2026-10-02: Artifice Child
- Log: Artifice Child
- Cast: Yua Ijuuin, Maya Amano, Miho Ijuuin
- Where: Aoba - Main
- OOC Date: October 02, 2026
- IC Date: January 18, 2013
- Summary: Maya Amano comes to visit Yua Ijuuin, and Miho Ijuuin is there. Introducing: Pyon-Pyon! But Yua still has difficulty with her emotions, and reveals that Miho likes vampires...
(|=============================== Aoba - Main ================================|)
-=================================================== Sumaru City/Aoba Ward ====-
To Sumaru's east is Aoba Ward, where fashion and commerce abound. The city's
fire department headquarters is based here too. Ample shopping can be found at
the stores that dot Aoba Way. Past it, Aoba Park is a popular place to walk
around and relax, especially since there's an outdoor concert hall located
deeper within where one might catch a live concert.
Various programs are filmed at Sumaru TV, where famous stars like veteran
actress Junko Kurosu, talk show host Hidehiko "Brown" Uesugi, and popular model
Eriko "Elly" Kirishima might be spotted. Along the way, one will pass Kismet
Publishing, where popular publications like hot teen magazine Coolest are made.
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ijuuin has posed.
Yua has been in her new home away from home for almost a week, now, and she's already ready to leave. Even more ready to leave than she was yesterday, which is saying something--!!
(Yua has asked to get out of here every day since she got here. Every day, they've had to insist that Miho wants Dr. Matsuhashi to clear her before she's comfortable letting her go. Every day, she's gotten upset, and they've had to ask Miho to talk to her when she comes for her daily visit.)
... luckily, Miho's already come for her today, though. It means Yua is... a little more settled, even after that scare this morning with her blood pressure dropping so low. They still won't even let her walk around without help... and not walking so much is really making it harder when she tries.
She's a dancer...
Mouuuuuuu...
Yua can't be sad, though -- because she's holding Hiroki, and when she gets upset, Hiroki cries, too! If anything, that's been even more stressful, especially during all those times when she can't control how she feels... someone told her it would just come naturally, but it isn't coming naturally, and maybe that's just one more reason why she's broken.
... at least looking at Hiroki makes her happy. He's bigger than he was, before; he's 29 weeks, now, and three days, and he's shed a little of that fuzz. He's still so small and has so many things sticking out of him, but that's less apparently when he's wrapped against her bare chest, the wrap keeping him positioned so he doesn't get into trouble as he keeps trying to figure out how feeding works. (Dr. Matsuhashi says they'll be doing 'dry breastfeeding' for a while yet... it's just one of the ways Yua thinks Miho's a better mother, right now.)
Her private room -- she's an Ijuuin, she has a private room -- is looking more homely by now, at least; there's a weighted blanket arranged around her shoulders (no doubt by Miho's careful hand), giving her a little more privacy despite her bare chest just being covered by that wrap, and the bedside table has a small stack of Destiny movies and a portable DVD player for when no one's visiting. (There is, of course, also the omnipresent Hospital TV up there, for live broadcasts.) There's a cot in the corner with a terrifying amount of gadgets around it where Hiroki sleeps; Yua's hospital bed has an awful lot of stuff around it, too: IV poles for her intravenous medicine, drains, a wheelchair whose particulars ought not to be deeply examined... Miho's lounging chair, of course, has prominence right beside the bed (it doubles as Yua's chair when they get her out of bed to sit up properly!), but there's another chair or two by the wall. One of them has towels and a basin stacked on it, from where a nurse began a task and then got sidetracked by ten others.
And of course, there are an awful lot of cards and flowers which have been delivered, over the week.
<Pose Tracker> Maya Amano has posed.
"Ja-jan~!" Maya calls out in a singsong voice. "Maya here!"
The door to Yua's room abruptly opens and there, standing in the doorway is none other than Maya Amano, smiling cheerily. In her hands she holds a large plush rabbit, its soft fur the same shade as a mug of hot cocoa. It wears a pink ribbon around its neck.
"Sorry I'm late to visit!" Maya says apologetically as she shuts the door behind her. "I thought you might have had plenty of flowers already." She glances over at the veritable collection of bouquets gathered on a nearby table; her reporter's intuition was right on, after all! "So I brought this instead!"
Maya waggles the bunny side-to-side before handing it over to Yua. Maya really likes rabbits -- so why not share the love, right?
<Pose Tracker> Miho Ijuuin has posed.
Miho has helped as best she can; unfortunately, that's not always enough here. It's difficult!
But just now, she's been outside the room, collecting a Snack for Yua and some coffee for herself. Now, she arrives just after Maya.
The door does not shut after all; instead Miho catches it. "Timing," Miho reflects positively.
"...That rabbit is very cute."
Yes, she can acknowledg cuteness. It can happen.
"I have your snack, Yua. And hello, Amano-san."
Miho looks a little tired... But happy, too. Look at Hiroki!!
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ijuuin has posed.
Miho's doing her best... but Yua has so many problems. There are moments, at least, she can step out, clear her head, get some coffee, perhaps cheer Yua up with a nice little slice from the cafe...
... but judging by the sounds from their room, something's already cheering her?!
"Ah! Yaa-yaa!" Sorry, Maya, you have a CUTE NICKNAME now. Suffer injustice. "Yaa-yaa here!! ... hands!!"
Miho's stepped out, so there's a moment of silence, plus metaphorical tumbleweed, before Yua remembers to explain: "You gotta wash your hands! No germs allowed! Hiro-tan's not strong yet!!"
That's the precise moment Miho catches the door, and Yua brightens, when she sees her. "Right, Mimi?" She asks, as if Miho is the arbiter of explanations and can grade hers.
(Don't worry, there's plenty of hand sanitiser. On the wall, at the end of the bed, on the bedside table...)
That interrupting moment, of course, is followed soon by Yua's gasp of: "Oooooohhhh!", as Maya reveals bunny. Miho declares it to be cute, and Yua admires it just the same, though her hands stay around Hiroki. (How is she planning to eat a snack?! ... come on, you know the answer to that question.) "Pyon pyon! Pyon pyon...!"
('Hop, hop'; it's the sound bunnies make.)
"Yaa-yaa, put Pyon-pyon with Gin! He can help, too!" Gin, it seems, is the silver kitsune plush on the bedside table she looks to. She smiles to Maya, as she says: "A friend of mine gave me Gin back when I first got pregnant, so he could help protect us... and now he's got another friend to help! When Hiroki's well enough, he'll have so many protectors...!!"
Is that how stuffed animals work...?
"Look, look," Yua says, as she looks down to the boy at her breast. "He has Mimi's hair!" What little wisps they can see, anyway. "And Mimi's eyes, too..." Hiroki is dark like Yua is, though -- even darker, in fact, though not so much so that it's inconceivable she's his mother.
<Pose Tracker> Maya Amano has posed.
With a comically serious expression, Maya gives Yua a thumbs-up and gets to washing up. "Hey, Miho-san! And Hi-ro-ki-kun~!" There Maya goes with the sing-song. Maya is apparently in a good mood -- but she is most of the time. They didn't call her Maya "Let's Think Positive" Amano for nothing!
Well... now, they called her Ya-ya. Maya's lips curl up in a little smile as she plays the nickname in her head again. "Let's move you over, Pyon-Pyon!"
And that's exactly how stuffed animals work!
She sets Pyon-Pyon over with Gin and offers Miho a proper smile in greeting. "I got it at the gift shop at the station!" she explains. "Pyon-Pyon was sitting in the window, just waiting for someone to take him home!"
And now a home he had!
"How old is he now?" Maya asks. "He's getting so big!"
<Pose Tracker> Miho Ijuuin has posed.
Miho, too, will sanitize her hands. She was outside the room!
"Right," Miho agrees with Yua calmly.
But BUNNY. Mr. Pyon-Pyon!
Miho smiles back at Maya. She may not be the most demonstrative woman, but this situation just brings that out in her. "He will," Miho agrees. "Very many. And we'll all keep him safe."
Of course she's a protector, too.
She nods then. A resemblence! "He will grow into both."
But how old is he? It's kind of Maya to say he's getting big; Miho's heart is softened by it. But the age...
"That..."
Miho considers. "That depends on how you reckon time," she decides. "He's up to 29 weeks of development, but he was born nearly a week ago..."
what counts??? Miho isn't a baby expert. ...Yet.
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ijuuin has posed.
Yua could use a little positive thinking right about now, it seems. Even Miho's getting into it, and that makes Yua smile, too! "Mm, mm! We'll be okay with Mimi here! Don't you feel safe with Mimi, chimbin?" That's the Okinawan word for crepe, as it happens. "An yaibiin, ammaatu ammaa...! We'll take care of you!" And that's an assurance to him that both his mothers will protect him... again, in Okinawan, because Yua's been switching between one language and the other all week. (More often, though, when papa comes to visit...)
"I wonder how far he travelled?" Yua muses, as she consideres Pyon-Pyon in his seat. "Maybe he's a rabbit from Inaba... like the ones Father likes...!"
But then... how old is he? "He's six days old!" Yua boasts, only to pause, and add: "But he came ten weeks early... so maybe he's... eto... seven, fourteen, twenty-eight, umm... forty minus four... thirty six... how many weeks was that? Um, eight? Thirty six plus fourteen... so six plus four is ten... so thirty plus ten plus ten... fifty... fifty minus six... so he's minus forty four days old!"
That's right. Yua went through her whole mental process trying to figure that out just for everyone to hear.
<Pose Tracker> Maya Amano has posed.
"One week old already!" Babies really were something. "I wish I could have been here sooner, but someone quit and we were scrambling to cover for her right before deadline." Whoops.
Maya accepts Yua's answer at face value; math has never been Maya's strongest subject and Yua seems to know what she's talking about!
"Do you have a discharge date yet?" Maya asks, leaning down to waggle a finger experimentally in front of Hiroki.
<Pose Tracker> Miho Ijuuin has posed.
More often... Hmm. That's probably not important.
"From Inaba," Miho reflects. "That would be interesting, wouldn't it? But I don't know that they're known for their plushes..."
"...But Pyon-Pyon gets to keep his fur."
Six days old... ten weeks early. Miho listens to Yua's logic.
"But then we'd have to celebrate his birthday later," she says. "Let's stick with six days." She smiles. "We just got to see him earlier than expected, is all."
babies really are something. "It's fine," Miho says to Maya. "You're here now."
But...
"I'm afraid they're both here for a while longer, yet."
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ijuuin has posed.
"Oh no! Did you manage to write it?" Yua asks, with a great gasp, as Maya reveals THE CHAOS AT THE PRINTING PRESS. (Is there ever not chaos at the printing press...?) "All those young women are counting on you, Yaa-yaa!"
Hiroki -- who was just cooked enough to come out able to blink -- is still quite unfocused, but when a WEIRD BLOB WHICH DOESN'T SMELL FAMILIAR comes into his field of view, he blinks those big eyes and turns his head from Yua's breast to investigate. "Uu..." He says, as he assesses whether this is a weird hand or a good hand, which is already something he's having to figure out with how many people are handling him in a hands-off kind of way... but when the finger comes no closer, he just nuzzles back into Yua.
Being fair, it's just easier to speak Okinawan with her fellow islander in the room... Yua's grasp of it isn't very good, herself, and she's had her grandmother's education. Poor Miho is trying to catch up to an endangered language... though Yua's always teaching her little phrases, like how 'ammaa' is mama, and 'ammaatu' is both mamas...
Yua giggles, when Miho makes her little joke about the Inaban rabbit. "Hee hee... poor bunny! Don't worry, Pyon-Pyon! Mimi will protect you, too!!" Will he still repay Miho's kindness if she keeps him from being flayed to begin with...?
Surely he must.
Miho mentions his birthday, though, and Yua gasps. "Oh, that's right! I'm sorry, sweetie! Mama wouldn't push your birthday back, no sir! Nuh-uh-uh!" For all she's experiencing transition shock into motherhood, Yua at least already has high baby register locked and loaded in her vocal profile...
... though her voice is sadder, as she heaves a great sigh. "Mouuuu... they say I'm unstable, so I can't go home, 'cause what if I get sick and something happens... but I wanna go home! I wanna! I --" Yua's distress, though, triggers Hiroki's alarm, as he stirs again, with an unsettled "uu, uu --"
-- and perhaps it's Miho's quick action which settles the both of them, because the best outcome to that is Yua letting out her breath and shaking her head. "It's okay, baby, you're okay, mama's okay," she assures Hiroki, gently, holding him firmly just as the nurses said she ought. "Mimi won't let them take us, we won't disappear, we're okay..."
... what kind of weird reassurance is that? Sure, Hiroki seems convinced, but...
<Pose Tracker> Maya Amano has posed.
Maya is not dismayed by the rejection; Hiroki is still young and figuring out the world. And there's a lot more time ahead of him to do it!
"Yup, just in time! Feels like we're always getting it done at the eleventh hour!" The work could be stressful, but the core team always managed to pull it together. Even if it meant a few sleepless nights. The two of them are probably having plenty of sleepless nights now that Hiroki was here, too!
"Is that so?" Maya says at the answer. "Well, take your time and get 100% better! The world will keep waiting for you and Hiroki-kun for as long as it takes!"
Still, Miho still seems considerably more pensive than Maya is -- and that hasn't gone unnoticed by Maya. She'll have to check in on her later!
<Pose Tracker> Miho Ijuuin has posed.
Miho smiles at Maya's interaction with Hiroki. "He can't show much interest yet," she says, "But the stimulation will help him develop."
There have definitely been sleepless nights, though. And, "I am not surprised that you managed," Miho says to Maya. "You were always talented and hardworking."
Miho will protect Pyon-Pyon...
"His birthday is important," Miho agrees, and then suddenly--
Unstable. "Shhh," Miho says soothingly, trying to address Yua's distress and thus Hiroki's distress. "it's all right. It's all right..."
Miho is pensive, moreso even than is usual. There is a lot on her mind.
"Yes, Amano-san is right," Miho says, still formal though she likes Maya. "You'll come out into the world with all of us."
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ijuuin has posed.
"Mm," Yua nods, when Miho explains Hiroki's sightline. "His eyes only just work... we need to be really careful, or he could go blind!"
(That's why this room's on the darker side, incidentally.)
Sometimes, it's not even Hiroki... but just the pain Yua's in, keeping her up. But it is often Hiroki -- he's only just developed the ability to enter REM sleep to begin with. Even now Miho's gone home, Yua often calls or texts at all hours, upset because something else is wrong...
('We won't disappear'; it's easy for her to say that when there isn't a needle coming for her. How can she protect her son when they're sabotaging her like they are now? She can barely even walk properly...)
But Maya, for all her talent, does not have the positivity to stopper Yua's strange outsized reaction to her stay; Yua looks up to her, when she feels her hand on her arm, and bites her lip as she reminds herself that those hands would rip the facility apart if she got lost inside it.
"The world forgot," she says, quietly, sullenly. "The world forgets... and just moves on."
It would be so easy, she thinks.
She wonders who wants her baby, with those strange listening bugs Miho keeps stripping from the room...
... the baby of a woman who shouldn't have a Persona.
It's Hiroki she thinks of as the target, not Miho...
"But... but Mimi never forgot," she adds, and presses herself to smile, as she looks from Miho to Maya. "Even when the secret kept eating... Mimi never forgot." When Remi went missing, too, she means... though of course she can't out her to Maya, here.
<Pose Tracker> Maya Amano has posed.
Maya blinks, trying to comprehend what Yua is talking about. 'The world forgets'? Mimi? A secret that keeps eating? She definitely needs to talk to Miho about this later.
Maya shoots a quick, concerned look over at Miho before returning her attention back to Yua. She should probably change the topic, right? Something she said may have made Yua worse.
"I can't stay much longer, but is there anything I can bring the three of you the next time I drop by? Oh! We have a horoscope feature this month on Capricorns!" Hiroki-kun's sign! "I'll bring a copy the next time I see you!"
Hiroki's birthday is important, after all!
<Pose Tracker> Miho Ijuuin has posed.
Miho, of course, knows exactly what Yua is talking about. The world did forget. It moves on...
Miho looks to Maya with a meaningful cast to her eyes. She nods to Maya, willing to talk about it another time.
"I didn't," Miho assures her. "I won't."
Then... Hmmm...
"Yua I'm sure would enjoy more things to make her stay easier. ...I could use some better coffee than they have in the cafeteria..."
She smiles. "Good. That would be fun. Let's talk later, too, Amano-san."
"As for you, Yua..."
She lifts Snack. "Are you hungry?"
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ijuuin has posed.
"I want... book!" Yua decides, her mood brightening when she thinks of gifts. "I like romance! Oh, something with vampires! That's Mimi's favourite...!" MAN LISTEN TO YUA OUTING HER WIFE AS A VAMPIRE ENJOYER
A-at least it's better than crumpling under the weight of hidden horrors...?
(Does Yua enjoy Sunset, that foreign young adult series which everyone keeps handwringing about teaching young women bad relationship goals even though the main enjoyers of the series are housewives? Obviously, yes.)
"Mm, mm... book and magazine! Reading stuff! Yay! I can read to Hiro-tan...!" Maybe... maybe get a third book for that one...
It's fine, Miho will take care of it, Yua's brain is just fried from having just had a baby.
Well, from having just had a baby and all those weird hypoglycaemic episodes as her hormones go nuts...
... luckily, Miho's already been briefed on how she can help with those, and Yua's eye lights up when Miho lifts that caramel slice. "Aaaa...!"
They said that Hiroki likes consistent pressure, so of course her hands are occupied, so of course she just opens her mouth for Miho to feed her.
Magically, just like that, she's happy again...