1610/Sleight of Laptop

Sleight of Laptop
Date of Scene:	24 May 2024
Location:	Mitakihara General Hospital
Synopsis:	Setsuna comes by Mamoru's hospital room for a visit after-hours and finds out that he's really not mentally doing so great at night-- and has a potential distraction for him. Ft. Anko the cat.
Cast of Characters:	Mamoru Chiba, Setsuna Meiou
Tinyplot:	Sunset of Sora

---

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
It's the middle of the night, and the hospital room's window is open to exactly the width of a small roundish calico cat. There's a teddy bear in a tuxedo with a white mask that's facing the closed part of the window, sitting on the sill, and there are a number of potted plants around the room, and there's a three-tier bento box on top of the dresser, and there are some cards.

There's also a small roundish calico cat sleeping-ish on the foot of the bed, curled up against Mamoru's leg and purring; Mamoru himself is awake and silent, looking out the window at the moon.

There's the beeping of a heart monitor; there are IVs; there are a fair number of bandages, but mostly they're on Mamoru's left shoulder and mummifying his right hand and wrist. There's some scarring on his left arm and some discoloration on his chin and cheek, but that's less visible in the mixed dim light of the moon and the hallway.

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
After hearing that Mamoru has been hospitalized, Setsuna of course sends a get-well-soon text to him...but for someone as closely tied to those she cares about, that is far from 'enough'.

Still, she knows that a lot of people will likely want to see and check up and visit him...so she waits.

For evening. Specifically after regular visiting hours...because she's well aware that her status as a nurse will let her roam the halls of the hospital unquestioned.

Thus it is that the awake young man might hear an approaching sound that is, in these circumstances, somewhat out-of-place.

The clicking of someone in high heels approaching...and coming to a halt in front of his door.

After a moment, the door opens slowly and fairly quietly, so as not to disturb the young man should he be asleep...

But once it's open wide enough, Setsuna pokes her head in and looks over...and seeing Mamoru awake, smiles and waves before stepping in and quietly closing the door behind her.

She walks over towards the bed, pausing for a few moments to check his chart before finally stepping over to quietly ask, "Greetings, Mamoru-kun. How are you holding up?"

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
The calico cat at Mamoru's feet darts off the bed and under it at Setsuna's approach, but when Setsuna comes in and Mamoru turns to look, and smiles, and says, "Setsuna-san. I'm all right. Anko, it's fine," the cat slinks out from under the bed and comes over to sniff at Setsuna's ankles.

"Feesh?" comes the little burbling purr of a voice as she sits back and wraps her tail delicately around her feet, looking up at the tall, tall nurse.

"Be polite," Mamoru scolds her lightly. "Usako brought you salmon earlier." He looks back at Setsuna again and explains, "She's a very young bakeneko, she's been making sure I don't lose it at night. Because I'm really not all right, I'm just getting better at pretending I am."

A beat. "The healing Rashmi-chan and Chiyo-chan have been doing, and the big burst of it that Cure Suzhen did earlier this week-- it's done a lot, but I don't like the way my hand is going. And I can't interface with anything the way I always do--"

That's more than frustration creeping into his voice, it's something worse than frustration or even anger. But he shakes his head. "But it'll come back. Everything everyone's said-- the magic will come back, at least."

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
As Anko sniffs at her ankles, then audibly asks for fish, Setsuna looks down, then kneels so that she can be much closer to the bakeneko for a few moments.

She offers her knuckles to sniff, "Hello there, Anko-san. Sadly, no. I do not have any fish at the moment, as I was unaware you were here keeping Mamoru-kun company. I promise that the next time I will bring something for you...however...

Her right hand makes a little 'rummaging' gesture before she twists it to reveal a small package of beef jerky that she opens up and gives a small piece to the youkai.

Straightening up, she puts the package on the bedstand nearby, "I keep some of this because it's safe enough to give to cats and because it also works as a snack if I need it."

She then snaps her fingers, "Ah...speaking of!"

Another bit of 'rummaging', then she twists her left hand four times, coming up with four bottles of the pineapple ramune that Mamoru liked when he visited the Casa last...then she produces a small white box, obviously from some patissier, "A few snacks for you as well."

She sets the box in Mamoru's lap, then her expression takes on a somewhat more compassionate air, "...it should. There are only a few ways a drain can last this long. One will go away when the drainer's spell is broken...the other will restore itself naturally even if it takes a while to get the flow going again, so to speak."

As Mamoru states how he's really not doing as well as he puts on, the older woman says, "...is there anything I can do to help? Be a compassionate ear? Get you things to distract? Tell you silly stories?"

She then frowns, "...and don't like the way your hand is going, how?"

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
Mamoru -- looks really actually embarrassed, and he says in a low voice, apologetic, "Can-- you put them on the little table, please? I can't pick anything up. I'm sorry. Thank you for the gifts, someone will help me with them in the morning--"

His face is burning, but not because of Sunbreaker.

He takes in a breath and lets it go, even as Anko delicately takes the jerky in her mouth and purrs her thanks, then starts eating it right there.

"I like silly stories, I can laugh without everything hurting again," he says, but then-- she's frowning, and he can talk shop, which also helps tremendously. He relaxes and explains, "I can't tell what's going on inside because my nerves are partly burned out and partly healed, but it's healing too fast without oversight. I can't control other people's healing the way I do my own, so it's--"

He shakes his head and says heavily, "I think what they're doing is encouraging and speeding up the natural healing process. From the outside in in one case, and in a different case from the inside out. Without surgery. I don't like the way it looks when they change the bandages."

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
Setsuna puts things over on the nightstand, then pulls a chair over. She frowns at his comment about how his wounds are healing, "...well, I can understand that. I've seen that kind of thing far too often for my liking...BUT..."

She smiles a bit, "...we have more healing options than normal medicine."

She then frowns a little as she ponders, "Well...we'll have to evaluate when things are more or less done...but...well...the human body's natural healing processes are kind of insane. I imagine scar tissue is a problem if nothing else is..."

She then taps her chin, "...the main question is...when you DO have your healing back...how much can you do? Can you regenerate skin? Can you fix damaged tissue? I recall you were able to pull off some neat little tricks with that last case we worked on..."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
"I'm hoping very much that they can kick Sunbreaker's ass sooner rather than later," Mamoru says quietly. "I can't heal things that are already healed, and Kazuo doesn't want me to just take all the skin off and re-grow it. Which I guess is fair. I've been trying to figure out how to convince my doctor not to do surgery, so that maybe I can...I don't know, do something with it later, but I don't trust myself to make the cuts without local anaesthesia."

He shakes his head again, pursing his lips. "Scar tissue's a problem, and there's something wrong with my fingers in addition to what she did to my palm. I don't want to ask anyone to google anything distressing for me, but I think the tendons are too short now. I could fix it if they were cut."

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
Setsuna frowns at Mamoru's comment, then sighs, "Well, yes. That would definitely be a problem."

She sits back giving him a LONG look, then says, "...okay."

She leans forward again, "Okay...this is conditional...BUT...once this is healed, if it doesn't heal right..."

She takes a DEEP breath, then she says, "...then it'll have to wait for a weekend where there aren't any emergencies...and I'll want to arrange a few things...and I'll imagine I'll want to arrange some very specific backup..."

She trails off...then sighs and shakes her head, "...but if you end up needing it...well...I suppose if you can heal what's broken or missing, it won't be much different than rebreaking a bone that's healed wrong to set it right once more."

She waggles a finger at Mamoru, "...we're going to be CAREFUL about it, though."

Setsuna leans back in her chair again, rubbing her face with her palms before leaning her head to stare at the ceiling for a few moments, "...that being said...based on what I've seen you and some of the others do...I think we can make sure your hand is back to one hundred percent if we do it right."

The greenhaired woman then looks to meet Mamoru's eyes, "...was that most of what was bothering you?"

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
"That was a big part," Mamoru says, letting his bedhead-y head lay back against the bed again instead of holding it upright.

Anko jumps back up on the bed too, after having disappeared under it for a little while, and walks across his legs and over to curl up next to his left hand, so she can get careful pettings.

"And-- it's okay if it looks messed up, as long as it works correctly." He sighs, blue eyes meeting garnet, and he says in a smaller voice, "I really hate being locked up in this tiny body, in my own head, not connected to anything. It's stifling and it's terrifying to think of it not coming back, if Sunbreaker ends up getting to go back to her world and taking all our power with her. This is my planet, Setsuna-san. And I can't talk to it. And I can't feel anything, not even myself."

He looks away from her, briefly back at the wall, then back at the moon out the window. And he scritches Anko carefully. "Just being locked up like this..." he trails off. "It's like... I've lost the senses I use to interface with reality the most. It's hard to keep things in mind as real when I can't sense them. It was a lot worse when the morphine dose was higher, I couldn't trust the senses I have left. But it'll come back."

A smaller voice still. "Until the Fade hits."

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
Setsuna reaches out and gently pokes Mamoru on the nose, "None of that. I have more to worry about that than YOU do...and do you see ME concerned?"

She arches an eyebrow, then smiles a bit, "I've got a line on that...but it's for later. Just...trust me, okay?"

She has thoughts and ideas...but they're for later. Mamoru's mood is for now.

She then sighs, "...well, I can't say I have that kind of connection with my PLANET...as Pluto is...about as arid and lifeless a rocky body as most of them in the solar system."

She lets that sit for a moment before she goes on, "On the OTHER hand, however, I know EXACTLY what you mean."

She looks him in the eyes once more, "...mostly through my connection to Time. I ALWAYS know when I am. I can literally feel each second as it passes. I can number them. The passage of time is my Realm, and I know it intimately."

She trails off, then goes on, "...I imagine it's vaguely similar to that...if rather different in kind and scope?"

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
Mamoru scrunches his face like a rabbit when he gets his nose booped, and he expels a breath in a way that's almost a laugh, but is still a little too unsettled for it.

But he's listening, and Anko is purring, and his fingers are in her silky fur.

The prince of Earth nods. "It's-- it seems like that's about right," he agrees. "I always know where I am-- except for now. I always know where Usako and my boys are-- except for now. I can always find North, I can always get a sense of other people near me, I can always see inside myself, I'm always-- like Kazuo said to me, I'm always aware of all my tendons and muscles and bones, my blood... it's background noise, and I really hope it gave Subreaker the biggest headache in the world because she wouldn't know how to tune it out."

He wiggles his feet under the light hospital blanket, then moves his bandaged club of a hand and rests it on his stomach. "I feel the planet like it's a part of me, except for now. I feel so small and closed off and alone in my own head with nothing attached to me. And I don't want to keep worrying everyone with it, or complaining about it. But I'm so tired..."

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
Setsuna reaches out and pats Mamoru's arm, making sure to aim for a spot that wasn't burned, "...Mamoru-kun, I know EXACTLY what you mean. When we were in that...pocket? It was exactly the same for me. I didn't properly know WHEN I was...how much Time was passing...how many seconds had gone by...and with seeing things that had already happened...well, not only did it take me a while to get my head on straight while we were in there, it really messed me up...so I know exactly the kind of thing you're going through. You've spent your life getting used to a sense that's gone...and having problems dealing with not having it."

She then hrms, "As far as getting stuck in your head goes, I think Rashmi had that same problem when she was laid up. Perhaps I could provide you with a similar source of distraction to the one I provided her?"

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
Patted! The contact does help, even if it's not the kind of contact he's used to, the kind that gives him more input than this-- but it helps, it grounds.

And Mamoru looks relieved, so very relieved, when Setsuna gets it. "I'm so sorry you had to go through that," he says, "but I'm selfishly glad you understand. It's vertiginous, isn't it, almost?" He shakes his head.

Then he tilts his head a little. "What distraction do you have in mind?"

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
Setsuna smiles...then pauses, looking momentarily confused.

She holds up a finger in the universal sign for 'just a moment', then begins patting down her labcoat pockets.

First one, then another...finally the breast pocket.

She goes so far as to physically pull the pocket spread open as much as possible so she can look inside to see what she's looking for isn't there.

Then she snaps her fingers in an obvious 'AHA!' moment and produces a small pocketbook from somewhere.

This is unzipped and rummaged through...though despite locating at least a dozen different kinds of coinage that, by the look of them, are some of them VERY VERY old...and what appears to be a scroll of some kind that has a faint aroma of smoke about it.

After whatever it is she's looking for is not found in there, she replaces the items, then makes her handbag disappear once more.

Setsuna pauses and scowls comically, and she takes a moment to rub her chin before her eyes shift over to one side and she says, "AHA!"

And with that, her hand darts forward, brushing Mamoru's ear as she obviously does the 'pulling a coin from behind your ear' trick...except when she pulls her hand back, she's holding a very thin laptop, "It was behind your ear!"

She then puts the piece of electronics in front of the young man and opens it up, "A bunch of games that can be played with one hand and a mouse, the complete works of Sir Terrence in both audio and electronic print versions, and connections to what I am told are all of the more popular streaming services."

She looks at Mamoru and commiserates, "Usually I use this when I'm stuck away from home and want to catch the latest episode of Doctor Who when it airs, but you can use it more and I can get another one."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
It's a moment, first, where Mamoru looks expectant-- then puzzled at Setsuna's confusion, and then he gets a wryly amused look on his face. Dimensional pocket antics. The look turns into a crooked grin, and then just an outright grin as Setsuna gets more and more ridiculous with it--

-- "Is that from the Library of Alexandria?" --

--and then just snorts, lifting his mummified hand and waving it around as if to say 'oh away with you!' as he laughs. "Come on," he says, but then Setsuna's explaining, and his eyes widen.

He can do everything with a mouse.

"Oh wow," he says, turning his good hand over on the bed for the mouse, and waving the cursor around-- "Thank you! Thank you so much, Setsuna-san. Is it okay to not lock it when it sleeps?" he asks, concerned. "I can't put a password in right now. I just, my hand is fine, I just can't lift the arm because of what she burned through in my shoulder. PT is doing what they can, but it's going to be a while."

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
At the question about the scroll, Setsuna looks over at it and absently unrolls it just enough to look, "Hrm? Oh, yeah. I was gonna let Rashmi look at this when she was done with the Clavicula Salomonis de Secretis...I could never make hide or hair of how the Egyptians did magic."

She shrugs, "I figure maybe some of the Device people can do something with it, if anything."

After everything is put back away and Mamoru is looking over the laptop, she shrugs, "I dunno if you really need to bother...but if you want, set the unlock to a fingerprint or maybe facial recognition and you should be fine."

She waves, "Anyhow, like I said, some of the best books I know of already preloaded in reader and audio formats, all the streaming, and what I am told are some of the best games you can play with just a mouse...from what I understand one is about building a civilization that conquers the world, the other is doing the same to conquering the galaxy."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
Mamoru's eyes are on that scroll until it goes away again, and he's thinking about Egypt, and then he's thinking about northern Africa in general, and then Tunisia in specific, and a little villa--

He tears his gaze away as Setsuna puts it back again, and looks back at the laptop. "I was in the middle of Night Watch," he says in a wry little voice, "and haven't finished it, and tomorrow is the Glorious 25th of May. Rough."

Then he moves the mouse pointer again and squints at the screen, then carefully lifts his bandage-mummy hand to push at his glasses vaguely. "Conquering the world? I wonder if it lets you use diplomacy and political marriages as viable routes to rule rather than just relying on military conquest..."

Quick, sidelong look. "It's really all right for me to play these? They're just games, it won't turn out to be the ansible or something...?"

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
Setsuna taps her chin, trying to remember, "...if I remember right, as I was told you can win victory through force of arms...but also through culture, religion, diplmomacy, trade and science...In both games, as I recall."

She then ahs, "Ah...the Watch series is fun. Not my favorite of the various groups of books about the Disc...but still wonderful fun."

The reference to Ender's Game, however, gets the older woman to blink a few times, then grin hugely, "No...no...no, they won't. No Bugs here."

She pauses, "...okay...wait...yes, as I recall one of the species options is for insectoid hivemind...but there's also non-insectioid hivemind and non-hivemind insectoid options, too..."

Setsuna shakes her head, "...but to the point you were TRYING to make, no...you're not secretly sending commands to some fleet somewhere fighting a war of extermination. This is mere twenty-first century Earth tech...no communications via quantum entangled particles here."

After a moment, however, she taps her lips, "...though from the bits I got to see when I was looking into it, the space game there DOES eventually get some stuff that might as well be called Clarke-Tech."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
"That is absolutely delightful," Mamoru says almost fervently, clicking on the outer-spacey looking one in the hopes that it's for conquering the galaxy. And he grins at Setsuna. "So -- Bugs, but only fake bugs, got it. But definitely invocation of Clarke's Law."

The Stellaris logo takes over the screen.

He tilts his head back and breathes for a moment, in the quiet and the darkness, and the background music starts to play and he lifts his head again. "I always liked the idea of telepathy via quantum entanglement, actually. Knowing you're always, in a way, close to the person you want to be close to..." he says a little absently. "It seems less like magic that can be stolen, if it's science, you know?"

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
Setsuna shrugs, "Magic? Technology? At the bottom, they're all the same thing. Manipulation of the universe around us. And some things are even more fundamental than that."

She stands up and absently brushes herself off, "Mamoru-kun...fourteen thousand years. And you STILL found each other. Magical manipulation and Dark Energy. And you STILL found each other."

Setsuna shakes her head, "...in all my years I've seen ONE other bond that strong."

She then waves a hand at Mamoru's hand, "This? This will pass. This will get better. We'll MAKE it get better."

She then shrugs, "...and if that doesn't work...well...we have a collection of hyper-powerful artefacts at our disposal. We'll bend the laws of the universe into a pretzel if that's what it takes."

She leans forward and gives Mamoru a motherly kiss on the top of his head, "Now don't spend all night playing that...though I've been told that's a danger with some of those games...you DO need sleep...and I need to get home...probably get some dinner on the way home...I don't feel like cooking tonight."

As she makes it to the door, she points at the box next to the bottles of ramune, "Oh, and those are a kind of cookie called Feng Li Su...there's a note in there telling Usagi to keep her hands off until you've had at least a few...otherwise I'm fairly certain you won't get any."

She shakes her head and mutters softly, "...love that girl, but she is an absolute black hole for sweets..."