Genre : Angst / Hurt / Comfort / Tragedy / Friendship

Chapter 1

The Cruel Reality

This night was extremely cold, or so he thought. His hands are wrapping his own body, trying to protect it from the cold that pierced through him. His crimson eyes continue to gazes on the crowded streets below him, watching every cars passing. Emptiness emblazon his eyes, long enough to draw the portrait of the living corpse. He was barely moving or talking. The desperation continued to drive his insanityas if he would throw his own body into the air.

Never once he thought that the reality and facts could do such a cruel thing to him, strips him from his achievements, pride, dreams and even his own life.

Dreams…he chuckled in bemusement. Is he even had once through his past life until now ?

Everything he did was all of his father's requests and rules,..all of it was his father's volitions not his.

Such a shameful,..living in the fake pages of existence,..controlled by any regulations from his father like an obedient absolute puppet which wouldn't be torn apart by anything.

Feelings and desires doesn't matter, it would only sabotage his mind and intercepts every works and accomplishments, or that's what he always thought. Sometimes, he could feel his burning desire asked why…

Echoed in his blank mind the words ,..

"Only people who are successful in all areas that deserve to be called as the part of Akashi's family"

Those utterances were inescapable, couldn't be claimed or violated. Absolute penalty would be imposed on those who don't comply…

That statement is amusing, really, if anyone noticed..…If it's fate and reality, could it be penalized ? Could every people including him, ..prevent this from happen ?

His mind drifted into his own world of consciousness, excavated his recollection of an event that he did never expect to happen in his life, crushing every inch of the things he previously had with despair, turning his life upside down to the earth…


It's all began two months ago, during his first time as an 1st year high school student in Rakuzan. The weather was very pleasant at that time, offering the graceful warmth in air. Strands of the flowers started to bloom, revealing the beauty that buried deep down in its center. Every students were already talking and laughing with each other on the first day. He, on the other hand, was already being assigned as the captain of Rakuzan's basketball team. He went to the gym that day to assisting along with his coach to assign the division of the string.

Two days later, he began his duties as a captain and immediately started to train his teammate's potential and skills. The first practice went enough facile without any nuisance, and him, along with the other members well began quite enough to knew each other attitudes. Though some of them were already discover with one another when in Junior High School. After the practice, he felt really very tired, but nonetheless he didn't think too much of it. It's very reasonable and normal after all.

Shortly afterwards, around five days later, he was appointed as the President of Rakuzan's Students Council. No one complain about it, as they assumed that position has been given to the right person. Trusts and expectations of him increased drastically. His father nonetheless still as usual. He only asked what is necessary for him. That position made his duties and tasks increases, and he barely getting any rests or sleeps. Every night he kept doing his work, as a student, the captain of basketball team, and President Council. He never complained, because that's his duties and he had to finish it.

That time, he started to felt the fatigue comes again continuously, and it's getting worse as every day passed. He could felt it from the previous practices he attended. One of his teammates would shot him a glance, and asking if he was okay, which he replied fine. Dizziness strikes his head like a wave more often, and it's increased rapidly. Sometimes he could feel his eyes saw everything became blurred and double. He rarely could sleep at nights. It's hard for him to slip into his own consciousness. Even when he did, he would wake up earlier than usual or in the midnight.

This drives him to the point that he started to felt paranoid over something so quickly. Everything around him seems to become odd. He tried to figure it out why, only to meet uncertain answers. All those tasks and obligations only became a heavy burden. They kept come to him endlessly. He wanted to scream so badly, escaping himself from this pressure.

Why no one noticed it ?

At that time, a very sharp frustration stuck within his mind and he couldn't get out from it. He felt very miserably and only wanted to rest, but the reality wouldn't allow it. Everyone were having high expectations for him, and he couldn't resist it. Fear of been exiled and ostracized provoke his insanity. And over time, that feelings were progressing bigger until that day, he couldn't hold it anymore. He snapped out of it during his practice by raging and punishing his teammates to vent his depression.

After that event happened, anxiety enveloped him very tightly. He tried to distance himself from his teammates, with laboring his best to avoid them. During the practice, he became less talkative than before despite his team tried to comfort him, saying that incident did nothing and asking him why he recently became strange. He refused to answered and only head back home, but deep down in his mind he knew that they were right. There is something reside within his body, and it's terrifying him.

He kept telling his mind that everything is fine, that everything is still in the same place and being normal. That was a lie though, a mere lie that he told to himself in order to establish himself in the illusion, to comfort himself. He woke up in nightmare that night, reflection of her mother flashed in his dreams. He didn't remember that fully, and came back tried to sleep again, despite only to meet ultimate failure in that.

The next day, he decided not to go to school for a while, trying to steady himself. His psychical and mentally problem will soon carried away, and he will be back to normal again, that's what he thought that time. But it turned out to be didn't work, as the pessimist mind always dominating the optimist one. His anxiety and depression never vanished, instead it got worse. His headache stabbed him merciless, and his double vision bothered him more.

Those signs was so disturbing that his father's private assistant, Tanaka-san, aware of his anomaly and immediately offering advice to go to the doctor which he refused flatly. But the incident next day made him unable to sustain this rarity longer that he chose to accept Tanaka's suggestion.

He woke up from his sleep in that morning, when the double vision quickly approached him as he opened his eyes. Everything felt awful as the headache came mercilessly. He tried to get away from it and stand up, only to feel his legs couldn't hold his own weight.

Balance evanish of his body as quick as his face touch the hard tiled floor.

Great concern gnawing his mind during his trip to the hospital, and he felt like want to vomit due to his paranoid. Arrived in the hospital, he immediately doing check up and waited for around fifteen minutes before his name was called in. In front of him, sat a middle-age doctor with green hair and wearing glasses, who is non-other than his past teammate's father, Midorima Shinji, a neurologist specialist doctor. He explained all of his lately problem, how his double vision and dizziness disturbing his activities, his insomnia and paranoid over something small. His last explanation was the strange thing that happened to him in that morning.

Midorima Shinji listened it detail and attentive, and he quickly carried out the tests and examinations. A motor system examination , lumbar puncture to draw out a sample of cerebrospinal fluid , tonsil biopsy, a prototype blood test, CT scan of the brain , MRI brain scan to produce the detailed image of brain, and an EEG to records brain activity. Clock ticking very quickly as the hours passed. His entire body trembling very tightly, cause of the fear of why he was having all these tests done to him.

Midorima's father only said that he will soon call him if the results are already come out, and told him to bring his father or someone who responsible of him to come along. He came back to his home with the negative thoughts constantly nagging on his head, and its haunt him for the rest of the days. The next five days, he came back to school and working his usual activities. His balance and co-ordination got deteriorating little by little that time. His illusions continue to rejects every worst possibility that ready to break him like a glass. His mind never prepared for the next thing that he would hear from the results that out one week later. With his inner thought continue to rejected the worse, every words that came out calmly shattered every illusions that he struggle to keeping it for weeks into several frail pieces.

"You currently suffered a fatal neurodegenerative disease called Creutzfeldt-Jakob.", told him, sympathy and guilt filled in his green eyes.


His knuckles slowly turned white as he tightened his grip. He still remembering how every sentences that came out from his mouth stabbed him merciless. His eyes widen fearfully, all of the cells in his body became numb. The taste of frozen ran quickly on his blood, these sentence went in one ear and out of the other without all of it being processed by his nerves. Mind was pent tightly from every these circumferences of embitter.

He remembered Tanaka-san's expression, as he was listening in the diagnosis. Disbelief and shock emanated from his expression.

His ears that time only caught some of those sentences. But he knew, with only those words, the declaration of his downfall will soon be assured, as his entire future slaughtered bit by a bit without getting left behind once. It repeated slowly in his head as to reminding him of his fate.

"As this disease progress, you will lose your physical co-ordination which can affect your speaking, walking, and balance. Along with the loss of the voluntary movements which make the difficulty to move your hands and legs. The last stage of it is the lost movement of entire body. Your vision will be deteriorating to the level of blindness. Eventually, loss of the speech also soon becoming a problem . Rapidly progressive dementia, alzheimer, seizures along with the memory loss and concentrating problem later include in the progress. Swallowing food will be difficult which increase the possibility of choking. This symptoms progressing very fast and the patients usually die within one year after the diagnosis. With the current medical technology, there is no effective cure for this disease."

These cruel words that caught by his ears still remained in his memory until this night. His hands still shook greatly, whether it's because of the cold air or the fear that crawl his body.

He is too afraid to face the reality, to accepting it inside him. His sense of rejection undermining all of his rational mind, cutting it without the slightest remaining.

He didn't want anyone, especially his father to know this disgraceful reality.

What would he do if he knew this?

For him…he is nothing more than a tool to inherit all of Akashi's family. Just it… With this disease consumed his body slowly, that absolute doll that once be proud will only shattered like a broken trash. And by now, he failed to meet all of the requirements to be a perfect heir, right ?

Perfection…

He laughed miserably in despair and sorrow. Tired of this façade that he wore until this day, he tired of all of it. He isn't that strong as they always view him to be. He is just a broken and weak person who is need to be helped out from the darkness that consuming him. Why no one want to helped him ?

Look at him. Now he is just a useless person, that soon will be fading away from this earth without anything to left. He will only be a burden that better to thrown away as it's no longer useful to everyone.

His hand then reached for his pocket. Three pieces of pills come out from it. His eyes stared at those pills that lay on his palm.

This will be the most effective and easiest way, they said. Only a couple of gulp, and all of his burden will be go away. He will soon be free from his miserable life. After all, he couldn't keep it any longer anyway.

He looked at the pills for a few moments before his hands began inserting it into his mouth, leading his vision into a blurred image as his own unconsciousness welcomed him into the world of blackness.


Author Note :

1. This is my first fanfic, and I am an amateur writer. Also, English isn't my real language so I hope you can tolerant my bad English ( along with my writing ) .

2. I decided to use Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in my fic in tribute of my long lost friend who died from it. . I choose to search the signs and symptoms from the Internet.

3. Now I will explained about Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease to you :

Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease is a very fatal and incurable neurodegenerative disease. This disease caused the brain tissue to degenerate rapidly, it will slowly destroying the brain, and the brain will develops holes and the texture changes to resemble sponge. There are four types of this disease, and what Akashi suffers now is Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob types. The earliest symptoms from this types is generally more of the psychological first such as personality changes, hallucinations, depression, etc, and then some months later will be accompanied by physical problems like the balance and coordination dysfunction, dizziness, double vision etc. But the progression of the symptoms in this disease usually still follow the sufferer's body. So this is how I made Akashi's symptoms ; He start of both ( psychological and neurological ), but his psychological symptoms are much more dominant at first ( insomnia, depression, anxiety, stress ) with minor signs of neurological ( only dizziness and double vision ) , then a month later his other neurological major signs came out later ( in which I introduce his balance and co-ordination problem ). Later, I will introduce any other signs such as dementia and Alzheimer, loss of memory, change in posture, gait, walking, etc, difficulty in talking, problem concentrating, etc.

4. When Akashi was raging to his teammates, he was screaming hard and threw the basket to his teammates. That's why his teammates noticed his current weirdness.

5. The reason Tanaka noticed Akashi's strangeness was because Akashi often unconsciously stared blankly at non-existence thing , also every time he had dizziness and double vision , he would touching his head in pain and almost falling to the floor.

6. Akashi chose to go to the neurologist doctor because he noticed that it is his brain that having the problems, but actually he was hope that it's just temporary illness. But you know, he is having a big paranoid over something even the little things.

7. The relationship between Akashi's family and Midorima's family will come out soon.

P.S. : Sorry, if my note is too long.