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A garbled mess, a failed attempt at speech, a disfigured face unrecognizable to the human eye. Natsume didn’t know what to think of it–it was never supposed to happen. The shadow makes a muddled sound, unique like no other, but equally as terrifying as it looms over the witch in her own room. There's rapid movement going on within the shadow, like a vortex of mangled parts struggling to break free. Any human face was greatly disfigured with bulging eyes and broken jaws that forced a toothless smile. It was horrifying.
“⬥︎♒︎□︎♋︎❍︎♓︎✍︎✍︎♋︎■︎⬧︎⬥︎♏︎❒︎💣︎☜︎”
Natsume peers through her ajar eyes, fearful to move, fearful to look. She drops her usual speaking quirk. “What do you want from me?”
“⬥︎♒︎□︎♋︎❍︎♓︎⬥︎♒︎□︎♋︎❍︎♓︎⬥︎♒︎□︎♋︎❍︎♓︎✍︎”
No distinguishable features could identify the creature itself. This was never supposed to happen.
“🕈︎☟︎✌︎❄︎♒︎♋︎❖︎♏︎⍓︎□︎◆︎👎︎⚐︎☠︎☜︎⧫︎□︎💣︎☜︎”
It’s close. It was merely a breath away from Natsume. Every time it moved, it made a disgusting sound. Natsume wished it were dead.
“What are you?”
“⬥︎♒︎⍓︎♎︎□︎■︎🕯︎⧫︎⍓︎□︎◆︎🕆︎☠︎👎︎☜︎☼︎💧︎❄︎✌︎☠︎👎︎💣︎☜︎”
The abomination lets out an ear-piercing shriek of what Natsume can only assume was frustration. She couldn’t understand it. She didn’t wish to. It was angry, and she could do little to calm it down.
The room was dark, lit by only the melting candles surrounding the drawn occult circle. The flames flickered every time the shadow moved. The reflections of several eyeballs moving frantically before staring at her from within the monster’s abyss frightened her. They knew it did. It let out a horrifying sequence of jumbled noise.
“⍓︎□︎◆︎👎︎✋︎👎︎⧫︎♒︎♓︎⬧︎⧫︎□︎❍︎♏︎📬︎♓︎⬥︎♋︎⬧︎⍓︎□︎◆︎❒︎☞︎☼︎✋︎☜︎☠︎👎︎”
“Stay back!” Natsume exclaims, holding her hands in front of her face, no longer wanting to look at the monstrosity that stood in front of her.
As a witch, nothing had come close to terrifying her as this. She’d encountered her fair share of demons and mythological beings in the past, but none were to the extent of this. Natsume believed she knew what she was getting herself into, always digging a deeper rabbit hole each summoning, but she never could’ve imagined this.
“⍓︎□︎◆︎♋︎❒︎♏︎♋︎⧫︎❒︎♋︎♓︎⧫︎□︎❒︎⍓︎□︎◆︎👌︎☜︎❄︎☼︎✌︎✡︎☜︎👎︎”
The creature makes an indescribable sound before belching out a human skull in front of Natsume. She stares at the monster. It stares back at her and jeers. It mocks her for being weak, it mocks her for being afraid. Natsume has never seen anything like it.
She had nothing. It had everything. It was simultaneously everyone and no one. She was alone. The creature lunges toward her, shrieking loudly with more garbled speech before it envelopes her body. It stings her, each second longer feeling like her skin was burning off. She screams in pain. Eventually, she felt nothing at all.
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Natsume is surprised to see she’s able to move, but she can’t feel her own body. Was she dead? Was it an out-of-body experience? Was she transported to another dimension? Was it her own doing, or was it the savior of someone else? It was completely black all around her for as far as she could see. Her hands were somewhat translucent, her body felt light. But she was no apparition. Likely, she was stuck in a limbo in between. It was completely silent, nary a soul or sound or light.
She walks. She walks and walks and walks until something ever so miniscule was seen in the imaginary horizon. It glowed a little but reflected no light on the environment. It stands perfectly still. Natsume calls out, but her voice is left unheard.
As she approaches it, the figure becomes more clear. A girl with a blue blazer, a short plaid skirt, orange hair tied in a ponytail, and harboring an expression that Natsume was uncertain of; her face was cold but appeared melancholic, yet it was calm and almost seemed defeated in a sense.
Natsume had never met this girl before, but felt an overwhelming rush of familiarity despite it. She touches the girl’s shoulder, causing her to snap awake and stare directly at Natsume without saying a word. Her expression warped into betrayal.
“IT’S YOU.”
Startled, Natsume withdraws her hand and steps back. The other remained still.
“Who are you?” Natsume whispers, but she doesn’t think her voice reaches the orange-haired girl.
“YOU DID THIS TO ME.”
The redhead tries to remember who this girl is. Her name is like a word on the tip of her tongue, yet nothing comes of it. She tries to remember anything from before the incident, yet nothing comes of it. She tries to remember, yet nothing comes of it.
“YOU DID THIS TO ME,” the girl repeats.
Nothing comes of it.
“I’m sorry. I don’t recognize you,” Natsume confessed. “I don’t know where we are.”
“YOU BETRAYED ME.”
“What…?”
“TRAITOR.”
It was frustrating to Natsume. She couldn’t remember the past. She couldn’t remember who this girl was, or what her relation to her was. The witch felt guilty for something she was uncertain she did.
“I’m sorry,” Natsume apologizes, hoping to calm the other down. “I’m sorry for what I did.”
“LIAR!” Her voice was airy, yet it echoed in the vast nothingness.
Natsume looks down at her own feet. She was still wearing her brown loafers. Before she could say anything, the other girl speaks up and breaks the silence once again.
“RELIVE THAT DAY. FEEL WHAT I FELT.”
Natsume passes out.
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She wakes up in the nurse’s office.
“Are you okay, ❄︎⬧︎◆︎🙵♓︎■︎♋︎♑︎♋︎📫︎⬧︎♋︎■︎?”
What was my name again?
She nods, responsive to the nurse despite not understanding her. The nurse disappears and she’s alone in the room. Sitting up, her head aches. Her entire body is sore and she wonders what she did that caused this level of pain.
She decides to go to the bathroom and wash her face with cold water, hoping it’ll wake her up more. As she stumbles out of the nurse’s office and into the restroom, she sees her reflection for the first time. She was not Sakasaki Natsume; she was a girl with orange hair tied in a ponytail, sporting a blue blazer and a plaid skirt.
Splashing water on her face, she hoped it was a figment of her imagination, yet when she looks at her reflection again, nothing had changed.
What is this? Why am I…?
She touches her cheek. She slaps herself and hoped it would snap her back to the reality she knew of. Nothing. All that she knew was that the orange-haired girl was unmistakably beautiful. For a moment, she admired the freckles that adorned her skin, the emerald eyes, the different shades of orange that actually lived in her ponytail. She wished she remembered who she was.
She walked out the bathroom, nearly bumping into a shorter blonde girl with a similarly asymmetrical haircut to her own. She felt familiar too, but she couldn’t remember. The more she tried, the more she met, the worse her head began to pound. It was a warning. She doesn't belong here.
“☹︎♏︎□︎📫︎♍︎♒︎♓︎■︎! Are you looking for something?” the girl asks.
“Wahaha, no not really! I’m looking for Nacchan~☆!” she responds, though she feels like her answer didn’t come from her own mind and rather the original owner of the body she inhabits. It was strange. It felt like fighting herself, but it wasn’t fighting at all.
“She should be heading to the library now, no?”
As soon as she heard those words, she darts off and waves thanks to her friend(?).
Running down the halls, she ignores the headache that pulses every step she takes. Before she reaches the library–and just as the blonde predicted–, there she actually was: Sakasaki Natsume walking towards the library doors to enter the room nobody knew about except for her and the librarian. But she knew, even if she wasn’t in her own body. She knew because she was her, and this paradoxical existence is an anomaly.
More and more students are scattered throughout the halls. Each one makes her feel an agonizing pain, her soul feeling like it needs to be ejected but it’s forcefully tied to this body.
She wants to vomit. She wants to shake herself and ask why this is happening. And that’s what she does, or, that’s what she will do. She’s hesitant. Interfering with herself can’t possibly lead to anything good. She’ll just have to pretend to be someone she’s not. She doesn’t know which of her thoughts are hers or the orange-haired girl’s. Her head hurts.
She watches herself enter the library discreetly. “Natsume” vanishes without a trace, tucked away in that small room she considers–considered–her second home. What would she be doing at this time in the day? Her own schedule becomes foggier. Her head continues to pound.
The universe knows she isn’t supposed to exist. Every waking second she spends in this body makes it feel like her internal system will explode. Stumbling through the hallway, she fights the barrier into the library; it felt like a forcefield keeping her away from herself, repelling her so she wouldn’t mess anything up.
Tears prick her eyes. The further she pushes in, the more it feels like her skin is melting. She’s hot and cold at the same time. Her heart is racing. White noise and static is all she can hear, her fingers feel like thousands of needles being pricked into her hands.
“Na…tsu…me…!” She struggles to yell out. And to her relief, “she” walks out the room, investigating the noise. The witch is taken aback at the scene.
“🙵■︎♓︎♑︎♒︎⧫︎📫︎⬧︎♋︎■︎?”
She doesn’t understand herself.
“Help me,” she begs. “Help me! You know what to do…! You always… do…!” She trusts herself. She trusts her abilities.
“Natsume” quickly grabs her wrist and pulls her close, a worried expression plastered across her face.
“I told you to rest. What happened to you, 🙵■︎♓︎♑︎♒︎⧫︎📫︎⬧︎♋︎■︎?” she asks, wiping the tears that ran down her cheeks. It’s odd. She’s being consoled by the version of herself that she isn’t. Her head continues to pound, but the noise dies down. If she forgets for merely a moment that she’s being hugged by herself, she would admit it feels comforting.
“Help me.” That’s all she could mutter.
“Okay,” the witch reassures, rubbing her back and kissing her forehead. “Okay.”
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She sits patiently inside the room. Things begin to appear foggy. She doesn’t quite recall what certain potions were, or how to make them. She trusts “Natsume” still does. Her forgetfulness can only be attributed to the paradox. This isn’t supposed to happen. This isn’t normally allowed. Her headache lulled only a little, and breathing becomes bearable again.
“Drink this,” the witch said, handing her a vial with green liquid inside it. She doesn’t remember what this is, or what it does. She drinks it.
Nothing happens. Natsume writes this down.
Vial after vial, she continued to drink what Natsume created. Some had minor side effects while others had no effect at all. She began to doubt her existence could be saved. Yet, something within her still wanted to believe in the possibility.
“I trust you know how to fix this,” she says after swallowing down the nth vial.
“Of course. Are you doubting me?” Natsume asks, focused on concocting a new solution.
“A little,” she admits. She subconsciously twirls her fiery ponytail with her fingers, something she never would’ve done in her own body. The moment she realizes, she stops immediately.
“Last one.”
She drinks it like all the other vials. Nothing happens.
Then her skin burns and becomes itchy and she needs to leave it immediately. Her migraine flares up. She screams in agony as she watches black ooze seep out of her veins. Natsume turns, horrified, and can only watch the transformation.
“What have you done…!?” she yells, the witch’s eyes wide as she backs away. Her vision becomes blurry and she has the urge to vomit blood. She’s unable to, and only the sickly feeling in her stomach and throat remains. She runs out the door and into the hallways of the school. Students ran in terror as she unwillingly consumes them. The more she consumed, the larger she grew.
I’m not doing this…! It’s not me…! Please!
She swears it isn’t her. Her body is out of her own control and she can only listen to the anguish of her peers die out in her own abyss. She cries out, trying to stop herself from eating and killing. She becomes an amalgamation: a disgusting, filthy, eldritch amalgamation.
She cries, watching from a near outside perspective of herself consuming all of the school. She needs an explanation. She needs to know why this happened. She trusted herself, and yet she became the very thing that destroyed her.
“NATSUME!” she yells out, her voice already warbled and gone.
She bursts through the library, no forcefield there to keep her out anymore. Opening the door, there the witch was, frantically mixing something together before freezing in fear.
“WHO AM I? ANSWER ME!” she roared. Was she ever this orange-haired girl? Was she ever Sakasaki Natsume? Was she ever who she claimed she was?
“🕈︎♒︎♋︎⧫︎♎︎□︎⍓︎□︎◆︎⬥︎♋︎■︎⧫︎♐︎❒︎□︎❍︎❍︎♏︎?” Something came out of Natsume’s mouth, but she could no longer understand her.
“WHO AM I? WHO AM I? WHO AM I?” she repeated, hoping one of them would make it to the witch’s ears.
“WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO ME!” Nothing was real. This wasn’t real. This couldn’t be real. Everything hurt. Having consciousness throughout it all was the most cruel punishment she could have endured.
‘🕈︎♒︎♋︎⧫︎♋︎❒︎♏︎⍓︎□︎◆︎?”
Frustrated at the communication barrier, she curses out the world. “WHY DON’T YOU UNDERSTAND ME?” Louder. She needs to be louder. She shrieks and yells and cries.
“YOU DID THIS TO ME! I WAS YOUR FRIEND.” Were they friends? She assumed they were, considering she was her. They were one in the same. Natsume only existed once, and she had made a grave mistake. Why didn’t she help her? Why did she make her condition worse to the point of no return? She was merely an experiment to the witch. She gets closer to her.
“💧︎⧫︎♋︎⍓︎♌︎♋︎♍︎🙵✏︎” the witch pleads. Or at least she thinks Natsume is pleading based on the expression she has. It’s comical. What right does she have to fear when she was the catalyst to it all?
And suddenly when she speaks, two voices overlap as one. “YOU ARE A TRAITOR. YOU BETRAYED.”
Whose voice is this? It’s…
She vomits. She vomits out a human skull. Who does this belong to? She laughs. It no longer mattered. She was irate and hurt and in agonizing pain.
She consumes herself in a sick and twisted way that she can’t even fathom.
Emptiness again. Just emptiness. She’s returned to a human-like apparition, running her fingers through the orange hair that she can’t actually feel.
How could I forget?
Tsukinaga Leo. That was my name.
Suddenly, an overwhelming amount of memories come flooding back to her. She remembered meeting the peppy girl for the first time when she moved into the new dorms. She remembered when her eccentric behavior was plastered across the walls in the form of scribbles and haphazardly drawn music notes. She remembered when she was always excited to try out Natsume’s potions, no matter the side effect. She remembered loving her in some way.
She can’t believe she had forgotten.
In the distance, a familiar redhead walks toward her. She doesn’t inch forward. She’s angry again. When she comes face-to-face with Natsume, she’s upset she won’t remember someone as important as the girl she is now.
“IT’S YOU.”