COMPLETE // CLOSED

[usedsolarbeam]

Characters: Shino, Misao
Summary: Customary morning solar-charge interrupted by a first-year who doesn't respect Shino's roof-owning rights
Time: Around 6 AM
Location: North end of the main building roof
Warnings: Shino may, in fact, be Wall-E

Comments

[kecho_geri]

Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy--! From exploring hidden passageways with Orihime, Toph and Hinata to militarily scouring every inch of the grounds, Misao was on a roll. She'd even managed to get Aoshi to divulge some of his personal favorite retreats via email, though she still had to locate all of them. Since there were classes later in the day and homework and social things at night, Misao had started waking up early, all the better to go exploring.

This time she had left her room, entered the stairs and decided the moment she'd reached the ground floor to turn around and go back up. And up, and up, and up she'd gone. Misao was pretty sure this staircase was leading to the roof, having just passed the door for the last floor of the building. Giggling softly in the darkness of the dim-lit stairway, she could just make out a door ahead of her.

Rationally, she knew she should slow down because running into a locked door at full tilt would be painful. But she decided to hell with it. If it hurt, it hurt and she'd know next time: door to roof? locked. And if it was locked, she'd just pick it! Misao wasn't too sure of her boundaries at this school yet so she hadn't been engaging in any casual B&E, but if the door was locked, it would be her first chance to try her powers out against the school's locking mechanisms.

Holding a hand out in preparation as she neared the door, she grasped the doorknob quickly with her left, jutting her other arm out and pushing hard with her right. The door swung open with a deeply satisfying BANG and Misao was out in the open air, the early morning sunlight caressing her face.

[usedsolarbeam]

Shino did not sigh, but he allowed himself a slightly more annoyed exhalation the moment he heard the footsteps steadily growing louder in the stairwell behind him. With any luck, whatever this person wanted with the roof wouldn't be important enough to outweigh the discomfort of Shino's blank stares, which he planned on doling out liberally in order to reclaim his quiet morning.

When the inevitable BANG rang out sharply through the crisp morning air, Shino swung his legs back onto the roof ledge and slowly turned to regard the intruder impassively. He did not recognize her, and decided upon closer inspection that she must be a first-year. Taking in the details of her appearance, Shino spotted something much worse, something that surrounded this girl in an almost palpable aura...

He fought to keep his nose from wrinkling in distaste.

Optimism.

[kecho_geri]

Misao's first thought was Oh god, I cheated on Aoshi.

There was a naked boy sitting in front of her in only his boxers. Okay, maybe not naked naked, but--Misao felt her skin go from excitement-flushed to fire engine red in under five seconds. She was about to turn away lest her virgin eyes be sullied when her second thought struck her.

She wasn't really in a relationship with Aoshi, and if she wanted to stare at naked boys who was he to stop her? Firming her jaw, Misao resolutely stared at the boy sitting in front of her.

He was shirtless. Okay, she could deal with it. She'd seen it before.
He was wearing only his boxers. Less firm ground, but boxers weren't that different than swim trunks at the public pool.
He was... covered in the coolest looking green tattoos! Misao forget her mortification in an instant and fluttered forward. She was maybe five feet away when she stopped, peering curiously at the strange green markings on the boy's chest, trying to make out what had to be the weirdest geometric design she'd ever seen. He must have paid a fortune.

[usedsolarbeam]

Shino had analyzed several different reactions to his morning solar charge, but this was a new one. He couldn't say he minded the change (screaming was so hard on the ears), but this one was still a rung below the student who had fallen back down the stairs.

Shino watched as the girl underwent a brief internal crisis and then moved forward to stare quite determinedly at him.

"..."

He raised a hand in one of his constrained waves.

[kecho_geri]

On closer inspection, the green marks did in fact have a pattern. Moving forward to get a better look, Misao squinted. They looked almost like... leaves? This guy had a forest growing on his skin. How cool was that!

Misao started going over everything she knew about tats in her head. This sort of detail work was amazing. Not that she spent much time scrutinizing other people's body art, but even she could tell. It was funny, though, because the placement of the tattoos was uneven, almost random. Whoever had done them had a certain artistic flair.

And they really did look like real leaves. Having completely forgotten that the markings were attached to a real person at this point, Misao reached out a hand.

[usedsolarbeam]

Shino bore this extended inspection silently. It was no small wonder she was interested in his markings; the effect was subtle but unnerving. The patches themselves were slightly translucent, unapologetically green, and waxy to the touch. Lighter-colored veins and capillaries were visible through the skin, and Shino was of the opinion that he would disconcert those around him with or without the coat.

She could stare all she wanted as long as she was quiet- perhaps he had misjudged her. About to turn around and resume his sunbathing, Shino stopped short when she moved closer. No, he had not misjudged her. She was invading his Personal Space and that was unacceptable.

When she reached out a hand, Shino instinctively jerked away, forgetting momentarily that he was perched on the edge of the roof. As he felt himself falling backwards, he inhaled sharply and grabbed the ledge, able to regain his balance and sit forward just in time.

At this point his eyebrows had reached an almost unprecedented level of slope, the only indication that Shino was highly offended. "I would appreciate it if you refrain from laying your hands on my person. Why? I wish to remain on the roof, and not on the ground thirteen floors below us."

[kecho_geri]

Misao blinked, coming out of her thoughts. For a moment she stood standing stupidly in front of him, hand still outstretched. Then his words finally got through to her and she dropped her hand, backing up a few steps, only to steer around Shino and peer curiously over the ledge around the perimeter of the roof.

"You're right! I forgot we were this high up! The view's really nice. I can see that Tower of No Doors, or whatever it's called."

Turning to her impromptu companion and completely disregarding his request for personal space, she sat down on the ledge next to him beaming.

"So, uh, there's probably a politically correct way to say this, but--how much did you pay?" She gestured to his chest if by some chance he didn't immediately grasp what she was talking about.

[usedsolarbeam]

Shino was unsure as to what this murderous first-year was talking about, but he had a niggling suspicion that it had something to do with prostitution.

After replaying her dialogue several times in his head, Shino still failed to grasp any pattern at all to her words, and furthermore could not discern what meaning the last sentence held, if it held any. The girl had nearly pushed him off the roof- he wasn't going to take her sanity at face value. She could quite possibly just be spouting gibberish.

"...What are you referring to?"

[kecho_geri]

Misao blinked, very slowly. It was kind of hard to figure out what this guy was emoting, since he was wearing sunglasses and he hardly changed the inflection of his voice. At this point, she was going on reading the movement of his eyebrows alone. She had to say it was kind of fun, watching them go up and down as he exercised the muscles of his face.

But, more to the point, she wasn't sure if she should be taking him at face value. She was pretty sure the gesture in the direction of his naked chest had been obvious. He had already made it clear he didn't want her touching him, so it was the closest she could get to his bizarre tattoos.

Maybe he was making fun of her by purposely misunderstanding? Misao narrowed her eyes, unsure and wary.

"Your tattoos," she finally answered. "What are you referring to?"

[usedsolarbeam]

"They are not tattoos. What are they? Presumably, they are the agent by which I absorb sunlight."

Case closed. Shino returned his gaze to the academy grounds, and hoped his words would forestall further questions. Normally he wouldn't be so talkative, but the quicker he sated this annoyance's curiosity, the sooner she would leave him be.

[kecho_geri]

The agents by which he absorbs sunlight...? Misao thought this over, trying to dissect his words. They weren't tattoos, but if he knew what they were, why had he asked her? ...And then answered himself?

Deciding to focus on his last statement only, Misao looked at his markings again. They absorbed sunlight, meaning they were photosynthetic in nature. Meaning this guy was a walking plant?? Trying to be surreptitious, Misao looked down at his feets. He didn't look like he had roots. Or branches. Or flowers, or leaves. And his hair looked pretty normal too. So presumably this guy had algae growing on his chest, or something.

"Are you half plant, or what?" Misao asked. "Do you need sunlight to... grow?"

[usedsolarbeam]

One of Shino's eyebrows twitched indignantly.

"No, I do not. I store the sunlight and later expel it, usually through heat and light-based emissions.”

There. Now the subject was surely closed.

[kecho_geri]

Oooh, eyebrow twitch. That was a new one. Misao wondered what it meant while she puzzled over his words. By now she'd decided that he wasn't making fun of her--he just talked strangely.

"Lasers!" she exclaimed the moment she got it. "You shoot lasers? Or, wait, do you? You don't just... poot it out, right?"

It made sense in her mind that he used his weird algae-plant growth to absorb sunlight and then shot lasers with it. He'd said something similar himself. But what he hadn't said was where it came out. Perhaps she was getting herself into an embarrassing conversation.

[usedsolarbeam]

Yes, lasers. People just had to call them that when he explained his powers, and he had long ago vowed to never, ever give in and just describe a complicated, dangerous mechanism he did not fully understand as 'lasers.'

At her last words, Shino gave one of his quiet not-quite-sighs and rested his forehead in a hand, hoping for strength. And patience. Lots of patience.

He sucked at patience.

With his other hand, he tapped curtly at his glasses.

[kecho_geri]

Uh oh. This was an embarrassing conversation. Misao could tell just by looking at him. He was holding his head in his hands as if he didn't know what to say. Obviously his powers were so embarrassing he was fearing for her mental sanity lest he tell her using the wrong wording.

Misao was oddly touched. He didn't even know her and he was being so nice! Still, if his powers were that embarrassing maybe she didn't want to sit so close to him. Very slowly, Misao started scooting away from him.

"Hey, it's okay--" she started awkwardly, only to feel her rump hit something that had been on the ledge behind her. She heard a soft tink noise and turned, just in time to see something that looked like a mug tumble over the edge of the roof.

[usedsolarbeam]

"..."