07.22.11

LOSING CONTROL OF THE SITUATION

There are two ways people usually deal with fear. The most common way is probably to freak out, at least that's what TV tells us. We've all seen it on Crime Dramas where the victim (often a female) is captured by the bad guy and held at gun/knife/whatever point. They shake and shiver and cry and wait for the hero to save them, unless of course the show feels like shaking things up and having the victim save themselves. Either way, there's always at least a little bit of crying and visible fear.

The other way is… well, the exact opposite of the first way. Some people just don't show fear the way other people do, or at all. It doesn't matter how dire the situation, they'll still maintain a calm composure, even if inside, they're scared to death.

If this experience taught me anything, it's that I am of the latter camp. I was scared of course, you'd have to be crazy or suicidal not to be even a little scared when someone much bigger and stronger than you is holding you at knifepoint. However, I didn't shake, I didn't cry, I didn't even whimper. Actually, if I could've seen my face in a mirror, I imagine I probably just looked confused.

The man's grip was extremely tight, so I didn't even bother trying to break free. I knew that however strong this guy was, he most likely paled in comparison to the six robots.

Oh, speaking of which, you're probably wondering how they were taking this.

"YOU FIENDS!" Tamaki yelled. "HOW DARE YOU DEFILE MY HARUHI WITH YOUR FILTHY HAND! UNHAND HER AT ONCE OR FACE THE CONSEQUENCES!"

"Yeah," the twins continued. "We'll break your skulls open!"

"You should never pick on a girl," Hunny stuck his tongue out at them. "Meanie-faces!"

The last one got the thugs laughing. The one holding me kept his knife steady, though I'm pretty sure he was close to breaking the skin at this point.

Tamaki and the twins looked ready to lunge at them, but something held them back. Kyoya ended up making the first move, although this only consisted of taking two steps forward and pushing up his glasses. He studied the thugs intently, placing special attention on the one holding me. I had no idea what he was thinking or how he was planning to get us out of this. The minutes dragged on, or so if felt. Really, I don't even know how much time passed before Kyoya finally spoke.

"You're doing this because we got you thrown out of a movie?" He asked like he was asking them the time. "Seems a bit disproportionate. Can't you just see the movie again at a later point in time?"

"You really think they'll let us back in the theatre?" The man holding me retorted. "We've already been thrown out of there, like, fifty times before. No way we're getting back in now. And it's the only movie theatre for ten miles."

"Hmmm," Kyoya brought a hand to his chin. "I don't see why they wouldn't let you back in. If they've been tolerant of the other 50 instances of disturbing the peace, why should this one be any different?"

Around me, I could see the thugs giving incredulous looks to Kyoya.

"50?" The man repeated. "Dude, I was just exaggerating 'cause… you know… it's been a lot of times... What the Hell is wrong with you?"

"I'd have to say there's something wrong with you," Kyoya smugly answered. "You're the one who lied about how many times you've been thrown out and then tried to make it sound like I was the one at fault."

"Are you ON something?" The man bit back. I noticed his grip on me was beginning to loosen, but not enough for me to break it. "Quit twisting my words around!"

"I don't see how I can twist your words," Kyoya put on a confused look that I couldn't determine as being fake or real. "Words are not tangible things. I cannot physically take your words from your mouth and twist them in any direction with my hands. You really don't make a lot of sense."

The man sputtered for several seconds, and I can't say that I blamed him. Kyoya was really something right now. I knew he was the smartest, so he should know this guy wasn't speaking literally. Was he just trying to confuse him?

"You have got to be kidding me," It seemed my captor had finally regained his voice. "You can't possibly be serious!"

"Actually, I'm not," Kyoya smiled cheerfully. "I'm just trying to distract you."

"Distract me?" The thug repeated. "From what?"

Kyoya's smile became a smirk as he motioned with his finger for the man to look around. I did the same, and instantly realized two things which I probably should've noticed a long time ago.

First, every robot besides Kyoya were no longer standing next to him. I don't know when they disappeared or why I didn't notice. I had a multitude of theories from temporary selective blindness to Kyoya's 'special talent' being some from of hypnosis. For the record, neither of those theories ended up being correct. The truth was… I have no idea why I didn't notice. Frankly, I don't even care that much.

The second thing you can probably figure out from reading the first thing, but I'll tell you anyway.

The second thing was that all the thugs besides the one holding me were now unconscious on the ground. Tamaki, the twins and Hunny stood over them with identical looks of triumph on their faces as they congratulated each other on a job well done (it should be noted that the twins were being extra careful to trample the thugs they'd taken down whenever the had the chance).

The remaining thug gasped and began to shake. He backed up a bit, still holding me. He stopped after hitting what felt like a wall, but that couldn't be since we were nowhere near one. That's when I realized one of the robots was still missing. I had to crane my neck all the way up, but I eventually saw Mori bearing down on us, his hard gaze resting square on the thug.

A brief staring contest followed, the thug was clearly too scared to do anything but stand rigid in shock. Mori wordlessly raised a hand and grabbed the arm that held the knife to my throat. He wrenched it away with ease, and I immediately took my cue to run away. I felt myself grabbed again a second later, but this time it was by Tamaki, and so I relaxed.

The blonde robot pulled me into his arms and refused to let go, even after I squeaked and began to fidget. He put his face in the crock of my neck and exhaled deeply (yes, they could breath, sort of. It's a story for another day).

"I was so worried," He whispered. "Don't ever scare me like that again."

For the few seconds after he said that, I had to stop fidgeting. Not because I was so deeply affected by his words, I just was surprised by how honest and genuine they sounded. I knew they said they loved me, but I figured it was just programming, and there wouldn't be any real emotion behind it.

I was very slowly coming to see that this may not have been the case.

Meanwhile, Mori was still silently threatening the thug. The man had dropped his knife (not like it would've done much good) and was now trying to find an opening to run away. Mori got to him first. The much taller 'man' grabbed the thug by his collar and lifted him about three feet in the air, holding him at arms length. What was interesting was that his face maintained the usual look of expressionless boredom, even though when he spoke (and said the longest sentence I'd ever heard from him thus far), his voice was low and, dare I say it, frightening.

"Leave Haruhi alone. Don't come near her again."

With that, he dropped the thug to ground. The terrified man needed no further prompting, he tore out of the alleyway with a scream, leaving his knocked out gang behind.

The twins cheered, jumping up high so they could clap Mori on the back. The large man didn't acknowledge them and simply walked up to me, a funny look I couldn't identify in his eye.

By now, Tamaki had let go of me and stood back, perhaps recognizing that Mori wanted to have a moment with me to himself. I was unsure of what to say. In the time since I'd gotten these robots, I'd have fairly lengthy conversations with all of them except Mori. Just why was he programmed to be so quiet anyway? Were there people who actually liked this sort of thing? I found it more odd than I did sexy.

"Uh…" I searched for the right words. This wasn't going to be easy. "I… Thank you, Mori. Thank you very much."

It was stupid and standard and I didn't really say anything. And yet, Mori gave me a reaction I never would've expected.

He smiled.

It wasn't a grin, it wasn't even a particularly defined smile, but it was a smile none the less. Then he reached out and lightly patted me on the head. I didn't really know how to feel about that, and I really wished he would just say something. Why did he have to be such an enigma?

So, your probably thinking the post will end here. You're also probably wondering why I played this event up as so insane when it really wasn't anything that special.

Well, you're wrong on both counts.

There's one more thing I have to tell you before I wrap this entry up, and it involved the directs effects of this little fight scene. The fight itself wasn't part of the event, rather, it was the trigger for it. So here's how it REALLY started:

What I'd failed to notice, again, was that the fight had drawn a pretty substantial crowd. Okay, maybe 'failed to notice' isn't really the right phrase. I did notice, I just didn't care to acknowledge it at the time, figuring nothing would really come of it since they hadn't done anything indicative of being more than human (except maybe Mori).

Boy, was I wrong.

"Excuse me, Excuse me! Coming through!"

I heard the voice before I saw who it belonged to. People in the crowd would jerk to the side, glaring down at whatever had run into them. Whoever it was made a path and got through the crowd a second later, finally allowing me to see his face.

The first thing I noticed was that he was short. Very short. Not quite to dwarfism levels, but pretty close. He was probably middle aged if his slightly worn face and graying hair were any indication. He wore a regular business suit and for some reason had a whistle around his neck, that was kind of weird.

He had a large smile on his face. Not a warm smile, mind you. He looked more like a villain in a Child's TV show. Minus the black clothing and mustache twirling stuff.

His gaze was set on the robots, and warning bells went off like crazy in my head.

"Hey there," Even his voice sounded wrong. "That was some amazing stuff you guys did just there."

I could tell the robots didn't really know how to take that. All except Kyoya of course. It was like he was their spokesperson or something.

"It wasn't really much," Modesty didn't really suit him, I noticed. "Our friend here was in danger, I'm sure you would have done the same for your close friend."

"Oh yeah, sure," His distracted tone said way more than his words. "Anyway, I'm Jonii Usagiuma."

He said it in a dramatic fashion, as if expecting us to immediately know who he was and flock to him like sheep. Obviously, none of us did that, we just stood silently while he slowly deflated.

"Jonii Usagiuma," He repeated a bit more firmly.

We continued to not react, so he gave an annoyed sigh.

"I'm a very prominent TV show director," He explained. Instantly, he brightened up again. "And I've decided you six would be fantastic on my new show!"

I don't know about the robots, but my reactions was instantaneous. Wide eyes, skin losing color, a weight dropping in mind stomach. You know, the usual.

"Oh no!" I said a bit too forcefully. "No, no thank you sir. My friends here aren't interested."

He raised an eyebrow at me.

"And who are you, their agent?" His voice was completely condescending. "Why don't we let them speak for themselves."

We both looked up at the robots. They had varying looks of confusion, nonchalance and thoughtfulness.

"You want us to be on TV?" Tamaki questioned, the look in his eye was not one I could say I liked.

Usagiuma grinned. "Of course! It's a primetime slot even. You'll be the stars of the show and everyone will know you're names."

He paused and wrapped an arm around me before I could stop him.

"You'll even impress the girl here," He pointed at me. "She may be a stick in the mud now, but wait until she sees your names in lights. She won't know which of you to choose."

"Get off me!" I jerked away and he didn't stop me. The damage had been done anyway.

I could see Tamaki, the twins and Hunny definitely wanted to do it now. Mori would probably do whatever Hunny did and Kyoya would never miss an opportunity to make me angry. It amazed me that no matter how hard I tired to explain to them that they could not, under any circumstances, do anything conspicuous in public. As you've probably come to realize, it was about the only thing they never listened to me on.

Usagiuma practically ran over to them, pulling several papers out of his jacket pocket. Once I realized what they were, I couldn't believe he'd actually carry them around him, like he expected to randomly find people on the street he could scout.

"If you'll all just sign here, please," He pointed to a spot on the paper and held out a pen to Kyoya, the one closest to him.

"You guys," I began a last ditch effort to stop this before it went too far. "You guys don't really want to do this, right?"

My desperation probably showed very clearly on my face, and it definitely wasn't a good thing. If I'd learned anything about Kyoya, it was that he interpreted everything as a yes. Either that, or he was just a complete asshole who got off an tormenting me. I would not have a hard time believing either on.

"Why not?" He asked me, taking the pen and smiling serenely. "It sounds like fun."

One by one, they signed the paper. Usagiuma was too thrilled to even inquire about their apparent lack of last names.

Just like that, my six unwanted robots had signed themselves up to be TV stars and there was nothing I could do about it besides beg them to reconsider (they didn't) and introduce my head to the wall (I did).

Now, you're probably wondering: just what kind of TV show are we talking about here?

Well, so was I. Throughout the whole conversation, Usagiuma failed to explain just what kind of show he was talking about and if it was written in the contract, none of us ever saw it since he immediately took it back once all the names where signed, gave them a piece of paper telling us where to go tomorrow, and left with a spring in his step.

I didn't find out until the next day, when the robots practically dragged me to the address listed, which I discovered was not a TV station at all, but an open field occupied by a TV crew.

So, would you like to know now what kind of show this was?

Well here, I'll give you a few hints, in the form of various things I heard from the TV crew and what was said to the robots:

"Do you all have medical insurance? You may want to give you carrier a call."

"Can someone get the motorcycle ready and bring me a blowtorch?"

"Be sure to wear a helmet or you're skull will most likely crack open. Assuming you're lucky."

If you can't figure it out from that, I guess you need to watch 'Extreme!' The hottest new stunt show on Japanese TV, soon to feature a group of six idiotic robots, with the goal of giving me as many heart attacks in a row as humanly possible.

And that's it for now, I think.

Wait, this doesn't count as a cliffhanger, right?

Ah, forget it. I'm way too tired anyway.

Posted by Haruhi at 11:56 pm 0 comments