Chapter Text
On a singular day in December, a family of four becomes a family of one.
Minato wakes up in a hospital bed, his body hooked up to machines and an IV drip in his arm. His head feels full, stuffed to the brim with haze, fire, and death. Voices that aren't his own, his parents' screams, or his sisters' tears? He can't think. It's too much for his mortal mind, and he falls back into the depths of unconsciousness.
The next time he wakes, his thoughts are his own.
When he finally opens his eyes he sees that he's alone. The room only has the bed he's in. There's a single vase on the windowsill, Yellow flowers being the only splash of color he can see. He has to find Minako. He has to save her.
'Do you think Dad got those flowers for us?' His sister's voice comes from nowhere, but he can hear it perfectly.
"Minako?" His eyes flicker around. This is just a prank, like on TV. "Where are you?"
'I'm right here!' Minato whips his head around. He can't see her. 'This is a strange dream!'
"A dream?" Minato's heartbeat slowed, calming from the rapid pace it was at.
'Mhm!' Minako's voice laughs. 'How else would you explain how I'm in your body?'
"You're what?" Minato sits up.
'I can see through your eyes!' Minako continues. 'And I can feel the blanket you're grabbing!'
"So we're both dreaming?" Minato releases the blanket. "But this feels real."
'You gotta pinch yourself! And it won't hurt! Then we'll know!"
"If you say so…"
'Ow!'
Minato felt that. And Minako did too.
'To….?" He can feel her rising panic. 'This…I want to go back to my body!"
"We just have to find it!" They're in a hospital. Maybe it's one with mad scientists! He just has to find Minako's body and he can put her back! And everything will be fixed! He scampers out of the bed, pulling the plastic thing off his finger and the tube out of his arm. He falls onto the ground, his legs failing him. He'll crawl if he has to. His escape is cut off by a handful of nurses rushing into the room.
"Give her back!" Minato screams as they pick him up and place him back on the bed. "Give Minako's body back!"
He continues to thrash around and scream. He almost bites one of them. But he is small and weak and he will not win this fight. They put something over his face and he fades.
That night, the sky turns green, and the water red, but Minato sleeps through it.
The next time he wakes he's not alone. Mom? No, the lady has the same shade of hair that his mom has but she's not her. She perks up once she realizes he's awake.
"Hello." She smiles. It's a sad one. "Can you tell me your name?"
"Where's Minako?" His voice is small. "Please."
"You're Minato, her brother?" He nods.
"We're twins." Somehow her smile gets even sadder. "Just give Minako back and let us go."
"I'm sorry." Minato's heart drops in his chest. "Minato, do you remember anything from before you woke up here? You would have been on a bridge."
"A bridge?" Minato looks down at his hands. "I don't remember anything about a bridge. Sometimes we go over the big one."
'Mom and Dad took us to the shrine!' Minako chirps.
"We were at the shrine." Minato notices that the lady didn't hear Minako.
"I see. Minato…" The lady takes a deep breath. "There was a horrible accident on the bridge that you and your family were in. You're the only one that survived. I'm sorry. We're going to offer you support and we'll hand the funeral arrag…."
The lady keeps talking but he hears none of it. Mom and Dad are gone? Just gone? But their birthday was coming up! And Dad said that he was going to be working less and…they're gone. Just gone.
But Minako's still with him! She's not dead!
"Minako's with me!" He finally speaks. "I just have to put her back! Please!"
The lady sighs. "I know this is hard, Minato, and you're still injured, please rest."
His attempts to escape from his room are foiled. He can't get to the door without a nurse or even a doctor coming in to stop him. They tell him he's not a prisoner but they won't let him see his sister. He would have given up, if not for Mors.
It happens every night at midnight, all the electronics stop working and people turn into coffins. It's something he should be scared of, with how the blood drips and the grumbles that lie within it. But he's not. It almost feels natural. Almost like he belongs there, and Minako feels the same way. They're not sure how they know that it's called Mors, or that the coffins are people, or that the water is blood now. But it allows him to slip out of his room, slip around the coffins, and take the stairs down to where they keep the bodies.
'Good thing we're not too far!' Minako's eager. Minato is too. Once they get her body back then they can leave.
The morgue is full. Minato carefully walks down the wall, looking until he sees the three labeled Arisato. He glances at Hinata and Kiyoko. There's nothing he can do for them. He carefully opens the one he's been looking for.
Other than the paleness of her skin and her stillness Minako almost looks like she's sleeping. His hands tremble as he places them on her cold skin. And….
And nothing. Minako doesn't move. She stays in her stillness.
He can hear her. She's with him. She's not dead. She's crying. He's crying. He can't fix this. He can't put her back. He can't do anything!
He's not sure when he left the morgue. He's curled up in some corner, sobbing.
'M-minato…' His sister's voice comes to him like a lifeline. 'Mors is going to end soon. W-we need to head back.'
'Y-yeah.' He shoots back before he forces himself to his feet. His parents might be gone, but he's not alone. Minako's with him.
Two days before he's released they hold a service for his parents. He doesn't include Minako in it, she's not gone, she's with him.
It's a solemn thing and only a few relatives show up. He hears them whisper.
"He's the only one who survived on the bridge."
"Cursed child."
"Did you hear about what he did in the hospital?"
"Shame that Hinata had to marry that dirty Arisato."
"Things are hard enough without another mouth to feed."
He tries to tune them all out. A task that becomes easy as he has to say goodbye to his parents, and his and Minako's cries are the only thing he hears. The coffins are closed, with only Minako's casket open. Not that it makes it any easier as they're taken away to be cremated.
Minato is sent to an orphanage. He doesn't fit in there, all the other kids think he's strange. He mourns his parents and his failure with Minako. So he keeps to himself.
There's one kid who makes an effort to get to know him, but Minato can't stand him. The boy has a sister who's always clinging to him. Something that he lost. Some part of him knows that envy and jealousy aren't fair to either of them. But he doesn't care.
"Oh, I'm sorry!" The silver-haired boy looks over at Minato, his melon bread on the ground. "I'll get you anoth-"
Minato's punch hits him square in the chest. There's a small squeak from the boy's sister, and he jabs Minato in the ribs. Minato stumbles back, but he doesn't fall. He launches himself at the boy, and they end up grabbing each other's hands and pushing. Minato waivers, and falls to the ground.
The silver-haired boy stands above him, and that familiar feeling of helplessness creeps into him.
The matrons descend on the two of them, and they're separated. He's given a long lecture before they tell him that he's being moved to a different orphanage. one outside of the city. Something about how it would help him process his grief and something about Kirijo money.
He finds it hard to care.
It becomes a pattern. He's sent to an orphanage, spends a few weeks to a few months there, and is then sent somewhere else. There are a few times when he almost gets adopted, but it always falls through. Then he's transferred and has to start over. Friends are something he doesn't bother with. They get adopted or he has to move.
He can't tell anyone about Minako either. It's a combination of not wanting to be bullied, not wanting to scare off potential parents, not wanting to risk losing her and something else. Something he can't put his finger on. Like others knowing about her is taboo. He knows she's real. That'll have to be enough.
Ten years pass like that. He gets a letter in the mail from a private high school, offering a full ride and dorms. Dorms that he would stay in until he graduated. No more shuffling. The letter is signed by an Ikutsuki.
Is it any surprise that they take him up on the offer?
—-
"Please take care to board before our departure."
Minato feels Minako 'poke' his mind, bringing the train car back into focus. They'd arrived at Port Island Station. He shuffles around checking his bags and exits the train. The power goes out and the world goes silent.
'Wow, midnight already?' Minako's voice rang out in his mind 'Glad we got to the station before Mors eh?'
'It would have sucked to be trapped in a train car' He agrees. They had gotten pretty good at not being trapped due to Mors. One time with an elevator had been more than enough.
'Hmm,' she hums 'how fair is the dorm?'
'Not far,' if he's reading the map right. 'We might even make it there before the moon ends.'
'What do you think our dormmates are gonna be like?' He can sense the excitement in her voice. Their enrollment in Gekkoukan was going to be for two whole years. They had never stayed in one place for so long. And if Minako wanted friends, Minato was going to try his hardest to get her friends.
'Dunno.' If Minako had seeable eyes he was pretty sure she'd be rolling them at his answer. 'We do have to be careful about this though.' It was an unexpected perk of being moved around so much, that no one had gotten to know him well enough to notice the oddities caused by his twin living in his head.
They finally get to the dorm. Knocking wouldn't do them any good so he lets himself in.
"You're late. I've been waiting a long time." There's a kid in striped pajamas behind the sign-in desk. It's another one of those things that Minato and Minako should think is weird. But it's not and he approaches the boy. He feels like he knows him.
"If you want to proceed, then please sign here. It's a contract." he points at a piece of paper on the desk. "There's no need to be scared. It only binds you to accepting full responsibility for your actions." Minato looks over it, It simply reads that 'I chooseth this fate of mine own free will’.
Minato signs the paper with no hesitation. Then he blinks and sees Minakos name right below his own. That, out of everything that has happened since he walked in, is what's weird. He doesn't get a chance to ask the boy about it as he picks up the paper and holds it to his face.
"...Very well. Time is something no one can escape. It delivers us all to the same end. Wishing won't make it go away. And so it begins…"
The boy fades into the darkness as he says that. And the lights flash on and he hears a girl yelling at him.
—-
The next day goes about how he expects it to, he introduces himself, bows, and goes to sit down. He gets a seat next to Yuraki, who had been nice to him, even after she pulled a gun on him, so he can't complain about it.
‘We can trade notes!' Minako chirps, 'Wonder if you'll get any more love letters here?' He doesn't bother responding to that.
He doesn't need the reminder of what happened in his first year of high school. None of those girls cared about him, just the 'emo'(whatever that was) transfer student. Didn't help that he'd never had a crush on anyone.
"Sup new guy!" Minato is saved from the horrors of unrequited 'love' by a baseball hat-wearing guy. "It can be tough being the new guy here, my name is Junpei Iori! Nice to meetcha."
"I'm pretty good at being the new guy." Minato taps his desk. "Minato Arisato."
"Right on man!" Junpei is thrilled. "We're just two peas in a pod!"
'He's such a dork,' he can hear the grin on Minako's face.
"Geez Junpei," Yukari said. "He just got here, give him a break before you bother him."
"I'm just trying to be friendly!" Junpei retorts "And he gave me a name so I'm already doing better than last time!" Did Junpei do this to every new student?
"Yeah yeah." Yukari was annoyed. "We don't have to deal with him Minato, let's go."
"Oh! I get it." Minato puts his fist in his palm. "You guys are like an old married couple!"
He got a pretty good look of horror out of them for that one.
—-
Minato is jolted awake by banging at his door. During Mors. Nothing makes noise in Mors other than him. Something is very wrong or very right. He rolls out of bed and shuffles over to the door. Minako is just as curious as he is.
When he opens the door he sees Yukari with a pretty sick sword. And a very panicked look on her face. She forces the sword into his hand and pulls him out of the room.
"There's no time! We have to go! Now!"
They end up on the roof.
"Okay," Yuraki slams the door behind her. "We should be safe here-"
A single hand clamps on the side of the building. Another hand, holding a blue mask with the Roman numeral I on it rises from the darkness. Then another hand and another and another and another. As it hoisted itself up onto the roof they could see that it was all arms and hands. And some of those hands were holding very sharp-looking knives. Something about it was oddly familiar.
Magician.
Minato can vaguely hear Minako's voice 'What the fuck what the fuck what the fuck!' He doesn't have time to chide her for the vulgarity.
It goes racing towards them. Minato watches as she points a gun at her head. Mumbling about how she just has to- she never gets a chance as the magician slams into her, knocking her to the ground and sending the gun clattering to their feet.
'Go on,' They hear the voice of the boy with the striped pajamas 'Do it.'
It was more instinct than anything, putting the gun to their head and pulling the trigger.
The sound of shattering glass echoed on the roof. Two figures appeared above them. One, a blue body with short white hair, and the other, an orange body with long brownish hair. Both have a lyre but the orange one is heart-shaped while the blue's is more traditional.
"I am thou," one spoke.
"And thou art I," the other echoed.
They didn't even have a second before head-splitting pain hit them. They grabbed their head, thrashing about. The orange one didn't disappear as much as she shattered into a thousand pieces.
In one fluid motion, the white-haired one was torn in two. A hulking beast with a wreath of coffins and a deadly sharp sword in one hand emerged from it.
The beast, called Death, lunged toward the Magician, dealing a few slices and then processing to rip it to shreds, leaving nothing but goop. Seemingly satisfied with the carnage it disappeared, replaced with the blue one. Which faded away without an ounce of pain.. A small mercy, given how much the rest of his head hurt. He stumbled and fell into unconsciousness.