caughtinanetwork | 03 - the morning after we talked all night of dreams, we stepped lightly

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tatara totsuka

03 - the morning after we talked all night of dreams, we stepped lightly - [Video]

[All that's shown on the feed at first is Tatara's face; there's a dark smudge followed by へーき、へーき (It's fine, it's fine) on his forehead, and he looks rather worried. There's also a monocle, mustache, and various tired lines painted onto his face.

But that's not the important part. There's a moment of rustling, then the SFC falls into his lap, showing that someone (Anna) has tied his coat into a bow, trapping his arms at his side.]

Can someone come untie me? I woke up like this.

[It looks like he's back in HOMRA now, though he has no idea when he got here.]

Has anything important happened?

[No one's left, right? ...King, Kusanagi-san, please don't hit him on the head for sleeping so much.]

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... Kuroh did?

[A nod.]

A while ago. Before we started calling him the Black Dog.

[He smiles.]

I only learned his name here. I think maybe he forgot about that time, when he saved some guy who was being chased by two thugs.

I see... before he knew me, even.

Though, really... I haven't even known him that long myself.

[It makes his connection to Kuroh a bit odd, all things considered.]

[Your current body killed the guy who helped your bodyguard recover from a fever. Yep, complicated.]

Did you two meet after...that night?

[That night is still not something he really wants to talk about, but...is that why Kuroh and Shiro met?]

... yes. Shortly after, in fact. He sought me out with the intention of killing me.

[...Well then. At least they ended up getting along.

He rubs the back of his head again.]

I'm very sorry for the trouble my friends caused the two of you.

[Maybe if he hadn't brought the camera with him that night...But there isn't any point in thinking about that.

It's fine, it's fine. It'll work out somehow...Right?]

It wasn't your friends that were the problem. I was used, and the one responsible for it didn't care what happened to me after that, just so long as I was out of the picture.

But they didn't give you any time to explain, did they?

[He's still going to apologize. If what he's guessed is correct, they did basically what he never wanted them to do; they forgot about the good times they had together and focused on revenge. He just wanted them to stay happy.

...That better not be why King lost his flames. K i n g. If his smile seems a little strained a little bit after, it's because of that.]

They didn't want to listen, no. But in the end it didn't matter anyway. Once I learned the truth of the Colorless King and what he had done, I knew it was up to us to destroy him.

Even... if that meant using their desire for revenge to accomplish it.

[Shiro had been taken away before he had ever found the two warring Kings, but his dream some months back showed him what he had expected was going to happen.

Did Mikoto lose his flames because of Shiro? He can't be completely sure, but that strained smile certainly says a lot.]

... I'm sorry. In some ways it was selfish of me, and I'm sorry I ever put anyone in that position.

[He shakes his head.]

If I'm right, you aren't the one who needs to apologize. ...Why is he such an idiot?

[What part of "Even as time passes and our paths part, I want you to continue to protect, without breaking, look straight ahead without looking back" is hard to understand? What part of "Your powers aren't made to destroy; they're made to protect" is hard to understand? Why didn't King understand what he meant? Was it really that hard to understand? He knew he was going to die; he didn't know when, but he knew. He just wanted King to stay with HOMRA, with the best family he'd ever had. Why didn't he listen?]

... you can't blame him completely, Tatara-san. Something had to be done. He would have kept on killing, kept on destroying if we hadn't worked together against the Colorless King.

And... I think in some way he knew that. Revenge might have been a motive for part of it, but he was also sparing anyone else the pain that he and the others went through when they lost you.

[He's quiet for a moment.]

I'm not mad that he killed him. I'm mad he probably got himself killed because he killed him.

[He tilts his head.] Does that make sense?

[He's mad that he put HOMRA through the pain of losing someone twice. Not that Mikoto killed the Colorless King. Making it so others don't have to go through that pain is kind of pointless if that very action makes your friends go through that pain again.]

Only a King can kill another King...

But I suppose that comes with a price, doesn't it?

And the Red King is too stubborn to let another King do it, even if one had offered.

[He sighs, smiling at the ground.]

Doesn't everything?

[It could probably be said that the price of his spending time with HOMRA was his death. Anna had told him that he wouldn't live very long if he stuck around Mikoto after all.]

... yes.

[Though the ultimate price, in Shiro's mind, was the unhappiness and pain he had brought to everyone. His research caused the events that took place over fifty years later, and to him that was opposite of what all of his hopes had been resting on.]

Tatara-san... I really am sorry. For everything.

Don't be. You didn't know what the Colorless King would do.

[The Colorless King was really the one who started the events with HOMRA, though that was only possible because of the research. What's that saying about good intentions again...?

And he wouldn't have met some of his friends, like Anna, Yata, Kamamoto, Saru-kun, Chitose, Dewa, Eric, Fujishima, Shouhei, and San-chan, if not for King becoming the Red King. Shiro really doesn't have anything to apologize for, in his mind.]

I didn't... but I'm still responsible in a large way.

[Anna mentioned that Shiro is the Silver King...]

Because you're the first King?

Yes.

First and Immortal. I've seen all the Kings since, the ones that lasted and the ones that fell.

[He's trying to tell you he's Older Than He Looks, Tatara.]

[Does that really matter? Anna was forced to be older than she looks. Shiro is Shiro, even if he's also Weismann.

Getting him to admit that that changes anything would be hard, Shiro.]

Then you're better prepared to make sure this doesn't happen again, right?

[If he really is immortal. Somehow he doubts he's let another King kill him before.]

[It does make him decades older than everyone he associates with though. He finds that odd, at times.]

To be honest I don't really know how to end what's already in motion.

[He doesn't tend to act like it though.]

That's what life is about, isn't it? Learning new things?

[He thinks you can do it, Shiro. If you try.]

[He acted like a big kid even before he was a King.]

Well yes... but my research has stagnated, and I wouldn't even know where to begin if I made it back.

[~~Don't most guys?~~ I mean...Weismann was a dork, yep.]

Why not from the beginning again? Maybe you missed something way back then.

[He was.]

It's possible. But all of that is gone now, anyway. The bombings saw to that.

03 - the morning after we talked all night of dreams, we stepped lightly - [Video]

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