[ closed ]

[moodyblue]

🧙 WHO: [ closed ] to Jiro & Abbacchio
⚔️️ WHAT: Quest!
🕒 WHEN: March
🗺️ WHERE: Bunny cafes
⚠️ WARNINGS: bad attitudes >:[



You've got to be shitting me. [ Abbacchio stares at the rabbit in Jiro's arms. He stares down at the one in his own arms.

They both met back up in the back corner of their fourth bunny cafe, convinced they'd each found the elusive Sir Fuzzlerton, but now that he's seeing them both up close...

Abbacchio groans and then lets the little lop-eared thing hop out of his arms. ] Neither of these is him, either. [ They've been at it how long? And they started out how confident that there was no way they weren't the ideal candidates for this kind of job, for something that was investigative and just needed keen eyes?

Abbacchio sits down in a pink upholstered chair with a huff. He dislodges yet another non-quest-related furry friend so he can lean an elbow on the tabletop. ] Okay. We need to rethink this.

Your powers here aren't anything that'll help with this, right?

Comments

[eardrums]

Man, this was supposed to be easy...

[One of her close friends even keeps a rabbit in their dorms - she thought for sure she knew how to handle this!
And it's not her first time looking for someone who's run off and gotten lost, either... she's supposed to be good at this kinda thing!

But then again, she doesn't really have her Quirk here. Sure, her jacks are present and accounted for - she's even wiggling one at the rabbit still in her arms - but she can't really use them.
Instead, all she's got is --]

Unless you wanna fly to the next cafe, not really. All I can do is, like...
Movement magic. Flying, speed, floating stuff with my mind - that kinda junk.

[She sits herself down in the chair across from Abbacchio, petting that rabbit just a bit.]

What about you? I don't suppose you've got spy gear magic or something?

[moodyblue]

It is easy...to catch them. [ Abbacchio sighs and leans an elbow on the pink tabletop, and slides a bit on the lacy place setting before he adjusts his stance. ] They just all look the same until you're up close.

[ This is hardly the ideal setting for sulking, nor is Abbacchio very keen on sulking in the first place, but there's not a lot of other ways to describe his expression while he sits in a pink chair at a pink table in a bunny-and-eggs themed cafe.

His attention is firmly grabbed by what Jiro shares, though. ] Really? That's useful, though. [ Sort of overpowered, if he's honest, and he left behind some people with truly wild powers back home. Flying and telekinesis, what the hell? ] Guess if we find the damn thing, you can just grab it with your mind...

[ Abbacchio frowns at the returned question, but unlike his powers from home, he...gets that the rules are different here. To get out of this alive, sharing this world's bestowed powers makes sense. It doesn't mean he likes it, doesn't keep him from grinding his teeth about it, but... ]

I can...well I haven't had to do it much, but. I guess I can heal shit.

Which is useless for investigating. [ And such a kind power that he is, frankly, horrified to have been given it. His momentary relief has since been drowned by the shameful certainty that he doesn't deserve this kind of useful, positive power. ]

[eardrums]

[Without thinking much about it, Jiro scoops up a rabbit that managed to hop its little front paws onto the toe of her boot, listening to Abbacchio talk as she does.]

I mean... you could've just told me it's not great for this kinda thing, if sharing this sorta stuff is really that uncomfortable for you. [She's a teenager, they can sense that kinda hesitation in the worst possible ways.
He's just very lucky that she's not the kind to use it any.]
But if it's all the same to you, I'm definitely gonna keep that in mind for the next time we work together.

As for this, though... yeah, I guess there's not much we can do to make sniffing out the right rabbit any easier.
Maybe at the next place, we should ask how many rabbits they're supposed to have on the floor? So we can figure out if he's even there in the first place, I mean.
We'd just have to count the rabbits and watch for a discrepancy.

[moodyblue]

I'll live, [ he snaps, a bit mortified that a teenager caught on that he's still uncomfortable about powers talk. He knows it's objectively different, he's working his way through it, he doesn't need someone four years younger acting more mature than he is and looking out for his feelings or whatever's happening here. ] Besides, we're all a lot safer if we know what everyone else does. And if everyone's got one of the same eight powers, the playing field's a lot more even than what I'm used to working with back home.

[ He huffs a sigh now that he's got that off his chest, but his attempt at a disinterested stare doesn't do too well because Jiro...actually has a good idea, really. ]

...That's smart. [ He admits after a beat, because he's an asshole but a plan is a plan. ] Now I feel like an idiot for not thinking of it myself.

[ Huh. After a second, he pushes up to stand, and maybe for a moment there's definitely a smiling curving one painted corner of his mouth up. ] Maybe you're not such a bad partner to get stuck with. [ As if anyone had forced them to do this anyway and they hadn't innocently bumped into each other while trying to do this alone. ]

[eardrums]

[By the time Abbacchio's standing again, Jiro's somehow managed to end up with a third rabbit in her arms.
They all seem pretty content, even as she moves to stand to match.]

Well, you gotta be able to come up with ideas like that when you're the one people go to for logistics and strategy. Right?
If you're the one doing the investigations, you gotta have the know-how, too.

[That's very gently aimed at him as well. She's sure he's got some bright ideas rattling in that old man brain of his.]

If I remember right, there's another cafe a block and a half down from this one, toward the south part of the city. Do we wanna stop there next?

[moodyblue]

Uh-huh. Don't get too carried away. You're a bit young to be a teacher. [ His tone is dismissive and snappy, but his expression is softer and gives him away — his instant embarrassment gives way pretty quickly to fondness.

(Damn, he's always been way too soft, hasn't he? The shell he's manufactured has always been thin and brittle because of that.)

He has to move no less than five rabbits out from underfoot to start towards the door, and eventually it ends up being easier to just bend down and scoop one persistent one up and out of his way. It's only so he doesn't crush it! He isn't holding this little white and black spotted rabbit for any other reason! ]

Might as well. I didn't start this nonsense to leave it unfinished. [ Abbacchio is a lot of things and a quitter is actually absolutely one of them...but he said he'd do this and it feels Iike following orders back home, so he's going to stick with it now. He'll see it through.

Even if all 'it' is is finding some rich person's pet rabbit. ]

[eardrums]

[That answer's enough to get a bit of a smile on Jiro's face - she knows a guy trying to be tough when she sees one.
(Mostly because she saw nearly twenty of them all day, every day back home. Her dad and teachers included.)
She almost doesn't wanna put the rabbits in her arms down... but she knows she should, so they all get a couple more pats before she lowers them to the floor.]

I plan on sticking through with it, too. So we may as well keep working together, I think.
"Two heads are better than one", or whatever they say.

Kinda helps that everything in between's been kinda easy, right? I mean, it's just playing with rabbits until we find the right one.

[Her tune's sure changed fast. One can only wonder why.]

[moodyblue]

[ So he's got a temporary partner on this, then. It had begun more by happenstance than anything — they'd both been responding to the ad in the same café — but now it's a planned, stated thing. Well...there's worse partners. Abbacchio still has trouble leaving room for truly new people in his life, tends to define any stranger by parameters made years prior, but in this case it's helpful, because Jiro reminds him a little bit of a mix of his previous coworkers.

(Well. Maybe you don't call them that, when you're working for a gang, but the sense of duty is certainly still there.)

He deposits his own rabbit just inside the door as they leave, so that it stays in its home restaurant. Look, maybe it's cute, but he's not about to try to steal it. ]

Don't know about that. I wouldn't say no to something more concrete to do. For all the talk about how dangerous everyone's worlds getting frozen was, I've been told jack shit about how to help with that.

[ Except he has, of course. Apparently 'just existing' and 'just using this world's magic' is enough to help. But that doesn't feel right in his gut, doesn't settle nicely with the rest of his restless and guilty soul.

For a dude who was told to find a bunny today Abbacchio sure is keen on being a killjoy. ]

[eardrums]

Well, I meant the stuff we're doing today is pretty easy, just tedious... but you're not wrong about that, either.
I've decided to just bide my time until me and the rest of my classmates can get in on things if we've got to.

[Because of course there are more tiny heroes-in-training running around here, why wouldn't there be??
Once they're out of that cafe, though, she's quick to turn and start leading him off to the next one.]

... You and I could always do some magic training together if you want something to do.
I've been looking for someplace nice and open to practice my magic, and considering that means tossing crap around with my mind, you'd probably get a lotta opportunities to practice your healing stuff, too.

[moodyblue]

...Christ, of course there's more of you. [ From a world where everyone has powers, but now they don't. Or, well. They do, but they're different in this world. Still, it's maybe a leg up...hopefully it is.

For his part, Abbacchio's more unbalanced by new powers than reassured. The sometimes-present sometimes-missing little sphinx cat that keeps following him around doesn't help, either; it doesn't really act like how he's used to that working back home. It's strange, using his powers without the focal point of his stand - or 'familiar' here, whatever - present. But here, it doesn't seem to matter.

So, damn, but if that isn't some well-timed offering. ]

...If you knock me out by telepathically throwing a rock at my head, deal's off. [ But said in a tone that pretty clearly suggests the deal is on otherwise.

He even smiles a bit as he looks ahead once again. Oops. ]

[eardrums]

[Now that he's looking away, he won't get to see the way Jiro ends up beaming at him accepting her offer - though he'll definitely get to hear it.]

I dunno, I can't make too many promises. I mean, that would be pretty funny...

[He's probably befriended the wrong superpowered teenager.
But she keeps going on walking behind him toward the next cafe, opening the door for him with her kinetic magic before he gets a chance to get it himself. ... Mostly because she would've done the same with her jacks, back home.
It's almost some kind of muscle memory.]