[OPEN] only god can see what i've become.

[killtime]

⬤ Andy @ the CR Meme ⬤
⬤ Permissions Post ⬤

Who ⬤ Andromache of Scythia (now of Enma) & YOU!
What ⬤ The bastard woman drinks and brawls her way through May substories
When ⬤ Throughout the month of May
Where ⬤ A bar, a backlot, and a bloody arena
Content Warnings ⬤ Profanity, violence, substance use, sex, etc. To be updated as needed!



A | MOON MEDICINE / SUBSTORY #1

[ This might be the most alive she's felt since arriving in hell. Whatever the fuck was in that medicinal mochi — it's like being high on cocaine and bloodlust at the same time. It feeds into that part of her that has always loved a fight. That up-close and personal shit where you can practically smell your opponent's breath. That's what she was raised on, seven thousand years ago on the Eurasian steppe — heir of the warrior-queen, bare and bloody on the battlefield, her mother's axe in her right hand.

No axe now. No battlefield either. Just the dirty alley out behind some dive bar. But that look in her eye is the same now as it was back then, wild and bright as she slams her fist into the unrecognizable pulp that was formerly the face of the yokai who had gotten fresh with her inside. Her knuckles are split open, but she doesn't seem to notice. Tunnel vision, everything else utterly irrelevant while her opponent is still standing — and he is, just barely. Just enough to take another clumsy swing at her, a move so obvious and slow that, in her violent fervor, she barks out a mean laugh, teeth bared. Bracing herself, she lets gravity do most of the work as she catches her victim by the clothes and flings him out of the alley towards street —

Right into anyone unfortunate enough to be passing by. ]

B | VEND ME A DREAM / SUBSTORY #2

[ Normally, on a day like this, Andy would have found some way to drink herself into oblivion by now. But she's spent most of her time in hell hungover, and somewhere between the constant headaches and violent nausea, she figured her newly mortal body was probably begging her for a break from the bottle. But being both idle and sober lends itself too readily towards her tendency to wallow uselessly in her own misery, so when the shirime approaches her with its winking butthole and a request for item A5, well...

Fuck it. It's not as if she has anything better to do.

That's how she winds up in that backlot, leaning up against a porno vending machine with a dwindling cigarette hanging from the corner of her mouth as she flips through Juicy Peaches. The look on her face is one of stoic apathy, but either she's bored or the asses within are just that compelling, because she's still turning pages. This page in particular has her head turning slightly one way, then the other as she considers it. Out loud, to nobody in particular: ]

...That's a fucking fish.

[ Given the context, she might mean that literally. Only one way to find out. ]

C | BRUISED & BLOODY / SHUTEN TERRITORY ARENA

[ She'd been beating up people for free in bars this whole time, so it seemed only practical to at least get paid for that shit. The booze and cigarettes don't pay for themselves — and gods forbid that Andy hold a regular nine-to-five. She'd rather have her bones broken. Besides, she makes for a good underdog bet. Compared to some of the monstrous yokai that have stood opposite her in the ring, Andy looks decidedly ordinary. A woman who is neither particularly tall or strong. Nothing to betray the centuries she's spent mastering different ways of using her body to cause others pain. Except maybe that certain look in her eye. Something sharp. Something a little mean.

On one of the nights that she fights, she might find herself facing off against another Lost Soul in her next match. Or maybe afterward, with her left arm hanging loosely from its socket, she might be looking for someone to lend her hand — hopefully someone who isn't too squeamish to shove a shoulder back in. Otherwise, after the fighting is done, she makes a habit of smoking a cigarette right outside the arena, usually more interested in indulging that bad habit than patching herself up. ]

Comments

[killtime]

[ She would have been disappointed if he hadn't corrected her. It's almost as if she'd said it explicitly just to hear him shut her down. The corner of her mouth quirks upward wryly when he does, smoke wisping around that faint little smirk as she gives him a bit of a sidelong look. With a pointed dryness: ]

You make it sound like he's my boyfriend.

[ Ever a mercurial creature, she seems in the mood to humor the subject the current matter — and somehow more present now, somehow more Andy in this moment than the dead-eyed creature that had thoughtlessly crushed a young man's hand under her boot not too long ago. ]

Should I be hurt you rejected me? [ She's not. She knows he's not interested, and she suspects why. Logistics, as it were. ] It's not because there's someone else, is it?

[aceslow]

Uh-huh, [ Kim says, fixing her with a look that makes it clear that he's neither impressed nor convinced by her attempts to play this whole thing off. Why she's doing it, Kim couldn't say. God knows he hasn't even met the man she's currently living with -- he doesn't even know his name. For all he knows, he already knows him, and she's out there shacking up with -- well --

No, actually. He can't imagine her with most of the men he knows. They're all too young by half. It isn't as though Andromache is a young woman, but she certainly looks younger than him. ]

No, [ he answers, patient, long-suffering. ] It is because it's not a date. [ He arches a brow at her. ] Not all of us can simply fall in... cahoots with someone our first week here.

[ Cahoots. He thinks she'll appreciate that phrasing a bit more. It's true, though; Kim has not been with anyone for many years, and he doesn't forsee that changing. ]

[killtime]

[ Cahoots.

Andy looks at Kim for a long moment, then turns her head away as a short, rough laugh abruptly escapes her. She's not sure what it is, exactly — the wording itself, or the fact that it's Kim who uses it. Kim, arching that single eyebrow in her direction as he encapsulates the chaos of her questionable cohabitation with the phrase "falling in cahoots." ]

Ah — [ She clears her throat, buying herself a second by taking a drag off her cigarette, though that does little to conceal the small, wry smile that lingers around the corners of her mouth. ] First of all, it was a hookup. It just... Kept going. [ Wryly then, because she knows how that sounds: ] I don't pretend to be in control of my life.

[ One of her little sidelong looks. ]

Honestly, you might know more about me than he does. And sometimes I think I sort of like it that way.

[aceslow]

[ Kim's lip quirks up as Andy lets out a bark of laughter, studiously looking off to the side as though it doesn't affect him in the least, as though that wasn't his intent in the first place. ]

Mmhm. You're in full control of your life. If you want a hookup to end, all you need to do is leave. [ He has always found it very, very easy to do so. ] But I suppose it must have presented something of enough value to get you to stick around.

[ He's not impressed with the excuse that it's beyond her control. It's just a convenient lie for someone unwilling to face up to the truth of the matter. He supposes he can sympathize; relationships can be terrifying things, though Kim has never found himself in one entirely by accident. ]

I'm surprised to hear you say that, though. I barely know anything about you. And I'm not the one who's seen you naked.

[killtime]

[ Full control might be giving her more credit than is really due, but she knows when she's being called out. Not willing to give her even an inch, is he? Yet, she finds she sort of likes that about him. The challenge of knowing the man. Of having a rapport with him. If she didn't enjoy it at least a little, she wouldn't be here. And they definitely wouldn't be going for dinner, the way friends do. ]

You make it sound easy. [ Though in truth, she's generally found it easy too. As long as a hook-up is nothing more than that. Men and woman alike have found her impersonal and even cruel. How many times as she left a one night stand out in the cold without so much as offering her name? Too many to count. Wryly then, an admission that Kim has probably earned but won't be surprised then: ] Guess I must like him a little.

[ That's more than she'd admit to most. But what difference does it really make? Kim's already seen more of her than she might have allowed willingly. Though maybe that's just the excuse she uses — so that she can let herself have this. This companionship, whatever either one of them does or doesn't want to call it. ]

Hundreds of people have seen me naked, officer. [ That might even be a conservative estimate. Wryly then: ] You're the only one that's seen me try to blow my own brains out. That's intimacy of a kind.

[aceslow]

Just a little, hm? Cute.

[ Kim has never liked anyone well enough to live with them. Not officially. Not formally. He always had his excuses: he kept odd hours, he had nightmares, his space was too small, he lived close to the Precinct and didn't want to sacrifice his short commute. He's fairly certain every partner he's ever had saw through it in the end, which is that he was a very private man and that he was unable to make that commitment, to truly join his life with another.

If Andromache is normal in that meaning she likes someone a little, maybe all those men who called him frigid were right. ]

I suppose you're right. [ It's the sort of intimacy that, Kim thinks, should be kept far, far away from anyone who holds any love for that person. He's glad he bore the brunt of it, not her partner. ] But that is not something you begin to discuss in the first month of a relationship. That was just a... serendipitous coincidence.

[ One that he's deeply grateful for. If he hadn't been there, would anyone else have stepped in? He deliberates on his next words carefully. He could let it go. He would prefer not to talk to her about her mental health, and he thinks she would prefer not to hear it. ]

I never did thank you for the cigarette, did I? So: thank you for that. It was nice not having to waste my money on a whole pack just to get a stick of tar. [ He keeps his gaze straight ahead of them, casually regarding a family of ayakishi blustering their way through the neighbourhood across the street. ] You smoke much more than I do. It would be a shame if I were no longer able benefit from your expertise.

[ Keep coming in during his shifts, Andy. He likes knowing you're still around. ]

[killtime]

[ A little, or a lot. It probably doesn't really matter how honest Andy chooses to be with her words — they both know he isn't fooled by her. He's probably never been fooled by her. And maybe she's stopped always trying to. Now, instead of being a wall between them, her deflections and half-truths are more of a game. Inside jokes between two people who have rarely indulged in the pleasure of simple friendship.

Maybe that day was just a serendipitous coincidence. But without that — without her nearly fatal impulse to put a gun to her head — they might have never bothered with one another at all. Each with their respective walls stacked high around themselves. Neither an especially easy person to be close with, for one reason or another. Both playing their cards close to their chest.

Now she knows him. Not much — where her walls might fold when the right man makes her breakfast, Kim's are a veritable fucking Jericho — but she knew enough to leave him that cigarette. And she knows enough to understand the unspoken meaning behind his words. ]

It was just a cigarette. You don't have to thank me for shit like that. [ But there's a subtle, almost imperceptible warmth in underneath her usual wryness that betrays her. ] Honestly, I should probably quit. Bad fucking habit.

[ She says that, even as she takes another drag off her cigarette before gesturing with it in the direction of a little ramen stall up ahead. The counter can only seat four people, but that's plenty of room for the pair of them, and whatever the old yokai manning the stall is cooking, it smells incredible. ]

Looks promising. What do you say, officer?

[aceslow]

You should quit. It's unhealthy. Especially the volume of cigarettes you consume.

[ Normally he wouldn't say anything - it would be hypocritical of him, all things considered - but she did open herself up to it. He says it lightly, though, knowing that she won't be quitting anytime soon. Of her vices, smoking is the one he's least concerned about. He's not going to pass up an opportunity to give her shit, though. It's not his instinct with most people, but it's how they seem to have fallen into step, speaking to one another with the sort of familiarity of those who have known each other for years instead of a scant few months.

Maybe it's just that few people are as inclined as Andromache is to joke around with him, liable to take his unmoving exterior as a lack of humour, a lack of warmth, instead of seeing what he's actually saying. It's not something that bothers him. If it did, he would try to change it as he did when he was younger. Nowadays, he's comfortable with it. It doesn't mean that it's not nice to have a relationship run counter to that, however, and he falls into step beside her neatly, comfortably, looking idly at the stall she's stopped in front of. ]

Oh! [ His eyes light with recognition. ] I ate here the day I arrived. It's where I met Kamui, in fact -- you've met him, I'm sure. He works at the 7/11 with me. [ It's been long enough that he almost feels nostalgic. ]

Nice kid. [ He knows Kamui is older than he looks. He thinks he's a nice kid anyhow. He nods at the stall. ] I'm up for it if you are.

[killtime]

[ She doesn't mind. In truth, it's been a long time since anyone bothered to scold her like that — the way you scold someone you care about, because you worry about things like their health. It's almost a novelty. And maybe a little sad that it even feels that way. Small mercies, though — she doesn't have to dwell on it. Instead, she gestures for Kim to go ahead and choose a seat at the stall. Seems as good a place to eat as any. ]

I know him. [ It's hard to read the mildness of her tone, but underneath it is a thread of subtle fondness. She knows Kamui, yes, and she likes him too. A nice kid — and not a bad shot either. ] Ran around in the tunnels together when I first got here. I've seen him at the gas station a few times.

[ Once Kim is settled, she picks the seat next to him. ]

Hell's a small fucking world, isn't it.

[aceslow]

Uncannily so. I always thought Hell would have more people... and maybe one or two people I know, at that, [ Kim says lightly, settling himself in one of the stools. He remembers the woman behind the stall, an ayakishi who had frightened him terribly the first time they'd met, and the way he had completely ignored her in order to get some modicum of control over his own emotions. From the sour look she's giving him, she remembers him too. ]

Good evening, madam, [ he says, nodding his head politely at her. ] Do forgive my rudeness the last time we met. It was my first day here, and I was -- rather out of sorts, so to speak.

[ The jorogumo behind the counter scowls, but apparently an adherence to etiquette is enough to make her soften, and she relents. ] Oh, it's fine, I suppose. [ She eyes Andromache, then, eyes moving inhumanly quickly across her features. ] What will you be having?

[ Kim merely gestures for Andromache to speak. A little shamefully, he has relied on a few safe foods during his time here, uncertain as to what everything is, and what would curdle on his decidedly Revacholiere palate. He may as well just copy Andy. ]