-17
Nov 17, 2015 19:45:28 GMT -8
Post by Naitome on Nov 17, 2015 19:45:28 GMT -8
REDMIST STATION * PLATFORM 17/-17 * MZU990299Sr91
It was a grotesque bird of a station; squawking steel heating puzzle-wings folded into neon beeps and walking people, a feathered tail parts musk and cigarette, fat discolored bottom that long ago shat doppelganger rows of squat train copies. The needless endless tinge. The noise-making of it. I stand astounded. Crowded in by a rush that does not care about my newness to it.
I am jostled by those passing, purely obstacle. Insignificant. I learn through eavesdropping that this is Platform 17, Redmist Station. I gawk aloud not even to the briefest of stares. This is Mizu No Kuni now. I don't know if it's my clarity, or the awe, like sick rutting burrowed under the cover of dirtsteam ash.
It is lonely, this. This feeling. That no one elses thoughts or words intrude into my walking about confused is, strangely calming. What has happened to me?
I touch the thin bandage and cheap cloth cloak over my stomach, over that seal. I don't feel what they put into me moving anymore.
"Excuse me ma'am and how are you, hi, you look nice, hi. How are you? What is ' -17 '? I keep seeing it painted over trashcans and on the floor."
I ask the first person who does not look like they will strike me for intercepting them. It is an old woman, her manner casual. She doesn't cringe at the subtle serpentine proclivity of my features, at the dulling glow of slit-eyes taking in her wrinkles like niceties.
"It's th' und'rground. The train run und'r th' mainlands? Only nobl's tak' th' 'l'vat'd train anyway."
Her voice is like a murder. A coughing death rattle through gritted teeth missing a few of their neighbors. Her scent is a cloud of cabbage and rose oil, her shadow is a bopping phantom through the glow-fog and metal piss of this wreck. this artificial titan-pen. The trains thread screeching horns into the buzz of a million batteries, of a billion-fold flies, and cannot rid the background hiss of her sounding and accent. It grates on me. I prattle.
"What nobles? Where does the underground train lead to?"
"L'ads to 'v'rywh'r', anywh'r' you want, just lik' all of th'm. But..did you say who ar' th' nobl's boy? Ar' you s'rious?
Th' Samurai, of cours'"
My heart slows, whispers a beat only once assured I will not rip the tiny woman limb from limb with my bare hands. I freeze, figuratively. Narrow my gaze into a lurid camber, speak. Terse as a hook through her throat.
"How. Do I crossss into the Land. Of Fire?"
I say slowly, reigning in.
"Down th'ir by th' sign that says 'Fir' Country."
She says, as if I am slightly off in the head, which I seem to still be.
I walk down.
Onto a train.
Off to a mystery.
I do not realize I am being followed.