A Scar and Kind Words Chapter 2: Resolution:
Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3.
Made on: 22 Mar, 2020
Word Count: 1,087 (4,561 overall)
Relationship(s): Yuuki Tougou & Akane Kasai & Shino Kominami,
Characters of Focus: Yuuki Tougou, Akane Kasai, Shino Koinami, Ghost OC,
Metadata: Soulmate-Identifying Marks (AKA: Soulmate AU), Ghosts (of course), Mystery, Canonical Character Death,
Setting Canon and post-canon,
Warnings: Major Spoilers in Chapter 3 for the ending of the game, There's hint of spoilers for the last chapter throughtout but not anything that gives it away (minus chapter 3)
“Love's not time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.” - sonnet 116, William Shakespeare.
On the way to school, Akane left her normal path to see if the flowers had been moved.
When she got there she saw the lady, Hana, looking at her at the other end of the street.
There seemed to be an expression of confusion that quickly changed to bitterness, but with her face caked in mud Akane couldn't be sure.
Akane blinked and she was gone.
'Well,’ she thought, 'it looks like we're going the right path!’
When Yuuki and Akane arrived at the club room, Shino was already there reading a magazine.
“Shino, did you stay up all night reading that?” Akane asked, putting her hands on her hips.
“Of course not.” Shino said, leaning back into one of the club's chairs, somehow managing to look down at Akane despite the vertical disadvantage.
“you know we can see the marks under your eye.” Yuuki adds.
“And I can see that as well, Yuuki, I didn't stay up reading. I just had trouble falling asleep.” Shino waves them off, “I did find something interesting in the magazine this morning though.”
Shino flipped to a marked page and pointed to the start of an article.
The two news club members looked over shino's shoulder to see the magazine.
“ How to help people with soulmates problems:
If a friend of yours or close acquaintance seems to have soulmate problems these tricks and tips could help them.
1: talk to them about their soulmate; this can help identify the problem that their having.
2: think and talk about possible solutions with them; even if the answer seems obvious to you it could be that they've never tried it
3: talk with their soulmate or someone who knows their soulmate; getting a good read on a person's soulmate can help you fix the problem.
4: talk to the person about their soulmate; you can find out what they have in common and what can be used to fix their problem.
Note: Do remember that you can only give this person advice, it is not up to you if that person follows through with it or if it works out. Don't take full responsibility for this problem unless you directly caused it and have good communication with both parties….”
It continued on with the vague advice for another half page before it moved on to pictures of celebrities that found their soulmates who were, coincidentally, also celebrities.
“A gossip magazine?” Akane questions, “I didn't know you were into those things Shino!”
“I'm not,” Shino replies cooly, “I found this on the ground at school as I was heading home and I had nothing better to do.”
“Oh, that makes sense.” Akane said.
“This is great and all but how are we going to use this with Hana?” Yuuki asks, gesturing to the magazine, “we've haven't been able to talk to her.”
“Don't lose hope yet Yuuki!” Akane grinned, “I think my flower plan is working!”
Shino looked at Akane, her eyebrows raising, “Your what?”
“I saw her today before I came to school and you didn't get hit by a car!”
Yuuki stood up straighter, “You saw her?”
“Wait, before you talk about her, I want to know what you did!”
Bbzzzt!
>Shino: don't do anything dangerous! Remember the plan and trust your intuition.
Akane smiled down at her phone and typed out an answer.
Akane: don't worry Shino!!! I'll be fine!!<
She followed it with a smiling bunny sticker and Shino replied with a 'watch over her Yuuki.'
Akane pocketed her device and looked over to Yuuki texting. They were walking home together and, of course, taking a detour to visit Hana to try to talk to her.
“Maybe if we can figure out what's keeping her here if we talk to her,” Shino explained back in the club room, “but you have to keep your distance from her and keep together if you're going through with this.”
Akane personality thought things will go fine. It isn't her first time doing something like this. She does wonder why Shino isn't tagging along, but she decides to keep that bit to herself.
“Do you think we'll have any luck Akane?” Yuuki turns to her, gently tucking his phone into his jacket pocket.
“I think we'll figure something out!” Akane replies, standing straight, holding her fist up, and smiling, “after all, we're in this together, and with my brilliant intuition and your smarts we'll do great!”
“Brilliant intuition, huh?” Yuuki tilted his head, side eyeing the girl to the right of him.
“Don't be mean!” Akane puffed out her cheeks, pouting and waving her hands, then grins.
“We're here!”
There are only a few flowers left, most of them swept away by the wind or wandering children's hands. the ones that remain are slightly crushed and muddied.
Akane looks around at the mostly empty street, glancing at cars that pass by and checking out the few stores that live here.
Eventually, when it seems that maybe she left or is busy terrorizing someone else, Akane sees Hana in an alleyway, a flower clutched in her hands.
“Akane, look! your flower plan worked!” Yuuki half whispered in surprise.
“Of course it did!” Akane grinned, standing straight and walking across the street towards Hana, “Come on Yuuki!”
“Ah, coming!” He rushed to get back next to her.
When they got to the alleyway they realized that it wasn't an alleyway at all, but rather a small road between two houses.
Hana had already walked a bit down the road, but something was different; her face was less muddy and the light seemed to pass right through her.
Akane only realised she stopped when Yuuki tugged on her sleeve, glancing at him Akane smiled and continued towards Hana with him, but slower then before.
When they approached, Hana turned away from the flowers she was looking at on the side of the road and smiled at them. There was something pinched about her face, a certain look in her shining eyes, that reminded Akane of something else.
“I'm sorry,” Hana whispered, eyes moving over Akane to Yuuki, gripping the flower in her hand tighter, “for bringing you out here, and for pushing you before.”
“It's, um,” Yuuki cleared his throat, “it's fine. I didn't get hurt.”
“That's good,” Hana nods, a few tears beginning to run down her face, “that's good.”
Akane tries to reach out, before a look from Yuuki stops her, “Miss Hana? Can you tell us how to help you?”
“We can just listen, if you want?” Yuuki adds.
“Ah, yes, that would,” Hana wipes some hair out of her eyes and rubs the tears off her face, “that would be nice, thank you.”
For a moment it's just them three in a back way road tucked away between two buildings, with only trash cans and trash littered around watching them.
Akane sees Hana change slowly before her, the remaining mud floating away in non-existent wind and her hair looking like it was bathed recently instead of years ago, the twigs remove themselves from her hair and her face becomes much, much more clear.
“When,” Hana starts, stops, then starts again, “my soulmate took me out one night, we both wanted to do something nice for our fifth anniversary.”
She looks up to the partly cloudy sky and smiles.
“After dinner we decided to take a short cut to get home, we were walking back here when someone came behind us and,” she breaks off, dropping her flower. no longer smiling, tears gushing from her eyes, “And, she, uh, and—”
Yuuki takes her hand hesitantly, “Take your time miss Hana,” he squeezes her hand, “we'll wait for you.”
Akane can only nod at the back of Yuuki's head, her mind running a hundred miles a second and at a standstill simultaneously.
Hana steels herself, starting again softly, “They had a gun and threatened to shoot it. My soulmate pushed me into the street to try and protect me. I got ran over.”
Hana began to cry harder, gripping yuuki's hand so hard it started to turn white, “She pushed me and I died. I don't— it was awful, I don't know why I would try and make others die that way!”
She curled downward, the legs she didn't even need buckling as she sank to the ground, dragging Yuuki down with her.
Akane steps forward, only to stop as Hana begins again.
“I'm so sorry!” She wails, “I didn't mean it! I just wanted someone to remember! It— I just wanted something nice!”
“Miss—” Yuuki was cut off by her.
“I'm so sorry I got you kids involved.” She whispered hoarsely, “Thank you so, so much. I have to go now.”
She looks up and Akane can see the smile in her eyes.
“Take care of them.” She whispered to Yuuki, her eyes piercing through his, “Thank you.”
She squeezed his hand one last time then fades.
They stumble out between the buildings unharmed.
If something is wrong with Yuukis face, Akane sure doesn't notice, or at least she pretends really hard not to.
Even if it's obvious, she's too busy texting Shino that they're ok to ask about his red eyes or scrunched up expression.
Of course, she'll talk to him about this, they are soulmates after all, she just thinks they both need some time to cool down.
Akane learns later on Yuuki's messy bed that his mom had something similar happen to her once, she's survived though, she's ok, Akane met her when she was invited over.
She tugs the sleeve on her right arm down feather.
>Reply
“This is the Newspaper club:
The woman was someone named Hana. She died when her soulmate pushed her into a car trying to protect her from a mugger.
If you see her, leave flowers for her, or mourn for her in some way, and when she accepts; listen to her story.”
End Author Notes: I'm sorry it took so long for this chapter to be posted! (So long, in fact, that this fic is now a year old, counting from when I started writing it....)
Anyways I hope you've enjoyed this chapter, I'm sad to say that it will probably be a while until I post the next chapter as I really need to rewrite it and before I do that I need to play mf&7r again to remember the characters personallys better.
So sorry in advance! Also sorry for any weird format this is in, I'm doing it on my phone so I can't really tell is everything looks ok.
Update 3/29/23:
-Fixed some capitalization
Thanks for reading!
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