The Igniter

by Reki Kawahara

  Whereupon the high school student stared at Minoru with his pale eyes and asked an unexpected question.

  “Are you the kind of person who levels up your characters? Or are you the kind who tries to get through the game on the lowest level possible?”

  …What? Minoru thought, taken aback, but he answered truthfully. “I haven’t played any games recently…but I tend to like to play for a long time, so I do a ton of leveling.”

  The student broke out into a friendly smile and extended his right hand. “I’m the kind who levels up so much that I kill the last boss instantaneously.…The name’s Olivier Saito. Looking forward to working with you.”

  …O-Olivier?

  If that’s his real name…did that mean he’s half Japanese, half French?

  No wonder he’s so cool, thought Minoru, shaking Olivier’s hand, flinching in his strong grip. He was definitely a Third Eye host.

  After squeezing Minoru’s right hand for a little while, Olivier Saito patted him on the shoulder and said, “All right! Let’s get to work together doing some unnecessary leveling! I’m just about to level up, so after that, I’ll let you join in.”

  Without waiting for Minoru to answer, Olivier sat back in front of the TV, controller in hand. Before Minoru could even break out of the pose he held from Olivier’s introduction, he heard an incredulous voice behind him.

  “Hey, Oli-V, don’t go and make the newbie your level-up slave.”

  When Minoru turned around, right behind him was Denjirou “DD” Daimon, with his trademark cap put on backward.

  “Hurry up and save your game, man. If you’re still doing that when the time comes for our meeting, Yumiko’ll pull the plug on you,” he said.

  “Yeah, I really don’t want to repeat that tragedy,” said Olivier, shrugging his shoulders, before saving the game and turning off both the cutting-edge TV and the old system connected to it.

  “Sorry ’bout that, Utsugi. What was your code name again…? ‘Isolator’? Anyway, we’ll have to have fun leveling up some other time.”

  “Su-sure, absolutely,” Minoru replied, surprised that Olivier knew about him.

  Just a minute ago, DD had called Olivier “Oli-V,” and Minoru had heard that nickname before. He was one of the SFD members who were out tracking Igniter when Minoru came to headquarters before.

  …Which means that Olivier and DD are partners? Minoru thought to himself as he watched them walk ahead of him. Even though they looked mismatched, something about them both seemed to fit, and Minoru unthinkingly cast his eyes down.

  Minoru had remembered that he made a huge mistake on his very first mission that he was partnered with Yumiko and wanted to run away somewhere.

  But then, Minoru heard the sound of the elevator reaching the fifth floor. Riri Isa, who followed Yumiko out of the elevator, took one look at Minoru, DD, and Olivier and said, “I see you’re all here! Well, then, let’s start the meeting!”

  While Minoru was listening to Yumiko, who had changed out of her leather jumpsuit and into her uniform, give her report, he spent the whole time making himself look small.

  Professor Riri, who stood in front of the eighty-inch monitor, sighed once the report had reached a pause. “You let him get away, huh…? We were so close this time…” She then turned her gaze to DD.

  “How far were you able to track him?”

  As DD answered, he had a stern look on his face. “We found the taxi that Igniter was riding in at the small underpass at West Ogu in the Arakawa district. There was a corpse in the passenger seat of the car, but the cause of death was not burning or suffocation but due to a compound compression fracture of his cervical vertebrae. It is unclear where Igniter went after he left, and the drive recorder for the taxi was also removed.”

  “I see. Did screening for fingerprints and other forensic tests bring up any results?” Riri asked.

  “I was not able to get any fingerprints off of the victim’s neck,” DD continued. “Instead, I found residue from liquid bandages, which he must be putting on his hands to hide his fingerprints. I found many fingerprints and hair follicles in the backseat, but to be honest, I don’t see us pulling any useful information from all of that.”

  “You’re probably right,” Riri said. “Sifting through the countless passengers who rode in that taxi to find leads would be very difficult… I guess our last hope depends on Mikkun’s memory.”

  His name suddenly called, Minoru shrank away even more.

  “…Mikkun. You’re the only one who has gotten a clear look at Igniter’s face up close. Now this is an old-fashioned way of doing things, but I think it’s worth a try,” Riri continued, pulling a sketchbook, pencil, and eraser from a desk in front of the monitor.

  Minoru, who had a bad feeling about what was going to happen next, asked, “…Umm, what is it exactly that you want me to do with that?”

  “What do you think? I want you to draw Igniter’s face,” she replied.

  Ten minutes later.

  After a long and difficult battle with the sketchbook, Minoru handed it over to Professor Riri. The fact that Riri’s expression didn’t change one bit, even after she flipped the cover to look inside, was testament to a level of restraint well beyond her age.

  “…Hmm,” she said and then carefully tore out the page and took it to a nearby scanner, and it was immediately enlarged and displayed on the screen.

  The first one to react was Olivier. He leaned back in his chair, barely keeping from flipping over, and kicked both of his legs in the air as he laughed. “Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! You call that a human?! It looks like a hobgoblin or something to me!”

  “Hey, Oli-V. Minoru gave it his best shot, so it’s wrong to laugh…fwa-ha…” Even DD seemed to have trouble containing his laughter, and it sounded like he had a hard time breathing.

  Minoru had expected this, but even he got a little hurt to be laughed at so much, so he retorted, “…I’ve never drawn anyone’s face before, so… Anyway! Igniter is a thin man who looks like he’s in about the first half of his sixties, with whitening hair all pulled back… The kind of person who you might think would be the vice-principal of a school.”

  After adding that explanation, Minoru returned to his seat and Riri clapped her hands twice together.

  “Now, Oli-V, DD, stop laughing. This is valuable information. I’ll put together a montage later based on this. He…is a lot older than I expected. Mikkun, is there anything else in particular that you remember about him?” asked Riri.

  Minoru sat silent, thinking. As his gaze wandered, Olivier and DD were still shaking with laughter, but Yumiko’s face was completely expressionless. On their way back to headquarters, after letting Igniter get away, Yumiko had hardly said a word.

  When they got off the bike, Minoru had thanked her again for saving his life, but she had just nodded without meeting his eye. At first he had thought that she was embarrassed for crying in front of him, but he had a feeling that it was something else. It seemed as if she had shut herself away inside her own heart…

  After shaking off those thoughts, Minoru replied to Riri, “Well…now that you mention it, I felt as if I had seen him somewhere before.”

  “Really? Recently?” Riri asked.

  “No…and I didn’t think that when I saw the side of his face, but when he looked straight at me, I thought, Huh? for a second and got that feeling,” he said.

  The moment Igniter had turned to face Minoru when he activated his power, with that intent to kill in his eyes, Minoru had felt a very faint stimulation of his memories. However, Minoru was terrible at remembering faces. He couldn’t even remember the face of the librarian he saw at the library nearly every day and at least once every three days, so it was unthinkable for him to remember the face of someone who, for instance, he had just passed by one day on the street.

  “…I’m sorry. I can’t remember,” Minoru muttered, and Riri looked down, her expression melancholy.

  “I see… Well, while I’m puttin
g together the montage, you might remember something else. For now I’ll call this meeting to a close. DD, I would like you to continue to be on the lookout for Igniter. Everyone else is to be on standby until we have any new information.”

  “Oh, before that, can I have a minute?”

  “Hm? What is it, Oli-V?” asked Riri.

  Olivier Saito, who seemed to finally get his convulsions of laughter under control, stood up in a graceful motion and turned his bluish-gray eyes toward Yumiko.

  “Yumiko, in the report you gave earlier there was one part that I didn’t quite understand. You said that you found Igniter, was attacked, and retreated, right? Why didn’t you launch a counterattack?” Olivier asked.

  With her head down, Yumiko visibly twitched.

  Minoru also fidgeted in his chair. In her report, Yumiko had omitted part of what had happened.

  In other words, she had omitted the fact that Minoru had inhaled oxygen-deprived air and had nearly died.

  Yumiko went silent for a little while, but then finally said, “Because it was dangerous.”

  “Well, obviously. We’re fighting Ruby Eyes, you know?” Olivier replied. His attitude was still easygoing, but there was a sharpness in the tone of his voice. “But I mean, if we keep running away instead of fighting, just because it’s dangerous, is there really any meaning in us being here at all?”

  “…Wait! Umm…,” said Minoru, finding his determination and standing up. Minoru needed to explain that Yumiko was not at fault. Minoru looked steadily at Olivier’s well-proportioned face and continued on, stuttering.

  “Umm… It’s my fault. I… Even though Professor prepared compressed air canisters for us, I didn’t have it ready…and… It looked like I was going to be done in by Igniter’s oxygen-deprivation attack, so Yumiko retreated. I’m sorry. I…made a mistake,” finished Minoru with a weak smile on his face as he bowed his head in apology.

  After Minoru did that, Olivier made a slight nod and smiled as well.

  “Ah… I see. Gotcha. I mean, it happens, right? We all make mistakes,” said Olivier, who then walked over to Minoru and patted his left shoulder.

  Olivier then took his right hand off of Minoru’s shoulder, raising it high as he clenched it into a fist…

  Seconds later an explosive force crashed into Minoru’s left cheek, and it sent him flying before he could even react. Minoru only realized that Olivier had punched him after he had been knocked back five meters and collided with the concrete wall. Minoru then slid down the wall and onto the floor.

  This was the second time this month Minoru had been punched by someone. However, the first time was during the incident involving Tomomi Minowa when he was punched by an upperclassman of the track club; he had subconsciously activated his shell, so he hadn’t felt any pain.

  It really hurts… Getting punched by someone…, he thought.

  Not only did Minoru’s cheek burn with throbbing pain, the pain was mixed with feelings of shame and helplessness that in turn would become a black liquid and flow into the swamp of his memories.

  “Utsugi. Do you know why I sent you flying?” Olivier asked Minoru, slumped down on the floor.

  “…It’s because I made a mistake, right?” Minoru replied after a moment of silence.

  “Nope.

  “I told you, right? Everyone makes mistakes. I’m not criticizing you for that. The problem is that you’re completely ignoring the fact that because of your mistake, someone died who didn’t have to.”

  “…!” Minoru took a sudden sharp breath.

  Olivier then walked past Minoru, his slippers clacking on the floor.

  “Inside your head you think of it like it’s someone else’s problem, and that’s because you lack resolve. You’re not fit to be a member of the SFD, Utsugi. You should hurry up and get your Third Eye removed, your memory wiped, and go home,” Olivier said, waving his left hand as he headed toward the elevator.

  “You’re wrong, Olivier,” said Yumiko without getting up from her chair, in a quiet but firm voice, before Olivier could leave.

  “Utsugi could have activated his shell before you punched him. If he had done that, right now your right hand would be broken in several places. At the very least, he had the resolve to take your punch.”

  Olivier paused and stood for a moment, but then disappeared into the elevator without answering.

  A few minutes later.

  DD and Yumiko had left and gone to the lower floors of the building, and in the experiment area at the west edge of the empty fifth-floor room, Minoru was being treated by Professor Riri Isa.

  Minoru had protested, saying that he had only gotten a cut near the edge of his mouth and she didn’t have to do anything, but Riri had forced Minoru into a chair, disinfected and bandaged his cut. After she finished and was uncharacteristically silent for a while, Riri finally spoke up.

  “Uh…umm… Well, you see. About what Oli-V just said a minute ago…”

  Minoru gave a wry smile and shook his head.

  “It’s fine. I don’t plan on quitting the SFD,” he said.

  “I see.” Riri smiled, looking relieved, and patted Minoru’s arm. “I was having trouble thinking about how I would persuade you against doing so if you had told me you wanted to have your Third Eye extracted and memories erased… Geez, communicating with other people really is tough. There’s never a clear-cut, single answer.”

  Riri the Speculator, who had the power to quickly find the answer to a problem if it existed, showed Minoru a bit of a childish smile, and she started to put up her first-aid kit.

  With Riri’s lab coat–wearing back turned toward Minoru, he said in a whisper, “…If I quit the SFD now and had Chief Himi erase my memories, including of what just happened, I didn’t think that I could forget the feeling of that fist…”

  “Well, then… Hmm… Yes, I suppose you’re right,” said Riri who turned around to look at Minoru and tilted her head in thought.

  “When I was in second grade, I got into a stupid fight with a friend I had since kindergarten. I still clearly remember the pain of the slap she gave me.”

  “Wait…what?” Minoru cried out, unable to contain his surprise. “Professor, you got into a fight? You?”

  “Now look here,” said Riri, a cynical smile on her young face. “Up until three months ago, I was as much of a kid as I looked. Every day I did tons of stupid things, got angry and got others upset, cried and made others cry. That much is normal, right?”

  “I…suppose so…,” replied Minoru. When Riri put it that way, Minoru thought she made sense. Even before the incident eight years ago, Minoru had gotten into fights with his friends and his parents…and even with his older sister sometimes, and he had cried as well.

  After Riri finished putting away the first-aid kit in its cabinet, she sat back down in front of Minoru on a stool.

  “But really, even nowadays I think it’s an experience that everyone needs to have,” she said.

  “You mean having a physical fight?” Minoru asked.

  “Exactly. Ever since…I was infected by my Third Eye and obtained the power of speculation, I solved some questions that I really shouldn’t have solved. Including, for instance, ‘What is the meaning of life?’”

  “Th-the meaning of life…?” asked Minoru, shocked, and stared at his strategic commander with braided hair. “Is there really an answer to that question…?”

  “Of course there is. If there wasn’t, what would be the point of philosophy or religion?” Riri replied.

  “Wh-what is the answer…?” Minoru asked.

  “It’s a secret,” said Riri, winking before putting a serious face back on. “However, due to finding that answer, while I can still ‘think,’ I have lost the human right to ‘worry’ or ‘hesitate.’”

  “The human right…?”

  “Exactly. Mikkun, haven’t you thought about it at least once before? Asked yourself why your worries will never end? During elementary school you might have been worri
ed about a test, or a marathon event, about vaccine shots, or going to the dentist. When you grow up a little more, you worry about friendship and love, then later about going to college or finding work, about marriage and loans, about fighting disease… In life, there is never a point where all of your worries disappear, and that is because those worries are necessary.”

  “Is…worrying and hesitating really necessary?” asked Minoru.

  “It is. The mental state of someone who does not worry is defective, just as mine is. So… After meeting you, I have felt a happiness rising from the bottom of my heart,” Riri continued. “Your ‘defensive shell’ power is a huge mystery to me. You know, I am pretty sure that I have completely seen through why the red and black Third Eyes have fallen to Earth. However, after meeting you, I learned that one of the ‘answers’ that I have found was wrong. There is nothing more exciting to me than that.

  “And that’s because I realized…,” Riri continued. “It might be possible that the answer I’ve found to the meaning of life is wrong as well. I believe…though this is just speculation, that your ‘defensive shell’ power is connected to the reason that Third Eyes exist. And that in turn is connected to the reason for all of human life to exist. Depending on a number of variables, it may be even connected to why the universe with its countless lives exists—”

  “U-umm…,” interrupted Minoru, as Riri had come so close to Minoru that their noses were almost touching.

  Professor Riri blinked her eyes a few times, and then with her trademark cynical smile she pulled back.

  “Oh, I’m sorry about that. I got a little carried away. …Anyway, as you can probably tell, I’m interested in you. So I really don’t want you to leave the SFD.”

  “Y-yes… I know. I won’t quit, even if it’s for a bit of a negative reason…,” Minoru said, embarrassed that the only reason he could find for staying was that if he pulled out now, the memory of the pain of getting punched by Olivier would just continue to grow.

  However, Professor Riri nodded with an all-encompassing smile on her face.

  “All right, then. Worry yourself about it, Mikkun. Worry, hesitate, and when you need to, jump up in the air and scream in frustration!”