phonetasmal | Calling the Old Man Out

Calling the Old Man Out

[Goro has barely been seen since getting back from the Fissure, only leaving his room briefly to eat a couple times a day, coffee in hand and looking half asleep. Now, though, he seems to finally be properly awake...at approximately 8PM.]

Good...erm, evening, I suppose. I’m sorry I’ve been so absent lately, that Fissure must have taken more out of me than I thought.

But, now that I’m recovered, there’s something important I need to tell everyone. The last batch of new arrivals included a man named Masayoshi Shido. He’s my father, and a truly despicable man, who has had numerous people killed for his own convenience or benefit. He even had my mother killed to cover up the scandal of my birth.

[Here he holds up a phone, showing a picture of Shido...with what looks like avocado and cheese smeared on his face and a shrimp up his nose, wearing the most tiredly Done expression as he reaches for the offending crustacean.]

I injured him in the forest in retaliation for the things he’s done to me, one of my boyfriends, and countless others, but don’t mistake him for someone who deserves your pity. He’s physically not much of a threat, but he is a skilled schemer and manipulator, and-

[ Which is the moment that the video will shake, and a very brief flash of a familiar face (spoiler: Akira’s) can be seen. Off-screen, he’s gently pressing a kiss to Goro’s cheek, whispering that he loves him. Don’t mind the view of a ceiling for a moment, guys - it’s a nice ceiling, at least?

… He’ll properly make it up to Goro, later, if he can? For now, though, he gently brushes the fingers of one hand through his boyfriend’s hair. Akira’s face can properly be seen, after he takes a quiet breath. He looks… well, how most would remember? Only with a bit more of a tiredness to it, maybe.

Though, that’s not taking away from how serious he looks as he speaks. ]

... and, while Goro is right about all of that, there is one more detail I feel should be taken into account. Shido isn’t a good person, but he’s well-aware of that now. He’s done unforgivable things, but his eyes were opened to all of it after his ass was kicked.

[ JUST SAYING… ]

Anyway, nobody has to worry about him. Besides, he knows if he tried anything, he’d have to answer to all of us from his world, and then some.

[ JUST SAYING... ]

[This is the point where Goro takes his tablet back, looking a bit huffy.]

It’s true, he isn’t likely to be a threat now. But he absolutely doesn’t deserve anyone’s kindness or sympathy.

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Ah...

[By this point, he looks...tired, more than anything. He runs his hands through his hair with a sigh and nods.]

Do you want to talk in person?

Yup. Talking on here isn't good enough. I need answers. If you got a good place you'd like us to go and talk? Lemme know.

[ She's cutting right to the chase. Otherwise she might lose her drive to keep up with this. ]

How does the viewing deck sound? I could use some fresh air.

Works for me. I'll be out there in five minutes.

[ As promised she is heading there without so much as a second thought. Staring out into the distance with a somewhat tense look on her face. ]

[Goro apparently hit the kitchen first, since he's carrying a box of fudge cookies when he walks out and sits down in one of the chairs.]

...Where would you like me to start?

[ Once he's sitting down, it's only a mere moment before she sits down in the chair next to him. ]

I want you to start by telling me about this 'Reaper's Game'. Is that how you ended up dying and becoming a Composer?

[ Many more questions kept burning on her tongue but she kept it to the one at first, gaze locked onto him. This probably wasn't going to be easy, but even as she waited, her mind was reeling and already thinking back to her first time running into him. Then to the time on the ride back from the Fissure. It was all kind of making sense now. ]

[He takes a deep, unnecessary, breath. Of course she broke into his private conversations to know what he told Izunia and Undiyne.]

It is. There are...creatures similar to Shadows, called Noise. They prey on people's negative emotions and multiply, and ordinarily can only be seen by the dead or people with the right tool. The Reaper's Game exists to manage them, offering ghosts of people who died young a chance to earn their lives back if they survived a week of fighting Noise. Normally, nobody gets involved in it unless they've already died of unrelated causes.

The problem now is, someone is spreading Noise to worlds they don't normally exist in, and those worlds don't have any way to control them. Since their population is growing unchecked, they can horribly damage, or even destroy, the world. The modified version of the Reaper's Game I was in was designed to train new Composers to introduce the concept to our worlds. Since one of the prerequisites is to be dead, they had to kill the promising candidates. But those involved in running the Reaper's Game aren't supposed to attack people directly outside of self-defense or specific circumstances.

[He kind of broke that rule with Shido, oops. Well, what his bosses don't know, can't hurt him?]

The Composer there decided to get around this by pitting us against each other. Each week, we were given an incentive to kill. If someone did commit murder, we were given time to search for clues and then taken to a trial, where we had to figure out the identity of the culprit. If we were successful, the culprit was executed by a self-aware golem. If not, everyone else was executed and the culprit allowed to go free. I was the second killer.

[ There's a few moments of silence that follows his explanation as she lets it all sink in. It was way too elaborate to be some kind of story, after all. Beings called Noise existed that fed on people's negative emotions and grew in number, but only people with certain tools or the dead could see them. Someone was running some freaky game to souls of the dead regarding a chance to live again, and now some individual was spreading noise to different worlds that would result in serious and irreparable damage if not taken care of.

So then someone else took it upon themselves to conduct their own reaper's game to train new composers and ended up not doing it the right way. Setting up a game filled with murder and weird trials once a week? The thought sent a small shiver down her spine before she realized it, but it was at the last statement that had Futaba stopping short in her thought process.

People were killed by some kind of golem if they were found guilty? Then that meant.. ]

...Since you're a Composer now, that means... that they found out it was you and you were killed, right?

[ This is just completely sinking in now, her eyes wide and completely affixed on him by this point. ]

That's right. Kurama noticed I smelled of smoke from disposing of evidence, so...I confessed to everything, to him and all of our fellow captives. There were fifteen of us, in all.

[He runs a hand through his hair with a heavy sigh.]

He and Akira tried to stop the execution, but it only got them rendered unconscious. Though, I can't say I don't find it a relief that they didn't have to see the moment I died. It was...roughly a week and a half, before I became a Composer, during which I haunted the mall we were trapped in as an ordinary ghost, invisible and insubstantial to the living. I can still reclaim those qualities, but I much prefer passing for living.

[One hand reaches into the box of fudge cookies and he takes one out, but only ends up nibbling at it distractedly.]

[ With him saying that, it made a lot of things click in her mind. Mostly going back to what Kurama had told her the one time and it made so much sense now. Though there was a lot to process and she had to let it all run through her head a couple times.

Akira and Kurama had tried to stop Akechi's execution but it failed and then he was trapped in that mall as a ghost before becoming a composer. That was certainly something else, especially when she considered that he had actually told a bunch of other people his secrets when he was revealed as the killer. Her expression turned a bit sad at this, bowing her head and closing her eyes as a soft sigh left her lips.

He really had a rough time. More than she'd first thought. ]

That's probably why you dress all different too. I... I'm sorry you all had to go through all of that.

[ A moment lingers in the air before something else occurs to her and with reluctant hesitation, Futaba looked over to Akechi once more. ]

While I'm at it... please tell me. Tell me what I actually am to you, Akechi. You treat me differently than the others and what my mom's shadow said back then has made me wonder. No lying or getting out of this, either.

Not all of my experiences there were negative...I made a number of friends, who still care about me despite knowing the truth. I've been trying to move away from tailoring my appearance to present a mature image.

[He falls silent at her question, staring intently at his nibbled cookie. What she...is to him. The question hurts...or rather, his thoughts of how she might respond hurt. Will she be upset? Disgusted? Ashamed? And how much of it would be because of him?]

...Before I answer that, I want to make sure you're certain you want to know the answer. I doubt it's something you'll like, and it's not something you'll be able to just put aside and forget about.

That's great! I mean, that you made friends and you're making progress there, but still. It sounds like what you went through wasn't all that great but you're here now so that's something, right?

[ She was trying to see things in a bit of a positive light but not to the point where it was unrealistic. Though when he showed that kind of reaction, and answered like that? It was a little worrying but she'd made up her mind. No going back. ]

I dont want anymore lies and secrets. I can't keep hiding from things my whole life, so why do it now? Even if it's bad, I want you to tell me.

[He glances at her out of the corner of her eye, then takes a deep breath. If she's asking...he's not sure he even could come up with a convincing lie, right now.]

You're...my half-sister. The reason Shido went to extra effort to ruin your life is because you're his illegitimate daughter, and your very existence threatened him.

[ A moment seemed to pass after that, her eyes wide in shock for a minute as things kind of just sunk in with what he'd said. There was no way this was a lie, not with how serious and reluctant he'd been in telling her about this.

That and he'd wanted to make sure she was certain she wanted to know this. Which she did as it would explain a lot of things and... now that it had happened? Yeah. Definitely something that was indeed something else all on it's own. Not what she was expecting. ]

I'm... related to Shido. That's...

[ A deep breath and she turns her gaze downward, only to close her eyes afterward as she exhaled. ]

I never did know who my dad was... of course there... was a reason for it. It... really does make sense, though. I mean... he could have just settled with making mom have a mental shutdown but then there was the suicide note and the blame placed on me for her death, too.

[ Futaba just brings her arms up to hug herself loosely, feeling suddenly cold even if the weather wasn't necessarily so at the moment. All the pieces clicked but still seemed just... she didn't know what to make of this fact still. ]

How long have you known this...?

I've had my suspicions since not long after...your mother's death. I did some under the table digging to find out what her Shadow meant, and found out she was a former associate of Shido's, who stopped working near him after she became pregnant. We also share an incredibly rare blood type.

[He pauses, then holds the bag of fudge cookies out in front of her. She...looks like she could use some comfort food.]

I wasn't sure until I talked to Shido in the forest. He confirmed my theory as to why he'd gone to so much effort to pin the blame for her death on you, when it would have been far easier to simply pass it off as a known workaholic passing out from exhaustion.

...Really?

[ So that's something new. Something to focus on instead of the other stuff she was still letting sink in at the moment. Honestly she really hadn't been aware they shared the same blood type so that was actually interesting.

Maybe that lingering train of thought in the back of her mind was why she didn't hesitate to reach out and take one of the cookies from the bag he'd offered her. ]

I see. [ Going to just take a small bite out of the cookie, quiet for just a few short moments. ] There was a LOT of work done in that whole set-up, too. I didn't realize why it was so deliberate.

[ Taking another small nibble at the cookie, she closed her eyes briefly. ]

Now it makes a lot more sense.

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Calling the Old Man Out

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