towerofanimus | [Open] How Far Will My Voice Carry?

Entry tags:

[Open] How Far Will My Voice Carry?

Characters: Sonata Shinonome and you! (Open)
Setting: Floor 1 cafeteria; morning
Format: Whatever floats your boat
Summary: Boring oatmeal isn't so bad. It's the new location that's got Sonata worried.
Warnings: Talking in the third-person?

When life throws you for a loop, you've gotta roll with it. That's what dad always said. And that's what Sonata reminded herself, over and over again, as she sat at that cafeteria table all by herself and worked away at the bowl of oatmeal that she had been handed. Those letters were total bunk. Lies, all lies, dirty DES lies to brainwash her and make her give up on AKB0048 and her friends and her dreams. She'd roll with it, and find a way out. Things felt way less scary and awful when you rolled with it.

She'd need to do it on a full stomach. Oatmeal was gross, but good for you, so she forced it down spoonful by spoonful. She'd need to be her best and healthiest if she was going to get out of this. But if you're sitting too close, prepare to have some fruit or sausage or something small and easily snatchable snatched from your plate. Variety in your diet is also healthy!

...and if you look like a big burly DES soldier jerk, you might be getting a splot of oatmeal launched at you.

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...Oh, okay then.

It wasn't often that Equius Zahhak actually ate out in the cafeteria; normally he was content enough to hole up in the small, two-person table in the kitchen. But today, he's apparently decided to actually venture out into the big scary world. Because it's really just that bad. ...And the first thing that happens is someone tries to steal his food.

Yeah, no. Equius has had a lot of things stolen from him in his life, so he knows what's coming; the plate is quickly jerked out of Sonata's reach, and she earns herself a very stern look from the grey-skinned alien kid next to her.

The moment Sonata realizes that she missed, she makes a noisy sound of protest. She makes another grab, but it comes up short when she realizes just how grey the skin on the guy's wrist is. That's not a very healthy skin color....

"Hey!" Her eyes follow all the way up the arm and wind up upon Equius's face, and then she's really surprised. There's blinking. There's staring. There are a few unsuccessful attempts to put together some words before she actually succeeds.

"Is that a costume?"

The stern expression broke down very easily when he saw Sonata's face. Her confusion caused him confusion, it seemed, and only when she asked her question did he realize: oh, right, oatmeal. She's a human who must be new here. Probably had never seen a troll before in her life.

"Uh, no," he said, glancing down at himself. "This is... what I look like."

"Of COURSE that's what you look like! It's not a costume?"

It's something that she's not having much luck in processing. There was no such thing as grey people with horns. So it had to be a costume. But if it wasn't a costume, then there was such a thing as grey people with horns...

She puts down her spoon, then starts to reach upwards to poke at his horns. Gotta test. Gotta be really sure that he's telling the truth.

"No, I-I already said... it's not a costume."

But he shrunk away when she reached up to poke the horn, aware of why she felt the need but displeased about it nonetheless. He had a personal space bubble, okay, and this girl was basically throwing her trash all over it. "Um. Do you mind?" He's trying to eat, jeez.

Sonata gives very little care about the personal space of others. She just continues to advance while he shrinks away, making grabby hands at those horns of his.

"Sonata just wants to see! Sonata wants to see if they're real! Come on, just one touch! Just one!"

Oh god no, no, no no no. Predictably, as Sonata moves forward Equius moves still farther back, actually moving a bit around the table in an attempt to get away from her while not outright fleeing. The logic goes that if he makes it clear enough that he doesn't want her touching his horns, he'll make her go away without actually having to tell her so... the way of the milquetoast is not easy.

"T-they are real, I promise."

There's only so far that she can follow. She's running out of table. And... this isn't really funny anymore. No one's laughing. It's only good if it's funny, right?

She withdraws, setting her hands in her lap, frowning.

"If you've got horns, what are you?"

Finally, she asks!

"...A troll. I'm a troll. I'm not from your planet."

"Of course you're not from Sonata's planet! Which one are you from, then? There's lots of planets... are there any humans on yours?"

Hey, questions beget questions. If she can't touch, she'll ask.

"My planet is Alternia," he said, not even bothering to touch his food. It would be horribly rude to eat while holding a conversation, even with a girl like this. "There are no humans. I only found out about them... later."

Edited 2012-08-05 21:32 (UTC)

"Alternia.... Sonata hasn't heard of Alternia.... So you're an alien?!" She's wowed! And also suspicious and worried. It's bringing to mind the letter she read. It's making her wonder if this ISN'T a DES trick. She doesn't like that.

He nodded. "Yes, I'm an alien." She looks a bit overly-excited by the whole idea of it, but she seemed to have learned her lesson before about flinging herself onto people's horns without being invited. It was really just a feeble hope, though. "We... we were for the most part isolated from Earth... so it's not really a surprise that you hadn't heard of it."

"Sonata's never met an alien! Sonata didn't think there were aliens... just people! On lots of planets!" She settles back down in her seat, gathering her bowl of oatmeal back to herself.

"No one lives on Earth anymore! It's all dirty and stuff and no one can live on it. So humans went and found lots of other planets instead!" She scoops up another spoonful of oatmeal, but doesn't eat it. Instead, she quirks her head. "Where's Alternia?"

Equius began to look surprised as Sonata's explanation continued. It was a step up from scared out of his wits, right? "...Your Earth has accomplished interplanetary travel?" he asked. "Oh, god. Well... I don't know how many planets your society has found, but... well, the Alternian Empire did more or less the same thing? Um... not that Alternia is a wasteland, or -- er -- was a wasteland, it just... there were overpopulation problems and the children stayed on Alternia while the adult trolls went off conquering more planets for the Empire. So they, um, must have been very far apart if humans and trolls have never crossed paths."

"Uh-huh! We did! Humans fly through space aaaallllll the time!"

Oh, wait, he's explaining his own planet... Sonata simmers down for a moment and makes an effort to listen. Though it's kind of boring. And wordy.

"..so you guys go conquer planets? That's not very nice!"

"N-no! We allow them to keep their planet and government..." Wow, Equius. Are you seriously trying to defend the biggest empire of sickos this side of the Iciphisphere? Woooow.

"Oh..." She supposes that's a good enough explanation. Or excuse. Or something. But there's a very vital question that's gone unasked.

"Is entertainment allowed in the Alternian Empire? Is it?"

This is going to get wildly misinterpreted. But that's okay.

"Entertainment?" Well that's a weird question. Fortunately, Equius' mind is pure and stupid as the driven snow, so it doesn't go as badly as it could have. "Um, well, of course it is. You need to keep citizens mollified, right?"

"Entertainment! Singing, and dancing, and music! If that's allowed, then it's all okay!" She nods repeatedly, waving her spoon around for emphasis.

"There are lots of planets where it's not allowed... so if the Alternian Empire lets people sing and dance, then it's okay!"

"Yes, they do." He truthfully hadn't heard of a planet that would care so much about song and dance that they make it illegal. But, then again, the Alternian Empire didn't really like to talk about planets that weren't conquered by them, so that perhaps made sense. "That's a bit odd, though. Why would so many planets put singing and dancing so high on the priority list?"

"Because the big governments say it's bad to have stuff that "moves people's hearts"! Like music, and dancing! So it's not like that everywhere?"

Maybe there are other horrible oppressive things happening back where she comes from... but the whole music thing is her big personal crusade. So hey.

Edited 2012-08-20 02:23 (UTC)

"Well, it's not bad." Equius shrugged. "But, uh, you shouldn't be doing that if you don't have some other, more useful skill that you're practicing also."

That was the general Empire mindset right there. At the end of the day, music and dance were just recreation, and the only time for recreation is after work is done.

"Music's useful! Entertaining people's useful! It makes them happy when things are awful!" She's getting pretty worked up, here. He needs to understand this!

"I'm with AKB0048! We go from planet to planet and sing for people and make them happy and fight DES! That's REALLY useful! Only the BEST singers and dancers get to do that!"

"A-alright." She had a point, he supposed, even though as far as he was concerned, the happiness was worthless if it wasn't used to get something more tangibly productive done. Looks like he's not in the mood to pursue it, though. Instead, he latched onto something else Sonata mentioned, shortly afterward. "...DES?"

Amalia, having eaten the oatmeal on her first day knew how horrible it was and now spent some of her time helping the other new arrivals. Since it was morning, Amalia had gotten some juice and fruit from the menu and was bringing it around to people she could tell were even newer than she was.

She approached Sonata with a smile.

"I know it's awful, but once you're done that oatmeal, I have some fruit here for you. It'll get rid of the taste, I promise."

Ooh, someone friendly. Someone friendly with nice hair, and also fruit! Her suspicious expression quickly became bright and smiley.

"Thank you! They wouldn't give Sonata anything except for oatmeal..."

She's already reaching out to grab one of the pieces of melon. If not warned that it's a bad idea, she'll just be popping it into her mouth.

"Eee! No, you can't eat it yet!"

Amalia picks up the plate of fruit and holds it over her head. "You have to finish the oatmeal first or you'll get sick!"

"I can't?" She's still reaching! She's still making grabby hands! She's.... sitting back and looking rather dejected.

"Why'll I get sick?"

Amalia looks terribly apologetic and pats Sonata on the arm. "I'm sorry, but not until you eat all the oatmeal. I promise it'll be worth it, all right? I don't know why people get sick if they don't eat the oatmeal first... and no one else seems to either."

"That's dumb...." Dumb, but she's relenting to girl's advice. With renewed determination she powers down the rest of that oatmeal. The last swallow is a bit difficult, and she's not sure if it's all going to stay down at first.

"Yuck..."

Victory! She shoves the bowl away, tosses the spoon into it, and is back to grabbing at the melon. "Now it's time for fruit! Yeah!"

Amalia laughs and doesn't stop her this time, keeping the plate from being knocked off the table as the girl energetically grabs the fruit from it.

"Go ahead. So your name is Sonata? I'm Amalia."

Sonata is too busy to talk for a bit, she's so preoccupied with stuffing her face with fruit. There's a muffled attempt to speak, yes, but the words are all garbled and... melon-y.

"Ahhmm-" GULP. Okay. Let's try that again. "Amalia! Amalia.... hmmmm... Ammy! Sonata's gonna call you Ammy! Good to meet you, Ammy!"

"Ammy?" She tried it out and then decided, it seemed okay. No one had given her a nickname in a very long time.

"Where are you from, Sonata?"

"Sonata's from Nevadastar! But I was staying on Akibastar with the other understudies and the rest of Zero-Zero and...."

Some of her enthusiasm leaves her. They're not here. If that letter was right, they're all gone.

"...where are you from, Ammy?"

"I'm from the Sadida Kingdom, which is on the continent of Bonta in the World of Twelve," Amalia answered. She paused and then smiled a little. "I guess that wouldn't make much sense to anyone else, does it?"

"Ooooooh..." It sounded very impressive. And very far away. And very much like somewhere she hadn't heard of at all.

"...Sonata doesn't mind! It sounds like a nice place! My places probably don't make sense to you..." She pauses to pop another piece of melon into her mouth, and only continues once its devoured. "...there are lots of people. So... they're from lots of places?"

Places that please, please, please, would still be out there?

"Yse, there are. Places I've never heard of before... and they've never heard of Bonta or Sukofia or any place from my world. It's strange to think of 'world' as a number rather than a size, at least to me."

"There was a boy with horns who said he was from Alternia! Sonata's never heard of that one, either! Huh... worlds as a size?"

"Oh, that sounds pretty by its name," Amalia answered. "And... well, I always thought of the world as big, that's all. I guess it must seem like a silly comparison now..."

"Maybe it is... he didn't describe it. But it is a pretty name! Hmm..."

The matter of relative bigness was an interesting one to think about. Sonata tapped her spoon against the edge of her bowl as she thought about it. "One world is big... but the universe is even bigger! And... and if there's lots of universes... then wow, things are really big, huh? And we're kind of little..."

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[Open] How Far Will My Voice Carry?

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fdjksalfhjkdl I THOUGHT I RESPONDED TO THIS u_u Sorry!!

IT'S OKAY I have been laggy as heck!

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