Bandolero by Day

[This is a tale of bb!Binshou and bb!Yukio, and I only hope I got little Yukio right by tatterpixie​!]

"LASER ATTACK!"

Every muscle in Binshou’s body froze when he heard the shoes of the other six-year-olds thumping on the pavement behind him. A hand came from nowhere and slapped his book from his grasp, and it was like a jolt of electricity through his body.

"Ha! I shot the book right from your hands! Now your secret plans are ours!"

Another child swooped in and picked it off the ground.

"Stop!" Binshou’s shout was pure instinct, and unnecessary, as the three boys turned to face him once they were just out of arms’ reach.

"What? It’s just a book. It doesn’t even have any pictures."

"No way you can read all these kanji!" one of them said, flipping through the pages. "You just pretend to! You just want to look smarter than us!"

Binshou shook his head and didn’t speak, afraid that if he did, he’d no longer be able to hold back the tears that were stinging the corners of his eyes.

"We’ll keep it and we’ll write something good in it!”

Suddenly, flames erupted from the open pages of the book. The boys dropped it with a shriek and scrambled away.

No one had seen or heard the tall boy with the too-long fringe approach, and when he bent down to retrieve the book, it didn’t seem burnt at all. The boys took another step back when he turned his yellow eyes on them, but he remained silent. The tiny black puppy by his side made up for this by yelping as fiercely as it could.

"Oh, it’s just the Weirdo," said one of the boys, mustering as much aggression as he could.

"You think we’re scared of you, Yukio? We just avoid you because no one likes you!"

"I don’t even want that stupid book, anyway. Let’s just get away from him."

And they ran off, their shouts of “Weirdo!” and “Alien!” and “Double Laser Attack!” echoing down the street.

Yukio turned back to his shorter classmate, and silently offered him the book. Binshou accepted it, slowly and with some hesitation, glancing from the solemn boy to the long-haired chihuahua that was now wagging its tail and looking quite pleased.

It did not occur to Binshou that Yukio might be waiting for his thanks, or any response, really. He just stared, and blinked and sniffled. Why was everyone around him so scary?

When he was little, he’d had dreams of other people—seven wonderful people, and not his parents!—out there in the world, just waiting for him to find them. People who would like him, and be kind to him. And he’d figured out quite early that none of them were at school. Most likely, they were only in his head.

Finally, Yukio just nodded at him. “Be careful.” And he walked away, the puppy following at his heels.

Alone at last, Binshou took a deep breath. And another. And he hugged his book to his chest. And as he watched Yukio growing smaller in the distance, he decided that maybe he, at least, wasn’t so scary. He’d just saved his book, after all. (And he had a puppy.)

Making friends in the real world was hard—maybe impossible—but he could try. He could start with “thank you”.

Binshou ran down the sidewalk and shouted as loud as he could (which was not very loud at all): “wait!”

Posted via Dreamwidth. Comment there. Or here. I'm not picky.

(graphic thanks to caltastic!)

Hoo boy, I did the best I could on updating Binshou’s profile, but I think I’m going to have to write his personality over from scratch if I’m going to be truly happy with it. I’ve had his character in my head for so long! He started out as the new carrier of the Nephrite starseed in a Sailor Moon AU RP back in 2004 (that is, not a reincarnation, but a new character), and now he’s the reincarnation of Chiriko in a Fushigi Yuugi/panfandom RP. In fact, it was surprisingly easy to port him over with almost no changes, but even so, his character has evolved a lot over time. And, of course, since his story is set in Japan (urban fantasy AU Japan, but still), I’m always doing research to make sure I don’t Fuck Things Up too spectacularly.

Anyway, since I creatively placed Binshou’s birth date under the Chiriko constellation, that actually makes him a Leo (HA), but Chiriko’s birthday is March 19th in the manga, and I’m finding more inspiration from the Pisces entries in the Shitty Horoscopes series.

"Don’t forget: you brought this on yourself."

If the text that had just appeared on Catalina’s comm pad made her jump a little, no one noticed. The people around her were all focused on their own workstations, speaking into microphones to each other, to the control ship in orbit around the planet, and to recording devices, for posterity. Future citizens of the Silver Millennium would want to know exactly what happened on the day they first powered up the Time Gate.

Once she was over the initial shock, it was a welcome distraction from the fact that everyone on the planet would be dead—or worse—within five minutes.

Was the text meant for her? she wondered.

Yes.

She knew it, as instinctively as she felt and knew the flow of time.

She glanced up. A woman stood in front of the Gate, still, taking readings with an electro-chronometer. Four minutes left.

Who sent it?

I did.

Of course. Her intuition had an actual basis: the shadow of her own thoughts upon the time stream. She knew it was meant for her because she’d sent it herself.

From the future.

The last of the scientists were clearing the area around the Gate. Their faces were a blur. Already she was forgetting the lives and identities of the people she’d worked with over the past year, and it was probably for the best. Three minutes left.

It had to be from the future, because she didn’t actually remember sending it. If she could remember, it would be in the past. What she was feeling was too strange to be memory. Was it the reverse, the opposite of memory?

No, the inversion of memory.

The control room went dark but for a few glowing screens and instruments. She could feel the spark of anticipation in the air, even over the growing hum of electricity. Two minutes left.

Why would she send such a text to herself? From the future? It sounded like a castigation, but it couldn’t be that. Why bother? If there was one thing she knew to be consistent about herself across the timelines, it was that she wouldn’t put forth the effort without a purpose.

It was a warning.

The Gate began to light up. The countdown began. T minus 60 seconds.

A warning against what? Against creating the Time Gate? No, she wouldn’t have sent it so late then.

T minus 30 seconds.

Maybe events wouldn’t play out quite the same this time around? No, she could feel the current of the time stream, just as swift and deep as when she’d first discovered the anomaly of the Gate’s creation. Everything was playing out as it always had, and always would.

T minus 10 seconds.

For the first time that day, she looked up at her colleagues and hoped to meet someone’s eyes. She needed a catalyst for another spark of intuition, the reassuring variable of another intelligence.

All she could see were stark planes of light across cheekbones and foreheads, outlines of humans in the dark. Even their instruments were dim, now. Only the Gate was glowing.

T minus 5 seconds.

Brought what on myself?

But time was rushing by too quickly. All she could do was feel, because if she stopped being aware of the weightlessness and crushing heaviness and loudness and stillness that filled her mind and her lungs, she would be swept away completely.

T minus 4.

3.

2.

1.

And suddenly she was buoyed out of the stream by an echo of loneliness, wide and empty and as long as the infinite arrow of time.

And everyone else around her was swept away as the Time Gate exploded like a supernova.

And she realized what the message had meant.

► Once again, no pictures this week, so here are two photos of me screwing around working in the cockpit of a TA-4 Skyhawk back in 2008.

► As I mentioned in a previous post, I went to the Phoenix Art Museum on Wednesday. I’d never been there before; I thought maybe The Met had spoiled most other art museums for me, but I loiter so long at each exhibit that I can’t even make it through the entirety of the PAM in one go. Took some notes on artists and concepts I want to look up later, and I’m sure they’ll be popping up on my tumblr.

► I DID MY FIRST TWO BLOODS THIS WEEK. Which is to say, white blood cell studies. Which is to say, hospitals draw blood from a patient, send it to our pharmacy, I centrifuge it and rinse it until I’ve isolated the white blood cells, tag them with radioactive material, recombine them with the patient’s plasma, and sent it back to the hospital where they inject it and wait between six and twenty-four hours to take an image of where the cells have traveled to in order to locate acute infections. Or you can just read about it here. Anyway, it’s very gross and very cool.

► The to-do list was successful again! I got all the info I need about certification renewal, looked at ticket prices for my Canada Adventure, cancelled my goddamn gym membership at last, did some writing for Akhet, and made some progress on apartment cleaning for mindsplinters's and tatterpixie's visit (DID I MENTION instead of doing NOLA this year they are coming to visit ME? WE WILL HAVE WONDERFUL DESERT ADVENTURES AND I'M SO EXCITED TO SHOW THEM ALL THE LOVELY SONORAN PLACES THAT ARE CLOSE TO MY HEART!).

► This week I ought to…

• complete at least 2 CE courses for my cert renewal


• finalize the dates with work and buy my tickets for my nanners visit


• DO MY TAXES, WHEEE


• keep working on the apartment (a lot of this is stuff that needs doing anyway, but it’s nicer knowing I’ll have the Casa Clan here soon to enjoy the fruits of my cleaning and decorating labor)


• MORE WRITING, next week for Catalina!

The lights drifted over her skin, trembling and waving before fading away, only to be replaced by another splash of color. In the pitch dark of the tomb, the effect was mesmerizing. Akhet didn’t notice.

Her eyes were on the glyphs that cast the light, a wall of characters that shone on and off in a pattern only she could discern.

"How long are you going to watch them?"

Akhet didn’t flinch at the sudden voice from the darkness. The fact that she could hear Sefet approaching was a mere courtesy.

"I… don’t know." Her voice was faint, her eyes still fixed on the glyphs. "How long has it been?"

"Three hours."

Sefet received no response, no indication Akhet had even heard her, for a very long time. Finally, “I felt something. A disturbance. I saw something in my crystal.”

"Something here in your brother’s tomb?" Sefet didn’t bother to hide the disbelief in her voice. "You built it yourself. You set the traps, created the wards– it would take someone truly powerful to break in. Don’t you think you would have seen some sign of them by now? After three hours?"

Akhet tilted her head, furrowed her brow. She opened her mouth, and no words came out.

Sefet was ready to shake her. “Do you want him to be disturbed?”

"No." Akhet’s face crumpled into a look of horror and revulsion. "Oh, no. Oh, by all the gods, no."

"Then I’ll see to it that he’s not." Sefet took Akhet by the elbow and gave a gentle tug. "You’ve seen no sign of intruders yet? I’ll keep watch the rest of the night, just to be sure."

"Oh." Akhet allowed her friend to lead her out of the tomb, back towards the palace. "Oh, Sefet. Thank you."

"You can thank me by getting some rest." She let go of Akhet’s arm when they’d left the tomb, and watched until she’d reached the steps.

Akhet watched as Sefet turned back into the darkness of the tomb, and felt no relief. She’d long since forgotten the difference between hope and fear.