jigokulogs | [OPEN] moving day!

Entry tags:

[OPEN] moving day!

Who ⬤ Minato, Eiichi, and anyone
What ⬤ July substories in a get-along “shirt” / knb camera footage / catchall post.
When ⬤ July to August because it’s already middle of the month orz
Where ⬤ Various
Content Warnings ⬤ Substory 2 has the naked guy? The camera threads may discuss elements of violence and horror imagery.

[ Around one of the Sutoku residential buildings, it’s a nice peaceful morning broken by the sound of an argument. What else is new. ]

[ The excuse for Minato’s presence this time (not that anyone in this building is buying it now) is he’s helping Tama with packing and moving. It’s a relatable plight to many others, honestly, after their residences were made uninhabitable after the cursed month. The arrival of their mutual friend Eiichi has only made the move that much more urgent. ]

[ That isn’t the cause of the argument. But it might be easy to guess, considering that for the rest of the day, Minato and Eiichi can be found together. Quite… literally together. Is… that a set of handcuffs…? ]

[ The sight of them makes for an odd mirrored effect, given their similar appearances. The only real difference is their expressions: Minato looks distinctly harassed, Eiichi has a permanent scowl — they do seem to be agreed on one thing: Doggedly go on with their day as if there is nothing weird about the situation. ]

(( All Substory logs below are duo threads with both Minato and Eiichi handcuffed together and trying to play it cool. Though if you’d rather only tag one or the other, it can be handwaved that they’d gotten out of this daft predicament at some point. If there’s something else you have in mind, hit us up or pm

watermemory /

frogmarched. ))

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Minakami didn't know everything -- or maybe more accurately, through Tamamori's fractured descriptions, he'd seem enough of the edges of it to have a sense of the wideness of those missing days. That revelation, though, had been gnawing at him for two months now, two months of not being able to do anything about it, burying the secret terror that the reason Kawase hadn't appeared in this Hell was because his soul was consigned to a different level of it.

"Why would I...?"

At Kawase's wave of dizziness, Minakami steps forward, catching himself before he's foolish enough to reach out again or uselessly apologize, or anything else to further drive open the rift between them. Instead he stands there helplessly, both of them stuck in this present moment, with nowhere else to go.

"I wish... I wish we'd gone to Madam's, all three of us." Not the only wish to change the past he could've made, but: in those words, the unspoken knowledge of what Ikeda's hospitality had been and where it ended up.

Despite how close the clinic was to Tama's job, it was probably annoying on some level that he'd avoided the place so intently. Even dropping by to check on Kawase and Minakami hadn't been appealing enough of a reason to arrive- and yet, there he was, rounding the corner towards the building's front, somber-looking in an attempt to honor the unspoken space Matoba needed. The blue had already overtaken his pupils like a broken dam splitting earth, so he had absolutely no context for the scene before him except for the fact that it looked like his two friends were arguing yet again-

"Hey, hey-" To some, it might have seemed callous to so quickly rush over to Mina and Kawa without giving Matoba a second thought, but he'd given Matoba a good chunk of his thoughts on the walk over, and besides this might be another spat, and right then he really couldn't deal with that happening again...! It was only when he was closer, forming the final side of the trio's ever-present triangle formation, that he realized Kawase looked more ill than angry. "Are you okay...? What's going on?"

[And at an even pace behind Tamamori, who had once been tailing after and now had rushed ahead, was a dark storm cloud.]

[While his expression was impassive as ever, Matoba did not exude his usual state of perpetual amusement. The clamor of voices ahead of them had already put him on guard- the last thing he wanted to deal with right now was Tama’s overprotective handmaids. Two of them, he reminds himself.]

[The dark left sleeve of his haori and kimono hid some of the mess, tattered as they were on inspection, but the bright orange apron Tama had given him to wrap over it showed the bloodsoak much better. His right hand clasps over it to keep it in place, red-stained and white-knuckled.]

[As he approaches, and attempts to simply pass without comment, his narrowed eye slides over Minakami’s distress, and then Kawase’s angry glint of faded blue, and finally off towards the clinic again.]

[Interesting.] Deal with them, [A blunted comment towards Tama, as he passes towards the clinic entrance.]

All of them at Madam Oizumi's, together. A part of him would've liked that. How many times over the past two years had he wished he could've? If it hadn't been him, it just meant some other kid would've had to endure it. Even still, it makes his chest ache; and as much as he wanted to hold onto that sentiment, it made him tense up. Minakami knew. Minakami always knew. He looks up at Minakami only barely, just enough make the pathetically haggard look on Kawase's own face more obvious.

But when Kawase can stand to fully open his eyes again, the blue has melted away, and the colorful splotches in his vision had faded away. And then someone else spoke.

"T...Tamamori-kun...?" He lowers his hand, eyes wide as he forces himself to look up. Matoba, with his arm bloody and compressed with Tamamori's apron. And Tamamori himself, alive, and red around the eyes, his irises looking like they only just now regained their own blue.

He can't process it. So instead, Kawase just focuses on Tamamori's face. His own eyes aren't particularly focused, but he grabs Tama's face by the jaw, leaning in closer to scrutinize the symptoms. Maybe even confirm that the blue was still there, and real, like the rest of him; though the gestures is surprisingly gentle.

"Your eyes are red." He states simply, still sounding a bit breathless. "Are you sick again? Do you have a fever? Allergies? You've been irritating them."

Stricken at the haggard look on Kawase's face, Minkami wants to step back, but he can't bring himself to move. What had he done? He'd only wanted to...

Then a voice speaks up to break the stalemate -- Tamamori, looking... as ill as Kawase did, actually, but still, impossibly, alive. And the hashihime returned to him: had it even ever left? There's no way Minakami could have mistaken that particular shade of blue, and yet... He's having the creeping sense that he doesn't understand anything anymore. Instead of answering Tamamori's question, he slumps against the wall of the building, feeling the adrenaline of the last few minutes ebb away.

Between all that, he only barely registers Matoba lurching past, stone-faced, with the ugly stain spreading on the makeshift bandage on his arm. "Dyer-san's in," he says faintly, because any other response is beyond him right now.

It's almost instinct, despite the quiet between them, to snap sarcastically at Matoba's command, but...no, this was better, wasn't it? It meant that Matoba could go in and get checked out, and they wouldn't have to awkwardly field questions together for Matoba's sake more than anyone else-

"Eh-?" Kawase grabbing his face so softly like a fussing ~~handmaid~~ nurse made him startle, anxiety flaring up for a second, but he could battle it back down, even if he'd had quite the tense afternoon. In at least a medical regard, their issues with contact were reversed, but it was still okay if Kawase took care of him. He didn't understand the questions, however, and even while keeping still for sake of letting the doctor among them scrutinize him, his eyes were still trying to glance off and make sure Matoba was heading in to the clinic. Once the door closed, he felt a lot more at ease.

"I'm not sick...I mean, I don't feel the best, but..." His brows knit, trying to parse why Minakami looks so boneless and Kawase is close to an anxious fit. "There was some trouble outside my work that Matoba-san had to help with. His arm is-" Dyer-san was the head doctor of the clinic, right? Maybe it was okay, then- better than letting Kawase interrogate Matoba. "-I-I hope Dyer-san can see to it, because it looks awful."

Edited 2022-07-23 03:16 (UTC)

Kawase didn't seem altogether convinced, his eyes still squinting suspiciously. He let go of Tama's face so he could feel his forehead, but indeed he didn't seem to have a fever. Then an external force had irritated his eyes, and the hashihime had... escaped? Disappeared? On top of Matoba's injury. And trouble outside the cafe...

The pieces were there, but he didn't care to put them together right now. Tamamori didn't seem to be otherwise injured right, and the eye irritation seemed to be something psychosomatic anyway, or some wandering irritant.

If they were both fine, then all he cared about was disappearing under the shame of his own fit. He dropped his hand away from Tama's personal space, and turned around with the intention of fleeing back to the clinic like a coward. "Dyer-sensei can help him. She's probably done with the other patient anyway."

Trouble outside Tama's workplace. Could it have been a remnant of the curse energy, after all? It'd make sense if an exorcist like Matoba had been summoned to dispel it, and a nightmare had attacked him. Still, there hadn't been any complaints of nightmare hauntings in this neighbourhood for weeks now, and it wouldn't make sense for the visual hallucinations to reach as far as the clinic...

Now the panic over Tamamori is ebbing away, shame for overreacting begins to take its place. If he'd just kept his mouth shut, he wouldn't have upset Kawase and whatever this "hallucination" was would have passed on its own, and meanwhile, the actual danger had occurred (and been handled) elsewhere.

As Kawase turns away, without a word Minakami starts to slip off in the opposite direction, the destination doesn't matter, just away. He only pauses a few steps away when he notices Tamamori's posture. Even if he's unscathed he looks... drained. "Tamamori, are you sure you're not sick?"

This was a...precarious position to be in. Tama knew what it looked like when both Kawase and Minakami tried to withdraw, and he didn't want that. Especially not after following after Matoba, who had stiffened his back rather than showing a drop of weakness. Maybe he only envied that in others because he was such a transparent person, bad at lying and too emotive...but, like he'd told Matoba, he knew how to tell a story.

"...something was trying to get in, or maybe it already had...Matoba-san banished it, and got hurt for it." Just enough truth to not be a lie, but hardly the full tale. Still, saying it made him slump further- he wanted to know what had the both of them in such a panic, but from how cooling his eyes felt now, all of a sudden, he was starting to wonder if he could guess. Not having to maintain the same firm stature as his 'senpai' meant Tama was much quicker to rub at the one side of his face, still with a black smudge at the outside corner of his eye. "I'm not sick, but I'm exhausted, and my head's pounding..."

If he thought too much about the 'tried/succeeded in getting in' thing, he might feel a lot more queasy. The hashihime was one thing, but something else pushing its way in to his mind was...gross, and creepy.

Something trying to get in...? Hm. An 'ayakashi,' if Matoba was involved. Maybe he'd speak with the cafe owners later, but they were barely surface level thoughts. Kawase does stop the few steps he's taken when Tamamori confirmed that he apparently felt like crap. He sighs, but even he's not sure if it was in exasperation or relief.

Either way, it's automatic again when he turns around, walking back up to Tamamori so he could grab his arm, and start tugging him along with him back to the clinic.

"Hurry up, Minakami." He practically grumbles it out. Because obviously, he was coming with, right?

That sounds close enough to his initial speculation, enough that it eases the tension in Minakami's chest, though it returns a moment later as he recognizes what "get in" implies. Tamamori doesn't look remotely in a state to entertain more questions, though, so he simply nods to Kawase's remark (even if Kawase probably has his back turned and doesn't see it), trailing behind the other two into the clinic.

The front room is already empty. Presumably Matoba was familiar enough with the building to have gone directly to find one of the other doctors on duty. It feels like a year since he arrived here with the day's deliveries, but Minakami tucks the parcels he'd left on the desk under an arm.

"I need to put this away. I'll join you two in a second, okay?" Maybe it's still avoidance, even if only for a minute, but. At least his eyes aren't sliding away from Kawase when he says it, or at least he's not running out the door.

Edited 2022-07-24 10:19 (UTC)

He almost went to complain about getting hauled in...but given he also wanted to complain that he wanted to just go back and lay down instead of going to the clinic, maybe Kawase had a point. Tama might have sulked as they entered, but didn't show any signs of hesitation until Minakami seemed like he might be trying to avoid the situation still. "O-okay...but don't take too long. I have to tell you something." He could have complained he didn't want to repeat himself, or stay longer than he had to, but that was ruder than he felt like being right then.

Of course, he took in the environment warily- seeing the akabeko did make him feel a little better, but the little room Kawase continued his drag in to was far less charming. Even with Kawase, this stuff still made him nervous, sitting on the little bed-things like a child, because his feet couldn't reach the floor. "You two must have noticed something had happened...is that why you're both upset?" Exhaustion had never stopped him from being a busybody before.

Kawase watches Minakami for a moment; but either he didn't care, or was satisfied enough that he wouldn't run out on them. "Sure," he states simply, before continuing to drag Tama into one of the rooms like a ragdoll.

It's not like the clinic had very many supplies, so it wasn't like there was much he could do to ease the awkwardness; but he makes sure the door is mostly closed, leaving it open a crack so that Minakami could find them, but they didn't have to look at too much of the rest of the clinic.

But, Kawase was perfectly content to leave Tamaori's question hanging instead of actually answering it. He grabs a hand towel and uses it to wipe the rest of the smudge from Tama's eyes; he squints at suspiciously, and then looks back up at Tama, but in the end he just places it on the counter as he starts rifling through the cabinet. Something from the eye...

He returns from the cabinet with a bottle of painkillers, shaking two pills out and holding them out to Tamamori. "Take these," he says as simply as the last time. Maybe he could've been more sarcastic, but he's still on edge. "If you need a drink to go with it, I'll have to go get it."

Minakami murmurs assent, waving the other two ahead as he moves to the supply room. It's only after he hears the footsteps halt and the creak of a door, that he presses his forehead onto the cold metal of one of the cabinets.

It's too much at once. The false alarm. Kawase's eyes being inhabited, however briefly; then the sight of him stricken and dizzy. The evidence of whatever confrontation had occurred at the cafe. The sense that the so-very-humanlike yokai have lulled him into forgetting what some of them could do, if another possessing spirit had gone after Tamamori. How was he supposed to look out for them like this? What could he even do about it?

Nothing, it seems. Minakami wishes he could talk to his father.

He doesn't stay there long, making a detour to pour a glass of cold water before slipping into the room with the other two.

...He blinks at the offered painkillers, but Minakami isn't exactly in the mood to comment on the serendipity, so he just wordlessly hands the cup to Tama, before sitting on one of the patient beds across from him.

Not being answered had a potentially-desirable effect of finally getting Tama to stop asking, at least; though it was more likely the effect of the clinic, than the silence itself. He'd already started to hunch in on himself after Kawase wiped at his face, goosebumps peppering his arms when he reached out to take the pills- and nearly jumping from the door opening, despite anticipating Minakami's return. He knocked back the tablets, then the water in quick succession, mostly to keep himself from thinking too much about it. His one eye was still bloodshot, but the other had cleared up significantly now that the hashihime was back where it "belonged".

"...I'm sorry." The second the apology is out of his mouth, Tama hates the sound of it- he's not going to reassure anyone sounding weak and tepid. If he doesn't keep himself under control, then things will just go bad again. They deserve a clear and direct explanation, even if he has to lie to give it. "Matoba-san stopped in, and saw my hallucinations a little bit at the cafe. He wanted to see them more properly, so we stopped by that little lot by my workplace, because I was just getting to my lunch break. I didn't realize anything was wrong until my eyes started to itch, but when I looked up again, the monster was already biting down on Matoba's arm. He banished it before I got a good look at it..." Tama let his hands wedge between his knees, still insecure despite his internal peptalk. "...Matoba-san is upset with himself for not being faster, I think. So, please don't ask after him when he's the one that got hurt."

He looks back to the door when Minakami returns, eyebrows going up a bit in surprise when he'd returned with a glass of water. It was a bit uncanny, actually.

Kawase sits down on one of the stools nearby the beds when there wasn't anything else for him to do (he'd have to check if they had soothing eye drops somewhere...), watching the both of them as he listened. Or, it was more like they were easy to look at when his eyes unfocused, but he was still listening. He could see the shapes around where the lies could be; Tama was always reserved in letting other people see his hallucinations, though it made sense Matoba was curious about it. The incident must have been caused by that ayakashi chasing Matoba's eye, so it definitely wasn't him running to the rescue. Between the goop that had been in his eyes, the hashihime being forced out... Apparently Matoba's little companion could possess people.

Well, it's all thoughts that he keeps in his head, but it not likes it makes him any more or less wary of the exorcist. His eyes narrowed in that critical way of his, but he didn't bring up any of his suspicions.

"Whatever. Dyer-sensei can patch up something like that easily, so he'll just have to answer to her instead." Haha idiot. "It doesn't involve me, anyway."

Even then, Minakami would have been willing to accept Tamamori's version of the events, if only for the sake of how miserable he looks. As he explains, Minakami reaches across silently to take one of his hands. The place still didn't look much like a clinic to him, still more like an office building folks had been dragging extra furniture into, but he knew must have been enough for Tamamori.

At any rate, for Minakami, it's the very last thing Tama says that clinches it: the sound of his friend covering for someone. He glances at Kawase, the expression on his face, and wonders if he's guessed, too.

If he was more suspicious-minded, he'd wonder if the exorcist had been trying to be rid of his curse, but even Minakami has to admit it makes no sense. If he was a different kind of person altogether, he'd be marching off in a fit of ire, but he isn't: he's only what he is. What would he prove by shouting at someone who was dripping blood all the way down the block? Besides distressing Tama and getting kicked out of the clinic.

So all he says is, "Is that so? Lucky that you weren't far from here, then."

He's still looking at Kawase, his narrowed eyes dark and back to normal next to Tamamori's. Even if he knows it was a false alarm now, the prospect of holding this secret hasn't gotten any more appealling now, no more than it did only-- was it only a few minutes ago?

"Tamamori, if you felt it, you may have guessed already. Whatever attacked you two--" he doesn't intend for it to come out like he's trying to catch him in a lie, but he's too drained to pick his words right "--it must have frightened 'her', too. She tried to leap to another host, it..." His grip on Tama's hand tightens, the scrap of calm he'd tried to find in the supply room already dwindling. "I've never seen it happen before."

It might be foolish, but Tama finds himself relaxing when neither Minakami or Kawase try to jab holes in his story. He's been as honest as he dares for the sake of not seeming like a liar, and because it genuinely was difficult for him to lie to these two after everything that had happened, but it seems like that had worked out for the most part? It'd take a few days to see if their minds worked out any further details- it's not like Tama has realized only one of his eyes was really bloodshot, given the clinic didn't have any mirrors.

The handhold is a little surprising, maybe moreso because he doesn't feel like he's earned it, with the white lies. But he greedily accepts it nonetheless, focusing on that than dwelling on where he is. Or what that explanation implies for that whole sequence of events.

"...it pushed 'her' out, then." It had 'dripped' out, dashed his illusions so effortlessly- but was that literal, or not, he didn't know. The hand was squeezed as he wondered about how long something like that could have been lingering...in his system, like a cold. It was easier to think of it like a cold. "When Matoba-san asked what I could do, I thought it'd make more sense to show him something I know really well, not...just make up something fantastical. So I made Umebachidou. When I was thinking about that place too much, the- the thing, it attacked." He'd felt 'allergies' even before Matoba had shown up at the cafe, so that was probably fine to admit to. Right? "My eyes have been irritated for a couple days, but when it showed up, they really started to hurt, and I felt empty and dizzy..." No, wait. The more he talks like this, the higher the risk he's going to say the wrong thing, getting stuck at the clinic or getting his co-conspirator in trouble- he wants to help Matoba, not make things worse for him. Tama swallows thick, looking up at Kawase like he's asking permission. "I can just go home, can't I? I'm just exhausted now, and she's back where she should be. Y-you know I can't relax in a place like this..."

The suspicious look on his face was clear as day, and after a moment Kawase glances back at Minakami in turn. He looks like he'd be smoking right now, if not for his respect of Emily's rules. Of course, Minakami must have known, too, with a look like that.

But it seemed Tamamori was determined to cover for Matoba, even so. He looks more and more unhappy as Tama explains; Umebachidou held no horror for him, but it surely would've for Tama, a haunted place in more ways than one. But Kawase's thought process is immediately cut off, and his eyes widen a bit as he looked at Minakami again, startled by him bringing up the entire-- everything that had happened before Tamamori and Matoba showed up.

"W-What are you...?!" Well, he's learned not to lie far less than the other two; but he just scoffs, crossing his arms and his legs as he straightens up on his stool. He lets out a sigh through his teeth.

"Yeah, yeah. Go back and rest." He scowls, though at least he's not argumentative. "Your eye's still irritated, so don't go wandering around in a construction zone. I'll find something for dry eyes after I leave today."

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[OPEN] moving day!

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[extremely tamamori voice] hey guys whats goin on in this thread

[extremely Matoba voice??] OUTTA MY WAY BOYFRIENDS

WAKE UP MATOBA YOU FUCKED UP BIG TIME

[minakami voice] [lies down in the middle of a crosswalk]

good job go team

this team sucks

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