Illuminated Star [Bambietta, Momo]

With the free time she had on this indefinite medical leave of hers, Bambietta was finding that she was running out of ideas for her to develop on her own. In a way, she’d gotten the biggest thoughts out pretty early on. She wasn’t necessarily desperate or anything along those lines, but it did leave a little bit of a bad taste in her mouth not to be coming up with any real ideas. She probably could have gone to her old colleagues in the 2nd—but her pride, whatever of it there was, wouldn’t let something like that happen.

Instead, she was in a rather different location, almost nervous as she stared at the entrance to what was, frankly, a fairly normal home for the Soul Society. The home itself didn’t really matter, though. Bambietta was one who built people up in her mind based solely on reputation, a habit formed well in her youth, and the owner of this home had no small reputation as an expert in their shared field.

Taking one breath in, Bambietta knocked on the door to the Hinamori household, and waited patiently, and a bit hopefully, for an answer.

It was a rather quiet day for Momo, one which she’d spent most of simply drawing on a sketchpad that she kept on her at all times. Inspiration could strike at any time, after all and did so quite a lot with her. One moment she could be wandering to herself and bang, another idea would enter her brain that she just had to get down on paper before it faded away. Such was the creative process for the former Gotei member and one that she’d gotten used to in her retirement. There was always another source to base a spell on somewhere and the dark haired woman was always on the lookout for something new.

The knock on the door drew her eyes away from her pad, breaking her concentration but she wasted little time in getting up and heading for the entryway. She hadn’t expected company that day but the thought brought a smile to her face nonetheless. After so long keeping to herself and those closest to her, Momo had sort of been in a state of rejuvenation just lately, mingling more with those she met, even those who belonged to the organisation that she viewed with such mixed feelings.

Opening the door without any trepidation, her smile would grow, attempting to ease any tension that there might be. Her guest was a rather tall, dark haired woman and Momo had to look up just a little to look her in the eyes.

“Hi there. May I help you?” She asked, a cheerful look upon her face.

Oh, she was shorter than Bambietta had expected. Part of that mental image had been someone larger than life, she supposed, in something of a literal sense, so she hadn't quite been ready to angle her eyes down. Bowing both deeply and quickly, Bambietta's face grew a faint shade of red as the case slung over her back, holding the Kido Gun Mk. II, slipped off her shoulder and landed with a "clunk" onto the ground, and her hat at the same time slid slightly downward from the force of the bow.

"Um, yes, my name is Bambietta Basterbine! Former 4th Seat of the 2nd Division, on medical leave, doing independent kido research. I know you're probably very busy, Ms. Hinamori, but I was very hopeful that you'd be willing to look at some of my work and my theories!"

There were few kido practitioners in the Soul Society that Bambietta would have thought of as being unilaterally more skilled than herself, and fewer still who were outside of the Gotei's current ranks. Momo Hinamori, however, was very decidedly one of those few.

The woman bowed with such ferocity that Momo considered herself lucky that she hadn’t been too close, lest she receive a nasty headbutt. Still, she appreciated the kind showing of respect, even if she did inwardly cringe a little as the woman’s case hit the floor with a nasty thud. The brown eyed woman hoped that whatever was in it wasn’t too fragile and without much thought, she’d helpfully walk out of the doorway and pick up the item, before handing it back to the woman.

As Momo listened to the woman introduce herself and reveal why she’d come, Momo absentmindedly scratched her head. It seemed that more and more people had become aware of her work recently, which while nice, was also a tad embarrassing. She’d always tried to be humble about her own skills but had to admit it was flattering to be known for them. It was certainly different from how she’d been viewed in the past.

Bambietta’s fondness for kido was clear, just from her tone of voice and Momo chuckled as she replied. “Of course! Come on in and I’ll have a look at what you have. It’s always nice to speak to someone with such passion for spell casting.”

Beckoning Bambietta inside, Momo would lead the way back to the main living room. It wasn’t the most extravagant living quarters but more than comfortable enough for the brown eyed woman’s tastes. A place where hopefully everyone who visited could lay down their troubles and relax for a while. That was her hope, anyway.

Offering her guest a seat, Momo would ask, breaking the ice.

“Would you care for a drink before we start?”

This woman was extremely kind, picking the case up for her. Bambietta was a little embarrassed it had even come to that, but she didn't want to run away or anything like that just because she was embarrassed. She was glad to accept the invitation inside, and the home was honestly the sort of comfy abode that put Bambietta a little at ease. She was more used to fancy things she wasn't really that familiar with.

"Oh, um, yes, thank you. I'm sorry this is a little out of nowhere, I've had a lot of projects going on lately so I wasn't really sure when I might have time to try and get in touch for an appointment or something like that..."

Really, if she'd been told to come back later, Bambietta would have accepted that pretty handily. Why wouldn't she? It wasn't like she could be upset about something like that. Oh, but thinking about that situation wasn't really worthwhile, seeing as it hadn't even happened. Focus, Bambietta!

“An appointment? Here? Oh no. Folks can stop by any time.” Momo replied kindly, finding the dark haired woman rather sweet in her way of speaking. “I do occasionally help people out with their training if they need something a little outside the box but it’s on a first come, first served basis. Not much formality here, which I think makes a nice change from the Gotei.”

Momo would briefly walk into the next room in order to prepare a drink for her guest, experienced hands moving around the kitchen with grace. She couldn’t help but wonder about just what Bambietta had in store for her in terms of research but already it was exciting the brown eyed woman. Much had changed over the years but her love for kido never had, so much so that she’d amused herself on more than night by accidentally scaring her neighbours with her own created spells. Not many people were used to seeing a massive flame serpent sticking its head over the fence, after all.

Once the tea was made, Momo would collect it on a tray and head back into the main room, placing it down in easy reach of both women. “Help yourself to milk or sugar if you’d like.” She’d offer with a smile, before taking a seat opposite Bambietta.

“All right then. Now that we’re settled, what’ve you been working on?” Her own enthusiasm would be clear to see, an almost glow in those brown hues of hers.

This sort of straightforward and welcoming politeness was almost enough to throw Bambietta off kilter simply from how little it resembled what she was used to. The 2nd Division had been a pretty regimented place, and 3rd Division was oppressive in its atmosphere most of the time. Both, naturally, were less than what she'd gone through with the penal legion. This? This was lovely, enough so that she had a little difficulty knowing how to approach it.

"Well, I've developed a few kido of my own, but they aren't really that impressive or anything, my main research has been in these talismans — er, well, I call them that, but they don't really have to be talismans specifically or anything, they can be anything, in theory."

Reaching into one of her shihakusho's inside pockets, Bambietta pulled out one of several talismans she always carried on her person, one containing Bakudo 62: Hyapporankan. The talisman took the form of a hanafuda card, with no small amount of ornate detailing having been added by hand to the otherwise fairly plain peony tane card.

"The idea is that you’re doing the actual incantation part of the kido way in advance, so that way, all you’d have to do is say the name while you’re focusing your reiryoku onto the talisman, and the incantation would be finished. It’s not really that much more effective than just using incantation abandonment or anything, in terms of the efficiency of the spell itself, but since the incantation’s already finished, instead of just ignoring it, it isn’t as taxing mentally. You can use a lot of spells a lot faster with these. One of my other collections is, um…hang on…”

Once more, Bambietta looked through her belongings, this time pulling a small leather sack from her pockets that made a faint rattling as she moved it and set it on the table.

“I was inspired by setsubun, you know, throwing soybeans at the oni and all that, so I etched an incantation for Byakurai into all these toasted soybeans. I can throw a handful of them out and they’ll all go off at the same time. I think—”

She clearly cut herself off there, having been previously rather excited about all of this. I think this could change how we think about kido itself. Bambietta was not a woman with much in the way of confidence, after all, and what she’d been about to say was a remarkably bold claim. She took a second to rethink what she’d been about to say, and after a moment or two, she spoke again in a more reserved tone, looking elsewhere rather than directly at Momo.

“I think this could be really helpful for a lot of people.”

Fascinated by what she was hearing, Momo would more than happily let Bambietta explain her creations without any butting in from the ex Lieutenant, as tempted as she was to interject. To hear such an eager and promising woman speak with such passion was incredibly uplifting and the dark haired woman considered that perhaps there was still some desire to improve in the Gotei. Her own views of the organisation still weren’t exactly complementary and even after a hundred years, Momo didn’t honestly recognise a whole lot that was different from the time she’d left. The coldness and arrogance remained, which was a pity and as the brown eyed woman recalled the fact that Bambietta wasn’t currently active within the organisation, she couldn’t help but wonder how they’d feel about the unwell Shinigami’s discoveries.

She would have responded sooner but the change in Bambietta’s manner towards the end of her explanations caught her slightly off guard. The woman had spoken with such freedom until then, only to seem to fold in on herself. It was a troubling development and Momo couldn’t help but feel sympathetic towards her. What had caused such a sudden and drastic change in behaviour? A lack of confidence or something more?

“If these work as effectively as you claim they do then I think your creations have a lot more potential than just helping people out.” Momo would muse cheerfully. “You may have discovered a whole new philosophy regarding the art itself. It is incredibly exciting and I do hope that you plan on continuing on this path of discovery. Who knows? Perhaps you may just give those old fossils teaching at the academy something new to consider for a change.”

She paused, her smile fading slightly as Momo considered whether she should try and pry or not but it did sting to see her guest so lacking in confidence all of a sudden.

“What’s wrong? You were buzzing with excitement just now.” Momo eventually asked gently, unwilling to simply let Bambietta simply sit there and struggle.

Bambietta was, more than anything, a bit disappointed in herself for making it quite so obvious that she'd had such a shift in her mood, but she wasn't going to totally dodge the question, either. She thought about it for a moment or two, taking a sip of her tea to try and collect her thoughts. It was complicated to convey to someone without just sounding pathetic...

Well. It was pretty pathetic.

"I'm...not really much of a scholar or anything. I've been putting a lot of time into all this, but it's just the stuff that came naturally to me, you know? I don't want to be overconfident."

Confidence had, at one time in her life, been what pushed her to do everything. It had driven her to find just what she could do, but it had also put her into prison. It had put her life on the line, and it was only good luck, really, that had put her on the path she was on now. She didn't want to risk everything she'd done, and everything other people had done for her, just because she was getting overconfident again.

A fear of being overconfident? That was most certainly an eyebrow raising admission but there wasn’t the slightest hint in Momo’s brown eyes that she thought any less of the woman before her. Humility was a rare trait, one that fewer and fewer people seemed to possess. If anything, Bambietta’s words only caused the ex lieutenant to respect her more. Yet, the curious side of Momo was naturally piqued as to what had caused her fellow kido lovers reasons for being so reluctant to show pride. There’d been signs of it during her explanations, after all, which drew Momo to the conclusion that there must have been an event, something unpleasant, which had led the woman to become the…nervous soul that sat before her now.

She was somewhat reluctant to press further but felt that perhaps it was necessary to do so. Momo, however, remained gentle with her approach, knowing more than most how difficult it could be to open up about unpleasant memories. She certainly had more than her fair share of skeletons in the closet.

“I think you’re selling yourself a little short, Bambietta and have more than earned the right to be a little proud of yourself for the progress you’ve made.” She finally said, choosing her words carefully. “I don’t know what you’ve been through in order to bring about this concern over confidence but I do know what it’s like to have none at all. I’ve been at rock bottom myself and I sympathise with anyone who’s been to that horrible place. It’s not somewhere I wish to visit again.”

She paused briefly and sighed. “I’ve also seen what overconfidence can do to a person, when ambition completely takes control. It can lead to complete misery, both for the one overcome and those who are left in their wake. It’s like a flame that consumes everything when let off the leash. So, I can understand the worry that you feel regarding it. I’ve been burnt by it myself.”

Looking at the woman before her again, she’d ask softly. “Have you been too?”