Prologue
"Maria-san! Please take care of Ojou-sama in my absence!" I yell frantically.
"HAYAATEEE-"
But the scream is cut off. The pale, golden, thread-like tendrils surround me completely as I am hoisted high into the air. They form a very tight knit around me, muffling out all surrounding sound. They wrap themselves around my outstretched arms and legs like yarn wound around a spindle, covering my butler uniform. I struggle against the tendrils in vain; it was over when they had me completely encapsulated. All I can see in front of me is an undulating sea of woven gold. The tendrils give off a faint glow like the sun rising through a misty morning. Specks of white drift softly in my field of vision and a soft ring fills my ears. My squirming seems to have agitated the tendrils, as they contract forcefully, binding me like a snake binds its prey.
The tendrils wrapped around my body begin to glow a venomous yellow, and from within my body hundreds of little "bits," palm sized, translucent white, and star shaped, begin to pour out. The surrounding mass of tendrils quickly starts absorbing the emitted star-like bits, whisking them away into the depths of their coils. Sometimes, before being sucked away, a star-like bit would pop open and display an image that was apparently hidden inside. I saw images of me being bullied throughout childhood, images of me working various seedy jobs, images of my parents squandering my hard-earned money, and images of me being sold off to the yakuza. As images from my rotten childhood continued to disappear into the depths of the coiling tendrils, I slowly realized that these images would never bother me again. The thought of that made me happy since these images only brought me sadness.
But after a while, different images started to appear from within the ever outpouring star-like bits. I saw an image of Nagi-ojou-sama, standing in front of a vending machine on a cold Christmas night, wearing my rough and oversized jacket with such a warm smile on her face. I saw an image of Maria-san, on that same Christmas night, wrapping her warm scarf around me with the smile of a saint. I saw an image of Hinagiku-san, standing in a tall tree, too scared to climb down but too vain to show it. And I saw an image A-tan, standing in that field of flowers, the same one we first met in, nearly ten years after our last encounter. Seeing these images- these memories, since I figured these images must be my own memories, made me happy because they are memories I have with people that make me truly happy. But then I quickly realized that to see these memories now means that I will never see them again, since they are disappearing into- being eaten by the surrounding tendrils, as surely that is what the tendrils around me are doing. My memories of my precious people are being eaten by the tendrils.
At this, I begin to scream. I scream at the tendrils, begging them to stop eating my memories. I scream at my own memories, begging them not to leave me all alone. I screamed and screamed, and screamed, but all that exited my mouth was incomprehensible noise. Perhaps the tendrils have already eaten my ability to speak communicable words, or perhaps they have eaten my ability to understand them. What's certain is that the tendrils have been eating more than just my memories. Regardless, I continue to scream and scream because screaming is the only resistance I could offer the tendrils when already bound so tightly.
After a while, I stopped screaming. Whether it was because I chose not to scream, or if it was because my ability to scream had been eaten, I did know. Neither did I care, perhaps because my ability to care has also been eaten. All that I have left are my most recent memories and my most basic of brain functions, and all I can do with those two is watch and vaguely comprehend as the last of my memories are extracted from me. I no longer even recognize the contents of my own memories; I simply watch with the passivity of an uninvolved observer.
I see two girls in matching pink uniforms, one taller with long, straight pink hair and the other shorter with blonde twin ponytails, berating me as we walk in the sunset while a third girl, with tied-up brown hair and wearing a frilly black and white dress, cheerfully greets us in front of an old fashioned apartment. I see nothing but darkness, but can hear a rushing sound and three distinct voices yelling beside me. I see a light lavender sky that slowly fades to deep indigo as it recedes away from a central point, the indigo portion dotted with tiny white points of light. I see three female figures, pink-haired, brown-haired, and blonde, lying prone in a barren, rocky landscape, their bright hair and clothes contrasting with the deep mauve that colors the ground. I see a lone pillar rising into the sky, and fanning out from the top are pale, golden, thread like tendrils that cover the sky like a massive umbrella. Finally, I see myself tackling a bundle of tendrils that have converged on the blonde and the brown-haired, only to find myself caught by the tendrils, and then shouting something incomprehensible, and then barely hearing something screamed back.
And with my last and most recent memory devoured by the tendrils, I am surrounded by darkness. Whether it is because I have nothing left to see, I lack the ability to see, or simply chose not to see, it did not matter. Even though I could no longer hear, the silence around me was deafening. My mind is devoid of emotion, memory, personality, character, dreams, beliefs, morals, and values. My mind exists as a single thought process amidst a sea of darkness, nothingness, and silence. And as its first thought, my new empty mind realizes how unbearably meaningless it is to exist as a single thought process. So my mind decides to self-terminate. And so, even as I feel the tendrils around me loosening and unraveling, with my eyes already closed, I tell myself to sleep.