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“Himeru does not think this is a good idea.” Himeru says as he looks up at the foreboding building in front of them. “So he thinks he will wait in the car.”
“Way ahead of ya, Himeru-han.” Kohaku was spinning the keys to the company van around one finger. Rinne’s eyes widened and he patted himself down, glanced left and right, and then he pointed an accusing finger at the pair of bees heading towards the car.
“What?!” Rinne exclaimed, chasing after Himeru and Kohaku. Kohaku clicked the button on the keys and the lights to the van lit up, bathing the deserted area they were in a bright yellow. “Don’t be pussies, I didn’t raise no pussies! I raised bees !”
Himeru gave the man a dry look, unamused. He slid into the front seat of the car. “Must Himeru really remind you that you are not in fact related to him, Amagi?” Himeru went to close the door before Rinne could answer but before he could, Rinne snatched at him, catching his hand with a hurt expression. Himeru rolled his eyes and yanked his hand away.
“Come on, Merumeru!” Rinne begged. “Is this how ya treat yer loyal and fearless leader?”
“Yes.” Kohaku said without hesitation.
Rinne ignored him, “Meru, this is bee-bondin’, ya can’t back out now! I won these tickets for us at the parlors, I provided for ya like a leader should! Weren’t ya just goin’ on about how I’m a terrible leader?”
“Well, you are.” Himeru shuts the door. Rinne’s face falls and he presses his face to the glass like a puppy that had just been kicked outside for being naughty. Himeru wrinkles his nose at the way Rinne was snuffling against the glass, his breath fogging it up in a cloud of moisture. Really, who knows where he has been? And here he was, wiping himself all over the perfectly clean windows. Shameless, as usual, of their terrible, no good leader.
But speaking of how terrible Rinne was, this all started a few hours previously when Rinne Amagi had burst through the doors of their dorm with a plastic bag in his hands and a triumphant look on his face.
“Whatcha got there, Rinne-kun?” Nikki had made the mistake of asking. Himeru had been lounging on one of the armchairs, trying to ignore the whole commotion as he mindlessly scrolled through hold-hands.
For a limited time only, come witness true terror at Starmaker Productions haunted house! Eichi shamelessly promoted in the idol group chat. The ad was brightly colored, decorated in spooky little drawings of ghosts and bats. Himeru’s lips tightened as the little Tatsumi Kazehaya liked an image popped up a moment later, followed by a That sounds delightful Eichi-kun. I will be sure to stop by :). Himeru could only imagine the way Ibara was restraining the urge to throw his phone across his office, somewhere across campus in some desolate, stuffy executive building.
“So glad ya asked!” Rinne had plopped down on the couch beside Kohaku, making the pink-haired idol yelp. Kohaku glared at him a moment, opening his mouth as if to scold the older man, but after a moment, he sighs in defeat and simply scooches over to the opposite side, as if already defeated by the man. Himeru couldn’t find it in himself to blame the boy really, not when Rinne had ceaselessly tormented him about being a “lil homie-sexual”. This was truly why they could never have nice things, let alone a peaceful date with various Alkaloid members, when Rinne Amagi was involved.
“Please tell me its groceries.” Nikki called over from the kitchen, waving a spatula in Rinne’s general direction. The chef-idol had been cooped up in the kitchen for the past few hours whipping up one dish after another as if he were preparing for an upcoming apocalypse. “Because if you really stole my money to go gambling again, imma be really mad at you, Rinne-kun!”
“Kyahahaha, don’t ya worry yer pretty lil head about that!” Kohaku looked disgusted by the public display of affection. “Because today, my fellow buzzy buzzy bees, yer old man has won big!” Rinne started to rifle through the bag. “We’ll never have to worry about anythin’ ever again!”
“Oh?” Himeru glanced up with minor intrigue. That was his first mistake really, throwing Rinne a bone of interest. His second mistake was soon to come though. “Please, Amagi, enlighten us.”
“Ah, patience Meru! Didn’t yer momma ever teach ya manners?” Rinne barked, tossing aside some sort of wrapper. Himeru’s interest quickly turned into a scowl, but before he could get a word of scolding out, Rinne's hand shot into the air and he let out another loud kyahahahaha!
“Tickets?” Kohaku said, blinking at the bundle of papers in Rinne’s hand. “To where?”
“Oh please tell me it's for a restaurant!” Nikki said with an excited smile, hurrying over with sauce spilling from his discarded spatula.
Himeru sighed, rubbing his temples as he watched more future stains appear on the couch where Nikki’s sauce landed, “Amagi, Himeru recalls you saying ‘we’ll never have to worry again’? Please tell us how tickets to a haunted house is supposed to cease any sort of anxiety?”
“ Because, Merumeru,” Rinne said matter-a-factly as he shoved one of the tickets towards him. Himeru took it, blinking down at it skeptically. “Near death experiences always bring a family closer together! We’ll never have to worry about fightin’ ever again!”
Rinne said that as he rubbed the still dark mark on his side, which was no doubt in a very Kohaku’s fist-shaped bruise. Kohaku did not look the slightest convinced by the statement either and he even rolled up his sleeve as if to pummel their leader bee again.
“Absolutely not.” Kohaku said, scowling threateningly at Rinne. Rinne had the brains to scramble away to the further side of the couch, but that meant he was pressed up against Himeru. Himeru rolled his eyes and he pushed the man off of him. “I don’t like scary things. I’m not goin’.”
Even Nikki looked hesitant, eyeing his pot of soup he’s been boiling for the past few hours, “Yeah I dunno Rinne-kun… I’m kinda busy and besides, being scared on an empty stomach gives me indigestion.”
“Wha?!” Rinne looked entirely offended, as if he couldn’t believe his bees would refuse to spontaneously go on a bee bonding trip to some random haunted house. “Are ya bitches serious?”
“Dead serious.” Himeru says as he stands up. He had much better things to do. He couldn’t name what they were at the time but anything would have been better than where he ended up.
“Yer old man works his ass off to provide for ya and ya ungrateful swines don’t even wanna reap the rewards of his labor?!” Rinne said indignantly. “Well then, I think we really do gotta get some bee-bondin’ time in if this is how we’re treatin’ each other now! I will not tolerate such unkindness, we’re a family ya know!”
“So now ya care about kindness?” Kohaku exclaimed in disbelief. “Ya didn’t think about that when you came to ruin ma date with Aira!”
“I didn’t ruin anythin’!” Rinne insisted. “Does yer leader have to remind ya who’s book landed you yer bitch, hah?”
Kohaku looked ready to throw hands. Himeru really thought another brawl was about to break out between the pair and suddenly all the regret he had felt about missing the original one in the idol-cafe evaporated but before he could properly begin to place bets on a winner, Nikki threw his hands in the air.
“Rinne-kun! Kohaku-kun!” The chef idol said, scrambling between the pair to stop them Kohaku’s fist came inches from Nikki’s face and he gave a squeak in terror, hiding behind Rinne, who had been preparing to dodge. “Nahhh, don’t hurt me!”
Kohaku glared daggers at Rinne, rolling his sleeve up. “Oh no, don’t ya worry Nikki-han, I’m savin’ this all for our old man .”
“This is elderly abuse!” Rinne shouted, shrinking back with one hand in the air. “Is this really how ya treat yer seniors, Kohaku-chan?!”
Himeru had let out a sigh, shaking his head. He couldn’t believe he was stopping such an entertaining spectacle but alas, he didn’t know how kindly Ibara would take to Rinne having another broken nose and needing another round of botox.
“Might Himeru suggest a compromise?” Himeru said, one hand still rubbing his temples. Maybe he was the terrible one, not Rinne, for being the cause of this whole misadventure. Past-Himeru was an idiot apparently, making future-Himeru suffer like this.“Perhaps Rinne is right and we do need to attend another bee bondin’.”
“Himeru-han, don’t let his stupidity infect you too!” Kohaku said, looking horrified that Himeru had in fact been infected by Rinne’s stupidity.
But Himeru had held up a hand, silencing the younger bee, “Please do not get Himeru wrong. He simply wishes to strike a deal with our careless leader.”
Himeru knew Rinne all too well. He knew the man could never pass up a gamble of any sort. Rinne perked up with his signature grin spreading across his face and he waggled his eyebrows at Himeru like he hadn’t been about to be beaten to death by a child just moments before.
“Ohoho, Meru in his gamblin’ arc, huh?” Rinne leaned forward with interest, still smiling. “Come on then, Meru, don’t edge me! Spit it out!”
Himeru’s face contorted in disgust. No, thinking back on it now, Rinne was definitely still the terrible person no matter the angle you looked at it.
“If you would refrain from such crass language, Himeru would love to ‘spit it out’.” Himeru gave the man a moment before continuing. “As he was saying, Himeru would like to suggest a deal. If we go to this haunted house with you, then you, Amagi, must leave us alone for the rest of the week.” Himeru watched the way the gears had been clearly turning in his leader’s head, bee-shaped brain cells hitting all the corners. “And that means you will not disrupt Shiina at work, or bar Oukawa from visiting Madara.” He added for a moment, “And you cannot interrupt any more of the time Himeru spends with Tatsumi than you already have.”
Rinne had considered the offer for a long moment, but clearly not enough for Himeru to realize the hole he had dug himself and the others into, “Ya have yerself a deal, Merumeru!” Rinne jumped to his feet, causing Nikki to tumble off the couch with a surprised yelp as Rinne plucked the keys out of the dish beside the door. “What are ya waitin’ for?! We have a haunted house to get to!”
Really, Himeru should have known that a haunted house was a bad idea from the start. It shouldn’t have taken them all piling into a stolen company van and driving through increasingly sketchy territory for him to realize that with their luck, the trip was bound to go terribly wrong, haunted house or not involved. But now, sitting in the front seat of the company van in the middle of some dark forest in the middle of some dark nowhere, it was far too late for Himeru to eat his words. So if he couldn’t do that, he was going to sit in the car until either Rinne got sawed in half by whatever serial killer was no doubt in the worn down house at the top of the hill or the man gave up and they all went home. Call it childish or petty but Himeru valued his life quite a bit and if it meant Rinne would ruin every single one of his future dates with Tatsumi then he’d take those odds over being killed any day.
“Didn’t we make a deal?” Rinne says, trying to appeal to Himeru’s sense of justice, which was really too bad because Himeru was quite content with going back on his words.
“Himeru does not want to get murdered, thank you very much, Amagi.” Himeru said, crossing his arms. “But please, by all means do not let Himeru stop you from such a thing if that is what you really want.”
“But I would protect ya! I’d never let mah bees get hurt!” Rinne insisted. Himeru simply sighed.
“Need Himeru remind you that our job is singing and dancing, Amagi? You would not stand a chance against an axe murderer.”
“Come onnnnn Meruuuuuu!” Rinne pounded against the door with a pathetic whine. Himeru pointedly ignored him. “I just wanna bond with mah beeeeees– FUCK!”
The sound of a slamming door causes all the bees to jump– well all the bees minus Nikki. Rinne picks himself off the floor, his eyes wide, and if Himeru would have known any better, his hair was standing on end like a frightened cat. He stares at the direction of the house on the hill and he slowly points towards the spot Nikki where had just been standing.
“Uh, Merumeru?” Rinne says. “Where is Nikki?”
Himeru rubs his head where he had hit the ceiling of the company van and he purses his lips, “It seems he has disappeared.”
“Maybe he got hungry…?” Kohaku offers, gulping as he leans around Himeru to look up at the house.
“Haunted house” was too shallow a word to describe the building Rinne had won them tickets to. The structure of the place was leaning so far to the left that a part of Himeru worried the next strong breeze would tear the whole thing down, and there were so many boards against the windows and doors that even with the tickets to enter, Himeru couldn’t fathom a way they’d even get in. But now, even through the thick, thorny shrubbery that was growing in front of the house, there was the faint glow of light forcing its way through the plywood nailed to the openings.
The bees looked at each other nervously as they waited for the chef-idol to pop out of the forest holding something vaguely edible like he always did. But as the seconds turned into minutes with the silence broken only by the whistling of the night wind through the forest trees around them, no Nikki Shiina appeared.
“Don’t tell me he actually went inside…” Kohaku swallowed hard.
Himeru pursed his lips tightly. His heart, which had been racing from the initial scare, slowly returned to its normal pace and he took a deep breath, steeling himself as he reached for his bottle of trusty Advil. He shook out a few and swallowed them raw, “It seems that we will have to fetch him.”
““That… that…I can’t believe he’d just– just run off like that!” Rinne suddenly burst out. Kohaku swears again, almost falling out of the car in shock of the sudden outburst. “Meru, didn’t ya say there were ax murderers in there?!”
“Himeru mostly said that to get you to stop talking.”
Rinne ignored him, “Meru, you don’t understand Nikki like I do! He’s like a lil prey animal, always thinkin’ about food! He’d never last a second in the wild!” Rinne’s eyes were wide as he stared at Himeru through the window. “We gotta go save him!”
“Himeru hates to agree with you, but he agrees with you, Amagi.” Himeru says as he takes the keys and gets out of the company van. Himeru couldn’t believe he was falling for the oldest trick in the horror movie book– following a friend into the clearly haunted house as if he was just asking to be brutally murdered next. There was never a good way around the scenario though, which was why Himeru is beginning to think horror movies continue to be so popular despite the continuous cliche.
The bees made their way up the hill quietly, eyes flicking left and right at every sound of wind and crunch of leaves. Himeru tried not to let it show how on edge he was. He hated to admit the way his palms were sweating the closer they got to the haunted house. Kohaku stuck close to his side, brushing up against him as if for the comfort of his presence, but every time he felt the touch of the younger’s sleeve against his arm, he almost jumped out of his skin but Himeru didn’t have it in him to tell the clearly shaken up boy off.
And Rinne? He was desperately trying to pull off the tough guy act. He strutted his way up to the front door with exaggeratedly large steps, eyeing the thick cobwebs that were stretched from one boarded up window to the rickety railing of the porch.
“Whatcha waitin’ for?!” Rinne snapped back at them, glowering. Himeru offhandedly wondered if the only reason he wanted them to hurry up was so he wouldn’t be alone up there just asking to get yanked into the darkness, never to be seen again.
“Didn’t ya get tickets for this place?” Kohaku said once they caught up to the leader bee. He grimaced as he watched a spider scuttle across the floor to disappear into a crack. “It doesn’t look like anybody has been here in years…”
“Himeru was just thinking the same.” Himeru replies as he glances around. There was dust on all the surfaces and the night breeze stirred it up into tiny gray clouds that got swept off into the surrounding woods. But there, beside Himeru’s own shoe, were the faint outlines of footsteps.
Himeru squinted closer. There wasn’t just one set either…
“Amagi, Oukawa.” Himeru called over. Rinne crouched down beside him and Kohaku returned from where he had been peering into the windows.
“They look fresh.” Kohaku commented grimly. “I… I don’t think we’re alone.”
The bees all looked at each other. Rinne was wearing an expensive necklace and Kohaku had a bit of sparkly eyeshadow glittering at the corners of his eyes. Himeru himself had opted for fitted slacks for the outing. Compared to the ax murderer they could be dealing with, Himeru very much doubted their chances of making it out of here alive.
“Whelp.” Rinne sighed as he straightened. “Better go get our Nikki-kun before we get kidnapped!”
Kohaku nods hesitantly, “How hard can it be? It's just one haunted house…” He forces a weak smile. “If we’re fast, we could make it back in time for morning practice?”
The bees turned towards the door ahead of them, all filled with camaraderie and conviction. But the door seemed to loom in the darkness, with one of those fancy brass vampire-looking knockers pinned to the front. The light that had been previously on no longer flicker out from the cracks in the windows, or from the crumbling seams in the wooden door.
Rinne hesitated a moment before he slowly reached out for the knocker. He lifted it, and after glancing at Himeru, he knocked a few times.
Kohaku flinched, “Great. Now the bad guy knows we’re here.”
“Shut up.” Rinne hissed. Kohaku obeyed for once and the bees all paused to listen for any tell-tale sounds of somebody coming to the door. But the only sound was that of their own baited breathing.
“Perhaps whoever else was here left?” Himeru suggested half-heartedly.
Kohaku replied darkly, lips tight, “Leaving behind only Nikki-han’s corpse…”
Rinne shot him a glare and if Himeru knew any better, his lip was trembling with terror, “S–Stop being pussies.”
Before any of the others could protest, Rinne shoved the door open. A gust of dank smelling air flowed out of the house to greet them and the bees all stood rigid. Himeru half expected a masked man with an ax to be standing right there, weapon raised and ready to kill, but instead there was only a rather ordinary looking foyer room, albeit a bit old fashioned and worn. There was a tassel carpet draped over the floorboards and several armchairs were set up as if just waiting for somebody to sit in them to read a book by the fireplace, which was filled with gray ashes. A bookshelf was pushed against one wall and on the other…
“Is that…?” Kohaku asked slowly. Himeru pursed his lips and nodded.
“Himeru does indeed think that it is a pentagram.”
On the wall opposite the bookshelf was a starkly white star drawn in a circle. Old wax was dripping down from unlit candles lining the base and what Himeru desperately hoped was just barbeque sauce was splattered in thick globs against the whole arrangement. But what disturbed Himeru the most was the fact that the candles were still smoking, as if somebody had only just blown them out…
Rinne suddenly shrieked. Himeru swore loudly and whipped around. Rinne had stumbled forward onto his hands and knees, eyes wide and his finger shaking as he pointed at the door they had just come from. Himeru doesn’t even remember walking through it. But regardless, it was now very much closed and as Kohaku tried the brass knob, it was also very much locked.
“Y–You didn’t close that, did ya Meru?!” Rinne frantically asked, his teeth chattering as he clutched his chest.
Himeru shakes his head and he raises his hands, “Himeru was looking at the pentagram with Oukawa.”
Kohaku nods, “Yeah… Also, it looks like we’re locked in here.” The boy gripped the hem of his jacket tightly, so tightly that his knuckles were turning white. He grit his teeth as he glared at their leader bee on the ground. “I–I can’t believe ya dragged us to this horrible place, Rinne! What if we die here?!”
Rinne got to his feet and he quickly dusted himself off, “I didn’t think Nikki was gonna run off! I can’t predict the future, y’know!”
“We will not die.” Himeru says, stepping between them before they could go to blows again. “But Himeru suggests that for safety reasons, we stick together regardless of whether we’re alone or not.” Himeru glances between them. Kohaku nods begrudgingly. Rinne sighs, one hand on his hip.
“Gotta agree with Meru.” Rinne said, taking a deep breath. Then, scowling, he shot a hand out towards the pair. “Buddy system. Homie-up, Merumeru.”
Himeru raised an eyebrow down at his hand, “‘Homie-up’?”
Kohaku grabbed Rinne’s hand without hesitation, much to Himeru’s surprise. The boy must be more afraid than he was letting on to “homie-up” with Rinne, who mind you had gotten them all into this mess in the first place. But Kohaku held his hand tightly as he nodded towards the hallway leading out of the foyer.
“We should hurry and find Nikki-han.” Kohaku said, steeling himself with narrowed eyes. Himeru sighed and took Kohaku’s hand in turn, neglecting to comment on how hard it was shaking.
So off the bees went, gripping each other’s hands as they single-filed walked down the hallway leading away from the way they had come. The hallway was just as dark as the foyer was, with only faint moonlight seeping in from cracks here and there in the old plaster walls. Strange paintings hung crookedly left and right. Dusty portraits, odd drawings of creatures pinned behind glass. Himeru could have sworn the eyes of a particularly off-putting drawing was watching him. Himeru quickly looked away. If Himeru has learned anything from his various misadventures it was that if he didn’t look at something it simply wasn’t there, whether it was escaping zoo animals or the clearly moving eyes of a disturbing looking animal drawing.
“Hey.” Rinne said after a bit. “Is it just me or is this hallway real long?”
Himeru pauses, then nods after a moment, “Himeru was just thinking the same thing…” He glanced over his shoulder. It was pitch black behind him. He couldn’t even see the fog of his breath in the chill of the night air. For all he knew, they could have been walking for miles.
There was a long stretch of silence that followed, as if none of the bees wanted to acknowledge the growing panic quickly building up inside of them. But then, so quiet that it almost slipped Himeru’s attention, there it was.
Creeeaaaak.
Kohaku’s hand suddenly became a vice around Himeru’s, “Didya hear that?”
Creeeeaaak. Creeeeaaaaak.
That was clear footsteps. There was no mistaking that sound.
“Fuck this shit.” Rinne said and before Himeru could stop him, he yanked on Kohaku’s hand, therefore Himeru’s in turn, and suddenly they were barreling down the hallway in a sprint. And all the while, creak, creaaaak, creeeaaak, was following, rapidly approaching even as Rinne snapped for them to hurry up. Himeru’s heart was thundering in his throat and the slick of Kohaku’s sweaty palm against his own was not helping. Himeru was in back, if whatever was chasing them caught up, he would be the first to go–
I’m sorry Kaname. Himeru thought desperately as the sound of footsteps pounded closer and closer. He was too afraid to look back though. What did that say about Himeru, being unable to confront the face of his killer? He truly was a coward, even in the end.
“There!” Rinne shouted suddenly. There, only a few strides away, was a brilliant light that flooded the hallway. It reflected off the glass of the strange paintings on the wall and Himeru’s previously wobbly steps became more confident now that he could see. Maybe he would survive after all! Kohaku gave him a final tug, screaming something unintelligible, and the bees all went tumbling head over heels into the light.
“Close the door!” Rinne shrieked when they regained their senses, adrenaline rushing through them. Himeru reacted on instinct as the creaaaak echoed in his very bones. He grabbed the door and he slammed it shut behind them, scrambling to press his back against it as he jerked a hand against the knob to keep whatever was chasing them from forcing it open. He panted as he listened for the telltale sound of whatever, or whoever, was chasing them, but the creaking was suddenly gone, just as fast as it had come.
Himeru weakly slid down the door. Kohaku was breathing heavily, hands over his knees. Rinne was flopped on the ground, head thrown back.
“We could have died.” Rinne is the first to speak. “Fuckin’ hell.”
Out of all their wild adventures, Himeru was sure he had never been this afraid. Not when a lion was chasing them down a freeway in a golf cart, or even when attack dogs and prison guards blocked their exit from jail. But now, Himeru’s heart was racing so quickly he worried vaguely it would implode with terror.
Kohaku looked close to tears as he finally straightened. He sniffled, wiping at his eyes angrily as he glanced around, “W–Where are we?”
The light they had seen was actually an overhead kitchen light. Himeru and Rinne were currently sitting on glossy checkered tile and there were smooth wooden counters for what Himeru could only assume was for preparing meals. Pots and pans hung on racks and a shockingly modern oven gleamed against a back wall.
The light flickered and all the bees scrambled together.
“Himeru believes that if Shiina was to be anywhere, it would be here.” Himeru says, pulling out his phone just in case the light went out. He glanced down at it briefly. Great. No service. Another horror movie cliche Himeru was foolishly falling into.
Kohaku slowly backs away from the door Himeru was still pressed against and he asked nervously, “Do ya think whatever that was is gone?”
Himeru hesitates a moment, “Himeru does not hear anything but Himeru thinks we should stay on guard regardless.” He also gets up, but not before dragging a chair over from a circular dining table. He jiggles it under the doorknob and he nods at it as he steps back, satisfied that no ax-welding serial killers could easily get through.
Rinne pushed himself up and he began to investigate the area they were in. There were various pots and pans hanging off of twisted hooks on the wall and as Himeru slowly wandered after the Amagi, his reflection was eerily warped. He looked away, a nervous shudder working its way up his spine.
“Is it just me again,” Rinne said as he paused at the counters. “Or is there a hell of a lotta knives here?”
“Himeru does not think it is just you for once, Amagi.” Himeru replied slowly. Knives of all kinds and shapes were scattered all over the kitchen now that Himeru pauses to examine. Butcher knives stuck in the wood of the tables, dozens of dull butter knives left in heaps. Kohaku flicked a particularly wicked knife pinned in the wall, spider-leg cracks spreading from where the tip disappeared into the drywall as if it had been thrown there.
“Where could Nikki-han have gone?” Kohaku sighs, shaking his head. He places his hands on his hips and he looks around in exasperation. “There’s no way he could have just disappeared like that…”
“Himeru was thinking similarly.” Himeru agreed, coming up alongside the pink haired idol. “We have searched for quite some time now and we still haven't found any signs of Shiina. It is simply not logical to think he was able to get so far in such a short amount of time.”
“Unless,” Rinne said darkly. He stared at one of the knives stuck in the wood. “That pentagram. There was blood on it…”
Kohaku shuddered, “You don’t think Nikki-han…”
“Himeru does not think we should jump to any rash conclusions.” Himeru raised a hand. “Besides, Himeru suspects we would have heard further sounds of–”
Beeeeeep.
All the bees froze, starting. But Himeru was the first to move, his head whipping towards the chair holding the door locked behind them. It was silent, the knob just as he left it. But what had…
“Uh.” Kohaku said slowly. “Guys?”
Rinne and Himeru glanced towards him. The pink-haired idol had a finger raised. He was pointing at the oven, which compared to how old-fashioned the rest of the house was, was shockingly modern. It was made of gleaming silver steel, and what had previously been dark-tinted glass concealing the racks inside, was now glowing a faint orange hue.
“Nobody touched that, right?” Kohaku asked. The bees shook their heads.
“Go on, Amagi.” Himeru gave their leader a nudge in the shoulder. “Himeru recalls that you are the most brave.”
“Hah?!” Rinne yelped, stumbling back with a nervous sounding laugh. “I don’t think so Merumeru!” But before he could get far, Kohaku shoved him forward.
“I thought ya said ya raised no pussies!” Kohaku put his hands back on his hips stubbornly but Himeru could see the way his legs were shaking with fear. “G–Go check it out, Rinne! This is all yer fault anyways, gettin’ us in this shit show.”
“Himeru agrees. Go open the oven, Amagi.”
Rinne gave a whine, giving them both a desperate look. Kohaku gave him another push. Himeru jerked his head towards the oven, not moving an inch. Himeru was not about to get ax-murdered by a creepy looking oven in a creepy kitchen filled with creepy knives. Rinne was a much better candidate for that anyway.
“Really?” Rinne groaned.
Kohaku nodded, “Get on with it!”
Rinne glared at him for a moment before sighing dramatically. He slowly made his way towards the oven and with each step closer to it, Himeru’s heart began to beat a bit faster. The light within the oven illuminated shadows across the ground, twisting in the half light in strange, eerie shapes. It all looked to be the perfect moment for a jumpscare, especially when Rinne hesitantly crouched down in front of the oven. But maybe Himeru has just watched one too many horror movies.
Rinne glanced over his shoulder at the pair, grimacing as he mouthed “do I really gotta?”. Kohaku gave him a shaky thumbs up. Himeru was too busy trying not to cringe with each suspenseful passing moment. Rinne turned back towards the oven and he reached out, taking the handle. And then, very slowly, inch by inch, Rinne opened it.
Blood. There was so, so much blood. It was splattered on the inside walls of the oven, on the ceiling of it. It dripped in horrible globs between the grates above the heat of the flame and fat sizzled viciously as it melted off the burning metal. And on a platter, sat like a turkey roast, was Nikki’s head.
Kohaku was the first to scream this time as Rinne fell back, his hands flying back as if he had just been burned. Himeru felt a terrible bile rising in his throat as he stared in frozen horror. Nikki’s long hair, always so well-kept and brushed, was splayed like a graying halo around the plate he sat upon and from slightly parted lips spilled a deep scarlet, thick and runny as it pooled within the lip of the pan. It spilled over and it crackled amongst the flames.
“N–Nikki?!” Rinne gave a sound that was something between a sob and a choked shriek of terror. He reached out a hand just beyond the heat of the fire as if he wanted to touch Nikki’s bloodied cheek. “Nikki, I–I… I never… never meant for this to happen…” His voice cut off into a keen, his hand coming up to clutch at his forehead. “Fuck… No. Nikki– He can’t be… be…”
Kohaku turned to the side, scrambling at the nearby table as he doubled over. The sound of his retching joined the symphony of hungrily sizzling flames. Himeru looked away, unable to look at the gorey sight any longer. Nikki was dead. Beloved Nikki, with his brain filled with nothing but food, had become the food himself in a scene fit for the horror movie they had found themselves living in. Fitting wasn’t it? That the most joyful of the bunch was killed first, as if to suck the very fighting spirit out of the rest? As if to prepare the rest for the slaughter to come? To show them exactly what would happen if such prey stumbled upon the den of a beast?
Himeru touched Rinne’s shoulder, “Shiina truly was the best of us.”
Rinne shook him off, jerking his shoulder back. He shot to his feet, surprising Himeru to take a step back. Himeru blinked at the red-haired man as he staggered over to the counter.
“Amagi?” Himeru asked hesitantly. He eyed the way the man wrapped a shaky hand around the handle of a particularly vicious looking butcher knife. “What are you doing?”
Rinne yanked the blade from the counter, examining it for a moment before giving a nod, apparently satisfied. Then with a wild grin, he turned towards Himeru.
“They killed our Nikki.” Rinne smiled much too wide for Himeru’s liking. “It's only fair we give em’ a taste of their own medicine, huh?”
“Amagi, wait–” Himeru tried as their leader strolled over to the door. He shoved the chair aside and he threw open the door, revealing the darkness of the hallway they had previously came from. He stepped into it and he threw his arms open, giving a crazed kyahahahaha !
“Come on, bitch!” Rinne screamed into the black void. “Don’t be a pussy! Be a real man and come fight me! Come get a piece of these hands if ya think imma just let ya get away with murder!” He whacked the blade against the wall. “ Fight me!”
“I do not think that is necessary!”
“ Fuck!” Kohaku fell on his ass with a loud swear as light suddenly flooded the area. They came from above, bright as the sun itself, so bright that Himeru had to lift a hand to shield his eyes. Walls began to move, shapes emerging from them, and for a moment Himeru thought it was over, that whatever monster had been stalking them had finally caught up, but as his eyes slowly adjusted, the familiar sight of the neon stagehand jackets came into view and what Himeru had thought were walls were really pieces of ragged-looking plywood set on moving carts. He stood there, bewildered as directors yelled at stagehands to move the counters and for the knives to be repainted with blood. One even walked over and plucked the blade right out of Rinne’s hand– by the blade too, which had been jagged with rust and dried gore, without suffering a single scratch. They simply tucked it under their arm and scurried away as somebody waved for a scene change.
“Excellent acting there, Amagi!” Ibara Saegusa said as he patted a stunned looking Rinne on the shoulder, who was still standing in the hallway– except it wasn’t a hallway anymore now that the directors had called cut! The bees were suddenly standing in the main foyer again. One man tutted for Himeru to lift his feet. Himeru dumbly obeyed as he rolled the dusty rug back beneath his feet.
“Wha–?” Is all Rinne could say, staring at the COSPRO vice president. “But– Nikki?”
“ Nyahaha, you shoulda seen the look on your face there Rinne-kun!” Nikki said, bounding over to the rest of the bees. The platter, which was filled with blood, was hooked around his neck and with each movement, Nikki splattered the gore on the ground. The stagehand that had been fixing the candles gave an outraged sound as Nikki’s blood got all over the pristine white of the candles.
“You’re alive!” Kohaku burst out, pointing at Nikki, who in fact was very much alive, grinning at the rest of the bees with a proud look on his face. “B–But the oven! The blood!”
Nikki stuck a finger in the platter around his neck and he licked it with another nyahaha, “Barbecue sauce! Who knew it made such good fake blood .”
Rinne, for once, still looked too shocked for words, staring between the two. Even Himeru couldn’t find the words.
“You didn’t really think I could let that awful Tenshouin beat Cospro in this year’s halloween haunted house, did you?” Ibara said indignantly, shoving his glasses up his face as the director called for the pentagram to be redrawn on the wall. “I would rather die in the battlefield then let such an awful fiend claim victory!”
Rinne’s mouth was hanging open so wide Himeru vaguely wondered if he would catch one of the spiders a stagehand was releasing to scuttle about the porch floor. This was all fake. Staged. A man with heavy boots going creak, creaaakk, creeeeaaakkk, walked out of the hallway, waving to Ibara as he went outside, calling out his shift. The oven was carried by two women out of the set, replaced instead by the big oak front doors. Even the strobe lights were turned off, instead replaced with the howling of the night wind by industrial fans.
And in the moment, as Himeru stared at the vice president of COSPRO in disbelief, various stage hands walking about shouting at one another to fix various props, what could have been either the adrenaline or the Advil cocktails finally got to him, Himeru took one shaky step, then another, then he properly passed out. He didn’t even feel his head slam into the hardwood, or how his forehead bounced off the fake twisted, rusted nails driven into them.
"Eh?! Meru?" Rinne yelped, scrambling over to the limp body of the blue-haired bee. He whipped around at Ibara. "Ya killed him!"
But Ibara was ignoring him entirely. Instead, he was bustling around a cameraman.
"You got that on camera, didn't you?" He asked desperately, leaning over to see the stagehand's camera. “‘ Idol killed on camera'! That is sure to get our haunted house publicity!" He laughed a rather dark sounding cackle. "And that horrid Tenshouin thought he could get the better of Cospro~"