Mannequin Ch. 12: The Shadows
In late honor of Sakurai Sho's birthday, I have uploaded all of the chapters of Mannequin to date-- including this new one! I was given a full-time position at the newspaper over Christmas, so I no longer have to work two part-time jobs and finally have more time to write and so forth (and I've dealt with some peronal issues). I know this was a long time coming, but it means a lot to me and I hope anyone who reads it, enjoys it.
Anyway, here we go!
Title: Mannequin
Pairings: Matsumoto Jun x Sakurai Sho, Ohno Satoshi x Ninomiya Kazunari (and more as the story progresses)
Rating: NC-17
When Sakurai's father sends him to manage a small costume shop, he doesn't understand why he's being punished. He doesn't belong there-- he belongs in the heart of the city, leading his department and working his way towards being company president. But somehow he finds the queer little shop more intriguing than he anticipated, and he's especially drawn to one of the shop's mannequins. Which is pathetic, he knows, because the thing is an inanimate object...
Or is it?
The Shadows
The sound was sharp and high, Aiba’s scream. And unlike Jun’s, who screamed from fear and confusion as he collapsed to the ground with Sho, Aiba’s shriek pierced the night with this horrible edge of anger and desperate mania.
It was rage, and no sound so unnatural to Aiba had ever passed his lips before, or after. From those full lips, as they panted shallow breaths between the screams, slipped a blackness. Like a long exhale of the darkest smoke, it continued to cascade down his chin towards the ground, dispersing in tendrils into the air as it went. Aiba had never looked so pale, and his eyes had never looked so dark-- and yet they shone. Glassy and bright.
“Oh god,” Nino’s voice was raw and tight; concern and fear hissed through tightly clenched teeth, “Aiba, what’s wrong? What’s happening?”
Ohno and Nino had both crouched, instinctively, when Sho dropped like a rock, but now no one knew where to look first. The sound of the festival around them was drowned out by the sound Aiba was making, and Jun’s concerned shouting that turned into choking sobs over Sho.
The blackness was rolling in waves on the ground, almost like a mist, and the festival lights and crowd were lost behind it. As the darkness edged closer to the four on the ground, Ohno felt himself starting to panic. He remembered this. This was something he had seen before.
“Aiba!” Nino screeched, eyes brimming with fear as he watched the darkness pour out of his friend. Something was very, very wrong.
“Shhh, Nino!” Ohno hissed and clutched Nino’s hair as he pulled the younger man’s face against his neck so he could speak into his ear, “That’s not Aiba. Sho was right-Sho was right.”
“What is it then?!”
“The shadows,” Jun replied, tears running down his face, “Oh God, the shadows.”
“They got Aiba… Oh shit, look at his feet!” Nino choked, his own tears streaming.
Jun and Ohno both gasped as they looked, Jun’s hand flying to his mouth and Sho’s head falling to his lap. Horrified, they stared as Aiba’s feet were no longer touching the ground. With the blackness swirling around him, Aiba was rising slowly-and his skin! His skin, obviously paler, suddenly looked sickly and…no, Ohno blinked furiously, but he couldn’t deny what he saw-Aiba’s skin was rippling. It was almost as if…as if something was moving underneath.
Nino saw it, too, and immediately gagged. Ohno took Nino by the elbows and pulled him to his feet, then turned to Jun.
“We need to get out of here.”
Jun nodded, trembling all over, “Help me with Sho.”
Ohno grabbed Sho’s legs, noting how stiff he was, and Jun looped his arms beneath Sho’s armpits. It was terrifying how the man who had been so anxiously energetic moments ago was now nothing more than dead weight in their arms.
“NOOOOO---“ screeched Aiba, his voice hysterical and metallically high.
Not looking back, they scrambled into the shadows as Aiba screamed behind them, desperate to escape. Nino whipped out his phone, using his flash, but it was useless. The light couldn’t cut through the darkness.
They surged forward, away from the sound, but when the shadows parted, they were back where they started, in front of where Aiba’s family’s stand should be.
“What?!” Nino whispered, terrified.
For a second, it appeared that Aiba was gone, but then Ohno gave a shout as Aiba’s distorted face appeared just inches in front of his nose. Ohno caught a sour, musty smell and stumbled backwards, but Aiba floated right after him, his face right in Ohno’s.
“Satoshi…” Nino cried, but when he ran forward, Aiba’s arm shout out and shoved him away. Sobbing, Nino fell hard on the ground.
Aiba’s mouth split into a grotesque grin that kept growing wider as his glassy eyes bore into Ohno. The shadows seemed to thicken-practically streaming out of every pore on Aiba’s body, and then, in a completely unfamiliar voice, Aiba began to giggle. The giggling grew in volume, and then there was this tight sound-like when someone over fills a balloon.
And then, as the three trapped by the shadows stared in horror, Aiba burst.
His body just exploded, and fine bits of flesh, blood, and gore rained down as Jun and Nino screamed. Ohno, who had been so close to Aiba, collapsed to the ground and wiped furiously at his face. His hands, just like the rest of him, were saturated with blood and carnage, so no matter how much Ohno wiped, he just couldn’t get clean.
Ohno started to dry heave and hyperventilate, and Nino flew to his side. They almost didn’t see the dark, shadowy figure hovering high above their little clearing in the shadows.
Ohno wasn’t willing to open his eyes while he still had a bloody mess of Aiba on them. Nino was doing his best to clear the gore from his face, so it was Jun who first noticed the tendrils of shadows falling from the sky. He followed the darkness upwards until he saw it, crawling in sporadic angles across the night sky, clawing at nothing but air-- and suddenly, Jun found it hard to breathe. Heart racing, Jun couldn’t make a sound. All he could do is thrust his hand up to point, and as he did, he noticed there was a dark blue circle on his arm.
Jun couldn’t think about the spell at that moment, except to acknowledge defeat. He saw that circle and immediately accepted his fate. There was no way he could break it now. Splattered with blood, Jun wasn’t even sure he’d live long enough to turn back into a mannequin after his 24 hours were up.
Fear was consuming all of Jun’s attention as the shadowy creature above him continued its frenzied crawl across the sky, maybe fifteen feet above their heads. Desperately, reflexively, Jun shook Sho’s shoulders.
Nino noticed Jun pointing, looked up, and nearly screamed. Ohno, hearing the strangled sound, made one last swipe with his arm across his eyes and, blinking furiously, opened them. Jun saw the tremor that wracked Ohno’s body, and he saw how his friend continued shaking even as Nino clung to him. The shadows were thicker around them now-- the clearing felt smaller, like the shadows were closing in. There was no wind. There wasn’t even a breeze. There was just the ink-black shadows and the yurei.
The dark creature croaked, teeth gleaming, and Jun saw the exact second its eyes honed in on Sakurai. Within seconds, it was scrambling down the sky. The shadows billowed around it’s thin form while pale, crooked limbs tore through the air. Ohno and Nino shouted something, perhaps they wanted to run back into the darkness, but Jun couldn’t move.
Fear sluiced ice through his veins as Jun’s eyes tracked the monster’s desent, and at the last second, fear won out and he looked down Sho in his lap. Jun needed Sho. Sho would protect him right now, Jun knew it. Sho wouldn’t let the yurei get him. . . If only Sho hadn’t eaten that dango.
If only Jun had believed him.
Sho’s lips were turning dark, his cheeks sallow.
“He’s dead, you know,” a voice whispered in Jun’s ear, causing the man to jolt both in fear of the creature and of what she said. His heart immedately cried out that she was wrong, but--
“Look at him,” Jun could feel the musty puff of the yurei’s breath on his neck as it spoke,, “His chest no longer rises. He’s grown stiff and loses color… Give him to me.”
“No!” Jun barked, voice shaking, “I won’t let you have him.”
Still unwilling to look at it outright, Jun shuddered, nearly crying out, as a sharp, bony hand ran an appreciative line down his back.
“His soul. It’s mine.” The voice was high and went in and out as it rose in volume, “He’s not perfect… Not you…not you... but I need it.”
“No…” Jun croaked, squeezing Sho against him.
“Can’t you feel it, Jun?” the yurei sing-songed, “He takes no breaths. His heart does not beat. . . And he’s grown cold, hasn’t he?”
Jun shook his head, violently, but… His body was suddenly aware of how cold Sho had become. He tried, for a second, to feel Sho’s pulse but it was impossible. Jun’s own heart was racing too hard-- that’s what he told himself as the yurei started wheezing in what Jun recognized must be laughter.
“You’ve lost him, Jun,” the voice was back in his ear, hissing gleefully, “Give him to me, like a nice boy.”
Jun held his breath. Closed his eyes. The monster was so close.
“Don’t make me take him from you, Jun!” the yurei’s voice grew darkly threatening, “It would pain me to ruin such perfect beauty.”
Jun cracked his eyes open to peek in the direction where Ohno and Nino were, he was so afraid. Sho felt dead in his arms. What should he do? What could he do? But all Jun saw was black shadows. Nino and Ohno were no where to be seen.
“You don’t remember the screams, Jun?” the yurei sounded like it was losing patience, “Do you want to scream Jun?”
“....no…” Jun choked, “please no…”
“He is dead, Jun. Give me the corpse, or I will take it from you, and you will not enjoy it.”
What should he do? What should he do? Sho was dead. Sho was dead--
He was.
Jun felt himself accepting it. Sho was cold and stiff and dead in his arms, and Jun did not want to die. Jun didn’t want to scream. He was so scared. He… felt his grip loosening on Sho’s body.
“I’m so sorry, Sho. I’m so sorry.”
Anyway, here we go!
Title: Mannequin
Pairings: Matsumoto Jun x Sakurai Sho, Ohno Satoshi x Ninomiya Kazunari (and more as the story progresses)
Rating: NC-17
When Sakurai's father sends him to manage a small costume shop, he doesn't understand why he's being punished. He doesn't belong there-- he belongs in the heart of the city, leading his department and working his way towards being company president. But somehow he finds the queer little shop more intriguing than he anticipated, and he's especially drawn to one of the shop's mannequins. Which is pathetic, he knows, because the thing is an inanimate object...
Or is it?
The Shadows
The sound was sharp and high, Aiba’s scream. And unlike Jun’s, who screamed from fear and confusion as he collapsed to the ground with Sho, Aiba’s shriek pierced the night with this horrible edge of anger and desperate mania.
It was rage, and no sound so unnatural to Aiba had ever passed his lips before, or after. From those full lips, as they panted shallow breaths between the screams, slipped a blackness. Like a long exhale of the darkest smoke, it continued to cascade down his chin towards the ground, dispersing in tendrils into the air as it went. Aiba had never looked so pale, and his eyes had never looked so dark-- and yet they shone. Glassy and bright.
“Oh god,” Nino’s voice was raw and tight; concern and fear hissed through tightly clenched teeth, “Aiba, what’s wrong? What’s happening?”
Ohno and Nino had both crouched, instinctively, when Sho dropped like a rock, but now no one knew where to look first. The sound of the festival around them was drowned out by the sound Aiba was making, and Jun’s concerned shouting that turned into choking sobs over Sho.
The blackness was rolling in waves on the ground, almost like a mist, and the festival lights and crowd were lost behind it. As the darkness edged closer to the four on the ground, Ohno felt himself starting to panic. He remembered this. This was something he had seen before.
“Aiba!” Nino screeched, eyes brimming with fear as he watched the darkness pour out of his friend. Something was very, very wrong.
“Shhh, Nino!” Ohno hissed and clutched Nino’s hair as he pulled the younger man’s face against his neck so he could speak into his ear, “That’s not Aiba. Sho was right-Sho was right.”
“What is it then?!”
“The shadows,” Jun replied, tears running down his face, “Oh God, the shadows.”
“They got Aiba… Oh shit, look at his feet!” Nino choked, his own tears streaming.
Jun and Ohno both gasped as they looked, Jun’s hand flying to his mouth and Sho’s head falling to his lap. Horrified, they stared as Aiba’s feet were no longer touching the ground. With the blackness swirling around him, Aiba was rising slowly-and his skin! His skin, obviously paler, suddenly looked sickly and…no, Ohno blinked furiously, but he couldn’t deny what he saw-Aiba’s skin was rippling. It was almost as if…as if something was moving underneath.
Nino saw it, too, and immediately gagged. Ohno took Nino by the elbows and pulled him to his feet, then turned to Jun.
“We need to get out of here.”
Jun nodded, trembling all over, “Help me with Sho.”
Ohno grabbed Sho’s legs, noting how stiff he was, and Jun looped his arms beneath Sho’s armpits. It was terrifying how the man who had been so anxiously energetic moments ago was now nothing more than dead weight in their arms.
“NOOOOO---“ screeched Aiba, his voice hysterical and metallically high.
Not looking back, they scrambled into the shadows as Aiba screamed behind them, desperate to escape. Nino whipped out his phone, using his flash, but it was useless. The light couldn’t cut through the darkness.
They surged forward, away from the sound, but when the shadows parted, they were back where they started, in front of where Aiba’s family’s stand should be.
“What?!” Nino whispered, terrified.
For a second, it appeared that Aiba was gone, but then Ohno gave a shout as Aiba’s distorted face appeared just inches in front of his nose. Ohno caught a sour, musty smell and stumbled backwards, but Aiba floated right after him, his face right in Ohno’s.
“Satoshi…” Nino cried, but when he ran forward, Aiba’s arm shout out and shoved him away. Sobbing, Nino fell hard on the ground.
Aiba’s mouth split into a grotesque grin that kept growing wider as his glassy eyes bore into Ohno. The shadows seemed to thicken-practically streaming out of every pore on Aiba’s body, and then, in a completely unfamiliar voice, Aiba began to giggle. The giggling grew in volume, and then there was this tight sound-like when someone over fills a balloon.
And then, as the three trapped by the shadows stared in horror, Aiba burst.
His body just exploded, and fine bits of flesh, blood, and gore rained down as Jun and Nino screamed. Ohno, who had been so close to Aiba, collapsed to the ground and wiped furiously at his face. His hands, just like the rest of him, were saturated with blood and carnage, so no matter how much Ohno wiped, he just couldn’t get clean.
Ohno started to dry heave and hyperventilate, and Nino flew to his side. They almost didn’t see the dark, shadowy figure hovering high above their little clearing in the shadows.
Ohno wasn’t willing to open his eyes while he still had a bloody mess of Aiba on them. Nino was doing his best to clear the gore from his face, so it was Jun who first noticed the tendrils of shadows falling from the sky. He followed the darkness upwards until he saw it, crawling in sporadic angles across the night sky, clawing at nothing but air-- and suddenly, Jun found it hard to breathe. Heart racing, Jun couldn’t make a sound. All he could do is thrust his hand up to point, and as he did, he noticed there was a dark blue circle on his arm.
Jun couldn’t think about the spell at that moment, except to acknowledge defeat. He saw that circle and immediately accepted his fate. There was no way he could break it now. Splattered with blood, Jun wasn’t even sure he’d live long enough to turn back into a mannequin after his 24 hours were up.
Fear was consuming all of Jun’s attention as the shadowy creature above him continued its frenzied crawl across the sky, maybe fifteen feet above their heads. Desperately, reflexively, Jun shook Sho’s shoulders.
Nino noticed Jun pointing, looked up, and nearly screamed. Ohno, hearing the strangled sound, made one last swipe with his arm across his eyes and, blinking furiously, opened them. Jun saw the tremor that wracked Ohno’s body, and he saw how his friend continued shaking even as Nino clung to him. The shadows were thicker around them now-- the clearing felt smaller, like the shadows were closing in. There was no wind. There wasn’t even a breeze. There was just the ink-black shadows and the yurei.
The dark creature croaked, teeth gleaming, and Jun saw the exact second its eyes honed in on Sakurai. Within seconds, it was scrambling down the sky. The shadows billowed around it’s thin form while pale, crooked limbs tore through the air. Ohno and Nino shouted something, perhaps they wanted to run back into the darkness, but Jun couldn’t move.
Fear sluiced ice through his veins as Jun’s eyes tracked the monster’s desent, and at the last second, fear won out and he looked down Sho in his lap. Jun needed Sho. Sho would protect him right now, Jun knew it. Sho wouldn’t let the yurei get him. . . If only Sho hadn’t eaten that dango.
If only Jun had believed him.
Sho’s lips were turning dark, his cheeks sallow.
“He’s dead, you know,” a voice whispered in Jun’s ear, causing the man to jolt both in fear of the creature and of what she said. His heart immedately cried out that she was wrong, but--
“Look at him,” Jun could feel the musty puff of the yurei’s breath on his neck as it spoke,, “His chest no longer rises. He’s grown stiff and loses color… Give him to me.”
“No!” Jun barked, voice shaking, “I won’t let you have him.”
Still unwilling to look at it outright, Jun shuddered, nearly crying out, as a sharp, bony hand ran an appreciative line down his back.
“His soul. It’s mine.” The voice was high and went in and out as it rose in volume, “He’s not perfect… Not you…not you... but I need it.”
“No…” Jun croaked, squeezing Sho against him.
“Can’t you feel it, Jun?” the yurei sing-songed, “He takes no breaths. His heart does not beat. . . And he’s grown cold, hasn’t he?”
Jun shook his head, violently, but… His body was suddenly aware of how cold Sho had become. He tried, for a second, to feel Sho’s pulse but it was impossible. Jun’s own heart was racing too hard-- that’s what he told himself as the yurei started wheezing in what Jun recognized must be laughter.
“You’ve lost him, Jun,” the voice was back in his ear, hissing gleefully, “Give him to me, like a nice boy.”
Jun held his breath. Closed his eyes. The monster was so close.
“Don’t make me take him from you, Jun!” the yurei’s voice grew darkly threatening, “It would pain me to ruin such perfect beauty.”
Jun cracked his eyes open to peek in the direction where Ohno and Nino were, he was so afraid. Sho felt dead in his arms. What should he do? What could he do? But all Jun saw was black shadows. Nino and Ohno were no where to be seen.
“You don’t remember the screams, Jun?” the yurei sounded like it was losing patience, “Do you want to scream Jun?”
“....no…” Jun choked, “please no…”
“He is dead, Jun. Give me the corpse, or I will take it from you, and you will not enjoy it.”
What should he do? What should he do? Sho was dead. Sho was dead--
He was.
Jun felt himself accepting it. Sho was cold and stiff and dead in his arms, and Jun did not want to die. Jun didn’t want to scream. He was so scared. He… felt his grip loosening on Sho’s body.
“I’m so sorry, Sho. I’m so sorry.”