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Fingers click furiously at a keyboard, a blond-haired boy absentmindedly chews on the inside of his cheek, the sound of children laughing breaches its way into the otherwise quiet bedroom.
A pink-haired apparition appears.
"Woah," the thing gasps, alerting the boy to the presence in his room.
Damon Maitsu—previously studying for a history test he was meant to take the next day—promptly falls out of his chair. "What the fuck?" he swears at the figure.
In front of him stands a young man, probably his age, with ear length pink hair and sharp yellow eyes. His clothes look vaguely trendy, or they would if they weren't covered in dark red blood. He looks like some sort of zombie influencer.
"Damon?" the intruder gasps. Somehow, it knows his name.
He repeats himself, "What the fuck?"
"Oh, shit."
Green eyes dart to the window—still closed. Children's anime figures line the sill, standing both as relics of a childhood Damon is too sentimental to entirely let go of and proof that the man infront of him couldn't have gotten in through that entrance. The only other option would be the door, but there's no chance he could've gotten passed Damon's parents. Not with his father diligently waiting by the front door for trick-or-treaters to knock.
This leaves only one option, one that should be impossible.
"Did you just teleport?" he feels foolish as he asks, but there's no other answer to this. Unless it's all in Damon's head.
The possible hallucination narrows yellow eyes, looking confused. "I don't think so? Oh my god, Damon."
The way he says his name sends shivers down Damon's spine—there's something almost reverent about it.
"How do you know my name?" he demands to know, unsettled by this false familiarity.
The man's face falls. It's such a naked display of emotion that it tugs at Damon's heartstrings; despite himself. he feels bad for whatever is standing in front of him. "What are you talking about? Damon, I—"
His voice fails to find the words. Damon waits for him to continue, to explain any part of whatever the fuck is going on, but it doesn't happen. Instead, after a tense frustration settles into his shoulder's he takes a step towards Damon and reaches a hand out.
Damon reacts on instinct, shouting, "Get the fuck away from me!"
Adrenaline courses through his veins; he doesn't think before he's slapping the hand away from him, desperate to get away.
Only somehow, miraculously, their hands don't touch. Not because Damon misses, but because his hand falls through the other man's.
Instead of reacting with shock, like any normal person, a look of understanding crosses the shade's face. "Oh. Oh."
"What the hell are you?" Damon finally asks the right question.
As if to reward him, the being answers, "I think I'm a ghost."
Damon scoffs, "Real funny."
Except, despite everything, this doesn't feel like a joke. There's nothing that could explain the way their hands reacted to each other—nothing that could explain how he got into Damon's room without making a single sound. As impossible as it is, the idea that this man is a ghost makes a small amount of sense/
"Dude," the maybe-ghost groans. "Does this look like a joke?"
Then he sticks his hand right through Damon's desk.
"Maybe you're a projection," Damon reasons, too tied to logic and reason to entirely except an answer that relies on the paranormal. "Some fucked up Halloween prank."
This surprises the ghost. "Is it Halloween?"
If the ghost has questions, that could give Damon an in to get some answers of his own. He tries asking, again, "How do you know my name?"
"This is Halloween," the ghost affirms, entirely ignoring him. "Okay. How old are you?"
Damon sneers, "Fuck off, creep."
"I'm not doing this back and forth, Damon. You need to lock the fuck in."
It's so absurd that Damon almost loses focus to laugh. Lock in? What is this guy even talking about? Thankfully, though, he's able to bargain, "I'm not answering your question until you answer mine."
The ghost pauses, giving him an appraising look. He must realise that Damon is dead serious about this, so he shares, "We know each other. Or we did? Or we will? I'm trying to figure out where exactly I am."
Damon has certainly never seen this man before in his life—he'd remember him, Damon knows that. Still, he wants to play fair so he can potentially get more answers. So he offers back, "I'm 17."
The ghost nods. "Okay. We will know each other."
"A time-travelling ghost? Sure."
It's just too farfetched to believe. Of course none of this makes any sense at all, but there's no way Damon can be expected to believe this. The second he buys in, some guy is going to jump out of his closet and reveal that Damon is on a prank show; this is all just an elaborate ruse to show how foolish the 'Ulimate Debater' can really be.
"I know this makes no sense, okay! I'm just trying to put the pieces together based on what I know." The ghost gnaws on his bottom lip, and laments, "Shit, I wish you were here."
"I am here?" Damon questions, looking down at himself to make sure he hasn't disappeared. He hasn't, which is a little disappointing—at least then he'd be able to write this all off as a dream.
"Not you! Future you! My you. He'd be able to figure this out," the ghost explains.
Damons feels the slighest amount of irritation at that—not jealousy, because it would be stupid to feel jealous of yourself, but irritation at the idea anyone, even himself, would be better than him at anything.
That's probably what makes him decide to take a leap of faith. "Okay. I'm not saying I'll believe you, but why don't you tell me what happened from your perspective?"
Silence fills the room again. The ghost in front of him seems to consider his next words. Damon's fingers pick at a thread in his sweater, anxiously awaiting whatever will come next.
Maybe it's foolish, but he's not expecting the ghost to say, "I died. That's the last thing I remember."
"That explains the blood," Damon remarks dryly. He hadn't brought it up out of respect, unsure if it would be rude. Now it serves as a shield, protecting him from having to face the reality of the ghosts' words.
Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) the ghost ignores him. He reiterates, "I died, and suddenly I woke up here."
"How did you die?" Damon wonders, probably too bluntly to be anything but rude.
The next words come as a whisper, and laced with shame, "I was executed."
"Like.. the death penalty?"
If you ignore the blood, the guy doesn't look like a murderer. Certainly not one that would warrant being put to death. Still, the word 'executed' sits heavy between them, and looks can be deceiving. Maybe Damon needs to go back to panicking, maybe he needs to run as far away as he can.
The ghost quickly clarifies, "No! Well, kinda. It was our punishment for getting the trial wrong."
Except that doesn't clear up anything at all.
"The trial?" Damon prods, he'll elaborate further.
"Okay, maybe I should start over," the ghosts proposes.
At this point, Damon just wants answers so he agrees, "Sure."
"You're the Ultimate Debater, right?"
Annoyed that he's not being told anything he doesn't already know, and that the other guy clearly knows way more than him, he spits, "Shouldn't you know that? If you know me?"
"God, I forgot how much of an insufferable prick you were at the start," the ghost chides. "I just wasn't sure if you'd gotten your title yet."
"I'm not an insufferable prick."
The ghost pushes right along, and succesfully avoids being drawn into an argument, "In a few months, you're going to get an invitation to Eden's Garden Academy. Which you need to turn down, by the way."
"Why would I do that?" Damon dismisses the abusrd suggestion. Offers from Ultimate Academies don't come for just anyone—to be invited is a great honoured, and to reject it would be unthinkable.
"Because it's a trap!" The ghost gestures wildly, seriously. He looks Damon dead in the eye as he says, with a hint of desperation, "A trap to lure Ultimates into a death game. Someone gets killed, the class holds a trial and votes on who they think did it. If the culprit is caught, they get executed. If they get away with it, they get to leave and everyone else dies. That's how we met, and how I died."
"Okay, sure," Damon outright laughs.
"This isn't a joke! You're going to die too, if you go."
Damon mocks, "How very scary."
Only, the ghost doesn't look amused in the slightest. He agrees, entirely earnest, "It was! It was, you dickhead. I went back to our room to take a piss—"
"—Our room?" Damon can't help but interrupt, taken aback by both the honesty on the guy's face, and the idea that they shared anything, much less something as initimate as a bedroom.
The ghost plows on through Damon's question, "— and when I came back, you were dead. And it was too late."
"Who killed me?"
Maybe it's a stupid question, but the ghost looks genuinely haunted by the memory of finding Damon's corpse. If he's telling the truth, if this isn't all some fucked up prank, it explains the man's reaction to seeing Damon alive and breathing.
As is becoming normal, the ghost doesn't have any good answers for him. "Isn't that the million dollar question?" he laughs humourlessly. "I don't know. We couldn't figure it out. You're always the one to solve the trials, and with you gone it was, like… I don't know, man! They voted me, even though I told them it was a mistake, and then we all died."
"I'm sorry," Damon says after a moment.
"Are you apologizing for being murdered?" Somehow, this is enough to make the ghost smile.
The smile catches him offguard, so he admits, "I don't really know what else to say."
They stand together in silence for another moment, an understanding somehow reached despite the fact that none of this makes any sense. Ghosts aren't real, time travel is impossible, and Ultimate Academies are safe havens of peace. This absurd story should only make this man more and more unappealing to Damon, yet he finds himself almost believing him.
Whatever is in the air can't last, so Damon isn't surprised when it fades. The ghost's smile slips off his face, and he states, "It doesn't matter. I don't know why I'm here, but maybe it's to save you. You cannot, under any circumstances, accept their invitation."
Damon asks, "What about you?"
"What?"
Operating under the assuption that this is true, because that's all Damon can do at this point, it doesn't make sense. Why would Damon's life be spared? Why would he be the one that gets warned? Is he going to skip out on attending this school, but the others won't? Will the man standing in front of him still die, just in a different way?
"If this is so dire, why aren't you telling yourself not to sign up?" he asks, needing the answer.
The ghost seems completely uninterested in exploring this. He just shrugs, and answers, "Because I ended up here, in front of you."
"Oh."
It can't be that simple, can it?
"Damon, you have to promise me. You have to promise you'll say no," the ghost pleads, that desperation returning. He takes another step toward Damon, but then seemingly thinks better of it and steps back again. Damon is thankful—he's not sure how he'd handle a closer proximity right now.
An idea strikes him, as well as a question, "What's your name?"
"What?" the ghost asks, somehow dumbfounded at such a simle question.
"We can find you, past you, and tell you not to participate," Damon offers.
The ghost smiles sadly as he shuts him down, "I'll never believe you."
It's said with so much certainty that Damon can't argue. This is a stranger, after all.
"Oh."
"My name is Kai, though. Kai Monteago," the ghost, Kai, offers, as though it's a consolation prize.
"And you're dead," Damon repeats, finally starting to believe it. Maybe.
"Yeah."
There's no good follow-up question to that, so Damon changes the subject, "Were we friends?"
What should be a simple yes or no question seems to throw Kai for a loop. He pauses and seemingly mulls over the answer in his head. Eventually he produces an entirely unhelpful, "Something like that."
Once again, this leaves Damon speechless. Clearly, there's more to the story; if Kai isn't willing to share it, Damon isn't going to push. Not when his head is spinning with theories that shouldn't make sense, and would be humiliating if wrong. It's safer to let that be the only explanation he gets, even if he's burning with the desire to know more.
"Did it hurt when you died?"
"Are you stupid? Obviously it hurt," Kai scoffs.
Damon defends himself, "Sometimes it doesn't!" but if pressed, he'd admit that it wasn't the smartest thing to ask.
As someone who isn't known for starting conversations at the best of times, Damon kind of gives up. All of his attempts have failed, so he'll let Kai do the work this time. It takes what feels like an hour—but in reality is probably less than a minute— for the ghost to speak up again.
"I'm sorry," Kai apologises.
Damon replies honestly, "For what?"
"Leaving. Letting you get killed."
The words are said with enough emotion to make Damon uncomfortable. It's clear in that moment that the apology isn't actually for him—not really.
Still, even if he's just a façade of the man that Kai is actually talking to, he feels compelled to reassure him, "Uh. I wasn't there, but I don't think that was your fault." He can't accept or reject the apology, it's not his place.
"We had a strategy, we got lazy," Kai explains anyway, the words pouring out of his mouth. It's clear that he has to say them. "It had just been so long since a murder, and it didn't feel like… I don't know. It didn't feel like anyone else was going to snap."
"I'm sure I didn't blame you." In all likelihood, he'd blame himself for slipping up, for relying on someone else for something so important.
"Thanks."
They sit in silence again; this time, Damon can't help himself. He's staring at this man who shouldn't exist, who speaks to him with so much passion, and he has to know the truth. He's never been good at leaving something alone, at ignoring his curiosities. There must be a reason that Kai ended up in front of him, he just needs to figure it out.
"Um. Were we—" he stars to ask, but he stops. What word would he even use? He doesn't want to put his foot in his mouth by making an assumption. After he's already opened his mouth, he realises that he doesn't know what he's asking. He doesn't understand why he's asking. So he weakly retreats, "Nevermind."
Thankfully, Kai doesn't even notice he's been speaking. As Damon is talking, he grabs his head and curses, "Holy shit."
"What?" Damon asks quickly, taking a step towards him.
"Sorry," Kai apologises. "I just. Got dizzy."
"You're a little more see-through," Damon remarks. It's like some of the colour has been drained from the ghost, but only sort of. If Kai had appeared to him like this, it probably wouldn't have taken them so long to figure out that he's a ghost.
"Great," the ghost moans.
"Kai Monteago," Damon tests the sound of the name for the first time; somehow, it feels right. To distract from the fact that Kai's losing colour, he requests, "Tell me something about yourself."
It doesn't work. Kai continues rubbing his head and distractedly replies, "Oh. Uh, I don't know."
"Anything," Damon doesn't plead.
At first Damon thinks Kai isn't going to answer, but then suddenly he announces, "I fucking hate coffee."
"That's kind of random."
Kai ignores him to continue listing things, "I'm scared of the dark. Blood freaks me out."
"Despite being covered in it," Damon quips crudely.
"Ugh. Don't remind me."
Damon is greedy, so he takes the inch and asks for a mile, "What about a secret? Something no one knows."
"What is this? An interrogation?" Kai complains, probably fairly.
"I'm just trying to even the playing field," Damon justifies. "You know me, I don't know you, and if I don't go to that Academy, it sounds like I never will."
His excuse is good enough for Kai, who shares, "Um, I grew up Catholic, so I had to do Lent. But every year, when my mom or whoever would ask me what I wanted to give up, I'd pick a candy that I secretly hated."
Damon gives him a moment to continue, but he doesn't. When it's clear that Kai is done talking, he can't help but bawk, "That's your big secret?"
"It was a big deal to me!"
"Well, I won't tell anyone," Damon agrees easily. If this is important to him, then Damon will respect it, even if he doesn't understand it.
That earns an grateful nod from Kai, which Damon would be able to appreciate if not for the fact that the ghost is looking even paler. Whether that be from sickness, or because he's fading or whatever, Damon's not sure.
"My head hurts," Kai complains, placing said head in his hands. "How is that fair? I'm dead, and my head hurts."
"I think- I think you're going to disappear soon," Damon stutters, voicing the terrifying thought in the back of his head.
Kai disappearing could mean anything, but no matter what, it also means that this conversation will end, and Damon will never see him again. That shouldn't matter, this man is a stranger, but it causes his chest to tighten in disappointment.
The theory seems to make Kai panic, which is understandable. Except, he seems to be thinking about Damon— he begs, "Promise me. Promise me you'll run as far from the killing game as you can. Move back to Japan if you can."
"I promise," Damon tells him, not sure if he's telling the truth.
In any case, it's enough for Kai. "Okay. Uh. I probably shouldn't say this, but it's probably the last time I'm going to see you." He pauses, and then he says just louder than a whisper, "And, uh. I just- I love you, Damon."
This time, Damon knows he's being honest as he says, "I bet I loved you too."
Kai smiles; it's pretty. "I think you did."
Then, slowly but too fast all at once, Kai fades away. He doesn't leave a single trace behind, nothing that proves he was ever there. Just the fast beating of Damon's heart, and the tears welling in his eyes.
Fingers begin to click on a keyboard again—this time furiously searching for Kai Monteago. It takes only one search to find him: the Ultimate Influencer. Damon stares at the picture of the man who is going to love him and is going to die. There's absolutely nothing he can do about it, and yet a desperation fills him. How he's supposed to live with this information but stay inactive, he has no idea.
Every night he dreams of a man he'll never meet. There's no logical reason that Kai should fill his thoughts this way, but Damon finds his mind drifting to the man more often than he should. Despite himself, he makes a social media account to follow him.
The more he sees of Kai's online persona, the more desperate he feels to actually meet him. The man in his room was so unlike the one that he finds online, down to the stupid fucking frappes he makes. And yet, he can't help but imagine their life together. When Kai posts a 'morning routine', Damon finds himself wondering how he'd fit into it. How they could fit into each other's lives.
He dreams of a great love, something out of the romance novels he'd normally turn his nose up at. When his peers look down on him, when he feels alone, he remembers Kai's quiet confession into the night. It's the moments that he's being particularly indulgent that he's most sure this must all be a fantasy. Something his pathetic lonely brain cooked up to simulate the feeling of romantic love.
And then, an invitation comes in the mail. A letter from Eden's Garden Academy.
Suddenly, in his hands, he has proof that Halloween was real. The first of Kai's predictions came true, something that would be impossible to fake.
He walks to the gas station and buys a pocket lighter; fifteen minutes later, he's standing in his room with the lighter in one hand, and the letter in another. He's about to burn it. He has to burn it.
Except it's proof that Kai is real, and how could he burn that? And furthermore, wouldn't Kai have also recieved this letter? Won't he be making plans to attend the academy, to march right into his death?
If Damon burns this letter, he's condemning Kai to death. He'll never know him, not really. For the rest of Damon's life, Kai Monteago will be nothing more than a ghost.Damon will never know what it's like to be loved by him, to actually love him. Somehow, that feels impossible.
So, he folds the letter and puts it on his desk. He'll just have to come up with another plan.
A few days later, he accepts the offer. No matter what, he won't let Kai Monteago die.
Months later, Damon stands at a train station. Unlike the other students milling around him, he holds no luggage; he has no intention of boarding the train.
His eyes scan the crowd for pink; with all of the Ultimates and their eccentric styles, it takes a moment. Eventually, though, he spots his man: Kai Monteago.
When he sees him, alive, in the flesh, his breath catches. He stops in place for just a moment, long enough for a blonde girl to knock into him. "Fuckin' watch it," she spits, then keeps moving. Damon realises he has to make his approach, and fast.
"Kai," he breathes when he's right in front of the man. "Kai Monteago."
"Oh!" Kai's face lights up, but not with recognition. "Are you a fan?"
"No," Damon almost laughs.
The excitment immediately drops. Kai is quick to assume, "A hater, then."
"No, neither," Damon quickly tries to clarify, then moves onto business, "Look, this is going to sound insane, but you can't get on that train."
None of this is going right—ever since Damon concocted this half-baked plan to stop Kai from getting on the train, he's spent pretty much all of his time imaging how this would go. He can already feel it going south, the picture-perfect meeting he'd hoped for slipping away from him.
"Excuse me?" Kai bawks.
A quick glance around the crowd reveals what Damon had hoped for: no one is paying them any atttention, all too focused on themselves to care about two random men having a conversation. This gives him the confidence to lower his voice and reveal, "It's a trap."
Kai, predictably, looks at him like he's insane. "A trap?"
"Your ghost told me," Damon whispers.
"What the hell are you talking about? My ghost?"
It's clear that he's losing the influencer, but this was expected. No rational human would believe such an outrageous claim without any proof; certainly not one that Damon could ever fall in love with. As long as he can continue explaining, it will all work out.
He shares, with all the seriousness the situation demands, "Your ghost travelled back in time to tell me not to attend the Academy. He said I'd die, and that's how you die."
That, it seems, is a bridge too far Kai slowly starts to back away. "Look, dude. I'm just gonna—"
"You're scared of the dark!" Damon quickly lists, "You hate coffee. Blood freaks you out. You used to give up candy you hated for Lent." Over the past few months, he's held onto these truths tightly. Small, insignifcant facts about someone he knew would one day be important to him.
Confusion morphs into terror. "Are you some kind of stalker?"
"No. You told me that," Damon insists.
"Um, I'm just gonna get on the train, and you're going to leave me alone. I'll scream if you don't," Kai threatens, no longer listening to a word Damon is saying.
"You can't!"
It's too late. Kai is walking away from him, towards the train of death. In just a few moments, he will be lost forever, and Damon will be alone. He remembers the ghost in his room, smiling at him, confessing his love. His chest tightens, physically hurting as the reality of the situation sets in. It's grief, he realises, grief for a man he'll never know.
There's a ringing in his ears, and his entire body goes numb. He must black out because one moment he's watching Kai walk away, and the next he's tackling him to the ground. The influencer screams, tries to squirm away, but Damon pins his wrists to the pavement and uses his knees to box him down.
"Agh!" Kai cries, "Get off of me!"
"You can't—"
Before Damon can continue, he's interrupted by a deep, buttery-smooth voice, "Is there a problem?"
A large shadow blocks out the sunlight. Damon turns his head and looks up to see a tall man wearing a long white coat. Security, maybe.
"This freak is stalking me!" Kai shouts, still trying to push Damon off of him.
"I'm not! I told you!" he says as he turns back to glare down at Kai.
"Are you two students waiting for the train?" the man asks cooly, seemingly unphased by their position.
"Yes. I am," Kai answers as he finally pushes free of Damon's grasp.
"Then you'd better catch it before it leaves. I'm sure any interpersonal issues can be sorted out once you arrive," the man assures, smiling politely.
Kai shoots Damon one more glare before he stands up and dusts himself off. Without pausing for another second, or looking back at Damon even once, he haughtily marches towards the train. Damon wordlessly watches him show his ticket to the conductor, and board the carriage.
He failed. He had exactly one job, and he failed.
Just as he's about to collapse to the ground, and lament his failure, the man standing above him prompts, "Well?"
And suddenly, Damon stands at a crossroads.
One path leads to certain misery, heartbreak, and probable death. Walking down it would be walking into a noose—worse, it would be wrapping the rope around his neck and jumping off the ledge. He knows what lies at the end of it, and he knows that he wil not survive it.
Except the other one, the safe one, the 'correct' one, leads to nothing. Damon will return home, have to explain his sudden decision not to attend school to his parents, and somehow scrape together a life for himself. Maybe he'll do it, maybe he'll find happiness and love, but somehow it feels unlikely. How could he live with the guilt of this failure on his conscience? How can he abandon Kai?
"Yeah, okay," he agrees, stands up, and walks towards the train.
Silently, he apologises to the ghost. He's breaking his promise, but he'll make certain that it's not in vain. Now he knows what went wrong—they seperated from each other. As soon as they wake up in the killing game, as soon as Kai knows he was telling the truth, he'll ensure they're glued to each other's sides. They'll survive, because Damon will ensure it.