felinguistic | (no subject)

Polly's first on my list, and then Chuuya. One living and one dead just to get their opinions. [And one less thing to bother Carlos with. But there's a nod.] That's the same one though, yeah. A lot of the items necessary are rewards given to us. We just need to make sure we hold onto them and they don't disappear when we do.

[i.e. when people fucking die.]

Spread out your options. Sounds fair to me.

[ There's a pause, and then he holds out the buttplug to him. Happy NonBirthday, Junpei. ]

Perhaps you should be holding onto to this then, just in case. Maybe find somewhere to hold them so we don't end up in that situation, and entrust the location in messages. Maybe even from the other side, if that's where you end up.

[...you know. He's going to make himself feel better and assume this isn't used before he'll take it and slip it into his pocket.]

Thanks. I'm going to ask Polly if we can store stuff on the other side until we need it. If not, Chuuya's office might be a good place, too. Somewhere people have limited access to and isn't a terrible idea.

[But he hums in thought then.] One more question. Hizamaru said there was something written on the headless woman's stomach and he thought you might've read it. Do you remember what it was?

... I would be careful with that. I had her take a message - a physical one - over there and she said it burst into flames when she got there. I don't know whether it's limited to messages, or anything physical, but it's probably not worth experimenting, is it?

[ ... hm. ]

"You Will Answer
To Our Truth."

[ there's another pause. ]

... Hizamaru said the same thing, just as I took the pill. I'm not sure he actually looked at the statue at all. If he's asking you to ask me then I'd say he probably didn't.

...in that case probably not, no. I didn't know you had tried. Maybe I'll just ask Chuuya then. [Haha yikes.

And double-yikes, what is that message?]

...that's...what do you mean? You're sure it wasn't some kind of weird hallucination or anything else? He just kind of mentioned it off-hand, and that you took something which apparently was this ritual item. That doesn't exactly sound like something great.

I only found out the outcome this week and-- well, a lot has been happening.

[ hahaha, worrying isn't it? ]

He may not be aware of it himself. But as I took the pill, he said that. I'm sure of it. And then my ears tried to explode and I was out for-- some time? I'd estimate five minutes.

That's an understatement. [Hilariously this would have tipped Junpei off to Hizamaru being the culprit so good thing this is backdated!!!]

Who's "our" in this case? The demons? [Something else? Ugh.] What happened after you came to? Are your ears ago?

[ the timing is entirely intentional, my dear. ]

Even if the demons don't get along, perhaps they have a common truth they're working towards too. Not so different from us, if you look at it that way.

[I FIGURED. THANKS.]

So it's a war between us and them after all. So...we should also be looking at what their goals are. I feel like there's probably more to it than "fuck and die."

[ :D ]

They're insistent on the sex part, and there are consequences for other for not doing it, and potentially even if we do.

...

Think it's a sort of energy, or fuel for them?

...probably. The mistrust and deceit could be the demons passing themselves around through us. "Energy drawn" and they're "thriving", so to speak. I wish talking to them gave us better results.

They never seem willing to share when we're about to dowse them in holy water and kill them.

Well I've talked to some of them before that. In their holding room on Saturday? Some of them are more obnoxious than others but we've had some interesting results all the same. I didn't check in with the one that was using Illumi, but whoever it is this week I might try and see what'll happen.

Might be worth it. What their motivations are, why they chose who they chose -- if they're all individual there might not be much stock in finding a pattern behind their actions. But it can't hurt.

One of the things I've heard is that they at least choose based on what might hurt the host the most. So that's something to consider, you know? Any kind of lead is good enough as far as I'm concerned. Even if it isn't much, we can try to work with it.

Hm. So you could be going after your fox bride, as an example?

[ interesting to note. ] Or pitting the brothers against each other, that sort of thing.

That's one example, yeah. Tamamo and I talked about this and even she agreed that if she were possessed, she thought that she'd come after me first. It's one of the most solid theories we have right now.

It would make it easier for the demon to get close enough to their victim, wouldn't it?

They’d have the element of surprise and potentially the benefits of their target not wanting to hurt the body they possess. Overall that’s a huge benefit for them, and a huge obstacle for their potential victim to overcome.

Not impossible, but potentially improbable.

I mean look at what happened with Monika and Prompto. He's not a bad shot and he still purposefully missed her because he didn't want to hurt her. I'd say they're totally aware of that.

...but getting people to be less hesitant about hurting their former friends isn't the easiest job either.

[ laughs in redacted ]

You don't really know what you'll do until you're faced with that situation, hm? Maybe if you think of them as a demon and a lost cause first and just took them out...

That's expecting people--normal people to be pragmatic and emotionless. I don't know if you've noticed but that's most likely not happening here. [There's a light frown.] How easily do you think you could kill any of us if we were demons?

[ He tilts his head, thoughtfully. ]

If I was ordered to...? Easier than you might want to hear. Otherwise, I don't know. That's why I'm talking in hypotheticals.

We can hypothesize all we want, but...maybe it's not enough. [Just musing out loud, he doesn't expect an answer.]

...why are we sitting in the dark, by the way?