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Post by Tomoko Hashimoto on Jul 28, 2011 2:14:00 GMT -5
I gotta tread carefully, Tomoko thought. He's suspicious. Out loud, she said, "The river monster! I hope he can hear me. He'll have a lot to answer for if he shows his face here!" Tomoko coughed roughly. Nnnnng. Her throat was already protesting.
Swallowing hard, Tomoko thought hastily. "I, uh. I live around here. I'm.... You know, you should go on ahead. Your friend is waiting for you," she lied. Pleasebuythis, she thought. She felt bad about lying, but she was glad he couldn't see how guilty her face was. She had pulled the name from a Sherlocke Holmes story - the title, A Study in Scarlet. It was the first thing she had thought of. It somehow was too James Bond for the situation. Tomoko edged away from Raziel. "You, uh, go on ahead! I live around here, just goin' back to my house, yessiree..."
What possessed her to go back and help a Heaven's Gate member anyways? She needed to leave. She managed a backwards slide, with the river on her right and Raziel on her left, inching away. Suddenly, it hit her - she could run, and he wouldn't be able to follow her! But...somehow she couldn't quite get the motivation to do that. Tomoko was tired, but as much as she wanted to run home and have tea and sink into her tub, she was loathe to leave a bruised and blind Raziel behind. What if the thing came back? Tomoko wasn't pleased with the notion of seeing his ghost by her favorite picnic area.
She quickly tucked her hair up into a messy bun and rubbed dirt on her face and arms so that Raziel would have issues recognizing her. She began inching closer. "I can help you find the way down to the path," she said, voice hoarse. "I promise, I swear on the bible, I won't hurt you. I want to help." She coughed again. The fake voice was soon going to give her real laryngitis. She reached out the branch. "Hold on to this," she prompted. "A..creature burnt my hands when I was little. I don't want you seein' them."
That was plausible, right?
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Post by Raziel Och on Jul 28, 2011 16:27:27 GMT -5
At the mention of ‘river monster’ Raziel bristled. How she knew about it, Raziel didn’t dare fathom. But the inescapable feeling of dread welled up inside of him. “How did you know— “ He backtracked his thoughts. Playing stupid was his only option if he did not want to give anything away to… whoever this hoarse sounding girl was. That is, if his momentary lapse in judgment hadn’t already. “You know as well as I do that there no such things as… ‘river monsters’.” He said with a nod of his head. Then he remembered his wounds, the way blood soaked and stained his tank top.
“I was attacked by a fox... in case you're wondering.” Raziel mumbled. Hopefully this strange girl wouldn’t think twice about his lame excuse for his condition. Or knew anything about foxes and their behavioural patterns.
When the girl told him to ‘go on ahead’, he hesitated and seized her with an annoyed look. She needed to make up her mind. First, she wanted him to follow her. And now she wanted him to walk off. Raziel began chewing on his bottom lip, then took a couple steps towards something he assumed to be a patch of grass. The world was all smears and blurs and blobs of murky colour, none of which he could make sense of.
Red flags were rising up faster than he could count. First off, just who in the name of the good lord was this girl? How did she know about the river monster, or even about Tomoko for that matter? All of it vexed him, made him feel antsy with worry. God, how he wished that blasted river thing hadn’t smashed his glasses.
The girl inched away, grew quiet and then stooped to the ground. She was… doing something with her arms. Raziel could recognizes the motions of rubbing one thing or another, but why? She stopped her suspicious actions and sidled up to him. Raziel backed away, unsure of what to think. Should he trust this stranger? Would there be danger in doing so? Her words rubbed him the wrong way, and he just couldn’t shake the feeling that he knew her from somewhere. When the hoarse girl handed out her branch, he took it with a heavy sigh.
“Look, I don’t know who the hell you are,” Raziel jabbed his finger at her viciously, seized with irritation. “but do anything funny, and you’ll regret it.” He glanced in the other direction to show that he was not staring at her hands, as per her request.
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Post by Tomoko Hashimoto on Aug 14, 2011 23:48:45 GMT -5
There went that feeling - that squirmy, hopeless feeling that Tomoko sometimes got, the one that was stifling and horrible and made her want to shriek and cry and never speak again. It was fear. Tomoko was scared, but she would never admit it to herself. She swallowed the feelings and tried to take a deep breath.
She was going to find out what was up, once and for all.
"Don't worry," she said in the throaty voice. "I work for Heaven's Gate. Under...Hiroto Otani." Her voice caught a little bit, and she cleared her throat to mask it. Specifics always made people believe you - it was a detective trick. You needn't say anything else but a specific name, or a meaningful place, and the person in question fills it in themselves. If Tomoko was wrong, and Raziel wasn't in Heaven's Gate, she could explain it away as a special police force for the supernatural or something. "I can't tell you more or it'll compromise my mission."
But...suddenly, a wave of tiredness hit her.
Whatever was going on, Tomoko wanted to run. Run far away, back to the shrine and it's familiar trees and paved stones, to her mother and her grandmother and the jasmine tea that always tasted a bit burnt. She wanted to sob out of exhaustion and disappointment while her mother stroked her hair and her grandmother smoked her pipe, and the world would feel safe for just a moment, feel perfect for a fleeting, precious minute. Tomoko wanted to run away from the grime, from the spirits, from Raziel, from the blood and gore and death and the brackish river water and her uncle and her father and everything. She wanted to collapse.
Instead, she dropped the branch (Raziel still gripping it) and said, in a tone much less deep but still hollow and broken and ragged, "Find your own way out."
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Post by Raziel Och on Aug 16, 2011 10:55:58 GMT -5
Even if he did work for Heaven’s Gate, Raziel wouldn’t admit to it. Not if he had never seen this girl before—not that he could either, what with the way the river monster made sure of that. He would have to continue playing dumb, for he had never heard of this “Scarlet” before, and the grape vine of Heaven’s Gate moved fast. Everyone and their grandmother knew if you even so much as sneezed. Even if she was a new inductee, Raziel would have at least heard of her name before in passing. So what if she named dropped Otani, that didn’t mean anything. She could have just gotten lucky with her guess.
“Heaven’s Gate? That sounds like some sort of religious cult—and I know not of what you speak of, neither of the organization or of this… Hiroto Otani.” Truth be told, Otani was his superior and Raziel had run errands for him on more than one occasion. He didn’t know much about the man; whether or not he had a family or a hobby or a favourite sport. He never told Raziel anything except for what to do, and how to do it.
And then the attitude of the girl change quiet suddenly, and her voice sounded so small and so broken. For a moment, he paused. It caught him off guard, the sudden shift in feeling. But his head still spun, still felt like it was going to explode with every step he took, every word he spoke. He hadn’t the energy to stand there and wonder why she became that way. All he really wanted to do was go home and pretend none of this ever happened.
“You need to stop changing your mind.” he said softly. If he ever wanted to find his way out of the forest safely (with his luck, he was sure that once he stumbled out of the forest, he’d find himself out in the middle of the road with an eighteen-wheeler mowing him down), he needed this girl—this “Scarlet” whom he was beginning to suspect wasn’t really Scarlet at all—to help him find his way out. And that more than likely entailed playing nice.
“First you want me to follow you. Then you wanted me to find my own way out, turn around and decide to show me the way out again, and now you’re saying I’m on my own. Again.” He leaned on Tomoko’s large stick, staring past her head (his lame pass at eye contact). “Frankly, all of these changes of heart are beginning to wear me out.”
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Post by Tomoko Hashimoto on Aug 19, 2011 15:46:08 GMT -5
Turning on Raziel, Tomoko had finally reached her limit. Fear and the strain of lying and hiding had wore her out, and she exploded in anger.
"I'm not doing this for your benefit! It's not my job to take care of your ass! You don't need me to do shit!" She snarled, forgetting to disguise her voice. "I'm sick and tired of people poking their nose into business that isn't theirs! Why can't you just leave me the fuck alone?!" Breathing heavily, Tomoko backed off for a moment, before thinking of something else. "If you want to get out of here so fucking bad, just leave already! Your eyesight's good enough to see trees, isn't it? Why even bother rely on me?!? The big tall dark things! You'll know them when you hit them!" She threw her hands up and stomped off.
She came to a halt a few yards away and tried to collect her thoughts. Her verbal assault wasn't clever, but it had been scathing, and she was too worked up to go back to where Raziel was. What did he care if she helped him or not? Why had he lied? Tomoko was doubting herself, a feeling that made her sick with worry. If she had fucked up, it wasn't just her on the chopping block. She had thought that bringing her uncle's name into the conversation would have made him trust her and confirm her fears, but now...he had a way to connect the "voice" to Uncle Hiroto, and wouldn't admit to being HG anyways. Everything about this was going wrong. Tomoko blinked back frustrated tears and sat down heavily, back to Raziel. She drew her knees up and buried her head in her arms.
She didn't look forward to telling her mother about this, less so her grandmother. Goddamn. Tomoko was just doomed to fail today, or at least that's what it felt like. She stood up, took a very long look at Raziel, and stalked off, pausing as she neared him.
She didn't bother asking why he had lied. It wasn't like she was the paragon of honesty today.
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Post by Raziel Och on Aug 22, 2011 13:18:00 GMT -5
One of the first things he should have done before any of this garbage even started was trust his gut instincts. He knew why she happened to be so familiar to him in the first place—and she was definitely no Scarlet— because it was Tomoko all along. Stress, among other things, made her drop the act altogether and snap at Raziel. Truth be told, it wasn’t unjustified, all the things she said.
For a moment, his face heated up with something not unlike shame as he listened to her scathing diatribe. He cast his eyes to the mud-covered grass. It was too hard to glance at Tomoko, and he didn’t like the guilt that choked him.
The blond did not stop Tomoko from walking away, could not say for how long she sat with her back to him facing the river. But it seemed like an eternity. Tomoko got to her feet, looked at him long and hard, then started stalking off. For reasons unknown, she paused when she drew near Raziel. A million things he wanted to saw fluttered to his mind, none of which he deemed acceptable to say aloud. Raziel swallowed his words as if they were acid. He was too tired and hurt and ashamed to be angry anymore.
He had lied for numerous reasons.
He had lied because he thought it was the right thing to do. He lied, not because he wanted to, but because he thought he had to. He lied because he was taught to. Raziel wasn’t sure what, exactly, Tomoko thought him capable of, or what she thought he might do now that she divulged that Hiroto Otani was her uncle.
In all honesty, he barely saw the man, hadn’t spoken to him in over three months. The higher-ups in the organization kept to themselves and hid their tracks well. Raziel couldn’t get hold of her uncle even if he wanted to. Hell, he was barely a grunt in Heaven’s Gate, he held no clout. He was no better than some damned meat shield his superiors could use.
He couldn’t do anything to her, or her family, or her uncle.
“I’m sorry.” He said, finally. And he meant it. Raziel wasn’t sure what she wanted him to say, or if he could really say anything at all to soothe her frayed nerves. He supposed he deserved those things she had said to him. “I’m sorry.” He said again, voice small and surprisingly meek.
The world around him still made little sense, all smears and blurs and things he did not recognize. His chest burned from the scratches, and his headache only continued to grow in its intensity. Raziel had to sit down, if only for a moment. With a sigh, he plopped to the ground, wincing as he did so. He was sure Tomoko would continue to walk off again, and with good reason. She had nothing tying her to this god forsaken river and its cleverly hidden horrors.
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Post by Tomoko Hashimoto on Aug 24, 2011 12:38:46 GMT -5
Instead of stomping off into the bushes, Tomoko turned around and stared at Raziel. Well, of course he should apologize, Tomoko told herself. He's been nothing but a huge prick who...got attacked...told me to... Tomoko struggled to find a good reason to stomp away, but she had simmered down enough to notice that this guy was probably a new member. He hadn't reached the rank where they beat any apologetic spirit out of you. Tentatively, the Japanese girl went and sat across from Raziel, far enough away that he probably couldn't see her face clearly.
She was silent for a long time, turning everything over in her head. When she did speak, Tomoko sounded like she had been working out what she was going to say. "You're not a very good member of Heaven's Gate, are you." It wasn't a question. "You haven't called in the South Isle Inquisition. Why," she asked, resting her head in her hands, "didn't you go report me the second the funny business started?"
It was fairly curious. Tomoko didn't know much about the shadowy organization called Heaven's Gate, but from what her mother and grandmother told her it was seeped in corruption and horrible people. Tomoko had been taught ever since she was little to keep HG at threat level Nazi - never to trust anyone connected to her uncle, never to talk to them. They were demonized more than the demons Tomoko saw daily. At least demons went away - no amount of exorcism could keep humans from hurting the Hashimoto family if they wanted. It was something that had always bugged Tomoko. She could do so much for the dead, but...
Wait. Maybe she could do something for the living. She'd have to play it right, but if at all possible...having an ally who knew the inner workings of HG was an incredibly attractive perspective. Tomoko turned the idea over in her mind, deciding to give the matter more thought before she did anything. What was the point, if she couldn't gain anything from it? She'd have to be sure that Raziel wouldn't snitch, and so she waited for his answer to her question.
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Post by Raziel Och on Aug 24, 2011 13:04:01 GMT -5
Much to anyone’s surprise, Tomoko did not continue walking off, leaving Raziel to stumble about the forest like some blind moron. He did not expect her to calmly sit in front of him. She was a smudge of red and white and long black hair, though. Her features were indescribable still, and the dirt was still smeared across her face and arms like cheap war paint. He hadn’t the energy to focus on her properly and opted instead for his smarting feet. The chill of the mud seeped into his digits, and he wiggled them idly.
Raziel shrugged his broad shoulders at Tomoko’s statement that he was something of a joke. Mainly because it was true and he knew it just as well as she did. He wasn’t going to sit there and defend his ‘manly ego’ when he had nothing to back himself up with. Or defend. His mercy granted to the phoenix and the adorable epimeliad was indication of this enough.
“Yeah, well, I guess I got more than I bargained for.” He mumbled into his knees. Raziel’s blond head shot up at the mention of the Inquisition. His blood ran cold. Something of a pained expression passed across his face, and he didn’t want to entertain such thoughts for overlong. If there were more creatures like Alice or Apple… he could feel himself growing gray at the very thought of it, and suddenly he felt ill.
“Why would I ever do something like that? That’s just senseless violence that’ll do no one any good. God,” He ran his hands through his short, flaxen hair. “reporting you wasn’t on my to-do list and besides… I don’t have much reason to.”
Maybe he was stupid, maybe that blow to his head was harder than he realized, but Raziel genuinely didn’t see why Tomoko would worry he’d high-tail it straight to the Heaven Gate’s headquarters to report her.
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Post by Tomoko Hashimoto on Aug 24, 2011 13:53:34 GMT -5
Closing her eyes and thanking whatever kami was looking out for her today, Tomoko could almost feel the metephorical weight fall from her shoulders. Raziel hadn't noticed her ghost association, and if everything went well, he would never find out. She rubbed her face with her hands, unable to keep the relieved grin off of her face. Her secret was still safe.
The grin fell as Tomoko realized that Raziel was still bleeding. His cuts were shallow, but they needed attention and neosporin at the very least. Tomoko knew her mother would be good at patching him up (she was the best in the family of three when it came to healing and purification), but her mother was at work. When not performing the Shinto rituals, Ms. Hashimoto was a hairdresser downtown. Tomoko would've liked her mother to look over Raziel, as she would have fussed and worried more about the injury than the strange boy Tomoko had brought home, but the only other person at the shrine was her grandmother. Tomoko got her stubborness from somewhere, and it certainly wasn't her father's side of the family. Her grandmother was a chain-smoking, foul mouthed senior citizen terror. And if there was anything Mrs. Hashimoto was good at, it was being suspicious - another trait Tomoko had inherited. It seemed to run in the family.
No, Tomoko would certainly not be taking Raziel back to her shrine, no matter how bad his wounds. Next best was his own house. Apartment. Whatever he lived in. As long as it wasn't a box and it had a first aid kit.
Shaking her head, she stood up and went over to Raziel. "Well, let's get out of here and back to your place," Tomoko said simply. "Can you get up? You okay to walk? It's only a five - well, maybe ten minute walk back to town."
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Post by Raziel Och on Aug 24, 2011 14:25:06 GMT -5
Yes, he most certainly could walk. He might have been the worst excuse ever for a Heaven’s Gate member, but he was no invalid. “Yeah, I can. Just… give me a moment.” He said with a sigh. It was mindboggling how hard it was to simply do things such as get up or walk when his eyesight was shot all to hell. Thankfully for Tomoko, he staggered to his feet with little complaint.
As much as he didn’t want to head over to his house, it was the best option he saw for them to take. His mom, at this hour, was busy cooped up with her acupuncture patients downtown, so the house was free for the both of them. Tomoko’s home, on the other hand, had the potential of being filled with relatives. Raziel did not savour the thought of explaining himself and how he knew their daughter and sister. That was far too exhausting a chore and Raziel had his fair share of tiring exercises.
“My house is fine---it’s on the corner of Cedar and Trick. You know those streets by the deli?” He gestured with his hands vaguely. Raziel didn’t question why she did not answer him from earlier, and he didn’t have the drive to really bring it up again. The Inquisition was an uncomfortable topic of choice for him, so he was glad for the change in conversation regardless.
“As much as I hate to admit this, you’re going to have to guide me. Be my eyes, of sorts…” It made him feel weak, almost, not being able to see as well as Tomoko. God, how he loathed having to explain his broken glasses to his mother. Anahita would throw a conniption; tear a strip right out of him. He had a spare pair in his bedroom, but they were a weaker prescription from years ago. And green. And much too small for him now. But they were better than nothing.
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