[AQ] The sound of your heart (Ai | Yuki | X-Mod)

[Ai]

SPOILER: Click to show

{Spoiler}A Dangerous Song
+ Description: There’s been a lot of X-eggs floating around Downtown; upon following them, it seems that their source is coming from a street performer dancing to a song with a strong X-aura. This needs to be resolved… somehow.
+ Cleanse the eggs and peacefully stop the song from continuing: +2 Guardians, +3 Faberge, +3 Roost
+ Cleanse the eggs: +2 Guardians, +1 Faberge, +3 Roost
+ Peacefully stop the song from continuing: +2 Guardians, +1 Faberge, -2 Roost
+ Use force to stop the song from continuing: +1 Guardians, -3 Faberge, -2 Roost
+ Use force to get rid of the eggs and stop the song: -1 Guardians, -2 Faberge, -3 Roost, +5
+ Fail to stop the song and/or chase the eggs away: +1 Guardians, -2 Faberge, -1 Roost, +1
+ Requirements: Tag for X-mod
+ Submitted by Teale and Pai

As summer slowly turned to autumn, the weather became colder and the days shorter. Not only that, but the mood of the Otonoki citizens also seemed to be going downhill. Whether it was tied to the weather itself or to something else entirely, it was hard to tell. What Ai knew for sure was that his inner self had certainly been affected by all the x-happenings and hunter encounters he experienced in the past weeks and months. The silver-haired second year felt that he was slowly changing, that his real self was becoming angrier to the point of him trying much too hard to hold those unappealing feelings back.

School had finished for the day and Ai was walking towards the station when he decided to stop by a grocery store in the city to buy some fish and vegetables to cook for dinner. The atmosphere seemed to be especially dark today, and with his heightened egg sense, the boy could feel mild signs of X-activity. It seemed like they were quite far, but did he really want to go and see what was going on? Part of him wanted to help, but the other part was just... sick and tired of all this.

Yukiya

[Yukiya]

Although it was starting to cool down, Yuki still liked to go out around sunset. He had completed more panels than he realized on the manga he finally went back on, so he decided to take the day off and enjoy himself. Besides, looking at the sunset and the night sky reminded him of Tanabata, and his wish...even though he was still lacking in so many specifics (political systems? magic systems? villains? what were those?) just knowing that he was working on it again gave him a small sense of pride.

But he knew that his enthusiasm could be disappear like a flame on a windy night. Kanpa, as always, was encouraging him to work on his story, but he still had so many doubts in his heart. If not just for the fact that creating something was hard - there were still the threats of egg hunters and X-Eggs all around Otonoki. He trained with Ai and Minji, but would it be enough? And still didn't know much about his transformation's powers besides that he had a sword and occasionally could summon water to defend people. He was thinking that maybe they should have another training session...when he saw Ai going into a grocery store. Well, what great timing he had! But right before he walked in, he felt a dark presence nearby. That was...probably an X-Egg, right? He rushed into the grocery store and found Ai as soon as possible.

"Hey, Ai, sorry to bother you," Yuki said hastily, "But you felt that, right?"

Miuna

[Miuna]

Deep within the streets of Otonoki, a strange sound was heard echoing against rooftops and windows. It crept along the edges of telephone lines and gutters, bouncing on every available surface until it dispersed into the chill of the autumn air. With it, a mysterious presence was carried through the streets. It was a heavy tension that could be felt even by the brightest of folks. Those without an egg would feel it as only another bad omen, yet those with their heart's wishes formed would understand its true purpose.

Along that path of despair, a group of dancers broke it down to a strange mix of songs, some dancing along to hip hop while others twirled to pop. It was a medley of music that attracted any performer in the area to strut their stuff as a crowd began to form. Had it not been for the darkened look in their eyes and the awkward jitter of their limbs, they might have even been enjoyable to watch. However, as a few dark eggs floated along the top of the crowd, the shaky movements of the dancers worsened.

"Useless, useless! Dance, dance, dance......"

[Ai]

As soon as the boy entered the grocery store, a pair of hurried footsteps seemed to follow him right in. A familiar voice called out to him as well, asking a question that Ai would have perhaps rather not heard. “ Hey Yuki!” The silvr-haired wasn’t his regular uber cheerful self today, but he still flashed a hint of a smile at his friend. “Ah, you mean the X aura…” He seemed rather thoughtful for a moment. If Yuki wanted to go check it out, of course he’d tag along. It wasn’t like he could just send his friend in the arms of whatever danger was looming. And besides, he knew that if it were the two of them, they’d get things done quicker and maybe safer. “Did you want to, uh, go check it out?”

As the two talked, the atmosphere seemed to become heavier. Obviously, the evil aura that the eggs emanated reached the two whose egg sense was fully developed. Ai could feel his already not so great mood was being influenced and decided that this had to stop. Even if the current situation and all the pressure about standing up to egg hunters was a bit over his head, the boy still couldn’t let other people (and himself) get hurt by X-eggs. He’d made a decision long ago that he’d join this fight… that he wouldn’t give up. And he should probably stop being a hypocrite and stand by it. “Actually, we probably should go check it out. This seems quite bad.” Remembering the reaction from the people at the Tanabata, Ai wondered if the ones around the area started to get angry and bicker with each other too.

[Yukiya]

Yuki was a little surprised that Ai wasn't his chipper self, but to be honest there were X-Eggs around and he wouldn't be surprised if Ai had noticed them anyway. And it looked like he did. "Yeah, there's X-Eggs," he muttered. He did notice Ai's reluctance to deal with them, which he understood. There had been many times when he passed by X-Eggs that he sensed but avoided them. He didn't want to deal with something so troublesome...or scary. Even when Kanpa had tugged on his shirt to go cure some, he looked the other way. But with the rise of the hunters and his own sister's egg hatching, he knew that he had to help out somehow. He stifled his own fears and smiled at him. "If...if you don't mind," he replied. As he settled down, he realized he might've interrupted Ai's grocery shopping. "...er, your parents will be okay, right?"

He grinned sheepishly, but he felt the aura was developing pretty bad. The hairs on his back were standing up - was this because he was scared or was this a heightened egg sense? He balled both his fists. He couldn't show that he was scared again, or panic. "Oh, yeah. Let's go," he said, just running out of the door first just so he could hide his face from the more experienced fighter. But god, was the aura even worse out here? And what was that noise? It sounded like it was coming from the next block...wait, that was some kind of music, wasn't it?

"A...concert?" he said. He knew Faberge sometimes had concerts in the park, but in the middle of the neighborhood. He shook his head and just headed toward the sound, feeling safer knowing that Ai was nearby. He couldn't help but wonder how many X-Eggs were involved, though...

[Miuna]

The X-eggs laughed louder and louder the more they danced. They were drawing a much larger crowd now, every person moving along with the music. The people affected here were not the same as the Tanabata Festival. Their movements were not aggressive but sad, slow even as they allowed their bodies to twist and turn around each other. Everyone seemed to have their own style as they showed off their moves, and all of them seemed to be completely hypnotized by the music.

"It's hopeless," They murmured, a few turning to look at the Seiyo students before focusing back towards the source of their despair, "It's all a waste of our time. What's the point? What can we possibly do to change?"

It was easy to be drawn in by the temptation of the sounds, the melody soothing to everyone's ears. Without much thought any passerby could be drawn into the lull of the song, tangled in the web of despair of the X-eggs. Above the crowd they chuckled, swinging around each other and pulling the strings of their eerie marionette dolls.

[Ai]

As Yuki mentioned getting him in trouble with his parents, Ai reacted with half a smile. “Nah, all’s good.” It wasn’t like there was any parent at home to scold him. His dad was always working and his mm was,…well. The boy would rather not think about his mom right at that moment. She already found out about his guardians, but Ai still tried to hide the real danger he was in because of them. She never mentioned fighting or egg hunters, so the second year preferred to assume she didn’t know about them altogether. No use telling her about all this and making her worry when she was already so ill. Ignorance is bliss, after all.

The two walked further into the alley, and what was initially just a feeling became a certainty: X-eggs were roaming about a group of dancers who listened to shady music. As he was a musical himself, the eerie sound low key made his head hurt. This really wasn’t a good time nor place for X-eggs to be. How would he and Yuki get rid of them with so many people around? And as they waited, even more seemed to come, joining in the dance. All of them had weird body movements too. So creepy.

“Not much of a concert, I think…rather…” Ai narrowed his eyes. It was hard to maintain his focus because of the music which seemingly wanted to suck him in. With his current disposition, it was even harder to resist, but he forced himself. He knew he had to fight against it. “a street performance… sort of thing, but it went wrong. Can we make them stop the music? Or maybe stop it ourselves?” Ai looked around, trying to locate the source of the sound. Maybe it was something that could be stopped by the simple push of a button.

[Yukiya]

"Seriously?" he asked. At his house, he had to dodge questions about why he passed out after fighting in the park for a day and why he randomly brought his old kendo shinai when he didn't even practice the martial art anymore. Suna had tried to cover for him, but his mom had been more suspicious and issued a curfew on him. So he really hoped that this didn't take long. He did wonder about Ai's family. He didn't really know much about the guy, but he tried to smile it off as if he didn't really want to talk much about it. Which was fine. That information could be given whenever Ai felt comfortable.

For now, the X-Eggs were more important. As they got closer, the worse it got. A tangle of dancers twirled around aimlessly and that noise - it was irritating, yet somewhat alluring. It was probably the X-Eggs' influence. "Don't we just purify the X-Eggs and it'll be all good?" he said. He looked up and saw quite a few of them - might've been more than he bargained for. That's probably why so many of them were affected. "Or is there a boss X-Egg or someone manipulating them so that these people are like...this." He didn't really know how to explain the sad moving bodies.

He hadn't cured an X-Egg before, but he remembered their talk about peacefully settling things with the Hunters. Since they were affected by the weird humming noise, maybe they could counteract it with another sound instead of transforming? Or at least transform only for a short period of time, since he was pretty far from home. "You think it's safe to transform here, Ai?" he asked. There were a few more people walking by, "That's the only thing we can do to get them all purified, right?"