Mask/Off

So she thought of the masked guy as weird. That's expected. Weird was probably the number one word associated with him. The talent part, however, made Yasu's eyes sparkled a bit as if he's the one getting praised himself. The word seemed like echoing inside his head, and he smiled a bit. He probably could have gone into his little world again, although that didn't happen this time.

"R-really? You think so?" he asked rather excitedly, before pausing. "I mean, uh, I like watching his fights! W-would be nice to see... more of him, yes?"

Wow, this dude was easy to please. The way he was going, you'd have thought he was the one taking the compliment. In fact, that was eerily how it seemed. There was something subtly off about Yasu. Something familiar. Too familiar.

"Hm." She raised up her hand enough to cover his face from her eyes, then lowered it with the slightest hint of a grin on her face.

"Yeah." She closed her eyes and lazily sucked off the lemon, enjoying the bittersweet taste. "He should put himself out there, start taking on some matches, make a name for himself. He plays it right, who knows? Might even make it to a pay-per-view. Sky's the limit."

Yasu gulped slightly at what Kozue said. Pay per view? That might be a long shot considering The Mask just only had one match so far. After such a show, though, that probably wouldn't be his only match, so who knew? The boy wasn't really paying attention to what Kozue was doing at the moment, a bit too occupied with remembering stuffs from the past.

"You know, back then The Mask was quite a hit in the underground league... until... uh, an incident. He kinda faded into obscurity after that, and then the league went belly. It's good to be... to see him standing on the ring again... in a bigger place, even!" he told her. "But well, who knows what will happen in the future..." he muttered, looking away from her again.

If this guy was any sweeter, she'd get cavities. More of them.

She had to bite her lip to keep from laughing out loud as he had a little fit at the idea of the bigtime, but it was understandable. That sort of exposure was a lot to take in, but she reckoned 'the Mask' would put on a good show. It wouldn't be the first time that new blood wrestled at a Pay-Per-View, even she knew that, and from what little she'd seen so far she could tell he would do well enough for the spotlight.

"Yeah, who knows? To the future." She gave a little toast and tapped his glass, though her small smile faded. "Incident? What happened?"

"Well, it's just..." Yasu seemed to hesitate a bit to tell what happened. "You know that some people don't take defeats too well. Whether they're a pro, or amateur, doesn't matter..."

He took a sip from his glass .

"So like, the league was open to both guys and girls. There's this one girl... uhm, a beauty to say the least," his face blushed slightly. "Also wearing a mask to hide her identity. Not like him, though, hers was like what superheroes wear. Except she's not a heroine," he paused. "A complete opposite. One night they fought each other. She's been on a winning streak, which was pretty impressive for a girl. But she lost."

Yasu took a longer pause. His cheeks blushed lightly and he looked down to his glass to avoid her gaze.

"So this girl went to his locker, or so I heard... I, uh, have no idea what happened... but they met again within a few weeks... and she... Well, I guess, she destroyed him," he said before taking another sip. "He became like, uh, a lackey to her afterwards."

Before Kozue came to the AFW, she would've had a lot of questions about that story. Now? She just took it at face value, more or less.

She didn't have any plans on fighting any women in the future - she got enough drama from her own sex in high school to last a lifetime. So Kozue didn't pay much attention to the females of Tension, and she hadn't heard of any masked lady running around. But then, she hadn't heard of the Mask, either, so there were clearly some loops she was out of.

"Huh. 'She destroyed him'. Well." She tapped her chin, digesting all of that. Sounded like a bad case of pussy-whipping. Poor dude. "I'd say he's too good to be taking orders from anybody, much less somebody he beat in a straight fight. That'd be my honest opinion. If you asked for it. Which you didn't. But there."

"Well, it happened," Yasu sighed. "There are people who didn't give a damn about what they have to do to win, after all... I heard that girl also moved to AFW and been racking up some victories too. If you'd ever ran into her, it's probably best not to get into her bad side."

For a lot of people, the rematch came off as surprising considering what happened in the first match. Then again, the masked girl was known for her cheating ways, inside and outside the ring. She had a lot of fans because she knew how to put a show, but one could only feel sorry for her victims. Getting paired with her in a match was more of a punishment spell rather than a contest.

"What are you going to do after this?" he asked.

"Chances are I'm already on her bad side and I just don't know it yet. I have this way with other women, things tend to get volatile. Part of the reason I stick with Tension - a drama-free Kozue is a happy Kozue."

She couldn't help but let out a full laugh at his question, though. He didn't mean to put any innuendo in there, she was sure, but her dirty mind slipped some in, anyway. She put her best Southern Belle accent on, which probably sounded like Dolly Parton with golfballs in her mouth. "Why, Mr. Mizuno, you trying to come home with me on the first date? I'm not that kind of girl."

Total lie, she so was. Trying to get better about it, though.

She shook it off and went back to normal, sighing. "I got a busy night planned. Probably going to go home, pop a Jack open and catch up on some shows for a few hours, then maybe play some..." She rolled her head from side to side. "Star Fox. I'm in a Star Fox mood. Probably just do that until I go to sleep or beat the damn thing. You?"

"Wha... T-that's not what I mean!" Yasu almost yelled as he denied Kozue's accusation, his cheeks blushed until he realized she's just messing around with him. "Tch..."

She definitely got him good with that one, although he's not the hardest target ever for that kind of jokes. Kozue wasn't the first girl ever to tease him, sure, but he never seemed to get better in that department. Well, at least she was having fun. It's just her laughter and his own voice earned themselves unnecessary attention and a couple of weird looks from the staffs and customers alike.

"Well, I don't really have anything important to do around this hour, normally," he sighed. "Apart from playing... uh, Fantasy Earth Zero... It's an online game... haha..." he smirked.

So easy. So easy. She reached over and gave him a pat on the head as the joke dawned on him. "Never change, Yasu."

She sat back again and started thumbing through her wallet, doing the math for a tip in her head. "MMORPG, huh? Never could get down with those. Too much screaming, too much loading, too much rage quitting, too much...everything really. It's why I keep it old-school. Mario 64's not much to look at these days, but I never wanted to throw my TV out the window when I played it."

She laid a few dollars on the table, enough to cover them. "Sounds like we both have busy nights ahead - want to get to it?"