Betrayal
His slip from humanity was noticeable. He came and went without as much as a word, and the more time he spent in his speechless state, the more distant he became. When confronted, it was said that it was only a small conflict, that Neku would be fine. An easy lie, but not a believable one. Neku was slowly leaving them, and not even Joshua could hide that.
He seemed to be a ghost, wandering around without much drive or passion, just a small goal that kept him moving. His friends tried to snap him out of it, but it was difficult, and they were uncertain of what would happen to him if they got him to speak.
So they treaded lightly. They spoke soft and smiled and lead him to where he needed to go, and warned him of the places he shouldn't go. Whatever had happened to him had broken him, and minds were not easy instruments to mend.
It was the nearing dawn when he appeared in her room, his face white as ash, and his clothing tattered, sticking to his abdomen from the mixture of blood and sweat. It was only a natural reaction for her to scream, and once she did she felt terrible. The way he looked at her suggested that he understood what was happening, and that he was ashamed that he'd frightened her.
Nevertheless, her father came knocking a few moments later, and she had no excuse for why there was a mute boy bleeding out on her floor. All she could say was that he was her friend and that he'd been through something awful.
That was all she knew. Neku had become an even bigger mystery to her than when they had first met, and he hadn't even known who he was then. The fact that no one knew whether he was still human was always gnawing their thoughts whenever he was near, and his silence only made them wonder more. What if it wasn't Neku, just something with his face? That begged the question, what had happened to him anyway? Joshua would not answer when asked.
She'd driven off her father by clinging to Neku and screaming hysterically, rambling without thought or care. She was half asleep, and worry was knotting up in her stomach too quickly for her to stand. Once he was gone, she let herself breathe, and she sunk to her knees beside Neku.
"What happened?" she breathed. "Idiot! I told you not to go to them!"
He shook his head as she pushed his shirt from his shoulders. It slipped away easily, falling to the carpet in shreds. She stood up when her father came in again, this time with a bowl of water and a cloth. She nodded to him gratefully, but he simply eyes Neku with distrust before backing away.
"I'm calling the police, Shiki."
Once she might have protested. But she knew that a higher power wouldn't allow Neku to deal with pesky human justice. No, he'd go to the hospital and be gone before any decent person was awake.
She leaned him against the wall, checking his pockets for his phone. His lips twitched and he grumbled, grabbing her arms with his bloodied hands. She pushed him away, her fingers already flicking away at the screen. He hadn't thought to delete his last messages.
"If I called this number," she said, glancing up at him, "what would happen?"
His eyes widened, and he shook his head. Don't, his eyes said. Don't do it. But she was too enraged by the fact that someone was hurting Neku, and he had no objection to it. The message was simple, but formal, carrying itself like an invitation rather than an order. It was made of something more powerful than a Mission Text, as if a threat wasn't even needed at the end. The message itself was enough to chill blood.
"Is it Joshua?"
That got a startling response. He laughed, his eyes rolling and a grimace pulling at his lips. He held his bleeding wounds, and shook his head again. Shiki wasn't surprised. Joshua was many things, but evil was not one of them. He simply made bad decisions with good intentions.
She sighed and focused on the phone again. She made a choice quickly by dialing her number, and she held the phone between her cheek and shoulder as she began to scrub at the blood caked against the muscles of Neku's abdomen.
"Hello?" The response was groggy and irritated, and Shiki was sure she'd lash out. "If you're not my school calling to say that, like, a freak snow storm hit and classes are cancelled, then please hang up."
"What?" Shiki barely understood her friend's slurred words, but she knew the girl was probably pissed. "Eri, it's me, I need a favor." Neku watched her with an alert expression, his eyes on her lips. They trailed upward to her forehead.
"Oh god," Eri groaned. "Shiki? Do you have any idea what time it is? I only just got to sleep! Like, two hours ago!"
"Eri, please, this is important, Neku's hurt." Scraping away the dryer bits of blood revealed the shape of the gash, and Shiki leaned back. "I'm going to take a picture, and I want you to look it up and tell me what it is."
There was a scuffling on the other line, and a few soft swears before a reluctant agreement. Shiki bit her lip and wiped her hand off on the carpet, hoping it would steady long enough for her to snap the photo. "Whose phone are you on?" Eri asked, shuffling.
"Neku's," she said. "Get on your computer."
"Sure thing, would you like me to do anything else? Sing a musical number, maybe? I'm going to blame my lack of sleep on you tomorrow, just so you know."
"I'm sending it right now." Shiki was exhausted, and confused, but she wasn't disoriented enough to not sense Eri's bitterness. Neku was still watching her with wide eyes, and she wondered if he even felt the pain. The silence that fell on them after the photo chilled her spine, and she adjusted her glasses just to hear the metal move.
"What the hell is this?" Eri's voice was shrill enough to make Neku wince as he played with the flap of his sneakers.
"Neku," Shiki sighed, walking to the door and quickly shutting it. "Just please look it up. Quick, actually, I'm in a hurry."
"Why can't you?" Even as Eri said this Shiki could hear the sound of a keyboard clacking, and she smiled a little.
"I'd have to go into another room, and I can't leave him. Look, I'm tired too, but this is really important!" Neku shifted behind her, struggling to his feet.
"Okay, okay, I'm getting results, hold on." Eri paused while Shiki turned to face her friend, who was still watching her with an eerie gaze. It was about now that Shiki longed for the sound of his voice, for his quips and disinterested tone. "It's like… it's an alchemical thingy."
Shiki leaned her back against her door. "Which one?" The symbol that had been carved into Neku's chest had been simple, at least, but she had no idea what it could represent. She thought an arrow might symbolize hunting, but she didn't know what that had to do with alchemy, or the higher plane.
"Phosphorus," Eri yawned. "Is he going to be okay? You might want to get some treatment for that, 'cause that can get infected real fast. Get him help."
"There is no help for him." She knew she'd said those words, but she didn't quite believe them. She hung up the phone just as Neku approached her, one hand in his pocket, the other extended. He jerked his chin at her, his index finger landing in the middle of her forehead.
"What?" she asked, raising her fingers to the spot. She glanced down at his chest, noticing the scars of other symbols that had been etched there. "You have to stop this, Neku. You know that, right?"
He nodded, his hand dropping back to his side. His expression was pained now, drifting between confused, scared, and angry. If this new Neku was anything, it was an enigma. Before the incident, he'd gotten much better at opening up and telling people what he really thought. It was all a waste.
His phone vibrated in her palm, and he reached for it. She stepped away from him immediately, her eyes on the screen. Her heart began to beat faster, and another scream came to her throat, but she didn't dare let it out.
Kill her.
No reason why, no indication on who had sent the message. When Shiki looked up at him, he was standing very still, and she wondered if she could smash the phone before she got to it. She couldn't understand this Neku, and she did not know what he would do if he read the message. Or maybe she just didn't want to know.
She hid the phone behind her when he stepped forward, and he paused again. Her head was pounding, and her heartbeat was echoing in her ears, and she understood the magnitude of whatever was about to happen. She'd always trusted Neku, and some part of her still did, even when he slid the knife from his pocket.
The sound of his voice made her knees give way, and she felt tears on her cheeks. "I know what it says," he said quietly. It was like it hadn't changed. His voice sounded sarcastic, and heavy with irritation, but underneath it she heard regret and sadness too. This terrified her, because it meant that… maybe this really was Neku. She would happily accept that he was gone if it meant that it wasn't him doing this.
In her heart she'd seen this coming. It was only a matter of time before he handed one of them over, and out of the four of them, there was Joshua, untouchable, Rhyme, who'd grown into something strangely malicious when it came to the higher powers, Beat, who was too afraid of Neku to be anywhere alone with him, and Shiki, who trusted him the most.
He reached over her head and locked the door. And then, carefully, he placed the very tip of the blade against her forehead, where he'd had his finger moments earlier. She closed her eyes and clamped her hand over her mouth to keep herself from screaming, because if her father came Neku would kill him too, and she couldn't bear the thought of it, not now, not with the cold steel of her death pressing against her brain.
She looked up at him once, just one last time, because she had to, or she wanted to, or she needed to, she wasn't sure. She felt herself shaking with sobs, and blood blurred her vision with tears. The thought of running and fighting was beaten away when she realized how hopeless that would be. He had a knife to her head, and he was definitely faster and stronger than she was.
"Neku," she gasped as he grabbed her neck. "Please… don't kill me, please…"
Joshua couldn't save her, not with this. When she'd died the first time it had happened too fast, and her second chance had come before she could even digest the fact that she'd died. But now she felt it, the creeping hand of death as it inched closer and closer, and the finality of it crushed her lungs.
"You'll be happier." His voice was different now, clouded and vacant of emotions. This wasn't Neku… it couldn't be. "I'm going to send you to our Father."
"Oh god." She clamped her hand over her mouth again as he smiled.
"Exactly," he said, and he smiled as he gripped her neck tighter. He pressed the knife deeper into her forehead, and she found that her hand did nothing to muffle her screams.
Letter B in my 'Dani's Death Alphabet' challenge. My reaction to reading this is probably the same as yours. WHAT THE FUCK?
When I finished this it was almost five in the morning, and as you'd expect I really wasn't sure what I was writing. But I did mean for it to turn out the way it did, because I needed to kill someone off. Death Alphabet, guys. I was actually sticking to favorite characters, but I think I like Shiki enough that I can kill her off in this thing.
I really wish I could explain what's happening, but to be honest, I don't want to. Let your imagination go wild with this shit, I REALLY HAVE NO IDEA WHAT'S HAPPENING HERE.
I'm going to add something interesting in terms of the differences between my A and B. In the story I did for A, I was genuinely sad when I finished it, and maybe even ready to cry. When I finished this I was laughing hysterically because it was almost five am and I was super giddy about finishing this thing. Or I was just fucking crazy.