Chapter Text
“Qiqi, I love you most. So, stop this now.”
Under the mask, the silver-haired man whispered the phrase to the undead girl as he held her from in an embrace, finally allowing her movements to come to a halt. Overhaul would never lay a hand on the girl unless she was in the process of an experiment, so Chrono had to take charge in snapping her from her spur. Qiqi remained motionless, her mind became a little more aware of her surroundings and sentience, as she waited for her next instruction.
“That’s all that was scheduled for today, tomorrow you’ll be given a new test.” He says, but it’s not like Qiqi would remember anyway, only to reinforce that the girl would forget in the next hour, and Chrono was really wondering that with enough reminders would she be able to recall. But, her inability to remember was never a hassle to them, and Overhaul seemed content that Qiqi never remembered the experiments he ran on her; she would never have a desire to run away—unlike that other child.
Qiqi never expressed much needs. She didn’t need to eat, drink, excrete or anything to entertain her. She was low maintenance, and eased the minds of the other Shie Hassaikai members whenever they were ordered to check up on the semi-dead girl. Overhaul seemed pleased with her compliance and blank tendencies enough so that he didn’t pay her as much mind as Eri.
For today’s test that had just ended, Qiqi was ordered to walk on a thin tightrope along other trials to test out how compliant the girl would be when it was discovered she would always complete her tasks to the best of her abilities, and and even when they were done she would never stop pursuing them until someone uttered her to stop. As hypothesized, Qiqi completed every task perfectly. Like a machine, she maintained an intricate balance on the rope despite being 15 meters up with no safety net. When told to move the weights from one of the rooms to the others, Qiqi did so without a sweat. Upon seeing this feat, Chrono noted the displayed relentless strength that he would for sure be reporting into Overhaul.
After all her commands were finished, she looked to do even more even when it was unnecessary. Chrono was satisfied with the results, although he could leave Qiqi in her locked mind to continue he useless toil, he chose to give the little girl a break as he wasn’t sure if she might fall into exhaustion.
“Okay,” she said monotonously. “...my next orders?”
Ah, she had already forgotten his words.
“Go to your room.” Said Chrono. He can’t understand how, but despite her terrible memory, Qiqi always knows where to head back after. Like a switch turned on, she displayed a blank expression before slowly pacing toward her destination.
—
Eri shook as the masked man waved the thin doll in his beefy hands, all she wanted for him to stop tormenting her, even if his intention was to comfort her. His voice tried being light and friendly but it only impressed her more. A familiar man that she didn’t know the name of that Kai had sent to check on her. Either he was oblivious to her discomfort, or he was deliberately ignoring it.
When he finally left—nothing particularly happened which bored him—it felt like hours had passed, yet it felt like time went by so quickly, snapping from her disassociation, Eri could not tell. Her frozen-in-fear face turned to a blank one, and then a frown when reality came to hit her; all alone, this would be her life.
—
Qiqi couldn’t move a muscle in her body. When Chrono had told her to stay still in her cell, she proceeded to follow through and stayed there for 12 full hours until some had to get her, but by then her muscles had become locked, garnering her unable to move. It was extremely frustrating for the zombie girl as she desperately tried to unlock herself, if it hadn’t been for Overhaul to come check on her, she might’ve unleashed the adeptal energy sealed inside her. Overhaul made quick work in examining Qiqi, from the earlier experiments he ran on her, he had found out that Qiqi was a moving corpse. He was unable to confirm if her form was a part of her quirk or if it had been afflicted by someone—maybe that someone was All For One, he thought. She had sentience, she was moving, but she still is a corpse; rigor mortis had been the cause of her stiffening muscles.
It was quickly solved with the use of his quirk—just tear apart and rearrange—and soon Qiqi could move again. The pain startled her, but that didn’t matter as she immediately forgot about it in the following minutes.
Of course, just because Qiqi couldn’t recall the memory, doesn’t mean her emotions were forgettable. She had felt fear and pain before, but without anything to attach them to, she didn’t bother to dwell on it.
“Poor you,” Overhaul uttered, “to be given a body like this, it must be terrible.” Even if it was not true that someone had afflicted her condition, it would be true that her parents had given her a terrible quirk if she was born with it. That was all the more to justify Overhaul’s cause of erasing quirks from the world.
But despite showing (faux) sympathy for Qiqi, Overhaul went through with his experiments on the zombie anyway—with no remorse and care in the world. All he had to do was order Qiqi to stay very still as he opened her flesh or applied unknown drugs to her. She was a subject of fascination as even without the use of his quirk Qiqi would recover quickly from scalpels, and even though the use of his quirk was not considered a wound, her body had tried to repair itself. Perhaps it wasn't injury or harm her body was trying to recover from but rather the reinforcement of stasis—her body always trying to go back to a particular form of hers. There was one time he became curious enough and shredded her into a splatter of blood, but before the pool of her blood made a splat of the ground her quirk immediately came into play and froze her blood in the air. It took only a few seconds before her body rearranged itself back to her normal form.
A quirk that refused to let her die…that just means that he doesn’t have to go through the trouble of finding more people to test on. He was secretly ecstatic at this development. No more did his men have to risk going out so frequently to find test rats, not when he had one here. (Qiqi didn’t have the typical body of a human so that still didn’t erase the need of normal humans.)
From her physical condition to the basis of her quirk, Overhaul wonders if he could do so much more with her than just being a tester for the development of that drug.
It was later decided that Qiqi would be assigned to Eri to prevent the crimson-eyed girl from escaping. Eri was naturally kind, Overhaul had executed a number of his underlings in front of her and it never failed to make her tremble, whether she was scared for her own safety or for them. Looking similar in age as well, Overhaul could find no more of a perfect candidate to stick to Eri’s side and lower her guards, and the best of all, Qiqi had no desire to escape, so there was no possible way Eri could coax the undead girl to use her insane strength to aid any sort of escape. He could order Qiqi to make sure of it.
But…it doesn’t seem like the plan might go anywhere with how the zombie was behaving. After a month of staying at the facility, Qiqi had developed the urge to want to go outside. The hills, she explained. She wants to go to the hills—to pluck out herbs. To do this, Qiqi broke through the security with pure physical strength—the hard concrete walls. She had no direction in her force, when she was lost she broke through the walls, only walking forward until she found stairs and reached the surface. The guards at the facility reported a chill air surrounding her as they approached, and were shamefully defeated in trying to stop her. She was able to inflict dangerous injuries to the men, showing that she was unable to control her power, all the more reason why she should be locked away. With no underlings able to stop her, the Eight Bullets had to be enforced in order to recapture her and a battle ensued. That was just how much was needed to subdue her.
In fact, the Hassaikai’s Eight Bullets pride were shaken when they weren’t even able to subdue one little girl by herself, Overhaul’s right-hand man had to step in to say they day, and it wasn’t even by his own strength; all he had to was pull Qiqi into his arms and say some flowery words to her—that was all that was needed to make her stop pursuing her goal.
This was then how Kai learned that Qiqi could give herself orders. Somewhere in between the month, she had unknowingly discovered she could give herself orders with no need of input from another. Qiqi needed orders to live, that was the only way she could function, but today she acted on order given to herself. That means…she has a will. If there ever came to be a moment she desired to, she could escape quite easily. Clearly, Qiqi has desires of her own.
To give his men such trouble despite her size, Overhaul could not let Qiqi grow complacent or this matter at hand go, instead of being like Eri, perhaps he could make her a loyal dog. As long as he catered somewhat to her desires, Qiqi will never be able to develop the want of running away or defying him. Yes, she is much too powerful for her own good, and making her stay put in a cell would be quite the waste of her strength. Truthfully, Overhaul was a bit shaken when he realized even his quirk could not kill her, but that made him want her as an asset all the more.
He never got to test out what she could do, aside from progressing his research, Overhaul thinks he just found a new interest. What were her limits, setbacks? What else could she do other than regeneration and having insane physician strength? How does her quirk truly function?
Overhaul started down at her, her eyes blankly stared at him, trying her hardest to recall wherever she had seen him before.
“Qiqi,” he spoke calmly, “I’ll give you anything you want, but you’ll have to listen to me.”
“What do I want?”
“Yes.” Although she spoke slowly, Overhaul was willing to be patient with her. “What is it you wish for.”
Stimulated by his words, Qiqi reacted with interest, but when she opened her mouth, “I…I want…I’m sorry. I forgot.”
—
The truth is, after the day of his proposal, Overhaul began to do more experiments with Qiqi—having it be a common occurrence, it was only natural that Qiqi would learn to remember the memories of such happenings and the pain that came with it. When she muttered it to Overhaul who came to pick her up from her plain room, he ordered her to simply forget about it—miraculously she did.
In time, she became able to differentiate Overhaul from the others who observed her too, but with no name to put to the man he appeared blurry whenever she tried to recall him. It was kind of upsetting. Right now as she trudges behind him, she could clearly picture him but by the time she is placed back into isolation everything is blurry. If only she could also forget about the fact that everything he tries to remember is blurry, then she wouldn’t have to feel so burdened and annoyed.
Qiqi might not be able to express her feelings, and sure her inability to remember things has led her to feeling…nothing? After all, people can only develop feelings and emotions about the world if they can recall and perceive the world. With Qiqi constantly forgetting everything, she has no perception of anything and can’t form a clear thought and develop emotions. But maybe, if she was able to maintain memory, maybe she could just be like a normal child, even if the biology of her brain is different from when she was alive. But that too, would be very cruel for her.
Overhaul finally stops in front of a heavily locked door, Qiqi almost ran into him if not for Chrono holding her in place. A hand on the metal, it deforms and creates an opening for the three of them to enter.
“Eri.”
Qiqi hears shuffling, her ears perk for a moment. A quiet whimper is heard when Overhaul shifts and gestures for Qiqi to come closer. His body was no longer blocking the way as she finally laid eyes to the girl pushing herself further into the head on the bed. After countless days of seeing the plain and monotonous colors of her room and the halls, the girl’s crimson eyes were strikingly eye-catching.
“Pretty,” Qiqi mumbled out. The eyes that were stricken with anxiety fell onto Qiqi, the girl’s fears were paused for a moment when she noticed her.
“Eri, this is Qiqi,” Overhaul gestured to her, “she’ll be visiting quite frequently, so remember her. Or should I say…”
He glanced at Qiqi in the corner of his eyes, “She has memory problems, you’ll have to introduce yourself quite often.”
Eri remained unresponsive. Most notably, she saw the bandages on her right foot, eliciting wary thoughts in the girl.
“Why don’t you say ‘hi’?” He suggested, almost threateningly.
“H-hi,” she squeaked, “I-I’m Eri!”
Qiqi blinked at her blankly, “Eri…”
—
In the events that followed after, Qiqi indeed did come to see, not everyday but the day after each day. At first, it eased Eri to know that there was a girl like her in this place, but that feeling turned to horror at the realization that she wasn’t the only one being kept here.
And all the more, Qiqi would always come to her forgetting her name. She always gave Eri a blank and confused look like she had never seen her ever, very much so like a doll—that terrified her. They wore the same clothing, but Qiqi doesn’t seem to ever have bandages on her except for the one around her foot, and she wonders if Kai—Overhaul—had been treating the other girl well unlike her. It scares her that Qiqi was here to observe her on the instructions to report back to him. But she’s just a girl like her, surely she could convince her to be nice and not do so.
Their interactions are always awkward, and the guard on stand by always pulls her away before they could meaningfully say anything to each other.
“Hi, I’m Eri.” she says. At this point, it’s routine that Eri always greets her like this whenever she enters the room.
“Hi…I’m Qiqi.”
Eri wonders how Qiqi could remember her own name.
On this particular day, instead of residing in the room with them, the guard leaves and closes the door behind him. Eri’s heart races as she anticipates danger from Qiqi but…that never came to be. Eri can’t tell the time, but it feels like an eternity already with the heavy atmosphere. In an attempt to control some aspect of the situation Eri speaks out first.
“Uhm. What did he ask you to do?”
“He?” Does she not know?
“K-Kai.” Even his name makes Eri feel nauseous.
“That man?” Qiqi questions, while Eri nods in confirmation.
“I…I forgot. I have a bad memory so I can’t remember well.” Overhaul did indeed say that, but Eri didn’t truly take it to heart until it was displayed to her. All this time, she had thought Qiqi didn’t like her at all and was deliberately trying to forget about her. She had every reason to believe she was playing pretend.
“Then, why do you remember your own name?”
That clicked something in Qiqi.”I don’t know, I just do.”
All of sudden, tears began flowing from her eyes. Qiqi doesn’t even realize it, but she’s crying. “I don’t know,” she repeated. “I don’t know…”
It hurts, Qiqi thinks. When asked to recall the reason to remember, a sharp feeling came into her chest, for some reason the words evoked deep memories that dwell inside her, they were all blurry and foggy as she saw figures moving about in the scenery, it all came in like a multitude of flashblack—all unclear but bright. The figures came closer and closer, waving at her, then she blinked and the scene changed; she sat down at a table with the unclear figures. Were they family? Qiqi doesn’t remember ever having a family. Yet, for some reason that makes the feeling in her chest squeeze all the more, her tears were surprisingly warm and it was hard for Qiqi to ignore them.
“It’s okay!” Eri stuttered. “You don’t have to cry…” She lifted her hand, but she was unsure of she should reach out to the other girl or stay put. “Please don’t cry.”
So that is what’s happening to her: crying. A feeling Qiqi could not fully understand. “Why? Why am I crying?”
Eri paused. “Maybe because you are sad,” she responded. Or scared—but Qiqi never appeared to be afraid.
“Why am I sad?”
That was something Eri could not answer; she didn’t know.
Her tears continued on, it never seemed to stop flowing. A few minutes had passed to where Eri deemed Qiqi to be non threatful, and really, she felt bad for staring at her for the minutes she cried. Hesitantly, Eri slid off her bed, and with small and gentle steps, she approached Qiqi. She had no idea what to do, all she could do was hug her.
“Please don’t cry,” Eri whispered again. Qiqi’s body was so cold, it didn’t make Eri feel any easier, but being able to hook her arms around her shoulder slightly did.
Qiqi was unable to remember, that pain of not being able to recall was genuine, which makes Eri feel bad too. Qiqi finally moves, and when she does she returns the embracing action to Eri. Closer to her, Qiqi could feel the vibration of a heartbeat—Eri on the other hand doesn’t.
“Mama?” Qiqi draws out. “I’m home,” she says, her last words before total darkness enveloped her vision
“Qiqi, Qiqi!” Eri called out but to no avail she could wake the pale girl whose weight was buried into her shoulder. Please don’t get in trouble for this, please don’t get in trouble for this. She prayed for herself, but maybe she should have thought more for Qiqi whom she dragged to rest on her bed.
Her prayers then turned to self blame as she glanced scarily at the sleeping girl, she was motionless and cold, not even a breath came from her. Then and there, Eri believes she had killed a girl like her, she had hurt someone again. Overhaul’s voice echoed painfully in her mind, she trembled with tears spurring on in her eyes. She killed her—that thought raced a million times back. Eri fell onto her knees, surely it was going to bruise. Before Overhaul would ever have the chance to find out, could she revert this?
But Eri didn’t realize, she could have never killed Qiqi—she was already dead.