The prompt list for these (if anyone in this beyond-dead fandom is interested) is on my tumblr, which has the same penname as I do on here. Sue me. I'm a simple soul. Anyways, this is day one of the list and day one of June: Closed Doors. Enjoy and whatnot. It's a bit shorter than what I normally do, but hey, there's going to be thirty more of these, and I need to finish them on a daily basis. Can't be everywhere at once and all that.

June 1st, 2018

Mion and Shion looked exactly alike. They had the same hair and the same eyes and the same skin and even though they had different wardrobes, they still used the same clothes.

Mion and Shion were exactly alike.

Except they weren't.

Mion was the eldest, the heir to the Sonozaki Family that everyone treated nicely and with respect. Mion got all the treats. Mion was the one everyone coddled when she fell down. Mion got invited to all the secret family meetings and got to know everything that was going on.

Shion was the youngest, the spare to the heir that no one had ever wanted. Shion got shooed away from treats. Shion was the one everyone ignored when she tripped. Shion got pushed away whenever something important was going on with their family.

But all Mion or Shion had to do was take out their ribbon, and switch clothes, and suddenly everything changed. Everyone treated Shion nicely while Mion was shunned and ignored.

Mion did her best to be a good big sister, and not hog the identity of "Mion" all to herself, all the time. It was easy when Grandma wanted her to do a hard lesson or dress up in a kimono and look solemn, but it was a lot harder other times, like when Mion got invited to a fair and Shion conveniently was forced to do homework, or when Grandma made special treats for Mion but not enough to share with Shion.

And then one day…

"No fair! No fair! You get all the good stuff, Mion…I've never had sea bream sashimi! I want to try it!"

"Okay. I'll trade places with you today!"

…Mion and Shion were stupid. So stupid. Why hadn't they thought of the reason Mion would get to go to a banquet and enjoy so fine a treat? Why hadn't they thought of how the family had been talking about "bestowing the mark of the demon" lately?

Mion's world cracked when a crying Shion burst into their room that night. Her back hurt, she said, it hurt a lot and she hadn't wanted to sashimi after all. She kept crying that over and over, like a prayer or a plea for forgiveness. She didn't want the sashimi and wished more than anything that she had stayed Shion for the day, that Mion had been the one whose shirt was pulled up and fire spilled all over her back.

Mion didn't understand what Shion had meant until she calmed her sniffling sister down and lifted up Shion's shirt. A glaring, inflamed oni tattoo had leered back at Mion from the skin of her twin's lower back, and they were both scared, because that meant that they might be caught when they switched again. They hadn't thought about anything else, because there wasn't anything else to think about yet. Mion calmed her little sister down some more and they snuggled together to sleep.

It was only when Shion got up the courage to ask their mother the next day what the tattoo meant that Mion's world finally actually shattered apart.

The heir to the Sonozaki Family, leaders in the village known as "the pit of demons", received the oni, the demon, as a character in their names, as a fire in their souls, and as a mark on their body. It was a great honor, mother told a sobbing Shion, and "Mion" should be proud to receive it.

Mion. Mion. MionMionMionMionMionMionMion.

MION.

Except Mion didn't own the demon. Shion did. Everything was wrong and upside-down, and nothing either Mion or Shion could do would fix it.

Tattoos were permanent. Tattoos couldn't be wiped away, and one like this couldn't be copied.

They could pretend. "Mion" could become Shion to trick their friends, and she and Mion could laugh. But they couldn't fool their family. Their family knew the demon. Shion would always be "Mion" to them, and Mion was forced to be "Shion".

She hated it. Being Shion was fun in small doses, but only because Mion knew by her sacrifice her little sister was enjoying the treats she would have in Mion's place.

Being "Shion" all the time, when the real Shion was forced to act in her place with a scared white face and guilty eyes, terrible. Her mother and father didn't comfort her any more when she had a nightmare and came knocking at their door. Grandma didn't let her sit in on the meetings anymore, and she didn't get to dress up in that white kimono, which wasn't so very bad after all, not really.

Doors were opened to Shion on that day. And doors were closed to Mion.

9.41 PM, USA Central Time