•Chapter 8•

The bell rang, indicating the end of the lesson and the start of lunch break.

Riku slowly rose up from his seat and left the class without further socialising with his peers. He didn't see them as his equal, rather, he saw them as things beneath him.

He had never been prideful, he knew that much. So there must be a reason why he thought his classmates as beneath him, maybe it was related to his indifference at life. But whatever the reason was, it did not unnerve him.

Back when Kakashi-san tried to bring him to the playground so that he could play and interact with other toddlers, he had refuse to do so and only stared intently at a crawling green yellowish caterpillar.

It was fascinating, watching the low lifeform try to wiggle his way when death was only a brush away.

Watching the little caterpillar following his survival instincts to squirm away from the imposing threat (Riku) despite the fact that Riku only squat beside the small shoot and stared at it with a gaze of harmless intent.

Besides the point, Riku didn't really care much for his 'peers' though the girls and some guys his age seem to be following him with hearts for eyes.

"Riku-kun!! He's so cute!" one of the girls swooned from behind a corridor, loud enough for it to resonate across hall.

"Is Riku-chan a boy or girl? He's a girl right? No way a boy could look that cute!" a boy spoke, contradicting the other girls' statements.

"Let's go see which toilet Riku goes!" one suggested, earning nods of agreement between the crowd.

True, Riku had inherited his mother's appearance (which he was glad for because appearance is an important factor in life). His face was already quite feminime, added with his neck-length hair, he could be both a boy and a girl. In short, androgynous.

It didn't bother him much either as gender has no meaning to him. It was like- a label, yeah a label. When you die, it doesn't matter. A corpse will be a corpse, beautiful yet lifeless, easy to break like a ceramic doll.

Ignoring the arguing strangers, Riku made his way to the lavatory located on the second floor; also the floor where his seniors' classes situated. It was one of the ways he could think of to escape the unwanted intruders.

Though what he saw there greatly surprised him.

* * *

The crest on his dark blue shirt, there was no doubt about it.

It was the same symbol usually embroidered on his outfits (a few years back) and the symbols painted on the walls erected around his house.

Red on the upper area of the fan and white below. His memory of the years before were fuzzy, but the fan symbol- he was sure of it.

The guy who wore the shirt with the nostalgic symbol grunted before shoving his hands down his white knee-length pants and walked out the lavatory.

"W-wait!" Riku called out, eyes still fixated at the symbol behind his shirt.

"Y-you. . .that. . ." Riku said, stumbling on his words and finding it suddenly hard to properly speak like a lump of cotton was stuffed and absorbing his voice.

However, before he could question the older boy about the symbol, the older boy gave him the stink eye him before walking away, leaving Riku agape in the lavatory.

"W-wait. . .please. . ." Riku muttered the last part, his eyes pooled with tears from unknown origins. He remembered the gentle touch of his mother, the sweet lullaby that would make him drowsy and the pranks his father would play on him.

"No——" he mumbled, clutching his head as the tears from his eyes drop on the floor with a 'tick' sound. He found himself crying years after the incidents, though it didn't matter when he had cried, the dead will remain dead.

Nothing will change just because he cried and he knew that, yet he found himself crying uncontrollably.

The older boy paused on his way, he looked back with slight hesitance before continuing his way, ignoring the parallel image of himself of that dreadful night where the full moon haunted the compound and where the bloody eyes would haunt his dreams as he watch——

As he watched —over a thousand times— the death of his parents in the hands of that man.

* * *

Refreshing his face with the cold tap water, Riku slap his cheeks simultaneously to get rid of the migraine that came after the cry.

He double-checked for anymore unnecessary yet cute puffs on his face before he exit the lavatory.

Thankfully, he was not late for class as the homeroom teacher wasn't there yet. He returned back to his seat and spent the rest of school pondering over the reason as to his emotional outbreak.

That senpai, he would have to search for him again. He was the only one, outside his family, wearing the symbol on his outfit.

He remembered his mother's words, that that fan is the symbol of his clan, U- something.

Uraraka?

Umami?

Uchiro?

"Uchiha?" He recalled after he attempted different vowels.

"You're getting closer to the truth despite knowing it for a long time. . . You just refuse to look ahead." the familiar teen whispered into his ear and the Uchiha quickly flip his head to where he thought the voice came from, only to see that nothing was there to begin with as his seatmate was on the other end of the lond shared table.

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