Chapter Text
It had been a couple of years since Kanade decided to create her group called Nightcord at 25:00, which had to disband after some events that still hurt her in the bottom of her heart. She was already an adult, even if it was complicated for her, she should stop thinking about it and go on with her life, if that could be called "life".
The silver-haired girl continued to spend her days locked up at home, doing nothing but composing songs and fulfilling her basic needs. The last one she did out of obligation, because she had promised it to a special person for her, her housekeeper named Honami.
Honami was the only one with whom the composer had a close relationship actually, in fact they already called each other by their first names instead of their surnames. It is true that Kanade pays her to take care of the house and also of her, but she noticed that her friendship and affection were sincere. They had things in common, like the fact that they liked music very much, the composer was surprised to know that she played the drums. She secretly had feelings for her, more than admiration and friendship.
It was already vacation time, so the housekeeper was going to be away for several weeks with her childhood friends and would not be able to be with her. Before saying goodbye, she said a few words to her, somewhat worried:
"Please take care of yourself and if anything happens or you just need to talk, remember to call me, okay?"
"Okay... I hope you have a good time," replied the composer with a slight smile.
Both said goodbye with a warm hug and then the brunette left Kanade's house.
The first few days were not difficult at all for the silver-haired girl, but as time went by she started to have negative thoughts about feeling lonely, it was not a new feeling, but it had been a while since she had felt like that, as she used to talk often with Honami and now she didn't want to bother her on her vacation.
That led her to remember her time at Nightcord. Deep in her mind, the memory of the people who were once her friends and companions was always present, she never forgot them no matter how hard she tried and even less how they ended up.
Some time ago, the composer had a great affection for her companions, especially Mafuyu because they had a special bond. Kanade loved sharing time with the purple-haired girl and wanted to save her from both the toxicity of her family and her depression. No one can come to imagine how many songs she had composed for her or how many times she had convinced her not to disappear. She dreamed of rescuing her like a princess and living happily ever after together, but a big reality check brought all those dreams crashing down.
In her mind came a flashback of that traumatic moment in the Empty Sekai, she remembered perfectly how she went to the girl since she saw her with an angry and tired face. Miku had told her that it was better not to talk to her because she wanted to be alone, but Kanade knew something was wrong and went to her groupmate even though the virtual singer tried to convince her not to go with a fearful expression on her face.
"Hello... What's wrong?" She approached Mafuyu, gently touching her shoulder.
"I don't want to talk..." The girl answered with her usual inexpressive voice, but her face showed anger.
"Mafuyu, remember that you can talk to me about anything" she said.
"What don't you understand about not wanting to talk? I've had a hard day, leave me alone..... I don't want to talk to anyone, especially not to you" The girl could see her anger more and more as she asked to have some time alone.
"Especially not to... Especially not to me? What happened? What did I do?" Kanade asked confused and worried.
"What do you mean, what have you done? You know perfectly well! I heard that some time ago you met my mother to explain my problems behind my back, who are you to talk to my mother? WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?" With a lot of anger Mafuyu would answer with tearful eyes and starting to raise her voice, which was rare for her.
"I would have liked to explain it to you but she didn't want to. I only wanted to save you, I thought that explaining her the truth would improve your situation but it only made it worse, I'm sorry" the composer confessed, believing that this and asking for forgiveness would calm her opponent.
"YOUR EXCUSES OR YOUR APOLOGIES ARE USELESS. With your bullshit about wanting to "save" me, you're just screwing up my life more. If you want to HELP someone start with yourself.... Stop composing so much, get out of the house more often, change your vagabond look, study something that since you finished the obligatory education you haven't done anything. In short, find yourself a LIFE because you need it, because if your mother raised her head she would regret the daughter she had. And above all leave me alone, really, sometimes I'm even ashamed that we are in the same group, because apart from the subject of music for the rest you are useless and I hope you disappear from my life" The words of the purple-haired girl were more and more aggressive.
"Don't talk anymore, those words are very painful and you shouldn't treat your partner like that, she may have made a mistake in how to help you but she does it with the best intention" Miku made Mafuyu shut up and put herself in the middle of both before a worse discussion could start, she could notice how Kanade was holding back the urge to cry.
"I can't believe you said those things to me, I didn't think you'd see me like that..... But don't worry, if that's what you want, I'll leave you alone", the silver-haired girl said through tears.
The virtual singer wanted to stop and convince her not to leave, but that had been enough, she didn't expect that the person she loved would have humiliated her in such way, the one who had been the princess she had to save, now had taken away her bandage and now she was able to see her most toxic and damaging side. When suddenly entered Ena because Luka asked for help to stop that situation.
"What is happening? I came alone because Mizuki is taking an exam" The brunette asked, looking at her classmates, confused after the information that the pink-haired woman had given her.
"Maybe I've gone too far, but I've told Kanade to stop trying to save me with some very strong words..."
Some time later, the leader of the group was in her room crying non-stop when she received a couple of messages in Nightcord's chat, one was from Ena saying "@K Read this, maybe Mafuyu went too far with her way of speaking but she's right, you should worry more about yourself and less about others" and another was from Mizuki where he said "Sorry for not having gone to the Sekai sooner, when I arrived everything had already happened and I only saw how @Enanan cheered up @Yuki, @ K you should be more careful with your actions." She was confused because the one they had insulted was her, why were they defending her opponent? The composer decided to explain what happened, in case they had heard another version that wasn't true, but to her surprise they knew perfectly well what had happened and they made a decision that she was not going to like at all.
"With what happened today, we have talked and decided that we are going to disband this group. We believe that @K's obsession to help us and save @Yuki has crossed the limits, you shouldn't have talked to her parents without asking her permission first and I don't care if her mother didn't want her to know, that woman is a monster. It's true that some of us here should improve our mental health, but for that there are professionals who are dedicated to it, no other person should do it for themselves even if she has a savior complex. We want the leader to learn not to put her own life for the group's sake. So after this, I want to say that I will miss you and remember the good times in this place. Goodbye" Ena wrote, later the other goodbyes came, when Kanade tried to convince them not to end the group and that she would improve if they wanted to, they had already eliminated her from all the groups they had on different social networks and she even saw that Mafuyu had blocked her.
Her blue eyes were now full of tears, everything she had fought for had now been destroyed in a very confusing way, she didn't want to hurt anyone but simply help them, maybe the purple-haired girl was right and she was a complete failure. Her heart felt empty and she didn't feel like doing anything, not even composing. She went to her bed and began to remember everything that had happened over and over again. One of the things that came out of her ex-partner's mouth and it hurt her the most was when she talked about her mother, she missed her and couldn't understand how someone as good as her was dead and a monster like Mafuyu's mother was so healthy and seemed to live well. It was unfair, her life would be so different if she hadn't gone to heaven.
Without noticing, she fell asleep until the afternoon, without remembering that that day Honami came to visit her and watch over her. The housekeeper gently woke her up and as soon as she saw her face she realized that something was wrong: her red eyes, her face puffier and sadder than normal and her voice still was somewhat broken. The girl with light brown hair asked her why she was like this, she pretended that she had had a bad dream but she couldn't fool her so the composer preferred to tell Honami the truth about how she felt.
"I'm not going to lie to you... I feel alone..." She sighed, afraid of expressing her feelings.
Honami looked at her worried, although it was something that didn't surprise her, spending so many years locked up, composing non-stop and the only person she used to have more contact with outside the Internet was her because she was her housekeeper, it was normal for her to feel that way.
"Whenever I can, I will be by your side when you need help. You can count on me for anything. If necessary, I'll come every day if that makes you feel better" From her voice, she could tell that Honami really cared.
"No no no, it's not necessary, I'm fine, I don't want you to work so hard for me. Really, there's no need"
As much as Kanade played down the matter, her housekeeper could tell that it wasn't a subject she should ignore.
"It's not work for me, I'll come here with you as a friend and we'll do things to entertain ourselves together, except the days I'm busy"
The composer was going to reject the idea at first, but she no longer had anyone to save with her music. Although she knew that Honami sometimes had negative thoughts because of her past and maybe her new songs could make her feel better in those low moments.
"Well..., okay" The silver-haired girl agreed.
From that day on, Honami started going to Kanade's house more and that helped her not feel so bad about what happened. In exchange for coming to her house, she dedicated songs to her, although it was true that it was difficult for her to compose again since she had to do everything alone as in the beginning, but at least she could see the girl's happy reaction when she heard the music.
Returning to the present, the composer wondered what had happened to the people who used to form the group that one day she had.
(To be continue)