Mako (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
arclightning) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
deercountry2021-12-16 08:50 pm
arclightning) wrote in deercountry2021-12-16 08:50 pm
Entry tags:
it's the solstice
Who: Mako, Wu, & close CR
What: They might be in a different world, but the solstice is the solstice, and that means it's time to feed everyone you care about, if you're Mako
When: Night of December 21st
Where: Mako and Wu's loft above the Raccoon Room
Content warnings: Sadness from potential memory-share stuff, homesickness, mentions of Mako and Bo's dead parents
© TESSISAMESS
If you have close CR with Mako or Wu, in the days leading up to the Winter Solstice—December 21st—you may have gotten a small text invite in your inbox. A few simple lines inviting you to the Raccoon Room on the night of the 21st for dinner "because it's the solstice." Normally the Raccoon Room is closed early in the week, but on the 21st they've opened it up.
They're actually having people over in the loft above the Raccoon Room, and their living space is decked out in lanterns and candles to keep out the long darkness. Snow falls quietly outside, but in here it's warm and it smells like ginger and pepper. Wu's put on a few scratchy records in the background. Here and there, Winter Mournings are hung, not quite out of reach. It's very easy to accidentally or purposefully touch one.
If anyone comes in early enough, Mako is still at the counter with his sleeves rolled up, rolling dumplings, covered in rice flour. Maybe help him cook? He's looking better than he was early in the month: his skin is the correct pallor without that odd gray cast, and there's no smoke rolling off his body, so that... has to be good!
For the later arrivals, Mako's made dinner, which means hot tangyuan in gingery broth, an entire bowl of mushroom noodles for sharing, and a simmering pot of broth for people to cook things in, as well as a lot of a tangy sauce that Mako gets kind of cagey about when people try. Sit down, enjoy some hot pot! It's a time to be together, after all.
[ ooc: tag around, top-level, have a good time! ]
What: They might be in a different world, but the solstice is the solstice, and that means it's time to feed everyone you care about, if you're Mako
When: Night of December 21st
Where: Mako and Wu's loft above the Raccoon Room
Content warnings: Sadness from potential memory-share stuff, homesickness, mentions of Mako and Bo's dead parents
If you have close CR with Mako or Wu, in the days leading up to the Winter Solstice—December 21st—you may have gotten a small text invite in your inbox. A few simple lines inviting you to the Raccoon Room on the night of the 21st for dinner "because it's the solstice." Normally the Raccoon Room is closed early in the week, but on the 21st they've opened it up.
They're actually having people over in the loft above the Raccoon Room, and their living space is decked out in lanterns and candles to keep out the long darkness. Snow falls quietly outside, but in here it's warm and it smells like ginger and pepper. Wu's put on a few scratchy records in the background. Here and there, Winter Mournings are hung, not quite out of reach. It's very easy to accidentally or purposefully touch one.
If anyone comes in early enough, Mako is still at the counter with his sleeves rolled up, rolling dumplings, covered in rice flour. Maybe help him cook? He's looking better than he was early in the month: his skin is the correct pallor without that odd gray cast, and there's no smoke rolling off his body, so that... has to be good!
For the later arrivals, Mako's made dinner, which means hot tangyuan in gingery broth, an entire bowl of mushroom noodles for sharing, and a simmering pot of broth for people to cook things in, as well as a lot of a tangy sauce that Mako gets kind of cagey about when people try. Sit down, enjoy some hot pot! It's a time to be together, after all.
[ ooc: tag around, top-level, have a good time! ]
no subject
[The memory continues, despite his lack of involvement, the witnesses on the stand giving their testimony of what happened inside of the Omnibus. Which meant it was after--]
No, unfortunately. This was my first case when I arrived in London. The man in the witness stand, Magnus McGilded, was my client. [He frowns, everything seeming to be in sharp focus as he watches Gina lie on the stand.] I wouldn't say we need to worry about anything, but if my memory serves, this is after we've had to recess due to smoke filling up the court room.
Which... means the evidence has been tampered with despite the prosecution calling for it to be secured.
[The whole situation makes him uneasy, as if he was actually standing in the Old Bailey again.]
no subject
[ Evidence tampering and shady witnesses—it's all a little too much like the Triple Threats' playbook for Mako's taste. Zolt had learned from the best, the first round of Republic City's criminal underworld, and he'd pulled every trick in the book to keep his best people out of jail despite Beifong's efforts.
He wouldn't have done the same for run-of-the-mill kids like Mako and his brother but Mako's not thinking about that anymore. ]
no subject
[Which was unusual, really, he didn't have time to prepare a proper defense. Let alone actually get to know his client.]
McGilded was both a well-known philanthropist and a loan shark. [He sighs, picking up the photographic print of the crime scene to take a look at it.] The prosecution, [He gestures to the gentleman across the room, watching as he fills his hallowed chalice in court. Something he's still not sure was even allowed, but no one questioned (and they even delighted) in him doing so.] had what can only be described as an open and shut case against him for murder. However, the tampering of evidence and the inability to prove when it was tampered with meant my client walked free.
[His frown deepens.]
no subject
...but you thought he was guilty? How did you end up defending him like that? That can't be how trials usually go in your world.
no subject
[He sighs, resting his hands on the defense bench.]
I knew he was guilty in the end, and I helped him walk free. I felt like a fraud. I didn't know the full truth of it for another two months either. Gina, the girl on the stand, committed perjury because she was threatened by him.
[It was a sorry state of affairs, but it was the only way he could prove himself as a lawyer at the time.]
no subject
It makes Mako's jaw set. ]
He still free, after all that? After you figured it out?
no subject
After the trial, he asked to inspect the omnibus again with Scotland Yard, something they granted despite the circumstances of his trial. He... He died in the omnibus that evening. Someone set the thing ablaze and burned him alive.
[A gruesome affair, one where he would learn the truth of that matter as well.]
It's a tangled mess. [He rubs his face.] I was a much more naive person then.
I'm sorry you have to see this. [The lies, the treachery, how easy it was to speculate that the murder of Thirce-Fired Mason could have easily been stabbed from above.]
no subject
[ Not exactly this, sure, but Mako grew up in the armpit of the city, surrounded by criminals doing exactly what they wanted with very little oversight from the police. A couple of the Triads even struck up deals with the RCPD, little protection and non-interference rackets to keep their noses out of Triad business. Mako's still pretty sure that's why his parents' deaths weren't investigated more. How could they be, when it was written off an as more or less an accident, when they were just two more tragic civilian deaths in a startlingly long line of them?
But it obviously bugs Ryuunosuke, and that's reason enough to sigh and unbend a little bit. ]
Look. It happens, even when you have good intentions. It sucks that you had to learn this way, but... you did learn, right? You get to use that to tell you what to do in the future.
no subject
Nothing about this trial was just. McGilded was guilty of murder and should have been found guilty of the crime he committed. Instead he was found to be not guilty not because he was actually innocent, but because the evidence wasn't secured. It wasn't enough, he thinks, but Mako's right. He learned from it. Learned hard lessons about being an attorney despite the fact that he nearly didn't step into a court room again.]
I did. [He agrees.] It was a hard lesson but I think a much needed one. I've learned a lot about being an attorney through these trials. [Things he probably would have learned in school if he had actually gone into Law instead of English.]
Thank you, Mako.
no subject
[ Not enough to fight for the people who deserve it, not enough who are willing to admit they were wrong instead of doubling down. Mako can see a shred of that, here, of that willingness to grow and learn, and that's more than enough for him. ]
How many of these trials did you end up doing?
no subject
About seven trials, one in Japan and six in London. Five were murder trials, two were attempted murder.
Nothing was ever straightforward with them either.