Welcome to chapter one. Before we get started, just a brief note about ages. Of the main characters, Shion, Mion and Satoshi are all about 17, while Rena and Keiichi are 16, but they're all in the same year. Rika and Satoko are both 12. Now, onwards and backwards!
Disclaimer: Der Blaue Wolf does not own any of the following: Higurashi No Naku Koro Ni, the characters from it, Tokyo or the Japanese school system. If I owned any of those, I would be pretty damn rich.
Higurashi High, Ch1
Shion was sat in her seat as usual on the first Friday morning of the new term. She watched as Rena tried to stop Mion from beating Keiichi's skull in. Rena was failing so far, and Keiichi looked as though Mion had taken a hammer to his head. Shion was distracted from the spectacle by the chair on her left being scraping on the ground as it was pulled back. She turned her head to see the new student, Satoshi, siting down on the chair.
"Morning, Satoshi-kun," she said.
"Good morning, Sonozaki-san," Satoshi replied.
"Please, call me Shion, everybody does, otherwise it'd get confusing with Onee."
"Okay then, Shion-san."
"You don't have to be so formal." Shion wondered why Satoshi was always so uptight about everything, and he always seemed so formal.
"Well I hardly know you," Satoshi replied.
"Yeah, but I don't like people being so formal all the time. I get enough of it at home when we have guests who want to suck up to Oni-bai... I mean Obachan."
Satoshi's normally frowning face seemed to lighten up for a second. "Why do you call her that?" He asked her.
"Well ever since we were born, she's only been interested in Onee, as she's the family heir. I don't blame Mion, but I hate Obachan for always trying to get me ignored and shunned. She even wanted me to be sent away to bording school, but Okasan refused to let me be sent away."
"Sounds like your family's complicated," Satoshi said, then looked away suddenly with a saddened look on his face.
"Are you okay Satoshi-kun?" Shion asked.
"I'm... fine."
Shion di not for a moment believe it, but did not push him. They hardly knew each other, and pushing the subject could drive him away from her. "Well, if you're sure. But you know that if you ever do feel bad, you can tell me. 'Kay? Satoshi-kun."
Satoshi turned back to her, looking less down. "Thank you, Shion-sa...-chan."
"So," Mion began as she and her sister walked out of the school gates. "You seem to be getting close to that new guy, Hojo-san wasn't it?"
Shion made a noise somewhere between a snort and a laugh, "Well that depends on your definition of 'close.' He seems to be very closed-in, and doesn't like talking that much."
"You seemed to be talking a lot earlier."
"If you call that 'a lot' then there's something wrong with you. Also, even if he does 'talk,' he rarely 'says' much really. I hardly know anything about him."
"Well, even if you don't know much, you must know more than most people. You're the only one he ever talks to. Maybe he's very shy."
Shion thought about it. It was true that she had not seen him talking to anybody else. But shy? Shion thought not. She had seen that strained look in his eyes, that look of fear and sorrow. What kept him from talking to people was not shyness, it was something else. Was he afraid of getting close to anybody? But he had talked to her, when he could just have shunned her. Shion did not understand, but wanted to. She did not want the knowledge out of curiosity, but because she thought that if she understood, then maybe she could help.
Shion's phone rang, and she took it out of her pocket and answered.
"Hello."
"Shion-chan? It's Furude-san." A female voice answered. "Sorry for asking so suddenly, but could you possibly pick Rika-chan up from school? Her father and I got caught up in traffic trying to get home, so we can't go and get her."
"Sure, I'll run over then."
"Arigato Shion-chan."
Shion hung up then turned to Mion. "Gomen Onee, I have to go pick up Rika-chan from school for Furude-san."
"'Kay then, I'll see you later," Mion said, before she continued the way they were going, while Shion turned and walked quickly towards the middle school.
The Sonozakis were business partners with the Furudes, so the families were fairly close, and Rika was a nice girl, if she was a little odd occaisionally. Shion and Mion had known the little girl since Rika was born.
Shion reached the middle school gates soon after. She saw Rika. The blue-haired girl was chatting to another girl who had short blonde hair. Shion thought the other girl looked vaguely familiar. She walked up to them and called, "Rika-chan."
Rika turned to the older girl, "Shion-chan? Hello!"
"Your mother asked me to come and collect you."
"Okasan did?"
"Yeah, she and you father couldn't make it back in time."
"Oh, okay." Rika then turned to the other girl, "Satoko-chan, Rika needs to go now, see you tomorrow."
The other girl, Satoko looked up, and Shion realised why she had thought that the girl looked familiar. Her eyes bore the same look as Satoshi's had. Same hair colour too. And their names were very similar. This could not be a coincidence could it?
As if to prove that there was no coincidence, Satoko suddenly looked behind Rika and Shion and something like a smile formed on her face, as she called out, "Nii-Nii!"
Shion and Rika turned to see who she was talking to, and as anybody with any deductive reasoning can guess, the boy they saw was Satoshi. He had the same almost-smile on his face as Satoko had. Shion thought he looked happier than she had ever seen him. She noticed Satoko ran up to him.
It took Shion a second to realise that she was bein spoken to. It was Satoshi, "Shion-chan, I didn't expect to meet you here."
"Oh, I'm just picking Rika-chan up for her mother." Shion paused a second before asking, "Is that your sister?"
"Yeah, this is my little sister Satoko," Satoshi replied.
"Nii-Nii, is she a friend of yours," Satoko asked.
"Yeah, she's in my class at school."
"She seems like a nice person," Satoko said, before turning to Shion. "I'm Satoko Hojo, pleased to meet you."
Shion smiled at the girl. "I'm Shion Sonozaki, it's nice to meet you too."
Satoko's face changed from the forced smile she had on before to a more genuine smile. But still, while Shion could see the smile on the girl's lips, Satoko's eyes were not smiling. Shion could still see the fear in them. What was the little girl afraid of? Was she scared of Shion? But Shion had seen that look in her eyes before Satoko had even seen the older girl. It made no sense.
Shion looked over at Satoshi instead. "Well I had better be taking Rika-chan home now. By the way, where do you live?"
Satoshi gave her an address, and Shion looked surprised, "That's in the next road to my house! I'm surprised we never run into each other on the way to school."
"Well, I have to take Satoko in in the mornings, so we have to leave early."
Shion vaguely wondered about this. True the middle school was further than the high school, but you would not have to get up that early, and she and her sister often went in early, as Mion had duties as class rep. It was odd that they should not run into each other, even after only a week. She put this to the side though and said, "Well as we all live so close, we can go back together. Let's go." Shion started walking, and the others, with a mixture of expressions, simply followed.
As they walked, Rika started talking to Satoko again, while Shion and Satoshi ended up walking together ahead of the younger pair. The older two walked in silence. Shion found the silence to be a bit unnerving, wondering if there was anything she could do to get Satoshi talking properly. She glanced up at him, taking careful note of his expression. For once it did not seem too sad. Shion wondered what could be the cause, Satoshi was always so quiet and always seemed so sad that Shion could not help but wonder what was causing it.
Satoshi turned to look at her and caught her staring at her, and she turned away blushing once she had been caught. He spoke then, saying something that surprised her, "You were wondering something, about me." He did not say it as a question, more as a statement of fact.
"I... I was just thinking," Shion said, looking up at him again, "you often look really sad, but at the moment you don't."
Satoshi looked ahead of him, staring into the distance, and Shion immediately felt guilty about talking about something so clearly personal, "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have..."
"My parents died in an accident over the summer," Satoshi said bluntly, cutting Shion off.
The girl looked at him shocked, "I'm sorry, I didn't know..."
"It's okay," he cut her off again, before she descended into a long apology. "I wasn't particularly close to Okasan or my step-father, I got over their death in not too long, however..." Satoshi abruptly stopped walking, and Shion turned to him. Satoshi put on a smile, then took his sister's hand, "Well, this is my house, I'll see you tomorrow Shion-chan."
Shion realised that it was indeed the address that Satoshi had told her, she smiled back, and replied "Okay, see you tomorrow Satoshi-kun."
She began to turn away, but before she fully could, Satoshi stared straight at her pointedly, then flicked his eyes to some bushes by the house, which were very close to one of the windows, then back to Shion, and down to her left pocket, then back to her face. She nodded slightly to show she understood. She turned and left, leading Rika, as the Hojo siblings walked up the path to their home.
It was hardly any distance to Rika's house, and as soon as she had dropped the girl off, Shion back-tracked to the Hojo's house. It was getting a little dark as she got there, and she saw a light on through the window by the bush Satoshi had motioned to, and, checking that nobody was looking, hid herself in the greenery. She then raised her head so that she could just see through the window which was slightly open so that she could hear everything on the other side of it.
What she saw was a kitchen. There was nothing remarkable about the kitchen, a table with chairs round it was in the centre of the room and it had a stove and cupboards lining the walls. At the stove was Satoko, it looked as though she was making dinner. It struck Shion as odd that the little girl would be the one making dinner.
Then she heard somebody shouting, a man's voice, angrily yelling at Satoko, "Oy, Brat! Hurry up with that dinner!"
Shion heard Satoko reply with what sounded like "H-hai Ojisan" before quickly returning to the cooking. It was not long before Satoko had finished, and, having put the meal on a board in the middle of the table, she went out of the room, presumably to call everybody else, as not long after Satoko, Satoshi came into the room. Shion noticed that Satoshi glanced in her direction, obviously checking if she was there. He locked eyes with her, then looked down. Shion ducked down, then waited for a few minutes, then pulled herself up to look again.
Satoshi had, it seemed, made sure that he and Satoko were sat on the far side from the window, so they could see it and Shion, while the two other figures at the table, a man and woman who Shion assumed were the siblings' Uncle and Aunt, were facing away from the window.
There was nothing inately odd about what was going on to start with. Satoko served each of them in turn, then they all started eating. Shion could not see what it was they were eating, but after a few mouthfuls, the uncle spoke, "What do you call this crap brat? It's disgusting. You cook this for your dear uncle and aunt."
Satoko trembled slightly, and Satoshi clenched his fist. The boy then spoke, "She did her best. It's perfectly good, you shouldn't complain."
"Oh but I am Satoshi. Now what are you gonna do about this Brat?" he asked to Satoko.
Satoko's eyes widened, and she bowed her head, "Gomenasai, I'll try harder next time."
"That's not good enough!" The uncle raised his hand and hit Satoko.
Satoshi instantly stood up, his chair scraping on the ground. "Stop it!" he shouted.
"What're you gonna do to stop me?" his uncle asked him. They stared at each other, trying to make the other back down.
Shion watched all this, and felt slightly sickened. So that was why Satoshi was always looking sad and afraid. She wished there was something she could do, then she remembered what Satoshi had done when they separated. She reached into her left pocket, annd found a scrap of paper. On it was written a number, a phone number.
Shion quickly pulled out her mobile and dialed the number, being careful to make sure that her own number was withheld. She heard the phone inside ring, and although she now could not see, she heard Satoshi's uncle leave the room to answer it. She carefully, and quietly moved out of the bush, then heard the phone at the other end being picked up.
"Moshi-Moshi."
Shion quickly thought about what to say, then had a sudden thought, "Can I speak to Satoko-chan please, it's Rika-chan from school," she replied, trying to sound as much like the real Rika as possible. Of course, the man had almost certainly never met Rika, but it was possible that he one day might, so she had to make the act realistic.
"Okay, one second."
Shion heard him call to Satoko, who then spoke into the phone, "Rika-chan? How'd you get our number."
Shion hoped that Satoko's uncle had not heard that. She replied, in her normal voice, "Satoko-chan, it's Shion here, but lie and say it's Rika. I'll explain properly later, but I needed to get you away from your uncle."
Satoko whispered, "You saw it?"
"Yeah, now listen carefully, I want you to copy down the number I give you, then give it to Satoshi-kun without your uncle seeing, and tell him to call it when he has a chance, okay."
Satoko agreed, and once Shion had given her the number, she asked "Is your uncle still nearby?"
"No," came back the reply.
"Good, now remember to give the number to Satoshi. Goodbye."
Shion hung up, then glanced at her watch. She was going to be very late home, not that it mattered. Her family, apart from Mion, hardly cared about her. She just needed to make sure that she got back home in time to get Satoshi's call.
A/N: Phew, a nice long first chapter. I hope you all like this. Please review and tell me what you think. I'll try to update in not too long, but I do have six other stories to attend to as well. But for the moment:
Bis Bald
BW
