Marionette

Oceans, Chapter Thirty Six - Namida [涙]

There was one emotion that always had a debilitating effect on Amaya. Always without fail, it would rip all control out of her hands and render her blind and mute to her own inward intentions. For some people, it was giddy happiness, others sorrow, and some, it would be jealousy that would cause them to lose control of themselves.

For Amaya, it was always Anger.

It was more volatile for her than it seemed to be for anyone else, always as if there was some deep-rooted trigger inside of her that would switch over when she got far too angry.

Karma had told her not to get angry, because it would just show the creature known as Koro-sensei just how much he was getting to her. But somewhere in the back of her mind, she wondered if that really was the reason.

It was like he knew just how debilitating the emotion was to her.

If he did, maybe that was why he always turned up just in time to stop her from doing something she'd regret?

By the time Amaya realized she had lost hold of herself, she was far, far away from where she'd last recalled to be. She was nowhere in the popular tourist routes of Kyoto - In fact, she was nowhere identifiable at all.

There was no-one here.

The world was dark to Amaya, empty, enough so where she didn't know if she was awake or asleep, in the real world, or in her inner world of boiling water.

She had her doubts that she was in the real world - In fact, with the burning, searing agony she was engulfed in, and the darkness, Amaya was certain that she was underwater; Inside her own inner world, like many times before.

In a twisted way, this world was far more real than the outside world - It was almost like the outside world was the dream, and the water inside was her reality.

No matter how hard Amaya tried to break free of the water, she couldn't.

It didn't matter how hard she kicked against the waters to reach the surface, something continued to pull her further down, and her anger and hate would continue to engulf her.

It continued to fuel her body into acting on volatile tendencies, instead of giving her control back to her.

'You're going the wrong way.' A soft voice spoke out through the darkness with alarming clarity.

Disorientated, panicking and scared, Amaya frantically searched the darkness for any sign of the voice. It sounded so familiar, it actually terrified her to hear it.

It rebounded inside her, all around her, a terrifying nostalgia that she couldn't identify.

'Here, let me help you.' The voice announced.

And then a white light began to flicker to life through the darkness, illuminating the emptiness around her.

A translucent, white hand reached out through the glare towards her, beckoning for her own hand.

And through her desperation, Amaya took it.

The hand was soft, a cool gentleness against the boiling pain that engulfed her, and as the fingers closed around her hand, Amaya could feel it pull her forward towards the white glare that blinded her.

The boiling water that had engulfed her seemed to just fall away, and she was able to breathe again.

The gentle cool from the hand instead began to wrap around her, much like a comforting embrace.

'I know it's hard, Maya-chan.' The voice spoke again, a whisper in the ear as her eyes began to grow heavy and began to close on her all of a sudden. 'But you need to start breaking down those walls ... You need to let somebody in, before it's too late.'