Remember the CD that Teshigawara and Mochizuki left behind in the locker , right at the end of the final the episode , and remember how we heard the final words of it. This is just me trying to fill in the rest.
Enjoy!
"Shall we start?" Kouichi Sakakibara looked around at Naoya Teshigawara , Yuuya Mochizuki and Mei Misaki , all of them sitting in front of the CD player. His finger hovered over the record button.
In sync , they all put his finger down , pressing the record button .
"If…if you are listening to this, there are two things that we can be certain of. One, you are also member of class 3, grade 3, like we were once and Two, that for you , it is a year that the curse has happened.
We are some of the survivors from the class of 1998:
Yuuya Mochizuki
Naoya Teshigawara
Mei Misaki
And me, Kouichi Sakakibara. The transfer student .You are probably surprised that a transfer student would be put into class 3, but it happened. It gets complicated though.
This year, they had all the seats needed for the class, until Sakakibara-kun transferred. So I became the non-existent student .But this year, that didn't work. You probably know that for it to work, the person must be made non-existent at the year's start.
It's not like we knew it then though. We thought it was Sakaki's fault , for talking to we made him non-existent too.
But, that didn't help either. Our homeroom teacher...He…he committed suicide in July. In front of us all.
So they made me and Misaki-san exists again. But that's not what you want to know about really, is it? We know you are listening, hoping to find a way to stop the calamity mid-year. Like we did. You may know about what happened this year. On our summer trip, a lot of people died. A fire broke out, students went on a rampage. More people than what were needed for curse that month.
It results from a tape. A tape from 15 years ago, the year we were born. Like with us, the class went to the shrine to pray for a release from the curse. On the way down however, it started to rain, and a storm started. One boy carrying an umbrella got electrocuted, and another girl fell off the mountain. Then, the boy, Katsuma Matsunaga, who is the speaker on this old tape, had an argument with another classmate. It ended badly, with the other boy dying. Terrified, he ran and left him. But the next day he went there, and the body had dissapereared, and nobody remembered him.
In other words, he killed the dead extra that year.
Yeah. And the last words on that tape were "Return the dead back to dead. That's how to stop the calamity once it has started."
But there was the pressing issue, of if one of us could really kill a classmate. Then I shared the tape with two other members of the class. Then one of them, a girl who had been left traumatised by the death of a boy she cared for, broadcast the tape to all the class. Telling them all to "Return the dead back to the dead."
Claiming I was the dead one.
Clearly though, Mei Misaki was NOT the dead one. Sure, she has a bit of a weird personality, but that doesn't necessarily make someone dead-besides, she knew something that the rest of us didn't. And this was…
The identity of the dead one. And while I won't tell you how it is she knows, since it is an extremely slim chance that someone in your class would have the same …attribute that allowed her to do this, but I can tell you who the dead one was. Her name was Reiko Mikami, our assistant homeroom teacher. My Aunt. She had actually died a year and a half previously. Murdered by someone unknown. This time round, I killed her. Returned her to the dead. It is this, and all that went on during the trip that still haunts me now, haunts Misaki-san now, and haunts us all now. But the advice still remains the same.
Return the dead….
…Back to the dead, because…That's how to stop the calamity. How you interpret this is up to you. Just carefully consider your actions. Think it through, and discuss it with your friends...so you'll have no regrets."
Shaking slightly, Kouichi pressed the stop button.
"No regrets." Mei repeated into the silence that remained. Kouichi took a glance at her, hugging her knees to her chest, face betraying nothing. Then at Yuuya and Naoya, sitting opposite them two. Both Yuuya and Mei hadn't said that much, but surprisingly, it was she who had said more out of them both.
"That doesn't apply to us, that are for sure." Yuuya gave a hollow laugh.
Naoya shrugged
"Well, at least we have done this now. Hopefully in the years to come it will help, nee, Sakaki?"
"Yeah."For a moment, they all stayed mute, each thinking about the regrets they carried
"We're going to miss you, are you going back to Tokyo then?"
Glad to move on to another subject, he replied
"Tomorrow afternoon." Kouichi reached for the CD player, ejected the CD, put it in the cover.
"You'd best keep in touch. Visit sometimes , even. "
"Consider it a definite. Infact , you should visit me in Tokyo sometime. Misaki-san is already going to.2
"Oh really now?" Naoya had a teasing look to his face.
Kouichi blushed.
"You, shut up. We were talking about it when we were non-existent."
"Ahh…."
"Where are we going to put this then?" Yuuya got up, picked the CD up and looked at it.
"Where we found the tape, of course."
Yuuya grinned. "Thought so, Teshigawara-kun, are you coming? We should get going now. "
"Of course," Naoya got up, "Misaki-san, are you coming?"
She didn't respond.
"Misaki-san?"
"Huh?"
Kouichi turned his head slightly to see what Mei was up to .His expression softened, Naoya raised an eyebrow and Yuuya giggled.
Mei had fallen asleep, her head slightly leaning on Kouichi's shoulder, one arm limp by her side, the other still hugging her knees. Kouichi put his arm around her, pulling her in closer. She didn't stir. He listened to her breathing, and then looked up.
"I'd see you guys out, but."
Naoya and Yuuya grinned. Exchanged a knowing glance and looked back at their two friends.
"No problem. We can see ourselves out you know. Just have a safe journey, and keep safe!"
"Keep in touch or ELSE!" Naoya pulled a mock-evil face.
"Oh, I will no worries."
The two of them walked out, waving. Kouichi used his free arm to wave, and smiled.
Yeah, I had to add that random cute bit in. I assume it was clear that different paragraphs/lines in the recording were being said by different people, but mainly Kouichi? If not , I'm happy to help clear it up.
Hope you liked this. Please review