SUB ROSA | Wind Breaker

Arc 4 || 1. Riptide

The world felt muted, wrapped in gray silence, the early morning light barely filtering through the heavy blanket of rain. Droplets fell steadily from the heavens, drumming softly against the worn metal roof of the bus stop. Akame stood beneath it, unmoving, her slender frame soaked through, her school uniform clinging to her skin like a second layer she couldn't shed. The blouse—once pristine—had turned sheer, translucent under the onslaught of rain, but she hardly noticed. She was far beyond caring about modesty or warmth.

Her socks squelched against her damp shoes with each shift of her weight, but even that discomfort failed to anchor her. She felt suspended between worlds—between sensation and numbness, between herself and the hollow shell that had quietly taken her place.

The kiss.

Her lips still felt raw from it, tingling with the ghost of Endo's touch, but the thrill she had once craved was nowhere to be found. The fire she had wanted—no, demanded—had flickered out the moment he hesitated, snuffed by that fleeting pause, by his uncertainty. He hadn't burned her. He couldn't. His hesitation had stolen the one thing she longed for: to be scorched beyond recognition, burned until nothing remained but something new, something free of her old skin and its ghosts.

But she was still here.
Still herself. Still bound by the weight of memory.

No one could burn her the way he had.

A shudder ran down her spine, her breath catching as she tried to chase away the thought, but it lingered—the memory of his hands, of his breath against her skin, of the places he'd touched that no kiss could erase. She clenched her fists at her sides, nails biting into her palms, wishing the cold rain could seep deeper, could chill her until she disappeared into the storm.

Her eyes lifted, unfocused, watching the rain fall in sheets across the empty street. There was no purpose in her steps anymore, no destination that mattered. She had walked until her legs ached, until the city blurred into one shapeless, wet mass of steel and stone. She hadn't stopped until now, drawn to the forgotten shelter of this bus stop like some ghost seeking refuge.

The wind howled through the narrow alleyways, carrying with it the sharp bite of rain. She breathed it in, letting it sting her throat, her chest rising and falling in shallow breaths. Numbness settled deep in her bones, a familiar blanket of nothingness, consuming her from the inside out.

She closed her eyes, head tilted back against the cool metal pole of the stop, the rain singing its steady lullaby around her.

I'm disappearing.

It wasn't a fear—it was a wish. A deep yearning to melt into the gray morning, to slip into the cracks between reality and memory and let herself vanish. To feel nothing forever. The thought scared her once, but not anymore. Not now. Not after the warehouse. Not after realizing that no one—not even Endo—could truly destroy her in the way she craved.

Her lips curled into a faint, bitter smile, barely there before it vanished into the cold. Even destruction was a luxury she couldn't afford.

A bus rumbled past in the distance, but it didn't stop. No one else was awake. The streets belonged to the rain and the wind and to ghosts like her.

Akame stayed where she was, her wet shoes rooted to the pavement beneath her. She didn't move, didn't seek shelter beyond the fragile roof overhead. She had nowhere to go, and no reason to go there.

The rain continued to fall, wrapping her in its icy embrace. For once, she didn't try to escape it.

She let it swallow her whole.

~

Kaji didn't know why he was awake so early. His weekends were usually reserved for long hours of sleep and lazy afternoons, but something about the rain had pulled him outside. Maybe it was the familiar weight of his headphones or the comfort of the steady rhythm in his ears that made the world feel less pressing.