DISCLAIMER: SKIP BEAT! and its associated characters are the creations of Yoshiki Nakamura. This author claims no ownership of Skip Beat or any of its characters. All other rights reserved.

****WARNING WARNING WARNING*: MAJOR CHARACTER DEATHS. YES. MULTIPLE MAJOR DEATHS. VIOLENCE. GORE. TORTURE. NO HAPPY ENDING. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED. *****

Note: I promise I will write more fluff in whatever I release next, but this is NOT what you'd usually expect from me, so please, if death games bother you, DO NOT READ THIS.

Kill Your Darlings

Now the angel's got a fiddle, the devil's got a harp
Every soul is like a minnow, every mind is like a shark
I've broken every window, but the house
The house is dark. I care but very little
What happens to the heart.

The lights were blinding as Kyoko was raised to the dais. She was numb. By now, she had to be. The very fact that she was still alive was improbable.

"Welcome to Kill Your Darlings," the host was saying, "the show where we see WHO LIVES AND WHO DIES. Friends and lovers, mothers and daughters, fathers and sons—we pit them against each other. Welcome to the only show willing to do it all…"

She knew she'd risen high in the standings. Who was still left? Why was she dressed in her LoveMe jumpsuit?

"Now if this is your first time tuning in, let's go over the rules…"

Her first kill hadn't been so terribly long ago. A few days, perhaps? She couldn't tell—the arena was always dark when they brought her up in her Kill Bubble, and time had no meaning in the cells downstairs. It had been Maria—poor, precocious Maria, who had just passed the threshold age to be old enough for the death games. Her own hands had sent the girl to her death. Just at the very last moment—just as the lethal gas threatened to overtake her consciousness, she'd slammed down the killswitch and Maria's body had been speared by a sharpened steel rod. It had impaled her. She'd died instantly.

Kyoko watched dully as an infographic played out on the screen floating in the center of the arena, showing two featureless figures holding hands. "Two people—friends, lovers, or family—per round. Each person has a killswitch. The game is simple: one of you kills the other, or both of you…DIE!" The upbeat music crested as the crowd roared its approval. One of the blue figures was on the screen jumping up and down in victory as the other's decapitated head rolled around at its feet.

The sight of Maria's mangled corpse made the nightmare real. Until that moment, Kyoko had somehow thought they would all escape—bruised, maybe, but intact. She had been trained by Lory Takarada himself, after all, and the man was an eternal optimist. Somehow he'd find a way to get them out of this fix, she'd been so sure. But nothing had happened. They hadn't been released. And then when the rounds started, she'd thought she'd be able to accept death gratefully, because surely one of her friends would choose to die with her rather than betray her that way, right?

She'd proven herself wrong. She was staring at the inside of Maria's skull before she'd realized what she'd done. She'd looked down in horror to realize her hand was still on the killswitch.

Kyoko had cried out, had screamed herself hoarse. She'd slammed her body against the unforgiving glass that formed her bubble, but the crowd couldn't hear. She could hear them though—wild, brutal, voices. Bloodlust had raised them to a frenzy.

She'd heard the announcer crow in triumph. "And that's FIIIIIIRSTT BLOOD, folks! First blood for our newest contestant, Kyoko Mogami!" The crowd went wild. And then to her neverending horror, she saw her face plastered on the giant screen. It was suspended in mid-air in the middle of the arena, straight from the LME profile reel, back when there had been an LME. She was smiling, fully made-up by Jelly Woods. It had been a different Kyoko from a different time. Had it only been a year ago?

Everything had changed after The Singularity. Whatever remained of humanity had been left to survive in whatever way they could. Some countries chose to resist, with varying levels of success. Like the rest of the Asian Pacific countries, Japan had chosen the route of placating the Others, who, it seemed, enjoyed the pathos of human reality TV as much as they enjoyed taking human form. The government made entertaining their new masters law, and programs like Kill Your Darlings were born. Japanese citizens were subject to lotteries, and winning that lottery meant taking your turn on the killing floor. Prizes were not particularly wonderful for those who won their games, though many were able to capitalize on their fifteen minutes of fame. Some shows specialized in truly random kills. Some of them featured obstacle courses. Some of them were gladiatorial in nature. Others had hapless humans solving puzzles that were always too hard for the time allotted, while others pitted captured enemy soldiers against each other. Kill Your Darlings, though, was unique. Unlike the other shows, it had special dispensation to select entire groups of people who knew each other. And it made killing easy—pushing a single killswitch would take your opponent's life. In the earlier elimination rounds, it did one no good to be a martial artist. A child could win, simply by pushing a button. The entertainment came from watching some hapless human killing their mother, or wife, or best friend, not from the combat itself.

Would it have been easier to kill total strangers? Kyoko didn't know. A human life was a human life, after all.

The show was ratings dynamite.

Looking out at the crowd that very first night, Kyoko couldn't tell who had been human and who had been Other. As far as she was concerned, they were all monsters.

And with Maria's blood on her hands, she was no different.

"Now I admit I was betting on little Maria," the host had said, "Such a devious little girl. But now let's watch the play-by-play…Kyoko surprised us all!"

The nightmare began to replay. Kyoko saw it again from a stranger's eyes and in high definition—from the moment the platform had brought her to the stage, and then as Maria joined her in the glass bubble across the way. They had dressed her up like a little doll, all golden ringlets and ruffles. Her heart broke again as she watched Maria weeping. She saw herself dazed, at first, and then increasingly desperate. She heard herself promise Maria that she'd never hurt her. She watched as the stopwatch on the wall counted down the seconds before the gas would overtake them both and she steeled herself. She could be strong.

And then, the moment Kyoko would never forgive herself for—the tendrils of the green-dyed gas had begun to enter into the bubble. Kyoko had been planning to inhale the gas and die a peaceful death, unstained by the blood of her loved ones and friends. The gas began filling her chamber; she could smell it. Was it the smell of apples? The smell of rotting eggs? She was getting lightheaded—her breathing grew heavier and more desperate as her lungs brought air into her body but not oxygen. As her field of vision darkened, Kyoko's hand moved of her own accord. Perhaps her conscience wanted her to die, but her body did not.

The killswitch cleared the air inside the bubble instantly. Kyoko was panting heavily, was lightheaded, was going to be sick—but Kill Your Darlings did not wait. They had a ratings sweep that week, and they knew how to bring the crowd in.

"YES!" the announcer screamed. The glass bubble disappeared into the platform, leaving Kyoko under a spotlight on the gaudy stage. She was still on her knees, feeling bile rise from her throat. The bubble had disappeared around Maria, too, and now she could smell the metallic tang of blood as it spread in an uneven halo around the body.

"How does it feel to kill a child, Kyoko-chan?" the announcer crowed. "Did you enjoy that? You're ALIVE! Didn't think you had it in you, huh?"

Kyoko shook her head, refusing to answer. "Bet you feel like Japan's sweetheart now!" The crowd roared its laughter at the host's baiting. It was true—her career had taken off in the year right before The Singularity. Though she was only eighteen, she'd been seen as an actress with great range, capable of playing the sweet girl next door alongside the very darkest of villains. "But you're not a sweetheart, are you? You're a killer."

The crowd began chanting. "KILLER! KILLER! KILLER!"

Whether or not she'd fainted or been drugged, the next thing she knew, she was back in her cell below the ground. She would remember the feeling of waking up like that for the rest of her life—her first day as a murderer, and as the murderer of a child, no less. If her very first kill had been Maria, who else would they make her face? The horror of it—everyone she'd ever known was in danger. That was how Kill Your Darlings worked.

She'd forced herself not to think that day, not until she'd been summoned again. They'd offered her a sedative, which she took gratefully. As she drifted off to sleep, she comforted herself thinking that at least Kuon would be safe.

=.=.=.=

The next time she was conscious, it was time for the next round. It had been Takatsuki-san, still puzzled and in disbelief that he'd been brought in with the pod of pre-Singularity celebrities that had been plucked from what had been Japan's showbiz scene. He'd died on a meathook, flayed by automated blades until he looked less like a man and more like something to be cooked in a stew. Dully, she wondered if he'd killed Okami-san before facing her. And Sho had followed him—Sho, who took away her innocence by breaking her heart in Tokyo. Sho, who took away her innocence a second time as she preemptively pushed down the killswitch as soon as their eyes met.

The sneer on his face disappeared as flamethrowers roasted him alive. When the Kill Bubbles cleared, all she'd remembered thinking was the fact that his cooked flesh smelled remarkably like pork. He'd been a pig in life, after all. Why would she question the fact that he'd smell like one in death? She'd wondered what his intended last words to her would have been—would he have called her a boring, un-sexy girl as she was dying? She hadn't waited to find out—the look on his face had been enough.

No one who looked like that had good intentions.

Sho had been her third kill, but it was the first time she'd pushed the killswitch with intent. The first time she'd done it, it was as a reflex with her body near its limit. The second time, too. But when she'd seen Sho appear, she understood: they were breaking her down. They were breaking down her very humanity, her resistance to killing on purpose. And when Sho had appeared, she'd done what she'd sworn she wouldn't do. She pushed down the switch with little pause or hesitation. It hadn't even hurt to know she was killing someone so integral to the trajectory of her life. She imagined the show's producers were high-fiving each other behind their control consoles, and the rage rose in her again: how dare they play with humans like this?

But she couldn't pretend she was unhappy that she'd survived and Sho had not.

Each successive interaction after that had melted into the next. It had been Hikaru Ishibashi right after Sho, wide-eyed like an innocent. Except he wasn't, was he? He'd been here as long as she had. She'd seen the highlights reel of him killing his handful of friends, too. Hikaru had exploded from the inside out, still looking surprised at the fact that she'd killed him. Saena had followed him, as cold in the bubble as she'd been outside it. Kyoko had pushed the switch without hesitation again, and the host gleefully called out her matricide as she watched two large metal plates crush her mother to death, still alive and screaming.

She shook the memories from her head. Who else was still alive? Who would she see across the stage next? How could she keep going? She didn't dare think of the people she loved still remaining. Two people, she thought: Kuon and Kanae. She found herself hoping that her best friend was already dead. Better to wish her dead, after all, than to kill her. And as for Kuon…well, he was in the States, wasn't he? Hadn't he left to visit his dying father just a day before LME's pod had been selected for the show?

Kill Your Darlings, she knew, was quite savvy in the way they pitted friend against friend and lover against lover. They started off with a strong pairing—first blood matches were always well-attended. If a former couple both survived their respective rounds, they'd be pitted against each other at the very end. Had she come that far, then? Had they finished torturing her in the bubble?

"Now that we're done with the preliminary rounds," the announcer was saying, "have we got a special treat for alllll of youuuuuu!"

"Bloood! Bloood! Bloood!" the crowd chanted.

"Now as you know, our preliminary rounds keep our contestants in the Kill Bubble," he explained. "Easy access to that killswitch." The man pressed a mock switch on the stage, which buzzed ominously.

"Ooooooh," the crowd responded.

"Quite. But now we're coming down to the finals! AND YOU KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS!"

The crowd screamed, cheered, whooped.

"THAT'S RIGHT! COMBAT ROUNDS!"

The lights went up around the stage. In the past, the vast platform had been kept dark, spotlights trained on the Kill Bubbles as the contestants grappled with what needed to be done. But tonight, for the first time in this cycle, the lights came up on the wider arena. Before this evening, Kyoko hadn't understood why Kill Your Darlings was always held in such a huge space. But she understood now: the lights revealed a panoply of horrors—piles of swords, battle-axes, throwing knives, butcher knives. Guns. Pits filled with sharpened stakes, a table full of unlabeled liquids…a forge, glowing a blazing orange with a number of tools heating inside it, a pool of water glowing blue and fathomless…rags and gasoline, sharpened wooden stakes…baseball bats with nails hammered into the wood. A million ways to die, all laid out helpfully and with a great deal of organization, and all placed around an open, multi-storied labyrinth structure fitted with high definition cameras covering every inch of the anticipated action—a dollhouse of death, put together to give the contestants an obstacle course. And on an open platform on the labyrinth's third and highest floor, two buttons glowed red. Twin killswitches, side-by-side. Kyoko admired the forethought. The contestants would have to meet in the middle to kill each other. Either one contestant killed the other in single combat, or one contestant hit the killswitch. And if neither contestant wanted to finish the fight, the familiar green gas would take care of the rest.

"Now that our contestants are…" He paused for dramatic effect. "...SEASONED KILLERSwe can't possibly just have the same-old-same-old, now can we?"

"Booooooooooooooooooooo!" the crowd said.

"I didn't think so." From her bubble, Kyoko shuddered. "Now you all know how this works. Either one kills their opponent the old-fashioned way—" Whoops arose from the crowd at the host paused theatrically. "OR they can go for the killswitches on Floor 3—a *great* option." The spotlight focused on the two buttons, glowing red. "EXCITING! Our contestants will have a whole hour to find and destroy each other—but the gas starts closing in thirty minutes into that hour, so our contestants will *have* to meet each other in combat. And don't forget! A killswitch kill is worth extra weapons if you go into the Final Round!"

She could see the host's figure not terribly many meters away. He was dressed in sequins. Her heart rate was up. She was afraid they'd do this—not every cycle of Kill Your Darlings ended in combat rounds, but the few that had were phenomenally well-rated. And brutal.

"You've seen them in their separate rounds," the announcer said. "Two beauties, both of them the darlings of Japan's stage and screen. Both accomplished martial artists, with multiple action movies to each of their names."

Oh god, Kyoko thought. So it would be Kanae, after all. It had always been a possibility, of course. She knew Moko had been taken with the pod the same day she had. And Moko was nothing but tenacious. She could easily believe that Moko had been ruthless in her rounds. She had no way of knowing, of course—their rooms below were isolated and soundproofed.

"THAT'S RIGHT!" she heard. "TONIGHT! AND TONIGHT ONLY! KYOKO MOGAMIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII AAAAAAAANNNNNNNNNND—"

On the other side of the three-story labyrinth, she saw the lights come on. They illuminated a lithe figure that Kyoko knew all too well.

"KANAE KOTONAMIIIIIIIIIIII!"

Across the stage, she could see that Moko, too, was dressed in her old LoveMe jumper. Why? she asked herself. The public didn't know about the LoveMe section—the fact that they were dressed in the jumpers was a mindgame to throw both of them off, then.

A trailer began to play. Footage from their respective careers—a clip from their Curara commercial, Kyoko in her practice turn as Liar, Moko in her role in Route. And then, in quick succession, their kills. Kyoko's first: Maria, Takatsuki-san, Hikaru, Sho. Kyoko went cold as the scenes shifted to Moko's kills: her own sister, Chiori, Hio, Erika Koenji. She knew, of course, that Moko must have killed to get here. But seeing those bodies made her question whether or not she could trust her friend—Moko surely had as great a will to live as she herself did. Was she willing to kill Moko? Was she willing to kill Moko in single combat to keep herself alive?

"Two BEAUTIFUL actresses! BEST FRIENDS! WHO WILL LIVE? WHO WILL DIE?"

The roar was thunderous. Kyoko could feel the concrete floor vibrating beneath her. Her mouth was dry, her stomach in upheaval. It was to be Moko, then. Moko, who'd been her partner in so many things—from their first commercial to their joint auditions. Moko who'd secured her the training with Uesugi-san that had won her her big break into the movies, who'd bought her that very first set of fairy-tale makeup.

Vaguely, she wondered if Moko would truly hurt her, and then she looked up.

Moko was looking at her with big doe eyes—eyes that looked as if they were wondering the same thing. Kill Your Darlings made a great deal out of turning loving relationships into bloodbaths, but Kyoko felt some hope. Perhaps…perhaps she and Moko could put an end to this. Perhaps they wouldn't have to wait until the end of their bout—perhaps it would be a clean death, a mutual murder.

Kyoko's heart twinged as tears began to fall from those beautiful eyes. Moko, don't worry! she wanted to say. I would never hurt you. I won't let them do this to us. She tried to convey all of her love and all of her feelings across the stage, hoping that Moko wouldn't miss what she was trying to say. She smiled at her, hoping that Moko would smile back.

When an answering smile broke through Moko's tears, Kyoko felt herself relax. Here, at last, was a friend. Someone who would fight against this game with her. Someone who would show them that they weren't puppets, that they weren't going to just turn friend against friend as if love didn't exist—

"AND NOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWW—-" The host's voice cut through Kyoko's thoughts as the Kill Bubble's glass sank into the platform below. A giant digital clock began its countdown on the screen overhead, each second marked with a tone that reverberated throughout the structure. "—my friends, it is time to PLACE YOUR BETS! PLACE YOUR BETS! PLACE YOUR BETS!

She could feel the wind rise up from around the arena, could smell the blood in the air mingled with the sweat of the crowd around them. She felt the crowd holding its breath in anticipation as the countdown to start dwindled to zero, and when the buzzer chimed, there was a collective scream.

Kyoko stood frozen in her circle of light for what felt like an eternity, frozen in place by dread or shock, she didn't quite know which. During the earlier rounds, the Kill Bubble had given her a sense of safety. So long as she was within it, her choices were limited: push the killswitch, or not. She hadn't been able to walk away, or hide, or run. It was because she'd pushed that switch that she was still here. Whether or not she'd done that of her own free will was a question she was not up to answering, but there had only been one of two choices.

Now?

Now a variety of paths were open to her. She could run towards Moko, or she could run away from her. She could climb the labyrinth to get to the killswitches, or she could run away from them. She could hide. She could fight. She could even end herself, and easily, though she'd proven again and again that she'd choose to live no matter the cost. One way or another, though, she'd have to get off the platform. At the very least, it would be nice to see Moko again. She wasn't quite sure whether her friend had ever seen her without makeup on. The only opinion that matters more than yours is he

"KYOKO!" she heard from across the way. It was Moko, who had begun sprinting towards her. She looked overjoyed, so eager to have found someone safe. Kyoko came out of her daze and moved towards her bestest of all friends. Down the concrete stairs that she found on the side of her platform and onto the weapons floor, up and into the labyrinth. Kyoko hadn't stopped at all to find herself a weapon—she was running towards Moko, after all. Why would she need a weapon? She saw Moko running towards her, motioning to the open space on the Labyrinth's second floor.

Moko was running with tears flowing from her eyes and a smile on her face.

Kyoko couldn't help her own tears; the smile on her face hurt. For the first time since the start of the ordeal she began to feel some hope. She had climbed up and into the labyrinth just to fall into the arms of her best friend. Somehow, she knew everything would be OK. Everything would be fine. They would show the Others—all of them, Earth-born humans, too—that love could conquer everythi—

Kyoko felt herself freeze, skidding to a stop before she could collide with Moko, who was, even now, running at full speed towards her.

That love would conquer everything? Are you stupid, Kyoko?

"KYOKO!" she heard, and the world started moving in slow motion.

Kyoko stood her ground, staring at her friend's smile. Three fundamental truths hit her, all at the same time. The first: Moko was acting. Moko never smiled. And Moko never cried. Not when she was happy, and not when she was sad. Not like that. Those tears were her signature as an actress. The second? Since when had Moko ever welcomed her running tackle? Moko, who exemplified the tsundere to a T, who'd never embraced her before, was running towards her with open arms. And the third: That she was an idiot, truly. A lovesick idiot then and now, and for all of her avowals onstage or otherwise, love had almost gotten her killed.

All of the hope in her turned to ice. Moko kept running towards her, smiling and crying and opening her arms, but this time, Kyoko watched her carefully.

Carefully enough to see the glint of a blade hidden up the sleeve of Moko's LoveMe jumper.

Kyoko felt her adrenaline rise as she sidestepped Moko's embrace, neatly pivoting so that her friend's momentum carried her far past Kyoko and nearly into the wall.

"Kyoko?" Moko had turned around, her face a mask of surprise. "Are you—are we?" Kyoko watched as Moko took a step towards her, haltingly.

Kyoko was frozen again, doubting herself. Had she read Moko wrong? Had this place twisted her so thoroughly that she couldn't believe in her very best of friends?

"It's me, Kyoko," Moko said. She was advancing towards her now, step by careful step. The smile was still plastered on her face, but now Kyoko could see the coldness in her eyes.

"You—you—I trusted you," Kyoko said. She was stepping backwards away from her friend. Whatever was in her sleeve, Moko was keeping it concealed. All this—the acting, the hidden blade—told Kyoko that Moko had developed a strategy to kill her as efficiently as possible. There had been intent. There had been premeditation. The knowledge hurt as much as an actual stab in the back. There were very few people who knew her better than Moko did. And Moko had used that knowledge to ensure she dropped her guard.

The smile disappeared from Moko's face, and Kyoko knew she'd been right. Had she intended on slitting her throat? Would it have been a knife to her back as they embraced? Or had Moko been planning on stabbing her somewhere on her chest in a frontal attack? She didn't even know if Moko had more weapons hidden in her jumpsuit—it would've taken just a moment or two while the crowd was cheering to grab more knives.

Kyoko was unarmed. She had come like a lamb to be slaughtered, ignoring all of the weapons that had lined the path to this labyrinth. And now there was nothing to grab, nothing to use except the structure itself. Whatever instincts she'd put to sleep when she'd seen Moko's face across that platform were awake now and making her heart race. She was in danger.

Kyoko backed away with each step Moko took. They were moving like partners in a very slow dance, Moko taking a step forward while Kyoko took a step back.

There was only one way out of this, and Kyoko knew it. She kept taking steps backwards, knowing that behind her were the steps to the third floor of the labyrinth. Once she got to them, she'd have to turn and run upstairs—the killswitch was her only option.

Ten paces now.

Nine.

Eight.

"I loved you, Moko," Kyoko said. "You were—you are—my best friend. Please—"

"If you love me so much," Moko responded, "then you'd kill yourself. Easy-peasy. And my name is Kanae."

Seven.

Six.

"How can you—?"

"How CAN I? I have a family to support, you idiot," Moko said, spitting the words. Kyoko recoiled. Moko had been her friend for so long that she'd forgotten just how cruel she could be. Best friend or not, the Moko she'd met at the LoveMe audition had been haughty and rude, only speaking to Kyoko to berate her for her air as a dowdy housewife. "You don't have anyone depending on you," she'd said. "Not one person is out there waiting for you." Kyoko flinched at those words. Moko didn't know. She and Kuon weren't public yet. He'd left for America just days before they were rounded up for this nightmare—she was glad, ever so glad, that he'd escaped.

But Moko was still talking.

"Not one person will starve if you don't come home. You play such a victim, Kyoko, but the truth is that you've always had a great deal of power."

"We don't have to do this, Moko—"

"Kanae. You're fucking right we don't," she responded, and their slow dance ceased as Moko sprang forward in a surge of speed, Kyoko eluding her grasp at the very last minute.

Kyoko turned and ran. As quickly as she could, she ran. She knew she was faster than Moko—her life before LME had required nothing but running, it seemed, and Kanae had never been able to keep up. Up the steps, two at a time, hearing Moko's footfalls immediately behind her, knowing that at any time she could feel the sting of a blade tearing at her flesh. And then she was there, at the very top of the labyrinth. It was a wall-less platform, fifty feet removed from the floor of the arena. They were exposed to the open air here—if one of them fell, they'd fall into the pit of sharpened stakes that surrounded the structure. She hadn't appreciated that when she'd first seen them. The two killswitches glowed red on their respective stands, some yards away.

Kyoko ran for her life.

Her hand was hovering just above the killswitch when she hesitated, the last vestige of loyalty keeping her from unceremoniously disposing of what had been her best friend.

That hesitation cost her. She was yanked back by her collar, yelping as Moko captured her and held a knife at her throat.

"So weak," Moko said. "You never did have the killer instinct—"

"NO." Kyoko tucked her chin underneath the offending arm and bucked, pulling down with all her strength as she broke Moko's grip and twisted the actress's arm behind her back. The knife clattered to the floor and Kyoko kicked it off the edge. They had switched places now, and Kyoko was holding Moko in a chokehold with one arm. Moko leaned forward, attempting to shake Kyoko off—but Kyoko clung hard.

"You will not," Kyoko said. "I won't die here. Not for you."

"We'll see," Moko replied. Her other hand had stopped clutching at Kyoko's arm and was now reaching forward—

Kyoko screamed as Moko's fingers made contact with the switch that would have killed her. Kyoko saw red. After all she'd done…all the friends she'd betrayed, to die in this way was unacceptable. Adrenaline filled her and she dragged both of their bodies up, wrestling Moko's resisting form away from the killswitch. She could feel her grip slipping now—Moko had nearly broken out, was out, had escaped—

But Kyoko grabbed at that long, black hair and fisted it at the nape of Moko's neck, pushing and dragging Moko's head downwards until it slammed with a sickening crunch on the opposite killswitch.

Blood pooled down the side of her pretty face as the bell tolled.

Kyoko found herself looking at what had been her former friend. Instead of horror or grief, she found herself wondering what on earth had possessed her to wear her hair down like that. Had she thought they were in a stage battle? Uesugi-san had taught her well, but apparently had never warned her how long hair was a liability in battle.

But the clocks had frozen. The round was over. Now, there was just the aftermath.

The death that came was far from instantaneous. Though Kyoko had slammed her head onto the switch, Moko was still awake when the cloud of drones began misting her with acid. Kyoko watched in numb fascination, unable to move, as the tiny machines formed a sphere around what had been her best friend. She knew immediately how Moko would die. If she'd taken a weapon from the tables below, she could have ended it early for Moko in a mercy killing. Could have. Would have? She wasn't sure anymore. The thoughts were pointless, anyway. She had come in good faith, and Moko hadn't. She paid no attention to whatever the announcer was saying—the sound of his voice and the roar of the crowd were just white noise in the background. The Moko of her memories bore little resemblance to the woman who'd tried to kill her, and even less resemblance to the body twisting in a pointless effort to escape the death assigned to her. She watched as Moko tried to shield her face, but the acid quickly ate through the hands she was using to shield her eyes. Her torso, her legs, her arms—everything covered by the jumpsuit—survived a little longer. But the face which she'd been so proud of melted off as she screamed and thrashed.

Kyoko turned away as the acid exposed the white of Moko's skull. The actress was no longer screaming. Kyoko wasn't sure if she had fainted from the pain or if the acid had taken away her voicebox, but the fact that the drones were still surrounding the body told her that Moko was still alive. She tried to find the outrage that she'd felt when Maria died. But inside, there was…nothing. She'd watched her friends reduced to meat. She'd watched herself reduced to a murderer.

She began to walk downstairs, exiting the labyrinth down the same staircase which she'd used to escape from Moko's blade. Past the pit of sharpened stakes, the glowing forge, the guns, the knives…she climbed up again onto the dais where she'd entered in the Kill Bubble, ignoring the crowing announcer in his sequined suit along the way.

She was hoping they'd allow her to go back to her cell quietly. She was in no mood to play or to simper to the crowd—she knew there would be at least one last round before the nightmare was over. Who would it be? She surmised it would be Lory. What could be more dramatic than a matchup between a President and his protege?

"Now now now, Kyoko-chan," the announcer was saying. His voice wasn't being amplified out into the larger arena for some reason, and she found that his voice sounded different when she wasn't in the Kill Bubble. "We can't have you going in quite yet. Aren't you excited? Just ONE more match—and then you'll be free. Citizenship in the New Territory, a new apartment in Neo Tokyo. And aren't you the least bit curious who you'll be facing?"

Silence. She looked at him with content and said "No." Her voice was hoarse. Had she been screaming too? She hadn't realized.

"No?" the man asked. He was truly puzzled. Kyoko wondered if he were an Other in a skinsuit, masquerading as human. "Wellllll, I'm afraid the crowd doesn't agree with you, now do they?"

He turned away from her, walking back to the center of the platform. "NOW TELL ME, ALL OF YOU—DO YOU WANT TO SEE WHO KYOKO WILL BE FIGHTING NEXT!?"

She was exhausted, but the rising chant raised the hairs on the back of her neck. "TSU-RU-GA!" they were crying. "TSU-RU-GA!"

"THAAAAAAAAAT'S RIGHT!" the announcer cried. "Kyoko-chan will be fighting her fiancé, Ren Tsuruga!"

The bottom had fallen out of the world.

How? She wanted to scream. How could this possibly be? He was supposed to be safe! Safe somewhere in sunshine, where people still fought against the invaders instead of offering up human flesh for alien entertainment. He'd texted her that he'd arrived safely in LA shortly after they'd been rounded up for the show. He had been her last contact with the outside world. And how had they known they were engaged? She and Kuon had never made their relationship public, much less their engagement—had been extremely careful, ever since the grand spectacle in TBM's elevators. Their mutual agreement not to change their relationship crumbled in the wake of The Singularity, and he had been her first…everything. Her first love. Her first lover. Her soulmate.

Kuon had boarded a flight for the United States to visit Kuu, who had been diagnosed with a fatal cancer. She'd insisted he leave to see him, he'd almost refused to leave without her. But with the Americans in open war with the Others, she would not have been permitted into the country—though he went so far as to ask her to marry him so he could arrange a fiancé visa for her while he was overseas. They couldn't marry in Japan, not without Saena's approval. Kyoko at eighteen was of age in the States, but not at home. They hadn't told anyone about that—and Kuon wouldn't even have had the chance to start the paperwork in LA. The only person who could have told them was Kuon himself.

Why was he here? Had they forcibly brought him back?

After Moko's betrayal, her soul was frayed. If Kuon betrayed her too, she would go berserk—it would break her like nothing else had during the whole of this monstrous competition. She thought back to the ways in which they'd been together—all of his vows to her, all of hers to him. I'd die for you, he'd said one night, as they lay in his bed. I'd die for you, too, she'd responded, and sealed the pact with a kiss.

Was that what he wanted?

"Now as we all know, Ren Tsuruga volunteered to take part in Kill Your Darlings. Our very first volunteer, yes, ladies and gentlemen, yes…" The announcer was playing up to the crowd. "He came all the way back from Los Angeles—" A chorus of 'Boooo' came up from the audience as the host tried to quiet them down "—yes, yes, folks, we know. We know. Those pesky Americans. He came back to volunteer."

Her eyes widened at that, and she was hoping the cameras hadn't caught it. Kuon had…volunteered? That…had been unexpected. For him to come back for the express purpose of volunteering—why? She hoped it wasn't some chivalrous ideal of rescuing her from harm. The show was just one of the shiny arms of a juggernaut slowly and surely conquering the continent. What did he think he was doing?

The reel came on, just as she knew it would. It was the grand finale, after all. There he was, on the arena screen, snippets of his most notable work—even one of their scenes in Dark Moon, with her Mio antagonizing him. And then…the kills. Kyoko knew that Kuon had never intended to come out publicly as the actor who played BJ. Not now, anyway. But the man Kyoko saw on the screen couldn't be anyone but that undead demon. He'd dispatched his victims coldly, without a trace of emotion. His first had been Kijima, his second, to her surprise, was Lory. Kana had been the third, and Yashiro had been the last of the preliminaries. The killswitch had been pushed within a second of activation every time—and in each of the initial rounds, he hadn't even looked his victim in the eye. Instead, he'd stared outwards soullessly.

The combat round took her by surprise. She'd expected it to be Yashiro, but Yashiro had already died. Instead, it had been Kuu he was facing. A caption on the screen pointed out, helpfully, that Kuu had been the second volunteer yet received by the show. What were you thinking, Kuon? she thought. And Otou-san, too. The fact that both of them were here, when they should have been safe, abroad—she dreaded finding out their reasons. Kuon had gazed at his father a long, long time before they began, but Kuu had just smiled at him. Even knowing that he only had months to live, she wanted to scream, wanted to stop it, even though she knew it was too late. She watched, her heart full, as the two men had fought, realizing as she did so that they weren't fighting, not truly. Her trained eye could see how Kuu was struggling to move, how his actions were slower than before. Kuon matched him and the combined result was a dance—just as she'd learned from Uesugi-sensei. A dance to entertain the audience, not to kill. Their feints and turns and jabs were more elaborate than they needed to be—she'd seen Kuon fight in earnest before, and he was not fighting.

The end, when it came, was swift. Fifteen minutes from the end of their hour, Kuu and Kuon faced each other across the third floor platform. Kuu had embraced his son, and then, with one swift movement, his son broke his neck.

Kuon's face was inscrutable as his father slumped to the ground. He remained standing, proud and tall as the bell rang to signal the end of the match.

"Anything to say, Kyoko-chan?" the announcer asked.

She shook her head. There was nothing to say at all. Her fate had been decided, whether or not she was ready for it.

"Do you think you could beat someone like that—someone who would kill his best friend and his father without blinking?" he asked.

Were they determined to get a rise out of her? She was determined they would not.

"He's one of the most accomplished action stars Japan's ever seen," he prodded. "And it looks like it wasn't just acting."

Kyoko knew he wasn't. Kuon truly was deadly—

"At least you looked like you hesitated a little, Kyoko-chan. I mean you killed a little kid, but—"

Kyoko had realized there was no glass bubble keeping her in place.

"—at least you looked like you felt *a little* remorse. Tsuruga-san, though—"

Enough. It was enough. She felt something inside her shatter. All of her resolve, all the numbness, everything she'd forced into the little black box in her mind broke through. She would not listen to any more of this—she sprang forward at the announcer, who had not expected the attack. How could he? She'd been so meek after her rounds had finished. She punched and bit and clawed at him as he screamed—she punched and bit and tore at him, for Moko, for Kuon, for herself. Everything she'd lost, she pushed to the end of her fist and rammed into his nose. Her eyes had gone blind with tears of fury as she struck him, again and again.

—and then there was nothing as a tranquilizer was shot into her system.

=.=.=

It must've been hours later when she woke. Perhaps an entire day. She was still disoriented from the dose they'd given her, still fuzzy in the head. Her mouth was dry and tasted of antiseptic wash…and she was still dressed in her LoveMe jumpsuit stained with Moko's blood. She felt as if she'd traversed entire continents in her sleep—whatever dreams she had must've been nightmares. She was glad there was nothing left of them.

Reality was bad enough.

She could feel her mind going to him, to what she would have to endure—

No. She would not think of it until she had to.

A klaxon startled her out of her haze. Was it time, then?

A tray of food and a package were shoved in through the slot in her door.

She knew the drill. She took a shower in the stall they provided her, changed out of the jumper before folding it and shoving it back out of the slot. She didn't want that blood in her room. She could still feel it staining her hands.

She shoved the food in her mouth, not caring to see what it actually was. As far as she was concerned, it was made of ash.

She was doing well with keeping her mind blank, really. She ought to be proud of herself. Today would be her last day alive, she was sure, and that was OK. So long as Kuon lived, right?

Right?

She loved him enough to die for him, right?

Would he really kill her so ruthlessly?

She shook her head and busied herself with opening the package. Whatever monstrosity they were foisting onto her today, at least they'd allow her to put it on herself.

And then she saw it.

A white dress. A floor-length sheath with a cowl neckline and thin straps in a filmy satin material, but with two high slits on either side for mobility.

Those sick motherfuckers were going to make her wear a white dress. Were they going to make him wear a tuxedo, too?

She smiled grimly. She'd seen what they did to recalcitrant contestants before they'd been placed in their cells. A shock of electricity strong enough to incapacitate, or a bootheel to the face. Beatings with bats. No matter what she did, she'd be in this white dress in that arena before too long had passed.

It was probably best to keep her body intact for all the running coming up.

She would have to face what to do when she saw him. Her heart—her ever traitorous, ever foolish heart—wanted to trust in him. Surely he'd had a reason for coming back to Japan—why would he do so, when he was safe in America? Surely it wasn't because he had a burning desire to kill her—or to kill others, for that matter. Kuon could be pushed into darkness, but it wasn't something that he sought. And even if he had, volunteering for Kill Your Darlings made no sense. The act of killing was much more celebrated on other shows. He'd excel on one of the gladiator shows, surely, and whatever lust for killing he had would've been more thoroughly sated.

Did he have a plan to save them, then? Something that even Kuu would sacrifice himself for?

It was possible.

But was it likely?

What was more likely was the fact that he would betray her. Hadn't they all? Hadn't they always? What was this exercise except a painful reminder that humans always looked out for themselves? She should have learned by now, and yet she hadn't. Her father's act of betrayal had made her, her mother had abandoned her at seven. Sho had done the same at sixteen. And Moko? Moko could have come at her honestly and openly, and she would have respected her decision. They could have fought with some modicum of honor. But Moko hadn't. Moko had deceived her and used her naivety to attempt her kill.

But what truly convinced her were her own actions. Repeatedly, she'd proven to herself that she was capable of atrocity. She'd never thought of herself as someone that could kill and yet—why, she'd killed her own mother without blinking an eye. Why would Kuon be any different? Perhaps his intentions had been good. Perhaps he'd had a plan, and it hadn't worked out. What was clear now, though, was that he could not be trusted.

The only thing she asked of him was that he kill her before whatever drawn-out-death they'd planned would occur.

Whatever else happened, she'd be prepared for his betrayal.

=.=.=.=

The spotlights blazed and blinded her on the way up to the stage. This time they hadn't brought her out first—perhaps it had been the way she'd attacked the host. Perhaps it was because they always brought out the favorite first, and she was most definitely not the favorite this time.

She could hear the announcer's voice as he spoke, too muffled for her to understand his words. She could hear the music, too, but nothing else.

When she came up, she looked across the dais and her breath caught as she saw him again. He was in a tuxedo—she'd been right about that—and he was looking at her with that look. For a while she forgot where they were. The noise of the crowd faded and all she heard was the beating of her heart. Her hungry eyes took him in—the curve of his jaw and the fall of his hair, the way his eyes caught the light. He wasn't wearing his contacts today, she could tell from this distance. She had a visceral desire to run to him and bury herself in the safety of his arms. She wanted to touch him again, to smell him again, to remind herself of every bit of his body. In happier times, she realized, they would have looked just like the couple on top of a wedding cake. She supposed they'd stand just like that on top of the labyrinth, instead.

At least…before he broke her neck.

She broke their gaze and looked down, missing the hurt look on his face as she did so. She had to be careful. Hadn't Moko done the same thing? Hadn't Moko also looked at her sympathetically? Inside her a small voice was screaming, telling her to trust her heart.

She ignored it. That was the voice that was going to get her killed.

Funny—she'd joined LME after swearing off love. LME had given love back to her. And now? Now she saw how empty love was. Everyone she loved had died here in this arena. All of her friends and even the scant family she had—all of them had died screaming. She would probably die screaming, too. She would have been better off alone all along.

She had been given a small handgun, secured on her thigh with a holster and easily accessible thanks to the dress's high slit. It was her reward for having used the kill switch in the last round, she was told. Before her entry to the platform, she'd checked it over—two bullets: hollowpoint .45s.

One for him and one for me, she thought grimly. And then another thought: I wonder if I should just…pre-empt the situation and end this now.

She'd received a note telling her that Kuon would not receive a weapon, having used his hands to break his father's neck. She merely shook her head. He didn't really need one—he'd already demonstrated how deadly he was with just his bare hands.

Vaguely, she registered the host's explanations: for the very final round, there would be no buffet of weapons at the ready—only the labyrinth with its stairs and empty rooms leading to the killswitches at its apex.

She only looked up again when the bell chimed the start of their time, and then she sprinted as fast as she could to the top of the labyrinth.

Kuon followed her into it, his pace matched to hers. Though Kyoko was an extremely fast runner, Kuon's long legs gave him a decided advantage. While she frantically ran up the steps, Kuon continued onwards, unhurried.

Kyoko reached the killswitches first and stood still before them. She could end it now, she knew. Right now, a single touch of her hand would stop Kuon where he stood.

She could. But she wouldn't.

Even now, at the end of all things, she loved him.

"Kyoko," she heard. She whirled around, grabbing the pistol as she did so and pointing it forward at him. She moved to stand between him and the killswitches.

He was standing a few paces before her, frozen. She was trembling with the gun in her hand, her finger on the trigger. "Why are you here, Kuon?" she asked. She couldn't keep the waver from her voice. "You were supposed to be in LA, and now you're here. You brought Otou-san, too, and now he's gone—"

He moved too quickly for her to follow, and she expected the worst. Flinching, she curled in on herself, anticipating the deathblow at any moment. But instead she found herself in his arms, the gun pointed downwards to the floor. He clung to her tightly, afraid she'd move, afraid he'd miss the chance to tell his story. For a while he just stood there holding her, waiting for the tension to leave her body. I am still here and I love you, he was saying.

He'd seen how they'd tortured her, how each and every kill had destroyed a piece of her soul. He whispered into her ear, frantically. The things he wanted to say were not things he wanted broadcast out into the world. "When you didn't respond to my last text, I panicked," he said. "And then we found out that you'd been selected by the Lottery. They said it would be a team-based show and so I thought—"

"You thought it would be one of those gladiator shows." She was beginning to understand.

"I volunteered, but I demanded to be with you," he said. "I thought I'd be able to protect you—that we could fight and die together, if we needed to, but instead—"

"You ended up here." She took a long breath. "And you brought Otou-san."

The revelation brought back the surge of emotions she'd tried so hard to put away. All of her rage, her grief—the shock of seeing Kuu's head twist at such an unnatural angle, the slump of his body as Kuon stood over him—she saw it all in sharp relief.

"He came himself. After he'd heard that I'd gone."

"You could have been safe with him. He still would be here. YOU could have been safe, Kuon. You could have…" Sobs wracked her. She screamed into the sky, clutching onto him, the gun falling and forgotten at her feet. All this time she hadn't cried. She hadn't cried for each of the people she'd murdered, not even for Moko whose death had left a dark mark on the concrete floor.

"Otou-san was told that he likely had days to live," he told her. "He had massive doses of medication, and all he wanted to do was to help. And you know he hasn't been the same since Mom died." He held her, close and steady, luxuriating in the feel of her, the smell of her. The gods knew he didn't have much time left, either, but at least he'd spend every second with her. When her body fell limp, he caught her and cradled her, leaning on the platform holding the killswitches. Their hands had entwined.

There was so much to say and yet so little. Their entire world had been destroyed—everyone they loved was gone.

"They offered me a knife to counter your gun," he said.

She laughed. "They told me you weren't getting a weapon, not that you'd refused one," she replied. Another instance of their gamesmanship.

"I asked to bring something else," he said. He held up their entwined hands and reached for something in his tuxedo pocket. Kyoko gave a small whimper when she saw the ring.

"Will you?" he asked.

Weeping, she nodded. The irony was not lost on either of them, dressed as they were.

"Hold me, then," Kyoko said.

He drew her closer and onto his lap. Both of them spoke in low whispers, taking comfort in their relative isolation. They had always been able to retreat into their own world, now was no different. She was nuzzled into his neck, his hands were wound around her waist. They could both see the clock winding down, minute by minute. Both of them chose to ignore it. Both of them were aware that the audience had fallen silent at the lull in action, too, but so what? They weren't there to entertain.

"The gas?" she finally said.

"Yes," he replied. "It'll hurt less than the alternative." He motioned to the gun, still on the floor.

She shuddered. "I don't want to think about it."

"Then don't," he said. He took a hand caressed her as she laid her head on his shoulder again.

The bell tolled at the thirty minute mark and they could see a green mist beginning to rise from the arena floor. They both knew that it would rise until it engulfed them at the top of the labyrinth; they both knew they weren't moving. Kyoko knew she'd dropped her guard, but here in his arms she found that it didn't matter.

Upwards the mist climbed, past the second floor and then inexorably upwards until it lapped past the steps and closed in on them. Kuon stood and held Kyoko up and off the floor. By the killswitches, where the floor was still clear from the mist, they stood.

As the clock ticked its fifty-eighth minute, he kissed her. Desperately, as if he were a starving man, he kissed her. She kissed him back, wanting to engrave the feel of him on her lips, wanting this to be her last memory. But instead she felt him move his arm—move it towards the killswitch. Out of the corner of her eye she saw his palm hesitate over the button. The realization of what he was about to do flashed before her—a last minute kill, just like what she'd done to Maria. It had never been his intent to die with her. He was still holding her hand as he reached forward to kill her. Her heart was broken, but the betrayal could go both ways.

Her hand darted out onto his killswitch and pushed—only to find his hand already there.

Shock. The great bell boomed, signifying the end of the round. Only four seconds remained on the clock, but high-powered fans had already cleared the gas from where they both still stood.

"NO!" she cried. Her hand pushed past his and onto her own killswitch, pushing it down repeatedly and ineffectually. "NO—no, Kuon, no no no—!"

Her eyes darted up to his as he smiled sadly at her. "I love you," he said. "I would never do anything to hurt you."

"This..this was your plan all along…" It had never been his intent to die with her—this was true. But he hadn't intended on living, either. It was his fucked up plan for saving her, of keeping her alive for god knows what reason. It was a noble, stupid sacrifice, and just when she thought she'd made peace with death.

"WHY, Kuon?" she sobbed. "I can't—I don't want to live without you—" Because what kind of life would that be? How could she bear it, alone and entertaining the Others without him?

"I'm sorry," he said simply. He couldn't say anymore. The arena had immobilized him. He fell onto the floor, and Kyoko watched with growing horror as the line of a single red laser cut through the departing haze of gas to take a paper-thin sliver off of his shoe. "Ah," he said. "The price."

The laser took a second sliver, and then a third. He was to be sliced slowly, then. A truly long and violent effort. Really, she had to commend the show's creators.

"Kyoko," he said hoarsely. His eyes alighted on the gun, still at their feet.

"No—Kuon—no…"

The laser had finished cutting through the shoes, and was taking slivers of his socks.

"Please." He said it simply and quietly. And Kyoko knew that if she didn't, he'd bear the death as best he could, suffering through every second of it.

She crawled towards the gun, hearing him gasp in pain as she did so. When she turned, she saw the blood beginning to pool from the soles of his feet.

She knelt before him, held his hand and kissed him once more before leveling the muzzle of the gun point blank at his forehead. "I love you," she said.

"I love you too."

She steadied her shaking arms and stared into his eyes as she pulled the trigger.

The gun in her hand had one bullet left.

=.=.=.=.=.=.=

Author's Note:

If you've gotten this far, thank you for reading, and I am sorry. A lot of stuff has happened recently, and this story is both a product of and catharsis for it.

1. The epigraph is from Leonard Cohen's "Happens to the Heart."

2. Yeah there's a Hamilton reference somewhere there.