"Remind me why we're doing this," Inari hissed as Ikuye tore open the back of a plush doll.
Ikuye ripped out the stuffing and, ignoring the demand, said, "Open up the bag of rice, would you?" While she waited, she took up a needle and a spool of red thread, nipping at the string to cut a length away. Licking the slightly frayed end, she added, "And can you fill up the doll?"
Inari gingerly picked up their "victim," grimacing, and started scooping the pearly, white grain from the bag with her hand, pouring it into the gaping hole that her friend had made. "This is so creepy…" she muttered.
"Shut up and do it."
During her weeks of research, Ikuye had stumbled across more forums about haunted "games" that reminded her too well of her own situation. She'd, of course, known about a few of them growing up, but she hadn't know that the effects were so… well, serious. She decided to test out a theory of hers the next weekend her mother was away (and her brother at school), and had Inari come along as backup. Just in case something else went awry. As her game of choice, she'd picked something called Hitori Kakurenbo, and the brief explanation she'd given Inari was enough to give the poor girl chills.
"I really don't think this is a good idea," Inari admonished, holding the doll out so Ikuye could sew it up.
"Ah, almost forgot." Ikuye chewed off a bit of her nail and dropped it into the rice-filled cavity. "There we go."
"Okay," Inari cut in, pulling a sour face. "One, that's disgusting. Two, if you need to add your own body parts to a kid's game, it's not a game anyone should be playing. Let alone kids."
"Will you hush?" Ikuye rolled her eyes and sewed the hole shut. Taking the doll from Inari, she started wrapping it up in the rest of the thread. "Alright, you're not supposed to be in here while I perform the ritual. Apparently you might get possessed, since you aren't playing."
"That's fantastic." Inari threw up both hands and made her way to the door. "If you run into any more trouble, darling, just scream. I'll come running."
Letting out an exasperated sigh, Ikuye snipped, "I've got my phone, dumbass. I'll just text you."
"Whatever. What do I have to do if that happens?"
That's when Ikuye held up the bottle of water she'd prepared earlier, and tossed it to Inari. "It's salt water," she explained, "If I need you to bail me out, take a mouthful of this, but don't swallow it. Come inside, find the doll, and dump the rest of the bottle onto it. Then spit the water in your mouth onto it, too."
Shaking her head, Inari muttered, "Ew. This is the most foul ritual I've ever heard of."
"You're such a whiner. You're not the one playing."
"You don't have to play it, either."
Their eyes met, and Inari's expression had softened from disgust to deep worry. She bit her lip, trying to find the right words to say, but Ikuye already knew. After their last adventure together… well, hadn't that been enough for her? They'd almost died. They could have lost their souls. But Ikuye gave her a solid smile.
"We'll be fine. It's just a game. I've got a plan. Now, hurry up and go, it's almost three."
Without another word—though she looked like she really wanted to say something—Inari gave Ikuye a thumbs-up and left. Once Ikuye heard her shut the front door, she knew it was time to begin. Walking slowly to the bathroom, the doll clutched in her hand, she started to fill the bathtub up with water. While she did, she took a second bottle of saltwater from her bag and poured it into a coffee mug. She took the mug to the closet in her brother's bedroom (still unable to really stomach the one in her own) and set it down in the corner. She looked down at the doll.
"Hmm…" she said softly to herself. "Now, what am I going to call you?" It was a stuffed Hello Kitty doll, staring back at Ikuye with her beady, black eyes. With a grin, she joked, "Let's go with Nekoko-chan, huh?" She checked her watch again and sighed. It was three in the morning. With only the slightest hesitation, she chanted, "Ikuye is the first it. Ikuye is the first it. Ikuye is the first it!"
With that, she went back to the bathroom and stopped the running water, then dropped the doll into the water. Without looking back, she turned on the ball of her foot and went immediately to her brother's room. His was the only light she'd left on, so it would be easier for her to switch things off. After that, she turned on his television, picking up the pair of scissors she'd left there, and went back to the closet. She closed her eyes, and counted to ten under her breath. Ikuye didn't know her hands were shaking until she tried to steady herself against the wall. Swallowing down the lump forming in her throat, she left the room and went back to the bathroom. The doll was still in the tub, floating face-down in the water lazily.
"I have found you, Nekoko-chan!" she declared, realizing that it sounded like she was an idiot girl in a horror movie. She reached down and picked up the soaked doll, then stabbed it as hard as she could with the scissors. This severed the red thread that she'd tied around it, but not what she'd used to sew it shut.
Setting it down slowly on the counter, along with the scissors, Ikuye told the doll, "You are the next 'it,' Nekoko-chan."
She then turned her tail and ran back to the bedroom, ducking into the closet and shutting it tightly behind her. Her cellphone was resting in her pocket, cold, and she took it out and clutched it tightly in her hand as she crouched down, happy that she'd remembered to switch it to "silent" mode. She checked it. No messages from anyone. Not even Inari, she was surprised to see.
It felt like she'd been waiting forever, and she was almost ready to nod off leaning up against the wall, but finally she heard something weird outside. It was the damn TV. She heard the static-y sound of channels flipping, of their own accord, no less. A shiver crept up her spine.
"Where—are—you—?"
Her eyes widened, but she kept silent. The voice had come from the television, but it was weird. Warped. She realized that the channels were still flipping, pausing only long enough to get a single word out.
"I—know—you're—here—"
Well, that wasn't exactly what she'd expected, but—
"I—ku—ye—?"
Her eyes snapped to the door, where she knew the TV was only a few feet away. Of course it knew her name, she'd announced it very loudly at the start of all this. But damn, that still weirded her out. The grip she had on her phone tightened, and she slowly reached out for her mug of salt water. Then, she heard footsteps. Very small ones, but fast, like a cat trotting over to its owner for food.
They ran past the bedroom door and down the hall, and she could hear her mother's door creak open. Just a little. Then came the steps, again, just as fast as before. They went down the stairs, and Ikuye found that her heart was racing, now. It took all her control to keep her breathing slow and silent. She looked down at her phone again. It was only two minutes after? That couldn't be right. She stopped herself from snorting. Those were clearly the longest two minutes she'd ever lived. Her thoughts were broken off when she heard the footsteps plodding back up the stairs, and they finally ran to the room in which she was hiding. She held her breath, not wanting to give away her position.
Knock—Knock—Knock—
It was firm, steady, and sounded hollow, like it was someone tapping on glass.
"I—ku—ye—?"
"I—know—you're—in—here—"
'Don't make a sound,' she had to remind herself, slowly bringing one hand over her mouth while she took a deep, quiet breath through her nose.
"Come—out—and—play—"
Something hit the wooden floor with a thud, and started dragging towards the closet. She realized that the doll must have the scissors that she left for it. It was close enough now that she could hear a drop of water hit the ground.
What did she know about the game, so far, she asked herself as she took a sip of the saltwater and held it in her mouth? She had summoned a spirit—who knows who—and actively dared it to come find her. She'd given it a name, told it her own name, and even gave it a bit of her body to attach the thing to her. It shouldn't go after Inari if she were to enter, not logically, yet the game rules she'd found explicitly stated that there was a danger of possession if someone who wasn't playing happened to be in the house at the same time. To top it all off, Ikuye had probably royally pissed the thing off by "drowning" it in the tub and stabbing it with a sharp object.
But that didn't explain how this game originated. Who was, exactly, the spirit inside the doll? What did it want, and what did it stand to gain if it won the game? As far as she knew, no one had actually lost this game, because they hadn't let it go on for that long, so there wasn't a solid way of knowing. Except, there was, wasn't it? The name of the game was literally "If you find me, you can have my body." She'd mostly seen it called "Hide and Seek Alone," by Westerners, of course, and she smirked wryly to herself. Well, that was the price she'd signed up for, she supposed.
She picked up her phone and texted Inari.
At the ready. Game's almost over.
Ikuye waited, staring at the screen until she'd been responded to.
I'm coming in. You've been in there for way too long.
Frowning, Ikuye checked the time, and held her hand over her mouth again to stifle the gasp. How was it already half-past four? She'd been playing for fifteen minutes, at the most. So she'd thought, anyway… Shaking her head, she heard the front door open downstairs. At least Inari wasn't stupid enough to call out.
The dragging scissors stopped at that moment. A pause.
"Who—is—there?"
Shit.
"A—new—play—mate?"
Shit!
The footsteps started running out of the room and down the hall, so fast that Ikuye couldn't hear them anymore by the time she scrambled to her feet and had more water in her mouth. Bursting out of the closet, she rushed as quietly as she could out the hall. She saw Inari's ponytail go into her bedroom, and she cursed herself. She hadn't told Inari where her hiding spot would be.
"Ikuye?" Inari whispered.
"What—is—your—name—?"
Ikuye ran into her bedroom and grabbed the doorframe before she could slide across the floor as she skidded to a halt. Inari had her head poked very carelessly into her closet, and the doll was lying on its back in the middle of the room. Without another thought, Ikuye leaned over the doll and spat her entire mouthful of saltwater onto it.
Dumping the remaining contents of the mug over the creature, as well, she cried out, "I win I win I win!" She heard her television switch off in the other room.
With a relieved smile, Inari turned and saw her friend, then blanched when she saw the doll behind her. "Th-that wasn't there when I came in here…" she squeaked.
Grabbing her by the wrists, Ikuye roughly yanked Inari away from the closet. "What are you doing?!" she hissed, shaking the girl by the shoulders. "You know better than to be sticking your nose willy-nilly into that thing!"
"Gods above, it was purified," Inari argued, exasperated. "And look who's talking! You willingly played this stupid game with the doll."
"That's different!" She couldn't think why, but it was. "Come on, we have to burn this thing."
"Right on."
They went out to the backyard and started building up a small fire, leaving the doll to dry out in the cool night air. Inari shivered, pulling her jacket closer to her body, but Ikuye was largely unaffected.
"So," Inari started uncertainly, glancing back at the doll every once in a while. "Did you find out what you were looking for?"
"I…" Did she? Did she, really? Shaking her head, she said, "No."
"What exactly was it?" Inari prodded gently. "I mean, after all we've already been through, you know better than to summon ghosts and things on a whim."
"I know, I…" Ikuye sighed. "I have this theory, yeah? That so many people play these stupid games, or perform these stupid rituals and get the same result. So… is the spirit the same every time you summon it? Like, if you were to play this game, would you end up binding the same spirit to your doll as I did to mine?"
"Okay…" Inari wasn't entirely getting it. "Your point?"
Ikuye's eyes blazed as the fire rose, and she unceremoniously dumped the Hello Kitty doll into the flames. "What if we were to destroy the spirit while it was here, with us?"
"No one could be able to play the game, again," Inari replied promptly. Realizing what she'd just said, she jumped up and clapped her hands together. "Oh—!"
"Yeah."
"Too bad you didn't get to bust this ghost, then, eh?"
Quirking an eyebrow, and much to Inari's mixed frustration and dread, Ikuye quietly said, "There's always next time."