2025-07-05: Reaching Out, Falling Away
- Log: 2025-07-05: Reaching Out, Falling Away
- Cast: Yukari Takeba, Minako Arisato
- Where: Iwatodai Dorm
- OOC Date: July 05, 2025
- IC Date: June 14, 2012
- Summary: After the briefing, Minako goes to check on Yukari. They talk and start to bond, but that proves to be the problem for both of them.
<Pose Tracker> Yukari Takeba has posed.
The common room is quiet again. Everyone is prepping for the upcoming operation. Yukari's seated upon the couch, a quiver at her side. She's in the middle of the ritual of prepping her bow. It's not the same one she uses for school.
Certainly, if she held it in town, an officer might wonder if she were breaking the law. It takes, somewhat longer to string this more sleek, modern looking metal recurve.
It's not her preference, she learned Kyudo archery, but it doesn't matter. The draw strength was more powerful... and she could hold nothing back against Shadows.
It's much like being in SEES, isn't it? She doesn't enjoy it...
... but she's also always the first, or one of the first ones ready nearly every operation. Her pink cardigan is on again, with the S.E.E.S. armband encircling her right bicep... it's still pretty hot even this time of night... but she has it on.
It gets cold during the Dark Hour, and she wants to be prepared.
"It's nothing new..." She murmurs to herself, as she strings the bow. She wasn't in SEES to make friends, even if she was relieved there were more girls staying here now.
That they all hate her... or at least should hate her? She's used to that idea... she has been for years, as the daughter everyone blames for what happened years ago.
<Pose Tracker> Minako Arisato has posed.
Minako comes into the common room, with her naginata over her back -- there's a little strap that lets her hold it across her back when she doesn't carry it. She pauses, a moment, as she looks at the bow in Yukari's hands. She doesn't know archery that well. This one still strikes her as more modern.
She looks up from the bow to the pink cardigan, and then Yukari herself. For Minako's part, she has her winter uniform coat on. Her S.E.E.S. armband is, likewise, on her bicep.
'Nothing new,' Minako says.
She approaches, then she smiles. Always smiling, even when she feels frustrated. She feels frustrated right now.
"Hey, Takeba-chan," she says. "Looks like you're about ready?"
<Pose Tracker> Yukari Takeba has posed.
As Minako approaches, Yukari pulls the bow taut, and finishes adjusting the cams on the end. With a look of satisfaction, she slowly nods.
"Yeah... I'm ready." As she takes a breath, "It won't be much longer now."
...
She looks up, and straight at Minako's smile, and that takes her aback, the contradiction - that image - to her mood.
To the mood Minako has.
"Come on..." Those two words are said in essence like 'Good Grief', like it's shocking to her, "...how can you be smiling like that... after everything that just happened?"
She's looking straight at her face, and indeed, actually looks shocked. Ordinarily, she wouldn't press, but right now, after all that, "I really don't get it... or you. I kinda tore into your brother... and those other two too, if I'm being honest, is this you trying to be professional as our co-leader, or what?"
There's a prolonged sigh, "You really don't have to you know, to prove... you'll still work with me or something. You can just... be mad."
That'd be way easier for her.
<Pose Tracker> Minako Arisato has posed.
"Should be soon," Minako agrees as she approaches.
Minako's smile falters a little, for just a moment, when Yukari looks at her -- and says all of that. She hesitates for a second, before she walks closer. She looks down at the sofa. "Is it all right if I sit down?"
She does hesitate for a moment before she responds. "I'm a little mad at you. And I'm a little mad at him," she says. "But... what he said, it wasn't great. And... I get why you might be frustrated. A little, at least."
She sighs, her crimson eyes glancing to the side. "...Besides, when I'm mad, I don't like to keep it bottled up. It doesn't do me any good, especially before a mission that's dangerous."
<Pose Tracker> Yukari Takeba has posed.
"Sure."
She allows, at least glad that Minako's smile faltered some. If it had remained... unflappable even then, she's not sure what she would do. How she would take it.
"Good." She interjects, softly to the idea that Minako is a little mad... but... Minako continues, and she lets her have her say, as she sets her bow down with the quiver.
And places her hands upon her lap. She looks upon Minako as she indicates she doesn't like keeping it bottled up... part of her might argue she kinda is, right now??? A little??
But - at least... she's trying to justify it. Weighing something with her gaze, uncertain how to take... all of this.
And then...
"It wasn't what he said, not really." She admits, as her posture turns in more upon itself. "I'm... scared. If he keeps fighting like this, only because someone asked him to... without any regard for himself."
There's a subtle pinch of her fingers against her skirts, as she looks down and away, not able to meet her gaze.
"He's going to get himself killed."
And Yukari doesn't want him to die - especially not because... not because... she was too weak. Because she needed him to save her.
"And the others, they're as bad as Junpei-kun... the day he got here, smiling like a fool - like he thought he was going to be some superhero. Both of them think 'You saved me, so now I'll return the favor' 'I can do this too' or 'I have to help' or 'I can't let anything happen.'"
A beat.
"But this operation... for their first time in Tartarus... to save a girl we don't even know is alive. They have no idea how risky it'll be. The way this is going down... both of them could be dead before they even had any real idea what they're committing to."
A beat.
"I hate it... but it's not like I can do anything about it."
<Pose Tracker> Minako Arisato has posed.
Minako takes a seat next to Yukari. She glances sideways -- and there's a blink when Yukari says it's good that she's still mad. A blink, and then a small laugh. "Good? I'm a little surprised."
She doesn't belabor the point, though. It's tempting -- just have a few jokes, just forget what's happening. But she wants to try to help Yukari.
So she listens.
Her smile doesn't stay on her face, as the other girl explains. Minako's lips part, her expression becoming more worried. The lip gloss that Yukari got her glints on them.
'He's going to get himself killed.'
"...I'm worried about him, too," Minako says. Her voice is quiet. "I--I'm not... not sure why he is here, either. And I..."
'He's going to get himself killed.'
"...I don't think you were wrong to stop him," she says. "I don't think he'd want to hear me say that, though. I don't... really know why he's here, either. I still need to talk to him."
Minako glances, once, to the side. She starts to say more. To say that she just got him back; that it must be so terribly selfish of her, to be glad that Yukari stopped him. But those words won't come.
So she smiles, instead. "...Yeah," she says. "They're doing something very risky. But..." She looks up at the ceiling. Minako looks thoughtful, for a second.
"I don't know what to think, exactly. This is the sort of thing I'd have never believed until April. I don't have some 'right' way to handle it," she says. "But I think... if they to help, if they want to go in there..."
She looks back at Yukari. "...I can't stop them. I'm..." She hesitates. "I'm scared too. They've shown they can be reckless, already. So the best thing I can do is to be there for them. To pick them back up, if they fall down, and try to keep the worst from happening."
<Pose Tracker> Yukari Takeba has posed.
A little surprised?
Yukari almost says something but... no, she shouldn't explain there. "Forget it. It's nothing."
It'd freak her out if Minako wasn't at least a little mad about chewing out her brother... because well...
... but the conversation shifts, and Minako indicates she doesn't know either, Yukari herself looking up, startled, "Even you don't know?" Even in the aftermath, she's just - astounded. But then that look starts to fade.
"Well... I guess, that's not too surprising. It's not like every family is close."
She just, thought the two of them were closer than that. "I guess he is a little hard to get along with, even for you." MOST people would say he's too easy to get along with.
Not her.
It's at least good to know Minako can be scared. There were times when she wasn't sure... she's too calm sometimes. And as she thinks about the statement.
"It's not like I think... there's a right way to handle finding this out, what you do next."
She herself doesn't know the right way to live... she thinks she's so apart from other people. "But, I do think that people should give it more thought when they're... making a decision like this. A decision to fight, and risk their lives..."
There's a shake of her head. "Is a reason like... feeling like you owe your life, because it was saved good enough? Not everyone becomes a police officer or a fire fighter if they save their lives as kids... but because it's us fighting monsters... and because they want to feel special... suddenly they're all in for trading their lives away. They... shouldn't treat it like some kid's show."
...
"If they fall down on this operation... there might not be time to someone to get them back up again. Is it... really worth that?"
Everyone should have a purpose for being here, that's what she thinks.
"I guess... I don't think it is, but - it's not up to either of us." She says, softer, trailing off into self-recriminations.
<Pose Tracker> Minako Arisato has posed.
"We're close," Minako says. She almost snaps it -- there's a cool, angry look in her eyes when she does. It fades after a moment, before she looks down. "...we had to live apart since we were twelve, when our aunt and uncle separated."
Her voice is quieter. She sounds more embarrassed, for briefly losingher cool. "So there's... stuff I--I mean, I talk to him, it's just..."
She sighs. She feels embarrassed then, as she looks down. "...I'm trying to make up for the years they stole from--" Her cheeks heat up. "...the lost time."
She said too much. She pulls in on herself, a little; she pulls her legs onto the couch.
Then she looks sideways at Yukari. She considers what she says, for a second, about them feeling like they owe their life. Minako hesitates for a second. She thinks back to a bridge, when she was a child. To crawling out of a car; to feeling throbbing pain in her leg; to the feeling of slick blood on her hands and knees; to seeing her brother, standing aone.
She smiles.
"...I don't think they feel like they owe their life," Minako says. "I think... they're looking at how they survived, when people they'll never know about surely didn't."
Her fingers curl about the hem of her skirt. "I think it's easy to want..." She thinks again of watching her brother standing alone, in the midde of that bridge, and never knowing exactly what happened to him.
"...to want to be there, the way someone was for you," Minako finishes, quietly. "Or even... the way someone wasn't. And to put a brave face on it."
<Pose Tracker> Yukari Takeba has posed.
Yukari is perhaps a little surprised when Minako asserts that they're close, enough to almost snap it, but her expression becomes contemplative afterwards, "Right..."
She doesn't drawl it enough to be overtly rude, but it doesn't necessarily sound like she's... fully agreeing with Minako either.
But her expression does soften as she hears her talk about it in sympathy, but it's not long before... jealousy creeps in.
It's an ugly side of her, and a side she knows well exists.
For a while, she bathes in that ugly emotion, but something does stand out to her, "... I... who's 'They'? Your relatives?"
Yukari did after all, read their file, she admitted it to both of them. But she never got the impression that years were stolen from them - or they resented their family for it.
She's not sure what Minako means here.
It makes sense to resent being away from each other but...
Yukari can't know the exact circumstances of what happened that day, and what Minako says...
"I guess... that makes sense..." And indeed, she can understand that question, that same question she asked about her Father.
Not why Yukari lived.
But why he died. Why everyone could so easily move on.
"... but..."
Is that what she's doing? Because no one was there for her? She's putting on a brave face? ... No.
"...I don't think I can relate to that." She admits quietly and closes her eyes. She told Minako earlier that she could relate to her - but now, she's not so sure.
Not in this regard, and not in the way she smiles.
She doesn't want to be there for anyone. That's not the way she lives...
... she just doesn't want anyone to die.
"Sorry... guess I'm being kind of a downer."
<Pose Tracker> Minako Arisato has posed.
Minako feels -- for just a moment -- embarrassed. Shame, even, wells up in her. She shouldn't have snapped angrily like that. Her left hand's fingers curl, tightly, around the bicep of her right arm. Like if she squeezes herself tightly enough, it will wake her up.
She sounds a little distant, when Yukari asks a question. "Yeah," she finds herself saying. "It's... not really their fault. Our surviving grandmother, she was too old to care for us both. So she took me, and an uncle took Minato-kun, and..."
She trails off. "...it's... just the way it is, I guess."
She falls quiet, though, and looks sideways at Yukari. She watches her close her eyes, and that makes her hesitate for a moment. The way she speaks -- the way she sounds...
The way she sounds unhappy.
Minako hesitates for a second, when she sees that. But only a second; she is a creature of impulse, and she finds an impulse stronger than the others. So, carefully, she reaches out with a hand. Instead of squeezing her own arm, until it's painful, she puts a hand on Yukari's forearm.
And she gives it a gentle, friendly squeeze. "Don't talk about yourself that way," she says. "Even if you're feeling down... I'd rather hear the real you, than have you hide what you're feeling. And even if we're both feeling sad..."
She leans closer, peering her head around to look at Yukari. "...We'll always be able laugh later, eh, Takeba-han?"
<Pose Tracker> Yukari Takeba has posed.
Yukari looks at her reaction, but startled as she was - she doesn't blame her for it. She was after all... commenting on something deeply personal. Something that was none of her business.
She'd get mad too.
It took a lot to get anger out of her... didn't it? Maybe she really does bottle things up... Yukari thinks.
As she talks about her family, Yukari thinks on it for a moment. It's... different from her.
Her Mom went from being someone she loved - to being like a stranger to her. But even if her Mom deserves that resentment...
"Hmmm... well even if it's not their fault... I don't think it's wrong to resent them or anything." Yukari implies gently, "At that age... you need somewhere for that feeling to go, or it would just drive you crazy."
... that doesn't mean she can't understand how it would feel. "If I had someone I cared that much about and was separated from them... I don't know what I'd do."
She still doesn't... death is the ultimate separation, but at least she had a target to resent.
Then, as she hits those emotional doldrums - waiting - waiting for the Dark Hour to come. "Eh?" She straightens somewhat as Minako puts a hand on hers.
Looking at her like she's not sure what to do with someone touching her like that, then gradually, she relaxes.
"The real me? Seriously?" There's a sigh, but then at least - something like a smile, "I don't think you really want that, but - I guess it's kinda funny that you think you-"
Minako leans in though and-
'Yukari-han'
Yukari's mouth is still a little open, looking at her in complete incredulity, and then... she starts laughing, "What was that?" She keeps laughing for a bit, before putting her hand on her mouth, and manages to smother it.
"Come onnnn, we're right before an operation. Get serious, Arisato-chan." She complains, perhaps she doth complain too much, "I thought you were worried if someone else could hear it! Someone could hear you right here! Someone could hear me! What'll they even think I'm laughing about right now-! Geezzzzz." She puts her face behind a hand, "But... I guess..."
She takes another moment to compose herself, "... thanks." She says, managing a smile again, even if it thins out, "You really didn't have to, especially because... I get the feeling, you needed something like this more than me..."
Cheering someone up?
... Oh... No...
She means... being cheered up.
<Pose Tracker> Minako Arisato has posed.
"Yeah," Minako says. "Yeah, that's... that's true. I needed some place. And being angry at... a twist of fate, I guess. That's a lot harder." She sighs a little bit, before she looks at Yukari. Separated from someone she cares so much about.
She smiles a little, then. "I hope you don't have to," she says, sincerely.
Even if a little part of her whispers: that's how it always goes. Everyone loses someone they care about.
But it's easy to not think about that, when her hand is on Yukari's wrist. She smiles, and then there is a little relief to see Yukari smile back. And then her smile breaks into a grin when Yukari starts laughing.
"I'm totally serious, Takeba-han," Minako says, with a giggle of her own. She pulls her hand away to cover her mouth as she laughs, too.
It takes her a second to stop. But, when she does, she is still smiling. "I didn't have to, but I wanted to," she says. "And..."
Oh.
Yukari catches what she was doing. Minako blinks -- the smile fades, for a second -- before she closes her eyes and then reaches up, brushing some of her red hair to one side.
"...it'd be completely shameless to pretend otherwise," she says. "So... thank you, too, Takeba-chan."
<Pose Tracker> Yukari Takeba has posed.
"A twist of fate... huh?"
Yukari at least can relate to that. Even if she's learning there's things she can't relate to about Minako, she can go back to square one.
They're both angry over - what they lost - their circumstances after. Separation. It makes talking with Minako decisively more and less complex in that moment.
If they're the same then... but... it's not exactly true either...
Whereas what Minako says, "Thanks. I guess... well- it's not something I think we need to worry about really. I don't have - time for that kind of thing with what we do... you know?"
It's a lie - well, mostly a lie. It's an excuse papering over the fact that she just tells herself 'I'll never let anyone get close - so that I won't ever have to be separated from them.'
"Pff-snrk!" She almost loses it again at the next 'Han', "Hey come on... quit it." She complains a little. "If Kawase-san or Fukura-san sees us carrying along like this they're gonna blow their stack again right before the operation starts."
And then...
... she admits it and... she closes her eyes for a time, takes a deep breath and...
... then opens her eyes again, "Don't thank me..."
She tells her softly, "Really... you shouldn't. Think about it. I made everything harder for you. I hurt your brother's feelings... you're gonna lead a bunch of people into this that aren't going to be their best selves, because I started a huge argument right before the mission."
Then there's a small shake of her head, "And you're down here cheering me up ... when you deserve someone who can do that for you."
The opportunity for her is right there... for her... but...
"... maybe Junpei-kun's available."
... she's too scared at what it means, if she reciprocates here. She can't let herself do that.
<Pose Tracker> Minako Arisato has posed.
Minako's crimson eyes blink. She catches the lie -- the notion that Yukari doesn't have time to get to know people -- and she doesn't press, right away. She files that away, for now, because she doesn't know it for a lie, exactly. She just doesn't think it's true.
And besides, she giggles again when Yukari does. Minako laughs. "Sorry, sorry," she says. "You have a point."
She falls quiet, though. She sees Yukari close her eyes and take that deep breath. She doesn't know her well enough to know what to expect. But she makes eye contact when Yukari opens her eyes.
Her smile falters, then it's gone. Her eyes look to the side. She is quiet for a moment. There's a moment of hesitation -- a moment where she feels hurt. She feels angry. She feels sad.
She feels betrayed.
So she looks Yukari right in the eye, and there's a tension around her crimson eyes. She looks like she might be about to cry. But, instead, that warm smile comes across her face.
"It's okay, Takeba-chan." She stands up, then she looks down at her. "I don't mind being here for you. And besides..."
Just a hint of hurt enters her voice, despite her best efforts. But she keeps smiling.
"...I've gotten good at cheering myself up."
<Pose Tracker> Yukari Takeba has posed.
The sorrow, the betrayal. Yukari can see it. And indeed, she wishes she couldn't... but that's the thing about Yukari Takeba.
Once she sees something, she can't look away. She'll just have to deal with the knowledge that she did this.
She hurt her.
This is why she doesn't get close or open up to people, because... she can't be that person for them, she can't meet their expectations. Seeing the way Minako smiles... after seeing the way she looks like she wants to cry.
It makes her want to cry too, but... instead. She slowly picks up her quiver, and her bow, somehow keeping her face composed. She's not sure how, "Don't give me that."
... and stands up, and glances her way...
"...because...no it's not."
She really hurt her feelings, but she accepts it. "And honestly..." There's a shift in her voice, and in that moment at least, it sounds sympathetic, "...it sounds like you actually really suck at it."
She thinks about something she said to Junpei once about Minato.
'Living like that? It must be very lonely.'
"Maybe you two are even more alike than I thought..."
She walks away then, she has to, because if she follows that thought to it's logical conclusion.
She'll end up crushing her feelings even more.
<Pose Tracker> Minako Arisato has posed.
Minako watches Yukari, until she says she stands up with her face composed. Is she even upset? Is she hurting? Minako feels like her heart is in a vice. Like--
She swallows, hard, and looks to the side. She makes herself look away. Then she flinches at the remark.
Maybe she does suck at it.
"...I'll see you at the mission," she says, and she tries to keep it calm. There's still a waver to her voice when she speaks, though. Yukari walks one way -- and she walks another.
As Yukari leaves the room, Minako leans her head against the doorframe. Her eyes squeeze shut.
But she doesn't let herself cry.