[April 22, 2007] [Princess Tutu] Familiar and Foreign

[haleysings.livejournal.com]

Title: Familiar and Foreign
Day/Theme: April 22: Coming back
Series: Princess Tutu
Character/Pairing: Autor, Fakir, Duck and a surprise character <3
Rating: G

The woman paused outside of Kinkan Town, watching the flow of people go in and out of the gates. To an outsider, there would be nothing odd about this…but she had never, in her entire life, seen those gates open before. It’s funny, really, how something can seem normal when it’s what you grew up with…

But now was not the time to be pensive. Someone was waiting for her. With a sunny smile, she melted into the crowd and stepped through the gates. Her brightly colored shoes clicked on the stone-paved path as she walked quickly through the town.
Everything about it seemed at the same time familiar and foreign. She recognized the river, the café, the blacksmith opening up shop for the day…she thought she maybe recognized that girl over there, but…hadn’t she been an alligator last time she saw her? No, not an alligator--a crocodile. That was it.

She paused for a moment on the bridge and looked down at the river. It was calm today, sleepily winding through the town and glinting in the sun like glass. She smiled at the daffodils growing by the riverside. They were blooming beautifully this year…

No, no, she shouldn’t spend her time looking at flowers. Someone was waiting for her.

She turned from the bridge and hurried along through the town. Finally, she saw her destination: a large house towards the center of town, nearby the water fountain. She ran over to it, putting her hand on the door handle and giving it a tug.
It wouldn’t open. It was locked.

She frowned. The man that lived here was a bit of a homebody, so it was unusual for nobody to be here. She tugged on the door again, but it wouldn’t budge. Giving up on getting into the house that way, she began to look through the windows. Inside it was dark, but still furnished…so, it was being lived in, at least. But the furniture seemed different somehow…less decorations, simply furniture of wood and marble. It seemed a little empty, even with the furniture in it.
But wait—that grandfather clock. She recognized it, he had—

“Can I help you?” said a voice in a suspicious tone. The woman turned towards the source of the voice—a young man with long, dark hair and a blue shirt that seemed to have worn out some time ago. His green eyes were narrowed as if studying her, and on his face was a slowly deepening frown. In his arms, he carried a yellow duckling.

At first, the woman was surprised by the man’s—practically a boy still, really—rather unfriendly demeanor…but then she realized how suspicious she must look, tugging on a locked door and peering into a window. She did her best to smile and show that she had no ill intent.
“Perhaps you can help me,” she said, tucking some of her hair behind her ear. Her large earring jingled as her hand brushed past it. “I’m looking for the man that lives here. Have you seen him?”
“Autor?” the boy asked, raising an eyebrow.
That wasn’t the name the woman was expecting, but…yes, she wanted to see him, too. Come to think of it, the boy would be about the same age as Autor…it made sense he’d think of him first. “Yes, that’s right,” she said.
“Why would you want to see him?”
The woman was rather taken aback by the question. She put a hand on her hip and opened and closed her mouth several times, trying to think of a good answer. Before she could come up with anything, however, the duckling in the boy’s arms erupted in a series of loud, almost angry-sounding quacks.
“QuaQUACK! Quack quack quack quack quaqua QUACK quack!!”
“I’m not being rude!” the boy said back to the duck, as if he had somehow discerned meaning from the noises. “It’s a valid question!! The only visitors he ever gets are me and you and Pique! Maybe Malen sometimes, but…”
“QUACKQUACK qua-quack quack!”
“I just think it’s odd, that’s all!! He hardly ever has anyone look for him at his house, and she’s trying to get into his house without knocking or anything!”
“It’s not as though I was trying to steal anything!” the woman said, stomping over to the young man, her sunflower-yellow skirt swishing wildly with every step. “I didn’t know he wouldn’t be home right now!”
“QUACK!” the duck said as she nodded her head in agreement. (The woman thought to herself how odd it was to be defended by a duck, but…well, she had seen stranger things in her life.)
The young man glared down at the woman before turning back to his duck-friend. “Are you sure?”
“Qua.”
He sighed, his expression faintly softening. “Fine, fine. If you say so.” He turned back to the woman, still frowning but no longer narrowing his eyes. “He normally spends his free time at the Academy’s library. I can take you to where he is. Follow me.”
He snapped around with the precision of a soldier, lifting the duckling to his shoulder to ride there as he did so. The woman, slightly flabbergasted by the odd conversation, stood in place for a moment—but when the boy turned to see if she was following, she quickly began to walk behind him, determined not to lose him.

The three made an interesting procession—a surly boy in a tattered shirt with a duck perched on his shoulder like a pirate’s parrot, and an energetic woman dressed in flamboyant, colorful clothing. As they made their way to the Academy, more than a few people turned their heads to look—all human, the woman noted. She saw very few animals on the way, and all of them were too busy to bother with what the woman was doing. The fact that she found this unsettling was another reminder of the lingering effects of the story, she supposed…

And then, there it was. The large, sprawling library—wooden tables and chairs set up in rows, sunlight filtering through the windows and revealing the particles of dust floating through the air, and volumes upon volumes of books lining the walls. Shakespeare, Goethe, Austen.
This had been her haven, once…

The dark-haired boy took her to an out-of-the-way corner of the library, where a small table had been shoved in-between bookshelves with just enough space for a chair. At the table was another young man with blue-violet hair and glasses, surrounded by piles of books. His head was bowed and his brow furrowed, bending over one particularly weighty tome on his left, a paper with some sort of chart on it on his right.
It had been a while since she had seen him, but…this was Autor, wasn’t it?

As soon as they reached him, the duckling burst out into another long series of quacks, this time much more cheerful sounding. Autor looked up from the book, his glasses glinting slightly. “Duck, be quiet! This is a library!”
The duck jumped off of the boy’s shoulder and quickly waddled over to Autor, fluttering her wings and continuing to quack.
“I said BE QUIET! Fakir, can’t you get her to stop?!”
“Sorry,” the other boy apologized, quickly scooping the duck in his arms and tapping the duck lightly on the head. “He’s right. Be quiet.”
The duck gave the Fakir a sour look, before silently fluttering her wings at the direction of the woman.
“What does she want?” Autor asked wearily, picking up a book from one of his stacks and flipping through it.
“We stumbled upon a woman by your house that said she was looking for you.”
“What? Who?”

The woman decided this was as good of a time as any to break into the conversation. She cleared her throat, causing both of the young men to turn in her direction. After she did, however, she found herself (for one of the first times in her life) practically speechless. What was she supposed to say…?
“…Hello,” she said.
Autor stood up from the table, his book still in hand, and squinted a little. It was a little dark back here, she realized. It wasn’t surprising he didn’t recognize her.
“Hello,” he responded slowly. “Did you need me for something?”
The woman laughed, a little uneasily. “You’re…taller than me now,” she said, partially to herself. She stepped forward, into the light. “You look a lot like your father.”
The book Autor had been carrying hit the floor with a thud as he grabbed onto the table to support himself. He stared for a moment, eyes wide and mouth hanging open. It was several seconds before he managed to gasp out one short, astounded word:

“Mom?”