The Chikamori Legacy (The Sanitized Version)
Prologue - "Seeds of Dissent" Part I (Author's Note: "This is the clean, sanitized version with no links back to my blog - meaning no contraventions against rules) Vancouver, BC, Canada - 1988 ...
Forum Discussion
Chapter One: “Love and Loss” - Part XII
Sunday Morning
Haruo’s DoubleWide
https://i.imgur.com/AYfAatW.jpg
Haruo sighed deeply as he looked over at the large number of insect terrrariums that he had stacked in the corner of the living room. A lot of fireflies, butterflies and other insects that he had managed to come across in his rummaging through the dumpsters. He rolled his eyes. Hopefully none of the things would get loose, especially the termite or he would have major problems.
He had been relieved last night when his dad had called him to tell him that he was going to clamp down on Mayumi and that he wasn’t amenable to Mayumi throwing Fiona and her daughter to the streets. As long as he had control of the house, he was going to make sure that Mayumi toed the line. This meant Haruo could live in his trailer without having to worry about anyone else. Sitting down at the kitchen table to eat his apple pancakes in peace and quiet, he thanked whatever deity that passed along that good fortune. He would enjoy his peace and quiet and maybe eke out a living in gardening, fishing and cooking. Nobody to pester him, nobody to make demands out of him that he was not prepared to meet and this way he was able to ease his wounded soul even if he wasn’t healed.
https://i.imgur.com/AwRUSbR.jpg
First of all, after breakfast, he headed out to the mailbox. He had figured that bills were going to show up on either Monday or Tuesday and that he figured he needed to make sure that was paid before the taxman sent the repo-man and the repo-dude decided that it wasn’t necessary for Haruo to eliminate liquid waste or defecate and repossessed the toilet. Let’s just say that would not be good for him or his internal digestive and waste system. It was Sunday anyways so he just enjoyed his little walk out to the mailbox. Tomorrow he’d start searching for the bills today, he would have to drop by the grocery store and pick up some apples. He also decided that he would do some hunting for some wild game as well as wild plants. He had four apples left and he would be good for another few days so he would leave one of the four apples in the fridge and plant the other three. Those three trees would give him a decent bumper crop of apples to make more apple pancakes with. He had enough money to get a few more crop plants that could be used to make money. This way he could get plenty of crops to sell to the grocery stores and make a tidy sum of money with which to support himself.
https://i.imgur.com/qszDPSY.jpg
And perhaps, he should get into martial arts as well. It was reputed that once you got high enough in ability, you could break apart space rocks and uncover the gemstones within. Maybe he should stop by Mai Liang’s martial arts shop in Chinatown and pick up a muk yan jong and a breaker board. And maybe get Sifu Hu Dun Ly’s martial arts teach-yourself Sim Fu for Beginners course. Break your way to Financial Riches? Well Haruo could certainly live with that plan. After all, all he had to do was get one tiberium. Evidently the going rate for that radioactive gemstone was at least §38,000-43,000 simoleons. And that would get him to the point where he could seriously think about making this house a real house instead of just a double-wide mobile home. Since he’d already borrowed money from his dad and bought a gem-cutter and a Lord Vladimir’s Conjuring Cauldron – Frankly that could conjure a lot of things including gemstones. Trying to conjure gemstones involved a lot of invoking and big headaches, especially when he’d conjured too much and hit the floor.. He did actually conjure a soulpeace from that cauldron which put him over §101,000 simoleons putting him in a financially secure category and he’d conjured several other gemstones as well as cutting the ones that he’d managed to find while dumpster diving. Other avenues he could choose would be to turn around and get a science station. That way he could clone samples and be able to keep himself in high value gemstones.
https://i.imgur.com/spc8MnS.jpg
That was it. He had to become a gemstone broker that catered to the wealthy. The wealthy would buy the high value cuts off him that made the most amount of money. He knew that the diamond brokers were very vicious about anyone new horning in on their line of business. The diamond brokers were known to consort with Cartel and Mafioso to flout duty and import taxes into the United States and Canada and had no compunctions about spilling a little blood along with their dealings if it made doing business a little smoother. So Haruo would have to become equally ruthless to survive. But he was already hard-bitten and hard-nosed. Could he get the necessary paperwork to conceal-carry in Canada due to dangerous occupation? Perhaps. Or maybe even cross border-lines considering who he would be dealing with. Or maybe he should stick with the lower end gemstones that would get him what would amount to pocket change yet would keep him safe. But Haruo’d had it with his mother who had financially held him down and he was going to make himself financially secure if it meant selling diamonds, soulpeace and tiberium. And if anyone got in his way…Watcher help them, because he would show no mercy.Now that he had a game-plan he would have to execute it. There were two ways to get the kind of money to get an unlocked gem-cutter and that was to either steal one or make enough money to buy a cheap one and start unlocking the cuts himself. The third was just sell cheap cuts that he cut at Aleister’s till he managed to make the 50,000 simoleons needed to buy the expensive gem cutter and thus would be able to cut his gems at home having a finer calibrated blade and polishing feature so that he could get the gemstones looking of highest quality. At least this way he would be able to get started and not have to worry about the front end investment costs.
https://i.imgur.com/DSaraQY.jpg
There was also the matter of having to deal with having to go down to Aleister’s every time he wanted to cut gems but at least consigning them would allow him to get a somewhat decent return on his investment of time and skill.
https://i.imgur.com/m1K56et.jpg
That was until his dad had just shown up with a smile on his face and another expensive gem-cutter on the back of his truck and an innocent query of could Haruo please help him get this thing off the back of the truck mainly because he wasn’t sure what to do with it and maybe Haruo could find some use for it? It was his dad’s way of telling him that Haruo was loved and that his dad only wanted the best for him.
https://i.imgur.com/SifXEdT.jpg
Haruo grinned to himself. He was going to be a very rich man. His train of thought was promptly derailed by the fact that he did need to get a few more items other than the stuff that he had in his fridge if he wanted to eat well for the next week. With the basic fridge things got raunchy after about three days. So making eight serving meals probably wasn’t the wisest course of action - green fumes and flies didn’t help foster a hygienic environment.What he needed to do was build a financial base and make certain that he was able to build it up so he didn’t have to worry about financial security. The only caveat here was how much of a cushion defined financial security for him? 10,000? 50,000? 100,000? But every bit of that cushion mattered because it would help him to launch into the upper stratosphere of financial net worth.
Haruo sighed as he looked at his watch and realized that daydreaming had cost him about two hours that morning. He had to go plant apple trees. So that he wouldn’t have to keep going to the store to buy his apples. On top of that he was going to have to get a few more fruits to start an orchard. Maybe some peaches or some limes or maybe even an orange tree. Hmmm. If he built a greenhouse he could grow bananas. Well, let’s see what we can do. Haruo thought to himself as he put on a light summer-weight jacket and headed out into what was a Pacific Coast drizzle.As he headed into downtown to drop off the rental vehicle, he noted that he would need to look into getting a vehicle of his own. He didn’t have a big budget for that since he was living on his own. Even one of the small compact cars could set him back almost 10,000 simoleons. Since he was in town, he might as well look at one of the dealerships and see if there was something that he could purchase that was reliable and cost-effective.He would take a taxi back home if he couldn’t find what he was looking for a nice subcompact with enough room for a bag of groceries.
https://i.imgur.com/sFEfZOf.jpg
Would he decided to stay here in Vancouver or move to the island? Upon checking his bank balance, he realized his gem sales had essentially put him personally over the §1M range so he was able to buy something decent in terms of a house; maybe it was time to move to the Island. So he had options. Would he decide to stay in Vancouver or put some distance between him and his family (as much as he hated to do that to his father and to his grandmother, perhaps distance and separation was the best thing to do in his life)? But he couldn’t make that decision just yet because he had tiberium growing so the best thing for him to do was to wait until those spires had grown and he could reap the benefits from that before he made a decision on whether he was going to uproot and move lock-stock and barrel out of town. Perhaps the best thing was to find a place on the Island and settle down.
But one of the first things he needed to do was to return this rental and purchase a vehicle of his own, since he now had a decent amount of money with which to do that. When he got to the rental place, he found that they had a decent selection of pre-owned vehicles that they were selling so that they could take that older inventory and turn them into cash so they could restock newer models in their rental inventory. When all was said and done with a handshake, Haruo walked out of the rental place, the brand new owner of a Vorn P328 pickup, like his dad’s except his dad’s was white and Haruo’s was blue.
https://i.imgur.com/q4MZvOe.jpg
Guess the next thing I should do is figure out whether I’m going to keep the property or offer a deep discount to my dad so that he can buy it off me so that I can make a clean break of it and find a place somewhere quiet to live. Haruo thought. But that meant calling up his dad and seeing the potential fall-out from his choice. But he needed the mobile home maintained. And if he wasn’t going to set his roots in Vancouver, then he would have to sell the property.
One point four-five wasn’t technically the threshold point for being classified as rich. But it certainly was considered well-off. And if he wanted the financial freedom to move around as need be, then he would have to have a value in the high tens.
What about his long-term friends? Phil and Noel? He looked at their situation with pragmatic eyes. They had graduated school. They were into their adult lives and busy trying to build up their own personal wealth. They had jobs, they would be alright. Haruo knew that the friendships that were so important while they were all in school no longer were primary in their minds as each person negotiated their journey through life. What mattered was family. And the only family Haruo had was his father and his maternal grandmother.
https://i.imgur.com/GvLNE8p.jpg
And that was the bittersweet part of growing up. Maintaining childhood friendships were no longer number one in his life. There were some who would come back to you, but on the whole, most wouldn’t and that was just part and parcel of growing and maturing.
And Haruo was prepared to make sacrifices for his own personal peace of mind. Because even at nineteen, he’d realized what was important to his own personal happiness: a quiet life where no-one could bother him. A life where he was alone to contemplate life and his role in the grand scheme of things as an insignificant cog in the realm of capitalism. Yay for fiduciary vision.
https://i.imgur.com/pUiYqSO.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/vO99c1Y.jpg
Over the next two weeks, Haruo made his preparations quietly, finally selling off his tiberium and seeing a tidy profit as well as some other conjured jewels. His dad and grandmother were not happy about his wanting to leave for Vancouver Island, but they understood his reasons and promised to hold their silence.
https://i.imgur.com/fQYiwJf.jpg
One week later
https://i.imgur.com/W8UZxBa.jpg
River had made excuses to herself to not go and see him at his new property. And she’d talked herself out of it multiple times. He doesn’t want to see me. I don’t think he’d be amenable to talking it out. I need to get a better argument together before I approach him with a suggestion to get counseling. And it was at Bebe’s urging that she finally got up the gumption to go out and see him out in Richmond. And that was mainly because Bebe threatened to drag her over there.
https://i.imgur.com/sUKT6GL.jpg
“He’s not going to go to counseling on his own, you’re gonna have to drag him there.”
https://i.imgur.com/aXseAuE.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/BjpPwiq.jpg
As Bebe crested the hill and came to a stop at the manufactured home that was or used to be Haruo's home, all they saw was an empty driveway and a large real estate sign on the property - the sign on the property said SOLD. River’s heart fell into the pit of her stomach. “No…no…no…”. She repeated, her heart shattering into pieces, not noticing her vision misting.
https://i.imgur.com/b8bLuY9.jpg
“Oh, no…” was all Bebe could say as she turned to see River in utter agony, tears spilling from her eyes. How could Haruo do this? He hadn’t even bothered to say good-bye.
https://i.imgur.com/NXRhcOO.jpg
If River had thought that rejection of her overtures hurt, nothing compared to this. Haruo hadn’t even bothered to tell her he was leaving. He’d never even left a forwarding address. Fourteen years of friendship had meant absolutely nothing to him? So many times where he’d been longing for release from his situation with his mother and when it came down to it, River had wanted to give him that freedom from having to deal with his mother; that they would gain their freedom together, at least that was her hope. They’d made plans together through elementary school and high-school.
The deep hurt within River coalesced flaring into a sheet white cold anger. This was betrayal at its worst.
https://i.imgur.com/5HwRZLE.jpg
And betrayal did not warrant forgiveness.
End Chapter One
Sunday Morning
Haruo’s DoubleWide
https://i.imgur.com/AYfAatW.jpg
Haruo sighed deeply as he looked over at the large number of insect terrrariums that he had stacked in the corner of the living room. A lot of fireflies, butterflies and other insects that he had managed to come across in his rummaging through the dumpsters. He rolled his eyes. Hopefully none of the things would get loose, especially the termite or he would have major problems.
He had been relieved last night when his dad had called him to tell him that he was going to clamp down on Mayumi and that he wasn’t amenable to Mayumi throwing Fiona and her daughter to the streets. As long as he had control of the house, he was going to make sure that Mayumi toed the line. This meant Haruo could live in his trailer without having to worry about anyone else. Sitting down at the kitchen table to eat his apple pancakes in peace and quiet, he thanked whatever deity that passed along that good fortune. He would enjoy his peace and quiet and maybe eke out a living in gardening, fishing and cooking. Nobody to pester him, nobody to make demands out of him that he was not prepared to meet and this way he was able to ease his wounded soul even if he wasn’t healed.
https://i.imgur.com/AwRUSbR.jpg
First of all, after breakfast, he headed out to the mailbox. He had figured that bills were going to show up on either Monday or Tuesday and that he figured he needed to make sure that was paid before the taxman sent the repo-man and the repo-dude decided that it wasn’t necessary for Haruo to eliminate liquid waste or defecate and repossessed the toilet. Let’s just say that would not be good for him or his internal digestive and waste system. It was Sunday anyways so he just enjoyed his little walk out to the mailbox. Tomorrow he’d start searching for the bills today, he would have to drop by the grocery store and pick up some apples. He also decided that he would do some hunting for some wild game as well as wild plants. He had four apples left and he would be good for another few days so he would leave one of the four apples in the fridge and plant the other three. Those three trees would give him a decent bumper crop of apples to make more apple pancakes with. He had enough money to get a few more crop plants that could be used to make money. This way he could get plenty of crops to sell to the grocery stores and make a tidy sum of money with which to support himself.
https://i.imgur.com/qszDPSY.jpg
And perhaps, he should get into martial arts as well. It was reputed that once you got high enough in ability, you could break apart space rocks and uncover the gemstones within. Maybe he should stop by Mai Liang’s martial arts shop in Chinatown and pick up a muk yan jong and a breaker board. And maybe get Sifu Hu Dun Ly’s martial arts teach-yourself Sim Fu for Beginners course. Break your way to Financial Riches? Well Haruo could certainly live with that plan. After all, all he had to do was get one tiberium. Evidently the going rate for that radioactive gemstone was at least §38,000-43,000 simoleons. And that would get him to the point where he could seriously think about making this house a real house instead of just a double-wide mobile home. Since he’d already borrowed money from his dad and bought a gem-cutter and a Lord Vladimir’s Conjuring Cauldron – Frankly that could conjure a lot of things including gemstones. Trying to conjure gemstones involved a lot of invoking and big headaches, especially when he’d conjured too much and hit the floor.. He did actually conjure a soulpeace from that cauldron which put him over §101,000 simoleons putting him in a financially secure category and he’d conjured several other gemstones as well as cutting the ones that he’d managed to find while dumpster diving. Other avenues he could choose would be to turn around and get a science station. That way he could clone samples and be able to keep himself in high value gemstones.
https://i.imgur.com/spc8MnS.jpg
That was it. He had to become a gemstone broker that catered to the wealthy. The wealthy would buy the high value cuts off him that made the most amount of money. He knew that the diamond brokers were very vicious about anyone new horning in on their line of business. The diamond brokers were known to consort with Cartel and Mafioso to flout duty and import taxes into the United States and Canada and had no compunctions about spilling a little blood along with their dealings if it made doing business a little smoother. So Haruo would have to become equally ruthless to survive. But he was already hard-bitten and hard-nosed. Could he get the necessary paperwork to conceal-carry in Canada due to dangerous occupation? Perhaps. Or maybe even cross border-lines considering who he would be dealing with. Or maybe he should stick with the lower end gemstones that would get him what would amount to pocket change yet would keep him safe. But Haruo’d had it with his mother who had financially held him down and he was going to make himself financially secure if it meant selling diamonds, soulpeace and tiberium. And if anyone got in his way…Watcher help them, because he would show no mercy.Now that he had a game-plan he would have to execute it. There were two ways to get the kind of money to get an unlocked gem-cutter and that was to either steal one or make enough money to buy a cheap one and start unlocking the cuts himself. The third was just sell cheap cuts that he cut at Aleister’s till he managed to make the 50,000 simoleons needed to buy the expensive gem cutter and thus would be able to cut his gems at home having a finer calibrated blade and polishing feature so that he could get the gemstones looking of highest quality. At least this way he would be able to get started and not have to worry about the front end investment costs.
https://i.imgur.com/DSaraQY.jpg
There was also the matter of having to deal with having to go down to Aleister’s every time he wanted to cut gems but at least consigning them would allow him to get a somewhat decent return on his investment of time and skill.
https://i.imgur.com/m1K56et.jpg
That was until his dad had just shown up with a smile on his face and another expensive gem-cutter on the back of his truck and an innocent query of could Haruo please help him get this thing off the back of the truck mainly because he wasn’t sure what to do with it and maybe Haruo could find some use for it? It was his dad’s way of telling him that Haruo was loved and that his dad only wanted the best for him.
https://i.imgur.com/SifXEdT.jpg
Haruo grinned to himself. He was going to be a very rich man. His train of thought was promptly derailed by the fact that he did need to get a few more items other than the stuff that he had in his fridge if he wanted to eat well for the next week. With the basic fridge things got raunchy after about three days. So making eight serving meals probably wasn’t the wisest course of action - green fumes and flies didn’t help foster a hygienic environment.What he needed to do was build a financial base and make certain that he was able to build it up so he didn’t have to worry about financial security. The only caveat here was how much of a cushion defined financial security for him? 10,000? 50,000? 100,000? But every bit of that cushion mattered because it would help him to launch into the upper stratosphere of financial net worth.
Haruo sighed as he looked at his watch and realized that daydreaming had cost him about two hours that morning. He had to go plant apple trees. So that he wouldn’t have to keep going to the store to buy his apples. On top of that he was going to have to get a few more fruits to start an orchard. Maybe some peaches or some limes or maybe even an orange tree. Hmmm. If he built a greenhouse he could grow bananas. Well, let’s see what we can do. Haruo thought to himself as he put on a light summer-weight jacket and headed out into what was a Pacific Coast drizzle.As he headed into downtown to drop off the rental vehicle, he noted that he would need to look into getting a vehicle of his own. He didn’t have a big budget for that since he was living on his own. Even one of the small compact cars could set him back almost 10,000 simoleons. Since he was in town, he might as well look at one of the dealerships and see if there was something that he could purchase that was reliable and cost-effective.He would take a taxi back home if he couldn’t find what he was looking for a nice subcompact with enough room for a bag of groceries.
https://i.imgur.com/sFEfZOf.jpg
Would he decided to stay here in Vancouver or move to the island? Upon checking his bank balance, he realized his gem sales had essentially put him personally over the §1M range so he was able to buy something decent in terms of a house; maybe it was time to move to the Island. So he had options. Would he decide to stay in Vancouver or put some distance between him and his family (as much as he hated to do that to his father and to his grandmother, perhaps distance and separation was the best thing to do in his life)? But he couldn’t make that decision just yet because he had tiberium growing so the best thing for him to do was to wait until those spires had grown and he could reap the benefits from that before he made a decision on whether he was going to uproot and move lock-stock and barrel out of town. Perhaps the best thing was to find a place on the Island and settle down.
But one of the first things he needed to do was to return this rental and purchase a vehicle of his own, since he now had a decent amount of money with which to do that. When he got to the rental place, he found that they had a decent selection of pre-owned vehicles that they were selling so that they could take that older inventory and turn them into cash so they could restock newer models in their rental inventory. When all was said and done with a handshake, Haruo walked out of the rental place, the brand new owner of a Vorn P328 pickup, like his dad’s except his dad’s was white and Haruo’s was blue.
https://i.imgur.com/q4MZvOe.jpg
Guess the next thing I should do is figure out whether I’m going to keep the property or offer a deep discount to my dad so that he can buy it off me so that I can make a clean break of it and find a place somewhere quiet to live. Haruo thought. But that meant calling up his dad and seeing the potential fall-out from his choice. But he needed the mobile home maintained. And if he wasn’t going to set his roots in Vancouver, then he would have to sell the property.
One point four-five wasn’t technically the threshold point for being classified as rich. But it certainly was considered well-off. And if he wanted the financial freedom to move around as need be, then he would have to have a value in the high tens.
What about his long-term friends? Phil and Noel? He looked at their situation with pragmatic eyes. They had graduated school. They were into their adult lives and busy trying to build up their own personal wealth. They had jobs, they would be alright. Haruo knew that the friendships that were so important while they were all in school no longer were primary in their minds as each person negotiated their journey through life. What mattered was family. And the only family Haruo had was his father and his maternal grandmother.
https://i.imgur.com/GvLNE8p.jpg
And that was the bittersweet part of growing up. Maintaining childhood friendships were no longer number one in his life. There were some who would come back to you, but on the whole, most wouldn’t and that was just part and parcel of growing and maturing.
And Haruo was prepared to make sacrifices for his own personal peace of mind. Because even at nineteen, he’d realized what was important to his own personal happiness: a quiet life where no-one could bother him. A life where he was alone to contemplate life and his role in the grand scheme of things as an insignificant cog in the realm of capitalism. Yay for fiduciary vision.
https://i.imgur.com/pUiYqSO.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/vO99c1Y.jpg
Over the next two weeks, Haruo made his preparations quietly, finally selling off his tiberium and seeing a tidy profit as well as some other conjured jewels. His dad and grandmother were not happy about his wanting to leave for Vancouver Island, but they understood his reasons and promised to hold their silence.
https://i.imgur.com/fQYiwJf.jpg
One week later
https://i.imgur.com/W8UZxBa.jpg
River had made excuses to herself to not go and see him at his new property. And she’d talked herself out of it multiple times. He doesn’t want to see me. I don’t think he’d be amenable to talking it out. I need to get a better argument together before I approach him with a suggestion to get counseling. And it was at Bebe’s urging that she finally got up the gumption to go out and see him out in Richmond. And that was mainly because Bebe threatened to drag her over there.
https://i.imgur.com/sUKT6GL.jpg
“He’s not going to go to counseling on his own, you’re gonna have to drag him there.”
https://i.imgur.com/aXseAuE.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/BjpPwiq.jpg
As Bebe crested the hill and came to a stop at the manufactured home that was or used to be Haruo's home, all they saw was an empty driveway and a large real estate sign on the property - the sign on the property said SOLD. River’s heart fell into the pit of her stomach. “No…no…no…”. She repeated, her heart shattering into pieces, not noticing her vision misting.
https://i.imgur.com/b8bLuY9.jpg
“Oh, no…” was all Bebe could say as she turned to see River in utter agony, tears spilling from her eyes. How could Haruo do this? He hadn’t even bothered to say good-bye.
https://i.imgur.com/NXRhcOO.jpg
If River had thought that rejection of her overtures hurt, nothing compared to this. Haruo hadn’t even bothered to tell her he was leaving. He’d never even left a forwarding address. Fourteen years of friendship had meant absolutely nothing to him? So many times where he’d been longing for release from his situation with his mother and when it came down to it, River had wanted to give him that freedom from having to deal with his mother; that they would gain their freedom together, at least that was her hope. They’d made plans together through elementary school and high-school.
The deep hurt within River coalesced flaring into a sheet white cold anger. This was betrayal at its worst.
https://i.imgur.com/5HwRZLE.jpg
And betrayal did not warrant forgiveness.
End Chapter One
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