2020-05-21 - Uminari Matsuri: Two Strange Requests
| Title: Uminari Matsuri: Two Strange Requests | |
|---|---|
| Summary: Fate and Mikoto come to the facepainting booth, and decide to honour their magical partners, much to the confusion of the attendant. | |
| Who: | |
| Where: Uminari Seaside Park | |
| OOC - IC Date: 2020-05-21 - 2015-08-29 | |
<Pose Tracker> Fate Testarossa [Infinity Institute (5)] has posed.
"Like... makeup?"
A child is standing at the face painting booth, hands clasped together. She stands out a little because she's obviously Gaijin, but she's in a Yukata. A navy blue field that's dark enough to be black has white lilies blooming. Some are merely buds, while others and half open with a hint of their future splendor. Others still are wide open. No one flower is the same size as any other. Her Obi is red, terminating in a large bow at her back. The ribbons in her hair, for this night at least, match the color of the Yukata.
The High School Girl who is manning the booth, tries to explain to her. "Not exactly. It's less like make up - and more like, decoration. Or a costume. A festival is a night where you can pretend to be someone else. Haven't you ever played pretend?"
Fate immediately answers. "Not really."
The girl gets a strange expression like, 'Do foreigners not have imaginations?'
"The one time I tried I wasn't very good at it." She adds a small addendum.
It's true, the one time the universe asked her to play pretend in a world where her Mother loved her, where Linith was still alive...
... she could not get into it.
"A-Anyhow - if you'd like to give it a try, you're welcome to join in."
The child stands right where she is, as if considering. As she watches a middle school girl apply facepaint to her fidgety younger brother.
<Pose Tracker> Mikoto Minagi [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.
"It's just pretend," comes a SUDDEN SUPPORTIVE VOICE FROM BEHIND FATE TESTAROSSA WHOA WAIT WHO, "so it's okay."
Mikoto Minagi is just there all a sudden hey hi Mikoto. Her yukata is blue, too, though more pale than Fate's off-black; the detailing on hers is white, too, though they call to mind clouds instead of flowers. There's red to her obi sash, but yellow, too.
At some point she got a yellow butterfly hair clip, clasped at the top of her left braid. Those braids aren't really damp, any more. She's had time to dry off! And win more prizes, evidently. Like cute hair decs. Mikoto Minagi is too rough-and-tumble for hair decs, most of the time, but she happened to win this one and now it lives on her face.
Just like a real butterfly!
"Let's do it!" Mikoto encourages her, brightly, as she steps up beside her. "It's fun!" And that might be an exuberant exclamation, but... it might also be an explanation, too.
After all, it's Fate.
<Pose Tracker> Fate Testarossa [Infinity Institute (5)] has posed.
'It's just pretend.'
Fate turns around to face Mikoto, eyes wide. There's a look within them as if she was wondering if she was doing something wrong - by not instantly agreeing to play this game that children play.
What do you mean you don't know what decision to make? Haven't you ever played House?
Arisa-chan. It's okay. Feito - if you want me to take the controller for a while...
Fate's lips part lightly, then she nods at Mikoto. There is not as much at stake here as there is her taking over the role of being a babysitter in that visual novel she was playing with the other two. She doesn't need to make decisions that could determine how well a child is cared for.
And if the only stakes are fun, then perhaps she's overthinking this.
Just what paint to put on her face.
"I see."
The girl stares at Mikoto's hairclip. "I like your hair clip."
She notes, then moves over to consider the paints. "What... options do we have?"
She asks, with a look over her shoulder at Mikoto.
<Pose Tracker> Mikoto Minagi [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.
Fate turns and Mikoto's smile is a shade less loud than it has been at some points tonight; there's a reason she would encourage Fate with such a serious reassurance, after all.
(It's really that serious..?)
"Thanks!" She chirps, eyes closing briefly in her smile. "It don't do anything, but it's pretty!" And sometimes it's okay, for things to not have any sort of purpose but just to make her happy.
Mikoto goes over to the paints with Fate, and points. "There's lots of colours," she says, "and... umm..."
HERE THE FOIBLES OF MIKOTO MINAGI ARE MADE PLAIN:
Mikoto doesn't actually know anything about facepainting, either.
It's not like festivals were ever really a priority for her for a long time.
Her lip scrunches and her nose wrinkles as she looks around the booth, trying to figure it out, because Mikoto has never let a lack of knowledge stop her. "Patterns!" She finishes her sentence, eagerly, as her eyes fall on that younger brother. "Patterns what look like stuff!"
Bold as brass, Mikoto declares: "I wanna look like a--!!" AND HERE MIKOTO STOPS, a finger curling at her lip. "Wait..." When Mikoto declared she wanted to talk to cats, she ended up looking like a cat. Here, now, if she wants to look like a cat, will she instead end up able to talk to cats..?
"Hum," Mikoto huffs a breath though her lips, as she looks back to the paints. "This is hard..."
<Pose Tracker> Fate Testarossa [Infinity Institute (5)] has posed.
Hair decorations are serious business to Fate Testarossa. Ribbons are emblematic of her whole friendship. So when Mikoto tells her it doesn't do anything, she gets momentarily surprised. She was thinking there would be some deep meaning, like an exchange of vows with her best friend.
That it isn't seems strange to her, but she can accept it. "I see. It is very pretty." She confirms, the validation. Do people around Tokyo walk around with things in their hair that are not of special significance, but simply look nice?
Perhaps she got it all wrong...
"There are." Fate replies as Mikoto says there are a lot of colors. "I'm not very good at drawing though. And I haven't been taught make up yet."
Mikoto then pipes up with patterns, "Oh! That makes sense." After all, otherwise this booth would only be good for consummate artists.
Fate listens to Mikoto's statement, and there's a slow turn of her head as Mikoto stops, suddenly indecisive. However, as Fate sees that most of the drawings are animalistic, a thought suddenly does occur to her. "Well... if you can't decide... then maybe I should go first."
Fate suddenly sits down on one of the face painting stools by the table of supplies. And the high schooler walks over to the pair. "We have a lot of cute patterns for you. What are you in the mood for? Pikachu has been very popular today..."
"A wolf." Fate says, and the high school girl stops. "An orange wolf - with a red gem in her forehead."
The high schooler stammers, "H-How very specific."
Sorting through the boy's pile, she eventually brings out the wolf, and hands it over to Mikoto. "You'll have to draw the gem in." She notes.
Fate's request was far too specific for a pattern on demand.
<Pose Tracker> Mikoto Minagi [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.
No, the exchange of vows with her best friend was last season.
(Does Mai still have that hair clip..? Mikoto hasn't checked.)
"That's okay!" Mikoto is quick to assure Fate. "I don't know makeup neither!" It might be more surprising to hear from one of them than the other -- Fate, after all, is still a girl growing, but Mikoto is halfway through high-school already. How did she go this long without learning how to put on makeup..?
Inscrutably, she offers no explanation.
Fate bravely goes first, and Mikoto watches, wide-eyed, as she makes her selection. "Yeah!" She cheers her on, once she realises just what Fate has gone for. "Arf, Arf!"
Luckily, Mikoto has already established herself to be a strange girl, so barking in support of Fate's decisions isn't entirely out of the blue. ... it's still pretty weird, but Mikoto doesn't mind any strange looks she gets from it.
She takes the wolf template, and wields the brush. "'Kay," she says, agreeably, as the girl who very well could be part of her cohort explains the catch.
"Stay still, okay?" Mikoto says, as she dips the brush in orange paint. "I won't hurt Fate." Neither does she stop to explain why she would make that reassurance.
Painting faces can't be that different to painting pictures, right..? She just needs to follow the template. And with it, she obtains success--!!
But it's not quite done.
Once the orange is all down, Mikoto leans over to add a circle for the gem. She pauses, once she's done it, and considers the dab of red... before she lightens the red on her brush with a bit of white, and adds an extra line near the top of the gem.
"'Cause it's shiny," Mikoto explains her artistic reasoning.
<Pose Tracker> Fate Testarossa [Infinity Institute (5)] has posed.
The high school girl suddenly puts a hand up to her cheek as Mikoto goes 'Arf Arf'. "... she's so into it..." She murmurs at the contrast between the older more exuberant girl and the younger more stoic girl.
Fate simply nods with a smile, "Yes. I want to surprise her."
Fate then squares up her shoulders and sits very still. Fate is the ideal painting subject. She does not fidget. She is very used to sitting still for long periods of time.
The only movements from her is the faint rise and fall of her chest, and the blinking of her eyes.
In a sense it's almost eerie, like Mikoto is painting a life sized porcelain doll that one would put on shelves as decoration on Girl's Day.
The small brush strokes are just faint pressure to her cheek, even if its painful, she still wouldn't move.
She's very good at not moving even when it's painful. She has to be hurt a lot before she can't take it.
When Mikoto explains her reasoning, Fate's eyes flicker down to her brush to check the color, her mouth parting slightly.
Then she closes her mouth abruptly and reasserts her stillness.
She was told to be still, and she almost messed that up.
<Pose Tracker> Mikoto Minagi [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.
Mikoto gets fired up about all sorts of things! Including, apparently, wolves.
(She must not know very much about wolves, if she's saying 'arf' instead of 'awoo'...)
Fate is still as a statue, but deliberately, Mikoto doesn't think of a doll; they're people, with blood beneath their skin in a hundred-hundred veins. "Almost done..."
That in itself is a strange defiance of the norm; that communication between subject and wielder, in acknowledgement of her own feelings.
An extra few touches on her cheeks so that cheek-fur floofs, and Mikoto lowers her brush. "There!" She declares, and reaches over to grab a mirror - entirely without asking - to show Fate what she looks like.
"It's a good surprise!" Mikoto speaks encouragement, as she looks over Fate's makeup. Soon enough, inspiration flashes in her own eyes, and she turns to the girl attending the booth.
"I wanna be an oni! A red and white oni!"
<Pose Tracker> Fate Testarossa [Infinity Institute (5)] has posed.
Fate blinks her eyes as she's told she's finished. Still wondering if it's okay to move. When Mikoto raises a mirror. She stares at the image of herself with orange facepaint with a red gem and whiskers.
"I love it." She says, even putting her fingertips up to touch the part of the mirror with the gem, seeming heedless of fingerprints.
A girl whose image is someone else smudges a lot of mirrors.
"She'll love it." She beams at Mikoto, as she stands up.
And then...
"I see. Leave it to me." As she looks to the high school girl, "A-An Oni...?"
The girl says in surprise, as yet again her expectations are turned on their head. Yet again retrieving a pattern that is popular mostly with little boys.
Eventually though, she finds a pattern of an Oni that looks almost ape like - with two horns.
"I'll do my best." The girl says seriously, and dips a clean brush in red paint, beginning to trace lines down the side of Mikoto's face, in accordance with the instructions.
Fate may not be able to draw well...
... but she's very good at following instructions.
There is a light pressure...
"If it hurts - it's okay to tell me."
The girl says, as she delivers a lesson that Lindy makes clear to her time and time again. Reiterating it now to Mikoto.
Using the pattern, she draws the lines that imply the scraggly Oni beard mutton chops, as she alternates between red and white.
She then gets to work on the War Paint, thicker lines that trace up the face, around the eyes and forehead.
"I'm going to work on the horns now." She warns, because she thinks this will be the most delicate part, to get it looking entirely even.
<Pose Tracker> Mikoto Minagi [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.
Mikoto's eyes light up, with a happy, wordless noise of confirmation as Fate says she loves it. She nods, braids bobbing up and down, as she shares that Arf will love it, too. "Yup!"
She's sure Arf will be happy..! After all, Fate and Arf are a team. They're in it together.
Just like Mikoto and...
She nods, again, looking expectantly to the girl at the booth. Luckily, this is a festival, so of course they have onis in their catalogue.
In the end, Mikoto isn't quite as adept as Fate at staying still; she wriggles, a little, under the tickling of the brush. But dutifully she stays still enough, different but not so different.
It's okay to tell her if it hurts, and Mikoto chimes in with: "It just feels funny!" This of course moves her cheek with the opening of her jaws, her forehead with the tilting of her brow, but she doesn't seem to mind.
She does close her eyes when Fate works around her eyes, though. It's more a reflexive action than anything. Her eyes are sensitive, and she doesn't want to get paint in them. (Does anyone, really? That's not so different, either.)
"Mm-hmm," Mikoto hums through her lips when Fate gives her that warning, because she is at least trying to stay still, and that wordless hum moves her face around less than talking.
<Pose Tracker> Fate Testarossa [Infinity Institute (5)] has posed.
Fate doesn't admonish Mikoto when she squirms, though her brush does stop. She doesn't admonish her when she says it feels funny.
Fate simply waits for her to be still again, and to keep working. She's very diligent at it. Trying her hardest not to make any mistakes.
Eventually, she starts to work on the horns, painting a perfectly pointed horn in a curved triangular shape. She then repeats it again. And with a separate color paint adds thin striations across each horn.
"I think we're done."
Fate puts down the brush, holds up the mirror.
"You look very fierce."
Fate says reassuringly.
The high school girl comments, "I feel like I should throw beans at her."
Fate turns around, looking cross, "Don't do that. You should put them on a plate for her."
The older girl just throws up her hands, and walks off to help someone else.
<Pose Tracker> Mikoto Minagi [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.
Mirror, mirror, in Fate's hand, who's the fiercest in the land?
"Yup!" Mikoto confirms, brightly. "Look! Look! It's perfect!"
Why she's bidding Fate to look when Fate looked so hard at her face to execute that design...
Mikoto's eyes gleam with happiness, and maybe it's not Fate she's talking to, with that noise. Maybe she's just satisfied with how the experiment turned out.
She laughs, beaming at the mirror, and surely - surely she was getting the attention of the girl at the booth. With that comment, Mikoto turns to her, wide-eyed under her fierce red makeup. "I want beans!" She says, immediately.
Do... do neither of these girls know...
Mikoto - well, first she makes sure to put down the yen for the booth, but as soon as she remembers to do that she reaches out to grasp Fate's hand. "Let's go get beans!" She insists, chipper. "There's taiyaki! Bean paste! Bean paste!"
LOGICAL CONCLUSION OF MIKONI MINAGI.
<Pose Tracker> Fate Testarossa [Infinity Institute (5)] has posed.
Fate gives Mikoto a curious look, then peers at Mikoto extra hard. Even squinting.
Eventually she nods in satisfaction.
"I did alright."
As with any artist she can see the flaws in her own works. Fate has not been that good at art class.
Mikoto though declares she wants beans, and as Mikoto grabs her hand, there's a faint gasp, before she takes it.
The origin of the gasp follows soon after. "I really like Taiyaki-!"
