D.E.M.O.N.S: Getting Summoned Weekly isn't so Bad

— Kat —

Kat had finally, agonisingly, managed to tease out the story of what happened from Kamiko. It was basically like pulling teeth. Kamiko would start, stammer, get distracted, make excuses for other people, bring up secondary or tertiary incidents, come back to the original and main point before backtracking. Kat was surprised that Kamiko had even been able to say everything.

She was quite sure that Kamiko had made more than one contradictory statement in that mess of an explanation…

But she got the gist of things. Meg was causing trouble. Obviously. The main incident was one with Brook and Church with Meg making everything worse, and then Kamiko not properly recovering afterwards not just because of the panic but because of the guilt associated with falsely being angry at Church. Even if Church didn’t seem bothered anymore and Meg was mostly to blame.

Which… was a thing. Meg’s other decisions and comments didn’t help matters but Kamiko hadn’t exactly been clear with those either and Kat didn’t want to force Kamiko into revealing all of the details of the lesser events. It wasn’t worth the potential mental anguish of Kamiko herself, as well as Kat’s own pain at needing to re-open her friend’s mental wounds to clean them out.

Now Kat had to come up with a way to actually do the cleaning part. *Urgh. Why did this have to be so complex an issue? The fact Kamiko doesn’t know if there really was any fear aura shenanigans at play is annoying. If we knew, either way really, then I could frame things certain ways without trouble… but the fact that it’s unclear just muddies the whole incident.

If I lean hard on the ‘it’s Meg’s fault’ side of things because of fear aura… only for Meg to catch on and say she didn’t use any Kamiko will crack and maybe break. I’d like to think my adorable friend is stronger then that… but well it’s just not a risk worth taking. On the other hand, if there was no aura involved… Kamiko might have bigger issues with social interaction.

Not that the situation was good… but Kamiko had a lot of power in that interaction. Physically she’s a lot stronger then Church. She had plenty of things she could’ve said. Heck, even just vocally announcing her discomfort would’ve had Church back off from the sounds of things. Slob that she is… she seems alright. That or Brook would’ve ensured she apologised.

So what do I say? I want to hope that it was just Meg being Meg. That would remove a lot of the guilt Kamiko carries about the incident… but dammit it feels just like that Greedy bitch to somehow scare the whits out of Kamiko without using any fear aura. I wish I could check with Hunter to ensure Meg DOES have a fear aura but I obviously can’t leave now and neither can Lily.*

[Not sure Kamiko would let me go at this point anyway.] Yes indeed. At some point Lily had been scooped up and squeezed particularly tightly as if she was a stuffed toy instead of a person. Lily was pleased to note it didn’t actually hurt.

In fact, with her horn digging into Kamiko’s arm side because of the awkward positioning it was more likely Kamiko was hurt then her… but the shy girl hadn’t let up at all, so clearly it wasn’t a major problem.

*So yes, how to go about things. Especially when Kamiko thought there was a good chance Meg instigating the whole incident to ‘fix’ an issue. Which… I don’t want to say I agree with Meg because it was clearly quite traumatising… but at the same time if Kamiko is reacting so negatively it is an issue that needs… gods I don’t want to say fixing but I can’t think of anything better.

Kamiko needs more confidence in herself. Even if she remains quiet and withdrawn she needs enough of a spine to just… deal with this sort of behaviour. What’s annoying is that she HAS that spine when it comes to matters of physical combat. She has all the tools to deal with issues like this if they escalate like that again… and she just isn’t willing to use them.

Maybe I should try and explain that verbal combat is a perfectly valid form of combat? Try to make it so that she can slip into a similar ‘combat’ mindset for stressful conversations? The worry is it goes too far the other way and she starts treating every conversation as a battle which… I can see that quickly being exhausting and horrible for her.

I’m not sure what that would even turn Kamiko into but it would not be a fun time.

So… let’s just start things slowly.* “Honestly Kamiko I think you did a good job,” said Kat with a soft smile and a hand carefully stroking her friend’s back, minding Kamiko’s little wings as she did so.

“Huh? But… but…” Kamiko started to retort but Kat kept up the soothing movements along Kamiko’s back.

“But nothing,” declared Kamiko firmly as she restrained her aura from leaking out. Part of her, a really large part of her wanted to let her calming aura wash over Kamiko and ‘solve’ the issue but that wouldn’t really fix anything. “Some voices were raised, some people got a bit scared but ultimately? You didn’t hurt anyone and you even patched things up with Church afterwards.

You did nothing wrong, and everything turned out well,”

“But it could’ve been really bad,” admitted Kamiko.

Kat didn’t interrupt this declaration. As much as she wanted to, Kat understood that simply cutting Kamiko off every time she tried to say something would chip away at her confidence further. “Ah but it DIDN’T end badly. In fact, I believe I explained that I thought you’d done a good job.

“Now, we can talk about steps to ensure you don’t feel quite so cornered in the future, especially with just a few words. Remember, you’re a powerful demon with a sharp stabby weapon,” Kat revealed a set of sharp teeth made of demonic fire and a fake snake tongue. A bit mocking of Hunter? Perhaps but it put a smile on Kamiko’s face so it was worth it.

“Just because constantly resorting to violence isn’t a good idea…

“Well it doesn’t mean that never resorting to violence is the correct path either. I mean, there’s an old saying you know? Sufficient applications of violence can solve any problem, and if you think it can’t? That just means you aren’t applying enough violence!”

Kamiko frowned, “But I don’t really WANT to resort to violence. Not against people who can think…”

“Ah, but a famous dude from my home world once said ‘Speak softly but carry a big stick’. What I want you to take away from that is that you can be nice and polite and as friendly or shy as you want… but to always remember you do in fact carry a big stick. The threat of violence is nice and threatening after all.

“Of course, do keep in mind the whole ‘never break a promise’ type deal with demons have. If you properly threaten violence and they keep crossing the line? You might have to actually use some violence to ensure that people don’t walk over you in the future… but that’s getting very off-topic.

“For now, what you need is to believe that you handled it well. Not worry about what Meg may or may not be doing. Not worry about how much she meddled in that conversation or how involved she was in your reaction afterwards… you need to recognise that you did the right thing,”

Kat grinned a bit, feeling like she was on a roll. Somewhere along the line she’d figured out what she wanted to say. What she wanted to convey to Kamiko. She wasn’t sure how much of it would get across, but she was hopeful that the major points would seep in at least a little. “Even if you can’t believe all that?

Even knowing that as a demon I can’t lie and as your friend I’d never WANT to lie to you for something like this?

“If you can’t believe it? Then let’s work together to go through the whole incident. Step by step. We can talk about the perfect outcome. The one you secretly hope for… and we can talk about how to bring that idea closer to reality. If that happens to be Meg getting beaten up for some reason?

Well we don’t have to tell her that!”

Kamiko smiled back at Kat when she finished talking. It wasn’t a perfect smile. It wasn’t quite as full-bodied and bright as Kat might wish. There was still a lot of uncertainty wrapped up in it. A lot of worries about the present, the future, probably other things… but it was a good step forward. It was unburdened.

Not completely but Kat could already tell the looming spectre of the incident was being pried away from her friend’s mind.