Act 3, Scene 17: A Song of Travel?
Sing a song of travel, really sing it. Think of the words and form them, Shizue told herself, as she walked along the edge of the road, as cart horses passed them by. Saya was looking bored, and clearly wanted to get to the point where they went off road and tried to go a little faster than this half-dead pace, and Genta was looking around as if he was trying to take everything in.
Shizue had been practicing her music at the inns along the way for the past two days, and they were still a day and a half from the capital.
"We should be going faster," Saya said, and then she pouted, "I still think we should convince someone to give us a ride."
Genta frowned and said, "They'd be suspicious."
"Of someone wanting to bum a ride?" Saya asked.
Down the road/ dust ahead… dust… no, no.
"I don't know," Genta said, "Something…"
"If there is a fight, or if someone does get suspicious, I can handle it, you can handle it…"
Saya turned to Shizue, who was still humming, "Darling, even she can handle it."
Shizue, who had not been paying attention to the constant halfway one-sided debate that had been running the last half-day, chose that moment to ask, "What rhymes with cart that makes any sense for a travelling song?"
Saya sighed, her rant defused, and offered, "Start…?"
"Depart," Genta said.
Shizue nodded at this, and then thought of more lines.
Down the road/ A new world far ahead/ No old horizons, fresh sights instead/ By horse or foot or cart/ Just pick up your feet and depart.
Well, it fit the tune...at least. But she didn't think she was going to be a great song-writer any time soon, and returned to trying to work on the melody.
[Opening Credits]
To explain how it got to the point where Shizue had learned the art of tuning both of them out, one has to examine the route between Degarashi Port and Kurihara. It was beautiful country, really, where the finest tea in the world was grown, and there were villages every few miles, plenty of inns for the weary traveller to rest their head.
In fact, most of the first day was quite pleasantly spent. Saya complained a little of the walking, but seemed remarkably robust and talked with Shizue about fashion and things they'd read and didn't even really remember to insult her, and Genta smiled and sometimes chimed in. At some point though, sometime in the day when Shizue was off ahead, or washing, or checking on her puppet or maybe in the bathroom, something changed, though at the time she didn't notice it.
All the travel kicked up a lot of dust, and as the second day dawned, the roads, unpaved dirt tracks, became all but mud as a downpour hit. Genta had seemed almost content to slog through the mud, but Saya had taken the wise decision and flagged down a cart (glaring over at Genta for some reason as she did), which managed to get a few miles before also being stuck in the mud.
It was about that time that Shizue decided that instead of merely practicing her instruments, playing the violin and the lute, the cello and even trying out the drums, that she should make a song, and so began the slow process of figuring out just how to do that. She knew the specifics, of course, how to write down notation and what made a good tune, but that wasn't the same as thinking of something original, and for the first hour all she heard in her head was reworked versions of the things her mother had written down, the poems and songs and tunes whose beauty was in their strange combination of fragility and robustness.
Fragile because they were so complex and robust because they relied on the skill and expertise of the person playing them.
It was amazing, the things that could be done, and it was also clear to Shizue that many of the piano pieces required someone with reflexes beyond those of a civilian. Yet Sae had also written versions of each of her songs meant for civilians, which were nearly as good, oddly. What they lost in virtuosity of speed they made up for in subtlety and delicacy.
That night, when they finally stormed into an inn dripping water, Saya muttered, "God, water, water… is this whole world wet?"
"Not quite," Genta muttered, as they all looked around the uncrowded inn and shuffled over towards the fire.
Shizue sneezed, shaking her head. She felt tired down to her bones, and tired of the argument which had broken out. Well, she was pretty sure it was an argument, though it lacked many of the components that she defined most arguments by. Genta barely said any words, but Saya kept on adding more for every two or three of Genta's, and it all began with Saya vigorously defending her choice to get on the cart despite the fact that nobody had said anything against it.
Until Genta said, after a minute of Saya explaining herself and how a proper lady didn't walk in the mud, "I could have told you." He said it primly, almost in imitation of her tone.
Saya glared at him, "Oh? Could you have, darling? How wonderful."
So they were fighting in some strange way that Shizue vaguely understood, knowing Genta as she did, but which was also completely unusual. That night, Saya paid for her own room, apparently unwilling to be anywhere close to Genta.
Not that she had a problem sharing a room with Genta, Shizue had thought as she made him turn around so she could get dressed for bed. Genta seemed like the sort of person who would be a good roommate, or at least she imagined so, and he didn't really give off any of the warning vibes one was...well, either way she changed and said, "What's going on between you and Saya?"
"I trust her," Genta said, and then he paused and looked over at Shizue and added, "Is this the game? Where we trade secrets?"
"Maybe not," Shizue said, shaking her head, still feeling damp even after she'd changed into pajamas. They each had their own separate beds, and she crawled into hers and looked at Genta across the room. The moonlight was streaming in through the window, and it seemed the clouds had broken briefly to allow this moment to exist.
"I don't understand people," Genta said, and then he shook his head, "No…"
"No?" Shizue asked.
Genta bit his lip and said, "I understand them just fine, until I don't." Then with a shrug, "Also, anyone could have seen the fact that a cart would get stuck in the mud just as easily as a foot. I didn't even have to use my Shomeigan to know that."
Shizue sighed, "Maybe, but Saya's trying. I mean, it was a good idea, and we do need to move faster, we're going to be behind schedule…"
"Speed is not worth secrecy," Genta said, and it sounded like he was quoting something. Either way he took out the volume he guarded closely, the one with the infiltration notes, and then another book, a thick textbook on something or other that he dragged into his bed, pushing away the covers.
"Maybe," Shizue said, "But…"
"Yes?"
"I don't know," Shizue said, "I know you were getting closer to her, and meditating with her."
"And?" Genta asked, and then he sighed, "Logically speaking you should have no room to complain considering you are the sort of person who would have wanted me to open up to others."
Shizue looked over at Genta and rolled her eyes, "Yes, but that isn't opening up...that's some sort of weird on-going battle. So what's the trouble in paradise?"
"She thinks things that are untrue," Genta said, "And seeks to act upon them. More than that, she's frustrating and it makes her hard to befriend."
Shizue frowned softly, "Genta, are you okay?"
"She tried to kiss me," Genta said.
"Oh…" Shizue said. "Oh."
Anyone else, she would have asked 'and' and then heard the details but Genta, Genta didn't seem like that sort of person. She couldn't imagine kissing him, at least not now, any more than she could imagine kissing a brick wall, or a relative. He wasn't in any way, shape or form unattractive in a physical sense, but he just...well, he didn't seem like the type that would encourage that sort of thing, and he'd stood aloof for quite some time.
"It is very awkward," Genta said, "Even more awkward than the Shomeigan giving me enough information to surmise when Emiko-sensei has had sex."
"...what?" Shizue asked, and she resolved that maybe she should not ask questions and try to bridge this tension tomorrow because that was far easier than learning these things.
"It's a guess, because…" Genta shrugged as if to indicate that his knowledge of these things was lacking, "But both the night of your debut and the night before we left, after that fact she was very happy and also to some extent hung-over. She fell asleep in a bed. The gesture that you described on another figure is the same as the one she made."
"What gesture?" Shizue asked.
Genta made a gesture that looked vaguely familiar, a sort of pointing with his fingers that looked at once a little stylish and a lot ridiculous.
"Who made that?" Shizue asked, realizing already that somehow Genta had managed to totally distract her from the matter at hand. It was working so well that she wasn't even sure how she was going to bring it back around without it being even more awkward, and from the look on Genta's face he understood that as he opened the book and began to read.
"Also, Emiko-sensei called her Kotone-chan and nobody protested. That indicates closeness."
Shizue stared, "I think you're reading too much into it."
"Perhaps I am, my Shomeigan has my own weaknesses," Genta said, "It is why I have been attempting to build myself up in other ways. For instance, I have been learning water jutsu to allow me to create mist, thus using my Shomeigan and clones to give me a tactical advantage. Analysis is the key, and my analysis suggests it's likely something was going on there."
"I suppose so," Shizue said uncertainly, "But does it matter?"
"No. It doesn't," Genta said, and he looked away and Shizue prepared to pounce. She was both curious and also hoping that she didn't have to be forced to play peacemaker all the next day, but then he did it. Somehow he outmaneuvered her. "And thus neither does the attempted kiss."
Then he turned, almost smug, and read his book.
Shizue had no words for that.
[Commercial Break]
Which is how she spent an entire day talking about music and practicing songs and even taking out instruments and marching down the road while playing them just to get practice in doing two things at once, because however troubled things were, if she wasn't taking part in them then it seemed that neither of them wanted to drag her into it.
So she enjoyed the weather, which had turned nice enough that by noon when they stopped for lunch the roads were finally dry, and Saya was finally ready to make yet another attempt at the cart idea. But before that happened, Shizue enjoyed her food and played her music, and so it was surprising that Saya approached her, and a little disconcerting.
The small, athletic girl's kimono had signs of the slog through the mud this morning on it, and she had done her best to clean it up, but her best still meant that she would need to clean it that night or it'd look even worse. In fact, Saya herself seemed to have lost a little of her poise and control, and her eyes were not anything like they'd been when she lost herself, but there was still a little panic.
"Darling, is that all you're eating? Commendable," Saya said, "All things considered."
Shizue rolled her eyes, too tired to care: from the walking, her legs aching and even dragging a little even as the notes and imagined songs floated above her head and lifted her however briefly over all of that. She knew that she was being insulted, but she just shrugged. "Get to the point, Saya-chan, I'm eating."
"Darling, that's not a ladylike response at all," Saya said.
Shizue snorted and then stretched out slightly. She winced as her leg cramped a little, the sudden movement drawing attention to it, the pain shooting through her as she glanced down at her leg and then moved to put it up on the bench.
Saya moved closer and touched her leg and said, "I'm going to massage it Shizue-san, and then we're going to talk."
"You're going to stoop to touching me?" Shizue asked, the pain adding a hint of bitterness to her voice, "Your generosity knows no bounds."
Saya looked hurt and she snapped back, "I'm helping you right now--"
"You decided to insult me while I was in pain," Shizue pointed out. "Also, you haven't been eating enough."
Saya opened her mouth, no doubt having planned some retort or explanation for why it was that it was fine for her to insult Shizue, but that stopped her short, "What?"
"With as much walking as you're doing, and that shadow-boxing or whatever it is I keep on seeing you doing when you don't see any civilians looking and want to annoy Genta--"
"Secrecy, pah, everyone knows we're shinobi. We're twelve and on the road in a set of three," Saya said, her voice calm and controlled.
"And you simply exercise more than me," Shizue said, "Yet you're eating that little."
Saya chuckled, "It's called a diet, Shizue-chan."
Shizue blinked and looked around, "Really, a diet?"
"Yes," Saya said, "Some people do those to control their caloric intake, as Azusa-san might have explained it."
Shizue sighed. "Why did you kiss Genta?"
MIght as well just get to the point.
"I thought it might be practice," Saya said, "For...I dunno. Most of the guys in our group are, well. I'm sure you are quite contented with Okiie, but…"
"Don't start," Shizue said, aware that the only way to handle Saya sometimes was to cut her off at the pass.
"I wasn't actually talking about his looks...yet," Saya said, "I mean, have you seen Ichiman-kun, anyways? Even Akachi doesn't look too bad, I guess. But I shudder to imagine dating them. They all seem so vulgar and…" she shrugged, "Perhaps I'm too ladylike for their sort, but in the meantime I wanted to test something out."
"On Genta?" Shizue asked, incredulous.
"I asked him if he wanted to experiment, he didn't say no," Saya said, "It was… eh." Saya paused and flushed, "But now it has led to problems."
Shizue winced as Saya's massage started to get at the cramp, helping to loosen it up as she sat there. "You should drink water, let it pass," Saya said.
"Of course it led to problems; what were you thinking?" Shizue asked.
"That Genta-kun was smart enough to know that it didn't mean anything," Saya said, flushing, "It was just a kiss. If we'd both enjoyed it then it would have been an enjoyable thing, and that's that. It's uncouth to over complicate these things, it makes one look like you're trying too hard."
Shizue looked at Saya, a little confused and said, "So now you're fighting."
"Yes, finally you see the light," Saya said, "We're fighting because he used his Shomeigan and played silly games right after that. The kiss itself isn't important. I thought we were friends…"
Shizue blinked and said, "I wouldn't do that with a friend."
Saya snorted, "Yeah, I know you're not… like that. Like Rika-chan." She said it absently, but Shizue felt as if there was something off about the way she said it, and Shizue wondered quite a bit about what Saya believed. She was civilian-born, wasn't she? So her own attitudes about...everything like this were likely to be very different than what Shizue expected.
But the casual attitude was very strange to her. Dating was serious, and so were kisses, not something to be...tested out on random people.
"It wouldn't matter if I was," Shizue said, "That's still not something friends do to each other, especially without warning and a lot of talking about it, or… something."
Saya snorted, "As if you don't check out Ichiman-kun."
Shizue allowed herself to consider this.
She did a little, that was true. But it was hardly a major thing, and she didn't talk to him just to get a chance to sneak a peek at him or something. He was handsome, and she noticed that but honestly it seemed like his uncertainty and awkward awareness of his own verbal limits was far more important than his good looks, for all that he could probably be in a movie if he was cleaned up a little bit and stood a little straighter.
Still, even that thought made Shizue flush as she said, "I look occasionally, but Genta-kun doesn't like contact. And you kissed him, without his permission. Did you think about that?"
Saya sighed, "It was stupid, but a lady should be allowed her own mistakes." She seemed insistent on this point, and Shizue frowned and shrugged after a moment, not sure what to say to Saya.
"And you'd be just fine if I kissed you right now without asking?"
Saya chuckled, "No. But have you thought that the reason he doesn't like contact is that he isn't used to it? The poor dear… well, that's the joke, isn't it?"
"What is?"
"Poor dear," Saya said, "When he's probably smarter than anyone has a right to be, and...well, if he were a girl and more outgoing, he'd be vicious socially."
"What do you mean by that?" Shizue asked.
"You know what he's like for secrets, and you know that his Shomeigan gives him all the gossip he wants, and knowledge of how to use it," Saya said, "He reacted to my… attempt by using it."
Shizue winced, well aware of the kinds of things that Genta could needle Saya. In fact, Shizue could probably needle Saya pretty effectively with what she noticed herself, so she couldn't imagine the sort of damage Genta could make, lashing out at the sudden contact, the…
"He was angry, he lashed out, and now you're fighting," Shizue said, wincing as Saya finished the massage.
"Basically, yes," Saya said.
"This trip…" Shizue began and then trailed off.
What to say? It hadn't exactly gone all that well, or rather Saya had done something wrong, Genta had fired back, and now Shizue was stuck in the middle.
[Commercial Break]
That was how they arrived at the capital the next day. Frazzled and tired and in the middle of a squabble. After all that she'd seen, she expected the capital, Kurihara, to be bigger than Degarashi Port. As if her every experience in this new world would be larger and larger. Instead, while it was in no way small, it was significantly smaller and a little drowsier, though there were guards everywhere, in armor. The city lacked walls, and sort of sprawled, out, almost lazily, districts of activity surrounded by whole areas that seemed as if they were halfway abandoned.
Perhaps nobles and other functionaries came and left as the season dictated, Shizue thought, as the three of them walked through the streets. They were not the only shinobi there, and small groups of shinobi were also patrolling every so often, though their forehead protectors and the tense attitude all seemed to suggest that there was something going on here. Beast was the official village of Tea, as it were, and yet not everyone here was from Beast.
Saya frowned, "Hrm, must not be the season," she said as they wandered closer to the palace, which was surprisingly small, guarded by a large iron gate, and not particularly imposing from the outside, for all that it had a dome and what looked like a small shrine attached to it.
"Season for nobles?" Shizue asked.
"Yes," Saya said, glancing over at Genta, "The books never told me when the 'season' was, just that it was important to be ready for it."
Genta snorted, and Saya glanced over at him, as if judging whether she should retort.
Before any judgement could be made one way or another, Shizue decided to intervene, "We need to meet that chunin. I believe she told us where to find him."
"He should be near the palace waiting for us," Genta said, and looked around.
"Is that him?" Saya asked, pointing to a tall, muscular man in a flak vest who stopped in front of the gate and talked briefly with the guards before stepping through.
"I don't think so," Genta said, and his tone was businesslike, even formal as they walked down the streets.
Shizue remembered the description, and it shouldn't be hard to notice a man with reddish-black hair that stuck up at random. Thin, oddly pale, with a number of interesting scars and tattoos, it all seemed hard to miss. Of course, he could be in a Henge, and so they wandered around for a little bit, and then Shizue said, "Perhaps I should go ahead and check in, try to get an appointment, while you're looking?"
"Makes sense," Genta said.
*****
The official was looking at her coldly from behind his desk, "State your name."
"Shi," Shizue said, "I work with the theatre in Degarashi Port, I was hoping to meet with the Daimyo to show him some of the latest play, 'The Dark Sorceress."
"Ah, yes," the official said, and he sighed, and said, almost confidingly, "My son wanted to see that, actually. But I told him that the Chancellor had already had his say. I think, girl, that you won't have a particularly welcoming audience. That said…"
He flipped through the pages, "The Daimyo has an hour open three days from now. Is that acceptable?"
"Yes," Shizue said.
"You will be patted down for weapons before you present the selections of the play, and we will be on guard for any actors' tricks."
Shizue nodded, and that was it. Days of travel, and she hadn't even seen any further than the front door and a small, cramped office that smelled of dust. "May I speak with Nobusuke at some point? I was told to seek him out."
"Ah, yes, the musician… that might be arranged," the official said, seeming to have already dismissed her in his mind.
She left, and at last the notes of the song seemed to fit together. The song would have to be simpler than that, she decided, simpler than her plans, because travel was often a little less grand than that, a little more of a disappointment. It needed to be a song that suggested everything traveling brought.
She thought about how Genta and Saya were fighting and how she'd spent three days making it to a meeting where an official had merely slipped her in, and how they still hadn't met the chunin that was going to meet them--though perhaps the latter would be fixed by the time she got back.
That was part of travel, she decided, already trying to figure out how to reconcile the two of them.
The road never truly ended, did it?
[Ending Credits]
When Shizue arrives back with the others, Takuma-san is there and a choice is in front of them. Where do they stay?
[] With Takuma-san in his apartment. It might be safer if there is a threat, though it'll also be crowded and he's going to be busy with some sort of project.
[] In an apartment paid for by Takuma-san, a few blocks away from where he lives. It's a temporary lease of some kind, considering they will only be there for a few days, but it's somewhere.
Both Saya and Genta have things they want to do, Shizue has time to do one of them…
[] Go on a shopping trip with Saya.
-[] Try to convince Genta to come along and use it to try to get them to make up.
[] Genta needs to check out some of the drug dens in the area, just note where they are, things like that.
-[] Convince Saya to go along as protection… and hope that by working together they can find a way to get over the awkwardness.
******
A/N: I admit I'm wildly dissatisfied with this, though maybe it'll get a bit better in editing. Eh.
Also, I'll update the character sheet in a little while.
