As soon as her mother goes missing and the only clue pointing to her whereabouts is her search history, Elise Newman has packed her bag and boarded the first flight to Japan. Having both lost somebody, Elise fears for her mother's safety and for her...
Author's note— the finale, I decided, will be split into three parts, hopefully to improve how it is experienced. Get ready for a mindfuck. Remember what I said about 'small details'.
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"THIS ISN'T FUNNY!" She shouted at the top of her lungs. The words echoed back to her. Kaito watched solemnly, leaning against a tree with his arms crossed, as Elise spun around in the foliage, screaming.
It had to be some sort of sick joke. The tape Kaito had placed was right where it should be, so they were indeed in the correct place, but both the rope that was their guide and the body had disappeared. Someone in the group had stolen them, but why? Who found it amusing to not only take away the rope but a corpse? No one was supposed to take the bodies away until the official end of the search; it was why they marked the locations with the tape.
And who had screamed? Was it a diversion?
Panting, Elise gave a nearby tree a kick, immediately retracting her foot and crying out. Giving a low growl, she sank to her knees, shaking.
"Are you finished?"
Kaito was still at his tree, not showing any fear or anger. He only looked tired, like this was just a normal day of work for him and he was ready to go home. Elise felt like curling in a ball then and never showing her face again. This was the second time in one day that she had lost it while he remained calm. She had to admit, though, she did feel better. Less shaky, less like everything had spiraled out of her control, even though that part hadn't exactly changed.
"We should...head back," Elise said from the ground, though she didn't want to waste any more time. She still hadn't found her mother, and was beginning to think she never would. This was a big forest, and they were sticking to trails—her mother, and Kaito's son, could be virtually anywhere.
Kaito cocked his head, raising his eyebrows. "We should. But which way?"
Elise noticed then, with the absence of the rope and all the spinning she'd done, that she couldn't remember which way they had come from. There were no landmarks; it all looked the same, all blended together into one vast and endless maze of green. Even if they decided the right route to take back, the path forked around randomly and split seemingly without logic into other trails, some dead-ending. If they began walking without any sense of direction, they would likely get more lost. They were stranded, now, in a labyrinth.
Naturally, Elise's next plan of action was to begin shouting again.
She screamed until her throat was raw and aching. Kaito joined in, though his shouts were half-hearted, but no one came to their aid. They heard nor saw no sign of other people nearby, and when they saw the sun begin to fade, they heard no warning whistle as they had the evening before.
She thought about scaling a tree, but they were all so tall that even if she was able, it would be impossible to get high enough to scope a way out. It wasn't likely she could climb one, anyways; these trees were mostly slick and slender and curved with no hint of footholds.
Elise watched through a thinner patch of trees the final light of day die and subject them to total darkness. She slumped to the ground.
"Now what?"
"Now, American girl," said Kaito, "we wait." Elise couldn't see him as anymore than as a darker figure in the blackness, but took from his tone that he was in an especially bitter mood when he added, "Do not leave this path again. No matter what."
They sat together in the nothingness. She took comfort in hearing his breaths, the only sound at all apart from her pulse thundering in her ears. Elise kept waiting to hear the normal wildlife sounds she would expect from a forest: birdcalls, scuffling in the undergrowth, insects chirping. Nothing came for a very long time.
With nothing else to do, Elise thought. She thought about things that should have stayed in her nightmares, and things that no wise person would think of when stranded in a mysterious forest far from home: she thought about the body.
She had only seen one dead body before, and that was much different. It was her grandfather's funeral, and she remembered swearing he looked as if he was just taking one of his afternoon naps. He was too still, of course, and there was a sense of nothingness to him when he used to exude life, but this body had been different. The eyes were still open, staring her down almost accusingly. This one hadn't looked dead...it looked like it'd never been alive in the first place. A gruesome prop for some macabre movie.
And now it had just...vanished. It could have been anywhere.
Elise shook her head. That thought was where she drew the line. She'd already been paranoid enough to think that body had been moving earlier. No, it had only been a trick of her exhausted mind. She knew the mind could be convinced of some insane things, but that did not make them real.
She took out her phone. There, of course, was no signal, but she swiped through her photos for as long as she dared, looked through her messages. All of Jack's texts were tinged with malice, it seemed, and Elise found it to be overdone even with what she'd done to him, to them. Even if she never made it back home.
Stop being ridiculous. Jack loves you.
But couldn't people lie?
Elise shook her head again. No, these thoughts were off-limits as well. She would not question Jack when surely somewhere he was looking at the same sky (even if her view of it was pretty slim) and thinking of her. Worried sick, he'd said.
It was always about him, though, wasn't it?
"Careful, American girl," Kaito cautioned, and she jumped, having forgotten his presence. "Do not think darkly here. It is not safe."
Had it been that obvious? Elise ducked her head and shut off her phone. After a moment, she said, "Kaito? Do you really believe the stories? About the...yurei?"
He was silent for so long she was afraid he'd disappeared, too. "It does not matter what I believe," he replied with a hint of dark humor in his tone. "What do you think?"
"I think...I think I don't want to die with a stranger."
She expected him to respond with how he didn't either, or that it would be better than alone.
Instead, Kaito replied firmly, "You are not dying this night, American girl."
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