hatesdeerstalkers | 15 strangers r7 | Week 3, Tuesday (Akane)

[She considers the question for a moment, sitting on the bed, slowly curling up closer, and studies his face, something measuring in her expression.]

The... the one nine years ago, you mean?

Yes.

[He says it simply, looking back at her, his expression nigh unreadable.]

[There's another small pause, a moment of regard as she studies his expression. She still looks slightly hesitant.]

I... don't think that I'm from the same world as you, Daddy.

I'm well aware - please, indulge me.

[He still...keeps that expression.]

[She studies him a little longer, purple eyes uncertain.]

I... um... I think they were connected to the hospital I got taken to...?

[There's a nod...before he closes his eyes.]

...And what do you have planned for them?

[There's no judgement, there. Just a simple, ordinary question.]

[That clearly startles her, and for a moment her expression shifts completely in surprise.]

Huh?

What do you have planned against them?

[He's looking back at her patiently...and again, without a speck of judgement or disappointment.]

Are you to have them face justice in the eyes of the law, or punishment by your own hands?

[There's a long pause, and she's looking up at him with slight uncertainty now, judging, and still with something of the vulnerable animal to her, something to shout protect, protect. She finally speaks.]

Both. Neither. Um. Why... What was it... that made you think I did have plans, though?

[Yes, something he's come to expect. Something the women of his time also did, as a socially acceptable way to protect themselves. To rely on men, who held more power and weight in their society.

It's no less different here - it is still a matter of survival, of making yourself seem less of a threat. Less suspected, if anything happens.]

Akane, with age comes knowledge.

[He laces his fingers together, gloves creaking softly.]

And I have been around for far too long to not notice when someone is attempting to make themselves seem harmless and fragile - as the urge to protect a vulnerable young girl is quite pronounced in most people.

[His eyes...they've regained that piercing quality he's sometimes shown, like the cold, calculating gaze of a spider in its web, even as his mouth quirks up in a small smile.]

I'm not such a doddering old man to not know that those who use that strategy are more cunning than one might think, and I respect your intelligence enough to assume you have more plans than you let on.

[She looks up at him without revealing anything as he speaks, though she feels vulnerable and does not much care for it, not with as hard as she's worked.

But what is, is, right? So finally, when he's done, she answers, sighing as she begins.]

It's... not an act, exactly. I'm....

[She smiles finally, faintly, a touch bitterly.]

I told the truth, on Sunday, mostly, but...

They killed me, then. Sort of. I... I was the girl who died in the incinerator. And it... it's, um....

I get fevers now. Because I'm burning. Or I burned. or I will.

[Another, soft, sigh.]

Cradle Pharmaceutical CEO, Gentarou Hongou, Nagisa Nijisaki, his right-hand man, Teruaki Kubota, the scientist who created the technology, and Kagechika Musashidou, their financial backer.

Hongou headed the project. He's the one who dragged me back into the incinerator, when I got out. Then turned it on.

[Ah, so it was paradox. Not that he's happy to hear about her death by fire, but when she says those names and what they've done...his gaze turns downright murderous.]

Hongou....I see.

[Even if they didn't come from the same world, a man who purposefully tried to burn a child to death could not be allowed to continue as if nothing had happened.]

[She looks at him levelly, her eyes clearer and sharper and more judging than they normally might seem, though a part of her is still hesitant. Her self is her greatest cover, after all.]

Are you going to tell anyone about me...

[And then, finally, she smiles, just a little, and finishes, and there's a touch of how she more normally is, though still tired, and curious, and so many other things.]

... daddy?

Whyever would I do that?

[The murderous glint fades, as he looks on at her with a gentle smile...and an undeniable fatherly comfort.]

I only wished to let you know that I knew there was more to you, my dear. Like attracts like, as it were.

[There's even a sense of...pride, to him?]

And I am impressed with how wonderfully you've done. Such things are rare in someone so young, after all. I most likely wasn't even so practiced at it! ...Though, er, I also can't Remember such things...

[It surprises her for a moment, and then it makes her smile, and it's a little more genuine again.]

You've been playing the game too, after all.

[She says it casually, and she's smiling, but still watching him as she does, though it's as much to let him know that she also knows as anything. But then, after that, she finally uncurls slightly, getting up onto her knees on the bed before stretching across it to kiss him gently on the cheek and then settles next to him, taking his hand up in hers and absently tracing patterns on fingers and palm.]

Do you... Were you just asking about my plans to let me know that you knew I had some? I... remember them now, but... not all of why, I think.

[And there was another matter, delicate and vulnerable, a fear that he might think less of her, or might decide to act against her, if he knew more of what she was.

She didn't think that of him, really, but she couldn't know for sure here, couldn't run the tangled paths of history to their conclusions, and that made it harder, and made it scarier.

She'd only trusted Aoi with these secrets so far, because he'd been with her every step of the way, he'd had to be. She would not have been able to do it herself.]

[He nods at her statement - he had been, though it was not quite so simple. Just as her vulnerability had truth to it, so did his charisma and general character. He lets her take his hand, watching her trace absentmindedly while placing a gentle kiss in return to the top of her head.]

Well, not entirely. I also wanted to know who dared to put you two in such danger, and if anything was being done about them.

[He chuckles.]

After all, we may not be from the same world, but that does not mean I cannot give you the means to summon me into yours, in the worst case. And no matter those plans, I would work with them - even if they involved certain...accidents for the men involved.

[He gives a much more...dangerous grin at that.]

Such a pity that all the power and money in the world will not save you if you do not secure and maintain that everyone around you has absolute loyalty to you, hm?

[She looks at him for a moment, clearly startled by the suggestion, and then smiles, finally, brightly again.]

Aoi and I... are Zero. Not the one here, but the one... when I was taken. We organized the second Nonary Game. It... I know it has something to do with... [A faint smile, a little wistful, perhaps] opening Schrodinger's box, but I can't really remember what. Hopefully I will, because... because I don't know how I'm supposed to... to survive nine years ago, at the moment, and if I don't then....

I guess I was never here at all.

Kubota is dead. He was the one who died, the one who... who blew up. Hongou is one of the other players of the second Nonary Game, and usually he dies too, after killing the rest of them. We'll take him to jail if he survives. There should be more than enough evidence to convict him for the murder of his friends.

[If he's surprised, he sure doesn't show it - instead, that pride in his eyes seems to grow, as his dangerous grin grows to one of delight.]

What a wonderful plan, my dear daughter! I must admit, such a thing is absolutely delightful to hear about. Setting it up so he is taken to jail for murder...Splendid! Truly splendid! Though I suppose I should assume no less from someone who has Clairvoyance.

[Since she's clearly some kind of psychic, given her comments in public before. He does tilt his head a bit.]

Though I must confess I don't quite understand how you could be the 'cat in the box', so to speak. It's no less impressive you managed that state, of course, but if you wouldn't mind explaining?

[She smiles back at him, and feels warm for all the pride--the delight--in his eyes. But now the question of how.]

... have you ever heard of the Morphogenetic Field, Papa?

I cannot say that I have, unfortunately.

[He'll listen, though - he's definitely curious.]

[She nods, and then leans against him, her arm winding through his, taking his hand in hers and spreading her much smaller hand against it, measuring the differences.]

The Morphogenetic Field is a hypothetical biological and social field that contains the information necessary to shape the exact form of a living thing as part of its epigenetics, as well as its behavior and the way it coordinates with and interacts with other beings.

Think of it as an invisible plane, or field, where the information for all biological life, and perhaps some things that aren't even alive, is stored. For example, have you heard the story of the crystallization of glycerin?

[He lets her, though he's fascinated by her explanation. A scientific explanation for something that seemed almost magical in origin? How wonderful!

Still, he shakes his head, wanting to have her explain more to him in her own way - even if he did know it.]

No, but I have a feeling you'll be happy to explain it to me, hm?

[That makes her laugh.]

Glycerin is a sugar alcohol. It can be used as a lubricant, it can be found in food, or even in industrial ingredients. However, for 150 years, no one was able to crystalize it. Scientists even though that a solid form didn't exist.

Until one day, a barrel-full of glycerin on a British cargo ship was found to have completely crystalized while en route. Naturally this excited scientists worldwide, who wanted to research the new, crystalized form of glycerin, and began asking for samples of the seed.

A seed is a sample of the original crystalized substance. It's a starter for it. With a seed crystal, further crystallization of glycerin would be simple.

Only... something strange happened.

Not only did the glycerin samples that were introduced to seed crystals begin to crystalize, but other nearby samples did as well. And, what's more, the phenomenon continued to spread, until eventually, all glycerin in the world began to crystallize naturally when cooled to less than 64 degrees farenheit.

Before then, no matter how glycerin was cooled, it refused to crystalize. But once the crystallization had begun then, even if the preparation and storage methods hadn't changed....

[She finally looks up at him.]

It's almost like that first barrel of glycerin learned something... and the knowledge was able to spread. As if the crystals were able to communicate in some way that humans can't sense....

There are other examples too, which show information inexplicably spreading between mice, or even humans. The more people who passively know the solution to a puzzle, the more likely it is that you would be able to figure it out, even if they were on the other side of the world, if there was no possible way for that knowledge to have spread from them to you.

Do you see?

If there were people who were able to access the Morphogenetic Field more strongly....

Then they would know what other people knew. Or they would be able to influence that. Change it.

It was why they ran the Nonary Game. Aoi and I showed high potential from a Ganzfeld experiment. So they took us.

[He does see...but also-]

This sounds...surprisingly alike to a few concepts in my world, though not under those terms.

[Still, it's fascinating to know that this is a studied phenomenon in her world, and it's potential applications. Though changing such a thing could also have potential consequences on top of it, as well...]

Regardless, you shouldn't have been kidnapped for something like this, potential or no.

You're right. None of us should have. But....

[A sigh.]

The Nonary Game was an experiment, designed to study the Morphogenetic Field. You see, there are two conditions that are able to strengthen a person's ability to access the information in it: epiphany and danger. So they put us in a place where we were forced to solve puzzles, thus leading to epiphany, while our lives were on the line, so we were in danger.

There were 18 children who were kidnapped. 9 were put on the Gigantic, and 9 were put in a building in Nevada that was built to replicate the Gigantic perfectly. They, the group in Building Q, were supposed to find the solutions to the puzzles and transmit them to us. We... were usually missing a crucial piece to solve it. 9 sibling sets. Only they messed up, because Aoi and I, and two sisters, didn't get put in different groups.

[She shakes her head a little.]

I can't really remember all of it, still. But... There was a police officer who rescued us, after we got trapped in the incinerator. But I had dropped my doll, and I went back to get her, and that man....

Hongou, he... he dragged me back into the incinerator. I was too little to stop him. To fight back. He dragged me back in and threw me down and then locked the doors again and then... h-he activated the room. And there was a puzzle that I had to solve or the incinerator would turn on and I'd burn to death, but...

[She smiles a little shakily.]

I wasn't even on the right boat. It's... easier for me to transmit than it is for me to receive, even if it's never just one or the other. But I couldn't solve it, and the fire turned on, and I....

He burned me alive.

He was watching. He had his face pressed up against the glass while I was crying.

But I... I did something. I don't remember what it was. Or... I might do something?

I... The Morphogenetic Field appears to also have a temporal element, because I was able to... to project forward into it, and do... do something. Only I can't remember what, only that it's tied to the second Nonary Game.

Daddy, I don't know how I'm still alive. I know that... when... when I got taken here it was only a few hours away from that nexus point. Something was supposed to happen.

That's why Aoi and I set it up. I...

It was easier to access the field, after, because I could die any time, I'd have been dead already, if I make a mistake. If I break the time loop. And I could see some of it, and....

I get fevers the closer I get to burning. So the worse the fevers get, the further away I am from being able to survive. So I practiced. I tried to scan the future, to run the different timelines until I found the different problems, to work out everything that needed to be done so that I could survive.

That's how I'm the cat. I'm still... waiting for the box to be opened. Only half alive.

15 strangers r7 | Week 3, Tuesday (Akane)

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