[Day 11 - Early Evening, Once Upon a Theatre] Some Real Entertainment

[Kuni Sumie]

The mother screams in shock but fails to stop her son from watching the remainder of the tape. The son seems rather oblivious. They soon get a phone call...

A screeching haunting sound is heard before it cuts to silence and "...7 days..."

Sumie turned to look at Hinta, giving him her best resting Kuni face on the matter. It wasn't her responsibility to console or pamper the Crane celebrity. She imagined that he had hordes of supporters on the Crane network, fans, friends, and the countless number of support staff. That was their job.

She merely gave a shrug on the matter, feigning any knowledge. "Oh, I don't know...maybe we're both cursed right now. Better find a way to enjoy your last seven days and avoid all informator screens. Sweet dreams and all that."

[Asahina Hinata]

O_O

Well that was Hinata avoiding all screens for a week now.

"Maybe I do have to learn Jade Strike now . . . "

[Kuni Sumie]

Needing to find help in her current predicament, she later contacts her estranged husband, who is a shugenja. The husband is skeptical at first before finding himself further engrossed in this mystery and even watching the same tape itself in order to find some evidence of how they could prevent the worst from happening...

Sumie would shuffle around a bit before she found the canteen she was sitting on and unto the top. She took a moment to sniff its contents to make sure it was alcohol and not chloroform before taking a sip. "Oh, you don't know how to cast Jade Strike...?" She would bring up curiously. It was a tradition as old as time for Kuni to share such a spell so that others in the Empire could defend themselves against the threat of the Shadowlands.

"...That's too bad, then." She gave a shrug on the matter before taking another swing, not really giving care on the matter. "Besides, it's probably more a gaki than a kansen. Pretty sure it would do nothing against that."

[Asahina Hinata]

O_O

Knees drawn up to chin and just two wide blue eyes staring at the screen now. But . . . was their hope?

"Oh the priest will solve it . . . "

[Kuni Sumie]

Sumie now had her sandwich in hand and started taking bites from it. She gave a roll of her eyes as the Crane's continued hope at the dismal situation that was already spoiled several times over, talking about it with dismissive sarcasm. "Uh huh, sure he will. Suuuuuuure he will. I'm sure it's a misunderstanding and everything. They're also going to get back together and become a traditional family unit. Ugh, marriage is so lame...children, too."

After watching the tape a few times, the husband managed to deduce the identity of the people on the tape and it seemed to have been linked to a remote village in the mountains. They travel there and find that the identity of the woman on the tape belonged to a heimen medium that was revered for her abilities but committed suicide. There were a lot of controversies revolving around the medium, including a samurai who had been having an affair with her as well as a supposed daughter that they had kept locked away. Supposedly, her power was greater than her mother's and she even showed elements of being intuned with the kami...creating many to fear her, including the samurai.

[Asahina Hinata]

Hinata was safe in the back of his seat, behind his wall of empty cartons.

"Kids are OK, if you can give them back at the end of the day . . . "

The plot continued on towards the happy ending. It has a happy ending . . . right?

[Kuni Sumie]

"Ugh! No! Have you had a kid use your core book as a colouring book? Have you had kids get your dice lost in the ventilation system because they threw them everywhere?! Worst of all, have you had kids with their grubby little sugar-encrusted hands handle your original Fantasy Fight 3rd edition print cards?! Children are the woooorst! Hurl, disgusting!" She tilted her head back as she rolled her eyes.

"Shhh!!!" Sumie would be reminded again.

However, it seemed that the shugenja would divine with the surrounding kami of the land and deduced that the mysterious daughter had been abducted by the samurai and tossed into a well to rid of her. She must be still alive if this curse was still happening and likely an extension of her power to inflict others with the same fate while she still resided in the well...

"Yeah, like kami would totally tell you all those things if you ever tried to commune with them. Whatever, small issue with an underwise good movie. Really, the shugenja is a hard carry to explain most of the plot. Finding facts from thin air," she let out a snort at that.

[Asahina Hinata]

The rant on children actually distracted Hinata from the movie and he stared at her for a moment wondering what she was talking about.

Then they got shushed, so he went back to being scared by the movie.

"Oh, but the air kami would totally tell you that if they knew . . . "

[Kuni Sumie]

"Sure...whatever..." Sumie gave a dismissive roll of her eyes, seemingly unconvinced before she went back to snacking on her smuggled sandwich as they continued to watch the rest of the movie. "Maybe you should have asked the air-kami about what you were in for before stepping foot in here. It seems you'd be happier watching some lame-o dog pilot or magical miko animated movie."

As time began to run out fo the two, The pair would frantically search the village and the former residence of the late medium's house to find the well buried within the confines of the home. They descend down to the well to discover the corpse of the daughter after draining the water, decayed but still rather preserved for being left there for some time. After giving the corpse some proper funeral rites, the mother and her son seemed to have been spared the curse after their 7 days are up...

[Asahina Hinata]

"I'm in that dog pilot show and it isn't lame . . . "

Was he actually pouting? No matter he continued to watch the movie with some hope as the narrative progressed.

[Kuni Sumie]

Sumie narrowed her eyes as she slouched forward by that admission. "Okay...Big whoop! Congrats, I guess? What, did they model you after one of the characters or something?"

Your face looks like a dog pilot, she thought as a slam dunk insult but that might have been taking it too far. Admittedly, it was too far of a stretch that Hinata would be recognized as an anamorphic dog pilot or any of the supporting characters.

Things had seemed to have returned back to normal after the incident and the movie cuts to a few days later when the estranged husband is documenting the matter in his diary, including the research notes that were taken during his role in solving the mystery. Unbeknownst to him, the large informator screen lights up without his knowledge, showing a lot of static. This draws his attention at first as he attempts to turn it off. However, soon the footage of the disturbing tape plays out in front of him and the screen pauses at the same well as its conclusion. Soon, the apparition is seen clawing itself up the well, dressed in a stark white robe with wet hair covering her face. She stalks slowly toward the street and it is seen emerging from the screen to the real world. The husband staggers back in shock and attempts to move away. Soon the apparition is in front of him, looking down with jet black eyes...

There's an agonized scream and the scene cuts to black...

"Eh, I guess they at least have that part in the movie." Sumie shrugged nonchalantly after finishing her sandwich.

[Asahina Hinata]

"No I'm the voice for the Bunny Drop Trooper Nousagi."

He said it like he expected her to understand.

O_O

The revelation that there wasn't going to be a good ending was rather shocking to the Crane.

[Kuni Sumie]

Your face looks like... Sumie might have said it out loud if she knew what he was going on about? Wasn't going to watch the show ironically so she could make that slam dunk insult? Meh, probably not...

The move switches to the mother and her son as she gets news that her estranged husband was found dead, scared to death. She quickly scrambles for the answers to how the curse managed to skip her and her son entirely but kill her husband. There didn't seem to be a sure answer to this curse and they were doomed...until she realizes that she showed her husband the tape after watching the tape. It seemed that the curse can be transferred to others if she gets others to watch the tape...

...with haste, she quickly fabricates copies of the tape. Once done, she drives to her father's house and asks him for a favour, presenting him with a copy of the tape...

Then the movie ends and the credits start rolling.

Sumie reaches over and starts packing her holorecorder. "Well, I hope you enjoy your last seven days. It's been real nice knowing you..."

[Asahina Hinata]

O_O

He stared at the screen as if trying to figure something out. Then a lightbulb went on . . . perhaps not the lightbulb they expected.

"Hey you recorded it . . . so you're going to show it to someone else!!!!!"

[Kuni Sumie]

"Uggh" Sumie said at first, perhaps disappointed that he managed to quickly find a loophole in his fictional predicament after watching the movie. She was really looking forward to seeing him squirm. "Yeah, I guess that might be true after I upload this on the network. I'm sure this might get a lot of downloads."

"Good thinking, you've really saved us both, yay..." She said dryly at that and then after a moment, she showed a twisted smile. "...but can you live with the knowledge that you're involved in a grand conspiracy to infect others with the curse so that you could stay alive?"

[Asahina Hinata]

He was about to make one of the smortest replies of his life when another random lightbulb went off.

"Oh but . . . hey wait!!! Those guys at the Embassy totally sent me here to watch this . . . . "

Eyes widened and he slid as far from Sumie as he could.

"You're in league with them!"

[Kuni Sumie]

Sumie gave Hinata a blink at that after stowing her holo recorder away and screwing back the top of her canteen. She gave him a roll of her eyes as she stood from her seat and began to walk down the aisle.

"Uh-huh. That's right, I'm working with your friends and made you watch this whole movie so that they wouldn't get cursed and also cursing myself in the process. Real genius plans, they've got you so good..." That was said with pure unabashed sarcasm. "So, if you see a ghost crawl out of an informator in the next few days and feel like you're coming on with a heart attack, be sure to call me when it happens. That's a really good one to get on disk. You know, for your friends who sent me here."

[Asahina Hinata]

The sheer amount of sarcasm finally broke through the Derp Shield. He blinked.

"Oh . . . yeah. The Embassy guys would never make a plot like this with the Crab. You're not our allies. They must be trying to blame you for this and . . . . oops, did I just ruin a political plot?"

He scooped up all his discarded cartons and binned them like a good boy should.

"Oh those guys are gonna get a scolding when I get back to the Embassy."

[Kuni Sumie]

"Ugh. Now that would be almost exciting," she said with a roll of her eyes. "So yeah, you'd better go and tell those guys off, give them a piece of your mind."

Sumie found herself looking forward then slowly down to Hinata's short height. "I don't think you don't really have much to give otherwise. Oh, don't forget about the curse and the ghost. Have fun and all that, bye now..."

With that, she put her hands in the pockets of her jumpsuit and casually strolled out of the theatre.

/exit

[Asahina Hinata]

"Bye, Kuni-samaaaaa!!!!"

Cheery already . . . as if the film had been forgotten . . . but no, he took a peek at the black screen just to make sure it hadn't lit up with static or anything in the last five seconds since he last looked.

"Right, those guys at the Embassy are toast when I find them."

He marched out to the lobby and was immediately distracted by the pop corn kiosk . . .

/exit

//scene

TY Boogie!!!!!!