Beaming in... (Himeko)

The key clicking in the lock was certainly an interesting feeling for Ayaka. She'd never had to share a room before. Tiny though it may have been, she'd had her own room back home. Hopefully she'd be able to get along well with her roommate. But, right now the little pinkette had other concerns. Propping the door open with her backpack, she dragged her suitcases into the room and maneuvered them over to the empty side of the room. There were only three of them, but they were packed full and she wasn't very strong, so by the time she grabbed her backpack and let the door swing shut, she'd broken out in a sweat and was panting a little.

Flopping down into her desk's chair, Aya took the moment to catch her breath and look over at what her roommate had out. The pictures of the girl and adults had to be her roommate and her parents. The stern looking men were harder to place though. The only thing Aya could come up with was that they had to be her roommate's grandfathers! Only problem with that was there were more than two of them. Aya's face scrunched up in confusion before brightening: "Ah! Great uncles!"

That settled, Aya nodded to herself and stood up, ready to get to work unpacking. First, the battered old laptop that held all her pride and joy was carefully, carefully removed from her backpack and placed gently on her desk - the thing was nearly ten years old and held together mostly through faith and a judicious amount of electrical tape. Next, the pennants - First the Starfleet Academy one, pined on the wall beside her bed in no time, then just below it, one for her beloved baseball team - the Rakuten Eagles. Aya grinned as she jumped back onto the floor. Her models came out next, all four of them. The Enterprise-D found a home on the top of her dresser, the original Enterprise atop her desk, joined her favorite model, though she'd never admit it, another original Enterprise painted in Rakuten Eagles red and gold. Finally, her pride and joy came out, the largest of her models, the USS Voyager. In no time flat, Aya was working on hanging it from the ceiling, standing on tiptoes atop a pile of her textbooks on her chair.

Her hands slowly lifted away from the ship, but hanging beneath it should any of the five wires holding it up not stay in place. Five seconds passed... then ten... fifteen... and at about twenty seconds of hanging free, Ayaka let her hands drop and leapt back to the floor, gazing up in awe at her creation, majestically positioned as if in flight. "Perfect!"

Another rehearsal had come and gone, classmates given farewells and now a time for rest and relaxation had arrived.  Himeko had been used to a very solitary existence on campus outside of her major's classes; she had her very own dorm room to herself for some reason.  Many of her classmates had lived with roommates from their first day on campus but she had been overlooked it seemed.  Whatever the cause of it might have been this was her own private kingdom in which she could totally unwind, unconcerned about the way that she acted around anyone else.  Nobody in there to expect her to be the most ladylike, reserved person in the room - she didn't have to be the super graceful princess who didn't so much as get annoyed within its confines.  She fished the key out of her school bag, eager to get inside and vent about some things to her stuffy chancellor Otto von Bearsmarck (in his new coat and tails!).

Then she slipped the key into the lock only to find that the door wasn't locked at all.  She wasn't sure why that would be - had she herself personally forgotten to lock the door on her way out?  No, she was pretty positive that she hadn't.  What if it were some weird person who'd managed to pick the lock to her personal kingdom?  Someone who, unannounced, had decided to come occupy part of her private state or even rob it of its riches!  A little princess with braids might not be able to do much to defend the Vaterland, but she had to try.  Himeko slipped inside the door with her bag, eyeing the bizarre sights which had suddenly populated her room.  Someone was here, and they were occupying half of the room with.. stuff.  Just stuff.  Just some girl with pink (pink!) hair deciding to take up residence here... wait, hadn't she heard something about a roommate from the dorm mother?

"Guten tag," she announced firmly after clearing her throat, "What reason have you for hanging... things ... in my room?"

The sound of the door opening and closing hadn't registered with Ayaka, as she was too busy gazing in awe at her masterpiece of a ship. So, naturally, when a voice came from behind her, she squeaked and spun around completely startled. She wasn't sure what was said to her, but it sounded almost... Klingon? But, no, this girl's aggressiveness seemed to be more Romulan than Klingon.

It was a this moment Aya realized that this girl was the one from the pictures on the other half of the room and processed what she had said. "Ah, you startled me! I'm just getting my decorations set up, I'm your roommate, Ayaka Inada!" There, introduction established. "Also, it's not a thing, its the USS Voyager, and don't worry, I made sure its only hanging over my side of the room. I'm still unpacking, so it may be a little messy for a bit but I'll try my best to get everything squared away as soon as possible!" She punctuated this rapid-fire ramble of information with a few calming hand gestures and while wracking her brain trying to remember what the paper with her roommate's name on it said.

The simple shock of having a roommate rather suddenly had prompted a fairly discourteous greeting in place of something more appropriate for a first meeting.  A bit of color flushed into Himeko's face as she immediately felt regret for her word choice.  Was that really any way to make a good first impression on someone whom she'd be spending a good amount of time around?  It might be best, to make up for that initial indiscretion, to listen carefully to what the newly arrived girl had to say.  Himeko took a deep breath, nodded to confirm the decision, and straightened up her posture to a more ladylike position.  She tried her best to follow along with every word that Aya spoke, but the best she could do was nod occasionally and feign understanding; it was nearly impossible to make out everything that the girl was saying.

Rather than asking questions for clarification that might just get more high speed responses, the singer took a look again at what had already been unpacked from her roommate's things.  None of it made a whole lot of sense to her - that laptop looked well traveled, whatever that ship type thing was certainly didn't appear to have any way to sail on the seas or fly in the sky.  Unless it had some kind of jet propulsion as its source of power, but that didn't appear to be the case.  As it'd be rude to just keep lingering in the doorway she gingerly strode into the room, past the new girl and over into her own side of the dwelling.  That gave her some solace after the bombardment of strange new things and persons, but she still felt a need to sit down.. or rather crash onto her bed, bouncing a couple of times before she steadied herself.   Ah, the safety and security of her little Kaiserreich!  All of her family members, the royal ancestors, and even Otto von Bearsmarck watching over her and giving her the strength to conduct the affairs of state.

"Hm.. all right then.  I'm sorry for being gruff with you, Inada-san," Himeko replied with a more friendly expression than before, "My name is Himeko Wilhlemina Wittelsbach, but something shorter is fine by me.. Himeko alone is okay.  I was surprised to see anyone else in my dorm room since I've been studying here for a while without a roommate.. or guests in my room, other than Otto von Bearsmarck here...   If there's anything I can do to help you get settled in, I would be delighted!"

The little pinkette was certain she wasn't making the best first impression, but then again, she rarely did. Still, it probably would have been better to not get defensive about her model. No, scratch that, the Voyager was exactly the thing to get defensive about, it was a beautiful ship that she'd spent hours upon hours laboring over. Still, she couldn't help but feel her hackles raise a little as her roommate eyed her things, but relaxed when the girl finally entered the room.

Aya had taken that moment to return to her unpacking, she could chat while she put things in their proper places. Well, more accurately, where they were supposed to be but likely often wouldn't be. She slid the bottom drawer of the dresser open and started tossing her socks in rather haphazardly. "Ah, it's alright. I can imagine it was a bit of a surprise to get back and find your room unlocked." She flashed an apologetic smile.

Wait. What was the name? Aya's brain chugged to a halt as she tried to process the foreign sounds. "I, uh, I'll just call you Himeko, I have no idea how to pronounce the rest of that." Languages were not one of her strong points. Much like organization, skill in that region had always eluded her. Ineptitude in the field of language now established in front of her foreign roommate, probably worsening the already poor first impression she was fairly sure she was making, she continued unpacking, but nodded along to indicate she was understanding. Even if she didn't understand, like with the teddy bear's name.

"Thanks for the offer!" It was nice to know that she was willing to help out, Himeko seemed like she was a nice girl, not a Romulan like she'd first thought. "But for now I think the only thing that I really need is to finish unpacking. Which I got, don't worry about that. Although, I'd like if if you would tell me a bit about yourself. Might as well get to know each other if we're gonna be living together for a while."

A truly proud German princess probably would (and could) have insisted on her roommate learning to say her name properly.  It was only right that someone with such a strong name be referred to by that and not simply a portion of it; in another era, perhaps, she would have tried to get the other girl to say it.  However she knew that German words could be very difficult for a Japanese speaker to manage.  The 'v' and 'l' sounds in particular were a horrifying challenge for anyone who'd grown up speaking Japanese first - Himeko had vague recollections of her own early attempts to learn it.  All in all she was willing to cut the girl some slack, and at least there was an attempt to be friendly despite the difficulty with German.  Himeko did frown a little bit at the pinknette's remark about pronunciation but she elected to simply let it go rather than make a fuss.


"Ah, I see  The offer stands if you change your mind about needing help with anything," Himeko replied despite Aya's assurances, glancing up at the odd plastic models which the other girl had put up.  Definitely not the same tastes in interior decorating which the princess held; there was still an odd charm about them all the same.  Something oddly unknown and mysterious about them -  stories just waiting to be told by someone who was more of an expert on their origins; maybe she could get Aya to fill her in at some point, since they were going to be living together.

"As for myself.. I'm not sure just what to tell you about myself," she continued, brushing a braid over her shoulder as she offered, "I haven't been back in Japan for very long, just a few months for school here in Fukui.  Before that I grew up with my parents in Germany and went to schools there, so it's taking a while to get used to everything being in Japanese.  Even though I was born here, I'm more German than anything; my parents send me letters and things from Germany sometimes, but I'm kind of alone here... anyway, I'm taking classes on the performing arts track with singing!   How about you?"

A grateful smile was sent the roommate's way at the reiteration of the offer to help Aya settle in. She'd probably need to take her up on that at some point. Aya kept unpacking as Himeko spoke, working on filling the dresser and closet, but still paying fairly close attention. It didn't take that long to empty the suitcase that held her clothes, mostly because Aya didn't have a ton of stuff in there to begin with. It was a byproduct of preferring simple, comfortable clothes and not coming from much in the way of wealth, which seemed to be the opposite of her roommate's story.

Sitting back down on the bed to take a bit of a break and just chat, Aya shared a sympathetic smile with Himeko. "I'm on the writing track, don't have much talent for the rest of what the school offers," she started, a bit self-deprecating but also honest. "But I wouldn't mind taking a few music classes while I'm here. School aside, I'm from Japan, though a bit further north than here, tiny little town up in Yamagata Prefecture, and when I say tiny I mean as in nobody native to Japan has ever heard of it tiny. Still, I'm kinda in the same boat as you, I don't know anyone at this school, and I don't have much in the way of friends back home."

Aya was rather hoping she and Himeko could be friends, and not just because they were sharing a space. "Still, don't have it quite as rough as you do, what with having to learn a new language and all that. Must have been a pretty difficult transition to being out here. If you need help with something, you can just ask. Can't promise I'll have the answer, but I'll try."