A/N: LOOK WHO DECIDED TO FINALLY COME BACC.
I'm sorry y'all, I haven't updated in... idk like three months?
I wish I had a better excuse but I'm just realllllly lazzzzyyyy so I haven't been on Wattpad for the longest time. But I miss you guys and writing so much, so hopefully, I can update more frequently. (No promises though.)
You guys have honestly been really supportive and I teared up like crazy when I checked on the story to see that so many people have such positive comments. Thank you so much for always being so nice.
Anyway, enough about my hella long absence... onto the story.
If you need a quick recap of events since it's been so long, here it is: (If you don't need it, feel free to skip over :D)
(Y/N) and Genji moved in together after high school, and were both in college. (Y/n) was accepted into a government strategy program since she's one of the smartest people in Japan. Maya left a note after graduation stating that she was running away with Erick, and hasn't been in touch since.
It's revealed through an unknown point of view that (Y/n) is being constantly monitored by Talon, and there's someone on the inside keeping tabs on her with the code name "Peps".
She befriends a guy called Pepper, a student in Genji's class, who later tells her that he feels as though she may be pregnant.
After conducting a test, (Y/n) confirms that she's pregnant and both her and Genji are excited about it. However, their joy comes to a quick end as one of the biggest military headquarters in Japan called the Akira is attacked by Talon.
(Y/n) comes to the conclusion that there's a Talon member infiltrating the government as the attack happened on the one day the Akira was defenseless. Before she can try to figure out a plan to find out who it is, Hanzo attacks Genji in anger.
Turns out Genji's father was in the Akira building, and Hanzo blamed him for their father's death. The two battle it out, in which both (Y/n) and Genji are severely injured.
Overwatch was in Japan at this time, and upon hearing the news of the battle, Angela (Mercy) finds Genji and takes him aboard their departing ship in the hopes of saving him. Hanzo takes (Y/n) to the hospital, and then disappears.
OKAY THAT'S THE END OF THE RECAPPPPP SO ONTO THE STORY!
"You have to eat something, (Y/n)," my doctor insisted. He lightly tapped the tray of food he had set on my lap, then made eye contact with me with hopeful eyes. "Please eat."
"I'm not hungry."
He sighed, flipping through the chart he had on the other hand. "Do you realize that you haven't had a single decent meal since you've woken up?"
I glared at him, my hands lightly squeezing themselves out of annoyance. "I realize it. And I don't want your shitty food."
He flinched, taken aback by the harshness of my words. "(Y/n), I didn't want to have to do this, but your grief has seemed to taken a toll on your mental health... I think I have to refer you to the psychiatric ward."
"Whatever. Just get the hell out of my room."
The doctor ran a hand through his hair, gave me one last parting glance, and then stood up from the stool at the end of my bed to leave the room.
I had been in a permanent bitchy mood since I'd woken up, and have been snapping at literally everyone, even the innocent little nurses. I wasn't in the mood to much of anything other than lay on my side and stare at the wall.
There wasn't any reason to feel any sort of happiness anymore, so what was the point in trying? They had sent in a therapist several times in the past few days, but I hadn't spoken to any of them.
I was pretty broken beyond repair. No amount of soothing words was going to bring Genji or my unborn baby back.
"(Y/n)?" a voice called gently by the doorway. I was just about ready to yell at them, whoever they were, until I realized that it was only Kai.
I turned and saw him carrying a blanket and some pizza rolls on a paper plate. He smiled innocently at me. "I brought you some things."
"I'm not hungry. But I'll take the blanket."
He padded over to the bed and sat down, draping the blanket over my legs. He swooped his black bangs out of his eyes, and offered the plate of pizza rolls to me. "They're your favorite, though."
I looked from him to the plate, and hesitantly took one in between my pointer finger and thumb. I placed it in my mouth and began to chew. "Happy?" I asked quietly.
Kai grinned even wider. "Very!"
The pizza roll tasted like sandpaper to me. There was nothing wrong with it, but everything was so tasteless these days. That's why I hated eating.
"Where's my mom?" I asked as I swallowed the pizza roll dryly. "You said you would get her to come visit, but that was days ago."
"Oh... um..." he tapped his chin, seemingly deep in thought. "I, uh... she wants to see you when you get better."
He gestured to the bandages on my face. "She said she wouldn't want to see you like this."
It was my turn to flinch out of hurt. Did she really not want to see me? The woman who had taken care of me since I was a little girl?
"But you said she was here when I was unconscious."
This seemed to catch him off guard, for whatever reason. He avoided my eyes and scratched the back of his head, looking really uncomfortable. "Yeah, well... she was in the waiting room, not in here with you."
"So you're saying she doesn't want to see me now."
"Yes."
"That doesn't sound like my mom," I stated with finality. There's no way she wouldn't see me.
He shook his head sadly. "It's what she said."
I blinked, and then leaned back onto the bed, heaving a loud sigh. "Okay. Thanks for the blanket."
Kai knew that I wanted him to leave. He picked up the plate of pizza rolls, waved goodbye, and left the room much like the doctor had done. I lifted the blanket up to my chin, and covered my whole body in the fuzzy warmth.
I may have been severely damaged in the head, but I wasn't stupid. There wasn't an army in the world that could keep my mom from wanting to see me.
I broke my ankle during ballet practice when I was a little girl, and remembering the way she had stayed at my bedside the whole time... she should be here doing it now.
Something was going on. But I didn't know what.
Kai wouldn't lie to me, would he? He's one of my best friends.
My eyebrows pointed downwards as I tried to piece something, anything, together.
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It was dark when I was awoken by a nurse. I hadn't even realized that I had fallen asleep in the first place. She had gently placed her hand on my shoulder, but it still startled me.
It was dark outside already. The dim lights in my room were off, making the whole room more like a sinister cavern.
I sat up in the bed, already dreading whatever it was that she was going to say. Was she going to take me to the psychiatric ward like she said she was going to do?
Her brown eyes crinkled. "There's someone here to see you."
"Is it Kai? Can you tell him that I'm sleeping?" I asked, irritated.
"No, actually... we haven't seen him before? He says he's an old friend of yours? Erick?"
Erick.
Erick from highschool. Maya's boyfriend. That had to mean...
"Is there a girl there, too?" I asked, my voice heightened. "A girl named Maya?"
The nurse frowned. "I didn't see any girl..."
I shot up out of the bed without another word from the nurse. My bare feet made contact with the cold tile floor, but I couldn't care less. The bottom of my nightgown swung to my knees, which wobbled considerably.
I hadn't really walked all that much outside of going to the bathroom, so that was natural. I cringed as I felt a sharp pain in my abdomen. The nurse reached out to steady me, but I smacked her hand away.
I made my way out of the room, probably looking like an escaped asylum patient. There were doctors and nurses eyeing me suspiciously, but none bothered send me back to my room.
I walked through the familiar blank white halls to the waiting room, where Erick and possibly Maya would be waiting for me. Just the thought of being able to see my red-headed friend again after this week of agony and loss filled me with the hope of feeling something other than pain.
I turned the corner to the waiting room, my heart twisting with excitement. "Maya?!" I called out, my eyes immediately scanning the black leather seats of the room.
I didn't see her head of familiar red hair, but rather, Erick. He was actually standing up in the corner of the room, reading a magazine casually. He had certainly changed over the years.
His hair, once long and messy, was now cut into a short buzzcut that didn't do a whole lot to flatter his features. He seemed thinner somehow, and far more mature.
He lowered the magazine as he saw me, his eyes widening in surprise as he surveyed my current state. "(Y/n)... I heard about what happened to you. I just had to come visit. I'm terribly sorry."
I shook my head, not fazed at all by his condolences and polite words. "Where have you been all this time? You and Maya?"
Erick frowned. "Well, I moved away to Tokyo... but Maya? I half-expected her to be standing right there next to you... huh. Time does change things, I guess."
"What do you mean? You don't know where she is?"
He took a long time to answer. His brows furrowed, and his mouth opened and closed as if he was having a hard time coming up with some kind of response. "Hold on a second, (Y/n), I haven't talked to her in years... but didn't you already know that?"
"What?" I snapped, confusion blurring the last shards of my sanity. "Did you break up with her or something?"
"She didn't tell you? I broke up with her after graduation."
"But you ran away with her, what the hell!"
Erick looked increasingly more uncomfortable by the second, judging by the nervous way he scratched the back of his head.
"There has to be some kind of misunderstanding here. Please, let me explain. Some guy-I'm not sure who but he called himself "Peps"- left a note in my house saying that he'd pay me $50,000 to leave Hanamura without telling anyone, and since I was planning on it anyway, I took up his offer to leave and broke up with Maya. I haven't been back until now."
I blinked. The gears were already turning, and I was putting the pieces together already.
The letter Maya gave me, where she explained, in detail, that she was running away with Erick was definitely her handwriting. But there's no way she would lie to me and then just disappear.
That meant that Peps, whoever he was, must've forced her to write the note and then paid Erick to leave to make the story believable.
But that left too many questions. What happened to Maya to make her disappear?
What did this Peps do to her?
Peps. So familiar sounding...
Peps.
Pepper.
Pepper from Genji's class.
It was him. It had to be. He had to be the one that payed Erick and made my best friend disappear. His nickname was Peps. Don't know why he's be dumb enough to tell Erick that he was called Peps, but I wasn't about to complain.
I hadn't even been paying attention to the world around me. I hadn't noticed that Erick had been approaching me until he placed his hand on my shoulder gently. "Hey, you've been through a lot. Why don't we sit down and try to figure it out together?"
I looked up at him, shrugging away from his hold. "I already figured it out. You're too stupid to understand."
I turned away from him and walked back to my room, leaving him wordless and shocked standing there on his own. I had no right to be mad at Erick; he did nothing wrong. But I found that I was caring less and less about what other people felt anyway.
There was one thing that mattered right now, and it was finding Maya. I felt like I had purpose again; like I had something to live for.
Maybe I was desperate to find her because she was the last remnant of happiness that I could get, considering that my mother apparently didn't want to see me.
Once I got back into my room, I flipped the light switch on for the first time in ages, and clawed at the bandages on my face to get them off. I was mostly healed, anyway. The bandages were there to conceal the ugly scarring that was left behind.
I slipped out of my hospital gown and reached underneath my bed, where I had a stash of my regular clothes for the day I would get discharged. But I couldn't wait for that day for much longer.
As I shuffled through the bag of clothing, my hand brushed against a familiar piece of cloth. Genji's stupid orange scarf.
For a brief moment, I stopped. I hesitated.
Would he really want me to be like this? Would he want me to... do what I was planning to do?
I picked the scarf up tentatively, but put it down almost immediately. That's right. What Genji wanted didn't matter. He was dead.
I picked up a wine red hoodie and a pair of jeans, making sure to pull the hood over my head so no one could identify me if they saw what I was doing. I was going to Pepper's house, and whatever I was planning wasn't very legal, so I had to stay anonymous.
I wouldn't leave the scarf; I couldn't. I shoved it into the hoodie pocket just to quiet my conscience.
The hospital window opened with ease, as if beckoning me to leave. The cool night air blew into the room, kissing the skin on my face that was previously covered. It felt nice.
I glanced back at the mirror in the center of my room once last time before I exited. I caught sight of my face.
I could hardly recognize myself. Long, jagged scars ran across the skin that was once so clear and pristine like dark stains on a white canvas. But I don't think that that's what made me look unrecognizable.
It was something about my eyes. There was something about them. I stared at my eyes that seemed to almost have this luminescent glow, glinting in the moonlight. They weren't my eyes. They were stony. Narrowed. Unfeeling.
They should've scared me, but they didn't.
I tore my gaze away from my reflection, leapt up onto the sill, and headed off into the night in the direction of Pepper's house. It was time I'd gotten some answers.