u_can_have_it_4_a_song | Reaching Out [Katsuya]

It's plain to see that the answer to that mystery is "he doesn't."

"Your recent falling out with Ms. Willis," Schön observes.

Better than he used to! Verity has had a phenomenally good influence on his personal care regimens.

"Among other things. I haven't quite figured out how to approach her. But she seems better than ever so..."He shrugs. "I'm glad. For her." Check the gun, check his pockets. Good, he has a chakra drop or two on him, in case things get messy. Helios is on high alert, and though the officer is conversational, his gaze is flitting from one alleyway to the next.

Konan is never much trouble as a district. It's always his first to sweep.

"Surely you didn't come out here all this way to see if I was alright?" Katsuya raises an eyebrow Schon's way. "I've survived much worse than a fight with someone I loved."

"Mm. Are you soliciting opinions on that subject," he asks, "or determined to go it alone?"

Perhaps Katsuya's wariness is contagious, for Schön's gaze sweeps from one dark corner to another, his thumb occasionally rubbing thoughtfully on the head of his cane, a bent stalk of bamboo rendered in silver.

"Did I not?" he replies to Katsuya's question. "Suffice to say, you have inspired concern."

"I'm not determined to go anything alone, but if it's a surcharge to obtain advice, I will politely abstain." Katsuya bobs his head politely. "I am already more indebted to you than I would like to be." Oh, Verity...yeah Katsuya should probably ask her if she wants that transaction cancelled. Add it to the pile of topics he's unsure of how to approach.

"I'm sorry to have caused you trouble." The officer is sincere in his apologies, even though his gaze is focused on the streets. They don't have anything to worry about until they venture further from the district the good officer calls home. If Schon intends to follow for longer, he may need to stay close. Or not, Katsuya won't stop him from fighting if it comes to that. "It certainly wouldn't be the first time I've unwittingly upset a lady I had feelings for."

Obliviousness isn't a crime, but at some level, it ought to be.

"No charge," he soothes, free hand rising in a placating gesture. "I simply thought to suggest that you might begin with an apology. From what I have heard, you ended the conversation--and perhaps the relationship--rather abruptly."

"A short walk and a taste of the Sumaru air is little trouble, Sergeant Suou." Schön hasn't fallen out of step, yet, nor asked protection. If he feels he needs it, perhaps he'll call in one of those favors. "Nor would you be the first man to suffer a certain myopia in matters of the heart."

"I did. I couldn't handle what wasn't true....or what was. But I wish...there had been more communication before it had gotten to that point." He's really not cut out for this sort of thing. Maybe that's what it is. He's better at problems he understands. "It would have happened eventually anyway. Her condition makes my entire culture seem upsetting for her."

Still. It could have gone better. He could have done better. But hindsight does him no good, now.

"It's..better. This way. She seems happier already."

The thin man tsks quietly. "Ever careless with your words, Sergeant Suou. I would say that one of these days the habit will get you into trouble, but I am too late. Whose fault is the lack of communication, hm? Who walked away from the attempt at it?"

After a few steps, and a moment's quiet, he adds an editorial. "You should not wallow in self-pity for the fight you started about mistakes you made. Blaming Verity, your culture, a lack of communication--you do very well at looking everywhere but inward."

That last line of Katsuya's gets a dour look. "Her life has seen many changes of late; do you think your presence, or absence, is the only one that might affect her? She has only begun recently, in the whole of her life, to sleep restfully--of course she seems happier. How chipper were you when last you'd had seven hours' sleep in seven days?"

"I know." It's quiet, small, and short. He's aware of his mistakes. Painfully so. And Schon is not the first to point them out, nor will he be the last. He didn't want to argue. Didn't want to fight. Walking away was a fight on it's own. A nonverbal one he couldn't lose, because she wasn't there to do anything about it.

He has to live with that choice. Waiting to face it hasn't exactly been doing him any good.

"You're incorrect about one thing, however. I'm happy that she's doing better. In general, I mean. My presence has nothing to do with that. She's safe and she's been able to face the demons lurking in her dreams."

For a fight he couldn't lose, he doesn't seem to have won.

"I mean only to point out that it is not your departure which deserves the credit for her rising status quo. I have no quarrel with your feelings on the matter."

When everyone loses nobody wins.

"It's a fair point. I just..." He shakes his head. "Nevermind."

Katsuya reaches into the front of his suit jacket and removes a pack of cigarettes, a Chinese brand, and offers the pack toward the thin man after he takes one for himself. If there's even the smallest convenience to his powers, it's that he never is in need of a light. A faint blue shimmer and a snap of his fingers and the cigarette is lit in no time. If Schon takes one, he'll light that, too.

He's quiet for a bit then, leading them across a street and into a darker side street downhill toward the less populated districts. He checks his handgun as they walk, more a force of habit than anything else. They're getting toward less safe areas.

Schön accepts the cigarette, but declines a light. Instead of smoking it, he rolls and flips it among the fingers of his free hand. "No, no, go on," he encourages, when Katsuya hesitates, "I am here to listen."

The cigarette isn't the freshest if Schon is a connoisseur. Katsuya doesn't have an addiction to the things yet. The pack is fairly old. Still, he doesn't pull a face or cough, either. It's a habit he's picked up and put down a few times over the years.

"I don't know." Katsuya admits, and the corners of his mouth turn upward around the lit smoke held between his lips. "That's the frustrating part. How much I didn't know." Whether it was kept from him, or whether he'd failed to ask. How much of either, he's got no clue. Both, certainly, but the details are foggy. It's all foggy.

Maybe that was the trouble all along. All the things they never talked about.

Nails scraping on cement. That Katsuya understands. The scent of rotting meat in the air. That Katsuya knows well. Immune to bullets, don't go for the gun. Helios is already coiled behind his shoulder, its golden eyes peering through the darkness, searching for prey. The officer's movements are automatic--his shift from conversational to hunter seamless and practiced. By the time the harpies are lunging he already has two handfulls of fire lobbed in their directions, the golden glow of singed feathers reflecting off of his tinted glasses.

"Kind of sad that this comes easier to me than dealing with women." He comments finally, taking a drag off of his cigarette.

"You practice this more," Schön points out, dropping back a half-step. Katsuya is more than welcome to take point with all his heroic impulses. The thin man snaps his wrist, tossing his cane up enough to catch it by the midst of its length, holding it like a ward between himself and the harpies. The ebony wood seems to blend into the shadows of the gathering dusk, but the silver head gleams as bright as ever.

"And there is a cure for not knowing, but it's ever-so-hard." He speaks casually as he fends off any harpies inclined to come after him, as though their present actions were no cause for a break in the conversation.

Katsuya's not certain he'd qualify this as heroism or cold practiced extermination. He doesn't feel for these creatures unless they show humanity first. If they talk to him, he will attempt negotiation. If they do not, he doesn't hesitate to strike them down. Trying to reason with most ends in disappointment and wounds by letting one's guard down.

"For all the good it does me now, I suppose that's true." Katsuya doesn't respond until the threat has passed, but he didn't forget the comment. He answers while adjusting his suit and glasses once more. "You're unharmed?" He knows Schon is fine, but it's polite to ask. He made sure to cover the other.

Schön was thinking more of the heroic impulse to walk the darkened streets, fighting monsters, so that other people don't have to.

"It does as little good, or as much, as you make of it," he points out, letting his cane slide through his hand and back to the ground. "I'm untouched, thank you."

"...I really do appreciate you coming to check on me. Whether your own care or...if Verity asked you to." It wouldn't surprise him if she did. She's kind like that, after all.

"I didn't mean for you to need to get involved. I'm...ashamed this has spread as far as it has. Consider me chastised and intent on speaking with her shortly."

Schön accepts Katsuya's appreciation with one of his inscrutable expressions and a dip of his head.

"I did not come to chasten you, Katsuya. I came only to see how you are doing. And if, while I am here, you should have some question to pose, what harm?" He shrugs. "And if not, then I shall see what needs seeing, hear what needs hearing, and bid you adieu when all is done."

Reaching Out [Katsuya]

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