Chapter 2

Hey y'all I'm back. Again I don't own Skip Beat. I don't own the picture either. No beta either, just me. Hope y'all are enjoying the story so far. Yes, it's dark I know. Also, I know I made Kyoko a little emotional in the first chapter but it will get better. I did that on purpose. It's been a long time since I wrote anything like this, the last story I wrote was when I was toward the end of middle school for me. Now I am about to graduate college.. Man time really flies by! My love for dark stories hasn't gone away over the years though! I always love an extremely dark story with a happy ending. Enough ranting now! Hope Y'all enjoy the next chapter. Y'all I've been writing this instead of studying for finals..

So give me a review of what you think!

WARNING THIS IS DARK… This is a very dark story containing: violent and graphic dark themes. If you don't like dark stories or can't take them. Please move on. Love you.

-JapaneseAnimeChic

Recap- We had only gone through half of it and then we were moved to a different floor for other experiments. At this point Kyo-chi was 6 and I was 10 years old."

They just sat there in silence taking in this information. Not knowing what to say or how to say it. What could you say in this situation?

Lory was still trying to process this information that he's been given. It was honestly a lot to wrap your head around. He had done a very thorough search on her background but why didn't this show up? People are useless sometimes, looks like I will have to investigate this personally to get my own answers. Especially if this place is still in business, it needs to be brought down and destroyed permanently.. If he could get more information, this could narrow down his search a lot. So he asked, "What was this place called?"

Yuuji replied "Yugemoro Medical Research Center"

Lory's eyes widened, he stilled completely in his seat then finally he said, "That place?"

Yuuji nodded..

"I knew they were shut down, but no one was able to figure out why." Lory exclaimed.

Sighing Yuuji said, "Yes, their illegal human experiments got found out, but since there was a big figurehead involved everything was covered up and concealed from the public."

Yashiro chipped in saying, "Oh, I heard they were shut down and being investigated a while back, but we never heard anything else about it."

Yuuji then said, "When they found out people were selling their children into this place for money, they got investigated but apparently someone struck a deal with the investigator. Nobody knows what that deal was either. Probably sealed the guy's mouth shut with money and then moved to a different location and changed the name. Everyone from that facility was silenced one way or another. They tried to destroy the evidence. Only Kyo-chi and I are the only survivors from that place, the rest died.."

"They died?" Yashiro questioned with chills running down his spine.

Yuuji continued saying,"It was too late for them, they couldn't be saved. No amount of treatment could have helped them, that was the state we were in. It was a miracle that Kyo-chi and I survived through it."

"So then-"

Kyoko then tried to steer the conversation interrupting by saying, "Any other questions?" She wanted to avoid that conversation till the end.

It was then that Ren took that opportunity to ask a question that was burning in his mind, "So, at four years old you were sold and researched on while you lived with Sho fuwa. Does he know?"

Kyoko spoke up, "No, he doesn't. Only his parents know and now the three of you know now. Sho was not allowed to know."

"How did your school or anyone not find out? Like for example your absences?" Lory asked.

She knew it was hard to believe…. So she tried to explain as best as she could," Well like I said earlier my wounds were covered by the adhesive skin so they didn't find out that way. For the absences, the Fuwa's always came up with some excuse for me like: I had poor health, doctor appointments. If they couldn't get me out of school, then they would take me to the lab at night then bring me home early in the morning. There I would sleep for about an hour, maybe two then go to school. I would get in trouble in class all the time by falling asleep in class constantly. I still had a life outside the labs, it was hard but I managed to keep it up. When I wasn't at the labs I was working at Fuwa's ryokan after school. I had to juggle the labs, the ryokan's work, homework, and life itself. It was not easy having to pretend your life was okay when it really wasn't. When I was at the lab I got beat and when I was home I was beat as well. No matter where I went I couldn't escape it. So I carried on the best I could. No one could know what happened because if they found out. Fuwa's parents would be arrested… Then Sho and I would have been put in the system and went who knows where. I was ready to never breathe to anyone about this. I cover myself in with skin everyday to hide the numbers and the scars.``

"Numbers Kyoko-chan?" Yashiro asked.

"Yes, numbers, they are our identification numbers from the lab. They were tattooed on us, so we hide them." Kyoko replied back.

"Where are they?" Ren asked. He was extremely curious because he had never seen such a thing on her before. Could it be in an intimate spot? His curiosity was getting the best of him. He wanted to know as much information as possible about this.

Taking a deep breath, Kyoko slid off of Yuuji onto the sofa they were sitting on. She slowly started to remove her outer jacket…

"Wait Mogami-san! You don't have to show us!" Ren and Yashiro exclaimed, shocked at the sudden undressing. Giving a small smile over to them she said gently and nervously," It's okay, it's fine… I'll show it to you." As she removed the jacket with Yuuji's help, she then tugged on her shirt, pulling it over her shoulder. Next she pulled out a cream from her purse then started to rub it in her shoulder. Slowly, she started to rub the area to get the edges to come up. Finally pulling the adhesive off of her left shoulder. A gasp went through the room when they saw the skin come off. It looked so real and it was so thin. Someone not knowing they had this on, would never know the difference. Staring at them were the numbers between her shoulder and chest - 4527902-10. If they didn't believe her then, they should now. She then started to do the same things with her arms. When the adhesive came off her arms, the room went dead silent. A pin could be heard dropping, if one had dropped.

All eyes were on the poor girl's arms. You could see the scars from the cuts, needle pricks, and more that decorated her arms. It was painful to look at because the scars themselves told a story of their own… of pain and misfortune…. They weren't horrible or disgusting but they were there though. A lot of them were faint probably due to how old they were. Still there were some that still had a red tint to them which meant they were more recent than the others. Ren was seeing red, not at her, but at the "doctors" that did this to her. Interrupting his bloodbath that he was planning in his head, Kyoko stood up and then asked Yuuji, "Can you come with me for a second? I've shown my arms might as well show the rest. Can you help me take the rest of the adhesive off? I'm done hiding this from them.. Yuuji please.." She said this nonchalantly but inside there were fireworks going off in her chest. Butterflies were swarming in her stomach, she was on the verge of throwing up due to nervousness. Deep down inside of her, it was a step that she knew she had to take in her life...but she was afraid of being rejected and abandoned.

"If you need help, I can help you if you like. " Ren said as he was trying to digest all the information and keep calm. He had just been shown her arms and her numbers. Not that I would care honestly about her scars. But to have help to get it off? To have HIM help her? He didn't like it one bit… Unknown man.. Unknown intention… Alarms were flying off in his head as he was trying to keep his cool and trying not to show it because he wanted to be there for her. He knew now that her life wasn't as simple as he thought it had been. It had been a lot more complicated and darker than he ever imagined. His heart went out to her for not going absolutely crazy from the madness she had gone through all alone. He wanted to be someone she could lean on, if she would let him.

"No thank you, Tsuruga-san. Yuuji can help me, he knows how to take it off faster. If you don't

know how it can be very time consuming."

Welllll there she goes again rejecting my help…. Let me in Kyoko!…Let me in for once in your life

When she said that she blushed a bit but stood firm on who she wanted to help. It was extremely hard for her to face her past and talk about it. Let alone show them. No one except Yuuji had ever seen all of her scars. She was comfortable with him, and she needed comfort at the moment. She was afraid of him being disgusted by her scars. Her anxiety was starting to act up. Her head was filling with thoughts that scared her which was making her more nervous than ever. The longer she stood there the more her will and courage were going away. But…... she was tired of hiding it… tired of concealing how she really looks. The work she would put into patching up the broken pieces of herself, she was exhausted keeping up that facade.

"You sure, it's fine me helping you?" asked Yuuji, looking over at the three planning his death. He was fine with it, she was like his sister. Also it was just taking off the adhesive skin, nothing he hasn't seen before either. He didn't have a problem with it but others seemed to.

"Yes, I want you to help me. " Kyoko replied sternly.

There was a reason she was not looking at Ren again, she could feel his eyes staring into her soul ready to wreak havoc. She knew he was displeased with her answer. So, before anyone else could give their opinion, she pulled Yuuji to the connecting bathroom to help her get it off. She could take it off by herself but it took a long time. It went much quicker with a partner to help you get the hard to reach places. It was now or never. She wanted to get this over with before she chickened out on herself.

From the bathroom, they could hear one strip after another being ripped off, it seemed like it went on for eternity. Is she completely covered in this stuff? While they were waiting for Kyoko and Yuuji to come out, Lory and Ren were in deep conversation.

"Did you know about this President Lory? Because I know you did two background checks on her and the other one I know wasn't about where she worked in the past." Ren asked.

" No, I did not know. She must have been put under a face name or something there or I would have found it." Lory explained.

"This Yuuji guy calls her Kyo-chi, wonder if that was the name she was under?" Ren said.

"I will look into it for sure…It is amazing that Mogami-san has been through all this and was hiding it so well. It is hard to think a sweet innocent girl such as her has been through so much in such little time." Lory replied earnestly.

Ren was still in shock from seeing her reveal her identification number as he said," Yeah, I knew some about her past but not all that. She never told me about that. I couldn't believe those numbers on her shoulder… It really did happen….. She really... did… have.. to go through all that… not that I didn't believe her but I just don't know what to say. This is crazy."

Inside the bathroom, Kyoko was stripping down to her bra and underwear. She was used to being only in her underwear due to the lab. They both had seen each other with nothing too. Not all the time they got to be clothed so it was normal for them to be in their underwear. Yuuji started to apply the cream to her back so they could start this process. He knew what certain people out there were thinking, he didn't want to take too long with this. "Kyo-chi you do your stomach and I'll do your back and neck." "Okay, Onii-san." (Onii-san= Big Brother)

"Haha I see you finally got the courage to call me that again? " Yuuji surprisingly said.

Laughing Kyoko replied, "You have always been my onii-san that's never going to change. Now help me rip this off."

Snorting at her, Yuuji said, "Yes, nee-chan! *rippppp*" (Nee-san =Little sister)

Finally she had it all off, she had not truly seen herself in years. Yes, she saw it in parts because of the reapplying of the skins but she had not looked in the mirror on purpose. Standing there, she saw herself in the mirror for the first time in years… She saw all the scars that covered her body… It was painful… She looked used... tainted…scarred…. Tears streamed down her face as she choked back a sob. This was her…. It really was her body… her confidence went completely out the window..

Yuuji freaked out when he saw her burst into tears. He instantly pulled her into his chest and wrapped his arms around her. Her legs suddenly went out from underneath her, grabbing her around the waist he slowly guided her to the floor so she could be in his lap. At this point, it was like a scene out of their past. Her crying...afraid.. holding onto him for dear life as they sit on the floor in each other's arms.

Her crying was getting louder, not that he minded but they had people waiting on them, so he whispered to her gently, " Hey, hey look at me. You can do this. You are beautiful, you know that?"

Sobbing she exclaimed, "I can't, I can't do it!"

Grabbing her face, he stared at her seriously and said, "Hey, hey, hey Kyo-chi you can do this. It will be okay. Do you want me to take off my adhesive skin to go out with you? So you won't be alone?"

With a teary face, she nodded. He then smiled as he wiped her tears away.

"Then you gotta help me then" Yuuji said as he was taking off his shirt. Most of the damage was on his upper body, so it would be pretty quick. As they tore the adhesive skin off piece by piece his scars began to appear. When they were done with each other, it was now time for the big reveal. Kyoko was not ready… She was confident earlier but now that she saw herself. She wasn't so confident anymore. But a big part of her wanted Ren to know what she really looked like... also his reaction to her body.

As the door opened, there was a collective intake of breath of shock. Complete silence filled the room, as they walked out of the bathroom. Could she blame them? No…. The scars covered her stomach, legs, arms, neck, and chest. It was a sight to see. More like a freak show she had scars covering his chest, stomach, legs, arms, and neck as well as Kyoko did.. They were very prominent on his body. He looked like he endured countless sessions of torture and pain. It was a testimony written on their bodies of the horrors they had faced in the past. It was a grueling sight to see.. It was very hard not to just stare blatantly at them and make it awkward. Lory was the first one to speak up as he asked, "Mogami-san are all these from…."

Trying her best to keep it together, she answered with as much confidence as she could muster up she said, "Yes…. They are all from there. Except some on my back were from the Fuwa's."

"Your back Mogami-san?" Don't tell me there's more… please no..Ren said.

She knew the worst scars were on her back from the beatings from both parties. Slowly, she closed her eyes then turned around slowly. There was another strong collective intake of breath from the group as they looked at her striped back. She knew her back was a horrid sight to see. So she turned around again, she was trying her best to hold back her tears. Yashiro's eyes widened, he had never seen such a sight in his life. His heart hurt looking at the girl. She was so sweet and kind. It was a shock to know she had such a brutal past. Looking into her eyes, he saw for the first time her eyes reflected the horrors she went through. It was like looking into a soldier's eyes worn from battle, almost dead inside. It broke his heart completely. She never deserved what she had to go through. She never should have gone through something like that.

On the other hand, the President Lory was beside himself, he had grown to love the girl as his daughter. It was heartbreaking for him as she turned around and he saw the abuse she endured all those years. It brought on a protective streak to go through his heart for this girl. He had just been sitting and listening making comments here and there but now he was determined to see anyone who had laid a hand on her be brought to justice. Looking at Ren, he knew that he would demand to be a part of this.

Turning around she felt so vulnerable and at that moment she wanted to know Ren's reaction. She had shown her deepest darkest secret to everyone including Ren. What would their reactions be? Will they still accept me? Her lip started to tremble as she looked at Ren with such raw vulnerable emotions. Waiting for a reaction… something…

When they walked out, all Ren could see was her. His breath got caught in his throat. So many emotions were welling up inside of him, he couldn't tell which he felt at the moment. As he looked at her scarred stomach, arms….legs... shoulders...neck.. But when she turned around it was like a string on an instrument breaking… Anger started to well up but not towards her...never…. but the people who did this to her. They say a picture can represent or say over 1,000 words but in this case her scars told the story of her life.. What she lived through… by herself… His heart was heavy with grief…. He didn't even know if he could come out of that and be sane. She truly was an amazing woman to get through all that and still be able to function… to have that childlike innocence. How could she do that? He was amazed by her strength that it took to overcome everything and live. When Rick died years ago, he couldn't live properly at all. He couldn't eat or sleep. He was void of all emotion, he didn't care for his life. But her, she took things in her own hands and lived to the fullest as she could. At that point, he really did admire her strength. He saw her in a new light. She was such an incredible woman.

When she turned around and he saw her looking at him with those molden golden eyes brimming with tears. He saw the anguish, pain, sadness, vulnerability, he saw it all. She had kept this inside for so long… He couldn't keep sitting down any longer. He had to comfort her. He couldn't stand it any longer. Rushing over to Kyoko, he grabbed her and held her to his chest. His hands felt the rippled scars on her back as he held her. After a while, she pushed away from Ren. At first he was confused, but then she said blushingly," I think I am going to put my clothes back on now." She left his arms and went back into the bathroom to change. As she was changing, she had forgotten what it was like to not have those adhesives on. She kinda felt naked a bit without them, but she didn't have the supplies nor the time to put them back on. So, she just threw her clothes on and grabbed Yuuji's shirt on the way out. After handing his shirt to him, she went to go sit on the couch again. At this time, it was about 7pm at night they had been there for a while talking. Taking a big breath, she asked, "Now that is over with… okay, any questions for us?"

"How long were you there?" Lory asked.

"I was there till I was 12 years old, while Yuuji was 16 years old." Kyoko answered.

"Till 12 and 16? That's a long time" Yashiro blurted out.

"We heard about what happened before you were six. What happened after you were six years old?" Ren questioned.

Yuuji knew more about it since he was older and remembered more… he continued with their story,

"After the whole supercell experiment failed, we were transferred to the drug administration experimental floor. Where basically we were their drug bunnies. They would tie us down to a table and then administered several different drugs together to see the results it would bring. Other times it would be experimenting for new drugs coming out on the market. So they would give us medication to create the symptoms that the new drug supposedly cured. Then they would try to use the new wonder drug to cure it. It was brutal on our bodies. The constant medications running through our systems, would give us extreme side effects like nauseousness, vomiting, fevers, abdominal cramping, diarrhea, ulcers, tremors, internal bleeding, heart attacks, seizures, blood clots, etc... Most of the time, we went through these side effects in the cages at night. One night Kyo-chi had gone through a huge mixer of drugs that day and it was taking a toll on her system. She had a high fever, vomiting, and abdominal cramping. She was not in a good state at all, but nothing could be done. She had to detox to get rid of the symptoms. Detoxing was a brutal thing in itself. It was really hard on us, especially kyo-chi.. She was so little and frail at that time. I still remember many times panicking as I held her limb shaking body as she detoxed from the drugs. I never knew if she would make it till morning. And I know there were also times I was detoxing and she had to take care of me. It was really hard at the tender ages we were at, to have to go through something like that over and over again.

Times were tough. We were just kids thrown in the world of adults. There was no mercy, no stopping anything. Nothing was in our control. We just had to go to our happy place till it was over. Think about something different…. anything...than what was happening to us at that moment. We had been shown things kids our age should never be exposed to ever. Seeing children right next to you screaming due to tremendous pain and then watching them die a table away from you. It was something not even a sane adult would be able to handle. It made you feel like a monster when that became your normal and it no longer affected you as badly as it first did. Seeing bodies tossed out like they were nothing…then bringing in another one to start the process all over again. You couldn't think about it, you just had to block out your senses… your morals… You had to block out everything to protect yourself and to just stay alive. But there was one light in that hell, it was Kyo-chi. No matter what happened, or what they did she would overcome it and smile. Even through the pain, the torture she would endure it and make the best of it. She would smile the brightest smile, she wouldn't let her circumstances bring her down. It was extremely contagious. When we were together, it felt like we weren't there in that hell hole of a place. Kyo-chi was that one light in my life, that kept me going and breathing. No one else cared about me as she did. In that hell pit, all we had was each other. My parents didn't care one bit about me at all, neither did hers or her adoptive parents. We both didn't have families that loved us so we made our own. That was when she became my little sister and I her brother. The only way we survived that bullshit was we stuck together and lived for each other. We swore to each other not to die at this place and that we would break free of this place one day."

Kyoko then added in,

"Until then, they had tortured us with beatings, ice baths, and hanging to get us to comply with their experiments."

Confused Lory questioned, "Hanging? Like in actual hanging."

Kyoko answered, "Hanging like in binding your hands above your head then stringing you up over a rafter to hang there for hours. Or the worse way, was binding your feet and cutting a small incision on your neck then hanging you upside down. The incision was to make the hanging worse and to keep you alive longer. You would hang there as your blood seeped down your neck, onto your face, then finally hitting the floor one drop at a time. Your body would slowly become numb, and your head would feel as if it was a pounding drum. You would hang there until you gave up or passed out…. It was a cruel method. Afterwards, you would have the worst headache of your life. Even though those methods worked, eventually you got used to it and it didn't work anymore. You knew if you just waited long enough they would just cut you down from frustration. It was then they found out about us. They figured out if they just separated us they would get the results they wanted. We cared about each other, so they played on our emotions to get what they wanted."

Yuuji then added,"It was then we had enough of these games they were playing with us. They would let us be together then tear us apart. It was this game constantly. Finally, we devised a plan to escape that place and run away together. I secretly hid a lock pick, it was very small and discreet. Our plan was to pick the locks to our cages then sneak out and run. Great plan right? At that time, we had taken great strides to learn the codes to the doors. We had planned so hard for our jail break. Such a plan we thought. Little did we know that alarms went off in the security room when an unauthorized door was unlocked. One night, we had enacted our plan just as we planned. I picked the lock to our cages and we snuck out. As we were running in the halls going past and unlocking the pad locked doors. They knew where we were headed… it was the only door that could get us out of that place. Security guards met us at the doors and captured us. Our plan failed. Because of our failed escape attempt, we were beaten and tortured for trying to escape. Hopes of escape were now crushed. This was our first escape attempt.."

Thank you for reading! Hope you are enjoying my story! Please leave a review for me, I want to know what you think! See ya next time! If y'all are good I might add some lemons later hehehhehe. RenxKyoko of course.