Previously titled Crying Rains, Antidepressant is the remastered version, which I lifted directly from one of Serial Experiments Lain's minimalist soundtracks.
This was an old piece that I deleted because it contained a note that was particularly degrading to a group of people. I regret having said any of that, and I've grown to accept that some people are different. I am putting this story up again, but I've deleted that note—though I do want to make an apology for those who I've offended, if you somehow come back to this piece. If you do not know what I'm talking about, read on. :)
So, it's been two years since I last wrote this. And as I was editing this one-shot, well, I thought: wow, what a terribly obnoxious writing style. Why hasn't anybody said that to my face yet? You people are too nice. I on the other hand was cringing.
This entire piece was a cringe fest! :-( XD
Perhaps it still is, but I did my best to edit it…or, cut out the sickeningly ornamental parts. Welp, those were the first days of my fanfictioning life—excessive use of adjectives and adverbs. ~ I wanted to ditch this editing project altogether, too ashamed to face my past writing mistakes, but then I kept reminding myself that there are too little Ayato Naoi fanfics in this world. Too little. So I wrote on, no matter how painful the cringes were.
And I endured them for you, Naoi. For you. You don't do this kind of thing for something that doesn't exist. If I ever get to meet you, I will crush you under the weight of my hugs. You exist, Ayato-senpai. You do. In my heart.
(Also, this editing project is prompting me to rewatch the series and love Naoi again. Ugh. Feels Truck, here I stand in your path. I am ready to be run over and killed all over again.)
Dark skies loom over the student campus.
A low rumbling thunder threats to pour down a storm.
But the growl only grows louder. And louder, until it turns into a desperate howl, though thankfully, mercy comes to put an end to the thunderous wail in the form of an ear-splitting clap!, punctuating it with blinding cracks of blue light all over the campus.
The brief flash of lightning shatters the fragile air like glass, casting a sharp contrast about the confined spaces of the room, angrily throwing the outlines of the hiding shadows into chaos.
One. Two. The raindrops fall one at a time, each a loud and harsh tap against the misted windowpanes. Until suddenly—
It pours.
The winds scream their agony. The storm bawls its sorrows. Driblets as heavy as bullets pepper the earth, spattering, clattering, pattering onto iron roofs to deafen any of those within earshot. The shadows grow ominously longer as a chill descends upon the already cold room.
And in the midst of this storm, he waits.
Patiently.
For someone to crack open the door.
For someone to call his attention.
For someone to need him.
It is a sentiment that he's certain he'd been cursed to live with by whatever cruel gods lived up there in their cosy heaven. He had tried to get rid of it, of course. Of this stupid sentiment. But it seemed that no matter what method he did to stomp the needless desire until it faded into oblivion, it kept coming right back to hit him on the face like a block of ice after block of ice.
Like a pathetic weakling, he knows that he has fallen victim for the basest, shallowest, commonest of all desires.
…to be appreciated.
To be acknowledged.
To be given importance.
By someone.
Anyone.
He clenches his fists. His eyes darken. His patience ebbs.
Slowly.
…he has been waiting for hours.
He ducks his head, lets the brim of his cap cast a shadow over his face, and stares down at the pair of fists resting—shivering—over the polished wooden surface of his desk.
No. Stay put.
He is not certain who he does this for, but he puts on a show of keeping up the façade of expressionlessness. He has to keep reminding himself to stay in check. Of who he is supposed to be at the moment.
Which is, to say, not Ayato Naoi.
No.
Not him.
Not the insignificant pawn that died like a pathetic wimp.
Not the accident that no one ever asked for.
No.
He begins to shiver, though it is not due to the cold.
No matter what, he hisses to himself, an edge suddenly in his golden eyes.
Do not be that useless, crying little boy who mattered to no one.
Because they only valued Ayato Naoi whenever he isn't Ayato Naoi.
There is an easy solution to that, he found many years ago.
And that is to be someone else.
Entirely someone else.
Be Student Council Vice President Ayato Naoi.
Powered by this thought, he nods to himself determinedly. Heaves a calming breath. Sits straighter up. He lets his chin touch the air once again, forcing his pride to kick the little whimpering bits of sentiment in him into silence.
That same pride is had what kept him strong.
He unclenches his fists, sets them calmly over the table. He drums his fingers along to the steady rhythm of the clock's ticking.
And he continues to wait.
He has to. He has to, before making assumptions. Before surrendering. He has to keep his composure, like the Vice President that he is.
Not the pathetic, incompetent potter, no. He has to maintain this. This…this mask of calm, while he waits.
And he waits.
He counts the painful little seconds as the grandfather clock in the corner of the room ticks them away.
Every single little tick.
And every agonizing tock.
His patience shivers. A time-bomb to be detonated.
All this waiting is getting him nowhere.
…he cannot wait forever.
His long fingers slowly curl in on themselves, balling into a tight, indignant fist. Once again, he feels it roil in his veins.
The anger.
Tendrils of dark forest green hair fall over his blank eyes, their usual golden glimmer washed over by the shadows. He stares impetuously at the door.
She is not going to come.
He stands up, the legs of his chair loudly scraping against the marble floor. The offensive, grating sound resonates across the entire room, and he stands in the middle of it all.
He lifts his head. There is a frown on his face.
He is displeased.
No, he screams angrily to himself, no.
The rain continues to patter.
He is livid.
You are such a blithering fool.
"Wait for me at the Student Council room," is what Tachibana had said, and he should have said no.
"I will need your help to finish the paperwork," she had said, and he should have said no.
"I will be busy, but expect me there," she had said, and he should have said no.
But what? Instead of wisely refusing, of saying what he should have, of blurting out that simple, uncompromising no, that no that would have freed him from this agony, he had actually tried a smile.
He is furious at himself for falling for such a pathetic little joke.
It had been barely noticeable, really. The smile. That smile.
He wore his usual frown like a gas mask—it was plastered onto his face like concrete, after all, and minor changes like the littlest upward quirk of the corner of his mouth would have to be microscopic to exist.
But that was it.
He had taken the bait.
And actually smiled.
She…Tachibana. Tachibana Kanade.
She had admitted to needing his help. So he smiled.
Because she acknowledged his existence.
Or so he thought.
This is torture if nothing else, really. It had been such a strange, annoying feeling—smiling, that is. Something had tickled his nose and a lump had grown in his throat, and he felt…happy. He could never be certain, though. He had no past experience of what being truly happy felt like, so he had nothing to compare it to.
But it had felt…nice.
And that is what made this experience such an agonizing torture.
He had let his hopes soar high.
Tachibana had no idea how much this simple request—of being needed—meant to him.
So she, likewise, had no idea how much rejecting it immediately afterwards hurt.
From the suffering he had endured in his distant life, years away from this stupid and pointless Afterlife, he thought he had learned his lesson.
That hope is for fools.
Ha, truly, it is!
Hope is only for those who wish at stars at night and believe in miracles.
Hope is only for those gullible blockheads thinking it's worth the risk, exposing their vulnerable glass hearts for everyone to see and for everyone to freely stomp upon into a thousand tiny miserable pieces.
So why?
Why hope when you very well know it would all be in vain?
Naoi gripped the edge of his desk.
He had lived to learn that some people are born to get all the love, while some are just not. He had lived to find that the meaning of his life was to realize his worthlessness. That even if it was Ayato who lived on, even if it was Ayato who worked hard, even if it was Ayato who underwent through all those hours of rigorous training, Ayato would always, always remain unnoticed.
Forgotten. Dead.
His brother's name would keep on hoarding all the praise and cheer from every art exhibit and Ayato was just there to do his job: be the good spare twin and play the actor.
But so foolishly, in the midst of it all, he had hoped. That someone, someday, a person would look at him and see past the mascot.
And see Ayato Naoi.
How laughable it had all been, really. His life had been nothing but a comedic story of how to trample hope and crush it beneath the shoe, leaving an empty hollow in his heart that he thought had taught him his lesson.
The lesson that if there is no hope, then it logically follows—there would be no misery.
Apparently it is a lesson he has ultimately failed to learn.
He'd been foolish to hope for Tachibana to come.
Such a little act of rejection from someone else should not have this kind of impact to the average person, but Naoi is far from one's average person.
Because he needed it.
He needs it.
He needs Tachibana to come.
It's a basic human desire, one that he'd been denied for so long.
A validation of one's existence.
He feels his anger burst. He lifts a clenched fist and pounds it down on the glass of water near him, smashing it into a thousand, blood-stained smithereens. Broken glass rips through his skin and nerves shriek in agony as dark red blood is extricated from the veins.
They say that that the brain blocks out all the other nerves in the body to highlight the worst damage done to the body, so that the person only registers what needs the quickest attention. They say that it manifests itself into pain that demands and screams for attention, momentarily distracting the person from the needs of the rest of the body.
Naoi breathes hard, but his attention is not directed onto his injured hand.
Apparently, what they say is false.
His mind is barely registering any pain. Even the physical aspects of himself are numbed by the mental anguish that had been plaguing him his entire life. He stares at the door, desperate eyes holding desperate yearning.
His tiny flame of hope flickers. The hand of the grandfather clock loudly ticks the seconds away. That small flame continues to shrink, until, finally, there is nothing left.
Extinguished in a wisp of smoke, vanishing in the void.
And reality comes crashing down.
Face it.
Tachibana had obviously finished doing all the paperwork herself by now.
Tachibana obviously would not need his help anymore.
Maybe she even forgot that she even considered seeking his assistance in the first place.
Or, worse still, perhaps she even forgot who he is.
He brings his bleeding, open hand up before his face. The gore sight of pieces of glass peeking through his flesh greets his eyes.
And he laughs.
He laughs, because this is the only way he knew how to deal with pain—he clenches his hand, tight, tighter, enjoying, relishing, feeling the pain, until he feels the cut edges of glass tear and pierce through the flesh of his hand. More blood gushes out, and it creeps down onto his wrist, staining the edge of the sleeve of his uniform. His nerves are wailing, begging him to stop the mindless torture—
But he laughingly does not allow it.
Better it be physical than mental.
As if the skies are delighted at the feast of blood, thunder cracks and lightning flashes, illuminating the shadows in sharp, frightening contrast around his laughing silhouette.
The more the pain, the more you'll learn your lesson.
Eventually, he leans over his desk, exhausted by his mad laughter. Soft cackles still linger at the edges of his mouth, but, closing his eyes once, he regains command of himself.
He walks out the door.
His posture perfect, his hands at his back, his cap on his head, and not a wrinkled fabric out of place, he walks down the busy halls. It is filled with chattering students, but they fall silent as he breezes past. Murmurs spread out as they observe with shock his bleeding hands.
But Naoi wouldn't be fooled. These are NPCs. Programmed. Artificial. Empty shells of code. He continues to walk forward.
Until, suddenly—
"Na…Naoi…sama?"
Naoi looks down at a girl. She is staring up at him with glistening eyes.
He narrows his own, telling her through his glare to speak up.
What is this about?
The girl clears her throat. She hesitantly reaches out a hand to touch his shoulder.
"A-are you…alri—"
Slap.
The girl withdraws her hand in shock. She holds it close to her and cringes at the pain, all the while looking at Naoi, her widening eyes welling up with tears.
But he isn't looking at her. His head is bowed down so his raven bangs cast shadows upon his face.
His eyes stare fixatedly at the ground.
The hand that he used to slap hers away is still suspended in the air.
Everyone in the hall is stunned into silence.
Naoi brings his hand down, placing it behind him once again.
"I am fine." He glares at all the other nosy onlookers, urging them to go back to minding their own businesses. He looks back at the girl. "Now leave me alone."
Hesitation grows palpable in the air. But it lasts only for a second, because everybody begins their hustles yet again.
Naoi scoffs at the girl before beginning to walk again.
But a hand grabs his wrists to prevent him from going any farther.
He glowers down at her, but he doesn't pull his wrist still in her hand.
"A-Ano…" she begins, and a rosy blush spreads over her wet cheeks. "I was…g-going to confess, b-but—"
With a flick of his wrist, he suddenly grabs onto the girl's instead, reversing their roles. The girl had no time to cry out because Naoi has already yanked her to him, her back against his chest, the fingers of his hand digging onto her shoulder, and the other twisting her hand above her head. She stares at him, horrified—but that in itself is already a grave mistake.
Because once she engaged in eye contact with him, she immediately drowns in a sea of crimson, of glowing red eyes, and Naoi feels her consciousness slipping away—it becomes a struggle for her to stand, because her knees, they are suddenly wobbling.
"Now." His breath prickles her skin, a commanding force hidden behind his low, enchanting tones. "I wonder. Would you tell me how pain feels like?"
She flinches at the way he says his words in a gentle, soothing tone. His words are so softly-spoken that it must feel to her as if he was merely serenading her to sleep.
She opens her mouth as if to ask him what he meant, but suddenly, there it is—
A burning sensation in her muscles, and suddenly, she couldn't move.
A scream is trapped in her throat. She remained still despite wanting to flail.
Of course, the sensation is only in her mind.
This is the power of suggestion.
Naoi grabs her chin vehemently and forces her to face his eyes, his expression growing ever exhilarated at the miserable sight.
"So?" he softly inquires, "How does it feel like?"
But the girl merely whimpers. Literally unable to express it.
Naoi smirks.
How does it feel, to hide your pain?
To wear a mask?
To be unable to scream when it's all you ever want to do?
He knows how it feels like, of course. He had lived his entire life pretending he was completely fine with the idea of being imprisoned inside his room while his brother harboured everything else.
So as he looks down at the girl, at her pathetic attempts at trying to break through the mask he had built for her, trapping her own pain and excruciating her body from inside out, he realizes that this…
The electrifying sensation of making someone else feel the misery he went through…
The joy of seeing it suffered through by someone else…
The refreshing, maddening current of witnessing someone else suffer under the shadow of his influence…
This feels delightful.
"Please," she whimpers to him in bathed breath, as if struggling to keep afloat on the surface of a vast ocean. She raises her head to look at him, but does so in quiet pain. "Stop this, N-Naoi-sama. What did I ever do to—"
Naoi twists her wrist and raises it even higher into the air, causing her to flinch and fall with her weight onto him. He smirks at the effect. A malicious wickedness igniting the fire in his mesmerizing eyes, he nears his face to hers. With the mere force of will, he shuts out all sort of noise from the girl's perception, filtering through only a ringing sound of silence.
"Listen," he sneers, savouring the feeling of having a brilliant idea. He knows it, he knows it is gratuitous, but what did it matter? He is in control, and this is just a doll—not even human. "There is…a way for you to stop this pain. Do you know the topmost floor of this building?"
She nods.
His smirk grows large.
"Well, you could walk out to the terrace." His lips almost touch her ear when he whispers the final blow.
"And fly."
With a last, scornful sneer, he thrusts her onto the ground with a force that tore her away from his command, and whatever perverted bond that had formed in the brief minutes of their encounter is savagely ripped apart and he knows the girl is left torn apart.
The girl is breathless. She turns to look back at him in hate, but her shrunken pupils, as tiny as pinpricks, are all the assurance Naoi needed to confirm that his charming, sweet words of silent murder are effective.
Tears stream down her face.
Naoi looks around.
He finds everyone else accusatively staring at him.
And suddenly, he feels the electricity in his veins shrivel into horror.
He takes a step back. His eyes widen as he took sight of his own hands, one of which remained a bloody mess. These hands that had just imprisoned someone else and forced her to do something she didn't want to. These hands that just took control over something he is never meant to touch.
The girl in question is now being surrounded by other girls who are trying to comfort her from her tears. The other boys in the hall remained standing, staring daggers at Naoi.
His gaze hardens once again. He clenches his fists by his side, anger once again washing over him.
He adjusts his cap.
And stomps away.
Fine.
Keep your pathetic school of afterdeath.
He does not belong here.
He never did.
He never belonged anywhere.
Not here, not in the real world—
Nowhere.
These thoughts are the plague.
The plague in his own mind.
And they are stabbing him, again and again, each a sharp pain that drew out fresh streams of agony.
He flees. He flees from the student hallways.
He runs down the stairs.
Rushes through the dark hallways with shadows haunting his every step—
He stumbles.
Picks himself up again, quickens his pace.
His eyes grow turbulent.
Thoughts swirl around and around and they swallow him up whole, a hurricane ripping apart his barricade of masks—
He didn't belong anywhere.
He was just a stupid piece of mishap.
A mistake.
A supposedly non-existent mistake.
Like a car colliding against a massive truck, like a crashing place, or even a hurtling meteor, he is unwanted.
An accident.
He was never supposed to be here in the first place.
He struggles to keep himself intact.
He walks fast, faster, faster still.
Footsteps echo dissonantly against the grey walls.
His fists clench and unclench by his sides.
Rage boils in his blood.
And he keeps on walking, walking, because if he ever stopped, he knows his agony would be able to catch up to him.
It had always been him. His brother.
It was never he.
It was never him who worked hard, never him who existed, never him who lived.
And he had to keep saying that to himself.
He had to keep saying that to himself, or else he'd begin to hope again.
To hope that someone would come and rescue him.
Because he would never admit it to himself, but he is lost.
Naoi trips over his own feet and he falls against the wall. He is heaving, his chest rising and falling in heavy rhythm. Desperately, he searched the dark walls that seemed to enclose him, constrict him, narrower and narrower until finally—
He turns the hidden doorknob and stumbles right outside.
He pushes his way out the backdoor, out onto the wet pavement, wilted feet mindlessly pattering against watery puddles. He walks further outside to stand in the middle of the storm, wild eyes staring through torrents showering over the dark campus. Trees sway, twigs fly, and dormitories flicker with nightlights.
He pants.
His hands fall limply by his sides.
…you were the one who died.
He stops walking, and like a drunken man his eyes are glazed over.
He stands there.
And like the girl whose life he'd just destroyed, all control he has over himself vanishes.
Tears fall from his eyes.
He lifts a hand, stares at it for a moment, and watches as his hot tears drop onto his cold skin.
One by one.
And he lets his hand cover his eyes.
He feels weakness seize his knees and he falls onto the concrete with a splash.
His cap is knocked away by the winds.
As he kneels there, the rain continues to pour.
He stares at the reflection staring back at him from the murky puddle of water before him.
Face it, the reflection told him.
You are on your own.
He lifts his face up to the sobbing sky. He gulps down the lump on his throat.
And he lets the tears stream down his face, lets them mix with the rainwater, lets the weather help him mask his pain.
Because he is too cowardly to truly break out of his hiding place.
This is what made him Naoi Ayato.
And he hated it.
No matter what, he thinks. Don't be that useless little boy who mattered to no one.
He spends an eternity, sitting there, drenching himself in the rain.
Then, he picks up his cap.
…Stands.
He looks up at the sky, letting the rainwater continuously stream down his passive face—and whether or not they were tears, no one would ever know.
Be someone else.
Because, somehow, people only respected, obeyed, feared Naoi Ayato…
…whenever he wasn't Naoi Ayato.
He puts his cap back on.
He lets a smile grace his face as some sort of sense tingles inside his brain, and he doesn't know, but the girl he met from earlier—
Oh, she flew.
The smile morphs into a smirk.
And he bursts out laughing in the rain.
This…this feeling.
The power. The control. The chokehold over lives.
How addicting.
If he is going to throw his identity entirely, why just be Student Council Vice President Naoi Ayato?
He is, after all, perfectly capable of being god.
Tachibana Kanade stumbles into the Student Council room, shuts the door, and heavily leans against it.
She had been preparing the words "My apologies for the delay," but it seems that there is no one left in the room to hear it.
She shuts her eyes close. Lets her body slide down to the floor.
She clutches the bullet wound on her waist. Blood seeps through her fingers.
The last thought to enter her mind is the fact that she still has to do her paperwork before ultimately passing out.
~fin.
Original word count: 4482.
Word count after revision: 3907.