Fate/Stay Night Fan Fiction ❯ Escaping Fate ❯ Star of Darkness ( Chapter 14 )
[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]
By: Zekk_Skywalk 
Interlude.
Anime/Manga: Fate/Stay Night Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Supernatural / Horror / Fantasy / Hentai / Drama / Action | Type: Continuation | Uploaded On: 09.29.2011 | Pages: 1 | Words: 1.4K | Visits: 255 | Status: Completed
Interlude.
Anime/Manga: Fate/Stay Night Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Supernatural / Horror / Fantasy / Hentai / Drama / Action | Type: Continuation | Uploaded On: 09.29.2011 | Pages: 1 | Words: 1.4K | Visits: 255 | Status: Completed
AN: Oh god now I feel like I have to hurry and get this out faster. Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu~~
Continuing with pun names, Takumi’s surname Hoshino is “star field.”
Escaping Fate
Interlude 10-1
Star of Darkness
Takumi Hoshino* could not quite put it to words, but something had changed.
Of course, he had been waiting for change to occur for a while now. Back when Matou-san had introduced him to Yumi, Takumi had been able to tell the difference in the girl. She was fragile and wounded in a way that only stemmed from intense pain and trauma, both physical and mental. Takumi thought, after seeing the way Yumi had glanced about the school and fifty emotions seemed to vie for dominance, he had known that even without the introduction, he would have gravitated in her direction.**
The same way he had to Matou-san.
It was something he never voiced to her in any fashion, but watched carefully. It had nothing to do with romantic yearning, as many in the Archery Club thought whenever they had caught him staring at Matou-san. It was more…concern for her wellbeing. Because everything about her screamed that she seemed to hate the world in almost Biblical fashion, yet kept a tether on sanity only due to the genuine smiles of those around her.
So Takumi had smiled at her whenever he could.
For the most part, it was a useless thing. His grandmother had once told him his family had ancestors that were renowned for exorcising demons, surpassing even the monks of the land at detecting their presence amidst the people. Takumi figured whatever feeling he had of people and their ills was just some far-removed sense like that, no more than some recessive blue eyed gene.
Whatever the case, he was sadly aware of how broken Matou-san was.
To him, it was like a flickering star. The light was barely perceptible and easily mixed up amidst the thousands of other lights in the night sky, just like the feelings and emotions of people at school blurred into one another. If he concentrated hard enough, he could see it, and notice how unlike the healthy lights surrounding it that single star was. If he concentrated hard enough, he could see how Matou-san flinched ever-so-slightly at unexpected intrusions into her personal space, or how she kept most boys at an arm’s length. It was not difficult to add the pieces together and understand that some kind of abuse was or had been a part of her life.
Yumi was like that too, though in a different way. She mainly set up a sense of distance in herself, like viewing oneself from the outside objectively. Takumi noticed how she never seemed pleased at positive things that happened to her—good grades, teacher praise, laughter on the occasion she made a joke or witty comment—nor upset at bad things—like the passive-aggressive vibe from some of her female classmates. It was more like she took pleasure or took pain from the experience of seeing these things play out and being around them, not the action itself.
It bizarrely reminded Takumi of his grandfather, how the old man would watch his grandchildren play during a festival or get in trouble with their parents, likely thinking something along the lines of, “Ah, those were the days.”
That, though, confused him. If Yumi was akin to an old person looking back on life, he wasn’t sure what could have happened to bring that on.
As Wednesday lunch rolled around, Takumi split from his regular clique of friends and headed to the first year classes***.
“I know you feel sorry for ‘er, but man, isn’t she a little, I dunno, weird-looking?” Kozuki said. “She looks like she needs more sun.”
Takumi grinned back at him. “I guess I could take her out on a date, and then she’d get plenty of sun.”
Kozuki gaped at his forward statement and Takumi laughed, taking the stairs before his friend made a comeback.
1-A was right next to the stairs, so Takumi only had to round the corner once on the first-year floor. When he entered, however, he immediately froze to take in the picture presented before him.
Yumi stood at her desk, though she had turned in place and had her hands on the desk behind her. In the corner beyond were three girls that Takumi did not know, huddled together in abject terror.
Glancing about, Takumi found those still in the classroom also frozen in place. “Everyone out. Someone get a sensei,” he said, jabbing the nearest one in the shoulder to pull them out of their daze.
Some people in the room complied, while others continued to watch. Takumi cautiously made his way over to the corner of the room and his eye caught sight of what seemed to have the girls’ attention.
Yumi’s right arm was purple.
It was not the kind of purple from being bruised. It looked bizarre, like a malformed mole, only it covered a good portion of her forearm. Takumi looked to her other arm, but it as always sported the rather odd red bandage Yumi regularly wore, covering the portion of her left that would correspond to her right.
“Get her away from me,” one of the girls pleaded.
Takumi reached out to put his hand on Yumi’s shoulder. “Emiya-san, maybe we—”
Yumi’s right arm came up, and moved.
What moved, Takumi could not explain. It was like a giant panther leapt from Yumi’s arm and charged headlong into the girls clustered together. All three shrieked at the visage, black and nightmarish, before it collided into them like a bowling ball into pins. The three girls collapsed, and the black creature swerved around to do the same to him.
Takumi charged right into Yumi, a full body-check that crashed them both into the wall, then into a sprawled mess between desks. He thought maybe he heard bells ringing in his ears, but didn’t know if that was just the shouts and screams coming from those that had remained in the classroom.
Grabbing his head to try and control the throbbing, he first looked to Yumi, who now appeared out cold. Quickly, he glanced over his shoulder, but found no sight of the dark thing that had come out to play.
What the hell was that?
**It’s regularly suggested in the Nasuverse that weirdness attracts weirdness. This is implied in Tsukihime, where Arihiko is friends with Shiki because they both have become much more aware of death in a way the average person does not, while in FSN Masters often seem to summon Servants that have similar issues or warped personalities, and is even a fairly major plot point in Kara no Kyoukai by the wraith spirit that attacks Shiki in the hospital. Takumi is meant to be a stand in for an Arihiko character in that way and is not meant to be a magician or anything else like that, just someone with “normal” experiences that lend to understanding others that have supernatural-badness follow them around.
***…I should have just been funny and named him Koyomi Araragi (sorry, I stuttered) or Touma Kamijou (with this right hand…) what with the nice-guy thing. Actually, I think it’d be pretty funny if Shirou, Koyomi, and Touma teamed up and saved the world one girl at a time. Team Martyr-Without-A-Cause!
Converting /tmp/phpOMxlCI to /dev/stdout
Continuing with pun names, Takumi’s surname Hoshino is “star field.”
Escaping Fate
Interlude 10-1
Star of Darkness
Takumi Hoshino* could not quite put it to words, but something had changed.
Of course, he had been waiting for change to occur for a while now. Back when Matou-san had introduced him to Yumi, Takumi had been able to tell the difference in the girl. She was fragile and wounded in a way that only stemmed from intense pain and trauma, both physical and mental. Takumi thought, after seeing the way Yumi had glanced about the school and fifty emotions seemed to vie for dominance, he had known that even without the introduction, he would have gravitated in her direction.**
The same way he had to Matou-san.
It was something he never voiced to her in any fashion, but watched carefully. It had nothing to do with romantic yearning, as many in the Archery Club thought whenever they had caught him staring at Matou-san. It was more…concern for her wellbeing. Because everything about her screamed that she seemed to hate the world in almost Biblical fashion, yet kept a tether on sanity only due to the genuine smiles of those around her.
So Takumi had smiled at her whenever he could.
For the most part, it was a useless thing. His grandmother had once told him his family had ancestors that were renowned for exorcising demons, surpassing even the monks of the land at detecting their presence amidst the people. Takumi figured whatever feeling he had of people and their ills was just some far-removed sense like that, no more than some recessive blue eyed gene.
Whatever the case, he was sadly aware of how broken Matou-san was.
To him, it was like a flickering star. The light was barely perceptible and easily mixed up amidst the thousands of other lights in the night sky, just like the feelings and emotions of people at school blurred into one another. If he concentrated hard enough, he could see it, and notice how unlike the healthy lights surrounding it that single star was. If he concentrated hard enough, he could see how Matou-san flinched ever-so-slightly at unexpected intrusions into her personal space, or how she kept most boys at an arm’s length. It was not difficult to add the pieces together and understand that some kind of abuse was or had been a part of her life.
Yumi was like that too, though in a different way. She mainly set up a sense of distance in herself, like viewing oneself from the outside objectively. Takumi noticed how she never seemed pleased at positive things that happened to her—good grades, teacher praise, laughter on the occasion she made a joke or witty comment—nor upset at bad things—like the passive-aggressive vibe from some of her female classmates. It was more like she took pleasure or took pain from the experience of seeing these things play out and being around them, not the action itself.
It bizarrely reminded Takumi of his grandfather, how the old man would watch his grandchildren play during a festival or get in trouble with their parents, likely thinking something along the lines of, “Ah, those were the days.”
That, though, confused him. If Yumi was akin to an old person looking back on life, he wasn’t sure what could have happened to bring that on.
As Wednesday lunch rolled around, Takumi split from his regular clique of friends and headed to the first year classes***.
“I know you feel sorry for ‘er, but man, isn’t she a little, I dunno, weird-looking?” Kozuki said. “She looks like she needs more sun.”
Takumi grinned back at him. “I guess I could take her out on a date, and then she’d get plenty of sun.”
Kozuki gaped at his forward statement and Takumi laughed, taking the stairs before his friend made a comeback.
1-A was right next to the stairs, so Takumi only had to round the corner once on the first-year floor. When he entered, however, he immediately froze to take in the picture presented before him.
Yumi stood at her desk, though she had turned in place and had her hands on the desk behind her. In the corner beyond were three girls that Takumi did not know, huddled together in abject terror.
Glancing about, Takumi found those still in the classroom also frozen in place. “Everyone out. Someone get a sensei,” he said, jabbing the nearest one in the shoulder to pull them out of their daze.
Some people in the room complied, while others continued to watch. Takumi cautiously made his way over to the corner of the room and his eye caught sight of what seemed to have the girls’ attention.
Yumi’s right arm was purple.
It was not the kind of purple from being bruised. It looked bizarre, like a malformed mole, only it covered a good portion of her forearm. Takumi looked to her other arm, but it as always sported the rather odd red bandage Yumi regularly wore, covering the portion of her left that would correspond to her right.
“Get her away from me,” one of the girls pleaded.
Takumi reached out to put his hand on Yumi’s shoulder. “Emiya-san, maybe we—”
Yumi’s right arm came up, and moved.
What moved, Takumi could not explain. It was like a giant panther leapt from Yumi’s arm and charged headlong into the girls clustered together. All three shrieked at the visage, black and nightmarish, before it collided into them like a bowling ball into pins. The three girls collapsed, and the black creature swerved around to do the same to him.
Takumi charged right into Yumi, a full body-check that crashed them both into the wall, then into a sprawled mess between desks. He thought maybe he heard bells ringing in his ears, but didn’t know if that was just the shouts and screams coming from those that had remained in the classroom.
Grabbing his head to try and control the throbbing, he first looked to Yumi, who now appeared out cold. Quickly, he glanced over his shoulder, but found no sight of the dark thing that had come out to play.
What the hell was that?
Escaping Fate, Interlude, Out
*I swear, this is the only chapter that will feature this OC. I just needed an outside perspective for this.**It’s regularly suggested in the Nasuverse that weirdness attracts weirdness. This is implied in Tsukihime, where Arihiko is friends with Shiki because they both have become much more aware of death in a way the average person does not, while in FSN Masters often seem to summon Servants that have similar issues or warped personalities, and is even a fairly major plot point in Kara no Kyoukai by the wraith spirit that attacks Shiki in the hospital. Takumi is meant to be a stand in for an Arihiko character in that way and is not meant to be a magician or anything else like that, just someone with “normal” experiences that lend to understanding others that have supernatural-badness follow them around.
***…I should have just been funny and named him Koyomi Araragi (sorry, I stuttered) or Touma Kamijou (with this right hand…) what with the nice-guy thing. Actually, I think it’d be pretty funny if Shirou, Koyomi, and Touma teamed up and saved the world one girl at a time. Team Martyr-Without-A-Cause!
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