Chapter Text
Ghosts.
They were known for being strange apparitions, hollow and transparent, and typically blind to the normal human eye. They were spirits, fragments of the already-deceased, and moreover, those who had long been dead. In telling, they were said to be terrifying, monstrous creatures whom refused to sleep until a senseless tale of revenge was fulfilled. Until they could give their victim the haunting they desired. Most deemed such a concept of vengeance-drowned monsters an old-wives tale. A mere tale made to scare children into behaving correctly. A story to tell around a campfire.
That's what it's supposed to be and that's what it always was. A childish take on strange occurrences.
Nene knew otherwise to this, now.
Everything had been just fine, everything had been normal and like it always had been. Her job as a knight was going well, with her even getting recognized among her peers as the 'may be sharp-tongued, but will never lose in a battle' person of their division. She was improving and taking on more responsibilities and getting acknowledged for her efforts. Everything had been beyond just normal, it had been great..!
That was when things started changing.
The peculiarities started out small. A flash of movement here and there or an unnatural 'gust of wind' on an average day. The subtle shift in objects that shouldn't have moved, or the way the dusty floors would occasionally part, as if it were making a path for something. She'd hear these noises that nobody else would and it made her feel like she was going crazy, but she couldn't do anything to stop it. Bringing up her concerns would merely ruin what she was already building in her career, yet others had already been noticing the changes in her personality besides. She couldn't even count on her fingers how many times her colleagues had asked her if she was alright. It was agonizing and she thought for a while that maybe that it was just fate telling her she needed to go to bed earlier. It was, indeed, not that.
These subtle things had been bothersome enough, but eventually, these blurs, these shifts, gathered form.
It was outlandish and nonsensical. They'd started out like subtle swabs in her vision, like when you'd first wake up in the morning, blurry-eyed and tired. But, eventually, they reached a point where they would appear tangible. One day, it might simply be an illusion, something you could brush off as collection of dust in a unkempt stairwell. Another day, they could be vivid, clear, real..
They were strange, often tinted different colours and transparent. They had whole personalities, behaviors, and simple, humanoid forms that made them seem more human than monster. Nene had never tried, but she figured you could probably reach your hand through them, or push them away with a gust of wind. It was startling to her. They would just appear and she'd struggle to take her eyes away from the apparitions. They were so peculiar. She'd thought creatures like them were filled with malice, staying among the humans with the objective of revenge and revenge alone. Nene wondered now if that was ever even true. She'd only seen them vaguely in the halls of the castello or various other places among it, and they'd never done anything particularly bad. Y'know, apart from sending her into madness and making her think she was delusional....
It wasn't even solely the things around her that had been changing. Things had been happening to herself that she knew weren't supposed to be.
One morning in particular, she'd woken up like any other day but was troubled at state of herself in the mirror. It was as if her upper canine teeth had lengthened and grown, or rather, like she now had fangs. She could barely even handle such a thought or the sight of herself, and had spent the whole morning shaving them down with a nail file. It was painful, and she struggled to eat anything solid for the next week without flinching from the pain. She knew it was wrong. All wrong. Though, once again, she couldn't do much of anything to fix it. How would she ever explain to a doctor that her teeth were sharpening themselves in ways no normal person's should..?
Her nails themselves as well were peculiarly long. She would vividly remember cutting them short, but the next morning, they would be long again. She could barely even call them nails anymore, they looked more like claws than anything else. It was like anything she did to combat the changes to herself were instantly parried. It was a losing battle and it was draining.
Nene knew none of it was right and that she simply had to be going crazy. Her performance in training had began to decline and she could barely focus on a single thing at once. Everything was so loud and bright and she was losing much-needed sleep over everything that was happening to her. How would one even fathom sleeping when such a retched thing is happening to them..? All she wanted was for it to stop, for the torment to cease..
This morning had been particularly excruciating for her, actually.
She was actually hoping to attend a training session because she knew the king was to be checking their performance in the near future. Nene wanted to get all the practice she could for whenever he decided to make his appearance. It was quite rare for anyone from the upper palace to visit them and if there were visitors they were merely upper-class servants and never the ruler himself. Nene had heard he was quite nice as a general person and had only ever seen him in person once. That was when she was first appointed as a knight. Oh, what a simpler time..
The knights of their division were self-operating, being only in charge of themselves and reporting their progress to the higher-ups. The king and his dukes trusted their squadron to manage themselves and merely left the group to their own devices, leaving them to sort out their own positions. They were all technically a team, all working together to become stronger and worthy for eventual battle, despite not having many enemies as of the now. While they'd all been brought along in the same status, with no one actually appointed by the king to be higher or lower, a few had reached a point in their careers where people deemed them 'responsible' or 'significant'. One of those people to note was Mochizuki. She was a very nice girl, very kind, and so there was no wonder why everyone loved her. She earned a reputation for being caring and concerned and therefore earned general respect from those around her, most addressing her as the Lieutenant of their group. Nene herself was generally respected for her work, too. Most of the knights in their whole group had earned the trust of each other in a way that let them work together well. It was no wonder how they always ended up with the highest performance reviews..
That morning, Nene had woken up from another sleepless night and was more tired than when she'd gone to bed. The sun filtered through the cheap curtains and the rays landed directly in her eyes. She dragged herself out of bed, pulling up the blankets over the mattress and getting ready for the day with a kind of tiredness she knew she shouldn't have possessed. She walked up to the small mirror above her desk, as she now did any morning now, and promptly sighed when she saw the fangs had grown back. Her nails too, were long like claws. She took out her half-disheveled nail file, making a mental note to buy at least a few more.
As she sawed down on the keratin of her nails, she thought back to the situation as a whole.
I wish I could just understand, at the bare minimum, what is going on... Because really, how is any of this even humanly possible in the first place..?
I haven't changed anything significant in the past several weeks, at most I probably just changed something small like my toothpaste or something..! And the ghosts hallucinations.. Are they really just figments of my imagination? Or am I actually going crazy..? I want to think that they aren't actually there, but they seem so real, so still, so visibly tangible... I hate it. And too, if they are real, why am I of all people seeing them..? Am-Am I dying or something?! Is that why I can see them..? I hope not..
She sighed and mustered all her energy into her job. They had a training session bright and early that morning and she knew she couldn't be late.
Nene was dressed in her knightly attire and was simply pulling on her gloves when a knock sounded at her door. She physically flinched at the noise, as it sounded deafening to her in the small, echoey dorm. Begrudgingly, she made her way to the door while wiping her eyes, trying to look somewhat presentable and well-slept.
"Mochizuki-san." She responded to the knocking girl, a little confused. Why would the lieutenant be at her dorm at such an hour..?
"Kusanagi." Mochizuki nodded her head in greeting. "Are you feeling any better today..?"
Oh yeah... she thinks I'm sick, doesn't she? I might as well be at this point, I'm so sleep-deprived I can barely keep my eyes open..! She isn't even the first person to ask me that, too. Kiritani and Momoi have expressed their concerns, and even that grumpy Hinomori asked if I'm okay...
"I'm fine, Mochizuki. Thank you for asking." Nene was certainly not okay, but felt the need to lie. Who would even believe her complicated circumstance..?
Mochizuki seemed very reluctant to accept her response. "Are-Are you sure..? You seem like you could use a few more hours of sleep..."
Oh I need more than a few hours, Mochizuki, waaaaaaayy more than a few.
"I slept fine, you don't need to worry about me." Nene tried to leave the room but the brown-haired girl blocked her path. She seemed very hesitant and apprehensive about what she was doing.
"Actually, me and some of the others wanted to tell you, that-..that you could stay in your dorm for a few days. Y'know, get more rest and-and stuff like that..." Mochizuki was stuttering, jittery and uncertain. "I know we can't force you, b-but we really think that you could use a few days and-"
Nene interrupted Mochizuki's frantic stuttering, trying to spare both of them the trouble. "That's okay, actually. I'm fine to go to practice as always." She tried to leave her room once more but the other still wouldn't move. Mochizuki looked down to her boots.
"Can I leave my dorm..?" She sarcastically inclined.
Mochizuki didn't move out of the way. "We wouldn't want you getting hurt or anything, Kusanagi. We really think you should stay here..."
"I think otherwise, Mochizuki." Nene objected sternly. She could get through the day just fine. "I appreciate the concern, but I would like to get to practice and-.."
"No." A third girl entered the scene and she flinched upon her entrance. It was only more noise for her head to juggle. She had to force-blink her eyes a few times to make sure she was actually real. She was.
"Hinomori." Nene acknowledged, though she had to hold back a sigh. She knew Hinomori. That girl was as insistent and stubborn as winter..
"Kusanagi, I've seen you..! You've barely been able to function right for god only knows how long and you keep saying you're fine.." Hinomori shouldered past Mochizuki and stood in front of her, her grey bob-cut looking yellow in the pale morning light shone from the windows behind them. Her green eyes flickered with something like annoyance.
"That's because I am fine!" Nene raised her voice to match Hinomori's tone. "All of you keep acting like I'm sick when I'm perfectly, amazingly fine..!" Another lie.
"No you're not, you literally have visible bags under your eyes..! And that's also why you're not going to practice today!" Hinomori lifted her chin and crossed her arms, irritancy evident in her eyes.
"-And who are you to decide that for me?" She lowered her voice to something less forceful but even sharper. Hinomori couldn't force her to do anything, they were of just the same status of each other. How dare she even think otherwise..?! Nene ran her tongue over her freshly-shaven canines in distracted tendency, angry at the situation being caused. A few other knights from within the corridor were now trying to get subtle glimpses of the interaction.
Hinomori was about to retort back some snide remark when suddenly, Mochizuki chimed in, surprising them both in the process. "Guys, stop arguing!"
They'd rarely seen the brown-haired girl have a spine to stand on when it came to arguments, though she'd made it clear in her body language she disliked them besides. It was strange to actually see her speak up, so Nene gave the grey-haired girl a pointed glare and backed away. Hinomori did the same.
"Kusanagi, we have a note from one of the nurses advising you to visit her." Mochizuki told her, handing her a thin, paper slip.
She then grabbed both of Nene's hands and looked her deep in her purple, sleep-deprived eyes. "Please, even if it's only for this practice, I think you should stay here and get some much-needed rest." Mochizuki was practically begging the green-haired girl. "I don't know what's going on with you, if anything is going on with you, but you seem exhausted, Kusanagi. So, please. If not for your own sake, then for those around you; Stay back for just this practice. One practice."
If her hands weren't currently being held in Mochizuki's then she would have facepalmed.
Why do they even care that much? They won't even listen to me, but at this point, that's probably rightfully so of them. Have I really been that sloppy at practice..? I know that a lot of people know me for my reflexes and accuracy, and I have been particularly off with that recently..
Or maybe they've seen the way I'll 'space out' on seemingly-empty pockets of air, or flinch at things they can't see... I'll even admit I've done those things... But really, it's not even my fault! I shouldn't even be experiencing any of this at all! Why is this all even happening to me...?
She looked into Mochizuki's pleading eyes and actually considered the offer being laid before her. She knew it was wrong to miss a practice session over something as stupid as her little visions, but the offer was quite tempting. She could use the time to rest, or maybe even figure out what was wrong with her.
"Fine..!" Nene finally said in a tone mixed between slightly apprehensive and snarky. "But hear me when I say this, I do not need to see a nurse, nor am I going to see one."
"That's wonderful!" Mochizuki said and Hinomori merely scoffed in the background. "We'll visit the nurse together another day, but yes, stay back and get lots of rest, okay?" Mochizuki seemed grateful that Nene had finally listened to her.
Nene wanted to protest, but Hinomori was already trying to close the door. "I hope you feel better soon, Kusanagi." The words were completely opposite of her attitude and she still sounded like she wanted to fight the green-haired girl.
"You too, Hinomori" She responded, shutting the door on the sympathetic Mochizuki and the irritated Hinomori. Hinomori wasn't dense, she could figure out what she was implying with that..
As the door clicked shut she could already hear Hinomori letting out her frustrations to the other. It was something along the lines of 'Why is she like this?' or 'Can she not be so stubborn for once?!' or 'What a jerk!'. It made Nene release the sigh she'd prevented earlier, which ever one it was.
She still held the small paper slip in her hand and was mentally preparing herself for whatever foolishness the other knights had told the medicinal wing. She was a little annoyed that she was already in her knightly uniform and had been awake for too long to go back to sleep easily... If she'd even slept at all in the first place, that is. She used the fact that her half-obligatory prisoning was only for a day. As much as she'd love it to be longer, she knew she'd grow lazy and sluggish if given enough time.
She turned around to face her bedroom and suddenly felt her heart drop down to the floor alongside the paper slip that had been in her hands. Her breath caught sharp in her throat.
No...