9th dream / canon update; [gap]
You had a bad dream. Fumbling around in the darkness, you lost Takumi.
As you drift into consciousness, you feel rain on your face. It's a cool, misty rain. You can feel the forest breathe out fresh air. There are people talking around you. You are being carried on a stretcher to a moving van. If you open your eyes a crack, you see them.
White men in black suits with umbrellas and cellphones. It's nighttime and they're wearing sunglasses. They're talking about you. About cleaning up this mess, about the remaining girls, about a fire that started that had to be put out.
You reach out with your mind, try to find the silver threads you used to use to pull the weapons from the other side, to call Gennai to your world. You are groping in the darkness. There is a gap in your heart where Gennai was.
A gap in your heart shaped like a boy with blue eyes.
You are totally awake now. The moon shows her face with shy, flirtatious glances behind heavy clouds, but you already know. You can no longer see the red star approaching.
Why did the star matter so much? Why were you the only one who could see it? Weren't there others?
What was your objective on this mission? You can't hold onto it. You try to reach out to the silver threads, try to make your kunai and shuriken and your Child appear, and you cannot.
It all feels like a bad dream. The creature of metal and steam you conjured, the weapons, the mark on your back, the white-haired boy who laughed, the shadowy monsters you fought. It's slipping away.
You recall you saw Takumi collapse in the woods. He was wearing his stupid green pajamas. You need to get him back to the hospital. He's due for his surgery. The doctors will be cross if they find he was wandering out in the rain. He could catch a cold. Where is he? You have to...
You're being lifted into the back of the moving van. You attempt to sit up. A gloved hand covers yours. The men who are carrying you all wear masks. They are your father's men. They are assassins for the First District. They think you will be their master someday, as your father is their master now.
Where is Takumi?
You attempt to sit up, and one of the men places a hand on your forehead, beckons for you to lay.
"Young Master, please do not struggle. We are you taking home."
Home? No. No. Home is your dorm room, with the sheet pulled through the center. Home is the smell of Takumi baking cake or cooking spaghetti. Home is the place you almost killed him, once, tackling him, placing your hands around his neck.
One of the men with sunglasses is here. He sees you are awake, and shines a light in your face.
"Are you hurt anywhere?"
"Bruised."
"How are you feeling?"
How are you feeling?
Your voice sounds so foreign. So far away and weak. "Where's Takumi, I have to... he collapsed. I need to go to him."
The man with sunglasses speaks into a microphone. "Much like Subject A, Subject B is suffering from severe emotional shock, but no outward injury. It is apparent Subject B has slipped into a similar state of hysterical denial. Will take further notes."
"What the hell, I'm still here, asshole!" You sit up this time, and the world slides sideways for a second. "Tell me where Takumi is! I'm his roommate, dammit! If he doesn't get his medication he could die, and if he's passed out somewhere in the woods he'll catch cold. He needs to be in strong health for his surgery, we have to--"
The man who put his hand on your forehead is now putting his hands on your shoulder. You decide to tolerate this for now. He's one of your father's loyal men, after all. "Young Master, please calm down."
"Young Master? Now this is interesting." The man flicks a card at you. It's your student ID. "Read that back to me."
"Okuzaki Akira. Male. Junior Hi--"
"You're a girl, aren't you Akira?"
The world slides again. The back of this moving van is such a funny little box. Why won't anything sit still inside of it?
You don't know how to answer.
You don't know how to answer at all.
Weren't you a girl once? Your mother scolded you for getting mud on your new patent leather Mary Janes. You are remembering this now. You are remembering a white kimono hidden away in storage.
And there was that awful morning you found blood in your underwear and you thought you were dying.
You thought you were really dying.
Aren't you a--
Takumi saw you shirtless, once. Saw the bandages you bind your chest with. That night, you almost killed him. You had to.
"My father raised me as a man."
Why? He never told you.
"It was to protect me from creeps like you!"
And suddenly you are angry. And the four men who brought you here all have to hold you down, keep your arms pinned behind your back.
"Why do you do this? Why do you make girls fight? Why are you covering it up?"
You can see nothing in this man's expression. Just your own angry reflection glaring back in his sunglasses.
"Because that's how we've always done it."
You feel like you are underwater. No, spinning. Nothing holds still for you and it's moving so fast and so slow. All you know is--
"I have to get to Takumi! He needs to rest! He finally decided to go ahead with the surgery! We need to get him back to the hospital!"
Your are held fast. Held hopeless. And you feel so tired and indistinct.
Hey, Akira. I made some extra dinner--
He's still alive. He's wearing a pink apron. He's carrying a pot of stew.
"Your foot. Your foot on my side of the room! What're you thinking, doin' something wussy like cooking?"
"Young Master, please. Just be still."
The men in black masks lay you down in the van. They hold your arms and legs to keep you from thrashing as you scream and curse them out. And you hear Takumi's voice so vividly, he can't be gone, can't be gone, can't be gone.
I don't mind being bound to you, because you were the one who restored my will to live.
"You moron!"
There's something like a perverse grin trapped on the face of the glasses man.
"Just out of curiousity, do you consider yourself a man or a woman?"
A man or a woman? Which one are you?
Which one are you?
All I ever wanted to be was...
"I consider myself to be... Fuka Academy's secret ninja guardian."
You are tired. Your head hurts. You close your eyes.
You think you hear your father's voice, somewhere far away. You bury yourself in the damp, cold darkness.
When you awaken, you're in your chest binding and underwear, in one of the rooms of your father's house. Your hands are tied behind you, around a post.
You stare outside at the moon. She still pulls a high collar of clouds around her face, but you can see her beauty.
The moon getting closer.
The world is ending soon.
There is a gap in your heart shaped like Takumi.
You think:
Father tied you up so you wouldn't kill yourself, probably.
That's too bad.
[Akira sits up suddenly, eyes wide. He's not the least bit sleepy.]
That wasn't...
As you drift into consciousness, you feel rain on your face. It's a cool, misty rain. You can feel the forest breathe out fresh air. There are people talking around you. You are being carried on a stretcher to a moving van. If you open your eyes a crack, you see them.
White men in black suits with umbrellas and cellphones. It's nighttime and they're wearing sunglasses. They're talking about you. About cleaning up this mess, about the remaining girls, about a fire that started that had to be put out.
You reach out with your mind, try to find the silver threads you used to use to pull the weapons from the other side, to call Gennai to your world. You are groping in the darkness. There is a gap in your heart where Gennai was.
A gap in your heart shaped like a boy with blue eyes.
You are totally awake now. The moon shows her face with shy, flirtatious glances behind heavy clouds, but you already know. You can no longer see the red star approaching.
Why did the star matter so much? Why were you the only one who could see it? Weren't there others?
What was your objective on this mission? You can't hold onto it. You try to reach out to the silver threads, try to make your kunai and shuriken and your Child appear, and you cannot.
It all feels like a bad dream. The creature of metal and steam you conjured, the weapons, the mark on your back, the white-haired boy who laughed, the shadowy monsters you fought. It's slipping away.
You recall you saw Takumi collapse in the woods. He was wearing his stupid green pajamas. You need to get him back to the hospital. He's due for his surgery. The doctors will be cross if they find he was wandering out in the rain. He could catch a cold. Where is he? You have to...
You're being lifted into the back of the moving van. You attempt to sit up. A gloved hand covers yours. The men who are carrying you all wear masks. They are your father's men. They are assassins for the First District. They think you will be their master someday, as your father is their master now.
Where is Takumi?
You attempt to sit up, and one of the men places a hand on your forehead, beckons for you to lay.
"Young Master, please do not struggle. We are you taking home."
Home? No. No. Home is your dorm room, with the sheet pulled through the center. Home is the smell of Takumi baking cake or cooking spaghetti. Home is the place you almost killed him, once, tackling him, placing your hands around his neck.
One of the men with sunglasses is here. He sees you are awake, and shines a light in your face.
"Are you hurt anywhere?"
"Bruised."
"How are you feeling?"
How are you feeling?
Your voice sounds so foreign. So far away and weak. "Where's Takumi, I have to... he collapsed. I need to go to him."
The man with sunglasses speaks into a microphone. "Much like Subject A, Subject B is suffering from severe emotional shock, but no outward injury. It is apparent Subject B has slipped into a similar state of hysterical denial. Will take further notes."
"What the hell, I'm still here, asshole!" You sit up this time, and the world slides sideways for a second. "Tell me where Takumi is! I'm his roommate, dammit! If he doesn't get his medication he could die, and if he's passed out somewhere in the woods he'll catch cold. He needs to be in strong health for his surgery, we have to--"
The man who put his hand on your forehead is now putting his hands on your shoulder. You decide to tolerate this for now. He's one of your father's loyal men, after all. "Young Master, please calm down."
"Young Master? Now this is interesting." The man flicks a card at you. It's your student ID. "Read that back to me."
"Okuzaki Akira. Male. Junior Hi--"
"You're a girl, aren't you Akira?"
The world slides again. The back of this moving van is such a funny little box. Why won't anything sit still inside of it?
You don't know how to answer.
You don't know how to answer at all.
Weren't you a girl once? Your mother scolded you for getting mud on your new patent leather Mary Janes. You are remembering this now. You are remembering a white kimono hidden away in storage.
And there was that awful morning you found blood in your underwear and you thought you were dying.
You thought you were really dying.
Aren't you a--
Takumi saw you shirtless, once. Saw the bandages you bind your chest with. That night, you almost killed him. You had to.
"My father raised me as a man."
Why? He never told you.
"It was to protect me from creeps like you!"
And suddenly you are angry. And the four men who brought you here all have to hold you down, keep your arms pinned behind your back.
"Why do you do this? Why do you make girls fight? Why are you covering it up?"
You can see nothing in this man's expression. Just your own angry reflection glaring back in his sunglasses.
"Because that's how we've always done it."
You feel like you are underwater. No, spinning. Nothing holds still for you and it's moving so fast and so slow. All you know is--
"I have to get to Takumi! He needs to rest! He finally decided to go ahead with the surgery! We need to get him back to the hospital!"
Your are held fast. Held hopeless. And you feel so tired and indistinct.
Hey, Akira. I made some extra dinner--
He's still alive. He's wearing a pink apron. He's carrying a pot of stew.
"Your foot. Your foot on my side of the room! What're you thinking, doin' something wussy like cooking?"
"Young Master, please. Just be still."
The men in black masks lay you down in the van. They hold your arms and legs to keep you from thrashing as you scream and curse them out. And you hear Takumi's voice so vividly, he can't be gone, can't be gone, can't be gone.
I don't mind being bound to you, because you were the one who restored my will to live.
"You moron!"
There's something like a perverse grin trapped on the face of the glasses man.
"Just out of curiousity, do you consider yourself a man or a woman?"
A man or a woman? Which one are you?
Which one are you?
All I ever wanted to be was...
"I consider myself to be... Fuka Academy's secret ninja guardian."
You are tired. Your head hurts. You close your eyes.
You think you hear your father's voice, somewhere far away. You bury yourself in the damp, cold darkness.
When you awaken, you're in your chest binding and underwear, in one of the rooms of your father's house. Your hands are tied behind you, around a post.
You stare outside at the moon. She still pulls a high collar of clouds around her face, but you can see her beauty.
The moon getting closer.
The world is ending soon.
There is a gap in your heart shaped like Takumi.
You think:
Father tied you up so you wouldn't kill yourself, probably.
That's too bad.
[Akira sits up suddenly, eyes wide. He's not the least bit sleepy.]
That wasn't...