There was a fairly substantial difference between a rope and a phone charger, but that was probably it.
“Right, that thingy. Could you bring that over for me?”
“Sure! Okay!”
With that, she stood up and padded toward the hutch behind the sofa.
It was laden with a motley crew of bric-a-brac, from old-looking books to eerie-looking bits of pottery, with a few retro toys thrown in for good measure. I had trouble telling whose tastes in interior design I was witnessing here.
I had a hazy image of Kido being responsible for this, but Kano might have a keen eye for this kind of stuff, too.
Marie pawed through this antique shop of misfits, nearly knocking the whole thing over as she rifled through drawers chanting “Rope…rope…”
Who was this girl? You just can’t help but want to protect her…
Delicate as a lily, but so innocent and guileless. No description could have fit her better.
Compared to my sister, tromping around and grunting like a heavily armored tank, she was so, so much more feminine.
…No, no, no. I am such a virgin. I’m losing all sense of rationality.
Thanks to my total lack of interaction with the opposite sex, I’ve turned into the kind of man liable to cross the line at the slightest of provocations.
As an elite-level virgin, this was seriously bad news.
I have to regain my wits. My hermit’s will.
Marie, oblivious of this inner struggle, was having some trouble of her own. That happy rope song of hers was gone, replaced with an increasingly desperate-sounding groan.
“Hey, if you can’t find it, you don’t have to keep looking forever, okay? Besides, she’s just gonna start yelling at me again once she’s back, so I don’t mind at all if…”
As I spoke, Marie turned around and pouted at me.
“Why are you so mean to her?!”
My shoulders shuddered in the sizzle of this icy-hot burn. Being shaken by this girl reminded me yet again of what a wimp I was.
Marie could barely keep it together around me when we first met. Now she was acting surprisingly forceful.
She must have opened her heart to me a little. It wasn’t a bad feeling.
“It’s lonely, being by yourself. She has to be the same, too.”
Then she started scrounging around the hutch again, cheeks still puffed up in anger.
Ene must have gotten on her good side, judging by that act. I never liked Ene much normally, but I suppose I could have predicted they’d hit it off.
I should have picked up on that the moment she saw Ene…and expressed no surprise whatsoever at her.
Most normal people would pelt me with questions like “how does this girl work” and “who developed this thing” and so on.
If I was confronted with Ene, that’s what I’d almost certainly do.
But to these guys, all pretty far off the beaten path themselves, there wasn’t much point in trying to explain oneself. That kept everyone on the same, fairly friendly level.
Looking at it like that, I realized I had a lot to be thankful for right now.
“Great news, huh?”
I spoke softly as I rubbed the powerless phone’s screen.
I don’t know where it came from, but somewhere along the line, I guess I developed an affinity for Ene.
Her appearing in front of me, all alone in my room, could very well be my salvation when all’s said and done.
Running into all these guys, and opening up to them like I have, was kind of her doing, in a way.
“Shintaro, I found it! The charger! Wait just a second, okay? It’s kind of deep inside…”
I looked up to find Marie, hands buried deep in the hutch, trying to pull out the charger she found.
The heavy piece of furniture began to rock, making the collection perched on it wobble and clatter.
“Whoa, watch out, Marie. Take it nice and slow, okay?”
“Yeah. I’m okay, I’m okay…Oof!”
Marie extracted her hand from the clutter. The cable from the charger was clutched in it.
I was a bit worried about what we’d do if she really did pluck a plain old rope out from that mess, but it looked like my guess was correct.
“Ooh, nice! That’s the one! Thanks a lot.”
“Ee-hee-hee,” Marie said as she tilted her head at me, a bit bashfully.
Yep. She’s a cutie.
By the time Marie finally untangled the cord and padded her way back to me with it, Kido was just beginning to bring her breakfast plates out from the kitchen.
“All ready…Ooh, you’re up, Marie? Good job waking up by yourself.”
“Mm-hmm! Oh, and Shintaro said I was good, too. I found the charger for him!”
Marie held the charger high in the air, beaming. Something long and beltlike was tangled around the far end of the cord, something I had failed to notice from behind the sofa.
I couldn’t discern what it was at first, but the moment I did, I froze.
Simultaneously, Kido let out a shrill “Aiee!” and disappeared as my eyes were focused on Marie.
“Oh, what’s that? It was caught on it.”
Marie grabbed the object knotted to the end of the cord and gave it a studious look.
“Uh, dude, that’s a snakeskin! Why do you have something like that in there?”
“Huh? Why…? I dunno why. I think Kano brought it in from somewhere…Agh! Kido, what’s wrong? Are you crying?”
Marie was talking into thin air. She must’ve been able to see her. Interesting.
Kido’s “concealing eyes” skill was pretty helpful at times. It allowed her to reduce her presence to a bare minimum at will, keeping people from recognizing or even noticing she was there.
For it to work, though, all other eyes had to be off her at the moment she chose to “disappear.” Marie never stopped looking at her, which must have been why she never noticed anything amiss.
“I-I’m sorry, Kido…Hmm? Does your stomach hurt?”
The look of concern was clear on Marie’s face, even as she still clutched the snakeskin in her hand.
Even though I still had no idea where she was, I had a pretty clear picture of her current state. Crouched over in mental anguish, no doubt.
“M-Marie? I don’t think Kido likes that snakeskin, okay?”
“This one? Uh, is that true, Kido? …Oh. Okay. I’ll put it back.”
The child then padded back to the hutch and hid the snakeskin behind a rather large model of a three-wheeled antique car. Kido must have told her to do that.
“Weirdo,” Marie muttered. None of this likely made sense to her.
“Hey, Kido, you okay?”
I tried talking into the empty space near us. I was rewarded with silence. She probably didn’t want me seeing her quivering in tears.
“She said ‘just a second,’” Marie said, interpreting for me after returning from the hutch.
For the second time since yesterday’s haunted house, her propensity for being spooked into submission at the drop of a hat made me wonder why she was the boss of this gang.
I mean, when it comes to freaking out over stuff, I consider myself something of a pro. But from what I knew about her, Kido was an all-star at it.
Having nothing better to do, I took the cable from Marie and waited for Kido to come back as I started charging the phone.
Marie and I sat there for a few minutes until Kido appeared from thin air with zero advance warning.
I surmised that it wasn’t the exertion of using her skill that made her eyes red and puffy.
“S-sorry to keep you. Ready for breakfast?”
I nodded and said “Yeah” as she awkwardly smiled. It was a bit late for her to pretend it was nothing, but I didn’t want to add insult to injury.
Making several trips back and forth, Kido had her breakfast menu out in the main room in the blink of an eye.
We were greeted with scrambled eggs, salt-grilled salmon
, toasted seaweed sheets, natto soybeans—everything you’d expect for breakfast in Japan from a kind old grandmother.
“Wow. This is, like, the epitome of down-home cooking.”
“Oh? Well, it’s pretty much the routine around here.”
Kido placed a rice cooker on the side table as she replied.
This eminently traditional Japanese breakfast? In the middle of a hideout I could only describe as “atmospheric”? Consumed by this kind of crew?
It was a bizarre sight to picture.
I grumbled to myself about how a Western-style breakfast would’ve been more fitting, but the appetite-inducing aroma from Kido’s handmade miso soup made any lingering doubts instantly fly off.
Struck by the urge to slurp away at once, I suddenly noticed that there were only four settings on the table.
Just enough for the four people I had seen so far this morning. Not enough for Seto, Momo, and Hibiya, none of whom had emerged into the living room yet.
“Hm? Hey, uh, shouldn’t we wake the other guys up or something? They shouldn’t have to miss out on breakfast just because they overslept…”
“Oh, Momo and the other guys? I think they already went out.”
Kido placed her bowl on the desk, fished a folded piece of paper out of a pocket, and handed it to me with a nod.
I opened it up, not knowing what to expect. I was greeted with a child’s scrawl, like a line of ancient hieroglyphs on a wall painting somewhere.
I thought it was a secret code at first, but—just barely managing to spot the “Momo” signature on the bottom—I realized that this eerie message from beyond was from my sister.
“God, her handwriting’s messy…”
I couldn’t help but say it out loud.
“Yeah,” Kido followed. “I’d be kind of worried about her education at that level, but…let’s just interpret it as artistic license, huh?”
Once I realized whose hand I was reading, the rest of the message became clear much more quickly.
The general gist was, Hibiya and I are out looking for a girl named Hiyori. I’ll contact you if anything comes up, but we’ll be back for dinner.
“Hiyori’s the girl Hibiya talked about, right? They’re out pretty damn early looking for her…”
“Well, they fell asleep early last night, so…Seto probably went with ’em, too. They probably didn’t want to leave him alone.”
Kido stood up and hurried over to the front entrance, no doubt trying to figure out what to do with the still-unconscious man by the door.
“Hey, how long you plannin’ on lying there? You wanna get up?”
“Nngh…mmh, I’m fine…”
Konoha’s loose, stilted reply came in the trademark growling drone of a non-morning person.
It’s fair to say that someone refusing to wake up is far more preferable to someone unconsciously replying to you as he stayed asleep.
I shot a look toward the door, dreading what may have to come next. But despite my expectations, the moment Kido said “We got food,” Konoha shot upward.
“Morning.”
“Yeah, good morning. Go take a seat. We’re eating.”
The two of them came back together, Kido sitting next to Marie and Konoha settling beside me.
“Seto’s gone, too?”
“Yeah, he sent a text earlier. He had work.”
“So this is all of us?”
“Yep, I guess so.”
There was no restraining my empty stomach any longer. I picked up a pair of chopsticks and placed my hands together in a gesture of thanks.
“Time to eat!”
We all began ferrying food to our mouths, each in our own unique way. Konoha, despite having just woken up, was chomping away at a remarkable clip.
It was all pretty simple fare—fish, eggs, miso soup—but none of it tasted bland or boring to me. Kido must have a talent after all.
And the amiable, nonconfrontational flavoring she added to the dishes was, in its own way, very Kido-like as well.
“You mind if I have some more?”
Konoha thrust his bowl toward Kido. Not a single grain of rice remained inside.
I doubted my own eyes at this sight, taking place not even a minute after we began eating. What kind of digestive system does this dude have?
“Oh, sure. Eat all you want.”
Kido, supremely satisfied, took the bowl, filling it with about twice the amount of rice as before.
She grinned evilly as she handed it back, all but saying “Well? Can’t get enough, can you?” with her eyes.
This was enough to make the normally inscrutable Konoha betray a look of captivation. If it were framed and drawn just right, it’d be scene right out of a girl’s comic.
We had to get through a lot to reach this point, but a nice meal with the gang isn’t so bad after all.
I reflected a bit as I sipped my miso soup. It felt like a great morning, thanks in no small part to our health-conscious menu. Then I noticed Marie trying to peel the skin off of her salmon.
You wouldn’t normally eat that part, no. Not that it ever stopped Momo, of course. Though if she ate something, that definitely couldn’t be the norm for everyone else.
Marie was doing an awfully thorough job at skinning this fish, though.
So intent she was at her work, delicately picking and pecking at the filet, that it left me staring at her plate in wonder. Once the skin was off, Marie picked it up, a satisfied look on her face, and thrust it right at mine.
“Shintaro, look, look! It’s just like that snakeskin!”
This unforeseen announcement made Kido, chewing her rice to the side, emit a baleful oooorggh.
It must have been a painful blow, especially after the trauma of just a few minutes ago, but I doubted Marie meant anything sinister by it.
“M-Marie! Come on, you really shouldn’t play with your food like…”
I tried to make her stop as softly as I could, having trouble finding the right words. Kido nodded briskly in response.
“Aww, but I got it just right and everything.”
Marie returned the skin to her table, put her chopsticks down, and gave us a crestfallen look.
Everything about her suggested that the mere sight of a reptile would make her faint on the spot. But here she was, displaying a much thicker skin than I expected.
Even if it was childish of them, most women don’t want to go near cold-blooded animals like that. Although Momo asked if we could keep a chameleon at home once. Though if she wants one, that definitely can’t be the norm.
“You really don’t mind those kinds of things, huh, Marie? You’re still a little girl and all, too.”
“I’d say so,” Kido muttered to the side as she blended some more natto into her rice. “She was living by herself in the mountains before she came here. It’d take a lot more than a snake to spook her.”
The matter-of-fact tone she took suggested that her observation was nothing particularly noteworthy. I had to bite.
“By herself? In the mountains? Her?! Come on. Where were her parents or…?”
The moment I said the word, Marie’s shoulders shook, her hands forming two fists on her knees.
Territory I wasn’t supposed to tread into, I supposed. That was sure inconsiderate of me.
Regret began to form in my soul as I opened my mouth, attempting to apologize. But before I could, Marie slowly began to speak.
“Daddy died when I was real small. I was with my mommy after that. But I didn’t do what Mommy told me to do. I went out, and there were these scary people, and they probably took Mommy away somewhere.”
“Wh-what do you mean…?”
“Um, well, my daddy wasn’t like this, but ever since she was born, Mommy’s eyes were bright red, and she said we were like the Medusa that you see in the picture books. She said people outside were afraid of us, ’cause we’re different. And that’s why Mommy said I shouldn’t go out, but…I did anyway…”
He
r speech silenced the room. Even Konoha, still packing away the food like a well-oiled machine, stopped in rapt attention.
Was that why she lived by herself?
From the tone of her story, it sounded like Marie’s family was persecuted in some way by the people around them.
Maybe they were called Medusa to their faces, even.
Kido told me that Marie had the power to make anyone she locks eyes with freeze temporarily.
That was nothing any normal human could do. If the general public found out about it, I could understand why they’d treat her with fear and scorn.
“Marie…”
Kido broke the silence.
“That’s the first time you ever really told anyone, isn’t it?”
Apparently I wasn’t the only one surprised by the tale.
“Y-yeah. I guess having more friends…It makes me feel safer. I don’t think it’s so scary for me to say it anymore.”
Marie flashed a fleeting smile.
It made sense. Marie hadn’t been here for that long, the way I heard it. She must not have talked about herself much before now.
“Oh. Well, that’s great. I doubt anyone filed a…missing-persons report for you, huh? …Oh, hell.”
The anger was clear on Kido’s face. She must have had the same thought I did.
If Marie’s mother had those “red eyes,” she must have had the same kind of powers this gang all possessed.
And if Marie was still with us after presumably being kidnapped when she went outside, she must have protected Marie from people in the outside world. In other words, she acted the scapegoat so she could live in peace. That made sense.
If her mother was killed in the process, that was one thing. But if she was “taken away” instead—that implied there was something in this for the people on the outside besides purely defending their own hides.
A man’s curiosity can be so easily stoked by the bizarre at times.
This was pure guesswork, but perhaps it meant Marie’s mother was taken away by those with more malevolent things on their mind than simply murder. Someone seeking to profit from their situation, somehow.
The thought made a dull feeling of disgust manifest itself inside of me.
Marie and her mother were living all by themselves, trying to cling to whatever happiness they had left.
And despite that, not only did no one lend a helping hand to them—they ripped them apart from each other. It was horrifying to think of.
The Missing Children Page 4