IC INBOX / BUSINESS CARD ( ARCHIVE AS OF 12/13 )

[manuscripture]

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[ Somewhere around town-- at the bookstore, the Tomoe-Kaname Bakery, attached to posts and notice boards --you find a small white notecard. On it is printed a little message and some numbers in ornate lettering. If you look closely, it reads the following: ]

Rohan Kishibe, Mangaka & Visual Artist
Owner Pro Tempore of Ebony Threads Tailor Shop
Highly Experienced.
Commissions & Advertising For Hire
Pay Negotiable.
Contact At: 512.66.730.91 for inquiries
Castle Lüvchaque - Directly North of Bavan per appointment ONLY.

(( feel free to use this as an action-based prompt too. any random interactions will MOST LIKELY take place in the form of walk-ins at the tailor shop unless it's pre-planned. just drop a starter in here! ))

Comments

[manuscripture]

[ This can go one of a whole three ways. Rohan is cranky. He's cranky as Hell. He's flashed his claws and his teeth at Jotaro enough times to know that he can tell if he's bluffing or not.

Being difficult is HIS THING... ]

I don't play guessing games. I like offers upfront on the table.

[ His upper lip twitches up... And he turns to let Jotaro and his stupid giant everything into the shop. ]

Since when do you need my clothes? You look like you're doing just fine.

[ He moves to the front desk to turn on the single lamp over it using nothing but the tips of his claws. ]

Dandy, in fact.

[starmark]

There've been some...new developments.

[There is no amount of suave in the world, not possessed by any man and therefore certainly not possessed by Jotaro Kujo, that can make a phrase like "just look at my ass and see for yourself" sound elegant. As such, his minor moment of fluster is evident while he follows Rohan inside and casts around for a better elaboration on that remark.]

I'm pretty sure I'm growing a tail. I'd rather not wait until it ruins my pants to find out whether I'm right.

[manuscripture]

[ OKAY.......... ]

Uh. [ Rohan is left staring straight ahead at the wall between the two book end paintings over the desk. That needs a minute to register. ]

How are you 'pretty sure' and not 'absolutely sure' about that? You don't just GUESS.

[ Then again he hasn't worn pants for about three months. He can't have a say in these things. ]

... Are you bribing me now? Points for creativity.

[starmark]

I don't know, Rohan, I've never had a new appendage sprout out of my ass before.

[Look at Captain Sarcasm go.]

If you've got something in mind, let's hear it. Though I'm already inside...but I guess the bribe is to have you wait on me like I'm a paying customer. And I need to be a customer one way or another, so. Make me an offer and we'll see if it's one I can't refuse.

[manuscripture]

Oh, I'm sorry Jotaro. Forgive me for not having sympathy when I am made of my own tail.

[ All of that is still said to the wall but his hands find something to do in grabbing a stray pen and one of his ten thousand trusty little notebooks. ]

Just take your goddamn pants off and show me what the malfunction is.

[ This is literally the opposite of a malfunction. ]

[starmark]

It's not just that. I could use a couple of shirts, too; I just ripped the back out of this one.

[And suddenly this is shades of That One Nurse Trying To Treat His Wound Back In The Infirmary, and for a second it shows; he stops and holds still for just slightly too long with remembering (it's not a pen, it's a thermometer, and then suddenly there he was, Kakyoin sitting in the window), then visibly shakes it off and seems to regroup.

That's the determination that leads him to follow through where he might've once been reluctant; maybe it's something like expending the last fuck he had to give, or maybe it's about proving something to himself, but in short order he's turned away and gotten out of his notoriously expensive pants, idling around in plain soft boxers worn backwards so that his lump of tail has room to escape out of the split.

The rest of him is there, too — the talons that resemble Star Platinum's black boots, the scales that make his Stand's patterns on his legs and run up over his hips toward his ribcage. At home, he'd drop his clothes on the floor and be sure that his mom would pick them up eventually; now he folds his own in half and tosses them over some nearby empty space of surface, then absently makes like he wants to stick his hands in his pockets and stops when it occurs to him that he doesn't have them available to him anymore.]

...So. That's it.

[It sure is a tail, all right. And those sure are his wings showing through the ripped back of his shirt, and those sure are his legs, and his arms, and his all of him.]

[manuscripture]

[ There are some days around here where things happen and Rohan is 100% convinced that he fell asleep at his desk again or caught a bad draft of wind that forced him to just nap out for a few minutes. Anything that happens within those periods of time until he wakes up in half a coma are all in his head and he can just get right back to work afterward. That would be too goddamn easy to have as an excuse today.

This whole thing has Monster Firefighter Model Calendar written all over it when he clenches his eyes shut, opens them and comes to the realization that he has not been inhaling too much ink again.

Monster Firefighter Model Calendar in 92-point boldface font in Microsoft WordArt. The orange and yellow one that is doing the upward WHOOSH to the right-hand side of the screen. Add a dropshadow to it and unnecessary underlines and you've got a vague idea of what is flying up over Jotaro's head toward the ceiling.

Sweet, merciful Fog God, he's a beauty. ]

That's it.

[ Levelheaded AS EVER, Rohan pushes off from the desk and goes to investigate. Too levelheaded. He's trying pretty hard to keep it together with JUST a pen and JUST this little thing of paper. That's because he's doing this for CLOTHES... Not Art. Right. All his paints and shit are in the back but he has to do all this garbage first no matter how many times he's seen Jotaro in various states of undress. He IS his best model after all.

Forgive the limp-wristed picking up of that tail... Just to make sure it's.... Real? ]

I still don't see why this is a problem.

Option A: No more pants.

Option B: I rip holes in your pants and we call it a day.

Option C: Shorts are comfortable.

[ That's a nice forearm you've got there, Jotaro. Nice elbow too. How about that shoulder.

Oh right, look at the customer's face. ]

It's a tail.

[starmark]

The point is that I don't want to rip holes in my uniform pants. I want to be able to dress —

[He's tempted to say "like a student", but quickly catches himself; it's an excuse he's used before to little effect on criticisms on his clothes, so this time he goes looking around for a different one rather than rehashing an earlier debate.]

...I'd rather not look like I was desperate to make alterations. It's not like I'm not used to having a lot of trouble finding clothes that fit. All the ones I wore at home always had to be tailored, too.

[When they weren't outright custom. Sucks to be 6'5" in Japan, also built like a truck.]

All I'm looking for is to look like I didn't get dressed by accident. Or that I had an accident somewhere between waking up and the present.

[manuscripture]

That's not hard.

[ Snakebutt thoughtfully swishes some dirt along the floor. Swoosh, swoosh. ]

Listen, Jotaro. Almost everybody here has a tail. This isn't a new concept. I'm positive there are patterns lying around here somewhere made for this.

[ BUT-- ]

Also consider that I can just go grab my measuring tape and you will have to suffer through altered pants for a few days while I just use my free time off to make you some. Three days. Tops. Maybe two.

[ He points to the curtain toward the back room. ] Want to do it that way?

[starmark]

...That's fine. I can put up with makeshift stuff for a few days. Just not forever.

[The mention of free time off catches his attention, though, and he tips a sideways look at Rohan, eyebrows raised.]

But I said I wanted to be a customer for a reason. Not for you to take up more of your own time doing me favors. If the turnaround is longer for business-only hours, then I'll wait. I'm not looking for any more handouts.

[He is probably looking for semi-handouts but at least he is having the decency of trying not to be a full-fledged gigantic mooch about it.]

[manuscripture]

[ Implying he would make him wait forever.

Rohan puts his fist on his own hip and then slinks away to set down whatever he thought he was going to accomplish with his notebook back on the desk. ]

You are a customer who can openly complain around me at all times of the day. You can't use that. It's not a handout if I want to get it done either. [ Even better: ] I don't have any other customers right now.

[ Snakebutt is half-ahead of him when he slips back over to the gargoyle, tail winding about his ankles to pull his smarmy self too close to pat his cheek. ]

You're my first real customer, Jotaro. Look at you go.

[starmark]

You want a chance to dress m—

[But boy oh boy, does he shut up fast at that pat to his cheek, and there's a single brief second where he falters with fluster, either unequipped or unprepared or both for what appears to be a genuine, albeit teasing, compliment.

So many people know him and see him as an impenetrable wall with few social graces and even fewer weaknesses. What a change, ferreting out a legitimate chink in his armor that way.]

...Oh. Okay...right. That'll...that's good. Yeah. I'll be good to practice on, sure.

[manuscripture]

[ When Rohan finds an in, he finds an in. It's mutual. They both poke and prod each other's weak spots on and off for the sake of reactions or otherwise.

It's the only way to get anywhere sometimes. His tail squirrels its way up to one of Jotaro's knees. ]

It won't be practice. [ WHAT DO YOU TAKE HIM FOR? ] Practice would imply that you are getting this for free.

You're not. You still have to pay me.

[starmark]

Then this better be the standard customer treatment.

[HE SEES YOU, SNAKEBUTT.]

Since I'm a paying customer. Take it from the top — I think you said something about a measuring tape?

[manuscripture]

[ SNAKEBUTT DOESN'T CARE WHAT HE SEES OR DOESN'T SEE. ]

My tape is all the way the Hell back there and I'm warm here. [ Rohan is the one who has to pry his own tail off of Jotaro's leg. It has a job to do now. It can go check things out later. ]

I just need a couple of things. [ Snakebutt has recently become pretty good at being controlled to do things of Rohan's accord. Open doors, hold things. Be a makeshift measuring tape when he doesn't feel like moving......... ] The numbers for--

[ Rohan drops his tail next to Jotaro's hip until it reaches the floor and then proceeds to wrap it around his waist, hips, one thigh, and lastly has it take the other two marks of the inseam and waist-to-crotch-do-not-misconstrue-this ratio. ]

Here, here, here, here, here, here, annnnnd here. [ Okay so NOW he has to fetch his notes again, quickly jotting those numbers down because if he isn't aware of how long certain sections of his tail are by now, there is no hope. It is all done by never actually leaving Jotaro's side and just using the reach he can get instead of slithering back and forth.

He holds up the little notebook full of numbers and little notations. ]

See? The only drawback is that I don't know if that tail is going to get longer and make our lives harder...

[starmark]

[His eyebrows are presumably somewhere near his hairline (it's difficult to tell with the brim of his hat in the way) as Rohan methodically goes through the checklist of measurements; whatever it was that he'd been expecting, accurate readings via his snake tail certainly wasn't one of them.

But now his fluster is gradually melting into open admiration, and he's not bothering to hide it. After all the struggles that Rohan has been through in adapting to his snake tail, all the frustration and anger and despair at the loss of his legs, it's really something to see him like this: fluid, adapted, using it to his advantage instead of treating it as a detriment. Look at how far he's come since the days he'd been in a stupor on the living room floor. Look at how he's made something of his circumstances, no matter how bad they might be.]

It, um.

[Pick your figurative jaw up off the floor, sweetheart.]

It will. I'm pretty sure it will. The gargoyle book says they're for, um. Stability in flight, I think. So it should be...balance. Probably a couple of feet long, to balance my weight distribution out.

[manuscripture]

Okay, so I have to anticipate that.

[ Rohan had pissed and moaned about his situation for so long from the second he washed up on the beach to when he lost his legs. He's done pretty goddamn well for himself since managing how to put up with his Literally Self-Aware tail. They still have their disagreements. ]

Since I don't have that, I can predict it via your height and your wingspan. It may not be accurate, but it's a ballpark. [ The naga may be busying himself with getting actual work done but he has noticed a certain shift of tone in the air between them. He diligently circles around to measure his tail against Jotaro's. ]

You are here right now. Changes happen gradually over the course of the months... [ He draws his tail along the floor to double what he has it at now. A little wrinkle forms at the bridge of his nose. ]

It could stay here or it could be twice that again... [ Remember, Rohan himself tops out at forty feet of tail-body. There is a science to it. ] There will probably be a lot. You're not exactly compact.

[starmark]

Right. Like Da Vinci did? The guy in the circle.

[He spreads his arms out to their full span, loosely pointed at the fingertips, as if for emphasis.]

Human armspan fingertip to fingertip is equal to their height. So maybe the wingspan on a gargoyle does the same thing horns to tail...or something.

[He pauses, then glances away quickly, with the tips of his ears turning red. His nerd, much like his calf muscle, is showing.]

That's what you meant, right?

[manuscripture]

Plausible.

From a biological standpoint, the anatomical shift makes sense and works well. [ He notes. And then he hums... ] I'm not looking at it that way though. I have to observe it from the point of aesthetics.

To a point I am glad that I don't have to worry about pants anymore. For you, I need to figure out how to get that-- [ Pointing to Lizardbutt. ] Into those. [ Pointing to the pile of pants on the floor. ] Every day. The more tail you have, the more you have to thread through.

That could cause wear and tear and then you're getting new pants once a month or you need them fixed weekly at best. You could always just not wear them but I think that's trashy...

[starmark]

If your next suggestion is "you could switch to skirts", you might be fixing your teeth along with the clothes.

[But it's an idle, utterly baseless remark that comes nowhere near the level of a threat. It's likewise mitigated by Jotaro turning and pivoting as best he can, trying to catch a glimpse of his own Lizardbutt around his wings and the rest of him.]

Josuke uses zippers to make room for his wings. Maybe something like that?

[manuscripture]

Josuke puts zippers where zippers don't belong all the time.

[ lest we forget.

He leaves Jotaro's side and goes to pull a sheet off of a bit of wall not occupied by a painting. Ta-da, a mirror. Full-length. ]

I want to ask him where he got a zipper-foot because I sure as Hell can't find one. I could do something like that for pants maybe. Your wings are another story. Josuke's are small and nonfunctional. [ aw. ] Yours are meant to move and provide support for the rest of your body-- like you mentioned balance and weight.

[ A finger pulls a Come Hither curl to draw Jotaro closer, making a circle in the air for him to turn around. ] That blown-out shirt of yours is a good starting point. How easy is your range of motion with that much of your back exposed? You can fly just fine without issue, right?

You already know good and well that it isn't your wings doing all the work. Your back and shoulder muscles do the lion's share. If you did NOT know that, see how easy it is to move them if you isolate your shoulders or tighten your back.

[starmark]

[Now fully in Rohan's element and out of his own, Jotaro does indeed resemble a fish out of water a bit as he gamely obeys the directions he's given. As he thinks about his wings, though, they flex and start to extend, but he catches them quickly before they can go too far or create any sort of hassle; the movement they make is almost catlike, rather than dragonish, in the fluidity of the stretch and recede.]

Yeah. Yeah, this is good, I flew over here like this and didn't have any hassle with it, so. Um.

[He casts around briefly, side to side.]

Is there room for me to put them out the whole way? I'm not going to knock into anything important?

[manuscripture]

Ah...

[ The only place he can think of is the back. Front of house has too many of his paintings and shit that don't need to be signed by a wing busting through them. It is clear that Rohan's mood has improved since Jotaro got here as it sometimes does. Jotaro can't fix everything-- he is no miracle worker and they both know that --but there is the slim chance that with the right amount of workaround, he can be made somewhat more tolerable to be around. Getting him invested in something he can think about is one of those lucky workaround tactics.

Oh, he can work on something else back there too... ]

There is less you could possibly destroy back here. [ Off he goes to have the gargoyle follow the trail of his tail to where he keeps himself sequestered in the back beyond the black curtain over the door. It's just a workroom. Jotaro will probably recognize a lot of the unfinished paintings near the far wall joined by an easel supporting an empty canvas. It's bigger than it looks, cluttered only by a bench with an archaic sewing machine and the shelves of fabric bolts boasting sophisticated, luxurious hues that he can't move around. Another full-length mirror sits between two of the shelves. ]

If you put a wing through something, I won't miss it too badly. [ There is nothing to worry about. Rohan tells him this while stuffing part of himself against the wall across from the mirror. ]

Stand in front of me facing the mirror and stretch out your wings as far as you can. Tell me how it feels when you give yourself the freedom to do it. Which parts of yourself do you feel working the hardest?

[starmark]

[He follows obediently, and takes particular care with his wings even despite the apparent replaceability of everything in the back. So he finds a position and checks around before rolling his shoulders and stretching his wings out in stages until they're at full extension. He's much better at it these days than he was once; they move under his intent instead of clunking around like he doesn't know what to do with them, and better suit the rest of his changes instead of seeming like a hasty add-on.

The sight of himself in the mirror seems to strike him, as it always does. He's himself but he's not; his gargoyle is echoes of his Star Platinum. And his scales are — striking, was that the word? There's beauty to this...this. Someone finds this beautiful. Striking.

Is that something he can be?

If there's something beautiful about this, then maybe the other things he sometimes considers ugly about himself don't have to be, either.]

It feels good.

[That's not helpful, but it's a start.]

It's in my shoulders. And a little lower, near the blades. It's hard to describe...like pointing my toes, sort of, except it's not arms or legs, it's wings. A different set of limbs. Down here, in the small of my back —

[He moves to reach for it, but it's gawky with his wings extended that way, so his hand recedes again.]

...Is this helping? I don't know if that's what you want...

[manuscripture]

[ Rohan is occasionally looking over Jotaro's shoulder and at the mirror. Not for long, never for long. He keeps the one in the front of the shop and often this one covered in sheets because he has a habit of just flat-out breaking them. They're an unfortunate necessity around here. He uses the same method that he does when speaking to people-- spending only a second or two looking directly before averting his eyes elsewhere.

It's been a problem. ]

Mmhm...

[ The hum is a sound of approval. Jotaro is doing precisely what he asked him to. He keeps a close eye on the unnatural-looking parts pulling in Jotaro's back. The newly-routed muscles and ligaments which hold the new bone mass together and keep it from slouching or moving independently. It's incredible to watch. ]

Your body has adapted by reworking your musculature. You should feel it there in the small of your back, in your shoulders, and in the top of your chest. [ Rohan indicates this with a his fingers painting an outward straight line from his collarbones to his shoulders. ] Without your tail, you would fall right over with how your wings have developed.

[ He quietly admires the colors in the dim light. They don't glow like they do at home but the hues are savory to the eyes. Slowly, Rohan reaches behind himself to the top corner of what he is leaning on. It's another black sheet which drops when he pulls it. Another mirror he has to keep hidden from himself. ]

Do it again and watch from the reflection behind you. [ He slithers out of the way so that Jotaro can see the perfect image of himself from behind if he looks straight ahead at the mirror he is staring into. ] Carefully... Try to flap them a little if you want. Understanding how your body works is the key to figuring out what to put on you. I already have a direction that I want.

I want you to understand it the way I do.

Tell me what you see and then I will ask you the next question.