Kaoru Miyamoto's page

Hmm, Kaoru was quite good at causing distractions. He could probably hack into something AEGIS-y. Though that might be tricky without his computer.... He stared wistfully to where his bag was sitting on the once-floor-now-ceiling of his temporary prison. Wait, why wasn't *that* affected by the gravity reversal? There was probably something there he could use to get out.

Though for now, the fact that comms were coming through at all, meant he did at least have something to work with. He removed his watch, unfolding it into a phone and started typing up a text through one of his fake accounts to his contact in the Halcyon Inquirer.

> Hey, you hear about the collapse downtown? I heard the mole men army is invading but some government goons are trying to cover it up!

He added the address and sent it. While HI was hardly what one would call a reputable news source, they were persistent. A pretty high percentage of them were also conspiracy theorists, meaning that they considered resisting authority to be rites of passage, collecting arrests like badges of honor. They'd come out in swarms at the barest hint of a government coverup.

Basically trying to get conspiracy theorist reporters to swarm AEGIS and distract them while Bron makes a getaway.
Are you watching closely?: 2d6 + 3 ⇒ (4, 4) + 3 = 11
- You confuse them for some time
- You avoid further entanglement
and I guess since I get a third option,
- You expose a weakness or flaw of AEGIS

Kaoru was currently stuck clinging to a statue as if his life depended on it. Which it did. There just wasn't really much of a risk of him actually falling. The real problem was figuring out how he'd reach the mechanism that had suddenly reversed gravity so he could then get to the schematics of the weird machine that had healed him so he could figure out what else it had done to him. Because that magic guy Xan had taken him to was a quack (apparently quite literally given a recent accident that had occurred at the magic academy) and clearly didn't know what he was talking about. It was, of course, just his luck that the device had been magic fused with technology and that magic users seemed morally opposed to storing their data online like a normal person, instead opting to keep it locked up behind some kind of series of magical traps.

He was surprised to hear Bronwyn's voice coming across his comms. Not only for the obvious reasons but also because he had been about 90% sure he had been transported to some kind of pocket dimension. But apparently the evil magicians who had set up this little trial had found some other way to cram a seemingly endless series of hallways and rooms into what had clearly just been a closet in a long-abandoned building. That or apparently they had wanted wifi for their breaks while creating this monstrosity.

After hearing Bronwyn's request, he responded, "Couldn't you just look up sewer maps yourself? They put them all in the public domain." Which he definitely didn't already know because he'd been working on faster, traffic-free routes across the city (arguably less dangerous than hijacking the city lights system). "You're probably a stone's throw from at least half a dozen sewer entrances. There's also a maintenance tunnel not too far away that's currently closed. Though scuttlebutt is that it has something to do with hitting a magma pocket, which is weird since there's not supposed to be one in the area. Or if you wanted to trek out a bit, there's a water processing plant that connections to one of Halcyon's major aquifers that's said to have a cave system that connects most of that area. Alternatively, if you believe the Halcyon Inquirer, there's a colony of mole men who have taken up residence in a nearby park that you could 'coerce' into loaning you some digging equipment." The last one was mostly a joke. Sure, it had been in the Halcyon Inquirer. But he had also sent them the most absurd article he could think of without absolutely along with a 'donation' and they had published it. Which was totally worth it to win that bet with Chloe. He send a few map pins over to her corresponding to the mentioned locations.

I am back from vacation, though I'm still fighting off jetlag and catching up at work. As a result, it might be good just to keep Kaoru in the periphery for now. If you have something concrete you want him to do or something you want to use him as a mouthpiece for, I could probably manage that.

Kaoru bit back a retort. He inhaled slowly through his nose and then back out again before flatly responding, "Whatever you have to tell yourself."

There was no point in arguing with someone who was willing to make up lies to excuse their behavior. Especially if it got to the point that they had convinced themself it wasn't a lie, though he wasn't yet sure if she had gotten that far. Either way, he had delivered his message. She had been the one who wanted to talk about this touchy-feely b!@$+$*+. He wasn't going to get upset and spill his guts to someone who not only didn't care but probably just wanted to use it against him. He had already let her make a fool of him once. He wasn't going to give her the chance to do so again.

"You were the one to declare that, not I. And despite whatever you may think, why would anybody get rid of a perfectly good car, super or not? Not all of us have super-human speed and a bicycle will only get you so far. And I don't know if you've noticed, but you and Chloe aren't exactly friends, so essentially what you're saying, and what you've shown me, is that we're about as much friends as you and any other schmuck at school. But hey, thanks for noticing something was up too late to actually do anything. I'm just glad the friend who gave me this car was a bit more on top of things and already had contingencies in place to get me to a safe place before Balor's rotting beam, y'know, managed to kill me. Because I'm sure the thing you seem to think happened after that fight was whatever techno-magic was being used to save me from that magical corruption of his. But hey, good to know I could've used whatever the hell is up with you to identify my cause of death at my funeral; I'm sure that information would have been of great comfort to my mom."

FYI, I'll be going be on vacation starting on Wednesday Sept 22nd and I'll be out for about 2 weeks during which I don't plan to be checking games.

"I'm only here as a favor. I quit the team, so the rest is irrelevant."

First step would probably be convincing/showing Kaoru that there is some kind of concrete benefit to him from continued interaction with her.

Once they started off, Kaoru flipped a switch to turn the inside of the car into a mini-Faraday cage. It was overkill, he knew. It's not like he would have any bugs on him. But this was just an extra precaution to make sure they weren't overheard. "I was just doing recon. It wasn't even clear if he'd be there. It's his grandmother's house after all. I just wanted to see if I could get her to tell me where he was. It was just a favor for Wingblade anyway." He ignored the pointless, non-professional babble and simply continued reporting the results. "Tell her that the text I sent was BS. According to Sidney, the people who have been getting killed are most likely the ones who drew unwanted attention to either themselves or the people they were working for. Their parole officer put them in contact with some anonymous benefactor who paid them to tutor kids with similar power sets. So as long as Sidney stays low-key, he'll be safe. That's about all the info Sidney had to give."

Kaoru blinked slowly, looking up from his phone where he was in the middle of typing of a new message now that he figured he was a safe distance away. "Would you have preferred a premature update before I managed to get safely away? I wanted to make sure I had gotten away cleanly before posting an update less Mr. Jumps-To-Conclusions decided beating the crap out of me really was the best course of action. Which he might have done had I tarried outside long enough to text."

Checking his rearview mirror to confirm that there still wasn't any oncoming traffic, he finished off the text on his phone.

> Seems like this was a dead end. Be glad I managed to get out without taking a beating; Xan would've had a fit.

He briefly considered giving a fuller update. After all, the messages were encrypted. But after that most recent encounter, he was feeling a bit paranoid. Though unfortunately, this would mean needing to tell the group what he actually found in person. Unless...

He looked up at Bronwyn again. "You need a ride home?"

Kaoru's probably about to drive off, but I want to give Bronwyn a chance to show up before he does.

Kaoru grabbed his phone and allowed himself to be escorted out. As he opened the door he called back. "Informing XPN might not work out as well as you'd hope. For all we know, they're the ones behind the sudden rash of deaths of people connected to them. At the very least, if I can follow the paper trail from them to your grandmother's account, I'm sure whoever is taking out XPN affiliates can as well. Or hey, maybe there's no relation and they're just hunting the parolees of Rodgers. Or people associated with Deathmark. Hard to say, but given you're connected to all three, things don't look too good for you right now." He got in and closed the door, rolling down the window just enough that he could still be heard. "Hopefully you have a better safe house you can go to in case you are a target. Or do you need me to make arrangements for you? Though I imagine if I did that, you'd be expected to help figure out why you're a target, so they could catch whoever is doing this. Of course, that might be in your best interest anyway."

The car silently started as he prepared to zoom off should Sidney change his mind about being violent. He supposed just driving off silently probably would have been the safer bet, but Sidney had shown he was capable of at least some restraint. It was enough to earn Kaoru telling him what little he knew thus far.

Provoke to spilling what he knows that may be relevant: 2d6 + 3 ⇒ (5, 4) + 3 = 12

Regardless of Kaoru's thoughts behind the words, this is definitely a provocation towards Sidney to think about what he's doing. So I'm calling it a Provoke move for Kaoru. If you'd like, you can roll in the discussion thread and I can work from there.

It's really not. From Kaoru's perspective, Sidney came in overly aggressively for really no good reason. Sidney also clearly wants information. Kaoru is playing those two against each other to see what wins; he's given what he sees as the options as well as warned him about some potential consequences. If Sidney chooses not to think about his options and just reacts, that's fine because that's his choice. It demonstrates that Sidney operates on base instincts and can't take a mental step back even when it's (in Kaoru's opinion) in his own best interests. The problem with Provoke is that it's actively influencing Sidney's reaction, so by the nature of rolling it, it's ruining whatever information Kaoru gets. If Sidney's choice means Kaoru gets beaten up, then so be it; Kaoru is just as happy trying to file a police report as he is for the situation to de-escalate (and the spiteful part of him would be happier even). As far as he's concerned, both options are a win and all a Provoke is really doing is forcing me to choose if Kaoru's spiteful side wins over his "better half" as it were. Because if his spiteful side wins, that Provoke is probably going to be to escalate the situation to make Sidney's crimes look more egregious.

I'm not really sure what questions I would ask for a Pierce. Kaoru isn't trying to get any sort of advantage. At best, he finds out about Sidney's intentions and then what? Sure, he may know what Sidney will choose but the point is for Sidney to take an action because it's the action that he's judging, not the intent behind it. I suppose I could roll Provoke to get Sidney to take an action/any action, but what's the alternative there? That they just stand around in this woman's living room all day?

If a Provoke is going to be insisted upon, I'd honestly rather just rewrite my post to something that's more likely to be interpreted in line with my how I mean for it to be interpreted.

Kaoru - seeing as you're trying to get Sidney to back down with your words, that's a Provoke move, so please roll for that to advance the scene.

As I was trying to imply with Kaoru's thoughts, there isn't really something Kaoru wants him to do. Or at least, he's of two minds about it. He's simply laying out what he thinks Sidney's options are and is planning on judging him based on his decision. Kaoru wants to know what kind of a person this guy is and he doesn't get that information if he's manipulating that through a roll.

Kaoru was starting to get annoyed with the guy's stupidity. But hey, at least he was no longer hurting his grandmother, so that was something. He carefully raised his hands to show he didn't intend to start in a fight. Nevertheless, he didn't back down as he spoke in a calm, even manner. "You're the one who rushed in here acting all threatening. I wouldn't have had to take action to get you to stop hurting Mrs. Lemmons if you hadn't, y'know, hurt her. Now the way I see it, either you can continue acting like a thug, beat the crap out of me, and then get arrested for assault. Or you could start acting like a reasonable human being and try actually having a conversation."

He waited to see how Sidney responded. If he were being completely honest, the spiteful part of him kind of wanted him to go with the first option. He was pretty confident 'I thought he was trying to scam my grandma' wouldn't hold up in court versus assault, especially given that he hadn't actually asked any questions that lent themselves towards that. Plus he had a prior record, which never looked good. And it wasn't like he'd never gotten the crap beat out of him before. It might teach the a@~#%++ a lesson about "reasonable responses".

That being said, he supposed hoping for a de-escalation was the 'smarter' decision. Or at least it was the decision that lent itself best to goals that he was becoming more and more indifferent to. He supposed it was lucky for him that the decision of where things would go was out of his hands. Though he had to admit, he was a little curious about which direction Sidney would go in. From what he had seen thus far, he didn't think he was the kind of man to beat an unarmed kid up in front of his grandmother just for a lark. But how important for him was it that he get information? Was he the type of person who thought violence was the best way to get what he wanted? Would his animal insticts switch from fight to flight? Was he so far gone into his animal instincts that reason was out of the question?

In a flash Kaoru had his phone out and recording, simultaneously linking it to team chat with the quick message "Potential target found." "Let her go this instant! That's elder abuse!" Still keeping the camera on the two of them, he directed his next comment at Ellen. "Ma'am, are you alright? Do you need me to call an ambulance? Or the police?"

He hoped the camera was enough of a deterrent to stop Sidney from hurting the old woman further. Though admittedly, video of abuse didn't always seem to translate into "obviously guilty" to legal folk for some reason. He had briefly considered just calling the police instead of threatening it as a more solid measure to make sure he stopped, but he rather suspected Ellen would prefer to keep them away from her grandson-with-a-record. He hoped this was just a case of Sidney getting carried away and that the two didn't have an abusive relationship in general, but the man's reaction would likely tell him more.

K is sending the video/message to team chat. He's mostly expecting just Wing to be interested in it, but I'm giving anybody an opening to respond since I think Bron at least was looking for a way into a scene.

Kaoru blinked, hand already extended to shake. He spoke just loud enough that he was reasonably certain Mrs. Lemmons would hear. "Uhhh, no sir. Just the opposite really. I was told there was some suspicious activity on Mrs. Lemmons' account and was asked to pose a few follow-up questions to make sure things were on the up-n-up. And, I mean, I googled XPN Financials when I was told they were offering me an internship. Sure it's unpaid, but my mom said it'd look good on college applications..."

Provoke: 2d6 + 3 ⇒ (6, 6) + 3 = 15
Trying to provoke Ellen Lemmons into defending the poor, just-an-intern Carl from her grandson who's clearly forgotten any sense of manners.

Kaoru stood, turning to face the opening door and getting ready to put his hand out to politely introduce himself.

"Oh yes ma'am, the system is hard on people formerly incarcerated. It's like they don't realize that by making it harder for them to re-integrate, they'll just put them in a rough position where they're more likely to relapse. I think I have a friend who likes to volunteer in community outreach or something like that though. Or at the very least, likes to run in those circles. Would you like for me to give her Sidney's contact information? Maybe his resumé? I don't know that anything will come of it, but it can't hurt to ask, right? You miss all the shots you never take, as they say."

"Yes ma'am, after hearing what you've said about them, my guess is Telebank is most likely managing your XPN account on your behalf. Knowing that, I think we should be able to contact them to get the anomalous data access patterns cleared up. And certainly, I'll at least be able to correct your phone number with us as well as the fact that Telebank should be our primary point of contact for all future issues." He then went on to explain what XPN stood for, complete with the company tagline and a cheesy smile and thumbs up like he was on an ad for them. Getting these sort of simple, background details had been part of the reason for googling them after all. Plus, y'know, getting their company logo so he could put in on his polo and a fake intern access badge.

As he talked, he took a subtle glance at his watch to check the camera on his car to see if the garage was a vehicle arriving or leaving.

I don't care what you think: 2d6 + 2 ⇒ (2, 4) + 2 = 8

Kaoru politely accepted the can of soda. "Oh don't worry ma'am, all the money I make from this internship is going straight into a Roth IRA. With the 40+ years of compounded, tax-free interest I can expect to make over my working lifetime, I think I should be ok. Though I know one year's contributions won't be enough by itself, which is why I plan to continue with it for as long as I'm working as well as maxing out contributions to a 401k. Together these serve double duty: both building up a nest egg for retirement as well as teaching me to live on a reduced income." Clearing Angry; Kaoru's smart enough to know what's up with financial planning for his future

He took a moment to think through his next move. It was abundantly obvious that she lived with someone else. And frankly given her obvious tendency to natter away, he would have thought he had already given her an opening to do just that. Perhaps he needed to go with a more sympathetic note. "If you don't mind my asking, ma'am, if you're worried about money, have you made sure you're maximizing your tax credits? If you're perhaps supporting someone else, you can always claim them as a dependent. Or if you have a family member who helps out, maybe they can claim you on their return for a tax break?"

Provoke: 2d6 + 3 ⇒ (1, 6) + 3 = 10
Trying to get her to ramble about whomever is living with her.

Kaoru nodded politely as the woman rambled on. This might take a while... "Yes ma'am, one of the senior technicians tried to call but it seemed like he got the wrong number. This hopefully shouldn't take too long, but it might be best if we went inside for privacy reasons." I don't really care if she agrees or wants to have the conversation at the front door. It just seems a little weird to me for Kaoru not to suggest it. But once sitting inside or she says she wants to just do this here: "First order of business, could you verify your phone number for me ma'am?" Once Mrs. Lemmons had done that, Kaoru nodded, picking one number to mention have been 'mistyped'.

"Now ma'am, we've had unusual activity across a few accounts, yours included that I'm trying to verify. It's most likely nothing, but as they say, better safe than sorry. You said you have Telebank manage your finances; are you the sole account owner there or is there someone else with authorized access to your accounts on your behalf? A family member or some such, perhaps someone who misremembered the password or account pin a few too many times?"

Kaoru parked his car on the street, getting out and pulling a clipboard full of papers with him. He had dressed more preppy than usual with grey slacks, a white polo with the XPN logo on the chest, and a pair of thick-rimmed glasses. He made a mental note of the obvious collision the sedan had been in, but decided to leave it for now. There was enough attention on him already and he didn't want to draw more to himself just yet. Instead, he walked promptly up to the door and rang the doorbell.

When an older woman he hoped was Ellen Lemmons answered, he spoke to her in a thin, reedy voice, pushing his fake glasses further up his nose. "Excuse me, Mrs. Lemmons? My name is Carl Wu. I'm an intern at XPN Financials. I've been asked to visit a number of our clients to verify some recent activity. Would you mind if I took a few minutes of your time to check some details?" He coughed, wishing he could say the slight crack in his voice had been intentional. But then such details were why he had opted for the intern cover story.

After a quick search, Kaoru sent Wingblade a text.

> Potential target: Sidney Lemmons/Sideswipe
> Going to talk to his grandmother.
> If I die, you're the one who has to break it to Xan.

He attached the address, looked up a few quick details about XPN Financials, and then got in his car and drove to the grandmother's house.

Unleash: 2d6 + 3 ⇒ (1, 3) + 3 = 7
Temporary or unstable

I'm not really sure as a player what y'all want me to do with this. Like, I get the impression this is an attempt to involve me except that it's not clear to me how as a player you want me to be involved. Am I just supposed to make something up? Am I being a mouthpiece for information? I basically have no idea what I'm supposed to write other than something like, "I do what you already did and see if I come up with anything new." I don't think I have anything I can roll and the description of how Matrix got the data was "I did some digging." I could come up with more tech-y ways to say that but asking for me to come up with something Kaoru could find that Matrix couldn't or didn't feels like a pretty narrow target to hit.

Kaoru rubbed his temples. It had not been a great day. He could not for the life of him figure out why any modern day company wouldn't have at least semi-decent tech. Sure, old tech with a codebase written entirely in FORTRAN that no one wanted to touch less they break everything he had seen before. But this place didn't seem to even have that. Their website, if he could even call it that, seemed to have been written in the 90s and never updated. Which basically made it useless to him since it had no useful functionality he could exploit. So he had spent all day trying to find some back way in that as far as he could tell didn't exist. And he didn't mean "didn't exist" as in "was completely secure." He meant literally didn't exist. Which sure, some companies had internal networks that could only be accessed physically, but he was starting to think this place was so far in the Stone Age it might be relying on paper records and typewriters. Hell, maybe even that was too advanced for them and they needed good ol' quills and parchment.

So he already wasn't in the best of moods when an email from Wingblade popped up. It seemed to be some dossiers on some low life criminals. The implication was clear but infuriately vague. She wanted something with him, but apparently couldn't be bothered to actually tell him what. He briefly considered responding with a deluge of all of their grade school reports, class essays, videos of school recitals but it was honestly more work than he felt like going to just at the moment. Not that he hadn't gone to extreme lengths to prove a point, but he was already getting a headache. So instead he just sent back a simple, one sentence response. And then deleted it and tried again a few more times until he was satisfied it was appropriate enough.

"What are you hoping I'll do with this information?"

Kaoru was feeling edgy and off-balance. His choice of clothes had grown increasingly baggy resulting in a more-than-usual avoidance of mirrors. He hated the poor fit, but it was a choice between that and going insane with a constant awareness of his own skin. He had also grown increasingly anti-social. Which, given his current general lack of friends mostly meant he was avoiding Alexandra, and she had noticed. He was pretty sure the only reason she hadn't yet confronted him with it was because he had figured out that she was more likely to let him off the hook if he was busy doing "heroing" things as opposed to just lying on his bed getting lost in music. But he wasn't sure how long that would keep up. Every day he grew more certain a break up was imminent which then made him retreat more while then made things worse. It was a spiral of anxiety and he wasn't sure how to escape. Well, probably the escape was to somehow explain how uncomfortable any sort of touching made him. He used to love hugging her and holding her in his arms, but now every time he tried, he could slowly feel his anxiety ratcheting up until he had to pull away. And it wasn't just with her, even if she was the person with whom it was most obvious. He had no idea what was causing it and therefore no idea how to talk about it with anyone. So then he just avoided everyone.

Everyone except for, well, Pinky. Which wasn't the same since their relationship was entirely virtual. And it's not like he talked about these kinds of things with them anyway. It was mostly joking and "did you hear about X" and once he figured out the best way to distract himself, various little "missions" he could go on that would plausibly be helpful to the world in some way. But they didn't talk about anything too personal, and that's how he liked to keep it. Not that Pinky hadn't noticed some changes in whatever. They had expressed concern, but he'd asked them to drop it. It was one of the few outlets he still had, so he needed to keep their newly opened lines of communication intact less he drive them off with his issues and lose that too.

So...as far as he could tell, everything was going great. For the world anyway. And he pretended he was part of that world. Even if he could slowly feel the sides of the box he was living closing in tighter and tighter and eventually it'd be too small to move, too small to breathe. But if he pretended he was out in open space, he'd be ok, right? Mind over matter and all that? He was pretty sure that's how it worked anyway. Hopefully.

Doesn't Matrix use she/her pronouns?

An Android walks into the room, its soft silver body distinctly features feminine features. She's most likley the AI that runs the Defender's network and provides support from base, Matrix.

I'm still around, but between leading a project that keeps having last minute changes at work and the various games I'm DMing taking more creative energy and/or prep work than I had anticipated, I don't really have the energy to be more proactive in writing things for Kaoru.

Putting more confidence in his voice than Kaoru felt, he called out to the titan dressed in white robes. "Themis. I was starting to think you might not show up."

The woman turned to look in his direction before starting to walk towards him. "He needed to be driving in order to crash." She responded simply. "You know my name."

He nodded from behind his mask. "Yes, I've been following your work. I gotta say, I'm a fan." He supposed technically speaking Pinky had brought her activities to his attention. They had been right when they thought he might find her antics amusing.

"I simply put people in their place."

"Yeah, but you do it with style: making those dog fighters fight each other, beating up a wife beater, blinding a peeping tom...very poetic." Some people had been all up-in-arms about what had been going on, but as far as he was concerned, the so-called 'victims' had all earned what they'd gotten. It's certainly not at all like the so-called 'justice system' had managed to deal with them properly. The a$$~**%s had practically bragged about getting away scot free, either due to money, connects, or dumb technicalities.

"Yes, there is much wrong in this city. The scales must be balanced."

"Oh, no doubt. You're doing good work. I just wanted to come out and see you in action. But I gotta admit, I'm curious: why Halcyon?"

"There is much wrong in this city. The scales must be balanced." She repeated.

"Well, yeah, you said that. I just mean...it seems like you're trying to balance an elephant by putting grains of sand on the other scale, one at a time. It doesn't exactly seem like the most...efficient way of doing things."

"It is the right thing to do. If it takes me a thousand years, then so be it."

"But wouldn't it be better to tackle something a little...well...bigger?" Not that that was really her fault. He doubted a being from Ancient Greece knew the proper information sources to find the really big crimes. And apparently she hadn't bothered to look past the first random blog complaining about injustice she had found. "Y'know, set a big, noticeable example that'll make people think twice before stepping out of place?"

She paused. She may not care about having to do hard work, but she was practical. She had no reason to turn down a suggestion of a better way to do things. "I'm listening."

"Well, there's a lot of bad stuff going on in Africa. Plus, bonus points, it's just across a sea from your old stomping grounds in Greece."

"I will go wherever I am needed. Its proximity to one place or another does not matter. What only matters is the injustice."

"Right. Well, as I was saying, there's a lot of bad stuff going on around there. Lots of killing. Genocide. Oppression." He shifted slightly uncomfortably; there were some things no one deserved, poetic or not. "Ummm...rape. Y'know, that kind of thing. Lots of bad warlords doing terrible things. You turn things around there and people are going to notice. You'll not only be balancing that scale but also preventing elephants from joining that other elephant to make things even more unbalanced."

She paused, considering.

"Plus, y'know, you can always come back here and continue where you left off."

She was still hesitating.

"And, I mean, there isn't exactly a lot of people stepping in to stop things over there. Here in Halcyon, we attract wanna-be-heroes like a magnet. You can't walk down the street without bumping into someone who wants to balance the scales."

"Like you?"

He started.

"You tried to stop that man."

"Oh, ummm...yeah, I guess?"

"You weren't very good at it."

He flushed hot under his mask. Spluttering slightly before collecting himself. Yelling angrily at a giant was a very dumb idea. And while his position gave him the high ground, he wasn't exactly out of arm's reach... "It was the right thing to do." He echoed, imitating her smooth, matter-of-fact tone. Though he couldn't help but add "It wouldn't even have taken a thousand years; he was about to hit my backup plan, which definitely would have stopped him"

"So then, I will deal with Africa while you balance the scales here."

He paused. While the self-aggrandizing BS most of the 'heroes' here practiced didn't appeal to him, he had to admit the thought of punishing arrogant a$~~%+$s who publicly flaunted the law like this was...appealing. He just wasn't entirely sure if he could actually do it. As excited as he was about the shiny new sword he had ordered, having a cool sword and actually, y'know, using it on a living creature were quite different things. But he could at least take steps to ruin their reputations and/or livelihoods. It wasn't always going to be as poetic, but it's not like it was something he had never done before. And starting off like this certainly didn't prevent him from changing his mind later.

"Yes. I will 'balance the scales' here." He agreed.

Plus worse came to worse, he could always change his mind later. He had a feeling she wasn't likely to know how to lookup Halcyon news to check up on him.

Coax: 2d6 ⇒ (3, 4) = 7
Hold 1 Monster Hunter.

Kaoru sat perched on the edge of a building, enjoying the cool night breeze that ruffled his hair. On the street below there was a burst of noise as the door to a bar opened to allow a man to stagger unsteadily out. Doug Jacobs seemed to be in high spirits after his late night bender. And why wouldn't he be? He had just gotten off on a technicality from his DUI conviction. And apparently he had learned nothing from the experience as he shuffled towards his beat-up old truck while riffling through his pockets.

Where *was* she?

His eyes flicked around. He had chosen his building because it was the tallest around -- which since he was hardly in the skyscraper district wasn't actually all that tall. Short enough for a fire escape to provide easy access. But that should have meant he'd be the first to see her. So where was she? Unless he had predicted wrong and this wasn't her next target. But he couldn't be wrong, could he? He grimaced as he saw Doug manage to find his keys and get into his truck and picked up his crossbow.

Normally he didn't do this kind of thing. After all, he was out of the heroing business, so what did he care about drunk driving? Sure, he had run a couple of errands for Pinky. Gotten some sweet-ass magical metal automatons for him (and a few for himself). But that was more a favor to a friend. Besides, it's not like he was even here for Doug. Doug was just bait.

He swore softly as he heard the engine start, glancing around to once more confirm no sign of his target before moving the crossbow into a shooting position. Sure, he wasn't here to be a hero. But that didn't mean he was going to sit around and just let the drunken idiot get into another accident, one that possibly hurt someone just because he had been wrong about him being the next target. He had been taking shooting lessons with Xan. More because weapons were kind of cool then because he actually meant to use them. Plus he had to admit, he liked pretending to be hopeless so that she'd exasperatedly fix his stance. Even though he was absolutely sure she knew he was faking.

With those lessons, at this height and distance, the chances of him missing the wheels of a moving vehicle were....still pretty good. But then, that had been why he had a back up plan including of strip of spikes that would deploy across the road at the push of a button. Though even at night with very little traffic, that stood a chance of catching some rando's car as well, which he'd rather avoid. Even though he had been sure she'd stop him, he had made sure to have contingencies in place.

As the truck started to pull away he took in a deep breath, held it, aimed, and pulled the trigger. As the bolt clattered harmlessly off the vehicle, he cursed, quickly moving to try to take a second shot even as the truck screeched, the driver clearly spooked by the noise. As he reloaded and missed again, he was just about to deploy the spike strip when the truck came to an abrupt halt accompanied by Doug getting thrown from the vehicle and the screaming of metal as the front of the vehicle crumped inwards under the force of a collision with a giant leg....

TBC

Despite the address, Kaoru had originally walked into the wrong Starbucks. Which is what happened when you had dumb franchising rules and decided it was a good idea to have two coffee shops right across from each other.

"Hey Chlo, are you-"

He was cut off by a flurry of red hair and a slightly painfully tight hug that he returned a bit more gently. The hug went on longer than normal. Which would have normally been fine except the public area and noticeable glares from some of the male patrons was starting to make him feel very self-conscious. He kept trying to think of a question or something to say that might cause things to move forward, but they all sounded accusatory in his head. 'Why didn't you tell me you were in town?' 'What are you doing here?' So instead he just stood and bore it.

Eventually Chloe pulled away but it turned out that wasn't much better. For a brief instant his expression furrowed into a frown as he noticed the too-wide smile. That was quickly followed by the slightly forced cheeriness and accompanying yellow tinge in her tone.

"Hey Kay. Sorry about all this." She waved vaguely at their surroundings. "I had meant to surprise you, not drag you out to pick me up like some drunk party girl."

He shook his head slowly. "Yeah, no worries. You ready to go?" She needed to...he wasn't sure what. But he was pretty sure whatever it was would work better when not in a public place surrounded by a group of strangers.

Chloe looked slightly startled. "Ummm, I guess?" She shot an uncertain glance at Bronwyn.

Follow the patterns: 2d6 + 3 ⇒ (6, 6) + 3 = 15
You learn something else about the way these creatures work - Hold 1 Monster Hunter and Hold 1 Secret.

Kaoru was pleased. He had managed to make it to Friday without anything terrible happening to him and had therefore had managed to quit without incident. Which meant more free time for hanging out with Alexandra. Chloe had gotten home safely and was already talking about coming back to visit (though admittedly in a kind of mother-hen, worrying about his safety, fashion). On top of that, he had completed the tasks Pinky had given him, thus re-establishing contact.

Yup. Everything was going great. Absolutely, 100%, could-not-complain-about-anything great.

Well, except there was this one thing. Things with Alexandra were a little weird. Or...maybe it wasn't weird? Maybe it was just because they were now officially a "thing"? She seemed to be dressing more casually. Less blouses and more tank tops. Or different blouses that seemed to be missing a few buttons. He kind of missed what she had been wearing before. But it was a pretty minor thing. And the other thing was probably just in his head. Though he could have sworn before she quit, Xan hadn't been nearly as clumsy as she had been lately. She kept dropping things. And then sometimes it seemed like she was examining him after she picked the item up. It made him feel like he was failing a test of hers somehow, so then he started trying to pick up the item for her in case that was the problem. But even then, he felt like he was disappointing her in some way he couldn't fathom.

He had resumed chatting with Chloe on pretty much a daily basis. Though he felt a little guilty each time he did as he still hadn't told her about his little 'transformation'. He wasn't sure why, but for some reason he felt like he shouldn't mention it. After all, it was temporary, right? No point in answering whatever awkward questions she'd ask when it'd be over by the next time he saw her. And really, it wasn't that big of a deal. For all he knew, it'd wear of tomorrow, so not even worth mentioning.

And then Pinky had been acting weird (texting weird?) ever since they had gotten back in touch and they'd found out he had already quit the heroing team. They had almost been mothering him as well, which was weird. All this talk about how dangerous Halcyon was and at least with a team of supers to back him up, he'd have more protection. Even after he had pointed out how epicly poorly that had gone before what with him almost dying and no one even having a bloody clue.

Which is how he found himself in his current, less-than-desirable position. Apparently there had been mythical shenanigans going on. Pinky told him that apparently someone had been sending out automatas to do their bidding. Which, y'know, whatever. Anybody could make robots to run around doing stuff. Except that these apparently weren't your normal mechanical creatures. They were Vulcan automatons (ok, so maybe Pinky had said "Hephaestian" but let's face it, the Romans were cooler).

Which, ok, he had been skeptical about. But then he had started observing them. They definitely weren't your run-of-the-mill hardware. They had done things that really shouldn't have been possible. Pinky had claimed they were powered by magic. He still had his doubts about that (or more accurately, hoped that they were at least mechanical enough he could try copying the technique into his own gadgets), but certainly his limited attempts to hack in had thus far proved unsuccessful. They certainly weren't running typical programs or using normal communication protocols. But either way, it had been enough to pique his interest. Even if Pinky hadn't been insisting that he look into finding a way to use these things for his own. I suppose if they're too magical for me to get anything out of, I could maybe turn one into armor. Or at least grab one of those badass weapons they seem to be carrying...

Will try to get a post up tonight. I had meant to last night, but wound up needing to crash thanks to being on call and getting pointlessly woken up every night for errors I couldn't fix.

Kaoru gave a half-shrug. "I guess it depends on what she wants. I imagine I'm going to be spending a lot of time with Xan in the near future, so depending on if it's a task she's interested in doing with me, I may or may not have the time. Especially if she decides to run things like I've heard she does in her classes: all assigned groups. I somehow always get matched with incompatible people. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to get to class." He walked away.

"No, she didn't." Kaoru responded simply. "What's on the 8th? I would have expected Lunar New Year to make a better week to do something, but it's a bit late for that."

Apologizing is also the polite thing to do, hence Kaoru would have been more annoyed if Alexis hadn't apologized. Alternatively, a +1 for breaking his car in the first place would have made sense as well, though then I would have expected more significant damage.
"A friend gave it to me. It's a prototype or something. I think I'm supposed to be giving user feedback or something on how well it works." Kaoru wasn't about to admit that he wasn't actually sure what metal it was made out of yet. Though even if he were able to get a sample, he wasn't exactly sure what he'd do with it given he was pretty sure it wasn't one of the common metals. Though, come to think of it, alloys were combinations of metals, right? So surely there was some way to analyze it to figure out the break down maybe? Bronwyn might know. Not that he was about to ask her. He was pretty sure good, old, reliable Internets would also know as well. And it was less likely to laugh at him behind his back after he asked.

I don't really think that apologizing qualifies as "frustrating your rival." Sorry.
"That's not how it works." Kaoru said flatly. "The shrinking seems to be tied to the metal it's made out of. You'd have to completely scrap your current armor to make a new suit out of the same stuff." Which would, of course, somehow required finding whatever the hell material the car was made out of somewhere. He just hoped Alexis was attached enough to her own armor to decide to try to tearing his car apart to make a suit for herself. Though since he hadn't yet figured out exactly what mechanism was being used to induce the changes, that would likely just result in them just both being useless. Though hopefully that wouldn't happen; the semi-fluid nature of the metal seemed to make it weirdly durable. After all, he had been rear-ended by a speeding van with nary a scratch.

Also, for my bull's heart question, I'm going to ask what kind of death does Alexis think is the worst?

Kaoru barely glanced up as he moved the last of his things from the trunk to the back seat of the car. It gave him time to make sure his face was blank and voice flat. "No, I'll fix it myself." He said simply. He didn't really think Alexis would be able to help with the delicate work required. Given she already had trouble controlling her strength, it seemed pretty likely she'd only manage to make things worse. "And politely decline Wingblade's offer on my behalf. I believe I can manage." Plus he wasn't about to let some stranger take a look at his top-of-the-line, practically-brand-spanking-new baby. Especially one who might want to install spyware or place a tracker on the thing or who knew what else. Or worse, wanted to "improve" it and broke it somehow. Not that he had personally ever done that. Nope.

He gave Alexis a quick, sideways glance and almost immediately regretted it as his jaw tightened ever so slightly. Her current face definitely wasn't doing her any favors in the 'make Kaoru not want to punch you in the face' department. Forcing himself to remain polite, he added, "Was there anything else? If not, I was going to get started tinkers. I don't like leaving my backseat cluttered. It's dangerous for anybody up front."

I could be wrong, but I think that's only a 6 as Alexis doesn't have influence over Kaoru.
Bull's Heart Question (Kaoru can ask a question in return): How can Mercy make amends?
Find/Give him some kind of interesting, non-sketchy tech gadget/blueprint.

I'm exhausted. Will try to think of what question to ask Alexis later.

You can do that if you want. Kaoru already knows it was Alexis who did it though.

Kaoru waited just long enough to see the situation was contained before leaving. He left the drone hovering for a bit with orders to retreat someone else he could pick it up later. Largely because he rather liked the idea of it annoyingly "accidentally" canceling out any noise as people near it tried to talk. Hope you a%*%*@*s know how to sign. Though in truth, there was only one sign he was interested in sending them and he was pretty sure it was universal enough that even they'd get it.

...yeah, leaving was probably the best bet before he'd do something he'd regret. He had taken a certain amount of satisfaction from watching those a$*!$&~s get smashed and burned but ultimately, it had just frustrated him more. He kind of wanted to punch every single one of them in the face. And if not for the fact that all he'd accomplish was breaking his fist, he might consider doing it. He couldn't stand the thought of looking at any of them right now. Idiotic, lying psychopaths the lot. They only made his life worse and on top of everything, his g&!!@@n clothes still didn't fit right.

Maybe fixing his lock would make him feel better. It had been a weirdly long time since he had had a chance to do anything physical with his hands and he kind of missed his tinkering. Now might be the perfect chance to try to get an idea of exactly what this thing was capable of. Maybe that would occupy his interest enough for him to cool down. Assuming he could forget why he even needed to do repairs in the first place, that was.

Kaoru pulled his arm free as he quickly tried to suss out why he might supposedly have a 'magic' aura on him. The obvious answer was whatever the hell it was that had happened with Balor's magic and caused his current condition. Though wouldn't that be all over him and not just on his chest? Or maybe it was some remnant of that quack's tests. Either way it was probably not something he had to worry about? Or, y'know, maybe it was and he'd die a horrible death. His lips twisted upwards slightly at the thought. It would serve them right. "I'm sure it deserves about as much worry as that fight," he said simply before continuing his walk and back to the office.

*****

Kaoru managed to get to the edge of the parking lot just in time to watch Alexis break his car. His vision went red briefly before he managed to push the burning anger down with one grimly satisfying thought: now he wouldn't need to meet up with the idiot after school. As the idiot bounded away, he ran to his poor baby, grabbing up a few of the other things he had stashed in the trunk and moving them to the now more secure body of the vehicle. He quickly tossed his drone up in the air as he climbed it. Tapping a few short directions on his watch, he opened his laptop and started pulling up his music editing software as he waited for the little machine to reach its destination.

Unleash: 2d6 + 3 ⇒ (4, 4) + 3 = 11

The creature was using sonic attacks. That was just sound waves. That was therefore pretty easy to neutralize. He had done plenty of work already trying to slice together multiple music tracks or synthesize instruments he hadn't learned yet. Just for a lark, he had even worked on some real-time auto-tuning software. This was what he now modified. Instead of taking in a sound and pitch-correcting it, he had the software invert the input and play it back out. It was actually much easier than auto-tuning. As long as the drone could stay relatively close to the creature -- which would hopefully decide to focus on actually dangerous objects and not a flying thing following it -- it could play sound waves that would neutralize any future sonic attacks the creature attempted.

Kaoru wasn't quite able to suppress the slight, wry twist of his lips at the 'I thought we were better friends than that' comment. Who was lying now? He at least had been perfectly honest. "I'm not the one dragging you out of class to-" He stopped in the hallway, suddenly looking down as her last statement caught up with him. He relaxed slightly when he didn't see a giant, man-eating spider on his chest or anything of that ilk. Then his face pulled into a slight frown. His shirt was just as clean as it had been that morning when he put it on. "What are you talking about? There's nothing on my chest." He resumed walking slightly faster than before. He wasn't sure what she was trying to pull, but he was eager to have this over and done with.

Kaoru's pace only slowed for a moment before he continued his brisk walk towards the office. At the very least, it would get the timing right for his absence. "No one has attempted to contact me on comms, and I'll be handing Alexis her armor after school." He responded simply. "I would also not say that I'm pissed." Which was true. He was annoyed at being pointlessly taken out of one of the few classes he liked but something apparently as dumb as a talk that, as far as he could tell, could have occurred some other time. But there wasn't that flush of heat he associated with anger. Almost the opposite actually. Just a vague disinterest in this entire interaction. He didn't see the point in it. And he didn't like spending his time on pointless things.

And...g%&%+$n it, now his pants were riding up again. With a conscious effort, he avoided tugging at them again. When he didn't have something to engage with, he became irritatingly aware of seemingly every place his clothes were touching him. And the longer it went on, the more he started to feel...he wasn't sure what exactly. Slightly off balance? A vague sense of malaise? He couldn't quite place it and that just made it worse. He just wanted to be done with this and go back to concentrating on class.

Kaoru stood slowly, reflexively tugging at his pants before mentally rebuking himself; it was one of the few things Xan had told him to stop doing that he couldn't seem to get down. Though fortunately, it had been one of the less obvious giveaways that she had helped him work through in his attempt to get used to this new body. With her help, the best the most observant people would be able to tell was that he had chosen clothes he was starting to outgrow.

He bowed slightly to Mrs. Li. "对不起老师 " Really, he would have liked to say more, perhaps ask something that would prompt her to refuse the request, but such was thus far too complicated for him. Unless of course, he wanted to spend a lot more time to race ahead in the class. Which he didn't. He was already spending more time on this class than any of his other ones, which was admittedly a rather low bar given the courses he had picked. It just figured he'd have to get called during one of the few classes where he was actually learning something new.

As Mrs. Li nodded her acknowledgment and indicated that his practice partner should join a different group for now, he walked towards the door, face a firmly fixed neutral. As he started to head briskly towards the office, he vaguely wondered if this had been a legit summons or if Bronwyn was abusing her position for something else.

Kaoru looked up at the...power station? Cell tower? He wasn't quite sure what it was. Or what the odd device he had been asked to place was supposed to do. He assumed it was some kind of hardware hack to bypass whatever defenses Delphi had put up, but as expected, it was just as advanced and beyond him as every other little gift Pinky had sent his way. Whatever it was, it had been simple enough to get in and install. His target hadn't even been guarded. He wasn't quite sure if he was pleased by that or disappointed.

Whatever it was, it was the last of the set of tasks he had been asked to do, none of which had been especially difficult. Which was a sure sign that Pinky didn't live in this area or they could have just done it themself. Or hired that what's-his-face guy to do it. But then, that would probably be expensive, and Pinky had already spent more on him than he should have just by hiring the guy to save his life. Which he was grateful for even as it made him uncomfortable. He wasn't sure what it had cost but he was pretty sure it was well more than he was worth. Enough that even running these errands wouldn't make them any where near even. Especially since these errands were actually for him so he could continue to chat with his friend after stupidly getting caught by that Greek-but-probably-not a%@@~+*.

He shook his head, trying to push the anxiety out as he noticed he had a missed call. Frowning and hoping to distract himself -- or distract himself as much as he could given that he was still using the beyond-next-gen probably-a-one-of-a-kind-prototype that had also been a gift -- he listened to the voicemail.

"Hey, uh, so, you might have heard that Alexandra is um, quitting the team. Which, well, she has her reasons. You can still... be on the team? Dammit. Look, I don't know what to say here, but I understand if you want to quit too, okay?"

His jaw clenched at the words. Yes, he totally had no idea his girlfriend had quit the team. </sarcasm> And Wingblade was clearly hoping he'd quit along with her. Probably so she could be leader again.

Ugh, and he still had that stupid armor, didn't he. It would have been easy enough to drop it off at school, but given the last-minute cancellation, he didn't feel like seeking Alexis out to give it back to him. Her? ...it?

He probably should quit the team. Gods only knew the only good part of it had already left. And after Friday, he'd at least be free to do so. Sighing, he started up the car. Maybe he'd stick around the outskirts of the city until he cooled off. Try putting the car through its paces. Test its limits and then check out what was under the hood. Unraveling a puzzle like that should be enough to keep his mind off of everything else that was going on.

Kaoru grinned and splashed Alexandra back. "Well, if they're dicks about it, let me know, and I'll come try to cheer you up."

He spent some more time splashing about and enjoying both the water and the time spent with Alexandra. It was a welcome change from heavier thoughts. He wasn't quite able to shake off the feeling of being indecent without a shirt on though. It was a niggling little worm crawling at the corner of his consciousness. It was eased a bit by having his torso submerged in water up to his neck, but he still felt a little like he was in one of those dreams where you were just running around naked and couldn't find clothes or a door that locked properly. You need to get used to it. Even if it's temporary. This is how you can be a proper boyfriend to her. At least for a couple of months.

With her quitting, this might mean more time for date nights. Though perhaps less exciting dates than the whole breaking into the SCA thing. Not that that had been a date. But he had read adrenaline was good for dates. Maybe he could bust out some horror moves? And pray that they didn't make him scream like a little girl. Horror was admittedly not his genre unless there was a strong comedy or satirical element. Or zombies because at that point it was more supernatural than horror.

After heading home and changing, he left again. He still had some errands to run and this was probably as good of a time as any to do them. First stop was some kind of electrical tower at the edge of town.

Kaoru froze as his brain suddenly stalled. It seemed to bounce between the mix of embarrassment and nervousness of "But we've only kissed! We can't skip straight to sex!" and the streak of fear that accompanied "Knives?!?" The rapid back and forth caused neither thought to progress very far before the other asserted its demand for his attention. He finally managed to pull out of the stall when Alexandra laughed, though that wasn't quite enough to dismiss the slightly sick feeling in his gut.

"Can't work with people you don't trust. They'll understand that. They'll probably get defensive about it, but they'll understand." Bonus points for it hurting them in the process. He almost hoped he was there to watch. But then he'd have to be there. So instead he just savored the thought a moment before ducking underwater to swim back and forth a little.

The water felt good. He had forgotten how much he enjoyed swimming. The muted soundscape of being underwater that made everything feel distant and unimportant. The near-weightlessness and feeling of floating. He used to sit at the bottom of the pool, refusing to come up until his lungs burned and he was an inch away from inhaling water to douse the fire. Only then would he surface again to refill his lungs and repeat the process. Between that and all his vocal lessons, he was getting pretty good at holding his breath.

He dove deeper, lightly running a finger along the bottom of one of Alexandra's exposed feet as he swam underneath her and surfaced on the other side, grinning. "So, what are you going to do with all your new found free time?"

Not quite able to keep his amusement off of his face, Kaoru responded back. "Oh, I wasn't pretending not to know what the riding crop was for. Merely questioning the consistency with the outfit. I would have thought that surely something like a bullwhip would match better, would it not?" He was enjoying the light-hearted banter after a second day in a row of possibly almost dying. Plus it wasn't like it really meant anything. Chloe tried to pull this sort of thing with him all the time; it didn't mean she was actually interested in it, let alone interested in doing that with him.

He started to move a little into the water, trying to adjust to the temperature before he had to decide if the shirt really was going or not. "Well, if they do, you can just throw back at them that it's because you can't be on a team with people you don't trust. I bet that'd shut them up."

He smiled as she agreed to help show him some things. There was admittedly a small part of him that was hoping for that whole 'No, you're standing wrong. Here let me show you' trope move. He was smart, so he could probably arrange it. She'd know of course. But somehow he didn't really think she'd mind. Maybe he could also get her to teach him some fighting skills. Those sparring scenes in fanfics had always seemed so...charged. He was skeptical that that's how it would actually go -- after all, you were throwing punches and kicks at each other -- but he was interested in at least trying it.

Completely in his own mind, he barely even noticed what he was doing until he was up to his waist in water. A sudden wave of embarrassment washed over him. Gritting his teeth he tried to distract himself by quickly pulling off his shirt, tossing it back to dry land, and diving into the water. It would hopefully serve to obfuscate his body and wipe the most likely dopey look on his face off.

Kaoru frowned. "Would a Dark Sorceress be proficient in riding crops? It seems a little...incongruent. But maybe I'm just picturing it wrong."

He was a little surprised with Alexandra agreed to go swimming with him. A little surprised and a lot unexpectedly nervous. Part of the point of going to a private location was for him to get acclimated to his new form, which would be easiest alone. But it was just Alexandra, so that would be ok, right?

He nodded slowly as she spoke, toe gingerly testing out the water. He was still wearing his undershirt. He hadn't quite worked up the courage to take it off yet. Intellectually he knew it was ok. But for some reason, it still felt like he would be flashing her. And what if she didn't like his male body? I mean, she'll like it more than my normal body, which is a plus. But that doesn't mean I'm going to suddenly have a six-pack or anything... Which meant he should probably start working out. He heard testosterone helped build muscle mass quickly, so now that he had more of it, it should be easy, right?

"That makes sense. And as I said, I support you in whatever direction you want to go in. And if people give you s##@ about it, I'll ruin their credit score for you. But, I was thinking: you should totally teach me to use a crossbow. And do you know how to use a sword? 'Cause I was thinking it might be cool to buy one. They would probably just sit in my room after Friday, but they'd make fun decorations. And I read somewhere that if someone breaks into your home, a sword makes a good weapon for self-defense because they can't just grab the blade and a judge isn't going to ask all those 'was that really necessary' type questions that you get with a gun since if they were close enough for you to hit with a sword, they're too close."

My preference would be for Outsider then Nova then Harbinger, chosen solely because of tone. It's not that I can't handle a dark tone; it's just not a direction I'm personally interested in engaging in.

I also wouldn't worry about stepping on the sex change thing; the majority of the things I'm interested in exploring are internal struggles. As such, it's very much going to be a plot around how Kaoru feels about suddenly being male. Other people changing sex is kind of irrelevant to it.