underlined | IC INBOX: INUGAMI

were not
stick close to someone who can protect you
dont go anywhere alone
dont let yourself get caught by the weird students

right...
ill try my best
they are acting weirder than normal, right?
ive been trying to avoid them but there are so many

try to find a room or a hallway that isnt busy
stay there
or stick to someone who can help you fight if you have to okay?

[A moment's pause.]

okay
i will
i

[Another.]

i just dont like being a burden on people

[ ................................

for the love of ]

[ fucking RING RING RING keisuke answer this phonecall before it answers you!! ]

[Oh, no.

He nearly drops the phone (again...) in surprise when it starts to ring and vibrate. He's... never actually received a call on one of these before...

After a moment:] Um, hello?

[He sounds scared...]

[ he should be.

the voice that comes up on the other end of the line is one that may be familiar to him, but only vaguely. pitched lower now than her usual sweet, light, sing-songy tones, and much more steady, much like the time she'd said something similar to him, face-to-face.

...except for the mildly threatening tone, that is. ]

If I hear you call yourself a burden one more time, I'm going to personally hand you your ass, do you hear me, Keisuke?

[If the phone hadn't already told him that it was Dal Dal on the line, he wouldn't have recognized the voice as hers.

Honestly, it's almost as frightening (if not more so) than all of the weird things happening around the school lately. She'd been headstrong, nice, but he hadn't really anticipated her to get serious like this all of a sudden...

Especially about... something like this. He's silent for a moment, a bloom of static across the call indicating an unsteady sigh. Part of him wants to argue—it's perhaps the one thing he knows is empirically true about him. Someone was always having to keep him safe because he was always screwing up. It's why Akira had said—]

B - But that's how it seems when I just rely on others to stay safe, right?

[He's only emboldened to argue because she's not physically there to hand him his ass (...?!??!). Otherwise...]

[ she doesn't know him that well, having really only spoken to him once, and then, quite briefly, but there is something about him that is undeniably familiar to her. she's seen it before, in the eyes of the young man she loves, and though she's quite good at keeping things within a small circle, it isn't pleasant to see it anywhere else, if she were to be honest with herself.

and so, while he thinks of another man, so will dal dal, her grip on the phone tightening enough to reopen the cut skin across her knuckles. ]

Selfish, [ she spits out quite venomously, but it's under her breath, more a puff of air against the phone than anything else. words she'd never quite been able to say to jae gu before, feelings she'd done very well to bury in the midst of the happy high she drowns herself in whenever he's around her; but they're coming out now, blossoming forth like the blood against her bandages. ]

What are you saying about the person who's offering to keep you safe? Do you think this is pity? That this isn't coming from somewhere sincere?

If this is all they can do, then you should let them do it!!

[He'd caught himself thinking that others tried to minimize this sort of behavior because they couldn't stand it as weakness. Keisuke had tried—he'd tried a lot—to fight against his natural disposition and become someone who would fit in better with their world. When everything had broken apart at the seams, falling down around the fault-line of the war, strength had become a status symbol. Those who could prove physical superiority became a new class, given wealth and celebrity. Keisuke had seen it happen to Akira, a Bl@ster champion, even though he knew better than anyone else that Akira didn't care about any of that.

The weak, however, were unnecessary. Perhaps it was a war-time mentality that had carried over even after the fighting had ceased. The weak, the poor, the addicted—the government would prefer they all be swept away. It was a pervasive mentality that seeped into their culture, all the way down to how Keisuke saw and valued himself.

Selfish. He reacts sharply, as if he'd been stung, almost anticipating the numb before sharp pain. Close enough. She can't see his face right now, but it's twisted into a mask of pain and frustration.

In a nicer world, Dal Dal's words should have helped. They did, in a way. People like Rin and Dal Dal, who had gone out of their way to help him, they could be applied to this. That they wanted to help—it was all they could do, so they might as well. He didn't understand why, but that wasn't his place...

The problem was, he faced a similar situation to Dal Dal, simply reversed. Where she might be frustrated with someone that she might've been trying to keep safe, he was thinking about what Akira had said, about how the way he'd always followed him, tripping and getting into trouble and always needing to be cared after, had pissed him off. (That's not exactly what Akira had said, but anxiety had warped his words so bad in Keisuke's mind, he might as well have.) It had been an obligation born out of a time-worn precedent—and one he'd grown sick of—nothing more. He hadn't, had never, wanted to.

For everyone else, it might help him. Just not for the one he wanted. Sound familiar?

Keisuke's silent for a long moment, grit like sand stuck in his throat. Then, finally:] Okay. [Paper-thin, almost as if it might blow away.]

...okay?

[ a whispered echo, though even her small voice sounds larger than his. she says the word again, breathed around a laugh — ]

Okay?

[ — as if it were the most ludicrous thing she's ever heard. an answer like that, weak in both its form and its delivery, might as well have been a non-answer. actually, it might be worse than a non-answer; at least silence can imply some level of thought, of consideration. okay is so dismissive, it's insulting.

and if there's ever a time dal dal is in the worst mood to be insulted, it's now. ]

Who do you hate more, Keisuke? Yourself, or whoever it is that hurt you?

[ in the background, he may hear some rustling. she's definitely on the move. ]

[Perhaps she could hear him cringing in his silence, laden with electric tension drawing his face and causing him to shrink somewhat where he stood in the hallway. What do you want from me? he wanted to ask, not knowing how to speak or respond when it seemed no matter what he chose, it would be the wrong choice. He had thought he was being diplomatic in his choice, but now her voice burns in his ear as she throws his half-hearted response back into his face.

It would have been the quintessential example for "bad timing" for both of them if it weren't always "bad timing" for Keisuke. The issue at the heart of this matter was a live-wire topic for him which sat as painful as an exposed nerve, constantly being set off by the smallest thing, sometimes things that surprised him even.

But—this. Her questions were brutal, worse than a guy who'd held a knife to his throat and threatened him for his tags, nearly as bad as Akira staring him dead in the eye and telling him that he hated him hanging around.

One shoulder leaned into the wall as he closed in around where he held the phone to his ear; he didn't even seem to have the spine to hang up, too afraid of how she would face him about that later.] Don't - [he mutters, stressed tone apparent,] make me answer that...

[Perhaps he should've noticed the rustling of movement around her silence. He might've had the idea to start going somewhere out of the way. As it was, he's a big, obvious idiot, standing in the hallway outside their classroom.]

[ it takes her exactly eight minutes to find him. in those eight minutes, she doesn't respond, but doesn't hang up the line, either, instead panting softly on the receiver as she stalks through the halls. the pain in her leg flares with each step she takes, and some of the bandaging along her ribs loosens when she moves, but by then she's learned to stomach the pain. easily enough to replace one kind with the other, after all. ]

Keisuke!!

[ she announces her presence at the end of the hall with a loud, rough shout of his name. he'll find her there, standing with the phone held tightly in one hand, before she chucks it off to the side in dismissal. fuck words.

within seconds, she's there, moving faster than she should be in her condition, using strength she should be reserving to grab the front of the boy's uniform and shove him up roughly against the lockers, creating noises that echo for seconds down the empty hallway. ]

I'm getting real sick of guys like you, [ she utters shakily beneath her breath, ] deciding what I should or shouldn't value.

[ her fists, though. her fists remain steady, white-knuckled. ]

How many times does someone have to prove it to you before you start listening?

[Keisuke remained on the line, not knowing any better, too anxious and fearful of what hanging up (as the idea did occur to him, after a while) might incite in her even if he did manage to avoid her—class would bring them back together at some point, after all. It was inescapable. With that in mind, he occasionally weaves into his verbal distress appeals to Dal Dal, telling her that it's fine, no big deal, a bad time, and all that sort of et cetera until finally—

Keisuke!! His shoulders rise sharply in surprise and fear, turning around to face her as she hurls the phone (he tracks the movement, dumbfounded, electric alarm in his eyes) and stalking towards him. It's fast, though he soon realizes it shouldn't be. She's injured, moving in a sort of uneven gait that makes a bubble of concern rise up into his throat, burst the instant that her hands curl around the front of his uniform.

And she is strong, much more so than he might've expected of someone as small as she was (and injured...), and that combined with his total absence of resistance sends him into the lockers with a crash. The impact jars his phone out of his hand, clattering to the ground as he grits against the pain of where the back of his head had cracked against metal.

He isn't sure if it's that or just that he seems to be missing something, but he doesn't really follow what she's saying. Guys like him...? What—what was he doing?

He makes no effort to struggle or get away from her, yielding despite how solid he was.]

Dal Dal, [he starts, words a little strained; her fists were still, pressing uncomfortably against his ribcage.] Wh - What are you talking about?

[He can't help it then, the concern that's leaking into his tone of voice, his expression, the cut of his stance. In a way, it was avoidance for the issue he was dealing with himself, but in another he's beginning to quickly wonder if he wasn't the only one dealing with things like that, persisting even still in a place like this.]

[ what is she talking about?

she has to wonder that herself, really, as the rush of the adrenaline of anger starts to ebb, and she's left panting and heaving with the wounds along her knuckles newly opened, straining against the iron-grip she has around his shirt.

what is she doing? keisuke didn't deserve this, even if she isn't saying anything he doesn't need to hear. not from her, at least. he was simply sounding too much like someone she wishes were here, next to her... someone she wishes would wish the same of her.

all at once, her grip on him loosens, and her body grows just as slack with the releasing of tension. her head lowers, most of her face hidden beneath her fringe, and she draws in a breath, attempting to recollect herself. ]

...nothing.

[ suddenly, she is so, so tired of trying. ]

[The red is eye-catching, a splash of bright crimson seeping through the torn skin of her hands. He—knew what sorts of wounds those were, having seen them perhaps a dozen times or more with Akira and all of his fighting in Bl@ster matches. With that and the way that she had walked... a fight? Something twists in his chest, a lump forming in his throat. He's already falling into habits that would continue to frustrate her, thinking that he had just given her more trouble when she was already hurt. Angry at himself for doing just that...

The strength of her grip wanes until she releases him, though he doesn't move to get away so soon. It's scary to see all of the fight go out of her all of a sudden, even if all of that fury had frightened him to start.

He can't... leave her like this, even if the whole situation made him a little nervous.

He's silent a moment, knowing she was lying just as well as if he'd answered it was "nothing" himself. It wasn't. It never was.]

Dal Dal... [He lifts his hand, a momentary beat of hesitation there, before lightly placing it on her arm, lightly tracing up to her shoulder in what he hoped was a reassuring gesture (a bit unused to being comforting since Akira didn't really need it... but he remembered a bit from when he'd been dating his ex).] I'm sorry, I... a - are you okay? You're bleeding...

[His hand's still on her shoulder, warm and surprisingly light and gentle.]

[ her initial response is to laugh — a low, hollow sound that manages to echo in the empty hallway they're in. her fingers grip once more around his collar, before her hands slip away from him entirely. she looks up then, meeting his eyes with a dull gleam of gold. ]

You think this is the worst pain I've ever felt?

[ her scoff is dry, humorless. she lifts one hand and idly inspects the damage — scabbing skin re-opened and bleeding freely, making the bandages wrapped around them damp and useless. ]

You'd tell me the truth, wouldn't you, Keisuke...? [ she's stopped looking at him now, consulting instead the blood on her hands as if that were what she's speaking to. ]

You'd tell me if I were just wasting my time.

[He stops, a sudden inaction that goes further past that of body, all the way down to a thud of his heart and a sudden stillness and blankness of his mind.

No, is all he can think when he looks into her eyes. He’s suddenly reminded of something that Akira said every once in a while, that no person could ever truly know. They were all strangers, separate entities who could only understand one another cursorily. It had always distressed Keisuke to hear him talk about it like that, thinking that it didn’t have to be that way if he’d just reach back out towards another, but he had never built up the courage to say something like that.

But right now he’s thinking about it, thinking that he had no idea what Dal Dal was going through, despite all of her courage and self-assuredness. The same was true for her not knowing his own situation.

And it was difficult to just talk about it.

He can’t reply, expression falling into the furrow of concern and sorrow. No matter how she regards the wounds on her hands, she should make sure they were treated and allowed to heal. Otherwise…

He blinks, trying to trace back where her train of thought might go but coming up blank. After a moment, he decides that it’s not important.] Yes, of course. [If there was one thing that could be said about Keisuke, it was that he was earnest—he was only silent when he didn’t have the courage to speak up.] I wouldn’t lie to you.

So tell me.

[ she looks up at him then. really looks up at him, wide-eyed and hopelessly open. bare. finally seeing him, instead of the shadow of a boy who always seems to be a few steps too far away. ]

Am I wasting my time here?

[But that's the point where it catches.

He isn't sure. He has his doubts, actually. He likes to think that he isn't some sort of waste of time, that he could prove to be valuable to others without also providing too much to worry about. But in his life he had only really made one friend—someone who had meant everything to him—and he's, at this point, convinced that that one friend reviled him for just that. His confidence is shot, and as much as he wants to improve so that it's no longer an issue, he isn't sure. He's not self-assured by nature. It's a constant fight.

So there's a hairsbreadth of a delay before,] No, [slightly rushed.] No, you aren't.

[He resists the urge to look down, away, anywhere but where she stood looking up at him point-blank, both the way she looked and was looking at him feeling particularly raw.] ...Sorry. [For the misunderstanding, for his abominable lack of confidence. He can't help but mention it.]

[ even if he isn't looking at her, he'll be able to see her shake her head, the edges of her hair rustling lightly against her shoulders. ]

Friends should only say 'sorry' if they've royally fucked up.

[ there is a pause, and then she is reaching up. her touch against his skin is light, palm gently cupping his cheek to steer his gaze down towards her. he's much taller than her, but he's still slightly hunched over, so it is easier for her to rise up to her tiptoes and lean up to press a soft kiss on his forehead.

softly, she whispers: ]

I'm sorry.

[He’s not sure what to say about that. He apologizes all the time, but for each and every time he does feel as though he made some sort of grave misstep. Not that it’s impossible he could do such a thing—he’s kind of clinically obtuse, rarely realizing what after-effects a word or action might create, but—

He’s snapped instantly out of that tangled line of thought as she reaches up, the remarkably gentle and fleeting touch of her hand against his skin, traveling to rest at his cheek send his heart leaping up into his throat, a powerful wave of irrational fear surging over him.

(He’d tried to explain it to her as best he could and she had slapped him, ashamed, forcing him out into the street and never speaking to him again—)

He’s utterly powerless, more than easy enough to guide down enough to where she could, ever so gently, as if it were something precarious, place a kiss on his forehead.

Keisuke has no idea what to do, what to say, but there was something… reassuring in it, something that (despite a nagging feeling of past mistakes and inadequacies) did calm him down ever-so-slightly.

“I’m sorry.” That, too.

He’s silent a moment (smart, as any word he might’ve tried to say right away would’ve been little more than a garbled croak), but then he does manage a very small, quiet,] It’s okay. [Hopefully. For the both of them.

Except. He lifts one hand from his side to very gently take her own, turning it softly so that he could see where the wounds had reopened and allowed blood to seep into the bandages. He’s—more familiar with these types of wounds than he should be. How many times had Akira ended up with the very same, hard-won “rewards” from Bl@ster matches? Of course, that guy had never bothered to actually wrap them properly…

He’s naturally concerned.] …We should re-bandage you, just so - it doesn’t get worse.

[ for dal dal, apologies don't exactly come easy to her. nine times out of ten, she is faultless, perfect, immaculate, and the last 10% is probably a mistake anyway, obviously.

or, perhaps, it's more that she's never had to apologize. because she's never really had the kind of friendship that welcomed it. her "friends" back home... moon young... jae gu... even joon gu... her relationships with them are so unconventional, she's stumbling and fumbling along just as much as keisuke. but what she lacks in experience, she tries to make up for in earnestness.

she meant what she said, the first time they met. she'd do what she could to protect him.

even if maybe he didn't really want it or need it. ]

Are you going to be my nurse, Keisuke? [ now her tone takes on that familiar, playful lilt. ]

[She'd stand out in stark contrast of Keisuke, then. He's constantly apologizing, the words of varying degrees of politeness and severity almost always on the tip of his tongue for whatever reason he might dredge up. It had always been something that put Akira on edge, he remembers, but he couldn't just stop. He simply found that he had a lot to apologize for, bumbling as he was.

He feels as though an apology was rare from Dal Dal, though. There was a self-assuredness in her that he recognizes from all of his years near Akira; he imagines it might be just as rare to hear that from her as it would be from him.

Good to know she could roll with the punches and return right to something he might expect of her, something to make him fluster just a tad and stammer out,] W - Well, if you need it, then yeah, I guess so? I'm, um ... [A brief, thoughtful pause.] I'm kinda experienced at that sort of thing.

[Why does he gravitate to these kinds of people... Probably just a natural magnetism to those who had all of the combative nature he lacked.]

IC INBOX: INUGAMI

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1/2

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rip...

you will be missed

will he though.........

nah jk

wow

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gomen for the late... ;;

honestly how dare you

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HONESTLY HOW DARE YOU

:3c

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