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tampered2008-12-08 10:40 pm
sciencedaughter.livejournal.com) wrote in tampered2008-12-08 10:40 pm
log; ongoing
When; December 8th, afternoon
Rating; PG
Characters; Nemu [![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
sciencedaughter] & Ishida [anti_buttons]
Summary; Cursed, Ishida, in his own way, has offered a bit of company for the shinigami that he can excuse as not quite violating his vow to have nothing to do with shinigami. After all, she was created, and thusly, had no choice in the matter. Completely justifiable.
Log;
Nemu did not... "get out" much.
This was something that had just always been so. Why? Not so much because of her time, because yes, she worked often, but she did have time. She had time, and yet she chose to do nothing in that time that was hers and hers alone. Hobbies, entertainment... very rarely did she indulge. Why? Of course, because of him, because of Mayuri-sama.
Was it wrong of her, to always have that in the back of her mind, knowing that no matter what she did, how she grew, how she learned or felt, the minute she returned to his side, it would all be for naught? No, she would not- could not think so. ... She tried not to think so.
A soft mewl, and the false shinigami looked down. The cat had... grown. Still young, but no kitten. A pale fingers moved, slow, and curled under it's chin, eyes soft and distant. She was waiting, but Nemu was no stranger to waiting, on a bench in a park, or in the hallway of a lab covered in blood and someone else's pain.
Rating; PG
Characters; Nemu [
sciencedaughter] & Ishida [anti_buttons] Summary; Cursed, Ishida, in his own way, has offered a bit of company for the shinigami that he can excuse as not quite violating his vow to have nothing to do with shinigami. After all, she was created, and thusly, had no choice in the matter. Completely justifiable.
Log;
Nemu did not... "get out" much.
This was something that had just always been so. Why? Not so much because of her time, because yes, she worked often, but she did have time. She had time, and yet she chose to do nothing in that time that was hers and hers alone. Hobbies, entertainment... very rarely did she indulge. Why? Of course, because of him, because of Mayuri-sama.
Was it wrong of her, to always have that in the back of her mind, knowing that no matter what she did, how she grew, how she learned or felt, the minute she returned to his side, it would all be for naught? No, she would not- could not think so. ... She tried not to think so.
A soft mewl, and the false shinigami looked down. The cat had... grown. Still young, but no kitten. A pale fingers moved, slow, and curled under it's chin, eyes soft and distant. She was waiting, but Nemu was no stranger to waiting, on a bench in a park, or in the hallway of a lab covered in blood and someone else's pain.
no subject
The focus on the cat was necessary. By thinking of the cat, he could not think about what the damned City had forced him to do, but for once, he could not blame the City for the reminder.
Uryuu had been negligent for far too long. The loophole he had so easily, and yet carefully, constructed for his relationship with Kurotsuchi-san, could stand this- because it had been quite awhile ago that he had resolved, for her, if only for her, that there were certain things he could not put his word above.
On the dot, Uryuu turned down the prearranged path, his grown (still young) cat in his arms, and stopped roughly a foot from the shinigami, "daughter" of the man he hated most. A beat passed, and another half, and he felt himself smile.
"I like that dress more every time I see it."
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Her head raised, and her mouth opened as if she would speak. She almost let out things that were reeling in her head, useless girl, the resounding sounds of slaps and beatings the curse had seen fit to remind her of, but- It was so far off. So potentially close, but so far away. She had not seen her father's face and months, and she she not- Did she miss it?
Instead, she paused, took a moment, and a small, almost wry smile was placed on her lips.
"Considering you selected it, I would hope so, Ishida Uryu."
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For Uryuu, his life could only ever operate through tangles, turning around and around. This City left him dizzy with the force of the revolutions. To make the exception for her, did it open the door to shattering the promise completely? If so, what was his word? What was his pride? Was the worth of that promise greater than that of the bonds he so vigorously denied.
The cat in his arms, the shade of her dress; on these he focused.
"I hope that you, too, are fond of it?" He asked, the memory of his attempt to encourage her own taste, only to have to settle for her adopting his, fresh in his mind. It had not been what he intended, to stand-in for that external authority.
Bowing, Uryuu let Kukiko to the ground; the cat immediately crossed the distance to Yuu. It was simpler to be a cat and he almost envied them - almost, as Uryuu was not quite so inane.
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"I like it." She said softly, something that, months, a year ago, would have been an impossibility. The dress was flattering, she could do these things sometimes, let her hair out of its stern braid, done a colored dress and the sweater he'd picked out, not her severe black uniform. It was brisk out, however, and she'd also worn a scarf, something she herself had gone to purchase. White.
An attentive caretaker, Nemu gently sat the cat in her arms down. She did not worry for it straying, because she would immediately bring it back, a cat was no match in speed for a shinigami, or a Quincy. Eyes watched, every so carefully, every move of the animal, fingers curling loosely without something to hold.
no subject
But he believed it. After all, had he not promised to believe in her, until she could? That word, at least, was one in which he had no doubts.
The scarf he had noticed, and as his attention stayed on their pets (how queer), his head tilted just slightly. "It compliments it nicely," he began, "but surely Kurotsuchi-san is otherwise cold?"
Winter now, even in the City; she ought to have more than a sweater. "Perhaps we can find you something."
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"I do not often shop... and I am rather resistant to temperature... ah- that is to say, I am... often cold... and a coat does not help that, so I had not gone yet." A slow blink, and she cocked her head somewhat as well, hands folding gently in her lap, thin fingers would be cold- they were. Because she was dead here in this City, courtesy the Octava Espada, and no matter what she wore, she could not outrun that inner dull chill.
no subject
"Ah," he began, hesitating with the phrasing of his intent, "but, does Kurotsuchi-san have any vulnerability to sickness?"
To always be cold beyond the help of layers seemed too sad to the young Quincy, but was not even the type to have a brief, illogical thought of catching her hands in his, to try and lend some temporary warmth, ever doomed to only pass.
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"With the exception of illnesses caused by curse days... I have never been ill in my... "life"." She puzzled over to say life, or death, considering she had never truly lived as humans do.
"Is that odd?" She looked almost entirely different, when removed from the stern braid and sterner clothing. A softer frame to her delicate features, a bit more color to her cheeks with the blue and not the jet black and whites. She politely refrained from citing the reason- that Mayuri-sama would never make a thing that could be felled by illness.
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"Of course not," he answered, smooth in this sweeping over of the truth, always practiced in seeing what he waned to see, in speaking likewise, "it's evident that Kurotsuchi-san simply knows well how to take proper care of herself. If she has not been sick, it is through her diligence. And possibly vitamin intake."
If not for the cats, he might have suggested lunch. Perhaps they could find something easy with a street vendor.
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A pause, and she nervously readjusted the scarf- hard to tell what she felt, but it was a slightly nervous gesture, smile trembling only slightly.
"Has Ishida... san been sick much, here? I would most hope not."
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"I have not," he answered, after a moment. "I am also, I think, careful to take care of myself. Life is troubling enough here without adding avoidable illness to the table."
It was also a product of how he had been raised, of course. With Ryuuken a doctor, Uryuu had had certain habits drilled into him from a young age. Later, as his distaste for the clinical, for hospitals evolving through association with that man, it became habit embraced so to avoid him better. When Uryuu sighed, his breath clouded in the air.
"It is kind of Kurotsuchi-san to hope."
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She hadn't worn that choker, that collar, in nigh a year now.
"But, it is an adjective countered by some other things I have heard pertaining to my nature, so, there is a conflict."
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Of course, the way in which he could be and act in so many oppositional ways was not something he practiced consciously, intending it with informed vigor. But it was, and even he could face the reality of it. His fingers reached, more from habit than need, to push his glasses. Kukiko pawed at Yuu, mischievous in the cold.
"...And when you are not kind, I doubt that you are cruel."
Making her, perhaps, his superior.
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"I have been called cruel by apathy, and by neglect. ... But no, I have never been called... sadistic, in that way." The way she said it was oddly clinical and self diagnosing.
"... But that is simply what has been said."
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"It does not do," he said, self-importantly, with the air of one who knows, "to listen much to the words of others. It sounds as if you simply don't care for and overreact to every person's little problem."
Kukiko disappeared into a bush; leaves rustled. It could prove problematic. At least her fur would keep her standing out.
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A soft, tsking call noise any normal person might make to call a pet back. Scarf unraveled from her pale neck, dangled and flipped with her wrist, a tantalizing bait lure that redrew feline gazes.
"... I have also heard that-" She finally said, "That the only opinion that matters is one's one, at times."
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When Yuu sprang toward it, the leaves rustled again; Kukiko's interest following that of the older cat. Uryuu was smiling, glad that Kurotsuchi-san had the cat, an animal that made her that much more human.
"At time," he agreed. "To discount all exterior opinion would be arrogant and irresponsible, but above all, one must ... remain true to oneself."
Though it was a worrying claim, as she might read into it a call to that man, as if to be true to herself had to equate to remaining true to the creator.
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"To be... in the sense of society, mind, and behavior... "human"." Aware, that she herself was not human, that she was shinigami- could only claim that existance, because unlike all the others, she could never claim a human existance, the behavior and personality all set out for her to work off. No, she was a physical frame, her mentality constructed by a crazed creator, and left to its own devices beyond him, as far as the short leash allowed.
But here...
"It must be hard."
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He wondered, in an absent-minded deviation from the severity of the topic, if it would snow by Christmas. It had little meaning in Japan, true, but -- But, to be human.
"What it comes down to, I suppose," he said, finally, "is an exaggerated sense of importance, and the inability to know how to do it right - probably because there isn't a right way. In that way, don't you think..."
He trailed off, perhaps more for effect. His fingers pushed his glasses.
"Don't you think, Kurotsuchi-san, that you're as human as the rest of us?"
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But the dilation of pupils was evident, the way she turned her head to him just a bit too jerky, hair swung out a bit too far, knuckles clenched a bit too fast, and he couldn't hear it, but her heart- slow, cold and no longer beating, about beat just one more time.
"... Do you really think that could be so?" Soft, gentle. But inquiring, truly, honestly.
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"I do," he said, firmly, "I would not have said, otherwise."
With her, somehow, he found himself more often saying what he meant truly than with any other. Perhaps because it would be easier to lie to her, he found it all the more difficult. Instead of reaching to her, he rubbed his own elbow through his layers, a restless action.
"It... used to be, in the human world, that those of different race and color were thought of as subhuman. Inhuman, lesser somehow. They weren't, of course. They were all human. Is the next step not, from different colors, different souls?"
A bit of a deviation from the original argument. But a part of it. "Black, yellow, white, deformed, someday cloned... it's all the same uncertainty in how to live."
no subject
"Then perhaps... I am human, in the sense that... I live, in the way of experiencing... "life"."