[OOC][PLOT] The Fourth Thread of Planning for Arc 1 - Arrivals

[robkelk]

It appears I need to give a few hints.  I assure you, there is enough information there for most readers to figure it out.

I'm kind of a fan of the mystery genre.  I used at least two of the common techniques used in mystery stories to obscure information.

After explaining a few of the sights along the waterline, Akari couldn't stand the suspense any more.  "Are you a movie star, miss?"

She giggled a little.  "I guess I can say I've been in a few movies," she said enigmatically.

That was one of the hints that I noticed. Yay!

I've PM'ed Brent, and he's given me an okay to share more hints. Here's two:

President Aria [...] smelled her hand, thought about it a minute, then smelled her hand again. Now that doesn't make any sense, he thought.

"I once knew a man who believed with all his might that love is the only law, love under will. And that our true will would guide us to do the right thing, if we only follow it. But it doesn't always work," she shook her head to emphasize.

[Black Aeronaut]

.....That doesn't hel-

...hold the frickin' phone here....

She's a displacee, isn't she?

[Norgarth]

Like I said, I was sort of assuming she was Usagi with the disguise pen. there were at least 3 Sailor Moon Movies, plus

along with a golden brooch with a five pointed star resting inside a stylized crescent moon.

Though I suppose the fact she corrected Akari on a date and apparently grew up in the area disqualifies Usagi. Maybe Serena from the Dubbed version of Sailor Moon? 8P

[Labster]

.....That doesn't hel-

...hold the frickin' phone here....

She's a displacee, isn't she?

Why yes, I tend to write mostly about displacees. :3

Like I said, I was sort of assuming she was Usagi with the disguise pen.  there were at least 3 Sailor Moon Movies, plus

 along with a golden brooch with a five pointed star resting inside a stylized crescent moon.

Though I suppose the fact she corrected Akari on a date and apparently grew up in the area disqualifies Usagi.  Maybe Serena from the Dubbed version of Sailor Moon? 8P

Heh, it's not Serena or Usagi, but you're on the right track.

[Black Aeronaut]

Sounds like Venus - she'd definitely have "Glamor Girl" on lock-down. Dunno if her dub version also had acting/modeling chops, though.

[Labster]

Sounds like Venus - she'd definitely have "Glamor Girl" on lock-down.  Dunno if her dub version also had acting/modeling chops, though.

And angsting over love versus duty is definitely something she'd do.  But...

She glanced back to the boat's pilot, true relief showing in her green eyes.

So same problem as Usagi, wrong color eyes.

[Norgarth]

Plus she's torn over doing a job instead of being with her SO (Significant Other), and is happy when she realizes that the SO will wait for her. AFAIK, Venus doesn't have a SO, even in terms of this story.

[Labster]

While Sailor Moon was the inspiration for this passage, the passenger is not any character from any version of Sailor Moon (excluding crossover fics natch). I'm not sure that's helpful unless you recall the specific scene I'm thinking of, though.  

That does mean Norgarth's guess is the just about the closest you can get and still be wrong, though, so kudos to your powers of deduction.

[robkelk]

I've PM'ed Brent, and he's given me an okay to share more hints. Here's two:

President Aria [...] smelled her hand, thought about it a minute, then smelled her hand again.  Now that doesn't make any sense, he thought.

"I once knew a man who believed with all his might that love is the only law, love under will.  And that our true will would guide us to do the right thing, if we only follow it.  But it doesn't always work," she shook her head to emphasize.

I'm guessing nobody has done a web search for "love is the only law, love under will"...

[Dartz]

That's the one part I did recognise - by sheer chance at having a random wikiwalk the day before.

[Inquisitive Raven]

Oh, I recognized the bit from Aleister Crowley. I just didn't find it the least bit helpful.

[Labster]

Huh, I'm not getting why it's taking this long.  I've searched a combination of only a few of these facts online, and gotten a link to the character in question.  So it's definitely not impossible.

Like, no one has guessed Gidget yet?  She grew up in Malibu (in fact she still lives there) and visited lots of beaches.  I mean, it's not her, but she checks out against most of the facts I gave.

Without getting into facts about her personality, these are the raw data I included in the story.  While there are evasions and Akari is an unreliable narrator, nothing the passenger said was false, nor is she disguising her natural appearance in any way.  But there's definitely a trick here; more than one of the facts is true in an unexpected way.  Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.


Instead of the jeans and T-shirts and worse common around the SoCal beach scene, this woman was fashionable with a capital F.
- Fashionable dresser

Her other hand she offered to the young woman, perhaps twenty five years old, skinny, and gorgeous.
- Corporeal (normally I wouldn't bother to mention, but given the next story, y'know?)
- Aged ~25 years
- Skinny and gorgeous

She came aboard with ease
- Agile enough, typical human weight

Wearing the big straw hat ... the single most common fashion accessory among famous women trying not to be recognized.
- Wearing a weak disguise, still fashionable

The short-haired brunette wore a sheer pink scarf ...
- short-haired brunette

... along with a golden brooch with a five pointed star resting inside a stylized crescent moon.
- wearing a brooch (possibly emblem) with five pointed star resting inside a stylized crescent moon

He smelled her hand, thought about it a minute, then smelled her hand again.  Now that doesn't make any sense, he thought.
- Aria thinks something about her smell is out of place

"But don't you have a special undine name?"  She asked it almost like she already knew the answer.
- Might already know the Akari's undine name (uncommon, but googleable knowledge in story)

You know that the Romans believed that aquamarine gemstones would protect against peril on the sea?
- Knows at least a little about ancient Roman culture

Well, if you believe in magic.
- Possibly believes in magic

"I guess I can say I've been in a few movies," she said enigmatically.
- Has been a creator or subject of a few movies

"Don't worry about it.  I used to live here when I was a kid, and I learned a lot about the town."
- Lived near enough during some period of her childhood to know Venice Beach trivia

"It's just, I have a hard decision to face back at home.
- Faces a difficult decision at home involving conflicting duty and love

"I once knew a man who believed with all his might that love is the only law, love under will.
- Knew a man who was seriously into Aleister Crowley's doctrine of Thelema
-- Aleister is kind of the guy running Academy City in the Index/Railgun series

"Yes, he will, but to make him wait for so long?" she sighed.
- current significant other identifies as male

true relief showing in her green eyes.
- Has green eyes

The question took her by surprise, as not many people in Venice knew to ask for a canzone.
- Knows enough gondolier or undine tradition to ask for a song

"How about something Japanese?"
- Believes it is likely or certain that Akari speaks Japanese
- Interested in hearing a song in Japanese

After receiving the fare, and a very generous tip
- Good tipper

"Oh, I'm sure you'll be seeing me sooner than you expect,"
- Knows that Akari will see her again soon in an unexpected context
- Willing to tease Akari a little

it was getting to be time to pick up the kids from the magnet school
- Can't find her with a magnet, not a robot

From the forum:
- She is a displacee
- Akari thinks she is an actress, which is not necessarily true.
- Passage 3 is inspired by the Sailor Moon manga.

[robkelk]

Interrupting for a moment...

I'm getting reasonably close to having the Halloween Party story ready to go ("reasonably close" being relative - maybe a month left), and would appreciate folks who have wiki accounts to preread and proofread the story as it stands. Commentary on the wiki page's Discussion page, please. Typos ... just fix them. EDIT: Story page and Discussion page

We now return you to the guessing game.

[Bob Schroeck]

I know I'm lacking knowledge of one referent from Brent's list above and I suspect I'm lacking at least one more, which explains why I'm at a loss to identify her.

[Black Aeronaut]

Trivial Pursuit: Anime Edition?

Really, some of these clues are fine-grain trivia. The thing with the Romans for example... I know of absolutely no female characters in anime that are Roman Empire Fangirls. Granted, this may be because I tend to shy away from anime that are a bit too much of "normal people doing normal things".

[Norgarth]

BA, there's nothing saying she has to be from an anime. We've got the Firefly cast and Commander Data running around at minimum.

That said, I'm clueless.

[Labster]

I'll take a look at the long, long story.  I have a little bit more to include, but it's really just little things.

Trivial Pursuit: Anime Edition?

Really, some of these clues are fine-grain trivia.  The thing with the Romans for example...  I know of absolutely no female characters in anime that are Roman Empire Fangirls.  Granted, this may be because I tend to shy away from anime that are a bit too much of "normal people doing normal things".

Well, more of a "has knowledge of ancient history".  I just mentioned the Romans so someone might think of Amelia Pond, a fangirl of a very specific centurion, or her daughter.

[robkelk]

Trivial Pursuit: Anime Edition?

Really, some of these clues are fine-grain trivia.  The thing with the Romans for example...  I know of absolutely no female characters in anime that are Roman Empire Fangirls.  Granted, this may be because I tend to shy away from anime that are a bit too much of "normal people doing normal things".

I'll mention Thermae Romae before saying you're headed down a blind alley there.

[robkelk]

Sometimes, it seems like every displacee had heard of Sailor Moon before arriving in the Metacontinuity. So I went looking for which shows the Senshi could have heard of, and discovered one that's already been called for a residence and was aired at the right time for Usagi to have seen at least the end of it in its first run when she was a few years younger. And it ties into what was an unwritten scene for the Halloween Party, too.

---

"I'm Ayumu Kasuga, but everybody calls me Osaka."

Usagi's eyebrows headed for her forehead. "Kasuga? Like in Kimagure Orange Road?"

Osaka nodded. "Uh-huh! Same kanji and everything!"

"Does that mean you're an esper?"

"She couldn't be," Ruiko complained. "Dual Skill, like the Kasuga family had, is a myth."

"Er..." Everyone turned to Kazari. "You were in a coma when Kiyama-sensei demonstrated Multiskill."

Osaka looked hopeful. "That being the case... how do you become an esper?"

---

So, if Osaka gets esper abilities, it's Sailor Moon's fault in-universe.

And, yes, I double-checked - they do use the same kanji.

[Bob Schroeck]

(from a fanfic twenty years or so ago... I wish I'd noted which one...)

KASUGA FAMILY REUNION
Members of the Kasuga Family
ONLY
May Enter
Unless You have Godlike
ESPer Powers
In Which Case We Can't Stop You
Now Can We?

(Just offered for possible use)

EDIT: Google, you have failed me. But yay for my quarter-century of FFML archives: It's from Chris Davies' Together Again: 1996 Chapter, Act Two.

[robkelk]

If we could identify the story it came from, I just might use that.

Enough Kasuga digression for now - time to return to guessing who Akari's passenger is.

EDIT: And there's a clue to her identity somewhere in this post.

[Labster]

Well, I'm going to go on vacation, leaving on Tuesday for Europe.  I won't be away from computers for too long -- at least part of every week I'll be at a computer conference or at a company office.  But I wouldn't expect too much writing.

And my inner Brent won out against my inner Akari -- I am not going to Venezia in the summer.  Which is just as well, from what I hear about the local weather it's "Europe's Houston".  I did add a stop in Stockholm, though, so perhaps I can employ Kiki's Delivery Service.

Given that I'm leaving so soon, maybe I should just tell people the passenger's identity?  Or maybe not -- it's not like I can go back in time and unsay it if I want to return the sense of mystery.

[robkelk]

Split the difference and offer another hint?

"This area is the site of the original canals here in Venice, just newly reopened. I'm sure you've heard all about the incident."

"Ah, well," the ingenue admitted, "I know all about it."

She said she knows about it, but she didn't say she'd heard about it.

[Labster]

I doubt that the last hint is helpful to anyone, since it refers to a story that hasn't been written yet.  I did make some progress on said story while on my flight, 9kB worth.  So for now, a break from your regularly scheduled slice of life:

Mulholland Drive
November 8 2016, 2:45 PM

One moment it was stalking through a verdant forest a klick outside the city, and in the next, it was waking up on the warm pavement in the hills above an entirely different city.

The beast was roused by the sounds of armed men in black uniforms trying to encircle it.  The men were wary, not afraid; the beast felt very weak.  But not so weak that it couldn't teach these humans a lesson.  It stood up and voiced a horrendous roar, terrifying folks halfway to Coldwater Canyon.


Los Angeles County Animal Control
Venice, California
4:31 PM

A man in a dark green coverall warily eyed the creature behind the steel bars of the compound's largest cage. "That thing freaks me out.  It's like it knows I'm afraid.  It *wants* me to be afraid."

"You'd be more freaked out if you were on duty this afternoon.  I think we must have shot it like a hundred times, and it's still alive.  It's a miracle we managed to capture it."  The animal control officer's uniform looked worse for the wear today, ground in the dirt, with a couple rips across the sleeves.

"Yeah... but what the hell is it?  Doesn't look like any bear I've ever seen."

"Fuck if I know.  We've got some professor-types coming by to look at it in the morning."

The beast actually didn't look much like a bear at all, except in size -- a dire wolf would have made a more apt comparison.  Its body was covered in jet black fur from head to tail, with white claws and horns protruding from its joints.  The most disturbing part had to be the face, almost like an exposed skull with two red veins traced across the top and deep crimson eyes, which stalked them around the yard.

The animal shelter employee decided it was probably for the best to avert his gaze.  "Do you think Nguyen's gonna pull through?"

"God, I hope so.  What that beast did to him, was awful."

[Norgarth]

A Beowulf I see.