It's Not Like I'm Making Friends or Anything

"Mn..." Aito replied, averting his eyes again for a moment. "It's just something about manga and anime tropes there seems to be a fascination with..."

That they seemed to love categorizing him in...when he wasn't! He was being wrongly categorized...

She looked at him curiously, before frowning. That... That wasn't even an answer. "Hey... I asked a question.. What does Tsun actually MEAN...." She said with a slight huff. Jeez... Aito was cute but he could be ENTIRELY frustrating...

How did Selena manage to have sex with him?

"Gh...I don't know, soft on the inside, not on the out?" It was stupid bullshit if you ask him! He was not soft and therefore not a tsundere!

Why were they even on this subject!?

"What, like an M&M?" She asked with a quizzical expression on her face. "That's silly. Tsundere. I guess it makes sense." She finished her drink and set it aside for the waitress to get her a refill when she came back.

"So I take it you wouldn't be a fan of any sort of candy based nicknames. M&M is silly though. Skittle? Yes. I take it I can't call you skittles." She said with a little nod.

"..." Aito blinked; what....

What...

Call...him...what!?

"Absolutely not." No way in hell could she call him any of those things! He would not accept any dumb candy based nicknames!

"Awww..." She leaned forward grinning. Under the table, she was kicking her feet happily. Aww, she supposed she could see why Selena had so much fun with him. Not that she was planning to start THAT sort of drama.

"Why not? It'd be a cute nickname." She said, before suddenly her face lighted up with delight. "Ooh, let me call you that or I'll pass it along to SELENA to call you that."

"Because it's not my name. I wouldn't be a cute nickname, because it's not even cute..." Aito replied, a frustrated noise escaping him at the apparent deal Alison was throwing at him.

That...This was bullshit! He hadn't come here to discuss dumb stuff like this!

Please... she was the definitive expert on cute, she felt and it was cute. "Well, I suppose Selena will just have to be the judge of that, won't she..." She said with a sigh. She sipped at her drink before glancing around. Hmm..

"You know... I have a LOOT more questions about things like nicknames or you and Selena.. But... I probably could be distracted if someone spilled EEEEEEEEVERYTHING they know about Bell's Viper?" She said before grinning. "But~ until then, what nickname do you think Selena will like more? Skittle? Or Tough Cookie? Cause get it? When a cookie is tough it's usually still soft inside?"

Aito's eye finally twitched again; could he just leave? Could he just get up right now, and walk away? He obviously couldn't spill everything he knew, nor was he even remotely happy with these stupid nicknames she was throwing at him.

"Gh...g...No." No. No to all of it.

ALISON leaned in close.  "Oh?  But No isn't an option..."  She said with a downright evil grin.  "Hmm... You know what's hard on the outside but so soft and sweet inside?  Cooked peeps.  But we could just call you peeps for short."  She said with a chuckle.

"Yes.  I am fairly sure that Selena would like one of these nicknames.  In fact..."  She tapped her lip.  "I think if she heard you denied your involvement with her, she might be so inclined as to get the nickname tattooed on you so you don't forget.  Think of it.  Skittle or Peeps right on the neck."

These nicknames were damn annoying...

The hell did she mean "no" wasn't an option!? If he didn't want to be referred to by this shit he shouldn't be! This was stupid!

"No." No to these damn nicknames!

She sighed. "All right. That's fine. You don't have to tell me about anything... and I don't have to call you any nicknames." She said despondently. "You can order whatever you want and eat here alone in peace."

She nodded solemnly. "Oh. Hold on." She pulled out her phone. "Did Selena ever mention Julian? Do you know who he is?" She asked calmly. Her expression was calm and her voice peaceful, but there was an evil edge to it.

"Nicknames are annoying. I have a name..." He stated, glancing off to the side; well, she could at least refer to him by the alias he went by...around here it wasn't that useful anymore, but still...

Julian?

"Ah...She mentioned him once, her music teacher, and another, but that's mostly it; not much details..." He replied, remembering some of what she'd told him about, most of it'd been shared when she was sharing pictures of her pets...? Ah, he remembered something about electric powers? Maybe?

What was with that tone of hers? Did she not like that guy or something?

"Right, so you wouldn't like it so much if Selena took to calling you an embarrassing nickname, right?" She asked before turning her phone on. "Well. Julian is her... very close friend." She said with a chuckle.

The phone began to ring. "And I imagine they're close enough he could sell her on any of the nicknames I've come up with." She said before the phone picked up. She put it on speaker phone so Aito could hear the voicemail message. "Hey, Julian? Yes, it's Alison." She said, once it had beeped. "I met that boy Selena liked and I've come up with some DARLING nicknames you can tell her to assign to him when you get this. But I'm going to hang up if he starts explaining more information about what I want to know. Okay, I'm going to start listing them now. Snuggles.... Skittles... Tough Cookie..." She was going to just keep going.

Yeah, he knew; Selena had a damn harem according to her...

Obviously, Aito was frustrated as all hell, though he was masking at least half of it, especially as that damn phone rang. Why the hell was this even happening!? Why hadn't he just lied earlier about knowing anything and went on his way!?

"What the hell do you even want to know?" He was genuinely annoyed, that much was clear.

Alison winced as obvious signs of anger became more apparent. She shrunk back just a bit. Why did he need to yell? It's not like... okay... well she WAS prying... a bit much... a lot much. She replayed their conversation since entering the diner and sank as she did so.

Okay... so she was maybe being an asshole. She sighed. "Um...I'm sorry, Mr. Yoshioka... I didn't mean to make you so upset. I was being very rude." She said after a few moments of silence. "Um... I would understand if you wanted to leave, but I promise I'll be more respectful if you will give me the chance."

Aito was quiet for a few moments, calming his nerves as Alison apologized; he moved to drink some from his drink before setting it down again before giving a small sigh.

Fine...They'd start over...

"What do you want to know...?" He questioned, his fingers tapping once against his glass.

She nodded rather solemnly, feeling more than a little small at the moment. But she took his question as a sign that her apology had been accepted. Still, she had that icky feeling in her stomach when she'd done something wrong and it hadn't gone away just yet.

"Um.. Well, I don't want to pull up any painful memories, but any names or history of the group or any of their bases locations would be helpful. Especially if they'll be destroyed soon, I'd like to learn about them as much as I can first."

"From what I hear most of the important names are dead now..." Aito replied, "I don't know when it all started, I was never told that much, I just know they drug tested on kids, they had 'em fight sometimes too...usually only one came out alive. Weak ones were sold off to other underground facilities..."

There was no one sitting in their general area, this place not being the busiest right now, which was good; it'd be weird if they were overheard...especially with him talking about shit like this.

"Kids that get snatched up are branded, and given an identification number to be known by. If you don't obey the rules, or the adults in general it could result in certain punishments that ranged from a beating to death depending on the mood..." Beating, self torture, lashings, death...lots of things...

She frowned more. And he'd been through all of that? She understood a little bit why he was so... defensive... and she'd pestered him so much. She looked like she was going to sink right under the table with shame. "Um... I'm sorry... I'm really sorry. For how I pried and that you had to go through that." She said quietly. Did he know where any of the bases were? How had he escaped? He said most of the names. Were some alive?

She remained quiet though. If he'd started talking, maybe he would continue?

"...s'fine..." He muttered after a bit, he'd been annoyed as all hell, but whatever...she looked like she was going to sink into the damn floor at this rate.

He could tell she wanted to ask more, but she wasn't...

Was she waiting on him...? He waited a few moments before giving a small breath again. "The base I was in...I don't know what's going on with it right now, or if they've attempted a move...I was a tracker for one of the main doctors...no use finding him though, he's dead now, but that's for the best... He had me tracking Okura, the female subject I mentioned earlier, she was wanted for being the cause of all those escaped subjects in the first place..."

They'd crossed paths more than a few times and fought, so they'd ended up choosing him for the job of tracker...It was over with now though...

She nodded as he continued. Okay... Well she supposed it was good his own personal torturer was dead now... What about this Okura girl... From what he'd been saying earlier he wasn't particularly fond of her... Hrm... Maybe something a little more positive?

"What about.. Um. What about your family? From before? Could it be possible to find them? If not your immediate family, SOME kind of relative?" She could certainly find people rather well.

"They're dead." Aito responded, "My parents didn't have any siblings, and their parents died. So no, no immediate family or any other relatives. The organization snatches orphans for a reason, no one will care eventually..."

For now he was strictly under an alias, even if it wasn't always respected as such... As long as his real identity didn't spread too far then whatever...

"It's been over twelve years...so for now I'm probably marked as dead still from where I'm from and the records are collecting dust."

She frowned. "But.. But you have somewhere to stay, right? I mean... You're getting by, yes?" Did he have anyone? Well, there was Selena but she lived halfway around the damned world. Did he have friends here? "I-I mean... I don't want to pry... Sorry." She said with a little nod. After how much she'd nosed her way into his personal affairs before she had no intention of repeating that mistake.

"I have an apartment." He replied, "It's enough."

It was small, but it wasn't like he needed anything big anyway; before everything his family may have been rich, but he had only lived with that lifestyle...what? five or six years? In comparison to the twelve he spent in that hellhole what he had now was enough.

As long as he had food to eat and a roof over his head he was fine.