Needle and Thread - Oumasai

Twisted Art

Saihara quickly tied his sweatpants as he made his way down the stairs, losing his balance and almost falling down a few times. He didn't process the fact that he had no shirt on at the moment, but there was no time to waste. His uncle was already waiting for him at the entrance of the house with the door that had been ripped off its hinges and now laid flat on the ground.

The blue-haired male narrowed his eyes at the individual with a half-annoyed and half-frightened gaze, "Get out of here!! Abuse me all you want at your house, but you will not come over here to hurt my soulmate!"

"Quiet, Shuichi. You've made far too many mistakes this time..." The man smirked and leaned against the doorway, "I'm doing this with good intentions. Sure, you'll hate me now, but you'll thank me later."

Shuichi nearly choked hearing those words, "You think I'd ever forgive you for anything?!? Are you joking or delusional?!"

The older man let out a snigger, scoffing again that the pure action of Shuichi standing up to him once again, "You're a child, you've been spoilt and blinded by how I've given you a privileged life."

Shuichi's anger only began to fester more and more inside of him. This situation by itself was dangerous.. more risky than any other situation he had ever been in; yet he wasn't as scared as before. The monster that was his uncle was beatable, he was able to be taken down.. but the strength needed to do that, both physical and mental, he didn't have.

He was weak. That was an undeniable fact. After years and years of torture and beating and burning and screaming, shouting, pleading, begging.. after all of that, he was physically broken and fragile. Sure, in a fight he could land the occasional large blow, but.. his uncle could land punch after punch in the correct places, almost as if he could have been trained professionally.

Before he knew it, he was blocked out of his thoughts by a heavy punch landing in the center of his stomach. He doubled over and choked, but didn't allow himself to fall to the floor. He was a logical person, which is why he was so terrible during a fight.

The older man laughed loudly, rolling his eyes at how unbelievably weak his nephew was being. He attempted to move past the crippled boy that he'd left on the floor, towards the stairs. He slowly delved his hand into his trouser pocket and took a shiny, silver object from it. He twirled it around his fingers, gazing at how the light reflected on and around it. There was always something reassuring about it. The object was a lighter. "You'll thank me later, you'll soon have nobody holding you back and retraining you."

Upstairs in his room, Kokichi was pacing the floor after he hung up on the phone; Concern was taking over his other emotions. "He told me to stay up here and hide..." he mumbled to himself, often glancing over towards his closed door, "But...I can only imagine what's happening down there."

The purple-haired male finally couldn't remain in his room anymore and opened his door to dash out towards the stairs, but he was shortly greeted by a large shadow and a punch to the face. He staggered backwards after the hit, almost tripping and slamming his head against the wall. Fortunately for him, he was able to catch his balance before that happened. He lifted his gaze to glare at the man for a few moments and then looked around for some type of weapon.

"Don't bother."

"W-where's Shuichi?!"

The uncle flashed Kokichi a large grin, "He's dead."

His eyes widened at his words and he clenched his fists, however, Kokichi glanced down at his finger to see that the string was still red, "Th-..that's a lie!!" The uncle quickly caught on to what Ouma had looked at for that brief moment, "Hm... I should've known that the two of you were soulmates. It's very unfortunate that only you and him can see the string, I would've disposed of you much sooner if I could see it."

Kokichi saw the menace in the other man's eyes and knew that there was really no means of escape. Shuichi...he may not be dead, but he's surely under some kind of pain right now, he thought to himself. Then he watched with horror as he saw the lighter that was loosely hanging around one of his fingers. The smaller male had seen the damage done to Shuichi with that lighter.. all the scars and all of that permanent damage was all down to something so small.

"Why do you look so scared?" He questioned with a smirk, flicking off the cap of the lighter and striking a flame. "..Ahah, I understand why now. That look in your eyes, it fills me with excitement. You must have seen Shuichi's punishments, surely you have?! Me, I'm very proud of my artwork, expert precision is needed of course, so tell me, what did you think of it?"

Ouma began to panic, wanting to find some way to stall the uncle from doing anything before the person he called for help arrived. He decided to shout, maybe he'd get some answers, "W-what's your problem?!? Why can't you just leave Shuichi alone?! He hasn't done anything wrong!"

The lighter was swiftly moved closer to his face as the older man let out a frustrated huff, "Answer my question. Your petty attempts to avoid it simply anger me more."

As if he gives a shit about what a low rank thinks, he thought to himself and swung his arm to try and knock the lighter out of his hands, "It's disgusting!!"

The lighter slipped out of his hands but he managed to catch it before he lost grip entirely. His eyes narrowed, "My art is.. disgusting? How dare you say that! A low rank like you commenting on an achievement of a high rank, who exactly do you think you are.. you are nothing, you understand that? Completely nothing, the entrails of humanity itself."

Unfortunately, both of the individuals were completely unaware that the lighter caught on something due to the tense atmosphere. Now it really was a race against the clock.. the entire house could burn down..

Kokichi took another swing, and this time, was more successful but still ultimately failed, "You think that what you've done to Shuichi is art..? I-It's abuse!"

He tucked the lighter into his coat pocket and went back to the old fashioned way. He knew he was strong and more than capable, so that was the only option. He began to wrap his hands around Ouma's neck, holding him above the ground, against the wall. "To get results, you use torture, pain and whatever you have at your disposal, Shuichi wouldn't have learnt if I were to have gone easy on him, rewarded him and provided for him, then he would have ended up like you, people like you, scum of the earth."

He slowly continued to strengthen the grip he had around the others neck, enjoying watching him squirm and struggle. "I never caught your name, speak it. That way, I'll know which gravestone will belong to you."

But Kokichi couldn't speak, he could only gasp for breath.

Their thoughts were interrupted as a certain smell wafted through the hallway and was detected by the older man in the room. "What is that.." He let go dramatically and glanced round the room, his eyes lighting up with the reflection of the tall flames which had gone unnoticed until now. "Flames?"

The already torn up curtain at Ouma's window was the object that was burning. "....This is inconvenient.. time to improvise," he spoke with an idea in mind. The man released his grip from Kokichi's throat and shifted it to pull on the teenager's hair. He dragged the male along the floor and entered a random adjoining room. The room was barren and looked completely stripped of all possessions, but there were a few objects scattered about. A couple of empty boxes, a roll of tape, some scissors and a basic metal bed.

Perfect. This surely couldn't be easier. He dragged the purple haired male further into the room and took ahold of the roll of tape.

With the low rank dealt with, the older individual slowly marched down the stairs, grabbing Shuichi's arms harshly when he reached the bottom of them. He squirmed in pure agony at the touch of skin against the new formed, raw burn marks that his uncle had made when he left him there before to die.

"Stop moving around, if you do continue this disobedience, when we get out of here, I'll make you pay dearly for it."

"LET GO OF MY SIDEKICK, OLD MAN!!"