Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Being in a new place has surprises for Sunny. Especially since he and his mother moved into the big cities, even the air's weight felt different in his lungs in the city in comparison to Faraway's. It's already been months since he'd moved, but there was a new surprise for him in every corner.

His mother has been giving him her best attempts at subtle glances for him to take a bath. He knows she wouldn't outright say it since she wants him to get better at his own pace, and as much as he really wasn't feeling like it, even he's started to stink to himself.

He was planning on taking a bath tomorrow. Due to him heading to visit his friends in Faraway. But he supposes he'll just take one today and just take a quick shower tomorrow.

So, Sunny reluctantly leaves his ever soft bed as his socked feet shook off the covers wrapped around his ankle, as if it were begging him not to leave. Sunny frowns, he didn't want to either, but it was for the best.

Closet just by the side of his bed, Sunny pulls the wooden doors of the closet open.

..Did his mom put a mirror in here?

Sunny blinks, squinting for a moment, and realization dawns him when he notices that the figure's eyes don't follow his movement, skin borderline porcelain. He quickly staggers back and reaches for his violin behind him, only for his thin fingers to grab at air. Shoot, he left his violin downstairs. His only option now is to keep his eyes on the figure, making sure to focus on the person(?) before him.

Omori sits leaning his back against one side of the closet as the other had his black socked feet pressed on the wood, his arms are curled around his knees and Sunny can see the faint shine of his knife in his hand.

"Hi," Omori simply greets.

The older only slightly dropped his guard, sensing no maliciousness from Omori—but you can never be too sure!

Sunny blinks again, making sure he wasn't seeing things again (he thought he'd gotten atleast a tiny bit better now!). "What—how are you here?"

The shorter shrugs. "I don't really know, I just sort of..got here?"

It sounds sincere, it sounds genuine. Sunny believes him because Omori is a part of him, it was useless to try and lie to eachother when they were..sort of eachother.

Okay. "How long have you been here? Out of...Headspace, I mean."

Maybe he should be a bit more surprised. Omori lived in his head, after all. But in all honesty, Sunny has been through way weirder shit to make a fit about it. It's still shocking, though!

Omori suddenly wrinkles his nose a bit, making a vague gesture of whooshing away the air with his free hand. "You reek."

Sunny was lightly offended. "You don't exactly smell lovely, either. In fact," Sunny neared the shorter, his usually plain expression slightly crinkling."You smell worse."

"Nobody smells in Headspace." Except, of course, Sweetheart, she practically doused herself head first into a swimming pool filled with too-strong strawberry floral scent.

"Well, you're not in Headspace; we're taking a bath."

Omori could answer his questions later because Sunny can't multitask to save his pathetic little life, all he has on his mind as an objective is to take a bath; every other problem could wait after atleast an hour of soaking in the tub. Including Omori coming to life in the real world.

The taller gestures for Omori to leave his closet, the latter hopping onto his feet and standing behind Sunny, patiently waiting for him to pick out something to wear for them both.

Omori rolls on the balls on his feet when Sunny faced him, presenting him with a simple gray hoodie and some shorts. He grabs the offerings, aligning the hoodie onto his frame. Sunny was already small, his self-neglect in the past 4 years wasn't any help, so the hoodie was only a size or 2 bigger than him.

"Shortest one I could find. Had to give away most of my old clothing so there'll be less stuff to bring for moving."

"It's fine, thank you."

There wasn't anything embarrassing about being in the bath together, they had the same body and the same face (and the same person?) But for some reason, Omori seemed hesitant.

Sunny stares at him. The bathtub is a bit small, nothing to be afraid of drowning for, but.. "I thought I was over drowning, are you not?"

The other slowly shook his head, dark eyes watching the water ripple around Sunny's knees when he fidgeted. "No, I wasn't made to fear. I wasn't created to have emotions other than in battle. It's just..."

Omori plays with his fingers, the words dying in his throat so he opts to just close his mouth shut.

Omori was created when Headspace was too. He knew his purpose, what he was supposed to do, and how to do it. He was made simply to host the DREAMER; whatever he wanted him to feel and do, he did so without question. So what is this? His stomach felt a little heavier, throat a bit tighter—

Oh, he's nervous. As much as he didn't want to admit it, it made sense, he had his own body now. Even if Omori's been with Sunny for the past 4 years, it's not as if he was feeling the things the latter did in the real world.

Omori knows, it'd definetely be no different from what he experienced in Headspace, since what was in there was based around the real world. The taste of lemon drops on his tongue would be the same, the feeling of Mewo's soft fur between the gaps of his fingers would be the same.

But something about experiencing it in Sunny's reality made it different.

He supposed he can't really call it Sunny's anymore, it was his reality now as well.

And so, Omori holds his breath and sinks into the water on the other end of the tub.

It's cramped, he doesn't mind.

Omori felt like as if he were experiencing it all over again for the first time. Somehow, the water feels a bit warmer. The tiny waves lapping at his goosebump riddled skin causing his bones to ache pleasantly.

He sighs, hugging his knees into his chest. It felt good.

Sunny stares, letting him have a few more moments to himself before grabbing the showerhead and shooting tiny continuous pellets of water at the top of Omori's head.

He jumped a bit, his palm lightly pawing away the showerhead in Sunny's hand. Attempting to keep a straight laced face, Omori says "cold."

"Sorry." Sunny quickly gave the knob a few twists until Omori gave him a satisfactory nod: the water was just right.

Oh, he almost forgot. "How long have you been here?" Sunny repeats his question from earlier.

Omori pressed his lips in a thin line, thinking over his answer as Sunny turned him around and poured shampoo onto his head, fingers lightly digging into his skull to clean out whatever had gotten into Omori's hair (dirt, tiny leaves..fur?) "Might be around 3 days."

"3 days?" Sunny repeats, shocked. How did he not notice that? Did he even eat?

"Yes." Omori nods, and seemingly reading his mind, he says "I ate the leftovers and slept in the closet."

So that's what Sunny's mother meant when she said she was proud of him for growing used to eating bigger portions and getting second servings again. Sunny thought his mother had eaten the leftovers and forgotten, she was getting quite old after all, and only thanked her in response. Didn't want to kill her good mood—wait, did he just say he slept in his closet this whole time? Creepy...Sunny was going to make sure to air it out later.

Sunny backs away from the other, now paying attention on cleaning himself as he handed Omori a bar of soap and a scrub. "Why didn't you just tell me you were here?"

Omori answers with a simple shrug. Sunny remembers that he's 12, he probably just had no reason to do so and just felt like it.

He made him feel so old. Sunny is 16. Screw this guy.

Sunny squints his single eye (his other kept tightly closed due to him not wanting to soak his eyepatch. Are waterproof eyepatches a thing?) at Omori. "How do you plan to hide from mom?"

"I don't, it'll be useless to even attempt that. So, I'm-"

"Hoping for the best?"

"-relying on luck. Yes."

Omori caught something shimmering from the corner of his eye from the side of the tub in a lone corner, he scoops it up into his palms, peering at the thing colored in a sweet pastel pink. It smelled of sweets that it caused a small pang of hunger to stir in his stomach. It had a small crack on it, if Omori squinted his eyes, he could see the faintest sparkling. Perhaps that's where the shimmering had come from? He wants to know.

Instinct fueling him, Omori opens his mouth in a wide 'O' and slowly brings it closer between his teeth.

Until he felt Sunny's hand rest on his shoulder, causing him to drop the ball into the water in surprise, a plop noise going unheard as he hurriedly gave Sunny the bar of soap.

"Ah, I meant for the scrub-what's that?"

Omori turns to look. To his horror, something was frizzling pink into the clear soapy water. He slowly slides away from the infection, grabbing the sides of the tub. Man, he knew he shouldn't have left his knife!

"Mom's bath bomb," Sunny answers for himself, scooping up some of the leftover white and pink foam. Before returning it back to frizzle itself into non-existence on the water.

Oh, wait, nevermind. Right, he wasn't in Headspace. Omori thought it was another one of Headspace Mari's experimentations she often subjected her little brother into trying out for her. 8/10 times it somehow blew up, Mari was proud.

Omori returns to his spot, watching the pinks and white in the water swirl into spirals around his fingers.

"You're going to Faraway tomorrow; I assume I'll be joining you."

"Not like I can leave you here anyway. We'll just have to inform Mom."

Omori quietly hums, sinking into the pink and inhaling the sweet scent until he could practically taste it on the roof of his tongue. He scoops up some of the pastel, draining it between his fingers, only to find dark pink glitter sparkles on his palms. So that's what the shiny was inside. Pretty.

The 2 soak in the tub until Sunny almost fell asleep. It was a challenge attempting to get Omori out of the tub, it was even more of a challenge trying to water down the glitter that stuck onto their bodies. Seriously, who decided to make these things!? He'll be sure to warn his mother about buying ones with glitter in them when she got home, he and Omori had to take 6 extra showers just to feel comfortable again.

"Hungry," Omori informs him, pink glitter still shining in his dark hair when he turned his head just so. He's putting on an old pair of the same knee-high socks he found rummaging through Sunny's closet when the latter went to put their clothes into the washing machine.

He was quite hungry as well, stomach churning just enough for him to ignore. But Sunny promised his therapist he'd try to not neglect himself for his own sake, so he sighs and uses what little cooking skills he learnt from Hero and his mother and makes some simple fried rice with chopped up bits of meat from the leftovers he found in the back of the fridge.

Omori takes a bite, the same neutral expression plastered onto his face, but there was a light shine in his dark eyes that made Sunny feel a little proud (but then again, they were the same person. Sunny liked fried rice, and so would Omori).

"Blehh," the younger says, after finishing up a whole 3rd serving. Uh huh, sure.

"Why aren't you sleeping?" Sunny asks, tucked into bed as his eyes followed Omori pacing around the room and picking at old trinkets he still kept around, before ultimately deciding to sit on the floorboards and dig his socked toes into the rug.

"Don't need to,"

"But you can,"

"Don't want to,"

What is this? Sunny was pretty sure he didn't act that bratty as a kid, so where was this attitude coming from? Ah, but, he could never be too sure.

"Just sleep," Sunny says, pinching the bridge of his nose in annoyance. "There's nothing for you to do, anyway."

Omori frowns, but thinks it over and comes to the conclusion that DREAMER may be right. He shuffles back onto his feet and opens the closet, setting a foot to brace himself.

Sunny shakes his head. "Not there," and pats what little space was left in his bed. "Here."

There was a silence, before Omori eventually broke it with a brilliant quote and a roll of his eyes. "..Ughrh."

"I'm not letting you into the closet again." Sunny jabs. "I know there isn't much space but just make do for tonight."

"..Fine." Omori releuctantly shimmies underneath the blanket, already planning to sleep on Sunny's arm for him to get shoulder pains tomorrow.

Despite not wanting to sleep, Omori had dozed off first.

Sunny tries to adjust, but finds that his shoulder was being crushed on by the other. Was this some sort of extra punishment from whatever god was up there?

Chapter Text

Public transportation is a pain in the ass, in Sunny and Omori's honest and correct opinion.

People were always bumping into them, slotting themselves into what little space there. (One of them particularly smells, Sunny making a quiet comment on saying that's what Omori smelt like yesterday, resulting in the latter kicking him in the shin).

Sunny had woken up today expecting his mother yo come home and drive him there as she promised—Him and Omori brainstorming up a fake backstory for the younger to play it safe—but as always, she always found a way to get herself distracted. Sunny already expected it, so he'd taken some extra cash from the little box of money she left for him everyday.

"Can we go home now?" Omori asks, pulling on the fabric of his clothes.

"We're almost there," Sunny reassures for the 58th time since they got onto the bus. Sunny suspected Omori already knew how many times he had asked him, and was simply asking it over and over again like a broken record just to get on his nerves.

Sunny looks out the window, and gasps a bit. Surprisingly, they actually were!

The person next to them left, another one coming up to sit beside Omori, causing the younger to immediately press into Sunny's arm to get more centimeters between him and the stranger.

"Ahh," the woman suddenly piped up, Sunny and Omori jolting at the noise. "You're so pale! And you're so thin!"

Sunny wanted to bang his head into the wall. Literally anything but a stranger who couldn't mind their own business!

Deciding to play it safe, Sunny offered a—what he considered—polite nod. "Thank you for your concern, ma'am."

The woman seemed pleased with his action, making Sunny feel a bit proud of himself for handling such an unexpected social attack. Hopefully, she'd forgotten all about Omo—

"But you, you're way too pale! Do you have a sickness? It's as if you've never went outside in your entire life." She points at the younger, Omori throwing Sunny's arm around his shoulder as the woman started to lean into his space.

Sunny gave a few squeezes to the other's arm, hoping he'll get the message and basically just copy what Sunny had done. But to his demise, Omori just stared at his hand with a slightly raised brow.

"I didn't want to." Omori answers simply. Sunny taking note of the light annoyance in his tone, and kicks the underneath of his seat in frustration.

"That's bad, y'know. Actually, I have a daughter, she's 10 years old and the smartest of her class, who frequently had headaches. Until I pushed her to go outside more did they ever go away. She became more lively and the healing made her make her goal to become a doctor and—"

Sunny and Omori cringed simultaneously. It was sweet how the kid wanted to become a doctor but they really, really didn't want to talk! It's only when Sunny noticed Omori's hand reaching for the zipper on their bags where Sunny hid his knife that he practically scooped him up and their bags.

"Oh, it's our stop..! Nice chat, ma'am. Have a nice day."

Before the other could even respond, the 2 were already stepping outside the vehicle and onto the dirt.

Sunny took in greedy huffs of air as he dropped Omori and their things done, adrenaline pumping in his veins as Omori gave him light pats on the back.

"You..you can't do that. We're not in Headspace."

Omori presses his lips together, before sighing. "..Okay."

Sunny seemed to be frazzled from his attempt, so Omori supposes he shouldn't try that again (maybe).

Omori really didn't like that lady, or any else of the passengers.

"How far from the town?" Omori slings on a rucksack, patting away invisible dust on his shorts.

The older took a quick look around them, hazy memories lighting up at the familiar surroundings. "Pretty close, actually."

"She poked alot about your skin," Sunny notes.

"Should we.." Omori thinks it over, "cover me in spray tan?"

Definetely not. "Waste of money."

The two begin to trek their way to Faraway, hoping to get there before lunch time where Kel planned a lunch at Gino's with their friends. Hopefully, the backstory they made up would work.

Sunny didn't want to lie to his friends again, but like hell they'd believe him if he said Omori was actually from his head.

When Sunny's friends first saw him, Kel practically swung himself at him and attempted to pepper his face in kisses, before eventually being shoved off by Aubrey as the two got into yet another quarrel, an undistracted Hero leading Sunny to their table as he asked him simple questions, and Basil who stares at Sunny with a strange mixture of nervousness and excitement; waiting for everything to calm down a bit more for his turn to chat with the boy.

It was amazing to Omori, how they forgave him, even if some took time longer than the others. Kel was the first to forgive Sunny, he was heartbroken and crying and pathetic, but he was still his friend first and foremost. Aubrey was the second, angry bubbling underneath her skin, forgiving Sunny with a punch in the ribs. Hero took the longest, he was in love with Mari after all. He wonders how it went for Basil since he was the one to stage it as a suicide, but judging from how they joked around with him, Omori thought it wasn't too far-fetched to think they forgave him as well.

There'll always be anger, there'll always be doubt. Omori was surprised that they could even face Sunny and Basil.

The human mind works in strange ways, he supposed.

Just as he was about to hide away into the bathroom, Kel took notice of the other.

"Sunny, that kid kinda looks like you!" Kel points at the younger, Omori stopping in his tracks.

Aubrey hums, eyebrow raising. "Not really 'kinda'..more 'super', actually."

Ah, right. Sunny clears his throat, reciting the fake backstory in his head like a mantra. "That's Omori, my little b-brother."

Omori gave him a look for the stutter, before turning back to the others and offering a little wave.

Kel nearly screamed at the tiny interaction, running up to the smaller (and he meant smaller, Omori was just at his stomach) and picking him up.

"Hey, hey! Don't just pick people up!" Aubrey nags, her comment being ignored by the other boy.

"So, you're Sunny's bro?" Kel begins to lift him up over his head. It was either Omori was extremely light like Sunny or Kel was just super duper strong!! He liked to believe the latter. The action causing Omori to stop his light struggling, taking note of the sudden change of placement, and promptly kicking Kel in the jaw.

"Oh shit! Serves you right!!" Aubrey cackles as Kel rubbed his jaw in pain, Omori falling to the floor in a sitting position, adjusting his socks.

Hero, giving a few pats on his brother's head and checking on him, quickly made his way to Omori and poking his arm, as if he were asking for permission. Omori cautiously held it out for him, the older grabbing on his forearm and inspecting it with interest.

"I'm Hero, though you probably already know that, being Sunny's brother and all." He laughs. "I'm actually studying to be a doctor and I've..never seen skin like yours. Is it alright if I ask about it?"

Man, they should've went with the spray tan idea after all.

Sunny pipes up. "It isn't any condition or anything. Omori just uses alot of—" c'mon, think, think, think! "—whitening soap. He used to live with my aunt and she had a whole lot of them at her place. And he never really went out much since it was always cold at her place."

Omori wanted to shove his face into his hands. That wasn't part of the script!

"Still.. he's so pale, it's almost scary." Hero mumbled. "Where did he live back then?"

Urgh. It seems like he and Omori will have to make quite a few adjustments to the script.

Sunny takes a breath. "...Alaska."

This was the worst.

"Woah, all the way up there!?" Kel jumped back up to his feet, acting as if he wasn't just kicked in the jaw. "Did you see the, uh, the Northern Lights?"

Omori nods his head, deciding to just go with the flow as Hero ushered them back to their seats.

"We've already ordered a huge family set," Hero smiled. "I recently won a sort of cooking competition Kel motivated me to go to, so why not spend it on my friends?"

"Hero's seriously cool, guys!" Kel beamed, expressing how cool his older brother was through vague hand gestures. "He's paying!"

"That's why I'm cool..!?"

Aubrey whistles. "Damn, a competition? Why haven't I heard of this?"

"Mom 'n' Dad have been hogging him lately 'cause of it." Kel leans into his hands supporting his weight on the table. "Leaving me to take care of Sally! I mean, I love her, yeah—but like, it's hard to take care of her on my own."

Kel waves a hand. "But anyyyyywayyyys," he suddenly turned and leaned into Omori's space across the table, the latter automatically moving away into Sunny's. "Look at you! You look way too much like Sunny, you and him are looking like twins! But there are differences, though. Other than what Hero pointed out." Kel gave Omori's left cheek a light pinch, making sure to quickly jerk his hand back before the younger swiped at his hand. "You've still got more baby fat."

"Omori looks like Sunny when he was 12.." Basil comments, a little disturbed. Perhaps the sight of a younger Sunny-looking person brought...certain memories. He'd have to get used to it though, Sunny and Omori were staying over at his place for the whole time they were gonna be in Faraway. Sunny has hope for that.

"No way." Aubrey furrows her eyebrows, a weird constipated look on her face before inhaling heavily and pinching Omori's other cheek. Squishy and soft...!

They could all tell she only said that as an excuse to touch his cheek.

Omori shook his head to get her off, placing both his cheeks in his palms and rubbing them, giving them a slightly annonyed look.

"Would you like anything else, Omori?" Hero asks, showing him the kiddy's side of the menu. Petting his black locks and thoroughly messing them up from their neat comb. "Don't be shy!"

Sunny turned his attention away from his friends coddling his 'younger brother' and instead faces Basil, who offers him a small smile.

"How's school?"

"Oh, it's uh, going fine. Mom signed me up for an online tutor to teach me on the things I missed out on."

Basil beams at the good news. "That's great! Mine is going fine as well. It was a good idea to let Polly persuade my parents to let me get homeschooled online as well after..after what happened."

The two were silent for a while, until the tip of Basil's ears went a bit pink, eyes only a little watery. "Again, I'm so sorry about your eye.."

"It's alright—"

"Cut it out you two!" Aubrey points, jabbing her finger in their chests. "This is a fluffy crack fic, no angsty shit!"

"And, of course," Kel adds. "They wouldn't have it any other way."

...Huh? They? Who the hell was that? Certainly not a writer who writes only to indulge themselves in their own imagination about characters in a psychological video game as they ignored the fact that they need to study for their final exams tomorrow!

Really. Never.

Sunny is teared back from his own head up the clouds when he smells cheese, and looks down at the table to see it filled with glorious food bestowed upon whatever god was up there to possibly apologise to Sunny for the shithole they put him through.

"We're gonna stab a hole through Hero's wallet!" Kel sang as they all dug in.

Omori stares at a sloppy bread stick, and takes a bite, a small noise of appreciation humming from his throat.

"Do you like that one?" Basil asks with a sweet grin. Despite his embarrassment, he quickly places his own share of the garlic sticks onto the smaller's plate. Seeing Omori's dark eyes light up just a tad bit made it worth it, though.

He usually doesn't like Basil all that much. The boy made his job of protecting Sunny from the truth harder than it should be. Everytime Basil would find some way to remember the truth, Omori would drag him to Black Space to kill him off. But Sunny's subconscious always brought him back, he was an important part of his childhood, after all. So, Omori had to do it over and over and again and again, until he ultimately decided to kill him off once and for all. Basil was a danger to Headspace, his acknowledgement of the truth made Black Space grow stronger and stronger.

Not like it mattered anymore, Headspace was long gone. Omori was it's foundation; him being Sunny's vessel to interact with the wonderful creations of his own mind. What was the use of a Headspace when the DREAMER couldn't interact with it?

There's no reason for this Basil to be a danger towards Sunny anymore. Omori decides he likes this Basil and gratefully accepts the offering.

..Man, these bread sticks were amazing.

It's not too long until everyone is stuffed, head in the palm of their hands as they continued chatting idly.

All except a Kel who took notice of Omori still continuing to shove a new load of garlic bread into his tiny mouth.

"He sure has an appetite, Sunny."

Sunny was slightly weirded out by the sight of—well, himself eating so much while he could barely finish a second slice of pizza. "How can you eat so much?"

Omori momentarily stopped his eating and wiped his hands with tissue, making a gesture for him to come closer; Sunny abiding and leaning his side into the other's.

"You didn't design me to have a capacity on how much I can eat. You wanted to be able to eat alot."

"So, can you get—"

"No, I can't get full."

Yikes, just an endless continuation of eating and eating and never being full? Sunny felt sick, and immediately went back to his conversation with Aubrey and Basil.

Kel smiles at him, bright toothy grin that was extremely distracting to Omori tha he reluctantly looked up at him. "Wanna play a game?"

Holy fucking shit, this kid is a monster.

Kel was going to die. He was going to die because of his own stupidity, not like he hadn't known he would before. But still!

Kel lay his head on the table, hugging his poor stomach, all the while Omori took the last bit of his lasagna. He looks a bit victorious. Kel reminds himself to warn everyone he knows to never challenge Sunny's brother in eating contests.

"Oh ny god, are you finally dead?" Aubrey pokes him on the forehead, Kel groans at the contact and pitifully digs into his pocket and pulls out—the girl took it into her hand, a finger separating what she already counted—2 dollars.

"Find something for me...please.."

The sight was sad and awful and pitiful and fucking hilarious. So as the good friend she was, Aubrey skips out the door and into what Sunny presumed would be Othermart.

Hero places reassuring pats on the back of his little brother, before quickly pulling away when he remembers how the weight of his hand might cause Kel to cry his bile out..all his holes. He just opts to sit beside him instead.

"That was kinda gross," Sunny tells Omori in lieu of congrats.

Omori pushes away his plate. "Thank you."

"Don't you think that was a bit unfair? You can't even feel full..."

"He should've known that."

"He just met you." Sunny bites back. Entertained.

Basil sinks into his chair some more. What he witnessed could quite possibly be a slice of hell. The image of Omori absolutely devouring his pizzas made him imagine it as himself as Omori gobbled him up like watermelon on a hot summer day. And momentarily excuses himself into the bathroom.

The pink haired girl comes running back, throwing something from her hand like a baseball at Omori's direction, the latter barely being able to catch it as he and Sunny fumbled not to drop it.

"I'm keeping the change." She says, proudly. Kel doesn't respond, perhaps he passed out?

Omori inspects the plastic thingy in his hand, before disappointment washes over him.

All that shit for a fucking Kinder Egg!?

Chapter Text

"You 2 don't mind sharing a room, right?" Basil asks, creaking open the guest room door and letting Sunny and Omori place their bags by the side.

"It's fine," Sunny nods. Omori lived in his closet for awhile without his knowledge anyway.

"Don't worry about making a mess, I'll clean it up for you." Polly smiles, quickly walking away before Sunny can decline.

Basil left in hasty steps, apparently, he had somewhere he needed to go.

Omori takes a scan of the room. Warm beige colored walls, a wooden closet, a bed with dark green comforters. Smells better than Sunny's room, too.

"I'm tired," Sunny announces, slurring a bit on his words as he tucked himself under the covers. "You know your way around from my memories, right? Just make sure not to go to the church, might be having one of their meetings."

Omori nodded. "Goodnight."

Sunny knocked out like a light, Omori turns to pull Sunny's sketchbook from his bag to hopefully find something to draw, when he hears a sort of loud noise of calling over.

From the opened door was Polly, calling him over with a few quick flicks of her wrist once she noticed he was paying attention to her.

Omori follows, making sure to lock the door. Goodnight, Sunny.

They arrive at the living room, Polly is obviously hiding something behind her back, making Omori curious.

"Hello, Omori. How are you?"

..What an awful question. Why should Omori know how he is? Such a hard question! Omori can already tell how awkward this little chat was going to be, and wonders if the memory will haunt him in the future like with Sunny and his constant embarrassment over his childhood actions (before the incident).

The boy figured a few nods will be enough as an answer, and the satisfied look she made relieved his shoulders.

"So, I..uh," Polly starts. "Basil texted me about you! So you don't really need to introduce yourself. You are 12, right?"

Another nod. Good.

Polly observes him. He's kicking his legs back and forth and grazing his socked toes across the carpet, his shoulders a little tight, she can tell he's struggling with maintaining eye contact.

All in all: he's just as awkward as his older brother. Maybe even more.

She's damn good with kids. Polly knows just the things that will make him more comfortable with her.

"I have a gift for you,"

She could've said 'do you want a gift?' but knew that would be horrible. The kid was nearing preteens, he'd get embarrassed and shy if he said he wanted it.

Polly then makes a gesture for Omori to reach out his palm, he slowly does, his palm faced the top.

She then slapped a few dollars in and shoved his hand back to him.

See!? She didn't even assume what he wanted, because she just met Omori! He can go buy whatever he wanted. She's DAMN GOOD with kids!!

..Perhaps the whole Basil ordeal made her a bit sad. Nah.

Omori looks back at his palm and quickly looks away as if he were scared of it. Sunny never gave him so much money! He never trusted him with money at all! What is this!?

"Th-thank you.." and remembering what Sunny said earlier, "...ma'am."

EW EW EW EW EW EW EW!!!! Yikes, he felt so gross saying that. Never again. In a strange way, his barely existent respect for Sunny grew just a tad bit.

No more respecting adults for him, but Polly would have a special place in his—what Sunny designed it to be—heart.

"Run along now, buy yourself something nice, would you?" She grins, watching Omori run out the door while simultaneously weirdly bowing when his eyes met hers and hitting the doorframe on his way out.

"Aha..." Basil huffed as he caught up with his friends, leaning onto his knees for support as he regained his stamina from running all the way to the other side of Faraway.

His friends were inside the old treehouse they had built, someone had already moved in Sunny's old house, but was kind enough to let them still use it. Just make sure to clear a path through the trees and make a new way to get in that wasn't through the front door.

"Basil!" Kel says in lieu of greeting, and helps to pulls him up halfway from the ladder.

"Thanks." He smiles and wipes away a bead of sweat on his forehead with the back of his hand. "Anyways, what did you want to talk about, Hero?"

"Don't you think it's weird?" Hero asks, quickly, like he'd been wanting to say it for so long now.

Aubrey huffs, a strand of her pink hair getting tucked behind her ears. "...It sorta is."

"I didn't want to say anything, but.." Kel plays with his words, before they eventually die in his throat.

Basil cocked his head to the side, worried confusion growing in his chest. "What's 'weird'?" He asks Hero.

"The fact that Sunny has a brother all of a sudden."

"Ah...that."

Hero drums his fingers on his thigh. "I know Sunny already told us why, but his skin is too—strange. I've seen pale people, but even they've had the slightest pink tint to it. Omori is just, well, paper white."

"And the fact that he never told us he had a brother, like not even the tiniest mention when we were younger?" Kel adds.

Aubrey draws her knees to her chest. "Not even from Mari."

Basil wanted to say that maybe it was because he was taken away at a young age, but he's 12. But Sunny would be 4 and Mari would be around 7. Sunny's memories of him would be extremely blurry but Mari would be old enough to remember. Yet not a single mention.

"It's like he's from a different plane of existence," the oldest pinches the bridge of his nose in frustration. "Just like those weird creature things—whatever they are—appearing all over Faraway."

Basil sighs, it was going to be a long two-week visit.

Yes, this was it.

Omori had found himself the perfect thing to splurge on in Hobbeez. He quickly set it on top of the counter.

The shopkeeper checked him up and down again. "..Are you sure you're not Kel's friend?"

"I am not Sunny."

The older pressed his lips in a thin line. "Uhm. Okay. But are you sure you want to buy this, kid?"

Omori nods.

He scans it, before putting the thing in a large plastic baggie, and Omori hands him his pay.

Just as he was about to leave the plaza, he felt a warm hand on his shoulder, causing him to whip around, pulling out his knife he took back from Sunny while he slept.

The stranger hadn't even flinched at the sharp object pointed directly at their...trash bin?

"You are interested in those types of activities, I presume." They said, pointing at his baggie.

Omori furrowed his brows, hiding away the plastic behind his socked legs.

"No need for such suspicion," they calmly say. "I have just a few words of advice..if you are willing, of course."

Morbid curiosity made him lower his knife just a bit. What did they want? Were they planning on asking him to get rid of a body for them? Maybe collect certain information?

"Pick up atleast 20 cigarette butts, please." They say, drawing Omori back from his mind before his ideas got too crazy. They hand him another plastic baggie.

..Not like he had anything to do today, anyway. He wasn't all that interested in what that 'advice' was. But Omori gets bored easily and quickly makes his way back to the 2 cigarette butts he walked past around the plaza.

Omori, sweaty and only a little dirty, hands the baggie back to the older person. They seemed to be happy, from what Omori could tell that wasn't from their expression. What's with that weird recycle trash bin on their head, anyways?

"Splendid, you've made the Holy Bin delighted, young boy." They leaned down, Omori getting the hint and leaning his ear, standing on the tip of his toes. "Now, here's my word of advice as promised."

"That sort of thing would never work without giving something precious, many people make the mistake of not offering something up. Don't be like them."

Omori, despite his confusion, nods and treks back to Basil's home.

"Oh, you're back." Sunny greets, looking him up and down before making his way over to him by the doorway and picking away a stray leaf in his dark hair. "What did you even do?"

"I bought something." Omori answers. He brought up the plastic bag by his side and took out a large box.

Sunny's eyes widened. "That? You're interested in those types of things?"

The younger boy shook his head, lightly shaking the box. "Not that. I've just got something planned."

Well duh, why else would you buy an ouija board for?

"Fine. Just not anything too dangerous." Sunny waved a hand at the box. "Polly made dinner, put that away for now."

Omori nods, making his way into the guest room and sliding it underneath their bed.

That'll have to wait.

Chapter Text

The noise of the 1 of 4 wheels of the shopping cart that won't move scrape against his eardrums, making a light throb reverberate through his head. Sunny ignores it, much too focused on squinting at the bread tag's blurred expiration date.

"Does this say 'Feb 17' or 'Jun 1'?" He asks to Omori, who's attempting to roll the unrollable wheel of the shopping cart with an annonyed expression.

Omori hums, taking the bread away from the older and staring into it, and gives a defeated shake of his head.

"I think it'd be best to buy both." He succumbed.

Sunny thought this over for a moment, before giving up as well and stuffing two of them into the cart.

Polly had sent them out to buy groceries at Othermart. She apologized profusely, saying she was going to be late for a meeting she had apparently planned with some old friends for lunch from different towns. She said she'd quickly cook them and Basil dinner once she got home, but Sunny instead got her to promise to leave the whole food thing to him for today.

Which meant Sunny was going to open up a tab in incognito mode for a recipe tutorial of what Polly was planning to make for tonight. He's already got all the ingredients, he's just buying some extra things as she instructed them to 'go and buy anything you want and what you think Basil would like' and handed him a little money pouch.

He handed the pouch over to Omori. It was made with shiny beads and had a little chain string attached to it, Omori noticing the latter and donning it around his neck. It hung proudly over his chest, glittering obnoxiously when it hit the dinky supermarket lights.

It's a pretty lazy day for a Friday, usually, you'd see kids hanging around here for the free air conditioning and Adults picking away at their coin purses so they wouldn't have to spend away the cool non-crinkled dollar they owned.

They're at the cash register when Sunny notices that the price scans were going a bit too high than the money Omori had. Oh shit, what could he do?? Should he, like, take away some of the items that hadn't been scanned? Ah—no! The register lady was already holding onto the last item! Does that mean he has to...he has to talk with the workers to let him go to Basil's and get more money..? NO! he's too afraid of being embarassed and just social interaction with people who he wasn't close with in general!!

Sunny feels fear crawling up to his throat and choking him alive—until his eyes catch a familiar sight. Only thing to do now is s-speak up.

"Uhm, excuse me?" Sunny calls, voice a little hoarse. "I actually have to go and get something else."

The lady gives him a look, but nods.

He looks back at Omori, the latter giving him a weird frown that seemed to tell him he already knew what was wrong. Which wouldn't surprise him all that much, Omori just knew things. "Stay put, okay?"

Omori nods, handing him a reassuring thumbs-up.

Sunny walks away until he knew he was out of the cashier's line of vision, and bolts to the end of the store.

Reaching the end, he pulls up in front of a specific meat section, and points at the poster. Needing no words as the worker had already understood his unspoken words.

She hands him a fly swatter, and Sunny gets right into the job.

Standing here with the cashier and doing absolutely nothing was honestly making Omori sweat a little.

Should he strike up small talk? Maybe he should ask how the business is going? Wait, that's weird, no 12-year-old would have the remotest of interest in finances!

Omori looks down at his black socks and rolls on the balls of his feet, a rhythm of thump, thump, thump playing in his head when his toes dug into the concrete. He's thankful of his black socks as they made the dirt that got caught between the threads of his socks invisible. Omori would never understand why Sunny hasn't switched out his white ones for black ones. Despite them being one of the same.

"You look to be about the same age as my daughter Katie," the woman suddenly spoke up, scanning him all over with sharp eyes. "A bit younger, though."

Omori tilts his head a bit, only responding with a curt nod as he was unsure what to say to such a comment. He wasn't any better than Sunny when it came to communication.

She's particularly looking into his hair, though. She seemed a bit pleased.

"Say, why don't you come over to play with her? I'm sure she'd appreciate the company. Ah, but, was the one who left your brother?—he looks so much like you—you'd have to ask for his permission first."

Omori, in all honesty, didn't want to go. His social circle was much too large already (Sunny, Kel, Aubrey, Basil, Hero and wow, even Polly) and knowing that much people was already tiring him out. He'd have to convince Sunny to decline.

Suddenly, he senses a light irritation and confusion sort of feeling running in what Sunny designed to be his veins. It didn't feel like his, though, more like a second-hand phantom feeling settling within his bones and causing a light ache. It felt as if he were getting drawn to something, a link or such connecting him between—whatever it was.

Omori turns his heel and follows.

What..what the hell was this?

The flies buzzed at him annonyingly right by his ear, as if taunting him. Sunny immediately slapped the fly swatter on his ear, uncaring if the flies stinky dirty yucky juices got onto his skin.

Somehow, though, the fly flies away from the swatter, causing Sunny to hit himself with it with no satisfying reward of hearing it's tiny body get crushed into bloody bits.

Sunny was borderline manic at this point. He hates flies so fucking much.

He heard something crash, and suddenly Omori is right next to him. And as quick as he could possibly blink, the fly was dead. Sunny looks back at his other's knife, the tip slightly stained with blood. Did he just???

"Did you just stab the fly?????"

Omori was silent, only staring up at him and absentmindedly rubbing away the blood at the hem of his sleeveless shirt. Sunny didn't care all that much for cleanliness unless it was necessary, but it was still such a gross slight that he crinkled his nose and looked at the boy concerningly, and shook his head.

"What are you doing here? I told you to stay put." Sunny asks instead, willing away the image of Omori wiping insect blood on his clothes that lingered even though the latter had already finished.

"I felt..." Omori shuts his mouth, as if playing with the word that was going to leave in his mouth before letting it go. "..Weird, as if the—"

Light buzzing by his ear drowned out Omori's words.

Sunny feels enraged all over again. The fly, as if sensing this, quickly flies away.

Just as he was about to throw his swatter at the last annonying—stupid, stupid, stupid—fly right by the cereal boxes, he sees something with an even dumber face than the fly over at his peripheral. Sunny turns the other cheek.

What? He was sure he drank his pills today, Omori even reminded him to do so. Or maybe that memory was a day ago?

Standing just on top of a toppled over cereal box was a lone Sprout Mole, crushing the box just a tad bit under it's light weight. Once it realized Sunny was looking straight at it, it gave him a look and crushed at the box even harder.

"Oh..oh wow." Omori and Sunny say.

Chapter Text

Omori squints at the Sprout Mole, staring into it's beady eyes. It was staring at him, but he wasn't really sure. Their eyes looked as if it were staring at everything and watching his every move, or they were having an out-of-body experience and he just so happened to be in front of the Sprout Mole.

Another reason why he hated those stupid, turnip looking veggie mush.

But, other than that—

"What? What?"

Omori furrows his brows. Another thing from Headspace that wasn't him? Or was he second-handedly experiencing Sunny's hallucinations as they were the same person?

He wasn't one to overthink like Sunny, though. He has one sole purpose and despite being free from Headspace, he still plans to follow his original purpose.

Omori brandishes his knife, and jabs it into it's face-body, twisting it to add more damage. The Sprout Mole vanishes in glittering ashes, before completey fading away from existence.

Even if he can't host Sunny anymore, Omori could still fill in his other purpose: protecting him.

Sunny frowns. "Y'know, we could've maybe interrogated it."

Ah. "..Perhaps."

The older suddenly snapped his neck to the side, and quickly picks up his fly swatter. "Move over—!"

Omori obliged, stepping out of the other's way just in time to see him successfully smack the fly with the green swatter.

Sunny watches it fall, staring down at his swatter in silent amazement, dark eyes widening and shining. Omori does so, too—but he's not looking at the swatter. He feels a little proud of Sunny, despite it only being a small action.

Sunny collects the money, the woman behind flashing him with an 'OK' hand sign as she handed him his pay.

"Is that enough?" Omori asks.

Sunny presses his lips together, making a gesture to hand him the wallet hung around Omori's neck. Omori hands it to him as they walked back to the cashier.

"It's enough..!"

Once they returned, the cashier looked slightly unimpressed, perhaps they took too long..

"Did you find what you were searching for, sir?" The woman asks, looking at Sunny's empty hands. She already knew the answer.

Shoot, he completely forgot about that! "Ah, no—" what are you apologizing for, stupid!? "so these are the only things were buying."

"I see, I see," she quickly scanned the items. "Oh, I was talking to your little brother, and I wanted to ask if it'd be alright if he were to spend the day with my daughter."

As quick as a bolt of lightning, Omori kicks him in the shin. Sunny hands him the stink eye as Omori kept on looking at the lady as politely as possible (not much). He gets the silent message, though.

"..No, sorry we can't—"

"Why's that?" She presses. Oh no.

Sunny sweats. "We have plans..."

"What sort of plans? It didn't seem as if you two had plans with how long you took trying to find whatever it was that you were searching for.."

Sunny clenches on Omori's hand for support, both of them screaming keysmash in their heads enough for them to both hear the other's, as much as it didn't make sense. She was a vengeful woman! They wanted to sink to their knees but it felt as if thick roots were wrapped around their ankles, crawling up to their neck and choking what the woman wanted out of their traps.

"Ah—ah, nevermind! I forgot we'd already finished up all we had to do yesterday. It's fine...!"

The woman brightens up. "Really? That's great! Is it okay if I take him to my house right now? I'm just about to have my break."

Her eyes seemed to say there was a right answer.

Sunny nods in quick fashion, snatching his hand back from Omori and pushing him forward just the slightest bit.

Omori throws him an furious look. What a traitor!! He'll be remembering this to guilt trip Sunny into buying him donuts—or maybe save it, for future use.

Omori quickly lost what little respect he had for the older. As the lady took him away to his own personal hell, he mouthed at Sunny: "You are so feeble-minded. You bitch."

Sunny doesn't understand why Omori didn't just call him a bitch and left it at that. But makes his way back home with the groceries, anyway. He'll come back to pick him up in 2 or so hours.

He really wanted to ask him why there was a Sprout Mole, though.

Omori blinks up at the woman's daughter—Katie, or something like that. He's trying not to stare too much at her outfit; bright hair clips in her blue hair, casual overalls adorned with little pins, striped socks of different colors. All in all, there was alot to look at, not that it was a bad thing, though. He's just trying not to stare as it might be rude.

The mother had already gave Katie a short introduction consisting of his name and that his brother was going to pick him up, which kind of got on Omori's nerves as he wanted to be the one to introduce himself for once.

"Well, you two, have fun! I'm heading back to work since my break's almost over." The woman slipped her shoes back on, and right before closing the door, she gave a look to her daughter. "Katie, be good."

The shut of the door made them both jolt.

There was a silence, until Katie clearing her throat had him looking back at her. "Did my mom force you to come here?"

She acted as if it had already happened before by the tone of her voice, which made Omori lightly raise a brow as he nodded.

Katie sighs, pinching the bridge of her nose. "Gah, sorry about that. She's been a serious pain since I dyed my hair, been bringing home some kids around my age that looked like their hair hasn't been dyed. Like she's tryna teach me a lesson 'er something."

Oh. So that's why she was looking at his hair particularly. Omori rose a hand to pick at a strand of his black locks, pinching it between his fingers. Katie grabs that arm and leads him by the wrist up the stair, presumably up to her room.

"Like—she never acted like this when I came out as trans to her. Apparently, coming out wasn't what I needed to be all bothered about. It was dying my hair."

Katie quickly threw him a look behind her shoulder. "You're not transphobic, are you?"

Omori shook his head, it was sincere. Of course he wasn't. Being a transphobe was 'super lame' according to Aubrey, and Omori could wholeheartedly agree. Omori looked to the side, seemingly staring at the 4th wall. Don't be a stupid transphobe, idiots. Omori hated transphobic people.

"Hey, where are you looking?" Katie calls, catching Omori's attention before it quickly went to the large plain white door in front of him. "Sorry about my room, lil' messy."

Katie opens the door, pushing him in before closing the door behind her. "Since she brought you here 'n all, might as well have some fun, right?"

The girl switches open the lights. Omori is greeted by colorful furniture and fabrics, and is somewhat surprised the door wasn't thrown in rainbow glitters. He doesn't have the blessing of looking around as Katie quickly sat him down onto a small seat in front of a large dresser, and is face-to-face with himself in a circular mirror.

"Do you mind make-up?" Katie asks, aligning his shoulders to fully front the mirror. "You're, like, so pretty! In a monochrome way, a real cool contrast, I think some bright colors would really match on you! But if you don't want to, that's fine as well. I've got some video game lying 'round"

Make-up? Omori had found some of Polly's lipsticks around Basil's house, and did not like how sticky and hard it became to wipe off his arm, but other make-ups he supposed he wouldn't mind. "Just not lipstick, I'm not too fond of how sticky they are."

"'Kay," Katie smiles, pulling out cute hairclips in multiple arrays of pastel translucents to blunt colors in matte. "Gon' make you sooooo pretty! I haven't tried putting make-up on anyone except me, though. An honest review would be really cool."

Wait, what? Not on anyone else?

Omori's small voice fell on deaf ears as it was drowned out by the loud music pouring out of Katie's speakers.

"And....there we are! Look at you—" Katie pulled at his cheeks behind him, quickly snapping them back to her sides as she's already known Omori would slap her hand away if he felt like it—which was a lot, apparently. "—super cute!"

Omori opens his eyes, blinking repeatedly at the bright lights by the mirror as his eyes readjusted. Until Katie suddenly shoved some whitish-gray fuzzy cloth on his shoulder as she put on a neon orange puff jacket. "Ohhh, before you see, wear this! Not really pretty, but still really soft!"

The younger shrugs it on, large enough to slightly slip past his palms feeling the fluff between his gaps of his fingers. Katie was right, Omori felt as if he were laying on an actual cloud. But if it had furs.

Katie finally graced Omori with taking a look at himself. Katie made sure the make up was only light, as it was his first time. Pink dusty blush colored his pale cheeks, his lips taking on an even lighter shade of lip tint for that natural-like look, eyeshadow a nice red rim—basically a whole lot different from what he'd usually see in the mirror when he and Sunny brushed their teeth together. Omori probably liked the clips in his hair the most, though.

It wasn't..bad. A little messy around the edges, yes, but it was nice. Omori nods at Katie with a thumbs-up, the girl beaming at his silent praise.

"See!? It isn't that bad!" Katie claps her hands together, before snapping her fingers with a sudden thought. "Well since we're done with that 'n all, wanna play some games? I'll prepare the console!"

Omori looks towards the side of the room as Katie set up the console, and his eyes catch something..out of place.

"What's this?" Omori asks, standing from his seat (his coat was sagged on the floor, it really was too long for him) and pulling at the poster. It was an inky black designed with a simple inverted pentacle drawn in white paint. Severely out of place within everything else in the room. Omori shows it off to Katie by his finger.

"Oh, you do speak." Katie notes, leaving behind the console and strolling forward. Her eyes take notice of the poster. "Nothing big, you aren't freaked out by my occult stuff, are you? If you are, I can hide them all in my dresser. No biggie."

Omori shook his head. It might just be a fascination, or maybe a hobby, and it might just be too much of a stretch but—"do you happen to know how to prepare an ouija board?"

Katie huffs, her chest puffing with pride. "Yup! Why's that? You interested?"

The boy gave her the poster back. "No, but would you mind helping me with something?"

"As long as I don't leave the house, sure."

Omori bit his lip. "Can you show me the phone?"

"Better not be making some weird, sketchy deal over the phone." Katie tells him, leaning behind him as Omori dialed in Basil's house phone (he had made him memorize it, so when they were leaving and he wasn't there, they could still say goodbye to him even over the phone).

"I'm not," Omori lightly swatted her away, to which Katie guffaws before patting him on the back and returning to her room.

A few rings was heard as he held it up to his ear.

"..Hello? I'm not Basil." Sunny's slightly hoarse voice rang out.

"I know you aren't," Omori puffed his cheek. "I want Sunny."

Sunny made a noise for him to continue.

"I need you to get me my ouija board under our bed and come over here."

"There?" Sunny's voice slightly cracked. "I don't know where that is."

"About..3 houses from Aubrey's."

Sunny pressed his lips together. Such a scary woman lived so close...

"Oh, and while your at it, drink some water. Your voice sounds a little hoarse." Omori gently reminds him. "And your pills as well. It's about time for that."

Sunny nods despite Omori not seeing him, and makes a noise of acknowledgement. "Is that all?"

Omori thought it over. He had...big plans, to say the least. Was it really okay to do such a thing without the others..?

They were her friends, after all.

"..Actually, bring the others with you as well."

It surprisingly didn't take too long for them to arrive. Omori pulls open the door and quickly shuts it when they had all came in.

"What's this all about?" Hero asks. "That coat's too big for you.."

Aubrey grins deviously as she gave a casual shove to his shoulder. "Want us to raid this house for you?"

"Woah! Spiral stairs! Must be really weird to fall off of those!" Kel laughs, hitting the wooden rails repeatedly.

"Nice make up," Sunny hands him the ouija board in a plastic baggie, Omori gave his thanks to both of those.

"Please prepare yourselves." Omori piped up as he gestured for the others to follow him up the stairs.

"Waah..sounds scary!" Kel smiles.

Omori knocks on the plain door of Katie's room. A loud bang was heard before the door was quickly opened wide.

"Sorry, I tripped a little over there. Also, I found an old game I thought I lost! We can pop it into the console and—wait who are those people, Omori?"

Aubrey whistles, a light flush at the tip of her ears. "..Cute room."

"These are Sunny's friends." Omori introduced. "They're here for the thing I asked of you."

Katie spared Sunny a glance. "Assuming that is the brother you told me about? But anyway, okay, sure. Come in so we can get started."

"What is this?" Sunny asked him as Katie had seated them into her room.

Omori graced him with no answer. But Katie takes his attention away by pulling out a little foldable table, and making them sit on over there in a circle.

Omori handed the older girl the plastic baggie. Katie takes out the board and set it up in fast speed.

"Ah!! I'm so excited! I haven't really done this with anyone but my friends—so I'm not really sure if it worked with us since I'm pretty sure one of them is moving it themselves." Katie gushed, lighting on some candles (just to set the mood) as Omori flicked off the lights and returned to his seat.

"Wait, wait, wait, wait." Hero says quickly as he fidgeted in his seat. "This is supernatural stuff! Aren't you guys a little scared?"

"Scared? Nah, not really." Aubrey huffed. "I don't really believe in that sort of thing. Just letting Omori and the girl have their fun." She says. Everyone already knew she believed in them.

"I've experienced..much, much worse things..." Basil muttered, looking over to the side with a hazy look in his eyes.

"Ok." Sunny affirms his large, overflowing feelings. Such a little word had so much to say!

Kel flicked the planchette. "Nope! I wanna ask the spirits if it actually believed me when I stare into the corner of our room pretending I could see it."

"Okay; so we're all good?" Katie asks, ignoring Hero's multiple questions about the safety. "We all good! Hold hands, you guys."

Their hands joined together in a circle, Hero giving up and only doing so since his brother looked so excited.

There was a silence.

"Uhm..okay, what now?" Basil asks.

The girl let go of the hands holding onto her own. "That was nothing! Did you actually believe that had anything to do with the séance? Check yourself before you shrek yourself."

Basil jolts. "What—"

"Anyway," Katie claps her hands together. "For real this time, what we actually do is just place out both our middle and pointer finger on the planchette."

They did so, Basil more cautious to make sure he doesn't shrek himself this time.

"Good, good!" Katie praised, making what nervousness was left residing inside Hero and Basil's bones melt away—what a terrifying power! "'Kay, who wants to ask a question first?"

"Me!" Aubrey calls quickly before anyone else could. "Dearest, darlingest, spirits, can I put something inside Sunny's eye socket since he doesn't have his other one anymore?"

Sunny rose a brow, instinctively scooting closer to Omori. "What?"

Kel made a hushing noise to Sunny. "I've actually been wanting to know for awhile!"

"No, no, they're right." Omori piped up. "I want to know as well."

Basil pressed his lips into a thin line. If the metal of his gardening shears could jab into there, there was probably a whole lot of things that'd fit.

"Guys," Hero chided. "Focus. We're doing..whatever we're doing. Let's let Omori go first since he's the one who asked us to come here."

Omori nods, taking in a deep breath as everyone watched his every movement with calculating eyes. Something told him he didn't have to exactly explain anything, not to her at least.

"Dear Mari," Omori starts, ignoring the way they flinched at the familiar name. "What is happening?"

Chapter Text

Omori was silent, everyone was silent. Silence so thick you could hear a pin drop—oh, a pin really did drop. Everyone's head but Omori's turned towards the noise.

"Sorry," Katie whispers, blindly groping around the floorboards for the pin that fell from her overalls. "Found it!" And places it back onto her chest securely.

Omori realizes his eyes had instinctively shut, and opens them at once. "Why won't it work?" He asks, more to himself than the others.

"Wait, b-before that," Hero stuttered. "What...does this have to do with Mari?"

Even if the truth of Mari's death had already surfaced, they still weren't all that okay to talk about her. Omori knew that, he knew it but..

Not even he knows what's going on, the other's most definitely didn't know either.

But Mari's always been watching. She was his best shot.

Realization dawns Aubrey. Her eyes widen, goosebumps rising up her skin as her arms went rigid. "You're not trying to contact Mari through this, are you?"

"I thought it'd be better if you were all here with me to witness it. But if you're not ready then.." Omori vaguely gestures to the door, attempting to be considerate.

"I mean—I don't..I don't know." Basil says, voice cracking as tears welled up in his bright blue eyes. "I know Mari would've forgiven me and Sunny but...Sunny, are you okay with this?"

Sunny's lip quivered, but otherwise kept his composure still, counting in his head in a familiar rhythm his therapist taught him to do. He nods, brief and quick. Blinking his single eye away from sight to bat away the wetness in his eyes with his eyelashes.

Katie makes a noise, quiet enough to not disturb everyones' emotional spirals, but loud enough for Omori to hear.

"Hey, is this Mari person, like, dead or something?"

Omori would've frowned at her bluntness, but knew he was the same. "Yes," and just to add, "for a while now."

"Cool, cool—oh, wait, maybe not actually." Katie reevaluates. "Sad, yeah, sad."

Katie frowns. "Sorry if it sounds disrespectful, I'm just not used to this sort of thing and I'm not really sure how to react. I feel like attempting to be sad with them is..offensive. Or something."

Omori wasn't mad or anything at her, it was hard to feel much if someone you don't know was dead. "You're fine. I was the one who brought them over here anyway."

"Nah, nah, it's cool." Katie shook her hands over her chest. A sudden thinking expression plastering over her features.

"Should I just go, maybe? This whole ouija board thingy isn't all that hard, just ask a question and let the ghost do it work moving the planchette."

Omori gave a curt nod; trying his best to remember the instructions, Katie doing a mock salute and slipping out of the room as quick as possible. Maybe she should make some sandwiches in the meantime.

The boy took a look back. Even the dead could affect the living like this, huh?

"Should we really do this? It feels like we're bothering Mari. She should be up there doing whatever it is angels do in the afterlife." Hero says. "Like, vaping because it's not like it'll affect her since she's—y'know. Mari should be having dinner with Mozart; not dealing with the problems of the living."

"What? Wasn't Mozart an artist? why would he be in heaven?" Kel asks, but quickly shook his head. "Anyway, on my part, I don't..really mind. I miss Mari, I miss her alot! I don't want to disrespect her or anything, though. So I hope she doesn't mind us contacting her through this...luigia board."

"Ouija board," Sunny corrects.

Hero blatantly ignore their comments. "But I can't help but be a little selfish... let's do it."

Omori nods, then turns to the pink haired girl. "Aubrey?"

She doesn't respond with anything, hanging her head low as she fiddled with the cuffs of her jacket. A quick movement of her head. Yes.

Once everyone else had already given their permissions, Basil gave a hesitant thumbs-up.

"Great," Omori clapped his hands together. "We can contact her once this actually starts working."

"It's not working?" Sunny repeats. "I don't know anything about these sorts of things, maybe there's a passcode or something."

"Please?" Kel asked the board.

"A little harder than that," Aubrey frowned.

"Pretty please?" Kel asked once more, batting his eyelashes at the ouija board for added effect. Unsurprising, it doesn't work.

"Maybe it has to be some word that isn't pleasant." Hero theorized. And opens his mouth—until Kel's hand came flying to cover his lips.

"Do not say anything too big wordy!!"

"I'm going to say a slur." Aubrey announces, taking in a huge breath before it was covered by Kel's other palm.

"That's not nice!!"

Aubrey handed Basil a side-glance, the latter immediately nods. Looking a little excited, even.

"I'll say the slur."

Kel gaped. "BASIL!!" And realizes he was all out of hands. Basil had nothing holding him back now.

"Sorry, Kel, you're cishet." Basil says, tone clipped. What the hell was happening to him?

"Oh, you fucking know I'm not anywhere near those—"

"I remembered something!" Omori piped up, catching everyone's attention. "There was a something some..cultist told me at the square."

Kel popped his hands from Hero and Aubrey's mouths. "Oh, the recycultists?"

Omori nodded. "Something about offering up something precious..or else it'd never work."

"I didn't bring the photo album." Sunny admits, scratching his cheek. Basil practically melting at the implication of their memories being his most precious. He didn't bring his as well; all his friends were his treasured, or something cringey like that.

"I don't really bring it around." Kel laughs, Hero gesturing at his little brother that he didn't as well. Aubrey shook her head 'no'.

Omori hummed. And suddenly, there's a weight heavier than his knife residing in his pocket.

Slowly, the boy drags it out, curling his fingers around the object and carefully placing it on the ouija board. It rolls off the board by stays attached to the side.

"Hey, is that the kinder egg i gave you...?" Kel asks. It was supposed to be a statement, but had confusingly morphed into a question.

Omori quietly nodded. He's keeping his eyes trained on the unopened plastic of the kinder egg, telling himself he was only trying to see if the ghost would offer an example to him of it's presence by perhaps rolling it the the end of the table.

In reality, though, he's just a little shy. He was practically saying it was his most precious, okay!?

"It's the boy version, I wanted a girl egg."

"I'll get you a girl egg next time!!" Kel cheers, nearing knocking over a candle.

Omori says in a polite tone: "Thank you,"

"..What?" Aubrey piped up.

Then, he motioned for all the others to replace their fingers onto the planchette once more. And once they were all done recollecting themselves, Omori stares down at the kinder egg lying peacefully on the side of the board; careful to not place it onto the middle of it as to not disturb the planchette moving along the the flat top.

"Mari, what is going on?" He asks.

A silence once more. The gang waits, patient.

Basil presses his lips together, unintentionally causing a small sound to ripple from his throat.

"Wait," Omori says. "Wait."

What happened was.. honestly underwhelming.

Something had popped into existence above the ouija board, a flaming ball of light blue and white, before growing into a more..human shaped figure. It was slightly disembodied, the top of it's head to the waistline was the only things visible; as it slowly fades into transparancy. If they were to squint, they could see faint outlines of the legs. A little string with a white triangle propped around it's head, almost comical.

It—or rather, she— was chewing on the kinder egg.

"Gross," Mari spat. "I think this chocolate went baaaaad. Tastes like shit."

The first one to stop gaping and speak up was Hero. "Oh... so she's not a angel."

"Did you expect her to be?" Kel asks, despite knowing the answer. "I honestly thought she'd be a troll."

Aubrey crossed her arms. "Are there trolls in heaven? Trolls live under bridges."

"Yeah, but—like, I expected her to be a troll, still."

"Would she bring a bridge with her?"

"Guys, shut up," Sunny hushed. "Mari's here..!"

"And her first words spoken to us since she died included a swear word." Basil notes, nervously chuckling.

"Girlboss." Aubrey nods.

Mari takes one look at them and starts laughing, airy and disembodied in a way they didn't notice her voice sounded like during her first sentence. "Man, you guys didn't change, like, at all!"

She quickly circled them around. Once, twice, thrice. "Miss me??" She ask, purposefully breathing on Hero's neck—nothing as warm as Hero could remember.

Just another reminder that she was dead.

Mari makes eye contact with Omori, her blue-tinted eyes staring into his not-soul. "You're the one who called me right? Called me to answer your problem! But before that, though—"

Hands quickly reaching for his face, Omori half expects it to phase through him yet still shutting his eyelids shut. Instead, her hands are placed on both his cheeks as she stretched and squished them apart. "I can't believe I've got a new brother! Look at you, unlike Sunny, you've still got baby fat!!" She gushed, pressing a (cold) kiss on his forehead and squealing. "You seriously should've been here before I died! You should've been an actual person with us!!"

Huh? Sunny was confused. Was Omori cuter than him? Was his literal manifestation of guilt cuter than him?

The answer to that was: yes.

Basil rose a brow, catching notice of the last offhand comment. "Actual..person? Omori is your little brother, right?"

"Oh, uh, oops." Mari covers her mouth with a translucent hand. "You two were probably hoping I'd keep it a secret, huh?" And hands Omori and Sunny an apologetic glance.

They nod, frowning.

Hero smiled, a little wobly. "Wait, we're right then? That Omori isn't a real person, I mean."

"You knew?" Omori pressed. Sunny simultaneously admitting with a weak "yes.."

"All of us—no one from outside the group, though—have been seeing these...weird creatures or whatever they are crawling all around Faraway for a few weeks now. And now you come here and suddenly you have a little brother? It's too sus—"

"SUSSY!! SUSSY AMONG US!! OMORI IS THE SUS IMPOSTER—"

"DUN, DUN, DUN, DUN, DUN, DUN, DUN..D-D-DUN!!"

"Nice one, Kel and Aubrey, but later." Hero hushed him. "Plus, no amount of whitening soap and cold environment can get your skin to be that white."

"Yeah, Sunny's really stupid." Omori adds, Sunny shooting him with a half-hearted glare.

"Aren't Omori and I the only ones supposed to see it? Since it is my imagination."

"Are you gatekeeping your imagination?" Basil asks.

"That's where I can explain things now, I guess." Mari interjects. "Okay, so first of all, I've always been watching you guys since I died. Pretty cool, I know. The reason why you can all see them is because you all listened to Bo En's My Time too much. Like, waaay too much."

"..What?" Aubrey repeated her brilliant, wonderful quote from before.

"Yeah," Mari smiles, explaining nothing and everything at once.

Kel's mouth formed an 'O'. "I'm not burning my CD!!"

"What do we do about the Headspace creatures?" Sunny pressed.

"Well, you could just kill them; like you did with the Sprout Mole at Othermart. But stronger beings don't die."

"Stronger beings? Like Sweetheart? What do we do with them if we can't kill them?"

Mari laughs, waving a hand up and down like it was an obvious thing. "I eat them, of course! They're basically feelings in human shape—kinda like Omori, but also not. I'm not even sure what Omori is at this point—and I've learned that spirits feast like myself feast on human emotions."

She quickly grinned brightly at Omori, patting his head. "Oh, but I wouldn't eat you, though!"

"Wait, holy shit," Kel paused, catching all their attention. "We're like the Ghost Busters!"

Aubrey huffed. "Huh? No way, this isn't what Ghost Busters is about."

"Aubrey, you've never seen Ghost Busters, and neither have I; so we can't really know if Kel is right or not." Basil blows out the candles and switches the lights back on, thankful for the slightly eerie mood washing away in the waves of his friends' chatter.

"Hero, have you seen Ghost Busters?"

"Me!? No, I haven't. I was planning to watch it with my college friends but we suddenly had a test to prepare for..."

"I've seen it," Sunny spoke up. "Only the first few minutes, I got bored and decided to go out with Basil to bury Kel's old goldfish."

"Doesn't count!" Aubrey yells.

"Shawn was alive??"

Hero laughs nervously, scratching the back of his neck. "The thing is, Mari was scaring me with holding a dead spider up to my face while I was carrying Shawn and I accidentally tripped. I scooped him up and placed him in the toilet since it was the closest water source, I might've accidentally flushed it out of habit..though."

Kel looked close to tears.

"And somehow, he ended up in my toilet—maybe he swam up my pipes?—but he came up while I was..." Basil suddenly looked a bit shy, the words dying in his throat.

"He pissed. Basil pissed on your goldfish. Basil pissed on Shawn." Sunny graciously explained.

"Yes, thank you, my best friend. I peed on Shawn and he died. So I picked him up with chopsticks and watered him down, and he wasn't coming back to life so I called Sunny to ask if he would mind if I buried him in his backyard, he said yes and decided to help out as well."

"Oh, Shawn," Aubrey says, sympathetic. "You deserved to drown in piss for having that godawful name."

"So, I wasn't the only dead one to wound up in the backyard." Mari whistles.

"Sorry we didn't tell you 'til now, Kel." Hero smiled apologetically.

A loud knocking on the plain white door of the room, before cracking open as a single eye scanned the room, before slipping in.

Katie's carrying large tray her mom kept when they had a handful of visitors, plates of warm butter sandwiches almost clashing to the floorboards when her eyes catch the sight of Mari.

"Yo, no fucking way." She says, disbelieving.

Her mom probably wouldn't be bringing around anymore kids for her to hand with. Her new playdate literally just summoned a ghost.

Katie didn't really care; there's no way she'd ever get a playmate as cool as this one.

Chapter Text

hey its been awhile !!!! i got into a huuuuuge writers block and linda forgot this fic even existed (oop) but a few days ago i finally got the encouragement to write out another chapter!

and thats when one of you commented smth that rlly made me :( yknow?

one of you made fun of my hamsters fucking death. i wont say who dw but like, how fucked up is that? why would you do that???? it went smth along the lines of "seems shawn took revenge by killing your hamster" and bro like. shawn is a FICTIONAL character made up, while my hamster is very much so real. well, WAS, ig.

im putting this fic up for adoption to whoever wants it, contact me thru my twitter kebab_skewer kay? i still have some random ideas i wrote down for this fic a long time ago, as well as what i planned for what was supposed to be the next chapter. but you dont have to follow any of those lol, u can do ur own thing.

i actually rlly RLLY adore this fic, so i hope whoever wants it would find it just as fun to write as i did once !!

BTW please do not go after the person who said that comment. i dont rlly want any drama, especially in this case considering id get pulled into it :( ive been srsly under the weather these past few months and THAT AINT HELPIN FR