smash_logs | WAH: The Log

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WAH: The Log

Who: Ishida and Vivian
What: CONFRONTATION, getting Ishida to cool his tits
Where: Somewhere in the halls
When: Future dated for March 10
Warnings: ...Ishida. Partners. Emotions.

Vivian may not be good at many human things, but she had managed to learn discretion when observation was at hand. Her partner - No, Mr. Ishimaru, wasn't it? - had driven her away with his eyes casting her into a nothingness that only he and the Doctor were capable of holding over her. They were her entire world when it came to matters of the heart she had yet the full ability to understand, and they were not a pair she could disregard even by their explicit command.

Following him around was more or less entwined with her desire to understand what had happened to him. She'd replayed the broadcasted montage of him a million times in her head. She thought of his story from when she could not see, the quake beneath his words reaching into her nerves from her fingertips to the back of her skull. She was only able to play his memories given to her against the darkness of her broken eyes, but what lingered was how every time she recalled it, the hairs on her forearms rose and she felt her cheeks burn with the extension of his emotions she no longer had access to.

Whether he knew it or not, his words were always a powerful definition that gripped her throat and pressed against her very human heart as she struggled to fit in but always stood out.

So how could it be that he could change so much about how she felt in the vastness of the universe that is, to her, this school, and yet she couldn't even make him smile anymore?

Had she ever?

But there was so much she wanted to tell him. It'd taken her weeks to get it all together and even now when she was pulling herself from obscurity and ready to face him, there was a slew of vocabulary she would have to do without to convey her feelings to him. Determination was an essence she knew he would recognize and it was all over her expression when she went to approach him.

"Kiyotaka Ishimaru."

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He knew he wasn't alone. It was hard to find absolute solitude in these halls; either people were scurrying between classes or just outright skipping them all the time, or maybe the janitor was around, or something. Ishida had finally given up on trying to pick fights with people he passed by for so much as being in the way. He had, in fact, begun to give people a much wider berth. By this point, he was exhausted. Tired of fighting, of alienating everyone else, of just being so angry and directionless. But what else could he do? He'd gone far enough down this road that there was nothing to do but keep pushing forward, especially since all other paths had been blocked off.

He didn't even kick up much of a fuss when he heard that name, though his body did tense and a bit of his rebellious spirit flared up again. He turned to face Vivian, gazing down his nose at her.

"You again."

What was she doing, talking to him after he'd already cut her out of the picture?

For an instant her confidence wavered. Ishimaru just hypnotized her in such a way, albeit a blip in time for this pivotal moment between them. No, today she was standing up straight, eyes locked onto his face as if to say, You can't overlook me.

"Yes." She walked right up to him without stopping now, only pausing her feet when the appropriate amount of space for a firm confrontation was between them and it was just enough so that she could stare into his eyes without a struggle.

And she wouldn't let him get a word in until she got her own out first. "I want to understand!" She demanded, fingers curling into fists as if asserting control of the reins before the horse began to kick.

For a little girl, she had some balls. Or maybe it was just a lack of common sense, some defect in her programming that was the impermeable barrier between her true nature and the humanity she sought.

"Someone like you wouldn't understand!" That only being one of the reasons. He barely even understood his own actions when he looked back on them, which was why he chose not to when he could help it. "Nobody would."

He puffed his chest out a bit despite the hollow feeling inside, ever contrary. "Don't even waste your time! Now scram before I say something you'll regret!"

Yeah, she knew that sound. Right now he may have held her about as high as you could hold dirt, but that was not the voice of the man that reverberated throughout her entire form on a daily basis. Ishimaru's words were ones that stood on the basis of conviction. Ishida's fell through the cracks and she knew it.

"No," And with another feat of bravery, "Kiyotaka." She stomped another foot forward.

"I want to understand this. This..." Vivian sought the word. Whatever this change to Ishimaru was, it was not of any type of benefit. So the word that left her? "downgrade."

"Look, this is no downgrade! I'm new and improved all the way! Left the old model behind!" That about exhausted his capacity for computer-related metaphors. But how dare she talk like he was worse off than he was before? At least this way he was someone, unlike that shell of a man he cast aside.

"Moved on so much, even that name is nothing to me anymore!"

Yet his ears longed to hear it again - deep down, he recognized the significance of her finally using his name again. Kiyotaka, Kiyotaka, had she even called him that since her reset? Why did it have to be now?

Vivian carried many noteworthy moments away with her when she got a glimpse into her own mind. While the memories of her using his name were not among them, the implication of the importance behind it had been willing to remain in the back of her head. It was enough for these results and she fully intended to bring out the heavy arsenal if it meant getting her partner back to full form. Before her was only part of her precious companion, pieces of his data devoured by the sunken spirit surrounding him now.

For as long as she had been watching him, there was something strange she had noticed about his eyes. In every instant she gazed upon them, never seeking a chance in her stalks to look directly into them, there lacked... something. She thought maybe much like her experience before, Ishimaru's eyes were broken. However he could see perfectly well. What could it be?

Now she had the opportunity to dig deeper through this head-on collision and there was no way she was letting him get away until she had a proper answer. She was afraid as equally as she was determined.

"What's your purpose, Kiyotaka?" Was that the word? "Your... parameters." No. She looked this word up. She was right and she was throwing it back out there. This human word. "No, your purpose! That is the word!"

"Kiyotaka has no purpose anymore," he spat. He utterly lacked one as he was now too, and he knew it, but Ishida had no time to waste on caring about it. He curled his hands into fists so tight that his blunt fingernails cut into his palms, actually taking a step back from her. Run away, run away, that was all he did and he would never stop even if it wore his feet down to the bone.

"A purpose is nothing but a cage!! I'm free now, I told you! Fucking free!"

Fine. If he was going to take this route...

"I understand. Okay. What is your purpose?" And because the word he was throwing around meant everything to her in an existence that would otherwise suggest she had never been free at all - "What is your freedom?"

It was just another level of his own personal hell.

"Shut up!! Freedom is not having to deal with you or anyone else!" He drew in a sharp breath, rolling his shoulders back and forcing on his 'I don't give a shit' smirk.

"But I told you, you wouldn't understand it. So I won't waste my time explaining it!"

"You say it again and again. 'You wouldn't understand it.' But I understand my freedom!" Her voice was shaking. Her knuckles were pale. Vivian was finding her voice.

"I understand I can learn what I don't understand! That I'll cause errors! I'll repair them and grow up! I understand I have to learn!"

A red glow emanated from her chest. "So please! Tell me what was Kiyotaka's error so I understand you now!"

He'd helped her learn that very lesson, hadn't he?

Back when it was his duty to do so. There was absolutely no reason for him to care now, to feel proud and guilty all at once that she could recall it so well. To feel so ashamed to have it thrown back at him. The corners of his mouth pulled back even more, lips stretched painfully over his sharp grin.

"Then listen up. I'll lay it out really simple for you! His error was giving a shit about anybody in the first place! Thinking there was a god damn thing he could do to make a difference, like he had to... Absolutely pathetic!"

Not once did Vivian avert her eyes from his. Every syllable was seared as he spoke, completely destroyed as quickly as he was creating it all over again. It didn't seem stable. Nothing seemed correct. In short, she did not look very impressed with his reply.

But more importantly, there was a major problem with what he had just said and she wasn't about to disregard it. "I'm sorry. You're wrong."

All at once the ugly grin faded, and there was a flicker of doubt in his eyes before they flared right back up again.

"Prove it."

The gap between them was beginning to close again. Ishida was just a sad bird with wings of resolve and confidence broken and despaired, hopping back as often as he could to escape his overwhelming predator, but she was going to keep moving these legs of hers until she had him against the wall. Keep challenging her freedom, her capacity, her spirit - she wasn't going to back down this time. It was her turn to smile upon him with the utmost composure in her resolution, albeit a brief one.

Slapping her palm to her chest, the evidence he demanded declared without skipping a beat,

"I am proof."

"Ha! The hell are you trying to get at?!"

He wouldn't let himself be cornered like this. So long as there was an ounce of fight left in him he'd lash out, keep the wounds in his heart from tearing open any further. A heavy boot came slamming down just in front of Vivian's foot, his challenge made clear in a single defiant step.

"He didn't save you, you said so yourself!"

There wasn't so much as a flinch from the small, colorless child. This version didn't frighten her. This software wasn't the one she was looking for.

"I understand," she began, reaching for her armband and curling her thin digits around it line by line, beat by beat. His every breath's weight in stones was threatening her to her knees, a suffering indescribable with even a dictionary in hand. Hundreds of languages, thousands of dialects, endless streams of possibilities in what could be said between them and all she could do was lock onto his eyes and scrap by with what lingered at the tip of her tongue.

"But I understand why."

Vivian held her breath as she ripped the armband from her sleeve like it was one with her flesh, the safety pin clinking against the floor to remind her that time was still passing.

"Kiyotaka didn't save me. It was the right thing to do. Those were his parameters - " She shook her head.

"That was his purpose."

"Look where that got him. Fucking. NOWHERE."

He tore his gaze away from hers at long last, watching with thinly veiled interest as she removed her armband. What was she doing? There was no way she was renouncing her status as a disciplinarian to join him if she was also disagreeing with him and his idea of freedom, so what the hell...?

God, he hated that red scrap of fabric. It and everything it stood for.

Even Vivian was beginning to be furious with him. She slammed the red sash against his chest, her firm on it just loose enough for him to take it if he wanted to.

"'Do you hate me?' Do you remember? Kiyotaka asked me. I didn't know." It was difficult to stay angry when the sorrow of what she could lose was starting to become more coherent. Little did she know that the mourning stage was surfacing when she was yet to finish fighting, the emotions conflicting as she forced herself to speak.

"I don't. I don't hate Kiyotaka. My partner... " She pushed harder against the sash on his coat.

No... No.

She looked up at him.

"I don't hate you! Partner, you didn't save me because you said it was the right thing to do. Do what is right. That is being human, correct?" Fingertips began to drag down his chest. She missed him. She missed him so much. "That is being my partner...!"

Taking the sash away, she pulled it back and threw it right in his face.

"Take it! Take it if you'll stop crying! Humans cry when they're hurt!"

And she was no exception anymore because she was losing it very quickly, her wrists pressing into her eyes once the sash was lost to him.

"Your partner's gone! Forever!!"

He snatched the band away from his face, taking it between his hands and pulling as if to try to tear it right down the middle. But his fingers trembled, and the tremors weakened his grip.

"I'm not... I...!!"

There was a quiet sizzling as tears of water met with tears of flame. How could she say that with such conviction? After all the ways he'd continuously let her down as Kiyotaka, or told her she was absolutely nothing to him as Ishida, she persisted? She and Hajime both wanted to believe in him even after he'd lost all of his faith in himself. It didn't make any sense at all to him, but maybe there was something he was missing.

What he did know for sure was that he really couldn't fight it anymore. Do what's right. Continuing to push away one of the only people who was still willing to keep pulling themselves in wasn't right at all. Neither was hiding behind this mask. He couldn't escape reality forever, and all he'd done was make it even harder to face now that it was catching up with him.

He was a complete fool.

"Vivian," he choked out, the fire in his eyes lowering to a nothing more than a few dying embers, leaving tears to stream freely down his face. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I..."

The world around her was swaying back and forth, blurred by the sharp burn coming from her own eyes this time. He was apologizing but she was angry, her emotions running haywire in a mind that still struggled to not only project but contain them all. One step and a hiccup and Vivian was right in his torso, swatting at his chest and getting dangerously close to escalating into full strength.

"Please stop! Stopstopstopstopstop!"

He didn't know if it was her own inhuman strength or if he was just still sore and bruised from his previous scuffles, but it hurt. He made absolutely no movement beyond wincing and shifting his feet to keep his balance, knowing well that he deserved each and every blow. Ishida had finally reached his limit - emotionally drained and hollow as his rage finally subsided, physically weak from lack of proper sleep or nutrition and shaking as the adrenaline ebbed from his bloodstream.

At some point his blind, directionless running had become less about trying to get away from what he once was and more about trying not to let the consequences of his actions find him, but now that they had, he wouldn't struggle any more. There were a lot of people he would have to explain himself and apologize to, and some he had hurt more than others - recalling his last encounter with Mondo especially drove another sharp spike of agony through his heart. How could he have said those things to his own brother?

Apologies weren't enough, but he knew nothing would be. And he was... so scared of what was to come.

But he would stand and face it, just as he took Vivian's onslaught now.

"I've stopped," he said quietly, but that was his only protest.

And when his words rested in her ear, so followed her flailing limbs. They dragged to a crawl until she stopped entirely, her face planted against him until she could barely breathe. Every shaking sob that followed the moment couldn't even be punctuated by the unconscious need to hold onto him. It was the same, wasn't it? Carry something so tightly in your arms and never let it go, and so it would never fall again.

Her face was fuzzy, skin prickling and red, eyes puffy and nose clogged. Little Vivian was a mess, but she wasn't about to move away. If she did, she was afraid he may look at her with scorn again. The rejection... that would make her shut down for sure.

Ishida--

No. That was wrong and it always had been.

Kiyotaka would have joined her right along in her sobbing if he still had the energy. A few gross tears did still dribble down his cheeks, but that was the extent of it.

His fingers tightly rubbed the fabric clutched between them, aching for the small, simple, familiar constraint around his arm again. But it wasn't his, and it never would be again. This time, instead of having it snatched away from him, he pressed it against Vivian's hand and let it go.

"This... this belongs to you."

Coughing as she leaned back, Vivian's swollen eyes fell to the first gift Ishimaru gave her since his return. She wanted to smile through the weakness of her pain, but weakness is as such. Left, right, she searched the floor for the fallen safety pin from earlier. When she found it, she scooped it up and approached him again.

Rather suddenly Vivian held the sash between them and ripped it right in half, cutting between the two kanji that made up the mission that guided them. She filled the space between them, the 風 portion pinned to his sleeve. The winds of change falling to him, though she wouldn't know.

"W-we'll share," she sniffed, fastening the safety pin securely.

She ripped it.

She ripped it.

She tore that precious symbol right in half and he had nothing left to replace it with.

"What did... What did you....?!"

Oh.

OH.

"A...aaah." The panic escalating on Vivian's face was priceless. The eyebrows on high and her jaw unable to close. "I was... sharing!" OH GOD. Would he start crying again?

Oh. Oh she was. Such a naive and innocent child.

"It's... just an armband." One that had belonged to him once upon a time, one he invested so much time and effort into earning, that stood for everything he was until a month ago, and watching her destroy it right in front of him was absolutely horrific. Fortunately, growing up in his family's particular situation meant learning to sew rather than spend money on new clothes when it could be helped, so stitching an armband back together would be easy. If only replacing everything else could be.

He unpinned the scrap from his sleeve with a sigh. "I appreciate what you're trying to do, but it isn't about whether or not you wear this. It represents your commitment to maintaining order, but... but it in itself is not all there is to it." His thumb traced over the white kanji out of habit.

"I've lost everything this stands for, so there's no point in having it." He still had the want to do good, to create an environment where everyone could do their best, but... was that enough? "Because of that, I can't be called your partner anymore."

A soft, sad sound left her throat when she realized she'd made a mistake, but if this whole disaster was anything to go by, she had learned how to deal with it. By that point, Vivian wasn't sure if her speech could contend with his on what she desperately wanted to convey, but that wouldn't keep her from trying.

"Kiyotaka," she started, deciding it might not be suitable to refer to him ~~by his true name~~ as 'Partner' when he was speaking this way. "Do you still want to do, uhm, what it means?"

"Of course I do!!"

The passion he barked that out with took even him by surprise, and his next words sounded so meek in comparison. "I'll always want to pursue justice and order and do the right thing. But I've... done so much wrong lately."

Kiyotaka's answer was exactly what Vivian had hoped he would say. She just had a feeling it was still in him to be the person she'd grown so attached to, because that person was a one of the best she'd ever known.

"I think... You learn from your mistakes. Right?" A smile softened the rough edges around her worn face. Really, there had been too much frowning lately. "And then you're free." With a nod, she added, "If you don't need that armband, you can keep doing what it means, right?"

"...Tanaka told me something similar."

Before he decided to misinterpret the promise of freedom to choose his own path and decided to go on an angry month-long rampage instead. And again he had doubts, because no matter what he did now, everything he strove for was still gone, along with any future his achievements were building up to. The fact remained that these days it seemed no matter how hard he did try to do right, something fucked up along the way.

But he would never hide behind "Ishida" again. The one and only thing he could be sure of. To think such an ugly part of himself existed in the first place was more than a little disturbing...

"I see now it is right. Even if it is no longer my duty to do so, I still want to work towards making a difference. All I need to do is find a new way." His brow furrowed a little and he gently placed his hands on Vivian's shoulders. "...Thank you. For believing in me when I could not. Even after everything... I...!"

Whether or not this was okay was left up to him, but to her, it seemed... well, right. Vivian sealed the gap between them and gave him a good squeeze around the torso, resisting the urge to crush down and probably break his spine. Let's not.

"No hard feelings, friend."

Edited (cries) 2014-03-04 02:49 (UTC)

Friend was a title he could accept.

A little positive contact felt good after all most of what he'd felt from others lately was more of a violent nature. Right now he didn't care about indecent public displays of affection; didn't have to now that he didn't have a standard to set. He put his arms around her shoulders and held her close for a very long time.

When his warmth and sunk in and she felt a calm wash over, Vivian took a step back just enough to look up to him. She liked this Kiyotaka much better.

Now she was unsure of what to say or do, still gripping her small fingers into his back while her free hand touched at her lips.

"Kiyotaka, I'm glad we're friends."

AND SO.

"I learned a lot about friendship from a cartoon, Kiyotaka! It has, uhm, ponies."

Thank god.

And just like that, a new thread secured the bond between them.

"What?! You mean... you too...?"

Oh yes. The guy who once denounced television as a complete waste of time had stumbled on a certain colourful children's show not long after ending up at Smash, and he had been quite taken with and inspired by the tales of a dedicated student making time for both her studies and friendships. When she was rewarded for all of her efforts with political power? He was MOVED TO TEARS.

But he'd kept quiet about it for the most part because it seemed a little girly and childish. Until now.

Vivian's eyes lit up in a way Ishida could only dream of. Get outta here.

"Yes! Some things are still confusing so..." It was hesitant, but she took his hand. "Can you watch it with me? Please?"

FRIENDSHIP

"I will," he promised, but he gently pulled his hand away. "Soon. There are some things I have to do first."

People he had to find and apologize to. Objects he probably had to repair. A life to figure out.

More than anything, he wanted to fall into a deep sleep.

Her hand tingled where his had been, the sensation of being so friendly with him once again sinking in through her palm. Happiness. That was this feeling, wasn't it?

Vivian nodded and smiled up at him. "Okay. We'll watch the friendship ponies later."

At least that was one thing he could look forward to, no matter how trying to mend things with everyone else went.

"...Vivian? Thank you for being my friend."

What a fool he'd been, worrying that the loss of their partnership meant that a distance would open up between them. For pushing her away and trying to ensure that there was. But their bond had run deeper than that, and they were friends underneath that. Maybe even like family. And no matter what, he'd continue to guide and protect her as long as she needed it, partners or no.

Edited 2014-03-06 15:05 (UTC)

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WAH: The Log

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ruins this moment

This is standard.

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GOD DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMN

(◕▽◕)

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stares

SOON...

DELETE MY UNDERWEAR WILL YOU