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Ito Keiichi (伊藤慶一) (keiito) wrote in disappear_rpg,
@ 2010-02-01 11:34:00

Entry tags:

keiichi, kiriko

WHO: Keiichi, Kiriko
WHAT: Difference of opinion?
WHERE: The Butterfly Room
WHEN: Post-K1 dungeon, pre-beach episode.
WHY: Because Keiichi's head isn't fond of her, and Kiriko's not fond of the rest of him.

The Butterfly Room was one of the few truly quiet places around Nanakamado for Keiichi that wasn't his own too-familiar room. The door to the garden beckoned to him, but he still had difficulty going back into *that* place, nice though it was.

He sat on the couch, surrounded by a wide variety of hugdolls. The hands were off in a corner of the room. As of late, they'd seemed particularly wary of him.'

The arrangement of hands and hugdolls was not lost on him, given where each came from.

Keiichi held his journal in his hands, scribbling away at a new entry. He was trying very hard not to look at all of the torn out pages. Better than anyone else, he knew what was written on them.

The new entry was far less stressful than most. It was essentially planning for Cooking Club. Ways to get more money from the school. Ways to try and make the Club, well, not a joke.

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apathyisboring
2010-02-01 06:56 pm UTC (link)

"A what?" She looked back over her shoulder and again looked him up and down. "That's not a word," she added bluntly.

She was paused with her hand on the door handle, eyeing him with guarded suspicion. She might not have any idea what an 'Explapology' was, but she had a pretty good idea where this was going and was little interested in putting up with it.

But... she would have to eventually, wouldn't she?

Slowly her hand left the door handle and fell to her side. She adjusted the strap of her bag, doing her best to clear her face back to a neutral expression and managing it for the most part. There was still definitely something critical in the way she watched him and something impatient in her body language, but clearly she was listening and waiting for him to continue.

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keiito
2010-02-01 07:21 pm UTC (link)

"Nope," he agreed. "It's not a word."

That little anecdote probably explained about all anyone needed to know about the differences between Ikeda Kiriko and Ito Keiichi.

"First of all, I apologize for making you go through that. Beyond that, though, I'm admittedly a bit confused and still trying to sort out *why* you went through that."

His expression was somewhere between sheepish and thoughtful. Clearly, it was still a point that needed pondering.

"I repressed a lot. I think that's pretty clear. I don't...usually repress my negative opinions about people, though," he observed. "Akuba-san, Satou-senpai, Shirai-san...it's somewhat obvious we don't quite get along or particularly enjoy each other's company." There were some understatements in that, and he sighed again.

"But what bothered me when I began thinking about this was that, honestly? I don't dislike you. We're of different opinions on a lot of things, and our ways at looking at the world are about as opposite as they get, but that's considerably different than how things are with the other three I mentioned."

He cast a troubled glance at her, almost as if feeling...guilty for both what happened and his lack of a better explanation.

"I guess what I'm trying to say is that beyond the obvious "I wanted to be the leader" rationale, I'm not really able to explain *why* all of that happened, and it's bothering me. I apologize for you going through that particularly because I can't even tell you why properly. Post-Paradise seems to be all about self-discovery and explanation of what happened."

Even as he spoke, his face seemed sort of scrunched up. Something was on the tip of his tongue, but the neurons weren't firing enough to allow him to convert thought to speech.

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apathyisboring
2010-02-01 09:00 pm UTC (link)

How could he not know why? It was a mystery to her. If nothing else, you are the master of what goes on in your own head. Her Paradise had been entirely intelligible to her. Could it be he was just too embarassed to share the explanation he had? That would make more sense, really - she'd been embarassed too and hers had frankly not been half as bad (though perhaps it might have been had that elevator made the few pitstops it did upon her entry).

She canted her head. What was she to make of that apology? It didn't really change how he thought of her, did it? It was hard to believe he didn't like her, and even if that was true, something inside of him certainly had it out for her. The guilty look was all that enticed her to speak.

"Shouldn't you have an explanation ready before you try to explain?"

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keiito
2010-02-02 02:57 pm UTC (link)

"It's...well, most of the reasons you and I haven't been the warmest with each other are reasonably obvious, I'd say," Keiichi replied. "You're...a lot more pragmatic than I am. Cooler. Calmer. I've...got more of my father in me than I'd like to admit."

It was probably the first time he'd been willing to admit it. Which, considering how Keiichi WAS, tended to be somewhat impressive prior denial on his part.

"I'm not quite comfortable with how my head treated you, to be absolutely honest," he continued. "Some of it was probably just residual jealousy -- I don't think it's a secret I wanted to be team leader. But the rest..."

Keiichi sighed. "I'd like to think that you and I have both at least gotten along with each other," he said. "We might not ever be great friends or anything like that, but we at least get along better than Akuba-san and I, for example. That's why it bothers me, really. It's not like you've done anything to me to make me dislike you. At the end of the day, I guess it's just...professional disagreements? That's not exactly what I'm going for, but it's close."

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apathyisboring
2010-02-02 05:41 pm UTC (link)

She'd gathered that from his shadow, really, but now she was beginning to wonder if that meant his father was a lot more like him than he'd care to admit. She couldn't really picture Ito-sensei in cooking club, but maybe the megalomaniacal streak ran in the family.

She listened while he spoke, waited to see if there was anymore, then nodded - a little sharply, a little curtly, though with no intention to be rude. The conversation was irritating her for different reasons than she had anticipated. She'd been expecting a Ito Blow-Up(TM) - some speech on how much of a horrible, irresponsible leader she was, how little she had ever deserved to be put at the helm, and how while his shadow was over the top, he was planning to stick to his guns on that point. On some level, she'd have preferred it. She was braced for it. And it gave her a good opportunity to shout back.

This just left her cold.

"So why did you need to tell me all of this? You'd prefer we didn't speak to one another?"

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keiito
2010-02-02 11:48 pm UTC (link)

"No, that's not it. I told you all of this because, well, I owed you some sort of explanation. Considering we *have* been cordial at least with each other, the whole head thing probably came as sort of a surprise."

Sort of, probably, but not totally.

"Do I think you were the best choice for leader? No. Was I slightly irritated when I saw your reaction to what happened with you and Kanaye in Paradise? Absolutely, I was. But beyond that... at this point, I think the arrangement we have is probably best -- any possible claim I could have had is pretty much justifiably dead. I wanted it for the wrong reasons."

He nodded. "I think that's more or less it. I'd like for us to continue being able to go on as we have: working towards figuring out just what's happening."

Quietly, he bowed. "I apologize again for what you had to go through."

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