|
Jack
It's New Year's Day, and Jack...is not hung over. What he is, however, is asleep. Bundled up in a coat and under a few blankets in front of one of the small firepits in the hollow, taking a nap. The fire is dying down, but still warm enough to sleep by, and it illuminates the lazily shifting lines of the Changeling's Mien - what little that can be seen under his layers.
Saya
Saya looks like she might not have made it home yet from whatever she was out doing last night to celebrate New Years Eve, given the short, gold, sparkly skirt she's wearing under her coat, and the silly height of the heels on her feet. Not that they actually manage to make her anything other than tiny, no matter how towering the height of her heels. The pattern of the tsukamaki wrappings up her legs makes it look like she's wearing some kind of fancy tights, even if the pattern is actually part of her body, and she moves with a slight limp toward the fire she notices shortly after making her entrance.
She's already part way there when she notices that someone is laying under blankets by that fire, and she hesitates for only a second before just continuing in that direction, apparently not deterred by the current occupancy of the area around the fire. The only real change is that she tries to move a bit more quietly to avoid waking the strange man, which works fine until one of her steps comes along with a short sound like two rough metal edges grinding against each other somewhere within her. It's the kind of sound that can send shivers down the spine, like nails on a chalkboard or other such unpleasantnesses.
Jack
Jack shudders awake at that metal grinding sound, bits of charcoal flying away from his face to drift toward the ground, disappearing before they the the snow. He blinks his dark eyes blearily, looking around for the source of the noise.
"Shit..." he mutters quietly, and shakes his head to maybe wake himself up a little more, eyeing the new Changeling with a little wariness. "Hey - sorry, d'you know what time it is Ironside by any chance? I hopped in here for a nap and...well. You know. No fucking idea what year it is anymore." It's accompanied by a self-conscious laugh, because of course Changelings have complicated relationships with time and the Hedge. (edited)
Saya
Saya's metallic face offers Jack an understanding smile, an expression that turns a bit impish a moment later as she answers with a faint Japanese accent, "there's a part of me that's really quite tempted to tell you it's early afternoon in June of 2035 or something, but no. It's early afternoon on the first day of 2022. Hopefully that's an answer that's not particularly concerning for you, and I'm not about to learn that you dozed off in 1990 or something."
One thing that Jack might notice pretty quickly, as he's eyeing the diminutive young woman, is that one arm of her coat is neatly folded around the elbow and pinned up with the cuff at her shoulder, done in such a way as to prevent anything from falling in the empty opening at the end of the sleeve, and also to keep the dangling arm of the coat from getting in the way and flopping around as she moves. It's rather evident that her right arm is either mostly or entirely missing.
Jack
The joke makes him chuckle, and he stretches with a groan, yawning as he does. "Nah...I've only been asleep for a couple hours. Didn't plan on sleeping, but the fire's warm, and First Night's exhausting as fuck, and - ah. Fuck. I'm Jack - Sylvan Emissary, 'f you wanna get fancy in here, which I really, really don't..." The charcoal lines that make up his silhouette shift and slide as he smiles, and sits up enough to hold out a hand for her to shake, if she wants.
Saya
"I actually haven't gone to bed yet," Saya admits, "which I'm sure I'm going to regret later, but at least I didn't drink very much, so I'm not going to also have a hangover to contend with." She glances at his extended hand and then offers out her left, the only hand that she has to offer, though not the one that people usually shake with. "Saya, Ranger of the Thorns," she introduces in turn. "It's way too late for fancy if I don't have to be, so I'm fine with not being any more formal than that."
Jack
"I...used to do that. I think I'm too old for it now," says the man who can't be older than 30, and even that's pushing it. "Harder when I gotta work - did you do First Night, or make your own fun?" He sits up properly, now that he's awake, before leaning toward the fire to try to stoke it into something actually resembling fire, instead of just glowing coals.
Saya
"I'm pretty used to sleeping really odd hours and staying up all night more often than I probably should," Saya admits with a shrug. "I have no idea what I'm too old for and what I'm too young for at this point, so I mostly just do what I want." She herself looks... well, young, but it's hard to tell age when you're dealing with someone who has metal skin that's doesn't really show aging, and when you're dealing with people who can live for much longer than human lifespans. Also, the fact that she is well under 5 feet tall probably just makes her seem younger.
"I was at a friend's house. The idea of being out in a crowd full of people who are partying, often intoxicated, not really on their best behavior is a bit too much for me, except on my best days. A fun evening with friends is much more my speed."
Jack
"Oh, it's my joints - and my sleep - that have decided I'm too old for shit like that," he says with a smile. "Sounds nice - yeah it was a mess, like it always is. Don't think anybody died, so that's a plus, but...I'd rather work it than attend any day...there was a pretty nice performance line-up, at least. Nice folx, low ratio of assholes.
Saya
Saya laughs, a somewhat unsurprisingly metallic but otherwise pleasant sound. "Oh, my joints hate everything, most of the time. That doesn't really change based on whether I'm getting enough sleep or not, unfortunately. I'm determined that I'm going to let my disabilities keep me from enjoying myself as little as possible, which I guess is a pretty Spring thing to say, now that I think about it. Any performers that I'd be likely to know? Keeping in mind that I've had a few years in the modern world, so my pop culture knowledge is a bit of a strange patchwork."
Jack
"Nobody big enough that I'd heard of them - ska band, a couple singer-songwriters. Some former broadway star - I expected her to be awful but she was lovely. Gave the whole crew those mini bottles of champagne." His smile gets just a touch smaller there. "But all in all, a good night - just fuckin' long."
Saya
"What's a ska band?" Saya asks with apparent seriousness, demonstrating (if she's being genuine) that she does, in fact, have notable gaps in her knowledge of popular culture. For certain definitions of popular, at the present time. "I'm glad it was a good night for you, though! It was for me, too. Some drinks, playing video games with friends, I enjoyed it. I hope it's a sign of a good year to come." She glances around and finds a place to sit down, which she does with a strange combination of considerable grace of movement and exacting care. There's a sharp metallic *ping* sound and a faint wince in her expression as she lowers herself down as explanation for the caution in her movements.
Jack
"It's...like..." Jack pauses to consider. "Punk, but with a brass section, mostly?"
He winces in sympathy as she sits, his own knees clicking as he moves to find a more comfortable spot under his blankets. It's very much the sound of human joints, rather than metallic ones, despite his scribbly, sketchy appearance. "That does sound nice. I'd been thinking about doing that at home, today, but..." a smile, and he gestures vaguely, "here I am just waking up, not at home. Honestly, I've woken up in worse places."
Saya
"Huh. Really? That sounds interesting," Saya says with a slight tilt of her head. "I'll need to make a note to myself to listen to that. Do you play a lot of games? I'm a bit of a video game fiend, I'll admit." She laughs and gives a little helpless shrug. "I think that for those of us who left very different worlds than this modern one and came back to find all this change, technologically and socially and everything else, we either embrace it wholeheartedly or end up resisting it. I'm very much in the first category."
Jack
"I am the most casual," he replies with a laugh. "One of my partners plays a little, he's taught me some. Mostly Xbox, though he does more shit on PC. But that makes sense, I know folks in both categories. I was only gone six weeks, myself - Ironside time, at least - so it's a little bit of a different story, for me. But it's also...embracing the changes that come with stepping out of time like that 's a pretty Spring notion, too, yeah?" His smile widens, and he pulls the hood of his coat down so he can run his fingers through his hair.
Saya
"I suppose it is, although I'm an Autumn myself. I did give Spring some consideration, but ultimately it wasn't for me, at least not at the time and place I was in then, and I am now, with my life." Saya briefly smiles. "Who knows what might happen in the future." She leans down and slides one of her shoes off, and then the other, then flexes her toes and her feet as if the shoes have been killing the, and she's glad to get them off for a little while. "I was returned to this world only a few years ago, and I left in the early 1800s. I have no idea how long I was over there, since I was a sword, and swords aren't really the most aware of things like the passage of time. It's mostly all a bit of a blur of brief moments of awfulness combined with being kind of asleep. Sort of. Only six weeks? That must have been strange in its own way."
Jack
"Six weeks Ironside time, fuckin' lifetimes Over There." He huffs and shakes his head. "At least that's what it felt like, I..." he grimaces. "I don't remember much. But a lotta people didn't really notice I was gone, or just thought I'd gone on a bender, or to rehab. I haven't...most of them still think that." His smile is humorless. "But man, it...everything is different, now, for you, yeah? The world, I mean."
Saya
Saya shakes her head. "That seems like it would be so hard!" she exclaims. "To come back and have had this terrible experience but not be able to talk to the people you're close to about it? I'd have to guess it put a bit of a strain on some relationships." She glances away briefly. "I came back to learn everyone I'd ever known was history now, and that I was alone, but I also had a life that was so rigid, structured, and outside of my control that I was also free for really the first time in my life. Free of expectations, able to make my own choices. It was scary an awful in its own way, I say as an Autumn, but it was also wonderful."
Jack
Jack nods. "I'd imagine that kind of freedom would be fucking terrifying. Sounds like a way to make a completely new start, too, no one with any preconceived notions of who you were, or are, yeah? Was your first Freehold here in Philly, or...?" He cocks his head curiously, and warms his hands over the fire.
Saya
"I had a life before I was Taken where I never got to make a single important decision for myself, everything was decided for me. For all the time I was over there I was a tool, something not capable of making a decision or acting with free will, really. Then, suddenly, I had to make all of the decisions," Saya says with a laugh. "I can assure you, I made some terrible ones for a while. I still do, I suppose, but that's part of life, right? I'm still figuring out exactly who I am, but I'm pretty sure that will go on for a long time." She shifts a little and stretches her legs out in front of her. "My first Freehold was in Tokyo, which I can tell you is a wild place for someone from when and where I came from. In my day it was called Edo, and I'd been there couple of times, but it was like a completely different world. I'm here in Philly because of a friend. Miguel. I'm not sure if you've met him yet?"
Jack
"Name sounds familiar - he's a Spring too, right?" Jack frowns thoughtfully, scribbly lines appearing and disappearing across his forehead. "And yeah, the mistakes - for a while I was...mm. Afraid to make any decisions at all. Which still ends in making the wrong decisions, ultimately. You know I've never been to Tokyo - did a little touring, Before, but never got that far. Sounds like some culture shock, suddenly appearing two hundred years in the future." His smile is easy and warm.
Saya
"He is a Spring," Saya says with a sudden smile, like she's glad that someone knows who Miguel is, at least a little! "I think he's my best friend, at this point. His particular variety of friendship and acceptance and love are what I've needed to find my footing. Everyone should have a Miguel in their life." There's a soft, wry laugh and she points out to Jack, "I don't think most of us are strangers to culture shock, but it actually took me a while to even be reasonably sure I was back in the real world, and not some strange new realm that was only loosely based on the world I came from originally."
Jack
"I thought getting dragged Over There was just a bad trip, at first - and yeah, took me a while to really trust that this is the real world, when I got back. I hope Tokyo's freehold was helpful, getting you back on your feet, I've heard that they...vary. This's the only one I've ever really been a part of, so I've got zero first-hand experience."
Saya
Saya takes that first statement with a bit of surprise. "Really? I'd never been drunk or high before that, so I didn't have that foundation for thinking it was something like that. The people I fell in with in Tokyo were quite helpful, fortunately. I can't speak for every area of Tokyo, but you have to keep in mind how absolutely massive it is. Almost 40 million people live in the metropolitan area of Tokyo, and it's a significantly larger area than New York's metropolitan area." She shrugs, then smiles. "I've found that I love it, though, and coming to a small city like this has been almost as much of a culture shock as going to Tokyo in the first place."
Jack
"I mean I was definitely not sober when I got dragged into the Hedge, so." Jack shrugs. "Made the most sense, at first. But wow - yeah that's...I don't think I can conceive of how big that is, even New York is big to me." He chuckles. "I'm glad the Freehold treated you well - or at least the bit of it you fell into. We're a pretty good group here, if I do say so myself. But one'a my fiance's is Autumn - the one who plays video games - so I'm probably a little biased about your court. Which..." He trails off, his nose wrinkling in amusement. "I could say that about all of 'em, at this point. Courts, I mean."
Saya
"Did you say fiances, plural?" Saya asks with a couple of surprised blinks. "I didn't think that people were allowed to marry more than one person, here. I'd love to meet him if he's an Autumn who's also a gamer, though. He sounds like my kind of people, so far."
Jack
"They're not." His expression sours, his features scribbled a little more darkly. "But it - doesn't change how I feel about them both. He's been out of town a lot, work keeping him busy, but I'll throw him your way when I get the chance. What sort of games do you play? PC, or...?"
Saya
Saya tilts her head, considering Jack, and then says, "I'm sorry if I said something wrong. I promise you have I have no issue with the idea, except to hope that relationships with more than one person get handled better these days than they did in my time, when concubines were common. At least among the people who weren't going to be told no. I have to admit that relationships in this modern world are one thing I haven't gotten around to learning about much, at least not first hand."
She smiles. "I play a little bit of everything, though. Most commonly PC, because I enjoy competitive play and the skill ceiling is a lot higher on PC. I enjoy console games, but some things are just better with a keyboard and mouse."
Jack
"It's -" he waves vaguely with a shake of his head, dismissing whatever issue he may have had with what she's said. "Yeah, Mearc does a lotta PC stuff. It's a world that I've never really gotten into, I was a band geek and a theater nerd in high school, not a gamer, you know?"
She probably doesn't know, and Jack realizes this a second later, his cheeks darkening slightly with a smeary blush. "It - wasn't something I did a lot of when I was a kid. But it's fun watching Mearc play when I have time."
Saya
"It wasn't something I did a lot of when I was kid either," Saya points out with a laugh. "As you might be able to imagine, since I came from early 19th century Mito, Japan. I did have a thing for theater nerds, though, even if I wasn't one myself. In fact, my weakness for theater nerds is ultimately how I ended up over there as one of their playthings, but that's a longer and more complicated story. Fortunately for you and your fiances that weakness is for the women, not the men," she adds with a little shrug and a considerably mischievous look.
Jack
"Oh no worries on your end, either, I don't go for women," Jack says with an easy laugh. "But what can I say, theater nerds are pretty hot." He grins at her and winks. "I'm never onstage, though - or if you do see me there something's gone very wrong..." he laughs again, his dark eyes glittering.
Saya
"Well, there you go," Saya answers with a laugh. "One thing we don't have to worry about, though to be maybe just a little bit forward, because I've found I actually kind of enjoy not playing things close to the nest," because idioms are HARD, "like I was raised to, I'm not sure if romantic or sexual interest is even something that made it back with the rest of me. I feel like if it did, I'd probably have had it come up in the last few years." She just shrugs it off like it doesn't really matter to her, though. "I left a lot of me behind, but oddly enough, I've never been happier, so I do my best to remember that and accept who I am now. "
"What kind of things do you do at the theater?"
Jack
"Huh. Maybe? But yeah hey, if it's not a problem it's not a problem. And anyone who tries to make it a problem's an asshole, so like." A shrug, similar to hers. "And seriously, there's not a lot you could say that wouldn't be too forward, for me. Ask...literally anyone who knows me," he says with a grin. "I do all kinds of things - I'm a stagehand with the local union, here, but my main gig is running sound at this jazz club - Stardust? And I work part-time at PTC. Philadelphia Theater Company. Running the board there when the house guy calls out, and generally making myself useful and employed."
Saya
"I've come to enjoy directness and open communication," Saya says with a smile. "Which is an extremely un-Japanese thing for me to say, but I've actually found myself enjoying how acceptable that is here in Philly. In Tokyo? Well, it's a little easier to get away with it there than some other places in modern Japan, but it's still not really the way people do things." Her head tilts and she points out, "I don't actually know what quite a bit of what you just said means. The board?"
Jack
"I bet it was a lot of a culture shock coming here, too, yeah? But - ah. The sound board, for making sure the audience can hear the actors, and for sound cues and music if there's not a live orchestra. I can run a light board too but it's not where I'm happiest. Does that answer your question, I never know quite where to start explaining what I do..."
Saya
"It was, but I also have a pretty good means of escaping from the culture shock and getting to something familiar, with the gaming that I do," Saya explains with a slight smile. "I can go online and have my same friends, and familiar settings, and some familiar routines. Having that makes adapting a lot easier." She dips her head in a nod. "That answers my question well enough. I've never actually seen any of those things being used, just what I've caught glimpses of in movies and stuff, so I don't really understand how it all works, but I can picture it in my mind, at least."
Jack
"I make actors and the show sound good, is the main bit," Jack nods. "Yeah I hadn't really thought about that - you can really just travel with all your friends in...I mean in your pocket really. Anyplace but here." He gestures to the Hedge around them. "And here we've got a built-in support system, kinda, so..." He nods again. "Yeah, I can see how the online thing'd help a lot, with that."
Saya
"I'm also an oneiromancer, and fairly good at navigating through the Hedge, so I can escape into my dreams or find a quicker way back to Tokyo through the Hedge for a visit, if I need to," she explains. "But mostly I use games for that. That's how I met Miguel in the first place. I killed him in a video game, and he decided he had to compliment me on that, and we ended up talking, and one thing lead to another." She considers Jack, her expression rather inscrutable, before she nods a couple of seconds later. "That seems like an important role for a production, even if it's not one the audience is going to think about most of the time. Does that ever bother you?"
Jack
"Oh man, I know shit about fuck when it comes to dreams," he huffs in amusement. "So 's good that some of us know that shit." Her question makes him pause, and he chews on his charcoal-sketch lip. "Does what bother me? That most people don't think about the work I do?"
Saya
Saya says, "I think that most of what I did over there was dream, but I'm not really sure." Her nose scrunches up a little in distaste at the not-knowing, and then she shrugs it away as she shifts forward on her seat and starts getting carefully back to her feet, where she starts sliding said feet into her towering heels. "I do know they called me yumenagi-no-tsurugi, the dream-cutting blade. What strange logic was involved, I can't really say." She slides her hand into a pocket and smiles. "But that is what I meant, yes. That people enjoy the fruit of your labor but never know that you made it possible for them to do it." She glances toward the exit. "I should get going, though."
Jack
"Eh, nah, not really - I don't do what I do because I have an ego though, that's for sure," he says with a chuckle. "I'm fine to be the one behind the curtain, as it were. It was nice to meet you - Saya, right? I hope you continue to find Phily to your liking."
|