a sudden change is in the air

Q) SUMIKO NISHIKAWA “You... you said we were friends! You said...we...”

"Sumiko. I enjoyed the tea, despite it's taste.”

Q) YOSHIROU OKUMURA: Yoshirou stares at Jiayi as the tears start to fall down his cheeks.

"Yoshirou, I told you, didn't I? It would be easier, if you disliked me."

Q) MINAKO YAMAGISHI: "I WANT YOU DEAD. NOOOOOOWWWWWW! WRETCHED BEAST. You are the reason I died?! You are the reason I ascend to the next realm without my consent?! FIE! I want you dead! I want you dead NOW! PAY FOR WHAT YOU'VE DONE TO ME! Pay your due! Pay what you owe me immediately! In blood! In guarantee that you die! In guarantee that you fall to hell! I WANT YOU DEAD! YOU... YOU...!"

"Ms. Yamagishi... as bold as ever. We can discuss what happens to you and I and the rest of us soon enough."

Q) KASUMI AIUCHI: "Fucking Shorty! I knew there was a reason I wanted to tease the fuck out of you! I totally said I would accuse you too- Fuck this! If my sister continues to decline because I'm not there, I'm going to fucking murder you, you hear me!?"

"Ms. Aiuchi, you vex me, and I ask you hold off on murder."

Q) MOTSUI TABAYASHI: “Fat head.”

“Ms. Tabayashi... that’s fair.”

Q) HAKU HOUJUU: “Kuhuhu! A witch and a monster! I knew it. I knew it was Chen. Or rather, a shinigami and a bakemono, working together to cause despair. How dreadful. Whatever made you two want to cause so much pain? I'm genuinely intrigued.''

“It is… simply a response of how I was raised. Foolish, looking back. Well, we live in a society, don’t we? I am a bastard child born into the upper class. I have been taught that everyone was going to gut me, had I not followed everything to a perfect T.” “I suppose I eventually became tired, one day. I began to hate the situation with which I was placed in. The upper class of idiots who only cared for money and fame and legacy. Adults who only cared about success, and not happiness. A society full of weeds. I originally attempted to kill… my ex’s father, in order to rid society of those idiots, one by one by one. But I failed, of course. It is not something so easily done on your own, and especially after murder is involved, ahaha…” “Eventually I ended up in Hope’s Peak Academy, and heard rumors of intense forest spirits with power. I came across Nara Sanctuary, and ran into Shuichi. The Tethered hold the strings of fate in their hands — if not something that I can do alone, do you really blame me for wanting to place trust in the Gods? They need souls and emotions to operate. I provided both. I apologize, for dragging you all into this, but it was the easiest thing to do.”

“Equality between the classes; upper and lower. Rebuilding mortal society. Perhaps, then, there wouldn’t be such shitty adults. Perhaps, then, there wouldn’t be anyone like me — angry and hating the world. That was what I agreed to, but I should have realized things wouldn’t be so easy.

Q) MINAKO YAMAGISHI: Minako pulls the orb off of her jacket and chucks it at Jiayi.

She ducks.

Q) YUUTO TSKUSHI: "Why did you both take it ?"

"Why did I take...? Mr. Tsukushi, I tried. Looks like I'm just not cut out for murder, no matter how I dice it. What are the Gods to you? They're powerful; all-knowing. They are supposed to be who you look to in times of need."

"They have more power than I, a tiny human, could ever achieve. But..."

"It's as Shuichi said. There's a chance, that for once in my damn life I can make things right. Or do my best to."

Q) FUUKO KAGEYAMA: Fuuko recalls that some time in his life, someone told him that his name was an unlucky one. It made sense to him - everything in his life was just one bad event to another. And now, his taste in men. This sure is the circus, and Fuuko is the biggest clown in the show. He stares at his podium for a long minute, then kneels down, unties one of his shoes, and pulls it off. "KISS MY ASS!" A shoe goes flying across the trial room.

This was all expected, really. The hurt in peoples' voices, the yelling, the endless stream of questions. What he didn't quite expect however was a shoe hurtling directly towards him, firmly hitting him in the chest as it almost knocks him over. Not only did it hurt physically, but the words he said stung more than any physical pain ever would.

Q) VICINIO A. VARGO: “Reward our efforts? This really is just a game to you, isn’t it? Well, don’t leave us hanging, Ueno. Would you like to tell the court why you let them suffer for so long?”

“I deliberately sought out The Tethered for reasons unrelated to this killing game. To be honest, I was never a huge fan of this idea but what are you supposed to say to beings that have had a foothold over your entire family for generations? I was just looking for a way to break off my family's deal, and... I was offered a compromise." 

 "Help a current deal reach its intended conclusion and I'd be promised freedom. In a world where society would be restructured there'd be no need for families like mine, right? I think it's safe to say now that now I realize it wasn't worth it. I acted too late, and for that I can't really apologize without it sounding completely disingenuous, can I? So instead I'll just take whatever you have to say to me and also help you figure out one last thing." “After all; There's one person left, right? The Reaper who forged a contract with The Tethered in the first place."

Q) HAKU HOUJUU: “Kuhuhu! A witch and a monster! I knew it. I knew it was Chen. Or rather, a shinigami and a bakemono, working together to cause despair. How dreadful. Whatever made you two want to cause so much pain? I'm genuinely intrigued.''

"The reason I decided to trust Jiayi and this plan was, frankly, because our goals aligned. I wanted freedom from everything that was holding me down, Jiayi planned to eradicate it all. Even if I... didn't agree with the methods and, at times, we were at odds with each other I stuck with her. There are several reasons I did so but, mostly, I did so because I trusted her to follow through with her plan and I trusted her conviction. It's probably safer to say my loyalties lay more with her than The Tethered."

Q) YOSHIROU OKUMURA: "...S-So what happens now ...to us...? Alive and dead...? Can...Can we all just go home...?"

"...You know, I think something like that could potentially be arranged Okumura-kun."

[HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS]

Before long, Fuminori finds himself enveloped in a cold, suffocating darkness that seemed to press on him from all directions, and fill every part of his body with a sensation of immense heaviness. By all means, he was met face to face with nothing but his own sense of self, but even that was beginning to ebb away with the numbing of his limbs and the fading of his consciousness, leaving behind only the sound of his heart beating wildly against his ears, and the fear that poisoned the blood that coursed through his veins. Perhaps this was what awaited him. Perhaps this was justice. Perhaps this was death. He could do nothing but wait and wonder with what little lucidity he had left, but just as his thoughts began to dissipate into a mere fog,

they suddenly converge, and he wakes up.

The first thing he sees is a blinding light, and the blurry shape of his own hand as he instinctively moves to block it from reaching his eyes. As his senses return to him, he feels his body pressing down against a soft bedding of weeds, and the gentle rays of the sun that shone through the sparsely covered sky, beating down against his being, wrapping him in a comforting blanket of warmth. For a moment, he feels as if he were in a dream, but clarity was next to return, and with it the strength to sit up, skin meeting a gentle breeze thereafter, and eyes, a vast sea of tall grass that swayed in waves with the push of the wind. He looks around, yet strangely, not with fear. The land was unfamiliar to him in every shape and form, but it instilled into him a comfort. A desire. A need to stand.

The horizon expands as he pushes himself to his feet. Now, he sees the subtle rolling of the land, and while abundant with greenery, the distance was another story, barren of anything but the plains the stretched out below him. By all means, there was nowhere to go, but not to Fuminori, for something beyond his sights seemed to pull at him, as if reaching out for an embrace, only to fall short. He’s hesitant; he did not know where to start, after all, and to set off of a journey without direction was something only a fool would do, but the wind then joins in its ushering, blowing past him, behind him, and towards a distant wish.

There’s a moment of doubt, but he eventually turns, and he walks. 

Soon, the sun sets, and the stars begin to shine brilliantly through the thin canopy of clouds while the moon, from the endless void above him, swathes him in its blue glow. Time passes, and his eyelids eventually grow heavy when he comes face to face with inevitable drowsiness, but he doesn’t cease his walking to rest, only pressing forward and onward, up until the sun peeks out from the horizon once again. 

Day. Night. Day. Night.

The scene around Fuminori begins to change, shifting and morphing as if subject to fantasy. The lush green fades into a dusty orange, and from the ground came trees that grew in his wake, sprouting leaves that just as quickly turned red and began to fall off of their branches, trailing behind him like a crimson storm. It’s only a matter of time before every last one falls, and the moment the final leaf leaves its abode, a biting cold quickly fills the air as if on cue.

The vibrant colors vanish under the dust that falls from the sky, which covers the once decorated scenery with a monotonous white. Nothing is spared from the cleansing storm that thickly coats the ground and bare the trees, turning everything into nothing more than dry, hollow shells of what they once were. It’s empty now, more than it ever was, but the farmer continues onward without pause nevertheless, in his persistent search for something in the distance.

Summer. Fall. Winter. Spring.

…

…Huh? How long has it been?

It was only when thousands upon thousands of all sorts of colors bloom from the dirt in the form of equally numerous flowers when reason returns to Fuminori. He pauses all of a sudden for the first time in hours, days, maybe even months, but as soon as he stops letting his legs carry him, it’s as if the blind force possessing him had suddenly left his body. With its departure, all sensation returns, and so does the weight of his journey on his body all at once. 

Suddenly, utter exhaustion and the intense ache of his legs sends him to his knees, while hunger and thirst grip at his being with an iron fist, afflicting him with an indescribable pain. He coughs and heaves as he curls up on the ground; it’s all overwhelming, crippling even. Everything strikes at him all at once and with an engulfing intensity, but it is before he finds himself drowning in this discordant sea that he pulls himself to shore.

He takes a deep breath, slow and steady. 

It sure feels like it, but he knows deep down that it’s not the end of the world. With this thought in tow, he lays there for a moment, maybe two, and then the worst of it subsides, allowing him to stumble back to his feet. He’s barely recovered before he sets his eyes forward, ready to trudge onwards all over again, but this time, something else shows itself to him, appearing in light of his tenacity.

Not so far away, there was a small house, old-seeming but well taken care of, and in front of it six blurry figures, all of which were wholly familiar. 

He runs forward before his thoughts could even begin to catch up to him. In that moment, all becomes clear-- he was chasing his desires, his purpose, his safety, his home. They were what his journey was for, and he was on his final stretch. Of course, how could he not see it? There was nothing more he wanted in the world than to be surrounded by what he loved the most, whether or not life was perfect. Perhaps he had lost sight of this simple philosophy along the way in his pursuit of stability, but now, through unyielding endurance, he is met with it once again. That was all that mattered to Fuminori, who’d suffered in its absence.

The faces of those he cherishes grow clearer when he draws closer. From a few feet away, he could see Naruki and Kayoko wave at him widely, while Kimito, Yoshika and his grandmother stand aside, far more subdued with their actions. In front of them all stands his mother, who remains still, but as soon as Fuminori stumbles over to their doorstep, she opens her arms, and with a big smile, exclaims,

“Welcome home, Fuminori! We all missed you, you know?”

He slows, and stares for a moment in disbelief, before he falls into the arms of his mother without a second thought, closing his eyes as he relaxes into her welcoming embrace. It’s something he missed so, so, dearly. The warmth of family, and the sound of their voices as they greet and tease him all the once; it might’ve been childish for him to call this moment as such, but he was finally home, where he belonged.

He made it.

Bliss graces him for the first time in a long while, and willingly he indulges, starved of anything even close to joy for so long, but before he’s able to fully come to terms with it,

the illusion quickly crumbles as a cold blade pierces his back.

It all happens too fast for him to even cry out, though reality is quick to fall on him as pain contaminates the short-lived joy. He begins to panic, just as anyone would. The arms that were once wrapped around his mother now flail as he grabs at the cloth on her back, and he pulls and pushes, but struggles to escape her grasp. Agony wracks him. Blood begins to fill his lungs and rob him of breath, and it hurts, but nothing stops his desperate attempts to wrench himself away. 

He claws, he twists, he pushes, and he tries his hardest, and yet he’s still weak and unable, even against his mother’s thin arms. Adrenaline does nothing. Resistance does nothing. He can do nothing. His silent gaze then begs the figures standing behind his mother for help, but they only watch, once happy expressions falling into that of resignation.

Indignant, he only continues to fight, but it’s too much. The sting of betrayal, the fear of death, the pounding of his wound, all add to the emotions that begin to mount and burst at the seams, and as tightly wound feelings unfurl into an ugly mess, he chokes out with a feeble breath,

“Why?”

A sudden stillness fills the air. It’s as if his words alone caused time to stop, but the pause does not last, as his mother begins to speak in a way that does not intend to mock, but to comfort.

“Don’t you think it’s about time you rest, Fuminori?”

Rest?

To rest was not what he wanted, he longed to say. He so desperately wished to say that she was wrong, that he could still persist, that he could keep going for all eternity if it meant that they could return to simpler times, but the only sounds that escape his mouth are weak coughs and gurgles. Frustrated, he grits his teeth, trying with all his remaining strength to prove her wrong, but the anger is quick to turn into tears once he realizes that he can’t. It’s stupid. It’s unfair. It’s pathetic, and he curses at himself, but from behind him, his mother’s expression only shifts. 

“…The world is cruel,” she says, “and efforts are not always met with success.” 

Her words are harsh, but her tone is gentle, loving even. She holds Fuminori close, cradling him as if he were still the small child he used to be, but this steady facade is quick to fall apart as her features begin to shake. She lays her head against his shoulder, and with great effort she murmurs, 

“I’m sorry.”

…Ah.

Fuminori was stubborn, but not dumb. He never thought that he would ever have to come face to face with it, and while he had refused to acknowledge it as an end for as long as he’s lived, he knew what this was, in all of its dreadfulness.

This was failure.

Regardless of whether or not Fuminori choses to continue fighting, his body soon refuses to listen to him; his arms fall to his side as the final traces of defiance drain away, and his legs then fail to support his weight despite his protests, causing him to sink to the floor in the arms of his mother, who keeps her hold, slowly lowering herself to the ground with her eldest son slumped over her shoulder. There’s silence, before he hears her begin to weep for him, and eventually, everyone he’s ever loved follow with their own sorrowful wails as they fall to their knees by his side, unable to do anything but watch the boy who’s succumbed to fate’s cruel hand wither away.

In his final moments, Fuminori thinks. He thinks about how he wanted to wipe his loved ones’ tears. He thinks about how he wanted give them a reason to be happy. He thinks about how he wanted to give them everything. He thinks about his many unfulfilled wishes, and his equally plentiful regrets. If he could, he’d chase all of these desires for as long as he had to if it meant that he’d someday come close to a happy ending, but the choice seemed to be his no longer. In the end, it was that of death, in all its finality. 

In his utter powerlessness, Fuminori could do no more but listen to his family’s cries, and lament about how terribile they sounded.

As his vision swims, so do the images in front of him, before they eventually fade along with the flame that one burned brightly within. He dies, but not of his own accord.