Snow and Ash - Seven
Why do we run? Is it because we are afraid we won’t get there fast enough if we take too much time? Do we run for the fear of the words “It’s too late?”
Or do we run because it is too painful to stay in the current situation? We run to find a haven, a comfort like that of a mother’s arms or of warm, yellow sunlight that filters in from the rising sun.
Even if you run for something, along the way to such things are rocks, obstacles, and sometimes it’s easier just to turn back.
---
Ryo:
The steam around me fills my senses and fogs up the mirror, and the heat of the water runs over me in my attempt to calm the nerves that have been buzzing in my stomach.
Tomorrow morning.
The three days that will change everything will begin in mere hours.
---
When I reach my bedroom, Shige is still sitting in the same spot on my bed, his hand wrapped around the scrap metal hanging from his neck. If he notices me come in, he doesn’t make any sign of it.
“Shower’s free,” I mention as I turn to the dresser to rummage through the drawers for something to wear.
In the background I can hear something and then two arms are wrapped around me, his body pressed up against my back. Warm lips trail across my shoulder and I close my eyes, stepping out of the embrace at the count of eight. “What?” I ask softly.
“I’m afraid.”
“You want this, don’t you?”
“I’m not as much afraid of the pain as I am of losing my only chance.”
I turn to face him and his stare pierces right through me. “Things won’t change between us.”
“They already have,” he says quietly. “And I know you can see that too.”
That night, as he lie on the futon next to my bed, asleep with his back facing me, a sense of loneliness overtakes me, one I can’t quite explain.
I miss that feeling of happiness that exuded from him before, that smile I felt against my neck at night as we fell asleep.
If nothing else, being able to see and feel those things again is something I want to come out of these three days we’ll spend in the past.
I don’t want to fall asleep with this wall between us anymore. I hope that this is one of the last nights we’ll spend apart, though I know that it might be the first of many.
Only time can tell.
---
“One more time,” the mutant begins, “at the end of the three days, if you succeed in completing what we agreed to and you decide to stay, Kato-san as well as everyone else will come back in the state they are in during the last moments. For example, if one of you is sick or injured during the last moments of the three day mark, that person will come back sick or injured.” Once he’s done, he calmly sits on the couch, wearing a necklace similar to the one Shige has, and looks to Shige.
“I’m sending you back to July 17th, 2008, about an hour before the incident occurs. Okay?”
Shige nods and then looks up to me, anxiety clear in his eyes, and I plaster on a fake smile as he makes his way over to me. He hugs me, and I don’t quite know what to say. The words get caught in my throat and so I just take hold of the necklace, squeezing it and feeling it cut into my skin.
He pulls away and nods, seeming to get what I mean, and he looks over to Koyama.
“See you in a little while,” Koyama says gently and when Shige steps over to Yamapi, Koyama takes hold of my hand, healing the sting from the cuts of the metal.
“Don’t get something cooler than all of ours,” Pi teases and Shige turns away when he ruffles up his hair.
“Mine’ll still be the best,” Tegoshi jokes and shocks him playfully like he usually does.
“This sounds too much like a goodbye,” Massu concludes with a frown.
I watch as Shige walks over to the couch next to the mutant and before he disappears, something pulls me to say Wait and postpone it for a bit longer. But even if we wait, things will still happen regardless. And so it does, with a touch of the mutant’s hand, and even though it’s only for a few minutes until we’re back where he is, for the first time he truly is somewhere I can’t reach.
For these few minutes, he doesn’t exist.
When the mutant ends his focus on sending Shige to the past, he looks up at us, his eyes pure white. “Alright guys, it’s now or never.”
As we’re sent into the past, dizziness takes me over and vaguely I can hear in the background, “Good luck.”
---
Shige:
Once the dizziness wears off, I’m lying on the ground with a guy I hang out with at school hovering above me.
“What the hell was that?” Masaru says with a laugh.
My head is pounding and I quickly realize I must have hit it. Hard. “I don’t know…” I don’t know where I am, only that it’s warm, summery. Masaru helps me up and everything seems foreign, not like it should when I must have taken this road several times before.
I shrug. “I tripped, no big deal.”
We continue walking, and nothing seems familiar until we reach the crosswalk and all at once pieces of memories flood my mind.
His hand reaches over and brushes the hair off of my forehead. “You look better with this style.”
…
“Shige told me you were some sort of freak. I see you’re not though,” Tako smirked. “You’re not a freak, you’re just an ass.”
“Nice to meet you too,”
…
“What are we?”
He glances over to me. “Hmm?”
“Us.”
He was silent for a few moments. “Two people who are continually separated but somehow always end up being drawn together again.”
They all piece together to form my past.
Ryo…
Even for just a few minutes, I was living in a world without him.
In the past I walked this very path, not knowing then that my life was about to completely change and transform into what it is now. I didn’t know that I would be rescued from a man who wanted to mutate me by five guys who are now my second family. I didn’t know then that the quiet one who slid through the shadows on rooftops would completely change my life, would be the one I fell in love with despite the scars from the dozens of stones thrown at us.
As I talk to him, it feels so fake, almost like I’m watching a home video and I’m suddenly expected to respond to the one on the screen. But I continue regardless, enduring the déjà vu until the sun fully sets.
Though I fully know what I am doing, my heart drops into my stomach as I realize what’s about to happen.
“Do you want me to walk you home?” he asks.
“Nah, it’s okay. I can get home from here.”
“Are you sure, Shige?” he asks once again with an unsure smile and I nod and watch him walk away.
I’m alone. That fact hits me harder than it ever has as I walk down the sidewalk. One moment, I’m okay. The next, I’m wondering if I did something wrong and at the same time wondering when the scene will begin.
The next moment, I have my answer.
When I reach the next alleyway, I see a young girl pressed against the wall with an older man pressed against her.
“It’s okay, it won’t hurt…we’ll pay.”
I swallow hard and take a deep breath before yelling to him. “Leave her alone!”
He freezes and turns to me with a deer-in-the-headlights expression on his scarred face before loosening his grip enough for the girl to escape. He doesn’t stop her, just like he didn’t the last time.
“Thank you,” she chokes out with tear-filled eyes as she grasps the collar of her shirt and continues to run past me.
That was the last remnant of my actual past, I realize as a few other men, bigger men in only the literal sense of the word, follow behind the scarred one as they make their way over to me.
I knew what was coming. How could I forget?
And so I let them beat me. Why would I fight when they are trying to take me to the place I want to go to? And so I grit my teeth and endure it, including the burn on my stomach, until one of them thinks I’m unconscious and tells the others to stop. They pick me up roughly, and I feel a piercing sharp pain before I’m gone.
---
When I open my eyes, dim light is shining from an old wooden end table and the cold floor is hard beneath my aching body. My arm stings when I move it, and I let out a breath of relief when my fingers meet the metal necklace. But I don’t take it off - not yet. I knew this was going to happen.
But that…is one of the last things that are left under the safety blanket of the known. I don’t know what it will feel like to be injected. I only have what the others told me, which wasn’t much, but their lack of detail led me to the realization that it was a lot worse than they were willing to mention.
When you’re afraid, it’s almost impossible to stand being alone. But I am, and so I close my eyes, and think of the past. I think of shooting off fireworks as a toast with the others, of eating countless meals together that were accompanied by countless conversations. I think of the nights Ryo and I were so exhausted that we collapsed against each other on the couch, and he would put in a movie from where he was and the lazy part of me would be grateful that he had such a power. He’d tell me what it’s about, and we’d begin to watch it, but neither of us would make it past twenty minutes or so before we fell asleep. I remember the first time my mother smiled at him, one night when he treated them to dinner. I knew she hadn’t fully accepted him or the situation we were both in, but at that moment I knew she could begin to.
Sometimes, when engrossed in a memory, sometimes I wish it wouldn’t only be in my mind. Because when I open my eyes, once again I see the small, empty room, the one that is not much different than a jail cell.
About an hour later, though that is only an approximation since there are no clocks nor am I wearing a watch, I hear the jangling sound of keys and the distinct click of the door unlocking.
A man walks in, and I realize that he is the one behind it all. The one who created all of this, and also the one Kei-chan and Massu destroyed by the use of his own injection.
“I apologize for the pain you are in. That wasn’t my intention. Can you walk?”
I try to get up, but instead I gasp in pain. He frowns. “I’m terribly sorry.” He pulls over a chair and takes out a cell phone from his pocket. “Believe it or not,” he begins as he dials, “I once created a mutant that could heal you. He’s not around, however.”
I know he’s talking about Koyama, and I try my best not to make any sign of knowing him.
“Ah,” he says with a smile once the person on the other side picks up. “Could you come to room 40, please?” He shuts the phone and we wait in awkward silence for whoever he called to appear.
“You called?” The door opens and Noriko steps in, looking at me like some kind of rotten food. “What the hell happened to him?”
“The ones I hired for pick-up weren’t so gentle.”
“What can you expect from scoundrels like them anyway? What did you need from me?”
“He can’t move. Find me someone who can fix this.”
She leaves, annoyed, and the man faces me once again. “You see, I’m in the process of creating a better world - one where everyone has a place, a job that no one else can do. I’m going to help you become a part of that. You’ll be alright here.”
Is this how he brainwashed the other mutants? He continues, but I don’t even bother listening, focusing instead on calming my nerves and waiting until Noriko comes back.
When she does, she has another with her, one that I’m sure I’ve seen before.
“What room?” the other mutant asks and appears in front of me, picking me up with ease.
“Two rooms over, dear.” The man says and instead of turning towards the door, the girl faces the wall.
“No problem, Daddy.” She walks towards the wall and we go through it, into another room not much different from the one I was in. Through another wall, and I’m into a room with white walls. The room with no door, I remember from the last time I was here. She sits me in a tall chair with syringes next to it and a large needle hanging by my head. She straps me in and goes through the wall into an area where other mutants are waiting, watching me.
I glance down at the metal hanging from my neck, and then up at the silver liquid about to be injected into me and I swallow, knowing that I just have to get through this. I bite my lip, hard, and watch as the needle reaches my arm and enters me.
The man presses a button and his voice comes over the speakers.
The liquid that is entering your body is causing an unnatural mutation of your genes. “Why would you want to do that”, you’re probably asking. The mutation will slowly reach a point where it will drain your energy and you will be forced to absorb the energy from something around you. When that happens, you will be able to recreate that energy.
So sit tight, and when the experiment is finished, you will be free. It won’t take long…
I feel everything draining from me, bit by bit, almost like I’m about to die but a single string is holding me in place.
For a moment, my mind drifts back to last night. Ryo looked at me with eyes still saturated with worry, and his voice cracked a bit as he said, “Will it really be worth it in the end?”
I didn’t answer, just like I wouldn’t be able to answer right now. The truth is, I don’t know. I won’t know until I’m out of here.
What will he be?
I don’t know.
Can he hear us, Daddy?
I’m not sure. He doesn’t look like he’s too conscious right now.
He looks really bad.
Don’t worry. He’ll be fine. It’ll all be fine…what was his name, Noriko?
Kato.
So common. But there won’t be anything common about him once it’s finished. Once it’s finished, he won’t have to be a left out human anymore. He’ll have us.
A family.
No one will ever break us apart, right Daddy?
Never. We’ll ruin anyone who tries.
Why is he screaming?
I…I’m not sure.
He looks like he’s in pain.
He shouldn’t be.
Kato-san, it’s okay.
They should’ve just taken the girl. She would have been quieter.
…
“I’m not the loud one.”
“Oh?”
…
Why won’t he stop?
I…I don’t know.
---
Ryo:
“We don’t have these bowls anymore,” Koyama mentions as he holds up a stack of bowls. For the past hour we’ve been noticing what is different around the house of the past.
He places a bowl of rice in front of me and I pick at it while the others stuff their mouths with pieces of meat and vegetables off of the plates in the middle of the table.
“Ryo-chan?” I look up at Yamapi’s concerned face. “You okay?”
“I just wish I knew how it was going.”
Massu smiles with a mouthful of food. “We’re still here, aren’t we?”
“But were any of you even conscious after it happened to you?”
“We all were,” Koyama states and places a piece of meat in my bowl. “Eat.”
“We’ll need our strength for tomorrow,” Tegoshi says with a nod of his head and a fist in the air.
Later that night, I lie in bed, unable to sleep, wishing I could at least be there. Just to make sure he’s okay, because I’m sure they aren’t too concerned with his well being there. A few times I almost go, but I know that would ruin everything. And so I wait.
No matter how slowly the minutes pass, no matter how hard it is, I wait. If he’s enduring it until tomorrow, so will I.
No matter how hard it is, I want to get him out of there, and afterwards I want to tell him that I love him, like I should have done before he left.
Until then, all I can do is wait.
End of Chapter Seven
A/N: I took a lot of things from 7PoG and put them in this chapter, so hopefully they didn’t throw anyone off if you don’t remember it. ^^; I hated to stop there, but the next piece of the story will have three parts to it so I didn’t want to start any of it yet. I hope this was enjoyable~ :) As always, feel free to ask any questions, because sometimes I’m not as clear as I should be.
Also, if anyone has a mutant they want to see reappear in the next chapter during the fight, or an idea for a new one, I’d love to hear it. :D
Or do we run because it is too painful to stay in the current situation? We run to find a haven, a comfort like that of a mother’s arms or of warm, yellow sunlight that filters in from the rising sun.
Even if you run for something, along the way to such things are rocks, obstacles, and sometimes it’s easier just to turn back.
---
Ryo:
The steam around me fills my senses and fogs up the mirror, and the heat of the water runs over me in my attempt to calm the nerves that have been buzzing in my stomach.
Tomorrow morning.
The three days that will change everything will begin in mere hours.
---
When I reach my bedroom, Shige is still sitting in the same spot on my bed, his hand wrapped around the scrap metal hanging from his neck. If he notices me come in, he doesn’t make any sign of it.
“Shower’s free,” I mention as I turn to the dresser to rummage through the drawers for something to wear.
In the background I can hear something and then two arms are wrapped around me, his body pressed up against my back. Warm lips trail across my shoulder and I close my eyes, stepping out of the embrace at the count of eight. “What?” I ask softly.
“I’m afraid.”
“You want this, don’t you?”
“I’m not as much afraid of the pain as I am of losing my only chance.”
I turn to face him and his stare pierces right through me. “Things won’t change between us.”
“They already have,” he says quietly. “And I know you can see that too.”
That night, as he lie on the futon next to my bed, asleep with his back facing me, a sense of loneliness overtakes me, one I can’t quite explain.
I miss that feeling of happiness that exuded from him before, that smile I felt against my neck at night as we fell asleep.
If nothing else, being able to see and feel those things again is something I want to come out of these three days we’ll spend in the past.
I don’t want to fall asleep with this wall between us anymore. I hope that this is one of the last nights we’ll spend apart, though I know that it might be the first of many.
Only time can tell.
---
“One more time,” the mutant begins, “at the end of the three days, if you succeed in completing what we agreed to and you decide to stay, Kato-san as well as everyone else will come back in the state they are in during the last moments. For example, if one of you is sick or injured during the last moments of the three day mark, that person will come back sick or injured.” Once he’s done, he calmly sits on the couch, wearing a necklace similar to the one Shige has, and looks to Shige.
“I’m sending you back to July 17th, 2008, about an hour before the incident occurs. Okay?”
Shige nods and then looks up to me, anxiety clear in his eyes, and I plaster on a fake smile as he makes his way over to me. He hugs me, and I don’t quite know what to say. The words get caught in my throat and so I just take hold of the necklace, squeezing it and feeling it cut into my skin.
He pulls away and nods, seeming to get what I mean, and he looks over to Koyama.
“See you in a little while,” Koyama says gently and when Shige steps over to Yamapi, Koyama takes hold of my hand, healing the sting from the cuts of the metal.
“Don’t get something cooler than all of ours,” Pi teases and Shige turns away when he ruffles up his hair.
“Mine’ll still be the best,” Tegoshi jokes and shocks him playfully like he usually does.
“This sounds too much like a goodbye,” Massu concludes with a frown.
I watch as Shige walks over to the couch next to the mutant and before he disappears, something pulls me to say Wait and postpone it for a bit longer. But even if we wait, things will still happen regardless. And so it does, with a touch of the mutant’s hand, and even though it’s only for a few minutes until we’re back where he is, for the first time he truly is somewhere I can’t reach.
For these few minutes, he doesn’t exist.
When the mutant ends his focus on sending Shige to the past, he looks up at us, his eyes pure white. “Alright guys, it’s now or never.”
As we’re sent into the past, dizziness takes me over and vaguely I can hear in the background, “Good luck.”
---
Shige:
Once the dizziness wears off, I’m lying on the ground with a guy I hang out with at school hovering above me.
“What the hell was that?” Masaru says with a laugh.
My head is pounding and I quickly realize I must have hit it. Hard. “I don’t know…” I don’t know where I am, only that it’s warm, summery. Masaru helps me up and everything seems foreign, not like it should when I must have taken this road several times before.
I shrug. “I tripped, no big deal.”
We continue walking, and nothing seems familiar until we reach the crosswalk and all at once pieces of memories flood my mind.
His hand reaches over and brushes the hair off of my forehead. “You look better with this style.”
…
“Shige told me you were some sort of freak. I see you’re not though,” Tako smirked. “You’re not a freak, you’re just an ass.”
“Nice to meet you too,”
…
“What are we?”
He glances over to me. “Hmm?”
“Us.”
He was silent for a few moments. “Two people who are continually separated but somehow always end up being drawn together again.”
They all piece together to form my past.
Ryo…
Even for just a few minutes, I was living in a world without him.
In the past I walked this very path, not knowing then that my life was about to completely change and transform into what it is now. I didn’t know that I would be rescued from a man who wanted to mutate me by five guys who are now my second family. I didn’t know then that the quiet one who slid through the shadows on rooftops would completely change my life, would be the one I fell in love with despite the scars from the dozens of stones thrown at us.
As I talk to him, it feels so fake, almost like I’m watching a home video and I’m suddenly expected to respond to the one on the screen. But I continue regardless, enduring the déjà vu until the sun fully sets.
Though I fully know what I am doing, my heart drops into my stomach as I realize what’s about to happen.
“Do you want me to walk you home?” he asks.
“Nah, it’s okay. I can get home from here.”
“Are you sure, Shige?” he asks once again with an unsure smile and I nod and watch him walk away.
I’m alone. That fact hits me harder than it ever has as I walk down the sidewalk. One moment, I’m okay. The next, I’m wondering if I did something wrong and at the same time wondering when the scene will begin.
The next moment, I have my answer.
When I reach the next alleyway, I see a young girl pressed against the wall with an older man pressed against her.
“It’s okay, it won’t hurt…we’ll pay.”
I swallow hard and take a deep breath before yelling to him. “Leave her alone!”
He freezes and turns to me with a deer-in-the-headlights expression on his scarred face before loosening his grip enough for the girl to escape. He doesn’t stop her, just like he didn’t the last time.
“Thank you,” she chokes out with tear-filled eyes as she grasps the collar of her shirt and continues to run past me.
That was the last remnant of my actual past, I realize as a few other men, bigger men in only the literal sense of the word, follow behind the scarred one as they make their way over to me.
I knew what was coming. How could I forget?
And so I let them beat me. Why would I fight when they are trying to take me to the place I want to go to? And so I grit my teeth and endure it, including the burn on my stomach, until one of them thinks I’m unconscious and tells the others to stop. They pick me up roughly, and I feel a piercing sharp pain before I’m gone.
---
When I open my eyes, dim light is shining from an old wooden end table and the cold floor is hard beneath my aching body. My arm stings when I move it, and I let out a breath of relief when my fingers meet the metal necklace. But I don’t take it off - not yet. I knew this was going to happen.
But that…is one of the last things that are left under the safety blanket of the known. I don’t know what it will feel like to be injected. I only have what the others told me, which wasn’t much, but their lack of detail led me to the realization that it was a lot worse than they were willing to mention.
When you’re afraid, it’s almost impossible to stand being alone. But I am, and so I close my eyes, and think of the past. I think of shooting off fireworks as a toast with the others, of eating countless meals together that were accompanied by countless conversations. I think of the nights Ryo and I were so exhausted that we collapsed against each other on the couch, and he would put in a movie from where he was and the lazy part of me would be grateful that he had such a power. He’d tell me what it’s about, and we’d begin to watch it, but neither of us would make it past twenty minutes or so before we fell asleep. I remember the first time my mother smiled at him, one night when he treated them to dinner. I knew she hadn’t fully accepted him or the situation we were both in, but at that moment I knew she could begin to.
Sometimes, when engrossed in a memory, sometimes I wish it wouldn’t only be in my mind. Because when I open my eyes, once again I see the small, empty room, the one that is not much different than a jail cell.
About an hour later, though that is only an approximation since there are no clocks nor am I wearing a watch, I hear the jangling sound of keys and the distinct click of the door unlocking.
A man walks in, and I realize that he is the one behind it all. The one who created all of this, and also the one Kei-chan and Massu destroyed by the use of his own injection.
“I apologize for the pain you are in. That wasn’t my intention. Can you walk?”
I try to get up, but instead I gasp in pain. He frowns. “I’m terribly sorry.” He pulls over a chair and takes out a cell phone from his pocket. “Believe it or not,” he begins as he dials, “I once created a mutant that could heal you. He’s not around, however.”
I know he’s talking about Koyama, and I try my best not to make any sign of knowing him.
“Ah,” he says with a smile once the person on the other side picks up. “Could you come to room 40, please?” He shuts the phone and we wait in awkward silence for whoever he called to appear.
“You called?” The door opens and Noriko steps in, looking at me like some kind of rotten food. “What the hell happened to him?”
“The ones I hired for pick-up weren’t so gentle.”
“What can you expect from scoundrels like them anyway? What did you need from me?”
“He can’t move. Find me someone who can fix this.”
She leaves, annoyed, and the man faces me once again. “You see, I’m in the process of creating a better world - one where everyone has a place, a job that no one else can do. I’m going to help you become a part of that. You’ll be alright here.”
Is this how he brainwashed the other mutants? He continues, but I don’t even bother listening, focusing instead on calming my nerves and waiting until Noriko comes back.
When she does, she has another with her, one that I’m sure I’ve seen before.
“What room?” the other mutant asks and appears in front of me, picking me up with ease.
“Two rooms over, dear.” The man says and instead of turning towards the door, the girl faces the wall.
“No problem, Daddy.” She walks towards the wall and we go through it, into another room not much different from the one I was in. Through another wall, and I’m into a room with white walls. The room with no door, I remember from the last time I was here. She sits me in a tall chair with syringes next to it and a large needle hanging by my head. She straps me in and goes through the wall into an area where other mutants are waiting, watching me.
I glance down at the metal hanging from my neck, and then up at the silver liquid about to be injected into me and I swallow, knowing that I just have to get through this. I bite my lip, hard, and watch as the needle reaches my arm and enters me.
The man presses a button and his voice comes over the speakers.
The liquid that is entering your body is causing an unnatural mutation of your genes. “Why would you want to do that”, you’re probably asking. The mutation will slowly reach a point where it will drain your energy and you will be forced to absorb the energy from something around you. When that happens, you will be able to recreate that energy.
So sit tight, and when the experiment is finished, you will be free. It won’t take long…
I feel everything draining from me, bit by bit, almost like I’m about to die but a single string is holding me in place.
For a moment, my mind drifts back to last night. Ryo looked at me with eyes still saturated with worry, and his voice cracked a bit as he said, “Will it really be worth it in the end?”
I didn’t answer, just like I wouldn’t be able to answer right now. The truth is, I don’t know. I won’t know until I’m out of here.
What will he be?
I don’t know.
Can he hear us, Daddy?
I’m not sure. He doesn’t look like he’s too conscious right now.
He looks really bad.
Don’t worry. He’ll be fine. It’ll all be fine…what was his name, Noriko?
Kato.
So common. But there won’t be anything common about him once it’s finished. Once it’s finished, he won’t have to be a left out human anymore. He’ll have us.
A family.
No one will ever break us apart, right Daddy?
Never. We’ll ruin anyone who tries.
Why is he screaming?
I…I’m not sure.
He looks like he’s in pain.
He shouldn’t be.
Kato-san, it’s okay.
They should’ve just taken the girl. She would have been quieter.
…
“I’m not the loud one.”
“Oh?”
…
Why won’t he stop?
I…I don’t know.
---
Ryo:
“We don’t have these bowls anymore,” Koyama mentions as he holds up a stack of bowls. For the past hour we’ve been noticing what is different around the house of the past.
He places a bowl of rice in front of me and I pick at it while the others stuff their mouths with pieces of meat and vegetables off of the plates in the middle of the table.
“Ryo-chan?” I look up at Yamapi’s concerned face. “You okay?”
“I just wish I knew how it was going.”
Massu smiles with a mouthful of food. “We’re still here, aren’t we?”
“But were any of you even conscious after it happened to you?”
“We all were,” Koyama states and places a piece of meat in my bowl. “Eat.”
“We’ll need our strength for tomorrow,” Tegoshi says with a nod of his head and a fist in the air.
Later that night, I lie in bed, unable to sleep, wishing I could at least be there. Just to make sure he’s okay, because I’m sure they aren’t too concerned with his well being there. A few times I almost go, but I know that would ruin everything. And so I wait.
No matter how slowly the minutes pass, no matter how hard it is, I wait. If he’s enduring it until tomorrow, so will I.
No matter how hard it is, I want to get him out of there, and afterwards I want to tell him that I love him, like I should have done before he left.
Until then, all I can do is wait.
End of Chapter Seven
A/N: I took a lot of things from 7PoG and put them in this chapter, so hopefully they didn’t throw anyone off if you don’t remember it. ^^; I hated to stop there, but the next piece of the story will have three parts to it so I didn’t want to start any of it yet. I hope this was enjoyable~ :) As always, feel free to ask any questions, because sometimes I’m not as clear as I should be.
Also, if anyone has a mutant they want to see reappear in the next chapter during the fight, or an idea for a new one, I’d love to hear it. :D