sparring with an audience

[tigerpoet]

[If you're passing by the detective agency's office today, you might get to see a fight. Fauna, a familiar sight to most around Starsand, and Atsushi - no, the other one. The other other one.

Atsushi's grinning as they battle, so there's probably no bad blood involved… then again, with these two, it's hard to tell, especially with Fauna's mask covering any expression she might make.

Atsushi is a straightforward fighter, and his strikes with his sword are powerful. He doesn't dodge much, but he takes Fauna's fire and ice attacks head-on and keeps going strong. His attacks are almost reckless, the aggressive style of someone who knows he can tank any hit his opponent deals him and can fix any injuries later, trading openings in his own form for damage dealt to his opponent.

Fauna's fighting style, in contrast to her normal, headstrong nature, is quite methodical- First, blasts of fire and ice, scarring the battlefield to restrict her opponent's movements. Then a form change to her owl form, a bombardment of high-speed knives as she flies around to create openings. Then, when she's finally restricted and worn her opponent down, she strikes- Her lion form comes in swinging, intending to end it in a single, electric blow.

The battle ends in a draw, with Atsushi's sword at Fauna's neck and Fauna's sword at his heart. There's plenty of time afterwards to catch either of the two in conversation, if you've stuck around to watch.]

Comments

cw: starvation and homelessness

[nightwild]

[Fauna listens. He's had it rough too, huh... More than her, even. Her first instinct, then, is to assume she didn't have it that bad. Dazai had it worse. She shouldn't have said anything. She should have just kept quiet-

... But if she's confessing everything... No, she needs to confess everything. If Dazai will have her in this family, then they need to know who she is. What she's done.

Everything.

She rubs at her eyes.]

I... hope you're right. I want to believe you're right. But I still get scared.

... After a while, I couldn't take it anymore. They were both hypocrites, and nothing worked the way anyone said it would work. Family was supposed to love you, but mine was like that... If you were honest, people would be your friend, but that never worked. If you tried hard, you'd get results, but that wasn't true, either...

So when I turned fourteen, I couldn't take anymore. So I ran away. Out into the streets.

... No one would help me there, either. I survived for a while by eating what other people threw away. I didn't want to steal from anyone, after all. But I couldn't keep that up... and I thought I was going to die there. On the streets, alone, starving.

[She sniffs again, trying to keep herself from crying more...]

That's when the Goddess found me.

[bluemackerel]

[Now, he remains silent. Comforting. A pillar. He can't put on his comical act to this, he has to be supportive. 'If you were honest, people would be your friend. If you tried hard, you'd get results.' Neither were true - he knew it. His little displays of honesty were nothing short of chilling to people who witnessed them. That was why he was a clown.

He knew the life of a runaway quite well, too. He'd been one himself, after all, but people were able to take pity on him, even if he hadn't perfected the image of a clown yet at that time. He was a young man. A young man with promise. That was what drew in the Port Mafia, after all.

Though he did resort to stealing. Human beings were corrupt enough, he'd told himself, that taking things from them meant nothing. Nothing but survival. It was like nature taking its due. A taxation on humanity for bringing forth such a being to this world. So she still remained far more morally upright than him.]

The Goddess.

[He repeats, quietly, showing that he's listening.]

And she assisted you.

[nightwild]

[oh, dazai...

Fauna nods, quietly.]

... The Goddess of Salvation. She could... sense my despair. And offered me power. The power to grant my wish.

I wanted a better world. A just world. But she said... that it wasn't possible to fix the world we had. We just had to break it. Destroy what was there- and put her in charge. If she was in charge, she'd be able to make a perfect world.

[She reaches into her pouch, and pulls out her changer, though its screen is dark due to Dazai's power.]

I believed her.

cw: child abuse

[bluemackerel]

...

[In another world, Fauna would've been in grave danger. There were people - people like Fyodor - who would've preyed upon something like that, but done it with absolute devotion. That was his sales pitch to a T, preying upon the weak, promising them a better world in exchange for devotion, especially when it came to children. His 'rats', as he called them. Except he had no real power to give. Only falsehoods and fear.]

I don't blame you.

Things like that are quite easy to believe if you're young and have very little options.

[nightwild]

Yeah.

... My job was to go around. Find other people who were in despair, outside of where the Goddess could reach. Grant them the same choice she granted me. Power to grant their wishes.

[She lowers her head, forehead to her knees as her voice comes out muffled.]

All of them became monsters instead. Obsessed with using their new power for their wishes. Monsters called Wishes.

They would attack people, destroy buildings, whatever they wanted. And I was to stop anyone who tried to stop them. I knew it was wrong, but... I was scared that if I left, or disobeyed, I'd be back on the streets again, and this time, there would be monsters sent after me. So I learned to steal, to lie to people... Whatever it took to survive. It didn't matter who I hurt or stole from, because I was already trying to destroy the world as it was anyway...