CHAPTER 22
Kagami slowly lifted her eyelids and was immediately consumed by an endless sea of black. She was awake and as far as she could tell fully conscious as well but she couldn't even see her nose in the front of her face. The twin-tailed Hiiragi slowly pulled herself to her feet and couldn't help but whimper in fear as she hugged herself tightly while trying to look around the infinite darkness. She outstretched her arms as shields and began walking forward while breathing hard and feared bumping into something. The last thing she remembered was her lying on Miyakawa's bed and she was examining her pain-stricken rectum and she applied some medicine to it and Kagami eventually fell asleep.
Before she could call out a familiar name or request help, she felt and saw a light appear from behind her and cast its shadows across her. Kagami slowly turned and saw an entirely new scene before her and it frightened her so much that she felt her blood run cold. Thousands of dead and twisted trees were standing in front of her and furthering Kagami's fear, she saw hundreds of figures hanging from the dark branches from hangman nooses while ravens and vultures began to land on the branches near the bodies. The black sky around her began to slowly turn red as blood and a haunting black and silver moon stood high within the red.
Kagami suddenly began to hear voices echo all around her. They whispered her name countless times and their tone invited her to walk forward into the twisted forest. Feeling unable to control her own legs, Kagami began to slowly walk forwards while still holding herself tightly and she felt the dead grass crunch beneath her boots. A layer of fog drifted out of the forest and curled around her ankles as she walked, sending a deep chill throughout her body and Kagami shivered. She approached the forest and the details of the hanging bodies became frighteningly clear. Human corpses were dangling from the trees by nooses while ravens sat on their shoulders and began pecking at them. Kagami nearly shrieked when she saw one of the black birds remove an eyeball from a socket and swallow it.
Other ravens cawed at her loudly with hostile vigor and Kagami suddenly began running forward into the forest until she heard a familiar voice call her name from one of the trees. She quickly looked up and Kagami couldn't contain herself any longer when she saw Matsuri with a noose secured around her neck and hanging from one of the trees. Kagami screamed her sister's name loudly and tried to climb up the tree to aid her sister's body but suddenly found it coated in a liquid and she kept slipping. Kagami took several steps back and let the moon show her that her hands and arms were coated in blood, making her scream again.
"Kagami…" Matsuri's voice whispered, making Kagami look up at her sister's hanging body and straight into her eyes and Matsuri spoke again as she hanged. "Kagami…look what you're doing to us. You're a disgrace. You're a whore."
"Matsuri, I…I…I…" Kagami stuttered in fear.
"She's right. You're a filthy slut, Hiiragi. You've done things that not even I was perverted enough to do." Another voice said and Kagami quickly spun around and saw Misao hanging but with a raven on her shoulder.
"Ku…Kusakabe! I didn't want to do any of those things…but I needed to!" Kagami cried. "Please forgive me!"
The raven suddenly latched onto Misao's left cheek with its beak and began pulling. The dark bird soon tore the flesh off Misao's head and held the blood-dripping piece in its beak while Misao responded while appearing unfazed by the action as Kagami could see the teeth and jaw muscles through the injury. "Never Hiiragi, never. Especially because of what you'll do to your oldest sister."
As Kagami trembled, Misao slowly opened her mouth and to the twin-tailed girl's horror, a large snake slithered out of her mouth with one large eye in the center of its face with a catlike eye and a horn on its head. The snake opened its mouth, revealing two used and rusty syringes as fangs and it hissed loudly at her, making Kagami scream and she took off running through the forest. The bodies hanging from the dead trees suddenly came alive and began pointing and laughing at Kagami as she ran and cried for them to stop. Their laughs were high-pitched and some resembled childish pitches, only adding to the disturbing surroundings. Their cackling became too much for Kagami and she covered her ears and shook her head fiercely as she ran with her eyes closed.
Kagami suddenly tripped and fell to the cold ground and quickly spun on her back while looking back at the forest. To her surprise and horror, the trees and bodies hanging from them were all gone and she was alone again. She was drenched in sweat and the blood that had rubbed off from the trees. Trying to figure out what to do next, Kagami suddenly heard a quick rustle behind her and she quickly turned and saw a small puppy sitting in front of her. The puppy was light brown with some dark brown spots with big floppy ears and big innocent eyes. The small animal was so cute and Kagami couldn't help but blush slightly and she inched closer to it.
"Hello…what are you doing here cutie?" She asked.
The puppy created a human giggle and replied in a childlike squeaky voice, "I live here, Kagami."
"Then could you tell me where I am…or how to get out?" She asked nervously while looking around.
The puppy giggled again. "Oh Kagami…you still don't know where you are? That's easy, silly. It's your fucking nightmare!"
The puppy's voice erupted into a deep and monstrous tone in the last sentence and it suddenly changed. The small animal sprouted spikes out of its back, its fur grew stringy and changed from brown to gray, its claws also grew and mutated into razor talons, the puppy's tail also grew and formed a large triangular spike at the tip. The puppy's eyes also glowed red and when it opened its mouth, rows and rows of spiked teeth lined the inside as it drooled and howled at Kagami, throwing green saliva that became acid and began to scorch the ground near Kagami.
Kagami screamed again and scooted backwards as the puppy started to inflate. It wasn't evolving into a much larger dog but rather it was inflating like a balloon as Kagami sat and breathed hard and showed her fear as the dog grew larger and larger until it exploded. The bang was loud and it echoed across the area and when Kagami saw the end result of the explosion, her screaming deepened. Tens of thousands of greasy maggots now covered the spot where the puppy once sat, as well as all around her and they began to crawl up her legs towards her body and she tried desperately to brush them all off as she screamed and cried for help. She quickly shot to her feet and began running again in the darkness as the slimy creatures continued to cling to her but kept falling off one at a time until they were all gone.
She ran and ran until she was out of breath and as she continued to tremble and pant in fear, Kagami collapsed to her knees and quivered. Still feeling the slime from the maggots begin to dry on her skin, she felt her stomach flip and she couldn't contain the contents of her stomach anymore. Quickly remembering to hold her hair back, Kagami vomited on the solid black shade she sat on and when it was over, her eyes looked at the spew.
The discolored liquidly mesh suddenly began to swirl like a hurricane cloud and movement began to stir under it. Suddenly hundreds of tiny demons with horns, glowing eyes, long spiked tails, and fangs began to rise out of it and chant Kagami's name and she could hear them say "join us, Kagami" over and over again. Kagami once again stood up as quickly as she could and before she began to run, another bright light caught her attention and she looked up.
Rows of tall waving grass were obscuring her vision to the bright light on the other side and she suddenly smelled smoke. The smell was followed up by screaming and laughing. She recognized the screaming and it horrified Kagami when she identified them as belonging to her parents. Kagami disregarded the small demons still talking to her and she crawled forward to the grass and parted them with her hands. The puppy's earlier words of this setting being her nightmare was truly confirmed for her when she saw what was happening before her.
Before her, she saw her mother and father tied up and hanging upside-down from trees and they were slowly being lowered into cauldrons of boiling oil as they screamed for mercy. More demonic creatures, some with hairy and grotesque pig faces, danced around them while holding pitchforks and torches and pointing them in Miki and Tadao's faces as they wept at their impending deaths. The demons laughed at their fear while some of them danced around the cauldrons of boiling liquid and Kagami could hear her parents screaming their final goodbyes to each other. It was all the twin-tailed girl could take.
"Mom! Dad!" She screamed at the top of her lungs.
Her parents looked at her with petrified stares and the demons also stopped dancing and turned to her. As they started laughing at Kagami, Miki's last words were, "Run, Kagami, run!"
Before Kagami could heed her mother's words, two of the demons cut the ropes holding Miki and Tadao up and the two plummeted and disappeared with a splash in the hot black liquid. Kagami could only scream as the demons kept laughing at her and the twin-tailed Hiiragi took her cue to turn and begin running.
As the demons kept laughing at her while dancing around Miki and Tadao's bodies that were continuing to melt in the oil, one of them called for Kagami to hear, "Victim of your own creation!"
Kagami ran as hard and as fast as she could despite how depleted of breath she was and the ground beneath her feet began to rumble and quake. It suddenly split open and began to collapse all around her. She suddenly felt unrelenting heat rise up as well as bright lights from below. Kagami quickly glanced downward while still running and saw rivers of lava and molten rock flow beneath her feet and her sweating increased as the world around her collapsed.
The ground in front of her suddenly broke apart and fell away, forcing Kagami to stop and nearly run off the side and she looked down. She watched the rest of her path disappear in the seas of lava and to her horror, she also spotted her family house further down on another ledge and sliding towards the edge. She cried for it to stop but the house finally fell off the side and plummeted to the burning sea and it landed with a splash, immediately converting it into a massive fireball until it sank beneath the crashing waves of orange and yellow.
As Kagami wept at the sight of all her childhood memories disappearing in the ocean of fire and brimstone, she suddenly heard another familiar voice whisper, "Kagami…"
Kagami quickly spun around and wanted to weep in joy upon seeing Inori standing with also a scared and crying face but she appeared to be in good health. Kagami cried her sister's name and was about to rush over to embrace her but Inori rejected it.
"Don't come near me, Kagami! Something's happening to me!" She cried. "There's something inside me and it's getting bigger!"
Inori showed her physical pain was mounting and she fell to her knees while hugging herself and groaning in rising agony while the ocean of lava sprayed bursts of the scorching liquid upward all around them. Inori suddenly vomited a large puddle of blood and screamed in pain. Kagami's panic was as hot and burning as the fiery lava below them and she kept screaming for her sister to let her assist her but Inori remained adamant about her staying away.
Suddenly, another pair of arms sprouted from below Inori's real ones, followed by another and Inori suddenly had six arms. Her slender body began to grow taller and taller and Inori continued to scream in agony as more arms sprouted out of her sides and her skin began to tear open like paper while Kagami looked up at her towering sister while still crying and screaming. Two large insect feelers suddenly sprouted from Inori's forehead and the skin around her face also began to tear and reveal a large, rough hide hiding underneath. Inori's clothes suddenly tore apart along with the rest of her skin and Kagami's screaming only increased when she stood before her biggest sister, who was now a towering centipede.
The large centipede breathed fire and aimed its feelers at Kagami, following it up by releasing a blast of gray smoke and it swallowed Kagami. The twin-tailed girl recognized it as crack cocaine smoke and she waved it away and watched the large centipede that was once her sister crawl down the side of the rocky ledge she stood on and disappear in the ocean of lava. The stunned and petrified Kagami didn't know what to do now but her growing nightmare made the next move for her.
The ground holding her up crackled, crumbled, and collapsed and Kagami fell down to the ocean of burning lava. She screamed the whole way down and felt the heat grow more and more excruciating and she saw the orange and yellow abyss begin to swirl around like another hurricane cloud and it formed a tunnel and Kagami plummeted into it and fell further and further down the sea of lava. Kagami still remained unburned or even unscathed by the flames but she still felt the intense heat until she reached the bottom of the ocean and plowed through a solid layer of rock and arrived in another fiery underworld filled with demons torturing and even eating other demons. The only sound she could hear was that of screaming agony and pain from the endless torture until Kagami landed on the burning ground and quickly scrambled to her feet.
"Kagami…welcome." A deep and sinister voice said from behind her.
Kagami quickly turned and once again shrieked. Before her sat the very Grim Reaper on a throne made of human skin stitched together with its scythe leaning up against the throne. The back of the throne was lined with human bones and skulls but it wasn't the throne or even the skeletal figure that frightened Kagami the most. What hit her hardest was when she saw the crying and trembling Tsukasa on her knees with a collar around her neck and a chain leash with one end attached to the collar and the other end attached to the throne. Tsukasa was also stripped of her clothes and was wearing only a black bra and g-string, clothes she was clearly distraught over wearing and the Grim Reaper began petting Tsukasa on her head like a dog, only making her cry louder.
"Tsukasa!" Kagami cried. "Let her go!"
The Grim Reaper began to laugh at her as Tsukasa continued to cry and the skeletal figure stood while taking its scythe and said, "You should've known the price of evil and I bet it hurts to know that you belong here."
Kagami fell to her knees and cried, "Please, I beg you! Let my little sister go! Don't make her stay here forever! Take me instead!"
"Oh Kagami…your tragic fate is looking so clear!" The reaper exclaimed only this time it was in a girl's voice, taking Kagami by surprise.
The Grim Reaper reached up with its free hand towards its skull covered by the hood of its cloak and suddenly ripped it away. It dropped the skull and Kagami looked straight into the eyes of Yuka Miyakawa as the Grim Reaper still wearing the black, tattered cloak. She had a dark smile on her face with two glowing eyes and she suddenly grabbed Tsukasa's chain and pulled her head up, making Tsukasa cry in strangulating pain again.
"Let her go, Yuka!" Kagami yelled. "You promised me you wouldn't hurt her!"
Miyakawa smiled and opened her mouth, allowing a disturbing fork-like tongue resembling a snake's to slither out and it kept coming towards Kagami. She giggled and said, "Slip me some tongue, Kagami!"
Miyakawa sent her lengthy snake-like tongue forward and it kept coming and coming and it began to wrap around Kagami's entire body, making her cry and the fork front of the tongue dug itself into Kagami's mouth. Kagami squealed and allowed more tears to fall from her eyes until Miyakawa retracted her long snake tongue back into her mouth and raised her scythe upward with the blade ready to come down on Tsukasa's neck.
"I don't want anyone to come between us, Kagami! I'm the only one who truly loves you!" Miyakawa exclaimed. "Now let me get rid of this little cunt and then we can be together forever in Hell!"
The blade plummeted downward and Kagami threw her face into the burning ground when she heard the sound of human skin being sliced open, followed up by a human head falling from the neck and rolling on the ground. Kagami threw herself up and screamed NO as loud and as violently as she could as more walls of fire crashed upon her, as well as the haunting laugh of Yuka Miyakawa.
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Kagami Hiiragi screamed loudly and she awoke with a start. She rocketed upward and sat in Miyakawa's bed covered in sweat and was panting out of sheer panic. The distraught Hiiragi looked around anxiously and it took a few seconds for her to realize that she was in Miyakawa's room because her settings at first glance made her believe she hadn't awoken from her nightmare. When the familiar setup clicked in her mind, Kagami's panting eased but she still trembled and leaked sweat everywhere.
"What a nightmare…" she whispered to herself. "That…that was horrible…"
Kagami glanced at the clock sitting on the nightstand and it read nine o'clock in the morning and she pulled herself out of bed. A fresh wave of pain erupted throughout Kagami's lower half when she shifted in the bed, making her yelp and reach for the sore spot and the memories of what happened suddenly returned. She couldn't help but let a fresh tear slip from her eye knowing that that happened to her but was at least thankful she didn't have a nightmare about that. Still the images of what happened to her family burned in her mind and it kept her heart beating at a hastened pace.
She did her best to shake it off while repeating it was only a dream in her mind over and over again. Kagami pulled herself out of the bed and took her nightgown off to get dressed. When her dark ensemble was attached to her body, she slowly opened Miyakawa's bedroom door and was immediately blasted by a strange smell. She could hear Miyakawa cooking in the kitchen down the hallway but it was an odor that Kagami couldn't recognize. All she knew was that it was some kind of meat being cooked in a skillet. The only thing she could connect the smell with was beef of some kind but it wasn't any that she could identify.
Regardless, Kagami slowly walked out of the bedroom and down the hall to the kitchen where she saw Miyakawa sitting at her table and eating what appeared to be a small cooked steak while several other ones sat on another plate. When Miyakawa slipped another forkful of the meat into her mouth and she chewed, Kagami's presence caught her attention. She chewed with a smile, as if she was showing some sort of pride over the food.
When Miyakawa swallowed it, she said, "Morning, sunshine. How about some breakfast?"
Kagami sniffed the meat on the plate again. "It does smell good. What is it, Yuka?"
Miyakawa giggled. "Oh it's just a little bit of this and a little bit of that. It's mostly scrap meat that I threw together to make a breakfast steak. Have a seat."
Kagami shrugged and sat down in front of Miyakawa while also giving her a peculiar look. She had a feeling that she saw Miyakawa in her dream but couldn't put her face to any figure. Either way, she had to admit she was hungry and Miyakawa slid a plate with one of the streaks on it and Kagami began to eat it. She chewed it a few times and looked at Miyakawa.
"It's not bad actually." Kagami said as she took more bites.
Miyakawa giggled again. "I'm glad you like it, dear."
You should like it…because I'm feeding you the guy who fucked your ass.
"Where's Ryuji?" Kagami asked, snapping Miyakawa out of her internal thoughts.
"He's off pushing our homemade meth on the streets." She replied and grinned. "So what are we doing tonight? Are you ready to tease, please, and squeeze more peas tonight?"
Kagami looked away. "No. I don't want what happened to me the other night to happen again."
"You know you could just take a weapon with you. I've got a few switchblades and knives you could look through until you find one you like." Miyakawa replied.
Kagami shook her head. "I couldn't do that. I could never pull a weapon out on anybody let alone use it no matter what they did to me. I couldn't live with murder on my conscience."
"Even if they tried to kill you and rob you or just fuck you without paying?" Miyakawa asked with a sinister voice, catching Kagami off guard. "You need a reality check, Kagami. What happened to you with that guy will happen again unless you defend yourself. I'm trying to help you so quit being a little bitch about it."
Kagami glared at Miyakawa. She didn't appreciate being talked to like that, especially after she was the victim of a horrible and traumatic incident that caused her so much pain. The distress of being raped that way made Kagami sick inside and her frustration with Miyakawa prompted her to excuse herself harshly from the table.
"I'm out of here." Kagami snapped and started walking towards the front door.
"Kagami." Miyakawa called to her, making Kagami stop and look at her who suddenly formed a conniving grin and added, "What you experienced last night was just a dream, Kagami. It was only a dream. None of that really happened…"
Kagami gave another confused look at Miyakawa, who somehow seemed to know about the repugnant nightmare she had. Kagami quickly exited the apartment and began walking down the street.
Miyakawa giggled to herself and stared at her plate. "None of that really happened…yet."
Kagami couldn't make a quarter mile down the road until she had no choice but to slink away into an alleyway and dig into her pockets. Her body on the verge of rejecting the food she had consumed, Kagami quickly took out a crack pipe from her pocket that was ready to go and she lit it up. She took in the toxic smoke like it was water after spending a long time in a baking desert, only illustrating how truly addicted she was to the drugs. The drugs took her clarity away and she wasn't able to acknowledge the fact that she was sitting next to a rotten garbage can in a dark, dreary alleyway smoking crack. Countless more people walked past her as she smoked the drug.
Most of them didn't even acknowledge her existence while the ones who did only gave her a quick glance before they marched onward. To them, Kagami was just another junkie and prostitute living in the streets of the Aku District, which wasn't news to many people. Sadly, it was just another day in their world to see a young girl Kagami's age sitting in filth while destroying every aspect of her being with drugs and prostitution. Kagami's tragic tale of how she ended up in this situation wouldn't faze them even if they heard it because it too was nothing they haven't heard before. Everyone had a story of demise and angst within the Aku District so to them, what would make Kagami any different or any better?
In the midst of her high, Kagami lost her ability to read time so it didn't upset her when three hours had passed and she still sat in the alleyway smoking crack and even popped a few pills she found either in her jacket pocket or several in an unlabeled prescription bottle near the garbage can. She didn't care what was going into her body, just as long as it would take away all the physical and mental pain that tortured her on a daily basis. The twin-tailed girl could still see her sister hanging from that twisted tree in her nightmare, as well as hearing the petrified screams of her parents before they were dropped in the oil. Worst of all, she could still see Tsukasa being treated like someone's pet and it made her sick to her stomach to see her in chains like a slave.
Eventually, Kagami's hunger returned a little past noon and she once again began walking the streets. Though she wasn't who she used to be after Matsuri's death, she still couldn't deny the fact that she always had a relentless sweet tooth. It was an unusual scene for someone with an exterior like Kagami's dark wardrobe and appearance to arrive at an ice-cream parlor but she didn't care about all the stares she was getting.
"Could I get a hot fudge sundae with all the toppings, please?" Kagami asked the stunned employee.
"Make that two." A voice said from behind Kagami.
That voice…it couldn't be…
Kagami quickly turned and felt a tidal wave of mixed emotions when she looked into the vibrant yet saddened pools of green in Konata Izumi's eyes. Her best friend was standing behind her with a look that showed both happiness and disappointment and she could tell that Konata had a lot on her mind. Her stare said it all as Konata stepped forward to the confused employee and stood next to Kagami.
"Like I said, make it two…and put them both on one check." Konata requested and the employee left to process their order while the blue-haired girl looked through her wallet and pulled out the necessary amount of money to pay for the treats.
Kagami slowly looked away from Konata and whispered, "You didn't have to do that, you know."
Konata nodded. "I know. I just figured I would because I believe that this is the first decent thing you've eaten in awhile. You're starting to look a little skinny, Kagamin."
The twin-tailed girl gulped and replied softly. "It…it's nothing. It's just that the heroin and crack takes away all my appetite. Sometimes I can go two whole days without feeling hungry."
"I don't think that's anything to brag about." Konata replied. "Either way, I wanted to buy this for you because I want to talk."
Kagami rolled her eyes and reared her attitude. "Christ…I can only imagine what the fuck this is going to be about."
"It's about Tsukasa." Konata quickly replied.
The seared image of Tsukasa being treated like a slave in her dream suddenly returned and Kagami quickly turned her head to Konata. "Tsukasa? Is she okay? Is she hurt?"
The employee abruptly returned with their sundaes and Konata paid for them. The two girls kept a low profile and even Kagami was smart enough by this point to not make a scene and attract any unwanted attention. She knew she was breaking the law with her activities and didn't want to get caught over something as pathetic as throwing a tantrum in an ice-cream parlor. They took their ice-cream over to a secluded table in the corner of the parlor and Konata addressed Kagami's concern.
"Physically…Tsukasa is fine. Mentally however she's a mess." Konata replied and slid the first spoonful in her mouth and added. "You know I can't go one whole visit without her breaking down into tears? All she asks about is you. Whether if I've seen you or if I've heard from you at all and it upsets me every time I was forced to say no."
Kagami paused while looking at her sundae and replied, "How did you find me, Konata?"
Konata sighed internally at her already growing frustration over Kagami disregarding her sister but answered anyway. "I heard about all the things you've been doing with your body and my mind could only come to one district as sick and deranged as those things you're doing. I've been looking for you since five this morning and you know how much I hate getting up that early. That means I also had to sacrifice a night of gaming but for you…it was worth it. Even though I found you like this."
Kagami lowered her head further, almost as a subliminal attempt at bowing in shame. "You shouldn't have come here, Konata. You better leave while you still can."
Konata tilted her head and squeezed her facial muscles to form a glare. "Is that a threat?"
Kagami slowly shook her head. "No…it's a promise. If you stay here…you'll regret it. This is my home now and I can't go back to my family."
"Why?"
"Because what they'll demand of me are requests that I'll never be able to meet. Let me guess; you're here to try and convince me to go back and get clean, maybe even see that family therapist Tsukasa was rambling about last time I saw her." Kagami snorted and her ice-cream sundae began melting around the glass bowl. "Do you know what it's like to be high on drugs, Konata?"
Konata shook her head.
"Then you couldn't even begin to imagine what kind of fucking hell it is to not be high." Kagami retorted. "Those drugs…they're nothing short of a miracle. All those things I said and did that became the deaths of Matsuri and Kusakabe suddenly disappear and it's like it never happened. But if I go back, I'll have to go through some kind of treatment where I'll have to face what I did and go through rehab and withdrawal."
"And you're scared of the mental and physical pain you'll endure in rehab and recovery?" Konata asked.
Kagami nodded. "I've gone through minor withdrawal sessions before and I can't even describe how terrible they are. They're so terrible that I'm willing to do anything to keep them away. Even sleep with some of the most vile and disgusting of animals claiming to be humans if it means I can secure enough money to stay high."
Konata slowly shook her head.
"I don't give a shit about what you think about me, Konata." Kagami snapped. "You don't know what it's like to feel what I'm feeling and to know that you're trapped and those drugs are my only keys to peace."
The blue-haired girl sighed. "You're right about everything, Kagami. I don't understand what it's like to lose a sister or a friend the way you have. It was so unfair and you didn't deserve it. But I do know what it's like to have a friend who can't sleep at night and who can't stop crying because she loves and misses her sister so much that every day is an uphill battle just for her to get out of bed in the morning. I know what that's like because that friend of mine is also your little sister. And I also didn't come here to try and talk you into going to rehab. I'm here because you're right about another thing; Tsukasa wants you to see that family therapist, if not for one session and afterward, you can walk away with no more questions asked."
"Forget it." Kagami quickly retorted. "I'm not going to some pathetic dime-store shrink."
Konata narrowed her stare. "Then how about we make a deal? One that doesn't end with you either shooting something into your veins or even lying on your back and spreading your legs for once."
Kagami shot a sinisterly evil glare of pure anger at Konata but allowed her to continue.
"One session. I won't even tell your family you're going. One session with Dr. Kishimoto. I have her card with me now and Tsukasa already gave me permission to give you this deal." Konata reached into her jacket pocket and dropped the therapist's card on the table in front of the leering Kagami. "It'll just be you and this doc together for one hour and after that, you're free to walk out her door and you'll never have to see her or your family or even me ever again if that's what you want. Tell me Kagami…what's the harm in simply going and having a conversation with someone who is legally obligated not to judge you?"
The twin-tailed girl looked away and sneered. "I'm out of here. Thanks for the sundae, Konata."
Kagami stood and began to walk out of the parlor, having never once touched her dessert that Konata bought for her but that didn't stop the blue-haired girl. She stood, took the business card, and dashed after Kagami. The twin-tailed girl started to walk fast but Konata stayed right on her heels.
"Look Kagami, no matter what you think I still consider you not only my friend but also my best friend." Konata said to Kagami's back as she held Kishimoto's card in her hand and readied to execute a sneaky maneuver. Konata caught up to Kagami and the two walked side-by-side. "I'm still going to go back to Tsukasa and tell her that I found you and that you're in good health but that'll do little to ease all her fears over your safety. Would you do me a favor and at least think about that one session?"
"I said no!" Kagami yelled at her but Konata took the opportunity and quickly slid the card into Kagami's back pocket and she didn't notice as she continued her angry rant. "I'm not going to any fucking shrink's office so drop it already! You don't understand me and neither does my family or some damn bookworm! Now get out of here, Konata!"
Konata stopped walking and watched Kagami keep moving down the streets with venomous spite in every step. She sighed to herself while shaking her head and knew that she had to leave the Aku District as soon as possible. She didn't want to keep breathing in the toxic fumes of the sector's decay but at least she was able to deliver the card to Kagami. Konata's hope was that Kagami would discover it later when she wasn't so angry and maybe even consider it. Of course, there was a possibility that Kagami would also only consider it after yet another traumatic event, which was what Konata feared. With each perverted encounter Kagami made for herself, she was getting closer and closer to her last one ever.
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Later that night, Kagami rested on her back and her conversation with Konata replayed in her mind. What she remembered the most was when Konata referred to her deal to see Dr. Kishimoto and it not involving her either getting high or lying on her back with her legs spread. She remembered this because she felt another customer thrust in and out her over again as she laid on her back on the backseat of his Mercedes Benz sedan.
As her third customer of the night continued to do his work on her, Kagami stared into space while trying to ignore the animalistic sounds he was making as he was almost finished. In retrospect it did sound like a pretty good deal but Kagami was just rejecting it out of anger. Kagami would be able to talk to the therapist with zero strings attached and once it was over, she would never have to see her again. At least it would help ease her returning guilt about making Tsukasa worry about her so much, as well as the rest of her family.
Kagami had to admit to herself that with each passing day, she was still missing her family more and more despite what the drugs were able to do. It was driving a mental wedge between them, sure, but they still loved each other and Kagami was still the daughter of Miki and Tadao Hiiragi, as well as the sister of Inori and Tsukasa Hiiragi. Maybe this one simple session would do some good. Maybe it would bring some closure to their demons but the only thing Kagami was still concerned about was the future.
Sure, the session would remain confidential and her family would never have to know that she was there, but Kagami feared that a deal that simple was coated with hidden probabilities down the road. Even though she was now part of the streets, she was still smart enough to know that the only way she could ever get out was through rehab and proper treatment with doctors, but she still didn't want to go through that ordeal. It would be long, hard, and drastically painful, maybe even more painful than the initial anguish she felt when she lost Matsuri and Misao. But still…she did miss Tsukasa.
The man on top of her grunted and howled and was finally finished with her. He rested his body on top of Kagami and breathed hard and the twin-tailed girl rolled her eyes. As the man slowly pulled himself up while panting, he released an exhausted chuckle and said, "Thanks, baby, that was awesome."
"At least one of us enjoyed it. That'll be twenty five thousand yen." Kagami hissed and was anxious for him to get off her.
The man got off Kagami and allowed her to sit up with a frowning face as she reached into her skirt pocket and retrieved her crumbled panties. She slipped them over her legs again and pulled them tight and a large bundle of cash was dropped onto Kagami's lap. She quickly collected the money and stashed it in her boot, a lesson she learned the hard way of where to keep a prostitute's income.
Kagami opened the door and stepped out, thinking she was in the clear once again. She brushed off her clothes and as she was about to walk the streets again, the man in the luxurious car honked his horn at Kagami, telling her to come back as he sat in the driver's seat. Kagami groaned and walked back to him.
"You ready for another round already?" She asked with an annoyed grunt.
To her surprise, the man started laughing. It wasn't a chuckle over what they did in the back of his car, but rather a deep and satisfied laugh over something else he did. The laughing was creepy enough to worry Kagami.
"What the hell is so funny?" She barked.
"Oh, nothing. I just thought you would want this back." The man said and lifted his hand up and to Kagami's horror, he was holding the condom she gave him to wear and it hadn't even been opened.
Kagami's face melted to form a combined look of anger and anguish. "You fucking asshole! You said you put it on! The whole time you were…?! Did you…did you…inside me?!"
"Enjoy motherhood you dirty skank! Consider that my only child support payment!" He laughed again and flicked the condom at her, striking her face with it and Kagami flinched as he put his car into drive and sped away, laughing as he went.
Kagami was left alone in the alleyway with nothing but her boiling anger as her only company. She gritted her teeth and screamed with all her might, picked up the condom, and threw it towards the shrinking car in the distance and yelled, "Fucker!"
Her knees knocked together and Kagami's anger was suddenly replaced with unrelenting sorrow and tears flooded her eyes. She fell to the concrete, covered her face, and began crying loudly over what had just happened. Now she truly feared what the future had in store for her as she sat down in the alley and kept crying. She tried to convince herself that she knew her menstrual cycle by heart and that this wasn't going to be a problem. It still didn't take away from the fact that Kagami felt that she had been violated yet again.
As Kagami shifted her buttocks on the cement, she suddenly felt something. She felt a foreign piece of paper in her back pocket and she reached into it and grasped a card. Upon inspecting it under a streetlamp, she identified it as Dr. Kishimoto's business card. Feeling alone and defeated once again because of the unimaginable cruelty of the streets, Kagami gripped the card tightly in her hand and buried her face in her knee caps as she sat beneath the streetlamp.
As she wept after yet another violation on her body, she whispered, "Okay…okay…I'll do it. I'll make the appointment…"