142. Collateral [voice]

[corrinesbell]

Guess it's about that time again, huh? Hey, everybody. I just wanted to say that we're kinda shorthanded at the tea shop these days and so if anyone wanted to work a day or two, there's...a lotta space in the schedule for it. It's weird not to work for money, and everything, but at least it's something to do.

Or you could just come have tea, too. That reminds me I've gotta ask at the bakery again about making stuff. We've got just about everything you could want, I think. Uh, I mean, if what you want is a specific kind of tea.

And the last thing is that...Ayumu went home. So the house is pretty empty again. [The vocal equivalent of a shrug, followed by a shade of actual shrugging.] Kinda the way things are here sometimes. I've been here for a little bit more than five years and you just get used to it eventually. Most of it. Sorta.

Anyway. Didn't mean to make this whole thing depressing.

[And as usual, anyone may catch her at work. Avoiding the house? No way, of course not!]

Comments

[ action ]

[herotypical]

[ a small shrug. buffy herself had gone almost a year before taking guy up on the offer at the bar. ]

Scope changes things, I guess.

[ action ]

[corrinesbell]

Yeah, kinda. At the start - well, I guess what I call the start, we couldn't even use most of our magic or anything. People didn't really work together.

But nobody sat around satisfied either.

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[herotypical]

...You know, there are plenty here still working without magic. Or anything.

[ it isn't argumentative. in fact, it's delivered quite warmly. but the line had struck her: we couldn't even use most of our magic or anything. magic and supernatural abilities are cold hard facts in her world, but even her closest compatriots are hardly all magic users.

buffy herself isn't normal by any stretch of the imagination. perhaps her tone remains affable because: ] Don't get me wrong. Deprived of my own or anything, I'd be pretty pissed off. Was pretty pissed off, for five months. But I'm not sure I could call using that magic or power as a dealbreaker, given how many here do it day to day. Even now.

[ action ]

[corrinesbell]

Oh. Yeah, I know that, but...back then, on top of being cut off from home and without most of the people I knew? It was like just another insult. More proof that we couldn't control anything if they didn't want us to.

...They're a little different now, I guess. It's hard to let go of thinking the other way.

[ action ]

[herotypical]

...Personally, I think that all they've really done is graduated to the stick-and-carrot method of control.

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[corrinesbell]

The...stick and carrot method?

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[herotypical]

Y'know. A mix of rewards and punishments. The carrots are the rewards; the stick's the punishment. It's mule talk.

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[corrinesbell]

Oh. Not what I was picturing, but I think your picture works a little better. What's a mule?

[ action ]

[herotypical]

Think...ugly horse.

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[corrinesbell]

[Lucky them, there are horses in the stables and Raine has a horse and- yeah. Okay.]

Why d'you give it a carrot and then hit it with a stick?

[ action ]

[herotypical]

Reward and punishment. It's a behaviour modification thing. Reward wanted behaviour; discourage the bad. The Malnosso use it on us all the time. It's psychology 101.

[ action ]

[corrinesbell]

[The tips of Sheena's chopsticks scrape against her empty plate.]

I don't know whether to be really impressed or totally freaked out about how true that is.

[ action ]

[herotypical]

It's science. Sorta. But almost every psychologist I've ever met was either evil or a grade-A jerk, so it only stands to reason that the guys in the labcoats can wield it as good as them.

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[corrinesbell]

I've known a few scientists who weren't that great either. [She rubs absently at her right wrist.] But I get what you mean now.

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[herotypical]

...Not that all psychology is bad. [ she hastens to add -- leaning back in her chair. ] Given half a chance? I probably would have majored in it.

[ she was good at it. it was rare for her to be good at things that didn't involve bloodshed. ]

[ action ]

[corrinesbell]

Majored? [It's been months since such a weird world-related split has happened to her in conversation.] Is that...something the military does?

[ action ]

[herotypical]

...Normally, I'd offer a resounding no. But it turned out the military was spookily involved at my college. A major is what you choose to concentrate on for your studies.

[ action ]

[corrinesbell]

Oh. Okay, right. [Ninja children don't really...do studies. Not like the research academy and everything.] I'm gonna guess you didn't have a major for running a bar either.

[ action ]

[herotypical]

Not quite. Besides, I'm what my world affectionately titles a college drop-out.

[ action ]

[corrinesbell]

Too busy saving the world to go to school? [It's kind of a joke. That's what happened to Lloyd, Colette, and Genis.]

[ action ]

[herotypical]

Family stuff, actually. [ ...well, the family stuff was pretty much entangled with the slaying stuff at that point. even still. ] I was needed back at home.

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[corrinesbell]

Oh. Yeah, I kinda get that. You don't totally need formal school to be awesome, anyway. [After all, look how she turned out.] Just don't tell Raine I said that, okay?

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[herotypical]

I'm guessing that in your world, tea-serving ninja is totally a viable vocation choice? 'Cause generally speaking, back in mine, being a Slayer isn't. Not by most people's standards.

[ action ]

[corrinesbell]

Only if the tea-serving part is part of your deception. Or, y'know, you're in charge of Mizuho's actual tea house. Ninja like me are supposed to be...well, the usual stuff. Assassins and spies and...things like that.

[ action ]

[herotypical]

They're kinda ancient history, in my world. Brought up now-a-days only for kung-fu films and clever comments.