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[ Grief ]
Hideki never knew his father for long, and now he never will.
[ Grief / Guilt ]
[ Longing / Sorrow ]
The final nail in the coffin- pun not intended. The last thing holding the family together before it fell apart- the kingpin, the domino that started the fall. How could he ever hate him? How could Masao do anything but long for Katsu to be alive again? To hug him, tell him it'll be okay, to tell him he's enough? God, all he ever wanted was to be enough.
[ Grief / Guilt ]
Katsu tried his hardest to make sure Masao was okay while everything crumbled, but it inevitably came to an end. He loved him- he loved all of his children, dearly, and if he could, he'd tell all of them he loves them. That it's not their fault.
But the dead do not speak.
[ Confusion / Conflicted ]
Hideki loves his mother- he always did, but now he can't help feel alienated. She's not the same Ami that he once knew. So badly he wants to disregard everything if only for a moment, if only to receive her comfort after so long, but he couldn't just.. forget. How could she let grief consume the entire family the way it did? But, at the same time, he knows he's a hypocrite for thinking such a thing.
Or maybe, he thinks, it really was his own fault in the end.
[ Familial Love / Regret ]
She loves him. But that's just the problem, isn't it? She loved him more than she cared about her family- all of them. Everything that's happened.. Riko, Masao, the.. the thing that now lives in her home in replacement of the alleged 'favorite son'- she caused it. Does she deserve to love him like a mother when he's returned? How can she still love him like her only son when that fact alone is the reason her family is in shambles?
[ Familial Love / Regret ]
How could she let this happen, indeed? How could she drop everything- everyone- for only one? How could she let her children.. deteriorate like this? Decay before her own unseeing eyes? Should she apologize? Would it do.. anything? Could she even begin to apologize for everything she's done? The misery she's caused? How.. how could she ever, ever being to even fathom what she's done to them?
[ Guilt / Frustration ]
' How could you just let this happen? ' is what Mai wants to say- they don't even know the extent of what happened, and they just feel so frustrated. How come they were left the short end of the stick? Why did everything have to fall apart just like that? Why can't they even feel justified in their own anger?
Mai isn't sure how to feel anymore.
[ Despair ]
He wants to talk to them again. He wants to read to them like they used to, to sit up in bed telling them stories about the nightlights, playing in the yard. Everything they should've had, everything Hideki took from them, everything Ami stole from them- everything he deprived them of. But was it better to abandon them and let them grow by themselves, or hold them dear, shelter them so gently, and then let them feel that freefall and impalement of the realization that you're not what you should've been? Who you should've been?.. He doesn't know. He was too young to know. He shouldn't have had to have known, not then.
[ Guilt / Grief ]
Mai hasn't spoken to their brother in a while. They wish they had the courage to even knock on his door, but they know it won't change anything. They don't think anything could reverse this mess.
.. They wish it was possible, though. They miss their brother.
[ Grief / Guilt ]
Katsu did not live to see the full extent of the damage done to his family- the stress became too much, and a simple fall became an abrupt end. His remaining years were filled with the grief of losing a child, as the supports of everything they built up had begun to crumble.
Maybe, if he was still there, things could have been different. But now, he is only an echo of the past- a ghost unable to be forgotten.
[ Regret ]
Was it the death of her husband that truly sent her into a tailspin? The loss of that pillar of strength, the thing that kept her going, the person she shared every worry, every tear, every lament with? What would things be like if he'd survived?.. It's a fantasy. The dead don't speak, the graves don't comfort, and the phantoms in her house are far from supernatural.
[ Guilt ]
Katsu didn't even get to see his baby Mai grow up- if he could say something now, it would be full of regret. He tried his best, he did, but all it's left is mourning.
[ Grief ]
Mai can hardly remember Katsu anymore, but with how much they resemble him, they feel even more like a ghost; an echo of the past. An echo of what could've been.
[ Confusion / Guilt ]
Hideki hardly knew his little sister, really- he had gone missing when they were only 2 years old. He feels guilty for not being there for them while they grew up- for not being there for everyone in that house.
But, he wonders, what good will lamenting about it do?
[ Frustration / Guilt ]
Mai never met their other older brother- only knowing him at an age too young to remember now. Being left to grow up with a broken family, they wonder if it was somehow their own fault that Hideki went missing. They feel frustrated, too; why did he have to cause their family to be like this?
But they know it wasn't his fault- but they don't have a way to cope with their own frustration.
[ Confusion / Grief ]
" .. What *happened* to you? "
Hideki isn't really sure what happened after that day- he never saw his family again. And now, returning, he can't help but be confused. Part of him wants to mourn the loss of the family he knew as a kid, but the other part feels distraught that there's almost nothing he can do anymore.
He wonders if things could've been better, in a different universe.
[ Spite, Sorrow ]
When there's nothing left a child can do to explain something away, someone has to take the blame. And it fell on the only person no longer there- the perceived cause of the disappearance of his mother's love, the loss of stability. He hates him, he hates him so much that the rage can barely be contained- released in senseless bouts of violence. And yet... he's his brother. His little brother who he loved so dearly, so deeply- the reason for where he stands now. How.. how could he ever hate him like he says he does? How could he betray him like this?.. What has he done to himself in so much isolation?
You have nothing to thank me for. It's what anyone should do, but I'm glad it was you. <3
[Love]
[ It's Really Fucking Complicated ] [ Come back later to learn this information ]
Youse is one nosy mothafucker, y'know dat? Hows 'bout you go sit on it n' spin, then I'll tell you 'bout my family life.
[ Cares about ]
You could've turned out so much better if I had just tried a little bit harder to keep you away from them..
[ Familial Love ]
Me too, squirt.. we should really get together again. Just to talk. That'd be nice, wouldn't it?.. like how we all used to.
[ Like ]
Othana is okay with their presence. It's nice.
" ..want me to catch the fungi thieves? "