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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Davies" data-source="post: 8569768" data-attributes="member: 30538">Tomokaze Kyousuke/友風京介<img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/My-First-Gallery/i-5CG5sv7/0/5540ca13/M/Kimihiko_LN-M-M.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />It probably said something unfortunate about his lifestyle that his immediate reaction to awakening in considerable pain was a sense of resignation. Nothing so verbal as the words, "here we go again"; the pain left no room for that sort of coherent thought. But mixed with the hurt was a weariness, and a bit of dread on top of them both. After a moment, the pain eased to a manageable level, and his eyes opened to an unfamiliar ceiling. The view was then interrupted by something much more familiar -- the face of Nagase Aya, Isekai no Miko, Warpwitch. His charge, his employer. His furiously angry all-of-the above. The furiously angry part was especially familiar, and he braced himself for what was to come.She did not disappoint. "You did it again," she said, in a quietly menacing tone. "Again, you jumped in front of some inane science fiction weapon that was pointed at me. Again, it went off and put you in the hospital. Again, you interrupted my line of sight to the inane science fiction weapon so that I couldn't interfere with it and thus prevent the part where it went off. You did it all again -- after I told you to stop. Doing. That."He opened his mouth to offer some sort of defense to her accusation, but she kept right on delivering her opening argument. "This is the fifth time this year. You will be in here for a week. During that time, I will have to hire a temp to answer the phones, do the filing, drive me places, all that stuff that is in your actual job description, plus the things that aren't in there like the foot massages that you are starting to be slightly competent at doing. This is an enormous hassle. Why are you inflicting this enormous hassle on me?""I regret my actions," he managed to mutter."You regret your actions," she repeated in mockery of his tone. "Well, that makes it all just dandy, doesn't it? No, it does not. How many more times am I going to have to say, stop trying to help me outside of the office, before you actually do it? Or are you determined to keep doing these things and thus keep arousing my anger? Do you enjoy my anger? Is that it? Does this little song and dance that I do amuse you?""No," he said. "It does not."There was no real right answer to that question. Both claiming that he did find it amusing and claiming that he did not would have made her equally angry. The only comfort in telling the truth was a sense that he was doing the right thing, even though it caused him nothing but pain. That was probably a sign of a serious flaw in his character."Then why?" she said, subsiding a bit, to her quietly menacing level of anger. "Why do you keep doing this? Why go through this, over and over? You could quit. I wouldn't give you a good reference, because you know how much you irritate me, but you have years in this job that could get you one that wouldn't put you in this sort of danger. Tell me -- why do you keep working for me when you know what's going to happen?"He looked at her, remembering the day that they had met, the day that the most unusual person had come into his life and changed it forever, turning it upside down. He remembered learning the truth about her, being told to keep it from her, and watching that hurt her over and over again. He remembered the day his nerve finally broke, and he told her the truth, and everything had turned upside down again, but not in a way that set things back to the way that they had been at the start. More like moving it up the threaded shank of a screw, towards a destination that he still did not understand, and probably never would.The truth, then. "I have a duty," he said.She stared at him. "Fine, then," she said quietly. Then shouted. "Fine, then! Do your damned duty! Get yourself killed trying to help me! I won't care if you do! I will forget you the second you're dead, you hear me? You -- you person without relevance or significance!" Finally bereft of language, she let out a snarl of purest anger, then turned and stomped towards the door out of the hospital room.Just before she reached it, it slid open, and a nurse with bright pink hair was standing there. "Please do not shout, it disturbs the patients," she said in a calm tone."That's fine, my patience is disturbed, too," Aya snapped in English, then brushed past her.The nurse closed the door behind her, then approached the bed where he had, after a moment where he managed to sit up enough to watch that confrontation, collapsed once more. "She seems quite angry," said the nurse as she made a note of his vitals. There was something odd about that, but he was too tired to give it much thought."I said the wrong thing," he replied agreeably. "I don't know what the right thing would have been.""I suppose you could have said that you have a duty of care where she's concerned," said the nurse."Kindness can seem cruel, sometimes, and too much truth can be just as harmful as a complete lie," he said, shaking his head. "I learned that the hard way.""Maybe," said the nurse. "Or maybe you learned the wrong lesson. Oh well. I guess that's love."What a weird thing to say, he thought as the nurse walked away from his bed. What a -- "Wait," he said aloud. "Do I know you?"She paused at the door, looked back as she slid it open. There was something strangely familiar about that smile, and the cool blue eye above it, but he found it hard to remember any details. "Not anymore," she said, and was gone.The nurse walked down the hallway a short distance, then pulled a fob out of her pocket and clicked it. With a sound like a key being drawn along a piano string, a glowing portal opened up before her, then closed as she stepped through.Tomokaze Kyousuke -- PL 5Abilities:STR 1 | STA 3 | AGL 1 | DEX 1 | FGT 3 | INT 2 | AWE 2 | PRE 2Advantages:Contacts, Defensive Roll, Equipment 5, Language (English [Japanese is native]), Luck 2, Ranged Attack 2, Well-Informed.Equipment:Meta-taser (Ranged Affliction 5 [Fortitude; Dazed, Stunned, Incapacitated]), Smartphone, and 13 points of equipment as needed.Skills:Athletics 4 (+5), Deception 6 (+8), Expertise: Administrator 3 (+5), Expertise: Science 4 (+6), Expertise: Streetwise 2 (+4), Insight 5 (+7), Intimidation 4 (+6), Investigation 6 (+8), Perception 4 (+6), Persuasion 4 (+6), Ranged Combat: Meta-Taser 2 (+3), Technology 4 (+6), Vehicles 4 (+5).Offense:Initiative +1Unarmed +3 (Damage 1)Meta-Taser +5 (Ranged Fortitude 5)Defense:Dodge 5, Parry 4, Fortitude 4, Toughness 5/3, Will 4.Totals:Abilities 30 + Powers 0 + Advantages 13 + Skills 26 + Defenses 8 = 77 pointsOffensive PL: 5Defensive PL: 5Resistance PL: 4Skill PL: 3Complications:Responsibility--Motivation. Duty of Care (Nagase Aya.) Secret (Argus agent.)</blockquote>

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