sure that's not what is meant by the question, but the words still come out. {"Not like how you can look down at a hand. I can feel, I think, I can sense, I think, but it's so-"} The magical girl coughs, a sharp noise in contrast to ragged, silent breathing. Her voice comes out the normal way, afterwards, painted through with an unavoidable nervous fear. "W-why? What do you mean..? And- and how would I know?"
Tamamo	Tamamo relaxes on her seat. The fact that she wasn't already fully relaxed is only made apparent by the act of doing so. Or, perhaps, she still isn't, fully. That sort of upright posture looks more natural on her than it would on some. The effect is the same -- acknowledgment that Meika's listening, after all. "It is, so far as I can recall in this moment, a unique effect in its particulars. I can understand some of what Mr. Parsons meant, perhaps, though I believe he was wrong to say so, at the time." It doesn't look like she's going to explain that one. "There have been others, most of them now more distant in my memory, to which I might compare your state. If I were to consider the worse situations, the hazards which one might wish to avoid, chief among these is that of 'losing sensation of the self.' The point at which one becomes so far from self-conscious that they... well, let us say that it is not unpleasant for them, at the least, but not a fate for which many would wish, if they had known." Tamamo gestures with one hand, as if tossing something away. "It does not seem you are suffering such a danger. Your existence flickered not at all. It is somewhat curious, in fact, just how little changed. I would need see a bit more to call it 'stable,' but it is a promising start." Nothing of any 'expected reaction,' that she shows. Maybe that should have been expected. Or, maybe, she's just hiding it, though there's no sign of that, even when certain tricks are used to check for what's being left unsaid. "Well, now, I did offer to show you something, did I not? It is... not something I am quite used to showing, but it would be quite unfair of me to avoid it, I think. Please do not worry for that it lacks resemblance to yourself." Tamamo's eyes might shine, but the smile she gives with that is dulled. "There is no part of me that is 'human,' after all." 'No, truly, you could look away, if it is too much,' are the words that are barely breathed. They could hardly be meant to be audible.
Tamamo	Tamamo doesn't move. She doesn't get up. Something shifts. She'd spoken of 'another side.' Places that are separate and invisible, connected and elsewhere, unreachable without the exact steps necessary. She hadn't mentioned that the same could apply to people. Fundamentally, the way she's moving is not something that senses bound to space can experience. The only thing left is the inexplicable result of something unseen having always been present and unavoidable. Light and flame. The instantaneous impression is that of a woman whose fading sky-blue silks are left in halo by what must be her tails, and whose face is more so framed by the flowing flames that must have seemed to be pink-red locks, a moment before. Her eyes don't catch the light of what sets beyond the city's skyline, but make their own. It should hurt to look at her. It might, but at the same time, it's difficult to look away, as if space has curved to draw every line the eyes would follow back to her, and to her face. It's still her. The lines are different, wrong, and terrible, but it's still her. 'A fox.' Maybe she'd look like that, if one could hold to just the right angle, but that angle doesn't exist. There is only the flickering impression, something that can't be focused on, of slit pupils, of long and sharp teeth, of too many without being able to point to any moment in which her lips were more than barely parted, in the first place. There's the raw, instinctive and inexplicable sense of danger, as of facing a hungry beast -- and, at the same time, of staring into the Sun. Neither should be capable of reason in any understandable manner. It burns. Warmth rolls away from her like the sudden coming of Summer, enveloping the park in an instant, without room for escape. It's not yet suffocating, but it could be. The burning is something more focused, like a light focused through the eyes, at a spot in the back of the mind. And just like that, it fades. Like shifting clay, drawn into perfect shape, and then not like clay at all, but exactly as any human face should be. There are still those talls ears, of course, and her three tails. There are still the signs she leaves, always, so no one can accuse her of having tried to fool anyone into thinking she was really human, but the rest is hidden away again. She's only a little more shining than a person probably should be. "It is something like that." The air continues to be tingling warm. That much, at least, was definitely real.
Meika Kirenai	'The point at which one becomes so far from self-conscious that they...' "Get lost in it, or- or something..?" She guesses, worry still ragged in her tone. She winces, as if it's somehow physically unsettling to speak like that, acclimating back still, after even a moment. Thoughts catch up to something that's snagged- "... You've seen stuff close enough to- to know what to worry for?" 'It is somewhat curious, in fact, just how little changed.' The words don't elicit much surprise to hear, building off a gut-instinct, painful relief in the affirmation of the aching worry that maybe she's still like that no matter what face she wears, that it's less of a difference than it looks. "... Stable? What- what sort of stable? If it's dangerous? Or- or if it's something I can keep..." Not trying quite as hard anymore to scoot away, or to turn her face away, the magical girl shrugs. Her words still feel rough. "I didn't have to stop. I can hold it like that. I- I've never had to. I just-" Another shrug, whatever reasoning she'd fill in still left blank. "That's- that's it. Not like the drawings." Knees tucked to chest, wrapped tight with arms, squeezed as if to crush and compress- Despite the location, there's still the hint of distant thunder audible. 'No, truly, you could look away, if it is too much,' Like the small dip to make sure a roller coaster can reach its real dive, or like tensing before a shot, Tamamo's whispered, overheard words set Meika up with the expectation of fear to be knocked over all the more by the shift. Eyes shoot wide and, despite the cautioning, don't manage to pull away. Framed by 'no part that is human', every expected similarity to human frames and outlines everything else. That it's still so obviously her, makes it hard to retroactively compare Tamamo-no-mae from right here and right now to any held mental image of her from before. Meika tastes blood from where she's bitten the inside of her cheek, to keep her jaw from trembling. 'It is something like that.' It's over, words taking sensory focus out from sight, but there's tangible lag time before Meika reacts, physiological effects of surprise and fear still piloting until they're sure whatever looming sense of threat and danger haspassed, and that always takes longer. Meika's arms squeeze her knees, and release, much like an exhale- if she does breath out, it's silent, much the way her fear-racing heartbeat is. Uncomfortable in the heat, she scratches at the fabric of her letterman. "... Oh."
Tamamo	'... Stable? What- what sort of stable?' "By 'to be stable,' I mean... being without a danger that taking the step forward to stand in a place will not risk you falling another step forward. It may be of that kind, for you." Tamamo speaks after the vision is gone, and she remains. "For myself... I have not moved. I am standing in the same place, yet have chosen the face to present. It is... usual, no? To select the face that others see, though some are upset by the knowledge of it, that what they see may not be all that exists." A faint smile. That's all she has to offer, afterward.