Chapter Text
“So. Why’re we here?”
It was about time someone cracked the question. Sousuke, Rin, Ai, Momo and all of Rin’s Iwatobi friends were standing outside the Iwatobi Forest in a semicircle, and after some awkward greetings, they’d just stood there for a minute, glancing around at each other.
“Well, Rin-chan,” the blond-haired one (Nagisa, maybe? ) said, “it’s about time you asked.”
He paused, everyone staring at him in silence, and looked satisfied with the dramatic flair he’d caused.
He took a deep breath. “You all know it’s Halloween, right?” Everyone continued their staring, so he continued. “And you all know we’re outside the famous Iwatobi Fores-“
“Just get to the point already!” Rin snapped.
Nagisa laughed, sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck. “Right, right! Sorry about that. Anyway, have any of you heard of the Iwatobi Halloween tradition?”
Everyone simultaneously shook their heads.
“You haven’t?!” Nagisa said, sounding quite shocked. He quickly recovered though, and proceeded in that silent, creepy, horror-story-telling voice. “I’ll tell you, then.”
He faced toward the dark forest and pointed upwards. Sousuke, along with the rest of them, looked up, to see that Nagisa was pointing at a tree toward the middle of the forest. This tree, however, was considerably taller and somehow older looking than the other trees. Nagisa turned back to face them and continued.
“Every Halloween, the bravest of the brave venture into this forest, trying to make their way to the tallest tree in the middle. If they make it there alive, they carve their names into the tree trunk.”
“W-what do you m-mean, ‘if they make it there alive’?” the brunet of the Iwatobi group (the captain, Sousuke remembered) stuttered, visibly shaking.
A mischievous grin spread over the blonde’s face, and he took a step toward the captain. “And you know what else, Mako-chan?” Nagisa continued, stepping even closer. “Some people carve their names on the tree,” His voice dropped to a whisper now, and he was face-to-face with the brunette. “But they never find their way back out…”
He suddenly placed a hand on the captain’s shoulder, and the poor guy was so terrified, Sousuke actually felt sorry for him. He let out a shriek and ran behind Nanase (even though he was clearly much taller and wider than him), clutching onto his shoulders like life depended on it. Nagisa and Momo, on the other hand, seemed to find the whole situation hilarious and doubled over laughing, Ai and Ryuugazaki scolding them.
Nanase sighed. “He was joking, Makoto.”
Makoto still looked unconvinced, but he reluctantly let go of Nanase and took a deep breath.
Sousuke turned to his left to see Rin, who was scowling. After everyone had calmed down a little, he spoke up.
“So you called us here to carve our names into some stupid tree trunk?”
“Yup!” Nagisa exclaimed excitedly.
Rin made an irritated clicking sound with his tongue. “Nagisa, I have better things to do than play along with some lame old Halloween tradition.”
“B-besides,” Makoto stuttered, pointing to the forest and looking terrified, “we can’t go in there.”
Nagisa was pouting now. “C’mon, you guys are no fun! Please??” He turned to Ryuugazaki, pleading with those big pink eyes of his. “You’ll come with me, right Rei-chan?”
“Well…” Ryugazaki started, obviously trying (and failing) to look away from those puppy eyes. In the end, he sighed and gave in. “I suppose I don’t have anything important to do right now…”
Nagisa pumped his fist into the air in victory. “Yeah! That’s the spirit, Rei-chan!” He then turned to Ai and Momo. “You guys will come with me too, right Ai-chan, Momo-chan??”
“Please don’t call me that,” Ai sighed. Then he looked toward the forest. “Well, it does look a little scary, but if Rin-senpai agrees to it-“
“No way!” Rin snapped. “C’mon guys, let’s go.”
He turned around and started walking, Ai apologizing to Nagisa and Momo muttering about how he thought it was a pretty cool idea. Sousuke just shrugged. He didn’t really have anything to do back at Samezuka, but he supposed it was better than going into some forest with Nanase (he didn’t really mind Rin’s other Iwatobi friends) and carving his name into a tree trunk.
“Rin-chan, c’mon! Don’t leave!” Nagisa exclaimed, trying to pull Rin back.
Rin sighed and pulled his arm away from Nagisa, continuing to walk. He raised his hand in a half-wave. “You guys have fun.”
“Are you scared, Rin?” Nanase suddenly spoke up out of the silence, and Sousuke could hear the faint amusement in his voice.
Rin turned, quick as lightning, to face Nanase. He gave him a glare. “As if, Haru! I, unlike you guys, have more important things to do right now!”
Sousuke let out a small sigh. He’d seen this kind of scenario between Rin and Nanase before, and he knew exactly where this was going.
“Like what?” Nanase challenged. “Tomorrow’s a weekend. You don’t have practice.”
“I, uh…” Rin’s voice faltered as he looked away. “There’s other stuff…”
“You’re scared.”
“I am not! Why’re you even onboard with this idea, Haru?! Shouldn’t you be eating mackerel or taking a bath or something?”
Nanase shrugged. “I did. Before coming here.”
Rin let out an exasperated sigh. “Well, whatever. We’re leaving-“
“If you’re that scared, Rin, I’ll let you hold my hand.”
Rin stopped in his tracks and turned around, and Sousuke could clearly see the color rise in Rin’s face. “What was that, Haru?”
“Since you’re so scared of the dark, you can hold my hand.” Nanase said, smirking.
“That’s it,” Rin growled. He turned back to his team. “C’mon guys, we’re gonna be the first ones to carve our names into that tree!”
Sousuke sighed. He knew what Nanase had been up to, and he knew that Rin would fall for it. Nonetheless, he walked back to the entrance of the forest, where Rin’s Iwatobi friends were standing. Nagisa immediately jumped up and hugged Rin, laughing while Rin struggled under his embrace.
“Nagisa, let go-“
“So you guys are coming! I’m so happy! Thank you, Rin-chan!!”
“I’m only doing it to prove to him,” Rin pointed at Nanase, “that I’m not scared of the dark!”
Nagisa let go of Rin, but continued to excitedly dance around, slapping high-fives with Momo and Ai as Ryuugazaki tried to calm him down.
Rin turned to Sousuke. “You’re okay with this, right? Like, you don’t have anything to do?”
“Wouldn’t have tagged along if I was busy,” Sousuke replied, shrugging.
Rin smiled, then turned back to Nagisa. “Okay, so when do we start?”'
Nagisa took of the backpack he’d been wearing since he’d arrived and placed it on the ground in front of them, unzipping it. He took out four flashlights, four pocket knives, a few bottles of water, bug spray, and…salt?
“Purifying salt,” Nagisa said, nodding up at Sousuke when he saw him looking. “For good luck.”
“Oh,” was Sousuke’s only reply. He knew that Rin was used to it, but Sousuke still found Rin’s Iwatobi friends, well, weird. There was Nanase, obviously, who didn’t really piss Sousuke off anymore but was still pretty weird, with his love of water and mackerel and that monotone voice. Then there was Nagisa, who was insanely hyperactive and bubbly, calling him “Sou-chan” the first time they’d spoken (not that Sousuke really minded). Then there was Ryugazaki, the guy Rin had taught all the strokes to, and all Sousuke knew was that his favorite adjective was ‘beautiful’. And then there was the captain…
Sousuke looked over at Makoto, who was (unsuccessfully) trying to convince everyone that this wasn’t a good idea, and that there were probably ghosts (Ryugazaki told him that the idea was illogical), and he was visibly shaking out of fear.
…well, Sousuke didn’t know much about him, except that he was probably very scared of the dark.
“Okay, we’re ready to go!” Nagisa burst out, startling Sousuke out of his thoughts. He looked around, seeing that Nagisa had given Rin, Ai, Makoto, and himself flashlights and water bottles.
“Hey, no fair!” Momo whined. “What about the rest of us??”
Nagisa laughed and rubbed the back of his neck. “Sorry, Momo-chan! I only had four flashlights, so we’ll have to share.”
So we’re doing this in pairs? Sousuke immediately took a step next to Rin. Rin turned to him and grinned.
“Alright!” Rin exclaimed, and then pointed at Nanase. “Sousuke and I are gonna beat you to that tree, Haru-“
“We’re all going together, Rin-chan!” Nagisa interrupted.
“Huh?!” Rin’s face fell. “Why?! I wanna race Haru!”
Nagisa sighed. “That’s the point, Rin-chan. You and Haru-chan are always racing and competing, so this time we’re all going to act like a team. So no racing!”
Sousuke saw Makoto nodding. “That’s a good idea, Nagisa,” he said, a small smile on his face. For some reason, Sousuke found himself staring. “A-and it’s less scary like that,” Makoto continued, tightly clutching the flashlight and fearfully peering into the forest. Sousuke was slightly amused that someone as muscular and tall as Makoto was scared of ghosts and the dark.
Rin let out an exasperated huff and made his way towards the entrance of the forest. “Okay, fine. Let’s just get this over with quickly.”
“Scared, Rin?” Nanase smirked, holding out his hand. “You can still hold my hand, if you want.”
Rin’s face reddened and he slapped Nanase’s hand away. “Sh-shut up, Haru!”
With that, they all switched on their flashlights and made their way into the famous Iwatobi forest.
~~~
“Where the fuck are we, Nagisa?!” Rin asked, clearly pissed off. “We’ve been wandering around in circles for half-an-hour!”
“Um…well…” Nagisa muttered, peering intently at his map. “I’m not really sure.”
“So we’re lost?” Makoto squeaked, sounding panicked.
“Don’t worry, Mako-chan!” Nagisa said, looking as cheerful and sunny as ever. “I’m sure we’re really close by now!”
Everybody let out groans and started complaining. Sousuke sighed and rubbed his forehead. Nagisa had been saying that for the past twenty minutes. He made a mental note to never tag along with Rin’s Iwatobi friends again.
Suddenly, out of nowhere, they heard a painfully loud screeching sound. Everybody froze and looked toward the direction it was coming from, the forest suddenly dead quiet.
“W-what was that?” Makoto whispered, clutching Nanase’s shoulders so tightly that Sousuke was sure there’d be a bruise there.
“It sounded like an owl,” Ryugazaki answered, not whispering but his tone still very low.
Another screech was heard, even closer and this time accompanied by the sound of flapping wings.
And then another one, so close and shrill now that Sousuke was fighting the urge to cover his ears. Everybody was completely frozen in place now, panic clear in their faces.
“Nagisa, we should leave-“
Makoto didn’t get to finish his sentence. At that moment, a whole flock of owls flew out of the darkness of the forest, making the most shrill, ear-piercing sounds that Sousuke had ever heard. He automatically pressed his hands to his ears, gritting his teeth and trying to get closer to Rin, who was also covering his ears.
That was when the owls decided to fly over them. It happened so quickly, one second he was reaching out to grab Rin’s arm, next second he only saw white-ish brown blurs. For a moment, he couldn’t even comprehend what was going on, he just stood there, wings flapping in his face and the sounds of muffled yells and footsteps around him. And then he felt a sharp claw scratch across his forehead.
Now that snapped Sousuke right back to reality.
He was suddenly aware that there were owls, goddamn owls, flying all over his face, their wings and feathers slapping him in the face. He let out a yell, which was smothered by the owls, and he started running. He had no idea where, he was just trying to get away from the owls and find Rin. He tried calling out Rin’s name a few times, but all he’d got were owl feathers in his mouth. And now his forehead was stinging, and he felt a trickle of blood running down the side of his face.
He ran for a few more seconds, going as deep into the forest and as far away from the owls as possible. Finally, when he was sure he couldn’t hear the screeching anymore, he stopped running and leaned against a tree, panting. He was sweating and out of breath now, despite the chilly air around him. He looked around, but he couldn’t see anyone. Heck, he couldn’t even hear anyone. Or anything, for that matter. The forest was completely silent.
When he got his breath back, he got up and decided to look around. After all, it was pointless just sitting there. Sousuke scowled when he realized how dark it was. He didn’t even have a goddamn flashlight. Great. This was going to be a harder than he thought.
At that moment, Sousuke heard something. He perked up, straining his ears to hear more clearly. Were those…footsteps?
Yes, they were definitely footsteps, and now Sousuke could make out someone’s shadowy figure amongst the trees.
He jogged towards the figure, and it suddenly froze.
Huh?
“Rin?” Sousuke called out, also stopping in his tracks.
Wait…
That wasn’t Rin. The figure was clearly taller and broader.
“Wait, Yamazaki-kun?” The person called out, and that’s when Sousuke realized who it was.
Makoto ran up to him, a small, slightly intimidated smile on his face. His face had streaks of dirt on it, and his brown hair was sticking up all over the place, but somehow Sousuke still found himself staring. There was something about that smile…
“I’m so glad I found you, Yamazaki-kun! Do you know where anyone else is?” Makoto said, looking slightly out of breath.
Sousuke shook his head. “We should look for them, then get out of this goddamn forest.”
Makoto only nodded, and the two of them started walking. At least Makoto had a flashlight.
Sousuke sighed. Looks like he and Iwatobi’s captain would be spending some time together.