Chapter 50 - Possession

Everyone stared at Yumehara, noting the faint heat mirage about her form, despite the sudden chilliness of the room. There seemed to be a darkness that shrouded her outline.

Yumehara's head was half bowed, and her now golden-colored eyes were half-lidded, as if waking from a deep sleep.

"Possession," uttered Toritsuka breathlessly.

"Wait. Possession?" repeated Aiura. Then she looked at Toritsuka accusingly. "Isn't that your gig?"

"Yes. But it's usually someone possessing me!" explained Toritsuka. "Saiki Kuusuke taught me how to possess others, but I need to find a separate spirit to inhabit my own body first or else it will die within 34 seconds. But I haven't done it since that one week with him. And I don't know how to get another soul to possess someone else."

The exposition had to be one of the longest and surprising explanations that Aiura had heard and it annoyed her. "Don't give me one of your shitty..." Aiura stopped mid-sentence as she felt a hand on her shoulder.

It was Akechi. In midst of the events, he had scooted over closer to Aiura so that he was partially behind her, as if proximity to her could protect him. His beady black eyes, however, were staring at Yumehara with a fascinated fright.

Makino, who was still the master of the ritual, director of the seance, seemed to take the event in stride. She nodded approval toward Yumehara-senpai, who must have slipped on some sort of glow-in-the-dark Halloween yellow contacts for effect. Part of the charm of the occult was the make-believe of the supernatural.

After all, Makino knew that ghosts and psychic powers are not real.

By now, everyone had let go of the Sayaka-chan and the silver bowl, except for Makino, the master of the ceremony. The wussy senpais of Toritsuka, Aiura, and Akechi were beside and slightly behind Makino, having shuffled away from Yumehara's harmless display of weird-colored eyes.

Presently, Makino pressed the ritual forward. She gently put down the bowl, not noticing how it had no discernable ash.

"O magnificent spirit," addressed Makino. "With what name art thou bestowed?"

Golden-eyed Yumehara's head was still half bowed, her neatly trimmed auburn by the side of her face. She slowly brought her arms forward, palms up, like she was examining merchandise.

Everyone watched, noting how Yumehara's fair skin started to change color; splotches of deep red and black seemed to be swimming underneath, fading in and out.

"What an inferior vessel," stated possessed Yumehara in a voice that was not her usual high-pitched adorably girl speech. There was an ambiguity to it, neither too young or too old, nor female or male, and it seemed to reverberate terribly in everyone's heads. "It's already deteriorating."

Makino jumped backward, taken aback by the unexpected words.

Yumehara-senpai usually acted as if their occult ceremonies were immediately effective. Makino would have expected her to spout out the so-called 'last words' of a spirit.

Did Yumehara's lips even move?

Everyone stared at the possessed girl before looking to each other for reassurance.

Makino took a deep breath, ready to direct another question, but Aiura interrupted.

"Are you Kusuo's older brother?" asked Aiura.

Yumehara's eyes slowly traveled from her own arms to Aiura, her expression incurious. "No."

"Then who are you?" Aiura quickly followed.

"Kusuo."

For a moment, everyone's jaw dropped slightly.

Kusuo?

Had they summoned Saiki Kusuo?

That just didn't make any sense.

Saiki Kusuo was alive. They all had just seen him on the last day of school, looking as grouchy as he ever did. When they went to his house earlier in the day, the pink-haired young man's father didn't indicate anything horrible having happened to Saiki Kusuo, just that he was 'not home.'

"Saiki-san?" repeated Torituska in disbelief, sneaking in an honorific per his habit to be polite to a powerful psychic. "Is this a joke? Did you possess Yumehara-san? Who is watching your body then? How did you find someone to occupy your body? Did you do a soul switch?"

The questions were rapid-fire.

Aiura and Akechi watched Yumehara closely, looking for any hints of unusual behavior.

Yumehara finally looked up completely, her unfocused golden gaze falling upon Torituska, seemingly looking through and past the spirit medium and onto others.

Toritsuka could not help but let his jaw drop a little more as he saw mottles of blue and black peeking on her skin from underneath the neckline of her dress.

That ringing voice spoke in everyone's minds. "Yumehara? Is that the name of this vessel?"

The four others, Aiura, Akechi, Toritsuka, and Makino looked to each other, trying to see if this was expected behavior.

Suddenly, Yumehara jumped up. She flipped in mid-air and landed on the ceiling on all fours. She then stood, as if the ceiling were the ground. Her clothes and hair floated as if she freely manipulated the laws of gravity.

Then Yumehara giggled.

The sound was that familiar child-like laughter from earlier.

"This is exhilarating!" exclaimed golden-eyed Yumehara. She began to move, in a clumsy manner, with arms out as if balancing, then falling 'over' repeatedly. It was reminiscent of a tight rope walker. "I can see why Ani was so attached to the living that he tried to live as long as he could."

Makino took a moment to whip her long bangs to the side so she could look clearly. She took care not to move her hand from Sayaka-chan's figure.

Did Yumehara-senpai up her occult game by using movie stunt wires? Was this all part of a prank?

Or was this real?

"Yume-senpai?" called Makino, using a more informal term to show her endearment to Yumehara. "You can stop acting now. You're kinda scaring me."

The words seemed to affect Yumehara. She suddenly stopped moving and floated back down from the ceiling. She ended up standing in front of the four seated PK Academy students.

The mottled dark bruises had stopped fading in and out, but instead, they held their position and began to take firmer coloration.

Makino, however, seemed relieved that her beloved Yumehara-senpai had listened. Putting down the creepy cursed doll Sayaka-chan, Makino stood up and motioned toward her much respected Yumehara-senpai.

Yumehara, with an impassive expression, stood still as Makino came closer.

Makino shivered a little bit as she felt a sudden chill. It was a sensation that she ignored as she walked toward Yumehara to get a closer look at the hyper-realistic special effects that Yumehara-senpai was using.

In one swift motion, Yumehara moved with an unnatural speed, her left hand outreached.

Within a blink, Yumehara was on top of Makino, knocking the younger girl to the ground.

Yumehara straddled Makino, pinning her legs. Yumehara held Makino's shoulder down with one hand, and the fingers of her other hand dug into Makino's windpipe and squeezed.

Makino's hands immediately shot up to claw at the pair of hands at her throat. Her heart pounded. Adrenaline immediately shot through her veins. She noiselessly fought for breath as her airway was squeezed shut. All thoughts disappeared as Makino's legs kicked aimlessly, trying in vain to wiggle away.

However, Yumehara was heavy, far heavier and stronger than a high school girl should be.

"Hum...this breathlessness...it seems familiar," that same childish voice remarked.

Makino choked, trying but failing to breathe as the fingers closed. In her struggle, she was not aware of the black spots in her vision.

Soon, Makino saw no more.

Suddenly, there was another movement and the weight was off.

It seemed that the boys came to the rescue. In an unusual act, both Akechi and Toritsuka grabbed Yumehara from behind in an attempt to drag her off.

Yumehara let go of Makino's throat. She allowed the boys to pull her up to her knees. With monstrous strength, she reached back, grabbed the boys by their arms and flung them against the wall of the absolution room. They landed in a heap.

In the scuffle, several candles were knocked over. Wax and flame dripped onto the low wooden table and the straw tatami mat floor.

Aiura immediately went to attempting to smother the little smoldering flames with seat cushions.

Meanwhile, Yumehara stood up. With unsteady, weightless steps, as if her body was supported by levitation, she approached the two boys.

The red embers rose like fireflies, some fading into the tar-coated straw roof, some falling on the tatami floor, a cloud of red flaking ember flaking off with each step.

Both Akechi and Torituska struggled to get up, not used to being in fights. When they recovered, they looked up to see golden-eyed Yumehara standing before them, heat mirage and red embers around her.

She held out an arm; it was discolored by deep blue-black bruises.

In a move that appeared classical psychokinesis, Akechi and Toritsuka began to float as if being lifted by an invisible force, until they were levitating a meter off the ground. Both of them began to wiggle like a fish in the air, trying desperately to get back down to earth, but could not.

"Hey. Hey. Hey! Put us down!" cried Toritsuka.

Akechi, with the sports tape still on his mouth, muttered a bunch of grumbles.

"No." said golden-eyed Yumehara in that echoing petulant almost childish voice. "I want to see human juice."

Immediately, Akechi's mumbles became a desperate throaty scream as his body contorted. Elbow and knees cracked and twisted in an unnatural manner

For a moment, Toritsuka and Aiura could only watch.

Akechi's long throaty scream suddenly increased in intensity as he began to claw at his throat and scratch at his chest.

All of a sudden, both Akechi and Toritsuka fell with a loud crash.

At the same time, Yumehara fell forward and onto her hands and knees as she was struck by a heavy object.

It appeared that, in their moment of desperation, Aiura had picked up her crystal ball and smashed it against Yumehara's right temple.

Aiura was breathing hard. She had a cell phone in her left hand, dialing a number. The phone was left on speaker mode and rang and rang.

Meanwhile, Akechi was on the ground, twitching. Red had stained the tape that had covered his mouth.

Toritsuka, who only had fallen, took a moment to recover.

However, while Akechi was on the ground, twitching, golden-eyed Yumehara snapped back up straight like a marionette.

Yumehara was a sight to behold. The right side of her head was scraped and bloodied. Shards of sharp glass were in her hair. The whites of her eyes were red. A minor trail of blood was dripping from her nose and mouth. The bruise that had so marred her arms had now traveled up her neck, as if a black flame was wicking up from inside her.

The cell phone was on speaker mode. It had reached whatever number Aiura was trying to dial, but no one had picked up. The generic 'leave-a-message' in the auto-generated robotic voice.

"Why is my name on that device?" inquired Yumehara in a childish voice, musing upon a passing thought. "No matter. I don't like it."

The cell phone screen immediately cracked. In two more blinks, the cell phone's plastic casing splintered. Smoke emanated from the phone as the lithium battery was punctured.

Yumehara suddenly began to laugh.

It was a terrible sound, like a robot trying to imitate human affect.

"Manipulating the physical world is fun!" chortled golden-eyed Yumehara.

By now, her face had taken up an ashen coloration. Her arms, the visible skin of her lower legs, seemed to be blistering into plates like hardened leather.

Yumehara seemed to be aware of this as she brought her hands before herself again, looking at the dark, bruised skin and blue-black fingers. "So worthless. This vessel will ignite soon." Her bloodshot eyes now turned to Aiura. "You. Seer. You've provided blood sacrifice and your vessel seems robust enough."

With that, Yumehara took a weightless step toward Aiura before launching herself at the gyaru woman.

Just in time for Toritsuka to body-check Yumehara.

Running at full speed, Toritsuka used his body weight and flung himself against Yumehara, causing the smaller girl to change her trajectory. She landed on her side as rolled like a log until she hit the wall, leaving a wake of black soot on the ground.

Toritsuka was breathing hard, visibly shaking

"Shit," cursed Toritsuka. "Of course that didn't work."

Aiura, though fearing for her life, had enough presence of mind to demand, "What do you 'that didn't work'?"

"Demonic possession," said Torituska. "Not that I had another spirit to occupy my body anyway."

Yumehara, now with full heat mirage, had charred the tatami mat where she was laying for a brief few seconds. The girl stirred, though with much difficulty, as if severely weakened.

Toritsuka grabbed Aiura on the upper arms. "Right now, we should get out of here."

Aiura shook her head vigorously. "No way. Talky, Ari-chan, and Chiyopipi are still here. We can't leave without them! And we haven't asked Kusuo's older brother the question!"

"No. Didn't you see him just tried to tear Akechi from the inside out? And he completely threw us against the wall!" He pointed at the ceiling that had started to smoke from, caught on fire. "He already set the roof on fire. We're not sticking around and wait for him to kill us."

Aiura's expression was conflicted. Run away and preserve her life, or stay and help her two incapacitated friends escape.

Toritsuka had a point. The thing that they were facing had no compunction about hurting people. Looking around at the other two people in the room, Aiura realized just how precarious their situation was.

Ari-chan was still knocked out. The unusual shape and discoloration of her throat and faint wheezing noise suggested that her windpipe was crushed. Akechi seemed to be breathing, judging by the slightly larger red stain on his taped mouth.

And Chiyopipi. She looked...almost like a dried mummy. Her skin was black and blistered.

Suddenly, Yumehara was drawn up again, like a doll being pulled up by a string on its back. She was hunched over. Her sock-covered toes barely touched the ground as she levitated. Her white dress had started to brown and blacken from oxidation. Her face was face down as her blacked hands were raised again. Without warning, her entire body flew like an arrow from a bow toward Aiura.

"Aiura! Watch out!" yelled Toritsuka as he pushed the gyaru girl out of the way. He made sure he closed his eyes and braced himself for impact.

When Toritsuka realized, after several seconds, that he hadn't moved, he opened his eyes again.

Between him and golden-eyed Yumehara was Saiki Kusuo!

The pink-haired psychic had arrived just in time!