...

dear battle panties,

i hate you.

that is all.

05.26.09

sadako forced me to eat lunch with her and akihiko-senpai today. 'n'
well, to be fair, she didn't force me to eat with him as much as she made me feel bad for not doing it, but...

i think it's been that way for a while. sadako's lunch, i mean. she eats with akihiko for part of it and then goes to visit me, later. i didn't think much about it, but i always wondered if it would be easier for us all to eat together, but... akihiko-senpai is so high-profile. i didn't want to bother him or sadako or anything.

but anyway, so, we ate lunch together. it was as quiet and tense as you would expect, because none of us talked very much. at least akihiko tried... he was nice enough. then sadako took a picture of us for some reason.

really! a picture! why? for what reason did she feel the need to whip out a camera and take a picture of us?

i'm onto your plot, sadako-senpai. >_>

but he doesn't like me at all...

after jumping her and forcing her to erase the picture, lunch was pretty much over. that's all that happened of interest today. but... erm, it went okay. i still don't think akihiko-senpai likes talking to me very much, but he was friendly, so maybe we can get to know each other better.

oh, and i went to health committee, too, but nothing interesting there.
except... edogawa creeps me out sometimes. ;n;

...well, anyway. i have homework and mlh to watch.

05.25.09

kaito visited at the dorm today. n_n

it was something that we arranged a while back, but i don't think i ever mentioned it. yukari-chan was discussing it with me when we went to the sweet shop the week before last (wow, it's been a while since I wrote an actual update, huh?) and so i told everyone that he was coming.

except akihiko-senpai. we don't talk much as it is, so it feels weird to mention it to him...

anyhow, so, when we got back to the dorm, yukari-chan and junpei-kun were already there. today was akihiko's recovery date, so he came back a little later than usual, but we all started to play truth or dare to pass the time. kaito didn't stay for too long, but he still managed to almost make himself sick while he was there... and akihiko-senpai. they were both eating raw eggs and doing cartwheels as part of their dares. whatever. if they want to ignore me and make themselves sick, that's their business >_<

i just wish they wouldn't anyway ;n;

everyone else started to come back and join in too, later, like shokora and minato. i think his visit went okay, though i could tell some of my dormmates didn't take to him... minato-kun especially was cold to him. but maybe that's how minato usually is. it's hard to tell sometimes. yukari-chan doesn't trust him either -- she even told me so -- but everyone was civil. he gave me a hug, too... we're friends, but... some of the things he does, i'm not sure what to make of them...

w-well, it was just a hug. i like hugs anyway. <3

animal meme

Cat:
[ ] - You take pleasure in fooling/tricking people
[x] - You're easily scared
[ ] - You hate getting dirty
[ ] - You can be really flirty when you want to
[x] - You keep your hair long
[ ] - You don't like getting wet unless you're bathing
[x] - You like to just lounge about
[ ] - You get annoyed easily
[x] - You like seafood.
[ ] - You can spend hours trying to make yourself look good.
Total for 'cat': 4

Dog:
[ ] - You're almost always smiling
[x] - You're nice to most people and like to get to know people before you judge them
[x] - You rarely resort to violence
[x] - You would NEVER hurt your friends
[ ] - You really like tickling people, just to see if they're ticklish
[ ] - You stand up for others.
[x] - You would tell everyone that you love them if it wasn't so hard on your reputation
[x] - You don't get angry easily.
[x] - You share your food with people who are out of lunch money
[x] - Your favorite color is either blue, yellow, or purple
Total for 'dog': 7

Fish:
[x] - You're really good at swimming.
[x] - You like to swim
[x] - You like sparkly things
[x] - You are really ticklish
[ ]  - You can fit through almost any space.
[ ] - You've gotten stuck in a net or/and rope before
[ ] - You're romantically lost
[ ] - You're really good at keeping a straight face when you need to.
[ ] - You aren't very drawn to people who "stand out"
[ ] - You can wear just about anything
Total for 'fish': 4

Bug:
[ ] - You like to wear bright colors
[ ] - You like vegetables.
[ ] - Your entire life revolves around sparkly things
[x] - You always worry about falling prey to bullies/gossipers
[x] - You're terrified of things that other people aren't scared of
[x] - You aren't afraid of some things that other people are terrified of
[ ] - You have been told that you lack emotion
[x] - You keep your opinions to yourself
[x] - You can be social one minute and a loner the next
[ ] - You are a good impersonator and/or you like to dress up as things you're not
Total for 'bug': 5

Rodent:
[ ] - You're always prepared for something bad to happen
[x] - You make little piles of things in your room that your friends/parent(s)/guardian(s) claim is 'unorganized'
[x] - You run rather than fight from danger
[ ] - You designate people to hide behind
[x] - You say "uh/er/um" a lot
[ ] - People have told you that you talk really fast before
[x] - Sometimes you stutter
[x] - You like to have pets
[ ] - You far prefer animals to people
[ ] - You can't trust very many people
Total for 'rodent': 5

Deer:
[ ] - You are prone to spelling errors
[x] - You have been told that you are pretty before in any given way
[x] - You are modest
[x] - You would rather run from a fight than actually fight
[x] - You would protect the ones you love
[x] - When you get really frustrated you cry
[x] - It breaks your heart to see ads about animal cruelty
[x] - You love your friends but sometimes they're mean to you
[x] - You never say so, but you think that you're kind of pretty
[ ] - When you were little you wanted to be a princess/prince.
Total for 'deer': 8

Horse:
[ ] - You personally think that you are pretty
[ ] - You always have boys/girls asking you out.
[ ] - Sometimes you aren't very smart in decision making, and have some regrets following you around in the back of your mind
[x] - You hang out with an exclusive group that isn't open to just anybody
[ ] - You never leave the comfort of your own home without your makeup on/your hair brushed
[ ] - You are constantly altering your body
[ ] - You are quick to judge people
[ ] - You're always up to date on the gossip going around
[ ] - You take ridiculously good care of yourself
[x] - The only thing you like about school/College/Work is having friends there
Total for 'horse': 2

so i'm a deer...?

awww 'u'

my little horsie!

i discovered the adorable that is mlh today.

i've heard of it before when surfing the internet, but i didn't think too much of it -- some of the fads lately haven't been worth checking out (-ahem-... twilight) and i figured it would pass as quickly as it came, but it hasn't. a lot of artists on dA have been posting related artwork, and i've seen it hit a few tumblrs... so i checked it out myself.

it is so cute 'u' i watched an episode or two, and all of the characters are so endearing, but there's one i especially loved; her name is fluttershy. she's very sweet and soft-spoken, and she even has a pet bunny for a best friend! what's not to like~? <3

i've got a picture of her here.

the art style for the show is really cute, too. i understand the fad... though i'm still confused about why most of the show's fanbase is comprised of middle-aged men...

that's slightly concerning '-'

i'm not sure if anyone else in the dorm knows about it, or is interested (not likely), so i'll have to settle for dragging rumiko-chan along into it... i'd hate to bother the others -- it is still a children's show, when you get down to it.

hm. now i want to call her right away. n_n I'll write again later!

sweet shop~

still the week before exams. things have definitely been calming down. kaito has wanted to hang out with me most of this week, so i've been doing a lot with him, but today yukari-chan took me to the sweet shop!

i love the sweet shop! 'u'

yukari-chan told me about these delicious strawberry rice cakes that the sweet shop had. she gets them a lot. since she did, she shared them with me, and they were just so good! i think i've had them a lot before, because we ate lots of mochi back in hawaii, but the ones at the sweet shop are really amazing. i took a picture of the rice cake i was eating with my cellphone;

it was just so yummy!

we chatted a lot while we were there. at first i didn't want to get anything because yukari-chan had to pay for all of this... i still don't have any money... but she insisted that i get whatever i wanted, and that i could pay her back later. we split up just about everything between us, so i ordered some kansai-style sakura mochi and some creampuffs which we ate while we chatted. my mouth waters just thinking about it >w< I was really happy to be able to visit there again, i'm glad yukari-chan took me. she didn't eat as much as i did (mostly just the strawberry rice cakes), but... i hope she had fun, too.

all right, so, i didn't take these last two pics, but i had to look them up! don't they look yummy?

other than that, i think everyone is relaxing from all the stress that's been going on lately, especially with exams coming. or, well, some of us can't really relax with those coming up. junpei always talks about how much he dreads them, and i hear shokora and yukari talk a lot about how they need to start studying more so that they can make good grades. minato doesn't seem too bothered by it. the seniors both do a lot of studying, too.

i should probably do the same. i'll update again soon!

05.10.09

i can hardly believe i'm alive today. i've spent all of it appreciating that i'm here to breathe the air, walk the streets, feel the sunshine. what if things had been even slightly different? we'd all be dead.

last night, we had a mission involving an immensely powerful shadow like the one that attacked the dorm about a month ago. none of us were really expecting it -- though minato-kun said he 'had a bad feeling' and tried to prepare us for it. i ended up falling asleep, but while i was, mitsuru found something.

...akihiko-senpai had to wake me up. i guess i was being difficult, because when i did, i saw that he must have slipped into my room and was carrying me up to the command office. i got all flustered and ended up running away after he accidentally dropped me. /sigh

from what i heard at the time, mitsuru had only pinpointed the shadow's location. it was on the monorail that we use to commute back and forth from the dorm and school, the one that runs from iwatodai to tatsumi port island. we left to get there, and since it was within walking distance, it didn't take very long... mitsuru said she would provide backup from the station and that we would have to walk on the monorail tracks to get to it. minato was chosen to lead us again (i think we'll just be keeping him appointed as our leader) and we went off to find the shadow before it could do any damage.

getting there wasn't hard. in fact, it was almost nice to be able to walk on the monorail tracks. it was quiet and peaceful, so long as you could ignore all the blood and that giant moon. i thought it was weird that when we made it to the monorail car where mitsuru sensed the presence, the doors were open... train car doors are usually fastened shut during the trip, right? but we had to get on no matter what, so we did.

we all had enough time to get on before the shadow trapped us in the train car. that was frightening. mitsuru told us to be careful and make our way through it, which we did. at first there weren't that many shadows on it. then one popped up by itself, and ran away. if there's one thing these shadows don't usually do, it's run away. most of us knew that the shadows must have been up to something, but despite that, junpei insisted that we could handle one measly shadow and ran off to kill it even when minato told him not to.

nobody wanted to go after him. it was reasonable, i know... splitting up our forces would only worsen our chances of survival if a bunch of shadows ambushed us at once. but i felt bad for junpei. i wanted to make sure he didn't get hurt. i ran after him, which seemed to warrant a bunch of shadows popping out of hiding to fight me on the way, but i eventually made it to him. we struggled against a trap of at least six shadows all attacking him at once -- probably what that first shadow had been leading him into -- until the others caught up and we regrouped safely.

then the monorail started moving again.

it wasn't that the dark hour had ended, but that the shadow in control of the monorail was starting to move it. none of us were sure why... but then we realized it was because the shadow was going to try and make the monorail collide with another train. for whatever reason, it would go to lengths as drastic as sacrificing itself just to be sure that it killed us. it was our job to kill it before it managed to do that, not only to save ourselves, but to save all the passengers on the monorail and avoid mass public panic.

it was terrifying, i won't deny that. but i wasn't as scared as i thought i should be. i don't know... i just wasn't too scared. i tried to stay calm with minato and follow his orders so that we could make it through. we made it to the actual source of the control within a few minutes -- i think it was called the 'priestess arcana shadow' -- and we had to kill it in order to get to the command room, because it was blocking off the only path to the room. we had to fight with the monorail crashing ahead, with mitsuru constantly coming in to remind us that we only had a few minutes left to stop the monorail before it crashed and crushed us all to death...

i don't remember much after that. i mean, we fought it... but one of my knives stabbed right into it's eye. it screamed.

...

we went to a store to get a treat before we went back to the dorm. shokora-chan paid for mine... that was really nice of her. she's so kind to me. she's so open and friendly, too. i wish i could be like her.

i went straight to bed when we got back to the dorm. we were all exhausted.

exams are coming up soon. today was pretty normal, but i wanted to update about that since it was on my mind. i'm not sure what good this blog has been for aside from chronicling my life. i just never got into using my computer for very much. it's a small netbook laptop, hah, ametoki (my brother) got it for me before i left to go live in the dorms. that was a few years ago. all i've done with it is write down notes and surf the web, really... i'm sure i could do more with it.

but i digress. i should probably study some while it's on my mind. i'll try to update again soon. ^_^

05.06.09

been a while since my last update! not much was going on, so i forgot.

the day after my last one was frightening though. it was our second trip to tartarus. since we'd been there before, it wasn't as scary to go in and fight the shadows; we were a little used to the routine and minato-kun led us progressively higher into the tower. but after traveling up a few floors, we ran into this dome-like floor where mitsuru said she felt a really powerful presence of shadows.

that was a little disturbing, all things considered. none of us were confident that we could take down a monster like the one that attacked the dorm last month. it turns out that it wasn't a monster like that -- but it was five of these normal-tier shadows called venus eagles coming at us all at once.

if we hadn't gotten any practice before this battle, i don't think we would have made it. we managed to avoid panicking and scattering, which would have only made the eagles' job of killing us easier. we all stayed calm, shokora-chan used her persona to illuminate the floor, yukari-chan healed us as needed and the rest of us whittled at the birds as much as we could. it was a really hard battle. we all got beaten pretty bad.

i've never been able to heal with my persona, either. but during that fight, seeing everyone hurt and knowing that yukari-chan wouldn't be able to heal everyone at once, i felt like i had to do something. when i summoned, i actually healed everyone. i remembered mitsuru telling me that if you really wished something, it might manifest in the power of your persona. and it happened. she was right.
but the healing didn't come without repercussions. the skill that i used didn't just heal, it took the wounds from everyone else and inflicted them on me instead. i... i passed out, i guess. when i woke up, the eagles were dead and everyone was around me, seeing if i was okay.

after what happened the day before, i was... surprised? why were they so worried? i mean, maybe they didn't talk to me all that much, but the fact that they were worried had to mean they cared a little bit, right? and shokora-chan, she hugged me she was so happy.
god, i tear up thinking about it. it was just a hug. ;n; but it meant so much.

i would have written about what happened back then, but i was way too tired. i went to sleep and kind of got caught in the motions of life and going to school.

i wanted to write about today because i hung out with kaito some more, though.
i felt bad when he came up to me after school. he was so happy to see me and he wanted to hang out with me. he said he missed me over the break, too. (we had monday and tuesday off ^_^) i thought that was sweet of him, if a bit... odd. is it rude for me to think he's a little odd? we're almost total strangers and yet he's still so nice! ...i thought, maybe it feels so weird because i'm keeping him at a distance. and if he really wants to be my friend... even if he doesn't know the real me, even if he would never be my friend if he did... i felt like i should try to be more outgoing with him, too.

i can be his friend. i can play this game. it makes me feel normal. it... gives me someone to talk to, someone who likes me for who i am -- on the surface.

i offered to go to boxing club with him. he has it from tuesdays to thursdays every week. akihiko-senpai is the captain of it, too, but he wasn't there, probably because of his ribs. i still feel bad about that. he seems so miserable all the time because mitsuru won't let him go anywhere until it's healed.

i was really scared about going to boxing club at first, but kaito reassured me that everything would be fine, and that they would like me. the boys there were pretty nice. they stared quite a bit, but i figured that was just because i was new and they must have wondered why i was there... none of them really introduced themselves to me except for this boy named tamotsu. he was really friendly, like kaito.

i ended up kind of regretting my offer to go in the end. i felt so weird and misplaced there -- i knew it was my suggestion to go, too, so i felt bad for wanting to leave. and then everyone on the boxing team decided that, since akihiko wasn't there, they were going to spar. as in, fight each other. i really didn't want to watch them do that. i hate fighting. i hate it so, so much. but... watching people fight, while it really upsets me, isn't as terrifying as being hit, and i knew they wouldn't seriously hurt each other... i couldn't really leave, either. so i thought, since i'm here, i might as well make myself useful.

when they did happen to get wounded in the fight -- they would stop sparring after that, thank god -- it became sort of like my job to go in and fix them up, make sure they were okay, give them some water and sit them down. it wasn't completely necessary because i'm sure they could do all of that on their own, but it gave me something to do, and the members of the boxing team seemed to appreciate it.

all in all, the day was kind of... stressful. things ended up okay, but i really don't want to go to boxing club tomorrow, too. i'm exhausted and stressed, all my nerves are frayed. i'm not used to all of this social interaction. i'm so used to coming to school, doing my work, slipping through the hallways and going home by the end of the day. i'm shaking a little, too. ugh... it's pathetic of me to be this way, isn't it? forcing myself to talk to people, to include myself in things that involve people even where it makes me uncomfortable. but it'll get better eventually, right? i think if kaito-kun keeps spending time with me and i keep trying to make myself more open and friendly, it'll work eventually.

i'll do it! i'll be a more outgoing person! as long as kaito helps me.
and as long as i get a break tomorrow. i really don't want to go back to boxing club until i've had a chance to calm down from everything.

but i'll do it! 'u'