Hanabi

Chapter 41: Control

Mami felt like her head was about to explode. Not only her head, but her chest as well. In a way it felt like she was being electrocuted, but at the same time it wasn’t exactly that. Tomomi was holding her and yet she felt distant, like the blonde could only have a faint perception of her touch. That was a whole new level of pain, scorching through her brain like a knife ablaze and leaving her completely defenseless. She could barely move, the feeling of pain increasing with every tiny little movement she made.

She had thought having an Oni close to her was sickening and painful, but she had never even imagined what would be like to have more than one. It didn’t help that many of those horrible feelings kept hammering into her chest, the grief and the sorrow, the anger, the sense of injustice, everything those people in the city were feeling. Those were still ringing aloud in her ears, slowly driving her mad. It was unbearable. For a moment she even wished the Oni would just get her and suck those feelings away.

But she couldn’t think like that. Thinking like that was the same as accepting to die in their hands.

A bit of her sense of reality came back when she felt a strong impact, but the sounds and sensations from her surroundings were still vague and she didn’t want to open her eyes. It felt like things would only get worse if she opened her eyes.

Haruna cursed and fought to keep control of the vehicle meanwhile, as they had just gotten hit by one of the pitch-black creatures chasing the truck, trying to throw them off the road. She drove as fast as the truck let her, trying not to think about how screwed up things seemed to be in the back seat. She needed to keep her eyes on the road and to come up with some kind of plan and she had to do it fast, and watching Mami like that wasn’t helping.

As they dashed through the road and approached Mount Kurama, Haruna remembered they should stay away from the path to Kurama-dera, because many people would probably be going there as well. She was almost forgetting about that important detail before.

When realizing that the same Oni who hit them before - the bulkier one that reminded her of a huge tiger - was about to jump the truck again, Haruna turned the wheel roughly and they broke into the forest, leaving the deserted road behind. Her eyes met Rina’s for a second, and that was the most dreadful expression that Haruna saw on her face. As the truck bumped while she tried not to hit any of the trees around, Rina clutched Akai against her chest.

Tomomi held Mami so tight that she was digging her nails on the blonde’s back, but she wasn’t really conscious of that. That was the most scared she had ever been. She could see the forest path ahead of them and the group of Oni right behind them, and she wanted to cry not only out of fear but because that reminded her of the nightmares. The only difference was that there was still some daylight passing through the treetops. Whatever happened for the most part of her nightmares, they would always end in a dark forest. They would always end with her using the last bits of strength in her body to take Mami away from them, to run and save her no matter the cost. But she always failed. The nightmares would end with Mami’s screams every single time, with a darkness that she couldn’t see through, with Haruna and Rina nowhere to be seen and bright red eyes staring into her soul.

Because of those nightmares she hated the day when Sojobou told her she could be an itako. She would prefer if he never said anything. If she really had talent for that, if her dreams really meant more than she always thought they did, then that meant she could’ve been seeing the end of their struggles this whole time. She didn’t want to believe it because it wasn’t fair, but at the same time she couldn’t drive away that feeling. No matter what they did in real life, her nightmares would always have the same ending and now that felt scarier than ever.