Nanakusa (THE END?!)

[whytphyre]

Hi. This is soo not soon, but I don't care. Just read it. And enjoy.

Please enjoy.

Chapter 13 :: Hana wo Pu~un!

Bullets hurt.

If I could understate that any more, I would. I don’t have enough page time to do it (explain bullet pain I mean), so I’ll stick with that… oh, and the following:

Holy mackerel of all that’s pink and cute! (random swears here)! THAT FRIGGIN’ STINGS!

They don’t call me the reaction queen for nothing.

I don’t remember much after the immense amount of pain, but I do remember Gocchin’s voice, and the pain had stopped for awhile.

I took a pretty good nap between then and whenever the pain started up again.

Then, all I remember after that was popping my eyes open and being greeted with sobs and more pain.

“Gaki-san!”

Especially the pain in the head region.

“Sayumin… I’m… OW OW OW!!!”

Letting out a shrill cry (a very shrill, head hurty one), Sayumin stumbled back and stared.

“Thank you. Just keep it down some, okay?”

“She’s been like that since we got here. Give her a moment.”

My gaze snapped over to Ai-chan. Her eyes were puffy, her cheeks were tear-stained, but she had the same composure Yocchan had on her own graduation.

It was kind of scary.

I almost expected her to demand I stare at her until I burst into tears, then give me those bug eyes…

Nevermind, reaction queen as I might be, I’m horrid at that comparison thing.

“Sorry to give you a scare,” I tried sheepishly, “At least I’m alive, right?”

“ALIVE!? You’d better as hell be alive after all this worrying I’ve done! OHMIGOD Gaki-san, what is your problem!? You expect me to just say ‘everything’s alright, just get better soon’!? I’m not forgiving you for getting shot!”

Pause. Silence. I couldn’t tell who burst out into tears first, but we were crying and hugging and comforting not long after that short moment of silence.

“You didn’t go off and do anything stupid, did you?” I finally asked. The crying had stopped, but she still clung to me, like Sayumin did during her little moment.

She must have felt left out.

“No, not really…” Ai-chan said, through the last of her tears. I had no idea what she meant by that, but I knew it wasn’t ‘of course not Gak-san!’

“Ai-chan…”

“I… sent… one of the Berryz girls… out for clues…”

“Why?”

“So no one else got hurt…”

Sometimes Ai-chan was a great liar, and could even weasel her way out of even Yocchan’s motherly interrogations.

This was not one of those times.

“Ai-chan.”

“I don’t want whoever it was hurting you again!”

Pause. Silence.

Oh.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Why?

What did Kamei-san ever do to him? Why did he do that?

To say the least, I had no idea why she was bleeding all over the place. I just knew who did it.

He was angry, with wide eyes and scraggly, black hair. He didn’t have a gun or knife or anything.

He just spoke some Latin at Kamei-san, and she started splurting blood all over the place.

First I was trying to help her, getting her blood all over my new clothing. My mom was gonna kill me.

Then I was crying my heart out over the whole ordeal. My dad was gonna kill me.

And now I was watching an ambulance drive off with her because I was in too many, much… whatever, hysterics to go with them.

Damn that stupid language barrier.

Linlin was gonna kill me.

Tears had finally stopped by the time the ambulance drove out of sight, but I rubbed my eyes anyways.

I should have stayed in China, really I should have. My parents were probably worried sick.

I swear, if I wasn’t dead by the end of the day… I would have been by the end of the week.

“Junjun…”

Her voice startled me, but when she calmly put her hand on my shoulder, I settled down again.

“Kamei’ll be alright… he didn’t kill her. Let’s just get you cleaned up, and we can talk about what to do now over some cake… or something soothing, okay?”

I sniffed, and nodded, smiling over at her before giving her a large hug.

“… Alright, we stop by my apartment first… ‘cause now I need a change of clothing… you’re such a little bugger…”

She knew I understood her, and never tried to simplify her language around me. After she realized how smart I was, she just went right back to talking as she normally did.

Though her saying hello to me was just amusing.

“… Hai.”

“Good. Maybe we can get you into some clothing that’ll fit you… despite the fact that you’re… taller…”

She noticed that I had let a stray tear fall from my cheek, and she brushed it away.

“Hey now, big girls don’t cry. Especially the cute Chinese panda types. Toughen up. Let’s go.”

[JFC]

Bullets hurt.

...

They don’t call me the reaction queen for nothing.

I don’t remember much after the immense amount of pain, but I do remember Gocchin’s voice, and the pain had stopped for awhile.

...

Then, all I remember after that was popping my eyes open and being greeted with sobs and more pain.

“Gaki-san!”

Risa got shot?

* JFC goes back to check previous chapters.

Oh...right. Aichan's on some vengeance trip to find out who shot Risa.

*sigh* So many sub-stories in this one. Hard to remember them all.

My gaze snapped over to Ai-chan. Her eyes were puffy, her cheeks were tear-stained, but she had the same composure Yocchan had on her own graduation.

...

“Sorry to give you a scare,” I tried sheepishly, “At least I’m alive, right?”

“ALIVE!? You’d better as hell be alive after all this worrying I’ve done! OHMIGOD Gaki-san, what is your problem!? You expect me to just say ‘everything’s alright, just get better soon’!? I’m not forgiving you for getting shot!”

...

“You didn’t go off and do anything stupid, did you?” I finally asked.

...

“No, not really…” Ai-chan said, through the last of her tears. I had no idea what she meant by that, but I knew it wasn’t ‘of course not Gak-san!’

“Ai-chan…”

“I… sent… one of the Berryz girls… out for clues…”

“Why?”

...

“I don’t want whoever it was hurting you again!”

Pause. Silence.

Oh.

Yep.

Sweet...clueless...baka Risa. Only realizing it now are we?

What did Kamei-san ever do to him? Why did he do that?

To say the least, I had no idea why she was bleeding all over the place. I just knew who did it.

He was angry, with wide eyes and scraggly, black hair. He didn’t have a gun or knife or anything.

He just spoke some Latin at Kamei-san, and she started splurting blood all over the place.

GODDAMMIT now what? Last time we heard from Eri and Junjun, they were just trying to buy some FUCKIN pocky at a corner store!  How'd the FUCK did we go from THAT, to FUCKIN Eri bleeding?!?!?! And who the FUCK is "he" and what exactly did he say to Eri? 


This whole thing is getting more incoherent than a daytime soap opera! (I HATE shit that's incoherent) Instead of going 1-2-3-4-5-6-7, we're going from 1 and skipping all the way to 7, then (sometimes) going back and touching on 5, 2, 6, and 3, which thus confuses and frustrates the living hell out of people like me who actually like knowing what the hell they're reading! 

[whytphyre]

That's kinda funny. I don't like writing 1-2-3-4-5-6-7... 'cause then I can't totally confuse everyone.

Everything will be straightened out within the next two chapters... at least somewhat mostly explained. Sorda. You'll see.

Then I'll get to the slightly humorous part, and then I'll go right back to confusing again!

[inDeceit]

I for one like being confused. Creates suspense and stuff Kinda makes you keep wanting to come back just to check when the next damned chapter would be up and reveal more about the situation.

Anyway.. OMG ERI D:

[lil_hamz]

Oh my, JFC, your comment's too funny

About Eri having blood all over the walls, floor and what not.... WHY DID YOU LET THAT HAPPEN?!?!?! *grabs whytphyre and attempts to shake her/him but ends up getting whack over the head instead*

First Risa, now Eri. You're targeting all my favorite members. If the next one getting hurt and spilling blood is Reina, I'm convinced you're determined to kill off everyone I like

[whytphyre]

If I killed off everyone you liked I'd have killed off everyone I liked by now too. None of them die in this story. Big hint.

These next two chapters will wrap up this set of problems, like I stated before. Then we'll get into a real big thing, and go back to confusion.

Chapter 14 :: Wrapping Things Up...

“C’mon Maki. If I didn’t ask, someone would have!”

She was in what could conceivably be called her ‘private dressing room.’

She had been in there for awhile, at least an hour or so.

Miki was knocking on her door pretty hard, as if her knocks could burst the door down.

Despite this, Maki was still hiding inside.

“Shut up! Go away!”

Well, at least she was alive.

“Ya know, Yocchan doesn’t like it when people hide in dressing rooms! She had to drag Reina out one time, remember? She was ranting about it for a week!”

Maki highly doubted it. Miki knocked again.

“Gocchin! Do you wa-“

“DON’T CALL ME THAT!”

“Wow, bratty much?”

She sighed, and glanced behind her shoulder, at Rika, who finally made a noise.

“Yeah, ain’t she weird?”

“I think she’s just… upset… That you said mean things to her.”

“Like what?!”

“No naked closet time? What kind of crap is that to say? It’s inappropriate! It’s bad enough Gocch-“

“I SAID DON’T CALL ME THAT!”

“… Maki-chan… has to worry about Yocchan’s well being… but you go and say mean things to her about it? No wonder. All her grump must go down to her boobies.”

The door swung open, and Maki gave Rika a cold stare. After a small moment, she tightened the ponytail that now held her hair back, and snorted.

“Don’t tell anyone I’m going after Yocchan.”

Miki and Rika stared. Maki had dressed herself in a red workout suit, much similar to the blue one Hitomi had always favored.

Complete with matching, red shoes. A girl had to accessorize, after all.

“You can’t just go after Kabutomabushi,” Miki said sternly, “She told you to stay here.”

“Well you know what? I don’t care.”

“Maki-chan…”

Rika gave her a cute, watery eyed look. She didn’t want to see Maki die or anything stupid like that. Hitomi wouldn’t ever forgive her for letting Maki wander recklessly into her own death.

“Rika-chan…”

Maki gave the girl a warm smile and put a hand on her shoulder.

“Don’t worry about me. I mean it. I’m just going to make sure Yocchan doesn’t go kill herself. I won’t get myself in danger.”

Was it a blatant lie? Probably, but Rika seemed to buy it, as she nodded and smiled back.

Miki didn’t, however.

“No. You aren’t leaving.”

“I didn’t ask.”

“I didn’t say I was answerin’ a question.”

They stared each other down for a long moment, and Rika let out a squeak.

“Please not here. Let her go. We have more important people to worry about,” she said. Miki gave Rika a look.

“…. Fine. But if Maki dies, I’m blaming it on you.”

“Then blame it on me. I don’t think she’s going to die. I think she’s going to be just fine.”

Maki’s smile appeared again, and she gave Rika a small hug.

“Thank you. If Yocchan comes back tell her I told her not to yell at you. Or she gets no happy fun time.”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Reina wasn’t sure how long she could keep Koharu out on the street. The girl wasn’t a hindrance to anyone, and she didn’t wave her arms around wildly or make things burst into flames, but she was clinging to Reina a little closer than Reina would have liked.

“She’s out here… I know she is.”

“Not right now she’s not. We’ll get back to Miki-san, and then we’ll deal with it from there, okay? Once we get to Miki-san, everything will be alright.”

Reina was livid with anger at Miki, but she didn’t tell Koharu that. She was sure the girl realized it anyways.

“Reina-chan.”

“Hai?”

“Was Mikitty-chan angry at me?”

“No. Don’t worry about it.”

Koharu smiled and nodded fiercely. Reina gave the girl a small, playful bump on the cheek, like Hitomi used to do for her.

“Koha-chan, why were you in that closet?”

Koharu was quiet for a moment, but she nodded to herself and gave Reina a fierce look, determined to tell her 6th Gen senpai what she could.

“Saki said that Sayumin had seen her almost kill Yocchan last night, so she tried to come and get Sayumin… but Sayumin was already headed for work, and I had just missed her too…”

“What were you doing at Sayumin’s place?”

“I wanted to borrow her mirror again…”

Reina nodded. It was beginning to click now.

“So Saki did some things to you and stuffed you in a closet?”

“… She scared me and stuffed me in a closet…”

Koharu looked down after that, as if revealing more would give away too much. Reina nodded again, and brought the 7th Gen girl close.

“It’ll be alright. Like I said, we go find Miki-san, and she’ll scare Saki away. Promise.”

[JFC]

Ok, is the Saki that is going psycho on Yossi, is she Captain or not?

[whytphyre]

No. That Saki is Aya's sadistic personality. Her name came from the Sukeban Deka name... and then everyone flipped out. I honestly wasn't thinking about how many Sakis are in H!P... so Momo was sooooo me poking at everyone ^^;;

[JFC]

^ Okay, THAT helps clear things up a bit. It was really confusing there, especially when you had back to back chapters that had Momoko and Saki (aka "Captain") in one, and then shortly after you bring in Aya's "Saki".

[g4rfield]

Ehh? Aya with a split personality?? Funny that I think in real life she does too, just not as extreme to the extent of wanting to kill people.  You messed with my brain with that 'Saki' name cuz seriously I thought it was Captain, I never once think that it was Sukeban Deka character name.  What a  baka! You should definitely continue this fic.    I'd like to know what's happen with Yomaki and Aya Miki, esp. with the split personality problem, and Sayu/Reina? That's new. I like Sayu/Eri but well, I'm open to new combo. 

[whytphyre]

The source of Eri's 'killer' is revealed! Bourne Supremacy references! I need a nap!

Enjoy the chapter! OR ELSE!

Chapter 15 :: ... Is What We Do Best

“Junjun.”

“Your apartment’s white.”

“I noticed. Take off your shoes before you enter.”

Hitomi walked past the bewildered Chinese girl, who stared in complete awe of her former leader’s apartment. It was different than what she imagined.

“Junjun, you hungry?”

“Hm?”

“Hungry. You know, hamburgers, ramen, food.”

“Ah! Yes. No. Not anymore.”

Very short, sweet, simple answers. Hitomi liked that.

“I can see why Tsunku chose you…”

Junjun grinned, before taking off her shoes and following her leader into her room, purely on instinct. Hitomi raised her brow.

“Junjun, I’m getting changed…”

“Hai.”

“… Do you wanna… leave the room?”

“No. We… are both girls, right?”

Hitomi smiled, and nodded.

“Guess we are.”

She didn’t waste any time after that, shedding her now bloody, white tee and replacing it with a new one of the same style and color. Junjun noticed that there were scars on her stomach. Not big enough to imply a horrible flesh wound, but enough to be noticeable.

“Yoshizawa-sama?”

Hitomi stopped, and stared at the girl. No one called her that. Really, no one ever called her that. Maybe Junjun had a problem with honorifics.

Yeah, that’ll explain that one.

“Junjun?”

“Why did you bring me here? Why not… back at… work?”

Letting a sigh escape her lips, Hitomi smiled at the girl and scratched the back of her head in a thoughtful manner.

“… I don’t know. It seemed right.”

“It just… seemed right?”

“Kinda like destiny Junjun. It just feels right.”

“… You didn’t… seem to be into… that sort of thing…”

“I’m not, but I can’t explain it any other way.”

She smiled at Junjun, who smiled back.

“You need to get washed up kiddo. The whole blood thing? Doesn’t suit you. Makes you look like someone out of Battle Royale.”

Junjun looked down, and smiled back up at Hitomi again.

“I like Battle Royale.”

“You would say that.”

Junjun grinned smugly, and received a light punch on the cheek, a playful one. Hitomi grinned back.

“Wash up. Then I’ll give you a change of clothing… and then we’ll eat something, ‘cause all I had for breakfast was some pastries. I need some meat if I wanna go save the world.”

Junjun stopped, and stared at Hitomi, who stared back in the same manner.

“What?”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Her footsteps were light, as she rounded the corner of the warehouse. She had followed the trail that she was given by Ai. She wasn’t entirely sure how Ai got the trail, but there was a feeling in the back of her mind that Ai had powers she wasn’t telling people about.

Miyabi let a small sigh escape her lips, as she rounded another corner. She was closer to the trail on who shot Risa, or who they all thought who shot her.

“The stupid turtle girl was easy…”

“I was aiming for the taller one… What’s she, Chinese?”

“You aimed wrong, and you got the turtle. Don’t worry ‘bout it. We got one. She’s defined dead.”

“I didn’t hit her close enough to her heart to kill her!”

“I coulda sworn I felt her die!”

“Your powers don’t have anything to do with that!”

There was a pause, and a grunt.

“Fine. We’ve terrorized Morning Musume… who’s FRIDAY want us to deal with next?”

“… Berryz Koubou. More specifically, they want Sugaya Risako in a scandal, out in the open, and ready to kill…”

“… Hmm… I guess we could use the Asset on ‘er…”

“No. Remember what happened to the last few Assets?”

“… Oh yeah… Yaguchi's not a people person when she's being toyed with…”

“Doesn’t matter. I’ll go after Risako myself. And I know how to get to her. I gotta kill one of her little friends first…”

“Which one though? We don’t know enough about them to expose…”

“We’ll find out, and you know there’s only one way to do that.”

Laughter, then a pause.

“We just kill ‘em off, one by one.”

“Probably not the effe- Wait, what was that?”

That would have been the noise Miyabi made as she tried to turn and hightail it out of the warehouse.

What did Ai send her into!?

Moreover, what did they want with Risako? She had to get back to the other Berryz, she had to warn them.

Screw what her senpai wanted anymore. Her friends meant more to her. Risako meant more to her.

.... Mostly her friends.

“Ack! They’ve found us!”

Miyabi didn’t look back, just ran harder. She could make it. Turn a couple more corners, get out into the open. They wouldn’t shoot her if they were revealed… They wouldn’t harm a Berryz if they couldn’t find her either.

“Oof!”

She fell backwards, onto her bottom, then her eyes slowly rose upwards.

“… I don’t suppose… you’re willing… to… uhm… not kill me?”

[JFC]

Junjun likes Battle Royale = winnar

[MyDearYossi]

Only insane leaves the room if there's possibility to see Yossi changing clothes

Whuhuuu! Go Yossi! Save the world

[whytphyre]

^^ Glad someone agrees with Junjun. On both counts *cackle*

Oh, and I forgot to add this part to the end of 15 and 14, so you get 15 and 1/2. I'll do 16 when school starts or something.

Chapter 15 and 1/2 :: Whoops!

“Was it really smart to send Sayumin out on her own?”

“No Gaki-san… but I didn’t want her to be here… it’s starting. Can’t you feel it?”

“Yeah…”

“I want you to know… that… no matter what happens, I’m gonna be here for you… okay?”

“I know. I’ll be here for you too. You’re gonna need it more. You’re the subleader.”

“… I miss the days when we were the newbies…”

“I don’t. Ai-chan, don’t miss those days. Just think ahead.”

“You’re always so uplifting.”

“It’s what I’m here for.”

“… But will everyone else be? We need everyone for this.”

“… There’s only one way to find out, isn’t there?”

“But we can’t bide our time.”

“What else are we going to do?”

“I don’t know… I … I just don’t know.”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

“All the pieces are in play.”

“Saki… no more hurting people…”

“I get to watch now Momo… you didn’t get that, did you?”

“… I don’t know what you’re talking about…”

“Of course you don’t. Tsunku doesn’t tell anyone anything.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You’ll see Momo. You’ll see.”

[whytphyre]

Double post update. Sorry. I just felt it needed to be said.

I'm at a crossroads in this fanfiction. Does this mean I'll stop the story? No. It means that this arc has 'ended,' leaving a lot of characters at a point that many readers (if I have any of those left) would kill me for if I went on in this route now.

And for all intents and purposes, if I just went on in the story the way I'm going now, none of you are going to like it. At all. However, the other choice that opened itself up to me is not a favorable one for you guys either.

Unless you like sequels that start.... later on, picking up not where the last one left off but months afterwards, ONLY explaining why the hell things are happening when someone looks back in a flashback.

And believe me, there will be flashbacks if I go the route. Too much would have happened for me not to want to.

To be perfectly honest... I'm stuck. I know there are ways I can go and just belt out a chapter... but I'd feel like I'm jipping you all. I'd rather you all confused, going on my roller coaster, with my best work, than something that's half as good. Make sense?

So, in a nutshell... I think I just talked myself into doing something by talking to all of you. You'll get more story. You just might not like the way it's packaged.

I will tell you who dies. Just one of them. The second one plays such a huge part in the storyline anyways, if I just told you, you would later on say 'now why the hell did you go and tell us that!?'

Mikitty

HIGHLIGHT FOR INFORMATION

If you don't want to know, don't highlight. If you do, then find out and yell at me for it 'cause I DO dare to go there.

Oh yeah, I do.

Till I write the new story of confusion,

~ whytphyre

[Kreuz_Asakura]

 

[JFC]

No offense, but since you're stopping this fic, it's time for some harsh critiquing here. What I'm about to say next, I say in my capacity as an English teacher first, and as a fic fan second.

To be honest, the only reason I continued to read this fic was in hopes that somewhere along the line, stuff would start to make sense. However, that never happened. The way that the chapters appeared and what they covered was such a jumbled mess that, quite frankly, it's not surprising that you're calling it quits. You've started too many small story arcs and because you jump between them all so much, nothing is clear anymore.  You were no longer telling A story, you were trying to tell multiple stories at once, and you were doing it with TOO MANY stories.  There's no MAIN arc that ties all of the smaller arcs that you've started here together.

As I said in a previous post, one of the big problems was that you weren't writing things "1-2-3-4-5-6-7", but instead in something more like "3-5-1-7-6-4-2".  You say you did it because you like to keep your readers confused, but in doing so what did it get you? It got you an incomplete and incoherent story that has become as difficult for you to write as it is difficult for us readers  to try and comprehend.  When you deliberately try to be confusing in your writing, you lose readers. Readers like being kept in SUSPENSE, but they don't like being deliberately confused.  It's frustrating, and when readers are frustrated with a story, they stop reading it.  The problem with this fic is that the structure is overly-complicated, which lead to the story arcs degrading in quality. 

Look at some of the other fics here, and you'll see that the REALLY good ones (such as the Love x 2 series, Detonator M, All Aboard, etc.) don't jump around the way this fic does. These fics are the ones that us readers keep referring to as "crack". These fics are the ones where we readers keep begging for updates. Most importantly, these fics are the ones where there are multiple people repeatedly posting responses. These fics prove that you don't have to write your story like "3-5-1-7-6-4-2" to keep your readers on the edge of their seats.  Unlike this fic, the really good fics posted here begin at the beginning, work their way through the middle, and end at the end.  These fics prove that it's the strength of the story that keeps the readers coming back and that even if you write "1-2-3-4-5-6-7", you can still write things in such a way that will keep your readers guessing. Unlike this fic that has at least half a dozen different stories going on, the really good fics here usually they stick with one obvious MAIN arc, and at the most will have only one or two smaller side arcs.  They keep their structure simple, which allows them to focus on the actual arcs themselves.

One thing I always tell students when they're having to write a story, is that in terms of how they actually structure what they write, to follow the old "K.I.S.S." rule (i.e. Keep It Simple Stupid).  When you have a good, solid story to tell, and you do it in a way that is easy to understand, THAT is when your story will flourish and take a life of it's own.  I've known students who had planned on writing relatively short stories (say, around 5 pages), only to end up writing 20-30 pages because they just couldn't stop. And even for the odd time when they'd get a case of "writer's block", even if they never touched their stories for weeks, they could still easily resume it later because they kept the structure simple, and people that read it later couldn't tell that they took X amount of days/weeks between writing chapter 8 and chapter 9.

The K.I.S.S. rule. It works.

[Amarghetta]

whytphyre: JFC said much, but I won't. Your biggest success was frustrating us. Your failure, aiming for dadaism. 

JFC: Man, that was painful... I'm glad we never met in the past, you'd have grilled me for sure! 

[JFC]

^ Well, you know what they say, you got to be cruel to be kind.   And like I said at the beginning of that post, no offense was intended. I just looked at it as an English teacher, and called it as I saw it. Whatever whytphyre does with it is completely up to him.

[whytphyre]

Again: I'm a girl. I know I don't mark it, but I didn't think I was that much of a guy >.>;; 

Secondly: I didn't write to get readers, in all complete honesty. I wrote to make myself happy. The next one's much better in organization (Which was why you saw 1-4-3-5-7 and maybe 2 if I felt like it.), considering I started that story's plot midway through the summer and am currently writing it all out now.

Besides, my mother would say the same thing if she ever read this (She kinda IS an English teacher) so I don't feel bad, and if you do I'll slap you with a wet noodle.

Anyways... the confusion in the next piece will probably come from me trying to explain what was supposed to happen this piece but didn't because I was lazy and didn't wanna write it... (And it's September, about a month since I wrote a chapter last. I had the ending in mind I knew exactly what and how. I just didn't like the idea of drawing it out.... so nyeh).

I won't guarantee that that fic will be any less confusing, or that 1-2-3-4-5-6-7 will happen, because I take my inspiration from the chaos (Ya know, stubborn like that), but I will promise that there will be LESS to keep track of up until chapter like 20. Then chaos, then resolution, then simplicity again. Maybe it might be easier to follow. With less to keep track of, one would hope (There'll only be 5 arcs instead of 7 that's for sure!)

And more freaking fluff. I got depressed with myself.