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sabraeal · 13 days ago

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If the Mind Is Willing, Chapter 7

[Read on AO3]

Written for @bubblesthemonsterartist, who has been waiting quite patiently for four months to really get a giant dose of TTRPG information, and truly, I do not know who is torturing who with this fic anymore 🤣

Classic Japanese aesthetics; that’s what Satsuma Estates boasts on their website, right below a scrolling banner with artful pictures of their “related amenities.” The hotel Zen garden, for one, conveniently angled so the student center isn’t visible from the koi pond; their conference rooms complete with tatami mat floors and faux shoji walls —modern forced air vents not shown— and the pièce de résistance: their honeymoons suites, the blurred suggestion of a white porcelain hot tub hidden behind the sleek, Asian-influenced furniture.

But for all their touting immersive, meditative Eastern Experiences, the double-queen Yamazaki’s booked is as Western as it comes. Both beds and bedside tables queue up along one wall like oarsmen in a galley, bolted to the floor just in case the freshmen in overflow housing gets interesting ideas about interior design. Considering how only two weeks ago, three students from one of the campus high-rises decided to see how their common room couch would look falling off the twenty-first floor balcony, it’s a prudent precaution. Even if he keeps jamming his toes into the TV stand straddling the aisle across from their beds.

Which Yamazaki manages one last time as he stumbles to the door, catching himself on the entryway with a muffled curse. “Was there really no other place to put that? They make ones that go on the wall now!”

Saito’s gaze lingers on the entertainment center, long enough that Yamazaki half expects a lecture on the history of hotel furniture to fall from his mouth, fully formed, like Athena from Zeus but filled with more pedagogic minutiae. But instead it slips back to the hallway, taking in his shoes— still beside the door— and the wall he’s idling against, and Saito says instead, “Are you ready to leave?”

“Just a minute,” he grunts, reaching down to slip his shoes on. And tie them for good measure; the rest of those uncultured heathens might just slip them off— laced!— and leave them at the door, but he cares about the long game. The continued integrity of his sneakers’ heels is worth a few extra seconds. Or at least it would be, if Saito didn’t keep looking at him with that mild stare of his, like somehow he’s the one causing a scene.

“You think we should check up on her, don’t you?” His voice strains as he stands, swinging steady as he crowds Saito in the jamb. “I’m not just— it’s the rational thing to do, isn’t it? She’s three floors up, on her own, and—”

“Behind a locked door,” Saito reminds him with infuriating patience. Not that he’d put up much of a fight when Yamazaki suggested they go just a few minutes ago. Oh, he’d raised his eyebrows— a hint, maybe, that this was all a little much— but he’d gotten up, no badgering necessary, and put on his shoes. Left Yamazaki to scramble after him, hurrying to put out his armor to air and arrange his jinbei for proper wrinkle protection. Stood there waiting for him like it was his idea in the first place. “If you just wanted to see her, there is no need to—”

“That’s not it at all!” The lie might land better if his skin wasn’t so eager to give him away. His whole face could violate dorm regulations for how quickly it burns. “It’s just— you know how Yukimura is. Someone could knock on the door and she wouldn’t even think to look through the peephole.”

Saito’s head tilts, considering. “A compellingly plausible scenario.”

“Then you agree, don’t you?” His height rarely bothers him— he’d rather be able to fit into attic crawl spaces than hit his head on every doorway he chanced across, like Harada— but in moments like this, Yamazaki can’t help but wish he had a couple more inches; enough to at least look across to meet Saito’s gaze than up. “We should go look in on her, just in case—”

A hand lifts, cutting him off as thoroughly as a cleared throat. “I already agreed that we should go up. I simply think it would behoove you to be more transparent about your reasons for doing so.”

“Wha—? My reasons?” he splutters, nearly tripping over himself to keep up as Saito starts down the hall. It takes him three doors to realize theirs is still open, light spilling across the aggressively neutral carpet, and he traipses back to close it, the lock beeping shut behind him. “I’ve already said that I’m concerned someone might try to—”

His phone buzzes, so loud even Saito glances at his pocket.

[The1andOotori] sorry to keep you all waiting we’re absolutely slammed at check-in this year

[Susumu Yamazaki] No need to apologize

[The1andOotori] i know i know problems we want to be having anyway, Enemoto wants to move our little chinwag until after dinner if that’s good with you

“Ah.” Saito leans over the screen, the corner of his mouth slyly slipping up. “And there is our excuse.”

“I wasn’t looking for an excuse.” A flimsy protest when the relief of having one was already washing over him. “It was the rational course of action considering her situation and the, er, proximity to dinner.”

Saito hums, not a note of it sincere. “Of course.”

[Susumu Yamazaki] Of course. We can make ourselves available at any time that is convenient for you and the other Game Masters

[The1andOotori] great thanks Enemoto just didn’t want to cut things short because time got tight and Itou thinks it’ll be more fun this way apparently filling you with confidence, i know

[Susumu Yamazaki] We’ll be ready.

Saito waits for the elevator doors to close before shoving the first pin into the cork board of his mental wellbeing. “Was there a reason you chose to take the front passenger-side seat this afternoon?”

“What do you mean by that?” His mind sifts through the question with a fine tooth comb, detecting only curiosity rather than complaint, but that doesn’t stop Yamazaki’s shoulders from picketing up around his ears. “I offered it to Yukimura, but she told me the arrangement was more optimal if she remained in the back.”

Both Saito’s eyebrows lift. “More optimal?”

Yamazaki shoves his hands into the windbreaker he’s got zipped up to his throat, warding off the ambient chill of the hotel halls. “She thought you might prefer a more familiar copilot.”

Saito blinks. “It was only twenty minutes away.”

He slants him a weary glance. “That was exactly her point.”

That pulls Saito up short, brows furrowing deep enough that they drop beneath the dramatic sweep of his bangs. “You could have given it to Heisuke.”

“What?”

“The front seat. Shotgun, as they say.” Saito’s head tilts, the question implicit in its angle. “You could have given it to Heisuke, and then you would have been able to share the back seat with Yukimura.”

It’s not until his jaw begins to work, trying to put something— anything— together that he realizes it’s been hanging open. “I was trying to be considerate!”

“You were considerate,” Saito agrees, the words nearly lost over the ding of the doors opening. “But failing that, you could have been clever. In any case”—he steps over the threshold, into an identical hall from the last— “have you changed your mind?”

“M-my mind?” It takes him a whole minute to remember he had feet, the kind that he could use to not only leave this little metal box, but that he should. Unless he wanted to be at the whims of whoever called it next, that is. Which he nearly is; the doors box at his shoulders as he steps through, only a twist of his torso letting him slip past before they bounce off. “About what?”

“About telling Yukimura.” Saito glances back at him— only Yamazaki’s blank stare to meet him— and clarifies, “About your feelings for hime-sama.”

Well, first off, he’d rather die. Second— “I don’t feel any way about hime-sama,” he manages, so even, and it’s almost not a lie.

Saito is too sincere for sarcasm, too direct for deadpan, but yet there is something utterly leveling about the way he says, “Pedantry over diction does not save you from its meaning.”

“It’s not me, it’s…a trait I roleplay.” It’s splitting hairs, honestly, but Yamazaki refuses to cede this ground. For his own sanity, if nothing else. “And it’s better if she doesn’t know. If she did— well, you know how Yukimura is. She’d feel pressured to have hime-sama reciprocate no matter how she actually felt about it. Ah, hime-sama, I mean.”

Impressive how confident he sounds, how authoritative; like he has a real, solid reason not to address the situation, instead of avoiding it solely because his knees go to jelly the minute he contemplates saying the word ‘love’ in Yukimura’s immediate vicinity. Saito evens nods, like it’s a logical consideration, and not one he’s invented to keep himself from stammering out backstory like an idiot.

“I cannot refute that.” Surprisingly. “But do you really think Yukimura hasn’t already entertained the possibility? Hime-sama’s backstory is…thorough to say the least. Certainly more than most players invest into a character that might never come up in the course of play.”

“Because she is a crucial part of how both your character and mine were constructed.” It had been a novel concept at the time, one that Ootori had been all-too eager to encourage— two characters built with the assumption of a third, their set of skills incomplete without her. It had felt…fitting at the time. “Not just because, er…”

Saito’s back is to him, expression a mystery, but Yamazaki is almost certain he isn’t imagining the arch tone when he offers, “You’re in love with her?”

“I’m not— my character is in love with her. Hime-sama,” he clarifies, after the fact. “Not Yukimura.”

“Exactly,” Saito agrees, far too easily. “That would be you.”

“I'm not—!” His teeth snap shut at the warning simmer beneath his skin, just waiting for the lie to slip out so it can spread from collar to hairline. “I was the TA for her Biology section. It would have been completely inappropriate for me to—”

“Start a physical relationship with her while her grade was dependent on your objective assessment. Which you did not,” Saito reminds him, as if he might have forgotten starting a torrid affair with a student. As if he hadn’t been scrupulous over showing the smallest amount of favoritism, just in case one of her less academically inclined classmates started taking notes about how often the Lab Section 3 TA floated around Yukimura’s bench. “But the first semester has ended.”

“Well, yes.” Not like he’d been wringing his hands to the bone as the days counted down, hoping that he’d make it one day longer without Matsumoto calling him into his office to write him up for some sort of academic misconduct. That sort of misdemeanor goes on permanent records; the kind that med schools care about. “But that’s besides the point.”

Saito’s eyebrow twitches, so quick Yamazaki’s not sure if it’s a flinch or a feature. “Is it?”

It’s rhetorical, a question that doesn’t beg an answer; Yamazaki knows that. It’s just that he has one, a reply and a protest wrapped up in a single convenient package so that he can put this topic of conversation in the ground once and for all. But while he’s marshaling his thoughts, putting all his arguments into convenient order, they take a turn down a hall and Saito says, “That’s it. Yukimura’s room.”

His parents weren’t the kind of people that keep screens in their house— it had taken his older brother going off to college before they’d broken down and bought their first cell phone; one they’d shared, leaving it on the charger instead of in their pockets, utterly useless until a patient introduced his dad to Candy Crush and revolutionized the way electronics were seen in their household. But Yamazaki had friends, the sort that had cable or sometimes even Netflix, left on continuously in the background as their own parental figures took meetings or worked on spreadsheets two rooms over. He’d seen cartoons, that’s what he’s getting at. Even the old ones, the kind where some hapless man-animal thing— fursona, Heisuke’s enthusiastic whisper echoes in his ears before he can chase it away— has his arms stacked so high with boxes it sheds layers through doorways and around corners, each package so weighty that it’s a balancing act even on level ground. All it takes is a stray pebble, a wrinkle in the carpet, and—

And every last box tumbles to the ground. Which is what Yamazaki’s thoughts do now, right when he least needs it.

“Our fellow players are aware of the Daodoji’s feelings toward hime-sama,” Saito reminds him, pointed. “If you believe it is a secret, it is a poorly kept one.”

“Well, yes, I know.” Though Yamazaki had been hoping it would have been more of a reveal, a slow peeling back of his Harrier’s stern layers to show the man beneath. Instead, he’d mentioned her name once— a very professional hime-sama, in his opinion— and Greg had thrown up The Potato to wheeze out, ninja boy’s down bad, huh? “But they found that out through the course of play. Not because I…debriefed them before session start.”

Saito hums, unconvinced. “I only mean to suggest that it might be beneficial to give Yukimura forewarning now, rather than to wait until after she meets our companions tonight.”

Yamazaki manages a respectable, “Why would you think—?” before Saito concludes, “Since they will almost certainly inform her themselves.”

His jaw rebounds off the collar of his jacket before Yamazaki realizes it’s even dropped. “Everyone here are seasoned players! They would never” — he practically spits out the word— “metagame like that.”

“I agree. Such experienced roleplayers would never compromise the integrity of the game.” Saito stops right at Yukimura’s doorstep— er, so to speak— and slants him a meaningful glance. “But they would meddle.”

Yamazaki grimaces. As firm as their party might usually be about the boundary between character and player, even he can see: a real, live hime-sama might prove too much of a temptation.

But it’s easier to knock than to admit Saito may have a point. And so that’s what he does; three firm raps to end the conversation.

“Are you afraid of bleedthrough?”

Yamazaki whips around. “Excuse me?”

“I mean of the Daodoji’s feelings toward hime-sama,” Saito continues, heedless of how firm a period Yamazaki’s put on this conversation. “And your feelings toward Yukimura.”

God, she could be on the other side of this door right now. “N-no! Why would you— why are we talking about this right n—?”

The door rattles open, and there she is, the wide neck of her shirt askew across her shoulders, hair slipping from the twist of its holder. And just like clockwork, the terrible donkey kick of attraction hits him straight in his stomach, painful no matter how hard he’s braced.

“Good evening, Yukimura,” Saito says, formal. “It’s time for dinner.”

“Oh!” Her breath catches, and, ah, she must have ran to the door. It’s obvious now; apparent in every ragged rise and fall of her chest. Which he’s not watching with any particular interest, just, er, noticing. “But didn’t Keisuke say that we would be…er…?”

“There has been a change in plans,” Saito intones, incidentally ominous, and Yamazaki hurries to add, “Check out ran a little longer than Ootori planned. He says they’ll grab us after dinner.”

“Oh, all right!” Yukimura’s too-wide eyes ease, her smile easing to more its more natural bounds. “Just let me grab my shoes. Er, I mean, unless I need to wear something more, um…?”

“Dinner is out of character.” A welcome break, most days. As fun as losing himself in the story is, it’s a relief to come back from it too, to drag himself out of the high-tension, high-stakes world of Rokugan and into the real one, where his most pressing problem is whether Matsumoto has turned in his grades on time. “There’s going to be a bit of a prologue tonight to tease the main plot of the event, but we won’t be expected to be in costume.”

“Ah, sounds great!” She props the door open, just wide enough to imply an invitation. “Just give me one minute, and I should be ready to head out. Are we going to go pick up everyone else, or…?”

“I will let them know we’re heading down,” Saito informs her back as she pads across the floor, disappearing through an open entryway. “We’ll meet them in the atrium.”

She answers— he hears something like her voice from one room over, the last bit of it pitched in question— but the words are lost, leaving only the rise and fall of it behind. Yamazaki glances at the gap between door and jamb, more than wide enough for him to lean through, to take even the briefest glance of the space, if he wanted—

And Saito strolls right through, the soles of his boots silent on the faux tatami carpet. “Your accommodations are quite nice, Yukimura. Very…spacious.”

Yamazaki strains a sigh through his teeth and shuffles in after him, only to haul up short. The angle is different, but he’s seen that low, bamboo coffee table before, the corner of that sleek modern couch. And if he angles himself creatively enough, the white porcelain edge of a tub through the bathroom door— “Definitely not standard.”

Saito hums, mild. “They did specify that it would be an upgrade.”

“It’s a little silly isn’t it?” Yukimura’s doesn’t so much laugh as quiver at a high pitch, her smile stretched far too thin. “Sort of a waste when it’s just me here.”

“Would it make you more at ease if you had someone with you?” It’s not a casual offer; not with the way Saito narrows his eyes, not at Yukimura but over at some corner with only a waste bin tucked into it. “I’m sure any one of us would be happy to share accommodations with you, if you are uncomfortable with being alone.”

“Oh!” Relief washes over her, easing the knot between her brows and the stiff line of her shoulders— just before it’s swallowed whole by her least sincere smile. “No, no, really, I only have a couch to offer, and you’ve all paid to have beds! I couldn’t possibly impose.”

Her daily personal sacrifice complete, Yukimura traipses past them with a spring in her step, squirreling her shoes out from where she left them beside the door. A half dozen thoughts jostle behind his teeth— it’s not imposing if we want to help, and I’ve never heard of a free upgrade to the Honeymoon Suite, and what were you doing in the bedroom if your shoes were out here the whole time— but he bites his cheek, shoves his hands in his pockets, and minds his business.

Too bad he’s the only one.

“I doubt it would be a problem.” A quick glance is Yamazaki’s only warning before Saito offers, “I know Yamazaki wouldn’t mind if—”

Saito has too many abdominal muscles—squarely the fault of all the hours he spent swinging around bamboo swords at the dojo— to be quieted by the elbow Yamazaki shoves into them, but it at least stops him long enough for Yamazaki to hiss, “What are you doing?”

“Helping,” he says, infuriatingly mild. Good thing Yukimura is too busy struggling with both her flats and her conscience to hear.

“Well…don’t!” Heat already prickling at the highest parts of his cheeks, and god knows what’s going on with his ears. “If Yukimura wants…you know…she would let us know!”

Saito’s eyebrows twitch up under the generous sweep of his bangs. “Is that so.”

It’s not a question; it doesn’t need to be when Yukimura bounds up to them with all the restrained energy of a puppy on its best behavior and says, “You two don’t need to worry, really! I’m used to being alone.”

In terms of height, neither he nor Saito have much to write home about, but it’s enough to look square over Yukimura’s haphazard ponytail and exchange equally bone-weary stares.

“Are you sure?” Yamazaki presses, pockets cunningly concealing the way his fingers curl into fists. It’s the best way to make sure he doesn’t do something stupid, like grab her phone and leave a nasty voicemail for the man she calls her father despite all evidence to the contrary, or worse, touch her. “Saito’s right, it wouldn’t be a big deal if—”

“It’s fine.” There’s a finality to the way she says it, a resignation. “Really. Don’t worry about me.”

It’s not worth it, she doesn’t say, but Yamazaki hears it loud and clear, quivering in the empty space it leaves behind. “Yukimura—”

“It’s dinner time, isn’t it?” She smiles like punctuation, marking the end of one page and the start of another. “You guys must be hungry.”

They exchange another glance— wary and concerned in equal measure— but it’s Yamazaki who finally says, grudgingly, “I could eat.”

“Damn. I gotta say, I didn’t expect this thing to be so…big.” Nagakura puffs up, neatly dwarfing the dining chair he’s settled most of himself into. “There’s got to be, what? Maybe a hundred people here?”

“Something like it.” Saito surveys the room, plate still untouched on the tablecloth in front of him, tallying up each head between the double doors and the buffet. “One of our better turnouts. It seems Marie’s new social media strategy has been reaching more of the local roleplay community.”

“Marie.” Harada rolls the name around in his mouth like he’s savoring it, interest too sudden for Yamazaki’s personal comfort. “Was that the cute blonde at check-in? Does she play too?”

“Is she single?” Nagakura adds, smile all teeth.

“She’s a Game Master,” Yamazaki explains, each word weighty with his disapproval. “She doesn’t play, per se— or at least not the way we will. She may take on the part of an NPC— maybe even multiple NPCs, depending on what’s needed— or she could simply be one of the administrators running the scenes. We won’t know until they do character introductions, and even then, only if she’s playing a major character for the campaign.”

“Too bad.” Harada props his chin up on the heel of his hand, like some sort of Byronic poet, minus both the dark and brooding. There’s more than enough wistful sighing, though. “I think I’d like to run into her a couple more times.”

A reaction Yamazaki can only term as distressing, to say the least. He opens his mouth— ostensibly to inform him that this is a live-action roleplaying event and not…speed dating— but Saito swoops in first with, “I believe she is not currently romantically attached.”

Harada perks. “Really now…?”

Yamazaki furrows his frown into its most forbidding depths. “Don’t—“

“Toshi!”

The greeting’s warm— eager, even, before he even sees the frantic wave from across the room, or the girl bouncing on the toes of her scuffed up tennis shoes— but it has an immediate and, unfortunately, curious effect on the table he’s seated at. Or at least most of it— Yamazaki stiffens instead, glowering at the too-knowing look Saito levels his way

“Toshi?” Heisuke bobs around in his seat, half on top of it to see over the crowd. “Who d’you think they’re calling for?”

“You don’t think he’s here, do you?” Nagakura cranes his neck over his shoulder in what he tries to pass off as a cursory glance. “I mean, Shimada is, isn’t he? God, that would harsh the whole vibe. Hijikata out here, glaring at everyone, knee deep in nerd girl pussy—”

“The professor would not be— he would not be partaking in any sort of…of…” It takes Yamazaki’s mouth several seconds to settle around, “genitalia.”

It’s the force of his guffaw that whips Nagakura around, eyes wide and enjoying himself entirely too much. “You gotta be kidding me, my guy. First, he absolutely would be. Can’t go anywhere with that guy without panties—”

He stifles a yelp, leaping out of his seat before he catches Harada’s pointed look across the table. To where Yukimura sits, pink from hairline to collar— and with the sweeping line of her sweater, there’s quite a bit of it on display.

“Er…I’m just saying…he’s popular, you know?” Nagakura clears his throat, but it does nothing to hide the rosy tint of his own cheeks. “And second—”

“Toshi! There you are.”

It’d be rude to pretend that he has never met the gaggle of fellow college students that traipse up to their table, Greg and his infectious grin at the helm, but Yamazaki can’t suppress the cringe. Not when everyone is just staring at him like he’s got more than the standard amount of accepted heads. “H-hey…”

“We’ve been looking all over for you.” No one’s ever accused Greg of being able to read a room, and he certainly doesn’t develop a proficiency now, clapping him on the shoulder in a stunning display of strength and laughing loud enough to rattle the ventilation system. “Can’t do this thing without our favorite ninja, can we? And Goro, you’re here too! This weekend is going to be fucking epic right?”

By the stares he’s getting from his housemates, epically embarrassing is more like it.

“Toshi?” Harada echoes, attention fixed to him with the sort of consternated concentration that suggests the gears are churning but they won’t catch. That they can’t possible be catching, because then—

“You’re Toshi?” It’s a miracle Nagakura’s slack jaw contracts enough to manage the question; one he repeats for an additional, “Really?”

“Woah!” Heisuke surges forward on his chair, mouth split into its widest, most friendly grin, like a golden retriever you can tell is about to gleefully vomit on the carpet. “Is that because you’re Hijikata’s biggest fan?”

“N-no,” Yamazaki stammers out, palms itching where he grips the table. “That’s not…I mean…”

“Listen, I know you look up to the guy,” Harada starts, the corners of his eyes creased with pain, “but not really?”

“Maybe I took a little inspiration,” he admits; better to cede a small amount ground and win the war than lose it and the day altogether. At least, that’s what the professor always taught. “But it’s not like I…I mean, he’s not really…” He darts a helpless look toward Saito. “Help me out here!”

Saito fixes him with a stare so eloquent it somehow says both you’re on your own and you made this bed all on yourself with only the angle of his eyebrows.

“Whatever,” he mutters, shoulders hunched up around his ears. Not like it does anything to hide how red they are. “Just don’t say anything.”

“Oh.” Okita’s mouth pulls wide in a grin so unhinged it would give the Cheshire cat some pause. “I’m posting this to Twitter as we speak. Gimme a sec, I’ll at Toshi too—”

Yamazaki groans, sinking further into his seat. Death would be a mercy.

“Oh, hey, are these the friends Ootori was talking about at check in?” It’s no surprise that Jeff’s the one to step forward, scritching awkwardly at his beard as he surveys the two circular tables they’ve pushed together, only half the seats filled on either one. “Your…roommates, right?”

“Housemates,” Saito corrects with unerring precision, oblivious to the way the party stifles giggles behind their hands, exchanging the sort of looks that Yamazaki, even in the mood to be uncharitable, can only call fond. What had Kyle said last month? Looks like we’re about to be blessed with a bout of Goro’s meticulous pedantics, again. “I had not been aware that it would be such an exceptional circumstance to have made its way around to other players yet.”

“Are you kidding? You guys have been playing longer than most of the people in this group except the game masters.” Kyle crosses his arms over his hoodie, tugging impatiently at one of the pull strings. “We didn’t even know you had other friends.”

“I think some of us could have guessed,” Katie deadpans, goodwill already wearing thin in this crowd. “I mean, it’s not like the both of them do bad for themselves or whatever.”

It’s only because Yukimura’s next to him that he catches the little ripple across her friendly face, the barest twitch of her eyebrows as she murmurs, “Do bad for themselves…?”

“Is that why you got held up at check-in?” Jeff asks, dropping into the conversation with the subtlety of a brick. “Some of the guys were saying Ootori was giving you some kind of trouble.”

Jeff’s too nice a guy to stare right at him, marking him out as the Origin of the Problem, but he’s also not looking hard enough to rattle Yamazaki’s teeth. “Er, no. Not as such.”

“You get some new gear or something?” Greg offers; the most likely explanation. “I know Kyle had a new katana this year, and it took him forever to get through the line.”

“Marie couldn’t seem to keep her head out of her ass,” Kyle grunts in agreement, warming to the idea of conversation now that he’s got something to complain about. “I swear I filled out those stupid forms twice before Ootori took ‘em straight out of her hands. Let her go take a walk around the hall before she sat back down and filed them all. A real pain in my ass.”

“Oh, shut up.” Katie’s eyes roll, all the more obvious for how bright they are. “Like you could even do one administrative task without catastrophically fucking up. You can barely keep your character sheet up to date, let alone bother with anyone else.”

“Well, it’s not my job—”

“No new weapons,” Saito confirms, pitched to cut off the argument before it starts. “But Yamazaki has done some impressive improvements on his costume.”

“Whaaat? Toshi, when are you gonna help me with my costume?” Audra shoulders her way past the rest of the pack, nearly tripping over her own toes in the process. She’s all energy already, still bouncing on her toes, looking him over like she might find some hidden hint of embroidery. “Your needlework always comes out so nice. You have to show me how you do it.”

“It’s not anything complicated,” he insists, like he always does. “Black on black just looks impressive.”

“But it is hard.” Her lip juts out, just like some little kid one ‘no’ away from causing a scene in the food court. “I always lose track of where I am! How can you even keep track of the needle when—”

“So if you didn’t bring new shit or whatever, what’s crawled up Marie’s butt and died?”

“Jesus Christ, Kyle, what the hell is wrong with you?” Katie wheels around on him, finger already mid-wag, ready to dig it right into the graphic print across his chest. “It’s not like that’s Toshi’s problem!”

“Oh yeah? You really think—?”

“So are you going to introduce us?” Audra asks at a rather pointed volume, her dark eyes flitting over Nagakura first, then Harada, before her brows twitch an infinitesimal degree toward her hairline. There’s interest there, the kind that wants to make him slump his head into his hands and groan; it’s not as if she’s been shy about sharing her physical preferences— namely that she likes her men climbable, which isn’t exactly a feat when most fourth graders could stare her in the eye. But there’s also a healthy dose of skepticism, like it’s somehow impossible he might know a couple of guys who could lift, let alone live with them. “You brought so many I think I’ll need a cheat sheet to remember them all!”

“Sanosuke.” Harada’s quick to slide a hand out, eyes meeting hers at half-mast, smirk hoisted to his most charmingly casual. “But you can call me Sano.”

“Shinpachi.” Nagakura practically climbs over Harada to thrust out his own hand, that winning politician’s son smile sparkling beside Harada’s more subtle one. “But all my friends call me Shin.”

“A pleasure,” Audra giggles, like this isn’t a complete and utter nightmare on every level. It was bad enough having his roommates and fellow players in the same room, let alone…mixing like this. Perhaps even…sexually. Yamazaki suppresses a shudder.

“I’m Heisuke!” Not one to be left out, Todou sticks his hand out too, friendly as a dog wagging its tail. “You can call me…uh…Heisuke.”

“Nice,” Harada murmurs, all teeth. “That’s a good one.”

“I think so!” Todou chirps, utterly guileless as Audra gives him a firm shake. “You guys are Hajime’s friends?”

“And Toshi’s,” Katie confirms, watching both big men like a hawk as Audra pulls back, a troublesome grin painted across her mouth. No, a thoughtful one, which is worse. “We’re not Crane clan, but well, we’re all still friendly.”

“Allies,” Kyle offers, earning himself the filthiest glare she can summon up in mixed company.

“I’m a lion.” Heisuke grins at them with all the hapless joy of a small child showing off his best Spiderman costume. “Because it’s my—”

“Sano and Shinpachi have also chosen to play members of the Lion Clan,” Saito interjects, smoothly skirting around yet another fursona incident. “And Souji will be playing a member of the Cat clan.”

“Cat Clan?” Jeff huffs, surprised. “That’s not a usual choice.”

“What can I say?” Okita hums, so mild, like he isn’t going to relish every opportunity to put a knife in their back. “I guess I just have a real affinity for cats. Some might even say a—”

There’s a thump beneath the table, swift and precise, and Okita’s smile turns positively angelic.

Greg laughs, hooking his hands on his hips. “They’re a tricky bunch, you know! I guess we’ll have to keep an eye on you.”

There’s more teeth than tenderness in the smile Okita turns to him. “You can try.”

Katie zeros in on where Yukimura sits— a girl-seeking missile, Jeff called her once, with a laugh, she can smell a potential player from fifty paces— and asks with all the delicacy of an inquisition, “And what about you? Who are you playing?”

“O-oh, me?” Yukimura’s flustered, cheeks already flushed from the attention. “Ah…Doji Kaoru.”

At their blank looks, she adds, “I think she’s, um…Hogkyu’s daughter.”

Jeff’s eyes bulge. “The Hogkyu? Doji Hogkyu?”

“Um, yes, I think.” Her head tilts, thoughtful. “The daimyo of Crane Clan.”

A nuclear explosion would have hit with more subtlety and far, far less collateral damage.

“You’re hime-sama?” Audra breathes, clasped hands turning it halfway to a prayer. “Really? Hime-sama?”

“What,” Kyle manages around his slack jaw, “the fuck, dude?”

Katie’s the first to round on him, all of that Torquemada-level focus leveled squarely in his direction. “You’re really letting someone play her? The real hime-sama? No joke?”

“You could have told us you had a girlfriend,” Greg adds, somewhere between admonishing and elated. “We’re happy for you! Especially since she’s such a—”

“Oh, I’m not”— Yukimura waves her hands, the rosy pink dusted across her cheeks spreading north and south, turning a deep sun-burned red— “we’re not— I mean, I only, um…?”

“Yukimura is a friend,” he informs them with as much authority as can be mustered in front of five people who regularly witness his transformation into a ninja for four hours at a time. “It was her first time joining a roleplaying game, let alone one of this scope, and she inquired as to whether it would be possible for her to assume a previously established character with ties to veteran players. Hime-same was simply the best fit.”

Kyle’s gaze flicks up her from flats to flyaways, and he snorts. “Oh, I bet it was.”

Jeff spares him a quelling sort of glare. “Don’t start.”

“It’s not a big deal,” he blusters— uselessly, he knows, but protesting too much is better than not protesting at all. At least while Yukimura is here, trying her best to look anywhere but at him. “Ootori was planning on introducing hime-sama this session anyway. Yukimura merely saved Marie the trouble of playing her.”

“Oooh.” Audra winces, her and Katie trading needlessly sympathetic glances. “Poor Marie.”

“Has anyone bothered to tell her?” Katie asks, accusing, as if somehow that would be his job, rather than Ootori’s.”

“Marie met Yukimura earlier, at check-in.” There’s a sternness to the wait Saito shapes the words, a tone he rarely takes when he’s not kitted out in Goro’s armor. “I was under the impression it had been previously discussed, after Toshi approached Ootori about Yukimura’s participation.”

Air rattles out from between Kyle’s teeth, judgment heavy in every sibilant hiss. “Well, that’s one fucking mystery solved. No wonder Marie was acting like something bit her—”

The lights flicker, and Ootori’s voice booms from over the PA system. “If everyone could take their seats, the formal welcoming ceremony will be starting soon!”

“You guys want to sit with us?” Nagakura asks, so quickly it’s more reflex than conscious thought, a gracious host through and through. “We’ve got plenty of seats.”

“Oh, sure!” Greg’s already sidling over, taking the empty space next to Okita. “That’s real kind of you.”

“Nah, nah, not at all…”

Katie’s quick to take Yukimura’s other side, tossing him a glare that could melt pavement. Audra settles in beside her, legs crossed over the cushion.

“I don’t think we were properly introduced,” Katie says with as much manners as she can summon outside of character. “I’m Katie, I play—”

The drops into darkness cutting conversation down to a gasp— for most, at least; Katie’s only muted to a muttered, though heartfelt, “Oh my fucking god.”

One that’s well-earned, since the lone light that pierces the darkness is a spotlight, trained on where Itou sits, every inch an imperial prince in his seven-layer kimono.

“My countrymen,” he intones, head bowed before his audience. “I am humbled by the number of you that have come to lend your support in these troubled times…”

For all his years among the Doji, bowing and scraping in the presence of daimyo and bushi, Toshizo must admit— none have possessed the presence this prince does in a single hair, let alone taken in his entirety. He was just as their eyes in the capital had reported; young and vigorous, in every way the inheritor of his father, both in beauty and bearing. No daimyo’s hair has ever shone with such luster, nor retained such a purity of color; it glistened in the firelight like a dark mirror, an abyss that those touched by the void could have no hope of escaping. And when his voice finally lifted in greeting—

Ah, it was as if the Jade Dragon whispered into his ear herself.

“My countrymen.” It is not the place of a prince to prostrate himself before his followers, but even so, his tone is all that is good and modest. “I am humbled by the number of you who have come to lend your support in these troubled times.”

“What else are we to do?” Goro mutters beside him, too low for all but the closest ears to hear. Too many, even still. “Our only other choice is a madman.”

It is an effort not to glare, not to shush him with the same precision his cousin wields his blade, but Toshizo knows better than to feed this mood of his. Not when that Dragon Clan girl is watching them with such interest, her smile never quite reaching her eyes.

“As you are all well aware by now, my lords, my honorable father has already released his newest edict of succession, announcing his intention to have me supplant my brother as heir.”

There was murmuring now, a wave of renewed oaths, avowing their loyalty— and an even quieter minority who merely shifted on their knees, unsure of this new precedent. It was one thing to kill a man and usurp his place within the clan, and quite another to have it pulled out from beneath his feet, all without a single blade drawn.

“But I have ridden here without rest not to tell you what you already know. No…” The prince took in a shuddering breath, letting his soft flesh turn to steel before them. “I come to bear you news of the greatest misfortune: my father is dead, killed by my brother’s own hand and our family’s most blessed sword.”

Gasps ripple over the crowd, followed quickly by cries of grief and protest. Toshizo’s own blood cools in his veins, his limbs leaden where they lay, and he knows, the way his kind must, that the prince speaks the truth. Hantai Jodan has passed from this plane, and gone to where none but the Kami may reach him.

“It may seem impossible,” his son admits, his grief-stricken heir. “But it was witnessed by my very own retainer, the shugenja Iuchi Shahai.”

It is only now that Toshizo sees her, nearly lost among all the murmurings; that small form seated in the prince’s shadow, Iuchi Daiyu’s eldest daughter. There is not a man in this room who does not know of her, or of her father, the Ki Rin’s daimyo; notably missing from this assembly. All that they know is rumor of course; mere conjecture— that she is the single child by his legal wife, and not his notable lover, the Ki Rin’s champion. The one who was invited into the Forbidden City and taught mastery of meishodo, her family’s most guarded mystery; the same she later taught without hesitation among the Hidden Guard, angering the rest of the Iuchi. The one said, even now, to be the second prince’s lover.

The one who is currently looking straight at him, as if her magic might be able to peel back the membranes of his mind and allow her access to the secrets within. An odd occupation, for the second prince’s most masterful shugenja.

"You all must see now what I would not for so long: my brother will stop at nothing to see that he is seated on the throne.” The second prince squares his shoulders, facing them with all the pride of a Hantei. No— of the Hantei. “There will be plenty who support him simply due to his position as the eldest of my brothers, no matter what my father wished on his deathbed. If we wish to deny him the bloodshed he seeks, the only thing left to us is to press the legitimacy of my claim however we can. And if it is not my bloodline that will sway his supporters, or the words of my father, well…”

His mouth curves in a beatific smile, the lamb being led to the block. “Then perhaps the proper lineage of my wife will. From this day forward, I swear to do as so many of my forebears have— I will marry a Crane wife, and there is none among them more pedigreed than the Doji daimyo’s own daughter.”

Yamazaki flinches back, only his hands on the table to steady him. The Doji daimyo’s daughter. We were going to have to cast her for this session, that’s what Ootori had said, that rat bastard. It actually takes a load off my plate.

He stifles a groan. Didn’t it just?

“However,” Itou continues, too far away to see the way Saito’s wide eyes meet his, bright in a bloodless face. “It seems my brother is of the same mind as I, and has already sought the Doji girl’s hand. Hogkyu, in his infinite wisdom, rebuffed him…and paid for it with his life.”

“This explains Ootori’s insistence on Official Hallway Time,” Saito murmurs. “If the daimyo’s daughter is supposed to marry the prince, then we are not merely participating in the plot…”

“The daughter has gone into hiding. If she can be found, our marriage will cement my ties to the Doji Clan, and lend the legitimacy needed for the traditionalists to be swayed to my cause…”

They are the plot. Yamazaki’s fingers curl against the tablecloth. That is…an added complication.

A hand lands heavily on his shoulder, and he follows it right up to where Ootori grins, finger pressed to his lips.

“Hey guys,” he whispers, too pleased. “You got a minute?”

#yamachi #hakuouki #my fic #modern au #college au #LARP AU #we have finally reached the unlimited OC works #and also the confirmation that YES THEY ARE SUPPOSED TO BE IN AMERICA BECAUSE I AM NOT GONNA RESEARCH THIS STUFF IN JAPAN #I went for the whitest whitebread names to push the fact because there were more than a couple commenters who brought up college in japan #and i was like no no no this is FIRMLY based after the area I went to college in #also every day we draw closer to the point where I have to really explain how tabletop and LARPing works #which cracks me up because joanna keeps nibbling me for this fic #and soon she will have to sit through MATH and VERY WEIRD RULES #her FAVORITE 🤣

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