2026-02-25: Intel for Ogre
- Log: Intel for Ogre
- Cast: Hyousuke Suzuki, Ichika Kawase
- Where: Kasugayama High School
- OOC Date: 2026-02-25
- IC Date: Mon Oct 01 2012
- Summary: Hyousuke calls Ichika to Kasugayama's rooftop to share a crucial piece of information on Jun's whereabouts, and to try and formulate a plan for the coming battle. Though the topic of the Joker Killer's true motives causes some confusion, both come away resolved to put an end to everything and get their friend back.
<Pose Tracker> Hyousuke Suzuki has posed.
Once more, Hyousuke found himself atop the roof of Kasugayama High. Once more, he found himself leveraging his reputation, his build, and a fierce glare accented by a deep scar to ward off anyone that might have thought to spend their lunch there. He didn't much like having to force back friends looking for somewhere private to eat, or ambitious students looking to confess to their crushes, but the business he had with Ichika was as important as it was sensitive. He couldn't risk there being prying ears, and it simply could not wait any longer.
> got a lead on kashihara-san
> meet me on the roof
The text had been short and simple, reading more like an instruction than an invitation, but he could not wait any longer to pass on that information. He only regretted that only one person was there to hear him give it. There was no time to organise a get-together and figure out niceties, however, and Ichika would have to do for now. A long, rattling, sigh escaped him as he once more reflected on the reality of the situation, and just how dire things were getting.
"Working with a demon..." He murmured quietly to himself. "...Fucking hell, I must be desperate."
<Pose Tracker> Ichika Kawase has posed.
Ichika doesn't care that much about intimidating some folks. The rooftop is prime real estate!
...But she is in a good mood, despite the news being of Jun Kashihara, about whom she's very worried.
> You got it.
Ichika doesn't even mind the presentation; she walks up onto the rooftop at the appointed time, and hears Hyousuke muttering to himself as she does.
"...Demons have useful intel sometimes," she points out. "If you can get it from them without being eaten, anyway."
"What's up?"
<Pose Tracker> Hyousuke Suzuki has posed.
Hyousuke started a little, clearly not expecting to have her hear his musings. He did not bother hiding his surprise, instead choosing to force himself to settle quickly so that they could get to the matter at hand.
"Or if it's not a trap." He mentioned, echoing Ririka's sentiment, in his own roundabout way. He saved whatever wry remarks had been brewing, however, and moved on to what he deemed important. "You remember I said I was going to check something out with Uchida-san the other day? We got something. A Fairy told us where the Joker Killer might be keeping Kashihara-san."
As he had with Fuuka and Ririka, Hyousuke slipped a sheet of paper from his bag, and held it out for Ichika to peruse. For the most part, it was a list of printed notes he himself had taken - little of which was useful, less of which was actionable. The section near the top was the important point, however - it was what the Fairy had said, written down to keep him from forgetting.
> "The Old Maid isn't the 'true' Joker, and the pretender has spirited away the original to 'awaken' from this dream we all reside in."
> "A tall building, but an abandoned flat. Many people used to reside there, but the Old Maid plans to fill it with new nightmares given form. What better way to wake up again than by a terrible fright?"
"We think he's being held in an abandoned apartment building, but the Fairy didn't say which." Hyousuke said, after giving Ichika some time to take the information in. "Finding which building that is ain't gonna be the only problem though. From the sounds of it, we're gonna have to fight our way through if we want to get anywhere near the killer *or* Kashihara-san."
<Pose Tracker> Ichika Kawase has posed.
Ichika's here now, anyway. "True," she agrees about traps. And then, hegoes right into it, and she nods. She looks a little surprised herself--that's some lead!
But she looks over the paper, the section near the top...
"The true' Joker...? A dream?"
She hands back the paper. "Well. That's pretty actionable, I guess."
Not which... Hrm. Ichika nod thoughtfully. "...Yeah. So it's not something we can do half-cocked," she says.
"We're going to need a plan, enough people to carry it out, and enough cool to stick to it."
<Pose Tracker> Hyousuke Suzuki has posed.
Given Hyousuke's tendency to rush blindly in by himself, and lose his cool the second he was in an actual fight, few would have been blamed for expecting him to rail against Ichika's assessment. However, he remained remarkably calm, and even nodded at her - albeit reluctantly.
"I hate waiting around, but you're right. The whole building's gonna be packed with demons, and that's before we even take on the Killer himself. We go in with just a few of us, we're not gonna make it past the first floor. Your sister and one of her friends said the same thing when I told them about all this."
Hyousuke hesitated a little before bringing up that he'd spoken to Ririka first, but quickly decided against obscuring her involvement. She'd shown up at the Palace, after all. If that wasn't proof that she could could take care of herself, he didn't know what else could be done to show it.
"I'm hoping numbers aren't gonna be a problem here. They said they could bring backup with them, and it looked at the gallery like Uchida-san's got some people she can call in too. And if Ogre can talk to her friends..."
He considered what else there was to share, then continued.
"Your sister and her friend - a Navigator, I think she said - are trying to figure out which building we're attacking, but we haven't got much of a plan yet. We figured a distraction'd help clear a path for another group to grab Kashihara-san, but that's all we got." Hyousuke didn't sound pleased to admit it, but they had precious little information to work with. Part of him was surprised they'd even managed a semblance of a plan, though that was perhaps his decidedly un-strategic brain talking. "As for the rest, I've got nothing. They thought that it might mean the Joker Killer's trying to Awaken Kashihara-san, but we couldn't figure out a reason *why* he'd even bother with that. All I know's that whatever his plan is, it's gonna get a lot of people hurt. Or worse."
<Pose Tracker> Ichika Kawase has posed.
"Right," Ichika agrees. But--her sister and a friend? Ichika frowns thoughtfully. "So she's already involved..."
"She's got a lot of good friends," Ichika says of her sister. "I think you're right. We can get numbers."
A Navigator. Ichika's familiar with the term, these days.l But, "So..."
"In my experience, anyway--the demons are gonna be an obstcle, but we're unlikely to get them all on our asses," she says. "They don't, like, work together that much."
She considers a little further. "If Ririka-chan thinks that, she might be right. She's really smart."
"So we bust in with a group, keep focused on saving Jun-kun, and maybe that means we can stop the plan."
"it's weird though... from what you said, it looks like the demons think Jun-kun is this 'original'. But how does that make sense? He's never had a Persona."
"...Well, I guess we're not gonna figure it out, we're not the smart ones. But we should keep it in mind, in case."
<Pose Tracker> Hyousuke Suzuki has posed.
"She was at the art show." Hyousuke said flatly. "I had a feeling she was gonna get herself involved either way. Besides, I've got a couple of people up at Gekkoukan that I wanted to pass this information onto - I figured it would've gotten back to her sooner or later, so I wanted to give it to her directly." He paused a moment, then cocked his head a little, frowning slightly as he looked to one side. "Besides, it's like you said. She's smart. We don't know if that *is* what the Joker Killer's planning, but it's our best guess."
Hyousuke crossed his arms as he mused about the rest of the situation, and looked back at Ichika while he spoke.
"As for the demons, they might not be working together, but they're probably gonna be working *against* us. If the building's full of them, it's gonna be a fight just finding out where Kashihara-san *is.* Joker Killer's finally got what he wanted, and even if he's not expecting us to kick the door down in the middle of the night, he's probably got plans to deal with us if we don't deal with *him* quick. Might have to rely on those Navigators to do a little more tracking once we're in. You haven't got any friends like that, have you?"
He was, of course, entirely unaware of Hibari's status as one, or of the Thieves' lack thereof.
"Still... Even if we don't figure out *what* the Killer's plan is, I can't stop thinking about it. I mean, why's it gotta be Kashihara-san? What's he the 'original' of? Like you said, he doesn't even have a Persona. Hell, he didn't even seem to know the Killer past that sick fuck being obsessed with him." Hyousuke considered it, then shook his head. "...I dunno. Maybe he's just crazy, and trying to understand it's not worth trying. He's got our friend though, and that's all that I care about."
<Pose Tracker> Ichika Kawase has posed.
"Probably," Ichika says of Ririka involving herself. "I'd rather she get involved in the jump than have to chime in later where nobodoy planned for her. ...She's not abd at this stuff or anything. There's some things i'd rather not get her involved with..."
"But for this, that ship's sailed."
The rest... "Yeah, definitely. It's gonna be a fight. But I mean, we don't have to wipe out all the demons--is my point. We just need to punch a way through."
"Ririka-chan's Persona is like that," she says of Navigators. "And she's got at least one friend who is. I think they'll cover us." She does know Mujina--but you don't keep other peoples' secrets by volunteering them!
"I don't know," Ichika admits of the plan. "If we could understand, it would give us a big advantage--we'd be able to predict him. ...But I have a feeling we won't know until it's too late to deal with it by any means but hitting him as hard as we can."
"If the others find him, let me know--I..."
She shakes her head. "I haven't told Ririka-chan that I have a Persona," she says. "The stuff I get up to, I don't wnat her to be an accomplice if something goes wrong."
<Pose Tracker> Hyousuke Suzuki has posed.
Though he didn't say anything - and showed little more than a slight twitch of his lips - Hyousuke felt a small pang of guilt when Ichika mentioned not wanting to involve Ririka with certain things. He certainly didn't feel regret, for reasons he'd stated aloud, but hearing her response left him feeling like perhaps he could have been more delicate about the whole affair. Still, it was like she'd said. The ship had sailed. He was glad of the shift to the topic of the plan itself, and whatever it was the Joker Killer had in store. That, he supposed, was something he was far more comfortable touching on.
"Hitting him? *That,*" Hyousuke said emphatically, "I can do. Maybe someone can figure out what's going on once we're done getting our friend out of there, but I don't think any of us are going to figure it out right now. Hell, until your sister and her friend are done scouting, we won't even know where he is. I'll let you know as soon as I hear back from them though. I'm pretty sure they're gonna be heading over here during the Dark Hour - might not be tonight, but it's probably soon."
A small tip-off for Ichika, to make sure she was not caught unawares. Forewarned was forearmed, after all, especially when it came to hiding things from one's siblings.
Ichika's reasoning for not telling Ririka of her own Awakening gave Hyousuke pause, and caused his gaze to drift upwards in thought. The pause was a long one, extending beyond hesitation to the point where it was clear he needed to consider his answer carefully.
"She's smart." Hyousuke said offhandedly, trying to keep as level a demeanour as possible, and sound as neutral as he could. He didn't want to sound judgemental - not in the slightest - but what he thought, he could not hold back. "You're smart too. Way smarter than me, at least." He supposed it wasn't a particularly high bar to clear, but decided to leave the particularly self-deprecating remarks for later. "But I think she's probably gonna figure something out sometime. Don't get me wrong, I'm not telling you to tell her. That's for you to decide. But if you're gonna keep secrets, you'd better get ready for when she starts asking tough questions."
<Pose Tracker> Ichika Kawase has posed.
Ichika isn't upset with Hyousuke; this is one of those things she's not going to be able to spare her sister from, and that's fine. ...Ririka chose to fight the supernatural, after all. It's not her place not to tell her to do it at all.
Ichika grins at Hyousuke. "Yeah. That's something you're real good at." But, "Cool. The Dark Hour... Well, if it's in Hirasaka, I know the layout around here anyway."
Still...
She's smart? Well, ichika knows better than to argue with compliments outright, but she can't help but be skeptical. As to that, though...
"I'm ready," Ichika says. "Maybe one day I will--she knows I'm wrapped up in all this stuff, anyway--but..."
"I want to avoid it, for now."
"...Anyway," Ichika says, "Thanks for the heads-up."
<Pose Tracker> Hyousuke Suzuki has posed.
Telling Ririka was Ichika's fight, not his. Hyousuke knew that. He could have all the feelings and thoughts he wanted on the matter, but at the end of the day, it was not his business unless either of them made it his business. So, despite wishing he was wise and delicate enough to offer some sage advice or a comforting word, he simply nodded firmly in response, and offered a low "Alright." He unfolded his arms a little after he'd spoken, and though they did not quite hang by his sides, they seemed a little looser - a scant bit more relaxed.
"I know I don't need to ask this, but get the word out. We need everyone we can get on this. I'm gonna take care of some things in the meantime, but if you hear anything - *anything* - let me know."