2026-08-07: Aces Wild
- Log: Aces Wild
- Cast: Isabeau Fontaine, Kanae Fuyuki
- Where: Shujin - Practice Building
- OOC Date: 2026-08-07
- IC Date: Fri Dec 21 2012
- Summary: Finals are over, and Yasushi moves in to comfort Isabeau about it... but Kanae interrupts him, and hears uncertainty from Isabeau which doesn't match the confidence of her parkour. Kanae makes a resolution; Isabeau manages an offer, before she bolts. Is this rivalry really a matter of idealism and cynicism...?
<Pose Tracker> Isabeau Fontaine has posed.
It's the last day of finals, and Isabeau...
... well, she's started going out with the heavy boy from 2-E, so perhaps that's her excuse for doing so poorly this time.
"How'd you do?" Yasushi asks, as he finds her coming out of her room.
"Do not ask me that," Isabeau scowls.
"Don't be like that," he encourages her, reaching for her hand. "C'mon. Let's get out of here."
To the practice building, that is -- dead quiet, right now, because there's no Tennis Practice during Finals. The giant court echoes with their footsteps, and Isabeau snaps: "You want to talk here? All Shujin will hear you through this microphone." She probably means megaphone, but she doesn't know the word for megaphone.
"Don't worry," he assures her, as he slides open the doors to one of the storage rooms where they keep all the things which go out there. "Come here. Whatever happened, we can figure it out..."
... and Isabeau, notably, follows him.
<Pose Tracker> Kanae Fuyuki has posed.
It's the last day of finals... and Kanae managed to compartmentalize well enough that she still did well. Anger clarified for her the fear she was also feeling, and helped her focus on the material she'd been studying all along. She's a very good student, and maybe that will be enough to save her reputation later. ...Probably not, though.
There is no Tennis practice today... but Kanae's been paying attention to the rumors about Isabeau, and as she walks past the practice building, she does indeed hear the giant court echoing. Kanae considers...
Still in uniform, she's avoiding her own 'boyfriend' for the moment. Instead, she walks along after, a little more quietly--
And then pokes her head into the storage room before the door closes. "Hey, Isabeau," Kanae says.
"You haven't introduced me to your guy."
She knows what she's probably interrupting.
That's fine.
<Pose Tracker> Isabeau Fontaine has posed.
And so, Kanae pokes her head in the door, and Yasushi's already got his arm around her, hand to her blushing cheek --
-- which at least means there's not as much room for her to cross before she barks, pale face quite red: "KANAE, DO YOU MIND?! YOU LITTLE --"
She barks that in French, but Yasushi can at least pick up one word.
"Hey, hey," he says, tugging at her shoulder to stop her from descending upon Kanae. "That's not how we do things, here, remember?"
"This is not about you," Isabeau snaps, scowling to him, switching back to that stilted Japanese. "Give me a moment."
But instead of doing that, he squeezes her shoulder. (Reassuringly?) "Hey, c'mon. You said you'd hear out my advice, right?"
"... fine," Isabeau snorts. "What is it."
"Since she's your teammate, you'd call her 'Kanae-chan'," Yasushi explains, patiently.
"Fine," Isabeau says, though it's clearly not fine, Isabeau's fought viciously against having to use honourifics since she was ten. ... and Kanae knows it's because the children made fun of her for not doing it right, so maybe he's really trying to help, telling her what she'd use here? "Kanae-chan, mind your own business."
"Wait, weren't you two cool now?" Yasushi asks, looking between them. "I heard..."
"Pff... no, you are right. We are chilled." That's not the term, Isabeau. (That's kind of the term.) "Kanae-chan, this is Yasushi-kun. We are... seeing each other, so..."
"It's nice to meet you," Yasushi smiles, to Kanae. "Sorry, we don't mean to be rude. It's just stressful after the last day of finals. You get it, right?"
Was it really stress that's made Kanae's breakup gossip around campus?
<Pose Tracker> Kanae Fuyuki has posed.
Kanae's aware of that word, too.
To her surprise, Isabeau is held back. Kanae lifts an eyebrow as the shouting is cut off. Reassuringly?
Kanae, being polite, would apologize. But she really doesn't feel like apologizing today. She's missing out on her planned Christmas date with a guy she doesn't even want to see right now anyway; she's probably going to have to make out with a monster one of these days, and if she's lucky that's where it ends.
And Isabeau doesn't seem very happy, but if she did, Kanae still might feel like blocking this guy.
"That's why it's my business," Kanae says, in Japanese, more sweetly than before. "I have to make sure my rival's guy is treating her right. You get it, right?" she asks Yasushi. "Since we're all friends, can I call you Yasushi-kun too?" she wonders. "Either way, it's nice to meet you too. I won't interrupt you lovebirds too long," she adds. "...Because I totally get it."
"Maybe if Shinichi-kun were around I'd be 'de-stressing' myself."
Smile.
<Pose Tracker> Isabeau Fontaine has posed.
Is Isabeau capable of looking happy instead of terminally pissed off?
(Yes. But the only people who see that are the cats.)
Yasushi, at least, has a friendly smile. He's much more 'jovial' than 'nasty', as far as the stereotypes go; a lot of his friends are looking forward into the future, seeing his father's job in politics, but to be fair boys are also much less likely to think there's anything about him which precludes him from being fun.
Some things are just locker room talk, you know?
"Of course!" He says, and doesn't tell her that kind of talk, because of course she's a lady. "Any friend of Isabeau-chan is a friend of mine! You know, I reckon I saw him when I was leaving class, he was just heading to his locker... you could probably still catch up."
Isabeau frowns. "Merde!" She swears, as she clicks her fingers. Does that need any translation? Clearly, she's realised something she forgot, as she helpfully translates back to Japanese: "I forgot -- Kanae-chan gave me her vibration dampeners from her locker the other day so I could buy some more for our team, and I left them at home! Excuse us, Yasushi-kun. It is best if we go home together to fix this..."
"You're sure?" He asks, rubbing her arm. "I was all set to worry about you..."
"I will be fine," she assures him. "You will still escort me to the dance?"
"Sure thing, babe," he assures her, and leans in to smooch her on the cheek -- a thing she's far more surprised by than her loud queerness might suggest, though it doesn't seem entirely unwelcome, either. "See you then."
"S--see you," she stammers, a little, as she grabs Kanae's wrist and hurries out.
They will not be going via the lockers.
<Pose Tracker> Kanae Fuyuki has posed.
Kanae can guess what the locker room talk about her is, especially with Shinichi being involved. All the stereotypes they held back from before because of Touma they sure won't now.
"Great," Kanae answers Yasushi. "Oh yeah?" she asks, and to her credit, she hides the fact that that makes her want to go anywhere but the lockers. But before she has to come up with an excuse--
There's Isabeau, right on cue. "Yeah, I was missing those," Kanae confirms for Isabeau. "Yeah, excuse us. I'm sure you'll get in more 'quality time' later, right?"
That'll add to the gossip, probably.
But Isabeau wants him to escort her, apparently, so...
Kanae is grabbed and hurries out. She lets this happen, letting Isabeau set the terms of where they're going so long as she doesn't make it via the lockers... and as it happens, she doesn't.
But when they make it far enough away...
"Wanna hop the fence?" Kanae offers. "I want to talk, either way."
<Pose Tracker> Isabeau Fontaine has posed.
You know what they say about French girls.
"Ugh," Isabeau says, and she says that in French, when Kanae says she wants to talk. "Fine. But only since I'm about to royally show you up."
The fences surrounding Shujin are reminiscent of those which keep in prisoners; easily twice the height of a teenager, the cold, gunmetal grey grating is reinforced by broader steel bars in a rectangle pattern, and the top edge of the fence tilts inwards at an acute angle to forbid just what they're about to do.
That's never stopped her; she just needs to do up the buckle which crosses her chest and her belly, securing her backpack in ways many of her classmates can't. They make fun of her for bringing a hiking pack to school. And yet --
Grips on her sneakers both make it easy to accelerate from zero -- and to make a running jump; she lands halfway up that fence, easily, and kicks up from it with that grip, bringing her hands up to grip the thick bar which runs halfway along the fence. It serves as her anchor as she climbs the wall, rapidly, until that bar sits under her feet -- and she kicks off of it, to grab the bar where that angle starts.
She dangles, there, where the curve starts. It might look as if she's just trapped herself, like a cat up a tree. Instead, she pushes off of the fence with her knees, her hands swinging her backwards -- her legs flipping up over her head, as she hooks her knees over the top of the fence, and uses the power of those thighs alone to flip herself bodily up and over it. Her hands find the fence, as she completes her full vertical rotation, and hand-to-hand she descends rapidly until her fingers curl and lock around the middle bar and she drops -- her hands releasing after the rest of her has finished obeying gravity.
Thunk, she lands, firmly, on her feet.
From there, it's a simple ('simple') of flipping down over the concrete, grabbing the bush to arrest her momentum to make sure her second flip doesn't accelerate too fast for her bones to keep up.
The 'ta-daa!' is silent.
<Pose Tracker> Kanae Fuyuki has posed.
Kanae knows what they say. She has a feeling she's going to know it better before too much longer, too.
Now, Kanae asked about jumping the fence knowing that Isabeau is very good at this kind of thing. However...
She's not especially, not without the power of her Persona anyway.
So Kanae watches Isabeau work for a moment, inclining her head in approval when she moves from dangling to climbing again. But then...
In all the hubbub, she disappears.
...And comes around the other side, having gone out the gate instead.
"Guess nobody can say you can't get over," Kanae says in French, switching to the language Isabeau is more comfortable in. "Nice work."
And Isabeau might be suspicious, because Kanae's being kind of nice.
"But if we're going to stick to our story, you're stuck walking home with me."
"Are you mad I interrupted? Or are you mad somebody saw you?"
Ah, there it is.
<Pose Tracker> Isabeau Fontaine has posed.
"I'd like to see you do that," Isabeau huffs, adjusting her backpack on her shoulders as Kanae bustles out via the stairs. "But of course, you can't. I'm simply the best!"
... there's a reason why, in the cognitive world, she's such a peerless dragoon of a girl. Part of it is her own belief in her abilities -- and part of it is the legend she's built up around herself. Even now, a few students mutter, having watched the whole affair.
(They can't figure out her bragging in French, but of course, Kanae can.)
She is suspicious, though, because normally Kanae wouldn't give her that kind of opening. Still... "All right," she says, "don't fall behind."
It's a train ride, from here to Shinjuku and Kagurazaka within it -- but luckily, none of the people commuting home speak French, either, so they have no idea why her face reddens up as she snatches one of those overhead grips with her unfair height advantage. "Both, obviously!" She snaps, and hopefully no Shujin students are watching now...
<Pose Tracker> Kanae Fuyuki has posed.
"I definitely can't in this skirt," Kanae admits. But she's different; she's not a peerless dragoon at all. In supernatural spaces, Kanae is more noted for just... continuing along the ground, moving forward all the while. She has no such legend to draw on. ...Kanae can figure it out though, and indeed, she wouldn't.
"I won't," she says of falling behind, and soon--the train!
Kanae has no such height advantage either, but she does have her bag hugged to her chest to avoid taking up too much room (and to make it harder for someone to grope her).
She's good at being stable, at least.
"That's fair," Kanae says, still in French, quiet enough so as not to disturb everyone else. "I wouldn't usually get in the way of your fun," she says, because obviously that's supposed to be fun, right? "...But he moved in pretty quick, so I wanted to..."
Ah, that's gonna start a fight.
"I mean, you can't keep that thing away from me if you're busy making out with some guy when he's around me."
<Pose Tracker> Isabeau Fontaine has posed.
"You're wearing tights," Isabeau lobs back.
(In summer, Isabeau wears shorts under her skirt, instead. She doesn't realise the whole problem is her skirt flipping to begin with?!)
She blows her lips out, "pff," hearing her start her sentence the first time -- but she thinks better of it, and Isabeau's at least gracious enough to let her. The second --
"Bah," Isabeau scowls. "It's not as if we were going to do anything like that, anyway! We just started seeing each other a week and a half ago! If you hadn't gotten in the way, that was just going to be our fourth date..." ... they've had three dates in a week and a half?!
Isabeau's pretty sure that's normal, don't worry about it, her mother was a great example for romance.
"Well, whatever," she shakes her head. "Don't think so little of me. I can do two things at once, you know."
<Pose Tracker> Kanae Fuyuki has posed.
"Yeah, and going over that fence is a great way to rip them, too."
Still, he definitely moved in quick from what Isabeau says, and Kanae can't help but lift an eyebrow at it. Three dates in a week and a half? "...I didn't say you were going to have sex with him," she points out. "Just make out. You didn't notice he was putting the moves on you?"
"Anyway I guess you can, since you helped me out today."
Her eyes darken. "...Well, if he pushes you too hard, remember, you don't have to do anything you don't want to do. Boys want one thing out of girls most of the time--and they'll act really nice to get it."
By this point Kanae is practically scowling, which scares another passenger who she doesn't notice. "...So he's 'helping you out', huh?"
<Pose Tracker> Isabeau Fontaine has posed.
"Bah," is how Isabeau dismisses the risks.
Still, there's a difference between dismissing risks and not seeing them. Isabeau is loud, and takes up space; she's a performer. Does that mean she knows what she's getting into? "Euh, well... of course I did," Isabeau scowls. "It's just..."
She pauses. "... you know... when mom was seeing a lot of people... it was annoying, so I never paid all that much mind to it."
That dark expression, though...
"He was quite forward, last time, but... so am I?" Isabeau says, and the way she's not quite sure about defending him is carried in the way that sentence raises in a question. "Euh, you know... he wanted to... tell me how those honourifics or whatever work, and... I guess I can be nice about it if he's trying to be."
<Pose Tracker> Kanae Fuyuki has posed.
Bah!!
But at least Isabeau did notice. Still, waht she says... "Mm. So you didn't exactly learn everything about the subject," Kanae points out. Because it was annoying. That for the reason.
"Mm..." Kanae finally stops scowling and looks back at Isabeau. "If you want what he wants, then that's great," she says. "I don't even think boys are bad to want it... it just irritates me when they lie to get it. Or when they don't tell you what they're really feeling."
"He does seem to be trying, and you seem to be willing to listen to him..." But she's still a little dubious, frankly. But she can't just say she's worried about Isabeau, so instead Kanae sighs.
"Just... Make sure that you don't give up things you want to hold onto because he's being 'nice', is all I'm saying."
Pause. "But you know... Seeing one guy versus seeing a lot of people..." She specifically doesn't say 'guys' in this case, for osme reason, "..it's not like it ends up making a difference. If you pick the wrong ones, they just want to use you anyway."
<Pose Tracker> Isabeau Fontaine has posed.
"It wasn't relevant to me," is how Isabeau tries to justify it.
(She's embarrassed.)
But Kanae keeps talking about what he wants, what she wants, and she scowls to her. "I'm not so irresponsible as to need to move that quickly!" She snaps. "It's not as if I'll get a new one in a week!" Not like her mother. "If you can't take the measure of someone, how do you know if you really like them?! If you want to find true love, start by holding him above a volcano!"
M--metaphorically, right, Isabeau?
RIGHT, ISABEAU?!
"... I just... am not heartless. Sometimes it is -- nice when someone is nice for once." Her fingers curl, around the handhold. (It's not just 'a boy', but Kanae knows that. When she was eleven, she decided that she wanted to marry Feather Pink, after all.) "It's not as if I need anything like that, but if he's going to make the effort..."
Her own expression grows stormy, as she trails off. "... anyway, it's not as if there's much to use in my case," she mutters. "My father isn't the kind of man who throws his weight around like some of theirs... he's a scholar."
Of course, there's a lot there she might not be seeing, too.
<Pose Tracker> Kanae Fuyuki has posed.
"Right. It wasn't." But now it is! That's Kanae's point.
Not so 'irresponsible'. Kanae's not so sure; making it about responsibility seems to her to be a good way to get argued down to nothing. But what she says strikes, anyway--
"..." Kanae glances away. "I thought I knew," she says more quietly, still in French. "I really thought so."
Metaphorically? Maybe she should do it for real.
But she's not heartless, and Kanae does know it's not 'a boy' necessarily. "It's nice," Kanae agrees. "I guess I'm just jealous. I'm not going to get anything like that for a while. Not unless I want to take a monster home. And I don't."
But not much to use...?
Hm. "...Isabeau," Kanae says, and looks at her more seriously. "Do you really think that?"
She's not just dubious. She's worried. There's a lot she isn't seeing, to Kanae's perspective.
"..."
Kanae scowls again. "Just--"
"I have experience in this, OK? Just try to benefit from it."
At least the train is almost there. That means that she's at least going to get to lower her bag or something.
"So believe me when I say that 'you' are plenty to use already. And if he does, I'm going to dump him over a volcano, 'nice' or not."
<Pose Tracker> Isabeau Fontaine has posed.
"Hmm," Isabeau scowls, when Kanae quiets.
... but for once, she doesn't feel confident enough to attack that head-on.
"You won't!" She insists, instead, when Kanae says she doesn't want to take that monster home. "It's not going to corner you like that. If you think it will, set a camera to record in your window and come to my house. I know you don't see things my father's way... but even a monster like that can't stand up to him."
Does Isabeau have an outsized view of her father's capacity, or is Laurent a bigger problem than he seems...?
... no, it's got to be Isabeau's blind faith in him.
(Well, either way --)
"Just... don't mention why you're really coming over unless you have to, all right?" She adds, glancing away. "Father... thinks I got hit by a stray serve. I just -- I can handle it."
On her own.
How much is she worth, if she can't handle it alone?
How much is she worth --
"I'm just saying I haven't proved myself by any measure they care about at school," and it isn't a 'no.' "The days where I might have gotten by on physical skill alone are long gone... euh, it's not as if it's even a bad thing, since it changed when they got rid of that creep." Kamoshida, she means.
Her frown darkens, as she says, "... you and your experience. One day you'll realise that warrants more protection, not more protecting. It's just..."
She struggles with her own concern for Kanae, for a moment, before she realises anger is so much easier. "Sometimes something is just nice!" She snaps, with the heat building in her lungs. "Quit trying to make this into more awful shit, Kanae! Maybe he really did just need the opportunity! You're talking like I don't know I'm a bitch!"
With that furious merde, she shoves out of the train as the doors open, running into the hillside streets of Kagurazaka.
It's a full six hours before she remembers to actually text Kanae her address.
<Pose Tracker> Kanae Fuyuki has posed.
Isabeau insists--but she has a plan, more than just insisting, and maybe just this once Kanae can trust the Wild Hunt for something she can't do herself. "All right," Kanae says. "That's what I'll do, then. If it really comes to that." She says it more quietly than before.
Laurent is an adult, after all; if she can't trust an adult now and then...
Are there really so few she can trust?
"Ah," Kanae says. "Fine."
So Isabeau's not handling it well, either...
"Isabeau," Kanae says again. But the matter of experience quiets her for a moment--she doesn't feel she's been protected, after all. Quite the opposite.
But anger gets easier, and Kanae opens her mouth and then closes it. "You--"
...
Kanae steps out after Isabeau, but Isabeau's long gone. As she gets out of the way of the other passengers by rote, Kanae sighs again. "Good work, Kanae," she mutters. "You really are just the hateful bitch he thinks you are."
Kanae looks down, lowering her bag to her side. "...Fine," she says. "If I'm 'wild'..."
"I'll be wild."
Bitterly, Kanae sets out for home.