2026-03-11: Knowing Why
- Log: <Your log's title.>
- Cast: Hyousuke Suzuki. Ichika Kawase
- Where: Alaya Shrine
- OOC Date: 2026-03-11
- IC Date: Mon Oct 08
- Summary: Following his outburst during the fight at the sanitarium, Hyousuke seeks Ichika's counsel on how to deal with Minako and Moriko requiring answers of him. But cracks soon begin to form in his usual facade, running far too deep for him to hide...
<Pose Tracker> Hyousuke Suzuki has posed.
It was not uncommon for Hyousuke to ask for a favour. Recommendations for one thing or another, assistance with hauling around boxes or stacks of paperwork, clarification on some academic topic that he could not quite parse - menial tasks, in the grand scheme of things. Far less common was it for him to ask for help. Not for assistance, a favour, a hand, or any other such things, but help. Yet, against his better judgement, he had asked Ichika to take a trip with him to Alaya Shrine once their respective businesses at school had been concluded for the day, because he needed her help.
Hyousuke had long since concluded the customary rituals. The bowing, clapping, and token offering had all been performed to an acceptable standard, and to any casual onlooker, it would have just seemed like he was a little clumsy. Perhaps that was true, on some level, but there was something deeper to it. The distant look in his eyes, interspersed with flashes of worry and the odd tensing of his jaw. The sluggish movements his limbs made, as though they were leaden, or being held aloft by strings held in an amateurish puppeteers hands.Then there was the way he sat upon the bench. He did not place himself upon it, but seemed to crumple into it instead.
As he had been on his previous visit to a different shrine entirely, Hyousuke still bore the telltale signs of injuries in the midst of healing. Enough time had passed that the more minor ones seemed to be on their way out. Small cuts had scabbed over and begun knitting themselves closed, bruises had faded into faint patches of blue, while what few scrapes he'd taken that had been serious enough to linger had dissipated into little more than scattered spots of pale red. It was the bandages that might have given someone worry. Most were hidden beneath his uniform, but still they peeked past his collar, and if the light hit his shirt at just the right angle, the outline of those wound about his chest might very well have become visible.
Hyousuke waited. He tapped his fingers against his thigh with one hand, and the other flexed while he gripped his knee. He wanted desperately to run - to pretend like nothing had ever happened. But it was too late for that. The meeting had been arranged, and all that was left was to face the music.
<Pose Tracker> Ichika Kawase has posed.
Ichika had a few things to take care of after school, so she couldn't go with Hyousuke immediately. She was down to meet, though. He needed her help...
That's a good enough reason for her. So, after she concluded school stuff, she went back to the dorm to get her car, and has since parked nearby and walked over to the shrine. Stepping onto the shrine grounds, she's stuck with a strange sense of melancholy...
"Hm," she wonders. She's still in uniform, a delinquent to the looks of her, and there, she sees--
"Hey, Hyousuke-kun," Ichika greets, closing the distance. "What's up?"
<Pose Tracker> Hyousuke Suzuki has posed.
It took a moment for Hyousuke to notice that Ichika was there. It took another for him to register that the look on his face was still a sombre and pensive one. Hastily, he arranged his features into a polite smile, but it was more reflex than conscious effort. His eyes looked in her direction, but seemed to stare through her, not at her. Nevertheless, he shuffled to the side a little, making room for her at the bench's far end if she had any inclination to take it.
"It's a long story." He said, trying to lighten the mood a little, only to fail miserably in his attempt.
A breeze rolled between them. Though as slow and meandering as any summer day's, the slight gust was cool, and a herald to the shifting seasons. Hyousuke wondered briefly if that was the reason such a melancholy air lingered around the shrine, or if it truly was a supernatural phenomenon. Soon after, he realised that he - unconsciously - had distracted himself from the topic at hand. So, he looked to the middle distance ahead, and began to speak.
"You remember me and Tsubasa went to go check out the sanitarium the other day?" He asked tentatively. The words came slowly - he had to force them out, lest they stick in his throat.
"While Tsubasa was getting people out, I went after the Joker Killer. But the Bride and some of her friends showed up to try and get him first, and we..." His hands had clasped together at some point. He didn't know when, but he didn't spare much thought for it either. It mattered little. Then and there, his fingers were knit together tight, until the knuckles were ghostly-pale. "...And Ryouhara was there. Our underclassman. We fought, and I had help, but..." He paused again. His tone wavered, his features contorted, and he looked down a little.
"...I lost it. I saw him, and I just... I saw *red.* The people with me - some of your sister's friends, I think - they backed me up, but when they saw how I was acting, they wanted answers about why. And now I... I feel like I owe them an explanation. They went in because I told them he was bad guy, but now they're wondering why, but I can't just *tell* them about Tsubasa-san getting kidnapped, and I-" Hyousuke paused, and swallowed, and his gaze lowered even further. Even the breeze went still as he cut himself off, and the silence that hung in the air was like that of the grave.
"I fucked up. I know I did." His voice was as small as he looked. He'd all but curled into himself, and his hair hung forward as his gaze met the stone path, unable to look her in the eye as he spoke. "They trusted me, but now they want answers I don't even know Tsubasa-san'll feel alright about me giving. And now, I- I don't know what I'm supposed to do."
<Pose Tracker> Ichika Kawase has posed.
The breeze is nice. But the Sanitarium...
"Yeah," Ichika says. She wasn't in the active party for that one; don't worry about it. She doesn't approach the shrine itself, meanwhile--she hasn't cleansed herself, after all--but does listen to Hyousuke... "The Bride," Ichika repeats. "...She makes me feel... worried."
"Oh." Ryouhara--the younger. They fought, but--
"Mm..."
"It's... pretty scary when you get mad like that," Ichika admits. "I'm not surprised theyw anted to know why."
"Nah," Ichika says. "You didn't fuck up. You can't help how you feel." A pause. "But," she says, "You should talk to Tsubasa about what they feel comfortable with you sharing. If you ask me, though..."
"You don't have to give them all the details--just that that boy hurt your really good friend, and you're still mad about it. Just say it's not your story to tell. They'll get it."
"If you can't talk to Tsubasa before you talk to them, then go with that. But like..."
"It's not gonna be a secret that we got issues with the guy. All they have to do is watch us interact with him."
<Pose Tracker> Hyousuke Suzuki has posed.
It was one thing to become some ravening monster on the battlefield, and inspire fear in those watching flesh and metal bear down upon them like a murderous tide. It was another to hear that it scared the people he fought alongside - the people he fought *for.* He couldn't bear to meet her gaze, or even lift his head to see if she had deigned to look towards him. His posture was hunched, his eyes remained fixed upon the stonework, and his expression seemed incapable of deciding whether it wished to be despondent, pensive, sombre, or something melding the three.
When she gave her thoughts on him 'fucking up,' he twitched. At least, that was what he claimed it was to himself, and would have claimed to anyone that thought to ask what that sudden tensing of his shoulders and tightening of his grip was. In truth - a truth he knew deep down, but refused to meet - it was a flinch. Suppressed and ignored, pushed through like he had so many other unpleasant thoughts and emotions, but a flinch nonetheless. As if he'd expected something far harsher, only to be met with something as gentle as the breeze cooling the thin fabric of the bandages that suddenly felt so much tighter.
"...I don't think they'd have asked if I hadn't gotten mad." Hyousuke said, after another lengthy silence. "He was getting in our way. Someone else - someone that looked like their leader - told him to leave, and I think we all knew he wasn't going to. There was gonna be a fight, whether we wanted it or not, and we would've been backing each other up either way." The words came quicker, but not out of ease. His speech was rushed, almost frantic, and sentences almost seemed to fall past his lips rather than drift from them.
"They only wanted answers because of how *I* acted. If it'd been anyone else, they could've kept their cool, or said something that'd stop them asking questions, or- or-" His speech guttered to an abrupt stop when the words caught in his throat. Hyousuke swallowed quietly, as if the motion would clear his mind and allow speech once more, but it did little. His mind was both blank and storming; rife with thoughts, but unable to summon anything coherent to the fore. When he did speak again, it was in a strained and uneasy tone, the words given more to fill the silence than to add anything meaningful. "It happened 'cause of me."
<Pose Tracker> Ichika Kawase has posed.
Ichika is looking at Hyousuke; she's not afraid right now. But he twitched... hmm.
"OK," Ichika answers. "I guess that's fair. If you feel like you messed it up... Then I can't tell you to feel diferently." In the way... someone else.
Hmm.
"I'm not sure that's all true," she admits, "But all right. Let's say it is," she says. Ichika is calm--resolute. She's sure of what she's saying.
"Then, if you fucked up..."
"What are you going to do about it? How are you going to avoid doing it next time?"
<Pose Tracker> Hyousuke Suzuki has posed.
For all the calm Ichika displayed, Hyousuke could not bring himself to seem any less tense. He inclined his head towards her some fraction of an inch, but doing so took monumental effort, and every muscle in his neck screamed to try and force him back. He kept quiet and waited, but it was not the quiet of someone awaiting their turn to speak. It was like he had been caught in the eerie silence before a storm, or trapped within its eye as he waited for the winds to come howling at him.
Then, the question. The answer was, on the surface, easy. 'Do not lose yourself to your rage.' He thought to himself, the solution proposed by the part of his mind still capable of some manner of logic. But the words would not come to his lips. They were lost to the clamouring shouts of his own mind, drowned out by cries that it was not possible, or that it was not needed, or that change would not be that easy. For the longest time, he said nothing, but his mind was a maelstrom.
"I... don't know." Hyousuke spoke eventually, as if only coming to that realisation in the moment. "I don't know what I'm supposed to do. I'm speaking to Marlowe-sensei, I'm trying to do stuff to clear my head more, I'm doing stuff that's productive and I thought it was working but I don't know if it is and-" Another screeching halt to a runaway train of thought. Hyousuke, as if on instinct, drew in a long and shaking breath. He held it, swallowed something back, then let free a rattling exhale.
"I just don't know."
<Pose Tracker> Ichika Kawase has posed.
Ichika is not howling; if she's to be the winds, then she won't be the storm today.
But Hyousuke doesn't know, and Ichika nods. He's talking to Julian, he's clearing his head...
"OK," Ichika says. "If it's that hard," she says, "Then it's not something you can just fix overnight, right? Things like that... they take time."
"So rely on your friends. We'll help you pick up the pieces when stuff like this happens."
"We all have our own stuff to deal with, so..."
<Pose Tracker> Hyousuke Suzuki has posed.
No matter how gently she assured him, Hyousuke could not bring himself to reciprocate. He was the very image of a hound backed into a corner, waiting for something - anything - to happen, muscles coiled tight like pressed springs in preparation for the worst. But the worst never came. Still air gave way to soft winds, and there was no deafening gale or vengeful storm. His brain told him that it would not come. Logic and context dictated that it could not. But it was a voice too weak to be heard above the din that wracked him, and even he was not sure if what little ease crept into his manner was genuine, or an act put on to try and keep the situation from devolving into something that forced him to show more vulnerability than he already had.
"I..." He began. Again, the words caught in his throat. But that time, the fact confounded him. It wasn't as though they were much different to the ones he'd spoken before. All he had to do was to say that he didn't know how. All he had to do was summon the will power - to scrape together whatever sparks and embers of it lingered within his tattered soul - and ask for help. She had offered it to him. He was certain that, if he asked for it from others, they would offer it too. All he had to do was say that he needed it.
"I... will."
The sparks sputtered. The embers faded. The fires of his will perished, smothered by the cold dark. The words died in his throat, and crumbled to ash. For all his conviction and prodigious willpower, he could not make that one simple request, and instead lied through his teeth.
"Thanks. I... Thanks. I'll talk with Tsubasa about it later, if they're free. If not, I'll... I'll just tell them what you told me. It's not my story to tell."
<Pose Tracker> Ichika Kawase has posed.
Ichika can't read Hyousuke's mind... but she can read his body language. He has difficulty with the idea. She gives him a sympathetic look, but isn't sure how to address that, and without knowing just what he's thinking, she can't come up with a solution.
"All right," she says. "I know that's not always easy... but it's important. Friendship goes both ways."
But Hyousuke thanks her. "...Sure," Ichika says. "Sounds good. People get that--and if they don't, well, that's their problem."
She pauses. "...You want me to drive you back to the dorm, or anything? You still seem kinda rough..."
<Pose Tracker> Hyousuke Suzuki has posed.
The words registered. He knew what they meant, and believed she was genuine. But he couldn't will himself forward and accept them. He let them linger on the air and in his mind, until they faded to silence, unaddressed save for a quiet grunt and an accompanying nod. She acknowledged that it wasn't easy, though. That much gave him some small manner of hope that she would at least be patient, and that - if he was supremely lucky - so would everyone else. When he shook his head, however, it wasn't out of pride, but practicality.
"Nah, that's fine. I'm not going back to the dorms yet - I've gotta see a doctor about this. Dunno how I'm gonna explain that I got cut up by a ninja though..."
He forced a chuckle at his halfhearted attempt at lightening the mood.
The laughter barely twitched his lips, and died before it could reach his eyes.
<Pose Tracker> Ichika Kawase has posed.
Ichika doesn't laugh. She didn't actually think it was funny. Instead she lifts an eyebrow. "...All right," Ichika allows. "I'm glad you're gonna see a doctor... you really should."
"Good luck, Hyousuke-kun. I'll see you around."
Ichika waves, and starts back down the way.
...That guy... He's really good at making her worry.