Work Text:
Tatoe asu ga [missing]
Ikidomari demo [going]
Jibun no te de [breaking]
Kirihirakunda
Sukumu karada [get up]
Tsuyoku idaite [stacking]
Kakugo de fumidashi
- BLACK SHOUT
hikawa sayo
You're comfortable backstage. Many performers, you've heard and observed, seem to suffer from some sort of mounting anxiety before it begins; in fact, you are watching several of your own band members display a lamentable lack of composure at this very moment. Imai-san is uncharacteristically tucked away in a corner doing her very best Shirokane impression, entirely failing to keep up her usual Team Mother demeanor, Shirokane-san herself is huddled near Udagawa while swallowing the obvious build-up to a panic attack, and Udagawa is air-drumming with a nervous, slightly manic grin on her face, mumbling something about "knights of shadow rising from the infernal darkness" or some such nonsense, as much for her own sake as Shirokane-san's, you suspect.
Stupid, all of it; allowing those feelings to take control is only going to destabilize them. You could halfway excuse it with a firm roll of your eyes were you only starting out, but this is far from your first performance as a band. All of you have proven yourself, even Imai-san. This is just an opportunity to showcase your talents. Can't they try to emulate yourself and Yukina - er, Minato-san? You prepare for every show calmly, tuning your instruments, nursing a controlled excitement if anything at all, like sane, healthy-minded human beings.
Well, whatever. It's not your problem. In fact, you're irritated that they've wasted your time and concentration by making you notice them. Although, in terms of noticing... where actually is Minato-san? Despite being the most refined and elegant person here - well, aside from yourself - you haven't quite found her.
Ah, no, there she is, entirely opposite you. She's heading toward... Imai-san, in fact, no doubt to attempt to get her to focus. Minato-san is rather dedicated that way; frankly, you admire her relentless stamina in cracking down on the weaker members of the band. Nothing can drag her down, but she will not let any amount of tomfoolery keep her from dragging everyone else closer to her level, so as to avoid obscuring her own considerable talent. Not that you think anyone can, except for yourself. No matter how hard a mortal struggles, it will never truly touch the divine.
(Sometimes you like to think of yourself as the Erato to her Euterpe, all the rest merely followers who can be inspired to some slight value by way of their worship.)
You decide to edge a bit closer, to listen in; there's something very satisfying about watching one of these idiots get whipped into shape. Once you're in range you notice Minato-san standing with her back to the same wall Imai-san is leaning against. She is fidgeting very slightly. Something is very off about this; Minato-san is not someone who fidgets.
"... Imai-san. Perhaps it is - improper. However..." Hmm. Minato-san, drifting in and out of audibility, but her tone of voice is peculiar, hard to place. If you didn't know better you would peg her as nervous, though you can't fathom what could place her in such a state. Imai-san, for her part, is suddenly smiling, which is not at all what you'd expect. Her obnoxiously obvious anxiety hasn't disappeared, but...
"... can just call me Lisa, if you want." Imai-san, softly.
You struggle to process that excerpt for a moment; you must have misheard her. Nothing about what you clearly, definitely misheard would make any sense. It's just been warped by the noise of the crowd on the other side of the curtain, the...
"... Lisa-san, then. When we're alone. Not here." Minato-san. Your mind, in an instant, goes almost entirely blank. The ground beneath your feet is suddenly unstable.
And then, the most unthinkable thing of all. Imai-san's hand drifts just a bit to the side, brushing against Yukina-san - Minato-san's, and instead of recoiling... she takes it, squeezing for a brief instant before releasing her again, a slight blush creeping onto her cheeks. You feel as if you've been struck by something heavy and cold.
Both of them are smiling, which is strange because you're unable to imagine smiling as a concept that still exists in this world.
You remove yourself from hearing range. There is a set to play. Distractions are not conducive to cohesive music. Yukina-san said it herself: there is no room for personal problems in Roselia.
No room whatsoever.
The set goes by in a strange blur. You hardly know where you are, playing on autopilot, some force apart from your mind commanding you to pluck away at your guitar. All you can think of is Yukina-san and Imai, their terrible smiles, their traitorous hands.
(What does Imai have that you don't?)
For some reason Imai's bass feels louder, more obtrusive than any other instrument, louder even than Yukina-san's singing. It echoes cruelly in your head. Nothing about it is out of place on a technical level, but it rips at your eardrums like a cheese grater on a chalkboard.
(Why aren't you good enough? What are you doing wrong?)
Midway through the last song, you finally slip up, a single discordant twang proclaiming your lack of worth to every single listener, the worst mistake you've ever made on-stage. Somehow only half your brain has room to be horrified; the other half is too busy imagining garroting Imai with her own guitar strings.
(No room for personal problems in Roselia.
No room for problems.
No room for you.)
It's over. It's finished and the music is gone and you are in a new location, wandering wordlessly along with the rest of Roselia to... somewhere. You've gathered, vaguely, that this is some kind of casual "celebration." Yukina ought to be opposed to that, should have shut these animals down instantly, but... she hasn't done it. Udagawa is excited for some reason, literally dragging Shirokane-san along by the hand.
(Hand in hand.)
Imai's bass is still grinding at the inside of your brain, an itch you'd claw your skull open to scratch if you thought you could. It's her. This is all her fault. You wouldn't have humiliated yourself if it weren't for her and her stupid bass, her impossible volume, her presence here in your band distracting your Yukina-san stealing what little things are yours and you
("Call me Lisa, if you want.")
turn on your heels, ears ringing, and glare directly at the offending organism with enough force to level a city block.
"Imai-san," you all but spit. "Your playing tonight was unacceptable." One by one, everyone stops. Shirokane-san looks terrified, as if she thinks a murder is about to take place. If only it were so. Udagawa is obviously confused. Yukina-san and Imai's eyes are equally wide. You suppose that for them, thoughtless as they clearly must be, this is coming out of nowhere. They blindsided first; you have every right to do the same.
"... Was it?" Imai has the gall, the audacity, to act surprised. To put on airs of distress. "What did I do wrong?"
"What - what didn't you do wrong?! You're - distracting. Crass. Are you not aware that you're our weakest link? Because I am! If it weren't for your so-called performance, mine would have been flawless!"
"Hikawa-san," Yukina-san says, stepping forward - and god, you can hardly stand to look at her now, heartless and beautiful and further away than ever before. "You are making excuses for yourself. I would have expected better from you than shifting blame to -"
"Oh, yes, naturally you'd defend her!" The endless hallucinatory bass is still buzzing, still stinging. It's a miracle your head hasn't caught fire from the friction. "She shouldn't be here in the first place and we all know it, she's an anchor weighing us down, she's weighing me down! Do you really think I would have erred so severely if -"
"Stop it." Yukina-san's voice is so... empty. So cold. Hostile. "There is no time for this childish nonsense." Childish? Nonsense? It's the hard truth, it's a mouthful of broken glass you have to spit out as quickly as possible before you choke on your own blood. Dimly, you realize there are tears in Imai's eyes. Good. Good! Does it hurt, not being good enough? Even she sees it! She herself! So why can't Yukina-san? What disease of the mind has she contracted?
"Yu - Minato-san -" You stutter, trying to think how best to explain yourself. How to get through to her. To remind her that if anyone here should be able to put the warmth back in her eyes, it should be you.
"Hikawa. Go home." You stop dead, mouth hanging just slightly open. Perhaps you are dead, Yukina-san's words piercing your heart like a dull knife.
"... I... but I..." Why? Why did it come to this? How can she look at you with such contempt, such disappointment, like she doesn't even grasp who the failure here is?
(How can you endure it?)
"Go. Home. There is no room for personal problems in Roselia. Leave, and we will discuss this matter when - and if - you can conduct yourself like an adult again."
And with that, your strings are cut. You ought to collapse on the concrete in a tangle of dead limbs, clatter like the lifeless thing you are, but you remain dizzily standing, tears you hadn't even noticed building up now spilling down your cheeks. Every single member of your band is staring at you, an array of ugly expressions from fear to shock to hurt to rage. Imai, like a pathetic child, is crying silently. She looks as gutted as you feel. You hate her for it, fiercely, madly, like you've never hated anyone before. You want to scream at her, throw her to the ground and break her fingers.
Instead, you turn away. You do as Yukina-san commanded.
In a daze, walking through evening air that's nightmare-thick, smudging your eyeshadow with the back of a careless hand, you go home.
By the time you get home, you have stopped actively crying, at least, so that's one tiny scrap of dignity half-recovered. The whole way here you kept expecting it to rain for some reason. It didn't, and it's difficult to pin down exactly why that upsets you.
Your front door looks like a portal to sanctuary for the two seconds it takes you to remember that Hina will be home, too. Lovely. Simply lovely. Well, there's nothing for it. All you can do is stumble through and face the music, or lack thereof.
Hina is home, fouling up the living room with her presence, watching some obscure anime and idly humming what you unwillingly recognize as one of her own band's songs. You try to sneak by her, to quietly slink into your room while she's distracted.
Naturally, you fail.
"Hey there, Sayo-chan! How was your..." She turns to face you mid-sentence, and stops dead upon seeing the utterly wretched state you're in. Her expression shifts immediately from vacant happiness to worry and furrowed brows. It's repugnant, vicious. "Sayo-chan?! What's wrong, what happened? Did somebody die?"
"None of your business," you mumble. "I'm going to my room." Hina's unwanted concern doesn't matter. Nothing matters.
"Um - w-wait!" She scrambles up off the couch, doesn't quite block your way but still makes herself an obstacle. "Hey, come on! Oh, this will cheer you up, something funny happened today!" Hina looks grotesquely, inexplicably desperate to please, as if anything she has ever said or done has given her the idea she could make your life better instead of worse.
"Get it over with." You don't have the energy to waste waving her away. She can run her course and then you can go hide in your bed and feel properly sorry for yourself.
"It's the weirdest thing. I got a confession today! From one of my bandmates! Crazy, right?"
You. Have no idea. How to respond to that. God is dead. God was always dead. Your sister's birth killed God.
"I mean, I had to turn her down? Like, Eve-chan's fun to hang out with, but she's only got one interest and it's Japan? Which is... kinda not boppin' in a way that makes any sense to me, but I guess that's just how life is sometimes! So I said -"
You shove your sister out of the way. She lets out an offensively wounded squeak, stumbling sideways as you stalk past. The escape feels about as long as your entire trip home and crossing the threshold between rooms feels like stepping into another dimension.
"... what did I say?", Hina sniffles.
You make a point to slam the door.
Once you're inside, you wipe every trace of the incredibly, unbearably, outrageously unfair thing she said to you from your mind, scrubbing the memory out with imaginary steel wool. Then you stumble over to your bed, sit on the edge, spend at least a minute staring into the middle distance. Get up again, moving like a half-powered machine, pointedly refuse to thank the corpse of God for the fact that your room connects to the bathroom (even if Hina's does, too), wash your ruined make-up off at the sink.
Your reflection gazes emptily back at you, eyes puffy and red, and you wonder, are you just plainer than you realized? Is Imai that much more attractive? She's certainly more devoted to her appearance than you are. Or is the problem not so shallow?
... How silly of you. Yukina-san has not been "shallow" for a second of her entire life. Whatever is wrong with you is far more important than your unremarkable looks.
You sweep aside some of Hina's cheap jewelry - the garbage is scattered all over the sink - and dry your face. What's next? It's difficult to remember the sequence of actions necessary to put an end to the day. Ah, right. Clothing. You may as well change into something appropriate. A plain white nightdress ought to do. It fulfills its purpose in a practical sense, and nothing more.
You've hardly finished changing when a knock at your door startles you enough that you're forced to stifle a gasp.
"What do you want?" You aren't about to open up for her, but if you don't respond, she might try to barge in or something, and you simply won't have that.
"I want to know what's wrong," Hina says, muffled by the wood.
"Well, that's too bad, because I don't want to talk about it. Goodnight." You try to keep your voice as level as possible. If you sound at least stably angry, perhaps she'll -
"I want you to talk to me for once," she replies, and a little knot of something you can't quite describe forms in your guts. "You're totally not okay, and like... I just want to understand. Is that... is that wrong?"
"Yes. Leave."
"No! I don't like leaving! Why do you get mad when I try to act like your sister? Why do you want to be strangers all the time?"
"Because I hate you!", you say, and after a few seconds of silence, you realize you were quite a bit louder than you intended. Well... so what? So what if you yelled? Why should you suddenly feel a twinge of guilt? "Because you're you! You get every little thing your empty heart desires, you're better than I am at everything under the sun, and you don't even appreciate it! You just wander through your life not knowing how it feels to be human, torturing me by trying to pretend you ever knew how to love someone!"
You're shaking. A lot. You... may have... gone too far. Been too honest. These things are simply not said. They are horrid truths that go unspoken because truth is horrid. And here you are putting them under a blazing spotlight.
Remaining upright has begun to require a lot of effort. Everything is effort, or at least it is for you. So you let yourself sink to the floor, half-consider just lying there. Eventually you settle for sitting with your back pressed against the door. Insurance, in case she tries to open it.
Hina does not try to open the door. She doesn't even reply. The silence is so loud in your ears that you want to scream. Can she either spare you with the sound of her footsteps retreating, or puke up her next hollow sentiment already?
... She does neither. Instead, she becomes the third person this night to cry over someone else's words. Your stomach turns at the sound as it intensifies, moving from pathetic little sniffs into actual proper crying, a step or two below outright sobs.
"Stop it." You don't intend to speak. It just... comes out. "Stop it. Or at least do it somewhere I can't hear you."
"... W-will you at least... give me a h-hint?"
"Fine. If that'll shut you up. I..." You can't tell her what actually happened, the full breadth of it. You refuse to. "I made a mistake. That's all. I messed up." You hate the way your voice trembles, how you have to swallow hard to get your lip to stop quivering.
Hina is still crying; you wonder what she's doing out there other than being pathetic, and then something thumps against the other side of the door at almost the same level as your back. It takes you a second to visualize, and when you do, you almost laugh out loud. You're both back-to-back with the door in between you. How absurdly dramatic.
"I... I talked to... m-my band, a while ago," she finally says. So what? Why should you care? "A-and I realized... really realized that people are, different than me, I guess? They can't just - do things. And I don't understand it. Maybe I can't understand it. But - but if that's how you really think of me, then... maybe I don't know what it's like to be human. Maybe that's what's wrong. Only people get to - get to h-have sisters, so of course I can't have you."
You feel sick. Deeply, horribly sick, like you're coming down with a flu or you ate something spoiled. This is definitely the worst night of your entire life.
"Is it wrong to miss you?", Hina says, and you're legitimately impressed with yourself for not throwing up. "R-remember when we were little? And you loved me?"
"Please. Please, please just. Stop this. Don't... don't..." Why are you about to cry again? This is absolutely stupid, it's twisted and cruel and she doesn't get to have this, she doesn't get to steal your sadness too, she doesn't get to be all of the things she is and still be real. It's not fair. It's just not.
"It was nice," she says, quietly, so quietly. "I don't think I ever stopped loving you. If I love anything, it's you."
"... Nobody loves me, Hina. Not you, not Yukina-san -"
You slam on the brakes one word and honorific too late.
"Wait... Minato-chan? Do you mean you... like her?"
"YES! Maybe! I don't know!", you wail, and it's maybe the quickest transition between silence and sobbing in your life. "What do I know about love? I don't even know if I love music. I just - I wanted to be the best at something for once! I wanted to be the most important thing just once in my stupid life! But no, of course there was someone she liked more, of course there's a better girlfriend for her than me! Of course there's somebody who didn't even have to try!"
There's another long, awkward, utterly bleak stretch of time where no one is doing anything but crying. Of course, now you're the one doing most of it, screeching like an injured child, hugging your knees to your chest. Is this the one thing you're better at than Hina? Being a detestable, tear-soaked wreck?
"... Onee-chan?" What is it now? What could she possibly have to say to you now? "I'm good at, um, everything I try to be, right?" You don't dignify her with a response. After a few seconds she goes on anyway. "So maybe I could be good at being somebody who's in love with you."
...
You think that you understood each individual word she said, but the sentence itself is gibberish. It simply doesn't parse.
"You're already the person I like most, so... maybe I could be your girlfriend." Her voice is tiny, terrified, and something else you can't identify. It's something you've literally never heard in her before, and that really doesn't help you comprehend what she's saying.
"... Did you just... what? What are you talking about?"
"I don't know," Hina says. "I'm good at stuff so I could probably be good at being that too. I'm - I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that, it was - that was weird. I didn't... um." Her shirt scrapes against the door as she moves away or stands up.
"Why would you even want to do something like that?" This is some weird dream, right? Maybe the whole night is a dream. If this isn't real, then none of it has to be real. But... it doesn't feel like a dream, and you're not... you're many things, but you're not stupid. This actually just happened.
"Because you're the coolest," she says. "Even though you're kind of mean to me sometimes, you're still... y'know. The boppin'-est! I guess!" Hina giggles, high and panicky. She sounds like a parody of herself, and you think she knows it. "I said I loved you, and you wanted somebody to love you, so..."
"There's a difference between 'loving' your family and loving somebody in a way that makes you want to date them!" You can't believe you're having this conversation. It is, without doubt, the most bizarre conversation you've ever had. You are breaking so much ground in absurdity that the planet ought to crack in two.
"I know! I'm not dumb, I know what I said and I... and I meant it. It's not like this is..." A second passes in tense silence, before she half-whispers, "It's not like this is the first time I've thought about it."
"... Oh," you say. That's really all you can manage.
"Can I... can I come in?" She sounds so scared. Vulnerable. It's nothing like the cheerful, vacuous image she normally projects. She sounds almost human. You should hate her for it. Didn't you hate her, just a moment ago? You do, of course you do.
But... you didn't always hate her, did you? There... really was a time when the two of you were just... happy. Small and stupid and happy and together.
"... Yes," somebody else says with your mouth, and somebody else stands up with your legs as you hear her shuffling quickly to her feet outside, and somebody else, in the same distant dreamlike way, opens the door with your hand.
Hina - your sister, Hina - is standing directly in front of you, face wet with tears and flushed with embarrassment, and there is nothing even slightly fair about the hopeful puppy-dog look in her eyes.
Maybe she has a point. Your life is as stupid as any life can be, now. You've probably ruined things forever with your band; certainly you've destroyed any hope of Minato-san being interested in you. An unfortunately large number of your terrible, unvoiced feelings are out in the open. Why not just keep on going until you destroy every last bit of sanity and respectability you have?
... and it's not as though hating someone you live with is pleasant.
You do remember, being small, and happy, and loving your sister. Drawing things, and watching things. Playing together, laughing together, bathing together. The way... the way things still feel like they should be, like they would be if Hina wasn't so very Hina.
"Um. I didn't really think this through any further. I kind of... didn't think you'd let me in!"
"Right," you say, blinking a few times, dragging yourself out of your memories. "I... did not really put any thought into it either."
How strange, that you almost want to smile at that; wryly, yes, self-deprecatingly at best, but... the urge is still there. Hina reaches up almost absent-mindedly and wipes the tears from one of your cheeks. This, apparently, is your cue to notice that your heart is pounding rather hard. It's quite possible that it has been for a while. You've just had other things on your mind.
"Hoooow about... I kiss you. And if you don't like it... then I'll leave you alone and we can never ever talk about it ever." You can feel your face heat up at the word "kiss." Are you really going along with this? It's your last chance to back out while still completely free of this particular debasement. You can say no. You should want to say no. You should say no.
"Okay," you say instead.
She stares at you in astonishment. Her lips twitch as she clearly tries to forcibly keep some kind of stupid expression off of them.
Then she leans forward and presses them against yours.
... They're very soft, so that's a mark in her favor, or something approaching one. It's... a bit difficult to think clearly enough to make a cohesive judgment about that. Your eyes are open, and as a result you can see that hers aren't. In this moment, resentment dulled and temporarily buried, you can't help but notice how apocalyptically adorable that is.
It occurs to you that you have no idea how to kiss someone, but she probably doesn't either. (Then again, she'll figure it out in no time.) You slowly move your lips against hers and she presses against you a bit more firmly. Is this a long time to be kissing someone? It feels like a long time already, but your ability to track elapsed seconds has completely gone out the window. For all you know, you've barely started at all.
Her mouth opens just a little and her tongue brushes against your bottom lip. Something something sharp and hot lances through you, way down low in your stomach, and a small, oddly desperate, squeaky sort of noise escapes you. Hina pulls back, startled.
"I'm sorry! That was an accident, I'm sorry, I -"
"Please shut up," you say, and pull her back in. You're dizzy, as dizzy as you were earlier in the evening except somehow it's different, and it's tough to hold on to any thought apart from 'you stopped kissing me and I disagree strongly with that course of action.'
You're a bit more aggressive this time, and are oddly pleased by the discovery that if you brush your tongue over her lip, you can cause her to make almost exactly the same embarrassing noise that you did. It doesn't feel like winning, exactly, but it feels like not losing, which is better than nothing. You don't like settling for less than total victory, but right now you're willing to lower your standards.
If nothing else you can be the first person to push her tongue into the other's mouth, so you do, and are thus in the lead. She tastes like mouth, which probably shouldn't be a surprise, and she's warm and a bit wiggly. Hina's arms wrap around your back; you realize dimly that you've already done precisely that to her, too, in your newfound need to be as physically close as possible. Maybe if you squeeze and keep squeezing, you can forget that you're two different people who are more or less incapable of getting along, pretend that you're a single, better person who won't forget how to be happy as soon as this is over.
She is clearly feeling something that's at least superficially similar, and takes it further by pushing her leg in between yours, stepping even more deeply into the kiss. You, like a dumb animal running on instinct, attempt to imitate her. This is not actually physically possible. What happens instead is her thigh ends up pressed into your crotch through your nightdress and something halfway between a perversely pleasant cramp and an electric shock burns its way up into your insides.
"Nnh," you whimper involuntarily, digging your fingers into her shirt, and in the process you accidentally bite her lip; she squeaks loudly, stumbles, and both of you nearly fall over before you manage to disentangle.
"... So," Hina says, wide-eyed and breathing hard, leaning against the door frame for balance, "um, do you hate me and want me to leave, or?"
"I think," you say, straining every one of the roughly ten un-fried neurons you have left, "we should go into my room, and close the door, before our parents come home."
(Our parents. Because this isn't Yukina-san, or anybody who's even a tiny little bit reasonable. It's Hina, specifically. Your sister. Who just kissed you, and then was kissed by you. Hina, and not someone else.)
"Wow, that's really obvious and a really good idea, let's do that, like, instantly?"
So you do.
You sit on your bed for the second time tonight, but this time you're not alone. Hina sits down right next to you, close enough that her arm is squished up against yours. Then she turns to you, an idiot's grin plastered on her face.
"Do you know what that was? That was totally -"
"Don't you dare," you say, already knowing it's too late to cut her off.
"Boppin'," she finishes. You shove her over and she flops down onto the bed, giggling hysterically. You're sort of astonished to find that you're laughing, too. Not much, of course. An entirely respectable amount. But it's still the first time the two of you have laughed together in... God, you don't even know how many years.
Now what, though? You would very much like to be kissing her again, but also... well... also you're feeling distinctly... excited.
You've already made an incredible host of bad decisions tonight, so what's one more?
"Hina-chan," you say awkwardly, suddenly finding it tricky to meet her eyes. "I... think that it would be, er... nice, if... wait, what happened? What did I say?" Her face has suddenly scrunched up, and her eyes are filling with tears all over again. What did you do? What did you do this time? Did you -
"You called me Hina-chan," she says. "You haven't called me that in... in a really, really super long time."
Did you? You didn't even notice. That's vaguely disturbing. You think. Maybe. Your concept of what is or isn't disturbing has proven to be impressively unreliable.
"That's lovely I suppose, but you are distracting me from my point, which was that you have made me very aroused and I think you should do something about that!" ... Oops. Well, you sure did just irritably blurt out that sentiment. You thought your face was hot before; you were an idiot. Your face now feels like it's downright ablaze.
"Wow," she says, blinking away the little glisten of tears that didn't quite overflow. "O-kay! Okay then. Wow."
The two of you stare at each other for two or three long, nervous seconds, and then she reaches up and pulls you the rest of the way down onto the bed with her, and then you're fumbling to straddle her waist and leaning down and she's kissing you again, feverishly, biting your lip, and your hands are up under her shirt, and this has all escalated incredibly quickly and no part of you is capable of regretting it or worrying about it, because she's soft and warm and alive and touchable.
Hina's fingers tangle in your hair at almost the exact second your hand slides all the way up to knead her breast. You feel like you're committing some grave offense that you should probably be punished for; your sister clearly disagrees, whining into your mouth and accidentally tightening her grip on your hair, which is something you had no idea you would like until just now.
"Take it ooooff," she whines, pulling up her own shirt with her free hand. You are absolutely willing to oblige, but she has her stupid jacket on and it gets stuck above her breasts, which is an interesting moment to realize she must have taken advantage of her time home alone to skip out on wearing a bra, as well as a look you think suits her quite well.
"Is that close enough?" You're... to put it frankly, a bit smitten. Of course you knew Hina was technically very pretty, but - the combination of her exposed breasts (nipples hard in the cool, conditioned air) and your current, possibly temporary ability to see her as something other than your enemy... all of that goes together to reveal that she is, in fact, gorgeous.
"That works!" And she unceremoniously yanks your nightdress up past your waist, staring brazenly at your panties. It takes all of your composure not to shriek. "Oh. You're kinda..." Hina trails off, swallowing.
"What?" You can't keep a hint of exasperation clear of your tone. You're feeling more and more desperate to get on with this.
"You're kinda real wet, huh?"
If you are not red as a tomato, it's only due to some sort of miracle, and as you have in fact declared God to be long dead, those don't exist. At least that means there's no one to judge you for your sins. You sit up straighter on your knees, your dress still caught firmly in both of her hands, and look for yourself. Well then! She is not wrong. You had somehow not quite noticed it, but there's an obvious wet spot in your panties. Maybe that's normal for someone trampling over taboos at such an alarming rate.
"And whose fault do you think that is? You'd better - EEEEK!"
You managed not to shriek when she yanked up your dress like a common pervert. You do not manage not to shriek when she lets half your dress fall down only to press the newly freed hand in between your legs and run her fingers along the aforementioned wet spot. Suddenly, your knees aren't quite working; you topple forward and catch yourself with your forearms, slipping all the way down until your face is buried in Hina's shoulder.
She could do something kind and merciful, like giving you a second to breathe, but she's herself, so instead she doubles down, cupping your crotch and running her fingers firmly up and down your panties while you muffle your extremely pathetic noises in her warm skin, nuzzle against her hair.
"J-just, pull them, off, already," you manage. Hina kisses your neck, which is deeply unfair, trails her hand up your rear until she's snagged your dress comfortably around your stomach, and then tugs your panties down while you flop awkwardly to get your body parts at an angle you can actually leverage to get them off.
Once they're gone, the reality of them being gone sinks in, and then the reality of everything sinks in, at least partially. You're straddling your own actual real life sister, on your bed, with her shirt pulled up to expose her (cute) breasts, and you are completely nude below the waist, and she is staring directly at your - parts.
... You did decide to keep on dynamiting your future; you suppose you're doing quite well at that, aren't you?
Her hand moves up your thighs again, but this time there's no mitigating factor whatsoever. Hina's fingers slip humiliatingly easily through your folds, which are every bit as wet as your underwear indicated. There's very little you can do but kiss her to hide some of your shame, panting into her lips while she continues exploring. You can try to even the odds at least partially, adjusting yourself to lean harder on one arm so that the other one can grope her chest, flicking your thumb across her still quite stiff nipple. There, let her be the one to make embarrassing noises again!
You feel her fingers suddenly dip farther back, and realize too late what she's going for. She slips into you, one finger at first while you twitch and squeeze her breast, and then very unkindly starts shoving in a second one. It's not - it's not more than you've ever had inside you before but - would it have killed her to go slowly?
Then again, you're not about to just give in. You can take whatever she's got.
At some point, in the middle of working her fingers in and out of you while you make a mess of her hand and see how much you can tweak her nipple without her squeaking turning into squeaks of actual pain, you notice her breathing hitch and then speed up, getting more and more erratic, and you tilt your head to look back and discover she's shoved her spare hand down her jeans. Well. That's... fair. You can't exactly reach her, the way you're organized right now.
Things go on in the same vein, kissing, touching, feeling her hips buck below you as she gets herself off, rather more intensely feeling her palm grind against your clit over and over while she fingers you harder and faster, the world utterly quiet except for your breathing and ridiculous mammal sounds and maybe just a little bit of embarrassing squelching and the quiet protests of the bed underneath you.
You wonder, dumbly, if this is what being happy feels like, and can't decide what you want the answer to be; if this isn't happiness then you'll never be happy, surely, but if it is then it's going to be over.
Happiness always is, though. Why should it be any different now?
"God," Hina gasps suddenly, squeezing her eyes shut, "God, o-onee-chan - S-Sayo-chan, I'm going to, I'm," and then she seizes up, losing the rhythm she had been fingering you with, whining long and low. You massage her breast and bite her neck and try to figure out if her coming first means you've won or lost. Quite some time later she finally goes slack; unfortunately you still aren't sure how to track your scores.
"You'd better not, take this as an excuse, to quit what you were doing, Hina-chan," you say, grinding down against her hand meaningfully; she rolls her eyes, speeds up again, and then she withdraws the hand she was touching herself with and - seriously?! - raises it to your lips like she expects you to lick her fingers clean.
"Pleaaaase?" She flutters her eyelashes sadly. A vein ought to be popping in your forehead.
"You can't be serious."
"I bet you'll like it, though," she says. God. You know what? Fine. This is a challenge, and haven't you already decided you won't be backing down from any of those?
You lean forward and suck on your stupid sister's stupid sticky fingers. They taste... not exactly like you do, but not all that different, either. You don't love it, you don't hate it. But... there is something very primally, barbarically hot about knowing you're - sucking your sister's slime off her fingers. Well, now that you've phrased it that way it's gotten sort of weird, but that's beside the point.
... A few seconds later, your mind is suddenly echoing sister, sister, she's your sister, you're doing this to your sister, and it's all too much, her palm on your clit and her fingers flexing and pumping inside you, caught up in a sudden spike of both hideous panic and equally hideous arousal, and you finally come, hiding your face in her shoulder again to muffle something that's not quite a scream, you swear.
There's nothing left to do now but collapse on top of her in a pile of sweaty, shameful limbs.
"... You are my sister," you mumble. "I just did that with my sister."
"When you put it like that it's kind of... a lot," Hina admits. You snort. It would've been "a lot" even without the outrageous taboo; "a lot" doesn't begin to cover it.
"Do you... really love me?" You're starting to feel very, very sleepy, which is not a new experience; you usually do this right before bed because it's all but inevitable.
"Yeah," Hina breathes. "Do you... do you still hate me?"
"No," you say, simply. Everything feels floaty and light and you honestly can't even remember how this crazy thing got started.
"Will you hate me again tomorrow?" The mixture of hope and fear in her voice is just painful enough to register in your half-conscious state and make you feel like the worst person who's ever lived.
"... I... I don't... probably not," you whisper, and that's the best you can give her without being dishonest.
"I love you, Sayo-chan," she says, clinging to you so tightly you wonder if she's afraid you'll vanish if she lets go. You wonder if she's right to be.
"Love... you too..." Finally you let your eyes drift shut, and it occurs to you that it's the truth; right here and right now, you love your sister.
Your last thought before passing out is to hope that you'll still mean it in the morning.