#adrotans

@adrotans asks: Never put passion in front of principle. / Taehee! PROMPTS FROM COBRA KAI

Katsuo listened without interrupting, elbows resting lightly on his knees, eyes fixed somewhere just past Taehee rather than on him directly. The lights glinted faintly against the chrome lining his neural ports, the only visible hint of how much of him had been refined for the corporate world he had once left behind. When Taehee finished, Katsuo gave a quiet breath through his nose, the ghost of a smile touching his lips.

“Funny thing about principles,” he said at last, voice low and even. “When you grow up around them, they stop sounding like wisdom and start sounding like gravity. Just… something that’s always there. My father used to talk the same way. Lines you don’t cross. Rules that keep the machine running.” He rubbed his thumb slowly along the rim of the coffee cup in his hand. “I believed that once. Still do, in some ways.”

Katsuo finally looked back at Taehee, expression thoughtful rather than confrontational. “So when you say never put passion before principle… I get it. Really, I do. That’s how empires stay standing.” A small pause lingered between them. “But sometimes passion is the reason someone bothers protecting those principles in the first place.”

He leaned back in his chair, folding his arms loosely. “Right now Arasaka’s got me on a leash, making sure their prodigal son doesn’t wander off again. Mentors, oversight, the whole package.” His tone carried a quiet amusement.

VIVIENNE ALLARD -- SPEAKING. «

anger reeks like hope left to rot; in his stead should have been another one. she watches him through long ink-stained lashes, the shadow of welles & him meeting, clashing, their borders kissing in a grotesque picture. the question, of course, is not worth being answered: it was fine. welles had a lot of friends. welles was well-liked, a happy-go-lucky kind of guy that you couldn't help but love from the very start. vivienne would know best; she got swallowed into his orbit like a star crashing into a black hole, even though she had always identified as a bottomless pit rather than a shiny, if perhaps already dead, beam of light. he had a way of subverting whatever she thought of herself; now that the funeral has passed, a one-sided goodbye, she wonders if this is all she'll ever be: this ugly final version of her, painted by his bloody fingerprints on her temple.

the funeral was fine, because welles was a nice guy, disgustingly kind, with no expectations except for a hand to clasp his on the way down; both of them walking into each other's steps with a familiarity that vivienne assumes only ever happens through blood ties. he was her first friend. will probably be the last. she doesn't know how to mourn any of it. she knew she would always grieve for the job she wanted & couldn't keep. she knew she would always grieve for the family that never lived up to its title. she knew she would always grieve for the little girl and the teenage one that had sacrificed their social lives for a job that would never love them back.

the slow process of that grief, the stank of it clinging to everything she possessed & everything she would ever claim. she knew there would never be a happy version of her, but she had thought... naively, perhaps, that if she could have a friend like jackie welles, then perhaps there was still time. he was the star at the center of her galaxy; a reason to push through, to get out of bed, to try.

watching taehee with vulture-like eyes, hungry and mean-spirited, she finds her composure loosening at the seams; first the polite air of distance disintegrates to reveal the sharp line of her clenched jaw, the hard angle of eyebrows that dip down in irritation, the flat stroke of her mouth as she asks, derisive & unamused: "what do you think?" somewhere else, johnny huffs around a cigarette, and turns away, his silhouette flickering out of existence.

how much can arasaka take? how much can it dig out of her, bare-handed, before there is nothing left to destroy? she watches the corporation's golden child & finds herself eager to get closer— to press her fingertips to his chest, to prod in-between the mounts and valleys of his ribcage, hard enough for skin to open up like a rose in spring; to hold the most human part of him and squish it between her fingers, knowing she'll leave no fingerprints for arasaka to find. that, too, has been sacrificed to the machine that she has become. she is a being whose essence has been turned into fuel; soon there will be nothing left for her to drive forward. soon there will be nothing to mourn. (besides, only welles would have had the fortitude to even try.)

she imagines she could lose herself in taehee's skeleton for a little while as the motor runs too hot, as the rest of her deteriorates like roadkill. corpse illuminated by the fluorescent lights of night city; another nameless failure in a sea of nobodies. she'd hide in the cocoon of his skull for whatever time she has left, perhaps she'd find echoes of his mind still reveberating there. she would let herself be lulled by what should have been hers & yet never was. she would pretend that it was her; her mind, its rhythm, its ruthless race for greatness. a last song before the curtain's closing. she would hide away from johnny's endless rage. she would hide from her own.

She appreciated his nonchalance, the way he didn't gawk, didn't do multiple takes at the man lurking. She knew Kenshin wasn't green around the gills, but it was still nice to see. Piper tried to do very much the same, her gaze on Kenshin, her posture easy.

But it was wrong, wrong in small tells. Wrong, because her mind was going too fast with too many ideas.

Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, he walks into mine.

The idea of this being mere happenstance, luck, was something she found herself torn on. But even if it was mere coincidence that he had come here to begin with, it had stopped being chance the moment he had come back. So why, then? Why crop up like a waking nightmare now?

A bony hand wrapped itself around her stomach and squeezed, a sickening sensation of anxiety that she hadn't felt in years. And she hated it. Hated it because a ghost shouldn't be able to make her feel so uneasy by merely existing.

And yet.

         𝑶𝒑𝒂𝒍𝒖𝒔𝒄𝒆𝒏𝒄𝒆 𝒊𝒏 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒏𝒆𝒂𝒓𝒍𝒚 𝒕𝒓𝒂𝒏𝒔𝒍𝒖𝒄𝒆𝒏𝒕 𝒍𝒊𝒈𝒉𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒇𝒊𝒙𝒕𝒖𝒓𝒆𝒔, he doesn’t know where they are, one of many decadent eateries boasting of their omakase is simply superb. The bill is already taken care of, he thinks it’s from a mark that was set free, too dizzy on the notion of fabricated love that Naoto once spilled into their mouth - anything, just for a glimmer of the truth he so craved. Contemporary, overly flashy, the liquor is abundantly sweet but he doesn’t touch it, instead a mocktail of pomegranate & raspberry staining the pale effigy of his bottom lip, blood red. He holds the overly expensive crystal with a reckless abandon, a man who has always understood his station, sneering at anyone who would deem him inferior or lesser. “You made it” his attention stirs, rising out of politeness, lean, tall, elegant - a structure that could fit into the simplest of fabrics only to wear them akin to water gliding upon the flesh.

    Subtly in modifications, gold that wrapped around his forearms, warm instead of a cold grasp, the metal underneath augmented yet fleshlike. Old money that did not wish to boast when it usually did with little regard, only this time, it flaunted minimalistic touches with the latest of tech; there is no need for gaudiness when each piece cost into the thousands. “I took the liberty of ordering wine, though I’ll have to pass - never was a drinker” strange while sincere, eerie as if he knew the profile of what to order, how to keep it chilled, meticulous on details that were not yet exchanged. Such was the life of recon & elimination, a division that was assured to erase those who wanted to be gone while others, they must vanish. It’s all customary, business talk that leads to nowhere, soft jests made at the expense of himself, cold eyes that matched the jade bracelet he seemed to stroke, touch, self soothing. “Oh, I should mention” his index finger, rubbed quickly against the skin of his thumb, a brief glint of roman numerals on each knuckle underneath large gemstones, snapping together.

    “I remember our last discussion, you had a bit of trouble with a rather pushy sales pitch from Biotechica, correct?” The decanter is left between them, acting as a piece to either delight in or set them apart, whatever it may be. Naoto doesn’t touch it, though the wine is just as sweet as the faint smell of nectar wafting from the bits of bare skin. “Well, whatever it was, apparently they were on my division's radar for some time. Long story short, it’s been handled, no need for thanks, your company is good enough. If you want to pay the bill I wouldn’t be opposed” nonsense, as if he would allow it, the need for all forms of control were done in a mannerism only that could be likened to surgical precision. It’s dark enough to give them privacy, subtle flirtations in dry wit, that was until he could feel the warmth between them exchange.

     Privacy that he assured they would have, jammers to block off any audio signals, recording devices, anything less was an amateur's mistake. It’s feather soft the exchange of their lips, he laughs sweetly & without a hint of shame, presses deeper. Slow, languid, deceptively tender for a man that was rumored to understand the root of violence, primal as it was contained & exercised with care. “So cute, I didn’t know corporate espionage gets your heart racing, I’ll remember that for next time” as the door slides open, he echoes for another bottle, another mocktail of overly bitter juice, laughter held between his ribs & in a split second, he nearly appears charmingly boyish. At ease, as if the darkly lit areas were more comforting than direct light.

@adrotans

His comment holds more truth than she'd like to admit. Compared to many residents of the hellhole known as Night City, she is far from being the most grotesque. Even compared to him, she's about as scary as a stray kitten. And it's not just her looks that lack the ability to strike fear into the hearts of those that are unlucky enough to earn her ire. The vulgarity she verbally spews is not a consistent stint of creative quips lashed from a barbed tongue; merely a vocabulary that would make even the saltiest sailor blush.

In reality, she should just shrug the comment off. Give a bit of a laugh and treat it like a joke; give him a playful shove as she does so. Because for one thing, it's coming from Kenshin. Ke who's ribbing varies from airy shit talk to calculated mutilation while always having an undercurrent cadence of teasing. Bastard probably wants a reaction anyways. It's not uncommon for him to strike a nerve or three. Yet this time it's more than just that.

Or maybe she's just mentally at the end of her rope.

His comment burrows through her skin, writhing and festering like maggots in carrion. It's not just stepping on an eggshell — it's stomping on it, grinding it down to dust in one swift motion.

Not intimidating equates to being underestimated; and that leads to the assumption of WEAKNESS. And she is not WEAK! Time and time again like an onryō, she's crawled out from the well with bleeding hands; dug her way from beneath the soil back to the realm of the living above. She has been like nettles – persistent in her thriving and survival despite the unfavorable conditions. Not a delicate blossom wilting at the slightest breeze.

Butterflies are a symbol of death and rebirth. The souls of the dearly departed. When she dies would she disintegrate into a cloud of them — a release of all the souls she's claimed?

The thing is, the blinding fury that flares up, V isn't sure if all of it is hers. The line feels blurred.

"I don't need to be fucking intimidating to gut a bitch. Or splatter skull sponges like fireworks." There's a guttural quality to her tone — rougher than usual, warbling as if a second voice is overlayed and mixed with her own. While her expression darkens, a fuchsia glow ignites in her optics. Her hand itches — the left one to be exact. It's that same hand that shoots out like a viper. The punch not aimed for the face (which is too high of a target currently) nor the throat. Gut is what she goes for.

hi… i love you… ok so i really had to think about this, but not in the ‘is the answer yes or no’ way, bcs the answer is yes just based on sakura’s maturation as a person and her current day-to-day, but i had to think a lot about the specific situations wherein her reneging on her honesty would be sth she could justify to herself, bcs at the end of the day she does value the truth a lot. especially in her profession, as you said -- working in the medical field and maintaining her veracity is sth she’s proud of- and thinks she has a right to be, considering the insane things she’s seen other doctors/scientists do/say in pursuit of medicine.

some backstory to start.

so for a long time, sakura operated under the modus that moral righteousness = following the rules. you were good if you followed the rules bcs the rules were there to help you and those around you. you listened to your elders and authority figures because they knew better, unquestionably. you never lied bcs lying was a show of bad character. 

mind you, this has nothing AT ALL to do with her being a haruno daughter -- harunos primarily center individualism and a person’s organic development in their environment ie. being responsible for discovering your own character, so all of sakura’s philosophies throughout her early-adolescence were a result of her surroundings, not her nucleus. the haruno clan has traditions, but it doesn’t have credos as they are. 

her identity as a paper ninja also attributed to this. sakura didn’t have mentors as a child. she had her parents as role models to look up to (until their passing), but very little of their parentship involved hands-on teaching sakura what sort of person she was meant to be, how she was meant to act, what was good and what was bad, etc. they gave her plenty of experiences early on in her childhood during her travels with them, but little in the way of direct/verbal guidance (bcs that was for sakura to initiate- if she wanted answers, she had to ask questions). 

there’s a possibility that might have changed in time as sakura’s character grew post-academy graduation and she started asking more questions about how things should be bcs she would have turned to her mother and father for guidance first and foremost, but her parents’ passing occurs in that short gap between the forming of team 7 and the chuunin exams/oro invasion and she never gets the opportunity.

the academy trains child soldiers and sakura has no secondary sources of guidance like the other clan kids do nor does she have any connections outside the academy (and remember, her parents are largely absent after sakura enrolls in the academy bcs they never stay in konoha long). as such, she turns to paper -- she memorizes the rules on ninja conduct, reads and examines textbooks and history books and relies on the written form to supplement her knowledge where she feels it lacking. 

these are her formative years. she’s brilliant and intelligent and knows how to interpret the information straightforwardly-- she believes these rules are correct because she has no one in her life to challenge them. she trusts that a dogma so long-persevering wouldn’t lead her astray, and why wouldn’t she? twisting the truth and manipulating the reader is bad, right? who would do that haha

*realizing how long this post will get if i just keep yapping* um. anyway… there’s also the theme of seconding that plays a big part in this. a major attributor to sakura’s reliance on such strict moral rules is how the narrative (ie. the author. but let’s use ‘narrative’ here to sound more professional and less hateful <3) likes to sideline her and leave her in the dark regarding a lot of key issues in the plot. it takes her so long to begin eschewing from the straight and narrow because she’s narratively never given the benefit of learning the truth and being trusted to make the ‘right’ conclusions. there’s a lot of half-truths and other characters taking advantage of her ignorance and manipulating her emotions, but few characters are ever actually straight-up with her. 

this is also why i made individualism such a core principle of the haruno clan btw. if the narrative won’t give her agency, i’ll make it a key feature of specifically her story <3

tying into the above point: the thing is, also, that there’s instances where sakura does lie, canonically, where she believes she’s doing the good thing by doing the bad thing, but let’s set those aside because they’re all situations where she’s under duress/other characters emotionally influenced her (ex. the fake confession scene the incels just looove to bring up as a gotcha to treat sakura like she’s a moral failure) and imagine a hypothetical situation where sakura (a grown sakura, mind you, and not a grieving fifteen year old) is the one making the decision to lie, uninfluenced.

ultimately, sakura’s character is unquestionably good- the characteristics she displays are the markers of a principled person and her beliefs are honorable. (that’s me as the writer saying that objectively btw haha) she doesn’t think she’s perfect (is actually hyper-critical of herself and nitpicks at everything she does) but she tries to do the best she can, always. the key here isn’t sakura’s honesty itself but how she uses her honesty. when she was young, she never lied because she believed lying was bad- a harsh truth was better than a kind lie on the simple basis that it was the truth. it was straightforward. 

as an adult, she thinks it all depends. on everything. what would be the merits of the lie? is it a momentary lie ie. it won’t have any long-lasting consequences? is it a harmless one? does telling the truth mean being unnecessarily cruel? does telling the truth even help anyone? white lies can be anything- there’s the tatemae aspect of japanese bonton, for ex., that sakura absolutely adheres to bcs sometimes being completely honest in certain situations means being rude, as well. the difference between then and now is that she doesn’t think lying is always wrong just because it’s not the truth. 

                 A MULTI SUNSET OF NEON GLISTENING IN THE DARKNESS; there’s a record that plays, genuine, old, he would leave it behind before slipping away. The coolness of the night infused with the damp aroma of rotting sea salt was strangely calming. Cheap cigarettes, a throwback to the days he was kept awake with thick coffee in the stomach & the bustling of residents, all of whom eagerly spoke of contracts, higher potential. Nothing has changed, Itsuki wants to believe, except the backdrop, the clientele, the same brand of smokes that erode the mechanical valves of his lungs. Damp hair, pulled back in a sleek ponytail, the holographic mask was discarded long ago, allowing the nature of his carved features to remain on display. A peculiar looking creature with slivers of liquid silver, he was not important to wear gold, organic lines that crinkle when he smiles, laughs, or lies - all in the same order. Black denim that was slung on his hips, a silk shirt, quickly buttoned with his organic hand concealing the myriad of patchwork scars - love bites, failed attempts to rid him of this life, all of whom he held no qualms in displaying.

     Was it his movements, quiet, pale, did they stir Kenshin awake? “I have a meeting in the morning” not that he would attend, the Good Doctor only ever showed up when he could bother to care, as long as the corporation continued to beat in an ecosystem of totality, they didn’t care what he did. Lest it bring them disgrace, then, it became an issue. The smoke dims as he grinds the end into the old humiliated ashtray, placing it upon the end table. They would meet like this, strange, in places they shouldn’t, having done so for years where it pulled at whatever emotions he kept at bay. Permafrost that was entangled in his core, not even top of the line heart could allow him a moment of weakness, it was cowardice, the inability to say what he desired now. Itsuki smiles, plastic, rigid, the type one would give in the midst of business exchanges.

          “It would look rather suspicious if I stumbled in smelling like the ocean, whatever body fluids we exchanged, don’t you think?” a gentle jest but his voice lacked amusement. There was no one else that could fill him with such delight, an utterly devoted obsession that spawned for too long, grotesque & genuinely filled with adoration. The words are different from before, spoken with intent that was fragile, where his mind always moving seemed to remain in a state of stasis. He was too old for hesitation, yet in the midst of each other’s company, there were times he felt himself second guessing, a fracture in the tightly composed persona that he controlled for what felt like eons. Warm lips, stained, bruised ever slightly from the previous moments of collusion reach to press against Kenshin’s forehead. How long would it take Arasaka to recognize his tracker was offline? Not long, a day if he was able to assure the ICE was thick that surrounded his neural system. Soft, unfathomably he was whenever their paths would cross, be it bullets, data collection, or playing coy whenever he cracked open the locks. Long locks of powder white, the natural hue of waves that fall, cascading & tickling as those eerie eyes remain unflinching, burning down.

          “We only have one day together, don’t become used to this indulgence” I love you, lodged in his throat like a knife that was threatening to open the skin, he wished to utter it so tenderly that it could repair & destroy what was left of him. The tip of his cool nose pressing against Kenshin’s cheek, dry laughter enmeshed with that quick wit, ever spry even as the passage of years continued on.  “Araska isn’t too keen on losing assets, they will think it’s a hostage scenario. In some sense they are correct, but, who remains to be the hostage is a mystery” deep rumbling, as if thunder itself cracked open when he laughed, it was the type he reserved for company he cared about. Thousands of soft kisses, the sharpness of his teeth, the worn expression that wished to be held as he urged for them to both rest.