Open Alive, Awake and Able

[Kazumi]

A few tenuous days had passed since the procedure, and Suzume’s recovery was progressing, albeit at a slower pace than the doctor had indicated. It had been difficult adjusting to simply walking, it was as if her body had simply forgotten how. Each motion seemed exaggerated and numerous time she had attempted to react to a simple stumble and had ended up launching herself into nearby furniture. It was hard to recall after being in that vegetative state for so long, but she felt like her muscles just didn’t respond the ways that they should.

She could not complain, however, being able to blink had nearly brought a tear to her eye. Sleeping, which had once been the bane of her existence, was one of her most treasured activities. Eating, bathing and even using the restroom felt foreign to her, and yet was immensely relieving. Aside from sleep, food had become her second obsession as soon as soon as she was able to lift her head from her pillow. During her very first meal, she consumed more food than she had in as long as she could recall. A part of her knew she would need to burn off the calories or else she would quickly become a misshapen soft blob, but even after her fourth plate of food she still hungered for more.

The Storm Lord’s chefs were surprised at the rate that she was eating, sure that she would become sick with the endless appetite she seemed to possess, but even after four days she still ate thrice her fair share with each meal. Nabushin was not overly concerned; he did not understand exactly what Ryuu Tama had done but it made some sense to him that she would need to eat to refill her strength. He didn’t expect her to eat twice as much as he had in her meals, but perhaps she was attempting to compensate for her lack of food for the past few months, even if that did not make any sense to him.

 

[Takahashi Aki]

It was hard to know how long Sousuke had sat there near Suzume’s bedside. It could have been four seconds, it could have been four minutes, it could have been four hours, it could have been four days. The Steward had a knack in his younger days of losing himself in a crowd. It was a rare talent for one of the most known individuals in the village. Suffice it to say Sousuke knew things because he wanted to know things. The people he had in his employ to bring him news about the village were of a number, and they held various stations in the village of various levels. People in the employ of the Steward were of several walks of life. The networks the Steward had were extensive.

The Steward knew the workings of several households in Sungakure. He even knew of the format of the household of the Oushi-Ouja. Suffice it to say Nabushin did not tell Sousuke of this supposed surgery that did not happen on the books. The Ox King tried to play things close to the chest, yet there was always something he had grown sloppy with. By the same right Sousuke suspected that Nabushin had known a few things about Sousuke. Did the Ox King know about Sousuke’s current situation after the Accident? That he could not get a feel for. He didn’t know if during the meeting at the Toraono house hould if Nabushin was able to read between the lines when Kuro had blurted out some items that Sousuke had wished to remain quiet. For all his might, bluster, and blunder Nabushin was not a complete fool. What Sousuke took offense to was Nabushin’s politics.

Sousuke wore his skin suit. On top of that he wore a three piece emerald green suit. Suffice it to say, Sousuke took his Journeymen duties a little too far in the sense that he was now making fabric suits as well as metallic ones. He wore the skin suit as he didn’t expect any malfunctions to cause the skin suit to tear and make awkward of the situation. He wore his normal jewelry. Two rings, one on each hand. One on his left signalling his Journeymen mark, and the other being what some could suspect to be a wedding right. He had his trademark gold earring on his left ear. He had a streak of grey in his normally purple hair. Subtle age hints, as Sousuke had shown slow signs of aging. People changed around Sousuke, and finally he decided it was his time to change ever so slightly.

For the time being here was here to see a recovering Suzume. Nothing more. Nothing less.

 

[Kazumi]

It was early in the morning and Suzume was having fitful dreams once again, tossing and turning in her bed with unusual vigor. This was the case for the past few nights, and was one of the things she actually did dislike about sleeping once again. She never could recall them, but one time she had awoken with her pillow nearly ripped in half and a mouthful of fuzz in her mouth. Thankfully this morning was not nearly as bad as the Steward sat nearly motionless nearby. She had tossed her pillow and blanket away at some point and clawed absently at the bed as she slowly broke from whatever fantasy her mind had her encased within.

A small yawn grew louder as she groggily pushed herself up from her bed, her night dress bunched up around her waist, though, thankfully, she did have undergarments on and so the next few moments were only embarrassing and startling and not horrifying. Suzume pushed herself up to sit on the bed, her legs folded under her as she rubbed at her eyes, the girl’s mind slowly pieced quickly fading dreams from reality. A reality that had a familiar face sitting just a few feet away from her at the corner of her vision. Her eyes snapped to the human face and she let out a shriek of panic as she shot backwards out of the bed.

Still not in control of her own body, even after over half of a week, she became a tangle of limbs in the air as she launched back away from the invader, collapsing onto the ground a few feet away in a complete daze. It took her a few seconds to recover from smacking her head against the hard ground before she untangled herself and quickly stumbled up to her feet, looking similar to a new fawn standing for the first time on wobbling legs. As she had a moment to examine the well dressed stranger, her guard and panic began to subside, she didn’t recognize the outfit but that face was familiar.

“Sou…suke?” She asked tenuously, her eyes blinking away the sleep and tears from the pain of her fall. Sub-consciously she began to try and smooth her knee length gown out, only to find it bunched up in multiple places in her underwear. Her eyes shot down, and her face instantly flushed with embarrassment and anger as she tried to both cover herself and pull the bunched fabric free so that it would cover her again. “W-what are you doing here!?” Had she not as been as flustered as she was, she would have not spoken to her idol in that tone, but how could he just swop up here and stare at her like that?

 

[Takahashi Aki]

Sousuke allowed several minutes of Suzume to make herself presentable. His eyes rolled in and clicked. While he was stationary he was able to keep his chakra level consumptions to a minimum. He blinked and at that time his eyes focused. “Last time I checked, I am still Takahashi Sousuke the third.” He spoke in a slightly amused sounding tone. “Although in my career I’ve been called many things.” He would hurl one of the pillows she had thrown from the bed at her. He knitted his fingers together and he looked at her. “I’m here to make sure your surgery was a success. If my sources are correct an individual with the initials R and T was involved. He and I have a very long and storied history. He’s given me this eye in more ways than one.” He spoke and pointed to the mechanical eye. Both of them were mechanical now, but with the skin suit on he wore lenses on the other eye to hide that.



Sousuke knitted his fingers together. Now was the time to make some inquiries. “You’ve been absent for a long time. The last time I saw you was … at the Toraono meeting we had to discuss a successor to Kuro. I was hoping to have that finalized some time ago, but alas such was not the case.” Sousuke was somewhat annoyed at Nabushin’s position. Yet if Tama was involved in this, then by proxy so was Michino. Tama had a difficult relationship with his brother, but the Steward understood that Tama was perhaps in some ways trying to mend. The problem was that the Tama of today was a very different Tama given what had happened in the Diamond District some time ago.“How have you been since your surgery? Has everything been satisfactory?” He inquired. “How has Nabushin’s temperament been lately? I take it ... he has been pleased?”

 

[Kazumi]

Suzume was not intimate famliar with The Steward, and most certainly was not intimately familiar, but she could immediately tell something was off. There was something different about him that she couldn't place. As her mind tried to sift through what it is, she found a pillow suddenly flung at her face. She attempted to reach out and catch it, but her arm seemed to move too quick and it ended up grabbing for the pillow a few split seconds before it actually thudded against her closed fist. It flopped to the ground and she paid it a moment of attention as Sousuke began to talk once more before she came fully back to herself.

Suzume looked up from it to him as he gestured towards his artificial eye. She had seen him out of his armor on a few occasions, but he had preferred to be garbed in it at practically all hours of the day, as far as the girl knew. "I uhm.. I don't know who that is or really what happened exactly." The Storm Lord, for all his generosity was not as free with the details of what exactly had happened. She had vague swimming recollections of lights and sounds and of half-remembered faces, but coherant thoughts were not something she had in ample proportions. As he talked she listened, leaning over slowly to pick up the pillow. Slow movements were, thankfully, better under her control now and so she didn't appear like a newborn fawn as she scooped the pillow up and tossed it onto her bed.

"Yeah, the um... the banquet with Lord Kuro." She did remember that, though it felt like an entire lifetime ago, back when she was starting to show serious signs of her illness but still had control of her faculties. It was only a few weeks after that when she had become bed ridden, and today was the first day she had seen much of anyone outside of members of her own clan. "The Storm Lord is in..." she paused a moment, as if searching for the words, "good spirits. I only have seen him twice, and he was walking with a limp." She didn't recall him ever looking injured, the man had likely not been in a real battle for the past decade after all. The thought genuinely worried her for his health.

"I am doing fine though, much better I guess." Such words felt strange, comparing how she was to nearly anything that wasn't either dead or a vegetable seemed to do the difference an injustice. "I-I'm sorry," she finally stammered as she stepped over to the edge of the bed and sat down, her body seemingly to release from a tight tension as she did so. "I was just jarred from not, you know, seeing you in your armor. Or seeing much of anyone I guess. I really must look terrible." Suzume was not one who used makeup with any frequency, and even during elaborate ceremony she tried to go without the triflings as much as she could. As such, the worst one could say about her was the wrinkles in her sleeping outfit and the nearly tangled mess of hair. "But like, what brings you here, Lord Steward? I am sure there are much more pressing matters for you to be attending to."

 

[Takahashi Aki]

To Sousuke’s surprise Suzume did not know who helped her. He wondered why that was. What exactly the Storm Lord trying to do in hiding that it was Tama being used? He tapped his fingers together as he considered the situation here. The meeting that was held at the dojo was something of an oddity here. Did Tama know that the Storm Lord seemingly thought little of Michino? Did Tama know that Sousuke was trying to propose Michino to be a member of the upper management of the Toraono clan now that Kuro was absent? He pause continued as he was considering all of this. His attention snapped to as he heard that the Storm Lord had been walking with a limp. That was new. The man always carried with himself a strong stride. Old age didn’t creep up on a man like him easily and neither did Sousuke notice that he had trouble during his meeting at the Dojo. He was in good spirits, there was no doubt that was the case because this surgery was a success. Suzume was one of the keys to the future of the Oushi-Ouja clan. If Tama had failed, there was perhaps a killing done quietly, and given Tama’s … ability to fall off the grid, it would have perhaps gone unnoticed by most.



Suzume spoke of how she was feeling much better. She then apologized which was unnecessary. She spoke of how she was surprised that he was not wearing his armour. He nodded his head. “Sometimes… sometimes it’s a refreshing moment to be free of armour. Sometimes it is nice to try something new.” He would shake his head at the second comment. “I came to check in on you, not to see you in a proper social setting. I mean it’s not like you’re hideously scarred or that you were burned by acid or the like.” He spoke in reference to the other bit. “While you were asleep we were attacked. Trust me, I have attended to far more pressing matters before this visit. We’re in a time of healing at the moment, to recover from the attack that had come upon us.” He answered. He made a shrugging gesture of sorts. “That being said, checking in on people is one of my duties. It does people good to know … that someone cares about them in some capacity.” He would pause for a moment, “How are your friends doing … the Chains? Was Nabushin ever aware of them? Was he ever in communications with them? Have you been in communications with them at all?”

 

[Kazumi]

Suzume listened intently, as she always did to the Lord Steward. Her nods were subtle as she sat listening to him, but her calm expression peaked to worried surprise when he had mentioned that the village had been attacked. She barely managed to keep herself quiet, allowing him to finish with his other questions before she finally blurted out, “attacked!?” She was leaning forward on the bed now, looking at him with an intense stare, his other questions forgotten as soon as he uttered them.

“What do you mean attacked? The village was attacked? How? When?” She broke her stare off after a moment, wracking her brain to try and think of when that had occurred. Honestly, it could have been almost anytime within the half year. Even when she was able to move she did not go far from the compound, if the village had been assaulted and they did not breach the outer walls, it was feasible that she never would have even heard about it. The girl’s panic continued for a few moments, but slowly it began to subside.

If something bad had happened, Sousuke wouldn’t be here with her right now, after all. He was probably on the frontlines of whatever had happened, leading the charge against whomever it was that perpetrated the assault. Her eyes relaxed from their moment of panic as she looked over towards him, her fingernails unknowingly tearing small holes in her sheets as she continued to grip them with tremendous force. “Sorry I… what happened? Who attacked?” As she regained herself, panic began to subside to shame. Rationally she knew that she would have been useless, even if she knew or tried to help, but the feeling that she was in here when people were out there risking their lives to defend the village did not sit well with the clan heir.

 

[Takahashi Aki]

Sousuke suspected that what he said was going to cause a rise. He got to his feet for a moment. He would place his fingers on the wall to check for a presence, in particular he was waiting for Nabushin. Sousuke’s mastery of metallic allowed for him to interact with it in ways that most people could not do. He could speak to metal in a particular way. Once he was comfortable knowing that they were not going to be interrupted by people he would return to sitting down. He would place his hands on his knees. “We were attacked, as in an opposing army marched several units to our walls and engaged in physical warfare. It was through traditional means. We knew they were coming, so for the most part we were prepared. We suffered some losses, but we certainly did not lose everything and everyone – if we did, then even I would not be here and neither would you.” Nabushin was not at the Wall, it made Sousuke wonder if the man was combat capable anymore. “We were attacked by ... ”



He paused for several seconds. He didn’t exactly have the words to describe them short of the word monster. They were humanoid; some of them were at least. They were not capable of using chakra. They were ... at best using an energy source. It could have been ki. Sousuke himself did not know as during the final attack at the wall he was shut down. It was a disturbing notion that even he was turned off for a moment. It made his current state of existence a problem. Did the enemy know he had been turned off? How was he turned off? Was it because he was literally hard wired into the wall itself? For the battle at the wall, Sousuke had debatably become the full might of Sungakurian technology. The wall had weaponry, but their foe did not make it to the wall, all except one. That was a troubling thought. Be that as it was, that foe was deleted from exsistence. He would not be given a chance to study that foe, and neither would the Oracles.



He would hold out his hand and from plasma he would generate the image of what they fought. First he would show Suzume the smaller monstrous Unbent, then he would show her the Hulkbreakers, and then he would show her the one that had for a moment disabled the Wall itself. “I am told they are led by an ancestor of ours, supposed ancestor.” He described. “Our war with the Daimyo has reached its conclusion for now, this is the new enemy. Perhaps someday we will finish our war with the Daimyo once and for all, but for the time being this is our primary concern. They are of a ... great number. They are not limitless, not that I know of.” The image would shutter and then it would fade. Perhaps for the first time, there was a tiredness about Sousuke which seemed to be contrary to his current state of existence.