She had made up her mind, Crocus didn't seem to have anything more to offer. The lazy administrator in the Rune Knight quarters had beseeched her to take her paperwork to the main headquarters in Era anyways, the time was as ripe as ever. With her bag packs and her dues paid to Batra the bartender, she had decided to take one cursory stroll around the capital, as a sort of farewell. She wasn't the emotional sort, but the roller coaster ride of hurt and mending that Akira had experienced in the city, begged for a certain kind of closure. She started with the artisan's building, where she'd fought the darkness mage, Valencia, then to the grounds where she'd had the misfortune of meeting the earth magic wielder, the one who had gifted her the power of light...

All the memories swarmed into her mind, she crouched in the tentative location where she had succumbed to unconsciousness, sheltered and trapped by that dome of mud, her fingers swept the soil, taking a sample, and slowly letting it slide of her hand. Her walk continued, now leading her to the hospital she had to visit a few times, through her stay here. A wary grimace stretched her lips. As she traced her path to the garden and then attempted looking for the warehouse where she'd met that healer, to no avail, unfortunately.

With a heavy heart, she ambled through the particular areas she had attempted to protect while defending the capital. They wore a very different look now, although some scars of the attack remained. The Westgate had been tougher to visit, so she chose to get that over with first. The towers were being repaired, her eyes scanned the scaffolding around the construction and the builders that had busied themselves with work. Slowly and idly her choices led her to the street where she'd taken down the archer... She stood facing the building, with her hands on her hips and sighed softly. For some reason, this revisit felt healthy... Maybe eventually, she'd learn to cope with the battles that her duty as a Rune Knight demanded her to take part in.

Akira, was gifted with a keen pair of eyes. Additionally, she possessed the ability to observe and correlate events to information in her head rather quickly. At the moment her sight painted perfectly jarring flashbacks of the fight. It was almost as though Aki had alternate visual perceptions. For a second, she noted the slightly dull sky of the present and then the day from the past, which was bright in appearance but dark in its event. In a jiffy the street bustled with the usual late morning buzz and then her head animated the chaos and screaming that she had witnessed. A photo of the contrasting blue and gray of concrete and sky and then the fire, smoke and ashes...

Needless to say, despite her observation skills and such, Aki was hardly truly paying attention to her surrounding. She stood rather still and oblivious. To an onlooker she may look strange, crazy even, since she was just standing on the path and staring at the street with this blank expression. Yet, when something, or rather someone bumped into her. Her temper flared and sought to blame the other person, even though she was in the way.

It was her side, that had been walking into and instantly her hand shot out to swiftly but gently grasp onto the person's shoulder. 'Hey! Watc-' but her words were interrupted by a soft spoken apology. There was a music to the girl's voice, a shyness that softened Aki quickly. The lunar mage turned and  her eyes fell on the young dark haired girl. Aki's eyes widened as they met the crimson ones of the stranger. That hair do, the color of her eyes, it all reminded the Shimada of Alisa Vollan, but the demeanor was so very different. 'Er... It's ok, you should be careful though...' Aki mumbled now her other hand reached out to gingerly grab the other shoulder to straighten the young girl as she bowed. 'New around here?' she asked, while her gesture encouraged the young one to stand up tall again.

Aki's eyes widened a little in mild surprise, following which her heavy lids lazily resumed their usual positions, emphasizing her habitual and seemingly bored expression. 'Rune Knight huh...' she redundantly repeated. Part of her wanted to earnestly ask the girl why she would join this organisation, despite now rising in the faction, she still harbored a small reluctance to affiliate herself with it. They were a notoriously desperate force, known for taking in the runts of the litter, the rejects, much like herself perhaps. The funny thing was, after taking them in, they underwent this pseudo-scrutiny, the exams and orientation processes, which were basically a way of judging whether the person was going to fit in or not, in terms of their race and magic... A thinly veiled reason to discriminate and develop bias against people, another things she'd been a victim of.

Instead of revealing her usual skepticism, Aki decided it was time once again, to put her social skills to test. The kind that she was relearning and practicing, hoping it'd aid with her job a little, so she wouldn't have to rely on her partner for all the interactions. She cocked her head and smiled at the sweet girl. There were the few that joined the Knights for noble reasons, like Tsuru and Asura... Perhaps it was too easy to discount this young one, maybe she was among those few as well. 'I'm with the Rune Knights as well...' Akira said smiling a tad wider. 'But I've been with them and in Crocus for a while now...' the girl added.

'Don't worry about it... Accidents happen.' Aki said waving her hand dismissively about the younger ones concern. 'I'm not on duty, but was taking a stroll anyways, kinda a habit now.' Akira added, as a response to her statement before her offer to do make up. 'I could take you around if you'd like.' she offered, perhaps uncharacteristically, or maybe she was just growing out of her loner attitude. 'I'm Akira Shimada by the way, and you?' she finished.

Akira shook her head slightly, less a gesture for the world and more a reaction for herself, upon her observations. The young one apologized and bowed again, this sort of respect and slight subservience was rare to see and definitely had never been directed towards Akira. It made her a tad bit uncomfortable, given that it put her in a place of superiority and that somehow always felt like a burden and a responsibility. 'It really is quite alright.' she reassured again, this time perhaps her tone was a little curter, she wanted to aid in getting this girl to snap out of it. Perhaps, unfortunately, for the girl, Akira had never been one to mollycoddle. Steering herself away from her usual snappiness, Akira had forced a smile, simply because that was usually the more polite way of dealing with things and making someone feel at ease, from what she had gathered.

When the girl went on to introduce herself, Akira's mouth hung open just for a jiffy before she closed it. 'Vollan, did you say?' she asked just to confirm. A crease formed between her brows, it probably was a common name, but the girl did bear a stark resemblance to Alisa too... It was one of the first things Aki had noted in fact. So it would seem it was likely that they were related by blood. 'I take it you're related to Alisa Vollan, then?' she asked, wondering how closely related they were. It also piqued her interest that Agnes had chosen to join the Rune Knights while Alisa was a part of Blue Pegasus... She'd reserve that question for later though. It almost slipped her mind that she had promised a tour.

'Er... I'm between ranks technically...' she muttered. Akira wasn't particularly fond of rank talk, they meant very little to her. 'Apparently, I'm gonna be a seated soon, but I need to head to Era for that and I've been putting it off.' The lunar mage added as she took the lead in steering the two towards the popular areas of the town.

It seemed that Aki's stern smile had finally resolved whatever lingering discomfort there was, post the bumping into each other. As per usual, once she had reassured the newer Rune Knight, she averted her gaze, unwilling to let it linger to long on the dark-haired girl, eye contact was definitely not favored by the Shimada. The presumably younger knight, went onto explain how Alisa and she were cousins. Aki wasn't the least bit surprised given the similarity in their appearance, in fact, she'd assumed a closer blood relation. 'Mhmm... I see...' she said softly, following which the girl added that she'd been on the lookout for the Blue Pegasus mage. 'Oh, unless I'm mistaken, she should still be in Crocus, I met her just the other day.' Aki offered, a gentle crease forming between her brows, as she wondered how the two fell out of touch and why, another addition in the questions that kept her rooted to the conversation.

Unfortunately, the conversation slipped back into talk of ranks. Aki cleared her throat, wondering if she should just not contest the girl's technically accurate assumption, with the unofficial rank up she was promised. Aki had essentially been picked as a seated, she just needed to attend to some paperwork in Era. Nervously she decided to go with the truth, but it was apparent in the tone she employed, that this wasn't something she considered to be a great accomplishment. Her voice was devoid of anything that may be seen as her showing off. 'I'm technically an apprentice on paper, but that's only because I'm yet to turn in the paper work to substantiate my promotion to Seated. ' she said, shrugging almost apologetically. 'For sure... I'm pretty sure there will always be the next big mission that'll need all hands on deck and we'll get to work together...' she said with a slight bitterness lacing her statement, the wounds from the war had still not completely vanished.

'I'm surprised you haven't run into Alisa already, does she not know you were here for the exam?' Akira asked curiously. 'I ran into her after the attack at the Cathedral, though I doubt she's the sort to visit everyday...' Aki added, contemplatively. 'I could be wrong though... So, how come you joined the Knights instead of the same guild as your cousin?' she finally popped the question as she idly led the Page down the street, to nowhere in particular actually.

Unfortunately for Aki and her emergent curiosity, before the Vollan had a chance to answer, a distraught Rune Knight messenger raced towards them. In response, Aki already slumped her shoulders, she had a sinking feeling about this. Sure enough, upon his arrival, he clutched his chest and tried to catch his breath, in broken words he relayed the fact that Akira had been called to the headquarters for missions that possibly required her departure from Crocus. With an apologetic glance towards Agnes, she trudged after the Knight who had come to fetch her. 'I do hope we run into each other again, Agnes...' she turned and said before jogging to keep up with the hasty man.

~Exit~