deadendsmile | In Logic, the Symbolic Dream

In Logic, the Symbolic Dream

It's been a few months since the situation with Rust and Irezumi was settled. No dreams or unexpected trips to another person's mind happen. No monsters that don't obey the laws of physics and reality appearing. As far as everything was concerned the world went on without knowledge of who the Oni or Rust was. Almost as if those horrors never existed. But that isn't going to last.

It's any old day and any old situation when this begins. Hiroshi could have been in class and nodded off. He could have been going to sleep or just about to wake. As long as his eyes close for a period of time, he will feel a tug like a sudden thought in his mind before being pulled into that same void. The fall down the pitch black abyss is long and cold but the impact with the ground is surprisly soft this time.

The area he finds himself in is much like the one in Irezumi's mind, a black void that emits occasional static like a faulty TV set. Unlike his, however, is the color of the ground. Blue is scattered around like scribbles in a book or rather, as the image may invoke, scribbles drawn on the floor and ceiling from a place that's probably very familiar by this point. The door before him is the exact same as the one to the entrance of the mansion as well. But there's no shaking the feeling, regardless of the set up, of warmth in this place. It too was familiar in a way that Hiroshi has been here before. It's his own home, his own mind this time, without being connected to anyone else. But as always in this place, someone or something is watching.

Welcome back to the Nexus.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Maybe, maybe not. That's how these things usually went. But either the voices agreed with going on or something was up because they have stopped.

The bus trip there was pretty uneventful but the closer they got, the more uncomfortable Irezumi felt. Doctor Ochiki's home was still intact, not demolished, so they really didn't have any reason not to go into the basement as soon as they could. He didn't want to go.

The first warning bell should be that everything inside was untouched. Even the rotten fruit in the kitchen was there and the smell of blood was still in the air, although that and the bodies have been cleaned up. The police had come to collect them but that didn't explain why the rest of the house was left alone.

The door to the basement was closed but not locked. It took Irezumi a moment to open it and enter. Inside it was the same, same darkness with that tiny light, same smell of blood. It was sick.

"...don't know if there's anything in here but...maybe those boxes from before." He tried.

Irezumi's discomfort did not get past Hiroshi. He definitely understood. After all, he wasn't entirely comfortable returning himself considering their mutual experience there. But he had to admire Irezumi for going through with it anyway regardless of his distress. The older boy definitely had strength of character going for him, something Hiroshi doubted he had himself.

The house was... undisturbed. Worrying. He KNEW the police had been here. Surely some sort of evidence should have been extracted? Why was it like that? He followed Irezumi into the basement, but made a practical point of pulling out a stick of chewing gum, chewing it for a bit before sticking it in to prevent the door from locking on them. Not that it necessarily WOULD. But Hiroshi didn't like taking chances in places like this.

He nodded at Irezumi's suggestion, heading over to the boxes. Yep, there was the one with the hole in it, even. Hiroshi opened the boxes again, looking.

He may need to be careful in one of those boxes, as there is glass littering the bottom. The chunk of hair from Yuki was in that box in particular along with the mirror that Smile had used to jump Hiroshi when the light went out in the basement. Again, oddly enough, the mirror was intact when it had broken before. Everything in those boxes were in the same state they were before. Put the bodies back and it'd be the exact same.

Irezumi meanwhile was looking in the back. He was trying to avoid where Yuki and Sabitsuki's bodies once were but found himself drawn there eventually. There was something carved on the wall. Remembering what Hiroshi had said about voices over the phone, Irezumi called him over.

"Didn't you say you could hear people telling you 'don't'?" He pointed at the wall. There was the word 'please' carved in with a knife a number of times. "I don't remember doing this."

What the hell... Broken things don't just fix themselves. How could everything be back in place? Did the police conduct an investigation or a cleaning job?

Hiroshi blinked as Irezumi's call to him brings him back into the present. "Yes, that is true, but..." He stopped, staring at the wall. Please... Hadn't the voices in his head also said that? "Are... are you certain?" he asked, a sick feeling settling in his stomach.

"Yeah...they look fresh." He ran a hand over the carvings, thinking. "I might have said it to Ochki once or twice when I was awake...but he made sure I didn't have anything sharp. Rust found that hammer, so..."

What were those voices trying to warn them of anyways? 'Please don't' sounded desperate, not hostile like a good chunk of all the creepy voices they had encountered. But why just tell them that instead of telling them what they needed to not do? He knew these things didn't make sense often but seriously he was starting to wish that they would!

"Either way, I think we should try and figure this out. It's warning us about something so--"

But he's interrupted by the sound of the door snapping shut and...a giggle. A girl's voice.

"....Sabitsuki?"

Hiroshi frowned as he listened to Irezumi. So everything was the same as that time... EXCEPT for the writing. What did it all mean? Why couldn't the voices just tell him what was going on? Why the hell did everything need to be so enigmatic! And please tell him he didn't just hear the door slam shut.

Hiroshi rushed towards the door, checking it. Surely his preventative measure...?

No dice, it's locked tight. Nothing seemed to be holding it shut this time though.

Irezumi, meanwhile, was trying to follow where the 'voice' of his friend was coming from. He was frowning because he knew Sabitsuki as someone who didn't laugh a lot and when she did, not like that. Not a giggle.

His eyes finally rested on the boxes and he called to his friend. "Hey Hiroshi! Did you find that mirror?"

How was that even possible? The gum should have prevented the door from closing properly! He hit the door in frustration. Locked doors. Why was it always locked doors?

He turned, blinking. "Ah, yes, it was in the box. Actually, it was still intact, which does not make any sense..."

Irezumi started digging through the boxes, tossing one over his shoulder when he couldn't find the mirror in it. He remembered this set up, remembered it from the bits and pieces by watching from the Home Door and oh god if it really was that--

He finally found the mirror and the girl's high pitched laughter could be hear. His face twisted in anger.

"Hiroshi. Get down here now."

Because on the other side of that mirror, much like Smile from before, was Sabitsuki. But the smile on her face wasn't her's. Rust's.

Hiroshi heard the undertone in Irezumi's voice, saw the look on his face. He headed over to where he stood and looked at the mirror. His brow furrowed. "That's..."

But she was dead, right? The only one who could be Smile anymore was Irezumi, and Hiroshi had put an end to that. So what did this mean...?

'Sabitsuki' giggled and Irezumi had to resist the urge to smash the mirror then and there. Why why why--

"It's been awhile you two! I didn't think I'd see you again." She said. "Are you in over your heads again?" Because it looked that way from the disease's perspective. Did they really think they were safe, coming here?

Hiroshi was the first to say the name out loud. "...Rust. I suppose it was overly optimistic of us to assume you could not survive without a physical form," he growled. He could only imagine how Irezumi was feeling right now, seeing Sabitsuki in that state. If it was one of Hiroshi's friends...

"Why are YOU still here?" There was no reason for Rust to still be around here. Nothing left for it. Right...?

"Two reasons, one of which has nothing to do with you Irezumi, so stop looking at me like that." Irezumi's grip doubled on the mirror and he growled. "What?" The disease asked. "This was the form I took when we talked in the Memory Door and since you two did a number on my other one, I had no choice but to take this body again. See...?"

The view on Rust's side moves until a body comes into view. It's twisted, broken and still somehow was leaking that organic rust but can be recognized as Irezumi, or at least the form that Rust had taken once upon a time. The disease laughed again and turned the mirror back onto herself.

"But I should get the last thing I need to do. Hiroshi, I have a message for you!" And the sing-song tone of Rust's voice is a sign that this isn't a good one...

A message for him, but not for Irezumi...? Hiroshi felt a cold sweat on the back of his neck. "What could you possibly have to give to me?" he asked, low and terse.

"From your friends...they're lonely in the mansion Hiroshi, with just the Oni. But you would have been safe there if you had gone instead of come here. It's all empty. Everyone is gone."

Irezumi felt cold. He lacked the experience that Hiroshi did with the Oni, having only seen them through reading his friend's memories, but that was enough to know that for however goofy-looking they may be, the Oni were terrifying creatures. And if what Rust meant what he was thinking, then....they might be loose.

For Hiroshi, the full implications of what Rust was telling him took a moment to wash over him. When they did, they hit like a sledgehammer in his gut. "Impossible. They never left the confines of the mansion! I know they had the opportunity to do so, and they..." He shut his eyes as the memory came back. Him, fleeing for his life from the Oni he knew once as Takuro. He hadn't been sure exactly when Takuro had stopped pursuing him, but he knew at some point he'd simply... stopped. "They would not just leave like that. If what you are saying is true, then where did everybody go?"

Rust rested his chin in her hands and smiled.

"That, I think, could be a question that Irezumi could answer! If you had a chance to meet your friends again, where would you go? Assuming you didn't kill them I mean."

Irezumi bit his lip and it took a moment for him to answer with something that didn't involve breaking the mirror.

"I'd...go and try and find them." Rust grinned again and looked at Hiroshi. That should clear it up, shouldn't it?

He furrowed his brow. This didn't seem to make any sense, but. "Are you trying to say that they're wherever I go to look for them?" he asked incredulously.

The light in the room flickered and that feeling of dread began creeping on Irezumi. "Hiroshi...." The voices also started up again, adding 'please' to their chanting.

"Perhaps. But you're also a little slow to helping them, last I remember! So maybe...just maybe, they've decided to come find you."

...What?

Hiroshi turned ashen white, backing away from the mirror, his eyes darting around the room. Something was happening. Something bad. No way... They couldn't be here. They couldn't. He'd have seen something. Felt something. Wouldn't he? It wasn't THAT dark in this room...!

He began to fumble in his bag, looking for his flashlight, his hands shaking. He wanted to write it off, say it was Rust trying to scare him. But the voices in his head, and the lights...

And the door is locked.

He found his flashlight and began shining it wildly around the room, barely contained panic just under the surface of his actions.

And standing right behind them is Takeshi. His skin is blue and he seems...bigger, somehow. Hiroshi probably knows why.

"Now..." Rust was saying. "I just finished the first thing I came here to do. Being a distraction is rather fun!" The mirror shattered into pieces and Irezumi dropped it, loudly cursing.

At the same time all the lights in the room turn off, even Hiroshi's flashlight and won't turn back on again. The last thing that happens is Takeshi taking a step forward towards them...

"Ta...Take..."

No no no there's nowhere to run the door is locked how could he have been such an idiot and now both he and Irezumi were going to die this wasn't happening this wasn't happening...

The flashlight fell from his hand. The last thing Hiroshi sees before everything goes dark is a hand reaching out towards him.

Luckily enough, it isn't a hand grabbing him but someone tackling him out of the way. The last thing Irezumi saw was Takeshi reaching out towards his friend and he knew he had to get Hiroshi out of the way by any means. Hopefully it knocked them far enough though...

"Find the backup light in the back!" Irezumi hissed. "I'll try and hold him off!" He had no idea of the backup power source would even work anymore but they had to give it a shot! He would not die down here again, not again. Not without a fight this time.

Irezumi's interruption was all it took for Hiroshi to snap back to his senses. Somehow, Irezumi had bought them some time... but if Hiroshi didn't move fast enough, Irezumi might end up a sacrifice.

Hell no. Not again.

He nodded, even though he couldn't be seen, and fumbled towards the back wall, hoping to find the backup light. It was around here somewhere, he was sure of it.

The light was exactly where it was before. The only difference was that the switch was coated in something that burned. He could still get a grip on it, luckily enough, but it was going to hurt slightly.

With the lights back on, Hiroshi can see some interesting things. The Oni had yet to change its form back to its original, monstrous shape and instead was still "Takeshi". The reason for that may seem to be a practical one. While the basement itself was unusually large the ceiling was low. If it changed forms then maybe it would get stuck. But had that stopped it before, back in the mansion?

Either way, it had Irezumi down from a punch to the stomach. Hiroshi will have to be watching closely but on the ground there's that organic rust spilled like blood, although neither of them seemed hurt. Finally, the door creaks open on its own.

Darkness takes over again when the light actually shatters this time. With the door open, their escape was clear, if Hiroshi could get to Irezumi. But he had to ask himself...where were his other two 'friends', if they all came looking for him like Rust said?

(no subject)

all_onis_are_true - 2014-04-25 02:15 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

rustdream - 2014-04-28 01:53 (UTC) - Expand

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only