route_1065 | i've got just one regret to live through

Entry tags:

i've got just one regret to live through

Who: Saionji

enjoymyatelier
Where: Ecruteak City Dance Theater
When: February 27th
Summary: Saionji is practicing in the dance theater. Kayneth visits the dance theater. In other news, the planets are aligning in the prediction of the apocalypse.
Rating: G, unless Saionji enacts some serious act of violence on Kayneth
Log:

Honestly speaking, the entire detour to Ecruteak City was a good one.

Saionji is ever-so-gracefully tapping her fingers against the stage floor, the fan opening quite loudly in her left hand. The Kimono Girls here are rather polite figures, and have no issue with others coming up onstage to practice. Sure, there were Rocket attacks, but who would ever think that a girl like Saionji would be a Rocket member? Her obi was finally tied into an actual knot instead of being disgracefully tied together like rope for manual labor, though the bow was still a bit casual for her liking. Still, she would learn the complicated formal bows later. She's taking notes, after all.

Of course, her good moods didn't exactly count on someone she recognized walking through the door. She wouldn't just happily show off her skills to anyone- and especially not this guy.

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He wasn't even gone that long...!

But, anyway, he arrives carrying a rucksack filled with art supplies... and a Reuniclus floating behind him carrying a canvas and a stand.

Because he knows it will annoy Saionji and he is a petty loser, he surveys the area a bit before acknowledging her... though, it is for a practical purpose. He does want to get the best angle, after all.

After looking over the courtyard, he eventually nods to the Psychic Pokemon who sets the canvas down a yard or two away from Saionji, obviously having been given some sort of telepathic command as to the best location for it.

Doesn't matter, letting her wait for even a second is unacceptable unless you have somehow earned her favor. Actually getting her to arrange meetings is already an achievement in itself.

"If you're trying to avoid my gaze out of embarrassment from shooting your mouth off, you can just say it." Still, she's not going to say anything else- Saionji is actually slightly interested in what he has to show. If anything, to make fun of it.

She's confident nothing he produces can beat her in terms of skill, though. Her umbrella is still tilted back, and she stares at the canvas and Kayneth- with her Petilil Nako coming from god knows where carrying a drink.

Well, doesn't he just feel special.

"This is a delicate process, you know. Don't distract me."

Actually, this is a pretty perfect setup. He just had to figure out a good pallet for it... maybe he should go for a bit of a pastel look. Something a little Monet might fit this nicely...

He does begin with a light sketch --- admittedly, it's a bit rougher than usual, but he already knows that this isn't going to be his best work. He has to get the maximum quality he can in a limited amount of time. He can't really say he's happy about that aspect of it, because he prefers the methodical route... but, well, keeping his subject too long would get dicey.

Sigh. She can understand that. Not that she'll respect it.

So, what kind of artpiece will it be? Watery, choppy, thick, paper thin, fragile, bulky...? What even is the paint he's using? Saionji never did much in terms of creating pictures with materials rather than her body and movements.

She sticks her neck out now and then to look. So, is he sketching the landscape?

For now, yes. There's at least the briefest outlines of the surroundings so far, and it's pretty easy to determine the shapes... but it's still really rough and vague.

Which is to be expected, if you know anything about art.

He kind of tolerates the peeking, though without breaking concentration, he gets a few words out.

"Try to stay more still, please."

...Oh.

Oh okay what.

"Ehhhh?" Her umbrella is lying on her shoulder a bit ungracefully, and she adjusts it a bit- somewhat like her stage pose. She normally stays rather aesthetically pleasing most of the time, but not when she's trying to be a brat. "Teehee, I haven't had myself painted in any Western style before... let's see how bad you butcher my form."

"Admittedly, I'd wanted to keep mum about it just to see the look on your face," said Kayneth as he started to work on the subject proper, "but I'm sure that if I had, you would have made things far more annoying than necessary."

He took this part of things a bit more slowly than the landscape part; after all, the portrait aspect was the part he was considered most important here.

Keep mum about...? Okay, she can deduce the meaning. "Obviously. You don't expect me to watch the whole process, do you? In arts like those, while the work is important, it's pretty boring."

...She does stay very still, though. Like- an energetic kind of stillness, from pausing a video, and not from lying down. Something that screams that she should do something, but she isn't. She's used to pausing like this, in dances and all- but she's gonna start complaining sooner or later.

"It depends on the artist, I suppose... I know of some who make it therapeutic, at the very least. But that end of it depends on one's taste, I suppose."

He sounds more thoughtful than argumentative at this point, at least. And he does seem to be working quickly --- he's already moved onto the first sections of paint. Of course, he is rushing a bit, since... well, Saionji is proving to be a surprisingly decent model, but he's not in the zone enough to think that she's going to stay that way.

There's a desire to look pretty in an artpiece. And also a desire to get Kayneth angry so he looks like an idiot.

This is certainly a predicament.

Right now, all she's doing is repeating- "Are you done yet? I'm getting tired!" -now and then. She is pretty impatient to get a good look at the painting, too, so there's that.

He puts up with it longer than one would expect... but he is certainly not a man of infinite patience. It's not impacting his work much, but...

"Could you not? These things take time, you know."

Saionji cannot not. "You should be grateful I'm even posing for you, dummy! I have no obligation to!"

WHAT ABOUT HER NEEDS. She does want to see the picture, though, so she'll just. Stare loudly. Since when did a visit to the theater turn out this way?

"And you should be grateful that I chose to draw you instead of a more cooperative model, like, perhaps, an enraged Beedrill."

Staring loudly is, at the very least, something Kayneth can deal with. In a strange way, he actually does seem to be enjoying this, despite his jabs. It is kind of challenging to get this to look nice even though he's working more quickly than he ever usually does. Actually, by this point, he's about halfway done.

"But if I don't do anything, I can't trust that you won't paint me as a lifeless dummy." Because obviously, in her head, everything happening in the real world was being translated perfectly into the painting. That's how it works, right? Passion and all!

Still, she's pouting and making do, the umbrella proving to not be so good in the 'gives shade' and more-so in the 'looks pretty' department. Dammit, she misses her actually functioning one back home. This feels like one of those China umbrellas.

"...That's not how it works," said Kayneth flatly, not looking up from the canvas.

Granted, Caravaggio did it and look at where he ended up. God, what Kayneth wouldn't give to look at real art right now... But this was looking good, if he didn't say so himself (of course he would say so himself). It shouldn't take too much longer...

"But a corpsed subject wouldn't look good to paint, and standing still for too long is exhausting!"

Yes, corpsing and standing still are two completely different things. Performing arts, everyone! Buyo dance is related to Kabuki theater for a reason- it's an acting technique, dynamic stillness. And it takes more energy to maintain than sprinting.

Still! Just... endure it a bit longer. If the painting isn't impressive, she's gonna break his face.

"Well, I should very well think not," said Kayneth, a bit deadpan. "With that said, I am almost finished --- thankfully."

...for both of them, really. Just a few last finishing touches...

PREPARING TO BREAK HIS FACE IN THREE TWO-

"Finally! I was about to get bored and wander off." She's not really telling the truth, since she's still honestly curious, but now that he's said that, her patience has all but fallen by around 100%.

"So? Finish up and let me see!"

"This didn't even take that long," said Kayneth, adding a few last finishing touches. Of course, it also needed to dry just a tiny bit...

But in any case, shortly after, he turns the easel around with a bit of a smirk. It is very skilled; it's painted in a rough style that betrays the fact that it was done in a short amount of time, but if anything, it gives the paining a pleasant hazy quality that makes it look vaguely Impressionist.

Saionji's figure is by far the most detailed aspect of the painting, and the realistic style that captures her pose quite well, even though she'd been antsy throughout. Combined with the hazy background, it makes it it look like a photograph with the subject in closer focus than everything else. There's another contrast between her and the background --- the background is subtly more muted than Saionji's figure, which is painted with brighter, more vibrant colors.

"Well?"

...Oh, well. Uh. Shit, she can't actually bite back against that.

It's something, definitely, and Saionji actually does value aesthetic talent. Swim a few dozen laps in front of her in record time? Steroids. Solve the Millennium Prize Problems with her as witness? Nerd. But the painting Kayneth has just produced in front of her is worthy of at least some respect. She can't dream of doing that, and she knows it- there's a unique style to it, but it's nothing actually bad. Knowing her school, SHSL standard would be to paint the whole fucking field of grass down to each blade in several minutes and catch every quirk about her, from the way her hair falls to the muscles of her face tightening from strain, but the artwork was ten times better than what she actually expected.

"Ehhhh? It's actually decent! Maybe just a bit more." She's not going to outright say she likes it, of course.

She walks a bit closer. "Perhaps I should reevaluate my view of you... teehee!"

"It would have likely been better if I had more time to sit down and work on it, but I suppose we can't have anything," said Kayneth, with a very slight hint of false modesty to his voice.

"In any case, I suppose we're practically even, then."

She can tell that's false modesty, Kayneth, she has tons of it.

Her main response is to that last statement, though. "Wha- it isn't even close to SHSL standard! Don't be ridiculous."

Saying she kinda wanted to keep the painting out of fascination and ego is probably affirming he kinda is even, however. GOTTA PHRASE THIS WELL. "If we let me take that painting off your hands to sell, though, I might consider it."

"Oh, come off it. You haven't even seen my best work."

Besides, would Hope's Peak even have a Super High School Level Magus...?

...at that second question, he looks less than amused.

"Well, if you're going to sell it, I expect some of the proceeds."

"Don't expect it to actually sell, though! You'll most likely just be disappointed."

It's kinda bullshit, she's pulling this all out her ass, but she does look pretty in the painting. So she's gonna get it!

"...well, given the subject matter, I'm honestly not."

Does he care enough to suspect it?

No, not really.

i've got just one regret to live through

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