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Who: Max [

manticorean] and Ryohei [

kyokugen_sun]
Where: Max's room
When: Sometime after Faith's mini-plot
Rating: PG? Come on.
Summary: Ryohei does not like the thought that he helped kill someone. So he goes to see ~~his big sis~~ Max.
the Story:
Ever since he punched a hole in her, it's become routine for Ryohei to show up at Max's room at least every other day to spar with her. Given the monotony of living in the mansion, it's something he looks forward to. He's not in the mood for a fight today, though, and hasn't been since Faith died. Although he can't figure out quite what it is, he knows that means something is wrong, and because Max is smart, she seems like the logical person to go to if he wants to figure this out. ~~Plus, all of his cast mates are too derp, don't care, or are hiatus'd.~~

So Ryohei knocks at Max's door and waits, plucking at the bandages on his hands. He's pretty certain she'll be there--she usually is--and even if she isn't, he can come back another time.

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Max just managed to finish changing into comfortable sweats after her shower when she heard someone knocking on the door. She tensed for a moment; the effects of Faith's rampage effected more people than she'd initially realized, and it seemed like more and more problems kept crawling out of the woodwork.

Never being one to turn away from her problems, she went to the door and answered it. Pleasantly surprised by who was standing there, she grinned down at the teenager. "Ryohei! Hey, haven't seen you in a while, boo. Where you've been hiding?"

His first reaction was to deny that he had been hiding--even though she probably didn't mean it literally--but then realized that he kind of had. Instead he shrugged and offered her a forced smile. Not his normally carefree, extreme smile at all.

"Just...you know. Been around." He forced himself to stop picking at his wrappings, pulling the sleeves of his sweatshirt down over his hands instead.

Max's smile faltered when she saw the smile he gave her, seeing enough false ones to know the counterfeit from the genuine article. Moving aside so he could come in, she leaned on the door and tried not to look as concerned as she was. The last thing she needed to hear was that he'd died recently, too. She had enough surprise deaths.

"Something up?"

Ryohei came in, still fidgeting with the ends of his sleeves. Oh, he had died recently, but not during Faith's rampage.

"Um, well, Faith got killed." He went and perched on the edge of her bed, watching her guilelessly. "After I took her away, that blonde girl with the knife came and stabbed her in the neck."

His eyes darkened a little as he recounted Faith's death. He was still appalled at himself for not intervening--and for not even wanting to intervene.

Max closed the door as he entered, her arms crossed over her chest as she listened to Ryohei. She half-expected there to be more to the story, but she'd almost forgotten that most people were fortunate enough not to have had her childhood.

With a sigh, she covered her face with one hand as she muttered, "Ruby. Musta been." She paused for a moment as she looked up at him, quietly asking, "She did that right in front of you?"

Though she was fairly certain she knew the answer, Max wanted to clarify things before chastising the blonde demon for killing somebody in front of a kid.

He nodded. "I let her in. And I didn't stop her." Which, to him, was just as bad as killing Faith himself. Not to mention that he hadn't helped Faith any when he's broken half the bones in her upper body with his fist.

"I really, extremely don't like this."

Max stared at Ryohei for a moment, suddenly realizing that this was more than just a matter of witnessing a death. He was feeling guilty. She knew that feeling all too well.

Moving towards the bed, Max gently sat down besides him, looking at him steadily. Deciding that he wasn't too old for a hug, she reached over and embraced him about the shoulders, murmuring, "Nobody's asking you to like it. Sometimes, life throws you things you're just never gonna like."

He leaned into her. Definitely not too old for a hug.

"But my older self does that. No one told me for sure, but I think he kills people."

The way he spoke about himself and himself in the future as different people might sound a little odd, but that was how he had come to think of them. Maybe not a totally healthy thing to do, but it was the only way he could keep track of events in his world.

Max wasn't sure how to respond for a while. It's not often that she meets someone who has reason to believe he's a killer in the future. Heck, time travel in itself isn't one of her specialty areas.

Stroking his hair and picking her words carefully, she asked him, "Got any ideas about what would make you - him - do something like that?"

The whole thing was pretty confusing to him, too, honestly, and he'd actually experienced it.

"It's the mafia. Isn't it just...what they do?"

Trying to remember that he was still a kid and so intimidating him with a sharp tug on his hair probably wouldn't be the best of ideas, Max remarked, "Yeah, pretty much. Kinda makes ya wonder why decent people wanna fall in with them."

He was quiet for a minute. Even though he could be dense at times, he understood what she was getting at.

"It just kinda happened," he admitted finally. Even he couldn't remember how exactly he'd gotten so involved. Somewhere along the line, spending time with his friends had somehow turned into being a hitman. Although it hadn't gotten to that point at home quite yet, he knew he was considered part of the famiglia and that it was just a matter of time before things got more serious.

"Just kinda-...." Max trailed off for a moment, trying and failing to keep her sarcasm at a minimum. "Falling into a tank of sharks at a water park just kinda happens. Getting into a car crash in a busy intersection just kinda happens. Being mauled by a pit bull on your way to the store to grab some beers just kinda happens. Becoming a killer? That takes some kinda planning and preparation."

Shaking off the clipped edge of her tone, she stroked Ryohei's hair and lowly added, "Best to get off that path before it leads you to a dead end, y'know?"

Ryohei could see the logic in what she was saying, and that just made it even more confusing. Finally pulling away to look up at her, he frowned in thought.

"I dunno if it's that easy. 'Cause I got involved without even knowing what it was at first. Just tried to get Sawada to join the boxing club, and later I got beat up. But then my master came and trained me, and I fought that okama from Italy and everything got really serious. But I mean, even then I extremely never even thought about killing him or anything. It was just a game, you know? Or it seemed like it. And in the future, it just happened too fast for me to even think about what was going on, and I couldn't say no 'cause Kyoko was there and we were trying to save everyone--"

He stopped, realizing that most of what he was saying probably didn't make any sense without more information to contextualize it. He made a frustrated noise and lamely finished, "So it just kinda happened. And it's normal now."

Max had no clue what he was talking about, but she didn't think she needed to. Not now, not for this part of the conversation. They were talking morals and ethics, not the logic of time travel.

Gently rubbing his arm, she let a moment pass before bringing up, "So if you know what happens, if you know that things are gonna get rough too quick for you to stop it, shouldn't you just quit it cold turkey? Do what you can to set up a new ID for yourself while the bosses aren't looking, and then blaze before things get too tough? Because believe me, Ryohei... you can come back from being a killer; it's just a long, messy road."

"Yeah, but my friends need my help," he insisted, fidgeting with the ends of his sleeves again. That was what it came down to in the end, really. These were his friends and he needed to support and help them. And most of them were just as clueless about what was going on as he was.

"I can't just abandon them. And I have to protect Kyoko to the extreme, and if this is how I learn how to do it, then it's good, right? Just not the killing part."

"If it leads to you killing people, then no, there's nothing good about it." The words came out a lot more sternly than Max had anticipated, but she wasn't about to just let up on this. Ryohei was a good kid, and he was feeling gulty about just being indirectly involved with a murder, so she wasn't going to let that piece of innocence errode just because he was trying to rationalize losing it.

Taking hold of his shoulders to get him to look at her, she told him, "You gotta protect what's yours, and nobody better let you forget it. But you don't gotta stoop down to the bad guys' level to do it. If your friends don't know what's gonna happen, give 'em the 411. Let them know that they've got a choice, and they've got a chance to back out before they make the wrong choices. And if they're anywhere near as strong as you are, there's not a damned person who can make them do something they don't wanna do. You don't have to abandon anyone. But you can save them."

Ryohei looked back at her, blinking at the force in her voice. He knew that she was right--and when he thought about it, he knew that some of his friends were either unaware of or actually were against the mafia aspect of the things they ended up being involved in.

"I know," he said finally, nodding. He wasn't sure it would be as easy as Max made it sound, and it definitely wasn't something that could be taken care of quickly, but it was the best choice he could see.

Then something else occurred to him. "But we don't remember stuff here when we go home, do we?"

Max hesitated for a moment before deciding that it was best to answer honestly. "I don't know. Dean didn't, and it looks like Yamamoto didn't either. But maybe that's just for the people who leave and come back. There's a chance that the people who go and stay gone get to change things up a bit when they get home. And that's why they stay. Because things have already started going a way they weren't supposed to have gone."

He thought about that and nodded.

"It's a different Yamamoto, though," he told her. He knew she'd made friends with the older Yamamoto, so he thought it would be fair to explain the situation. "That one was the one from the future. The one that's here now is his younger self."

Max shrugged slightly. She missed the older Yamamoto and didn't feel at all cool about seeing the younger version around and realizing she'd been on a date with the kid, but she admitted, "Like I said, this whole crazy time travel thing doesn't exactly make sense to me. I just know actions spark reactions; keep your nose clean, and you won't need to go on a major guilt trip in the future, you get me?"

"I get you," he replied. "I'll do my best to the extreme!"

Max couldn't help the smirk that emerged on her face. "Good. Just... just keep cool, Ryohei. Hang with a good crowd, and keep making the right choices. That's all you can do at this point, right?"

"Yeah," he agreed, and smiled at her. "Thanks, Max."

"No prob," she told him, ruffling his hair a bit. "I know it's hard, but that's what life's about. That, and really good food, if you're lucky."

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