Author's Note: After six years of off-and-on uploading, we finally made it to 50K words! Act 2 will likely be 30 chapters just as Act 1 was, and hopefully in this spurt of uploads I can finally finish it and move forward to the next phase of this fic. Thank you all for being along for the ride with me!

Reluctantly, I oblige and enter my own house. When I come in, though, it's not at all how I remember it.

The walls, carpet, furniture… It's all a dull gray. The whole place pulsates with a lifeless energy to it that gives me chills.

Not that my dad ever had a knack for interior design, but this is a new low for him.

"So, what do you want exactly? Don't waste my time."

I snap out of my train of thought and look back at the other version of myself. We stare at each other in silence for a couple of seconds before she blurts something else out.

"If you're here to try and date me or whatever, I'll kill you."

"God, what the fuck!? Hell no!" I stop momentarily before realizing my hurtful tone and self-correcting. "I- I mean, I'm sure you're great and all. That's just… Not at all what I wanted to talk with you about."

Getting more irritated, she raises her voice. "Well, stop beating around the bush then! Why are you here?"

"I…" I pause, then rustle through my baggy pockets. "Well, first off, do you want a snack? I brought some granola bars."

The girl looks at me, totally dumbfounded. She probably wasn't expecting me to just straight-up assume that she needs food in her own home. I know I would be in her shoes.

After a few more silent seconds, she brings herself back together again. "Why the fuck would you offer me food like that? I'm in my own house…!"

Hiding my intentions is annoying as hell, and it's getting me nowhere. "I know what your living situation is like. How my- your pops treats you."

For once, she doesn't even try to respond. Doesn't try to hide the look on her face.

"You bake all those pastries for everyone in the school every single day… How many of them do you eat?"

"..." She stubbornly averts her eyes and turns away from me.

"How many of them do you eat!?"

At first her posture doesn't change, but then it shifts back towards me. Her shoulders droop, admitting her loss to me.

"He doesn't let me eat them… Did it to prove one of his stupid points. Makes me do it every goddamn night, I fucking hate it. Hardly get any sleep."

That's it, then. If that's true, it can only mean one thing.

It's not this universe's version of my behaviors that's exacerbated, it's the cause of it that is. My dad was shitty as hell, but he'd never go this far just to prove a point. All of her actions and habits make sense now…

She's even more miserable than I was.

I grit my teeth. Someone is behind this, someone changed things to make her and everyone else this way. Sayori's depression, and… God, I can't even imagine what this world's Yuri is going through.

Whoever's behind all this… They're dead meat when I find them.

Suddenly, there's the sound of an unlocked door from behind me. Both my alternate and I quickly shudder. "Fuck, he's home early… Quick, hide in the storage closet!"

I quickly run out of sight into the closet and shut the doors. Shit, this isn't the way I wanted this to go at all…

"Have you gotten started on your food for tomorrow, hon?" A sharp, all-too-familiar voice cuts through my thoughts.

"Yessir, I was just about to." Her voice is much quieter than it just was. I can't help but remember having been in her place once before.

"And what about my dinner…?"

"Not yet… You got home earlier than I thought you would."

"You should know your fucking job when you get home by now, how do you think this laziness is going to serve you in the real world?"

"I'm sorry, sir, I'll get started right now."

"It's too late for that, I'm hungry right now. I'm going to have to waste money and eat out because of your insolence. But before that…"

I'm not liking where this is going.

"Please, sir, I promise it won't happen again…"

Suddenly, the clap of a palm against a cheek fills the house.

"Know your place, girl!"

As the slaps go on, my breath gets heavier. My legs grow weak, and any resolve I had before is now gone. It was easy to forget when I was living alone in the real world, but his influence is still as strong as ever.

As I'm ready to resign myself to my shame, though, I hear a different, muffled impact followed by a cry of pain. Without thinking, my legs spring into action as I burst out of my cluttered containment and, before he even gets a chance to react…

I punch the confusion right off his face.

He cups his now-bruised cheek in his hand. "Who the hell are you…?"

I kick my shoe right into his nose to knock him onto the ground with a pained scream. "You ruined my life, that's all you need to know!" I yell at him as he lies on the ground, struggling to get back up and guard himself. "And you ruined hers, too!"

"What the hell did I do to you, kid…? I've never even met you. How I parent is none of your business, you're the one invading our household!"

"This was my household once too… And I'm gonna screw you up so bad that it won't be yours any longer."

"Your household…? Who do you think you are!?" He'a yelling louder and louder. He can tell that his illusion of power is fading.

"Who am I? I'm your kid when she's free from you, that's who I am!" I yell with a passion, standing over him for the first time in my life. "I'm her when you become nothing but a memory to her, a tiny speck of sadness in a good, happy life! I'm her when she doesn't visit as you grow old, I'm her when she makes sure you never see her grandchildren, and I'm her when I look down at your grave and laugh at how much better a life I'm living with you gone. THAT'S who I am, are we clear?"

A smug look of confusion starts to cross his face, but before he can respond I kick his stomach in where his guard is open.

"For someone who loves beatin' down on people weaker than you, I really thought you'd be able to take a bit more…" I look over to the girl who is standing at me, dumbfounded. "Say, Natsuki, you want to join in?"

"Join in? Are you crazy!? The cops are going to find out about this, and then…"

"Don't worry about the cops! This world ain't real, anyways… We'll get out of here and be home free."

"Not real? What's that supposed to mean!?" Shit, I don't think I was meant to say-

My thoughts are interrupted by a punch in the face from my dad, who had gotten up while we were chatting and snuck up from behind. My legs buckle, but don't falter as I retaliate. He's able to block the impact with his arm, and soon enough we wrestle each other to the ground as strike after short-range strike bruises and batters our bodies. The physical abilities of this body keep me on top for the most part, though, and I wonder to myself if this was all part of PS's plan. I swear that I can feel her smile ingrained deep in my head…

Lost in my thoughts, he's able to gain on me slightly and take me to the ground under him. Throwing punch after punch, blood begins to drip down my nose. That blood intermingles with saliva as he starts to yell at me. "I don't give a shit who you are, you're a fucking crazy person! You're fucking delusional and have no place in my damn house!"

"Shut the fuck up!" I hear a sharp, all-too-familiar voice. This time, though, it comes with a kick to her father's cheek to knock him off me.

"You have no right to be saying any of this shit! You've never cared about this house, all you've cared about is stroking your own ego and convincing yourself that it wasn't your fault that Mom left! That it won't be your fault when I leave you, too!"

He doesn't even have a chance to respond as she just keeps kicking his face in. Over and over and over again, she kicks and knees at him with all her might and courage. Holding him in place, I make sure he takes every single blow.

As blood flies and bones bruise, he doesn't say another intelligible word.

For the first time that night, I see my younger self smile.