What you don't know is

[infestedcouncilpresident]

Who: Kohaku Yuhara, Ako Yuhara
What: A test of conviction
When: Mid December
Where: Soleil
Warnings: Reckless endangerment

Kohaku felt strange. Calm, but with an undercurrent of internal screaming that she wasn't letting herself think about. The world might be ending, but the matter was out of her hands now. By her own choice. All she had to do now was graduate and pretend that everything was okay.

She was having an ordinary day, for once. She had a paper she had to finish, but that wasn't due until Monday, and a runecrafting assignment but Jailbreak didn't really give a shit about due dates, so she was just poking around the school library's small fiction section to see if she could find something with dragons on the cover that didn't look unberably horny.

Kohaku stopped at one particlar title to stare at it. "And people think MY generation has weird art tastes..." she mused to herself.

Surely, nothing out of the ordinary was going to happen today.

Comments

[strongestimouto]

Ako Yuhara can, if she desires, suppress her violent intent for stealth purposes. That's the only reason Kohaku didn't notice her until she was picking Kohaku up and holding her over her head like she was going to do some kind of wrestling move on her. Except, instead of a wrestling move, she just ran off.

"We're going on a field trip, onii-chan!"

[infestedcouncilpresident]

The book went flying out of her hands and landed on the floor, where a librarian found it an hour later only to shake her head at the irresponsibility of today's youth.

Kohaku, meanwhile, let out an indignant "WHAT THE FUCK!?" as she was carried off unexpectedly. She hadn't heard anyone near her, and she only knew one person who could-

Oh fuck.

"AKO WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING!?"

Never mind that she just answered that, or that she was yelling in the library.

[strongestimouto]

"FIELD TRIP!"

No further explanation was coming as Ako busted out of the library, then bounded out of town and into the woods. All further protestations would be met with "FIELD TRIP!"

Eventually, Ako put Kohaku down, about as ceremoniously as she picked her up in the first place. The reason for stopping was soon apparent - a monster from the Outlands, lurking in the woods in the real world. It looked sort of like a giant velociraptor with the claws of a monstrous crab.

It was stalking, slowly but deliberately, in the direction of civilization.

[infestedcouncilpresident]

Kohaku stumbled against a tree, which she clung to for balance as she tried to regain her sense of what was going on. Which didn't take very long, considering her everything. She started to round on Ako and shout "WHAT THE FUCK AGAIN" when she saw the monster and shut up.

After a moment she whispered, "Ako what the fuck?" in a more stealthy tone while still watching the...the whatever it was slowly make it's way towards Soleil.

[strongestimouto]

She chose this particular monster for being kind of dim. If it was too observant, this whole scene wouldn't work, because she'd have to be too quiet.

"This thing's gonna cause a ruckus pretty soon. I'm giving you your big chance to give up on fighting by looking the enemy in the face and not fighting it. Call it your graduation ceremony!"

[infestedcouncilpresident]

Kohaku looked back and forth between Ako and the monster for a moment. "Okay. I'm not fighting it. You fight it."

That was easy.

[strongestimouto]

"Nah."

[infestedcouncilpresident]

"But if it gets too much closer who knows what that thing will do!"

[strongestimouto]

"Not my problem!" It is. "Maybe someone else will deal with it."

[infestedcouncilpresident]

"But-"

The bottom dropped out of her stomach as Kohaku realized what Ako was doing. "...Why are you doing this?"

[strongestimouto]

"Why did you enroll at AEGIS?"

It was just about the most serious Ako had ever sounded around Kohaku.

[infestedcouncilpresident]

"They...said they could help me learn to control the parasite." Not true. "Come ON Ako that thing looks like it could crush a guy's skull without even trying!"

[strongestimouto]

"Not yours. You're too fast for it."

Her hand rested on the hilt of Kohaku's sword. Of course she brought it with her.

"I'm not here because I think you owe the world anything. I'm here to make sure you don't do something you'll regret. Why did you really enroll?"

[infestedcouncilpresident]

"You're REALLY gonna do this to me right now!?"

She was.

"Ugh! Because I was a little kid when they asked, and they said I could help save the world!"

[strongestimouto]

"And here you are, fixing to walk away from a place where you're doing just that. So, if that's what you really want, just turn around and let that monster be someone else's problem."

[infestedcouncilpresident]

Kohaku glared at her. "I can't believe you're calling out my childhood dream like this."

But...she was going to do it. Deep down, she knew she was going to. Ako was right.

[strongestimouto]

Ako held out the sword, handle-first.

"You've already figured out whether or not you're gonna take it, haven't you? Go with your gut."

[infestedcouncilpresident]

She reached out for the sword, but hesitated. "Just answer me one thing first. Why's it so important to you? Why do you even care what I do with my life?"

[strongestimouto]

"'Cause I'm your sister, dumbass."

[infestedcouncilpresident]

She just stared at Ako in surprise for several seconds before looking down with a “heh.”

“Of course. I forgot you could be such a brat, when you aren’t being insane.”

She drew the sword, which made the odd almost chiming sound that it always did, vibrating with its own unique harmonics alien to that of steel. She DID have a responsibility. Not to the fate of the world, maybe, but to herself. If she just pretended everything was okay and someone else would fix everything for her, she’d end up hating herself. The world was too big for her, but this little chunk of it in front of her, this velociraptor with crab claws...

Kohaku was pretty sure that was just the right size.

[strongestimouto]

That's more like it.

Ako stepped aside to let Kohaku get at the monster up ahead. "You can use this guy as a warm-up, because you're gonna need some serious training from me to get back on track after this."

[infestedcouncilpresident]

This was...unfortunately part of her responsibility to herself as well. To her credit, Kohaku barely shuddered. “I...guess I could stand to get a few pointers...”

First, the creature. Kohaku spun her sword around in one hand idly while walking over towards it. She listened to its heartbeat (heartbeats. Apparently it had two hearts. Good to know.), and watched it’s muscles bunching as it moved. Judged its reaction time between when she yelled “HEY FUCKFACE!” And when it actually looked at her.

Yeah, this wouldn’t be very hard at all.