2026-11-06: Crazy Stupid Love

• Log: Crazy Stupid Love
• Cast: Don Penguan, Yukari Takeba, Minato Arisato, Suzume Fukura, Hitomi Mandai, Fuuka Yamagishi, Umie Akabane, Hyousuke Suzuki, Reiya Aomori, Ririka Kawase, Niko Kirisaki, Noriaki Okaga, Aigis, Kurou Ryouhara, Mitsuru Kirijo, Koh Katsuhiro
• Where: Central Street - Main
• OOC Date: November 06, 2026
• IC Date: February 08, 2013
• Timing Note: Takes place immediately before Heartbreak Hotel, on the same day.
• Summary: SEES - and others - make their way to a love hotel in Shibuya in search of Lovers, one of the Greater Shadows. But when they get there... What were you doing before? You just can't remember. Does it matter anyway? Does anything matter other than the person in front of you? Of course not...
• Content Warning: Sexual references and comments; undergarment nudity; implied other nudity; mental coercion/mind control/loss of control

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<Pose Tracker> Don Penguan has posed.

Where are you right now?

It doesn't matter

An altar dedicated to the carnal lusts of humanity. A hotel room by which people might experience the bliss of adulthood. Beds are shaped as gaudy hearts. The bathrooms have windows that allow one to look inside towards the glass-encased shower. Mirrors are everywhere. Mirrors by which to see every angle of love-making.

The Dark Hour enshrouds you - you do not even notice.
Time is irrelevant
So many things are

Why are you here?

It doesn't matter

That is the truth. The only truth. Your life before this point might as well be meaningless. The present is the only thing worth consideration. The anticipation, before the act. The air is thick with an intoxicating scent- sweat, saliva, the heat of another's breath. The pulse-pounding thrum of another's heart.

Even if you were averse to such things before, you are not now. Inhibitions seem distant, far away. There's no need for bashfulness- courage- or anything in-between. There is only room for the instinctual impulse, a facet of humanity written into existence.

Don't think
Feel

The impulse grows stronger, thrumming through you, bringing frissons up your spine. Don't question this. You don't want to question it. You just want to feel it. Why are some of you questioning it?

I am you
The voice of your inner self
Revel in the moment
That which cannot be felt is merely a dream
The present is all we have

You've always known there was someone in the room with you. Always. Because what came before is irrelevant. You are here now, and so are they. They are wanting for your touch. They crave it. And you are wanting to be touched, so very badly. Your very presence is consent- as is their own. Why wait?

The future is but a fantasy, memory a fabrication
Let desire free you from your shackles
Such is your wish...
For pleasure
Don't deny this as you stand before the doorway to bliss

Why wait even a moment longer, to have what you desire?

OOC Notes: Your character is being controlled by the Lovers Shadow into ignoring their usual inhibitions and is filling them with an intense desire to be with someone else. While this can be resisted, please don't pose your character as having resisted it already by supreme force of will. Play with the situation at least to a point, before then resisting. If you'd like to have your characters fail their saving throw, that's an option! I will pose the deadly peril that will result, which PCs will have to save your characters from.

Your characters are in a gaudy love hotel in Shibuya with no memory of how they got here, but are ostensibly 'garbed up' for battle- and have an intense attraction towards whoever else is in the room with them. Pair up with a PC or PCs to be in the room with you, or contact me for an NPC for these scenarios. Don't break rating! And don't put adults (We're defining it as age twenty here) with children. Having two characters make out is A-Okay for how far you'd like it to go, but no further, even if you decide your character fails to resist.

If you would like to opt out of this scenario, and not show your characters in this situation or to save that for a private scene with someone else, that is fine! Wait until I say to pose in and it'll be left ambiguous the state they were in prior. If you truly want your character to be completely unaffected and opt out completely, you can say they were outside in reserve, and only entered the hotel later.

<Pose Tracker> Yukari Takeba has posed.

A door opens, then shuts behind. A girl enters the room where a boy awaits her presence. Many such encounters have began this way throughout all of human history.

A rustle of clothing, as she sheds her jacket. Then her cardigan, one by one, they all fall upon the floor, as she walks towards the shower.

A twist of the faucet as water begins to spill out. Despite the time it would take for it to heat up, the restroom is soon enough, full of steam.

No water flows. No steam rises within this world locked in time.

Soon enough, the glass shower that would show everything of someone within, is near opaque with steam. The window on the other side follows. A silhouette of a girl, running her hands across her hair, over her skin- washing herself in the hot water.

Readying herself for what comes next.

I don't want to think anymore
All it causes me is pain and loneliness
I just want to feel
I just want to be close
To somebody - anybody

The screech of a faucet indicates she's finished showering. The sound of the water's flow ceases. A silhouette of her body wraps itself in a towel. A thin shield, but one of anticipation, yearning.

With a single tug, can someone see everything, know everything about her that matters.

There is no dampness in her hair. Her skin is bone dry.

Barefoot, she walks into the room of mirrors and gaudy decor, no apprehension in her body language. No sense of caution. Or inhibition, drilled into her through years of being brought up in a society that told her that nudity is shameful.

No, she steps right up to him, eyes empty of everything that normally makes Yukari Takeba who she is. A girl who represses herself as easily as she breathes. A girl who requires impossible standards in order to come close to her.

Is standing now, less than a third of a meter away.

Touch me
Want me
Love me
Nothing else
But this

Closer she comes, as she leans in, wanting to kiss.

Wanting to be kissed.

<Pose Tracker> Minato Arisato has posed.

    A boy grasps his head, clad in the vestments of SEES's Leader. It looks a little like a school uniform -- but sharper; and that red band about his arm contrasts the black of his gloves, veiling his touch.

    Where am I?
    My head feels foggy...
    I can't remember why I'm here...

    He frowns, slightly, as he pushes away the urge to dismiss why.

    What was I doing...?
    I feel like I'm forgetting something important...
    ...?

    His head lifts, as his fight for consciousness expands his awareness, just a little -- just enough to reach the door, past which water pours into a drain. That trickle of vulnerability, it's...

    I can hear the shower running in the bathroom...

    Embrace your desire...

    The boy grasps his head, again, hands lifting from his knees to clutch at his hair.

    There's a strange voice ringing in my head...

    I am the voice of your inner self...
    That which cannot be felt is merely a dream... The present is all we have.

    All of it... why is it so heavy...?

    The weight of their hope feels so much heavier, right now.

    How much of that weight... could wash off with a little water?

    Trickle, trickle...

    No... he doesn't need that. No, his first defence, the thing that has kept him from that connection all these years, it's --

    "Who cares...?"

    But as soon those words leave his mouth, he feels his consciousness slipping from him, again, until even that trickle barely registers in his thinking mind. That sluggishness feels even slower, now, as his mind struggles to put its thoughts together. His hands move, without thinking, to slip off his black jacket, to unbutton the white shirt beneath it.

    My consciousness is starting to blur...
    But I know I still have work to do...

    He's undone those buttons by the time his hands grip, in the fabric, and he lifts them with effort to look at his palms. He can't... fall into those old thoughts... when he needs to fight.

    Why do you resist...? Do not avert your eyes from the truth...
    I am the voice of your inner self...
    Revel in the moment...
    That which cannot be felt is merely a dream... The present is all we have.

    The boy's brow knits, as he drags the thought from his sluggish brain, reluctant as a youth dragging themselves to their last day of school as he realises that voice has repeated itself in its incessant nature.

    "That's not true..."

    The future is but a fantasy, memory a fabrication...
    Let your desire free you from your shackles... Such is your wish...

    "I can't give in..." Minato -- his name is Minato -- drags each word from his lips, neither fleeing from nor embracing that allure, as he grasps his head again.

    Pleasure is what you truly seek.
    You stand before the doorway to bliss.
    You cannot deny your instincts... Embrace your desire...

    Minato is a boy like many others; he can't say such a thing is wrong, honestly, inside himself. Even so, with a light, rough shake of his head, he says: "I'll pass..."

    With those two words -- a rejection which suits him -- that cloying quagmire recedes, from his thoughts. Minato sits up straighter, shaking his head to clear that honey from it.

    My mind is getting clearer.
    Seems like something was trying to manipulate my thoughts...

    There is the twist of a faucet, and his head turns, to look to what is in fact a perfectly normal bathroom door.

    Someone turned off the shower in the bathroom...

    He pushes his hands to his knees, and stands, to step forward to meet them.

    To meet her, as she steps up.

    Yukari is only wearing a towel...
    It seems her thoughts are being manipulated as well...

    Rather than stare at that towel, he examines her eyes, searching for any hint of light.

<Pose Tracker> Suzume Fukura has posed.

Another shower seems to run.

This bathroom does not have a window - or it does, but it's covered, a thin curtain separating those in the bedroom from peering into the shower. There are still shapes moving behind it, but it works as well as the steam, and between the two the shapes are little more than a featureless blob.

And in the bathroom...

What was she doing? Suzume can't remember why she came here. But she knew, for one of the first times in her life, she wanted to make herself look good for someone.

Stepping out of the shower, she returns to her pile of discarded clothes. She doesn't want to go out in just a towel; it's not inhibition so much as she wants to cut a certain kind of figure. She doesn't know what that figure is in words, but she'll know it when she sees it.

There's a bit of excitement she's not used to, a bit of heat in her cheeks. She wants this. It's right, even though it's nothing like she's considered before.

Desire...

Kicking her SEES combat jacket (and her tonfas, which she dropped next to it - why does she even HAVE those here?) over to the corner, Suzume starts to pick up some of the rest of it. Pretty soon she's dressed again: tailored slacks, with just a little bit of give so they're useful for combat activities (or other athletic actions); a neatly buttoned, also fitted short-sleeved shirt; a red armband that she considers for a moment and then tosses with the jacket as unnecessary.

She looks at herself in the mirror. Better, she thinks, but not good. She starts to brush out her messy, constantly tousled-looking hair, which takes more effort than it should if it's wet (it's not wet), but she's considering her clothes more than anything else. She wants to be...

What does she want to be? Dashing? Charming? ...desired?

Maybe there's something else she could do...

<Pose Tracker> Hitomi Mandai has posed.

 
The apple slices really were the right call.

Hitomi Mandal feels her heart pound as she walks towards the bed. It is a warm feeling, a passionate and carnal feeling. Liberatory, really.

Don't overthink.
Go with your gut.

Hitomi takes in a deep breath as she reaches up to her arm. First things first. Her fingers slide in at the straps, finding the clasps that fasten and restrain. Click. The lowermost one. Click. The one at the bicep, the one that sits a little differently. Click. The one higher up, near the shoulder.

Take it off.

Hitomi shrugs her shoulder and twists the ballistic plastic of the arm protector off, twirls it up, and throws it past the bed she's facing. She giggles to herself, though it's more of a breathless gasp. Her face is flushing, she can tell, but there's no shame.

I want it so badly.
I feel so light...!

Her head tilts down. Smiling, she undoes the buttons on the jacket she's wearing, loosening first the left hand, then the right. Her hands are shaking. Her lips finally part and she breathes out, hard enough that her glasses fog slightly, near the bottom.

I want it I want it I WANT IT

Down lower, she undoes the clasp of the belt, loosening it and shrugging her hips back and forth several times, a deliberate and purposeful sashay

Look at me!
Want me!

which, after a couple of repetitions, leads to the belt sliding down and falling with a solid thump and a clatter from within its pouches.

Hitomi raises one foot, sliding it out of the loafers she was wearing -

I'm so horrible

and placing it in front of the other. The process repeats for the other foot, and she places one foot in front of the other for the next half-dozen spaces. Crossing what seems like the vast gulf of the room to the ridiculous round bed and its red satin sheets. As she does it, she loosens the top of her blouse. The pussybow neck tie is just undone; buttons one, two, and three are pulled loose, allowing her chest to rest more naturally, enough that the fourth button comes unbound on its own.

hehehehehehe I'm bursting

Hitomi seethes inside, but it's in a wholly good way. Welcome. No rush. (What is there to rush?) An obscure sense of triumph wraps over her as she bites her lower lip and unclasps her skirt, letting it come apart and fall to the ground too as she takes in a deep, deep breath. Scents wash over her, simmer-hot. Jasmine and almond. The rich musky underlayer of ambergris. And the indefinable scent beneath.

Her last two steps are done on arched feet, each one planted firmly into each other, adding every hint of hip-sway she can. Her arms come down, her shoulders push back -- and with a twist, she hurls the red-lined jacket to the other side of the room entirely.

Hitomi raises up one leg and plants her feet at the edge of the bed. Her thumbs slide down into the elastic of her leggings, hooking into them. Gradually, she tugs down the left, even as her head rolls back and she turns her gaze behind herself, eyes turning to look sideways, her tongue tip running over her lower lip and letting out another a hot sigh before she sighs, at last,

"Then, shall we...?"

<Pose Tracker> Fuuka Yamagishi has posed.

Fuuka Yamagishi lies sprawled on a heart-shaped bed, staring up at the ceiling. It doesn't register as strange to her that she's in full SEES combat uniform in this squishy bed.

It feels like someone filled her head with cotton and put plugs in her ears... Thoughts are fuzzy right now, and her senses are dulled. It feels like something's missing, but she can certainly see everything right after - if only within the confines of this room, thanks to the mirrors lining the walls and ceiling that reflect everything and everyone happening in this room.

That's enough, though, isn't it? (...Is it?) Here and now, in a situation like this, she shouldn't want to see anything else. (...Shouldn't she?) Isn't it fine to shut your eyes and cover your ears every now and then, to appreciate the now? (Is it really?)

Don't look behind the curtain. Enjoy the now. Isn't this the connection she wanted?

Except... Fuuka is alone on the bed, but she isn't alone in the room. Something seems off about this situation...

...but surely('Surely'...), the only thing 'off' is the fact that her companion isn't here right now. She rolls herself carefully - she has a few false starts before she picks up the necessary momentum on this bed - until she reaches the edge of the bed, sitting on the side of it.

"Aomori-san." Fuuka requests, her tone simultaneously questioning and demanding in a way it usually isn't.

<Pose Tracker> Umie Akabane has posed.

    Umie Akabane can not remember how she got here.
    This may be a problem.

    But, it doesn't feel like one, as she stands in front of the bathroom mirror straightening out her makeup. Why did she come without any on?

    Is that why her face feels like something should be there? Like a mask.
    Isn't makeup is a mask of sorts?

    The side braid along the right side of her head draws her attention. Doesn't she normally have two buns?
    Ah, that's because--

    Something violent and boiling crosses her memory, of a young man with a predator's eyes, crossed with the memory of the fracturing Noh mask, the fluttering of a moth's wings--
    'I can't be cute for you if you're not there to admire it.'

    Don't think. Feel. Whatever life there was before this is meaningless.
    'What am I going to do with you, Akabane.'
    He must be in the other room right now.

    This may be a problem, as Umie Akabane... is beginning to feel like she's dying right now.

    Every pulse, every frisson up the spine of 'right' is met with an equal, opposite feeling of something being *wrong*, like the second after a bone is moving in the wrong direction.

    It's nothing personal.
    Umie's just not supposed to be here.

    From the other side of the bathroom door, Noriaki will see the doorknob turn, turn, turn, like someone is trying to repeatedly turn it, but failing.

    On Umie's side, red-nailed fingers try to turn the knob as Umie fights to keep from bending into herself like a folding knife.

    It feels like she bit into the apple offered her, and found it sweetly poisoned.

<Pose Tracker> Hyousuke Suzuki has posed.

It felt like he was mired in a swamp.

When Hyousuke came to, and realised that he was conscious and capable of thought, the first thing that struck him was just how sluggish everything felt. His arms and legs were leaden, taking effort to shift, let alone support himself. His breathing was slow and laboured, its pace uneven and only steadying gradually. Even his thoughts were a victim of whatever had ensnared him. He could not concentrate on a question long enough to figure out an answer, and any attempt felt like trying to cut through fog - a futile effort that only exhausted him further.

Hyousuke blinked, trying to clear his vision and make the blurring colours before him coalesce into discernible shapes. Even that took supreme effort, and he struggled to lift his eyelids back up once he'd chanced to close them fully. Things grew clearer, at least. He could see where he was - and he wasn't certain that he liked it. Though he'd never been inside a love hotel before, the trappings of one were not unknown to pop culture, and he was just about coherent enough to piece together what having so many of them in one place meant.

"Why am I... here?" He asked, more thinking aloud than asking a question. He forced his mind to try and think of an answer - any answer - but every attempt ended with his thoughts drifting away like smoke on the wind. Only one prevailing notion remained at every turn, and it was that it didn't matter. Whether he'd ventured in of his own free will, been dragged there by someone, or arrived purely on business, was irrelevant. All that mattered was the here and now. Any thoughts of duty or honour could be discarded to never again be considered.

A quake ran through his spine. The tremor rippled out from there, bringing with it a surge of heat. Not the rush of adrenaline that battle instilled in him, not the fire in his belly that determination and courage and rage would have given him. It was something else. Something warm... comforting, almost. An embrace that enveloped his very being, and implored him not to think, and instead to submit to his basest instincts and desires. Do not think about the future, it told him. What little of his conscious thought was left surmised that it was best not to dwell on the past either, given how the voice murmuring sweetly into his ear insisted he focus only on the present.

The warmth... it was stifling. He needed to do something about it. He needed to free himself from his binds, and let the heat flow out of his core. With a quick flail of his arms and a dull crumpling in the corner of the room, Hyousuke tossed his jacket to one side, baring a t-shirt that clung snugly against his toned, taut, physique. But that still wasn't enough. In fact, giving in to that desire only seemed to make things worse. His breathing hitched as he realised that something else had begun to claw its way out from the depths of his soul.

A great, gnawing, hunger practically chewed its way from the dark of his mind. It was a feeling that was supposed to be completely alien to him. Some small voice in the back of his head screamed that it was, and that it was not natural, but it was smothered as quickly as a candle in a rainstorm. Hyousuke *ached* for something to fill that void, his visage a grim mirror of a man starved and hunting for even scraps of food. But mere food would not sate the beast in him, and it was a different kind of hunger to his battle-lust and bloodthirst.

He couldn't describe it. He'd not the words nor the experience nor the cleverness to try. But he could feel it all the same, and it drove him to his feet, staggering and swaying as he glanced around the room. He needed anything - anyone - to help him. To stay with him. To be with him.
"Shit... Anyone here? Hello?" He asked, half in search of the companions he thought could help, and half in the hope that they could help to sate that yawning void that threatened to engulf his very soul.

<Pose Tracker> Reiya Aomori has posed.

Clack. Clack. Cla-clack.

Reiya Aomori does not know where he is. He does not know how he got here. And in the moment, these questions indeed don't matter. This is the scene:

Shoes are neatly placed by the chair, with socks beside them. A uniform jacket is spread over the back of that same chair, sinuous and curved and pleasing--but not too expensive. The chairs aren't why people come to places like this.

Reiya Aomori stands before the table, and pulls another knife that he'd had hidden and places it on the table where it joins his two sai, his brace of throwing needles, and his Evoker, forming an increasingly large pile of weaponry. He does not think about any of these things in the moment.

He is barely thinking at all.

I miss her.
...But maybe someone else will do.

Such a room is unfamiliar to him, but its purpose is not, especially. Reiya stands alone with the influence of the room by the table; his shoes are off, his shirt open. He stares down at nothing in particular.

No. There is someone.
...Her name is...

Reiya stands, and his well-muscled torso--what can be seen of it between the edges of his open shirt--is strangely pale in the green and pink light of the room.

...I don't remember. It's no one.

'Aomori-san.'

Ah, no. It's her.

Reiya turns then, when Fuuka addresses him. "Yamagishi-san," he replies, and walks towards her, looking down at her with intense eyes. He doesn't seem to notice she's still in full combat gear. The expression he gives is the sort of smouldering one that makes the girls like him despite his cluelessness on many matters...

Or it would be, if his eyes weren't completely blank.

"We..."

No. It isn't...

"I..."

<Pose Tracker> Ririka Kawase has posed.

Ririka blinks, sitting on the edge of a bed in a gaudy hotel room. Wasn't she...? She's dressed in her SEES uniform, but that doesn't matter, does it?

"... why do I hear love songs...?" she mumbles to herself. Everywhere, in an overwhelming way, and yet... nowhere at all. Nothing that registers as real to her senses.

That which cannot be felt is merely a dream
The present is all we have

... must just be her imagination, then. Ririka hums along with one of them as she slides her boots off and then stands up, looking around. She's spent so long holding herself back, worrying what others might say, worrying about so many things that don't seem important at all, not that she can remember them.

It's kind of warm, isn't it? Her fingerless gloves come off, tossed on a table, and a moment later her jacket is thrown on top. She stares at them for a moment. There was something... she was wearing all that for a reason...

... No, there was someone. Someone she'd ben waiting for. Looking forward to. After a moment her holster joins the jacket. Why did she even have that?

She'd cut her hair short recently (except no, it's always been like that, in this place.) A short bob, both sides even... no, not like... She leaves the right side to frame her face, and tucks the left side behind her ear, to make it asymmetrical. A dark purple ear cuff retrieved from the jacket pocket clips on the ear.

She checks herself out in a mirror. Better.

Next is the ribbon, a couple of buttons of her uniform shirt...

Ririka checks herself out in the mirror again, turning this way and that. Much better.

She's still humming, still tapping along to... something that doesn't quite seem important. The person in the bathroom that she's getting ready for is the only thing that matters.

... right?

<Pose Tracker> Niko Kirisaki has posed.

If you ask Niko Kirisaki, few things are better than to be immersed in hot water. So relaxing, like you could just drift away, don't think about your worries. Her right hand almost automatically seeks out the golden Pisces pendant around her neck, clutching it tightly, for the support it brings her. A smile of fond remembrance comes to her lips.

Oh? You're keeping it on in the shower?
Yeah! It'll make the fishies happy!

She never did grow up very much, did she? But... that's all in the past now. That's not who she is anymore. In this reality, she's someone who lives to enjoy herself. That's why she's here right now, isn't it? That's why... they're here right now.

Wait a second... does that actually... make sense...?

Of course it does. Why wouldn't it? You went to this sort of place, with him. There's no other reason there could be for coming here.

If that's true, then... who's idea was this?

Yours, of course. There's no way Kurou would suggest this. He probably doesn't even know what this place is. He just goes along with whatever you want. You know that.

I... wanted this...

There really is no other way this would make sense. Does it matter that she can't clearly remember how they got here? Having come this far, is she really going to back down now? Give up on what she really wants? ...What, surely, she must really want...?

Having stepped out of the not-really-running shower and 'dried off' while alone with her thoughts, she hurries to put her clothes back on, all the same. Poor Kurou probably hasn't figured out what's going on yet, she shouldn't confuse him too much at a time. He won't have a clue what he's supposed to do, is he? Which means it's gonna be all up to her. Can't let on that she has no idea what she's doing either...

When the door to the shower opens, Niko is all smiles for her companion, her usual self - or so it seems. "Well! Here we are! In this place. All to ourselves. ...Nice room, huh?"

Why are you stalling? Come on. You know he's not going to do anything. Say it. Say what it is you want. You never have any trouble with that. What's holding you back now?

"...No. It shouldn't be me. It shouldn't be me, goddammit!"

In a total 180, she abruptly storms up to Kurou and grabs him by the collar, pushing him up against the far wall. "Can't you see what I want?! Figure it out! You're a guy! Take the initiative! Do something!!"

<Pose Tracker> Noriaki Okaga has posed.

    Where the hell is this...?

    It's been a long time since he's been in a bed this comfortable.
    ...A long time? The thought slips out like honey and just as sticky: time has no meaning here in this place. There is nothing before now, before this moment of deep anticipation.

    Of gnawing longing.

    Sprawled out on the bed, his gaze traces the lines of the ceiling as if they had meaning or purpose. There was... something? Some reason he'd,

    It's not here, whatever end-point he's trying to reach. It's not anywhere.

    His left hand twitches atop the sheets, callused fingertips gliding over silk. Here, here. He's here, here and now. Just action and impulse amidst the churn. It's hard to shift against the tide, to do anything but feel.

    Metal. His hand finds metal. The metal is not well-kept: rust scores its length as his fingertips trace its length. Metal, metal, rusted, metal

    pain

    Pain sings against the softness, the syrupy sense that wants to swallow up even the suggestion of thought into its all-feeling embrace. Noriaki jerks his hand away from the thing that wounded him, can see the blood that runs bright from his finger. Red, the stuff that runs in his veins.

    Red, the...

    Click, says the door to the bathroom.

    He sits up, suddenly, swinging his feet over the side of the bed. His hand smears his blood against the sheets.

    Red, the color of his blood on his hands.

    "Seigo...?" he wonders as the door to the bathroom continues to click with the effort of someone turning the knob from inside and failing.
    A man's name.

    He rises, leaving behind bloodied sheets and the weapon atop them as he walks like a man possessed for the bathroom door.

<Pose Tracker> Aigis has posed.

    Since the months between her re-activation and now, Aigis thought that she had an answer as to how she felt about the twin 'leaders' of their group, which stems from her answer about whether she was even capable of experiencing attraction in the first place.

    She feels a sense of duty to them, a debt which she must repay, and the affection of friendship they've developed in the meantime. Nothing more, nothing less, at least in the sense that schoolyard rumors may potentially misinterpret it. That answer still remains true.

    However.

    Clearly, she was wrong about the latter question being settled. Whatever siren song permeates this place, it's completely drowned out her usual running feed of readouts and signals and overlays and timers and reminders. Whether it's possible for her or not, she feels an insatiable need to find out if she can form connections with humans in all the ways that seem to come so naturally to them.

    It must be. It must be! The alternative would mean that she's the only one of her kind, condemned to an existence entirely alone, unable to truly relate to those she had sworn to protect.

    It's with that hunger that she sits upright on the bed and swivels her optical sensors to intensely focus on the boy staggering around the room. "Suzuki- ... san." She regards his body for a few moments, then casts her gaze downwards as she considers. Never mind how they got in here together, she's just ecstatic that it's him. He's one of the people who best understands her, right? A gentle smile breaks out on her face, and she looks back up.

    Aigis rises from the bed to slowly walk towards him, her face beaming with adoration. "You and I, we are both the reckless sort." She places her hands on his forearms as gently as she can. (They're cold; metal covered by plastic and synthetic fibers.) "If we so callously regard our own respective well-beings, then let us at least mutually watch out for each other."

    There isn't much more that Aigis can actually remove from her person to become more intimate and vulnerable. Her chassis resembles a white uniform with rivets lining its fabric, and her joints are exposed. To go any further would mean exposing her wiring and circuitry and ... that. Even so, there's one thing she can do:

    As a symbolic gesture, Aigis undoes the red bow which usually adorns her chest and sets it aside, then steps back to the bed and curls her finger to beckon Hyousuke to it.

    A pang of some other feeling hits her as she lays the bow on the bed, and her expression falters as she shhakes her head. That felt wrong to her, somehow. But surely it's nothing, yes?
     

<Pose Tracker> Kurou Ryouhara has posed.

There are many things Kurou does not remember, slipping through his fingers like trying to squeeze a fistful of water. How he got here must be just another droplet that's fallen through his grasp. Many of them were important, surely. But even if they were, it doesn't matter. Only now matters. It's the only moment that can.

Something like aggression roils, but without anger. His heart thrums, blood slick in his veins. It's so much like hunger, except it doesn't hurt.

... It's too much...

He traces part the edge of the heart shaped bed with an ungloved hand. Ungloved? He looks at the veins on his wrist, wondering why all he's wearing is his vest.

Focus. That's not important. She likes heart patterns. She said it wasn't 'very original', but he's not sure why that matters. What matters is she likes them. He wanted to remember that, despite forgetting so many things. Because it matters.

At the first Well! of Niko's voice, Kurou looks up, watching her with the same blank face and intense eyes he always has. It doesn't matter what goes on under the surface, it's always the same.

That doesn't matter, either. She's all that matters. Yet Kurou does not respond, eyes pinned to her, watching. Waiting?

He waits too long, evidently, and finds himself effortlessly thrust against the wall with the full force of Niko's frustrations. His head bumps back against the wall with just enough force to dislodge a thought:

Is this what she wants?

It must be, or why else would they be here? A song thrums in the back of his mind. hold me tight, hold me tight, hold me tight

Kurou's dazed eyes manage to find Niko's refocusing. He lifts his hands, curling them around her fingers. His fingers grip tighter than he means to, but he does not loosen them. His voice barely able to find the strength for a whisper past the pulsing of his heart demanding that he shut up already and give in to hunger.

"... Is that how I make you laugh and cry at once, Niko-chan? To make you smile the kind of smile that feels yours?"

I want to see it.

The line between fog and clarity is thin.

l

<Pose Tracker> Mitsuru Kirijo has posed.

              Don't think
                     Feel

Something feels wrong.

                                                       doki

Dark red eyes snap open to complement a started, but muted suck of air. The ceiling she stares at is unfamiliar, saturated with the afterglow of red. This is not her room. Something feels wrong.

But isn't this the room she wanted to be in all this time?

                                                       doki

No. Her breathing is heavier. Her skin feels warm. This is not normal. Red eyes roll from one side to the other to take stock of her surroundings. There is a console table behind her. A control box for something behind it, with a series of dials. This bed is... large. It doesn't feel like hers. It feels like she could sink into it and just get lost in the warmth and forget every problem that has plagued her for her entire life. Something feels wrong.

The glint of her Evoker, strapped to a belt long abandoned and drape across the long console, goes unnoticed. Her capelet and gloves dangle and sway off the edge.

                                                       doki

The air feels warm on her skin, musky. Like there's tangible moisture in the air, balmy from heat. On her skin? Red eyes squeeze out a blink as she looks down. Her ribbon is gone. The front buttons of her blouse undone. The SEES patch she is so obligated to -- proud of is missing. Her bare palms feel clammy. They're never clammy. Something feels wrong.

Is she nervous? Why should she be?

This is what she wants. What she really wants.

                                                       doki

Slowly, groggily, she rises from the safe, protective cushioning of the bed beneath her, a palm rising to press against her chest, clenching the unbuttoned stretch of her blouse's plackets, red eyes narrowing as a low, uncertain sound spills from her scarlet lips. Scarlet lips. Royal red hair. Deep red eyes. In this room awash in vital reds she practically becomes one with her surroundings, blending in like a camouflage of passion. Passion...? Mitsuru is more acutely aware of how her black vest half-hangs off her single, right shoulder. Was she taking it off? Something feels wrong.

She needs to get out of this--

                         thmp!

                                                       doki

The impact of something palpable makes the bed mattress all but bounce beneath her. The vibrations jolt through her nerves like electricity, red eyes widening. She's not alone. Why would she be? Why would she be here, of all places, all alone? She's tired of being alone. Tired of everything being dictated to her. Tired of living the path she's meant to live. Isn't she?

Red eyes tentatively turn upward. They widen in surprise. That hand falls away from her shirt, the warmth brushing her chest and rising swiftly up her throat towards her cheeks as scarlet lips part. She can't look away. For a second, she's without words. And then, she can only think of one thing to say:

                               "M-Mandai..."

                                 dokidoki

Something feels wrong right.

<Pose Tracker> Koh Katsuhiro has posed.

Koh at Koh and Koh stares back.

He's been here before, hands pressed to the rim of porcelain, the hiss of warm water gushing from the sink. What teenage boy hasn't spent hours looking at their own reflection, forehead pressed against the mirror, looking for that thing choking underneath their skin until

Revel in the moment

That which cannot be felt is mer e]ly a dream

The present is all we have

What is there to wait for?

The empty eyes turn from the mirror, Koh's fingertips withdrawing from his temple.

The future is but a fantasy, memory a fabrication

He can't wait, doesn't want to, wants to feel something before it's too late, anything, and now.

His fingers are frantically tugging loose jacket and shirt, like they're going to suffocate him if they remain on any longer. Off his lanky, unimpressive chest and into the sink they go.

He goes. Now! Before it's too late!
    In his haste he slides across the tile, a commanding shove of the door turning into an awkward stumble.

<Pose Tracker> Don Penguan has posed.

A vague smile. This tomboyish girl has always dreamed of this moment. Now, it truly is like a dream to her. Anticipating what comes next- this intense attraction between her and someone else.

She wants him.

Yuko Nishiwaki is used to being overlooked. She isn't, right now. She's the center of the world. He's the center of her world.

She loosens the red tie around her neck, buttons start coming undone.

And then comes the stumble, as that boy comes right through the bathroom door, where she'd been waiting. She stops undressing, there's no need to continue.

They can do that during.

"Hey there handsome..." She says, with this insistence that belies the lack of emotion in her tone, as she steps closer to the panicking teenager. Taking Koh's hand she places it on her waist, right where it belongs.

As she leans in to try and kiss him, Yuko says, in a dreamlike tone, eyes hazy.

"... wonder... what our kids will look like..."

<Pose Tracker> Yukari Takeba has posed.

There is none whatsoever, the amber of her eyes may as well be glass as they stare at the boy. Whether it even matters who that boy is to her, is unclear.

He's a boy, she's a girl. That's all that's necessary. Humanity perpetuates itself through such instincts engrained deeply within us.

Closer.

Closer.

Her lips are so close, when they just- stop.

This isn't right
Not like this
I want
Need for it to mean
Something
Need for them to mean
Something

There is no meaning to be found in denying your urges
Pursue your desire
Embrace an eternity of bliss

But
Wait
Not like this
Not this close
Not this soon
I want to be loved

A tremor runs throughout her body, as her lips quaver, her eyes have a certain light return to them.

Love isn't necessary
When you can be desired
Embrace it

I don't want
Just to be
Desired

Some semblance of consciousness returns to her, when she's already so close, "Huh- what am I-" Inhibitions return, shame returns, self returns, a sense of personal space returns. As she stumbles back half a pace. "Hawha-KYAHHHH!"

Winds up a hand.

And immediately slaps Minato Arisato across his left cheek, before turning to flee back in the restroom, with a frightened, confused and angry slam of the door behind her.

She has many, many, MANY questions about what just happened, but she's too embarrassed to even ask them as she quickly gathers up her clothes, and starts to rapidly dress to cover herself as quickly as possible.

<Pose Tracker> Hyousuke Suzuki has posed.

The very second he heard the bedsprings move, Hyousuke snapped around like a dog hearing their master snap their fingers. The muscles in his face tensed, and he swivelled around with wide and searching eyes, chest heaving visibly beneath the thin layer of fabric pressed against his skin. Even lost to the throes of desire, he resembled a hound more than he ever did a man, lumbering and oafish. Even his lips were curled into something that resembled a snarl, with the whites of his teeth bared a little as he parted mouth to breathe a little easier.

He should have felt nothing. Aigis was an ally and a comrade, and that of course came with a degree of friendliness. But what should have been and what did not always align. That gnawing hunger in his gut became a ravening void at the sight of her, consuming everything that it touched. It demanded to be filled, screaming loud enough that any other thought was simply overpowered, until any sense he might have tried to instil in himself was bludgeoned into submission. Even the cold of her touch could not interrupt it. Ironically, it only served to stir the warmth in him, and stoke it to a blaze that spread to the very edges of his being.

"Right... Yeah. If we might not make it until tomorrow... We gotta at least try and enjoy ourselves now..." Hyousuke eventually said. His voice was low as a hound's growl, and as the words carried up through his throat, so too did the hunger. His words reached the air and dispersed into echoing ripples, but the hunger reached his eyes, plaguing them and twisting his features. He stumbled forward at her beckoning, each step as unsure as the last. He'd not done this before - everything was done on instinct, down to the very words he spoke. He was a puppet on strings, or a hound on a leash, not so much acting as being led along.

While she could remove little, Hyousuke was but a simple human, and came with all the trappings that one expected. One of them came away in a clumsy series of motions, culminating in him more or less clambering out of his top and heaving it into the same spot as his jacket. The head did not subside. Even as his taut, toned, figure was bared to Aigis like marble hewn into the shape of a man, Hyousuke could feel every inch of him being plagued with unpleasant warmth that refused to subside even a little.

It was all so alien. He could not recall ever having wanted, or even involuntarily felt, anything like what he felt when he beheld Aigis. There were a lot of things he could not remember in that moment, but there was not even the vague notion that he'd forgotten that unique strain of desire. It had simply not been there, or perhaps had been buried so deep beneath the surface it might as well not even have existed. It felt odd and unnatural, like clothes that did not quite fit right, or lenses with the focus shifted a little away from the ideal.

Yet it felt right. It felt like he should have been doing it long ago, and that if there was anyone that could understand his hesitance to start, it was her. Bound to duty and sworn to sacrifice as he was, the cold of her shell a perfect contrast to the blaze that seared more of his very self away with every passing day... Who better to help him indulge these new feelings than Aigis? It was that thought which dragged him towards her, closing the distance slowly, until he could reach out and press a rough palm to her shoulder.

The gesture awoke something in him. Not desire, however. It was a distant bellow in the corners of his mind, and echoed off its recesses, demanding to be heard and growing slowly louder the more attention he paid to it. It was guttural, screaming, bitter, and white-hot, all at the same time. It thrashed and raged in the dark corners of him, and like embers callously left in the underbrush, they began to smoulder. They slowed him, and - just for a moment - a savage clarity cast aside the hunger in his gaze, contorting his mouth into a snarl. It faded as quickly as it had come, but it threatened to rear its head again, having already stopped Hyousuke in his tracks.

"What now? I've never done this. I don't... I don't know what I want." Hyousuke asked of her. Even with a hand pressed to her shoulder, and the other hovering slowly towards her, he could not figure out what he was supposed to do with all those feelings welling up.

<Pose Tracker> Suzume Fukura has posed.

Suzume finishes brushing her hair into something vaguely approximating order (not really; it still looks kind of messy). It's as good as it's going to get, though.

Desire...

Suzume has never wanted to be wanted before. She doesn't know what she's doing, but the impulse, the urges - they tell her to go for it. To let herself be free of shame and modesty. Why else would she have come *here* of all places?

What else is there...?

She unbuttons two - three - of the buttons on her shirt, but frowns as it reveals the layer beneath; slightly ill-fitting, plain, utilitarian, no decoration. It's ugly, she thinks. Nobody wants to see something like that at a time like this.

No need for your usual modesty...
Why hide yourself? Just *be*.

A few moments later, and a bundle of elastic and cloth gets tossed randomly aside, ending up nowhere near her jacket as Suzume rebuttons her shirt partway. Better, she thinks to herself, as she looks in the mirror, adjusting her belt before smoothing the slacks over her hip. She looks good.

Don't stop.
There's no need to worry.
Just give in...

Suzume opens the door. And then, with no hesitation, no thought, she steps out.

---

"You look gorgeous."

That's what Suzume says as she steps out, looking at Ririka as she examines herself in the mirror.

Suzume, herself, has made an effort. Her shirt has the top several buttons undone, and she's done something with how her pants and belt sit to draw attention to the curve of her hips.

Suzume thinks she's not pretty. She's said as much before. If she has a thicker waist and thighs than the 'supermodels' she compares herself to in SEES - ungenerously at best, cruel to herself at worst - it's not fat; she just naturally runs toward being a little stocky, large-chested and broad across the shoulders and hips. She's fit on top of that; she's someone who does endurance *and* speed running, and climbing, and boxing, so while she's not bulky-muscular (even for a girl) she is obviously athletically toned.

And, of course, even though it doesn't always show, she has a great smile that lights up her face, or a crooked grin that burns with energy and vivaciousness. Ririka is getting the slightly goofy grin full force right this minute.

Any hint of the normal shyness Suzume has about her figure, hiding it behind boxy or oversized shirts and loose pants, has vanished. The flesh revealed by her partially-undone shirt is a surprise to anyone who's never seen Suzume in something that actually fits before, and maybe some people who have - because she'd never normally show it.

But this is right...
Why not show what you have? Just be happy in the moment...

But her eyes are only for Ririka as she steps forward, even though her eyes still look a little blanked by the Lovers. She walks all the way over to Ririka, trying to put a strut in her step as she gets closer to the taller woman -

And then, all of a sudden, she reaches, drawing Ririka up into a princess carry.

Why did you ever think this was wrong?
You never wanted anything else...
No matter how you lied to yourself.

Suzume realizes almost immediately that this would be much, much easier if Ririka wasn't over a half foot taller than she is. It's a real effort to pick her up and swing her to the proper position without scraping her heels against the floor, and she ducks her head slightly so Ririka can throw an arm around her neck for balance as Suzume begins to carry her toward the enormous, soft bed.

Let your heart rule you...

<Pose Tracker> Fuuka Yamagishi has posed.

Clack. Clack. Cla-clack. The sound of equipment being piled onto the table forms the audio backdrop of the evening. Fuuka hears every weapon as it's removed, and she can see them, too. Even with her mind as foggy as it is, the part of her that can't help such things notes a running catalogue of each piece as they're removed and set aside.

Maybe she's just looking for a distraction. Or maybe...

Reiya's reply gives her mind a convenient off-ramp from following that train of thought further, from questioning this.

She looks up at him as he approaches her. She notes the way his shirt, open and without his uniform jacket holding it back, reveal just a teasing glance at that well-muscled form that would make any girl swoon. She looks up at those intense eyes with his steely demeanor, which should captivate anyone with just a glance...

Isn't she happy that it's her he's with, the quiet, mousy girl who's never really stood out aside from her hair color, out of all the girls here?

...She should be, but...

There's something - no, maybe it's more accurate to say that something's missing.

It's his eyes, she thinks. That expression is there - that expression that should have her transfixed, but...

It's missing something. Something crucially him that should be there if they're... doing this, and the moment she thinks that, other questions begin to fall into place.

Isn't he dating someone else right now?

When did they get here? What made them decide to do this?

...Does she really think about him that way? And even if she did, is this really what she would want it to be like right now?

Fuuka stands up to meet him... and offers Reiya a small, sad smile.

"...This has... been nice, Aomori-san... But I think it's time we woke up."

Maybe it would've been nice to indulge this feeling... maybe she did want to feel some kind of connection...

...But whatever she's feeling right now, she knows isn't her own.

With that revelation, her mental fog starts to clear. She can feel Lucia's supportive presence once more - and with that, she reaches out. This place is... a haze of thoughts, some of them are difficult to reach, but there's one she can connect with.

<I can finally reach you... I'm sorry it took so long, Arisato-san. How are you doing? Are you okay?> Fuuka asks, mentally reaching out to Minato.

<Pose Tracker> Minato Arisato has posed.

    Yukari leans closer, and Minato -- freezes. It doesn't look much different to his normal face; a touch dull to dumbfounded, staring into those lightless eyes of hers.

    Yukari is still compromised...
    What should I do?
    For some reason, my throat isn't working...
    If I run away, she'll still be in danger...
    ... she's getting very close.
    But... it's wrong to headbutt a girl, even in an emergency...

    His eyes widen a little, as he sees a glint of light return to those eyes he's staring into so intently. "...?" Minato grunts, seemingly as impassive as ever as he he hopes desperately that she's okay.

    Words tumble from her, and then --

    SMACK!

    "HUAUGH!"

    That's the sound of Yukari's hand hitting Minato's cheek at 200 miles per hour, leaving a large, angry handprint there as his head snaps sharply to the side. He stumbles back, all his hit points lost in an instant, as she runs back to the bathroom.

    Dazed, he takes another step back and sits on the side of the bed. His hand brushes his jacket, and he looks back to it, his eyes focusing there after a moment. He pulls it back on, and buttons up his shirt without a word...

    ... until he hears Fuuka's voice, in his mind. "Yamagishi-san...?" He wonders, as he looks up, his bangs veiling his face.

    "Uh..."

    He reaches up, to rub at his swollen cheek, his eyes taking on the quality of looking a thousand miles away as his lips turn downwards in a mild pout.

    "... I've sustained some damage."

    In other words, judging by how normal his voice sounds, he's fine.

<Pose Tracker> Hitomi Mandai has posed.

 

<Pose Tracker> Hitomi Mandai has posed.

 
entrance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xb6DG4G8vy8

ahhhhh she's right there and she's beautiful and she's gorgeous and there are so many shades of red

Hitomi brings her hands up to gently press on either side of her face; her eyes swim, the faint fog on her glasses not veiling the look in her eyes and its slight gleam in the dim and sultry lighting of the room. "Ahh..."

She brings her arms down again, this time to reach behind her back, even as she remains leaning onto the bed, one knee on, one foot on the ground. "... You're beautiful, you know that? Mmhmhm~ I'm sure you do."

After unclasping Hitomi slides forwards, bringing her other leg up and pushing herself along on the heels of her palms. Sliding over the sleek red sheets, she brings herself up, one hand on the far side of Mitsuru's head. She shifts her legs, straddling her and looking downwards, long black hair pooling atop of red.

Gazing downwards, she breathes, "And..."

One hand comes up, to cup Mitsuru's cheek. Mitsuru Kirijo!! The gorgeous heiress!! The perfect sempai!! I'm going to--

As Hitomi leans down, she murmurs, "... you don't need to be so formal."

Closer. "We know each other pretty well by now. Surely, unless it's your preference, we can call each other by our names."

Closer. "Mi," closer, "tsu," closer, *chu*

A hot deep breath later, Hitomi draws back - only a millimeter or two. "Ahh... so, tell me... did you like the apple? Be honest," Hitomi breathes, before moving cl

o
s
e
r

Apples? Wait.

Hitomi stays perfectly still, incredibly close, still steaming with desire.

Oh who c it wasn't apples

"... it was strawberries. Why..."

Though not frozen, Hitomi stays there for several seconds. Her eyes, hazy with desire, clear into something more familiar. They shift a little and turn down, meeting the eyes of Mitsuru Kirijo for the space of one heartbeat.

Two heartbeats.

It's like that exact moment where you can see the seam on the monster's back.

Three heartbeats. Hitomi's eyes widen.

Four heartbeats.

Five. Six, seven, oh yeah they're speeding up

Hitomi brings one knee up and turns and rolls briefly onto her side before completing another 180-degree roll and falling off the side of the bed with a sinfully soft 'fuwafu' onto a plush carpet that brings pleasure to bare feet that walk upon it.

Hitomi brings her knees up to her chest, hands on either side of her face as her mouth contorts in an enormous silent scream.

departure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3028oDEKZo4

<Pose Tracker> Reiya Aomori has posed.

There's a lot of those weapons in Fuuka's perception at the moment. Reiya carries more than is reasonable... Because the things they fight aren't reasonable.

Reiya looks down at Fuuka in turn; his mind turns aside from her outfit, turns instead to the soft beauty of her hair, the even complexion, the look of her eyes. He in this moment does not think of her as mousy; he sees beauty. But...

There is someone else. Isn't there? ...No. It doesn't matter.

Reiya does not immdiately understand what's going on. But when Fuuka gives that sad smile, it pierces through. A smile is one thing... But sadness? There must be something wrong...

Ah. There is.

Reiya realizes it; he likes Fuuka, but he is with someone else. They do not have this kind of relationship. And he...

He pauses, and blinks, and a faint redness of all things spreads about his face. "I apologize, Yamagishi-san," he says. "I should not have subjected you to such indecency." He steps back enough to bow low. Then--

"!"

HE's not with 'someone'. He's with Suzume. And she's somewhere here. "The others!" Reiya says in alarm, and while Fuuka is contacting Minato, Reiya goes for the table. He picks up a single brace of needles and his sai--

"Yamagishi-san! I'm checking the next room! Please direct me!"

He goes for the door.

<Pose Tracker> Koh Katsuhiro has posed.

Koh could have made a better entrance. The collision is almost awkward, would be if there was anything lifelike about it.

But his hand takes Yuko's waist when guided there and his lips find hers and he's almost, almost almostalmost

His drooping eyes come to a halting stop as a thought hammers its way into Koh's muddled skull."...kids."

".......HUH?"

Simewhere on the left side of his forehead the beginnings of a familiar headache begin to bloom. "Waitthat's, hold on," The palm on Yuko's stomach suddenly becomes an unsteady barrier ash Koh attempts to muddle through what, exactly, he's doing.

"Nishiwaki-chan, I can't, I mean I'm not gonna, but II think"

"I gotta go get" He stumbles through a mental inventory of vending machines definitely in a love hotel between juggling the rest of the unpleasant reality flooding in. "Cigarettes? I'll come back."

<Pose Tracker> Niko Kirisaki has posed.

Niko could ask herself 'what am I doing' all she likes and never come up with a satisfying answer. In that respect, this is business as usual.

In all respects that matter, it absolutely isn't. She's here, in a room with a heart-shaped bed, with far more complicated feelings about that pattern given the circumstances. This situation creates obvious Expectations. Obvious... to one of them.

There's no way Kurou would understand this. There's absolutely no way. She's the one who got them here. This is what she wanted. She must have planned this... but she just... can't remember. The impatience she feels towards him now, is it the same as back then...?

Spitting our her demands at him, she continues to grip Kurou's clothing tightly.

I don't want to let you go.
And... I don't want you to let me go.

She gasps, breath catching in her throat, when Kurou's hands curl around hers. Is this it? Does he understand...?

His response comes in the form of a question. Asking her to confirm, after a fashion... but in a matter that can't help but send her thoughts racing. A smile that feels hers... could that actually happen? From this...?

It hits her once again, the vague feeling she had earlier, redoubled in intensity. This... isn't like her at all. Not like the real her. No, this, this couldn't possibly have been her idea. There's no way she could even manage to pretend where it comes to this sort of thing. It's... it's too embarrassing...! Wait, are they holding hands right now--

With an abrupt second shove wall-wards, Niko suddenly backs away from Kurou, eyes full of confusion, fear even. "Wh-what the hell... what the hell is going on here?!" Though she feels her cheeks burning red, all she can do is double down on aggression, her demands taking a wholly different form now. "Y-you! You better have a really good explanation for this!"

If there's no way this could have been her idea... then, after all, it must have been Kurou's.

<Pose Tracker> Umie Akabane has posed.

    There was something Umie Akabane was supposed to do.
    It's a whining, obsessive gnat of a feeling, buzzing stinging buzzing stinging in her mind until it becomes trapped in the gentle, suffocating molasses of something calling her to another mission.

    But the noisy racket just won't stop.
    Her face still feels naked, after all, despite the makeup.

    Stop looking at her.
    Who? Who's there?

    Doesn't she want to feel loved? Connected?
    Open the door.

    Her nails are red.
    Candy apple red.
    Red, like the color of blood on Noriaki's hands.
     
    Red, like the light back of her eyes, as she falls like a marionette let loose from her strings.

    Red, like her anger.

    Seigo. Who's Seigo? Who's there?!

    One last bid for the doorknob which seems so, so, so high. Turn the knob.

    Her name is Umie Akabane, and she is not letting her co-worker down tomorrow morning _by dying here_.

    The door swings open from the weight of her body, banging against the wall as a short young woman falls forward, face clammy, fingers clenched, ash blonde hair sweat damp.

    Not Seigo. Not even close.
    But neither is Noriaki Shiryuu, so Umie is equally as disillusioned.

    "You're not Shiryuu."

<Pose Tracker> Kurou Ryouhara has posed.

A second becomes several. It could be a lifetime. Kurou is watching her, and his face so rarely changes except for the glint in his eyes. There's something shrouded there, but it's not without sharpness. He is waiting. But he is not waiting like someone hesitating.

He's waiting like a wolf trying not to spook a rabbit before it strikes. If his gaze is empty, it's because it seeks to be made whole.

Once it starts...
... when will it stop?

Never, never, never.

...

His head hits the wall again with a decisive thunk and another thought is jostled free.

Hm. I do not think she wants this.

Kurou gingerly rubs his head. That infuriatingly opaque face of his does not even have the courtesy to shift as one moment moves to the next, and then becomes now, and clarity finally overtakes the shroud.

"I apologize," he says, easily as he ever says anything, "My memories have been compromised. If I am not relapsing, then... it is unlikely to be a trap by SEES." SEES should not even know they're here. "It could be the work of a Shadow or demon..."

Is he even aware what she's worried about at all?! His gaze strays toward her, looking down from her eyes to her neck, and lower still, with her fresh out of a false shower. Just where is he looking...?!

"... Oh. That is a nice necklace, Niko-chan."

Of course.

Of course.

<Pose Tracker> Aigis has posed.

    Hyousuke's timid admission causes Aigis to sympathetically bring a hand to cup the side of his chin. (Not faux-fleshy like her face is. Gloved. The safety's on in those fingers of hers, right?)

    She gently admonishes him, "Do you believe that I fully know what it is that I want?" And yet, she still moves closer in to his embrace. "Other than this, I mean. Other than ..." Despite her solid frame, her shoulders and hands begin to slightly tremble.

    While the other rooms may be playing out scenes as old as humanity itself, Aigis takes notice of Hyousuke's trepidation and hazards a guess that it's the same as her own. Knowing that he might struggle with the same things she does heartens her, and she steels herself as she looks up into his eyes and continues.

    "... other than this. Other than that I simply want to try. Given our situation, given the nature of who I am, I think it is perfectly natural to not know. We are treading new ground. There is no observation we can make to learn from others what to do for ourselves, we are all there is in this regard. Emulating the typical script will not get you and I very far."

    She lowers her hand from his face and onto his shoulder. "But that is the wonder of it, is it not? We get to define the path for ourselves." Then, just as she begins to adjust so her face approaches his, as she gives her reassurance that "It's okay to not know what you want," ...

    Somehow, somewhere, Aigis could swear her audio sensors faintly pick up the sound of Misato claiming that he has 'sustained damage.' Her head immediately swivels to face the door with an alarmed look. She wasn't imagining that, was she? Now caught between two competing impulses, she looks back up at Hyousuke with tension in her expression.
     

<Pose Tracker> Ririka Kawase has posed.

Ririka keeps her hair neater as a rule, and she had an easier time straightening it out. As she stares into the mirror she keeps fussing. Was this enough? A quick tug untucks the shirt from the skirt--there, a little more casual, a little more relaxed, less like being dressed up and more like... being.

She is happy with what her lightly-unbuttoned blouse reveals, as it happens.

But she pauses, staring at the mirror, as something tickles just out of sight, just out of mind, just on the edge of the perceptible...

There was something she was doing. Something trying to surface in her mind. She stares at her Evoker on the table. They were here for--

'You look gorgeous.'

She turns to look--to really look at Suzume, gasping softly as she feels a flutter in her chest. "Why, thank you..."

The thought slips away from her, submerged in a wave of other feelings.

Her cheeks flush with heat but she smiles, looking the other girl up and down. "Suzume-chan... what did I always tell you?" That some girls look good in a suit. Suzume might not be wearing a suit per se, but... it's more of an attitude thing. Suzume has suit attitude right now. And it's working for Ririka.

And that smile... Ririka can't help but return it, subconsciously fussing with her hair and clothes just a little bit more, taking a first step towards Suzume as she does so.

Ririka's always had her own awkwardness... suddenly becoming so much taller than everyone else--even a lot of the boys--left her feeling like she stood out way too much... Skateboarding helped with the coordination (and gave her her own athletic build, even if a lot of it doesn't show), though it made something else she had to keep hidden.

And she also hid just how badly she wanted to just be with someone, trying to keep up the apperance of a proper model student and a piano prodigy. Some of that's started to loosen up recently... though in this place, with the voice whispering to her, self-restraint is the last thing from her mind.

A lot of things would be easier if she were shorter. But when uzume goes to lift her in her arms, Ririka lets out a startled noise. "Wha-- Suzume-chan!" She laughs, instinctively reaching out to wrap her arms around the other girl's neck, pulling close. Her eyes are blank but she's smiling as she presses her forehead to Suzume's. "... you've really been working out, huh...?" she asks in a low, playful voice. "Think you can go all the way?"

Wasn't there something important about Suzume she needed to remember?

... no, this is all that matters in the moment.

<Pose Tracker> Don Penguan has posed.

'hold on,'

Yuko doesn't so much as wait, as she becomes a momentum that's been momentarily dammed. A river against a wall of concrete that is his palm, he can feel the pressure against it, her weight.

'I mean I'm not gonna,'

"Why not?" She asks, and if it were not so toneless, one might wonder if she were genuinely hurt by the rejection.

"... Come on..."

As she tries to reach her own hand forward towards his nether regions, but never quite makes it.

'Cigarettes? I'll come back.'

"You don't need to smoke... Don't be shy." As she tries to press against his hand. "... you're gonna be my husband... after... so you can touch me any way you want." And suddenly, to Koh, she is out of focus. Because behind her, something is dripping from underneath the room's mirror.

Then out from under the furniture.

drip drip drip

She smiles at him, blissfully unaware of the danger around them.

Then Aigis sees it, in her room- drip drip drip - or rather, her sensors detect it beneath the haze of unfocused desire, as the lamp shaped like the symbol for 'woman' begins to seep fluid out from under it.

As Suzume and Ririka give in to the impulse, they cannot possibly notice the drip drip drip of fluid that seeps out from behind the mirror, the pictures on the walls, the lamps.

Puddles form beneath the furniture. It is ever so slow, but the room is beginning to fill with it, like a faucet left on for too long from a plugged sink.

Little did you understand under the influence of this aphrodisiac haze, this was the spider's web and the two of you are the flies- drawn in by the siren song of desire. One brief touch will cause that part of the body to go numb.

Soon enough, however, the entire room will be flooded with it. A fitting resting place for two people, caught in the throes of passion without reason or sense behind it.

To slip away into apathy while drowning in the purest bliss. To feel no pain, as everything is stripped from you, only pleasure.

Who could ask for a better end, than that?

<Pose Tracker> Hyousuke Suzuki has posed.

It worried Hyousuke a little that neither of them had the faintest idea about what they were doing, whether it came to that moment of intimacy or the future in general. But the future didn't matter, did it? Only the present was important. They could remain there forever, if only they could take that step forward, and fulfil their desires. He nodded slowly at her assessment, and offered his answer in a hesitant voice he tried to plaster over with false confidence.
"You're right. We can figure out what we want later. We're in control of our futures, and we'll figure out what... what we..."

Hesitance lingered in him. It was just for a moment, and it was as faint as could be, but fate smiled upon him with its timing. Aigis looked away at the exact moment he hesitated, and though the overriding impulse that plagued the room soon crept back to exert itself, that singular moment had broken a crack into its influence. And a crack was all that Hyousuke needed to feel his sense of self begin to carve its way through the fog, snapping and snarling its way back into the fore.

"No, we're not in control...! This- This is wrong...!" Hyousuke's voice was strained, as was his expression. His features seemed to war with themselves and his voice wavered with every word spoken, each unable to decide exactly what kind of message they wished to put forward. But, more and more, his look tended towards anger. A crack had formed in t he dam, and all the water that had been held back began to press against the only escape it could find. It grew, and grew, and grew, until pieces of the dam began to fall away in ever-growing chunks.

Then, finally, it burst.

A guttural and primal cry of blinding rage and indignation, ripped through the air as Hyousuke ripped himself from Aigis. He clenched his teeth, shook his head as if it would shake loose whatever influence still lingered within his mind. His stint doing an impression of a dog shaking itself dry was brief, but if the look of seething hatred carved into his features was any indication, it had also been effective.
"Son of a-! Aigis-san, snap out of it! Something's screwing with our heads! You gotta- Ngh!" Hyousuke lurched, and his rage began to falter.

"Aigis-san, listen carefully and do *exactly* what I tell you." Hyousuke growled. Already he could feel the room trying to take back what his rage had burnt away, and he needed something to stoke the fires again. "I need you to hit me as hard as you can."

<Pose Tracker> Noriaki Okaga has posed.

    The door, even as he lopes towards it, slowly starts to open.

    What stands behind it is,

    is,

    is a person.

    His eyes, Umie may notice, somewhere in the throes of the woe the grips her and threatens to destroy her, are light grey. They're young-looking, especially against a face like his. Noriaki stares at her intently--
    Stares through her might be the more appropriate sentiment.

    Wait, curls up the smallest glimmer of thought, struggling against the congealing tide that bears down upon it. Wait--

    "You ain't... lookin' good," he tells the person who stands in the doorway. "You been out again," he continues, his face twitching with the struggle of the thought that joins thought before: something isn't adding up about this.

    "Forgettin' your... you're getting more like me," he continues, reaching out to touch the person in front of him, to palm half of their face and their hair with his bloodied hand as he,

    he realizes the problem. There's something smooth here, something that hangs from the person's earlobe. An earring, supplies his brain. An earring. He'd never worn an earring.

    And also he's--

    Noriaki remembers it now.

    "----The shit's this--" he growls, grabbing Umie roughly by the shoulder and yanking her into the room. "What kinda shit are you--"

    He'll let go of her just as roughly as he grabbed her, stalking back into the room to grab the weapon left across the bed.

    This, he brandishs at her, even should she lie on the floor prone. "Got a new fuckin' trick, crow-girl? I ain't into chicks!"

<Pose Tracker> Mitsuru Kirijo has posed.

        dokidoki dokidoki

Something feels strange.

Mitsuru Kirijo can't put words to it, because it's something she's never felt before. Her heart feels like it's in her throat. Every nerve ending at her fingertips feels acutely aware of the passage of each thread of the bed sheet's comfortably indulgent threadcount across them. Her breathing is shallow, her chest rising and falling over and over like the frenetic lap of stormy waves on the shoreline. And yet it isn't panic. It isn't fear. No. It's like...

                             dokidokidokidoki

Excitement.

She doesn't remember why she's here, or how she got here. The entirety of her world right now is the way that Hitomi's hands reach behind her, and the sound of that clasp popping is like a cannonade in her eardrums. She reflexively sits up straighter, drawing backward a single scooting inch that drags those covers alongside her to pool decadently around her long legs, one raised at the knee, the other half-dangling off that bed edge.

    dokidokidokidoki dokidokidokidoki dokidokidokidoki

Her ears are so hot and full of the pound of her frantic heart dokidoki that she can barely hear Hitomi as she calls her beautiful, and yet it cuts through sinks down into the very core of her until she feels as if her stomach is starting to flutter dokidoki, as if it could take flight all on its own.

She's so beautiful? Hitomi dokidoki is so beautiful. Everything about her. The sound of her voice tickling at her ear. The way those glasses fog whenever she's excited in a way that inspires something deep and warm dokidoki in the core of the Kirijo heiress. That other side of her...

She feels like a fire to Mitsuru. And in this moment, she's like an dokidoki inferno.

Something dokidoki blazing and beautiful dokidoki that she knows she shouldn't touch. And yet--

thmp!

The bed jostles as Hitomi lands on it and glides across it like she was just as silken. dokidoki She should tell her. Tell her how beautiful she is. Mitsuru's lips part, but the words don't quite come. dokidoki She's never lost her words before. Hitomi is getting closer. So much closer. dokidoki She can feel the warmth of her against her skin. She raises a hand like she should stop her.

It falls on Hitomi's shoulder and then glides as if dokidoki under its own power dokidoki until her fingers press against the back of the Second Year's neck.

... you don't need to be so formal.

dokidoki Mitsuru sucks in a breath.

Surely...

dokidokidokidokidokidokidokidokidokidoki

... we can call each other by our names.

dokidoki Mi she's so close dokidoki tsu she's so close! dokidoki

Mitsuru Kirijo's eyes shut.

Pink warmth floods the scarlet saturated room, backlighting making a shadow of one silhouette growing closer...

... and the other drawing in to close the rest of that gap the rest of the way.

                       dokidoki dokidoki
                   dokidokidokidoki dokidokidokidoki
                 dokidokidokidokidoki dokidokidokidokidoki
               dokidokidokidokidokidokidokidokidokidokidoki
               dokidokidokidokidokidokidokidokidokidokidoki
               dokidokidokidokidokidokidokidokidokidokidoki
                 dokidokidokido kidokidokidoki
                   dokidokidok "Hitomi...." okidokidoki
                     dokidokido kidokidoki
                       dokidokidokidokidokidokidoki
                         dokidokidokidokidokidoki
                           dokidokidokidokidoki
                             dokidokidokidoki
                               dokidokidoki
                                 dokidoki
                                   doki

                                   chu~

Deep reds crack open into slivers. The way Hitomi's lips move is hypnotizing. And the things she says...

                               dokido"Hold."

That hand is on Hitomi's shoulder now, gripping firm but not harsh. Mitsuru Kirijo's eyes are open. Her jaw sets.

"What apples?"

                                                       doki

Time seems to be gripped in stasis' cruel claw, dragging precious few seconds out into eternity in which Mitsuru Kirijo and Hitomi Mandai remain like that, silhouettes divided by eternal millimeters of separation. She feels the rapid beat of her heart chill with the icy drop of reality. The weightlessness of this moment feels the torture of gravity settling in with agonizing explicitness as everything floods back to her with six painful words she tries so hard not to mutter.

Scarlet red lips part.

"... ... This is not why we're here."

                                                       doki

Mitsuru's heart slows from that delirious, intoxicating staccato beat just as Hitomi's accelreates. "We need--" And a second later Hitomi is -- rolling off the bed?!

Mitsuru's eyes fly wide. "Wait--!"

She reaches out too late. She remains frozen like that, wide-eyed and bewildered, left in the aftermath of Hitomi's slow but inevitable noping out of this entire situation.

"Ah... ... ..."

                                                       doki

The reality of the moment comes rushing in. Where they are. What they were doing. What Hitomi was - what SHE was - what THEY were about to do...!

"............................"

Her cheeks flush bright ruby red, lost to the saturation of the room so that history shall not remember this ignominy.

Paralyzed for a moment, Mitsuru gropes for something, anything to say. She wants to comfort Hitomi. To let her know it's okay. To say something to salve the embarrassment of the moment they were both feeling.

It felt so right. So real. And yet... it was just...

Like cold water, reality rushes in. Her responsibilities. Her obligations.

Her mission.

                                                       doki

"..."

Bed sheets shift and spill with Mitsuru's slow movements until the corner of one end sweeps against the top of Hitomi's head as a shadow passes over her. Mitsuru's knees drawing to the ground scarcely make a sound as she settles in a comfortable three feet across the way from Hitomi. Those deep red eyes watch as the other girl screams her silent scream, and Mitsuru's expression twists briefly.

Her right hand lifts. Stretches towards Hitomi.

She wants to take her hands. Draw them away from her face.

"Hi--"

She wants to tell her that she wasn't the only one who wante--

"..."

Her hand hesitates at the threshold. Her fingers draw backward.

"... Mandai."

The weight of Mitsuru's hand settling on Hitomi's shoulder is a palpable one.

"Look at me."

And she will wait. Wait until Hitomi's hands fall away. Wait until those eyes meet hers, until she stares into a face she wants to unburden everything she's pent up for so long to. There are so many things she wants to say.

"......... I promise you, I am going to make it pay."

And only one thing she can bring herself to.

                                                       doki

It's only a minute or so of unspoken silence later that Mitsuru Kirijo is fully clothed once more, securing her belt around her waist.

She hesitates. And then takes a deep breath, and takes hold of her Evoker. And her sword.

"Yamagishi. Where are the others?"

<Pose Tracker> Yukari Takeba has posed.

Yukari Takeba dresses so quickly in her embarrassment. One might say she's never dressed so swiftly before. In the bathroom's mirror, her cheeks are a bright pink, visible even despite her makeup.

"God. A few more seconds and-"

Leaning against the wall, she presses her hands to either side of her head, and bites back a scream, only finally expelling her words of sheer, unadulterated teenage apprehension.

"I don't even know if I'd be loud! Everyone might have heard me!"

She wants to slump down and hug her knees. She wants to take a cold shower, too bad its the Dark Hour and a room has a Window in it.

She kind of still wants to kiss him. No, wait. She wants him to kiss her.

She can't be the kind of woman who kisses first. She can't. If she is...

Taking a deep breath, she straightens her back, and walks out of the bathroom fully dressed in her SEES attire, with a quiver over her back and bow in hand.

And the greatest resting bitch face she can muster on command.

"Come on let's go." She says to Minato, imperiously, "Nothing happened. If you mention this to anyone-"

https://tinyurl.com/YukariMad

"-we're through."

And she immediately storms out the door, not even realizing in the heat of the moment, that in order for them to be 'through' they'd have to first be 'together' in the first place.

<Pose Tracker> Fuuka Yamagishi has posed.

Fuuka sees the revelation cross Reiya's face - followed soon after, surprisingly, by a blush. She doesn't think she's seen Reiya's expression go beyond 'mild surprise' before... Surprise crosses her own face at his embarrassment, and she shakes her head quickly as he apologizes.

"It's alright, Aomori-san. It wasn't your fault. We both were..." She starts - but he's right. The others... The others! If they've been put into a situation like this, then -

"Yes, of course!" Fuuka assures. "I'll guide you."

And then, she gets a message back. Minato has sustained some damage...

<I-I see...> Fuuka replies hesitantly. ...It sounds like he's fine. And not just him - she hears Mitsuru a moment later. <Kirijo-senpai! It seems we've all been separated... Aomori-san and I are moving to check on the others. I can guide you, as well.>

She projects a mental map of the area outward to anyone who can receive it, and then looks toward Reiya with a serious nod. She doesn't know what has occurred to him exactly... but she can tell it's important.

"Let's go." She replies - and hurries to follow.

Now that the fog has cleared, both for herself and others, she's starting to get a clearer picture of the area. And as she expands her consciousness, she starts to notice a pattern.

<If you can hear my voice... the power taking hold of everyone seems to originate from the mirrors. If you destroy the mirrors its using, you should be able to weaken its influence!> Fuuka explains.

<Pose Tracker> Reiya Aomori has posed.

Reiya gets his stoicism back a few moments later--and he will want to discuss this with Fuuka later. OR rather... he absolutely doesn't want to discuss this, ever, but he should discuss it with her later. Reiya...

Well, Reiya didn't have time to find his jacket, or his shoes. But he does have weapons, and that's what matters most. "Yes, Yamagishi-san." They go.

Reiya steps out into the hallway, looks around--and opens the next door.

...There's three coffins in it. He closes it.

Next room: he opens the door. The first thing he notices is the fluid dripping from the mirror, the pictures, the lamps. The second thing he notices is--

Suzume and Ririka. In particular states of partial undress, with Suzume carrying Ririka, Ririka looking up at her like...

Ah. That is what Ririka told him, the other day. Many thoughts occur to him--but he pushes them all aside to follow Fuuka's advice. Striding past Suzume and Ririka in their reverie, he pulls a knife and hurls it--blunt-side meant to hit--to shatter the mirror in the room.

Then, he clears his throat, and turns to Suzume and Ririka.

"Excuse me," he says. Then, he puts his hand to his mouth and makes a loud, piercing whistle to get their attention if they're still groggy.

"You have been affected by the Shadow. Please dress and join us outside."

Reiya starts for the door, fully intending to walk through it and close it behind him.

He will take the opportunity to button his shirt.

<Pose Tracker> Aigis has posed.

    Another element to concern herself over makes its presence known to Aigis. That dripping. Some part of herself may genuinely feel disappointed by Hyousuke pulling away from her, but at this point, it's grown distant, faded by the urgency of everything else. "Please mind where you step. There is a strange substance which has found its way into our room. Contact with it seems inadvisable."

    As for his request: Aigis stares at him and informatively intones, "I do not believe you actually want that, Suzuki-san." To demonstrate, she holds up her hand. It rotates around her wrist socket and picks up speed as it spins to form a drill with her fingers as its tip.

    "Besides, from what I can glean about personality traits that we both share," she loudly says over the whine of her spinning hand's servos, then brings them to a halt.

    She eyes the liquid dripping down from the lamp, around where it's making its way on the floor, and the feet of a very agitated Hyousuke. She returns her gaze to him and adds, "I fear that would only exacerbate matters even further."

    As she takes a moment to pick up her large red bow-tie ribbon, she looks around the room again to consider their position, then nods sharply. "That said, I believe I have a solution which may satisfy the both of us. Brace yourself, please." With that warning, she hoists Hyousuke up ...

    ... and hurls him full-strength towards the door. That ought to do it!
     

<Pose Tracker> Hitomi Mandai has posed.

 
Hitomi stares at the crack between the floor and the wall, which is a space you don't quite usually see, isn't it? Even if you're prone to sit on tatami mats, you're not usually looking right there. Maybe towards something else set low for appreciative observation, but not that space.

That seam that breaks the illusion.

Everything that was hot is cold now. The sheen of sweat that was on her skin in the sultry heat that she'd so eagerly turned towards, like a budding shoot turning hungrily towards the light, it's still there, but now it's tepid and wet.

She isn't thinking of anything much. Everything is just a thudding afterecho. Neat, thinks Hitomi, so this must be mindfulness. Oh, wait, that's a thought? So is that. So is this. Damn, I didn't even achieve enlightenment before I died.

Sheets rustle. Hitomi wants to close her eyes but it doesn't really work. She can hear exactly where and how Mitsuru is moving. A shadow passes over her.

The shadow descends.

Hitomi looks at Mitsuru.

She feels absurd.
She wants, in that single moment, to die.
Maybe that would take the edge off things, right?
Just suddenly, pow, straight into nothingness.
You have to consider it later, or really get your defilements cleaned, before you can see what happened.
It'd probably be funny, then.
But she's not that enlightened at all.

Hitomi, feeling full to the brim of defilements. starts to open her mouth. Then something impossible happens. It isn't the evoker, it isn't some grim reaching for her throat to discreetly end things, it's a hand. Hitomi's eyes turn for a moment to focus.

Fingers coming out.

One of Hitomi's hands slips off her cheek but all it really does is flop onto the carpet, palm turned up.

And then she's touched, and she shudders, strongly, but it seems to push her out of whatever shock or shame that was. The blanched look on her face, that total annihilating feeling of 'wow, did I fuck up, it's all over now' lurching away like the sensation of a rollercoaster in that split second after the track guides you out of that heart-pounding fall--

A hand rests on her shoulder. The one, at least, that isn't bare. Hitomi's eyes turn momentarily towards it, and then back up to Mitsuru's.

That look in her eyes, thinks Hitomi.

Maybe this ruined it. Maybe it's dead, like a tender shoot in a vicious April frost. Maybe it was all a waste, an awkward mistruth. A daring gamble, but something that had no strategy behind it, no hope, just a blind urgent push.

But there *was* a shoot there, wasn't there? Something, at least, to console herself with later.

She looks at Mitsuru. The hand she'd slid off her face reaches up, momentarily. A brief chaste sort of touch on the back of her hand. It would be a clasping of hands, but for the ways they're facing.

"... me too," Hitomi answers her quietly.

SOON

Hitomi hasn't looked Mitsuru in the eye after she got up. Her face began to bloom red, not simply alive but actually flushed, but it's a different kind of flush. She's not putting herself together very effectively; she grabbed the skirt, put on the shoes, fastened the belt, shrugged the jacket back on, and just when Fuuka makes connection, she was strapping the arm guard back on.

She still looks dishevelled (much more than her natural slightly rumpled casual style) but nothing's falling out or off or asunder.

'If you can hear my voice...'

"Got it," says Hitomi, reaching into the pouch on her hip and pulling out three silvered dice with neon-green pips. She winds up for a moment before *hurling* them down at the now-empty bed, at which point they ricochet up and hit the rectangular mirror atop the bed, smashing it with an ugly sound and sending shimmering fragments to the ground.

The dice bounce near Hitomi's foot and she scoops them onto the sole of the other shoe, bringing them up to scoop with her hand. "Destroy all mirrors." She turns around to do something less furious to take out the bathroom mirror, where - as always - they explode in bursts of gunpowder-esque force. And over the shattering, she answers Fuuka, "Hope my luck holds up," with the most withered and deflated tone of voice. After a sigh, she -

-- with a struggle --

Looks over her shoulder at Mitsuru. "... I'll follow your lead."

Don't cry, Hitomi commands herself, *do not cry*. That is later.

<Pose Tracker> Minato Arisato has posed.

    Minato might not have resting bitch face on account of not really having any face at rest, but rest assured: he can still feel shame. Fuuka stammers out an acknowledgement, and Minato stares into space, for a moment.

    Yukari seriously almost kissed me...
    But if it's mind control, it doesn't count, right?
    Still... control based on desire...
    Does that mean Yukari wants to...

    After a lacuna just a little too long to not be suspicious, Minato tells Fuuka, with just a hint of stiffness: "Resuming operation."

    He stands -- just in time for Yukari to burst out, bow in hand, as she lays down the law.

    ... Minato feels, in this moment, as if he'd been executed by Mitsuru herself.

    "Understood," he says, and if his dull expression looks a touch freaked out...

    ... it was probably the mind control, man.

    Yukari storms out, and Minato pauses, as Fuuka's voice echoes through his head.

    He looks to the mirror that might have trapped them.

    He pulls out his sword, and smashes it.

    "My health is already critically low," he excuses his vandalism, as he leaves the room.

<Pose Tracker> Niko Kirisaki has posed.

Niko has been, and continues to be, a little too preoccipied to take notice of any hints to the shifts in Kurou's mental state, and her own effects on such. He's difficult to read at the best of times, but at the current time, there is no chance of it happening. Double especially when she appears to be having a hard time looking directly at him all of a sudden. Odd indeed.

It's almost a relief that he doesn't persist after she backs off - almost, because she still can't be sure how any of this happened. By what sort of trick could she possibly have been lured into this situation? Did he drug her somehow?! She knew she should have been more suspicious of someone carrying tea wherever he goes!

Leaving Niko to continue making such assumptions for long could have caused some serious additional problems, when an apology draws her attention back into the here and now. Her kneejerk thought still goes along the lines of 'oh compromised memories huh, how convenient', but rather than voice that one, her face scrunches up as she realizes that actually, that's how it was for her too.

Besides, to Kurou's credit, and to Niko's incredible relief, he DOES manage to actually explain things. Everything else, well, not forgotten, but pushed aside for the moment, she fully straightens, and slams a fist down into her open palm, she too abruptly realizing the truth of the matter.

"Shit, shit, that's right, SEES! We went to stop them, that's why we came here! Of course, of course, that's the only reason we would, absolutely nothing else!" Spoken with all the insistence of someone who very badly needs that to be true. ...Wait, what is he looking at...?

...Her necklace. Of course. Niko's not even upset about that one, in fact she laughs out loud, as the stress of the past few minutes (which felt like hours) falls away with the realization that, yeah, same old Kurou. Always getting distracted by the dumbest things at the dumbest times.

"Way too late to still compliment someone for a thing they're always wearing, Kurou-chan. Or maybe you're still a little groggy?"

Though it was not meant for her, she yet catches Fuuka's voice, sharpening Niko's gaze. That was a lucky bit of advice to happen to catch... and informs her next actions.

In a flash, Niko draws her Evoker and fires it at the side of her head. Ate briefly appears, the Persona's long hair briefly wrapping around the pair before fading away. While nothing outwardly changes, the pair instantly drops off the supernatural radar through a layer of active obfuscation.

"Phew, that's better," Niko declares, feeling the last foggy remnants lifting from her mind as a helpful side effect, then turning to her compatriot. "Sounds like SEES had some trouble too, so I guess you were right. How you feel about some vandalism?"

She nods her head towards the mirror that evidently had something to do with all this, leaving that part to Kurou. She'll save her wrath... for where it truly needs to be applied.

<Pose Tracker> Umie Akabane has posed.

    Where she expected the carpet, she instead finds her body suspended by hands, smelling faintly of something sweet and metallic.

    Ah, what trouble did Shiryuu get into now? He's such a terrible person.

    He'd probably set the world ablaze if she died like this.
    Good.

    'Forgettin' your... you're getting more like me.' Yes, she has blood on her hands too.

    tick tock, akabane
    But, beyond the smell of blood, there's no scent of rain.

    The earrings are simple studs, a fake silver.

    Did Seigo have a mark under his right eye?
    Did he smell like water?
    Was he ever this light, even in his last days?

    There. That's it. That's the stuff to get the blood pumping again.

    Good old-fashioned violence.

    Umie is grabbed and roughly yanked into the room, nearly limp.
    She'll fall just as limply, cackling like a crone.

    "I'm not into you either, but here we are!" Umie wheezes.

    '<If you can hear my voice...>'

    Umie gives Noriaki a weak, but sharpening grin as she flops on her back. "You could stay here forever, you know. You're waiting for someone, aren't you...?"

    He could come over and strike her with that rusty blade, gut her like a fish.

    ".... Or you can show this place what you think of it~"

<Pose Tracker> Hyousuke Suzuki has posed.

Contact with both the drill and the liquid seemed, at best, inadvisable. At worst, outright deadly. Nevertheless, Hyousuke stood and braced himself, looking at her as if she would nevertheless hit him with something designed to kill things a lot bigger than he was. He almost seemed disappointed when she declined to hit him with anything and instead gave him a softer, more dignified answer.
"...Fine, but we need to do something about-" He began, only to find himself hoisted unceremoniously into the air. The surprise of it was the first thing to cast the fog from his mind.

The second was, of course, the fact that he'd been flung through the air like a fastball.

Hyousuke scarcely had time to think about what had happened before he made a distinctly Hyousuke-shaped hole in the door. Solid as it was, no doubt intended to keep sounds of various carnal indulgences contained within the room, it was no match for Aigis's sheer power and the absolute brick of a man she'd hurled through it. A thunderous splintering was followed by a loud thud, itself followed by another, smaller, thud from beyond the threshold. A few seconds passed, and a familiar voice called back, notably free from any influence by untoward entities.
"I'm ok! Probably!"

Hyousuke proved this in short order by storming back into the room. The sensible option was, of course to open the door normally. Even if it were locked, there was a hole he could reach through. However, Hyousuke was not a sensible man, nor did he care for sensible options. When he heard the call to destroy mirrors, not only did he laser-focus on that and that alone, he also took it as an excuse to tear the rest of the place down. In the name of 'making certain he was safe,' of course.

Kicking the door down while wielding a shattered chunk of wood in his hands, Hyousuke bludgeoned his way back into the room (making sure to avoid any strange-looking spills in the process) and heaved himself past Aigis.
"You heard Yamagishi-san! Get the mirror!" He shouted, speaking with a little *too* much eagerness. With a shout, he heaved the wood down into the polished surface of the nearest mirror he could find, over and over again. Did he have a Persona? Yes. Did he have a shotgun? Also yes. Did he find beating the source of his mind-warping into scrap far more cathartic? Without a doubt.

The fact that he couldn't bring himself to look Aigis in the eye during the entire ordeal was probably not relevant. Him doing his best to immerse himself in a violent and angry endeavour in order to escape the clutches of lust and love - however false they might have been - was probably not relevant either.

<Pose Tracker> Koh Katsuhiro has posed.

"Sorry," Koh apologies, emotion seeping back into his voice as he attempts to fend his would-be wife off. "I would, if, I mean-I'm not going to be around-"

His eyes move over her shoulder, catching himself again in a mirror. This Koh's eyes have something behind them. But the mirror also has something behind it.

"F-Fuuka-san!" His voice raises an octave. "We're not--oh, yeah, right!"

Koh takes more decisive action. Which first involves taking Yuko's shoulders and planting her on the rounded bed. He puts some effort into it (she probably exercises more than he does). Nothing good comes after that, though.

Well. Shinji might think it's cool, actually.

"I'm really sorry!" Koh apologizes once more as he grabs the nearest implement of mass destruction, a lamp, and bashes the offending mirror.

<Pose Tracker> Suzume Fukura has posed.

Suzume's grin only broadens. "I've been trying," she says, modestly, about her workouts. Truth be told it's not easy for her; Ririka is taller than her, not lighter than her (Suzume is not going to inquire to figure out if she's actually heavier), and Suzume can feel the tension in her shoulders and upper arms and back. But she doesn't have to walk that far. She can do this. She'll MAKE herself do this.

When did you ever say no to a dare?

That's not even Lovers, entirely; that's just Suzume. "I'm willing to try," she says, her voice a little husky, as she leans in when Ririka does, forehead-to-forehead. Suzume almost goes for a kiss, but - no. Anticipation. She does *blow* a kiss, though, as she pulls back.

Suzume is far too distracted to notice the fluid. Not the sound of it, not the sight of it, and none of it touches her yet. She would

Just give in...

Suzume carries Ririka gently to the bed. She's about to set her down on it tenderly, when -

The door opens.

Reiya throws a knife at a mirror.

Suzume jerks straight upright at the sound of breaking glass, practically spins to see what it is - which is a ponderous, awkward thing with Ririka in her arms. She catches her hip on the edge of the bed and stumbles, rolling onto the bed with Ririka carried along, tumbling through a half roll and ending up on top of Ririka, her half-bare chest pressing into Ririka's face.

Suzume lets out a sound somewhere between a yelp and a squeak and leaps off the bed (and Ririka, so she can breathe again) with sufficient speed that she does a pretty good impression of teleportation. She lands *off* the bed, hiding behind it from Reiya's point of view, not only her face but her ears flaming red to a depth that she ordinarily never hits. She wants to shout. Her eyes and cheeks feel crinkled in a way that she knows means she wants to cry, and she never does that where people can see. Not anymore. She knuckles at them, burning even brighter red -

Huh, she thinks, my butt is going numb.

Suzume has sat right at the edge of one of the puddles, gathering under the nightstand next to the bed. She scrambles back to her feet, stumbling only slightly as she darts toward the bathroom, vanishing inside.

A moment later, and the sound of *extremely* breaking glass comes from within, tinkling and ringing for some time, as Suzume has taken out her frustration (physical and otherwise) and sheer mortification by smashing the bathroom mirror with her tonfa with enough force to send shards halfway across the room as the frame rebounds.

"Fuck! There's all this glop in here too!" The shower is full of it. Suzume looks around - she can't gather everything she tossed in here out of here in time, so a few moments later she comes back out. Her shirt is buttoned - but she buttoned it off-line, so the shirt hangs askew as the top button is actually in the second hole and thus all the way down - and her jacket is thrown overtop, hanging open. Her tonfa are in her hands, resting against her arms.

Suzume refuses to meet anyone's gaze, and - in complete opposition to the way she normally runs her mouth - she doesn't seem to have the ability to put any words together. She's so red it looks like she's sunburned, all the way up to her ears; even the tips of her ears are luminescent.

The other stuff she tossed aside was sitting in the liquid. She didn't dare pick it up. There's going to be surprised cleaning staff in the morning.

<Pose Tracker> Kurou Ryouhara has posed.

Such a strange influence that had washed over him. Kurou is a creature of conviction. One must take their actions and squarely own them, but that was... it was not him, but wasn't it him? Does that mean it was her? And if it was not her, then it was not him?

... It doesn't matter right now. Focus. They have their mission.

"Yes," Kurou affirms as Niko reminds them of that task, as much as a means to cement it in his own thoughts. The only reason, and nothing else. Exactly. No notes.

Except for one note, distracted by a fishy necklace.

"Ah --" The utterance comes stilted, Kurou blinking back at Niko. Too late. He was supposed to notice it earlier, then. Is he still groggy? She's laughing, and that laughter lingers like an echo in the back of his thoughts even after it ends.

"... Maybe."

Ate's appearance sharpens his senses and attention. Kurou straightens and stills until Niko's works her Persona's magic.

"Good. Then we are not as disadvantaged as I feared." The trap has cut both ways.

He follows her attention to the mirror. Without further word or fanfare, Kurou draws his blade and shatters the glass with a single strike of the pommel.

"... Let's keep moving."

<Pose Tracker> Mitsuru Kirijo has posed.

*click*

The sound of her belt clasping is like a thunderclap in the stark silence of a room that once felt much warmer than it does now.

She has not said a single word. She doesn't look Hitomi's way.

... She just can't afford to. Not now. Not now that she remembers.

Remembers all the reasons this was just a sad fantasy that thing taunted her with--

                                  KRRSH!!

The sound of the butt of Mitsuru Kirijo's rapier meeting the full-length mirror opposite that great bed in a shattering ramrod of impact adds a violent rapport that just doubles the cacophony caused by the canny cast of Hitomi's die.

"Understood," Mitsuru says to that familiar voice in her head. Did Fuuka manage to resist all of this? she wonders to herself. She feels even more foolish for being so easily ensorcelled--

"Thank you, Yamagishi."

She slides her rapier back into its sheathe. Checks her Evoker's holster. She turns--

--and pauses, just as she feels Hitomi's eyes on her. For a second, Mitsuru lingers like that, caught in a stretch where shadow bisects through the red lighting of the room. She draws in a breath.

"I..."

Say it. Just say it.

"... ... I'm... counting on you, Mandai."

And she curses herself even as she all too calmly strides towards that door.

"Let's go."

                                  ~ </3 ~

BGM: https://youtu.be/J6EDW5WFb2M

There's a trail of unholy love destruction following the wake of Mitsuru Kirijo, Executioner.

Mitsuru is scraping the errant shards of glass from a shattered mirror away from the main stretch of the love hotel's halls when Hyousuke Suzuki just kind of explodes through the door next to her Fred Flintstone style.

She looks down at him, brows raised, expression hovering between 'emotionally sundered but not daring to show it' and 'exasperated confusion but slightly less unwilling to show it' which mostly just leads towards the deathly stare of Gekkoukan's Merciless Queen settling on Hyousuke.

... and then just following him as he goes crashing back through the door shouting and shattering mirrors with eagerness aplenty.

"..."

She watches - she listens - as the others shout and smash and refuse to look at each other.

Mitsuru closes her eyes. Suzume somewhere in the distance is shouting about strange fluids in the love hotel.

Mitsuru's hands quietly ball towards fists.

"Enough!"

Eyes snap wide. And Mitsuru just starts marching.

"Everyone, outside and regroup on me. This farce has gone on more than long enough. Yamagishi -- can you sense where it's hiding?"

Her voice is once more as steadfast as ever. And yet there's a certain, implacable edge to it now.

As if this is absolutely the Wrong Time to be second guessing her.

<Pose Tracker> Aigis has posed.

    While Hyousuke bashes away at one of the mirrors with what remains of the door, Aigis stares, baffled. Moments ago, she had thought that they understood each other clearly due to their self-sacrificial natures, but ...

    He has a Persona! He has a shotgun! He has her! Yet here he is, she thinks, foolhardily running back into peril for no strategic purpose, simply his own satisfaction. (The possibility that he's throwing himself into this task to try to keep his head above water in this supernatural situation doesn't occur to her.)

    At his suggestion to 'get the mirror,' Aigis points a finger at the bathroom and casually fires a single round, followed by the sound of shattering glass. "Done," she announces before she turns to exit through the hole in the door.

    Not 'I have finished the task as you have requested.' Not 'The mirror is now shattered.' There's never any irritation in her voice, but one could be tempted to read into her sudden brevity.

    "Suzuki-san. Let us go find the others and ensure their safety." She closes her eyes and politely adds, "Please utilize some form of ranged attack when destroying any more mirrors from here on out."

    "... Or perhaps it is best that we wait outside."
     

<Pose Tracker> Noriaki Okaga has posed.

    No, not at all.
    Never.
    Never, never.

    In the end, there had only been blood.

    That person who he had thought for just a moment to be standing in the doorway, right before his eyes, isn't there at all. What had been is no more.

    In the darkness of this room, slipped free of the syrupy grasp of delusion that had coiled around his psyche and nearly drowned him, Noriaki glares down at Umie as she collapses to the floor. In one bloodied hand, he brandishes his weapon at her.

    Yes, indeed. Anger is a potent antidote against such influence. So is the disgust curling his lip.

    "...Shit," Noriaki grunts as the message rings out loud enough for even someone like him to hear. "That's right. Got wind SEES was up to somethin' around here. ...All that, and we got caught like a bunch of bugs..."

    Like ants to sugar, when all is said and done.

    So the mirrors are the key. Place must be crawling with SEES at this point.

    He glares down at Umie, fury writ large in his pale grey eyes. "Pain in the..." he mutters, glancing away from her sharply. "Well, get off the fuckin' floor, crow-girl. This ain't naptime."

    With his free hand, Noriaki tugs his hood back up, his eyes once more lost in shadow.

    Then, fishing in his hoodie's front pocket, he produces his Evoker. Jamming it up under his chin, he pulls the trigger.

    When Efnysien appears in a burst of red light, the Persona is his barely restrained rage incarnate.

    Forget the mirror.
    The room might not be safe.

<Pose Tracker> Ririka Kawase has posed.

Suzume's been trying, and Ririka lets a hand wander for a moment to feel some of that muscle in Suzume's arm and back. "Yeah you have," she replies. She grins and blows that kiss back. "You got this!"

She, likewise, doesn't notice the fluid pouring in. Nor does she notice Reiya, at least at first.

(This is... something like what Ririka told Reiya the other day. But when she suggested a double date to Reiya this is definitely not what she had in mind.)

But the shattering of glass cuts through the fog, finally, and Ririka blinks as she starts to come to her senses. "Wha-- wait, we were..." She winces visibly as Reiya whistles sharply. "Shit! What was that for-- oh crap! The Shadow!"

She also tries to bolt upright, but she doesn't have her feet on the floor. "Wait why am I--" Her vision snaps to Suzume as her eyes widen. "Suzume!?" Realizing what position she's in makes her want to get on her feet again even more, and her panic makes it even less likely that she's actually going to succeed.

... especially not when the two of them take a tumble onto the bed. "Waugh!" Her own flailing limbs aren't helping anything and soon enough she winds up underneath Suzume.

Her cheeks turn bright red once her brain catches up to what it's looking at. It's all up the back of her neck and her ears and just all of her face, too. "Uh..." She sits up when Suzume teleports away, taking several deep breaths.

The rest of the hotal, and especially the room, comes flooding back into her awareness. When Suzume comments on her butt going num Ririka is trying to roll over and get off the bed. "Get out of the liquid."

She stares down at the floor as she reaches the edge of teh bed. Crap. More liquid. "Uggh..." She throws herself forward as best as she can, tumbling onto the floor in a heap before she starts to pick herself back up.

Her height is good for one thing: She can reach over and pluck her boots from where she left them beside the bed, scrambling to pull them back on. <Fuuka-chan! I'm-- I'll be ready to coordinate in a moment!>

How can she sound out of breath in her thoughts???

She pitches herself at the table, throwing on her jacket, gloves, and holster, and absolutely forgetting to button up her shirt, tuck it back into her skirt, or even close the jacket properly.

She can hear all the breaking glass in the athroom. She pauses partway through buckling on her belt and holster to look that way. Oh boy. There's... a lot to unpack there. "C'mon. We have to regroup." She rushes for the door and pull it open, only to come to a sudden halt.

"Aomori-kun? I..." Her eyes widen. "Oh. Shit."

There's a lot more to unpack than she thought.

<Pose Tracker> Don Penguan has posed.

"Of course you're going to be around..." Yuko says, oblivious to any implications in this state, "... you wouldn't leave me."

Koh then pushes her down on the bed, as she lets gravity cause her to fall backwards on the bed, as a little titter leaves her lips. "Taking the initiative like a real man... I like it..."

As she then whispers, "I like you."

Then as he takes a lamp in hand, she blinks, like some distant part of her just doesn't get it. "Are you... being kinky?" Look, there are some things that even a Shadow's manipulation can't explain away in a young teen's brain.

"... I don't really get-"

SMASH

Yuko just lay there now, in a daze, eyes unfocused- not speaking. Without the Shadow's influence, this place is something she just exists in.

Something she must survive in.

And now, Koh can only hope she makes it until morning and never returns to this place. Because unlike him... she has a future ahead of her.

-=-=-

One by one the mirrors are broken.

And that's when Fuuka finally pinpoints the presence of the Shadow. On the floor above, a grand suite. The walls are more like hanging crimson curtains along a wide room of that scandalous decor. On one side of the room is a water bed, that spins round and round with the touch of a button.

On the other, is an enormous hot tub, shaped like a heart, with glowing pink lights within casting it in a hideous hue.

And what is hovering over it, is the Shadow. An enormous heart vessel, with dripping, jelly like wings and golden trim. Containing inside a bobbing symbol for female on its right side, and male on its left.

It remains over the hot tub, the most important guest here at this hotel of lust. A representative of connections forced between people who do not desire it.

How many couples now suffer apathy syndrome because of it? It does not seem to even acknowledge the presence of those who have come after it. Whether it's because it presumes they're still under its control- or does not consider them even to be a threat to its predation.

Because instead, through a paper screen, appears the tip of a blade- slicing a hole with a harsh SHRWIP, right before the person wielding it bursts through. "Hehehe-ahahahahaHAHA! Hereeeeee's JUNPEI!"
 
With cheeks aflush, and eyes of yellow hue under the control of some other, a young man in a baseball cap and SEES jacket brandishes his Greatsword, as he wolf-whistles at the crowd, leering at them with a manic glee in his eyes.

"All of you looking fineeee-hehehehe-looking HOT!" Licking his lips, "If staring is a crime then-"

Taking a few test swings, like a star batter, the mask atop the Shadow, taking place of the perfume stopper begins to glow red, and Junpei begins to charge as he swings away at the Persona Users with a wild abandon- trying to cut a path towards Mitsuru in particular.

"-EXECUTE ME SENPAI!"

TO BE CONTINUED