Astraea Hill has always been a haven for innocence, for budding love devoid of exploitation, devoid of degenerate lust and devoid of the dark touch the rest of the world laid upon everything sweet and innocent. The girls, towering and small, shy and blossoming, hesitant and assertive, have found friends and lovers along the borders of these trees, along the gentle white pathways back and forth from the dormitories, and in the hidden groves beyond the brick walls. Every tree holds the private memories of lovers, who crept away to commit their tender-hearted passion physically and emotionally, for only the stars to witness.
However, further beyond the majestic groves of trees that belonged to the lovers, there were darker woods still. No longer connected to Astraea Hill, and left to be touched by the rest of the darker world. All the coarseness and brutal envy spreads forth like roots and tendrils of a dark monster, coveting the hearts of girls not yet touched by love. It is here where the flowery strawberry romances end, and the despair begins. The turmoil spreading out gluttonously, looking for a way back into the sweet world of the girl's dormitories, and erase the last place in the world where true love could exist.
Twenty years before the Amane and Hikari joined together as etoiles, long before the fall of the sickly Kaori and long before the arrival of the girls you knew today, is where our story begins.
Tendrils of the wicked world planted a single seed of despair and overwhelming desire in a starry-eyed girl, bearing a bright white Spica uniform, tainted with the wrongness that was another girl's blood. Beside her was the one who shed blood, dressed in torn leggings, her sleepwear attacked by the sharp branches that caught upon her repeatedly, as she was drug to this hidden opening in the forest.
"Kazusa...why are you doing this to me?!" she whimpered out, her golden hair being the only color to stand out amongst the hues of black and grey in this lightless dungeon of a forest. The moon seemed to only paint her skin a shade of dead blue, to contrast her against the rest of her surroundings. "Kazusa! Answer me! I thought you were my friend!" she pleaded with the uniformed girl standing above her, her whimpering arms tied with a rope to keep her submitted to her captor.
The black haired Kasuza shook her head, peeking through her bangs with only a single blue eye. All doubt and empathy that once floated there was gone. "I'm sorry my dear Eri-chan. I wish I could've warned you not to care about me, to move along. There were many better girls you could've given your heart to, and you chose me. Like me, you fell in love with a person who didn't love you..." She let out a labored, pitiful laugh. Bordering on the edge of evil, and heartbroken. A laugh that was not truly malicious or dark, but somber, and almost like a cry. A last cry of one who would commit such a terrible deed to get what she wanted the most. To earn love that was impossible by any other means.
"It's not too late...we can go back...I promise I won't tell the headmothers. Just let us leave this evil place, together! Don't fall to the temptation of that demon..." Eri's cries began to get louder as she shook her tied-up arms, and tried to flail her weakened body enough to get away. It was all for naught though. The forest had weakened her on the way here. It was like the branches, with their sharpened ends and grasping arms, wanted to harm her. They prodded at her bare skin and tore at it as she kicked bare foot through crusty leaves and splintering thatch.
"Eri-chan...tell me...what would you have given, to be my one and true love?" Kasuza spoke, gazing off into the blackest reaches of the forest, devoid of any moonlight. The forest stayed silent, hushing its leaves and stirring branches to hear her answer. Eri whimpered to herself, prying out her answer through her shivering lips, her arms lowered to her barely covered chest. "I would give my everything for you...I would carve your name into my skin, into the oceans, into the moon, just to prove my worth to you. You are my angel Kasuza...so please, will you be my angel this one time? Please rescue me from this evil place..." Kasuza shook her head in consigned apathy. It was too late now.
"I'm sorry, but the only angel I can be to you now, Eri, is one of death. I'm so sorry, but I have to do this. I've come too far to stop now." Kasuza let go of Eri and let her fall to her knees in the middle of the soggy clearing, and the winds and growls of the forest began to roar once again. "Remi, I have brought my payment. Please take her away into the forest." Kasuza stepped away, and Eri broke into a panic of survival and rage. As she reared up on her worn down legs, shivering but filled with trepidation, filled with such unbearable betrayal that she wanted to lash out with every fiber of her body, she found she could not move anymore. She gazed towards Kasuza with malice, and heartbreak. She really did use her as a tithe, as a payment for a dark deal. "Did I really mean...so little to you?" she spoke out, as a wicked figure rose behind her, and placed its pitch-black hands across the girl's neck, measuring her as if she was going to place a necklace around her head.
The form began to emerge from the inky darkness with an inhuman luminosity, the tentacles forming into gentle glowing hands adorned in black gauntlet gloves that stretched all the way up her arm, the soft hum of a seductress voice whispering into Eri's ear. "Don't take it so personally dear...you're coming to a much better place." The feminine shadow's face pushed away bangs and gazed with hungry eyes that did not belong in such a sweet world, that should not have stared so lustfully at a pure-hearted girl like Eri. This was Remi, a demoness adorned in an open back dress that trailed off like the fins of a wretched siren or the cape of a wraith, and behind her were the most impressive features. Those wicked monstrous wings, a fusion of demon's leather and animalistic membrane, things that made the skin of both girls crawl with a feeling of foreboding wrongness. Such a human looking being should not have those. Yet here she was, and she was going to collect her sacrifice.
"Kasuza! I loved you! Did I really mean so little to you!?" screamed Eri, as monstrous branches and vines began to creep from the forest, and wrap around Remi's new acquisition, preparing her for the plunge into an unknown hell. Kasuza began to shiver, in the Spica uniform that should've kept even the most pervasive winds away. This was not a shiver of coldness, but the last memories of Eri being sucked away. The time they first met in the church. The time that they had eaten lunches together, when they had sat next to each other when the torrent of rain kept them locked underneath a tree, and touched hands. When Eri looked to Kasuza for the first time, and dreamed of a kiss that would never come. When Eri let Kasuza lean her face into her chest to cry for a love that she would never have, and hope that someday, Kasuza would come to love her instead.
These memories had to go to, she had to free herself from them, or going through Remi's deal would absolutely destroy her. "Yes...because I love Maaya-chan, and I can't go on in this terrible world, knowing she's not mine." Kasuza cried for Maaya-chan. She cried for the girl that the universe seemed to keep away from her. Every pained moment she watched her beloved redhead love somebody else, felt like a monstrous wrongness, like a sickle in her chest that cut deeper and deeper with every moment that Maaya spoke "I love you" to somebody else. There is no other way to have her. This is it. "Goodbye, Eri-chan." Kasuza shuddered and fought the tears that came, as if she was wrestling with a monster in the back of her head, threatening to break out.
Eri screamed, and with a wisp of her hand, Remi guided the poor girl into the edges of the forest, consumed completely and forever. Remi smiled, and glided across the ground without a step to Kasuza. She opened her hand, and placed a pendant of etched gold and a black teardrop jewel in her palm. "Your sweet Maaya-chan, is all paid for. Her heart belongs to you now." The wicked demoness smiled, and with that, she vanished into the forest, taking the noise and roar of the surroundings with her, leaving only Kasuza alone.
Kasuza shuddered at the horrors she had committed to the one who loved her, but soon, the girl that once sat underneath the tree with her, that cried into her chest, that thought that she could've chosen different, slowly died, and became no more. Only a crazed shell stood there in the tainted whiteness of her uniform, shaking her hands with the black pendant in her hands, laughing as her madness consumed her. A crazed heart-sick, wide-eyed expression and the insanity of desire and lust remained, as she screamed out to the moon, her only witness, of her horrid crime.
She screamed out until her vocal cords quivered, ill-omened and overfull in madness. "I've finally done it! Maaya-chan finally loves me! I'll never be alone again!"
Once upon a time, a girl wanting nothing more than to turn the World that Could Have Been, into a real place, felt the weight of a seed in her hand, that could make it all come true.
"Yaya-chan!" a soft voice echoed through the bright green grass and tickled the ears of a dark haired girl, wanting nothing more to be left alone. When she saw that it was Hikari running across the grass to meet her, her knife-sharp eyes relaxed, and seemed to flow with approval and happiness at the sight. "Hello Hikari-san, what brings you to my spot with such overwhelming energy?" Yaya replied, breaking from the wall and twirling in the grass on her feet, ready to welcome her sweet-faced friend.
"Your spot? I thought it was my spot too!" she huffed, playfully rocking back and forth on her feet. "Ah yes, I forgot how you claimed your spot. However, all of this..." Yaya raised her hands, signifying all of the bright grass that stretched on from the wall. "...is mine. Your spot is over there." Yaya pointed to the tuft closest to the shrubs that was a mix of sweet Astraea Hill grass, and the wilds beyond. Hikari made small, cute fists and wiggled them in front of her. "What? You made my half smaller again!? How could you Yaya-chan..." she made the irresistible cute face, feigning tears and sniffling. "I won't have anywhere to sit if this keeps up...you're so cruel." she whimpered again, eventually melting Yaya's heart and making her cave in.
"Okay, okay, I renounce my selfish claim, and have formally decided to merge our lands together. Your half is my half, and vice versa. We shall share the secret spot." Hikari cheered, and Yaya smiled. She missed being able to make Hikari smile. There was something heavenly about Hikari that Yaya was only able to put a finger on in certain times. No, there was something sacred about this girl. Her beautiful face was a work of perfection, one that you could stare into forever, and let your heart be completely consumed by. It made you want to protect it from the despairs of the world, to hold it in your hands as it shuddered and cradle it. Don't cry, sweet Hikari. I will be your guardian. She remembered the incidents Hikari between Kaname, a girl too aggressive and antagonistic to be left alone with her sweet crush, and that drove her into a protective state every since. There were people who could harm her angel, and she would never allow it.
"Yaya-chan? wake up." Yaya responded to the calls of Hikari. "I'm sorry, I was just remembering something. That time with Kaname..." A slightly somber mood fell over the both of them. Like Hikari always could, she broke the somberness with her cheerful and happy energy. "I'm not mad at her for it though. I forgave her, just like I forgave you, Yaya." She let an honest smile stretch across her face, that almost brought Yaya into tears. Right. Yaya had tried to force herself onto Hikari. How hypocritical she felt in that moment, thinking of herself as a heroine, only to become the next hound who lusted for her and tried to force her desires upon someone else. She pushed it away with as much fortitude as possible. Not without a shudder in her breath though. "Hikari..." was all she managed to say.
"You don't need to beat yourself up over the past, Yaya-chan. You are my best friend, and I'll always be here for you. I know your hiding places, and when you shy away from everything, I'll be here to bring you back. I'll support you like you supported me. I'm the etoile after all." Hikari flexed her arms, letting her white uniform ripple as the teardrop pendant around her neck danced across her chest. "Lord Etoile, guardian of all the dormitories, representative supreme! I get to be your protector now!" They both shared a laugh, and Hikari grabbed Yaya's hand. "Alone time is over, come eat with me and Amane in the grove!" Yaya was dragged from the sulking privacy of her spot, and pulled back into the sugary world of Astraea Hill once again.
Amane welcomed the both of them, and they all retreated into the grove with picnic supplies in hand. In all of her sophisticated glory, Amane happily swept her fellow etoile from the ground and nuzzled her, petting her along the head and securing a kiss on her cheek. Together the three of them found a perfect spot along the side of the waters to enjoy their food. "Won't we get in trouble for being here though?" Yaya asked, narrowing her eyebrow at Amane and Hikari. They both tilted their heads at Yaya, and almost perfectly synchronized, they pulled out their jeweled necklaces and smiled. "Oh! Right. Etoile privileges." They all laughed together, skipping rocks across the waters. In a fervor of competition, Yaya locked eyes with Amane. "I skipped it more than yours, dear Etoile." She smiled with playful impishness, and Amane accepted the challenge. "It's only because I am sitting down. Let us stand equally across the bank and do a real test." With her tongue poking from her lips, she measured the angle of her hand, and flung a rock across the surface, making it bounce 4 times. "Alright, you are next my-" Yaya interrupted Amane with a quick flick of her hand, and made the rock bounce 1,2,3,4...and 5 times across the surface. Amane blinked with surprise.
"Can you one up that, my prince?" Yaya snatched a rock from the ground and with playful sinisterness awaited for Amane to respond. "Oh no my dear princess, it would be wrong to stop now." Yaya and Amane continued their game of skipping rocks, some sinking before 5, and others sprawling across the water so distortedly it was hard to count the amount of splashes. "I think -huff- that last one was 7." responded Amane, her arms on her knees as she caught her breath. The amount of rocks they threw spanned over twenty minutes, and they emptied the beach they were on. Yaya held her hand in pain, pink with the rush of blood of flicking her hand too hard. "I don't know, give yourself some credit, it might've been 8."
"I thought you would've said 5, and accuse me of faking my score." Yaya rolled her eyes. "Hey, I'm not that bitter!" Yaya stuck her tongue out playfully, as she matched Amane in her position. "Well, looks like neither of us know who would be the better, right Hika-" A flat rock burst from between them, slapping across the cool water and leaving a trail of circular splashes that spanned the pond until the entire thing was rippling. Hikari had casted her own rock while Yaya and Amane rested, and amazingly, she had left 12 rippling rings in its wake. Yaya and Amane gazed at her in amazement.
Hikari only stood in place, her arms proudly at her sides. "Ah, Newbies." They all laughed, while Yaya and Amane showered Hikari with surprise and praise. "Well, maybe we should continue this tomorrow. Of course, we'll have to find a new beach. This one barely has any rocks." Amane joked, as she readied all of her picnic supplies and joined Hikari. Yaya nodded her head, and looked to the emptied beachside closest to her, and noticed something. It shimmered like Amane's necklace. While Amane and Hikari traded affectionate smiles and touches, Yaya walked over to the dirty patch, and pulled on a dusty gold chain that protruded from the mud...and revealed a necklace.
It was an etoile's necklace, for sure. It was the same exact make, even down the the ornamental gold chain it sat on, however, the teardrop jewel was different. She rubbed it, trying to get the black tarnish off, but it remained. It was a deep black jewel, crystalline in make and certainly not plastic, but the touch of it felt crude, it felt unearthly, as if it was carved from the heart of a dark mountain, and the golden metal simply grew onto it like a parasitic weed. It was a rather creepy thing, but it drew her in. Yaya pocketed it away for later, shoving it into her coat pocket and meeting up with her friends once again.
Amane walked them all to the front doors of the Spica dorms, and as Yaya reached the vast doors, she felt a tinge of nervousness. Why was she nervous all the sudden? Because the day was over? No, they always had tomorrow, and with all of their chores attended to and classes caught up, there was nothing to disturb the days of her and her close friends. Yaya assured herself, pulling from the doors to look back to her room mate Hikari. "Hikari, you ready to call it a...day?" Yaya hesitated at the end of her sentence, as she looked on, and realized she had walked alone to the doors. On the pathway towards the school, in front of the fountain of Virgin Mary, Amane and Hikari stood, their hands bound together in such undeniable affection, with eyes filled with true and utter happiness, that stars peaked past clouds just to witness them. Hikari glowed with joy, her big heavenly eyes tearing up as Amane opened up to her. Hikari brushed Amane's deep blue bangs out of the way, just to lock eyes with her lover and share this personalized essence of joy with her. Hikari wrapped her arms around Amane's neck and shoulders, pulling her tall lover down towards her and locking a soft, love-filled kiss onto her lips. They blushed with the intensity of a lily's bloom.
Yaya could feel their heart beats rattle out of control even from her position, the thrill of the kiss sending shivers down their spines, and even into her own. The excitement tantalized Yaya, but triggered something deep that she had thought she had pushed away a long time ago. Loss. Yaya gazed on and realized, in an undeniable truth, that Hikari was happy with Amane, absolutely and completely. Amane made her feel things that Yaya could never do. It felt wrong to be in this scene with them, to share the same ground as these two happy lovers, Etoile and Etoile. They have found their happily ever after. Yaya, however, had not. Yaya lowered her eyes, allowing them to curl into their defensive knife-like sharpness, and she entered the dormitory alone, leaving her friends to adore each other in a moment only for them.
Yaya had reached the dorm room first, and looked down the hall to see nothing. It would make her so happy to see Hikari running up the stairs towards her, waving her hand and trying to catch her breath. "Wait for me, Yaya!" she would cry out, and it would relieve her, it would make her feel important somehow. Hikari did not run up those stairs, and Yaya entered the room alone, and closed the door behind her. Yaya leaned upon it, as if to keep her feelings of loss, of jealousy and undeniable wanting locked out. Yes, Amane was a good person, Amane is perfect for Hikari. There is no right reason to hate that princely blue-haired girl, is there? No reason other than jealousy, of envy, to justify your yearning heart.
Yaya shook her head, and pushed her hands deep against the door. "No. Those feelings belong out there. They are not welcome here anymore. My friends are happy, I should be happy too, shouldn't I?" She spoke aloud, chuckling to herself as the facade she held, as this true friend that Yaya was pretending to be began to crack like stressed porcelain, the white smoothness being damaged by a force too much to bear. "But I'm not happy. Not without you Hikari." Finally, she caved in, sliding her back across the door until she was slumped at the bottom. She could see that undeniably beautiful face gazing upwards, happily nuzzling a nose that wasn't hers, drinking in the life essence of another and lovingly whispering a sentence that would cause Yaya's heart to continue to cry out in pain. "I love you, Amane-san."
"Was I not pretty enough? Was I too aggressive? Did I choose the wrong room mate? What went wrong?" Yaya began to break down there, clenching her fists, feeling the urge to batter the wooden floor with them. "I wish I didn't love you anymore Hikari, it hurts so much. I wish I could hide from you forever. I wish you never knew where to find me. Because I can't let you see me like this, I can't let you know...that I can't do this anymore. I want you to tell me you love me...not her." Finally, Yaya crumpled across the ground, and sobbed, letting the sorrow and the heartbreak bulge from her aching soul and go flying into the ethers of her heart, like leaves set free from an autumn pile. The pain made its own shapes, made its own colors as she hated this world she was in, hated this situation, and hated herself for being less desirable than Amane. "I want to be your etoile, Hikari..." As she laid across the ground, she felt the sting of a bead against her breast.
Yaya wiped her tears, and pulled out the pure-black necklace, staring at it through the kaleidoscope of water and pearly light. Her glossy eyes measured it, and she felt its weight in her hand, welcoming, happy. Yaya fancied the idea that floated in her head. She left the door, and went into the bathroom. She clipped on the black etoile pendant, and let it sit there upon her rising chest. She rubbed the teardrop between her fingers as she gazed at the pained girl in the mirror, trying to find what was so wrong with her, that Hikari could not gaze dreamily and longingly at her. It was time to shower, time to call it a night. She pulled away her jacket, dressing down until not even her bra and panties remained, and left the black jewel in place to pretend, even for a few minutes, that she was Hikari's etoile.
As Yaya let the steam and touch of the warm water cleanse her tears and her hopeless musings away, she felt the coldness of the pendant on her neck seem to negate the harshness of the shower. It cooled the burn, like a gentle shard of ice fighting away the breathless burn of steam. She welcomed it, and ran her fingers through her hair, eyes closed and mind fading into a blackness of relaxation. As she let out a sigh of relief, she felt the clasp of hands reach around her breasts, and caress them unwelcome.
Yaya violently surged back, panic and rage filling her body as she hid her chest and slumped against the shower walls as closely as possible, her eyes measuring every inch of the bathroom with violence ready in her mind. What the hell was that!? Who was that!? She saw a figure there, standing in the shower with her, pale and naked and heavenly. So heavenly, that it paralyzed her and set her stupid with shock. She had expected a man, a pervasive monster or skulking predator to have invaded her private moment, but instead, it was everything she wanted.
It was Hikari. Her soft blue eyes with perfect lashes, and her perfectly sculpted face gazed at her with carnal softness, her eye-lids relaxed and her face blushing. The water ran off her body in admirable rivulets, revealing not a single imperfection on her skin. She was so beautiful to behold that even the tendrils of lust that lived in her heart refused to lash out. Hikari was truly an angel, something to worship, not to violate or defile, a lily of purity, of beauty. It left Yaya breathless as she tried to wrestle with the wrongness of the situation. On Hikari's bare chest there sat the Etoile's necklace, but the bead there was as black as her own. This was not the real Hikari. Yaya waved her arms at the phantasm in anger.
"You aren't the real Hikari, get the hell out of here!" she said in the sternest voice possible, swearing for the first time in a long time, teeth gritting and expressing her repulsion. Instead of revealing its wicked nature, or hissing, or smiling with demonic intent, the gentle expression of the false Hikari flinched. Her eyes widened, and her eyebrows curled into sadness, of shock and hurt, and the false Hikari looked down as if she was wronged, as if she was denied what she wanted most. As if she was Yaya so long ago, having to accept Hikari was never going to be hers.
Yaya caught herself reaching out to the irresistible figure, wanting to protect it and hold it, to comfort it. "No, I'm sorry, don't go!" she caught herself saying, already throwing her caution and defensiveness to the wind as the false Hikari hopped out of the shower, and vanished completely. What took her place in the bathroom, was schadenfreudian laughter, the laughter of a older girl disembodied and unseen in the shower.
"Well now, Yaya, I think you've made it obvious what your weakness is. I can't believe you'd reach out to that illusion. What if I was here to kill you? You would've shown your neck at a blade just to gaze at the nude body of your paramour, wouldn't you?" Remi said, sending Yaya back into her defensive state. Yaya kneeled down, covering her body, and thinking about the jewel. She hooked it with her fingers and ripped it off over her head, tossing it onto the ground in a phobic rush. The necklace sat on the ground, still and wet until it shivered, and floated up next to the door, and in the air, a girl in a long black dress appeared, eyes ruby red and lips curled into a sadistic smile.
"Who are you?" snarled Yaya, who cautiously measured up the phantasm before her. "I am Remi, and I am here to answer your pleas where nobody else would, my dear." Remi played with the jewel on her neck, and locked onto Yaya's golden eyes. "I want to let you know, that I am the only one who listened to you when you cried out, when you longed for a touch from Hikari that would never come, that I understand the heartbreak you must endure to assure her happiness. I am no agent of evil my dear, I am an Etoile just like them, just from a darker part of Astraea Hill's history." Etoile. What etoile looks so unheavenly, so wrong in this sweet world of hers? Everything here was saintly, innocent, filled with smiles and pureness, but merely looking at this sultry creature, a curvy godless spirit that left the lust in Yaya's heart to stir, made her feel wrong, she did not belong here.
"I don't make deals with the devil. Get out of here." Yaya harshly said, her eyes cruel and violent, wet hair spilled over her face but letting the wild gold of her pupils glare through. Remi frowned, and pulled the black necklace from her body, and set it gently on the bathroom counter. Any other girls would get terrified, scream out for help, or whimper like a fawn at the sight of her, but Yaya was different. She was a defiant one, a fighter, no mere virgin to push into fright. She could trust Yaya in this moment to be silent enough to hear her offer. No need to paralyze her with a touch. "I am no devil, Yaya-chan. I am the only thing that can save you from this terrible world, where you must watch the one you love, love somebody else. I've felt that pain too, and swore I would save others from that terrible fate, even after my death." Remi gazed at the mirror, analyzing herself with sorrowful eyes, and for a second Yaya realized that she had once made the same expression. The time she tried to take Hikari as her own, and was pushed away. The time where she lost Hikari as a lover forever.
"Yaya, I can make Hikari love you. But what I do is not free. The cost is blood, a taste of this sweet world where I am no longer allowed. I can stay here no longer, but I leave the decision to you. Feel free to ignore me, feel free to drive me away in the words of your God. However, remember if you do this, you'll remain in this tempest forever, and you accept your fate." And with that, Remi vanished, and left Yaya all alone in the bathroom, doubting whether or not what happened was a figment of her imagination. Yaya had just had her first supernatural encounter. She laid there in the shower, the water being the only contrasting sound she could hear beyond her violent heart beat. "That nasty creature touched me. She really did touch me." She had worn the skin of Hikari, and a sickening feeling welled up in her chest, as she realized the shame of her instinctive actions. She tried to comfort the fleeing demon, despite defiling her breasts with an unwanted touch.
That night, Yaya returned to her bed, ignoring Hikari completely and feeling the cold weight of the necklace in her hand once again. She wasn't sure what to make of this relic. Every single cell of common sense told her to throw it away, to bring it to the church and have it exorcised. Whoever this Remi was, she wasn't of this world, and she sure as hell wasn't a friend or benevolent creature. She touched her in the guise of Hikari, invading her privacy and using her yearning heart as a sadistic toy. For all she knew, it could've been a stress induced fantasy. Nothing was for sure except for one thing, Yaya would test it out in the morning, she wouldn't let this Remi try to bully her or seduce her in Hikari's form. She would learn more about what this creature, this succubus was, and when she was done, she would destroy it.
"Yaya...are you awake?" a soft voice said across the room.
Yaya choked up, but composed herself, her back facing Hikari and her hand clutched tight, hiding the necklace. "...Yes Hikari-chan..."
"I hope I don't make you uncomfortable, when I ask you to hang out with me and Amane...it's just I don't want to lose either of you. I don't want either of you to dislike each other." Hikari's small voice was a sweet thing, disarming to the point of brushing away all of your apprehension and anger. Hikari was not naive though, and she knew that Yaya was uncomfortable in some instances.
"It's not that I dislike her Hikari. That's not it at all, she's perfect for you. She treats you with so much respect, and she loves you as much as you love her." Yaya didn't continue after that. She couldn't say the next line. "I feel like I am inferior to her, and that's why I couldn't have you."
"I can feel how sad you are sometimes, even now. You are strong and full of energy, but that's a cover for something else, a pain. You were hiding something today. What was it?" Hikari asked. Yaya had an idea, looking at the black necklace in her hand. If it really was a delusion, this would be the best way to test it. It would better than admitting what she couldn't say.
"Hikari, I found a necklace over by the water...and I think it might be cursed. Can you put it on and tell me what you see?"
Hikari accepted, and took the necklace from Yaya's hand. "While normally, people would say no to putting on supposedly cursed jewelry. But since I have the tough Yaya-chan defending me, I trust you'll keep me safe from any curses." She turned her hair to the side, and pulled it over her head, and sat there for a few seconds. "Do you see anything? Do you feel weird at all?"
Hikari paused for a beat, but shook her head. "I feel like a double etoile, but that's about it." She grinned, and unclipped the necklace. "But Yaya, I have something to ask of you too. Come kneel before me." Yaya looked up confused, but obeyed, kneeling before Hikari's bedside. She bestowed the necklace onto Yaya. "I nominate you as the third, secret etoile. It is a prestigious title I only give to a select few, and I think of you as the most honorable..recipient." She stumbled on words, and as Yaya chuckled, Hikari drew Yaya in with a powerful hug. "I am thankful for all that you've done for me. I hope I can be as good of a friend to you, as you've done for me. I don't want you to ever feel like I want you to stay away." As Yaya absorbed Hikari's hug, she could feel herself tear up, letting Hikari's silky golden hair blanket her face, and she felt the old evils of her heart suddenly flood back. How wrong she felt as a creature to be cherished by such a beauty. "I am not worthy of being your friend, Hikari...I am a petty and jealous animal who can only think of having you for my own, and I hate it so much, but I can't make it go away..." raged the thoughts in Yaya's mind, and as she shuddered in Hikari's arms, the coldness of the necklace danced along her collarbone again, and in that moment, she realized that she would not reject the offer, she would not send the relic away to be destroyed or purified, and that whatever dark creature that this once belonged to, she would not challenge it or be rid of it.
Even if it only sought out to make her suffer, to kill her, it would be no worse than this. To lie to the girl you love most and make her believe you did not covet her so adamantly. She was so tired of this world, tired of the world where this gentle benevolent angel was unobtainable to her, and to exist in the same world as her, unable to progress your love any further, was a curse all of its own. Yaya rested her weary head against Hikari's and felt the weight of the necklace rest in her fingers. She gazed on towards their window, at the dark of the night. Remi...are you telling the truth? What blood must I give, to have this world be real?
Once upon a time, a girl wanting nothing more than to turn the World that Could Have Been, into a real place, felt the weight of a seed in her hand, that could make it all come true.