After her short stay in the tent than had been set up in the gym, she had left for her own room; her injuries would be severe had she not died during the battle - all that was left was a mild headache from exhaustion, as well as a lump on the back of her head, which hurt if pressure was applied. Her fingers and palms still had cuts on them from when she was trying to free herself from the net, and she was sure there were bruises on several parts of her body.

At least she wasn't badly burned though, from dying in Red's fire-

The memory caused her to shiver and she brought both hands up to rub at the opposite arm, as if it would help erase that memory; the fire had ate away at her flesh, but her insides were freezing cold when she finally perished. It was that sort of cold that was probably the result of FEAR, because she could still feel it lingering in her body even now... And it scared her. Was it psychological? Did she even want to know?

Her room was exactly the way she had left it - pillows under the covers, windows bolted shut with the curtains drawn, bathroom door left ajar so that she could peek in from the entrance to her room, minipet beds stacked up together since she had sent all of her minipets through the closet except for Rosenthal, who was independent enough to take care of himself while she was away... Except he wasn't in.

Familiarity. Home.

She felt something wet on her cheek, and she quickly wiped it away with the back of her hand as she marched into her room, closing the door behind her; had it only been a day? On a regular day, she would complain about why the day felt so short - there was never enough time for her to do everything she wanted... So many things to sew, so many things to draw, so many friends to meet up with and so many books to read!

During the field trip, one day felt like a whole month - so many things had happened that she still wasn't sure it was real. Humans who call themselves hunters. Turning Halloweeners into weapons using a machine. Professor Red's death... Permanent death...

She removed the small piece of bone, taken from Red's skull just before she left the 'Haunted House', from her skirt pocket. It looked even duller, grayer, more lifeless now, especially when held in her hand, the angry looking dark red cuts across her palm standing out more than the black-grayish piece of skull. She closed her eyes, taking in several deep breaths, trying to stop herself from crying again; she had shed enough tears for one day. Professor Red would not want this.

"Sorry Professor..." She murmured, walking over to a cabinet where several empty bottles of all shapes and sized were kept. She had always collected these "raw materials", hoping to make something like a bottle of colored sand or even a bottle of paper stars out of them. This time, she reached for a bottle with a wide mouth and neck before carefully setting the piece of Red skull into in with a pair of tweezers, "We'll give you the burial you deserve... I'm just... Sorry we couldn't bring everything back with us. Sorry we couldn't stop them from breaking away a piece of you and taking it with them..." How dare those hunters! They didn't have the right to do that! It was adding insult to injury, rubbing salt into their wounds...

Something that could be anger rose, but she squished it before it could show, hastily placing the bottle down on her desk. There, it stood out against the pencils and stacks of paper; she would always remember the gym professor - not as a giant beast, but as the confident woman who once made them run across a field littered with skitter sharps. The woman who gave her life to protect her students.

The woman who cared more about her "kids" than she would lead them to believe.

... Heh, caring. Those students she regarded as friends - on the final battle field, she only had eyes on a few of them. She had been worried sick about 'everyone else', but did they worry about her? At some point, she found herself growing jaded and bitter. Nobody came looking for her except Amrita and Tess and Xiu - if she had dropped down the cliff would nobody notice except for those three? Would anyone care?

Then again, she had been guilty of the same. Guilty of being uncaring. Guilty of looking out only for certain people. Guilty guilty guilty. How could she make up for all the mistakes she had committed? She should have looked out for all of them - Junko, Mot, Hel, Mitsu, Levi... Vieve. The last name left a bitter taste in her mouth as she dug her fingernails into her arms; there would be a lot to atone for...

Normalcy.

Fresh change of clothes. A towel. Her body sponge. The little red light on the switch beside the bathroom door that meant that the warm water had been turned on. Little things that she had taken for granted her whole life; she had already learned that lesson during her second field trip, but this was like a refresher course that she did not appreciate.

The shower was warm, but uncomfortable and thus, rushed. Every cut on her body hurt when they came in contact with the warm water - the way they burned reminded her of her death, and she had never been that eager to get out of the shower before. Her hair was then quickly blow dried, combed and styled into a braid that hung from her shoulder before she stuffed two days' worth of clothing into a duffer bag.

She needed to see him, feel him. It was silly... Maybe he would call her stupid for missing him that much when she was only away for a day, but she didn't care.

It felt like she had been away for more than a day.

[1040 words]