Description:
Sada Asai's dormitory room is the regulation size, although it seems slightly more luxurious as Sada has exploited her lack of a roommate. A lacquered wood plaque with the Asai clan mon sits over the head of her bed, and there is a small TV, as well as the most notorious gaming system of the year - the Wii - which Sada, for some reason, seems to like.
She is playing with it now, twirling the nunchuck end of the controller around periodically while maneuvering it around, steering Meta Knight to inevitable victory over the freshmen one floor down. Playing games by yourself can be lonely, but then perhaps such is the nature of her ability. It isolates you, even as it rewards you!
Also, she's in a bathrobe, which may reveal the true reason for her behavior. The game bloops, bleeps, and plays a variety of upbeat remixes, ignorant, like Sada herself, of the approaching doom!
Her dormitory room is near the end of the left-hand side of second floor: 257. It is closed, for now, but...
Flora was not expecting to be asked to share a room when she was switched. Although she's been going to Seijyun for two years now, Flora had always had one of the rooms traditionally assigned to freshmen; nobody had ever gotten around to asking her to move. With a recent influx of said freshmen, though... she was.
Which is why she is currently lugging three bags up the stairs; a suitcase in each hand, and the other, which is being treated with a lot more care, a long narrow wooden case on shoulder straps. Every once in a while one of the suitcases bangs on a wall or the floor as Flora missteps or just doesn't judge how large they are correctly. The narrow one never does. It never even comes close.
There is, a few moments later, a thud as she accidentally drops one just outside room 255, a pause, and then two much quieter thumps as they are placed down outside 257. Flora briefly debates just using the key - she has as much right to be here as anyone, right? She can just let herself in?
She ends up knocking politely and waiting instead.
The noise of the game is very faintly audible from right against the doorway. "What," comes the call from within a moment later; dorms are always casual places.
We cut briefly to Sada's dormitory mailbox down near the room attendant office, and the three days' worth of mail accumulated in it - including her new roommate notice. Oops!
A moment later, the voice continues. (Surprisingly deep, too.) "Is that you, Sacchan? I ran out of soft drinks, so if you don't have any right now you're going to have to tough it out!"
Flora is somewhat taken aback. Don't people get their doors anymore? Especially if they know someone is coming. Flora, apparently, does not check Sada's mail.
Which is probably a good thing.
"No, it isn't," Flora calls back. Her own voice isn't all that deep. Somehow. "It's, ah, it's Flora. Akahana. I know I'm here a little later than I'm supposed to be, but..." BUt what? It's not like she could have gone somewhere else; she needs to be in this room now, as that's where they've assigned her. She put it off plenty long enough.
She eventually finishes with a rather hesitant, "Can I come in?"
There are footsteps.
THEN the door opens, and Sada opens her mouth to say something, before briefly being consternated as she seems to be staring at the underside of Flora's cleavage. Her head tilts back to look up at the towering woman, and her facial expression is unambiguous; her lips are pulled downwards in an expression of momentary horror. Is she revulsed at Flora's genes? Is she disgusted at her impure Italian blood? Perhaps she is simply anticipating a great loss of personal space.
"Where's your form," she says, looking downwards and not getting out of the way. "Are you sure you have the right room?" She - she can't have to share her room with someone! she thinks to herself. She is also in a bathrobe, which may explain some of the curt and vaguely shrewish behavior. Perhaps.
Flora reacts to being treated like that by - well - not doing a lot. She darkens, slightly, and takes a step back as she usually does to avoid crowding people. Probably fortunately for Sada's sensibilities, Flora speaks the language fine (she doesn't actually speak Italian, at least when not referring to pasta) and, aside from blue eyes and enormity, looks perfectly Japanese.
Flora bends down to rummage in one of the bags when her paperwork is demanded, and - unusually - it only takes her a short time to actually find it; it's been folded a few times but is still perfectly readable. The tape where they attached the key (which is currently in Flora's pocket) is still on it, even. "This is the right one. I checked twice," she says, her tone apologetic even if the words aren't.
Seeing as Sada /is/ in her bathrobe... "Do you want to, ah, go back in?"
Sada extends a hand to accept the form. She rustles it and she looks down, lips pursing into an expressive frown... but she can't deny that the papers are in order, right down to the little flowery signature.
"I suppose it can't be helped," she says, turning around on one heel and waving Flora inwards. "Come on - I don't know if there's much space left, but we can figure something out. What grade are you in?" Flora, she thinks. Is that a foriegn name? Maybe, though, she reasons, her parents had a weird taste. Olivia Nakahara back in middle school was as Japanese as eating raw fish with fermented rice; her parents were just weird.
Flora spends a moment picking up her bags again. They both somehow manage to hit the edge of the doorframe as she walks through it, although she ducked enough that the wooden case on her back didn't hit the top of it. Neither did her head.
Juggling all her gear and still closing the door is tricky. Flora gives up after a couple attempts, puts a bag down, and then just comes the rest of the way in. "The same as you," she says, which is true; Flora has only been seventeen for a few days. "I think that may be why they had me move in here instead of with someone else," she volunteers, putting her bags down again once she's further in, and out of the way. She keeps the case though.
And they may be in that grade for years, thanks to Yurika's ability to hack the grade books.
"Mm," Sada says, tossing her hair b ack with one hand and shaking it out. "So where did you go to school before?" She also steps over to the little TV, frowns at it, and turns it (and the wii) off. Why? Because she lost, and she's damned if she'll let that loss go on her records.
Flora will find that there is room, but Sada's stuff (including some boxes of old girls' comics collections) has slowly expanded to encompass nearly seventy percent of the available space. At least it's well organized.
Flora is polite enough to not go snooping through the stuff, certainly not when Sada is right there. Maybe later. For now, her suitcases can just make a pile against a wall where she's not likely to trip over them. (Anything Flora is unlikely to trip over, Sada is almost guaranteed not to.)
Flora hesitates, than admits, "A few places. We moved around - for the last eight years I've lived in Southtown, though, so I went to school there. Before that my mother taught me herself." She's not sure if she would have preferred regular school to that, which is why she doesn't bring it up most of the time. "...What about you?"
Sada is briefly mystified. This girl didn't go to school? Was she rich and tutored? No, her mother taught her, she reasons. So - maybe she was sick? She's certainly made up for it, Sada reasons, but maybe that's what's made her sick. Some kind of growth hormone deficiency or overabundance... yes, that makes sense.
"I'm from Kyoto," Sada says proudly. "I came here for the sake of finishing school. Of course, the education's better here than at most of the public schools there, and you learn ladylike refinement, too." Like wearing your bathrobe.
She looks over (and up) her shoulder. "You've lived here eight years? How can you STAND it?"
The real reason, of course, is that her father kept moving and her mother kept following, and Flora didn't spend more than three months in one place. But that's a significantly less interesting answer.
"I've been to Kyoto," Flora says, which may be setting herself up for a discussion on the merits of that city she is not particularly qualified to keep up with. "And - yes. Well, there are some good private schools here; I went to one, before Seijyun." BUt presumably after her mother, and only for a year or two."
The question takes her by surprise. "Stand it? It - it isn't that bad a city, is it? I mean - it's not too dirty." Most of the time. "And there are certainly a lot of interesting things here..."
Sada makes a face, a rather eloquent one. She gestures with a hand. "Downtown it's all whores and drug running, and that horrible little community center. Ugh! Though I suppose it's a nice idea." She steps back to her bed, then, folding her legs as she settles down on it, in order to continue. "But it's infested with foriegn criminals and shady elements, and you get all sorts of lower-class fighters and American wannabes coming in. I have to take my weapon with me whenever I leave campus."
She adds, "You may have heard of the reputation of one of them. I should tell you about him... You shouldn't risk spending time near him. He likes to take advantage of young women."
Flora hadn't noticed quite that much downtown. She's either inobservant or has the city-dweller habit of ignoring things that it might be dangerous for her to pay too much attention to. Or both! They're not mutually exclusive.
"I don't always carry mine," Flora says, finally slipping the wooden case off. She keeps it nearby as she sits on the ground, not wanting to crowd Sada on the bed and not having her own bed set up yet. Flora has not quite mastered sitting in a skirt, and it takes her two tries to get settled decently. This puts her below Sada, which is probably right where the other girl wants her.
She asks, "Which man is that? I don't know him... There are a lot of Americans around, though, and thugs, but aren't they mostly at Gedo and Pacific?"
Flora, of course, is also over six feet tall. Nobody messes with a gorilla!!
"Yeah, they're there too," Sada says disdainfully. "This city is just full of lower-class elements... Yurika, you know Yurika yet? Well, I suppose you wouldn't. I think Yurika said once, it's like the drain in the sink of modern Japan."
She rubs the bridge of her nose. "Anyway, this man's really dangerous. His techniques are powerful, and he likes nothing better than to molest and offend schoolgirls who are going about their daily business. Perhaps you've heard of the name..."
"Tran."
Flora would probably frown if you called her a gorilla. Or be sad. Nobody wants a sad schoolgirl.
"I know /of/ Yurika," is about as far as Flora can go on that front. They're not in any of the same clubs or teams, and she's just never met the girl, although she's probably seen her before (Yurika's hair is pretty memorable). "I wouldn't go quite that far. I mean, it's a city, but it's not /that/ bad..."
She shakes her head, dropping the topic. "No, I don't know this Tran - but I think I saw his name once!" Probably on the list of Neo League participants; Flora only signed up yesterday, after all. She's not sure, though. "Is he really that bad? Or is it, you know, a reputation...?"
Choi does. Your tears excite him!
"Yurika is one of our leaders, so you should be respectful when you meet her," Sada says with a slight nod. "And yes, Tran's very dangerous. He'll come at you at strange times. They say he's a man of honor, but I think that's just his press machine. He'll try to rip up your skirt and pin you down and 'steam' on you."
She adds, "Oh, and that filthy little Korean gnome, he's bad too. What's his name? Koi? Chong Quo Guong?"
Flora looks totally blank at that one. Korean gnome? "I'm afraid I've never heard of him at all," Flora says, sounding as polite as ever despite also sound totally perplexed. She's not that hard to confuse, and throwing names at her very quickly is one way to do it. Especially when all of them are foreign and none of them are familiar.
She does take the warning about Tran to heart. "Ugh. I'm glad I haven't run into him, then - and I'll keep an eye out. I don't think he'd rip up my skirt though." If only because, most of the time, when she can get away with it (rare at Seijyun) Flora wears pants. It's much, much easier to find pants that fit.
"Just as well," Sada says with a slight nod. "So..."
Sada trails off, raising an eyebrow in an illustrative way, as if to prompt Flora to volunteer something about herself. But what?! What is she getting at! Curse her enigmatic, dare we say it, /inscrutable/ gaze.
Flora doesn't take getting stared at well. She reddens quite badly and averts her eyes. A sign of guilt or just embarassment? Whichever; she does it quite badly, and seems rather tongue-tied when she actually tries to speak again.
"Ah..." She pauses for a few seconds more, awkwardly, then: "So, ah, were you not expecting me? I thought they'd send a - a letter, or tell you, or something of the sort. I'm sorry to intrude." Getting her to talk about herself actually requires /questions/, you see. She's embarassed. Easily.
"They should have told me," Sada sighs, leaning back on her bed with a sudden groan. She shifts, then, straightening up on one elbow as she says, wearily, "I guess nothing can be done, though..."
Unless, Sada thinks, I kill you.
"You play games much?" Sada says, leaning towards the TV. "Maybe we can work together to crush the freshmen downstairs. It's Akahana, right?"
Flora is not psychic. This is, right now, a /very/ good thing, as she remains innocently naive.
"Akahana, yes," Flora agrees. "Akahana Tsubasa is my father." Although a long shot, Sada /might/ recognize it; he's an older staff master, retired now, who traveled and fought when he was younger. He is also not as big as Flora is. It's a very Japanese name, though! It makes her sound more native. "ANd yes, I play some games. Some of them, anyway... I'm not very good, though. It's..."
Flora is awkward and uncoordinated at almost everything, except when she's holding a staff or a bow (or, better yet, both at once). She holds up her hands, and mostly mumbles, "Too big for the controller."
That gives her an in! "So how did that happen, anyway?" Sada asks, straightening back and crossing her legs as she muses on the name. She thinks she's heard it, but where? Where?! "Were you sick? I heard sometimes that sort of thing can happen, like that tall Chinese guy who plays basketball with Lucky Glauber."
Oh God she's actually asking.
Flora goes from 'a little red' to 'bright freaking red' about now. "No, no, it's nothing like that," she says - eventually, because she's actually stuttering. 'It's just - it's normal. Um. I mean, some people are just tall, and..."
She is looking nowhere near Sada and, in fact, seems likely to keep going on like this for a while. Or just shutting up. Her face is hitting new records in shade.
"Alright, alright," Sada says after drinking in the rich brew of suffering in silence for a moment. "I'm a little funny looking too, so you can relax." She leans over then, to tug open the door of the technically-against-regulations minifridge, pulling out a glass bottle of refreshing soft drink and lobbing it gently at Flora.
"You can have one if you want," she says, "but you're going to have to help pay for more if you do." Sada, naturally, is spending her SNF winnings /wisely/.
Flora's devilish foreign contacts have a positive side: they come with money. Flora doesn't need to spend her SNF winnings on soda because she could already afford that.
She almost catches the bottle, but it slips from her hands and lands in her lap. Fortunately, it lands softly enough to not break, although it may be slightly fizzy when opened; Flora opens it /very slowly/ because of that, and is saved from a drenching via putting the end of it in her mouth until the fizz dies down.
Flora finishes sucking on it once it's done and sets it to the side to finish defizzing. "Thanks," she says. "I think I can do that - I have some things in my bags, too - " In fact, Flora gets up to kneel nex to them, rummaging. This takes some time. "You're in the choir, aren't you?" she asks, after a few moments. Her memory is pretty good when she concentrates.
Log created on 19:02:56 06/11/2008 by Sada, and last modified on 00:30:04 06/12/2008.