The Missing Children
Page 10
No. I couldn’t do anything.
And yet he broke my fall, and now he can’t move anymore.
The light was already gone from Konoha’s eyes, but the blood still diligently pumped its way out to the ground, spreading outward.
…Please, you gotta do something for Konoha. You’re supposed to be in his body.
We’re friends. I want to help him. Please. Please…
The moment I made that silent prayer, I felt like the air froze over for an instant.
Like I was being watched by some kind of terrifying creature.
I had little time to dwell on the sensation though, because a teeming tangle of black snakes slithered out of Konoha’s motionless body, gradually entwining themselves around him.
Konoha’s previously lifeless eyes began to glow a deep shade of red. Even from my distance, I could hear the sharp beating of his heart echo around me.
All I could do was stare on, powerless, as my friend began to reconstruct himself.
REAPER RECORD IV
The flickering light of the candle just barely illuminated the top of the desk by the window.
I put my pen down on it, the first entry in my journal complete, and checked over my writing one more time.
“Hmm…Hope this is good enough.”
I knew what a journal was, of course, but actually attempting to write one proved a trying task.
I had our little trip outside to report on today, which made things a tad easier, but what on earth was I going to come up with from tomorrow onward?
Even after giving it a second reading, though, it was hard to call what I wrote about today’s events “interesting” at all.
“I wanted to start this with a bang, kind of…but this really isn’t much of anything, is it?”
I grew exasperated at my lack of storytelling ability.
“You don’t think? I think it’s wonderful.”
“Agh!” I replied, startled by the voice behind me.
“Ah-ha-ha,” Tsukihiko said, his smile still the same as always as he scratched his head. “Sorry.”
“Wha…?! Who said you could peek? You fool!”
How could I let him see me? I had let my guard down. I didn’t write anything I regretted though, did I…? No…I should be fine on that point.
“Aw, I’m just happy I showed up in the first entry, is all.”
Tsukihiko acted abashed as he spoke, but I had no idea what delighted him so much about seeing the day’s wild bee chase rendered in words.
“Pfft. I don’t have much of a cast to work with. I have no choice.”
A journal didn’t need a “cast,” precisely. But the idea of me making him happy irked me, so I ignored that detail.
“Is Shion asleep already?”
“Mm-hmm. We had a busy day outside. She’s out like a light.”
Shion’s grown into a healthy girl. She really has.
I never imagined I’d be in the position of raising a child. But it was surprising, how everything seemed to work out with it in the end.
Her birth came with a mountain of anxieties—she was the offspring of me and this fool, after all—but now, even with that, every day was happy for me.
“Do…do you think Shion will keep doing well? As she ages?”
Tsukihiko caressed my head, the way he always did. “Of course,” he said. “She’ll grow up to be a beautiful woman. Just like you, Azami.”
I didn’t ask him to go that far. I constantly told him to knock that off, that it’s embarrassing to me, but there was just no fixing that aspect of him.
“Mmm…I’m getting sleepy, too. I should probably go to bed.”
Tsukihiko punctuated the statement with a heavy yawn.
Compared to the day I first met him, his face was more wizened, clearly older.
That’s the human race for you. They age.
And yet he still ran around like a child with Shion today. Little wonder he was tired.
“Oh? Well, sleep well.”
Tsukihiko looked a tad crestfallen for a moment. Then he spoke again.
“Azami, why don’t we sleep together once in a while? Shion’s here and everything, too. What do you think?”
It pained my heart slightly. I didn’t let it show, my face cold and steadfast.
“…Fool. I never sleep. Do you want me to just lie there all night next to you, staring at the ceiling?”
“Ah-ha-ha. No, I guess not. Sorry, sorry.”
Tsukihiko laughed it off, but his face still betrayed his lonesomeness.
“It’s fine. We’ll be together tomorrow.”
“True,” he said with a smile. “See you tomorrow, then.” Then he caressed my hair again.
I gave him a light wave as he disappeared into the bedroom.
Just as he left my sight, the loneliness I kept cooped up in my heart burst out of me.
Did he say that because of something I inadvertently wrote in the journal?
I knew how his mind worked. He wasn’t the kind of person to be bothered by small things like that. But:
“How many more summers will the three of us see together?”
I knew I wrote that sentence in my journal, but now it seemed so needlessly cruel to me.
Tsukihiko was oblivious to it still—because I hid it—but recently, that thought had a tendency to consume me during the nights.
I tended to forget about it when I was with him, but I knew that the flow of time would never bend its rules for my sake.
…I wasn’t sure he and I would be together for very much longer.
He was approaching the end of his life span. He was going to die before me.
But that was something I knew, theoretically, from the start.
Why, at this point in time, am I letting the thought trouble me so?
Because being without him filled me with a desolate sense of loneliness.
Just thinking about it made me lonely, to the point where my eyes welled up.
But that still wasn’t enough to make me wish I had never met him in the first place. Anything but that.
We ran into each other, Shion was born, and then we were three.
The time we spent together was invaluable, irreplaceable to me.
So I didn’t mind. As long as I enjoyed the days to come, even more than ever before, it would all work out.
Spending that valuable time tormenting myself like this would be a terrible waste.
When the time comes that we’re parted, I can cry then. With all my heart.
I’d give him all the abuse I could muster: “Why did you die first?” I’ll say. “You said you’d be with me forever!”
That would probably unnerve him. He was always so pathetically weak against my self-centered griping.
Did he think he could scratch his head and apologize for that? I’d like to see him try.
As I pondered over this, I suddenly realized that my tears were dripping down into the pages of my journal.
My breathing was tight. I tried holding it back, but the loneliness seemed to stream out of every pore.
I resolved to do away with the tears not a moment ago. Am I really this much of a fool?
…I can’t stand it. I don’t want him to go. I want to be together forever.
My head was buried in the thought. I began to stare into space.
Maybe I had cried too much. It was an odd feeling, somehow.
I wasn’t trying to consciously think about anything. Yet I was gripped by the natural desire to close my eyes.
What is going on with me?
I didn’t understand. But the feeling wasn’t disagreeable to me.
It felt like the loneliness was fading away…
…little…
…by little…
Welcome.
Welcome, my master.
Ah, you’ve finally allowed yourself to let your body go where it does?
You’re looking rather haggard, I should say. You must have been pondering over some rather difficult thoughts.
I’ve been waiting here, for I couldn’t even guess how long, and yet you never seemed to notice me, master.
But if you’re here now…does that mean you have a wish you want to make true? No matter what it takes?
Oh, no, no. It is fine. You don’t have to explain everything.
What are you talking about? You are me, and I am you. There are certainly no misunderstandings between us.
Yes. Yes, I am aware.
Mm. I see, I see.
…Well! A strange and funny thing indeed, that!
Oh. No, no. Forget I ever said it.
But if that is what troubles you at the moment, master, you must have changed quite a significant amount over the years.
But no matter what your wish is, master, I am here to make it happen. You can be quite assured on that point.
So. You say you want to be with that human for the rest of time, but if you will allow me to cut to the chase, that is simply not possible in this world.
Oh, dear. There is no need to be so pessimistic.
Remember, I said “this world.”
Yes, exactly.
Which, I suppose, begs the question: Which world do I mean?
I will be happy to explain. That is why I traveled here, after all.
Yes. Those abilities of yours. You need to use them.
Depending on how you use them, those abilities can allow you to accomplish…well, almost anything.
As I stated earlier, there is simply no way to make your wish come true in this world.
Unfortunately, I am unable to relate the reason for this to you. Please understand. I do not make the rules.
But all you have to do, then, is create a new world!
For example, how about a world where time repeats itself endlessly?
You could live there forever with the human you love, and your daughter.
With your powers, it could be accomplished in a snap.
Oh, of course, yes! These are your abilities, after all. No one else’s. The power is right there, at your fingertips.
……
…Ah, but I see our time is rapidly coming to a close.
I will explain in further detail the next time you are here.
Until then, I will remain here, waiting for you.
Certainly. Go ahead.
In that case, see you in your next warm dream.
CHILDREN RECORD VI
The heat of the day finally loosened up, making it much easier to remain outside.
The sky was already a shade of deep purple, the streetlights only beginning to pop into life.
“Are you…serious…?”
I doubted my eyes for a moment, but there was no point checking and rechecking. Reality, in its purest form, spread before me.
We were in front of a vending machine nearby our hideout.
Occasionally you’d see machines that give you a second can of soda if you matched three symbols on the slot machine–type LCD display. I thought those were BS my whole life—I assumed it was just for show, having never heard of anyone actually winning a free drink—but the chintzy electronic display on the top of the machine clearly flashed WINNER! in bold lettering.
“So it wasn’t an urban legend…!”
I thrust my hand into the bottom compartment. My fingers detected the clear presence of two wet, cold-to-the-touch plastic bottles.
Taking them out, I was greeted with the warm, inviting sight of two sodas.
An intoxicating elixir of joy circulated from my palm to the rest of my body.
How wonderful it would’ve been to drain their contents right there, on the spot. Instead, I forced myself to retain a modicum of patience.
“Saves me from having to buy two, I guess.”
I handed a bottle over to Konoha. “Uh, thanks,” he said, no trace of emotion present in his acknowledgment.
We stood side by side in front of the machine, both greedily guzzling our respective drinks.
The pleasant sensation of sugar pulsed down my throat, steamrolling through my esophagus and providing its sweet delights to every other organ on the way to my stomach.
Ahh…Yes. That’s the stuff.
This fabled land, this paradise, known only to those who experienced a summer death-march hike like mine.
I was at its peak now, having a heart-to-heart conversation with the soda.
It was a feast for every bodily sense, growing deeper, sultrier, more intense as it continued.
This was what it was. Soda, a passport to the heavens, provided by God in equal measures for all of His creations.
“Praise be to soda…”
“Wh-what?”
Oops.
I was soda-ing it up so much that I left Konoha to himself.
But, realizing that the soda in Konoha’s hand was no longer full either, I experienced a joyous sense of glee.
“Good, huh?”
Konoha briskly nodded twice.
Before long the sky settled into the color of cola.
It was a long day, as summer days generally are, and it was finally over.
“Funny how time flies when you aren’t paying attention, huh?”
Konoha was blithely staring at the sky as well.
He was hiding it with his bottle, but there was a gaping hole in his clothing.
I finished off my soda and tossed the container into the recycle bin next to the vending machine.
“Hey, Konoha.”
“Yes?”
He turned to face me, expressionless.
I was starting to understand now. This was just how he was.
He never showed it on his face, but there was nothing expressionless about his heart.
I thought he was some kind of freak at first. But I was wrong. He’s pretty much just a nice guy, is all.
“You said you were my friend earlier, didn’t you?”
“Yeah,” Konoha replied curtly.
“So, listen, don’t make yourself shoulder all the pain, okay? ’Cause I felt terrible down there.”
This guy just saved my life.
I knew I was in no position to harp on him about that. But no way did I want to feel that way again.
“Yeah,” he said again. I couldn’t tell if he understood or not.
Yet I felt like this second “yeah” somehow had more feeling behind it than the first “yeah.” The thought made me a bit happier.
“…We better get back. The boss is probably gonna kill us.”
“Yeah.”
After a short walk, we were face-to-face with the creepy-looking building with the 107 plate on it.
Stepping inside, we were greeted by Kido and Marie, chirping “Hello!” in unison.
I was practically dead on my feet.
I sat on the sofa and groggily stared at the ceiling.
As I stared into space, Marie began mending Konoha’s clothing. “Kagerou Daze…,” Kido said to herself, still proud of the term.
Suddenly, I heard the front door open, followed by a familiar set of loud, tromping footsteps.
I drummed up my last remaining bit of strength to greet the voice I knew too well.
“Yeah…Welcome back…”
HEADPHONE ACTOR V
In front of a banner ad for an eBook site, I whispered to no one in particular:
“…I’ve been through here before, haven’t I?”
I leaned against the banner and heaved a sigh.
“I can’t believe I forgot how to get back home…I’m such an idiot sometimes.”
In this world of continually tangled data, a single eye blink would make everything seem startlingly different.
The gardening page I traveled through yesterday was now occupied by a rather sinister-looking, members-only cosplay site.
A band site, once filled with the soulful lyrics of some would-be musician or another, was now devoted to ranking the best ramen joints in Tokyo.
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This kind of thing happened every day. I was familiar with it by now, or so I thought. But if we’re talking a gap of two years, that’s a different story.
“Hmmm…I better come up with an idea or something…”
I tried flapping my arms around, but there were sadly no good ideas hiding in the nether regions of my sleeves.
Somewhere along the line, I had fully transformed into Ene.
The dull sense of exhaustion that made me sleep half my life away was gone now. I was Ene, my master’s personal girl-power life coach, running on all cylinders twenty-four hours a day…
“I guess that story was true all along, though. But, ooh, I gotta make that faker pay!”
I began flailing around in frustration.
Soon, I was floating on my back, listlessly looking at my surroundings. The boundless world around me was filled, as always, with the electronic desires of all the world’s population.
“Though I guess this whole world’s a fake in the end, isn’t it?”
I rolled to the side and steeled myself. I needed to find my way back home.
Extending an index finger, I began typing a URL into the air in front of me.
“Can’t win the lotto if you don’t buy a ticket, I guess. I think it was something like this…Here we go!”
Once I typed it out, I was greeted by a familiar-looking window.
“Yes! Bingoooooo!”
I flashed V for Victory to myself and dove into the window, eventually reaching a small, square space.
“Whew! I haven’t been here in ages! Not that it was all that great an experience…”
I had sobbed hysterically in here.
I wouldn’t call that “great” at all, no.
One side of the space contained a list of options, INBOX and SENT MAIL among them.
I selected FAVORITES and opened the top mail on the list.
“Sorry I’m so late on this.”
As I spoke, I tapped the REPLY button. The one thing I couldn’t do two years ago.
Subject: Sorry I’m late
Sorry I’m so late in getting this reply back to you.
I had trouble believing you and I didn’t really know what to do, so I kept dodging the issue instead. I apologize for that.