The Silence After the Storm

[vrdr_mods]

The Ken Amada who made certain threats, whom Igor didn't bring to the Velvet Room and didn't welcome, has been permanently contained within his other-world self. Many of the Velvet Room residents mobilized in the effort to neutralize the threat he posed, and now, in the moments after the devastating battle that sealed Ken away, perhaps you have business to conclude.

Maybe you're a fighter, left in the rubble the battle made of its surroundings—or maybe you were a noncombatant this time, left behind to wonder what's happening or prepare for the aftermath. Maybe you linger around the battle site, or maybe you have other things to do.

Or maybe you didn't survive. Maybe you're one of the glowing forms slowly coalescing in front of Igor's desk in the Velvet Room over the course of the subsequent half hour. Igor presides over them gravely, with no sign of his usual smile. Near his desk sits a box of snacks, familiar to anyone who's used the operation's training room.

[[ooc: This post is a general catch-all for the aftermath of the battle! It's backdated to February 26, the day Ken got got.]]

Comments

[wipingallout]

"I'm proud of you."

What... a special sentiment. Pride in someone else... she feels it all the time, she felt it in this very moment with everyone on the team, mistakes or not. But... it's been so long since she'd heard it said to her.

Specifically to her. By someone who had been through what she had to face, who was in her corner wanting her success, who fought with her. Got to know where she had been wavering before tackling the fight, and accepted her and gave her advice. Believed in her.

Hamuko's eyes welled up, and she smiled, happily. She'd repaid his confidence and he was proud of her.

"Thank you. I mean it. And... it's rough now, but... I think it'll be okay," she assured in turn. The painful argument, the sense of betrayal and the sense of failure... however long it took for them to work it out, she thought that they probably could. And will.

[unit_8910_wolf]

Hamuko's expression softened the uneasiness and hesitation in his stance. Like the slow pouring of cold water over a burning wound, a temporary reprieve from the infection that was already making home in his heart. He finds himself curling one hand over his stomach- as if trying to put away the pain that nearly forces him to blink tears paired with Akane's raw declaration of how she regrets taking the hit for him.

Obviously he regretted that too. Akane should have never stepped out like this...he isn't worth all that saving.

It's been rough for far too long.

"Can it...there's no point boarding the ship now," he closes his eyes as he runs his hand over one of the scars barely reaching his lips- now splintering off his damaged mask. He knows once he goes to sleep it will be back to normal from there.

It's already sunk.

"...I appreciate you offering to talk to Akane, by the way," he says. "She will come around to you."

With that, he settles down and tends to his whiskey again with really nothing else to do. He really doesn't want to talk about his end of the deal...nor does he wish to talk about anything else.

[wipingallout]

"I promise I'll look after her. She's my friend," Hamuko whispered back, dabbing at her eyes a bit. She'd be checking in with Zenkichi, too, but she got the sense that he didn't want to hear it - and they were both probably on the same page... of the two of them, the teenager needed more support in the moment.

But Hamuko wouldn't be forgetting what Zenkichi's done here for her, even when he was deeply hurting.