Hello peeps!

Summary: AU. 21 year old Mikan Sakura starts getting nightmares of her high school sweetheart Natumse Hyuuga, who went missing on graduation night and is now presumed dead, telling her to commit suicide. Are these just dreams, or is something else at work? M/N

Warning: Has some dark themes, mentions of suicide and death, and language.

Disclaimer: Not mine! It's all Higuchi.

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Chapter 1: The Beginning

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Sometimes… life is a curse that you cannot break free from. It holds you in its constricting grip, making everything and everybody seem like they're against you. Friends seem to be enemies; enemies are each deities of hate. There's a point in it where life changes from fun to ridiculing. Nobody seems to understand you, nobody wants you, everybody hates you… why is it this way? Can you escape? Is there a way to break free?

Is it to end your own life?

~(-)~

"Holy shit."

A young brunette woman sat upright in her bed, with ragged breathing and sweat slicking her face. Tendrils of hair stuck to each side of her head, and the rest was in a mess of brown knots. Large, doe-like brown eyes pulsed and flashed in shock at what she'd just been dreaming about. His red eyes, blazing yet cold at the same time. Black hair only down to his neck, the hairs she used to clutch when he held her close. Emotionless voice as he spoke, chilling her until she felt like she was in the ground, a decaying body.

"It was that dream again."

Ignoring her horrible physical appearance, the young woman tiptoed off her bed, pale pink nightclothes still on. Out her bedroom, into the kitchen she went. The brunette turned on the dimmest light next to the sink, got a mug and poured herself some water.

But the cool liquid on her lips didn't soothe her at all. Inside, her mind was in turmoil. Her head swam with images of him, so long ago in the days of high school, yet the image of him always stayed clear.

"Mikan?"

Another figure emerged from the hallway, a barely awake women the same age as the first with short, cropped raven black hair.

She walked straight over to the brunette and say down onto the chair next to her. Instantly she looked into Mikan's eyes, studying her.

"It was those dreams again."

It wasn't even a question, she just knew.

"Yeah. It was them again."

Awkward silence.

"What happened this time?"

Mikan sighed, burying her head in the crook of her bent elbows on the table while keeping her eyes out.

"It was even worse than before, Hotaru. He was speaking to me, telling me how life was horrible and that I should…"

She shuddered.

"…do what, Mikan?"

Her large eyes, innocent as when they were children, peered at her. She couldn't lie.

"C-commit s-suicide, Hotaru."

Her eyes disappeared into her elbows too, and sobs racked her body as she cried. Even though she was twenty-one years old, the brunette was overly sensitive and cried a lot. Not that she was crying for no reason- there were reasons. Reasons that could be fatal.

"Mikan, get a hold of yourself."

Hotaru's voice rang full with harsh, stiff command. She was right, of course; it wasn't good to grieve your life out. The words she spoke were so similar to back when the two were younger, when Mikan herself had dreaded waking up each morning to see harsh reality greeting her. Because one man had been ruining it for her, making her cry more tears than everybody else in her life combined could. But then he would always cover it up with soft caresses and kind words that he said only to her. Yet she always feared the pain.

"He's been missing for five years. He's dead. Natsume can't possibly be not dead. He can't bother you from the realm of the no longer living. The Natsume you've been seeing in your dreams is a figment of your own imagination."

The black-haired beauty stood up, preparing to go back to bed because she thought that the woman next to her was a lost case.

Her actions of going away were halted when the brunette latched onto her sleeve and looked up at her with eyes full of pain.

"Those are lies, Hotaru! He isn't dead! Why would I get these dreams so suddenly, for no reason at all, if he were dead? I've never even contemplated suicide or any of this nonsense before they started. As for he himself, the investigators found no evidence to support that he'd died! Only a vanished person who left without a trace."

Mikan nearly didn't look sane in her craze to prove that her ex-lover wasn't just another murdered person.

"Why would he leave us? He told you that he loved you the night he disappeared."

Hotaru's tone was cold as ever, but in her eyes you could sense that she was trying to help Mikan, keeping her safe from the pit of pain she was near falling into.

"He wasn't murdered, or anything like that! I don't know why my Natsume left, but it was for a reason! He isn't the type of guy to just run off to escape from his fears."

Hope. It still lurked around in her expression and heart, it never went away for even a second.

"Why would he disappear if he truly loved you?"

Hotaru instantly wanted to take back those words.

…I just went too far.

"!"

Mikan recoiled from Hotaru's hand, more tears already falling under the swollen area underneath her eyes. It's been said that for some people, they use up their tears in grief for another, and that they don't have any more tears to cry. But for Mikan, her sadness for the loss of Natsume in her life only makes more salty droplets able to fall. Her ability to cry will never dissipate; her need to do it will never subside; the amount of tears able to be made in her tear ducts is limitless.

But Mikan started trembling while looking down. When she looked up, Hotaru expected her to be crying even more. But instead, she found a smiling young woman with traces of tears down her cheeks but no more coming out, not melancholy at all, just optimistic and bright than ever.

"It's fine, Hotaru. It was just a dream. I just overreacted a bit. You can go back to bed now; I'll be down in a sec."

If a total stranger was looking at Mikan, they wouldn't have suspected anything. But Hotaru had known Mikan longer and better than anybody else in the world cared to, and she knew that she was just hiding her hurt like always, not wanting to affect other people.

"Mikan…"

The brunette smiled grimly then walked away, back into her own room.

"I'll be going back to sleep now, Hotaru."

That was a lie. Mikan Sakura didn't sleep for another second that night. She drooped a little, sure, but always pulled herself back up in fear that the nightmare would come back to haunt her. Her body was fragile looking that night, as she held her knees to her chin, and rocked back and forth ever so slowly in the delicate moonlight. Only one word came out of her mouth during her vigil.

"Natsume…"

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I hope that my first Gakuen Alice story isn't too bad. It's the darkest multichip I've created so far on . Cheers! Or not.

Oh, and the "!" dialogue in there was just an expression of shock for Mikan. You know how in manga a shocked person might have some vertical exclamation points next to them? That's what was here.

Please review! I love every single one I receive, even criticism and critiques!