Ryuugamine Mikado (Shark) (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
digitalemperor) wrote2012-07-15 02:43 am
digitalemperor) wrote2012-07-15 02:43 am
Entry tags:
Memory 08
Memory: Significant Negative - Being unable to stop Dollars members from kidnapping/first instance of "black feelings" (Vol 6, chapter 5, part 6)
Game: Game (played)
Game Master: Odile
Day: 159
Notes: Memories come in the form of familiar-looking blood rubies. Hold it with intent to view it, five uses. 2/5 used (Hunter)
---
At that moment, one of the man suddenly covered a girl's mouth with his hand.
"Urgh…!"
The man stifled the girl's voice and put a knife to her throat.
"Here, here. If you shout, I might cut her by accident."
Rio and the others fell silent at the sight of the shining blade against the girl's white neck.
A black van had stopped outside the alleyway in the meantime, its door open.
"You sure we can stuff five people in?"
Grasping their arms and covering their mouths, the dozen men dragged the confused girls out of the alleyway. It was an unusual sight.
"We can if we squeeze them in." "I want to squeeze in too!"
"Are you an ape or something?" "Exciting ride with high school chicks! Thank you!"
"God, you're sick!."
"But the one who was seen with Kadota, is he really Toramaru's leader?"
"Yeah, there's no mistaking it. I've seen the guy before."
More pointless chatter.
Or at least it was no more than chatter for these delinquents.
For the girls, on the other hand, the casualness in their tone was a painful reminder of the reality, sinking them further into despair -
"W-Wait a moment!"
A voice that sounded extremely out of place was heard. It was from a boy who still looked somewhat like a child.
Every gaze was focused on his childlike face. Panting, he looked back at them with shaking shoulders.
"Ryuugamine…kun?"
The face Rio saw none other than Ryuugamine Mikado, her classmate.
But just like she was not close with Anri, neither was she close with him.
Question marks popped up in Rio's head. The boy, however, didn't have the time to answer them. Summoning as much courage as he could, he shouted:
"W-What are you doing?"
The delinquents exchanged looks and frowned. As if trying to get rid of a fly, they waved their hands at the boy and said in cold voices:
"Whatever we're doing, it's none of your business, kid."
"Yes, it is!"
"Huh?"
"I-I'm a Dollars member too. I came here because…I saw the message."
It took almost all the courage Mikado had in him to say it.
But whether because of his confusion or his fear to see Dollars members arrested, he did not alert the police.
He came here as nothing more than a Dollars member.
"B-But, taking girls hostage is too…"
Before he could finish his sentence, one of the delinquents was already heading his way with a malicious smirk.
"Ah, yeah, we know about that. Just shut up, kid!"
As he said that, he kicked Mikado in the chest.
It was by no means a powerful kick; he was an untrained delinquent, after all.
Had Mikado been Heiwajima Shizuo, he'd probably have hardly even felt it. But he would get mad at the sight of the footprint on his belly and punch the delinquent till he flew higher than a two-story building.
Had he been Orihara Izaya, he would probably have already driven a knife into the palm of the delinquent's foot.
Had he been Kida Masaomi, he would probably have dodged it and begun to counterattack.
Had he been Celty Sturluson, he would probably have bound the delinquent to the ground with shadow ropes.
He was, however, just Mikado, a high school student with average - no, below average - physical strength.
It was most unfortunate, but Mikado happened to be "nothing out of ordinary" in the situation he was in.
"Argh…"
Mikado fell onto the ground and curled up into a fetal position.
His stomach felt as if a heavy ball of iron had been dropped into it.
Before the pain could register, his brain was taken over by agony. His body screamed "Don't move!", but his nerves couldn't take the agony anymore. They yelled "Roll around!" in shrill voices.
"Argh…argh…"
"If you're in Dollars, don't you know this? There's no rule in Dollars that says you can't take women hostage."
The man looked down at the naive boy on the ground and began to teach him about "Dollars" in an arrogant manner.
Of course, they did not know that Mikado was the founder of Dollars.
But even if they knew and believed it - would their attitude have changed?
Mikado continued to groan in pain as he sought to answer that question. Soon he came to the conclusion: no.
Even if he spoke to them as the founder of Dollars, it would have made no difference whatsoever - because that was just what Dollars was.
"It's not only that. Dollars has no rules to bind us. Of course, neither does it have a rule that says we should listen to kids like you."
Mikado's shoulders were touching his knees. The man kicked his shoulder as he spoke.
Mikado rolled on the asphalt, still thinking.
- Ah, that's right.
- This man was right.
Dollars has no rules.
No one can force anyone else to do anything.
I was the one who made it that way.
Mikado thought and clenched his teeth. The delinquents, meanwhile, sounded somewhat shocked as they talked amongst themselves.
"Looks like Dollars does have all sorts of people to offer. Never thought there would be kids like that one. Would someone have called the cops, too?"
"Get your asses to Raira's Second Ground quick. Staying here is getting boring. Let's finish off the Toramaru bastards and take these girls to someone's place to have fun."
Mikado gritted his teeth harder as he heard their voices.
- No.
- This is…not it.
- These people are…not it.
- This…
- This is not the Dollars I had in my mind at all!
Mikado simply refused toaccept the reality right in front of his eyes.
Trying to suppress the sick feeling in his stomach, Mikado rose to his feet to shout at the men already getting into the van.
"Stop…!"
"…Huh?"
One of the delinquents who looked like the center of the "Dollars" group raised his eyebrow and said:
"What was that? Didn't catch that."
His tone was teasing, but his voice was not without menace.
Mikado, however, did not wince as he shouted from the bottom of his stomach:
"Dollars…Dollars would never sink as low as taking girls hostage!"
"…Shut up!"
The delinquent leader was obviously exasperated at being called "low" by someone as inferior to them as Mikado was. Before he could think further about what Mikado had said, he had already swung his fist at Mikado's face.
"Oi, we'll be in trouble if he goes to the cops. You three, take care of this kid and make sure he's broken like a sandbag. "
"W-Wait! We want to be with the girls too!"
"You will! It's not even gonna take a second to take care of a kid like that."
The taste of iron filled Mikado's mouth as he fell to the ground again.
The inside of his mouth was probably bleeding. He might have broken a tooth or two.
But these weren't important to Mikado right now.
What pained him more was the fact that the man who hit him did not even bother to look at him.
The mental pain was several times more severe than what he was suffering physically.
It might be paining him even more than the fact that he had not been able to save those girls -
By the time Mikado struggled to get back on his feet, the black van was nowhere to be seen. Only three delinquents remained behind to corner him.
"Oi, get up, kid."
"Urgh…"
Mikado sought to fight back, but never having been in a fight before, he could hardly make his fist listen to him.
His clumsy fists weren't even as steady as an elementary school bully's. The delinquents laughed and hit him again, making him fall back on the ground.
Mikado couldn't even remember how he fell.
The only thing he felt was the merciless kick on his side.
His arms and legs were going numb under repeated stomping. He began to wonder if his bones were broken in places. The fibers in his muscles felt as if they were disintegrating.
"Wah….arghhhhhh!"
Mikado couldn't help but wail.
Seeing him in pain, one of the torturers laughed and said:
"Yo, kid. You remember me?"
"…Huh…ah…?"
Mikado struggled to raise his head and look at the man with eyes watering in pain. His head was stomped mercilessly back onto the ground the next second by a heavy shoe.
"It was more than a year ago…some bastard broke my ex's cell phone. You were his friend, weren't you? You looked like a kid, I couldn't believe you were in high school…so I remembered your face very…well!"
The delinquent let his weight fall on his shoe, grinding Mikado's face hard on the asphalt.
Mikado felt his nose twisted into such an impossible position that blood began to squirt out of it.
"And the Black Motorbike showed up out of nowhere to ruin everything…are you friends with him too? You can't possibly be."
- This guy…?
His face did not ring a bell, but Mikado tried hard to remember who he was in the overwhelming pain.
The next words he said finally made Mikado recall who he was. It was an ordinary memory for Mikado, so ordinary that he wouldn't have been surprised if he forgot about it altogether.
"I only got to know this recently after I joined Dollars. His name's Orihara Izaya, right? The one who broke my ex's cell phone. Looks like he's pretty famous."
- Ah.
It was back when Mikado had only been in Ikebukuro for a couple of days. He had tried to save Anri from some bullies, and Izaya had stomped on one of those girls's cell phone.
A few days after someone had come to his school gate claiming to be the bully's boyfriend. Celty had appeared then, however, and sent him unconscious with one kick.
A cracking sound reached Mikado's ears from inside him.
No parts of his body were being kicked, but Mikado felt sure that he heard the sound of his own spine being ground under a foot.
"Goodness. Just because all your friends are big names you think you can put up a fight against us? Or were you thinking you'd be in the same league as us just by registering at that Dollars website? Argh?"
His back was being stomped on, but Mikado could no longer feel pain.
He was overcome by one single emotion he had never felt before, one that was stronger than any kind of physical pain.
He remembered.
He remembered everything about this man.
"A little bastard like you, in Dollars? You're just getting in the…way!"
The man suddenly decided to deliver a kick at Mikado's head - at the same time, he muttered something silently to himself.
It was a thought Mikado would never dream of thinking in his everyday life.
- Ah, I remember now…
- It was that…
- That boring bastard.
It was the first time any definite "change" took place in Ryuugamine Mikado's heart.
But since it was only taking place in his heart, no one had been able to notice.
Mikado was not able to pursue the thought any further. His head was kicked forcefully, and his consciousness left him.
Things we learned:
-Some girls are being kidnapped? One of them is my classmate!
-I don't even know her well but This Is Wrong
-I am trying to stop this!
-W-wait this is Dollars? Aren't they my gang?!
-Oh. I see. Dollars has no rules...
-Pain. A lot of pain. Holy crap I'm getting the shit kicked out of me.
-These thugs... They're....
-Man. They're such boring bastards.
-Gain +100 Runs Into Traffic
-Gain +100 Disdain for those I dislike
-Pass out at end of memory
What this means:
HAHAH this is such a major one for Mikado. It's the proper unlock of his yandere feelings, if only in part. Up until now in Aather he's never really looked down on anyone as inferior in any way, but from now on it's possible if others piss him off enough or are counter to his beliefs/ideals enough, he will view them with contempt. Because sanity.
The memory itself is a huge deal. It's part of a chain of incidents that contain most of his Significant Negative memories, and ends up with him choosing violence over pacifism as a way of problem solving, which is his huge and major shift in the middle of the series. He won't quite be at Violence is Acceptable by this memory, that's later, but it'll certainly make him a little more open to it.
This is also his first memory of being directly hurt and truly helpless. For all he tried to save those girls, all he managed was being beaten up himself. There's a lot of information in this memory so I may add more to this as I look over it again later, but in short, this is the beginning of the turning point from Moekado, the nice guy, pacifistic idealist, to Bosskado, the crazy yandere gang leader violent revolutionary.
Game: Game (played)
Game Master: Odile
Day: 159
Notes: Memories come in the form of familiar-looking blood rubies. Hold it with intent to view it, five uses. 2/5 used (Hunter)
---
At that moment, one of the man suddenly covered a girl's mouth with his hand.
"Urgh…!"
The man stifled the girl's voice and put a knife to her throat.
"Here, here. If you shout, I might cut her by accident."
Rio and the others fell silent at the sight of the shining blade against the girl's white neck.
A black van had stopped outside the alleyway in the meantime, its door open.
"You sure we can stuff five people in?"
Grasping their arms and covering their mouths, the dozen men dragged the confused girls out of the alleyway. It was an unusual sight.
"We can if we squeeze them in." "I want to squeeze in too!"
"Are you an ape or something?" "Exciting ride with high school chicks! Thank you!"
"God, you're sick!."
"But the one who was seen with Kadota, is he really Toramaru's leader?"
"Yeah, there's no mistaking it. I've seen the guy before."
More pointless chatter.
Or at least it was no more than chatter for these delinquents.
For the girls, on the other hand, the casualness in their tone was a painful reminder of the reality, sinking them further into despair -
"W-Wait a moment!"
A voice that sounded extremely out of place was heard. It was from a boy who still looked somewhat like a child.
Every gaze was focused on his childlike face. Panting, he looked back at them with shaking shoulders.
"Ryuugamine…kun?"
The face Rio saw none other than Ryuugamine Mikado, her classmate.
But just like she was not close with Anri, neither was she close with him.
Question marks popped up in Rio's head. The boy, however, didn't have the time to answer them. Summoning as much courage as he could, he shouted:
"W-What are you doing?"
The delinquents exchanged looks and frowned. As if trying to get rid of a fly, they waved their hands at the boy and said in cold voices:
"Whatever we're doing, it's none of your business, kid."
"Yes, it is!"
"Huh?"
"I-I'm a Dollars member too. I came here because…I saw the message."
It took almost all the courage Mikado had in him to say it.
But whether because of his confusion or his fear to see Dollars members arrested, he did not alert the police.
He came here as nothing more than a Dollars member.
"B-But, taking girls hostage is too…"
Before he could finish his sentence, one of the delinquents was already heading his way with a malicious smirk.
"Ah, yeah, we know about that. Just shut up, kid!"
As he said that, he kicked Mikado in the chest.
It was by no means a powerful kick; he was an untrained delinquent, after all.
Had Mikado been Heiwajima Shizuo, he'd probably have hardly even felt it. But he would get mad at the sight of the footprint on his belly and punch the delinquent till he flew higher than a two-story building.
Had he been Orihara Izaya, he would probably have already driven a knife into the palm of the delinquent's foot.
Had he been Kida Masaomi, he would probably have dodged it and begun to counterattack.
Had he been Celty Sturluson, he would probably have bound the delinquent to the ground with shadow ropes.
He was, however, just Mikado, a high school student with average - no, below average - physical strength.
It was most unfortunate, but Mikado happened to be "nothing out of ordinary" in the situation he was in.
"Argh…"
Mikado fell onto the ground and curled up into a fetal position.
His stomach felt as if a heavy ball of iron had been dropped into it.
Before the pain could register, his brain was taken over by agony. His body screamed "Don't move!", but his nerves couldn't take the agony anymore. They yelled "Roll around!" in shrill voices.
"Argh…argh…"
"If you're in Dollars, don't you know this? There's no rule in Dollars that says you can't take women hostage."
The man looked down at the naive boy on the ground and began to teach him about "Dollars" in an arrogant manner.
Of course, they did not know that Mikado was the founder of Dollars.
But even if they knew and believed it - would their attitude have changed?
Mikado continued to groan in pain as he sought to answer that question. Soon he came to the conclusion: no.
Even if he spoke to them as the founder of Dollars, it would have made no difference whatsoever - because that was just what Dollars was.
"It's not only that. Dollars has no rules to bind us. Of course, neither does it have a rule that says we should listen to kids like you."
Mikado's shoulders were touching his knees. The man kicked his shoulder as he spoke.
Mikado rolled on the asphalt, still thinking.
- Ah, that's right.
- This man was right.
Dollars has no rules.
No one can force anyone else to do anything.
I was the one who made it that way.
Mikado thought and clenched his teeth. The delinquents, meanwhile, sounded somewhat shocked as they talked amongst themselves.
"Looks like Dollars does have all sorts of people to offer. Never thought there would be kids like that one. Would someone have called the cops, too?"
"Get your asses to Raira's Second Ground quick. Staying here is getting boring. Let's finish off the Toramaru bastards and take these girls to someone's place to have fun."
Mikado gritted his teeth harder as he heard their voices.
- No.
- This is…not it.
- These people are…not it.
- This…
- This is not the Dollars I had in my mind at all!
Mikado simply refused toaccept the reality right in front of his eyes.
Trying to suppress the sick feeling in his stomach, Mikado rose to his feet to shout at the men already getting into the van.
"Stop…!"
"…Huh?"
One of the delinquents who looked like the center of the "Dollars" group raised his eyebrow and said:
"What was that? Didn't catch that."
His tone was teasing, but his voice was not without menace.
Mikado, however, did not wince as he shouted from the bottom of his stomach:
"Dollars…Dollars would never sink as low as taking girls hostage!"
"…Shut up!"
The delinquent leader was obviously exasperated at being called "low" by someone as inferior to them as Mikado was. Before he could think further about what Mikado had said, he had already swung his fist at Mikado's face.
"Oi, we'll be in trouble if he goes to the cops. You three, take care of this kid and make sure he's broken like a sandbag. "
"W-Wait! We want to be with the girls too!"
"You will! It's not even gonna take a second to take care of a kid like that."
The taste of iron filled Mikado's mouth as he fell to the ground again.
The inside of his mouth was probably bleeding. He might have broken a tooth or two.
But these weren't important to Mikado right now.
What pained him more was the fact that the man who hit him did not even bother to look at him.
The mental pain was several times more severe than what he was suffering physically.
It might be paining him even more than the fact that he had not been able to save those girls -
By the time Mikado struggled to get back on his feet, the black van was nowhere to be seen. Only three delinquents remained behind to corner him.
"Oi, get up, kid."
"Urgh…"
Mikado sought to fight back, but never having been in a fight before, he could hardly make his fist listen to him.
His clumsy fists weren't even as steady as an elementary school bully's. The delinquents laughed and hit him again, making him fall back on the ground.
Mikado couldn't even remember how he fell.
The only thing he felt was the merciless kick on his side.
His arms and legs were going numb under repeated stomping. He began to wonder if his bones were broken in places. The fibers in his muscles felt as if they were disintegrating.
"Wah….arghhhhhh!"
Mikado couldn't help but wail.
Seeing him in pain, one of the torturers laughed and said:
"Yo, kid. You remember me?"
"…Huh…ah…?"
Mikado struggled to raise his head and look at the man with eyes watering in pain. His head was stomped mercilessly back onto the ground the next second by a heavy shoe.
"It was more than a year ago…some bastard broke my ex's cell phone. You were his friend, weren't you? You looked like a kid, I couldn't believe you were in high school…so I remembered your face very…well!"
The delinquent let his weight fall on his shoe, grinding Mikado's face hard on the asphalt.
Mikado felt his nose twisted into such an impossible position that blood began to squirt out of it.
"And the Black Motorbike showed up out of nowhere to ruin everything…are you friends with him too? You can't possibly be."
- This guy…?
His face did not ring a bell, but Mikado tried hard to remember who he was in the overwhelming pain.
The next words he said finally made Mikado recall who he was. It was an ordinary memory for Mikado, so ordinary that he wouldn't have been surprised if he forgot about it altogether.
"I only got to know this recently after I joined Dollars. His name's Orihara Izaya, right? The one who broke my ex's cell phone. Looks like he's pretty famous."
- Ah.
It was back when Mikado had only been in Ikebukuro for a couple of days. He had tried to save Anri from some bullies, and Izaya had stomped on one of those girls's cell phone.
A few days after someone had come to his school gate claiming to be the bully's boyfriend. Celty had appeared then, however, and sent him unconscious with one kick.
A cracking sound reached Mikado's ears from inside him.
No parts of his body were being kicked, but Mikado felt sure that he heard the sound of his own spine being ground under a foot.
"Goodness. Just because all your friends are big names you think you can put up a fight against us? Or were you thinking you'd be in the same league as us just by registering at that Dollars website? Argh?"
His back was being stomped on, but Mikado could no longer feel pain.
He was overcome by one single emotion he had never felt before, one that was stronger than any kind of physical pain.
He remembered.
He remembered everything about this man.
"A little bastard like you, in Dollars? You're just getting in the…way!"
The man suddenly decided to deliver a kick at Mikado's head - at the same time, he muttered something silently to himself.
It was a thought Mikado would never dream of thinking in his everyday life.
- Ah, I remember now…
- It was that…
- That boring bastard.
It was the first time any definite "change" took place in Ryuugamine Mikado's heart.
But since it was only taking place in his heart, no one had been able to notice.
Mikado was not able to pursue the thought any further. His head was kicked forcefully, and his consciousness left him.
Things we learned:
-Some girls are being kidnapped? One of them is my classmate!
-I don't even know her well but This Is Wrong
-I am trying to stop this!
-W-wait this is Dollars? Aren't they my gang?!
-Oh. I see. Dollars has no rules...
-Pain. A lot of pain. Holy crap I'm getting the shit kicked out of me.
-These thugs... They're....
-Man. They're such boring bastards.
-Gain +100 Runs Into Traffic
-Gain +100 Disdain for those I dislike
-Pass out at end of memory
What this means:
HAHAH this is such a major one for Mikado. It's the proper unlock of his yandere feelings, if only in part. Up until now in Aather he's never really looked down on anyone as inferior in any way, but from now on it's possible if others piss him off enough or are counter to his beliefs/ideals enough, he will view them with contempt. Because sanity.
The memory itself is a huge deal. It's part of a chain of incidents that contain most of his Significant Negative memories, and ends up with him choosing violence over pacifism as a way of problem solving, which is his huge and major shift in the middle of the series. He won't quite be at Violence is Acceptable by this memory, that's later, but it'll certainly make him a little more open to it.
This is also his first memory of being directly hurt and truly helpless. For all he tried to save those girls, all he managed was being beaten up himself. There's a lot of information in this memory so I may add more to this as I look over it again later, but in short, this is the beginning of the turning point from Moekado, the nice guy, pacifistic idealist, to Bosskado, the crazy yandere gang leader violent revolutionary.