Chapter Text
Things between myself and my employer after the whole scenario with the mansion and the cleansers had been... tense, to say the least.
As it turned out, she had not known about the existence of the cleansers, and she has been telling the truth about the suicides. That did not change the fact I had lost an arm. It wasn't as if I could obtain a prosthetic, as those had to be fitted, and I was not completely willing to search for however long it took me to find a ghost prosthetic arm.
She had asked if I would be able to go back to the mansion, this time with proper tools to destroy the place and the cleansers within. I had refused outright. I was still able to remember the pain I felt in my arm as those freakish little things surrounded me, as it began to turn itself into plant matter, being eaten from the inside out.
Not quite sure how she managed it, but I remained in her employ. For a lot longer than I thought I would have. I know I'm not going to find happiness like this, not after what happened to me in the mansion, but... if not this, what?
So that was how I found myself on another job she had given me. After the whole cleanser fiasco, I demanded much more information concerning my targets and their surroundings, partly out of paranoia, and partly out of necessity, as I only had one arm remaining, which made things much harder.
The mission was simple, a serial killer, someone who murdered and defiled the corpses of children, had to die. He had been hiding out in a small town known as Morioh, and was known for hanging about abandoned places, and it was in such a place that I found him, alone in the middle of an abandoned warehouse. Maybe abandoned was less appropriate and unused was more accurate. He seemed to be reading something as he perched upon an old cargo container, scratching his head in puzzlement.
I lined up the gun I had brought with me, keeping my remaining arm steady. It was too much of a risk for me to go near targets anymore, while I was permanently missing one of my limbs, so consigning myself to guns it was.
My name is Yoshikage Kira. I cannot remember how I died, nor anything of what my life was like before. But one thing I know for certain, is that I am not going to heaven. I used to do this job to try and search for a sense of purpose, but that has long since been lost. Now I do it because I have nothing else, and I refuse to be one of the ghosts that lurk quietly in the shadows, scared of the light.
I set my scope at around where my target was keeping his head still. Perfect. The only sound was that of my breathing in my ear, a force of habit from when I was alive, something that one couldn't drop so easily, even in death. I wondered what a heartbeat would sound like alongside it?
There was a slight shift in the gravel of the roof behind me. I ignored it, as pigeons tend to flock around this part of town like winged rats.
The noise sounded out again, louder. I shifted slightly to turn around and see what it was, only to throw myself to the side in reaction to getting hit in the face by something heavy.
I skidded across the roof, reflexively trying to use both arms to stabalise myself despite having only one. A gunshot rang out, and a striking pain shot through my leg. Fuck! Ghost objects, here?
I tried to pick myself up from where I had landed, to flee and maybe try to fight back, the possibility unlikely with two limbs out of commission, but the heavy thudding of footsteps racing across the roof caught up with me faster than I could move, and the last thing I saw was heavy, black boots before everything went dark.
.....
..........
.....
I awoke slowly, to the extremely unpleasant sensation of every limb I had aching something fierce. I shifted over to my side, cloth rubbing against my skin, only to wince when I ended up putting weight on my arm.
Wait.
My arm?
I shot up in bed, using both arms- because I had both, rather than missing one from the elbow downwards. My eyes took in the sight incredulously, before I glanced upwards and scanned the room I had ended up in. I felt a mild feeling of Deja Vu, a particular feeling of familiarity that I rarely felt as I gazed upon my surroundings. What chord did this room stike in me to provoke such a reaction?
I shifted off the covers -and this place must have been a ghost house, as I would have simply passed through the bed otherwise- and picked myself off where I could not remember lying down to rest. A quick glance down revealed that my suit had also changed. Now it was some white suit with a cat-skull motif tie. Odd.
Had that person on the rooftop been a stand user? I had encountered a few over my time working for the monk, people who possessed odd abilities and the capability to see ghosts. And hurt them.
I noted my hat was missing, as I brought up a hand to my head. I froze. My hair was longer than I remembered. It was typically kept cut short, as ghosts didn't grow hair unless they wished to, but now long strands of blond were hanging over my eyes. There had to be a mirror somewhere around here, right?
There was what seemed to be a connecting bathroom to the bedroom I had woken up in, so I quickly entered there. A closer inspection of the bedroom however, as I strode across the hardwood floor, revealed that everything had been covered in a layer of dust. Something to investigate later, then.
The mirror was opposite the doorway to the en-suite, which was arguably a good thing, as I practically collapsed backwards upon seeing my reflection. My whole face had changed, cheekbones shifted, hair both a different shade and far longer, and my noise was pointier as well. I was staring at a completely unfamiliar face... and yet, when I saw myself, the faint feeling of remembrance I was having intensified to the point it felt as if my stomach was doing backflips. There was a noise in my ears, like rushing water, but muted. What else was different with me? What else had been changed?
I stripped from the suit I was wearing to check myself. There were a few differences, the scars I had obtained as a ghost were missing outright, I had slightly more muscle mass, but most damningly and unnatural of all, there was a tattoo on the wrist of the arm I had lost. It glared back at me in big bold numbers. 07.23
What could it mean? What was this place? I had a sinking feeling in my gut as my fingertips lightly brushed against the tattoo, the action sending a faint shiver throughout my entire body. Definitely a stand user then. Stands never tended to be anything good, especially when they attacked me first, and this specific one had changed me. In order to see what the hell happened, my first course of action should be to find the stand user, as swiftly as possible.