[AN: So this one is a bit like a mini movie;;; I hope you don't mind and enjoy the story. Small warning: This chapter deals with death; specifically drowning. There's no graphic descriptions of it, but if references to drowning make you uncomfortable I recommend skipping this one.]

It took a moment for Luke and Verity to register what just happened. Then they both started to panic.

"She's gone! She said yes and then she disappeared!"

"What do we do? How do we get her back?"

They ran out of the locker room into the hall, when Verity grabbed Luke by the arm. "We can't just leave her here. We have to do something!"

"Do what? You saw her get taken by Sabishii-chan, nobody's ever come back from that!"

"How are you so sure of that, we don't know anyone else who ever got taken away! There might be a way to get her back."

Luke looked completely hopeless. He pensively looked at his camera, and his eyes grew wide. "Wait, remember that photo I took earlier and we saw a something weird in it? Maybe we can get Sabishii-chan to reappear, and…" He paused. "Well, I don't know what to do after that. I want to save Lucy but I don't know if getting spirited away too is the solution."

"We should go get Desdemona," Verity said. "It's still half an hour before she leaves the school, we might make it if we hurry. Maybe Sabishii-chan will let us go back to our own world because she's got what she wanted. And Desdemona isn't human herself, she might know how to deal with spirits like this."

Lucy in the meantime bounded up the front steps of Hachigoya High in all its sun-bathed and very much bustling-with-life glory.

"No running in the hall!" Someone shouted after her, and she instantly switched gears to a brisk step. She was late for gym. Way late. At the corner of the main hall she turned around and saw that the teacher who called her out had his attention focused elsewhere now, so she resumed her run after turning the corner, through the small connecting hall to the locker rooms. As always the locker room smelled distinctly of chlorine, and to Lucy's fear she saw the gymbags her classmates left behind, but no classmates. It was her second day; Lucy could kick herself for being tardy already. What had she been so busy doing that she was late, anyway?

She sat down on the bench and put her bag down when a second wave of panic and embarrassment hit her: Today they had swimming lessons. She had forgotten her swimsuit. "Oh my gosh, what is wrong with me today," Lucy whined at the ceiling. She could hear laughter and the sloshing and splashing of water from the next room over. She supposed she should tell the gym teacher, and she dreaded the detention that was likely hanging over her head. She decided to stay on the bench a few seconds longer to mentally prepare herself for going up to her teacher.

Then she took a deep breath and got up.

Suddenly someone flew through the door from the hall into the locker room, bounding past Lucy so fast she was little more than a blur. She slammed open the door to the pool, and just like that she was gone.

For a split second Lucy was stunned, but then she realised this meant she wasn't the only person who was late, and she quickly followed the girl to the pool. It'd be easier to talk to the teacher if she wasn't alone.

Before she had time to scan the room to find the teacher however, something else grabbed her attention. A girl, the girl who had ran past her in the locker room, was standing at the edge of the pool, shouting at something in the water.

"Kaori, no!" She yelled.

Then she leapt into the pool.

Lucy was at a loss for what to do. She couldn't see what the girl had been shouting at before she leapt into the pool in full uniform. Three girls at the edge of the pool in inflatable tubes and on floating beds seemed irritated by the screaming girl, until one of them noticed whatever it was she had seen in the water and screamed.

The girl in uniform resurfaced and was holding something. Lucy's heart flinched when she registered it was a person, until it stopped being a person. Initially she saw long black hair covering a stark white face and two lifeless equally white arms, but as the girl in the uniform tried to lift the person out of the water, the hair seemed to grow longer and longer until she was tangled in it. All the while the girl in the tube kept screaming.

All at once Lucy remembered who she was, and where she was. Was this what Sabishii-chan did to the people she took? Whatever was that figure in the pool?

She saw the gym teacher walk up to the girl in the uniform, with a distinct lack of alarm, as she fought with the long strands of hair that were now wrapped around her arms like tendrils. Nobody else did anything. Why was nobody doing anything?

Finally, Lucy snapped out of her trance and ran over to the edge of the pool. "Sabishii-chan," she called, at nobody in particular. But she had to be somewhere, right?

When Lucy turned the corner she slipped on the wet floor, which disappeared from under her before her side made impact. The next moment she was back outside, on the school grounds. In her hand she held a red piece of paper, which she knew meant detention. She also knew this was a new day. She didn't know how she knew. But there was a lot of knowledge she held in this strange place that wasn't hers.

At detention were only a few other students so the classroom was largely empty. Lucy saw that The Girl In The Uniform was there, in the corner in the back. Now that they weren't at swimming practice she no longer stood out in her uniform.

Her posture however made sure she still stood out. Everyone was diligently working on their homework, and she did have a book open in front of her and a pen in her hand, but Lucy could see she was staring blankly at the table in front of her; lost in thought while furiously tapping her foot on the ground.

Lucy sat down next to the Girl, looked for her Maths book and opened it up on the table, though she had no idea if there was homework. It seemed Sabishii-chan had decided Lucy was a ditsy girl who was late for school and forgot about her homework.

Lucy looked at the Girl, and then at the teacher. He was grading papers. He didn't have a laptop, and the board behind him wasn't digital. The language written on the board looked unfamiliar to Lucy, but she still knew what the words on it meant. How far was she from Old Town? Did she go back in time?

"You were in the locker room, weren't you?"

The Girl In The Uniform was looking at her with a slight smile on her face. Her hair and eyes were dark. Part of her hair was tied into a ponytail behind her head.

Lucy looked at the teacher again before answering.

"Oh, don't worry about him, she's not here, so everyone's a little… Out of focus, so to speak."

"When you say 'she', do you mean Sabishii-chan," Lucy whispered.

The Girl nodded.

"I thought I heard you say that at the pool. But I advise you not to use that name here, she doesn't like it."

"Where are we?"

"You don't know? We're in Hachigoya High School. It's in a small port town, though she doesn't let us off the school grounds. How did you end up here if you've never been there?"

"I know of the school, but to my knowledge it's in a forest. I think it transports you somewhere else when you go there, though," Lucy said, throwing another look at the teacher, who didn't look like he heard any of their whispering.

"Well it is haunted, so maybe it teleports, who knows," The Girl In The Uniform said, and shrugged.

"It might be a little cruel to say, but I'm glad you're here. I haven't met anyone else who's still real since coming here. My name is Haruka. Well, Haruka Kurosawa, but please just call me by my first name."

"Lucy," Lucy said. "What do you mean with real?"

"Most of the people you see here are puppets. Kaori's memories brought back to play their parts in her story. Not all of them, though. Some are people who have been here so long they've forgotten who they are, I think. So I don't count them as real, I guess."

"How could you tell I was real?"

Haruka laughed. Then it dawned on Lucy.
"Oh, my skin," she said, flustered. But when she looked at her hands, they were pink, like Marlucy's.

"I meant your hair," Haruka said with a furrowed brow. "You're clearly not from around."

Lucy thought about how everyone she'd seen up until now had dark hair. Maybe Haruka had a point.

"Where is Sabishii-chan," Lucy asked.

Haruka leant on her table with an elbow and screwed her eyes up to the ceiling as if getting ready to make some complicated calculations.

"Well, since she died about five minutes ago, and now we're here, I'm gonna say she's on her way to school from wherever she lives. We'll have our first class of the day with her in about half an hour."

Lucy didn't know what to say to that, she stared at Haruka with her eyebrows scrunched together.

Haruka laughed.

"Time doesn't work as normal here. The day ends at the end of the final class and immediately goes into the next morning right before the first class. Or detention, in our case. It ends really quick on the day she dies though since she died in the morning. I'm still trying to figure out how to stop that, but as you saw I haven't had any success so far."

"What was that thing in the water?"

Haruka pulled a face of discomfort. "That was her. I guess she's getting fed up with me trying to interfere because that's the first time she turned into a ball of hair in my arms. Maybe it was a warning."

Haruka sighed. "I've tried to save her pretty much every single time she resets the timeline but she makes it harder and harder each time. I used to be there at the start of the class so I'd be in the pool with her and I'd be able to swim over, but I'd be too late every time. Then when she figured out I was trying to go to her before she could get into the pool she made it so I'd be late for class every day on the day she died. I don't think she wants to be saved, I think she wants to trap people in her suffering."

"She sounds pretty cruel," Lucy said. She thought Sabishii-chan was a sad spirit, so this came as an unpleasant surprise.

Haruka shook her head. "I don't think that's fair to her. She was a regular girl when she was alive, and she was dealt a bad hand in life. She just happened to come back as an onryo, I don't think she can help the fact that she's so full of hate."

Lucy frowned. "What's an onryo?"

"I guess those aren't a thing where you're from, huh? They're vengeful spirits, basically. If someone dies while they're in a state of extreme anger or sadness their spirit can get trapped in the world of the living, so to speak. They're stuck in a constant state of rage and they'll inflict pain or fear on anyone who comes near them, doesn't matter who it is."

"Oh, I see," Lucy said. She instinctively grabbed the gems in her skirt pocket.

"So you knew the legend before entering the school, huh?"

Lucy nodded.

Haruka raised an eyebrow. "Why did you say yes to her?"

Lucy turned slightly red. "I thought I could help her. There is something I want to give to her and I thought it might make her happy. But now I know more about this place I'm not so sure."

Haruka smiled. "That's very sweet of you. I bet she'd be happy about it if she wasn't so full of hate all the time."

"What about you?"

"It's kind of a long story," Haruka said. Before she could say any more, the bell rang. "Time to go meet her," Haruka said with a sigh.

Lucy followed Haruka to their next class. When she went to sit down Haruka stopped her.

"That's where she will sit. I don't particularly fancy finding out what happens if you sit in her spot. Best not to mess with her play too much."

So Lucy sat down in front of Haruka instead, next to the window. "There's usually a puppet there but I'm sure he'll move for a real person. Or he'll cease to exist, guess we'll see how she handles it."

Haruka sounded energetic and unbothered about the situation they were in, which struck Lucy as odd. She wondered how long she'd been trapped in Hachigoya.

The other students began filing in. Nobody particularly stood out to Lucy except a group of three girls with rather fancy looking hairstyles. She could see a girl lingering in the hall who occasionally leant forward to peek into the room, but she never came in. Lucy wondered if that was Sabishii-chan, but then another girl sat down in the seat Haruka said was hers.

Because Lucy had been focused on the girl in the hall she hadn't seen Sabishii-chan's face. From the back she did not stand out from the other students. She had long, black hair that was thick and shiny, which almost made it look a deep shade of blue. Unlike other students, who were wearing blazers or cardigans over their teal sailor uniforms, she wore hers plainly. She was wearing shoes and socks, unlike when she'd first appeared to Lucy in the dark halls of the abandoned Hachigoya High.

"Alright everyone, quiet please," the teacher began. "We've got a new student in our midsts today." He looked into the hall. The girl gave a small start and hurried into the room.

The first thing Lucy noticed was a dark, splotchy red mark that covered most of the left side of her face. The girl flitted one hand up to her cheek to cover it as if she'd forgotten to do so in her hurry, before turning to the board to write her name.

Like everyone else she had dark hair, though it was cut in a bob that set her apart from everyone else.

After the girl finished writing she quickly turned around again. Her hand shot up to her cheek for a moment, but she quickly put her arms behind her back and assumed proper posture. "My name is Ayako Kurosawa, I moved here a week ago with my family from Takayama. Um, it's nice to meet you! I hope we can be friends."

She looked at the teacher uncertainly. He flashed her a smile and nodded to the classroom.

"Thank you, Kurosawa. Please sit down in the third row, behind Kuze."

Lucy saw Sabishii-chan shift a little and wave at Ayako. She pointed at the empty desk behind her. Lucy couldn't quite see her face but she looked excited. She seemed to perk up the moment Ayako walked into the room.

"Ayako," Haruka whispered after the teacher had started class. "Hey, Ayako."

Ayako turned to look at Haruka. She looked a little frightened and her eyes shifted momentarily to the teacher.

"Do you remember me," Haruka asked. Ayako stared at her blankly.

"Come on, try to really think," Haruka urged her on.

"I don't-"

"KUROSAWA! Don't distract the new student. You can talk to her all you want after class," the teacher said. Lucy turned back around with a jerk. The way he had shouted Haruka's name had startled her; it was like a bark Lucy deemed overly loud for the occasion. She looked at Sabishii-chan, who was focused on the blackboard, seemingly uninterested in what had transpired behind her.

When the bell rang Lucy moved to get up, but Haruka urged her to sit down again. "You're gonna miss it," she said when Lucy gave her a puzzled look. She nodded at Ayako and Sabishii-chan.

Sabishii-chan turned around in her seat and patiently waited for Ayako to finish packing her bag. "Do you like it here," she asked when Ayako had finished.

Ayako stumbled over her words. "Th-The school or the town?"

"The town, I mean, you've only been at the school for an hour, right," Sabishii-chan said with a smile.
"Oh, of course," Ayako said and she cast her eyes down at her desk. "I like the ocean, but I haven't gone out much yet. We were busy moving and all," she said in a small voice. Her hand went back to her cheek, and this time it stayed there.

"I can show you around, if you'd like? And I'll show you where all our classes are. Oh, and you can call me Kaori, if you like." Sabishii-chan smiled. Her eyes were so dark they looked black but they glittered at this moment. It was easy to forget she was the same sullen girl who drifted on the air in the darkness of the swimming pool hall.

"I'd like that," Ayako said, and now she smiled too. Then they got up and left.

"She made a friend," Lucy said. "I thought she didn't have any."

"This is only the beginning," Haruka said.

[break]

After a few more lessons they had lunch break, which unlike in Lucy's real school was held in the classroom itself. Haruka put Lucy's and her desks together and shared some of her lunch with her, as Lucy hadn't brought any.

"I swear if I forget to bring one tomorrow too, I'm just gonna magic one up," Lucy said. Haruka laughed. "I guess Kaori thinks you're the forgetful type."

Lucy blushed. "She's not wrong." She wondered if she should tell Haruka more about where she was really from and what she really was, but decided another subject was more important.

"Why did you try to talk to Ayako? Didn't you say everyone here is a puppet?"

Haruka nodded. "She is, but she didn't use to be. She was a real person before, and I hope she's still in there somewhere. She's the whole reason I'm here, actually."

"Really? How so?"

"Ayako Kurosawa is my mother."

Lucy gaped at her. "What? But she's like, sixteen or something!"
"Fifteen, actually," Haruka said with a smile. "If you're spirited away by Kaori, she makes sure you fit in with the scenery. I've wondered if maybe some of the teachers used to be real people, but my mum is a special case. That's probably why she's a student and not an adult."

Lucy looked over to the center of the class, where Kaori was excitedly talking to a bashful Ayako as they ate lunch. Ayako's hand was still glued to her face.

It was hard to hear Kaori over the noise in the room, but from Ayako's body language Lucy could tell Kaori had said something about her birthmark. Ayako cast her eyes down again and her hair fell so even more of her face was covered up.

Then Kaori did something surprising. She reached out to Ayako and tried to take her hand off her cheek.

Ayako quickly pulled her arm back and twisted away from Kaori, her hand snapping back in place on her cheek as if it was its natural place.

Lucy didn't need to be a lip-reader to tell Kaori was now profusely apologising. At the table behind them the girls with the fancy hairstyles looked at Kaori in disdain.

The tallest of the three, a slender girl with long, dark red hair that slightly curled at the ends said something to Ayako.

"You don't have to sit with her if you don't want to," Haruka said in time with the movement of the girl's lips.

Ayako looked at her and spread the fingers on the hand covering her cheek a bit more, as if she felt a stronger need to hide it when looking at the girl.

"Oh, no, it's fine, Kuze didn't mean any harm," Haruka lip read aloud.

The girl turned back to her friends without a word. Ayako and Kaori continued their lunch in silence. Lucy could see tears gleaming in the corners of Kaori's eyes.

"I've thought of going over there and just punching Hasegawa in the face," Haruka said, vigorously chewing on a piece of egg.

"The red-head?"

Haruka nodded. "Kazumi Hasegawa is part of the reason Sabishii-chan exists."

When Haruka said "Sabishii-chan" Lucy saw Kaori momentarily flinch. The light vanished from her eyes and her hair fluttered, but the windows in the room were closed and thus there was no breeze.

"Oh yeah, definitely don't use that name in her presence," Haruka said. "She's always listening. Even when she's not physically in the room with you, she hears everything we say. There was a boy, when I first got here, and on the first day of the cycle he just burst out screaming that name over and over at her during Ayako's introduction. It messed up her whole scenario. I guess he'd had enough."

"What happened to him?"

Haruka pointed at a table at the other end of the class with her chopsticks.

"She immediately reset the day. He didn't say a word that time. I don't think he's said anything ever since that happened. He's sitting at that table."

Lucy looked at him. She could only see his back. He was sitting at a table with two other boys who were happily talking to each other. He'd become a part of the scenery.

"Anyway," Haruka said. "I want to stop this curse. She took away my mother and I came here to save her. I've been here for about two weeks now, I think, and I haven't figured it out yet, but I hope that now there's two of us it'll be easier. I definitely think trying to become Kaori's friend should help. I'm pretty sure by now that we can't stop her suffering but we can show her that she's not alone." Haruka's eyes were fixed on Kaori's table, she slowly balled her hands into fists on the table. "I wonder… No." Haruka shook her head.

"What?" Lucy asked.

Haruka rolled her eyes, and shook her head again. "Kaori knows I'm Ayako's daughter. I told her as much when I met her in the abandoned Hachigoya High, in the real world. I wonder if that might be why she won't let me help her. Originally when the rumor appeared that mum had been spirited away by by her, I didn't believe it. I thought it was just an urban legend, like Hanako-san or Teke Teke. But then I looked more into it and there's actual documentation of people who disappeared after they visited the town Hachigoya High is in. That's by no means solid proof, but mum went there before she vanished, and it all just sort of… Added up."

The bell rang. Lucy let out an "aww", she didn't want to wait for the rest of Haruka's story to sit through a class that wasn't even real. People around them began to pack up.

"Don't worry about it," Haruka said. "The next class is gym, and nothing happens. Well, Kaori and Ayako bond a bit more. They're not gonna care we're not there. And if they do we'll just get detention again." She shrugged.

Lucy was glad Haruka would continue her story but it did feel a bit weird to stay behind in the class as everyone walked out. Even though it wasn't her real school, she felt like she was doing something bad.

"My mom's always been really insistent that I treat everyone nicely," Haruka went on after everyone had left. "She'd say I didn't have to like everyone, but I shouldn't make them feel bad. She said there was nothing worse than making someone feel awful and knowing that you're the reason why. I used to think that was a pretty normal thing for a parent to say, but I found out that wasn't really true soon enough. I think most parents try to instill in their kids that they should be good, but it's just a formality, you know. But mom treated it more like a philosophy. I always thought it was because of her face."

Haruka gestured at the side of her face.

"I figured she got bullied because of it. Kids can be cruel and all that. But one time she showed me photos of her when she was in school and the mark was a lot bigger, she's had it surgically removed when she got a bit older. You can still see it a bit but it's nowhere near as big and dark as it was on the photos, or how it is here, in Kaori's world. But she said she regretted getting it removed. That really surprised me, but I didn't ask why. I took her advice to heart though. I've never been mean to people who stood out in some way, or because other people were nasty to them. I'm not really someone to hold my tongue so I've stood up for people sometimes, if I thought it was necessary. It's not made me particularly popular but I don't really care about that."

Haruka began to smile, but it faltered rather quickly when she moved on to the next part of her story.

"Mom went on a trip to the town about a year ago. Dad was really surprised she wanted to go there because she never liked talking about her time there, though the town looked like a nice place in the photos she had. But she said there was something she had to do there. She said she wouldn't be able to be at peace with herself until she'd done it, but she wouldn't say what it was. I think dad knew, but they didn't tell me. So she went and…She never came back."

"And now you're here to save her," Lucy said. She'd heard so many sad stories the past few days she had responded to with "that's awful," or "that's horrible," that for once she wanted to say something positive and maybe try and cheer the storyteller up.

Haruka nodded resolutely. "It took awhile before I figured out where she was, though. She'd been missing for about half a year and they'd gone looking everywhere, including the school, but she wasn't there. Dad was really insistent they check the school, which is what tipped me off. So I went to look through her old photo albums.

I looked up the name of the school and I found the urban legend. I recognised it, because I've heard it at my school too, but nobody knew the name of the school so the version I knew was just about 'a port town somewhere'. But now I knew it was about Hachigoya, and putting that together with how mom was so insistent on never bullying people I got the feeling this story was more than just a legend.

I looked through her photo albums and I didn't see anything strange at first, until I realised there was only one photo of her first year in Hachigoya. There were lots of the later years, all where she had a bunch of friends and she started wearing makeup and stuff. But that first year photo... It was just her, plain, with one other girl. The other girl had her arm around her and mum looked a bit uncomfortable but happy, still.

It should be insignificant but I couldn't let go of it. The photo had such a different feeling than the other photos where mum looked confident and her friends were fashionable popular kids, as opposed to this happy plain girl who I guess didn't have a great sense of personal space. I also couldn't find her anywhere else in the album. None of the other Hachigoya girls looked like her, and none of mums later college friends did.

They eventually stopped searching for mum in Hachigoya, but my dad kept fighting to get them to look there again when it was clear the search wasn't going anywhere. They were trying to convince him she'd just ran off which made him really angry because mum would never do that.

Anyway, about a year after she went missing he managed to convince them to go back, and dad and me went with them. I had ulterior motives but I didn't tell dad."

Guilt flashed on Haruka's face.

"I wish I'd left a note or something… Anyway, when we got to the town it became a lot easier to find out more about the legend. People didn't believe it was real, but nobody denied that a girl died in the year my mum started attending school there. I learned the girl still had a grandmother who lived in town, but I didn't want to go bother her with something that was just a theory I had. Nobody could remember what the girl's name was though. They'd taken to calling her what the legend calls her. Apparently nobody would bring it up with her grandmother because they didn't want to make her sad. I thought it might be easier to find her if I knew her name, and being nicknamed "Loneliness", nobody wants that, right? I thought maybe she's be benevolent if I knew who she was.

While dad was helping the police on their search I went to visit an archive where they held a lot of the old school books of Hachigoya High before it closed down. I couldn't believe my eyes when I actually found the one for the year my mom started school, it felt so surreal I was almost afraid to open it.

The photo was right at the start of the album, the third years. Everyone sitting neatly in three rows with the teacher planted in the middle. I found my mum, surrounded by pretty girls who somehow managed to look fashionable in uniform. Everyone looked serious, but mum, she looked scared. At least, I think she did. I might've been projecting that emotion onto her, I don't know."

"Was Kaori in the photo," Lucy asked, almost breathless.

"She wasn't among the students, but I found her quick enough. In the top right corner was a little oval-shaped portrait of a black-eyed, black-haired girl. I instantly recognised her, even without the grin she had on the one photo I had of her. Number fifteen, Kaori Kuze. I bet the book had more information about her death and memorial stuff and things like that but after I found her name I just snapped the book shut and hurried out of the archive."

"And then you went to the school," Lucy guessed. Haruka nodded.

"It wasn't even dark out but the moment I set foot inside and the doors closed behind me it felt like it was midnight. I was scared but I kept thinking of my mum to keep me motivated.

'I know your name,' I said. 'I want to talk to you.' Nothing happened, which I expected honestly. So I kept talking. 'You took my mum from me last year,' I said, 'I know she was your friend when you were alive. I'd like to talk to you,' I said, again. Nothing. Then I said 'Kaori Kuze,' and she instantly appeared. I think she must've been listening. I had this whole monologue in mind to convince her to give my mum back but I just stood there frozen in fear. I don't think my brain could comprehend she was real, it seemed impossible, even with all the information I found in my search. The urban legend says she asks you a question, but she didn't ask me anything. She just… smiled, and then I was gone. It was like I was falling in darkness, and then I was at Hachigoya High."

"So your mum was friends with Kaori."

"Well…"

"What's wrong?"

"You've heard the legend, right? Kaori died feeling abandoned."

Haruka decided they should go to the next class because she argued it probably wouldn't be smart to mess with Sabishii-chan's scenario too much. It was English, which was quite amusing as Lucy turned out to be very good at the subject, to the surprise of everyone including Lucy herself.

"I was really bad at languages at my old school," she said when the teacher expressed how impressed she was. "But the level here is quite different."

"Marvelous," the teacher said, and Lucy thought the conversation would end there but Haruka wouldn't let it. She shot her hand up into the air.

"Kurosawa?"

"Maybe Lucy can teach students who have trouble with English? I mean, I'd like that, and I bet I'm not alone in that." She very pointedly looked at Ayako, who looked bewildered at being singled out by Haruka once again.

"If Lucy would like to do that she is free to do so," the teacher said noncommittally. She gestured for Lucy to sit down again.

"S-sure," Lucy said to Haruka when she sat back down. "I don't think I'll be very good at teaching others things, though."

"That's fine," Haruka said. "It's not really about that anyway. But Ayako is bad at English, and I bet Kaori will tag along if you ask."

So after class she went up to Ayako and Kaori.

"Oh, hello Lucy," Kaori said.

Lucy instantly forgot anything she was going to say as she didn't expect Kaori to address her by name. "N-nice to meet you," she stammered, then quickly directed her welcome message to Ayako so it'd fit with Kaori's play better. "I hope your first day was a nice one."

Ayako nodded shyly. "Kaori's shown me around. This looks like a really nice school," she said, her hand resting on her cheek once again.

"Uh, so yeah, I thought Haruka had a pretty good idea about the English lesson thing. And I was wondering if you wanted to join because Haruka says you're bad a- you're new so it'd be nice to have a club to be a part of." Lucy wanted to sink through the floor. Maybe if she screwed up enough Kaori would make it happen for her.

"Oh, that'd be really nice, thank you." Ayako smiled. "I actually really struggle with English so I'd love some help." She turned to Kaori. "What about you?"

"I… don't know. My English is fine, I guess," Kaori said. Lucy was a little surprised she didn't jump at the chance; her whole thing was asking for friends, why did it look like she was trying to pass up the opportunity?

"I'd like it if you joined me," Ayako urged her on. "And you're really good at explaining stuff so maybe you can help me when I need some extra help."

A shy smile appeared on Kaori's face. "Oh, alright then."

"Thanks! When do you want to do the classes?" Ayako asked Lucy.

"Oh, uh," Lucy hadn't thought this far ahead. She secretly hoped Haruka would come over and help her out, but she didn't.

"What about after school on every day we have English class? Then we can go over material that's still fresh in our minds."

Ayako nodded. "Good idea!" She turned to Kaori. "Everyone is so nice here, I like this place better than my old school already."

Kaori smiled weakly. "I'm happy for you," she said. "See you tomorrow Lucy." She packed her things and walked out the door, Ayako in tow.

Lucy and Haruka were once again the only ones in the room, aside from the teacher at her desk. "See you on the flipside," Haruka said with a wave.

Momentarily everything ceased to exist, it was swallowed in darkness like Lucy had been when she'd told Sabishii-chan yes, then a pavement materialised with a quiet road beside it, surrounded by green. Lucy felt she was walking and tasted something sweet. When everything was fully realised, she became aware she had a piece of toast with jam in her mouth.

She was walking to school. She had never been here, but she knew exactly where she was and that she would see Hachigoya the moment she would turn the corner that was coming up. The air was salty with the scent of the sea and that same sea offered a nice breeze as the morning sun shone brightly in the sky.

Such a beautiful setting for a horrible story, she thought.

"Good morning!"

She turned around. It was Haruka. "That's nice, we're taking the same route."

"Do you think she did it on purpose," Lucy asked. Haruka shrugged.

"She obviously knows we're friends, but she seems to be okay with that. That's a good sign. Hey, where'd you get that?" She pointed at the toast.

"I woke up with it," Lucy said, and she took another bite.

Haruka blew up her cheeks. "Aw boo, she never gave me anything. Maybe if I wish for it really hard at the end of the day," she wondered.

"So what happens today?"

Haruka thought for a moment. "I think today nothing special happens. The early days kinda blend together in my mind because the problems didn't start right away. You'll notice Hasegawa being a bitch to Kaori but Ayako won't confront her over it."

"Someone should," Lucy said as she finished the toast. She decided she really liked raspberry jam and hoped this would be a common occurrence in the morning.

Haruka nodded. "I agree, but I don't really blame mum for staying quiet. She doesn't know why Hasegawa acts like that to Kaori, and she hasn't noticed yet that Kaori doesn't have any other friends. She doesn't want to jump to conclusions and burn bridges she hasn't crossed yet."

"Why does Kaori not have any friends," Lucy asked. "She seems friendly and helpful to me."

"You'll see," Haruka said. "She's very fond of showing off how much she suffered in life."

At lunch the four girls put their tables together. Once again Kaori was a little hesitant, but Lucy spied the hint of a smile on her face after they sat down to eat their lunches.

"Oh good, I didn't forget mine today!" She exclaimed triumphantly.

Ayako cocked a brow. "You forget your lunch a lot?"

"Sometimes, it depends," Lucy said. She glanced at Kaori but quickly looked away again when she noticed the dark shadow over Kaori's pale face.

"Did Kaori show you around yesterday," Haruka quickly asked.

"A little," Ayako said. "But I had to rush home so I haven't seen the sea yet."

"Maybe we could go see it together after class," Lucy proposed.

Ayaka nodded happily but Kaori looked a bit perturbed. "I mean, if you'd like to, sure," she said after a moment. Her face was normal again.

Suddenly, with an unnecessary amount of gesturing and noise, Hasegawa shoved a chair next to the table they were sitting at and sat down at the head of the table, between Kaori and Lucy.

"Hey Loushy, can I join your English club?" Hasegawa had a smile on her face and looked friendly enough, but Lucy was still on guard. She saw Kaori tense up.

"It's Lucy," she said without answering her question.

"Oh, sorry! I've never heard that name before, so I wasn't sure how to say it. Clearly I could use some English lessons," she laughed.

"How do you like school so far, Kurosawa?"

"It's nice, but some people should really work on their manners," Haruka said before Ayako could answer. Hasegawa narrowed her eyes at her.

Ayako tried to hide her face with her hair and said nothing.

"Anyway," Hasegawa began, "I think this English club is a great idea. I just have one bit of advice for you," she turned to Lucy and put on an expression as if she was looking at a drenched kitten. "I know you probably don't know this because you're new, so I'm telling you to help you. You have a murderer in your group. And I'm sure you don't want that."

A hushed "what" escaped Ayako's lips. Kaori said nothing. Haruka sighed harshly.

"Yes, thank you Hasegawa, you are so thoughtful. Now please go back to your own table, your friends must be wondering where you went."

"I'm just helping the new girls out, what's your problem," Hasegawa said with a smile.

"The same as everyone else's here," Haruka said. Lucy felt a sudden icy cold brush her right side and knew it came from Kaori. She was afraid to look at her, so she tried to stay focused on Haruka instead. It appeared she'd sensed the cold too, because she stopped talking and stared Hasegawa down instead.

After a few very awkward seconds Hasegawa got up. "Just thought you should know," she said to Ayako, and walked back to her table.

They spent the rest of lunch eating in silence.

Haruka urged Lucy to come with her, telling Kaori and Ayako that they had to get some paperwork done for the English club.

"What was that talk of someone being a murderer," Lucy asked when they were alone.

"Complete nonsense," Haruka said angrily. "Do you see now how awful Hasegawa is?"

"She reminds me of someone from home," Lucy said.

"Please deck them for me when you get back," Haruka said. "Anyway, I should tell you what Hasegawa means by that. I don't know if mum ever asked back then, she was probably too scared. Kaori's mother died while giving birth to her, and her dad ran off soon after. She was raised by her grandparents. Obviously she's not a murderer but people will make up anything if they need a reason to hate you."

"Why does Hasegawa want people to hate Kaori?"

"I'm not sure about this," Haruka said, "mum never asked her and Kaori's kind of vague about it herself. Hasegawa's from a rich family and her dad's kind of a shady guy. From what I gathered Kaori insulted her dad and Hasegawa's hated her ever since. I figure she was jealous of how popular Hasegawa was, but she didn't say that, of course."

"Maybe if we can do something about Hasegawa everything will turn out better," Lucy proposed. Haruka shook her head.

"It didn't start with Hasegawa, she just turned quiet shunning into full on bullying. Mum's talked about a girl she knew, of whom everyone said she was cursed because her mum died and her dad left her. People interpreted that as nobody wanting her. Cursed from birth. Mum said that if I ever heard a story like that at my school I should disregard it because it's nonsense and nobody deserves to be shunned. That must've been about Kaori, it matches up perfectly."

"So… What can we do?" Lucy asked.

Haruka looked at her, eyes full of determination. "We keep trying until we find something that sticks. We're trapped here, so it's not like we have much of a choice regardless."

Not much happened the rest of the day. Kaori dropped a pen during one class and nobody tried to retrieve it for her. It landed under a boy's table, but he pretended he didn't notice. Ayako made the effort to get it for her, and Kaori looked ready to burst into tears when she handed it back. Lucy simply couldn't understand why Ayako seemed so against asking what was wrong with Kaori.

After school the four of them stepped outside. "To the ocean," Haruka said.

"Y-yes, follow me," Kaori stammered as she took the lead. They went off the school grounds, crossed the road and walked for a bit until Lucy could hear the waves crashing into the sea.

"It's so nice to be close to the ocean," Ayako said. "I used to visit the beach all the time with my parents when I was little."

"I don't think I've ever seen the ocean," Lucy realised.

"You've never been," Ayako said, surprised. She talked to Ayako for a while about places they liked to visit as kids, so Lucy had to make a bunch of stuff up. Haruka was uncharacteristically quiet.

"Well, here we are," Kaori said as they stood on the beach sand that swallowed up half their shoes, her arms stretched wide. "The ocean!" The wind beat enthusiastically at their hair and coats.

"I love it," Ayako said. "Doesn't it just feel like all your worries are blowing away over the waves?"

Lucy agreed that there was something oddly liberating about being blown about by the wind like this while the ocean raged in front of them. Maybe it wasn't so much the sea blowing away their worries, rather than drowning them out with noise and turmoil.

Kaori dropped her arms and closed her eyes, her face turned slightly up, as if trying to listen to the wind.

"I've never left the school grounds before," Haruka said to Lucy. "I didn't know it was possible." She looked hopeful, and a little bit scared. Some of her usual scorn had left her.

Suddenly Kaori started screaming. Ayako jumped in shock, knocking into Lucy. They stared at her as she yelled, wordless screams that were blown back at her in different directions by the ocean wind. Kaori grinned, but when nobody said anything her smile started faltering.

Lucy waited for Ayako to say something, or maybe Haruka, so she wouldn't mess up Kaori's scenario, but neither of them said anything. They seemed to be astounded by what Kaori just did. Lucy wondered if she was the only one who understood why she had yelled at the ocean. She felt a shiver run down her spine and realised that nobody was going to do anything, so she took a step forward into the damp sand, took a deep breath and yelled her lungs out. She felt Kaori looking at her as she did, her eyes wide.

"I feel so much better now!" She said, her voice slightly hoarse. "Come on, try it!"

Haruka immediately stepped up, gave Lucy a knowing smile, and yelled too. Ayako hesitantly followed once she was in the minority of non-screamers. Her voice faltered rather quickly though and when she turned around she apparently saw something on the bridge, so she urged the others to stop too.

Lucy caught a glimpse of Hasegawa on the bridge before the day vanished and went into the next. Once again she awoke tasting toast and jam.

"Hey, I got one too!" Haruka appeared beside her and waved around a piece of toast of her own. She took a bite. "Apricot. That's mum's favourite."

"Do you think going to the beach helped her," Lucy asked as they walked.

"It helped enough that she gave me a piece of toast," Haruka replied. "I don't know if we can break her out of the cycle, but it seems we can influence it. When I was alone Kaori liked me but she still kept her distance. Now it looks like we're proper friends with her. That's a step in the right direction!"

"Does anything happen today," Lucy asked as they rounded the corner.

Haruka shook her head. "Don't think so. We've got some time to hang out together and be regular students, I guess."

The days seemed to fly by, and Lucy, Kaori, Haruka and Ayako became a pretty tight knit group.

Whereas Kaori became more outspoken and energetic, Ayako remained demure and rather quiet. At times Lucy felt this didn't make sense, as they were all very comfortable around each other now to the point that even the vengeful ghost that kept them all trapped was happily playing along, but she understood that Ayako was playing a role she couldn't break out of.

There were times Lucy could see in Haruka's eyes that this hurt her, but there was nothing she could do about it. Every day she wondered when it would be a good time to reveal her intentions to the group and take out the Cure Gem, but she worried what such a serious deviation from Kaori's play would do to the world around her.

Despite the amount of time they had spent together, she felt that she didn't really know Kaori. She appeared bright and happy now, and it was easy to forget that the place they were in was Kaori's invention where everyone was doomed to watch her downfall over and over. She had to remind herself that she was talking to a ghost, not a regular teenage girl, and that everyone around her was trapped or made up.

One day, after lunch, Hasegawa approach their table again.

"Hey Ayako, I was wondering if you wanted to join me and some friends after school to do some shopping. I think your personal style is really cute so I'd like your advice!"

Ayako turned red. "Sure," she stammered.

Lucy noticed Kaori had frozen in place once again. Why? She had friends beside Ayako now, so even if Ayako befriended Hasegawa she wouldn't be alone, why was she still so afraid?

"Here we go," Haruka whispered.

"Cool," Hasegawa said. "You could join us next lunch, if you like. Then you don't have to hang out with a murderer anymore."

Kaori mumbled something; Lucy could only make out "not" and "murderer".

Suddenly Ayako pushed her chair back and stood up, and she glared at Hasegawa.

"Kaori is not a murderer! Her mum died when she was born, that's completely different. She's really nice, I don't understand why you're so mean to her!"

When she noticed the room had gone quiet to stare at her she quickly sat down again.

Hasegawa did not look impressed. "Sure," she said. She moved to go sit with her friends again, but turned around one last time. "You don't know what you're talking about. She's cursed."

Ayako pretended not to hear.

"Thank you," Kaori said. She had attempted to hide the fact that she'd been crying by trying to do so in silence without so much as a whimper, so her entire face was wet with tears and snot. Haruka handed her a handkerchief.

"It doesn't have to be this way," she said as she handed it over. Kaori didn't reply as she wiped her face.

"What's her problem," Ayako said, her face still red. Lucy thought she could feel Ayako's heart pounding through the table. "She seems like such a nice person when talking to anyone else, but she's so mean to you. I don't understand."

"Hasegawa is not nice," Kaori spat, with a startling amount of force. It had the same energy as the teacher shouting at Haruka to be quiet on the first day.

The day ended with no further events, and Haruka was once again excited to find she got to have toast in the morning.

"What's yours?"

"Raspberry."
"Do you want to swap?"

"Well, I already took a bite out of mine…"

"Aw. Tomorrow then?"

"I always wake up with it already in my mouth, so I guess, if you don't mind it having a bite taken out of it…"

"Ew. Never mind then."

Lucy chuckled.

To her surprise Ayako had gone with Hasegawa and her friends after school. She walked into the classroom with her, said goodbye and went to her seat to greet Kaori.

"I didn't think you would go," Kaori admitted.

"It is a bit surprising, isn't it," Ayako said placidly. Her face looked apologetic but she didn't express regret. "I won't let her say anything bad about you, I promise," she continued. "When she says bad things, I stop her. But I'd like to have more friends, so… I didn't want to reject them."

Lucy didn't think that was a particularly good excuse for hanging out with Kaori's bully, and Kaori seemed to feel the same; she didn't say anything but something in her face gave away that she felt betrayed.

Lucy and Haruka tried to cheer Kaori up for the rest of the day, but nothing seemed to work. She'd laugh, or smile, or thank them for being so nice, but she instantly reverted back into her somber mood right after. Ayako was equally sulky. She did apologise to Kaori eventually but quietly followed it up by saying "I don't think I should feel sorry about making more friends."

"I think we're becoming set pieces," Haruka said during a quiet lesson. "If we're friends with Kaori now it interferes with her play so she's acting like we're not there."

Lucy wondered if now would be a good time for the Cure Gem; the play was about to start the first act of its horrible finale and perhaps it would be better to reveal it to Kaori before that.

Haruka thought for a moment. "Let's stop playing it safe. I tried that for two weeks and it doesn't work."

Lucy wanted to ask Haruka what her plan was, but she already leaned over to tap Kaori on the shoulder.

"Let's go to the beach," Haruka said, beaming at her. "Get our minds off of things."

To Lucy's surprise, it worked. Less surprising was Ayako denying the invitation to come along. "I have too much homework," she said.

"No you don't," Haruka said. "I know you always do your homework right after school, you don't have any except for today's."

Ayako turned scarlet. "There's just… Stuff I have to do! I can't come along." She turned around and began to walk off at a brisk pace. Kaori tried to follow her.

Kaori and Ayako acted like Lucy and Haruka had ceased to exist.

"Am I not good enough anymore," Kaori said, far too loud in the busy hallway.

Ayako stopped. She balled her fists for a second and her shoulders tensed, but they relaxed again by the time she turned around.

"That's not it," Ayako said. She was still blushing. Her hand went to her cheek again, something she hadn't done for a while now.

"What is it, then? I thought we were friends, but now you don't want to hang out with me." Kaori's voice was quavering. This was the first time Ayako had rejected an invitation from Kaori, wasn't she overreacting a little?

"I don't want to go to the beach," she said.

"We could go somewhere else," Haruka proposed. She was ignored by both.

"Why not?"

"Could you lower your voice, you're shouting for no reason," Ayako said, her eyes glued to the floor. She sounded embarrassed but Lucy detected a hint of annoyance in her voice.

"Why not," Kaori said, quieter now.

"It's embarrassing. Someone might see us."

"I didn't think you cared about that," Kaori said. She wiped her eyes, though no tears had actually come from them. Her voice was steadying a little too.

"Well I do," Ayako said. "I'm sorry. Please don't think I hate you, because I don't. I still want to be your friend."

Kaori breathed a sigh of relief. "Okay, I understand. I'll go with Lucy and Haruka, then."

Ayako continued walking away. Kaori seemed to feel a little better.

They stood together, staring at the ocean, which was now quiet and flat. They didn't yell at it, instead they stood a small distance from each other, their shoes and socks cast aside with their feet half sunken in the sand.

"Maybe we should go for a swim," Lucy said. "I know its a bit cold but every time I look at these waves I just wanna dive in."

Kaori next to her tensed up.

"Good idea," Haruka said. "It'd be more fun than swimming at school because we can do whatever we like."

"I don't…" Kaori trailed off. She was fumbling with a hangnail on her index finger while staring at the water.

"What's wrong," Lucy asked.

"Please promise me you won't tell anyone," Kaori said in a small voice that would've been inaudible in the usual turmoil of the wind and waves. "I don't know how to swim. I nearly drowned when I was little and my grandparents have kept me from the water since, so… Now I can't swim."

Now she mentioned it Lucy realised Kaori had been absent for every swimming lesson they'd had. "Well, you could still learn it now, right," she said. Kaori shook her head.

"I don't want anyone to find out I can't swim. We live right by the ocean and part of my name means ocean, it would just give them ammo to make fun of me."

"We could teach you? We could go somewhere private and nobody would be able to judge you then," Haruka said. Once again Kaori shook her head.

"It's too late now."

Haruka sighed and said: "I suppose it is." They continued looking at the water pensively.

"Do you think I'm weird," Kaori suddenly said.

"No," Lucy said, honestly.

"Why do you ask," Haruka followed.

"Because…" Kaori paused a moment. "Because I only have one friend. Before Ayako I didn't have any for a really long time, and even when I did they would leave."

"We're your friends," Lucy said.

Kaori nodded. "Hasegawa tells them things and then they don't like me anymore. I'm a murderer and I'm cursed." She fell into Haruka without warning, who had to put in some effort into catching her. "I don't want to lose Ayako, too," she sobbed.

"I know," Haruka said. She petted Kaori's hair. "I know you don't. I wish you'd let us help you, Kaori."

"You can't," Kaori said hoarsely. She looked up, and Haruka looked horror struck.

Then the day faded into the next.

"I'm not hungry," Haruka said as she joined Lucy on the path to school. She held her piece of toast out in front of her as if it was a crawling insect.

"Hey, you've got raspberry jam this time," Lucy noted. She'd once again awoken with the toast in her mouth. She decided she liked raspberry better than apricot.

"I'm surprised it's not covered in cockroaches after yesterday." Haruka shivered.

"What did you see? You looked really freaked out."

"Her face." Haruka stopped. "It was…" She frowned as she searched for the right words, but then shook her head. "She looked like she had- You don't want to know."

The next few days went by as normal, with Ayako hanging out with them and Kaori becoming more cheerful again. Ayako would still talk to Hasegawa and her friends and eventually added a charm to her bag that was given to her by Hasegawa to match hers and her friends; Lucy could tell Kaori was bothered by this. Eventually Ayako stopped having lunch with them and switched over to sitting with Hasegawa instead. She'd tell Kaori it was only for a little bit to discuss some things with her new friends, but it ended up taking over the entirety of lunch after a while.

One day, as Lucy was leaving a bathroom stall, she heard Ayako come in with Hasegawa. She quickly closed the door again and listened.

"That charm goes so well with your bag," Hasegawa said.

"I agree. Thank you for giving it to me," Ayako answered.

"Of course! We're friends, right?"

"I guess we are," Ayako said shyly. Hasegawa tutted.

"You're far too shy, you know that. There's no need for that at all."

"S-sorry… I've always been like this."

"Oh, I know." Lucy heard the rustle of a bag and something being taken out of it, followed by the sound of something plastic snapping open.

"We can't wear makeup in school," Ayako said.

"Oh shush, this is an exception. It'll make you feel better which is totally a good reason to wear makeup, school rules be damned."

They went quiet for a moment.

"There. What do you think?" The plastic thing snapped shut with a click. "I think I did a pretty good job, it's practically gone."

"Thank you, Kazumi," Ayako said. "I don't know why I never thought of doing that myself."

"You just needed a push in the right direction that no one had the decency to give you yet," Hasegawa said cheerfully.

"Are you going to badmouth Kaori again? Because I asked you not to do that," Ayako said sharply. Lucy felt proud of her. She heard Hasegawa sigh.

"I'm just trying to help you."
"She's not a murderer! That's ridiculous. I can't believe you'd say that about someone," Ayako snapped back.

"Yes, okay, that was stupid, I get it. She's technically not a murderer."

"Tech-" Hasegawa cut her off.

"But have you thought of why Kaori is so clingy with you?"

"I'm her only friend, she's-"

"You don't think it's annoying?"

"Well, yes, a little, but-"

"Have you considered she's trying to keep you close to make herself look better?"

Ayako didn't have a response this time. "What?"

"She's the most hated girl in school, no friends whatsoever, she's poor little Kuze Kaori-chan. Then in walks a new girl: Shy, keeps to herself, and… Sorry Ayako, I don't mean to hurt your feelings but you've got that mark on your face. Don't put your hand on it now! You might smudge the concealer."

"I thought you said I was still pretty even with the mark," Ayako said bitterly.

"Yes, you are! I don't care about the mark on your face, I like you for who you are, that's why I tried to befriend you all the time. But I bet Kaori does care."

"What do you mean?"

"Now this isn't my opinion, this is just what Kaori thinks of you, okay? So don't get mad. Kaori probably thinks if she befriends you, with that huge uneven mark on your face, people will stop being mean to her and they'll be mean to you instead. She's so attention-starved, she'll be okay being friends with an outcast like you, and all the hate will be directed at you instead of her. She'll defend you if anyone says something I'm sure, but that'll just hammer home how dependant you are on her. That's why she gets so upset when you hang out with other people."

"That's not true," Ayako said, but some of her resolve was gone.

"Maybe not. But I bet when you walk into class now, with that mark covered up, she's gonna complain. If you look pretty like you do now, she's gonna feel attacked. She wants you to look different so she has someone to hide behind."

Lucy heard one of them turn and walk away in a hurry.

"Ayako, wait!" Hasegawa called after her. More quick footsteps followed.

After making sure they were gone, Lucy left the stall and ran back to the classroom.

In class she saw Ayako was hovering her hand over her cheek as Kaori sat backwards in her chair to talk to her. If anything it called more attention to her face, and as such it didn't take long for Kaori to ask about it.

"I put concealer on it, don't you think it looks nicer?"

Kaori's expression was tough to read. "You can barely see it anymore," she said neutrally.

"Yes, that makes me happy," Ayako said, as if trying to steer Kaori towards the appropriate reaction.

"I think you're cute regardless of that mark," Kaori said, which was clearly not what Ayako wanted to hear, and her eyes fell.

"People say that but I feel better if it's hidden," Ayako retorted. Her response was snappy, too guarded. Lucy tried to interject but Haruka stopped her.

"There's no point. The play is almost over."

"But why? I think you should wear it with pride," Kaori tried.

"There's nothing to be proud of! It's an ugly stain and if I want it gone, I want it gone! Why don't you get that?"

"Yeah Kuze, why don't you leave her alone." One of Hasegawa's friends forced herself into the conversation.

"Shut up! Both of you, just shut up!" Ayako stormed out of the room, past the teacher. Hasegawa got up and followed her out. Kaori remained in her seat, her face turned away from Lucy and Haruka. She turned to the girl who had interrupted her conversation with Ayako. Lucy couldn't see her face, but heard her question perfectly.

"Why do you hate me so much?"

"Where are you going," Haruka asked when Lucy got up too.

"I want to hear Ayako and Hasegawa's conversation," Lucy replied. Haruka shook her head.

"I already did that, no need. Ayako's upset about Kaori's reaction but also about Hasegawa and her posse trying to choose her friends for her. Hasegawa says some more nonsense to try and convince her that Kaori's just trying to use her and Ayako doesn't want to believe it. Then…" Haruka sighed. "Then we get to the part that's the reason we're all here. Hasegawa says that if Kaori truly supported Ayako, she'd attend swimming class, since Ayako can't cover up her face in the pool. So they'll come back in a moment and ask Kaori to come to class tomorrow. You already saw what happens when she does." Haruka's face remained stern throughout her explanation, but her face had gone a little pale.

"We have to stop that," Lucy said.

Haruka nodded. "Do you have any ideas?"

Lucy reached for the gem in her pocket. "I do, actually."

At that moment Ayako and Hasegawa walked back into the class and walked straight towards Kaori.

"Sorry," Kaori began. "I didn't mean to insult you with what I said."

Ayako didn't make eye contact. "I know. Will you come to swimming class tomorrow?"

Kaori didn't reply. Hasegawa smirked. Lucy wanted to slap her.

"I… I don't know, I always help my grandmother on those mornings, I can't make it to swimming class in time," Kaori stammered.

"What if I said I'd really like you to be there," Ayako said. "To support me." She rubbed her cheek.

"I don't know…"
"I told you." Hasegawa rolled her eyes.

Lucy sprang up. "Let's all go together!" They all gaped at her.

"Well, not you," she said to Hasegawa. "You can go with your own friends. But the four of us could meet up outside the school and go to swimming together, right? And maybe we can help your grandmother out later, Kaori."

"I would like that," Ayako said.

Once again, Kaori hesitated. "I'm sorry, I really can't. I can't let my grandm-"
"Oh stop talking about your nan, you made that up. You clearly don't care enough about Ayako to not skip gym for once," Hasegawa said.

"That's not true," Kaori said in a high pitched tone.

"If it's not, then why won't you come with me," Ayako said, sounding more hurt than angry.

"I'm sorry Ayako, I really am. But I can't, I just can't." She turned to Lucy and apologised to her. Lucy felt it had a deeper meaning than just Kaori's play, but she wasn't sure.

"Fine. I see how it is. If you won't support me, don't expect me to defend you next time someone says something mean to you. I thought you were my friend but I guess I was wrong."

The rest of the lesson was extremely awkward, with Ayako writing her notes down with great anger, Kaori blankly staring at her table and Hasegawa and her friends whipping their head around every few minutes to look at them in smug superiority.

"You better hurry with your plan," Haruka said in normal volume. People turned around to look at her. "Because the day is about to end, and tomorrow it's over."

Right as she finished her sentence the day faded out into the next one. Lucy had not anticipated for this day to end right after class; they were supposed to have their English lesson after school hours - but with Kaori and Ayako's falling out, of course that wouldn't happen. Why hadn't she realised that? - and now she was back on the street, yet again tasting a mouthful of toast. Today it was two pieces - why? - but she had no time to think about it. She had no idea what time of day it was, if swimming lessons had already started like when she first woke up in Hachigoya, or if it was before school. She started running. She wished she was faster. Then she realised there was a way she could be faster.

"Mirabilis Cerebrum Kaibutsu!"

Cortex made it to the corner in two giant leaps. When she turned, she saw Haruka running in front of her. She let out a surprised yell when Cortex scooped her up and continued running.

"What the hell?!"

"It's me."

Haruka frowned. "Lucy? What happened to your cloth- Why are you green?!"

"It's a long story that we don't have time for right now. Let's say it's dream magic," Cortex said. She then handed the gem she had been holding in one hand to Haruka. "Please keep this safe for me for a bit."

It shone brilliantly in Haruka's hands.

"Is this what you wanted to give to Kaori," Haruka asked as she studied the gem.

Cortex nodded. "It started glowing when I first passed the school, I just know it's meant for her. Though…" She looked down at Haruka while jumping over several cars to make it to the school faster. "It's shining very brightly now you're holding it. I think you might be Precure material, too."

Haruka's eyes widened. "Precure?"
"Yes, a legendary hero, like me," Cortex said.

Haruka smiled and sighed. "That'd be really cool but I think you should give it to Kaori. She needs the light in her heart freed. I'll be fine going back home with mum and being regular Haruka."

"I'll come visit you," Cortex said, bounding around the school building to get to the pool faster. "I don't know how yet, but I will. Now tuck in your head!"

After Haruka did so Cortex twisted her upper body and sprang elbow-first into the window of the pool, shattering the glass as they burst through. She put Haruka down and tried to find Kaori in the mess of students in the pool, who were now all looking at her. She saw Ayako sitting in an inflatable tube in the corner nearest to her, Hasegawa and her friends surrounding her.

"We're too late," Haruka said, "she's already jumped in."

"Kaori!" Lucy shouted, much the same way Haruka had on her first day in Hachigoya.

Haruka swore and ran past Ayako and knelt down next to the water, where Cortex now noticed something dark right below the surface.

"Lucy, help me!" She stuck her arms in the water and tried to pull what Cortex now deciphered was Kaori out of the water.

Before Cortex could do anything Kaori's hair wrapped around Haruka's arms and pulled her into the pool. Ayako shrieked.

"No," Cortex said, momentarily at a loss for what to do. In a panic she conjured her wand, and incapable of thinking of anything else to wish for said: "Lux Stella Praesens! Kaori, stop pretending!"

In a moment everything changed. At first Cortex thought she had been too late and the day had turned into the next, but the pool and the people around her were still there; everything had just become a lot darker and dilapidated and covered in a green tinge. Haruka and Kaori had not surfaced.

"Haruka!" Cortex yelled. She kneeled at the side of the pool but hesitated just before reaching in. What if Kaori pulled her in too? She tried to think of another incantation, when one by one her classmates were pulled under. None of them reacted to it, and they disappeared so quickly Cortex didn't have time to do anything.

Then something started rising from the middle of the pool. It stayed perfectly still as it slowly rose further up, the water streaming down it as if watery ropes sliding off what they had been holding captive.

Cortex edged away from the side of the pool. She knew the figure was Sabishii-chan, was Kaori, her friend, but the aura surrounding it was so distinctly hostile her instincts were screaming at her to run.

Her long, black hair stuck to her face in a way that made Kaori's head looked like a splotch of ink on her pale white shoulders. In the light her skin almost looked blue.

Cortex stood up and swallowed hard. "Kaori," she said in a voice that trembled a lot more than she would have liked. "I want to give you something."

When Kaori made a horrible choked noise she briefly lost her composure, but decided to keep going because Kaori hadn't at least directly tried to kill her yet, so she saw that as positive.

"I want to give you something," she repeated, and she held out her hand.

The green Cure Gem was in her palm, despite Haruka going down with it just a few moments before. They were linked to Cortex, nobody could take them away, somewhere deep inside she knew this.

"I've seen you as you really are, and this gem is proof that you're a good person!"

When she pointed it at Kaori, it glowed as brightly as it had in Haruka's hands.

Kaori's posture changed slightly and her hair floated off her face, the ribbon of her shirt gently billowing on the non-existent waves. Her eyes were no longer hidden by her hair and Cortex instantly wished they had been as she looked so hateful it was hard to maintain eye contact. But Cortex pushed through.

"Please take it, it's yours." She held up her palm.

"Why did you ruin my play," Kaori said in a low, strained voice that contained very little of the happy melody Kaori's voice normally was. Cortex realised the choking noises from before had been an earlier attempt at this same sentence.

"Because I want to help you." When she blinked she felt the floor disappear from under her and Kaori's face was right up next to hers. The smell of chlorine made her eyes water.

"Nobody can help me anymore," Kaori said. Cortex arm holding the gem was pressed between them.

"That's not true," Cortex tried. "I know that for you it's hard to believe but I know that's not true!"

Kaori coughed and inhaled in sharp, short breaths. Cortex' lungs felt tight. She tried to fill them with a deep breath but it seemed they were empty again the moment she stopped.

"Please let me help you," she said in a strained voice.

Kaori backed off again and let herself fall into the pool. When she didn't surface again Cortex once again pulled out her wand.

She pointed it at the pool but before she could start something jumped up at the edge of the pool. It was Haruka. She coughed and spluttered and clambered out of the water. Cortex quickly went over to help her out, but Haruka slapped her hand away.

"It's no use, Lucy," she said. "We failed her again."

"I don't-" but then Cortex got a good look at Haruka's eyes and noticed they were like Kaori's, not Haruka's own bright and brave eyes.

"My mother let her drown and lived the rest of her school days blissfully with her new popular friends. Honestly she should be left to rot here for all eternity."

"Kaori, I know that's you talking! Let go of Haruka," Cortex said.

"She came to Hachigoya a year ago, you know, to say sorry. But it was too late. More than ten years too late, when there was nobody left to condemn her for what she did in school," Haruka said bitterly.

"That's not true! Ayako didn't mean to hurt you."

"You take her side?!" Haruka's voice changed to Kaori's damaged one. "I thought we were friends, Lucy. I really thought we were friends!"

"We are," Cortex said. "But you're not letting yourself see beyond your hatred."

"I'm dead," Haruka said. Her hair changed from brown to black and grew longer and she gradually shrank until she was a head shorter. Kaori floated off the ground to be level with Cortex again. "Hate is all I have left."

Cortex shook her head. "No, if that was true, then this place wouldn't exist. And this gem wouldn't be telling me that it belongs to you."

Kaori started making horrible noises again instead of replying and Cortex caught onto what she was trying to do.

"You can't scare me! I know I'm right. You can throw whatever you want at me, but I'll still be here in the end and I'll still try to help you!"

She had not intended this as an invitation for Kaori to try, but that's how Kaori took it.

Suddenly she was underwater. When she looked up she saw the surface was far, far above her and she would never be able to reach it before running out of air. But she was a zombie, she didn't need to breathe anyway, so this didn't really bother her. Instead she looked around in search of Kaori, but she was nowhere to be seen.

The next moment she was in a casket. She tried to move, but couldn't. People were standing over her and crying. She recognised one of them as one of Hasegawa's friends, crying harder than anybody else. Lucy wondered if it was because she felt bad or was simply frightened by the sight of a body. Then she wondered if Marlucy got a funeral and concluded she probably did not.

Then everything became darkness and something was pressing down on her from all sides. She tried to open her eyes but immediately closed them again in discomfort as something fell into them. Not this again, she thought. She didn't think she'd have to climb out of the ground twice in one life. Before she could shimmy around to move the ground enough to move her arms the earth fell away and she was next to the pool again.

This time it was empty and appeared exactly the way it did in real life, except there were bodies strewn all around it. Kaori recognised Haruka, and the boy from lunch. Near Haruka was an adult woman with a small mark on one side of her face. She felt a wave of relief when she noticed all of them were breathing.

Kaori was floating above the pool and stared at her.

"I told you that you couldn't scare me. I know you're dead, but that doesn't have to be the end of it. This isn't the purpose of your existence. Look," Cortex gently pulled on her cheek. "I'm dead too, see? And unlike you I don't have my own soul, but I'm happy!"

Kaori continued staring.

"...Maybe you think I'm a witch, or something, but I'm not." Cortex detransformed. "I can be a normal girl, like you, see? I came here because I heard your story and I saw one of my gems glow and I knew that meant something. And I saw how you are, how you really are, who you were when you were alive and I want to help free that person inside of you. I know you don't believe it's there anymore but I can feel that it is!"

Kaori didn't move but when Lucy blinked the pool was full of water again. If Kaori was going to disappear underwater again she'd dive in after her.

"You don't have to be in this place. You can come with me, and I'll be with you and I'll introduce you to my friends and you won't be alone anymore! I can't do that if you won't let me help you." She clutched the gem in her hand. "You don't have to take the gem if you don't want to, but please listen to me."

Kaori appeared in front of her again and grabbed her shirt. Lucy gasped, which earned her a mouthful of water as Kaori pulled her under the surface of the pool.

They went deeper and deeper, far deeper than the depth of a normal pool and Lucy actually felt a little uneasy as the water grew darker and colder. Kaori looked down to the invisible bottom of wherever they were now. Lucy looked up towards the surface and saw the speck of light of the surface grow smaller and smaller.

Was Kaori trying to scare her again? No. This was something else. Down here it was cold and dark and endless. It was loneliness in a tangible form.

She wrapped her arms around Kaori, and she was so very small. Kaori dug her face into Lucy. Once again her instincts told her to let go and try to swim away, but she resisted. In a last ditch effort to scare Lucy and deter her from her plans Kaori suddenly snapped her head up, her eyes full of hate and resentment.

"You can leave this place." Lucy's words were bubbles. She wrenched her eyes shut, unable to look at Kaori's contorted features any longer, and tightened her grip. For a moment she feared what Kaori would do in retaliation, but then she felt she wasn't holding her any longer.

Her feet hit the ground. When she opened her eyes she noticed she was still underwater, though the water was a deep blue as opposed to the black they had been falling in before, and she could see her surroundings as little light filtered through from above.

Kaori was floating just a few meters away from her, a stark white little figure in the darkness. She had covered her face with her hands.

Lucy carefully approached her. Kaori lowered her hands a little. Her eyes were dark and shiny.

"I felt so betrayed, it's all I could remember. And it hurt so much," she hiccuped. "I didn't think it would ever end. And then it didn't. I didn't want to die, so I held onto the things I could still feel and I ended up like… Like this."

Lucy opened her hand again, and the gem reappeared, but Kaori shook her head.

"I can't take that. I don't deserve a better place than this. I've hurt so many people. You saw them, up there!" Kaori kicked her feet and put some distance between herself and Lucy.

"That wasn't you," Lucy said.

"But it was! It was all the hate and pain I felt, it was still me!"

"But there is a lot more to you than that. You're not just those feelings, something dark and evil made you that way, but you can break free. You just have to let go."

"I'm scared," Kaori said.

"That's okay," Lucy said. "I'll be with you the whole way, I promise."

Kaori hesitantly reached out to Lucy's hand. With trembling fingers she lightly touched the gem.

Instantly a green-tinged light enveloped her. When it vanished, the gem was gone. Kaori clutched her hands to her chest. "I feel different," she said in a high voice. "I can feel my heart, and I know words I didn't know before." She looked up at Lucy, her eyes wide.

"I told you! I told you it was destined for you," Lucy said and she danced towards Kaori with as much fervor as the water allowed. "Let's get out of here."

"I- I don't know-"
"You do know, this is your world, right? So you tell it what to do!" Kaori hesitantly closed her eyes. She started floating up and quickly gestured for Lucy to grab her so she wouldn't be left behind.

As they went up Lucy noticed something shed off Kaori, like a dark blanket. They drifted further and further away from it, leaving it down in the dark depths of Kaori's old sanctuary.

With their feet back on the ground in Hachigoya's pool, Kaori let go of Lucy. The people strewn on the floor were still there.

"They must hate me," Kaori said, her eyes quickly filling with tears. "I've been so awful to them."

"Let's set it right, then," Lucy said. Kaori wiped her eyes and nodded.

She took a deep breath and concentrated. The lights in the pool came on. The water looked pure and everything was clean. The sun began shining in through the large windows. Lucy could hear excited chatter coming from the nearby school halls and saw the wind gently blowing through the trees outside.

The people on the ground slowly came to. She quickly went over to Haruka.

"Lucy?" Haruka wiped her eyes groggily as she moved to sit on her knees. "Goodness, you're still green."

"We did it," Lucy said. "Kaori's free now." Haruka's eyes went big.

"No way, how?" Kaori shyly waved at her, but didn't come over. She looked extremely guilty.

"I gave her that gem," Lucy said.

Haruka frowned. "Wow, was that seriously all it took? I didn't think you could break an onryo out of their state by flinging a magic rock at them."

Lucy smiled. "Sort of."

"Kaori?" A shrill voice full of disbelief rang out near them. It was the woman. Lucy recognised her voice. "Kaori, I'm so sorry," she said as she started towards Kaori who flinched back.

"I shouldn't have forced you to swim. And I shouldn't have let Hasegawa influence me."

"Mom," Haruka whispered. Ayako turned into her teenage self again.

"You must have been so scared, it's all I thought about after it happened, but I… I never apologized." As she talked Ayako turned into her teenage self again.

"Ayako," Kaori said in a voice obstructed by tears. "I was hoping you'd show up every day I was trapped here," she continued. "I wanted to talk to you so badly. But when you finally showed up after all those years and you apologised all I felt was anger. I thought… I thought you were just apologising to get rid of your feelings of guilt. So I trapped you…" She sharply breathed in. "For so long. I should be the one asking for for-"

"No!" Without another word Ayako hugged Kaori with such force it knocked the air out of her.

"Thank you," Haruka said to Lucy. "I was beginning to worry I'd end up like mom before you showed up. You saw the good in Kaori… No, you helped Kaori see the good in herself."

"I wouldn't have been anywhere if it wasn't for your help," Lucy said. "Thank you." They embraced.

"I don't know how to say this, but… I don't think we'll see each other again for a long time. I don't think we're from the same world," Lucy said after they let go.

Haruka nodded. "I got a feeling that was the case when you were running around with that shiny gem, myself. I'll miss you. Please take good care of Kaori."

"I will! And you take good care of your mum, she looks like she needs the support," Lucy said as she looked at Kaori and Ayako who had now turned into a heap of tears and arms.

Looking around it seemed Kaori thankfully had not trapped that many people, Lucy counted less than ten. Most of them looked very confused.

"Okay," Kaori said after a moment and she approached Lucy. "I'm ready to go. I will send everyone back, and then we can go together." She held out her hand to Lucy.

"You… You still want to take me with you, right?"

Lucy scoffed and lightly bumped her elbow into Kaori's arm. "Of course. I keep my word." She took Kaori's hand. Kaori nodded to herself and smiled lightly. "Of course."

Haruka and Ayako (now back to her real form) waved goodbye as everyone faded from the room.

Then the room itself faded and Lucy and Kaori reappeared in the forest near the mansion.

"Whoa, you're here!" A familiar voice said.

It was Luke and Verity, accompanied by Desdemona.

"What in the good name of The Lord was that," said Verity. Her eyes were the size of golfballs. "We just made it back to the school and I blink and it's gone, and now you're here!"

"It's a very long story," Lucy said.

Luke shrieked and hid behind Verity. "Is that…?" he clutched his camera tightly.

"Um, hello," Kaori said. "My name is Kaori. I'm a ghost, I guess," she said as she inspected her hands. She looked a little bit worried about that and turned to Lucy. "But wait, Lucy is a zombie, so I'm okay with not being normal too."

"You won't stand out here, don't worry," Desdemona said. "It's nice to meet you Kaori." She smiled at Kaori but cocked a quizzical brow at Lucy.

"Are you…" Luke tried again. Verity pushed him out from behind her.

"Sabishii-chan? Yes, sort of. Well, no, that was me, but now I'm Kaori. I'm just Kaori." Something in Kaori's eyes showed that she was very happy about this.