The soft shuffle of Koemi's shoes had faded behind him. Yuushin walked alone one hand in his blazer pocket, the other lazily half-raised in his last wave of goodbye. His mesh of a mind for now was strangely clear. "The club welcome meeting," he muttered to himself. "Needs something flashy. Fireworks? No. Stage lighting? What about red lilies? Tired…" He reached into his pocket, pulled out his phone, and tapped the screen.
His fingers moved without thinking: 514623.
Incorrect password.
"Huh?" he blinked, maybe his thumb slipped. Again, 514623.
Incorrect password.
A third attempt. This time he stared at the numbers as he pressed each one.
514623.
The phone now flashed a warning: Phone Unavailable…Try again in 12 seconds [support.luna.com/[password]
"Wait…That's not right." His heart gave a small hiccup. He tried another number. Something old. Something instinctual that only worked half of the times.
427061.
The lock clicked open. Yuushin exhaled, part in relief, part in surprise.
But this wasn't his home screen. Gone were the fantasy widget stacks, the battery percentage, the pixel cat warrior mascot character. Instead, it displayed a high-resolution image of Mount Fuji, seen from a strange angle. The colours were also off, violet, too silver, a bit too bright.
"Did I… reset it?"
He scrolled. The apps were arranged in perfect symmetry. No music, no games. He opened the phone app, thumb hovering over the keypad. Then paused. "Now, what was it?"
Koemi's number. He couldn't recall it.
Not even the first three digits. Not even whether it began with a 0 or a 9.
"Wait… I texted her just this morning." He checked his contacts. Empty.
Call history? Blank. Messages? Wiped.
He glanced up from his screen and for the first time, he realized the road he stood looked different. He spun around once, no corner store, no school banner across the station gate. The alleyway with the vending machine was gone, just another flat wall.
He turned left. Then again resulting in a loop. Nothing was familiar. His pace quickened until he finally pulled out his student ID. The plastic card was still warm from his blazer. He flipped it open.
Blank. No school crest. No barcode. No photo. Not even his name, nor his address.
Yuushin's mouth went dry. He didn't panic. He didn't believe in panic.
He opened the map app, tapping the search bar. He tried to remember his address. Not the numbers. Just the area name. The station. The ward. The house number, anything. But nothing surfaced. But then, slowly an old address floated up. One he hadn't thought of since childhood. A house that no longer existed, his old family household.
He typed it in. The map app chirped softly.
"Directions set."
Then, without warning, the shy changed. Not instantly seamlessly. The warmth dimmed. The world dulled. A low drizzle began, silent and unrelenting. No thunder, no wind, no drama, just soft rain.
Yuushin looked up.
The clouds were thick and heavy. Rain gathered around his shoes, spreading outward. In seconds, the water reached his ankles. He didn't feel cold, but his shoes were soaked. He could hear each step squish softly as he moved.
And above it all music began. Not from his phone or any direction. It was a distance ethereal choir, singing high notes that were unhumbly present.
The streets around him cleared. The houses, the road, the trees all relocated from the foundation. But they were too still, the curtains didn't move, the lamplights didn't flicker
Then the world turned, not flipped. It was as if the earth itself had folded in between. The gravity choaked his neck, the sky was pulling him towards itself, yet his legs were being sucked in a clear flood.
Then the sky cracked, patterns emerged. Geometric symbols of arcadian rings that sigils that sung like mage like diagrams, drawing threads of gold and white. They traced themselves across the clouds in perfect circles. In a logarithmic progression the choir grew louder.
High notes, tiggering a cathedral burn out.
Yuushin stood frozen. His body obeyed gravity, but his feet began to sink in the mourning water. One inch, then two, he tried to lift a foot, but it refused. Two equal yet opposite forces were working on his body. But still he wasn't afraid, he was amused.
His reflection trembled, the phone in his hand vibrated, the screen was blank. His blazer was soaked up to stomach.
His hands reached into his pocket. Something floated out, a scrap of paper that Koemi had passed to him during his rehearsal.
私は愛するあなた
But this time, it disintegrated mid-air, its edges breaking into glowing dust. Yuushin let out a breath, half a laugh.
"Koemi would hate this, you hated me, right?"
The rain fell harder. The symbols spun faster. The water rose.
And still, the choir sang.