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Flowers and what they represent

Lavender Heather - Solitude

Now this was why she hadn't run away screaming days ago.

Not the hastily - and cheaply  - framed picture of Daigo and Edge and Gan that she'd stuck in the mirror overlooking her section of the place.  Nor the polished and obviously little-used equiptment currently scattered about a stale concrete floor.  Not even the piles upon piles of mechanics-related books she was sadly expected to teach herself from, and happily rather in love with.

Nope.  This was definately it.

Akira Kazama was outfitted in the loose prussian jumpsuit they'd given her to ward off grease and other such unladylike things.  Her named - stitched in red on white base in the corner - was not exactly inconspicuous, but she'd live.  And the smell of motor oil had been in her thoughts for so long that it was practically in her blood.

Her bike, though....

Her bike was simply beautiful.  Breathtaking, even.  That wax they had did wonders for the finish, if she did say so herself, and it had been nice to put in that new transmission that Akira would have felt hellishly guilty asking Diago for.

What she really, really loved about this place was that there were no other teachers.  Or students for that matter.  And bent over metal contortion the only voices she had to deal with were teh ones who didn't talk back.

A bizzare mix of Mettalica and X-Japan - old but classic - had beaten out any errant noise to create a beautiful white noise.  Whoever had invented the discman, greatest excuse known to man not to seek out conversation, was a god.

If so, Saori Isami must be the devil.

"Hallo! I finally tracked you down!  You're silly, wandering around to all these wierd places."

Dashed from her zenlike state of mental peace, Akira could only brush her hair back and faintly sigh.  Two days.  Two days she'd been able to avoid that girl.  And now....

Now she was just getting that feeling that crept up her spine sometimes in situations that could become remotely confrontational.  The feeling that desperatly hoped for some sort of natural disaster to occur.

"Ummm.. hello,"  as the larger girl walked up Akira turned down the volume on her music, cursing silently the fact that she had not gone riding today.

Why?  Why did these people insist on talking to her? Didn't they have things to do with their time like go to classes and... umm... giggle at stuff?

Yellow Lilly - I'm walking on air! False and cheerful

"C-can I help you?"  the girl managed to rasp - no, breathe out.

"Oh nononooooooo!  You've got it all wrong, you silly!"  the one whom Akira had taken to mentally calling 'That Saori Girl' flopped herself up onto a nearby counter.  She was surprisingly nimble for her weight, but utterly graceless.  Saori Isami obviously hadn't exercized at any point in her life past the age of five. "I'm here to help you!"

...riiiiiiiiiiiight.

"....Help me?" Akira wondered, a bit suspicious, but taking care not to raise her nose from the book on fuel injection that she'd hastily shoved it into.  Somehow, if she stared at the words and the diagrams long enough, she was sure she could just sort of phase this person out. Bikes were much more interesting than people, and far less scary.

"Of course!"  painted - against regulation - fingers grabbed the offending little tome from the mechanic's hands, as Isami leaned down to surprise her still-standing host.  Oblivious, of course, to the mechized little domain that she had invaded. "Oh, hey would you mind turning down that music?  It'd be really really cool if we could chat just us girls and all that English just goes strait over my head!"

Similarly painted lips struck up a quick, easy grin as the quieter of the two headed towards the speakers she'd jury-rigged to her tiny cd player.   People asking her to do things terrified Akira into too much of an automatic pilot to do otherwise.  But the noise was probably what had drawn Saori there in the first place.  She'd take care just to wear the headphones after this.

"Oh that's so much better! " bubbled Saori, whom Akira now noticed was carring a funny little black bag. "You have really neat taste in music, Akira!  I just know we're gonna be great friends."

"I...."  the mechanic paused, unsure of how exactly she was supposed to be recting to this little... offering?  gift?  revelation? taunt?  Whatever.

"I guess so."

"Great!  Now.. mmm'kay, so I totally know you're a Kazama, right, and that's cool and all since my cousin's best friend knows your brother and he's really hot."

Akira looked stricken, turning chocolate eyes quickly back to her beloved, rock-solid bike.  Saori's newest giggle trickled past.  Diago was not, nor had he been, nor would he ever be this thing they called... 'hot'.  Brothers aren't allowed to be... 'hot'.  That Saori girl must be mistaken.

"Oh sorry!  I know that's gotta be kind of weird and I totally understand.  So anyways, I know what you Kazamas do if ya know what I mean..." the heavyset girl winked, pulling a tube of lipgloss from her purse. Big brother really shouldn't keep such a high profile.  If girls in posh schools like this knew about him, then the cops might...

"....I'm not sure..."

"Oh come on, " a layer of pink candy-somethingorother (Akira had seen it in a magazine, and hated it) was quickly swabbed on.  " Crystal meth?  Extasy?  Heroin?  Pot?  Opium?  Crack.. geez, what doesn't he sell?"

If the mechanic had looked sticken before, she was now rather unsubtly casting wild glances at the helmet laying all the way on the other side of the room.  To her own horror, to be certain.

Crap.

"Oh nonono!" her tormented continued, with a nonchalance that just gave the former gang member some really really bad vibes. "I think it's awesome!  He's a total entrepreneur, right? My familly so does not have this kind of many.. I barely get through on scholarship, you know?  So anyways, I was all talking to these girls in my Lit. seminar who're so totally on acid, and they really can't get what they need out here, hey?  And then I though - what perks up a study session like speed, right?  And these girls can all afford it, right, so if we just take advantage of the market..."

Saori stepped down.  Akira stared.  And somewhere, somehow, a butterfly flapped its wings while the larger girl pleadingly took the smaller's hands.

"And I just know," big fat puppydog tears seemed on the verge of rolling down broad cheeks that Akira could no longer help looking at by virtue of position, "that we'd make lots of money and build the kinds of connections that last a lifetime.  Just like you're supposed to do here!  Sooo... whaddya say..... partner?"

The mechanic could think of thirteen ways to break one or more of Saori's bones by turning this into a throw, and ten thousand (most involving a disappointed Daigo) reasons to run away as fast as she possibly could.  But alas, Akira Kazama was not one to go with instinct.

"I...."  The girl stuttered, thoughts racing through her head like some kind of cerebral motocross.  Snap descisions were, fortunately, rather her forte.

"Let me think," the shorter girl replied with a surprising amount of assertiveness, eyes fixed most anywhere but on the disruptuive presence in her sanctuary.

"Ummm.. okay," she was more than a little shocked herself when it actually worked.

Lavender - Devotion

Pulling the silvery cellphone her brotehr had had.. erm... 'couriered' to her, Akira began the slow and painful process of enlightening her brother to the fact that they had one fairly serious problem.  Or, to be more accurate, he did.  Akira was fairy ambivelent to the whole drug thing, but...

But.. well.. when you've been on your own as much as the two young Kazamas, you know a little something about trusting people.  Don't.

On the other hand, there was the fairly comforting assumption that, if need be, she could proabably kick Saori's ass.  And it was so very expensive to say and it would give her a good excuse to spend more of her time off the grounds....

"Daigo?"

This was not the easiest of descisions to make.  Didn't Daigo want her here to have a normal life?

"Akira.. is that you?  How are ya doing?" his voice was a comfort to her racing heart.  Like on of the lullabies he'd sing to her as a kid, when they were in foster care and the people downstairs were yelling oh-so-loudly.  Momma #3 and Daddy #4 had fought alot - more then the others.  But when he'd tried to hit Akira Daigo had broken his arm while Akira had had to hide in a closet.  It was quieter in the closet.  No one could see her or hear her, and the world had made so much sense.

But then they'd had to leave, and Daigo was put in another home than her for two whole months, and he got that funny scar that looked like it hurt like hell sometimes. There was a reason she trained every day.

"Umm.. okay, I guess.  How are you?" the mechanic visibly brightened, locking the doors so noone would walk on her her quality time with the contraband device. When Akira Kazama needed to fix things, she did it alone.  When Akira Kazama needed to work, she did it alone.  And when Akira Kazama needed to fight.. well, she did that alone too.

But thinking?  Thinking required a sounding-board.  Preferably one that wouldn't muddle up her thoughts when it talked back.

"Busy.  You know how it is.  New shipment in from Taiwan - premium speed.  But some moron cut it with God-knows-what ground up glass and...." her sibling faded into a cannonade of laughter.

"Big brother?"

"Nothing, Akira, nothing... Gan just..."

"Never mind," the younger smiled wryly into her tiny reciever.  The cellphone, being of teh cutting-edge variety, was almost too small to hold.  Only the best for the budding yakuza leader's baby sister. "Daigo.. I .. well.. I kind of have something to tell you and...."

A random noise eminated from the background static, and Akira reflected briefly that at least Saori could be counted on to drop stuff less than Gan.  Hopefully.

"Is it about that fat girl?" Daigo cut in.  "Like I said before, just pay her off.  Or if you want something done to her I can call some people.  But.. tell me you haven't beaten her up or anything.  If you're IDed then..."

"No, no I didn't.  But.. Daigo, she wants to set up a cell here."

For a split second, dead air.

"She wants.. to deal!?" came the incredulous response, as tempeered with a healthy dose of white noise. "She wants you, my baby sister, to deal drugs just so she can.."

"Daigo...." the mechanic murmured, "Daigo calm down."

"Calm down!? She's probably trying to trick you, Akira.  Turn you in to the cops.  You know I can't let that happen.  And I've always kept you out of this sort of thing before.  I have no intention of dirtying your name because..."

Daigo was a wonderful big brother.  He always helped her make up her mind, even when he didn't know it.

"Daigo!" the girl hissed uncharaceristically.

"... Akira?  Do you have that helmet on again!?  Akira, I want you to take off the..."

"I... I don't have the helmet on Daigo," his sister deflated a bit, now crouching in her loose garage clothing.  "But.. big brother, don't you see?  Your name is my name.  And this is costing so much.  If I could just pay you back I'd feel so much less guilty about being here when you have to stay at Gedo."

Ah, Gedo High..  A bad place.  A horrible place.  Where the strong survived, and the weak rotted, and she'd grown so far from herself that it had seemed like a dream once she'd left it.  A nightmare that she'd loved with all her heart. A place so utterly and completely unlike this well-ordered world of pretty little girls with their pretty little worlds with mothers and fathers and so much money they spent it all on cosmetics and perfume and the latest skirt from Paris.

He wouldn't be getting an education, like she would.

"Please... I think she'll go to the cops maybe if I say no, but not if I say yes!"

"Akira," the elder Kazama sighed into the airspace, halting his sisters pleadings. "Just because I do something doesn't mean you have to.  I'm doing this so you don't have to."

He would never be able to apply for a passport, or stroll with impunity into a courthouse.. like she could.

He'd never have a clean resume or a clean life.. not ever.

Bloody hell.

"Then you're silly, big brother.  We're a family.  We've always been a family, and we've always just had each other.  I learned alot running things at Gedo last year... I just can't forget that. And I'm much older than you when you started!  You know there's really no choice...."

"I don't like this.  You can't just start dealing drugs because some random girl came up to you and aren'tyou supposed to be learning things there?  I wanted you to learn how to be a lady, not.. " a rock-solid grumble.

Lady talk?  Again?  This had to be stopped at all costs.  Poor Daigo meant well, but...

"And I've made up my mind, big brother."

"... alright then." poor Daigo sounded burdened.  But he'd feel better later. "I'll have Masami meet you tomorrow.  Let her know what you need."

"Thank you, big brother," Akira nodded into the emptiness between sattelites.

"But if she pulls anything, and I mean anything to you, you call me.  Do you hear me, Akira?"

"I hear you."

So reliable, Daigo was.  Akira didn't know what she'd do without him.

Gladiolus - Strength of character, Give me a break, Really sincere, Flower of the gladitors

Just keep it all together.  That was the way.  Turn, step, lunge, and punch.  Posture.  Posture.  Snap kick and axe to a handspring. Stay on the line taped to the floor.  Stay moving to the blistering beat of the music.  Fade it all out, push it all away - you're alone now.  Hear what you want to hear, feel what you want to feel, and see what you want to see - the track lighting and the tools bolted to the wall.

Exhale.  Deflate.  Forget yourself.  The world balances in that thin line of white tape.  Here and now - you and only you are in control.  You can stay there, if you want to.  You can stay there forever.  Just turn, step, lunge, and punch.  Turn, step, lunge, and punch. Snap kick and axe to the handspring.

Focus behind the music, beyond the feeling of rough cement wearing off on your hands.  And picture it, that thing beyond the madness.  Picture the skull cradling your very mind - your very soul.  And picture yourself as that controllign power.  Wou can do it. You can control anything.  Just stay on the line and....

'My goodness."

That was a voice. Not the music.  Nothing?

"This certainly is a powerful sound system.  I hate to ask, but would you mind terribly if I..."

Apparently not.

"... oh dear," two light-pink lips mouthed at the practicing martial artist.  Luips that were half-hidden by a cascade of curly alabaster hair, and considering that Akira was stuck in a surprised handstand, rather upside-down.

.... no one here knew how to knock, apparently.

"... can I help you?" the mechanic queried, still suspended on her hands in the middle of the garage-room floor.  This girl must have some kind of access key.  Damn.

Faintly, Akira could feel the blood rushing to her head.

"That's really very impressive," the intruder calmly responded, wildly spiralling hair actually oddly controlled, though bobbing in place a bit.  Whoever she was, she was carrying a - violin? - and practically oozing girly.

"It's not too hard," Akira shifted her palms a bit to keep balance, frozen a bit in the light-blue headlights of another person's attention.  Maybe if she didn't think about this other girl she'd go away.  And maybe had it been physically possible, she just would have shrugged instead.

"Apparently not," girly-girl nodded, smiling calmly while she looked about the somewhat disorganized chamber.  "My name's Yurika Kirishima - it's a pleasure to meet you."

"Ummm.. yeah," Akira foundered, absentmindedly noting that the track lighting was burnign its way into her retina, so she shoudl probably start looking at the mat again.  "You to... my.. erm, that is... my name is Akira.  Akira Kazama."

And suddenly, that wadering gaze was looking at her again.  Almost immediately, in fact.  So the mechanic really had no choice but to roll to the floor, the sonic assault of Trashwreckah Punks vibrating its way through the concrete to the base of her spine.

But the girl - this Yurika - gave away nothing. You learned to be careful around people like her in Gedo.  They were the types that would be your best friend if you rubbed them the right way, your worst nightmare if you rubbed them teh wrong, and either way you'd never be able to tell until it was too late.

Cheshire cats did not amuse her.  Social art was not something that Akira Kazama had any inclination to comprehend.

"As I said, very impressive," the paler musician reached down to pull Akira up from her comfortable, catlike crouch.  An interesting mode of disarmenet.  Why did a toy poodle like her suddenly care so much about a chick like Akira?  This was just odd.

"I got that," the mechanic stumbled a bit, readjusting the rumpled legs of a garage outfit that looked as frumpy as a sixty year-old librarian compared to Yurika's immaculately pressed uniform. Akira wanted her leather back.  It was much less cumbersome to practice in.

"Ummm.. thanks again, I mean. Ermmmm.... how'd you get in here?" the short-haired student suddenly blurted, chocolate eyes darting out of the path of a direct gaze.  Look at the floor, look at the floor, look at the floor.... clam yourself and you can do this.  you can carry on a perfectly normal conversation if you just...

"I'm the vice-president of the Music Club," a liquid soprano reply rushed past Akira's ears over the guitar-based racket.  She herself had been yelling, but Yurika didn't seem to need to. Funny.  "And I was just wondering if you would mind turning your music down a little bit.  If it's not too much trouble that is.  It's just that I like to practice in this building since it's so nice and quiet after classes. "

The melodies in the background harmoniezed - bass not bothering to beat back the stubborn, more flamboyant contralto.

"Sure," Akira shrugged, a bit too cowed to stand up for her right to violently clashing guitars.  This student was obviously someone pretty important, and in schools - as in gangs - pissing off important people in not condusive to them leaving you in peace instead of visually dissecting you (or maybe that was just her) and...

"Great!  It's so nice of you to be so understanding.  Hey - why don't you let me practice in here!  If I wouldn't be in your way.. I know some 'fighting' sort of moves too - though I wouldn't really call them something so unpleasant - and that way you wouldn't need music at all!  And the acoustics in such a large room must be just grand."

No.  No.  No.  And finally, no.

"If you want to."

Stupid, stupid shyness.  If she had her helmet on....

Daigo Kazama would later be heard to remark that this entire affair was a huge character-building experience. The man did not, nor would he ever, grasp the mechanics of the mousish.

Spirea - Victory, Conceit
Tiger Lily - Wealth, Pride

"Yurika.. where the hell am I supposed to park now?"

"It's nice to see you too, Kurow."

"What the fuck part of this could you possibly consider nice?"

"Kurow, pouting is entirely unbecoming on you."

"I am not pouting, Yurika. "

"Very well.  You shall still have to keep parking your bike in the trees, though - I'm terribly sorry."

"Sorry my ass...."

"Kurow!  It's not my fault that there seems to be an occupant of the garage now, though I understand the difficulty of your situation!  We are both fortunate that I was able to deflect her before I opened the door to let you in."

"Have you ever cross-dressed and commuted three times a week?"

"Brother... we have bigger problems."

"How so?  Don't tell me some ignorant fool is trying to challenge for the Presidency again.  As head of the..."

"Not that.  That girl I told you about... she's Daigo Kazama's little sister."

"The drug lord?"

"Who else?"

"Are you fucking serious? How the hell did someone like her get in here?  Great.  Just great.  We have buisness to do here, and soem halfassed dealer is going to start setting up and then the cops might come and investigate.... fuck. We don't want any interference.  But... with their kind you never know, hmmmmmm?"

"My thoughts exactly.  I'll keep and eye on her."
 

White Rose - Innocence, Secrecy, Purity, I am worthy of you, You're heavenly, Silence
Roses (Single Full Bloom) - I love you, I still love you

Roses.

There were roses.

Roses all around a coffin made of glass.

Pure white - really a lovely flower.  Karen made sure to take care of them above all else.  What was the use of doing this without symbolism - without style?  No one appreciated style more that the resident of this particular mausoleum did, except perhaps her youngest brother.  No one understood the significance of these particular blooms better.  If she were to let them wilt or dry...

But she would not.  No.  Never.  That wouldn't be right at all.

"Em... I've come to visit!" the woman, long red hair a bit matted by the humidity of the place, leaned down to look into a pair of chocolate colored eyes.  Mind you, she had to open them herself.  Use both fingers to pry apart thick, dark lashes.  But that was beside the point.  Em's pupils were not yet dialated.  For one day more, there was hope for sleeping beauty.

Karen thought it best to let her sleeping beauty rest.

"Angel - are those tears?  There are no tears for sleeping beauty, angel. You musn't cry," Karen murmured gently, eyes half-closed.  She was sitting at the edge of a bad.  Coffin.  Shine.  Whatever one wanted to call it.  A place where ivy twined around IV and the flora packed enough oxygen into the air that her sleeping angel would not have to use somethign so unpoetic as a ventilator.  Poor, dear Em - Karen had brought her angel rosemary today.  Em should not think that Em was forgotten.  And her angel would wake up one day - Em would.

"Don't cry Em. It's all coming into place now," ignoring the watering of eyes unnaturally opened, Karen stood up once more.  "It shall be just like you wanted - just perfect.  You'll wake up to see it, won't you?  To see the swans?  It won't be the same without you, but you must watch.  You'll have to."

The machines whirred in response.  She tried to this them with living boquets, but it did little good.

Laughing a little, Karen pushed up the galsses that cursed those who took after mother's side of the family. "My partner.. my equal. It's not the same without you.  But you'll come back soon.  I'll make it so they never hurt you again.  I promise."

Opening a door in the large greenhouse and leaving her cocoa-skinned angel behind, Karen stepped out into the cold night air.  That particular door opened only from the inside.   She could not have her swans disturbing her angel - or her flowers.

It brought a smile to coral lips when, in the distance and through the fog of her won breath, she saw one of them.  The white-haired girl was unconciously humming the Dance of the Cygnets.

Oh, she did love Tchaicovsky...

Orleander - Caution
 
 
 
 

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