We're finally here! 5 years later and it's finally finished!
I have found this final chapter particularly difficult to write. Much like some of you dear readers, I myself have found it really difficult to say goodbye to my favourite couple and this story. I have loved writing this story over the last five years and bringing a new life to two of my all time favourite characters.
While this might be goodbye for Sougo and Kagura for now, there is still a lot I have left to say about this universe. Stay tuned for some spin offs around some of the other character's in this story, their story's are left unsaid and I'm excited for you to find out more about them!
Please enjoy, it has been a wild ride but I'm glad we finally got here!
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Memories Part 4
Kagura hyperventilated into her pillow the moment she hit her room. What on earth was that? She panicked, trying to convince herself of the reality of the last hour.
Kagura wasn't sure how long she had been laying on her bed having a small panic attack when her phone ringing dragged her out of her daze.
"Hello?" Kagura asked, too stunned to look at the caller ID before answering.
"What are you doing?" Came the familiar voice of Nobume, "I've been texting you for hours."
Had she? Kagura had no idea, "sorry, I didn't notice."
"Did something happen with the Sadist?" Nobume asked slowly.
Kagura shot up into a seated position instantly, "how did you know?" she asked in amazement.
Kagura could hear laughter from the other end of the phone, after a few moments Nobume said lightly, "are you serious?"
"What?" Kagura asked in confusion.
"Do you remember the first time we met?" Nobume asked suddenly.
Kagura frowned, unsure why her friend was suddenly changing the subject. "Of course, you tried to punch me."
"And who stopped me?"
Kagura was still not following her friend's point, "the Sadist?"
"The Sadist." Nobume confirmed, "he was looking out for you even back then."
"And?" Kagura asked.
Kagura heard Nobume sigh harshly through the phone, "did you see that kid near us at any point, Kagura? He must've sprinted across the room to be there in time to stop me."
Kagura reflected on the first time she met her now close friend. Nobume was right, the Sadist was nowhere near the two squabbling teenagers but he somehow managed to prevent a fight from breaking out. He must have been watching them closely from where ever he was.
Nobume continued, oblivious to Kagura's existential crisis going on over the phone, "the first time I met him he was nothing like that. He was this emotionless, depressing, little creep and then when I saw him for the first time with you he was like a completely different person. You've always had that effect on him Kagura." Nobume paused, "I knew it from the first time I saw you together, he loves you."
Kagura was lost for words for the first time in her life as she realised the depth of her childhood friend's feelings for her.
"Kagura? You there?" Nobume asked.
Kagura snapped out of her daze, "uh, yeah! I gotta go, Nobume." Kagura ended the call suddenly, unsure if she could take anymore.
Kagura couldn't take her mind off the first time she met Nobume. She had been filled with an inexplicable hatred towards her now best friend that she had never been able to explain. Kagura thought about how the first time she saw Nobume was when she was berating the Sadist at an event for Sho-Chan and it hit her suddenly.
Do I love the Sadist? Kagura asked herself.
Kagura remembered that day and how the Sadist blew Nobume off the moment he saw her. Kagura could still feel the sense of security that washed over her when the Sadist's bored look turned into one of amusement as he picked a fight with her over something stupid.
Kagura knew her answer.
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Familiar/Comfort
The two teenagers stared suspiciously at the feast of food laid out before them.
After several beats the glasses bearing boy asked, "what is this?"
"Hey Gin-chan, are you dying?" Asked the red-headed girl seated beside the other boy.
The silver haired man chortled arrogantly, "I'm treating you both to a meal to celebrate your graduation!"
The two teenagers looked each other in confusion before they both asked in unison, "is this a trap?"
Clearly fed up with the hesitancy his good gesture was met with, the adult at the table snapped, "you can just leave if you don't want it!" With that the older man snatched up a piece of meat in front of him and began munching furiously.
The two teenagers hesitated a moment longer before launching into the meal before them after the older man began taunting them that there would be none left soon.
After all of the plates of food had been furiously licked clean, much to the disgust of Otose who cleaned up the mess, the two teenagers went back to eyeing their adult companion suspiciously.
"What did I ever do to deserve this mistrust from you both?" Wailed Gintoki dramatically after several more minutes of this.
"You convinced me that I could fly when I was ten years old. My arm has never been the same." Shinpachi stated.
"You told the school I failed my exam because I was rebelling but you actually made me stay up all night looking after your cats on Neko Atsume." Kagura continued.
"You got me grounded by telling my sister that I was the one who ate all of her icecream."
"You stole the Wii my Papi gave me and then you broke it, uh-huh!"
"You stole my lunch money at school. Six times."
"You wouldn't let me get my license because I was 'too dangerous'!"
"Actually, I stand by that last one." Gintoki interrupted the two teenager's rant. The man dragged his hair through his hair roughly, "look, look, I haven't always been the most mature adult influence in your life." He admitted, "but can't you just let me do a nice gesture for your graduation?"
The two teenagers continued watching the man in silent confusion. Gintoki took that as an invitation to continue.
The silver haired man placed his hands softly on the table and unveiled two small wrapped boxes. He pushed them towards the two children sitting across from him.
"These are a token of my gratitude towards you both."
"Gratitude? What for?" Shinpachi asked in confusion.
Gintoki sighed warmly, "you're both too young to remember this, but I was quite a different man before you came into my life." Gintoki shook his head softy, appearing to remember some unpleasant memory from his past. "I used to be wild in my youth. I had been abandoned my entire life and I was always acting out of that loneliness I felt. But then I met you and your sister, Shinpachi, and then Kagura came into my home not long after.
"You three taught me how to trust. You opened my heart up to the possibility of being loved and you showed me what it was like to have a home. I'm so incredibly grateful that you came into my life when you did and I wanted to give you a small token to show you that."
The silver haired man looked at the young adults across from him and smiled gently, "I'm so proud of you, both of you."
The two adoptive siblings turned to look at each other in astonishment for what felt like hours. They were both having trouble processing what had just come out of their brother-like older companion and neither of them knew how to respond.
That's why it was a blessing when the Queen of the Kabukicho herself announced, "we all are!"
"Sister?" The glasses stand asked in surprise, noticing his elder sister sitting at a stool at the bar for the first time.
"Leave it to perm head here to take all of the credit for your graduation presents!" Catherine spat sharply from behind the bar.
"I think what Catherine is trying to say," Otose said pointedly at her employee, "is that all of us here are very proud of you. Just like that useless perm head said, you both changed all of our lives."
Tae nodded along decisively, "we'll miss you so we wanted to give you something to remember this place and all of us by."
"I contributed too!" Madao chirped up pathetically, as though he was worried that everyone had forgotten he exists.
Shinpachi and Kagura once again looked at each other briefly before turning to look at Gintoki again. Both teenagers stood up abruptly and turned to face the room of the precious adults that shaped their childhood.
Both teenagers shouted in unison, "thank you!"
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~~o~~o~~
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Simplicity/Love
There was something sweet in the simplicity of her feelings towards the Sadist. It was love, plain and simple, and that was all there was to it.
Once she accepted that she loved the strange boy next door, not as her childhood friend but in a "I always want to be near you" kind of way, it was like everything made sense again. Maybe she didn't notice it at first because she always thought love meant that you couldn't live without the other person like her Mami had taught her when she died after her Papi left, and she had never wanted any part of that. But this, this simplicity of she just wanted the Sadist to be happy and especially when he was with her, she could get behind that. Because the truth was, she could live without the Sadist. It would suck, and she would be miserable for a long time, but she would live. Much the same way the Mayonnaise king had managed to live without the Sadist's older sister. She just didn't want to.
Kagura and her adopted family were sitting at their kitchen table for a celebratory brunch with their wider family. Shinpachi had found out that he had been accepted to his first choice University and they were all now officially going to college. It was set in stone now that the Sadist would be going to the same university as Kagura, now it was just about getting through the summer.
Kagura might have felt pressured to do something about her newly discovered old feelings for her lifelong best friend but right now she was content just knowing that she had four more years to torment the Sadist.
Kagura sat at the kitchen table watching the Sadist make faces at his gorilla parent and she felt a sense of serenity at the scene, it was grossing her out really.
Kagura caught him looking at her with a quirked eyebrow as if to say, "what are you looking at?" but she ignored it, looking away quickly towards her own embarrassing parent who was currently making a dramatic speech about the 'springtime of youth'.
One day she would tell him she knew he was in love with her long before he said anything.
And maybe one day she would also tell him that she is in love with him too.
Kagura excused herself to go get her phone from her bedroom. Kagura tripped over the array of dirty clothes on her floor, knocking over her bedside table in the process.
"Crap," Kagura muttered, picking up the items that fell to the ground.
Kagura stopped suddenly when she caught sight of something pink amongst the dropped items. Kagura picked up the plastic pink ring gingerly, overwhelmed with the flood of emotions that were attached to it.
Or maybe, she just might throw caution out the window and tell him today.
Kagura sat through the rest of their brunch impatiently, waiting for her foster dad to stop crying annoyingly so that she could leave.
Kagura followed the Gorilla's family unit out the door as they went to leave. Kagura suddenly found it hard to follow through with her plans and choked on her own words.
The red headed girl watched the Sadist's back as he retreated towards the staircase on the landing outside their childhood apartments and mustered up the courage to try again.
"Hey Sadist!" She called out at his distant figure.
Said Sadist stopped in his tracks and called out over his shoulder, "yes China?"
The Gorilla chief and the Mayonaise lord looked at each other briefly in apparent understanding, "we'll go on without you, Sougo" said the Mayonaise lord and Kagura felt overwhelming gratitude towards him for the first time.
Kagura waited until she was alone on the landing with her childhood friend. The flaxen haired boy looked confused and nervous as Kagura continued staring at him warily from his fixed position. "China?" He asked.
She took a deep breath and matched his nonchalant tone with a nonchalance of her own, "Me too!" She called out.
The flaxen haired boy cocked his head, "what are you on about, pig-girl?"
"I said" she drawled impatiently, "I think I might love you too, you stupid Sadist!"
Kagura didn't have time to register the look of pure shock on the boy's face as he quickly closed in on her. The older boy was obviously not going to give the red headed girl time to change her mind as she found her face gripped between his decisive hands and her lips pressed surely against his hot and fast.
Thirteen long years he had waited, and she had finally said it back.
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EPILOGUE
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Future Part 3/Happy Ending
Nobume choked back some vomit as she watched her two friends act like love sick teenagers, never minding that this was exactly what they were, from across the dorm room she shared with Kagura.
"My roommate is just so annoying." Drawled the Sadist in a sickeningly gentle tone from his position on Kagura's bed laying on her lap, "he's worse than Zaki. I would even prefer Shinpachi as a roommate over him."
Nobume gagged audibly at the sound of her friend giggling, "Shinpachi would at least do your washing."
"And cook for me." The Sadist mused in agreement, "that's not such a bad idea, China."
"I'm full of good ideas." Kagura replied teasingly, nudging her companion's head with her hip.
"Oh yeah? Maybe we should-"
"Please, please stop." Nobume moaned, "you're being disgusting, go get a room," Nobume continued hastily, clearly fed up, "but like not this one, another room. Anywhere else, far from here."
The Sadist raised an eyebrow at his girlfriend, asking with apparent bemusement, "shall we?"
Nobume gagged silently, desperately missing their four eyed minder for the first time in her life.
"I can still probably arrange that 4 square metre cell if you're interested," The Sadist continued, ignoring Nobume's obvious disgust.
Kagura appeared to consider this seriously before responding, "why don't we just wait until you're stinky rich and I'm living off your money." Kagura paused before adding, "in a mansion. As a trophy dog mum to Sadaharu."
The Sadist contemplated this for a moment before grinning cheekily, "deal".
Nobume removed herself from her the room when it became clear that the Sadist couple weren't going anywhere.
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The End.
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It's done! The final chapter of Daily Score is posted!
Thank you for following me along on Kagura and Sougo's journey with a twist.
I hope you enjoyed reading this story as much as I have enjoyed writing it. Thank you to all of the new readers who joined along the way and those of you who have been here since day one!
Please please review to let me know how you found the ending, your reviews mean the world to me.
As always.
Lots of love,
Hils xoxo