Chapter Text
It was a regular Wednesday morning when sae decided that he had to go back. Months of violent nightmares that he could never quite remember had culminated to its peak the night before when things became far too real.
he had been lying in bed softly stroking the old framed picture of he and Rin that sat on his bedside table. It had been his nightly routine for years to lay on his stomach and stare at that photo letting silent tears slip down his face. He often spent full nights awake staring at though usually he would pass out from exhaustion.
If his foster parents (the people who had taken him in after the incident) knew how he had spent every night for the past six years they would freak out. They thought he’d gotten over the events of his childhood years ago. Sae could tell they made a conscious effort not to mention it maybe hoping that sae would forget all about it.
if they knew how tortured he was from the nightmares they would send him back to the physiologist and he would have to spend two hours a week staring into space while a middle aged woman with a soft voice tried to get him to connect with his emotions and memories.
he’d hated every second of it as a child and he knew it would be no different now. Maybe his fear of being found out was the reason he kept the nightmares to himself for so long even when they got worse until it was too late.
there had only been 10 months between them but sae always felt responsible for his brother even though Rin was already taller than him by the age of 9. Their parents had just claimed that sae grew slow and he would have a growth spurt someday but as the years slinked by he stayed short and slight.
as he glued his eyes to Rin’s smiling face he begun to feel an odd sensation under his stomach. He shifted uncomfortably thinking that maybe his blanket had gotten balled up beneath him but as he moved it out of the way he realised that something was sticking out of his mattress.
he narrowed his eyes and began to prod at the odd intrusion. Where had it come from? He had certainly never noticed it before. Just as he shifted up onto his hands and knees he felt another hard object push up beneath his left knee.
He gasped and fell back pulling his duvet away only to watch in horror as countless objects that looked like hands began to push up from seemingly inside his mattress all sliding and groping together as if they were trying to reach out and grab him through the thin material.
sae screamed and dived onto the floor tangled up in his bed covers. He struggled against his bindings as the hands were joined by other body parts till it looked like there was a whole group of people pushing and shoving against each other desperately trying to reach him.
he crawled desperately across his floor to tug on the door handle but it wouldn’t open. He tried screaming for help but he knew no one could hear him. His foster parents had left a couple of days before for some kind of work trip and he knew that they wouldn’t be back for at least another week. He was completely alone.
as he was tugging against the door handle a cold hand gripped his ankle and dragged him backwards across the floor. His face slammed against the floor and as he began to claw at the floor trying to pull himself away from the door frame he felt warm blood pour down his face into his open mouth and onto the floor staining the old grey carpet.
when his new parents took him to this house for the first time six years ago when he was twelve they had told him he would be completely safe in his new room. He had believed them at the time but now he knew he could never sleep there again.
As more hands reached out from under his bed to pull him closer he started to hear horse whispers in his ears. There was a whole chorus of strained voices some laughing, some crying but they all called out the same words. “You have to come back” they pulled him further under the bed and sae gripped the edge of the bed frame with all his strength tears dripping down his face to join the blood.
In his deep panic he tried to appease the voices hoping that if he did they might finally leave him alone. “I’ll come I’ll come!” He cried at the top of his lungs. “Please” he screamed “just let me go and I’ll come I promise… I’ll come I’ll come back just please let me go”
after what seemed like hours the voices began to whisper amongst each other like they were trying to make a decision. Eventually they seemed to come to a consensus and the hands finally retracted as if they were never there leaving sae on the floor half under the bed sobbing so hard he couldn’t breathe.
he laid there crying for so long that when he finally calmes down enough to get up the sun was poking through his curtains. He rose soundlessly and dragged his duvet and pillow onto the couch in the living-room downstairs where he made base.
he hat for hours his body completely numb and his mind clouded just staring at the cream walk in front of him. His nose had taken a long time to stop bleeding so he sat with the front of his night shirt completely soaked through with blood.
he waited for hours hoping that at some point he would wake up revealing the whole experience to just be another nightmare but that never happened. The blood on his bedroom floor and the rips in the mattress didn’t lie. It had been real.
The voices had told him to come back, if he didn’t would the hands come back, he started to cry again as he pictured it. The voices had never told him where they wanted him to go and yet somehow he knew the exact place they meant.
Silent hill.
the town he had grown up in, the place he went to school, the place he had friends, the place he had grown up with his brother. He hadn’t been back since the incident the psychologist deeming him too mentally unstable to safety return. He had to go back.
He had no car so he would have to take busses and plan out his journey but it was the best time to go. His foster parents would flip if he ever even suggested going back. They were nice people but far too over protective.
If he didn’t act quickly he would psych himself out of it and he would never go. He pulled his old backpack out from his wardrobe and filled it with the things he would need. He made sure he had more than enough money for both his travel and a place to stay once he got to the town. What he was going there for he didn’t know but he decided to not think too hard about it.
He wore dark baggy jeans, a long sleeved top and a thick jacket over a dark blue jumper. It was cold that time of year and he wanted to be prepared. He didn’t bring the picture of him and Rin he was far too scared to loose or damage it on his journey.
His parents had immigrated from Japan to America only a year before she got pregnant with him. In his childhood he never left silent hill and since the incident he moved over here then never left his new town so he knew very little about the rest of America he had lived a sheltered childhood.
He could still speak his mother tongue as his parents had insisted they speak their natural language at home so they didn’t loose it and even years later it was just as familiar to him as English.
As he walked out of the front door to make his way to the bus station he turned to take one last look at the house he had spent the last six years in. Little did he know it was the last time he would ever see that house.
Sae had practically isolated himself from most of society for his teenage years so he greatly struggled to get on the right bus, he couldn’t stand being close to so many people’s. He curled up at the very back of the bus until it reached his stop where he got out to catch the next one. The third bus was the longest which would travel through the night into West Virginia the state that was home to silent hill.
As he got on that bus the driver gave him an odd look and asked if he was sure he was in the right place. Sae just looked down at his feet and gave him a quiet yes. He was too nervous to even look in the older and eyes. The man had eventually let him on but sae noticed that he kept a close eye on him for the entire ride.
the bus drove throughout the night and by the time it reached his destination it was about one in the morning. He had been travelling for 17 hours straight yet he hadn’t got a wink of sleep. He was exhausted but he couldn’t sleep in fear of more nightmares.
he quietly thanked the driver before hopping of the bus and sitting on a bench for a while. Now he was here he would have to walk the rest of the way following a paper map.
There were no busses that went near silent hill. He guessed it made sense it was a quiet little town, in his childhood it had hardly ever gotten visitors and even then whenever they would see a newcomer on the street his father would lift him into his arms and leave wherever they were as fast as possible.
The community of silent hill had always been funny about outsiders, in fact there had been a small riot outside the police station all the way up to the towns gates of people angry that Sae was being driven away from the town after the incident.
he remembered sitting quietly in the back off a police car swinging his kegs softly as he tried to avoid the gazes of his old friends who had been taken along with their parents to the police station to stop him from leaving. At the time he couldn’t bare to look at them, they all just unlocked painful memories if the incident. He remembered the kind but stressed looking police officer turn back in his seat to assure Sae that it would all be ok.
Lots of people had told him that since the incident like they thought it was a tape they could use to stitch his fractured soul back together but an important piece was already long gone.
As sae walked through the quiet forest roads his hands shivered uncontrollably in the gloves even when he buried them deep into the pockets of his jacket. He didn’t know how long he walked for in the pitch black when he heard a siren come up behind him. He turned just in time to watch a police car pull over next to him.
He stared as a young man in his mid twenties crawled out of the car and went down to one knee in front of Sae like he was talking to a child. “A bus driver sent us a call about a kid riding his bus alone at night, that you” Sae lamented the snitching bus driver but he nodded.
“How old are you kid.. what are you doing out here alone” Sae hesitated for a minute. “Ive just turned 18 which means I can go where I please” the officer looked him up and down. “You don’t look 18 you look far too small and bloody exhausted you know you can tell me if you need help” Sae scoffed and pulled his ID out of his bag to prove his age.
The officer checked it carefully before handing it back to Sae. “What are you doing out here Sae don’t you know this road doesn’t lead anywhere” sae scrunched his face up. “Yes it does, I’m going to silent hill” the officer froze. “You’d better get in the car kid so we can go back to the station together I promise you do not want to go to silent hill” sae took a step back and the officer lifted his hands to placate him like a stray cat.
“that place kid it’s practically a ghost town most people cleared out a few years ago and the people left they don’t take kindly to strangers” That gave Sae pause. A ghost town? Sure it had always been quiet but it had never been like that. Could it have something to do with his nightmares?
He stared the officer down “I grew up in silent hill it was my home and I promised someone I would go there to see them” he decided not to mention that the someone had been a group of disembodied voices and grabby hands he didn’t think that would go down well. The officer looked conflicted before seemingly coming to a decision.
“ok here’s what we’ll do your gonna get in my car” sae opened his mouth to argue but the man cut him off “I’m gonna take you down to the station where you can warm up a bit then when it’s light I’ll drive you down to the gates of the town myself how about that… I can’t in good conscience leave you out here in the cold”
sae wanted to be conflicted but it was an easy choice he was absolutely freezing and he was a legal adult who had committed no crime so this man had no right to hold him if he went back on his word. He eventually nodded and followed the officer back into the car.
“my names Callum by the way” he said. Sae nodded his teeth still chattering as Callum turned the heating on and began to drive away. The drive was almost completely silent with Sae spending most of it with his head resting on the cool glass and his still fingers rubbing at the fabric of his clothes to keep himself calm as he sat in the car with this stranger.
when they finally reached the little police station Callum led Sae by the shoulder through to what looked to be a little break room for staff. It was a seemingly quiet night and there were only two other officers in the break room, a woman and an older man who looked a little familiar.
Callum sat him down on one of the break room chairs and handed him a drink as he went to speak to the older officer. They spoke quietly but Sae still caught most of their conversation.
“is this the kind we got the call about” Callum nodded his head “he’s 18 so we can’t hold him. I offered to let him stay here for a while before I drive him up to silent hill in the morning” the older man sent Sae an odd look and leaned in closer to Callum. “Silent hill is he sure he wants to go there”. Callum shrugged “he told me that he grew up there, wants to visit someone”
The older officer finally gave Sae a proper look. Recognition bloomed in his eyes when he looked at his face and he walked up closer. “Sae Itoshi?” He questioned. “Sae nodded hesitantly confused to how this man knew his full name. The older officer put his head in his hands and sighed.
“sae do you remember me I’m the officer that took you away from that town a few years ago” Sae’s eyes went wide in recognition. That was why his face was familiar. “Look I know for a fact that you shouldn’t be here so please just call your foster parent and tell them to come and pick you up for the love of god” Sae shook his head “no no way I have to go back” the nan groaned and shook his head while Callum watched the exchange in clear confusion.
The officer walked closer to Sae and kneeled right in front of him “look sae I know what happened to you I can get why you might be curious but I promise that you do not need to go back to that town” Sae looked at him through half closed eyes exhausted clouding his brain.
“I’ve made my decision… you’ll still take me right? If you don’t I’ll just walk it doesn’t matter” Callum nodded mutely. Sae was glad that the man was going to keep his promise. “Good” the conversation ended there. Over the next few hours the older officer continued to try and speak to Sae but he just ignored him.
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Sae’s memories had a fuzzy boarder at the edges. On that particular day Sae had to go to school alone since Rin was sick at home. Sae thought he might have been coming down with the same thing since he felt tired and the had the beginnings of a cough.
That morning his father had walked him to school carrying him in a piggyback since Sae had claimed he was tired. He was 9 at the time but still small enough for both his parents to hold him comfortably and Sae liked being carried, he liked to see the view from above since most of the time he had to look up at whoever he met.
His father had dropped him at the front gate where he met up with some of his friends. It was a small school so people of all ages were closely knit but he still didn’t share lessons with most of them.
He spent his morning classes quietly chatting with Loki who was just a few months older. Both of them tried to avoid getting involved in any of the mischief caused by Charles who was a few months younger.
Sae like his classes with those too he thought they cancelled each other out well. He enjoyed watching Charles’s antics and listening to his rambles and Loki always made sure that Sae was involved properly in everything with his more shy personality. He learnt with them and then the trio would go and join the rest of their friends who were a little older at break times.
there were only about 8 students in Sae’s class but he could never quite recall the faces of his other peers. He was always too shy to speak to most people he was only in his friend group because Charles had dragged him along with him on the first day of school when they were five years old and Sae was upset at being separated from Rin for so long.
After morning lessons the trio went to join the rest of their friends in their usual spot by the school fence in the far corner of the field. Sae sat on the soft grass in the warm sun rubbing his fingers over the seams of his clothes and plucking at little clover as he sat in between Bunnny and Kaiser with a small smile on his face watching the antics of the rest of his friends.
The two older boys had a quiet conversation over Sae’s head while he watched on as Charles chased Hugo and Ness trying to jump onto their Backs while Loki laughed. It was all completely normal till Hugo turned and saw something just past the fence the smile falling from his face.
Sae frowned and turned around to see a young man stood by the fence. He was completely unfamiliar so Sae guessed he must have come from outside of town.
The man was unsteady on his feet and he looked very out of it with a glassy look in his eyes. Sae got up to ask if he needed any help when Bunny grabbed his arms and pulled Sae behind him with a tight smile on his face as Kaiser went up the the fence to shoo the man away.
The rest of his friends quickly got up after that to move away from the fence. When Sae tried to look back at the man Charles grabbed his hand and cracked a joke while gently tugging him away.
At the time Sae thought it was all slightly odd but he didn’t question it. Sae’s parents had always acted in a similar way in the presence of outsiders and it was the same. With Luna the teen who always looked after him and Rin if his parents were away which was a few nights a month when they stayed with other friends in the town.
Sae had never realised before then that his families wariness around strangers extended to the rest of the town as well.
the memory warped and twisted at the edges till Charles’s smiling face changed to his it was when Sae saw it out of the window of the police car on that day. He had looked sad then.
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Sae jolted awake when he felt the engine of the car switch off. He quickly thanked Callum for the ride and waved off any final concernes. He walked up the road for a minute till he finaly reached the front gate that led to the town of his childhood.
“He was finally home”
Silent hill.