xxxHOLiC·Heikou

Disclaimer: I don't own xxxHOLiC. If I did, I would make the Live Action drama last longer than 8 episodes!

Previous Chapter Summary: Two uncovered investigators aiding the police tell Doumeki and (fake) Watanuki about the strange deaths and how are those linked to Doumeki's temple.

Note: The first part is set on the Horitsuba-verse and the second one, in the original Watanuki's time.


IX. Lost & Found


[Horitsuba verse]

"She is CRAZY! Sending me to a place like this… and telling you to carry your archery stuff, I can't understand her!"

We walked into the screening rooms, trying to avoid tripping over with the broken cinema chairs and other leftovers.

Even though it seemed impossible to find such a small item, Watanuki seemed to be guided by something. I just followed him around.

"This way!" He pointed. "I know it is this way…"

"How?"

"Can't you see all of this smoke?! Yuuko said it held something nasty, so I suppose the more dangerous it gets, the closer we get to it."

Dangerous? I didn't get it at all. Even though the rational part of my brain thought Watanuki might be a little bit out of his mind, the other part told me that perhaps there was something I couldn't sense that he could sense. Like my grandfather…

Watanuki was coughing heavily by the time we had entered the fourth screening room.

"Ugh this thing stinks!" He moved some broken floor tiles away and found a small, black item. "I think this must be it, it is filled with smoke and it is all sticky! Yuck!"

"I just see a normal USB." I answered.

"Really?! This thing looks terrible! It is all broken, dusty, it has this strange liquid and-"

Suddenly, he was pushed away by some sort of invisible force and his back hit the nearest wall.

"Oi…?" I was completely lost.

"Doumeki! RUN! Run!"

For me, the cinema looked completely empty and Watanuki was the one behaving weirdly, making strange movements. He even looked as if he was humping the wall… weird.

However, I became alarmed when I saw Watanuki's neck getting strangled and some fingerprints on it.

"Watanuki!"

I ran towards him, but I couldn't reach him on time since he was lifted about 3 meters from the ground by whatever was helding him captive.

"Ru-Run…" Watanuki gasped. "Before… they-ugh-see you too! No! Run! Doumekigh!"

Suddenly, some sort of invisible hand blocked my vision.

"Doumeki!" Watanuki screamed. Although I couldn't see anything, I felt it: the hand, the fingers... And Watanuki had somehow foreseen it. Was this a nightmare?

"I see…" I muttered to myself as I finally realized it. Watanuki could see and feel the dead.

Suddenly, a weird voice whispered to me. It was the voice of my grandfather.

"Someone that needs you to live"

I began to remember the first time he had handed me his bow. When he had taught me archery.

"When creating the tenouchi, extend and flatten your left hand so that the fingers are in line and snug against each other."

"Yes, grandfather."

I reached for my bow and as soon as I touched it, whatever was blocking my vision vanished completely.

"Now, place the hand along the left edge of the grip so that the edge is parallel to the base of the fingers."

I reached for an arrow but couldn't find any.

"Fold the last three fingers lightly around the edge of the grip. Leave a space, there, yes, correct, a space between the middle joint of the fingers and the grip."

"Grandfather, is it ok to practice without an arrow?"

"If it is you-"

"-then it is alright." Yuuko's voice echoed from the other screening room.

She entered the fourth screening room, looking at Watanuki.

"Shizuka-chan, the alignment of the arm, wrist and hand varies among styles of kyudo but generally speaking the crease of the arm should be vertical and the hand" he held my hand and placed it elsewhere "should not be bent to the right or left at full draw."

"Do it… as your grandfather taught you." Yuuko said.

How she had appeared out of nowhere, found us or read my thoughts were details that didn't matter at this current situation. All it mattered was saving Watanuki. Not only because it was the right thing to do but also because he seemed to be someone that could help me answer the questions I had all this time. His ability to sense the death… I was desperate to know more about it.

I pointed an imaginary arrow at Watanuki's neck as my grandfather hand instructed me and released the bow with no hesitation on my mind.

Watanuki fell to the floor and gasped for breath. By the looks of it, he had slightly twisted his ankle due to the height of his fall.

Yuuko walked towards me, then placed her hand on my shoulder.

"You have done well."

She gazed at Watanuki, examining him. Then, she opened her bag and pulled out a notebook.

"Watanuki, hand me the USB."

I covered my ears because I knew what would happen next.

"I was ABOUT TO GET KILLED and instead of asking me 'hey Watanuki-kun are you alright? Is your ankle OK?' you HAD to ask for your STUPID USB how UNCONSIDERATE ARE YOU ARGH! I was about to get killed, you know!"

"Yes, you've just said it about two times and we saw it too, now be a good boy and hand me the USB."

Watanuki went from red to purple to blue and to every color of the spectrum. However, he did hand her the USB.

"Are you alright?" I asked him, trying to be polite.

He sent me a death glare.

"I didn't need your help!"

Just tell me who in earth could understand this guy. I could only roll my eyes.

The good thing is that he seemed like he was Ok.

"By the way, how did you find us?" Watanuki asked her.

Yuuko ignored his question and opened the USB files. She told us to have a look.

There were files about the scholarships. She smiled, mischievously.

"Do you know the Clamp Corporation?" She asked me.

"Yeah. They own our school. They also own several pharmacies, bakeries, Japanese restaurants, and other businesses."

"I see. Very well. The Clamp Corporation decided to implement the scholarship policy based on the arguments presented by your previous director. It seemed that their precious and respectable director was hiding something… hee hee…"

I looked at the PDFs on the screen.

"He was using it as a financial aid for his daughters. One of them was denied a scholarship, supposedly because the school had reached the limit. So he made his moves and gave her Watanuki's scholarship."

"This school can't be that expensive, right? For him to go over such things to get scholarships…" Watanuki gulped. The look on his eyes told me that he resented said fact and wanted his scholarship back.

"He could pay for them, he had a lot of money, but people are the greediest of all… Oh! This is interesting!"

She opened some Excel files.

"Her daughter is 23 years old!" She exclaimed, clapping her hands.

"Twenty-three?! What the F-"

"She has been granted a scholarship but she hasn't been coming to school. In this case, the money for this financial aid is being deposited in his parent's account. This guy is making a lot of money…"

"But- the scholarship policy said that you had to be talented-"

"Well, well. He was the school director."

She closed her laptop.

"This is enough for you to get your scholarship back, Watanuki."

Watanuki was surprised and then smiled warmly.

"Really? Will I get… will I get back to school?"

Yuuko just chuckled.

"Well, yes."

"I- I can't be more grateful with you! I-"

"I didn't do it for you, Watanuki." She told him.

"Huh?"

"The board suspected something was wrong with the things he was doing. One of them was the new school policy. So they hired me with the condition that I cleaned out this mess. So, after doing some research, I found out he had lost an important item which contained valuable information to this whole policy of his…"

"And how did you know I could sense it?" Watanuki asked her.

"During the time I was investigating, I heard of a certain student which had been denied said scholarship. People told me you were some sort of weirdo…"

"HEY!" Watanuki complained.

"But there are others who believe that you can sense things that no one else can… So this USB and the negative energy it emitted lured you. Even more, if that negative energy affected you in a direct way: having your scholarship rejected. As if this was almost set as a trap to consume you entirely."

"You believe in those things?" Watanuki asked her. Yuuko chuckled. This woman was really enigmatic.

"I just did my job. My previous job. Now that I've quitted, I just want to become a school director."

Yuuko grabbed her stuff and was about to leave the screening room.

"You should thank Doumeki for saving your life, he repels 'them'. I still need to examine the other files in this USB."

"You're leaving just like that?"

"Bye! Bye! Thanks Doumeki!" She left.

"Repels what? Yuuko! Argh!" Watanuki looked at me. "What was that?! And by the way, why did you only thank Doumeki! I was the one who found it and nearly got killed! Argh I hate her so much! I- hey Doumeki."

"What." Thanks god, he shut up.

"That thing that you shot." Watanuki looked at me, puzzled.

"I didn't shoot anything."

"Yes you did! It was all white and bright, like a white arrow or that sort of stuff."

"Really?"

"Yeah."

"Oh."

"It killed the monster, spirit or whatever that thing was. As if you had somehow exorcised it!" Watanuki raised his arms, making weird gestures. I must admit, this guy is kind of fun to watch.

I looked at both of my hands. Did I really have that power? The power to exorcise? Yuuko said it too: I repel… them. I smiled to myself, as I felt my grandfather smiling at me from heaven.

"Anyways, let's get going. I know you think I'm a freak for saying this weird stuff 'cause you can't see them."

"The fact that I can't see them doesn't mean that they don't exist."

"Huh? What do you mean?"

"I believe that what exists and what doesn't exists doesn't depend solely upon what I see. Because there are certain things I can't sense. Yet I saw you getting strangled and being lifted. If you say those were due to spirits, then I believe you."

"Oh." Watanuki was surprised and taken aback. "Okay…"

"Yet you still looked pretty lame humping the wall like that, like a dog in heat."

And you know the rest. Watanuki started screaming and flailing around while I covered my ears.

Watanuki. The guy who could sense, feel, smell and interact not only with the dead but with every paranormal thing. He always kept running from them. I had thought that he was just a freak but now that I am putting the pieces together, he was being chased by said paranormal beings. I remember hearing him screaming 'No more!', 'Please, leave me alone!', or 'Get of me!' and now it all made sense.

"This spirits, are they attracted to you?"

"Yeah…" He grumped. "They follow me everywhere…"

Watanuki, the guy who was chased by spirits. He couldn't be left alone just like that, no wonder why he was always injured. I realized… I could repel them and exorcised them. Logic stated that Watanuki needed me. And I needed him, otherwise those powers would go to waste, wouldn't they. If I never trained them, then I would never be like my grandfather, the person I admired the most.

At that time I thought that it would be convenient to hang around him, even if he didn't like it. But I needed to know more about that power I had, the one I had inherited from the person I had cherished the most.

So, that's how Watanuki started making me lunch as a 'payment' and I guarded him from evilness.

And that's how my monotonous days turned into fun days, where I watched Watanuki flail around all day and get pissed off at my comments.

"Are you listening to me, you JERK?!" He screamed.

"Yeah." Of course, I'm not listening to him.


II.

[SHOP Verse]

[Watanuki's POV]

Song: Angel by Massive Attack

"Dou-meki…"

He had pinned me down to the floor, both of his hands were clutching my wrists.

His gaze… it wasn't the one he always gave me. He looked dangerous…

"Who… are… you…" He muttered.

"Dou-"

"WHO ARE YOU!?" He screamed, which took me aback. Doumeki was sweating.

"What… What's WRONG WITH YOU?!" I screamed back, in fear.

Doumeki freed one of my wrists to get something on his pocket. He placed it near my neck. It was a knife.

His eyes… they didn't have any sort of shine at all.

"I wonder if you bleed like the rest… If you are truly human…"

He gently pressed the knife against my throat and made a small cut. I was terrified and tried to hold back the tears. I was shaking. He was shaking too…

"Why…" I muttered. "I thought you were… the only one I could trust…" I tried to hold back the tears. The cut was painful. Perhaps not the cut itself… but rather being cut by him.

"If you can answer these questions, I'll let you go…" His hands were trembling.

I couldn't move at all. I was too terrified… I wanted to call for help. But then I though… He was the one I've always called when I needed help. Right now… there was no one who could help me or rescue me.

"What are your parents' names?" He asked me.

"I don't know… both died when I was little."

"When?"

"When I was… I can't remember…" My mind went fuzzy.

"When they died, whom did you stay with?"

"I… I don't remember… Alone… I think…"

"How did you end up being in this apartment."

I was shaking. Because… I couldn't remember.

He deepened the cut… was he going to slice my throat?

"Doumeki… no… it hurts… please…"

"Which middle school did you attend?"

"I… I can't remember…"

Doumeki's hand was shaking a lot, he could barely hold his knife.

"Do you know… what your own food tastes like?"

"… No… I don't…" I sobbed. "I don't… Doumeki…"

"Tell me… Watanuki…" he was sweating and panting. "What is your earliest memory?"

I cried. I cried because I was scared. Because I was bleeding. Because the person I trusted was trying to kill me. But most of all, because I had realized one thing.

"Waking up in my bed in this apartment…" I sobbed "going to the supermarket and meeting you… that is my earliest memory…"

I had realized… that…

"I see… I knew you weren't real after all…" Doumeki said, coldly.

Tears streamed down my face.

Doumeki didn't deepen the cut. He just stared at me, for what seemed like hours to me, while I grew scared each passing second.

"I can't remember… why… who am I…"

[Doumeki's POV]

I headed towards the bookstore. The impostor was looking at the books with a weird expression. He held a pricy dictionary and tried to read the book cover but apparently couldn't, even if the word 'Dictionary' was printed in a very large font size. I remembered Watanuki needed glasses but I doubted his eye measurement was too high to not being able to read such gigantic letters.

Know that I remembered, the original Watanuki had never read the pricy dictionary but did read the famous comedy manga Urusai Baka. The font size of the manga was kind of small.

At that time, at the supermarket, Watanuki could barely see but he could identify that red-tip leaf lettuce and he knew his way around the supermarket.

It seemed that this Watanuki could only see or interact with the things the original one had interacted before becoming the shop owner.

"I… I can only remember…" I was still clutching his wrist and pointing my knife at his delicate throat. "…the time I spent with you…" his eyes were red. "It's weird… isn't it, huh?" he tried holding back the tears but it was useless. "Since I just tend to be sleepy whenever you aren't around… why…?"

Tears streamed down my face too… It was in fact the first time I cried in front of him.

"You… you are my wish…"

"Your wish…?"

I pressed my forehead against his and nodded.

"Then… I'm not real… am I?"

"No…" I whispered, softly. I felt as if I was breaking away. "If I don't get rid of you… more people will keep on dying… and my delusion will get stronger…"

"Then… do it..." Although his whole body was shaking with fear, his eyes were filled with determination. "If I'm not real… if I'm hurting others… and becoming your delusion… then I don't need to live, do I?"

Just like the real Watanuki.

He placed his hand on top of the hand that held the knife.

"Please… be quick…"

I gave him a quick peck on his forehead.

"Ok…" I said, while clutching the knife and preparing to get over it.


III.

[Watanuki's shop]

Although 3am wasn't the best moment to visit Watanuki, I needed to see him. So I entered the shop, went to his bedroom and slowly poked him. He turned around, slightly pissed off but upon seeing my current state, he violently stood up and questioned me.

"Doumeki-" Watanuki, the shop owner, looked worried. My eyes were red and I was still shaking. "What-?"

"I… I killed… I killed my mother…"