ripples in the ocean (open post)

[nishizono]

Who: tetora nishizono & (open)
When: fluid
Where: generally the ingress complex
What: when you miss your band of misfits from home, you end up with some pretty bad decision-making.
Warnings: PG-13 language

a) chicken scratch
He hasn't learned to write.

This is an interesting realization to come to when up in space, and a pretty frustrating truth to come to terms with. The facts haven't changed since his "awakening" - he's a delinquent raised in thinly disguised captivity, and when he's not being poorly managed, he's skipping out on basic education to murder politicians. Kind of hard to fit maths and basic kanji in a schedule like that.

Which is why he's sprawled out on the floor with a cheap notebook and fat marking pen, struggling with his own name. He's written it before. He can spell it out with the English alphabet. Ironically, pinpointing the locks and buttons that isolate him from - well, himself - also means he's not accessing the wealth of information the identities have made easy for him to use. Add that to the list of fuck-ups, he thinks wryly to himself. Writing is hard.

"Hey!" He calls out at the first humanoid-shaped thing that crosses his peripheral vision, ever the rude person that he is. "Do you know Japanese?"

b) drop the beats
Rigging up a mixing console from scratch is exactly as tedious as it sounds. Relearning the technical parts took the better part of a handful of months, and in the end Tetora's only managed to build a bass-treble amplifier, with a switchboard for mono and stereo audio channels. There isn't even a panning slider, or a reverb unit; just switches from option A to option B, some volume controls.

He's stupidly proud about himself for something so basic, though. He loves music. Whether or not Lucy Monostone has anything to do with it is a can of worms he's not going to acknowledge, but for all it's worth Tetora knows he's always going to be captivated by music no matter where he goes. He doesn't know how to play any instruments, or maybe one of his versions did and kept it to themselves, but Tetora had inherited Ooe's skillsets and nurtured it whenever he got the chance. Just like he's doing now.

The growing collection of handmade tools are scattered around him on the long bench he's commandeered for his work. Screws, wire clippers, a soldering gun running on batteries and held together by tape. If anything, Tetora's been resourceful.

Unfortunately, he also only has two hands. He looks up and stares at the first person he catches staring back, before asking (somewhat politely): "Wanna hold this?"

C) make your own adventure
[ Leave a prompt for him, anything goes. ]

Comments

[nishizono]

Guy sucks at communication. Tetora should've expected that much.

It's not the most benign description, to be fair. Tetora's downplayed his own peculiarities when needed, as grandstanding doesn't always have a place in every conversation. There's something a bit disingenuous about the way the man says so, though. The shape of it - vague around the edges - is inviting, and probably for the wrong reasons.

How does a man with a horn-looking thing end up where he does? What's the story behind that protrusion, anyway? What kind of mercenary is he? Is it all for the money, or are there a bit of morals involved in there, too? Is it something you aspire to be, from a young age? Tetora's never had aspirations loftier than surviving long enough to wipe out Gakuso, and he's certainly never thought of what comes after that, if he succeeds.

He flops onto the floor. The day's been very social, by his personal standards.

"My name's Tetora, by the way," he murmurs, staring off at a middle distance as his mind whirrs on the daily if-then-elses left unchecked. "I'm a clone."

[alterplex]

Being obtuse is easy, because Venom's mind is a mess. Some kind of Jackson Pollock disaster that you have to be standing 5 yards away from for it to be cohesive; rattle him too much and his safety pins start to fall off.

Ask him about anything that has to do with killing a man in 50 different ways— ask him what it feels like to dig his knees into desert sand and line up his scope for a perfect headshot. Ask him to map someone's spinal column and point out which vertebra he has to damage to make a man never walk for the rest of his life. Those questions, he can answer with clarity. Those are objective facts.

Ask him for his name and his hobbies, and he's stuck. He almost wants to laugh when the kid next to him slumps and offers him a neat rundown of the who-and-what.

"Tetora," is the easy repetition. His single eye narrows in something close to wolfish amusement. Of course. "We've 'talked' before, then."

No visible reaction to the clone bit, save for a vague turn of his shoulders. Attentive.

"Over the phone." He motions to the TAB in his pocket. "You remember 'Venom Snake'?"

[nishizono]

The name doesn't ring any bells - until it does, easing Tetora's slight frown into a somewhat-delighted recognition. He remembers, if belatedly.

"'Poison snake or something'," he quotes himself, elbowing his way up to a better-seated position. "Miller said you're a friend. Told him it was really fucking weird for some guy to offer food but not give a name." It wasn't the longest conversation, but certain points stuck for the unintentional hilarity.

Tetora, accidentally getting "creeped" on. The jokes write themselves.

"So, Mister Stranger Danger." Tetora regards him with his head tilted a bit, casually pointing a lazy finger-gun at the man. "You're not stalking me, right?"