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There is a certain point of oblivion one takes on just moments before mere destruction.
A clandestine moment of veiled tranquility that takes the form of feeling the wind in your hair, hearing the mockingbirds mimic the voices of those who have trekked the same path, seeing the different flowering vines stretching for miles around the overgrown woodland--because it has been too long since a groundskeeper has roamed these woods.
It’s even longer since the last house by the hill was occupied by a loving family who lived in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Inumaki tries to be strong, fastens his hold on the bulging knapsack the people in the village scraped together in what little they already had, in hopes of blanketing his journey into the unknown abyss with some semblance of comfort.
The two little girls that Getou, their last unsuccessful expeditioner of many, left behind a year ago still weep by the wisteria garden every morning.
They were quickly running out of the twining vines, too--which reminded Inumaki once more of the urgency of his situation and how he vowed to not be honoured through the blooms.
Inumaki tries recalling the first time they heard the siren-like screams coming from the backwoods that surrounded their humble village.
The second their screams ripped through the silent night, everyone was instantly overcome with unspeakable horror at having heard such heart-wrenching wails so close a pace. All the able-bodied adults automatically formed a small team of volunteers who scoured the area with torches of fire and all the passion of wanting to put an end to such misery.
None of them came back the next morning, or the next three years since.
Losing Gojo and Nanami that night was a blow they were still struggling to recover from to this day.
Perhaps what let their plebeian community thrive in discretion for so long was their strategic location to so much wildlife at their disposal in the said haunted forest. Lush green pastures filled with different kinds of nutritious fruit trees, fresh river water flowing seamlessly in the confines of the deeper parts of the lands, stray animals from the mainland grove their skilled hunters proudly took home from time to time that had the entire village celebrating their small victories.
It was hardly the most luxurious of lives, but they were all living in one way or another.
Only come the break of dawn the forest wailed and wept as it took and took, until suddenly there were more children than adults to care for and the kids from three years ago were thrusted into guardianship before they even learned the ropes to lead.
The Zen’in sisters and Megumi were busy keeping things in order, with as much knowledge they could before Toji, too, was taken from them. Panda and Todou rotated between guard duty each night, having the most bodily girth of everyone. Miwa and Momo cared for the infants left behind by courageous parents as they made do with whatever scraps were left in the rations.
Everyone had roles to play, and this was Inumaki’s.
Because not all days were bad.
Some days they found light at the end of the tunnel and sowed more than they reaped, some days someone especially skilled managed to break through the curse of the night and come back, though bloodied and bruised and more shaken than he has ever seen him—Yuuta made it back to camp one night.
He shocks everyone by disclosing it was not the sirens who did the screaming and wailing at night.
“The voices are not theirs,” he explained. “It belongs to all they stole it from. When they cry at night.. we hear everyone. They steal voices because they do not have the agency to speak for themselves. They pry the voice out of you by forcing you to see such horrendous images.”
The moment Yuuta said that, all eyes turned to him.
If he was an outsider looking in on the situation, he would have turned a hopeful gaze to the only one born with a speech disability, too.
For years he has loathed being selectively mute, but this was going to be the one time he was proud of it.
There was no question or debate to be held over this, Inumaki decided he was going to do it then and there.
Sensing his growing resolve, Yuuta was quick to close the distance between them, reaching for him; not as one of their fallen warriors who finally made it home, but as someone he has been with every single day for the past seventeen years and doesn’t want even a day to separate them.
“If you have to enter the forest,” Yuuta warns, “You must sing to keep them away.”
Inumaki notes his deliberate word choice, using have to instead of must.
Because even if they are each other’s very soul, the one lifetime tether they are confident will never snap into two no matter the forces that raged on; the same cannot be said for the world they have been thrusted into where lives are being broken every waking day and they are losing more people than they can live for.
Yuuta knows very well that he cannot sing to save his life, much less do it under life threatening situations; but the advantage of having a weighing disability for all of your life, is that you are used to feeling terror but never having to scream.
Even in this life and death situation, he was still giving him the option to choose a fate of his own, never pushing him in one direction or another. The same way he was always confined into being the weird quiet kid when they were younger or the rude way people poked fun at his muteness.
Yuuta was there for him every time, whether it was defending him from bullies or giving him one last chance to choose himself in this life the same way his birth didn’t give him the option to choose whether he would have liked to be able to speak or not.
Inumaki’s resolve soared higher. He would do this.
He would gather enough wood to keep their fires warm and fetch enough water to have them survive for another week without dipping into their food supply or live off measly blades of grass no longer.
But most importantly, Inumaki will make it back home.
He's brought out of his thoughts when he hears a twig snap somewhere behind him, whipping his head to locate the point of the sound.
Sirens do not walk, they linger in the air; feeling the atmosphere until they deemed it a long enough time to catch you off guard and whisk away the scream in your lips before you even register the voice of someone close to you lulling you into false safety.
For Getou, it was Gojo.
For Nanami, it was Haibara.
Inumaki takes comfort in the fact the only person he could possibly be affected by is safe back home, getting his wounds treated by Nobara and kept in close company by Yuji.
So when he is staring into the signature raven locks of his best friend who languidly stepped out of the birch tree, his long butcher knife nestled snugly into its leather holster and his back riddled with the last of their supplies; he does not know what to feel first.
Yuuta was always just a tad careless, but not never, ever this reckless.
He signs, What are you doing here?
Yuuta comes out of the shadows completely, allowing him a full view into his partially bandaged wounds that still had much healing to do and the terror still lingering behind his eyes.
He simply shrugs and gives probably the first genuine smile he’s seen in ages. “Cradle to grave, remember?”