Yuri Worlds
[108] Treks
Carrie expected Yuka to at least mention all the happenings with the contract and the company. But she pressed her colorful lips closed when anything ventured near the subject. As far as explaining how she was communicating, Yuka focused on the vague mention that they had company technology in their possession. Documents confirming the tuition grants and other promises from the contract hadn't arrived at Naoko's doorstep yet. Yuka tensed with that but did her best not to show irritation. Carrie understood that it had been mere hours since the agreement, but considering how quickly the forces of the company could work, there really was no excuse for them dragging their feet or sending out traditional letters to friends and family. Not that there was anything any of them could realistically do about it aside from screaming into the device and hope someone was watching.
Yuka confirmed, mostly by swinging the device's camera around, that the other world the travelers came from had been transformed by the flood they unleashed. Naoko swiftly started capturing the screen footage along with insurance screenshots. She got a good look at the forms the three of them had wound up with and raised her logical eyebrows at "Chika".
Naoko also had some of the same criticisms, curiosity, and advice about the house setup and use of space as Yuka. A peek around outside reminded Yuka that she'd seen so very little of this new world, especially in the daytime, post-flood, aside from a brief walk.
The communication device didn't appear to have a battery icon or a method for recharging. That could be good, implying that it either had a renewable source of power or one that lasted so long that measuring the minuscule drain wasn't necessary. It was limited to direct communication, though. A fragment of bad news from Naoko highlighted that Kosame injured her leg in a scuffle involving agitated and confused returnees getting back from the shrine. She was in good spirits, along with putting on melodramatic laments at such a random injury.
Other news dealt with the Sasakis doing a lot of nervous wandering to burn off anxiety about being alone without their daughter Haruka. This pulled at Yuka like an invisible rope she wanted to follow to return to familiar lands. She resisted this urge as well as all the others. The old woman was as well as she could be, but Naoko hadn't seen her yet since everything that happened. She likely still had her fading hair and less elastic skin, unless the sprinkles that hit them had benefited her as well. As for Ayame, the clinic was closed this Monday over there because of uncertainty and the international crisis, but she couldn't stop herself from taking emergency patients, especially injuries from recent events. She'd tended to Kosame.
Yuka leaned back and absorbed all this from her friend. Carrie could see and feel the yearning stir within the girl she loved to bring to bear all the different talents and forces she could wield in aid of her friends. The girls spent much of the time after that talking about the most random sci-fi silliness, along with books, clothes, and a dozen other stray thoughts. Yuk had one clear and firm resolution, though. She had seen so little of the world and ventured on this strange vacation so hesitantly.
With help from the three of them and Naoko tossing out the most random ideas, they came up with priorities from their list of possibilities. Driving around town like Silvia and Fiona had done on their own was absolutely necessary, no matter how bizarre, rude, and disturbing this other world might be. Beyond that, she had seen the mountains in the distance and wanted to experience them in much the same way she had shared her own mountains with them. Carrie could sense the unspoken desire to make a very suggestive mountains reference, but the desire and the moment soon passed. The beach was absolutely necessary too; she'd seen it colorfully flutter across the screen during the otherwise useless morning news. Geek venues and precious entertainment spots spilled out of Silvia's focused phone searches.
Possible treks to local museums, zoos, historical areas, and cultural havens piled up like a dish brimming with sumptuous aromas and even more inviting flavor profiles that Yuka wasn't sure if she could even begin to partake in before the meal was up. But she was sure going to try.
Eventually, there was nothing more Naoko could offer in words and nothing Yuka was willing to reveal. She also didn't allude to possibilities, reunions, or promises she couldn't possibly keep, but the mood remained optimistic and cheerful throughout. They said goodbye without much preamble, as though it were just the end of another routine phone call.
In the lingering, quiet aftermath, Yuka desperately resisted the urge to tear up with everything she declined to say. Carrie embraced her tightly and emphasized that they still had so much before them to see and explore—an entire world that no one could ever fully know. In the same way that a week would never do justice to Yuka's homeland, they could never do any sort of justice here, but they had to share it.
One interesting element Fiona noted was that they had only had a pair of unfortunate visitors to their front door. On any typical noontime, ranging from the middle of the week to the weekend, there might be a wide range of unexpected knocks.
Occasionally, it would be a handyman looking for work doing some job that they were already ready to take care of but had to put off due to scheduling. When their extremely late, Mediterranean-climate fall eventually arrived, they would hand off the job to help those guys out. More commonly, it would be a proselytizer from one religion or another championing their rock concert or barbecue to help appeal to a wider audience. None of the events were bad, nor did they ever have the aroma of a timeshare event. Carrie just never felt like it was for her, same with her friends.
What did she believe now? It was hard to disentangle. It would've been nice to easily and confidently proclaim that a kind, benevolent, merciful power held sway over reality. And she had plenty of passing evidence to suggest that maybe things weren't as bad as she feared. Yuka existed in this world.
Yes, she knew that their existences were a tangle of dark motivations and nervous uncertainties. But she wanted to believe the sway of evil, greed, and suffering didn't hold the ultimate power. Love. There had to be love.
Whether that was a God above all, a cycle of eastern reincarnation she didn't understand but Yuka probably grasped better, pantheism of a bewildering variety, some sort of shamanism, or a spirituality no one had discovered yet, she had no idea. Her parents and extended relatives would plead with her to give herself up to one in particular. It was simple, don't you understand? This is your immortal soul!
It wasn't that she doubted spirituality by this point after all their different experiences; she just had no idea what to do about it. Yes, some sort of group of business-minded individuals or entities of human nature had been sucking human souls out of the gaps between worlds and riling them up into a battle royal. Reproduction in another place came down to sharing a part of your spirit. And she had left her body and been at the edge of what sure felt like oblivion.
It was too much. Too much to process. Too much to integrate into a belief system. Too much for one person to comprehend. Other, better, smarter girls, she knew, would've resolved it to their benefit and growth as human beings. What she trusted and felt faith in was grounded in Yuka, in love. It didn't matter that the reality of that sentiment might have been simple, confused narcissism, because they were linked by black goo. She had to believe there was more, and she couldn't besmirch anyone else for hoping in the same way.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
Carrie did her best not to show the details of this extensive internal, philosophical scrutiny with a blank face or a distant stare. But the others still noticed that she seemed rather pensive, suspecting that going outside made her nervous. Fiona and Silvia relayed every comforting detail they could manage about how the world was both normal and had also changed for the better. Carrie smiled and nodded.
It was interesting but perplexing that these series of thoughts occurred to Carrie right then since, when they opened the door to head off on their drive, waiting for them, neatly tucked into the side of the screen door, was a freshly printed newspaper-style manuscript proudly announcing that even though Jesus was a girl now, that didn't change His/Her love for you.
Yuka seized upon the little paper and scoured it for fresh details about this world. She noted that some of these kinds of self-printed materials existed back home. There were isolated groups, some more fervent and radicalized than her mother's calm, cool sentiment toward Shimai. It was often concentrated on social or nationalist isolation. Some pushed for the unity of all girls around the world into a singular goddess being. Yuka soon set aside the paper and marveled at the patch of world just outside their front door, even though they had seen it several times today. It still offered up fresh wonders.
The wind toy fluttered under the shifting branches of the tree out by the fence. It was a forward-leaning duck made of wood with fluttering limbs and legs. They all giggled as a light gust made it turn and wiggle in place. Yuka grimaced and groaned at the visible marks on the right side of Fiona's car, but she reassured her that it was fine, it wouldn't cost that much, and it was worth it to escape those bastards.
Yuka relayed that she understood that; she just lamented that she hadn't thought to include compensation for it in the contract. Fiona reassured her that she was already doing more than enough. She smiled back, but it was a weak smile.
The car had a lot more room with just one of them each. Yuka enjoyed the windows but liked sitting next to Carrie even more. She joked about sticking her head out the window. Fiona urged her to do that if she wished. Yuka immediately turned bright red, with a practically cartoonish shade to her cheeks.
Despite her embarrassment and uncertainty, she still lowered the window and marveled through the opening as the air gently wafted and played with her hair. When it occasionally picked up, she narrowed the opening to prevent Carrie from getting blasted. Considering how often Franklin encountered sinus pain from the wind, Carrie deeply appreciated her concern.
Putting the world in motion with this curious expression of art first made Carrie tighten her teeth, considering looking out the window of the train several days ago left her queasy back in Yuka's world. However, it was soon obvious that Yuka was the one who needed the occasional break. Recalling the train incident, she commented that it was only fair.
The brightest blossoms of winding spring glinted even sharper across the gorgeous landscape. Rocks and sand were still in abundance, but a new tableau of colors spread like a twinkling carpet of soft and sharp shades.
Yuka had trouble at first, but soon developed a system of absorbing the overall landscape, focusing on a specific point of interest, and following that with her eyes before landing on a new one. She had to rub the space above her eyes with her knuckles a few times, but she didn't have any complaints. Carrie gently rubbed other parts of her for relaxation.
Nothing that came into their purview shocked or amazed them, but the quiet touches and subtle shifts of tone and life were still remarkable beyond words. Everyone was a girl. But not everyone followed the distinct anime girl mold from the other world. It generally had the character of a Japanese anime attempting to sincerely depict an American town, but with the most monumental budget to present always-changing art in a 360° pan. That alone deserved gawking.
Some random people on the street were definitely living it up with large, lacy dresses and other clothes turned into fresh art. Most just wore normal clothes, which extended the sense of odd realism but also surreal translation. It wasn't rotoscoping, CGI, or anything else that Carrie could really pin to a work or style she'd encountered before.
She focused hard on not letting it become mundane and ordinary because of desensitized exposure. This world was special; it had been infused with the very essence of life and flooded over until every drop of land was touched by what once had been so desperately scarce.
Carrie wanted to hold on to the twinkles of wonder Yuka gleamed with as she focused hard on everything that flowed past her. She recognized their version of Seven & i Holdings and promised that they would stop off at one of them soon, with the caution that their version wasn't quite as nice as what Yuka knew.
Seeing everything, even in their relatively cozy suburban area, just wasn't going to be possible. But Silvia suggested some prominent landmarks and mapped out a course on her phone. They'd brought along the communication device, and Yuka made sure to save video to it since Naoko was currently away. The separation of hours put her around midnight. Hopefully, with the mass adjustments, the hours would remain consistent. It occurred to her that the current time lag had to be comparable to real-life Japan and America. An interesting coincidence.
The list of things to do locally wasn't that long. It included some parks, animal preserves, and performing arts venues. Yuka didn't stress too much about the locations they were going, so long as they did it together. A general gloss of the region, along with the discovery of a cozy stuffed animal store, was the early focus. Each of them picked up something, from Yuka's fluffy, sleepy wolf cub to Fiona's purple octopus, Silvia's happy cat, and Carrie's black lab, which she shared with Yuka.
The owners of each establishment they chanced across had a vaguely disconcerted, distant look when they weren't talking. As though they knew everything was different now, but they didn't want to say it or couldn't put it into words. A fair number behaved as though they were wearing costumes they hadn't quite settled into, simultaneously desperately exposed and wishing to apply a protective layer. The four of them hinted at recent events, but most reactions were noncommittal and uncertain.
Yuka adored their small hike through a hilly wilderness preserve nestled on about two hundred acres in the middle of the city, but so distant from it that it felt like somewhere else. It wasn't too hot, and the scarring winds were still playing nice. Carrie hesitated to show off the land because it seemed so barren in comparison to the verdant climes nestled in the other one.
To Yuka, though, this was a strange and surreal territory alluded to in certain programs and prodded at in the margins of the show they both adored. And the deluge seemed to have awakened a second nature as curious roadrunners, lopping hares, lazy tortoises, and more wandered throughout the transformed landscape. The rabbits especially earned Yuca's attention as she carefully tried to bend down and tempt them with little treats from the visitor center. They all eventually scampered away, but a few did pose for her to smile at.