floor burns | hxh

viii. START

開始

It's been six years since the massacre.

If Sakiko is being honest, it all feels like such a blur and yet at the same time, it doesn't. Sakiko's a new home, a real house with a kitchen, a bathroom, and a couple of rooms. Of course there's a basement and roof, but sometimes she gets cold feet and it takes her 20 minutes to have the courage to go there if she needed to. It's not like she's scared though, she's really not. She's seen⎯done⎯way worse things than what could possibly be there. (At least Sakiko tries to convince herself she isn't scared).

When Sakiko reaches the bathroom, her feet touch the cold tiled floor and she avoids looking at the mirror as she gets ready for her morning routine. It's a mundane process but once she's done washing her face and brushing her hair, she looks up. She's never really thought about her appearance, or rather, she tries to avoid it as best she can. It's strange when she looks at herself, because, really, it isn't her at all.

Everytime she looks into the mirror, her blood eyes drift over the exposed scars on her shoulders, her arms, and her hands. They aren't too ugly, but they aren't really pretty either. They are just there and her paleness and thinness doesn't help hide them. If she's being honest, she used to hate her skin. It was one of many things that showed she no longer was who she used to be. Now, indifference is all she really feels about her body.

She has blue locks, but not overly dramatic like on TV when those famous people dye their hair neon or very bright hues. In artificial light, it's always looked like a turquoise blue-green type of scenario, but then in the sun, it's like icy water. Sakiko used to think of it as leftover magic she got from Hisoka, her only power being the fact that she could change her hair color in different lighting. Of course now this sounds ridiculous and doesn't take into consideration that shades change a color's appearance⎯what am I even thinking right now?

It doesn't matter what Sakiko looks like. She's 13, and today, her father is leaving again. Speaking of him, he waltzes in the bathroom after deciding that she was doing nothing important.

"Little miss, I've been thinking." Having Hisoka around is oddly therapeutic (just like those small, rubber balls that will never break even if you squeeze and squeeze and squeeze).

"That sounds like a bad omen." She offers as a reply, matching the amused look her father sends her. They are both very alike; a little bored, cynical, most likely "insane", dead. They only have each other. He stands there analyzing before sitting across from her. He wants to make Sakiko do something, and it makes her chest ache. "The hunter exams are coming."

They look at each other stone faced, yet he looks slightly more feminine than she. That's only because of the make-up though. It makes her lips tilt upwards, but all her smiles are empty and just for show. It dawns on her that he wants her to go to the Hunter Exams—why now all of a sudden? He smirks back.

"Should I go?" She asks, but it's more of a formal acceptance. She's going to go either way, so it's better if there's no complications, right? He looks away and he's frowning as if displeased by her actions. Why?! She's screaming in her head angrily and disgusted but at the same time she's hurt and she loves him so much—she's doing everything he wants her to do, there was no reason for him to be annoyed by her lack of restraint.

"Ah. Since I failed the first time, I thought it would be easier if at least one of us became a hunter. That way I won't have to worry about holding myself back so much," his explanation is a transparent truth, so obvious it makes her insides burn. He knows that she's caught his blatant lie, and he's amused—