Chapter Text
Mika can't explain how it turned out like this.
Ravaged cities, skies of powdered asphalt, that rot-and-iron stench that hits you wherever you turn—gone in an instant. A stab between the ribs brings him tumbling, and the earth he falls into is different.
Accepting. Soft, almost pillowy. The dirt hugs his limbs like a well-fitted coat and he finds his legs tangled in its sinews when he writhes.
Twisting.
Turning.
Wrenching a hand free.
Digging. Taking a fistful of earth to pull himself out of his makeshift coffin, feeling a tendril catch him by the ankle when he struggles.
And when all’s said and done, Mika crashes down into
a bedroom.
(This, and not a second sooner, is the moment Mika opens his eyes.)
He lets his vision adjust first to the sight of his hands, to the twisted sheets that pool beside his elbows on hardwood floors.
Then he takes it higher.
The walls, dressed modestly in paintings and photographs he can’t make out, are a dark green. Dim light catches on the surface of what looks like an award on the nightstand. There’s a laundry basket with a single discarded blazer peeking out from the corner, and beside it sits a wardrobe with fabric spilling out where the doors part.
Here’s what Mika learns from this preliminary search:
One, Mika doesn’t know where he is.
Two, he’s been abducted, probably.
Three, he feels phantom pains for a stab wound that he’s realizing is not in his chest.
And before he can think of a fourth point, he realizes something on the nightstand is buzzing.
He’s sluggish when he pushes himself to his feet, a stray blanket tripping him as soon as he’s steady enough to walk, and he’s cautious to approach a cell phone he doesn’t own. Mika turns it over in his hand like a ticking bomb, rubs at bleary eyes to take in the caller ID, and—
Click .
“Yuu-chan?”
“Mika?” Cue the static and the rolling breaths, the sounds of shuffling. “Hey, that’s you, right? What the hell is going on?”
It’s a question Mika can’t answer. While he searches for a way to reply, Yuu fills the silence.
“I never remember what happens after I take those drugs from Guren. But I do remember losing you, and I remember losing myself with you.”
Mika musters through a throat gone dry, “Did you wake up in this place, too?”
“Yeah.”
“What do you see?”
There’s a pause. Mika takes it to mean Yuu is listening to him for once.
“I’m in someone’s room.” Yuu’s farther away from the receiver now, and it’s hard to pick up what he’s saying. “Man, it’s crazy messy in here. There’s a—huh? Whoa, I’ve got pizza.”
“Focus.”
“Sorry.”
Another pause.
“There’s barely anything in here but garbage,” Yuu concludes. “Hold on, I’m gonna try scoping things out. I’ll call you back in a minute.”
Mika’s brows are furrowed before he knows it. “That could be dangerous. We can come up with a plan toge—”
Dial tone.
Mika knows he’s lucky he got a call in the first place, but he’s still going to feverishly thumb over Yuu’s contact and hit that green button as many times as it takes to reach him again.
(“Many times,” as it would seem, is not what it takes.)
See, Mikaela Hyakuya is nothing if not tenacious. He’s willing to sit through endless cycles of ringing, of automated messages telling him the number he’s dialing never set up a voicemail— typical Yuu-chan , he thinks—and even of Yuu answering a single time on accident and immediately hanging up.
What he’s not willing to sit through is a pointless exercise. Mika notices by the fifth or sixth call that he’s being taken to Yuu’s inbox before there’s even a chance to ring, meaning Yuu turned off his phone.
Are you kidding me.
For what feels like forever, Mika thinks he’s still. He doesn’t realize how close to the wall he’s hovering, doesn’t feel the fingertips dipping into every painted-over pit on its surface, hardly notices when he fumbles with a light switch until he realizes he can see everything around him.
Everything.
An entire life that Mika has never lived.
Books he’s never heard of, medals for academic achievements he’s never earned, journals and a backpack when he owns neither. And the thing is, he’d be willing to write this off as a kidnapper’s belongings if it weren’t for a certain elephant in the room: something hanging just above his bed, rectangular and large and covered in photos that he’s sure don’t exist. A pinboard.
And at its very top comes worn corners and smudged Sharpie marking the date 12/25/12. It’s hazy, and the way dust catches in the light makes the picture look almost haunted, but he can make out some faces in a crowd of children. Mika, young and smiling, is at the forefront. A number of familiar, smaller faces crowd around him with bored expressions and wandering gazes. In the background is a blurry flash of black hair and green eyes trying to exit the frame.
Mika’s eyes keep moving. He’s not sure his body can still do the same.
The other photos seem to be placed chronologically under the first, going from right to left. There’s Akane (his breath hitches when he sees her) and Yuu. There’s the girl with the scythe (he remembers her name, actually, but it shows he cares less when he doesn’t refer to her by it) and Yuu. Himself and Yuu. Yuu and Yuu and more Yuu . A Yuu for every situation and lifestage, vast and varied.
He’s almost glad a call finally comes and he doesn’t get the chance to process this.
“Mika,” and Yuu is out of breath the second Mika answers the phone, “Get this, I think we’re in another—”
“I know.” Another world, or something like it. He’s sure Yuu doesn’t have any more of an explanation than he does.
“Wait, what have you seen?”
Mika briefly scans over the Titanic Photo Wall of Yuu-chan. “Nothing much. Just some papers with my name on them.”
“Yeah, exactly!” That seems to strike a chord with Yuu, at least. “I don’t know what’s happening, but it looks like we’re in the same school.”
This time, the dial tone is imaginary.
“What.”
“You weren’t talking about homework?”
“What.”
There’s a pause, an audible click of the tongue. When he speaks again, Yuu says simply, “I’ve got a lot to explain.”
And true to his word, he does.
It makes none of it easier.