Matsuko, in a new jacket, beneath a new knit shawl, with a new furred flap-ear cap on, stared open-mouthed through her condensing breath at the seemingly boundless body of water.
She'd really gone all out for the little send-off trip. With the way she spent yen, and the buzz it gave her, the young girl was almost destined for a life of retail therapy. But, now and then, such an expense could be justified. And that justification was the World Martial Arts Championship; champions (and some fellow students) would be shipped off to Tea from Port Cirrus, with the city and waving hands in their rear-view.
The lecture hall soundbite rewound in its mental cassette, the name Port Cirrus punching like a finger on "play": Port Cirrus, located in the lowlands, occupies a special place in our country as our premier trade hub. Should you make it there, keep your eyes on the brilliant, sprawling harbor rather than Cirrus' dark alleyways, students. The track swiftly cut, memory all out of material, as that point her brain cast the lecture aside for fantasies of a dangerous, dazzling city. Matsuko didn't much know what was being traded or what a harbor even was, but as soon as the send-off field trip became available for application, she snatched herself a spot.
A harbor, Rin mock-patiently informed her, was like a very big lake full of ships, ships full of stuff. A lake so big, she said, that you could fall in and no one would even notice your flailing, and you would drown, because you swim like a rock. And that's why you cannot go to Port Cirrus.
Matsuko smiled brilliantly, defiantly, against the harbor-touched gusts. But she did go to Port Cirrus. Maybe not in Rin's book--in Rin's book, another out-of-village assignment had found Matsuko, a longer one. Just a tedious, long, escort mission between country towns, accompanied by Fujimura Aneko (a bold weirdo) and Taka Sobakiri (she didn't come up with a personality for this one, the petty name tickled her enough). Honestly, five rambling minutes into the fabrication, Rin had more or less tuned out. Dull acceptance; that's all Matsuko needed.
The success billowed in her sails, and then neurotic terror flattened them. The whole trip to Cirrus she stood alone, wearing an exsanguinated, iced pallor in the warmest, coziest get-up. What if she notices? What if she really thinks it out? Part of her hoped so, like how you hope a pimple pops so the infection drains. It'd been a long time since they had that discussion, and she still held wide-eyed hope. But beneath that, there lay strata of fossilized fear from Mesozoic memories. A bedrock under her mood.
And, shifting tectonic plates in her soul, she saw Port Cirrus' harbor. She'd never looked out onto a horizon and saw absolutely nothing, nothing but water and sky; and ships, of course, bridging two blocks of blue.
It could've been five or fifty minutes. It only felt like a few seconds.
Turning away from the sea almost stung, as if all the harsh, salt-laden wind coalesced at one moment into awareness. But their inn, the Requies de Mari, expected them an hour ago, and they'd lose their dinner if they didn't get there in time. Unmoved, the sight of the harbor sat with her still; more accurately, it unseated her. She bobbed on scrawny knees down the streets, behind her companions, light as a clipper on choppy waves. So light, almost as if she... wasn't... carrying...
Oh no.
The group meandered ahead, away from the now-stationary, always-petite figure. Her backpack. Her supplies. They were mostly replaceable, at least. Food, medicine, emergency flares, she could buy all that. But her rental books... she'd just wanted something to read on the way... the librarians. No. There was no point in returning to the inn without those books. That would be delaying an inevitable, gruesome, rubber-stamped death.
Like dark lightning, Matsuko jolted back down to the pier. Her eyes could still see the benches on which she'd left her bag, the rails she leaned eagerly upon, the glow of lamplight as she was led away; the lamplight, yes, one had been extinguished. There it was.
No bag. No books. Just a man. Maybe...?
"Pardon," it came out an undignified, exasperated wheeze, "but have... have you seen a bag around here? There were... some books..." her hands gestured weakly, "on top of it..."
WC: 751
She'd really gone all out for the little send-off trip. With the way she spent yen, and the buzz it gave her, the young girl was almost destined for a life of retail therapy. But, now and then, such an expense could be justified. And that justification was the World Martial Arts Championship; champions (and some fellow students) would be shipped off to Tea from Port Cirrus, with the city and waving hands in their rear-view.
The lecture hall soundbite rewound in its mental cassette, the name Port Cirrus punching like a finger on "play": Port Cirrus, located in the lowlands, occupies a special place in our country as our premier trade hub. Should you make it there, keep your eyes on the brilliant, sprawling harbor rather than Cirrus' dark alleyways, students. The track swiftly cut, memory all out of material, as that point her brain cast the lecture aside for fantasies of a dangerous, dazzling city. Matsuko didn't much know what was being traded or what a harbor even was, but as soon as the send-off field trip became available for application, she snatched herself a spot.
A harbor, Rin mock-patiently informed her, was like a very big lake full of ships, ships full of stuff. A lake so big, she said, that you could fall in and no one would even notice your flailing, and you would drown, because you swim like a rock. And that's why you cannot go to Port Cirrus.
Matsuko smiled brilliantly, defiantly, against the harbor-touched gusts. But she did go to Port Cirrus. Maybe not in Rin's book--in Rin's book, another out-of-village assignment had found Matsuko, a longer one. Just a tedious, long, escort mission between country towns, accompanied by Fujimura Aneko (a bold weirdo) and Taka Sobakiri (she didn't come up with a personality for this one, the petty name tickled her enough). Honestly, five rambling minutes into the fabrication, Rin had more or less tuned out. Dull acceptance; that's all Matsuko needed.
The success billowed in her sails, and then neurotic terror flattened them. The whole trip to Cirrus she stood alone, wearing an exsanguinated, iced pallor in the warmest, coziest get-up. What if she notices? What if she really thinks it out? Part of her hoped so, like how you hope a pimple pops so the infection drains. It'd been a long time since they had that discussion, and she still held wide-eyed hope. But beneath that, there lay strata of fossilized fear from Mesozoic memories. A bedrock under her mood.
And, shifting tectonic plates in her soul, she saw Port Cirrus' harbor. She'd never looked out onto a horizon and saw absolutely nothing, nothing but water and sky; and ships, of course, bridging two blocks of blue.
It could've been five or fifty minutes. It only felt like a few seconds.
Turning away from the sea almost stung, as if all the harsh, salt-laden wind coalesced at one moment into awareness. But their inn, the Requies de Mari, expected them an hour ago, and they'd lose their dinner if they didn't get there in time. Unmoved, the sight of the harbor sat with her still; more accurately, it unseated her. She bobbed on scrawny knees down the streets, behind her companions, light as a clipper on choppy waves. So light, almost as if she... wasn't... carrying...
Oh no.
The group meandered ahead, away from the now-stationary, always-petite figure. Her backpack. Her supplies. They were mostly replaceable, at least. Food, medicine, emergency flares, she could buy all that. But her rental books... she'd just wanted something to read on the way... the librarians. No. There was no point in returning to the inn without those books. That would be delaying an inevitable, gruesome, rubber-stamped death.
Like dark lightning, Matsuko jolted back down to the pier. Her eyes could still see the benches on which she'd left her bag, the rails she leaned eagerly upon, the glow of lamplight as she was led away; the lamplight, yes, one had been extinguished. There it was.
No bag. No books. Just a man. Maybe...?
"Pardon," it came out an undignified, exasperated wheeze, "but have... have you seen a bag around here? There were... some books..." her hands gestured weakly, "on top of it..."
WC: 751
