Back again, haha. I really wanted to write this chapter, so it didn't take me all that long to just... jump right into it! X3
This chapter is one of the sort of FLASHBACKS TO HH ones, it's the first I've written in the first person but this one gets intensely emotional and I felt like I wouldn't be able to capture what I was going for in the third person, so, haha. It's about Nana Ogasawara, Nari Amatoya, and Chihaya Yamase—they're the MCs of Corpse Party (Blood Covered: Repeated Fear's) Extra Chapter 1 (and 11, if you've played the 3DS version).
Pokelife93 requested a chapter starring the three so here they are ^^
After Host
11: The Altercation of Death
Nana
sschhhhhhhllluUCK.
Between the plump, pinched fingers of a little girl, one frigid hand holding her sewing scissors behind her back as the other proudly displayed her catch in front of me, there dangled the ripe red tongue that once lived in my mouth.
I felt dry. An emptiness, vast and wide and so, so cold, yawned from a pit deep within me that I'd never known existed before. Tingling and knots of anticipation that had held me taut now went slack.
Shock. I think I was... going into shock, then. A warm lake of blood pooled in my mouth and the acrid taste of it had been lost to my utter lack of tongue. It dribbled where it could out of my slightly ajar lips and I watched it, little droplets, spat, spat, spat, as they crawled down my cheeks and fell off somewhere far beneath me.
The little girl perched in front of me threw my tongue like the wrapper of a candy bar. I don't know where it sailed; I couldn't... watch, I was going so blank, my thoughts sludge in my skull. Vision spotty, quickly leaving, all sensations draining... It wasn't long until all I could feel was the itching sensation of... so-something.
My hysterics had gone down; tears ceased to leak from my glassy gaze. But I didn't feel all of this happen and I wondered how I knew if I'd lost all sensation, how I could so plainly see my body giving out when I was inside of it.
Until, with a jolt, I realized that the eyes I now sought into were my own. No—No, not... mine anymore. Blue fingers traced over my cold, cold body. I was staring at myself. Ghost to... corpse.
But that was it. An unrelenting chill, a breeze of burning cold. I felt nothing else. No pain, no fear, no sorrow, no... no nothing.
A cloak of shock enveloped me as I hung my head and shivered uncontrollably.
Dead. I was... I was...
Yet I didn't... feel anything, nothing but the blizzard charging through my bloodstream, the snow festering in my soul. I just—I just felt cold, that was it.
Oh my... God.
I probably should have been scared. After all, the dull sense of shock cascading me seemed so... unnatural, surreal, fake. This wasn't it... was it? Was this... it? Death and... Death and nothing more? No more Nari-chan, n-no more Chihaya-chan...
The little girl who ripped both my tongue and life out with a single snip had evidently lost interest in me. I couldn't say whether it was worse to be killed in hate or just... this, a murderer who didn't even care I was dead, who probably wouldn't have cared if I lived, either, had I never stumbled upon her.
My emotions had become... murky. Shock thrived from some unsightly pit slowly spreading within, and... and tiny tinges of grief, of fear, came like little shocks of their own whenever they worked themselves in, but these moments passed so quickly I couldn't tell if they were real or not.
In a daze, I stood up and stepped through the door of the bloodstained chamber. Walking was a fumble, each step a gamble of whether or not I held the awareness to focus enough on moving forward on solid ground instead of... letting my feet sink through the floorboards. I wobbled more than I moved and I passed through objects more than I bumped against them but I... bu-but I guess that's what happens when you're dead, ha-hahaha... ha...
Nari-chan and Chihaya-chan were around here somewhere, before I... um.
But I didn't hear them now. We wandered together, the three musketeers, for hours upon hours until our strength was sapping and Nari-chan kept picking fights and Chihaya-chan ran away and... I had to find the both of them all over again.
I've... failed. We weren't going home together anymore. I-I didn't even know if they were still alive and... even so... I couldn't leave as I was. Ghosts didn't... take up residence in the real world, a-as far as I knew. I'd never even seen a ghost before we... c-came here.
In my state, I meandered, seeking out nothing in particular, calling out to nobody. I'd assumed my cloak of shock would begin to wear thin the longer I stayed dead, and it's possible I simply didn't know how long I had... be-been dead, so I couldn't recover or something, but that tingling never faded.
But I meandered anyways. Perhaps I stumbled more than I moved and I continually sunk through the floor or suddenly flitted far above, suspended in a battle with gravity that I no longer could control, but I meandered even so. Eventually the old bomb shelter where the little girl finally found us fell far below my feet and I reached a wooden door which spilled out into the nexus of Heavenly Host.
I felt nothing upon recognizing the hallway sprawled out ahead. A few... new bodies rotted out here and there. Some had dispersed and I-I didn't wanna think of what that meant. Where they we-went. Numbly I trotted onward, pitching and spilling outward with my movements.
Sometimes I caught sight of a ghost. My breath would hitch and I'd duck around a corner and hide until the trill relented enough for me to remember that I was a ghost too. S-So therefore they couldn't kill me. S-So therefore it didn't matter if they saw me, and besides, what if I... recognized one of them?
...no. I didn't want to recognize one of them.
On the second floor of the school, a particularly unruly glob of flesh lay waste. I-It certainly wasn't something I'd seen before I got here, certainly wasn't... something I recognized. Its soul must have... been in... so much pain at that very moment it—hi-hit the wall.
I remembered that whatever a ghost felt at its moment of death became a palette of their emotional state for the rest of eternity. S-So maybe I should've... considered myself lucky that a numb ecstasy was all that ruled me: no pain in my mouth or pain anywhere else; no grief, no anger, no nothing but... eternal shock.
My lip quivered and I bit it. Hard. Movement was shaky at best afterward.
It was like cotton balls in my mind... I could hardly think, could hardly fo-focus, could hardly see through a cloud of immense... pressure tight in my chest. I'd swallow and then remember it had no use on me, what with my... nonexistent body.
Didn't even think I was leading myself anywhere until I trudged up a staircase and suddenly caught sight of my surroundings. Nothing much other than creaky floorboards and a small pile of corpses, but to the right of the hallway stood a door.
The... boys' restroom.
With a shriek, I burst through the entrance and went through the wall on the other side of the room, too, until I managed to compose myself and sit in front of the stall at the end.
My voice was so weak, so tired, so spent I thought it would snap right there and then. "Mis...ur... Mis—ur..."
I couldn't pronounce the "tuh" in... "mister".
It was a punch in my stomach, remembering the state of my tongue.
But he knew it. He... knew it, even so. Not seconds after, he politely tipped his stall door aside and glanced over his rimmed glasses toward me. First a small warmth shrouded within—and then—he wrenched back and—and a gap filled what once was whole. "Nana-chan! Oh my dear girl, what's..." He sputtered, and he shook his head and his mop of hair went flying. "My dear girl, what sort of monster would..."
But what was there to say?
When I met his gaze, my heart splintered, and for the first in an achingly long time, I felt.
Swallowing, I mumbled, "Misur Shimoha..." and I cringed as it came out, and I tried it all over again with the same result and I cringed once again, my shoulders slumping, my body shaking.
I couldn't speak right. I-I couldn't—Even the words that did come out came out a little off, like my tongue had become a funhouse mirror. Somehow that sickened me more than lack of speaking in and on its own: this new... corrupt version of my voice, and in another sense, a corrupt version of me.
It's... inexplicable, this sensation crawling down my spine. I'd altered in a way that I never once considered could possibly alter before. S-Sure, everyone's voice has their off days, but I... I couldn't even feel my tongue anymore, just this squishy, half-inflated half-organ that lived the life of a turd crusted in the back of my head.
My body chilled. I-I hated it. I absolutely hated it. Little sobs heaved out of me, little pathetic wet sobs I could hardly hear, I so afraid to put my voice into them, so afraid to... listen to it. This it that wasn't even me any longer.
Perhaps I could have died right there and then was I not already dead.
Finally, with a moan, my gaze spilled outward and I caught sight of him again, of... Shimoda Souichiro. O-Oof, his name was so long... Sou-i-chi-ro... I-I doubted I could pronounce it correctly, though a quick and quiet run-over proved I at the very least could mock-pronounce the sounds in his first name better than his surname. None of them... c-completely cut out on me. Shimoha. My cheeks flamed in hot, sticky embarrassment.
"I ahmm soreeh I cannoh prouhhouse ii-ee"—I found the sound "yuh" no longer existed in my cut off vocabulary and panicked—"aaeeme. Uhh"—another hard dosage of panic—"Sooweesssheeruh... I—ahhhhhh..." Awful. Nothing but awful.
In a frenzy, I kicked back and started forcing myself to stand, my shaking body phasing in and out of material items I no longer had the pleasure of touching. As I turned, warm fingers fastened around my wrist and I collapsed. S-So much for my rough start, huh.
"The monsters found you..." The heat from his hand sifted into the rest of me, slowly, achingly slow. I found myself leaning toward him and flinched. "That's what... happened to you, Nana-chan." A flush of heat swooned in my head. I managed to nod and tried to scoot back from the toxic warmth he gave off, something I now sorely... lacked. Precious seconds passed as I felt and I felt and I felt more, the chill of shock so tainted in me suddenly melting.
A sense of disgust broiled within me at what I had become: this broken, wretched, sniveling little girl who couldn't even speak without cringing at the sound. I reveled in it, as ugly as it made me feel, this... this emotion, this vile catharsis, this something.
"Nana-chan, my... deepest condolences." Such warm, warm words.
Panting, I closed my eyes and tried not to whimper. Forced another nod.
I couldn't feel time passing, just the throb of his hand and the snaking warmth that pulsed into me. How ugly I felt. How much more warmth I needed, how cold I still was. How much I hated it.
Souichiro's next words set my heart aflame.
"Nana-chan, where are your friends? Where are Chihaya and Nari-kun?"
"A-Ahhhh..." My whimper returned full-force and I choked on it, my voice thick. "I-I ohh... I ohhhh ohh... I o-oh owwh..." Each word only further set me into my resentful state. Tears escaped my vision and I had a hard time pretending they weren't there.
I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.
A horrible silence descended upon us and I thought, my frigid body throbbing—I thought he was going to leave. I didn't even know why but I felt this certain that he would leave me all alone to freeze in a numbness I had no power over, that he would denote me a lost cause and go off on his own.
Of... course he didn't, gentleman he always has been. But I couldn't bring myself to consider any other option than isolation.
With an air of hard-set finality, he murmured, "Nana-chan, you poor precious thing," and suddenly spun me into an embrace. When I looked up, I caught foggy blue-faded eyes brimming of concern behind his glasses, his lip quirked somewhat to one side. And I don't know what overcame me but the suddenness of it all, the submersion of all of that heat, how warm, how tender I suddenly felt, all of it coming together caused me to all-out... bawl.
It's funny how the unsightliness of a situation can alter one's perspective drastically. I clutched tightly to him—to—to Souichiro—someone suddenly so... dear to me—as I cried... and I cried... and I cried.
He was so... kind. He let me go on for so long I trembled, thoroughly exhausted, when I finally ceased. Swallowing, I blushed and mumbled, "H-Hanhh oouh... Souwee...shh..." Couldn't bring myself to finish. I sighed.
"Ah. We should... figure out a name for you to call me by, since it appears mine gives you... difficulty" An upset grimace. He tried to push it away. "Um... a nickname..? Something simple, like... 'Sou' or 'Soui' or... 'Chiro'?" It was kind of funny watching someone so sophisticated-looking and dignified making faces as he called himself cute little names.
Another swallow and I tried at them. "I... uhhlllihhk..." H-Haaah... The "ul" and "kuh" sounds could surface from the back of my throat and s-sounded pretty scary but substituted far better than bypassing their letters altogether. Trying again, I managed, "I lllihke... Cz... Shhz.." Sputtered. "Shiro." It was cute. A-And stupid cute and I liked it.
And he was so nice.
"Alright. Heh..." A faraway look entered his gaze. "Shiro." Small exhale. "It sounds like something Aya would have called me—ah, but... that was so long ago. I hardly... remember her these days."
"O-Oh... I'm sowrrrhee..." Nnngh, I was so close to pronouncing it correctly...
Shaking his head, Shiro pursed his lips. "No, no, it was all so very long ago. I'm sorry, Nana-chan—we should be focusing on the dilemma of your missing friends as it is."
"O-Ouhh"—I doubted I'd ever find a way to make the "nuh" sound in "no" and that greatly bothered me—"Ou arrh fiih... O-Oh, um... um..." Slight panic. "Is ohkeh. Is... oohhkay." A-Ahaha... there was something. I felt so strained but... but there was something. Is okay. God, I sounded like a preschooler... B-But at... at least I sounded like someone.
Shiro took in a small breath, stilling himself. "Should we... go searching, then?"
"W-Waih... Waiih..." That meant he was... "Comihh? Wihhh me?" My heart pounded in my chest. He'd never... really left that stall before, a-as far as I knew... S-So why leave now, I guess? A-And I was dead at this point so it wasn't like he needed to protect me from anything... e-except my own feelings, I guess, but that didn't really count and I wasn't sure it was... that obvious I...
N-No, it was probably that obvious... nnh...
But even so, with a little smile, he nodded. "I can't leave you in this state, Nana-chan. Besides, I'm worried about the other girls too."
"O-Ohhh..." I blushed. "R-Rihh... Righ..." B-Bah.
Shiro strode on ahead and I darted after him, gently grasping his sleeve with hesitant fingers. He made a little chuckle at that, and I glanced away shyly. The warmth gathering amongst him filtered into me by my touch and helped ease the conglomeration channeling deep inside of me.
Funny how that's all it can take sometimes. I leaned into Shiro, and he let me, and... i-it was nice. I felt... weirdly, like... safe—or as safe as I'd ever feel again, seeing as I'd be... t-trapped here now... for the rest of eternity.
His erasing the fog of shock that clung to me did reveal a throbbing in my mouth, at the end of wherever they cut my tongue off from. But it was a dull thing, and I couldn't really tell of its existence. I suppose the moment itself, the shock of it, r-really had... killed me.
I didn't like thinking about it, but when my mind wandered so did my gaze and all that surrounded us was an ever-reaching sea of hopelessness.
Down the hallway on the second floor, we kept silent, l-like the creatures on a muted television show, and it stayed that still until a wail rose above my thoughts and broke into me. By instinct I jolted and glanced around and—and there in my feet I was... I was wading in somebody else's organs. They passed cleanly through my pale slippered toes and I hadn't even noticed and I could hardly believe the disrespect I'd given and panicking, I dashed ahead and collapsed where the floorboards were clear.
S-Someone's... body. Strewn about the ground, shredded open no more nicely than that of the wrapping on a birthday gift. I shuddered as I remembered... s-seeing it before. My hands went to my forehead, and with a whimper, I covered my face.
Shiro waited. When I looked back, I saw that little chips began to crack into his calm demeanor, but he held himself together despite his difficulties like the—like the gentleman he was. I choked on a laugh, my eyes a little wide, before I wrapped my hand around his wrist again.
I liked being there. Maybe it was stupid but it was all I had and... I liked it.
"Poorhh iir-irrl..." my voice sputtered. I hadn't even thought about it: the thought came so suddenly and now there it sat in thin air. My throat pinched as I remembered the sounds I... could no longer pronounce.
We filed down another staircase before Shiro responded. "Heh... I didn't know how to start a conversation with you anymore, if I may be honest. I didn't know if it'd... bother you, trying to speak as you are." Small shake of his head, his glasses catching a light out of somewhere. "But I liked talking to you earlier. I'm... pleased you returned to my side, though it pains me that you no longer are..." Long breath. "Alive, Nana-chan. My... deepest apologies."
"Oouh, is"—I blushed, biting down hard on the inside of my cheek—"is ohhkaaaayyyyh, prohmussss..." Pff, s-so much as I wanted to say I liked being around him too, so many words and... so little tongue to speak with.
But I squeezed one of my hands together and tried anyways. "Iouuh... are... eeel—ll...rrrhhhh—hmmmice." Ahhhhhh... my eyes sunk to the ground.
"Mice?"
"Ouhhhhh..." No no no... "Iiiiice. I... I—Ice, I..." That's not what I...
A small intake. "Oh! You mean..." His tone was enveloped by an endearing warmth. "You think I'm nice."
Th-Thank God. "Iiiieeyy—yes." I let out a breath and couldn't help myself, my feet bouncing with each step. This dumb smile happened across my lips and for a little while, not even the nagging feeling that recently this would have been trivial could deter my joy.
"Heheh. Well, I..." It hadn't occurred to me that if my eyes held onto Shiro, his... would lock onto mine. S-So he'd be giving his full and absolute attention onto whoever he spoke with. Presumably, I guess, but... still. "I couldn't stay in the stall forever, right? Not... forever..."
There was a moment where the hollowness in his voice, the lofty absence in his gaze, protested otherwise, and that miserable notion stayed suspended upon him for so long I realize he probably couldn't tell it was there. But it did pass... eventually. S-Sent a chill down my spine in the process.
"Hannhk yoooh..."
He sighed again, a tinge of mirth spilling into the air. "You're welcome."
Sure, I didn't need someone else to traverse this nexus with me now that I was... d-dead. Sure...
Past another corridor, I bumped against Shiro and paused and gasped and pointed erratically at the hallway in front. "Ihhh... eckspaahheh!" Th-That hallway was so short before. Not to mention that a... pile of bodies corroded at the other end, partially blocking a door.
But as I stepped closer, I began to feel this beating in my heart, like a string had been attached to me and it was tugging. And with a whine I pulled closer, and her name slipped from my mouth: "A-A...Ari..."
"Nari-kun?" whispered Shiro. "Do you see her?"
"O-Ouhh... ot eeyeh..." But soon. Not yet, but I felt it seeping deep within me. Not yet, but... this way. I knew not to but I couldn't help a surge of relief crowding into my heart. Clutching Shiro tightly, my heart beat so—so... warmly I couldn't believe it. So I tugged, gently, not daring to let go, and while a small fragment of reluctance floated onto his features, he did follow.
"Hissss waeey, hiiisss waaaaey," and I stumbled as I went but I didn't care. Every once in awhile some other ghost's moan would cut into my mind, and I'd see one of them numbering the bodies up ahead, and perhaps I thought a little about their existence swarming the area ahead but I hadn't it in me to care. I'd see my friend, someone who came so far with me on this... disgusting journey.
Up a hallway, a turn left, up a staircase, another turn. Some candle flickered in the corner of my vision as I worked my way up, up, up each stair leading to a third floor, and I caught sight of another lighting the way ahead, but it was within this impasse that I finally heard her fierce, flush tone.
"Die already. I hear you crying and I know, I know, I know it's gonna be soon. Put down that phone. Stop looking at it." The rumble of a growl curling into her voice. "Die, die, die die die die die!"
My heart hammered. I wrenched my gaze up to Shiro, who let out a small breath and led me down, down another flight, where nestled just by the entrance to a hallway sat this boy. O-Older than me, that was for sure. He had an older phone model in his hand as he scrolled through images, laughing quietly to himself. His tone listed from a mumble to something I could actually comprehend, so I only caught snippets of his conversation with him...self.
Something about a—a person, Mayu. A school. Loneliness. Something... vile, something I heard less than I saw with the pained stretch of his expression. The way his head tilted back and hit the wall and he told this Mayu lovely things she probably couldn't hear, seeing he was alone.
I began to question whether or not I'd heard Nari at all until a figure leaned into the doorway, pressing her shoulder into the wall and staring into the boy's phone like it was her own personal property, making snide comments at whatever it was she saw on there. Her body was more fizzled than present and it took long, painful seconds to discern any distinguishing factors whatsoever in her shady expression and a face I-I swear I once knew.
My body... wasn't all fuzzy like that. I had angles, curves, features where there had been features before my demise.
And my... color. I wasn't red. Wh-Why was... Nari red? Why wasn't I red? I wanted to be red if she was... red. I didn't get why I couldn't be red too. Wasn't I a girl? If I'd only seen male ghosts and they were all blue but Nari was red then I think I should be red like her like my friend like dear—dear—my dear—Nari-chan.
Shiro fell away from my grip. "ARIIII! ARI-SHAH ARI-SHAAAAhhh!" As I let go I felt that chill seeping in through my pores and I hardly cared; I threw myself at my friend and we both tumbled to the floorboards, my head passing through the boy's leg. He didn't notice, di-didn't even look up, but I wasn't paying attention to him. Some... living boy.
"Ari, Ari..." I mumbled, "Ari... he-here yoo are..." O-Oh, it almost came out right... here sounded more like heah, but... close, it was so close. "Ari, I missehhh you... Ari..."
As I nuzzled my head into her, this... this coldness, this chill I certainly hadn't felt before, even alongside my own numbness, buffeted me. I shook my head and tightened my grip on my friend. "A-Ari... yor soh... soh colllh... Why are you so... colh?" I froze at my p-pathetic mispronunciations, but she hardly reacted.
Her blurry face, once so sharp and smooth and fierce, approached mine. Icy breath pooled over me. "Naana, Naaaaaana-chaaan..." Recognition made its steady trickle into her tone. I didn't feel much of a difference, though; if anything, I was... more cold. My body began to collapse into itself, clutching tightly to Nari. "So we both ended up fucking dead."
That stopped me. I coughed. "Ari..!"
When she grinned, I caught a hint of tongue in her mouth and let out a breath. I-It was obvious with her speech but... hey, I... felt happy she hadn't ended up like me. "At least a bucket of oil wasn't poured over your body and left to burn, huh? I see you've lost your tongue, though." Ticking, ticking silence. "Oh, the fuck, that's it? They cut the tongue out of your goddamn skull and you died? So now that's all you fucking feel is the pain in your mouth?"
An emotion I hadn't seen Nari so visibly display before creeped over what little expression she had left: envy. Envy toward my missing tongue.
Wheezing, I cried, "Ariiii, Ariii! I-I'm so so so-sorry! Ari..." And I think I was crying, but I couldn't really tell. Her face was too blurry to make much of a difference either way.
"Naana, you bitch." An ugly wound of a smile cut over her lips and she chuckled lowly. Pulling herself back, effectively letting me spill over the ground, her foot kicked my head aside. Then she laughed again. "Why the fuck couldn't I die like that? Dammit, I have to feel this heat for the rest of eternity and you just have a shitty tongue to cry over! You little bitch, Naana!" Giggles cut into her voice. I couldn't understand her very well. "You—You bas..." Rolled her eyes. "PFFFF, BASTARD, BASTARD, BASTARD!" And she kicked me again, her laughter shrill.
I felt so cold. I curled into myself.
"GODDAMMIT, I HATE YOU, NAANA-CHAN! YOU'RE THE WORST FRIEND I'VE EVER HAD! CHIHAYA'S BETTER COMPANY THAN FUCKING YOU! ULHHH, I'M SO SSSICK OF YOU AND YOUR SMUG LITTLE FUCKING TONGUE, I—RRRHH!"
Hissing, hissing as she laughed and laughed and laughed.
"Nari-ku—"
Suddenly I recalled Shiro's existence.
"OH, LOOK, NAANA-CHAN GOT HERSELF A FUCKING BOYFRIEND WHEN SHE DIED! WOW, DEATH'S DOING HER BETTER THAN LIFE EVER DID, HUH?"
So she didn't remember him.
"Nari-kun—"
"SHUT UP, YOU BITCH! LIKE I'D LISTEN TO AN ASS LIKE YOU WHO'D HANG AROUND HER! LEAVE ME THE FFFFFUCK ALONE!"
And I... And I couldn't hear them very well anymore. I thought I could hear Shiro try again, and again, and be shot down each time he raised his voice for Nari-chan to hear, but I just didn't know. My mind spun, lost in a sea of empty nothingness, this blackness I couldn't break free from. The throbbing that encompassed me had shackled me to the earth and I just saw this horrible, stained red face laughing as she kicked me aside.
I remembered once. Something from a long time ago. Something about a girl, a girl who later became a friend, a friend who followed me where I went, whether I went to drama club or band or art class or math tutoring after school, a friend who told me once she had no hobbies but she liked what I did. Because she thought I made class more interesting.
She thought I was special. Special enough to be her friend, her cherished friend, the friend she could go to when she was too scared to go home. Home was supposed to be a safe place, someplace where you could be happy, be loved, but not all homes were like mine.
My home became hers, in a sense.
Then I realized Nari would never go home with me again.
I probably would have laid there for a very long time had the window not shattered.
With a violent, sshHHRHRRKCKKCKKK, I felt shards pass through my ghostly figure and I heard them sSSCRAPing all over the walls and bbbBBREAKing all across each other, exploding midair and slowly tumbling far below like glitter.
I gasped. And then I stood. And I ran to the window behind me and I stared out below and I watched the boy hit, pfhfh, the ground. And I watched him for a long time but he didn't move.
When I fell backwards, I bumped against Shiro and suddenly my heart swooned up into my throat and I felt my breath spiraling all around me as I collapsed to his side and tried and tried and tried not to let go again. My fingers twitched and the cold invited me, the numbness that made all of these terrible people doing terrible things go away, but his grip was tight and that was it.
A shriek of laughter burned through the hall. I felt more than heard Nari whisper, "Ffffuck, yeah," beckoning to the boy. The corpse.
I lost track of time. Nari went off at some point in search of what she called another victim, someone else to watch die. I was... too scared to try and talk her out of it.
A part of me deep down inside knew it would be useless to do so anyways.
But I hated that part of me, so I shoved it further into my festering darkness far within.
Shiro and I sat against the far wall. We were both so quiet. Nothing to... talk about, with what we had hanging in between us. I pressed my cheek to his shoulder, and if he cared, he didn't say so.
It was so quiet.
I felt comfy where I was, though. M-Maybe I shouldn't have, but I did, so I clung to that notion.
Eventually, pressing my cold lips together, I mumbled, "I miss Ari."
Shiro's presence returned to me, full attention and all. "That wasn't Nari."
"Ouh. Ih wasuhh." I didn't really care how my voice sounded. "Ari is... ouh more."
Murmuring over my words, Shiro nodded. "No more." He gently pressed a hand to my shoulder. He was probably just trying to comfort me, but... I felt a gap in his words, a slight tremble in his grip.
Then a sigh. In the corner of my vision, Shiro's head bowed. "Wh-Whah are you—"
"I'm..." His lips worked and reworked into an almost-smile. "I want to pray for Nari."
"O-Oh. Ohhhkay."
It felt kinda weird sitting in that new sense of silence. My parents weren't all that religious and none of that had... rubbed off onto me, and I didn't really know what to do with myself as I waited, my cheeks all hot, my thoughts a blur. But it was the thought that counted, and I made a little smile when he raised his head and locked eyes with me.
When I stood again, my eyes swiveled back to that accursed window and I gaped when I saw that the boy's cor-corpse no longer laid where it had been before. And I c-could have been wrong, but I didn't want to be wrong, so I believed that he was still alive somewhere. Suddenly he meant the world to me, just because he had yet to let go of his last breath.
He'd gone through far more than me at this school. I didn't need to know anymore than I already did to know that.
"He's... ohh... oh... ahhhh..." I realized postmortem I no longer retained the ability to recite a word as small and simple as gone. Maybe if I worked around with that guh sound I could... try to force it out of my throat, like kuh, but that also weirded me out a little and I didn't care enough to try as it was. "He's ot here aehhey more."
"Oh... Well that's very good." Y-Yeah. Shiro might've prayed again but I didn't look back so I didn't find out.
I couldn't imagine holding onto a religion in a place like this. H-How it would work, what it meant de-depending on your belief when this became your afterlife... b-but then I didn't have the courage to ask... and I felt like it might be... rude...
Perhaps he caught the funny look in my gaze, because with a little smile, Shiro murmured, "It's hard to continue my, ah, faith in a place like this. I want to think that this... nirvana, of sorts, blocked off any other afterlife. For now at least. But it's been so long that it's possible I'm just a stubborn old ghost who can't let go of his old beliefs."
"Ouh, is..." I shrugged, a little smile working onto my own lips. "Is coohl."
"Pff. I never thought I'd be called that by someone." And he waited as I strung my fingers into his sleeve, gripping tightly to it as a flush of heat warmed my clinging chills.
So I bumped against him. Smirked a little. "Yer cool, Shiro." And he laughed, and he had a nice laugh. It wasn't scary.
I didn't think laughs should be scary, but... well, a-anyways, his wasn't, and that was nice.
But I missed Nari. My Nari.
My heart throbbed weakly, like it had gone... raw. And it hurt to think about, but I felt another tug somewhere beneath our glowing feet, somewhere further below than I'd like to think my dear Chihaya-chan would go. But I guess she did.
That small part of me told me I already knew what would happen if I went to see her. But I managed to shrug it off and tell myself it might be otherwise. I-I couldn't just... assume that because of what happened to one friend, the other would be the same way. Besides, I... Chihaya...
So we went. I explained what I felt to Shiro and we slipped down beneath the soil, pushed more than anything into the depths of the place I last saw before my death.
It didn't take very long to find her. Quiet sobbing just loud enough to attract attention while still soft enough not to come off as much of a nuisance led us into a restroom I had no idea existed so far down here. There, in the girls' room, she sat tucked in a corner, bawling gently into her hands.
She was red too. I tried to ignore that.
She didn't... look all that scary. Didn't s-sound all that scary.
Just sad.
"Shi"—I winced—"Shihaya-shaaaah..." I sat down next to her, my free hand wrapping around her side as the other one clasped tightly to Shiro. "Is... me! A-Aaaaha..." Didn't realize I couldn't say my own name unt-until I tried. H-Ha. "Ahhd Shiro! You rememhhher him?
I couldn't say whether or not Chihaya even acknowledged me. There was a pang in my heart. I tried again. "Shihaeeyaaaa... Is me... I miss you, Shihaya... I-I'm sorry ahouhh whah happehh..."
This, I noted, my heart spiking, returned a color to her cheeks. It was with this that I noticed the number of... fuzzy lines coursing over her body in off... chunks. Stripes down her chest. A line like a noose around her neck. This net-looking mesh of cuts all over her face.
My mind moved back to Nari, and I realized my dear... Chihaya must have been in a lot of pain. A stone sunk to the pit of my stomach. I tried to swallow.
"Naana-chan..." Finally, her tiny, frail voice wafted upon me. I could have cried, I was so relieved, was I not so drained as it was. Instead I sagged against her. "Naana, Naana... you said"—and then I straightened to the urgency in her tone—"you said I could blame you, if things ended up bad, right? You said so... You said so..." A hot flush burned into my cheeks as I remembered her asking earlier, back when we were all still...
Nari tried to tell her off about it, but Nari wasn't here to tell her off about it anymore.
And I knew I didn't have it in me to deter Chihaya. Because I'd... always... Nnnnnnnh, Chihaya was so... sweet, and maybe fragile but I liked the comforting sense she gave off, the way she'd attach herself to me when I was around and how we always hung out after school, how we'd go shopping together and do stupid, frivolous, normal things.
How I really... liked her.
How I'd started to question just how... much I liked her. And I let her walk all over me sometimes but she was so gentle and innocent I didn't mind and I knew she didn't mean it, she was just so... attached.
Besides, Nari always made Chihaya sound like a spoiled... brat. B-But she wasn't... not always... not really... Sh-She just was fragile sometimes, about little things you could learn to avoid if you got to know her. Ch-Chihaya, I...
"Is it your fault, Naana? Is it your fault we're dead now?"
I flinched. Was it my fault?
Hikari found the charm online somewhere. I never even had a say in any of that; I just... we-went along with it. Like everyone else. Nari's the one who thought it was stupid, who said we didn't need a dumb "piece of paper" to be friends.
Chihaya came to her own conclusion while I stared dumbly ahead. "I can... say it's your fault. Right? I can say it's your fault. And I can believe it, too."
Swallowing, I mumbled, "Shi-Shihaya...shah..."
Even if she did think back and decide to mark Hikari as the culprit, Chihaya didn't like to pin her problems onto people she didn't know very well. And she... didn't know Hikari very well.
H-Honestly, nothing about her felt all that... different, u-unlike Nari.
She was just... so... sad. H-Hopeless. Desolate.
Yet I couldn't bring myself to leave. My heart burned to sit next to her, to... fall into this pain with her, to cry about it, to complain about it, to find solace in the fact that at least she was here with me, at least I could still be around her, even if she did say I was to blame.
I couldn't... bring myself to stay, either.
Shiro stayed quiet throughout the duration of the ordeal, his eyes swimming as he took the both of us in. Two little ghosts, just as lost as he, just as broken and pathetic and unsaved and everything else as someone they'd never even met while he was still alive.
I caught his eyes behind those glasses of his—so... refined, and it was kind of funny how well they suited his soft yet sharp appearance, how well his crisp suit fit him and how elegant he came off as. I really... liked that about him. And he always made an effort to be respectful toward the three of us... he made s-such an effort to be polite to me, even as I made dumb mistakes and hurt myself a lot more than anything else got done. Heh...
When I stood, retaking my place by Shiro's side, Chihaya's head snapped up at me. She wailed, softly, gently, "Noo... Naana-chaaan... don't leave me by myself... it's scary... it's so scary..." Bawling, she curled into herself. "Naanaaaaa... this is your fault... this is your fault, Naana..."
I swallowed, and I felt that throbbing inside of me again. It really wasn't impossible for me to stay. I could... be with her again. And it'd just be us—w-wasn't that something I'd wanted before..?
I ripped my heart out of my chest and squeezed it, pulsating, when I turned away from her. I whispered under my breath, "I love you," and I couldn't tell if I meant love or loved sin-since I couldn't pronounce both of them anymore. But I didn't know.
I just... c-couldn't stay there.
Maybe I'd come back sometime. But maybe she wouldn't welcome me. Not that... this last appearance had... felt very welcoming. He-Heh.
Funny to think I would've stayed with her had Shiro not been there. I-I... certainly would've. But I didn't want to think about it... I-I didn't want to think about it...
So we left.
…
Far away from that abandoned corner, I met the boy again. But he was like us now.
A fuzzy heart etched across his chest. He told me that it hurt a lot. It felt better being around other ghosts like us but it still... hurt a lot.
But he said sometimes it felt good. Because it felt like love to him.
He said he loved someone, but she was dead now like all of us and he couldn't find her. He heard her voice sometimes—and later we heard her too—but she didn't seem to have the courage to show herself.
He was in drama club at his school too.
I decided I liked being around him.
Heh... Shiro felt that the trip had been a bit too much for him, so he went back to his stall.
We all hung out in that restroom a lot, and it sounds pretty pathetic and maybe it was, but it was also a really fun time.
Mayu eventually showed herself to us. She liked to hide in the walls, in the floor, anywhere to conceal herself. I couldn't say if she was pretty or not since her features were so fuzzy—like... Nari's—but I kind of saw her. And I could pronounce her name. U-Unlike Shig. Unlike Souichiro.
I liked them. They were nice.
It made everything a little better.
O-Of course, that was... until the day Mayu disappeared... and came back half-alive... and came back scary... and Shig started losing pieces of his mind... and I was left almost completely alone again.
But Shiro didn't go anywhere. So I didn't go anywhere either.
He said it was funny that I thanked him so much, but he... liked it too. Which was great because I... really liked him, and that was something I kept to myself but it was something.
I felt so weird saying it, though, so much as I enjoyed that warmth in me afterward. Hannhk you.
This was... a very different chapter xD
also very long, haha
I wrote the majority of this in a little over two hours while half falling asleep but that's not important xD I just really wanted to write... so uh here I am
all pronunciations of Nana's are possibly terrible since I don't have my tongue cut out/don't know anyone whose tongue is cut out and I tried to do research into what people sound like with their tongue cut out and I found some stuff but not a ton xD
I did my best? haha
Lots of headcanon-y stuff happened in this chapter! Nana may or may not have/had feelings for Chihaya and/or Shiro so there's that
did she? did not? I dunno xD
Also Nari has family problems, which I got stupid feelsy about because I can relate haha
I keep putting so much into fictional characters that I don't even own whatsoever pffff
Hmm what else... Oh and Shiro has a religion xD I just... I dunno he reminds me of people from back then and most of them believed in something cuz it was The Norm(? sort of?) so that happened
geez imagine being of faith and also being dead at HH like, yikes
oh and blue ghosts can find comfort by being around each other, that's also a headcanon(ish?) thing, but it's mostly me thinking, Well, Souchiro isn't even an hh victim so he doesn't have issues like most of them so being around him's probably a lot better for your health hahahaha
I have no idea how the whole faith thing works if he was dead for a long time before hh
does anybody know
ah well xD I'll stop rambling now xD
this'll probably be the indefinitely "last chapter" of After Host for who knows
and if you're reading right now and see there's another chapter after this one then I guess I was wrong, my bad, haha