False! I believe I stand out just enough. [at least she's not wearing the bookskirt? god. props her hands on her hip] And again, I prefer the term mysterious over weird.
[Look, you can't just drop dimension hopping on a girl and expect her to be okay with it! It's not like Magilou came out of Mementos.
(Or did she?)
And Magilou's honestly not helping, and is that fondness in Akira's tone?
Yeah Futaba is just. Going to cross her arms in the universal "nope, done with this shit" gesture.]
Hold on, time out! You--! [This is to Magilou.] Keep your quirky side character commentary to quiet asides until I get this all figured out!
And you! [To Akira this time!! Except...a little softer.] ...What happened? It feels like you went on a quest without the rest of us and I'm trying to catch up.
but akira knows that this is going to be a lot to process. he's not even sure how he's going to tell futaba what happened when he did so many shitty, disappointing things? bad leader etiquette, a bad time overall.
but it's probably a bit obvious that akira's just a little... off, and not because he's fond of the quirky side character.]
I kind of did, but it wasn't a very good quest. It was kind of like... [hm. for futaba standards?]
A non-canon sidequest that leads to a bad ending.
[o h . . . ]
How about... I make some coffee, and we sit down and talk about it? [he was going to have to tell her eventually, and despite futaba's dubious feelings towards magilou, he thinks it'll be easier with someone there to verify his story and his feelings on the matter.
and maybe step in when he loses his words, because she's better at exposition than he is.]
On the bright side, you picked up a new party member along the way. ☆ Right?
[OKAY, OKAY, THIS IS SERIOUS. . . but she had to get at least one last shitpost in]
[even though Futaba asked her to keep her quirky side character commentary to quiet asides. oops. at any rate! she links her hands behind her head and slips into one of the booths]
[She's not very sure about this... this is already starting to sound like a Super Serious Talk, and that's not what she signed up for here.
Still.
Akira clearly went through something, and it's her job to find out what. She's supposed to be the one keeping tabs on him, after all. It's just not right if she doesn't know!
(And, well, she's worried, but you know. Doesn't have to be said.)
So while her face is basically the epitome of (unsure), she's going along with it.]
... I want it like you made it that one time when it was like--ziiing and then ker-pow!
[You know what kind of coffee blend that was, right, Akira.
Because that's all you've got.
Otherwise, she just...sits at the counter? Yeah, she knows Magilou sat at a booth but look--she's not convinced yet by Magilou's everything so she's not sitting there until Akira's sitting there. Until then, she'll pillow her cheek on the countertop and mutter to herself:]
What's the point of a non-canon sidequest with a bad ending...? [???]
[he seems amused enough as he says it; clearly, akira is concerned enough with wanting to take care of this properly.
but the coffee part is easy, at least. he seems a bit at home in front of the siphon these days—futaba should be more than accustomed to that, though for magilou, it would be a pretty new experience. they both know him in such different ways, for such different things, despite being two of the most important, small, quirky ladies in his life.
(will he get the coffee blend right? who knows, but it'll probably taste good.)]
There's not really a "point" but to... amuse the developers. Basically a situation where everyone loses but the person who profits on it.
[this is fine!! she doesn't mind sitting by herself in the booth. it means she can slump forward and spread her arms out over the table without worrying about bumping into someone. ALL THIS SPACE, FUTABA, AND YOU'RE NOT OCCUPYING IT]
I don't think we ever figured out who was profiting, did we?
[other than Halpal? were they even profiting? or were they just doing it for kicks and giggles?]
...The happy ending is that I'm here now, and I'm alive.
[..oh. he looks to magilou for a moment, shaking his head.]
I tried not to ask question since they hated straight answers. The probably would have said it was to appease the volcano spirit.
[fuck halpal!! he's still #bitter about everything that happened there and it shows. he sighs quietly as he prepares the coffee, focusing his attention back to futaba.]
"Happy ending," is a loose term, anyway. That's what it's akin to. But it's not a fun sidequest. It's a game that exists in a nightmare.
[that sounds really dramatic and yet. it's literal? sorry, futaba, he's not good at this.]
[... She slowly lifts her head from the table, brow furrowing.]
Been done before, you know.
[Boring, she'd say, predictable, except she doesn't like that this is coming on the heels of Akira saying that he was the one on this bullshit sidequest.]
Except it was just virtual reality that time.
[...]
Akira...? [No taunting or jabs or pseudo-video game talk, just:] What happened?
[magilou gets right to the point, which he expects; she's a storyteller, and she's damn good at it.
so with a breath drawn, he looks to magilou.]
Do you want a cup, too?
[he'll get to futaba in a second, softer as he places her cup of coffee in front of her. he'll pour one for himself too, but he lingers, waiting for confirmation from magilou on at least that.]
It's a long story, Futaba. Let's sit at the booth and talk about because... there's truth what she's saying. Not of the virtual reality variety.
[of the "very real" variety, and akira seems pretty serious about this, with a level of solemnity that he rarely uses with futaba unless they're dealing with phantom thief business.]
Mmm. Fix me up your specialty, Trickster. Impress me!
[and, as always, despite the serious subject matter, Magilou adds a small flair of levity into the mix. but she does address Futaba in a more even tone seconds later]
Not "virtual reality." [she still doesn't know exactly what that is but whatever] It happened in a dream. An illusion shared even between people who lived universes apart, I suppose, but every bit of it felt as real as this conversation does now.
Kind of creepy, right?
[especially since the implication here is "Akira dreamed up a girlfriend on a murder island and now she's actually a reality." oops]
[...Alright, fine. She can tell when a situation is serious, and it's pretty rare that Akira asks for anything in that sort of tone. So she takes the cup and silently slides into the booth across from Magilou obediently, staring down at her coffee. A dream. An illusion. Something that felt real, but with the same plot as Dangan Ronpa.
Hm.]
... You're saying this all happened? To the both of you? [Murder island?
She's not forgetting that Akira said that the "good end" is that he lived, after all. And she's piecing together the pieces real quick, brow furrowing.]
Like a forced shared dream sort of thing? Obviously the people in it had to be real if you brought one of them home...
[She taps a finger on the table, an idle nervous tic, frowning to herself.]
[akira follows suit soon enough, placing down a cup of coffee in front of magilou; he elects to it next to her—directly across from futaba.
which in itself, it a weird position to be in. sit next to his eccentric girlfriend or his quirky lil sis who probably wants to be near him in this unsure situation? yeah. ultimately, he elects on that position so he can look at futaba more directly when talking to her about this—
even if making eye contact with her will definitely get more difficult as the story progresses.]
It can really happen. Think of it as... a form of cognition. It's still a collective unconscious, but it works... really, really differently than what we're used to.
[he talks about those things easily enough though, even with magilou right there. huh.]
[cradles both hands around her mug of coffee, blowing on it so she doesn't accidentally burn her tongue when she takes a sip]
Real people, real universes, fake stage! Which was kind of a shame. It was a really nice island.
[Magilou. . .]
Anyway, a very specific five people on that island were given specific instructions to kill as many people as they could. They were told that if they didn't commit at least one murder a week, the island volcano would erupt and everyone would die. And while that part may have been a lie. . . that didn't keep them from taking people's lives.
[There is a certain amount of seriousness to Akira sitting across from her instead of next to her, too; Futaba's at least aware enough of social cues to pick up on that. He's usually next to her, so the fact that he's meeting her eyes like this instead...
She frowns a little.
Naturally, it's not hard for her to put together the pieces. Her knowledge of cognition on top of her general video game savvy means this all comes together a little...well, too quickly.]
It was a game of Mafia. [Yeah.] A cognizant game of Mafia where everyone was sharing a collective experience... hence a "dream" of some sort. I guess the win conditions were probably similar? Villagers versus Mafia... if the Villagers caught all of the Mafia, they won?
[Somehow, it's a little easier to talk about this...as if it didn't happen to Akira, which she's still trying to parse slowly but surely, though it probably won't be able to stay distant for long.]
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[solemn nods. he's going along with futaba here, rule of siblings.]
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Seven hundred gald, actually. And I prefer "lovable sidekick character" to "token quirky party member."
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anyway like.
She's forgetting to be scared with all of this rpg talk but:]
That sounds exactly like what a token quirky party member would say. [SUSPICIOUS POINT!!]
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[apparently, this is easier than explaining the Real Ass Shit that was never even real anyway.]
She's the party mage. She usually has the hat and everything.
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Bingo! Newt got it in one!
[still calling him Newt apparently., also, POINTS BACK AT FUTABA!!]
But every time I wear the hat around here, people ask me if I'm cosplaying. I like to stand out, but not that much.
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... ... ...]
Party mage... but not a cosplayer... "travels across dimensions"...
[???!???
... Nah that's crazy. She's crazy. She's just tugging on Akira's sleeve like. Seriously, Akira, who is this.]
You know, you still stand out way too much...
[If you were wondering, Magilou.]
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Is the idea weird to you? I think we've seen things a little weirder than dimension hopping.
[considering.
they also kind of dimension hop? the metaverse sort of counts, even if it's cognitive.]
She is pretty weird though. [fondly?? he says that fondly.]
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False! I believe I stand out just enough. [at least she's not wearing the bookskirt? god. props her hands on her hip] And again, I prefer the term mysterious over weird.
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[Look, you can't just drop dimension hopping on a girl and expect her to be okay with it! It's not like Magilou came out of Mementos.
(Or did she?)
And Magilou's honestly not helping, and is that fondness in Akira's tone?
Yeah Futaba is just. Going to cross her arms in the universal "nope, done with this shit" gesture.]
Hold on, time out! You--! [This is to Magilou.] Keep your quirky side character commentary to quiet asides until I get this all figured out!
And you! [To Akira this time!! Except...a little softer.] ...What happened? It feels like you went on a quest without the rest of us and I'm trying to catch up.
[Why does Akira sound so fond of this lady?]
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but akira knows that this is going to be a lot to process. he's not even sure how he's going to tell futaba what happened when he did so many shitty, disappointing things? bad leader etiquette, a bad time overall.
but it's probably a bit obvious that akira's just a little... off, and not because he's fond of the quirky side character.]
I kind of did, but it wasn't a very good quest. It was kind of like... [hm. for futaba standards?]
A non-canon sidequest that leads to a bad ending.
[o h . . . ]
How about... I make some coffee, and we sit down and talk about it? [he was going to have to tell her eventually, and despite futaba's dubious feelings towards magilou, he thinks it'll be easier with someone there to verify his story and his feelings on the matter.
and maybe step in when he loses his words, because she's better at exposition than he is.]
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[OKAY, OKAY, THIS IS SERIOUS. . . but she had to get at least one last shitpost in]
[even though Futaba asked her to keep her quirky side character commentary to quiet asides. oops. at any rate! she links her hands behind her head and slips into one of the booths]
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Still.
Akira clearly went through something, and it's her job to find out what. She's supposed to be the one keeping tabs on him, after all. It's just not right if she doesn't know!
(And, well, she's worried, but you know. Doesn't have to be said.)
So while her face is basically the epitome of (unsure), she's going along with it.]
... I want it like you made it that one time when it was like--ziiing and then ker-pow!
[You know what kind of coffee blend that was, right, Akira.
Because that's all you've got.
Otherwise, she just...sits at the counter? Yeah, she knows Magilou sat at a booth but look--she's not convinced yet by Magilou's everything so she's not sitting there until Akira's sitting there. Until then, she'll pillow her cheek on the countertop and mutter to herself:]
What's the point of a non-canon sidequest with a bad ending...? [???]
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[he seems amused enough as he says it; clearly, akira is concerned enough with wanting to take care of this properly.
but the coffee part is easy, at least. he seems a bit at home in front of the siphon these days—futaba should be more than accustomed to that, though for magilou, it would be a pretty new experience. they both know him in such different ways, for such different things, despite being two of the most important, small, quirky ladies in his life.
(will he get the coffee blend right? who knows, but it'll probably taste good.)]
There's not really a "point" but to... amuse the developers. Basically a situation where everyone loses but the person who profits on it.
[this story is so fucked, futaba.]
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I don't think we ever figured out who was profiting, did we?
[other than Halpal? were they even profiting? or were they just doing it for kicks and giggles?]
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Still... Futaba's just frowning a little.]
Bad End AUs are no fun unless there's a happy ending at the end.
[Futaba's not here for your shitty miserable fanfiction!!]
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[..oh. he looks to magilou for a moment, shaking his head.]
I tried not to ask question since they hated straight answers. The probably would have said it was to appease the volcano spirit.
[fuck halpal!! he's still #bitter about everything that happened there and it shows. he sighs quietly as he prepares the coffee, focusing his attention back to futaba.]
"Happy ending," is a loose term, anyway. That's what it's akin to. But it's not a fun sidequest. It's a game that exists in a nightmare.
[that sounds really dramatic and yet. it's literal? sorry, futaba, he's not good at this.]
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. . . it's probably best to start from the beginning.
[but. knowing Akira is no good with words, she continues for him]
Forty-two people woke up on a deserted island with nothing but a swimsuit and one item on their person.
Forty-two people were instructed to kill each other for the right to return home.
[her explanation is clinical. no dramatics, no shitposting, no jokes. just facts]
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Been done before, you know.
[Boring, she'd say, predictable, except she doesn't like that this is coming on the heels of Akira saying that he was the one on this bullshit sidequest.]
Except it was just virtual reality that time.
[...]
Akira...? [No taunting or jabs or pseudo-video game talk, just:] What happened?
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so with a breath drawn, he looks to magilou.]
Do you want a cup, too?
[he'll get to futaba in a second, softer as he places her cup of coffee in front of her. he'll pour one for himself too, but he lingers, waiting for confirmation from magilou on at least that.]
It's a long story, Futaba. Let's sit at the booth and talk about because... there's truth what she's saying. Not of the virtual reality variety.
[of the "very real" variety, and akira seems pretty serious about this, with a level of solemnity that he rarely uses with futaba unless they're dealing with phantom thief business.]
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[and, as always, despite the serious subject matter, Magilou adds a small flair of levity into the mix. but she does address Futaba in a more even tone seconds later]
Not "virtual reality." [she still doesn't know exactly what that is but whatever] It happened in a dream. An illusion shared even between people who lived universes apart, I suppose, but every bit of it felt as real as this conversation does now.
Kind of creepy, right?
[especially since the implication here is "Akira dreamed up a girlfriend on a murder island and now she's actually a reality." oops]
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Hm.]
... You're saying this all happened? To the both of you? [Murder island?
She's not forgetting that Akira said that the "good end" is that he lived, after all. And she's piecing together the pieces real quick, brow furrowing.]
Like a forced shared dream sort of thing? Obviously the people in it had to be real if you brought one of them home...
[She taps a finger on the table, an idle nervous tic, frowning to herself.]
That sort of thing can really happen?
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which in itself, it a weird position to be in. sit next to his eccentric girlfriend or his quirky lil sis who probably wants to be near him in this unsure situation? yeah. ultimately, he elects on that position so he can look at futaba more directly when talking to her about this—
even if making eye contact with her will definitely get more difficult as the story progresses.]
It can really happen. Think of it as... a form of cognition. It's still a collective unconscious, but it works... really, really differently than what we're used to.
[he talks about those things easily enough though, even with magilou right there. huh.]
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Real people, real universes, fake stage! Which was kind of a shame. It was a really nice island.
[Magilou. . .]
Anyway, a very specific five people on that island were given specific instructions to kill as many people as they could. They were told that if they didn't commit at least one murder a week, the island volcano would erupt and everyone would die. And while that part may have been a lie. . . that didn't keep them from taking people's lives.
no subject
She frowns a little.
Naturally, it's not hard for her to put together the pieces. Her knowledge of cognition on top of her general video game savvy means this all comes together a little...well, too quickly.]
It was a game of Mafia. [Yeah.] A cognizant game of Mafia where everyone was sharing a collective experience... hence a "dream" of some sort. I guess the win conditions were probably similar? Villagers versus Mafia... if the Villagers caught all of the Mafia, they won?
[Somehow, it's a little easier to talk about this...as if it didn't happen to Akira, which she's still trying to parse slowly but surely, though it probably won't be able to stay distant for long.]
no subject
yeah.]
With different names, and slightly different purposes. But yeah, it's mostly like that.
[that's definitely the gist of it, at least. he can't even be surprised that futaba picks up on it so quickly.]
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