2025-12-21: Our Future
- Log: Our Future
- Cast: Yua Ooshiro, Miho Ijuuin
- Where: Aoba - Penthouse
- OOC Date: 2025-12-21
- IC Date: Tue Aug 28 2012
- Summary: Following their mission, Yua recovers from her invocation of the Mark -- while Miho works. She has plans for the future, and Yua plans to support her, no matter what.
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ooshiro has posed.
"Oh," Yua sighs, as she looks at her phone, at a reminder that's popped up. "The fireworks festival... the one they were holding near Gekkoukan... looks like it's finishing up."
They've gotten home from their outing. Placing it at the time of the fireworks festival was entirely on purpose; it kept a few other go-getters out of the office earlier than usual, given their families in Iwatodai, and Rokuro estimated it would keep several of the busybodies distracted too. It was a serviceable distraction, all in all. Miho and Yua, naturally, were not consulted on the timing.
... but she'd wanted to go.
Yua is in bed, already in her nightgown; it's one of the few times, perhaps, that she could be permitted to be resting in bed this early. She certainly wouldn't put up with the indolence most times... but she'd told Sudou the truth, about how hard the Mark's invocation is on her.
"... will Hiroki really be all right?" she murmurs, as she puts her phone aside. "Those gifts... they're hard on me, Mimi..."
<Pose Tracker> Miho Ijuuin has posed.
"I suppose so."
Miho wears proper pajamas usually, top and bottom, when she wears something to bed. Or lounges near the bed. She's already changed into this, and is working on something unknowable on a laptop at her desk, across the room. It is not particularly secret, but it is not particularly... sane, either, story chained to story, link chained to link. If it were on the wall, it might be on a corkboard, photos connected by string. But it's a on a computer, so it looks sensible and businesslike. but when Yua speaks up...
Miho turns from where she is working, and looks to her. "I hope so," Miho says. "...But I also believe so. The doctor would have noticed if something were wrong."
She considers, and, after carefully logging out and turning on encryption again, she closes the laptop and rises from her chair. She begins to cross the distance to Yua again.
"I know," she says. "I would prefer if we never had to see you use them."
"...Not seeing what they do to you."
"...I'm sorry about the festival," she says. "I was also interested."
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ooshiro has posed.
"But... how can they know? Has... someone like you, or me..." and there's a little pause between them, because there is a slight distinction in Miho's arrangement, between those who received their powers from Gozen and those who did not, "... ever been pregnant, and used their Mark? I know Matsuhashi-sensei said the scans were all okay... but... but what if it's something the ultrasound can't see?"
(Miho had the foresight to book a somewhat-out-of-office-hours appointment with their fertility doctor after their crime, to be sure Yua got through it safely. Himari scolded them for putting Yua through so much stress, particularly before the thirteen-week mark which would put her through that high early risk of miscarriage, but all her investigations were reassuring. The baby wasn't harmed; Gretchen really was able to protect them.)
"... what if he's born, and his skin is Marked all over...?"
Apparently, Sudou's not the only one who's thought of it.
She looks over, to the desk, laying on her side so that she can better face Miho; she knows she's still working, and feels guilty that she is so exhausted, after what she's done. "... you're working hard..." She murmurs, but...
But Miho closes her laptop -- Yua, for her part, would never pry into it -- and rises up. Yua smiles, still a touch fragile; she plants a palm on their fine silken sheets, and shifts back on their nice, oversized bed to give her space. "I just wish... it wasn't for them," Yua frowns, lips pressing into a pout. "If it was really you asking, I'd feel a lot better about the risk... but why can't they ask someone else to frighten the poor man?"
... well, it probably has something to do with just what Yua's powers are.
Her pout only deepens, when Miho expresses her own sorrows about the festival. "I really wanted to go with you, before... before the wedding. I was going to wear my nice yukata, with the morning glories and the roses... moooouuuuuu..."
<Pose Tracker> Miho Ijuuin has posed.
There is a distinction. But what is it?
"...The ultrasound, paired with the various blood tests and other tests, can detect most problems that would be possible. We must simply trust them for now." Himari scolded them, and Miho... did not think she was wrong to do so. Still...
"That will not happen."
Miho is sure of that much. Sudou thought of it, but...
Miho would trust Yua with the laptop. This one she would not trust to the Order. That is why it must be so encrypted. The Order, and all those within it who would prey on Miho's secrets--who would search to know what she knows, would tap her very mind had they the ability.
Her Persona protects her from that, she thinks on worse days.
Miho comes to bed, then, and takes a seat. "I also wish that," she says. "I would that we could shake that influence..."
But Yua is sad. "I know," she says. "I wanted that, too."
"You would have been a vision," Miho says, and reaches to take Yua's hand.
"But..."
She frowns, troubled. It's not because of the man they terrorized earlier.
"...I think I will have to work harder," she says. "To achieve our ends, instead of only theirs."
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ooshiro has posed.
"Mm... I trust you, Mimi. If you say they can tell..." It's a subtle distinction; Yua doesn't trust medicine, but she'll trust Miho if Miho's trusting the medicine.
... Yua isn't sure she can be trusted with the laptop, though. Miho is... better at resisting their questioning, than she is.
Still... if Miho says their baby won't be marked, then...
On Miho's worse days, sometimes, she even convinces Yua.
When Miho comes to sit on the side of the bed, Yua pulls the sheet back to let her in, with a silent invitation. (Not that Yua would ever make Miho sleep in the guest bedrooms, of course. Miho does not go to the doghouse.) She releases those sheets to take Miho's hand; they fall against her silhouette, a little more curvacious than it was, as she twines her fingers in between Miho's.
"I wanted to be for you," she says, and the wedding looms as silent context to her sadness.
She takes in a breath, and sighs. "But, Mimi... what can we do? Even with that man and our power, and Ton-ton, too... how would we build enough power?"
<Pose Tracker> Miho Ijuuin has posed.
Miho believes it. They can tell.
...But as it happens, Miho would trust Yua with it... but doesn't have to, because Yua doesn't go for it! And Miho is indeed better at resisting questioning. But today is not one of those worse days. Today is a different kind of worse day, and when Yua invites her, Miho nods, and slides underneath the sheets. She keeps her hand in Yua's for now.
"I know," she says. "I want that."
But what...?
"I'm looking into possibilities," she says. "...Because you're right. On our own, we don't have it. I have some ideas..."
"One option is to gather those with that power. But that won't be enough. No..."
"I think that I must seek the powers that others rely upon. I must make some of the Order's powers subordinate to my own."
"...It will involve much search, and some travel. But I believe it can be done."
"It is... preferable, to the other option. If chaos empowers these abilities..."
"Then that would be a logical thing. But it is not my preference, to cause harm that might serve our ends."
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ooshiro has posed.
Yua slides over onto Miho, in turn, wrapping her body around her as she brings both their hands to rest against her chest.
"Mm," she hums, as she thinks of the words she'll need to say, and the woman she'll really be saying them for. "... it's okay. I'll be an Ijuuin soon."
Surely then... it's for her, regardless of what the invitations she penned with her beautiful calligraphy said.
But... possibilities.
"I don't want to... be that indiscriminate, either," Yua sighs. "He might see what you do, Mimi, but... I don't wish to do the things he does. He causes so much pain, to so many people... even people who aren't involved. Before you calmed me, I was scared, Mimi..."
She looks up, her brow creasing. "But... will the Powers that Be really let you take that power, Mimi? They're laughing at you... the men in the office said, you were next on the market... I guess that's something bad."
<Pose Tracker> Miho Ijuuin has posed.
"You will," Miho agrees. "And then we'll share a name." And more. But a name, that matters. And Miho continues to hold Yua, now that she's with her; she lays her other hand about Yua, and listens, and thinks.
"Yes," Miho says. "I agree. ...it is a crude, inelegant means. Perhaps one day it might be necessary... But I would prefer only to break what needs to be broken."
"It is not unreasonable, to be afraid of such a man."
She smiles, at that. "They will not have the choice. The dragon lines... I've begun tracing them to their sources."
"Once they are all mine, they will be unable to take them back."
But next on the market... Miho scowls.
"Hmph. So they say. But try as they might, they have not succeeded yet."
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ooshiro has posed.
"Your name..." And that does make Yua smile, for all her misgivings.
Her smile fades, though, when she thinks of Sudou's methods; she burrows in beside Miho, as if to seek safety from an assassination long since attempted. "Mm... I don't really want to think we'd have to do that, but... I trust your judgement, okay?"
Yua looks uneasy, beside Miho, though it's not because of Miho's decrees. No: "... he seemed very nice when he realised who we were, though. I guess... we're not that different, are we?" Yua causes pain and fear when she strikes, too...
Still, when Miho smiles, she gasps. "Mimi, you traced them already? You're amazing...!" She exclaims, smiling to her. "But how can we take them? Disturbing things like that... I'm not even sure Gretchen's strong enough to obscure it." Though she would surely try.
"Mm..." Yua scowls, when Miho speaks of her coworkers. "They really might try again, Mimi... when I'm married. They'll say something like, 'she's abandoned you', or 'you need to keep up appearances too', or..." She heaves a breath, and sighs. "... maybe it won't even be them. Well, I guess... image is important, and... if you need to... I won't blame you, okay, Mimi? Those things people expect... mm... it's not your fault."
<Pose Tracker> Miho Ijuuin has posed.
"It will be 'our name', soon."
But Sudou... Hm. "I appreciate that," she says of trusted judgement. "It is true that to effect change, blood must often be spilled. ...But to spill blood where it only might be of assistance... I am not so far gone as the Order, in that way. There are things yet that I will not do for them."
But he seemed nice. "We have similarities," she says. "But he is clearly unhinged, and dirty besides. He may yet have important wisdom to show us--but that does not mean that he is just like us."
Dang, Miho!! You took his sake and everything!!
"...That said, he may become a valuable ally. In time. If he seeks what I seek... Well."
But taking things? "There would be no need," Miho says. "When I reach them and claim them, they will become tied to me; then it will not matter if they can find them. They could not be taken for another hundred years. That is what the writings say."
But...
"They probably will," Miho agrees, "Try something of that nature. But they have dangled handsome men and beautiful women in front of me before. None were sufficient to shake my devotion."
"No, they fear me because I am free. They seek to chain me with a pawn of their own making."
"...No. I have no plans to do as they wish in that respect."
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ooshiro has posed.
"Our name!" Yua sighs, happily. "Mimi..."
She strokes her thumb over the side of Miho's hand, as she listens to her wisdom regarding blood. It's something which frightens her... but she's right, after all.
They are not the Powers.
Yua -- privately, at least -- isn't all that sure she's much more hinged; dirty, though, is a straight point to Miho. He was... not someone with a spa bath, is perhaps how she would put it. "... okay," Yua nods, when she adds that might be an ally anyway. "Mm... maybe we should have offered him a bath..."
Yua, you can't let the poors into the nice fancy bath you asked Miho to install because you were too scared to go outside back then. You don't know the first thing about being rich, Yua!!
"Then... we need only make sure you travel in darkness," Yua supposes, when Miho claims it's the claiming that will secure her power. "If it's like that... I can help you, Mimi!"
Miho's devotion, though...
Yua smiles, unlacing her hand at last -- but just so that she can reach up, to trace her fingers along those prominent cheekbones of the Ijuuin line. "Oh, Memimi...! I know nothing like that would convince you to betray me... but if you could be free, I'd be really happy. Appearances and tradition, they've been really heavy... you know? And I can't lift the weights you can..."
... which is not to say Yua can't lift any weights. Before she became pregnant, she could handle ten kilos on the bench press! ... which isn't a significant number, but it's one she had to work for.
Miho, you see, needed a training partner in her home gym, and a ballerina benefits from strength as much as a fencer... though through that communal exercise, Miho learned how delicate Yua is compared to the average woman.
Because Yua had to work up to ten kilos, when most women her size could have started at fifteen.
<Pose Tracker> Miho Ijuuin has posed.
Miho speaks, but she listens too. "I do not think he would have taken it," Miho says of the bath. "...Certainly not our bath."
But to travel in darkness? "Yes," Miho says. "Though for some of these, I may need you to stay here... to conceal that I am gone. Sometimes, leaving in darkness is as important as staying in the darkness." A smile, and a squeeze. "But you can help me in this way regardless."
But her devotion? It is clear. "Free... yes," she says, "That would be... preferable." Heavy...
"I am sorry they've been so heavy for you," Miho says, and does think of the way Yua can lift but small things. She is so much stronger than she is... physically, strong, though.
There is only one person who could ask Miho to marry and have her listen--and she does not think he is likely to do so soon.
"Let me help you with these weights. ...At least right now."
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ooshiro has posed.
"Mm... I guess not..." Yua sighs. "He seemed like he was very busy, so I suppose he wouldn't want to come all the way out here..."
Yua, that's not the point of him not using your bath.
"At least I won't have to worry about you," Yua smiles. "Even if you go to some far off land... there's no one who could defeat you."
(Miho, as an elite villain, can of course only be defeated on screen.)
"It's all right," Yua smiles, to Miho, and of course she can tell when she's being brave, because Yua is not brave at all. "Moms are tough!" She declares it, and then giggles, face turning in against Miho's chest. "I heard some of the children talking about that in class one day... they say it's from a video game! But it's true, don't you think?"
Yua, who has never played a single video game in her life, has no idea how that ends.
"Still... I really rely on that, you know," she smiles, stroking at Miho's cheek. "You're my rock, Mimi... if I couldn't hide beside you, it would certainly be too heavy."
<Pose Tracker> Miho Ijuuin has posed.
"That is also true," Miho allows, and decides not to belabor the point. It's fine. At least Yua won't have to worry. "I'm very strong," Miho answers. "...I won't be stopped."
(That's very important.)
But, Miho smiles back. "Is that so?" Miho wonders. "I didn't know the games these days were so concerned with mothers..."
"It is true," she agrees.
But, Yua relies on it. "You can always stay beside me," Miho says. "...We belong together."
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ooshiro has posed.
"You're the strongest!" Yua chirps, and certainly she must believe that.
She giggles, again, when Miho wonders about what video games are like. "I'm sure there are lots of video games about moms, Mimi! Who wouldn't want to play a mom?" Oh, no. No one tell her.
"Mmhm! That means I'm tough, too!!" ... and she must be tough in some respect, if she's able to be cheery for Miho, after a grueling mission like that.
She sighs -- more loving than beleagured -- as she rests her head on Miho's chest. "... then I'm happy," she says, legs curling around her a little more as her arm slips around her chest. "So long as I'm with you... I'm happy, Mimi."
Yua nestles in, eyes drifting closed. "I'm with you... whatever you need. I know you'll find a path forward, Mimi... whatever you need, I'll be right beside you."