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Character(s): Minato Arisato, Hope Estheim
Location: Dorm A115, then onward to Balamb
Rating: PG
Open/Closed/Finished: Closed while in the dorm, then open for anyone who wants to bump into them
Summary: Minato wants to get to know his roommate. He also needs an alarm clock. The weekend gives him an opportunity for both.

When Igor had told Minato that he could still access the Velvet Room, even while in Garden, he wasn't expecting that to mean that the Velvet Door was going to be right in the common area of his very dorm. It didn't bother him much at first, since he was planning on just winging it through the first week before settling on a line up.

By Saturday, he had taken a good enough feel for the general student body to know which Arcana to favor on which days. So he decided to start the day by visiting his favorite hook-nosed man and flighty attendant to decide on a proper Persona roster for school life, something that were functional and that covered a wide range of personalities.

Of course, while he was doing this, any outside observer - like say, his roommate, would be left wondering what he was finding so interesting about that wall.

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Minato left the Velvet Room, once he had defined his choices properly. Strangely enough, Elizabeth had hinted that she would start giving him requests for this world soon enough...

Upon 'returning' to the dorm, he felt a slight scratch on the cheek, and heard the voice of his roommate. His name was... Peace? Change? Hope? ...Hope, right.

He blinked, as if to signal that, yes, he is still alive. "Sorry, spaced out for a bit," she smiled sheepishly.

Hope frowned slightly. 'A bit' usually didn't mean, by standard definition, a full three minutes of just standing and staring at the dull paint on the wall, not budging a millimeter. Still, it wasn't his place to say what kind of odd hobbies an older student could or couldn't partake in.

It didn't mean it stopped him from asking a concerned, "You sure? Don't need to go to the nurse?"

Minato did a small internal check-up... Nope, not feeling tired or anything.

"Yeah, I'm sure. I probably need to get some fresh air, though." With that, he remembered he needed to go buy an alarm clock - and maybe whatever they use to store music in this world.

"Hey Hope, will you be needing something from the town?"

Hope looked skeptical, but he didn't press. "The town? Does our sponsorship take care of that too?" he asked, sounding impressed. This Sponsorship thing was almost too good to be true - all paid expenses and even unnecessary needs. There had to be some catch. "Otherwise, I don't have any local money."

He nodded anyway, though. No harm in seeing what was outside of the campus.

He nodded. "Yeah, the sponsorship includes a small allowance for buying other stuff. I think the money can be taken out of the student cards."

He went over to his room to take out the practice sword and Evoker. "Don't forget to bring your weapon; there are monsters on the road and I haven't taken the driving test yet."

"The weapon would be what I'm going into town for," Hope replied, somewhat sheepish. "They don't carry the type I use here. But don't worry. I can take care of myself without one."

He watched as Minato retrieved his equipment of choice. A word and a gun - sort of like Lightning's gunblade, perhaps, only...separated. He stepped toward the door. "Are you ready?"

"Really? That's cool." Minato would have to pay attention to see what Hope could do.

"Ready as I'll ever be. Let's go." And with that, he moved out, Mission Face on.

This guy was hard to read - Hope thought that was his Stare At The Wall For Extended Periods Of Time face.

Closing the door behind them, Hope followed after the other student as they made their way out of the dorm and then the campus. At the very least, Minato seemed to know his way around much better, and he carried that same sort of confident air that Lightning did.

"Have you fought the monsters before?" Hope asked, looking around.

"I have some experience from my homeworld, yeah." Minato replied as they made their way through the campus. "I haven't made much use of the Training Center here yet, however."

Shortly they reached Garden's entrance, the fields of Balamb extending for the world to see. "The town's about an hour from here at walking distance. We should stick to the road."

Hope pulled his gloves on tighter, nodding. "No problem."

Along the road, there were sounds of creatures lurking off to the side, their footsteps echoing in the shadows, and the leaves swaying as they slid through them. Hope quickened his step, following closer to Minato. "The same type, I mean?"

"Well, they're a bit different from the ones here." Minato, oddly enough, slowed his step, then turned left. "For one thing, they're better at ambushes."

With that, he unsheathed his sword and charged forward, startling the three Bite Bugs that were hoping to catch them unaware and getting a free hit against one of them.

Following the other boy's cue, Hope also slowed to a stop. He didn't see whatever Minato was looking at until the overgrown insects screeched in surprise, however, and even then, he stayed put. Hope wasn't naturally a melee fighter, after all, and even standing where he was, it was easy enough to cast a Fira towards one of the bugs trying to creep up on Minato's flank while he was distracted with another.

It stumbled back, its armor singed black where the magic had hit and clearly close to being finished off. Not too strong then, he mentally noted. If they were as well armored as some of the creatures on pulse, it might've been more of a problem. Perhaps the population of creatures dwindled since they were so close to civilization.

One enemy wounded, another burnt off, which leaves... Minato backpedaled to dodge the third bug's charge, and then noticed he had all three oponents at a disadvantage. Might as well finish this off.

He knew sending Thor out for these creatures was overkill, so he settled on calling out the other thunder deity. Pulling out his Evoker, he summoned Take-mikazuchi the usual way, unaware of what that may look like to his companion.

"What are you- ah!" There was no way he could run fast enough to stop Minato, who already had the barrel pointed to his temple. All Hope could do when the bang rang out was shut his eyes and turn away, hands over his ears. Even then, it didn't block out sound completely. When he heard the roar of new voice over the screeching of the Bite Bugs, he cracked open one eye and looked up.

Rather than lying in a pool of his own blood, Minato was still standing there, unwounded, but the scene was hardly the same. The enemy insects were all curled up on the ground, defeated. Speechlessly, Hope raised his eyes just in time to see the form of a white-clothed man disappear, sword raised over his head with one arm. What was that? An eidolon?

Feeling a bit woozy (it had been a full week since he had summoned a Persona, after all), Minato took a look at the resulting scenery, putting his Evoker back in its holster.

Then he noticed Hope, and realized what this must have looked like to him. "Ah, sorry, I should have warned you beforehand - that's not a real gun I'm carrying."

At least he had the grace to look ashamed.

"What...what did you just do? Was that an eidolon?" Still a little shocked here and recovering, sorry.

"An eidolon? No, it's a Persona - ah, I think the definition went that it's a manifestation of my psyche that protects the user from life's hardships." At least that's how Igor had described them to Minato long ago - minus the constant stroking of a phallic nose, that is.

All right then. Minus the constant stroking of that phallic nose that Hope thankfully doesn't know about, this 'Persona' sounds a lot like his summon regardless. Perhaps they were just similar things, with different names, from different worlds. "Oh," he said slowly, still staring at Minato warily. Pretending to shoot yourself in the head was a strange sort of summoning ritual as far as he knew, but he supposed it was just...a difficult culture. Right. Be open-minded.

"I guess that's a little like Alexander." He brightens a little, regaining his wits. "It was strong, though!"

"Alexander's the name of your... eidolon, then?" Minato asked, attempting to steer the conversation away from the fact that he shoots himself in the head to summon - he should have known from that that the people behind the Persona/Shadow studies were suicidally insane.

"Well, there's also the fact that those things were weak, but yeah, Take-mikazuchi is pretty strong for one of his level."

"Take-mikazuchi," Hope repeated slowly. It was a foreign name, and a little awkward on his tongue, but that wasn't to say that they didn't have odd names for their summons either (of the few, Alexander was actually one of the easier-to-pronounce ones).

He nodded in confirmation. "Yeah. Alexander's mine. Though he..." Trailing off, Hope slowed to a stop. Alexander hadn't been there since he arrived, and he figured it was just some sort of after-effect of the Time Compression, but it was still a little disorienting. "Well, I'll show you him sometime, if we get the chance. Let's just continue to the town for now."

"Yeah, I guess it's hard to pronounce if English is your first language. The others are less of a mouthful, at least..." Minato trailed off, but then Hope reminded him of exactly why theye were outside Garden today.

"Right. Let's move on, while it's still morning." With that said, he set the pace and continued walking.

The rest of the path was relatively similar. Occasionally, a few bugs or overgrown fauna would snap at their ankles, but between Hope's magic and Minato's persona, they went down in a matter of minutes. Of course, a well-traveled road couldn't be expected to be dangerous - not with all these cadets being trained in combat around.

Hope skipped ahead at the first sign of buildings on the horizon. He hadn't been out of the campus yet. While the town was certainly no Cocoon metropolis, it still held a sort of quaint charm about it, and quite simply, it would be nice to stop walking. "That it?" he asked, turning to Minato and pointing a thumb over his shoulder. "Everything we need is in there?"

Sure enough, there was Balamb Town, looking like a small town as designed by a big city architect.

"Yeah, that's it. Most of the stores are closer to the harbor, though there's a cafe near the train station if you're hungry." Minato replied, remembering what he had read on that brochure.

Hope hid a smile behind his hand at the tour guide-ish line, and nodded. "Are we going together, or should we meet up later?"

He didn't want people to think that chaperoning was needed, after all, even if he was a little younger. The town seemed friendly and harmless enough.

"As you'd prefer. You look like you could make your way around town without trouble." Yes, thought Minato, it was best not to treat Hope like a kid, especially when he was only three years younger. "Let's meet up at the cafe in 90 minutes. That all right with you?"

"That's perfect. I'll see you then." Hope nodded in confirmation, and, after a quick look around, choose a street and headed down it. The place was small enough that a little exploration wouldn't hurt. Besides, Boomerang stores were probably uncommon enough that a little search would be necessary.

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Hope you don't mind a little fast-forward?

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Can probably wrap up soon and assume the rest?