A Devil's Luck

[bondsofsuffering]

Who: Hizumi Mizushiro, Miyako Hotsuin, and YOU
Where: Various places around Hinoto-Ri, most notably Cancer and Pisces districts. Takes place on April 1st for the general open portion and April 6th for the yakiniku dinner because saving log space saves the world.
Summary: Hizumi has obtained a job at a game arcade and is hunting down alternate versions of people both while on and off the job! And later in the week, he treats a certain lady to yakiniku because this is an important dish to experience in your life.
Warnings: Fierce yakiniku parties.

[APRIL 1ST: CANCER DISTRICT]

It's a smaller arcade than most, but that doesn't make its selection any less good. Indeed, some of the more hardcore gamers prefer it, as it has less of those fake gamers with their mainstream games and more of the classics standing side by side with the latest and greatest.

Hizumi's on clerk duty today, but that doesn't stop him from weaving among the customers and generally being friendly and conversational. He doesn't interrupt people during their play of course, but he's quick to crack a joke with anyone around, or even point out flaws in peoples' strategies in the case of a person failing a stage. If you're standing around, he might just end up chatting with you!

"Hey, how's it going?"

[APRIL 1ST: GENERAL]

Once he gets out of work, he'll be wandering around the city, keeping a sharp eye on all of those around him. With all the time he's spent in Hinoto-Ri, he's gotten quite good at telling Visitors from normal civilians, and thus it is these whom he is on the lookout for. If he spots anyone, you can be sure that he'll be casually walking up and greeting them. "Hey! You're a Visitor, right? Think you could help me out a sec?"

[APRIL 6TH: CLOSED TO MIYAKO]

The food is prepared, with slices of various meats and, after much debate, a selection of vegetables on the side. He hasn't begun cooking them on the small table-sized grill, of course - that would have to begin only when his guest had arrived, so that they could enjoy the food when it was at its peak deliciousness.

Which meant that for now, all he could really do was wait for his poor, deprived honored guest to show up.

Comments

Cancer District

[hetried]

Daichi didn't really care about all that hardcore, fake, gamer stuff-- he basically picked which arcade to go to at random if he felt like messing around Cancer on any given day.

Right now, he'd been standing around waiting for his turn on one of the machines, but when Hizumi got his attention, he didn't seem all that bothered if he got distracted from his current goal. The opposite in fact, as he turned and greeted him with a smile and a wave.

"Hey! Pretty good; I'm just loitering around against the better judgement of society while waiting for one of the machines to free up. You?"

[bondsofsuffering]

"Oh, not much, just being an ordinary, contributing member of society by taking my place in the workforce and helping the city's economy."

Yep. There is a kid younger than you who is already making himself useful mostly so he can afford nice food again. How does that make you feel, Daichi?

He glances at the nearby machine, even though at this point he's more or less memorized where everything is. "This game though, it's pretty popular. Ever played it before? If you're not prepared, it's going to give you a lot of trouble!"

[hetried]

At least Daichi can profess to helping save the world against an alien invasion and working with a government agency in the past! That's gotta be something.

Possibly blows to the self esteem aside, Daichi can't help a laugh, as he turns his attention to the nearby machine. "Hm, I don't think so. I think there's something like it at the other arcade, but it's always so crowded I haven't gotten a chance to. How've you fared against it?"

[bondsofsuffering]

"Well, it can definitely get tough!" He puts a hand to his chin as though in deep thought. "I mean, there are patterns of course, but they're pretty unorthodox as far as most games go. The system is really good about keeping you on your toes. And even if you do figure it out, either way you'll need fast reflexes to keep up with it."

He then gives a careless shrug. "...But I'm actually really good at that sort of thing, so I've been able to get through all of the levels on my own. Now I'm just aiming to rack up points so I can make the high score list!"

[hetried]

"Augh, the ever-dreadful randomization factor. It's always about luck in the end!"

He sounded exasperated, though the way he shrugged and sighed, it was obviously affected. And he was back to a smile pretty quickly after that. "Heh-- Good luck. I've never been able to make it to the Top Ten on these sorts of things. The people that play them that much are almost insane!"

[bondsofsuffering]

"Ehh, they're not too bad. I already scored high enough on a couple of the other games. I think if I keep at it, I'll be able to have my name on every single machine here in no time!"

He sounds pretty confident in his ability, at least.

[hetried]

Confidence was a good thing! It was entertaining to Daichi at least.

"Do you think you'd get some kind of bonus then? You'd get people to spend even more money trying to dethrone your high score!"

[bondsofsuffering]

"Heheh, maybe! I'll try pitching the idea to my boss. I mean, it couldn't hurt, right? It gives the others something to shoot for!" Truly a noble task for an employee to take on!

"If we made a contest out of it, we might even be able to drum up even more business. The people who come here are really hardcore... They'd be pre-tty mad if someone stole the spotlight by grabbing all of the top score slots!"