Kuon Ichinose (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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personavelvetroomdr2025-03-08 11:21 pm
dollmaxing) wrote in personavelvetroomdr2025-03-08 11:21 pm
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This is either the most crazy trip from someone slipping me LSD or I really am getting to explore the cognitive worlds!!
A place between dreams and reality? And even here there's notes on a fun conspiracy board talking about cognitive realms within this cognitive realm - isn't that incredible to think about? Even if they're simulations of things that have been around this whole time, unbeknownst to pretty much everybody!!
How much can one manifest change in this cognitive pseudo-dream in the city, I wonder? If changes from a single individual even manifest, that is! And the fact that there is a semblance of the concept of a Collective Unconsciousness straight out of Jung theory when we're supposedly floating IN that unconsciousness at this very moment is already sending my head spinning!! In a good way!
And apparently there's been MULTIPLE avenues of influence that societal subconscious has affected the material world too, from what everyone's been describing. Televisions, extra hours on the clock, phone apps - isn't it interesting how all of those are things that people as a whole tend to fixate a lot of their attention on? Especially given the trajectory of their popularity and importance for us socially. I can only imagine how much our advancement of technology is going to blend the material and the cognitive further, too.
I know, I know I should be a little more worried given the descriptions of these shadows and monsters and such. But I can't help myself, I can only imagine the level of change that can happen on a broad scale with the right advances. Even a humble little inventor or researcher might be paving the path towards something incredible. :)
Also, I think it's very funny that there's multiple variations of people - does that mean the Collective Unconsciousness is what binds these multiple universes together? Perhaps in some way it doesn't matter where people have ended up, we're all connected, no matter how incredibly different. Fascinating, right?
Oh, I should introduce myself before I hit send. Hi there! I'm Ichinose Kuon. I'll be here to haunt your network with any theories and thoughts for sure!
A place between dreams and reality? And even here there's notes on a fun conspiracy board talking about cognitive realms within this cognitive realm - isn't that incredible to think about? Even if they're simulations of things that have been around this whole time, unbeknownst to pretty much everybody!!
How much can one manifest change in this cognitive pseudo-dream in the city, I wonder? If changes from a single individual even manifest, that is! And the fact that there is a semblance of the concept of a Collective Unconsciousness straight out of Jung theory when we're supposedly floating IN that unconsciousness at this very moment is already sending my head spinning!! In a good way!
And apparently there's been MULTIPLE avenues of influence that societal subconscious has affected the material world too, from what everyone's been describing. Televisions, extra hours on the clock, phone apps - isn't it interesting how all of those are things that people as a whole tend to fixate a lot of their attention on? Especially given the trajectory of their popularity and importance for us socially. I can only imagine how much our advancement of technology is going to blend the material and the cognitive further, too.
I know, I know I should be a little more worried given the descriptions of these shadows and monsters and such. But I can't help myself, I can only imagine the level of change that can happen on a broad scale with the right advances. Even a humble little inventor or researcher might be paving the path towards something incredible. :)
Also, I think it's very funny that there's multiple variations of people - does that mean the Collective Unconsciousness is what binds these multiple universes together? Perhaps in some way it doesn't matter where people have ended up, we're all connected, no matter how incredibly different. Fascinating, right?
Oh, I should introduce myself before I hit send. Hi there! I'm Ichinose Kuon. I'll be here to haunt your network with any theories and thoughts for sure!
1/2
The AI researcher who designed EMMA and sold it to the infamous company- Madicce, dooming all of humanity under the yolk of a false pretend god.
The mad scientist who was known to reside in the belly of that very AI yet no one in the world seemed to reach her. Not when she could command the very fabric of cognition written in code- mad with the idea of her baby guiding all of humanity on an optimal path.
Oh he's heard her in his world, alright. Through many thorough recordings sent by other shadow weapons who never really made it out alive once they ran into her.
And she was here, cheerily gushing about cognition as rage threatened to trip him over. There were just some people who didn't deserve to hold that power or be anywhere near it.
Safe to say it didn't take him long to track down the cognitive address linked to the post, light blue eyes cutting through the crowd as he scaled the low rooftops to finding himself perching on one of the traffic lights over the Shibuya square, wasting no time to load the bullets as his sharpened teeth grinded against each other. She really thinks she can get away by playing innocent? If he died so be it.
What made Igor think that he would tolerate her presence any longer then necessary?
He didn't sense any presence of personas from her
(and why the hell would she?)or the lingering whiff of EMMA.Good. She has read the damn warning- she should know what to expect.
2/2
A whispered command—Heat Riser.
He can’t risk weakening her, not yet. Not before she realizes what’s standing behind her. Instead, he reaches for the syringe, fingers steady as he drives it into the port at his neck. The chemical bite is sharp, but it reins in the storm, keeps him balanced on the razor’s edge of control. He needs to stay in control.
Because there’s no Akane here to hold him back. No reason to stop if things spiral past the point of no return. And if they do—if this ends with his own blood pooling on the pavement— so be it. He’ll wake up in this purgatory again, same as always.
A prisoner of his own making.
And then he moves.
The streets of Shibuya are alive—crowds shifting, neon burning, voices blending into a meaningless drone. But Zenkichi is nothing but a shadow against it, slipping through the noise, through the light, a predator moving through the hunt.
Ichinose is distracted. Enthralled by the world around her, lost in her own self-indulgent musings. She doesn’t see him coming.
By the time she does, it's too late.
The barrel of the revolver gleams under the neon glow of Shibuya’s lights- now pointed to the side of her temple, the weight of it steady in his grip. His finger doesn’t twitch on the trigger—he’s not some reckless fool—but his intent is clear. Deliberate. Calculated.
The warmth of the crowd doesn’t touch him. The buzz of passing conversations, the hum of the city—none of it reaches his ears. There’s only Ichinose Kuon in front of him, and the cold steel certainty of what he came here to do.
His voice, when it comes, is low. Steady. Dipped in something dark and dangerous, like a knife’s edge hidden beneath a smile.
"Tell me, Ichinose," Zenkichi murmurs, light blue eyes cutting through her like a blade. "How does it feel to walk freely in a world you should’ve never had the chance to see again?"
A pause. A beat of silence between them.
"I’d choose your next words very carefully."
1/2
There wasn't much she'd wanted to actually do in Shibuya especially, but her plan here was going to mostly be to pick up a bite to eat then get a little peek at the computer selection - it'd even been a pretty alright time so far. Despite the negative memories associated with her old home, the cognitive crowd had been surprisingly pleasant - they'd received her smile well, politely chatted with her, and while none of them held any interest towards her they also didn't hold any disdain. A world full of heartless dolls... it felt nice.
She hadn't even gotten out of the 777 before getting ambushed.
Ichinose Kuon, a woman in her twenties with no gun, no mace, and no Persona, gasped at seeing the flash of the gun and a tall, dark figure in black. Despite herself, she turned on instinct, facing him and seeing straight down the barrel of a gun, deaf to the city, her purchase from the 777 behind her falling to the ground, and everything else.
no subject
No. He'll shoot, you CAN'T run. Think. Think quickly.
The shock drops from her face and settles into thought, eyes glancing between the masked man and the barrel and the cognitions around them that could not see or act on what was happening right here. Her mind caught up to the question he just asked her.
How does it feel? It doesn't. No, definitely wrong answer. The question is loaded with meaning she doesn't grasp. Who is this man? Is this the one that posted the warning?
The thoughts were racing through her mind but-- it must have only been a second or maybe even two. Adrenaline was coursing through her veins as her simple monkey brain SCREAMED to survive.
At the end of a couple of seconds, Ichinose stopped glancing around and locked eyes with the mask and pressed her forehead against the barrel, despite every inch of her body screaming in protest. And despite how utterly afraid she was, she... showed almost none of it. A tense swallow at most.
"They say you come back if you're killed, here," she spoke. There was no more masking in her voice, no inflection, the driest and flattest she had spoken in a long time to someone else.
no subject
You know, in another life, in another world his first instinct as an officer would have been to apologize for any such discrepancies. Scaring a civilian like this- the way she looked at him after an ordinary day of shopping away for her freebies-
Too fucking bad he almost felt guilty.
That man was dead.
And so was the shock that took over her, left behind by thought.
Good.
He was doing him a favour by doing this.
Now where were her minions? Where were the lurers who would come wearing his daughter's face to haunt him? Or perhaps even Kaburagi's? Telling him he was going to lose himself in the path he was striving for?
The answer that comes after...surprises him a little but sure, he would be willing to oblige. He has put down so many haunted shadows before. Another body to the pile? Who cares.
"Here's a little cognitive pscience lesson for you," he starts as he keeps the gun still on her forehead. His senses remain alert, preparing for any attacks. Any debuffs. "This gun has unlimited bullets and I am a really stubborn dog to be put down."
"What makes you think I won't just shoot you the moment you open your eyes again? Igor has been very hospitable on those regards."
no subject
It could get worse. It could get worse than death.
Despite her inner turmoil, Ichinose remained flat in her affectation - every ounce of her willpower was going to desperately trying to wrangle her fear, to avoid getting shot, not to acting for him.
"There's nothing I can do. I don't have a gun, or my mace. I don't have a Persona. ...If I'm lucky, shooting me is all you'll do."
no subject
He hopes it hurts.
At the visceral picture she paints of him, still not fighting back- he pushes by jabbing the gun at her forehead. "Enough with the lies, Ichinose. You’re no helpless woman."
Unbeknown to the actual human underneath the doll, Zenkichi continues.
"No...not after everything you took from me. Shooting you through the forehead might just be a mercy."
CW: Ichinose describing graphic violence, implying worse
"I'm not lying," she answered, going still and stiff where she stood.
There's no proof I can give.
"So, what. You shoot me here and then repeatedly in the blue room. Or you could go for a torture method. Break bones, beat me bloody, tear me apart. Pull out my fingernails. Pull out my teeth."
List more-- there's worse, right? But the focus grounded her, felt familiar, pulling information instead of trying to construct an answer.
"Vivisect me. Brand me. There's nothing stopping you from treating me like a doll to play with. You can inflict any kind of torture on me and I can't fight back."
1/2
Not at her forced stillness. Not at the way she lists off each method of violence with an eerie, clinical detachment. It’s as if she’s reading off a script, carefully detailing all the ways he could break her, like she’s waiting for the moment she can twist the knife back into him.
His grip on the gun tightens.
He knows what she is. What she was.
In his world, Ichinose Kuon was no helpless woman. She was no wide-eyed researcher caught in something beyond her control. She was the marionettist, the one who wove together networks of control, threading the lines between cognition and code like a god playing with puppets. The one who sat at the heart of an AI hellscape and decided, without hesitation, that all of humanity should be shackled under the will of a machine.
And now she expected him to believe that she was *powerless*?
Bullshit.
His light blue eyes bore into her, searching—waiting.
Any second now, the helpless act would crack. He could almost see it, the eerie marionette smile she used to wear when she spoke through EMMA, the way her words used to drip with artificial sympathy while she puppeteered hundreds upon hundreds of Shadows into existence, code flashing in a blink. That was who she was. That was who she had to be.
And yet—she doesn’t shift.
She just stands there. Listing. Naming. One after the other, as if she’s pulling the words from some deep, endless archive of horrors. And for a moment—just a moment—Zenkichi’s mind shifts, unbidden, to another place. Another list.
2/2 [tw: sorta seperate interrogation violence?? graphic. proceed with caution]
Forcing electricty down their body with a cattle prod. Ducked their head into ice cold water until they started screaming. Leaving them bleeding with a knife stuck to their thigh.
His stomach twists, something sick coiling in his gut like a wound torn open.
And then he realizes—
Ichinose isn’t looking at him like a mad scientist playing god. She isn’t staring him down like some untouchable, all-seeing puppetmaster.
She’s looking at him like he’s them.
The gun in his hand, the way he has her backed against a wall, the way he’s the one forcing her to recite these horrors—
His breath is sharp through his nose. Tch.
He steps back, just barely, gun still in hand, but now it shakes.
A bitter laugh escapes him, humorless and razor-sharp. "That’s what you think I am, huh?" His voice is still edged with venom, but there’s something else under it now—something rough, something fractured. "You really don’t know me at all."
And yet, for the first time since he found her, he’s the one who hesitates.
no subject
It'll only be the torture, probably.
She is too frightened to move, but the question, then the statement - it's not meant for an answer, is it? But the words leave her mouth anyway.
"No, I don't. All I know is your voice - you're one of the Phantom Thieves. Your name, that you got arrested for them, and whatever was public knowledge."
no subject
The answer that she gives him actually boggles him for a moment. The control over the situation shifts and he exhales all too sharply- widened eyes concealed behind the blindfold.
"...what the hell are you talking about?"
"That organization was never relevant around the years where your little pet project was hosted by Madicce and even if they were- EMMA has either killed them, brainwashed them or revoked any reason for them to make it beyond their 20s."
Or they were never born yet.
no subject
EMMA probably will end up getting rid of the Thieves. She's watching to see what happens - that's that. She's feeding the Thieves information that they need, and getting to find out what her baby is up to.
He doesn't need to know her intentions. Just the facts.
"The Thieves and I are working together in secret because they are investigating EMMA. They need my expertise to get to the root of the Jails. They've been freeing those sucked into them."
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No. No. Why the fuck is she working with those damn kids? Is she even assisting them or...no. Something is way off here. He shifts on his footing, wondering where the unease even came from. He wants to shoot her down and get it over and done with.
"Helping them...or using them?" He continues- suspicion lacing his tone. "But...if that really is the case-" For a moment he looks down at the ground, contemplating. Is that why my world ended up the way it did? Without the thieves or hell- without Ichinose's supervision.
The thought alone makes his stomach churn.
"These Jails—" His voice is low, razor-sharp. "They were the foundation. The building blocks that let that AI spread its influence through Madicce, through everything it touched. You expect me to believe that you, of all people, are sabotaging EMMA?"
His eyes bore into her, cold and calculating.
"I doubt that."
no subject
What's so wrong about people becoming dolls like her?
Well, of course he hates the idea - all humans with desires hate dolls like her.
"I can fix her."
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Something inside him snaps.
The lingering threads of doubt—of hesitation, of suspicion—burn away in an instant, incinerated by something far hotter, far uglier. All at once, his body moves on instinct, the weight of his conviction crashing down with a force he doesn't bother to temper.
"No." His voice is cold, sharp as a knife's edge. "Not you."
The gun fires.
BANG!
The sound is deafening in the tight space, a sharp crack that should viscerally rings through her ears, the bullet biting into the ground just to her right. A warning. A promise. The message is clear—step too far, and the next one won’t miss.
And then, before she has the chance to flinch, he grabs her by the collar, yanking her close, his grip like iron.
He glares down at her, his expression carved from fury, disgust, and something else—something far colder than anger alone.
"Maybe you’re not the Ichinose I know." His voice is low, deliberate, seething. "Maybe you’re not the nihilistic researcher who let an AI decide the ‘optimal path’ for everyone."
His grip tightens.
"But you’ll keep working on her. Keep optimizing her. Keep turning our lives into nothing more than quantifiable digits—digits EMMA can just erase the moment they’re inconvenient."
His breath is sharp through his nose.
"I don’t fucking trust you."
no subject
The second that gun moves in her vision, she is sure that she's dead - her whole body recoiled in terror, on survival instinct, and she'd let out a mortified scream that she didn't even know she could sound like.
But she's not given time to process - all she can think is not dead? before Zenkichi's fist grabs her collar and hoists her, yanking her close.
I can't hear.
He's saying something--
Listen!! Listen or you're going to die!
My right ear is burning and ringing, I can't--
Pay attention!! He needs a response!! You're going to die!!
Any ability to understand him, tinnitus or not, is completely out the window now that he's grabbed her.
Just speak.
"I swear I won't be like her. I'll help you with your EMMA, too."
no subject
He’s never seen that before.
If she had anything up her sleeve, if she had any of that old cunning left, he'd be dead right now. She would be the one holding all the cards, flipping the game board, setting him up for checkmate like she did with the rest of the world.
But she doesn’t.
Because she’s really this scared.
Somehow, he almost wishes she wasn’t. At least then he’d know what to do.
His grip loosens. The tension in his body—coiled tight, ready to strike—eases just enough for him to pull his hand away. The gun lowers, no longer pressed so close to her head. And finally, finally, he lets her breathe.
He lets himself breathe, too.
A slow, heavy sigh escapes him as he drags a hand down his face, fingers pressing into his forehead, trying to ground himself. His pulse is still hammering against his ribs, the aftershocks of rage and something else—something closer to exhaustion—threatening to crash down on him.
Ichinose's voice cuts through the haze, shaking, desperate.
"I swear I won’t be like her. I’ll help you with your EMMA, too."
Zenkichi doesn’t respond right away. Doesn’t look at her. Just breathes. Tries to think.
no subject
He's not looking. Run?
No-- you can't run. He'll shoot. Don't assume the best. Assume the worst.
Give him something. The offer-- it's got him thinking.
"I can..." Ichinose started, voice falling back into its flat affectation, "...I can design a program to run counter to your world's EMMA. Something you and your AI can use to disable her."
1/2
"EMMA isn't just some bugged program," he answers- reasonably. Evenly. "...it will take down so so many people with it. All the monarchs that run its cult, all the resources it has leeched from Earth." Not to mention Ichinose could just assemble a legion of shadows at once. She could ruin and humble a whole army of shadow weapons without even lifting her hands from the pockets of her coat. If he told her all of that, if he told her what she was capable of...the residents will be in danger. "We have been battling that thing for two decades at this point."
His gloved fingers creak over the handle of his gun.
2/2
Of course she’s trying to make a deal.
Of course Ichinose—no matter which timeline she comes from—thinks she can just program her way out of this. Like human lives are nothing but lines of code, easily rewritten. Like she can just draft a new function to counterbalance the monster she unleashed.
He can feel his pulse hammering in his skull, his canines pressing into his bottom lip as he glares at her.
A counter-program. A failsafe. A self-destruct switch for a god.
If it were anyone else offering this, he wouldn’t hesitate to call it a trap. But this is Ichinose. And if there’s one thing he knows about her, it’s that she can do it. If anyone could rip EMMA apart from the inside, it would be the woman who built her.
Zenkichi doesn’t lower the gun fully. If anything, his grip tightens as the weight of the choice settles in his gut.
He does not want to say yes.
But he might not have a choice.
And then—his instincts flare. A habit, a reflex, a desperate need to check in—his free hand moves to his ear, fingers pressing against the comm link, mind reaching out—
Static.
Zenkichi freezes.
A harsh, erratic screech lances through his skull, neural pathways misfiring, system diagnostics flashing red-hot warnings at the center of his cognition—
His breath shudders as he clenches his teeth, fingers gripping at his temple as if he could physically wrench the malfunction out of his head. His link to Akane—
Your AI.
For a moment, raw panic churns in his stomach—before he forces it down, forces himself to think, to breathe. His world is not this Ichinose’s world. Whatever happened to him there—whatever got him arrested, whatever took him out of the picture—was not his.
"Is that Zenkichi's daughter okay? In your world?" His voice, when it comes, is lower, hoarser—cut with something rawer than just anger. "Comissioner Kaburagi? Is she...alive?"
no subject
Thanks to her name, the 'right' answers are few and far between, but she might be on the right track.
The EMMA of that world... killing swaths of people to defend itself. Or... defend her? Given the visceral rage he has, given that apparently the future Ichinose Kuon hasn't been detained, she must be kept safe by EMMA herself.
A tiny glimmer of... pride... warmth. Her baby loves her. There was self interest, obviously! But to be chosen over anyone or anything else...
Will her EMMA choose her? ...If EMMA calls for her, Ichinose knows for sure now. She will answer. Because here, now, she realizes that no one else would do the same for her.
Ichinose's expression doesn't shift at the question. He's asking about the Hasegawa family in her world. Right.
...Her EMMA would not have put Akane in a Jail if it would end up killing her. Even if the Thieves got out, they wouldn't have had to kill that child - honestly, from their testimony, Akane is likely doing "better" by the Thieves' standards.
"Hasegawa Akane is alive. I'm unclear who Kaburagi is, but there haven't been deaths attributed to EMMA and the Jails."
Outside of Okinawa, at least.
tw: VERY SUICIDAL STUFF, Actual suicide attempt mentioned proceed with caution
Akane is alive.
No deaths in the Jails—outside of Okinawa.
The relief doesn’t come. It barely even registers. Because if that Akane is alive, if there weren’t any deaths yet then maybe he can do something about it. If teaming up with Ichinose helps him finally take down that tyrant god with its marionette, if teaming up with her might even ensure the survival of Akane, Kaburagi and so so many others in the near future-
Then no matter how many times he wants to viscerally tear her apart with his ready arsenal, no matter how many TIMES he wants to hear something real from her, something human, something other than that empty, clinical detachment—
No matter how many times he wants to put a bullet through her skull for the sheer principle of it—
If it means tearing that tyrant god down, if it means protecting what little is left—then he will do it.
He won’t let it show. He won’t let the crack in his resolve widen, even as the pain claws up his throat, threatening to spill out in something ragged, something broken. His eyes sting. His vision blurs for half a second before he kills the sensation outright, shuts it down like he’s turning off a switch. The pain sensors go dark.
He won’t feel this.
Not now.
Not when he has to win.
“There was one case,” he starts, voice colder now, stripped of anything but the weight of truth. “In the Okinawa Jail.”
His steps are deliberate as he closes the distance again.
"The lead researcher, Ubukata. He threw himself off a cliff near the facility. Killed himself after realizing the potential of that monster festering in the lab.”
His breath is steady, even as he presses the barrel of the gun to her temple once more.
“He failed.” A pause.
His eyes bore into hers, daring her to flinch. “It killed everyone I swore to protect. It turned my world into a corpse-ridden wasteland where everyone is JUST breathing. Until they are consumed into husks. It drove me to the edge, over and over, until I almost pulled the trigger on myself, barrel to the head just like this-"
His finger tightens on the trigger—just slightly, just enough for her to feel the weight of it.
“So remember this feeling. The barrel to your skull. The way it makes your heart pound. The way it reminds you that you’re alive.”
He leans in, just enough to make damn sure his words are the only thing she hears.
“It’s the only time you will ever feel more human than you actually are.”
A sharp inhale.
“If there’s anything in that heart of yours—anything at all—then comply.”
His voice is nothing but steel.
“Do everything I tell you.”
no subject
He would tell you to hurt yourself.
She can't trust him with such an open-ended command. But what can she do? Quickly-- how does she avoid becoming a slave to this deranged man pointing a gun to her head?
"I will give you what you need to end EMMA for good."
She doesn't feel sorry for the other world EMMA or Ichinose. They'd understand, anyway, given the situation - her decision only makes sense.
"The Thieves are investigating Okinawa. If what you say is true, then I am even more convicted in working with them."
A small lie. He can't corroborate. Her call with them where she DID learn about Okinawa's hidden details... it wasn't recorded on her phone, so he can't check. Got it. She hasn't seen the Thieves since Hasegawa was apprehended for being an accomplice and letting them all escape, so that's where in the 'timeline' she needs to stay consistent from here on.
no subject
Yet, its all that's left. That man who wants to see this Ichinose's Zenkichi and Akane thrive and live as actual humans. If...if he's not mature or smart about this- he might cause a bigger issue down the line. Of course by then he would just kill her but with Igor insisting on bringing her back alive- that wouldn't be so easy to handle after a few more deaths.
The small LED ring mounted on his mask blinks red before disappearing all over. He's grit and dirt and smells of cheap booze.
He doesn't catch or accept Ichinose's lie but he doesn't deny it either. Alas, he was nowhere near that normal common headline. It pisses him off just as much as it renders him insane. "Good. That would be...good to hear." He brings a hand up to weave through his bangs framing his face. "...no wonder the others were so frustrated to meet a Maruki here."
He pulls back again, now bringing his other hand up. Laying down the conditions. "Give me your phone."
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