Description: Zach Glen, after a long trip back to Southtown, makes sure to catch up with his buddy and rival Howard Rust within a somewhat remote warehouse - the location chosen to ensure his power can't harm anyone if it goes out of control. Meanwhile, something interesting gets lodged in the windshield of Rust's truck.
Zach's quiet return to SouthTown was likely noticed by one person, and only then because Zach had sent Howard Rust a text message indicating an address well outside of Southtown proper. It leads to decently sized warehouse that was abandoned until recently, when it was bought and refurbished...
...by Zach Glen. The young psychic, prior to his fighting career, had squatted in this very warhouse to keep out of the weather at night. At the time he didn't trust himself not to unconsciously let loose his pent-up power. At least out here, there would be a minimum of property damage, and its isolated location ensured that there would not be many people around to be injured.
When Zach's fighting career took off, Glen bought the warehouse partly from nostalgia, but also because he reckognized that having a bolthole would be an excellent idea. After all, as he had indicated to others, there were people out there with ill intent towards people like him. So the wandering psychic returns to this place, and lets the only likely person (to his mind) who was waiting for him to return.
Zach's quiet return to SouthTown was likely noticed by one person, and only then because Zach had sent Howard Rust a text message indicating an address well outside of Southtown proper. It leads to decently sized warehouse that was abandoned until recently, when it was bought and refurbished...
...by Zach Glen. The young psychic, prior to his fighting career, had squatted in this very warhouse to keep out of the weather at night. At the time he didn't trust himself not to unconsciously let loose his pent-up power. At least out here, there would be a minimum of property damage, and its isolated location ensured that there would not be many people around to be injured.
When Zach's fighting career took off, Glen bought the warehouse partly from nostalgia, but also because he recognized that having a bolthole would be an excellent idea. After all, as he had indicated to others, there were people out there with ill intent towards people like him. So the wandering psychic returns to this place, and lets the only likely person (to his mind) who was waiting for him to return.
There was a bit of rain earlier in the day when Rust first got the text message while he was passing by the drug rehab place he's been having Antoine stay at. It has since stopped, but aggravatingly enough, something hit his windshield and got one of the wipers stuck. The one functional one he has remains enough to get him where he needs to go unscathed, given it has stopped raining.
Given that this is a text from /Zach/, though, he forgets to even check out his car for when he comes across the supposed warehouse in question. It's kind of foreboding to look at, truth be told... what's Zach doing here? Did someone catch him and want to set up a trap? His right hand falls atop the makeshift hilt of Ol' Rusty as he approaches from the outside, taking slow measured steps and ensuring there isn't anyone looking to pounce him from any of the darker corners nearby.
Zach can probably tell who's coming just by the sound of a popping elbow alone when the man leans up against what he thinks to be the door and knocks on it politely with his free hand.
"Zach?" A gravelly voice asks, prior to the sound of a throat clearing. "You in there, or... or what?"
The door is, in fact, a door. It eases open slightly, allowing Rust to catch a glimpse of purple hair and emerald eye. "Of course I'm here," Zach says with quiet relief. "Who else do you think it would have been?" Zach opens the door a bit more to allow Rust in.
The warehouse, it would appear, is much like its owner in that the outside does not give you any clue regarding what the inside might be like. While not nearly palatial or luxurious, the interior of the warehouse seems to have been renovated to allow someone to live here for a while. It even has a functional kitchen and a bathroom with a shower in it.
The man owning the building, however, may surprise Rust a bit more. Zach has lost a little weight during his journey and perhaps traded it for some bandaging. One large one dominates his left cheek, and there are hints of more wraps underneath the loose fitting t-shirt. Zach's hands and wrists are /also/ wrapped as if he were expecting a fight at any moment. Perhaps he was; Zach's right hand is hovering over the hilt of the wakazashi as the psychic allows Rust inside the building.
"Let's get you in out of the weather," Zach says quietly. "Can I get you something to drink?"
"Ahh... I'm, I'm sorry," the older man says in something of defeat with a sigh of relief. He's got somewhat bad, scary memories of being asked to come to a specific remote place during the invasion to rendzevous with a truly, utterly dangerous man as he relaxes his hand from Ol' Rusty.
As he pushes in the door, it seems Zach had something of the same idea. Either way, the tension on the shop teacher's part more or less dissipates, if the tension in his joints does not. (It probably never will, them being as they are.)
"You... you look like," he says as he closes the door behind him, "you had a, a hell of a trip," which is putting it rather lightly. The rearranged fixtures and stuff to make this location remotely livable comes as a secondary surprise in comparison to Zach's slimmer, bandaged appearance.
"Ahh, if you, if you got some... uh, some of that cucumber Pepsi, I'd be, uh, much obliged." Somehow, that amazingly disgusting concoction has grown on his tastebuds. "I mean, ah, if not, just, just a glass of water."
Zach pulls a face. "Ugh. I'll get you some water," he says. "And yeah... it was an interesting trip, to be sure," he finishes, pulling two bottles of water out of the refridgerator. "I ran into some people on my way back. You probably heard about a couple of them," he says referring to his Neo League matches.
"But enough about me for a moment," he says abruptly. "What's the deal with Antoine? Is he okay?" Zach sounds concerned. "How's Quon holding up, for that matter?"%r
"Thanks," the man nods his head as he stretches out one of his legs. His body feels kind of ready for Kyokugen, but, he can no longer go as much as he has been. These little stretches are about as much as he can get away with, as he can't afford to be laying too badly injured on a given night before class day.
"I, I admit, I haven't watched Neo League in a while," he concedes as he takes a water bottle as soon as it's offered in his left hand, though he has yet to unbottle it. He really wish he didn't forget his water bottle back at Pacific yet again. Considering it had yet to be opened, someone else has undoubtedly taken it and enjoyed the fresh, overpriced goodness.
"Antoine?" The man looks up when Zach asks, along with the followup about Quon. The older man shakes his head. "I, I dunno what to say 'bout Antoine, he's... he's been actin' up, gettin'... violent, his chi lights are a whole different color... Quon 'n I found him out in the forest, acted like he, he didn't know us."
At this point, he labors to twist the cap off with his right hand. The cap proves really stubborn. "After, after he stopped, I, I took him to drug rehab to check and see if he got... y'know, crack, or somethin'. You wanna know what they found, Zach?"
"His system was clean," Zach answers without any kind of hesitation. There is, however, a frown on his face. He had half-expected Cammy to be leading him on about such a thing. "But even without any drugs in his system, he was still wild." Zach glances at Rust, but doesn't need to wait for Rust to even give a tell.
"Like maybe his chi was all fucked up somehow?" He asks with a bit more certainty than Rust might feel comfortable with.
The older man's mouth hangs open for a bit as Zach answers that first bit, a slow nod as if to say 'uhh, yeah, you're right,' but as Zach continues, the older man approaches closer with a significantly less friendly expression on his face, as though uncomfortable with just how spot on Zach is - speaking up almost immediately about the time Zach finishes the sentence about chi being all fucked up.
"How the, how the hell'd ya know?" He points at Zach with his left hand and waves it. "Ya just... ya just got back, I, I was by there earlier 'n I didn't... see you or anything, but somethin' hit my, uh, my windshield and busted one of the wipers."
Which probably has nothing to do with any of it. "Did someone tell you? Quon?" He's not sure if Quon has visited Antoine yet.
"Um," Zach says with a nervous chuckle, "If I told you the truth, you'd probably freak out worse than I did when I learned about it." He sighs, unable to keep it back. "But it sounds like Cammy wasn't jerking me around, either." Zach flops himself into his hammock and pulls back some water. "I've been thinking about it since India," he says. "Then I saw this when I got back to town."
Zach reaches down to pick up something before tossing it to Rust. It slaps down in front of the low table in front of the older man, revealing an article written about an event in Metro City. There is a picture of a young lady in handcuffs being lead to a riot vehicle. The young lady is drenched, and bleeding from several cuts that mar what would otherwise be pleasant features... although the cold, almost implaccable look of pride on her face might also do that.
"I met her," Zach says. "In Tibet, before that incident happened." Zach frowns. "And I took two things from that encounter. The first was that while she might have been hardcore, that her actions were... a bit beyond the pale?" Zach says uncertainly, as if not really sure how to describe actions that could, and at the same time could not /possibly/ in keeping with that person's character.
"The other thing... was a hell of a lot freakier," he says. "Something happened with the collar. It... felt like it was wriggling around on my neck. I'm not really sure why, though." Zach frowns. "Almost as if it were reacting to something within her."
"Cammy?!" Yes, the man raises his voice all right, angry at having to hear her name, how she wants to involve herself in every little detail for some nebulous purpose that nonetheless probably benefits her complete monster of an overlord. He's moments away from going on a tirade about how sick and tired he is of having to deal with her poking her nose everywhere when a newspaper is slapped down in front of him.
He doesn't know this person, he's not sure what he's looking for, though there's that really huge lady in the picture that comes off as infinitely more dangerous than that crazed-looking woman, let's not be mistaken here.
"Huh." he comments idly as he just tries to take in whatever from that article Zach is trying to point out, beyond saying that he met this lady in person before she went crazy over in Metro, apparently. He somehow manages the dexterity to free a finger from its grasp around the bottle to scratch the side of his head as he slowly lets the paper back down on the table.
"Antoine said, uh... somethin' along the lines of how it's like... things are makin' him act up, or... or some such," he comments to that.
The other thing, he's not sure what to make of it as he goes back to struggling with the bottle's cap. Twist. /Open!/ "Uhh... wrigglin', what?" The older of the two tries to follow what Zach's saying, but to be fair he's already encountered what appears to be a physically impossible garment that for the life of him he couldn't figure out how Zach even got it on to begin with.
"Did it... did it get tighter, looser, or..."
"Think about it as if you had a snake wrapped around your neck," Zach says uneasily as he stares at the ceiling. "And is was slithering around your neck really fast." He waits for Rust to try and figure that one out. "It didn't loosen, or try to choke me. It just felt like it was /alive/ for a moment."
Zach continues to stare upward, as if he could see through the cieling and through the roof of the building. "She said she had acquired some kind of power she couldn't really control that had... I dunno," Zach says tiredly. "It threw off some sparks when her hand got close to it. Or maybe she threw the sparks. I'm not really sure... it had been a long day."
That's a picture that's really hard to imagine, despite seeing things of that nature plenty of times on TV. But here they are, in reality, with Zach describing his collar as something that slithered around in the presence of that person featured in the photo.
"That... that sounds kind of, kind of like what Antoine's, uh, talkin' 'bout." At long last, the cap of the bottle twists off spectacularly. The cap bounces and rolls along the table, curving once in its roll before it loses all momentum and falls upon the side of the newspaper.
Howard gets in a long-awaited swig of water that he really needed.
"I, I got... quite a few long days too, right as I got home."
Zach finally turns his head to look at Rust. He looks honestly concerned. "Yeah?" he asks. "Everything okay at Pacific? I know you were worried about taking the time off for King of Fighters." Zach sits up, slowly in the hammock. Partly to keep his balance, partly to keep from tugging at some earlier injury. Even with his ability to internally use his soul power to patch himself up, he has been outpacing that ability for weeks now. It's starting to chisel away at him.
"If I, if I take 'nother day off, if the kids don't score better for finals," the older man says as he gulps down the rest of that bottle lickety split, before lowering it on the table and lowering his head as one of his shoulders creak while giving it a bit of a roll.
"I'm fired," he finishes. "No more, no more second chances, no more nothin'," he says as he starts to pace around the table. "I, I really did a lot to, to prepare for King of Fighters and... well, I figured my boss wouldn't have, uh, liked most of it."
He doesn't make eye contact with Zach as he dimly considers his prospects. "But, but that's it. I'm a high school teacher, Zach, so... so I gotta do my job."
Zach's face expresses worry towards his friend and rival. He regards the older man for a very long moment, before taking a pull of water. "That so?" Zach asks. "I mean, I get it in a way. I might have to put fighting aside for a while myself." He waves a hand tiredly. "I can't keep climbing into the ring while this thing is on. It wouldn't be safe for me, or my opponent. It wouldn't be right."
Both of them have heavy things going against their ways of life. Zach, given too much power for himself to control, and Rust, being given an ultimatum by his very day job. "I, I just don't know any more, Zach. Quon... we, we haven't been on good speaking terms. Can't forget all the, all the Sakazaki family drama... now we got Antoine all, y-y'know, messed up." He points a finger briefly while not looking at Zach eye to eye. "Your thing 'round your neck."
His posture dips a little lower by the second, with another sad head shake. "Just, just can't get a god damn break."
Zach grins a bit as a thought occurs to him. Quon... was always using climbing analogies. "The team was put together pretty hastily," Zach admits. "But I think we can still keep climbing. We just need different tools for it, I think." Zach points toward the sword he has been carrying. "I mean, I'm still in pretty good shape, even without my power. I just have to learn how to fight without it, is all. And when I get this damn thing off of me, I'll be that much better for it."
"We'll help Antoine /and/ Quon get through this. It /has/ to be tearing both of them apart. I'm not sure how though... Maybe I can ask Frei and Alma. Frei knows a lot about chi, and Alma's a top-notch psychic." Zach frowns. He has possible paths for himself and the younger men. He looks at Rust with a great deal of concern. "This shit ain't going to be easy," he continues quietly. "But you need to think about what it is you want, and how badly you want it. I don't know," Zach says honestly. "How much you enjoy teaching, or how good you are at it. But I /do/ know how much you have worked your ass off to get as far as you have in fighting."
It is good, perhaps entirely reassuring, to see that Zach retains some optimism over all this even as he is a victim of forces well beyond the understanding of just about anyone and everyone around them. Zach's concerns after mentioning getting help are well-warranted, though.
Howard Rust is forty years old. He doesn't have a whole lot of time left to make up his mind as to what he'll be doing for the rest of his life.
"Zach," he says at the end of those thoughts as he turns to face him, "I, I worked my ass off to, to /get/ my job as a teacher back when... back when I thought becoming a fighter was... y'know, done, when the construction firm I worked for just... sponsored some other guy on the other side of the state," he gestures broadly with one hand off to some direction, as though it has become once again something of a sore spot.
"My workplace, yeah, they give me hell, but, but I'd like to think, Zach, I'd... I'd like to think I can offer more to the world than, than just bein' someone who could beat the, beat the shit out of people," he continues as he starts to pace around the table again.
He grows silent for a while, considering everything. Sure, his team made it to King of Fighters, but they were a round one loss. This caliber of tournament is increasingly rarer and rarer as the days go on - he may never get to see another invitation before he decides he just simply cannot go any further in fighting. After all, he is forty.
"I just... I just don't know, Zach. I just don't know."
Zach startles a little when Rust talks about being more than a fighter, as if those words cut him right to the core. He collects himself fairly quickly, and only someone who knows Zach as well as Rust does would probably even have a chance to pick up on it. He is silent for a long time as Ayame's words echo in his head, as if taunting him.
*What ideals did you exercise for such a gift? Have you ever wondered why /you/ can do what you can do? Have you ever done anything noteworthy with it or merely squandered it on futility? At the very least, you should use such strength to enforce your will. You have the power to make things go your way but here you are, wandering alone through ruined wasteland, effectively a self-made outcast from society. Why are you so afraid to embrace what you could be? Why so reluctant to use your gift to gain power?*
Zach is still quiet, staring at the floor as if his gaze could bore a hole in it. "Take your time," Zach says. "Is what I would normally say." There is something in his tone, as if he is not only saying this to Rust, but also to himself. "Someone I met in China told me a story. That back in the days of Rome, when a general would return in victory, he would have a parade. Behind him would walk a slave, who would whisper momento mori into his ear. To remind the mighty general that someday he too, would die and be forgotten."
Zach doesn't raise his head, but levels his gaze at Rust. Those emerald eyes, that are normally shining with passion or excitement, look tired. "But to the both of us, maybe it could be a reminder that time is just is as limited as death is inevitable."
"I've known 'bout my time for years, Zach," Rust speaks up as he looks away, waving an arm up. Where Zach is passionate, Rust feels more than a little defeated. "It's just... sometimes, sometimes things come up and just, they just, they just all come, slappin' me upside the head and make me wonder if... if it was all worth it."
That's something he's going to have to decide for himself as he stares down a road that splits into more than one path that cannot be easily crossed side by side. A direction has to be chosen, and from there, there would be no going back.
"Uhh... hey," Howard says as he turns around, "while I'm here, I think... I think I'm gonna check the wiper before I drive on back. 's been botherin' me just 'bout the whole afternoon."
"Sure," Zach says tiredly. He pulls himself off of the hammock, the exhaustion of the trip, and the trials that came with it, clearly showing in the young psychic's movements. He's in no condition to do much of anything other than rest.
"Where'd you park," he asks as he drags the Miraitou to his belt.
"Ahh, pretty close," Rust says as he opens the door. It's a bit wet and muddy outside, but the rain's since stopped. The wind has calmed down - really, it'd be a perfectly safe trip back even if he waited to take care of the wiper for when he got back to his apartment.
Sure enough, there's Rust's truck not all that far off. Just a short walk. It's a fairly new model but has been accumulating a bit of wear and tear. There's something about the way one of Rust's knees pop that just seems to add an ominous air to the largely abandoned scene save for the truck and these two men.
"Did ya, did ya want me to... park further back next time?"
"Nah," Zach breathes with a tired looking grin. "Just wanted to know how far we were walking." He gives Rust that weak grin, the one that says he is not about to let some pansy-ass exhaustion get in his way. "Ready for a nap," he finally admits.
"Ah, cripes, I, I don't mean to, to... over-exert you, Zach, c'mon." Howard slows down - not that he's even really fast of foot to begin with - so that Zach can lean on him if he needs him to while they draw nearer to the truck.
"'s the, the weirdest thing, Zach, I mean, I just... I just drive by, hear this... kinda soft 'thump' and all of a sudden one of the, y'know, the things just... just, ah, gets jammed."
Sure enough, there seems to be /something/ caught in one of the wipers, affixed solidly and yet somehow not entirely giving way between the wiper blade and the base of the windshield.
Zach leans, just a little, into Rust. His pride is not nearly as great as his drive, but he's quickly brushing up against those limits. He manages, mostly on his own, to get to the truck to peer at the windshield.
Zach rubs his eyes, having trouble making out what it is.
Howard digs around with his finger, as if trying to forcefully lift the wiper. Considering his strength, this is a really dumb move that might actually break the thing off to begin with. He probably realizes this, starting to scrape away at something underneath with one of his fingers.
"Y-Yeah, somethin's there alright," he grumbles, "some kinda... heavy leaf, or..."
Zach may be able to make out the head of a strangely intact paper crane while Rust is trying his hardest to dig the stupid thing out.
Zach blinks once or twice. "Hold on," he says quietly as he leans in. "Let me take a go at it." Zach pulls at the wiper carefully before reaching in to take what appears to be an origami crane out. He looks at it before hefting it a bit.
"Damn," he says. "Seems kinda hefty." Zach feels his way around the crane, looking for where the weight is.
"Huh?" The older man turns his head at the mention of something being hefty as Zach pulls out a slightly crumpled but largely intact paper crane. Which is quite a feat, considering, oh, it must have been stuck underneath a windshield wiper while rain was dripping down said windshield, almost guaranteeing that it be soaked into formless slush.
"That?" Mr. Rust takes it out of Zach's hands as if to give it a suspicious look-over, which unfortunately puts a brief damper on Zach's well-cautioned test for the weight.
"The hell did this get in there?" He asks as he holds it by its little paper bead and otherwise just stares at it.
"I don't know," Zach says quietly. He takes it back, and starts to carefully unfold it. The exhaustion starts to shed off of Zach like old skin off of a snake as curiousity starts to take hold. Zach must know why this paper bird survived the weather. He needs to know what is making it so heavy.
Zach picks at it, but yet there doesn't seem to be anything tucked inside of it of note. There's no clear mechanisms on it - it seems to be, for all intents and purposes, a paper crane. Considering Zach's considerable experience having fought with many different people around the world, however, he might get the idea there's a certain... thing about it. A certain feel.
"The wind, uh, it got pretty bad for a bit," Howard struggles to reason as to why the hell a /paper crane/ was lodged in his windshield, "maybe it... it blew off, uh, a table... over a hundred feet away, or..."
He rubs the back of his head and then just sighs. He's got nothing! Until he thinks about what Antoine told him about how he needs to open his eyes up to the weird things around the world. It kind of strikes him at that time.
Maybe he ought to go and do what that crane reminds him of, all of a sudden.
"I think I'll, I'll just take it back," he says to Zach, "I dunno, maybe... uh, this is me graspin' straws, but, maybe something that oughtta help Antoine."
Zach regards it for a moment, looking up ar Rust. Maybe this is... "No," Zach says firmly. "Let me hang onto it for right now. Visiting Antoine's not a bad idea. But my gut says that this was meant to get to me anyway."
Zach shrugs slightly. "I'll make sure nothing happens to it at any rate. It's kind of interesting all by itself."
"...You mean, to you?" Howard's having trouble processing this - how would anyone know that he was headed towards Zach's little hidey hole? That said, it's incredibly weird how that thing ended up where it did. He runs his hand under the wiper to make sure it's not really something else that got gummed up underneath the wiper, but, it seems clean.
"I, I dunno, Zach, it's not like, it's not like I said out loud that, that I was gonna visit you or, or anything," he says as he tilts his head down to the windshield. Nothing else, huh - it really /was/ that crane, wherever the thing came from. He's really at a loss as to how one could've ended up there.
*Ninjas,* Zach thinks. *Always with the crazy shit.* "I could be wrong," Zach says as he holds it up to Rust. "Cranes are auspicious symbols in Japan," he says. "Paper cranes are a symbol of peace. Legend has it that a wish is granted to someone who folds a thousand of them." Zach looks thoughtful
"Sounds like a lot of work," he finally says. "It'd take a ton of dedication to do, I think." He offers the crane to Rust. "You can have it, if you want."
"That's, uh, that's exactly what I'm thinkin'," he says when Zach mentions the whole thing about folding a thousand of them - he's not really sure why it came to mind and frankly it seems like an extremely strange bit of chance that someone's hard folding work has ended up in a place it has no right being in.
"I'm, I'm really outta other ideas, Zach," he says in some defeat as he brings his hand out to take back the partially unfolded paper crane, "I mean, Antoine's... not on drugs, somethin' 'bout his chi being corrupted, hell... maybe that's the sorta thing we need to look to."
This is a man grasping at a whole lot of straws. Before you know it, someone in the homeopathic medical care industry is actually going to see a customer.
"I'll make some phone calls too," Zach says with a nod. "See if I can't drum up some help from the Center."
Log created on 19:46:30 03/14/2011 by Rust, and last modified on 23:13:39 03/14/2011.