SIRENSPULL - contact.

[reassures]

[Cue mechanical answering machine voice.]

"You have dialed the number for N-I-L-L. This person is unavailable. Please leave a message after the beep."

[...BEEP]

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[reassures]

[She's trying so hard to keep everything in her head, but it's like trying to hold water in your palms. It keeps dripping out through the cracks, little bits at a time.

The memory is rather simple this time; Nill is just staring at down at her NV, apparently having a conversation. For all of her typed messages, Shika's voice replies.

...You really like him?

Without missing a beat, "Yeah, I do."

But he's-- Souji.

"He's a good person, Nill," and it sounds like Shika believes that.

Something in her surroundings goes a little gray, like there's a little less happiness in the world. He still took Yosuke away.

"Yosuke took himself away."

He did. But if it weren't for him, maybe he wouldn't have.

"That's not something Souji had any say in." He really is trying to convince her, but angry bile and sadness rises in Nill's chest, making her heart ache.

He could have let us keep him. He could have told him to stay. Her vision is slightly fogged over now, growing teary-eyed. We loved him more.

"And Yosuke didn't love us. Nothing Souji could say would ever change that."

A few seconds go by before Nill manages a response, and Yosuke should be able to feel the tears on her cheeks, since he's watching from her view.

It's not fair.

And that memory, too, fades out, pulled back and far away from Yosuke.]

[inthejunk]

[That definitely smarts to watch. Yosuke tips out of his worried crouch onto his hands and knees, palms slapping the floor at the impact. It's not news, to him. He knows the Yosuke that came before didn't treat them well. Shika had told him that much one night, when he'd worked up the nerve to ask.]

[What's worse is that he knows he shouldn't care the way he does, either. And they shouldn't return any of it. He cheated, plain and simple. Both times. Both versions of him. It's probably worse this time. Worse because he's even clinging with everything in him to them, preying on remembered love, trying to squeeze in and fill the hole that he left behind. It's reprehensible, but that's beside the point. He's just happy that it worked.]

[He couldn't leave Nill when she needs someone if he tried. Maybe he did before, but that was a Yosuke who had friends. A Yosuke who had the upper hand. Not like him. He's on his knees. Nill may want him to leave, but he's not going anywhere.]

It's okay. You...you can say it. Whatever it is. Just don't hurt yourself. Try to calm down, alright? I'm still here, okay? I-it's fine.

[reassures]

[Nill doesn't even try to reply, she's still trying to keep things in place, but she shifts her hands to hold the water a little more securely, and more of it drips onto the ground of Yosuke's mind.

Nill's walking down the street, groceries her main concern for the moment, but worry for her senpai who always walked her to school lingered in her thoughts. Sick? Hurt? She had no idea. But almost on cue, a familiar voices calls to her, and she turns to see Yosuke there. His smile comes naturally, the kind a good senpai would wear. But his arm is bleeding, and he'd been waving it at her.

"Hi, Nill. I have a question for you, is that okay?" He sounds amused, but angry, too. He doesn't give Nill a chance to reply before he grabs her arm and starts pulling her into a nearby alley. "It's real important, Nill."

Nill mostly just looks worried, following behind Yosuke as she tries to gesture towards his injury. "You're hurt! You should go get looked at." Though it's not like he could hear her back then. She spoke mostly in gestures in her younger days, and she continues to do so when they're in the alley, not finding the situation strange at all. Just worried.

She reaches to take his hand, but he slaps it away. The way Yosuke looks at his bleeding hand, he's pretty clearly unstable.

"Like I said, it's pretty important. But you're worried about me being hurt, huh?" Yosuke tilts his head. "That's such bullshit." A knife appears from up his sleeve, and he swings it at Nill's face, forcing her back against the wall of the alley. Her eyes go wide, confusion and worry the only thing on her mind.

"You apologized before for not being at the hospital, right? He said you shouldn't have been sorry, but that's a lie. He wanted more people there so that he could feel sorry for himself. So that people would pity him."

"I think it's worse that you pitied him. That's not real friendship, you know." Everything is coming out of his mouth fast and angry, like he can't keep any of it down. An involuntary reaction. "That's right. He just wanted to be the hero. Wanted to protect you."

"That's not good, is it? Lying like that so that you'll like him." He laughs, and points the knife at her face. "Man, I keep forgetting to ask my questions. I just talk so much because I haven't been able to."

"So, Nill, do you think you should like someone like that? Someone who was just manipulating your emotions so that you'd like him?"

It's a little obvious that Nill doesn't really understand what's going on; she thought very highly of Yosuke, and she doesn't get what this is about, or why he's upset.

Nill lifts her hands, and reaches out for Yosuke, but all of a sudden his free hand grabs her chin roughly. "Look, it's a really simple yes or no question. Do you think you could like someone like that? I mean, you don't like me now, do you?"

"It doesn't matter if I am the one here now, does it? People are just going to think that I'm Yosuke." The knife is stabbed into the wall, just near her wing, and Nill jumps. "You can't even answer me with a simple head shake if you think I'm real, can you?"

"I have to ask everyone, you see. I don't want to -- I think it would be easier to just get rid of you all, but... I can't. You see, Yosuke couldn't stand the thought of being all alone. Of being hated." He leans down, resting his chin on top of Nill's head. "But I don't care what he thinks anymore."

"It's such shit, Nill. It's really unfair."

"Just shake or nod your head -- do you believe I'm Yosuke?"

Nill, having caught on to the situation, steels herself for his next poor reaction, and she nods her head. Yes. Yes, he was Yosuke. Even if he wasn't acting right.

"No. I'm not."

He tosses his knife into the air, and does a trick that makes Nill press further into the wall to avoid being hit. He grins. "Neat, huh?"

Yosuke smiled, and then without hesitating for even a little bit he rammed the knife through one of her wings, lodging it in the wall behind Nill. He looks like a kid with a magnifying glass, and all Nill can do is stare at him as her body starts to tremble.

Why?

"I'm not him." He flicks the knife with a finger, watching the look of pain on Nill's face. "Got it?"

Still, Nill reaches for him, trying to grab his hands, this isn't right and she doesn't want to fight and god that hurts but it was okay, he was just mad, she didn't care--

"You better run."

And out of nowhere, a Jiraiya made out of what seems to be blood appears behind Yosuke, slamming it's arm into Nill's side with a sickening crunch (Yosuke should feel that, too, a sharp white hot pain in his ribs) and sending her flying like a ragdoll out into the street they'd been on a moment before. The memory ends when Nill passes out.]

[underachiever]

[...which is about a second before Shikamaru bursts into the room. He'd heard Nill's telepathic cries of distress from damn near halfway across the city, but he hadn't imagined it would be Yosuke he'd find there with her. He'd even been halfway to preparing a genjutsu.

But Yosuke's not harming her, he can tell that. Shikamaru releases the chakra he'd gathered for his attack, taking in the sight. He can guess what's happened. It's not the first time, exactly.

Shikamaru isn't as battered-looking as Nill is. He has the benefit of accelerated recovery and the medicines of his home. But he's still moving a bit stiffly as he steps forward and kneels down to examine Nill. He doesn't say anything yet, not out loud. But his thoughts are all concerns for her well-being - psychic and otherwise.]

[inthejunk]

[Yosuke groans quietly from where he is, pained and miserable and concerned. He scrambles backwards at Shika's approach, not wanting to fight. He can't even grasp what he sees in his head. The pain is physical somehow, but it's so much worse than that. The room spins a bit, either from Nill and her inner screaming or from the sucker punch to the gut those memories -holy shit, that's what they were isn't it? Memories oh shit- Oh, shit.]

[He doesn't know how his back got pressed to the wall, or how his hand got pressed to his mouth, but Nill is far away suddenly. He can't decide if he's making it better or worse, but he's trying too hard to keep his own rising panic down. Shadow or not, that was...true. Even now, it's true. Yosuke closes his eyes, trying not to move or breathe until he can-until he can just think. Nill needs them not to panic. He makes a quiet, nauseated sound in the back of his throat, but he crawls closer again, ready to help.]

She's thinking-remembering-about him. I mean me. Him. The-his shadow. He...shit.

[reassures]

[Nill lets out a shuddering sob when the memory ends. She's about to start calling for Shika again, maybe he couldn't hear her, maybe he was too far away, maybe he wouldn't come-- but as soon as she thinks that she can hear properly, and it's obviously not Yosuke that she's hearing, he'd be too distracted. Nill lifts her head, fingers uncurling slightly from her scalp. Her cheeks are covered in tear tracks, and they have yet to stop.]

I'm sorry I tried but it didn't help nothing helped I made it worse I'm sorry

[She hiccups miserably, and it's only because she's trying to talk to Shika that she isn't showing anything she shouldn't. Lines of text are probably floating in the background with the new introduction of Shika to the mix, what little that's being shown takes a turn; bits and pieces of hard to decipher text, obviously from a conversation between him and Nill. They should both be experiencing that, and Yosuke can probably hear her as Nill talks to Shika, too.]

I wanted him to be safe and happy but I messed up and now he's scared and miserable and it was all for nothing no matter what I try nothing is ever okay

[Nill's fingers curl in her hair again, but the multitasking with her head makes her seem only half there or so physically. Despite that, she reaches a hand out towards Shika, though she doesn't grab him. He has to leave, right? Right.]

Everything is full of this terrible blackness and it won't let us out anymore and it's going to get him too

[And as she says that, words appear as if on a screen. Just the slightest snippet of a conversation.

"it'll be over for us too

eventually

soon maybe"

I know.]

Please I don't want to hurt him