blood on whose hands? | chapter one: ON MINE.

The sun warms her skin, welcoming her into the life she once knew. Behind her, the blood of people she called allies soaks into the ground. In front of her, a boy drags her along rapidly. She can't even hear the sound of her own screaming and sobbing.

Sara Chidouin escapes the death game with her best friend, Joe Tazuna. They weren't gone for longer than a day, and yet, nothing will ever be the same again.

YTTD; Chidouin Sara, Tazuna Jou, Hirose Ryoko; Warning for grief/mourning, suidical ideation, and depictions of mental illness.; Joe is written as Filipino, Sara is written as mixed Filipino/Japanese, and Ryoko is written as mixed Japanese/Vietnamese; Post-Game (Red Text Ending (Sara's miniepisode)).

AUTHOR'S NOTE: N/A

The world feels more empty than it once did.

It all feels so surreal. Millions of people die everyday, and yet, Sara can’t shake the awful feeling every time she wakes up. It’s a pounding, aching feeling in her head and her chest, a tingle in her fingertips. Somehow, she feels as if she’s adapted to the sensation at this point.

An alarm clock blares for just about the fifth time that morning. With a pillow wrapped tightly around her ears and her blanket raised over her head, the sound is nothing but muffled noise. Each beep is more irritating than the last. She squeezes the pillow tighter. If she waits it out, the noise would surely go away.

But it doesn’t. The ringing grows more and more deafening, yet at some point, it starts to feel more like she’s imagining the noise rather than the alarm continuing to blare—still, no matter how annoying, her body begs her to grant mercy on it today and stay in bed. Like she did yesterday. And the day before that.

Throughout the sea of beeping, she doesn’t even realize the door clicking open. Before she knows it, the alarm clock is turned off, granting an even louder silence to meet her ears. One that can’t be blocked by a pillow and a thick comforter.

“Sara… Are you coming to school today?” Ryoko’s voice, laced with the same worry it always had lately, barely manages to protrude her cover.

For a while, she doesn’t respond. Ryoko allows her to take her time, for her footsteps don’t trail off out of the room. However, her patience isn’t infinite; time moves on and never stops, and she’ll be closer and closer to being late for her classes. On a good day, she’s willing to wait until the very last second before hurriedly walking out of the room, and assumably running to school. On other days, the ones that followed after disagreements or Sara lashing out, she walks into the guest room, shuts off the alarm, and leaves.

Sometimes, the morning is more bearable on those days.

Despite it, there's a small aching in her bones. It yearns for more movement. Something that isn't just the occasional shift in bed. Her skin crawls for the early spring breeze to remind her that her heart is still, beating, pounding, bleeding out as it slowly inches towards an end so far from now.

“...How long?” The question is quiet. Sara can’t handle speaking any louder, she thinks. It’s the first time since Friday she’s spoken at all, much less in the morning.

Ryoko sharply inhales. “Fifteen minutes. Thirty if you feel like running.”

“Okay.” Her voice feels empty, her throat hoarse, but she tries to sound… well-rested, at least. “Don’t wait for me.”

“Alright.”

Footsteps indicate Ryoko’s departure, finished with the sound of the door clicking once more. Sara’s ears begin to ring with the silence all over again, her skin growing hot from remaining under the blanket. The stuffy air of early April seethes into the room; she must have forgotten to turn on the air conditioner last night. In the absence of the breeze, she feels like she’s suffocating.

The blanket feels so much heavier when she pulls it off of her. Amber strands of hair stick to her forehead, air meeting the sweat that had formed. It's icky and gross, yet she knows she has no time for a shower—and she said she would go today. She should at least try to make it outside.

Dragging herself out of bed already feels like she's won a battle, but she knows that's next to nothing. A glimpse into the mirror of the open closet door does the trick of reminding her how much of a mess she is, with wrinkled pajamas and hair so tangled she can't even make out her signature bang among the rest of it. The bags under her eyes are more prominent, and she looks almost sickly. Not to mention the scratch peeking past her short sleeve, just barely starting to scar up again after she picked on it impulsively.

Her eyes flick over the barren contents inside the guest room’s closet. There wasn’t a lot. Just a few spare changes of clothes, some of which were still fresh out of her closet back home, even after three weeks, and Sonobeno’s uniform.

As embarrassing as it is to admit, that very uniform was one of the main reasons Sara had wanted to attend. It was cute. The colors were slightly jarring to the eye, but it was part of its charm. Its flower-patterned skirt was certainly what sealed the deal. She'd mostly adhered to the uniform recommendation, because there wasn't much she would change about it. The only things she swapped out were the white socks for purple ones with cat ears, and the green tie meant for the boys, as opposed to the ribbon for the girls. The latter wasn't even her own doing, truly—Ryoko had received a tie instead of a ribbon like she asked, and traded it with hers. She just grew attached to it over time.

The day Joe and Sara had returned, she remembered sitting on the couch in her living room, telephone in her hand as she tried again and again to reach her father. Water ran from the kitchen faucet as Joe scrubbed as much of the blood as he could out of their uniforms. Even after they changed into some spare clothes lying around in her room, she felt icky—she kept rubbing at her skin, like she hadn’t washed her hands enough yet.

Joe didn’t stop washing the clothes until long after all the blood was gone, washed down the drain, and the water didn’t turn off until Sara threw the phone back into its socket next to the keypad in distress. The uniforms were dry by the time they went to see Ryoko later that day.

Sara tries not to grip the fabric too hard as she haphazardly tosses the uniform over her shoulder. The less she looks at it, the better.

“Make sure you lock the door!”

Sara spins on her heel, turning the doorknob to double check. Surely enough, there's no way she can open it without the key. A small feeling of relief washes over her, allowing her to walk towards Ryoko on the sidewalk in peace.

“It's locked,” she confirms, once she's closer.

“Good.” Ryoko nods and beckons Sara to follow, walking ahead. “Did you grab the lunch Mom made before you left?”

“Yes.” Last time Sara forgot, she had to eat the school lunch. It wasn't the best experience, to put it lightly. “I didn't get any of the toast for breakfast, though. I'm… not really hungry.”

Truth be told, she forgot to brush her teeth until the very last minute, and therefore abandoned eating the bread. She didn't feel like having it minty.

“That's fine,” Ryoko says, and Sara already knows what she's going to say next. “Just make sure you eat during lunch today. And drink your water. She said she packed a strawberry flavor packet, so you can put it into your bottle later.”

“Ms. Hirose really does think of everything,” Sara warmly remarks. “Even when she's in a rush. I think I heard her trip over something on the way out while I was getting ready? And I’m pretty sure she swore.”

Ryoko snorts, almost in disbelief. She slows down to where she’s walking right next to her, so Sara doesn’t look like a lost puppy following behind. “Really?”

“I mean, I assumed so. You know I’m not fluent in Vietnamese.”

“Aw, dang! I wish I was there. I could’ve probably told you what it meant. That’s my specialty, remember?”

Sara laughs, the tension releasing from her shoulders. “Yeah, of course. I’m still not teaching you Tagalog swear words, though.”

Ryoko sticks out her tongue. “So mean… Guess I’ll have to ask Joe next time he shows up. He’d tell me.”

Her chest pounds at the mention of him, and not in the giddy way she wishes it could have been, like the way she sees it on television. In the shows and movies, the character smiles and twirls, or squeals and kicks their legs, but this feeling made her want to return to the mess of the guest room in Ryoko's house, deprived of the lavender scent Sara misses so much.

The strangest thing is: it’s not like they haven’t spoken since that day. They've shared a few conversations here and there, mostly started by Joe and asking how she's been, like old friends who hadn't seen each other in a while. Those conversations were always short. Despite it, she dreads the idea of seeing him, dreads having him beat around the bush and dreads the fact she knows she can't respond to his question with the same old “I'm fine” . It's not sickening. It's worse. It drives her up the wall.

Her frown must have been noticeable. Or her silence. Maybe both. Ignoring it, she continues, mimicking Ryoko's playful tone as best as possible; “Good luck with that. I don't think it's entirely necessary to be fluent in every language's dictionary of curses.”

The response gets a dry chuckle from Ryoko walking beside her, keychains on her bag alerting her of every step she takes. Sara can sense her worry radiating off of her. Maybe she's become more observant recently, but she can see her bite the inside of her cheek, her eyes averting elsewhere.

Before she can comment, Ryoko pulls out her phone from her pocket, glancing over the time—“Ah! We've gotta hurry up if we wanna get there soon,” she exclaims, putting the device away. “Come on, let's just take the short route.”

The first time Sara went back to Sonobeno, the following Monday after she returned, she remembered taking this route. It didn't look much different from the long one, the one that wrapped around a block or two extra, but it had this strange aura to it now that made her uneasy. Not to mention, there were a few missing posters hung up, placed by people who were worried sick about their loved ones.

Sara keeps her head down as she follows behind Ryoko again, staring at the ground as she moves. She's never found this much interest in concrete—the uneven surface, the cracks from the heat, and even the small weeds growing between those cracks. She can't look up.

She assumes Ryoko checks her phone again. “We're almost there!” she exclaims, not looking back. “Record timing too. Dare I say, we might be five minutes early!”

Ryoko's teasing doesn't make her feel much better. She knows it's not meant to be malicious, but it comes as another sting to an already bleeding heart.

“That's good,” Sara replies, shutting her eyes. “I miss being early.”

Silence falls upon the two once more. Ryoko’s silence speaks for her. I don’t really know what to say to that. Sara doesn’t know what she would say to that either.

A buzzing noise fills her head as she walks, an eerie hum she knows is beckoning her to look up, to take in the surrounding. Beyond the dreadful sounds inside her head, she hears cars passing by and other students chatting as the two get closer to the school. Ryoko pauses in her tracks, as does the jingling. The rest of the noise persists around her.

She looks up, meeting those gray eyes she’d grown to become attached to over the years. Though Sara was commended often for her mind of steel, Ryoko’s steel gaze wasn’t one to mess with. Her eyebrows furrowed.

“Hey… are you alright?” she dares to ask. Somehow, it feels less of a genuine question, and more of a cursory opening to whatever Ryoko wishes to say next. She already knows the answer to that question.

It doesn’t stop Sara from giving it anyway.

“I’m fine.” And to add a little variance to today’s response: “Just tired. I couldn’t sleep last night.”

Ryoko seems pleased with the honesty, though it doesn’t truly soothe her. “Another nightmare?”

“I guess.” It could have been that. Truth be told, she couldn’t remember the last dream she had. It wasn’t recent, but it probably wasn’t pleasant. “I don’t remember a lot of it now. It’s fine.”

The girl’s shoulders slouch forward. She has always been taller than Sara, so usually, whenever they were talking like this, she leaned forward just a bit so she seemed shorter. It wasn’t like something as small as that would make her feel less closed off from Ryoko, but she never stopped her.

Her eyes narrow. “If you’re sure.”

She knows she’s lying. Ryoko isn’t stupid.

Sara hates making her upset. Recently, it felt like there was a barrier between the two. A transparent one, one that could be seen through clearly, yet solid enough to allow no entrance and exit. Ryoko could knock on the glass all she wanted, and Sara would rather she got hurt trying to break through it than by letting her in.

But she doesn’t feel like letting the glass get smashed today. Maybe another day.

“...Come on,” Sara says, cracking a tiny smile that hurt her cheeks just to force. “If Joe’s here today, maybe you’ll be able to startle him this time.”

Like any other day, the halls of Sonobeno are lively with students going about business as usual. They were all scattered into their respective friend groups, filling each other in on the weekend’s events. Some people had gone to this party on Saturday. A guy lost his dog and was asking if anybody had found him yet. There was a different party on Sunday. A girl was talking about how some out-of-control dog ruined her parents’ barbecue.

Sara had never really been one to eavesdrop, no matter how good she found herself at it sometimes. She used to not care about what other people had to say if it wasn’t about her. Not to mention her usually early arrivals having the hallways quieter before the first bell of the day rang. Those few minutes, guaranteed, she knew she would have found herself cleaning her classroom or reading one of the novels on her bookshelf for the nth time again.

Of course, being so… not early, there wasn't any time for her to do any of her usual routine. Not that she brought a book with her, anyway.

Ryoko pauses in front of the science classroom, glancing up at the clock on the wall beside it. The swaying of her black and highlighter violet hair is easy enough for Sara to spot from a distance, so she can always stay close. She doesn't get the chance to read the time.

“I have to go ask about our upcoming project,” Ryoko says. Her soft, cloud-like eyes flick over. “I'll be just a sec, okay?”

Sara nods. “Take your time.”

The girl smiles at her, to which she does her best to return. Ryoko must think she's ungrateful. Nonetheless, she walks away, disappearing into the classroom. It isn't long until she hears her striking up conversation with the teacher.

It's weird for Sara to stick around waiting, standing awkwardly outside the room. So she leaves.

The crowd of students is more intense now that she's on her own. She swerves around ignorant groups of teenagers who take up the entire hallway, leans against the wall to make sure there's space between them and her—anything to pass through undetected now that Ryoko isn't with her.

She reaches her locker, easily recognizable for the large dent smack in the middle of it. Four months ago, Joe had tried to scare her by arriving at her locker before her, but he slammed into the door of it so quickly that he hurt himself. They convinced a teacher it looked like that when they got there.

Sara can still remember how hard she was laughing, how frantic Joe was, freaking out and apologizing in an almost cartoonish fashion. The worst part was that he didn't even scare her—she was a few feet away from it, watching with confusion as he clumsily rammed himself against the metal.

“What in the world!?” she screamed, her bag almost falling off her shoulder.

“Ow!” Joe stumbled back, rubbing his arm. He hadn't acknowledged Sara yet, sucking in a breath (and likely a swear or two) so he wouldn't draw more attention than he had already.

“Joe!” Sara had scolded, “What happened? Why did you—”

His eyes widened, staring past her at the locker in horror. “Um…!!”

The memory makes her want to laugh again. Or cry.

Her fingers mess with the combination lock, fiddling with the four numbers. It wasn't that she forgot her code—it was 8150, her birthday but backwards—but her hands feel especially shaky. She scrolls through the digits carefully, aligning each one exactly before moving on.

Click.

With a pull, the locker opens, revealing its ordinary insides. There were a few photos Ryoko and Joe had taken clipped to a magnet on the door, but otherwise, it was just books.

The crowd thins behind her, with students dispersing as the minutes tick by. Either Ryoko was wrong and they had way more time than five minutes, or those five minutes are way longer than they should be. Nonetheless, her chest tightens when she swears she hears a sort of faint jingling among the buzz of chatter. Not like the keychains on Ryoko's bag, no—

“Sara?”

Bracelets.

Her heart slows.

“...Mornin’,” he greets. She can hear the poor attempt at sounding cheerful. All the conversations in the hallway melt away, and she can't tell if it's actually getting quiet or if she's subconsciously canceling out the rest of the noise.

Sara reaches for her textbook, and then turns. She closes her locker with her elbow. “Good morning, Joe,” she says, unable to feign anything that wasn't fatigue.

Silence. Joe smiles anyway. It doesn't feel right.

“Good to see you made it today. How did you sleep?”

Not a lot.

She makes a vague gesture with her hand. “Fine, I guess. Um… How about you?”

“I… did my best,” he sheepishly replies, resting a hand on his neck. Like this, the scar on his arm is pretty noticeable. He's picking at it, too. The scab is missing some parts and the flesh around it looks flushed.

He's more honest than her, though.

“At least you're trying.” Sara shrugs, unsure of what else to say. What would she say on a normal day? “Don't fall asleep in class.”

Despite the lack of her usual teasing tone, Joe manages to chuckle. It doesn't even sound that forced. “I won't.”

And then, silence meets them again. Sara fights the urge to look to the side, searching for Ryoko to swoop in and say something that would make talking easier. Instead, she looks at Joe's brown eyes, focusing on them a little more than she should have. They look tired. Not empty, but tired. He hasn't slept at all.

The sight tugs at her heart painfully. Even without the information he obliged earlier regarding the lack of rest he'd gotten, Sara knows she would've been able to tell from this alone. Joe always presented himself so openly, wore his heart on his sleeve—that wasn't to say he didn't also have his own façade, but… everything about him was just natural.

“Hey, don't pity me…” Joe crosses his arms, a wry smile etching onto his face. Then, he leaps onto the next topic of conversation, snapping his fingers as if he just remembered something. “Oh, uh, have you seen the news?”

“...No?” Sara hardly had enough time in the morning to get ready, much less put on the television and watch the news. Maybe Ryoko did, but she certainly didn't say anything to her about it. “Why would—”

“A cop went missing,” he supplies, but it still leaves Sara confused—why does he care about that? “And, um… their photo was released.”

She stares at him for a few moments, processing the information before the horrifying realization dawns upon her; that cop, surely…

Joe shakes his head, almost as if reading her mind. “It's not Keiji. Which is weird. Usually if a detective went missing, it'd have surfaced on the news overnight.”

Talking about Keiji was… weird. They weren't close—far from it, really—and yet Sara was able to rely on him a few times that night. He was definitely suspicious, but in a situation where cooperation was key, it was difficult to not get used to the sound of a living person’s voice speaking to her and engaging in conversation.

It was so much worse to watch them die one by one, all within the same hour, as she did nothing that could be of help. Scream after scream, tears mixing with blood—she knows the thought should disturb her to no end, but all it does is make her feel numb. A tingling feeling in her skin. A dull pain in her chest. Maybe she's already grown tired of mourning these people she barely knew.

Sara's eyes furrow, forcing herself to focus on the information. That was strange. The last she could remember, he mentioned working on a case about a criminal group. Wouldn't they be looking for them? Certainly, media outlets would have known about it already.

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because,” Joe starts, almost like he has to come up with a reason, “I dunno. It seemed important. Do you remember the names in the bar?”

His voice lowers with the question. Of course. It's weird for teenagers like them to be talking about a bar. The distant scent of alcohol makes her nose scrunch up in disgust.

“I remember,” Sara confirms, keeping her voice quiet, too. Not that it's difficult. Raising her voice was more draining than worth, especially now. “One of the names… Was it—”

“Yeah.” He nods. “Megumi. I think her last name was Sasahara. She's been missing for three weeks.”

That's the same time Sara and Joe had gone missing too. She knew what he was trying to get at, but it seemed like such a far leap. “Do you think she was working with Keiji before…?”

“It makes sense, y'know? Keiji mentioned a co-worker, but didn't see them with us. There's someone named Megumi that was supposed to be in our group, according to the chalkboard, and now an officer who goes by that name is missing.”

For that moment, Joe sounds so confident, the way he did when he was absolutely sure about something. It was moments like that where Sara was ready to place her full trust in him without another word, but they weren't like that anymore. She can't help but stare, soaking in the information like a sponge and trying to make sense of it.

He falters.

“Or, um… maybe not. I'm sorry.” His shoulders slump. “I-I don't really know where I— we stand on… any of this. Are we talking about it?”

No, we're not, is what was most reasonable. No, she didn't want to talk about everyone that died. No, she didn't want to humanize the people she didn't even get to meet. No, she didn't want at least eight more reasons to curl up in bed tomorrow, and let the bedsheets claim her for another day. No, but yes.

Yes. Yes, she wants to know everything. Those people deserve to have their lives known, and the least she can do for killing them is to carry on their memory. Yes, she needs to know why them—from the budding rockstar to the young boy who just wanted to see his mother again—why was it them who were put here, these people who didn't deserve to die. Yes, it sickens Sara, and yes, she wants to know everything, even if its asking for trouble. Yes, but no.

No. But yes. But no.

“I…”

Jingling keychains sound in the hall. “Sara! Joe!”

She doesn't get to respond.

Published November 10, 2023. (Archived December 28, 2023.)