Yuri Kuma Arashi -Another End-
So, I felt strongly enough about the finale for Yuri Kuma Arashi that I actually cooked up an alternate ending myself. This is how I think the series should have ended. Of course, it contains massive spoilers for the events of the show, so be warned! With that out of the way, let's get the show started!
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Yuri Kuma Arashi -Another End-
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Rooftop of Arashigaoka Academy. Countless girls were standing in formation, bearing rifles in their slight hands. Those rifles were trained firmly on the two bears at the far end of the roof, on a boardwalk of sorts leading out into open air.
Those bears were Kureha Tsubaki and Ginko Yurishiro. The latter was a bear who chose to become human once, the former was a human to chose to become a bear.
In both cases, their reasons for choosing were the same.
To be with their beloved. Now, the two were facing certain death before the 'Invisible Storm', the forces of society which sought to exclude those who stood out from the herd. Leading that 'Storm' was Oki Chouko. She was the one who brought the two- once human and bear- to the roof, and she was the one to order their demise.
"W-what the Hell are you, like, doing?" Oki stammered, her face twisted into a look of abject horror. "T-they're not even, like, human anymore!"
"They're bears! Like, evil, man-eating bears!!"
The words rang false even in her ears. What she saw before her eyes was proof. Proof that there was no hard and fast line dividing humans and bears. No perfect severence delineating the safety of the herd from the danger of the outside world.
That's why. She had to fire. She had to kill them. The Invisible Storm those who refused to follow social cues, and the two before her had committed the most egregious crime of all in their world.
Love.
...
Kureha clutched tightly to her lover's hand... er, paw. It was okay. She steeled her heart. Even if she died, she still got to be with her love. Everything was okay. They'd be together forever on the other side, Ginko and her, Lulu and Sumika...
It'd all be okay. There'd be a better world beyond this one... beyond all the tears and pain and suffering and cruelty and ugliness and evil and...
No. Kureha felt a sudden jolt of realization. That was wrong. What she was thinking about was just death. There wasn't any nobility or beauty to it. She didn't want to die.
She wanted to live, make all kinds of happy memories with Ginko. She wanted to teach her the love song again, she wanted to try pancakes with honey again, she wanted for the two of them to just cuddle in bed for hours on end, basking in the warmth of each other's presence.
Kureha wanted to hold Ginko. She wanted to kiss Ginko. She wanted to embrace Ginko. If she was dead, then all those things would be impossible. Their love would be frozen for eternity, a platonic ideal forever unsullied by the world. Stagnance.
...
Lily petals drifted gently through the air like tufts of cotton. Time seemed to advance at a crawl. The assembled girls raised their rifles with quivering hands.
Their fingers began to draw back on the triggers in unison.
"Quit waiting around, idiots!" Oki howled. "Like, shoot! Don't even think about it, just pull the trigger and shoot!"
Kureha and Ginko squeezed their eyes shut, holding each other tightly before the end came. There was no way out. Deep down, they both knew from the start this was the only conclusion. Their love would never be approved by the world.
The only thing left was to await that final, dreadful moment.
...
A lily blossom touched the ground. At the same time, the sound of several dozen rifles firing rang out through the sundrenched early morning air.
"Ghrk...!" a cry of pain resounded, but it was from neither Kureha nor Ginko.
Scarlet blossomed over Oki Chouko's chest as countless bullets tore through her insides.
"D-damn it...!" Oki rasped in shock and horror, crumpling to the ground while clawing frantically at her bloodied chest. "Y-you... s-shot... me...!!"
"W-why...?!"
For a moment there was silence. Every one of Arashigaoka Academy's students gathered on that roof had come to the same conclusion. Their iron-hard gazes told Oki everything she both wanted and feared to know.
"Since the beginning, the Invisible Storm sought to exclude evil." Spoke up Kiko Higashi, a girl from class 4-B with hazelnut brown hair tied into a side braid.
"But, we realized something." continued another girl, Satoko Mitsuzawa from class 5-C with deep red hair cut in a bob style.
"You were the greatest evil of all." Every girl in the assembly spoke in a single, unified decree.
"You manipulated us, talking about solidarity and friendship as a justification for exclusion and cruelty. You cared for nobody but yourself. The real monster in Arashigaoka Academy wasn't any bear... it was you."
"N-no...!" A gutteral scream built up from deep within Oki's throat. "This can't be happening! I'm not evil! I exclude evil! I can't be excluded myself! Q-quit playing around! This isn't some kind of game! Shoot Kureha Tsubaki! Shoot her!!!"
The Invisible Storm looked at Oki Chouko with pitiless eyes and pronounced one word, "Exclude."
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"Well now, isn't that a twist?" commented Life Sexy with wry amusement, balanced stylishly on a large piece of construction equipment.
"I know, right? Who could have ever expected that the Invisible Storm would turn on its very own leader? So cool..." added Life Cool from his perch on a nearby pylon, adjusting his glasses with a melodramatic flourish.
"Hmph. I'm disappointed. I thought it for sure it was going to end up a beautiful tragedy!" exclaimed Life Beauty on top of a large crane, swishing his hair back while surrounded in green sparkles.
"So this is your will then, is it Lady Kumaria?". Sexy asked softly, more to himself then any goddess that might be listening. "An outcome that even we of the Severance Court could never have predicted."
"How very... sexy."
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"Say, Kureha?"
"What, Ginko?" Kureha asked, nuzzling closer to the girl next to her. They were both in Kureha's childhood home, cuddling naked under the bedcovers just as she'd done with Sumika on a night so very long ago.
"W-would you have been willing to die for love? If it came to that, I mean?"
She clutched Ginko's paw affectionately, letting its warm vitality suffuse her. "Of course, silly Ginko. But, don't you think it's better to still be alive?"
She laughed. A pleasant, joyous, tinkling sound.
Ginko scrunched up her face adorably in thought. "I... guess so."
Kureha's voice turned resolute. "This world can be cruel, but it can be beautiful too. As long as I'm alive, I'll never give up on my love, or the world. I'll never accept the end quietly, but I'll fight against it with every fiber of my being."
"You're so cute when you get like that, you know Kureha?" Ginko teased, planting a light kiss on her lover's cheek. Her lips tingled pleasantly against Kureha's skin.
After that fateful day on the rooftop, Kureha's fellow students had realized the error of their ways and accepted her and Ginko's love. Bears and humans began to reconcile, and there was even talk of dismantling the Wall of Severance.
Of course, things were never perfect. Kureha always had to struggle against bigotry and intolerance. There were no easy answers, and it wasn't like all the world's evils went away in that moment.
But. Isn't it better that way? As long as you're alive, there will always be struggles, obstacles to surmount. If there wasn't, would it be really be worthy of being called 'life'? Love or life without sacrifice are equally meaningless. It would be a mere idealized love for a society that refuses to face reality's harshness.
Real love, real life, was so much greater then that. Then the closed, complete happy ending to be found in any fairy tale. There were no easy endings in life. And thank Kumaria for that.