NuclearStudent's Cursed Zone

[NuclearStudent]

FEATURED PIECE

"Saki Gives A Blowjob"

Posted March 9th, 2020

Genre: Drama

Content Warnings: Sadsack, Sex

GENERAL INDEX OF STORIES

[Mirage_GSM]

Okay, disregarding everything else: How can a headless corpse scream?
Also I wonder what the "location" of this was supposed to be...

[Hanako Fancopter]

Well then. That was a thing. It's actually pretty effective as a post-apocalyptic survival horror piece. It's just.... so far removed from Katawa Shoujo. But pretty good for what it is!

[NuclearStudent]

Okay, disregarding everything else: How can a headless corpse scream?
Also I wonder what the "location" of this was supposed to be...

The scream thing was a mistake. If it were a scream, it would be the tea-kettle sound of the skin hissing off. But no I'd just fucked up there.

I am disappointed in myself that the location wasn't clear. It's outside on the rubber of the track, which had half melted itself but is now still. Perhaps on her last day Emi left a shard from a broken prosthetic buried in the track she used to run on. It'd be cool if that were the trace of the last run she made.

Well then. That was a thing. It's actually pretty effective as a post-apocalyptic survival horror piece. It's just.... so far removed from Katawa Shoujo. But pretty good for what it is!

I think I learned how to edit a comment! I'm proud of myself. I'm remarkably bad with technology sometimes.

Anyway, that's why I apologized for it. Because it's really not very KS. I very much normally see and write my fiction and poetry through tilted stained glass, but this goes too far away from the essence of KS.

[Oddball]

It's an effective horror piece, actually, it's a pretty dark good horror story. It's just that as a KS piece it's really lacking.

[NuclearStudent]

It's an effective horror piece, actually, it's a pretty dark good horror story. It's just that as a KS piece it's really lacking.

One long scream into the night means a great deal less when it's a stranger.

Oh pooh

[NuclearStudent]

THIS SPACE LEFT INTENTIONALLY BLANK

[NuclearStudent]

GENERAL INDEX OF STORIES

"Until I Rise Again"

Posted Aug 12, 2019

Genre: Horror

Content Warnings: Body horror

"Burnt Woman Burns Body"

Posted Jul 14, 2019

Genre: Horror

Content Warnings: Body horror

"help"

Posted Oct 26th, 2019

Genre: Horror

Content Warnings: Body horror

"When It Falls On You"

Posted Aug 13, 2019

Genre: Drama

Content Warnings: Violence

This has certainly got to be the worst-written story here, and if I wrote it now, I wouldn't consider it good enough to post. It's an pointless bout of violence with barely any narrative justification. Still, it exists.

"Reprisal"

Note: Set during Lilly Good End

Posted Jul 15, 2019

Genre: Drama

Content Warnings: Sadsack

"The Long Walk Alone"

Posted Sept 29, 2019

Genre: Comedy, drama

Content Warnings: None

"Blue Sweet Blue"

Posted Jan 2, 2020

Genre: Police Thriller

Content Warnings: Violence

"Saki Gives A Blowjob"

Posted March 9th, 2020

Genre: Drama

Content Warnings: Sadsack

Poetry

"Rin Goes To Sea"

Posted Nov 6, 2019

Content Warnings: None

[NuclearStudent]

THIS SPACE LEFT INTENTIONALLY BLANK

[NuclearStudent]

Index

Until I Rise Again

Preliminary Notes: This piece was produced in response to a writing challenge by Stiles Long. He thoughtfully provided a number of randomly generated prompts to write fanfiction to, and I made my own choices through the use of a random number generator.

I got out of bed at six, having not slept the entire night. With finals season here, my usual insomnia was exacerbated by exam-stress. I didn’t know if I could continue to stand staring at the ceiling for four am, listening to my heart beat. Worries about exams yet to be passed raced through my skull, yanking me from my rest in an endless series of hypnic jerks.

I wandered out of my room aimlessly. There was nobody in the rec hall, not like I spent any time there. The corridors are empty. Outside the sun is only just rising. I stumped along and took a glance at the pool from outside. Someone, presumably Saki, was diving in and out of the water’s surface with remarkable athleticism. I kept on walking and let her be.

I ended up near the track, wondering if Emi would be there. I knew I’d get berated or guilted into running laps, probably, but even that would have been better than being stuck locked-up inside my own head alone. She wasn’t there. To my surprise, a different solitary figure was sitting alone in the middle of the field within the track. I watched her feet paint away at a canvas. It was Rin.

I clomped my feet across the muddy ground and made my way towards her. If there was anybody capable of filling my head with weird nonsense, it was Rin, and I knew I could use the distraction. Knowing that it hardly mattered to Rin, when I got near I said whatever comes to mind. “I thought you weren’t much of a morning person.”

Rin looked at me, seemingly acknowledging my presence. Then she looked back down at her canvas.

The grass was cold that early in the morning, but Rin found a solid dry spot. I lay down and looked at the sky. It lit up red and orange and white in its regularly dazzling way. It had been a while since I’d watched the sun rise like this. After a while I noticed that that Rin’s paintbrush had stopped moving. I looked over and saw Rin staring at me expectantly.

“Hisao.” Rin said. “I want you to look at my painting.”

I don’t think Rin had ever said that to me before. Somehow I’d never expected her to. I looked over at Rin’s canvas, expecting to understand nothing. But to my shock I instantly knew what I was looking at.

“That’s Hanako.” I said absurdly.

Rin nodded, looking more pleased than I’d ever seen her.

“And she’s pouring a can of gasoline...onto an alien. A sort of zombie alien with a giant worm coming out of its spine.”

Rin smiled. Instead of treasuring that rarest of expressions from her, I just let my mouth hang vaguely open. My eyes flit back to the canvas.

“This is Yamaku. On this track. The whole place looks kinda like volcanic glass and there’s ash everywhere. And there’s Hanako pouring gasoline on a zombie alien thing.”

Rin had that same pleased expression. This was the first time I’d ever known what I was looking at with one of her paintings, but I still felt like I’d understood nothing. I wondered vaguely if I should have become offended on Hanako’s behalf. I decided to ask a question which has always and will always be useless at divining Rin’s intentions.

“Why?”

Rin shrugged, still quietly beaming. “This is the something new. The one that was coming out of me when I was painting differently. The one that was growing when I was working for the gallery. I didn’t think I could do it. I nearly gave up on wanting to.”

She looked at it with something like pride. “It’s something I’ve been thinking about. The art of saying the obvious. Drawing it. Of doing things that make sense, of having an impact on the real world, of starting to draw real things.”

I frowned. “Rin, you’ve completely lost me. I have no idea what you’re going on about.”

Rin laid back on the grass with her eyes closed. She looked content. “That’s okay. I did more today than I ever did before. Or did I do it yesterday? I was here through the night. I didn’t sleep. Or if I did I don’t remember it.”

“Well,” I said carefully, “Rest is important. You should probably catch up on your rest some time. Especially in the middle of exam season.”

Rin didn’t react. I wondered if she was even going to take exams, or if she had gotten an exemption for it. She’d missed so much class and spent so much time spacing out that I couldn’t imagine her doing well on any of the tests. I didn’t know how she did on her quizzes, but I did know that she didn’t always do her homework. Mutou sometimes got on her case for that.

I just sat there. The sun was done rising. It was a Sunday, so without classes, there was nowhere to go. I should have been studying but I frankly didn’t want to. I didn’t feel hungry for some reason, so I just stayed in place. I waited for cicadas to call, but they never did.

After an unknowable amount of time passed, a big daddy-long-legs appeared and came crawling near. I flinched then tried to shoo it away. For some reason it ignored me and crawled straight towards Rin. I accidentally touched it, knocking it back, and I cringed at how it touched my skin. I got up and kicked the frightful thing away. Throughout it all, Rin kept on lying there, her eyes open and watching the scene placidly.

I peered down at her. Rin had just displayed the most flagrantly lazy or indifferent behavior I had ever seen. I couldn't tell if she’d just assumed I’d deal with the problem for her, or if she didn’t care about having something crawl on her face and eyes. Maybe she saw the thing and just didn’t think much about it.

“What stops worms from pushing up through the ground?” Rin asked out of apparent pure randomness. I resigned myself to the fact that I would never see Rin show contrition over the Daddy-Long-Legs incident. I wasn’t even sure I could explain to her what was wrong.

“Sometimes they do.” I replied to her question about the worms. “When it rains, you can see them poke above the ground, trying not to drown.” At least I thought that was what happened. Now that I considered it, I wasn’t so sure. I look around the field to see if I can catch sight of any, but I see nothing.

“What stops them from going through skin? The worms, I mean.”

I took a moment to digest that. I regret having to digest that. “I mean, they don’t have teeth.” I said cautiously. “And we learned from Mutou that the skin is actually quite good at stopping things from getting in. That’s what it’s for.”

Rin was silent for a while. Then she spoke again. “What if we could make our skins softer? Give them teeth? Let them through? I feel like I could do that.”

I closed my eyes. “Jesus Christ, Rin. I don’t want to hear about this.”

By the time I opened my eyes again, Rin was laying down in her usual position, on her back and watching the sky like I was. I saw something shift beneath the contours of that usually placid face, a kind of squirming of her cheeks and her eyebrows and her mouth that looked completely unnatural. I turnt away. I wanted to throw up on the grass.

Rin’s voice was low and calm as ever. “It’s like that leg feeling when your knees hurt. Before a rainstorm. I feel like it’s my fault. Do you think it could be?”

“I don’t think you can blame anyone for the weather.” I said weakly. I felt bile in my throat. Maybe I was genuinely sick. I shouldn’t have been able to feel so physically wrong after a few disquieting words from Rin. But probably it was just psychological. “Nobody can cause it. Not unless they have some sort of enormous cloud seeding machine, or they set an entire forest on fire to change how the clouds blow.”

“I see.” Rin said. “So there’s nobody to blame. Unless there’s a forest. Do you think there’s a forest on fire. It’s not always true that someone started it when a forest is fire, is it? How do they find out if someone started it?”

This was still a morbid subject, but it was still better than thinking about worms. “Police and firefighters have ways of tracking down the source of a fire. I read a book about it. Apparently they can often track down exactly where a cigarette fell if it starts a big fire.”

Rin, as usual, said nothing. I took a long dragging breath and let it out slowly. I dared a glance at her. Her eyes were closed and she looked peaceful. She opened one eye, stared at me, and opened the other. Then she pointed with her left foot towards roughly the middle of the field.

“There.” Rin said simply. “That’s where it is.”

I stared, waiting for some kind of clarification. I know Rin was just being cryptic as usual, but I felt sick to my stomach again. My spine tingled. My skin raised gooseflesh and it felt like someone was crawling through it. I knew there was no reason to feel this way, but I couldn’t fight it off.

Of course, Rin just changed the topic. She lifted herself up from the grass a little and looked at me straight on. Her eyes were unusually clear and purposeful. But she was still saying nonsense. “I feel connected. Like I’m in rain. And I feel like a firestarter. I think those should cancel each other out, but they don’t. If they come one after another, they can both be there. If they come at the same time, we have steam, like making steamed buns. If they meet up on the ground, they can make glass. Like lightning and sand, except there is no sand here.”

I just pushed my breath in and out of my lungs, taking deep breaths, trying to settle my stomach. Outside of the track, I saw Kenji in one of his rare appearances outside of the dorm. I had the sudden and absurd image of him walking out towards us and getting struck by lightning.

Rin was really getting to me. “I’ve got to go back to studying for finals.” I said. I needed some anti nausea pills too. “I’m going to go back to my dorm. See you tomorrow.”

My stomach didn’t stop hurting that entire day. I packed it in for the night early. Just when I thought I was safe, my guts roiled up again as soon as I got into bed. This, combined with my insomnia, was going to mean a hell of a night.

“I’m sick.” I said, sounding surprised to myself.

I’d convinced myself it was all purely psychological. Rin’s words, combined with the stress of worrying about finals, had really gotten to me. I’d figured that the nausea and everything else came from Rin and my lack of sleep. But there was no mistaking it. There was, indeed, something gone physically wrong with me. Maybe that was also partly psychological in origin. Stress and sleep deprivation combined to take my immune system down and let physical illness happen. If that was true, then I was more thin skinned than I thought. Just a couple of weird words in a stressful time was enough to invite all the bugs of the world in.

I rolled onto my back, trying not to squash my belly. I felt bloated and my stomach gurgled. I burped, and burped again. Acid burnt away at my throat and my stomach wouldn’t stop moving. I felt my head spinning. I coughed into my hand and felt something warm and wet and moving.

I slammed my hand away. I coughed again and burped up another wriggling thing into my mouth, onto my tongue. I spat it out. I kept spitting. I slammed the button of my lamp to catch what the hell was going on just when I threw up and my entire mouth filled with the wriggling things and I could see moving white worms filling my bed. I screamed and then my screams muffled when my mouth filled with the worms faster than I could vomit them out.

I fell backwards. My head starred at the point where it slammed into my desk and then I felt something slice out of me. A long white snake stabbed out from the back of my neck and pushed itself upwards, shoving me back as it rose. Another burst out from my belly button and turned upwards to join it, both now above my head, as if watching down at me. I felt their lengths dragging from along my spine as their tips lowered themselves towards me.

They curled like two question marks as they got closer. Then they knifed down and gnawed through my eyes. Choking on worm and screaming in pain, I grabbed at the snakes with both hands and struggled to yank them out. I gripped and pulled as hard as I could against their slippery lengths but they were like impossibly taut cords. They squelched as they bit through my eyes and it hurt like nothing I’ve ever felt.

I kept screaming through all of it, but I felt my screams get quieter and my grip get looser. There was a snap and jerk when the full lengths of the two worms pulled out of my body and crammed completely into my eyes. Blood poured out everywhere onto my chest and legs. Incredibly, I could still see as though I was looking through fish-lens, bloody and bent.

I scrambled onto my feet, now screaming completely silently, the air rasping out from my lungs. In an act of desperation I pushed my fingers into my own eyes to grab the snakes and pull them out. They bit back and when I pulled my fingers out they came with them, teeth clamped down. They let go and dove back in when I jerked my arms back, but tiny teeth remain dug deep into me, hard and dripping with my blood. I stood there, utterly overwhelmed by the shock.

A knocking sounded on the door. The ruins of my eyes widened and I rushed over there. I slammed it open with all of my remaining energy and Kenji’s worried face greeted me. It was the most welcome thing I had ever seen.

“Everything alright, man?” Kenji asked. He seemed a little uncomfortable, but he doesn’t react nearly as strongly as I expected and needed him to. “I thought, you know, a feminist might have gotten to you or something. You can never get too careful.”

“Naw.” I heard my voice say. “It was just a nightmare. This is kind of embarrassing, but I just have them sometimes. Might be a side effect of my medication. I’m really sorry I woke you up, but there’s nothing. It’s all in my head.”

My head tilted down and looked at myself. My face wrinkled to mimic something like embarrassment. The white snakes were gone and the remaining worms on my body were wriggling directly through my skin and into my body. They licked at the tiny remains of blood on my shirt as they went. I silently begged Kenji to notice something, anything.

Kenji nodded seriously. “Your eyes are kinda bloodshot, man. Just all red. You gotta catch up on your sleep, you hear me? We need you well rested in this fight.”

“Absolutely.” My voice said. “I’m glad to have you looking out for me. I’ll try to make up my lost sleep and take care of my health. The feminists might never rest, but we need our energy.”

Kenji smiled and clapped my back. The dumb bastard still didn’t notice a thing. “Hey, it’s the least I can do. We’ve got to watch out for each other, as brothers. It’s always the unknown that gets you, and to fight that you need to be alert. Be seeing you.”

Kenji turned around and my body closed the door. I stepped back to my bed, lay down in the mess of worms, and tucked myself in while they burrowed in through my skin. I kept lying there, unable to sleep, while worms inched up from across the room and crawled towards me. All night the worms punched through my skin.

I lay there until morning, when my body dragged me up again.

Index

Author's Notes: "Until I Rise Again"

This piece is intended to provide an unusual answer to the question of what it would take for Rin to find the transformation she was looking for. It is not intended to be taken too seriously, and instead to be taken with a sort of fun. It is also supposed to be a shocking horror piece. I was very pleased about it when I wrote it and for the week following that. At the moment it feels inadequate to me.

I would like feedback, in particular, about the pacing of events and whether the introduction succeeds in drawing in the reader. It begins slowly and with a number of seemingly irrelevancies. It is also intended to have reread value due to foreshadowing and references to the events ahead.

Index

[NuclearStudent]

Index

When It Falls On You

Just two weeks ago Rika's eyes followed Miki's body with a satisfied grin. In the present Rika simply looked out over the track field, then turned to meet Miki's stare with a clinical friendliness. She acted like everything was completely over. It was hot under the lunchtime sun.

"So," Rika said blandly, "How's Tarou? I hear he's a nice guy. Good grades too."

Miki’s mouth swung open and stayed there. The wind-driven banging of the door to the school roof helped to fill the silence. Like a normal human being, Miki gave off sweat after running and had to take a shower. Rika gave off awkwardness and sat in it, perfectly comfortable, allowing other people to adjust to her environment. Miki wondered if, somewhere deep inside, Rika got off on how she forced other people to match her agonizingly slow pace.

"Things are pretty good." Miki said staidly. She found herself clenching her fist. She forced herself to let it go. "He's a pretty nice guy like you said."

The door kept on banging as Rika nodded placidly. Miki wished desperately for Rika to get to the point. But Rika could never be rushed. Miki was a pretty lax person, but all of that went out like a light when exposed to Rika’s all-consuming imperturbability. Miki could feel an exhausting numbness crush all of her emotions away.

"So how's your life been?" Miki forced herself to say. "Going well?"

Rika beamed genuinely and pointed up at the speck of a hot air balloon drifting over the nearby valley. “Saki and I got a lot of test shots in. Completely ahead of schedule. The final ignition is in two weeks, and should be quite a show. You should bring Tarou over to watch. It should make for a fantastic date. The sponsors are giving out free stuff.”

With a sinking feeling, Miki realized that her new fuck buddy might want to go watch Rika’s hot air balloon show. He was like Rika in that way. Extremely nice but extremely tactless. Miki had no idea why she seemed to be drawn to that type. She didn’t know a thing about Rika’s balloon show and didn’t want to know a thing about it.

“I’ll be busy with track practice, but I’ll think about it.” Miki said. Rika kept staring at Miki expectantly. “I, uh, hope it goes well. You’ve been working on it for a long time. It’s cool. You’ll get lots of attention from universities and stuff.”

Rika smiled, not showing the slightest crack in her politeness. Maybe there was nothing underneath to crack into at all. Then she finally, finally got to the point. “I got all of the stuff from your sister sorted out last weekend. Here’s the big box full of her letters and notes and things.”

Rika went over to the side of the roof’s entrance. Her bags were there. She hefted a big cardboard box from a supermarket shopping bag and hauled it over to to Miki. The box smelt musty, and when Miki touched it with her fingers, it felt like it had been dumped in a wet forest for about ten years and had been dried with an electric blanket.

Rika spoke. “I still don’t get why she left her writings to me, but with the balloon thing it took me a while to go through it. I made as much time as I could. I couldn’t rely on anyone else to read through it.”

Rika covered her mouth and yawned politely as a thousand-pound weight slammed into the bottom of Miki’s stomach. Miki spoke quietly and dangerously. “You read all of it.”

Rika nodded. “Nothing she wouldn’t have wanted you to see after she passed. I spent some time thinking about it. She left a note.”

Miki considered using the stump of her arm as a battering ram, beating Rika’s nose through her brain and against the inside of that impenetrable skull. Rika kept on smiling pleasantly as Miki’s vision began to turn red and blurry. Miki barely pulled herself back from beating the shit out of Rika and then slamming her off the roof.

Deep breath in. Deep breath out. Deep breath in. Deep breath out. Miki felt Rika pat her back and Miki instinctively lashed out. Miki’s right knuckles grazed against Rika’s cheek and Rika stepped lightly back. Miki glared at Rika through tears, still breathing hard in and out. She so badly wanted to punch Rika again until Rika looked like a squashed tomato.

When Miki wiped the tears from her eyes, Rika was sitting on the floor. She was cradling her jaw and looking up at Miki with a sense of concern.

“You alright?”

It was Rika who said that. Miki shook her head.

“I’m sorry about that.” Miki found herself saying.

Miki had no idea that Rika would do something so unforgivable. She knew for certain that Rika had no idea that she’d done something unforgivable either. All this time she wondered why Rika was keeping those letters from her. Miki had thought it was spite. Miki had been determined not to show a shred of weakness. Instead Rika had shown something worse than Miki could ever return.

Miki just kept shaking her head. Miki didn’t even bother to ask for an apology. She’d get it immediately. And it would mean nothing.

“Just give it.” Miki said. Already her head began to feel blurry. She was out of her own head, watching myself and Rika from above the track. Her body was the dead clockwork of Big Ben and her soul had checked out from the whole attraction. Rika walked towards her bag and Miki just watched her go.

Rika went back to her pack, delicately held a small silver case, and stepped gently back towards Miki. Miki just stared at the box. Now that she had it in her hands, she suddenly wasn’t sure that she wanted to read what was inside. Rika just waited a few feet away, holding the small silver container and looking at Miki.

“I want you to promise that you won’t try to grab this from me. It’s something that should be handled delicately.”

How dare Rika say that. Miki nodded yes. Arguing with Rika would be like trying to shove through all the walls in the Siege of Osaka. The silver case slid slowly open and Miki had no idea what she was looking at.

“This isn’t the majority of of it.” Rika admitted. “The bulk of the bombs and all of the fuses are at my house in the shed.”

The shed that Rika and Miki had screwed inside. Miki completely failed to absorb anything except for Rika’s words about the shed. Rika kept on talking.

“I don’t know how to dispose of the rest of it. If you want to carry on with what your sister did, I’m not going to judge. It’s all yours.”

Now Miki reared up and smashed Rika’s skull like it was a fucking squash ball, letting Rika fall ball backwards. Rika still cradled the case like it was her baby. Miki ignored her. She kicked Rika in the leg. Rika mumbled. Miki slammed her heel down onto Rika’s leg and Rika screamed. She walked over and side-slammed Rika in the skull. She just stood there, breathing heavily, as the lunch bell rang.

Rika didn’t make a sound.

Miki crouched down, suddenly afraid. Then Rika gurgled. Miki hadn’t killed her. Rika had ducked a little, and if it weren’t for that, Miki might have smashed right into Rika’s throat or chest. With Rika’s condition, she might have died right there. Miki cradled Rika’s neck in alarm, holding it upright while Rika’s eyes stared accusingly upwards.

“My neck isn’t broken.” Rika gasped. Miki had no idea how she could even talk. “I don’t know if anything else is. Please don’t do that again. It really hurt.”

It really hurt. Miki just lowered Rika’s head back to the ground and sat back. The enormity of what she’d nearly done settled into her. She really could have killed Rika. If she broke Rika’s spine right there and left Rika a quadraplegic for the rest of her life, Rika would protest quietly but say nothing to no one.

Miki walked over to the fence and threw up off the roof. Miki’s eyes stung and her throat burned and she hated herself for beating the shit out of someone who would never fight back. She heard Rika gurgle again and spit out onto the roof.

When Miki turned around Rika was staring vaguely at Miki. It was the most emotional Miki had ever seen her. Rika raised a hand up from the ground politely and then collapsed back into a pain infused pile. Miki just looked down at Rika as entire minutes ticked past. The lunch bell rang.

“That was very dangerous.” Rika said, finally. “You promised not to do that. It was partially my fault for exposing any of this to you, but I trusted you not to touch any of this without understanding it. You could have killed both of us here. And it could have hurt a lot of people if it contaminated the rest of the school.”

Rika sounded more like a robot than a person who’d been kicked in the skull. Even the school nurse had more emotion when rattling things off. Rika was at Yamaku Academy because the Academy accommodated for Rika’s hypoplastic left heart syndrome. Nobody could ever accomodate for how Rika completely lacked half of her humanity. No pump, no surgery, and pill could ever account for that glaring deficit.

Miki changed her mind about hurting Rika. She wouldn’t kill her. Nothing Miki could do would really affect Rika. All of it would make Miki feel better. Fuck anger management. That was for dealing with fucking human beings.

“You’re going to kill both of us.” Rika said urgently. Miki paused. Miki couldn’t really remember what Rika had been saying, but understood that it had been important enough for Rika to risk her life. Rika had to have known where this conversation would go when she’d shoved that crap at Miki and said that shit.

“What’s in the fucking case?” Miki said. “It’s just lab crap. Not enough of it to do anything. I don’t give a fuck.”

“It’s poison, Miki.” Rika said. “Anthrax. A bit of sarin. I can’t recognize some of it. I think your sister wanted to replicate the Tokyo terror attack.”

A cold numbness sunk into Miki’s spine again. What she’d nearly done blared into her mind all at once. “You’re shitting me. You really didn’t go to anyone about this?”

Rika shrugged. “Nope. You know me. I don’t lie. “

Miki stared at the silver case. She had no idea how to feel.

“I don’t want anything to do with this.” Miki said dully. “Take it to the police. They already know that she did a bunch of fucked up shit.”

Rika nodded. “Ok. Please take this case off of me slowly and put it down. I’m worried that I might drop it. Tell me if anything fell out anywhere.”

There it was again, that surreal feel of dealing with Rika. It was like Rika was a zombie, acting out everything about being human. If they ever figured out how to make thinking robots real, they’d probably be just like Rika, inhuman, without the basic ability to feel what a human being felt. Maybe Rika was a space alien who didn’t know it herself.

Miki took the case and then put it down. Rika waved her over again.

“Ok. Now please help me up.”

Miki stared at Rika’s raised hand. She did exactly as Rika asked. Rika swayed back and forth, dazed with pain, and Miki instinctively grabbed Rika to steady her. Rika turned her head and body slowly around, relying on Miki’s support, her eyes sweeping the floor for any errant tubes or shards of glass.

Rika stepped on her own two feet and nodded in Miki’s direction. “Thanks.”

A few moments passed. “No problem.” Miki said back.

Rika stood there again, just evaluating Miki. Miki still felt, somehow, that she was being jerked around. Not by Rika. Nothing alive could fake a nonreaction to being pounded into the ground. God, or her ancestors, or some kind of trickster spirit had put an atmosphere of unreality over everything.

“If that’s all then.” Miki said. Her words seemed ridiculous in light of everything that happened. She wasn’t sure how she felt. She was still angry, and afraid, and bitter at herself, but mostly exhausted. All of those sensations swam around in her, adding up to nothing coherent. She felt like she wanted to go back to class.

If she just went down those steps and sat in the English classroom, then she could act like none of this had ever happened. She’d get scolded for being late and then the teacher would drone. She’d sit through everything and then go to her next class and sleep through that one and go back to her dorm and collapse there. Then she’d fuck around like usual and pretend this wasn’t real.

But Rika was standing there, bruises swelling up on her face and legs, proof positive that all of this had happened. Miki wondered what Rika would do. She did not expect Rika to walk over, grab Miki’s hand, and shake it.

“If anybody asks, I’ll tell them it was an accident.” Rika said blandly. “I think that’d be more or less the truth. I’m not sure you really meant to hurt me like this.”

What in the absolute fuck. She gripped Rika’s hand back and shook it and stepped away as quickly as she could. Rika bent over, picked up the silver case, and closed it up carefully. She wobbled off towards her school bag. She opened it up and a few pieces of styrofoam packaging flew out.

Rika put the silver case delicately into her school bag and sealed it up. She nodded at Miki as she stumbled out, through the exit, and down into the school. Miki walked forward and tripped over the cardboard box on the ground. She’d completely forgotten about it. Miki bent down, clutched it with her stump, and wondered what the hell to do next with her life.

Author's Notes: "When It Falls On You"

I am mostly concerned about whether my characters are interesting or just gimmicky. It is also quite difficult to make violence genuinely interesting instead of mindless.

Index

...flagging this for a retcon at some point

[Mirage_GSM]

I would like feedback, in particular, about the pacing of events and whether the introduction succeeds in drawing in the reader. It begins slowly and with a number of seemingly irrelevancies. It is also intended to have reread value due to foreshadowing and references to the events ahead.

Well... That's not really the kind of story I like to read, so I can't say it's managed to draw me in. By the second half I more or less just wanted it to be over and I'd certainly not read it a second time.
That's just my personal preference though, and from a technical standpoint there's nothing wrong with the story, pacing or otherwise.
The Miki/Rika one, though... To me it felt as if neither of those two had anything to do with the characters from the VN.
Sure the story mentions Rika having a heart problem, but that's not an issue in this story at all. There has been another fic about Miki having anger management issues, but other than an offhand mention of track training and one mention of her stump there's nothing that would have let me recognize Miki as a character. Maybe the scene would have worked as part of a longer piece where you had time to establish their personalities, but just like that it feels random.
Finally we don't know anything about Miki's deceased sister - WHY Rika has those letters in the first place or why Miki is so angry that she read them.
While reading a few possibilities came to my mind - maybe Rika was dating Miki's sister... but then why would Miki be mad about Rika reading the letters? So yes, the violence in that one felt very unmotivated...

[NuclearStudent]

Index

Reprisal

Lilly and I wait for a gap in the afternoon crowds to open. It feels like all the world passes us by, but there's no way through to our dorms. I look at her and I whisper an idea for a place to go, and we end up in Mutou's classroom. It's just him in there. I explain to him that we need the room for just the two of us. He sits still, and without either of us saying anything I know he instantly understands what this is about.

I wonder if he's shocked at how forward I am about this. It would be no big deal, but I've never asked him for a thing in all the months that I've been his star pupil.

He glances left and right. For a moment I think he's going to say no, but he smiles awkwardly and says that he can guarantee the privacy of the room for a while. He's going to lock the both of us in together for half an hour, and then come back to let us out. We can use the tissues on his desk to clean up, he adds hurriedly as he leaves.

We're going to need those tissues. We're calling Lilly's parents to tell them that she's going to stay in Japan. I hold one of her hands with both of mine. "It might be better if you don't mention me." I say quietly.

She tilts her head in my direction, then nods. I squeeze her hand. The phone rings, and rings again. I suddenly doubt what I'm doing by asking Lilly to hide how I'm involved in this.

Is this how I want to think of her, as a dependable coward and a fool who never lies but hardly tells the truth? I feel like if I got angry at her, I'd fall apart. I worry about her just as much as she worries about me.

It's not that Lilly is perfect or I am. Something in me is just desperately, desperately trying to hold things together as if they're alright. I want to believe that they will be alright.

"I love you." I whisper to Lilly just before the other side of the phone picks up. It is a mistake for me to say that. Lilly's mouth opens soundlessly and her eyes are full of years. I reach over and wipe them off before holding Lilly's hand again. Her tears rub on my fingers

I don't know enough English to follow the pace of the conversation that follows. The tinny questioning of Lilly's mother gives way to a rapid-fire male barking. It sounds as if hounds have broken loose thousands of kilometers away, ready to hunt down Lilly and me to pull us apart.

She takes her hand away from mine and grips her phone with both her hands. Snot and tears mix in an ugly downpour, and all I want to do is kiss her until it's alright. Instead I'm crying myself, and cleaning off Lilly's face with tissues. I'm wiping her and folding up the dirty tissues into a neat stack with a clean tissue underneath.

I take a moment to clear my own eyes and hold at Lilly. I see that her knuckles are white and she's shaking. Her grip is so tight that I wonder if the phone will snap in half. I don't dare touch her there out of fear that she shatters the phone entirely. She keeps on weeping, talking through her sobs as the voices on the other side switch from strident female to yelling male. It's all so distant, with the gap between Lilly and I impossible, and the distance from us to her parents being as unimaginable as the space between stars.

She lets the phone fall into her lap and stares at me with a terrifying emptiness. I think that if she could see, her eyes would be equally unfocused, looking through the world as if boring her gaze through the earth and towards distant galaxies where everything is alright.

It's not good.

I see her wavering again, her face uncertain. All the reserve is gone from her. All that's left is a girl who can't see her way forward. I hold her hand again and stroke the inside of her palm in a slow little circle. I close my own eyes. Lilly raises her hands up towards her ear again and I let her take them away.

After a few moments, the voices give one last snarl and cut off abruptly. There is a gentle clack when the phone is set down on the table. Then Lilly's hands are in mine again. I hear the crowds outside grow louder then softer. The evening bell rings.

"I've been disinherited." Lilly says quietly. "They froze my bank account and forbid me from ever visiting Scotland or getting any money from Akira. I'm going to have to find a job. We might both have to. I don't have much cash in savings."

I just nod.

"They're never going to change their minds." Lilly says. I listen while tracing circles in her palm, surprised at how certain she is. "That's just how they'll be. I know it."

I think about Yuuko. I imagine long hours rushing between two jobs we can barely handle while keeping up school at the same time. But I have my parents to support me. They don't have much money after sending me to Yamaku, but without question they would do their best to help us. We could stay with them for the time being. We would have to settle for the universities and college local in my home city. I think we could manage.

Not for a moment would I doubt Lilly's choice. I hope she feels the same. In a single conversation, our path for years to come has been decided.

There is a knock on the door. I open my eyes. "Please come in." Lilly says. Her eyes are red but her voice is clear.

The door opens slowly and Mutou pokes his head around the corner, as if afraid to interrupt whatever his students are doing. For some reason he stops in surprise when he sees us simply holding hands and sitting upright with all of our puffy-eyed dignity. He widens his eyes and looks away. He doesn't seem to know what to say or how to react. He doesn't ask.

"Thank you for letting us use your room, Mutou." I'm surprised that my voice is just as clear as Lilly's. "We're sorry about the mess, and we're going to clean your desks and floor after this."

Mutou shakes his head. He tries to insist that we let him do it this once. Lilly declines. Mutou stands awkwardly as we fetch the cleaning rags from the corner of the room, soap them, then and wipe off the place we were sitting together. I ask Mutou if he has any advice for finding a job as a student and he says that he's not sure, but if he'll pass on all the information he's got.

I thank Mutou and we leave the classroom together. We hold each other right and it seems impossible that we could spend the night sleeping in separate dorms. By silent agreement we guide each other to Lilly's dorm. We shower. We have something to eat. Absurdly, we try to study. We make love. Then we go to bed, side by side, touching noses.

Author's Notes: "Reprisal"

This is the Lilly Good End I wished to read.

I'm not satisfied with it and I can't define what's wrong. It is also the closest thing I've written to being conventionally good. It starts with sexual innuendo to lighten the mood. I am displeased.

Index

[Mirage_GSM]

Well, first of all: Who's Yuriko?

Apart from that the biggest problem I had with the story was the sexual innuendo at the start. It does not mesh well with the rest of the story.
At the start I was expecting this to be a crackfic, then suddenly it turned completely serious - which was jarring.
And then in the end when Mutou comes back it tries to get back into the exaggerated crackfic mood again which completely destroys the effect of the phone call.

A minor thing is how Lilly's parents could forbid her from receiving money from Akira. Akira is her own person with her own bank account which her father has neither access to nor control over.

[NuclearStudent]

Well, first of all: Who's Yuriko?

Apart from that the biggest problem I had with the story was the sexual innuendo at the start. It does not mesh well with the rest of the story.
At the start I was expecting this to be a crackfic, then suddenly it turned completely serious - which was jarring.
And then in the end when Mutou comes back it tries to get back into the exaggerated crackfic mood again which completely destroys the effect of the phone call.

A minor thing is how Lilly's parents could forbid her from receiving money from Akira. Akira is her own person with her own bank account which her father has neither access to nor control over.

Yuriko was a misspelling of Yuuko. Mm.

Mutou returning was not meant to be such a mood breaker. Mm. I made no attempt to imitate Suriko's writing style or put this as anything other than a reflection of my own wishes, but I was quite serious in that part. I'll mull on it.

The Akira point is a hole. I could probably rewrite one of Hisao's options as getting some support from Akira.