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[He can school his expression into impassivity, but he can't hide the flash of pain in his eyes when she says she doesn't like it. It hurts. It hurts because the person he is now doesn't even want these talents. He doesn't hate them, he can't hate them when he was able to use them to save everyone, but it's still so hard to shake the feeling that he's someone else entirely. The Hinata who had existed before the virtual reality, and the Hinata who had been created in the virtual reality, the one everyone here had thought they'd known... were they really still him? Her words hurt.

All of those thoughts flicker through his mind faster than any words ever could be spoken, and he finally releases her hands, fully aware that he's at risk of having his cheeks slapped again.]

I'm sorry, but... I had to try. I came back to find everyone suffering... I had to test my theory. There's no way I'd risk anyone else getting hurt. Luck had nothing to do with that, I just... I'm not the kind of person who can sit idly by when there's something I can try to do to help.

As for our circumstances... it's complicated. For all of us.

No, I get wanting to help people. Just don't try to take it all on yourself? There are lots of people here with very comfy shoulders for you to lean on, and I hope that I can be one of them!

[ hajime glances away from him to look at the paused cartoon. ]

We probably won't ever fully understand everyone's circumstances while here. Our worlds can be pretty similar to each other, but there's also a lot of differences! I still want to do my very best to get to know you though. You're a very important person to me and I want to learn everything about you that you're okay with sharing.

[You're a very important person to me, stop this emotional roller coaster, he wants to get off?? One emotion at a time, please.

He just sighs quietly and leans forward a little, clasping his hands between his knees and staring at the floor.]

You're... a really important person to me too, Ichinose. I know I can rely on you. But if I tell you what happened... why I have all these talents, what they actually mean...

[He glances sideways to her again without straightening his posture, and echoes her words from before.]

You wouldn't like it.

I don't like a lot of things, but that doesn't change the fact that it happened to you. If we only listened to things that we did like then we wouldn't really know much about anything.

[ her gaze leaves the screen and returns to him. ]

If you don't think I'm the right person to tell these things to, that's fine. I just want to make sure that you're okay.

...You're really mature, Number Two.

[He repeats what she'd told him those few days ago, glancing up from his hands to meet her eyes. He's trying to read her face, use what he knows of her to determine exactly how telling her might affect their friendship. He still cares for her, even after everything he'd told Roxy about how that wouldn't be a good idea.

So he just exhales through his nose and shakes his head. It's better to be honest if he wants to let himself get closer to her, he knows that. It's just difficult.]

Have I told you about how... I was part of Hope's Peak Academy's Reserve Course? How I was so plain, so ordinary, someone so completely bereft of talent I was considered less than trash?

You didn't mention that part.

[ he told her about all the murders, but not this. the displeased face she is making is because she definitely does not agree with that assessment of him? ]

No offense, but your school was awful. [ a pause. ] And wrong.

It wasn't just the school. Ask Komaeda sometime what people with talent thought about people who had none. Ordinary people...

[He gives her a bit of a crooked smile and a shrug, accepting what she says about it being wrong.]

Anyway... Hope's Peak needed more funding to keep researching talent. So they created the Reserve Course, a normal school with the Hope's Peak brand, all to get more money to study talent. There's no way someone like me could afford the tuition to go on my own, but they offered me the chance to enroll in exchange for volunteering for a certain project. A project to create someone who could be everyone's hope.

[ that seems kind of sketchy. she doesn't say so, though, since she would prefer for him to finish his explanation. ]

And you took the offer.

[ that's really the only conclusion to jump to. hajime waits for him to go on. ]

Yeah. I didn't think I had any choice. To become someone who could make a difference, someone who meant something...

I didn't want to be trapped in a boring, normal life. So I volunteered for the program. To turn someone ordinary into someone extraordinary, they had to go through extremes.

In short, they tried to erase my personality completely and jam every single talent into my brain. And I volunteered for it willingly.

[ it kind of reminds her of rue, in the sense of making people who lived normal lives into heroes. the difference being that rue didn't actually believe that the average person was useless; he wanted to prove that they were just as extraordinary as people with powers, like the gatchaman. he'd probably be absolutely furious if he heard about hope's peak. ]

And that's what you remembered when you came back. [ she reaches over, cupping his cheek with her hand. ] What happened?

Ah...

[He pauses with her hand on his cheek, meeting her eyes with no small amount of surprise and a hint of a flush. But he sighs and closes his eyes, resting his cheek against her hand.]

I wasn't myself after that. I was someone else. They called me Kamukura Izuru, the Super High School Level Hope. Hinata Hajime back then couldn't handle all of that. What parts of my personality they hadn't cut out or erased were repressed completely by my brain in an attempt to protect itself.

It's not until the Neo World Program restored my memories of my time before the Project that I could really be Hinata again. The murders, everything you saw... that all took place in the virtual world of the Neo World Program. When we finally chose to exit that program, after uncovering the truth of it all... we all reverted back to the people we had been. But we kept our memories of the time in the program.

I have all of Kamukura's memories and all of my own. All of his talents.

[ ah. that does explain some questions she has been wondering, like how he suddenly got very good at certain things that she (no offense?) knows he wouldn't have been great at before. at least, not on the first try. hajime's neutral expression doesn't shift except for a slight twitch of her lips, downwards. ]

What do you think about those talents, Number One?

Mm.

[He hums quietly, keeping his eyes closed so he doesn't try to analyze her expression.]

I was able to save all my classmates because of these talents. Leaving the program to have talent was never the goal, but... I can't regret it. Not when more than half of them would have stayed braindead.

Braindead?

[ from... the murders in the virtual world? ]

You always amaze me, you know. You do so much for the people you care about-- even before you had these talents here.

If you thought you died in the simulation... yeah.

[He opens his eyes finally, lips parting in a bit of surprise when she says he's amazing.]

I... I try to. It's why I want to do so much here now. If I have these talents, I want to help people with them. That's all.

It actually makes me very... hm, what is it? Angry, I think. I'm angry that people would ever treat you like you're worthless because of something like talent.

[ not that she sounds angry or anything, her tone is the same as always. ]

[He huffs a quiet, unamused snort through his nose and tilts his head, still keeping his cheek against her hand if she'll let him.]

I did tell you that you wouldn't like it. But... back then, I really thought that was the only way I could ever really matter. The only way I'd be worthy enough to stand among those with talent.

Edited 2016-11-04 21:33 (UTC)

I have this friend named Rue-kun. I'm not sure if I ever mentioned him to you before, but he kind of had the exact opposite view of what your world seems to have. He believed the common people were more powerful than anyone with talent.

[ she smiles, thinking about it. ]

He even wanted me to quit being a Gatchaman, since he said that I was basically useless in the type of world he wanted to create.

Didn't you say yourself that being Gatcha was a feeling, and that anyone could do that...?

[This friend sounds Mistaken. Ordinary people are definitely only more powerful than talented ones if there are enough numbers to overwhelm them. He's seen it firsthand.]

That's what I believe! But umm, Rue-kun didn't want people to just sit back and let other people take care of things. He wanted to give everyone the power to help and make the world a place that's sparkly for everyone! So in a world where everyone is a hero, there's no need for the super.

[ she finally drops her hand, but instead goes to hold his instead. ]

It's just strange how where we're from can differ so much in things like that, when there are so many other similarities.

I can understand that kind of thinking, but I don't think either extreme is good.

[He lets her take his hand, wrapping his fingers around hers gently.]

It is strange, I agree. But...

[And he pauses, looks at her.]

Does knowing this change the way you feel about me...?

No. Why would it?

[ she's still annoyed about the whole gun incident, but she's spent enough time around komaeda to get that he's the kind of guy you need to go to extremes for. ]

I don't know. That's why I didn't want to tell you any of this, because... we're already friends. I didn't want that to change.

[He squeezes her hand gently and offers her a tired smile.]

If it makes you feel better, don't worry. I don't plan on doing something like that demonstration for Komaeda again.

[The dreamscape tho...... yeah no promises there.]

I'll hold you to that!

[ she smiles back but... yeah. she very much means that. ]

I'm just glad you're okay.

...Yeah. I have to keep moving forward toward the future.

[So, not exactly "alright" but not worse off, either? He's working on it. But he'd said he would be honest with her, and that's all technically true.]

Is there... anything else you wanted to know...?

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