Chapter Text
It's the first winter since the Demise Game ended. Concluding towards the end of July, it's now early December. A little under five months have passed. It was slightly uncomfortably warm in that tortuous week, and it's now quite cold. There was doubt over whether or not it would happen, but it even snowed today; not much, but the temperature remained low enough to keep it from melting, remaining frozen on the ground.
E-noru feels like the snow isn't the only thing that's frozen too.
Things are… stagnant.
That's putting it lightly. The past few months have been nightmarishly monotonous since the turmoil all ended. It was so sudden; after loops repeating and repeating over and over, the Occult Club was able to put things together, and he was exposed as the traitor. His memory feels hazy, mixed together with memories of a handful of failed confrontations where they'd figure out someone behind the scenes was the fox (but not much more than that), and he doesn't fully recall how things ended, but he did.
On one particular day, in one particular moment after what he thought was another failed confrontation, he came to his senses with the worst headache ever, a letter which made him feel so incredibly sick, and the knowledge that the game was over for them. It was now his turn to survive, and he struggled through it.
He was honestly quite certain it was over for him. It was like being terribly ill, his consciousness wavering back and forth, from awake to asleep at any given moment. He knew what his fate was supposed to be; to not do anything different from the dream, and sleep forever. He had a stubborn, foolish A-ya there who weirdly insisted on trying to keep him alive and awake, even as E-noru kept telling him to put him out of his misery so he wouldn't be stuck in some disgusting dream world. A-ya didn't.
Somehow, E-noru lived. Everyone else had conflicting feelings about seeking out a traitor after everything, but A-ya tried. E-noru wouldn't let him. He refuses to see any of the Occult Club; they've made it past their fates, they've lost the need for a traitor, and have broken from the confines of the story the film contained.
…
It's been so exhausting to be alive since then. His life is frozen in place, in the same habits and routines. He goes to school and carefully avoids people he doesn't want to see. He's doing decent in his classes; honestly, he has nothing better to do, and he would be lying if he said he doesn't enjoy the praise when he does well. His mother always considered him a smart kid, after all.
He goes home, and continues to play a part that doesn't fit right for his mother as the original person in that role continues to sleep his life away. Occasionally, he thinks about what could have happened if the worst came to fruition after receiving that letter. A-ya probably would refuse to kill him in the end, and he'd be in that position…the thought made him incredibly nauseous.
He goes through the motions of life. He has for months now. He's gotten pretty good at it. He does a lot of it while hardly even thinking. He hasn't seen any of the Occult Club in a while; he only slipped up and spotted them a few times at the start. If he's acting, he doesn't think much during it, only after it once he's alone (often after conversations with his mother) when disgust overwhelms him.
It's a lot like how life was before he met the Occult Club. Before he got so heavily involved with the characters of the film. Things were essentially the same, except he was now avoiding a specific set of 4 people instead of just everyone he could possibly avoid. He thought it would end such a stagnant life, but it only brought suffering and then returned him to the same circumstances, just with more thinge to feel worse about. Nothing had changed. Nothing was going to change.
He sighed, and realized what he was doing. He had zoned out while sitting in the snow-covered grass outside, and who knows how long he had been there for now. He probably looked really silly.
He stuck his hand in the snow, and left it there. It was cold, wet, and felt unpleasant. Leaving it there long enough caused his hand to start going a little numb, and he pulled it out. That was stupid (but, at least he could feel it—outside of sudden moments of intense emotion, he had been feeling nothing but emptiness lately). He wiped the water off his now-damp hand on his pants.
E-noru didn't check the temperature today. He also wasn't really dressed for winter weather, especially on an extra-cold, decently windy day like this. He wondered how long it would take to freeze to death if he kept sitting there. He remembered something about wind being a major factor in how dangerous the temperature was or something like that, and wondered if it wouldn't take long.
It's dark outside. Not many people had even walked kind of close to him in the entire time he had been sitting there. His mother was already passed out inside the house. No one would find him or his body for a decent amount of time if he just… laid there and died. Would he feel better then?
Well, if he was dead, then it'd be best if he just felt nothing at all. He thought about the idea of death quite a lot in those moments where he feared the worst would come. What would it be like? Was there somewhere he would go? (If a heaven and hell existed, he was also pretty certain of which of the two he belonged in, so he did kind of hope that wasn't the case.) Would he become a ghost? Or was there just.. nothing?
When he was a little kid, he was scared of the idea of there just being nothing. Nowadays, the idea feels a lot better than most options.
He was so tired. He flopped over, laying there on the ground. Honestly, whether he lived or died didn't matter at the moment. This would be a pathetic excuse for a suicide attempt anyways, so he wouldn't care if he woke up unharmed. He'd be pretty annoyed if someone found him, but that's just because the consequences of being found passed out in the middle of the night during a very cold day outside would be too unpleasant to deal with.
Plus, hypothermia seems like a pretty unpleasant way to go out.
For now, he just wants to get some rest…
Ever since that day in July, A-ya typically hasn't gone a day without wondering about E-noru.
He was always an interesting one. The mysterious transfer student that came from who-knows-where at a weird point in the year. The one who suddenly, abruptly proclaimed his knowledge about the Bookmark of Demise, joined the Occult Club, and acted as if he always belonged there. He always had interesting things to talk about, and the two would spend countless moments talking about whatever seemed to pop into his head; random hypotheticals, questions, paradoxes, rumors, all things that the two could talk on and on about.
He still remembers so many moments vividly. From being brought to the hospital room and finding out about the creator of the Book and Bookmark so early on to eventually confronting him when they realized that he was the hidden traitor this whole time. Moments where he was there in the group.
There are countless moments he doesn't tell the Occult Club about, though, that were just the two of them. He couldn't tell them, after all, especially because of C-ta; if he told anyone, it'd eventually reach his ears regardless. But those moments happened. He misses them.
Once, E-noru brought him to that hospital room. Alone. Instead of talking about the things that boy created, he talked about… his own life. His relation to the boy. He talked about how despite the strong resemblance, he was actually his uncle.
He told him that the boy's name was E-ki, and that they lived together with his mother before he became comatose. He talked about his mother and her relationship to his father; apparently, the two rushed into marriage, had a very unsteady relationship, and separated when he was around 8.
He remembers how E-noru tensed up a bit when A-ya asked if he was close to E-ki.
There were many secret moments in which A-ya and E-noru had secret, private time alone, but the one that stuck out in his mind the most was what happened after it was revealed that E-noru was the traitor.
It was very strange, how what they were experiencing seemed to end right after they exposed E-noru, and A-ya could only fear what might have happened if he didn't go and seek out E-noru afterwards. That day, he found him hardly conscious, on the ground, clutching the paper from a letter.
“Dream's Conclusion — Don't do anything different from the dream.”
That certainly was a scary one. After secretly taking him home, E-noru briefly was able to regain enough lucidity to explain that his body was… actively trying to force him into a coma.
Just like how the dream of E-ki's concludes. A coma. E-noru tried to make him promise to kill him if things came to that, but A-ya couldn't agree to it. He was stubborn, and despite knowing how stupid it was, kept trying to treat him himself. Keeping him from getting dehydrated, overheating due to his fever, just… keeping him safe. He knew how much C-ta would hate it if he found out he was doing this, but he couldn't just leave him to die.
E-noru was in such a desperate, vulnerable position; it was in those few moments of lucidity he had throughout the week that A-ya learned the most about him. He would talk a bit more about his life, and though it wasn't in depth, A-ya could figure pieces of it out.
E-noru used to be scared of heights and bad weather. E-noru liked to hide under beds when he was little. E-noru had a VHS player in his room. E-noru doesn't like the sound of dogs barking. E-noru's favorite foods are fried tofu and foods with azuki beans. E-noru didn't know how to be genuine around the Occult Club. E-noru occasionally feared he was only kept around because of his connection to the Bookmark of Demise and E-ki. E-noru didn't feel like he had a choice at any point throughout the Demise Game. E-noru didn't get along well with his mother.
…
Some of that stuff wasn't directly stated. A-ya had to do a lot of guessing. He listened to everything E-noru said very carefully as he made efforts to care for him, not wanting to miss a single word.
And so, because of his efforts, E-noru lived, and then A-ya never saw him again.
Well, early on, he did a few times if he chased him down, but he didn't have the chance to even get a word in. C-ta kept telling him to just quit it, and neither of the others necessarily disagreed with him. E-noru became more skilled at avoiding him, and in the end, A-ya couldn't find him again.
The boy he was so curious about, who brought about sudden break in the constant boredom of his life, the one he wished to know more about, suddenly disappeared.
He didn't disappear from A-ya's thoughts, though. Having never told him that much about his past, his life, anything like that outside of rare, sudden moments, he truly was shrouded in mystery. He'd always wonder about those things he was told. Why did he become the fox? Why did he start the Demise Game? What was his life like, leading up to it? Who was he? Where was he now?
…
But, he'd never receive an answer to those questions. A-ya knew that, and he had no choice but to return to boredom.
Today was boring as usual. It was really, really cold; the temperatures were in the negatives, and it was quite windy. He thought he was dressed pretty warmly, or at least warmly enough for himself, only for C-ta to fret about his outfit when he went to school that day. As a result, he now had a bit of an excessive amount of outfits.
He went on a walk. He didn't really know why, but he wanted to. He didn't have to worry about staying out too late; not only would his parents not be home for a while, but it was a Friday, meaning he didn't have to worry about seeing C-ta and getting his sleep habits criticized. (Honestly, despite all the turmoil, despite how at one point E-noru revealed the existence of cameras in his room placed by C-ta, it felt like nothing changed between the two. A-ya didn't like it.)
…
Eventually, illuminated by a streetlight, A-ya came across a familiar face which left him stunned, standing there for what felt like hours as he tried to process what he was seeing.
Laying in a patch of snow covered grass on the side of a sidewalk was E-noru. He hasn't seen him in months, and he's just… there. Laying there. Asleep, seemingly
A-ya, not sure what to even do in this situation, walks up to him and crouches down. He tries to poke him— he's freezing cold. Scarily cold.
Goodness, are they always only going to see each other when E-noru's life is in danger?
He really is full of surprises.
When the original shock subsides, he feels two things: concern that E-noru's actually dying of hypothermia, and the realization that if he brings him somewhere to warm him up, he'll have an opportunity to ask questions about… everything, actually. Perhaps things had become interesting again.
This felt like such a… not-so-shocking thing to come from E-noru. Suddenly re-intruding on his life in strange circumstances, bringing something entertaining to it.
As A-ya picked him up and began to walk home, he felt grateful that he didn't wander a significantly long distance.
E-noru woke up, feeling… really, really weird.
Well, he was alive— he looked around, and realized he was in someone's room.
…
This was A-ya's room. He was also in A-ya's bed, bundled in an amount of blankets that made E-noru wonder where he even got all these. He knew it was A-ya's home because he was sitting in front of his bed, with his back turned to it, holding a piece of paper and a pencil.
He looked closer, and he was writing questions. Seemingly questions he was intending to ask him, since it mentioned the Demise Game and being the fox enough times for it to make no sense to ask anyone else.
…
He really, really wished he could've just died out in the cold. This was the absolute last thing he wanted to happen. He was afraid of seeing A-ya again.