Scene #838:

Owner	Pose
Shiro Kurosawa	Feeding one mouth is hard enough. Feeding FIFTEEN? Yeah, that's even harder. Particularly when all fifteen mouths are rats. There are downsides to being the only Skulker in the nest. The only Nezumi in the nest, the only one born human, and the oldest of the nest, it often falls to Shiro to get food for his siblings. This time has seen him sneaking into shops and snitching food items, fruits and breads mainly. It's true, he could make his weird porridge stuff... but his siblings don't like it. And if they don't like it, they won't eat it! So snitching foods! Besides, there are humans everywhere. Not like they're going to die from starvation if they lose enough to feed a mischief of rats. Now, this is going to look weird to someone who doesn't realize what's going on. A nondescript Asian man with black hair sits on the ground behind a dumpster. He doesn't look particularly down on his luck or anything like that. Except there are like FIFTEEN RATS CRAWLING ON HIM, AUGH! And he doesn't seem to be at all bothered by this. He's splitting up the results of his thievery amongst the rats. And oddly enough, they're not fighting over the food.
Corvo Attano	...And he's being watched. At first watched with bridled tension- the shadow on the roof's edge was watching the man to make sure he wasn't being ripped apart/about to be ripped apart and devoured, but the man seems to be feeding the rats inste- Feeding the rats- Feeding the- He is suddenly back home, in his mind, watching Granny Rags clicking and whistling and making soft noises, feeding her little 'birdies', all the rats dancing gently around her feet. A witch, oh yes, and yet he got along well with her, much as he knew she was a twisted, spiteful creature; he seemed to identify with her, better than he did with any member of the Overseers, though they were supposed to make things better. He seems to relax, when the man's flesh isn't being stripped from his bones (the rats back home weren't no joke) and he settles out to just watch the man and his... pets? No they were, wild rats, and he was... a thief, but then who was Corvo to talk? His were desperate circumstances but let's be honest. He has a bit of a case of sticky fingers even to this day.
Shiro Kurosawa	The black-haired man doesn't seem to be nearly as crazy as Granny Rags. He isn't calling them birdies, not mumbling to himself about this or that. His brown eyes are free of the clouding of madness. He has a calm look on his face, and seems to be projecting himself as the alpha rat here. He's not making any audible noise, but very sharp hearing might hear some near supersonic sounds coming from both him and the rats. The feeding itself happens in a very organized way. Those in the front of the line take pieces from the bread and fruit, retreat somewhere nearby to eat their bit of food, and those behind them step up and take their share. Once finished, some rats get back in line. They wait their turns for more. It seems for all the world like the man's got it all under control. He's even taking some of the bread and fruit himself. And the rats are staying away from his share, even the one that's perched on his shoulder, sniffing and sifting through the hair near his ear. Once all the rats are fed, Shiro lays back against the wall, tilting his head back. He looks up towards Corvo, begins to look away. Then suddenly looks back, eyes widening. There's a moment of silence that passes, and Shiro's nose twitches a few times. And then suddenly there are hissing rats! Several of the larger rats in the pack suddenly bristle, looking up. the rest of the rats just flee like... well, rats. Shiro stands, the rat on his shoulder one of those who had chosen to hiss and bristle at the 'intruder'. He frowns, and then looks down at the bristling rats. His nose twitches again, and the rats stop all their posturing. Most leave, but the one on his shoulder remains. Of course there are still tiny, beady eyes watching from the shadows...
Corvo Attano	And like a fool he's let his guard down. He's not got his eyes up; useful as it is he's not always comfortable seeing everything in sepia tones. So he doesn't have that great glowing golden nimbus to tell him when he's being looked up to and spied, and he sort of freezes when he sees the young man's head turning upwards- Lookawaylookawaylookaway- Yes- No, dammit. And the figure in the gold-traced dark and the metallic skull mask tenses, body rigid with tension... and then, as if expecting the man to pull out a gun and start blasting away, he looks like he's about to bolt. But the man doesn't move, so he doesn't move, almost frozen to the spot. Regarding him, silent, silent- and then the head cocks, birdlike, as the man stands, the rats stilling, he sort of regards them in utter silence for long moments... Before 'whf' and he's gone.
Shiro Kurosawa	Shiro blinks. That birdlike head tilt. A Tengu? But no... he would have shifted and flown away if he was a Tengu. Not... Whoa wait. Did he just... 'Whf~' He did. He totally did just teleport. Shiro's eyes widen, and his face takes on an expression of shock. And then the expression shifts from shock to joy. Oh boy! If it teleported... it's probably a spirit! Which means it can teach him something! Maybe it's some kind of urban spirit that can teach him more city wisdom! Maybe even a Gift or two! Maybe that's the spirit's test... maybe he has to catch it! It happens in an instant. Suddenly Shiro's body begins to shift, with a soft grunt-- discomfort? Maybe. There's no painful-looking splitting of skin or muscle, no eruption of bone, or anything too freakish. He doesn't grow taller. The mousey young man's face grows longer, lengthening into a muzzle like that of a rat. Whiskers grow in. His body becomes covered in brownish-gray fur, and a long, pink tail grows from his backside. His hands become ratlike claws, but with the configuration of a human hand, and his legs become digitigrade. And then where a young man stood... Is a large five foot rat-man hybrid! A moment's concentration, and the rat-man's hands raise to shoulder level as he closes his eyes. The city's smog seems to cling to him for an instant... and then he's up the side of the building, skittering up the drainpipe like... well, like a rat. He gets onto the roof quickly and perches on the edge, ratlike, as he searches for the 'spirit'. His head tilts up, he sniffsniffsniffs the air, and his ears swivel to catch a sound. Where did that spirit go?
Corvo Attano	It didn't disappear, that's for sure. There's a faint fishy odor about it, and the slight smell of sickness. Maybe it's some sort of a heron spirit? No, the scent of the sea. A cormorant, gull, pelican? An albatross? He looks more like a crow, a raven. Sea raven. Skua? Frigate bird? Who knew. Maybe just a crow that lived by the sea. Maybe just a man with powers. There, a shadow, a hint of a- there! The figure is off and running, running running running, and oh it's fast, /fast/, a sort of full-on dash, liquid and low.
Shiro Kurosawa	Now that makes no sense at all. A bird spirit that smells like a Same-Bito? Weird! Not being all that familiar with sea birds, aside from the albatross, Shiro has no idea what other kind of bird it could be. But it's not important right now. What's important is catching the spirit first, and to do that, he has to... AHA! A ratlike little grin and Shiro's off as well. With his Gift active, he can move across the roofs of the cityscape as easily as if he were running on the ground. With the huge bonus to speed in this form, hopefully he can close the distance quickly. While he scampers across the roofs, his grinds his teeth, chattering them furiously!
Corvo Attano	Corvo turns, tensing, eyes wide behind the mask. And Shiro gets a moment to try to close the distance, because for a beat there's just, no movement, the body language one of dis-eased shock, the body coiling up. "BY THE VOID!" Not hate but definitely fear and shock and a certain tight tense sort of loathing, like Shiro is something out of a nightmare. Because he is. Pretty much straight out of a nightmare. How many times has he ran beside a river populated not by water but by the blood-sobbing shambling outreaching desperation of weepers, a thousand of them, ten thousand, a hundred thousand, a sea of hands and desperation and stinging, biting flies, and him running through a mud that's more red then brown, bogged down as the rats walk as men, dressed in their watch uniforms, chasing him with bloodied teeth and swords held high, the cries of the helpless ringing maddening in his ears. Straight out of a nightmare. And then he's tearing off again, and as fast as Shiro is, he'll have to be fast to keep up with this 'spirit', because it's booking it. Run run run LEAP, leap-again? Mid air? Up and over, 'whf', and another rooftop. Close yes, jumpable but still running! Fast spirit, yea.
Shiro Kurosawa	This is actually a reaction Shiro's used to... out of humans. Spirits would be aware of his existence, wouldn't they? Unless this is a spirit from another world? But even then, a spirit from another world wouldn't be THIS upset by his presence, would it? Either way a spirit wouldn't curse by 'the Void', would it? Maybe... maybe this is a person after all? And then the person double-jumps like something from one of those human video games. Well, definitely not a NORMAL person, but maybe a person. Now Shiro's curious! And it's clear the man is more afraid of him than Shiro is of him. So there's no reason not to pursue! Except since he realizes he's probably scared the EVERLOVING CRAP out of the poor man, he calls out, "Oiiiiii! I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you! If you'll stop running I'll be human again, I promise!" ...Squeaking tones or not, it... it sounds like... a young boy.
Corvo Attano	The man sort of slides, skidding and sending up grit and pebbles from the next door roof- and then there's a 'whf' and it disappears. He, disappears? He disappeared. Where did he go? Where did he... there's the smell of fish. Just slightly. Around here, somewhere. So he's still, here. Somewhere. But where?
Shiro Kurosawa	Shiro lands on the roof just after the man disappears, and pauses. He raises his head to sniff. Sniffsniffsniff! That smell is still here... so he can't have gone too far, right? Crouching to all fours to sniff-- the ground, the air, the nearby AC units, anything he can that has that scent. He really didn't want to hurt the man. Yeah, by now he's figured out the guy's not a spirit. But he's still curious, and the guy doesn't seem to be any threat to him. At least, not at the moment. And in fact, he's still quite happy to be sniffing out the person! It's like hide and seek! So happy sniffsniffsniff! Pause, brux brux. Boggle boggle. ...God that looks weird. But there's enough of a human quality to the rat-man's face to be able to see the smile. So he seems happy, at least.
Corvo Attano	Would he still be happy if there was a sword under his nose? Cause ya there's a sword under his nose. There's a slight klk klkkk and then there's the flat of a sword under his nose, tilting it up. The man seems to unfold from the shadows, not quite peeling out of them, not quite supernatural but other than the scent damn near perfectly hidden in the shadows, despite the dull gold glint here and there. He turns, step, step, the skull mask both grotesque and disconcertingly almost empathic in it's odd glassy gaze, the voice rasping and hollow behind it, breathy and close, an inhuman sound through the mask. "Why do you follow me." There's a guarded tension behind the movements, a tightness to the body- he's still, scared. Still shaken, disquieted, but there was a certain wary curiosity as well. "Why do you follow me. Who are you, and how do you, look as you do." He's worn the flesh of rats before- a tight, closed space, claustrophobic and close, all around him, ending in their deaths and his disorientation, but he's never met one who lives in both worlds, a foot in one, a claw in the other. He was both warily fascinated and very warily repulsed. And very wary, either way.
Shiro Kurosawa	Shiro FREEZES. Bruxing and boggling stops, it seems he even stops breathing. The instincts of the rat tell him to run away run far away just run far far far awaaaaaay! But the ninja training says the opposite, that if he moves a hair that sword will find purchase on his throat and end his life right here and now. He listens to his training, since it's more logical. Humans are creatures of logic, aren't they? The rat-man closes his eyes and saws his teeth together. And Corvo might find a strange sensation around their general location suddenly. Something like a dog whistle, but quieter, and a fluctuating tone. A supersonic wail, barely perceptible. Besides that, nothing. However, Shiro did promise to be human if the man would stop running, right? The man stopped running (even if things went from 'why are you running away' to 'oh Emerald Mother SWORD IN MY FACE!'). So it's time for Shiro to hold up his end of the bargain. There's a soft grunt from the man-rat, and his body began to change again, to shrink and unshift the ways that it shifted before. Once he's done the boy is the mousy Japanese boy from before, the one who was feeding the rats, one knee and one hand on the ground, crouched. Now comes the answers to the questions Corvo asked. "I thought you were a spirit," he explains. His voice is wavering. And now that he's human, one can see him shaking. "My name is Shiro. I'm a Nezumi. Hengeyokai." The translation effect substitutes 'Changing Spirits'.
Corvo Attano	His voice is tense. "I am not a spirit /yet/." Did he take it as a threat? Maybe. Maybe. Maybe just tense. But as he becomes human once again, the man in the mask... withdraws the sword. Which he, flips, closed, into an object no bigger than the handle. Collapsible sword? Yeah. Though he then- pulls, the mask up, staring down at the now-just-a-boy. He's a tired man, pale and drawn, his skin waxen and wet with sweat. His eyes are distant, half lidded under heavy lashes. He looks mediterranean, middling thirties and either recently or currently sick. Rather agile for an ill middle aged man. "I am, sorry. You, startled me. I thought I was... hallucinating. Dreaming... I don't know."
Shiro Kurosawa	...Ah. Yeah, that totally explains everything. The boy shifts to sit on his rear end, legs folded tailor style, putting his hands in his lap and hunching his shoulders over and down. He pouts a little, sadly, and puts his head down. "...I'm sorry. Spirits in my world are like that. Sometimes they test those who seek them before they'll grant their favors." He squirms a little. "A city-spirit taught me to navigate the rooftops like I do. I thought you were a spirit and were testing me, challenging me to catch you. That if I caught you, I could learn another Gift." Even in speech, the capital 'G' is so clear that it might as well have been written.