when you open a sci fi book you just grabbed from the stacks (you work at a library in this scenario) cos someone just recommended it in a podcast (you were just listening to while you work) and you flip to the acknowledgements page and see the name of a former professor (from your grad program) and her (very smart) bird
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Torou rises from her seat and passes so near that Obi feels the heat from her body.
Pausing with her back to him, she looks over her shoulder. The robe has slipped down to show the warm curve of her skin.
She holds his gaze as she reaches out and pushes the door shut behind him.
...
At different stages in her career, Torou has both posed and worked as a street dancer. Flashing skirts and whirling ribbons will tempt gold coins in many quarters, or draw unwary eyes away from a partner slipping through a door that ought to have been locked.
Her costume is more muted, but she is dancing now: a lithe, teasing display.
He can see that she is enjoying every step.
...
Torou turns to face him, leaning against the doorframe. One eyebrow arches inquiringly.
She has set the stage.
Now it is his turn to act.
...
'Hey, Torou…’ he says, answering her unspoken question with a tone of mock confusion, ‘you would have any man, wouldn't you?'
'Not at all!’ She lifted her nose, answering him with haughtiness.
A sly smile disrupts the aristocratic air when she adds, ‘He would have to be good-looking.'
...
Obi half-smiles. She had a tongue like a knife, this one, and she used both willingly.
‘Is that so?’ he asks softly.
Instead of answering, she melts back into the wood, tipping back her head to expose her neck and regarding him from under her lashes.
Obi steps into the space she has opened between them, accepting the invitation. He stands looking down on her.
She is all curves and coy smile, tempting as a ripe peach.
...
He sets a hand on the wall beside Torou's face, studying her with that now habitual flatness in his slanted eyes.
Could she drive out the ghosts for him?
Could she free him from the unrelenting pain of memory, of regret?
...
She has done it for many men before him, he is sure of that.
The solitary room, the flickering candlelight, the musky scent perfuming the air, all attest to her skill.
She has waited for him, welcomed him in, even spared him the trouble of walking across the room to her.
...
Obi is a step from losing himself in her arms, drowning out conscience in animal instinct, surrendering his will to sensation.
His body is bruised, aching; his soul even more so — everything in him cries out for relief from the awful pain that dogs him everywhere.
Why hesitate? Thinking comes sluggishly, this late at night, after not enough sleep, too much drink.
...
There is something inevitable in it, in his finding a familiar face here — someone who knows him and yet expects nothing, would not begrudge him a mercenary exchange, would think no less of him for using her and letting her use him.
She is ready to devour him, and he wants her to do it.
He wants anything but to endure another night of emptiness, another hour of facing his failure, another moment of knowing himself worse than useless to the one he had cherished most.
...
Torou watches him with that hungry curiosity of her half-wild nature. She likes the uncertainty, he knows, relishes the suspense.
Obi pauses on the brink, the possibility of oblivion yawning before him, and then he leans in.
Her lips part.
A breath away from closing the kiss, he turns aside.
Torou’s questing lips meet only air; Obi’s forehead thuds against the wall.
...
It is worse, not better.
...
Somewhere in a dusty archive, locked away in the castle vaults, lies a paper with two names scratched out in ink.
Nothing remains on his person of their vows to each other — no ring, no token, not even a mark like the one he bears for the late master.
There is nothing to see or touch, yet the owner of that name has marked him more deeply than flesh, than blood, than bone.
...
He has wronged her in most ways imaginable, but not this one.
She might have been standing right behind him, looking over his shoulder with the look of solemn compassion she wore when in the presence of something despicable.
The closer he came to another woman, the nearer he felt her.
...
Her voice has been weaving through his thoughts, plaguing his dreams, but just now she might have whispered in his ear.
The roughness of the wood, the brush of Torou’s loose hair against his skin — it all feels insubstantial as mist compared with the sense that she might be a moment from laying her hand on his arm.
Even the heady perfumes have somehow faded; all he can smell is that unmistakable mix of fragrance and medicine, flowers and earth.
He could almost taste her.
Obi’s body slumps, folding in on itself, as the tension drains out of him. Inside there is nothing but a bleak and blighted waste.
...
Torou’s shoulders quiver. She makes a sound, low in her throat.
Obi jerks back, eyeing her warily.
She shrugs at him, grinning. “Can’t blame a girl for being curious.”
...
No sign of offended feeling or even irritation shows; she regards him not with hostility but a nonchalance bordering on amusement.
“You’re not even surprised,” Obi accuses her.
She shakes her head, grin widening.
...
He drags a hand down his face, searching for a well of anger to draw on, to show some resentment that she has played him like a fish that she always meant to throw back into the pool.
He finds only exhaustion.
Coming here had been pointless, like everything else.
...
“Going so soon?” her mocking voice follows him, as he crosses the room in a bound. Obi doesn’t pause on the windowsill.
He doesn’t look back.
Throwing up the glass, he releases himself into the night and lets the darkness swallow him, for what little relief it brings.
*****
Torou straightens and stands with her arms akimbo, frowning after him.
She had rolled the dice to see how they would land, not to win — but she couldn’t call herself satisfied.
The reports had not overstated the case.
He was half-mad and running amok. All her tricks had barely slowed him down for less than a night.
...
Torou walked to the dressing table and began pulling the sleeves, shifts, pads, and skirts of her usual costume from the drawers, attiring herself in a more practical sort of a battledress.
She pursed her lips as she worked, weighing her training against her inclination.
There was no money in following Obi — clearly, he would be no good for a job, even. That made it a waste of resources.
She knew that, yet still she found herself wanting to.
...
Tugging her own laces tight, in a show of strength and flexibility that would have impressed a circus performer, Torou turned from the mirror.
She has always liked Obi, but it is not just nostalgia for old times making her restless in the wake of their encounter.
The night before, while sniffing out Obi’s trail, she had encountered a rumor.
Someone dangerous was on the loose, it was whispered — someone who had a bone to pick with the royals of Tanbarun and Clarines.
...
She had thought it meant Obi. He was dangerous; he had crossed swords with one or even two princes, if the gossip could be believed.
After seeing him tonight, though, she wondered.
No one could mistake a man like that, crazed with his own memories, for a hunter questing revenge.
ooo when i was like 3 i used to watch Ponyo like everyday i distinctly remember watching that movie over and over again core childhood memory right there
Oh my god fINALLY I get to draw something for myself again...Time for something winter-themed!! :D
Somewhere in the far future Guzma and El definitely took a weekend trip to Galar jUST to catch a Snom. And then 10 more of them. And then pray to Arceus they’ll get accustomed to Alolas warm temperatures...
...W-what do you mean they're blushing more in the second panel, t-that's just the cold, I dONT KNOW WHAT YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT
