Ever since the decision to split each Empowering Artifact into a set of seven fragments in accordance with the splitting of the Throne, there have been concerns about the ability to find suitable candidates to wield them. Certainly, while the property of individuals' aura being colored in reflection of their soul has made detecting affinities easy enough, that is a different matter from determining a candidate's worthiness to be entrusted with such power, even if at a lesser scale than previous. In particular, given the abilities of outmost consequence typically associated with Pink, there is worry that an Entrusted one could abuse that power, whether from active malice or merely irresponsibility, and cause more harm than good in the long run.
For six of them, I cannot answer this question with confidence. But in my time speaking with different teams and candidates and assessing them not by their power or potential, but their deepest and most core values, I have developed a certain theory - overly optimistic, perhaps, but heartening if it is true.
I believe that by virtue of the traits that are reflected in an aura as the essence we know as Pink, candidates for that power naturally self-select for suitability. Regardless of outside appearance or surface attitudes, those with the most vivid aura that I have spoken to have almost always shown themselves to possess a certain core trait that makes them perfect for this responsibility.
That is not to say that those of the other colors are lesser, or lack that trait in contrast. Rather, I posit that essence reflection operates much like color in the visible spectrum, which makes it all the more fitting that we use the same terms for specific hues of each. Much like color is made of light of multiple different wavelengths working in tandem, and the wavelengths that are most plentiful appear to us the most; aura reflecting a certain hue of essence does not preclude the presence of traits tied to the other Fundamentals; it simply means that the one reflected is the most plentiful and foundational, and the more intense it is the more plentiful it is. The key difference is that before the split, wielders were chosen for their balance of all traits to keep them in line despite the empowerment, and now we select for those strongest in a specific one to draw out the full potential of their power.
And yes, that change in focus has some of a more... traditional... mindset worried. Some have said the quiet part aloud, that they dislike the potential for Entrusted ones to act outside our direction, whether from lingering attitudes we must work hard to grow past, or from the very real concerns surrounding the cataclysms inflicted upon our colonized worlds. But for the moderates, who are more concerned with the potential for Entrusted ones to inflict harm upon each other or those we wish for them to protect, I wish to offer some hope. Hope, and the affirmation that this approach is the best to take; I firmly believe we will only have lost our way if we let dread cloud our souls, and choose candidates once again to mitigate their strength for fear of what ill they could do, rather than trust in what good could be done instead. I hope that thousands of years from now, we will not have lost sight of that...
As I said, I do believe that the seventh and most momentous of the Fundamentals, Pink, is tied to an aspect of essence that renders those strongest in it most fit for carrying its power. It is an ideal that could be easily mistaken for something lesser, such as the more focused passion of Red, or the compassionate reliability of Orange, or a specific mode of relationship. However, in this context I refer to it in a more meaningful, more all-encompassing, and more unconditional sense.
Love.
-An old, unsigned memo resting buried deep in the Shades' archives, unseen
With your opponent between you and the exit, a cavalcade of half-baked plans rush through your head as you steadily back away. Hide away? No, somehow you know the plants can sense your presence. Run away? She would surely chase after you. Transform and fight her? The knife cannot really hurt you, but you have a sneaking suspicion that she has other options. Make a distraction and knock her out? You are not even sure how to do the first part, let alone the second.
Thankfully, you are granted some reprieve when yet another thump from below catches her attention, making her turn away, and you take this opportunity to slip past to the living room. Without her blocking your exit, and with the reminder of the others still down below, the idea of simply fleeing feels like the only natural course of action. If nothing else, you will have strength in numbers, instead of having to contend with her alone.
Still, you hesitate a moment, feeling like there's something else you should do before leaving. Glancing about, you zero in on the clippers she had used just moments ago, and a nearby fern still laden with strange fruits. Evidence. Before you can overthink it, you snatch up the tool and hastily scissor at the fern, chopping stems and fronds alike and jamming whatever falls off into your skirt pocket in a rush.
The wild defacement does not go unnoticed, as you hear an affronted "HEY!" behind you, and dive backward just in time to avoid a wild slash of her knife. You only get a split-second glimpse to see something long and shimmery jutting outwards from her bare back, but don't stop to get a better look. Throwing the clippers at her to buy time, you scramble the rest of the way to the door, half-opening it, half-phasing through it in your rush to leave.
The door slams the rest of the way open, followed by a disturbingly guttural roar, but you refuse to look back. Transforming as you run, you tear down the hall and use the momentum to swing around the end of the banister, launching yourself nearly headfirst down the stairs like your brother used to, skipping three or four steps at a time. You land in a painful kneeling slide at the bottom, but the rush of panic pushes you to clamber upright regardless, leaning on your naginata to do so.
Your frantic thoughts are already several steps ahead, considering how to regroup with the others in the front room without sabotaging their interrogation, but all plans go out the window a moment later as you stand and turn to the door-
-Only to find the others already in the back room just ahead, staring back at you and frozen in surprise.
You blink, struggling to quickly take in the scene. Everyone is transformed and armed, seemingly having been squaring off… against each other? Sakamoto-san is cowering in a corner near the fire escape door, Pallavi standing protectively over him and clutching some sort of large axe or halberd in front of her. Miho and Shimizu-san are both facing her with their own weapons raised, while Midori stands between both parties as the very picture of frustration, though any prior hostility from any of them has been thoroughly derailed by your arrival.
The moment of shock is interrupted by another sudden loud roar, and the sound of something large barreling down the stairs after you. You only spot a brown blur in the corner of your eyes, as panic seizes you to jump out of its way just in time to hear it smash into the wall opposite.
Whirling around to see what just happened, you find yourself staring in horror at nothing less than a massive brown bear, half-embedded in the wall plaster but seemingly barely dazed from the impact. Claws gouge further holes in the wall as it struggles to pull itself upright, shredding through the weak material until finally gaining purchase on an internal support beam that can carry its weight. With a low growl like a rattling car engine, its heavy jowels part in a grimace that shows off long, sharp yellow teeth, each at least the size of one of your fingers. Now towering over you, it blots out the light from the ceiling fixture behind it, and you feel frozen in place.
"What?" Someone demands exasperatedly, only to be drowned out by the loudest roar yet, and then the scene becomes lost in absolute mayhem.
The back room is not strictly small, but with so many people and a whole entire bear filling the space, it becomes decidedly cramped. The animal rears back a meaty paw to swing at you, and only then do you finally regain your senses enough to dodge aside - only to back into a wall and still take a glancing-yet-heavy blow that pushes you into the plaster. Pain explodes across your front and back alike, and your vision blurs; it feels like a bell is clanging around your ears.
Not for the first time, some detached part of your mind has the wherewithal to grumble about the pointlessness of still feeling pain despite the lack of physical damage.
Even in the time it takes for your head to clear somewhat, you find Shimizu-san has managed to hold the bear at a distance with aggressive jabs from some sort of javelin, though its advance has still pushed the others toward the back wall, opposite you. Still too weak to pull yourself back into the fight, you instead frantically fight past the lingering ache to try to think of something, anything that could help. All that comes to mind, though, is that a wild animal should not be acting this aggressive. Unless…
The thought is interrupted by a harsh clang, and you glance back up to see Shimizu-san's weapon has been batted harshly aside. Wisely, she opts to focus on wresting it back out of the side wall it has been lodged in, instead of staying in the bear's path.
Taking advantage of this opening and her small size, Miho ducks through where Shimizu-san was standing and slides beneath the bear's arm. Thankfully, it seems to have turned its attention to Midori and Pallavi, giving her time to awkwardly clamber back upright from her otherwise impressive action pose; were the situation not so dire, you would have had to stifle a giggle.
"You alright?" She casts a concerned glance your way, but without waiting for an answer, turns back around, setting a foot against the wall and extending a pair of wrist-mounted blades to ready her attack. At the same time, another thud sees Midori, having attempted to use her hoop blade as a shield, now slumping back against the fire escape door, wincing as she holds her midsection again. It's at this point that Miho decides to make her move.
"YYYAAAHHH!" She shouts as she kicks off from the wall and makes a running leap towards its back, and you can already tell how this is going to go. Sure enough, ears perking up at the sound, the bear whirls with surprising speed just as she leaps, and with an overhead paw, spikes her straight into the floor.
For a moment you're terrified that it may step on her, and finally peel yourself out of the wall to stand between them if it comes to that. Your quarry glares over at you, growling in warning, and a connection sparks in your mind.
However the next moment, just as quickly as it took out Miho, she turns back away to focus on Pallavi, advancing on her with slow, purposeful strides, arms raised menacingly. To her credit, the other girl stands her ground over Sakamoto-san, expression fearful yet determined, clutching her long-handled axe before her in trembling hands, even as she's cast in the bear's imposing shadow.
You watch helplessly, the naginata in your hand feeling like little more than dead weight as you mentally race through and discard plans to try to help her, or stop the bear. She's too fast to be bound like the monster from before, and too strong to fight… and you are not even sure if you want to use your blade on her, given what happened to Gushiken-san. Nothing feels good enough, not while Pallavi's still trying to stand against her… Oh. Perhaps that's the answer.
"Get out of her way!" you shout to Pallavi, and she casts you a wild-eyed look of disbelief. "She's not here for you, just get away from her brother!" Despite her clear confusion, after only a moment more of hesitation she takes your direction. Skirting to the side without turning away, she meets the bear's gaze with an uncertain look, only for her to drop to all fours in the spot that had just been vacated. You and Pallavi both let out a sigh of relief.
Taking only a moment to sniff at Sakamoto-san, she wraps one arm protectively around him, dragging him over to the back door. Roughly scooping Midori aside with her other paw, she shoulder-checks the pushbar, shrinking down a bit to pass through.
As soon as the door slams shut again, you immediately turn to the pile of limbs and regret known as Miho, and help haul her up off the floor, while Pallavi does the same with Midori. Thankfully, despite how nasty her impact had looked (and sounded), Miho seems… relatively less hurt than you had thought. The way she wavers in place with a slightly cross-eyed stare is rather worrying, though…
However, your efforts to take further stock are swiftly interrupted by the last of the group. Shimizu-san, having finally freed her weapon from the wall, shoves past you on her way to the door, hefting the long and gleaming silver lance ahead of herself as if about to enter a jousting match. With a kick to reopen the door, she wastes no time in charging outside. The remaining four of you stare at each other for a moment, before Midori rolls her eyes with an irritated huff and limps to the door as well; you and Pallavi share a brief shrug before following suit.
You pass through the door just in time to see Shimizu-san's charge halted, the bear wrapping a meaty fist around the tip of her lance before it can hit, and then hurtling it aside, the girl stumbling and falling to her knees from the sudden redirection.
"Let's stop this from getting any more stupid, alright?" Midori grouses, before stopping to hold herself with another pained hiss. Pallavi quickly takes the hint, rushing over to Shimizu-san and grabbing her from behind right before she can pick up the lance for another try.
"What are you doing?" Shimizu-san demands, but after a moment of struggling falls still. Bending down to pick it up herself, Pallavi drags the bluenette back away from the bear, shooting a glance somewhere between terrified and apologetic as she does.
You can't help but feel relieved as she retreats further in return, depositing Sakamoto-san behind her and turning her gaze between the rest of you, hostile but restrained. Midori steps forward slightly, hands up, and for your part you take up a supporting position behind her, naginata at the ready in case the situation falls apart again.
In the silence that follows, you could have heard a pin drop. Clouds roll slowly overhead, the moon coming out to bathe the enclosure in silvery light. The bear's gaze is fixed firmly on the captive Shimizu-san at first, before gradually shifting to take in the rest of you. Sheepishly, you lower your weapon slightly to match Midori and Pallavi's unthreatening stances.
The tension continues to stretch for several moments longer, before the moon becomes half-hidden again, and the bear's posture finally relaxes. Suddenly, the brown of her coat turns pure black, until she's nothing more than a silhouette against the faint moonlight through the clouds. The shape is joined by other silhouettes, layered over one another like translucent cards, with a different one coming to the fore and regaining colors as the rest fade away. Now, instead of the bear, you find yourself once again looking at Sakamoto-san's sister, clad in the bathrobe from before, but no less imposing for it. Behind her, Sakamoto-san stands up and dusts himself off, looking sheepish. "Thank you, Rina nee-san…"
"Are you unhurt?" She shoots back, gaze never wavering from the group before her.
You notice a bruise on his face, but after a moment's hesitation, he mumbles "Yeah, mostly. The orange one was protecting me." Pallavi lets out a nervous chuckle as the sister's piercing gaze gets turned on her, but after a moment she nods in affirmation.
Rina's posture relaxes some more, and she closes her eyes for a long moment. When they open again they look different, glowing green in the shadow cast by her bangs, with slit pupils and double-layered irises; you stiffen back up in response, but she stays put. Instead, she once more scans the four of you up and down, and slowly her stony glare shifts into a confident smirk.
"Magical girls, hmm? You must be a new team, for that sad showing," she spits out at Shimizu-san. "I don't know what your masters think they're accomplishing, to send you after us, but tell them we won't take this insult lightly." Shifting her attention over to you, she adds, "Besides, I would worry more about who you're supposedly working with now. One of you clearly isn't who - or should I say, what - she claims to be." You feel yourself go cold.
What to say?
> Say Nothing (Better to stay quiet, and let the burden of proof fall on her) > Admit To Being A Ghost (No. If there is a place or time for that, it sure isn't here or now)
> Defend Yourself (You can't let her claim go uncontested, or at least unobscured)
-> Write-In
Freezing in place, eyes locked with her suddenly alien gaze, the rest of the world fades out of your awareness for a long, phantom-heart-stopping moment. Under her burning eyes, glowing acid green ringed by a dark cyan, you can feel all your secrets exposed. Yet you remain locked up and unmoving, a deer in oncoming headlights. While you had felt ready to crumble under the pressure of expectant gazes during the meeting earlier, this penetrating stare is a very different kind of intense, and though words and defenses and justifications bubble up in your mind, your mouth may as well be cemented shut.
"I could say the same of you!" The long, agonizing silence is broken by Shimizu-san's retort, and the oppressive gaze sweeps away. It's like a crushing weight is lifted, and you do your best to hide the way your shoulders slump in sudden relieved exhaustion, though for better or worse, nobody else present is looking your way now. "You're one to talk about not being what you claim!"
You're glad to see that Shimizu-san seems to have finally stopped trying to attack, even after pulling herself free of Pallavi's grasp; instead she stands defiantly with arms crossed, staring Rina down. Even though something about the woman's stare turning on her makes her sway back for a moment as if pushed, she recovers quickly and refuses to wilt. "You two can lie and hide all you like, but we won't have it. We know what you're up to, and we won't let you get away with this!" Pallavi nods in affirmation.
Rina simply sneers in response. Her eyes blink back to normal, only to shoot the bluenette a condescending smirk almost as withering as what had come before. "Sure you do," she drawls, voice dripping with sarcasm. "And even if you did, I'd love to see you try."
Shimizu-san jolts forward, before being once again grabbed by Pallavi; a second later you realize both you and Midori have your weapons raised again, and Sakamoto-san has darkened into a silhouette. Rina, however, simply rolls her eyes, one arm held out across his chest to stop him, and you sheepishly lower your naginata.
"Nee-san," Takuya mumbles, melting back into color as he tugs at her sleeve. "Let's just-"
She cuts him off with a sudden annoyed sigh, holding a hand to her temple. "Not now. You and I will have to talk about this later, too."
"Not a chance!" Shimizu-san shouts again, wriggling against Pallavi. "Will you let me go already? We can bea-"
"You can lose again," Rina eggs her on.
"Look-" Midori tries to say, only for the ka-chunk of the fire escape door opening again to catch everyone's attention, the argument grinding to a screeching halt.
You turn around, only to see Miho finally poking her head out sheepishly. "Bad time?"
Of course, in that moment of distraction, Rina makes her move.
Turning back, you find her already cycling to a new form, and tense in preparation for the fight to restart. Rather than the bear, however, this time she shifts into a long, serpentine shape with far far too many legs.
The massive centipede-like creature that emerges immediately spits a glob of acid onto the manhole cover you'd seen earlier, melting most of it away with terrifying speed, before she grabs up Takuya in her forelimbs and dives down atop it, smashing the remains apart and slithering away down the hole before anyone can react.
"We should go after them!" Shimizu-san declares, finally breaking free of Pallavi's hold and rushing to the manhole, but by the way her posture slumps and her tone loses all force by the end, you can tell the siblings are already past pursuit. Pallavi meekly hands her back her lance, but after harshly swiping it from her hands, Shimizu-san turns glum and simply dismisses it, the weapon turning into a splash of water that evaporates before it hits the ground.
Midori simply shakes her head in frustration, turning away from the now-empty alley and glaring at the rather confused-looking Miho. "No, we're done here." The frustration in the air is palpable, and you're not entirely sure you can blame her or Shimizu-san.
Backing away from the latter, Pallavi instead approaches you with a small smile. "Thank you for helping me, in there. There was so much going on, I couldn't think, I never would have thought that bear was trying to protect him. Or that it was actually a woman…"
"That wouldn't have worked if it was a real bear," Midori mutters from your other side. "You would still be too close to the cubs and she still would have attacked you."
You shrug sheepishly, unsure how to admit that you didn't know for sure either if that was going to work. "It did work, though." You mumble. Pallavi smiles gratefully again, while Midori just brushes past you silently. "Saw they were siblings the first time I visited."
"That's right, isn't it?" Shimizu-san seems to have recovered some of her bluster, turning toward you with a dangerous look in her eye. "You were here before, but you didn't say anything about another person, let alone that she could shapeshift!" She jabs an accusing finger at you, and you shrink back instinctively.
"I didn't… know about that last part," you manage to force out; if nothing else, her accusing stare feels less intense following right after whatever Rina had been doing. "I thought her brother was the important one to pay attention to."
"Plus," Midori speaks up behind you, "She did say 'they' in our meeting before, you just must not have been paying attention." From the inaudible muttering following that, you can guess she was taken off-guard as well, but you're still thankful for the defense.
"And you! Why were you defending the enemy?" she turns on Pallavi now, frustration boiling over in all directions. "We all heard her, there's someone here lying to us! With how you were acting earlier, how do we know you aren't secretly on their side?"
"Why were you attacking him to begin with?" Pallavi shoots back, once again holding her axe up defensively. "I thought we all agreed we were just going to ask some questions and hold his attention, not start a fight! And if I was on their side, why would they tell on me like that? I didn't even want to lie to them, let alone to any of you! I hate lying!"
"Right, because telling our enemies everything they could possibly want or need to know about us is such a good idea instead," Midori says drily. "But yeah, if anyone here is a liar, it sure isn't you. Really should get off your high horse about that, frankly."
"Fine, fine, you're not a liar." Shimizu-san admits, before her expression darkens again. "Either way, he was acting suspicious and confirmed they were up to something, so the time for talking was over! We have to stop whatever they're up to! Except, you fought against me, not him."
Pallavi looks frustrated to the point of tears, and you wonder if you should speak up and stop this from devolving further. You're not sure you can, though, realizing you've backed away against the dumpster as the fight escalates. "Because you were being too forceful! We're still not supposed to just beat them up without knowing what's actually going on!"
Shimizu-san's grimace deepens. "They're the bad guys! That's the whole poi-"
"JUST SHUT UP, both of you!" Midori shouts, stepping between them. "Look, what's done is done, so let's just get back to Nel-san and put this stupid mess behind us, okay? Accusing each other isn't going to get us anywhere." Glancing over at you with a comforting smile, she adds, "Besides, if they are the bad guys, who's to say they're not just lying about us? Trying to turn us on each other instead of them, so why are we taking her at her word? Frankly, I'd probably do the same if I was them."
After a silent, tense standoff, Shimizu-san finally relents with a sigh and backs off, going back to the manhole and lightly kicking at a nearby piece of the cover. Turning away before she can come jabbing at you again, you see Miho is now sitting back against the door, Midori kneeling over her and holding up fingers for her to count. Her nose is bleeding a bit, but at least she seems more alert than before. "So... Anyone want to tell me what I missed?"
She makes to hold a sleeve over her nose, only to nearly swing one of her ornate ruby-studded wrist-blades into her own face. Flinching and detransforming, her dress and blades dissipate into short-lived swirls of flame, which Midori frantically fans away with an offended yelp. "Excuse me?"
"Fine, please could someone tell me what I missed?" Miho says with an exaggerated bat of her eyelashes, and Pallavi giggles. As she walks over to fill Miho in, Midori also releases her transformation, dragging the smaller girl's arm back from her bloodied nose and pulling out her first-aid kit.
"You could have held the door for us to get back in, at least," Shimizu-san mutters, and Miho glares and flips her the bird with her free hand. Turning on you, the bluenette adds, "Please at least tell me you've found something useful… before bringing a bear down on us, anyway."
You simply nod stiffly, resisting the urge to shrink away again. You realize the evidence you had taken, that strange fruit, was stuffed in a pocket before you transformed, and indeed on patting your dress hopefully, find it's no longer on your person. And if you detransformed now to retrieve it, that would be tantamount to confirming what the shapeshifter had said. "I did." You finally say, deciding to spare all detail for the time being.
"Oooh, mysterious..." Miho chuckles, and you feel everyone's gazes directed your way again. With Rina's words still echoing in your mind, you don't trust yourself to speak, unsure if the hidden suspicion attached to those searching looks is real or just in your head. After all, she had been staring right at you when she said that; surely it must be obvious to everyone else, right? Even with that accusation towards Pallavi, you can't help but feel like a blaring neon sign hangs over your head, marking you as other. At least Midori already knows, and for better or worse is unlikely to tell the others.
"So what do we do now?" Pallavi asks.
"I was going to suggest searching the shop some more, but now that we're locked out," Shimizu-san casts another glare Miho's way, which goes ignored this time, "I'm just going back." with a press on her ring, it doesn't take long for Nel's door to pop up against one of the walls, and she marches through.
As soon as she's gone, Pallavi slumps down to her knees, clutching onto her axe like a cane. "Couldn't we have just been calm and honest about this?"
For her part, Miho looks as conflicted as you feel, but opts to let out a sarcastic, "Couldn't I have had some popcorn for this?" Midori lightly swats her across the head, before dragging her to her feet. "Ow ow ow, okay, let up, that got me pretty bad. Thank goodness for the carpet…"
Finally, the feeling of autopilot you'd been on since upstairs fades away, and you realize you should probably do something as well. Glancing between the others, Nel's door, and the open alleyway beside it, you're torn between wanting to help and wanting to just get away.
What To Do?
> Help Pallavi (She looks rather upset right now, and she helped you out earlier, didn't she? Though you're not certain Midori would take well to that.)
> Help Miho (Even with Midori supporting her she seems rather more injured than the rest of you, and even with her attitude she could use someone on her side.)
> Just Return To Nel (Shimizu-san didn't seem to be in a mood to stick around long, so this could be a chance to detransform and hand over the evidence to Nel without getting anyone's attention, once she leaves the office.)
> Detransform And Leave (You're already exhausted, and you can give Nel your account later when there's more time without the others. Besides, you don't want to keep your brother waiting too long.)
For a long moment of indecision, your instinctive self-consciousness battles against itself. On one side, with the mission done and Shimizu-san already gone, now feels like a good time to leave and avoid any further drama. On the other side, the awkwardness after Shimizu-san's huffy exit hangs heavy in the air, and you are struck by how unfamiliar this whole situation is to you. How long are you usually supposed to stick around before splitting up? How can you disengage without drawing attention back to yourself?
You even glance back up at the window you used to sneak in, tempted for a moment to try to get back inside, just to have a wall between you and the others; only to note with disappointment that it is shut now. Rina-san must have closed it after getting out of the shower, before she came across you snooping.
With that idea foiled, the urge to flee passes, and you are left with a more pertinent dilemma; your restlessness to get back home, running against your natural concern for the others. You're itching to go talk to Kichirou properly while you still have the chance, but some part of you objects to just leaving the others behind so quickly. Pallavi is looking downcast after the argument, absentmindedly twirling some of her hair around a finger as she stares blankly at Nel's door; meanwhile Midori winces again as Miho's shoulder lands against her stomach, the smaller girl looking faintly nauseous and rather dizzy now that she is standing again, needing to be steadied. "Sorry 'bout that." Midori just shrugs in response.
In the end, the here and now wins out, and you find yourself stepping over to help Midori. With a grateful smile from the verdette, you pull Miho off of her, holding her up between you both but allowing her to lean more against you. Despite her obvious unsteadiness, Miho has enough presence of mind to give a thumbs-up.
(Immediately, you realize a potential flaw in this plan, and realize you have no idea if she could accidentally fall through you while you're transformed. Not wishing to take any chances, a running mantra of keep staying solid, keep staying solid takes up the background noise in your mind.)
For her part, Pallavi seems to snap out of her trance, though still subdued, as she notices the new arrangement. "Ah, I could help too!" She offers, but Midori just waves her off.
"No no, we should have this covered. She's not gonna die or anything,-"
"Oh, thank goodness. I was in suspense over here."
"-just need to get her home."
"If you're sure." If there's a little too much vigor in Midori's denial, Pallavi doesn't seem to notice it, and you are anything but keen to point it out yourself. "In that case, though, you should go first." She sidesteps away from the door, allowing your impromptu four-legged race to shuffle awkwardly through and back into Nel's office.
You catch just a glimpse of another door slamming shut and sinking away on the opposite wall, before your attention is taken up by Nel's alarmed yelp. "You're hurt!"
"Heard I'm not gonna die," Miho snarks, though her voice is woozy. "Just a biiiiit… dizzy. Yeah. Like that."
Nel still seems fretful, coming around from behind the desk to check more closely, and you are struck by the surrealism of their cloudy figure giving off the mannerisms of a mother hen. "Shimizu-san told me some of what happened, but failed to mention this. What else was there?"
Midori looks as impatient as you feel. "Can we talk about all that tomorrow? I'm kinda not in great shape either, so the sooner I can put her down the better." Nel backs off, but still hovers.
"Put me down? Well suddenly I don't feel so good about going to the vet anymore. If you bring out the carri… urgh, …carrier, I'm hiding under the bed." Miho adds, unhelpfully.
"I found something, I can show you later," you add, somewhat more helpfully.
"Just something? We could do better than that." At the lack of response, Miho huffs in annoyance. "I'm actually being serious now. The… uh, the owners, took off, right? How did you sneak in before? We can do that again, properly search the place top to bottom, and get all the clues we could want or need that way."
"That's closed off now," you mumble.
For her part, Midori seems to genuinely consider it for a moment, before being reminded of the weight hanging off of her shoulder. "Besides, it won't be you or me, not tonight anyway." Biting her lip, she casts you a hopeful glance over Miho's head, but with your other obligations still weighing in the back of your mind, it proves surprisingly easy to decline with a silent shake of your head.
Miho is not deterred in the slightest, irritation granting clarity to her tone, nearly stalking towards the desk despite her condition, leaving you and Midori to awkwardly stagger along after to keep her supported. "Fine, then. We can smash one of their big stupid front windows or something, do it that way. Masami-san's way too much the goody-two-shoes for this, sure, but you can get uh, Varma-san to do it or something."
"I'm not going to do that!" Pallavi protests, and you realize she has finally come through after you three; the door to the bookshop closes and sinks away as soon as she is inside as well. "Threatening him was bad enough, we don't need to add an actual crime to this!"
"Right, I forgot you're a goody two-shoes, too," Miho snarks. Midori half-lowers, half-drops her into a chair in response, and you eagerly take the chance to let her go for a moment as well. Now that your thoughts are not so focused on remaining tangible, you are surprised to find only the suggestion of an ache in your arm, when before such exertion would have left your noodly muscles sore. "Don't forget the part where they could turn into animals, or monsters, or whatever."
"I'm still not doing that," Pallavi insists, finally releasing her own transformation to reinforce the point. "Even if they are our enemies, it still doesn't feel right to ruin their store."
Nel seems to feel similarly, speaking up again in her support. "As much as I would like more information to work with, we cannot afford to make a scene." They pause for a moment, sounding suddenly nervous as they add "You didn't make a scene, correct?"
"Nobody else saw us, if that's what you're asking," Midori confirms. "Back room of their shop is a bit torn up from the real fight, but the front area's fine…" She has the grace to look sheepish, adding "we didn't transform until we'd already kinda backed him up into a corner. Plus, the area behind is almost all sealed off, and since we went in right before closing, nobody else was around anyway."
"That is good, then. So yes, we cannot afford to do anything that could get innocent witnesses involved. If you broke their window, we would not have much time to gather evidence before law enforcement arrived, especially with you two wounded on top of that. If we missed anything magical that they might then find, it could fall into the wrong hands, and create even more problems for us all. Some things we cannot control, yes, but where the things we can influence are concerned, there's no need to gamble like this. Especially since Yukimura-san did get some evidence already." You nod in agreement, feeling more than a little impatient with the whole discussion.
"What if the owners come back?" Midori asks, fueling your impatience further. "After tonight, they'll be on the lookout for us."
Returning to their desk, Nel seems contemplative. "At the very least, our quarries do not seem to want any attention any more than we do, and have not been causing active harm yet. There are other avenues of investigation we can pursue, besides. So for now, we can simply allow them to return and resume keeping up appearances themselves, until we have gotten to the bottom of their plans."
"Sure, fine, don't need cops crawling all over the place too, I guess." Miho grimaces in frustration, but any further willingness to argue is cut short by another dizzy spell. "If we're not going back, can I go home already?"
"Right!" Nel looks sheepish as they produce another pair of doors, one near Pallavi and one directly beside Miho's seat, and you and Midori quickly help her stand again. "You all must be tired, so we can discuss this further tomorrow."
With a parting nod to Nel and Pallavi each, you dutifully shuffle through the opening after Midori and Miho, grateful to finally be free. Perhaps it was just the water pressure bearing down on you in there, but you feel a weight come off your shoulders, even with Miho still half-leaning on you. (At least, water pressure is what you tell yourself it must have been, as you mentally push aside the fresh arguments and the memory of the earlier stressful briefing alike.)
It isn't until the two of you have successfully manhandled the brunette to another seated position at the edge of her bed, that you are able to back away and survey your new surroundings. On first impression, it is… neat, almost surprisingly so. You've had too much on your mind tonight to give much thought to exactly what sort of living space a girl you'd only just met would keep, but you have evidently come to some conclusions without even realizing until now. If you were to be honest with yourself, based on just the past hour or two with her, the seemingly natural assumption was that she must have risen from some sort of pigsty junkyard of dirty laundry and ramen wrappers like an otaku swamp monster; and so nearly anything else would have been less messy than that.
But not only is it clean, it is all downright orderly, even your own room feeling almost shabby in comparison. Miho's bed is pushed up under a window, opposite to the door, beside a computer desk with a few more monitors than seem strictly necessary, and a neon sign hanging above that bathes the room in a warm red hue. Other than a closet door in a far corner, the remaining wallspace is all taken up by a bevy of floor-to-ceiling shelf units, most loaded with a small library's worth of books. Drifting past, you scan some of the titles idly, and realize they are all divided neatly into nonfiction, novels, and manga. The last shelf, closest to the bed across from the desk, instead plays host to a collection of figurines, some of which you recognize as popular anime characters, and a few more who remind you of your brother's tokusatsu shows, but the majority are unfamiliar to you. The floor is clear of detritus, with the expected dirty laundry tucked away into a basket by the closet door, and a garbage pail under the desk serving a similar purpose. It certainly does not feel clinical, but it still feels almost too clean, somehow.
Or maybe, you reflect, you just need to admit to having made a rude assumption.
"So what's the verdict, Doc?" Miho's sarcasm breaks through your musings, and you turn back to watch as Midori checks her over a second time.
"Don't call me that." Midori snaps on reflex, before sighing. "Okaasan's a nurse, I picked up some things from her, but I'm no expert. As far as I can tell, you should be fine with some rest. Kind of a miracle it's not more serious, with that hit, but I still wouldn't take any chances if I were you, just stay right here and try to rest. You should set an alarm… maybe a few alarms. If you have more trouble than usual with waking up in the morning, that's a big sign of something more serious, and you should go visit the hospital to get an actual doctor to look at you. Will your parents be able to take you if that happens?"
Miho looks suddenly uncomfortable, glancing away. "Probably not," she mumbles. "They work Saturdays too." She seems like she wants to say more, mouth hanging half-open as if to keep going, but after a moment of hesitation, she simply shrugs. "I can just take the trains, of course, one runs pretty close to here."
"If you're dealing with something more serious, then that would be a bad idea," Midori insists. "Here, look. I'm also going to be going tomorrow, to get this looked at," she pats her midsection, suppressing a wince, before turning to glance at you, "and also look into something else Yukimura-san found."
You're not sure what to say, so simply nod in acknowledgement.
Stepping back from her patient, Midori concludes her point. "So here, we can exchange numbers. If you feel like you're having trouble waking up, call me, and I can have Okaasan take us both there. I can figure out a story, so don't worry about that part. If not, I would still take it easy over the weekend." Miho gives a noncommittal hum in response, before immediately trying to stand back up. "No!"
Miho is quick to wave her off. "It's fine, just gotta let some friends know I may not be on tomorrow." She pauses briefly, looking annoyed at something, before amending with a sarcastic grimace "This is just tomorrow, right? You aren't gonna suddenly be mapping out the next month for me or something?"
"...No? Unless you're in seri-"
"Good." Steadying herself on the back of her computer chair, the raven-haired girl reaches down to retrieve a pair of headphones from the seat, with a pair of odd triangular pyramids made of some grey rubbery plastic affixed to the top of headband. To your slight embarrassment, it's only once she has put them on that you realize they are meant to resemble kitty ears, though the silhouette it creates looks surprisingly natural on her. Miho taps her keyboard, and after a moment's delay all four monitors light up; however, she doesn't get any further than logging in before a green blur half-tackles her back to the bed, pinning her down.
"What did I just say?"
Midori's exasperation is matched by Miho's own indignation, the two glaring daggers at each other, you once again left frozen in mild shock by the sudden shift. With an irritated huff, the smaller girl removes her headphones again, tossing them onto her pillow as she begrudgingly recites her instructions. "Call you if I feel like I'm dying tomorrow. If not, then still don't do stuff."
"Fine, before that." Before the smaller girl can whip out another sarcastic remark, Midori answers for her. "Don't move anymore tonight, even to your chair. Just get some sleep, your head's more likely to heal right, that way. Suck it up now, or it'll be worse later." Getting back up, she keeps a watchful eye as Miho reluctantly complies, rebellious muttering notwithstanding.
As she removes her shoes and sets them on the floor, then shucks her oversized hoodie to reveal a tank-top and ill-concealed bra beneath, she addresses you. "Since I'm on bed arrest or whatever, can you send the message along instead?"
Mainly grateful to have something to distract you from the awkwardness, you comply easily. Scurrying over to the desk, you lean over the seat to get a better look, while the other two pull out their phones to exchange contacts. It takes a moment to adjust to the different setup, overwhelmed by the stationary ball mouse, the rainbow glow of the keyboard, and all four screens displaying completely different things at once; but after some fumbling you at last find the cursor amidst the chaos, helping it all resolve into clarity.
The top-left monitor is filled with the main menu of a video game; Pirates Of The Cyber-Seas, which you were never especially interested in, but remember seeing Kichirou playing intermittently in recent months. Underneath it on the bottom left, some sort of fansite for an anime? Mahou Shoujo Sachiko Sinisteria. You had heard of that one in passing once or twice, you think, but still don't know much about it. The poster dominating the page is cast in gloomy monochrome hues, with a decidedly small-looking girl in an excessively frilly pale-pink dress kneeling in the foreground, shoulders slumped and gazing upward with tears in her eyes, other girls looming ominously behind her. Glancing behind, you see all but one are present as figurines on Miho's shelves. You once again find yourself surprised, not having taken her for the type to like magical girls, even with being one herself now. Moving on, the upper-right screen has an open document filled with dense blocks of kanji, but seeing you looking that way, Miho hurriedly clarifies "Bottom-right, ignore the rest!"
The warning comes a moment too late, as you scan the first few lines and quickly realize what kind of writing this is. Overtaken by a burning blush, you swiftly avert your eyes to the final monitor, simply hoping the lurid contents will erase themselves from your memories somehow, along with the guilt from your accidental snooping.
At last, though, you have found your original objective in a browser window overloaded with tabs; thankfully it is already opened to an online chat program, and you follow Miho's instructions to find a particular group chat. "FYI everyone, got slammed by a bea… er, with schoolwork, so might or might not be on tomorrow. If it doesn't work out, we can raid the Tycoon Typhoon on Sunday." Casting a bemused grin at the last part, you dutifully type out her dictation and hit send.
"There, ya happy now?" She asks Midori, who just pinches the bridge of her nose. "Anyway, put it back to sleep now; I guess I gotta do the same." Fiddling with her phone for a few more moments, she adds. "There, alarms set too. On that note, parents are still at work, but might be back soon if they aren't doing more overtime, so you two should probably get out of here sooner than later."
"Where are we, anyway?" You find yourself asking, hoping you can just walk back to your house from here without having to dodge more of Nel's questioning again.
Those hopes are promptly dashed by her answer. "South side of town, not too far from the Tochaku line." You are on the complete opposite side of the city from where you want to be, in fact, and Midori seems equally displeased with the news.
"Right, okay. Well, there's always Nel-san," she sighs, "But we should go outside before that so I know what place to look for, if you need to be picked up tomorrow."
Miho just throws a lazy thumbs-up, tossing aside her tracksuit pants and snuggling under her covers, as Midori picks up her shoes to take to the entryway. Once you've opened the bedroom door to leave, she flicks a switch to turn off the neon sign over her desk, leaving you all in near-darkness.
"Hey, uhhh, thanks for helping me back," she says quietly, as if admitting to something, "and for making sure I'll be alright."
"It's no problem," Midori responds, before adding, "As long as you actually follow my instructions!"
"You got it… Doc," Miho retorts, her usual irreverent tone back in full force. "I'm too cozy now, either way."
Midori sighs again, but sounding a little less annoyed this time, as she brushes past you and out the door. Before you can follow her, however, you feel something else brush against your leg in the other direction. Peering downward, in the dim glow of a night-light down the hall, it takes you a moment to make out the silhouette of a small cat batting lightly at a fold in your dress. Reaching down to let it sniff at your hand, the distraction comes as a relief, turning all higher thought mute for a blissful moment in favor of the absolutely paramount need to pet a kitty.
Unfortunately, the cat ignores your outstretched hand entirely, and slips away back into the shadows from which it had appeared. Only now does it occur to you that as a ghost, you must no longer have a scent. In any other situation you would not especially care about that, but getting snubbed by felines has a way of making such a thing suddenly matter. Either that, or perhaps it is just hungry and fickle.
Straightening back up, you turn back in Miho's direction. "Should I feed your cat?"
You detect a careless half-wave in the darkness. "Nah, Jijihime's fine for tonight; I fed her after school, before the big meet-up. Wasn't counting on getting hit like this, but didn't know how late pare- I'd be out, on our grand ol' quest."
"Okay." Drat. You had hoped smelling like food might have made her more friendly.
Yet even with that distraction solved, and despite still feeling overwhelmed from the events of the night, a buzzing undercurrent to your thoughts that creeps back in after Jijihime's brief respite; you find yourself hesitating a moment longer. Curiosity lingers alongside the background stress, the desire to see your brother, and take care of Death's errand, balanced by wondering if you should say anything else before leaving.
What To Ask About?
> Shimizu-San ("Why didn't your friend want you to join?")
> Grand Ol' Quest ("What did I miss before the fighting started?")
> Hobbies ("Why do you need so many screens?")
> Figurines ("I didn't think you'd be a fan of Magical Girls.")
> Parents ("How often is your family around?")
> Kitty Kitty Kitty ("Can I adopt Jijihime?")
> Other (Write-In)
> Just Leave (She needs rest, and you still have things to do)
Plan To Get Back Home?
> Take The Train (It may take longer, and further cut into the time you have to talk, but at least you can take a rest, and have some space to consider how to explain all of this to Kichirou)
> Take Nel's Doors (As long as they do stick to saving further plans for tomorrow, you will get more time to talk to Kichirou right away; you can figure out the rest once you are home)
Lingering at the threshold of Miho's room, you're surprised to find you want to talk some more, intrigued despite yourself. If nothing else, it feels like she may have something different to say about what happened earlier that the others may not, given her unusual perspectives so far. Even if you can fairly easily guess what happened while you were upstairs, and the team's quick explanation to Nel all but confirmed it, perhaps there was more to it yet. She also, you have to admit, reminds you just a little bit of Kichirou.
…However, now that you are reminded of him again, you still think your brother should take higher priority. You must admit to being genuinely curious about the entire affair at the bookshop, especially with your own strange findings, but perhaps not right now. Impatience still pulls you to get home as soon as possible, even more so after this detour, and you can almost feel your own thoughts sliding away from thinking too much about this newer mystery, a puzzle tantalizingly in reach yet which you suspect you're still missing too many pieces of. You still have commitments for tonight anyway, so best to focus on those.
…Besides, your new teammate already seems well on her way to sleep, if the soft snoring from the far end of the room is anything to go by, so you finally decide to just leave her be for now.
Softly closing the door as you depart, you glance around to see where Midori went, and find the near-darkness has been lit while you were dithering. You're standing in a very short hallway lined with a few other doors, with a small closet on one end, while the other opens up into a modest living room with a kitchenette on the other side. Whereas moments before, only a pair of simple night-lights cut through the gloom from each end, now a wide cone of light is cast on the living room's floor and ceiling from around the corner, brightly concentrated but just diffuse enough to make the rest visible.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, you quickly find the space is as oddly clinical and clean as Miho's room was. There are enough little touches that you can tell people live here, like a series of memos on the fridge, but nothing more than that. A cat climbing tower in the corner beside a sliding glass door (or what you assume to be one, though it is blocked by long vertical blinds reaching to the floor) seems to dominate the space just as much as the modest couch in the middle, or the massive, dusty flatscreen television it faces. Even less surprising is that Jijihime, dark coat now starkly visible in the light, seems to favor the couch to the tree, lounging upon it with an air of regality. The impression that this is her domain and her humans simply happen to live here, you suppose, may not really be inaccurate.
The source of the illumination turns out to be an open door off to the right, opposite the tall blinds. The carpeted floor ends at a step down to wood flooring, where Midori has just finished dutifully putting Miho's shoes into exact position beside the door. "I think this is an apartment building," she whispers as she straightens back up. "So I'm going to head down and take a look around the area. You can come with me, if you want?"
You're spared from an immediate response as Jijihime gets up from her seat and drops to the floor, heading towards the exit door with the specific gait of a cat trying to look indifferent, and you instinctively keep an eye on her, ready to stop her from getting into trouble.
Midori, meanwhile, fiddles with the doorknob and deadbolt, humming unhappily. "We don't have a key. Hopefully her parents won't notice if the door's unlocked…"
"I can stay in here and lock it behind you," you volunteer, trying not to sound too grateful for the excuse to split off. "Nel can take me back from here, and then you can call on them separately once you're done." You had briefly considered taking the train back to give yourself more time to think, but you're too anxious to get home as soon as possible, and following Midori around while she spends however long getting the lay of the land would only fray your patience further.
She pouts a little, but reluctantly nods. "That… makes sense, I guess. I'll see you later, then. I should get out of here before anyone sees me."
"Have a good night," You simply say, and she flashes an appreciative grin before finally shuffling out into the bright hallway outside. A streak of black in the corner of your vision alerts you, and you swiftly move to block your new kitty acquaintance from escaping after her with an outstretched foot. She mews angrily at you, but thankfully Midori slams the door shut before she can try again.
It's simple enough to lock both of the latches behind her, and you're once again left in darkness. Pressing down on your ring, soon enough another now-familiar door rises up along the wall nearby, leading into the same slightly gloomy office as usual. "Is she alright?" Nel asks the moment you step through, standing up behind their desk.
"I think so," you mumble with a shrug. "Kasai-san needs rest, and may need to go to the hospital tomorrow if she still feels bad? But it's probably fine. I hope. Kazane-san can fill you in better, once she's done."
"That is… concerning. We really must complete the team soon, then." They sit back down, deep in thought as they stare at the box once again. "You are all more vulnerable without the full benefits of an interconnected magical latt-"
You interrupt their rambling with a half-irritated wave, and get the impression of a sheepish wince. "Right, right, you all still have to sleep. We'll figure this out tomorrow." So saying, they summon another door for you, and you waste no time pushing it open to escape any further tangents.
~~~ .oO◯Oo. ~~~
After all the recent conversation and spying and running about, the somber silence of your room is downright blissful, and despite yourself, you take a moment to just sink down into your futon and go limp. Despite having wanted to just hurry up to this point all night, now that you are here, it is suddenly so very tempting to just blow off your obligations. You can ask your brother to wait another night, and if Death arrives, to tell her the same thing but slightly more rudely. Perhaps you will get another chance to talk tomorrow, and those corrupted spirits won't exactly be going anywhere soon.
Nonetheless, the annoyingly logical part of your mind reminds you that with everything else you've gotten yourself into, having another chance like this may not be something you can count on. It really is just best to do this now, instead of regretting it later. All that aside… If nothing else, you just miss your family. Exhaustion clings to you like cobwebs, dragging your ghostly form down, yet you somehow find the strength to push yourself upright again.
You spare a moment to consider detransforming to hide away that strange fruit in one of your unused desk drawers, but ultimately decide not to. Wherever your clothes have gone, it's probably safer there for the time being, and in all honesty, you don't want to have to try to have this conversation without the benefit of being perceived. With that decided, it's just a matter of teasing open your (normal) door, and creeping across the hall to knock softly on your brother's.
Kichirou opens it way sooner than you expected, and you realize with a pang of guilt that he has most likely been waiting for a while already. "I'm here," you whisper, and his shocked stupor is finally broken by an instinctive eyeroll in response.
"You really are, huh… Come in," he ushers you through, locking the door behind you. "Mom and dad are already asleep, but I have no idea how to explain this to them if they woke up for some reason." You absently nod in agreement as you take a seat in his desk chair, before realizing you still have no idea how to explain everything to him either, or how much you should.
For his part, Kichirou sits down at the edge of his futon, picking up that Werewolf Hunter volume from earlier and riffling the pages without looking at it. Instead he stares at you again, almost disbelievingly, and the close attention makes you squirm in place somewhat. Still, despite clearly being a bit worn out after a long school day, and his shaggy slate hair is messier than usual, you note with some relief that something in his posture feels less… deflated, you guess, than when you watched him at the train platform. He opens his mouth a few times, and you can almost sense the questions swirling, but he doesn't say anything yet, simply watching you as if half-expecting you to vanish again in a puff of smoke.
Glancing about to stall, you find his room as a whole looks much like you last remember; a disorganized array of manga, old half-completed homework, clothes, and anime merchandise and game cases all scattered about with little rhyme or reason. There is a clear path between the door, futon, and desk, but otherwise you have no idea how he finds anything in here. It isn't trashy by any means, but it certainly used to make you recoil a little, whenever you deigned to enter his territory. Now though, after the past few days, and especially after the oddly sterile mirror of it you saw in Miho's abode, it just feels comfortable in a strange way.
"So," he finally gets out, breaking the stretched silence between you two, "maybe this isn't really happening, but if it is… what's going on?" After a moment, he raises an eyebrow. "Also, what's with your dress?"
You sigh. Despite all the stalling, you're still not sure how to start, but you're now committed to this either way. He's sitting up attentively, awaiting your response, and there is no more putting this off; you need to decide what you are going to say, and how.
There is simply too much to talk about. Where should you start? Where can you start? So much has changed, so many things revealed in the past few days, and it all bubbles up within you as if threatening to burst out in an incoherent stream of words. You only barely manage to keep your mouth shut and avoid hastily spouting complete nonsense. You're even tempted for a millisecond to just say that the world was secretly just an anime all along, before rejecting that thought.
Instead, you finally take a deep breath, banish the useless whirl of thoughts for a moment, and start with one thing. "So… Magic exists."
"Well, clearly," Kichirou snarks back, though he looks more awed than disgruntled by your apparently obvious statement. "I can't think of any other reason for what happened earlier, or how you're here now."
You nod, and feel yourself relax a little bit more. Despite everything, this feels… casual, like any ordinary debate about stupid semantics over dinner, and a far cry from the stress of talking to your new teammates earlier. You find it a little easier to shuffle your thoughts into some semblance of order, and you press on. "Magical Girls exist too," you gesture down at your dress, "and I am one now."
Kichirou wrinkles his nose. "What? That's way too dumb and girly."
You facepalm. "Girly? I am a girl."
"It's still dumb."
"And your 'sentai riders' aren't? At least this turned out to be real."
"...Okay, fine, got me there."
Silence falls for a moment, the two of you glaring at each other slightly, before he cracks a grin. "Maybe it can be a little cool, I guess, as long as there aren't too many sparkles. I'll wait until I see you in action to decide." You hope he won't have to, but keep that thought to yourself. The last thing you want is for him to get hurt, or worse.
That reminds you of the other elephant in the room, and you glance back down at yourself. "Magical Girls exist, as do ghosts. Which I also am." Despite the comfortable atmosphere, an echo of the hollow feeling from the funeral still lingers, and that admission makes you all the more aware of it.
Kichirou doesn't say anything to that, face falling, and you quickly move on. "And there's also werebears, apparently? Definitely not one of those." You're not sure that's really what Rina-san was, but right now it's the first thing that comes to mind. "Oh, and also aliens." You recall the talk with Nel about the other worlds that the Shades influence, and your silly image of an extraterrestrial in a tutu. In a way, it occurs to you that the Shades themselves are also aliens, even if not what you would have expected.
Mental tangents aside, you're glad to see that lightened the mood a bit again. "A werebear? Did you fight one?" You suppress a wince, unwittingly recalling the distressing sound of Miho getting slapped down.
"...Yeah. We sent her running, too!" You don't think of yourself as a particularly egotistical person, but your pride does feel a bit more bruised over it than you realized until now. Technically, despite how poorly it all went, Rina-san did flee in the end, right? That totally counts. For sure, yep.
If Kichirou notices your plastered-on bravado, he doesn't comment. "Aliens… Do they like, abduct and probe people or something?" Putting his hands to his forehead, he wiggles a pair of fingers like antennae, adding a series of silly mouth noises and "beep boop, neener neener"s, and you giggle loudly. You just as quickly shut up, conscious of the noise, but laughter still shakes you into a slumped position. It feels… nice.
Finally sitting back upright, you shake your head with a lingering grin. "Not exactly, no. Really, one of them was the one who offered me this job. Magical Girl, uh, Kikuko, protector of this city!" He rolls his eyes again, and you stick your tongue out at him.
After a moment he suddenly sobers up. "Are… are they trustworthy?" You give a noncommittal hum, but nod after a moment. Nel, at least, feels too airheaded to have any ulterior motives, and the explanation of the Shades' history yesterday has mostly appeased any doubts you might have had before. Something still feels a little off, and the hospital nurse flashes in your mind, but you push that away. Midori will be looking into it tomorrow. So lost in these thoughts, you almost miss Kichirou's next question. "You said 'we'. There are other magical girls, right?" You nod again, tilting your head curiously. "Then are they… you know… deadorsomething, too?"
Ah. You close your eyes and sigh. "No, it's just… just me. My situation is quite specific." You find yourself trying to recall your first conversation with Nel, and the reasons they had given for approaching you, but so much else has happened since, that exchange is already a bit muddled in your recollection. Finally opening your eyes again, you simply shrug. "I just happened to be available, and… it lets me stick around."
This time, the melancholy silence lingers longer, before you can work up the courage to break it again. "At least when I'm in my Magical Girl form like this, I can interact normally with the world. Kind of attention-getting, really, but it's something. Otherwise, it's like when we 'talked' earlier."
It's your brother's turn to nod silently, chewing on his lower lip, before his brows furrow in discontent, tone curdling. "Then why didn't you say anything sooner?"
Your own frustration flares up in response, and you nearly snap back about how busy and overwhelmed you've been, dump everything you've had to deal with onto his shoulders and see how well he takes it. But you once again manage to hold yourself back, sinking back down into the chair, only now realizing you had leapt to your feet, and noticing the way your brother shrunk back.
Thankfully, rather than all of that, there is a much more convenient scapegoat for your ire. "Alien-san wants as much stuff kept under wraps as possible, for some reason. Can't tell the others that I'm a ghost, because that might make them look bad, and I wasn't supposed to talk to my family unless it became absolutely necessary."
Kichirou nods in understanding, looking mostly relieved, though he still raises an eyebrow at you. "But here you are."
You grin nervously with a slightly-too-shrill chuckle. "Yep. I uh… I, finally got permission? And here I am! Heh…" Your lie does not even convince yourself, and judging by the flat gaze you're met with, he sees through it too.
Then after a moment, he smiles wide and jumps up, and before you can blink, you're dragged into a tight, warm hug. "...Thanks, Nee-chan. I'm glad you talked to me anyway," he mumbles into the area of your collarbones.
Your stiff stance quickly melts, and even with your arms pinned at your sides, you find a way to return the embrace. Neither of you were especially inclined towards close contact like this, and you'll start getting uncomfortable if this lasts too long, but just this once you can make an exception. Exhaling, you lean your chin on the top of his head to hide your fond grin, and feel a little piece of that hollowness from before fill back up. For someone you were never too eager to spend time with before, you suddenly realize just how much you've missed him these past few days.
"Brrr, you're freezing!"
Thankfully, the hug ends before it can get weird, and you giggle teasingly at his exaggerated shivering, rubbing his hands together to warm them again. (With Miho's lack of complaints about the cold when you were helping to carry her, you have to wonder just what's happening here. The first place your mind goes is your old Yuki-onna costume from last year; could this be some new side-effect of being a ghost? Or perhaps your newfound ice powers are to blame; you are transformed right now, after all, though why hasn't this happened until now? Maybe you should just move on, rather than overthinking things. You need to stop thinking about this now. Stop it.)
Sitting back down much more gently this time, you lean your head back a bit. You're still not sure how much more you want to tell him, or how much you should, really, but there's a relief in having gotten this far. Nel may not approve if they knew, but it isn't without a little spiteful satisfaction that you resolve not to inform them what you've done. More importantly… You have some of your family back, in a way. Even if you are… a ghost, you are not gone, are you?.
Ghostly tears drip from your face, and yet your cheeks could almost hurt from how wide you're smiling.
Suddenly, a loud knock on the door startles you out of your feelings, and you nearly detransform on instinct before remembering the door is locked. Instead, you glance back to Kichirou, who seems just as frazzled, but makes no moves to open up. "What is it?" He finally squeaks. "This isn't a great time!"
"It's me," comes the other voice. Your father, Naruhito Yukimura. "Your mother and I have been talking about this weekend, and while I wanted to tell you earlier over dinner, we didn't make up our minds until just now. May I come in?"
Kichirou glances at you, and you hold up a finger for him to wait. Quickly picking your way across his messy floor to a far corner, you nod at him before detransforming. He stares at you in shock for a few moments more, but before you can start to worry that you're still visible, he hurries to the door to unlock it. "Toh-san, what's going on?" Kichirou asks while ushering him in.
Your father sits down heavily in the seat you just vacated, shivering briefly and subsequently frowning, before writing it off. "Given… what's happened, I realized that I have…" He pauses, giving you time to notice his crumpled business clothes, and a few grey strands (dull and flat, as opposed to the gleaming silver you and Mom share) in his short black hair that you don't remember being there before. His voice is low and quiet as always, but something about it is heavier, more exhausted, than you have ever heard it before, and his blue eyes are dull and downcast. Your soul aches at the sight. "We have not spent as much time together as a family as I would wish for in recent years, and that is largely my fault."
Your brother slumps back down onto his futon, nodding mutely.
"I still need to decide exactly how to balance my responsibilities at work with spending more time at home, and I have been… considering something, since even before last week. It isn't usually done, and I do not know what may come of this, but I may end up requesting a demotion back to my old position." You gasp, unheard. You half-remember many dinner discussions from several years ago; he had worked long and hard for his current promotion in the first place, and mixed feelings roil within you at this new admission. Kichirou looks just as shocked as you feel, but father merely gives a wry grin in response. "I don't care if that impacts my reputation in the company; I want to prioritize the important things in my life, like your mother, and you. While I still have them."
You slump back into the corner, sinking down until your chin rests on your knees. The morose mood is suffocating, too thick to even cut.
But finally, he cracks another, more genuine smile. "But all of that is long-term business. For the short term, what we can do is take a weekend vacation. Just the fo-er, three of us. You, me, and your mother, to get out of the city for a bit and get our heads on straight. We also still need to figure out whether to take condolence leave with our workplaces and your school, but for now, this is the plan."
Kichirou's eyes flicker toward your corner, but he quickly focuses back on his guest. "...What if I want to stay?" Father seems confused by his reluctance; you have no idea how to feel about any of this at all. "This just seems like pretty short notice, is all."
Your father sighs. "It is, but we didn't settle on this sooner, and I did not want to give you false expectations before we decided one way or another. I am sorry for springing this on you, but I really do think this will be good for us all."
Kichirou shrugs reluctantly, looking troubled. "I guess. Then in that case… What time are we leaving?"
"Before noon, if all goes well. We will all have to spend the morning packing, but I want to be on the highway before the lunch rush, so we can arrive in the mid-afternoon. We can spend tomorrow evening and most of Sunday sight-seeing or just relaxing, before driving back that night." Standing back up, Naruhito claps his hands once. "So if you want enough time to get your things together, bedtime should be soon. I know your teachers have assigned light homework, you can take care of that in the car tomorrow. Whatever else you are doing right now, should be finished shortly."
"Alright, alright, you got it, Otoh-san." Kichirou grumbles in annoyed resignation. You can't help but crack a small grin at the familiar tone, grateful for the levity. You are suddenly very glad that you didn't push off talking to him until later.
The two of them briefly hug, before your father heads back to the door. Before leaving, he turns back one last time. "I hope you know that I love you. Both of us do." With your brother standing almost between you and him, you can almost imagine that he's looking your way, that you're being addressed as well. He shuts the door behind him, Kichirou locks it again, and the room blurs with tears.
~~~ .oO◯Oo. ~~~
It takes a full ten minutes for you to finally pull yourself together again and retransform, startling your brother with the sudden flash of purple light. You wordlessly make your way back across the room and not so much hug him as drape yourself over him, and he seems to understand why, quietly, literally supporting your limp figure as you let out lingering sniffles and tears.
Once your frigid contact becomes too much, he taps your arm, and you shuffle back to the chair to fall into it. Unlike the unexpected frost you left for your father, there is a warmth in the cushions left over for you, and you take comfort in it before it is soon overpowered by your deathly cold again. There is probably a metaphor in that, though you swiftly reject following that thought any further.
For his part, Kichirou busies himself with digging around in his closet, presumably for the small rolling travel suitcase buried somewhere very deep within. You notice him taking occasional glances back at you, though, and you're not sure whether he's checking on you, or checking to make sure you're still there at all. Most likely both. He doesn't say anything, and neither do you, the silence stretching wide and heavy. It feels like a dense cloud has rolled into the room, simply looming over you both without breaking into rain.
Finally finding a handle and hauling his suitcase from beneath a big pile of assorted junk, Kichirou speaks up at last. "Will you tell them too?"
You slump down further. "I…" You don't know. You hadn't even thought of it too much, and if you're perfectly honest with yourself, have been trying your hardest to think about everything but that as long as you could. Even the thought of whether to approach your brother hadn't quite crossed your mind until seeing him at the bookstore, and instinct took over then. You're glad for what's come of it, but somehow your parents feel like a different thing entirely to worry about. It's awful to see them hurting like this, but… you don't want to hurt them even more, either.
Indistinct thoughts and possibilities you can't quite put the right words to spin endlessly in your head, and in the end you just pull your knees up to bury your face in them. The thick white leather and black laces of your long boots feel weird against your forehead, reminding you of your transformation, and the whole other set of reasons to hesitate. And still yet, you miss them both so much it aches.
Kichirou speaks up again, sounding a little impatient now. "If you want to go tell them right now, I'll be here with you. Otherwise, it's two, probably three whole days before you get another chance. I get you had your reasons for waiting to tell me, but this past week was… it felt like nearly six years, not six days."
You lift your head just slightly, enough to peer over the tops of your knees at him with a frown. "I'm sorry," you mumble, "for all of… that. I just… but I don't…" You sigh. The right words refuse to come together, a blizzard raging inside of you with flurries of half-formed feelings swirling every which way. Closing your eyes again, it occurs to you that perhaps instead of trying to understand them all at once, you just need to find one to follow.
What Do You Want?
> To Tell Them Now (You're already a mess and even more unprepared than with Kichirou, but maybe you really should just rip off the bandaid while the opportunity is here. Making them wait could be too much. Whatever it was you promised to Death can wait another night.)
> To Wait Until Later (Maybe telling Kichirou sooner was good for him, but you don't know that the same will apply to your parents. Let them have their vacation to figure things out, and hopefully buy yourself the time to be better-prepared as well, and then try to find a good opportunity once they've come back. Kichirou will have to survive the weekend without saying what he knows, but you won't make him wait too much longer than that. In the meantime, you have a corrupted spirit to defeat.)
> Not To Tell Them At All (There's a part of you that worries that no matter the timing, revealing yourself to them would do more harm than good. They might not even believe you, and even if they do, you won't be coming back to life. They already lost you; it would be too cruel not to let them grieve properly. And with your new duties, you can't guarantee against them losing you all over again if something goes wrong.)
> To Abstain From Deciding (You still don't know what you want, but what you do know is that you've already committed to work with Death, and you don't intend to break that promise on the first real job she's given. You're not in a good state to be making big decisions about your parents right now; it's better to bury yourself in your work and come back to this when you've had more time to think. This may be kicking the problem down the road, perhaps, but despite feeling annoyed with yourself, you see no good point in breaking tonight's apparent streak.)
Warning for bereavement, mild suicidal ideation, trauma, estrangement, and severe suicidal ideation.
"...I just want my o-ka'a-chan."
The words slip from your mouth before you've entirely realized it, catching your brother off-guard. "What?" He asks, turning back to you.
"I want to talk to ka'a-san," you mumble, and the flurries of chaotic thoughts in your head suddenly fall still. The one thing that you had been avoiding thinking about the most, the woman whose absence hurts like nothing else to the point that you had no choice but to shut her out of your mind completely, is suddenly and inescapably made clear before you. You can picture her so clearly now, as if standing amidst the now-settled snow on a clear night. Her tall and commanding figure that has never shown you anything less than absolute care; long, silver hair draped over her shoulders much like your own; framing warm reddish-pink eyes crinkled at the corners with mirth, twinkling like the stars overhead; and a patient, comfortable smile. Ruruka Yukimura, your mother.
You vaguely remember in elementary school, being picked on by other kids for being a mommy's girl, and yet you did not even realize until looking back later that it was meant to be an insult, instead always taking a certain quiet pride in it. She always gave you the space you needed, but she has also always been there for you in some way - a comforting presence to lean on, a strong and protective personality to hide behind when you were overwhelmed, an enthusiastic (if overly precise) teacher, and just, just… your mom.
Even as you grew up and realized the world was so much bigger than her, never did you entirely lose the sense that she still dwarfed the entire universe, and her role at the observatory was more akin to a queen cataloging her vast starry domain than the mere curious astronomer she would humbly diminish herself as. She was the one who had brought everyone up that mountain in the middle of a clear winter night to watch the Aurora Borealis, she was the one who you had shyly clung to on your first day of school, and she was the one you could always turn to when you needed or even just wanted. If your father was the yardstick against which other adults failed to reach, your mother was so impossibly beyond comparison that it would be unfair to even try.
You miss her. She is just down the hall, and you miss her so much.
Before your brother can even do anything, you find yourself on your feet, striding to the door and unlocking it without a single word. Any justifications or reasoning for or against talking to her are null, irrelevant; swept away and buried by the avalanche of pure feeling driving you forward. You barely register your brother's quiet "Good luck" as you leave, or the clattering sounds of your father's preparations from downstairs.
Past the top of the staircase, past the restroom and the home office, you walk down the short and darkened hall, a path at once so familiar and yet so surreal now, in your magical dress swishing softly against the hardwood floor. Reaching the door to your parents' room, you hesitate only a moment, before gently turning the handle and pushing the door open.
The room is pitch-black, blackout curtains pulled over the windows, and as you close the door again behind you, it takes your eyes a few moments to adjust to the darkness.
The first thing to make itself known is the pale green-white gleam of hundreds of glow-in-the-dark plastic stars affixed to the walls and ceiling (in exacting faithfulness to the positions of the real constellations, of course) twinkling at you. Their shine has not faded for the night yet, so you know she must have laid down to sleep just recently, likely while your father talked to Kichirou.
But even in that dim illumination, the pale silver of her hair on the dark pillows is unmistakable - even if it is cut much shorter than last you remember, styled into a bell-shaped bob rather than her original flowing locks like yours. A pang of pain spikes your heart at the reminder of why this must be, but you quickly suppress it to hesitantly step closer, rounding the corner of the futon and kneeling at her side.
You try to speak, but nothing comes out, just quietly gasping into the darkness. You feel at once overwhelmed and numb, too many thoughts and feelings at once at an impasse and straining to be let out, yet all blanketed and muted in a thick layer of grey snow. Yet despite all of that, there is still the undeniable fact of who lays there asleep before you.
Only half-asleep, you realize, as white lashes flutter open; even in the low light, her pink eyes are vivid and clear as they turn to focus on you. You must be nothing more than a silhouette in her vision right now, and yet the recognition is immediate. "Ki… kuko-chan?" She murmurs in disbelief, and an arm reaches out from under the covers to cradle the side of your face. You immediately lean into the contact, holding the back of her hand with your own, tears dripping again at the warmth of her touch.
"I'm here," you finally manage to say. "I'm here, o-ka'a-chan."
She blinks tears from her eyes, but slowly lifts herself into a sitting position, propping up her pillow against the wall to lean back against as she stares with dull, clouded eyes, taking in the sight of you before her yet struggling to comprehend. Extracting her other arm from the blankets, she slowly reaches forward, gently pulling you closer and wrapping you in a tender, crushing hug. "Kikuko-chan…" She whispers. "My dear daughter. What… what are you doing here?"
"I came back to see you again. I missed you so much." You let yourself fall limp, curling up against her side as you sink into the embrace, hearing the beating of her heart and feeling wet tears in your hair. Her arms are around you, her face is pressed into the top of your head, and you feel finally, completely safe. Nothing the past few days have thrown your way can hurt you now, because your mom is here. "I love you, o-ka'a-chan."
"I love you, Kikuko-chan," she responds. "I miss you everyday." A convulsing sob tears itself from you, but she is there, softly shhhing and rubbing your back, petting your hair, brushing the pain away. The hollowness from before that talking to your brother filled a part of, now feels nearly whole. You want this moment to last forever.
"...I know this is just a dream," she finally admits, "I know that this isn't real. This can't be real. You… I lost you already. But even if it is just a dream, then… maybe I don't want to wake up."
A stab of cold pierces your heart, eyes snapping back open. "No," you whimper. "I'm here. I'm really here, I promise."
Mom just shakes her head sadly. "I wish you could be. But please, don't say anything, let me pretend a little longer."
"You don't have to pretend," you insist, dragging yourself back upright to meet her gaze. "I'm really here. I'm really here! Please!" More tears fill your vision, but they burn ice cold this time. Mom's breath becomes mist, yet you barely even notice, trying to stare deep into her eyes even as she turns her head to look away in sudden discomfort.
"It's impossible," she whispers, voice heavy with grief, "You're gone, my Kikuko-chan is gone, and once I wake up I'll need to live with that. Why can't you let me forget even here?" She's barely even talking to you now, continuing to avert her gaze, and looking smaller than you ever thought possible. "Why can't I let myself…?"
A renewed sob breaks loose from you, as you pull yourself free from her arms, drawing her eyes back to you. Falling over her, crying uncontrollably now, you grab her shoulders and grip as tightly as you can, desperate to make her feel how real you are. "You don't have to pretend, you don't need to live with that! I'm right here! I was gone, but I'm back now, please believe me! Please stop being so rational, and just trust what's here! Because I'm here!" You are begging and sobbing, all the comfort of before turning into pain. You're begging and you feel so, so cold; and for the first time it bites deep into you, frigid and cruel instead of familiar and comforting. "I'm right here, and I'm real! You're awake already, please believe me!"
"Stop," she gasps, suddenly afraid. "You're hurting me! You're not- Who are you? Stop it, let me go!"
She struggles to push you away, grabbing your wrists to try to pull you off, but your grip is too tight. The cold spreads out of your hands, wreathing her shoulders in frost. Even wracked with sobs, you can't let yourself let go, not now. "I'm right here! I'M RIGHT HERE, I'M STILL HERE!" You can't see through your tears anymore. You can't see and you're screaming now, voice broken and shrill, uncaring if you're heard; desperate to be. "KA'A-SAN,PLEAAASE!!!"
And everything feels so cold.
You feel an abrupt impact in your chest, and blink away sudden stars to find yourself lying prone on the opposite end of the room. Mom has her leg still raised after freeing it from her blankets, the two of you staring at one another in shock. Distantly, you note that her torso and upper arms are covered in white frost, some even reaching up her neck. "Who… are…" Her leg drops back down, and she shivers violently for a few moments before falling limp, eyes drifting shut again.
Somehow, you don't know how, you muster up just enough focus to detransform, before rushing back over to her. "No, no, nononononono…" you whimper, frantically brushing at her sleepwear, uselessly trying to whisk the frozen moisture away as if that will fix any of this. "Please wake up, I'm sorry, I didn't want to hurt you, I'm sorry, please just, I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry sorry sorry sorry just please be okay-"
The door slams open, making you jump; Naruhito stands imposingly in the doorway, light from the hall spilling in and casting his shadow over you and your mother. "I heard screaming, what's wrong?" He demands, breath hitching as he takes in the sheets kicked away and her crumpled, half-frozen figure. Kichirou peeks out from behind him, still absentmindedly holding onto a rolled-up shirt he must have been packing, but becoming wide-eyed at the sight before him.
You know they can't see you, but hunched over your mother like this, you feel incriminated, like some feral monster caught in the act of slaughtering livestock.
You back away on all fours, scuttling into a far corner as your father half-marches over, half-sinks to his knees in the same spot you had just vacated, pressing a hand against her forehead. "Get some blankets from the downstairs closet, right now," he orders, "We need to warm her up immediately."
Your brother's still stuck in place, staring in horror, but jolts back to awareness after a sharp "NOW!" Scanning the room before he leaves, even as his gaze sweeps unseeing right past you, you are unable to miss the fear and betrayal in his eyes.
Stilling his trembling hand, your father puts two fingers to Mo- to Ruruka's neck, going still for several breathless moments. Then he slumps in relief, and unseen, you do the same.
The moment Kichirou returns with a stack of blankets, the two of them set to work wrapping her up snugly, before your father scoops her up into a bridal carry and stands. "The thermostat must have had a glitch," he reasons out briskly, "It felt cold in your room earlier, too. Let's take her downstairs where it's warmer, can you make some hot tea? Or no, maybe hot chocolate. If she doesn't wake up soon, we may have to call the hospital."
Kichirou just nods mutely, stepping aside to let them pass, and casting another suspicious glance back at the futon, though you notice him still trembling as well. "...What happened? Why would you… Why did you do that?" He asks the empty room, but you can't bring yourself to reappear. Not now. And so he leaves.
You sit there, still as a statue, light still spilling in from the hall to starkly illuminate the rumpled blankets like a spotlight on a crime scene. Your head is blank. Your heart is empty. All the whirling, overwhelming thoughts and feelings of before are completely gone now, everything erased by sheer disbelief, or perhaps lack of comprehension, of just what happened.
Finally, numbly, you find your feet, barely registering your actions as you stumble your way out into the hall and down the stairs. It is indeed warmer down here, Ruruka huddled in her wrap of blankets at the dining table, Naruhito gently rubbing her back, in a horrible echo of when you saw them the first night after the funeral. But this time, they're facing you; you can see the worry in your father's eyes, barely-concealed by a mask of stoicism, while Mo- while his wife leans back against him, head lolling in unconsciousness. A glance around the corner into the kitchen reveals Kichirou dutifully pulling down a box of instant hot chocolate, expression unreadable.
You stand alone in the living room again, feeling like an intruder.
Finally, she blinks awake again, looking around the dining room in vacant confusion, before glancing up at her husband. "What… why are we down here?" She asks. "Why is it so chilly?"
"Your room was freezing; I think something went wrong with the heating systems," he answers. Kichirou growls under his breath, unnoticed by either of them. "Though I thought I also heard yelling, did something happen?"
Ruruka frowns, clutching her arms closer to her chest, and wincing in pain when a heavy fold of her blanket wrapping lands on her shoulder. "I think… I had a nightmare. It was about…" She sighs heavily, voice going quiet. "It was about Kikuko-chan."
BANG
Kichirou has a tight grip on the mug he'd just slammed down onto the counter, knuckles going white from the force of his grip, but he simply waves off their concerned gazes. "I'm fine, it's not broken," he grumbles. "Just heavier than I expected." Neither looks convinced by the obvious lie, given the mug he chose is in fact quite small, but they don't press him on it.
Ruruka takes a moment to recollect herself before finishing. "She came to me at first, and for a moment it was like I had my daughter back. But then…" She chokes back a sob. "But then she turned into something else, some kind of phantasm, a-and screamed garbled nonsense at me as I became frozen. It was… terrifying."
Rubbing away tears, she leans against Naruhito again. "But it was just a nightmare, and I'm… okay enough now. It must have been from the room turning so cold, that's all. I'll be fine. Though we will really have to get someone in to look at the heater; do you still have that list of…"
She's okay. Her rambling continues in the background, but you pay it no more attention, relief flooding through you and turning your knees weak, wavering in place. She's really okay, and thinks it was just a nightmare, and you didn't…
You could have killed her.
Your relief drains away as quickly as it arrived, and now you really do fall to the floor, legs splayed out on either side as the weight of guilt finally comes crashing down on you in full. She's fine, but she might not have been, if she hadn't kicked you away in time. What were you doing? Why couldn't you just let her think it was a dream? Echoes of your earlier desperation linger in the corners of your mind, but now they feel alien, incomprehensible, disgustingly selfish even. You didn't kill her, but you could have, all because you lost control of your powers and lost control of yourself trying so hard to get her to just listen. The more you think about it, the more you find yourself agreeing with the betrayal in your brother's eyes.
Finding your feet again, you take one last glance at the tableau before you; Mom at the table, your father at her back as always, your brother delivering a freshly-brewed hot chocolate to warm her back up. And then with a few stumbling steps backward, you turn away, phasing through the front door without even registering it, and run out into the road. With feet pounding on pavement and a fresh wave of freezing tears streaming from the corners of your eyes, you flee as far as you can.
~~~ .oO◯Oo. ~~~
You don't so much come to a halt as fall into it, tripping on something in the nighttime darkness and skidding across the ground. You don't bother to get back up, or even lift your head to see where you are. It doesn't matter.
You don't even have it in you to chuckle at the paradox of wanting to die when you already have.
You don't know how far you are, how much time has passed since you started running, nor since you stopped. Time blurs into meaninglessness, and it could be anywhere between a half-hour or an eternity. All that registers is the cascade of self-loathing and guilt and longing and shame and emptiness and pain and cold. It's probably good that you're not transformed anymore, because otherwise wherever you are would surely be engulfed in another circle of ice and snow and cold and cold and cold.
What you do know, without even having to open your eyes, is the moment Death arrives. The low, eternal bell tolling of her realm is hard to miss, even before you see the blood-red skies above.
She's sitting on an electrical box nearby, staring down at you with a morose expression, somewhat undercut by the way she appears sideways from your perspective on the ground. You don't dignify her presence with a greeting, let alone the effort of lifting your head. "Is… is this a bad time?" She finally asks.
"I hate you."
"I…"
"I hate you." You still don't move, but you inject as much venom and pent-up rage into your voice as you can muster. (It's not much, but it is better than nothing at all.) "I hate you so much." Your voice cracks.
"...I'm sorry."
"If you would've just taken me when you were supposed to, none of this would have happened." Even your anger runs out too soon, leaving your tone unfittingly conversational as you muster up whatever energy you have left to tear into her, tell her everything on your mind you've been suppressing ever since you first met her. "I could have just disappeared without all of this nonsense."
"I'm sorry."
"Nel-san could have picked their first choice, whoever it is that actually deserves this stupid magic ring. My family could have moved on in peace, without me stumbling back in and messing it all up for them. I don't want to have died, sure, but at least we could have committed to it properly, not this half-and-half… whatever the hell this is."
"I'm sorry."
"And…"
You know it's unfair. You know this isn't how things work, that she has no control over it, but the thought has been waiting in the back of your mind since your first meeting, and finally you're able to spit it out.
"And I hate you because I died in the first place!"
She opens her mouth to rebut, shifting on her high-voltage seat of choice, but finally she just nods. "I… am truly sorry."
You close your eyes again to shut out her pity. "I know you are. Why did you have to be so damn nice?"
She doesn't respond to that, and you don't particularly care why right now. The silence is strangely comfortable. More words would just break everything again, after all.
"...Can you at least take me now?"
"...Do you really want me to?" You hear a metallic swish, followed by the ticking of gears. Opening your eyes again, you see the shadow of her scythe on the ground before you, just past your outstretched hand. You could reach out and touch it so easily…
Instead, you close your eyes again. "...No. I need to find some way to fix this first."
"Understood." She sounds more relieved than she should, as another swish brings relative silence once more.
It's that admission; that realization, really, that finally gets you to clamber to your feet, despite the leaden feeling threatening to drag you back to the pavement. Still you refuse to meet her gaze, instead taking in your surroundings. Not too far from school, yet again; you must have followed the route by instinct. You're starting to get sick of it.
"So… how will you do that?" She asks.
"I don't know," you say. You really don't. But you need to do something if you're going to stick around, and the question at least gets you thinking.
What To Do? > Go Back Home (NO! Not yet. Not tonight.) (Maybe not ever.) > Go To The River (You need to understand how all of this happened. Maybe if you return to where this started last night, you can find some sort of enlightenment again. If not, at least it is a prettier spot to feel awful at.) (How was it only last night?)
> Go To The Town (You are sure Death was going to nag you about it before she saw you being pathetic. Even if she is not pushing you on it now, you may as well take out all your feelings on that stupid spirit. You are not a violent person, but you feel the need to hurt something right now.) (…Something that isn't your family, anyway.)
