recolle | (no subject)

WHO: Okita Souji and you!
WHERE: Cabaret Club Sunshine / Black Lion Bakery / Park
WHEN: September 9 onwards.
WHAT: Sakura's moping at the perceived loss of her girlfriend to some alternate world bs. (Like with all sorrows, its only temporary.)
WARNINGS: Drinking, possible violence. Huge akitas.

Cabaret
[ Sakura's got her head down against the table in a booth somewhere in Majima's cabaret. In front of her looks to be a table full of appetisers as if to offset the giant bottle of sake she's got there. Beside her in the booth is a fancy looking wooden bokken in its sheathe as if it were her drinking companion.

She's not really one for drinking, but she understands it has its uses. ]

Stupid Aki...

[ she hiccups into her arms. The red tinge on her face may indicate that she's a little tipsy, but not completely gone. ]

I regret falling in love!

[ wails Sakura to the whole club, looking up with tears in her eyes. ]

Bakery

[ Sakura loves dogs - she can't place it, but she has a special affinity for them. Even if they are big, huge and somewhat spoiled.

During a nice, warm day she takes Akita Souji around for a walk. And when she's satisfied that Souji's gotten her daily dose of exercise, she takes her to the Black Lion Bakery so that she can get a snack and Souji can have a treat herself.

It's a great day for people watching and playing mobile games, so she idly taps the screen on her phone - half paying attention to it, but more gazing off into the distance and watching people. Occasionally she'll take a sip out of her coffee but she seems not entirely here.

Her dog on the other hand, is a floof of boundless energy and will happily go up to people, annoy them and generally look for pets. ]

Park

[ When she couldn't stand staying in her apartment when she wasn't at work, she heads to the park with her bokken and her gym uniform. The park lends itself to be a decent training locale because of the large open spaces. She wasn't going to hit any one, nobody found it particularly strange and she could practise her slices and strikes without interruption until she got tired.

She's going through the motions - her heart isn't really in any of the downward slashes she's doing, but each one is clean and precise. Sakura raises her sword, concentrates for a minute and stops before looking at her bag. Inside there was a real sword. She wasn't sure whether she was scared to use it, because now that the adrenaline had stopped coursing through her every time she used it, Sakura bordered on apprehensive. Who was she in a past life? There was no way that plain old Sakura Fujiwara would have -- ]

Guh --!

[ The memory hits her like a train - which was where she was in. The carriage was narrow and long, swaying ever so gently in the night. But the air was tense - Sakura had her sword raised as if primed to strike. She sensed danger.

At the other end of the carriage was a woman, floating in the air as if with some magic. She laughed imperiously, cackling as she pressed her advantage. The bullets on the ground and the matchlocks floating in the air next to her opponent seemed to suggest that she dodged a torrent of them heading her way. ]

One strike is all I need...

[ With a singlemindedness, Sakura dashed towards the other woman with her outstretched sword. She had to be fast, she had to strike while her opponent was revelling in their circumstance. There was no time to laugh!

She closed the distance with a lightness of being that she could barely get to grips with, like her feet barely made contact with the earth beneath her. The point of her sword inched forward and with one precise strike, she aimed straight and made contact!

Her opponent let out a strangled yell. Was she really not... expecting the strike?

What a fool.

Sakura pressed her advantage, she couldn't stop to breathe as she thrust the sword in deeper before --

She was back in the park?

She blinked.

Somehow she had sunk to her knees, clutching the sword as if her life depended on it. Her head was swimming as she was now keenly aware of her breathing, letting the air fill her lungs.

She couldn't move. Not yet. Her legs wouldn't let her. ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Eh, well... Some of us were, I think.

[Others were SAMURAI SWORDS but that's just five kinds of struggle and exhaustion and he doesn't really like dumping it on strangers.]

Maybe people were samurai from different eras so they never even met though, y'know? Or maybe they're from the same side and fought together instead of against each other. That wouldn't be too far off from how things were last month, honestly...

[What with all the monster-slayin' going on.]

[ Souji circles around Sakura's feet, sniffing at them curiously before settling down again. Idly, Sakura pats her head and thinks about that. ]

This sounds like the premise of an anime... like we could have Nobunaga Oda, Souji Okita, Miyamoto Musashi, Kojirou Sasaki and Minamoto no Yoshitsune all fighting in some sort of battle royale.

[ Was that an anime she watched for? It probably was. ]

They'd all be pretty good. It could have flashy action sequences.

[THAT SOUNDS exactly like something he'd expect from Sakura, and he can't help but laugh just a little. Not mockingly, though. If anything, there's something mildly endeared in it.]

That's pretty crazy, isn't it? But I guess if reality's basically play-doh anyway, something like that could totally happen.

[Does he actually believe it did? NOPE. He's a fool who knows nothing of the vast numbers of wild, wild canons out there...

He also moves on pretty quickly though, because there's one name in that list that stands out to him in an almost unpleasant way. He doesn't particularly want to dwell on what he's remembered about the Shinsengumi, so:]

Would you want a flashy action sequence of your very own or something?

[ Sakura has used anime or manga or video games to frame this new reality, because that's the only way she can explain it without going insane. If she had to try and parse all the new info and new situations, she would completely freak out and not know what to do with it. ]

Yeah!

[ She pauses. ]

Well... hopefully. I think my past self was very good at fighting but was ill or something. So it would be one of those things where I'd use all my energy to defeat a big opponent and then...

[ Sakura trails off here. ]

Collapsing to the ground coughing blood I guess...

[It's something else he remembers - blood, that man coughing up blood. He hasn't pinpointed anything beyond that yet, since he hasn't actually researched Okita Souji because that would end with him completely freaking out and not knowing what to do with it. Still, hearing that someone else is out there coughing up blood after battles is definitely enough to alarm him.]

Did that... happen every time you fought, or something?

[ She's taken aback, but she answers Kashuu's question in stride. ]

Um... no. There was one memory I had where it seemed like after a battle I was in, I was on the floor of a traditional inn. You know, sliding doors, wooden pillars, tatami mats - the works. And I was coughing blood while clutching a sword...

[ Sakura pauses, because she feels something in her chest she's not sure is real - but it's a chill none the less ]

And the other time I was fighting something, I felt something in my chest that wasn't right. I wasn't coughing blood... yet.

[ the yet is said with a little uncertainty. It didn't add up to her a lot - why would her past self as a great samurai warrior be ill as well? ]

[The description leaves him feeling chilled, too. A traditional inn, tatami flooring, shoji screens being torn through, bodies, blood-- It rings too familiar, and he looks distinctly discomforted for a second before shifting his gaze to the side.

Geez... He supposes fighting in general wouldn't be uncommon depending on the time period, even in buildings, but still... What an unpleasant coincidence.]

So... It's almost like you could tell you were sick or something, then?

[ She nods. ]

I don't get sick often, well I don't get sick at all but I imagine that's what feeling sick would be like. But past me soldiered on and kept fighting.

[ Sakura doesn't like talking about the scarier or the more negative parts of her memories if she can't help it, which is why she's kinda sitting a little uncomfortably. Without thinking about it, she's absently reaching to grip onto Souji's back ever so slightly - the poor dog looks a little concerned that she's being gripped this way and senses something is wrong. She shakes free, walking up to Sakura and nuzzling her leg. That's her way of saying it's gonna be okay, human.

Meanwhile, she's biting her lip and trying not to let her emotions overwhelm her... again... ]

[He certainly doesn't miss the atmosphere either, and watches as Souji attempts to cheer her up in that way that only dogs can. He can't exactly use the same tactics, tragically, and relies on his words instead even though they're clumsy.]

We don't have to talk about those parts if you don't want to. It's fine, I think... Taking time to come to terms with everything you remember and all, I mean.

[He took three months to actually acknowledge the possibility that he hadn't been a human in his past life, and another three to come to terms with the fact that he'd been a dang inanimate object. ...Or an animate inanimate object, he supposes. Either way, he understands some things are discomforting to look at in the eye, and he's the last person who'd force someone to face them head-on.]

You remember other things too, right?

I remember people, but I don't know their names...

[ She takes a deep breath. Sakura's calmed down a little bit, but it's very hard for her to keep everything under wraps when everything is just several magnitudes of order beyond her everyday experience. ]

It's all a bit of a haze, I've been writing these weird memories down every time they happen in a diary at home.

[ admits Sakura with a little bit of a blush on her cheeks. ]

I don't want to use my phone because even though I know Retrospec is behind it, I don't want them to know know, you know?

[ If she were a normal girl it would just be filled with her crushes and tales of her day and cute stickers. ]

But have you had any weird memories?

[There's no point in saying that they probably know know no matter how Sakura chooses to write things down and keep track of them, because he's pretty sure everyone's at least tangentially aware of that... There's really just no outrunning Retrospec on their own turf.

Still--]

Does it help you any? Keeping track of stuff like that, I mean... I guess it'd be good if you're remembering stuff in weird patches. That seems to be what it's like for most people here.

[Everything's out of order and disconnected which causes way more hassle than it's worth.]

Mm, I've had a few, yeah.