Messenger Box

[eyeswideopen]

If you need to get a hold of Komaeda, here's where you do it.

Messenger birds, action, what have you.

Comments

[eyeswideopen]

[For a second he just stands in place. Every time he reveals who he was people don't leave. It doesn't make much sense sometimes. Komaeda strides for Gengar, trusting the ghost and Red. After all for all his fears, Charizard had brought him safely to land. What to say to that?] I want to fix what I can fix. I'll only hurt others to protect myself and protect others.

I'll never kill again unless I have no choice. ...even as I remember more of that time, I'm not a danger to you or anyone else.

[But he might become one, if healing erases him completely and leaves behind Servant. He hasn't talked to anyone about that but his partners and Mu.]

...as for the school. They did things no human should to another. Whether my Hajime knew or not, what they did was unforgiveable. Hope that desperate and high, only falls to earth as despair. ...hope should never be at the cost of a life.

[Especially not that life is heavily implied. His affection and love for Hinata not hidden in the slightest.]

[gottacatch]

[ Her shadows scoop him up, and it's more sudden than as gently it could be, a sing-song sound to tease how he's now cradled by the darkness before her form. But everything else -- other than that odd chill that'll touch at his skin -- is as considered as promised (by Red). Her body keeps sunk half-way, and Komaeda's feet could near graze the dirt and grass if Gengar was to play any nasty tricks, resuming their journey at a speed that's faster than a run.

There'll be no nasty tricks, of course, and Gengar even watches out for the space of the trees and how he'll fit, and if the support at his back will need to prop him up not. He's so lucky she's in a good mood!! ]

You two sound closer than before. [ Red hadn't not recognised -- something. Felt affection, of course, understood love in his own way, but that's his first thought from that, and 'my Hajime'. He remembers that part of Hinata's full name. Where he is, he breathes in the sea scent from Lapras's body, a tree to his back and her at his side. ]

I've heard a lot of terrible things since coming here. Stories about peoples' worlds and what's happened here too. To be honest... I never understood any of it. It made me feel angry, or hopeless. I just started to accept it, that I might hear things like that from anyone. [ ... ] It was hard enough to accept back home people would want to torture pokémon for profit.

[ Komaeda didn't ask, but something compels him to share it, as ignorant as it might make him sound. Some things were different now, at least about his state of mind, only implied for as far he goes, as there's a direction to for instead than to continue on a more personal reflection. ]

Someone like Junko is harder for me to understand. [ A pause. ] But I spoke to her during the festival. That arrow -- Junko... it wasn't just an attack on Hinata and everyone around him, but on herself too, wasn't it? Despair makes her happy. She knows she won't stay dead, so she enjoyed it, and she gets to hurt the people she has a connection to here and come back to a bigger mess.

[ It's hard to understand, yet there's another thought on his mind, like a small heavy weight. ]

That thing-- the one that went after Kylo Ren... what would it do to someone who would plan their own death this way? Would it be able to tell her intentions? What if she's aiming to get the same treatment as he did? Wouldn't that make her happy?

[eyeswideopen]

I think it would. But like always, I can only guess what precisely is her goal. She's quite...chaotic. Even to Servant, her motives weren't always clear. [It's an odd sensation riding a ghost. It feels a bit like drifting in cold water. While he's thinking on that he might as well answer Red's other question.]

...but, you're right. Hajime and I are closer. I have to be careful with how I operate for this case. Enoshima might be able to get whatever I testify or submit as evidence thrown out since my bias is...very much on my boyfriend's side.

For a lot of reasons aside from that. But she'll fix on that.

You're also right she loves despair. ...she killed her own sister to further her own despair. If I could I'd submit that as part of a testimony on her character. But I don't have the memory petal. She does.

[gottacatch]

Boyfriend? [ Like before, the word gets fixated on, repeated--yet there''s nothing yet emotionally to it. It sticks out, but why it does--well, Komaeda calling Hinata his boyfriend is...

... ]

[gottacatch]

[ ...wait

WAIT


WAAIIIITTTT ]

[gottacatch]

--You and Hinata are d-- d-- together!?

Dating!?

[ Sorry, was there a more important conversation going on here involving the murder of sisters? Because there's nothing but fluster and high emotions on Red's end that one might be able to translate as oh my arceus they're together?? A couple?? Two guys??? REALLY???? despite being wordless. ]

I mean-- uhhh, Junko-- umm!

[ He's scrambling to get back on topic here, give him a second!! GIVE HIM A SECOND!! ]

DR1 spoilers

[eyeswideopen]

[Apparently everyone will fix on that. He sighs. This is going to be a very long day.]

Yes, we're dating. Us and our partner, but let's get back on topic, please. Are you familiar with the girl Ikasaba Mukuro?

[He projects an image of Junko Enoshima and Mukuro Ikasaba standing side by side, and the resemblance is almost perfect. Junko's prettier, but minus some freckles on Mukuro's face they are definitely sisters.]

She was from a different timeline than ours. In hers, she survived, in ours Junko Enoshima killed her at the start of the first killing life murder game she set up on a whim.

[gottacatch]

[ His embarrassment finds some lower level to exist in, quivering like a field of Aiada's sprites huddled up, bright red and shamed and flushed. It's useful that Komaeda's explaining what they're meant to be speaking about or where they were--Red had, as one might guess, entirely been distracted by the revelation of a certain love life. And a third?? --now's not the time to think about that. ]

I...no, I've never heard of her. [ Right, this is actually serious stuff. Red tries to focus on what he's supposed to be thinking about. ] Would... a memory work against Junko? What if...what if I could get the memory I saw onto a memory petal? If I make Gengar pick up on it again and I see it...

[ Couldn't it work? ]

[eyeswideopen]

It would keep your testimony from being thrown out. A memory will back your words. The prosecution will be doing their level best to throw out anything they can. Always keep in mind that evidence used needs to have impact that sways opinions in our favor.

Any cross-exam is done with the lawyer or detective, or questioner trying to control you. They will ask things with a goal in mind. Or to discredit you.

[He could get the memory where she admitted killing her sister, but how much relevance does that have? He'll discuss it with Kirigiri.]

Anyway, the members of the first killing life Enoshima established, were her own classmates.

[gottacatch]

... Komaeda... before you continue, can you wait until you get here? I don't want to hear something like this inside my head right now.

[ He doesn't know if that's strange, but calmer as he might be (both compared to a moment ago, and when he firs contacted Komaeda), it's unsettling to hear in a place so close to his thoughts.

He's not sure if he wants to hear any of it any time soon, but better in person than through the amulets. ]

You're nearly here. I know Gengar's getting closer.

[ Gengar leans her bodied face closer to Komaeda without any effect to how she carries him, a sing-song tune coming out from behind her teeth with a look that might translate as questionable, but was it? The darkness cradling him, the same which surrounds her too, seems to bleed out into tendrils that burst into smoke when they smack into the trees, as a distant feeling can be caught in the air, something ever so hopeless, making her ever the more energised.

Those shadows take it in, a laughter rippling lowly within the shadows down below under the surface, as faint as a whisper--manic, choked, unhinged. Female. Familiar.

Even cartoonish. ]

[eyeswideopen]

[A chain rattles, and his eyes turn dark. The laugh that haunts the halls of his dreams is enough to stir up the vast well of despair he tries not to think about in the day to day world.

His form doesn't change like it usually does but his dark eyes with thin bands of hope swirling in their depths keep locked to Gengar. He knows if he had been that darker self, he'd have laughed himself. Instead fury coils his chest and black scales of hate start to mar the air.

He hates Enoshima so much and even her laugh still kicks up what messed up his left hand that night in mental spaces. By the time they reach Red, he's back to his usual self. Calm, collected. One would never think he'd exposed a bit of what was behind that to anyone.]

[gottacatch]

[ Gengar senses his hope, meaningless to her next to his so refreshing taste of fury (not her particular brand of negativity, but it's certainly a funny emotion), and receiving a rather unasked for plfffftttt of what she keeps to at least the tip of a tongue in the gaps of her teeth than rolling out the entire thing. That wouldn't be very nice.

But the soft chime of a bell as much announces Komaeda's arrival as it does his and Gengar's approach to those who wait, Red upon the shell of a large aquatic blue creature, a whisper of a sing-song tune leaving her mouth as her trainer jumps off. She's got an eye on Komaeda, but more importantly on Gengar when, with her job done, the ghost-type lets Komaeda back onto his feet without warning or preparation, tipping his body so that his feet just find the ground and he can deal with his newfound balance all by himself.

Hey, she could have just plopped him straight onto the ground. And she would have, if she didn't know Red would dislike it.

Lapras's look is more unamused than Red's is, the gengar sinking in the ground and then re-emerging right at her side and grinning her usual grin at her, faint whispers of smoke rolling up off her body and then fading away. Whereas a sense of despair could be felt in the air before, here, strangely enough, like in a bubble unseen surrounding them it's a calmer story, everything far more at ease than it should be. There's a faint glimmer that comes off from Lapras's body, a soft light sparkling in the air after. Even without Komaeda finding his own inner peace, here, this pokémon provides it.

Red walks towards Komaeda with an apologetic expression, clueless as to how he would have taken to that short time with a pokémon like Gengar. ]

Were you okay with her? She can be strange, but she's a good pokémon.

[ Komaeda might just catch Gengar looking overly pleased at that, and Lapras turning her head as she rolls her eyes. ]

[eyeswideopen]

[His feet hit solid ground just as he finishes balancing his mind out. Komaeda stumbles forward and stops. Gengar is... His eyes follow her as she moves across the area. What a creepy person. And that's saying something coming from him. He turns to try sensing the despair but there's a calm all around them that reminds him of the eye of a storm.

He pauses,]

She's fine. Ah, but she really likes Enoshima, doesn't she?

[Why had she repeated that laugh? Had she been looking to sample the feverish despair of Servant? He can't figure out her motives anymore than Junko's.]

I'll know for sure if it's her despair if I can get another sense of it. But...don't be alarmed if I look different when I feel it.

[gottacatch]

[ He can't not be taken back by that view of Gengar, yet the expression of discomfort that shifts on Red's face isn't entirely one of offence. That would be denying too much of Gengar's nature, which....was what it was.

But he motions, stepping with the look still half of his face when he shakes his head. ] That's fine. It's...over this way.

[ Out of the eye of the storm, and over to where the ruin way. Red hadn't wanted to keep too close of it. ]

Gengar, she's... she's exactly how you'd imagine a ghost type to be if you listened to the stories back home about them. They go anywhere where some big tragedy's occurred, and all this despair Junko left behind is... well, it makes her.......happy.

[ That's. Awkward to confess.

But the despair junkie's emotion (no, not Gengar's, but Junko's) will welcome them like an odour in the air, somehow even killing the smell of the wildlife the closer they got before the sight of wilted life came into view. Only a few leaves still cling to the rotten trees on the farther side high above from where Junko had last been standing, hanging limply and dry and waiting for the right soft breeze to make them flutter down, with the ground more parched of moisture and colour than them.

Red knows not to get too close. He stops, as soon as he feels a laugh not his own attempt to make its way out of his throat, his hand slapping over his mouth for good measure. Gengar hadn't followed him, but the invisible strings between him and his pokémon were as strong as ever.

He really had to work on how loud she came through when negativity was this strong. ]

[eyeswideopen]

[It's darkness but, he knows it. Faint images swirl in the fog of his mind as he walks on heedless that Red has already stopped. The world around him inside his head changes to different places, different times like grains of sand falling through an hourglass.

The energy of his spirit answers with the rattle of chains and the implacable sense of death. It's the hopelessness of having no hopes for yourself. Being the unworthy fool who dared to try to reach for the heights. That which brings chaos.

Dark smoke swirls around him, his clothes forming differently. His shoes on the parched earth no longer the boots he wears. A long steel chain winds up his chest and the locks to the steel collar at his throat. Komaeda comes to a stop, no longer a teenage boy but a tall, rail thin man. It lasts only for a few minutes before he sweeps his left hand out and cuts through it.]

This is her. There's no one else that stirs up despair this thickly, or deeply with this undercurrent of glee to it.

[gottacatch]

[ Red eyes blink into existence within the branches of one of the untouched trees, keeping a distance like somebody that shouldn't be there. But there was no reason Gengar couldn't quietly watch, to observe the two of them, keeping an eye on them and the state of where they dared to stand.

What a nice location.

The chill in the air isn't even that of her own, but that what was left behind. The cold pricks at Red's skin, his hand lowered to his chin, mouth trying hard not to break into a grin he doesn't want. He doesn't speak a word when the illusion falls over Komaeda's body, his eyes not widening. Yet he recognises it, or recalls when the same had happened to Hinata, black hair like tree roots framing him, unkempt and unnoticed. Uncared for.

It's a relief to see the ease that Komaeda seems takes it away with, and Red can hear a voice he knows when he finally speaks. Without realising it, the hand had dropped from his face down over his chest, fingers screwing into the fabric under a shoulder. ]

... She was laughing the entire time. It was crazy-- the way she laughed was like some kind of joke, but-- in a way, I felt it too. How happy she was to be beyond help.

Can the police point this place back to her? [ Did they have the technology to do identify somebody through emotions? ]

[eyeswideopen]

I believe they can. [He circles the place where the trees were, his eyes narrows. He can feel the despair beating upon him but now he's maintaining a balance. It slides off of him like water.]

...ah, her laughing hardly surprises me. She is a bit broken in the head and nothing will fix that. [Except some handy death that he has no desire to give her anymore. He studies the damage the way a bird watches a bug crawl across a branch.]

Likely whoever assisted her here is someone just as messed up. But it won't Hinata or Kamukura. The former is smarter and would never. The later...we'd be seeing holes and apathy damage. That crime scene is sloppy. Neither would be that bad at it. ...and it was too clean. Not a drop of emotion.

And again, [He shakes his head.] he didn't do it.

[gottacatch]

[ He takes in a deep breath, letting it out before he speaks. ]

She couldn't have been attacked where she tried to pin it on Hinata and make it all the way out here. It has to be a set-up.

[ Which was what Red was ready to believe when he heard about the mess. Whatever history the pair had, he couldn't imagine the story that had gotten out about the crime.

The arm about him falls, coming down to meet his other as he folds them both, still hugigng somewhere around his stomach as his eyes close. ]

...Whoever helped her, I think they must've had some kind of power. I didn't see them...stab her, or anything like that. [ His mouth is tight each time he pauses, creased and uncomfortable. ] I didn't hear a gun either. It was...all she was focused on. The pain. But she wasn't watching what was killing her.

[ And wouldn't that have been worthwhile? ]

[eyeswideopen]

With that in mind let's look back over what we know of the crime scene and who is being framed. [Komaeda returns to Red's side and holds up his left arm. In the months and months he's been training with Mu he does have some muscle definition. He turns to face the clearing and swings his left arm as if he had a knife in hand.]

First, all of the blade marks are too low. To get marks that low, Hajime would have had to use a much heavier chopping weapon. Don't you think so? Then marks would be more precise and deeper. A larger weapon would require more upper body strength.

A knife is small, easy to rotate or throw. But there's a mistake there too. Do you know what that is?

[gottacatch]

[ ...Asking him about blades, Komaeda? Red's looking at the outstretched arm, frowning slightly. ]

Um... do you mean with the crime scene? I haven't actually seen it. [ Guess who didn't answer the hum of a call from Junko when it came through. ]

But if the marks are light and it was a smaller weapon... what kind of marks were they anyway? Were they in one spot?

[eyeswideopen]

They were all over. It was as if the attacker lost their mind and attacked like a crazed animal. [Neither form of Hinata could be called that. Especially the dark god that is blurring with the normal boy he fell in love with. Kamukura would have been utterly precise. Having seen him move before...he could keep from leaving foot prints but there just wouldn't have been a scene if he'd done the killing.]

Neither one, Hajime or Izuru would be that reckless. If they decided to kill they would be far better at clean up. Hajime would kill as last resort and Izuru would do it only if provoked.

Do you want to see the crime scene? I investigated it.

[gottacatch]

[ Would seeing it do any good? ... He nods within a second, the decision not entirely on that. ]

I want to know how exactly Hinata's getting blamed. I've heard about his name written on the ground, but there has to be more she did to pin him to the scene than that!

[ Right? Wasn't she smart and calculating to do all she's done? A name in blood couldn't be enough to get Hinata sent down. ]

[eyeswideopen]

The case against him is full of contradictions and holes. I don't think she's aiming for a win. In fact...I'll bet she isn't. [He turns his head, looking back at the despair drenched ground. What could she gain just from this? Too much. If they allowed it. He spreads his hands apart and continues.] Right now, Hinata has no alibi. We were going to have...dinner together after I got off work. But I haven't seen him since yesterday.

He says he was at his apartment all day. There are no witnesses for any side. I'll bet she is going to use his anger and hatred of her as a defense. Potentially anything...no she will use his offers to teach others how to defend themselves. Remember?

Because of what he's recalling, he's an arms master. She'll use that and Kamukura against him. [He turns entirely to face the marks of Enoshima's despair and then turns partway back to Red.] No one hates Enoshima more than Servant and Kamukura. No one.

[gottacatch]

Except no one knows that but you and the people from your world, and it's not enough to get anyone thrown into jail. Junko's made herself someone that lot of people dislike, ever since it came out what she was doing to Peromei. She put the island at risk. When the person making accusations towards anyone is someone like Junko, every detail needs to matter than just her word. Or even a name!

[ He doesn't care if his bias is showing, but his voice raises a notch as he continues, a hand going out. ] What would drive Hinata to do this now? What's to show he was at the crime scene than a name and her word? There's no reason for him to suddenly do it now, not when-- [ his face flinches, shyly, coming and going ] --not when he has you, when he would be at his happiest! There'd have to be something, like an argument, or anything to lead up to what she's trying to say happened! And without witnesses, she has nothing but old history that makes her look just as guilty as everyone knows her to be.

[ With all that, Red doesn't doubt that Komaeda is right. Who would firmly believe in a win in this scenario? ]

She just wants to drag Hinata's name through the dirt, and the rest of you with him! Well, it doesn't matter what comes out. In the end, it's what she's capable of that's going to stick in everyone's minds than whatever she tries to use against him or brings out.

[eyeswideopen]

Remember, she is out for despair. Her despair. Even when it was just me she was picking on it was all centered around what she wanted for herself. It didn't matter if I became Servant again or not. If I did it would just be another reason to despair.

It isn't make sense to the rest of us! We're just dragged along for this dismal ride! The Enforcers, Peromei, all of us. The law will begin its due process because it must or it isn't really a law.

At this point we have to accept that. Society must turn upon the order it imposes upon itself. Don't doubt for a moment that she knows this. I'll bet out of boredom at some point she read through the laws. [He spreads his hands apart and shakes his head slowly from side to side. It isn't that he doesn't agree with Red. It's just he knows the laws so well these days.]

But what you've found here might just well be the arrow that nails all the controdictions to the wall during the trial.