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WHO: Tatsuo Kihara (

invocate), & OPEN
WHERE: all over town
WHEN: throughout the month
WHAT: I'm being lazy and mushing open logs for both of them into one post
WARNINGS: n/a

TATSUO

A -- let's paint this town tonight

Finding and painting back into existence his apartment had been priority number one for Tatsuo at the beginning of this month. Shortly followed by the police department and crime lab. That... had taken a while. With both of those objectives met, Tatsuo went in search of the dojo, but it's proving a bit elusive. What he found instead was the pet shelter.

Which he'd almost walked past except he heard the animals inside and couldn't really just leave them there, white and blank. So he spent a good afternoon getting the exterior mapped out, snagging any passersby to help.

"Hey, do you have a minute? It's going to take more than one person to get this done."

B -- wrong color

Someone was kind enough to paint back one of the supermarkets in Tisse, though not everything had been restored to its proper color yet.

Except the bananas. Sitting there, bright yellow in the middle of the produce department.

For some reason, that just irked Tatsuo, so he pulled out his paintbrush and recolored them a mild shade of blue.

Sometimes you wanted blue bananas, okay?

C -- feeling a bit blue

It was about halfway through the month when Tatsuo realized he's not heard from or seen certain individuals on the network. A few he'd bumped into in person on the street or at work, but been too distracted to realize they hadn't still been on the network. Something had felt off, but it took a while for him to put together exactly what.

When he did, it hit a bit hard. He was used to one or two, maybe three people getting reset at a time. But this time it'd been five. And some of them he'd been quite close to. Sure, he could still talk to a few of them, but it wasn't the same. It'd never be the same again unless Retrospec put them back on the network.

That evening he found a bar that's been outlined back into existence and ordered a drink. Liquor still tasted the same, even if didn't have color.

LI-NA

A -- the grass is greener pt 1

Li-Na quickly got the hang of how to paint outlines with her paintbrush, but actually painting things green was a little trickier since it required someone else with a green paintbrush. Maybe you just painted that grass green with her, or maybe you were just walking by after her partner departed, but one of those brush creatures was currently sweeping away said green. And Li-Na was not having it. She waved her paintbrush at the creature, trying to chase it off.

"Stop! Leave that alone! We just finished that!"

B -- the grass is greener pt 2

It was fairly easy to paint back the buildings are ground level, and even a story or two up if you had a good arm. But Recolle had a number of skyscrapers and frankly painting them from the bottom up was a bit daunting if you weren't sure where they ended. So Li-Na loaded up a bag of paint filled water balloons and used her boots to locate the tops of buildings. A few splashes here and there until she located the very top and then lobbing balloons in each cardinal direction to locate the buildings around it.

So if you looked up and spotted Li-Na perched on seemingly nothing, it's just a building she hadn't fully marked the top edge of yet.

C -- is that your real...?

Between repainting the city and sleeping, Li-Na made sure to go to school (the high school having been one of the first locations she helped paint back). Finals were coming up, and even though Li-Na technically did not actually need to graduate from Recolle High, she still wanted to put in the proper effort until the end of the school year. Especially in her more difficult subjects.

But with the collapse of the layers, some of her classmates had taken renewed notice of her hair and eyes.

"There's no way she grew her hair that fast. It was chin length before Christmas." "And who would want to wear extensions that long every day? It would get soooooo heavy." "Do they even make extensions that color? I bet you it's a wig." "How does it never slip? She even wears it in gym class." "She's so weird, wearing a wig. And did you see her eyes? Purple contacts."

Li-Na could mostly ignore the whispering behind her in class. But must they do it during class? She was trying to listen to the teacher!

D -- relaxing cup of tea

For the most part, Li-Na kept herself busy. Painting and school and dance classes once the studio was painted back. One afternoon she found a bubble tea shop and decided she could use a short break. White bubble tea is better than no bubble tea after all. It took almost an hour to properly paint back the interior of the shop, but once it was done she ordered a coconut milk tea. Alas, no jellies, because without color they couldn't tell which ones were which.

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Perhaps it is something separate to Retrospec? If we have lost the "layers", whatever they were and these things can undo our attempts to rebuild them....

[ He glances down at his brush. ]

A light blue. It is a pleasant colour, or at least I feel it is.

Hmmmmm, and I have a light green. So unless we want blue-green grass, I suppose those spots will be recoloured later.

[she turns her attention back to the brush creature and pokes the ice gently with the handle end of her brush]

You think they could be related to why the layers collapsed?

[Li-Na squints at the brush creature, but can't fathom how it could affect the layers]

Or maybe they are like the Christmas decorations. Random chaos.

[mostly because she doesn't like the idea of anyone or anything being able to mess with the layers]

... Blue-green grass sounds rather pleasant, come to think of it. Vibrant, yet soothing.

[ Lovely. He could get behind that idea. ]

I am merely speculating. Something had to have caused all of this to happen - perhaps not these creatures precisely? But something acting in a similar manner, on a much larger scale.

After all, the world does look a little like someone liberally applied white spirit to it.

[Were it not for living with Chiyo for almost a year, Li-Na would have no idea what 'white spirit' is.]

It does look like all the color was washed away. Layers have to do with how we... 'see' the world... I think. So when the 'layers collapse'... not being able to see anything at all, makes sense.

[Li-Na gets a slightly mischievous look in her eye.]

Speaking of seeing, I suppose we could paint the grass blue-green. If someone else does not like it, they can colour it something else.

Until someone tells us otherwise, I feel we can do whatever we wish to do. Within reason.

[ He motions his brush at the grass. ]

Shall we? I think it would be a quite striking sight, even if it may be temporary.

[Li-Na flips her brush bristles down and sets it next to Yusuke's]

Yes. We shall. Maybe someone else will find it amusing too.

[and since they're going to embark on this endeavour together...]

My name is Li-Na. What is yours?

Yusuke. A pleasure to meet you.

[ This is going to look charming. He can't wait. ]

[forget touching grass, the new thing is painting grass]

So, are you from Recolle?

[just trying to make small talk while they paint]

[ a new trend beginneth. ]

Originally? No, I was born in Japan. But I've lived here for about thirteen years now... so I suppose the answer depends on interpretation.

[ yuSUKE ]

How about you?

[True, it does depend on one's interpretation. Li-Na laughs a little at that remark.]

I am from Hong Kong. Born there, grew up there. I have only been in Recolle for about a year.

Did you come here to study?

[ That! Seems to be the most common reason that half the people he knows have come to recolle in the first place. If he is honest. ]

[Yusuke is right on the money, though it is a pretty easy conclusion to draw]

Yes, I did. I wanted to improve my English before I start university. So I am taking classes at Recolle High, though that ends that next month.

Ah, I see. That's not a bad idea - learning English can be tricky, it has so many odd and complicated elements that don't seem to follow any sort of logical pattern.

Yes!

[Li-Na's expression basically says 'Someone who gets it!']

I learn one thing and I think I understand the rule. But then it has twenty exceptions and it is impossible to remember them all.

"To", "Too" and "Two". As a simple example. I was taught it alongside my mother tongue, pretty much, and parts of it still don't make any sense.

What really confuses me are tenses. Past, present, future. We do not have verb conjugation in Cantonese. Why change the verb because the action is occurring in the past or the future?

English is supposed to be formed from a mixed of current and dead languages, isn't it? Perhaps that explains the sheer number of tenses present. If you take from many languages, you take all the quirks and intricacies.

[Li-Na shakes her head a little]

Well all those quirks and intricacies are very annoying for people who do not grow up speaking the language.

[ S H R U G ]

I imagine we get our revenge with our own languages, should English speakers choose to learn them.

Ah, this is true. Cantonese and Mandarin have tones.

[tones, the bane of anyone who speaks a non-tonal language]

Tonal?

[ Hm. ]

We have pitch accents in Japanese for certain distinctions in meaning, but nothing that would count as a tonal language. They sound quite... difficult.

From an academic stand-point... I suppose they are. Especially if someone is coming from a language that does not have tones. But since I grew up with tones, my ears are used to them. That.... and words will completely change meaning if you use the wrong tone.

[so it's kind of a... you either learn tones as a child or you forever misunderstand everything]

That, to me, sounds very intimidating. Not only must you remember a brand new word in both speech and writing, you must remember exactly how it is pronounced or you could make a terrible faux pas...

[ aaaHHHHHH ]

[and then there's the thousands of characters you have to learn for writing...]

Usually we know what someone means through context, but it can still lead to awkward moments. Like when one of my classmates said, 'Where can I shit?" instead of "Where can I sit?"

[ well, he did that once before. Mmm, kanji. ]

... Yes, see. This is exactly what I'm afraid of with tonal languages.

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invocate - 2018-06-15 06:03 (UTC) - Expand

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