2026-07-10: For My Next Act
- Log: 2026-07-10 For My Next Act
- Cast: Shinichi Nagisa, Yanagi Nagisa
- Where: University Hospital, Shibuya, Tokyo
- OOC Date: July 10, 2026
- IC Date: Friday, December 07, 2012
- Summary: At the same time that Yanagi Nagisa is called to a certain hospital to deliver a jewelry commission, Shinichi Nagisa is called to the same hospital to help with a shift. The two estranged siblings meet eyes, and both misunderstand the other. It's exactly how she planned it.
<Pose Tracker> Shinichi Nagisa has posed.
Just another commission for Peacock Silk, requesting specifically the talents of one Yanagi Nagisa. They've requested a piece which seems rather strange and contradictory.
A diamond bracelet, of alternating cut diamonds and uneven cheap raw ones- the colloquial diamonds in the rough. Linked on one side to the Shogi piece for the Gyokusho. On the other side, the Fuhyo.
Simple enough, but why? It must have meaning that is only evident to the commissioner. Yet it's strange enough a piece that it might intrigue Peacock Silk's sensibilities.
The one final request is that Yanagi Nagisa deliver it to the commissioner in person, at the University Hospital in Shibuya. Today, on Friday, at 15:45 sharp. Which is why it might be puzzling with such exacting requirements that Yanagi receives a message that she's 'running late' with her 'apologies' and will be there shortly.
Meanwhile- a young man jogs from the station, still wearing Shujin's uniform, though one can't see it with the grey coat he's wearing, bag swinging in the chill of the December breeze behind him, breath fogging with every exhalation. He'd gotten a text that they were swamped today by a nursing supervisor, asking if he could get there as soon as possible after, if he were available.
Still it takes time to get cross town, even going as fast as he can. He can't just leave school early. Still, he's making good time... the hospital's in sight, and he doesn't have to park, so it's a straight shot for that front door.
Slowing his pace into a fast walk so he won't run into anyone leaving the hospital, he makes his way across the crosswalk quickly, up to the sidewalk.
<Pose Tracker> Yanagi Nagisa has posed.
It may be strange and contradictory, but to Yanagi Nagisa, it's quite exciting. Her long-time dream as an amateur and later professional jeweler has been to cut her own diamonds. Diamonds can only be cut by other diamonds, so it's quite difficult and quite expensive, even by Peacock Silk standards where money is just a number. However, if this client wants badly cut diamonds, then that's the perfect opportunity to practice!
The end result is an absolute hot mess of a diamond bracelet in terms of the stones. The gold in which they're set, along with those shogi pieces, is immaculately shaped, though. Maybe that'll heighten the elegance of the contradiction. Or maybe the buyer will get mad and throw it in her face. Who knows! Yanagi is interested to find out.
That's why she doesn't mind the very exact requests of being hand-delivered at this exact time and this exact place. She is annoyed when she gets the message than the client is running late, though, and her eyebrows furrow as she frowns at her phone.
However, sometimes these things happen. Yanagi takes a seat at one of the chairs in the hospital waiting room and retrieves earbuds from her purse. Connecting them to said phone, she puts on some classical music, then puts the earbuds in and listens with eyes shut.
She's humming along, fingers tapping on the handle of her oddly shaped walking cane, when Shinichi enters the hospital. She's on the other side of some of the seating from the entrance--the view from here is nicer for when she opens her eyes, even if it's a longer walk--so he may not immediately notice her.
Even if he does, if they're really that swamped, he might well get dragged off before he can get a good look at her. And while she may be wearing a chic pink alpaca wool dress with a layered frill skirt and a high neck, a white bolero jacket to ward off the chill, and several pieces of her own jewelry... she has that same pale gray, wavy hair, even if it's clipped to the sides with a pair of silver cloud hair pins.
<Pose Tracker> Shinichi Nagisa has posed.
Certainly they're paying exorbitantly for this piece. More than enough for Yanagi to cut the diamonds herself, enough to even experiment with it in a trial and error.
The fact that it's a hot mess is fine, after all, that's exactly what they desired.
Shinichi enters the hospital at a fast walk, when a younger nurse who was just waiting in the lobby strolls up to him.
"Oh! If it isn't Shin-chan."
Which forces him to stop mid-stride, in a stutter step because he was trying to hurry to where he needed to go.
"Ah! Hey there, Ooi-san. You kinda caught me in a rush- apparently they're swamped right now upstairs."
"It's true, we really are today- say while you're here, can you help me get a discharged patient into a car? Everyone else is so busy, I couldn't find anyone."
"Oh- ah, yeah of course."
"I'll just bring them down then- you wait here, Shin-chan."
As the woman hastened into a nearby elevator, and he just stands in place for a while, keeping his hands in his coat pockets to warm up, as he fidgets, still high energy from the quick trip on over.
-=-=-
The nurse entered the elevator by herself, and as the door slid shut. "I did as you asked."
"You did."
A key is handed over.
"You'll find it in this bus locker at Shinjuku station. Remember- none of this ever happened. Especially if he asks you about it. You weren't even at work today."
"I don't get it. Why all this- what do you want with Nagisa-san?"
"Let's just say- I'm doing him a favor. I work for an agency that reunites separated family members and she desires to surprise him."
The nurse looks surprised, then dubious, but- "Well if that's all, there's no harm."
It was certainly shady- but not illegal as far as she could see. She didn't want to probe any further into what that teenager had gotten himself into.
She'd heard about the drug trafficking in Shibuya earlier this year, after all.
-=-=-
It's about five minutes later and he's already checking his phone's clock again, looking anxiously towards the elevator.
Then taking a deep breath, he moves towards the chairs. Discharges get held up often, he knew that much. So he might as well look over his homework from class.
He turns towards the seats, dropping his bag on the arm rest of one unclaimed one, but as he was about to sit down-
He catches a glimpse of that shock of pale grey wavy hair, and there's an audible, sharp inhalation. Because that look at her really takes him back, to just a few years ago. He'd never seen her dress so chic, because well, she spent most of her time in a hospital during those years of her life.
He then takes a moment to steady himself, a smile, like 'Get it together Shinichi. That's obviously not her.'
But the longer he looks, the more he doubts that impression, as he listens to the humming- wondering if that could be what his sister sounded like- thinking it might be. Before long, he's just staring outright at her. Not the stare of a boy checking a girl out or anything-
It's more a dawning mixture of fear and doubt and outright horror. His skin loses that ruddy color from the cold rapidly, breaking out into a cold sweat, his pupils dilate and-
"Nee-san?" He says out loud, at a low volume, but perhaps enough that it might reach her beneath her head phones.
It can't be her- it just can't be. Yet it feels like his entire reality is breaking down at the possibility it might be.
She died at a hospital...
...but not this hospital.
Even if she were a ghost it wouldn't make sense! And Shinichi Nagisa certainly believes in ghosts.
<Pose Tracker> Yanagi Nagisa has posed.
Five minutes can be a long time. Less so when you're wreathed in the world of music you love. Ballets in particular have such robust scores, too. As she listens and hums along--and that is certainly something Shinichi's sister used to do--she idly kicks her legs back and forth...
Fearfully skinny thighs and... oversized calves. A hallmark of someone with DMD.
And DMD is exceptionally rare in girls, much less women.
She has her eyes shut, so she doesn't see him; she has earbuds in, so she doesn't hear him. But as she bobs back and forth, one of those earbuds falls out, and she looks down to retrieve it with a light, "Oh!"
She's in the middle of setting it back in her ear when she happens to hear her brother's voice. She looks up and spots Shinichi staring at her like he's just seen a ghost.
Because, in a sense, he most certainly has.
Yanagi also looks stunned to see him. He ought to be back in Mikage-cho with their parents. But... that uniform... that's from a Tokyo school. The look on her face turns blank. Whether her entire family moved or he's just here to attend school or something else entirely, it doesn't really matter; given the time of year, maybe it's more surprising that they haven't run across each other before now. It's approaching the end of second semester, after all.
Her eyelids droop. He looks quite horrified to see her.
He must be disappointed that she's alive after all. Afraid that she'll go back to ruining his life by existing.
Well, she doesn't plan on coming back to the dead for him or their parents. She loves them, and that's why she has no desire to chain them down by returning to them. She reasserts a soft smile, waves to Shinichi in a friendly sort of way, and returns to her music.
Humming with eyes shut and slowly kicking her feet all the while.
<Pose Tracker> Shinichi Nagisa has posed.
The details get taken in, moment to moment. The build of her legs, for example. They have the hallmarks of someone with Yanagi's disease. He remembers how the thighs never quite grew like they ought to.
"It- it can't be you-"
'Oh!'
The breath, the word he might have said hitches in his throat, becoming a hoarse rasping sound instead, like someone who can't quite catch their breath.
She obviously recognizes him! What other explanation is there other than the idea that she is her.
There's not one.
Then she just- waves, and returns to her music, like it was no big deal whatsoever the fact that she came back from the dead.
She might as well have said 'Hey bro'. Then just went back to what she was doing like he was a stranger- but that it was no big deal. "What- what the-" He chokes on a laugh, "-Ahaha- ha-...!" -nothing makes sense- nothing about this makes sense!
At least if she were a ghost from beyond, here to haunt him and torment him for his sins, he'd get it! He'd get it! But there she is, alive and- it's just nothing to her.
Nothing makes sense! NOTHING MAKES SENSE! It can't be real. But it is.
He takes a step backwards, not even remembering his bag is there, not even caring. Then another.
His sins are immense- he killed her...
... but she's alive.
... but she bears him no grudge.
... but she acts like they're barely acquaintances.
It's a vertigo of contradictory, dissonant thoughts, as he takes another step back, ramming into a divider like stand of furniture, and stumbling, as now the others in the lobby all glance at him.
Concern.
Judgment.
They're all looking at him. Like they know what he's done.
And the person he did it too doesn't even seem to give the slightest damn.
Like a deer caught in the headlights of society's attention, he freezes. And then- without warning, he turns around and bolts out the door, the mechanical doors having difficulty opening in time to keep up with his speed, as his shoulder checks the edge of it.
"Hey no running- ... Shin-chan?" One of the greeters questions it as he tears off.
The next thing Yanagi hears from outside is angry honks, because he ran across the crosswalk when it wasn't time. Shouts from people condemning the reckless- dangerous behavior.
He keeps running. No, indeed, he has to keep running. He has to keep running until he gets so far away from her that the world makes sense again.
And his school bag is still there, right where he left it.
<Pose Tracker> Yanagi Nagisa has posed.
And thus do brother and sister misunderstand each other... Yanagi believes that Shinichi is upset because she's alive after all, and attempted to convey that he needn't worry, that she won't interfere with his life again; Shinichi believes that Yanagi smiles and waves and returns to her music because she doesn't care and seeing him again means nothing despite how badly he hurt her.
That's the pain of bonds. A world in which it matters so much, but people still pass each other by.
Since she has those earbuds back in, she doesn't hear him choke on his laughter or see him melt down on the spot. Certainly she doesn't see him freeze and bolt. It's the impact, the subtle vibration, that gets her to look up and over at him in time for him to barrel past the greeter and dash into the street. She turns in her seat, removing her earbuds, and sees and hears him nearly get run over.
"...Shin-chan...?"
He acts like he's just seen a ghost.
Yanagi laughs a little, ruefully. They always did say that at school, back when she still attended.
She turns her attention forward, to the spot where she originally saw him. From here, she can see the bag he left behind. With care, she leans forward and uses her walking cane to support her up onto her feet, then hobbles over to what he left behind. When she reaches it, she sinks to the floor with care and turns it over to toy with the zipper for a moment.
Ultimately, she decides not to. These are bonds that are best left severed. Perhaps, later on, he can pretend it was all just a bad dream.
Rising upright with difficulty, she takes the bag with her to the front desk.
"Excuse me--that young man who was just here left this behind... Could you please make sure to return it to him?"
Yanagi smiles.
"Thank you."
She looks up and down the halls; checks her phone. There are no new messages. She finds she's feeling rather unsettled and she'd rather not stay either. She half-turns and decides to wait one more moment. She cares just enough about this commission for diamonds to give that much of a courtesy.
Then she plans to leave, with or without payment.
<Pose Tracker> Shinichi Nagisa has posed.
And it's at that moment, that a woman approaches Yanagi from behind. "Ah, are you Nagisa-san?" The woman who she faces is in her mid-thirties and- a complete hot mess in the sense of style and fashion.
The colors she wears are so searingly bright as to hurt the eyes, with mismatched accessories that make it feel like asymmetrical disharmony.
It feels like everything she's wearing is an experiment in discovering who one is, like a person screaming loudly to the world that they're there.
And begging the question: 'What are you going to do about it?'
All haphazardly selected by the person watching her to play the part of their eccentric clientele.
"I hope I didn't leave you waiting for too long! I'm excited to see the commission."
-=-=-
He'd left the sink full of vomit, from the stitches he'd given himself from sprinting that long and that hard across Shibuya.
For once in his life, he did not feel bad about the inconvenience to other people.
"The fuck- fuck!" He panted in the stall, having struck his forehead against the tile wall.
Sometimes all it takes is a chink in someone's armor. And what happened today had transmuted it to dross.
"It's her- what am I going to do. Fuck- what am I-"
And in the panting breaths between one moment in the next, as he tries to put together who he is now- with a Yanagi who is still alive.
Pointless
Useless
I know who I am
I've always known who I am
Suddenly, the answer became clear.
And a monster in the shadows of his mind pulls a disappearing trick- it's such a good trick, that Shinichi Nagisa doesn't even realize he's no longer present.
"Fuck it. Haha... Goddamn. I've made myself into such a useless shit over nothing."
The answer was just so very clear. After all, he came up with it himself.