Pandemonium Parade: Bone women
Prompt: Hyakki Yagyo and a Chinese cover of 幸魂 by 音頻怪物
Genre: Horror, Supernatural
Pairing: Nichu?
Warning: There are dead bodies and common horror stuff.
Summary: Kiku worked late in school one day and met an old, distanced friend while he is walking to the bus stop.
A/N: Even though the gist idea of this story was conceived years ago, I never quite managed to actually write it out. It was originally intended to be rochu, but I finally let go of the idea because it just doesn't work with that pairing. I have always been fascinated with Hyakki Yagyo, so recently when I tried to rewrite this story, I have decided to go with Nichu instead, since fundamentally Hyakki Yagyo is a very East Asian stuff. This is an original fic, unposted.
Happy new year everybody! May all your wishes comes true :)!
"Finally done." Kiku grunted, as the pen lifted from the last stroke on the letter, the last of his adrenaline was drained with it as well. He suddenly felt the onslaught of fatigue just weighing down on his body heavily.
He glance over at the clock hanging on the white wall just above the white board, its stated with his hands that its three thirty in the morning. Slightly earlier than the past few weeks, but nonetheless still late. There are only 3 people left in the research room, and the whole building is pitch black at this time. Kiku started packing his research papers filled with findings and conclusions and his stationeries into his briefcase.
"It's really late, I think I would just take a rest here and go back home in the morning to change into a fresh pair of clothes." He heard the conversation going on behind him.
"Why?" another voice replied with concern, though his tone revealed how worn out he is.
"Haven't you heard about the drowning case yesterday. Somebody fell down the bridge over the lake last night and drowned."
"Is it? I overslept yesterday when I went back home, so I guessed I missed out? How was the body found?"
"Yeah, I recalled. You were called in by the professor to get scolded. Hmmmm….. I heard that somebody noticed it under the bridge and called the police, the divers were called in to retrieve the body, but it was apparently stuck, and the divers can't get it out, it was quite late then, so they just called it a day."
"What... So, there's actually a dead body just out there soaking in the water..."
"I'll be going off first." Kiku announced, not glancing over to the two lower class students at the back, his eyelids are too heavy to make any more extra movement, but the two lower class students was apparently too engrossed in their conversation to notice Kiku's goodbye.
Kiku open the sliding door, and closed it, he noticed that he have forgotten to write his name down on the list hanging over the door. He let out a sigh, it no longer matter anyway since he was done using the room. He decided that he will just have to inform the professor later when he is home, although a little tiny dread seems to bother him because the professor will probably make a huge fuss out of it.
Shaking the dread away, he walk down the corridor, down the stairs and out through the main door. It was pitch black throughout the journey saved for the occasional green and white gleams from the exit lights over the door. But Kiku have walked through this route countless times and he could have navigated out even with his eyes closed.
There is a good 5 minutes' walk from the university's research building to the gate where the guardhouse is located. Just outside of the research building is a park and a large lake where everybody have to pass through before you can be on your way to reaching the bus stop.
Kiku Honda walk pass the outpost which serves as the guardhouse, the old man behind the glass window is looking down writing something intensely. Kiku decided that if he ever look this way while he is walking by, he will give him a bow. But the old guard didn't seem to notice him.
Swinging his briefcase lightly, using its momentum to take another step forward, Kiku briskly walk along the stone path that will leads to the park alongside the lake. The cold midnight air seems to perk him up a little considering that it is freezing his eyelids open. The streetlights shines down brightly, but seemingly only contained within the area of a large cone, everything else outside the cone became pure darkness after a few feet.
"Tomorrow is another day." Kiku mumbled and sigh under his breath. Out of the corner, he heard another pair of feet shuffling from afar, something that sound like a person jogging, Kiku continued walking, slowly moving to the extreme side of the pathway to let the jogger surpass him. A minute or two passed by and still Kiku did not see the jogger passing him through, feeling slightly annoyed, he turned around.
To find nothing.
Brows draw together in bewilderment. He attributed it to him being too tired, however, within the same split seconds, he suddenly realise that there shouldn't be anybody jogging this late at night as well. Fear seize his heart, it begin thumping hard against his chest, with bated breath, he slowly turn back around, and there he saw it: a figure in a jogging position, slowly jogging along the path just a few feet away from him.
Kiku froze, immediately stopping his feet at the sight. To his horror, the figure in front of him stop jogging forward as well. It just jog on the spot. Kiku's breath hitch, as he stare at the figure in front of him, he could feel goosebumps rubbing against the fabric of his clothes, yet he remain calm, because he knew that any sudden movement he made might potentially trigger this thing in front of him.
He have heard stories about this park. He recalled his classmates talking about hearing and meeting strange things when they are in this park - the jingling of bells, people whispering in language that sounds familiar yet somehow you can never seem to hear them clearly, or doppelgänger that just disappears when you call out to them. But how can Kiku call out to someone who looks exactly like him.
The same short, black hair dressed in black tracksuit, the same attire he wore during his jogging session. The thing was facing the front, still jogging on the spot. Kiku remember his classmate's casual conversation on how to avoid stuff like these, he didn't realise that it might actually saved him today. Carefully, Kiku took a small, tiny step back while his eyes stays with the thing, it did not move. Then he decided to try his luck again and took another, and another, and another, until the darkness outside the streetlights cover him completely. Cracking sound like the snapping of wood split through the cold air as the thing in front of him turn its head from left to right, then it jogs slowly forward. Kiku stood there staring at the thing moving through the path underneath the lights, he could still hear the sound of the cracking noise as it gets further from him.
Kiku finally let out the breath he didn't know he was holding.
As he was contemplating between the decision to go back to the research building or continue on along the path to the bus stop, he saw a sudden flash of red out of the corner of his eyes. Startled, he look to find a person walking on the road, a face that he immediately recognize.
With a swoop of his arms, he grab hold onto the person's arms and pulled him into the darkness.
"Who are you?" the person asked agitatedly, rather loudly in a quiet night. "Why are you pulling me!?"
"Shhh, shh, shh, please be quiet, I mean no harm. Please, come with me." Kiku hush the person, easing but firmly pulling the person along. "It's me, Kiku Honda."
"Kiku?"
"Yes, Wang Yao-san. It's me."
"I can't really see you in this darkness. W-What's wrong?"
"There's something dangerous up ahead." Kiku whisper, as quietly as possible. "Just stay here with me until it is gone. Please."
"O-Okay." Wang Yao replied hesitantly.
Kiku held on tightly to this person beside him with his eyes still on the thing. It is still jogging on the path, occasionally stopping, looking around, and occasionally it will jog backwards for a few feet at a time, all the while facing the front as though looking for him. After standing for god-knows-how-long, Wang Yao begin to feel as though Kiku is fooling around with him.
"What are we doing?" Wang Yao asked.
"Please lower your volume. We have to wait till that thing leaves."
"What thing? There's nothing here." Yao replied, he push Kiku's grip away from his arm and moved back to the pathway. "You wasted all my time standing there with you."
"No!" Kiku blurted out. "We can't be seen by that thing; else we will be dead before we knows it!"
Kiku could see the exasperated expression on Yao's face under the lights. His heart held the breath in his lungs as he kept quiet, he could no longer hear the sound of the shoe against the gravel on the path nor the occasional cracking sound anymore. He turn his head towards the rest of the road and found that it is now empty.
That's weird? Maybe… It is really gone because Yao-san is here. Kiku thought, letting out a breath of relief.
"Come on." Yao urged, with that same overbearing yet brotherly tone of concern he always use on almost everyone. "Let's go."
The tone he used to react with disdain somehow brought a certain reassuring comfort in this situation. The awkwardness in Kiku seeps into his behavior again, and lowering his head, he moved out from the shadow, focusing on his hands gripping on the handle of his briefcase.
Wang Yao tilt his head to the road with a smile, gesturing that they should be on their way.
Kiku look up and nodded, returning the smile, they both walk on side by side on the path again, like before.
"How have you been? Yao-san."
"Great. Never felt better."
"That's good to hear." Kiku replied, there's still a lot more question pressing against the lips of his mouth, but feeling somehow inappropriate in a situation like this, Kiku kept them back. Instead, he decided on asking a series of mundane questions to fill the space of time.
"Have you finished your research papers?" Kiku asked.
"Almost, but not yet done. You?"
"Just finished it today."
"That's great." Wang Yao answered, nodding. Kiku could not feel that Yao is intending to continue the conversation.
"Anyway, I don't think it's all that safe to go home so late at night anymore. So do take care if you are working late tomorrow."
"Why?"
"There are things here."
"What things?"
"Erm… There was a thing that was jogging along this path earlier, and I don't think its going to be good if anyone is caught by that thing. Haven't you heard the rumours about the things going on in this park." Kiku explains, he could see with the help of faint lights that they are approaching the bridge. His heart thump hard from the recollection of what the two lower class students was talking about in the room before he left.
"You've got to be more specific than that if you want me to be convinced." Yao answered, not amused with whatever Kiku is trying to say.
"There is a dead body just underneath that bridge." Kiku retorted, slightly angry. He suddenly remembers why Wang Yao was not well-liked by people in the university.
"And what does that got to do with what that 'thing' you are talking about?"
"Its…." Kiku stuttered, hesitating to continue. "I…"
"Yeah?" Yao egged on.
"There…"
"Yeah?"
"This whole place is haunted, that was what I was trying to say. There was something along the road just now that looks exactly like me. Jogging. And… I don't think that it is a human. I think.. I think it is a ghost." Kiku retorted, silently bracing himself from Yao teasing him for being superstitious, unscientific, and scared like this.
Wang Yao suddenly stops, and Kiku stops too, looking up to him for answer.
"Ghost? Where?"
"It appears on the road before I saw you walking past. You didn't see it? It's… It's gone now… So, if we hurry, we won't see it. Hopefully." Kiku mutter, worried eyes looking all around the path for any sight of that thing again. "It.. It have no shadow."
"Shadow?"
"Yes, I didn't notice it at first, but when I look on the ground as the thing jog pass the streetlights, it is obvious that lights just pass through that thing. It's a clear sign that it's a ghost."
Wang Yao turned to Kiku and let out a snicker, covering his mouth, he laughed hard as though he head the funniest joke from him. Kiku dreaded this moment, he knew that Yao would not have believed him, and he suddenly felt stupid to have told him anything at all.
"I have no shadow too." His hand left his mouth, and what replace them is a stretch out grin with pointed teeth and widened eyes, and from between his lips, a loud, maniacal, and piercing laugh rips through the silence of the night.
"Y-You're… You're a ghost too!?"
"Of course. What's the big deal with shadows? You have none to speak of." Wang Yao reveal between his laughs.
Kiku raised his eyebrow, his mouth open and close, his head gravitated downwards onto his own feet. Why didn't he notice it before? Why? What happened? When did it happen?
"M-My… My shadow… Where did my shadow go to?" Kiku finally managed out, looking around in panic.
"Probably….. Floating along with your body." Wang Yao offered cheekily, his finger tapping on his face while staring and seemingly enjoying the fear in Kiku's face.
"W-What?"
"Over there." Yao pointed over to the bridge, eyes brightening in a malicious tease. "Ah." He suddenly gasp in delight as he noticed Kiku running awkwardly over to the bridge.
Kiku stood on top of the bridge and tentatively, he peer down to look down in the water, then as he moves in further, he could start seeing underneath the bridge. The bridge's position in the water is solidified with metal grills, mostly trapping seaweeds and moss as it flaps with the flow of the water.
"Do you like what you see?" Kiku heard Yao saying, feeling him getting closer and stopping just as his face is beside him. He could almost taste the overbearing stench of rotting flesh that seems to burn the area between the nose and the throat, and he could see from the corner of his eyes under the help of the streetlights that Yao's face is falling all over the bridge railing, revealing the bones and muscles. "I was wishing your skin would be useful, but it looks ugly now."
He felt scared, from the bottom of his heart, that he could feel the tears hovering just on top of his eyes.
Lights gradually pours in, and from in between the grills and weeds, a white face floated just slightly above the waters, tangled in weeds and moss, the bulging, bloated eyes, and mouth widened in horrified manner, staring back at him, as though begging for help.
Wang Yao tilted his head slightly away from Kiku's and look into the sky, with a light sigh he said: "Ah. Dawn is breaking."