Inspired by Nagisa's Revenge by Kumikoko on Archive of Our Own.

When I first found "Nagisa's Revenge" I was somewhat hopeful. I wasn't as much when I finished it. That isn't to say I didn't like it, I actually adored it. But I also found myself wanting for a sort of hope, aftercare, or positive ending. So I wrote one myself. I purposely kept the non-con elements to this extremely vague. This was written to (and best read to) "Angels Of Porn" by Nicole Dollanganger.

Takaoka reminds him of his mother. No, his mother is kinder, sweeter. She screams and yells and pulls and hits, but her words drip with honey and apologies the next day. Takaoka takes and takes and takes and only gives back pain. There's no rot-sweet touches, nor asking for forgiveness. Hiromi wants and takes and sighs. She does not love him, not truly, but there's no hate or grudge. Takaoka is cruel.

But Nagisa is used to cruel, it should not bother him. It does. It does, because he is here on a roof and concrete digs into his knees as his friends' last hope explodes before Nagisa in a twist of fire and a sound like a gunshot amplified till the corpses of dead gods shake from their sleep. Nagisa's throat feels raw and he vaguely thinks that he's screaming.

Beg.

The voice grates like shards of glass in his ears until he barely registers fingers (- wrong - too large - where are his mother's nails? why aren't they tearing his scalp apart? -) digging into his hair.

On your hands and knees.

He can't hear his friends anymore - because his skin is tearing and dear God, make it stop, make it stop! - but he thinks that they're screaming too. His vision blurs and shakes and all he can see through the haze is skin and fabric. It doesn't feel right, no it burns . Maybe he is burning too, though.

Get on your hands and knees and beg.

Behind the tear of nails on concrete, behind the slow, sickening scrape of blood on the ground, behind the pressure of hands on his neck that feel like teeth burying into his flesh, he burns.

The world fades in that moment. His face is skin-warm, but the air leaves it cold as the wind dries tear tracks in place. Somewhere, faraway, he hears the creaking in his spine as his back folds under the constant, rhythmic force. He smells blood, and tastes salt. Nagisa thinks of his father, because the world feels fake and he can't feel his fingers or toes or lips anymore.

Make it stop please - someone save me!

Nagisa thinks of his father, because he thinks of sushi. Koji* is nice, but a different kind of nice than his mother. Nagisa misses his father - even though somewhere in his mind he knows he's not dead, just on the concrete roof of a hotel - because they were going to go out for sushi soon. He likes sushi, and Koji's calm voice that always felt a little like cool water soothing a burn when he tucked Nagisa in. When he would apologize for leaving Nagisa with Hiromi. His father had none of his mother's temper, and sometimes Nagisa would wonder how they ever fell in love.

Nagisa! I'm sorry, I'm so sorry.

Nagisa doesn't register standing up, but he knows he must be because his blood is flowing down and his feet are firm on cement. Dog teeth nip at his lower back and his fabric falls back into place with a swish. A sound, cruel and harsh and like gales of wind crashing and bringing down a mountain floats into the air. The feel of cool, cold, searing, burning metal in his fingers focuses his eyes enough to see a figure. It's large, tall and wide, imposing. He gags - at least he thinks so.

He sees the knife fly, sharp and the only beautiful thing in this night, watches it land in the shape's shoulder, watches the shape fall. Nagisa does not feel it, isn't sure it happens though. Then, he sees stars and hears voices calling and feet pounding into the ground, shaking the foundation of the ocean floor. He closes his eyes.

Nagisa is tired.

-0- -0-

He comes to it in a car, a white, boxy car. Oh, Nagisa thinks, it's an ambulance. He's still vaguely detached but there's two hands in front of him that ground him.

One is his. He knows it is, because it's pale and thin and the nails are cut and shaped carefully. Nagisa knows it is his because it is cold, the tips are raw, and the fingers flutter when he tried to wiggle them. The other one is Not His. It is warm and calloused - but not rough, never rough like in his nightmares. There is a scar, small and white, on the second knuckle from the thumb.

He kisses the little scar and relishes in its warmth. The hand that is Not His turns and its palm is even warmer, pressed against his cheek. A voice shushes Nagisa carefully, smooth and caring. The Voice says, "You're safe here, okay? He won't touch you again."

The Voice doesn't say "you're okay" "it'll be fine now" or "it's okay" or "you're alright". He isn't alright.

"I'm not okay," Nagisa says, a hair above a whisper, and it hurts because his throat is as raw as his concrete-torn fingers.

"I know," Karma tells him. Nagisa feels better, just slightly, because Karma is safe. Karma is good, he'll protect him and keep him safe because Karma is an angel and he saved him. He says again, "I know." And then: "We can try to make it okay again, though. If you want?"

Nagisa is tired again. He's falling asleep but first he has to say this. "Everything," it's barely a murmur, "everything is good with Karma."

He sleeps again, lighter and without a monster crawling through his bones.

-0- -0-

When Nagisa wakes up again, he's completely aware to the world and he's in a hospital room. White heathers and poppies and yellow tulips** sit in a blue vase to his right. There are four people in the room when Nagisa looks up. Karma sits on his left, cradling his hand with such delicacy that Nagisa has to pause to revel in the sensation for a moment. In front of his, from left to right, sits Karasuma-Sensei, Irina-nee ***, and Koro-Sensei.

Irina-nee looks like she's started crying at the hotel and hasn't stopped since (how long have I been here, Nagisa wonders), Karasuma-Sensei is stone-faced - though even his eyes look stormied. Koro-Sensei worries him most though. His face is solemn, that unnatural grin gone (though there are no tears, because his tears have only ever been comical), his skin the darkest blue Nagisa has ever seen. It's like he can't decide whether to be sad or angry.

Irina-nee starts to cry again, and Karma presses the softest of kisses to the heel of his hand. Reality crashes into Nagisa, and though he only remembers it in a vague haze, he knows what it means. He cries too. "I'm sorry," he says - sobs - and it's barely audible. The four of them are shocked, he knows (he feels).

"It's not your fault. It shouldn't have happened." Karasuma-Sensei's voice sounds flat. Not distanced or emotionless like it normally is - should be - but flat. Karasuma-Sensei hurts too. The realization makes Nagisa cry all the harder.

It takes a while, but it's not too long before it's silent again. Nagisa watches his hand dance in Karma's and Koro-Sensei finally speaks. He's terse, definitely angry and definitely sad (there aren't enough words to describe his voice though) when he says, "Ta- he will never see the light of day again. I swear it Nagisa."

Nagisa falls, bonelessly, back against the pillows. "I'm not okay," he parrots back what he had said to Karma in the ambulance.

"You don't have to be." Irina-nee says it this time, and it's fierce. As horrified as Nagisa feels and as determined as he wishes he could be. It makes him feel safe again. For just a moment, he smiles. He wishes he could thank her, but he's so exhausted that it's a wonder he manages to react at all when a nurse sticks her head into the room.

"Mr. Shiota's parents are here. He'll be in in a second," the nurse says, cheerful, and panic floods Nagisa's system.

"No!" Nagisa says, alarm and dread thick and sweet on his tongue. "I don't want to see my mother. Never again!" It's desperate, and sitting up again, Nagisa can see the flash of confusion-realization-then-conviction in Karasuma-Sensei's eyes. He nods to Nagisa and it calms him slightly.

(He doesn't say that amidst the punches and kicks He through at him, Nagisa saw his mother's face there, too.)

The door groans open. Karma's hand is gripping his tightly and it holds back the shudders the Nagisa wishes would leave. Koji walks into the room. Nagisa's teachers obviously don't recognize him, and even Karma seems unneededly worried.

"Tou-san**** ?" Nagisa asks and almost starts crying again. Koji gets closer, but Karma doesn't let him too close. That would ruin Nagisa's thin veneer of calm and capability. And they can't have that, can they?

"Hey, Nagisa," Koji says, gentle, "I'm sorry it's been so long."

"I -" his voice breaks "- I don't wanna go back, tou-san."

"You don't have to. You can even change schools, if that's what you think will help."

(Nagisa's father is kind and his mother is nice and Nagisa knows which one he wants to hold onto and never let go of. And even though he loves her, it's not his mother.)

"No!" Nagisa says, louder than he means to. He winces, and shoots a glance to Irina-nee and Karasuma-Sensei. Koro-Sensei has disappeared, but it doesn't bother Nagisa much - he knows that it's out of necessity. He says, more hesitantly, "I want to stay, tou-san. I like it there."

His father smiles. "Okay," he says, like it's nothing. "Get some sleep, kiddo. We can talk more later. I want to have a conversation with your teachers." Koji leaves the room then, followed by Irina-nee and Karasuma-Sensei.

Karma presses his lips to Nagisa's forehead and sighs. "Rest." It's kinder than how anyone else could say it.

"Yes, anata*****," Nagisa murmurs as he drifts away for the third time that day(?).

Nagisa wasn't okay, but he would be.

* Nagisa's dad does not have a canon name, so here I used the Japanese name "Koji".

** White heather - protection; white poppy - consolation; yellow tulip - "there's sunshine in your smile"

*** I love the concept/idea of Nagisa seeing Irina as an older sister figure (though usually in my head, I get this idea of an au where Nagisa does become an assassin under Lovro and sees Irina that way thusly, but whatever)

**** I used Japanese honorifics in this, as seen with Karasuma-Sensei, for example. In Japanese, "otou-san" means "father". Tou-san means "dad", the lack of the "o-" implying a less formal and more warm/closer relationship with the father. (Alternatively, calling a father 'tou-chan' would be like a little girl calling her father 'daddy'.)

***** Japanese terms of endearment are often done with a person's name. (Like Karma calling Nagisa 'Gisa', 'Nagi' or even something like 'Naah'.) However, in Japanese culture there's a word, anata (あなた), which is used by women to address their boyfriends/husbands, and can be translated as "darling".

I hope you enjoyed this! Please leave favorite and a comment if you feel like it, but it's not required. :) BIG THANKS TO THE ANON WHO ALERTED ME TO THE WEIRD CODING THE FIRST UPLOAD OF THIS!