Work Text:
so for your arrogance
and your ruthlessness
I am swept back
where dead lichens drip
dead cinders upon moss of ash;
so for your arrogance
I am broken at last,
I who had lived unconscious,
who was almost forgot;
if you had let me wait
I had grown from listlessness
into peace,
if you had let me rest with the dead,
I had forgot you
and the past.
— "Eurydice" by H.D
/
i: dukkha
There was something almost foreboding in the air, almost seemingly at odds with the lightness of the crisp autumn air.
Mizuki felt the heaviness intensely. It was the sort of unease that would usually send jolts of ice down their spine, making their instincts blare with the urge to retreat.
As it was, they rested their head against the cool glass of the train window instead, letting the smooth vibrations of the train lull them into a state of mindless inattention. Eyes half-lidded, their vision of the world faded gradually into a blur of amber hues from the autumn foliage.
At 4pm on a Thursday afternoon, they were one of the few stragglers on a train bound away from the bustling district of Tokyo. The train ticket crumpled in their hand was folded and refolded with meticulous precision. There was nothing else to do; they hadn't brought their phone, or any other means to entertainment to occupy their time.
The quiet ordinance of the motions was a countdown of its own, resembling the ticking second hand of a clock. Left corner folded, turn, refold. Right corner folded, turn, refold. Unravel the paper. Do it all over again.
It was evidence of passing time. The rhythmical lull of predictable motion as the quotidian world around them marched onwards to a steady beat. In hindsight, perhaps the juxtaposition was only perceived as such because of how it felt like Mizuki alone had stopped moving forward with everyone else.
It was a somewhat lonely feeling. Any other day, it might've made Mizuki feel sick.
There wasn't much else to do on the train but think, even if they were tired of thinking and their thoughts only ever brought them in circles. It was an inescapable web spun with threads of gilded promises and honeyed lies. One they couldn't untangle themselves from, nor truly ever leave behind.
Overhead, the drone of a train announcement signalled the end of their ride.
Mizuki stood, smoothening their skirt out. The crumpled ticket in their hand crinkled slightly as they jammed it into their skirt pocket.
The slide of train doors behind them was accompanied by a sense of finality, heavy enough to make every ensuing step forward a herculean task.
The further they ventured away from the station, the more the murmurs of the sleepy town gradually began to give way to roaring crickets and chirping birdsong over their head.
Mizuki counted their steps in time with their breaths, stumbling unsteadily through overgrown roots and dense undergrowth. The ragged terrain gave way to open roads eventually, smoothening into flat dirt paths under a canopy of trees. A tunnel revealed itself in the midst of the tiny clearing; an expanse of darkness leading into the distant void.
This was it.
Mizuki smiled. "Ah... It's really been a year since then, hasn't it?"
They took ambling steps forward, dragging a hand over the cold walls of the tunnel, heading towards what might've once been considered the start of the journey.
The darkness was a momentary respite. There was no one there to look at them, and they were spared the cruelty of having to peer upon the most despicable parts of themselves they'd tried to be rid of, time and again.
They still couldn't understand how it had all gone so wrong, so quickly and suddenly. It was likely something they would never understand, no matter how much they screamed or begged or cried.
In Mizuki's kindest dreams, they dreamt of a sunlit world where everything was quiet and warm. Cozy afternoons sat at the corner booth of a family restaurant. Laughter, electric and bubbly, easier than anything else they could think to do.
In those dreams, they asked Ena, "Do you think it's okay for me to deserve this?"
Perhaps it was kindness, perhaps it was mercy, that they never once got an answer.
All they remembered was the after that always accompanied those fleeting dreams—the sunlight streaming through their half-opened blinds, the tears in their eyes, and the painful, agonising indefensibility of being clawed open and seen.
It was the view from the other side. The final step out from the inky darkness, the final push of courage to be able to stand proudly in the sun.
Something unfathomable. Something cruel.
...If only it were possible to go back to the happier days; the simpler ones, where they were once all so very happy. Even if it were only a lie; an illusion preserved through honeyed words and sugar-spun promises.
Mizuki hesitated, and turned back to face the darkness. They hadn't moved just yet, but their indecision had sealed their fate all the same, sweeping away any semblance of courage they might've garnered to move on.
In the darkness, a spectre from the past watched them with world-weary eyes, smiling as they whispered, "Do you think you deserve mercy, after everything you've done?"
And— Ah. Mizuki thought. So it's like that, in the end.
The visage of the spectre fractured and broke. With it, echoed the sounds of phantom laughter from a trip taken all those months ago. It sounded like shattering glass; the remnants of what Mizuki had tried to bury before, smothered under the weight of warmth and gilded lies.
A ticking time bomb that was never meant to have lasted this long.
It was a story foretold from the very beginning, with its ending set in stone. It was only ever going to end this way.
Fear slipped further away from them with every step forward.
Mizuki crossed the threshold with the pieces of themselves once left in the void; fragmented stardust dissipating into wisps of ash, sugar-spun lies bitter on their lips.
/
"But to get along so well that you want to be together with them even when they die, isn't that amazing?"
"Ahaha, well it's not like I have anyone like that in particular either!"
/
ii: samsara
The phone booth sat innocuously at the edge of the dirt path, a distance away from the secluded mountain town they had trekked towards.
It was a tiny thing with a slightly rusted door handle, transparent walls lined with a few pasted flyers. The numbers on the call pad were faded. The drone of the dial tone, muffled from the crackling static, greeted them as they pressed the handset to their ear.
It was childish desire that spurred Mizuki to dig through their pockets for the last of their small change. Every coin slotted in was a chime from the execution bell, born from the unrelenting desire to hear Ena's voice again.
Slowly, they inputted the digits of Ena's phone number, staring at their trembling fingertips, exhaling shakily. It was the last thing they had thought to do before leaving; a number learnt by rote, each digit carefully sounded out and memorised with meticulous care.
Ena picked up instantly. Her voice was strained, holding an edge of weariness one might regard a caller from an unknown number with. In typical Ena fashion, she snapped impatiently, "Hello? Who is this?"
Mizuki couldn't say a word. Still, they listened, drinking in the sound of Ena's voice. Their grip was white-knuckled, tight enough to hurt.
The blinking numbers on the screen display stared back at them. 01:30... 01:29... 01:28... Their non-answer dragged the silence on, static filling the space between. It was shameful, unbearably so; an undoing fitting for a coward unable to tell the truth, right to the very end.
"Hello?" Ena said again. "Is anyone there?"
They let out a brief, shaky exhale. It was hardly audible over the drone of the static, an unexpressed plea drowned out by the roaring of their heart. Their trembling hands struggled to keep their hold on the hand set. Surely, this much was enough. Surely, this was the most they deserved.
"You... Are you Mizuki?"
Impossibly, time froze, and the world stuttered to a halt.
The waver in Ena's voice parted through the sea of crackling static and waves of roaring anguish, cutting right into the core of their being. Mizuki had not anticipated being caught—let alone being acknowledged by name.
Unwittingly, caught entirely off-guard, they startled. A single step back had their shoulder slamming loudly into the door behind them. Their anonymity was torn away with ruthless abandon. Fear rekindled itself in their raw, aching heart. All at once, Mizuki knew: their cover had been blown.
Sure enough, when Ena spoke again, her voice was hoarse, desperate with hope. "Mizuki, it's you, isn't it?"
Even with no one watching, Mizuki shook their head. They didn't want to be them. They didn't want to be here. Squeezing their eyes shut, the world disappeared behind a familiar blanket of darkness. Even so, their limbs remained impossibly locked. They couldn't move, frozen in place. Their breathing ran ragged, loudly and uglily, their heart pounding in their ears.
"You don't have to say anything. I understand if you don't want to talk to me right now. But just for a minute, won't you listen to me, please?" Ena begged.
Mizuki shuddered, but didn't move. The length of the silence strained as tight as the burning ache in their chest.
Ena took in the pause, then finally said at last. "Ever since that day, I kept thinking—if I had said something different, if I'd reacted in any other way, maybe you'd still be here with us."
There was no trace of resentment in her tone; only that familiar, painfully earnest sincerity, one that layered her words with nothing but vulnerable heartbreak.
"Your secret... Our promise... That kindness that you told me you hate... None of it matters to me right now! Everything else doesn't matter—because the most important thing to me is that I want to stay friends with you, Mizuki! So please—let's talk, okay? You're important to me. I don't want to lose you."
It was everything Mizuki could possible hope for. It was everything that they were terrified of. Even now, the irony was twisting.
A future where Mizuki could stay with everyone else was something they had never dared to want. The happiness they felt spending time with everyone was sometimes so painful it was hard to live with.
It was why listening to Ena like this hurt. The idea of being wanted, the possibility of being able to stay—it made their chest tighten with unspeakable agony.
Something unfathomable. Impossibly cruel. Like the tears in their eyes after a half-forgotten dream, the relief of being able to bask in the ignorance of the nebulous in-between.
Because if Ena and everyone else found out about the truth— if they knew—
"You have supplementary classes today, right? Won't you come talk to me? I'll wait for you, okay?"
The truth was that—
I can't face you.
Even after all that, I still can't do it.
—Mizuki couldn't imagine a way out of this. The reality they were faced with was terrifying in the most immeasurable ways. Maybe it had been set in stone from the very beginning. A Sisyphean task—their comeuppance for always running and running and running.
For wanting, perhaps, something that was never meant to be theirs.
I'm sorry, Ena.
Goodbye.
The dial tone clicked as they dropped the handset back into its holder. The faded numbers on the display flickered, then died. For a while, there was nothing but silence in the booth, suffocating and cold.
Then, Mizuki began to walk.
Their shadow loomed darkly against the backdrop of the burning sun.
/
They dreamt, sometimes, of the worlds where they might've been braver. Or worlds where Shinonome Ena had waited until the end, that fated day on the school rooftop. A kinder world, a more cruel one. A world where Ena had heard their shamefully whispered confessional, and refused to let them run.
In that world, she smiled at Mizuki, speaking with nothing but warmth in her voice. "Thank you for telling me your secret."
When she entangled her hands with their own, the imperceptible tremor in her fingertips would give away the turmoil she refused to show them. She would make them a promise to always be friends. She would promise of nothing needing to change.
It was in those dreams where Mizuki would wonder if this was the mercy they'd always begged to be granted. The happiness they'd always wanted. A kind, kind dream, one where Ena smiled and laughed at all the right times, and said all the right things.
It was a reality that was everything they wished for. The perfect world. A dream Mizuki never wanted to end, yet was terrified of its fruition, when they woke up with tears in their eyes at its sheer vividness, so realistic it almost seemed to have come to pass.
But time and again, the tears in their eyes betrayed the truth—that it was fear that reared its ugly head in place of hope in that perfect, make-believe world. Sickening and cloying, a parasite they couldn't be rid of.
The terror was insurmountable. That was when the line between their dreams and reality would begin to blur.
Wake up. Mizuki would think, even after blinking the sleep out of their eyes, even as they sat in sunlit cafes, basking in the laughter, the ease of it all. None of this is real. This is not the world you know. This is what the world will never be. You cannot trust this. Wake up. Wake up. WAKE UP—
/
In the end, even as Mizuki wished so dearly to stay, to see the flowers again with everyone, to hold their head high without any secrets or the shame curdling in their gut, the truth was that they just couldn't bear it: a reality where they were happy, a future where they stayed.
Quietly, that spectre from the past watched them with world-weary eyes.
"The perfect world you wish for isn't one in which you stay with everyone," it whispered. A confessional. An accusation. "It's one where no one finds out who you really are."
They dreamt, sometimes, of worlds where Shinonome Ena would hold their hands with tender, unabashed care. Making a promise to always be friends. Of nothing ever needing to change.
In those dreams, Ena no longer looked them in the eyes. Even with all the right things said. Even when laughing at all the right times.
Even then, there was an inexplicable sense of relief. Sickening, twisted anticipation.
They could survive this, they would think. They had survived this, countless times and more. Because it was all the same anyway. It was always meant to turn out this way.
"What a joke." The spectre (the monster) would laugh then, watching them with curved, crinkling eyes. "You never trusted her at all."
("Do you think you deserve mercy, after everything you've done?" )
/
The steps leading towards the abandoned shrine were dusty, with moss overgrown on the cobbled path.
"Haunted by sisters who died apart, huh?"
Mizuki recalled the story they had told the last time they'd come here. Clasping their hands as they reached the threshold of the shrine, they mused. "Haha... And last time, Ena was so adamant about Otouto-kun not coming back as an evil spirit too."
Mizuki had never been particularly devout, save for the customary New Year and Obon shrine visits. Even so, they wrung their hands together and prayed.
They didn't know what they were looking for, or if there was still a point to everything. Coming here, wishing for things to change, for that fundamentally flawed part of their being to perhaps be wiped away. Was it in hopes of salvation? Of mercy?
Mizuki's hands, clasped in a facsimile of a prayer, began to shake.
In another world, a kinder one, do you think I could have stayed?
It was wishful thinking; the sort of idealism that Mizuki thought they'd outgrown a long, long time ago. Still, even then, they couldn't help it. More than anything, even as they stood alone on the dusty steps of an abandoned shrine, the prayer remained on the tip of their lips like a shameful confessional.
They laughed humourlessly at that, dropping their clasped hands. The thought wasn't particularly funny, but there was poeticism to it, perhaps. The irony of cowardice; the knowledge of having come full circle.
If it could've been real, if it were possible to imagine, then it would've been nice to live in a reality where Akiyama Mizuki's wish of a perfect world was that of being seen and understood, of being able to stand by everyone's side without any more secrets to hide.
Maybe then it wouldn't be so hard to think of Ena's promise, and Mizuki wouldn't always be waiting for the other shoe to drop, for everything to end.
A world where living wasn't so agonisingly painful, where they could wish to never want to wake up or emerge from the dreams where they are wanted and loved, even whilst being torn open and peered upon, unbearably so.
Perhaps it was always meant to turn out this way.
Reaching into their pocket, Mizuki pulled out their crumpled train ticket and a single, compact blade.
They sat for a long, long time, folding the train ticket into the likeness of a paper crane, before setting it gently onto the corner of saisen box.
/
"...Hopes and expectations, huh. Then perhaps this was for the best. Being alone, without anything to hold you back. Things are a lot more bearable that way."
/
("Ah... I want to disappear.")
/
iii. nirvana
The end that arrived all too soon came in a whisper. Perfectly mundane in a deceivingly quiet sort of way; so peaceful it felt almost too good to be true.
The tree in front of their eyes was nothing short of breathtaking. The sprawling tree branches with fiery red leaves were resplendent under the glow of the setting sun.
("For something's end to be so pretty... it's unfair.")
("Ah... That's right... It's a bit unfair, how pretty they are.")
Each step forward was steady and sure. Time measured itself through those slow, deliberate increments. A faint breeze swept across their loosened side-tail, freeing wisps of hair as they marched forward to the echoes of a solemn funeral dirge.
("Hey everyone! Today was super fun, so next year, too... Next year...")
The sensation of relief was dark, so deep that it felt like they could fall into it and never crawl out.
Mizuki stared wordlessly at the sight in front of them. Their steps halted, having finally reached their intended destination. Slowly, they set their hand on the gnarly tree trunk.
The silence in the air was interrupted only by the sound of their faint breathing. Everything else was still; the world was waiting with bated breaths, perhaps wondering what they would choose next.
Unravelling the ribbon from their hair, they tied it in swift motions to a low hanging branch of the sprawling autumn tree.
I was here, once. I lived, once. I wonder if that's okay, for someone like me?
In the quiet scenery with no one else watching them, they sank to the ground and leaned against the tree.
The leaves overhead were a vibrant fiery red. It was different from the soft pink of the flowers that had captivated them all those months ago, but no less pretty or melancholic. Autumn—the season of change—signalled the imminent arrival of cold, dreary winter. Soon, all the warm memories Mizuki had made would fade into nothing but dissipating wisps of stardust and ash.
Perhaps that was kindness. Cruelty in the most mildest of forms—mercy, despite everything, in light of a fate they deserved, from the very core of their being.
Casting their eyes down to their hands, Mizuki blinked sluggishly as their fingers loosened their white-knuckled grip, dropping the blade under the glow of dying sunlight. A steady trail of red began to drip onto the ground beneath them, just as vibrant as the flourishing autumn leaves.
It was evidence of passing time. The rhythmic lull of predictable motion. The quotidian world would move forward, with or without them, and soon, the encroaching winter would help the ice creeping into their veins freeze even the most deep-seated and rotten parts of their being.
Maybe then, the mercy which they had been granted time and again would finally be easier to swallow.
A world where we're happy... A world where I...
They laughed softly, fond despite everything. "...I wonder if everyone'll come again when the cherry blossoms start blooming. Maybe I'll come back as a bird. A crane or something. That would be fun, wouldn't it? It would be fun to see everyone again."
It was a nice thought, weaving into existence a warm and kind dream they leaned into immediately.
Gradually, Mizuki's eyes slipped shut, and they retreated slowly into a safe haven the cold was unable to reach, even as the world around them began to spiderweb and crack.
...A perfect world where Akiyama Mizuki no longer exists.
Wasn't that such a nice thought?
Sleep came with ease from whence it had once eluded them before.
They sank into the darkness, and dreamt of a world where they would never wake.
"—MIZUKI!"
/
iv. satori
When they opened their eyes, it was to a fantastical dream; a reality so vividly picturesque they hardly dared to think it real.
A girl, red-faced and sobbing, knelt by their side. Her screams were muffled through the cotton in their ears. In her hands, a single paper crane—slightly crushed, as though having been held in a tightened grip for a prolonged period of time.
The sight of it was dizzying. Agonisingly painful, unbearably so.
A dream spilled into the waking world. A phantasmagoria of unreality and broken promises; an impossible presence haloed under the backdrop of the setting sun. Ena, who was good and kind and merciful—whom they had wanted to let go of, selfishly, shamefully, for their own foolish desire.
Overhead, a faded ribbon fluttered in the faint autumn breeze. Unwittingly, it brought a pang of aching want. That ever-present desire, the loneliness that refused to fade. The twined ribbon was like the illusory noose corded around their neck; the burn of Ena's hands, trembling and cold, clinging tightly to their wrists, holding them prisoner and captive.
The tears came quickly and shamefully.
Even now, at the end of the line, that fundamentally broken part of them remained even as the rest of them faded into distant starlight.
In every dream, in every world, Ena was there.
In the end, all Mizuki could say was this: "I'm sorry that I lied."