Exploring

[pre_ramune]

Gai is well aware that he stands out like a sore thumb on this...Earth, or whatever planet he's ended up on. Still, what's a warrior of light to do except explore and try to figure out what's going on?

He's made his way through parts of the city, but it feels weirdly like someone is watching him. He can't pinpoint anyone in particular, but it's...unsettling. Kind of like the way he could always "hear" someone in trouble.

Every so often, he finds a place to stop and looks around.

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[miraculous_future]

Mirai is nearby when she stops at a shop, digging in her purse. "Ah, two ramune please!" she exclaims, holding up a few yen.

Taking her bottles, she hands one to Mofurun who fumbles for it. "Mirai, I can't get it open-mofu," she complained.

"Ah, just a second Mofurun, I need both hands!" Exclaimed Mirai, not noticing Gai standing there nearby.

[pre_ramune]

Well, no one watching him that he can see. Just a girl and her...alien something. Both of whom are struggling to open some kind of bottle.

"Excuse me," he said. "Is there anything I can do to help?"

[miraculous_future]

"Oh!" Exclaimed Mirai. "Yes, um er..."

"Can you open this-mofu?" asked Mofurun, holding out her bottle of Ramune to Gai, offering the bottle to him.

"Sorry! I'm just juggling a bunch of things at once! I can get you one too actually! I'm Mirai, and this is Mofurun!"

[pre_ramune]

Gai smiled.

"I'm Gai. Pleased to meet you."

He took a look at the bottle, trying to figure out how to open it. Glass, so it was definitely designed for casual drinking, as opposed to the tin cans of rations apparently common to O-50, Kanon, and Earth. But normally a bottle like this would have a screw-off cap or one that could be pried off.

He held it from another angle and finally got a better view of the mechanism.

"Oh, the marble inside is keeping the drink inside--is that it?"

He carefully placed the bottle down on a table and pressed down on the lid...only to have the ramune come fizzing out.

[miraculous_future]

"Ah, it's fizzy!" Exclaimed Mofurun. "Nice try-mofu!"

"Sometimes Ramune does that," said Mirai. "They can build up a bit of pressure, because they get shaken and the insides are carbonated. Here." She offered him a paper napkin from the stand for his hands as she paid for another one for Gai to try for his own.

[pre_ramune]

"Really? We don't have anything like this where I'm from."

That was safe to say, right? Gamu had said something vaguely about Earths that weren't used to aliens and how he and Fujimiya had kept their identities as Ultramen secret. Mofurun was decidedly not an Earth creature as far as he could tell, but was it okay to just admit that Gai himself was from another planet?

[miraculous_future]

Mofurun was an Earth creature, just a magical one. Gai had clearly never seen a stuffed bear before, even a talking one as Mofurun exclaimed, "You can drink it! It's really tasty-mofu!"

"Are you from the Magical World then?" asked Mirai. "Your clothing suggests you're not from Earth at least."

Busted, of a sorts at least.

[pre_ramune]

Yes, very much busted. Although Gai really had only been doing this Ultraman thing for barely a few weeks, and in that time, he'd had to reveal his powers to everyone he met, so he did pretty well not getting caught for maybe a couple of days.

"No," he answered, smiling as he shook his head. "Magic's pretty rare there too. But I suppose you could say I'm on a journey right now."

O-50 may have been the planet where he'd gained his powers, but it didn't feel like home. The rescue squad...maybe. Until he and Juggler got it in their heads to climb Warrior's Peak. And once the Light chose him, it meant he went wherever it told him.

[miraculous_future]

"Ah! That makes a lot of sense. I'm from the Non-Magical World, or Earth as they call it from where I am. Mofurun was my stuffed bear before she got the magic to move and talk."

Mofurun in the meantime, managed to pop a second Ramune bottle open and offered it to Gai. "Here you go-mofu. It's fizzy, and really refreshing!"

[roaminglight]

....oh, come on.

"I've seen different Jugglers, and now a different me," he says by way of greeting, with a certain amount of irritated amusement. "So what's your story?"

[pre_ramune]

Well. You don't see that every day.

"How..." he starts before realizing this is not even the first thing on his mind.

"Are you me?"

[roaminglight]

Gai nods, jamming his hands into the pockets of his jeans. "From your future. Or an alternate universe," he says, groaning a little as he realises just how possible that is. Alternate universes make everything more complicated.

"Ask me something, if you want. I should have the same memories as you, plus a few thousand years."

[pre_ramune]

It's...worth double-checking, especially since, as Gai has recently learned, becoming an Ultraman means you suddenly attract a lot of bad guys with ridiculous plans.

"How did I escape Psychi's ship, then?"

He figures that it wouldn't be believable, even down the line, that Juggler saved him. Especially with Juggler's reputation suddenly taking a nosedive.

[roaminglight]

Gai winces at that one. Not because he needed saving, but because of everything else that was going wrong at that point to do with that particular dark elegant pissiness.

"Juggler," he says quietly. "Which makes me believe you're more likely to be a younger me, or very similar to a younger me. Not many people would know why that was particularly important."

[pre_ramune]

That's a relief, even if it is still extremely confusion.

"So that's why that...Leito-san, I think it was?...said he knew me from later."

[roaminglight]

"Yeah, I know him," Gai agrees. He shakes his head a little, still boggling at the dancing, in particular.

"I think Juggler knows him better. Anyway. How are you?"

[pre_ramune]

Gai keys into exactly one word of that and ignores everything else.

"Juggler? He's here? You--I--we found him?"

Tense be damned, he hasn't seen him since Earth. What happened to him?

[de_light]

He knows Gai is here. He's seen him. What he doesn't know is that there's more than one of him, even though he does know there's more than one of himself and therefore it's a possibility. And he has a sinking feeling when he recognises that outfit, but he keeps a certain level of optimism as he finds a way to appear in a spot Gai isn't currently looking, casually leaning against the wall as if he's been there for ages.

"What are you doing in those clothes?"

[pre_ramune]

The talk with his older self did give Gai some warning about what to expect. It did not entirely help, however.

Juggler looks older, hair cut, more earrings, very different style of dress. Gai really doesn't know what to do with this. Part of Gai wants to know where the hell Juggler's been all this time, but the rest of him knows he probably doesn't want to hear that answer.

"You're the one from my future, aren't you?"

[de_light]

He doesn't. Not least because Juggler won't sugar coat it in the slightest if he asks.

He raises an eyebrow. "So you really are another one. As if one of you wasn't enough."

[pre_ramune]

There's really too much going through Gai's head right now that he really doesn't even know how to deal with it.

"Are...are you okay?"

It's about all he can manage right now. And it's something he desperately needs to know.

[de_light]

Somehow, that throws him entirely off balance. Maybe because it's hard to imagine his Gai, the one who's lived through all that time with him, asking the same question so earnestly and so unprompted.

"I'm alive," is all he's going to offer back, and it's more of a legitimate response than this Gai could know. "What concern is it of yours?" It's a deflection, but also he wants to know how this version of Gai intends to answer it.

[pre_ramune]

It is really hard to understand why Juggler doesn't seem to get that Gai cares about him and that this is not meant to be an insult to his honor the way he always acts like. Despite their rivalry, despite their future, Gai still considers him a friend.

"Because you disappeared after the battle on Earth. I had a vision of you on O-50--I thought you were really there, but you weren't. If the Light showed it to me, then I have a reason to be concerned."

[de_light]

His eyes widen just slightly at that bit about having a vision. This is the first he's heard of it. But then Gai continues to that last bit, and a wave of bitterness crosses his features.

"Yes, I'm sure the Light is very worried about me," he says sarcastically. As it should be, really. He still considers the Light an enemy, even if he's made peace by now with fighting alongside its servants.

[pre_ramune]

"Even if that weren't the case, I am."

Isn't it nice having a younger, less reserved Gai who's not as sensitive about being a socially awkward mess?