Subject: [I share Sylvia's feelings about chopsticks.]
Author:
Posted on: 2012-08-29 21:59:00 UTC
One week ago I ate in a Japanese restaurant. I had some misunderstandings with the chopsticks.
Namely, I couldn't grab anything with them.
I ended up sticking the chopsticks INTO the food instead of using them to grab it. Seriously, how do Japanese people eat with them?
Kelok woke up. He found it very odd that he hadn’t been woken by a drooling green puppy-monster or the shrill BEEEEP of the console. In fact, the very peacefulness of his awakening was disconcerting to him after having lived in the PPC HQ for over two years. He stretched and then frowned. His entire body felt wrong. He felt taller and thinner...in a pretty way?
He ran his tongue over his normally quite monstrous teeth, and found them to be perfect, according to human standards. He sat up quickly, knocking his head against the bottom of the top bunk. Suddenly the room was a blur of movement as Unger sprang from the top bunk, giggling.
Giggling? Unger was usually annoyingly hyper, but he didn’t giggle. Unger was finally still long enough for Kelok to get a good look at him. He felt his eyes grow to cover over half his face, his cheeks turned red, and his mouth gaped open, but he was sure there were no teeth showing, and he felt like flailing his arms around, but he suddenly realized that he couldn’t do a take like that, because he was the Aloof Older Brother, and had to remain Aloof. He felt his features return to normal.
Unger had literal sparkles of Cute hovering around him, and a Stuffed Rabbit of Cuteness had appeared from somewhere and seemed to be welded to his hand. He looked even younger than normal, and oh yeah, he was animated. Not as in lively, as in drawn. Maybe cel-shaded, maybe hand colored, Kelok wasn’t entirely sure, but this was definitely no longer a Live Action story.
He walked aloofly to the nearest mirror and stared for a while at his new bishonen look. He was about to call for some de-Sue-ifying back-up when a message began blaring from the console, or everywhere, anyway, a message was blaring.
Attention all PPC personnel, do not panic. You may have noticed that there have been some alterations in your appearance and in the way you feel you must behave. Not to worry, this will be remedied within twenty-four hours. There was a giggle Not now, dear, I’m giving the personnel the warning More giggling and suggestive sounds followed until the now embarrassed sounding voice said, Oh no! I left the broadcast o-- and it cut off with a slight electronic squeal.
“Come, Kelok! Let us go find a hearty mug of ale!” Unger said Boisterously.
“I thought you were the Cute Bruiser?” Kelok said in his best Big Brother tone.
“I’m a Subversion of the Boisterous Bruiser! No will suspect a thing in the face of all this Cute!” He giggled a again, slung his axe over his shoulder and marched out the door. Kelok followed to make sure the younger agent didn’t get into too much trouble.
[Real-life aside: This is a roleplay that will cover no more than one day of HQ time (which conveniently enough lasts, in real life time, as long the Board doesn’t get bored), at the end of which there will be a reset by mass neuralization triggered by a Flower or a character that is playing out a genius inventor role. Basically one day in HQ everyone wakes up to find themselves looking decidedly animated, with an anime style slant to the animation. They will find themselves compelled to act out a particular character type. This is all to be taken about as seriously as the Shipfic Fest usually is, or in other words this should be total and complete Crack!fic. Have fun with it! Go silly with your bad selves!
For a handy list of character types, should you need ideas, look at this list of http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/StockCharacters?from=Main.StockCharacter “ target=”blank”>Stock Character Types
This is what happens when I get bored and start playing with http://www.kongregate.com/games/xdanond/anime-character-maker-2“ target=”blank”> an anime style character generator to re-create a bunch of my agents.
One more bit of housekeeping. To keep this neat and clean looking, only reply to the last reponse. So we’ll have a long string running toward the edge of the screen. When it starts to get uncomfortably squished against the edge of the screen, the next person starts the thread back up at the top, and we begin a new march toward the edge.]
Is this Canon, or can I bounce my pair of Agents off other Agents?
Anyone can play. That is typical for roleplays on the Board. I figure if anyone wants to make this canon, that it is an understood thing that there are at least hundreds of unnamed agents and personnel working in the PPC. If you play with agents who never see the light of another post, then I see it as those names just belong to some of those hundreds of unknown agents.
Since the links in your post got messed up, I'm reposting them.
Stock Characters.
Anime character maker.
Miah woke up to The Message blaring in her ears, and decided that she really wanted to punch someone. Or shoot them. Hmm. Maybe both. She slid out of bed, noted her slimmer figure and more exaggerated facial features only in passing, in favor of spending more time hiding non-lethal weapons in the hammerspace she had suddenly gained access to. She knew she’d normally make sure Cali had breakfast before heading out, but being the TsunTsun she might just shoot him instead. Why, of all the character types, was she saddled with this one? It’s not like she’d actually shot anyone in the halls for months.
Cyba's target was in range. She reached carefully for his helmet...
Joke was quite well aware of both the fact that he had this agent's attention and also exactly where Mess Efekt was. As such, he pulled his best cute and adorable look just as the other mini, disgruntled that the agent had inadvertently avoided him, de-cloaked and leapt at the agent's back in an attempt to knock him over.
Nobody had noticed the dinosaur in the doorway, all being too intent on their next moves.
Everything quite literally slowed down.
The mini Mess Efekt flew towards the agent, his metal legs in a four-legged version of an epic martial arts leap. Cyba's hand reached for the agent's samurai helmet...and Eagrus came hurtling around the corner.
Throwing his useless sword away (which squeaked as it hit the ground), he pulled a rather less fake one from hammerspace - or maybe swordspace - and pointed it at the agent. Apparently the anime character had taken over, because he cried:
"I see you are another swordsman! At last, a worthy opponent! I challenge you to a duel!"
After receiving a quick shot of healing magic, Gaspard struggled to his feet and thanked the nurse. He picked up his briefcase and hobbled out of the doors. He immediately doubled back and hoisted his fake corpse over his shoulders. The spy wasn't sure whether he should leave it to despawn naturally or to take it with him somewhere where it wouldn't be seen. He thought it felt rather rude to leave a fake corpse of himself in a place where people ate.
Instead of heading for DoI central, he made his way to Medical to drop off the body and explain everything. After all, he knew that if he chose to hide the fake body somewhere where he thought nobody will ever find it, somebody would just happen to be behind him and say: "What's all this, then?"
He turned the corner and came face-to-face with some more agents. One of them suddenly drew a sword out of nowhere and exclaimed to an agent who was about to have his helmet pinched off of his head:
"I see you are another swordsman! At last, a worthy opponent! I challenge you to a duel!"
The doors to Medical were just on the other side of this hallway. All that stood between him and his destination was yet another potential fight. Gaspard felt the salaryman side of him act up: he needed to hurry up and get rid of his load so that he may go to work. His personality put up a valiant fight against this irrational thought, but he was already shuffling between the agents, muttering excuses and struggling to keep the fake corpse in his shoulders.
The mini called Mess Efekt was still flying in slow motion as Gaspard shuffled past. Being already in the air, there was not all that much he could do to stop himself hitting the wrong target. So it was that he collided hard with Gaspard's back and rolled off from the recoil to land face to face with a dinosaur.
Now, the dinosaur in question was looking quite cute at the moment - but this was still a dinosaur and neither mini had ever seen one before. It was also bigger than them. Seeing said dinosaur standing over him, Mess Efekt let out a startled beep and cloaked again. This prompted the other mini, Joke, to notice and run for safety on the other side of Agent Cyba's legs, ruining her stealth operation completely.
Cyba, who had changed her mind at the last minute and confiscated the potential combatants' swords instead, suddenly became aware that pretty much everybody now knew she was there. Worse, she was holding Vid's and Eagrus' katanas.
Suicide was awake, sprawled on the floor with a dog-eared copy of The Art of War, when the message arrived. He frowned, looked down at himself, then glanced across the RC at the battered couch Diocletian was sleeping on.
Huh. She was looking somewhat . . . cuter than usual. Not that he'd ever admit that his partner was slightly cute to begin with--albeit in a hammer-stunned woodland creature sort of way--but this was definitely a type of cute she didn't normally subscribe to. There were long lashes. There was chocolate-colored hair and ludicrously oversized eyes, as well as some worrisome curves. Even though she was currently wearing her usual rumpled black uniform, he had a worrisome feeling that she ought to be wearing a schoolgirl skirt.
Suicide paused and thought for a moment. Then he made an executive decision, opened the medkit, and grabbed a syringe full of a high-powered sedative. Diocletian was terrified of becoming a Sue again, reverting to her old limpid-pools-of-silvery-light-deep-within-her-eyes self. She only made a "muhrm" noise as he injected the sedative into her neck. Better to let her sleep it off, because if she woke up as an anime character, there was going to be trouble with a capital T.
Once that was taken care of, he carefully checked himself over. Yep: definitely a bishonen of some type. Well, to hell with that. He grabbed a dagger and cut several ragged chunks out of his hair, dug through the hamper for his smelliest clothes, and rubbed a handful of saddle grease into his face and skin. His three-day stubble seemed to have vanished, which was annoying, but a strong smell of horse and some pants with Orc goop on them would go a long way towards evening the balance. Whistling a little, he slung his human-skin quiver over his back and strolled out into the corridor to observe the chaos.
And then she groaned. Brilliant. She looked over at her partner Christianne, who looked completely oblivious.
"Chrissy. There's something wrong."
Christianne looked up from her oblivious stupor, saw Eledhwen, and frowned.
"...Why on earth are you suddenly kawaii desu?"
Gaspard was walking back to his Response Centre after an exhausting 8-hour shift in the Sorting Room when the oddest feeling overcame him. It was an cold, tingling sensation not unlike someone filling his shirt with snow. He shivered and looked around him. Was it just him or did the Generic Grey hallways become a bit more... cartoony? He looked down at himself. He was dressed exactly like a typical Japanese salaryman, complete with the suit and tie.
He started to walk faster. What if the Anime-Sues had taken over and imposed their version of reality in HQ? Luckily, he already had a plan for that. He would fall back to World One and lie low for a while until things quieted down and then have a look around. He'd have to contact Mom and Dad before doing any of this, so he would need to send them a message...
Gaspard threw open the door to his RC and hurried over to the console. Its screen was flashing red, meaning that somebody was broadcasting an important announcement all across HQ. The junior agent gulped and pressed the "play" button.
He breathed a sigh of relief as he learned that the Sues were not invading. Good. No serious emergency then. Still, the invasion could have happened. Of course he wasn't being stupid by thinking of an escape plan. No sir.
The console BEEPed. The DoI logo flashed on screen and was replaced by a message from the Sub Rosa herself. Gaspard sighed. She was announcing that all operatives were to report to the Sorting Room to scan all incoming fics for anime-influenced irregularities. Hooray, a double-shift.
Another strange sensation gripped Gaspard as he shuffled towards the door: he suddenly felt compelled to grab a black briefcase and to go to work in a gigantic office with other similarly dressed people. Oh his way out he instinctively grabbed a briefcase that had mysteriously materialized by the coat rack.
Gaspard made his way towards DoI Central with the distinct impression of being some unimportant part of the background.
When Sergio got up from bed that day, he had the feeling that something was wrong with himself.
Well, for once both his partners woke up before him.
"Good morning."
Then, he noticed that both of them were wearing typical Japanese school uniforms.
"Why are you two dressed like that? Is it sailor fuku day or something?"
"Not exactly..." Nikki answered, and produced a mirror from her schoolbag. Or, rather, the schoolbag that somehow was near her. She nearly tripped in it when going towards the male Agent.
When Sergio looked at his reflection, he found out that he was an anime-like character too. And wearing an high school uniform. A male one, luckily. Being genderbended once was enough.
"Well, this is awkward. Any clue on who made this mess? 'Cause I have a burning desire to storm out and kick his ass."
"I don't know, but the Flowers say it will be over in about 24 hours." answered Corolla, "Well, something less, since we received it exactly 3 hours, seventeen minutes and forty-six seconds ago. Wow, I never was this accurate!"
Sergio stared at Corolla, then at Nikki (who managed to topple a full tea tray that he was sure wasn't there ten seconds before), and finally at the console.
"So, until those flowerheads sort this mess out, you'll be an even more robotic Cute Robot Girl, Nikki will be a Dojikko and I'll be an Hot Blooded shounen hero?" Sergio frowned, "This will be a looong day... Let's go kick some Sue ass!"
Agent Vid had just opened the portal to headquarters, eager to get to someplace where the progression of time made at least a modicum of sense, when he heard his console beep loud enough through to be heard through the portal.
"Shut that goddamn thing off," he told his partner, who sprang through the portal with goodwill and a velociraptor's agility.
Upon hitting the ground on the other side, however, something completely unexpected happened. Vid watched in amazement and not a little horror as the claws on Trask's toes shrank, his head enlarged to grotesque (but somehow still endearing) proportions, his limbs shrank, and his yellow eyes became large and fawn-like. The velociraptor took one look down at his forelimbs, which had shrunk to chibi proportions, and sat down on his haunches with a thud.
"Vid?" His voice came out in a chirp.
Vid stepped through the portal after his partner and couldn't help but chuckle. It wasn't often that you got a good excuse to laugh at thirty seven pounds of velociraptor.
"I don't know what happened," he told the theropod, still chuckling, "but we'll get it fixed as soon as I take a picture."
Trask's eyes had gone wide, which meant that they took up more than eighty percent of his face, and Vid snapped a picture quickly. Instead of complaining, however, the velociraptor still looked shocked.
"Vid, something's happened to you, too."
Despite his better judgement, Vid looked down.
A skirt. The was wearing what looked like a long, black skirt, and his feet were clad in shoes that looked like flipflops on stilts. In a daze of morbid curiosity, he yanked open the door to the bathroom to get to the cracked mirror that hung over the sink.
His hair was long, tied in a ponytail, and... red? It took him a moment to even register the thought, and another second to notice the long and improbable red scar that crossed the bridge of his nose. Then he bolted from the bathroom and slammmed the door shut behind him.
Trask was fretting. "I've been turned into a cute animal companion, I just know it," the chibi velociraptor was muttering, not quite as darkly as usual. "And you've become some sort of self-insert swordfighter."
"Swordfighter?"
Trask pointed to the katana sticking out of Vid's duffel with one tiny foreclaw. Vid suddenly remembered that he had a skill in sword combat, and while he'd never, ever seen the katana before, surely it wouldn't be hard, in theory...
The console beeped, very quietly and apologetically. Vid automatically punched the button for the message, which blared through the room.
"Twenty-four hours?" Trask asked, incredulously, "I'm supposed to go around with arms this small for twenty-four hours?"
Vid shrugged. "I don't know what you're going to do about it, buddy," he said, "but today, I'm going to learn to use a Katana."
[Bip. Bip. Bip.] The until-now unusually quiet Console in RC Log102 beeped. Anebrin put his much-read copy of The Lord of the Rings down and went to check the message. As the file played itself, the elf felt his eyebrow twitching. At its end, he sweat-dropped.
Eloh in the sky, he thought, they weren't kidding. We were animé-fied...
He went to the wall opposite the Console and looked at the mirror (his partner needed one, or he couldn't shave). It seems that since his features were already pretty much Animésque already, he didn't change a lot. He sighed with relief, and was disgusted to see that it caused a small, white, keyhole-shaped something to escape his mouth. He sweat-dropped again and went to check his equipment. His shortbow seemed unchanged, but his sword was now longer, and curved. So it – whatever caused the animé-fication of HQ – messed with his sword. He felt blood rising to his face – it was his sword, Eloh damn them!
Then he noticed that four veins positioned on his temples, were popping. With difficulty, he calmed himself, and went to wake his partner.
When he saw Des, he recoiled. The teenager was much more affected than him. First of all, now he was sleeping with his mouth open, and a small bubble was attached to his left nostril, inflating and deflating as he breathed.
“Wake up, Des, wake up,” said Anebrin. He shook the teenager. Des blinked.
“Tazovoti,” he muttered in his native Hebrew. He turned on his side, obviously wanting to continue sleeping. Anebrin shook him again. With a groan, Des sat in his bed. He blinked groggily.
“Hey, Anebrin,” he said, his voice muffled, “why are your ears so exaggerated?”
“Look at yourself,” the elf replied, pointing to the mirror. Des nodded sleepily. He took his glasses from the night-table, got up, and went to the mirror. He blinked. He could feel that his eyes' shape was abnormal. Worse, he saw that now, instead of being normal, he looked like an animé version of himself: his short beard was now drawn on his face, his eyes were, indeed, abnormally large, and his hair was longer. He had sidebangs – sidebangs! - too.
He moved a little to the side and began hitting his head on the wall. Anebrin pulled him away.
“Ow,” muttered Des. He cursed. It was a very foul curse; thankfully it was in Hebrew and thus, the only person around that understood it was him. Shaking his head, he went to the bathroom/shower to dress.
With a sigh, Anebrin returned to his chair, picking The Lord of the Rings up again.
After a while, the sound of the shower's closing door announced that Des finished putting his clothes on. Anebrin lifted his gaze from the book and sighed (visibly) again. Des's attire was changed, too: His brown longcoat became even longer, now reaching his shoes; his shirt and cargo pants looked like drawn version of those articles; instead of a single, normal belt he had too many, and their buckles looked like dragons; and he now wore black half-gloves.
“Now what do we do?” asked Des. “Nanoka.” he added, and immediately covered his mouth. Please, he thought, don't tell me that I've got a verbal tic now... nanoda!
Apparently, not even his thoughts were exempt. (Nanoda!)
“Have you any idea what was that addition?” asked Anebrin in reply.
“A verbal tic, curse it, nanoda,” answered Des. He went to his pack, only to discover that his greatsword – okay, great wooden sword – was transformed into a bokken. He looked at Anebrin.
“Did it also affect your weapons, nanoka?” he asked.
“My sword. Look,” said Anebrin and showed it. Sunlight (Des didn't know how sunlight got into HQ, but was too occupied with other matters to care) glinted off the long, curved blade.
“It's a katana, nanoda,” Des said. “Japanese hand-and-a-half sword, nanoda. Used to be the best in the world for two-hundred years, from circa fourteen hundred to circa sixteen hundred, nanoda.”
“I hope it won't stay that way,” said Anebrin. “We should probably go outside.”
“Okay, nanoda,” said Des, and the pair exited their RC.
Dr Kindheart (well, technically she was a nurse, but she DID have a doctorate in medicine from Equestria) was having a lovely dream. She sat at a banquet table, just filled with dishes made of dandelions, and daisy salads, and, oh, an arrangement of orchids off to the side; the sort of plant-based delicacies she’d missed since she’d come to the PPC. Even if your bosses were quite understanding of the fact that you were an herbivore, it still wouldn’t be good to rub it in their face. Kindheart licked her lips and reached for the sunflower soup, when suddenly all the lights flickered out. An annoying beep began to fill the banquet hall, and all the soups turned into stuffed turkeys, staring at her. She squeaked and backed up, scrabbling off the floor, when another, louder beep came in and broke through her peaceful sleep.
“I’m up, I’m up,” she grumbled, trying to reach out with her telekinesis to shut off the little console in the room she slept in when she wasn’t pulling shifts in Medical. Strange, something felt off about her mouth, and her hooves, and really everything...
She tumbled to the floor and shrieked when she saw her hooves. Or what USED to be her hooves. In their place, she had grown hands, hands of all things. She gritted her teeth (her teeth, why did she have four sharp teeth in her mouth?) and struggled to sit up. She bit back another yelp when she saw her body. Instead of a perfectly sensible quadrupedal pony body, she’d become a pale, human female. She tried to focus.
“Celestia, Luna, and Cadenza. What happened?” she ground out, struggling to put her back to the wall. She took in a deep breath and looked at herself. ‘OK, human body. Thank goodness I’m not naked,’ she thought, ‘though this pink thing isn’t much better. Looks like some anime’s idea of what medical personnel wear.’’ She looked around the room, noticing out of the corner of her eye that her dress had a patch shaped like her cutie mark on its shoulder. She was about to complete her scan of the room when she saw a small, pointy object just next to her bed. She crouched down, thanking the Alicorns that her dress wasn’t as hard to maneuver in as it might’ve been, and picked up--was this her horn?
Kindheart scrambled into a sitting position, checking her horn for cracks. She frowned, carefully running the pads of her fingers over it. It didn’t seem to be injured, luckily. Kindheart held her horn and tried an experimental bit of telekinesis--the horn glowed, carrying her first aid kit over. She picked it up, and sent a telekinetic push towards the buttons of the console. “Attention, all PPC Personnel...” She sighed as she tucked a few strands of hair underneath her pink cap. Well, this was going to be a long 24 hours...
An announcement blared over the intercom. Zanna Ashlar, who had been asleep moments prior, snapped awake. She sat up, immediately alert. After a moment she frowned, shaking her head slightly. Something felt off, somehow. The fact that she normally took a good half-hour and a cup of coffee to go from "asleep" to "fully awake" didn't help her disquieted nerves, either.
Attention all PPC personnel, the intercom blared. Do not panic...
Of course, hearing something like that never helped either.
Zanna jumped out of bed. Something caught around her thighs, and she and nearly fell on her face.
"What - ?" she said, almost reflexively, then squealed in shock. "What!!! A miniskirt!!! With ruffles!!! Why am I wearing that??? Wait, why am I saying all this out loud?!?!" Zanna looked around wildly. "And why, in the name of Eru, am I using all that punctuation?!"
She scrambled to her feet again. She looked around the RC for her partner, bouncing on the balls of her feet as she did so. Another question: why did she feel like such a spaz today? She knew she was normally energetic, but it felt like her blood had been replaced with Red Bull.
"David?" she called. "David-san, what's going - wait, what - ?"
"Z- Zanna?" His voice came, wavering, from the bathroom.
Zanna flounced over an peered around the corner.
David turned away from where he had been staring into the mirror, but quickly averted his eyes in embarrassment at Zanna's revealing outfit - though he'd been in HQ for months now, many of his native Victorian values remained. After a moment, he peeked back up at her face. His eyes were wide with terror. Literally - his eyes covered nearly half of his face. He was hugging himself tightly, his arms gripped across his slender chest as if he was afraid that if he let go, he would melt into a shapeless puddle of pure kawaii.
It was all somehow incredibly endearing. Zanna wanted nothing more than to jump over and give him a hug and tell him that he was going to be okay.
Since she didn't have any evidence that this was actually true, though, all she could say was, "David... I think we're anime."
"What is such a thing, though?" David asked, his voice rising to an almost hysterical wail. "What happened to me? What happened to you? What has happened to what appears to be the entire world? And why do I seem to be slipping into a fit of hysterics?"
"I think you're a Moe," was all Zanna could think to say. Then, her curiosity getting the better of her tact: "You're eighteen, right?"
David nodded.
"Ah. Cause you look about twelve. You're adorable, by the way." At his continued silence, Zanna went on, "And I'm not going to make a joke about yaoi. I'm not. That would be rude, and you wouldn't get it anyway."
"Zanna," David said, breathing deeply and deliberately in an attempt to stay calm, "what in the name of Jesus, Mary and Joseph is - this - anime?"
"Oh. It's this Japanese thing. They didn't have it in the Victorian Era, you probably wouldn't have ever come across it. Unless you found some when you were sitting around in FicPsych. Which you might have, I guess, that's where you read and watched and stuff all the other stories you know, isn't it? Lord of the Rings wasn't around in the 1880s. Neither was Homestuck. And you like those, don't you?" Zanna stopped in sudden realization. "Oh dear Lord I'm a Genki Girl."
"What is that?" David asked.
"I don't think I can explain it. I never really watched much anime." Zanna perked up at a thought. "But I know plenty of people who can! Come on, let's pop down to the Anime divisions, I'm sure they'll know exactly what's up! If not, well, anime party anyway! Come on!"
Zanna grabbed his hand, then barrelled through their RC, out the door, and down the hallway, dragging a hapless David in her wake.
The intercom faded, but no sooner had the speakers clicked did Christianne spring to her feet, her huge, sparkly green eyes narrowed (or as narrowed as they could get with their disproportionate size to her face) as she scrambled for the door, half a piece of toast magically appearing in her mouth.
"I need to get to the bottom of this before it's too late!" she declared dramatically at Eledhwen, who had suddenly turned roughly the size and physique of a hobbit, albeit with even bigger eyes and a lack of hairy feet.
"No, we need to get to the bottom of this, Chrissy-san," Eledhwen snapped. "I'm coming with you!" she added in a squeaky chibi voice, for she was obviously a chibi.
"To the Cafeteria, then, Ellie-chan?" asked Christianne, talking around her toast. "I hope sempai notices me..."
Agent Miah's stomach growled loudly. She looked down and saw that it was actually making large animated ripples in time with the growling, so she decided to head to the Cafeteria for some food. It was early into this thing, so far, and she hadn't seen that many people that had been willing to venture out into the halls yet.
When she entered the Cafeteria, she revised her previous statement. They all seemed to be gathered here. It was a juxtaposition of order, anime drama, and weirdness. One part of the Cafeteria was occupied by salarymen and school children in matching uniforms eating peacefully, though the kids were all laughing in unison--to a beat almost.
Miah shook her head over that, stepped around a major kung fu battle that seemed to be over the last bowl of the blue pudding-like substance that many people seemed to like, dodged the food fight that was weirdly confined to only two tables, and stepped around at least three people who had to Appear Younger Than Are who were in full big eyed, screaming incoherently, flailing mode.
Over in the back corner there were some girls in mini-dresses wielding improbably large weapons against monsters that looked like something made on the old Doctor Who filming budget...or maybe the original Power Rangers. Miah shook her head and ignored them all. She was really hungry.
Miah finally got up to the food line, just in time to see the Cafeteria workers whisk the last tub of food away into the back. There wasn’t so much as a pre-packaged onigiri in sight.
“That is it! I’ve been patient. I’ve been calm. But now there’s NO FOOD!?!” Her appearance had taken a comical over-exaggeration of anger. Steam was literally boiling up around her head.
She pulled an enormous sword from hammerspace. So it wasn’t the tranq gun she’d put there earlier, so what? She shrugged and then screamed. She felt the perspective centering in on her, ranging from extreme close-up of her eyes and mouth to further out of her running. In fact she ran at the table, which was only a few feet from her, for a full fifteen seconds before finally getting close enough to bring her sword down with an almighty crash that split the table clean in two. Several people sitting at the table ended up with bowls of noodles on top of their heads, even though they hadn’t been eating noodles, but Miah didn’t care and ran dramatically toward the next table.
Things were not looking too good.
Gaspard had only planned to stop in the Cafeteria to grab something to eat before his shift--maybe a bowl of ramen or some donburi-- but not only was there an apparent shortage of food, there was also this crazy madlady who had pulled a sword out of nowhere and who was taking her anger out on the tables. The way the spy saw it, it was only a matter of time before the blade would lodge itself in something that wasn't a piece of furniture or part of the building.
He tried to back away to the exit, but got tangled in the mass of people who were also trying to put as much distance as possible between the madlady and themselves. It looked like rush hour on the Tokyo subway with the horde of agents struggling to get through a small set of doors. Gaspard tried to push his way to the exit, muttering excuses all the while:
"Sorry... Sorry... Excuse me, coming through... Sorry Philip, I'm trying not to get my head cut off here... Sumimasen... Wait, the last one is not like the others."
The crowd suddenly heaved backwards, sending Gaspard and some other agents sprawling backwards.
It wouldn't have been too bad if the junior agent hadn't tripped the crazy lady as he fell to the floor.
"Mercy?" squeaked Gaspard as he slipped his hand in his suit pocket, searching for his Dead Ringer watch.
The trio of Agents entered the Cafeteria. With all the anime stuff around, there was a chanche the food was indeed edible that day.
"... and I still can't believe you anime people wear skirts this short as a school uniform."
"I can't find anything wrong with it, Sergio" Corolla answered.
"But it looks like you're going to give a pantyshot to everyone just by moving a little too much!"
The Ironic Overpower must have been listening, since Nikki choose exactly that moment to stumble on another Agent crwling away from danger.
Her skirt obviously raised enough to give her partner a full view of her panties.
"KYAAAAAAA!"
"Madoka-damnit, I forgot about the Ironic Overpower!"
The male Agent put an hand under his nose to stop the blood coming out of it. "White suits you, though."
The obvious answer was an hammerspace mallet to the head.
"Thank you. That wasn't very in-character from me."
"No problem." Nikki turned her eyes away from the comically big X-shaped band-aid on her partner's head and glanced at the Cafeteria's kitchen. "Too bad, they're out of food already."
"And seems that someone's not too happy about it." Corolla pointed at a crazed sword-wielding... Girl? Woman? The anime style made discerning ages an impossible task.
"There's a 73.6% chance that she'll end up injuring someone, with an additional 17.4% chance that it will end up in that someone's death."
Sergio, owing to his new Hot Blooded personality, launched towards the sword-wielder.
"I CAN'T ALLOW IT!"
He quickly drew his gun. And then her realized two things.
One, his school uniform didn't have a gun holster.
Two, he was now wielding a comically big sword.
"Oh, fine. Let's roll with it."
Sergio parried the woman's blade just in time to stop a... Japanese salaryman? from becoming a shishkebab.
The two swords kept emitting sparks long after the initial contact.
"Calm down, will ya? Oh, great, I'm talking in Kansai accent now. In English"
Gaspard gibbered incoherently as the swords met just above his face with a loud clashing sound. The madlady hadn't meant to impale him, but the way she was theatrically waving her sword about before he tripped her might have been enough to send him in Medical.
Still lying on his back and holding the activated Dead Ringer, he scooted away from the duel using his feet. He had watched and read enough anime to know what happened next: these two would be locked in an ultimate showdown of ultimate destiny. These usually entailed a lot of called-out attacks, flashy physics-defying moves, massive amounts of environmental damage, but rarely any fatalities.
He continued to scoot to the door, not wanting to be chalked up as collateral damage. His new salarman personality was now berating him for taking so long to get to work and for getting his suit dirty. He wasn't going to impress his superiors with this poor work ethic and scruffy-looking getup. Then again, he was lost in a dead-end job as a Spy, 13th class so it really didn't matter.
Now feeling the office worker blues, he edged away from the two agents at the centre of the cafeteria and continued to try to push his way through the wall of agents surrounding the door.
Natasha was awake and felt completely normal as she sat down in front of her laptop. She glanced at her partner. Sylvia was sleeping, peacefully in front of the console. The minis, Virtibird and Nygma, had been glaring at each other from across the room since the guy from maintenance had left. It was peaceful in RC 821.
Natasha opened up the laptop and reached for the power button. Then she saw her reflection on the black screen.. She blinked. Her reflection’s abnormally huge eyes blinked back. She raised her hand to the top of her head and touched a lock of hair that had decided that gravity was for suckers. It made a “sproing!” sound as she fidgeted with it. The agent shut her laptop and stared straight ahead for a few seconds.
“AAAAAAAA!!!” Natasha screamed, clutching her head.
“Whoa!” Sylvia woke up and her chair toppled to the floor, making a strangely loud crashing sound as it did, and shaking the entire RC.
“Ah!” Nygma jumped up!
Virtibird lifted his head and looked at the panicking agent.
Attention all PPC personnel... The message started.
“Huh,” Sylvia commented from her position on the floor.
Natasha took a deep breath. “AAAAAAAAA!!!”
Her partner got up and went to go look at herself in the mirror. “Huh,” she said again. “This is pretty cool.” She tugged on her now slightly spiky white hair.
Natasha inhaled again.
“Hey, Natasha? What’s anime?” Sylvia asked, still fidgeting with her hair.
“I’ll answer that!” Nygma jumped up, striking a heroic pose. His eyes had also grown to abnormally large proportions. “Anime is Japanese animation! It’s art style-”
“What do we do?! What do we do?!” Natasha screamed, her arms flailing wildly. She noticed this, and they became a blur as she quickly hugged them to her chest.
“Well first, we aren’t going to panic.” The white haired agent turned away from the mirror and looked at her partner. “Okay?”
“But-”
“No buts!” Sylvia crossed her arms and wagged her finger at Natasha. “Take a few deep breaths.”
Natasha did as she was told. Her eyes became slits as she inhaled and exhaled, slowly. She opened her eyes, and did it again. A puff of white air came from her mouth on the exhale.
“Okay. They said this would be over in 24 hours, so it prob- isn’t permanent.” Sylvia ruffled Natasha’s hair and smiled. “Besides, this could be fun!”
Natasha smiled back. “If you say so.” Sylvia was so cool. She always knew what to do. Except when she didn’t. Which was half the time...But she was still so cool! The agent clasped her hand together. Sparkles appeared in her abnormally large eyes as she watched Sylvia turn to address the minis.
“Hey Nygma, Virtibird? Natasha and I are going out-”
“We are?”
“-To see if anyone knows anything. Stay here, and don’t break anything!” Sylvia looked sternly at Nygma, who nodded, then at Virtibird. The Deathclaw gave his best “Who, me?” look, which was greatly helped by his new, almost puppy-dog-like eyes.
“Come on, let’s go.” Sylvia ushered her partner out the door.
The BEEP startled Doc in the middle of a Douglas Preston novel, just as he was getting to the chapter where a major mystery was about to be explained. He somehow launched himself out of bed and ran to the console, but the message had already started playing. It was only after he reached the console and realized how very much taller it had become that he started listening, and realized what it was talking about.
Looking down at himself, Doc discovered he was occupying the body of an awkward preteen schoolboy. His school uniform was a white shirt with dark blue coat and dress pants. He also wore a black tie sporting the Floaters flashpatch. His glasses were now ludicrously huge. Running a hand through his formerly buzz cut hair, he discovered it was much thicker and spiky.
He began to turn to where Vania had been before the message had started. “Well, Vania, I guess we WAAAH?” Doc felt himself forcefully pushed from the side, causing him to hang in the air for a moment before crashing to the ground. The pile of books he hadn’t been holding a moment ago now came crashing to the ground.
Vania stood at the RC’s open doorway, her ponytail hanging down past her waist and her baseball bat—now shaped like a massive sword, though still made of wood—held out dramatically behind her. She wore a yellow kimono, which fluttered in a nonexistent wind. She opened her eyes, which were sharpened into triangles of anger, and they briefly zoomed in to Doc’s vision in a horizontal bar.
“Imawatashino ushinaware ta kako ni iki masu,” she said in an oddly deep, scratchy voice. Her lipless-looking mouth moved in broad repeating patterns that didn’t really match up with her words. Subtitles beneath her translated the Japanese into English. “I go now to reclaim my lost past.”
Doc watched in horror and bewilderment as Vania clenched her fist and literal fire ignited in her eyes. “BANKAIHAMEHA!” she cried, charging out the doorway.
“That’s not going to end well,” Doc said just before a long-delayed book finally landed on his head. His eyes transformed into swirling patterns on his face. As the day wore on, a puddle of drool pooled on the floor under his open mouth as he conveniently sat out of the plot.
I realize I’ve probably butchered the Japanese here. Anyone who can help me fix it, please please PLEASE tell me!
Cyba Zero and Eagrus Khan were coming back from dropping off twelve of the fourteen mini-Colossi they had acquired on their first mission when the change hit. A message blared suddenly over the intercom just as Cyba noticed Eagrus turn into...a samurai. Her eyes widened in surprise, and grew wider still when she realised they had not been able to open quite that wide before.
"Eagrus...what's happening?"
"Flaming Denethor! You're all cartoony! WE'RE all cartoony!"
Cyba, who was feeling around for any other abnormalities, decided that it was probably safe to scream.
"AAAAAAAAAAAGH!"
That done, she felt composed enough to inspect the rest of herself. As it turned out, her uniform had become rather more - stylish - and she felt somewhat stealthy. She had sharp, false claws protruding from her now-gloved hands, a pair of thermal-imaging goggles perched on her head and an immense sense of balance and poise.
Eagrus himself was so surprised by the unexpected transformation that he had failed to pay full attention to the message.
"We're under attaaaack!!! For the next twenty-four hooouuuurs!!!" He took one glance at his new armour and charged off down the corridor, drawing the katana that had replaced his usual sword as he went. Presumably he intended to repel the attackers he believed to be invading, with much heroism and skilful swordplay.
Cyba backed away warily, wishing she could disappear. In so doing, she found a convenient shadow (which was odd, seeing as she had never really noticed shadows in HQ before). Judging by the way in which the two minis accompanying her blipped in surprise and started looking around for her out of their now oversized, single eyes, she had indeed vanished. At the very least, she had mastered the art of avoiding attention. Mess Efekt promptly cloaked as if to make a point. Cyba made a note to ask the mini about that once this was all over. For now, though, she felt a distinct kleptomaniac urge. So she was what...some kind of cat burglar? Well, she did rather like armour, and it wasn't as if she had a samurai set yet...
To any onlooker, Joke would have appeared to be a lone mini-Colossus strolling down the corridor in the vague direction of the cafeteria. Little would anybody know, without looking very carefully, that there was a mostly-invisible second mini, Agent Zero sticking to the shadows and a highly-strung samurai around the corner.
[Let's try to keep it to only one response thread]
Unger heard the glorious sounds of fighting coming from the cafeteria. The door was blocked, by people attempting to flee, but that didn't bother him. He simply jumped up and ran over the tops of people's heads. Several looked up angrily before becoming dazzled by his extreme level of Cute.
He landed just outside the path of the two much larger than him sword wielding fighters. He smiled broadly. This should be fun.
Kelok had been left behind at the door, being much too cool and Aloof to do something as ridiculous looking as running over the tops of people's heads. He sighed dramatically and began pulling people free of the jam up in the doorway.
Dr Kindheart raced into the cafeteria. Well, raced was a bit strong--her gait was something like a cross between a waddle and a piaffe, with bursts of telekinesis to keep her from falling. When she managed to get through the door, she saw that two agents were fighting. While that was perfectly normal for the PPC, their oversized swords were not. Kindheart rubbed her eyes for a moment, before making her way over to the sidelines. She frowned and looked at the two combatants. Was that Sergio and Miah fighting? She tried to focus, but she could feel something, presumably the weird, anime-induced other personality, trying to make her do something. As Miah brought her sword down in a slash that somehow threw Sergio across the room, the other personality took hold.
She raised her horn in the air. Under her feet, a complex magical circle that seemed to be based around her cutie mark glowed with pink energy. She performed a completely impractical pirouette (how did she even do that? thought what was left of Kindheart’s pony brain) and pointed the glowing horn in the general direction of the fight. “Status Buff! Harmony’s Light!” she yelled in a voice several octaves higher than normal. (A buff spell? She didn’t know how to do buff spells, and wasn’t that cheating? she thought?) before a pink blast of light shot out and hit the Big Ball Of Violence.
"Vid. Vid."
"What?" asked Vid, whose concentration on the movements he was practicing with his shiny new katana had finally been broken.
The velociraptor eyed the katana's shining blade warily. "Take a look out into the hall," he instructed his partner.
Vid, with a soldier's caution, poked his samurai-helmeted head out of the open doorway.
"Holy shit," he said, "Is that a mini colossus?"
Trask just snickered, which, on a velociraptor, was a sound with entirely too many teeth. "There is a paradox in the hallway," he noted with the glee of an agent who knew that their partner hated anything resembling a pun.
Well gosh darn it, that spell the nurse cast didn't do much good to anyone. Gaspard thought it was the words "buff" and "harmony" that were to blame. For some strange reason now, the agents involved in the mêlée were displaying absurd amounts of power by shooting light out of their fingertips and belching rainbows in the general direction of their opponent.
In Gaspard's terrified salaryman mind, there were only two overriding orders: primo, to get out of the hot zone by any means and deuxio, to go back to work in his nice little office where nobody was going to laser off his face. If he wasn't as confused as he was now, Gaspard would have seriously questioned his decision-making process.
He reached for his briefcase and pulled out an Ender Pearl. These things allowed whomever threw them to teleport wherever the pearl lands at the cost of five Minecraft heart points. Self-injury-teleports were not encouraged by Medical, but Gaspard deemed it necessary to get himself out of the cafeteria as soon as possible. He gripped the pearl tightly. A perspective shift showed his eyes as he squinted at the gap between the mass of agents blocking the exit and the top of the doorway.
I can't miss this shot!
An appropriately suspenseful theme played in the background.
The junior agent wound up and pitched the pearl like a professional baseball player. It would have been a beautiful throw if an agent in the crowd hadn't deflected the pearl by accident with an upraised hand. The Ender Pearl was sent flying back towards the fight.
Gaspard's eyes turned into comically large white circles and a candidate for the multiverse's biggest sweatdrop trickled down the side of his head. Thinking quickly, he reached into his suit pocket and activated his Dead Ringer, hoping that the watch's damage-reduction system would shield him from the effects of teleportation.
Several things happened in quick succession.
Firstly, Gaspard teleported to where the pearl landed. The world exploded into purple, white, and black squares and for a few seconds the spy felt as if he was being crushed by a boulder. The world came into focus again as he hit the ground with a mighty slapping sound.
Secondly, the Dead Ringer performed its job admirably by absorbing most of the shock for the agent. It continued to do its job by dropping a fake corpse of the agent and turning Gaspard invisible for a few seconds.
Thirdly, somebody noticed the fake corpse and started screaming.
Finally, Gaspard flickered back into sight. Anime physics and the Dead Ringer had considerably reduced his actual injuries but he still felt as if he had been trampled by a herd of elephants. He crawled over to the nearby nurse and pulled on one of her pink stockings.
"Doctor? I don't feel so good."
Still in the shadows, Cyba notices somebody wearing a samurai helmet about to fall into Joke's little trap. She hides in a particularly deep shadow by the doorway and waits for this person to come out of the room fully so she can relieve them of their armour. She also notices the mostly-invisible form of her other mini preparing to act as a trip hazard.
Meanwhile, Eagrus reaches the crowd exiting the cafeteria. Not recognising them in their anime forms, he charges - only for his sword to squeak loudly and turn out to be inflatable. He then runs away back towards Cyba in much haste.
Des and Anebrin arrived at the cafeteria later than most people. Why? Two reasons. One was that they, as usual, got lost. The other was that they weren't trying to get there, and only when they decided that asking the Flowers about the whole mess was a good idea (of course, they were wrong, but they are new...) did they reach it.
They found themselves at the fringes of a battle. Anebrin found himself sweat-dropping again, for that battle was nothing like the battles he knew. Instead of a chaotic mess of soldiers hacking and slashing at each other, there seemed to be a large ball of flying dust; every once in a while a fist, a sword or a rainbow-coloured beam of light would emerge from it for a few seconds before diving in again.
“Yay, a big ball of violence, nanoda,” deadpanned Des. He looked at Anebrin. The elf shook his head.
“Do I look like a hero?” he asked. Des smiled a wide, fake smile.
“Yes, in fact, you do, nanoda,” replied the teenager. He opened his mouth to add something about elves and heroism, but a spasm racked him. His form changed; his head grew, his body became smaller, his nose and eyebrows disappeared, and his hands became even less defined than before.
“Ugh,” he said, doubling up, “I feel like I'm going to puke, nanoda. What happened, nanoka?”
“I don't exactly know,” said Anebrin, “but your proportions are... weird. Overly large head, some of your facial features are now gone...”
“Dammit, don't tell me I'm a chibi now, nanoda...” said Des, his eyes becoming little Vs pointing at where his nose was. “Och, this is going to be a long day, nanoda...”
Cali had been sitting at a table by himself in the school uniform section since the change had happened. He was fairly certain that he'd been in his bed before the change, but when the announced started playing, he realized that he was at a Cafeteria table, wearing a white button up shirt-tucked in, slacks, belt, dress shoes, and a visor thing instead of his normal glasses. He was also feeling compelled to act extremely shy.
He had seen Miah come in, and then go beserk over there being no food, and he'd had the idea that food might calm the beast, so to speak, but he'd had a mini-panic attack over the idea of getting up in front of everyone.
The Big Ball of Violence that now included at least Miah, Unger, and Sergio was rolling around destroying tables, but somehow, in complete cartoon fashion, was managing to avoid all contact with people.
Cali took a couple of deep breathes, that were in no way edging on panic at the thought of being up in front of everyone, really, no near panic at all. Completely calm here. He picked up the plate of sushi that had been sitting untouched in front of him the entire time. He wasn't exactly sure what sushi was, and wasn't feeling adventurous enough to try it today.
He felt his eyes get bigger, and his face turn red, and he was sure little lines had appeared across his cheeks, but he resolutely marched up to the fight, and said quietly at first, but building in volume, "M-m-miah, Miah!"
Everything froze for a second. Sergio was in mid-air, Unger was in the middle of throwing a punch. Miah had been in the middle of running dramatically toward Sergio, but now she did a take that flipped her end over end still holding the sword, but somehow not injuring herself at all. She landed at Cali's feet.
He tried to say something, but found that his voice was refusing to work properly. He stood there gibbering and quaking, but managed to hold out the food tray.
Suddenly Miah's sword disappeared back into hammerspace. Her eyes became two happy arches, her voice went up a few octaves to near painfully high levels, and she seemed to shrink a bit.
"You're giving me your food. That's so kawaii!"
She threw her arms around his neck and kept talking, only so fast now, that Cali wasn't really hearing what she said.
"The fight is over! Justice prevails again! But... How do I get down?"
Sergio was still floating in mid-air, in a rather awkward victory pose he made when proclaming victory.
Nikki grabbed him by the feet and pulled him down. The two Agents ended up in a tangled mess on the floor.
"Why me..." Nikki groaned, "Do I have to mess up everything I do?"
"According to your current Dojikko status, you have a 98.5% probability of failing at whatever you attempt to do." Corolla calculated, "I would ask Sergio why he got involved in that fight, but I also calcolated that the probability of a Tsundere and a Hot Blooded clashing is 89.2%. It was almost inevitable."
Dropping into a half-crouch, his back to the wall, Vid slowly approached the mini colossus from the side, for better viewing. He'd heard that there were agents from every possible continuum, from every possible species. There were an innumerable variety of minis as well, and while he'd encountered mini spine-leopards, mini allosaurs, and the inevitable mini aragog or balrog, but he hadn't seen that many minis in the form of robots. He had no idea how it would react to being approached.
Trask also emerged into the hallway, looking for all the world like a plush toy maker's idea of what a velociraptor should be. Although his body had become cuddly and adorably disproportional, his senses had not been dulled by his transformation. He took one sniff of the air in the hallway, which was not yet saturated with the smell of his human, and his entire spine stiffened into a hunting posture as he crouched closer to the ground.
There was someone out here besides the Colossus.
Kelok had finally managed to clear the door of its human traffic jam, just as the fight was suddenly over.
Over for everyone but Unger that is. Kelok could see the glint of battle in the small agents eyes. It manifested as literal flashes of red emitting from his eyes.
Kelok ran, dignified-like, over to Unger. Just when Unger darted to attack Sergio, Kelok put his hand on the top of Unger's head. This stopped Unger in his tracks, where he flailed and generally raged against the injustice of Kelok being so much bigger and stronger.
Unger finally settled into simply fuming (there was literally smoke coming out of his ears) at Kelok, and gave up the idea of more fighting for the moment.
Sylvia dragged Natasha through the crowd of people blocking the entrance to the Cafeteria. They had been on their way to medical, but when Sylvia heard the sounds of fighting and chaos, she just had to see what was going on. After all, from what Natasha had been describing about Anime, the fight scenes sounded spectacular!
Unfortunately, by the time the two had squeezed their way through the crowd, the fight was over.
“Awww,” Sylvia said, disappointed.
“H-hey! It’s okay!” Natasha said quickly. “Um, there’s still stuff to do here, right?”
“Yeah, you’re right!” Sylvia perked up. “We can get some anime food!”
Natasha beamed, sparkles appeared around her head.
“Come on!” Sylvia dragged her partner towards the kitchen.
“I’ll go find somewhere to sit!” Natasha tugged out of Sylvia’s grasp and darted off. Sylvia smiled approvingly.
“Somewhere to sit...somewhere to sit...” Natasha muttered to herself. “Somewhere to... Ah!” That was not the sound of her finding a place to sit. That was the sound of Natasha tripping over two mini’s that had gotten bored in their RC and had started looking for their Agents.
“Owww,” Natasha moaned. She pulled herself up onto a nearby stool. Virtibird and Nygma looked at her innocently. The black haired agent’s eyes became half lidded.
“There’s a perfectly reasonable explanation for why we’re here!” Nygma started. “And that reason is... that...”
“Raawwr!” Virtibird cut in.
“Exactly!”
Natasha glared at them. “You two are going to be in so much trouble once Sylvia get’s back!”
“Oh come on!” Nygma stamped his foot. “Everyone else gets to have fun! Besides, this may be the only time that I’m in animated form!”
“Hey! You found somewhere to sit!” Sylvia came over to the three, carrying two trays of food. “They told me this is something called “Soo-shie”. I have no idea what it is, but it looks delicious.” The agent stopped when she saw the two minis. She raised an eyebrow. The two minis gave her their best “pleeeeeeeeaaaasse?” look. The air behind them was glowing pink, and there were little tinkling noises coming from it.
Sylvia sighed. “Oh alright, fine.”
The two minis cheered.
Sylvia set the trays down on the table, and sat down. Pulling out chopsticks. She looked at them, confused.
“Here, let me show you how to use these,” Natasha said, taking a pair.
One week ago I ate in a Japanese restaurant. I had some misunderstandings with the chopsticks.
Namely, I couldn't grab anything with them.
I ended up sticking the chopsticks INTO the food instead of using them to grab it. Seriously, how do Japanese people eat with them?