Chapter 14 : Tempus Fugit - Lesbian swordfighting
The human girl her King was so fond of seemed a little bit down those last three days, Akeno muses as she side-eyes the objects of her thoughts across the crowded cafeteria.
Today again, she had felt strangely numb, for some reason, declining that the three of them eat together since she wasn't 'in the proper headspace to be a good conversationalist today'.
In a way, Prima's current attitude reminded her a bit of the one little Koneko had some days, where nothing could pull her out of her funk, and so she tended to isolate herself until what troubled her came to pass.
Granted, the yokai had been steadily getting better as time went on, but seeing someone the half-fallen at least knew going through the same process tugged at her usually carefully hidden heartstring.
It still was nothing compared to her King's growing discomfort and upset at not being able to help her friend when she clearly didn't want to talk.
The timing was, obviously, quite odd, the dark-brown haired girl seemingly having a breakdown right after the strange case with the Stray Devil, which had of course prompted the Gremory heiress to ask her, through gritted teeth, to go for a second round of observation on the strange orphan.
Yet, the girl remained stubbornly mundane and, dare Akeno say it, kinda boring to watch.
Though, in all honesty, not as mind numbing as-
"Urgh, no way!" a moussy brunette, whose name she couldn't be bothered to remember, like all her little 'friends', scrunches her nose as she gestures emphatically in denial, "I'm, like, not going out with Kenta-kun! I know we've been friends for, like, ages, but, come on: the poor boy has a face only his mother can love.
"I mean, he's sweet and all, but, having to…" the girl shivers exaggeratedly, "No, hard pass!"
"But he's been pining for you for months now," another girl, black haired, with a neck slightly disproportionate and a voice a notch too high to be easy on the ears, cuts her, "And you're stringing him along each time we go to the movie theater."
"Well," the first answers, smiling impishly, "Not my fault he's loaded. In a way, he's paying for the opportunity to spend time with me."
The assembled table giggles, her and her King excepted, and Akeno feels like dying inside a little.
After much reflection, she'd rather be spying on a certain tattooed girl rather than endure this vapid, empty, and frankly quite rude, gossiping any longer.
Between this whole high-school thing and Devil's society, she was actually starting to miss the latter, and that was saying something.
Though, in her opinion, it wouldn't be long before one member of the assembled gaggle would mess something up and sour their relationships with her King, if the trend continued.
That day couldn't come any sooner.
"So, Rias-chan," a blond with glasses calls across the table, prompting the Queen's eyebrow to twitch at the blatant disrespect -even Hanako-san wasn't as familiar with her King as that sow-, "You got tired of your delinquent friend?
"Or have you seen reason and gave up on her altogether?"
Akeno's hopes rise at the prospect of this charade actually ending way sooner than she expected-
"Ah!" her King perks up, takes a second to register what has been said, before visibly frowning, "No, nothing like that.
"Prima-chan has had a lot to deal with, those last few days, and told me that I'd be better served with people who wouldn't be a downer in a conversation.
"I tried cheering her up, but it didn't work, so I'm giving her some space." the Gremory heiress concludes, way more diplomatically than Akeno would've expected.
-Only for them to die a quick, messy death.
Those girls had no idea how lucky they were: had they been young devils, spellfire would have been flung before Rias even considered that talking maybe was the better way.
"What?" the mousy brunette gasps in mock-shock, one of her hands dramatically clutching at her heart, "The big bad girl who isn't afraid of anything can feel a bit under the weather? I'm shocked, truly.
"Hey, that isn't nice." Rias points out, her frown tightening, "Prima-chan is a nice girl."
At least, she isn't two-faced like those bitches, Akeno idly comments in the privacy of her mind.
"If you say so." the blond demures with a 'polite' smile that just screams hypocrisy.
"So, you never told us: what do you like to do as a hobby, Gremory-san?" the black haired girl asks.
Akeno inwardly smiles as her King's mood makes a one-eighty, the crimson haired girl opening her mouth-
Now, if her otaku tendencies don't alienate her from those useless wastes of air, the half-fallen doesn't know what will.
…Well, if somehow that still didn't work, the half-fallen can still use her rather handy hypnosis to help things move along.
I was feeling numb, distant.
I had been like that for the last three days, going along with the flow on autopilot.
Sleeping fitfully, rising early, meditating, eating, going to school, eating, going to the Kendo club, leaving school, meditating, rinse and repeat.
I was feeling… floaty, in a way.
I had known, intellectually, that this was a kill-or-be-killed world, that I would have to take a life, or even multiples, at some point.
It was a given, clearly, considering how I was supernatural-adjacent and the town I lived in.
I wasn't quite ready to watch a mind get ripped apart in close proximity, though.
I think that this was what was messing me up more than the fact that I had killed someone.
I watched a mind, a soul, collapse under the metaphysical pressure of the Warp, and I had found beauty in it.
In any case, I was far from being at one hundred percent, going through the motions more than anything else, and, apparently, someone caught on to it.
Well, multiple people, if I have to be honest, considering the complicated looks Rias and Akeno had thrown my way for the last few days, and the strangely flat expression Toroko-san had on his face when coaching me.
Though the last one to have caught on it is the one currently pertinent to my situation.
A shinai strikes me behind the knee, making me stumble with an inelegant yelp, prompting me to about-face, not-quite fuming in anger but close-
-only for my ire to get instantly doused in cold water as I lock eyes with Koryu-Buchou, who looks at me coldly, impassively.
"You're not in it, sloppy." she enunciates, "This is a simple kata, focus."
Remember when I pinned her mentally as a slave-driver?
I was wrong.
She's actually way worse.
I inhale through not-quite gritted teeth, my momentary lapse of control having lured tHe VoIcEs back in.
"Hai, Koryu-Buchou." I exhale, giving her a nod, and my grip on my shinai tightens.
I go for another two-handed chop-
-only for another strike to make me stumble, prompting a low growl out of me, about-facing once again-
-almost fumbling the reception as a helmet is thrown my way, catching it just in time before it falls.
I stare at it, a bit dumbly, before looking back at the Kendo club's captain.
"Katas won't do it. On the tatami, now." she orders, a few jeers and cheers echoing around -will wonder never cease, but I'm not exactly a star among the Kendo girls, thanks, rumor mill- that the captain silences with a death glare almost instantly.
I sigh, before putting the helmet on, stepping on the tatami soon after.
I face my hot senpai, as armor clad as me, my hands loosely gripping my shinai, and go to ask her how she wants to do this-
-only to get taken aback as she takes two steps forward, going for an overhanded strike that I instinctively parry along my bamboo blade, correcting my footing just so to shrug off her attack and create an opening-
-but she steps back instantly, apparently reading my intent like a book, and it's all I can do not to overcommit.
Around us, the silence is deafening.
I almost go for another question, but she's attacking once more, the 'clack' of our shinais meeting in the middle as we lock blades echoing in the now quiet room.
She's stronger than me, and I have to take a step backward, redirecting her blade downward-
-only for her to somehow slip into my guard, the tip of her shinai hitting me squarely in the plexus, making me take a step back.
It doesn't hurt, barely a poke.
At least, not my body, because my pride sure is.
"Better." she comments, getting back in guard, "You've got solid footwork, and good instincts.
"Really, the only thing you're messing up…" she trails off-
-dashing back in action, the 'clack-clack-clack' of a fast-paced exchange resonating around, a few gasps getting lost in the room as we strike-parry-strike-parry-lock blade-strike-
-and the tip of her shinai once again slip by, hitting me square in the helmet, wrenching a yelp out of my lips, and signaling my loss.
"...Is that you're focussing too much on the blade, not enough on the shoulders." she elaborates, rolling her own for extra-emphasis.
"Of course, all of that is nothing: the real issue is your mental state right now."
"What?" I ask back, a bit bewildered.
She rushes back in, our blades meeting for a short time, before stepping back as if I don't even impede her.
"You stand like a warrior," Koryu-Buchou suddenly says, echoing her words from a week ago, "Yet, you play it defensive."
My brow furrows.
"A soldier defends his country." I answer mechanically, not really seeing the point she's trying to make.
"Why, yes, they do. But they also know that, sometimes, the better defense…" she trails off-
-rushing me in once again, the exchange even more frantic than before, the 'clack-clack-clack-clack-clack' somehow louder than previously, as we circle around each other, strike mixing into parry into feint and parry into an opening-
-and I take a hit on the forearm, making me stumble back, this time truly feeling it.
"Ah!" I yelp, because it stings like an absolute bitch.
"...is a good offense." the club's captain ends, pulling out her helmet in a fluid motion, before shaking her head, not-quite in slow motion, and signaling the end of the spar.
I sigh, pulling my own helmet with noticeably less class, huffing away a few stray bangs, sticky with sweat, as they fall in a heap right in front of my face.
Koryu-Buchou steps closer, before extending a hand.
I blink, before going for a handshake, a gesture I absolutely wasn't expecting to see in this country, especially not after a spar in a dojo.
"Good match." she says simply, her eyes having lost a bit of their edge, "Think about why you took the blade, and the next one will be even better."
I watch her about-face, already barking a few commands to the assembled club members, all of them having apparently stopped what they were doing to look at our fight.
I look at her back for a few solid seconds, before looking at my hands.
One held the handle of my shinai, the other empty.
Slowly, a realization, no, two, come into my mind.
The first is that I literally got shounen-troped, having my ass kicked seven ways to Sunday by a teacher until I pulled my head out of my ass and stopped moping.
The second is that lesbian swordfighting may be a thing for a reason, after all.
My lips curl up, and I giggle.
ENTRY: Alpha-004
ANNO:0 - LOCAL:2009
LOCAL DATE: APRIL, 15TH
BEGINNING RECORD
"So, the last few days have been a bit hard on me.
"I understandably got affected by killing for the first time, and I had some troubles coming to terms with it.
"Though, if you have read the previous records, you should already know about it by now.
"Koryu-Buchou knocked some sense back into me, quite literally I might add, during a spar earlier in the afternoon.
"I mean, she was wrong on some levels, I didn't really choose to pick up the blade, after all, but on others, she had the right idea.
"Sure, the voices, the Warp, may have guided, urged me to do it, but had I had a bit more time or information to make my decision, I figure I would've done the exact same thing.
"Especially considering that there were no strange reports about a guy missing his head in the newspaper these last few days, so I was probably right on the money when guessing that it was a Stray Devil that I put down.
"One of the two peerages, probably Rias' since she has the numbers contrary to Sona right now, must have taken care of the clean up.
"Anyway, I'm… not really fine, I would say, but I'm getting there.
"It's a kill-or-be-killed world, it would've happened eventually, and I certainly didn't put down an innocent.
"Now is the time to stop moping around and get back into it."
ENDING RECORD
ENTRY Alpha-004: ARCHIVED
[AN: and cut!
We speed through all that angst bullshit with the good ol' shounen inspired therapy, folks!
And I may or may not have set up a few things just to make a call back to a meme, don't thank me for it, it was my pleasure.
Oh, and remember: girls, between each other? Vicious as fuck.
Hope you enjoy, xoxo]