putting the fun in funeral!

_

Hey, Sashi, d'ya reckon gods get sad up there?

_

There's a waterfall in your mouth, but your lips have clogged it all up. There's a blonde child sleeping on your couch, she stole your shirt and she won't let you forget. There's a tension in your head and it 2:17AM. There's always something wrong with your life; you wonder what you did to deserve this shit.

Well. Not really, you've been through worse.

So.

So.

You don't really care at this point. It's all pointless to think about in retrograde, but that's another thing to add to the long long list of things you would like to avoid. It's impossible to avoid fire your whole life, but you've done your best to avoid it when you remember why you did it in the first place. So. So yeah. You're doing your best, even if it's not enough, you have enough tries of this ― you've lived six eternal lives. This one isn't the worst of them. It isn't so bad, all things considered.

Yeah, right.

You have to get up today. You do. At some point, not right now, even if you've got nothing better to do. You close your eyes and your brain melts.

_

When you wake up, your alarm is seven minutes to ringing. You stretch your neck, listen to the unholy popping of vertebrae. The girl is still sleeping on your couch. You breath out. Well, whatever.

You put a blanket on her, even though it isn't cold. Even you aren't that much of an ass. She's like, eight. This is the least you can do.

You humm something off beat when you leave that room. It's almost like you're leaving it all behind.

You want to be on another planet, at times like these. Too many thoughts and things around you. So you take one of your handy cyanide pills and you wait to forget it all.

_

All of your knuckles are bleeding, fingernails caved back, your skin is peel peel peeling, you're so hungry you eat whatever you can. Pull out your hair and eat it because it hurts when you don't. Scratching your skin off until the pieces are big enough to eat it ― hurts.

You thing you might be dying. You hands are all scarred and if you're dying anyway, you don't want to go hungry.

You look at your pinkie finger, you put it in your mouth and you chew.

_

You wonder whose kitchen you're in. It's a rather nice one, really. You stand up from your spot on the floor―you should go to sleep, you muse. You aren't tired, even if the clock on the oven says 7:23AM. You wonder if you oughta be, though.

You sneeze into your elbow crook. Loudly. You wonder if you've always been this loud. You think you should have been quiet, if you're in someone else's house. In someone else's kitchen, livingroom, whatever it is.

There's a girl. She's on the couch and, though she may not be a girl at all, you wonder. She's stirring, her eyes open up and it's gold and you wonder what color your eyes are.

"Oh," she says, a cat-tooth smile playing on her lips. "you're up, huh?"

"Hello," you say. "where am I?" You ask.

"This is your house!" She says. You wonder how many times she's done this. How many times you've forgotten. "It's pretty neat! You were cleaning when we got back and you showed me where everything was! Do you know?"

You shake your head. "Who are you? Who am I?"

"Oh. Well, I'm Toga Himiko, but you usually call me Miko-chan." She's walking away, back to you, to the world. You wonder what you were like when you were her age. "You said to give you a book - and walk you too Yuuei!"

"What's Yuuei?"

"It's a hero school, silly!" She's bright. "You're a teacher there, I think."

"Okay," you say to her, you've forgotten what she is. What you are. She's golden, though. You wonder if you are, too. Overflowing like a waterfall, you want to spit all your thoughts up. "thanks."

She's walking up to you, her hands are red red red like war. Like fire. You wonder what it means to burn like that, to drown in red red red skies so bright it's an omen. There is no god, you think, every kami from here to Shinjuku is gone ways away. You wonder wonder wonder if block seven is still broken. If names have no meaning, and they do not, why have one.

"D'ya want me to walk you there? You seem a little lost - it's probably normal though, huh?"

You wonder if it is. "Probably," you muse. "I wouldn't know."

She gives you clothes, shows you to the bathroom. You change, you put on your shoes, both of you walk to the train.

Blue-blue eyes pass you by. You wonder how far away you are if you think the sky is looking down on you.

You wonder if there is a war on the horizon. Solitary confinement seems like a daunting punishment in this life. It's too cold for that shit but fire is war and it'll swell your skin until your bones crackle like things in a campfire. Monsters have nothing on humanity, you muse.

(Blue is the color of distance, you think, you wonder, you muse.)

_

A man in black and white meets you by the door. He's dressed in a jumpsuit, you wonder if he have any grey hairs, under the bandages.

"Hello," you greet. "how are you?"

"Could be better." He says. It's odd, you think. "Nedzu said to bring you in."

Who's that, you want to ask. You don't, of course. It would be quite rude to do that, now that you're not with.. your roommate. You can't remember her name but you're sure it's nothing new.

The hallways twist awkwardly.

Something hits you, hard.

_

Hey kid?

Mama?

Hey kid y―y awa―

Mama where are you?

Kid kid sta―can you j―

Mama where are you―are you there mama?

_

"Do you think the sky is ever lonely?"

"No! Look, it has all the clouds up there."

_

You wake up in a cushy office you're too familiar with. "Nedzu," you say. "I've already told you that it works."

"Still, always better to have multiple examples."

"You just wanted me dead."

He smiles, more vinegar less honey. "But of course." He sips his tea, whiskers twitching in a way that means he likes it. "You'd finally be gone, dear friend."

You grin at him like a knife, "Glad we feel the same."

"Yes."

"Quick question." Says the man in black. "Who the fuck is that?"

Nedzu says your name like a sin and you just smile about it like a joke. This place isn't for newbies and if it's just the three of you then you're safe enough to take you're tea too sweet and drink it like a shot of vodka.

They both look at you like you've done something atrocious and you strongly remember Sashi pulling the same stunt when you were.. twelve-ish? Maybe a teenager. Time isn't very coherent but you were already gone when you were grown, so.

So.

(Well, nothing. You've got nothing. Wow, you used repress! it was super effective.)

"Quick question," you say. "do I get a say in.. whatever this is?"

"Nope!" Nedzu says cheerfully, like a child after learning how to pick a lock on their window. Or whatever it is children get happy about.

(You wonder if you've lost your autonomy again. In this cage that's only so much bigger than your last. You miss the woods like this, the green overhead going forever ― sky so blue, so far away.)

There's a kind of ocean in your chest, you want to spill it, maybe it'll crack the glass; you'll loose all the sand will be gone. Film from your grandmother's time going rotten. It's grainy in your head, like static or VHS movies from movie nights after [RED IS THE COLOR OF WAR] happened. You feel like a toy like this, stretched thin, you want to go empty again.

(If they spilled you out would your insides go green?)

The subtlety of the future is too much for you―it's too much for your head, you want to―

You want to―

(Hello, what's you name?)

Go away from here, you guess; the sun is too bright, the sky is too far away. Everything is the same like this, rocks turned over on block eight in Chiba.

Your brain will die at some point, you're sure. You hope so, at least. No, you're sure, you have to be. You'd dig your own grave happily if you are to ever use it; you know you'll just outlive a stone, outlive and crematorium and fine china urn. They will wither away. Every single time.

(You ignore the fact you'll be digging forever.)

(There's a grave in the woods, somewhere by a lake, by a cave, by a tree with a hanging branch, mangled from one too many suicide attempts; birds fall off often enough for it to become a hunting ground for predators.)

Monsters became humans far before you were you and the people knew how to shift.

You smile while they talk.

History never learns it's lesson, does it?

(Hello, what's your name?)

__

(Do you think the sky is lonely that far away?)

__

It's a sign, this monotony. Repeat repeat repeat - there is a block in the road in the form of an eight year old thats actually seventeen. You're too old for this. You are too tired for this.

Your bones.. ache, you suppose.

You aren't new enough for this. You are unborn in the way only gods are.

Clouds are too far away for you to touch but nothing can hold you back from the idea of flight; no angel or kami, malackym have no hold over your unholy soul.

You are a funeral pyre, you are war.

You are an orphan.

That isn't new information, you've outlived everyone you've ever known but it still breaks you the way you lost them, the was you lost your family - you tried getting married, they all left you, spilling salt on open wounds. They said you don't love right and you have to wonder what it means to love wrong these days. You don't think that you've ever loved right if that's the case.

You are a wreck, a waterfall, floating away. You are an angry sea, bleeding hate (white is hate then, pure white, the kind that looks holy but is anything but― holy).

(It's fascinating.)

God's do not die, but you are no god, you are an ocean.

Drifting.

_

Nobody bothers you until you step into your house and there's a knife at your throat. To be fair, it's a very pretty knife, all hand crafted and gold-splayed, sequins spiral in flowers around it, pink like bad cotton candy. You drop the bags in your hand.

(What's your name?)

"Hello Toga-kun." You greet absentmindly. "Did you know that birds, typically larger ones can kill cats?" you pause when she drops her knife. You make your way to the kitchen.

She blinks, taking a bag. "Really?"

You open one on there counter. This is a nice house, it's clean. "Yes."

(Pomegranate seeds get squished between your toes, under you nails, you get clumps of fruit between your hair, peeling the remains off your face. Spit it out what's between your teeth. It's bitter.)

There's a rampage in you, a tide of bleach and restlessness that makes you scrub until the skin on your hands have gone raw. Pink like lemonade or the sequins on Toga's knife.

You cut the green onions and put them in a bowl while the miso boils. Today is quite, you hum.

"Watch the soup," you tell her. "watch the rice cooker, I'm going to the bathroom. There's chicken in the freezer, it's cut up, please put it in the miso when it's done!"

"Okay," she nods. "come back soon!"

You head to the bathroom. You open the door, use the bathroom, wash you hands, and dry them. You take the razor from behind the mirror.

Slitting your own throat is easier now that you've had so much practice.

_

Mama, Papa, do you think that the sun is ever lonely? Mama do you think it's lonely up there? Mama are you lonely up there? Is Papa lonely up there too?

_

Rerun rerun. Encore encore.

OPEN THE CURTAIN, EINZ, TWIE, DRIE!

_

You wake up in a bathroom you've never known, you wonder where you are, why the floor is covered in blood― did you kill someone? Are you an Alter? You think you know about Alters, you knew someone who had five once, you got confused talking to them, because if you said something off, you'd trigger one.

You don't know where though. You don't know when, though. You don't know at all, though.

There's red all over your hands, probably a last ditch attempt to keep a body hidden. You wonder who works this place. Who the main Alter is.

(Are you a god? Is this blood yours? Are you gone away?)

There's a knock at the door of this nice bathroom. "Hey!" It says. "―you've been in there a while! You good?"

"No." You say. There's blood on your socks. Your fingertips are a washed out dream, like you've been wrung of blood. You wonder if you died, if you are just reliving you past.

(Can gods die?)

The door is latched open by a knife that can't really do anything except pick the dirt under unbitten fingernails. She's wearing purple socks and a golden rage, teeth blinding, pink in her hands like spring.

You wonder if she's a god, too.

(Does she know that you are sunk in your own blood? That you are just dreaming up a hell so you don't go insane?)

"Hello," you say. You wonder why she's golden, glowing like a dead star, while you feel like a second choice. Maybe she's here to kill you for real. "who are you?"

She looks at you, looks at the blood on the floor, on your hands, is it on your face too? On your stomach? Smoothed over your wrists?

"That's how you do it―" she whispers. You wonder what she means. "I'm Toga Himiko," she says, smiles. Her teeth are sharp. You wonder what kind of god she is. "you usually call me Miko-chan."

"Okay Miko-chan."

She smiles. That's good, you think. She's smiling, that's good. Right?

_

You are dead. I killed you.

_

She hands you are notebook. That is the first line.

You are dead. I killed you.

"It's yours." She says. "You said to give it when you can't remember nothing."

You are dead. I killed you.

(Are you a god?)

"Thank you," you are dead― it's so neat. "Miko-chan."

I killed you.  It says. 

"Are you okay?"

"No." You say. "I'm a ghost." you tell her. You are a second choice, the backup for when Host does not want to exist. You are a replacement for a god and you aren't wrong enough to replace something so unholy as a kami. 

"Well yeah," but she's smiling when she says it. "but really, we're all ghosts of when we were small, ain't we? We were all so happy once, weren't we?"

You look at her, gold gold eyes, she looks like something that would kill you in the woods. You wonder if she would. Maybe. Things are always  uncertain in places like these. In times that rest between an apocalyptic war. 

(You wonder if anyone else feels like their own body is a crypt.)

"Yeah," you say, a smile pulls at your face, cracked like concrete, like ice. "I guess we are." You close your eyes and try not to think about it to much.

You are dead. I killed you.

It doesn't work. You excuses yourself but she drags you to the kitchen. She's made you miso with rice and chicken. You wonder if the Host likes the food this this, warm.

You wonder if she knows your Host is a monster in sheepskin. A murderer. She holds her knife like Host has done something to her, and she can't leave. She should. You should tell her to leave before the thing that puppeteer that strings this body like a violin made of a human throat comes back alive. You should tell her to you before the Host wakes up, though you cannot feel a fragment of yourself stir, no turbulence nor bloodshed. Maybe she can be safe while you're here.

Maybe you can show her that she doesn't need to hold a knife like that around you, but you would know.

You might deserve it. After all―

You're dead. I killed you.

―there's a murderer under your skin, somewhere. Someone bad like an omen, the original sin. Dust sparked like gasoline, you are dirty.

"Hah? Why aren't you eating?" She cuts through your guilt like a punch to the throat.

"Are you afraid of me?" You say, slow. "I'm sorry."

"I―" she pauses. "you, what?" She giggles. She chuckles. She laughs, cackling. Heart spilled out over her sleave like you―you don't know what to do with that. "Aw! You think you scare me, do ya? Yer cute, I ain't scared for shit."

"I." You look at your soup and smile. "Okay, good."

You are haunting your own skin, but you can fake away the nausea that makes you dizzy if she doesn't feel guilty about it.

"So, how does your quirk work?" She leans toward you.

You tilt your head at her, like she's said some sort of joke. Maybe something to confuse you. It seems like something she'd do. "My what now?"