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[ A predictable vague rise of something vaguely upset, but that's just how Tokinaga does. He'll try to do as instructed, lying down in this far too large-ass bed. Four people is way too many already.

He folds his fingers over his tummy, staring up at the ceiling and tries not to think about how gaudy this damn place is. ]

Like this?

"Yeah, just like that. You're doing good."

[ Just a bit of encouragement in case Tokinaga feels nervous.

Hien doesn't need physical contact, but it could help ground them both, so he reaches out to put a hand over Tokinaga's forehead. Alright, boy. What are you unaware of about yourself? Anything that has to do with Tokinaga's identity, self everything, desires, etc will be looked for. Yippee. ]

...

[ He feels the touch to his forehead, but just one thing, a little pushback of hesitance before he can dig. ]

You wouldn't judge me, right?

[ Ah. Hien doesn't take his hand off the forehead for a moment, but it moves to gently pat his head instead. ]

"I'm the last sort of person to judge anybody. I'll want to understand, but I won't judge you."

...

[ He hopes Hien is telling the truth.

He lets him in, then -- starting from the superficial layers of what they talked about. Hien sees flashes, images -- colours that reflect themselves on the gaudy hotel-room walls. A young Sachiyuki running through fall leaves with a dog almost the same size as him, whose image remains his profile picture on his social media to this day. The same boy in the back-seat of a car, sandwiched between two girls, voice at a pitch as he asks his mother in the passenger's seat to repeat the question while his father drives them to the park. Just barely older, sitting in the back of a classroom, hand on his cheek and peering curiously at all his classmates before him.

They grow up. Tanutanu isn't nearly the same size as him anymore, maybe around half. He meets his older sister's boyfriend, and he thinks that's a pretty nice fellow. All his classmates ever want to talk about is who's dating who, and they ask him his theories. He's a little confounded by the game, but he plays along, because it's just a question of who likes people better than others, right? His mother and father ask him too, if there's anybody he thinks is particularly cute. Maybe he should start thinking about this.

Tanutanu doesn't run as much as he used to, but it's okay when he can rest his head on Sachiyuki's lap. His older sister's wedding was yesterday, and he'd never felt so much joy in the air, it was electrifying. He doesn't think his sister's ever shined brighter, and he watched his mother cry tears of pride and joy. Love is a wonderful thing, isn't it? Maybe he should think about getting a girlfriend and about marriage too, if only so that he can also feel and share this joy with everyone around him.

Apparently, people physically feel something when they're in love. Not just that stirring of the heart, butterflies in their stomach -- but somewhere deeper below that, a heat of want and desire, to love through the body. He'd realised that he didn't quite understand that when he was young, but it wasn't a big deal. And then, much later, he realised it wasn't just that he didn't get it, it was just that he didn't have it at all. He tried to imagine it but he couldn't picture it, that unique 'love' that everybody talked about that was different in some way from the way he loved his dog, loved his friends, loved his family. Was that physical desire the only difference...?

The colour of the world distorts. The soft hues begin to dim and grey out like a cloudy day. Sachiyuki's grown up to Tokinaga, and he continues on with his life. He'd come to the realisation, at some point, that if he wanted that precious love and union that so many others around him had, then it couldn't come without sacrifice of either himself or the other person. It's a horribly sad thought, he thinks, a distancing and lonely feeling the longer he lingers on it so he tries not to. He tries not to...

Does Hien want to delve deeper? ]

[ Hien processes what he sees, taking in all the information. This was what Tokinaga told him before, but it's nice to see it like this too, to reconfirm. Also, Tanutanu. Cute dog.

He delves deeper. ]

[ The scenery continues on, smearing gradients of desaturated colour on the walls. In another perspective, it looks like how light pierces through the waves of the sea, sinking deeper, deeper below. Hurtling past the mesopelagic, into somewhere underneath.

Colour is all gone, suddenly. Space and time distort so hopelessly, so meaninglessly. Everything feels so utterly fake. Like Tokinaga is sitting all alone, the sole audience of a theatre whose film reel keeps skipping, showing the same event -- complete and utter collapse. There's no way forward from here, and there's no strength to leave.

Except for one thing. In the screen, his attention is taken by one, singular thing. It's so damn beautiful. It's a distant dot in the horizon, and yet, focusing on it carries every sensation on the wind. It's every colour at once, every atom of existence and in-between. It's the scales of a morpho butterfly. It's the cell structure of the underside or a leaf. It's a cluster of crimson berries, one side lit so bright by the morning sun. It's a close-up on a cat's eye, every thread in the iris a whole entire galaxy in rainbow. It's pollen on every flower petal, still vines snaking with ethereal patterns that whisper so seductively.

It calls like a siren and offers to catch him (Tokinaga? Hien?) in its arms, clasp tight in talons and drag him further, further, into the cold abyss. His mind is melting into the lightless black, but he can't give a single care in the world, because it was the most beautiful thing in the universe.

Does Hien want to keep delving? ]

[ Hien was sort of expecting depression, but man. This is pretty bad. He understands viewing the world in such dull colors though--he's experienced it himself at some point. Depersonalization, he wonders.

The object that catches Tokinaga's eye is fascinating, especially from Tokinaga's point of view with all those sensations that are so vivid, but then. What... happens here? It feels like Tokinaga was lured and caught inside a trap. Hm.

He keeps delving. ]

[ It catches Hien in its grasp. It's the beautiful hands of a young woman, pristine and so-very clear. It pulls him lower, closer, closer into the folds of petals and vines, where it's warm (so cold), so safe (so dangerous), so lovely (so alone).

The grasp turns into claws and he's yanked through glass, fragments shattering into a million pieces. For a brief second, a million eyes tear through the dark, lit up by their hollow, triangular pupils. They all look at him. They all look only at him.

Then they all rush to seize him, and the pain digs deep in ways more than physical. It feels like being torn apart from the inside out, pulling at his guts, smiling wide at his terror with bloodstained teeth grit in abject hatred. Tokinaga's body seizes in the real world, breath quickening, heartrate rapidly rising. He feels tense down to the bone, and already he's struggling to breathe, one leg kicking in protest. Red and white streaks criss-cross the room by design, a visual display of the pain, the fear, the suffering wrought upon him -- and one more thing.

His first-ever spark of desire. ]

[ Ah.

Hien is aware of both sides at once, so he keeps a warm hand on Tokinaga's, trying to firmly hold it to tell him that it'll be okay. It's okay. Also because goddamn, Hien feels it too, because of the weekly effect. He forces himself to calm down. ]

"Tokinaga... you have to breathe. Slowly. Count to three. You're in a room in Luxuria. You're on the bed. Only I'm here with you. Don't forget that. Can you count how many dots are on the ceiling for me?"

[ He doesn't even know if there are dots on the ceiling. Anything to keep Tokinaga distracted that makes him suffer like this.

Back to the delving, okay. Being shredded? Just a normal weekday for Hien, so he's fine with this personally, but he knows it's definitely not for Tokinaga. And he wonders... what is this thing? An IPO that Tokinaga talked about? Did it mess with his senses? Is there some sort of brainwash mechanism going on over here? Hien tries to see if he can make sense of that by attempting to find the answers to those questions.

It's not that he's judging for the spark of desire and what caused it, but he wants to eliminate if this truly came from Tokinaga or if he was influenced by something. Even if it's from Tokinaga himself in the truest sense, he doesn't care about judging him. That's not important right now. ]

[ Unfortunately, it doesn't do a whole lot. He hears instructions through the mounting panic but it's like he's hearing it through several thick layers of static, mentally chasing the dissonant sound of Hien's voice -- so strange, so distinct -- but he misses, slipping worse into the mire. It hurts, somehow, so very awfully, like he's having a heart attack. He's felt it hundreds, thousands of times before by now, knowing calling an ambulance would be meaningless. He grasps wildly at the hand in his, a bit too tight, feeling his own hand getting crushed under his grip and it hurts and he doesn't like it but anything is better than this pain that he so horribly hates and yet his body responds so positively to it, feeling the shameful flush in his neck, ears, face.

Because Hien follows the path, though at this depth, it's more a cacophonous maze than a path. Calendar pages whoosh by, steps are taken by too many pairs of legs. A corpse sinks into the sea, but glittering amber floats on the surface. He finds himself sitting in a train with a shadowy figure beside him, then traveling on foot after it into an abandoned stretch of land past the fence. Pink fog creeps in, so sweet and full-body paralysing. Everything hurts, so so so badly, and above him he sees --

So that's what they call a god. Every thing in existence, all light concentrated in a way that breaks human understanding. It's terror. It's beauty. It's horrific fear. It's absolute freedom. It's both, so much at once. I'm going to die --

But he doesn't. Somehow he doesn't, but there's a whisper of a shadowy thing looking at him from where it perches at the foot of his bed with a permanent grin.

"It's a bug."
May the person I love, love me as I love them. ]

[ BEGONE, CREATURE!! Hien shoots a glance at the foot of the bed to see if it's actually there. Jesus tapdancing Christ on hot rocks.

But all this. Hien is at a loss for words, but he frowns. He needs more information. He wants it so badly. Tokinaga doesn't deserve this. Why does this happen? Why do these sorts of things happen to good people? Why? And what the hell is that thing.

He tries looking for the answer. Will the depths provide him with one? Will the shadowy figure? ]

[ Despite how strangely unpersonal everything else has been up to this point, here, this shadowy thing seems to see Hien too. It's seemingly equally as surprised that Hien has come this far and be able to perceive it, but no more.

It leaps in a flurry of feathers, and a taloned claw shoves him (in the face) backwards. Out. Out you go. Because Hien will not stop ■■■■'s wish from coming true. ]

[ OW?????? bitch

Hien is forcibly booted out and urgently checks on Tokinaga's condition. Is he still panicking? Is he still in pain? He gets out a small bottle of industrial-level painkillers, even if... it might not prove to be fruitful. He has to try something. ]

"Tokinaga...!"

[ The moment he's let go he's

Well, he's scrambling and crawling to the bathroom, which surely there is one in a love hotel room that is possibly designed for threesomes and above. The sound of retching soon follows. ]

[ Okay! Cool!!! (not cool)

Hien immediately follows Tokinaga into the bathroom regardless of what's happening right now. ]

"Sorry. I'm sorry. I didn't there would be such a strong pushback--"

[ He tries to rub Tokinaga's back. Please. For the love of god. He gets out a bottle of water. ]

Edited 2025-12-11 17:09 (UTC)

[ His heart's beating way too loud like it'll burst out of his chest any second now, and all four of his limbs feel so numb yet painful, like when they fall asleep but about a hundred times worse. Despite that, there's a full-body tremour that's practically a rattle, and he still feels too hot, and the inside of his mouth tastes bitter. He slumps over the bowl. He came prepared for this, but really -- it didn't make it much easier, not that he expected it to. He makes a small sound at best, just vaguely aware enough that somebody else is there. It's his best attempt at a plead to leave. ]

[ Hien just stays there for a bit, but he understands. He leaves the bottle of water there in case Tokinaga would need it. After that, he goes to wait on the bed.

Feels bad, man. ]

[ So nice of him... I'm sorry that Hien is probably going to have to wait quite a bit until his symptoms die down, at least enough that Tokinaga can more or less function.

It's not subtle anyway in the slightest. It's whenever the physical pain and the other sensations underneath it subside, and so do the stuffy sound of sobs. ]

...Hien...?

[ He doesn't really come out, he's talking through the door. ]

[ At the call of his name, he immediately bolts to the bathroom, but stops in front of the closed door. ]

"Hey, I'm still here. Are you feeling better? Do you need any help?"

No. It's okay.

[ By the sound of it, he's sat on the ground with his back to the door. ]

...Sorry.

"What are you sorry for... that was a perfectly normal response."

[ Hien sighs. He gets the feeling that the back is against the door, so he doesn't try opening it. ]

No it's not.

...It's the entire point of why I asked you to look.

[ Added on as though to soften his own refute. ]

"Throwing up after being subjected to that? I'd say that's pretty normal."

[ He didn't feel like he got the direct answer he wanted from peeking in there, so he'll just ask Tokinaga himself. ]

"... Do you think it came from yourself or because you were affected by that IPO?"

[ All he knows is that gods are connected to IPOs, and that's how it was referred to so maybe. This was an IPO. Jesus christ. ]

...The IPO. My body was changed by it.

[ The 'bug' in question that was introduced to his system... ]

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