GRANDPAW HUNTING SEASON | Hollow Plot

[betheman]

Who: Gongenzaka, his grandfather's hollow and others
What: 'Grandpaw' is stalking people close to Gon to psyche him out- and then just pummeling him (it's fine we'll pummel Grandpaw back)
Where: Around campus
When: March 17th - 21st
Warnings: Serious Violence in the Hollow Fight Prompt; Far more minor (though varied) in the Mingle Prompt

Comments

MARCH 17th - 20th | MINGLE OPTION/OTA

[betheman]

It is the week of the Super moon. The Worm moon, the moon of the Equinox. It falls all upon the same day, the season of chance now meeting the air. Perhaps that's why things feel as they do all of a sudden.

At least, for some.

Something is targeting you, though it's difficult to tell how, or even what. For some it seems tame. Bags and possessions moved, despite no one being around. A false step at the last stair, threatening you to trip. The chair not quite being where it was when you went to sit.

For others it's less so. Something flies through a window where you were standing not long before. The labels of certain chemicals aren't quite right, and your science lab nearly ends in catastrophe. Nearly. It's a series of little things that escalate more and more, from broken mugs to shelves toppling from overhead, and while no one is seriously injured there is one thing in common.

You- the target- are someone Gongenzaka knows and cares about.

And chances are, he's either just seen something happen, or is about to hear about it some other way.

[[OOC - This section of the plot may be treated as a Mingle. Either those targeted can interact with Gongenzaka, OR, they can chat with others about the incidents occurring. They're free to figure out it's a Hollow in the end, as well!]]

[hippocarnival]

Yuya doesn't think twice about the odd occurrences at first, assuming that they're the result of his own dazed state. Stumbling down the stairs, reaching for something that's moved too far and tipping over, books almost falling on his head... he's so distracted with the dueling senses of two familiars he doesn't realize what's happening around him as any fault but his own.

He's walking slowly from one building to the next for his next class, rubbing the heel of his palm to his eye as he tries to clear his head. This is really the worst.

[betheman]

"Yuuya-!" To say that Gongenzaka has been worrying himself sick, and running ragged, is...

To put it very lightly suffice to say. He runs after the other to try and catch him before the next class. "Hah- Hah, Yuuya..!"

He really hopes that's not a dangerous class. "Wait..!"

[hippocarnival]

Yuya stops, looking over his shoulder. When he sees who's calling him, he offers Gongenzaka a smile and a wave--although it's still a little weary.

"Hey, Gongenzaka. Want to walk to class with me?"

[betheman]

"Auh-! C-certainly! Though Yuuya, I, the man Gongenzaka wanted to ask...auh..." He stammers a fair bit, not even bothering to think on if they even share this class. "Have... ...Are you faring well?"

[hippocarnival]

"Oh... you noticed?" Of course he noticed. Yuya puts a hand briefly to his head before waving his hand dismissively. "I'm fine! It's just since summoning that other familiar, having both of them in my head is... a lot."

He stares blearily in the distance, but he holds his smile with determination. "I just need time to get used to it, like when I first summoned Odd-Eyes. It's okay!"

[betheman]

"Auh... ...Your other familiar?" There was a seco- Oh yes, there was a second. Familiar. Second familiar-

"Auh. Well...that isn't quite what I meant," he mutters with a cough. "Has anything else...."

How does he say this. Gongenzaka waves a hand somewhat. "...Has anything...strange? Happened recently..?"

[hippocarnival]

"Strange...?" Yes, actually, related to demons, and it makes Yuya's chest get tight. Had Gongenzaka noticed something...?

He suddenly feels very alert of his nervousness. "Like what kind of strange things?"

[betheman]

"Just...anything, truthfully. I, the man Gongenzaka, understand that sometimes things are truly just as they seem, but..."

He swallows, rubbing the back of his neck as he looks about distractedly. "It simply... ...Something does not seem right. Not at all..."

[morelikeisabeast]

Isabel was having a bad day. A bowl of cereal that just mysteriously rolled over into her lap. A flat tire on her bike that had almost thrown her into traffic while trying to ride to school. But she had made it to lunch. Glorious food. Nothing can ruin lunch, right?

While she thought this, the glass she was about to take a drink from just shattered in her hand, spilling apple juice and shards of glass all over her and her lunch and and her hand. She stared at her hand in outraged shock as blood started to well up from a cut right on her palm. This had to be more than just bad luck, right? Three times is an enemy action, as they say.

Oh right also her hand is bleeding. Isabel finally caught up with the moment and grabbed a napkin to press over it while looking around for help. "Jiminy Christmas what is wrong with today!?"

[betheman]

"Mnh- Isabel?" Isabel isn't someone Gongenzaka has necessarily thought of in his paranoid panic. He just. Keeps feeling like something's wrong. And bad. And-

And he just heard a crash, and now Isabel is holding a napkin...?

...Oh that's a blood smell. "MNH- did something just-" ...Happen? Yes. He already looks a bit like he's been running around headless- for starters, he hasn't gotten a full sentence out yet, but the fact that it took more than a few seconds to realize someone broke a glass all over their hand..?

That's not a great sign. "Mnh- Auhh... ...Just what happened..??" he manages, somehow getting his own napkins to offer for a temporary patch.

Smooth, buddy.

[morelikeisabeast]

"Stupid glass broke. Cut my hand. It's fine, I'll just get some band-aids." She said, through gritted teeth. The truth was it hurt like hell but she didn't like admitting that. When she actually looked up at Gongenzaka, part of her noted that he looked very stressed. More so than the situation warranted. It was just a cut, right?

But she had other things on her mind. Still clutching the napkins to her hand, Isabel got up to see if she could sneak into the nurse's office and steal some band-aids without getting anyone too worried about her. The last thing she needed was grandpa hearing of this.

[betheman]

"It just...broke?" Interesting how the fact that it broke is the issue but- "Auh- at the very least the nurse's office should have supplies for that then...I could come with?"

...

He sounds like he really, really wants to come with. Just in case, y'know.

[morelikeisabeast]

"Yeah. Just-" she made a glass shattering noise. "-right all over my lunch."

Her first reaction was to say "No I'm fine" but before she actually said it she heard the tone in his voice. And she couldn't deny that there was something OFF about today. Even besides her bad luck, she felt almost like something was watching her.

So instead she said "Yeah...okay."

[betheman]

Gongenzaka's shoulders practically sag with relief, and with a nod he walks beside her. "It has been...a very odd day," he 'explains', not really explaining anything at all. "I can't prove things are simply 'happening', but somehow it feels..." He waves a hand. The point is that it really, Really feels like something's off. Shattering glass is only a small part of it.

[morelikeisabeast]

"Like something is watching you but you can't see it?"

If he felt it too then maybe she wasn't just trying to project her bad mood onto outside forces.

[betheman]

Hooooooo.

"...Exactly that, yes..." He looks extremely uncomfortable about it. "...M...More precisely, it feels as if I'm the rabbit being hunted..."

It's a bad feel.

MARCH 21st - NOON | CLOSED FOR THOSE WILLING TO FIGHT/RESCUE | CW: VIOLENCE

[betheman]

This is the weakest time of the day for a lycan, even on a blood moon. During the previous night, Gongenzaka spent his time within the Mythril Cage to be safe. Blood moons were worse than standard ones, and who knew what the Equinox would do to it.

Gongenzaka still doesn't know entirely. He just knows he's exhausted. Exhausted...and being followed.

He has classes off today- it's the worst part of the full moon period, and it's better to let him recover than try to go through as unfocused and distracted as he is. Even without turning into a bear, his temper is just a hair testier than typical, and combined with the events of the last few days he does what he can to avoid others.

There has been a scent on the air though.

The...feeling that someone is there while not. A ghost in the corner of his eye that vanishes with focus. It is disturbing- more disturbing perhaps is that he can't shake it off, and has been entirely unable to find the source.

And then...

"Such a tragedy...such a disappointment..."

He feels he remembers that voice from a distant time- distant enough that he almost fails to recognize it.

He certainly doesn't recognize what he's looking at when he turns, turns to see a figure resembling cloaked shadows, topped with a mask of white like a bear's skull.

"...Who-"

Gongenzaka has little time to react, and even reacting he's still knocked backward by an abrupt blow to the chest. He fumbles for his geta to hold, to block the next incoming fist, but it is only their pause that gives him reprieve.

"...To think I had thought you capable... ...I suppose we simply can't escape our curse..."

The boy chokes- and slowly, he seems to realize who he's 'talking' to. "G... ...Ojiis-"

That's as much as he gets before the true 'fight' begins.

Most of the beginning, none properly see. If someone does, they're wise enough to run for help as the hollow sets their beatdown upon the other, taunting his weakness and cowardice alike. By the time anyone arrives for real, it's even more obviously a onesided battle-

And it's not with a 'cloak' and mask either. The figure is massive- fur like spikes, bear-like yet somehow manshaped all the while, and they are massive. A scar runs down the fearful mask, they they easily pin Gongenzaka against a tree by the throat. Gongenzaka is alive enough to weakly have a hand on the beast's own...

But not enough to argue. Not anymore.

"Monsters we are boy...Monsters...we were fools to deny it, and you above all were fool to Try...Fool still for denying the proof ever after..!" the beast sneers, tightening their hold. "NOW..."

...Now, might be a good time to interrupt.

lmk if things need changing!!

[playitagain]

Nana pauses, as she hears the voice. It's talking loud enough for Nana to hear. She does not arrive, however, until there is time to see the massive figure -- bear-like, but with spikes, and with a claw about Gongenzaka's throat. Her eyes widen.

She heard enough to have a vague idea of what is happening.

Nana doesn't need much more to know her opinion. She strides forward, and she doesn't call out immediately. Her arm has been healed for all of a day and a half; she is still favoring that arm, slightly, but she feels she can manage well enough. She knows to use her main hand. Light flashes and flares around her. Katana and wakizashi appear; so does her white outfit, with skirts, coat, and embroidery. So, too, does that red coat.

She takes a few steps towards Gongenzaka and his grandfather, before she calls out -- in a harsh voice, quite unlike the kind and gentle one that Gongenzaka is used to. "You are going to let him go, immediately!"

She draws both swords and brandishes them at the Hollow.

[hippocarnival]

Yuya has classes today, but like every supermoon and worse he skips them entirely to spend the day with Gongenzaka. Money in his pocket, he leaves his room later in the morning to catch Gon after he's had time to sleep in... but he doesn't find him where he expects.

After waiting, texting, and receiving no response he starts wandering around campus to find him. It's not like Gongenzaka to go off his route. But his assumptions of what's happened are innocent until he hears struggling and--Nana?

Yuya breaks into a run, reaching the opposite side of the hollow, to see it pinning down...

"Gongenzaka!"

[betheman]

"NGH...KKGGH..." Gongenzaka seems only barely aware of the others initially, still fumbling at the grip on his throat as he wheezes. But when his grandfather's attention moves, he manages to turn his eye as well. And when he sees his friends, the werebear's desperation rises. "G...No..! Y...You must r- KHGHHUUUH-"

There is a brief tighten of the hold, and the hollow's eyes narrow. "Aaaah, child heroes...so tragic...so terrible, for the world to rely upon..." he sneers lowly. "...Small heroes, to spare the monsters...." He does not seem to worry about the swords, at least not yet. He'll move when they're doing more than sitting in view.

[playitagain]

Her eyes shift. To Yuya, when she hears him cry out, and then back to Gongenzaka. Nana pushes down the cold fear gripping her heart, and she starts walking forward. It is fast, but methodical -- she wants to strike an unaffected pose at first, to mask all the terror that Gongenzaka struggling -- being hurt -- fills her with at first.

"Call us small if you want. I said," she repeats, "That you are going to let him go."

And then Nana is a blur of motion. She rushes in, slashing the smaller of the blades along the huge were-bear's side. The longer one swings up to slash across the arm holding up Gongenzaka.

[hippocarnival]

Yuya gapes, his shoulders tensing. He doesn't recognize the hollow, but if it's been after Gongenzaka... no, there's no time to figure it out. It doesn't matter.

He's too small on his own, so Yuya brings his hand up to let out a loud, shrill whistle. He hopes Odd-Eyes will be quick.

When Nana goes for his arm, Yuya goes for Gongenzaka. If that hold loosens, Yuya needs to help move him.

[betheman]

"Aaaahhh....such passionate fools... ...You should be wary of striking monsters..." comes the casual reply, and rather than run from the slashes, he moves to greet them-

...With Gongenzaka. "...They care not for their kin after all..." The hold won't loosen- but while Nana might have to back off thanks to Gongenzaka being moved toward her blades, it isn't as though he expects that to be a very permanent shield. Which is exactly why he continues moving the other from there.

The bear scoffs as he tosses Gongenzaka aside, the boy a ragdoll in his grip and little else as he lands. Once his hands are free, he'll put more effort into moving from the spot to avoid much injury from Nana's blades...but no matter how deep any wounds, how severe any blows, his voice is as impassive as ever.

Perhaps even amused. "Even you... ...Such incredible dedication...to an ideal in one's mind..." Is he speaking to Nana? To Yuuya? It's uncertain. (Technically it's definitely Yuuya though)

[playitagain]

Nana is, as it happens, utterly unwilling to strike Gongenzaka. Her approach is slowed, and her slashes end up light at best. She slides to the side, eyes briefly on where Gongenzaka was tossed to. She can't heal him. She can only check the injuries briefly; she doubts the Hollow will allow her the luxury to be sure he is fine.

She looks to Yuya -- trying to get a sense of what he might do next. Then, she rushes again, barreling towards the huge werebear. She leaps; this time, she doesn't go for the arms but comes flying in for the head. Her left sword strikes at the snout. The right ties to slash deep into the shoulder, and Nana tries to land on top of the werebear.