The food in this place is lousy, thought Akuta as he sat idly at what equated to 'trendy' in the slums...which meant no broken front window, clean tables, and food that was flavored with just a hint of spice rather than the bland gruel that was normally served. At least it's large portions.

He stared at the menu that was set beneath the piece of transparent plastic that formed the table, bouncing between a few choices. Settling on one, he looked over to the counter, which had a woman approaching her elderly years, wearing a thick pair of spectacles. She was staring at him like he was personally offending her by not ordering fast enough and taking his shabby self out of her place of business.

"Oi, obasan! Give me some of the nut noodles with the fried tofu. Drown it in the soy, eh?"

A scowl was his only reply and her turning around to place the order with the chef.

Leaning back a bit against his wall seat, the ronin looked out the window to see if anyone of interest was passing by.

Not far down the lane, Seika is finishing an interesting conversation with some young heimin women on their way back from the public laundry. She passes around a pack of gum one last time for everyone to grab another stick before going their own ways, then waves a good-natured farewell.

There's one stick of Watanabe Confectioners Lychee Ice! chewing gum left in the foil pack. Almost the end of the handful of packets she'd tossed in her trunk on the other end of her space journey to get here... she's going to have to figure out where the shop nearest the Mantis embassy is. She shakes the stick into her palm and balls up the silver packet with her other hand, tossing it into a precariously full waste receptacle. About to unwrap the gum, she hesitates. Isn't it about lunchtime? That looks like a food place across the lane...

So it is that a short woman in street wear, with only a Mantis-print scarf tucked in at her neckline to make her clan affiliation clear, peeks into the heimin eatery.

---
Roll dump:
D2 LM--cast Mental Quickness on a piece of Seika's jewelry before investigating. Fire TN 15, school tech applies to Fire spells in daylight. | 6k3 ⇒ 31 (TN: 15)
Success!

Making use of the Mantis embassy perk from D1...
D2 LM--Seek Information with Lore:Underworld/Int. Crafty applies. MQ and VP for 1k1 each. Mantis Embassy FR for more/better info. | 6k5 ⇒ 29 (TN: 25)
Success! Details in PF in just a sec.

Lightly drumming his fingers on the tabletop with a somewhat bored expression, the lean ronin keeps on people watching. Always the hustle and bustle of heimin coming and going, an endless stream of lives thrown into the meat grinder that was the planet, churning away to keep their Scorpion masters looking posh and pretty. What a waste.

Speaking of posh and pretty though, the woman with her culinary quandary is spotted fairly quickly as she approaches after speaking to the group of women. She stuck out like a sore thumb, mostly on the account of her being clean and the dab of Mantis green around her neck was a color almost alien in the dingy slums.

Lazily turning his head as the woman peeks in her head, he gives a lift of his chin in greeting. "Oi there, samurai-sama! Come on in before you let all of obasan's cool air out. If she gets too warm those wrinkles of hers start to droop."

A pair of chopsticks strike Akuta in the side of the head and he smirks.

"Gosh, don't mind it, Auntie, you look lovely." The Mantis's bold-painted lips quirk as she slips inside. She actually doesn't stick out too terribly; her clothing is of the type and quality often favored by ji-samurai and ronin with more style sense than disposable income, and it looks comfortably lived-in. On the other hand, it also looks to be of off-world manufacture--which makes complete sense on a samurai from an off-world clan. Off-world accent, too. "Are those spicy noodles Shinseist-friendly? Perfect! I'll have one with extra spice, please."

Leaning against the counter to wait for her bowl to be assembled from among the various tubs of ingredients, she casts the rude ronin a look half skeptical, half curious. "I wouldn't talk like that to people who handle my food, personally," she says with a shrug. "You must be either rich, or a really old regular, right? Or both." She decides not to point out that he sure doesn't look like the correct answer is 'rich.'

Picking up the chopstick package from the floor, he brushes them off with a smirk. His glance lingers on her dress for a moment as he considers. Even with her more muted wardrobe, it was certainly fancier than his. The deep navy blue of his kimono bore patches in several areas and hung loosely from his shoulders. His hakama was in similar condition, but looks a bit newer. The only thing that looked even remotely new was a pair of white rope belts that wrapped around his waist, crossed in an X-shape.

"Obasan and I here are old acquaintances...she's been making the same nut noodles with fried tofu for me ever since I was a pup...isn't that right?" He turns and looks to the old woman behind the counter who rolls her eyes and reaches behind her, pulling out his order from the serving window and sliding it across the countertop, forcing Akuta to catch it before it hits the floor. "She's just grumpy and I'm a smart ass. Thank you, obasan." He reaches into his pockets and swipes a payment stick over the e-reader, which chimes an affirmative that his account is indeed full enough to pay.

"Rich with life experience though." Scooping out half of his meal from his bowl and placing it on a plate, he sets it to the side and spears some of the hot food into his mouth. In between mouthfuls, he gestures to her jewelry. "Looks like you might be more flush with koku than I am, though."

"Comes with the territory." Seika shrugs, seemingly not embarrassed by the subject in the way that a Crane or Lion (or even many Scorpion) might be. "You stand on top of what your ancestors built... and try to, like, keep building, or at least not knock it all down."

She thanks the proprietor when the latter sets a fresh bowl of spicy noodles on the counter for her. To pay, she fishes a few small coins out of one of her many jacket pockets, rounding up. Casually generous, which is sort of baseline decency for a clan samurai invading a place like this, but ever so coincidentally done without flashing around much cash or making it obvious whether (and where) she's carrying a banking credit seal.

She picks up her bowl and, after a moment's thought, invites herself to Akuta's table.

"Yoritomo Seika, in from Watanabe Shipyards. I guess you must be from around here."

"Nice sentiment. Foundation my parents were building turned to glass when the spirit furnace went critical and made the playground that is the Desolation."

Slorping down some more of his noodles and crunching into the crispy breading of the tofu, he chews in contemplation for a few moments, savoring what little flavor there is to be had. When the Yoritomo sits down at his table, an eyebrows raises slightly for a moment, but then lowers. He moves the plate out of her way and sets it on the windowsill beside him.

"Watanabe Shipyards, eh? Sounds posh. What do you do over at the shipyards, Yoritomo-sama?" He scoops up another piece of tofu and bites into it, a bit of grease dripping into his noodles. After chewing, he will seem to at least remember a semblance of manners and offer, "Akuta, born and raised here in this hab."

"Oh, whoa, I'm sorry. Were your folks serving at the old plant when it, uh, went?" Seika casts Akuta a worried look.

"Anyway... I don't know about posh, unless your aesthetic is, like, giant welder bots. It's a shipyard." She plies her chopsticks, mixing the double helping of spicy sauce through her noodles until the entire dish is enticingly (at least from a certain point of view) colored a glossy, oily shade of red.

"Actually, as it happens, right now I'm running a team that's working on... experimental spirit-power generation." Her brows scrunch together a little. "One that can run in solar orbit, far from any place people live."

"Mhm. They were doing something for the maskers in there. Never wanted to talk about it, which probably meant it was something they weren't proud of. But, have to put koku in their pockets and food in their bellies. Worse ways to make a living." His voice gains a hard edge to it as it stares bitterly out the window in the direction of the former location of the Kinuran Spirit Furnace.

He goes quiet for a few moments now as he finishes the food and looks at the plate beside him, placing his chopsticks in it as though someone else was going to eat. A quiet prayer is murmured with closed eyes before he turns his attention back to the Yoritomo, the flinty look in his eyes returning.

"Well, you don't look like you've spent alot of time working in a factory with oil and grime everywhere...unless you clean up real nice. But who knows, been wrong before."

As she explains about the experimental power generation, an eyebrow cocks upward in query. "Sounds like it'd be alot of work."

Seika slurps the first bite of noodles with an expression of satisfaction. Apparently it's spicy enough. She pauses her meal while Akuta conducts his private ritual; untraditional though she might look, she's still a shugenja to the bone.

"You might be surprised some of the stuff I've gotten into," she remarks offhand, returning some attention to her noodles. "Yeah, Flarenet is a lot of theology, a lot of engineering." She gestures with her chopsticks, drawing a loose circle in the air over her bowl. "I'm not in the deep weeds with the nerds or the Moshi priests, I'm there to keep them actually talking to each other. The point is, though, once it's set up, it's not going to be a lot of work. No incantation loops to control, nothing that can go critical. The divine suns generate enormous energy in all the inhabited systems... all we have to do is catch it and channel it."

Realizing she's gotten a bit carried away, Seika shakes her head at herself. "I'm really not not trying to sound like some kind of promotional movie. it's just, the more people I talk to around here, the more I hear about the Kinuran incident, you know? My brief for this court basically didn't mention it, it's like one sentence and a gray spot on the map. I didn't realize how messed up it was."

"Experience has taught me that most people aren't more than they appear, but you seem to at least be self-aware, so kudos to you."

That same smirk comes again as he leans back as listens to her give the details about the solar power project, happy that she didn't choose to go over details that would have glazed his eyes over and put his head on nodding repeat. When she makes her apology, he waves a hand dismissively.

"By all means, talk about it. That way if someone talks about it later, I can say I talked to one of the geniuses behind the whole project and I can drop your name. Should get me a free drink at a Mantis bar." He gives a wink and looks out over towards the Desolation again after she mentions the lack of information.

"Maskers don't like talking about failures unless they planned them. Too many shadows etched onto walls and things that don't like being bothered are the only things there now. Well, and the glint. I wouldn't recommend taking a stroll in there, anyway. Unless you're feeling particularly plucky or want to see what the business end of a gakimushi looks like."

"That's funny, I'd say I get taught the opposite more often." Seika shrugs.

"Not talking a whole lot about your screw-ups is pretty normal all around, but that is a really big mess to be so quiet about, huh?" She swallows another bite of her noodles, thinking. "Somebody else already told me not to go in there, yeah. They also said they pull all kinds of strange stuff out of the ruins, in between all the near death experiences." Her brows arch wryly. "What's a gakimushi, anyway?"

"How many people do you know that are really different than you first peg them to be? Broad generalizations about people got to be the way they are because they applied to enough people to be a relatively safe bet."

When she goes on about the person who did the ruin diving, he nods. "Yeah, some people are willing to go in there and risk life and limb for some baubles. Some not baubles as well, if you can afford them." An eyebrow was raised in regards to gakimusha. "Never seen one? Angry scorpion things. Some the size of cats or dogs, some the size of a horse if the tales are to be believed. Angry things, big stingers and it hurts like a bitch to get stung."

"It definitely happens. For example, I pegged you as a meathead asshole, and here it turns out you're not a meathead at all." Seika's lips quirk a bit ruefully.

"No, I haven't seen one," her eyes widen a bit at the description of the monsters apparently roaming around the Desolation. "I, uh, don't think that's the kind of thing most people expect to see, like, ever. Not on a planet that isn't aligned to one of the unclean realms, anyway. This one isn't supposed to be..."

"Yeah, just an asshole...but good on you I suppose. Might just be I'm used to people who have the depth of a street puddle."

As her eyes go wide, he gives something of a grim nod. "Not an expert on spirit engines or furnaces or whatever, but I imagine when one goes up, it can't be healthy for the spiritual balance in an area. Imagine some of 'em would be hopping mad. There's a reason they keep armed guards patrolling the border."

"Sheesh, yeah, I guess so." Seika shakes her head. "It's so weird, to think a place like that is this close to the planetary capital and all those tourist beaches and everything. People living right up next to it, too..."

"The wards and the fences put up keep it pretty safe so far," Akuta says, snagging a nearby plastic bottled water from a shelf and tossing a coin over to the counter for the cost. "Never know though...and you can bet your ass if anything got out the maskers would be on it real quick like. Can't have anything damaging their image, eh?"

"It's okay if the Beast of Kinuran or whatever eats people, as long as no one talks about it?" Seika's brows draw together as she pokes restlessly at her remaining noodles, stirring them around in the radioactive-red pool of spicy oil. "That what you're getting at? I mean, I guess if they are doing stuff that keeps the Emperor's subjects safe, the motive only matters so much either way..."

"Do the Mantis regularly talk about things fucking up in their space? Not that it's right or whatever, but panic is gonna make it's own problems." Cracking open the water, he takes a long drink and shrugs. "Might just be used to seeing the shit sandwich we all get, but I'm not really surprised. Maskers do what they have to do to get people to work within 'acceptable safety margins' and that's just how it is."

"I mean it's not a picnic every day for every single person on our worlds either. But I'd say... we care about how things are more than how they appear."

She shrugs, pushing her now empty noodle bowl aside, and pokes a fingertip at the tabletop for emphasis.

"I mean, look, you don't just slap a fresh coat of paint over a compromised hull, right? 'Cause when it loses integrity and you're breathing vacuum, you're really not going to care anymore that no one knew you had a problem. Sure, paint over it after you patch. But you've gotta patch first. That's the Watanabe answer, anyway."