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flow-or-crash liked your post “[… You’re a little bored.] [So you put your pencil down, get on your...”
[You find yourself interrupted by a sudden change in intuition. Someone’s coming?]
[... Who is that? It’s familiar, but you don’t think you’ve met anyone who casually runs around at that power in the area?]
[It’s... In the back of your mind or something.]
[You open the door.]
[Event!] An Afternoon at Capsule Corporation
Hokuto looked into the alley where they usually practiced and found a small encampment of homeless people. West City was warm enough to support them, even in winter, so this wasn’t an uncommon sight, overall.
Still, Hokuto preferred not to upset tents or hurt people, so the alley was no good today.
Moving on, the parks were full of people, the amusement park was full of couples, the promenades were heavy with traffic. All in all, a typical day in West City, but hardly conducive to practice unless Hokuto wanted to kick a ball without kicking a ball.
That left... Capsule Corporation’s public grounds at the home office.
It was a mild draw, mostly for business types, engineering students, and elementary school children.
Today, thankfully, was mostly devoid of all of them, and the testing ground wasn’t displaying any red flags.
Hokuto remembered it from his own school trips, a long time ago. They’d become separated from the group and simply sat there looking at it. In a distant, foggy imagination, it was a giant landing pad for aliens! Or a distant wasteland that didn’t exist and they’d never seen!
The nostalgia filtered in as they looked at the high wall separating the main public grounds from the currently open testing grounds. No one was looking, and security seemed uninterested... Why not give a nice big jump a shot?
Hokuto had found in general that ki, as might be expected-- or at least their ki-- much preferred to work with the body as presented, rather than try to make new things. Had Hokuto tried to vault the wall with pure ki by levitating, they would have risen maybe a few inches, exhausted their ki entirely trying to bring in field ki to push off with, and fallen flat on their face.
With a jump, however, amplification of what was already there came much easier. A standing jump of three meters was... doable, and simple, if not easy, even with workbooks and a five-kilo bag of river rocks strapped to their back.
The backflop was probably a worse idea than originally planned, and Hokuto hit the grass hard, rolling off their backpack and skidding to a stop. Hokuto blinked. Despite a fall that should have broken something they were completely fine. A brief chuckle slipped past their lips. They stood up and dusted themself off, closed their eyes, and recentered, touching the wall to make sure they understood where that was.
... There wasn’t anyone else here, and no interest had been drawn by that little feat. Good. Now, those bushes-- Should be... Ah. There, towards the main building.
Technically, Hokuto’s father worked there. But he was in distribution and vending, which required his presence in far-flung regions that Hokuto had only ever seen pictures of, home for maybe a scant week or two out of the year.
Sometimes, Hokuto wondered what their father spent all that money on. Or maybe their father just didn’t much care for better living situations than what he already had-- a place that kept the rain off, at best. Maybe he had other kids, kids who lived better.
Hokuto sighed and dumped out some of the rocks. Today, let’s just try and hover as many as I possibly can.
Eight was nearly the same as eight cans, and they set each one to gently revolve around them while they reached to pluck another out of the small pile of smoothed rocks. Wait, timer--
All the rocks dropped and Hokuto sighed, turning on the stopwatch and lifting again...
flow-or-crash
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“westcitydunderhead: [[Do you like Dragon Ball? Are you interested in...”
It’s a quiet evening in the alleys of West City. Near the oldest buildings-- the apartment buildings, big, and tall, and square, unlike the Capsule-adjusted housing nearby, there’s a boy. Like most boys, he looks something like a work in progress. His dark eyes are hidden behind thick lenses. His limbs look like someone stretched them out, and forgot to pull from his abdomen so he looks especially pudgy. His neck cranes around, as if he’s looking for something or someone else, before he reaches into a plastic bag and pulls out--
An empty beer can? He walks a small distance away from the bag, and then sets the empty beer can on one hand. He closes his eyes. Usually he walks and centers, because that quiets his mind enough that he can focus on centering. but because he’s actively doing things, now, he needs to stay still, stay quiet, and let his ki do the talking.
Reach in. Feel the center. draw out the ki and gently push in one direction--
There’s a little, sad tunk as the can leaps out of his hand and into the air. His finger twitches as it nears his eyes and the can sails into the air once more. His eyes snap open. “Ack--”
Sadly, his third attempt just crushes the can. He sighs, closes his eyes, and walks back to collect the plastic bag. Time for more centering practice...
He opens his eyes at the sound of wind and mists blowing in out of nowhere.
Uh-oh. Had he walked straight into a mugging?
... A musical mugging?
viderxanima liked your post “[Event!] Synaesthesia And Visualization”
… it’s Ian. This could be a bad time.
Hokuto is hell of pale right now. “I see you came by to visit, but it’s really not necessary. Part of the risk, right?”
@viderxanima started following westcitydunderhead
“Oh-- Hey, Ian.” Chin raised one hand. “Could you tell everyone I’ll be about half an hour late to club? I have something I need to take care of.”
Self-improvement, after all, didn’t wait for anyone.
“Oh, right. One more thing before you leave, Hokuto.”
“Huh? What’s that?”
Piccolo allowed himself a cruel grin and pointed. “150!”
The sudden change in weight caused Hokuto to flare up to compensate and-- slowly-- they straightened up. “... You heard about my little stunt from Bra, huh?”
“Can’t show off athletically if you’re almost dead on ki all the time,” Piccolo said, tapping his temple. “By the way, it’s about an hour until midnight in Satan City. You might want to get a move on.”
[... You’re a little bored.]
[So you put your pencil down, get on your weighted stuff, and start running through forms.]
[You pause and feel the two beans in the belt pocket.]
“Now you listen to me. There’s two things I need to tell you before you go there. First, don’t let your teachers know you have these. They know the rules-- if they want the senzu, they can climb the tower themselves. And second-- These are only for emergencies. Don’t waste them. Each one is food for ten days. Now I don’t anticipate that you’re going to need food for twenty days, nor travel for twenty dats, and you’re pretty resourceful, but if it’s a choice between starving and having one, eat the damn bean.”
Hokuto nodded. She closed her hands around them and put them in the pocket of her weighted clothes.
Korin nodded. “Right. That about covers it. Be careful with those, OK? Don’t lose them.”
[You wonder, idly, what Korin felt might need such a thing, but considering how much stronger you got because of his tutelage, you can’t begrudge the old cat being mysterious.]
It’s PE. Mandatory, daily. Hokuto would love to learn other things, but honestly it’s not so bad, if more than a little old-fashioned.
Today, apparently, was weight room. Hokuto was familiar with the environment. They also knew damned well that they would be hauling over 75 kilos quite some distance later to get to the Satan Gym on time, so they decided to take it easy on the machines and practice their breathing. In, raise ki as hard as you can, out, fold as deep as possible. In, out. In, out. In--
As you increase the speed at which you can control your ki, your ability to improvise and improve becomes greater. Make it move faster than you can think!
Now, reverse the rhythm! ... Reverse it again!
Hokuto’s concentration was suddenly broken by someone poking them. “Hey, why don’t you let someone who actually needs this machine use it?”
Hokuto had seen him, and his buddies, over at the rack, generally grunting and whooping. All well and good! The Self-Improvement Club was like that sometimes-- after all, people generally don’t get better if you keep grinding them into the dirt. But now?
They sat up. “You think you can lift more than me?”
“Pfft, yeah. Your flabby ass can barely lift yourself out of bed.”
The careful bubble of Hokuto’s fold popped all at once. “You know what? Prove it.”
“what?”
“Prove it, let’s go. The rack, right now. Let’s see how much you can squat, genius.” Hokuto grit his teeth.
It was two minutes later. There was a crowd. Hokuto had thought the guy was a jock, but instead he was just incredibly popular. He wished he regretted it, but instead he was just getting even more angry.
40 kilos? This guy dragged him off the leg press for 12 reps of forty kilos on the bar.
Hokuto’s fist didn’t shake, but his eyes seemed to flash as he looked to a random member of the crowd. “You. Double it.”
His friends laughed at that. “Aw, come on.”
“You can’t lift, don’t act like--”
“Double it,” he interrupted. There were a few snickers, heralds of humiliation. Hokuto walked up to the bar, rolled his neck, took a deep breath, and started.
... 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. Hokuto set the bar back in its place on the rail. One fist pump. He walked back to-- Oh, what was his name, CT? Something like that. The fear and respect was in the boy’s eyes.
Hokuto smiled, just a little. “We done?”
CT nodded.
Hokuto nodded. “Good talk.”
“Chin!”
-- Wait, the coach!?
