A/N: ahhh a lot of you seemed to want a second part, so here it is! I'll probably end up writing a third part to it in the future too tbh I didn't expect this to be such a big project lmao. I hope you enjoy it!

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She stares at her reflection in the bathroom mirror.

The water facet is louder than the blood pounding in her ears and she has to take deep breaths to steady her nerves otherwise she thinks she really might stick her head under the running water to get her mind off this horrible anxiety trembling in her hands. Mirai still isn't sure what to do. She promised Izumi that she'd kill Beyond the Boundary, but that was before she found out the monster resided inside her most precious childhood friend.

Akihito-kun was special to her, she wasn't going to deny that. Even if they hadn't spoken in 8 years, killing him is impossible. Raising her blood sword against him would be tantamount to ramming it through her own chest. Its almost embarrassing, how often she looks at the picture of him that Izumi sent her on her phone. He looks so good and he grew up so well, she thinks, even if there is a tiredness rimming his coffee-stained eyes.

Izumi is expecting a status report soon, on Mirai's progress with eliminating Beyond the Boundary. But she blinks at her flustered, frustrated expression in the mirror because there isn't any other option than to refuse the job. What else can she do? They can lock her up. Put her in a jail cell for the next forty years for what she'd done to Yui. Mirai would rather die than kill Akihito.

It's been almost a week now since she joined the school and she still hasn't approached him. She tells herself its because their paths just haven't crossed yet, but deep down it's because she's a little scared. Nothing changes if he doesn't remember her, but. . . she doesn't want that. She wants things to change. Wants him to remember her. Mirai doesn't expect things to be the way they were as children - of course not, she's not an idiot - but he was the only one who understood her so completely. She misses that. Misses him.

Most of all, she misses how safe he made her feel. He was always such a sweet kid, comforting her and promising her that things would be alright. Mirai hasn't ever felt that safe since.

She takes a deep breath and blinks at herself. "This is unpleasant."

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Akihito leans against the window and sets the book down on his lap with a sigh. Mitsuki said it was her favorite book she'd read this year, but his interest in it is ebbing away. The protagonist is too extraordinary, the circumstances too bland for such a flawless character. To be honest, it's on the negative side of boring. He'd rather sit on the window sill and admire the sunset as it casts it's last golden rays across the majority of the town, down in the valley. Something about the sunlight slanting across the rooftops reminds him of happier days, when a little girl saw past the monster inside of him.

His right hand plays absently at the chain around his neck, pulling it out from behind the un-buttoned button-up shirt and the loosened tie. The window is cool against his cheek as he rests his head there, allowing his eyes to wander the students leaving the school grounds. Somewhere behind him, Mitsuki turns a page in her book and makes a popping sound as she removes the lollipop from her mouth.

"You're going to break the chain if you keep tugging at it like that," she says blandly, rupturing the silence unexpectedly.

He drops the chain and the ring serving as its pendant back against his chest. "Thanks," he replies sarcastically, not looking away from the students walking home to glance at her. Truthfully, Akihito went through two necklaces a year - once he almost lost the ring on it when it broke, but had luckily found it lying in the grass outside his apartment the next day. It was just a habit he couldn't shake. Touching the ring made him feel like he was a little bit closer to the girl from his childhood.

She's fading in his memories a little bit every day, and the hope that he could find solace in someone like that again fades with them.

"You're more irritating today than usual," Mitsuki observes.

He makes a noncommittal noise in the back of his throat and continues to ignore her, instead staring out at the students who are making their way out of the school gates.

He sits in the window on the third floor but his eye catches on the curling, pale hair of a pink sweater girl near the gates. His heart pauses for a moment in his chest and he sucks in a surprised breath, because he is absolutely sure that she is suddenly here at his school, in a town that neither of them grew up in. He clenches his hand hard around the necklace and then shoves himself away from the window and sprints out of the room, his belongings forgotten on the table.

It might not even be her, he reasons. It might just be the fact that her birthday is approaching and he's thinking about her more than usual. Making him see things that aren't there. The sunset is in the position where any blonde hair could easily look peachy.

Students step away from him warily as he fights his way to the gates once he's reached the first floor of the school. Frantically, he looks for her, the girl from his childhood. He dredges up the memories of her round face and those wonderful red glasses, eyes flicking over every face before him. After spending an irrationally long time trying to find the peach-haired girl, he heaves a sigh and leans against the wall outside of the gates.

It must have been his imagination; of course she's not here. That would be silly. Akihito rests his head back against the wall and gazes up at the clouds in the sky, painted in soft shades of pink and orange. He's not eager to get home - it's too quiet there. Instead, he stares at the twilight that's turned the color of her hair and murmurs to himself that somewhere out there, she's alive and well.

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Mirai chooses to approach him the next day. She feels small in her oversized pink sweater as she waits in the shadows under the staircase. Her hands are trembling, and she wishes she was more excited than apprehensive. A part of her deep inside, however, is joyful because even if things turn sour for her here and now, at least she can visibly see him again, and know that his life is good.

She freezes when she hears footsteps on the stairs and her breath quickens. The sun slants in deep shadows across the floor and her heart aches when he appears in her vision, the span of his broad shoulders. The years separating her from him had been good to him and her face begins to feel warm at his physical maturity.

"U-um," she says softly, stepping half out from her hiding spot.

He stops immediately, his body going rigid. The tremble in her hands becomes stronger and she has to fight the urge to flee. It terrifies her that of the millions of scenarios she's played in her head, this one may not go down one of the paths she prefers. Her tongue runs nervously over her chapped lips, her thumb smoothing over the rough exterior of the bandage wrapped around her right hand. Something in the pit of her stomach flutters as he turns around slowly but her heart is strong in her chest.

"H-Hi." The heat in her face travels to her hairline.

Akihito stands ten feet away, his shadow sloped over the floorboards, dark in stark contrast with golden glow of the setting sun. It lights up his face perfectly so that she can see his mouth part in surprise, his eyebrows arch. His fist clenches severely around the strap of his bag and she swears that in the dead silence of the hallway, he draws in a sharp intake of breath. Surely this is not the reaction of someone who forgot her. Her chest aches and even if this is all she ever gets out of this moment, she'll be happy.

He blinks slowly, as if he is unsure that what he's seeing is real. When he speaks, the timbre of his voice sends a shiver down Mirai's spine. "How. . ."

A smile curls at her mouth, happiness suddenly welling up in her like a wave. "It's really good to see you again." She wants to call him by his name, but it's been eight years and it might not be appropriate anymore. But Kanbara-san seems too unfamiliar and she may have spent a long time without him but her feelings toward him are warmer than ever.

"It's really. . .it's you." He blinks again but then he is smiling widely and her heart flops unexpectedly in her chest as his happy-crinkled eyes appraise her. Her breath catches in her throat as he takes a few steps forward, until the toes of their shoes are separated by a mere twelve inches. The space between them feels as heavy and bloated as an elephant; her hands curl around the hem of her sweater to tame the jitters in her skin. "I knew I saw you the other day. What are you doing here?"

Mirai stares at him because his memory of her has not faded and his face is flushed with a blush. He's a lot taller than her now - the top of her head only barely clears his shoulder - and there is something very tender and exuberant about his expression. "I. . .It's a long story," she replies after a moment, unable to tear her gaze away.

He glances over his shoulder as the sound of a group of students shuffle past, a few of them hollering their goodbyes at Akihito. Her heart shudders abruptly when he smiles back at them and its both thrilling and upsetting. She never wanted to feel like this when she saw him again. When he turns his eyes back to her, she's sure that her blush and her erratic heart are obvious.

"Well, I'm willing to listen," he remarks cheerfully. "I'd love to catch up with you. Wanna grab a bite to eat?"

The thought of telling him why she is here almost urges her to spurn the offer, but that would be ridiculous, all things considered. Clasping her hands behind her back, she steps around him and starts walking down the hall. "I'm hungry," she says, and its true because she always is.

Even without looking at his face, she can feel the grin in his expression and it brings her back to the days when they were inseparable. Maybe being friends again wasn't going to be as complicated as she anticipated.

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Somehow, they end up at his house. Akihito is unreasonably nervous as he opens the door and flicks on the light of his tiny apartment. Their supper conversation was filled with a lot of shallow, meaningless thoughts and he had noticed easily that Mirai deflected all his questions about her back onto him. It made his stomach ache - what had happened to her after he was forced to let her go? With the way she'd drop her eyes and shovel the food in her mouth, he was wary to find out.

"You're not as messy as you used to be," she observes as she steps over the threshold, no doubt recalling how his childhood room had been strewn with toys hidden under clothes, acting as unintentional land mines - more or less.

He smiles and closes the door behind her. "Yeah, cleaning is good," he replies lamely.

She snorts, her eyes sparkling with amusement. "Yeah, it really is."

There is a bloated silence for a moment before Akihito decides that walking on eggshells is not how he wants to proceed; he feels bothered knowing that she is silently refusing to talk about the rest of her childhood. "So tell me how you've been."

She blinks, her face becoming apprehensive under the sudden rosy glow on her cheeks. "I'm okay."

"Are you really?" he asks, raising an eyebrow as he sheds his jacket and takes her cardigan from her.

She brushes past him and goes to sit on the floor of his bedroom, blatantly avoiding his eyes. His suspicions get stronger as she pulls her knees to her chest, her glasses sitting crookedly on her nose. After hanging up their coats, he sits across from her, cross-legged, his eyebrows slanting downward over his gaze.

"Kuriyama," he says, "tell me how you've been."

There is a long pause and then she shrugs and he's frustrated. He already told her everything - leaving out the incident with Hiroomi, of course, because that's hardly worth the time - but she hasn't said one thing about herself, about what she's been through. He's upset that she won't even give him a little bit to go on. Every day for the last eight years, he's thought about her, wondered how she was. Akihito feels his teeth gnashing together in irritation; he reaches up to tug at his hair and takes a deep breath.

"You're driving me nuts," he admits, trying to keep calm.

She glances up at him finally, startled. "I am?"

He laughs anxiously and shakes his head. "I've been worried about you since the day you left. For all I knew, whoever killed off your clan could have come after you and I couldn't stop wondering," he confesses shamelessly, reaching for the chain hidden under the layers of clothes; her eyes go wide as he pulls it out. The ring sparkles as the light glints off its metal surface. "And you won't tell me a thing."

"Akihito-kun," she breathes out in a low, low voice.

He replies to her unspoken words. "Of course I kept it." His face feels hot; the way she used his name so familiarly makes him feel like he's nine years old again as he drops the chain back against his chest. "Of course I did. You gotta give me something."

She gapes at him for a few long minutes and he wants her to break the silence this time because he can't quite seem to find his voice anyway. It hadn't occurred to him earlier - the shock of seeing her again at all had delayed his noticing - but he's looking at her on his bedroom floor with her knees pulled up to her chest and her crooked glasses and he's sure she's the most beautiful girl he's ever seen. She's always been pretty, he remembers, but noticing this about her this time feels different.

Her mouth twitches and the spell breaks, and he sees the resolve in her eyes. "I'm here because of you."

"Because of me?" Akihito doesn't want to immediately jump to conclusions - that she'd sought him out so that they could be friends again. The only reason he's able to reign in the sudden burst of joy is that her face turns pale and guilt-stricken. His voice becomes unexpectedly sharp. "What about me?"

Mirai knots her fingers in the fabric of her skirt and takes a deep breath. She steels herself and meets his gaze strongly, without hesitation. "I know about how you went berserk on one of the Nases," she explains in a voice that's much smaller than she intended. "That he. . .almost died."

He closes his eyes in understanding, nausea rushing through him.

Her voice trembles as she continues. "I killed someone. She was my best friend, and I killed her. She was possessed by a youmu and I was going to die. Her. . .her family hated me. They wanted me dead. They said that I should have died along with my parents in the first place. "Akihito tries to reconcile that sweet-faced Inami woman he met when she came to take Mirai away with his childhood friend's story, but he's still reeling from her words and it only strengthens the twisted feeling in his gut. "Izumi saved me from them, under the condition that I pay her a favor."

He might be sick.

Mirai is clearly holding back the tears now, her lower lip trembling violently, her eyes dropped to the floor, eyebrows drawn in sharply over her honey-amber eyes.

"She wants me to kill you."