#ic:yasu

Crouched, with his hand hovering over his own hilt, Taikyuu is ready to pounce if an enemy showed itself... but no.

It's just a rabbit.

He sighs as well, though it's more in a bit of frustration (and perhaps a bit of embarrassment) than relief.

He'd heard the rustling and was immediately on edge about it, and then when it had stopped, he'd assumed whatever it was had heard him point it out, and that had lent more credence to his determining it was a hidden foe. Now he just feels like an idiot.

Not to you. Not worth my time

Nagasone is too nice. To Taikyuu, to Hachisuka, to everyone. Taikyuu can hardly fathom how he can handle himself in such a way when the tantou knows damn well he would fly off the handle. And the way he (and the others, of course) tries to make him feel included in the Shinsengumi goings-on...

There is so much of Taikyuu that feels like he should hate Nagasone, fight with him and butt heads with him at every turn. He can say it has something to do with their former masters, and maybe it does, but the uchigatana's honest-to-goodness goodness makes it so damn hard to hate him properly.

The enkai has pretty much come to a close by now. His brother and Kashuu have tottered off to their room to get some sleep. Kunihiro has walked a sloshed Kane back to theirs.

Taikyuu has been simmering in these strange conflicting feelings for a few hours by now, swirling around his mind in his drunkenness.

It's just him and Nagasone now. He wonders why Nagasone is still here, and then he remembers, Hachisuka will probably have something bitchy to say if he comes in late and wakes him up, he assumes.

"Are you feeling alright?" He hears Nagasone ask, and it sort of pulls him aside from his seething.

There he goes again. Caring.

"Just... Thinking about how much I wish I could hate you," he grumbles-- but it doesn't sound as mean in tone as the words do. It's more of a sigh, a pout almost. He doesn't see Nagasone's reaction, because he feels himself about to do something probably stupid and reckless and so he finds Kane's cup that he'd left mostly-full. Taikyuu snatches the cup, downs its contents, and then turns to face Nagasone again.

He stares at him, breathing heavily for a moment, before practically crawling over him and pressing his lips to Nagasone's.

"Huh?"

When Sayo gets his attention, Taikyuu isn't ready for the question posed to him. It takes a moment to register what exactly he means-- because in his mind, of course there's no danger where they're going.

But he gets there, of course, and his confused furrowed expression softens just a little-- Sayo probably knows Taikyuu enough by now to notice it.

Taikyuu's amethyst eyes stay locked on to Yamatonokami, applying a silent pressure that clearly seems to work. They flick away for a brief moment, though as his brother admits he's worried he'd be upset. He feels bad, but... well, he can't blame him.

But he's still, and while his expression is intense, it's more of curiosity and concern. If Yamatonokami, of all people, keeps a secret... he's got his reasons.

He reaches over to pick up one of the ends of the cloth.

It's that dream again. He has it somewhat often, but today it's seemed to linger more strongly with him. It's hard for him to pinpoint why exactly-- it's a great dream, enthralling even, save for the murky vagueness of the spear he knows he was close to for so long. Perhaps it's less the dream itself and more the fact he'd had to wake up from it.

Either way, he's snappish and irritable today to a higher degree than usual, and so he's been trying to stay by himself as much as possible.

That night, after he expected most others to be done there, he had taken a rather long shower, using the time to try and relax and just let go of some of his tension. He's particular about his appearance, after all, and putting in extra steps tonight should've been a good way to re-center himself.

Instead, he just felt kind of... sad.

He'd changed into his night clothes and sat down against the wall, under the impression he'd be unbothered here at this hour.

He'd been wrong, of course. An encounter with Izuminokami in which Taikyuu's efforts to repel him have failed.

Taikyuu is not having it. He couldn't exactly stop Yamatonokami from charging in like an idiot (he thinks, but the reality is he is prone to do similar things), and while his brother did impressive work in cleaning up, he's taken a lot of damage and they're still far from being in the clear.

"Bullshit," Taikyuu hisses, poised to launch himself at the nearest retrograde soldier that makes a move. "Like I'm going to let you do all the work! Hold them off, I'm gonna start clearing some of them out--" He catches the blade of one soldier on his own, but he's ready. He diverts their sword and strikes through him easily. But that's just one. Hopefully if he takes the brunt of it from here on, they can defeat them quickly enough to avoid any further injury.

Butting heads with Hasebe, burning lunch while on kitchen duty, and just in general being antsy after a still-unbroken stretch of not being dispatched for a sortie... Taikyuu is already at the end of his rope by the time of his run-in with this visiting saniwa.

He's trying very, very hard to not lash out at this sage, this guest, but when he suggests cutting his hair, about seventy percent of his restraint goes out the window.