#hachirou — loverboy

[seamstress-girl]

The End of the World.

“Leave? Why would you try to leave?”

Megumi understood just as well as Yukie what “leaving” meant. To leave, Megumi would have to go as well… and her perfect world, without her as its supporting pillar, would crumble away. Dust to dust, dreams to dreams.

Yukie could understand how appealing this place could be. A fantasy world, where she could live with the people that she loved, where even the dead were revived, alongside the love that they possessed. It was, put simply, the golden land where she could live her dreams in. …But all of this, every little aspect—it wasn’t real. It was eating away at her life, feeding off of her deepest regrets, trying to fix something that… couldn’t be fixed, couldn’t be taken back.

“…you miss your siblings, right?”

Megumi took a deep breath, trying her best to hold back her tears. “…the oldest was eight when he died, Yukie. …I spent so, so long thinking- thinking I was the one who killed them… I… I don’t even remember if I went to their funerals…”

“…but they’re gone. Auntie, you’re neglecting the living—you’re neglecting your life to live in the past.”

Megumi’s eyes were glossy, and when she closed them, Yukie could spot the tear that dripped down. “I know. But I… I can’t, I can’t go, I- I can’t, I—”

The lights were flickering. …Yukie could hear the rumbling of the ground, the way the ceiling didn’t seem to be… there, anymore. She had the key in her hands, and with a gentle movement, she held her aunt’s hands between hers alongside it.

“You’re scared,” She managed to get the words out with great effort. …She was crying, too. “…I’m scared too. But… you taught me about it, so I’ll remind you too. …The single element of the world, right?”

Yukie told her of what she had been told, once, by the kind aunt that she loved very much.

“Without love, it can’t be seen. And what is love, if not hope? If you don’t have love for the world, you can’t have “hope”. Hope is believing in yourself, and believing that you’ll be alright. …Even when it doesn’t seem like it will. …Even when you wish very, very much that things were different. …That’s the hope you learnt with Naegi-san, right? That’s the hope you told me about.”

…Megumi nodded, weakly resting her forehead against her niece’s. She was tired… but, even if she was tired, she smiled. And Yukie smiled, too.

“Let’s go home, …and let’s remember about that hope.”

…

…

“Hey.”

“…Hey.”

“The world’s crumbling, right? …Are we gonna go, too?”

“Not really. We won’t have physical forms, but we’re still abstract ideas in Red’s brain. We’ll still be there… somewhere. This might be our last chat, though.”

“…‘pathetic little man’, huh?”

“I wasn’t about to pick a fight with a kid. You, on the other hand…”

[seamstress-girl]

They're okay, kinda

“…Yukie’s not doing too well,” Hachirou admitted, before looking back at her injuries. The depth of those cuts were nothing to sneeze at, and he knew a child her age and with her lack of strength wouldn’t last long like this…

Kosei seemed to understand the urgency in his voice, nodding before dashing towards the kitchen. “I’ll- I’ll get Shiroma-sensei, don’t worry!”

…once Kosei was out of sight, Hachirou limped forward, doing his best to kneel and pick the key from the ground. …That Jay had placed it on the ground before moving towards the wall… and disappearing where he was. He wondered if it was because he didn’t belong to this world and nor to the real one. …He might never get a true answer to that.

Instead, he clung to the key, before moving back near Yukie. “…keep this.”

She couldn’t keep her focus. “…no, I… you keep it, I… I can’t… move my arm…”

He took her hand, opening it and closing it around the key. “You need it more, right? …I’ll be fine without that…”

[seamstress-girl]

You have a key, now you need a lock

“Budou-san, are you okay!?”

The little boy came rushing, doing his best to not touch either his or the young girl’s injuries. …Honestly, he had no idea who that girl was, but he was sure he had seen her arrive at the wedding and be greeted by Megumi, so he wasn’t worried about who she was—rather, he was worried about how they got so hurt.

Hachirou was frantically looking around, before carefully placing Yukie on the ground. “…the guy that was here, he—”

“Did he hurt you?” Kosei’s eyes flared with fury, as he turned around…

But there was no sign of anyone there. …Only a sparkling, miniscule key on the floor.

[seamstress-girl]

Kosei, not now...

Kosei didn’t seem to hear the anons at all, for he crossed his arms and stared the man… up, for he was significantly taller than him. “I don’t remember having invited you.”

“Kosei, this is really not the time,” He looked back—

…?

There was the wall, the one right where there should be one. It was the wall behind the staircase, the door that led to the basement sitting there, just as it should have if this was the original house. …The door was open.

Hachirou slowly climbed the stairs, carrying Yukie in his arms. Kosei’s eyes flickered from anger to worry, as he rushed towards the man he recognized (and the man he knew was no doppelganger).

…this gave him the opportunity to slip away, unnoticed. This situation was too risky for him to be in, after all.

[seamstress-girl]

It's locked from Yukie's side too

The key was on the ground, alongside a doll made of fabric. In front of them, was… that thing. Slender, tall, claws long and sharp… the tips of its fingers melting, just like its mouth. Drip, drip, drip, flesh dripping like the blood dripping down those claws, nothing but empty sockets where there should have been eyes. An empty void, reaching out onto eternity from its depths, a gutural noise leaving its mouth at any second.

And Yukie was backed into a wall. …There was a deep, deep gash in her thigh and arm, and she was desperately trying to stay away from that creature that resembled Jay.

Hachirou was in no condition to fight. …He, himself, was at a very big disadvantage.

This was insane. This was, putting it simply, asking to be killed. And even then…

He grabbed the doll from the floor.

The creature, immediately, averted its eyes from the detective, looking straight at him.

He dashed up the stairs, not glancing behind—because he could hear the steps of the creature coming after him.

[seamstress-girl]

monster

He tried once, twice, thrice, but all it did was cause him more strain than necessary. He couldn’t do it, but was there anything else he could do!? There wasn’t enough time, there wasn’t any other option, there was no one he could ask for help, and—

Hachirou got up.

“Don’t try to play the hero, you—”

“You c- can’t open… open it alone, …so…”

Even if he tried to keep him from moving, would he ever be able to dissuade Hachirou? He was hardheaded not unlike himself, and truly… did he have any option?

Another scream. It was more than enough to have them both run at the door. Surely, he hadn’t been enough to get the door to give in, but himself plus Hachirou seemed to do the trick; there was a loud noise as the door fell down the small set of stairs, and he didn’t need anyone to tell him to rush down those. If he was lucky…

It was almost the same scene he had seen when rescuing Hachirou.

[seamstress-girl]

Hachirou? Jay?

He shouldn’t have let that girl go in there alone.

“Kid!? Are you alright!?”

Screams. More and more of them, alongside the noises of things being knocked about. Things falling, the noises of slashes and cuts and the growling—he shouldn’t have waited outside, Hachirou was a grown man, he could handle himself! That was a kid, scrawny, small, clearly starving, and now—

He couldn’t go and call for help. He wasn’t supposed to be there in the first place, he’d end up raising too many questions; and by the time he got there… then, it’d be too late!

He didn’t have Monokat to help. He didn’t have any of his tools, any of his weapons. He wasn’t allowed to have those, so he couldn’t even make them—his only solution was to throw himself at the door, trying to force it to come down with his weight.

It barely budged…

“Y… you ha- have, …ngh… to go inside…!!”

“I can’t do much without a key, you know!”

[seamstress-girl]

L O V E

Yukie opened her hand, looking up at him. “Piece.”

Once she had all of them in her hands, she started placing them in the holes, getting on her tiptoes to reach them. It didn’t take a genius to figure out what those letters spelled, and once she had placed them, a small compartment opened in the middle of the door.

She took the key from inside that compartment. …What a beautiful, intricate key. Jay seemed to recognize it, but if he truly did, he said nothing.

“…can you stay outside with Hachirou-nii? He’s in no shape to go inside.”

“Gotcha,” He stepped to the side, though he kept a close eye on the door. “If anything happens, just scream and I’ll come in. …Who knows if that painting’s in there again.”

I sure hope not.

She placed the key on the keyhole, turning it until she hit the limit. …She grabbed the door handle.

[seamstress-girl]

Dead or worse sounds right

“That’s always the case with us.”

He seemed more bitter than anything, saying that. Still, Yukie couldn’t help but feel a little bad for this man—

Why should she? He was the most horrible monster she could have ever met. The Army of One was nothing when compared to this… thing. Even her own mastermind, even the friend that betrayed everything she loved- she could even understand them, but not this… this monstrosity.

But this wasn’t Jay, was it? This was a man tortured by the hubris of someone who wasn’t him.

Literal torture. Several accidents. Attempted murder. Each scar, the way they had been inflicted, the angle, the apparent age of the scars… it wasn’t hard for her to figure it out.

“…you’re a pathetic little man. I don’t sympathize with you, and you deserve everything that happened to you ever since your killing games.”

Her words were sharp. They were those of a detective who understood the pain of the victims, who knew what dying felt like. For that, she could not forgive a man like him.

“…but,” She maintained her eyes away from him, actively avoiding knowing what expression he would have made. “I think you’ve suffered enough for a lifetime. …I hope the real you can get some peace, like you have here.”

The silence was heavy. He stopped in front of the door to the basement, placing Hachirou against the wall. “Probably a little late to want good things for either of us.”

[seamstress-girl]

Now you have all of them!

“Do you know what it spells out?”

The question made Yukie raise an eyebrow. “…you don’t know?”

It was fairly visible. Four letters, L, E, O, V. They had gone in the wrong order from the slips she had picked, but she knew well enough what that would spell.

The man shrugged, pulling Hachirou up so he would rest more securely on his shoulder. “I can’t see the letters. …I have a guess, but I wouldn’t risk it; I can think of two four letter words she’d use.”

“…she doesn’t want you to know,” Yukie kept her eyes ahead, but she could almost see his wry smile regardless.

“Guess she’s done having to go on rescue missions for me and decided to keep me locked up herself.”

She did look at him at that. “So, are you…?”

“The real Jay? No, that kid’s probably dead or worse, I’ve kinda accepted that by this point. …I’m something like a memory? Or how she thinks he’d act, something like that.”

[seamstress-girl]

What do you know about this place?

“As much as you do. This place is how Red found a way to cope after the key and the locks went missing.”

Yukie… couldn’t understand what he meant. But she tailed after him, walking right behind that man. …His voice was just the same— no, maybe a little deeper. …He had been a teenager as a mastermind, so… of course… the way he walked, the way he moved, even the way he looked at things while moving around…

It was him.

But it was also not.

“Hachirou got the last letter, at least,” He sighed, before taking a glance at the redhead he was carrying. “…next time, don’t throw yourself into a painting’s mouth. You know you could’ve died, and this would all be for nothing, right?”

“…ppf… i… ghn, …did my part…”

“If you’re gonna talk about the difference between sacrifice and suicide now, save it. You have a world to dismantle and a Megumi to snap out of… this.”

[seamstress-girl]

If you don't get moving you might be next

…the man bringing Hachirou… That was unmistakably Jay. It had to be. The shape of the face, the shape of the eyes, everything—he was just as she remembered. But… not.

His eyes. His arms, his hands. …The scars. The hair. Everything was just… a little bit odd. Like a reflection in a house of mirrors, he wasn’t the same Jay she knew. He wasn’t the same Jay from the portrait.

So, she was scared, …but not as scared.

She wanted to ask him.

“…a… are you…?”

His smile wasn’t smug, like in the painting. It was closer to someone attempting to smile. “Even if I said it, would that help at all?”

…she shook her head.

“Let’s get going. This place’s really dangerous once you start getting deeper into it,” The stranger warned, before gesturing for her to come along. …He kept dragging Hachirou with him, so she had no choice but to follow…

[seamstress-girl]

Cover your ears, keep walking!

She couldn’t, she couldn’t move, she couldn’t think, she didn’t want to she didn’t want to but she had to but she couldn’t she can’t, moving was dangerous but this was dangerous but she couldn’t stay and she couldn’t go—

A hand clasped her shoulder. …She shuddered, but… just like having a taste of the forbidden fruit, …once she knew…

“…i… said… i- i’d look cool, …yeah…?”

Hachirou’s voice was what made her look to her side. There he was, slumped over someone’s shoulder, his face bruised and cut and… bit, as if something had tried to bite off his face… his clothes, they were torn and ripped and dirty with blood, but he was still smiling…

And… he…

That… man…

He didn’t… look like the one in the painting…

[seamstress-girl]

You're so close to the end, you can make it

Don’t look behind.

She flinched when she heard the noise of fabric ripping. …Then, the moan of someone in pain. She wanted to stop and ask if everything was alright. She did not take the next step, but—

“Kee- keep going, Yucch- agh, ugh, ah a h, cough, hack!! uweghh…”

“Hachirou-nii!?”

She could hear… horrible noises. They were… the worst noises someone could ever hear. As a detective, she recognized them. But, ah, if she looked back…

If she looked back, maybe she could help… but if she looked back, maybe she would be the one making those noises next…! She had to keep walking, her tears increasing in volume and strength, but she had to keep walking…!

“Are you okay!?” She had to ask. Because, if she didn’t… if she didn’t ask, all she would be able to hear was those disgusting, awful nasty filthy sounds…!

“T-Te- tell, them— Gah... eeh... ack... hh!! I, i, i tried, and I- I did, i did what… Uuuu, ...gah, ...eeeggh, …geh, ggghh... gggggghhkkkkkkk…”

She had to turn back.

She had to turn back and save him, she had to turn back and see if he was alright, she had to see if her niisan was—

There was silence. She was at the end of the hallway, at the point where the living room began.

“…Hachirou-nii…?”

…

She didn’t hear a thing, not even a noise.

[seamstress-girl]

Just stay behind best boi Hachi

Yukie walked behind him. She did not ask questions, even if she hesitated for a little bit; he squeezed her shoulders so tightly she had to move, however, and when she was about to turn—

“Don’t look back. Keep walking. …Please.”

“But, Hachirou-nii—”

“I know what I’m doing,” He reassured, but his voice didn’t sound sure of it at all… “Hey. When we’re out of this, tell my little sugar dumplings that I was really cool while helping you, yeah?”

Yukie wanted to cry. She felt her eyes fill up with tears, but she endured. She took the first step away from Hachirou, and she could hear the fabric of his jacket moving. …Then, a step behind her. He was stepping away from her, but she had to be strong.

For Hachirou-nii. She kept repeating it like a mantra, each step paining her further. She didn’t want to be separated from him, but she couldn’t disappoint her niisan…

There was an awful, awful noise, like nails dragging across a chalkboard. But she did not stop walking away, doing her best to fight off the need to make herself as small as possible and hide.

[seamstress-girl]

Maybe Hachirou can retrieve it?

“…Yukie.”

Her eyes never tore off the paper. She remained static, as if the thought itself glued her to the ground. She could not move. She couldn’t, she wouldn’t, she—

Hachirou grabbed her shoulders, so tight it hurt a little. She looked up at him, just to see how pale he had become. His face was the embodiment of fear, and she was sure her own face was reflecting that same expression. He seemed worried enough to snap out of her trance.

“I need you to go behind me… and keep walking. Don’t look back, okay? I need you to do that for Hachirou-niichan, alright?”

Hachirou kept looking at her.

…aah… no, …but he wasn’t, was he…? His eyes, they- his eyes never focused on hers, did they?

Right over her shoulder… he was looking right over her shoulder, ever since he looked away from that paper…