#koune

Everything in her runs cold as Chioko threatens her. As Sibyl's face turns. As she is met with the fact that her words were wrong. But she wouldn't, she couldn't, take them back. Would she be able to rest if she hadn't at least defended Kenta, Robin, Miyu, Willow? No, that's not who she is. That was never who she was. But--

That didn't matter now as Shigure made her choice. 

She was going to get Yuka back, she was going to get Robin back. She was going to get her fairytale ending, and yet she didn't feel like she deserved it. Instead her heart sputtered and it clenched as she saw the break downs, one after another. She had been there. She had that moment of desperation as someone was ripped from your arms. The moment where it was so easy to bite and lash out and fight. To become savage, to become feral, because that one moment was never going to be enough. The rings on her hand felt so heavy. 

Opening her mouth, she closes it almost immediately. What can she say? What can she say that'd mean anything. Shigure had only recently come around to her. She had wasted so much time with a fictitious enemy. She wanted so badly to make it black and white. She wanted so badly to be the good and for Shigure to be the bad. But in reality, they were closer to each other than she wanted. The same color of grey. 

"...I'm sorry." Is all she can get out before shuddering her breath. 

What is she sorry for? For being childish, for being naive, for living her life only viewing it from a filter. For never knowing how cruel the world was, for never trying to understand, for standing with those who the world hated and for shunning those those people hurt. She's not sorry for picking Shuuya, she will never be sorry for picking Robin-- but she was sorry for not trying to meet ends. She's not sorry he died accepted by her, she's not sorry for yelling and for fighting. But she's sorry for being selfish. 

"I wanted to be your friend so badly in the beginning. I wish I let ourselves heal before the end...If I just talked to you instead of avoiding. I even...ahaha...I even liked you. Though that was a mess of not knowing if it was platonic or not." Kaneko pushes back her bangs and looks at the idol. Surrounded by love, surrounded by those who took the energy to get to know her. "I--..."

She has no words. She has nothing she can state. She didn't know if she would write, all it would  be would be documentation on the fact that she was living a life Shigure would never get. The right to fight tooth and nail for freedom, the right to love and the right to be loved. She wouldn't hug the idol because she hadn't earned that privilege. 

"I'll miss you."

And of course she would. She'd think of Shigure when the sun shone across the ocean, pinks breaking with the waves. She'd think of Shigure every time her fingers grazed the shells that decorate a part of the shop. She'd think of Shigure every time Ena would cook a spicier dish and she'd think of Shigure whenever she felt weary of dealing with it all. The urge to keep fighting, that was Shigure. 

She had been playing tango with her emotions, dancing around making an opinion and dancing around stating how she felt about the situation. Of course, there was a part of her that felt she didn't deserve to have a say in this but maybe she would have felt different if Kaz had never saved her, if Kaz had left her to be executed for a crime she never did but even then. 

"Robin-chan died for an accident...and that-- keeping him dead hurts," she begins. Selfish, selfish, selfish, but Shuuya told her that it was a good thing that she fought for people no one else would fight for. "Kenta-chan died for an accident. There was no intent to kill anyone, just a mix up of medications. Letting them stay dead to play halfsies feels ingenuine! And think of the guilt the dead that get's brought back will feel knowing that four people are going to remain dead. Yuyu-chan died from possession they didn't even WANT to go to the music room. I just--" She grits her teeth. The guilt she still feels for being the one to get saved, the one that sparked so much and yet so little.  

She just what? She wanted them to be alive, she wanted them to be alive no matter what but could she truly enjoy her time with Yuka knowing they were only around because they sacrificed others. 

"I don't want anyone else to die, but--fuck. Fuck, I just...I don't think the half way option is smart! No one deserves to be dead but the fact that Kenta-chan, Robin-chan, and Yuyu-chan died because of the onryo bending the rules makes it even crueler to keep half that party dead!"

Her hands go to tug on her hair as she tries not to panic. She's going to be hated for this isn't she. She said that she would make this Shigure's option but she just couldn't stay quiet, that's not who she was. 

"Mishu-chan told me that I shouldn't regret feeling strongly about others so...I am not going to back down on this. I won't hold your choice against but please...Weighing part of the dead over the other is irresponsible and will create situations that we cannot predict and an egregious amount of survivor's guilt to those who are saved." 

She doesn't know if they'll go for it. 

It’s with a sickening motion that the onryo presents themselves to be none other than Shigure, as she had felt ever since the moment the idol showcased the true reason she had acted so cruel during the secondary trial. Why the two couldn’t see eye to eye and why they both had been in the wrong. And now, now there were two options that laid themselves out for Shigure. Possibly die and reset, or live and keep the seven dead. A choice she wouldn’t wish upon anyone else.

In the moment she could speak, speak about all those she lost. How if Shigure sacrificed herself she could have the moment to meet Robin again, a redo. To have that moment she had told him, to slowly fall again and live out their university years as a weird and awkward couple. She could meet Yuka again, bond under better circumstances and neither would be wiser upon the tragedy that had occurred. But then, who would Kaneko even be without the tragedies that had unfolded for all of them to take part in. She’d be the same sheltered heiress who believed too much in others, who still saw everything with a rosy shade of pink and who knows when or even if those would ever shatter. Would she become compliant, find herself no longer fighting and taking up the mantle? Would she ever realize something was wrong?

And if she had everything reset, would she remember Shuuya? She promised him she would be back, she promised Neo that she’d write. And how could she if they didn’t remember her and she didn’t remember them. There was no chance of having the meet-cute they wrote about in stories with spirits that were long gone. She would revert back to being scared, to hanging on the every word of the fairytales and stories, avoiding areas that were meant to be the resting grounds of yokai. But she wouldn’t know this pain, the pain that swirled up inside her chest and pricked against the back of her throat.

But, no matter what happened to her, it had no bearing on Shigure. She knew people would feel conflicted. Save one life, keep seven dead. Allow one to die, but bring back the seven. Send people back to unwelcomed circumstances, undo growth, allow the vindication of a creep. But, seven would be alive. People who did not deserve to die. But Shigure didn’t deserve to die either.

Kaneko folds her hands over one another, long nails digging into the soft flesh. Everything she had to say was selfishly about herself. About how this outcome would affect her. No more survivor’s guilt, no more constantly thinking about how to break the news to Yuka’s loved ones, no more yearning for someone who was no longer there. No more progress, no more freedom, no more exhilaration in being known as Kaneko. She wonders how the spirits must feel in the moment, to have your lives be weighed out on a scale like nothing more than a statistic. 7 to 1, which was heavier? Steel or feathers, all one ton.

“No matter what we say, ultimately it’s your choice, Shigure-chan,” she begins. Voice quiet and solemn, almost afraid to lift it above. “That’s what you said to my corrupted self when she beckoned me to the life of a yokai. That she nor no one else could decide how I lived my life nor what I did and didn’t deserve.”

It’s hard to speak, her voice was caught up within itself.

“I’m not going to try and push you one way or another, that wouldn’t be fair…this is already a difficult decision. But if it’s any solace, if it means anything. I’m glad, no matter what, that I got to meet you. Even if it had been rough, even if we hated each other for so long. I learned so much from the moments we had together.”

And it’s true, Kaneko grew because she had someone pushing against her in a negative manner. She learned because of the negativity but she also learned to forgive. She had never been so angry in that moment before, blaring hot heat, and she never knew how to put that aside, to swallow the feelings and move on. Shuuya taught her how to feel and come alve, and Shigure taught her how to forgive. Just in the same way that Riley taught her how to care, Robin taught her how to love, and Yuka had taught her how to accept.

In the negative there is always something that blooms, and Kaneko had no idea how to put that forward. That no matter the decision people lost and people won, that there was no person coming out of either outcome unscathed.

The onryo, despite being caught in the end, would receive some benefit.

How unfair.

How cruel.

This was the cold sinking feeling she had felt earlier. She knew about the injury Shigure had endure, of course not in the same detail as Yumeko, but she still knew (and she's forever grateful she didn't have to be the one to strike the podium with the gavel, calling out such an event). If this had been Kaneko earlier, Kaneko still processing the death of her best friend, a Kaneko who still thought Shigure only saw her as the caricature of herself she would have felt vindicated. Suffer, suffer and suffer like she had. (Loose someone, loose someone you love, you've made it to the end without a single nick). 

But the onryo wasn't Shigure. This didn't feel fulfilling as she watched Yumeko break, as she listened to everyone's pleas. This wasn't fucking right. She knew this, and even if she had a distaste for the idol before she still wouldn't wish this on anyone else. In the end the rite could undo, reset. In the end she'd win, and that caused the copper taste in her mouth to grow even more. The idea that people could win in a death game. In a game where so many people were destroyed, hurt, torn down. 

She should say something, she should say SOMETHING. But she can't, not something anyone has not said. 

"None of us wish to see you hurt."

Is it a lie? She can't tell, swirling emotions still bubbled up in ugly ways in her mind as she forced them down. If Shigure was the onryo, she didn't possess her, she didn't kill her best friend, she didn't kill her lover. It's not her, it's not her, it's. not. her. And yet, and yet it was her hatred, her angriness. The hatred she's felt because of it, the infectious swirling of malaise. (Naïve, naïve, naïve, doesn't understand.)

Gritting her teeth, she bottles it all up. Locks it up tight. 

"This...this was your choice, and I'm glad you had the freedom to be honest."

She could feel the tension in her body as she gripped the podium as each person took their turn one by one. Placing down the cards, waiting idly for someone to say something incriminating, tigers watching prey in the fields.

“I don’t think if someone had a connection to February 10th, they’d mention it. Whoever the onryo broke off of is probably scared. Scared because there is no way to say that the end results will be… pleasant.” She grits her teeth a bit.

There is someone that fits all of this so snug that its causing everything in her to turn to pure ice. But she doesn’t dare open her mouth, these things coming from her wouldn’t benefit anyone now would they. “There are a few of us that struggled with privacy for different reasons. I know I’m one of those people but…” but what? “I never felt a death of myself until I came here. Prior to this I never really realized anything was wrong…”

Kaneko expected to be alone. 

She didn't expect anyone to comfort her in her final moments. She expected Yumeko to cling to Shigure, for Riley to hold hands with Sibyl and Chioko, and for Himeyuri to stay by Yuuto (who also had Kanna). And yet, as the results were read out, she had Yumeko's tight embrace around her and she felt at peace. 

Hugging him back, she silently let herself cry. For, in a few moments she was going to die. But, she was dying as Kaneko. She was dying as herself. At least in her final moments she was free, she had aspirations, she wasn't in a box. What would her parents do when they learn the news? Take Hope's Peak's hush money, or burn the establishment to the ground? Would they even miss her, would they reconsider the actions they had taken, would they regret how they made her feel? She didn't know, and probably wouldn't know. 

The onryo's words cut through her, and she feel the acidic feeling in the back of her throat grow and grow, anger bubbling and lapping at her. 

"I pity you, you know?" Her red eyes stare directly at the mist. "You're hurt, and you've made it your mission to lash out and hurt and hurt and hurt other people. You're pathetic, sitting there watching thinking that you're making some kind of statement or really enacting some kind of just punishment against innocent people because the pain inside is too much to bear. And yet, and yet there's love and there's community. Despite this tragedy you keep shoving upon us, even though I'm going to die, at least for a bit I was loved for who I am, I found a real family." 

With a shivering breath, she slowly pulls away from the hug. The trial room felt like a sea, the other's dissipating as she was left there with their tormentor. 

"I don't expect Yuyu-chan to forgive me...but I know th-that you had a hand in what I did...So you will spend your afterlife hurting, miserable, never able to move on, and I will spend mine content knowing that I was loved. You will never be satisfied with the choices you've made." 

And yet, despite her heroism and her confidence in her speech, she was shaking. She knees wobbling under the pressure, her hands quivering, her lips trembling in their corners. She was saying she was content, but she wasn't. She had so much more to do, to see, to live. She finally felt like her life was starting, that she was going to see Ena, Fuwa, Akiteru...hell she even wanted to see her mom again right now. Have her caress her head with her long elegant fingers and tell her she'll be okay. 

'Breath Kaneko, darling. Breath. Mama's here. Mama's always here.'

She wanted to be sitting in Ena's kitchen, sewing and talking while she cooked. She wanted her knees to be scraped up from climbing trees, eyes stinging with tears, as a warm bowl of stew is placed in front of her. It always tasted earthy, it tasted like home. It tasted like love.

But she was weak, she had no control. She didn't expect any other outcome. 

Robin died on accident, she couldn't save him, the onryo didn't care. So if she was under an influence of some kind the onryo wouldn't care either. 

The few moments of thinking felt like an eternity; they were born, they stumbled around, they matured, the grew old, they died when they were supposed to. Is this how they all felt before it happened? Is this how Robin felt, and yet he used his final moments to push them all away and to finally let her know that he loved her. She had no such confession, her heart always on her sleeve. She had no such unsaid business, nothing to do to make them hate her, to make this easier. Maybe that was selfish of her, to want to go out loved instead of as a monster who killed her best friend. 

What right did she have for that? 

"I...Well...I guess someone get's the motive now right?" She begins, finally breaking her silence. "Ahahaha...feels kind of cruel now doesn't it? Knowing you get to be okay for two people's deaths and I feel horrible transposing that guilt onto anyone...But..." Trying her best to smile, trying her best to stay grounded she finally looks at Riley. "Yuh-you deserve this. You deserve a break...a moment because I think if you're grounded then you'll be able t-to help...Riley-chan..." 

Her voice hiccups. She can't even fathom what she must think of her right now. Disgust, maybe, but that would be mean to think of Riley like that. The person who has comforted even someone who killed with the full intention to kill. 

She feels like she can't cry anymore. And yet, they still keep streaming down her face in hot painful movements, feeling like blistering iron ran down along with it. These are her final goodbyes. 

"Pl-please. If you can find an Ena Sugimoto... she-she...she's all alone and I was all she had. She's old, and is struggling to take care of herself s-s-so..please...please thank her for me...Thank her for being a wonderful mother...for being a wonderful caretaker....For loving me unconditionally. And--" her voice cracks as she starts to break more. "Fuwa Hasaki, Akiteru Shikayama. Ak--Akima-chan is a traveling actor, he should be home n-now.. and Fuha-chan is studying finances at the University of Tokyo...Tell Fuha-chan to actually pursue his dreams he's a wonderful artist...he...he taught my everything I know..." 

Reaching into her pocket, she grasps the two rings she had, letting them roll between her fingers. They were two lives, two people gone, and she would be the third. 

"Saying good bye to you guys doesn't feel real...I'll be in the closet...I'll be around. B-but...I--" 

Her voice gives out for a bit as she begins to sob harder.

"Thank you...Thank you for loving me, and for caring. I wouldn't be the K-Kaneko I am today without your support even if all of us didn't see eye to eye or y-you hated me for my decisions. I had t-to make them...I had to be hurt...I had to learn...I had to learn the world isn't a perfect place but even when that pain grew to be too much I still felt like I wanted to save it. What I said at the st-start still remains true.  'I want to save everyone, I want to be a hero. I want to be someone who makes others happy and reduce things that are harming our Earth. All because I love humanity and humans. I love being a person in this collective.' That's what I said to K-Kaz-san. And even now...it still remains true." 

With a deep breath, she tries to take in the minutes. There were only a few left. She spent so many delaying her inevitable, taking her time to try and not think too hard on it. It was scary, she was scared. And yet, it felt like a different fear than her initial one of ghosts, and different than her fear of being alone. The unknown, the gaping maw of the beast, was about to swallow her whole and the sensation that she could do nothing now was terrifying. 

Once again, the votes may not have been unanimous, but they were clear.

Koune - 8 votes

Yaldabaoth - 1 vote

“...You have voted for Koune, or Kaneko Yoshida, as the culprit of this case.” The two glimmering motes of energy reappear on either side of the scales, and you watch with resigned forlorn to see which scale would fall and seal her fate. 

And just like it had done in the three trials before, the ball of dark energy presses its side down towards the wooden desk.

“You are... correct,” Rei murmurs, before shaking their head. “Though... The discussion is far from over it seems-”

The onryo turns with a smack of their smoky tendril to silence the kokkuri-san. “And what is that supposed to mean? Do keep quiet when you’re not needed.”

It didn’t hurt them so much as shock them, and the white-haired spirit glances listlessly between the onryo and you all. With a shake of the head, they fall silent, but you know they wouldn’t have spoken without reason. What did they mean?

“Kaneko, lovely, you’re going to die in seventeen minutes. Say your goodbyes before I send you to join your best friend and your boyfriend!” The onryo cackles. They pause, and then laugh again. “Well, that’s assuming Yuka will even want anything to do with you after this.”