451/Haulin'

Haulin'
Date of Scene:	18 September 2023
Location:	Pikarigaoaka Ward
Synopsis:	What is that noise outside the Outer Senshi's shared domicile?
Cast of Characters:	Setsuna Meiou, Haruka Tenoh

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Setsuna Meiou has posed:
Weekends at the Casa Del Outer are generally fairly relaxed affairs, comparatively.

During the week, after all, all three have to get up fairly early to make it in to school when it opens.

Something that her housemates may pick up on is that Setsuna apparently gets up at exactly the same time every day PRECISELY. To the point where one could set their clock to the exact moment she shambles into the kitchen for her morning coffee.



Weekends, however, are more relaxed. Without the urgent needs to get up, everyone gets to rise or sleep in as desired.

This Saturday morning is no different.

At least at first.

A sound that's rather unusual for this part of the city can be heard rather close outside...the insistent beeping of a large industrial machine backing up...followed by the sound of chains and short bit of more beeping...a clang of something striking pavement...then some indistinct noises...and finally a little more beeping.

Unfortunately for quick investigations, the sound seems to be coming from the front of the mansion...and the wing with the bedrooms is on the other side of the house.

Haruka Tenoh has posed:
    "What... in the hell..." is Haruka's response to all of that noise. She is... not consistent when it comes to waking up. She in fact sleeps pretty late on Saturday and Sunday. And other days if she doesn't keep tabs on herself.

    But the noise gets her up, grumpily at that. She staggers to the closet and pulls out a dress shirt, putting it on and haphazardly buttoning it so that the sides are slightly off, stagger-stepping into some jeans, and scooting slowly towards the front of the house. "What the hell, are they digging up the street out there?" She asks, out loud to nobody but herself, as she makes her way to the front. But she looks out the window... and shakes her head because she must not be seeing what is out there. After a few moments beyond that, she opens the door to stand in it with her messy dress shirt and jeans, barefoot, looking up. "What. The. Hell." she asks, speaking each word very loudly. And crossing her arms.

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
And there, sitting out in front of the house where the delivery left it...is a Ford F450 Super Duty.

It's giant, enormous, and painted metallic black.

SEVEN Feet Tall

NINE Feet Wide

TWENTY-TWO Feet Long

And There's a small envelope left under one of the windshield wipers.

Haruka Tenoh has posed:
    Haruka looks at the giant monster of a truck. She's quiet for a little bit, but eventually shakes her head and reaches up to grab the envelope. She figures, though, it is probably a delivery notification of some kind. After all, it doesn't take her very long to guess how a mammoth heavy duty truck like this ended up on her doorstep. On Setsuna's doorstep. She wasn't consulted, and she bristles at that. But more impressively, it was about as wrong a choice as anybody could make for anything the three ladies in this house would be doing anytime soon.

    She took the envelope and started back towards the house while opening it.

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
Inside the envelope are what are almost certainly the keys to the ginormous truck, as well as a letter. It's apparently from the local Ford headquarters to Setsuna.

Blah,blah, lot of flowery, kowtowing language, blahblah, per your request, blahblah reallocated a shipment blah blah, more kowtowing language.

Inside, Setsuna is sitting in the kitchen, sipping a coffee and wearing what is her common 'bombing around the house' attire...ie, a comically oversized t-shirt that comes down to her knees. This one has a large image of a D20 with the 1 face prominently at the top and the legend 'Do Not Ascribe Agency To The Polyhedron'.

As the dishwater blonde wanders into the kitchen, Setsuna nods, "Morning, Haruka."

Haruka Tenoh has posed:
    For the third time this morning, Haruka lets the three words come out of her mouth. "What. The. Hell?!" she asks, pointing out the window. "Why, Meiou-sensei, why in the world, did Ford deposit a truck-shaped peice of heavy industrial equipment on the drive in front of our house?" she asks. It's early, she's flustered, she actually called her Meiou-sensei again. "Of all of the motor vehicles, on this planet, why." she asks again, her voice incredulous.

    "Oh, I'm sorry. Not on the drive in front of our house. Halfway on the curb of our house because a truck that big basically doesn't fit on Japanese Roads At All." she continues.

    "Forget driving fast, I'm not sure we can get this thing -to- the highway. What possible use would we have for a truck that's designed to haul like, heavy loads of concrete?" She's confused, flustered, tired - and finally looks down and notices she's got her dress shirt buttoned wrong. She lets out a bit of profanity and turns around to go about fixing it.

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
Setsuna blinks the blink of the innocent.

Or, in this case, the ignorant.

Which is much the same at the moment.

Finally, she stands up, walks over to the window and looks out, "...huh..." She then turns back to look at Haruka, "...well I figured that we might want to have something with more seating to drive now and then, so I told them I wanted something that had seating for at least four and could haul...since I remember you said you liked cars that could haul. So I told them that hauling was very important."

She looks back out the window, "...I suppose it IS kind of big..."

Haruka Tenoh has posed:
    Haruka sighs the sigh of the put-upon. And she kind of smiles a half smile. But her eyebrow is twitching. She walks over and puts an arm around Setsuna's shoulders. "Setsusan..." she says, softly, a much closer name than Meiou-sempai, something on the opposite scale of closeness. "You are... not a car woman. And that is okay. But you should really let the car woman handle this. Because... when I said I wanted something that could haul. I meant it. As in haul ass. As in go fast. I like cars. That go. Fast."

    "This... is a truck... and it does the opposite of haul ass. If the cars I like are like me, lithe, fast, quick... then this is a sumo wrestler."

    "If we wanted to move the entire contents of our house in one trip, this might be the kind of vehicle. But. As it is. We have no use for something this big. It's kind of troublesome just being here."

    "Is this what it's like when I misunderstand the quotes you and Michiru-san are using from Lord of the Rings?" she asks. "Because you are... extremely far off the mark with this one. And I *know* getting one of these into Japan wasn't cheap..."

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
Setsuna blinks as Haruka puts an arm around her shoulders, but she doesn't seem to mind...instead she just looks over at the shorter woman, "Ah. Haul ASS. Okay, yes...I can see where the mistake was made."

She then shrugs a little, "...and is it really that hard to get one into Japan? I confess I'm not really sure. When I called and told the people at Ford what I wanted, they were all falling over themselves and didn't mention anything about shipping."

There's a moment as she frowns in thought, "...though, now that I think of it, that might be because I own something like one percent of outstanding Ford stock."

Haruka Tenoh has posed:
Haruka's arm slips slowly off the taller woman's shoulders. "I think it's because when you told them you wanted to buy it, ship it to Japan, and have it delivered to your door, you were comitting to making a purchase that's probably worth about one percent of Ford's stock." Haruka says. "Did you even look at the number on the invoice? Or heck, even think about putting this thing somewhere? Even if it was much smaller... our garage is full?" she says.

    "I thought Pluto was the guardian of time and space? Cause we don't have space. In the garage. For another car." Haruka points out. "Much less the front half of a semi truck trailer grafted onto a pickup bed." she says, sighing.

    "Unless you're planning for us to like... tow the entire house. Or all three cars. Did you... look at dimensions or did you just Google "hauls the most"?" Haruka asks. "... and ignore the likely suggestion of 'hauls the most ass'?"

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
Setsuna is, by this point, looking at least a little embarrassed. At Haruka's speculation about what Google search she used...she pointedly coughs and looks away...but it looks like she's actualy blushing and trying to hide it, "...maybe that last bit..."

She then shakes her head and walks over to the fridge, pulling out a small mess of ingredients.

Quick! Cover embarrassment by making breakfast!

Haruka's comment about the cost, however, just gets the older woman to pause, then look over at Haruka quesioningly, "...it wasn't THAT expensive. I mean, as a lump expense, yeah...but it wasn't beyond what I can afford."

She absently starts cracking a few eggs into a bowl as she goes on, "...I suppose I'll donate it to some charity or group or something since we need to get it out of here." Little bit of milk, some veggies...diced ham...cheese...lotsa cheese...start a pan on the induction top...add some butter...half the mix, "...I'll look into charities or organizations that can auction it off or something."

A few minutes later, a plate with a big omlette is put down near where Haruka is.

Distraction!

Haruka Tenoh has posed:
"I mean, we sure can't keep it. Not unless you want to build a whole garage to hold it. And a driveway to safely bring it up here. And pay to have the roads rebuilt to accomodate it." she says, chuckling. Oh, No. Setsuna, you can't show *weakness* around an Outer Senshi like this!

    "Just because you have a lot of money doesn't mean you can spend it on things we can't use and don't need. That's how you go from having a lot of money to not. I don't think Radiant Heart Academy is paying their nurse well enough to offset that monstrosity anytime soon." she adds. "But yeah, let's see if we can do some good out of it. Maybe Michiru knows somebody, she's all high and fancy life, she probably has some philosopher connections." Haruka means Philanthropic, but that is not what she said. Maybe just back to focusing on not harassing Setsuna over this.

    "Oh, thanks for breakfast." she adds, genuinely. Looks down. "This is a big omelette." she notes. "It's almost as big as the giant freakin' truck sitting outside." Okay, maybe not.

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
Setsuna gives Haruka a bit of a flat look at the joke about the omlette as she walks over with her own, "...just for that, you can get your own drink."

She shakes her head as she sits down, "Haruka, dear...I think you haven't quite grasped things yet. I was making investments back when the Phonecians invented the concept. As one wag once put it, 'If you're immortal and poor, you're doing something wrong.'"

She pauses to take a few bites of her omlette, then absently gestures with her fork, "...now, granted, I'm not ACTUALLY immortal...but for these purposes, I might as well be."

She shrugs again, "I'm by no means the richest person on the planet...but it's unlikely I'll be hurting for money anytime soon."

Haruka Tenoh has posed:
    "Not thirsty anyways." Haruka said, sticking out her tongue. "Anyways, you know what I mean. Probably. I know that you've been around a really long time. Heck. I even know I probably can't understand how old you are. Or at least not until I get one of those pens you two have. If I'm ever supposed to get one." she begins, cutting into her omlette. "But up until this morning I also thought you knew enough to read the dimensions on things you bought, and now look. So maybe the other stuff I think you know, I'm also wrong about." Haruka added, with the most impish grin on her face.

    "Plus, the rules for things have to change over time, right? Who knows what old-stuff is stuck in your head between all the dice rolling and romance novels you put up there lately. You can't know everything. Case in point." she adds, gesturing outside with her fork.

    "You know, it's gonna be real relaxing for you when you find out I'm not a Sailor Soldier and you're not responsible for me." she adds, and chuckles a bit.

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
Setsuna rolls her eyes, "Romance novels aren't worth the read. They're all the same and they don't even make for interesting reads. And there's a whole subgenre devoted to Scotsmen, but all the covers are pictures of clean-shaven chiseled athletes with no body hair and naked to the waist..." She takes an annoyed bite, swallows, then goes on, "...it's bloody COLD up in the highlands of Scotland and no Highlander worth the name would be caught DEAD without a beard."

...grumblegrumblegrumleStupidBloodyInaccuraciesgrumblegrumble...

Then at Haruka's comment about responsibility, she pauses, and gives the blonde a serious but not severe look before she says with sincerity, "...Haruka...Senshi or not...you're like family to me...you'll ALWAYS have a place here if you want it."

Haruka Tenoh has posed:
    Haruka smiles a bit at that. It's genuinely nice to hear. To hear somebody wants her around unconditionally, not because of a specific thing that she is or isn't. She stops eating the omlette and plays with her food for a minute, taking some timerto avoid becoming too misty eyed and serious.

    Instead, after a little bit, she looks up. "That means a lot to me. Thank you." she says, with every ounce of honesty she has.

    "But... you know I'm never going to let you live this down, right?" she asks. "I think it's only fair I warn you before you tell me I've always got a place here." and that grin is back on her face.

Setsuna Meiou has posed:
Setsuna gives the blonde a flat look, "No, Haruka...I have lived you with the last few months and somehow managed to not realize that I won't be hearing about this for a long, long time."

She sighs, then shakes her head, "...now eat your breakfast before it gets cold."