Half Innocent
Prologue
She was going insane.
Nothing made sense, and even the thoughts in her head didn't stick together anymore. There was some strange whispering, the voices she didn't know. She couldn't understand them, they talked above each other, screaming, in languages she did not know. But most of all, the haunted melody. The lyrics she could not say. She knew the song, but it did not exist. And it was driving her crazy, the need to find the song, to prove to the voices she was not crazy. She read through books, and websites, and even looked through her own old memories to try and find the source of where it came from, but she had nothing.
The nights were even worse. She could not sleep, and when she could all she had were nightmares. She remembered them all, they were so similar. She saw people. She didn't know them, didn't know who she was either. She would see these people suffer. They would scream without sound. They were tortured, and she would watch, and do nothing. They were put into equipment, designed to torture people. Their arms would be stretched from their bodies, or bend in so many different ways the bones would shatter, and they'd lay there, like broken dolls on the dirty floor, still alive, but barely. But most of all she remembered the last part of the dream. In some abandoned old hospital. Where the beds were old and broken, she sheets ripped and gray. The walls were the worst. They were covered in writing. It didn't make sense, just random thoughts of death, of suicide, of suffering. It was written in blood. And then she'd see two girls, twins, on the floor, writing the final chapter to the book of death, on their walls. They'd see her. They'd walk. They'd look with their hollow eyes, and ask.
"Mommy, why did you leave us here?"
They looked strange. They had the same white dresses that seemed so ghostly on them, and pale blonde hair, with red streaks of blood. Their eyes a similar stale gray, that burned you, without regret. They didn't look alive anymore, thought their hands still bled, and the writing on the walls still stayed. It felt so real, so horrifyingly there, she didn't know whether to scream or faint. She was afraid to touch them. Their skin peeled of in places, making them look like zombies more then anything. She could feel the tears on her face, but she wouldn't move, wouldn't dare to make a sound.
And then, they'd have claws. And fangs. And their expressions weren't so lifeless anymore. They were mad. Insanity swirled in bright crimson eyes. And the last thing she'd see was her own blood on their claws. And the final line of their song.
"We hate you, Mommy."
She would wake screaming. And she would look around to find herself alone. Her face would be wet with tears, and the horrible song would play in her head. She would stare at the walls, and look at the lights she never turned off. Her messy room, her sanctuary, seemingly her own prison.
It's been this way ever since the accident. She's been picking up every bad memory from everyone she met. She would see the fake masks and she would see the pain. This is why she tried not to meet people, and stay in her room, alone. The nightmare was from the last person she met, Kaede.
Her mother, say legal documents. A stranger says her heart. She had a sister, she supposed. Somewhere. A mirror image of herself, should not be so hard to find. But it was. She was not her real sister, they had different fathers, thought they looked exact. A biological miracle, said someone once, though she did not know who, but one of the strange voices bounced around in her head.
She supposed they'd meet one day, and maybe she would remember who she was. Maybe she'd stop seeing everyone else and see herself. But maybe she didn't really want to.
She knew it wasn't good for her to do this to herself. She knew she needed help. But she couldn't help it anymore. The insanity made her want to scream. And the voices would taunt her. They'd say things she didn't understand. Quote people she didn't remember. But even without the memories, the words hurt and she cried without a reason.
She didn't remember much. But she remembered him. Silver hair and wild golden eyes. She'd see his pictures in her head, and sometimes flashbacks, with no sound. He would be screaming. She couldn't make out the words, but even without them, she'd still feel like she was about to die.
She remembered his name. But she never said it out loud before. It scared her. This one thing she knew about her life.
She didn't remember the accident either. She'd remember blanking in and out. She remembered blood. She'd be in that white room, and she'd see people around her, giving her sad looks. She wouldn't understand, just then she didn't know the masks they wore. They were hurting her, but she couldn't make a sound. And she would sleep, because then she couldn't feel them inside of her. Changing her, making her. She didn't feel like a robot, like a lab rat. Like the experiment she was.
She didn't know who did this to her. She didn't think she ever knew, not even before. She would remember the blurry faces of people. She would remember voices that didn't make any sense, and screaming, thought she couldn't make out the words. She would remember flashes, people running around, panicked. Something was wrong, she knew, but everything was slipping.
She didn't remember anything for a long time. Just the blackness that she so loved. She knew not to try and change it. Because it hurt more then should be possible if you opened your eyes. The last of her memories was when she finally tried again. She was moved somewhere, and when she looked; she saw eyes, close to her own. Pretty gray eyes stared into her own. That was the first time it happened.
The flashes. The lights, the creaming so loud, she'd thought she'd go death. She didn't see the pretty gray eyes anymore, she saw scared silvery ones. The girl, she was a miko.
She didn't know what was happening. Only that it was something bad. She saw bodies everywhere. She saw death for what it never was. Everything was destroyed. The miko child stood alone, in front of some crumpled form. She stood against a demon. The evil could be felt to the bone, without miko powers. He was the devils incarnate. She didn't remember much of him. Except the name.
Naraku.
He was the one who destroyed the city. Only to find the miko child. He could not touch her though. The shield prevented him from even getting close. And when he left, all was quiet. The child turned to the crumpled form on the ground. Her mirror image stared at her through unfocused gray eyes.
And the last whispered phrase:
"You'll make it, sister."
That flash would stay with her, no matter how many people she met after. It seemed close, personal. She understood it to some point, and it was engraved in memories better left forgotten.
She tried to find the person of the memory, but she could not. She knew she would one day, but the waiting was never her thing. Time wasn't on her side, and it was all leading to her inevitable break down.
She didn't know what triggered the flashes, but she's never met a person who didn't have a bad memory. As soon as you look in their eyes, you see it. All that is wrong in the world. All the things that movies never show.
Kikyou sighed, and pulled her messy hair into a loose pony tail. As much as she didn't want to, she had to leave the house again. She was running out of food.
She left quietly, the door locking after her, footsteps echoing down the stairs.
You couldn't ignore life, after all.
She pushed the door open, and stepped into the cold winter air.
Breathing out a puff of white air, she wondered why she didn't think to wear something warmer.
She smiled to herself, half dazed.
Had she forgotten the snow was cold again?