Walk to seek the answers I can't find

[notamisfit]

Who: Naoto Shirogane and OPEN
What: Trying to work out just exactly where she is
Where: The streets of Promenade
When: Day
Warnings: Nothing of note

Comments

[daienkai]

Ever since he'd dreamt his first ship up over the course of a couple of weeks, Ace went out to sea fairly often, able to make longer trips than when he'd just had his skiff to rely on. Still damp from wading in to tie the ship up to the moorings, he hoisted a bag over his shoulder full of little things that he took to trade at the market. He never traded for much really but he liked it in the absence of any sort of currency, a little reminder of home.

Shirtless as usual, his mask, bells jingling as he walked, hat hanging around his neck, held in place by the tie, the bull's head pendant resting just beneath the beaded necklace he was wearing.

After catching the broadcast from a few days ago, he jogged to catch up with whoever it was, tapping them on the shoulder.

"You should stick the mask on before any guards who might be out catch you. They're probably all still on edge just now."

[daienkai]

He nodded his head as a thanks, the PORTAL going away again because it was more than a little cumbersome to hold a Den Den unless it was one of the tiny little wrist versions. But then again he wouldn't be able to type on that and he had enough stuff on his wrists as it was

[notamisfit]

"Hmm, yes. The more I hear, the more I'm inclined to think that there is something interfering with our minds directly." Which was a troubling thought indeed but not altogether unexpected of a place that could persuade people.

Her eyes widened a little as Ace spoke, her already-busy mind whirring with this new information. "You mean you were able to return from this place into your own world? Then there is an exit to be found somewhere...and yet another example of our captors wanting to keep us living at any cost. Perhaps, then, they knew that was to come and returned you to face your death in hope that it would coerce you into doing as they wished." After all, being saved from certain death did tend to invoke positive sentiment towards one's rescuer.

[daienkai]

"I wish I could say I remembered how I left but I don't. I wasn't...I wasn't even thinking about it because being here was better than being there, being in that situation. Getting some closure, seeing the people I loved, that was good but knowing I can't ever go back?" He shook his head, a dark look unlike him passing over his face at the thoughts of people he would never see again. If he was just dead then he wouldn't wonder but here he did and he couldn't even see anything in his mirror, just a long expanse of black that he'd covered up instead

[notamisfit]

Naoto nodded, trying to imagine what her response would be if she were in the same situation. She couldn't, at this stage, imagine how anyone could consider this predicament to be preferable to being on their own world but then she was fixated on the need to return and solve the ongoing case with the Midnight Channel.

"I see. Well, Ace-san, you have given me plenty to think about. If it is convenient for you, I would like to talk with you again once I have made sense of the things I have learnt since my arrival."