Description: Sakura, it's time to wake up. Sakura, you'll be late for school. Sakura, Shadaloo's stealing all your chi from you...
Welcome to Dream Amusement Park. Sort of. All of the usual sights are there -- the roller coasters, the ferris wheels, the midway, the souvenir stands, the food vendors -- but none of the sounds. The sky is also a very unusual shade of amber -- almost as if the sun had just gone down, except for the brilliant amber color flooding over the entire sky, as if the park were transported to the inside of a bowling ball.
More accurately, welcome to Sakura Kasugano's subconscious mind.
The park is empty, save for one faceless, nondescript operator running the roller coaster, and Sakura herself in the front seat of the roller coaster. At the moment... the coaster making the long, steep climb to the top of the first hill.
Kasugano is rather confused, really. She knows of the location, but is in the disoriented state typical for most dream dwellers. Looking around vacantly, the only thought on her mind is: where is everybody?
Meanwhile, her body is in Shadaloo headquarters, shackled by 45-pound weights, and heavily dosed with a cocktail of drugs. She's not going anywhere fast, but she's quite clearly not snug in her bed at home.
The coaster rattles its way upwards. It's empty, silent, and lonely up here; it has been said that in the end, we are all alone with outselves, and that is the horror that we all try our best to hide from.
There are ways to penetrate these boundaries. Rare ones, and ones which approach violation - violation worse perhaps than anything physical. Sometimes, though, the approaches are gentle.
"I remember this roller coaster," a faintly accented voice says, sitting in the same car as Sakura, in the second row. "Although, I did not know how it would feel, to be seated within it..."
Normally, Sakura is shouting more in her dreams. She speaks her mind even more than in reality, which may be hard to believe. But normally there are a lot more people around to be shouting at. Here, she's alone.
Was alone, anyway. Snapping out of her silent reverie, Kasugano looks back over her shoulder. When did that other person get here? Maybe she was here all along. Sakura always looks forward, and rarely looks behind, after all.
And yet, this being a dream, Kasugano instantly knows that she =was= here all along, without question.
"Heh, well now you know, huh?" She smiles, looking forward again. Voices carry infinitely, even over the clack-clack-clack of the coaster car. "It's like I never really got off the ride," she laughs, deriding herself. "Still letting it take me wherever."
A pause... and then another brief chuckle is loosed. "... The loops disappeared a while ago." Sure enough... there is no end to this hill, the upward climb dissolving into the clouds. "Never figured that out."
The voice remains silent in a few moments, although there's that companionable presence. Rose is sitting there, but her head is tilted slightly forwards and her eyes are closed. She looks solemn. Maybe she's afraid of the fall when it comes.
"And yet," she says. "There's still that steep drop, coming up, is there not? And it will, I think, only get steeper. Do you think that it will come when all the clouds are gone?"
Her tone is conversational, at least. It may be better than silence.
"Maybe, maybe not!" chirps Sakura, folding her hands behind her head and smiling cluelessly. "All I know is: I can't wait for it to happen! I'm bored, y'know." Chuckling, she notes, "I mean, it's like... my whole life has been like this the past few months. Can't do that, gotta do this. Can't fight with friends, gotta study for finals. Can't go to the party, gotta study for entrance exams. It's all just..." Another laugh, this one accompanied by a shake in her head. "I =graduated= the other day, I mean, that should count for something, but no... I keep =losing=."
Quite simply, her train of thought keeps going all over the place. It all seems to make perfect logical sense to the schoolgirl, somehow, as she never stops smiling through it all, even as the car keeps rising, clouds creeping ever closer. "But I keep training, keep studying, everyone tells me I'm heading towards my potential."
Pausing, she glances back to Rose, quirking her head to the side. "What does that =mean=, anyway, 'potential?' I don't even believe in 'destiny', I make my own path, don't I?"
Laughing again, she rocks her head back. "... Man, this =is= a steep hill," she notes, as the car passes through a cloud. Still no end in sight. \
"Potential," Rose says, softly, as the car enters a cloud. "Potential..."
Rose then laughs, faintly. It sounds muffled, underneath the cloud. "Potential means many things to many people. It could mean energy, or the possibilities within you. That is what they are seeing, I think. But..."
The cloud grows thicker, even darker, as Rose continues. "What they are all trying to do, I believe, is to help you keep moving forwards. But, each of them may think, ah, it will be okay if I tell her - live up to your potential. Work towards it! Struggle hard, and you will triumph in the end!"
Rose sounds like she's shrugging. "And, then, there is each person thinking they have given you a good message, only there are five, or ten, or twenty... Does this sound like what has happened?"
Potential, yes.
Sakura can't help but laugh in response to Rose's poignant assessment of her situation. "Yeah, that's it exactly! People keep wishing me well on my path, but ... I don't even know what that path is! Kinda hard to walk it when..."
The track is not going up any further -- rather, it's not even there. Coupled with a levelling of the cart, this... means they're at the peak of the crest.
And the car has stopped.
Kasugano looks over the edge -- unable to see the track itself, as the car itself is concealing it. That's one hell of a steep drop.
Gulping, she looks back to Rose, noting dully: "It stopped! What's that s'posed to mean?"
Rose rests a hand on the seat next to her. It may be an illusion, but it is comforting to her. Beneath the car, the wheels might be glowing with Soul Power's ripples, but in practice, the car merely remains suspended. For now.
"You feel," she says, "trapped. The world has opened too widely to you, and you are facing too many directions at once. Everyone tells you that you may do anything you wish, but to do anything - or to do everything - is, at the same time, to do nothing at all."
Rose thinks for a moment. Inwardly, she suspects that this did not make sense, but she thinks she saw the motif in Japanese media once. Late night television always flies through your brain...
"So," she continues, "you sit here. You are at a precipice... because the train may pause, for a moment, but it never really stops. You worry perhaps that you will spend far too much time 'preparing' for your potential, in order to wake up one day and realize it is all..."
The car starts to tilt slightly forwards.
"For nothing?" Rose says. Her tone is gentle, despite the creak of the wood.
Sakura shakes visibly as the car tilts forward. She may have been smiling before, but she's terrified now. Pale. Her heartbeat is deafening, exaggerated through the atmosphere for no reason other than the simple fact that the dreamscape's owner is obsessing over it.
"... yeah..." assents Sakura, her own train of thought derailed. She nods, once more, slowly. "I... I feel I should... teach." Pause. "But I can't do anything myself, any more." The concept of 'those who can, do; those who can't, teach' won't actually hit her until she =enters= college, mind -- she's actually more worked up about her own inability to... fight as spontaneously as she has been. "The more I train... the less I'm capable of. The more I know the right path... the less I'm able to walk it." She scratches her cheek. "Does that make any sense...?" It seems to have very little to do with hanging over a precipice, ready to fall at any moment -- but that's just how Sakura's disorganized mind operates.
"The question is," Rose says, "what is it that you are training? Are you repeating the same motions, or truly testing your boundaries while letting yourself stay sharp? And -"
Gravity wins.
The ride down starts out steep - in fact, it's almost a fall. It's possible, if this was a real ride, that Rose's ripples of energy would be the only thing glueing the train to the track. However, there DOES seem to be a twist back out of the way - a faint hint of a curve upwards, long below.
Rose doesn't speak over the roar of the wind. Besides, the train's still speeding up!
"I am..." protests Sakura, though it seems, initially, like more of a rebellious plea for attention than a true, honest-to-god denial.
Gravity interrupts the conversation, however, as Kasugano's headband suddenly shoots up from the wind resistance, much like her ruffling hair. Her skin pales from the fall, but... oddly, she doesn't seem to be showing signs of shock.
Even more oddly, her voice doesn't seem dulled by the wind, as she responds a few moments later, much more sure of herself. "I... =am= repeating. Because I don't know what else to do." A pause, as those clouds from before whoosh past. "I mean, I =try= hard, try to fight tough people." Another pause. "I fought you, right, and I know you're tough, but..."
She glances over the lip of the car. "I hear if you hit the ground in your dream, you die in real life." It's a funny thing to say, really -- Sakura's still not =lucid= yet, just musing aloud because she can -- which is evidenced by her turning, distractedly, back to Rose: "... Where am I now? Where should I go? I don't know..."
"What were you trying to prove when you fought me?" Rose says, her voice carrying well as well. The coaster plummets down, accelerating impossibly fast - the wind itself stops moving faster after a moment, perhaps because at this speed the wind shear would rip flesh from bone!
The clouds are growing thicker. The wind makes it hard to see, but the drop off seems to be getting close. Rose asks, perhaps more commandingly now, "What is it - what is it that you are seeking? What is your conclusion? Where do you wish to take that potential and apply it, without regrets or second thoughts?"
"Nothing!" blurts Sakura -- and is perfectly honest in saying so. "I was just... fighting you. To learn. I'm weak against a lot of things..."
But then Rose leans close, and Sakura waffles, back flattening against the side of her car. Squinting her eyes from the wind, Sakura thinks for a good few moments on Rose's question. This is Serious Business, after all. "... I want to be stronger, to protect those I care about... and those who need defending." Sakura's resolute, in this regard.
Jarringly, a beep can be heard, crystalline, distant but sharp nonetheless. Sakura's eyes close for a moment, her persona actually growing a bit fuzzy, translucent for just a moment, as if her life energy was being blocked.
In fact, that's exactly what's happening... in the real world, even as she plummets to the ground in this dream world.
Kasugano opens her eyes again, drowsily... but not quite cognizant of what just happened. "Does that... answer your question...?"
Rose's eyes narrow as she looks at that peculiar fading of Sakura. She breathes in, and raises a hand forwards ahead of her. "Look!" she says, ignoring the question offered to her.
Sakura, if she can focus, may look down to see that the track is trailing away. Curving down, down, that bottom place where the track finally evens out and lets you roll to a coasting stop always the same, oh-so-close distance away.
Rose doesn't point. She settles back in her seat, looking up.
If Sakura does look up - or if she can, in her current state, which Rose is suddenly concerned about; the difficulty in this sort of travel is determining just WHERE you are! - she will see, above her, a thin white line that seems to carve a loop through a star-spangled sky.
Looking up, however, can be hard.
Look? "Look at wha..." Sakura responds half-consciously. She initially thinks Rose wants her to look down at the track, and... for a moment, she actually throws her arms up, opening her mouth to scream like a high-school--
But that's as far as she gets: "I'm not =in= high school any more..." she notes in unnecessary vocalization of internal monologue. Hey, it's her subconscious here.
But then Sakura looks back to Rose, who is looking up at the stars. And Sakura takes the hint, twisting to one side, looking up to find the constellation Orion -- that bastard's =always= in the sky when she looks, dangit!
"I... I'm trapped..." she stammers, hands falling back to the protective railing of the car as it rolls downhill, shaking her head in the process. "I can't move, I'm.... I'm stuck. Here." Perhaps it's hard to understand... but Sakura's no longer speaking in metaphors -- even if she'd ever realized she was in the first place.
"Does leaving a school change your heart?" Rose asks, in answer to the first. Then -
Then she blinks. This is not an intermittent thing, or some minor health issue soon to be resolved. Rose doesn't step out of her explanatory mode yet, though, her scarf trailing behind her as she says, "We are all stuck, but we can move the world around us..."
A moment later, she asks, "Sakura -- are you..."
She suspects something, perhaps, but the suspicion has not yet gelled. Even so, the presence OF that suspicion might be detectable to certain other parties, if they happen to be looking.
Move the world? That's crazy-talk, woman! ... At least from Sakura's perspective, anyway. She's so used to the world working just fine without her. Perhaps that's the real message to be gleaned from this discussion!
... But it seems Sakura's only partially listening to it. It's only when Rose calls attention to her condition that Sakura even realizes she's being talked to. "I--" she stammers, shaking her head. "I can't feel my..." She has no words; instead, she just curls her hands by her side, then thrusts her open palms forward. It's the International Fighter Language symbol for 'Hadouken'. "It's not... there..." she states in a notable moment of lucidity. "I don't know who... or what..." She shakes her head, grimacing and tilting her head forward as the car... stops falling.
They're on a level section of track, now, the amusement park dissolving into a Bangkok street. A taxicab is parked to one side, and the blurry shapes of two women in Shadaloo Doll outfits can be seen.
"I'm =stuck=," she reiterates, fixating upon a single point, inches before her face as she raises her head. "Trapped."
And she looks over to Rose. "I don't know where... I just feel... lost."
This alarms Rose. Her eyes widen and her lips thin, even as the world shifts. She seems to unfold her legs as if she was sitting in thin air, but that's plainly impossible, and as such, must not have happened.
Then, she thinks, the best that I can do now is to try and piece things together. She looks around, left, then right, and takes in what she sees. It's Southern Asia - it doesn't take much to guess that it is likely Bangkok.
Not again, Rose thinks. God, what am I doing. All of this and it's useless; HE has no problems coming to a conclusion....
She looks to Sakura, reaching out for the girl's shoulder. "It will not last," she says, forcing herself to try and sound confident. "Be strong!" Easy to say, of course, when you're lounging on a couch in Southtown.
It might be a bit more difficult to piece things together when the environment shifts so suddenly, surely. But ... Sakura knows where =she= is. At least that angle's covered.
What =is= Rose thinking? Sakura's too... lost to really know what's going on. Something clearly was taken from her, just that moment, about the same time as that beep sounded: Her sense of chi equilibrium. She'd relied on it throughout growing up, in small and subtle ways. It gives her a connection, a kinship to the world... and it allows her to orient herself when standing or jumping.
Which is probably why she wobbles as soon as Rose touches her shoulder, even collapsing to her knees if the elder woman allows her to.
"I..." she stammers, but she... well, she =is= strong! Really! Looking up at Rose, she closes her mouth, nodding with the cheer one normally =expects= of her. "Right! I'll... I'll find a way out. Whatever's going on." With a grin, she nods, "A brave heart can turn 10% into 110%, or however that sayin' goes!"
And with... effort, she'll try and stand back at her full height.
Rose doesn't know, but this, at least, is something to lean on. "Sakura," Rose says softly as the girl falls down towards her knees. She doesn't pull her up - but she does grasp Sakura's wrists for a moment, and smile in what she hopes is an encouraging way as the girl rises up once more. "Never give up," she says. "It will not last long."
She cannot imagine what it would feel like to be blocked from that energy - but then, her very existence was predicated on it. When Sakura's risen again, she lets go, and smiles again - more apologetically. "I think we shall be parting soon. Is there anything else, that I can do for you?"
Sakura smiles, radiantly. She knows... there is going to be a tough time ahead of her. Rose's optimism tells her that much, and she's got to be strong. She's got to =live= with that encouragement. "I... I will be strong. I know I have to."
She steps free of Rose, wobbling a bit as she stands unsteadily on one foot... but soon stabilizes, planting her hand behind her head.
"Yeah, if... if you don't mind," she asks, dropping her chin for a moment. "I'd like to see you again soon." Pause. She laughs, a bit nervously, as that sounds a wee bit, um, desperate. So she then adds, "I mean, like, don't be a stranger or nothin', alright?" Laughing, she waves her other hand goodbye.
"Thanks for dropping in, it was fun!" She looks behind her.
... Why, look, there's the roller coaster they just got out of. Fancy that, it's like they just stepped off the ride, at the very end.
"I'll come back, as soon as I can," Rose assures Sakura. "And take care of yourself - and everyone else, too." She lifts a hand, with another slight smile. "Ciao."
After this, she steps out through the turnstile. She steps out, it seems, onto nothing itself - a moment later, and with one last glance over her shoulder, she vanishes from sight. Will she come back? She intends to, certainly. Hopefully, intentions will help to pave the way.
Log created on 00:08:02 06/09/2007 by Sakura, and last modified on 10:57:24 06/30/2007.