CONTENT/AGE WARNING

Alright, ladies and gentlemen, for those of you who are used to seeing much more light-hearted content from me, this is your one and only warning: we're not playing kiddie games with this one. Age restrictions and content warnings abound and they're ALL mandatory for your own safety.

Blood and gore, suicide, murder, depression, self-harm, PTSD, physical/emotional/psychological abuse, anxiety, and mature themes will all be present in decent chunks of this story. Depending on future events and my outlook with the story, explicit content may also be present in later chapters.

If you are under the age of 18 (or the age of majority in your country of residence), or are easily disturbed, LEAVE THIS STORY IMMEDIATELY.

I cannot guarantee, nor am I liable for, your mental or emotional well-being or any changes in such if you decide to progress past this point. This will start out as, far and away, bar fucking zero, the most fucked up story I have ever written.

In addition, there will be no A/N at all in this story, nor will I attempt to explain or defend the writing. That should be both deliberate and obvious if you've played DDLC before; I want all of your attention to be focused on the events in the story so you can understand the gravity of the narrative.

FOR YOUR OWN SAKE, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED. PROCEED AT YOUR OWN RISK.

DISCLAIMER

Exit Music: The Record Repeats is a DDLC and Exit Music: Redux fanwork that is unaffiliated with either Team Salvato or Wretched Team in any way. All copyrights belong to their respective holders.

Reading this story requires prior knowledge of the events of Doki Doki Literature Club and Doki Doki Exit Music: Redux, so go play those first - and in that order - before reading this story; you WILL be starved of crucial context otherwise. DDLC is available for free at ddlc\dot/moe and itch\dot/io, and EM:R can be found on the r(slash)DDLCMods subreddit.

The sound for this chapter is Apologize by OneRepublic.

PROLOGUE: Exit Music
Chapter 1: Apologize

Monday, November 5, 2018
3:39 PM

Overcast skies were overtaken by the water below as I roughly hit the ocean, barely cognizant of Sayori's terrified scream sounding out above me. I let myself drift down into the depths of the water, and released my breath as the memories came flooding back to me.

Reading Parfait Girls with Natsuki in the classroom on the second day of my new life at the Literature Club, and enjoying her excitement as she explained what was happening in the story...

Slowly, I emptied my pockets, feeling the pressure of the water against me as it dragged me down. I would describe the sensation as being similar to walking into a big freezer after a day of hard work in the summer heat, only more wet.

Sayori's absolute elation at seeing me get along with the members of the club, and her nervous demeanor when I brought said fact up to her...

I grabbed onto my phone, which was waterproof and hadn't yet cracked from the pressure, and unlocked the screen as I continued to drift downwards into the depths.

Natsuki showing up on my doorstep, cold and hungry, and letting her in to give her a place to crash for the night...

I could feel my chest start to burn from the lack of oxygen, but my detached mind no longer cared, instead continuing to replay memories of my time at the Club and afterward, all the while Natsuki's suicide and the final note she'd left for me sat at the front of my mind.

Our first kiss under the patch of moonlight emanating from my living room window, after having helped her make a daring escape from her abusive and neglectful father...

Distantly, I became more aware as my body started convulsing, struggling to use what little oxygen remained.

Natsuki and I eating at the burger joint as our first 'date', and trying to hold in my laughter at how she looked in Sayori's old star-shaped aviators...

Inevitably, the demand for oxygen became so great that survival responses took over, forcibly opening my mouth to get oxygen, only to inhale water instead.

Reading more Parfait Girls with Natsuki on the couch in the middle of the night after both of us had been unable to go to sleep...

My body desperately fought to keep the water out, but it was inevitable that those efforts would be in vain, as the water began to fill my lungs, and my body spasmed violently in a last-ditch effort for survival.

Doing my best to comfort Natsuki after her nightmare and trying to give her the best support I could in the aftermath of the break-in...

Finally, as my consciousness and life began to drift away and darkness filled my vision, my body, unable to stop the inevitable, ran out of oxygen and went still, and one final thought crossed my addled mind before my journey into oblivion began.

I'll be with you soon...

My phone drifted in front of my darkening vision, showing a picture I had pulled up... before losing all control of my body. A picture of Natsuki and I, taken two days... after the school festival, right after things had truly started... going to hell.

She looked as beautiful... as the day I'd... lost her...

Natsuki...

Sayori's heart hammered in her ribcage. Her breaths were shallow, shaky, ragged. Her stomach dropped, as if a pit had formed there and swallowed up every other aspect of her existence. Horror bloomed in every corner of her being as the reality of what she had just witnessed set in.

"MICHAAAAEEEEELLLLLLLLLL!"

And she screamed.

Her lifelong best friend... The first man she had ever developed feelings for... Someone she could honestly say was one of very few lights in her world... The man who had saved her life...

Had just jumped off the ledge into the water far below... A hundred and forty feet, the analytical, yet very quiet part of her mind distantly pointed out. The thought didn't even register.

Denial quickly took over. Long-ingrained fight-or-flight responses kicked in as her mind feverishly went to work. It's just water... Sure it's a long drop, but people have lived through worse.

She frantically pulled her phone out of her jacket pocket, shivering in the brisk afternoon air, and dialed 119 as fast as she could.

"Name and address, please," the voice on the other end, distinctly female, asked. Sayori frantically gave her the information. A delay. "Alright, Miss Akakura, what's your emergency?"

Voice shaky, she tried to compose her scrambled thoughts as quickly as possible. "M-my best friend j-just jumped off the Shimazu B-Bridge, I n-need someone right away! I d-don't know how l-long he's got!"

"Please try to stay calm, Miss Akakura. We have paramedics and a rescue team en route to your location now. Keep an eye on the water as best you can for bubbles. Now, can you please tell me what happened?"

Sayori was forced to swallow the growing bile in her throat as she recalled the day's events. She told the operator the best she could. Her eyes darted about the water's surface wildly, looking for anything. Bubbles appeared.

"Alright, ma'am, we have a helicopter one minute out from your location. Please remain where you are and stay on the line."

The bubbles disappeared. Sayori barely held herself back from full-blown panic. Four minutes, she repeated in her head, recalling her high school biology class. The body can survive for four minutes without oxygen. She desperately hung on to every strand of hope she could muster.

She checked her phone as the helicopter flew overhead. Three minutes already. Please hurry! She waved to the helicopter and pointed at where she had last seen the bubbles.

A rescue team dropped out of the helicopter, a basket was thrown down to the water's surface. Sayori unconsciously held her breath as the divers went underwater.

Another minute. Hope slowly faded. Suddenly, the divers came back up - they had found him! The elation faded, replaced with dread as she saw Michael's body - he wasn't moving.

No, nonono, please don't go, please! The world faded away around her as she watched the divers haul his body into the helicopter. The helicopter flew away toward the nearest hospital. A pit of emptiness formed in her heart.

Suddenly, the world snapped back into focus. A police officer shook her shoulder. "Miss Akakura, please come with me. We'll need a statement down at the station." She quietly nodded her head, and followed the officer to the squad car. She quietly got in and waited as the station drew closer. The emptiness grew with each passing moment.

She found herself in an interrogation room. The officers across the table gently asked her for the story. Her voice cracked and her heart broke as she recounted the events a third time. The two officers left for a moment that felt like an eternity. Only one returned. They sat down. She didn't need words to know what had happened. She could see the emotion on the officer's face plain as day. All remaining joy in her soul drained away. Darkness remained.

"He didn't make it. I'm so sorry."

The words still drove the final spike into her heart. The man she loved, the man who had saved her, had just taken his own life. First Natsuki, and now, on her 19th birthday, Michael.

The other officer returned. The two talked. A piece of paper was withdrawn and handed to Sayori, who was on the borderline between catatonic and hysterical. "We found this crumpled note in a trash can near the scene. His fingerprints are on it."

Sayori, almost without energy, opened the letter and began to read.

"I wish id asked you if you believed in god because right now i really wish i did."

Sayori regained enough composure to try and figure out the handwriting.

"Even after everything, i dont want anything to happen to you. please take care of yourself. Tell my friends i love them."

Sayori's blood froze in her veins. Her hands started violently shaking. Tears welled up in her eyes. No... nonono, this can't be... what I think it is...

"Ive been thinking about this for a while and it"s my only way out. Im never gonna live a normal life, not after the shit ive been through."

A choked sob escaped Sayori's quivering lips as she tried to continue reading. Natsuki...! This... She...?

"I was always powerless. powerless to stop Dad, powerless to escape, powerless to keep my life to myself, and powerless to really change anything."

Sayori's heart was already threatening to rupture at the seams. She was not ready to read the final part of the message - a suicide note, her traitorous mind whispered to her - but she did anyway.

"sometimes taking control is the last thing you can do, and thats what this is. I finally have a choice. So thats why."

"I love you"

"Im sorry Michael"

Sayori's already-fragile heart shattered into a million pieces as she finished the note. She thought she could understand what Natsuki was thinking about in her final moments.

This note put everything starkly in perspective. Natsuki didn't take her own life because she wanted to, or because she couldn't handle the emotional stress... She'd taken her own life because she felt she had to, to get away from the specter of her father. She didn't want to die, but she felt it was necessary to protect everyone else, especially Michael, and that it was for the best.

Recent events had just proven otherwise.

A loving and affectionate, if a bit standoffish, couple who, if they had braved the storm a little longer, could have had everything they had ever wanted. Instead, one took the worst possible way out of an impossible situation, and the other, utterly destroyed by his lover's sacrifice, had done the same without hesitation in a futile effort to see his lover just one more time.

Sayori screamed again, head landing on the cold metal of the table as she mournfully wailed. The officers slowly got up to take her out of the room, and she put up no resistance as she became engulfed in her sorrow. Drowned as she was by her turbulent emotional and mental state, didn't notice as she was moved to a rest area inside the station. Nor did she notice as a shot of morphine was injected into her system, and eventually, she fell into an extremely fitful slumber.

Tuesday, November 6, 2018
1:18 AM

Sayori slowly awoke, the groggy feeling of having been knocked out with a powerful sedative making her body feel laden with lead as she gauged her surroundings. She remembered being taken to the police station... and suddenly, the memories of the last twelve hours hit her like a train.

Immediately, her eyes welled up with tears as she remembered watching Michael jump off the bridge, taking his own life barely a year after he had stopped her from taking the same path. She held in the overwhelming desire to scream in anguish. Instead, the depression amplified in her psyche at the realization that her best friend, the one who had stuck with her through thick and thin, the one who had helped her in her darkest hour, was now gone and had taken everything she had learned to live for with him. The end result instead left her feeling numb to the world around her.

She slowly got off the cot that had been set up for her and changed into a fresh set of proffered clothes that had been left at the adjacent desk. Upon hearing the doorknob click and turn, she wiped away her unshed tears and put her smile back on - the same smile that had once been an unshakeable mask for her - as an officer, the same one from yesterday at the bridge, entered.

The officer, surprised, gently set down the tray of food and water she'd brought in for Sayori, and gave her a soft, yet sad smile. "You don't have to say anything until you're ready, Miss Sayori. All I ask for now is that you eat and drink. You've been out of it for almost nine hours."

Unwilling to speak to anyone for fear she'd let her true emotions out, Sayori silently nodded, not making eye contact with the woman as she picked up the tray and carried it over to her cot, gingerly eating the apple, carrots, chicken, and bread that had been brought. Once finished, she quickly drained the whole glass of water in one gulp to wash it all down.

After she'd finished, the officer took the tray back and turned for the door. She stopped, turning back to Sayori with a gentle smile. "I have to grab some files so I'll be a few minutes, but once you're ready, let us know and I'll take you to the interview room to answer a few more questions, and then take you back to your home. Does that sound alright?"

Sayori again nodded, neither trusting nor wanting to use her voice, and the officer walked out with the tray in hand, softly closing the door behind her. Sayori sighed, staring blankly up at the ceiling and wondering to herself why she had to be saddled with everything bad that could possibly happen.

She'd lost one of her closest friends in Natsuki to a desperate suicide a year ago now, only finding out yesterday why Natsuki herself had gone through with it. And now, she was also being forced to contend with the horrifying realization that her best friend had, just hours ago, done the same thing and followed Natsuki into the void.

After a cold moment of thought, Sayori deduced that the suicide note had to be what had tipped Michael over the edge. He'd tried once before, back before Sayori had made him go to the psychologist like he had done for her, but she'd stopped him then, having caught him just in the nick of time. She also remembered the police officer mentioning to her that they'd lifted his fingerprints off the paper, and that it had been discarded in the trash nearby, which meant that given recent developments, it was something even he hadn't known about until very recently, possibly as recent as just yesterday.

But this time he did follow through, and you couldn't do anything to stop him. You still don't seem to understand just how worthless you are, the traitorous voice in her mind whispered as Sayori's external mask began to crack.

'No, you don't know anything!' Sayori mentally screamed back. 'He was just too strong... I really wish I had kept up on the karate lessons Mom had me enrolled in when I was a kid. I might have been able to save him then...'

My point exactly, the voice countered. You could have had a whole arsenal of things to keep him from jumping or at least slow him down long enough to talk him out of it. Instead, look where your lack of motivation has landed you.

'No, shut up! I don't want to listen to you anymore!' Sayori tried to rebuff the voice, as unshed tears, unnoticed, shone in her eyes. 'All you've ever done is hurt me and drag me down, and tried to keep me away from the things - the people - I care about the most! And now two of them are gone, and you're trying to tell me it was MY fault!'

But it is your fault, the voice harshly fired back. You could have kept up those lessons, you could have seen the signs Natsuki displayed for what they were. You could have offered her a place to lay low and avoid her father, and you would have had the ability to stop him if he ever came around looking for her!

'Just stop... I don't want to listen to you anymore...' Sayori tried to plead, her mental fortitude rapidly fading, but the voice ignored her pleas.

Instead you sat idly by while your traumatized best friend tried to deal with a situation he couldn't fully understand, and only tried to help him AFTER things had already gone off the deep end, and Natsuki had killed herself! And now he's gone right off to join her, her father is running rampant in the world to do this to heaven-only-knows who else, and the two friends you have left are too far away to do anything about any of this!

Sayori had already given up any resistance by this point, and the voice continued, unabated. Face it, you were never going to succeed at anything you wanted to accomplish. Your best friend found another girl, you couldn't help one of your other closest friends when she needed it the most, and you couldn't repay the debt you owed by stopping him from jumping. Nothing you've done has EVER mattered. You. Are. WORTHLESS.

Mentally destroyed, Sayori cried as she laid on the cot and stared at the blank, whitewashed ceiling, her depression having once again gotten the better of her. But this wasn't like the other times, before she'd started getting actual assistance for her condition...

During the other times, she sure felt a lot of pain, but she was able to slip her mask back on and go about her life as if nothing had ever been wrong to begin with.

This felt different. In a way she couldn't really describe, this somehow felt a thousand times worse than the other times this had happened. In her state, she failed to recognize that this had only happened one other time.

3:41 AM

After a long line of questioning which gave the officers more answers than questions, they had allowed Sayori to leave, and the officer had dropped her back off at her house. She had waited until the officer left and was nowhere in sight, and had gone to the hardware store, completely devoid of emotion, without even the motivation required to slip her emotional mask back on.

Once getting back from the hardware store and setting everything up, she had called her telephone service provider and had them cut her subscription to turn off her phone, since she was about to not have any use for it any longer. It was weird to be told 'once I refresh your data and disable your account, you will immediately be disconnected from this call and will no longer be able to access cellular or data services', but she wasn't particularly concerned about not having a usable phone - and why should she be?

That had been almost forty-five minutes ago. Now, she stood on a chair positioned in front of her bed, tying another noose around her neck. Unlike how she had intended this to go last time with the ceiling fan, she didn't want to feel anything as the moment came, so she had gotten the parts and tools required to bolt the rope straight to the ceiling, draining out what was left of her bank account to do so.

Eyes listless and devoid of any remaining emotion, she slowly made sure the rope was tight enough for its intended purpose, and that the ceiling would hold up against the sudden force of her falling body. She took one final look at the picture on her nightstand, a memento of her childhood a few months after she and Michael had become best friends, and a single tear fell from her right eye. Once she felt fully prepared, she took a deep breath, closed her eyes... and simultaneously jumped and kicked the chair out of the way.

A half-second later, a sickening snap resounded throughout the quiet room, and Sayori's lifeless body hung limply from the rope in the quiet room, undisturbed except for the pale moonlight flitting in through the blinds.