Yosuke Hanamura App @ splendorocity
Player Information:
Name: Em
Journal: safelybeds
Method of Contact: iTakeKids000 (AIM), 3farthingstone[at]gmail[dot]com (Email)
Previous characters: N/A
Character Information:
Full Name: Yosuke Hanamura
Series: Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4
Canon point: He’s just knocked Souji out of the way of Izanami’s Thousand Curses and is dragged into the ground by dozens of ghostly hands. Essentially, he is dead. Occurs on March 20th, 2012.
Age: 17 (18 in a few months)
Species: Run-of-the-mill human.
Appearance/PB: Standard Appearance | Alternate Outfits/Expressions | Personalized Glasses | Design Sketches
Appearance upon arrival: He’s sore and scuffed up after a long, strenuous battle (goddesses will rough you up a little, apparently). There’s a bone deep weariness to his demeanor in addition to general disorientation. The effects of Izanami’s curse are still clinging to him, despite him escaping their reach through splendorocity . On his face are a pair of orange novelty glasses.
History:
Previous RP memories: None!
Bringing someone along?: Nope!
Character History: Here!
Personality:
When it comes down to it, Yosuke Hanamura is a kid who doesn’t know what he wants.
He has some idea of what he’s should want, sure. Yosuke can’t forget what he’s supposed to be doing with his life: get good grades, don’t slack off at work, be responsible and begin the transition into adulthood as smoothly as possible. Be self possessed, sure of himself, and a better man than he could ever hope to be. But unlike those who rise to their cultures’ high expectations, Yosuke buckles underneath their weight. Where’s the thrill in adulthood? Where’s the happiness in taxes? Yosuke isn’t exactly a free spirit -- far from it, actually -- and his heavy reservations over growing up are based more off a fear of failing those around him by simply…being himself. Shaken together in an insecurity cocktail, Yosuke finds himself desperate to meet a standard his low self-esteem is positive he’ll never attain (and doesn’t even want to attain, really). He throws everything into winning the approval of others. But even when he gets the validation he’s after, it’s never the feeling of relief he hopes it will be. His nerves are always there in the back of his mind, terrified of making even one misstep and sending his carefully constructed happy-go-lucky, takes-being-the-butt-of-every-joke-with-a-smile, will-totally-pay-for-this-one-guys-no-problem persona toppling over. If anyone ever actually got to know him, Yosuke is positive they would have absolutely no reason to stick around.
And, unfortunately, that fear is something of a self fulfilling prophecy. Yosuke’s over eager behavior and desperateness to please isn’t only exhausting for him, but for everyone around him. If you send him a text, he’ll respond within thirty seconds (and then another ten minutes later, asking if his text went through. And then another in an hour, asking if everything’s alright. And then another wondering if your phone is broken. And then six more apologizing for being such a needy idiot, lol, sry man jst me being stupd!). If you already have plans when he asks to hang out, it’s hard for him to read it as anything other than a rejection of his entire existence. It was hard being friends with Yosuke Hanamura.
Before moving to the small town of Inaba for the opening of a new Junes location his father is assigned to manage, most of the kids at his school are tired of him and the ones still hanging on are mostly in it for the free meals. Once Yosuke leaves his home in the city (and god does he miss it; the lights, the crowds, the noise), responses to his texts get slower and slower until stopping completely. Combined with being dropped in a town that despises what he and his family symbolize, his loneliness reaches a new low. That loneliness and isolation are compounded when it’s revealed that the one person who gave him the time of day in Inaba -- Saki Konishi, whom he had a hopeless crush on -- is killed and shown to have secretly been as irritated and exhausted with him as everyone else.
But things aren’t as bad as they used to be. He has genuine friends now, ones that know who he is and like him anyway. It opens his eyes to the possibility that working and working at making people like him isn’t the necessity he thought it was; that maybe people might actually like him. Although he still has a long ways to go and many maturity hurdles to jump before he really gets there, he is getting there. Slowly but surely.
Yosuke still separates “people” and “people who he trusts to like him” in separate categories. Working in retail for his father’s store -- the mega-shopping emporium, Junes -- has given him a knack for customer service and it will be an unsettling day when Yosuke realizes just how good a salesman he is. This is the person most strangers get; all bright smiles and politeness and how may I help you, sir or madam? Remember, every day is customer appreciation day at Junes! The people who he’s close to and trusts, they get a different picture. Yosuke can be solemn, passionate, vulnerable, and intensely furious when riled. However, his inherent snark and clumsy inexperience when it comes to being himself around people can lead to a few a lot of unfortunate foot-in-mouth moments. His ribbing and teasing occasionally goes too far, although being called on it (usually) leads to apology. When it doesn’t, a quick threat of physical violence is a surefire way to send him cowering. If there’s one thing Yosuke avoids, it’s confrontation. Even with all the growing he’s done overtime, the fear of losing all he’s gained still lurks in the back of his mind.
At the point in his life when the music box spirits him away, his confidence is on its way to changing for the better. He's more assertive, less of a doormat, and has a hope for his future that wasn't there before. He is still nowhere near grown up, but when faced with an extremely difficult decision, he is capable of making the choice that needs to be made. Well. Most of the time.
Extra:
Character Abilities: Yosuke isn’t the most impressive kid, hard though he tries. His grades are average to below average, he’s fast but too scrawny to use the skill for much more than running away, and has an inherent clumsiness that can get him in a tight spot. Still, when his Persona is at the forefront of his mind, the sum truly becomes greater than its parts. In battle, he duel wields any two small hand weapons (either blunt objects [i.e. wrenches], knives, or kunai) and has a flare for the acrobatic. His speed is enhanced even further by Susano-o’s (his Persona) wind oriented skills and its his primary asset against enemies far stronger than he.
Susano-o was originally Jiraiya, but transformed when Yosuke came to terms with the death of his coworker and crush, Saki Konishi.
Susano-o’s Information | Susano-o’s Stats| Susano-o’s Appearance
In addition to his supernatural abilities, there are a few mundane talents rattling around in his generally mediocre body. He has an affinity for guitar and has taught himself about as much as one person can without lessons (any sight-reading or general music skills won’t be found here). He’s also a fairly good dancer, but only -- only -- when he’s alone and the music is catchy (and good, hopefully, but that’s more negotiable).
Possessions: Aside from his TV World glasses, he’ll have a pair of headphones that are all but surgically attached to his neck and his mp3 player. Unfortunately, there’s a large crack in the in the shell of the left earpad and his players’ charger is sitting at home by his desk. Damn.
Anything else: Nope!
Samples:
Action/Communcation thread/post sample: Action Sample! (my apologies that this isn’t 15 comments in length yet; only 8 10 at this point. It should be up to 15 before very long, but I will gladly make an additional sample if necessary!)
Change of plans! It is actually located here~
Log/Prose sample:
How could he? How could Mitsuo sit there and laugh? What had she done to deserve this? She’d done nothing, that’s what, and now and now this bastard was just going to walk all over Saki-senpais’ memory and for what, just so he could--
Yosuke blinked hard, finally noticing that everyone around him was staring. How much of his confusing jumble of thoughts had he actually voiced? And why the hell was there a hot trickle of wetness running down his face? He wasn’t sad, he was pissed. Or at least he had been. Kanji’s firm tone brought him back to reality, draining Yosuke’s body of the tense energy his rage had given him. With that gone, it was all the brunette could do to keep his legs from giving out underneath him.
With a few flimsy excuses about finding a phone, Yosuke made his escape. He needed to be somewhere else, not listening to that bastard giggling on the floor like he’d won.
He was alone now, sitting on the toilet with his forehead pressed against the cool tiles while he sobbed; crying for a girl who could’ve cared less about him while alive. Or at least that’s what her Shadow had said; her resentment magnified as if by the sun at dusk. But he could never ask her about them. He could never ask what the context of those words were or if there were layers to them the Shadow’s disembodied voice had left out. He could never ask because she would never be there to answer. Just like she would never know him now; never know the person he was becoming.
It was a selfish instinct, to still crave her praise and approval even after death; to want that almost as much as he wanted to talk with her again. Maybe even a little more. And when he thought about it -- scrubbing at his eyes while his rattling, embarrassing crying faded to whimpering and sniffles -- he wasn’t just crying for Saki-senpai or himself, but for the case. It was over now -- it had to be, Mitsuo confessed -- and he felt none of the satisfaction or closure he had hoped for. There was just…nothing. Absolutely nothing changed.
There was a knock on the bathroom door -- probably his friends, judging by the hushed whispers he heard on the other side -- and Yosuke grabbed hastily for the stack of paper towels by the basin. The crying was through for now; and though Yosuke knew it would be back, his head felt a little less foggy. There was still things he had to do, still people who needed him…what would Saki-senpai think of him if he just threw them away?
With a loud, honking blow of his nose, Yosuke stood shakily to his feet and put a hand on the doorknob. Catching the killer didn’t fix everything like he’d hoped, but he was wrong to think nothing had changed.
The people waiting for him on the other side of the door proved that.