Zodion Application
✖ PLAYER:
Name & LJ: Anne/bicyclehelmet
Birthdate & Age: June 20th, 1989 - that makes me 22.
Characters played in Zodion: None!
✖ CHARACTER:
Name: Itaru Hikami
Canon: Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side: Second Season (DS)
PB/Image: Here!
Info links: It's a bit difficult to find proper sources, but here goes!
Here is a walkthrough to the game - the section on Hikami contains quite a bit of information on him.
Wikipedia has a tiny bit of info on him.
Canon Point: The night after he has successfully been elected student council president, which is to say November 17th, in his second year of high school.
Gender: Male, physically and mentally.
Age: Seventeen. Hikami will be aged up to eighteen.
Birthdate/Sign: October 6th; this is canon. His sign is Libra.
Tattoo: About the two inches in diameter, it is on his upper right arm - exactly where his prefect's badge usually is.
Suitability: Hikami, despite his slightly overenthusiastic image, is one of the more mature guys in the Tokimeki canon. Needless to say with the game's "skinship" option, Hikami is rather used to being touched, and asks whether the heroine would mind if he returned the favour on several occasions. Although of course no actual sex is had in Tokimeki canon, Hikami is a healthy teenager with a healthy interest in the physical aspects of relationships, as most teenage boys his age. Really, when it comes to intimacy, Hikami is the kind of guy who flusters at the hint of kissing and the like - but he has no qualms participating in rather vigorous make-out sessions after some dates. He's one of the more easily winnable guys in Tokimeki canon, and would - perhaps unwillingly, but still - submit to a bimonthly requirement to have sex if it was necessary for his survival. Giving up, after all, is not Hikami's style. Additionally, Hikami's extreme need to follow the rules will probably have him find a "rule to have sex" a comfortable thought. Hikami knows how to follow rules, so dealing with them is like a built-in security blanket to him.
As mentioned before, he's a hard worker, evidenced by the work he puts in for the Student Council, and in-game is shown to adapt to circumstances with relative ease and extreme motivation. In the first year, Hikami alienates the student body during his student council speech by antagonising them. In the second year, he has learned from this experience and takes the position as Student Council President after a rousing speech. In his third year, he has fulfilled this position so well that the new council buys him a bouquet (and Hikami, who clearly wasn't expecting this gratitude, is floored). Another example is his little bun saga with Wakaouji, his chemistry teacher. Throughout first and second year, Wakaouji blows Hikami off when he comes to ask some chemistry-related questions by giving him the excuse that he's just off to get a limited edition bun. In the third year, Hikami acquires this limited edition bun before it even hits the stores, giving Wakaouji no way out - and telling him that if his teacher doesn't want him to abuse his position as Student Council President anymore, he'd better give him some answers.
Hikami does not have a part-time job in the game, but would be able to provide for himself if the work he puts in for the student council is any indication. He's a fast learner and extremely motivated to prove himself, so this should be no problem.
In addition to this, Hikami is less than a year away from being eighteen at his canon point.
Power: Hikami has no canon powers (unless you count extremely safe bike-riding has a power), so he will be getting the Air-related Healing power of potions and medicine.
Personality: The protagonist often comments that Hikami is "one of those straight-laced [people] you read about in manga", and that he's a "textbook kind of person". Indeed, he's the kind of guy who hardly even uses contractions when in serious business mode - and Hikami is in serious business mode all the time. Still, like in any dating sim, Hikami's mode of speech changes the closer he gets to the heroine. Before he warms up to her, he is aloof and professional, with just a hint of friendlessness: when called for a date while in neutral state, he'll drily state "that's probably all you wanted to ask me", and hang up. He's a stickler for rules and punctuality (much like his cousin from the first Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side, really), calling "adherence to the meeting time [...] a rule of the world". He's into knowledge to a huge degree, preferring dates to "educational" places like the museum and the aquarium, where he will always bring up how the protagonist and he should take the opportunity to learn things. Indeed, he's the kind of person to go to a mall on a free day and see what side of a path people walk on ("traffic rules state that pedestrians walk on the right. But that is not the case inside buildings") because "many ideas come to [him] while relaxing". Hikami lives a life of the mind - he enjoys educational outings in his free time and generally jumps at the opportunity to show off his intellect.
Still, beyond this professional side of Hikami, there is his romanced side. He'll stutter when flustered, which he really only gets in romantic situations with the heroine. Like most Tokimeki guys, he'll react to the accidental kiss event with something much like horror (referring to the kiss as "something i-important" she lost), and then immediately tells her not to run within the school - although he'll still be pretty shaken the next time the heroine calls him. On the Drama CD, Akagi tells Hikami that he might just be popular with girls because he is tsundere, like his older cousin Himuro. Hikami - utterly nonplussed - first mistakes tsundere for tundra, and takes quite some time to actually arrive at the true meaning of tsundere although it is quite an obvious term. Indeed Hikami exhibits some decidedly tsundere traits, although he hardly ever exhibits the truly hostile behaviour of hardcore tsunderes. Hikami's style is more subtle - he starts out as very business-like and strict, but once he warms up, he positively turns into a heap of willing goo, stuttering and flustering.
Although polite, well-mannered, and truly trying to be the best he can be, Hikami ends up not being all that likable (although that of course changes a bit with the heroine's loving intervention). He proclaims he has only one friend; he met him playing chess over the internet, and refers to him as a "close friend". His first speech to become student council president is a fiasco, with an angry Hikami berating his audience; he is promptly booed of stage. He doesn't understand why, after all "[he] said the right things, they didn't understand... It's always been like this". He is well aware of his unpopularity, but in an attempt to become a better person he sticks to his rulebooks so much the effect is entirely the opposite. Still Hikami is known for being intelligent (and, indeed, book-smart) and other characters do not hesitate to make use of this side of him. This tendency of Hikami to theorise in order to solve problems and become a better person is evident in Best Friend Mode as well. When occupying the position of the heroine's best friend, Hikami will provide the heroine with his assistance by researching 'love' so she has more of a chance of winning her guy over. He'll read one hundred literary masterpieces to get a feeling of what love is, and even then wonder if perhaps he should've read two hundred. Indeed, Hikami does things because he should, not because he likes doing them per se (although of course these two somewhat overlap to an authoritative, rule-loving person like him).
Hikami is the kind of guy to have dreams, and then devise "a stringent plan to make them come true". He takes all courses in high school in order to enter a first-rate university and study astrophysics, after which he intends to go to graduate school, get his PhD overseas, return to Japan "to work for a space research institution, make a great discovery, and win a Nobel Prize". He's much too practical to be a dreamer, and yet all this practicality has turned him into somewhat of a worrier, both when it comes to what others will think of him if he doesn't abide by the rules, and worrying for the heroine when she's even a few minutes late or kisses him in public ("you should mind the public eye!"). When embarrassed, he'll start speaking rather loudly (to the point of yelling) while attempting to cover up his embarrassment with zeal; when offended or angered (for example during the pillow fight during the school trip) he will have no qualms about attempting to exact his revenge.
Hikami has a great interest in astronomy and a bit of an obsession with his cousin (the strict math teacher from Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side 1), wearing the same brand of glasses as Himuro, sending him flowers, attempting to mimic his driving style, and (worryingly enough) explaining to the heroine that excessive skinship is something that is generally restricted to members of his family, whatever the implications of that may be.
At the end of the day, Hikami is most of all a hard worker. He stays late during the Culture Festival to make a schedule for the other students, because "if I make this today, then everyone can go home early tomorrow, right? Everyone should be tired since they stayed back after school. I want them to relax tomorrow." Throughout the game, a small saga between Wakaouji-sensei and Hikami illustrates just how persistent Hikami can be, even if it takes him a while. Once he has decided he wants to ask his sensei a question, he cannot be deterred for long. Hikami doesn't often get recognition for the work he puts in - so when he does, he's extremely touched. After all, he's not the type to boast - Hikami seldom brags about anything, and has a tendency to talk himself down once the heroine gets through to him, whether they're talking about his room or his grades. To Hikami, his achievements are the result of hard work, and why should anyone brag about hard work? It's normal to do your best, right? That doesn't mean he wouldn't like the recognition. Hikami - when pressed - will talk about the trouble he had making friends in middle school, and even now in high school; this is why he turned to working his hardest for the student community and following every possible rule. The big tragedy is of course that this is exactly what made him even more of a difficult person to get along with.
✖ SAMPLES:
"Zodion" First-Person Network Entry:
[The camera comes on to show a particularly perturbed person, who manages to look rather dishevelled while wearing an immaculate school uniform. He's stuttering a bit, but then seems to pull himself together, frowning and puffing up his chest.]
A-ah - yes! I need to talk to the twelve representatives who have transported me here! [He holds a fist in front of his chest, and you can see the prefect's badge tied around his upper arm.] I am Hikami Itaru, recently elected President of the Hanegasaki Student Council! I... [beat] demand that you provide me the means necessary to return home! I cannot abandon my duties as President!!
[His mouth opens, already forming the tha of thank you when he thinks against it and slams his mouth shut in frustration.] Yes! That concludes this transmission.
[And the feed abruptly shuts off.]
"Zodionlogs" Third-Person Prose Entry:
Overwhelming bliss, a sense of completion, of reaching a finish line, of tipping over a cliff and falling into warm, warm water... pleasure that consumes everything, satisfaction beyond his wildest dreams, and after that climax sleep comes so very easily-
This was how Itaru Hikami felt when he went to bed that night, the memory of his election to the position of Student Council President warming his limbs. When he finally woke up after what felt like a thousand years of deep, deep sleep, he felt decidedly different. His bed was as Spartan as the rest of his room, but it was definitely not as hard as what he was currently lying on, and then there was the scent - a scent so familiar, and yet so out of place. Trees? But he didn't have trees in his room, did he... oh, that was a silly thought, of course he didn't, and when he'd open his eyes he'd see the closed curtains, the neat desk, his folded uniform already laid out-
He opened his eyes, and saw none of these things. This was not his room. He was outside.
But this was preposterous. Hikami reached up, trying to rub his eyes, but found he was already wearing his glasses - and, it seemed, wearing his uniform. But that was strange; he surely hadn't put it on and then walked here in his sleep? Adjusting his glasses, he peered at his surroundings. He'd gone on enough hikes to realise that this was not anywhere near his home. This was a strange place, and the atmosphere itself breathed something foreign, something that seemed bigger than himself. He got to his feet, and only then noticed the box.
Who would put a box here? The entire affair looked man-made (Hikami knew well enough that perfect circles and the like were generally not natural) but the box seemed to confirm that someone had recently been here. The same someone who had dressed him? Silly, silly - but then the answer would be found in that box for sure, wouldn't it? Yes, he had to verify it with the box. He had to look into the box. The box-
-and before he was fully aware of it, he'd stepped over the ring of water, instantly clutching his arm at the sharp pain stabbing there and letting out something that was almost a whine. Too preoccupied to notice his reflection, he rubbed his arm. Maybe an insect or something like that? When he looked up to find the perpetrator, he was confronted with his own body. Instantly Hikami averted his eyes - this was shameful! And he wasn't - he wasn't naked...! But wherever he looked, he only saw his own body, skinny and tense like a tightly wound spring-
and marked with what seemed to be a glowing, pink... alchemical symbol? It looked familiar somehow. Frowning, he rolled up his sleeve, taking care not to wrinkle his badge. Sure enough the mark was really on his arm - small, light in color, but definitely there. His stomach felt as if he'd swallowed a brick. This was beginning to look really worrying.
But the box, of course - the box would solve it all. The box would tell him exactly what was happening, what was wrong - and how he could solve it. He clenched his fists, tried to calm himself down - panicking would get him nowhere. He was going to have to deal with it. He'd look inside the box, find the solution to all of this, look for someone to tell him just where he was and what he was doing here, and then when he'd made sense of it all he'd find his way back home and go over the material costs for the coming Christmas party with Onoda-san...
Everything was going to go absolutely back to normal as soon as he opened that box. Hikami was sure of it.
Name & LJ: Anne/bicyclehelmet
Birthdate & Age: June 20th, 1989 - that makes me 22.
Characters played in Zodion: None!
✖ CHARACTER:
Name: Itaru Hikami
Canon: Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side: Second Season (DS)
PB/Image: Here!
Info links: It's a bit difficult to find proper sources, but here goes!
Here is a walkthrough to the game - the section on Hikami contains quite a bit of information on him.
Wikipedia has a tiny bit of info on him.
Canon Point: The night after he has successfully been elected student council president, which is to say November 17th, in his second year of high school.
Gender: Male, physically and mentally.
Age: Seventeen. Hikami will be aged up to eighteen.
Birthdate/Sign: October 6th; this is canon. His sign is Libra.
Tattoo: About the two inches in diameter, it is on his upper right arm - exactly where his prefect's badge usually is.
Suitability: Hikami, despite his slightly overenthusiastic image, is one of the more mature guys in the Tokimeki canon. Needless to say with the game's "skinship" option, Hikami is rather used to being touched, and asks whether the heroine would mind if he returned the favour on several occasions. Although of course no actual sex is had in Tokimeki canon, Hikami is a healthy teenager with a healthy interest in the physical aspects of relationships, as most teenage boys his age. Really, when it comes to intimacy, Hikami is the kind of guy who flusters at the hint of kissing and the like - but he has no qualms participating in rather vigorous make-out sessions after some dates. He's one of the more easily winnable guys in Tokimeki canon, and would - perhaps unwillingly, but still - submit to a bimonthly requirement to have sex if it was necessary for his survival. Giving up, after all, is not Hikami's style. Additionally, Hikami's extreme need to follow the rules will probably have him find a "rule to have sex" a comfortable thought. Hikami knows how to follow rules, so dealing with them is like a built-in security blanket to him.
As mentioned before, he's a hard worker, evidenced by the work he puts in for the Student Council, and in-game is shown to adapt to circumstances with relative ease and extreme motivation. In the first year, Hikami alienates the student body during his student council speech by antagonising them. In the second year, he has learned from this experience and takes the position as Student Council President after a rousing speech. In his third year, he has fulfilled this position so well that the new council buys him a bouquet (and Hikami, who clearly wasn't expecting this gratitude, is floored). Another example is his little bun saga with Wakaouji, his chemistry teacher. Throughout first and second year, Wakaouji blows Hikami off when he comes to ask some chemistry-related questions by giving him the excuse that he's just off to get a limited edition bun. In the third year, Hikami acquires this limited edition bun before it even hits the stores, giving Wakaouji no way out - and telling him that if his teacher doesn't want him to abuse his position as Student Council President anymore, he'd better give him some answers.
Hikami does not have a part-time job in the game, but would be able to provide for himself if the work he puts in for the student council is any indication. He's a fast learner and extremely motivated to prove himself, so this should be no problem.
In addition to this, Hikami is less than a year away from being eighteen at his canon point.
Power: Hikami has no canon powers (unless you count extremely safe bike-riding has a power), so he will be getting the Air-related Healing power of potions and medicine.
Personality: The protagonist often comments that Hikami is "one of those straight-laced [people] you read about in manga", and that he's a "textbook kind of person". Indeed, he's the kind of guy who hardly even uses contractions when in serious business mode - and Hikami is in serious business mode all the time. Still, like in any dating sim, Hikami's mode of speech changes the closer he gets to the heroine. Before he warms up to her, he is aloof and professional, with just a hint of friendlessness: when called for a date while in neutral state, he'll drily state "that's probably all you wanted to ask me", and hang up. He's a stickler for rules and punctuality (much like his cousin from the first Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side, really), calling "adherence to the meeting time [...] a rule of the world". He's into knowledge to a huge degree, preferring dates to "educational" places like the museum and the aquarium, where he will always bring up how the protagonist and he should take the opportunity to learn things. Indeed, he's the kind of person to go to a mall on a free day and see what side of a path people walk on ("traffic rules state that pedestrians walk on the right. But that is not the case inside buildings") because "many ideas come to [him] while relaxing". Hikami lives a life of the mind - he enjoys educational outings in his free time and generally jumps at the opportunity to show off his intellect.
Still, beyond this professional side of Hikami, there is his romanced side. He'll stutter when flustered, which he really only gets in romantic situations with the heroine. Like most Tokimeki guys, he'll react to the accidental kiss event with something much like horror (referring to the kiss as "something i-important" she lost), and then immediately tells her not to run within the school - although he'll still be pretty shaken the next time the heroine calls him. On the Drama CD, Akagi tells Hikami that he might just be popular with girls because he is tsundere, like his older cousin Himuro. Hikami - utterly nonplussed - first mistakes tsundere for tundra, and takes quite some time to actually arrive at the true meaning of tsundere although it is quite an obvious term. Indeed Hikami exhibits some decidedly tsundere traits, although he hardly ever exhibits the truly hostile behaviour of hardcore tsunderes. Hikami's style is more subtle - he starts out as very business-like and strict, but once he warms up, he positively turns into a heap of willing goo, stuttering and flustering.
Although polite, well-mannered, and truly trying to be the best he can be, Hikami ends up not being all that likable (although that of course changes a bit with the heroine's loving intervention). He proclaims he has only one friend; he met him playing chess over the internet, and refers to him as a "close friend". His first speech to become student council president is a fiasco, with an angry Hikami berating his audience; he is promptly booed of stage. He doesn't understand why, after all "[he] said the right things, they didn't understand... It's always been like this". He is well aware of his unpopularity, but in an attempt to become a better person he sticks to his rulebooks so much the effect is entirely the opposite. Still Hikami is known for being intelligent (and, indeed, book-smart) and other characters do not hesitate to make use of this side of him. This tendency of Hikami to theorise in order to solve problems and become a better person is evident in Best Friend Mode as well. When occupying the position of the heroine's best friend, Hikami will provide the heroine with his assistance by researching 'love' so she has more of a chance of winning her guy over. He'll read one hundred literary masterpieces to get a feeling of what love is, and even then wonder if perhaps he should've read two hundred. Indeed, Hikami does things because he should, not because he likes doing them per se (although of course these two somewhat overlap to an authoritative, rule-loving person like him).
Hikami is the kind of guy to have dreams, and then devise "a stringent plan to make them come true". He takes all courses in high school in order to enter a first-rate university and study astrophysics, after which he intends to go to graduate school, get his PhD overseas, return to Japan "to work for a space research institution, make a great discovery, and win a Nobel Prize". He's much too practical to be a dreamer, and yet all this practicality has turned him into somewhat of a worrier, both when it comes to what others will think of him if he doesn't abide by the rules, and worrying for the heroine when she's even a few minutes late or kisses him in public ("you should mind the public eye!"). When embarrassed, he'll start speaking rather loudly (to the point of yelling) while attempting to cover up his embarrassment with zeal; when offended or angered (for example during the pillow fight during the school trip) he will have no qualms about attempting to exact his revenge.
Hikami has a great interest in astronomy and a bit of an obsession with his cousin (the strict math teacher from Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side 1), wearing the same brand of glasses as Himuro, sending him flowers, attempting to mimic his driving style, and (worryingly enough) explaining to the heroine that excessive skinship is something that is generally restricted to members of his family, whatever the implications of that may be.
At the end of the day, Hikami is most of all a hard worker. He stays late during the Culture Festival to make a schedule for the other students, because "if I make this today, then everyone can go home early tomorrow, right? Everyone should be tired since they stayed back after school. I want them to relax tomorrow." Throughout the game, a small saga between Wakaouji-sensei and Hikami illustrates just how persistent Hikami can be, even if it takes him a while. Once he has decided he wants to ask his sensei a question, he cannot be deterred for long. Hikami doesn't often get recognition for the work he puts in - so when he does, he's extremely touched. After all, he's not the type to boast - Hikami seldom brags about anything, and has a tendency to talk himself down once the heroine gets through to him, whether they're talking about his room or his grades. To Hikami, his achievements are the result of hard work, and why should anyone brag about hard work? It's normal to do your best, right? That doesn't mean he wouldn't like the recognition. Hikami - when pressed - will talk about the trouble he had making friends in middle school, and even now in high school; this is why he turned to working his hardest for the student community and following every possible rule. The big tragedy is of course that this is exactly what made him even more of a difficult person to get along with.
✖ SAMPLES:
"Zodion" First-Person Network Entry:
[The camera comes on to show a particularly perturbed person, who manages to look rather dishevelled while wearing an immaculate school uniform. He's stuttering a bit, but then seems to pull himself together, frowning and puffing up his chest.]
A-ah - yes! I need to talk to the twelve representatives who have transported me here! [He holds a fist in front of his chest, and you can see the prefect's badge tied around his upper arm.] I am Hikami Itaru, recently elected President of the Hanegasaki Student Council! I... [beat] demand that you provide me the means necessary to return home! I cannot abandon my duties as President!!
[His mouth opens, already forming the tha of thank you when he thinks against it and slams his mouth shut in frustration.] Yes! That concludes this transmission.
[And the feed abruptly shuts off.]
"Zodionlogs" Third-Person Prose Entry:
Overwhelming bliss, a sense of completion, of reaching a finish line, of tipping over a cliff and falling into warm, warm water... pleasure that consumes everything, satisfaction beyond his wildest dreams, and after that climax sleep comes so very easily-
This was how Itaru Hikami felt when he went to bed that night, the memory of his election to the position of Student Council President warming his limbs. When he finally woke up after what felt like a thousand years of deep, deep sleep, he felt decidedly different. His bed was as Spartan as the rest of his room, but it was definitely not as hard as what he was currently lying on, and then there was the scent - a scent so familiar, and yet so out of place. Trees? But he didn't have trees in his room, did he... oh, that was a silly thought, of course he didn't, and when he'd open his eyes he'd see the closed curtains, the neat desk, his folded uniform already laid out-
He opened his eyes, and saw none of these things. This was not his room. He was outside.
But this was preposterous. Hikami reached up, trying to rub his eyes, but found he was already wearing his glasses - and, it seemed, wearing his uniform. But that was strange; he surely hadn't put it on and then walked here in his sleep? Adjusting his glasses, he peered at his surroundings. He'd gone on enough hikes to realise that this was not anywhere near his home. This was a strange place, and the atmosphere itself breathed something foreign, something that seemed bigger than himself. He got to his feet, and only then noticed the box.
Who would put a box here? The entire affair looked man-made (Hikami knew well enough that perfect circles and the like were generally not natural) but the box seemed to confirm that someone had recently been here. The same someone who had dressed him? Silly, silly - but then the answer would be found in that box for sure, wouldn't it? Yes, he had to verify it with the box. He had to look into the box. The box-
-and before he was fully aware of it, he'd stepped over the ring of water, instantly clutching his arm at the sharp pain stabbing there and letting out something that was almost a whine. Too preoccupied to notice his reflection, he rubbed his arm. Maybe an insect or something like that? When he looked up to find the perpetrator, he was confronted with his own body. Instantly Hikami averted his eyes - this was shameful! And he wasn't - he wasn't naked...! But wherever he looked, he only saw his own body, skinny and tense like a tightly wound spring-
and marked with what seemed to be a glowing, pink... alchemical symbol? It looked familiar somehow. Frowning, he rolled up his sleeve, taking care not to wrinkle his badge. Sure enough the mark was really on his arm - small, light in color, but definitely there. His stomach felt as if he'd swallowed a brick. This was beginning to look really worrying.
But the box, of course - the box would solve it all. The box would tell him exactly what was happening, what was wrong - and how he could solve it. He clenched his fists, tried to calm himself down - panicking would get him nowhere. He was going to have to deal with it. He'd look inside the box, find the solution to all of this, look for someone to tell him just where he was and what he was doing here, and then when he'd made sense of it all he'd find his way back home and go over the material costs for the coming Christmas party with Onoda-san...
Everything was going to go absolutely back to normal as soon as he opened that box. Hikami was sure of it.