wipingallout

"Yeah, getting hammered with a lot of emotions can be overwhelming for me too... I'm sorry to hear how coercive the situation is," Hamuko frowned a bit, sighing in understanding.

"What sort of things did you want to know? What sort of questions are bothering you?"

...right.

"Actually I- I don't know. I wanted to know more about my past as a human and why...Wolf is the way he is. Stubborn. Frustrating." He only managed to pour out his reasons when he was drunk anyway, barely meeting her gaze as she stared down at him from an adjoining advertisement board with her face plastered all over it- just so that he didn't run away. "But that aside- I am just trying to investigate things on my own. I will tell you some other time but right now..."

She lets her legs settle down and fold on the couch instead, fidgeting with her hands before raising one up and finally, finally the environment loaded- showing off her room. It was still blank but she was planning to decorate it soon anyway. The icon of Flutter hovered over that hand.

"Have you been checking the network lately?"

That all makes sense... Akane would want to know what she was really like, how much of her was her, and all. It must be a scary thought - but since she's shuffling along, Hamuko let the conversation move. Poor Akane probably only wanted to dwell so much for now and they'd probably talk more later.

She did make a mental note to ask Zenkichi a little more about why he was keeping things close to the chest... not to be a mole or anything, just to get an understanding.

"I haven't," Hamuko admitted, "I've been taking a little bit of a break. What'd I miss? Hopefully not another doomsday, I'm still putting together the party for last time."

Akane's eyes perked up in curiosity at what she just said. "...a party?" She turned that word over in her head, considering it. She knew the literal definition of it, even if she hadn’t participated in it. "That does sound like fun." Hell, she couldn't deny it but maybe she should go to that whenever its organized.

Set up all the arrangements, the decorations, order a variety of cool games and consoles, help in the invitations-

...

Right.

Her dad would be invited too, wouldn't he? She wasn't against it, she knew better than anyone that maybe he needed that too.
~~Even if she hated that he would take any distraction over just telling her the truth. Or why didn't he do something about it back in their world?~~

"..."

"There’s a newcomer- Ichinose Kuon," she starts as the flutter icon melted into a page and she magnified on one of the most recent network posts.

"She's an AI researcher, currently from the year 2017."

Anger threatened to slowly boil over.

"She's the creator of EMMA. The artificial intelligence who became a false heretic god in our world- 2038."

"Oh," Hamuko uttered, eyes widening. She sat straight and started reading the post through, scanning through the words and drawing up a bit short.

There's a lot she can parse from her general academics, but there is some jargon that is edging towards dense that makes some of what she's rambling about inscrutable.

"Do you think it's the same person?"

"Yep..." She followed with a drifted gaze, considerably shocked that she hadn’t blown up about this whole ordeal yet. Her anger...she couldn't even process it emotionally. Not yet anyway. The actions that Ichinose had committed were only laid onto her like code while whatever was left of her human soul was forever left unsatisfied with her actual conclusions.

She tapped her fingers against her lap and sighed. "She also created EMMA, yes. In fact, her description would perfectly match a possible Ichinose who hasn't brought about humanity's ruin...yet."

Igor...

Not to mention.

"And Wolf well-" her voice picked up tension. "Tch, he certainly didn't react well." A scoff left her lips before he threw an arm in anger, "That asshole is SUPPOSED to be the adult here! Do you know what he did!?"

She was about to offer to keep an eye out for Ichinose, but the last bit had Hamuko worried. Uh oh.

"It already sounds not good," Hamuko laughed awkwardly. Uh oh.

Oh it was far from good. The very thought of it made her want to simultaneously pull her own hair and yell her heart out to her father all over again after seeing how the whole mess only got worse rather than better.

"Wolf went after her and immediately threatened to shoot her with a gun to the head, knowing damn well if she was the Ichinose we knew he would have died on the spot!" Her eyes widened, anger bubbling on the surface like hot lava. "He was so so lucky that he just terrified her and probably scarred her for life!"

"You know what he just did? A goddamn suicide mission. That's what he did. After everything that happened with Fatalis he-"

She reigns herself, now falling back on the sofa.

"Wolf..." Hamuko breathed, tone exasperated in the way a disappointed teacher or parent might be.

Self-destructive behavior. She knew what that looked like. With what he drank, with how he was beating himself up... that was probably a long-ingrained vice of his, a tendency to deliberately hurt himself as some form of penance, maybe? Some sense that there needed to be justice or fairness, but he could only punish himself? Hamuko didn't know the specifics, didn't know him specifically well enough, but the effect was the same.

It left the person that would depend on him the most to watch him hurt himself. It probably wasn't the first time, but this was a pretty extreme example. It hurts to see the people you care about falling apart, and... possibly losing them as a consequence for it.

"He should know better," is what Hamuko says after thinking it through, a frown on her face.

The frustration felt real. Jittery nerves correlating to error codes flashing in her eyes as everything only felt worse despite her systems trying to optimize through everything. A part of her wondered just how many times she had felt like this and found it so much easier to simply overwrite the errors so that she was stable again.

Maybe that's why Kirijo Group removed the memory of her being human.

"He should know better," she growled but at the end, her voice cracked but not enough to really notice. "But then again...he doesn't exactly care about his human life like I do."

"Is this how things were when we were...family?"

Edited 2025-03-26 16:25 (UTC)

"It could have been... self destructive behavior happens a lot even when you aren't a soldier putting your life on the line," Hamuko gently answered, her heart aching sympathetically for Akane.

She had to watch him self destruct, and it was probably not new to him. She never heard about a mom in the picture, so... the blanks can be pretty easily filled in. And with how Zenkichi refuses to acknowledge his humanity...

"...I'm just guessing, but he might blame himself for what's happened to you two so far. And since he can't 'fix' it, maybe he's punishing himself over it. It's not rational behavior... it's depression. I know what it feels like and looks like," she explained after a beat. "First and foremost, Akane, it's not your fault - whether you know that already or not, I think it needs to be said out loud."

Akane didn’t answer right away. Instead, she curled up again, pulling her legs to her chest, letting her chin rest on her knees. Her eyes flickered, glitching faintly at the edges as she stared through the screen—through Hamuko, through the room, through everything.

A family.

What kind of family lets things get this bad?

She couldn’t remember what they used to be like. Not really. She could fill in the blanks between the memories with all the clichés of a distant father and a neglected kid. But that wasn’t enough. It wasn’t real enough.

How did they talk? How did they fight? Did he ever make her breakfast? Did he ever pick her up from school? Did they have inside jokes? Did she ever tell him she hated him in the heat of the moment? Had he ever yelled at her in frustration? Had she ever cried in front of him?

Had he ever held her when she did?

Her fingers curled against the fabric of her sweater. She hated this. This uncertainty. This not-knowing. If she had all the data, all the pieces, maybe she could reconstruct it, make sense of what they were before everything went to hell. But Wolf—Zenkichi—wouldn’t give her that. Wouldn’t let her know.

Maybe he was ashamed.

Maybe she had done something.

“...If he’s hiding so much from me, then maybe... maybe I did something before,” she said, her voice distant. Not sad. Not even bitter. Just... cold. “When I was human.”

That would explain it, wouldn’t it? Maybe she was the reason everything fell apart. Maybe he wasn’t just keeping things from her because he was an idiot who thought she was too fragile to handle it. Maybe she was something he didn’t want to face. Something awful.

Maybe that’s why she couldn’t remember.

Akane exhaled sharply, forcing herself back into the moment before she could spiral further. She unclenched her hands, setting them on her knees instead, grounding herself.

"...Not that it matters anymore. He’s stopped now. Said he won’t do anything reckless. For now." Her fingers tapped against her knee, rhythmic and calculated. "But he also said he will do it again if Ichinose crosses the line."

She glanced at Hamuko, the fire in her eyes dimmed, but not gone. "A big reason he isn't running right now is because she offered us a deal."

Hamuko shook her head at the suggestion that Akane might have done something she can't remember, rejecting the concept entirely. Whatever mistakes or choices were made, none of them would be Akane's fault for how things were now. People aren't omniscient, and kids especially don't have the life experience to know what to expect.

And most of all, there is nothing she could have done to make Zenkichi as self destructive and depressed as he is now. Not his daughter.

"Saving her own skin, I guess," Hamuko sighed, folding her arms in front of her and leaning on them on the desk. "Reckless and dangerous, sure, but that's still something you guys can work with. What's she offering? Insight into EMMA's code?"

Hamuko could shake her head however she wants but that isn't really an answer, is it? Their world was so...painfully unique. So painfully set apart from the rest- it didn't matter what kind of pains their unit will be carrying, only for a select few here did things go as bad as they did.

~~Maruki's research could fix all pain, could it not?~~

She shook her head, tsking in frustration.

Looking ahead, she released a groan right after. "Well we have all the insight we could have into EMMA's code but...she said she can construct a program which might help us defeat the EMMA in our world. She's convinced that her EMMA wouldn't let things go this far."

"And not even going to lie- she has done far more than save her own skin. She got help."

Edited 2025-03-27 00:24 (UTC)

"What kind of help?" Hamuko asked, brows furrowing hesitantly. There were a lot of people she could think of here that might be willing to step in and de-escalate a confrontation, but that didn't sound like something that Akane was talking about.

No, Akane looked worried about it, so... it must have been someone she didn't consider trustworthy. Only Maruki fit that bill of the people Hamuko was aware of, since Fatalis wasn't around...

Akane raised her head from her folded legs, eyes shutting close for a moment before she sighed as the question followed. The way her brows furrowed, the passing notion of wonder and speculation...well she didn't have to look far.

"It's probably who you think it is," she adds helpfully, knowing her words don't help at all. "Really- have you seen the way they talked on Flutter? I can bet you my whole streaming set up that they have locked out their conversation."

...Sigh...

"It's Maruki, isn't it... oh no," she sighed again, rubbing the back of her neck. "I've been trying to keep in touch with him, thinking - maybe he needs a friend to keep him grounded, help him come to his own conclusions instead of being threatened into changing his mind on things. But this is... going to make that a lot harder."

Damn.

"A friend can help someone come down off of their ideological high, but they could also feed into it pretty badly... and Zenkichi attacked her, so since she's a girl, she probably ran right to the one person who seems safest."

Wolf.........

"Okay. It might get worse before it gets better, but, maybe we can make this work in the long term? I'll keep talking to Maruki like I had been and ask Zenkichi to just-- cool it. On Ichinose. If we make sure enough people are aware of Ichinose's whole deal, then no one should get suckered in by her either."

Edited 2025-03-27 01:45 (UTC)

"Yep, its the good doctor." Dr Takuto Maruki. Akane didn't actually think much of him beyond mild confusion and the (un)pleasant surprise of his true potential. Her father had been far wary of him in comparison but both of them found his situation more sorry-like rather than anything else. Maybe even an extension to something like friendship.
After all this? There was no point in denying it- something had cracked in that ultimate truce and Wolf was itching to bite on it.

"Wolf didn't go into any details about it...but I could tell their exchange wasn't pretty. Even beyond the gun to the head or him firing the weapon right next to her ear."

Still.

She lowered her legs again, attentively listening to her strategy as she hummed along while considering the next steps...only for her eyes to widen at a little detail. "You talk to Dr Maruki?!"

"Are you sure he's like...safe? Everyone keeps talking about him like he's going to trigger the next Fatalis war arc."

Edited (fixing italics ) 2025-03-27 15:27 (UTC)

"What, you think I can't handle myself against one guy? I'm the Hamuko Arisato!" she joked, laughing a bit before settling back down.

"I know how a lot of people talk about him. And I'm sure there's genuine things to be concerned about. But I've been seeing a side of him that's pretty empathetic and isn't too lost in his ideology, so... I think he's not completely dunked off the edge," she explained with a smile. "So if having a normal friend or two is what might keep him from becoming completely hopeless and deciding to make a drastic decision, I'm happy to do it. I'm not one of the people that was ever hurt by him, so it doesn't hurt me to spend time with him."

Akane just goes quiet for a bit, eyebrows hiked up before she adjusts the headphones over her ears as if making sure she heard her right.

"A friend..." Or a babysitter? "You are using friendship as a way to...make sure he doesn't blow up like a pipe bomb. Interesting." She wasn't being judgemental at all, her tone was in fact levelled. Hamuko’s joke served as a well enough distraction atleast. "I admire that level of patience though I am not sure how Wolf would feel about it- given he's Ichinose’s refuge."

"I have opinions about Maruki's ideologies but as of now I am going to have to queue them in the backburner." She continues rather methodically. She fidgeted with her hands, weaving different thoughts together.

"...it makes sense why he was so obviously excited when Ichinose spoke up on the network. Or why she found him as a safe spot- given the mutual persecution."

"I think there's a normal guy under all of the red flags, so I'm just trying to convince him to stop being a matador," Hamuko chuckled. There was a man that desperately wanted to help others, that was lost and hurt and confused... maybe Ichinose was the same way.

"When people treat others with extreme suspicion, with threats of violence and stuff like that... it makes them feel alone. Only people who are like them can be trusted, at that point. If we want this Ichinose to also not turn out to be a genocidal egomaniac, then we have to see if she's still on a ledge and can be walked back from it."

Still... Hamuko raised a finger, waggling it a bit.

"That said. I don't think it's the responsibility of people who've been victims to be the ones to try and reach out to someone that had abused them. Even if it's not the same Ichinose... you and Zenkichi shouldn't expose yourselves to someone that's hurt you in the past."

Akane listened intently, considering Hamuko's point as she built up Maruki's profile. Maybe it was a way to prepare herself when she finally bites the bullet and meets Ichinose face to face, predicting what he would say or the way he acts is the right way to go about it so that she isn't caught off guard.

"Human feelings are so goddamn depressing," she muttered. "The Ichinose in our world is completely isolated from the rest of the world. She could go anonymous and no one would even notice but no- she still sticks around that AI who ruined our lives."

She closed her eyes for a moment, considering her next steps before she peaked in to find the waggling finger and then-

It's almost as if she's read her mind.

"..."

"No. I don't think we have an option of turning our backs from her, knowing what she's capable of," she shakes her head. "Dad definitely sees her as his responsibility and he will be around me when I will be auditing her code. Will say though you know despite everything..." She looks up and her expression almost feels guilty.

"I just know I died. I don't trust her but I can't...process my pains. Not more than factually. He says he will never forgive her because her actions lead to him losing almost everyone in his life and I am like...do I even feel that level of anger? Or is it just easy for me to direct my anger on him since he's the only one I have really ever known?"

"How does it feel like when you lose someone dear to you, Hamuko-san?"

What a question. Hamuko has to pause, to really collect her thoughts and consider what the most clear, honest answer would be.

It might give Akane insight into how her father feels. It might be impossible to really understand until she felt it herself. What does it feel like to lose someone you care for...

Her mind goes to her parents and brother, of course. And to Junpei crying out in rage and anger as he clutched tightly onto Chidori. As she and the rest of SEES desperately ran, carrying their dearest Shinjiro to a hospital and waiting in anguish for the Dark Hour to end before he bled out, of hearing later that he likely would suffer brain death in his coma. She thought of Ryoji, smiling gently as he waved farewell to everyone, wishing them a happy new year as he left the dorm to disappear without anyone present to mourn him as he perished and became something else.

"It... hurts. It hurts deep in your chest, physically, and it haunts you in your mind for years. You're stuck wondering... was there any way it could've been different? Any way you could've saved them - and then it hurts all over again because even if you could have, that doesn't change the fact that they're gone," she admitted, voice quiet to keep it from wavering too noticeably.

She failed, on that front. Her voice was trembling.

"The pain does... wane, a little, with time. Other important things come up and you put your focus there. But it's so hard. Your mind will want to go back to them, clinging onto whatever it can because... you don't get to see them again. And you miss them. And sometimes, maybe you hate yourself because you couldn't save them."

To lose someone important...someone close to you. Is it like losing a limb? A missing part that is unfairly taken away from you- never to be fully replaced ever again? Akane can construct those questions in her head. She can look up websites in a matter of few seconds and weave over all its possible symptoms and effects but the loss itself is...its human.

She thought the human soul attached to her code would help her understanding all that. Why can't she?

Any way you could've saved them - and then it hurts all over again because even if you could have, that doesn't change the fact that they're gone.

Gone.

Her mind went back to Zenkichi, remembering the look of utter defeat in his eyes when Akane had stormed out of the place.
Then she had felt like crying. She wished she could cry to relieve herself from her heavy emotions- instead all she was left was this gaping emptiness.

This...void.

Dad...

Her sigh hitched as she heaved a deep breath and considered her words.

"If you ever had the option to run into them again...would you tell them what you just told me? About a different life? The memories that you shared with them?"

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1/2

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not actually crying since she can't actually cry yet

Akaneeee....

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